Gromm's Story

Elsewhere in the material plane, another entity stirred.

The landscape that he had chosen to awaken in was flat, monotone, and featureless - in other words, completely indistinguishable from any other part of the God's great work.  Being so unremarkable, the few mortal creatures that already existed had never taken more than a passing glance at it.  This had allowed the new deity to use the land as the focal point for his emergence.

He had started, as he always would, slowly.  The alterations he made were few and far between; a minor breeze here, a shift in the dirt there, building a suitable body for a deity, speck by speck.  The process was minutely executed and would have lasted for years, had this universe been designed with a concept of time in mind.  Another being might have called it needlessly laborious; he called it sensibly scripted.  Regardless of how overly drawn out the great birthing was, the end result was just as desired: a sturdy bipedal shell, fashioned from the dust of the grey world and infused with the will to change it.

The body of Gromman Craggon was enormous.  Not particularly tall or broad per se, but in the sense of something that has been built about fifty percent over scale.  All his limbs were covered in black lines, curving and spiking in nigh-unnoticeable ways.  The only accessory to his head were a pair of perfectly round, black eyes, peering out from a rock-solid skull of earth.

They twitched.

With an almost reverential smoothness, Gromman Craggon bent to the ground on one knee.  Digging his hands into the grey dust beneath his feet, he drew an outline, the dust hardening at his touch.  When he placed a hand in the centre of the shape, it detached from the ground and came away in his fingers.  More formless matter quickly flowed into the gap, covering it as if it had never existed.

He turned the tablet over, inspecting it for blemishes.  Yes, for now it would be adequate.  As he held it in his stone grip, a black dot appeared on its top left corner.  Though to a mortal it would appear static, a deity would see that it was spreading at a subatomic crawl, developing minuscule curves and spikes just like Gromman Craggon's own body markings.  He inclined his head in satisfaction,  pushed the tablet into the grip of his right hand and stood up.  Clouds of dust rose in his wake as he turned and began to walk.

When moving into a new universe, it is always advisable to say hello to the neighbours first.

Everything was peaceful, everything was still. There were no sensations, no thoughts. It was simple in that it was merely existence. Awareness came from a diminute speck of consciousness of subatomic proportions. The nothingness, or the everything, was comfortable, though the speck was too small at the time to recognize that. Very comfortable.

Until, for some reason or another, the speck began increasing in metaphysical volume. Slowly at first, it pushed against the comfort. No longer was existence the sole thing, now there was acknowledgement of such existence. Realization that, indeed, there was what there was yet the comfort remained tremendous.

Now the speck's growth was faster and the most minuscule of sensations crept up. A feeling of being dragged, smoothly and pleasantly. Thoughts began to form and it occurred to the being that it was contained within a vessel. A vessel that stretched out and felt weightless. Albeit the dragging sensation continued, it could feel how the vessel remained static at the same time. The speck became a star and became unable to support it's enormous size. It burst in a flurry of thoughts and awareness and sensations, and two violet eyesrose from the top of the vessel. A body.

Her body.

And the eyes saw far, into the emptiness. And the eyes saw near, down at her appearance. Beneath her eyes there was naught but a black gown and flowing hair. Further down there was a surface. Featureless ground with infinite intricacies that separated her from the emptiness surrounding her. She floated down to touch all there was and as the ends of her gown tentatively collided with the something in the nothing, feathers sprouted from her sleeves, her hair and beneath her garment. It was like a greeting. A final notification that she was there at long last. She enjoyed it. She enjoyed how the feathers brushed against each other and whispered her name. Poändra.

She saw figures she hadn't noticed before that moved on their own accord, atop the ground that had preceded her. She was aware of tiny murmurs in the back of her being that emmanated from some of the critters. It was a quality that she welcomed with less enthusiasm than the rest of her emergence. The mutterings, she knew, were not inherently part of her. Poändra could understand them, however, and that eased her being. At least, it would have, had she bothered to stop and interpret the murmurs.

