The ascent of the steps of light - [Ra's al Ghul]

[Deleted]

Then the priest stood up and I heard from above a voice say to me, "I have completed the descent of the fifteen steps and the ascent of the steps of light. And it is the sacrificing priest who renews me, casting off the body's coarseness, and, consecrated by necessity, I have become immortal."

And when I had heard the voice of him who stood in the altar formed like a bowl, I questioned him, desiring to understand who he was.

He answered me in a weak voice saying, "I am Ion, Priest of the Adytum, and I have borne an intolerable force. For someone came at me headlong in the morning and dismembered me with a sword and tore me apart, according to the rigor of harmony. And, having cut my head off with the sword, he mashed my flesh with my bones and burned them in the fire of the treatment, until, my body transformed, I should learn to become immortal. And I sustained the same intolerable force."

And even as he said these things to me and I forced him to speak, it was as if his eyes turned to blood and he vomited up all his flesh. And I saw him as a mutilated image of a little man and he was tearing at his flesh and falling away.

And being afraid I woke and considered, "Is this not the composition of the waters?" I thought that I was right and fell asleep again. And I saw the same altar in the shape of a bowl and water bubbled at the top of it, and in it were many people endlessly. And there was no one whom I might question outside of the bowl. And I went up to the altar to view the spectacle.

And I saw a little man, a barber, whitened with age, and he said to me, "What are you looking at?"

I answered that I wondered at the boiling water and the men who were burning but remained alive.

And he answered me saying, "The spectacle which you see is at once the entrance and the exit and the process."

I questioned him further, "What is the nature of the process?"

And he answered saying, "It is the place of the practice called the preserving. Men wishing to obtain virtue enter here and, fleeing the body, become immortal."
- Zosimos of Panoplis. 3rd Century AD


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The heat from the sun as it beat down upon the flaming hair of the naked Lex Luthor did not burn as hot as Luthor's blood in that moment., even the portion that flowed down from his nose and over his face. Ubu had crushed the object, and they had stripped him naked before the sun, breaking the plastic and steel into its component parts. 

He had a fiery rage in his eye that drove him to a place of rage, even though he lay helpless before Ra's al Ghul, he was still driven to rise up, defiant before the Old Man of the Mountain. Barely 18 years old, this was his birthday before the old Master. His toys taken from him, he was left helpless and harmless here. Lex Luthor had been a poor student of the League of Assassins, despite the use of the training and the excesses, he'd never quite submitted. Never quite broken down. He'd always found an alternative method to bypass the lessons that Ra's would seek to teach him. 

This was punishment, of course, a lesson, a reminder, perhaps. For Lex had blood on his hands, and had grown proud, too proud. He'd dealt with Ra's last object lesson in humility with a destructive impulse. These impulses were to be treasured, but they were to be shaped. He had murdered his last instructor in cold blood with that genius magic that let him build and hide these wonderful yet horrible toys. He was still Thaddeus Sivana's protoge, and not quite yet the protoge of Ra's al Ghul. Yes, Lex Luthor was brilliant, yes, he was deadly, yes, he was ruthless, but he depended too much on easy solutions and pride, ever the pride. He'd built the death engine with the solid waste of the camels and the camp followers that Al Hassud made him clean. He'd crafted the trap carefully, using the very spoon that Al Theuban had made him use to collect the material, placed in the bowl carefully that Al Theuban had planned to make the young man eat the waste from. A lesson in humility, the young American, flaming red hair flowing down to his shoulders, made to eat the collected dung in front of the assembly. A lesson in humility, a punishment for speaking back to his mentor. A lesson many had learned well from the myriad of lessons drilled into their heads. Discipline was key to the Assassin, as was loyalty and humility, submission to the will of those above them, no matter what the command, no matter what the goal. It was a cruel lesson, perhaps applied with slightly more glee than proper for a mentor.

Beatings were more common, or uncomfortable forms or tasks or embarrassments. They were often required but once or twice, but with Lex Luthor, he remained unbowed and proud in the face of embarrassment. He did not know his place, and through this task, he would learn it, an object lesson before a portion of the assembly. 

The lesson had turned into a horror of flaming death as Al Theuban's skin melted off. The dirty camel water Al Theuban grasped from the bowl on the table, meant to add an extra and twisted mercy to cleanse the taste of feces from the mouth of Luthor, had done nothing to quench the flames. Instead, they caused the flames to spread over his entire body as his echoing screams shocked the camp and caused the daily practice of forms to pause for just a moment, as the Assassins had grown confused and then stunned. The muscles had turned to liquid, and then char leaving only remnants of bones as Lex Luthor glared with hatred in his eyes, unbowed. 

