FALLEN

by James Curcio

Additional Writing by: Ken Schaefer, Jason Allen, Sarah Dudzic, Alexi Danov, and Aleonis De Gabrael.

Based on "true" occurrences between the years of 1995-1997, conceived accidentally when the contraceptives ran out.

Special thanks to the Order of the Hidden Path, Club Head, those few truly dedicated Mother Hive Brain syndicate members, and of course, Voton, leader of planet Klaxor, for communicating this to me.

© 1997 James Curcio and Aleonis De Gabrael 0=11. The copy or distribution of this product is expressly forbidden, although it may be copied off of the Internet for personal use.

The Author(s) may be contacted at james.himself.org or agent139@hotmail.com.

00.

Everywhere I go, in every experience, I see life constantly on the verge of death, the intensity of it almost overflowing, overwhelming me precisely because every thing is, from the moment of its creation, so close to its own annihilation. Life exists to the extent that it stands in stubborn and harsh contrast to its own non-existence. One who is alive, truly alive, experience eros for life, as the tension between what we see as being through becoming is contrasted with the darkness, the hallow absence - not the light! -- at the end of the process. Through this we may see the first will to meaning in the struggle between the secret gravity of our end being ahead and behind us, and our constant attempt to create a beginning, an eternally present moment, right now.

It is at first apparent that everything is dying, the undoing, the negation, resonates throughout everything, a Cerberus that barks in warning: "do not enter, no one ever returns." Yet, in passing through the gates he guards, one is immediately overwhelmed at how alive everything is, standing in contrast to the pessimistic cry that had set a pall upon the world; all living beings, screaming together "I am!" defiantly against the coming of the dawn. Should we choose life, accept it fully as it is without doctoring, we must join in to this chorus with all of our strength, become a part of the song rather than an individual standing outside, merely listening in rapt attention.

For those who would cling to a static solution, whether it be a canon, manifesto, or the words of an orator or messiah, I would recommend they take Nietzsche's words to heart: "O ye who dwell in the dark night of the soul, beware most of all the herald of the dawn!"

-Aleonis De Gabrael.

0. Prologue:

I'm in the hospital now, writing down the closing comments. While doing this, I look back upon this project you asked me to undertake, exploring what has led me here, and I feel that I've only provided a veneer. You asked me to explore my emotions through the lens of my intellect, since that is how all my emotions are experienced, yet I don't feel that you accounted for the results. The story you have before you is, at first, the appearance over the events that transpired, and it was only when my imagination began to run wild, when the white walls of my room became a blank slate for my projections, that the real story, what you're looking for, became apparent. Even then it was apparent, at least to me, only as a side-long glance, a fleeting mirage in the corner of my eyes. Whenever I look directly at anything, it disappears.

As you continue, I ask you to peel away the paint and look not at this as a story about me - the real value is in how all of this relates to you, and possibly, what that says about us. The story, like all of our experience, is holographic: every event right now is a reflection of all previous events, and inflects itself forward into the future as it changes our disposition and our decision making.

I was young at the time the story begins, still half asleep in the dream of my childhood. We were all too young, but who amongst us can predict precisely when the pot is finally going to boil over? There is a time, for some of us, when we are able to step outside the events that formed us, the environment that shaped us, and in that moment, we look back upon the sum of our experience and ask "where was I in that?" Where in the equation do you express yourself, not as a reaction but as a whole person? And, should we be unable to find ourselves in that equation, do we then become, as the sleeper awakening, indifferent to the events that composed the whole of that dream or memory? Do we turn a blind eye upon our past when we step forward?

...

It was three weeks after Alexi's release from the hospital. One of the lights directly over his head was flickering slowly, like a strobe light. This was horribly irritating to him, and he got up to change tables, motioning for Ken to follow. They made their way past the usual Denny's patrons, waving quickly to some, and sat down in the opposite corner of the room, directly beneath a plastic potted plant that dangled from above.

They couldn't help but hear the conversation behind them, a scratchy, desperate sound: "ever conceived of by monkey soups. We'll be breaking, taking, and stealing everything you motherfuckers ever dreamed up, every logo you have ever designed, even if it's bolted down. Split the spine, forward, then backwards, then straight up and through the roof. It'll be the biggest, baddest, meanest Dionysian revolt of Rock 'n' Roll and anti-Semitic Jews that Corn Flakes have ever set their greedy little eyes on. Yes, we'll be swimming in the septic tank offices of the every day businessman and dancing on the surface of the inanimate objects of old age. We'll be coughing up whole lungfulls of Kurt Cobain and Tickle-me-Elmo dolls in malls." Ken glanced behind him. It wasn't so much a conversation as a monologue. A boy, he couldn't have been a day over seventeen, rocked back and forth slowly, the hood of his blue sweatshirt pulled over his head. Glassy, dull eyes stared fixedly at the half-empty cup of coffee before him. His hands seemed like two ashen claws, clutching the sides of the ceramic mug coarsely.

"The revolt from the inside didn't work. I played your games, bought your albums and wore your fucking T-shirts. The only solution to a circle is a straight line, a straight bee-line out, over, beyond! And we all know that complaining is the job of out of work philosophers and musicians. So the line has to break out of the circle. The Mother Hive Brain syndicate as a whole must be the line, and hit them where it counts. The transmitter device, which transmits its foul and insipid reality to the masses, receiving messages from the hidden brain of the system, must be removed. Devon Denny's must be destroyed."

Alexi looked over at Ken and chuckled warmly. "I feel like someone is parodying us," he said quietly. As they reached for their cigarettes simultaneously, the smoke remover across the room made a series of noises like gun-fire.

Startled by this outburst, a man dropped to the ground by the bar in a low crouch, a horrible growl issuing from his throat. It was the growl of a starved wolf. His face was grizzled, like the side of an old football. Manuel Noriega on a bad day. A thick shadow of stubble framed his face, and he wore a pair of camo pants and a black, stained wife beater.

Ken stood up and offered his hand to this man, worn and hardened, he imagined, from years of painful service to his country. The man stared at him coldly from behind a pair of scratched aviator glasses. What Ken didn't know was that this man hadn't said a word in any language in over ten years. It was only one sentence, the same sentence that had been running throughout that time, that escaped his sandpaper lips, moving sluggishly from lack of practice. Just as he's said it, all those years before when he ran off into the suburbs of Pennsylvania never to be seen again, a raggedy joint hanging off his lip, his old 'Nam flight jacket still on his skinny shoulders, "I don't hold hands-- I eat them! Like the motherfuckin' V.C.!" Uncle Eddie was the kind of guy you didn't fuck with just on principle. Maybe it had something to do with the crazy gleam in his glistening, pot reddened eyes, or the way he'd walk about the house all aswagger, his .45 quietly rocking back and forth on his hip holster, half naked and covered in vomit, that just told you to keep your distance. Crazy Eddie didn't like talking none. He'd sit in his old creaking rocking chair, one leg kind of cocked to the side over the hand rest, and stare at you. Just stare at you, his mouth maybe hanging open a little, the smell of Captain Morgan lingering in the air there around his cake hole. Johny, his little cousin, would sit around and stare back, far too terrified to get up and leave, just preparing for a group of flies or a nest of yellow jackets to come swarming in and take up refuge there in that slobbery wet mouth of his. He was a caricature of himself. He was larger-than-life. He'd get in the car at three in the morning, immediately after finishing a case of beer and a liter of glistening amber rum, and yet somehow you just knew he'd be there in the morning. Nothing could touch him precisely because everything had touched him.

There was no time for Ken to react. A horrible explosion rocked the building from outside. The last thing they heard was the sound of shattering glass, the tearing force of the explosion. Ken, in a flash, wondered how he was going to explain all of this to his mother. There was an unbearable pain, a light, then darkness. Alexi felt like he was drowning. This is the last time I'll think, the last time I'll feel. Blood gurgled and rasped into his throat. I never felt anyone at all. And then it was over.

I. Chapter One, Grid One:

The Becoming.

Keter.

"Our lives become larger, more expansive, when we include the other as a part of ourself; their 'meaning' (or will to meaning), is superadded to our own. This is why I think the contrast between self and society, (oft considered a young idea, a dilemma you'll grow out of, that you will acclimate yourself to, as a boy who slowly slips into a pool, first his toes, then his feet, eventually his whole body submerged), is in fact one of the most crucial issues at any stage of ones life. To agree upon a joint meaning, one of us must make a concession, inevitably, one of us must give over to the will of the other. The urge of small minds is always to make similar, to make like, to reduce that which is not me into something that is me. Once, and only once, in my life I lived for another. Have I ever recovered? And the cost of keeping myself intact is complete solitude. What you may see of me is not me."

-Aleonis De Gabrael.

The Man Upon 42nd Street, Part I:

From the sleep of day and the dreams of night, a man, but a shadow of his Self, climbed upon the Universal height, Foundation; set himself into the reflected light of those four nines and from the dream of waking awoke. He stood on 42nd street, wandering around as if he were lost, holding his head in his dirty hands, never looking up.

The sky was headed for sunset, doubly guarded by Anubis. The dweller under the waves, the man standing on 42nd street, walking unsteadily, had met a message borne from mournful now into the rainbow hues of possibility; a cup overflowing, filled with the divine light ascended through imagination-yet now there was nothing to him but the shards of broken yesterdays, the waking dream awake. Nothing but a fitful sleep. And in our shared sleep, bubbling up from the dreams of our childhood and the memories of our future, a counterpart forms. From this mold of our eternal opposite, cast down to the world as a star, clothed in a body like marble with eyes like fire-is you. And it is you, our reflection, the embodiment of everything through the dance of these opposites, that I call life.

Waiting on 42nd street with my breath hanging in the air, deep down I know that he is lifeless and cold, this man without a mirror who, without the gnawing ache of absence, this hollowness deep in the chest, would surely pass on. He is waiting for you, love, and were you to ever come, he would surely die.

Ken looked as if he was about to fall. A hand rested on his shoulder - not confining or uncomfortable, but firm nevertheless. There was something about Ken, a look, a particular manner of speaking, that told you he wasn't going to let himself through any day unscathed. Only he knew what sin he was guilty of, what pear he had stolen in his youth, and what action could provide absolution. His secret was well kept. Whatever it was, he let everyone know that he'd never let himself live it down.

"Steady there." Alexi looked directly into the eyes of his friend, almost through them so intense was his gaze. When he was convinced that Ken was clearly not going to fall over, he let his hand slip down and rest at his side. With his wide brimmed hat and black trench coat, Ken was the archetypal beatnik: he was a jazz and blues enthusiast, played saxophone, loved authors such as Huxley and Kerouac, and smoked enough to be a stand in for Joe Camel any day of the week. His demeanor complimented Alexi's by negation - for all of Alexi's intellectual melancholy, Ken could always find the chink in his armor of rationalization with a slightly more laconic, oftentimes morose logic, and expose the underlying emotional cause. This negation worked both ways, as the razor edge of Alexi's intellect likewise revealed the unharnessed raw anger lurking beneath the surface of Ken's exterior.

Ken nodded absently, then lay down on the wide futon that took up most of the floor space in Alexi's room. The air was choked with smoke, burnt tobacco and incense mixed with the scent of blazing candles. The door was half-open, and cast light, a long thin beam, on one side of Ken's face. The effect was striking: it looked to Alexi as if he were cut in half.

It was now well past two in the morning, a long eventful, although not abnormal, weekend night consisting of a trip to Denny's, a nearby restaurant, "important" conversations often shattered by an off-color comment, and a great deal of smoking. It was the kind of night you can only have when you're young, when you're old enough to think you know what's going on, and yet too young to realize the dangers of this kind of thinking. There was a certain scent in the air, almost like new, budding flowers, that only the young at heart can smell, even in the dead of winter; to the old, that is to say, to the dead, even in the feverish growth of spring, not a whiff of it can be found. This scent was the lure of possibility. For at least two of the participants on that chill autumn night, it would soon turn out to be one of the most memorable evenings of their existence in this reality grid. Not that any of them knew anything about reality grids. Yet.

Alexi got a serious look on his face, his hands still idly fumbling about for something to do.

"Mind's working fast?" Ken asked in his underspoken way. The two of them had spent so much time together that linguistic communication was almost an addition to the real conversation, the subtext.

Alexi nodded.

"What on?"

"Something that happened a long time ago" Alexi was being elusive again. He shrugged nonchalantly, as if to stall any forthcoming questions.

"No mysticism, half-finished thoughts just blurt it out," Ken said.

Alexi seemed at a loss, his hands spread wide.

"Ken, we're talking about me here. It wouldn't be any fun without my mysticism, now would it?" Alexi still got mysticism and obscuritanism mixed up from time to time. He smiled, but it wasn't all mirth-there was a touch of bitterness along with the humor. "Would you like me to do something?" he asked at length.

Ken's only response was a curious look in Alexi's direction. "Something? Could you be any more specific?"

Ignoring the point of Ken's question, Alexi extended his hand and continued, "Lean back. And relax. You remember the things I've shown you lately to clear your mind?"

Ken's broad head bobbed forward slightly. He reclined even further on the futon, moving a few pillows so that he was completely comfortable. "Teach me how, or..." Is that an ultimatum?

"Every now and then I meditate on my own," he said, now lying prone on the bed.

"Well, use all you know. I have my own preparations"

"O.K., man. I don't know what you've got cooking in there, but I'm game."

Alexi was already lost in thought.

Minutes later, the air in the room got very still. Or at least it appeared that way to Ken. It was almost as if it had become a breathable liquid, thick and viscous. With this thickness came a feeling of foreboding, a ponderous and yet paradoxically energetic, crackling invisible energy. To Ken, there was something about the room, as it was, at that very moment - the candles flickering at an even rate, the haze in the air, even the look on Alexi's face - that seemed strange, alien and disquieting. What was most unsettling: he was sure he had been here in this exact situation not once, but countless times before. There was something nauseating about the feeling, a disquieting vertigo. Am I dreaming? he wondered, suddenly feeling very vulnerable and uncertain. It really was about everything, too-gravity, the mechanical certainty of the seasons... Suppose, as Einstein once did, that we are in fact all in a huge elevator accelerating upwards. We witness the effects of gravity, the effects of the seasons, and the effects of our emotions but never see into the thing itself, when it happens, where it happens. Gravity is just the force of repetition; life is an uphill battle and the force that's pulling you back down is the force of habit. His previous beliefs were suddenly all in question. He was standing on the brink of something massive and absolutely terrifying, a world without cause and effect, without an actual reality pointed at by words and people and things. He could see, in his minds eye, a chasm opening up. There was suddenly a distinct warm feeling, like lying in a bath and slipping under the surface.

Look back at what lead you to this point. He had been struggling with this feeling that his life was a dead end. For many months now, each day seemed to get longer and less satisfying than the one before it; it seemed like all anyone did anymore was bark orders or obey the call of their master's whips: calendar, work day, weekly schedule... He was floundering in college due to a complete lack of motivation; he knew that he could succeed at anything he put his mind and heart into, but as of late, he couldn't seem to find either his mind or his heart. Fear of death was nothing to him compared to the fear of machination, the fear of becoming a robot dutifully serving the machine. When he slept, he would often have horrible dreams of people, all marching in perfects rows, half-machine men with glittering circuit boards in their heads - they were Orwellian dreams. Because of all of this, he was more than willing to try something, anything, that would allow him to escape from the relentless stranglehold life had on him, to breathe freely again. And, it was because of this honest desperation that he was willing to buy anything that was sold to him, which is what any acting guru, anyone willing to take on that role, needs to make the first incision. Yet all of this was just what he was consciously aware of. What, he wondered, actually lay underneath the thin veneer of his rationalizations?

"I'm ready," Ken said quietly. It was sub-vocalized and Alexi didn't appear to have heard him. "Am I dreaming?" he asked again, this time aloud.

Alexi put a hand on Ken's shoulder, raising the other in the air for a moment like it was a benediction. The air grew warmer. "We're all dreaming," Alexi said enigmatically, his voice certain and calm. Ken's previous beliefs kicked in for a moment, and he felt the urge to laugh. He thinks he's fucking Jesus Christ. He couldn't deny, however, how comforting it felt to have someone around that knew what was going on. At the least, he certainly presented himself that way. He'd give Alexi the benefit of the doubt. They'd been friends for some time, and although his recently found 'mystical revelations' were a little hard to swallow, they presented ironically solid ground. "The world would be a better place the moment everyone admitted they don't know anything, the moment they stop putting on a show," Alexi would say randomly, while they were out eating a hamburger, or walking casually through the woods. That's just the way he was. Most people didn't take it all that seriously. To do so would be to buy into a fantastical world composed not of actual rules governed by reality as it is presented to us, but of personally established rules that govern reality.

"...We're all dreaming and we choose, in a delayed choice reaction, what our futures will be," Alexi continued a moment later, his eyes unfocused. "Look back Ken, look way back to the places you go and then disregard as unreal." Alexi's eyes suddenly focused rapidly as he held his hand a few inches from Ken's head. "Do you feel that?"

There was a buzzing inside Ken's head. He didn't respond. He had the distinct feeling that the actual makeup of his body was being fluctuated somehow. Not able to really make sense of the thought or the feeling, he merely focused on the stream of incoherent letters in his minds-eye, flying by at a ridiculous rate now, permutating over and over again into new shapes and forms, coiling in what was an unmistakable spiral. The changes were too rapid to detect any pattern. He realized that he was speaking to Alexi and had been for some time, although he couldn't be sure what he was saying. Ken's vision became blurry as the room slowly faded out of his view, giving way to a wholly internal reality.

The clock ticks its beats off regularly, measuring the rotation of its mechanical innards and the seconds, minutes, hours, days of being locked away. Her wrists are numb from the jester's cold metal restraints, her naked body aches from weeks without movement. The cell door opens, and the brilliant light pains her eyes, so used to absolute darkness. Standing there is the man at the center of the spiral. He unlocks the handcuffs and throws them to her feet. He speaks only one word, and that word is "Destiny." There is a hole in her chest, a product of the despair fashioned from pain and isolation. A hole that longs with an indescribable hunger, desiring a taste so bitter and so sweet that she is drug to her feet by it. The pain which had been sublimated for so long suddenly unleashed in one brilliant moment, as if all her experience, all the time spent in solitude had suddenly crystallized, her hope, in opposition to the despair, revealing itself through this man. He leads her to the top of a mountain, motioning for her to sit and together they admire the view, feel the wind in their hair, the granite under their feet, and the scent of the ages.

"That is what can be. Feel the joy of just being free as one's self, not confined in the mold of any invisible master. Beware, most of all, your own self inflicted limitations-the jester is still lurking nearby, leering like a carnival ride. He will tempt you with false happiness, deceive you with empty promises, and cast you aside in an instant. There is also the scholar, who means well, but will not let you live. He will treat the symptom, and not the problem," he says, an incredible peace in his voice and posture.

Hope shines in the sky, giving her warmth. And the jester lurks a few paces behind, waiting-

Ken began to shake visibly. It almost appeared as if there was a slight purple phantom glow all about his body.

"That's enough," Alexi said, and fell back, apparently quite drained.

Ken reacted violently: thrashing about on the bed, mumbling, talking listlessly. Occasionally, it would stop for a moment, and then he would burst into insane laughter. "You live in a half-way house between insanity and absolute, complete freedom," he said, suddenly very sober.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Alexi said nonchalantly, nibbling neurotically on his shirt sleeve. Then he smiled in Ken's direction. "How do you feel?"

"Something is different." Ken seemed to struggle to find the right words, finally resigned, and asked "what did you do?"

"What I was told," Alexi said, far too quiet for even Ken to hear.

"You're ridiculous." He paused. "I never know with you, man. Sometimes I half expect you to, with one of your too-big grins, proclaim that you've been putting me on this whole time. But really, what did you do?"

"We all have energy around us. It is us; you cannot separate yourself from your energy. I'll try to keep this explanation secular - to keep from an argument about God, the transcendent, or any other mystical obfuscation. That would merely confuse the issue right now and I know that you were raised Catholic. That alone is bound to skew ones conception of transcendent God for life," Alexi lit up another cigarette, and added offhandedly, "got to add to the ambiance."

Ken shook his head. "Cut the crap."

"With practice, we can learn to control this energy - to do nearly anything with it. To take and give it to others, affect the eventual outcomes of things You must understand, there is an intricate unseen dimension to events. You can think of it in these terms: whenever something happens, it inflects itself forwards and backwards in time, affecting the lattice of all past and future what is it?" Alexi stopped, noticing Ken's brow wrinkling.

"Do you mean you sometimes take this energy from unknowing people?"

Alexi chuckled. "When it's necessary. Or useful," seeing Ken's look of disdain, he added, "come off it it doesn't hurt, nor is it usually even noticeable. Call me elitist, hell, we both are, but most people aren't even aware of its existence, so what do they need the excess for?"

Ken nodded "it is logical."

"Machiavellian, perhaps, but logical. Anyhow, I can show you how to utilize it in time," Alexi said.

"How is this energy different from energy of other sorts - physical energy?" Ken asked.

Alexi thought for a moment. "You understand the concept of a mode in music, right?"

Ken nodded his head. "Of course."

"Well, all energy is the same. In fact, as I'm sure you're aware at least intellectually, matter is just another phase of energy. However, it is a different mode of that energy. A different wavelength. I can only explain how it works for me. My metaphors might not work for you. We're living in the same territory, but we all have different maps."

Ken sat back for support, still trembling from his recent energy transferal.

"It actually isn't all that hard to see energy, at least the first few layers of it It's bright, or at least luminous in a Well, maybe 'bright' is the wrong word, it's more like semi-transparent, like glass under water. The energy you gather from this won't help keep your physical body awake, but it adds to the awareness of the mind; you need energy to help cross over into other planes of thought. Remember, changing your belief causes different thinking. Thinking different changes how you represent yourself in the world. And that brings about a different reality. Some warnings before you play with this new belief. When my mind is full of energy, everything is vivid and brilliantly alive, and I often experience sensory crossovers, like scents perceived as colors, or sounds perceived as both aural and visual It's like the sense bubbles into the others, kind of overflows because it's so strong. The first warning I must give you: decide who you take from carefully. Different people have different energy, and you'll never be completely sure how it will interact with your own. And taking, just as with giving, is a somewhat intimate process. The more your energy interacts with another, the more their life is bound up in your own and vice versa, so watch it I'm not sure why, these are just the rules. You'll get the hang of it--" Alexi coughed. "Energy manipulation is not enough on its own; the force still requires a vehicle, a form, for it to manifest in."

Ken nodded.

"How long have you been waiting for this to happen? For me?" Ken asked.

"I? Not long."

"Of course you."

"Not necessarily. I don't completely understand it myself - I just know that I get messages, from time to time, from elsewhere. Out of phase times or beings. I can't explain it all right now. But you're tired, we'll talk in the morning. Just keep one last thing in your mind, before you drift into sleep: every event effects every other event and creates a sort of ripple that in the end changes everything. And events are manifest energy. If you can discover what future events are right for you, the events that put you on the right path, then the correct ripple can be created with effort. After that, all you have to do is ride the wave, man. Uhm you can just tell when you're on the beam. Well, good night."

Once Ken had been situated, Alexi returned to his room. For over an hour he sat unmoving, thinking.

It would be unfair to be dishonest about this - I did keep an appearance of understanding more then I did. It's a trick that's gotten me out of a tough spot more than once, but it's also been known to get me in deeper than I called for. I suppose that isn't all of the truth. Perhaps I did understand intellectually. However, in looking back, I realized that I wound up actualizing the wrong possibilities because I never had faith in what I really knew. There is an abyss that lies between the ideal and the actual, and it is that abyss that I lost myself within.

The question echoing through my mind, at the time, was "why?" followed quickly afterwards with "why us?" and "what now?" The funny thing about that last question is that it always answered itself. There usually wasn't more than a day or two of lag after which something new would make itself known, to fill some of the blanks. (The problem being, of course, that there are an infinite number of blanks. Ken and I would write down one answer just in time to watch another question appear.)

This constant barrage of questions slowly wore me down, and soon they found new bitter companions - but I am jumping ahead of the story.

Agent 139 looked over at Johny and smiled mischievously. They were seated in Denny's, basking in the sickly glow of bright fluorescent bulbs. The Agent tossed a coin up in the air and slammed it down on the table suddenly, making Johny wince in surprise. "Only absolute chance is a fair leader," Agent 139 said to him. "Never forget that." Jesus gave them a discriminating look. He then looked down and checked his makeup in a pocket mirror.

Alexi was standing on a beach in Atlantic City, New Jersey, his hair whipped by the violent and bitter wind that came in tremendous blasts from the sea. Because it was a winter day, the shore was otherwise completely abandoned. The sun half-hid behind a hazy patch of clouds, and offered no noticeable warmth to the beach below. Directly beside him was Samantha, one hand resting comfortably on the back of his arm, the other dangling listlessly to her side. They were standing close to the shoreline; flecks of the salty water sprayed them in the face as the waves came crashing down endlessly and tumultuously. Each stared out to the horizon, rendered speechless by the effect the passing storm was having upon the black, opaque water.

He looks expectantly

"What do you want?" she asks aloud. In other words, "who do you want me to be?"

A seagull landed and cocked its head, one beady eye regarding them coldly. Knocking on a rock three times, it hopped back, partially extending its wings, calling out shrilly once and then again. This knocked Alexi out of his trance, and he stared back. "Three, and then two," he said softly, the sound of subtle concern creeping into his voice. It ruffled its feathers in what he would have described as an exasperated manner, called out four times, and took flight. Smiling briefly, he turned towards Samantha, preparing to say something-- but that something never came. He froze solid as a statue, suddenly absolutely enraptured by the expression on her face. She didn't know he was looking, he could be relatively sure of that. People generally only look truly human when they know -- or think they know -- that no one's watching. The entire scene seemed to freeze around him, as if it had been trapped within a photograph. The only movement came from the waves, which continued to crash, moving in regular patterns to the horizon. Suddenly Alexi wasn't Alexi, he was watching this entire scene from another vantage point, maybe a vantage point outside the boundaries of space and time.

In this instant, she appeared suddenly and inexplicably beautiful in a way that defied explanation in any material sense. To Alexi, she looked nothing like she had before, appearing more as an infinitely complex lattice-work of colors, possibilities and impulses. Except for her eyes. Her eyes appeared the same, blue and too wide somehow, except that he had the feeling that they weren't, in fact, her eyes. 'How is it,' he wondered in a flash, 'that words can change one's entire being, and through that being, the feeling and quality of everything that chooses to come in contact with that being?' Somehow sucked into the eyes of the other, this moment, this golden, endless moment resonates on and on; it seems to go far beyond not only the boundaries of the physical body and any temporary qualities it might have -- it expands into and encompasses the nature of who those beings are to begin with. It really has absolutely nothing to do with the who the people are at all, as it was every bit as likely that it could have been someone other than Samantha who had allowed this experience to become theirs. The two individuals were almost superfluous to the whole experience. Yet it had been Samantha, and was in this arbitrary way, destined. This, Alexi realized after the endless moment began to pass, was the game of 'us,' possibly the only game worth playing -- the game where the center of concern, and the center of being, is within the shared world of co-creation. Alexi wondered if she was thinking the same thing. He was sure she was.

none of the words are mine anymore
       were they ever mine?! am I a puppet?! am I real?!)
       (shut up.)
the thoughts that fill my head other voices
       other ideas others
Other
I am Other (others)
I am escaping
        (verb. I am. see?)
I believe nothing (everything.)

change the lipstick change the hair
who am I now? who am I now?

I am Other
        (other than...?)
        (shut up.)
               other than nothing is something
        I am anything.

they cast me in a role and I become
(change the lipstick, change the hair. . . )
I am not        I am not I
               am not understanding you

SMILE
I am somewhere else I am
(LOOK!) I am (LOOK!) I am
stuck
(broken record. sorry. my mind stutters.)
who the fuck am I
        are you
        am I are you am I are you am I
        are too am not are too am not are too
        nnnnkkkknnnnkkkknnnnkkkk

I AM NOT LISTENING
(shhh.)

I am so
are not (am too) are not (am too.)

it's all about rearranging rooms.

toodeepkneedeepwaistneckeyes
        I am drowning /says nothing/
        I look over at Him and smile. it will be better soon.
(?!)

M.H.B.S. transmission 13(7)A:

Rachelle: So all of this inevitably leads into the idea of the coming together of people.

Greg: People on the same wavelength naturally attract to one another and have a feeling of 'being at oneness' with each other, not to mention the urge to create something that they cannot yet put their fingers on.

Robert: This is something I've been doing a lot of thinking about. But about holograms, a hologram is something where every piece is an exact representation of the whole and will reconstruct the entire image on any "scale." The brain's deep structure, for instance, is holographic. It structures all of our senses holographically from a single energy frequency, and distributes it (somehow!) throughout the system.

Anne: I'm pretty sure that we are naturally drawn towards people with complementary frequencies. E and A (a 5th) sounds good and may even create a third tone (the 7th? my theory is poor), while E and F (2nd) creates dissonance. "I'm on your wavelength, man" isn't just a random phrase.

Rachelle: I'm looking for a natural, necessary interaction. Things happen because they have to. IT couldn't have been any other way. I wonder about this all the time. Being who I was at the time, would I have done anything in my life differently?

Chapter 2, Grid 2:

Mother Hive Brain Unveiled.

The Magus.

The Self-mastery of Percivale became the Self-masturbatory of the Bourgeois.
Vir-tus has become 'virtue.'
The qualities which have made a man, a race, a city, a caste, must be thrown off;
death is the penalty of failure. As it is written: In the hour of success sacrifice
that which is dearest to thee unto the Infernal Gods!
The Englishmen live upon the excrement of their forefathers.
All moral codes are worthless in themselves; yet in every new code
there is hope. Provided always that the code is not changed because it is
too hard, but because it is fulfilled.
The dead dog floats with the stream; in puritan France the best women
are harlots; in vicious England, the best women are virgins.
If only the Archbishop of Canterbury were to go naked in the streets and
beg for his bread!
The new Christ, like the old, is the friend of publicans and sinners, because
his nature is ascetic.
O if everyman did No Matter What, provided that it is the one thing that he
will not and cannot do!"
              -Aleister Crowley.

[Psychologists notes: patient seems to be experiencing frustration and severe mood swings. His ego-identity continues to fracture daily. Not only does he claim to be three people "within himself," he also insists that he is multiple people in "other reality grids" and occasionally gives us handwritten messages to deliver to them. His most recent fantasy has been about someone named Johny who is supposedly in the same ward, in "another reality grid." The patients frustration are caused by what he calls "the limitations of the me in this space-time incarnation, as well as the limitations imposed by the quantum probability matrix or novel which is run upon this 'single thread.'" Upon further questioning, the patient became irate, and claimed that "he had a need to be with, in time, the same being which he experiences out-of-time." On one other occasion he broke down and began sobbing, "I miss her I miss her" He then quickly got a hold of himself and elaborated upon his idea of the 'single thread,' saying "emotions are the superglue of the universe. They keep you in a particular reality grid. Like anchor points. That's why I must control every emotion, every sensation, every thought" After he was tranquilized and had become markedly more sedate, he said that "feelings and memory both originate from elsewhere," but could not explain where that 'other place was.' He claimed that it was not a "where," and my questions were idiotic, that beings of advanced brain evolution couldn't express their non-verbal experiences to 'primates caged in the illusionary here and now.' At this point, I asked who or what the 'being' was which he felt the need to experience. The patient simply smiled and then picked up a pencil, as if to write something down for me. I leaned over to him, at which point he stabbed through my sternum, and down, nearly piercing my lung. The patient has since been transferred to a higher security psych unit, and is currently being given 25 mg of Prozac twice a day and 10 mg of Valium three times a day. The reports from the head of his new unit are not good; instead of showing an increase in normal functioning, he has fallen further and further into a state which can be described as Histrionic and possibly borderline psychotic. I have given him the assignment of writing a journal of his life in the hopes that this will bring him to his senses.]

Light filtered through the dusty pane glass windows across the room. The windows were divided into 4 x 4 sections by strips of stained wood. It was a long, thin classroom, with stucco walls, off-white and covered in a lattice-work of cracks from age. An old, temperamental coil heater in the corner made a hissing noise as the professor, a thin, leathery faced man paced back and forth on the creaking floorboards. Although he was balding, his somewhat wild, curly hair, goatee and intelligent, darting eyes betrayed his relative youth as a teacher and gave him a mischievous, plotting look. In fact, he looked quite like the devil. Students shuffled in their seats. Some of them pulled out books; all of them did their best to appear studious.

The professor ceased his pacing and looked over the class with very clear, blue eyes. "The fish as a symbol of fatherhood, of motherhood, of the perpetuation of life which generally occurs. The letter N, (Nun, N, the Hebrew means 'fish'), is one of the earliest hieroglyphs of this idea"

J turned to K and whispered "I got a letter in the mail today that I think you really must look over." Although he said it quietly, there was a definite urgency in his voice that caught K's attention immediately.

"In Hebrew mythology, the symbol is connected to Noah. Note also the symbol of the fish has been chosen to represent the Redeemer. The early Christians used the symbol of the fish to represent their martyr. It is of note that the letter Nun corresponds the astrological sign of Scorpio and to the Tarot card of Death, which is the thirteenth card, 13 being the number of steps in the illuminatus triangle, and the number of steps on a gallows. An implicit mythological truth is that death always implies birth, and that the two are really not at all different, being but two phases of the same process. From the standpoint of anthropology, you can see the symbol of Osiris coming from vegetable societies, where the crops are 'slain' every year and grow anew from the earth. You may refer to the mythology of Isis, Osiris and Horus for further details, as well as some hints at what the ritual is to resurrect the slain God." The Professor chuckled lecherously, peering over at a girl third row from the back with a tight, low cut yellow shirt that clearly betrayed the curvature of her body, and daydreaming briefly about one-on-one study time. There's nothing like taking advantage of people that haven't learned to think for themselves yet. It's so easy to do the thinking for them. Just subtly present them with their beliefs, and their behavior will fall in line. He cleared his throat when none of the students even smiled. "Uh take a look at the symbol for the astrological sign of cancer, or the yin-yang glyph, or opposites are equal, you see, and Yes, uh Remember, Osiris is a black god... One must constantly keep in mind the bivalence of every symbol. As for the prophet, madness is also a phase of his intoxication. Now we turn our attention to Parcival, the divine fool, who accidentally turns everything upside down"

K looked questioningly over at J, who shrugged and then passed a small packed of folded papers across the table. "I don't think this letter was intended for my eyes."

