(More 404.)
"We don't die, it's much worse: we vanish. In other words, we never were. There is no reality." Petr Král
As I said, everything was already starting to change for me. These things begin little by little. It seems that all at once there is an audible snap and your life is wholly different. But when we look back we can see that it was actually a long time coming. It seemed to begin with my dreams that night.
I was on a giant battleship, which was - I think - steaming toward the US capitol. I’m not sure how, but in some way I understood that our mission was a last ditch effort to save the American Dream. Crew were carrying missiles back and forth through the hull. Screams, smoke, flashing lights. Amidst the commotion, I inquired what they were planning on doing with those, (the were sidewinders, air-to-air, we had no planes onboard, what the hell good were they?)
One of the crew awkwardly dropped one and an auto-door slammed shut on it with a clink.
Everything seemed to stop. The rocking of the boat. The yelling and carrying on of the crew. Even the sloshing of the waves below deck. All our eyes went toward thousands of pounds of munitions, rolling around on the floor as the doors opened and slammed shut again. And then the gut-wracking moment. There was a sucking oomph and metal and bodies became high velocity shrapnel themselves, shearing people like they were little more than paper cut-out dolls. I was lying on the ground and I wondered when this was, was this world war 3? Was this the Queen Mary? Was I alive? What the hell was going on?
I thought I was waking up for the first time, at that moment, but of course I was neither awake nor aware. But it seemed that I was. And if things can seem so true and yet be complete lies, then what can we trust, really?
I got up. There was smoke, screaming, chaos, you know, the kinds of noises you would expect after a bomb went off on a crowded ship... but I was distracted, gliding past them. I was scared of something but couldn’t put my finger on it. Not the bomb. Not the war. Something more ephemeral. A lingering something, hiding just outside the bubble of my conscious thoughts. I headed down a deck, and
now
now
now! i'm walking past this starbuck's cafe (a cafe on a war ship? i guess even soldiers of the new revolution need lattes). i get that kneejerk hunger for caffeine, and as i’m scanning the scene i see stella, sipping a drink, reading a book and holding it in the way only she can, gently like she’s cradling a baby in her arms. i need to bathe in that kind of calm. i go in to say hi. i'm starting to realize something is up now, i was just talking to her as we lay in bed together, and now here? i remember brushing her red hair from her brow, and kissing her, telling her about my dream from the night before, and suddenly we’re on a cafe in a warship my brain catches and whirrrrs, a 'where the hell am i really?' thing.
...
i ask her for a hug. that uncomfortable feeling is growing, and she’s the one familiar thing i feel i can hold onto. i still can't really know whether it’s a projection, but i can't know what-when-why when awake either. the mystery, the great mystery, is there, just a half-step behind. she murmurs something and then gives me a hug with her mind, never taking her eyes off the book.
"do you know you're dreaming?" i ask.
"of course."
we're talking at arms length but there's still the sensation of being hugged and held. a conversation ensues which was probably important but i don't remember a word of it. i just remember the sensation of being home, for once and only ever the still point axis mundi foucault's pendulum home, and then this weird moment where i was rubbing her back in the way a cat kneads a blanket, somehow my hands were passing through her back and onto mine, as the conversation continued she literally faded away, until i was rubbing my own back.
and i was alone. she had left me.
the boat lands. no longer a war ship, she’s now a luxury liner. attractive naked young men and women are chasing one another around deck, or fucking one another right there in the open, heedless of my presence. i'm walking around a patio towards a pool in what looks like some sort of upscale compound. around the bend, there's the pool- and a bunch of people waiting for me.
the buyer, agent 139, and agent 506 are the first three i recognize. they were sitting with someone i didn’t recognize, a frenetic man with wild hair and eyes. i had only met 139 and 506 once in person. they were the living legends of the syndicate. bradley, of course, i know all too well. i sit down and turn towards them. i feel incredibly elated that he decided to show up. bradley is dressed in army fatigues, he’s smoking a cigar and nodding his head. the other agents are wearing swim suits.
"you taking your pills, son?" bradley asked me.
"i'm sorry? which pills? fuck, bradley. you can't even make sense in my dreams."
"if it is true that alienation has been the principle of all history, it is our task not just to pull the emergency brake, but to bring this history to an end, to clear a way for a new beginning, a new story, illuminated by the dawning of the New," the stranger said to no one in particular.
at this point bradley did the most unusual thing. he inspected my hands very closely, and gives me a look that freezes me in place. in that look i saw the kind of calm, serious but genuine contemplation that i would never normally attribute to him. sober. he says "see, you're wrong. you've been one of us all along. there are tiny creases, all over your hand..."
