WITHOUT FACES, WITHOUT EYES

The tone sounded in the deep tunnel, and the Turaga scratched his head with puzzlement. He was sure the council hadn’t ordered any new workers. He checked the piles of tablets stacked along the walls. Yes, the last order was not for some months. Nevertheless, the Rala was winding up. 

He sighed and set his lightstone in its niche as the tone sounded again, then took up his position on the special stool at one side of the tunnel, just beyond the dividing line, which even Turaga may not cross.

If it wasn’t a new order of Matoran, then that could only mean . . . Well, he’d find out soon enough. Deep in the earth, down the tunnel, there were halting footsteps. Just a single pair. The elder leaned forward, squinted into the dark. Two eyes glowed, and a small figure stepped forward, hand braced against the slanting wall. A Po-Matoran.

“Well, come along on then,” the Turaga said kindly, gesturing to the Matoran. “Let’s get you registered and on your way.”

The Matoran stepped over the dividing line and moved toward the Turaga’s stool obediently. The Turaga picked up a tablet and prepared to carve a new name, then stopped.

“Oh, you have a name already, I see,” he said, surprised. “Pawha, is it?” That was a knack of his, knowing the names. Didn’t even have to look them up.

The Matoran nodded. He still had not spoken. 

“Well, now it makes sense, I suppose. Let’s see, where did I put the other tablet . . . There. Now, Pawha, tell me where did you, uh . . . Ahem, where did you die?”

The Matoran shook his head.

“Come now, I know it was probably a shock, but it’s done now. All mended. If you can tell me where, I’ll get the records updated and we can get on with the day.”

“Po . . .” the Matoran said haltingly, each syllable an effort. “Po-Metru. Statue Fields.”

“Something wrong with your voicebox?”

“Some-thing . . . something wrong.”

“That’s what I asked.”

“Tu . . . Turaga.”

“Yes? Well?”

“Turaga, I . . . fell.”

“Ah, that’s what did it, then?”

“I fell . . . and . . . and . . .”

“And then you were back here, yes? It’s a quick process. No more than an hour or two of work-time lost though. Don’t ask me how it works—we’re not meant to know everything!”

“No. I was not here. I was . . . in the dark.”

“Down the tunnel, remember? It’s dark down there, and then you just walk toward my lightstone here and—”

“Not there, no. Not that dark. Another dark. Dark and . . . and red.”

“Er . . . well. That’s all very interesting.”

“They hurt me there, Turaga. The ones without faces, they . . . it hurt.”

“. . . What?”

Words began pouring out of the Matoran in a rush:

“I fell from high up, so I was smashed, and I hurt. They put hooks in me, and popped my joints apart. They took my arms and legs away into the dark, and they . . .” He gestured vaguely. “They took off my head . . . my head, Turaga . . . it was broken, my head.”

“What in Mata’s name are you talking about?”

“Turaga, they were like Matoran, but they had no faces and no . . . no eyes. Their eyes were little holes, maybe not eyes . . . They had tools. Sharp tools, saws and welders I recognized. They cut out my broken eye and took it away. I could feel my arms and legs somewhere else too. They cut them and burned them back together. Then they put their tools inside my broken head, and their fingers . . . and they took things out, and put things back in . . . inside my head.”

The Matoran put his hands up to his face, to the side of his head, started scratching. “In there . . . in there . . . What did they put in? What did they take out?!”

“Hey now, none of that! None of that,” the Turaga caught the Matoran’s hands, tried to steady him. “Calm, calm.”

The Matoran relented. His arms hung limp. His gaze met the Turaga’s at last.

“Turaga, I was broken from the . . . from the fall, and they . . . They put me back together after.”

“But who—”

“They don’t have faces, Turaga, nor masks I think. I screamed at them, when my lungs were back, and they put my throat back in. I screamed hard, and I think they heard me. They flinched, like they didn’t know I was there before, that I was alive. One of them sniffed at me with its . . . with its eyes . . . But then another hook came down and . . . a red tunnel . . . And then I was here.”

The Turaga blinked, swallowed. He could feel the Matoran trembling.