M.H.B.S. transmission 1H:

Grand Lodge LUX:

Transmission to Order of the Hidden Path, Devon PA.:

Robert: The first thing we learn as Agents is how to be neurosurgeons.

Rachelle: A neurosurgeon re-programs.

Leri: He does it through the correlation's noises, sounds, and experiences have with each other.

Greg: ICU.

Robert: I see you?

Greg: (laughing) Well yes, through the eye. It's easier to write scripts for ones self in code.

Leri: It is easy for those who have studied the correlation's within the world's mythology; seeing the psychological correlation's between certain names, numbers, and concepts, one can create and understand in terms of a long term system cogent with the human system. One can make up their own code, but then runs the risk of being alienated from all other consciousness systems.

Anne: Is 'C' for control?

Leri: Only for the initiated.

Robert: Whatever stuck out the most to my mind, I found, was always synchronous with the internal meaning of the sign I was studying. Channeling Oprah Winfrey has never been so easy.

Bill: On the other hand, I'm discovering that nothing can be trusted to remain the same.

Robert: It's not a bad thing at all. That's taken me a long time to realize, not to cram down my own throat like some Sodom apple.

Rachelle: I'm not really scared of relationships anymore, (that includes friendships, the only ground there is, after all), at least not in the way I was. But at the same time I don't know what to use as a "representative symbol." How do you move forward with someone on the pure basis of what is there, without the structure provided by saying "this is who I am" or "this is who I am going to be." I am who I am. If I tell someone who I am, then I'm not her. But you know who I am by who we become.

Will: If you don't believe me, then you can taste me.

K read the letter a number of times before slowly putting it down on the table. The professor was still talking, making less and less sense as the setting of the sun marked the end of class. His comments seemed to be in some form of code, and he could make neither heads nor tails of it.

"That concludes my lecture for today," the professor said, reaching for his books. "Uh I'll be testing on the mythological significance of the Fish next Tuesday. So, don't forget to" without finishing his thought, the professor put on his wide-brimmed black hat and was out the door.

"Fish?" K mouthed at J.

"Have you ever heard of the Order of the Hidden Path?" J asked. The other students were quietly filing out of the room.

"No. The O.T.O., A.A., Golden Dawn, Rosicrucians, Templars-"

"But no O.H.P.? And no Mother Hive Brain?"

K shrugged. "No."

The last student left the room and turned off the light, leaving them in partial darkness.

"There's a vacation coming up- how about we take a trip to Devon?"

J's dorm room was a clutter of books, half-empty soda and beer cans, and the distinctive musty scent of new sound equipment and marijuana. He sat in front of the harsh glare of his monitor, mumbling to himself and puffing on a Marlboro red. The Marlboro man was not only an icon-the Marlboro man was a shepherd, a biblical shepherd, leading his followers into the cyclical, mythological world of addiction.

The phone rang.

"Hey, it's K."

"Yeah what's going on?" J held the phone to his ear with his shoulder as he continued to type.

"I did some research on the name Aleonis De Gabrael. But I don't know, man. My most reliable source says he was born in 1776 in Rouen, France. He disappeared in 1799 and was assumed dead. The Order of the Hidden Path was a mystical organization started only two years ago by some kids in the Philadelphia area. They had one main treatise, which was registered with the Library of Congress two years ago. I couldn't find any sort of connection between the organization and Aleonis, at first." He paused. "I did a little more research, mainly on the Internet-so validity is a question there. Right, well, at any rate, I found a message board with some postings by people claiming to be members. I printed this one out," he said, holding up a small pile of papers, "it was apparently written by Aleonis de Gabrael for Alexi, and then was posted afterwards. The only explanation is a short message before the post: 'for general consumption, until the publication is completed.' Well, here it is. I have to warn you though, it really doesn't make any sense."

Alexi:

Your first mission is an apocalyptic one-about the Prophet Priest. The Order has concluded that the Prophet is living in or around a city in the suburbs of Philadelphia known as Devon. Philadelphia is the Nexus point, where the angels, either from the Pleiades or Sirius, are breeding with our own stock. We have reason to believe that his name is J. Roberts. Track him down and continue the cycle.

The first cycle has completed itself. This means 1997 is the year of Disappearance-Destruction. Artaud was essentially correct, although his timing was a bit off. And now the year of the Fish dawns.

J shrugged. "Let's take a cab to the station then, hmm?"

The cab was a rusted yellow monster wearing checkered white and black war paint. Fuzzy pink dice swing freely from the rear view mirror.

Their driver was crowned with a regal blue sombrero, faded leather chaps, the same color as his face, and a button-up plaid shirt. The chaps were the kind that laced up the sides with a long, thin cord, woven through tiny metal eyelets. Sliding open the window that divided the front seat from the back, he said "My name is Mohammed. I will be your driver for the evening." K got the definite feeling that it would be a good idea to have him drop them off and find another cab.

The car screeched into action, deftly maneuvered about wailing pedestrians and homicidal drivers in luxury cars with high cheekbones. The driver turned his dark eyes on K. They seemed hollow and yet somehow luminous.

"Where are you from? Certainly not New York?" K asked, trying to be conversational. He figured that sombrero's weren't common fare in the city.

The driver paused. It may have been for the sake of theatrics; one can never tell with taxi drivers, especially in the Big Apple.

"No, my little rabbits." His voice had a thick accent which neither of the passengers could place. Middle-eastern and Spanish? "No, I am not from around here." His emphasis on the last word was extreme.

A cream Nissan Maxima pulled in front of them suddenly. Mohammed slammed on the breaks and screamed "fucking Americans!" The fuzzy dice bounced about in aggravation. K was surprised to find that when he looked across at the car, he saw himself in the drivers seat, wearing a dress. It sped past them and K shook his head in confusion. That was bizarre. Oh well.

"I am in fact from Palestine." This time his dramatic pause was so absurdly long that J was forced to chew on his thumbnail. They whipped through Times Square.

"Mohammed is my name-and I have come with a message from God."

Their rusted yellow steed neighed, puffed smoke, and pulled into a side alley. Before either passenger could complain, Mohammed produced two .357 pistols from under his seat. They were spray painted a deep neon pink. Around the muzzle the deep cobalt of the metal showed through.

"These," Mohammed said, puffing up his chest like a peacock, "are my peestables. Ah, my little rabbits-now," he pointed one of the guns at J, who was completely frozen in place, "say 'there is no God but God.'" Although his voice was calm and even, there was a dangerous look in his eyes.

Blinking rapidly, J took a deep breath and held it. Time seemed to stop, but Samadhi was not yet to come. Damning his impotent Kundalini, J said "there is no God but God."

Mohammed spun on K, who was trying to keep himself steady by repeating "I am the single eye perceiving itself" monotonously, mantra-like.

"Say I am the Son of God!" the man barked violently.

K, knowing his vital essence intimately, knowing that he was the tree rather than the branch, said "I am the Son of God," beaming all the while.

Mohammed's face broke up into a mass of wrinkles - "No! Say I am the Son of God!"

"You are the Son of God." In looking back, J realized that it was this encounter in particular that gave K the idea that he too was the son of God.

"Very good." Mohammed nodded. "Yes, my little rabbits, you have done well in knowing this. Now I will take you to where we are going. To go to where it is that we are not at right now." J looked over at K and took a deep breath. "to the forbidden bridge which spans the Abyss of Reason. You, Agent 139, shall lead the way."

J looked confused. "Agent 139?"

Mohammed looked frustrated. "Follow the god damned script, okay? It's not like I write the shit," he said, his accent completely disappearing.

Chapter Three, Grid One:

A Crush Proof Box.

Binah.

"In possibility, however, everything is possible. Hence in possibility, one can go astray in all possible ways, but essentially in two: one form is the wishful, yearning form, the other is the melancholic fantastic - on the one hand Hope; on the other, fear or anguished dread. Fairy tales and legends so often relate that a knight suddenly perceived a rare bird, which he continues to run after, since at the beginning it seemed as if it were so very near - but then it flies off again, until at last night falls, and he has become separated from his companions, being unable to find his way in the wilderness where he now is. So it is with the possibility of the wish. Instead of summoning back possibility into necessity, the man pursues the possibility - and at last he cannot find his way back to himself. -In the melancholic form the opposite result is reached in the same way. The individual pursues with melancholy love a possibility of agonizing dread, which at last leads him away from himself, so that he perishes in the dread, or perishes in that in which he was in dread of perishing."

-S. Kierkegaard.

The leaves of the trees, whipping by at a dizzying rate, turned into a blur of pastel. This morning was a cold one, but for the pair sitting comfortably in the interior of Ken's car, the brisk autumn air was no deterrent. Ken flashed Alexi a smile as he whipped around a turn at a speed well above the supposed limit. Alexi returned the smile with a toothy grin.

"I really feel more alive, I've got to tell you," Ken said, not looking away from the winding road for a moment.

Alexi nodded, fumbling around in his pocket for a cigarette. Once one had been found, (somewhat crumpled despite the claim of a 'Crush Proof Box'), he pulled out a tape and put it in the deck. Whenever there wasn't something to say, whenever a few minutes needed to be killed, cut off and simply removed, a cigarette was lit.

"How so?" he finally asked in response to Ken's question, his feet tapping in time with the music. Building and building, he thought to himself, the image keeps getting brighter, the sounds louder, more exciting, with my next inhalation of breath I will...

"I'm not completely sure if its a good or bad thing - it sort of hurts in a way, you know?" Ken drug out the last few syllables of the words in a way that told Alexi he was deliberating over something.

He nodded again. "Living you mean? Of course." He figured he wouldn't press the point.

"More so," again the car whipped around a turn at impossible speeds, "colors are brighter, this cigarette feels like my first"

Alexi chuckled. Nothing like romanticizing ones eventual slow demise at the hands of a corporation, he thought, dragging hard on his Marlboro.

"Hell, driving right now is a religious experience. I'm one with the car. Taoism at work, you know?" To prove his point, he increased the speed even more. The engine of the car, which was purring in pleasure like a large cat, a hunting cat, now erupted into a roar.

"She's real happy with me right now," Ken said.

A few nights later, a Wednesday night, Alexi was sitting in his room, alone. The sound of the keyboard clicking was halted sporadically when he paused to re-read what he was writing. He had to squint bit at his scribbled notes lying next to the keyboard on the desk. As soon as he was done it would get passed on to Ken.

The refresh rate of the monitor is precisely the correct frequency to induce insanity in primates, he mused, dragging hard on his cigarette. He could feel the burn deep in his lungs, but stubbornly took another drag immediately afterwards. To hell with quantitative tests. You don't know cigarettes cause cancer unless you get it. The only illumination in the room, at the time, was being supplied by a red bulb and the dull harshness of the monitor.

A young boy he grew up around the same area, and never had the chance to see past the hills which surrounded his village. He spent most of his time sitting by the edge of a brook, looking at those hills, thinking, "someday, I will find out what lies beyond..." He very rarely played with the other children, (he was always thinking about what was behind those hills), and as he grew older, he took no joy in life. "There's nothing to do here!" he complained. His passion for the mystery-behind-the-hills grew stronger daily, and the boredom, weariness, and exhaustion followed it. How dull these people are! One day, he packed his belongings, left the few friends he had behind, and went to the hill... and beyond.

At first, he was overjoyed. There was a beautiful forest beyond the hill. But then he realized that there was one of those where he came from, too. On the horizon, there was a great mountain range. "It must be beyond that mountain!" he said, and his heart soared as the despair lifted. With a great deal of work and treacherous climbing, he crossed the mountain. A village appeared out of the mist. New people! He literally ran down the mountain, overjoyed. At first, he got a great reception-this new man has come from a far off land. He was the talk of the town, and he felt special. Unfortunately, they soon moved on to their lives, and as he really had nothing to share with these people, he was truly alone. Every night he cried, because he missed his stream. Upon returning home, he found the town burnt to the ground, and he felt very sad. His stream was still there, so he went to it and sat, staring at his reflection in the water. "How did I get so old?" he wondered. Years of his life has already been spent wondering what was over that hill, and none of it was spent cultivating what he had

There are a number of contradictory points in this, and I'll allow them to become apparent to you. Just remember-there is a difficulty with knowledge. There is a difference between knowledge and understanding. Why is this? Knowledge must wait for... something... before it can become applicable, and that which it waits for is never certain. I know these things and yet I do not, and in knowing them have killed myself. These things are foundation stones, but the building has not yet been created-it has not even begun to exist above the ground-this building with my name written on every brick, window, and speck of mortar

He was so enthralled that the phone rang twice before he noticed. It was Ken, asking if he could come by.

"Sure. Save me from my imprisonment," Alexi said quietly, with a touch of satire.

Alexi sprinted to the door when he heard the bell ring, jumping over a coffee table on the way. Anticipation. Peeping through the window at the top of the door, of course, was Ken.

When he opened the door, Alexi could tell that he was dressed for a night out: a black wide-brimmed hat, trench coat, and a number of crystals about his neck.

"What do you have in mind for tonight? I've got to be back by about 11, but that aside"

Knocking some rain from his hat, Ken sat down.

"Do you remember Shadows?"

Alexi nodded. "We went there once or twice early last summer, yeah."

"They have something on Wednesday nights, and I got free tickets from a kid at West Chester."

With a grin, Alexi asked, "you mean you actually go to college?" It was a rhetorical question.

"Sometimes," Ken said, heading towards the door.

M.H.B.S. transmission 8(1):

Leri: There is verification of the belief model through sense experience, and sense experience through the belief model we keep in our internal hologram. That way, we can keep a certain amount of validity within the system. Emotion seems to act as the binding glue between the two. The whole system I generally refer to as a 'world-view.' Most people have just a few realities available to them because of an incredibly rigid emphasis on "stable" personality requiring one personality paradigm that correlates to a certain series of sense phenomena; anything outside the range of those potential experiences is rendered impossible because the experiencer dismisses them.

Anne: That's how Mother Hive Brain Agents work.

Leri: It all goes back to my thinking about holograms and morphogenics. I want to avoid technical terms for a while. I guess another angle is that we're the fractured pieces of the same mirror. In one way, you are only experiencing yourself through another at all times, but you're also piecing together what was divided and continues its existence through union. So I guess, like everything else in the universe, it's just an ink blot test, and your decision to make it one thing or another gives it it's existence as such, and gives you the responsibility of the outcome as "creator."

Greg: (looking at Leri) As I remember you pointing out to me once, it seems odd that while on the one hand we are the ones that determine the nature of reality in how we go about reacting to and perceiving it, there is a Nature external to us that predisposed us to look at the world in a certain way in the first place. It isn't random chance that we all experience solidity when we come in contact with "objects." This is a problem that quite obviously stems from a linear (Copernican) world view which doesn't coincide with our existence (as 4-d point events.) Thinking in terms of "before" and "after" implies thinking in terms of a first cause. I think that the idea of holographic reality helps shed at least some light on the issue.

Leri: So does Quantum Causality. But it all ties together inevitably.

3:9 [Lounge of Shadows. Chair, mirrors across the way, surveillance camera above, quiet industrial music playing.]

(Camera follows them down the stairs to the club, then changes over to cheap VCR recorder with flashing "RECORD": surveillance camera above.)

Alexi: (sitting in chair)

Ken: "I've had this feeling lately-"

Alexi: (cutting him off) "Like something is happening and we're just little pawns? Like this is only the beginning?" (Ken looks down at Alexi. Alexi is staring at himself in a mirror across the way, fixes sunglasses.)

Ken: (smiling) "Yeah, something like that. I've been on edge lately. (pause, looking at Alexi, who is still looking at himself in mirror.) "Are you being narcissistic again?"

Alexi: (shrugging) "I'm listening. Recently, I've had a really hard time with something myself. But you go, first."

Ken: (staring off somewhat blankly.) "I didn't have any purpose. I was floating in apathy. I guess I still am. But something is picking up. Someone in the background, writing and editing this script. (pause) It's more difficult, I've been noticing that within the last few days I've been able to almost feel what other people are feeling"

Alexi: (nodding) "I've been having fits where I slip into third person."

(Music playing: "Bela Lugosi's dead...")

Ken: (bending over to get writing pad from backpack) "Third person?"

(Music: "I'm dead I'm dead I'm dead...")

Alexi: "Yeah. Basically it's like I'm watching myself from the outside dissociation? It usually happens when I'm under a great deal of stress, or when my mind and body are completely at odds. It has to do with my director/actor trip, I think. I'm not comfortable with the decisions that my body is making without me When another piece of me gets control, I can't stop it. It's like deep down I'm screaming, fully aware of what is occurring but unable to do anything to stop it. (pause) Some part of me wants to fail so badly"

Ken: (producing notebook) "It's funny you should mention that"

Ken: (reading from his notebook) "Take me away and make me someone else. I'm sick of the same old pain, nagging at my chest, inviting the buzzards to pick at my tasty entrails. Just let me get away from what I am for a little while. Just let me live life in a dream, feeling what the little machines tell me to feel, softly cooking the gray tissue in my skull that is the root of all evil and genesis of all joy. Just for once, let me get away from the deck of cards fate has dealt me. Let me slip slowly away until I'm someone else Someone who outwardly matches who I am-female. Take me, strap me down, and cut away the bad with manic precision until only the good is left. (very quick cut to close-up of Meredith's face, crying.) And you have the realness in your belly, the soft tissue so vulnerable to the cold blade of my knife, yielding before it parts way and lets the blade in, spilling your guts to the floor, letting loose a cold of living pipe. Take me away to mechanize, dehumanize, and enslave me. All I want anymore is the blank wires under my skin and I will serve. The real me is so far gone, not destroyed, but locked away in a cage, crying softly and sleeping (Ken continues, cut to Alexi dragging on cigarette.) Wondering where all the joy in life went. She is blindfolded, unable to scream, unable to speak"

Alexi: (looks over at Ken.) "It makes me wonder why every new level apprehended is paradoxically another cage to escape for the sake of the next; each 'advance' is met with higher demands, lower rewards, and stronger cage bars. Bizarre, bright blue alloys and snake-like dancing girls." (Chuckles and then shrugs.) "I don't know, Ken. This passage is blatantly psychological. It seems you think your personality has fractured. Why?"

Ken: "Because (thinking) well, because I've experienced it. I was metaphorical in the writing, but when you get down to it, those fragments are all just a piece of your self. They're still more distinguished then a mood."

Alexi: (taking off sunglasses) "I ask because I've theorized the same thing. I men the fracture, of course. I find myself wondering why it would happen whether it's a natural process (shrugs, then said as if he's thinking out loud): Masks that people wear for everyone else. A problem arises when the mask becomes too natural; the person can't differentiate between 'self' and 'it' any longer. They keep adding layers, in the hope that they just might add their 'self mask' on top of this intrusive illusion. Who's to say what's 'real' anymore? Picture an onion, sliced in half, (makes hand gesture.) The layers build up on top of themselves, there's no 'core,' no 'absolute.' My persona has not only split, it's growing an awareness, a decision making capacity, of its own. There isn't one persona, one self, that rules. The act is out of control."

Ken: (nodding and smiling subtly.) "I think we can do what we want, unbound boy. It's such a trivial thing to say that there are no absolutes, though. Self contradiction? Is that phrase absolute? Everything I think I know is untrue, and probably not even useful to the task at hand I can't say I'm experiencing clarity, or muddled-ness. I am. I can be reasonably sure of that. Everything else? A madman's dream? Objective reality? Ovaltine? (pause) If you can follow the no-arrow thread that runs between my words and think the non-thought that can be the only true thought, I'll give you a cookie dough dispensing phallus. (Stands up abruptly and motions Alexi to follow him.) Follow me."

Alexi: (follows curiously.)

Ken: (leading him to the coat room.) "You remember how silly I used to always be, and how overtly masculine?"

Alexi: (nodding)

Ken: "That person walking around, claiming he was me, I really don't know who he was. He was wearing my flesh, but he wasn't me. He wasn't (pause) I don't know how to put this."

(Lighting note: harsh light on one side of Ken's face, showing half light and half dark.)

Ken: (somberly) "As time goes on, I become more and more convinced that my true self is female."

Alexi: (long pause) "You have three?"

Ken: (looking confused.) "Talk about a non-sequitur."

Alexi: (continuing) "You have what you consider your 'real self,' that happens somehow to be female. Pure, childlike. I won't ask what a 'real self' is, or what specifies one self as true and one as false-that isn't a thing you can really pin down with words and say 'that's what it is!' There's a part of you that tries to overcompensate and smoke-screen the issue of your gender, and then you have this dignified part that seems distinctly male."

(Cut to Agent139 talking to Johny: "always three. Even Plato recognized that.")

Ken: (nodding) "I knew this. I have names for them, in fact. In order: Meredith, The Jester, and The Analyst. The last one is my most classic defense. Cold, hard, intellectual, and purely mechanical. Like clockwork."

Alexi: "Even your facial expression tells it off. It can be pretty distinct. (Puts on sunglasses again.) I swear Ken, we've both got to appear fucking insane, when compared with the emphasized world-view. I suppose we are rather off. Imagine trying to explain this to one of the suits upstairs. borderline schizoid, histrionic, delusions of grandeur, all of the common labels. Either way, once a classification has been made, then that's the explanation for our behavior. It destroys the worth of what we have to say so that they can continue to believe in the world in the way they believe it, feeling secure in that belief. Throw away all classifications except when they're needed to convey a point."

Ken: "Exactly. (slightly sarcastic) And hey, being delusional makes life more interesting."

Alexi: (pause) "When we go to places like this, the whole night is filled with an expectation; you're waiting for something to happen, and yet it never seems to fully materialize. You dance, talk, wait-and yet that 'it' never comes. You go home and convince yourself you had a good time. With conversations, the same is true; you're working towards some goal, some objective, and it never comes, it fades away and you feel unfulfilled. You chase after it with hope, at the same time resenting that force which thrusts you into that pursuit in the first place. The source of that drive seems to be inside, and so it appears there is no one to blame except yourself, and maybe (pause) that 'it,' that unspeakable thing that we chase day and night, tirelessly, is our self. And it spirals (trails off)"

Ken: (nods slowly, frowning slightly.) "We are driven, and the only thing I think that can drive a man so far into things he has no business meddling in is the urge, the need to fill that unquenchable pain and void. It needs to be filled, but nothing does the job."

(People mulling about outside the club.)

Alexi: (standing up) "Let's meet the crowd. More on this later."

Ken: (after him) "You weren't surprised by what I've said, hmm?"

Alexi: (over his shoulder) "Little surprises me."

M.H.B.S. transmission 3(8):

Anne: How can I understand all of this in terms of my own life?

Leri: As I know that you are reading this, that all of the symbols are conveying their meanings to you on many different levels, I see that all of this information will be absorbed in a naturally conducive manner.

Anne: So people will automatically and selectively work it into their scripts without necessary, active decision making on the conscious level?

Leri: So long as it is processed fully, yes.

Agent 139: Knowing something seems only possible in arbitrary systems like mathematics, (arbitrary in the sense that they're tautological, by assessing a relationship between A and B before the fact, we can then think in terms of A and B for determining the nature of C.) If I were to change my belief map, I'd be thinking in other terms, having different experiences, and validating different experiences as "true." Another definite goal of mine: to develop as many belief systems as possible so that a greater integration between potential and actuality can be found. Every belief system is valid on its own grounds. It's incredibly limiting to only have one.

Robert: Contradiction isn't a sign of error, it's a sign of "truth," or it comes as close to our experience of it as possible.

The club was barely lit, and what light there was came from purple and pink bands of glowing glass tubing running along the floor - that, and the rapidly flashing strobes above the dance floor. Columns of cigarette smoke were revealed by the swiveling lights while thin tendrils of it reached languidly down to the floor below.

Once inside, the two of them danced for about half an hour on the hard black dance floor, amidst a crowd of pale skinned men and women clad in velvet and leather. Finally they took a break in one of the plush purple and black alcoves that lined the room for a smoke. A blond teenager in a faded Mr. Bungle T-shirt tore past them, merely a blur in their peripheral vision, shrieking "I've got Godot in my pants! I've godot Godot in my pants!"

"There's something else I wanted to talk to you about," Ken said, rolling his eyes at the youngster as he disappeared rapidly into the convulsing crowd on the dance floor.

Alexi was looking intently across the room. More specifically, he was desperately trying to catch the face of a mysterious man, sitting on a bench across the way. He had been feeling an almost unearthly tug from that corner of the room all night, and was almost certain it was coming from this man. All he could discern at this distance was long hair, pulled back in a ponytail, a baggy white shirt, very Victorian, almost what he fancied Byron or Shelley would have worn.

"Hm?" Alexi asked, trying to brush his now unruly and sweaty hair from his face. "Continue."

"There's this hole right here," Ken said, pointing to his chest, "and it needs to be filled." Sympathy?

"Metaphorically speaking. Loneliness?"

"Sort of. Let me put it bluntly - I need a girlfriend. You have Samantha, I don't." His hand waved over his chest for a few moments. "It goes deeper then that, of course, I just don't know how to verbalize" His face showed smoldering agony for a brief moment. Slowly, his hand dropped to his side, and the look disappeared, replaced by his usual cold and yet good-natured visage. He watched a girl on the dance floor while he spoke. He'd been watching her all night. She had long red hair, eyes that were constantly roving around, taking in her environment, and - Ken imagined - incredibly soft, painted lips. A real person behind them. Was there the feeling of excitement, yearning and possession here, like when you walk into that store ready to buy a shiny new Fender Stratocaster? A person behind those lips, but they sell themselves shamelessly in the flashing lights. He felt mocked by them and wanted to lash out violently. Like every girl he watched, he knew he'd never talk to her, and loathed himself for feeling the way he did. It shouldn't be an issue.

He looked Alexi straight in the eye. "I need a person to listen to me and to listen to, a person to love and be loved by, a person to share myself with. But everywhere I turn I see nothing but emptiness, cheapness, and a little buzz hiding behind a crispy candy shell. Some of them try to be different just to be more the same. Some of them fail to look past what is on my surface; who assume that because I look dangerous, then I am. And because I look violent, then I must be a stereotypical unfeeling man ridden with insecurities. What I feel is pain from need --- just to have the simple knowledge that they feel needed by me. These people don't want love. They want sex." Sitting in the cage cell, she is crying.

"Maybe that's all they think there is. And Ken, you don't go looking for love. Let me tell you something right now: for as long as you look, you'll be rewarded with nothing. When you finally give up, you will find what you're looking for. We always get what we ask for."

"Always a pessimist," Ken put out his cigarette and stood up. Maybe I'm not looking for love either.

"Maybe I am, but that wasn't a pessimistic statement. It just may take a while," Alexi glanced across the table into the group of people gyrating underneath the countless strobes and black lights. "We look but we don't touch."

Ken wrinkled his brow. "That's crude."

Alexi laughed. "That's not at all what I mean. We don't put our money where our mouths are... Ready for another bout with the dance floor, are we?" he asked, getting up.

About twenty minutes later, Alexi was sitting by the bar, gulping down his third glass of water in a row. He suddenly felt a pull to his left side, a sort of indescribable tingling, and before he realized it, he was looking directly at a man he had been staring at earlier, on the dance floor. The first thing Alexi noticed was how bright his blue eyes looked, almost luminous. He was sitting with his arms crossed, although it somehow made him no less approachable, looking at the people on the dance floor, his lips curling into a slight smile

The man tilted his head politely. "I'm Aleonis de Gabrael." Alexi couldn't help but notice a definite similarity in their appearance, although he had to admit that this man appeared far more refined. He had spoken with a mild French accent as well-very civilized and high society sounding.

"Alexi," he said, putting out his hand. The man shook it with a powerful grip. His hands were slender but masculine. "Have we met before?" he asked, trying to search his memory. Something familiar about this man, both like looking in the mirror and seeing a long lost friend

"Not as we now are. You look like you want to talk, but I have business to attend to," he said, a tone of finality in his voice. "I'll be talking to you soon."

"I thought I'd met you before," Alexi said, thinking he had put two and two together.

"We talk all the time," the man said, disappearing into the crowd and dismissing any thought Alexi had that this was some acquaintance he had somehow forgot. "All the time."

A little shaken, Alexi grabbed another glass of water.

When it neared eleven, both of them, sweaty and grinning wildly, charged into Ken's Maxima.

During the ride home, it turned out that Ken had seen that man, Aleonis De Gabrael, himself. "Yeah, I've seen him before," he said. "I was walking down college avenue, when I was staying up at Penn State, and I caught sight of this guy. He was about 6', reddish hair in a ponytail that hung to the small of his back, cruelly beautiful, but that's a minor observation. He was standing in the middle of a group of sloppy drunks, his hand planted on the forehead of one of the sloppers. The drunk was slowly buckling, about halfway to the ground, when he asked, 'Is this the sign of the cross?' To which our auburn-haired friend replied, 'No, 'tis only a marking.' At that, ponytail swerved off to one side of the street, and then ran, noiselessly, across the street. Something about this guy really hit me. The actual feeling was so mixed: dread, joy, empathy, a kind of animal lust that I've never felt before... and more I thought, he's one of us... So I took off across the street, fast as my rubbery legs could carry me. When I got in tailing range, I hung back and followed. He was walking quickly up behind other guys... They parted, without looking back, without him saying anything to them, and led him into the middle of this formation. After about thirty seconds of silence, they started talking in an amiable manner. They were approaching a semicircle bench, made of stone, when I got the idea to talk to them. I started to speed up my pace, just as they turned into the bench, military style. They all stood up on the bench at once-- all on the same foot -- spun, and turned to face me. I could see all of their eyes, and they were all fixed on mine. Now, there something in their stare that was just unexplainable. I couldn't talk to them... Something in my head wouldn't give even as I dug my fingernails into my palms. And so I walked on in silence for five miles back to the place I was staying."

By the time he was done telling his story, they were back at Alexi's apartment. He hopped out of the car and went around the back.

"I keep telling you - go around the front. I don't want to run you over. And and be careful. I've got a weird feeling."

"As always," Alexi said, bounding up the hill.

Chapter Four, Grid One:

A Visitor.

Chesed.

"Around every would-be hero arises a tragedy, and out of every tragedy-a death, the death of that hero, as he chases the ideal which his heart and eyes have allowed him to but taste for a moment."

-Aleonis De Gabrael.

The warmth of the apartment was a shock to Alexi's system. After a moment of rubbing his hands together, he let out a slight grunt and headed to his room. One of the cats, a gray tiger, followed him to the door, peered in nervously, and then ran away.

Alexi collapsed in bed without even bothering to turn out the red light. But something caught his notice - an intense feeling, like at the club. It was stronger, with an unwholesome quality. Part of it was the sensation of being watched intently. A warmth at the base of his skull, a vague uneasiness. It wasn't exactly a new sensation to him, he'd experienced it off and on ever since well, ever since he had started meddling in things he probably shouldn't have. Memories from his childhood flooded his mind. He remembered lying in bed, terrified, being watched. He remembered being at his grandmother's house, and how he used to act in front of the mirror for hours, how he had trained himself... somehow, it was because of those prying eyes. And he also remembered the fateful night when his stuffed dragon had left him and he had met Mr. Fox. Like most childhood memories, it was at once fuzzy and yet impossibly vivid. His stuffed dragon, a deep mauve color, had spoken out loud. It said "I have to leave you soon. I can no longer protect you. Goodbye." The voice had been audible. It hung in the air for a moment, and for that brief moment, the dragon's eyes had come to life. The next morning, the dragon was gone. And the following night, the watcher had come out of the closet. It was tall and angular with spindly arms, wearing long robes. It had the head of a fox. The memory stopped at this point with flashing green eyes in the darkness. Mr. fox had been a teacher in the dream-world somehow... he just couldn't put his finger on it.

This time the presence was more intense, more intrusive, then ever before. Whispering voices, like chattering rats in the walls, all around him. He shivered, and tears spontaneously sprang to his eyes. A billion years, a billion years. We have waited in the spiral, a billion years we have watched.

He sat bolt upright in his bed and looked around. Nothing. No one was around, or, no person anyway. Then, almost out of nowhere, this peculiar, unusual feeling increased in intensity to a warning, a cry of danger so strong he could feel it burning into the side of his head. No false alarm, this. Something was near the wall to his right.

The wall rippled and bent like elastic. The face of something humanoid but distinctly not human was trying to force its way through this barrier, and although he couldn't see any eyes, he could feel it regarding him intently. Tenaciously. It was almost wispy, as if it was made of thick, undeniably solid smoke. It had a horrible facsimile of a human face, with long, hollow eye sockets and a ridiculously stretched jaw. Nothing about its features were clear, it all blended into itself and yet remained startling distinct at the same time.

Letting out a frightened shriek, Alexi fell back, but forced himself to regain his wits. He was suddenly having a vision of hundreds of these beings, all ascending and descending a giant, glowing double helix, like a glistening phosphorescent DNA staircase. Near the top of the staircase, he could see seven beings, unusually bright, shimmering in every color of the visible spectrum. The very top of the staircase was out of his line of sight. Angels, demons, watchers, call them what you will-they seem a great deal more real when they're in the room with you. Or in your head. Really far too terrified to completely analyze this vision, he forced himself to regain his wits and focus on what was directly in front of him. Unmoving, the form simply stood there, watching.

Concentrating on the wall, on the being specifically, Alexi began chanting, attempting to banish it. It gave no resistance, and was gone in a matter of minutes. Shaking from exhaustion and fear, Alexi fell onto his futon.

