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Evbo is hungry.
Sometimes it feels like he has always been hungry; like he was born with something missing inside of him, and his whole life has been nothing but an attempt at filling the hole.
It's funny, in a way, that he never, ever can.
So Evbo is empty, and that emptiness he calls hunger, and it is all he knows – an endless horizon and the pit inside his body where there should be something.
Maybe then it is no wonder that he keeps running, keeps jumping, keeps reaching for something he cannot name. A dream, maybe, on the cusp of being born.
Evbo runs, and he is hungry.
Evbo jumps, and he is hungry.
Evbo sleeps, dreams of a blue sky, and wakes up starving.
So Evbo keeps dreaming his impossible dream, running his hands along the walls of the parkour temple, keeps wondering: Is this all there is?
An entire life of being blind, of being buried underneath the world of people better than him, only able to dream of the sky? A lifetime of hunger, of his hands outstretched but never touching, a lifetime of fear?
For the first time, Evbo wants something. Wants it so hopelessly, so fiercely that it aches, that it makes him desperate. He is just so hungry, so empty, haunted by his dreams of a blue sky and wind in his hair, answering his own question of purpose with visions of a life above: He jumps for the beef, still so very sure he's going to die.
And then he keeps jumping.
(And then, then, so impossibly close to the realization of his dream that Evbo can almost grasp it, can almost brush his fingertips against it, he falls.)
The food is better, in prison.
After the parkour, Evbo presses himself against the hot metal bars of his cell, let's the ache remind him he's still alive – there's a sickness in this place, in Evbo, so far from the sky; an ache that makes the emptiness harsher, more mocking. It is a cruelty to have expected death and be faced with this instead: A mockery of life, of normalcy.
He needs to go. He needs–
(The pro says, You can leave now, and never be able to rank up again. Or you can stay, and wait out your sentence.
Evbo says nothing, feels nothing, feels–
There's smoke in his lungs, his leather boots melting into the hot floor, and he will die here, he will die here as surely as the sun must rise every morning; but what is a life doomed to the bottom floor if not a long, painful death? A slow fading that will last his entire life?
The pro says, What'll it be?
And Evbo aches, has ached for as long as he can remember, with only a dream to fill the emptiness, with only a goal to keep him going: To give up would be to die, as surely as anything else.
To stay would be–
Evbo breathes in deep. The smoke sears his lungs.
He says, Alright, and steps through the portal.
He says, Alright, and dooms himself.)
The top of the parkour temple is not the top at all. Evbo digs his fingers into the grass, feels the pebbles dig bloody trenches into his palms, ready to wake up again.
A nightmare, surely, another nightmare of dirt above his head and the sky blocked out, of emptiness and restriction; but then the blood on his hands and his pants stained green by the grass, and the reality of it carving an even deeper ache into him.
This is it. The realization of his dream, an entire life wasted on visions of a blue sky; nothing but a mirage, a fairytale. Evbo was never supposed to make it up here. In a moment of cynical self hatred, he wishes he hadn't. Wishes he could've died with at least the dream intact; with at least the vision of freedom to dull the pain.
But there is nothing, nothing, another layer of dirt and darkness, only the long view down remaining as a promise, and Evbo is empty. Remains empty, on his block of grass, high up in the sky. Somehow exactly where he was before. Bitterly, he thinks, I know nothing about Parkour Civilization at all.
The day he discovers the food, Evbo eats enough to make himself sick and marvels at the sensation of it: A fullness heavy as stone in his stomach, an ache borne not from lack of something but because of the abundance of it. Once again, it feels like he is reaching for something, dreaming a dream of something left out of focus, falling once more–
(Beneath him, hundreds of people must be starving, digging their fingers into slimy, raw meat – beneath him, hundreds of people like him must still feel the hunger.)
And Evbo feels it too, still, the ache, the emptiness – he's not where he has to be, not at the top. The dirt ceiling taunts him, ever present.
And then again the dream, the feeling of wind in his hair, an endless sky stretching out around him; that wondrous longing filling his chest anytime he glances upwards.
On the horizon, the parkour palace stretches ever higher. Evbo keeps dreaming.
(The assassin says, You were born to be at the bottom.
Evbo wipes the blood from his eyes.
The assassin says, You can never rank up.
Evbo thinks of the endless bottom level, the loneliness, sitting alone on the steps to his house and wondering about the people above. He feels– He–
There had been nothing there, nothing, only Evbo and the void, only Evbo curled up on his bed with the emptiness festering inside of him, a life of nothing but trying to survive, of dreaming of more, of aching.
He thinks of the hunger, the feeling of never being quite there, of falling.
A dream of drowning. A prison cell buried somewhere far away.
There is no returning, no reverting back to who he was.
Evbo jumps.
Evbo jumps, and he feels–)
The masters live in towering skyscrapers that need to be parkoured into with water buckets.
Yet still the ceiling above remains the same impenetrable dome of dirt. Evbo stands staring at it for a long time, feeling very small. Here he stands, in golden boots, high in the sky – and yet the view remains the same, has remained the same forever; hopeless and dark.
