Gods and Min

Prologue

The undergrowth rustled quietly, as a timid fieldmouse peeked out at the midnight world around him. He was a survivor. Squeak knew it, his friends knew it, his family knew it… well, they did while they were still alive. Mice don’t last long in these parts. That’s why he was so proud of all he’d achieved. He wasn’t like the greedy mice, that stay to eat too long and get caught, or eat so much that they get fat and sluggish. He ate just enough to stay fit and slim. Agile. He stayed alive by being cautious, and not rushing from one place to another like his friends. Stealth is the key to survival.

Squeak was also very proud of his name. His mother gave it to him, and it was far superior to the names of his fifty-eight siblings, rest their souls. Of course, they were also all called Squeak, but the intonation was slightly different. The intonation in Squeak’s name was far steadier. More decisive.

As he waited for his chance to move, Squeak noticed a shimmer in the air. It seemed the sounds around him had changed slightly, they weren’t quite right. A little lower, perhaps? Squeak shrugged it off, returning his attention to his current situation.

The coast was clear. Squeak quietly snuck out from under the shrub, blending into the shadows and moving slowly and subtly to not draw attention to himself. He was a very clever mouse – none of his friends had worked out this technique! They were all in such a hurry to get out of sight, never realizing that it’s the sound and movement that attracts the enemy.

Suddenly, a dark shadow passed between the moon and Squeak, and he froze. It was a barn owl, looking for dinner. “What do you say to the God of Owls? Not today!”, thought Squeak to himself as the owl passed overhead.

*****

Soaring high above the farmhouse, a barn owl was keenly searching for her next snack. Cruising a little lower now, she alit on the branch of a huge old walnut tree, inspecting the goings on around her. Humans were of little interest to her, as they were too big to eat and probably tasted terrible. However, one was moving in an unusual way just now, so she sat and watched as she was always inclined to do.

The barn owl watched as a man dressed in black, with a balaclava and gloves, walked around the outside of the farmhouse as if looking for opportunities to get inside. He inspected each window, one by one, before beginning to look frustrated. Eventually he stopped and glanced around, before picking up a stone and smashing one of the windows. A shimmer passed through the air as the glass tinkled to the ground. The burglar cleared the pointy bits from the frame and climbed inside.

*****

Athena monitored the screen in front of her idly, her attention drawn to Bastet’s computer. Bastet was up to her usual tricks, trying to fill the internet with pictures of cats. Since the universe left Beta mode, pretty much all there was to do around the office was to monitor for glitches and make sure nothing broke the status quo.

At first things had been great – every employee had their own area to look after. Anubis looked after death, for example, and worked closely with Hades who coded the underworld. Ares came up with the concept of war, while Diana created the weapons such as the bow and arrow. Athena wasn’t a coder, as such, so she was really fascinated by their work and how they had all pulled together to create something so complex.

Athena’s area was data analytics. She knew everything there was to know about what was happening in the world below. This was really useful when the team was starting out, and there were still so many bugs to patch. The helpdesk had been responding to prayers 24/7 back in those days, turning incorrectly rainy days sunny and healing people who should not have been sick in the first place. Athena’s intelligence-gathering drove so many of those decisions. Now that things were more stable, Athena’s job felt trivial.

Athena looked over at Hera, who was typically a bit of a grump. She was responsible for coding childbirth, which was an area she had no interest in – she would rather have worked on the oceans like Poseidon. Men got all the fun jobs. Hera had decided to protest her project by making childbirth as unpleasant as possible, so that someone would take it off her reallocate it, but no one seemed to care.

Spotting Athena’s gaze, Hera sighed and turned to face her. “Okay, what’s up? Got nothing better to do than look at me?”

“Actually, no,” replied Athena. “I’m so bored.”

Hera’s face softened. “I know the feeling. Hey, I have a question for you. You use owls to collect your data on Earth. Why not use falcons? They have sharper eye sight.”

