The Living Earth - Mud Thread

The swamp awoke. It had no ears to hear, yet it heard the birds singing, no eyes to see, yet it saw the flowers blooming. Nature was beautiful.

Time passed, the flowers withered, the birds left, yet as austere as the winter was, the beauty was still there.

The seasons passed one by one, each with their own beauty, each their own facet of nature.

As the years went on the swamp desired to go out among the creatures, to see the world as they saw, it but it was simply to fluid. Unable to form a cohesive body it simply went on as it had for so long it almost forgot its desire. Eventually however, another of the rifts that had been appearing formed within its borders and sounds could be heard on the other side. A beautiful laughter that brought an ache to its heart was the first thing it heard through the rift, followed immediately by the same beautiful voice screaming in terror. Moments later yelled commands emerged followed by the chanting of many voices. The rift began to contract; as it did though, the chanting came through it in almost a solid wave, as this struck the swamp’s surface something miraculous happened, a segment of the swamp’s ground solidified, not dried out as sometimes happened in the summer, but merely became more cohesive than the mud’s normal consistency.

With great effort the swamp embodied itself in the solidifying muck and formed a body; two arms, two legs, a head with two eyes to see the world, two ears to hear the world, and a mouth to speak and interact with the creatures it encountered. Unlike before, this time the body did not flow away as it moved like the normal liquid muck of the swamp, nor did it crumble and fall apart as dried mud so swiftly did. It remained whole; the swamp finally had a body with which to go among the creatures as it had so long desired to do!

At first the animals were scared, but nothing has as much patience as the earth and soon enough the swamp’s body was accepted by the animals.

More years passed and the swamped lived happily, both around and with the creatures inhabiting it. Gradually, the fragment of the swamp inhabiting the body developed a sense of self, separate from the main swamp yet still connected on a telepathic level.

As this sense of self developed, the body desired a name, something to call itself that differentiated it from the main swamp. “What am I? I am of you but not you.” it said to the swamp one day.

The swamp thought it over for a while before answering; “Never before has this happened… Do you truly desire a name so badly?”

“Yes, I do” the body answered eagerly.

“Then I shall call you Gnome, you are my Gnome and I am your swamp. We were one, now we are two, but never forget our connection.” The swamp answered slowly and solemnly.

“I will always remember!” the newly named Gnome responded, equally serious.

More years passed until one night when a fire was lit within the swamp’s borders. In its haste to extinguish the flames before they could spread, the Gnome tripped over the human sitting next to the flames as it threw its body onto them. Rising up from the ashes, it seemed a monster and the human, terrified, attacked in self defense.

Never having known pain before, the Gnome was both terrified and enraged when the human’s glowing blue blade connected with its side. The wound healed immediately, but the terror and anger remained. The Gnome struck back.