Chronicles of Gaia

History of how the person nicknamed Gaia, who is like an incarnation of Mother Nature, came to be.

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Once upon a time...

 

            because all good stories start out Once Upon a Time.  So,

 

Once upon a time, God created Earth.  Earth was beautiful, majestic, powerful, and pure.  Earth was told it was created to house others God would create.  To keep them safe from the rest of creation and to provide for all they needed.  Earth, in an attempt to do all it had been tasked with, broke itself.  It grew up and out, it split in several places, moved, settled....  it looked to the sun in judgment of its own positioning, and tossed, and turned, and worked and worked and worked.  Eventually it had groomed several locations upon itself into very different conditions.  There were places of extreme cold, of extreme heat, extreme wet, extreme dry, extreme dark.  Places that were perfect balances instead of extremes.  And places that varied from one opposite to the other and back again.  Earth was pleased when it was done, believing it had accounted for every possibility of conditions God required for the others that were coming to live on it. 

 

When God returned with the first of the others, God was indeed happy with how Earth had followed God's instructions so well.  God was confident Earth could take care of itself, leaving God to the work of creating others without concern.  

 

After the first of God's other creations had been on Earth for only a short while they started to die.  Earth was very concerned, God had entrusted the creatures to it and supposedly it had been properly prepared, yet obviously something was wrong.  Earth soon discovered it had overlooked one very important detail.  When Earth was told the others would live off of it, gaining sustenance from it, Earth assumed they would know how to do so upon their arrival.  Except for those that took up residence inside the Earth itself, they did not.  Quickly Earth began growing in a new way.  It created small extensions of itself.  Some smaller than others, as it had to accommodate all different sizes of others.  Some extensions it grew hard around the bottom so ground creatures would not be able to take sustenance from those very tall or those who could fly.  Many of the others immediately took to the extensions, biting and eating them, and thereby gaining the sustenance they needed to survive.  Earth was happy, and relived.  But it noticed some of the others either did not understand the new extension were meant for them, or they could not figure out how to properly eat them.  This problem took more creativity on the part of Earth.  Finally it grew some extensions with soft parts on the ends in different colors from the green it had grown all of its extensions in to begin with, hoping the rest of others would be able to eat these new forms of itself.  They did, and Earth was sure it had fulfilled its purpose.

 

A while later a new dilemma appeared to Earth.  After it's extensions were consumed by the others it turned out they still could not survive.  The others needed more sustenance, in fact they needed it constantly.  Which meant Earth needed to keep growing extensions of itself consistently.  It devised several methods of doing so in an attempt to find the best way.  What it found was different methods worked best in the different locations of itself.  Some places allowed extensions to grow all the time.  Some places allowed extensions to grow, hibernate like the others did ever so often, and then re-grow.  Some places demanded extensions be consistently renewed.  Earth made arrangements with some of the others to help it deal with the situations were extensions needed to be constantly renewed.  It put tiny pieces of itself in the parts of its extensions that others ate, so that they could take the pieces and put them where they wanted new extensions to grow.  In this way Earth was sure it was growing new extensions exactly where and when the others needed them.

 

More others came, and Earth tried to care for them and teach them as it had the first.  Only a few of these others took to the Earth.  Many instead decided to take their sustenance from the first others, eating them instead of Earth's extensions.  Confused at first, Earth eventually decided that was fine since Earth sustained those which sustained the rest.  It was really up to God if the new others were doing things wrong, Earth felt.

 

Eventually God created the last and greatest of the others.  There was only one though.  The one was created in God's own image.  God chose a very special place on Earth for this other.  Quickly God created another version of the other.  Soon Earth found it had several of these new others on it.  And they kept multiplying, overall faster than any of the others that had come before them.  Earth was impressed when these newest others began adapting themselves to the various different locations on it.  It was obvious to Earth these others were very special and that God favored them.  Earth began to teach them in ways it had been unable to teach others, showed them secrets - such as how to start fire.  In return they took it upon themselves to care for Earth.  They looked after some of the others to help lessen Earth's burden.  They worked with the Earth, respected it, some even loved it.  Calling themselves humans, they tilled and cut and changed the Earth from how it had originally created itself in places.  But Earth didn't mind, it knew it was to provide and care for them, and it if wasn't they way they needed it to be and they wanted to do the work of making it so instead of telling Earth and having Earth do the work itself, well that was less for Earth to have to do.  It had so much to do as it was, Earth was grateful for the help the humans gave it.

