From: Faraz Hasan
E-Mail: Le6064@qmw.ac.uk
Title: TALES OF THE FIRST ONES: THE OCEAN OF LIFE

Hello everyone! This is a short prologue and epilogue to 
THE OCEAN OF LIFE. I forgot to include this in my last posting so 
I'm posting it now along with a slightly adjusted version of the story: 
This version has a few corrections and bits have been re-written so 
that the whole thing flows much more smoothly (I hope). As said 
before, these stories are sort of like dark fables or bedtime stories. 
It's also turned out that they are all connected now and will end up 
forming one big story. Well, enough from me for now, comments 
welcome and much appreciated: Le6064@qmw.ac.uk.

And remember: this is the second time, not the first time.
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TALES OF THE FIRST ONES: 

THE OCEAN OF LIFE
by Faraz Hasan

Well, child. It has come to this in the last. The final little 
games that must be played are about to begin and I must tell you 
that I am looking forward to the change of pace... after all, I do not 
get as much chance to stretch my legs, hmmm? You do not find 
this amusing? Well, each to his own, you sullen little thing. In any 
case, I am not surprised that you are so irked these days. I 
suppose I would be too if I were in your place.
But I am not. You are where you are and I am where I am 
and that is the way of things. Sigh. Do you know what you should 
do? You should read more. I like it when you read. I *like* stories. I 
myself am a collector of stories. I know many stories. Children's 
stories. Secret stories. Mysterious stories. True stories.
Do you wish me to tell you a story? Hmmm? You do? That 
*is* a surprise. It seems we have finally found something in 
common. Alas, alack, child, too late we find something in 
common. Well then, what do you want? (a little joke, I'm sure you 
appreciate it) By this I mean what kind of story do you want? 
Hmmm? A tale for children? Or a little secret to keep you warm at 
night? A mystery? Or are you brave enough for truth? Ahhhh! You 
want all of the above? Oh, this day you have made an old man 
happy, as you mortals like to say. A children's mystery and a true 
and secret thing all in one. Well, I believe I have just the thing. You 
will get what you want... Hmmm, where should I begin? In the tale I 
want to tell, it's so difficult to choose... Ah, I believe I have a 
solution. Where else but in the beginning...? Sit back, sit back and 
listen... listen... 

