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Chesed's face was pressed against the floor. The frothy blood that choked him was spilling out of his half-open throat, and wetted the carpet beneath him. The rug was one he had asked Angela to materialize only a short time ago, because he felt the bare ground of the Floor of Social Sciences was a disappointment to the cozy atmosphere. Chesed wasn't good at imagining woven objects. Therefore, he directly took it out from a nostalgic memory of his first life, which is from the living room of his family mansion. The restoration of the carpet was much more successful than his coffee beans. The soft, warm touch of the wool, the intricate and exquisite arabesque pattern, were just as he remembered. At the moment, his blood dyed the brownish-black wool even darker, blurring the already dim and invisible cursive "D" embroidery at the corner.
He was going to die, he thought.
Like countless times before, Chesed forgot that the dead could not die again. He faced his collapsing life with the same hopeless fear that returned day after day. "Facing" was an inappropriate word, because this whole thing was inside him—he was locked inside the fragile body of a human being. He heard his own dying gasp, a horrible snorting wind in his broken throat; he felt his limbs going cold and numb, and the soft wool beneath his palms was soaked with his cold sweat; the process was almost painless: his heartbeat was slowing, and his senses were dulling. Worst of all, he was still conscious, which gave him the suffocating feeling of being buried alive in a coffin. His trepidation was not helping. Even these signs of death were leaving him. He was detaching from himself.
His mind became heavy and was falling uncontrollably. He desperately tilted his head back in an attempt to breathe. It was just then that he saw some black light above his head. This wasn't an oxymoron, for his near-death vision wasn't pitch black, but ghostly blue that filled the entire space. When he looked up above him, he could see a circle of floating light spots on the surface of the water, and he was like a dead fish descending to the bottom of the ocean. The black beam of light came from above the surface of the water and passed through the dead ethereal blue without resistance, piercing his sinking consciousness. It was at this point that he felt pain for the first time. The pain was sharper than a weapon penetrating his internal organs. It had no center, came from no place in his body, and was a diffuse, soul-rending, excruciating pain. It even made him scream without regard for his decency, but the sound he made was immediately swallowed up by the sea and turned into a string of tiny bubbles.
Spurred on by the pain, he opened his eyes. He returned to the carpet on the Floor of Social Sciences and saw a lady standing in front of him.
The lady was dressed in a black fur-collared robe and landed in front of him like a giant black bird with its feathers spread out. Both of her hands were covered under the robe, and no age or features could be discerned from her face. She was more like a shadow than a person who was actually there. Paradoxically, she was also beautiful and impressive. All of these contradictory elements were recombined in her body, giving her a kind of grace and elegance that should not exist in this world. A mere trace of smile appeared on her face as she gazed down at Chesed, but there was no glimmer in her eyes, which were like bottomless black pools.
Chesed remembered who she was. He had once been in the same position in front of this lady's feet, as this lady had once looked down on the wretchedness of him with the same smile. He returned to the only self that had ever truly lived. The microphone of the intercom appeared in his hand, the carpet was replaced by the gray masonry floor of the Laboratory, and he was dressed in a brown old-school wool suit instead of the dark blue Librarian garb. His blood kept gushing out. He lay on his back in the dirty corner where the light couldn't reach, dying between his dripping entrails. The woman, however, just looked at him, not even bothering to turn him over with her toes.
His heart clenched and resumed beating at such a rapid rate that it shook his chest. He tried to back away and escape, but his bruised arms did not allow him to brace himself. All he could do was to lie on his side in an even more twisted and wretched position, curling up in the corner between the couch and the coffee table. He coughed and retched uncontrollably, choking on the blood froth in his throat with tears and mucus.
The lady didn't change her position, watching with amusement as Chesed struggled at her feet. "Poor boy, it seems you haven't gotten used to the fictional death and rebirth in the Library."
Chesed then recalled that they who were given flesh by the Seed of Light would never truly die in the Library. This oblivion felt like a bad joke played by this giant colosseum, deliberately making them think that every fight was a matter of life and death for the joy of the audience. But it mercifully soothed his conscience at the same time: the ostensibly fair fight had made him forget that his essence was still that of an executioner, no different from the indifferent Sephirah back in the Lobotomy Corporation, and still no different from the sanctimonious traitor in the Laboratory. Such self-recognition calmed him down.
As he had practiced in his mind countless times, he reminded himself once again that Binah was now just his colleague, a newly awakened neighbor on the Floor of Philosophy upstairs. He closed his eyes and took two deep breaths, feeling the wounds on his body recovering, even the ghastly opening in his throat disappearing. It was as if time had been pressed backwards, as the dark red blood stains faded from his jacket and from the elegant carpet.
Chesed stood up from the floor and put on his iconic smile again, extending his right hand, apologizing for his earlier faux pas, "Please pardon me, Binah. I really haven't gotten used to fighting yet, and I wasn't able to greet you properly just now. I am glad to see you awake."