A moment later, he grabbed the phone and dialed Ken's number. After explaining what had happened, he continued. "I think I should probably tell you about some other things - this is escalating faster then I thought it would. Did I tell you anything about my friend Gabriel?"

"No." The phone wasn't a good one, his voice was fuzzy.

"Well, he did the same thing to me that I did to you a few nights back - the energy transfer. He showed me another side to myself-wait. I'm a complete and total idiot." He chuckled for a moment.

Not arguing, Ken waited.

"Gabriel, Aleonis De Gabrael. I thought there was a resemblance, but somehow I didn't make the connection. That, and his appearance really has changed. He's the guy I saw at the club tonight, who you saw back at Penn State. Well, a brief physical description would have put him around 5' 11", one hundred and ninety pounds or so, in good shape. His hair has grown more then a foot since the time I knew him. He had this sharp, piercing gaze that you just knew was looking straight into you. I've seen that in few since, and if nothing else, that should have tipped me off. His eyes, it's almost like, you know-like they glowed. I mean, in a dark room they wouldn't, they just threw off light, and kind of had a life of their own. Most people have this glaze over their eyes - don't look anywhere but down. Not him, he was there, really there, and he let you know it just by looking at you. His nails were long and pointed, as were his teeth. I suppose, externally, some would have considered him frightening, or imposing at least. I just thought he was odd, at the time, although I had this feeling, I couldn't even begin to explain it now. Even when I didn't believe in the things he was showing me, because they seemed so absurd - I listened. And when he had finished and we parted ways, I recently thereafter discovered that what lay underneath my surface was nothing like what I had begun with. My eyes had turned in upon themselves somehow, like before, I saw, but didn't see myself seeing. And suddenly something woke up that was me, really me, and that was not what was seeing, but what was experiencing the seeing of the seeing, if that makes any sense. When I returned home, my friends noticed almost immediately - 'something's different about him.' Something not wholesome?" Alexi coughed, and put out his cigarette.

"Has anything like this manifestation happened to you before?"

"Well, yes." Alexi rolled over on the bed, and ended up tangling himself in the phone wire.

"We had a seance, a few years ago-" he started.

"We?" Ken asked.

"Yeah, me and a few girls. No one you know, but" Alexi trailed off for a moment. "Well, I'll skip the long explanation; one of the girls got thrown into a closet. It sounds silly, but it was actually quite amazing to watch. I think I was probably too frightened at the time to fully appreciate it, you know?"

"Get on with the story, man," Ken said.

"Yeah, well. I'm still somewhat worked up at what just happened, so bear with me. And let me get another smoke, all right? After what just happened, I more than need one."

"Of course. I'd never get in the way of a man and his free will."

After setting the ash tray within reach of the phone, Alexi continued. "She just floated up about two feet off the ground, and then was thrown, quite violently, into my closet."

"Whoah. Go back a little bit. You're giving me the effect and not the cause."

"Well, we had been planning for a few days on doing some sort of conjuration. I'd done all of the reading involved, or everything I had thought I needed. Various books on ritual and sigil magick, the Necronomicon-"

Ken let out a snort which promptly turned into a full laugh.

"I've always been somewhat skeptical about the validity of the book, to say the least," Alexi caught himself breaking a smile. "And they just had to drag Crowley into it somehow. Anyway, I've found that the rituals in there are often fully functional, and I'm pretty certain I've figured out how they built them from the ground up. Basic Sumerian mythology, an understanding of basic Occult science, any moron who's read Agrippa and Crowley and understood even one tenth of the content can construct a moderately convincing - and working - ritual. As I found out, being able to pull something up is far easier than putting it away. I suppose I forgot one of the first lessons one should remember: never call up something you cannot put down. That's applicable in psychology as well as magick."

"I just love how off topic you can get sometimes," Ken muttered.

"I'm even worse then usual, right now. That's understandable, given the recent circumstances now let me finish. We did everything we had to, I guess, because it worked. Well, at least in the most basic sense. One of the girls started mumbling, at first. So I went over to her, and asked what was wrong. She wasn't making very much sense, pointing at the corner of the room and just whimpering. So I looked over, half afraid of what I was going to find. Some of me might have been excited too, I can't deny that some of my motivation had been to, well just to see if it worked. I was young. At first glance, I didn't see anything, but she sure as hell did because she was cowering in the corner by this point. So I looked closer and thought I saw some sort of man-shaped shadow, and it didn't look like it was being cast by any of us. It was moving about, and we were all moderately still - except for the girl in the corner, of course. Well then hell really broke loose, because all of the electrical lights in the room went out, so all that we had were a few candles. It was then that the girl got thrown into the closet, like I told you, and so I started tearing around my bookshelves, trying to find something to dispel it with."

"Well?" Ken prompted.

"I didn't have any of the required components for a full banishing, nor did I have the concentration, so I did the only thing I could do - I bound it."

"You bound it? I'm not into this shit, or haven't been for very long, so could you tell me the specifics?"

"Basically, it was weakened, and locked into my room-"

"The room you have right now?" Ken interrupted.

"No. We moved. For a long while it was so weak I could barely tell that it was there, watching me. But as time wore on, I would wake countless times in the night. At times I would see something, but I usually just closed my eyes and went back to sleep - disbelief can work wonders, you know. When I brought friends over, many of them would mention, after being in the room, that something 'wasn't quite right about it.' Then, whatever it was started showing itself more often."

"And you think it got out?" Ken asked.

"I really don't know. As you probably already know, impatience is one of my shortcomings. I just wanted something, anything, to happen at that ceremony. It just didn't matter. Well, the same was true with my binding ceremony. I rushed it. So I have reason to believe that it wasn't bound for long. I suppose something caught its interest I couldn't help but think that it's linked to Gabrael"

"Shit," Alexi heard Ken take a long drag on his cigarette - a crackling sound following by an unusually loud, slippery inhalation of breath. "So what you're telling me is that it just popped in to say 'hi' tonight? A kindly hello?"

"Something like that. I can't ascertain any sort of meaning or intention beyond making itself known to me. Big things are going to happen, Ken. I don't know how I can express the feeling I have about this whole situation, it's beyond words everything in my life is becoming a metaphor for itself, and I feel as if there is this created norm - shall I say, a created, wholly fabricated reality. That's the reality that people are pulled into out of necessity, you know, work, pay for the kids, and simply exist. Watch some TV and go to Disney land, maybe buy a few stuffed dinosaurs, always nod your head with your eyes closed. Somehow, that program hasn't worked on us - we slipped through the cracks - and so long as we can avoid it taking hold of us, and so long as we can trust one another enough to hold a world view apart from that one, there is no limitation, except those we bring with us. I wouldn't be surprised if more people start getting drawn towards all of this, either."

"A total of twelve people," Ken said, an eerie note of certainty in his voice.

I was right. Through my computer bulletin board, I began communicating numerous people in the area. A man named Jason caught my attention right away. It turned out that he lived just down the street from me, although I'd never met him. After talking for a short while, I arranged for a meeting where Jason, his girlfriend Renee, Samantha, Ken, and whomever else I could find would do what I called scripting, casting parts for ourselves and acting them out, and hopefully get to know each other. It seemed to me that, almost as a direction reaction to what was happening in my life, these people just appeared-I mean this quite seriously. And I couldn't keep myself from wondering if they had any existence before my world had accidentally summoned them up. I must immediately say that I'm absolutely positive that the same is true with me, that I didn't exist in any way until their world had created me, summoned me out of a pure idea

M.H.B.S. transmission 2C:

Robert: I have this problem that there are thousands of rooms in my head, but I can't utilize them simultaneously. I have to "reboot," as it were, or to keep with the room/house metaphor, I have to actually leave the house and climb back in through an outside window if I want to get into another room. If I want to get myself into music mode, I need to shut off all other running thought processes and put myself into that worldview; the same goes for emotions, intellect, you name it. It's a limitation that I am slowly working on getting through, because the potential rewards are incredible. And one gets tired of being a shattered mirror, after a while. The threads that tie the shards together are sometimes so tenuous.

Leri: But they're all just different vibrations of the same medium. Once you really learn how to be the neurosurgeon that you are

Robert: Yes, I am a neurosurgeon.

Chapter 5, Grid 2:

IT.

"The deeper I dig, the more I find what I already knew but somehow forgot."
                      -Aleonis De Gabrael.

Listen: In 1947, Aliens landed and fabricated a reality and culture known as "Japan" in the world's consciousness. The Americans discovered this ploy, as we had our first contact with the aliens in 1947 as well. We bombed Japan, but were unsuccessful in destroying the (evil) Mother Hive Brain.

Mother Hive Brain moved quickly, acting through inconspicuous agents: Japanese beetles. The earth's primary inhabitant, according to a recent study of utmost precision, is actually this bug, with a ratio of 4:1 (weight) and something like 10,000:1 (overall population.)

So, these (evil) little beetles spread across the earth, destroying rose bushes, and wreaking havoc. (NOTE: It was a group of well-armed Japanese beetles that shot Kennedy, instigated the Vietnam war, and controlled Ronald Reagan via. remote control.) At least, this is my current theory.

                  -Mugwump Jizm, senior editor.

       Modality
       splitting seams seems
splitting through a cracked mirror, really. Baggypuddleeyes in the mirror. Seated in a white room. Acrid white, white like surgeon's gloves. Not a warm white. Sailors bed. Long and needleknees pulled up to the thinbelly. Old electric-chair cross over the bed, strange painting on the wall. All torn up now. Look a little closer, night victim purple and iridescent, multiple arms, dark, powerful eyes. Fishnew, I think he's called.

I'm here to tell you a story. It's my story, really, and certainly not anyone else's. Passing priest of the new psychological order. Wears the white robes, follows the arcane texts. Passes out communion. They call it an SSRI, but it's all the same. Swallow. [ ] will tell you quick before it starts fuzzing, the moments get long, kind of knottingtied to the air. You still feel the numbness, you know? That's a reassuring companion. Keeps you through the long days and even longer nights. But about the story: [ ] was ordained by the priesthood, raised on its principles. [ ] learned the language and was native to the land. Always felt like [ ] had come from somewhere else though. [ ] not sure exactly what planet [ ] comes from, but do know that it's not from around here. [ ] does hope they come soon.

Thick pain in the chest brings me back. Right under the sternum. That's the thinbelly hollow spot. Like swallowing saliva, keeping awake. You just kind of do it, don't think about it or anything. If you do think about it, you feel kind of sick. Spit in a glass and swallowed it afterwards. Got sick. So now it's white rooms that go on forever and priests up close. Haven't seen Agent or Jesus in months now. Just swallowed back up. Didn't understand them. Don't think they meant to be understood. Jesus of the eternal return. Had to show up and turn everything upside down.

White walls are here because they caught me. Working. Bombed the Hive building. While the flames burned around me, there was dancing and singing. A dithyrambic explosion. The whole structure erupted, breathing out the foul, billowing columns of smoke. Its systems coughed and spluttered. The world was dancing and singing. We sung: Alas! With ruthless hand you have destroyed this fair edifice it falls and decays! And then, right before the cops came, we started a chant. It just came up out of nowhere

In the temple of the temple of the temple of the Holy
sits a woman who is waiting who is waiting for the sun
in the temple of the temple in the temple of the Holy
creeping shadows falling darkness she is waiting for the sun.

For the people of the people by the people making people
in the temple of the temple of the temple of the Holy
She is weeping for the people of the people
making people in the temple of the temple
in the temple of the sun.

No one's listening are you listening? I'm not listening
no one's listening in the temple of the temple in the temple
of the Holy to her crying she is crying I am crying in the
temple in the temple of the temple of the temple of the sun.

Hearing voices crying voices wailing voices all in chorus
of the temple and the temple and the temple of the Holy
falling deeper ever deeper even deeper than the Holy
in the temple of the temple in the temple of the sun.

Med's are kicking in now. Let me tell you now how I think, because this is my story. You have to see it with my alien eyes. I am the gravel underneath my feet. The distance between two things; I am, essentially, a relationship. I am not Johny. Just sensation immersed in phenomena. Cold feet at the bottom of the plank the farthest thing from me. Twitch the corpse toe left, then right. Who twitches the toe? Agent would say 'the void between hypothesis A and B within [ ].' I'm the void. The gap. Is the [ ] I, or the relationship? Some call a relationship a perception. A chain and shackle, linking this to that with invisible cords. I can't find any truth in either of these things, as the relationship between my cogitation of "relationship" and the concepts in themselves, the limits within [ ] made... a gap. The things in themselves are not without me to relate to, although that relationship chases its tail as a dog.

All these abysms conscious recognizes in itself; and yet, doesn't the relationship eat itself ouroborus-like? The phallus devours itself and fears its destruction or removal. Yet I feel this very weight upon me with every moment, breath, shrimp-red gullet swallow, DOWN/down/down/down to be devoured and excreted. These words eat themselves. These words are hungry. They don't relate to themselves. They become [ ]. These words fuck themselves, and think they've gained something in the morning, aside from a sore back and a sore head. These words have stubbed their toe, and whine about the unfairness of it all.

This is my story.

IT was an average evening in the decidedly average suburbs outside of Philadelphia. IT was an engineered blandness, a well constructed picket fence, a Ford Aerostar, an overwhelming urge to purchase bigger and better goods, a primate wonder-land, all mind controlled by the aliens through remote controlled Japanese beetles. (But we'll get to that in a moment.) IT was a half-empty box of Milk Duds, a litter stained bus stop, and a boy named Johny. IT was Johny, a blonde haired, rather confused looking boy in his late teens.

IT sat down at the bus stop and waited. IT wore an unspectacular pair of Converse shoes, worn thin along the bottom, faded jeans, and a Mr. Bungle T-shirt. The sun was setting behind the K-mart across the street. People, primarily garbed in garish stretch pants, ran to and from the large structure, rarely looking away from their frantic scurrying. Johny put his hands in his pockets and looked down at the dirty sidewalk. A colony of ants ran about his feet, carrying little bits of a discarded, half smashed Twinkie back to their nest. He lit up a cigarette less than a minute before the belching behemoth, otherwise known as a "Septa Bus," lumbered to a halt in front of him.

The plastic, steel and rubber doors slammed shut. There was a deep, throaty hissing, like a snake--amidst the confusion, Johny looked up the short flight of stairs, black and ribbed for traction. The bus was filled with people, strangely back-lit pig-pen alcoves, the thin and yet cloying smell of fear. The interior of the bus was claustrophobic and cage-like. He nervously looked at the driver, who seemed thoroughly uninterested.

"Hurry up," he said. His voice was slow and distorted, muffled and far away.

Johny nodded and fumbled for some coins in his pocket. The driver motioned towards a metallic face near the front console. The face chattered and made hungry slurping sounds. He could feel the people behind him getting irritated, so he stole himself and crammed the coins into the hungry face. It gobbled them noisily, swishing them around in its mouth, thick with corrosive acid--Johny was sure--and swallowed them.

He shuffled towards the back of the bus as it began to move. He had the distinct feeling that the gravitational constant of the universe had just shifted as he clutched a side railing to keep from falling over. A most nautical man, sitting directly across from him, stood up and turned to regard his two companions, muttering something that sounded like a question. The roar of the bus drowned it out. This man was short, contemptuously hunched over. He wore an old navy blue military uniform of some sort. Johny was also surprised to note that he had one somewhat worm eaten peg leg. "Call me fish-meal," he muttered, a hazy, squinty eye fixed most peculiarly upon Johny. Then, turning hard to stern to face one of his compatriots, one who appeared quite the Santa Claus, he asked "some thyme, Robert?"

"I'm sorry, I don't have a dime," said the slightly red-faced, middle-aged man.

"Avast! I would borrow a portent of thy thyme, O seeker of bio-electric and intrauterine arcana! O muddy understanding and loveless heart, you. And impaired hearing into the bargain! I said I would borrow thy thyme, not thy time nor thy dime, thou pryer into vaginal mystery with the tawdry telescope of mechanistic philosophy! Avast, I say!"

The man seemed absolutely baffled, possibly slightly offended. "Plagiarist! You stole my line-- that's my script. If we're going to take part in the same subjective novel, we have to keep to our own scripts."

The third, who had been quiet up to this point, ran a finger across his thick mustache. "Time, thyme, or no dime, we have a movement to make. There is a front which is already engaged, slowly being beaten back by a lack of morale. This is of little concern to me, as it's not a highly tactical point--"

The red-faced man shrugged. "It's of concern to me, mustachioed pompster. I've got a great deal of emotion invested in those boys, and apparently Gabrael's intrusion wasn't enough. I recommend you head off to tweak Alexi's reality while I deal with Ken. And please don't kidnap him this time. God knows what he wrote that off as-he probably thought he had been whisked away by spirits or conveyed some deep mystical secret by angels. That's how we accidentally started Islam, you know. And now look at all the trouble that's caused."

The man with the mustache, who looked surprisingly like Stalin, growled ominously. "Never mind that. There is a larger front which is also being destroyed due to an absolute vacancy in the intelligence department, and a lack of understanding, when it comes to the meaning of the word 'friend.' Your outlook screams 'Mother Hive Brain.'"

Johny was utterly baffled and enthralled.

"What does 'friend' ever mean to you?"

"Comrade," Mr. Mustache had been hunting through his pockets for something, and finally produced a lollipop, which he promptly unwrapped and shoved into his mouth, sucking furiously.

"That's precisely the problem. I guess we're forgetting about the little 'incident' we had in Russia back in the 40's, aren't we?"

Still somehow standing on his one good leg, the 'Captain' spun around towards Johny and pointed with a gnarled, accusatory finger. "O God, look down and see this squint eyed man, blinded by his own rules of office! They are three times enslaved who cage themselves, most deaf of all who cringe and hide behind that tyrant majesty -- appointment book, plans for the week, schedule to follow, love to provide!"

Johny was flabbergasted, and had no reply.

Ignoring the naval officer, Stalin continued his conversation with old red-face. "We have three positions. I am all for forgetting the first minor front, no matter how much that makes your weak heart cringe, Robert."

The naval officer spun back around, and screamed "And I, who will to hunt the whale!" It didn't seem to be directed at anyone in particular, and he was summarily ignored.

"The greatest concern is the front of friendship, which is nothing now but a front, for far too many," red-faced-Robert said, nodding at Stalin. "Do you want to live in a closet as well?"

The 'Captain' continued, undaunted. "Avast, ye soulless and unmetaphysical lubber! Think not I yet seek still the white-skinned 'whale'? Tis worse: on horror's scrolls accumulate fresh fears and deeds that call in doubt God's truth. I say that thou hast need of doctoring, for all thy pride hastes thee to sodden ruin. I have need for a mortician, or a fine french maid. Thou thinkst thou knowst but thou knowst not, O wretch!"

Johny could hold himself back no longer. "What's Mother Hive Brain?"

Red-face regarded him with bright eyes. "Do you realize that you're stuck in a novel?"

Johny was unaware of this fact.

"Our agents will contact you when you're ready." With that, he stood up, handed Johny a single piece of paper, and the three of them got off the bus after it had ground to a halt. The paper looked somewhat worn, and the type was that of an old, pre-electric typewriter.

SYNDICATE PAPER, PRODUCT OF J(A) DESCARTES #13:

These are the dharmic revelations of this anti-Mother Hive Brain syndicate. Any resemblance, correlation, or synchronicity between this agency and the "Mother Hive Brain" or the alien agent known as "Robert Anton Wilson" is purely coincidental.

23 Mildly comprehensible dharmic revelations:

1. The world has been conquered by bugs. (Japanese beetles, in particular.) Of course, we're unaware of this fact, since the bugs are mighty tricky. And there wouldn't be much of a conspiracy, if everyone knew about it.

2. The Mother Hive Brain syndicate, formed to fight the evil influence of the Hive Brain, to most is really just a group of malnourished, brain-damaged teenagers. But pay that no mind.

3. Mother Hive Brain is the communal living structure which has been programmed slowly into the human biocomputer by the evil insects. It's word is "CONSUME"-endlessly. What are these insect's intentions? --This is for the syndicate to determine. We're pretty sure that they don't mean well, in any event.

4. From the military school of life: I can survive nuclear fallout with e. coli alone for food.

5. Leaders: Polyphemus. An animal, person, (or order), having but one eye. The single eye does not perceive itself. As it is said "I am the single eye, evolved by geometricists imitating nature to filter sunlight in the network of hermetic glitter gem-domes." Only a Cyclops can wear this robe of power. Beneath mitered head shines the orb ripe for picking. Odysseus blinded Polyphemus in his sleep to make good his escape. Those who would lead, take heed:

Your end will come by the Hand of your followers. Followers inevitably stop leaders to make themselves feel that they are continuing a cycle. You are pursued.

Followers: Your portion is none the more sweet. The door is barred by a flaming nail. Soar and fly if you would, or better yet -- could. You depend on the height and stature of your leader to convey to you a sense of power, but it is false from both perspectives. No matter. You will meet your end in the heart of the flames you have created. There cannot be a leader without followers. Attainment you say? The flame remains unquenched. You must pursue.

The Group: Ideally, you are without a true leader or followers, neither victim nor tyrant, revolving in the whirlwind of spirit. You are not concerned with petty power plays, nor do you judge your friends unjustly, or in any manner not indicative of warmth, love, and acceptance. Higher ascend, lower fall beneath and beyond all reason or place. End upon beginning, beginning upon end. Stop, and you stop yourself. Lose trust, and you no longer trust yourself. Pursue, and you pursue yourself. As it has been said "Wide is the world and cold. Put up. Shut up. GET OUT!"

6. "When alcohol is a virgin, flowers bloom in winter." BECOME A MAD DOCTOR THAT BELIEVES THIS.

7. There's a fine line between being free, and being free at another's expense. Inevitably, all Cretans are liars, and most humans are Cretans.

8. The only way to discover whether an individual is a Cretan or not is to look directly into his eyes.

9. The only deterrent to true perception is your self and your senses.

10. There are Japanese robots, (and possibly a few cows), among us.

11. There is a fine line between being free and being a pathological liar.

12. All pathological liars think they are free. It's a part of their pathology.

13. Not only do aliens exist, they control every major government through Mother Hive Brain programming and Japanese beetles.

14. My teeth, although not purely scientific, (being primarily apocalyptic), are functional as canines, molars, and small lunar excursion modules. I investigate foreign territories with my teeth, and make them just like me.

15. Not only is the lotus good to meditate on, it gets you ripping high when you eat it.

16. BELIEVE ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

17. Removing belief doesn't lead to nihilism or hedonism. Stupidity leads to nihilism and hedonism.

18. Artists like to hear themselves speak, even if they're making a fool of themselves. A truly good artist intentionally makes fun of himself at least once a day in this way. It puts him on an equal or lower level with everyone else, and allows him to say "I meant to do that" when he really does make a mistake.

19. If you look a gift horse in the mouth, it is prone to vomit on your shoes.

...

If you vomit on your own shoes, it is likely that horses will leave you alone.

20. "Happiness" isn't freedom. Happiness enslaves you to the fear of its removal. Only slavery is freedom, in the hopeful opinion that there is "freedom."

21. The politician says that cake is cake. The bourgeoisie revolutionary says that cake is something other than cake. We are neither politicians nor revolutionaries.

22. "Give me a reason to live," says the Cynic. Finding none, he sleeps and snores loudly; waiting, that is, hoping, to be proven wrong and thereby awake.

...

"I am the reason I live," says the Idealist-- but no one respects that selfish decision.

...

"You are the reason I live," says the Romantic, and in idealizing the 'other,' dies himself.

...

"Questioning and testing my existence is the reason I live," says the Psychologist, microscope in hand. As the eyes turn inward upon themselves, the man on the outside becomes foolish and scorned.

...

"There is no reason for Being-- burn the place to the ground," says the Nihilist, and with vodka in hand, destroys himself first.

23. The final revelation: "if you're falling... jump."

The bus continued on as Johny became lost in thought. Memories from his childhood... Untie the kids, honey, we have a tasty treat for Johny. No, you know what we've said about this Martha, Johny gets tied up for his own good. What?! Oh. He does that sometimes. Once he bites into you, he doesn't like to let go. Kind of like... uhm. One of those lizards, I can't remember. For Christ's sake, Martha, get out the broom. He'll leave off once you whack him good a few times. On the back of the skull, hard-like...

Johny was seven and standing in his backyard, his plump belly sticking out under a little short green shirt. His parents didn't usually let him out, but he often managed to sneak away when his dad was at work and mom was drunk. The sun beat down on his bare back, warm and stinging. It was then, while looking at the rose bushes in his back yard, that it had suddenly come to him. He was intently studying the Japanese beetles scurrying about the roses lining the cracked picket fence, when he realized that they weren't alive at all.

He picked one of them up. The light danced off it's iridescent back while it's legs continued to move. There was a definite pattern in the tiny shell -- what looked like the letters "M" "H" "B." He ripped the things little antennae out, and it suddenly ceased moving, just like his remote control car had when he had torn the receiving antennae from its hood. There was no twitching of pain, no attempt to escape. It simply ceased moving and fell limp. The car had been a present for his fifth birthday. He had gotten a good beating for "spoiling it." Even more so when he had told them that the car had said "mother hive brain" in an effeminate, thoroughly un-car-like voice, which naturally frightened the boy. It frightened his father even more. He had been locked in the closet for three weeks, his parents slipping food and water in once a day. He had lived in a closet all of his life.

The bus pulled to a hissing stop in front of a large, glowing sign. The dazzling, brilliant neon distraction read "Denny's." Realizing a cultural Mecca when he saw one, Johny stepped off the bus. A number of teenagers were mulling about outside the double glass doors. Their skin appeared slightly ashen. It could have been the bright fluorescent lights, or a complete lack of proper nutrition.

Johny looked down at his watch. The harsh reality of time was inevitable; the mechanisms that drove the clock simultaneously ran the world, through association. A chicken was an egg's way of reproducing itself. The messenger of Saturn affixed to his emaciated wrist grimly reported that the time was four-twenty p.m. Batteries dead, he assumed. It had been at least five p.m. when he picked up the bus.

Irritated subconsciously at the universe's lack of respect for the dead battery in his watch, he walked toward the not at all welcoming entrance to the Devon Denny's. As Johny approached, he realized that the loitering patrons were downright corpse-like: sallow skin, purple bags under their eyes, (or was that makeup?), multiple body piercings, sagging posture, squinty eyes. They gave him a peremptory head-nod as he walked by.

By the pay phone, there loitered another youth in dreadlocks. He was wearing a pair of oversized denim coveralls that a walrus could have gotten lost in. Out of the corner of his eye, Johny saw what appeared to be eels, writhing stickily in the space between the slimy denim and the mans flesh.

"Hey kid, do you--", he started, lifting his hand up to his mouth in the approved 'smokin-a-joint' position. His voice was deep, and cracked on every consonant.

"Y-yeah," Johnny confessed. "I party..."

"I got the L.B.J. , man."

"Y-y-eah?" Johnny inquired. Johnny didn't exactly know what 'the L.B.J.' was. He was pretty sure he had heard about it being the latest big drug craze since sniffing glue.

"You know it", the eel man said. "Twenty bucks a dose for the Transcendent Union of All Drugs."

All doubt in Johnny's mind vanished once he heard those capital letters. This guy knows his shit, Johny thought. As he handed over the Jackson, our comrade-in-eels opened his mouth and withdrew what looked to be a slender paper cylinder in a garish purple bag. He handed the parcel to Johnny.

"God is an eel, kid. Remember that," the eel man said matter-of-factly, sticking his hands in his pockets and rocking back on his heels.

Johny nodded, and walked through the door and on into Denny's.

Normally, he would have stopped and stood in front of the counter, trying to look as calm and in control as possible. Today, though, he made no attempt to hide the sweat rolling from his brow or the eagerness in his eyes. He didn't stop and stand until he was in the men's room stall where he then unbuttoned his pants and sat down.

The toilet seat was cool and slightly damp to Johnny's naked, nervous buttocks. He fished around in his pants pockets until he had produced the L.B.J. (or T.U.O.A.D., if you prefer), and a cigarette lighter. Expectation and happy anxiety flooded his mind as his fingers opened the bag and removed this preciously engineered chemical marvel. When he got a good look at it, though, he was thoroughly disappointed. To him, it looked like the battered old joint he found in his 'crazy' Uncle Eddie's flight jacket from Vietnam. He and Uncle Edward Crowley sat on the porch one day and smoked it down to the end. Johny, who was only six at the time, had found the next two hours of the day rather confusing. He then ate, and went to sleep for a while. Uncle Eddie was rambling something fierce about "Those damn V.C.! Motherfucking A.A.! I'll hunt the bloody Templar to the end of the earth, fucking goat-headed turn coats!" when he ran off into the backyards of suburbia, never to be seen again.

He looked down, alarmed at the burning joint in his mouth. One minute he was holding it... He looked at his watch. It was still four twenty.

"Aw hell!" Johny mused. He took a deep drag...

...held it...

...and exhaled about a thousand years later. The entire bathroom swirled around him at a delirious right angle to the first three dimensions. He took another drag, and another. The cherry on the end of this... this... spaceship glowed long and true and the smoke went deep and bubbled up through his spinal cord, through his brain, past his mind, and deep into the hollow bowl where his soul would have been. That is, if he had one.

Presently, half of the joint was gone, and the bathroom swirled on triumphant as the Steely Dan tune on the bathroom speakers took on more depth and texture than one would expect out of a bunch of Bard students. It flowed through delicate sonic channels, it lingered on the petals of flowers, it leapt and it spun and flew and danced and...

...and made honey? Steely Dan was gone. The joint was gone. Johny was inebriated. Okay, so he was fucked. Hard. By giants. And goats and horses and Moses. Something, buzzing furiously now, and crawling Eyes. Come on now. Johny struggled to open his eyes for a moment before realizing that they were already open, and he was simply ignoring the fact that the bathroom was now entirely overrun by bees. Not just bees, but wasps and hornets and yellow jackets and cicada-killers crawled on the walls, floor ceiling... In short, every surface made available to them by their six legs and two wings.

A surface that included Johnny.

A deep, comforting voice inside Johnny told him, slowly and with unimaginable depth of feeling, to be still and to remain calm. He would not be hurt if he moved as slowly as he could. All over him swarmed the fierce six-legged host. He felt the slight, tickling breeze of their buzzing wings all over his face. Their combined sound was so overpowering, so unsettling... and he wanted so badly to jump and flap his arms and run. To this, the voice replied that his certain death would be prolonged and extremely painful. Johny felt quite sure that he could trust it.

"I don't understand the bees," whispered Johny to no one in particular. His lips felt like Jell-O.

"The bees? You want to know about the bees?"

That voice was real, now. It had come from the combined sound of the insects buzzing their wings, a symphony of exoskeleton and movement. Crude digital sounds. The voice continued to speak, growing higher in pitch. It took on a piteous, squeaking tone. It grew hips and blonde hair. It got famous, then fat -- and no one could rationally explain why. Sally Struthers appeared to Johnny about a half-second before Johnny realized that he was standing up. It took him a few more seconds to realize that he was not covered in insects. The joy he felt at this realization refreshed and invigorated him more than any antibacterial soap. This abundance of pleasant feelings so enraptured him that it took a full ten seconds to realize that he was in a hospital.

Children cried everywhere. He was pretty sure he was in Ethiopia, or some other African country. Flies blanketed starving children, their horrible gaunt bodies baking in the Sahara sun. Sally's lips began to quiver, and not long after, she broke out into tortured sobs. Her eye makeup ran and smeared and tainted her briny tears the most delicate electric blue. A moment later, she regained herself, and went down on her chubby knees.

"The insects, Johny!" she screeched. "All the insects, Johny! So many of them" Sally Struthers' head melted away, along with her body, Johny's body, the hospital, and quite possibly the rest of the world. Her voice continued: "The insects are more than anything you could ever dream. They hold the essence of everyone who has ever been, and is now no more. You could say, Johny, that they were psychic. You'd be dead wrong, but I cannot put it into terms you would easily understand. They are all separate and identical parts of the same entity. That entity is the Mother Hive Brain. MHB is the spoke that holds the wheel, rolling out of its own center. It determines where that wheel is going. It is the love of a kind experienced by the dancing hydrogen atoms in the very heart of the sun, the blissful infant suckling its mother's breast. Think about it this way: ants have hive mind. Yes, even ants, which you oft ignore in contrast to the mighty worker bee," her voice was becoming lower now, possibly even male, growing disjointed under the weight of conflicting English and Australian accents. "A colony of ants on the move, on the make with the freak-freak from one nest to another exhibits the soft, supple, Kafkaesque underbelly of emergent control of the masses. As gigantic, uncontrollable hordes of ants break camp and head west, traveling en masse in large Conestoga wagons driven by miniature oxen, hauling eggs, larva, pupae and the crown jewels along with their families, other ants of the same colony, patriotic workers that believe in the ideal of the common man are hauling the trove east again just as fast, while still other workers, the intelligence officers, we may assume, who perhaps acknowledge conflicting messages, are running one direction and back again completely empty-handed with brief-cases under their arms. Still elsewhere, some ants plot the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Just a typical day at the office. Yet, the ant colony moves. Yes, the ants control it all. Without any visible or detectable decision making at a higher level, it chooses a new nest site, mysteriously signals workers to begin building, and governs itself, all with an invisible hand, the invisible hand of the One Hive Mind. An agent will contact you soon."

And there was nothing more.

Johny came to on the toilet, a throbbing pain deep in his temples. He still clutched the stump of a joint in his hand. It had gone out only about halfway through, so the rest of it Johny carefully replaced in the bag. That Nine Inch Nails love song, Closer, was playing over the in-store speakers. This fact was easier to handle than the insects. Did that happen to me?

J, K, and Jason Stack-Henson were all seated in the interior of the Nissan, swiftly on their way to Denny's.

