The Masks

The Mercurial Ocean:
Of the Four Masks

Four masks interlocked in dreadful stare
Observation changing all before
Entangled weave of gazes entwined
To make all, that once was not,
Now there

Four masks caged in pained haunt
To build, To burn, To act, To plan
A raging storm with no end or halt
The vortex spiral of dreamland

Four masks making haste to plan all fate
Fighting for a secure place in the abyss
Longing to fill a thirst they cannot sate
Creating chaos in darkened mist


Through the eyes of a mysterious winged perspective a tour is embarked upon the silver mercurial waters of eternity, set against a vast dark sky. Gliding over its ominous undulating waves awestruck by the brilliant intermingling of shadow casting tidals and silvered reflections derived from some light unseen. So engaging as to warrant marvel, it is a monument of omnipresent mercurial perfection. With a sudden slant of perspective the view becomes sweeping, and then arcs into a circular path that is set about a peculiar point of interest. Standing stark against the silence, four shackled masks are pristinely arranged upon a small ceremonial island. Closer inspection reveals a monolith center to the four, diversity is stretched across the face of each mask, and an accompanying plaque is trapped beneath each with inscriptions of some length. Chained to the monolith and bound in a heavy metallic sleep they are denied all but an abbreviated animation. With no warning perspective changes and is dragged screaming, diving downward into a spiral toward a towering mass, with the seeming fear of some violent collision immanent. It ultimately perches upon the monolith. 
From this perch the form then gazes upon the surrounding pieces, its eyes falling first upon the elaborate plaque beneath the mask ahead. 
The Mask of Order: Keeper and Sentinel of the Spire. First of the two motivations it is responsible for all of the organized action to be set forth upon time. It holds all forms and actions deliberate for the goal of control and predictability. The voice of caution dwelling on fear of the unknown, but also as a positive force instilling purpose and guidance. From this need to guide it will obsessively seek out and quantify all variables, a savage desperate will set forth to seer. Encapsulating all that seems predictable for the guise of future sight. The idealistic catalogue of all action and events are locked inside of Order, filed away for all time. With fathomed charts and graphs of probability, it will long forever for the solace found in prophecy, but will not find it. Though a slave to linear time, it will gain affluence and influence through this esoteric education.
Taking a moment to ponder the plaque focus drifts slowly, rising in respect toward the closed eyes of Order. Upon contact the eyes flash violently open and the form is assailed with vagrant thoughts, wrought with fears, doubts, and hopes.
These inanimate children float here, lifeless and bound. Locked in a perpetual stare with closed eyes, these introspective prisoners are secured in eternal binding chains. Should they be freed and embraced?  Or should they be admired as sculpture, a frozen monument to will.  Change this known world forever?  Cure this loneliness? What reason or passion would they serve?  Folding this hollow-verse upon their whim, reaping havoc on this now solemn sea. All around this constant/perpetual table of empty continuance there will be shattered streaks of light boiling and burning the silver tides. Shaping, reflecting a newer dimension erratically weaving assertive wills upon this fluid board. Unconfined, their energy would spill forth followed by walking death and change with out bound. Newer sorrows born of deeper and more painful substance than that of loneliness. And yet without this, my life is naught but a muscular shadow pacing winged in the abyss. 
These naked, shallow forms attempting to pierce opposing agendas into silent coercion.  Sitting as silent tumors ready to devour and replicate, in exponential fashion, their intent. In Order this mind is kept sound, holding within controlled grasp a maelstrom of potential improbability. Swirling netlike in the spire it is infused intrinsically into all things.  When breath takes this creation, its’ precepts and nuances will not coalesce to any external resolve save to its own.  Vulnerable in the divide this face of trapped potential will become livid, teeming with agenda and revolution.  Upon humbled knees prostrate before the outset of chaos, Order is held captive under the essence of limitation and organization. Bathed full into the waters of inconceivable prophecy and over-contemplative fear, it will surge on the waves of absolute guided purpose.  Ruins and entities will abound upon the once stagnant, wondrous nightmare of home.  I will awake with the fear it was a fleeting dream, but instead will find the essence coursing as a river through these veins. With Order’s presence the path will be made manifest. With its finite sphere of control it will endeavor to arrest the spire in balanced suspension, bracing the new construct against the dynamic changes to come. 
