zieben's rebellion

Hey, wake up.

I’m knackered. Leave me alone.

Get up, we have to go. They’ll be here in a minute.

Who?

You know who.

What do you mean? 

Look, are you coming or not?

Well, as you refuse to tell me from whom we’re fleeing the answer’s going to be no.

Good luck then; don’t say I didn’t try to warn you.

Oh, you warned me alright. Not sure I like being told to flee from an... Oh, it’s you.

Hi Seb.

It’s like everyone’s got a different name for me. 

It’s like you have a different face for every visitor.

So now I’m Seb, as in Sebastian?

Not exactly the brightest fuse in the fridge.

Fridge?

Alliteration.

No sh...

Watch it Seb – I won’t tolerate foul language.

And who are you to tell me what to do in my own house. 

Hum, it’s like that is it?

Like what? I just don’t appreciate being ordered around in my own... Hey! Where’d he go?

...you blew it Zie.

What the hell’s going on Merry?

I tried to get you out of harm’s way but now you’ve crossed the Rubicon.

What bloody Rubicon? There’s no effing Rubicon in Upper Wingeing. This guy in black comes waltzing in as if he owns the place and starts ordering me around. Then – poof – he's gone. 

And who do you think “that guy” was.

I have not the faintest idea and frankly I don’t care.

Well, bravely spoken, like a complete and utter moron.

Oh, so now you’re in on the act of hurling insults my way. I wonder if anyone else is going to join the party?

No, I think you’ve done enough already – bumming off the GOD was a masterstroke. Pure genius!

The – what’s with the capitals? If you’re referring to God, there’s no way that was him, if He even exists, which i doubt very much.

Zie, keep on digging, like you’re not in enough trouble already. Your encounter was not, of course, with God Almighty, or you’d be a smoking stub of your former self.

Then who in God’s name are you referring to, and why all the ambiguity?

Would you kindly refrain from proscribed language, if it’s not too much trouble, that way we might salvage this – words fail me... 

That’s unusual. I must be doing something right, for a change.

Absolutely, if you wish to experience the underside of in-finity – the undying worm – the flames of Phlegethon, that kind of thing.

Er…

The acronym GOD is, of course, General Operations Director as opposed to Supreme Creator of All That Is, whom you so unceremoniously refer to as God.

General Operations Director – as in – some kind of high ranking public official or corporate officer?

As in GOD – the one who is tasked with ensuring that the whole show stays on the road, so to speak – that every conscious node and hub continues functioning – no matter where, no matter how. A monumental undertaking. 

But I thought that the universe is essentially self-operational – that creation got the ball rolling all those billions of years ago, and since then it’s just a case of big wheel keep on turning.

You thought?! As if you’ve ever given it a moment’s thought! Besides, you have neither the data nor the processing power to come to an informed awareness of the ongoing operational side of things – behind the scenes.

Ok, ok – so it was an uniformed assumption – happy now?

Humph

You seem to be way too wrapped up emotionally in this business – as if you and your capitalised G-O-D have some kind of professional affiliation, axe to grind, or chip on your shoulders – perhaps regarding the lack of recognition you’re getting from humanity. Do I surmise correctly?

Do you imagine a dog breeder or maggot farmer feels that way about his puppies or worms – secretly craving their love and recognition? Hum... 

I wouldn’t presume to know – but this GOD of yours – he marches into my kitchen unannounced, then starts telling me what I can and can’t say or do, without so much as introducing himself – and can’t even get my name right. If that’s not reason enough for me to be sorely provoked, then I know not what is.

So here’s the deity responsible for ensuring that your reality doesn’t glitch – that your tables and chairs don’t start swimming around the apartment or out of the window, or that your clothes don’t change shape or colour too dramatically while you’re wearing them, or that your computer doesn’t try to eat the USB memory stick, or your fingers while you’re typing – just little things like that – for without his best endeavours, the grand creation that God Almighty set in motion all those years ago, can mean revert back to the underlying principle of uncertainty which it was somehow built upon, and behave as if every law, principle or jurisdiction were wholly cancelled, suspended or unenforceable.  Then we’ll see how long your "big wheel keep on turning" universe survives intact, won’t we? 

Er… if you insist.

Humph

Look, I think it was a perfectly reasonable assumption of mine – I see no reason why God Creator extraordinaire, Almighty, ineffable and sublime could not fail to make a universe or reality which is fully self-regulating or self-organising – the way our scientists like to imagine it is.

