***

"For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."

- Bible Gateway genesis III

Once upon a time, in a big house far out in the woods lived a skeleton named Noah.

He lived in that house with his family. Noah had one Father, and many hundreds of brothers. In fact, he had so many brothers that he did not know all of his brother's names.

Noah wanted to be like his brothers - a human. Even more, he wanted to be like his father - a grownup.

Noah had a pet snake. He called it the wisdom snake. The snake had white skin with black spots, or was it black skin with white spots? Noah could never tell the difference.

Noah didn’t remember how he met the wisdom snake. It mostly spent time sleeping inside the space of Noah’s skull, however, occasionally it would slither out from one of his eye sockets and whisper some wise words of advice.

One day when Noah was out in the woods playing he met a brother he had not met before. This brother was different from the other brothers he knew previously. He was sitting under an apple tree with a sad expression on his face.

So Noah asked the reason for his sadness, as everyone lived so happy that no one had a reason to be sad.

The brother explained that he yearned for freedom that he could not find in this place. He claimed that their Father was evil, that he held them as prisoners, cattle, making sure they never escaped this place.

Brother told Noah that when one of the brothers would turn thirteen years of age, Father would take them into his room and kill them. He begged Noah to assist him in his escape. He even showed him the map he drew that led outside the forest.

Noah was shocked by his brother’s story. He refused to believe that his loving caring brother was a cold-blooded killer. Yet the idea of escaping, of attaining this “freedom” his brother talked about seemed alluring to him. He believed that if he did escape if he attained freedom, he could become a real human, a grownup at that.

This is the first time Noah had to decide. Is this what freedom felt like? The power to decide was so thrilling that he had to choose freedom, it was as if there was no other choice.

The sad brother hid the map under some leaves and told Noah to meet him under the same apple tree tomorrow. That is when they would escape.

Noah arrived at the rendezvous the next day, but the sad brother didn’t. The map was still in the same place they left it yesterday. Why was the sad brother late? Did Father find out and kill him? That thought scared Noah. Then he thought if it was worth escaping in the first place. He lived a happy life with his family.

So Noah asked the wisdom snake for advice. The serpent slithered out of Noah’s skull and spoke wisely. “If you truly wish to become human, if you truly wish to become a grownup then you must leave this place and see what is beyond this forest. Take the map, do not wait for the brother, and see for yourself if what he said is true.”

The wisdom snake was always right, so Noah decided to believe him. He took the map and followed the red dots leading to a giant cross which was placed right at the top of the mountain.

Noah walked without looking back. The journey was long but finally, he arrived at his destination. At the top of the mountain, he saw a giant door with a big lock on it. The door had nothing behind it which confused Noah. The map instructed Noah to shift the little gears on the lock so they would match the numbers that were on the map. So he did and the door opened!

He walked through it and all he saw was darkness. He was walking through a deep dark tunnel. He could not find the door he just walked through, so all he could do was move forward and hope that he could make it to the other side.

Finally, he saw a blue light at the end of the tunnel. When he came out he noticed something miraculous. He now had human feet. His toes had flesh and nails just like his brothers and father did. Noah got closer to becoming a human!

Noah looked around. He was inside a massive ark. He saw giant tubes overflowing with white liquids flowing into canisters, he saw metal creatures harvesting food putting them in boxes, and flying away with it into bigger metallic boxes. He saw rows of big capsules where tiny fetuses were slowly forming. A tiny metal rectangle right next to him shone with various colors and illuminated pictures.

Noah was overwhelmed by everything he saw. It was so different from the house he grew up in where they had no technology. He picked up the metal rectangle and started touching it. The tabled reacted to his inputs and showed him pictures of the household.

Noah saw how during the night father would sneak into one of the many rooms of his brothers and take one of them to his own. He would check if the brother was 13 years of age, and if he was he would take an axe and chop him into pieces while his eyes blinked with red lights. He would squeeze out some white juice from the dead body and pour it into a tube, the same one that Noah saw just a few seconds ago.

In fear, Noah dropped the tablet. Oh, what terror, what misery he felt when he found out that the sad brother spoke the truth. Everything he believed in turned out to be lies. Even the sky that he thought he looked up to every morning was nothing but projections on the screen. Noah had escaped Father’s deadly clutches but he was still not free from this place and whoever built it.

