MYTH XIV - IT'S STORY

It’s Story - by Prathana Gandhi

Introduction

Who am I? Who are you? Where are we? What is this? Why are you reading this… because you want to know what my myth is about? Do you want to know what I believe in? What do you believe in?

There are many definitions of what a myth is. I think that it is a story of the existence of everything around me – from the entire universe to the smallest mortal and entity. It is about man, nature and the cosmos. It forms the base of religions. It is a story of someone’s belief that has been passed on from generation to generation. If you believe in a phenomenon, it happens to you and then it becomes true for you. Thus, your belief in that event or object becomes stronger, thereby, giving meaning to every expression of yours. You hold on to it and have faith in it for the rest of your life.

It is different for different religions, cultures, societies, and nations… but, ultimately, in my opinion, a myth is different for every human being. It means something, in a different way to each and every person. In some mode or the other, everyone has dissimilar sets of beliefs.

Why do some people write with a particular pen in their exams? Why do some wear a distinct color combination on one specific day of the week? Why do others believe in a special stone – worshipping or wearing it for the rest of their lives? What are superstitions? Why do they pray to God? Who is God?

It is all about one’s conviction and trust in something – be it a pen, a unique grouping of colours, a specific stone or anything else. This is how myths evolve. It is a strong, intense and powerful web of beliefs. The beliefs could either be the person’s own creation or adopted from someone else. In my view, what is important is the belief… belief on what is a secondary question. But I also think that the belief needs to be in the positive sense to add greater meaning to one’s subsistence. This, in a way, also requires one to be constantly aware of the inner self.

It is a vicious circle of questions that lead to another set of questions… questions that can never be answered and answers that keep turning into questions. It is fanatical as well as ambiguous. And I suppose that the uncertainty is never ending and will keep reappearing just like the way I keep wondering as to whether there is an end of life or not… whether the universe will come to an end or not… if yes, then what will it be? What will happen next? Even scientists speculate on the same till date.

Well… coming back to my myth, frankly speaking, I don’t believe in my myth. I have written it but I don’t completely accept it as true. I don’t know whether you would want to believe in it or not. And neither do I force you to. But to find out whether you consider it as genuine, I suggest you to go ahead and read it.

Part 1

The creation of the universe was actually a punishment given to a seed of life called It.

That day, just like any normal day for you or me, was the biggest day of It’s life.

It, Itier and Itiest, the triplets, were all very happily playing the famous game, Zunka that evening on Dot. The rules of the game were to be strictly followed because they had been inscribed on the magical game board by the most humongous ant, the seeds had ever known of. You follow the rules or you get hurled into this deep red boiling liquid which would make the seed itch and scratch its body to death. And if, for hell’s sake you made a mistake, you were to bury yourself into the soul of your creation and live in it for more than a billion years. Only after the completion of its punishment, could the seed return to the game. The winner of the game gets full control of its other two siblings.

The game starts.

It tosses the small, slippery and shiny triangular disc for the first time and announces the grand beginning. The disc comes to a halt after spinning for a hundred years. Everyone plays turn by turn, merrily but cautiously, pondering for months before they make a move. With every progress in the game, a single strand of white hair, of about 5 inches long, grows on the player’s body. More amount of hair implies greater power and hence the winner.

A thousand years have passed since the game began. It is winning. It has become the most hairy one of them all. Itiest is extremely jealous to watch this happen and decides to cheat It. They are all very deeply and intensely concentrating on the game. No…Not a word from anyone. Silence prevails for a few years. No one knew what was happening… except for Itiest. Suddenly, all of them hear a thud!

“It sounds familiar. I know what it is. I know!” Itiest exclaims. Itier vibrates in agreement. All sensory organs of the two of them turn towards It.

“Its unbelievable! Itier, come here. Fast! I can’t imagine this in the wildest of my dreams.” Itier continues to overact. “Our ancestors would prefer to die rather than see this sight.”

It just shat. Now this was also supposed to be one of the reasons for punishment, about which only Itiest knew.

As he got pulled into the red boiling pool the universe grew within him like a lethal ulcer and burst out of him in an excruciating moment of agony.

Now It is wandering in the dark, slimy and marshy surfaces of the universe he created as his punishment. The only soul around, It is lonely but somehow happy even in his exile and has learnt to live a life of this kind.

Part 2

The universe is still growing.

