At first, there was nothing; at first,
I did nothing. There was nothing to to. Before long, doing nothing
became tiresome, so I began to ponder. But, of course, pondering had
its limits, for there was nothing to ponder about. So when pondering
became monotonous, I began to explore. This came with its own set of
benefits and disadvantages; no matter how long I searched, I found
nothing, and it seemed there truly was nothing. I searched for
a long time, longer than I had cared to ponder, although, my
perception of time was skewed at best: There was no way to measure
time, nor was there certainty that time itself existed.
When I became disinterested in
searching, I soon came to the realization that despite the fact that
there was nothing, but there didn't have to be. I had found two
things to do already, was it not possible for me to create something
to do? I searched, but with a purpose this time: I searched for a
means of creation. I must have searched for a long time, but of
course this passed me by. With eyes for my new target, I began to
notice things. I noticed tiny clouds, barely distinguishable from the
possibly infinite black surrounding them.
These clouds were the most
interesting thing I had ever seen, as they were not nothing,
therefore they were something. I observed them for a long time: I now
measured time by their sporadic movements. This was not the best, nor
the most accurate way to tell time, but now time was sure to exist,
and I could now see events, their causes, their effects, and their
length; the cloud moving as a whole to its unspoken and possibly
undetermined destination seemed to be a much slower process than,
say, small parts of the cloud breaking away and rejoining. There soon
seemed to be an abundance of clouds, each of them made up of millions
upon millions of tiny particles, I had observed, when there used to
be merely dozens. This gave me my most radical idea yet: If these
clouds became from nothing, could I not create from nothing as well,
or perhaps use the clouds to create? My urge to make something out of
the infinite nothing began to grow to the point of passion.
With an even newer and more
ambitious target, again I searched on. In some places, the
concentration of clouds seemed more dense than elsewhere, and
sometimes, multiple clouds had joined to make a denser, larger cloud
– These, I kept my attention on. I noticed something else whilst
exploring – something else entirely. Where the clouds were large
and many, there seemed to be a pressure. A pressure that was surely
not coming from the clouds, and which seemed to always come down to a
pinnacle at a certain point in space.
It was at these points I observed
the particles that made up the clouds slowly appearing, seemingly
from nowhere. Perhaps there was another realm like this one
overlapping, and particles were coming through the weakest points of
the barrier that kept the entities of the two realms ignorant of each
other – or perhaps the entities in the other realm know of my
existence but I not theirs? If this was true, then where did the
material that makes up the other realm come from? Perhaps there was
no other realm, for if there was, would it not be a process such as
this that formed the contents of said realm? If this was true, there
could be infinite realms, each accidentally – or maybe purposefully
– forming the next? I took a moment then to admire how complex and
inquisitive my pondering had become. Whether or not it was possible,
probable or impossible other realms existed, these points of material
generation needed more examination than merely theoretical.
I began to interact with the
particles coming from these points. I caught them and held them, and
when they were many, I compressed them together. Many, many particles
compressed together seemed to make something very, very different
from the clouds, something that was not part of the infinite black,
but something palpable. Interested, I waited. I waited until
particles beyond counting – for it would take as long as the clouds
do to reach their destination – then I pushed them into each other,
making a very, very dense, solid object. This was far more dense than
many clouds that had joined, and far more solid than anything that
had ever existed. This was a material that was special – it needed
a name. After much pondering, I named it Rock, for only a sound so
dense and solid like the Rock itself could describe such a material.
After I had spent such a time
collecting tiny particles, the Rock continued my work. By itself, it
started to pull, a tiny force at first, other particles into itself.
It was soon surrounded by its own cloud, getting denser as it moved
towards to the rock. The cloud grew and so did the rock, attracting
clouds from further and further as it grew. Was a Rock the final
destination of the clouds, or were they merely misguided ghosts, the
only force moving them the momentum from the interactions of the
particles that make them up and from their creation?
The Rock grew and grew, with me
transfixed in pondering and observation. It grew to a strange shape
both long and wide, but some parts bigger than others, and when a
single part was denser or larger it attracted more particles.
Offended, I carefully evened it out into a perfect, round shape, even
on all sides, so that it could grow into a healthy, uniform shape and
not be burdened by parts of itself pulling the wrong amount of
particles in the wrong direction. I watched and pondered, and the
Rock grew and pulled.
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