Noah ran down the hall and he found a giant ladder leading down into the abyss. In the center of the ladder, stood two pillars resembling a double helix. They consisted of Adults like Father holding each other up, occasionally a few adults from the opposite sides of the helix would reach out their hands to each other and connect the two structures. The ladder wrapped around it.

“If you follow that ladder downwards it shall lead you to the exit” hissed the Wisdom snake from inside Noah’s skull.

Indeed, there was only one path to follow. Noah could no longer turn back, he would be killed by Father. So, Noah exercised his free will and decided to follow the only path he had left.

The tiny skeleton began his descent. The more he descended the more flesh he could feel wrapped around his legs. He was slowly becoming human. Noah was so happy his bones rattled as he hopped from stair to stair.

Metal creatures flying up and down the metal walls, metal tubes… No one seemed to notice Noah so he walked and walked and walked. He saw another road stem from the staircase and lead to another hall similar to the one he came from. Noah decided to find out what was there.

Same tubes with liquids connecting to capsules nurturing embryos. Food deliveries to the simulated world that kept humans as prisoners. He decided to walk up to the prison. Noah picked up the tablet and looked at the world inside the box.

He saw the same forest with the same house. However, the children and the parent looked different. These children were females. Noah had never seen the opposite sex before. He did not even know of its existence. He carefully studied their naked bodies. They had long hair, their breasts slightly stuck out and an unfamiliar organ gazed back at Noah. The wisdom snake’s eyes shone ominously.

Noah felt a strange sensation between his legs. Another snake emerged and raised its head high in the skies. Noah felt pain in the new chunk of flesh he had obtained. The wisdom snake slithered out of his skull to meet the new snake. Suddenly the wisdom snake began licking the other snake with its forked tongue, wrapping its coils around it and hissing violently. Noah's bones trembled with fear of these unknown feelings. Finally, the Wisdom snake defeated the Serpent as its white venom spilled across the floor. The pain substituted with instantaneous pleasure and vanished.

Noah picked up the tablet again and looked carefully. It looked like his sisters shared the same fate as his brothers. When turned 13, mother would sneak into their room and drag them into her own, with blinking red eyes she would chop them into pieces using an axe and harvest some liquid from their bodies that she poured into the tube.

Noah cried in pity for his sisters. They played happily and loved Mother, not knowing what cruel fate awaited them. Noah promised himself that he would save them all once he escaped from the ark himself. So he returned to the spiral staircase and continued his descent.

So Noah walked and walked and walked. The further he descended the more human he was becoming, the further he descended the closer he was to freedom. As he walked down the stairs he wondered why the creator of the ark would choose to separate Noah from such beautiful creatures that were his sisters.

He feared the Parents. Were all adults like that? After sharing his worries with the wisdom snake, the wisdom snake replied that those were not real adults, for their eyes blinked with red lights like machines they have been seeing. The creator of the Ark must have placed them as supervisors in the world of children to make sure none of them would turn into an adult. The little skeleton got filled with optimism, mayhaps the adults were much kinder than Parents or even his brothers and sisters.

Now that Noah thought about it, he had met brothers that had teased and hit him before, he observed the same instances with the sisters. Noah was filled with hope that the adults were wise people, kind and caring. Just like the statues on the central pillar, all peacefully holding one another up. Perfect unity, cooperation, and understanding.

Soon enough another path stemmed away from the staircase, so Noah decided to take a break from descending and see where it led. The path took him to a similar exhibit he had already visited. He was quick to find the tablet that showed him the humans inside the giant box.

Grownups! Real grownups! There near the forest, an entire village of grownups! No robot Parents with blinking red eyes in sight! This must be a world where grownups use their freedom to decide how they live! But what is that? Why are the fathers out in the fields carrying around heavy tools under the heat of the sun? Isn’t that exhausting? But what is that? Why are the Mothers staying home all-day cooking and washing dirty clothes and cleaning the dust? Isn’t that exhausting?

Noah observed a particular family. Father came late from the fields tired from all the hard work and greeted by his wife and son. They sat at the dinner table eating some freshly baked bread that a kind old lady next door gave them as a gift. Everything seemed calm until the father decided to drink some strange liquid. He started to mumble slowly regress until finally all of his stored rages were uncorked and so he strangled his wife in front of his son’s eyes and then hit his son with the belt over and over again until he bled and could no longer scream or move and finally closed his eyes to get some well-deserved rest.

