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DEXTER

IN THE

DARK

I N T H E B E G I N N I N G

It re, but that was all Then IT just waited

IT waited a very long time, but IT could wait easily because there was nohad screamed yet And so IT did not know IT

aiting IT did not knoas anything at that point IT just ith no way to mark time, with no way even to have the idea of time

So IT waited, and IT watched There was not a great deal to see at first; fire, rocks, water, and eventually soer after a while They didn’t do very much except to eat each other and reproduce But there was nothing to coh

Tis killed and ate one another ai that, since there was nothing else to do and there were plentybut watch And so IT began to wonder: Why a this?

IT could see no real point to anything that happened and there was nothing IT could do, and yet there IT atching IT thought about this a very long time, but came to no conclusions There was still no way to 2

JEFF LINDSAY

think any of this through; the whole idea of purpose wasn’t quite there yet

There was just IT and them

There were lots of the But there was only one of IT, and IT did none of those things, and IT began to wonder why that was, too Why was IT different?

Why was IT so unlike everything else? What was IT, and if IT actually was so, too?

More tiger and better at killing each other Interesting at first, but only because of the subtle differences They crawled, hopped, and slithered to kill one another—one actually flew through the air to kill Very interesting—but so what?

IT began to feel uncomfortable with all this What was the point? Was IT supposed to be a part of what IT watched? If not, then as IT here watching?

IT became determined to find the reason IT was here, whatever that was

So nohen IT studied the big things and the little things, IT studied the ways IT was different fros needed to eat and drink or they died And even if they ate and drank, they eventually died anyway IT didn’t die IT just went on and on IT didn’t need to eat or drink But gradually IT beca—

but what? IT could feel that so, but IT could not tell what it was; there was just the sense that so

No answers ca clutches paraded by Kill and eat, kill and eat What is the point here? Why do I have to watch all this when I can’t do anything about it? IT began to feel just a little bit sour about the whole thing

And then suddenly one day there was a brand-new thought: Where did I come from?

IT had figured out long ago that the eggs the others hatched fro Nothing at all had copulated to bring IT into existence There had been nothing there to copulate when IT first becaly, forever, except for the vague and disturbingelse had been hatched or born IT had not And with this thought the wall be-

DEXTER IN THE DARK

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