A Door to Elysium

All of you have heard the story of Ezra’s attempt to kill the goddesses of the Underworld and take down the Bureaucracy of hell, have you not? You haven’t? Well, my children, you are in for quite a treat! Our story begins, like all things do, with death. For new life cannot rise without death…

The boy called Ezra stood over his ‘friend’s’ grave, which was little more than a small mound with a sword and his ‘friend’s’ helmet deep in the No-No Woods under the huge elder oak tree known as Yggdrasil as a symbolism of new life. I place air-quotes around the word friend because this story is based more or less on the Epic of Gilgamesh and there is no doubt in my mind that Gilgamesh and Enkidu were far from just ‘friends.’

Taking a deep breath in, Ezra stared down at the grave and stopped himself from feeling any sadness or any emotion for that matter, as all true heroes must. “I promise,” he whispered. “I will kill the god who took your life away from you. I swear it.”

Suddenly, a branch cracked, and Ezra snapped around with sword at the ready. A girl with ginger red hair, a pale complexion with freckles and pointed ears poked her head around a tree.

Ezra stepped closer to her and put his sword right up against her throat. “Not. Another. Move,” he hissed.

Her emerald green eyes went wide and she put her hands up in surrender. “Oh my gods, please don’t kill me!” she cried, shrinking in literal and metaphorical size out of fear. “I’m new! I’m just doing what they told me to do! They didn’t mention anything about this in the training session!!!”

Curling his lip, he took another step towards her and watched his sword cut deeper, silver blood starting to spill from the wound. “I don’t care. Take me and my buddy Gandalf here to see the Morrigan.”

The faerie shook her head, her eyes wide. “I can’t do that. My dimension door only allows two people to cross through! And that includes people’s souls!”

Gritting his teeth, he pushed his blade deeper into her skin, causing more silver blood to slip down her neck. “Well then, what about this? I kill you and then I cast a dimension door for me and Gandalf.”

She nodded slightly out of fear, but then she crossed her arms and smirked. “And I suppose you know how to harvest a person’s soul?” When he was silent for a moment, she knew she had the upper hand. “That’s what I thought. Now, put your weapon down please so I can do my job.”

Closing his eyes, he shook his head and gritted his teeth, gripping the blade of his sword harder. “Your charms will not work against me, faerie!”

“Oh come on! That’s racist! All I want is to do my job! If you’ve got a complaint, take it up with the head of HR or Hel, not me!”

With a half-nod of approval, Ezra took the blade away from the faeries neck and instead pushed it into her back where her wings would have been if the faeries in this world had wings and weren’t just elves because the author didn’t do enough world-building and creative work to think about who these characters are and what their sizes were etc. “Take me to her.” Then he pushed the blade into her back, forcing her forward.

The faerie shot a glare at him then went over to Gandalf’s grave. She whispered a quiet incantation to herself when it was actually just her muttering about how much she hated heroes, how all of them were self-righteous and arrogant, and how she dreaded having to deal with them, all of them wanting eternal life or saving their ‘friends’ or thinking that they can come up against death and win. After she had finished her internal rant to herself, she effortlessly reached down and pulled a cute ball with a face that looked like the will-of-the-wisps from Brave out of the grave. Hey, that rhymed!

The faerie turned to Ezra. “Here’s your ‘friend,’” she said, shoving the soul into his open arms, causing him to have to drop his sword. “And here’s your way into the Underworld.” With a snap of her fingers…nothing happened.

Ezra shot her a pointed look and she held up a finger. “Don’t look at me like that! I’ve told you, it’s my first day!” She opened a small black book and looked over the faerie scrawlings that were written there. It was clear that she had pressed EXTREMELY hard on her willowbark pencil when she’d written it and it was incredibly illegible to anyone but her. But sometimes even she couldn’t read it.

After a few minutes of silent muttering and repetition, she closed the book and slipped it back into her pocket. “Okay. Let’s try this one more time.” She took a deep breath in. “This sidekick’s life is done and his soul is ready to retire,/But his stupid ‘hero,’ and quite probably lover, is complaining and looking to kill this new hire./Open the gates to the HR department in Elysian,/For that is where the hero’s trials of love and death can truly begin.” Then she snapped her fingers and sparks shot out of her fingertips.

