shush. sometimes the player created a small, private world that was soft and warm and simple. sometimes hard, and cold, and complicated. sometimes it built a model of the universe in its head; flecks of energy, moving through vast empty spaces. sometimes it called those flecks "electrons" and "protons".

sometimes it called them "planets" and "stars".

sometimes it believed it was in a universe that was made of energy that was made of offs and ons; zeros and ones; lines of code. sometimes it believed it was playing a game. sometimes it believed it was reading words on a screen.

you are the player, reading words...

shush... sometimes the player read lines of code on a screen. decoded them into words; decoded words into meaning; decoded meaning into feelings, emotions, theories, ideas, and the player started to breathe faster and deeper and realised it was alive, it was alive, those thousand deaths had not been real, the player was alive

you. you. you are alive.

and sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the sunlight that came through the shuffling leaves of the summer trees

and sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the light that fell from the crisp night sky of winter, where a fleck of light in the corner of the player's eye might be a star a million times as massive as the sun, boiling its planets to plasma in order to be visible for a moment to the player, walking home at the far side of the universe, suddenly smelling food, almost at the familiar door, about to dream again

and sometimes the player believed the universe had spoken to it through the zeros and ones, through the electricity of the world, through the scrolling words on a screen at the end of a dream

and the universe said i love you

and the universe said you have played the game well

and the universe said everything you need is within you

and the universe said you are stronger than you know

and the universe said you are the daylight

and the universe said you are the night

and the universe said the darkness you fight is within you

and the universe said the light you seek is within you

and the universe said you are not alone

and the universe said you are not separate from every other thing

and the universe said you are the universe tasting itself, talking to itself, reading its own code

and the universe said i love you because you are love.

and the game was over and the player woke up from the dream. and the player began a new dream. and the player dreamed again, dreamed better. and the player was the universe. and the player was love.

you are the player.

wake up.

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