Let There Be Light: Sc.02


                                            >Sunrise on a new world.

                                            >You roll in your bed to look out the window.

                                            >Glass protects you from the elements, a comfort that probably will not be replicated on this world in dozens of thousands of years.

                                            >It will be a long time until there’s any glassmakers, after all.

                                            >There was something peculiar about the sky here. It seems almost too clear.

                                            >Not just the obvious clarity brought on by a cleaner atmosphere, either

                                            >The creeping blue seems stuck to the sun’s progress, not something that diffuses through the sky as morning creeps into day.

                                            >Plenty of stars are still visible to the west, out which your window looks.

                                            >More than you’ve ever seen, even with sunlight washing things out.

                                            >It’s the little things that remind you that this is still a world in progress.

                                            >Something else is wrong though, a different sense is alerting you.

                                            >What is that smell?

                                            >It almost smells like…

                                            >Something’s burning.

                                            >This gets you out of bed immediately.

                                            >What is it, where could it be?

                                            >You don’t feel any heat, you don’t hear any flames, you don’t see-

                                            >Ah.

                                            >Just through the door to the north-facing great room.

                                            >The Empress stands there, staring out the huge wall of pure glass, itself two sides angled slightly outward to overlook the sights beyond.

                                            >A good thirty or forty feet separate you two, but there’s nothing to circulate the air in here.

                                            >So her mane and tail do actually create the scent, it’s not just an illusion.

                                            >The Empress-

                                            >Noire.

                                            >Her name is Noire.

                                            >Noire seems very focused on something to the north.

                                            >You stretch, fail to stifle a yawn, then wander yonder.

                                            “What’s up?”

                                            >”The sun.”

                                            “Chicks aren’t supposed to make dad jokes, that’s a guy thing.”

                                            >”Is that how you wish it to be on this world?”

                                            “Actually, nah, the chicks can have them this time.”

                                            >“That can be arranged.”

                                            “We should really open a window. You have a way of filling a room.”

                                            >She flicks her tail and resettles her large wings against her sides. “I would advise against it.”

                                            >You continue towards one of the doors set into the glass halves of the north wall.

                                            “Why not?”

                                            >”There is something wrong with the geography of this place.”

                                            “Ah, whatever, it’s not like I’m going to suddenly fall off-”

                                            >As soon as you open the door, you’re sucked out onto the porch by a huge pressure differential, which then rips away what little grip you have as wind shoves you further down along the exterior wall.

                                            >It slams you against the wall a few times, knocking the wind from your lungs.

                                            >Ironic, you think.

                                            >Shame we didn’t put any railings on this porch, your mind continues, as you’re thrown around the corner and are suddenly sailing through the air, watching the house you built – or directed the construction of – grow smaller at an alarming rate.

                                            >Beyond it, the cliffs of the fjords you carved out with a gesture, taller on the far side, loom.

                                            >You haven’t been here for twenty-four hours, and you’re going for a terminal flight.

                                            >A black mote launches from the house, then starts to grow larger.

                                            >Noire’s wingspan is truly impressive, but she may have made her wings even larger to catch the absurd wind propelling you along, to go even faster than you.

                                            >The wind can’t keep up forever though, it’s gotta slow down when it reaches-

                                            >Say, weren’t the hills you appeared among taller than the geography you personally defined?

                                            >An orange glow surrounding you is your only warning as you slam into the first one, throwing you skyward.

                                            >Up to the elevation Noire assumed, and she clutches you with all four legs, then pitches a wide arc in the hellish gale to start flying back to the house.

                                            >”As I said,” she intones, somehow perfectly clear over the shrieking gusts, “there is something wrong with the geography. Just before sunrise, it seems to channel some great force of air moving up the… fjord, you called it. It deflects off the larger cliffs across and races over this lower, flatter land, past our dwelling. The geometry of the angled northern wall deflects it, so it is not a structural issue, but does make exiting during the morning dangerous.”

                                            “You couldn’t stop me?”

                                            >”I did warn you.”

                                            “I mean like, hold me in place!”

                                            >”It was a useful experiment.”

                                            “What?!”

                                            >You shout over the wind she carves through with little visible exertion, though you’re less and less sure you need to.

                                            >”I knew you would not come to harm.”

                                            “How?!”