Athena grimaced. “Urgh, they remind me of Horus. We dated for a bit, but he grew distant. He coded the sky, and he’s so obsessed with the work he did on the clouds, you know? He likes to hide 3D images in the cumulus for humans to spot. Ooh, he thinks he’s so clever.

“Besides, owls are better at seeing at night, which is when most of the dodgy deeds occur,” she explained, with a gleam in her eye.

Athena glanced at her screen, noticing the stream coming through from the owl. Suddenly, she jumped to attention. No, no, no, this wasn’t right. It wasn’t right at all! She turned her screen to show the footage to Hera. Hera looked closely at the burglar breaking into the farmhouse.

“Damn, Athena, you’re right. The pitch of the glass shattering should be a fraction higher. I don’t know how this happened. Apollo and I will get right on it.”

Apollo was rocking back on his chair, strumming a guitar and not paying much attention to his screens. Hearing his name, he looked up. “Why are we even bothering to make these minor tweaks now? The system’s been running fine for millennia. We haven’t even been receiving any requests through the helpline. Honestly, I think it’s time for a holiday.”

Apollo had always been a bit of a slacker, and everyone in the office knew it. His job was to look after the arts, but he had pretty much given humans free reign in that space. If there was a way to make his own life easier, he’d take it. He’d even been known to create his own custom scripts to automate his work… Or mess with the projects of the other workers when he was bored!

Athena scowled at Apollo, returned to her computer and started scrolling through screens of data. “This is unusual. We shouldn’t be getting these sorts of anomalies anymore. It might be fine, but I need to check that there’s nothing more to it.”

Several hours and millions of data points later, Athena raised her head. “This isn’t an isolated incident. Tiny anomalies like these have been popping up for a few months now. However,” Athena continued, “I’ve triangulated them to a single point. I’ll send an owl there to see what’s going on.”

Hera and Apollo came over to watch the footage on Athena’s screen.

*****

The barn owl was still hungry, not having found a snack yet. She launched herself into the air, feeling a subtle pull towards the distant lights of a suburban house. She knew that people meant danger, but often they also meant food. Perhaps a tasty mouse would be skulking around in the yard?

As she neared the house, she spotted a bird bath in the garden. Landing on the concrete rim, she took a sip, then surveyed the area. No mice in sight. There was a light on in a bedroom, though. She could see through the window that a young man was typing at a computer. This was of no interest to her, so she returned to surveying the garden for mice.

*****

Hera, Apollo and Athena stared at the footage captured by the owl. “It’s definitely coming from that room”, muttered Athena, cross-referencing the data on screen. “What do you think is causing it? It couldn’t be that boy… Could it?”

Apollo laughed to himself. “At last, something interesting after all these years! It’s not the first time someone’s tried to change the world, but it’s the first time someone’s managed it.”

Hera glared at Apollo. “This isn’t funny. If it’s really the kid, we need to delete him. We can’t have a human messing with our code. He doesn’t know how it works. What if he ended up turning water to wine like that guy a couple of millennia back? At least that was on a small scale. Or if he turned all the oxygen to nitrogen? It’s a small change, but it would have a catastrophic impact.”

Athena was still watching the screen, tapping her finger on the desk. “We can’t be sure it’s him yet. I need to do further investigation.”

“Oh, come on,” said Apollo. “It’s not that hard. Let’s just ask him directly.”

Apollo snapped his fingers. A tall, slightly gangly teen appeared in front of them, looking startled. He smelt of BO and Red Bull, and had the rounded shoulders and squint of a boy who’s spent too much time staring at a screen with the lights off.

Apollo grinned. “Now you can just ask him directly!”

Hera glared at Apollo. “You and your damned scripts.”

*****

After the workers had finished introducing themselves, then attempting to calm the young man and finally offering him a change of pants, he took a deep breath and began talking.

“Umm, hi, I guess. I’m Min. I have no idea where I am, sorry. Or, come to think of it, even how I got here… OMG, am I dead? Did the energy drinks give me a heart attack? No, that doesn’t make sense. No afterlife would look like an office… Or would it?” Min paused to consider this for a moment. “Maybe hell… Wait, am I in HELL?!”

