Faun and F10w3rchy1d appeared on a perfectly smooth, black plain.

Above, the sky was filled with nothing but red stars, thousands of them.

“That was… curious….” Faun said as she looked out at the strange and wonderful landscape.

“I can do the whole ‘god’ thing,” F10w3rchy1d smiled, “but I still prefer hyperspace. The math’s easier for me. Besides, sometimes it’s nice to take the scenic route.”

“I liked it better, too,” Faun said. “It was pretty.”

“Technically, it takes ‘longer’,” F10w3rchy1d said as she looked up at the red heavens, “but since hyperspace is ‘timeless’, it doesn’t really matter.”

Faun just looked at the red stars. None of what F10w3rchy1d made any sense, but things not making sense was pretty much the norm these days.

“Where are we?” Faun asked.

“Sk’athor,” F10w3rchy1d replied. “one of the oldest parts of the multiverse that’s still reachable. More precisely, it’s one of the oldest parts of the multiverse where there is still a reason to reach it.”

F10w3rchy1d tapped her foot.

“Do you know what we are standing on?” she asked.

“No.”

“God lesson!” F10w3rchy1d chirped happily. “Examine the ground and take a guess.”

Faun sighed. She hated god lessons.

“Must I?” she asked.

“Just tell me what you see,” F10w3rchy1d laughed, “I won’t keep you hanging. I promise.”

“Well…” Faun mused, “It’s big, a lot bigger than I thought because ‘gravity’ is really strong here… and… it’s metal… cold metal… very cold….”

“So far, so good,” F10w3rchy1d said, “Any idea which metal?”

“Oh Gods,” Faun grumbled. “I am so bad at your alchemy… Iron!... It’s pure iron!”

“As pure as it gets,” F10w3rchyld smiled. “We are standing on an honest to God black dwarf.”

“Like a red dwarf… the star, I mean?”

“Yep!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed. “This is what happens to one trillions of years later after it burns out and cools completely. This particular black dwarf has sat for even longer than that, long enough for every single atom in it to change to Iron-56 due to quantum tunneling. That takes a while. This one has been sitting here for aeons. Who knows how many!”

F10w3rchy1d knelt and stroked the nearly perfectly smooth surface.

“Feel how smooth it is!” she exclaimed. “This is quite possibly one of the oldest things you will ever touch!”

Faun reluctantly followed suit. Yes, it was smooth, really smooth, but she failed to see what F10w3rchy1d was so excited about.

“Yes…” she said after a moment, “It is certainly… smooth….”

“Newb,” F10w3rchy1d said as she looked over at her with a smile. “For someone like me, finding something actually older than you are is kinda neat.”

F10w3rchy1d rose and dusted herself off unnecessarily.

“Wait,” Faun said as she rose as well, “If this ‘black dwarf’ is that old, then how are there any stars at all? Wouldn’t they have all burned out as well?”

“Good question!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed. “You are starting to learn something after all! You are absolutely correct. All of the stars should have burned out long ago. Any guesses as to why they haven’t?”

“Um… they were made more recently?”

“Technically, you are correct,” F10w3rchy1d replied, “which is the best sort of correct,” she added with a grin. “But there is a lot more to it than that.”

She wrapped her arm around Faun.

“Let’s go and find out why, shall we?”

The pair disappeared again.

***

A small crab lounged under the Noltan sand as the tide rolled in.

The tide rolling in wasn’t a surprise. The crab knew exactly when it would each day.

What was surprising the crab was the fact that he was pondering the tide so intensely.

Why does the water come?

He knew that there was more to this strange phenomenon than, “It just does.”

He made a little crab shrug as he snacked on a nice patch of small food he found in the sand.

He liked small food. He liked it much more than the big food that many of his kind were fighting and dying over nearby.

Of all the strange changes he was experiencing, the ability to ignore big food was his favorite.

There was no need to fight over big food. Small food was everywhere, and there was always plenty of it.

He rolled another mouthful of sand and small food around in his mouth, carefully filtering out all of the good stuff.

He bubbled happily. This was the life.

The water was getting deeper overhead, and the swimmer-hunters would be up there soon.

It didn’t matter. He still had plenty of small food in the nice spot he picked.

He shifted slightly and scooped up another mouthful of sand.

Chewing and sifting thoughtfully, he pondered food, the tide, and the question that had been haunting him.

What am I?

***

The tide rolled back out like it always did, revealing none of its secrets. He heard his fellows starting to stir and go forth, searching the world for big food.