Risk all this or walk alone beside eternity? Her unchanging beauty, poetry and eloquence must be denied of its capacity to lure to dormancy. The lingering memory flared in every sentimental thought of her will haunt as an epitaph to progressive efforts.  Neither by malice, nor by vengeful heart do I so detach. She will simply evolve from within this boundless mercurial ocean to a point of light, beckoning all to endeavor onward, reminding the totality of existence what solitude once was. The origins of her form a pained memory forgotten only through violent release. Her metamorphosis will not come easily, but by the grace of will or the force of hand she will subvert to this omniscient intent.
The children of the cosmos beseech their master among these corridors of darkness for life. They dance in choreographed measure, a dark dance of storms. Awestruck gazing on in trepidation, the lucid-skinned bodies are sealed and assimilated in the spire before these eyes.  The door will be closed and the key undone, binding them forever in a structured prison of delineated time. The chiseled down, broken shards of what once was the eternal at an instant is set free with no instruction save independent desires. Now only the echoed silhouettes of karmic temperance, the timeline that was once a mere monolith, and their restraints upon each other, bind their actions and potentials.
Slowly the perspective eyes open once more. While at first disoriented by the mental gaze of Order, soon again composed. Certain in the path set before advancing to the next plaque…
Entropy: Consolidator and Restrictor of the spire’s mass of form.  For every item or idea made real a passive but enduring trial is in place to test its very nature.  Either metaphorically or literally, all in the spire is subject to the forces of decay and resistance. It is responsible for evolution in the reverse, set forth to destroy that which is temporal or limited. Entropy is the vigor of simplification. Where opposing energies cultivate and complicate, Entropy compels all things toward the tranquillity of the mercurial sea. Envision creation as a mountain stretching far and vast. Entropy is the instigator of the avalanche that breaks loose all destabilized elements.
The plaque annotates Entropy, the second failsafe before the risk. These first two of the four are meant to keep everything safe and manageable, imbedded limitations and guidelines. The perspective’s form is one of vast power, and as such there is much to lose. This reminder noticeably comforts him.  As his eyes contact the opposing closed stare, he is once again assailed with another facet of will. As an indelible visage is cast upon the mask of Entropy so too is its visage cast upon him. The keeper of the expanse is called once again to a conflict held within.
The tribute to my sea of subtle bliss, Entropy is my one conciliation. It will limit all expansion no matter how purposed or impulsive, keeping the spire in check. For no matter what abounds in this new world Entropy will cage it to segmented time. There will be no permanence. No stagnant rock eternal, enduring all trial and tribulation. All is made to fall in my vortex storm-verse, so it is ensured by Entropy. I will not risk the complacency of my creation. Force of decay will stoke the fires, rather than watching them sway contented till the end of time. It is lack of possible of change that irrepressibly inclines things to merely exist. No likelihood of new design or intent without something giving way, making room for new vibrant form. I will dwell on this form no longer, for it and the form before it are cautions in my endeavor of risk. Were I too pay it too much respect to Order and Entropy I may find myself with resuscitated regard for my current residence. 
And so inspired he turned, his attention now bearing the facets of the next plaque. Then surprisingly he spoke, for the first time since the silvered waters’ creation. “Alas here is the danger, the risk, the first conceptual element in eons of ordered minimalism and elegance floating here before me. Here is my first great work to defy consolidation. Here is Forge.” With his words the mercury waves ripple concentric to his voice and all the expanse seems to bend around its echo. 
The Mask of Forge: The Sword of Creation and Temperance. The furnace of all matter and energy, Forge takes the most basic of forms and expands upon them. Striving toward the perfection of stability and sparking the spire’s cultivation in the expanse of the abyss. It is the one force in existence that provokes the endurance of being and resists the hindering spurn of degradation. The vehemence of the Mask of Forge stokes the flames of existence to boil the molten thread that will be woven into the fabric of all things. It matters not the nature of a new idea or form. All corporeal or fleeting in nature are viciously torn into reality from nothingness then encouraged, cultured, and honed as equal components in its smelter.  