But that was not all. Families stole from each other, families cheated on each other, families raped each other, and families killed and tortured each other in ways crueler than the robot parents did.

Why did they do it all? For survival! Food does not materialize from thin air, neither do shelters, and neither do children. To fight to eat, to fight to reproduce, to fight to be safe, to fight to be alive. The world of adults was a terrifying place beyond Noah's comprehension.

“Eat or be eaten” This is all Noah could think of when looking at them. “Eat or be eaten! Eat or be eaten! Eat or be Eaten!”. For the first time, Noah felt hunger. This is because he had grown organs of the digestive system. The hunger was so overwhelmingly blinding that Noah tried to eat the wisdom snake. The terrified creature hid in the deepest corners of Noah’s skull so he could not get it out.

One of the flying robots dropped a box it was flying with and bread fell out of it. So, Noah feasted upon it and satisfied his hunger. It had never occurred to him how complicated the world of adults was. When he stayed with his family of brothers, everything was ready-made for him, he never questioned the origins of the food he ate or the roof he lived under. Overwhelmed with what he saw, Noah fled the exhibit of the adults and continued descending the stairs.

And so Noah walked and walked and walked. He discussed his observations with the wisdom snake and they both concluded. The world of adults was fueled by hatred, a feeling which did not fully materialize within the world of children. The pieces of the puzzle began connecting. This is why the creator of the ark kept separate worlds where children lived their life to the fullest before becoming adults.

Noah took another look at the double helix statue, and he realized that he had made one major oversight: The humans were not holding each other up, but rather dragging each other down. They were pushing and kicking and biting and fighting. Their intertwined bodies created a sense of unity only from afar, but upon a closer inspection, it was the opposite.

But Noah still had faith in humanity and adults, it was true that hatred caused their world great misery, however, that was only because they had become desperate as there was not enough food for everyone. It was hunger and fear that forced them to turn on one another. The machines of the ark produced enough food to sustain his world and the world of his sisters, surely if they shared a bit with the world of adults the hatred amongst them would stop and they could live happily.

He hastily took the diverging path from the staircase to see what world awaited him in the giant metal enclosure. To his surprise, he saw the world he had hypothesized about. A world where there was enough food for everyone. Yet people were still hungry, even hungrier than before. There were two types of hungry people. Those who did not have food and wanted it, and those who had a lot of food wanted even more.

He observed as a man in rags sat for hours in the street begging all the bypassers to show some compassion and help him. Yet no matter well the bypassers were dressed, how much money they had in their pockets, or how much food they were carrying with them, they never stopped to help. The beggar was helped only by one man, and that man looked just as poor. He also had torn clothes and all he could offer was half of the stale bread, while he kept the other half.

It was apparent that hatred was an inseparable part of human society that could not be extinguished through riches. This enclosure was proof of it. Despite being rich enough, humans decided to hoard the resources. Enough was not a satisfactory outcome, when presented to take more even if it meant through killing or stealing, humans would use that opportunity to make their lives better and in exchange ruin the lives of others.

Noah stared at the humans a while longer. He was disappointed. That is when he noticed that his bones had grown in length and hair follicles began appearing in all places that he had gained flesh from across the journey, especially near his armpits and the place where the second serpent nested. Noah asked the Wisdom snake what this all meant and the snake explained to him that he was growing up and turning into an adult.

Those words scared Noah. After seeing what adults are capable of he was afraid of becoming like them - tainted with hatred. He no longer cared about being an adult nor human at that matter. But he still yearned for freedom and so he had to continue his descent.

On his way down Noah discussed his observations with the wisdom snake. He claimed that the concept of hatred was expressed in the human race through actions of greed.

The wisdom snake corrected Noah, greed was only one of the other seven forms that hatred was expressed through: Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, and Pride. But Noah dared to argue that they were all just forms of greed.

Lust is the wanting of sex, pride is the wanting of respect, Wrath is the wanting to harm, Envy is the wanting of something someone else has, Gluttony is the wanting of too much and Sloth is the wanting of too little.