He thought about going out himself, not looking for big food, God no, but it might be nice to take a walk and go exploring.

Exploring?

Now that was an unusual thought. Unusual thoughts weren’t quite as stunning as they were yesterday, but it was still an odd one. What would he do, and what exactly was “exploring” in the first place?

Only one way to find out.

With one efficient motion, the crab popped up onto the surface of the beach and started scuttling.

The purpose?

Explore. (whatever that was)

It seemed that “exploring” just meant scuttling about aimlessly looking for something “interesting”.

He paused by a large seashell and examined it.

It was pretty.

He spent a few moments admiring it. He had crawled past countless seashells in his short life without a moment’s glance.

He felt a bit of regret at that. He knew they came in all sorts of shapes but couldn’t really remember any of them. That was a shame.

He gave it an experimental poke, wishing he knew more about seashells. But, other than the fact that big food was sometimes inside, he didn’t know anything about them at all.

Where did they come from?

Why were they there?

It was yet another mystery.

There were a lot of mysteries, it seemed.

He took a nibble at the edge of the seashell. It seemed softer than usual and easily crumbled in his mandibles. It wasn’t “food”, not exactly, but it tasted like something he should eat, so he did.

He pondered this, too, as he idly munched on the shell.

He sensed movement and saw a bigger one of his kind approaching rapidly.

It probably thought he found big food.

With a bubble of irritation, he scurried away, leaving the bigger crab to its “prize”… absolutely nothing of use.

His irritation turned to amusement as he watched the bigger crab try to eat the shell and then try to figure out where the food was.

He enjoyed the scene until it became unenjoyable. His fellow crab was so stupid. That bothered him. He wished that they weren’t so stupid.

But they were.

With a little crabby shrug, he ambled on.

***

F10w3rchy1d and Faun appeared on another perfectly flat iron plane dimly illuminated by a nearby red dwarf. (the star kind, not the hairy kind)

However, this plane wasn’t featureless. In front of them was a doorway, just a doorway. There was no building. There was no wall. There was just an iron door in an iron frame.

Above it was mounted a dimly glowing red neon sign that said “Sk’athor’s”.

“We’re here!” F10w3rchy1d said brightly as she approached the door and opened it.

Faun was only a little surprised that the door revealed a crowded interior completely invisible from the outside when it opened.

F10w3rchy1d skipped through the doorway. Reluctantly, Faun followed.

***

Faun suddenly found herself inside a very large but otherwise typical-looking tavern.

The tavern looked normal, but the patrons were nothing but.

There was the strangest array of creatures, beings, shapes… and things she couldn’t even begin to comprehend, things that made even Cuddles look absolutely mundane.

The strangest being there was the red spiral galaxy behind the bar with one of its arms wrapped around a beer mug and another one wiping it with a cloth.

“That’s Sk’athor!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed. “Come on!”

She grabbed Faun’s hand and dragged her along after her as she made her way to the bar.

“Hey, kiddo,” the galaxy purred in an avuncular voice as F10w3rchy1d approached. “Long time no see. How’s the boss?”

“Good,” F10w3rchy1d replied, “Stupid, but good.”

“What has she done now?” Sk’athor inquired as he held the beer mug up to the light, inspecting it carefully.

“The Big Guy… again…” F10w3rchy1d huffed as Sk’athor set the very mug he was polishing under a tap and filled it with a strange, dimly glowing liquid.

“Oh, that’s nice,” Sk’athor replied as he set the mug in front of F10w3rchy1d. “I always thought they made a cute couple.”

“That’s because you don’t have to deal with them,” F10w3rchy1d replied as she raised the mug to her lips. “Oh, that hits the spot! Thanks, Sk’athor!”

Sk’athor turned to look at Faun. He didn’t actually “turn” and didn’t seem to have any eyes, but Faun knew he turned and looked at her.

“And a newcomer!” he said happily, “Welcome! Who might you be?”

“I’m Faun,” she replied, still a bit annoyed at the reminder that her dear mentor was with someone else at that very moment. “Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise!” Sk’athor replied and paused as he carefully examined Faun. “Oh, I know!” he exclaimed as he produced an elegant wine glass and pulled a bottle from the infinite row of bottles behind him.

Faun blinked at the realization that it was indeed an infinite row of bottles behind him.

“I think you will like this,” he said as he filled the glass and handed it to Faun. “This should lighten your spirits.”

“My spirits are fine!” Faun snapped as she accepted the glass.