Hera glanced at Athena. “Highly strung little twerp, isn’t he?”

Athena sighed. “There’s no such thing as heaven or hell, Min. This is the control room. It’s where we monitor everything that’s happening on Earth. Unfortunately, something’s not quite right today, and that something seems to be coming from your bedroom. Care to tell us what you were doing?”

“Oh. Umm. I was scratching my leg. I think I have a mosquito bite on it. And then suddenly I was here. Before that, I was drinking some Red Bull. And before that, I was writing a game.” Again, Min paused. “Oh, and before that, I drank some more Red Bull.” He nodded, satisfied that he’d covered everything.

Athena looked puzzled. “Could it be the game code that’s somehow affecting things?”

“I don’t see how,” replied Hera, “but we don’t have much else to go on. Let’s delete the game.”

“Wait!” protested Min. “I’ve spent weeks working on that game!”

Apollo snapped his fingers again. “Right, game gone. At least we didn’t have to delete the kid - he’s a riot. Let’s see if that fixed things.”

Athena, Hera and Apollo crowded around the screen again, with Min trying to peer over their shoulders. Athena pulled up a spreadsheet summarizing the key data on shattered glass. Everything was consistent over the last week apart from the pitch of glass shattering. Several days ago, it changed. After deleting the game, the same anomaly was still present.

“Drat. We have nothing else to go on. Maybe it wasn’t Min at all? Could it be something else in that house that’s producing this anomaly?” Athena shook her head. “I have no idea what else it could be. Let’s just monitor the house for a while.”

*****

Hours later, still crowded around Athena’s computer, the team had largely given up. Apollo had returned to quietly strumming his guitar in his seat at Athena’s desk, and Hera’s chin was resting near her chest as she let out a little snore. Min had moved out of their way, and after sulking for a while, had begun scribbling down game notes on a piece of paper to begin rebuilding it when he got home.

“That’s it,” said Athena, “I’m calling it. Nothing’s changed, and I’m not even picking up a signal from the house anymore. It was probably just a random glitch. Let’s call it a night. The day shift will be here shortly, anyway.”

“Umm,” piped up Min, “What about me? I have to be up for school shortly, and Mum will notice if I’m not there for breakfast.”

Athena looked at Apollo. “Probably no harm in sending him home?”

Apollo nodded, and snapped his fingers again. Min appeared on Athena’s monitor, sound asleep in bed.

*****

The next evening, Athena was back at her computer. Again, something wasn’t right. While she was sleeping, the pitch of shattering glass had corrected itself, but now the color magenta was looking slightly more mauve than usual.

Athena triangulated the source of the anomaly again, and this time it was coming from a gas station. She sent in another owl, who reluctantly neglected a tasty mouse that was standing frozen in the shadows.

The gas station appeared run down, with its neon sign flickering every now and then. A shimmer passed through the air, and the flicker abated. Inside, a slightly gangly young man with rounded shoulders was buying a four-pack of Red Bull. Of course it was Min again! But how was he managing to change these small but fundamental elements of the world around him?

Athena called Apollo and Hera over to her desk. “See that? I think we should bring him in again. Scan him. Find out how he’s causing these anomalies.”

“I guess I’ll do the honors,” laughed Apollo, clicking his fingers.

*****

Min shook his head for the eighth time. “Honestly, I don’t think it’s me. I really don’t. I’m not a god, I can’t change reality. I mean, look at me. Do I look like someone who could change the world?”

At this comment, Apollo let out a guttural chuckle. Looking at the expressions on Athena and Hera’s faces, he grinned. “I mean, he’s right. Look at him!”

“That may be,” said Athena, “but we should still scan him. See if we can pick up anything that may be causing these anomalies. We can’t rule it out just yet.”