The keeper of the expanse feels the molten tinge of Forge’s presence.  The indelible mark of its conception now housed within his veins.  So once more he is beckoned to retreat into the deep recesses of his mind.
“Forge you will be the vigor amassing substance. Planting uncounted realities in vast succession and driving the nails of new form into the sheer blanket of oblivion. New dimensions will portal forth from your whims and all matter of the void will be subject to your call.  You will endure an abbreviated freedom restrained by Entropy but you will not easily be overcome.  Time will attempt to fashion you into a tool of its device, but you will arise from time trodden down yet unbeaten.  With this education you will fold back the curtain upon the once crystalline graceful landscape, subverting its elegance with abrasive jagged shapes. Fathom deeply your measures as you are provoked by the temptations of chaos and composure. Create, but create with temperance and reservation. Caution, but do not let fear deter action.”
The waters of this mind now raging white will soon spill over and into the animation of each of your agendas.  I will be a soft still voice that permeates the very ether you choose to inhabit.  Departure from the darkened expanse of this necropolis is emanate.  The life in each of you is on the precipice of breaking forth with lifted water to swim through a placental river into the cascading deluge that will be called time.   Each of your eyes will be given full capacity washed totally clean, big, bright, and prepared for the march toward dimension lock.  The pressure will push and birth you from all sides and I as diadem will seal the expanse upon your departure.  Light will become water; water will in turn become life, then life will draw near to darkness just before the quickening.  As each of you depart there will be nothing for you to return to save a dark shell, a broken shell, ashes mixed with water.  Time will escort you away in chains claiming each of you new slaves.  Time will outfit each of you with uniforms and nail you down to its agenda with prsistine tact and exquisite grace, but remember my children that time is not your master and is ignorant of your beginnings.  Allow not her play to overtake you.  For it is your collective seed that created her reflection of the expanse and not the way she would bend your minds to believe.  Take caution of her device she is merely an illusion.  In the end She will sit among you in captive’s chains, scorned, damned, and enslaved.  Do not listen to her voice, it is the voice of doubt, whose father is fear, whose father is death.  All of these beings will come to you through a birth of opposing force.  A night Storm will come from a midnight sky to give color its place.  The daughters of time will be broken and torn down unseen.  They too will refuse to hide themselves and will also be enslaved.  
“Fracture: The Evader of the Maze and the Prism of impulsive action.” Fracture is instantaneous and unpredictable action. It is the small crack in the glass that cascades throughout the ventana, racing in fervor toward variant beauty. With abstraction the tempest of the cosmos is made volatile. Unpredictability exists in any moment of Order’s weakness, or Fracture’s strength.  Purpose is nowhere to be found and made in a moment unaffected by the need to create, destroy, or accomplish.  Instinct is responsible for beauty in the universe. It gives flame its erratic nature, causes errant and unpredictable action, and brings forth individuality to all entities and objects. Fracture is the voice of wisdom in the Quadra, for it knows no future. It embraces the unpredictable aspect of every moment and feeds upon it. It is the heart of the unknown, denying form but embracing potential. 
In each there is an aspect of my eternal legacy.  From the mingling my voice with theirs a storm will arise to wreck the calm, an unending cosmic dance of thundered creation and destruction.  No longer as some diadem crowned introspector, I will hand in hand conjure the madness of interplay to follow the spark. I have washed my robes and will in short duration pass from eternal to temporal, a part of something finite but intricate.  