Binah did not respond to his greeting; she remained quiet and playful as she watched him. She gazed at him with eyes so black that her pupils were invisible and her focus was unknown, and he had no doubt that she had seen through him — false politeness and real fear had no place to hide from her. A gaze like that made it almost impossible for him to control the muscles in his arms, which began to shake slightly. He withdrew his hand, secretly wiping the sweat off his hand on his trousers, and before the previous smile froze on his face, he offered a new, understanding smile, switching to a tone of flirtation that made him feel like a poseur himself, "Please allow me to apologize for the mess and untidiness. Perhaps I should go and wash my hands first. I beg your pardon."
“I wonder if you have ever savored the fragrance of black tea. I’m here to invite you to be my guest on the Floor of Philosophy.”
Chesed froze upon hearing her words once again. He could not understand the connotation of this strange invitation. He wasn't convinced that they had gotten along so well under Angela’s reign that they could sit together and talk over tea, or that Binah would do such a thing out of blue. And in such confusion, an idea with a touch of black humour struck him: maybe Binah just wanted to enjoy his struggling, by extending the torment that began with Daniel to Chesed, and letting the cruelty pierce through his three lives.
However, his mouth responded quicker than his brain could react, "It would be an honor for me. I ’will be there later today. Thank you for the invitation.”
The passageway between the Floor of Social Sciences to the Floor of Philosophy consisted of a single narrow staircase, flanked by a towering wall of books, and old-fashioned chandeliers emanated dim light overhead. Never thoroughly accustomed to this place since his awakening, Chesed kept his initial amazement. The collection of books in the Library of Ruina was vast, and just the number of books on either side of this narrow staircase overtakes that a person could read in a lifetime. If he were to use one word to describe this place, he would choose "infinite". In a city that no longer needed paper books, his place was like a lone lighthouse: its useless height making it appear to be sublime and eternal. It made him forget the origin of the Library, and subconsciously feel that it had stood in the center of the City since the beginning of time, and would always stand there thereafter. He agrees with this description: “I suspect that the human species—the only species—teeters at the verge of extinction, yet that the Library - enlightened, solitary, infinite, unmoving, armed with precious volumes, pointless, incorruptible and secret—will endure. *”
Chesed politely declined his Assistant Librarians’ request to accompany him, and ascended this staircase by himself. At the end of the staircase, the light grew dimmer and dimmer until he reached the Floor of Philosophy. The atmosphere of the Floor of Philosophy surprised him in terms of the contrasting impressions he had gotten from his few visits to the Extraction Team. Instead of the jungle-like tombstones that signaled death, the Floor of Philosophy seemed quiet but not terrifying. Under his feet were old black slabs of stone, already smoothed over time, and the light that upon them was evenly spread out like ripples of reflected starlight, forming a serene underground dark river. The river flowed deep into the forest-like layers of bookshelves and eventually disappeared into a brilliant golden halo.
He was greeted at the door by the Philosophy Assistant Librarians in black uniforms, who were just as silent as they had been during his time at Lobotomy Corporation. They bowed slightly toward him, led him toward the wooden table where Binah was, and then disappeared between the shelves on their own. There were no extra chairs.
Binah set down the teacup in her hand, "You're here. I have prepared you some black tea."
Chesed realized that she had no intention of inviting him to sit down and stood somewhat embarrassed at the table, picking up the other cup of black tea and taking a sip. He didn't have a particular preference for black tea, but he didn't want to offend Binah over an inconsequential matter of taste. Apparently, she knew this, and she nodded at him in satisfaction due to his compliance.
"What do you think philosophy is?"
Binah suddenly asked just when Chesed thought the silence between them would continue. He put down his teacup so abruptly that a sharp scraping sound between the bottom of the cup and the saucer occurred. He once again experienced the nervousness of facing a college examiner at the age of 18, and after a moment's thought, boldly decided to throw the question back. "Philosophy literally means 'love of wisdom', but you must be expecting something more than a shallow answer. Then, what is philosophy to you, as the Librarian of the Floor of Philosophy?"
"Take a look at the river in front of you that is made of light. If you are in the middle of the river, it will flow on and on, and even yourself will change if you go with the current; eventually, the rapids will swallow you up and wash downstream all that you have tried in vain to keep. But if you are above the river, you can look down on its course. You will see its every twist and turn, its source, and its end. Its water no longer flows, and there is no difference between its past, present and future in your eyes. When you rise into the air again, every river will be undistinguished; they are all nameless rivers, thin lines winding through the earth."
"You mean that philosophy is a transcendental perspective."
"If you understand it that way, then perhaps so." Binah replied ambiguously, draining the last sip of her tea and standing up, "Follow me. I'll show you around outside."