A billion years have passed but It has not yet come to a stand still. Wandering in dark space, aimlessly, It doesn’t want to live anymore, but dying is impossible. The only way to escape this was by unconsciously creating something that would make the space useful.

Suddenly, It entered a very weird and unknown blank space. There is no base to it, nothing that holds or supports it. Endless and infinite, there seems to be something creepy about the space. But now, It has become totally numb towards such minor shifts since every step it takes, a new endeavor awaits. It has gotten used to them. They don’t excite it anymore. But this one was totally abnormal and unusual.

The next step takes It to another huge chunk of slimy, marshy and stinky surfaces. Its first physical contact with the surface makes everything around vibrate. The surface becomes rock solid and cracks up. This mass was later called Earth which got formed by Its shit that had gotten collected over the years. Since it was an unconscious job done, It got sucked into the crack.

Everything has changed. It is still alive but has lost its memory.

On gaining consciousness, It discovered new things around and in itself. The new features of It included a face with eyes, nose, ears and mouth, a curvy figure; a pair of long, rigid things jutting out from the upper part of the body, and another pair of similar structures extending from the lower torso, making the infrastructure of the whole body. The two pairs of long fleshy things ended with five stick-like flexible things of varied lengths generating from the long thing. What didn’t change was the hair on its body.

Its attention then got diverted towards the brightness of the surrounding space. It started discovering new substances, which soon became more fun, interesting and fascinating to It. As a result, It started overanalyzing whatever it saw, thereby, realizing the importance of knowledge. It began referring to itself as a female, and named itself Beau. Soon, she started naming everything that crossed her way – animals, trees, water, rocks, mountains and other things. She also ate vegetables, fruits, leaves and animals; and drank water.

Happily roaming around in the bushes of Earth (as named by her), she also started discovering the functions of the newly added features on her body – the pair of eyes helped her in seeing, the nose assisted her smelling power, the skin formed her sense of touch, the ears facilitated listening ability, and most importantly the mouth which aided her in speaking and eating. The warmth of the Sun and the coldness of the Moon amused Beau. She discovered morning and evening, which gave her a notion of time.

Meandering through the forest one evening, Beau came across a violet coloured liquid, stored in a little niche made by dry leaves. She quickly gulped it down. Her head started buzzing. Slowly, she began to lose control over her sensory organs. Everything around looked blurred and fuzzy to her. The whole body felt as if it was vibrating. All her thoughts went haywire. She seemed to have gotten trapped in a huge cobweb. Lost and perplexed, she fell flat onto the ground.

The Sun shone bright as Beau opened her eyes. Having no idea of what happened last night after she drank the liquid, Beau woke up to a brand new day. Suddenly, a figure, similar to hers, appeared from behind the tress. Awestruck, bewildered and confused, Beau went close to it.

“Huh… who are you? Where are you from? How did you get here? Tell me something… fast!” Beau asked in astonishment. She held the arms of the figure and shook them hard. She scanned it from head to toe and found that it was quite similar to hers except for a few variations. It was more straight and muscular with a small tubular mass of flesh hanging from the crotch – the strangest but most attractive feature to Beau.

"I am your creation. You gave birth to me last evening. My name is Han and I am the opposite sex to yours”, Han replied.

“What? That’s impossible. I am not yet capable of giving birth to human beings”, Beau answered back with as much determination as possible.

“But you did…after drinking that liquid yesterday. And see, even I can speak like you because I am your child”, Han said.

“Where is the liquid? What was it?” Beau starts searching for the liquid. She runs around all over the forest but it is nowhere to be found.

“I have some. Do you want?” Han asks.

Beau turns around and gives a very angry look to Han.

With eyes full of pride, Han states, “It is called wine, if you didn’t know”.

Beau and Han became really good friends and an instinct of love, as termed by Beau, soon evolved. She, with her intelligent and experimental mind, also discovered the use of Han’s most attractive feature. It, with the help of Beau’s ‘V’ Power, created human beings. The creation would be impossible without one and required equal contribution from both of them. The whole process of conceiving took about nine months during which the mother went through innumerable mood swings.

After bearing a lot of pain, Beau gave birth to Han’s first child Chui. A few seconds after the first one, came the second one called Chin. They were twins. The parents had never seen children before, so they were startled by their size and were too scared to even hold them. Happy and excited, Beau and Han wondered how long it would take for the kids to grow as big as their parents.

