How Green Becomes Wood

He looked at Xander for a period of time, debating what he should admit to. Then he said, "I was taught Allah is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-loving. He is called Rahman, the beneficent, and he is called Raheem, the merciful. If he is all-knowing, he knew what was happening to me. Even before the war. If he is all-powerful, he could have stopped it. If he is all-loving, he would have. He did not. Five times a day I prayed to God. And he sent a war. So either he is not all-knowing, not all-powerful, or not all-loving. If he is not all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-loving, then what is there in him to worship? He may as well not exist, for the little he does. Or," he held up one finger, "He does not exist. Occam's Razor says the simplest answer is usually correct."
 
"I guess that makes sense," Xander agreed, having expected an answer like that. "But what if a god or multiple gods existed, and you were taught wrong about him, her, or them? What if humans were the ones to screw up what a god or gods were supposed to do or look like or be like or any of that? Or if Allah existed or exists like what you were taught, what if he was letting humans experience the consequences of their own stupidity instead of sheltering them like parents might a spoiled rich brat?"
 
"Xander, one of my earliest memories is hiding from my father with the awareness as soon as he found me I'd be hurt by him. If that is one of my earliest memories, how young must I have been when he began to abuse me? What God would think I needed that consequence?" He looked away for a moment, shaking his head, "If we all worship incorrectly, how are we meant to worship properly if this God or these Gods do not tell us what we should be doing? If there is a higher power, then we are left to guess and suffer, then what is the point? I had one father I desperately sought to appease. I have no need for a second."
 
Xander considered this as he toyed with a small piece of leather, not answering right away. His instinctual answer - whether or not he actually believed it, he was just used to playing devil's advocate and resisting the first thing he was told to the point where it'd become habit - was that it still sounded like screwed up humanity being nasty and a few other words he would only think and not say out loud. If a god, any god, Ahllah or otherwise, interfered too much, then what would be the point of humans being, well, human? Wouldn't that be no better than being a bunch of robots or, worse, trained pets?

Then again, on the other hand, he forced himself to actually think about Dark's side of things, letting a tiny, tiny child be messed up like this, that was... how could any compassionate, benevolent being ever sit by and just let that happen? If a god could sit back and watch it happen, wouldn't that make them something malevolent and worth fighting against in some manner? If they existed at all. Whether or not it was true, it was easier to believe there were no deities than to believe that one or many would sit back and let something like that happen. Wasn't it? He did have a point about the razor thing, though, except for the fact that the simplest answer wasn't always the right one, just usually. Still, odds were very much in favor of there being no god, right?

"What about, like, cosmic-style forces and things like that?" he finally asked. "Not an actual sentient, all-knowing, all-seeing, so-on-and-so-forth deity, just... fates. Karma. That stuff."
 
Dark shrugged his broad shoulders and looked out the window at his home, "I suppose I like to believe in Karma. I still doubt I have seen it practically. The world has always looked to me deeply unjust. To some extent I believe in fate, but not in the way your mother does. But I was born where I was to the parents I was born to, so in a way I was fated to have the struggles I do. I think little uncontrollable circumstances spiral and lead us to where we are, but I do not know if it is prophesied. I believe in free will." He frowned, looking back at Xander, "I have to believe in free will. What becomes of justice if it does not exist? How do we imprison a rapist if they were fated to rape and there was nothing they or anyone could have done to prevent it, because it was written in the indifferent stars above? How do we praise someone who put their own life at stake to help someone else, if they were never in control of their actions? Daizi does not believe fate is so rigid, she believes our free will alters our fate. But I have to believe we have free will, because I do not know how to admonish those who seek to harm others if they cannot choose to be otherwise."
 
In a very bizarre way, Dark was reminding Xander of Milo... and himself. Because things had been hellish, then that was all they'd ever be. Because of that preexisting bias, when they looked around, they saw the bad. The unfairness. The injustice. Not to say it wasn't there, but it was like wearing red-colored glasses and looking for red things. The world was unjust, but that wasn't all it was. It could be a nasty place at times, no arguing that, and yet...

Now that he, Xander, was in a safer, more loving place, a place that practically forced him to be more open-minded and less willing to jump to harmful conclusions, he could see more, like he'd taken off the glasses, but he was still adjusting. Most of that was thanks to Daizi, who had lived her own version of hell as a child. It wasn't anything at all like Dark's, but that didn't make it any easier to live with. That didn't make the hurts any less. Yet she looked for and therefore saw the good things. The bright things. The happy things. The world could be truly beautiful, he was learning. It had so much good in it.

The world might not be "fair" by human standards, but maybe that was the problem? He fidgeted with the strips of leather as he considered. Maybe... maybe the world was unfair because humans were trying to apply a standard of their own making to something so much bigger, something so much older, so much more complicated then they could ever hope to grasp no matter how hard they tried. Maybe that was why it looked so wrong. They were trying to play Europa Universalis with the rule book from Candy Land. That... that idea, brand new to him, felt oddly right in his bones. Yet it was so new and he was so uncertain of it that he did not dare to say it out loud, not yet, and certainly not to someone who carried the deep scars that Dark had. That felt like it would be stupid even for him.

