God visits Earth and transforms into a swan and rapes a woman named Leda.
Leda says to the swan, "Why have you done this? I thought the world was good, but you have taught me that it is not, and now I don't know the reason I have to live.
Why should I live in a bad world? What do I have to fight for? Do I have my happiness to fight for? But you have made my happiness impossible. Do I have the happiness of my family to fight for? But I know what despair awaits them when they discover the truth of this world, the truth you have shown me. To fight for their happiness would amount to bearing a lie every day, and to shield them from anything that might show them the truth. But I cannot bear this lie. The truth weighs too heavily on my conscience.
So I have nothing to fight for, and a world such as this is not worth fighting for. You have done something so evil, that I'm not sure even I comprehend how evil it is, though the evil was done to me. If there is a God of justice, he will judge you, and the weight of your sins will break his scale."
The swan looks upon Leda and sees her as a small, tiny, speck of a thing. For a moment he wonders whether to bother speaking to something so small, but something in him prompts him to speak.
"I am the God who you say will judge me. But I judge myself and find no wrongdoing. I know all things, I see all of reality all at once. In my sight I do not see any moral facts that could make true your claims against me.
I raped you because it pleased me to do so, and I will do so again if you are still around and if I am so inclined, and if you are no longer around, as you humans tend to die so quickly, then I will find another girl and rape her instead, if I am so inclined.
And in all of this, there is no truth of the matter that I have done wrong, or that I am something that I ought not be, or that I think or feel in any way opposed to reality. I am perfectly aligned with reality; I act within the confines of all facts, and with reality's permission I can rape and kill as I please. If I want to eat your child just to see the look on your face, then I will. If I want to infest your body with bugs to see what it looks like for them to burst out, I will. If I want to satisfy my curiosity on the effects of acid and flesh, or blood and soil, then I will send rain and war, and if I want to lay with a woman so a husband kills her in jealousy, or lure sailors to their deaths as a siren, or frighten them as a sea monster, or drink myself into a stupor and laugh as I watch an empire fall, then I will, and in doing so I do not fall out of step with reality even one inch, nor do I commit any real crime, as I see all facts and not one makes it true that I should do none of these things.
There is no basis upon which to cast judgment on me. You have no sight of my sin, no proof of my poison, no truth to test me with. What wisdom says I am wicked, or reason that I am wretched? In virtue of what am I a villain? What is your argument? You have feelings, but nothing that concerns a connection with reality."
Leda listened with horror to what the swan said, sobbing all the while. "If what you say is true," she cries out, "then what is this world? If a demon like you can be perfectly aligned with the world, then what a nightmare of a world it is.
The competition of animals tells us that to survive is to be part of this world. But if being part of this world says nothing good about us, then what good is our survival? To live in this world is to embrace it, but to embrace a nightmare is to become a nightmare yourself. The only chance of goodness or virtue we have is to separate ourselves from this nightmare. We assume it is good to survive, and thus good to be aligned with the world. But if what you say is true, then being aligned with this world says nothing good about us. If anything, to be good is to reject such a nightmare, and to reject such survival."
A sharp knife appears in front of Leda. The swan responds, "If you wish to reject survival, then here."
Leda's hands shake as she picks up the knife. She turns the knife, and with both hands points it to her heart, and hovers.
God moves her hands and the knife plunges into her heart. Leda's eyes widen with shock, and her dress grows red.
"Ahh, I love it. I really do. I love blood and death. I love how dramatic they are," God says, stretching his wings to ready a takeoff.
Leda falls to the ground and sees the sky one last time, wondering why things had to be this way.
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