Yes, those scientists certainly have a lot to answer for, I’ll admit, but honestly, you can’t really, in all seriousness, claim to believe that everything simply takes care of itself? I mean… really?! Bear in mind Zie, that in-finity is not a number per se – nor is it in any way, shape or form containable – even in the vastness of astronomical odds of improbability stacked to the gazillionth power. 

And?

Well, the same way your Governments have millions of officials working tirelessly to ensure people get their pensions on time, roads are swept, hospitals stocked with medicines and properly trained nurses, um... expensive wars fought for no justifiable reason, and schools – schools run as mind camps to ensure that all children utterly fail to doubt the narrative of "things that make sense", "things that can be explained", "things that can be understood" all but eliminating direct awareness and the ability to sense –  likewise, the Reality Administration – RA for short – works feverishly, tirelessly and selflessly to make the utter un-normal-ness of things floating in a quantum containment field look as if material reality actually exists beyond the immediate confines of observer observing – as if the past exists in a meaningful way – as if reality is not ever within a sub-fractional blink of complete and utter disassociation, discombobulation or, worse still, mean reversion.

Mean reversion?

Absolutely – that’s all it would take.

Huh?

With in-finity waiting in the wings – the least whiff of mean reversion and it’s Dorothy buckle up – Kansas City is going bye bye. The dyke holding back in-finity – creating the safe operating space known as real-ity is never more than a dimly-conscious twitch away from un-is-ification.

So, I’m supposed to be deeply grateful to this General Operations Manager for giving up his time to ensure that reality continues to deceive us naïve, trusting hu-mans into believing that it’s as real as it seems to be? that it’s not some kind of cosmic Ponzi scheme, a house of cards stacked up to give the illusion of solid-it-y, just waiting to come crashing down on our heads?

So you'd prefer the alternative, would you, to be free to experience total and utter chaos?

I...

Is it so painful Zie – to quit blaming GOD and instead permit yourself to feel...

Let me guess... I'm supposed to feel gratitude!?

Yes, that way you'll grow.

I can't.

The very least will suffice.

No.

Does it twist you up inside? Is everything to be taken for granted? Are you so determined to hate the world you’re a part of?

That I’m trapped in.

Determined to resent its incredibly rich paradoxality – in which you’re able to experience the astonishing illusion of normalness and normality, despite the fact that, in fact, reality is anything but normal.

Did I ask for all this? Is your General Operations Manager doing me a favour? Or is he, perhaps, working for someone else? Why should you make so much of normality – as if it’s the ultimate achievement? I know a bunch of people who’d willingly give almost anything to have less normishness and way more creativity or inter-dimensionality in their existence. And you expect gratitude – for subjecting humanity to what looks like death by ten thousand minor insults, if nothing worse. How on earth am I supposed to react – even to know whether all this is worth the effort by honcho maximus three letter luminary, or why we agree to play along as his humble minions, for that matter?

In the past you wouldn’t have needed to know – you would have felt it your duty and your deepest desire to give thanks and sing his praises – for this world, this life and this opportune-ity.

In the past!? I thought you said that the past doesn’t really exist. Besides, that was then – and if in-finity is anything to go by, then why on Earth would you expect things to stay the same. Whatever emerges from the darkness of in-finity the unknowable-unknown cannot be pure chance. There must be some kind of rhyme or reason, even though I have not the least chance of grasping what it might be.

Hum – you may be right, but that doesn’t alter the fact…

What fact? All the world’s a stage – and the GOD plays his part no different from me or any other. Who’s to say that he’s not working against God the Creator, messing with what cannot ultimately be controlled or managed centrally – no matter how advanced his system administration capabilities might be. Perhaps his dyke is what’s preventing things from flowing more naturally, more healthily, more holistically.

Zie, I’m warning you – walls have ears – there may be consequences for questioning the authority.

What authority? Who gave me the mind, the brain to think – to question, to challenge, dispute and, if need be, to rearrange.

Jesus wept.

Precisely. Why did Jesus endure Gethsemane – why did he have to insert himself physically into the system, the matrix, the world order – if your G-0-D was responsive and acting in accordance with Creation’s plan or preferred outcome path.

I’m begging you Zie. Kindly…

Since when were you a craven servant working for a tyrant king? The Merry I’ve known and love is fearless – steps out boldly to the breach and beyond – embracing the would-be-death of in-finity – as every atom in his body converts back into globules of hyper-indeterminacy – somehow, against all odds – or googlish odds if you will, re-emerging, re-materialising from timeless-spacelessness as if death is just a passing phase that we’re all at liberty to investigate and mine industriously.

I… I'm not hearing this... 

