ElvenWing
And the Smothered Goodness

Life is a
  core heart
  of goodness
with a lot of
  subsequent
  add-ons

ElvenWing knocked on the Universe door, gently at first, as asked in the sales literature. No one replied. Then a little louder. Still no reply. Then he looked around, what gives? Nobody home? Anyone know? Then he looked about for something to knock with, but couldn’t see anything suitable. Couldn’t see anything at all as a matter of fact, thus the nature of sheer emptiness, which he was crossing to reach this fabled door.

Then he knocked again, with his not really hand for he had none of those but as loudly as he could nonetheless. And so, finally, he heard movement on the far side of the door, some turning of locks, and now swung the door, slowly, open.

“Yes?”

“Is this the universe?”

“Who’s asking?”

“My name is ElvenWing.”

The door-opener, who stood many meters tall and was draped in a long, black cape, fished through pockets and pockets and apparently even more pockets and then fished some more, perhaps a second run-through, and then finally brought out a list of some sort, a long one.

He began reading it, from the top.

“ElvenWing you said?”

“Yes, ElvenWing.”

“With an E?”

“Yes. E Ell Vee E Enn, Elven.”

“Wing?”

“Yes. ElvenWing.”

The black cape was a fast reader. “Ah, yes, here we go. Here for a visit, it says. Did you bring your visa?

This he had brought. The return ticket had come with just such a thing. He held it up in the affirmative.

“Here, please,” said the black cape, signaling with his long-fingered hand.

ElvenWing handed it over. The black cape studied it for a while, then said “Two Eons?”

“The visa came with the ticket.”

“An Eon is a very long time.”

“I know.”

“And you cannot leave until those two Eons are up, are you aware of that?”

“No, didn’t know.” ElvenWing pondered briefly. “Can we change it to one Eon?”

“Not a problem,” said the black cape. “It is still a very long time, mind you, and you cannot leave until the Eon has run its full course.”

“Can I do half an eon?”

“Sorry no.”

ElvenWing pondered for a while. He had looked forward to this visit, it had looked and sounded very enticing in the sales literature. Then he made up his mind, “Fair enough.”

“A full eon then?”

“Yes.”

After some more pocket searching slash fishing, the black cape produced a pen which he used to change TWO to ONE, and then a stamp which he then applied to the visa, which he now handed back to ElvenWing. Then he stood aside. “Welcome to the Universe,” he said.

ElvenWing entered.

:

ElvenWing was pure goodness. Born, well, was he ever born? Time gets confusing at these enormous spans. He has never given it much thought—timeless regions of existence, which is what he called home, tend to have that effect. Immortal then? Compared to what? Mortal? Still a thorny issue of time or lack of. Suffice it to say, perhaps, he existed, had for a very long time if not forever, and he was nothing but goodness itself. A transparent, non-dimensional goodness, shall we say spiritual goodness, one wishing everyone and everything all the best, and doing its very best to help all those who might suffer, even ever so slightly.

Was he even a person? A dimensionless person? A core heart? Perhaps. And if so, a very, very good one.

So, this personified goodness stepped through the door and into our universe, here for an eon-long visit—a long visit indeed. The Buddha once defined an eon this way: Say we have an iron cube that measures one kilometer each side. More like an iron mountain, perhaps, this one-kilometer cubed chunk of iron.

Say we have a small bird, say a sparrow, appearing every one hundred years and then ever so slightly brushes one of its wings against this iron cube.

By the time this bird has worn this iron cube down to nothing, an eon will have passed.

Picture this and you will be picturing a long time.

Someone, not sure who—but based on Pali scriptures, estimated an eon to be 311.04 trillion human years. Me, I’m sure that’s underestimating it by quite a margin; that would be 31 trillion touches of small wing to iron and I don’t think that’s enough to wear it all down. Be all this, however, as it may, ElvenWing had entered and was here (both contractually and visa-wise) to stay for an eon-long visit.