Chesed had the idea that the height of the Library exceeded that of any Wing building he knew, but he had no clear perception of this until he reached the balcony beyond the Floor of Philosophy. It was as if he had come to the edge of the world, to the limits of the frontier that man could exhaust. The night sky that he could see in the City was always shrouded in a layer of haze, nothing but stifling dim darkness; it was only here that he saw for the first time a truly starry sky, with the Milky Way, made up of countless bright stars, looming above him, and above the stars a full moon half-covered by clouds. Stars and lights joined together at the skyline, the city huddled beneath them, and the great drawbridge beyond the Floor of Technological Sciences just a dull purple band of light. The boundaries of the Nests, the Backstreets, and even the Outskirts were no longer distinct, and could only barely be distinguished by the sparseness of the lights. At such heights, the City and the night sky were silent, except for the distant whistling of the wind.
Binah walked ahead of him, the cool wind lifting her robes backward like a bulging black sail. She stretched her steps and walked calmly under the stars as if she were the owner of this free, open, empty territory. At the end of the balcony, she rested her right hand on the railing and inclined her head toward Chesed as if to inquire his feelings.
"I have never been on such a height," he said honestly, "nor have I ever seen the City from such a viewpoint. Binah, you have shown me a striking view."
"This is where you were meant to stand, Daniel. your sister was once my colleague."
For the first time since Lobotomy Corporation, someone had addressed him by that name. The family from that part of his life had long since dissolved into a blurry white shadow in his mind, and it was only when it was brought up in such an abrupt manner that he remembered it wasn't them who had become ghosts, but he himself. He felt a hard, dull ache in his temples as he muffled, "I know."
Binah continued as slowly as if she were talking to herself, "She told me about you once. She said you were a brilliant child. You were smarter, and better at getting along with people than she was. Unfortunately, these smart young people always have their own opinions—often wrong ones—that lead to the wrong future. She did not know where you'd gone, she's just convinced that you're still somewhere in the City. She missed her dear little brother until the last time I saw her, and maybe it is still true until now."
The last sentence almost crushed Chesed. He didn't even dare think about her name; the familiar sequence of letters was enough to break him. His sister—the one with blue hair like his, the one who would hold his hand and look at him with concern, the one who was as majestic as his mother, but who would loosen her frown and smile when he finished a piece of cello—might still be searching for him like finding a needle in a haystack, searching for this traitor of the family, not realizing that he was already a dead soul imprisoned in a high tower. Chesed knew he must not have kept a good control of his expression, because he saw the cruel smile returning to Binah’s lips.
"You regret it?" She asked softly.
The black tiles swirled endlessly beneath Chesed's feet, churning like waves in a storm with the moonlight, stars, and lights. The City was moving away from him and the night sky was moving closer. The light of the full moon was released by the dispersing clouds, and the surprisingly large moon, along with the heavy stars, came crushing down on him with a destructive force. Just before it crushed the top of his head, they suddenly stopped falling. The clamor of the wind suddenly stilled, and a suffocating silence returned.
He looked straight at Binah and spoke slowly.
"My family lived in the center of the busiest part of a Nest. When I was little, I used to lie at the window of my room and look across the street at a tall building belonging to one of the Wings—My mother told me that if I passed my exams, I could be employed there. The light from every window in that building shone brightly all night long on the walls of my room. When the lights of my room turned off, I quietly opened the curtains, lay down on my bed, and stared into the darkness at the rows and rows of square shaped spots of light until I fell asleep. I had always thought of them as the background to my life, decorations as wonderful as Christmas lights. Until one day, I suddenly realized that in every window sat an employee who worked all night, and that the colored lights in my room were the lights on their desks.
"It's not that I didn't know that it was where they worked, it just never occurred to me that they were all living and breathing individuals with their own lives, their own likes and dislikes. For the first time they weren't the background of my life and turned into the center of my attention. I couldn't see what they were doing, so I imagined myself sitting behind one of the windows, imagining that I was going to and from work day after day. Like a cog embedded in a giant machine, I was swept around in circles until I rusted, never knowing where the machine was going or what had been crushed under the rumbling wheels. The vision horrified me for no reason, so I stopped opening the curtains after nightfall, and those patches of light never appeared on my walls again.
"I never told my family that I feared this life, for they had laid before me this road that millions dream of, and I would be guilty if I refused it. My feet were still going in that direction, but my eyes drifted in unknown directions beyond the road, my mind was troubled and shaken. Weak as I was, I would have chosen to go on with my life until I stepped into the Backstreets for the first time. While that guilt kept me up at night, her voice made me realize that there was not an absolute wilderness beyond the road in front of me.
