Hmmmm Hm. Okay. Worldbuilding/story Idea.

Hmmmm hm. Okay. Worldbuilding/story idea.

One million years after humanity disappears, octopi and ravens have independently developed sapience. And one day an octopus child and an elder raven meet at the edge of the ocean.

Where is your mother and father? asks the raven. I have no mother or father, says the octopus, blushing pale. All octopi are children. Once we’re grown, we will mate and we will die. It is the first and the last thing our mothers tell us.

But that’s horrible, says the raven. It’s not all bad, says the octopus. We play, we hunt, we make games for ourselves in the deep. Yes, but who remembers your songs? the raven says. Who passes down your stories?

What is a story? the octopus asks.

And the raven thinks about this question. And finally it says: A story is how you remember things in the past. It is how you know where you come from, and what happened before you were born. A story can be a warning, or it can be advice, or it can be a silly joke told to make you feel good. Someone remembers the story and tells it to the next generation, who remember the story and tells it to the generation after them.

And the octopus thinks about this answer. And finally it says: Can you tell me a story?

And the raven tells the octopus a story. And it’s a good story. And the next day the octopus returns and asks for another. The next day it brings its octopus friends, and the raven brings its raven friends, and many stories are shared on the edge of the ocean.

Months later, the octopus returns to the raven. I am grown, it says. I am returning to the sea to find a mate and lay my brood. I will not be coming back. I’m sorry.

I will miss your company, says the raven.

I have one thing to ask you, says the octopus. In time my children will come to the edge of the ocean. I would like you to tell them a story I have made. And when they have stories of their own, I would like your children to remember them and pass them down to my children’s children.

Of course, says the raven. What is your story about?

And the octopus thinks, and says: It is about an octopus child and an elder raven who meet at the edge of the ocean.

And this story has been passed down to this day.

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2 years ago

But honey, I was born with the world crumbling around my mother's hospital bed

I grew up stepping around the shards with childish innocence

If you didn't want me to take up weapons,

you shouldn't have shattered the world with yours.

Hm, eternity

Or: gods speak

A definitive factor of being human is not seeing the big picture.

It's very defining. Humans don't see the big picture. They don't see the celestial game, they don't even know their own nature. With a garden full of secrets on their own planet they haven't even stepped foot in, how could they? They know nothing of the blazing, terrifyingly holy power of a not quite ripe apple. Although they have crafted an entire worship around that particular fruit.

No, they know nothing of true eternity. Or maybe everything. If the unripe apple is holy to them too, does it matter that it's not my kind of holy? Does it matter that it's miniscule? There is no such thing as a smaller infinity, after all.

If I love you like the feeling of atoms assembling into wind gusts and solar flares, a human will love you like the feeling of that wind on their skin.

If I love you like the prayer of a million people to the greatest being they know, a god, a human will love you like the prayer of a child to the greatest being it knows, a mother.

If I love you like two black holes caught in each other's gravity, forcing each other into an unholy dance until they collide, a human loves you like watching two coins circling in a cone. Drawing spirals and spirals until they fall, with a gentle ping, into the hole in the middle.

Humans do not see the big picture.

Perhaps they are redefining holy as we speak.

Perhaps they make their own holy, and yet it is equal to mine.