The Curse of Immortality
It was the curse for Etzev to live for thousands of years, a witness to all the world's pain, shunned and alone from all his friends who he knew he would outlive. The lion had always wanted to enjoy the ability to live for centuries, even more than a millennium and he knew that would make humans jealous. But the wars and violence and hatred in the world kept him from enjoying these things. Instead of the joys of eternal youth, he had merely grown about 20 years and fully expected his long and painful life to be over but instead the lion continued to live. Etzev had seen in his many hundreds of years of existence the deaths of thousands of any animal who dared become his friend and the terrible wrath of those whose instincts led them to hate. As the desert night with its cold and harsh winds blew over a land without a people or even the vestige of human civilization, the lion could hear the human cries of anguish replayed in his mind, dating back to countless centuries ago when he saw the nearby city almost completely destroyed. But these cries were far more recent.
In the past two decades, Etzev had heard the pain and suffering of nightmares and they tormented the lion in his dreams. In those terrible dreams, he could see hundreds of human men and women, the sad story of despair written over their pathetic faces, forced alive into crematoria to be burned to death. He had seen men living in squalid conditions, mere skeletons on a shrinking garment of diseased skin dying in prisons from overwork. He could see the horror of a child ripped from its mother's arms and killed summarily, he saw in his dreams, the mass graves of innocent men and women stripped of their valuables and clothes, their naked corpses lying exposed in the winter for the most despicable of wild animals to feast on. There was no one to give the lion encouragement through these difficult nightmares and if his past few centuries had been any indication (wild animals don't know mathematics and even if they did, Etzev would have lost count of the centuries many years ago), he would always be alone through these ordeals.
‘Why must I be alone through all this? Why must I be cursed to see and hear and feel all the pains of the universe for all this time? Why can't I just pass on into I don't know whatever comes next?' he mediated while alone in his den, as he had done for centuries before. The nightmares contained all the same elements throughout the ages, it was only the scenery that ever really changed- the lion had never seen anything positive in his sleep, just pain, embarrassment, senseless suffering, death, and the razing of cities. But in the lion's mind, something told him that soon his mission in life would be complete- and that Etzev would find all the answer as to why he had to witness all of the inhumanity to humankind.
"I understand what you're going through and by the rising of the sun tomorrow all this pain, all these sorrowful memories will be gone and you can live in a better place." It was a voice, of what the lion could not know and spoken in a language that unlike the other humans he could understand. When he turned around, he saw near the entrance to his cave a human. Or at least that's how the figure appeared. His body glowed with a pure and shining light and as the lion looked out of the cave, the figure expanded to fill the desert sky. His body was composed entirely of eyes and tongues and at any one moment, they were closing, some were disappearing and others reappearing in places where the others were.
"Do not think that I neglected you, Etzev. No I had orders to keep you alive so that you could experience the beauty through all this pain. Know that a remnant still survives. You have seen in your visions the suffering of innocent men but I tell you, dear lion, the day you die there will be rejoicing as this martyr race returns home." The lion eagerly anticipated the day that would come, to see the end of this woebegone and terrible life. "Just take me right now," he thought out loud to this mysterious being.
"I'm sorry, Etzev, I can't take you this very moment. But I can tell you that the curse will end tomorrow morning. And when it ends, people will rejoice, not because you were a bad creature but a lost nation shall return to their homeland. This desert which all men despise and only the most resilient animals live in will be inhabited by them and they will turn this desert into a farmland," the many-eyed being said to the lion. It seemed almost impossible to believe but at this stage the lion was desperate for anything to believe in.
"The survivors who came out of the ashes of those terrible places you've seen will come to settle this land and they will be protected. And, lifted out of their state of misery, they will become the most brilliant and beautiful and happy people on earth. And when that blessed day should come, you will leave the world and all its problems behind. Look!" The being moved and Etzev could see the blackness of this night giving way to purple and he knew that his sentence would soon be over. He could hear the cries of agony and despair replaced by the sounds of happy human children, of farmers working their fields, of cities being constructed, of music and pleasant conversation. Instead of executions and murder, the lion could now hear men and women getting married, the cries of newborn babies, the singing of the birds.
And soon the sky gave way to a magnificent sunrise that would free the lion of this world of suffering that he had endured. A song was lilting through the plains of barren desolation as Etzev crawled further outside into the sand of the desert. It was a beautiful chorus that the entire earth was taking part in and though the lion could not see who was singing or what was producing music, he felt himself becoming part of the song. "Arise, my love, my fair one and come away. The winter has passed, and the rain is gone- the flowers appear on earth and it is a time for singing." From the being with many eyes, a hand appeared outstretched and beckoning for the lion to come and he did Etzev was soon taken hold of by the creature. and he saw the entire earth in all of its beauty, everything was glowing in a beautiful array of colors.
"You have been taken away to a new land, and to a place you do not know. Where you once stood shall be a city known as the Passage to Hope. But you will live forever, in a land without shame, death, or war." A new sense of peace and serenity the likes of which the lion had never felt before in his entire long and joyless life crept over him. There were meadows and pastures, filled with all manner of beautiful things and he could live in peace and as carefree and happy as a lamb forever in such a glorious place. All the animals he had known in life were there to greet him and the terrors of the previous world were completely erased in a never-ending sonata of joy. And Etzev, the lion knew then that his sentence was over.
Etzev the lion who lived a long and painful life waiting for the vagrancy of an entire nation to come to an end, passed on to the world to come. His dead body, the container for the innocent soul animal that only sought peace and an end to suffering, now lay dead on the desert ground. From his carcass, on the desert floor, a beautiful rose bloomed in the sand the day he died- the 14th of May, 1948.