A Little Speck of Light

 by

© Allan James Lammiman

Sept1998

   In the beginning there was just a tiny speck of light, if the one excepted that concept of light existed that is. For to have the understanding of light, there had to be the concept of dark. And vice-versa. That aside there it was. A tiny speck of light. Strictly speaking it was not even a light, but more a minute speck of glowing matter, lost in a vastness of black nothingness. It was so small that would not have been seen by a microscope, let alone the naked eye, if indeed there was such a thing as a microscope or even anyone alive that had an eye in the first place.

The speck of light grew slowly and steadily over a thousand millennium until it was the size of a small pea. (not that a pea existed either) After another thousand millennium it started to blink, not fast, but it did blink. It blinked on and off - or at least dimmer and lighter - for the next hundred thousand years, or what might of passed as a thousand years, for time itself then hardly existed. Then it began to rotate. Why we will never know. But rotate it did. The speed of its rotation of course could not be judged, for there was nothing else against which any speed could be judged. But let us just say that it rotated fairly fast. It turned. It turned on what could be deemed as its axis and as a result increased its mass. In time, the combined blinking and rotating of the tiny speck of matter caused it to expand in size. in the course of a hundred million millennium the speck grew and grew, until it had increased its size and mass by fifty per cent. A further hundred millennium and the speck of light was larger still. About the size of a cricket ball (if such a thing as a cricket ball existed, naturally), and the light it emitted was no longer dim. It was bright. The tiny piece matter was no longer a tiny speck of light, but a bright fiery ball. Deep within the lonely spinning ball of fire, chemicals formed and transformed. The changes of these chemicals caused a chain-reaction on other forces that had come into existence, causing the whole to erupt into flame with fierce intensity. In the due passage of time, the once fiery ball became a hot-pot of raging fire and multiple explosions.

These explosions caused great tongues of flame and matter to be hurtled out from the centre of the fiery ball and into the dark black void beyond. if one considered just how much matter was hurled away from the ball, one would not be blamed for thinking that its size would be reduced. But they would be wrong. These eruptions, far from diminishing the mass of the burning ball of matter, caused it to expand. It almost doubled its size, and mass. It was now the size of a large football. (again if such a thing existed). Time and time again these explosions occurred and each time the ball of fire grew larger. After another one hundred thousand millennium, the (foot)ball sized mass of burning matter was over ten thousand, million times the size it started out as.

Of course all this took place over a very, very, very, long time. So long in fact that a mere mortal (if one existed) would die of incredible old age before he, or she could manage to calculated the time involved, let alone comprehend its meaning. But needless to say, the passage of time involved was but a blip in scheme of things. (if indeed there was a scheme).

While this large ball of fiery gasses continued to burn, erupt and spin, some of the portions of matter that it had expelled also underwent a series of changes. In time they became fiery balls of gasses themselves. These new balls too changed and expanded, and in due course, the once empty void of blackness filled up with hundred and thousands of tiny specks of light. Space was no longer empty.

But not all of the matter that was expelled followed the same path of evolution. Some portions of matter failed to form into anything solid at all, and remained clouds of illuminated gas, doomed to forever drift around their ‘mother-ba11’s realm.

Some smaller portions of the matter that had been expelled began to cool. At first they mirrored their mother in manner, but then, for reason unknown, they began to take on a far different aspect. It took a very, very long time but eventually the matter that made up these small satellites began to solidify and form into spheres. In the course of a millennia or two, some of the elements that made up these hot balls of gaseous liquid transformed themselves into molten liquid. Then slowly, the liquid thicken and then surface formed a thin and fragile crust The crusty surface of this molten rock became more and more solid as time passed until eventually, after a thousand million millennia had passed since the fiery mother ball – which still rained heat down upon them from the void of space - first gave them life, the gaseous balls of fire became hot balls of molten liquid surrounded by a hard rocky crust, which in turn was enveloped by a gaseous cloud.

The once empty black void was no more. Thousand, millions of balls of fire now filled it with light. Around the first large fiery ball circled a thousand other fiery balls. Around them a further hundred thousand fiery balls circled. And circling around each of the balls, was a solid balls of molten rock and gas. The universe had been born.

And in the centre the mother sun burned on.

But that was not the end. On a few - a very, very few, of the balls of molten rock which inhabited this new cosmos, the consistency this matter cooled and changed sufficiently enough to form seas of water. Continents rose from the seas. And elements which had long been dormant deep within the bowls of the earth began to mutate. Slowly and surely these elements developed into living cells. Life had begun. These cells found the climate of the waters perfect and grew in abundance. Over the course of a hundred thousand years, the cells split and reformed, multiplied and evolved, until they had developed into small bobbing two cell microbes.

