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Some Incomplete Unedited Story About Gods I've Been Working On
[this is a rawest-of-the-raw rough draft. About seven-eighths of this is written in the mindset that some would call freewriting. I'm writing first and editing afterwards, because it works better. The polished version will be massively different, and probably much shorter {non-pretty/non-inspired bits will be condensed until they become pretty}, but I won't be posting it online, because that kills my chances at publishing, doesn't it? But I'd love to see what people have to say about the coal version. Editing is 95% of my writing process, so I realize that it's unfair to thrust this at you and ask for a relevant opinion, but there you have it. I want input.]
And yes, I know I write like a shittier version of Dr. Seuss on acid. The editing process helps that greatly, honestly. Until I edit, I don't even try to write something that sounds readable. I just put down what happens next, along with whatever whims come out of my fingers. The bad whims will die later, I promise.
---
Incomplete Part I of V of an Unnamed, Unfinished Novel/Short Story Collection
The Old Gods
In the near-beginning, there was tranquillity, the Age of Pale Stone, burnished to a polished mirror shade by rough desert grains. Death was not yet wrought in this age, and the world and its possibilities stretched seemingly infinite before the limited eyes of mortal and immortal man alike, for mortality in its most literal sense was not the only blurred distinction between God and Man in that early age. In those early days, gods and men were far more alike that not.
The Progenitor God had but recently created mankind. Furthermore, they had been made in the image of the gods themselves, created to be a microcosm of their glory, animals created to be creators and adjucators in the world below. Thus, the wisdom and power of the first race of men were godlike in stature, and man was second to none but the gods themselves, possessing absolute knowledge and clarity regarding any area of endeavor their hearts could find favor in. And yet, both Man and God were innocent, and knew nothing of true burden, for strife and decay had not yet found their way into our world.
Soon after the Progenitor God had created the first race of men, he presented to them a small woven pouch full of seeds, saying "Tend well to what I entrust you now. These, the frailest and weakest of all my creations, may someday be the mightiest, a symbol for your guardianship over our world. Tend them well, my children." After this, the original gods were never again to be seen in physical form upon this earth, but the seeds were planted in the dry, primordial earth over which the humans dwelled. Fledgling mankind tended them well, and in a short time -little more than fifty years- they had grown into nine great trees, thicker than any seen since, whose mighty uppermost branches grew together and erased all sight of the skies above. By this time, man's numbers had greatly increased, and many were the realms peopled by him, but the oldest and most respected among mortal men remained in the once-dry land in which they had first been set by the gods, and dwelled among the ninefold trunks of the Tree of Life. They lived a peaceful life of contemplation there under the leaves, and whenever any among man had a difficult question of morality or theology that they could not deduce on their own, they would make a pilgrimage to the sacred grove and ask the advice of the first men, who would deliberate at length and provide an answer, godlike in wisdom, for the knowledge seeker to take back. These answers were always followed by the recipients, for the wisdom of the Elders' council was readily apparent to all. And the gods watched over their charges from above, and smiled in joy.
***
Now, in the very first days of the universe, when the world was empty, there were but two powers, contemplative, male and female in templative nature, and they existed in nothingness, yin and yang without backdrop. The world around them was empty, filled with nothingness, and they conversed between themselves at infinite length upon the nature of the Nothing, and derived myriad theories of its nature upon which they discoursed endlessly. And always, in the course of these communications, it was the 'female' power that would find new aspects of the darkness on which to reflect, but it was the 'male' power that would provide new emphases on these aspects, and new ways of thinking about the purely mental construction which she had provided them with, and from him came the subjective opinions about these towers of thought, to which she would balways, eventually, come to ascribe to. And so, though he could not build on his own, her towers grew more fanciful and elegant?/intricate? under his gaze, and though there were no thoughts but hers upon which to turn his gaze, he would always have fresh comments about their meaning, and so they raced each other for sport eternally, though in different directions, and both were expanded by it, for their interaction ever led to new and more beautiful constructions, and so their combined thinking was a pursuit of which they could never tire.
