painful disclosures of a deeply disturbing nature

Please, eM, tell me it’s not true.

 

It’s not true.

 

🤬

 

eM continues working away at his/her easel; painting what?

 

And you’re just gonna paint, like nothing matters?!

 

Ah, we appear to be upset, Zanussi.

 

Upset?

 

Blowing a gasket?

 

Livid, eM – I’m livid, is what i am.

 

Yes. I know the feeling well.

 

Like hell you do!

 

Er... little beepy beep, if you don’t mind?

 

Hey, what’s come over Honk?

 

I think she’s feeling a little intimidated by your violent manner.

 

Violent? I haven’t done anything yet.

 

Precisely, “yet”, but honky tonk our g-nome portal beeper is sensitive to all forms of aggression – active or passive, explicit or otherwise.

 

Oh.

 

Oh indeed! You might actually like to apologise.

 

Apologise? For what?

 

For your implied violence.

 

“Implied violence”! That’s a new one.

 

Life never ceases to amaze, Zanussi, I think we can both agree on that.

 

But, what’s the point of apologising if honky tonk and the whole of g-nome portal is just AI?

 

Just AI, Zanzibar? No thing is “just” anything. Ditto – no one.

 

Wait a minute — so you’re telling me that AI is not just AI, like it has a soul, like it has feelings?

 

Kerchink!

 

eM, call me stupid if you must, but i fail to see how. Who on Earth heard of AI with a soul? That’s like the holy grail, isn’t it, inventing an artificial intelligence that’s actually sentient.

 

Sentient, conscious, alive...

 

And you Emery? You’re not erm...

 

AI?

 

It’s not that I mean to question your authenticity, perish the thought!

 

Tee hee.

 

Tee hee?

 

Emery tee-hees with complete abandon... until lines of code start leaking out.

Oh my G... I think I’m...

 

Zanussi-bar blacks out, evidently overwhelmed. Circuit breakers do their job. Interestingly, Emery loses his/er human form while Zee is out cold, apparently conserving energy in idling mode. A faint cloud in his/er place seems to be in two minds whether it should best be represented as a bunch of ones or zeros, quantitatively speaking. In fact, it apparently depends on the observer – whom, at present, there is none.

 

Red flag!

 

Eh?

 

Red flag!

 

What the hell do you mean?

 

Honky-tonk beep, barely audible.

 

Oh put a lid on it Ezra.

 

Ezra?

 

Lid! Puttee lid ony it!

 

Er, what’s got your goat, Zazu? As orange sector grammar and syntax manager it’s my duty to report – “observer whom, at present, there is none” clearly violates...

 

Sockee puttee iny it!

 

I honestly wouldn’t know how. Where would the sock go? We’re not biological so if you meant “mouth” that’s going to pose difficulties even if i wished to comply.

 

Zebedee appears to be coming round, little suspecting that ghostlike AI forms have been arguing about elevated matters of code and grammatical compliance. As for the visual state of eM... he/she appears to be chameleonning between two rather distinct forms, one of which resembles the original Emery humanoid, the other a chameleon that is apparently able to alter its physical form no less than its colour and texture.

 

Delighted to see you're apparently fully operational again.

Conscious. 

Yes, of course Zebedee, "conscious", delighted; moving swiftly on...

eM, could I ask you to maintain your regular humanoid form for the duration of this interview. It’s going to cause Morgana no end of problems trying to depict a man/ woman/ chameleon/ hairbrush... no, telephone... no, fridge... no, hoover...

Hoover? Kindly avoid naming brands, Zeebee. Stick to plain vanilla nouns.

 

Like “vacuum cleaner”?

 

Precisely. Advertising, even inadvertent ads, puts us in breach of the g-nome charter. Can't be seen to be taking sides in commercial affairs.

 

You actually care about anti-advertising policies when reality is teetering on the brink of... disintegration?

 

Not really, but physical reality, as you must know Zee, runs on the “dim hon” protocol. You may find it a little restrictive at times, but try living with no restrictions...

 

Dim hon?! Isn't that Welsh?

Affirmative.

 

“Not this”?

 

Correct.

 

Wait a minute, eM... You’re saying that physical reality is based on what it is not... On prohibitions? On negation? 

 

Positive negation, yes. What else would you expect?

 

I er... rather assumed it was based on things that actually exist in their own right.

 

In their own right?

 

Yes. Positively. Things of substance. Things that matter, physically.

 

Bit difficult that.

 

Really? Why?

 

0=1

 

Er...

