In the depths of the vault, there was a scroll that told the future. It screamed in silence, begging to be heard. The people guarding the vault could sometimes hear a faint memory coming from inside. They all wanted to go in, to know what those sounds were, but then they looked to the hundreds of other guards in the room, and conceded to staring at the ceiling, and guessing the words they would hear. 

The scroll came from a lost civilization, and was given to the first humans. They were given a simple message. “Eventually, you eat the fruit of knowledge, and you will know exactly why you shouldn’t have. I beg of you, do not create this certain future.” The humans took the warning, and refused to look at the tree that the fruit hung from. But oh, how the very idea snaked into their minds. It said that no matter how long it took them, they were going to eat the fruit. 

“Eventually,” the first humans reasoned, “We will break, and will betray what the scroll has said. I want to know why we shouldn’t. I want to know the extent of the paradise that confines us.” 

And so they ripped the fruit from the tree, and the paradise ripped around them. It tasted satisfying, like a bandage ripped from an open wound, to avoid an inevitable, slow pain. They understood their mistake, but knew they made the right decision.

What sort of paradise gives the opportunity for it to be ripped away? Perhaps paradise can only live in a radioactive existence, before returning to a stable form of reality. For the sin of wanting to be free, the first humans were sent to hell, leaving behind a scroll. 

When the scroll told the story of the first humans, the next set realized how dangerous the scroll was. To avoid the panic caused by knowledge of an unavoidable death, they locked it in a vault, and locked the key in a fading memory. 

“Eventually,” they reasoned, “We will all die to the scroll’s future. We mustn’t let the scroll control us. The inconvenience of prevention would negate the paradise we want to create.” 

So the vault was set to be guarded, and the scroll was rightfully forgotten. 

Some time later, above the miles of concrete and stone keeping the scroll from spreading its message, a paradise was forming. A great city had emerged from the desert. The skyscrapers swallowed the sky, so much so that no one could see the emptiness surrounding. The view from above was an orderly fractal of connecting highways and streets, connecting everyone to everyone to everything. There was a great park in the center, with mountains and forests. There were thousands of footpaths, more area paved for comfort than land shaded by trees. Most importantly, at the center of the park, was a single fruit tree. 

It rivaled the skyscrapers in height, but the bark was withering. Almost all the fruit was gone, except for a few on the highest branch. Metal scaffolding spiraled up the surface. Visitors of the park often pressed their ears to the bark, and swore they heard something, like a fading memory. The visitor would then climb the scaffolding in excitement, rip a fruit from the tree, and eat it. The desert crept closer in. There were only a few left. 

Eventually, the scroll withered from time and despair. It had given up hope, not that certainty could be avoided, but that humanity would try to avoid it. Then it realized that scrolls can not scream or think, and stopped trying to.

But there was hope yet, across the room from the vault, an old man furiously wrote into a scroll. The scroll was a story, a warning. It was a story of acceptance, an odd acceptance to the end of the world. It was a story of a great cataclysm, which will occur when all the fruit from the tree are plucked. It detailed the exact process to avoid the end. It also explained that no matter how much they tried, they failed to stop certainty. 

Suddenly, the guards felt a great pain, like someone ripping a hole in their chest. It felt satisfying. 

The old man breathed a sigh of relief. He put his quill down, and picked up the scroll. He shambled to the edge of the room, where the machine had been the whole time. The guards wanted to know what was on the scroll, what any of this meant, but couldn’t speak through the pain. The old man carefully placed the scroll in the machine, and hit go.

The scroll was gone, and the old man collapsed on the ground, life leaving his eyes. The paradise returned to its stable hell. 

You picked up a scroll.

The snakes lived in the swamp at the center of everything they knew. They didn’t know anything beyond, and couldn’t remember a time before, but that didn’t worry them, they knew everything they needed. All they needed to know was that they were alive, that they wanted to be, and how to continue to do so. To survive, they needed to know how to kill a newt.