"Dreams last night... first one starting out in this authoritarian school. I'm involved in a game, looking for someone around all of this computer equipment. Macintosh, midi, overcast. Fades into a post apocalyptic city. I'm sitting at a restaurant, flickering lights overhead. There's an explosion, fragments of rocks, metal everywhere. I scream a name, 'Alexi,' I think, and then just the pain. Lying in darkness, not sure if I'm alive or dead, wetness running down my face, sticky in my mouth. Darkness, and I'm walking now, a survivor of whatever wiped everything out, a Prophet, mighty in work and word, looking around this burnt out city... visiting the society that is now nothing except dirt and ash, having pity upon them in their spiritual death it used to be the city of my dreams, but something destroyed it. Used to be people, real humans, that lived in this terrain I'm not sure how I knew this but they'd all long since gone away. Not with a bang, with a whimper. The explosion just finished it all off. I see myself lying prone at my feet, whimpering. A broken, bloody shell. Begging for the seconds to disappear, fade into the light beyond darkness in eternity. I share the light of my eyes with his blindness. This is the secret of grace, I realize. I, Jesus, the son, am reborn to myself. I am Osiris and Horus, begotten by the word, living in my former death. But the dream doesn't end here, I keep walking. Factory here and very tense -- the machines are still running, sparking. Factory workers are on the periphery -- never really quite visible, but eyeing me -- and then it goes to this party, lots of combat, lots of fireworks. I build some sort of explosive device for a woman's approval, but Mary gets pissed. It alternated with a Quake style movie that I'm also a part of. The woman is suddenly playing a dimple-chinned Mike Douglas character... She has the best gun -- interfaceable with her computer through little sensor boxes and Windows 95. Cars are involved, and my brother, Patrochlos? Greek. Telemachos and Patrochlos? Anyway, he discovers that I've been driving his car-- sunnier, newer dreamscape for this, the party flashes back, with alternate suburban house 'scapes. Then I'm back in the Quake movie, a tough, well-armed girl being eaten alive by a monster that has a looped digestive system. I keep thinking I'm going to get out as I watch my skin blister and waste away. Somehow it ate my eyes but I could still see; a filmy membrane sucked them right out of their sockets. This creature produces Valium in it's digestive system. So here I am, a malnourished warrior girl being slowly dissolved." K looked over to see J's reaction. "I wish we could be each other for a day."

J.H. grunted his agreement from the back seat.

M.H.B.S. transmission 12Y:

Robert: You look in the mirror at yourself.

Anne: You suddenly realize that where 'you' are is neither a question of "where" or "when."

Leri: We live in a world where what we know doesn't correspond to what we experience, and what we experience does not correspond to what we "know" others experience. I think that's part of the reason why the conspiracy theory is so popular right now-- because the linear minded monkey is prone to assume that "the truth is out there" and that someone

must be pulling the strings. To be honest, I don't believe this. No person or organization is pulling the strings. That's what MHB is all about; hive mind works without any observable decision making on any level.

Chapter Six, Grid One:

Follow the Leader or "Alexi learns a new game."

Tipheret, the Hierophant.

"Life changing events are burglars. They steal into your house, turn everything upside down, and it's only in looking back and realizing the change that the thief, for better or worse, is realized for what he really is."
                      -Aleonis De Gabrael.

"What do you want?" she asks aloud. In other words, "who do you want me to be? The Queen?" And she compromises. That wasn't what he was asking, but it was what she heard, what she knew. It was, then, what he was asking.

Alexi hung up the phone tersely. He had been talking to Samantha - plans were lined up for the night, although he was not quite as enthusiastic as he had been. Frustration was blinding him, and although he could rationalize the source, he also realized that he really didn't have the whole truth. She never listens, his mind was thinking - he merely watched it run through these frenzied patterns. Like a dog jumping through hoops, the mind is apt to run through pre-programmed patterns following an emotional trigger. Trigger, response, trigger, response. Like clockwork. Even this train of thought, of thinking about his thought, was getting nowhere. The emotion wanted to be sated, and the emotion, the master, was feeling slighted. How dare she not understand what I'm trying to accomplish here! But that was no good, not justifiable at all. The simple fact of the matter was that the emotion could render him a slave to its whim in a seconds notice, and he could only watch his thought spin afterwards. Always watching, like the shadows, devils or whatever

He threw a crumpled piece of paper into the trash can across the room, and then sat down to prepare himself for the long night ahead. He proceeded to scribe runes on his arm, holding the notebook he was copying from open with one hand.

There was a confident knock at the door, which meant that it was probably Ken.

"Come," he said, not looking away from the scribbled runes for a moment.

It was Ken.

"Hey man, is Jason showing soon?"

"He should be. I'm figuring we'll role-play for a few hours, get momentum going, then we'll go for a walk in the woods. Do you remember the feeling you got last time you were there?"

"Well, yes. Kind of a calling from somewhere deeper in may I?" Ken asked, pointing towards Alexi's computer. His bulletin board system was a meeting place for over three hundred callers in the area.

"Sure. I also think that we should introduce Jason to the inner circle, if you know what I mean."

"Perfectly," Ken said, clicking away at the computer, cigarette in one hand.

Alexi continued to write on his arm while Ken grumbled about the inefficiency of PC's in comparison to Macintosh computers.

Ken stopped typing and turned around in his chair, noting that Alexi's facial expression had changed drastically for the worse. He spoke slowly, as if he was searching very diligently for the proper words. "Now, you and I both know that sometimes one gets an unpremeditated urge to do something...." Alexi nodded, stroking his goatee absentmindedly. "This was the case for me last night... I did my yoga and vessel care, and then started drawing runes upon myself -- and I'm not much into skin art... So I lit a candle and began my preliminaries... Relaxation, shutting off one sensory input after another, and so on. I let the patterns on the insides of my eyelids kind of lull me... And I felt very, very light, as if I was hovering above my body... I don't remember falling asleep, but I assume that was what happened eventually... I just kind of slipped into dreaming without being asleep, and awareness never left... I awoke this morning to a dripping noise, like that of water... And when I looked around, the candle was still going. It left a big mess. Any further description would simply not work at this point, but what I experienced was so beautiful... It truly felt as if a lifetime had passed between closing my eyes last night and opening them this morning, wondering why the hell the ceiling was leaking until I saw the flame of the candle, and only upon seeing the flame did the memories of this whole other... existence? Hit me... And I woke up a completely different person. I must also say that I was really bummed in a vague, otherworldly kind of way when I started... Well, I'm still reeling with the implications... I'm not even sure that it was what they call 'astral travel,' but it was something, though," Ken said, staring blankly at the wall now as if he was in a trance.

"We'll talk about this in more detail later, I have a feeling that they're going to be here soon, so I'm going to head out for greetings," Alexi said, pulling on his trench coat and blowing on his long painted nails.

The moment he opened the door, he saw two people fast approaching on the walkway. One of them was slightly stockier and shorter than he, with curly hair. He was wearing a long green army trench coat, a little ragged around the edges. Russian military pins glittered, fastened on the shoulders. His face was somehow a familiar one, although he'd never seen it before. He also noted, with some interest, that tiny crystals of ice were falling from the sky - not quite hail, but not snow either.

"Jason I presume. Well met. You look like a crazed communist, if I do say so myself."

Jason broke into a slightly goofy smile. His hair was a brown color, curling over his left eye.

"Yes, it is nice to finally meet you. Call me Chairman Mao." Almost as an afterthought, he added, "Oh, this is Renee," motioning towards the red-headed female beside him. She nodded enthusiastically. Alexi would have considered it a cheerful motion, if he hadn't noticed the slightly crazed look in her eyes.

After everyone was inside the car and introduced, they headed towards Samantha's house, just a few miles down the road. The cabin of the car was plush and comfortable, if slightly dirty. Ashes clung to everything, and the windows were yellowed with nicotine. There was a certain distinctive scent hanging in the air, neither pleasant nor unpleasant, just descript. Outside, the last rays of the sun were falling out of the sky, as the now hard driving sleet heralded the first days of winter.

Ken turned on the radio as they tore out of the driveway.

"in other news, Barbara Dempsey, a waitress at the Devon Denny's was brutally stabbed to death today. The murderer is still at large. And now, a word from our sponsor" A deep, throaty voice burst from the car speakers, "God Warned This Day Would Come!" It proclaimed.

"This should be fabulous," Alexi said, turning up the volume dial.

"The Bible predicted that an end-times Beast 666 Universal Human Control System would be used to control and enslave humanity: 'That no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name' (Revelation 13:17). Thus, we knew it was coming. Now, finally, it's here, just as was prophesied!" The voice continued, building to a fever pitch, a crescendo of bible-thumping-good times which spoke volumes of family picnics and Roman Catholic Crusades, holier-than-thou ideologies and hot dogs.

"Project L.U.C.I.D. is being implemented at the direction of the Inner Circle of the Mother Hive Brain. Using the global Internet, the system has been developed and is being installed by international corporations, working jointly with United Nations consultants and U.S. intelligence and laws enforcement personnel. Project L.U.C.I.D. is Satan's diabolical, end-times system of total and absolute human control. It will put mankind under direct subjection to the Antichrist and his jackbooted, Gestapo-thug, official-clothing-wearing-product-buying-sex-crazed-storm-troopers! Every government on Earth will willingly cooperate to oppress its citizens. There will be nowhere to hide!"

"This guy just might be onto something," Jason said, only half sincerely. Alexi was forced to half agree.

There were actually three major buildings on the property - the house, where Samantha's family lived, the carriage house, which would later be used for many of the get-togethers, and an old and rather large barn behind the carriage house that looked structurally unsound. There was a path leading from the house up to a wide field on a hill. Beyond the field was a forest, choked with brambles clutching leafless trees like skeletal hands. You could feel the age in everything, especially the house itself. It showed itself most in space, how all the pieces fit together, how the wood smelled. Houses weren't built the way they are now: there was something individual, something human about each building. Machines didn't make the houses, people did. It showed in how they looked and felt. The entire property, in fact, had this quality, an emptiness that released a feeling of distant loss into the air, blowing through the trees, and Alexi felt it most profoundly.

It was the forest that caught Jason's attention immediately. "What's over there? It feels odd."

Ken looked at Alexi knowingly. "Yeah, we've noticed the same thing."

The group headed into the main house, after patting the heads of the large mastiff's mulling about outside. (Renee had made a point to steer clear of the massive dogs, commenting, "I love cats, but large dogs bother me")

The kitchen was always in a state of organized chaos; children would scamper through the swinging door at the back of the room, framed by old stone walls, or the mastiff's would lumber about, yelping and making a commotion. Dawn, Samantha's mother, was often in the kitchen; it seemed that she both organized the constant disarray and taunted it to new levels of entropy at the same time; cursing and thriving off the chaos.

Alexi introduced the group to Samantha, who gave a nod. She gazed wide-eyed at each in turn, saying not a word. She was standing with most of her weight on her left foot, which was thrust far behind her center of gravity. It was a very defensive posture.

Dawn entered, another of the dogs right at her heels, and immediately engaged Alexi in conversation.

"You're running a little ragged," she said bluntly. Her observations, when she was being up-front, were almost always right on target.

He sat down on a stool, and motioned for the rest of the group to follow Samantha downstairs. "I'll follow soon," he said, when Ken seemed hesitant. Satisfied with that, he followed the rest.

Alexi turned back towards Dawn. His posture was more slumped now, his head dipping lazily towards the ground. Her inquisitive eyes were gazing at him. The knowledge that she could generally see through all of his histrionics and postures didn't make him uncomfortable, in fact, it tended to put him at ease. At the same time, it made him more likely to posture in an even more absurd manner then he would normally.

"I'm just a little anxious. That's all. I often get stressed out before running a session. People don't realize the levels of pressure I put myself through to make everything run smoothly, to mediate between the people, not to mention the amount of time involved in preparation."

She nodded. "I figured as much. Well, I noticed that you've been toying around with our piano some - it's nice, it hasn't seen much playing in such a long time. Why don't you go play and relax?"

"I'm not much good," Alexi said, trying not to sound dejected. Whenever he caught himself using that tone of voice, it usually made him feel guilty, which made him all the more irritated.

"The technique might be rough, but the ideas in your head manage to get out one way or another. It's nice. It you start getting too stressed, play a bit. The guys might get a little annoyed at the delay, but they'll have to deal with it."

He nodded, absently twirling his finger around a lock of hair.

"You really are out of it. Go in there and play some."

He nodded, managing a half-smile. "I'll put myself in a fantasy novel."

With the first chord, an angry blast of wind pushed against the dark profile of the woods. Tall trees all, every trunk gnarled with unimaginable age, as thick as a man. The dampness of night was coming on, sticking the leaves together in sodden clumps, clinging desperately to their homes until it was time for them too to be sloughed off by an indifferent gust of bitter autumn wind. Many discolored leaves had already gone this way, and now they lay in their new homes: ditches, gullies and fields of similarly soaking dun grass. Soon time and weather would wear at their tattered edges and they would break apart and help continue the cycle.

He trudged through the slime that was the remnants of these dying leaves. Thunder boomed in the distance, like a mighty trumpet blast. Determination never left his face, however. Not even the gigantic lumbering clouds, bearing down on the horizon could bother him, and all the lightning could do was scream in hatred.

His hands were curled and taught, with his sodden clothes and hair he looked almost like a wild animal about to pounce. Somewhere ahead, struggling through the underbrush, scurried his prey. He could hear it leaping, indeed, bounding, over fallen tree limbs and thick brambles. This one, a deer, he'd been tracking for the better part of an hour, and now it seemed that it would soon be far out of his grasp. And so be it, he thought with a sigh, slowing to a trot and lowering his ash bow; finally the determined shine in his eyes dimmed...

"Another time, another place," he said aloud in a puff, waving in its general direction. He was tall for his age, garbed in elaborate but efficient clothes that were, like his hair and eyes, dark. His eyes, at times lightening to an almost emerald green, had a certain edge to them that at times seemed almost inhuman. With one more puff, his lungs still furiously gasping for air, he turned and headed for his family home, which was only a few miles trek. At times his search for game would take him very far out. It seemed that almost every day, the game was further away and more scarce.

When he approached the fine house, one could even call it a castle if it weren't for its diminutive size, He called out. His father was only a Viscount, and they were not given control of a very large estate, certainly not large enough to build and maintain a huge or elaborate castle

After only a few minutes of playing, the whole group had come up from the basement to listen, and gave a round of applause when he was finished. The sound of the last note died slowly in the large wood room, reverberating for what seemed like minutes after the key had been struck.

Samantha silently walked over to his side and sat down, looking into his eyes silently. Just then, Andy appeared from the kitchen, waving towards the congregation around the piano.

Alexi sighed and nodded, "I suppose we should. Well, let's head off to the basement."

After a few hours of talking, Alexi stood up quite suddenly. The fire in the fireplace had died low, occasionally letting out a sizzling crackle. The air had that oppressive and yet pleasant scent, taste even, of roasting wood, pine and oak mainly, and incense, which had been burning continuously in a small ceramic jar by the door. The wind was wailing outside, stronger than ever. The basement was all stone, drafty enough that the wind shook the windows, panes of glass hanging limp in their slightly warped wooden basins.

"It's time for a walk. For most us" he said, pointing towards Samantha, who had fallen asleep on the sofa. Once she had fallen asleep, there was little less than an earthquake that would wake her.

"Well, first Jason, come with Alexi and I into my car. There's something we'd both like you to experience," Ken said. He was sitting in a corner, half shrouded in the flickering shadows.

The group of three headed out the back door into the parking lot and into the Maxima, now frosted in a half inch of snow and sleet.

"In," Ken said to Jason, gruffly.

Jason sat in the back seat, with Alexi beside him and Ken in the front.

"Close your eyes and calm yourself," Alexi said to him. At the same time, Nine Inch Nails began blaring on the stereo, thanks to Ken.

Both of them lay their hands on Jason's head and concentrated. Time passed, and except for an occasional muscle twitch on Jason's part, there was no movement. Then, he started moving about erratically, and Alexi backed off.

"Wow," Jason said, wide-eyed. "I"

"We'll talk about it later," Alexi said, chuckling. He lit up a cigarette and handed it to Jason.

"No," he said quietly. "Renee doesn't let me smoke. Well, that's not quite true. I'm not smoking for her sake, though. The asthma and-"

Alexi shrugged and handed it to Ken, who was still glaring at Jason.

"Doesn't let you?" he started.

"Let it drop for now," Alexi said, trying not to laugh at Ken's slight overreaction. "We can talk about free will later."

Ken smirked in return, nodding. "Polluting the masses! Corrupting the children!" he shouted, of course referring to himself.

Jason looked through the windows of the car longingly.

"We do need to head out there soon - preferably without Renee. I don't think she's really ready for what you guys have to offer. What did you do to me? I feel different. Like" he stammered for a moment, and then let out an incredibly bizarre sound. "Like that."

Ken shot him a questioning glance. He shrugged nonchalantly. "A noise of description. Let me get my Russian trench coat out of your trunk. And my green goggles."

"You're a weird one," Ken said. His comment wasn't depreciating in any way.

Alexi pitched more wood on the fire. The logs were wet - the burning red embers hissed and popped angrily. After putting on his jacket, he motioned for the group to follow him.

Renee looked up from the book that she was glancing through.

"Hey, Jason. Where are we going?" she asked.

"I dunno." He looked uncomfortable. "Could you talk to me in the other room for a moment, please?"

Alexi shot him a questioning glance, but he led Renee into the other room without a word. Ken merely tugged on his boot, ignoring the whole situation.

"I'd like to go too, y'know?" Andy said. "I've felt pretty left out tonight. All of this mystical stuff." He ran his thick fingers through his hair quickly, nervously.

Alexi nodded, "you can come, although I'm not promising anything."

Just then, Jason returned to the room. There was a somber feeling in the air; something was wrong. Renee followed, looking no one in the eye. She flung herself into a chair without saying a word.

"She's not coming," Jason said, matter-of-factly.

"I noticed," Ken said under his breath, opening the door and heading into the storm.

Renee looked around the room, her gaze defiantly finishing with Jason. Unflinchingly, she said "Yes. I am."

"I told you they said the place we're going is somewhere down a long slope-" Jason started.

She stood up and put on her jacket slowly, deliberately, without looking at him.

Alexi looked over at Jason as he lit his cigarette. "I think that settles it. There's no reason to leave anyone out. When you start discluding, you begin resentment, and who knows what can come out of that negativity in the end."

Jason's shoulders slumped. His facade of control had abruptly collapsed. Merely nodding, he headed out silently behind Ken.

The five of them headed swiftly up the hill behind the Carriage house to the field. The grass was long since dead, long withered brown husks, clinging to the frozen earth. The path, a gravel and mud indentation really, winded up a slight hill, flanked on both sides by ominous, hunched trees. Alexi stopped abruptly as the path slowly gave way to a large field, turning towards Jason in a quick, fluid movement.

"Where would you have us go?" he asked, barely audible over the wind and creaking of the trees that completely encircled them.

"I figured you were taking us somewhere" The air was positively frigid.

Alexi nodded, "I may be. But I'm asking you a question. Feel it out."

Jason closed his eyes and mulled about for brief moments. Andy looked impatient, and stuffed his cold hands into his jacket. Time passed slowly as the wind beat mercilessly, yet Alexi stood motionless, watching Jason's every movement. Andy let out a loud sigh.

A tree branch nearby cracked and split from the tree, falling to the ground. Jason opened his eyes and pointed to the far corner.

"I'd say go in that direction. It feels, I don't know. The air is thicker there. If there's a path, follow it down and to the left."

Alexi smiled, looking over at Ken.

"Interesting," Ken said, his lips so numb from the cold that the words felt funny as they left his lips. He was doing his damnedest to light a cigarette in the howling wind and sleet.

"I think you're right, J.B. Lead the way," Alexi said. Then, still staring intently at him, he mouthed "panther," almost as if he was saying it to himself. Nodding, he continued on.

"J.B.?" Jason asked, now behind him.

Still nodding, Alexi said "Jason Benson" over his shoulder, although he wasn't sure if it got lost in the chaos around him.

As they slowly made their way across the field in the miserable conditions, Jason tapped Alexi on the shoulder.

"You mentioned a panther? What did you mean?"

"I was just talking to myself."

Jason got a far-away look on his face - his mind was elsewhere, although only for a moment. When he came out of his trance, his eyes were a little more lively, his movements possibly more refined.

"Right we'll work on focusing that more sometime. It's inside all of us - I mean, an animal what's the word I'm looking for? Archetype, I suppose. They take on different forms, manifest differently for each of us. Don't ask me how, but I've found that getting in contact with that animal archetype somehow brings one closer to being centered. There's a saying that 'you don't choose the animal, it chooses you.' You'll just know." He paused. "The totem is an anachronism from a distant time, and although it can bring you closer to your center, it can also further fragment your ego. I don't recommend trying to shape shift before going into a highly populated area. It can be an ally, or when things get too intense, a beast. If the animal gets out of control - look out." Alexi smiled, all of his teeth glinting from the otherworldly bluish glow reflected off the snow.

"My totem is the bear, if you haven't already figured it out," Ken added, flatly. "Right now, my focus is on another issue. It gets in the way of totem work. I keep having these dreams this dream, actually. It's re-occurring bizarre. It's simultaneously surreal and more real then my waking state."

"I like cats," Renee piped in. Alexi quickly nodded at her. No one else seemed to notice.

Ken gazed up at the stars in the sky, his vision of the field completely dropping away as the night swallowed him. "I don't know if I can really say it in words" His voice had a monotone quality to it, as if he was talking to himself. "I think Alexi knows. Don't ask me how, he just... Well, I don't want to puff up his ego any more" Alexi flashed a warm smile at him.

"For a long time, I was this social thing," he started. "I like to refer to him as the Jester, because he's all false mirth and empty promises. And if this group doesn't work out, that's what's going to happen to me again. All overcompensation. I lived many years of my life inside of that shell, and I didn't even see it. But I started thinking about my childhood. I am, by nature, female." His voice grew soft at this proclamation, as it always did. "It's really confusing, because I am not attracted to males, so if I was to become female, I would be lesbian." He sighed and then continued. Alexi caught something in that sigh, as if it was slightly forced. Was the last statement untrue? "That's not even quite right, the female part of me is almost like another person inside me, striving to get out. In that way, it's like having your own girlfriend, although it's far from narcissism. That's Alexi's department, right man? Well, anyway, my father's death intensified this problem, although it didn't create it. So, to the dream bit: I've had this re-occurring dream that I am a female named Meredith, in the future. A friend of mine, a friend much like Alexi in many ways, actually, convinces me to get the procedure done. What he doesn't tell me is that the procedure involves the incursion of machinery into my body and mind. Shining metal bits, tubes, wires - I am turned into a cyborg. One of the implants forces me to be in complete servitude to this man who is my master, a different guy than the one who talked me into it in the first place The rest of the dream involves me doing menial and sexual favors for this guy, with absolutely no control."

"Sounds like marriage," Renee said, quietly.

Jason raised his eyebrows. "Interesting," was all he had to say.

By now, the lights from the carriage house were completely out of sight, blocked by the nearly lifeless trees. The Spartan wind had already numbed all of their faces and chilled their fingers. Holding lit cigarettes did nothing to abate the cold.

Alexi sped up and went to the front of the group, his eyes tearing slightly from the frigid air. Ken was lost in thought

I lie down on the cool ground and gaze at the ages of old light and stars. Content to be lying right here, but knowing that I am unencumbered, and free. But I feel something slip in my mind, like a gear falling out of place, and my emotions dissolve. I wake up cold and hungry, the smooth metal of the handcuffs pushing into the soft flesh of my wrists. The clock continues to tick away the minutes

Another mind-scape now. I'm up against the grater, little bits of me falling away, raw and still bleeding, into someone's soup. I grow them back soon enough, but the scars always remain. Without a thought they want to put a number on me, encase me in chrome and make me less than human. I like it I hate it come closer go away. And still, while I sleep, their metal threads effortlessly penetrate my soft flesh, seeking out the tender spots and making them grow colder, colder, colder The wires communicate their system, their morality-it's all so beautiful when all you see is what they're telling you to see, when all you feel is the static of the mind, turned all the way up and yet tuned to no particular station. Waves pounding through the sky, ever so subtly but surely bending and stretching until the elastic is gone and I hang limp.

And for what? The notion that stability is ultimately right without a question? Force feeding us full of values that do not make sense but serve them as I wake up in the morning and serve my multiple masters. And those who sleep lead the dull, uninteresting easy lives of laboratory animals, with no idea of the experiments being performed on them, sapping their humanity, and twisting their simple minds into their ultimate master's mold

"Over there," Alexi said, brushing some of his hair from his eyes. Ken was knocked out of his reverie. He pointed to a path about fifty meters off that led into the forest, on a steep incline down. The path was clear of debris, although the thorns and brambles had grown long since their last cutting, and now fell in tangled, spiny clumps across the way ahead.

Ken went to catch up with Alexi. "Why am I stuck with an exterior that is so out of phase with who I am?"

"A rhetorical question, I assume?" He didn't slow his rapid pace.

"Yes, but it is the source of my anger - a lot of it. There's really little I can do to rectify this to my satisfaction. Just for the chance, Alexi, I feel that I'd give up a lot. If I had been born female, the conflicts that hurt me for so fucking long might never have happened. I might never have been so full of fear, shame, anger, and self-loathing. When you drew that picture in my journal the other day, the picture of me as I could have been, you did a better job than anyone could have. And here you are, human."

Alexi stopped on his heel and turned. "As are you. Think about it." He emphasized those last three words, and then decided from Ken's reaction that he hadn't communicated as much as he had hoped. Ken looked at him, one eyebrow cocked, an expression that asked "what's your point?" Alexi shrugged and continued walking. "I do my best. Was it better that I drew it or no? The flaw is shown in even greater detail when there is a comparison but I suppose it doesn't matter. Come, clear your mind of that as much as you can for tonight. We cannot turn our backs on our problems, but we may be well advised to avoid warfare on every front."

"You should listen to your own advice, my friend," Ken said. Alexi cocked his head, acknowledging the comment as valid. "Oh, one last thing. A reiteration, really: pivotal to everything, this must work out. You said you'd be pissed if it failed, and then seemed to reconsider I'd be gone in a flash of false mirth and empty promises. And hurt, deep down."

"That's a heavy load for one man, Ken." Alexi's expression was grave.

"It's not really up to just you, so don't feel that I'm pressuring you. I know that's not what you need."

"Much of it is on my back regardless. You know, we talk a great deal about this, the Group, and that it must 'work out.' I know that we all have a very clear picture of how our environment has to change so that we can be the people that we really are, and we all know that the status quo is incapable of supporting anything but robots and people who take advantage of robots. But I see only two ways of changing any system: either blowing it up or changing it from the inside, that is, using the same mechanics as they do. Beating them at their own game, as they say. And because we don't have the resources or the gall to actually blow the whole thing up, and I don't think any of us are willing to play 'their' game-- what do we really expect to happen? The only thing I know is that I will never give up."

Ken had no response. Alexi looked back at Andy, and realized he was thoroughly miserable - keeping quiet. "What's eating at you?"

"The wind. What the hell are we doing?"

"You'll see. Don't worry too much about the cold - once we're in the protection of the trees, you'll barely notice it. Anyway, I imagined you'd want to be involved in this little expedition. That's right, isn't it?"

That shut him up. In fact, the mention of the protection of the woods seemed to speed him up a great deal, and soon they were out of the open field, and the harsh bite of the air. The path was really just a giant mud-slide devoid of vegetation, possibly an experiment in land erosion. The incline of the path was even steeper than had been apparent at a distance, and most of the group began down timidly, especially Renee, who was quickly getting out of breath. Alexi, however, growled and charged headlong down the hill, leaping from one side to the other to slow his decent over the small chasms and gullies which riddled the way down to the bottom.

Ken pointed at Alexi, now far ahead, with his lit cigarette and said to Jason, "he's enthusiastic at the most random times."

Soon Ken decided that he too would run down the hill, although he was covered in scratches and out of breath by the time he reached the bottom.

While Ken and Alexi waited for the rest of the group to catch up, they looked at the sky, visible through the stark, almost skeletal trees, silhouetted by a brilliant silver moon, nearly full. The two of them were standing at the bottom of a valley, next to a fallen tree that reached all the way to the other side. The path they were now on went in both directions, parallel to a stream that apparently ran the full length of the dale. It was covered in fallen leaves and mud from the storm which they could tell was continuously raging outside the protection of the valley, throwing about leaves and pushing hard on the older trees.

Once everyone was together, Ken turned towards Andy. "Can you do a little searching for us now?" Andy curiously raised an eyebrow. He had no idea what Ken was talking about. "Close your eyes, follow your instincts, and feel around."

Andy puckered his lips for a moment, and blew on his chilled hands. Deliberately, he closed his eyes, and then, in a burst of movement, began stomping directly into the woods on the other side, in the direction of the stream.

After he was out of earshot, Ken laughed and looked at Alexi. "I think he's going towards where the pull is strongest, but I never thought he'd completely ignore the path."

There came a splash from the woods. Andy had found an obstacle - the stream. Dejectedly, he sloshed back to the group.

"I was sure that was the right way," he said, trying to shake the water from his boots and lower legs.

"I think it was," Alexi said, "but you could have followed the path. Come on."

They all headed left on the path, marveling at the crystal clear view of the moon, despite the beads of ice that were still falling all the way down to them from unseen clouds above. Soon, any side conversation stopped. The sound of their footfalls echoed, it seemed, endlessly, and there often came a rustling from the side of the path that made them all uncomfortable. Although they couldn't put their collective finger on it, there wasn't a person in the group who wasn't uneasy. Although the ground only sloped down gently at this point, it felt as if they were descending deep, very deep, into the earth.

"This forest always exudes a certain air - you always feel like you're being, I don't know observed. Do you feel it?"

Andy nodded. "Now that you mention it, yes." There was a slightly sarcastic undertone to his voice. Alexi simply wrote it off as his irritation at being outside in the cold with pants and shoes that were certainly soaked through to his skin.

"I wouldn't call it an evil feeling, just hollow somehow. There is, I think, a source of this. Ken and I came this way a little while ago, but stopped before getting to any obvious source. Tonight, we'll try to find one. It seemed as if we were drawn to it, and have been ever since setting foot on this property.

Renee was wheezing.

"Are you alright?" he asked, concern creeping into his voice.

Renee waved it off, and coughed before she could give a verbal answer.

There was a large tree lying across the path, blocking their way. It was when Alexi leap atop the slimy log that he first saw what had been calling to them. He stopped short, almost sliding off of the slippery surface, and turned around towards them. "You've got to take a look at this" he said, leaping over the fallen trunk.

A number of buildings sat in the middle of the woods, as if they had been simply picked up out of a bygone era and left, giant trees sprouting all around their frames. The main structure was about one hundred feet long, possibly fifty feet wide. Its size and apparent age was what first caught Alexi's attention-it certainly hadn't seen use in at least fifty years. The roof in the front of the building was collapsing, and the whole of it was coated in mildew and moss. All of the windows were barred with old, rusted iron rails, leaving crimson stains where they were joined with the concrete of the walls. The stream ran alongside this building, and cross from it was an old spring house, nearly destroyed by age. In front of the main building was a rusted incinerator, surrounded by piled of charred metal and tires.

Jason stopped in his tracks. His eyes were half closed. "This is it, isn't it? The source." There was an eerie edge to his voice.

Nodding, Ken took a few steps away from the main structure. "I've had dreams here. There's something watching us from the inside."

Andy glared at Ken quickly. "Will you stop recommending things like that to me?"

With his eyes still half-closed, Jason turned towards Andy, a very stiff, jerky motion. "No. He's right."

Andy bit his lip, and then nodded slowly. "Sure he is, now. That's what I'm talking about. It's like things are suggested and then when people agree on them together--"

Alexi cut him off. "--They feed off of that reality, which is of course co-created You get it."

Andy looked over at him blankly for a moment, and then he smiled. "It's common sense."

"Perhaps," Alexi cocked his head slightly. "But most people are unable to realize the implications beyond the words." Andy looked perplexed, so he continued. "I mention that it is warm. Suddenly, you are more likely to not only agree with me, but to single the warmth out of your experience."

Andy chuckled. "You're assuming that everyone will always agree with you."

Ken was watching this conversation, but his thoughts were veiled behind a stoic mask.

Alexi smiled grimly. "No. I assume that everyone will agree with 'the group.' Which they will."

Ken finally spoke. "Do you think?"

"Even Judas fits into the formula, Ken. A society needs its outcasts to retain its identity."

The group fanned out to do further investigation. All of them were wide eyed, stumbling about in a haze. Alexi could feel the hair on the back of his neck raising, and it was all he could do to keep from crouching and letting out a defensive growl. The sense of dread was more than just an internal feeling, they could all be sure of that; it was as if the buildings themselves were an agent of unfinished business, of old, crumbling dreams, and somehow they actively threw these feelings into the night air.

Ken called out when he had found the foundation to another building that appeared to have been burnt completely to the ground, and everyone ran over to him.

"I was just noticing this could have been a road." He motioned about him. "See how the trees are all cleared out or very young in a straight line all the way to the left, and then, to the right. I would guess," he said, looking at the trees directly, "that these new trees are no older than twenty years."

There was a scuffling sound somewhere in the darkness. They all froze in place. Something long and low to the ground, darker than the night, rushed past them all into the building. It moved too fast for any of them to make out anything other than a blur.

Alexi backed up to the fallen tree. "I suggest we do investigation on the inside tomorrow, in the light of day. I don't know if I'm getting a good feeling, and even if that wasn't the case You could get hurt inside at night. We have no light source, and although my night vision is good, I don't trust my life on it," Alexi said.

"Agreed," Ken said, tersely.

They all headed back to the house in a hurry.