“Ehm, well . . . What a tale. I should say you are a bit more imaginative than most Po-Matoran I know.”

“Not imaginative.” The Matoran shook his head, rubbing his right arm slowly, feeling the armor, good as new. “I’m not. I didn’t imagine.”

“There’s no other explanation, I’m afraid. We all have dreams on occasion, even strange ones.”

“Not a dream, no—”

“Well, let’s get you settled and back to the jobsite, shall we? The Statue Fields can’t be missing a laborer for too long.”

“Back? Of course, I must go back . . .” The Matoran’s eyes darted around. “But, Turaga, what if . . . what if I fall again? It’s so high, and my chisel slipped. I’ll fall again for sure. I can’t . . . I can’t go back.”

“Can’t go back to the Statue Fields? Why of course you can! It’s all very routine—”

“No . . . back there. If I fall. If I’m hurt . . . If I die. What if I go back to . . . to them? To the ones without faces?”

“There are no such creatures, I assure you. It was just a dream; perhaps from the shock! Very understandable.” The Turaga patted the Matoran’s shoulder reassuringly. “Look, I shall tell you a story. I myself experienced grave injury once before, long ago, before my days as an elder. Hard to imagine, I know! But it happened. I perished then, but I was brought back, and nothing of what you describe happened to me. There was no dark place, no strange creatures, no pain. My memory is crystal clear: A short time of rest and a pleasant noise, and then back forthwith! This is the grace of Mata Nui. It shows that we are valued, that we have an important purpose in the world—too important to waste! There, does that help?”

“What noise?”

“What?”

“The noise you heard . . . What was it?”

“I don’t . . . Who can say?”

“They breathe,” the Matoran continued. “Their breathing makes a sound. I could only hear from one side, until they soldered my other ear back in. What noise do you remember, Turaga?”

“Nonsense, I—”

“Please!”

“It was . . . a sound of waves. That’s it, yes. Very calming, like a rise and fall of waves, or a pleasant whisper. Refreshing, even.”

“Their breathing was like words, I think. It wasn’t words, but sounded like them. ‘Toh-rah-kesh-toh-rah-kesh’ is what it sounded like. On ‘toh-rah’ they breathed in, and on ‘kesh’ they breathed out. Is that what you heard, Turaga?”

The elder’s heartlight was suddenly beating very fast.

“No . . . no, that is not what I heard,” he said, and his expression was hard. “Not at all like.” 

He turned to his tablets abruptly, clattered a few aside. “Now, Pawha, you are to report to the surface and give the Coliseum wardens this token.” He thrust a sliver of stone into the Matoran’s hands. “They will send you on your way. It is time for you to return to your Duty.”

“I can’t go back there, Turaga. I can’t—”

“Enough! Out!”

The Matoran flinched away, stumbled, and then fled past, up the tunnel, out of the Rala. Gone. 

The Turaga shook himself, dusted off his robes. His heartlight was still beating fast. Much too fast. He was usually such a calm person, not prone to outbursts at all. How strange. 

He took up the lightstone from its niche, pushed the stool back into its alcove, began to walk back up the tunnel himself, back toward the surface. Behind him, the deep passage of the Rala stretched back into darkness and unknown, but that was alright. We know only what we must know, in order to perform our Duty well, after all. The unknown is nothing to be afraid of.

The trudge of his feet made a little rasping noise as he walked. He tried his best to walk silently, but still there it was. Scrape, rasp. Scrape, rasp, traveling away down the tunnel. 

Down the tunnel, into the dark, like a whisper, like a breath. He did not remember that . . . that sound. Surely not. It was not at all familiar, was it? His hand went to his chest, to the place where the Jaga-stinger had ended him, back then. No marks, of course. Good as new. It was the grace of Mata Nui, he reminded himself. Showed that we were important, could not be wasted. So we are repaired . . . repaired by . . . what? In a dark place, long ago . . .

Scrape, rasp. Scrape, rasp. Like a whisper, like a breath. It was nonsense, that other dark. His memory playing tricks, of course. Dark and red. A red tunnel. He did not remember that. Preposterous! And things without faces, things without eyes?

No such thing.

This work can also be found on the author's tumblr, see here.