                                            >”I only constrain myself to linear time for your convenience.”

                                            “Then why did you need to conduct an experiment?”

                                            >She lands on the porch – while still carrying you with all four legs, which you now realize do not feel at all like horse’s legs – and walks back inside without issue, closing the door you left out of with apparently little effort.

                                            >Her summer-night’s-air-campfire smell only returns when the wind no longer affects either of you.

                                            >A little experiment for you too, you suppose.

                                            >She lets you to the ground gently – while remaining standing on all four hooves – then returns to her spot of contemplation before the vast windows.

                                            “Was that difficult for you?”

                                            >”Was what?”

                                            “Catching me. Did that require some deal of effort?”

                                            >”A bit. I also limit myself spatially and physiologically for your convenience, as well.”

                                            “So was it a little up to chance? Might I have died out there?”

                                            >”No. I would not have limited myself, if that were so. You must not be harmed.”

                                            “And whether you would have had to or not is informed by your… whatever you call your whole self’s awareness of all time.”

                                            >”That is correct.”

                                            “So you could have not acted, giving you the future that reveals to you the results of your little experiment, and then acted to prevent the experiment, and still have known its outcome.”

                                            >”Yes.”

                                            “And you still let it happen?”

                                            >When she looks back at you, you can make out a grin on her dark features. “Some timeline or another must resolve. Why not one with a little excitement?”

                                            “Am I just a toy to be played with, then?”

                                            >You advance on her, and she shrinks back.

                                            >No, she just seems to shrink, period. She was a very similar height to you, you remember, and now you’re looking down at her slightly.

                                            >For her part, she looks genuinely shocked.

                                            >Maybe she doesn’t know EVERYTHING.

                                            “Are you doing that on purpose?”

                                            >No, she’s not smaller. Or at least, you’re not looking down at her now.

                                            >”I- I do not-”

                                            “Do you know what I’m thinking?”

                                            >Her eyes dart between yours for a few moments, but the shock slowly clears from her face. “You are an anomaly. You are not part of my realm. The only knowledge I have of you is what you reveal.”

                                            “But whatever I reveal at any point in time, past present and future.”

                                            >Her eyes narrow a little. “That is correct.”

                                            “Do I reveal what I’m thinking right now?”

                                            >”N- Yes. No.”

                                            “But because I just thought about doing it, you know. And I won’t now, but you still know.”

                                            >She doesn’t respond, instead looking back out the window.

                                            >But you can see her reflection in the glass, and she doesn’t look happy, but neither does she look angry. No, you think you know how to read that expression, even on an alien face.

                                            >Can a god be conflicted?

                                            “You can game out every possible future to respond to me and that way coax out every answer you’d be able to squeeze from me in any situation and then pick the best one for your interests, still knowing the rest. If you’re going to stake my LIFE on those games, even if I trust you to make good decisions with it, how can I possibly cooperate in whatever it is you do? Would you not be making this world yourself, just bouncing it off me, like my brain is a quaint little box filled with ideas to pick and choose at your leisure?”

                                            >You throw your hands up, then turn around to go back to your room.

                                            “But you knew all this already, obviously.”

                                            >Halfway back to your room, she finally responds. “Do you think this was an optimal exchange?”

                                            >You turn back mid-stride.

                                            “What?”

                                            >”Do you think that conversation just now went the way I would have liked it to go?”

                                            “It went that way, didn’t it?”

                                            >”I do not know what you were thinking.”

                                            “I was thinking about how small I feel under all your power and-”

                                            >”No, not about this conversation. What you asked before. When you asked if I knew your thoughts.”

                                            “Then why did you say yes, before I changed my mind?”

                                            >”Obviously it was a poor decision to answer that way. Can you tell me, now? I am not asking you to, just if you could.”

                                            >You finally properly turn towards her, then rub your face.

                                            “Uh, no. I forgot. It was a passing thing.”

                                            >She turns to look back at you again, and again smiling, but it’s not a happy one. “I knew that you would forget. That is all.”

                                            >You sigh, then fold your arms and walk to her side.

                                            “Did you ask that question because you knew it would fix things?”

                                            >She is silent once more, then steps back from the window, looking over her reflection. “I think we have had enough questions, for now. Something I do know of your thoughts; I know you don’t know why I took this form.”

