Veritas | Meditative Adventure | Pluto Ep 1: Reflections
Welcome to Veritas… a meditative adventure like no other! First and foremost, what does it even mean? Veritas is Latin for “truth”. The question is, of course, which truth? Well, hopefully your truth. In this series, you find yourself on an icy planet. It is strikingly beautiful, but what ancient monoliths await you here? It's time to explore.
Transcript
So how we're going to begin is you're going to sit comfortably,
However that means to you.
It could be legs crossed,
Could be sitting in a chair,
Whatever it is,
Sit somewhere comfortably that you feel relaxed and comfortable and you're going to close your eyes and you're going to take three deep breaths.
Deep breath in,
Count to four,
Deep breath out,
Count to four.
And each time you exhale,
You're going to try and relax your body a little bit further.
So you're going to inhale,
Pause,
Exhale,
Pause.
So as you're doing this and you're relaxing,
It's in those pauses between breaths where we're going to go.
That is where your creativity meets your imagination,
Meets your subconscious.
So let's see what awaits you in the spaces between breaths.
So many lights.
The first thought to emerge from your consciousness is a sense of wonder at the lights.
There are so many.
Like millions of fireflies were splattered across a black page,
Gradually the sense of wonder gives way to a sense of orientation.
Where am I?
The sudden realization that you were lying on your back,
Staring up is disorienting.
As you sit up,
You blink and the cobwebs fade.
The ground is gray and colorless and sharp.
Endless rock covers the ground.
The rocks are jagged with no rounded edges.
But the sky,
The sky is wondrous.
The dust of the Milky Way is so clear you can't help but reach out to see if you could grab a handful of stardust.
How did I get here?
You vaguely remember a ship and you glance down at your arm.
A tattoo marks your arm,
A bison horn with a dragon curling around it.
Flashes,
Lights.
You hold your palm to your head.
Dragons.
Whirling,
You take in your surroundings.
You are standing near the edge of what appears to be a steep cliff.
Cautiously you walk to the edge.
A sharp vertical wall descends into a great crater that stretches as far as the eye can see.
Within the crater you see the Milky Way.
It is so crisp that you look up at the sky and then back down to the crater before realizing it is a reflection.
What looks to be black gleaming ice smooth to such perfection it almost seems artificial stretches across the surface of the crater.
Looking down at the lights of the sky is calming.
It's like a pool waiting for you to dive in.
Across the far side you can barely make out some shapes,
Like jagged ice sculptures ascending from beneath the black.
They must be huge if you can see them from here.
Your intuition tells you to explore the crater so you begin following the edge of the cliff looking for an opportunity to descend.
The face of the cliff is far too sheer to risk climbing.
The footing is precarious and slow going but eventually you begin to see something.
The edge of the cliff turns abruptly inwards and cuts across your line of motion.
As you near you make out features in the side.
There is a stairway and it leads down.
It is ancient yet like the rock it is unweathered.
The steps are smooth yet uneven.
In places there are pieces broken off as if something large crashed into them or descended them.
You have little choice so gathering your wits you take the first step.
Somehow this seems significant as if there is no turning back.
Step by step you descend trying not to look down.
The stairs wind down the side of the cliff face and there is no railing.
With that unseeing pull comes fear but you dare not freeze.
Keep moving forward.
At one point the stair has collapsed.
It is a far jump to the far side but as they are descending you can probably make it.
You think.
You realize that the choice to jump has been made already and it is probably because if you turn around you won't have the capacity to keep going back up.
With a last look up at the stairs you steel yourself,
Bend your knees and jump.
The fall seems endless like your brain has sped up in an attempt to take in every detail as you crash into a heap on the far side and slide head first down four steps before you come to a halt.
Your tattoo is the first thing you see,
A symbol of how far you've come perhaps or perhaps how far you still have to go.
Up you go.
Time waits for no one.
As you near the bottom the vertigo fades and you find yourself taking in your surroundings.
You appear to be in a notch cut into the side of the crater wall,
Inside of which great pillars support a clearly man-made structure.
The angles are as strange as they are menacing.
Like everything else here it is so smooth that even the stars reflect off the angles,
Giving it a sort of reality-bending camouflage.
At last you reach the bottom.
There is only one way forward into the interior of the structure and there is no door,
Only a high vaulted ceiling so large your sense of perspective is skewed as your mind frantically searches for reference points.
Again,
The angles are strange.
Like crystals,
It lacks right angles yet still is purposeful,
Almost as if it was grown instead of built.
In the centre is a great circular table.
Atop the table lies a perfect representation of the crater you saw from above the cliffs.
On one side the notch with the structure you currently reside and on the other it is perfectly smooth.
One piece however has shifted and fallen off leaving a large gap.
Instinctively you reach down and retrieve the missing piece without thinking you slide it into its rightful place.
Instantly there is a click and hum as if some great machinery was coming back to life.
The surface of the table shifts and liquefies leaving a black smooth surface and then all is still.
It is mesmerizing.
At first you only see dark nothingness and then slowly your own reflection appears in the black.
It is strange though.
Coloured lights hover around and within your reflection and you can't help but feel that you are being shown something beyond what the eyes can see.
As if in a trance you slowly extend your hand to meet the hand of your reflection,
Pausing only for a moment just above the surface before the real and the reflection touch.
The results are instantaneous.
A circular ripple immediately bursts forth from your hand and propagates across the table.
At the far end structures seemingly made of liquid begin to emerge,
Reminiscent of the shapes you saw earlier.
Just as they seem to take on a real shape there is a scream,
A terrible grating scream that reverberates throughout the structure.
In response the ground begins to shake and the same piece you replaced falls out of place and whatever was about to reveal vanishes.
The shaking is stronger now and large pieces of crystal fall from the ceiling blocking the entranceway.
Another shatters not far from you.
Frantically you search for a way out and there is only one.
Deeper into the cavern there appears to be an exit and you dash for it.
The sound of a crystal crashing to the ground can't muffle the terrible screaming and you have never run so fast in your life.
Out the exit and down the steps and you are 50 yards from the edge of the structure before you turn back.
Light seems to bend around it as you look back and storm clouds appear out of nothingness.
The sky turns dark and angry as more and more clouds begin to spiral together until at last there is an explosion of lightning that shatters what remains of the structure.
Did the lightning come up from the temple or down from the storm?
What matters is that the storm gathers and for a moment a face takes shape within those terrible clouds.
Its eyes are black pits and its mouth opens in a horrible scream as it looks right at you.
And that's when you realize you are standing out on the ice.
A great crack pierces the smooth perfection and then another and another.
Stumbling you turn and run.
Ahead of you the lights of the sky above and below.
Behind you the fury of the storm gives chase.