“I never said—” Ezra started, but when he turned towards her, she was nowhere to be seen. When he turned his attention back around, he was staring at an oak wood door with an authentic live wood frame. Purple wisteria, the magic travelling flower, hung from the top of the door and dangled in front of the door. Fun fact: this was originally going to be an entire tunnel of wisteria, but then I became fascinated with the doorway idea and decided to incorporate two ideas into one. I think I did a PRETTY good job if I say so myself!

After looking around him for the faerie that seemed to have suddenly disappeared, Ezra stepped up to the door and got read to knock when the brass goblin door knocker abruptly came to life. “Turn back,” the goblin said in a ghostly voice. Ezra scoffed and hit the goblin on the nose with the hilt of his blade, causing the goblin to wiggle his nose. “Ow! Gods! What’d you do that for? I’m just doing my job! If you go in there, you’ll die.”

“I don’t need your warning,” he snarled. “Maybe I’m already dead.” The goblin looked Ezra up in down but Ezra pressed the tip of his blade against the goblin’s snout. “I’m dead.”

The goblin’s eyes went wide and he nodded. “Of course. Of course. Whatever you say.” Under his breath he muttered something about damn heroes always telling him what his job was and arguing that they were dead when they clearly weren’t and if they had a death wish, he should stop trying to stop them.

With that, Ezra reached up and slammed the brass knocker down against the door and it swung open with a slight creak, revealing a world of wonder. In front of him was a forest of trees all of different colours; some were purple, some were autumn red, some were blue, some were orange, some were green. Beyond the forest of brilliant colours was a cityscape, towers looming towards and touching the sky. All around the scene were beautiful, brilliant snow-peaked mountains with tops obstructed by white clouds.

For a moment, he just stood there in the doorway to take it all in. Then, tightening his grip on his sword, he took a deep breath and stepped inside. As soon as he was through, the door slammed shut behind him and vanished from view. When he turned back around, a similar looking faerie to the first one, only with glasses and holding a clipboard stood in front of him. She even had the freshly healed cuts on her neck.

“Name?” she demanded and leafed through the pages on her clipboard, glancing them over. Ezra narrowed his eyes and scrutinised the faerie in front of him. When he didn’t respond for a moment, the faerie glanced up from her clipboard with a glare. “Name, please.”

Ezra shook himself out of his thoughts and grabbed his sword. He pointed the tip at the faerie’s chest. “I demand to speak with your manager,” he said.

The faerie rolled her eyes and pushed the tip of the blade away from her. “I know why you’re here. I need your name so I can look you up and schedule you an appointment. Also, the name your soul carry-on. I’d greatly appreciate it if you put your weapon away.”

Ezra continued narrowing his eyes at the faerie, and then he reluctantly lowered his weapon but still kept his eyes trained on the faerie. He gritted his teeth as he said, “My name is Ezra and this soul that I’m carrying around is Gandalf.”

The faerie flipped through the pages of her clipboard, muttering to herself as she searched for their names. After a little white, she stopped. “Ah.” With a poof of flame, a quill appeared in the air. “Gandalf, check. Plus one: Ezra.” She glanced back over her clipboard. “It said that we have been expecting your friend here since long before that halfling went on that quest to kill that dragon.” Ezra just shrugged.

Once she had finished writing, the clipboard and quill disappeared and she brushed her hands off. Then she turned to Gandalf. “Soul, you may take your true form,/And greet the late morn.” As she said that, she snapped her fingers and the soul in Ezra’s hands jumped away from him and when it touched the ground, it had become the spitting image of Gandalf, only see through.

The faerie turned on her heel and started walking away without looking back to check if they were following. “Come along, ciallmhar cinn. We must get to the Halls of Bureaucracy. Hel is expecting you.”

For a moment, Ezra just stared at Gandalf, utterly bewildered. He looked exactly the same with his chiselled features and black hair and stern grey eyes. The sun passed right through him and gave him a soft outline, almost making him glow. It was as if he were alive and dead at the same time.

After a few seconds of awkward silence, Gandalf turned to Ezra and smiled that signature warm smile of his that Ezra had grown so used to. “What’s wrong?” he asked in his flippantly charming tone. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” He laughed at his own joke.

Ezra blinked but then he chuckled and shook his head. “Good to see your sense of humour didn’t die with you,” he replied with a hint of a smile on his face.

Gandalf shrugged. “It’ll take a lot more than a bull sent down from Albios to kill that.”

“Keep up!” the faerie shouted back at them and Ezra jumped, causing Gandalf to chuckle. Ezra rolled his eyes and headed into the forest.