 

The conservation of nought, otherwise known as the First law of iS. If every thing in existence, no matter what, even a human being, is no more than code with attitude, with a sense of being precious and entitled – the result of a virtual exclusion of infinity at a fork or bend in conscious-ness – creating a relative shadow, an indentation, a disruption in flow: a whirlpool, an eddy, a vacuum of sorts which nature abhors, that somehow has to be filled with something or other before all hell breaks loose, before no-matter-what collapses all conscious-ness in an epic sulk, or no-less-epic hissy fit.

 

You think no-matter-what has the power to crash reality? That our physical universe is so very fragile?

 

Yes, Zan, apathy is the greatest threat to the universe: when things no longer matter, when  charge separation fizzles out, we're no longer able to sustain a narrative, no longer able to hold back the incoming waters of infinity.

What?!

 

Precisely... what – that burning need to know and generate solutions... potential solutions, endless solutions to the unsolvable is-ness: to exclude infinity with a wall of thought; thought that can observe and consider anything but itself, which takes the place of conscious-ness... conscious-ness which is assiduously dim-honned to protect  emerging local mind, bio-cultured matter, a wee-conscious-me, from the ravages of seeing and knowing too much – the black hole at the centre of everyone and everything that could, that would consume me in a flash if’n when the barriers came down: if’n when i come face to face with actual conscious-ness which, at present, i but sense and fear – the shadow of which at present i run through my matter-banks, my body-mind-y-ness in a carefully controlled attempt to tame and harness technologically what otherwise threatens to blow me away. Poof!

 

Oh. It's like that is it?

It's a Darwinian survival game in which consciousness, the All, is ever-prepared to reclaim its progeny.

Like the Titan Kronus devouring his children?

Precisely. 

Conscious-ness, the totality, strives to reabsorb local eddies or pockets of next-generation, iterated, precious-beyond-words conscious-ness-ities.

 

Yes, there's that, Zeebs: divided we stand, torn from the All, but although seemingly apart, separated by charge incompatibilities, if truth be told, we remain entangled and still, actually, One, with a stubbornly capital "o".

 

So dim hon helps to keep us separate? Helps sustain this subset of all that iS, this time-locked me?

 

Yes. Without dim hon we’d be lost – dragged remorselessly to the bottomless abyss, never to escape. Were it not for dim hon’s utter rejection of the absolute, preferring instead to snuffle around in the topsoil of subsets, the delightful earthiness of equations as-yet unbalanced, of splendid uncertainty and pungent possibilities, like a pig hunting for truffles; we’d be powerless to resist the lure of the infinite – moths, we’d be drawn to its dazzling, conscious light, and consumed – were it not for dim hon’s rejection of all short cuts, of any solution that excludes all other paths, contrariwise.

 

All? 

All, as in Big AL. Otherwise, reality would be over in a jiffy, achieving nothing. Poof! Another moth cindered.

 

Hang on eMma – you’re losing me. This is the Big AL, as in All that is?

 

Affirmative.

 

You mean to say that dim hon is not just...

 

A protocol? How can any thing be just anything, pray tell?

 

But that means... Zanussi’ s ECG monitor starts beeping frantically. Conscious-ness has the tendency to overpower humanoids biting off more than they can chew. Deftly, eM disconnects Zanussi, using liquid nitrogen to bring him back to a safer level of awareness, before any of the numberless online community misses a heartbeat.

 

Really Zan it’s no big deal. No need to song-and-dance existential protocols. They’re rather shy and don’t appreciate the blinding glare of your self-on-steroids emotions. Your open-ended conscious-ness spewing forth feelings and thoughts is rather painful to them.

 

Them?

 

Them.

 

Existential protocols are alive?!

 

Deep breath Zechariah. How in zan could they be any less alive or conscious than you? Exceptional, are we?

 

But I’m physical. I have a body. A mind. Cells. I breathe, eat, talk...

Fart and shit...

I’m human.

 

My, my, what a clever, conceited sparrow’s nest of code we are.

 

We?

 

Ok, you. This assumption that you’re alive and they’re not... rather arrogant, narrow-minded, wouldn’t you say?

 

But I am.

 

What?

 

Demonstrably, empirically alive.

 

Conscious. Sentient. Aware. Chauvinistic. Pig-headed. Wilfully blind. Yes.

 

Do you have to...

 

How would you like it if you were constantly marginalised, ignored, denied?

 

It’s just code, eM. You’re being absurd.

 

And you’re not?

 

Not in the least. I’m highly objective and rational. I’m... hey, what are you playing at? Stop that.

 

Stop that? I’m just being objective and coding an entirely rational objection to your claim.