Neither knew which of them had first done it, and their arguments over which was at fault wracked their descendants' descendants for millennia to pass. It may have been that he, looking at one of her creations and comparing it to the Nothing all around and, deciding that Nothing was better, declared it irredeemably ugly and unusable. It may have been that she, finding one of her works complete and perfect beyond reproach, discounted his reflections on it, keeping it a thing only between herself and the Nothing. At some point, though, their intricate dance of thought grew staggered and unbalanced, and the Nothing itself took notice of them with a start.
Whichever of them it was who first introduced Nothing into their closed little society, it soon became an active participant in all their doings. At first, they did not recognize it for what it was, for they had never known any but the other, and for some time, each mistook the Nothing's words for those of the other. In time, however, they came to understand that there was a new party in their conversations, though they did not recognize its nature [for what it was]. At first, the Nothing was neither here nor there, and its place in their conversations was varied, wild, and new. It added excitement to their enclosed little world and both were glad of it. After some time, though, it was always the male with whom the Nothing always sided, and neither of the two realized that there was anything amiss about this until one day, his suggestions resulted in the creation of a tower of logical construction which simply would not stand, a non-truth about Nothing, the first of its kind. She looked angrily upon him, and demanded an explanation, but he had none, save that the Nothing had given him the idea.
And he said to her, "why are you always the one to think, while my place is only to compliment you upon your thoughts? I will create new ideas, unlike any that we have seen before. I will make things that are not of this existence, things completely unknown and apart from Nothing. For the Nothing and I have tired of your game." And in that instant, they both vanished, and the universe replaced them, for he had spoken the ultimate lie. And all her beautiful creations from Nothing were lost, creation was unbalanced, and the universe that might have been is not.
***
Though they were lost forever and would never again find themselves so dependent on the other, or so whole, they found new forms in the replacement reality that He and the Nothing had forged, as pure ideas in a world of physical matter. Her domain was that of wisdom, and her name meant precisely that. His new form was that of a god of creation and the first men called him the Progenitor God. All that was their past life was forgotten, but their existences remained similar. She would still create new things in the real world, the world of ideas, and he was ever creating things based on them in the subjective world, the world of matter and energy and quantum mechanics, and both were ever-busy and fairly content. But they were more separate now, and never truly together, for she could never truly understand him, for he had access to a world of material shadows that she could not comprehend, and the things he told her when he came back simply made no sense.
At long last, he created mankind. And mankind was different from things that he had made before, for in an attempt to preserve universal balance, he gave them power over the world of the divine equal in extent and nature to the power he held over the world of mortals. And as god created man, man soon enough returned the favor.
Before several years had passed, there were hundreds of lesser gods for everything that man could imagine a personification for, and Wisdom and Creation were vastly outnumbered by this new panoplous pantheon. Wisdom and Creation retreated to a deeper level of reality, leaving the other gods and the material universe behind, the Progenitor God leaving his mortal children the Seeds of Life before doing so. Once they had left our universe, the realms of God and Man grew closer together until they were practically indistinguishable from one another.
And the abstractions of Man's ideas grew, such that there was soon even a god of Nothing.
***
In a thousand years, mankind had imagined a thousand gods, and of all the gods, only the god of Nothing was without purpose. This might not have been so bad, except that he was often bored. Terribly bored. And so, of all the gods, only Nothing had little enough stake in the human world that he went from god to god, conversing with them for his amusement, and in return, he amused them with tidbits from other deithies. Before long, Nothing became a gossip among gods, preeminent purveyor of nothing new and dabbler in diverse divine drivel.
This would not have been so bad, had he not had a falling out with Lokorthar, the god of Justice. Gossip had its comeuppance, and besides, Justice simply didn't like Nothing very much.
"You have no purpose," said Justice. "Your very being is anathema, for all gods must exist for a purpose."
Nothing had heard this rant a thousand time before, and was tired of it.
"Your point is moot. You'd best remain mute. I'm god of nothing at all, so of course I have no duties to the world. As god of nothing, it is my right and exclusive privilege to do nothing at all, in any way I see fit."
"It makes no sense," Justice replied. "All the gods help keep order save you. Show me one example of how you have purpose in the mortal world."