It was then that Lex Luthor had his name جحيم, Haqim, the Uncontrolled Inferno, for his was the flame and the fury, and for he did not know his place.

Lex Luthor wiped the blood from his face, the bruise was forming on his chest from where Ubu had beaten him. "So, another lesson in humility, oh Master of the Mountain? Who shall be my tutor now? Will he teach me to eat shit too? Or perhaps to clean up after animals? Or perhaps to hike up a mountain or wander the desert or to stand on my head or to burn my hand on the flames? Are these the lessons of the great and ancient League of Assassins? A lesson in humility? A lesson in fear perhaps?" He smiled, teeth red from the blood. The pain did not seem to move him, no matter how thoroughly Ubu had worked him over. 

"I am no peasant to quail and clutch and beg for the scraps of approval of farmers and illiterate shepherds; no matter how many shadows they may sit still in, or how many hot coals they clutch, or how many men they may or may not have killed. They demand my respect and teach me lessons I can learn in Nebraska from any illiterate peasant. They take my disinterest for lack of understanding. I understand exactly what they think they're teaching me. I understand exactly what lesson they wish to impart. I came here for more than shallow platitudes and beatings and ignorance, and demands from subordinate men, master. So. . . who shall be my tutor now? What lesson shall I learn, or should I just return safe in the knowledge that there is nothing here to be taught? Other than that my equipment will be broken by those who cannot understand them, because I learned that lesson as a child in Metropolis." 

He stared straight into the eyes of Ra's al Ghul, a defiant gesture that almost none had survived. Deep down inside, the Luthor boy had seen Ra's as a man. "I came here to learn, not to be broken and beaten by peasants. I came to learn from you, to offer what I have in exchange as my tuition. If you think that is meaningless, then I point you to the bodies of your killers, to the toys that you and yours have started to use since my time here. You know what I have to offer, so offer me an equitable exchange. Give me a tutor I can learn from." 

[Deleted]

What a land he thought, running his finger tips through the sun scorched pebbles and over the hissing mounds of sand. It was a terrain untouched by rain for months at a time if not years to the extent that even the water in your body trembled and quaked upon entering the vast swathe of emptiness as it knew that the heat would derive much pleasure from torturing any substance from an already battered body. If an environment had a personality and so often Ra's al Ghul found that different locales would take on differing human like qualities, then the desert could be surmised as simply patient. An avalanche, a flash flood, a land slide. You would find no such quick and seamless death in the embrace of this arid plain. Death was a certainty but without a time frame as the passive cruelty of the land would mean that the desert was distinctive as being the only form of environment in which a lost soul would openly welcome death given the opportunity. Sooner or later the desert would claim its tribute.

A whistling rattle from the distant hills broke the crouching Man's thought, snapping him back to the current moment rather than giving personification to the desert that surrounded them. There was only three of them standing there that day, no need for unnecessary protection in the middle of no where. Ra's was turned from the other two men, listening to the breaking of fists on flesh so that Hariq's physical form can be punished before his mental state can be challenged. Ubu was here for the physical beating for he knew no other method of teaching a lesson yet it was something he could teach well. Then it stopped and they were left with only the slinking sound of sand shifting in the mid day breeze and with this lull of pain the Demon rose its head and turned to face his two companions. What he saw in the kneeling man was potential, albeit it untapped and chaotic arrogance that had the potential to be honed into a finely tuned weapon.

Towering over him, Ra's wrapped his fingers around the scimitar pommel that stemmed from the scabbard on his belt, running his forefinger and thumb down the carvings as he listened to the mocking tone of his pupil. "Humility is as alien to you as this land is. You claim that you came here to learn our ways, to act and think as we do yet you disregard our methods and believe yourself to be above your Masters. When we first met I explained to you the conditions of this agreement and you consented though now you presume to command me. Child, you sought us out, we did not come to you begging for guidance so I advise you to trust in us."

There was no denying that Luthor offered them the next stage of evolution that would be required in the coming 21st century. From the dawn of the League it has been imperative that they grow and reform accordingly to the nature of the enemy at hand yet this can only be done if the Order stays ahead of the curve through men such as the flame haired young man at his feet. With a shake of his head Ra's stepped over him, looking out onto the gulch that lay before them. "You show great potential, Student. Your intelligence is matched only by a vivid imagination for one is useless without the other. Yet here we are. Al Theuban will not be mourned, you clearly showed that the man was unprepared to face a true challenge, one even as ill equipped as yourself. That is not what bothers me, what troubles me is that you acted without superior sanctioning of your actions. Taking a life is an unavoidable truth on the path to glory but by showing my murdering him you show me that at heart you will forever only have one master and that is your own selfish passion."