Instead, she floated farther and farther off the ground until she spotted dust rising from the surface. A being stood in the middle it, walking somewhere. Poändra stared. It was the first time she experienced a fascination of sorts. As opposed to the creatures moving about, whispering in the back of her being, there was something compelling about this one. A sense of familiarity rippled. She floated towards it, closer and closer, navigating the space over the ground with natural grace.

The being was larger than she was, and bigger and broader. The contrast in their appearances was astounding and heavily pronounced, where she had feathers he had deep black lines running over his body. Suspicious, her eyes locked on his actions. Why was he walking in any particular direction? Keeping pace with the collosal being, she floated once around it as she seized up his appearance over and over again, trying to understand how he felt so familiar.

In her suspicion, she kept her silence.

As he wandered through the vast, blank expanse, Gromman Craggon found himself growing increasingly restless.  The world was large, to be sure, and capable of housing some truly amazing creations if given a good push.  It offended the deity's sensibilities to see such a promising canvas lie wasted in such a way.  The desire to take it all and make it his own was powerful indeed, but he resisted it.  His biggest current priority was to make sure no entities were present that would damage or pervert his glorious works.

A dark blur on the edge of his vision made him halt in his stride, stopping as motionless as any statue.  His eyes, however, were not so still, and they trailed after the strange creature as it floated in wide circles around him.  It was evidently female, dressed in a flowing black gown with white feathers sprouting from underneath its sleeves.  Its hair was long, contrasting both the dress and the feathers with its vivid orange colouring.  The first colour, Gromman Craggon reflected, that he had yet seen in the bland grey universe.  The creature gave him a curious look; he returned it.

He lifted the tablet so that he could see the dot's progress so far.  It had not stretched by more than a nanometre since it was first marked, yet was picking up speed now that the small creature had encountered him.  Keeping the tablet raised in his hands, he opened his cavernous mouth and began to speak.  "Greetings.  I am Gromman Craggon," he rumbled slowly, noting with satisfaction that the black dot became longer and more detailed with every word.  "You may call me Gromm if the last three syllables prove to be too tedious for you," he added, sarcasm undetectable in his monotonous speech.

Through her floating around the bigger, Poändra had kept a constant speed. As soon as he spoke, however, she stopped in her midair tracks. It was her first encounter with sound, and it had been as startling as it'd been unexpected. It wasn't Gromman Craggon's voice; despite its apparent deep and cavernous character, speaking seemed natural to her, something of a habit she had merely forgotten about. But sound itself... The way it had cut through the eternal, calm silence of the universe... It irked her.

Gromman Craggon. She savored the name in her mind. It felt better there, without the whole the sound business. She cradled the pair of words. They had an exotic taste, but one that, again, rang with a sense of familiarity. With her distaste for spoken language and the feel of the name, Poändra hadn't paid attention to the rest of the giant's speech.

There was just something about the name that interested her much more than Gromm's contrasting appearance. He seemed quite dense, where she felt airy, and she thought the markings along his skin were really quite simple whereas a single feather of hers contained vivid detail to her eyes.

Floating so that their eyes were at the same level (but not making eye contact), Poändra whispered it, "Gromman Craggon," trying to determine if a second mention of the name sparked any information, now that her initial astonishment with sound was past. Quite the opposite occurred, however, as she realized she - herself - had produced sound. The mix of surprise and forgotten acquaintance came back. What was more, her voice wavered, where the giant's had been quite flat.

Orange hair flying about, her violet eyes met Gromm's black own.

"Gromman Craggon, yes." Her voice was unsteady as she struggled with its sound, but her face was dead set. "I call myself Poändra and that will be enough."

In that instant, she wanted to know. Already she understood the mortal creatures that ran at their feet better than she cared for yet Gromman Craggon gave off an entirely different persona. Poändra still found his familiarity curious, it had taken a back seat now that she was comfortable around his name.