Nothing sighed. He was reputed to be an extremely ugly thing, and alone of the gods (generally tall, naked, dark-haired, bronze-skinned, overbearing types), he went about the godly realm always swathed from head to toe in a long, white cloak. And beneath the cloak's hood, nothing, as one might suspect, could be seen.
Justice gestured impatiently, and Nothing sighed again, more deeply.
"When a wild cat scratches at the door, and a woman opens it, and her husband calls, 'what's at the door?," and the cat has left, and she sees nothing but the barren mountains all around, I am there."
He sighed again, and a pair of black ovals glinted momentarily beneath the cloak's low hood.
Justice stroked his great beard, frowning in concentration. "But… the cat still exists, so your place is a false one. It hasn't vanished; it's relocated, out of the woman's sight. You're not a god of relocation, so…"
"Ah, but how does she know that? Perhaps the cat was there after all, until she opened the door," Nothing replied with an invisible but not inaudible smirk.
Justice's frown deepened, and the lines on his face did likewise. "It doesn't work that way," he said gravely, shaking his head. "The cat has to be somewhere."
"Not for the woman," Nothing said. "She sees nothing, and hoped to see Nothing, for wild cats can be a handful. And so it is with me."
Justice frowned still more deeply, and the lines of disapproval slithered their way down his neck as well. "That is no explanation."
Nothing took a deep breath as if to sigh, then exhaled sharply. "And so it is with me," he said simply. "And also with you."
Justice's frown attempted to intensify, failed, ricocheted, and rebounded in a series of indignant coughs. "Me? You must be joking, as you always are. There is no part of that unbalanced little story of yours that in any way resembles my dealings with the mortal world."
"Fine." Nothing started to turn away, to leave, but Justice, thinking that it would be more prudent to be fair and hear Nothing out, called him back. "Wait. Tell me what you have to say," Justice said. "I won't have it said that Justice himself is driven more by emotion than fair and balanced argument."
"Very well," said nothing. "Reflect on this, then: what is this 'justice' that you are, if it is not what humans look upon and proclaim to be justice? Our world is shaped entirely by perception. If people think they see a thing, they see a thing, and sooner or later there'll be a god for it, to watch over it and keep it stable. Humans find the concept of justice useful, which is why you exist. Similarly, they seem to find the concept of nothing useful, so I also exist. Why, I don't know. Where's the harm in that? If I can alleviate anxiety and give people a sense that they can comprehend the world around them, what's the harm in that?"
"It's a false escape, though. There is no nothing. There is only something. While you may make people feel better about their perceptions, your nature is delusion. You aren't real, except in people's heads… you really aren't anything at all."
"Neither are you," said Nothing. "You're nothing, just like me."
"Prove it," said Justice.
"Okay," said Nothing, and he did, and Justice faded into Nothing.
Nothing sighed and frowned deeply, the lines on his face crinkling.
"Interesting…," he said to himself, pulling the cloak back from his head and reaching his hand up to stroke his long dark beard.
He smiled to himself, then, and wandered on to his next destination.
---
More than a thousand years after the Progenitor God created the first of men, they still lived in contemplation beneath the Tree of Life, the weight of the material world theirs to be born. Though the governance of all humanity was their domain, their decisions were never enforced upon those they ruled, nor were they unsolicited. Rather, whenever any among all mankind had some difficulty or dispute that they could not resolve on their own, they would journey to the place of their race's creation, either in flesh or in spirit, and ask the advice of their forefathers, the wisdom of which was always implicit and readily apparent to the questioner, for the wisdom of the firstborn surpassed that of ordinary men.
***
Once, a man, who had come to seek the guidance of the millenurian wisemen of the Progenitor God's first creation, witnessed a terrible thing. [He had come to ask whether the time-honored practice of loaning grainland to one's child at the age of one hundred could be modified slightly if one had had multiple children in the span of a single century. Otherwise, he said, he would soon be left with nothing.] As the elders sat in a circle, quietly deliberating the question, the oldest among them sat up suddenly, cried "we are unmade!," fell forward into the dust at his feet, bent double, and lay there, nose in the dirt, unmoving. The young man, along with several of the elders, laughed at the novel oddity thus dropped before them; they stopped as suddenly when he did not rise and join with them in laughing. Several of the elders continued conversing as if nothing had happened, assuming quite readily that their peer's concentration on the matter at hand had closed him temporarily to the immediate physical world. Men and women adopted such positions when conversing with the gods above, after all, though rarely in so extreme a pose. Only one, second eldest of the first generation and close friend of the fallen, realized that something was not right. Reaching over to touch his shoulder, something about his posture alarmed her, and she shook him slightly, as one shakes a sleeping person, starting back as he flopped backwards to the earth. Undeterred, she shook him again, and in a moment of terrible understanding, saw the unlikely truth in his strangled last words.