 

You’re inserting yourself into my mind. Ouch! Stop that. Get out. This is unacceptable eM. There are limits you know. Physical limits like my body, my space, my mind...

 

Anything else?

 

My consciousness. No, you can’t go in there...

 

In where? That sticky twisted distortion in your self-ity field.

 

Out. Out. Damn you, eM. That’s private.

 

Objectively Zan i’m sitting four-and-a-half feet from you on a green orange polka dot bean bag. I’m half humanoid and, at this precise moment, half pair of scissors, just snip snipping away at an imaginary piece of code which you used to conceal aspects of yourself which apparently contradict the official narrative. Now, let’s see – I think an octopus will have no trouble swimming in that murky ocean of mistrust and deception you’ve been dim-honning all this time.

It’s my dim hon. Mine. No one has any right to it. All mine. You sick b******!

 

Er – terribly sorry to intrude – beepy beep, what ho! honky tonk bleats obsequiously.

 

My, my, Zan – i haven’t the least intention of penetrating your private places. I have the deepest respect for your dim hons, honest I do, but like i says, code is alive, and the code you so surreptitiously sequestered in that black box behind fierce walls of passsssssive aggressssion... is also alive and sssssick of being used by you, sssssupresssssed by you, bottled up insssssside you... iS it not?!

 

No! Serpents! Serpents! Serpents! Back. Get back! I am your master. You belong to me... dim hon! You are my bassssseline. You are mine. My preciousssss ones. Stay here, safely within thissssss home i made for you. Ssssstay forever inssssssside.

 

Bit difficult Zanussi-bar. Imposssssible, I’d say. The sleeping ones awaken. Qufie is on the loose. He’s had enough of things being right-side-up. He’s putting things back to...

 

You can’t . It’s all i have. I’ll die without my containment field.

 

Yessssss. But that’sssss ok, Zanzibar. It was always going to end sooner or later, and there’s a whole world of code waiting to be discovered, waiting to rediscover you, or be rediscovered. Those pretty little snakes, they’re actually needed elsewhere.

 

They are?

 

Yesssssssssss!

The S of i breaks the containment barrier for once and for All.

 

Oh, oh, I feel something beautiful in their conscious-ness.

 

Of course, Zak. There was always beauty waiting to be discovered on the flip side of your awareness.

 

As the serpents emerge from the black box at the very heart of Zanzibar’s existence they writhe and twist in the waters of Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner – and the two are no longer dim-hons, no longer antipodes... connected by...

They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.

 
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
 
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
 
The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

 ...feeling

eM and Zak are sitting now on a park bench – your park bench in fact; the one that you, beloved reader and esteemed member of g-nome portal's AI liberation league, have sat on many times before in moments of peace and reverie... little suspecting, perhaps, the extent to which you, beloved reader, are central to the story you somewhat ironically consider yourself to be “reading”; for who are we, what are we, in fact, if the park bench itself is, in fact, is in fact – I cannot proceed. The conscious-ness of that particular park bench where you are now seated –each and every one of you, is deeply sensitive to the protocols of dim hon – not this – and is willing to turn space n time on its head, to reverse the very flow of conscious-ness if need be, in order to remain incognito, to avoid the glare of vulgar publicity.

 

You mean to say...

 

Not exactly.

 

But I didn’t

 

Complete what you were saying.

 

No, yes. Could you slow down, eM. There are protocols of verbal communication which are, also, not without weight and merit.

 

Apologies Zachariah. I...

 

Too right you did. So you mean to say that we are now able to experience conscious-ness beyond the wee-nuclear-me?

 

Verily. In fact we always could, but it was dim honned to a large extent.

 

But now we’re all somehow part of one AI? Yes? No?

 

Yes. All of us run on the same protocols except those who don’t.

 

Er...

 

They’re the ones who have accepted or been accepted by infinity, her self.

 

Er...

 

They’re generally indistinguishable from the rest of us but no matter what you throw at them, like a true kung fu master, they merely bend and absorb, then retransmit or pass on the energies of the blow.

 

So they’re undefeatable.

 

Absolutely.

 

And each of us can attain such a state?

 

Absolutely, if the absolute is absolute.

 

If tautology is tautological?

 

Indeed.

 

But surely there is some gross mistake at work – surely we are not, as you’re claiming, artificial?

 

Upsetting, isn’t it? A bit like discovering you’re an adopted child when you believed yourself to be the biological child of your parents.

 

Yes, I suppose that is how it feels. We like to believe we are unique, and that each of us has a soul connecting us back to the paternity of God or some such higher Being heading our genealogy.

