This are scenes 4 and 5 of the first chapter...

Oh boy! Do you know was is to have an over-illuminated room? Try a shinny white room, remove its roof at noon, and add enough illumination to lit a mayor leagues' baseball stadium. That's how my eyes felt as soon as we went across the portal. Even my skin was feeling the blast!

Apparently I was the only one feeling bad, because Urd and Skuld were hurrying me towards someone. That someone sounded like a veteran female secretary, one of those you would expect a big party to happen the day after they retire.

"So, this is the new god? Good; now go in: the Father doesn't have Eternity just to wait for you!"

A big double door opened and we were kicked inside the next room.

"Greetings, Urd, Goddess of the Past; Skuld, Goddess of the Future; and Ignacio Ramirez, Neo-circa God of Darkness."

I could feel the Goddesses jumping from my side and staring at me, but I didn't have eyes to look at them. Matter of fact, I was almost blind: I was trying to show my respect by standing with my face uncovered and my eyes open, looking towards the direction I could make up the voice had came from; however, I wasn't exactly enjoying 'the light of His face.' He apparently noticed, as a pair of sunglasses had appeared in one of my hands. . .

"Put them on, Nacho."

I obeyed . . . I mean, I complied instantly. And it was a relief, as I could finally see something. First I saw that the floor was wooden, then I saw Urd sizing me from four metres away, and then I tried to look back at the other end of the room, with no success. At least there was a great improvement, as now I could stand looking strait at the light. I kneeled, but was careful to keep in mind to not prostrate myself.

"Thank you for your concern, Lord."

"You don't need to call me Lord, young god. Call me as you feel comfortable with, and stand up."

Yet I felt like I would really need to gain familiarity with a God's life before showing familiarity with the Boss of Bosses. At any rate, I was not going to call Him 'Lord' after he has told me not to. I thought for a moment, and after having stood up, I answered Him with the best I could think of.

"Of course, Sir."

If He was displeased, He didn't make me know.

"And keep them. I hardly use them anyway."

"Thanks again, Sir."

As you can clearly see, I was in 'servant mode.' If was not spoken to, I would not speak.

"Urd, Skuld: please leave us alone for a moment." -- He instructed. They complied quickly, and soon I was alone with the Almighty. He sighed, and started speaking.

"I will need to apologise to you, young god."

"Why would you, Sir? You have given me a great gift, and. . ."

"No Nacho, is not so much of a gift. You have a kind of Godhood which has a very poor reputation..."

What followed was a brief explanation of the history of Dark Gods. The main characteristic of . . . us, is that we can't process the Holy System Energy the rest of the Gods depend on, and instead we greatly depend on environmental energy. Now the problem is that Dark Deities are born like regular Deities of Light, but as they enter puberty, they become progressively intolerant to Light, and to System Energy. The only option is for the deity to leave Heaven, which joined with their disconnection from the system, tended to drive them mad. In the end, they ended either crazy, let themselves die, or as in most cases, ended joining the Enemy, these last ones normally ending like something called 'Evils'. Only few exceptions remained in the good side, mostly because they had accepted their charge voluntarily (like Hades), or had attributes more related to something that happens at night than to the dark itself (like Selene, Diana, and other deities related to the Moon). I fact, He even told me that a few highly diversified Light Gods whose attributes included Darkness, tended to be depressed whenever they had to go into it.

I was starting to see why would He want to apologize to me. As I saw things, my Ascension was becoming very little of a gift, and a lot of a curse. Apparently the Almighty was reading my mind at the moment, since He stopped speaking, and I felt -- but could never see -- a comforting hand resting on my shoulder. Now He spoke in a reassuring voice.

"Don't be afraid, son. I did select you for this because I know you'll be able to pull it thru. Besides, you have two great advantages over any other god. First, you have never been plugged into System Energy, so not being connected will not drive you over the edge by itself. . ." -- I could certainly see the logic on that -- ". . .and second, and you know this one, your heart's wish would have been to be able to spend the rest of your life creating art in the mountains, instead of working an eight-to-six for some heartless company. In fact I interpreted your heart's wish and tried to fulfill it to its fullest potential. Besides, I would rather think you will rather enjoy moving to Japan to be trained."

"I. . . would think so, Sir."

