The Cleansing

A great wailing arose from the million souls gathered around the Hill. One million longing voices, raised in anger, in rebellion, in grieving, in tragic realization of their fate. One million voices arose above the lush green valley where the hill stood, seeming to drift upward on the wind, up, above the billowing clouds, carried on the currents of air in the upper reaches of the atmosphere, over the distant faded mountaintops, over the wide ocean, piercing the boundaries of space. One million truly lost souls -- men, and women, and children among them, all of them crying out in faithless desperation, in hopeless agony. One million voices carried high, and far, and stretched out around the whole world, covering it with sound and sadness so dark, so intense, it seemed to blacken the light of the Greater Sun.

And so it was, for the light of the Greater Sun dimmed, but only for a moment, when the Cleansing began. It began, amidst the darkness of those terrible wailing cries, upon the very hill surrounded by the million. It began with a light, but not from the Sun -- it began with the light upon the hill, so bright, so intense, a singularity for an instant, and then it exploded out away from the hilltop, expanding concentrically, absorbing and dissolving tragedy, sweeping the whole World as it Cleansed the Darkness of the Wailing. And for a moment the light remained, enveloping the world in pure light. In that moment, the Million Voices were quieted, pacified, and for that final moment as the light consumed and covered all, blinding eyes and enlightening and purifying minds and hearts, all the Million were at peace.

The moment ended, the light faded, and a light breeze swept over a carpet of lush grasses, gently swaying the tall trees on the outskirts, seeming to brush over the distant mountains with a wash of purples and grays and blues. The deep blue of the sky cradled the little valley, and the Greater Sun shone innocently down upon it. The Million stood not upon the hill, nor around it, but had gone -- had vanished entirely, as though they had been always a memory. Curious to the eyes of any who could have seen, the Hill itself had gone. The valley had been laid smooth by the Light. In the center of the place where the Hill had stood only moments before, floated, as though a disembodied spirit, a most brilliant light, yet not only a light, for it swirled and turned and gently pulsed as though a living, writhing creature; a floating, spheroidal mass of swirling light. And all around, the world was still.