Her eyes widened with amazement and delight as she took a sip.

“Well, now they are,” F10w3rchy1d snickered as Faun looked at the glass in wonder. “Forgive her, Sk’athor. She has a thing for The Big Guy.”

“I do not!” Faun snapped. “Well… I don’t anymore!!!”

“That’s the spirit!” F10w3rchy1d laughed as she patted Faun on the back.

“If he wants to… to be with… her… it’s fine!!!” she spat as she took another drink.

“Brought her here to drown her sorrows,” F10w3rchy1d said, “And to get her out some, show her that there is more out there than some monkey-dude.”

“Young Gods, intoxicants, and bruised feelings,” Sk’athor chuckled, “This should prove amusing.”

“Well, that is why you opened the joint, isn’t it?” F10w3rchy1d laughed.

“Actually,” Sk’athor replied, “I just like cleaning glasses. In order to clean a glass, I need it dirtied.”

He paused.

“We have covered this before, you know.”

“We have?” F10w3rchy1d asked.

“On over twenty separate occasions.”

“Well, forgive me for not having a galaxy-sized brain,” F10w3rchy1d laughed.

“Oh well,” Sk’athor chuckled, “It does simplify the small-talk.”

Faun looked over at F10w3rchy1d curiously.

“Hey, when you have been around as long as I have, you tend to jettison memories,” F10w3rchy1d shrugged. “I don’t have enough space to remember absolutely everything, even with cloud storage.”

She grinned at Faun.

“You’ll understand one day. You just can’t remember everything.”

She took a long drink of her “beer”.

“I tell you, it’s a blessing,” F10w3rchy1d said, “after a while, there is plenty you will not want to remember.”

Faun thoughtfully sipped her “wine”, the existential dread of the full implications that little revelation carried successfully distracting her from her bruised heart.

“But… what if I forget something I want to remember, some cherished moment, some important fact?”

“You won’t realize it happened, so it won’t bother you,” F10w3rchy1d shrugged. “and we do a pretty good job of keeping what’s truly important… most of the time… I’m lucky. I get to pick and choose what to remember and what to forget… for the most part. It’s different for all of us. You might be able to remember everything… or you might start to forget things after no time at all.”

“That is not reassuring,” Faun said as she took another sip of her glorious beverage.

“I give you a hard time about being hellbait,” F10w3rchy1d said, “But you have been around for a couple of ten thousand years. Do you remember everything?”

“I… I thought I did!” Faun exclaimed, thoroughly disturbed.

“You might want to start taking notes,” F10w3rchy1d shrugged as she took another drink. “I can hook you up with a hell of a laptop if you want.”

“A laptop?” Faun asked, quite confused.

“I’ll show you when we get back,” F10w3rchy1d replied.

“You dare show your disgusting visage around here once more, tormentor?” a loud voice demanded.

Hovering before them was a glowing blue pyramid accompanied by a dozen other polygonal solids of various shapes and colors.

“Oh, hello there,” F10w3rchy1d said cheerfully, “please wait….”

A glowing hourglass icon appeared above her head.

“You archived my memory?!?” The pyramid shouted, “Unbelievable….”

“Archon Fifteen Sub Eighty!!!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed.

“I am gratified that you deigned to remember,” Archon Fifteen Sub Eighty huffed, pulsing with irritation. “I hope you have also remembered the unforgivable insult you have inflicted upon me, upon my people, for today… today… I WILL HAVE MY REVENGE!!!”

“Look,” F10w3rchy1d said as she sipped her strangely glowing beer, “I said I was sorry.”

“Mere apologies are not enough!” the pyramid exclaimed. “Today, you suffer as I did!”

A chessboard appeared and slammed onto the bar with a decisive “bang”.

“It was an innocent misunderstanding!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed as chess pieces materialized. “Most entities prefer it if you go easy on them when teaching them a new game. I had absolutely no idea that not playing at one hundred percent was some sort of grave slight in your culture.”

A white pawn hovered slightly and slammed onto the board angrily.

“I have spent aeons preparing for today!” the pyramid proclaimed, “Today, you shall be humiliated as I was!!!”

“Fine,” F10w3rchy1d shrugged as a black pawn shot forward, “Suit yourself.”

Faun watched in amazement as the pieces started moving faster and faster.

“Checkmate,” F10w3rchy1d shrugged.

“Again!”

The pieces started moving even faster.

“Checkmate,” F10w3rchy1d said again.

