Starlight
Matthias dreamt that he had been shot into the heavens. He approached a star that flickered weakly at the edge of the universe, and pressed it against his lips, devouring it whole. He could taste the sulfur on his tongue, the liquid metal burning the back of his throat. Galaxies spiraled in panic as he was thrown high and lucid. He could trace the path back home with his finger, and he followed a sea of fantastic gold as he was swept away by its currents.
He awoke in an empty field, devoid of any form of life. Even the grass had lost what little hope it had, and now lay cold and dead against the surface of the earth. He had no recollection of how he came to be there, though, he had little interest of finding out.
Plains spread out before him; he could catalogue the edges of the earth, as if all the world had been laid out for investigation. He took the northern route, and followed a silvery orb that raced through the night sky.
Perhaps it was the very star he had devoured. It led to a tower that stretched upwards, beyond Matthias’s line of sight and through the thick, cloudy veil that permeated the air. Inside, Matthias discovered astronomical charts and walls etched in electrical diagrams. At the top of the spire, there stood an antenna, from which a red orb of light would flicker intermittently.
Matthias found himself drawn to it, like a moth to a flame. His curiosity was too great, and he couldn’t help himself from tampering with a nearby control panel. The ground shook, and the heavens shifted as objects began to lose focus. The rest of the world had become opaque.
A wave of relief came over Matthias, as if he had been freed from a terrible burden. He revelled in the solitude; he had become completely disconnected from the rest of the world. Yet, he did not feel lonely. No, it was as if he had become a part of the earth himself. He breathed as the trees did. The ocean was his sweat; hot lava ran through his veins, to the peak of every volcano – it was as if he been plunged into a pot of primordial soup. He had no beginning or end; he was the alpha, and the omega.
