What Will It Take?

What will it take? said Constance. What crazy confluence of circumstance, what random imposition of motivators, which asteroid, which alien, what catastrophe. Which heart string plucked, which mind blown, which vision induced, which freedom removed, what restriction imposed.

What will it take to change us?

The Sphinx had been asleep. Her tail lost in the shifting. Her face closed into the distance.

Constance disturbed the silence once more, When will we change? she said, and what may be the Catalyst?

The Sphinx shifted and an avalanche of sand came to rest. Her tail found its rhythm, then lay still.

There is no change, little one, She said, Only progression from this to that. I have seen it. Your pain and anger will move no mountains, even if I assist.

There must be a solution, mused Constance, maybe something dissolved in water. A Damascene vision or a threat to withdraw all streaming services. We could place a tax on ice cream or ban motorcycles completely. Surely someone would squeak, and courses would divert.

Well, said the Sphinx, being a student of history, I can only site the great changes that I have witnessed in the so-called progress of Human kind.

The first, Language itself, the second Art and the third Agriculture. The first two pulled things together nicely, but the third, farming, fomented settlement, the greasy pole of power and the acquisition of territory, sowing the seeds for all the subsequent conflicts.

Perhaps the expansion into the solar system in search of resources, Mused the Sphinx, the latest wild frontier, will give a new perspective. But I strongly suspect that this will just provide a broadening theatre for aggression. So, the lessons of history are not encouraging. Humans appear to have conflict written into their contract.

She Sphinx settled with her chin on her paw.

No problem is insoluble, said Constance defiantly. I shall search, Perhaps an approaching comet or an avocado blight. If only we could reflect deeply on our propensity for conflict, just realising that we are not very nice, now that would be a start.

I’ve been saying it for a thousand years and more, muttered the Sphinx, but will they listen?

I shall initiate The Quest for a Catalyst, said Constance, will you be my lovely assistant?

I must recuse myself from this quest as I am part Catalyst myself.

I shall go alone, said Constance, sounding disappointed.

Setting out, she first found, a tube marked Hardener in the workshop, a noxious liquid capable of ruining your day, but that was not it. In a mountain cave she found a prophet of dubious heritage, muttering prayers to change gold into bread, but that was not it. In the mind palace of an eminent mathematician, she observed some fundamentals that might describe eternity, but that was not it. She found a symphony, a masterstroke, a painting, a theory, two types of radish previously unknown to science and a superman comic, but they were not it.

Having such little success, Constance visited the Catalyst Rescue Centre, where stray Catalysts, found destitute and begging on the streets, were taken in and cared for. There they lay, listlessly, in cages made of cardboard and wires. Their faces pressed against the bars. Constance didn’t like it, she had heard about Catalysts, how they were ferocious and wild, and to see them lying so peaceful, well I didn’t seem right to the child.

Surfing the rows of portals, she eventually came across one which appeared to be empty. On closer inspection, she spied the outline of a Catalyst hunkered down at the back of the cage, behind the food bowl. Only its eyes betrayed the power to change. On a plaque above the enclosure, in shaky writing, the legend, Do Not Be Fooled, was inscribed.

Opening the cage door slowly, Constance gently reached out a hand. The creature shrunk even further into the shadows.

 Come now little, said Constance quietly, let us effect a change, you and I. Hearing this, the creature grew bolder, lifted its head and came forwards, shaking out its wings and sneezing the dust from its muzzle.

In the small office, with the volunteers, Constance signed and dated all the paperwork, she checked all the health checks, vaccinations, vitamin tablets, paw wash, wing wax, whisker direction, scent application and blow dry, genetic confluence, event history, ago, present and future.

Leaving, once more in the saddle, the catalyst perched on her gauntlet, a hood over its head to maintain calm, Constance set forth to change the stars.