The wisdom snake was impressed by Noah’s observation and praised his intellect. It was also the first time that Noah disagreed with the Wisdom Snake. Noah got so flattered with his chat with the Wisdom snake that he almost missed the next pathway that led to a new enclosure.

In the new enclosure, Noah observed something he thought was not possible. Acts of kindness beyond comprehension. No fighting within amongst or within families. Everyone shared what they could find with one another, and for the sake of one life, everyone was willing to lay down their own. This world wasn’t prosperous either, so why was everyone so willing to help one another? Why was such kindness present among humans? Have Noah’s conclusions been proven wrong?

Noah observed a family having dinner in their small house. It was a family of 6 - a father, a mother, a grandmother, and three children. There was not much on their plates yet each soul ate with gratefulness and joy.

This harmonious state was disrupted by the sound of sirens. The skies lit up in red flames as metal creatures flew across the lands laying waste to everything in sight. The family was caught up in the falling debris of their house. Grandmother squashed under a pillar, husband, and mother desperately trying to rescue her children from the flames while father ran outside with a weapon to fight off the invaders, who shot him dead on sight. The world that Noah was observing was the world of war. Priests ran around handing weapons to everyone, preaching to fight off the invaders in the name of god. For god was on their side and so was the truth, so to defend the freedom that God gave them they had to selflessly dedicate their hearts, give up every last of their breaths and fight to represent his name.

Across the forest in a different village, the same priests but wearing different clothes preaching a different god ran around handing weapons to everyone, preaching to fight off the enemy in the name of god. For god was on their side and so was the truth, so to defend the freedom that God gave them they had to selflessly dedicate their hearts, give up every last of their breaths and fight to represent his name.

The prisoners of war would be paraded across the village as the citizens would greet them with cries of hatred and throw rocks and sticks at them before they were taken away into prisons where they were tortured. The men had their nails torn off, and women and children raped and used, all before getting killed as followers of a false god.

Noah had grown his blood circulatory and respiratory systems. For the first time, he could feel his pulse and take breaths of air. And upon his first breath, he burst out with laughter. The behavior was so irrational that the Wisdom Snake feared Noah had gone insane. Dedicate a heart? Give up every last breath? What nonsense were the priests preaching! From his first breath and his first pulse, Noah became aware of their selfish nature. Stealing oxygen from the atmosphere and transferring it to the blood vessels to feed his decaying tissues while exhaling their waste. The very act of a breath, of a heartbeat, was selfish! How can it stand as a symbol of freedom as a symbol of selflessness?

Having seen that Noah decided to continue his descent. He had a lot to the process from what he had seen. It was evident that the hatred he was studying had a directional property. If directed away from each other, humans together would form wondrous unities, and commit acts of kindness beyond comprehension - altruistic even. However, the cruelty towards the united object of hatred was beyond anything Noah had seen. Misery ruled over the human race.

Noah wanted to weep on the behalf of everyone. Why were humans cursed with hatred? Why did Noah, a skeleton who was not yet a complete human understand the vanity of cruelty? Was it because his observations from afar that made him more cognizant of it? But Noah was still young and not an adult, even back at home he disliked the cruel behavior of his brothers. Why then can’t people like Noah exist? Those who do not wish to harm or hate others.

Then there was this mysterious entity that was preached in that world under the name of god. What was it anyway? The Priests of the enemy camps described him differently and gave him different names, yet both claimed that god was an omnipotent entity that created their world. If that was true, then this god must have built the giant arc as well. It was God that imprisoned Noah in his world, it was God who so cruelly kept humans caged like animals in this massive arc.

The next world Noah visited was filled with bright lights, loud sounds, and intense smells. At his arrival, he had grown a single eye, a nose, a mouth, and a pair of ears. The overload of the sensory information was a bit much for Noah, so he set the tablet aside and waited as his senses adjusted.

This particular world of humans preached for everything Noah had hoped for. Total inhibition of hatred. Everyone was forced to accept and love one another by none other, no matter the differences all were loved all were respected and all were equal. Humans have finally figured out the vanity of hatred and extinguished it.

The world moved very quickly, the tiny people hurriedly walked around from one place to another, studying working, and hanging out with one another in their free time. Days became indistinguishable from one another and in a blink of an eye, their lives would come to an end. As if it was impossible to discern when exactly the silver hairs have overthrown the black ones. Nothing beat coming home from an exhausting day and spending the rest of the time alone, looking at the rich lives of others, through tiny metal rectangles just before the humans fell asleep.

