_____???_____
It all started with a rough eternity at work. It was nothing, really- it was something he was used to by now. He hadn’t started his work with expectations in the first place, anyway. It was just. Work. Nothing more. But for the first time, he was starting to feel something for what he had worked hard to create. Worked so hard to maintain. It had been fun while it lasted, but all things had to end.
The planet was gone, he thought disappointedly. It wasn’t gone yet, not technically, but it soon would be, and to him it barely made any difference. He sighed again. It was his original work, too.
A lucky piece of work. He wasn’t the best at maintaining worlds, but he wasn’t half bad, and even to him, such an interesting planet was rare.
There were only a few ways to save his tiny world.
One involved plenty of resources, resources he wasn’t willing to waste, not when the planet only held sentimental value. It would barely fetch anything if he sold it. His Ama would probably yell at him if he used up his allowance for something so petty.
The other way was to do a Reveal, and to create an Interference- that would turn the world into the average, boring product, he thought to himself. Pass.
And there was another way- but wait. Maybe he should just turn Earth into another ‘normal world’. It was ‘unique’ right now, but who cared about unique; and Ama would be glad if he sold the thing. She always jabbered on about him having no ‘professional work ethics’, if he sold Earth he could show her.
But no. He didn’t want to have to listen to that foul creature, besides-
“Oh! Interesting!”
He looked curiously at the young female Homo Sapiens that had materialized in front of him. She was standing there with a bewildered expression on her face- he wondered if she had done something to come to his dimension. The only way possible was magic. But the Aurons couldn’t have started yet... A wild thought entered his mind- did Earth discover magic on its own? No, no, that wasn’t possible. He smiled at his own ridiculous antics before opening his mouth to ask, intrigued.
She was probably from Earth. English it is.
“Why are you here, child? And where is my book?”
“It’s here.” The girl tilted her head. Ah, an answer. Damn, he got the language right. The girl spoke pretty confidently, he noticed. She either didn’t believe in anything that was happening, or she was too young to understand. “I have it. I…” He waited and watched as the girl opened her backpack and took out something that looked very familiar.
My journal! He thought. So that was why. He wasn’t disappointed- magic wasn’t due on Earth until a micro-click later, which was nothing to him, but was probably something for human beings. Naturally the girl didn’t come to him on her own. When he summoned his journal, the girl must have been swept along with his stuff, he thought. Case closed. However, the human wasn’t done talking.
“I want something from you.” The girl said, looking expectant.
And there it was.
All human beings were greedy- no, it wasn’t limited to humans. All beings were greedy. From beings lower than them, they wanted to plunder- from beings higher than them, they wanted to steal. If they could, they would.
The being didn’t feel angry. He only felt a little surprised. He hadn’t expected such a small, weak but sentient being to be brave enough to voice their desires in his presence. But the less one knows, the less one fears, he summarized. It must be because the thing was young. But the bigger surprise was left to come.
“It’s written in this book here. The apocalypse. I want to know… is it real?”
He was surprised. So she did understand what was happening after all! And she did believe- if not, why would she ask such a question? As he nodded, the girl, not shaken in the slightest, continued her question.
“What will happen in the apocalypse? Why? What is the apocalypse?”
Interesting.
A little human pup, wanting knowledge. Did she have no idea that knowledge and insight were one of the most valuable things one could possibly offer? Or did she ask for such a thing regardless?
He thought over a few things, sitting on a stone stool. It was an expensive antique in the human world, being carved by the Romans. As he tapped his feet lightly on the ground, small pieces of dust scattered onto the ground, creating dust clouds, only to condense in tiny orbs too small to see with the naked eye. The air sparkled as light was generated from the orbs. Some turned dark as if to drag in other matter, some turned brighter before ending with a colorful tiny explosion.
The girl already read his journal, so she already knew most of what was happening anyway, he grouched. She even knew about the apocalypse. He had written his last entry in the language of the humans, that must be how. He shouldn’t have. He didn’t break any rules, did he? He wondered. Damn it all.
If the Aurons knew of this matter, it wouldn’t be pretty. He would be in serious trouble because of a single fuckup. No unauthorized direct interference, no intervention, as were the rules. He had even listed the world of Earth as a white universe, so there was no getting himself out of this one.
Maybe he should just kill the girl, and nobody would know-
He snatched the book away from the girl’s outstretched hands, laughing at himself again. Now that would be an even bigger fuckup. Ama would screech at him for multi-s if she knew.
“No killing ittle-bittle humans.” He mimicked. The human in front of him looked alarmed, and with her tiny stature she better be so, he judged, but he didn’t fucking care about what she thought.
It wasn’t as though humans on Earth were important, anyway.
Oh! Now that was a nice idea. He must be a genius.
He up-righted himself from his slouched position to sit up better on his stone stool- he had forgotten where he had left his fifteen sofas- and snapped his fingers. It didn’t take him a couple of seconds to quickly find an empty chair and whip up a couple of cupcakes.
“Sit here,” he snapped. Unlike his grim tone, his eyes sparkled.
The girl seemed to be cautious, but still obeyed. He smiled. Now that was the perfect solution!
He just needed to shove all of his problems onto this unlucky human! She looked young, he thought privately. Tiny. Well, the younger the better, wasn’t that his Abou’s advice? It would be awful if he gifted a human who died after only a few micro-clicks. This one looked as if it could last at least fifty years. Maybe? He wasn’t sure about human age.
