A send-off to one wild & exultant round of Ex Novo with Lucas. If the narrator’s apparent knowledge of true history is skewed… Well it is the nature of time to smooth events down to a flat line. The narrative people have of themselves will always suit their own values. (It says a lot that Cruzn and his memorial village have been entirely forgotten by this history.)
Our forefathers and foremothers came to this land with the dream of safety. It has long been the official myth that they were driven here by the clatterings of the northern storm, that ever-present tempest of the continental plains. Out of the Stormland, they made their way; leaving it forever behind, so they thought. And in this, we find a dollop of truth. But the founders of our city could never have expected their legends to catch up to them one day. They thought they were blessed.
That is what the ruling class believed, at least. It is said that the eleventh toe is a mark of grace, a sign of divinity. But here, at the end, I believe we can accept the truth. It has always been a curse. A bodily defect from the intermarrying of our distant ancestors — or a sign of remembrance struck by a vengeful storm god. This former heresy is now the path we must travel, to our demise.
Can you believe we used to bicker about which toe placement was best? We would tear each other apart over whether Big Left was holier than Right Pinkie. For generations, the debate raged over whether the Double Middle even counted, or they were just bad at counting. Now we are all gathered together as one band of stooges, caught in the rain as the storm comes.
It takes an outside threat to unite such bickering factions as our city once was. If you’ve read your family history, you remember. After Lord Johnson’s “Terror of the Falls,” the subsequent backlash, then the counter-backlash fires, and ultimately, the enshrining of failure in the “First Memorial of Folly,” there could be no peaceable resolution. I still pass by the burnt remains of its fence on my way to work. (Well, I used to.)
No, unity came from without.
The draw of this particular patch of forest, deep as it once stood, was a boundless flock of delicious ram. We imbibed this resource effervescently until the laws of nature tore us away. A monstrosity emerged; some defense mechanism born of the sweet, sweet essence of those ram. A hulking mass, moving slowly towards the city center, consuming all it touched. The astrologers claimed they warned us, but, as was popular consensus at the time, “They fuckin’ didn’t.”
This threat was only conquered by a new coalition of all Eleveners, led by the legendary hero Fink Tinysharpclaws (or Sharplittleclaws or Smallsharpclaws — sources differ). It was only due to a massive joint effort our people had never before been capable of that the ram-monster could be slain. That this was the sole effort of Fink herself is beyond belief. The notion that this historical unification — which we know took place! — was unrelated to the monster’s emergence and Fink’s subsequent slaying of it is absolutely ludicrous. All educated historians are synoptic on this matter, and we journalists humbly follow suit. So there.
I suppose it is fortuitous that we unified before the current crisis. A few generations ago, there came a storm from the north. As my grandsire wrote into our family history at the time, “The occasional attacks of the Boltriders join into the cacophony of murderous rhythm with conducts the symphony of our city.” [sic] A poet to the day he died.
The city has remained allied against this threat — and against Tenner complaints about “Beasts” in the forest, or some such. But now it seems the curtain is closing. With only hours remaining before the certain doom of we last few Eleveners, we huddle in the greatest creation of our city.
The artists drawn by the magnificent carcass of that monstrous ram have finally built something of use. A grand museum, and opera combined — the perfect invention. No expense has been spared my fellow eleven-toed citizens! We have collaborated with the greatest architectural groups in the city. Fear not the seemingly-approaching storm from the northwest! Please close the windows, and focus on your operatic museum viewing pleasures!
Yes, we had to significantly raise taxes to have it built… And, yes, it is constructed of the grandest, most flammable wood on the continent… And… Yes… The Tenners have gladly filled our storm bunkers leaving the entire Elevener population to occupy this museum… But the opera? I can’t hear the music?
Oh, the damnable astrologers were right! We were a doomed folk, to be born and to die with a mere toe as consolation. We were warned, at all times and for all things — we just never listened. We can only hope that the Tenners, who will soon have no need of that name, will fare better on their own.
Well — I hear the thunder beating at the doors — it is time to say goodnight to our grand, blustering city. Farewell, Utoepia.