So here we are. The black cape had vanished leaving ElvenWing on his own at the gate of the Universe, which, now closed behind him, was no longer visible, perhaps no longer even existed.

He looked around. Lots of stuff here. He pushed off (is how we would sense it) and sailed out into the enormity of trillions of galaxies and took it all in, globally. And by globally I mean that he perceived 360 degrees in all directions, up or down, globally, spherically. And it was nice. And it was nice. And it was nice.

And then, while remaining nice, grew ever so slightly boring.

And then it was fully grown boring.

Not being conversant with time, ElvenWing had no real grasp on how long this eon would be and was already considering leaving, to go back home. He looked around for anything like a black cape, but no such luck. There was just him, mid-space, globally taking in more and more and more and more galaxies and their stars. Yes, nice. But by now definitely monotonous, and quite repetitive. So much more of the same. Was this it? This place had been talked up at home, a lot, and perhaps, he now thought, a little too much, exaggeratedly—well, what do you expect from salesmen and their glossy literature? And no black capes. And no doors out of here that he could see.

He must have appeared confused, this confused goodness in the midst of all of what we think of as Creation or Cosmos—the Universe. Suspended mid-space. Forlorn. A forlorn goodness, a little homesick by now, perhaps.

It is a good thing (and lucky for ElvenWing) that this universe of ours comes equipped with very perceptive event planners, always on the lookout for bored customers. Always ready to come to the rescue (for a fee, of course).

And as luck would have it, here one comes now to ElevenWing’s rescue.

“Getting bored?” Wearing a long white cape.

ElvenWing did not look around, he didn’t have to. Still, he was taken a little aback for the white cape appeared out of nowhere and just spoke. “Yes, a little,” said ElvenWing. “Is this all there is to it?” Indicating a few thousand galaxies and their stars and gigantic gas formations, clouds of admittedly amazing and vibrant color.

“At first glance, yes,” said the white coat.

“I’ve glanced more than once,” said ElvenWing.

“Perhaps at second glance, then,” said the white coat.

“Oh, more than that.”

“But now it is turning a little monotonous, is that right? Is that what I’m hearing?”

“Yes, to be honest.”

“I know precisely what you need,” said the white coat.

“Please tell me,” said ElvenWing.

“You need an Experience Helmet.”

“What is an Experience Helmet?”

“It lets you in on some of the detail.”

“Some of the detail?”

The white cape put one of his long fingers to his chin and struck a meaningful stance. “What you see here is the universal view—what we refer to as the omni view—and while there is an amazing amount of all this, this universe reaching some ninety billion lightyears across, I can see that it might, after a while, turn monotonous.

ElvenWing was nodding his non-head.

“So, it is time to burrow down a little, to sharpen the focus a bit, to see the amazing minutia that this universe offers. There are trillions of stars in each of these some say two trillion galaxies, and there are many planets circling each of these stars, and a lot is happening on these little planets that’s hard if not impossible to spot from where you are, from your omni-view as it were. You need an Experience Helmet to narrow your focus, to shrink you a little bit so that you might fit on one of these planets.”

ElvenWing was still nodding his non-head, indicating that he understood and was interested in these Experience Helmets. Did not sound boring.

“For an ever so small a fee, you can rent one of these for the rest of your eon with us.”

“How much?” said ElvenWing.

The white cape named a price.

“Oh, I don’t have that kind of money with me,” said ElvenWing.

“Not a problem, said the white coat, I’ll put it on your tab and you can pay us when you exit.”

“At the end of the eon?”

“Precisely.”

“Okay then, let’s try one of those helmets,” said ElvenWing.

At that the white cape produced a rather amazing, cloudlike apparatus that virtually sucked ElevenWing into itself, contracting and compacting and squeezing him into something of a size he had never experienced before. The helmet was something there but not there, something light but also heavy. It gave him a better look at the white cape as well, who was smiling.

“Fit okay?”

“Is it supposed to be so tight?” said ElvenWing.