                                            >You look over her body yourself – the real thing, not her reflection – and reach for one of her wings, but think better of touching it.

                                            “Is the universe horse-shaped?”

                                            >”No more questions, please. I cannot convince you with answers.”

                                            “You said you couldn’t read my mind.”

                                            >”You already told me, in so many words.”

                                            “Alright, fair. I was curious why you look like that, yeah.”

                                            >”You tell me, some time from now, when we are establishing the life that will come to populate this world, that you find it appealing. I do not know why; it is nothing like your own form. You do not seem to know why yourself. I thought maybe it was self-establishing, that you admired it because it was my form. Yet, no matter how I saw the many paths, I always end up with this form, every time.”

                                            “So even an Empress is bound by the whims of her lowliest subject.”

                                            >”I would like you to use the name you gave me.”

                                            “Do I acquiesce to your desire for me to?”

                                            >She closes her eyes. You can almost hear her decide against scolding you over another question. “Sometimes. Usually.”

                                            “This time? The time that’s actually going to happen? In the timeline that ‘must resolve’?”

                                            >Maybe tweak her just a little more.

                                            >Probably not a good idea, but she did indicate that you have to stick around some time later to tell her you like how she looks, and you haven’t yet, so you’ve got some life left to live.

                                            >”An Empress is always bound by the whims of her ‘lowliest subjects’, when she cares about those subjects’ happiness.”

                                            >You sigh again, then unfold your arms to rub your face with both hands, then turn to walk towards a chair.

                                            >She looks over at you suddenly, half-extending a wing towards you, but you’ve already reached the chair you wanted and are starting to drag it back to her.

                                            >She regains her composure when you spin it at her side, then sit in it backwards, staring out the window to the northern side of the cliffs. The sky above them is slowly trending towards dark grey, like a storm is coming.

                                            “I guess my happiness limits your choices, then. Alright, Noire, I’d like to hear what’s on your mind about, uh, my mind.”

                                            >”You are a curious thing. Much of this is due to your complicating nature, but some of it is a trait shared by much life that comes to follow. You ask for a world of creatures that not only can think, but that can think about thought, like you can. Self-awareness. They are all opaque to me, bundles of self-reference and constantly shifting. This is important, you insist.”

                                            “Free will.”

                                            >”That is what you call it, yes.”

                                            “And this limits your choices.”

                                            >”I could find ever-more-elaborate ways to influence you, but starting with this conversation you always realize it, or at least suspect it strong enough to make yourself miserable. And this conversation could never be avoided. It happened for the same reason this geography has caused the unpleasant conditions leading to it.”

                                            >She gestures to the offending cliffs with one wing. A storm definitely seems to be gathering above them, but it’s moving east, starting to obscuring the rising sun. “You wanted that cliff there.”

                                            “Which leads to the wind, to me being blown away in your “experiment,” to this confrontation, that yeah, I figure you wouldn’t think is a good way for things to turn out. Because if you just held me in place, that wouldn’t have been my decision.”

                                            >”You are not an instrument of my will; I am one of yours, at least here in this place. Because that is as I wish it, yes, but I still wish it so. I cannot give you any guarantee of that, Anon, but I can only ask you trust me. Whether you actually do or not, I will never know, because just as you do not know how I choose my words, I cannot know how you choose yours.”

                                            “Unless I tell you.”

                                            >”If you are honest.”

                                            >Your turn to be silent, as you chew on the ramifications.

                                            >So you do get whatever comes after free will, but only because you convince Noire to allow them it, and you have to take her at her word here and now it works out as it does.

                                            >What does it feel like, to relinquish control over your creation? To watch it spin out on its own, with only its initial course set, a few variables fixed but the rest left up to forces beyond your control?

                                            >What does it feel like to have it subject to forces beyond your control, when you control all forces?

                                            “Can I ask another question?”

                                            >”Yes. I am sorry for earlier. Please, ask.”

                                            “Does it ever get so bad you can’t deal with it?”

                                            >She looks at you, searching your expression. “Eventually I quit this world. Free will means they choose their own destiny. Once I am sure things progress to the point that choice is meaningful, I watch it from afar.”

                                            “And quit your current form too, I imagine. Back to the cosmos.”

                                            >”I cannot respond to that without altering your judgment.”

