The Tower

And what lies beneath

New Year's Eve, 1960

I've been gazing at the sunset for hours, the heavenly golden glow of the clouds unnaturally extended as our plane pursues the sun westward. Below me I can see only water, behind me is only darkness. Though the view outside is exquisitely beautiful, inside me I feel a thick and oozing melancholy which pulls me ever downward. I know I can't keep up this race forever. I know that I too will be benighted soon.

The view is so mesmerizing that I lose track of time. Perhaps I fell asleep, or even blacked out, but all I remember is a hideous shaking, like someone trying to jostle me out of a nightmare. 

When I come to, I'm underwater. Jagged panels of metal are all around me. The sea is on fire, and in my delirious state, I can't understand how that's possible. The first thought I have is: I'm in hell. Funny, isn't it, that that’s the first conclusion my mind reaches.

Then I feel my lungs burning, and I sense the surge of animalistic instinct to simply survive. All my wandering thoughts are crystalized into just one: I need air.

But I don't know which way is up. Then I see a torrent of bubbles pass me by. Instinctively, I follow them. Now my head is pounding too; I can barely keep my eyes opening. At the moment I'm about to give out, I plunge past the surface, and I gasp several times uncontrollably. It seems I do want to live, after all.

It takes me several moments to catch my breath and I keep kicking furiously to dodge frozen waves of salt water. I scan the horizon and see nothing but more flames and more wreckage, except... wait... 

...what is that?

There, inexplicably, stands a tower. We are in the middle of nowhere, in the heart of the Atlantic ocean, with not a speck of land for thousands of miles. So what is this structure doing here? I shudder. It’s not just the near-zero temps—this place gives me the fucking creeps.

Then I feel heat against my nape. I turn my head, and see the ocean is still burning, and it's about to consume me too. Death is relentless. Just when I tried to escape it all, it takes on new shapes and forms and it follows me here. I have to get away. With nowhere else to go, I swim toward the tower. Towards my damnation, it feels. Or maybe, my deliverance?

I don't look around for anyone else; I just have to keep myself alive. I always have. My left leg feels like its broken. My jaw aches something terrible. But I keep swimming, hand over hand over frozen hand.

Finally, I reach the base of the tower, where there is a ring of stairs surrounding it and protruding into the ocean like a beachhead. I push myself up, painfully. Now, looking up at the tower from this close, it seems even taller than before, impossibly tall, dozens of stories high. What is this doing here in the middle of the ocean? Who built it? And, more importantly, why?

I tremble violently and look once more back at the wreckage. There's no one left. I must be the only survivor. That, or I'm dreaming. I don’t know which is worse. I sit there for what feels like half an hour, and the remaining debris finally succumbs to the sea. With them, the flames eventually fade. All at once, it's very dark. And I'm very cold. I have to get to shelter. 

I turn my head and look at the tower once more. Is there a way in? My leg is definitely broken. I hobble around the tower and arrive at the other side. There, I see two huge brass doors intricately carved in the Art Deco style with lightning bolts, sun rays, and an angel with arms upraised to the sky. If I'm in hell, then these are the gates before the river Acheron. I glance once more at the door and halfway expect to see the lines, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." But I don’t. Not yet.

The doors turn heavily on their hinges. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust to the dim lighting, but this place is apparently extremely well-made. The walls are composed of massive granite blocks, perfectly square and among them hang more brass iconography and rich tapestries. In the center of the room lies a brass staircase that leads down, down, down. 

"Hello?!"

Echoes and silence. 

I look up and notice the massive brass statue of a man with a smug and arrogant look. In his hands he holds a huge red banner. It says 

NO GODS OR KINGS.

ONLY MAN.

I have to find out more. 

I press on, more pulled than pushed, drawn down into the vortex of this enigma. At the bottom of the stairs is an elevator, with its door agape like the devil’s maw. Nothing feels right, and yet... I can't turn back now. I don't want to go back out there. The world outside is terrible... but this place feels... magnificent. 

Then I’m stepping inside, the door swings shut, and the elevator drops with a lurch. We are falling fast, almost absurdly fast, and we descend deep, deep, deeper into the ocean.

The far panel of the elevator slides away and I can peer through the glass. What I see next electrifies me. An entire city at the bottom of the sea: skyscrapers, neon billboards, bridges. Incongruously, between the buildings swim whales, squids, schools of fishes, and sharks. 

This is like nothing I've ever seen before. This is utopia. All the wonders of modern technology, the form and the function, but none of the noise and filth. Everything looks brilliant. For what must have been half an hour, I'm treated to an expedition through this wonderful, this impossible place. I'm in awe. 

