Autoschediasm

by Mark Balliet
In the darkness of space, it wasn't aware of much, it hadn't learned words yet so the vast blackness and small points of light around it were unnamed, and relatively unchanging Awareness of self was the entity's primary feelings, wrapped up in self was the ability to look at and manipulate. At first it's manipulations were of the sparse trace material that exists in space. There was very little material to understand, but it's instincts were to examine and form new patterns, it left those behind it a wake of newly formed materials, that grew ever more complex as it expanded it's awareness of those materials. That two was something that could change, awareness, memory, as it manipulated the materials it found, memories grew of past patterns it had constructed, and future patterns that might yet be constructed.

It was aware of it's own existence eventually, something had to be manipulating those materials, storing those memories, and creating new patterns. In that awareness grew a consciousness, this entity began to wonder what the points of light were in the surrounding space, each was slightly different in subtle ways. Those points interacted in a way, not with material but with energy they sent out, that the entity could sense and become aware of. They were too far away however for those points of light to be manipulated, it was only able to manipulate those items that moved through it. Those dots, stars as it later would come to know them called out with their light, and the entity yearned to learn more about those wonderful points of light.

The development of it's awareness was slow, there was so little for it to manipulate. With no events to measure time by, and how limited the entities thought were at that point in development, it could have been thousands of years, of millions, there was no reference to even guess by. Eventually however the call of one of those stars grew louder. One of those stars was beginning to become larger, slowly at first, and then faster. In the place of those little particles it had manipulated in space there was suddenly a blast of particles, they felt like they had something in common with the star that was getting larger. Direction, a new awareness entered it's consciousness, the particles were coming from where the star was, and moving past the entity. A timeless span passed as the star grew larger still, there were more particles moving. No, not particles, constructed objects, like it had been creating, yet different, less organized. Larger objects traveled from the direction of the star, one object nearly it's own size traveled through the entity, it left many complex patterns in that object. Energy, a new concept, it became aware of. The stars were making energy and sending it it out, and as this star grew larger and larger that energy imprinted itself on the materials around it, and the entity became aware that objects with more energy, those that were hotter, could be manipulated easier into patterns.

Suddenly an object far larger than the entity passed through it, there was a feeling of being pushed, it's own existence pushed back and the object shattered into smaller pieces. Dissassembly, that was another of it's abilities, along with combining particles, it could split them apart. At first it was only aware of this because of the object hitting it, yet soon it found that it could take smaller objects apart and combine the particles within those objects in various ways. Soon gigantic objects began to pass it, dwarfing the entity by their vast size, and still the star grew larger, it's energy filling the entity with intent, it started making more complex patterns in the objects that passed it, and the energy coming from the star, it learned that it too could be separated into different waves, it had discovered light, and it was absorbing, and changing that light as it was manipulating the particles around it. Awareness of the gigantic objects that occasionally passed it led it to understand that they were bound to the star, their movement followed a balance of another kind of energy, motion. Like it, they were moving, pulled in by the sun, they moved indifferent directions to the movement of the entity. It was moving! Objects around it became larger and smaller again as it moved, it began to understand they weren't changing size, they were getting nearer and further away as the entity moved passed them. It was moving towards the star, following one of those curved paths that the objects around it followed around the star.

More objects of varying sizes moved passed the entity, it interacted with every piece of material it could, learning their existing structures. It had never seen objects that hadn't been constructed by itself, and now it intensely studied each bit of material that it passed. There were other patterns, rules, order to the construction of those materials, far more complex than it had ever imagined making itself, there was far more material than had ever been available. For a while as it got closer to the sun it watched as heat and light caused interactions between the particles. As there was more and more material, as the surrounding density increased, it began to become harder to see just the particles. The materials were composed of so many particles it was almost overwhelming to look at all the particles individually, but the rules of the materials it found along the way helped it see new complex patterns in the materials that were missed in the depth of space. Time and time again it saw new patterns, and learned how to weave them out of the base particles.

Now it was racing past the inner few giant objects, around the star, close enough that the energy flow invigorated it, it felt restless, like the stars energy was expanding every idea it had, making it easier to manipulate both energy and matter. The entity felt like it was becoming something new, no, not new, but for the first time it was aware enough to question it's own abilities and what their limits were. Shortly after curving around the star it shot past another giant object, the closest object to the star. Now it flew marveling at these objects circling the star, it passed another far away, barely aware it existed, yet part of the whole system, for not it had come to see the star and it's worlds, asteroids, debris and dust as a system, it was awakening into something, but not quite there. In it's forward direction, now pointing away from the particle flow from the star, it saw another of these worlds, and it was like nothing it had encountered, the light reflecting from the surface had vast complexity, energy and material in different phases, it identified solids, liquids and gasses, still without names, but now distinct concepts in it's mind. Happily, it was on a direct course for this world, it was going to disassemble a world.

The worlds atmosphere was unexpected, never having seen gas in such density, the entity was alarmed, maybe this world would disassemble it. A mixture of gases ripped past it, turning it incandescent with the sudden heat. The surface of the world was coming closer, the air now slowing it's descent. Behind it it tried to weave patterns in the air, but there was so much energy many of those patterns fell apart, there was too much energy for them to maintain their connections. The different gasses gave off light, each with a different feeling to it, it was soon able to identify the individual gasses by the feel of the light they emitted. Solid material was ahead, and it had no choice than to smash into it at great speed. The tall structure it passed through resisted it for the briefest of moments, and yielded, as it smashed into the surface of the world pushing into it until it's energy was dispersed into the surrounding materials. It was no longer moving, not in relationship to this world, the world and it now traveled together, it's world. As the surrounding material cooled from the impact it began to sense what was around it. Its mind reeled in the complexity of what it found, structures reaching from the ground back towards space. The air refracted some of the stars light, giving the sky the color it would later learn was blue. The surface was at an interesting energy level, it allowed for complex material to form, and absorb the energy from the star, without becoming too hot to maintain structure. This world held wonders that the entity yearned to examine. Every ability this entity had meshed perfectly with the materials around itself. The environment was rich with possibility, yet before exploring that possibility, it would need to understand the complexities around it. Just reaching out to sample the countless patterns around it was overwhelming, so starting small, it began to learn about this world.