 

Earth didn't notice at first, things changed so subtlety and slowly.  But finally it did realize there were small parts of it that were feeling sick.  Bad.  A couple even hurt.  It tried to determine what was wrong, and fix the problems.  But when it did, it discovered it was hurting the others in the process.  So Earth decided it would bear the sickness or pain for short periods of time so it could give warnings to the others that Earth was going to heal itself.  While this worked for the most part, the humans still ended up getting hurt.  Some because they refused to heed Earth's warnings, some because they had forgotten how to listen to Earth.

 

At last Earth decided a more direct approach needed to be taken.  Earth had discovered that many times humans were responsible for the sickness or pain it felt.  And many times when it tried to heal itself the humans were the ones who ended up suffering.  And as time passed the things the humans did that caused sickness or pain kept growing.  Most didn't listen, or didn't understand, or perhaps couldn't even hear anymore, when Earth cried out to them.  So Earth decided it had to find another way to communicate with them.

 

Earth spoke to God, who agreed to let Earth extend itself to a human.  The human would retain its own soul and identity, but would house part of Earth's spirit as well.  In this way Earth would be able to directly communicate with a human, and that human could then speak to the others for Earth.  This arrangement ended up bonding the human who bore Earth's spirit with Earth, endowing the human with the powers Earth had over itself, and forcing the human to feel what Earth felt.

 

The arrangement worked for a long time.  The warnings from the human bonded with Earth to the other humans would be proven true, and so people starting listening to the human when speaking on things related to the Earth.  When the human died, the piece that was of the Earth passed to another human, one who existed in an area of Earth that was sick or pained.  At one point the human of the time decided to teach others instead of just warning them, and found a way to teach other humans how to recognize Earth's warnings and offerings.  Such teachings were passed from human to human, some changing along the way, some not.  After that most of the humans bonded with Earth also sought to teach as well as just pass on messages from Earth.  Each human bonded with Earth used their powers differently.  Most did very little with them other than aiding Earth in its job, as the sense of responsibility for its task that Earth had was also felt by the human.

 

Eventually the human of the time decided to actively use the powers to affect human life instead of just helping Earth.  There were many side effects of this, most of which did not concern Earth and so are not remembered.  As more time passed, more and more of the humans bonded with Earth used their powers in such ways.  Once it lead to a war that killed a vast amount of humans.  That made Earth take notice, it could not allow itself to be used in such a way intentionally.  It attempted to revoke itself from the human, and found it could not.  So it reached out with effort it had not used in a great long time and killed the human in order to reclaim its powers.

 

The repercussions of that event were a shock even to Earth.  It had been bonded with one human or another consistently for so long, almost since creation itself, that suddenly no longer being so threw off Earth's balance and sense of itself.  The results of this were a time of freezing across much of the Earth.  Once Earth managed to stabilize itself and return to proper states of supporting the others, which was facilitated by Earth bonding with another human, Earth knew it had to find a way to prevent another such event.  Earth knew it couldn't predict how a human would use the powers that would be gained from being bonded with Earth, but it refused to be held to whatever path the human of the time decided upon until the human's death.  It settled upon creation of a touch with a second human, the touch being a weak bond of sorts, one that Earth could use to quickly pass it's spirit to in case of having to destroy the current one.  This lead to the second human being someone in close proximity to the human bonded with Earth because this second human would always feel the urge to seek out the human bonded with Earth, the bond being something the second human could feel as very similar to something within itself except magnitudes stronger.

 

From then on those who did things with their powers Earth did not approve of Earth would kill in order to force its spirit to the Second.  About half the time the Second was not required, but half the time it was, and Earth felt that was too much.  Some of the humans bonded with Earth would use the powers to help other humans, some simply used them for their original purpose, some used them for bad purposes outside of their original one.  Earth soon realized those who used them in ways it considered wrong were usually the types of humans they called men, and those who either stuck to the powers original purpose or used them also to help were usually of the group called women.  From then on Earth only chose a woman as the human bonded with itself.