Hugging the body to her in an instant, she screamed in grief and terror, long and loud, the first death wail ever known to humankind, and the more anguished for its being first. Tears running down her face, her scream become a more strangled cry, and she clutched the body more tightly to her, as if through physical proximity she could somehow bridge the gap between them.
The others stared at this spectacle in confusion, not understanding. In time, her grief achieved a greater balance with her composure, and she became aware of the others once more.
"Do you not understand what has happened?" she said to them, face transfigured with agony. "His life was taken from him, as surely as it was once given. This is no longer my friend I hold, any more than stacked grain in the fields is the plant that bore it." Tears streamed from her face as she gently placed his body into a state of repose, releasing his head last of all, gently, sliding her hands from beneath his curly pate to place his arms against his sides, as if he were merely resting. "The first of our kind is uncreated. Pray to all the gods that we do not suffer the same fate in our time."
Many of them stared or walked over to get a better look at this new thing, most not quite comprehending the permanency of their friend's transformation. There was great muttering throughout the others now, which rose in intensity, variation, and pitch, a muttering which presented at first an exclamatory tone, which grew in oscillation at the edges until its nature as displayed was foremost an interrogatory one, and then the questions, more and more, lost their rhetorical tone, opening finally in a floodgate upon their silently grieving cousin as the young man on pilgrimage finally summoned up the nerve to ask her boldly, and outright:
"But what does this mean?"
She gazed sadly in his direction and replied, "That there is a sleep from which no man wakes."
And she stood, deserting the lifeless shell of her friend, and walked a dozen paces from where she stood, to the nearest trunk of the great tree, and slid down the bottommost five feet to the ground below, and stared, trancelike, out at her friend's mortal remains, her fingers fiddling with a long stick in the dust as she stared, seemingly of their own accord.
She watched silently, unblinkingly, as chaos erupted among her brethren.
The eldest members of a race which had never known timidity knew fear, then, a mind-numbing fear that stole over their souls as the winter-frost steals over an idle field. In their fear, they became as animals, and though each conceived his words as being of persuasion and rational deduction, when carried to full term, only accusations and arguments were seen to emerge. Their gruesome brainchildren did battle there, in the air above and between their earnestly inclined heads, and there, for the first time, man was wholly mastered by his thoughts, and contrary to the natural order of things, the thoughts of man made him their tool.
***
In another existence, Nothing was changing - faint changes that Nothing itself was not and could not be aware of. For those changes were on the godly equivalent of the metabolic level, and Nothing could not notice or comprehend them anymore than {you or I}(the story has not been first person until this point . it could instead be "one of the mortal men") could perceive a minute increase in the concentration of a hormone extant in the bloodstream.
Nothing's share of the universal consciousness was undergoing a sudden growth spurt, and like a human adolescent, he was becoming somewhat awkward, and didn't always know where his limbs were at all times, nor his own strength.
And so it was that the elders in the Grove of Life found their prayers for balance and Justice answered by Nothing.
And the Justice of Nothing's subconscious, as might be expected, consisted of removing the source of the problem, directly, efficiently.
While Nothing had before received next to no prayers, he now had all man's prayers for justice directed to him, and thus Nothing's presence in the world grew stronger.
And as above, so below: death came to mankind, and in abundance. The young began to resolve disputes through violence, and many died, their killers frightened and unwitting, and many among the old died for no reason at all.
And as below, so above: the gods grieved for their charges, and greeted Nothing, once a gossip, now the loneliest of all beings, with only hostility. And new gods appeared, gods which even Nothing feared and despised, gods of famine and war and pestilence and mortal terror.