“Oh, you’ll get used to that. It only feels a bit stuffy at first, when you first enter it.”

“Funny you should say that, it feels like I have entered something, something a lot smaller than I am.”

“Well, that’s how it works, but not to worry, once we take it off, you’ll inflate back to your regular size.”

“Glad to hear that,” said ElvenWing.

“Where would you like to go?” wondered the white cape.

“What do you recommend?”

“How about that galaxy over there?”

“Okay. I’ll take your word for it.”

“And now, how about that star, that large blue star over there?”

“Okay.”

“And now, how about that nice, green and yellow and violet planet over there, with the large oceans?”

“What are oceans?”

“For us to know and for you to find out,” winked the white cape.

“Okay.”

They settled on the surface of a large planet, upon a green field by a violet ocean. ElvenWing looking for his bearings, found them.

“And here we are,” said the white cape. “Here’s my card if you ever need anything. Enjoy.” And with that, the white cape vanished back into thin nothing.

ElvenWing looked around. Yes, he had to agree, this was better. Much better. A lot more going on. Feelings. Sensations. Things he had never experienced before, like wind in his non-face coming off the large liquid to his left, which he thought might be one of those oceans. Like smells in his non-nose of grass and trees and, well, danger. Odd sensation that, the sensing of intentions not entirely friendly.

Creatures, big and small and friendly some and not so friendly those others over there that smelled like danger. Although none of the creatures could see him, they did look in his direction as they passed, sensing the helmet if not ElvenWing himself.

Gliding out over the violet water ElvenWing could see schools and schools of fishes beneath, some cruising around, some chasing, some being chased. And then something odd happened below, a huge fish, mostly mouth and teeth caught up with a school of much smaller ones and swam through them, mouth open, into which vanished a whole lot of them. Huge fish then began to chew, spilling blood and crunched fish bits into the clear (though fast becoming reddishly non-clear) water. Again, ElevenWing sensed that strange danger, not dangerous for him, but dangerous for the smaller fish. Hugh fish had nothing else in mind: eat. Eat smaller fish.

ElvenWing did not know what to make of this. Interesting, surely, but not very nice. Perhaps this was not such a good idea or such a good planet. He glided back onto land and into forest. Large green and brown and black trees rose all around, beautiful and sweetly fragrant. But here, too, that smell of danger. Two very large beasts, probably twenty meters stem to stern, and like the huge fish, abundantly supplied with sharp teeth. They both stopped and sniffed the air, then looked in his direction. Not seeing him, for there was nothing to see, but sensing the helmet’s outline. They approached, snarling, growling, salivating, snapping jaws as if to dissect the air before them as they came closer and closer. Then they were upon him, or rather, in him—for he, even in his Experience Helmet—covered a sizeable chunk of real estate, and here they began to snap their jaws together more energetically as if expecting to bite something.

And while they caught nothing with their jaws, the odd thing was that it hurt. ElvenWing had never sensed this before. Not only did these beasts emanate danger to him, but the meeting of their jaws definitely was not comfortable at all, very jarring, very, yes, painful. The Helmet said that.

Alarmed, ElvenWing backed out of the forest, up and away from the green field and up into the clear sky above. Not to his liking, not much. Perhaps another planet would be better, less dangerous.

At that white cape appeared. “Something less dangerous? Is that what you’re asking?”

“What were those things, and that huge fish? Not very friendly.”

“Ah, yes, I can see that these sorts of things might be an acquired taste.”

“Something less dangerous would be nice. Something less bloodthirsty. Less hungry.”

White cape nodded, “Let’s try this,” he said.

And they shifted about sixty thousand galaxies to the south-by-nadir, and now hovered about an all-white planet, tranquil in silence. Asleep by all appearances. But dazzlingly beautiful. The blue-white sun sparkled its magic and the planet reflected it like a diamond.

“You might like this,” said the white cape.

“Yes, beautiful, very,” said ElvenWing. “But not much going on, though, is there?”