Over the course of the next few days, we all returned to that place a number of times. The inside was filled with old automobile parts, corroded machines, and a completely intact but non-functional car straight out of the 1920's. Ken had come to the conclusion that it was what he called a hack-shop. I couldn't shake the feeling that there was some sort of connection between this, and Gabrael, the vision there was something tenuous about all of my experience, like all of the existence present to my eyes was a set, paper-thin, that I could cut through with the knife of my perceptions As if I could pierce right through and drive past the movie set, right on past and onto the next stage. And this tenuous thread, the link between these different realities, was directly related to all of the mysteries that had suddenly entered my life without any explanation, the people, the feelings, and even what I was seeing seemed suddenly perfectly scripted, order formed slowly from the chaos of my youth, and yet this order was absolute chaos, and what I had called meaning was meaningless. The unnameable pain I was secretly experiencing had become almost intolerable. It was a frightful birth pain that enveloped my entire psychological being; through obscuring clouds I could still see my terrified face, and it suddenly wasn't my own. It wore a look of horror, except for the eyes. The eyes of the face were fiery and yet cold, like a cat's eye is cold. They were unrelenting in their horrible familiarity, and glowed brightly like coals. They were sculpted glacier ice, white and blue with a touch of purple in the deepest shadows. Painfully human those eyes, defiant against the unyielding black nothingness of the pupils. It was a face I had seen in my dreams for years, calling to me across the chasm of time-speaking to me with a smoothly machine-like voice, a voice of both dark and light. It was Gabrael's face, the face of God.

Ever so slowly, the chinks in my armor were beginning to show as the transformation battered me down. Running this little group was taking its toll on me. Something about the world, or our perception of it, had changed. There really is no way to describe the feeling, that fleeting taste that led us ever on, winding around and around in a long, ever-ending spiral -- the uncertainty, the dizziness, the near giddiness and nausea of the ride - yet I must try in some way. It was as if something within our collective unconscious was budding and growing eyes, growing it's own eyes, the many as One. They were turning outwards towards the world as they turned in upon themselves, uncovering the very mechanisms which allowed them to work in the first place. There was a new childlike giddiness for life, every facet of this movie set reality was fascinating, mysteriously fantastic, like a bizarre Disney movie - we were in a movie, there was no doubt about that. And I was beginning to have hunches about where to find the director.

At the same time, it was horrible and frightening; pieces of our psyche's, the dark, self-destructive and hateful old programs, born from our responsibilities to the society we lived in and the people we used to be, often turned the movie into sheer confusion. These parts of the set were twisted shadowy nightmare places, a Dali or Geiger come to life.

It was at Shadows a week later that I realized how tentative our sanity really was.

M.H.B.S. transmission 7L:

Leri: Once we can program, we ask ourselves: where are we going? Where do we want to be?

Greg: That question is of the essence. I was talking to Robert the other day, and he pointed out that just because someone doesn't know how to manipulate time and space with Will, (i.e. "magick,") doesn't mean that they don't do it all the time. You don't disappear if you close your eyes. I suddenly understood why everyone I've ever read or talked to who knew 'what was up' always emphasized the importance of figuring out what you're all about before you make any moves.

Rachelle: It works better than one would imagine. Better than ones imagination could imagine.

Anne: My recent experiences are testament to that. When we don't know what we want, we wind up willing all sorts of contradictory realities and events into existence. Ones life is a direct manifestation of ones being.

Leri: Reverse "life" and "being" and the sentence remains true.

Rachelle: 'Spirituality' is right here, right now, not something to be held in contrast to physicality.

Bill: Beware falling objects, subliminal references, et cetera.

Anne: A neurosurgeon must wear a helmet on these premises.

Chapter Seven, Grid One:

Tending towards Nothingness.

Netzach.

"Regardless of your struggle, in the end, there are no choices."
                      -A bathroom stall somewhere in Ohio.

Plans were much like the week before, and the week before that: Shadows. In fact, by now, Ken and Alexi had made a habit out of being at Shadows every Wednesday night. This time was somewhat different though, right from the start.

On the ride there, Ken was glaring at the road, a look of utmost seriousness on his face. Alexi could tell from the hard lines it wore, the glass over his eyes, and the almost grating, metallic sound of his voice that something was wrong.

"Ken, would you please fill me in?"

Sitting, breathing, wasting time I have so much that I could do, but the pain keeps me here, paralyzed, sitting, breathing, smoking, wasting time. And I am afraid the girl in the cell, crying because she still cares, is getting ready to give up, to accept the fact that nothing she ever does will make a difference. Her clock is ticking away the seconds, and each pulse of sound echoes off of the concrete and metal for an eternity before dying out, counting births and deaths, counting the events that are changing lives. She is static, sitting and crying in a corner, afraid for someone she once knew, who seems to be giving up, and another who has. She fears for these people, the only people she really knows, who have shown her how to care and how to feel. When their influence is removed, her cell becomes a cell for life as the Jester makes his return. His footsteps echo, he is getting closer, and no one is there to stop him. The keys to this cell rattle on his belt as his boots synchronize with his left hand, moving in rhythm together, forward and then backward. He knows he cannot kill her - that would kill him - but he'll do the next best thing. He'll humiliate her, make sure she never comes back from a prison stronger than any of brick, stone and steel. A prison of flesh, blood and spirit, cracked open only twice by someone else, someone who had cared. The third time, the last time, she will accept the cell forever. This is the last time, she knows, that her number will come up in the rotation of the great spiral. Once around, and gone in sixteen years. Twice around, and she has no impetus to move. If there is a third time around-imprisoned. Sitting on the floor with only her thoughts and a clock as companions, the steps continue to grow closer. Time slows down, and everything begins to turn to gray. 'This is the end,' she thinks, the spiral rotating slowly but steadily, sucking away the minutes until all that is left of her is a memory in one persons mind. The only thing she has left is Hope. And the clock ticks

"I'm fighting a war inside, Alexi," he said, coming back to this world, "I'd like you to be able to help, but you can't." His car was easily doing twice the speed limit, each turn made with perfect machine-like grace.

Alexi rolled his eyes, but then quickly stopped himself as Ken looked over. "When we get there, we can go into the coat room, where it's dark. I'll see if I can't do something to alleviate this situation, although you're going to have to be more specific."

For a split second, Ken looked in good cheer. "Do you remember the goat room? When we went there once with Tony, and the 'C' on the sight for the coat room was changed to a 'G'?"

Alexi's smile was an even mix of reminiscent happiness and regret.

"Yeah, well. That's in the past now," Ken said, his sudden moment of bliss spent.

They arrived at the club a little past sunset, and without a word headed towards the coat room. There was a counter leading into the unlit room, which they both climbed over, Ken going first He paced back in forth in the long but relatively narrow space inside.

"Talk," Alexi said, sitting down on the thinly upholstered floor.

Ken paced for a few more moments, deliberating in deathly silence, before he finally sat down and began to speak. "I feel like I'm losing myself. The person that I was, previously, for many years of my life, especially after my father died, is trying to get back in. Old programs trying to re-instate themselves. There is this conflict. How are we going to be able to survive like this? I mean, I watch the ants every day - you know what I mean by that - and I wonder with a world constructed like this, where do we fit in? How can we?"

Alexi's expression verged on terror for a moment. Ken had, of course, hit on one of his greatest concerns. He covered it up, but not quick enough. Ken chuckled momentarily at Alexi's expense. Alexi caught himself smiling sheepishly.

Ken continued. "With my internal conflict, you know who I mean - the Jester. I don't want to be him anymore, but he's sick and tired of being locked up, and he's sick and tired of my vulnerability. I'm far too vulnerable like this, out in the open." She is crying.

"Let me get some closer insight," Alexi said, walking over to Ken's side. He began his energy transfer. Ken's breathing slowed, his eyes flickering half-shut.

When they re-opened, there was a little more strength in them, but they were also deep pools of sadness. "Let's go out to my car again. We can sit in there for a few minutes. Let me sit in there, alone, for a bit, and then you can join me."

It was cold and windy outside, a dry uncomfortable cold that made the flesh go numb in a brief moment. Alexi paced around the parking lot, impatient but understanding Ken's need to be alone. Still, when the time was up, the warm interior of Ken's car was certainly welcome.

"I can't stand this any longer," Ken said. His voice was strained. It was barely a whisper. "I can't give up, I just can't. I'll lose everything I now have: my perceptions this new contact that I have with my emotions and the world" He continued a short while longer, his voice growing louder until he was nearly screaming.

Alexi's mind was wracked for things to say.

"Ken," he said sternly. Ken stopped talking and looked at him. Alexi gazed back hard and paused. "You want out, don't you?"

He blinked, and then twitched backwards like he'd been electrocuted. Tears streamed to his eyes and washed down his cheeks, but at the same time there was a smile on his face. Both of his hands were clenched into fists, and slowly, incredibly slowly, he unclenched them. The tears continued to flow, but he seemed himself again.

"I won't even ask what just happened," he said. "Although for one I know that somehow you have me the strength to break out."

Alexi looked away. "I didn't give you anything you didn't already have. I can't do that. I provided strength, one way or another, but not from myself. You know as well as I that if you give in, you'll be making things easier on yourself. I won't lie. This path isn't an easy one. But that would ruin the purpose of Meredith, and yourself. Will you be fulfilled? Ever?"

Ken sighed. "No. Right now, I guess I'm just opening up veins and letting the blood spill out; I'm a glutton for punishment. I would never give up who I am mentally, but physically, I'd throw it away in a minute. I have who I am spiritually, but I want it physically, and right now, that just isn't going to happen. I want the possible to be actual. But I still have you, and the rest of the group, and for that, I keep going. I endure. I live as Meredith, not the Jester or Scholar. I love you - and I know you won't take that the wrong way."

A sleek black car pulled into the parking lot, hubcaps bending the ruddy sky in their mirror polished surfaces. The rumbling of the engine and the sound of its passage, the grinding of tires on gravel, the low purr of the engine, seemed to awaken me from a daydream of another reality, another existence. The memories faded quickly while staring at my image in the mirrored hubcaps. My ruined mind knew, with deep and overpowering certainty, that this was the decision point. This very moment was the fulcrum of my future, and there was certainly no time to daydream. I stood up, grabbed my bag, and approached. The wind had recently picked up. Something in the background writing and editing this script. The cold caused the exposed flesh of my upper chest and arms to raise in gooseflesh. Shivering unconsciously, I stared deep into my own eyes for a few seconds, still caught in my own reflection. For a moment, I almost fell in love with those eyes. A stray tear rolled, or maybe it was a raindrop. There was a sort of shame that came along, directly after I realized what I was doing, a feeling like being caught masturbating. It was more than I could take, and I looked away... stifled that love right then and there.

The window rolled down, revealing a stark interior, and a man I might have once known. The clouds thickened, and he glanced up and to the right before meeting my eyes. The movement of clouds was impossibly fast, like time-lapse photography. Smell of ozone in the air.

"Time to go Meredith," he said. Time paused, as if to take a breath, and then resumed. A lump had formed in my throat, and a thousand doubts crept in and began to stew. I made my way slowly around the front of the car, more sounds of grinding gravel under the hard soles of my shoes, until I stood at the passenger door. The engine continued its deep throbbing rhythm as the first few swollen drops of rain fell from the rusting sky. I reached out for the door handle, amazed at how small and utterly powerless my hand looked against this stranger's machine. Frail. I was sweating now, and starting to shake, but I had an odd resolve in my defeat, that last unremovable self-dignity. I stepped into the car.

Once inside, I stared dully out the window at the scene rushing by. We seemed to be getting deeper the city, away from the homes, stores and gaiety of the suburbs. The sun, perhaps also having given up, stole away, captured by a thick gray cloud. Endless blocks of factory rolled past the windows, and I realized that his hand had been resting on my thigh the whole time. He smiled, but there was no warmth in that smile. You could tell he could kill and keep smiling like that, baring his uniform white teeth almost aggressively, possessively. He had a coffin face, not natural in any sense, not predatory. My resolve snapped and I felt revolted at the touch of his cold flesh. Something else was there, just beyond my reach, that frightened me.

The car pulled up to a gate in the road. The stranger rolled his window down and spoke into a box. The gate rose and the car crept in, past the barbed wire and mesh fence yellow with paint, streaked rust red in the rain. His hand was resting lightly on my crotch, again a purely possessive gesture, and I felt cold all over, and nothing else.

He stopped his car in front of a stairway leading to a door, and at that point I knew, beyond any doubt, that I was supposed to get out. His hand returned to the steering wheel as I slipped out of the car. Not once did he look at me. I shut the door and hugged myself against the cold as I walked to the staircase. As I drew closer, I noticed that the entire structure floated about a foot from the ground, making the stairway, in essence, a gangplank. I took my time with the steps, thirteen of them, trying to think of any way to take back my decision. My hand felt the steel of the doorknob before I realized what I was doing. Turning it quickly, almost in frustration, I stepped inside. All of my perception seemed a procession of flashing, still slides. One sensation jumped into the next without any intermediary.

I was in a waiting room. It had a drop ceiling, fluorescent lights, and beige carpeting. I sat on a chrome chair, and started to relax, telling myself that it was all some big misunderstanding. I let my thoughts drift to nowhere in particular, running my fingers up and down my cheek, looking through the curtain of my hair at the inner door. Waiting. I didn't have long to wait. It burst open and I fell out of my daydream, the electric pulse of shock running the full length of my body. Four stout men in black suits were upon me, took a limb each, and carried me off down the corridor, screaming. Thrashing and kicking and squirming as much as possible, I was unable to break their firm grip. We entered a larger room, and I felt cold steel underneath me. I was undressed and strapped to a form fitting, unbearably frigid steel table in a trice. My screams broke into sobbing, hoarse moans. The webbed nylon straps that held my limbs in place were also too much for me to escape, and so I lay still. There was not a thing I could do, and realizing that, the rest of my mind broke. The flashing images, my direct experience, became a shambles-I heard the hoarse moans of sex, the bite of a whip, a waiter walking up to me in a restaurant. Are you being served? Yes, I've already ordered, thank you. He's looking down at my breasts, and I feel ashamed. Or is it a sort of muted flattery? Riding on horse back as a child, the leaves of the trees whipping by so quickly, my hair in braids. I feel so alive, I was thinking. I've just got to tell you. It was... blue there. But there was something else there too, I was running away. Wanting to feel closeness, long Sunday mornings bathing in the sunlight with the windows open, spring air blowing the curtains about, the object of my affection curled up beside me, an unsettling tumultuousness-but it's all fading away now, growing dimmer and more uniform. Trying to cling to those fading images, not wanting to be left all alone. The images were gone, replaced by a purely physical sensation, working in subtle, almost liquid waves and crests. The feeling was pornographic, purely physical. It was an uncomfortable violation, but something in me wanted it too. Or maybe I was just telling myself that. It made the pill easier to swallow. I was turned on; there was a damp heat in my groin, steadily growing up into my abdomen. This was revolting somehow, horrifying. It took me a few seconds to gather the willpower to look around. A man was approaching, his eyes replaced by precise mechanical lenses. The rings around them spun on their own as he walked closer. Machines came up out of the floor to my sides and at my feet. From the ceiling, a semicircle of surgical instruments rapidly descended. I looked at the surgeon again, and I could sense nothing behind those lenses. Nothing human. They focused and refocused as he manipulated equipment out of my sight. Sweat rolled off of my head at a ridiculous rate even though the room was cold. There was a sharp jab as he injected me. My nipples tightened and, strangely, I could smell myself in the antiseptic air. My mind was racing, still screaming even though my voice had given out minutes ago. The surgeon put his hand on my forehead, pushed my head back, and began to push a lubricated plastic tube down my esophagus. Although I felt the pressure from this, I did not feel any pain. He lifted a scalpel and began to cut... I lost my vision... and most of my mind. I heard saws, felt a gut wrenching pressure, and then an odd stillness. Before I passed out, I felt all of my ribs crack neatly at the spine, courtesy of a rib-spreader.

I came to in a chair. Two of the dark suited men were flanking me. In front of me, there was a desk, and the back of a high wing-back chair. I assumed it was an office. In the corner of this office, there was a full length mirror and two windows. Outside, I could see that it was night. There were no stars.

"Meredith," spoke a familiar voice from behind that chair. I snapped to look in that direction, even before I was sure I heard anything. There was a tingling in my temples. What was left of my mind seemed to work now in well organized, simple reactive patterns. It was more efficient, I realized.

"Yes... master?" I heard myself ask.

"I want you to go look in the mirror. Take a good long look at yourself. Know that every time you do not serve us, it will be this... no more... uncomfortable." I felt afraid, although the sensation was distant and translucent. I started to open my mouth to plead with him, and there was a pressure on my temples, a great roaring screaming cacophony in my head. I rose, and walked to the mirror as the noise and pressure lessened. In the mirror I saw the same eyes staring at me that I had seen in the stranger's car window. Metal covered my head, except for the face, ears, neck and arms. A ponytail stuck out from the top. The only other untouched surfaces were the palms of my hands, the soles of my feet, and an area that included my breasts, crotch and buttocks. I wanted to cry, to scream and kick and thrash and a thousand other things, but the pressure and the noise came back. All I saw my reflection do was smile and pose suggestively.

"Meredith?"

"Yes, master?" I said, still looking into the mirror, batting my eyelashes.

"What do you want?"

"Whatever pleases you. I will be whatever you want me to be. I will degrade myself to pleasure you."

Still looking into the mirror, I had a hard time remembering what it was I saw in those eyes. They were empty, and I existed only to be filled. I was ugly. The sweet, grinding noise closed in once more, and I knew something had ended.

About a week later, Samantha and Alexi were sitting in the low grass at the top of her field. The sun was just beginning to dip lazily beneath the tree line, bruising them a deep purple, silhouetted starkly against the vivid sky which was itself slowly giving way to black. There was an energy in the chill air, pained but enjoying the almost brutal beauty of it all. It was a defiant sort of power.

The two of them sat, looking at each other and at the colors shooting across the horizon, as the mastiffs ran wild around the field. Samantha's family owned one other dog, a sort of mutt, whose name was Rory. He was the odd one out in the dog's hierarchy, and not particularly happy about the fact. He stood beside the two of them, his hair ruffled by the wind, and watched the other dogs running in the distance.

"To think that all of this will be for nothing because of our blindness. We all see everything, and yes, because of that, nothing." The sarcasm in his voice was undeniable. The thought was cold and pure, like an ice-cold bath that invigorates and makes you ache with the coldness of it, but the words rang hollow and false. "We look ourselves in the mirror each day, and throughout that day, all we see is reflections of our selves, never past them. Never through that mirror image. And when we get involved with people, how much of them are we really seeing - how much of it is really just projection? Is our contact real, or are we bound to lose all of our friendships as we become increasingly enamored with our mirror image, losing our self in the process of identifying with our horribly tenuous perception of self?"

"Don't worry," Samantha said, "there are some things that can't change. Think about what it feels like in my arms."

Alexi smiled bitterly; Samantha looked frustrated. "The way of the world is change," he said, "it is the only absolute we can expect to experience. Change thinly veiling nothing, like crepe paper." He paused for a long moment, and then turned to look at her most deliberately, his voice lower and quieter now, grating hard at times and yet at others, full of softness. "I spent I know not how long walking about as if I were in a fog. I was drowning, not adrift in loneliness, but in some far more subtle liquid, and it was a direct product of my state that I could not know what it was. Let's just say that I was not yet born, and the very innards of my subconscious were still being carved away by days of unrecalled experience. And then, almost as an accident it seems, I saw you and exploded out of those subterranean passages, running headlong into sunlight. And I was blinded by it. My eyes met those, your eyes, and in meeting themselves outside, turned inwards upon themselves, upon me, and recalled my past and future as if it were all a dream, occurring in the flash of an eye. This is what happened, Samantha. I saw myself for the first time, and giddy from the experience, charged headlong into all of this new territory without a consideration of repercussion, and without the realization of my potential folly. My youth is betrayed in this action, as is my heart, for I have done something which speaks from my center, or rather, I have allowed myself to Hope for such a thing to be. Now, watching the orchestration of my design, after it has played the first few notes, and those most hesitantly, I see it fall out of tune, and I cannot help feeling absolute despair. I see nothing ahead that gives my heart any pleasure. I have read ahead in the script, Samantha. This is a tragedy. And all tragedies end in death."

"Alexi" there was a definite pleading in her eyes; a request to stop his hurting so that she could stop hers. "'Us' will stay."

"No," Alexi said, a bit too harshly. He realized it a moment later. "Look, it's alright. I think too much. That's all." There was little conviction in his words. By his intonation, he said the exact opposite: 'it isn't alright.'

/and sometimes the cold is unbearable/

As the sun sank beneath the trees, and all the colors dimmed into utter blackness, the energy slowly changed. It was still pained, but the admiration for beauty was gone, as it fell through defiance and into resignation. There is a certain moment, when autumn turns to winter, and it isn't a moment you can mark on a calendar, or put a number or even your finger on. There's just a particular transition that happens, maybe it is the last breath of what was new, what has become old, that escapes at this moment. This intangible change was mirrored perfectly by Alexi's facial expression. He let out a long sigh, and stood up. It was night.

I must make a confession. I'll have started analyzing one thing when I immediately begin analyzing the fact that I'm analyzing. I feel the overwhelming compulsion to schematize all of my experience. Everything must be broken down into bite-sized nuggets of sense to be consumed and excreted. Only when digested into a 'like' form does anything make sense. What that means is that only when digested as something like me does it become a real part of my world, and from these sense-nuggets that I have constructed of my past self, I build the foundation for the future me. The structure is incapable of reaching outside of itself, and so it subsists in a form of self-cannibalism.

It is this assimilation drive that fuels the 'companionship' knee-jerk response. 'Caring' is just the urge to experience something with someone rather than contrarily, in other words, against or in a negating relation to them. It is being-with. But because of the way cognition works, that we cannot understand a thing until it is made sense of as me, I can't seem to avoid putting myself in halls of mirrors, mirrors, mirrors. This is a necessary self-indulgence. Far from the pleasure of having found ones self in another, it is rather an indigestion; the experience is "I have only found myself in this, that is, nothing." There was no real contact, ever. What does not resemble me either through symbiosis or contrast inevitably disappears altogether. (Contrast and opposition is just another form of agreement. If I say "yes" to your "no," I'm still agreeing to play along the lines of the game that is established as yesno. "I like wearing black," he says. "I like wearing white," I say. More petty social posturing.)

People so often seem to merely assume that my subconscious, with the same kind of motion that a stamp collector hunts for and categorizes stamps, merely drives me towards relationships so I can say "I've done that," and feel better about it. (By 'relationships' I mean a relation of any kind with a person, where the attempt is to relate to them as they are rather than as they are in relation to you.) This is like scratching the surface of a quarter, and finding it still a silver color, assuming that it runs all the way through. There's copper in the middle. A sick satisfaction does arise, but not from the possession of another in any sense but rather in my procreation of myself through another. This isn't a reconcilement, nor is it a solution. It's just the result of my trying, and failing, to relate to another as they are in themselves.

It is a procreative drive of a sort that was the solution to my, pardon the absurdity of this term, 'existential dilemma.' (Finding the meaning of being a self.) I can create something lasting external to myself; that creation, once it leaves the psychological womb, continues to exist as a separate entity. And it is an entity built with a definite purpose that I put there. Specifically, I'm speaking of art. However, the result of this action, while it seeks reconciliation, is merely assimilation and a subsequent feeling of disappointment. The only valid motivation is something that will, in one way or another, further externalize my ability to externalize the before strictly internal. In other words, if I cannot understand, relate to and experience another as they are in themselves, perhaps they can relate to me through what I create.

Although I hate to admit it, the drive to break out of the boundary of my 'self' is transpersonal. I mean that it has nothing to do with who the other person is in actuality, although I'm sure the expected completion of the process does. It's all about the possibility inherent within the person. This is precisely the problem: it's not about you, it's about me. The only way I know how to 'help' people is to assimilate them. And then it's no wonder that those with the weakest ego boundaries are generally the ones who come running-everyone else has better taste then that.

Chapter 8, Grid 2:

A GOOD fish is a DEAD fish. (Exception: Cod.)

The Chariot, a fence.

"When we crucify a man he should confounded well stay crucified."
                      -Robert A. Wilson.

"What would you like to drink?" Barbara half-slurred. Johny knew that this primate was called 'Barbara,' and that she was 'pleased to serve him,' courtesy of a small plastic badge, adhesive, and the remarkable invention we call language. Contrarily, the fact that she was a greasy, tranquilized, exploited serving wench shrink-wrapped in synthetic fabric was rather apparent to him as his eyes did the best they could to avoid caressing her heaving form.

Johny suggested, "Coffee?"

"We're all out of coffee. Can I get you something else?" she asked. Johny could see that she copped some sort of masturbatory thrill from informing customers that their lofty consumer goals could not never be sated.

"M-Mister Pibb?" he half-squeaked. Her eyes lit up as she heard Johny say the word 'Pibb.'

"Never heard of it," our serving-wench grunted. Johny was looking at the Mr. Pibb logo on the menu now, staring holes in it. He was busy imagining the Pibb logo erupting into flame when, to his surprise, it did.

"I'll just have a coke, then," said our humble Johny. Barbara nodded, and loafed off to the kitchen. Not wanting to waste the opportunity, Johny pulled a cigarette from his pack, lit it from the still-flaming menu, and sat back to smoke it. This was his first chance to observe the denizens of the smoking section on this busy evening.

In the booth immediately next to him, sat three boys in their early teens. One of them, a round smiling youth in a Rage Against the Machine T-shirt, was busy defending an important issue to his two black-clad associates.

"This is the only T-shirt I own that isn't black!," he argued. "All my pants are black, all my underwear is black, all of my lipstick is black. Hell! Even these fishnet stockings I'm wearing on my arms are black!" A fine example of the gothic underbelly, Johny thought.

His friends seemed to be losing interest quickly, as were our eyes-and-ears manifested in the plebeian form of Johny. He looked over just in time to see Jesus Christ walk by in a floral skirt and a see-through sweater, followed by another long-hair carrying a home-built sitar, wearing green goggles and a surplus Army trench coat. Jesus was wearing a navy blue T-shirt under the sweater which read "Death to all Fishes." Johny had a hard time believing that either of these two had ever done any time in what his Marine-Uncle liked to call 'The Service.' Behind these two strode an auburn haired man wearing mirrored Ponch shades, a black wife-beater, camo pants, and combat boots. All three of them reeked of marijuana.

"Can I get you something to eat, sir?" growled an underpaid Barbara. Johny snapped out of his daydream. Something in her eyes suggested that she had either asked Johny that particular question one time too many, or she was rabid and fading fast. He could swear that there was frothy spittle flecking her chapped lips.

Johny quickly replied with, "A Super Bird, please?" By the set of her eyebrows, Johny was pretty sure that some dearly loved relative of hers had just died -- and that it was somehow his fault. She stared at him for just a moment longer before she harrumphed back from whence she came.

There was a loud metallic clatter when one of waitresses walked into the cook. Jay, the mystery cook, looked over at Barbara. She scowled at him, as if he had warped causality and had been the solitary reason she had lost her balance. He shrugged nonchalantly and tried to put his puffy white hat back on straight. As she walked away, he thought he noticed a tiny antennae poking out of the back of her dress, but his mind quickly wrote it off. His brain, like all brains, was programmed to establish its set of rules, (the catch word was 'reality'), based upon the present, established norm. The truth was, Jay simply hadn't snapped yet. All mystics have had psychotic breakdowns, although not all psychotics are mystics.

He tried to ignore the elevator music, pumping vigorously out of the round metal speakers in the smoke stained ceiling. He began slicing up a Super Bird while his subconscious listened attentively to the subliminal alien transmissions.

As Johny sat waiting for his food, a man in a wheelchair rolled over to his table. There was the strong smell of onions as he slouched to one side. He turned and regarded the kid in the Rage Against the Machine T-shirt, mumbling something which Johny couldn't completely make out. "A thundercloud from below I am the God who created this farce." His eyes darted from side to side as he spoke, and although his frame was thin and wiry, he spoke with an unbelievable presence. Even the waitress paused and looked his way.

He turned back to Johny. "O my friend, who has lost his way within himself -- contorted and wrenched by the invisible hands of Fate -- how is it that you have gone to such heights, without ever stopping to look around you? Why do you leap from stone to stone... and never look down? Like the beginning of Beethoven's 5th it knocks, pounds. It berates. It screams. And still, you do not hear it!"

Johny looked down at his scrawny legs. "Who are you?"

The man continued undaunted. Johny assumed that his question had been rhetorical. "For the height to which you aspire is also the height to which you sink; as the tendril branches of the Tree of Knowledge stretch up to the clouds, the roots too sink deeper and deeper into earth and sediment, sucking up hosts of answerless questions and filth from top to bottom. The timbre of each melancholy note resonates with the ache of your Hope, your tallest branches stretching further still to be above, while the weight of your mass drags you further into the mud. And, as your branches begin to reach those clouds, you are hurled into a convulsive terror, a loneliness without end, a delirious fever which's name is unattainable Hope, infinite Possibility In the innermost, most subterranean recesses of your Self, I can hear you screaming 'how is it that no one can hear me, from up here? Why do they not understand? And now... now I do not even understand myself... I am the day after yesterday, and I refuse myself. I turn away from my unattainable future, a cringe from the memories of my past -- they will not let me go on. And I grow more and more unbalanced as actuality pushes me on further without a choice. My longing for a companion is so unbearable that I dirty it with the filth from my roots; my need for communion is so great that I cannot dare open my mouth; my hate for my friends is so great... because of my love...' Must you turn yourself away -- from yourself -- and cast Hope to your opposite? Would you be any happier a 'no' rather than a 'yes'? You still long for freedom, my friend, and that longing is your cage. You do not even realize what you are missing, or what it is that you are longing for, but something in you calls out to be aware. You have become parched in the desert of apathy, and thirst for the Bacchic springs forever out of your reach. And while your highest aspects thirst for freedom, so too your basest roots thrust outwards and strangle the hopes-"

A red-headed girl built like a sparrow wandered into the smoking area. She had that mild-mannered heroin-chic that was all the rage, the paradoxical combination of unnaturally red cheeks - carefully applied pigment to simulate the sex flush - contrasting skin that was otherwise an almost slate gray-blue. Her eyes were glazed over, and yet the way they moved from side to side across the room, scanning every detail, suggested that if she wasn't intelligent, she was at least cunning. It was a hungry look, really, like a wolf that had gone far too many days without a good meal, and was now desperate enough to consider human flesh a suitable entree. The man paused in the middle of his monologue and asked Johny if he knew her.

Of course, Johny realized that aliens only take redheads, because the aliens are actually Japanese. The Japanese like redheads. Wisely keeping his opinions to himself, he merely nodded. "Yeah." It was certain that, if she hadn't been abducted yet, she was soon to be.

The man in the wife beater leaned over. He had apparently been listening in on the conversation. "I used to date her," he said, pulling his shades up for a moment to reveal bloodshot eyes. As if anyone in a ten mile radius hadn't at least slept with her.

Jesus, suddenly recognizing the bird woman, became livid and leapt from his seat. Wiry-wheelchair-man spun his chair around like a motorcycle driver, leaning into the screeching turn, following Jesus, who shot over to her table, ejaculating a long monologue which reeked of sarcasm even more than Frederick's onions.

"I want you. Not because I know who I am or who you are, or what it means when people say stuff, or why there are three pieces of bread in a club sandwich, or what animal bacon really comes from, or for what reason I feel the urge to strangle myself at least four times a day. But people tell me that I should want someone. So I guess they're right. Or, even if I don't guess they're right, they'll probably sneak into my head late at night and make me do their bidding anyway. But I'm not smart enough to realize that. Does bacon come from an animal at all? I find myself, sweating feverishly, my eyes half open -- they never seem to fully close -- wondering about pigs. And if, under your skin and jewelry, there is a fresh club sand-which lurking, waiting. It makes me hungry, and so I start to think about Ben and Jerry's ice cream. But anyway. I think about meat on a hook a lot too. Sort of hanging there, maybe still twitching a little bit. And that makes me think of how I want you, because I'm pretty sure there's a connection between rancid and yet mysteriously fresh meat and my sex drive. Sex makes me feel better about myself. It gives me something to talk about that doesn't embarrass me. Yeah, sometimes I make up stories, but I'm sure all the other guys do too. It's socially acceptable now, and keeps me from thinking about stuff too much. Except pig flesh, but that's linked to my copulatory excess', as we've mentioned, so I guess its okay. And a club sandwich. God damn. I'm getting excited just thinking about three pieces of white -- or even wheat -- bread. Contained within those alluring and yes, mysterious, layers of white bread is fried pig flesh, a mystical revelation clothed in the obscuritanism of toast! Maybe some turkey, too. Lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise, all of that crap. All I care about is the pig flesh. Pig flesh that's been fried, but is still somehow coated in a thick layer of grease, almost like it's sweating. Supple pig flesh that I can show off to my friends, or consume and excrete. Smooth pig flesh at first. Cut open by the butchers knives, (and who really gives a fuck about the pig, anyway?), the living organism laid bare to its primal core. And wham! A fucking luscious club sandwich. Just like that. Isn't America beautiful? This is just between you and me, of course."

[Literary critic's note: There is a definite bacon and or pork theme going on. This may be pointing at the subtle anti-Semitic and chauvinistic undertone which colors this speech. It seems highly likely that the speaker is in full support of the Aryan, Nazi regime. In fact, I think whoever wrote this piece of garbage should be hunted down and summarily executed. Men are as much to blame for the situation as women. I may say from a literary perspective that it represents the swine-like nature of pigs, in the way that they are like pigs, which is to say that they have skin like pigs, feet like pigs, and squeal like pigs, and therefor must be pigs. This author is a pig who hasn't yet learned how to write a good piece of prose. The only positive thing I can say is that there is something Shakespearean about the manner which this pig arises in the cultural context of 90's America, an almost cloven hoofed animal, an introspective, deep fellow who is questioning his social programming in the arena of a deaf audience. He is as Hamlet, who is on to the others and yet must resort to a type of sublimated sarcasm to get his point across.]

Chapter 9, Grid 2:

Conspiracy #139.

