Thread by @kritheavix

It's not really a question of faith when god comes to visit you regularly.

Your people have long understood she isn't a goddess, but 'benefactor' or 'provider' fall so short it might embarrass her to know. She's a person, like you - but so much more, figuratively and literally.

For as long as your civilization has kept written records and as far back as oral history stretches beyond that point of learning, she's been there. Rarely has she taken a direct hand in affairs, preferring instead to supply ancient scholars and craftsmen with their own means.

It was long believed she was unique, and that her titanic size was appropriate to her divinity. It's now known that she is no celestial being wrought on the scale of the Creator, but an ordinary person - and short for her kind, you've since learned.

It is you who is tiny.

You've seen the outside world. You're aware of what exists, and where in the world you'd fit if you were to venture beyond the Four Walls and there find the competition that awaits.

Armoured leviathans dismissed as 'bugs' by the goddess, to say nothing of actual predators.

She has kept your little world safe for generations; nurtured it and held her secret close and saved you from the indignity and disaster of being a curiosity on some laboratory table far from home, of no more consequence than the ants and aphids you farm.

She's cute.

You know she's no divine being, but it feels like heresy to admit it, even to yourself. She's really cute.

She is so far out of your league you would fit entirely under her little toe with room for your friends and neighbors. It thrills you, just a little.

She has been a constant in the lives of thousands for so long that to imagine a colossal landscape in which she is merely one in a faceless crowd is abhorrent to you. She deserves better. She has been the light in the world of your people for centuries, as you reckon time.

Ah, but Time. The eternal enemy. Time moves differently for you and the goddess - be damned, but you'll use the word while it works.

The specialists of your civilization have long, meandering explanations as to why, but she moves with a slow, stately grace and speaks in thunder.

When it was discovered that low, sibilant rumble could be sped up to form actual sounds - real words! - worlds collided, centuries ago, and she became a fixture of your people's lives rather than a towering, distant horizon to them.

You count yourself lucky. You live in an age where she hears your people, and you can communicate with her. Due to the cruel quirk of time involved, she can't possibly respond to every question she's asked or message she receives, but you regularly send them anyway.

One day your communicator chirps and vibrates frantically in your pocket. Of course it'd be built with a special function to let you know when She had contacted you.

You tap the screen frantically and open the message.

"Thank you for your kind words. My schedule is posted so you can always meet me directly! We might not be able to talk, but if you would like to spend time with me I am regularly available.

"I am glad you are safe, and hope this message finds you well."

You remember to breathe.

You're supposed to be at work on the colony vessels readying to take your people beyond the Four Walls and into the wider world, perhaps even to explore space, but a message from the goddess is a free pass.

You book a ticket and board an airship headed for the Kitchen.

The trip is uneventful, though you can't find the space free in your mind to be bored the entire journey. Hours pass, and eventually you land on the kitchen counter. Disembarkation is swift and easy. You and your fellow passengers are herded behind a thick strip of tape.

Time passes. A minute off schedule for her is an agonizing, uncertain wait. You'd wait until the sky went out, though.

You can tell she's coming. The drumbeat of thunder heralds her arrival. She is a force of nature to your minuscule figure; each footstep rattles you all.

You've read the cultural documentation on her world. You at least understand some of the concepts that others like her would understand.

Trying to explain the sense of awe that snatches your breath, you might turn to the thought of standing in the path of a hurricane.

Muffled by distance, scale and the socks she's wearing - a century's worth of material to your craftsmen - she booms closer, eyes turned your way. You shudder to realize what lives could there be lost without even being noticed, but she exists so far beyond you.

She has set her entire day to run on the schedule of what amounts in her world to insects - to imagine her as some callous, careless force of nature? Impossible. One may as well curse the tide for swallowing the beach. But, still... your imagination wanders, just briefly.

The crew of the airship that brought you here begin distributing bedrolls, refreshments and making preparations for a long visit. She stops at last, and turns to fix your group under a curious, wondering eye.

There you see something reflected you would never have imagined.

Awe.

Your group of a few dozen mite-sized travelers, all eager to meet the benevolent titaness, can make out a few coloured specks reflected in the glossy wall of her eye as she leans down and slowly casts her gaze across you, holding her breath...

...but you know what you saw.

She is every bit as enamored of your tiny, marvelous little people as you are of her. Comprehension dawns in a blooming moment of amazement. What word exists that could describe her?

Omnipotent? Divine? No, not at all - but functionally, she is to you as the sun's light.

Your group chatters aimlessly among themselves and snaps a ceaseless barrage of pictures as the goddess leans down to examine you all in turn. You know full well she's lingering on you each individually, and you swallow reflexively as the long minutes guide her attention to you.

You stammer something. Words don't happen. All the reason your people have ever endured in the world is focused on you in one amazing moment. You see yourself reflected in her gaze and stagger, dropping to one knee. It seems appropriate. You can't breathe.

She smiles.

The moment passes, and she looks away. You don't bother to stand; you're sure you couldn't. You suck down air and gratefully take a bottle of water from one of the airship crew.

Hours later, one of them returns to you with a number you've never seen before and a note, "Call me."

Call... her?! Your hands are shaking so badly you can barely hold your phone. Tap, tap.

"I'm sorry I knelt like that. It didn't know what else to do when you looked at me. We owe you everything, it feels wrong to come and gawk at you like this."

There's a sonorous rumbling as the titaness' own phone buzzes once you finally hit send on your message. You watch every agonizing moment as she lifts the glowing screen to her face and reads what you'd sent her. Your message, right now, at the center of her attention. Again!

Her thumb moves and you're fairly certain you're going to have a heart attack before you even reach your first summer. An anxious hour passes before... she's smiling down in your direction again, and your phone gives you the special announcement again. You struggle to unlock it.

"It's alright. I come and let you guys hang here because I like the attention. I could pretend it's something else, but c'mon. Are we gonna tell on one another? ;) You're really sweet - you've got nothing to worry about from me. Just let me know if you need anything, okay?"

It dawns on you in that moment that you, in the nearly literal sense, are an oracle. You hold in your trembling, jittering hand a direct line to the woman that is functionally the creator to your people. Would she take you seriously if you did have some petty concern, though?

She has never failed to provide or care for your civilization, to make sure that what was needed was available. The idea seems absurd that she'd need your input on the subject. But...

You blink. So does she. Her eyes -are- on you.

Tap, tap go your fingers.

You can't think of a polite way to ask. You wonder if that would remotely matter. Two words, and then you hit send.

"Keep me?"

Her face lights up, but not from the screen. An expression that fills the horizon dips down to your level, lashes blasting a wave of air at your group.

One of the flight crew comes up to touch your arm. You don't notice until he squeezes your shoulder. "Hey, c'mon. We got a hard flight if we're gonna get the rest of the group back on schedule after dropping you off."

"Dropping me off?"

"The Collection," he says, bemused.

What follows is its own story, but you know where it began. Not in the distant past where oral history lay shrouded in tales of feral rats ravaging villages, or when early scribes clumsily tried to capture the radiant beauty of the single most important woman in your world.

Your story really begins when a goddess gave you her number.

(Fin.)

You might notice that I never described anyone. I found the same thing an interesting omission in 'The Martian.' Though I never mentioned any details, I guarantee you still saw your own particular someone in those stories.

Okay, but since I'm an absolute ham and can't help myself, this is actually the 'goddess' in question.