"Now I can answer your question—no, I've never regretted it. No matter what you ask, I have never regretted my choices. I have only ever felt guilt for one reason. I feel guilty for being born in a family with high social status while countless children are given birth in the Backstreets; I feel guilty for my incompetence and cowardice, for killing innocents with my own hands during my three lives; and I feel guilty for my loved ones, for not being able to find a way without hurting them, and at the same time following my own will. There is a difference between guilt and regret. The former is an apology to others, while the latter to oneself. I don't need Daniel to apologize to me."
Binah showed no surprise at his long speech, and she watched him with patient curiosity until he finished his sentence. She held out her hand to Chesed, inviting him to stand alongside her at the edge of the platform. She turned to face beyond the railing and extended her index finger to point to the City below her, "Tell me what is in that direction, boy."
Chesed looked in the direction she was pointing, it was just a dot in the City's infinite sea of light, indistinguishable from the surrounding points of light and nothing special. "I don't know." He admitted.
"That's right, you don't know. At such a height, you cannot discern what it is that you see. It might be a big company where countless people have set their foot on the doorstep, or it might be a humble home where a family lives, a place where some urbanite puts all his hopes. And it is but the most ordinary bright spot in my eyes, no different from any bright spot. I shall always stand on high and cast an eternal gaze on the metropolis with undifferentiated eyes and absolute calmness.
"The king dies, the king lives; the Arbiter dies, the Arbiter returns. In the eyes of those below, the City changes from day to day, and the streets in which they live are constantly changing their appearance, therefore, they are dazzled; in my eyes, the City was, is, and will always be in its own way. The ambitious new Wings, the Sweepers going after their prey, the Associations and Syndicates that encroach on each other's territories, the rich people in their Nests, and the starving children in the Outskirts, have changed their names throughout history, but have appeared over and over again in the same guise. This is the never-ending cycle called the City. I used to watch with great interest those who tried to break the cycle, even though I already knew that all attempts were in vain; A was one of them, and his agonizing struggles and failed attempts provided me with an interesting pastime.
"You will eventually realize this: when you reach such heights, the lights you once saw will revert to lights."
"As a young man, I had romanticized the idea of crashing through this cage with a group of equally naive young people. Our deaths proved that it was a case of hitting a stone with an egg; it wasn't a glass enclosure as we thought, but an iron house. Nonetheless, I cannot agree with you that the City is static. Its history cannot remain stagnant forever, and its structure cannot remain frozen forever. You cannot deny its deformity; but a deformed City will not last forever. The impact of our lives may bring about a crack in the iron house, and the impact of countless others, like moths to a flame, will eventually enable the darkness to boil over until the dawn breaks.
"Again, I cannot agree with your overlooking perspective. As you say, looking down from such a height, the differences between things are lost. You see it as a reduction to the essence of things, but such a world is very monotonous to my eyes. I'd rather look into every window and see every specific person sitting under every light: they may be vicious ones, they may be suffering from trivialities, they may be experiencing pain that I can't help, and it's even pointless to look at them for I can only feel the same pain and nothing else. But at least they were flesh and blood. In the moment I look at them, they are not cogs, or ants, or specks of light.
"If I could go back to where I lived as a child, I'd choose to open the curtains."
Chesed replied as he looked at Binah in the eyes. This time, he spoke quickly. He wasn't really sure what he was saying, maybe he was just trying to pour out his emotions pointlessly. When he finished, he realized what a horrible thing he'd done—he was arguing definitively against what Binah had said, with no rhetorical flourishes and no room for manoeuvre. Belated fear pinned him on the ground, a thin layer of cold sweat broke out on his back, and for a moment he even forgot to withdraw his gaze from looking directly at Binah.
Binah wasn't angry, however. She maintained the same level of interest and detachment, watching him silently with those dark eyes. The smile on her face grew more pronounced, finally forming a look that bordered on satisfaction. Just as Chesed tried to apologize for his rudeness, she took the lead, "Very interesting that you declined the invitation to stand with me."
"I'm sorry."
"What a pity, only for you, of course. Your choice will prolong your pain, and I precisely enjoy seeing you in pain."
Yes, Chesed thought, once again he had chosen to suffer. The time to leave had come, and he would soon say goodbye to the starry sky here, and descend all the way down the stairs he had come up, back to where he had been. There lies the abyss below, an ocean of tears gathered together, as cold as River Cocytus. But he did not fear the low place: it was where he was supposed to be. His fragile flesh would sink in the salty waters forever, his human heart pierced again and again by black beams of light. They were cruel and dazzling, they were as bright as the Ray of Genesis.
--END--
*The Library of Babel, J. L. Borges
A bit of self-explanation: the title, beginning, and end use metaphors from the Kabbalah occult, again illustrating my understanding of Chesed as the title "Top of Humanity, Underneath Divinity" shows. The River Cocytus corresponds to the frozen lake of the Ninth Circle of Inferno that imprisons betrayers in the Divine Comedy.