NaNoWriMo 2022, Fling Forty-Four

“Where is this?” Alissa asked, “I feel as though I had reached the end of all stories.”

The city and the ground and the rising were all far behind them, that and everything that came before it sliding quickly from memory.

“This is everywhere and nowhere. This is wisdom and foolishness, knowledge and unknowing,” said the voice, which Alissa had come to think of as the Voice. The tone of its words was like bright sunlight dazzling the eyes, or the ground dropping away suddenly at one’s feet.

“This is where we are supposed to be,” Glomorominith said, a floating shape of light against the infinite tinted void.

“I am not at all certain of this,” said Sonorandelan, also a floating shape of light, slimmer and lighter, “but I trust you, my lifelong friend.”

They moved through the tops of great trees, and wet leaves slapped playfully against them. They were moons, they were the vast rolling suns, they were rain and clouds and the nectar that runs through the veins. They were night, and dawn, and the rich dark soil.

They lived lives on strange other worlds, finding and losing each other and finding each other again, on sky-scraping mountain ridges and in machine-haunted tunnels under the flame-scarred field where the great starships come and go. They remembered, and forgot, and remembered, and always became once again shapes of light.

“Have we become untethered?” asked Alissa, thinking that it might be good to become untethered, as long as one could someday find the tethers again.

“We are tethered and untethered at once; we exist at the point of potentiality and decision.”

“I feel no desire to make a decision, my friend, I am content to flow where the ages take us.”

“There was something in my mind to do,” Alissa said, “but that was so long ago…”

She began telling a story of time and memory, and how people can leave signs for themselves, to regain lost memories in later ages. Somehow the Voice joined into the story, and contributed images from other worlds, from vast still waters and tumbling voids of joyous emptiness. People of all kinds have told themselves so many stories.

“Is this what the stones are for, in truth?” Sonorandelan wondered aloud.

“The purpose of a thing is what that thing does; the purpose of a person is what that person does,” Glomorominith speculated.

“What are we doing?” Alissa asked.

“What is everything doing? Where is everywhere going?”

After another moment, or an age, they reached a place where three pale people with few arms or eyes lay unmoving: one in a large squared fibrous pile with vines or wires attached to its (probably his, Alissa thought) head, and the other two in smaller piles that had been set up next to the bigger one.

All were wearing, or had had applied, what looked like a slim net of especially tender dark vines on their heads, with more vines or wires leading to a strange shiny arrangement off to one side.

“This one is elegantly designed,” said Alissa.

“I admire the simplicity of the configuration,” Sonorandelan agreed, “It is almost captivating.”

“She exists at this very moment here, and that makes me happy,” said Glomorominith, basking in the everywhere of everything.

They were drifting in the air over the center pile, where a young-looking brown person with only two eyes, but elegant eye-folds, lay peacefully. The third bed held an even smaller person, probably male, wrapped in rich purple fibers. Although the body was childlike in size, there was something adult in the strange flat face, even in sleep.

“There are people in this reality who worry about these three and their sleep,” the Voice said, “their bodies are well cared-for, but their minds are perhaps far away.”

“This one looks familiar,” Glomorominith said, drifting over the smallest sleeper.

“Perceiving this one makes brings a dull pain to my mind,” Sonorandelan said, peering at the various tendrils touching the head of the largest person, the one in the largest pile.

“You know–” began Alissa.

“This thought surprises me,” Sonorandelan broke in, “what has brought to mind the idea that we could–“

“There are three of them, and three of us–“

“We might be unable to come out again. Or their minds may perhaps return, and the owners resent our trespassing.”

“I… don’t think that would happen.”

“What would the experience be, to be them?”

“I don’t know… it… something draws me.”

The Voice remained silent.

Fling Forty-Five

NaNoWriMo 2022, Fling Forty-Three

“It feels like all logic and reason and the sequence of events have fled from the world.”

This from Kristen, who might as well have spoken for all of them, or at least all three of the humans.

Colin might have granted that one situation in which communication works more or less as it would in the simplest theory, is when the source and the target both already have, very saliently, the thought or feeling or other property that is being communicated (so to speak). But if the property is already salient everywhere, what if anything has been communicated? Perhaps the transitive-closure knowledge that I know that you know that I know that you know that we both feel that way (and you know it (and I know it…)).

“Are we everywhere at once?”

“No, no, it just turns out that space is also an illusion. There is no everywhere to be; being is not a thing that has a location property, neither finite nor infinite-valued.”

“Be Here Now, man!”

Perception was chaotic but potentially entertaining; sounds and images of all kinds occurring all at once. How these thoughts, or words, were traveling between the four to be reacted to and recorded, will remain a mystery.

“This present moment is all that exists, and equally obviously, this place right here is the only place that exists. Other places are not in this moment, other moments are not in this place.”

“Other moments could be in this space, though; we could go elsewhere and then come back — ooh, ice cream!”

Chocolate ice cream, vanilla ice cream, strawberry and rhubarb ice cream, banana split ice cream, rose hip ice cream, lemon sherbet, and all the others, in fact. And tables and bowls and spoons and chairs and a stereo playing Mosquito Song by Queens of the StoneAge.

“The further I go, the less I know,” Steve quoted happily.

“Now we are seeing all the things that we might choose to do.”

“Eat ice cream?”

“Is choice an illusion? Do we have free will?”

“Can we write down an account of free will that does not have to pretend that time and space are real?”

“Look, I could be a cave explorer!”

“Remember, stalactites cling tight to the ceiling, and stalagmites might get there in a century.”

“Or is it the other way around? I feel like it might be the other way around.”

The being called Tibbs shimmered with a pulse of high-frequency shimmering. “No,” came the caressing voice, “it is not the other way around. Do not spread memetic toxins!”

“Keep your darn meme complexes to yourself!”

“On that planet there, meme researchers are more highly regarded than everyone else except the pearl-divers. The pearls are deep and gold and foretell the future.”

“This planet has two moons and a debris-ring. The moons are gradually destabilizing the ring, and the planet experiences frequent meteor strikes.”

“That must reduce home values.”

After a moment or a decade, they reached a place where three humans lay asleep: one in a hospital bed with monitors attached to its (probably his, Kristen decided) head, and the other two in comfortable-looking cots that had been set up next to the bigger bed.

All were wearing, or had had applied, what looked like a standard realtime fMRI cap, with wires leading to an especially shiny virtualizing deck.

“She’s pretty,” said Kristen.

“A stunner,” Steve agreed, “I think I’m in love.”

“She exists at this very moment here, and that makes me happy,” said Colin.

They were drifting in the air over the center bed, where a young woman with brown hair and eyes and skin and elegant epicanthic folds lay peacefully. The third bed held a small young human, probably male, in rich purple silk nightclothes. Although the body was childlike in size, there was something adult in the face, even in sleep.

“There are people in this reality who worry about these three and their sleep,” the being Tibbs known as intoned, “their bodies are well cared-for, but their minds are perhaps far away.”

“This one looks familiar,” Colin said, drifting over the smallest sleeper.

“This one makes my head ache,” Steve said, peering at the various devices touching the head of the largest human, the one in the largest bed.

“You know–” began Kristen.

“Wait, really?” Steve broke in, “Are you really thinking that we could–“

“There are three of them, and three of us–“

“We might get stuck. Or they might come back, and get annoyed at our trespassing.”

“I… don’t think that would happen.”

“Do we really want to be them?”

“I don’t know… it feels right? Somehow?”

The being known as Tibbs just shimmered.

Fling Forty-Four