As time passed, Chui and Chin grew. The number of siblings also increased to eight in a span of ten years.

They were all living happily, until one day when Chin came running to Beau and said, “Mom! Mom! Chui is missing. We were playing in the field when suddenly two very weird looking creatures emerged from the dark and took Chui away from us.” Beau and Han along with the kids searched all around the area they inhabited, but couldn’t find Chui. They had lost their first child. It was a huge setback for Beau, but her belief that the Earth will give the child back made her strong.

Yes. It was Itier and Itiest who took Chui away from his family, to Dot. They knew that their sibling It, was reborn on Earth as Beau. They were jealous to see her happiness and hence, went to disrupt her blissful life.

Part 3

Chui is living happily in the sky. He doesn’t want to go back to Earth. He is thankful to Itier and Itiest who dropped him into this heavenly space with the power of wind-hopping. They didn’t want to take Chui to Dot. It was impossible for them to meet his demands. Chui couldn’t have survived there. And the main of Itier and Itiest to make It suffer in the loss of its son was fulfilled. They didn’t need him anymore.

Nothing greater and wider than the sky seems to exist. Chui keeps encountering these weird fascinating creatures that seem to float in the air, effortlessly. He is intrigued by these beings of the wind. They are all different from each other in every which way. One of those hundreds entices him with her flirtatious charm. Spellbound by her beauty… her mind-blowing beauty, he follows her to every nook and cranny. One day, when he least expected it, the chase takes Chui to an unbelievably magnificent and splendid part of the sky. It’s a totally new world inside the sky. It's colorful, bright, and full of those creatures clustered up together in the boundaries of that colorful space. Chui is scared of trespassing but neither can he resist the curiosity of knowing what is happening in the colorfully mysterious air nor can he shift his gaze from the stunning beauty he has fallen in love with.

A sudden silence prevails for a minute as all eyes turn towards Chui.

The beloved creature squeaks a few times to the members of its clan. It makes everyone one of them return to their respective business, twittering and singing among themselves. Chui is left amazed by the whole scenario. He realizes that it is the right moment to strike a conversation with the creature. Chui is wind-hopping as fast as possible in order to catch hold of her but she, with the help of the two long triangular extended masses of flesh, simply glides her way through. Finally, she stops and looks around. The violet of the colorful space highlights the creature’s attributes making them look extraordinarily stunning. Chui could have died then and there but he had to control himself. The creature twittered something to Chui and returned to her slithering profession. Chui guessed that she had asked him to follow her. And so he did.

She took him to another creature of the same species. The adored one squeaked something to this creature, which in turn, looked into Chui’s eyes and said “Hi! I am the Interpreter of this area. And this young lady who got you here is called Coo. Tell me, how may I help you?”

“Huh! You can talk in the same way as I can… how is that possible?” Chui questioned. “And you are also the same species as Coo. You only look like her but you can twitter as well as talk. That’s wonderful. Even I want to learn to twitter.”

“And Coo wants to learn how to talk. So that’s the deal,” the Interpreter replied.

Chui and Coo soon fall madly in love with each other.

Part 4

Beau cannot help waiting for Chui to come back. Little does she know that her son has fallen in love with a bird (as she named the creatures flying in the sky) called Coo. She misses him a lot and still believes that nature will get him back to her.

Sitting in the dark, under a sea of glittering stars, embedded in a sky covered with grey clouds, the light of a full moon illuminates Beau’s face. The tears in her eyes feel more and more helpless as the moonlight flashes on them making them shine in the dark. Han comes and sits besides her. He doesn’t say a word or ask her anything. She continues to weep. The wind and her sobs make all the sounds that are vaguely audible. Han catches a drop of Beau’s tears. Just when he does that, a star in the sky travels a long distance, taking a very jagged path, along with dragging its tail around. Han and Beau, both of them are left amazed by the stunning sight. Beau, in her head, is still wishing to see Chui. But she knew that it was almost impossible for her wish to come true.

All the changes in nature happen on Beau’s command. Everything is under her control… everything except one…Chui’s return.

The other children come running to their parents and hug them. That’s their world – Han, Beau and the seven children.