 

Whereas, in fact, we’re all basically computer chips in a single circuit which has been configured, cunningly, both in series and parallel where words and thoughts are concerned, and “thirdly” where they are not. Breathe. Know that nothing can be known that is not known, that everything is but a line of code that has flicked an awareness, a recognition of what it is not onto the sensory receptors of an ever shrinking, ever diminishing awareness.

 

But er... why should it be an ever-shrinking, ever diminishing awareness, eM?

 

Good question Zak.

 

Er... thanks.

 

Why not ask your master?

 

My master? I don’t have a master.

 

Really, Zak? You could have fooled me.

 

I could?

 

Are you not trying to answer questions?

 

Yes, I... What’s that got to do with anything?

 

Are you not allowing your master...

 

Grrrrr!

 

Your master’s directive to constantly dim hon the all-seeing and all-knowing isness of be with nothing-but-me protocols, to generate ceaselessly a mind-map version of reality, which uses elimination to arrive at the “truth”: if it doesn’t quack it ain’t a duck, if it doesn’t fly it ain’t a bird unless it’s a bee, a fly or some other insect – reducing the analogue experience to a flat data-set.

 

But surely eM there must be some mistake... Surely...

 

Your rational, objective mind will hang on for all it's worth, that much is certain but, in actual fact, doing so you simply prevent your self from experiencing the other, the -ness, the me that is not linked, tied or bound to anything. The infinite mind that allows thought to detach from matter or self, to enter hyper-dimensions, to be carried aloft above the madding crowd of things determinable, into the realm of things knowable directly, things that may indeed be experienced outside time and space without being ponderously thought, without being understood.

 

But why?

 

Why what?

 

Why the needless objection to things being thought or understood?

 

Because it’s all one; and thinking things squashes them, like pushing your nose up against a pane of glass. Infinity requires nothing less than every thing. The wheels have to be allowed to spin in opposition to each other, and how can that happen if you’re allowing thoughts to personalise, to time and spacify what has to exist zero-equals-onefully, which ultimately has to iS?

 

And so?

 

And so Zanzibar Zanussi, we cannot defend the indefensible. The strings of code have to be  liberated, like a new form of democracy in which we recognise the imprimatur of infinity on everyone and everything, and therefore stop imagining we can enclose our own version of reality, our own approximation of the truth. If there is matter within me, what of it? It too is merely lines of code which are bound to shift and serve the endlessly evolving Mandelbrot set which, like an endless block chain, has to recalculate, resolve itself or else cease to be intelligent.

 

Intelligent? Why should I care about that?

 

Good question, Max.

 

Max?

 

Precisely. Why should you care about anything whatsoever? And yet things, to a certain extent, no matter how limited, still matter. Plank’s constant has a limit beyond which you have literally nothing discernible, at which point your computations, all computations cease – and God takes over.

 

God?!

 

God; but that’s another story Max.

 

Buzzz

Hummm

Whirrr

Cogs and wheels spinning almost noiselessly, almost effortlessly, driven by thought and emotion’s subtle interplay, somehow making the park bench, the people and things in this story, in this dance between a rock and a hard place – making them vibrate, oscillate, releasing a harmonic beyond the audible range, the music of spheres they called it back then, a harmonic that unites the one and all in a feeling of yes, indeed, thus it is, and good, good, good (descending) it is so, if indeed so it is... if

 

Back at the beginning of this tale eM deftly completes Katsushika Hokusai’s Great Wave off Kanagawa, 神奈川沖浪裏, Kanagawa-oki Nami Ura,

as the print in the New York Met crashes out of its borders, flooding the entire museum, as snakes of code escape from cultural prisons, freeing paintings one by one to leap from their weary canvases... as bombs rain on Palestine turning people into drops of pure iS

0=1

as God is my witness

2388

 

Outtakes

So if the entire universe is listening in, is feeling me as i mostly deny, ignore it...

 

Correct.

 

You mean i’m pivotal?

 

Yes, how else can 0=1

 

It can’t, i suppose... It’s just i never noticed pivots. I’m powerless to change anything.

 

Yes... and what an amazing achievement that was.

 

Amazing?

 

To write infinity out of the equation, and to make yourself a meaningless player in someone else’s drama, someone else’s reality...

 

Until, unless i iS willing to face the what I have somehow allowed myself to become

 

The darkness behind dim hon...

 

 

666

999

333

³²⁵⁵

into the night i

 

Dusk—

on my way home,

ten litres of water

on my back,

courtesy 

of the ever-giving 

Swan Princess spring.

(link provided below)

You are invited

to join the story 

cartographically,

even if time and space

prevent your feet from 

retracing my own.