"We don't die, it's much worse: we vanish. In other words, we never were. There is no reality." Petr Král
As I said, everything was already starting to change for me. These things begin little by little. It seems that all at once there is an audible snap and your life is wholly different. But when we look back we can see that it was actually a long time coming. It seemed to begin with my dreams that night.
I was on a giant battleship, which was - I think - steaming toward the US capitol. I’m not sure how, but in some way I understood that our mission was a last ditch effort to save the American Dream. Crew were carrying missiles back and forth through the hull. Screams, smoke, flashing lights. Amidst the commotion, I inquired what they were planning on doing with those, (the were sidewinders, air-to-air, we had no planes onboard, what the hell good were they?)
One of the crew awkwardly dropped one and an auto-door slammed shut on it with a clink.
Everything seemed to stop. The rocking of the boat. The yelling and carrying on of the crew. Even the sloshing of the waves below deck. All our eyes went toward thousands of pounds of munitions, rolling around on the floor as the doors opened and slammed shut again. And then the gut-wracking moment. There was a sucking oomph and metal and bodies became high velocity shrapnel themselves, shearing people like they were little more than paper cut-out dolls. I was lying on the ground and I wondered when this was, was this world war 3? Was this the Queen Mary? Was I alive? What the hell was going on?
I thought I was waking up for the first time, at that moment, but of course I was neither awake nor aware. But it seemed that I was. And if things can seem so true and yet be complete lies, then what can we trust, really?
I got up. There was smoke, screaming, chaos, you know, the kinds of noises you would expect after a bomb went off on a crowded ship... but I was distracted, gliding past them. I was scared of something but couldn’t put my finger on it. Not the bomb. Not the war. Something more ephemeral. A lingering something, hiding just outside the bubble of my conscious thoughts. I headed down a deck, and
now
now
now! i'm walking past this starbuck's cafe (a cafe on a war ship? i guess even soldiers of the new revolution need lattes). i get that kneejerk hunger for caffeine, and as i’m scanning the scene i see stella, sipping a drink, reading a book and holding it in the way only she can, gently like she’s cradling a baby in her arms. i need to bathe in that kind of calm. i go in to say hi. i'm starting to realize something is up now, i was just talking to her as we lay in bed together, and now here? i remember brushing her red hair from her brow, and kissing her, telling her about my dream from the night before, and suddenly we’re on a cafe in a warship my brain catches and whirrrrs, a 'where the hell am i really?' thing.
...
"do you know you're dreaming?" i ask.
"of course."
we're talking at arms length but there's still the sensation of being hugged and held. a conversation ensues which was probably important but i don't remember a word of it. i just remember the sensation of being home, for once and only ever the still point axis mundi foucault's pendulum home, and then this weird moment where i was rubbing her back in the way a cat kneads a blanket, somehow my hands were passing through her back and onto mine, as the conversation continued she literally faded away, until i was rubbing my own back.
and i was alone. she had left me.
the boat lands. no longer a war ship, she’s now a luxury liner. attractive naked young men and women are chasing one another around deck, or fucking one another right there in the open, heedless of my presence. i'm walking around a patio towards a pool in what looks like some sort of upscale compound. around the bend, there's the pool- and a bunch of people waiting for me.
the buyer, agent 139, and agent 506 are the first three i recognize. they were sitting with someone i didn’t recognize, a frenetic man with wild hair and eyes. i had only met 139 and 506 once in person. they were the living legends of the syndicate. bradley, of course, i know all too well. i sit down and turn towards them. i feel incredibly elated that he decided to show up. bradley is dressed in army fatigues, he’s smoking a cigar and nodding his head. the other agents are wearing swim suits.
"you taking your pills, son?" bradley asked me.
"i'm sorry? which pills? fuck, bradley. you can't even make sense in my dreams."
"if it is true that alienation has been the principle of all history, it is our task not just to pull the emergency brake, but to bring this history to an end, to clear a way for a new beginning, a new story, illuminated by the dawning of the New," the stranger said to no one in particular.
at this point bradley did the most unusual thing. he inspected my hands very closely, and gives me a look that freezes me in place. in that look i saw the kind of calm, serious but genuine contemplation that i would never normally attribute to him. sober. he says "see, you're wrong. you've been one of us all along. there are tiny creases, all over your hand..."
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