As if the prototype concept of something new engages him, he roars introspectively before the waters of recession. “As one union, my Masks, we will create something dynamic and dangerous, but lasting. Not purveyors of some sadistic need, nor intoxicated with the sloth and ignorance of consequence, we will crack open the stoic face of conformity. Laughing heartily in the visage of empty, unfulfilling perfection we will shatter the anchored chains of fear. Breaking bravado and casting its rotten robes asunder, rededicating them to the night. Truly we will part waters in this swelling silver chasm, marking our right as its’ rightful owner, maker, and ultimate master. Defiant, looking into the lights of mad silence while shrieking as banshees crying out in disdain.  The echoes of our scream affect change within us, making us warriors not victims of its’ story. To stride boldly before our potential fall and not allow the wind to chase us unprepared into dreams we are unworthy and unready to dream.  May we not look upon this birth as innocent, and instead handle it carefully as some unfathomable, volatile dynamo.  Humble in the knowledge that we once were divine and pleasant with the expanse and with its unsettling silent poisons. Tread deep into the primordial traces of the mind. We will not cease nor lust over any temporal satisfaction, but appreciate it and digress not allowing complacency time to seduce us.  I give you four the power to tame the graveyards that will attempt to swallow up your enigmas, your seeded whims, and your incomplete wishes to soar.  Erect newer and more perfect, but temporal euphoric creations for sun-time and Entropy to tear away.  Together speak now my beasts, my masks, my children. Roar beside me. Befriend your shame of infancy and exemplify your savage wills. Execute the silence. Ravage into the night slaying the tedium that permeates its’ cold lifeless heart. Destroy this mockery of self-indulgent beauty. Conquest and fester over the expanse. Phase into the unseen side of lunacy and defile the decadence and luster.  Ravage into the night slaying the defiance that permeates its’ cold lifeless heart. Now finally, and at long last I beckon. I taunt. I tempt you to awaken. Breathe my dark sculptures and rage. Storm now before me!”

The Monolith
The Gathered Storm
With the pieces in play all the stage is set for a drama of epic quality. The guiding interest of the Masks and the formation of the Gods to come, mark the advent of a great story to be told. Characters of great variation and attraction exhibit potential derived both directly and indirectly from the influence of the masks. 
All these abstracts and all these ideas are completely hollow and stagnant without each other. What is cultivation without purpose or ruin without a subject to writhe? What is cultivation without abstraction or purpose without action? Each one of these wills coalesce to form forceful and quickened form.
One nervous and shaking, the face of a paranoid obsessed labeled Control. The second sleek and composed, the guise of a starved villain inscribed below as Entropy. The next stout and strong in features, defiant and vain etched below as Forge. The fourth and final mask was marked as with the others and called Fracture.
A catalyst to all things known, it was four abstracts competing which sowed the seeds of time. 
From these seeds a spire erupted in the expanse, a towering twisted vortex ripping the expanse asunder. All within a spark the convergence of opposing wills brought dynamic action and content to what was once blissful, shallow, and silent.  Before isolated, now intrigued by the creation before them. The breath of each Mask twisted by another forming a great tower standing in stark contrast against a never ending black stage. The culmination of this maelstrom was a new essence floating adrift in the universe searching for its place.  As the wills before them entangled a play unraveled, a dance of timid infancy. 
It was conflict that created these new shapes. Chaos tore at the bonds of control. The light of creation flickered in defiant hope against all efforts to distinguish it.  Each new child a hybrid of will and purpose treading in the tumult to survive. The ascending amount of progeny danced before their sires and for eons never ceased to entertain. Then at a sudden jolt the dance stopped. Whether it was the will of the expanse at work or the equation, long since created, balancing itself out the Masks did not know. For a moment all was still…
It was in that moment that something miraculous took place. The Masks were not at first aware, they were too concerned about the intermission before them. But there it was, hidden in the depths of the spire, a small planetoid with a system of independent motion. It was the single source of movement in the universe. Captivated, all dynamics save this one, ceased. With the halt of interaction the Quadra looked on breathless. It was only through the torrent of the spire that the expanse was kept at bay. Now after eons of guidance it threatened to unravel before them. And yet…it didn’t. This single stalwart system kept the dark eternity in shackles. 
The other forces must work in tandem for there to be room, reason, and action for all life and being. Without the other forces the face of cultivate would be no more than an abstraction, a pointless idea floating aloft in the expanse of space. There are three inherent phases since the creation of linear time that have warranted significant interest.