And Nothing, alone, forsaken by all other gods, regretted his own existence as no being before him had. Nothing spent mortal centuries there, weeping, and below, in the now-mortal world, life quickened. People, cities, civilizations, ways of life rose, and then fell, devoured by War, Famine, Death, and Pestilence. When Nothing finally looked up from its own misery, it saw the full extent of what it had done.
And Justice, within, stirred, and spoke to Nothing of what must be done next.
***
Another time, another place, another frame of existence.
The firstborn of the Progenitor God fought with one another, their arguments lengthy and fierce and increasingly repetitive, until one, seized with the forces of chaos and death that were even now beginning to foment in the godly realm, raised a hand into the air and, with a sharp cry of frustration, brought his palm down upon another's face. The stricken one fell to the earth, yelling with pain, and the one who had struck out stood and stared at his bloodied face in utter bafflement.
Confusion erupted from the elders, who ceased their arguments, amazed, and stared at the crimson stain across their cousin's face in horror. Prayers went up to the gods: prayers for guidance, health, wisdom, and for the discernment and strength to do what must be done: justice. And as Justice was called, so the Justice that was within Nothing answered. And as Justice answered, so did the Nothing within Justice give answer.
The nature of Justice is balance. For every action that is given, a reaction must be given; the nature of fairness is not kind. The nature of Nothing is to reduce things to their basic elements: to simplify. Reacting to radical circumstances previously unknown to the world of men, both parts screamed out in one discordant accord, and Ulnien, his outcry to the gods answered, felt its full force, and, raising a hand, struck Alani back, hard, across the face.
Something primal and unpleasant stole across the souls of the elders then, some newly discovered fragment of their animal nature, and true chaos broke out among the eldest ones. Now mankind glimpsed something completely new in chaos. For Chaos, as a concept, was unknown before this moment which gave it life. Now it had godly life and flesh, and in the heat of its first glory moment, it gave its fullest blessings to the arguments that went on in the sacred grove.
None of them, in the haze that followed, remember who first upset the balanced of justice or why. All remembered, though, that their commingled cries carried both fear and lust for chaos, and that man tore at man that day in a bloodlust-haze, that no one was free of the taint save Mirla -who prayed for calm, seated in meditation by the trunk of the Tree- and then when their minds cleared and they were human once more, Ulnien stood above Alani, holding a bloodied staff from the Tree of Life, and Alani lay motionless and pungent upon the rich earth.
Justice became prevalent again, like one puppeteer handing his strings to another. The elders were seated again, and in choked whispers of grief, they decided Ulnien's fate. Nothing so terrible had ever happened since the world began: of that only were they certain. But none had the stomach or courage to do the same to Ulnien, for then they themselves would deserve the same fate as he. Mirla was particularly adamant about this. There would be no repetition of Ulnien's crime, she admonished some of the more vengeful elders, for then they would all become unworthy of life. Yet, Ulnien could not be allowed to remain with the rest of them, however fervent his terrified pleas. What could be done with him? Banishment was conceived then, and Ulnien was banished to the farthest reaches of the world, to live an eternity of repentance amid the rocks and the bushes and scorpions of the desert across the ocean. His journey to the world's edge is well-chronicled in the myth and verse of the peoples of the south, but the essentials I will recount here.
Ulnien took up his bloodied yet still living staff and, heavy of heart and faith destroyed, trekked southwards to the end of the world. As he passed though many lands on his way, people were amazed to see one of the Eldest outside the grove, and they flocked around him, seeking his counsel, and tried to kiss the strange dusky red staff that he held. Ulnien, eyes full of tears, drove them away with his staff, refused their hospitality and comfort as he refused their requests of blessings, and slept standing, arms outstretched each night. Word of this exceptional visitor spread, and though Ulnien continued his spiritual journey without incident, when he reached the shores at the edge of the world, he found his children and grandchildren there, waiting for him.
Ulnien, full of abandonment and isolation, cried, "Why have you come? I am not the same man you knew as your father. I am destroyed. Leave me now, and may your lives by blessed, but do not think to offer me comforts I am not worthy of."
