Prologue: The Creator’s Design

 

     A gentle voice drifted over nothingness, drifted over the stillness of the black background that contained nothing; no matter; no air; no water; just a silent milieu of nonexistence.  The voice-sweeter than honeycomb, stronger than dragon scales, lighter than feathers, more powerful than hurricanes, calmer than a mother’s coos, and with more authority than a king-filled the void with electricity.

     Suddenly streaks of energy filled the darkness, clapping together like rolls of thunder, shaking it like an earthquake until, after several moments, light entered.  Streams of pinks and purples and oranges more vibrant than any eye has ever conceived filled the blackness with character.

     The voice spoke again with emotions and gesture.  This time, white streaks of energy filled the area, causing more eruptions of thunderous sounds and earth-moving vibrations.  In these strikes were grey and blue and black streaks, assembling themselves like a weaver would his basket materials.

     Finally, a third time, the voice spoke.  A loud popping noise filled the void and trillions upon trillions of little gems appeared in various places, dotting the vacuum with twinkling lights, sitting in places where, if connected, made patterns of beasts and people and things that were not yet known.  And a large orange and red and yellow sphere set itself in proximity with some of the lesser twinkling lights, blazing with waves of auburn haze.

     As all these things transpired, the owner of the voice looked on at what he had accomplished so far, and he smiled; a plan formulating before his eyes…

*~*

     The large ocean of orange, which the owner of the voice named the Sun, sat in the void, waiting for something to do; something that would make it important.  The voice spoke again with the tone of a potter, deciding what to do with the clay he held.  A moment later, an expanse in the void was made, brown as the muddiest dirt yet to be formed.  With a wave of his hand, he placed an azure blanket over the sphere, calling it atmosphere.  The voice’s possessor moved his hand over the area and took the clay in his hands, moulding it into a perfect sphere like the Sun, and placing it three and ninety trillion vast regions from the blazing orange globe.

     The owner looked upon his ball of russet stone and picked it up again.  He spoke words of gravel to the plain sphere and stood upon its surface.  Minute green shoots like blades sprouted from the brown mass, waving to the owner as he walked amongst them.  Next the voice told the mass to become gathered and spring up both tall and little and from the single column to be borne several long and short poles from their sides.  These horizontal poles were to create thinner lines that bore green oblong or oval or star-like or irregular paper of ever-changing colours, gently dancing for the possessor of the voice as he walked under them.  Oak and fir and pine and willow and acorn and cedar and sycamore and walnut and maple and birch and fig and crab-apple, he created and set them across the land as protection from the rain and the Sun and the wind, and as homes for the creatures yet to be made.

     Next, the voice called for members of oranges and reds and greens and yellows and purples and pinks to be splattered on the lines of the tall columns and the little columns, calling these colours fruit.  There were to be fruit of every column, which he called plants, whether it was large, that he ordained trees, or little, those he named bushes.

     He then thought of what would eat the fruit that the trees and bushes supplied.  Waving his hand in the air, he called forth some of the blue colour from the atmosphere and formed, with his fingers a small body with two identical horizontal extremities, he called wings, and a vertical one at its end, called a tail.  He ran his hand down its back and formed blue and white and black feathers, given to the creature for flight and warmth and protection.  Then he threw the creature into the air and watched as it used its wings to fly through the sky above his head.  This animal he called bird; and he made many others in different colours and sizes and with different flight abilities; some able to fly with ease and others without such luxury.  To these creatures newly made, he commanded them to multiply after their own kind, and fill the mass of brown and green.

     As the owner of the voice observed the dispersion and lifestyles of the many species of birds, he thought of what would eat the fruit nearest the ground; since the birds tended to stay nearer the trees and eat the fruit thereof.  He produced putty from nothingness and bent and twisted it to a shape that pleased him; four vertical limbs, slightly longer in the back than the front but not fuller, and a thin tail with a plume on the end. Its back lean, with muscles rippling near its underbelly, and a thick neck, covered with a mass of light and dark brown and black and blonde and threads of white hair that appeared to make the creature of royal class, holding authority over the other animals yet to be created.  The owner placed his hand over the face of the beast and put his fingers near the eyes, drawing dark lines that made it seem capable of compassion and emotion.  This animal, he called king of all the creatures of the wild; and he created many more, male and female.  Like the birds, he commanded them to multiply and disperse and fill the terrain with their own kind.

     The owner then created smaller and larger animals, each holding a purpose upon the mass he called Htrae.  He told them to cover the surface of this new planet, creating their own kind and keeping the cycle alive for many ages.  And so all the creatures he made-now called lions and mice, giraffes and dogs, elephants and horses-all those that now live on the earth as we know it, with the exception of larger animals he called dinosaurs, he scattered them across the whole world with the same task.