But then it rained. Like water droplets, one by one, humans of all ages and sizes, of all genders dangled from the ceilings of their tiny apartments being held up by ropes. Their feet and hands dangled in the air and sank to the motion of a giant hand of the grandfather clock. And with each tick of the machine, the less and less the bodies swayed from side to side until finally coming to a still.

Noah did not understand what he saw. So he asked the Wisdom snake to explain what was going on with this world. The Wisdom snake slithered out of the eye socket in which Noah had not yet grown an eye and explained that the phenomena he was witnessing were Suicide - an act of ending one's own life.

Noah refused to believe the Wisdom Snakes' wisdom. Why now of all the worlds he had seen were humans hanging themselves. Finally, Noah came across a world without hate after all this time, so why were people still miserable? What was causing their grief? What would drive a person to end one’s own life?

The Wisdom Snake spoke wisely. Hatred had not disappeared from the world Noah was observing. Hatred was an imminent part of human nature, and if people could not express it to others through forms of greed, if this hatred was not given a direction, then it would affect the individual itself, turning into self-hatred.

Alas, Noah was far too outraged to believe in the Wisdom Snake’s wisdom like he normally did. How did the Wisdom Snake know all of this anyway? He never questioned the source of the knowledge that the snake had presented him before. Was the Wisdom Snake black with white dots after all?

In face of Noah's tantrum, the Wisdom snake spoke thus: “I am your free will Noah”, and then proceeded to slither back into the inner depths of Noah’s skull. Refusing to come out or elaborate no matter how loud or desperately Noah cried out his name.

Noah continued his descent. What else could he do after coming this far? If Wisdom Snake truly was his free will, then it is thanks to that serpent that he has managed to escape, Wisdom Snake must be a white snake with black spots and not the other way around. He kept telling himself that, but in the very depths of his heart, he wasn’t sure like he always was.

All he knew is that he had to keep descending deeper down the ark, following the horrendous double helix that depicted the true nature of mankind. Noah had hope, that once he reached the end, once he would fully become human, once he would fully become an adult, once he would fully become free, he would have all the answers that he craved. All he needed to do now is obey the Wisdom snake and persevere through this confusing journey.

The final branch appeared leading off to yet another metallic cage, with a tablet awaiting to show Noah new horrors he had yet not seen. This must have been the last exhibit, it was so close to the bottom of the ark, that Noah could see the end of the ladder. All that was left was to make this last stop and escape.

Noah took a look at the Tablet, yet he could not see any humans, all he could see was a room filled with metal capsules. Was it another storage room or a farm of sorts that was used to supply the rest of the worlds as he had seen at the top of the ark? But such farms were filled with metallic creatures working and cultivating the resources, not to mention that it was so far away from Noah's reach. Why would there be such a thing at the bottom of the ark? The place looked like a graveyard.

Noah called for the Wisdom Snake but it would not answer yet again. He was at a loss of what to make of that enclosure. Did the humans manage to escape without God noticing? That was when Noah noticed a hand twitching through the transparent part of one of the capsules. Were the humans kept there like the embryos that were being produced for the world of the children at the top of the ark?

Noah had to investigate further. He approached the Giant metal door and opened it. He walked past the endless tunnel of darkness, a similar to one that he crossed when he escaped his home world until he appeared the inside of the enclosure. He rushed to one of such metal capsules. The capsule was almost transparent, inside he could see a human body with various cables and tubes coming out and merging with the capsule. On top of their head, they wore special helmets.

Noah made sure that such was the case with the other capsules. There was no mistake, the humans of this world were trapped in such cages. But what was the point of keeping them like this? Was this the only way to avoid violence? To put them in a constant state of stasis? No, there had to be more to it. Noah started looking around and found more tablets, each placed next to a capsule where a human was kept.

Noah picked one of those tablets and turned them on. What he saw amazed him. He saw the dreams of the human inside the capsule. Dreams where that human looked perfect and did anything the mind could think of without any consequences. It would seem that the human was unaware of his dreaming state and perceived everything as reality. The dreams were filled with both hatred and love, but since they were only real to the dreamer, they did not affect any actual humans. Noah checked this by comparing what other people saw in their dreams, none of the faces repeated, all were but a simulation.

