Hermit and Six Toes: Part VIII

In which the end of the world is nigh.  Written by Victor Pelevin.  Translated from the Russian by A. Baylin.  (Beginning here.)
  May 17, 2004

Hermit frequently spoke to the public, instructing them on how to appear as unappetizing as possible.  Meanwhile, Six Toes spent most of his time sitting on top of his heap of straw and pondering the nature of flight.  He rarely took part in discourses with the congregation and only occasionally deigned to bless a groveling layman.  The former ecclesiastics, who had no intention of losing weight, eyed him with hatred but could do nothing, for ever new gods kept visiting the world to marvel at Six Toes.  Once he even had a visit from some grey-haired, shrunken old man surrounded by a large retinue and treated by other gods with the utmost respect.  After the man picked him up, Six Toes defecated spitefully right into his shaking cold hand.  He was then returned rather brusquely to his usual spot.

At night, when everyone was asleep, he and Hermit desperately continued to exercise their arms.  The less faith they had in the chance for success, the more frantic their training became.  Their arms had grown so huge that it was no longer possible to train with the iron parts that Hermit had procured by disassembling the feeder.  (The entire socium was fasting by that time; everybody was getting thin to the point of translucency.)  With every flap of the arms their feet would rise above the ground, disrupting the exercise.  This was the complication that Hermit had mentioned to Six Toes.  Fortunately, there was a way around it.  Hermit knew how to strengthen the muscles using only static exercises; he taught them to Six Toes.  The green gate was looming large over the Wall of the World and, according to Hermit's calculations, the Great Judgment could not be more than ten eclipses away.  Gods did not frighten Six Toes anymore; he got used to their constant attention and accepted it with scornful resignation.  His spirits improved; in search of amusement, he started delivering cryptic, dark sermons that filled his flock with awe.  Once he recalled the story told by One Eye about an underground universe.  In a fit of inspiration, he recounted a detailed vision of soup being prepared to feed a hundred and sixty demons in green uniforms.  The sermon came out so striking that he not only scared himself witless but managed to terrify even Hermit, who smiled dismissively at first.  Many members of the congregation memorized every word of the sermon; they called it the Revelation of Blue Ribbon, for such was Six Toes' sacred name.  Afterwards even the ecclesiastics stopped eating and started running laps around the disassembled feeder in an attempt to shed some weight.

Since both Hermit and Six Toes ate food enough for four, Hermit had to come up a quick special doctrine of infallibility.  It nipped any mutinous whispers in the bud.

Whereas Six Toes had quickly recovered from his initial shock, Hermit on the contrary got worse.  It seemed that he picked up Six Toes' depression.  He grew more reticent by the hour.

At one point he told Six Toes:

“You know, if we fail, I will follow the rest into Section One.”

Six Toes opened his mouth in protest but Hermit cut him short:

“Since our failure is pretty much a given, you should consider this a final decision.”

Six Toes suddenly realized that whatever he was going to say would be superfluous.  He could not change another person's mind; all he could do was express his affection for Hermit.  Affection would be the ultimate meaning of anything he said.  In the past, he probably still would have ended up babbling, but something had changed inside him recently.  He simply nodded and walked off to cogitate.  He came back shortly and announced:

“I will go with you.”

“No, you won't,” said Hermit.  “You must avoid it under any circumstances.  You now know almost everything that I know.  You must go on living; you must find a pupil.  Maybe he will discover the secret of flight.”

“You're just gonna leave me here?” Six Toes protested, peeved.  “Leave me alone with these cattle?”

He gestured at the members of the congregation, who had prostrated themselves on the ground as soon they had heard the prophets converse.  Their identical wasted trembling bodies stretched almost as far as eye could see.

“They're not cattle,” said Hermit.  “They are more like children.”

“Retarded children,” said Six Toes.  “With a slew of congenital defects.”

Hermit grinned and glanced at his feet.

“I wonder if you remember what you were like before we met?” he asked.

Sit Toes paused to think.  His expression grew uneasy.

“No,” he said eventually.  “I can't remember.  Honestly, I can't.”

“Okay,” said Hermit.  “Do as you wish.”

This ended the discussion.

The final days went by quickly.  One morning, when the congregation was still barely stirring, Hermit and Six Toes noticed that the green gate was towering right over the Wall of the World.  Only yesterday it appeared so distant and harmless.  They looked at each other.  Hermit said: “Today we'll have our last try.  It's going to be the last because tomorrow we won't be around anymore.  Our arms have grown so strong that we can't even flap them without losing our footing.  That's why right now we have to go to the Wall of the World, where it's quiet.  From there, we must try to transport ourselves to the dome of the feeder.  If we're unable to do it, then we'll say our goodbyes to the world.”

“How will we do that?” Six Toes asked out of habit.

Hermit looked at him, surprised.

“How should I know?” he said.

They told the congregation that the prophets were leaving to commune with the gods.  It did not take them long to reach the Wall of the World.  They sat down and leaned back against it.

“Remember,” said Hermit, “you must imagine that you're already there.  Only then—”

Six Toes closed his eyes and focused his attention on his arms.  He imagined the rubber hose connecting to the roof of the feeder.  Little by little, he entered into a state of trance.  He could distinctly feel the hose hovering nearby, within his reach.  In the past, when he visualized being at the place where he wanted to go, Six Toes would immediately open his eyes.  Invariably, he discovered himself sitting in the same spot as before.  “But what if I slowly move my arms together so that the hose is between them,” he thought.  “What will happen then?”  Carefully, maintaining the sensation of the hose's proximity, he brought his arms together.  And when they converged on the space where earlier there was nothing but void, and now there was the hose, he broke down and screamed at top of his lungs: “I got it!”

“Shut up, you idiot,” said Hermit, standing in front of him.  Six Toes was grasping his leg.  “Look.”

Six Toes sprang to his feet and turned around.  The gate at the entrance to Section One was wide open; its doors were slowly passing above them on both sides.

“There, we've arrived,” said Hermit.  “Let's go to the socium.”

They walked back without exchanging another word.  The conveyor belt moved with the same speed as they, but in the opposite direction, so the entrance to Section One stayed with them while they moved.  When they reached their honorary seats by the feeder, the entrance passed over their heads and drifted away.

Hermit called on a member of the congregation.

“Listen to me,” he said.  “Just don't panic, okay?  Go and tell everybody that the time for Great Judgment has come.  You see how the sky grew dark?”

“What should we do?” asked the other hopefully.

“Everybody sit on the ground and do this,” said Hermit and covered his eyes with his hands.  “And no peeking, ’cause in that case we can't guarantee anything.  Make sure that everybody stays quiet, too.”

At first the news caused a racket.  However, the commotion quickly died down and everybody sat on the ground and followed Hermit's instructions.

“All right,” said Six Toes.  “Should we say our goodbyes to the world now?”

“We should,” said Hermit.  “You go first.”

Six Toes got up, looked around, let out a sigh, and sat back down.

“That's it?” asked Hermit.

Six Toes nodded.

“My turn,” said Hermit, rising.  He lifted up his head and cried at the top of his lungs: “Goodbye, world!”

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