Like the stars that filled the void, some of the planetary eliminates developed differently from others. Some grew roots and fastened themselves into the earth, and eventually became primitive plants. Some of these cell floated to the surface of the sea and drifted until they reached the newly formed land. Others remained deep below the waters where the crust of the planet was thin and molten liquid seeped though from the fiery ball beneath. Some cells continued to multiply and evolve until they had developed of form of primitive consciousness.

In time these life forms evolved into fish. A few of these fish crawled out of the sea and ventured onto the dry land beyond. Their rudimentary fins in time became legs, and their gills transformed into lungs with which they could breath the air that filled the space around the planet.

Still more creatures developed limbs which enabled them to use the movement of the air. In the due course of time these creatures of the air learned to manipulate these currents. Their once boneless bodies developed, grew and developed skeletons upon which an ever changing outer skin formed.

And all the while this miracle was happening, the great ball of yellow fire which first gave the cosmos in life, burned on. Billions of years went by. The stars continued to shine. The planets continued in their orbits. The creatures on the planets continued to evolve.

And above them the great mother sun continued to burn and rain down its heat upon its children.

A millennia went by. The stars of the cosmos settled into a orderly pattern. The planets cooled still further. The creatures inhabiting the planets became gradually became aware of their environment and became sentient. They learned to interact with each other. They learned what it was to love, hate and kill. Some species developed more swiftly than others. Some ceased to develop at all. Some ceased to exist entirely, killed off by the planet’s harsh environment or by

the greed of more aggressive creatures. Such was the way of life.

The surviving creatures formed themselves into groups. Mostly this was done out of their inherent need to re-procreate - to breed - to continue their race. But also they grouped together out of a need to protect themselves. From the harsh weather and the often aggressive nature of the other creatures inhabiting their planets. The beginnings of a civilisation had begun.

Thousands of years passed. The embryo civilisations grew and developed. The original small bands of loosely related creatures linked up with others families to form a mutual network of protection. Villages were formed. Some of these habitations developed in a gentle way. Others took a more aggressive path. And like some of the creatures from which first crawled from the sea, millions of tear before, some failed to survive.

The gaps these failed groups left were quickly filled by the more successful ones. The dominant members of these groups, generally the more intelligent or more often the more aggressive of the creatures, steered their fellows into a more orderly, more controlled way of set forth to breach the perimeter of the universe itself. At last the creatures of the universe were to discover what lay beyond the realm of their mother sun.

And the mother sun, burning bright at the universe’s centre started to grow.

As the creatures’ great fleet of vessels neared the outer edge, they paused. Before them, lay the furthermost star of the universe. After taking one last look at the cosmos behind, the commander of the creature’s fleet gave the order to proceed. In one great mass the massive ships moved forward. Soon the last star was behind them. Almost at once the fleet’s commander gave the order for it to stop. The creatures could not believe their eyes, Before them lay what seemed to be an endless field of nothing. There was no light No colour. No anything. There was not even the hint of the smallest particle of matter. What lay before them could not even be called black, for it to reach the distinction of a colour, it needed something to else to mirror it. The creatures looked back at their universe in wonder and felt humbled. And small. And against the blackness of nothing, the universe’s countless stars shone brightly. The fleet turned to follow the outer edge. Even travelling a speeds faster than the speed of light, it was years before the creatures in the great fleet completed their journey. Only then did the creatures finally realise that their universe was the only one and that they were alone, and they, the highest of its living creations had nowhere else to go. So with humbled hearts they turned the fleet around and went home.

And all the time in the centre of the universe, there burned the mother sun.

While the creatures were contemplating how insignificant they were against the immense expanse of space, the mother sun of the universe grew steadily in size. And it also started to spin faster. And as it did it’s gravitational pull on its many offspring grew in strength. Causing the universe to shrink. And the creatures in the fleet saw and began to worry. Had their act of penetrating the universe’s outer limits somehow caused it to shrink? Had they pierced what should have never been pierced? Had they gone where they were not meant to go? Was the mother sun angry? All these questions and many more were asked in the next thousand years.

But not one of the creatures could answer it. And none of the many expeditions that were mounted to try to find an explanation could find an answer either. The universe was just getting smaller. And the mother sun larger.

In the following millennia, the mother sun size grew by over ten thousand per cent. Its fiery mass now encompassed much of what the creatures deemed as inhabitable space. One by one the stars nearest the mother sun were swallowed up. The creatures living upon these worlds either left to live on other worlds or stayed and died. The population of the cosmos started to diminished. The once powerful civilisation that had conquered the universe began to break-up.