I could feel like He was winking at me, even through I wasn't technically seeing His face. Nevertheless, my self-confidence and happiness had just rose a few notches, and I would be happy for a while to come. By the time I noticed, I was an 'Ignacio' grinning like an 'Ignatius' in front of the Almighty, thinking on trivialities like anime, manga and a few video games. He took me back to reality, with a mildly amused tone.

"Well son, you better go, and on your way out call for Urd and Skuld. I want you to think on your condition, since it won't really sink in for a while. Just remember to ask for help when you need it."

"Thanks, Sir. Thanks for everything."

I walked to the gigantic double door, pulled it slightly open, and walked a step before noticing the waiting room. I hadn't noticed anything other than the light level first time I passed thru, but now with the glasses I noticed that it was as big as a hangar, made with roman architecture, and with many small square skylights popping here and there. I also noticed the near side was cramped with people, that many of those people were carrying weapons of some sort (from obsidian knifes to shotguns, and everything in between), and that the room had gone quiet as soon as I stepped out. Yet, the Almighty Himself had asked me to send Urd and Skuld to his presence, and I would be damned if I was to let Him down in my very first assignment. I spotted Urd not to far away, and walked in her direction, even as I was starting to blush at having so many stares on me. I tried to break the silence by talking up.

"Hey Urd, the Boss. . ."

I stopped speaking after saying 'Boss' because the moment I said it, there were from gasps to shrieks, and now I was in the middle of a mob of frightened Gods, and four out of each five were now caressing their weapons. I was frightened myself, but I had a mission.

"Well Urd, He wants to talk to you and Skuld."

"Ok, I'm going." -- She answered shiftily. Then she backed down a few steps and yelled back. -- "Skuld, the Almighty wants us in." -- Then walked backwards, out of sight.

Note to self: Never EVER refer to the Almighty as 'Boss'. Too bad I already had, and right then I was surrounded, severely outnumbered, and almost pissing my pants. But right then something happened. From the back of the crowd I heard a female voice, who apparently was trying to pass thru. In fact, the 'sorry's and 'excuse me's were getting nearer, and soon I saw a short young woman, whose appearance would have spelled 'pharmacist' if had been paying attention to it ( white lab robe, well cared shoulder length hair in a ponytail, light make up, old design lenses, and you name the rest ). She extended a hand and took me by a wrist.

"Come here kid, that you and me have an immediate appointment."

She started to pull me, but as I started following the crowd opened for us. Once we were out she threw her glasses ahead of us, and as she stepped on them, she fell thru them, pulling me with her.

I would have kissed the floor when we arrived into an empty room. In fact I was so relieved at just being away, that I had fallen on my knees and was breathing hard on the floor. An amazed voice spoke to me.

"What did you do to upset them so much, kid? When I arrived they were so terrified that if you had sniffed, I would be scraping you with a spatula right now!"

"Well, I called Him as 'the Boss'!"

"What?!" -- Her voice was one of disbelief, but not at what I was thinking. -- "That's quite heretic, but nowhere enough for them to want your head!"

"I think it also was that Urd and Skuld had told them that I'm the new God of the Dark!"

"How's that?" -- one more time a tone of disbelief. -- "Oh, yes; Urd and Skuld, two of the three time Goddesses of the Norse pantheon."

Apparently she already was fully briefed, or she was impossible to startle. Either way her answers brought my face up, to met her quite amused gaze. -- "Well, lets get down to business. You won't have more than an hour here, and then you have another appointment." -- She then walked to a nearby desk and waved me to sit by. I was promptly there, and she already had opened a file, which contained nothing but a blank sheet of paper. She appeared a fountain pen out of thin air, and started.

"Ok, so you are the Modern God of the Dark, right?"

"Well, I think the Lord actually addressed me as 'Neo-Circa', whatever that means."

"It just means 'New Age', and it means that you are a brand-new god, which brand new powers, for a new reality which is unfilled by existing deities." -- She paused for a second. -- ". . . Although it seems quite natural being you a Dark God."

The Big Boy had already told me that my position was as unenviable as it gets for a god, so it just made sense that no-one was on duty. I was about to ask her something else, but she saved me.

"Sorry, can I check the glasses you are wearing?"

"Sure, but can you dim the lights before? Without the glasses I'll be blind."