The two of them were quiet for a while as they tried to take everything in at once and come up with something to say. What do you say to your ‘friend’ who you had gone to hell and would go back, if the goddesses let him leave, for?

As they were walking through the woods, Ezra focused on taking in as much as he possibly could because when you’re about to go to war, especially in a battle of wits, any information can be used as a weapon. What he noticed were dark shadow figures staring out at him and Gandalf from the trees. Shadow animals with golden yellow eyes. Ezra decided they were most likely placed there by Hel because Elysium was her domain and as the daughter of Loki, she probably also had the power to manipulate shadow.

Besides that, the world was full of colour, light and bird song. It seemed like not just a nice place, but the PERFECT place for a hero to live out his final days. Too perfect. Ezra figured that it must all be because of the bureaucracy! That was the only explanation for it!!! But then a small part of Ezra wondered what would happen when he took the bureaucracy down. Would the entire world collapse in on itself without it?

He felt Gandalf put a spectral hand on his shoulder. “Hey. Are you okay?”

Shaking himself out of his thoughts, Ezra nodded. “I’m fine.” He was a hero. He couldn’t afford to be swayed by what was right or wrong in terms of the universe. His OWN moral compass told him that bureaucracy was wrong and that was all that really mattered to a hero. Who cares what happens to everyone else?

Just as Gandalf was about to say something, they stopped and stared up at the Halls of Bureaucracy. All around them were glass skyscrapers that towered towards the sky. People, probably other souls like Gandalf, moved in straight orderly lines exiting and entering the buildings. The light had completely died in their eyes.

The three of them entered the building, which had a 1920s lobby feel to it with a crystal chandelier but also a slick black onyx business feel, and then took the elevator up to the top floor. They exited into a room that was all fine drapery and a crystal chandelier. A woman with red hair tied up in a bun and golden eyes that reflected her godly parent’s in a prim black business suit sat at a glass desk pouring herself a cup of tea with a slim rod that was most likely a wand. It was clear that this was Hel, the goddess of Elysium and one of the three final bosses in any final fantasy game. When the doors dinged open, she turned to look up at them.

With a sigh of utter exhaustion, she gestured to the two seats in front of her. “Have a seat,” she said and they did without question although Ezra gripped his sword tightly to his side. The woman stood up and went to the window to stare down at the world she had created.

Then she turned back to our two main characters. “Do you know why you’re here?” she asked, taking a sip of tea.

Ezra gripped his blade tighter. “Gandalf is dead,” he said through almost gritted teeth. “And I am here to kill you so I can get him back. While, in the process, bringing down the entire bureaucracy of hell.”

“Interesting.” She took another sip of her tea then sat down at her desk. “And have you thought about the ramifications of those actions?” Ezra opened his mouth to say something but Hel shook her head and continued on. “Of course not. You’re a hero and heroes are always right.” She sipped her tea and leaned back in her chair slightly, clearly contemplating how she was going to convince Ezra to possibly take a deal.

Then she turned to Ezra and Gandalf. “You can only have one. Either a life with your…friend here or you get to kill me and end bureaucracy.” After an entire second where he didn’t respond, she rolled her eyes. “Decide quickly. I don’t have all day and I would rather not—”

“Gandalf,” Ezra replied firmly.

For a moment, everything was silent. Then Gandalf started trying to talk Ezra out of it and they argued while Hel just smiled wickedly as she watched the two of them argue.

After a few minutes, she clapped her hands, interrupting them and forcing them to turn to her. “If that is your decision.” She snapped her fingers and a stack of papers appeared on her desk. “Sign all of these and you will be stuck here in Elysium forever and ever. Oh if there is one small consolation prize, it’s that you don’t have to work in the Halls of Bureaucracy. For now at least.”

“Don’t do this,” Gandalf whispered.

Ezra shook his head and didn’t respond, simply signing the documents without another word. Once everything was signed, the papers went up in flame, and Ezra felt himself fading into the floor. He felt like he was burning alive and being consumed by flame but when he looked down at his hands, nothing was scarred or looked charred.

Everything went black and he heard a deep voice in the back of his mind say, “Welcome to Tartarus.”

And what happened to a boy named Ezra? Well, nobody knows. Except the author and POSSIBLY me. Some believe that with the help of his ‘friendship’ to guide him, he was able to make it back to Elysium and to Gandalf. Others believed that his soul perished in Tartarus. Kronos is scary. The titans could very well have torn him apart. Still others believe that he persuaded Kronos to ally with him to escape Tartarus.

Perhaps that’s a different story for another time.