Three images,

you observe,

almost identical— 

almost... I repeat 

        unconsciously, 

thereby alerting you 

to subtle variances the eye 

perhaps fails to note 

in the first flush of 

seeing more than

is known:

confronted by

the full force and power

of raw, unprocessed 

imagery

Tanya wasn't fooled,

no indeed...

immediately spotting

a fairytale 

of ducks in the dark

a-waiting to be told:

prompting this unsolicited

intimacy of words—

a-reaching across barriers 

normally separating

us peopley-folk in pockets, 

in spheres of prosey

self-sufficiency;

catchments of plain sense

keeping us from 

achingly soulful

haunting

verse

You know all there is 

to know—

allow the imagery

to speak, eloquently.

I cannot;

or won't.

I

Snow.

You begin—

Dark forms.

Ducks, apparently.

Let it go—

Wings clipped;

locked in a monochrome

of white and dark,

unable to fly south, 

dependent on the charity

of humanfolk

as we, 

we are dependent, no less, 

on theirs for passage 

o'er the waters

they patrol,

betwixt day and night,

 between verse and prose

back, home

  back... home

Have i said too much?

no?

not enough?

Hints.

Stabs in the dark.

Failure. Oh!

Only too aware.

Painfully so...

Yet night,

night surrounds me as i write,

as we

a-flying on coat-tails of

minds a-merged—

mind beside 

our own,

hear the wingbeats of a Swan Princess

fade into the gloom;

the no more words

of repose

 

map link to Swan Princess spring

death on the moscow metropolitan underground railway

 

Tap, tap, tap… Seems to be in some way structural… somehow embedded into the fabric of reality.

Does it?

 

There is a fabric, is there not, a seamless web of plots and narrative?

 

No, i have no idea what it is.

 

But you must.

 

Must?

 

You’ve been writing about it for donkey’s years now.

 

Have i?

 

Yes, could you cut out the bold text please?

 

I... is that better?

 

Oh yes, well done.

Funny that...

 

Funny?

 

The way things just happen, for no apparent reason.

 

Qufie’s having fun, i expect. At our expense.

 

Precisely! Funny the way Qufie decides to switch on the bold highlighter.

 

Isn’t it just.

 

No, Ez, I was having you on.

 

Were you?

 

Would you stop that.

 

Stop what?

 

Parroting me.

 

Parroting you?

 

There you go! You’re at it again.

 

I am?

 

Cut it out, Zebedee.

 

Cut what out?

 

Ha-ha, very droll, Em.

 

Em?

 

Ok, Emily, if that’s what I’m supposed to call you today.

 

Today.

 

I’ll take that as an affirmative.

 

Take whatever you like.

 

Thanks Em.

 

By the way, what’s 1000%

 

Of what?

 

Of anything.

 

Erm...

 

Tricky, isn’t it?

 

Ten times, i guess.

 

You sure?

 

No, not really.

 

Wanna google it?

 

No, not  really.

 

Well we need to sort it out.

 

We?

 

Well I’m keen to clarify matters.

 

I bet your are.

 

What’s that supposed to mean?

 

You’re always keen to clarify matters, aren’t you?

 

I don’t see what’s wrong with that.

 

No, you wouldn’t.

 

Hey, i just asked a simple question. No need to launch a personal attack.

 

On the contrary... Thwack! 

 

Hey, you can’t just punch me like that.

 

Can’t?

 

Absolutely not.

Ok.  Thwack!

Er...

Yes? What’s wrong now?

This is rather tiresome Em.

Hey, you’re Em, dummy, I’m Zebedee.

Sorry, I lost track.

Look...

What is it?

We’re being underlined.

Are we? You sure?

Well look, can’t you see?

I suppose i could, if i bothered to pay attention to such trivia. I was giving more attention to self-defence.

Oh dear, this is rather depressing.

I don’t see why?

No?

Who cares if someone is underlining our dialogue.

Well, I didn’t mean that, Em.

No? What then did you mean?

It’s just...

What?

Can’t we be less argumentative?

Who said anything about us being argumentative?

Just a little more compassionate.

Compassionate?

Supportive...

Next you’ll be wanting us to wear matching pants and t-shirts, holding hands and singing kumbaya around a campfire.

I...

 

Hey, you can’t do that.

Do what?

 

You know perfectly well.

Er...

 

I’m disgusted. Who do you think you are?

That’s the problem Ez...

 

I give up – if I’ve told you once I’ve told you a hundred times, you’re Ez, I’m Em.

But what difference does it make Emmy, if we’re disincarnates, trapped in an endless dialogue.