A lone bush swayed in the wind a few meters from them and Ra's glanced at it for a short period of time. It a collection of brittle sticks bloomed with only a handful of dying leaves. With a quick turn he moved his attention back to the man beneath him. "Clearly man's words can offer you little guidance in your current state. So this land will become your master for a time and you will learn from it the same burning truth that was once forced upon me. I will meet you in those distant hills in four days time, if you haven't succumbed to the wrath of the wasteland. Then we can begin and your soul will be born anew. Quit my sight." 

[Deleted]

Lex Luthor raged again, the gleam in his eye murderous as he stared at the man who would be his master, so little understanding, but this at least was a challenge. Another task, another trick, another hoop and another lesson. He’d learned from his desert, although he’d been much better equipped. They’d spoken again and again about his “toys” about his dependence on trickery and gadgets. The girl had mocked him incessantly for it, yet even so, he knew how they depended on his toys, how they enjoyed those crutches when they were available. No amount of discipline could really stand up to the might of hard science. . . but if the League of Assassins had anything to offer him, it was clear and obvious that Ra’s was the only one who could teach it. If Ra’s could not teach him, there was nothing to learn, and one did not become the League of Assassins without secrets to learn.

Unarmed, naked in the heat of the sun, he stared at the distant hills. Unarmed now, or so they thought. Without his “toys” left as a mewling and soft child in the face of the harsh reality of the desert. Stupid of them. Did they honestly think that Lex Luthor was ever truly disarmed? The hills, the desert, the sand, this was a landscape that killed armies, destroyed the unprepared, swallowed cities without a trace. Fine. This was not a problem. It was just another hoop. Lex Luthor looked up at the Master of the Mountain. “Four days. I’ll see you there, Master.” He started to walk, first tentatively, his bare feet on hot sand, and then with greater focus, his rage pushing him forward foolishly as he moved towards the shade of a sand dune, away from the sight of Ra’s al Ghul.

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A time removed from that meeting. The desert had been unchanged and the sun was a constant companion, an omnipresent and immortal one, unchanging in a way that the stone and the sand and the winds were not. The winds had shaped this land into a desolate death-trap, although the man who watched from the mountains had no companionship with Death. A man watched from the mountains, considering the progress of the naked man as he crawled over the dunes, another victim of the desert, dragging himself thirsty through the crags and the dust. The desert had a passive cruelty that awaited death patiently, devouring completely and leaving only bones as testament to the passage of time. In time too bones would become dust, and the dust would join the desert.

The man had seen it before, he would see it again. Omnia vincit tempus, Time conquers all. Well, almost all. The caravan sat nearby waiting, camped against the heat of the day, shaded in fabrics atop carpets in makeshift shelter, the Caravansaray was far from here, they would move as the sun moved from its point high in the arc of the sky. There was no shadow here to shelter from the glaring eye of the Sun. The man, broad shouldered, bearded and wearing the clothes of a foreigner took a swig of water, smiling as he stoppered up the skin, watching the slow progress of the naked man below, bruised and broken and bloody. A tribal perhaps? Yes, possibly someone from one of the local tribes, although the broken man, really almost just a boy. . . the boy wore a global and immortal costume. The man had seen this costume since he himself was but a boy. The broken and bloody nudity of the corpse. The man had given this costume many times to many people, at times while alone, often with the detrius of humanity that often found itself clinging to him. It made no difference.

He watched the man drag himself through the sand, working his way along. He’d made quite a bit of progress for himself, despite the fall, the dehydration. The traveller had been beset upon almost immediately in the wilderness, left for dead. The man had seen it happen, watched impassively, waited for death, but the young man, bright eyed and brilliant, had somehow survived. He’d put his will against a harsh world, and somehow he persisted, had persisted for some time. Perhaps. . . it was time to meet. After all, this sort of meeting didn’t come around often, even when one dealt with timelines as long as he had.

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A shadow cast over the young man’s face as a figure blocked out the sun. Tall and broad shouldered he looked down at the tribal. There was silence for a moment as he considered the boy, then his eyes went to the makeshift splinting, and the way that the boy’s wounds were treated. Cleaned, rubbed out with sand. Yes, the boy had taken the time to care and tend for himself, even in the midst of death and starvation. Even a smell of urine. The boy had used his own urine to clean out a wound. The bearded man smiled at his finding, placing a hand on the hilt of a sword, letting the fabric flutter in the wind as he reached down, holding water for the young man.

