thejusticelounge | a glint, a gleam, a tale for the dark

The human understanding of the universe is infantile, at best.

At its worst, it is prideful, ignorant. It believes itself to be the center of the universe. The crux of existence.

But, like infants, there is always truth underlying the exaggerations. A fever for the scream. A fear behind the laugh.

The truth is this:
Long before your sun existed, long before any star your human eyes observe in the dark night burned, there was a seed.

This seed became a plant. This plant became a tree. And this tree became a mother.

Of course, the tree was no more female than she was a tree, but these are the words that best fit your language, your understanding. It is infantile, at best.

The universe was an infant itself, and like you, it held beautiful potential. It was ready to grow—to expand. And the mother was swelling as well, swelling with life and hope she wished to share with the infant universe. She released a shimmering color from her roots, to match the sky as it filled with light. She was not the only one. Beings, deities, creators, and entities were all contributing power to the universe, sending out star systems and hand-sculpting species, releasing concepts and contagions out to fill the new void. The universe filled with galaxies and those galaxies filled with stars, and the vast expanse of space became ruled by whatever creation reached it first.

The deities of color reached many stars and their planets, sending emotions across their vast and barren surfaces, planting hope and rage and will into the soil alongside the seeds. But the universe is more than just those many thousands of sectors. It is expanding, growing, grown beyond any range of human comprehension.

The mother tree allowed her light-child to roam free in the new universe. And it found a place to call its own. There, it prospered, and the fledgling space around it reflected bright in its glorious crystal.

But the mother tree was not happy. Granted, the mother tree could not feel because she was neither a she, nor a tree, nor a being whose emotional state was intrinsically tied to morality such as yours is. Instead, the mother tree realized that she had created an imbalance in the young universe, and it was agreed among all other originals that she must balance the scales. There could be no light without dark, no good without evil.

So she quickly produced a calamity, a dark shimmering mass that was supposed to resemble the universe before light had awoken. It was malformed, disgusting. It could not speak, nor stand—it was a parasite.

The crystal-child realized far too late what its mother had done, long after the darkness took galaxies and stars for its own. It tried to wage war—to protect the fledgling worlds—but it failed. It failed again and again, and during the long battle the universe was still growing and expanding, creating new stars for fighting over, new worlds for the darkness to control.

It was not enough to take the outskirts back into the dark, though. The dark-child reached further and further, into places where other creations lived, embodiments and entities that were filled with light and power it could consume.

Earth is not the center of the universe. It is a child, just like its star, just like its system. But it is true that Earth is crucial—Earth is essential. For whatever reason, for whatever destiny, Earth is the crux of galactic power. It is where power flees when its original home is taken. The universe’s understanding of its own reasoning for this phenomenon is infantile, at best.

But the outskirts—the expanding rims and rifts—they are no longer enough. For a long time, longer than you will be able to comprehend, they have not been enough. And now, now it is reaching into your light, into your understanding of the universe. Into sectors you can name and locate and fly to within your own small lifespans.

We will try to protect you, but without your help, we will fail, as we have an innumerable number of times before. We would bring you into the light, not take it from you, but we are not strong enough.

For there is the irony of existence: there is no true balance.