 

While that choice proved successful at generally avoiding the consequences Earth wished to, another issue arose.  While naturally more nurturing, women tended to also be intentionally more active with the powers of the bond.  At one point the woman of the time, named Metha, decided to protect other humans against Earth itself instead of heading the warnings and passing on the message.  She had been undoubtedly one of the most powerful of any human bonded with Earth, having paid careful attention for a very long time and actively tapping her bond as much as possible in order to nurture and grow her powers.  She tried to prevent Earth from healing itself in one location.  For whatever reason she didn't understand why the Earth was doing what it did.  When she could not convince Earth to leave the area alone, she stood against Earth when it went to heal itself, thinking she had great powers.  She did.  The turmoil generated by their fight was fierce and extreme.  But of course her powers were merely an extension of Earth's own, most of which it rarely used anymore.  The woman's actions caused Earth great anger, which caused it to react very violently, more than it had since it had dealt with the last man bonded with Earth.  The results were a great flood, the same which is referenced in many other histories.  In the end Earth succeeded and the woman was killed.  But Earth specifically made sure the Second survived to see the whole event and pass on the story, and so all future women bonded with Earth learned the lesson of that woman's folly.

 

When humans took to written language, this history began to appear in writing.  Eventually a Second decided it was part of the job of the second to chronicle the events of the woman bonded with Earth.  It was decided this history would start the chronicle of every new woman bonded with Earth.  After the loss of the first set of chronicles everything was writing twice and kept in separate locations.  If one set was lost, either in accident or memory, the Second of the time was tasked with copying the entire remaining set.  The knowledge of where the sets were located was passed from Second to Second via the current woman bonded with Earth.  And so a consistent record exists to this day, though written in several different languages.

 

As time continued to pass, the amount humans were negatively affecting Earth grew.  Finally at one point the woman at the time came up with another way to help beyond just aiding Earth in its duties and passing on its messages.  She developed and used her powers to help clean away that which was causing Earth pain and sickness.  The next few women bonded with Earth built upon her beginnings and eventually methods that could be taught to other humans were devised - such as giving areas of Earth rest after extensive use before using them again.  This helped for a time, but the amount humans could, or perhaps only were willing, to clean up after themselves did not keep pace with the amount they would hurt Earth.

Throughout the ages the women bonded with Earth were given different names.  Some of the women intentionally perpetuated the legacies of well established names.  Some followed in the paths of using their powers for good beyond their base purpose but not making a big deal about it.  Some chose to remain anonymous.  Some used their powers only in private.  Some didn't test or push the limits of their initial powers.  Some tapped the bond with Earth as far as they found themselves able to.

 

Eventually humans devised their own methods of determining Earth's messages, and while not completely accurate, they worked often enough for most to be satisfied.  And they developed methods of defending themselves against Earth's healing efforts.  This actually pleased Earth somewhat as it meant it no longer had to worry about them in its efforts to maintain itself.  This also made the sharing of itself with a human almost unnecessary.  However Earth knew from previous experience what could happen if it lost its bond with a human.  And Earth decided it should retain its voice within the humans in case it ever became necessary to use it again. 

 

In the meantime, the woman bonded with Earth continued to aid Earth in its original purpose.  As the things humans did that caused the Earth sickness or pain became wide spread and commonplace, a few women bonded with Earth also managed to start trends of thought and eventually practice that lessoned the negative impact humans had on Earth.  Unfortunately that was only comparatively to what the humans were doing at the time.  In some places being in a constant state of sickness or pain on some level became the normal state for Earth despite its consistent efforts to heal there, because the humans were able to keep pace with if not best Earth's efforts.

 

-----

 

So concludes the current version of history that begins each new chronicle.  This chronicle begins in 1989 A.D. of the Christian calendar, AM 5749 of the Jewish calendar (1989 C.E.), AH 1410 of the Islamic calendar, 4687 of the Chinese calendar (the 6th year in the 78th cycle), and 5385 in the count of years of the Chronicles*.  This chronicle covers Amanda Harper, my niece.  The last woman bonded with Earth was my sister, Amanda's mother, who died in childbirth last week.  I am the current Second, Alonna.

 

Currently ten years old, Amanda began exhibiting the powers of the bond two days ago....

 

<nine years pass>

 

Here I, Sarah Harper, take over the chronicle.  The last Second, my Aunt, has passed away.  My sister Amanda is still the woman bonded with Earth.  This chronicle continues.

 

<five years pass>

 

To continued chronicles

 

* 

A.D. = After Death, meaning After the Death of Christ - B.C. = Before Christ

AM = Anno Mundi = year of the world - B.C.E = Before the Common Era - C.E. = Common or Christian Era

AH = Anno Hegirae = year of the Hijra

Count of years of the chronicles began the year the chronicle was first written