Her voice had a very responsible tone so she could be older, but nah, what the hell. She would do well saving the world, he judged. Polite too, albeit more careful than what was ideal. Responsibility and politeness didn’t always equal pushover but a lot of the time, it did. And all heroes were pushovers. It was what the world needed.
Maybe his Earth didn’t have to die. The Aurons would be pretty freaked out over it, but heroes were a normal thing. Everyone did it on a daily basis. It wouldn’t matter if he did it for once. Who cared about what his Ati thought.
“The apocalypse,” he began, “Is basically when your human race will be fucked up. Around-” he stopped, trying to remember how much time was left until then.
After two years? Around then. And there is no way to stop this.”
“I-” the girl opened her mouth as if she wanted to talk, but he didn’t let her.
“Eight years old, fucked up parents, dead grandma, and-” He took a deep breath before exclaiming, “Wow, girl! Your soul is stronger than I thought!” He looked appreciatively at the specimen in front of him, who looked mildly uneasy. The more deprived of love, the better. Made them easy to please. She would be perfect! He thought to himself, not realizing he had said the last sentence out loud.
“For what?”
“You’re basically fucked up anyway. Vicious stepmom, you ransacked your dead grandma’s house, stole all of her cash and gold, and you’re trying to get to a police station to get back home, aren’t ya?” He smiled even bigger, showing off his beautiful smile. The girl looked almost alarmed.
“Nothing much. Just a simple little mind reading from your God!”
“Now, since you wanted something so veeeeeery much~” He stopped for a while as if deliberating on what to give her.
“You can have a prize!”
“A prize?” The girl asked, as if confused.
“A prize!” He chortled to himself. He was sure he had it somewhere- oh! Found it. He dug into his pocket, where fingers touched upon something cold and circular. There it was. He tossed the gold coin over to the girl, who caught it. Her eyes widened.
“Is this real-”
“Now, it was Second Street you were going to, right? Not bad. It’ll still collapse in a couple of months but it’ll stand up till then. Not as bad as the hospital areas, with the mass zombie infestation. Just gotta be careful around there.”
The girl didn’t let go of the object in her fist. Her eyes started to wander across the floor, looking at the many gold coins and jewels that were lying on the ground. A greedy little thing, wasn’t she?
“And schools and small neighborhoods tend to be places filled with children and old people. They catch the virus easily, so I recommend you to live somewhere else. Maybe in the big city, where there will be plenty of people with gifts! Gifts from God!”
“I can take you to one, what do you say?” He waited.
The girl hesitated. Take the deal, take the deal, he thought to himself. Or steal something from his floor. Then the girl would be free estate. Then he could impose the Rules on her. It wasn’t her fault, he thought. She did have it real bad, pitiful thing. But that was just life!
He even gave her a gift! He certainly wasn’t the bad guy here!
The reply that came back was something he hadn’t expected.
“God isn’t real.” The girl pointed at him. “You are lying.” She said clearly. “If you are God, prove it.
“Besides, If you are an all-powerful God, why don't you perform more miracles to make everyone happy? Maybe make the supposed apocalypse disappear? ”
Not this again. God, god, god. That was how he had introduced himself to the child, he realized. He had thought it would make it easier for her to accept his existence, and also maybe put some respect into the thing while he was at it. Apparently, he had just created another cringe-worthy moment for himself. Humans. He grumbled. They expected him to do all the hard work.
“I didn’t ask for humans to make the Bible and all that shit either, okay?” he snapped. “Just fucking say yes.”
“You’re mean.”
Humans could be so very annoying. His face contorted into a frown. Arghhhh. The little girl looked at him for a while. Was that- a smirk? It was the same face his Ati made. Cheeky little fuck.
“I don’t want- whatever this is.” the girl said. She was wary of him, he realized. Fuck. “And-”
She stood up, and waved her hands around in the air. “Thank you for sharing with me your information, but I do not require anything more. Please send me back now. I didn’t mean to come here, you see.”
Damn it, damn it! “Yeah, fuck, bye.” He waved a hand in the air and the girl melted into the surroundings, disappearing from view. Her eyes were large and confused as she disappeared, the shiny metal piece still in her fist.
He was going to get an earful anyway, he thought to himself. If he was going to make a hero, why not just go all out? Who said there had to be only one hero? And- he brightened up. Fuck it! If he was going to be yelled at anyway, he might as well do the whole package. The world would take some time to link up. The system was going to take some time to upload- the girl should be linked up first, as well as the others, of course. The rest could be done slowly.
He put a hand into his long silky hair, driving it back from his forehead. Urgh. He groaned. Right. He almost forgot. He actually had to do the procedure. He needed to wire it up with that old project of his, along with a couple other chores: setting up jobs, settings, power magnitude- his head hurt from all of the thinking.
And he was back to boring work shit again. He sighed. It almost made him want to speak to that tiny human thing. Anything to stop work.
Maybe he should let Earth end, if only to decrease the amount of stuff he needed to do.
“Etol?”
Hearing a voice, Etol stood up straight, looking over his entire room in complete panic. Was it that time of the year already? Time went by too quickly- Oh, right! He fucking forgot to clean, fucking damn it! Ama was going to be so mad-
“Etol, answer me!”
Fuck everything. Etol allowed the call to go through. There was a screech.
Etol slumped back onto his stone stool, grouching. “Yes, Ama.” he mumbled dejectedly.
