knock knock::
Bilgamesh put down his clay iPalm and cocked his head at the front door.
knock knock::
“Uhm… okay,” he muttered as he pulled back the ox-skin curtain that covered the front archway. “How did you knock on a ox-skin curta…” His voice stalled in his throat.
In front of him was nothing. I mean nothing. No visitor. No rutted mud pathway. No sleepy Mesopotamian town. No horizon. No sky. Nada. Nothing.
Gilgamesh? A voice intoned from the Nothing.
“Uhm, no… uh…”
Gilgamesh? The Nothing repeated. I have a package for one Gilgamesh.
“Uhm… he, uh… he’s not here. Something about questing. A long one. I’m his son.”
...
“Can I help you?” the lad asked, carefully peering around the corner of the archway. The nothing was making his head swim. If nothing else, it was far more interesting that the iPalm he had been poking on all morning. Clay just wasn’t much fun after it hardened.
I… really need Gilgamesh. The voice sounded nervous. I mean, it’s important.
“Not here.”
But I have a package for one Gilgamesh
“Still not here.”
Are you sure? What’s your name?
“Bilgamesh.”
Close enough. Sign here.
Blinding white pain rapped him on the inside of his skull. He fell to his knees.
And here.
Crimson lightning raced up and down his spine as he gasped silently in horror.
And finally, here.
Rainbow droplets of liquid metal erupted from his eyes as he shivered in strange ecstasy.
Good. Come with me.
“I… I don’t think I can leave,” Bilgamesh exclaimed after finding his voice somewhere near where he thought his liver used to be. “I mean, when dad gets back…”
... he’ll understand. You’re doing him a favor, really. Trust me.
The humble wood and adobe home faded into more of the Nothing.
“Okay…”
You’ll be questing. Just like your dad. Kinda.
“Kinda?”
Kinda.