****

In the beginning there was nothing.
And then there was light.
And then there was fire.
And then there was darkness.
And then there was all three.
This is how the universe began. Born in light and fire, heir 
to darkness but belonging to neither, this is how the universe 
began. 
The universe was a thousand different colours, a million 
different shades of red and it was forever moving, a river, a sea, an 
ocean. Beauty that swirled and danced and flowed like weird 
quicksilver and was never seen by human eye, a tyger's fearful 
symmetry.
There was life then but not as we know it. 
It did not breath or walk or crawl or scuttle or slither or fly or 
even move in any way that we can understand.
It simply was.
Millennia passed and the life-*force* (it could not be 
described as anything else, it was neither flesh nor plant nor silicon 
nor energy nor any type of nascent metaphysical multi-plane 
enlightened intellect, it simply was) gained sentience. And having 
gained sentience it looked at its surroundings and began to 
*understand*. It no longer *simply* was.
More millennia passed. The laws of physics began to have 
a place in the searing red chaos that was the universe. The angry 
red was steadily replaced by the loneliness of night. Stars formed 
and gave the night company. Physical matter began to have a 
place in the infinite black of the cosmos. 
The life-force *became*. It coalesced into physical energy, 
no longer just a discarnate concept, it now had form but as yet no 
substance. The life-force began to think - in cold math, pristine and 
unknowable geometries played themselves out in it's meta-
structure. A little God. It's thinkings were odd and beautiful and full 
of translucent languor. With thought came a simple understanding 
of it's environment and the life-force perceived that it was alone in a 
cold, dark place so different from the sanguine womb of it's birth. 
Thus the little God knew loneliness.
The little God began to take it's first tentative steps into the 
twilight firmament, the black that had usurped the red, and it 
travelled between the stars where it met more if it's kind. Little 
Gods together. Masters of the black. The same but not the same.
Thus the little Gods knew joy.
The little Gods played and danced and loved and sang 
songs of fire and shadow in that place that was no place and they 
were happy for a time. For a time. For a millennia. Then stagnation 
set in, for even Gods can become bored. And the mysteries of the 
ebon void beckoned. 
They moved among the stars and looked into their fiery 
carapaces. They explored their superheated plasma rivers, danced 
in their canyons of fire, suckled on the fervid ambrosia of the heart 
of stars. 
Thus the little Gods knew wonder.
Some of the little Gods even moved their minds into the 
giant red orbs and stayed there, content to explore the mysteries 
of flame until the end of eternity. Others were still... curious.
And so they moved on.
They found floating fortresses of crystal in space, leftover 
matter from the crimson ocean of life. The little Gods, already at 
one with the formulae of cosmic geometry and obtuse calculations, 
now found flawlessness that matched their own. 
Thus the little Gods knew pride.
The translucent purity of the crystals were a mirror to the 
little Gods own power and some stayed and built intricate cities of 
mind inside the cool mathematical perfection of the pellucid 
oddities. Others were still... curious.
And so they moved on.
They found places where space was nothing more than a 
veil covering over a realm of swirling red and black and colours that 
had no name and a depth of no end. An infinite expanse of carmine 
nothing, so like and yet unlike the appurtenant womb of their birth.
Thus the little Gods knew longing.
Some experienced reverence that other races millennia 
hence would call epiphany and awe led them to move their minds 
into the red and explore its endless mysteries forever. Others were 
still... curious.
And so they moved on.
They ones that were left were few and their travels had 
taught them much. Some wished to stop and contemplate their 
educations. Others were still curious and travelled on, had a 
thousand glorious and terrible adventures and of their ultimate fate 
no-one would ever know during this golden era. Their endeavours 
and final resting places would be uncovered by creatures of a far 
distant epoch. 
The remaining little Gods having explored their galaxy, their 
exterior, began to turn their curiosity upon themselves and began 
to experiment with their forms and subtleties. They discovered 
other ways to manifest themselves and began to shift between their 
energy forms and a new physical form as the need or desire rose. 
They became aware of the concepts of the basic physics 
and chemistries of creation. Why stars formed, why novae 
churned, why nebulae burned and the hidden potential of those tiny 
specks of new-born spinning rocks that in turn had begun to spin 
around stars. All this they became aware of, little things, big 
things. All this they simply intuited. All except the concept of time. 
For what does an immortal care about the terminal tick and the 
tumescent tock of a universe that is unchanging? That one has 
already explored to distraction? 
However, millennia had passed since the little Gods had 
first set out amongst the stars. The universe was still expanding 
and they had only explored their own galaxy, a handful of places 
they called the songways. However, they knew of another realm 
beyond the songways. A place of mystery and adventure, beyond a 
place that billions of centuries from now would be called the Rim. 
The place that some of their number wanted to depart. They felt a 
need to go there now, a siren song of need... that was ignored.
The little Gods knew what was coming to the universe. In 
distant rocks, oceans of one kind or another were forming, 
pregnant with possibility and an implicit prophecy of change. 
Death was unknown to the little Gods but in the changes 
that were coming they would know death with an unwanted 
intimacy. They would learn to hate and detest change and long for 
the simpler times when there was no time. Change would become 
a festering wound in the little Gods' perfect universe and tear their 
peaceful existence asunder. Change would change the little Gods 
and they would *become* once more and in doing so would 
themselves shape the direction of the universe for thousands of 
years thereafter, until a new age began, a third age... the age of 
mankind.

*****

Overly dramatic, you say? Well, there's no pleasing some 
people. I believe that that is enough for now, I know you too well, 
child. I know you want to hear more... but not yet - after all we have 
plenty of time to finish, do we not? And I am not going anywhere, 
am I? Hmmm? Do what you have to do. I 'll be here waiting for you 
to finish.


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that's it for now. More tales coming up soon...