The Outer Edge

Over five and a half thousand years have passed, and the Cuckoos still rule the roost. Their sole aim is to protect a ridiculous delusion accredited to someone with neither a moral compass nor a spirit of adventure. The Cuckoos have successfully demonstrated that they are not stupid by making the evolutionary transition from primates and no longer live in trees unless they choose to. Bulbous clerics live a high life and evidence their evolution by becoming the occupants of glass houses and temples that have been adorned like palaces. Isolated from the real world, on remote islands inside their palaces with gilded walls, they slobber in unimaginable decadence, growing fat on the offerings of their naïve followers. In the harsh world outside the unworthy masses are left to live a life of squaller in slums where like cattle they are left to graze on grass. This debauched divinity is driven by the words of ancient scribes carved into clay tablets and knows less than an average twenty-first-century child.

This so-called modern society is rife with ignorance, the young are turning their backs on their parent's ways, claiming they are old and out of touch, and incapable of understanding the world they have created for their children. Yet with the next breath are claiming to believe every word of some nut-ball who posted an AI computer-generated video on social media, claiming they are being deceived by the establishment, which perpetuates the words of the ancient oracle stating that the earth isn't round but flat, as they were taught in schools from the age of six.

But despite a lack of forbearance, the love of God has no boundaries as the wretched still pray in the hope of a deity's forgiveness that will free them from their plight, they would have more luck if they tried to kiss the stars good night. However, there is no light without dark and there are always a few cavaliers who would dare to break the rule of the divine, in search of what lies in wait at the end of the rainbow.

The gang met as usual, it was a Sunday afternoon ritual, which began as an after-school escape from the predatorial clerics who preyed upon the young and naïve. They had found the safest place to play was in the jungle which grew up to the coastal cliffs from where they could see a secluded beach far below. The true beauty of the beach was its lack of accessibility, it had only one means of access, via a steep and narrow pathway. The route had inherent dangers, at your back was a vertical cliff and in front of you all that could be seen was the endless ocean, one wrong step and you would plummet to your death from the pathway.

The beach had proven to be the perfect haven, to escape from the debased clerics, for a group comprised of six boys, all of whom had sworn to keep their hiding place a secret from all the other children, knowing full well that if too many knew, their secret would soon be revealed. Notionally Alphonso led the group the eldest at twelve years of age, who had been the first to find the pathway and make a solo journey to the beach and over several months had enlisted five other trusted members. Everything remained blissful and happy, the boys seemed contented until one day after a storm they found a strange old man washed up on the shore. Being old they naturally feared he was a cleric, unaware that he was of another world beyond the boundaries of flat earth.

Total number of words: 608