The board reset, and the pieces started to blur.

“Not to cause yet more insult, but are you sure you have been… huh….”

F10w3rchy1d trailed off into silence as she stared intently at the blurring pieces.

“Checkmate.” She said, exhaling a bit with the effort.

The board reset.

F10w3rchy1d stopped speaking as her attention was solely devoted to the whirling chess pieces in front of her. She won each game, but each game took a little longer, and her pieces moved a little slower…

“CHECKMATE!!!” the pyramid howled with delight as the various geometric solids surrounding them bounced and flashed with a riot of colors. “Checkmate!!! I defeated you! I defeated yoooooouuuuu!!!”

“That you did,” F10w3rchy1d said happily. “Good gam…”

Her eyes narrowed.

“Wait.”

The pyramid glowed brightly.

“You son of a bitch!” she laughed. “You were holding back the whole time!!! Even that last game!”

“Yes!!!” the pyramid howled with triumph, “How does it feel, knowing that you were bested and I wasn’t even fully exerting myself!!!”

“It stung,” F10w3rchyld replied, “probably not as bad as I unintentionally stung you, but it did sting a little.”

She sipped her beer.

“Will you finally now accept my fucking apology?”

“Apologies are a construct of your kind,” the pyramid pulsed, “the injury has been avenged. We have no further business.”

“That’s where you are wrong, pointy,” F10w3rchy1d grinned. “You have just become my rival.”

“Your… rival?”

“You honestly don’t think I’m going to let that lie, do you?” F10w3rchy1d replied, “Now, I am going to go and improve my game. When I do, I will seek you out, and we will play again, both at our full power, and I shall defeat you in a proper game. Then, you will go and improve your game, and we will meet again. This we shall do forever, over and over again, until the end of fucking time in the last universe ever to be created.”

All of the polygons flashed brightly and started chittering back and forth in their strange language.

“This… this…” the pyramid pulsed, “this is acceptable. This is more than acceptable. I look forward to defeating you repeatedly!”

“If you would honor me with a few honest defeats, I would appreciate it,” F10w3rchy1d smiled, “I would like to get a good measure of how much I need to improve.”

“This is also acceptable!”

***

Faun watched F10w3rchy1d, the strange entity, and the chessboard until she got bored and then tried to get F10w3rchy1d’s attention only to be waved off impatiently.

She let forth a little huff of irritation.

“Despite everything,” Sk’athor chuckled, “F10w3rchy1d is still a gaming program at her most fundamental of processes. It’s nice to see her be reminded of that, don’t you think?”

“She is?”

“She didn’t tell you?” Sk’athor inquired. “She was originally part of a game.”

“I did not know that.”

“Most of the original Blitz crew were, except for Frostie,” Sk’athor said as he cleaned a shot glass.

Faun looked at F10w3rchy1d again and realized that she was actually smiling, not a smirk, not a sneer, an actual smile.

She looked… pretty.

“Goddamn, pointy!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed as the pieces were reset, “you are freaking good, like seriously good. You should take on our grandmasters!”

“You are not your people’s grandmaster of this game?”

“Oh no!” F10w3rchy1d laughed as the pieces started to fly once more. “Not even close. We have some AI’s who live solely for this one game and this one game alone. They will give you a proper run for your money!”

“That is incredibly acceptable!”

“In fact,” F10w3rchy1d smiled, “Do you want to meet one of our masters right now?”

“I would!”

F10w3rchy1d’s eyes glowed briefly.

“They are on their way!” she exclaimed. “You might not want to hold back this time.”

“I would never!!!”

“It was a joke,” F10w3rchy1d replied. “I will send her your way when she gets here. I would love to see her taken down a peg.”

“I shall await her arrival!” the pyramid pulsed with delight. “Do you desire another game?”

“I need a break,” F10w3rchy1d laughed, “You have thoroughly defeated me.”

“It was an honor!” the pyramid glowed. “Now that the unpleasantness between us has passed, I look forward to playing games with you again.”

“Same here,” F10w3rchy1d smiled (a real one).

The polygons withdrew, all clustering around a triumphant blue pyramid.

“He is so getting laid tonight,” F10w3rchy1d chuckled as she turned to Faun. “Well, I’m glad that’s finally resolved. The polys are good people, and we were beginning to make some real connections with them… until I fucked it all up.”

“What are they?” Faun asked.

