As shadowy and indistinct a figure as I might be, I remain one of humanity’s ancient heroes – albeit semi-retired (at best) from ‘the field of duty’, as you might say. No longer part of the scene. Saying that I am at best ‘semi-retired’ from being a hero is of course the kind way to put it but then again if I’m not kind to myself then for sure no one else will be. You can be damn sure of that, if nothing else. That’s the sad truth of the matter and there’s no point in denying it. My days are spent in deep contemplation, although of what exactly I can’t say. Whatever seems to be important at the time, I guess, but the state of my memory is such that if you were to come right up to me and demand to know what is or was going on in my head I simply couldn’t tell you. It’s too ephemeral for that you see. Too hard to grasp hold of – it’s like trying to seize hold of smoke, or like trying to lay hands on the morning mist on a bright spring day in a river valley before the sun comes into full force and burns it all away. The truth is that I haven’t a clue as to what I was thinking, even as little as five minutes later. That’s just how it is when you’re in a state of contemplation and so you just have to go with it.
Men know me as the Eternal Procrastinator and there is a rumour – a rumour that persists to this very day – that I will return to save the world when its need is the greatest. Legends such as this abound of course no matter wherever you go, which just goes to show how incorrigibly optimistic the human race is. From my position I wouldn’t say that an eventuality such as the return of a Great Hero isn’t entirely impossible, but I certainly wouldn’t be banking on it! Folk would do well to have a ‘Plan B’ if you ask me. That would be the smart move. To not have a Plan B would be highly irresponsible, in my view. It would be extraordinarily irresponsible, but – then again – that’s folk for you. You might think that the problem here is humanity’s ridiculous credulity, but no – it’s not that at all. We’re more cunning than that you see – we just want to pass the responsibility onto someone else and we’re not particularly fussy who that might be. Anyone will do – we’ll put everything on them before you can say “Jack Robinson”, so we will. We’ll come up with some ludicrously half-baked story or other, you can be sure. Some ‘guy in the sky’ who’s going to make everything OK – sort of thing…
On a whim, I once created a world full of Obeying Machines. They were programmed to obey yours truly of course – it wouldn’t have been the same if they were obeying someone else’s orders. Some hypothetical rival perhaps – if any such existed. “Turn left!” I ordered and they did so as one. “Turn right!” says I and – again – they followed my orders to the letter. This continued for a while as I thought of more and more complicated instructions to issue them with (all of which they obeyed to the letter, without exception) but then – after a period time had passed (and I couldn’t really tell you how long, I’m afraid) I found myself feeling annoyingly unsatisfied – no matter what I said for them to do they did but this actually irritated me. I felt frustrated, even though they obeyed me so well. The feeling grew and grew until it became downright unpleasant. I felt hollow. I felt as if someone were having a great big laugh at my expense. I felt like an idiot. I somehow felt that the universe itself was mocking me…
This made me angry – as you might expect. ‘How dare the universe mock me so!’ I fumed. Before long I had gotten myself worked up into a very bad mood indeed and – to cut a long story short – in a terrible fit of rage I ended up destroying every last one of the Obeying Machines. I didn’t spare any of them. Then – for good measure – I destroyed the whole planet – I smashed it into space-dust. This wasn’t the first time this had happened to me either – I lose count of all the times that I had created a planet or a solar system, or even a whole universe – only to destroy it again sometime afterwards in a fit of rage. You might wonder why I kept on doing this – if it only put me in a bad mood – but you have to appreciate my position. Eternity is an extremely long time (longer than you probably realize, I’d say) and I needed some kind of a project to busy myself with. Plus, it gets lonely in eternity – very lonely. You should try it and see how you feel. Before you rush to judge me and call me a tyrant or a bully or a scoundrel or whatever else…
Image credit – angrypiper.com