The Passing of the Torch

The torchbearer ran through the night. Or rather, his team ran. The inner circle carried him on a stretcher, bearing him through the dark, as he clutched the torch to his frail chest and gazed up wordlessly into the humid night. Onward they ran, these bearers of the torchbearer, like emergency medics rushing a trauma victim, without complaint or desire for recognition. Their proximity to the torch was reward enough.

Around the inner team was the outer team. These were the middlemen between the spectators and the torchbearer. They jogged, clenching palms overhead, relaying exuberant news through bullhorns to pump up the muted crowd:

All hail the torchbearer!

He bears the torch with unprecedented authority!

He runs vigorously on our behalf!

All hail the torchbearer!

The torchbearer only heard muffled sounds. He lay cocooned within the silent nucleus of the inner circle, which itself was walled by the rambunctious outer circle. Though he was motionless, his bearers discerned he was alive by his labored breathing and the white-knuckled tenacity with which he gripped the torch.

The torchbearer had sought that flame his entire life, and at last, in his twilight years, he had been crowned its bearer. It was no easy task. He fought public opinion, overcoming accusations that he was too old and enfeebled, too entrenched and corrupt. But the sponsors and announcers had always been on his side. They liked him. He had proven his dependability and devotion, unlike the former torchbearer, a populist rabblerouser whose unreliable rhetoric and ungovernability troubled them.

The torchbearer’s era had not been peaceful. The sounds of distant explosions and the cries of the bereaved were a staple of his tenure. Meanwhile, many in the crowd had been increasingly questioning his fitness. “He can’t even run on his own!” one heretic cried from the crowd.

Lies! Slander! Our leader runs tirelessly around the clock! the outer circle screamed back.

“Then let us see him!” another spectator shouted. “Why have you hidden him? Why won’t you let his teammates challenge him in a footrace?”

How can you be such ingrates? He’s busy running for our country!

This had been the dynamic for years now, the inner circle bearing him along, the outer circle shielding and defending him. They had kept up the game, canceling his appearances, hamstringing his challengers, smearing anyone who called him frail and incapacitated.

And then one day the unthinkable happened. During an open, crowded stretch, there was a momentary breach in his human shield and thousands of spectators saw him in full view.

The gasps among the public were audible. The torchbearer leaned up from his stretcher and raised the torch haltingly over his head, attempting to project strength. He began to murmur something but then trailed off. His eyes took on a glassy look. Then he stiffly lay back down. At once, his team closed around him again.

Too late. This time the outer circle knew the game was up. They had mastered the art of camouflage and transfiguration, but this was beyond even their deftest powers of reconstruction. The crowd would never unsee that sight.

With a compassionate savagery, his benefactors turned upon him in unison. They bewailed his condition. Their great man had fallen – abruptly, inconceivably – into disrepair and cognitive decline. What a shock, what a tragedy! They wept openly.

There is no avoiding it, they said, united in sadness, he must now pass the torch.

At this, the torchbearer sat up, gripping the torch even tighter. His inner circle, fear in their eyes, began to whisper to him that everything would be just fine. They lowered their heads and kept running hard.

“I’m the torchbearer,” he declared. “I’m running.”

There was a shocked silence at this defiance. Then the outer circle began to chime in how they all supported him. He just needed time to make his decision. They loved him.

“I already made my decision,” he snapped. “I’m going all the way. I won this fair and square.”

The outer circle smiled paternalistically at this. They emphasized again that they all supported him. He just needed time to make his decision. The right decision.

“I’m running, it’s as simple as that,” he muttered. “Gimme a break, man. Only the Lord Almighty can make me get out of the race.”

It was during the next moon when the Lord Almighty spoke. It happened as they were running in the dark, high up in the mountains, where the trail drops off into the gorge. One of the stretcher bearers tripped, it’s said, over a rock. As the stretcher tilted precipitously and the torchbearer slid, wide-eyed in panic, his hands momentarily released their iron hold. The torch was instantly yanked (or rescued, as they put it) from his grip. The stretcher then catastrophically upended, and the unfortunate former torchbearer went over the precipice, his tremulous cry ending in a thud when his head struck a ledge during his tumble down the mountainside.

As dawn broke, the outer circle stepped back, roaring and cheering. A new torchbearer stood before the public. There was confusion, for there had been no race, no debate. But the outer circle wasted no time. They sang paeans to their former torchbearer, a great man who had selflessly, courageously stepped down and passed on the torch to a more youthful bearer, to a new generation. Their laudations soon whipped the crowd up into a frenzy of enthusiasm. It was a moment of great party unity.

“But where is he?” a spectator cried. “What about his vows that he wouldn’t stop running?”

He is fine, my good sir. Most fine indeed. Most magnificently, gloriously fine. He is just nursing himself back to health from some minor injuries that require his permanent withdrawal. He says it was the privilege of his life to bear this torch. And his heartfelt message to you now is, All hail the new torchbearer!”

The new torchbearer smiled. She had been barely seen or spoken of in years. Four years ago, she competed for this very same torch. Despite an exuberant launch from the blocks in the footrace, she had struggled and flailed and dropped out. And yet here she was now, deified and reincarnate, newly anointed, freshly memed.

Indeed, it had been years since the crowd had seen a torchbearer stand on two feet. It seemed a miracle. This was no time for unease over competition irregularities. She thrust the torch high overhead, and the outer circle made sweeping, bowing gestures of deference with their arms and cheered and blew noisemakers and juggled coconuts.

The sun shone. The distant explosions and screaming and wailing could no longer be heard under all the revelry and euphoria. It was all so very inspiring and wonderful.