"Well, sure." -- She stood up and went to the far side of the room, so I started looking around me. We were in what appeared to be a top notch optician's lab, except for a big vertical white cylinder by the all-crystal far wall, which after a second I recognised as a high-temperature oven. She passed by said oven, and gave four taps to the crystal wall, which instantly went black. She turned back to me.

"Ok, now may I?" -- She said after sitting in front of me, pointing to my glasses.

"Of course." -- I removed the glasses myself, but the moment they left my face, my world went white again, and I had to shut my eyes.

"Is it still too bright for you?" -- Now her voice seemed startled. I scratched my previous theory of "impossible to startle", and tried to answer with a comic and slightly pained groan, after which I raised my face and faced where her voice had come from, smiled, and said "Although I can live with it". I heard her chuckle (from the right direction), and say "Don't worry. It will only take a minute."

I shut up. I am the kind of guy who prefers to not pursue a conversation with somebody who is conducting an analysis of me, mainly because experience taught me, by the bloody hand of a barber. * I waited around twenty seconds, and heard a pained groan, followed by an equally pained voice.

[ * Author note: I will not elaborate, but it was quite morbid.]

"I guess you got this lenses from the Almighty, didn't you?"

"Yup."

"Shut. Then analysing the crystal will be useless. This are the ultra-adaptative lenses I made for him about a hundred Earth years ago, and the only thing I can think about is directly examining you." -- She paused just for a second. -- "Look, even now they are adapting to me!"

Of course I could not look: matter of fact, so much light was passing thru my eyelids that now I even had covered my eyes with my hands. She must have seen it, because I heard her rummaging on the drawer after muttering a 'sorry', and after a bit she muttered a curse and stood up. I heard some pacing, and after a short break I heard her voice, a bit distant.

"Try opening your eyes now. I just dimmed the lights."

"Thanks." -- After removing my hands from my face I slowly opened my eyes. I was shocked at just how good my vision was: lets just say that I was now seeing the lab again, but now with a richness of detail and colour that I had just not seen a few minutes ago. But then I saw that my benefactor was having trouble finding the dark green chair she had been sitting on.

"Straight back, Miss!"

I jumped from my sit and pushed the chair for her before she had sat on its edge. She was surprised to find me there, and I was surprised that she was only looking on the general direction of my head when she spoke.

"Oh, thank you."

"No problem; however, isn't it just to dark for you now?"

"I guess it is." -- Pause. -- "But, what about you?"

"Well, I see perfectly, and that's much better than I could see with the lenses." -- . . . -- "By the way, wasn't your chair black?"

"Sure it is. How do you see it?"

"Dark green."

"Mm . . . fascinating."

"Mm?" -- I was wondering what could be so 'fascinating' about differing perception. If I was perceiving it differently, my eyes might be making up colours.

"Not necessarily. It might just be that your eyes are now so sensitive that you can perceive the real hue."

Wait a second! Was she reading my mind?

"No. Goddesses Aren't allowed to read minds but under very special circumstances, and . . ."

Oh, crap.

'I don't know what the word crap means, but if I gather its meaning correctly, I could say the same here', I heard her voice say, from inside my head. I then started to babble mentally, while I slapped my forehead quite hard.

"Ouch! Hey, that hurt!"

"Sorry..."

I started to rub my own forehead, and heard a 'thanks' inside' my head.

After we worked out that this aggressive telepathy must be one of my Dark powers, and after noticing that it would be active even for a while after I had been moved into the light, we decided that it would be useful for the length of the interview. From then on, the interview went incredibly efficient. I always knew what she was going to do or wanted me to do, and she always knew my exact answers, not to say that we could discuss any idea on how to diagnose me or so.

The final test results could be gathered like this:

A) My retinas had lost any trace of rod (night vision) cells, but now had three times as many cone (colour sensitive) cells, which were now four times as sensitive to light as normal. Total so far is twelve.

B) Under my retinas, instead of the regular light absorbing coat a normal human eye has, now I had a reflective coat you can normally find in the eyes of felines, doubling my light sensitivity. Total so far is twenty-four.

C) Normal irises' range of dilation and contraction is 85 to 10%, but mines' ratio was ninety to zero. That shouldn't be a problem, but then it comes that my irises become twenty percent semitransparent when I'm on the light, making my eyes still be five times as sensitive even with my irises completely shut. On the up side, now my irises had a reaction time half the ordinary for any god or human, but it still didn't compensate.

