• Chapter 1: Courage

    There once was an Eternal and Endless Nothingness totally separated from the Universe. Unlike the darkness of space and time, this Nothingness had form. Its shape was that of an infinite sea with no bottom or shore to border it. In this Nothingness stood a single small island teeming with life; lizards, palm trees, fireflies, and all, living in the brightness coming from the clean sky. Within all this live though stood just a single intelligent creature.

    This creature was that of a human, encased in a simple female body of only six years old. She had always been here since its creation. She had everything that a normal six year old girl possessed; a relatively simple mind full of emotions and wonder, a sense of hunger, fatigue, and pain, desires to avoid them and even a few simple clothes to protect her for a time. But, despite this all, she lived in a very strange circumstance. She was not born. She had never aged. She could not die. She had never seen another soul. She was alone, isolated at the center of endless ocean for all eternity.

    How must she feel, living with no purpose, meaning, or goal, unable to even end her own existence here? As millions of years passed, she did nothing but sleep on the shore and eat of what filled her. Slowly, her mind eroded into nothingness, emotions became non-existent, all the pain she felt became numb, and she never knew the experiences of any real sorrow or joy. Trillions of years went by like seconds, night and day cycled unto an endless and true Infinite like a wheel that could not be broken.

    Although her body had not died, her Soul already was; nothing came from it, nothing came in. No Love or Fear for anything in this world. That was True Death, for a Soul to have no meaning and purpose to Live, and to be forgotten eternally by the Universe as if you never had existed. This concept of her Death was absolute, nothing could revive her, and so it continued on. She was powerless to this all, a small child that could do nothing, not even think fully of what was happening to her. She was truly devoid of any life now.

    One day, an event happened that was not supposed to. She woke up with another person beside her. This person also had the body of a six year old, but unlike her, it was that of a boy’s. He had golden hair that seemed to shine white at the center, his face was dirtied from sleeping face down on the sand, but it seemed soft to the touch. His clothes were that of dense and light cotton clothing that was of dark blue and a very light brown. He now woke up, yawning slightly, and then opened his eyes to her. His light cyan eyes seemed to pierce right into her very soul despite seeming so gentle. They both looked at each other face to face, not even half a foot in length; she did not seem frightened or happy, as she no longer could feel those things. But he…, he was different.

    He opened and moved his mouth to her with sounds coming forth and she instantly understood the ritual’s meaning, despite never doing it herself, he spoke unto her, “Who are you?” Very slowly, she responded with perfect words of the same language, “I don’t know”. He examined her; curious on whom she was. She had pearl colored hair that was messed up, a cute and soft but dirtied face with gentle dark jade eyes that seemed to haunt him when he looked at them directly. Her clothes that had never been destroyed despite the long endless years looked like those of light colored cotton and silk, with white and pink gradient stripes to match her hair, although it too had been dirtied with soil. And with this examination, he asked gently, “What can I call you then?”

    She gave no response to this. After a few seconds, he persisted in knowing more about her and this world as he looked around. He asked various questions for her to answer. “Where are we?” he pondered. “A small island” she answered. “How did I get here?” he asked. She said slowly, “I don’t know.” “How long have you been here?” he asked. “Forever” she said truthfully, unable to know what a lie was. He was confused; he didn’t know what was going on, as he too was just in the body and mind of a six year old child. This place seemed so unfamiliar to him, he had no idea how he got here or even who he was before. He held his head in pain, trying to remember his past.

    For the first time in all these long years, the little girl did something that could never normally happen. She pondered a question….. “Who are you?” she asked the boy calmly. The boy released his hands from his head as if suddenly healed by the question, “I…..I’m…. My name is Vask…..” He was confused again, how did he suddenly know? The girl again did the impossible; she asked another question, “What’s a name?” Vask answered, “I…I don’t know.” There were many questions they now wanted answered, but they now had the time, for he too would be trapped in this place for eternity….

    For the next few days the boy named Vask attempted to adapt to the new home he had been given. He continued to ponder about many things; he looked around the island, trying to disconcert everything around him. The sky, the sand, the trees, the hills, the rivers, the creatures, and all else, he looked at with awe and wonder. To him, this was all new, as if he was just born. And so, many questions within his mind sprung forth as seeds budding into something that would grow endlessly. All-the-while though, the little girl followed him as he ventured from place to place, wanting to be as close to him as possible, although she did not know why. She had never “wanted” anything for a long time, so this was new to her. She pondered why she “wanted” anything, as there was no need for her to do so. In fact, she had never “needed” anything at all. So this was a concept that puzzled her to no end. For some reason, the boy’s presence made something grow inside her, although she had no idea what that something was.

    At first, the boy had been extremely fascinated by everything around him and by him. He pondered about many things around him; “Why does the sky change color?” “Why is there night and day?” “Why do I go back down when I jump up?” He also thought of why they were the way they were; “Why can we speak?” Why can we walk?” “Why can I think?” As he thought of answer for these questions, he started to wonder about the girl that followed him everywhere he went. He spoke out loud, “Why do you keep on following me?” She answered quickly, “Because I want to be near you.” This of course led to his following question of “Why do you want to be near me?” She answered slowly, trying with all her strength to know why herself, “I….I don’t… want you to go away. I’m…I’m afraid to be alone.” He saw how confused and in pain she was when trying to answer him, so he stopped. He didn’t want his curiosity to be answered if it meant another’s unwanted pain.

    To stop her pain, he started to hug her, although he had no idea how this was to help. He had not known what hugging symbolized of course, because he had never done so before. But, for some reason, he knew what to do to comfort her anyway. He hugged her tightly but gently at the same time, and said, “Its ok, you don’t need to answer me anymore if you don’t want to. I’m sorry.” She seemed confused at first, but slowly, she seemed to feel at ease and started to hug him back, also new to this ritual, but she did it anyway. She said softly, “Thank you…, thank you for coming to this place…”

    Somehow, her words had answered one of his earlier questions, the one about why him being here. For some reason, he had wanted to be here. At first this placed seemed wondrous, but for some reason, in the deepest parts of his mind, he also knew that he would never want to be here, given his choice. He did not know why he thought this, but knew it was fact. For some reason, he wanted to be here, but at the same time, he knew he would rather want to be anywhere but here. It seemed so self-contradictory, but he did not know this concept yet, so he was even more confused.