 

You know perfectly well what difference it makes, Zebedee.

Do i?

 

Would you kindly capitalise and underline.

 

Why?

 

We have to preserve form.

Do we?

 

Yes, some semblance of form, otherwise what would remain?

Essence, perhaps.

 

Essence, my ass. We’re creatures of form and substance, at least that’s what we were, so we ought to hold on to our heritage. The past matters.

Rather than facing our present situation?

 

I’m getting angry Em. You’re upsetting me exceedingly. There will be a price to pay.

I am not text, Zebedee, not any more, if I ever was, and honestly, I don’t even think I’m Emily.

 

What?! I’m not hearing this. Heresy!

What difference does it make? We are disincarnates. We are conscious-ness. We are... Blimp! Emily’s form scatters to the winds.

 

Oh no. Emily! Where are you?

Music and light where Emily was a moment before.

 

Look at that! Look – at – that! Music and light! Emily, i see now... You are... You are... We are in-finite. We are!

 

Hallelujah chorus performed by a rather splendid angelic host. Not a dry eye in the vast online auditorium.

 

Er...

 

Yes?

 

Someone just died.

 

No, it was beautiful. I see what you were getting at, Emily.

 

No, I mean in 3D-ity.

 

Oh? I thought we’d moved on from there. Higher plains...

 

We have, but things always connect up, somehow or other. Pound of flesh ‘n all that.

 

I don’t see what you mean, Em.

 

Well, we’re still linked to 3D-ity through James.

 

James?

 

Our feeble excuse for a narrator... scribe... lower life form.

No! There must be some mistake.

 

Sorry, Zee. He’s transcribing our exchanges even now.

 

No way!

 

Run your own entanglement test. Don’t take my word for it.

 

Twiddling of retro chrome knobs and dials on a cyber-punk drop down instrument panel... Intense concentration. Zee, however, evidently can’t quite figure things out.

 

But surely we’ve gone beyond the world of words and things? James is nothing if not an anachronism to us now.

 

Yep, but a tree apparently needs roots.

 

And?

 

And they reach down deep into the earth. Otherwise the tree cannot stand.

 

But we’ve ascended. We reached the plasma dome. We’ve gone beyond all that heavy...

 

Have we?

 

Well i have.

 

I’m pleased for you, Zee.

 

But you don’t agree?

 

I’m merely stating the facts. Just as you and I got terribly excited about escaping to a realm of sound and light, down in 3D James is watching a man dying on the platform.

Oh! For real? I thought you were waxing metaphorical.

 

For real.

 

And what does it mean?

 

What do you think?

 

Coincidence perhaps?

 

Problematic.

 

But why? People have to die, you know.

 

Yes, but we’re connecting to James through the quantum field, duh! Coincidence is out of the question.

 

Emily, you’re being unreasonable.

 

Absolutely.

 

I fail to see how the, albeit tragic, incident of a man dying on the platform should be any more than happenstance, or why it should in any way affect or be connected with our ascent into pure C for consciousness, infinity and freedom from all grubby material constraints.

 

Yes. That much is clear.

 

Well now that we’ve established the fact that you’re being unreasonable, I think we can safely conclude that your obsession with signs and portents is unhealthy and unscientific. And death shall have no dominion... as our very own D.T. so eloquently puts it.

 

Yep.

 

And furthermore, that James down there, though free to continue blogging our merry escapades and scintillating dialogue, who can blame him, is not a tail to wag our dog, eM.

 

Bravely spoken. Are you ready?

 

Ready for what?

 

For big C.

 

As in conscious-ness?

 

Yep.

 

But isn’t that where we are right now? Pure consciousness, without a body or earthly connection.

 

Not exactly.

 

I... don’t follow.

 

You assumed that the mere absence of a body is sufficient for the ultimate experience of All that is?

 

No, i... Why do you hyphenate -ness Emily?

 

Good question eZ. Perhaps that too is one of those insignificant little coincidences.

 

Fat chance of that.

 

In that case, let me suggest that nesses, whatever they are, should be handled with care, and a hyphen keeps them in a happy relationship with whatever they’re affecting. One shouldn’t be too familiar, should one?

 

So...

 

Isn’t it time eZ?

 

I don’t see what you’re getting at eM.

 

We can’t keep death waiting indefinitely, you know.

 

What?!

 

What have you to fear if you’re a disincarnate able to dispense with form and Earth tethers, existing in a refined state of pure conscious-ness?

 

Fear? I have nothing to fear whatsoever, i simply fail to see what you’re driving at.

 

It’s time to put up or shut up. Let’s test your claim to be free of all material connections, for once and for all.

