back to beetling

not God

Huh?

not God

I thought that's what you said. No idea what you're talking about Merry.

not God

Third time lucky -- am I supposed to get it now?

not thing

Here we go again.

not thing

If I keep quiet and say nothing I wonder if he'll say it a third time?

not thing

Predictable or what?

Merry vanishes the moment Zie utters the word "predictable". In his place a small, brightly coloured beetle appears to be doing some kind of a dance. The idea that Merry and the beetle are somehow connected does not, in fact, suggest itself to Zie, who is too shocked at Merry's disappearance to give more than a cursory glance to the beetle. You, the reader, on the other hand, immediately see things differently, immediately suspect that Merry and the beetle are in fact one and the same, not because you are more intelligent than Zie, but because you are at a distance -- and things are very often clearer at a distance, are they not?

What usually happens is that we forget things that are deeply disturbing, or simply fail to see them. Imagine, for example, that I turned into a beetle...

A beetle? What's the point trying to imagine something as ridiculous as that, Merry?

Oh just for fun. Abstract. Isn't that what separates us from animals -- our ability to think about abstract things rather than simply focusing on the bone, the banana or the crocodile?

Er... I suppose so, but there are plenty of interesting abstract things to consider infinitely more rewarding than imagining you turning into a beetle.

True, but we're in fact investigating the flexibility of our mind, and the extent to which it's able to move in any direction without prejudice. Think of this as a kind of meditation...

Oh... in which case the very absurdity of the task...

will give the greatest result. Precisely.

Ok -- I'm game.

But you might encounter some resistance.

Resistance -- I can't imagine why? That would imply there were some underlying fear, some kind of association too shocking to contemplate.

Yes, such as the fear that reality could all too easily slip into a dreamlike state of non-sense and ab-surdity ad infinitum.

Do you think so?

No, of course not, but irrational fears do tend to unexpectedly poke their heads up through the leaf mould of life. There's no denying the fact.

Well, I for one have no such doubts. I'm not the nervous type. I... 

Zie pauses mid sentence as he senses something inside revolting, refusing to be denied.

I...  not feeling good. I think I need to lie down.

What is it Zie? What's wrong?

Er... nothing -- I just had a turn.

A turn? What kind of turn?

A... I don't know -- it was so -- 

Strange?

Yes.

A strange turn.

Yes. It was weird. Like suddenly everything was moving.

Like this you mean?

Merry suddenly reverts back to the beetle form -- or disappears to be replaced by a beetle, if you prefer. This time Zie's ready to not block it. This is going to sound kind of weird, so bear with me, if you would. Obviously, as a reader safely removed from these events by a cosy narrator and containable, controllable medium of words on paper or screen -- it's easy enough for you to remain detached, to nod your head knowingly, indulgently, somewhat complacently in fact, as if you know only too well that such things can and do happen at the wild and wobbly margin of reality given the right planetary alignments and weather conditions, but Zie right now has no buffer zone, no comfortable degree of separation, no means of containing what he's just witnessed. It, like a virulent contagion, is dominoing its way through his conscious-awareness, ricocheting off the sides of his many biased and pre-conceived beliefs, ideas, thoughts and narratives -- none of which are particularly well integrated or correlated -- which causes further tremors and wobbling in the internal architecture -- throughout the plate tectonics of Zie's conscious awareness. 

Suddenly, for the first time in his life, Zie realises his entire what-is-what edifice, his house of chaos prevention, chaos exclusion, chaos elimination is paralyzingly ill-conceived and feebly founded. He has no defence against the beetle now that the first defence has fallen -- none whatsoever. The beetle may as well be his slayer, his ghastly death conjuror, his judge, nemesis and book-of-life auditor all rolled in one -- for the tenuous line separating fact from fiction, real from unreal, life from limbo has been irrefutably crossed. Zie lacks the tactics, the detachment, the wherewithal, the wit to step back and re-contain, re-define or relativise this tiny, yet fatal dose of in-finity.

Like I said -- Zie finds himself strangely disconnected -- I'm willing to give it a try, after all, what have I got to lose.

Absolutely. That's the spirit, Zie. It's only a beetle, after all.

Exactly. I've fried bigger fish. I've coped with 24 mile tail backs on the M25. There's no way I'm going to be affected by something as small and insignificant as a beetle.

Precisely. But don't forget to make the bzzzz beetle sound and dance around, flapping your wings if you see anything strange -- just for the sake of the experiment mind you, not because you actually need to.

Oh, the experiment -- yeah, why not. I don't mind. It's kind of fun to test the mind's resistance, in fact. Just because it feels childish and absurd -- there's no reason why I should let those feelings get the better of me. Otherwise I'd not be the one in control, would I?

No, I guess not.

Something in my mind would be able to hold me in a narrow band of normalcy -- in order to limit my life experiences, in order to eliminate the true, wild abstract, in order to keep me from the ultimate expression of my humanity -- my ability to experiment and study not only things, but how I'm reacting to things, even abstract no-things.

That's it -- I guess you've figured it out Zie -- you've cracked the code, now what's that...

Merry again collapses back down into the beetle -- dragging Zie with him -- for the attention seems to be hooked by such dramatic leaps from one state into another.

Without giving it a moment's thought -- instead of hyperventilating Zie seems to know exactly what to do. Simultaneously he starts making the loudest buzzing sound you've ever heard -- which amazingly, happens to be utterly convincing, while at the same time flapping his imaginary wings and flying round in a hypnotically beetle-like manner.