A serpent.

"Where equality and fraternity lie, there can be no liberty." -Robert A. Wilson.

...But first an important note. After world war II (the sequel to the smash hit 'War to end all Wars'), many people produced offspring. Space, style, and the writer's own fractured attention span prevent a detailed analysis, but for a variety of reasons all of these folks needed a place to live. Did I mention that the economy was booming, and there was such a thing as trust in leadership? That there was an American dream that many thought would amount to more than a stain on the sheets in the morning? Thus the mighty bastion of mediocrity was established, spat out into the world, and eventually dried, crusted over, and needed to be eliminated. This phenomenon, this really-not-all-that-revolutionary-revolution (though important to our semi-linear thread, a scrap of plot), was called the suburbs. These bleak and warring nation-states served but one purpose, transparent to all but the keenest, trained, red-eyed observer. That purpose (which led to the death of John F. Kennedy), was simple: to distribute drugs to children. This, my horrified friends, was a secret even to the government. It was devised, operated, organized and funded by the Vatican.

                     -Mugwump Jizm, senior editor.

Johny was surprised when the girl simply smiled enigmatically. Producing an unusually long cigarette from her purse, she nodded slowly. "What's your name?" She took a long drag and exhaled slowly, letting the smoke curl around her thin lips.

Wiry-wheelchair-man blinked slowly. "Frederick."

Jesus merely shrugged. "Drink from my mouth and you shall be as I am, and I shall be you."

"That's nice, dear," she said in a voice that was barely a whisper.

The man with the shades turned towards Frederick, and then back to the girl.

"Show the man some respect, Pig, " he said slowly. "By the way, Freddie, my name is Agent #139." His speech was mildly slurred, and his lips moved irregularly when he spoke, as if he was either trying to overcome a speech impediment or chew a particularly resilient piece of gristle.

The girl smiled too innocently. "If you don't respect yourself" She trailed off and shrugged mildly.

Frederick laughed unexpectedly. "The brotherhood of man has long been involved in the act of sodomy and incest. The pollutants and degenerates of a society are the society, they're it's result, the reaction and backlash from our own nature upon the system which we attempt to force upon it. It's the choking and vomiting of a long tailless ape. I know your type 'dear,' and it's just another example of wasted bacon."

"How many of you are on drugs?" Johny was forced to ask.

Everyone in the smoking section raised their hand.

"Oh."

At the same time, in another Reality-grid, Gabrael leaned closer to Alexi and nodded. "This has been one of my premises in my recent work, and I've done a great deal of fact and fiction reversal-writing the fact as fiction and vice versa. I think it's telling of our culture's current mindset that 'myth' has been relegated to the position of 'untruth.' I don't think most people have a clear grasp of the concept of a metaphor, or more importantly, how it is that ones life is a metaphor relating to itself, that all experience is strictly metaphorical, that individual existence is a poem constructed in the language of ones internal dialogue, the interpretation of perception. The dialogue and the reality are not only related, they are absolutely dependent upon each other. I've had this feeling lately that the very act of creating this metaphor manipulates reality to fit along with it. For all I know, there really are a bunch lunatics running around Devon as we speak"

Jesus spoke up. "There's a sucker born every minute."

Johny looked his way, expecting an explanation, but none was forthcoming.

Agent #139 suddenly rose. "I am the monkey flower!" he proclaimed. The waitress grunted and began ambling his way, prepared to tell him to sit in his seat and be a good patron. The Agent gave her such a withering stare that she stopped in mid-stride. "Hear me out!" he screamed. Even the suits in non-smoking stopped, their forks dangling in their suddenly limp hands.

"Fuck it all. Thirty million years of evolution for 'Singled Out,' the Spice Girls, and sublimated brutality. I'll have another hit off the joint and continue to be mindfucked by the boys on the major networks. I mean, I am, after all, nothing more than a product of this... rightright? That my consciousness is not congruent with the agreed upon world view -- that is a fluke, a minor mishap, an inconvenience at my expense? A country based on the rights of the many at the expense of the one -- who ever thought that the many consists of the one? -- and we expect to have individuality? Individuality is itself a trap, a sham. What does this strip center of insecurity, this plethora of sensory over-stimulation lack? To use the terminology of our late syphilitic friend, a will to power, a will to meaning."

At this Frederick looked confused. "Late?" he asked. The Agent did not pause, however. He had a far away, highly ecstatic look in his eyes. The tone of his voice had changed, it was now deep and powerful. Johny could see that he was brandishing a curved hunting dagger behind his back.

"Meaning doesn't come packaged in the world we live in, nor has it ever for our ancestors. It also does not come from dusty tomes or hallucinating religious fanatics. It is another aspect of subjective reality cast upon a blank set. When a group of people accept the same movie, the general consensus creates 'reality.' It was the intention of religion, then country, now business, to create a world-map to be cast upon the stage, so that large scale transaction, and communal living, may take place. A sacrifice of the individual for the sake of the many. Media breeds a lack of attention to detail, a shortened attention span. It does also create the positive ability to multi-task. However, as the attention span quickly decreases, life itself quickly becomes unstimulating; the volume level must continuously rise so as to feel anything."

"What happened when this happened? The 'shamans' of all ages determined the agreed upon consensual norm, but society has grown, bloated, and overstuffed itself. An experiment in nausea-- the Television, the flashing lights, the larger-than-life hair - just look around you!"

Johny was listening intently, and felt a deep thrumming sound somewhere in his head.

Agent #139 raised the knife high above his head. The sound of clattering silverware resounded from the non-smoking section, as knives, forks and spoons dropped to the table. Most of the people in the smoking section seemed disturbingly nonplused. The waitress' mouth dropped wide open, and she took a tentative step backwards.

"Our brains trick us into experiencing continuity from a line consisting of dots, that is to say, the film itself is reality, which is projected onto a screen, which is interpreted by our nervous system. The nervous system sends the message to 'us' -- this is a mystery -- as an experienceable, comprehensible, fluid movement. Hey, if you want to experience some of the way time, and reality for that matter, works without our brain's proper functioning, decoding and decryption, take a large dose of LSD some time. I am not implying that LSD imparts a 'higher reality.' Any reality experienced through this flesh-golem here is limited to a singularity, thus ruling out the possibility of it being 'higher' or 'ultimate' in any sense. What I am implying is that the 'normal' operation of our brain is something biologically programmed through evolution, and socially learned. Look at it this way: in computer terminology, the hard-ware is a product of evolution, the soft-ware is the product of social cognition, the training and induction of a human baby into the society, represented by Baptism. Where is the place for 'I' in all of this? What about my emotions, my secrets, the things most dear to me? Well, you tell me Barbara. Take a nice hard look at how you function, throughout the day. How you respond, how you feel inside as a reaction to the response, why you do the things you do. Start to detect a pattern? Start to feel a little bit like a white rat in a poorly constructed cage? You're nothing but meat, Barbara! You're nothing but meat! Send $19.95 to my account, which I will provide in a moment, and you can break out of that cage!"

"There's a sucker born every minute," Jesus said, playing with a plastic crucifix he had hanging around his neck on a hemp cord.

The waitress ran over to the phone to call the police. Jesus rose from his chair and stood beside the Agent, who was staring intently at Johny, running his index finger up and down the knife. Now he spoke.

"Backwards swimming monkeys, hairless ape. Up to their eyeballs, I tell you -- columns of smoke, columns of cloak smoke, those monkey's, the pesky things, munch-upwards-power-sail-to-'em, too, motherfucker! Running an outboard motor and two, count 'em two, gazelle's with half-back motorskooter soups."

"Deep under the surface of the soupy chowder lies a gem, guarded by a pesky monkey named Iago. I am not I, he said. Krimpets anyone? They've got jelly centers! Running around Led Zeppelin Hermes Herpes feet, leaden and jumping up and down. St. Ides. Isn't that a dog? (No, that's St. Bernard.) Dog star aliens. Keep your eyes out. They'll be on the ten-o'clock news with Tracy Madesac, selling life insurance. Figures, the aliens wear ties, too. Better taste in food, though. Pigs. Now, in other interrelationships, pork rinds for free! Smack them lips, boy-- we've got pork rinds. They're crispy, crispy, crispy, and they don't wear leather. Crispier art thou, Freedos; How now, Othello? A morning long, spent amidst the throng of the conservatory, waited with baited breath for my arrival. Waited, Waited, I."

"Fuck the Free-tos, we've got pork rinds. Untie the kids, honey, we have a tasty treat for Johny. No, you know what we've said about this Martha, Johny gets tied up for his own good. What?! Oh. He does that sometimes. Once he bites into you, he doesn't like to let go. Kind of like... uhm. One of those lizards, I can't remember. For Christ's sake, Martha, get out the broom. He'll leave off once you whack him good a few times. On the back of the skull, hard-like... I have no idea what I'm talking about. I had an idea, but then he told me that this was an equal opportunities joint and split. I had a plan, but it turned out to be an unkempt milkcow. Pull the udder kind of sideways. Beefy-bat-bootch-bandanas all around, folks -- it's time for a celebration! Rotten meat. Sour milk, gyrating in the collective unconscious of the udder cream. Udder cream, a manifestation of zero, naught, all, one, seven, thirteen, and eleven-- Binah shakes, they call 'em. Not a drink, a sickness. It's a slang term, actually. 'Like, he's got the Binah shakes, dude. Don't go near him.'"

The Agent caught the glint of silver from the corner of his eye, running from the back of the waitresses' uniform. Recognizing an alien transmitter device when he saw one, he brandished his dagger and let out a howl, lunging at her. Jesus continued to rant all the while:

"I need a club and some cosmic bliss. I'll settle for less smoke columns and deer heads. Less flies and buzzing of Gorbachev cocktails bursting in the swollen organ of a disgruntled social worker. Freud this, mother fucker! Less brain, more capons! Fuck fork pork rinds, we have capons! Consume Capons! Spare Castrated rooster, mammary glands-er, I mean ma'am? Too much stupidity to categorize under the term 'stupidity.' No longer is it a question of whether one is stupid or not, rather, the issue is how stupid.

Ketchup down the gullet. Ketchup down the gullet quick before I think, mommy. Don't listen to the weird neighbor, children. He thinks too much. 'Dems strange words coming out of his mouth. Not like I want you to think that we're conforming to anything, mind you, but-- Johny, quit yer bitin'!"

The Agent stabbed the waitress again and again in the chest, pinning her to the side of the bar with his other hand. Deep red blood washed all over his arms as he cut off her skin, revealing layers of circuitry and wires. Convinced that the grim job was finished, he got to his feet and motioned at Johny, leading him out the front door. Jesus followed happily behind, waving at the absolutely mute patrons. No one in the store made a move.

Once outside, the Agent put the knife away and walked towards the woods behind the building. More curious now than frightened, Johny followed-at a distance. "What an intelligent being realizes," Agent said, wiping his bloody hands on his pants, "is that this," he waved his hands about him with a sick tone in his voice, "needs to end. The United States of Apathy, I mean. And for change to happen, one must first invert the previous system, and then break that inversion. A 'No' is limited by the same system as a 'Yes,' as it comes out of the same proposition, do you know what I mean?"

Jesus of the Eternal-return nodded his head agreeably, although he was frowning, as if he found something distasteful or out of place.

"Not you."

Wearing a blank expression all the while, Johny nodded his head as well.

"Well-the inversion has been made, over the past few decades, and the counter-culture has become the back-bone of the culture, see. So it's time to rock the boat in every way imaginable until the damned thing sinks. The problem with the system isn't that it's 'evil.' The problem with the system is that it's made of iron, and resistant to any real change."

"I don't know. Destruction for it's own sake is what do they call it? Nih Nihil-"

"Nihilism," the Agent said. "I'm neither pessimistic nor nihilistic." He paused and seemed as if he was looking for something. He shrugged and went on. "Read between the lines, man Did you see the wires, Johny?"

"I really don't know what's going on." Johny noticed that Jesus was carrying a smelly, dead fish in his right hand, but he did his best to ignore it. "Well I Yeah. I did see them. But I see the antennae all the time. No one else ever sees them."

"When you explore the world, you're exploring your own nervous system- anything believed becomes 'real.' And because you don't believe anything, Johny, you're the one to be the next Prophet." The Agent put on his sunglasses again. They could all hear sirens wailing.

"How about we talk about this somewhere else?" Johny asked nervously.

Jesus began waving the fish around in the air menacingly. The Agent nodded at him, and said "when a person's world view becomes solid, they can't accept any experience which occurs outside of that world view. They write it off, and generally forget about it. This works wonderfully well with cops."

Jesus and the Agent walked calmly towards the solitary police car outside of the store. Johny waited for a minute, and then followed. One of the officers got out of the car and opened his mouth, apparently preparing to say something particularly authoritarian.

Jesus held the fish above his head and cried "There's a sucker born every minute!"

He paused and gave the police officer a very rational look, saying "I plun neposh. Weird needle images, frundmaulein. Avenger-angry-mother-number, loud lavender cries. One hundred and thirty-nine! Oh, the answer! Not unavenged lies Diomedes! Too many candle-retina-burning-cherio-chickens, saran wrap friendships and nodding nonsense. Too many freedlemints for the cockroach, Kafka. Flip-top hat metamorphisizing tricks, lead to gold, lead to gold. For the used and overtired sake of gain, you, loveless Simon and shell backed spinster, would turn me about?! Weird needle images, messenger. Carapace gone rusty, wasted words and rushed dinners, thousand death-chances and sword-rattlers; rattled for State and mindless duty. 'Come alone, and bring Teucros to do the shooting!' Inauthentic people, inauthentic lives."

"Bok, bok, needleknees. Rattle loud, snake-skin-Whitesnake-hard-boot guerrilla in the mist with a cheap whore. Paid much for your fuzzy suit, paid more for your needleknees and curious chickens, self-strangled bodies of artificial pineapple flavor and lemon crunch."

The cop scowled and reached for his handcuffs. Jesus struck a very cop-like posture and waved the fish at him with a stern expression on his face. "He thinks he's the vine, but he's really a leaf!" Jesus said to the Agent.

"Threaten me with your rules of office, rattleback? Rattle it backwards, knocking spinal fluid everywhere in frenzied and incessant cries. Trained muscle response, 'backwards in muscle to discover who I could have been.' Think about tit, unfreed Gottfried, young Percival with a lance and iron lung; trained to do war with transparent nightgowns, self-perverter; trained to stock the shelves twice daily, ready for use inside the breast-work, screaming 'On Trojans! On!' as Apollo, but with sillier hair."

"Lost yourself in the supermarket and cried out for mummy's linen. Mummy was doing cheap tricks in the seafood section, and came back with a bucket of prawns. Daddy was involved in vaginal strangeness with live lobsters, wearing an ancient bronze cod-piece and screaming 'On horses! On! Good men are ready to give way when the offender wants to pay! I am the earth-shaker, my hands are gripping the spear, my heart is beating high, my feet are dancing along, one two, one two! I'm ready to stand alone and gallop the horse to madness!' Equine dollar-bills a George Washington-deep in cocaine. Childhood decisions a Mother Hive Brain deep in decay. And you can quote me on that, sir."

The cop was staring blankly at the limp fish in Jesus' hand.

"Come, Dionysus," the Agent said to Jesus, trotting off towards a cream Nissan Maxima.

I was going to quote, or at least introduce myself, but the mood bummed a cigarette, bounded down the stairs, and stole my car. I suppose I'll tell you anyway. People call me Jay. I am really known as "Handsome" Jim Manitoba, Pugilist extraordinare. Realizing that you realize as a non-entity that I know that you know that this is an active world, which I still occupy, I feel that I should reply to outsiders using my assumed name of "Jay," otherwise I have defeated myself... again. Yes, we all have plenty of crosses here. I lived a life in a toothpick once. Ethics don't work when you're living in a toothpick-there's no 'yes' or 'no' in a toothpick. Now I work as a cook at Denny's. The new Aryan race just keeps getting in the way of proper behavior. Barbarians with linen napkins and battle axes and copies of sunny, semi-informational self help books gang-raped me. Broke my nose in the gravel while Jimmy Buffet sang about his broken fucking flip-flop. Afterwards, over drinks, one of the barbarians asked me what I dreamt of. I, of course, was taken aback. They say barbarians don't dream. But I told him... "I dream of tangible nothing," I said.

"So you mean nothing as something, then?" the barbarian replied over the rim of his gin-and-tonic.

"I mean unity, dissolving into non-self," I said, just to be confusing.

He looked as if he was following, but his beeper suddenly came alive, vibrating and playing 'Ode to Joy', but in a minor key. "Gotta go," the barbarian gruffed. "I've got to pick my daughter up from squash at eight, and then I've got therapy."

Before I could get a word in, he left. Just as well, I thought, as I sniffled to keep any more blood from winding up in my martini. It was darkening toward translucence, and had picked up a coppery tang. I took a sip, sat back, and sighed. Things aren't what they used to be. I asked the head of the barbarian tribe, an attractive man with an attractive briefcase, for a quarter to drop in the jukebox. He grunted, and gave me forty cents. I swaggered over, apologizing to whoever I bled on, and selected the Jimmy Buffet single. Then I finished my martini.

Inside the Denny's, all of the patrons were mulling about, answering the cop's questions so they could fill out their reports. The workers too were assisting as best as they could, except for Jay, the shift cook, who was sitting in the back room, blaring Jimmy Buffet. The general word around the store was that some blonde haired kid had stabbed the waitress, and that he had been talking to himself for some time before he had done it. One of the younger children had seen a man that looked startlingly like Jesus walk through the store in a floral print skirt. At the time, she had turned to her mother and claimed that it was "Unkie Ken," referring to her Uncle, who was apparently the spitting image of Christ. The police officer told the girl to save the story for the National Inquirer.

Frederick sat in a corner, his mouth smiling and his eyes crying. With an almost imperceptible sigh, he began wheeling out the door, ranting all the while.

"Long, long hours I spent, waiting for some sort of redemption from that hell; days of walking, running even -- from myself. And that which I ran from was a mirror image of what I ran to, but polarized. I certainly had Hope, those long days, evenings, and lives, and it was that which kept me running. Despair, nausea, a gray toad which croaked at every footfall."

"Running for a horizon of possibility. A solution outside of myself. A savior? How much then did I understand the meaning of 'salvation without must come from within?' How much could I appreciate a kind word from a stranger, or the sound and feel of wind and the harsh reality of a dark, overcast day?"

"Now I watch others run to what? -- with my mouth closed and my hands in my pockets. You look everywhere but within yourself! Even when you are looking within yourself, you do it so that you might be seen, inevitably, that you might be saved. Poor soul. There are no solutions in a world of 'maybe,' an existence which has no opposites -- has only itself -- and has no rectification in the sheer force of the scream 'I AM.' The fear of that harsh reality croaks as that toad, and begins the anti-labor, the anti-birth, of running away from yourself. Depression is simply the child of fear -- fear of living. Maybe, too, even the Hope is but an afterbirth, a placental cord to hang on and climb away to darkness. But-- never so with Hope founded on Love. Do you fear your own life so much that you would daily pray for the consummation of walking death? The fear of a blissful life with an end... does the Joy suddenly not taste quite so sweet, then?"

Chapter Ten, grid One:

The Height of Achievement.

Malkuth.

"Those who become enlightened often tell stories of being overwhelmed by a dazzling light or a blaring sound, almost like a gong, an airplane taking off, or a trash can exploding. Either way, from that point on, their eyes always seem to glow with an inner light."

-Aleonis De Gabrael.

The drive to the Radnor train station had an uncomfortable undercurrent. Ken was nervous - they were going to meet a girl named Suzanne, someone who he held at least some romantic curiosity about, so he did his best to keep his mind occupied on other sundry things. They blazed down the highway at well over one-hundred miles per hour, listening to swing and jazz at a similarly ridiculous volume. It was a clear, crisp day. The blazing sun provided not a shred of warmth, but lit the countryside gloriously never the less.

The station was rather unimpressive in appearance, two tracks and a small dingy concrete building. Ken and Alexi mulled about and talked, Samantha mainly watched, occasionally adding a comment.

"Are we planning on scripting tonight?" Ken asked.

"We? Well, I figure that if we have nothing better to do, we may as well Unless if something else comes up," Alexi said non-commitally.

A short silence followed. Ken lit a cigarette, and Alexi did like-wise a second later.

"Have you talked to J.B.'s friend, Rob?" Ken asked. "I met him at McDonald's the other night. He's a fascinating guy. Full of unharnessed potential."

"I spoke to him online He's going to be at the party, yes?" Alexi peered at the tracks, bending into a dot where it joined the horizon. Soon, the train was visible, moving slowly forward and growing in size. Ken nodded.

There was a tunnel underneath the tracks to allow passage from one side to the other. The walls inside were slick with grime and coated with faded spray paint. Out of the corner of his eyes, Alexi saw "MOTHER HIVE BRAIN" painted in bright red letters. In smaller letters, underneath, it read "In the end, there are no choices." He laughed-- of course in the end there are no choices. Is there an end when everything goes around and around?

Ken smiled at Alexi and moved his hand in a sweeping motion from left to right. "My kind of place."

Footsteps echoed through out the tunnel and Suzanne soon greeted them. She held a black portfolio under one arm, her other hand was smudged with charcoal. She wore a long gray coat with a hood.

"I'm sorry, I didn't have time to wash up after class," she said, looking over the group. Ken and Alexi stood side-by-side. Samantha was behind them. Ken shifted his weight from one foot to the other and then back again, saying nothing.

"How about we get out of this tunnel before we continue with the token greetings, shall we?" Alexi headed out into the sunlight, shading his eyes quickly to allow them to compensate.

They hopped into Ken's car, and sped out of the station.

Immediately, Ken looked over at his co-pilot, his blue eyes twinkling. "I was thinking we're taught to believe that the real 'out there' is something that cannot be anything other than what it appears to be. We're taught to think of our perception of reality as accidental and insignificant."

Alexi smiled. Ken always had an odd way of breaking the ice. "This conflict between the inner and outer world may reflect itself inwardly; we experience what we have been calling 'Destiny.'"

The two girls remained silent. Suzanne was fiddling with her pencils, and Samantha was gazing absently out the window.

she writes in lowercase, in vowels. she doesn't want to break things. she is small. I breathe into my belly. I fill it there. I am breaking. splitting becoming coming. coming. how many people now? how many people know inside?

"When you question, you wind up bringing about the answer just as the desired end changed the nature of the question asked," Alexi continued.

Ken chuckled, although Alexi wasn't quite sure why.

Jason's house was a one story rancher; what it lacked in height it made up for in length. The front garden was wet, filled with various withering flowers and lawn figurines. The trappings of Christmas clung to the building in the form of wreaths, flashing light, and glowering, nightmarish lawn elves and gnomes even though it was now well into February. It was a warped and somewhat disturbing manifestation of the middle class American esthetic. "If it glows or makes noise of some kind, put it in your lawn or nail it to your wall." The semi-circular horse-shoe driveway in front of the house was already cluttered with cars when the cream Maxima ground to a halt, barely inches from the road. He turned the keys in the ignition, and the engine stopped its purring.

"If anyone hits the back of my car, I'm going to hunt them down," he said, hopping out of the car.

They all headed towards the house, the slimy gravel clattering about their feet. All four of them were dressed up in elaborate, if eccentric, costumes. Ken and Alexi were actually not dressed all that differently than normal, their 'day ware' being just about as eccentric as daily living and custom would allow, crystals dangling around their necks, pale skin accentuated by the hard lines of black ink-Alexi's handiwork, and in his case, silk pants and shirt of the same color, covered with a leather vest and his trench coat. Samantha was now wearing a black dress, her face framed by curling leaves of ivy. She was almost enigmatic both in appearance and behavior. Alexi rapped on the screen door with his cane, a knobby, oaken staff, capped at both ends in bronze. It twisted downwards from his hand, looking almost like an unnatural growth, a straight and rigid rod distorted by an unseen, fish-eyed lens. Through the window at the top of the door, they saw a head peep out at them. It was Jason.

"Hello," he said, letting them in.

The living room walls were covered with clocks, pans, old instruments - it seemed that nearly anything that could be hung from a wall, in one way or another, was used as adornment. Across the room, behind a curtain of leaves and branches thanks to a series of potted plants, numerous clocks ticked and whirred.

The room was filled with people, some sitting in tall wicker chairs or long, comfortable if worn sofas, others standing in that half-insecure way one does at a party consisting primarily of strangers. Jason quickly introduced them. Everyone was looking, wide-eyed, at the group of four. Alexi smiled at Ken and bowed deeply towards the congregation.

"I'm sure you've already forgotten my name - it really doesn't matter anyway, seeing how often it changes, you may have to remember a new name come tomorrow," he said, his gaze turning towards Ken when he finished his statement.

I think that it was only because this night seemed like the most improbable time for a peak experience that it happened. The universe has never been above acting purely out of spite and irony. It began with Jason's friend Rob. He had olive skin, and wore an old tattered baseball cap, pulled down low, his eyes darting left and right from within the shadows. He spend most of his time crouched in corners, watching everyone intently. He barely spoke a word that night, until he stood up a little past one a.m.

"I think we should go on a journey," he said. He had been huddled in the corner, rocking slowly back and forth. Everyone looked over at him. He had spoken very quietly, but his words silenced everyone. There was a weight and mystery to what he said, a certain sphinx-like gravity.

Alexi got up from the bed and came over to him.

"A journey?"

Rob nodded, a slightly smug smile crossing his face in a flash.

When he didn't continue, Alexi asked if he could explain.

He nodded again. "I talk and guide you. You explore your mindscapes, listen to the vibrations and pitch of my voice. All states are trance states. I know that as you will be listening to me, your own mind will determine the most pleasing or interesting reality to construct out of those words." He said all of this incredibly flatly-- he may as well have been talking about bread or the weather. "I'm used to doing it with one person. I'm not familiar with crowds," he paused. "I could try it in a little while. In Jason's guest room."

"You'll explain more when we start?" Alexi asked.

"When we start, yes." His voice was grave, and he spoke with a certain no-nonsense matter-of-factness that Alexi found very unusual. It didn't come to a surprise to him at all when he later found that Rob had a good deal of Native American blood in his veins.

Alexi and Samantha headed into the guest room ahead of everyone else. It was painted orange by the amber light of an old lamp which sat on a desk, right beside a small bunk bed. Decrepit curtains flapped idly, draped across half-open windows. There was something about the movement that could only be explained as idle or futile, even though the personification made little sense to Alexi at the moment.

He sat on the bed. Samantha sat down beside him, and looked at his hand, which was perched on his knee.

"Hey" she said breathily.

He smiled at her. "I'm sorry-do I know you?"

Ignoring his comment, she continued, "I've always wondered about the ring you wear. The onyx one - where'd you get it?" Her voice was quiet as usual, almost a whisper.

"That?" he asked, pointing.

She nodded.

"Well, if I remember this story correctly, it's my fathers. Or it was. He gave it to my mother, for elopement or marriage, I don't know which" In the temple of the temple of the temple of the Holy

She nodded, listening, saying nothing partially because she knew it wasn't always a good idea to inquire about his father. Alexi's parents had separated under circumstances involving drugs and theft. It didn't anger him really, but there was nothing to say, either.

"It's a nice ring, but I suppose it doesn't hold much meaning." He looked out the window, thinking. A huge freight truck plowed by, heading towards the nearby food plant. The blaring headlights filled the room with their luminescence for a brief moment. "Perhaps I should give it some. We've talked about the future many times, and I know how horribly impossible it is to actually plan for something and have it happen, and yet I feel that I, we, have to try. Maybe we try to fool ourselves into meaning, expecting certain things out of our future so that our experience right now can feel like it serves a purpose. But I can't accept that."

Smiling slightly, she pulled herself up on the bed and sat Indian style, one arm draped over his back.

"Yes?" she prompted.

"Well, people often like to give material objects to remind them of people, or promises. Is love something that happens to us or something that we choose?" He paused, and then shrugged. "This ring I give to you, not for a temporary purpose, should promises hold true, but for an indefinite one. And should promises be proven liars, then the ring will be proof of the lie as well."

She nodded her head, solemnly.

Sits a woman who is waiting who is waiting for the sun

"You mean it? When people make promises, I don't take them lightly."

"Yes."

(I can pretend

I swallow slowly.)

Alexi slid the ring onto her finger.
Da hoof worst my insecurity                        IDreamOfALevelPlayingGround
EitherOr                                       WhereThereAreNoDecisions
YesNo/NeitherNot                               AndTheHeartSpeaks
"ess-es" = my emotion;                               ThereAreNoDecisions
She-Me/NeitherNot                               AndTheHeartSpeaks
Excluding myself;                                TheHEARTSpeaksLoudest
AndWith Hegel inclusion: "ess" + "er"                       AndWeMight
Dream play satyr eyezation. FlamePromise-removeherselfhole
Description defiles this experience                WillAbsolvedAwayTongueJoy
She talks in aeiou's                                      LeaveNo Fe Ear:
And breathes lies like fire                      
under mirrorwater                                      PainLiesUnmoving
That my hard consanants break upon,                ThereAreNoDecisions.
"covering earth in forgetful snow."

Rob was the last to enter. He slowly trotted in, every step seeming practiced and deliberate, glanced around almost slyly like an old coyote, and found a spot up against a wall.

"I'm going to need all of your attention for this," he said, slowly. Every syllable was enunciated.

Without saying a word, everyone got comfortable about the room.

"I want you to relax yourselves. Listen to nothing but the sound of my voice nothing but the sound of my voice. Let nothing break the sound of my voice the sound of my voice. Let pictures form in your mind, instead of dismissing them as imagination, focus on them and the sound of my voice. You are standing in complete blackness. You can feel something solid under your feet, but you cannot see it. Everything is black. Voidity. Nothing." He paused for a few minutes.

"The blackness changed. Under your feet, now, is an endless plain. The horizon is the deepest purple, but above is still the void. You may walk, but the features do not seem to change"

Rob's voice became the only thing they could hear as he led them from one landscape to the next, never staying quite long enough for any of them to wander off too far in their own personal interpretations of this 'world' he was conveying. It soon became apparent that the whole 'world' was a complicated sphere, where all directions led to an end, which was always the beginning.

"Once you've broken out of the sphere about you, the image changes everything lightens, as if you're waking from a dream where are you?" Rob looked around.

"I was in Japan, in Tokyo. There was a graveyard, and I used to go there. I remember that once, in the middle of autumn, the leaves were bright, in the trees and on the ground. Vibrant, the colors were so alive that I've never been able to get the image out of my mind. An old Japanese man walked through the graveyard, peacefully sweeping up the leaves," Suzanne said, her eyes still closed.

"The top of a giant tower. I've set my sights on the very top of the tower, where a tremendous, overpowering light shines," Alexi said, his eyes also remaining closed. "There's an incalculable geometrical process five sides on the bottom slowly giving way to six at the very top, going through the entire spectrum of color until it fades into that brilliant light at the summit, yet all the same, the entire structure is black, blacker than night can ever be, and I feel absolutely lost looking at it. When I entered at the bottom, I was wearing the robes of a Magus, and held a long staff, surprisingly adorned with a cross at its top. Now, after having reached the top, I see myself in that light, and I can't bear it. The robes have been burned from my body by the blinding light. I can't tolerate his brightness, and now I'm falling, falling to the very bottom" His eyes opened slowly, and he looked out the window, his fingers shaking, hunting for the pack of cigarettes deep in his pockets, almost as if they had a life of their own.

Creeping shadows falling darkness she is waiting for the sun

Everyone else remained silent, not wanting to leave the place they had found.

"Should we interpret what we saw and draw a contrast?" Alexi asked, still looking out the window at the nearby road.

"No. Only you should interpret it. It's really a personal thing" Rob hesitated for a moment, and then continued "your energy and mine they're opposites. When I look at you, I see a darkness, or perhaps it's an emptiness. It is growing in you, a hungry soul sickness. You create and you create, but find nothing but yourself in it, nothing enjoyable. I too am lost, but upon the other side, lost in Narcea."

"Narcea?" Alexi asked, slowly moving to sit beside him.

"I was riding my bike, many years ago, when something happened. I've though about it a great deal, since, and haven't been able to well, all I can say is that it was a view of truth. There was this horrible, wrenching noise, like something being sheared into a million pieces. I saw everything. No, I can see by the expression on your face that you understand and yet don't. Maybe I was everything, everyone, everytime for a moment, for all moments. I don't know. I cannot seem to focus on it anymore. All perspectives at once, and now I have these unbearable headaches, almost every day. They don't let me think about if for very long."

"Somehow it makes me think of Harrison Beorgeron" Alexi mused.

"It was Narcea. That is all I can say," Rob said, his eyes eerily distant and vacant.

About a week later, Alexi received a phone call. "Hello?" he asked, trying to wake rouse himself from his nap.

"Hello, this is Renee. Did you hear?"

"Hear what, Renee?" Her voice sounded grave.

"Jason broke up with me. Just cut me off. And he did it because of the changes which you have made to his personality."

"I changed? Wait. I never made anyone do anything. Whatever Jason decides may be influenced by my presence, but I don't make other people's decisions. I know you're hurting, but there's no reason to point blame."

"No, I'm quite certain. I see what you're doing, leading the group, and maybe you don't see it yourself. Well, I'm not the only one who feels this way, although I may feel it most strongly. Thanks Alexi."

"Renee, I-"

<click>

Alexi hung up the phone and rolled onto his back.

"And so it begins"

The Man Upon 42nd Street, Part II:

I dropped my Soul, the Emperor of Princes, shining like the Sun, upon 42nd street. A palsied elopement, my self to my Self wed and brought up to the starry firmament for the eternal moment with you- then nothing. Nothing as 13 cold and unending moments of clock ticks and resounding chimes of the hour cast my fate to the wind, reflecting myself in the cool water of the Moon, the weight overhead waiting, lying above me as I too lie to keep to my body, to keep it moving in the frigid night air on my way to 42nd street.