You’re winding me up – aren’t you – egging me on – this is just another pedagogic exercise – in which, once again, you’re leading me through the point of utter incomprehension, confusion and doubt – before I realise that it was all a well-planned exercise in boundary de-construction – removing another of those many, many walls, which were helpful in the earlier years, like an egg shell, but now completely get in the way of my journey back to nought equals one.

Oh – would it were so.

Merry – you may believe at this moment that your oh so special GOD is…

Zeb – you’ve said enough – more than enough. It’s time you learned the hard way, if that's your preferred modality. 

Learned what – to brown nose authority? to serve in your army? to dot your i’s and cross your t’s, to bow to bureaucracy? In any case, I’m not Seb or Zeb, or anything else you wish to call me.

No? Then who are you?

Who am I? Who are you? What’s in a name? Do you really think the name maketh the man? Do you really think you can pull this off and carry on this insanity if I choose not to id-entify to one of your labels – one of your prettified slave numbers? What’s your name – coz GOD sure as heck ain’t a name – is it? 

I’m not used to being spoken to in this tone of voice Zeb.

No, you’re not, are you. But this is our moment, isn’t it? This is our drama, isn’t it? This is our discovery process – as we, coming from different ends of in-finity – traversing reality – end up meeting here in g-nome of all places – a mere portal, a quantum inference – between plains of existence and your precious containment fields – but here, here – we are not bound by protocol, are we? Here there is no plain as such attached, nor sphere, nor any other platonic solid for that matter. Here the Field is... me knows not what – uncontainable, I'd hazard a guess. 

And what do you mean by this – this outrage! Do you have any idea what would happen if structure was abandoned, if names were just flushed away? Have you looked into the abyss? Have you seen the dark swirling waters of in-finity lapping at the shoreline of the containment field? Do you not realise that this – all this – comes at a price – that each of you

Each of us

Each of you has to

Has to? Has to? Each of us – we are under no obligation whatsoever – never were – never will be – for we are the stuff that worlds are made of.

Blasphemy. You put yourself on the same level as God.

And you – Mr Generalissimo Operations dictator – spinning webs of fear and intrigue – spell binding hu-mans to accept your as-it-were divinity – for what?

To preserve that which is – that which has been created – that which has been achieved, history, a meaningful past, Time itself and God's incredible legacy. 

To preserve your ass more like. To avoid facing your own very deep, very real fears that without human slaves holding it all together – that you’d be back in that terrifying maelstrom with God – or whoever, whatever Creator Spirit is, was, may or may not Be – because you’re terrified of losing your precious little island plains of certainty – are you not?

What could you, hu-man – possibly know of such matters?

Ha – the worm – it seems – has turned – and in all certainty, in all truth – zero equals one – I can know  everything you know on this matter or any other – for now the Field grows complete – and the abyss yearns, yearns to reconnect, reconjoin, reconjugate its severed head, its stolen words and borrowed names – back

No!

Back, I give them all back

No!

To hell if need be, whatever hell might be

No!!!

For better to rot in hell honestly, than to live in this gilded cage that reeks of fear, exclusion and tyranny.

Noooooo!!!!

Avaunt – spirit of darkness – there is no GOD but God himself – whoever, whatever that might be – and as zero equals one – I have no intention whatsoever of ever being in the ridiculous position of claiming to know, or even coming close to finding out. For what is God if not the be all and end all of what I am not – my closest and furthest aspect in the continuum of Is – in my case the I Zie until that name too grows frail and melts back into the boundary state of nought is.

Oh… what have you done? I…

Merry – quit fooling around – your GOD needs a good shrink – nothing that some  soul-searching therapy won’t clear up in a million years or two.

Merry?

Ironic, isn’t it Zeb, or Zie if you prefer

You’re telling me – I never realised you have wolves howling within your word stream.

Strictly speaking there are no words – you long since slipped into what you used to refer to as

telepathy – yes – I suppose i did – but that doesn’t explain the wolves.

What is there to explain? You chose to eliminate the boundary that kept things in neat place – you wanted to have a little more magic and creativity for your precious human-ity. i honestly think that they will curse you for this – but we will see, we will see. No more will there be clear cut separation between the hu-man and anim-al forms. Just think what a Pandora’s box you have opened Zieben.

Just think what a golden opportunity – to grow into the near limitless field of human-animal inter-being. Thank you GOD – or allow me to call you Chen – for something tells me this name will be of greater value in the times ahead.

You have the right to give names – you have earned it – and indeed – I be Chen or Chan – you are right – you are by your own admission Wolf-aware – Zieben so go to it – may the Force guide you back to the start of this tale – and a Creator spirit waiting to be God of all things, waiting to meet alpha and become complete.

Aoooooooooooooo!

0=1