For the reader - please read slowly before listening. You can either read this here or the included print out companion letter.

This is best listened to late at night, still and uninterrupted through headphones.

--------------------------------------------------------------

A labored breath in the ear of this malignant body I occupy.
The sound of blade to bone, as I saw back and forth.

Where is he? I followed his order. God forgive me, but his voice was louder. I bow to the will of this king. He will be pleased, and maybe he will return to where he came from. A place I shudder to think of, even in this ocean floor of visceral overflow.

The air is so heavy I can taste it. I can taste all of them. He will be pleased.

How can a creature become a king, a ruler over all, out of nothing? I never saw him before. But now he never leaves. He tells me that immortality is overrated. That death is much sweeter than life. He has died a hundred times and will continue to do so. I’ve seen it. I make it happen. These... husks. The remnants that lie behind, under, in front, everywhere around me. They were all him, at least in the moments before they died. He inhabits and I free him. A sort of reaper and to some it may be grim, but I know I have no choice. He will be pleased.

In their body, he takes control and he exists because they do. I have to let him out. To take everything they are, and remove the king in a bloodletting, an offering. I can’t keep up. He moves too quickly and there is not enough time. I am the vessel. I see him. He rests in their eyes, but I remove only one. Let us not leave the whole world blind. Under flame they bubble and dissolve and I can see in their remaining eye that they understand. This is how it has to be. In that moment, the king smiles, gently. He is pleased.

I asked him why he chose me and he said simply: “I made you, in my image and you made me in yours”. Whatever that means, the past remains the past so it does little to dwell. In the grip of his hand, they are free. I remove each finger and place them in a grave, so the hands that toil are one with the earth. And see him, staring at me, mirrored and smiling. Proud. Pleased.

It does no good to continue the pain, as they need to be free. He needs to be free. These hands. Are these my hands? The weapons of malicious self destruction?

The world once existed in colour but has fallen to monochrome, thick and syrupy.

Like the tar that stains a lung. The sounds of dyspnea echoing.

I join them on this journey. I see him, naked as I and the world returns to colour. In a swirling flash of blue and red before black. We have been appeased.

It is calm. It is over. In a lake of fire, far from still waters.