So. Time and space.
Interesting.
Well, actually, no. It wasn’t particularly interesting. In fact, it was rather dull. Nothing was at least a novel experience. This was…
She looked around at the infinite expanse of white that stretched out around her in every direction.
…Well, it was something.
Something. Not nothing.
Why did she ever think something would be better than nothing?
Well, she regained her sense of direction, at least. And she probably regained her other senses too, not that any of them had any use in an empty void of white.
Was she still herself after being submerged in nothing?
She brought her hooves up to her face and examined them. Yes, she was still a pony. That’s good. Her hooves looked normal and fine. What color were they?
…Huh, for some reason it was hard to tell. Whatever.
She looked down at the rest of her body. Yes, she was definitely a pony, all normal and regular, and yet… what color was she? Why couldn’t she tell?
In fact, now that she thought about it, the problem wasn’t just color. What was her build type? Was she fat or skinny? How old was she? She kept asking herself questions as she examined herself, and found it extremely hard to answer any of them. She seemed to have… every attribute at once? Or maybe none of them at all?
And her cutie mark… she just couldn’t seem to focus on that area of her body, as if she were always looking out of the corner of her eyes.
Huh. Very peculiar.
I am a superposition. I am a variety of possible events condensed into a single point, and I represent the actions of many. I cannot define myself because that would collapse the wave function preemptively.
Nice try. If that were the case, then how come she was sure she was a “she”? By doing so, she was defining herself, was she not?
…I still think it’s a sound hypothesis.
Yes. With flawed logic and all.
So anyway, what else could she do in a tub of infinite whiteness?
Wait! The ground she was standing on! It was the exact same shade of white as everything else, so the horizon wasn’t visible, but she was definitely standing on something, and it was a something that was different than the other somethings!
Questions instantly started running through her mind: What is the ground? What’s it made of? Is it malleable? Is it a flat surface or are there mountains and valleys somewhere out there? Why is there any ground here at all?
Oddly, despite all four of her hooves having direct contact with the ground, she couldn’t quite tell what the ground felt like. Thus, she decided that she would stomp on the ground instead and see if she could tell what type of material the ground might be made of by the resulting effect or sound. She reared up on her hindlegs and stomped.
…Which resulted in her front hooves going straight through where she thought the ground was.
The momentum from this stomp also managed to pull along the rest of her upper body into the sudden crevice. She shrieked involuntarily as she felt herself start to tumble over the edge, horrified by the idea of losing her balance and falling forever through an endless void of white. She scrambled to find footing for her front hooves…
…Which resulted in her front hooves suddenly hitting ground exactly where she knew there was no ground before, below the ground she had been standing on before she tried stomping.
She was in a slightly uncomfortable position now, with her rear hooves standing on ground that was raised a good foot or so higher than her front hooves. She walked around a little bit, trying to find an area with flat ground again, but it seemed like no matter where she went or what direction she walked, her back hooves were always on raised ground compared to her front hooves.
She eventually started to get annoyed by this, and thought that the ground really ought to be flat, like how it was when she first arrived in the void.
The ground obliged, and she was suddenly on flat ground again.
She tried to make sense of this.
Right! Of course! This world started as nothing, but then gained time and space because I thought it! There isn’t actually ground here, I just figure there should be ground here and so that’s what I feel. Everything changes depending on what I think.
Ah, so the ground is inconsistent because there’s no reference point. Well, that just means a reference point has to be made! Start with the basics, after all.
Horizon.
Horizon.
Horizon.
Horizon.
And then there was a horizon, with the ground whiteness now looking slightly darker than the air whiteness.
She grinned. Progress!