The children were playing in the fields. Thundering, lightning and heavy rainfall strikes the surface of Earth. The disaster and devastation that takes place is immeasurable. Because of the thundering, all the children are split into two separate human beings. It’s unbelievable for Han and Beau. The number has become fourteen now. The original child is the first one and the newly created one is the second. There is no similarity between them. This is how the population on Earth increases. Every time the planet is hit by heavy thundering, at least one kid in the whole world, standing in open space becomes a victim and gets split into two.

Earth soon becomes heavily populated. Human beings start overflowing out of it and there is not enough to feed each and every person. This is not what Beau wanted. She always wished for a peaceful life to everyone since all of them were God’s children and a part of the nature.

Beau could never leave her creation, according to the game. So she had to bear the pain of watching her world slip slowly, into the pothole of destruction. It was difficult but she could not save it.

Part 5

There is epidemic everywhere. Beau’s family, Han and the children, all are dead. They became lifeless because of various diseases in their fingernails – the most direct and dangerous effect of the growing population.

Some of the people, after struggling through a certain span of the disease, started turning into a variety of totally disparate creatures, with four legs, altered features and more amount of hair than human beings. Beau called them animals.

The fingernails could not be removed since they kept growing back. Hence, once attacked, the disease would take the person to death as soon as possible. And the disease affects everyone. Because the disease becomes so widespread, not one of them in the entire world is left unaffected. People keep struggling to find the reason for their illness but they can’t.

Beau is sitting alone under a tree, far away from the world. She is extremely worried about her creation – mankind, nature and the whole planet. To her, nothing seems to be happening the way it should be. Nothing at all. Everything is going wrong, thereby, heading towards devastation. Beau has no clue of what the next moment would come up with. She has slowly started losing her faith in God as well.

Chaos and commotion envelopes the entire Earth. Everyone is mourning because of the increasing number of deaths. No one is happy. All of them feel really helpless since they can control neither the thundering nor the spread of the fingernail disease.

There is no way out, no solution or alternative to the world’s problem. Even Beau, being the controller and creator of all systems, doesn’t know what to do. only one person can regulate the situation... Chui, flirting around with his endeared Coo in the open, free and surface less world of clouds, glances upon the condition of Earth that evening. He was wind-hopping with Coo, when suddenly Coo took a deep dive into the sky. Following her, Chui went too close to the Earth’s façade and was left astonished by the sight.

He could not believe his eyes. The scene was awful and excruciating. Chui could not bear the sting of the menace on Earth. He had to do something. He could either make things better or destroy everything. Coo also joined him in gaping at the sufferings of the planet. Chui realized that the people on land looked quite similar to him. He recognized them and understood that he belonged to Earth. That is where he originated from… not the sky. He had always been the only one of his kind in the wind-hopping world. But now he had found his right place. Chui could make things better only by going back to the planet. But he didn’t want to be made diseased by the other people when he went back. He also loved his new occupation of floating around in the air, aimlessly. Moreover, he could not have left his adored Coo alone and gone. So, the only way out was to destroy the whole planet.

Chui along with Coo and her entire world prepare for the destruction of Earth. They create a huge nest of clouds, which would wrap the complete surface of the planet and create a vacuum inside. This would lead to suffocation all around and will choke every thing – animate or inanimate – to death. This will mark the demise of all.

Chui goes back to Earth. Beau’s wish when she saw the shooting star had finally come true after a billion years. She was more than overwhelmed to see him. She couldn’t believe her eyes. She was at a loss of words to express her feelings. For a moment, she thought that she was imagining Chui standing a few steps away from her in the dark… she thought it was illusionary. To realize whether it was true or her misapprehension, Beau had to touch Chui. But before she could even run to hug him, the whole surface got trapped in the nest and within a few seconds everyone and everything went crashing down to a minute piece of mass – just like Dot.

Chui had unknowingly adopted the power of its own destruction, when he went back to the Earth, from Itier and Itiest. Coo and the wind-hoppers were with him. So, they also became a part of the devastation and their hopes of escaping went shattering down.

It was just a matter of a few seconds and everything got wiped out. No human beings, no epidemic. Nothing was left alive, except for Beau. She had to stay and be a part of her creation, according to the game Zunka, and then return to Dot. She woke up as It after everything had calmed down.

Now it has come back to Dot, and the game commences again. But this time around, someone else loses… yes, Itiest. It will make sure that Itiest goes through all the possible sufferings of the punishment. It has learnt a lesson and is ready to give it back to Itiest in a much more intelligent and covert way.

(THE END)