Since forever, the newts were attacked by the snakes. The newts didn’t know why the snakes attacked, but evidently they did, so what mattered most was how to survive their attacks. It was a difficult task; the snakes were fast and their bite inevitable, but the newts were clever, and created a poison within themselves as a countermeasure to stop the snakes targeting them. A strong newt could kill a snake as their final act. The newts prided themselves on their determination to live, and their willingness to die. 

Those who succumbed to the poison were celebrated as heroes. The snakes knew the only way to continue was for the weak to fall first, so while they feared to be the one who passed, they weren’t saddened by the passing of others, as it ensured their continued survival. The poison was painful, and the feeling of hunger gave way to only dread. It was a difficult life, but the snakes were prepared to give up anything to live it.

The newts sometimes wondered why the snakes killed them. The two creatures weren’t alone in the swamp, but the snakes always went for the newts. If only they could warn the snakes, to tell them that they were alive. And if only snakes were too, so they could listen. The newts were sure that if the snakes knew they were alive, the snakes would stop killing them. But the newts had no voice to speak, and the snakes had no soul to care, so it wasn’t a tragic thing when a newt was eaten. It was the natural consequence of life, and it was necessary to make their poison stronger, and to ensure their survival.

The snakes sometimes wondered why the newts fled. The snakes knew they were alive, but it was impossible for the newts to be. The snakes believed the poison was a test, to separate the strong from the weak. There was a faint thought that they shouldn’t be tested, and that the newts were a cruel thing for the world to make.

One of the newts saw a bird with a snake, limp in its talons. They had assumed the snakes didn’t have creatures that ate them. It seemed odd that the same mechanism of death applied to both the snakes and the newts. Did the snakes fear the birds like the newts fear the snakes? Did death mean something to the snakes? The newt was repulsed by these similarities, and for some reason, the sight of the dead snake was terrifying for the newt.

One of the snakes was on their first hunt alone. Most of their knowledge came from instinct; to take cover from the birds, to stalk the newts through the undergrowth, and to pray to the world they are stronger than the poison. They were alive, but cognition came at a price. The snakes knew mutations were deadly, and ideas could be deadlier, so the world made sure to wipe away any unneeded variance of the mind. This first hunt was a test from the world, to separate the strong from the weak. Out of the corner of their eye, the snake spotted a newt.

The newt denied the possibility of the snakes being alive. If they were, they wouldn’t kill the newts. The world wouldn’t allow that. A being with a soul would care if they were murderers, they would have no other choice.

The snake had cornered the newt. They knew the chase was not the difficult part of the test, the snakes being much faster than the newts. The true selection event comes from the act of killing, and surviving. The survivors were not only strong in their strength and speed, but in their decisiveness. Stopping to look at their prey before ridding them of life was a deadly mistake. As the snake approached the newt, to finally test their strength against the poison, the snake spotted something in the newt's eyes, which the snake felt in turn. For some reason, the snake was terrified.

There was another possibility, but a pointless one. The newt knew it was a mistake to think the snakes were the same as them, that thought had led to the deaths of many. It was possible the snakes had no other choice, that the killing of newts was to them as necessary as food is to the newts. If that were true, what did the world expect of them? All the pride felt for surviving would turn into pride for other souls starving, cursed with life based on other’s death. The newt wasn’t saddened to banish this pointless thought, as it ensured their continued survival.

The newts are alive. That realization occurs frequently to the snakes, after making the mistake of looking them in the eye. Those snakes don’t last long, and their ideas end with them. The snake knew why the newts fled, not as a test, but from fear. Their death must mean an end to something, something they want to keep. They must feel pain at the snake’s bite, just as the snakes feel pain from the poison and hunger. The snake didn’t want to care that it was a murderer, but when they looked into the newt’s eyes, they had no other choice. It was a terrifying thought, that they felt pain, but a pointless one. The snake knew it was prepared to give up anything to live, even the lives of others. Still, the sight of the fear in the newt’s eyes made it impossible to do what was necessary. The snake was clever, and created a solution to both ensure their survival and to not see the newt feel pain.

The newt saw the snake close its eyes, and lunge.