A speaker crackles to life, and a recording plays. The voice of a man with a commanding confidence. I imagine he’s the same one from the statue above. He says this place is intended as a refuge from all the tyranny of society—from religion, politics, economics, “petty morality”—a place where the individual could be free to accomplish his dreams, without the limitations of the world above. A joint effort of independent dreamers to construct a paradise.

Perhaps it is possible... I always believed it was just a myth. For as long as I can remember I've had this gnawing fear that life was pointless and worthless and hopeless. Maybe no one knew this but me, or maybe everyone knew this, but just refused to admit it. Either way, I felt like an outcast with a dark secret. 

On my tenth birthday, my parents separated, violently, and neither of them wanted to take me. I don't think they realized the significance of the date. Or cared, if they did. Since then I've been on my own, more or less. Time and again I've learned that I can't trust anyone. Behind me is only darkness and I feel as if I'm going to drown. But oddly, under the sea, I can finally breathe.

As I'm absorbed in these reveries, suddenly, the ride ends. The elevator, or tram, or whatever it is, has reached its destination, and it surfaces in some kind of moonpool. I hear great splashes as the brine pours off. I can hear rivulets streaming down the exterior walls. Then the doors swing open. 

The luxury of the tower’s first inner room is nothing compared to the decadence of this atrium. Great windows stretch dozens of feet from floor to ceiling, flanked by rich red velvet curtains. The floors are arrayed with thick rugs covered in ornate patterns. The inside of this city is every bit as gorgeous as I imagined from the elevator.

But oddly, no fanfare greets me. There is no bellboy or usher. No music, no commotion. I hear nothing at all, except the swish of seawater on the window panes. My stomach squirms. Goosebumps.

My eyes follow the carpets as they lead towards a stone staircase on the edge of the room. I walk slowly in that direction, still taking in all the brilliance of this room. As I reach the foot of the stairs, I finally hear something... it sounds like a… piano? Maybe a guitar. A voice. Someone singing. I’m still quivering. Am I eager or terrified?

I decide to press on. I must find out what this place is, what's going on here, even if it’s the death of me.

As I approach the top of the stairs I see a doorway partly opened. The music is getting louder. I recognize the tune, if not distinctly, then distantly, something very far away and long ago.

I am on the threshold. I am breathless.

I push open the door and it hits me all at once. 

I see a neon sign, brightly lit, that says HAPPY NEW YEAR. The sign hangs askew above a bar that is littered with broken glasses. The carpet stretches out on either side, filled with splendid patterns, leading towards several richly varnished wooden tables, many of them split in half. Beyond the tables, is a massive fountain with a pool at ground level, which spills onto the carpet. Chairs lie overturned in the pool.

The jukebox is still playing. I hear the classic chords which I instantly recognize as the Ink Spots. I'm awestruck as I take in the scene, and I let the lyrics wash over me: 

If I didn't care more than words can say

If I didn't care, would I feel this way?

If this isn't love then why do I thrill?

And what makes my head go 'round and 'round

While my heart stands still?

What is this wreckage that lies before my eyes? Decadence destroyed. A paradise lost. It’s sickening. And yet, what could I have expected? It’s always been this way. In my life, and in every life before, for all human history. Broken dreams and broken hearts. A tale told by an idiot, signifying nothing.

I hear shouts— a woman’s. She bangs her fists on a door, screaming the kinds of profanities that only lovers can truly express. I lean around the corner and see the woman, whose face is hideously disfigured. Her lip protrudes several inches. Her brow is grotesquely large and overhangs her partially shut eyelids, which are drooping with excess skin. Her hair is falling off in patches. With one hand she continues to bang on the door, in the other she holds a revolver. 

I was desperate to speak to someone, anyone, about what's going on here, what this place is. But I don't want to get involved with this... creature. I lean away before she can see me, and back away slowly. Then I’m hit violently in the rear and whip around to realize I merely bumped against a table. The surprise nearly kills me. As I look down, I notice that I disturbed the tablecloth. One corner is soaked in blood. In fact, an entire pool of blood covers this side of the room, all coming from the bar.

My heart sinks. 

I don't need someone to tell me what happened here, I already know, I've known it deep within me since my birthday when my parents showed me the truth, the same thing the world has been showing me ever afterward. All hope is lost, extinguished like this city will be once the glass eventually cracks and ten billion tons of water rush through to smother it all. I don't blame him, the big brass man, whose grand idea this was. We’ve all been fooling ourselves the whole time, trying to pretend it’s not true. But once for all, before I even see another room, I already know what happened. Sooner or later, everything breaks. And paradise is impossible.