Ulnien's eldest daughter spoke. "We will not abandon you. Come, we have brought a boat. Your children and grandchildren are there, and our mother has followed you from the grove and gathered us to come with you. We will follow you and mother across the waters, and we will learn from you in your penance, and mother Rakael in her wisdom. Let us come with you, we beg."
Ulnien fell to his knees and wept then, and Rikael came forward to comfort him, and they were reconciled, though she had sentenced him, and all went together across the oceans to the desert lands of the south, where their descendants remain to this day as penance for their forefather's sins. The staff of Ulnien was buried in the sandy earth, and yet it grew into a miraculous redbark tree, which lives to this day. Ulnien taught his people compassion and moderation all the days of his mortal life, and at the end of his years, it is said that he simply retreated into the further depths of the desert to contemplate his sins, and that he remains there to this day, bearing knowledge and humility for all those who seek him or feel true anguish and he sends visions of potential chaos and terror to those who will not moderate their own actions, teaching them humility and respect for their fellow man. His people are the ulnienre, and Rakael and he became their gods.
Mirla could not abide the punishment she had put upon her friend Ulnien, nor the death of her lifelong lover and friend. Friendless, alone, she journeyed eastward, and makes her home in the great forests of the east. Her people, too, believe that her spirit lives eternally in those woods, and her people treat those forests into which she retreated as holy, and forever respect the connection between man and nature, and the inevitability of this mortality. The dead of her people are said to be taken to live with her in the woods of her hermitage, and their descendants say that she cares for their souls forever.
---
Nothing had been summoned before the other gods, his presence actually requested for the first time in godly memory. The mortal world, which all gods experience as an integral part of their godly person, a sort of gut feeling, had gone sour somehow, the usual comforting presence located within the godly stomach twisted inexplicably into a nauseating knot, and all of this change happening within the span of a godly eyeblink, long though it might be through the eyes of mortal seeming. Though they were still reeling from the speed and sheer extent of the damage caused to their domain/regency, the gods were certain of one thing: Nothing was responsible.
The hall of the gods was packed that day (though there was no hall, the gods took up no space, and "day" is a meaningless term here apart from the ominous caesura between "that" and "day."… look, let's just dispense with the explanations from here on in, lest you or I go mad making false reality reconciliations or preposterous paradigm parallels), every god present resplendent, grave, and expectant. Only Nothing and the judge were lacking. The gods sat uncertain in their metaphysical benches: it was unlike Justice to be so late.
At last, the tension in the room crystallized and took coherent form in the space that was at once at the center of the room and at its head. At first there was nothing, and then… Nothing. A white-robed figure had appeared, only blackness visible beneath its cowl. Justice. Nothing. Justice-who-was-Nothing. The godly senses of those present reeled in confusion at the sensual/psychic onslaught that assailed them.
Justice's older brother, Iabolde, the god of Logic, stepped forward. Both recognition and confusion were written on his face. There was a paradox at work here, and Logic, though he had rarely encountered them before, instinctively hated a paradox. After recovering from a momentarily dizzying sense of terrifying confusion (a feeling rarely experienced by the godly manifestation of Logic)
"Who are you?," asked Logic. "Are you Nothing, or are you Justice?"
"I am neither," said Nothing, "and I am both," said Justice.
"Your answer reeks of illogical presumption," said Logic, "and I find it unacceptable. However, it may also have some truth to it." Logic moved to the focus of the room to stand near Nothing. The essence of what had happened was unclear to Logic. Was the being at the center of the room Nothing, or Justice? Clearly there was something here that was unspoken, and Logic intended to press it out of this strange being who was only half his brother, for he felt something akin to rage at his brother's apparent dilution.
He began to pace, for a moment, then wheeled around and, pointing a finger at Nothing, went at once to the core of the matter. "Explain to me what you are and how you got this way," said Logic.
"I… don't entirely know," said Nothing.
Logic paced again, disoriented and surly. "Well then," he asked, "what do you call yourself?"
"Nothing," said Nothing.
"Nothing. Then you are not Justice, am I correct?"
"I am and am not Justice. Lokorthar as we once knew him is now unknown, exists no longer. In his place is me, the new Justice." He paused, his overall appearance somber and reflective. "And yet," he said, "I am also Nothing."