He thinks, Is this it?
Is this all there is? Evbo risking his life for an impossibility, climbing higher just to find there is yet more to go, a life chasing a childish dream? Waking up choking on darkness every morning, thin air pushing against his lungs, grasping for a half-remembered dream?
And yet – the fall is much farther now. Looking down makes Evbo queasy. He's never had this much to lose. He's never had this much to gain, either.
You have to save us, the master says, his white eyes searching, It has to be you.
Evbo thinks of the bottom layer, of the people trapped there; thinks about saving people, about changing the system so determined to doom him – thinks, I will.
He follows the path laid out to him, into the endless nothingness of the night, and finally, crouched behind a plant, realizes the truth.
It is a cruelty to suddenly know he has comprehended nothing so far: Nothing of the violence, of the system always balanced against him – that it had been intentional, that no one was ever supposed to make it.
It is almost a relief to be discovered, to have someone to blame.
But it's hard reconciling the memory of Seawatt smiling and joking with the man standing before him now. Evbo keeps glancing back at his face, expecting the same amicable smile and finding nothing but a slight frown, the crease between his eyebrows the only reminder that Evbo has not slipped into another memory.
Evbo says, “I know you.”
Seawatt smiles sardonically, still leaning on his machine. “That's what they all say, y'know?” He scoffs. “That memory's fake. Meant to make you believe you can work your way up, or something.”
It is very dark outside. The artificial light catches on Seawatt's golden jewelry, making it glint sickeningly. His eyebrows, still pinched together, throw a severe shadow across his face. Evbo thinks about darkness. Evbo thinks about being empty.
He says again, “I know you.”
“It's worse knowing you actually believe that.” Seawatt spits, “Come. Look at this.”
He tugs Evbo in front of the machine. The display crackles, comes alive. It reads, Noob.
Evbo doesn't– he can't–
“Still think you know anything ?” Seawatt asks, boastful.
Evbo doesn't. Evbo does. He thinks of his life, of feeling on the verge of drowning everyday, choking for air that would never come. Of feeling empty, like he had been missing something since birth, like there was no purpose in life but to look for a way out, dreaming of blue skies. The crushing loneliness, the challenges meant to make him fail. He thinks of starving, and suddenly knowing the feeling of being full. Of purpose.
“That's– not fair.”
Seawatt's face cracks open in another sarcastic grin. “It's not about fair , it's about order. ”
It's then Evbo realizes that Seawatt will die. He knows him, has known him since birth – in his reflection, in all the choices he didn't make. Here is a boy who chose cruelty, who dreamt of a world shaped in his image and did not care for anyone else, who remains just as empty for it as he had doomed everyone else to be. Yes, Seawatt is empty, emptier than he even realizes, devoid of anything but cruelty, now.
Evbo pities him, he realizes quite suddenly. He pities him, because Evbo has been him, has felt the same crushing longing for something unnamed – but Evbo has changed, has seen kindness and beauty, and Seawatt is too scared of change to ever open his eyes to any of it.
So Seawatt will die, and he will die empty. Evbo pities him.
Then Seawatt challenges him to a duel, a duel Evbo knows is hopeless but fights anyway. Just as he's about to pass out, Evbo thinks, Oh. Oh, I know why he seemed familiar. He looks hungry too.
And then he knows nothing anymore.
(In the arena, Evbo keeps stumbling over his own feet, his heart outpacing him. This is it. This is it. He will either die here, or change the fabric of reality forever. He will either make this jump, or he won't. Evbo is hungry, has always been longing for a nameless thing, but now… he is beginning to understand. He jumps–)
Sitting on the throne, Evbo looks up at the sky.
It is blue; bluer than even in his dreams, endless and beautiful. It is the dawn of a new world, a dawn only Evbo can see, and the sky is blue.
Staring into the endless, at the culmination of an entire life of longing, of doing the impossible, Evbo thinks again of Seawatt – the look in his eyes, the hunger, like Evbo's reflection come to life.
Sitting here, Evbo feels–
For as long as he could remember, it had felt like there had been something missing within him. He had hungered for something without being able to name it, had woken up breathless from dreams always already half-forgotten, desperate with longing.
And then, he started jumping.
Now, the sky above him is blue, and it is over. Evbo, wild-eyed and bloodied, beaten down over and over, feels–
For as long as he could remember, it had felt like there had been something missing within him. Back then, Evbo had called it hunger – that nebulous feeling in his chest, making him only half of what he should be. Now, Evbo knows it had been something else entirely. Ambition, maybe, striving for purpose – a hunger not merely physical.
Now, Evbo sits on the throne, at the top of Parkour Civilization, about to remake the world.
He feels… fulfilled.
And yet, his thoughts keep drifting to Seawatt. It isn't about fair, he had said. But Evbo is not empty anymore, not alone, not hungry. He's not petty, or angry. Not anymore.
“In my civilization,” he smiles, “anyone can try again.”
And thinking of Seawatt, he remakes the world.