“Ah, not to the naked eye,” said the white cape.

“Oh, but my eye is not naked, I have this Experience Helmet,” said ElvenWing.

The white cape nodded sagely, “Yes, yes. You do. But to see the wonders of this beauty,” gesturing toward the planet below, “you’ll need another Experience Helmet. One with a little sharper focus, a little more detail.”

“Which, I am sure, you can rent me for a small fee.”

“Well, not so small, actually. But we can put this on your tab, not to worry.”

ElvenWing pondered this. “How much, precisely?”

The white cape told him.

ElvenWing pondered some more. “Okay,” he said finally.

“Here we go,” said the white cape.

And again, ElvenWing contracted inside his initial helmet as both he and it were sucked in, consumed, absorbed by the more detailed helmet (a “Phase Two Helmet” to those in the know, the initial helmet being a “Phase One” model, naturally).

“Ouch,” said ElvenWing. “That hurt.”

“Won’t hurt for long,” said the white cape. “You’ll soon get used to it. Follow me.”

And they descended and settled on the snow—for this planet was all snow—and once close enough to take a closer look, an amazing panorama of goings on, both on the surface and within the thick layer of snow, sprang to view, delighting ElvenWing.

“Wow,” is what he said.

“You have my card,” said the white cape, and vanished.

Not only was the snow saturated by creatures of all colors and sizes, but the snow itself was alive and moved around here and there, sometimes enclosing and, yes, vanishing some creature of other—no teeth though and no blood that ElvenWing to see, and sometimes opening up tunnels or gateways for the creatures to burrow through. The entire field, the vast, vast span of life shifted and sparkled and, yes, ate, and thrived. Even though ElvenWing did not like this eating bit, it made for a beautiful pattern and for an interesting game of guessing: will that little critter escape that slightly larger critter or the snow itself (which was a hungry snow), or will it give up the ghost as it were for the good of larger critter-kind?

Or perhaps chase down something smaller than itself and devour it. All this eating, but it made for a beautiful spectacle. Colorful.

He studied this for quite some time. Yes, so beautiful. Still, so much killing. And killing. And killing. And this is where ElvenWing was taken (one could even say taken over) by a nasty, though after a while not so nasty, surprise. He found that he enjoyed these little killings. He enjoyed the chase, the tiny escapes, the tiny failed escapes, the tiny mouths devouring and chewing and swallowing and the looking around for more, hunger apparently never quenched, never stilled. And all in this silvery, sparkling, breathing layer of snow and snow and snow.

The helmets were kind of snug though. He was still getting used to this. The original helmet was really squeezing and the second, outer helmet, was sort of pulsing as if with a life of its own, and pulsing a little tighter with each pulse is what it felt like. Maybe he was imagining this but this is how it felt. Still, the kill thrill, the chases, escapes and catches made for a very visceral sensation with was not so much pleasant as riveting. It was something he had not ever experienced before and he thought now that these helmets, well, this whole adventure, was worth the money, indeed.

And so he hovered and looked and consumed this thrill hour after hour, day after day, month after month, yes year after year. But with so much else in the universe, there comes the time of sating, when you’ve had your fill and after a long time enjoying the kill thrill, ElvenWing was indeed sated.

Rising higher and higher away from the snowy planet, he looked around for something else, some other thrill perhaps, and just as he started looking who should appear again out of nowhere if not the white cape.

“Had your fill?” it said.

ElvenWing nodded, hard to do with the helmets so tight, “Yes,” he said. “Enjoyable though, though perhaps that’s not the word.”

“Thrilling,” suggested the white cape.

“Precisely,” said ElvenWing. Then asked, “What else do you have?”

“More snow?”

“No, something greener.”

“Ah, I know just the thing,” said the white cape, and set off past three or four or a thousand galaxies till he arrived at a huge, green planet, ElvenWing in close tow.

They settled on a vast plain, miles (hundreds of them) of swaying grasses, crisscrossed by what we probably would have thought of as fishes, but these treated the air like water and hummed as they slid among the billions and billions of shifting stalks (in the stalk wind) in search of prey.

