In the distance, meanwhile, the two great gates, once collapsed against one another, now stood apart. The wounded one had traced a bloody trajectory as it drew nearer to the sunset, far from the clouds in which its twin had hidden itself. No skilled observer was needed to notice the veins of wood, and even the wrought iron, twisting upon themselves like a creature afflicted with tetanus. Bloodied voices of agony poured forth from several places, like pus or worms spilling from a rotting wound. It was no coincidence, then, that the stench of the dead invaded the nostrils of the winged warrior. Yet to him, crossing over heaps of things akin to shit and mud was no longer difficult, so long as he could prevent it from going any farther. Even his aged and frail body was scarcely an obstacle anymore, though the physical horrors that marred it were many: the left femur and humerus were riddled with tiny fractures; one of his ribs was on the verge of breaking through his skin, absurdly without disturbing the lung he had sworn to protect; several phalanges were shattered, and small cascades of blood flowing from his nostrils crusted over the place where his mouth was missing. White dandruff and clumps of dead skin broke away like pollen and, seen from a certain angle, seemed to camouflage themselves among their celestial sisters. It was the wind that kept them afloat, mingled with the love God had infused into every star, and which, at the same time, gave them their addiction. It was their intoxication that made them tremble, that prevented them from hanging motionless like some simple painting. The great heat radiated by the mother flames thus became more intense, drastically increasing the movement of the luminous particles that carpeted the immense blue, interrupted only by the rays of the golden bonsai. And so euphoria, agitation, and madness descended into the dull routine of these beings, causing them to tear themselves forever from the places to which they had been fastened. No one could help but notice them, nor remain untouched by their enchantment. For the first time, every pair of eyes turned toward the heavens, save for those of the winged creature, was drawn away from the two gates.
As though in answer, within that concentration of madness, of luminous bodies colliding, embracing, and drifting apart, a response was sent forth: a messenger. A new rift appeared in the sky, a new punishment inflicted by God upon yet another traitor, weary of that noisy, tangled celebration that no longer belonged to her. Like those before her, she wished to flee the great sea of God and reach the profane world below, where despair, lamentation, and death held dominion. How amusing that these two seas, and above all those who dwelled within them, kissed one another without ever realizing it, while at the same time casting upon each other indescribable glances of envy. The fire given by the countless mother flames against nothing but God.
But He was not there.
It was all an invisible love to which the green stars had clung, almost as though it were something each of them possessed for herself alone. And the shades of love that came into being beneath the gaze of the nameless angel were the result of those individual colors they kept hidden within themselves.
The new infidel fell, drawing a fresh red line across the backdrop, striving by every means possible to travel even a little farther than those who had come before her. Ordinarily, none of the renegades had crossed the third golden ray emanating from the bonsai-sun, as though from that point onward they simply dissolved of their own accord. The punishing fire pursued her in a frenzy, growing ever more intense like the arm of the mother flame that had hurled the angel forth.
As she passed the first golden flash, nothing happened.
Thus far, there was nothing new. Most fleeing traitors crossed this first obstacle without too much difficulty. It was, in fact, the second arm of the bonsai that inspired the greatest fear. From there onward, the only force that allowed the falling stars to travel even a little farther was the fierce courage that set them apart. Like unarmed warriors, they hurled themselves forward in a frenzy, swimming through waters that belonged to them, waters they knew well. It was their own blood that corroded them, yet it could not touch their sensitivity, their thirst for vengeance, their sense of belonging, nor their longing to belong to a single Mother Flame. And so God wept, hurling insults and flames, devouring soul and courage from within, until the latter was transformed into suicide beneath the third and final ray touched in the heavens. And despite everything, the final stage, the final component, the dear embrace of death, did not frighten them. On the contrary, it urged them onward.
Suddenly, the desire to die became a sacred reason, almost as though God no longer wished to stain His own hands, but instead left everything to theirs. Who knew whether this time it would happen the sa—
WHAM!
No one could say whether, this time, the new falling star had even managed to graze the fourth golden flash. The view was completely obstructed by the crossing of the wounded gate, which had appeared practically out of nowhere. And at the very point where the trajectory of the falling star collided with that of the bleeding twin, a portion of its body exploded. A figure emerged from a wide wound at its center. Liters of blood struggled to hold it back, taking on an elastic nature in their desperate attempt to drag it down into the gash that the young angel had, as fate would have it, violently torn open.
The blow hurled by the arm of the mother flame had struck true.
Tendrils of vital fluid strained with all their might to seize the winged warrior, who had appeared like a bolt from a clear sky. The last breaths of life exerted by the bloodied gate fought desperately to reclaim even the smallest shred of strength. Like an alligator, it then began a death roll, determined to rob its victim of all sense of direction.
But to no avail...
The determination within the Creator's son was perhaps greater even than that of the invisible God who ruled those heavens, reducing Him, in turn, to nothing more than a concept. Absurdly, the endless rotations brought the nameless one a sense of relaxation. But more than that: his upper and lower limbs seemed to be pulled by an external force, allowing the protruding rib to return and embrace its sisters, while the muscles that had been torn asunder repaired themselves, fusing their fibers with those of their nearby companions. Layers of bone tissue melted away, flowing into the nearest fractured places and repairing them. His nostrils widened slightly, gathering the encrusted blood and sealing additional cuts. Consequently, the distal and proximal phalanges of his hands came almost to touch, maintaining a distance smaller than before; so too did the wrist and elbow, the knee and groin, the intervertebral discs among themselves, and finally the upper half of his body and his legs.
Within those few dozen seconds, dragged along by the gate's mad rotational frenzy, the angel underwent a reduction in stature. And those liters of blood, still dripping and drawing circular trajectories around the colossal figure as it continued its rapid rotation, were the remnants of countless red blood cells that had failed to cling to the nameless one's hair.
Where fusion had occurred, however, the hue of his hair changed.
The red of blood and divine fire was often interrupted by flashes of gray and blue belonging to experiences long past. And immediately afterward, as if by magic, a mantle of ash, brushed over by the fleeting age of that body born from not even a hundred deaths, settled upon him with force. The colors that had appeared before withdrew into the hair follicles and capillaries, racing through veins and arteries until they finally reached the heart and mind. An indestructibly invisible shell embraced those organs, showing not the slightest sign of weakness. Thus, even the nameless one's feeble muscles prevented him from being torn away from the whirling movement of the wounded gate. A single spark, small and innocent, appeared as nothing more than a point amid the vermilion vines that writhed like blades of grass in the wind. Until that instant, it seemed to have remained attached to some blood-red tentacle born from the gate's hemorrhage. Only when it began to move could one realize that it was, in truth, attached to the young angel's hand, precisely to the nail of his index finger. The tip of the needle, fastened to the ring upon that same finger, brushed its lips against the radiance emanating from the fleeing star.
And so, something else new happened for the first time: a daughter of the sky succeeded in escaping from the despair of God...
אבא, ספר לי מתי התחלת להאכיל אותי במשמשים;
אבא, ספר לי למה צואתך חמה יותר מחיבוקך;
אבא, ספר לי למה המים שאתה גורם לי לשתות חדרו לריאותיי;
אבא, למה אתה מביט כל כך בגופי?
(Oh Father, tell me about when you started feeding me apricots;
Oh Father, tell me why your excrement is warmer than your embrace;
Oh Father, tell me why the water you make me drink has entered my lungs;
Oh Father, why do you gaze so intently at my body?)