at the beginning of time zero becomes non-zero but… we’re jumping ahead of the story for becoming is the child of ages before Time was born the nothing was something in itself in fact, it was many things that always and forever shall be enumerated the Initial Field of values belongs to Random, the Joker the first citizen of the multiverse whose domain is progeny of number and plurality (the two are one, forever inseparable) it was his wont that the nature of the thing be not monolithic not monotonic, not discrete but an uneven continuum it was his own image, his imprimatur, he produced an expression of fecundity but also of his cragged roughly hewn heart and the varying densities the disparities of his fancy gave rise to voltages (Love) to affinities and propensities a penchant for redistribution (Nature abhors a vacuum) yet, at this stage remained it all Potential without actuation or motion without mechanism merely the pregnancy of time and thus was forged the cradle of Father Kronos an enfant terrible destined to break Random’s broken toy refashion it in his own image and his nine arrows were each tipped with Rate for Distance belonged to Random and the triumvirate became Alchemy the force of the many Big Bangs Alchemy, the transmutation of the Ten Thousand Things the continuous metamorphosis of everything we see and that we do not see Alchemy, the god known by the ancient Dakhota as taku-ścan-ścan (something in motion) the sole religion worth having is the energy of the quantum leap the entelechy of ecosystems the élan vital in the breast of the finch the fibrillations of stars the twinkling of galaxies Alchemy, the calculus of mass, of solidity that formulation of Platform bedrock of sentience and human consciousness [19-I-22]