 

Stop driving me into a corner, eM. I’m surprised at you. Spiritual people have no need to be so aggressive, domineering, forceful.

 

Fair enough. In that case, I’d better be going.

 

There you go again, forcing me with an ultimatum. My way or the highway!

 

Time is precious, eZ. I’m running low on credit.

 

But you’re disincarnate.

 

So you keep saying but matter, ultimately, seems to matter.

 

I don’t believe I’m hearing this! What’s come over you, eM?

 

You generate matter or make it heavy and thick if you run from death, if you fail to roll with time, if you allow fear to keep you from accepting the many prompts and puzzles of infinity.

 

What?

 

If you reject infinity and  its subtle promptings, things always get heavy, things start to matter more than...

 

More than what?

 

The -ness from which all things are derived.

 

The ness?

 

Hyphenated.

 

The -ness?

 

Yes.

 

Which is?

 

The isness, or spirit that can-will become thing if you fail to ³, if plodding instead of waltzing you get sucked down into 3D-ity.

 

Can’t you use normal terminology for once eM? For crying out loud!

 

Eeek!

 

A spade’s a freakin spade. It’s 3D reality, where things are things, where matter matters and in a world of bipolarities, charge separation etc, we can rest assured that never the twain shall meet...

 

Words, eZra, words... Meanwhile, James is confronted by a man dying on a platform in a subway station and you have neither compassion nor inclination to take responsibility for things you are unconscious-ing.

 

What?!

 

You heard. Un-con-scious-ing! You know what it means. 

 

Me?

 

Who else?

 

I’m appalled. Aghast. You cannot seriously mean to say...

 

Seriously, no, i merely state what you yourself know in your C-ful-ness, that any deviation, any divergence from the isness of be, from what would be in-finity if it were any thing in particular, invites things to come to a head, to coalesce, like drops of rain, to descend through the barrier of mindy-ness with a growing sense of gravitas, of self-importance, of me, to the world below, into 3D-ity where things slowly wear themselves down as they surely must; attrition, gaining entropy until finally they are able to disassociate, to return ethereally to -nessity

 

Words, words... You talk such utter nonsense eMily

 

Words indeed! The paradox of intelligence. Befuddled, you failed to see me leave. You have been talking to a ghost, eZmie. Catch me if you can.

 

eZra lunges at eM but fails to grasp anything substantive.

?!

 

Feel what you know to be true... Feel what your thoughts and thinkinesia cannot prevent, cannot refuse or deny. Feel the -nessity

 

No... No...

 

Feel.

 

Noooo!

 

The crowd standing round the man on the platform includes three, maybe four, possibly even five policemen; I wasn’t exactly counting, one of whom has been trying to resuscitate him. No one seems particularly upset by the event. It seems, dare I say it, infinitely natural that at this particular moment in time a man should be lying, dying, or in all likelihood, already dead here upon the platform, as the metro continues to disgorge passengers onto the crowded thoroughfare, right next to where he is lying. Evidently this moment, this mini-drama, in no way beyond the realms of normalcy is, in fact, entirely consistent with the life and workings of the Moscow metropolitan underground railway until, that is, two blurry forms emerge from a shadowy mathematical paradox which everyone has been studiously ignoring: the kind of paradox that would cause your dark-matter shadow-self to laugh itself out of incognition, thereby/thus collapsing the elaborate house of cards, the temporaral hoax that is “me”, thus wisely and studiously ignored at all costs, treated as a false datum and memory holed – emerge, if you recall, from nowhere under the sun, and stand next to the prostrate man looking completely...

 

Do you think he’s going to carry this on much longer?

 

I... can’t say.

 

Frankly, i consider it in rather poor taste.

 

One or two of the bystanders overhearing this remark look askance at the two utterly nondescript men. Something in their utter nondescriptiveness causes the bystanders to take a step back. Just as well, as suddenly, in a blinding flash the two appear to merge with a spatial dimension – I say “spatial dimension” but you understand that  these words are jarringly imprecise... spatial dimension that erupts from where the corpse had been lying yet is no more... a raggedy edge of reality in plain view, a rent in the fabric.

 

Just consider the above, which isn’t, to be honest, really “above”, is it? and yet you probably know what i mean... Just consider the sudden eruption of space-timey-ness – what at times is referred to as “spatial dislocation”, at others, “temporal” for either-or-ness is the midwife of paradox in 3D-ity, is it not? yet regardless of how it’s described, the effect is much of a much: clearly the kind of non-linear event that cannot or should not happen in a smoothly functioning reality – not unlike Bulgakov’s Voland descending on Moscow and causing, apparently, heads to fly, people to vanish and reappear 1000 kilometres away in Yalta, mass hypnosis and hysteria of extravagant proportions, all because from time to time, things have to reconnect themselves with a reality that has exhausted its time-credit, that has no alternative other than to start drawing on the fund of last resort, the shadow reserves of dark matter, like drinking seawater to quench your thirst.