So intent is Zie on his beetling -- so desperate is he to assuage the panic, the insanity, the in-finity threatening to overwhelm him, that he crosses the critical threshold of beetleyness -- something like a mini sonic boom, and the reader nonchalantly notices another beetle flying alongside Merry -- evidently Zie -- which presumably indicates Zie has now shifted through beetle into an other dimension or world.

For a moment I felt kind of...

But before Zie could finish what he was saying -- a huge flashback compels him to do the beetle sounds again for all he's worth -- to flap his imaginary wings and run around the room. Evidently he's experiencing another panic attack. The reader of course knows why he's doing this -- there's evidently reason to his madness -- but Terence who just walked in, hoping to pick up a few grams of magic mushrooms from his flatmate -- hasn't a clue. He's watching bemused, a little concerned, in fact, until Zie suddenly, catastrophically-unexpectedly pops the dimensional membrane, vanishing in a puff of beetleyness.

Awesome dude! How the hell did you do that? – Terence inquires, looking in wonder and admiration at the spotted greeny-blue beetle that is now calmly flying across to the far corner of the room, where Merry is waiting under a pile of unwashed linen.

How come Terence doesn't flip out the way I did, Merry? -- Zie inquires.

Use your beetle vision Zie. Observe Terence's spindles.

His what?

There's a kind of sighful, yawnish being patient moment while Merry sinks into mental stasis -- allowing Zie to do a bit of go-figure-for-yourselfing, which happens remarkably quickly given the fact that beetles live short lives and have to get their thinking done between blinks -- but all things being relative -- it's still an hour or two in beetle terms.

Oh those! Strange -- I never noticed them before.

Such is the nature of strangeness, Zie -- a kind of protective membrane which keeps us from seeing what is what until it fish-tail slaps us in the face, cold, wet and stingingly.

Ouch. 

While Zie and Merry converse, in the minute or so that has passed Terence is unsuspectingly feeling with his spindles, allowing them to guide him, to align and draw him into whatever dream state is necessary in order to transition the veil between worlds, to join Zie if that's humanly possible -- and strangely enough -- something tells Terence it is. Let's stand back detachedly, dear reader, and observe.

So my beetle eyes see things completely differently. It's mindboggling!

If you say so.

Ok -- it's weird.

Absolutely -- the question being whether you’re the type who embraces and welcomes wyrd, or fears and detests it.

Oh... hey, wait a sec... what's he doing? His spindles are all over the place. They're even grabbing hold of me. Aaargh... help.

Calm yourself Zie. Do the snake slither if you can't handle the situation and need to pop another membrane.

The what?

You heard me.

And will I turn into a snake?

Not in this dimension.

That's not answering the question.

Well, obviously if you pop into a dimension in which you can perceive reality as a snake and move your spindles accordingly -- then yes, you might as well say you'll turn into one -- but that's hardly a categorical, definitive or emphatic yes, is it?

Er... ow! that hurt.

Terence felt some kind of spindly connection with the beetle slithering around on the floor down there by the pile of unwashed shirts, and the next thing he knew -- it was like he was off on a  psilocybin ‎C₁₂H₁₇N₂O₄P trip into infinity. 

Hi guys -- er, how's it going?

This was another bridge too far for Zie who realised he was going to have to do or die once again -- so he gets down on his belly and starts slithering for all he's worth.

What's he doing that for? - Terence turns to Merry with raised beetley brows.

Oh, nice to make your acquaintance Terence -- I've heard a lot about you.

Have you? Er... nice, whatever. I guess I can spindle Zie to figure out what's going on.

You could try.

Terence extends some of his spindles to Zie and feels what's bugging the poor dude. At the very moment Zie's about to pop into snakedom, a wave of empathy washes over him, as he feels Terence's concern, and suddenly grows calm. He lies on the ground, eyes closed, panting hard for all the exertion, before recovering quite suddenly...

Yo Terence -- what brought you down here? -- Zie trying to sound as laid back as Zaphod Beeblebrox when Ford Prefect emerges from the near infinite improbability of the vacuum of space uninvited into his shiny new, stolen spaceship, Heart of Gold.

Oh, you know, just wanted to... suddenly Terence, Zie and Merry all start sneezing and pop back into human form.

Like I was saying... another fit of sneezing -- actually not exactly sneezing -- more a cross between giggling, weeping and sneezing -- and they're apparently now trees standing in a rather beautiful forest.

Oh never mind.

Merry, Is there any chance we can hold onto human form for more than a minute before these spasms grip us?

This should be the last batch coming up. Suddenly they're hiccoughing and er... squeaking through an unrecognised orifice until they pop once more back into common or garden 3D reality.

Terence, dude, what are you doing here? -- Zie seems confused.

Merry winks at Terence who's about to tell Zie not to be an idiot. Terence gets a spindle alert from Merry letting him know that Zie is new to this field of awareness and needs time to strengthen his spindles before he's going to be able to jump dimensions comfortably -- without the disruptive memory loss of fragmented conscious-awareness. 

I was trying to figure what all that buzzing noise was, coming from your room.

Buzzing noise? No idea dude. I think it's those mushrooms you've been ingesting -- I tried to warn you about their deleterious side-effects.

Yeah man... I guess I'd better be more careful. Don't wanna lose my grip on reality.

Exactly. Fortunately you've got me to keep you centred dude. Anyway, what's up? Fancy heading into town?

What about your friend, Merry?

Huh? Merry? Who's that? Come on, let's go. I'm famished.