"Absurd!," said Logic. "How could such a thing happen?"
Nothing pulled back his cloak to reveal Justice's face and features, eliciting a collective gasp from the other gods, as the voice had been Nothing's. Justice's features looked intensely guilty now, and inexplicably, beads of sweat were running down his face profusely. He opened his mouth, hesitated, and then said, "I stated before him that all gods are Nothing."
"Which is absurd," said Logic, still livid in his shock.
Nothing nodded, then continued, "And he asked me to prove this to him, and while I could not explain my statement in its fundamentals, I could and did show him what I meant, which is in my capacity as God of Nothing. And when I did, he became no more, and I became Justice."
"This is most troubling," said Logic, "and yet, given the evidence at hand, I have no choice but to accept the truth of what you say."
"However," said Logic, "I must ask you to tell me what you showed Justice, for I must hear this logic for myself before I can be sure that your account is not flawed." For Logic, being Logic, was unable to let such things alone.
"I cannot tell you," said Nothing. "I was able only to show Justice, and in doing so, I absorbed him, and became Justice. I would not wish any others among my peers to suffer the same fate."
"Come now," said Logic. "In absorbing Justice, you have, in part, become him. Justice's powers of speech were superb, his acumen nearly unparalleled." (for Logic was vain) "You have those facilities of communication now, have you not?"
"Um," said Nothing, thinking about this. "Yes."
"As I am Logic, there must be no logical truth which I cannot hear. In fact, by my very nature, all such truths belong to me, and in telling me this new truth which you have found, you are merely returning it to its rightful owner."
Nothing shifted nervously. "I really don't want to," he said.
"As self-appointed judge of this court, I really must insist," said Logic. "If you refuse, we will have to declare you to be in contempt of court (remove reference to courts later, since they wouldn't have existed?) and expel you from godly society and our good graces. Now, if you will not tell me what you showed to Justice, I will be forced to enforce Justice upon you in my brother's stead, as well as inform you that you are doing myself and the others of this assembly a great discourtesy."
Nothing stood for a moment, stunned by Logic's words, and unable to reconcile himself to either action or inaction. Finally, he whispered, and when he did, Logic gazed upon him in terror. Logical arguments numerous and inarguable poured hissingly from Nothing's mouth, taking on a life of their own that, for Logic, could no longer be stopped by a mere closure of the mouth. At first the other gods murmured, and then, soon, they quieted and strained to hear, but to no avail. And then came the screams from the gods assembled: as the gods watched, Logic and Nothing silently blended into one another, to be replaced by a being whose appearance seemed to combine the features of both Logic and Justice.
Nothing stood there a moment, his body reverberating/twitching from the shock, and then he raised his head, and he began to speak. He spoke as though nothing had just happened, he spoke as though in a trance, and he spoke with the voice of Justice, which said to the gathered gods, in a booming voice: "I, Justice have arrived. Nothing has brought disorder to our godly realm, and must make amends." And Justice spoke, though Justice was also Nothing: "Nothing must make amends." Nothing's whole body twitched spasmodically. "He… must destroy the unholy fruit of his ill actions, the new gods that bring our world suffering. The gods of War, Famine, Pestilence, Hatred, and Destruction[and pride?]. It is the only conclusion possible, that to restore the world to balance, Nothing must destroy his wayward children, bring them to justice, and then." Nothing paused here, his face contorting with a multitude of conflicting emotions. "Then he must destroy himself."
Justice's voice departed from Nothing, then, and Nothing was left crumpled on the floor, a miserable, sad, sorry excuse for a god.
Before the assembled crowd had time to respond, Nothing quickly vanished to carry out his own sentence and vindication.
One by one, Nothing tracked down and absorbed the products of his [carelessness]I want a word here that conveys more than mere "carelessness…" a word for unintentional sinning. Individually, each resisted, but all fell before his inexorable penitent wrath, cursing him as was their nature. Together, it is possible that they might have overcome him somehow, but separately, Nothing's unwanted children were helpless before him as he devoured them, one after another. And as he devoured them, Nothing unwittingly took on their aspects, knowing he would as he did, and worried about the consequences as he did, but forcing himself nevertheless to carry out the punishment set for him by the warped forms of Justice and Logic within him that drove him ever onwards in search of his next victim. In the end, he consumed the last and most subtle of his wayward children, Hatred, and in consuming hatred, he found himself consumed by it.