One by one the outer stars wont out. Thousands more followed, until after a hundred thousand million years, only five star systems and seven inhabitable planets were left. The mother sun, creator of all that was once was, was now its executioner. Its burning, spinning mass now encompassed ninety per cent of what was the universe. The creatures on the surviving planets knew in their hearts that their time was over and gathered together in small groups to bid farewell to each other. Some attempted to flee the dying universe in the remnants of the great fleet of years ago. Others just waited and preyed for a merciful end. Then as if the mother sun had at last grown tired of the effort of maintaining its expansion, it exploded. It exploded so fiercely that the surviving stars along with their seven planets were vaporised in an instant Even the ships that had attempted to escape were destroyed in the massive blast. The universe and all life within it had ceased to exist Only the mother sun remained.

And against the black nothingness of space, the sun looked like a speck of light. If one excepted that concept of light existed that is. For to have the understanding of light, there had to be the concept of dark. And vice-versa. It was not even a light, more a minute speck of glowing matter, lost in the vast nothingness of space....

The End... Or the Beginning?

A Gullibility Rating of Four

by

© Allan James Lammiman

Tracy started bailing. It was a slow process being as she only had the cup off the top of her thermos flask. Kevin watched her from the bow of the little row boat, but did nothing to help, partly due to the fact that he had nothing to bail with, but mostly because he was attempting to paddle the flat bottomed boat with the flask itself. This however did not stop Tracy from glaring at him from time to time.

“You and your day out on the lake.” she spat. “I thought you said you knew how to row? And trust you to pick the only boat with a leaky bottom!”

“It’s not my fault you left the oars on the island.” shrugged Kevin, “How was Ito know that you were going to shove off without warning me.”

“Uh!” huffed Tracy, and shot him another glare. They, or more correctly Kevin had landed on the island so that he and Tracy could be alone. Something that Tracy, as it turned out did not appreciate - hence the rapid departure.

“Helen and John should be looking for us by now.” said Tracy. “Can you see them?”

Helen and John were the friends they had come on the coach trip with. They had remained behind at the cafe, preferring to talk than row a boat. That was an hour ago. Kevin looked up at the sky. It was getting dark. In another hour the coach would be leaving.

“I said I wanted to go home, but you weren’t listening!” complained Tracy. “You were too interested in being naughty!”

She groaned. The boat was filling up faster that she could bail. “Oh, my shoes are soaked now!” she complained, sobbing. “Are you sure you haven’t got anything to bail with? I’m hardly making an impression with this little cup.”

Kevin peered into the water. “Sorry.” he said causally. “All I had was that flask.”

She was just about to empty her cup over the side, when Kevin looked at her and frowned.

“I should empty some over the other side if I were you. There’s enough water on that side already.”

“Oh. Alright.” said Tracy, and emptied the contents over the other side of the boat. “Oh dear! It’s just as full over here!”

“A gullibility rating of four, I think.” mused Kevin, under his breath.

“Did you say something?” asked Tracy, continuing her bailing.

“No, nothing.” Kevin lied. He sighed. “I’m not making much headway myself. The water in the bottom’s making the boat too heavy. If you can’t bail any faster, we’ll sink before we reach the bank.”

“Oh no!” she cried. “What shall we do? I can’t swim!”

“I’m not much of a swimmer myself.” said, Kevin, letting his breath out slowly. He turned his face towards the bank. Two figures were walking along the waters edge.

“Ah! There’s John and Helen.” he said. He cupped his hands over his mouth and shouted.

“Hi! John!”

John saw him and waved back. “What on earth are you doing out there?” he shouted.

Kevin shouted back. “We’ve lost our oars and the boats sinking. Tracy’s shoes are all wet. So are mine for that matter! Can you help us?”

“Bog off!” shouted John. “You got yourself out there! You can get yourself back!”

The sound of twin air horns echoed across the park. Helen pulled at John’s arm.

“Come on!” she said. “That was the coach’s horn! It’s about to leave! Tell those two to stop mucking around and get back here. It’s time to go!”

“Oh, no!” cried Tracy. “What’ll we do?”

Kevin sighed and stood up. “Oh well, I suppose we’ll just have to get back by ourselves.”

He stepped over the side of the boat and into the water.

“Come on Tracy.” he said, holding out his hand. “The water’s only a foot deep. We can walk ashore.”

Tracy looked at him and then the water. Kevin smiled at her. “Yep.” he said. “Definitely a gullibility rating of four.”

The End