     Finally, after looking upon his creations, the bushes and the trees, the birds and the beasts, and the fruit in the trees, the voice’s owner smiled.  A thought came to him and suddenly a mass of crystal clear water appeared over the earth.  This, he called ocean.  In addition, he created streams and rivers on the land masses, for the plants and animals to get their drink.

     In this ocean and rivers and ponds and lakes, he formed fish to swim and thrive and multiply there.  He created for the ocean, creatures in the deepest parts of the waters-whales and dolphins and sharks and manatees and narwhals and alligators and crocodiles and jellyfish and seahorse and starfish and oysters and clams-all of which played a part in keeping the waters clean and depleting scum accumulation.  As with the birds and the land beasts, he told all the sea creatures to multiply after their own kind to fill the vastness of the ocean he had created especially for them.

     As he walked along the shores of the ocean, admiring how the Sun above glistened off the water making it sparkle with an innumerable amount of gems, and through the many forests that harboured the different species of birds and amphibians and insects, he observed the beauty held in the shadows of the enormity of the many trees.  All this and more he beheld as he walked past all the things he had made on the planet he dubbed Htrae.  And still, he felt his task was not fully where it needed to be for him to feel rightly accomplished…

*~*

     How to describe the creation of perhaps the most glorious most privileged most honoured creature to roam Htrae.  How to comprehend the design of the form, the persona, the being of one never seen or known to others.  How but through the creator himself.

     The voice’s owner, walking again through the forests and the fields, stopped at a stream and wiped the soles of his feet with his hand, bringing the dust collected before him.  With the skilful hand of a potter, he moulded the dust into a form as his own, making it grow to stand before him.  The possessor of the voice placed his hands on the shoulders of the form in front of him and breathed into its nostrils; a great wind immediately whipping behind him and ripping the dust from the form.

     Now stood two men.  One the owner of the voice, and the other his greatest creation…Man.  Tall as the voice’s person, hair and eyes matching his colour, his skin only a shade darker from the dust; the man looked upon his creator as a child would a father.

     “I call you Mada,” the voice said to the Man.  “As you have come from the dust of Htrae on which you shall trod and live and tend.  Everything will you enjoy here: the animals, the trees, the streams, the ocean, the lakes, and the fruit.  You are lord over all moving things upon Htrae and shall call what you see by the name according to your wish and it shall be so.  For I have given you dominion over the entire land.”

     And so the Man and his creator walked the land and the Man went about naming what things he saw: the birds and the beasts and the plants and the fruit.  Mada became a guardian over the land and its inhabitants, the ocean and its inhabitants, and the sky and its inhabitants.  He observed and understood their ways and practices and lives as he did his own; for they shared the same ground upon which they lived and slept.

*~*

     It was during one of Mada’s observations of a herd of buffalo that the owner of the voice approached him.  Seeing the clear signs of loneliness written upon his creation’s face, the voice’s person breathed a calming, soothing, sweet smelling wind about Mada, causing him to lie on the ground by the stream where he was made.

     The voice’s body reached inside the Man’s bosom and broke a rib, bringing it out before him.  He elongated it and twisted it in the form of Mada, but slightly different, making it more delicate.  Once finished with his new creation, he set his finished masterpiece beside the sleeping Man, to be discovered when he awoke.  As he silently left the stream, the voice’s owner whispered in the wind, “And you I shall call Reraeb, for you shall be a giver of much life.”

     Shortly thereafter Mada awoke from his resting state and noticed the creature beside him.  Standing to observe its form and shape, he rested his cheek in his hand and thought, “What hath the creator bestowed upon me that was not made known unto me?”  Mada moved in his position and felt a difference in his side that he knew was not there when he first made to lie down.  He placed his hands where his ribs were and discovered one was missing from his right side; then glancing at the new creation as it arose from its place on the ground and stood beside him.  It was at this time that he saw the beauty in its eyes and face, shining like his own.  “You,” he declared, “shall I call Woman, for you hath come from mine side.”

     The creator, hearing all things, smiled as the Man and the Woman walked the garden, Mada teaching Reraeb the names of the animals and insects and plants he had already dubbed, and as she added to that unchangeable list.  When they disappeared from the human eye sight, the voice’s owner returned again into the heavens and sat upon his throne of gold; those creatures he had afore created coming around him singing songs of praise and glory in one voice.

     “Holy is He that reigns forever.  Who hath created all things seen and unseen.  Holy is He that reigns on high, above all things now and forevermore.  We lift up His name, the name of Mihole, Who gives all things life!  We lift His name above all others!  Glory to Mihole, our King!”

     As their songs rose to the all-hearing ears of the creator, the heavens exploded with life-filled light and joy and peace and praise and glory, covering the holy inhabitants of the realm of Mihole: Nevaeh.

 

Author's Note

Please let me know what you think needs to be edited and how I could make it more interesting.