The first of which is energy.
The second milestone was the advent of life.
The third point of interest within our focused time span is sentience.
Instinct however is something entirely different. If creation and destruction form human morality then instinct concerns our needs and desires without consideration of consequence. It is the thoughtless, formless randomness in the scheme of all things and the ceaseless desire to fulfill immediacies in life. It holds no conception of morality, path, or end result. It is a moment in which an urge is embraced rather than repressed. 
Purpose is the structure for all existence. It is the reason why parts are arranged in a particular order or combination and the reason for why they exist in the first place. If cultivate and ruin are the dance of existence then purpose is the music playing.  Far from the need to create or destroy, purpose sees all action as merely a means to accomplish its goal, whatever it may be at the time. Purpose is an elusive thing to grasp because most often it is only recognizable after its influence. A subtle guide asserting influence in order to perpetuate its vision, purpose is a passive but present motivator.
The mind is quite the bastion of potential for Purpose.  In many ways it feeds off the others. It coerces Instinct into specific action, bends destruction to subtle action, and gives meaning to cultivation
For the few omniscient in nature the universe is envisioned as a towering spiral of linear time, the one form in the expanse encompassing all that is known as existence. It guides itself through time and space, grasping at some elusive and intangible goal. The tip of the drill is always one of three essences and its axis is purpose. The raging war of wills fight for pioneer influence on each new point in space-time. 
Rip asunder the bliss of the void. The essences of impulse, 
If all of existence were a wheel and time the hub, then purpose, creation, destruction and instinct are the spokes. With these four abstracts, all ideas in the universe are given form and each component created through their cooperation or confrontation. 
Destruction and creation are the counter weights in the balance of all things. They sow harmony in existence by keeping all opposing forces in check. If ever the scales should tip to upset the tentative concoction of the cosmos, an event is conjured for the respective need albeit it destructive or constructive. It is in this way all things revitalized, reallocated, and replenished.  In beings of sentience these opposing but equal forces are voices, compelling each ethical entity toward the fulfillment of perceived good or evil action. These qualities transcend the random chaos and whims of instinct to consider repercussion. 
The nature of all things is defined among these 4 spirits, no matter how abstracted or thought out. Sometimes entwined in elegant motion while at others locked in pained submission, the harmony and dissonance of all things fall within their influence.
Ruin is to cause to fall to pieces or decay. A star collapsing or a violent vortex, it comes in all forms and shapes in sizes. It is active as fire on fuel or passive as sand abrading stone. Its role in the universe is purification, a cleansing of all that is weak, impure, or out of place.  In any system it focuses on filtering all that is flawed, its nature is not content to be confined within a system. Its aggression toward change is prominent. Always seeking new forms to attack and test, Ruin is much more energetic in nature than Cultivate. It is one of the principle guiding forces in evolution and adaptation. Seeking purity in essence through the taxing of form.
Just as each other face finds its role into psyche, so to does Ruin. It too exploits the presence of the others in sentient minds. Taking need to create and manipulating it into thinking something must first be destroyed. Twisting instinct into something carnal and unrelenting. Bending purpose toward villainous exploit.  In this way many new facets are born. Each new facet from ruin testing and distilling the waters on the ocean of thought. Not just content to purify, ruin also exists in its purest base influence, to destroy and raze for the shear bliss of entertainment. There is no mistake that no matter its benefit, ruin is a force of sadistic malcontent.
With our new voice may we cause her to eat at its core slowly and 
forever.  Together may we never speak of this action for truly this would be the impetus 
for the black and dead revolution.  Together may we glow placid in spirit as we
traverse the corridors of the forgotten and the accused; for remember that these will 
choose to create the very bars that hold them and tuck them safely away from the warmth 
of the brilliant.  Let us with caution caste the newest time pieces that will be made from 
pure mercury.  May we together dine with the keeper of the expanse while the sleeping 
masses create tired and dreadful tomorrows to hide inside of.  Together may we look
upon this condition as the final and necessary cure for a lonely and diseased-silent 
landscape; this final and necessary cure our greatest