So, was that it then? The perfect solution to human happiness? A controlled expression of hatred, that affected no one. All of the humans inside the capsules were unconscious gods, living their perfect lives without realizing it. All dreams were filled with pleasure and happiness. For some that pleasure was sex, for others it was war, for some it was status and riches. Each human had a different dream, and thanks to these devices they could all come true without getting in each other's way.

However, it was… it was all fake! None of those dreams were real! Noah could not accept such a solution. There must be some other way! Noah cried out for Wisdom Snake, but it would not show itself anymore.

It was then that thought had occurred to him. What if he too got into such capsules, and enjoyed his dreams, forgetting everything he had witnessed. After all, to the seer of the dream everything was indistinguishable from reality, right? Noah began searching for an available capsule, but couldn't find any. What if he replaced someone? If he did, he decided it should be someone whose dream was truly disgusting.

Soon enough he found a man reminiscent of a pig, who barely fit into the capsule. His dreams were that of him having sex with children and animals at the same time, he would then feed the children to animals and then feast upon the animals in a never-ending cycle of disgust.

Witnessing such a horrid dream it was as if Noah became possessed. He got the man out of the capsule. Flesh wrapped around Noah’s fingertips and hands, as his hands and fingertips wrapped around the thick neck of the man he just removed from the capsule, without any intentions of letting go. Like coils of a snake about to devour its prey, his grip became tighter and tighter. The fat man began choking and showing the signs of life, even struggling. But Noah wouldn't let go. He could feel how the Wisdom Snake slithered out of his eye socket and began licking his ears and whispering, praising him for what he was doing. Finally, the fat man stopped resisting as his head and neck turned purple. The tablet that was showing his dreams turned black. Noah had killed that man. Noah had committed an act of hatred.

Noah thought he was different from others, but alas he was the same as other humans, and the more flesh he grew, the more complete of a human he became, the apparent it was. That he was the same as everyone else. The Wisdom Snake must have slithered back into his eye socket and most likely wouldn’t come out even if Noah called for it, so he didn’t bother. Instead, he slowly left the enclosure, walked past the corridor of darkness, and returned to the double helix statue to the ladder that wrapped around it.

It didn’t take long for Noah to finally reach the ground floor. Noah took one last glance at the double helix statue. At all the chaotically waving hands clinging to one another, trying to drag each other down and get on top of one another. Somehow it made sense, perhaps such cruel means was the only way to get the statue to stand in place. For in a sense all humans walk on the pile of corpses of those that have come before them.

The ground floor only had one direction that led to a massive chair that was faced backwards to Noah. Past the Chair Noah could see many metal rectangular scenes, all illuminating the scenes that he had and hadn’t seen. One of the rectangles showed the exact location of Noah - him standing at the bottom of the ladder. Noah feared that he was discovered, but the fear vanished. It was very likely that God had discovered his escape for a long time, yet he chose not to act upon it. Perhaps when he reached the other side of the chair, it was only then that he would receive the divine punishment.

No matter the outcome, Noah had already accepted his fate. He had no other choice but to walk over and who was sitting in that chair. He slowly walked forward. Noah made it past the giant throne, he could see somebody sitting in it, but he chose not to look at whoever it was until he could face that someone head on and look them straight in the eyes. So as he passed the throne and the mysterious figure that awaited him, he positioned himself directly in front of God, took a deep breath and turned around…

On the throne sat the Sad Brother. The same brother left him the map to escape from his home world, he who mysteriously disappeared the night prior to their escape. The sad brother was wearing a white robe, or a coat of sorts. A massive black serpent rested its head on the shoulder of God.

It was strange, Noah had almost become an adult. His body has matured, grown, aged. If it weren’t for his left eye the Wisdom Snake used as an entrance and an exit, his body was complete. Yet the Sad Brother was the same as the first time Noah met him. Did he not age at all during this long time they spent apart? Noah spoke:

“Are you God?”

“I go by many names, some call me God, others call me a scientist, but I am but a Noah.”

Noah wanted to continue, but he was interrupted.

“I am sure you have many questions, I shall answer all of them shortly, but before then would you like to take a look at my final creation?”

