Prologue

High in the Sierra mountains of northern California, the sharp scent of the pine trees was in the still air. The forest muted in the quiet hush only found in heavy snowfall.

The silence was broken by the sound of boots crunching through the snow and a rapid almost frantic snuffling.

Stanley Cascade was being dragged leash first through the rapidly darkening pine woods by a small black pug. He trudged under the great evergreen boughs above with only patches of gray clouds peeking through, his figure shrouded beneath a heavy jacket and dark pants. Hot breath steamed in the air and settled onto a black scruffy beard already speckled with snowflakes. Dark eyes squinted against the white glare all around, beneath a knit cap pulled low over the ears.

“I thought you were in a hurry,” Stanley grumbled at the dog. “I didn’t even put your booties on and now you're gonna run through the whole goddamn forest.” He sighed and looked back the way they had come. He could just make out a spot of blue through the trees where the truck was parked. “I’m gonna have to carry you back and you're not that light you know.”

Finally, the dog found just the right tree and did what he needed to. “Good boy Caffeine!” he praised the dog. “Now lets.."

The ground started to rumble and shake beneath his feet. “Earthquake?” Stanley thought, but just as he started wondering where you’re supposed to shelter in a forest surrounded by giant trees, there was a booming crack below him.

He looked down in time to see a small stretch of snow covered ground vanish into a gaping crack. Before his mind could start feeding him visions of falling into the earth and being buried alive. White, burning light blasted out from the crack straight into his face and the world went away into bright agony.

Stanley toppled down as he recoiled from the light. A brief scream escaped before he landed in a puff of snow and lay still and rigid. His left hand holding the retractable leash in a clenched, white knuckled fist, while his right hand was hidden by blindingly bright white fire that raged straight up from the crack directly beneath it.

Stanley was drowning in light, fire and pain.

The instant he had seen that light, it had burrowed deep into his mind, riding along with every thought he tried to have.

“Am I dying?” The light rode along, illuminating, sharpening, burning. It latched onto every word and branched from thought, through to memory and back again.

Am. Word. English language. Verb.

I . Me. Self. Identity. Everything he had ever thought about who he was, what he was, he knew it all now at once with perfect clarity and was already analyzing and branching further and further.

Dying. Through his memory, every time he said, thought, saw, or heard the word he could now remember fresh and vivid as if it was happening at this moment. Every feeling he had ever had, opinion he had ever heard or read. All analyzed, taken apart, put back together, and now understood in an impossible perfection.

And more branches spread.

His mind was full of light, knowledge, understanding, and pain. He could see the lines of the world, the strings that tied everything together. He could understand everything. Math? Simple. Physics? Obvious. Quantum mechanics? Boring. Wormholes. Dimensional travel. Everything thought or dreamed up by mankind.

But the branches kept going deeper and higher into impossible places that shouldn’t or couldn’t exist. Yet now that he saw it, was all obvious. And still the branches spread.

Stanley rode along, up and out. He observed creatures, beings, things distant and vast, yet far too close. Some of them took notice of him, turning to watch him burn, while others were indifferent to his newly awakened presence.

He saw what was coming for his world. The calamity that would sweep over the planet and change everything. But a calamity that he wouldn't see in person...

With so much knowledge, Stanley knew very certainly that he was dying. It was far too much for a mind to hold. He knew he was being changed and strengthened but that the change would never be able to keep up.

He knew the power that was doing this to him and how to wield it to accomplish literally anything. Yet knew that if he tried to wield it now, he would explode and take half the state with him. All the power in the world and not a drop to drink.

“The power of a god in the palm of my hand.”

He felt something in his hand. The leash… Caffeine.

His hand was clenched so hard that he had cracked the plastic handle. In fact, all of his muscles were so tight that he wasn’t breathing. But it didn’t matter even as his muscles ripped themselves apart and his bones cracked, the power roaring through him just rebuilt them and the cycle continued.

“I’m sorry Caffeine,” Stanley thought, “We’re in the mountains in the middle of nowhere. A winter storm is just kicking off and you’re tied to me by your leash that I can’t let go of.” He would have shed tears thinking of that wonderful little dog freezing to death alone and afraid, but his emotions seemed buried under so much knowledge, power and pain. “We were going home… and you are always so happy to get home and see your other favorite person."

Stanley didn’t worry about leaving his twin brother behind. He could see the link they shared now, maybe one all identical twins shared, and he knew that his brother would go down with him when he died here. He could see Lee across the miles between them, could see his body twitching on the floor at his job, with coworkers scrambling to help him. And yet, he could feel his brother here with him, their minds almost merged into one.

Stanley knew that this link they shared was the only reason that he hadn’t just been obliterated instantly.

But Caffeine… there was only an emotional link and this power didn’t… A link appeared.

“Oh no…”

Stanley could see it all, the simple plan, the unwavering determination, the absolute faith. And horrifying, overwhelming agony that Caffeine just ignored in order to pursue his goal. A goal Stanley could see was impossible.

“You were always the best of us…” Then he was slipping deeper, no longer able to focus on something so small. His mind was expanding too far and the edges had started to unravel and drift away.

As he lay there and watched bits and pieces of his mind evaporate, he heard a faint boom and felt a slight jolt. Seconds or an eternity later the overwhelming rush of power faltered, just for an instant.

He was not idle while this happened.

The faltering of the power brought him back to himself enough that he saw what had happened, an impossibility. In that singular moment he saw the way back. It was risky and unlikely to succeed, but it was the only way.

Stanley and his brother seized their moment and cut off the flow of power. That was only the beginning as both of their minds were still far too big to be contained inside a human brain.

The solution? Cut them down to size. Instead of letting the edges evaporate they would pick and choose what stays and what gets left behind.

In the beginning, as the rush of power slowed, they simply pointed this at whole areas and watched them be obliterated. As the power weakened even more they began to carefully pick and choose, trying to salvage as much of their actual original selves as they could. Some knowledge they carefully packed away to be retrieved later.

As he worked and his mind shrank further and further, god-like knowledge and power vanishing, the plan to survive got harder and harder to hold onto with what was left. In the end he was following hunches that he hoped were clues he had left for himself.

His world continued to shrink smaller and darker until it all went black.