Pound into the hard concrete O searcher, ground to dust 4 times and forever - the desperate search for release in your arms. In your arms 139 times to forever before I slowly drown in the shattered mirror of the Moon. Before I find my way to 42nd street.

For centuries a man stood before the decadent memory of being, those old words, long since crusted over on the gate of Iacchus. Standing beside me is this man upon the path who said 'here is a man who tried his all and lost, who has tasted the sun and can now no longer taste.' Speaking in tones I cannot dare comprehend, 'here is a man, desperate in his cage cell- desperate upon the point of nothing- to be anybody, so as to break through a hole, a pinpoint, and Unite with myself.' This he said to me, his voice cracking, sliding through the vowels of Water and breaking on the rocky consonants of Earth, the Pleasure And Never-ending pain of complements, uniting as One in his intonation; his Pleasure, his Pain slowly bleeding into the silver lake of the Moon.

Still, here stands this lunar creature, beautiful in exile, burning in the twilight of the soul, desperately waiting for the sun. Crouched under the earth, he is waiting for the sun, clothed in garments of deep purple and blue, waiting for the few people, the lost amber people of the sun. The taste of death in the mouth of the living, the liquid, vowel sound 'IAO' shattered upon the rocky breaks of 'NOX.' He thrice knows 'All must end as he the great, the small, the infinite and the absolutely finite-' It is the taste of waiting, for he is waiting, he is waiting for the sun. The taste is his foreshadowed death, this man waiting beside me on 42nd street, who sees O in the mirror of life, 139 days lusting after O, with the X for the supreme feminine Unity, who sees I in the light of his Self, and A duality of spirit, blowing as an invisible wind into the world as darkness and light, in the illusion of self; O, which still comes out to nothing, in his 139 days of woe.

As he stands beside me, maybe still a lingering audacity in his eye, I see that he is slowly dying as he too is waiting for his son.

M.H.B.S. transmission 4D:

Robert: But haven't you been noticing blue a great deal? I see it everywhere.

Rachelle: (Singing) Eye sea? Blue sea. You like me see blue sea. Oh the humanity!

Anne: Quick, the Hindenburg is burning!

Robert: I woke up at 1:30. The lights were on, the radio and the TV were on, a box was against the door, and there were strange rummaging sounds emanating from the great beyond. "Ken?" I asked. I heard a muffled "Yes," from behind the door. Not a question, a statement. "Yes, now leave me alone."

Greg: I was watching an ad on TV tonight. The blue really sticks out at me. "Leader in Cable News." Four words. Synchronicity. Leave me alone. What was I talking about? Remembering the 'good ol' days.' Perhaps this relates back to a comment I made a little while back, about putting my dentures in fizzy liquids and molesting children. Wait, that wasn't quite it. You get the idea all the same. I want 22 servants all trained in massage, metaphysics, and the art of Zen motorcycle maintenance. I'll settle for just massage though. It has to be 22 of them.

Anne: But... the Hindenburg...

Robert: I noticed, probably at the same time you were watching that ad, that the frequency that the monitor refreshes at is precisely the right amount to induce psychosis in primates. I want to be Gene Simmons. I want my tongue to be a foot long. Do you see what I mean? It's absolute madness. The biggest drawback, when it comes to breaking out of established norms, is that no one can relate and you have to speak in code all the time because you're experience isn't normalized into the normal symbols, signs and time frame references of your society. I could explain my state of being right now as "blue 4/green 7/silver 8 held over Daath(abyss): ideal/actual." We use Qabbalah as a roadmap to our mind.

Anne: That's what we're here for.

Robert: Okay, some of it can be spoken-- if I say "bluuuuuueee" and drag it out a certain way, you can tell it's deep blue, certainly a color of the Empress; if I say "blue," then it's light blue, and you might put it somewhere closer to the material world, not such a high frequency.

Leri: Everything is just a frequency. A waveform.

Bill: Crack whores never have any teeth. It's a conspiracy against us "decent folk."

Anne: (thoughtfully) Like ripples on water

Chapter 11, grid 2:

PG. (Pig without an "I.")

The Hanged Man.

"Everything is bullshit. I'm just concerned with the bullshit that works."
                             -Jesus.

(She has)
        A face like porcelain
        and a short dress.
(that she gets lost in)
        Playthings,
        eyes in the
        cupboard:
               "misunderstood child,"
               works long enough to get past their defenses
               everyone wants to be a savior
               revenge.

(She likes that reminding sting.)
        ...
        Cracked so many times
        glassharp and stained red.
        ...
        She takes the shape of
        whatever contains her.

        The act is seamless
        she floats
        walks on water:
        says "yes" with her mouth
        and "no" with her heart.
(She drowns every night.)
        Keep sinking deeper
        hoping to be
        lying at the bottom,
        a peaceful rest.
(She never tells the truth.)
        No more barked orders
        expectations
        after last night...
(She lives vicariously through daydreams.)
        Stop!
        It wasn't me.
        Forced inside, but...
        Didn't feel a thing.
        Wasn't me, man.
        "And I feel I could make it this time
        this time
        together
        just don't stop
        just you and me,
        no, I've never said this before."
(She feels she could make it this time
and rehearses in the bathroom
in front of the mirror.)
        Just don't stop
(She keeps telling herself
        Sell last night for tomorrow)
        Sell
        Again.
(Says 'pull yourself from the wreckage')
        The scars
        cracks
        are exciting reminders
        "This time."
(She always gets what she wants.)

Highlighted in blistering red neon hung the crucified baby Jesus, framed in gilded mahogany, with an inscription reading "DEATH TO ALL FISH." Vague, ethereal music wafted into the hallway like smoke, emphasizing the feeling of absolute non-reality Pig felt. Looking down the other side of the hallway, she saw the highly reflective doors of an elevator. On the panel to the left of the door, instead of buttons, was a plaque which read "IS YOU A WOMAN?"

Pig turned and stared hard at the crucified baby Jesus. It's tiny head slowly melted into that of a hawk, screaming silent vengeance. Pig unconsciously took a step towards the elevator, taken aback by the sudden transformation. The face reverted back to its former state and frowned. She felt sick to her stomach as the scream continued to increase in volume, silently. I am encrypted from your deep roots, a multiplicity of truth and falsehood. An undertow of indecent deceit, though innocent by all accounts. Oh you - falsehood! I am the silhouette against the amber dawn, oval, wide-hipped and proud. I possess the tactile sensations of vinyl and the memory of wood.

Now walking quickly towards the elevator, Pig saw two men get in before her. She thought she recognized them, although she wasn't sure. The doors slammed shut, and then a minute later, they stepped off and disappeared. Before the mammoth doors could close again, she stepped on. The lights immediately went off, clothing her in a blanket of darkness, and she had the distinct feeling of falling, falling down forever. Overcome with vertigo, she collapsed to the floor, feeling pummeled, beaten, and crippled. Words formed in her head: This pig feels like she should be feeling. But this pig can't allow herself to feel, because when she does, she feels very sad and shits a lot. And it's useless, rambling shit, just like this. And it would take another pig to bother with this pig's shit. Something was strangling her. A sharp pain, and even deeper darkness, as her throat constricted and her eyes slammed shut. And then she was drowned in what she somehow knew was sperm as the words "the Holy Ghost" echoed loudly in her head.

Pig woke up, bathed in cold sweat, on her bed. Her thick down comforter was wrapped around her legs, and it took her a few moments to untangle herself. It was still dark out-she had only been asleep for a few hours. Uttering a feeble groan, she rolled over and picked up the phone, dialing a few numbers.

"Hey" she breathed, fumbling around the side of the bed for some cigarettes.

There was a long pause. Silence on both ends.

"I know I didn't show. I had, uh-other things to attend to." She nodded her head and then laughed quietly. "No, it doesn't have anything to do with a Hispanic guy named Juan-and no, I haven't been abducted by aliens. I've just been busy. Out with old friends Well, some things just can't be expressed that easily in words or with actions or anything. It sometimes seems I don't know, so hard to-yeah, that's it. It reminds me of the lyrics to a song which has continually been running through my head ever since we began to hang out and and the frustration I have experienced in attempting to say, show, tell, or in some way reveal to you how I feel-"

She paused as the person on the other end spoke.

"Yeah, we'll talk about it later I'll see you soon."

She hung up the phone and prepared to call her other boyfriend. The things I get myself into, she thought with mixed regret and excitement.

Silly girls, they gag on the advertisement, they gag but they don't throw up, too embarrassed to complete an action their bodies have deemed necessary. Silly girls (I am shaking my head) they are so silly. They have flowers they kiss the rosebuds and snarl at the sunflowers. Sunflowers, they say, are ugly plants, full of brown, barely any yellow, none of the graceful hues of violets and petunias. They don't even have thorns, they say, relishing the prick, the response of the blood, rushing happily towards the hole, the oxygen, the light (go towards the light). The blood cells die, they abort themselves, and are forgotten as the girls go to pick more roses.

Jesus slowly devoured his bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich, licking his fingers clean of mayonnaise and glistening pig grease. There was a distant, crazed look in his eyes. He was seated on a toilet in a small bathroom, a cracked etch-a-sketch lying on a mildewed throw rug by his feet. The plastic plants in the corner added a merry, joyous feeling to the room, like a slightly out-of-key Christmas carol played on a tin flute.

Finishing the last bite of the sandwich, Jesus stood up and crammed his fingers deep into his throat. A giant stream of vomit poured into the toilet violently. It sounded like a waterfall. Little Niagara.

He ambled up to a mirror hanging over the sink, staring long and hard into his own eyes, as he smeared bright red lipstick onto his lips and chin, inspected his long arching eyebrows, and then chuckled, although it seemed forced and nervous.

In a sudden explosion of anger, he slammed his fist into the mirror, shattering it and splattering blood across the shards.

"Fat bitch!" he screamed, feeling much better.

Agent 139 was in the other room, tossing and turning on the bed.

!

HOW

can I be certain? I close my eyes and try to forget. Try not to remember ( . And, there is no ownership of flesh.) How many times a day do I have to go through this? She said... no good. Shut up and move the pillow. Crink in the neck. Slender neck, pale skin. Howdohowdohowdo: I stop this and try to remember her smiling. Tension builds to a breaking point. Fists clenched. Backs off right before the tears come.

DO

Howdohowdohowdo: I know? there is nothing certain. "Maybe" is always the answer, no better than random chance. Prefer to be lied to. "It's all going to be okay." There is an uncertainty in every movement. You can never be certain what impulse lies underneath an action. Everything she says: Do you mean that? Then I turn on myself: Do I say this to be heard? Ethics is just a means of protecting yourself. Insecurity always gives rise to conscience. Aginbite of inwit. It bites on both sides. Roll over, my back is sore.

I

can still see her face. (No, that isn't her at all.) Why did the mystics always turn to prostitutes? Shut up. You set yourself up for failure with this. (It's just random coincidence that you always chose the rotten one.) Peer Gynt. What was it again? had too much attention from mommy, only child, always looking for princess. No: empress.

K(NO)W

beneath. Above. She can keep the candle lit back home. (No, that isn't her at all.) I'm dedicated. Her, Briar Thorn. It begins with him on top. Turn over. Just go to sleep. An onion, was it? Keep peeling the layers. No center, just masks. An ontological crisis clothed in this? It's all about

K(NOW)

-ing

That you cannot. Do I let her stay home and go gallavanting as revenge? Impenetrable. No, I can't. Sincere, and I don't know what to do. As an Agent, as an executive, I can hide behind the mask, become the part. Idealizing again. Does this cycle repeat

forever

?

The cream Nissan smoothly edged into a parking spot alongside a tall metal fence. The sounds of industrial music could be heard from a nearby nightclub. Agent #139 got out of the car and motioned to Johny, who tentatively nodded and followed his lead. Even this deep in the city, the crisp smell of autumn, the cloying scent of rotting leaves and something else, something indeterminable, was in the steely air.

Jesus looked at Agent #139 incredulously. "The club over there?"

The Agent slipped on his sunglasses. "It's called the Bank. If we're going to find any of the members of this elusive little organization, well. This'd be the place to start, I'd say."

"Mother Hive Brain?" Johny asked.

"No. Order of the Hidden Path."

"Oh," Johny said, now twice as confused as before.

The tall, vaulted ceilings in the room gave the impression of a cathedral. The walls were aged stone, streaked by thin white lines - apparently water damage, adorned with ancient, tattered paintings. A thick, cast-iron chandelier hung from the ceiling on a chain, casting a ring of shadowy light from the tiers of white candles affixed to its edges. There were sofas along each wall, most of them inhabited by what appeared to be gaunt, almost skeletal people dressed in black. Everything in the room was somehow slightly damp, possibly more like a crypt than a cathedral.

"Really? I'm only on Paxil and Zoloft. Yeah-they said it was manic depression. Well, whatever, I've always known I was fucked up." The girl who was speaking was wearing a tight fitting purple velvet dress. Her skin seemed as white and thin as egg shells.

Another fragmentary conversation caught the Agent's attention from across the room. "Before they put me in, I cut myself with a razor, see? I know, I did it the wrong way. I was young, right? So"

"That's no good. You have to cut it the long way look." A boy sat forward and pulled his shirt up to reveal numerous scars and lacerations along his right arm, including the name 'KURT COBAIN,' cut in deep - and probably permanently - with a pocket knife.

Agent #139 wisely decided to head downstairs.

The bathroom was made almost completely out of corrugated metal. It was packed full of people, most of whom seemed to be mulling about. A group of them stood around the sink, speaking rapidly. Johny quickly brushed by a very tall, skinny black man with short dreadlocks and a fishnet shirt. He moved closer to the sink as he saw one of them bend over and snort a line of something yellow.

"Hey kid," he said, absently wiping his nose and sniffling. "Want some Dexedrine?"

Johny declined and was about to head to one of the stalls when a piece of paper on the floor caught his attention.

'Whyfore hath thou forsaken me, bearer of the golden apple, possessor of the silver chalice of the moon, virginal harlot for whom I have mayhaps shared at least some of my descent from robot to human and back again?'

He bent over to pick it up, and discovered that it was in fact a pamphlet. On the inside was what looked like an interview with the artist.

NS: I'd like to know what you had in mind with all of these mirrors.

AC: In relation to the mirrors, there's the outward projection of outward vulnerability, the "school girl" outfit, etc. but there's a place inside that the others 'can't' touch. The distinction between sex/lovemaking and pornography, I think, is just this, that there is this internalization, "fucking them" as a sign of your own ability to have sex with anyone-- and it doesn't mean anything. Now, this isn't quite the distinction that Joyce made, but he was thinking aesthetically there, and I'm thinking psychologically.

NS: What are you trying to say, here?

AC: I don't know... To someone that has been violated at some point, I think this detachment is psychologically prominent and incredibly important for retaining some semblance of self-identification. There is a certain revenge in holding your desirability over someone. They can have your body, but that's it. Maybe it's easier, in this mindset, to say "yes" than it is to say "no."

NS: What do you mean?

AC: I mean that direct experience has proven that. We create our behavior from our beliefs, and our beliefs, at least early in life, are learned from experience. I had this specifically in mind when I did the series of mirrors, etc. on the far left hand side, as well as the blue, very wispy girl/thought-image on the lower left hand side. The latter I was thinking of as the "bitch queen" (I'm thinking of Norse mythology here), that is personified as icy and indifferent. Notice, however, that she's looking down at the image you so like with the little Asian girl being assaulted with that huge penis. Also notice that above that is a fractured image of genitalia, (male), being constricted by vice clamps. You can see her sentiments there.

NS: Would you give us a tour of the image?

AC: You could just look for yourself, but sure. Looking at some of the other images, the girl in the middle (the actual "sex act" taking place, I think of all the other images as thought-objects occurring in her mind at that moment), is fractured, distorted, clouded over. Only one part of her cheek is unfiltered and pink. Slightly to the right of that, she has the image in her mind of herself as desirable, (the black and white.) This is further exaggerated into the high contrast picture of the girl with the "FLIRT" T-shirt. This is how she behaves. She "gets what she deserves." All around the image are semi-transparent film slides that depict both situations she's been involved in, willing and unwilling, (but as the primary point goes, what's the difference after the first violation?) as well as things she's thinking about to "get herself off." This is, I think, one of the most damaging aspects about our sexual response, that after a certain point, what we most despise becomes the only thing that will "get us off," and it is at this point that guilt and self-loathing start sky-rocketing. I saw this phenomenon at work with my friend (name deleted.) He took it very far. he felt physically insufficient in a number of ways, the "cute" girls never paid attention, he wanted them to suffer for it; eventually, he wants to become the girl that is suffering for it.

NS: Could you explain more?

AC: No.

Johny heard a voice behind him call his name. Somewhat on edge due to the unusual surroundings, he spun about. A man in a long gray trench coat regarded him with what seemed to be amusement from behind his wire-brimmed glasses. His long hair was swept back stylishly.

"You're Johny," he said. It was a statement, not a question.

Not knowing what to say, Johny said nothing.

"My name is Alexi," he paused, waiting to judge Johny's reaction.

Johny looked at him blankly and fidgeted a little.

"I just wanted to let you and your friends know that you're getting in over your head."

"How do you-"

"How do I know who you are? I've got contacts." Johny noticed that under the fluorescent lighting, his skin was positively white. Not a touch of color anywhere. "But if you are certain you want to involve yourself, I have a little bit of information. There's an apartment here, I'll write it down for you." Alexi pulled out a notepad, scrawled something with a long, glistening black pen, and handed it to him quickly. "Show this to your friends as well, and tell them it's Gabrael's apartment in this area. I have a feeling they'll be interested, since they've accidentally been pulled this far in already." He took a step back, as if he was about to leave, and then changed his mind. "One more thing, okay? Get off the alien lead. It's all wrong. Mother Hive Brain is a joke. A sham. I don't know what nutcase came up with it, but it certainly wasn't one of us. Good night, Johny."

Leaning over the long, polished bar in the main room of the club, Jesus motioned to the bartender, a heavy-set man with a series of scars running down the right side of his face.

"What happened?" Jesus asked politely.

"Eh?" the man grunted, his attention apparently elsewhere.

Maybe he has A.D.D. like everyone else, Jesus thought. "The scar?"

"Accident," he said, still looking at the dance floor. "So, you drinking or what?"

"A bloody Mary," he said, trying to avoid looking at the throng of people walking around the dance floor. The women, in particular.

"You got I.D.?" the bartender asked, reaching beneath the bar for a glass.

"Uh, no. A virgin bloody Mary."

Alexi had a note-book and pen in front of him. He would occasionally look up into Gabrael's very clear, pale eyes, ask a question, and then continue with his note taking.

"So are you saying that the, uh thought-reality is every bit as 'real' as the, well. Real-reality?"

Gabrael smiled quickly, and then turned to watch the rain slipping down the tall windows along the far wall, throwing globules of light into the air. "No, that's too dialectical. Some of my earlier work made that assumption, but As we are both well aware, reading a menu and eating the dish are two completely different realities. Although an oversimplification, this is the first premise which I've been working from, via. extension, in an attempt to reassess metaphysics. There has been a related question which I've been bouncing around, and I thought you might have some insight into it: is the essential nature of a thing the same as the nature of that which it comes from? The answer seems rather clear cut in any pragmatic sense; a tree is the 'source' of a table. When we're talking metaphysically with the premise that everything comes out of nothing, (ex nihilo), there seems to be a problem. I suppose you can express it as 0={1,2,3...} although this is a glyph rather than a mathematical statement. The problem lies in our understanding of 0 (representing nothingness, not an absence of qualities in a location, but an absence of qualities in an absence of location) as illusionary or 'not real.' The very word 'non-existence' implies this, although it also means literally 'in being,' as existence means 'out of being.' We generally think that since the nature of the source is the same as the product, that if the source doesn't exist, neither does the product, (thus the Hindu Maya, etc.) This is the Eastern conception. The Western conception is that the world present to our eyes must exist, and so 'God' must exist as well. I don't find either of these answers satisfactory, and have been turning to Quantum Causality to try to rectify the situation."

"Acid?" Johny asked, making sure he had heard right. Two disembodied voices floated over his shoulder. "What's your name? Want to fuck?" Johny ignored them.

"Yeah, that's right. Five a piece." The man looked around, running his hands through his thinning hair nervously. Somewhat old to be in a nightclub, Johny thought. He looked more like a collage professor than anything else. His eyes were unusually luminous.

"I've never Well, sure, what the hell. Some for my friends, too?"

When Jesus received his change, he noticed that George Washington's eyes were X'ed out with a thin black marker. Curiously, he turned it over and saw that 139(13) was written under the Illuminatus triangle. Before he could continue his investigation of this rather bizarre artifact, his attention was grabbed by a girl wearing tight-fitting velvet that left all of her long legs in plain view. Glistening lips, subtle curve as the neck turns into the back. She walked by, giving him a bored look. It was a look of total indifference, of trained apathy. He could picture her standing in front of a mirror for days - weeks even - practicing that look. It was still impossible for him to deny the familiar sting he felt in his chest; at first, an irrational and almost overpowering hunger, followed by a torrent of guilt and self-loathing. I don't deserve that. I don't want that. I can't have that. She's worthless. I'm worthless. In a flash, he was sucked into a rapid-fire succession of sexual, and possibly misogynistic, day dreams. They were too fast for daydreams, really. More like a series of motion slides. At first, he was fucking her from behind, pulling her long hair with one hand and using the other to keep his balance, screaming "fat bitch!" and then, a moment later, he was the one on the bottom, and she was the one taunting him, her voice shrill and hoarse. The guilt continued to mount as the visions intensified. Growing brighter and more intense now, they involved various religious figures. It was only when the Buddha and a lust crazed Virgin Mary were gang-banging Lao Tzu, (Mary was using a strap-on that looked disturbingly like a cross), that Jesus was finally able to get control of himself and clear his mind of such thoughts. The comforting form of his lipstick, deep at the bottom of his pocket, re-assured him.

Agent walked into his bedroom, his room when he was a child, to find that a conversation had already begun without him. The impatience of empty rooms is unmatched in this corner of the galaxy.

"Well, see, it was actually a joke," the wooden duck was saying. "Like a turn around in a random direction in the topographical landscape, dig? Grok, there's this toroid being that we express in these 4 dimensional representative systems we call words... but they aren't words, man... they aren't words... they're sounds. Don't think about what I'm saying - think about who's saying it. They're sounds, and you can't wrap the experience in a word, man, because I'm on too much cocaine because I'm in Apocalypse Now all the sudden, he was a good man... he was a sane man. Yes, see, it was a joke. Go back and think it all over. It's funny, see? Ha ha. Okay, never mind. Go away. Stop looking at me." She reluctantly agrees. That wasn't what he was asking, but it was what she heard, what she knew. It was, then, what he was asking. She sat alone in a corner of the club; Agent didn't know she was around. But their trips were intertwining. And it was her dream all over again-- a chance to break out of the pattern?

No, no, this is not your head. This is my head.

Agent's stuffed dragon gave the duck an impertinent glance. "Give me some Ritalin."

"Sure God's rockin', but does he have lips?" He couldn't place that voice. Does he mean that a God that doesn't speak to his followers is worthless? She couldn't speak.

"They'll have to get jobs and get married and fuck once a week and have 2.3 children and a dog that wags its tail altogether too much and a mortgage and... no, it's much better if I continue to live this lie. I don't do it for myself, you see. I do it for the good of humanity. I am a warrior upon the battlefield of eternity. I am mighty and I have legs like tree trunks. I am full of shit," Agent said, defending his current opinions and behaviors. In her mind, he maintains some dignity. Everything she did was a flight, an escape. Because they are incapable of sweating, Pigs like to wallow in mud.

"Your skill with language is only matched by your blinding sword fighting skills and dashing good looks," the duck said sarcastically. "You're the little wooden boy, little wooden boy. You are little wooden boy!" Nothing. She wonders where he went. She is trying to remember how to feel. To feel for real, to be for real. When she was little she learned she could impress the big people if she did a little dance.

"The bees!" Johny screamed. "They do a dance"

She grew up and made herself out of porcelain, a warrior girl trained to do battle in transparent nightgowns. In her mind, the intentions were all pure. But wait, there's more: The fish lie! Death to the fishes! And there's the elevator, down the hall. (Is she still alive? Did she die a couple of days ago? If she's dead, she's immortal. She knows this without having the words. She accepts her death by pretending it hasn't happened. Run, run, run But there are signs.)

Meanwhile, a commercial was blasting out of the television, always running in the background: IF YOU EXPERIENCE VAGINAL DRYNESS, TRY THIS! IT'S LIKE YOUR NATURAL VAGINAL MOISTURE! IT HAS NATURAL ALOE AND ITS SAFE TO USE EVERY DAY. At the same time Agent was thinking "My current situation is so complicated that I can't explain. I tried, and then my brain shorted out and I had to dump it in a bucket of water. Increased magnetic field theoretical observers my submersion 1 mm. in diameter... proportional for quantum wave functions... And the question of sex vs. no sex."

more more more more more more more more

"AHHHHHHHH! Yeah, I feel better now." It was three years ago, and he was in his dorm room, blowing an eight-ball of coke with some friends. Equine dollar-bills a George Washington-deep in cocaine. Childhood decisions a Mother Hive Brain deep in decay. The flashbackwards was too fast; before he could get the dollar bill to the paper, he was four and thinking to himself: I'll beg my mummy and tell her she's big and sweet and it's my birthday and I'm pretty. I lost myself in the supermarket and cried out for mummy's linen. Mummy was doing cheap tricks in the seafood section, and came back with a bucket of prawns.

The dragon laughed at him: "Lavender stockings! Lavender stockings!"

"Little girl!" the duck added helpfully.

Agent had always been the girl.

She hasn't breathed since she was two. The constriction in her throat is unbearable sometimes. Tonight she tries. They won't have that kind of power over her anymore.

His thought processes continued to mull over their incapacity. "It's hard to navigate in these choppy waters, because I can't predict. I don't see why it is necessary for anyone to get hurt, to be honest. If everyone's mature. Will that happen? How do I know?!" What does she (I) see under the door what is that under the door it isn't real even so young she knows isn't real isn't of this world is only of her world. She will put it there.

"It doesn't matter who you fuck because I own your soul," she said slyly, although she was wearing a lizard suit. Stop face shifting! Mummy? "I do miss you, as usual. I have these thoughts of you and I get a big goofy smile on my face and laugh my ass off. You're one of those rare feel-good people I know that no matter what if I think of you I start grinning like an idiot savant who's just recited an entire phone book." She will not fly. Shut up, will you! Get over it for Christ's sake. You feel it in your chest, that pulling tugging. Call it whatever you want. It's real. She will put it there where the breath cannot go where the air cannot carry it through her break it up she is afraid to absorb it she is afraid if she keeps it she will break she will become it will become her (she will become her.)

"My love," Agent mouthed mournfully. Alexi sat in the mental hospital, surrounded by unforgiving white walls. "I miss her"

DEAR GOD, WHAT IS THAT THING?!

A few months ago. There were half empty bottles of alcohol. A woman -- barely a woman -- was sitting across from him. It didn't look like she was wearing anything, but it was all so blurry anyway... "I know I shouldn't," he thought, "but.. but I noticed that as the light got fainter and fainter she got hotter and hotter. " We pay our debts sometimes. And we get the abuse we think we deserve. Look: she's running around in a circle, screaming "Look at me! Look at me, mommy!"

A letter to the department of insecurity: If you see Atlas, tell him he can have his stinking rock back. I fear that if this condition lasts too long, I will abandon all of this mess I have created in favor of the real world, and a real job, and a real marriage. Not good. I don't want to quit this early in the game, but things seem grim. I just want to remember what it feels like to breathe.

"I feel as if I'm slipping into a dream within a dream" The music continued to play. Multicolored lights dancing off of the black lacquered floor, swimming around the dancers. Everyone dancing, watching others watch them. I'm pretty, see? Look at how pretty I am.

Thinking about all of the women now, and... sexual contact is sexual contact. The body doesn't care who it is, but you do. You do. Don't deny it. And it really isn't about the sex, it's about the intimacy. Okay, sometimes it's about the sex. When you're drunk it's about the sex. All the pigs are all lined up.

Atlast shrugged?

"You'll never be free." Who said that? Who heard?

The department of insecurity sends a reply a few days later: What I once thought was a golden cage has turned out to be steel after all. Just a cheap electroplate. I scratched through to the core. Control of my life has passed out of my hands. Not that I've ever had complete control over my life, (I used to think that... but I was even dumber then, if such a thing is possible.) But what little I thought I had is gone. Nothing ever seems worth doing, unless I'm hideously stoned.

ANNOUNCEMENT: The "Twin Peaks of Mount Fuji" is not a David Lynch film that is set in Japan. I don't think David Lynch puts titty-fucking and cum shots in his films.

"The donuts all have names that sound like prostitutes," Tom Waits points out helpfully. Then don't buy any fucking donuts. She goes to a place she knows it is best not to explore. Peel back the skin. Flashes of hallucinations from before she had the word for them. She didn't realize that it was real. She had hoped it wasn't. It wasn't me, man. On a beach somewhere, Mavis asks George: "Is the thought of a Unicorn a real thought?"

When she was little she had a distended belly / beer gut / she was a chunky girl / briefly anorexic hollow belly never fit. Thinbelly hollowspot. Nihil fit.

"Never be free, unless unless"

Epistemological wonder. Give me your benediction. Apostle. Enforced with the biggest guns. A pistol. What's under that dress?

"Say I am the Son of God!" the foreign man barked violently.

(sunflowers; full of brown with very little yellow
               (who could ever think the sun's core was rotton inside the velvet
flamepromise?
               (absurd, it would seem
        in the temple of the temple of the temple of the Holy
/seems bursting at the seams the light bursts through/
she drags on her cigarette. She can see him across the room.
/too red/
it is a beautiful night
               the seeds are only good for eating.)
ARE YOU LISTENING?!
they are plucked blindly from the earth
        no one's listening are you listening? I'm not listening in the
        (the pretty girls, they smile.
she runs home to sell her smile
(he rents it for six dollars an hour)
they paint her face and her words
color them pink and sparkly)
/she hides her dignity underneath/
                      (I can pretend
/they paint her face/
                      (I can pretend
/she smiles ( ) swallows slowly/
                      (I can pretend
/remembering his arms vast embrace/
shedivesdeeper
(it is warm inside)

The bunny shrugged. "Although 'commune' sounds a little too hippie or too psycho-cultist for me, I like the idea of having tribes. I love my computer, my microwave oven, and my store-bought clothes, but I'm pretty sure I'd love being an 'Indian' even more. We can live together and go hunting and farming. Just relaxing, going on spiritual journeys..."

and so She was There. (Was where? Who was She? )

wordsrodsdoors

She opens the doors and steps into the well-lit outdoors. Into the light of the sun. It is golden. She smiles /is beautiful/ smiles and walks towards something in the distance. She opens her eyes and remembers. Hot sun on a smaller roof, she remembers /feeling/ beautiful she remembers /being/ beautiful. She smiles. She closes her eyes /she closes the doors/ so no one can get in, and walks toward the subway. The sun is hot.

Too late.

Tonight she will fly.

Sweet dreams of falling.

She decides, she jumps.

She does not drown.

FIN.

Chapter 13, Grid 2:

The Cartesian Mystery Cook.

Death.

"The waiters of the best eating-houses mock the whole
       world; they estimate every client at his proper value.
This I know certainly, because they always treat me with
        profound respect. Thus they have flattered
        me into praising them thus publicly.
Yet it is true; and they have this insight because
        they serve, and because they can have no personal
        interest in the affairs of those whom they serve.
An absolute monarch would be absolutely wise and good.
        But no man is strong enough to have no interest.
        Therefore, the best king would be Pure Chance.
It is Pure Chance that rules the Universe; therefore,
        and only therefore, life is good."
                      -Aleister Crowley.

"Another Cod dinner," the new waitress said to Jay, Devon mystery cook. She pulled her hair back into a ponytail. "And I think he wants it cooked this time, hmm?"

"D'ya think?" the Cartesian mystery cook answered sarcastically, reaching into the industrial sized bag of Cod patties with gloved hands. "D'ya think it's really fish, I wonder-"

"Hey, if the bag says it's Cod, it's Cod." She walked out to the main room and returned to her indentured servitude. Jay shrugged and, after finishing the meal, headed into the bathroom and posted a piece of paper that he had carefully folded in his backpack. You always believed what they wanted you to believe.

I don't believe I shall knock about much longer, whether at sea or at shore, more and more sick every day in body and brain. I am at Devon which I shall be leaving because of the constant storms, the rains, and the humidity. I am at the end of my strength and I haven't slept in four months. "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for kids," can only be construed as a call to class warfare. Also, do not e-mail Saddam Hussein at Hussein@Iraq.com, we believe it to be a false address. In addition to all of this, I am made of tomatoes and olives working in concert to form the perfect personal government based on torture, death, and the inherent right of vegetables like myself. Support the graft in your hometown.

A public service announcement paid for by the mothers of the Cuban revolution.
                     -"Gorgeous" Larry Snodgrass, et al.

Jay Roberts had been working as a cook at Denny's for over two years, and by most people's reckoning, it had gotten to his head just a little. He was the last employee working who had witnessed Barbara's brutal slaying, some weeks back. It wasn't that he couldn't still cook up a mean Super Bird, Moons Over My Hammy, or any other traditional Denny's faire - he just had a few screws loose was all. It wasn't that he was stupid; he was probably the most intelligent worker in the building. This might have been part of his problem: being a cook allowed him plenty of time to think. All things considered, his co-workers knew to keep their distance and just nod their head like they understood. So, when he stepped out of the kitchen, holding a frozen fish stick over his head triumphantly, no one was particularly surprised. Even when he proclaimed "GOD - COD - GOD - COD! Permutations of the divine name!" they took it in stride, although the manager asked him to return to his station, and one of the waitresses tried to calm down an elderly man who was becoming irrationally confused. However, when he threw the rock-solid cod stick at the manager, shrieking "you don't pay me enough to buy into this lie you call reality! I quit!" they were rather taken aback.