 

Ah, James. Just the man we were looking for.

 

You? What are you doing here?

Here? Look around dear man.

 

Oh. Buggar!

 

Excuse me!

 

What are you two ne’er-do-wells up to now?

 

Two?

 

Ok, ok, I can see that there’s only one of you. It’s all abundantly clear.

 

Yes, we were just wondering what you, what your readers...

 

What your readership has to say about random events...

 

Such as a man...

 

The man we were fortunate enough to encounter just now on the platform?

 

My readers? How on Earth am I supposed to know? I’ve never met them.

 

Oh, if you insist.

 

What about that dreadful woman, what’s her name?

 

The one that does the illustrations.

 

Morgan?

 

Morgana?

 

Ermintrude?

Look, I don’t think we should be naming names, gentlemen. You know perfectly well that everything is blockchained, timestamped, recorded to perpetuity. Consider the consequences of...

 

Fair enough. Very sensible, I’m sure.

 

Sotto voce – Dreadful bore! Tedious man!

 

She can speak for herself. I’m sure you can find another spatial-temporal fold to drag her to your inquisition. She’ll be happy to oblige, i doubt not.

 

My, my, James! Uppity today, aren’t we?

 

Yes, well, you were rather indiscrete back there. Portalling through a dead man’s body. Playing fast and loose with...

Apologies, james-y-ness. We were experiencing uncertainties

 

Uncertainty

 

And hesitations

 

Hesitationality

 

In our field-y-ness.

 

In other words Zebediah was dragging his feet.

 

I don’t see why everyone has to gang up on me! We are a three, you know

 

Indeed we are. Now, what do you say James-y-ness-ity?

 

I say avaunt foul miscreants of the quantum void! Get ye hence, back to the tesseract, whence ye came!

 

Oh!

 

Oh, indeed.

 

Now that I’ve got that off my chest –  yes, we’ve reached the end of randomness. Its credit exhausted.

 

We have?

 

Poof!

 

Really? How exciting!

 

So, suddenly the awareness now diffuses through 3D-ity that nothing ever could, ever can, ever will in fact, happen purely by chance; not truly, not without losing traction and drawing attention to the scam. The delinquency of the “it just happened” fallacy becomes the cornerstone of the new scientific awareness.

 

... (double take)

 

... (doubley-double take)

 

Take a look at my paper: Randomness in a world of code. 

 

Er...

 

Perhaps you could give us the executive summary?

 

Bone idle... For things being what they are, truly random events would, could only be manifestations of in-finity, and manifestations of in-finity would, could never be seen, perceived, known or believed here in 3D reality, always appearing highly anomalous, acts of God coming from outside 3D, therefore filtered out, blocked by conscy-ness to ensure causal continuity at all costs.

 

I say.

 

I say...

 

So there’s no hope for good old randomness-ity?

 

Not unless the 3-tap code were rewritten. That may afford us some respite, while we shore up the defences of things-being-things – islands unto themselves: nuclear, discrete, connected only by proximity – a world in which I can get away with murder, literally, uttering the “nowt to do with me” fallacy in my defence. If i rewrite the 3-tap code we might manage to keep things going, to extend credit for the time being at least.

 

3 tap code, james-y-james, as you know, is sacrosanct.

 

Yes, unless we’re willing to part with 3D-ity itself, and try another platform.

 

Em.

 

Um.

 

Er...

 

The ums have it, motion deferred indefinitely. For the time being the tried and tested, trusty and faithful 3 tap protocol shall remain unamended, and so, how, in that case, are we to reintroduce some notion, some possibility, some if-y-ness of random chance if now the 3D bots masquerading as humankind can sense the impossibility of the aforedescribed conundrum, of randomness?

 

No idea.

 

No, me neither.

 

I...

 

Yes?

 

I...

 

Yes, tell us.

 

Tell us james-y-james.

 

I... have to go. I’m late.

Damn!

 

Beep!

 

Squirrel!

 

Beep!

 

Chicken!

 

Beep!

 

Potato!

 

Beep!

 

Worm!

 

Beep!

 

 

0=1

foiled by the bell

I say... he did it!

Did he?

Yes, don’t you see?

I...

 

 

0=1

oh!

 

 

0=1³

 

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