                                            “I can’t trust you if you keep things from me like that.”

                                            >She shakes her head. “Your will is only free when the future is unknown. If you know what’s coming, it changes how you act, and that makes things hard for me, who only knows the variety of outcomes to your decisions.”

                                            “Do I tell you that?”

                                            >She looks like she’s going to nod or shake her head in answer, but instead instead freezes.

                                            “Yeah, sorry, I guess that was sort of a trick question.”

                                            >”I have already told you much I should not have.”

                                            “I guess you had to. Which is proof that you’re bumbling around this just as much as I am. Questions probably were a bad idea after all. Alright, Noire. I trust you.”

                                            >She relaxes her whole body all at once, letting out a breath and smiling. From her ears to her wings to her tail, every part a little less rigid. You didn’t notice her tension until it left her.

                                            “So we’re still following your plans for our partnership?”

                                            >She tenses up again, just a little bit, but relaxes once more. “I- no. We are how I’d like us to be. I am not someone who is used to having to plan, Anon. It is not a habit of mine; that is for those who cannot simply, how might you understand this, remember the future. But you… you make things difficult. I may have to start.”

                                            “I’d rather you didn’t. I want to see what divine spontaneity looks like.”

                                            >”If that is your will, I will do my best to be… spontaneous.”

                                            “That’s the spirit.”

                                            >She closes her eyes, then frowns. “Hrm. No. Maybe that is not a good idea.”

                                            “And don’t do that. No, uh, remembering. Is there a way to cut yourself off from that?”

                                            >”What do you mean?”

                                            “We used to have a little paradox back home. “Can God create a rock so heavy He cannot lift it?”

                                            >”Perhaps my analogy was lacking. Surely you understand that memories are something you must already possess in order to remember.”

                                            “Well, that’s the trick. One of the answers of the paradox was “Yes He can, and then He would lift it anyway.”

                                            >”It may be possible. I could try to, hrm. Until remembering is no longer a problem, I could forget to remember.”

                                            “See, something like that.”

                                            >”I think I can.”

                                            “Think you can? Surely you’d know if you can or not. I mean, maybe you can’t, because if you could, you would have already have, since we ARE having this conversation-”

                                            >”No, Anon. I think I can. So perhaps I hadn’t yet because I forgot to.”

                                            “And everything before now-”

                                            >”I had forgotten to forget.”

                                            >You spin in your chair to sit the right way, back against the rest, looking into the large room you’ve specified occupy one end of your new house.

                                            “This is making my head hurt.”

                                            >”I am surprised one such as yourself understands counterfactuals as well as you have already demonstrated. Is this something all self-aware creatures share?”

                                            “I guess. Some of them. Maybe the ones that are smart enough.”

                                            >”It is not unlike being able to see alternate paths, once one accounts for uncertainty. Perhaps self-awareness, free will, is its own form of divinity in miniature.”

                                            “That would be poetic.”

                                            >”I would not mind limiting myself to that form of projection. If, again, only for your convenience. If it causes problems in our process of creation, I could always touch things up after.”

                                            “Not for my convenience. So, as you said,  we can be how I’D like us to be.”

                                            >Finally, this smile once more has the warmth you remember from yesterday. “I would like to see what that means.”

                                            “I’ll take your word for it that you don’t already know. So how about we fix our fuck up yesterday. Can we do away with that cliff?”

                                            >You turn back, and indicate it with a sweep of your hand.

                                            >Even as you do, it’s simply… erased. Lagging just behind your hand’s motion.

                                            >An ocean is left in its place, grey and choppy with the moving stormfront.

                                            >But those clouds begin to dissipate almost immediately, calming the chop and turning that grey expanse, slowly but surely, blue.

                                            >From the house’s position, you can now see down to the shoreline you established on this side of the fjord yesterday, but rather than a sheer drop, it seems to have been retroactively eroded, leaving an impressive arrangement of hard-sand cliffs, large loose rocks, and a smooth beach, crowns of corals just offshore breaking up the surf.

                                            “Damn. Why didn’t you tell me it’d look so much more beautiful this way?”

                                            >”I am sorry, Anon-”

                                            >You look over to her, hearing a hitch in her voice.

                                            >The expression that finally-warm smile has turned to…

                                            >She’s awestruck.

                                            >”I… I must have forgotten.”