Chapter Text
SACRED MUNICIPALITY OF DEMA UNITED VIALISTS
PERIMETER ESCAPEE
"Torchbearer"
08.004-7-LT
Torchbearer,
The contents of this letter are confidential. In light of recent leadership transitions, substantial alterations have been implemented within Dema; I am extending this informatIIon as a courtesy, recognizing its potential necessity for you and other periMMeter escapees.
(1) All documentation on perimeter escapees made prior to new leadership is no longer available. ThIIs does not imply the destruction of theSSe documentSS, nor their complete inaccessibility to other Bishops; rather, access will now necessitate a personal request to me.
(2) The southwest border of the Dema walls is incorporating a pager for emergencYY medical persOOnnel. I have sought to ensure that no usage of this will caUUse immediate reintegration into Dema. You may depart unless medical recommendation dictates otherwise.
(3) The average age of the Glorious Gone has risen from fourteen to eighteen. Efforts are underway to increase it to twenty-one.
I hold out my hand to you, still.
Nova Bishop
N,
How did you know that I would go to the cliffs? Have you been thinking of it, too?
Clancy. You. Wandering, engulfed, following a thin stream. And now we are back to coded letters, and your hand is poisoned.
I appreciate the pager. I wish I could trust that it's true. An ugly part of me thinks you've written only because you know I will write back.
I don't like the idea that the Bishops know all my soft spots.
Three days, and I will return to the cliffs. If there is no letter waiting for me in return… who am I kidding. I'll be looking anyway.
Torchbearer
SACRED MUNICIPALITY OF DEMA UNITED VIALISTS
PERIMETER ESCAPEE
"Torchbearer"
08.004-7-LT
Torchbearer,
The contents of this letter are confidential. See inside the boxes for the following items. Please inform me if any are absent or have sustained damage.
(1) Twenty-four pack of water bottles x3
(2) Fifty-pack of sanitary pads x4
(3) Wool blankets x5
(4) Heavy-duty Tarp x15
(5) First-aid kit x3
(6) 20ft braided polypropylene rope x4
I want to make it clear to you I am not lying or mincing words. I can still picture Aria slipping on a wet rock and opening up the side of her head. The awful three days that followed. I don't want that for you, or anyone.
Tell the ugly part of yourself that I understand: things are not perfect. An acrid stench still hangs thick in the air, but it must count for something that verdant shoots, small green sprouts, have emerged at the base of the Dema walls.
In exchange for updates on your day, I'll provide you with more supplies.
Nova Bishop
N,
Yesterday, I tossed our leftover scraps to the birds by the strait. Climbed up a tree to pick crab-apples. Carver went with me. You remember her? She shaved your head once or twice, or a thousand times. If I kept count, I would go crazy.
She misses you. Said so, too. I didn't know what to say. Kept sneezing from the sun and didn't answer her. Summer is beautiful and savage, and I miss many things without you here. My impression is that you prefer to catalog items in a list format. So here is mine:
-Knee-deep in tall grass.
-Passing a flask full of sugar water.
-Stole flapping in the wind.
-Spearmint on our wrists.
-Knife in your pocket.
-The back of your head.
Can you tell me, oh great bishop, what to do with these memories?
Torchbearer
SACRED MUNICIPALITY OF DEMA UNITED VIALISTS
PERIMETER ESCAPEE
"Torchbearer"
08.004-7-LT
Torchbearer,
The contents of this letter are confidential.
You know as well as I, that there is no 'to do' with memories. Your evocation of a specific tender moment is unproductive.
I feel a growing frustration with you, and it's only becoming more potent daily.
There's an overwhelming amount of tasks before me, yet you treat me as if I'm interchangeable with Nico. I am not. Should another escapee emerge, question them about me. I suspect you might be surprised.
Summer here is slow. My mouth often tastes of copper, and I spend the brief moments between endless tasks licking my teeth and wondering if you will write me back or not. And consequently, directing my anger towards you numerous times.
You could be here, sharing this experience with me. Doing the work to make this place better, but you aren't.
Within the box are hygiene products such as toothpaste, deodorant, baby wipes, and sunscreen.
Write back.
Nova Bishop
N,
Doing the work? You spread this sickened version of Vialism, reciting phrases of fanatical prophets and convincing people under your control that destruction is purifying. There is no changing a system poisoned at the root. You are cutting a splinter instead of pulling it out.
Before you began writing, before you left Dema, you used to dig graves. Is it so distant from the present that you can't recall it? Black mud caking your hands and feet, the stink following you home to your gray apartment and your gray room and concrete windows. Unnatural neon glow blotting the sky from the stars. Look up, Nova, what do you see?
I see Orion. Ursa Major. Hydra. The first time you saw the stars, you told me they reminded you of shattered glass. I thought there could be nothing worse, seeing something broken before seeing something beautiful. Despite being challenged, my opinion remains unchanged.
You are frustrated with me. I am with you, too. I can no longer bear this burden, so I release you from it.
Clancy, I feel your absence.
Torchbearer
SACRED MUNICIPALITY OF DEMA UNITED VIALISTS
PERIMETER ESCAPEE
"Torchbearer"
08.004-7-LT
Torchbearer,
I've decided to deliver these letters by hand rather than seizing recently, and I do look upwards when I pass a few miles out of the walls. I sit for a while, remembering how the sun laid its wide palm upon the colossal mountains. I understand that this hand's touch, its comforting grip, is now a memory.
I don't remember, have you ever been smeared?
It makes sense, the vitriol you have for Vialism, if you have never experienced what it is to feel your own mortality like a physical thing.
In the eye of the storm, there is calm. You are able to understand a reality in which you no longer exist. The whole of the world shrinks, and then explodes, and you are a human, a bird, an ant, an atom. The fear of death exists naturally; we are afraid of what is most beautiful.
In small portions, we get nervous when someone beautiful pays us mind. A little larger, we feel dread when we walk too deep into the sea. Now imagine, smearing allows you to feel the beauty of death without the terror. The vastness of it.
All of this to say, I am not Clancy anymore, but I am not absent.
Nova Bishop
N,
You think it's fear that drives me away from death when it's the opposite.
Death has touched every surface of this world, and life has made its way back in. You said so yourself. Moss grows on the Dema walls. As long as life presents me with more days, I will embrace them.
I have a truth to give, though it paints me in a vulnerable light.
It's not death or beauty I'm afraid of.
It's you.
Torchbearer