This City of Glass (1) - Go Ahead

Far away from anywhere that you would expect, there is a city. The city lays next to an ocean, or perhaps a very large lake, that is as pale and translucent as the buildings it reflects.

Walk down the main street. The paved concrete is a deep blue without a single crack or disruptive weed. The tiles are neatly arranged. If you decide to look up, don’t look at the tallest skyscraper, the one with silver gluing its glass together and a bit north of the town center. Why not? It’s up to you. People manage to come up with the most astounding and admirable reasons to do things that others suggest.

Instead, stop. Face the side. Do you see yourself? Is it clear enough to view the water? … Ah, yes, both. A trace, an imitation, of yourself stares back. It stands just behind the first building, or maybe the second, or the third. It challenges you. Identical. Raise your hand and it will do too. Challenging. Challenging your existence. A threat to you.

If you were to act on a whim, and that is a very large if, I assure you, then it will be gone. Cracked. A web will mar the reflection and change it from you, and then the spider of that action will crawl up, up to the skies. The building will fall. Its glass will crack and fall to pieces around you and lightning will sound from those unmoving clouds and you will be a deity. A god. For you have felled your only challenger in this world and have created the weather itself. For you have uprooted the foundations of something that encompasses everyone in the world. 

But you are lonely. Trapped, trapped in that little world of tile because glass glints in the muffled sun and its jaws threaten you. One step, it says, and we will eat you. We will snatch up your toes and then your ankles and then your legs and not until the god has been vanquished from this place. However, I assure you that godhood shall hang over your husk long after you have turned into the air for you have joined the earth and now your ichor stains the world of white and blue. The red will shine greater than any shard of glass and when it decays it will mark your trophy because you have changed something in this world, this impenetrable world. The winds will whisper your name, dripping heavy with curses, but you will be remembered.

Of course, that is but one option. You can step away and let that reflection stare at you some longer. Daggers are underneath your eyelids and they prod you to take up the path of points and the gray, opaque steel. If you want, you may stay in this city of glass a little longer. This city where the ends and beginnings cannot be seen. The glass may reach up to the heavens itself, or be barely above the ground; Can you really trust those eyes of yours to distinguish the misty blue and dangerous grays from the skies? Just follow the main road. Trace its every tile and trust in it until you can trust yourself.

Why are you standing there? Skip. Run. Even crawl. You have a long way to go.

You are contemplating the prospect of ascension, are you? Many have decided that before you. Don’t feel bad. Solitude is only in your mind.

Just don’t forget that in this city, the entire world is for you.