Finally, he said, "Two things can be true at the same time: free will and a plan. Fate, or whatever. At least, I think it can be, but I'm just figuring this stuff out. I don't have your life experience, so maybe I'm being arrogant thinking I have any idea of anything. Thanks for telling me. It gives me a lot to think about."
 
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"I am not opposed to them coinciding," Dark replied, "at least, not as opposed as I am to other things. Do you know what I believe most of all?" He looked at Xander again, "I believe all of it: the unfairness, the brutality, the randomness... the unpredictability and the way sometimes the world just takes, and takes, and takes without any of it mattering, without any of it having a higher purpose... It gives us all the chance to make our own meaning. There is nothing that will make what happened to me okay. And I do not believe there is anything to make what happened to you and your brother okay either. Or to Daizi." He paused, thinking about what his wife had gone through and how wonderful she was, "But if there is no point to any of it, no grand ultimate design, then... We are free, all of us, to be as we desire to be. If it's meaningless and nothing we do matters in the end anyway... If this," he touched Xander's workdesk with one finger, "Is the only life we get, with no promise of paradise after? Then I believe it makes it all the more special. I may not have eternity with Daizi. I may not have it with Alec or Ivy or you, or Cooger. But I have this life. I have this. And if there is no point to any of it, and we are just on a rock, hurtling through space around the ball of radiation we call the sun, then is it not all the more miraculous we get to be here?" He touched his hand to his chest, "If the world is cruel, then I believe the joy we find in it is all the more precious. Being alone in the cosmos does not mean we are alone."
 
Xander took a deep breath, feeling overloaded but genuinely trying to listen and absorb. He'd asked, after all. He'd been forewarned. His fingers unconsciously started shredding the scrap in his hands, digging his nails into the soft leather and gouging shapes into it as his eyes stared at the bench and his mind struggled to process the heavy nature of this conversation. What Dark said made sense to him. It hit all the right notes, answered all the arguments, and was clearly well-thought-out and not an emotional response. Then why did it feel... wrong? Not logically wrong, it made logical sense, wrong in his bones? And since when did his bones get a say in anything?

If all of this was all there was... He didn't like that idea. He didn't know about a paradise, eternal life, or even a god or goddess to please. He hadn't gotten that far in his ponderings yet. But this, what this was right now, how he was living his life, it didn't feel like enough. Maybe he was being the emotional one. Maybe this was a response to living basically his entire life in a state of survival and he wanted some sort of grandiose goal beyond the mortal realm to make up for his own sense of inadequacy and missed childhood. Xander wouldn't put it past himself. It seemed like something he'd do. He hated to admit it to himself, but in his own way, he was just as emotional as Alec.

Dark's explanation, it made him sad, but he didn't know why. It didn't make sense for it to make him feel sad about this. If anything, he should be agreeing and totally going along with it! But Dark's viewpoint, when Xander tried to imagine following it himself, it felt hollow and hopeless. That was a silly response. If anything, Dark's explanation was filled with hope and the desire to love and live and embrace the life he had here and now. How could it possibly be any better than that? It was a wonderful, encouraging way to look at life! In this instance, his emotions and feelings had to be wrong. There was no other way around it.

"Thank you for sharing your viewpoint," Xander finally said, breaking the silence he'd allowed to drag on almost uncomfortably long. "I'm glad. That you have something so... not sad. Positive. You've got passion, I guess, for life. Not something most people would guess, but it makes sense for you, and I've seen it in other things. Different to hear it, though."
 
Dark watched the discomfort on Xander's face as he tore at the scrap of leather and wished he had decided not to oblige him in answering these questions and he wished Xander was okay with being touched so he could at least hold the kid's hands so he knew it was okay. But despite all of his urges to pull back and try to make things easier, he still found himself saying, "I did not always. For over half of my life, I did not." For the first time during their entire conversation, he felt his heart aching in his chest and wondered how long it had been, "I suppose if fate is real, I had to learn to find beauty in the act of being alive, or else I would not have been there to bring you and your brother home."
 
Xander glanced sideways at Dark and gave him a half smile. "True enough," he agreed quietly. "I don't know what I think or believe yet, but I think I like the idea of fate." He looked down at the leather in his hands. "It's messy and mean and cruel sometimes, but then it weaves this stupidly complex web to make things alright again. If we hadn't gone through what we had... if you weren't what you are... well, maybe it would have been better, but I don't know for sure. All I know is... I'm really glad you let us stay and put up with my s**t for all these years. Fate or no fate."
 
"In a little over a month it will be two years. I love you very much, Xander. I am glad to have lived long enough to know you." Dark told him, gently taking the scrap of leather, "and I am sorry if I upset you by having this conversation with you. I did not mean to."
 
Xander let him take the leather, watching it leave his hands. "You didn't upset me," he said truthfully. "I'm... confused, and I got a lot to think about, but I'm not upset-upset, and it's okay even if I was because I wanted to know. I wanted you to be honest, and you were. Thanks." He looked up at Dark. "I love you, too. A lot. You're the best Ba I ever had."
 
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