Act I: Over a Furnace
A sound pierces the air as the gates open. A rush of movement accompanies an unbearable barrage of noise, twinging the ears. Fear shoots down spines like molten metals hurtling down corroded casting molds, annealing into prods that poke, jolting bodies into lurching ahead—their legs kicking, fur twitching in spasms.
Act II: How to Raise an Ox
A sharp wind cuts the landscape, over which rumbling storm clouds approach. In the distance are two bulls. Emboldened by its size despite the other’s experience, Inanna’s hard-headed servant, the Bull of Heaven, challenges the other, grunting its ultimatum. Compelled to face this challenge, the wise Lamassu approaches.
A cacophony of skulls cracking now accompanies the storm: horns ricochet and entangle and bones creak, as pedicles threaten to break under the behemoths’ straining weight. A bellow is heard above the sounds of rain and thunder as a severed horn hits the ground. Inanna’s servant’s determination quickly recedes with the storm, its head lowered by fatigue and bloodletting, each step spraying speckles of red from its fitfully spurting stump. Lamassu watches, then returns to his harem.
Act III: Eating the Landscape
Compelled to chew, cud is split between teeth, fibers wetted and condensed. Jaws open and close, squelching saliva between the gaps left by the masticated meal. Dirt clods cling, dangling from dried debris that inches slowly inwards. Shouts are heard in the distance.
Reach, pull, and tear: the lengthiest shoots go first, closely followed by their cousins. The landscape is made barren, so move on to another patch, prioritizing the best pickings first. The way is blocked, though, so choose another path. But the alternative is also blocked. There is so much to do. The shouting is louder now; it’s hard to hear the rustling field, pleading for its own demise.
Unable to respond, the surrounding walls are foreign and foul: flat and filthy with grime. Through a hard, perforated surface, two figures approach. Barely visible, their entrance is announced by loud thuds and a rumbling engine. The holes in the wall start flickering, pummeling down disorientating beams and flashes.
Act IV: The King Devours his Sons
A few are tossed and trampled. Dust builds as the running continues, more vigorously now, to match the building noise and mayhem. Deep phlegm-filled coughs and whines mix with short raspy breaths, interjecting the din of sound. Shapes move with disjointed, hasty jerks, as they shift from side to side; they strike out, spurring more movement. The narrow corridor leads to a gaping maw with sharp teeth, insatiable and eager for its next meal.
Act V: Bring the War back Home
A chest-rumbling roar greets the newcomers who are quickly moved away, disappearing into the walls, leaving only Lamassu. The surroundings resemble an ocean: rippling and coruscating, bludgeoning the victim’s ears with sound. After laying their blows, the ripples reduce to a menacing tide that washes to and fro across the plain. A pronounced cry pricks the air as bespeckled figures approach.
Act VI: Meat Eater, Solar Bird
The wildfire consumes anything it touches, igniting sporadically across the prairie. Harsh winds spread the flames quickly: slashing away at the landscape, igniting isolated patches by windswept sparks. The scorched sections produce nightmarish springs that bubble up from the crisp, burnt soil remnants. The water has a reddish hue, reflecting the surrounding flames and smoke, mixing with dirt and forming a grotesque sludge that oozes and clots the affected land. The springs will eventually run dry.
Act VII: Palace of Reptiles
Each charge connects only with air. The bespeckled figures are elusive: their disorienting cadence is a dazzling display that flickers and inchoately moves at each approach. Their cloying smell grows stronger, followed by sharp pains. The latest attempt is met with jeers and laughter, sneering at the attacker’s struggle; the target, a showman, reverently motions its arms, presenting a suggestion to the rippling sea which is met by unanimous approval.
Blood soaked and shuddering, Lamassu’s final attack elicits a hush as its targets rear to deliver their killing blow.
Act VIII: Beasts only Die to be Born
Through the seared sections of land grows new grass. Fresh springs above the charred earth sink back into the sun-warmed soil. The prairie radiates brighter than the sun: the sky’s light darkened as it is outdone by the terrain’s inner glow. The soil holds together with a renewed strength as plants regrow, their roots intertwining, forming interlacing networks that weave between buried stone and along the prairie’s dips and peaks. The wind settles to a low hum before the prairie swallows the sky, obfuscating any difference between the heavens and earth, folding in on itself, its light eradicating all darkness.
Act IX: The Tiger Teaches the Lamb
Lamassu runs a horn through the first assailant’s chin before hurling its struggling body overhead—the attacker’s forehead is a gusher: blood pinwheeling as its body spins in tight circles before landing with a sickening crunch. The next figures’ actions are quickly halted, as Lamassu splinters their skulls underhoof. While a few attackers stand their ground, their blades bend and break attempting to pierce the bull’s glowing, impenetrable hide. The remaining fleeing figures are also flung into the sky, one by one, their gaudy limbs ragdolling before hitting the ground, leaving their disheveled, broken bodies strewn around the arena in the most unusual constellation.
The sea is tumultuous, roaring and frothing, spraying against each side of the arena in a desperate attempt to escape. Many ocean creatures wash ashore, crushed and lifeless from the waves repeatedly pummeling their frames against the rocky shoreline; others are stolen from the sea’s embrace, then, gasping their last breaths, dropped from the heavens onto an inhospitable shore. The remaining participants dive deeper to escape the soaring presence overhead: a shadow flying close to the waters, searching for its next target: a magnificent winged beast that continues hunting; insatiable and eager for its next meal.