The only thing: ElvenWing could not see this, time on this planet was speeded up to a point where a moving “fish” (only word for it) was more like a silver streak, more like a suggestion of a silver streak, and so the vast green plain was simply a shimmering net, fabric, of silver and green.

“Pretty,” said ElvenWing.

“You could say that,” said the white cape.

“Still pretty,” said ElvenWing a little while later. The white cape was busy checking his many pockets for something.

“Yes,” said the white cape.

“Is this all there’s to it?” said ElvenWing after another little while, as white cape found what he was looking for.

“Oh, no, there’s so much more,” said the white cape. So, so much more. “Only you’ll need this,” he said, holding up helmet number three.

“I should have known,” said ElvenWing. “How much.”

A sum was mentioned, along with “I’ll put it on your tab.”

“Okay,” said ElvenWing, thinking might as well since he’s come this far.

“Fine,” said the white cape. “Just put your head in here,” pointing.

“That’s very narrow.”

“You’ll get used to it, I promise.”

So ElvenWing squeezed his existing two helmets and inserted his head into yet another helmet which slid on easily enough and then put the squeeze on, very hard.

“Ouch,” said ElvenWing. “That really hurt.”

“Won’t hurt for long,” said the white cape.

At which point ElvenWing caught sight of the fishes, now in a much slowed-down version (thanks to the patented genius of helmet number three), and what a sight. Had he possessed a jaw it would have dropped, no doubt about it. Not only beautiful but also, well the best way to put it would be hungry. All these hunting fishes were starving, and emitting starvation, and helmet number three collected all this hunger and injected it into ElvenWing’s consciousness and how he was famished.

“I’m hungry,” he said.

“Happens,” said the white cape.

“Where can I get something to eat?”

“See those spires over there?”

ElvenWing looked. “Yes.”

“Go there, you’ll find food, delicious food.”

“And…?”

“And they’ll put it all on your tab.”

“I see.”

And with that white cape vanished. And while gazing at the amazing hunger dance all around him, he made his way, slowly it seemed, for he felt so much smaller now, toward the spires which as he approached turned into a city, which as he entered, turned into a vast congregation of restaurants, food shops, cafés, and other ways (street vendors and such) to still hunger.

And ElvenWing ate. And ate. And enjoyed eating. And ate some more.

And since ElvenWing did not possess a stomach per se, there was really no bounds to contain his hunger, to scream: Enough! So, he ate and ate and ate some more, running up, one must assume, a mammoth tab.

There is no way of telling how long ElvenWing stayed in this city of foods, but as with all things even the joy of eating does come to an end and one day or night or morning or evening ElvenWing (since his non-existing stomach had failed to) came to some version of his senses and said to himself, loudly enough to hear: Enough!

Heavy now, confined by triple helmets, he had trouble levitating, trouble leaving his city, leaving this planet of hunger and its stilling, but the goodness within despite such effective smothering and hiding was still buoyant, and once it got the drift of things allowed ElvenWing to rise, to leave, to gain a foothold in space high above and far away from food.

Yes, he missed it and missed it some more, but then he closed his eyes and simply took off in whatever direction he happened to be facing, and as luck (good or bad? the jury very much still out) would have it, his journey eventually landed him in our galaxy, our very own Milky Way.

Now, the Milky Way has nothing special going for it, nothing that any of a trillion other galaxies also have going for them, so soon enough, here came that villain again: Boredom.

He hopped around for a bit, hoping to find something to stir his mind, something of interest, but there was no doing. Been there, done that, seen that and seen that too. Until.

Until that little blue and white (but mostly blue) planet below caught his eye with its sparkle. Oh, how very pretty. How very exquisite. I should take a closer look. And so descends towards.

But only towards for suddenly, literally out of nowhere, he bumped into an invisible barrier. There was no going through or past it.

