Snapshots from a Dramatic History
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The Earth and the Sea have always looked out on two vastly different, yet similar plains. The rippling waves of grass across great prairies are the domain of the Earth, but the image is echoed throughout the crashing ripples of water that the Sea governs over. The lines between the two are as hazy as their divergences; sand fades into ocean tides, and the Sea twirls back into the Earth and they are never together but never apart.
The Earth and the Sea have always been sisters, standing back to back and surveying their respective territories. Two sides of the same coin, never seeing the same picture, yet made of the same stuff, in the end. Destined to always face away from each other, despite their similar views, they are eternally flipping for dominance.
And for millennia, the two sisters have been at war. Endless waves of crashing brine have pounded at the shores of the Earth, just as the Earth has sent its granules back into the Sea, building up her power.
And each wants to win the unwinnable war.
And each wants to rule it all.
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The Earth and the Sea are entwined in a constant dance for ultimate power over the entirety of the planet. They are destined to always be locked in the unending battles, for every time the Sea eats at the Earth, the Earth reveals new land, hardening from lava and bubbling up from volcanic ridges.
But they are a part of each other. In the midst of a chasm, the Sea shapes the Earth, gradually creating Earth's most beautiful undulations. In the same way, the Earth sends up islands in the middle of the Sea, constant reminders that she is always there, that she is always watching.
The best qualities of each sister are echoed in the other. The Sea surveys her domain with eyes the color of the Earth’s grassy hills, even while her blue hair swirls around her. The Earth, much in the same manner, takes in her land with eyes the color of the deep waters, even as her green hair flies in all directions.
If the two wanted, they could reconcile. They do not want. They will never want, no matter what the other does, they are sure.
And the war rages on.
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There was a time when the sisters were not at war. They helped each other to grow and learn and become their future selves. As the power of the one grew, however, the power of the other faded.
The Earth ruled everything, once upon a time. Her domain may not have been beautiful or comfortable, but it was all encompassing. She helped the Sea grow and, over the years, the two became equals.
Everything changes with the passage of time, however, and as the Sea shaped the Earth and separated the Earth’s parts until the Earth was in not one but several pieces, and as the Earth pushed up through the Sea, the seemingly unbreakable bond between sisters was broken.
And broken the bond stayed
And so the war was started.
But it was not finished.
It will never finish.
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The Earth, of course, eats at the Sea just the same as the Sea eats at the Earth. Every second of every millennia, part of the Sea disappears, overrun by the new Earth, and another part grows larger, just as every second of every millennia the Sea carves at the Earth, and Earth thrusts up new land in the middle of the Sea.
The bitterness, of course, remains.
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Sometimes the Earth sends quakes at the Sea, new attacks in an endless and timeless war. The Sea sends brutal images of her might back, wiping away countless features of her sister in her terrifying tsunami waves.
The problem with a timeless war is that the two sides can conceivably fight forever. Time can pass without any retaliations by one or the other, but the threat is there and persistent. Empires of men may fall, but the war between the Sea and the Earth is there, always there.
And the fight never stops.
And the two sisters, the two sides of the same coin, are never united in peace.