"Tell me," she spoke, her voice now well above a whisper. She raised an arm and her feathers rustled towards the tablet in Gromm's hand. "What is this? How does its purpose serve you?"

The feathered creature's first words were quiet and shaky, which perplexed Gromm to no end.  Was she (and it was, Gromm decided, definitely a she) not accustomed to her tongue?  She couldn't be a mortal, then, though that was already obvious: the dull little creatures that he had already seen did nothing to gain Gromm's interest, unlike this orange-haired being that floated without wings.  Maybe it was a new creation by another fragment of the creator.  Or maybe, Gromm thought disparagingly, it was a deity in itself that had rushed to create a body without forward planning.  The idea was alien to him.

And her name was Poändra.  Gromm silently mulled the name over in his head, considering the strange pronunciation.  It was distinctive and rolled off the tongue well, but lacked the kind of solid feeling that Gromman Craggon liked.  There was no use dwelling on such meaningless things, though; the flat and empty world wouldn't fill itself.  He was about to press further into Poändra's nature when he saw her violet eyes flicker towards the tablet in his hand.  When she questioned him about it, he raised the precious slab and spoke.

"It is a record.  A precise account of my existence and exploits, preserved for all time," he droned.  Despite his enthusiasm for being asked about the tablet, Gromm kept his voice to a consistently low monotone.  He felt faintly proud.   "When I have shaped this world to perfection and let it be truly populated, my followers will know every aspect of my being.  There will be no room for misinterpretation in their mortal minds."  Lowering the stone once more, he moved on to more constructive topics.  It was his way.  "Am I right in assuming you are another fragment of the original God?"  In his hand, the dot crawled on, endlessly scrutinising both his actions and Poändra's.

Perfection?
Hah. That was a thought.

"I am myself, Gromman Craggon. I was born from a tear of the Original One but I am not a fragment of them, I am a goddess whole. As I should hope you are."

And on that note... Poändra shot up, far from the ground that served as the only landmark in the desolate universe, she could see just how large the surface was. So extense, it stretched out in all directions, unspoiled save for the little creatures and the bigger shape of Gromm directly beneath her. Where were the other dieties? Within herself, she knew there were more. She saw none, couldn't feel any others close by.

Poändra returned to Gromm, descending not unlike a sheet of paper falling. She shot a playful look at the tablet before turning to the burlier god. "Gromman Craggon, what say you we invite our... siblings to play a game." To her it looked like he considered it, if only for a moment. Good. He had given her the idea, after all. Still, The goddess of desires didn't really wait for a reply.

With the grace of a silk ribbon, she took a handful of feathers from her hair. White as ivory, the shone under her gaze as she brought them closer. She whispered to them, This place is dull. Come, my brother, my sister. I have an idea that just might be entertaining for us all. With that she threw the messages in the air. They scattered in all directions, looking for beings that exuded the same kind of presence as Gromm and herself.

Poändra assumed not every other god would come. A handful of feathers were not enough to reach all the others. Plus, some gods were probably unapologetically dull. There was much to look forward, however. Her stare fell on Gromman Craggon, raised an eyebrow and smiled.

It was time for some healthy competition.

Gromm stood and listened while Poändra explained her nature, announcing her individuality.  He stood and watched as she proposed a "game" and scattered her feathers through the world.  He stood and pondered how best to react.

He stood in silence for a long time.  

What a strange goddess, he thought.

"Poändra," he said eventually, "you are eager to present yourself as a unique being, free of attachment to the Creator.  This is disingenuous."  Gromm's deadpan tone brooked no argument.  He was entirely right, after all.  "You exist as a splinter of Its will.  Everything that you are, the original God was first.  The same is true for me, and it is best that we do not forget it."  He paused for a few moments, as if calming himself.  Then he spoke again, "Now explain this game of yours."  The goddess's smile was starting to make him curious.  

Curious, and a little unnerved.