“You look like you’ve had a long and difficult road, boy. Although I see no mere boy here. No, you’ve cleaned your wounds with your own urine. Most men would not know to do that, but you did. And you’ve set your own broken bones with branches and fibers. I only assume you couldn’t find enough material to shield yourself for the day, and you’re a fool to move during the heat of the day.” He looked over the boy again then shook his head “My error, I see the bite-marks now. You HAD found shelter, but it was occupied, and you used your own urine to cleanse the wound, then packed it with sand. No, no boy. I shall you Tabib, for I can see you are a physician.”

After all, it was a new time in a new place, these were modern times. Far removed from the savagery of before, the westerners called it a new millennium, well, give or take a century perhaps. One millennium removed from that mess in Canaan. It was so hard to keep track of time out here, not that it was important.

He smiled again as he looked up at the sun. “Drink, Tabib. I assure you, it is not tainted. I shall take you over the hill to my people, and we shall restore you to health. We are not savages, despite what some have called me.” Vandal Savage looked down at the boy again. Perhaps a little charity was good, although Savage understood that this was far removed from charity, and he was no kind stranger.

[Deleted]

A single heart beat in the desert seemed to echo for an eternity as when on the precipice of death one seems to listen to every slight murmur with the knowledge, or perhaps more accurately, the fear that it'll be your last. Every time breath is drawn upon by the tortured lungs in your chest, whatever Gods take your fancy at that exact time are thanked a thousand times for granting you this small allowance of pained nourishment. Looking up into the flaring sunlight from above, noting the distinct lack of clouds on the horizon, no puff of smoke to hide behind, the Wanderer knew that there would be no point in crying for aid for none would be listening on this plain of existence or the next. The point of breathing at this point seemed irrelevant to him. Whether he died on that dune of sand or another was of little concern to him as at this point he was satisfied with the notion that he would either die in the desert or he wouldn't, so where exactly he finally collapsed was of little concern to him. Death is death.

Nothing on his person was hidden from the gaze of sun, not since the hand of fate or the grace of the Gods had seen fit to humble him either further by having him robbed of all his worldly possessions. The Christians believe that their saviour walked in such a desert for forty days and nights without sustenance. Well on that tale he pissed, there are no Gods out here, nor any sons of Gods for that matter. Not even the smallest notion of life found itself out here, except the serpent that did find its way to sinking its teeth into his thigh as he slept under the cover of a cloudless night. At this moment he checked the wound on his leg that he cleared with his own urine, stinging as if a dagger had been thrust in at great force. It wasn't his only wound, just one of many bruises and fractured bones courtesy of that pack of animals garbed like men who had viciously set upon him as he made his way through a tight ravine passage some three days ago. What little could be done for the wounds dealt out by them had been done but he wasn't foolish enough to realise that within a day or two he would be as lifeless as the sand beneath his scorched toes.

A lifetime of travelling in a moving cohort did little to prepare him for this kind of suffering. The Desert had always been his home but it had never been this unforgiving before. Was this merely retribution for the dreams of grandeur which had stirred him from his native home? One of the stern deities of his people spitting on him for turning his back on his heritage? Five generations before him had known only the moving sea of sands, a closeted life of simple living. His only worry was that he would die forgotten, a murmur of life gone with nothing to show for his work. From the start he knew that he was far more intelligent and gifted than the rest of them, why else would he be the only one to have left. Precisely this reason.

It was another mile before he collapsed into a slump on the floor as a crippling shake ran through his legs courtesy of the fanged wound on his leg. A moment to shut his eyes was all that he required to get his strength back. Civilisation wouldn't be going anywhere if he took a few moments to gather himself. Whatever voice spoke to him stirred him from his life in death trance, catching him as he fell into the arms of the grave, denying him that sweet release. "I have only my ambition and pride to blame. A fitting end for a man cursed by circumstance whether it be the sun or the wounds that take my life." A part of him wanted to turn his back to the figure before him, who his mind questioned whether he was but a figment of a tortured head. But the water that now ran down his throat, that sweet kiss of life felt all so real. Life was everything, no matter what form it took. Death would not have him yet. "A fitting name, my Saviour. Let my old self die in the wasteland behind me, I am reborn with your kindness." For the first time in many a day something resembling a smile curved its way onto his face as he reached up and took his supporting hand. "You know me, but what name shall I give you, Friend?"