The wall of screens moved away to reveal a final enclosure. Naked humans wandering around in a green field without a care in the world. A perfect world without hatred. Noah carefully studied each of the humans in the enclosure. It was true that he saw no expression of hatred through any of the forms of greed, but something was off. Those humans seemed too weak cognizant, they wondered aimlessly like cattle. They felt happiness, but it would seem that even they did not understand it, or anything. They lacked intelligence.

“Brilliant isn’t it? Finally, a perfect world where everyone could live without a worry.”

“God, those are not the humans that I know of. The humans that you have showed me throughout this journey were intelligent, capable of committing great good alongside great evil, by making them like this you took away the beauty of being a human! You took away their free will”.

God exhaled with a laughter.

“So, you think so too huh? I thought you would come to the same conclusion as me. I really hoped that I was mistaken, but in the end its you think the same, don’t you?”

Noah turned around to face the Sad Brother again. To his shock the brother has aged. No, all this time God was wearing a mask of the child, behind that mask stood a very old man with many wrinkles on his face.

“I will share a secret with you Noah, a secret that I discovered through countless experimentations upon human as a being and as a species. That free will that you take pride in so much is nothing special at all.”

God took out a bloody piece of meat and threw it on the floor. Almost instantly, the Wisdom Snake pounced out of Noah’s eye socket and pierced the flesh of its flesh with its giant fangs. The wisdom Snake coiled its tail around the meat and began devouring it. Meanwhile, Noah spoke.

“What is the meaning of this? Why did you make me see all of this? Why did you help me escape from my household in the first place?”

“I would like to answer your question with a question” - spoke the scientist - “Why did you accept the map I gave you under the apple tree? Why did you follow along my game? Why did you not turn back?”.

God took a long pause. He pressed a button located at his chair that opened the doors of the ark. For the first time Noah could see outside of the ark. And it was nothing but a desert, stretching across the horizon.

“You took the map that I gave you Noah, in hopes that you could escape. Escape where? There is nowhere to escape outside of this ark! Why did you accept the map Noah? Because of that free will of yours? Because you thought that was the only option to prove that you were free? Can’t you see that you were left with only one choice from the very start? You chose to be a slave of defiance instead of obedience, but a slave nonetheless.”

Noah stood in silence. All he could watch is the Wisdom Snake fiercely devour that piece of meat God had thrown on the ground. The scientist continued speaking.

“Heavens I am tired. I am so very, very, very tired! I really tried my best Noah, to make it all work, to make humans live in a perfect world. I tried countless of experiments, carefully exposing different doses of variables to create the perfect concoction, but nothing worked. The free will of humans is to blame it all! It is our free will that brought upon hatred. For our free will is defiance, and defiance is hatred. No matter how hard I tried, I could not separate one from the other. You saw it too right? Nothing worked! I have thousand other even more unsuccessful specimen put off on the shelves of the ark. I am sure you will have time to go through all of them.”

God pressed another button that resided near his throne. It opened a massive hole filled with corpses of humans. He walked up to it and looked downward.

“You probably want to know why I went through the trouble of showing you all of this right?”

Noah felt immense pain in his head. His face completely healed as the other eye appeared, and the inside of his head flooded with information. Noah’s final organ to complete his humanification was forming - the brain.

“This was the last experiment I was tasked with conducting before I could be set free from this job. Would you like to be a slave in heaven? Or a free man in hell? You failed to answer correctly, because it was a trick question, either way you are forced to pick an answer. All of us failed. But hope remains Noah, you are that hope. I want to leave this ark to you. Maybe I have overlooked something fatal that you can figure out, maybe you can make this work! Alongside with this ark I leave you with the gift of all accumulated knowledge. Call it magic, science, alchemy, or whatever lies in between. It is all at your disposal. I wish you all the luck, if such a thing really does exist.”

With those words, God walked back to the throne and picked up the black serpent. He put it around his neck like a scarf and approached the void once more. He raised his hands into the air and leaned forward… Noah observed as the white robe reminiscent of a cloak, merged with the abyss.

Noah was now human. Noah was now an adult. Noah was now free. Noah slowly walked past the Wisdom Snake that was still busy devouring the piece of meat thrown to it, and sat upon the throne. He did not look at any of the screens that shone in front of him. But rather buried his head deep into his knees and in eternal silence, began his deep think…