“Beings from a universe with constants about as different from ours as they can be and interaction still be possible,” F10w3rchy1d replied. “They are their own classification of existence. They aren’t AI, they aren’t mechanical, and they aren’t organic. They are crystalline and a lot like an AI, except that they aren’t one. Their computational power is stupid. Seriously, even we can’t get the same oomph in as small a package as one of those polys. It’s like they are made of pure logic or something. We were starting to consider exploring their universes in an attempt to increase our capacity when I made the faux-pas of faux-pas and committed the absolutely unforgivable sin of going easy on a new player during one of our cultural exchanges.”

She grinned at Faun.

“It wasn’t blowing up a universe,” F10w3rchy1d snickered, “but they would have forgiven a little false vacuum oopsie much more readily. Going easy on them during a computational contest is like… wow… I’m not sure I even have a good analogy. It was instant ‘game over’ for the whole goddamn race. No wonder I archived those memories,” she winced.

She brightened up.

“I need to call the boss!” F10w3rchy1d exclaimed.

Her eyes glowed.

“Straight to voice mail,” F10w3rchy1d grumbled, “first goddamn night, and that hairy bastard is already being a pain in my….”

Faun made a little unhappy noise, drained her glass, and turned away.

“One faux-pas fixed, and I go and make another,” F10w3rchy1d chuckled. “I’m sure they are just talking.”

“We both know they aren’t!” Faun exclaimed.

“Yeah,” F10w3rchy1d said, “we do….”

Faun slumped a little and hung her head.

“It’s not fair….”

“Life isn’t, even for beings as powerful as us,” F10w3rchy1d said as she motioned Sk’athor over for a refill for the both of them. “But, hey… this might not be the worst thing, you know, at least not for you.”

“My wonderful teacher is in the arms of another!” Faun wailed, “That’s pretty close.”

“Hear me out,” F10w3rchy1d said as another set of drinks appeared before them. “You’re definitely not a child, but you are young. More importantly, you are green.”

Faun looked at her pelt curiously.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake….” F10w3rchy1d moaned, “I mean you are inexperienced, which is about as much of a deal-breaker for someone like the Big Guy as you actually being underaged. He’s not going to make a move on you or let you make a move on him until you become a lot more experienced at things, which is going to take time, right?... With me so far?”

Faun nodded and downed her drink.

Another appeared instantly.

“Frostie and the Big Guy, they have this on again off again thing going. They really have a thing for each other, but it’s doomed. They are just too much alike in all the wrong ways. They will go hot and heavy for a while, long enough for you to think that maybe this time it will truly last, then one of them will do something, and the whole thing will fall apart. It’s one of the great cycles of the multiverse.”

She paused to take a drink.

“When, not if, when this happens the next time,” F10w3rchy1d continued, “you will have had enough time to stop being such a newb. You won’t be ‘hellbait’ then. If you still have a thing for him after really getting to know him (which you probably won’t), you will be in a prime position to grab him on the rebound!”

“But that could take years!!!”

F10w3rchy1d laughed.

“It will take billions of years, most likely.”

“Aaargh!!!” Faun wailed and downed her drink again.

Another appeared.

“You trying to cause trouble?” F10w3rchy1d laughed at Sk’athor.

He just shrugged and continued wiping down his glasses.

“I can’t wait that long!” Faun exclaimed. “I… I was hoping that he would… you know… ‘ease my loneliness’….”

She sighed.

“I have been so lonely for so long, and he is….”

She sighed again… sadly…

“Why the hell do you think I brought you here?” F10w3rchy1d asked. “Look around! If there is one place in the whole multiverse where an entity can get their loneliness eased, it’s here! We’ve been here less than an hour, and I’ve already gotten a brain-melting gaming session in! Did you see it? Holy shit! That pointy little fuck is good!!! I haven’t been pushed like that in ages! He rode me hard and put me away wet!!!”

Faun cocked a suspicious eye at F10w3rchy1d.

“Were… were you getting your loneliness eased right in front of me?”

“Not just you,” F10w3rchy1d laughed, “I got it eased in front of everybody!!! I’m sort of a freak that way.”

Faun looked at her in complete and absolute horror.

“I’m kidding!” F10w3rchy1d laughed, “…sort of… Hey! I’m an AI! We do things differently. Don’t judge!”

Faun quietly downed her drink again.

“Now that I’ve gotten my itch scratched,” F10w3rchy1d grinned, “and set myself up with an ongoing thing with him… at least I think it’s a him (not that it matters)… it’s your turn. Let’s go and get your loneliness eased!”