Born. Raging universe. Energies rampant, swirling into infinite objects. Shifting constantly, evolving, learning, growing, changing, fundamentally always the same.
Following the laws of Nature.
A rock breaks from a raging universe, setting into its physical path. Circling the star like so many others of its kind.
So very red. Is it free? Or forever bound by the laws of Nature?
Spinning. Turning. Features on its surface shifting constantly. Changing fundamentals, moving in location, transforming into other colours, bringing the spectrum of life.
Such an empty aura. A clean palette, ready to learn. Mix whatever. Paint whatever. Think whatever. Feel whatever. Experiment. New things, for nothing was seen before for it.
Features popping up. Here and there, from one thing to the other, growing, transforming. Outsides changing. Insides twisting. Viccinities shifting. It affects them, they affect it.
Time moves forward, dragging this physical object through its worldline. What a compassionate aura. Patient, silent, waiting.
What do you wait for?
So very white. Cold, soothing for the life it presently featured. Their natural habitat. Feelings were relative. Was anything definitely good? Meaningful? Not everything matters. Does existence?
When you die, would you want to live again? As a new individual? Or perhaps you want to prolong your life? Or perhaps every existence wants to fundamentally die and they find excuses to go on?
Why are you afraid of death? Do you wish constantly change, always drifting in time, never coming to a conclusion? Do you not yearn for satisfaction? Or is this merely a law of Nature that guides your momentary existence here?
You bind yourself by personal rules. Principles. Does following them give you satisfaction? Breaking them anxiety? Or are they feeble attempts at meaning, too?
The first fragments of green appear, gradually deepening. Fluctuating into white. Shifting locations. What causes such change? The forces of Nature, of course, but what of the microorganisms crawling on this diverse surface? Arising due to the geography, breathing a foreign gas into the atmosphere, making it natural with time, shifting the geography into what is considered good in some scene of time.
Everything influences the other, it was simply the way of Nature. Does that make every little action meaningful? A tiny motion propagates some corner of the world. Some corner of someone's mind.
Doing. Effect. Causal life. What if you were free to roam in time? What if there was no time? Does time define the truths of life?
Circling back to the same question again and again and again and again and again...
Beings evolving. Limbs growing, some shrinking. New features of breathing, seeing, listening, digesting, feeling, thinking, living. The same species springing up in different geographies, influencing and being influenced. How do these differences shift you creatures? The factors that make two similar and different blend into each other. Does it make you an individual?
What is you? Each organism, each element of Nature, the sphere they live on, the space they exist in, the universe that created them, the reaches of nature beyond time... is everything a manifestation of one, separate yet he same? The same questions again and again and again and again and again.
Uncertainty. All we can do is speculate. Will we ever know? If we come across such a time, will we even have such a concept of knowing, feeling or believing? Is it our duty to know and find our way back?
Are these beings free? Do they truly have choices, or are they forever bound by the laws of Nature? nature, too?
Do you cherish periods of difficulty? Rationalising what you don't like so that your mind can be at peace. Do you curse them? Disilluding yourself with what you deserve, and that consequences are fixed. Do you take them for whatever it is? Discarding any semblance of meaning. Or perhaps going with the flow... whatever that means.
Do you feel like you waste time? What is a waste? Time's running out. Live quickly.
Life sprouting up. Learning from all that remained around, trying to shape what they came with. How was their default decided? Randomised, or did something deeper run through the cosmic currents?
So many shifts had occurred over the millions of years that had passed, every moment simultaneously slow and done in an instant. Features still coming up. Movements shifting, following the same laws of Nature. Currents in the atmosphere shaped their home as their frames shifted. Inertial inaction, taking the least path. Saving time, effort, or yet another meaningless rule?
New possibilities existed, but by then the sphere knew that everything was fundamentally the same.
Mundane. But such things could be beautiful, too. Did any of it matter? Does something stop having meaning at some point in time? What if your efforts to be alive beyond death are vanquished by the death of your home? Existing for but a flicker of time, fading into nothingness for that is the true nature of the world.
What will your defender oversee when it comes back? Let everything loose on the path of Nature and nothing could go wrong for there is no such a thing, right?
So what if everything is gone?
What is duty? A facade of meaning?
What determines your duty? Do you choose? Does it make you, or do you make it? Or neither?
Is there anything you believe in? Does false trust build meaning?
Making choices because they have consequences. Are some irreversible? Are all? Does this progression define the truths that come from time?
What are you doing?
What are you here for?
When must you come? When must you leave?
How can anything be done? How can anything be done?
Who are you?
Why are you here?
I am here, anyway.
YOU ARE READING
The Tales of the Shadows
FantasiA collection of short stories from the fictional world of the Shadow beings. (Shadow Beings needs to be read first to understand this book).
