Nullibiety

Canon compliant AU?  Because I've decided that everyone has to be afraid of something.  Sort of.  Sauron refers to himself as Mairon throughout the piece.  It is possibly one of the most confusing things I've ever written, because this is a concept that is difficult to conceptualize for obvious reasons.  Thus, I have attempted (and possibly not succeeded?) at using it in a slightly metaphorical manner and incorporating bare minimum of time and basic dimensional theory.  Connected to "Prowl".  Takes place in Mordor in the Third Age (I think?).

Dedicated to my insane best friend who thought this would be an interesting prompt.  Better than cantaloupe, I say!

Disclaimer: I don't own the Silmarillion or LotR

Pairings: none

Characters: Sauron (mentions Morgoth and the Valar)

Warning: canon compliant, rather confusing, theoretic stuff, experimental ideas, unnamed phobia, mentions rape, torture and such, and no, nullibiety is not actually a word LOL

Song: Senya

Words: 1,038
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nullibiety (noun): the property of being nowhere
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/nullibiety

If there was one thing that Mairon absolutely needed, it was direction.

Direction was an important part of his world.  Without it, there was no telling which way was forward and which way was backward.  Which way was to the north or which way was to the south.  Which way was the right path and which way led to a sticky fate.  No way to find the place at the end of a journey and, indeed, no way to find your way back to the beginning.  No right or left or up or down or any other recognizable concept with which to navigate in a frightening and unknown creation stretching on forever in a mindboggling contradiction.

No time would weave its fourth-dimensional threads together into a recognizable, unbroken line.  No yesterday or today or tomorrow.  No past and no future to conceptualize when the line was broken and left in shambles.  Then, when one lost their footing, they had no notion of where they were or when they were, or if they were anywhere at all to begin with.

No planning or looking ahead in anticipation or dread.  No hindsight or analyzing what history, no guilt or remorse.  Just sitting still and doing nothing and feeling nothing and thinking nothing.  Without movement toward an image or purpose in action.

Because without knowledge of your place in reality, how can you dare to move?  How can you even imagine it?

Of any concept, Mairon feared this the most.  Nullibiety.  Being unable to look into the future and find a route, a means to an end, that would justify the existence of such a being as he.  There would be no goals to grasp and hold firm between his fists like a lifeline.  There would be no need to keep going, to persevere and survive, when the only reward was further silence and stillness stretching on and on forever.  Emptiness that never ceased and held to quarter.

Without a concept of somewhere, there was nothing.

And he feared nothing.

His entire life was about creation of something.  Jewels, weapons, artistry, technology--power-inducing tools subject to the whims of his godlike will to dominate and bend the earth.  To set it in its proper place and set himself in his proper place.  Organization and perfection.  Tactility and sensation.

Part of him knew it was an obsession that drove this ravenous undertaking of world domination.  Part of him knew that sadism was only an action created to put into place those pathetic life forms that dared step out of their bounds and upset the delicate balance personified within his mind.  That, should they succeed--should he lose focus for even one moment--he might lose his footing and plummet into darkness.

Might never find his way back.

The Void lingered heavily in the back of his mind.  A huge, empty forever-ness without end and without beginning.  Without any sense of direction or purpose.  Without a past and a future and a present, but something all tangled together in a mass of unraveled rationality.  A nightmare.

The very thought of it pushed and pushed and nagged and nagged.

In the shaping of the world there was enjoyment to be found.  Logic persistently was his companion.  The blood that flowed between his fingers was heavenly and the screams that rang in his ears centered corporeality.  Every second was devoted to that far distant dream being built with layer upon layer of destruction and reconstruction beneath iridescent eyes.  And it was the most beautiful, lenitive song Mairon could ever remember hearing.

Because it drove away the concept that he was heading toward nowhere and coming from nowhere.  This was his place in the world, and his past was the Lieutenant of Angband kneeling at his master's feet and his future was the dark throne in his dark tower in the ash-filled skies of Mordor as the world marched to his every whim.

That was his somewhere.  Too precious to forget for even a single second.

For not a moment could that thought waver or peter out of existence.  For the sake of his sanity.

As long as there was direction, there was focus.  And, as long as there was focus, Mairon was validated and his means led to an end.

As long as there was an end, there was a somewhere.

And that was all he needed.  Living in this little dream of a somewhere ahead and a somewhere behind, he could forget all about fear which his mind firmly existed was a useless and wasteful emotion to be purged and extinguished.  What was the wrath of the Valar in comparison?  What was the wrath of Morgoth in comparison?  What were torture and mutilation and rape and starvation in comparison?  They all led to somewhere.  And they could not touch him.

Mairon was not nearly the perfect being as his master had envisioned--that flawless diamond shaped in the image of cruelty and subservience and nonchalance.  Maybe he was even delusional, warped by that little whisper wrought before the existence of Arda itself.  But he wore a smile on his face and pretended, because better delusional than senile.  A translucent dream-coating hiding ephemeral reality was fixed at the center of his personal universe.

He would crush all those who opposed his new reality, who tried to shatter the opaque wall boxing Mairon inside.  How dare they try and destroy the order and the rationalism?  How dare they defy his indomitable will?

But as long as they were crushed beneath the sole of his boot, their pleas for mercy peppering his ears as little droplets of bliss in a scorched and blistered world of drought, he could be happy and amused.  He could forget all about that little fear--ancient and immaterial--in the back of his mind.  Could pretend for eternity that there was not a single intangible passing notion in all the history of the world that could shake the unshakable foundations of his eternal being.

Even if it was just pretending, it was real enough to create a somewhere at which to aim his traversing and striving.  And that was all that mattered in the end.
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Uh... okay then.  I don't even know what to say about this.  I was thinking about poking at string theory, but as soon as the idea popped up I decided that it was too much work and left it out.  This could be considered an entirely subconscious inner monologue, because we all know from previous stories that Sauron's mind does not seem to work like this.  His stream of consciousness is typically extremely sadistic and very impassive (in as far as compassion and pity go).

Thus, this is all just character analysis to explain motivation.  Because is it really likely that Mairon wants to run the world just because he thinks he can?  Morgoth, at least, had cookie-cutter villain motivations (e.g. jealousy, superiority complex, daddy complex, etc...).  Sauron very clearly did not experience any of those problems, and thus was not actually all that compatible with the original Dark Lord's evil machinations.

Blame the prompt.  It just made me do it.  And now my head hurts and I have zero motivation to edit stories.  But I will still try to finish at least one tonight anyway for AO3.  LOL.  The song is Senya by Yasuharu Takanashi, more commonly known in the Naruto fandom as Itachi's Theme.  I chose it because it is mysterious, and because I felt like it.  It's an awesome song anyway.  So listen.