bloodyrosemccoy | It's Still Funny

"The Duchess" Who Wasn't Day
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Here it is, the myth about the comet that I thought was oh so funny. It still makes me giggle.

This story deals with a myth about the comet Vurrakaladju, which orbits the star Gherresa with a period of 86 years. It is the brightest comet in the Kalkupu sky. The ancient Temavikrra people recognized it as a periodic object and created this myth around it.

One day two gods, Jomŕ and Vrana, got into a heated argument about the benefits of knowledge. Jomŕ argued that knowledge was always good, and always worthwhile. But Vrana argued that knowledge was dangerous, and too much would inevitably drive a person mad. As they could reach no conclusions through debate, they agreed to test this question.

Jomŕ used her power to copy the contents of the Library of Ñiitashe, and Vrana built a vessel of tswendale (the heavenly substance) to contain it, which he named Vurrakaladju. Then they found a hapless mortal, Dedhrrei, and approached him to mediate their debate. They said that the debate would take place upon the vessel, but they had tricked him: he stepped upon it and Vrana locked it while Jomŕ breathed the gods’ power into the tswendale and sent the vessel into the sky, trapping Dedhrrei adrift among the stars so that he would have no distractions from other people. He had no hope of rescue, for Vrana had enchanted the vessel to destroy any star he tried to land on. They ordered him to learn all he could from their library, and only when he had done so would he be released.

Jomŕ believed he would emerge as a powerful individual. Vrana believed he would go mad with the horror of some of the things mortals were not meant to know.

And so Dedhrrei drifted. At first it seemed he would go mad, but then he began to use the knowledge he gained. He needed companionship, so after reading one of the gods’ books he took the vessel’s figurehead and breathed life into it, naming it Silvoti. When he read another book, he learned to weave a net from his red hair, and used it to catch one of the great birds that travel the stars with messages for the inhabitants. He named this companion Bılyot. After a third book, he learned that the vessel itself, Vurrakaladju, was alive, and how to speak with it. While the ship had no control over its destructive nature, it aided him in his task as best it could, keeping him comfortable.

The gods would sometimes look in on him, to see what knowledge he had gained. He always began with a plea: “My captors, how can one man learn all there is to know? Many of the lessons are difficult. Let myself and my companions go with what we have. Have we not answered your question?”

And they replied, “Tell us what you have learned, and we shall see.”

But it was never enough.

Vurrakaladju still drifts, and every 86 years it nears Kalkupu. Someday, at the end of the universe, it will drift too close, and trigger the destruction of the world we are on. At that point Dedhrrei will have learned all there is to know, and Jomŕ and Vrana will have their answer.