Deep within the Unconscious Globe, something stirred.

Life gathered, shifted, and began to take different forms. Four small presences emerged from its depths.

They did not remember that beginning.

As far back as any of them could reach, the others were already there.

Around them, pale vapour drifted through open space. Light gathered in some places and faded in others. Here and there, small knots of matter held together, then loosened or changed.

The four watched.

One lifted a hand. Warm brown layers curved around her fingers, folding into the shape of her arm. Beside her, another stretched upward, his pale-blue edges opening as though the space above had gently drawn them out.

A third remained still. Indigo deepened within the folds of his body. The fourth leaned toward all of them in turn, peach and rose-gold layers shifting with each movement.

They had no names yet.

When one wanted another’s attention, he reached, waved, or moved closer. Sometimes the right one turned. Sometimes all three did.

This delighted them—until there was something particular to show.

“You,” said the brown little being one day.

Three faces turned toward her.

She looked from one to another, then laughed.

“The one beside me.”

The rose-gold one moved nearer.

Now two were beside her.

They would need another way.

At first, they tried sounds for the things around them. A sound for the vapour that slipped through their hands. Another for a movement they wanted to follow. They repeated them, changed them, forgot some, and kept others.

Often they disagreed about which sound fitted best.

They were learning that even something all four could see might draw each one’s attention differently.

The brown little being returned often to a small gathering of dense matter. While vapour moved past, it remained. She pressed it gently and felt its resistance.

Then she pressed her own palm.

The others came to look.

“It is a little like you,” said the indigo one.

She held her hand beside it. Her layers had something of its colour, something of its gathered weight. Yet she could move, and the little formation stayed where it was.

“A little,” she agreed.

They tried a sound for that earthlike substance. Over time, the sound settled into Gaia.

One day, when she had wandered away, the rose-gold one called it after her.

She turned.

He pointed toward the small formation, then toward her, uncertain whether she would mind.

She considered it.

“Gaia,” she repeated, touching her chest.

The name felt comfortable there.

The pale-blue one seldom remained in one place for long.

He followed rising vapour until it thinned. Beyond it, there was more space, and beyond that, more still. He stretched his arms toward it, his light layers unfurling.

Gaia watched him return.

“You look like where you have been,” she said.

He glanced behind him at the wide expanse.

“Up there?”

“When you open your arms.”

They had begun calling that skyward openness Uranus.

He spread his arms again, examining the resemblance as best he could.

“Uranus,” he tried.

Then he smiled and rose a little higher.

The indigo one noticed where brightness ended.

He would watch a shape pass into darkness and wonder whether it had changed, or whether he could simply no longer see it.

Sometimes the others followed him. Sometimes they lost sight of him among the dim folds.

“Where are you?” Uranus called.

“Here.”

“I cannot see you.”

“I can still see a little of you.”

Gaia came closer. His outline emerged gradually, dark within darkness.

Their word for that shadowed depth was Erebus.

“That sound suits you,” she said.

He looked into the dim space, then down at his own hands.

“Because I am like this?”

“And because you keep looking here.”

He was quiet for a while.

“Erebus,” he said at last.

The rose-gold one repeated it softly, making sure he had heard.

Three had names now.

The fourth tried standing beside Gaia’s little formation. He stretched upward like Uranus. He sat with Erebus in the dimness.

Each place interested him. None quite supplied his name.

Then one day the others wandered in different directions, and he found himself turning from one to the next. There was something he wanted to show them. More than that, he wanted them near enough to share it.

He called their names.

They returned.

“What did you find?” Gaia asked.

He opened his hands, then paused.

“I wanted you to come.”

Erebus studied his face.

They already had a word for that wanting—the pull toward something or someone, the wish to approach. They called it Eros.

Uranus tilted his head.

“Perhaps that is yours.”

The rose-gold one repeated the sound. Then he looked at the three who had answered him.

“Eros,” he said, smiling.

Afterward, they called one another simply to hear someone answer.

Their names travelled through the unfamiliar space, small sounds finding familiar faces.

They still knew very little about themselves. But now, when one discovered something, he could call to another.

And somewhere around them, the pale vapour continued to gather.