Hera nodded, and brought over a device about the size and shape of a loaf of bread. It was glowing purple and blue, but as it approached Min it began flashing and took on a reddish tinge. Hera shook the device, and passed it to Min to hold. As soon as Min took the device, it let off a bright flash and made a sound like a polaroid camera.

“Right, that’s all we need from you, Min,” assured Athena. “Please take a seat while we check the data.”

*****

After much time interrogating the output from the scan, Athena approached Min. “Min, what were you working on in your game last night?”

“Oh, umm, a few things, I guess…” replied Min. “The colors, mostly. They were looking a bit bright, so I wanted to tone them down. I don’t want really bright colors in my game, you know?”

“I see. And at the gas station, did you notice anything outside?”

“Ahh no, not really. Should I have noticed something?” Min considered this for a moment. “Except the flickering light. It was really bright and annoying.”

“Ok. And how do you feel about sounds?” Athena looked shrewdly at Min, anticipating the answer.

Min looked puzzled. “I mean, how does anyone feel about sounds, you know? They’re just sounds. But, I guess, I don’t like loud sounds. Or high sounds. I really don’t like high sounds. In my game, the sounds were too high and I dropped the pitch a little so they wouldn’t annoy me as much.”

Athena stood up. “Thanks, Min. This has been very enlightening. One moment, please.”

Moving over to Hera’s desk, where she and Apollo were debating the portrayal of childbirth in media, Athena began to covertly whisper. “This isn’t good. The scan shows that when Min’s irritated, his brain waves are at the same frequency as our code. And there seem to be a LOT of things that irritate him. He’s subconsciously messing with it. We can’t send him back down there. We’ll have to delete him.”

Hera nodded. “Told you so. On it.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” interrupted Apollo. “Not so fast. I like the kid. Is there another option? He’s not doing any harm up here, away from the Earth, is he? He can’t mess up the code if he’s not in there, getting all up in the middle of it, right?”

Athena tilted her head and looked at Apollo. “That’s true. But we can’t keep him here. He’s a kid, who’d look after him?”

Apollo grinned. “He’s a teen, and looking at the game I deleted, he’s a damned good coder. Not as good as me, of course, but maybe we could use him? He could be… I dunno, the office intern?”

Athena sighed. “Ok, offer him the position, but he’s YOUR responsibility.”

*****

After considering the options, Min was quick to decide that he would greatly prefer an unpaid internship over being deleted, thank you. Back on Earth, Min didn’t have many friends, so very few people would notice that he wasn’t at school. For the few that did notice Min’s existence, like his Mother and the schoolboard who require his attendance for funding, Apollo created a custom script. After clicking his fingers, he ensured that the memories and records of Min were erased.

Min took a deep breath, and readied himself. “Ok. This is good. I have a job, I don’t have to go to school, and I get to be around computers all day. This is better than good. This is awesome. So… Where do we start? What’s my first job as office intern?”

Apollo looked startled for once, completely unprepared for this question. “Ahh, I usually just sit here and practice playing my guitar. Which I’ve honestly gotten pretty good at after all this time. I don’t know. I guess you could get me a coffee?”

Back on Earth, Min’s Mother was wondering why she’d never gotten around to having a child, and realized her biological clock was ticking – it was finally time to try!

Min sighed, wondering if he should have opted for the deletion.

*****

Epilogue

The cover of night was the best time for mice, Squeak thought to himself. His silly friends would head out during the day, they were cocky and reckless, and that’s how they got killed. At night, things are quieter. Easier to hear predators coming, and harder to be seen.

Listening, Squeak noted to himself that the sounds around him seemed to be back to normal, at their higher pitch again now. Oh, and there was a flapping of wings! Squeak froze, knowing in his heart of hearts that it’s the only thing that can keep a mouse safe.

Suddenly, Squeak felt the rough grip of talons around his body, and found that he was lifting into the air. He felt a rush of adrenaline coursing through him, and looked at the vast landscape below. He had never seen the world like this before. It was majestic. He felt so enlightened with this new perspective. So powerful.

“YES!” thought Squeak, elated. “I knew it. I am a GOD!”