He backed off, slid to another side of the Earth and tried again; the same result. The invisible barrier was impenetrable, even for invisible beings (albeit with three Experience Helmets, of course).

He tried a third angle and approach with, the same result.

And at this who should appear if not White Cape.

“I can’t get through,” said ElvenWing.

“You’re not supposed to,” said White Cape.

“Why?”

“It’s not covered by our contract.”

“I didn’t read anything about that.”

“Fine print,” explained White Cape. “The finest.”

“So,” said ElvenWing, getting very wise to this by now, “there’s an extra fee involved.”

“True enough.”

“And you’ll put it on my tab?”

“True, too.”

“So, what’s so special about this place?”

White Cape did not answer right away, but then he said, “You’re a nice guy. I like you. Take my word for it, you don’t want to visit this place.”

“And why not?”

“It is, well, it is what one could call the Universe’s Red Light District.”

“I have no idea what you mean by that.”

“Which is why you should stay away.”

“How much?” said ElvenWing, not about to be talked out of visiting this little jewel.

White Cape shook his head and named the price.

“Whoa,” said ElvenWing.

“And you need…”

“Don’t tell me, another helmet.”

“Precisely.”

“And it has a good price tag as well?”

“White Cape named another price.

“Whoa,” said ElvenWing. “But fair enough. Put it in my tab.”

“Okay,” said White Cape. “But here’s the deal. Once you don this helmet, and once you enter this place, you cannot leave.”

“Ever?”

“Not until the Eon’s up.”

“Does it have long to go?”

White Cape nodded. “Quite a ways.”

Ah, what the hell, thought ElvenWing. “Deal.”

And so it came to pass that two massive amounts were added to ElvenWing’s tab and a small-ing, very snug sort of body helmet came to devour the already triple-helmeted goodness once known as ElvenWing and he found himself filtering through the invisible barrier, and now stayed hovering mid-air above the green and blue and white and red and beautiful planet below.

“Before you set foot, the helmet will give you a history lesson, a brief summary of what this place has been up to.”

ElvenWing was still battling with his helmet. Too snug. Too tight. Too painful. It was all he could do to nod that he understood.

And with that White Cape vanished again, for the last time.

And below, the little planet proceed to rid itself of any charm it had possessed, any beauty that had captivated ElvenWing and showed its very true, grim, colors.

 The hunting and killing and eating and killing, one animal after another, one species after another shivered ElvenWing, shook and screamed that this had been a bad mistake, but there was no going back.

Men now came on the scene, primeval creatures slowly standing up and walking about on two feet, many already with large stones or clubs in their hands the better to kill animals and the better to kill each other.

Each other!

And then there was this other thing. This new sensation that crept up on you from below and filled you with the terrifying and totalitarian need to, to, to attack one of these female human creatures and do things, insert things, insert, insert.

Male humans, he now discovered, do this all the time to their female humans and if studied closely, it appears that this activity is painful, for they grimace and moan and sometimes scream, but they also seem to like it and ElvenWing, watching and filling with the very ocean that seems to fill them too, likes it too and cannot seem to get enough of this.

And history speeds up and these humans begin to wear clothes, and begin to make more efficient weapons (than clubs) to kill each other with and still seem to focus on this thing ElvenWing discovers they call sex as much as ever before, if not more.

History finishes its rapid briefing and ElvenWing lands in another city, where two things dominate more than any other: food (again) and sex.

His number four helmet grows tighter and tighter and he grows smaller and smaller within and now when he looks down he finds that he has legs and a torso and one of those things growing from between his legs to insert as well, and arms, too, hanging from shoulders and head as well and that he now looks just like one of these male humans and although he is not sure how or when he acquired some clothes (on his tab, he figured) he has, he feels—and on some strange level knows—has become one of them.

So, here he goes, eating and inserting for the balance of his contract. His innate goodness as good as killed, but not killed-dead dead, for no one and nothing can kill the goodness within, no matter how squashed, no matter how smothered.

Whish him luck.

::

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