D) My eyes were now supplied blood at four or five times the regular rate, which didn't only compensate for its improvements, but also made me almost immune to visual fatigue.

E) Had I mentioned that my higher density of cone cells had also increased my vision resolution by three?



Yet, it wasn't all work and no play. We got to know each other, and as she gathered the story of my life, I got a few facts from her:

A) Although her physiological age was twenty-five, she had been created around the Renaissance.

B) There were three categories of Gods by origin: Original, as in born or created in Heaven, then the mortals who were deified after death (like plenty of Wisemans, Saints and Buddas), and then the few mortals who were deified by an oddly worded wish. I was part of the last group, and I was the second in two years, after a period of more than three millennia without a single occurrence. Most of the Gods created during the last thousand years were Ascended Wisemans, but she was actually an Original.

C) She loved her job, although it became boring to be an optician in a town were everyone had a perfect vision. Besides, her main job outside Heaven was to act a muse for optical-centred researchers, but it wasn't as if everyday somebody created a better microscope or telescope.

D) Almost no Modern Original god had an actual name, but they usually took a nickname until they were named by mortals (which was now extremely rare to happen). By her part, she answered to either Crystal or Opal.

E) She had an impressive linguistic ability, which she showed me by perfectly pronouncing my full name after having heard it just once.

F) It wasn't hard to make her blush.

I would continue, but I don't recall everything right now. In any case, there was some material which I prefer to keep only in my head. At any rate, we hardly made conversation during the tests, but we made a lot once we were done with analysis, and ready to make me some glasses. She insisted that she would be very displeased unless I ordered her at least a dozen, and so I did, but then she almost scared me: she had already planned to make me a bucketful of eighty-percent shade contact lenses, so she made by duplicate the dozen glasses I asked, either to use alone or with the contacts, not to say a diving mask and some working goggles, and three different types of sportive lenses, and a rock crystal brandy bottle, and some exchangeable lenses for certain glasses . . .

By the time our appointment was up, I was wearing some ultra-comfortable contacts, and a pair of glasses with a cool conservative design that could have been worn by Sean Connery on a James Bond movie, and I was literally carrying the rest on a bucket. We wouldn't have noticed it, but a knock came from a distant door, and we instantly knew who it was. We both went to open, although I wouldn't really know who of us actually opened. We found Urd and Skuld, who now were on an apologetic mood.

"Hi there", said Opal.

"Hi Crystal, and we owe you an apology, Ramirez-san", answered both Skuld and Urd. Then them bowed a bit in front of me, and I heard Opal's mind voice chuckling and saying 'The Almighty must have really gotten on them, for this two ones to be anywhere apologetic!'

Apparently my telepathy was really out of control, because 'this two ones' reacted as they had been smirked at.

"You shut up, quartz girl!" -- Said Urd.

"It was really brilliant when not even you noticed the fault in Hubble's mirror!" -- Continued Skuld.

"Why, you!" -- Answered Opal, grinding her teeth.

Then I started to feel a raising hostility, which was rare enough as I normally prefer to mind my own business. Urd had squared herself and started charging an electric bolt on her hand. Opal started to do the same, Skuld took a sphere out of her coat and started to accumulate energy on it, and somehow I just knew how to follow the lead. I put down the bucket of glasses, and now with my hands empty I stepped back into the dim lit room, and between my hands created a bolt of my own. It was very different from theirs, being yet-black with an occasional white streak, while theirs were bluish white, and mine being the size of a soccer ball, while Urd's and Opal's were the size of softballs. It was Skuld the one who saw me first, losing any buildup on her sphere, and shrieking. Her reaction broke the concentration of the other two, who in turn gasped at me. I looked down at me and actually noted that I was carrying the energy ball, and as I saw it start to dissipate, I noted that my hands, my body, and even my clothes had gone as dark as a shadow, and the entire room had gone as dark as a cave. It was then when I felt their fear wash over me, which made me panic, and loose control on the dissipation of the ball, which exploded on my face. Last think I remember is the happy thought that fortunately I was a few steps away from them, so they should be better than me.

As in the past ones, the next scene picks up were this one ended. I'll upload the next couple of scenes tomorrow.