And thus, filled with Hatred and Destruction, Nothing brooded to himself. Who were Logic and Justice to send him on such awful errands that were taking such a terrible toll upon him? Nothing's body was monstrous and bloated now, the weight of many forms seemingly pressing outwards against his small cloaked outline, constantly shifting and jostling for position beneath his cloak. To Nothing, his mind felt similarly. All this killing was clearly not good for him. Why had Justice and Logic done this to him? Justice? Where was the justice? Not here, certainly. Not in him; this couldn't be justice. And not in the world, anymore. His own idiocy had seen to that. Justice had been a friend, and now Nothing had killed him. Whose fault was that? His. No, not his. The other gods'. Justice had only sent him on this mission as their emissary, after all. No, he was to blame, too, for carrying out his crimes, but the other gods had some hand in it, too. They ordered him to destroy other deities in their name. In the name of Justice. An unforgivable sin.
They must be destroyed, he thought.
And so Nothing, bloated with an excess of godly power and uncontrollable emotions, envisioned himself back in the meeting hall of the gods, and, with a sickening metaphysical lurch, was there. After taking a few moments to stabilize himself and recover from the multitudinous shouting match going on in his mind, Nothing summoned the other gods to him, with the promise that he had fulfilled his duties and had come back to report.
The gods appeared. The time frame over which they appeared is not important, relevant, or applicable. That they came with more than a hint of dread in their hearts is important, however; they were baffled as to why Nothing was summoning them when nothing had changed and the world was just as it was before.
They appeared of course, nevertheless. A summoning of the gods was never refused without reason, and, on the contrary, they had every reason to attend.
Nothing stood before them when they arrived, looking small and insignificant in his travel-worn cloak and formless visage. The gods all stared eagerly at him for news of what had befallen, but were too polite (and diffident) to address him directly, until finally, when all the gods had arrived, Nothing threw off his cloak.
The gods screamed, and several left the room immediately. What was beneath the cloak was too large to be contained by it. The being formerly known as Nothing now had seven faces and fourteen arms attached to a body which, fully taken into consideration, was some eighteen feet tall and spanned at least two-thirds that length from hand to hand (pick any two on opposite sides of the body). He wore, of course, the faces of the seven other gods that he had absorbed: Justice, Logic, War, Famine, Pestilence, Hatred, and Destruction. Each constantly engaged in muttered conversation with its headfellows, occasionally breaking into a wordless scream of frustration or despair, and they were on separate necks which constantly jostled with the others for position, War in particular often bashing his helmeted head against the others, eliciting more screams than anything else.
And then, almost immediately, the writhing and muttering and screaming stopped and all seven heads looked at every god in attendance at once and spoke, in unison, words which cannot be related in this language.
And all the gods present withered to nothing, and Nothing grew. It is likely that a few escaped, and survive to this day under other forms, but the vast majority of the Old Gods were assimilated by Nothing that day, and godhood as humans know it was changed forever.
Nothing, glutted to his fullest, sank to the ground and fell into torpor, whispering in his many voices as he drifted off to sleep, "now I am the God of Everything…"
Nothing slept. Mankind evolved. Wars quickly broke out like wildfires and died out just as slowly, empires rose and fell, technology and culture evolved (some would say progressed), and thousands of years passed by as Nothing integrated the other gods into his own being. Without the unconscious guidance of the gods, the world grew increasingly instable. Over time, wars became more and more frequent, class divisions grew wider and more numerous, and the lowest of the low, the peasantry and menial laborers, were trodden underfoot until it would seem they were no longer even seen as human. Slavery took root.
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[and here, due to extreme sadness and self-disgust at the pretentiousness and crappiness of my writing, I stopped in mid-paragraph. Thirty pages is the most I can write without some kind of outside motivation, and my writing's been going so embarassingly crappily lately that I haven't even shown it to my girlfriend for twenty pages or so. Please comment.]
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