Elephantine

Part I

Yet another pot was set into the pile as a restless figure moved with no time. Khnum was the god’s name, a curious being that had unimaginable power. Power was of no interest to the horned being though. He spent his eternity doing what he did best: spinning clay on his potter’s wheel.

Khnum had always existed and always was. There was no chaos, harmony, or balance. There was only an existence of blank nothingness. No sound pervaded the existence except the loud spinning of Khnum and his potter’s wheel. Khnum had a menagerie of pots he had spun from clay. He had large pots, slender pots, wide pots, short pots, grotesque pots and even broken pots. Each pot was unique in form, but all of them descended from the same material Khnum called clay.

An endless number of pots piled in blank existence. Khnum never stopped creating. His hands were surprisingly skilled, even after a timeless eternity. There came a time though when Khnum lost interest in his potter’s wheel. Pots were great, but Khnum found no use for them. They only continued to pile and pile, growing upward into the nothingness. Finally there came a time when no sound existed. Khnum only stood, thinking.

Silence was foreign to the horned being. There had always been noise. Khnum himself never spoke, not knowing what to speak. Was it time now to create something different, something other than pots? A loud snort came from the being’s nostrils. For once, he would try some experimenting.

Khnum went back with to his potter’s wheel holding a ball of clay. He soon began spinning and creating. His fingers crafted and molded the clay, spreading it out so it was nearly flat. The horned being spun the wheel faster and faster and faster. Soon he was spinning so fast the flattened clay spattered everywhere. A booming shockwave exploded from the battered clay. The blast knocked even the horned being senseless. Everything had been released from the clay, occupying the blank existence like a piece trying to fit into a puzzle. Chaos emanated from the growing mass that was creation. A beacon of darkness covered the nothingness and made it whole.

A vibrant light came shooting out of the potter’s wheel as well, perceived as harmony. Out of the chaos came a black serpent created from nothingness. The serpent coiled around the whole blank existence and spoke a single word: “Apep!” The serpent’s fangs nearly engulfed what was left of harmony.

Khnum regained his senses and noticed the growing chaos that was once blank. Khnum’s jaw dropped in awe and fear. “What have I done?” The horned being noticed he had spoken for the first time. He immediately went to his potter’s wheel, molded what was left of the clay into a form similar to himself. “Fight the chaos,” he whispered to the clay. “Control the serpent who calls himself Apep.”

At once, the clay grew and became solid. Apep paid no heed to Khnum or the being he had created. Tall ears erected from the created being’s head, a black face with flowing red hair. His main body however, was like that of Khnum the creator: copper skin with two arms and two legs. This being was more powerful, Khnum thought. This being he had created was a form of chaos itself. A loud roar came from the new being’s camel-like head.

Apep had practically engulfed what was left of harmony when he heard the threatening roar of the new being. The serpent turned his head and laughed at the futile form standing below him. Apep’s laughs were like earthquakes to Khnum’s ears. Khnum hid behind his potter’s wheel, afraid of this new creation.

The new chaos being stood his ground. He did not even flinch at the slightest sound of Apep’s insulting laughs. The chaos being had a spear with him, one he called Wosret, the Powerful One. The chaos child raised the spear high above him, as if saluting Apep.

“Sssssseeeetttttttttt!” Khnum heard the horrible roar of his new child, his first created being. There was a disturbance in Set’s voice, one of power, anger, force, and unspeakable rage. But there was no hint of evil in the god’s crimson red eyes.

Set hurled Wosret straight for the serpent, turning it into a deadly harpoon. The spear impaled itself into one of Apep’s eyes. The serpent hissed in agony as his vision began to diminish. Blood came pouring down like a cascading river, drenching Khnum and Set most of all. Apep’s voice thundered above the turmoil he had been born out of.

“You have injured me, barely a scratch! Whenever creation shall be, so to will there be chaos! And I am Apep, that dissolution that will cause suffering in the universe! You can injure but not kill chaos. I will always recover, will always be! Neither gods will kill me nor the foolish mortals you will create!”

Apep coiled his body around himself and began to grow smaller and minute. Wosret fell out of Apep’s bleeding eye, floating in what was the beginning of the universe. Harmony, the light, came spewing forth from the chaos serpent’s disappearance. Apep was gone, non-existent, but still there. The serpent decided to hide in the ever expanding universe, to grow and spread his darkness.

Set retrieved Wosret and gave a victory roar. He tasted the serpent’s blood, growled at the strong pungent taste of the blood. The chaos being took no notice of Khnum the creator. Khnum saw his child depart into the newborn galaxy, not knowing the child’s destination. But one thing Khnum did know for certain: this chaos child would cause trouble in the future.