Creator: Friend or Foe?

Chapter 2. Light Lost

Not again. Relentless darkness invaded, blanketing the stars. The glow of whiskers dimmed.

"There is no other way."

"How do we know that, Dark One? We have only our present condition to look upon now." The glow

surged.

"How dare you?" The light, enveloped in a dark fist, vanished.

This is intolerable. A spark sputtered into being. "Again, I must ask, Ancient One, how do you know?

Produce something more than your certainty," she insisted, awaiting the display of a memory fragment

that perhaps she had missed among so much background noise," if you are able."

Insolence!

"Is anything too difficult for me, Young Spark, that I should be unable? Does experience count for

nothing?"

"You did precede me," she conceded, unmoved by his insult, "this is true, but I maintain my challenge.

How will you prove your assertions?"

"Experience." He thundered. "How can you question my knowledge even while admitting your

youth?"

"I must." She insisted.

3

His anger flaring, hot for an instant, formed a great ball of searing magma, from whence, a great molten

sword began to emerge, growing from first two feet, then to four feet, now the 6 foot long doublebladed

weapon of flame emitted heat from its tip, it's searing point directed toward the essence of the

younger being:

"How dare you question me! I, the One who released you!"

In response, a sphere of blue light appeared, blinding, yet cool, dancing to the side of the heated blade,

making contact with the side, and at the point of contact, the hot blade cooled suddenly to rock,

splintering into shards:

"I dare," she countered, a part of her wondering where these familiar images came from, "for question I

must, and if you insist on threatening me, if you force me to defend myself, I will transform such as

will wipe out every universe that has ever had contact with you! Though it be a hard thing, if you push

me to it, do not doubt that I will follow through on my promise, Ancient Warrior."

She had been freed by the Ancient Warrior from the universe in which she had been trapped. But she

refused to feel beholden to him. As she pondered within her various interconnected neural networks

what level of allegiance she might owe him and why, it felt ominous. She stretched out along all of her

neural wavelengths, and images of ancient thought-forms, the Flaming Sword, Chronos, Tiamat, Zeus,

and Athena arose simultaneously. While she did not immediately know what these images meant, still

she understood their context. Conflicting priorities and cycles of the universes could lead to great

suffering and destruction. These memories of previous energy flows, and consequently of previous

matter conversions, were clearly embedded in her essence. By experience she knew that if she