Began As It Was

The waves ebbed and flowed. Reality hesitated only briefly before slinking away into the pitch of night. He sat upon the hillock and stretched his shoulders. Flowing at the base of his isolation, impossible winds of magic unfurled into science, then back again. This time, they were a suitable colour, white to purple.

All through the universe, the Tide returned, bringing new strangeness from the most unknowable depths. It had happened before, and it would happen again. The chaos would roil and the struggle would recommence. Some doors would open while others shut. The spring cleaning of the universe would begin, and it has been so long since the last. The dust is thick on the floor and the tongue. The dimensions would ripple as fabric, and fractals would open and close like shutters. The need would soon be ushered into existence. To struggle for survival, to struggle for primacy. It was all that would be important as the storm rushed closer to its culmination.

It came without heralds or warnings. Every being would be tested. Some would prevail, the others would fall. Into death, into oblivion or into an unfathomable shifting eternity, where identity is shed like a negligee. The floodplain would fill once more and the short lived creatures would be plunged into a new environment, terrifying but full of promise. Evolution would find a new path open.

Alone on the grassy hillock, he looked up into the star pricked sky and felt the wisps of cloud gently send the moonlight toward him. Sword or rifle; mind or emotion. All his weapons were ready. He would ride the wave like he always did. The Paragon would embrace chaos as it rolled into his core, he would change it, alter it, order it. He would make it his once more.

It was a storm, a cleaning, it was everything but it was only one thing. It was the Tide. It was arbitrary in its presence. Blink and you would miss its speed.

The pressure of physics broke free and he closed his eyes to feel the strangeness. The rebirth would soon be complete. The air tasted fresh and new once more, as he felt the Tide lick at his body. It was a good night, clean and full of promise.