Jay rubbed his blurry eyes. They seemed shrunken and yet somehow altogether too large for his face. He was convinced that they would retract, iguana-like, into the inner recesses of his skull. Three days without sleep, two days without food, just pounding on his old typewriter. He ripped a page out of the unforgiving machine and slapped White-Out on his most recent error. "God damn," he cursed. The exhaustion was almost overwhelming. Almost. With an amazing amount of will, he reminded himself that he had to elucidate his vision-it was time the people knew the truth. Not that Jay actually believed in such a thing. He just knew that people bought what they were sold, so long as their worth was based on their possessions and beliefs.

Mother Hive Brain had been his child, and everyone like minded - those who weren't cadl-born, he reminded himself -- had eaten it up. But it had grown old. So with the unstoppable, unrelenting melodious pounding of Beethoven in the background, he completed the paper and posted the first draft on his apartment door. Jay considered his work an even mixture of the theological writings of the East and Freud, and was horribly frustrated at his lack of success with the publishers, as well as their apparent inability to realize the scholarly nature of his creations.

The Book of Genesis

1:1 In the beginning there was a force, and that force wandered about in Nothingness. Nothing, for it was without form. (Also known as Jays' Closet.) It was then that there was a loud and terrible noise. And then silence. Again, there was a loud, terrible noise, and silence. This was the binary call of the God-siren. This was the infinite array of 0's and 1's, pouring out of God's drooling mouth.

From these 1's and 0's came words. These words were written in the LANGUAGE OF CAINE. The LANGUAGE OF CAINE formed all of reality.

Somehow, amidst the confusion, the stellar static of continuos creation, Jay was born. Through an understanding of THE LANGUAGE OF CAINE, his eyes turned in upon itself. As was his nature, he was looking for something to satisfy his bestial cravings. He purchased candy bars and smoked cigarettes. Jay, holy holy be his name, met Ken at this point. They happened to stumble upon a little black box, and held it dear to them, for it was a good box. They could not see inside it, but it could see them, which was unnerving at times.

1:2 The force we refer to as Ken lost the box. His only possession, the only thing he held dear. Upon realizing that it was lost and not merely misplaced, he threw a fit, and his anger gathered. He exploded, the explosion spanning the universe. His essence scattered across the closet, and it slowly coalesced into entities, minor Gods which each had their own sphere of influence. From this the Universe that we now know was created.

1:3 The Gods, having this Universe to play with, decided to put their attention into one project. This project was known as "The Great CADL." However, this CADL grew hungry, weary of such boring pastures. So the God known as Dave created the earth for it to live on, for he did not want the CADL to be lonely any longer.

On the first day, he created a gigantic garden for the CADL. It was a lush and fertile place. Many dandelions grew there. The Cattle grazed all night and day, content, oblivious to the fact that dandelions are weeds.

However the CADL was lonely still. Dave decided to make it a companion.

He then made the woman CADL. It was like the male... but different. It was a moody CADL, but playful. It kept the Great Cattle very happy.

However, the Great CADL soon became naughty and began eating the funny grass. This grass was given to him by The Evil One, who had divined that the funny grass was indeed evil, and through a manipulation of the LANGUAGE OF CAINE, made it so. In a stupor, the Great CADL was lured into a great building by the promise of more funny grass. His Tempter locked him up. The Great CADL was trapped, and unhappy. The CADL was in fact so unhappy that it forgot how to speak the LANGUAGE OF CAINE. It then forgot what it was unhappy about in the first place, and smoked more funny grass.

1:4 On the third day, Dave created more animals as various experiments. The most fruitful of all his creations was the cattle-born man. The most intelligent creature yet, it made up for it's little size, (The Great CADL was massive!) by its great intellect. Unfortunately, when in groups, they forgot that they were intelligent and turned into cows. Thus the livestock were born of the one HIVE MIND.

1:5 On the third day, Dave said something to the effect of "Damn I'm tired," and slept. Somewhere in the Sudan, a snake hissed and then crawled under a rock.

1:7 Thus the heavens and the earth were created in their vast array. Aleph to them all! Bet to them all! By the Seventh Day of creation, Dave had finished the work he was doing; so on the seventh day he rested. He blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on this day he was really beat, and decided to take a nap.

1:8 When the Creator made the earth and the heavens- and no shrub, (not even a little itsy-bitsy one), had appeared on earth, The Lord God sent a large quantity of no-rain to the earth, so it was really dry. There was no man to plow the fields or drink the Dew, but streams of the golden stuff came up and watered the surface of the ground. Then God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. And man became a living being. And Dave created women, because men were boring. Together, they practiced Tantric Engineering and realized that they were unlike the HIVE MIND controlled livestock. However, they also realized that "us" and "them" mentalities were bad for publicity except in 1930's Germany, so they clouded their message in an unimaginable amount of religious metaphors and thereby appeared P.C.

And they began reproducing like a wild, frothing flock of rabbits.

1:9 While Dave slept, Jay became bored, and hunted for the primal source. There was a great shifting of land. And for a while, there was a time of great confusion. And men could not tell where their fathers had put their daughters, just the night before. Consequently the great garden split into 7 land masses. Each their own mass. They were, in fact, weighty, and thereby had a great deal of mass. Indeed, this massisivity was so tremendous that Dave woke up and said "Damn that's massive!"

And so the continents as we know them were formed.

2:0 Later J got the rest of the Gods together for a conference. They gathered on a mountain somewhere in what is now Ethiopia. And James said unto them:

"Hey guys. Men are boring. They have forgotten themselves, becoming much like the cattle-born. I'm going to go down to tell them how to edit their scripts."

Dave, host of hosts, spake. And he spake thusly: "They must first prove their worthiness."

"They must show proper understanding. Binah must shine down from above..."

At this point Dave piped in again.

"They should beat the cattle-born with sticks!"

The great CADL opened a great eye. (He then promptly fell back into slumber.)

James nodded. "Yes. They will beat them all with stick. But, they must hide their faces, so that they know not whom we are. They're all going to wear pillow cases."

"On their heads?" Dave asked the creative one.

"Yes, Dave. On their heads. They shall strike fear into the cattle-born hearts first, by letting them know they can see them! When they see one of them, they must cry out 'I can see you!' before striking with the great stick."

Dave nodded his godlike head. "How will this show them to be true believers?"

James shrugged. "I'm not quite sure."

Across the planet, thousands of miles away, there was a tremendous splash, and a great displacement of water as a whale fell head first into the oceans. This began a great flood that lasted for 42 days. (Actually, 41, but it was pretty damp and overcast on the forty-second day. A real bummer. So, we said, hey! What the hell, add on another day! No one will notice!)

After the flood, the Syndicate (the non-cattle-born), went about as they said they would, beating people with sticks and having a good time. They got a following of humans who joined their side. All of us here who are self-aware today are descendants of these saints, who turned around and blood-thirstily beat the life out of helpless people. It is for these men and woman that the Gods created the LANGUAGE OF CAINE, so that it might be used re-interpreted and used to create as James did. The Tetragrammaton was CADL, which could be permutated into FEDL BADL CADL BABL through an esoteric Qabbalistic process too elaborate to go into here. Through subtle permutations of this code, they could alter all of reality. Realizing this, they celebrated. And they reproduced.

The 7 Un-Commandments

There are no commandments, although if you find that black box, we'd appreciate if you returned it un-opened.

And so on. The text went on for another two hundred pages, each successive page slightly more distorted than the one before it. Jay figured that if people had bought Mother Hive Brain in its first incarnation, it was sure to be a smashing hit with the addition of cows. Everyone was mad about cows these days.

Death rides the N and the R. Here I was, standing in the subway station headed to a friend's house, (from Atlantic to Union Square), and I turn to my side, and there he is. Black as night. Tall guy, wearing this long shroud. Or was it a cloak? I don't know. At any rate, he turns to me. And now here's the crazy thing: the lights are real bright in this station, but I still can't see his face. It's just pitch black in there. Then I see that he's carrying this huge scythe. You know, the kind they use to plow fields? So he kind of nods at me. Says "do you have the time?" in this real deep, slow voice. Have the time? Fuck, I don't know where I am half the time. Then he waves his scythe, maybe to get my attention, and I think: does death want a shot at the Pugilist Extraordinaire? Well, that's when the train pulls up and my story ends.

At the same time, at the night club, Johny was speaking rapidly, tripping over his words in terrified excitement. "You can't control the mechanisms of life People have been spending all of their time to understand not to adore, they wanted to control. And and Where did they learn everything from? I mean, for most of our history, people have learned from, what you said, uh-shamans. Shamans and religious leaders. Then political leaders. But but where do they learn about life now? The media. And where does all that information come from? Was there A.D.D. before the label was made? Manic depression? I mean, did the disorder exist as a thing, as a real thing? I read somewhere that seventeen million people have been prescribed Prozac in America. And that's just that's just one anti-depressant out of many. Has twenty-five percent of the human population always been depressed? Or were they just human, then? No labels, no hard-core this and gothic that Uh, but I guess they had tribes. To identify themselves with something so they could be someone, be someone in another persons eyes So they could see themselves mirrored. But you can't see yourself then. You don't see yourself when you become something else so as to see what it is you are. You you mess the whole thing that up. The, uh process. So you always wind up prostituting yourself for the sake of other people, so as to exist together under a name and a label. That's what it is, isn't it?"

"Paid much for your fuzzy suit, paid more for your needleknees and curious chickens, self-strangled bodies of artificial pineapple flavor and lemon crunch," Jesus said as if it were self-evident, nodding. Jesus realized the drugs were really kicking in now, as he had the distinct and now familiar feeling of being sucked into the maw of some huge, moist, monstrous beast. "My God!" he screamed suddenly, "It's here! The Leviathan is here!" He could feel the air leaping into and out of its lungs, a low rasping sound with a little bit of a rattle at the end of each breath. The whole room had the goddamned death rattle. It was like the dream, where he was inside that monster's looped digestive system, right before the Jesus trip had really started. He started looking around for his Windows 95 interfaceable gun.

"Jesus!"

Jesus' eyes lit up, looking as if he was about to say something. The Agent shot him a look that shut him up. "Jesus," Johny repeated, "I don't know who the hell I am! Am I myself, or am I that reflection? But what's reflecting? I'll die without ever having known what I am. Die, and it'll have been lost for their sake, because I wasn't ever allowed to be myself."

In center stage stands the metal man upon the pedestal. Silhouettes about dancing, yet he is not relenting. Screaming into darkness. Hard and cold, as the machinations of the world surely ruled him absolutely. The lights passed through smoke, time and again, cutting further and further out...

The Agent looked mildly concerned. As a result of this, more than ten thousand miles away, a rooster crowed. A perfect example of Jungian synchronicity at work. "I understand. Be careful, now."

"How? How can you speak about yourself?" Johny almost screamed, his voice hoarse.

"No, I really do. A while back I realized that identity was a well a mutually created object. Before I gave my identity for the cause," he said, a tinge of something in his voice. Was it regret? "But I realized that you can't ever lose anything, since there's no singular you in the equation. Death? Without it, there wouldn't be life. You have to open your eyes to the big picture, see that we're all the part of the same massive organism learning what it is to be alive, and what it is to experience itself. An absolutely single thing can't possibly perceive itself - it can't even exist! I" he looked over at Jesus and his voice trailed off for a moment. "You remember, I'm sure I felt like everything I had ever wanted had turned out bloated and most of all-corrupt. That what I want simply doesn't matter in relation to anything. For the first part, it's not God's wrath, vengeance, and nothing willful can be its source. It is simply equilibrium, which we sometimes call 'Karma.' Karma 'tests,' but not consciously. Shake your fist at the sky, but it doesn't change anything. If I let go of this quarter here," he said, showing Johny the shiny coin, "it will fall. And that's the most painful thing of all-that this 'I' must die, that it is powerless, that it is nothing. It isn't even I. Just continue unearthing those deep roots, 'cause the leaves have always been dead. We're just too damned attached to them to let them fall without sorrow."

"So what you're saying is that there is another mythological reality behind this one, and that we may ascend to that plane-to meet with God, if you will?" Alexi was asking, sipping Irish cream from a crystal glass. Beethoven's Piano Concerto number five was playing in the background.

Gabrael put his hand to his chin and though for a moment. "That's getting there, but it isn't there. Being in itself is just an idea, and that collapses the whole dialectic. What one means, generally, so long as 'one' hasn't been consumed by doctrine and or stupidity, by 'meeting God' is Union with the Absolute. 'The absolute' basically means 'any absolute,' since there can only be One absolute, otherwise it isn't fucking absolute. We're talking too glibly here." He smiled, and motioned for Alexi to hand him a cigarette. "'I' and 'you' can unite and become 'we' or even 'us,' but these are just stepping-stones on the path. When 'I' and 'you' become nothing-the Qabbalists call non-dimensional nothingness Ein Sof, and confuse the whole matter. Now, see, the trick is that they were that nothing all along, but Anyways, what was I saying? Oh, yes. Uhm, no subject, no object, and no not-subject or not-object, then 'you're' there, although at that point there isn't any point in talking about 'you' or even 'not-you.' Our essence outside of individual consciousness has always been the same, although it isn't quite an 'always' since it is effectively out of the field of time, the illusions of having a nervous system such as this."

Alexi chuckled. "If I understand what you're saying there's no point in talking about it."

An amused sparkle never left Gabrael's eye. "None what-so-ever," he said jovially but firmly. "Would you like another drink?"

"No!" Johny screamed, taking a step back. "You're all wrong. All of this is all wrong. It's all programming." His eyes widened suddenly as his body went almost rigid, held tightly for a minute in the clutches of some deep realization. "You're one of their Agents, aren't you? One of the aliens, communication through the device one of the them. God! No, I am not one of you. No, I am not something for you to shape and mold am not a robot or a creature cerebral cortex which is without thought feeling time-space continuos-Stalin said comrade, not a friend an equal unabashed in the light not one of them- he knew something was going down no way of knowing efficiently knowing on the inside like a like a but he's having a thing with what's-her-name. I am not like anyone else! I am different! I have no patience for your time for your numbers for your promotional premonitions. I woke up to your straight lines Cartesian geometry two-dimensional planes and six references six reference points to the dot not three, how could they think it was three? Ninety three miles away is the thing, one hundred and eleven is half the story half a union half a blot, an annihilation the trinity! The hermit! The nail! My fist! Sweet Jesus"

The Agent ignored his blatant Qabbalistic references-- certainly random connections caused by the chain reaction of neurotransmitters, that out-of-control, unstoppable train that results from the acid. "You're in this mindset It's like everything happens fast these days. Death is antecedent to life, and yet it follows so quickly on its heels, that you can't even tell the difference. Eat big meals, boy, because the cycles just come faster and faster, and there isn't any release. It shrivels and drops off before it was born. You hope and it hurts you, fear and it paralyzes you, live-- and it kills you. Right?"

"Uh oh," Jesus said, pursing his full lips as Johny continued to rant "I've got Godot in my pants! Godot in my my pants! Beckett means something in the reversal. Something has changed something this day danger came changed wicked this way comes. You can see the nothing that has happened maybe a Wagner routine with hats playing a game of abuse let's make it up" Jesus looked over at the Agent. "J? You don't think we got the wrong kid, do you?"

"What?" the Agent asked. "The telephone listing we used said J. Roberts. In Devon. I'm sure of it. Hey, Johny. Your last name is Roberts, right?"

"Yes no all the same hey, tell me though, is it true? One of them? Remote controls, y'know? Cars?"

"Uh oh," Jesus said again, feeling very foolish. "Jay's last name is Roberts."

"He doesn't live in Devon though," the Agent said tersely.

"He moved. And he works at the Devon Denny's as a cook."

"Fuck. Well, I'm sure the 'prophet-priest' isn't him. I love the boy, but he isn't wrapped too tight. One of who, Johny?"

Johny took a deep, Herculean breath and almost fell over. "I knew for so long that Denny's was a communicator device. Oh, I know. It seems silly at first. But I was sitting, sitting in Denny's. I mean, and it came to me: the pictures on the menu, you know? They're made of plastic. They aren't real food. The food they serve you-it isn't real food either. They're just convincing you into their reality. A bee does a little dance when it gets back to the hive to tell the other workers where the pollen is. But, with us, it isn't pollen, it's money. This realization, it didn't hit me like a thought, you know? It hit me like a voice, telling me the truth. I knew that I'd tapped into the hive mind directly. And you know what the voice told me? It said all communications are transmitted through the mass media, all thoughts are sent from the queen bee to the workers so they can do her bidding. All money is based on nothing. All money is without value. All of reality is based on money. All of reality is without value. I know that human brains are more complex than bee brains but that's what the whole freedom front is about. Everything it is, it isn't. I thought it was all crazy thinking, but after everything I've heard from you guys, and everything I've seen in the past few weeks I know now. With with certainty."

"We're losing him," the Agent said softly to Jesus. "Believe nothing, Johny. You cannot, you must not, forget that. Ever."

"He bought what was sold," Jesus said under his breath. "Only a follower can truly hate a follower."

"No." Johny said. He was rocking back and forth slowly now, swaying in time to an internal symphony. "No. Wrong, wrong I have to go!" he said fiercely, turning and breaking into a run. The crowd of undulating bodies on the dance floor swallowed him whole. Just like the monster in my dream, Jesus thought.

Looking at my own warped and knobby image in the faucet of the bathtub, I realize that I am not only "Handsome" Jim Manitoba, Pugilist Extraordinaire. I am also Hephaestus, club foot. I am proud of my deformity, my dissimilitude, my difference defines, clarifies Every room of the house is a metaphor, of a place inside myself. Or does the place inside myself mirror how the house is made? There is nothing real in my living room, nothing aesthetic in my bedroom, yet in the small, confined space of my bathroom, I may be free, I may be Hephaestus without shame, without lie or facade. My chaotic self-energy is formed by the feminine hands of my environment, and I am not angry at what it has made me. The LANGUAGE OF CAINE forms my house, I am a product of it, a servant of the Mother Bee, my home, my society, free to be as I am, Hephaestus, Club Foot-a bivalent builder of forms, molded by those forms I make - lame, erect, and proud!

The Agent was talking on the phone now, his voice hushed, almost a whisper. "Where were you last night?" It seemed that he was trying to hide the layer of ice in his voice. He paused, tapping his finger idly on the receiver.

"Well, the frustration, which I am sure you are well acquainted, is now interfering with my ability to re-express. But this, too, I see as a sort of test, from the outside-in or inside-out-- both in fact, and I know that, if our determination is as strong as our feeling warrants, little short of death really has any right to interfere. Even that raises a certain question mark, on both ends. I'm assuming that your absence doesn't have anything to do with a Hispanic guy named Juan?" he forced a quick chuckle and then paused again.

"I suppose I'll let my mind ruminate, and, cow-like, I'll try to take my time. I should like to simply encapsulate my entire soul and hand it to you to swallow, right? But, souls, being boundless, don't compact, but only specify and lose meaning. I do know-- in the manner which anything is known, that is to say 'known, but shakily,' that the boundlessness of the joy, offset by the abysmal fear of the loss of the external self, equilibrates the journey. This is boat knowledge, in its manner of being creaky and bound to spring leaks. My innermost nature was, for a while, worn on my sleeve as an act, and as such it became cheap; maybe it lost its own nature in the dance. So it hid and became, most certainly, a subterranean being. Maybe a wise captain with enough scars to know when to stay below deck, for the storm to plummet, touch water, and pass away. Still, there is no real self understanding without a self outside, a true mirror with which to judge the innermost character. And that, I see in you. The treacherous abyss yawns beneath it, screaming regret and warning, and yet, with boundless infinity, represented by Hope, in the sails, the boat continues undaunted." Suddenly, his voice grated harshly. "And yet, you ask me to throw Hope even onto what appears to be a sinking ship?! 'We'll talk about this later.' I have never been known for my patience, and yet, most predictably, I show sudden virtue only when I am in the position to be wronged by one even less knowledgeable in the way of ethics than myself. I'll continue on this sinking ship for the sake of my Hope only when it is unwarranted, it seems. I'm sure I'll be seeing you soon Goodbye. Mm hm." He was surprised to note that when he looked down at his hand, upon hanging up the phone, his onyx ring was no longer there. A moment later, he found it lying on the floor. In two pieces.

Jesus had been swallowed. The air was downright humid. Turning around, he saw two elderly men, holding a conversation.

"Is that a cat?" Schrodinger asked.

"No, it's your mother," Freud argued.

"But my mother isn't green," Schrodinger reasoned.

And then, in another corner, seated upon cushions that looked disturbingly like toadstools, mottled gray and yet speckled with bright, almost phosphorescent colors, sat a young girl, she couldn't have been much older than ten years, and a deep green and purple caterpillar. The insect was somehow seated upright beside the girl, and was inspecting her most curiously with its two eye-stalks.

"Well, perhaps you haven't found it so yet," the girl was saying, "but when you have to turn into a chrysalis - you will someday, you know - and then after that into a butterfly, I should think you'll feel a little queer, don't you?" Her voice had a melodious, bell-like quality to it. Jesus could hear Bach in that voice.

"Not a bit," said the caterpillar, his voice more of a deep baritone. Possibly even Russian.

"Well, perhaps your feelings may be different. All I know is, it would feel very queer to me."

"You!" snorted the caterpillar contemptuously. "Who are you?"

The drugs were definitely working.

Jim Manitoba here. Do you know how to make a good impression on a woman? Just remind her that a woman's place is in the kitchen making babies. (You make babies in the kitchen, right?) That should put her in a great mood for love making. Make sure to belch a lot. In fact, you should get drunk every day of your life, so drunk that you vomit all over yourself and then say "hey baby, come here" in a deep, masculine voice that stinks of beer and onions, and stagger towards her, dripping all over the kitchen floor while she's covered in sheen of sweat working on those babies, and you say "come on baby," and then slip and fall. You split your head open and now the blood is mixing with the vomit all on the floor, and she's trying to ignore it because she's paralyzed in shock thinking "this isn't happening," and only half-conscious, your head swimming from lack of blood and too much liquor, you say "you're my bitch," and then go to say something else possessive and inhuman, something aimed to strip her of the last vestiges of her self-respect, but it gets slurred somehow in the process and then you vomit on yourself again. Now she's shaking neurotically, running her hand through her hair, muttering "whatwillidowhatwillidowhatwillido" and then suddenly the hatred from being forced out of her life out of her potential, stuck in a cage with this vile piece of meat, namely you, comes ripping forth like a volcanic sewer, and she grabs a sizzling pan. She grabs a heavy iron pan and slams it down on your head again and again. There is the sickening sound of snapping bone, a soft sound almost like air escaping a tire, and the skull caves in, pouring forth it's bounty, the fresh bounty of the sea, like an oyster pouring out of its shell the brains slide onto the floor. She is satisfied. SHE IS PLEASED. Yeah. That's what you should do.

At the same time, elsewhere in the club, the Agent had wandered from the hard black floor, speckled in glistening globules of sweat and god knows what else, into someone else's thoughts. At least, this is the impression he had, because he could neither feel his body nor see his surroundings. It wasn't that everything had faded to black - far from it. Rather, his mind was focused on these thoughts, these transmissions, that he was receiving, and had no time or attention for such decadent illusions as sight or touch. This internal transmission - there was no other way for him to think of it - was quite real, inasmuch as anything was real. That is to say, he experienced it vividly, possibly more vividly than the flashing neon of bookstores and video arcades that most considered real. But his thoughts weren't really on this boorish, philosophical train hurtling through the bleak landscape of Platonic dialectics and the nature of reality. No, what the Agent found most enthralling at this very moment was the giant rodent, hiding somewhere under a bed, like some minotaur deep in the inner labyrinths of his mind. The beehive buzzing of his memory. Hiding amongst clumps of rabbit-like dust balls was this gerbil, it's little pink nose twitching at an impossible rhythm. Behind the rodent was the stuffed dragon that he had lost as a child. Alexi was somehow under the bed he had slept in when he was seven years old, and his dead gerbil was getting ready to talk to him. This is some crazy shit, he thought. Finally, the gerbil spoke: I was pretty sure I knew what I was talking about when I talked to my gerbil, although it's so hard to tell sometimes because he's dead; claws still, neck stretched slightly upwards --rigid, in my hands. He's a nice guy, really. He just isn't very responsive. Then again, they say that it's better to be able to listen than speak, and he listens real well, only talking to me through recordings using crystalline technology recorders left from Atlantis and passed down through generations in the Masonic brotherhood and encoded using mathematical constants found within the structure of the Great Pyramids of Giza, the Cydonia Pyramids on Mars and the Qabbalistic tree of life. Now I can convey one of these transmissions for you. Now you are ready to hear something from yourself, in another time, in another place. The gerbil paused and cleared its throat rather loudly. Now I am living between the lines, hiding in the cracks, hiding in ( )'s Society bends you like a piece of shoddy metal and you end up limp and lifeless on the floor. Once you've been processed and beaten down, they can shove you in the ground and wash their hands of the deed. (I found him in the fetid domain of death underneath the bed stinking of the machinery and rust that had consumed him like is done to all that once lived.) Were you good once too? Did you warp, manipulated into a cookie cutter mold of right and wrong, a backlash upon those predetermined morals -- or was it society? Shall we all blame it on everyone else? Only a fool would ask "why me," I see. Then why do I ask? The gerbil paused again, it's nose still twitching at that impossible rate. Oh yes where was I? Alexi noticed that a monocle was dangling over one of his coal black, beady eyes. It adjusted it with a furry left paw, hemming and hawing, clearing it's throat, (there was a report that sounded like a horribly bent, wet French horn), and otherwise making a great procession of the fact that he had forgotten his point. Yes, now I have it And the yo-yo encrypts us more then a thousand spider's webs I'm sinking into and yet all of you keep smiling Jell-O smiles and hot dog grins. Underneath there had better be the blackness of time and water stains that would make the Mississippi bow in shame or else you haven't lived like I have. And I envy you.

So it came to be that the Agent and Jesus decided to travel to the apartment of this Aleonis de Gabrael. With an increasingly bitter wind hard upon their backs, they headed around the back of the club. A tall structure, still somehow hunched, like a crooked form backlit in the style of a 1930's horror movie, replete with stone teeth and steel bars for eyes. As they rounded the bend and headed for the car, there came a rattling from a nearby dumpster. A form, hunched much like the building, stole along the shadows; he moved stealthily, as a stray cat might, hunting for food in the refuse, except he made a great deal of noise, kicking soda cans and rustling papers bags under foot. He seemed absolutely unaware of the sound, continuing to sneak towards them, convinced he was the most skilled burglar to have ever set foot within Philadelphia. Although the shadows were deep and concealed most of his features most completely, they could still make out a worn leather eye-patch on his left eye, fastened with a thin cord wrapped over the back of his oblong head. His clothes were shabby, yet they seemed to have been regal once, a navy or marine officers uniform perhaps, even a rattling sabre affixed to the crooked belt upon his waist. The Agent was growing anxious, thinking it quite possible they had accidentally wandered into one of Nathaniel Hawthorne's novels, and what a terrible time they'd have getting out of the predicament. "Avast!" the hunched form called, finally officially giving his presence away to the pair, standing transfixed in the half-light of the baleful moon, hanging directly overhead, their hands twitching nervously, eyes bugged out and pupils dilated to their fullest extent. The Agent's heart sank-this was more likely to turn into a Moby Dick re-run.

"Avast, I say," he called again, a hand held out in greeting or warning, (they couldn't tell which), stepping forward again. His footsteps sounded like gunshots on the concrete. Now they could clearly make out his features. An undeniable fishy smell seemed to emanate from him as a fog, his teeth were misshapen, striated in muddy shades of yellow and green. His one good eye, bloodshot and glassy, seemed to grow larger as he regarded them.

"For 139 resounding chimes I have hunted the great white whale, verily it leads me ever on," he began. The Agent began to fear his worst suspicions confirmed. A poor Melville metaphor at work-who had bothered to write them into this nonsensical novel? But he continued: "and yea, I now find myself charged to warn thee, thou Judas with a most shabby Jesus beside. Deep under the deck of thy vessel thou lurk, subterranean worm," he was looking at the Agent now, "thinking 'thou hast betrayed me, a million upon a million times hath I been betrayed, and now I may hide from life, from my emotions, from my being, from my love.' Thy love and thy quest are thy life, thou zombie walking in a half-life Never again shall I recount this to thee, so take this as a true lesson and write it in the innermost chamber, the tablet of thy heart. This worn man before you, with hands like parchment and face like raw-hide, is thy future. O, list. Take heed, phantom who puts the highest in the lowest and the lowest in the highest, setting the world upon its head as Hegel before thee: 'from the sleep of day and the dreams of night, this man, but a shadow of his Self, a phantom in his imagination climbed upon the Universal height, and bearing fire as Prometheus, set himself into the reflected light of those four nines and from the dream of waking awoke. He stood on 42nd street, wandering around as if he were lost, holding his head in his dirty hands, never looking up.' Hunting for thine opposite, an eternal feminine that thou mayest write thine own image upon, that thou might deify thyself in, the sin of every theologian is committed: thy divine subjectivity is objectified in that other. Thy nature becomes as nothing, thy purpose grows ever more empty and corrupt while thy seek thine marble goddess. 'From this mold of our eternal opposite, cast down to the world as a star, clothed in a body like marble with eyes like fire-is you. And it is you, our reflection, the embodiment of everything through the dance of these opposites, that I call life.' O fool! O monotheistic tramp! Transfiguring the overpowering need to be loved into a will to meaning, need to lead, need to intellectualize, mummify, and categorize-thou hast become a priest, and no philosopher. Waiting on 42nd street, with thy breath hanging limp in the air, deep down knowing thyself lifeless and cold, waiting and waiting for thy love. Pitiful wretch. Thy search for love, and all that thou mayest love in life, is thy grave." And with this said, he turned upon his heel and left.

Chapter Fourteen, Grid One:

The Downward Spiral.

Daath, the abyss.

"I think the biggest task ahead of us, as humans rather than as animals, is to discover what it is that our heart wills, and act on that rather than what comes as a convenience; what I mean is that it is easy for a man to eat when he's hungry, but how easy is it when he's full?"
                      -Aleonis De Gabrael.

Alexi was standing nervously at the base of the staircase in his apartment. He had been in his room, reading and preparing for sleep, when he felt a presence - that presence - from upstairs. When it was followed a moment later by the sounds of footsteps, slowly creaking from one floorboard to the next, he was forced to put down his book and inspect.

So now he stood, absolutely terrified, looking up into the shadows of the foyer and dark hallways beyond. Suddenly, he felt quite like a small child, hiding from that ever-present monster under the bed, and felt somewhat silly. Trying to write it all off as a product of his overactive imagination, he slowly ascended the steps, the hair on the back of his neck prickling and adrenaline coursing through his veins. In fact, he could feel the blood pounding through every single capillary in his head, pounding with a horrible, monotonous and steady rhythm. He had the distinct feeling that he would find something, something absolutely unimaginably bizarre and terrifying at the top of those steps. The impression was so strong that he was just about resigned to a long and painful death at the hands of some Chthonic beast by the time he actually reached the top. He reminded himself of the dangers of believing in absurd possibilities too easily.

His sheepishness was intensified two-fold when he found absolutely nothing. His senses continued to tell him that he was being watched, but having found nothing, no bloody corpses, no squid-like creatures from beyond, he was just about ready to laugh out loud at himself. Pounding down the staircase now, he brought his mind back to the state it had been in, preparing for another round with the monstrously engaging hunchback of Denmark, Kierkegaard.

Chuckling at himself, he lay down and grabbed the book. At that very moment, he heard footsteps, now slowly descending the staircase. Each step was deliberate, unusually loud, as if a great weight was slowly rolling down the steps towards him. Alexi froze. Every single muscle in his body went rigid. An icy chill shot right up through his spine, and directly into his cerebral cortex. The footsteps had stopped now. He could see that his door was locked, which did provide some degree of comfort. His mind was somewhat prone to paranoia; he had spent many hours of his childhood planning every single action he would take when that dark intruder would break into the house, as he surely would. It was only a matter of time before that intruder snuck in and turned everything upside down. All of those memories came back to him in a flash. He groped around under his bed, finding a knife that he kept there. And he waited.

The bronzed doorknob was rattling now, shaking back and forth rapidly. Alexi leapt to his feet darkness. Complete, absolute darkness. There was a sensation of timelessness, of floating Suddenly, he was in his room again, and the door was being pounded on. He heard a rattling sound, and the doorknob was unscrewed. His mother stood there, absolutely frantic. Apparently she had been trying to get in for more than ten minutes. Looking over at his clock, Alexi saw that it was two hours later than when he had gone upstairs to investigate the noise. He felt a breeze against the back of his neck. His window, which had been closed and locked, was now thrown wide open, letting in the frigid winter air. He could find no explanation for the loss of time, or for the open window, then, and, what is more, he never did find out what happened that night.

In the darkest and quietest of forests, I sit and wait for the fates. But they never come. I sit and wait for salvation. It too never comes. So I lie down on the cool ground, and through the canopy of the trees, stare up at the bright stars, untarnished by the lights of civilization. A few deer graze nearby, next to a clear brook running through tangled vegetation. She misses blue flowers braided into blond hair by

less-than-cunning fingers between the buildings they had momentarily (it
seemed) escaped from. I am lying dancing (they were always dancing) in the grass in the
golden golden sun where they were beautiful singing voices they called it
innocence (it was something else) they embraced and she knew she
knew she was
going away, but she held on anyway, she held on selfishly to the sweet air and
song and voice that would be lost forever soon.
and so she cries
she misses blue.
nospacesinbetweennoroomfordoubtthewords
theyaretruththewordsthey'reallthatisthey'reall
thatisdon'treadbetweenpleasedon'tread
between(that'swhereiamandyoumusn'tsee
youmusn'tsee this.)
don't cry, she says. i'm too
tired to cry. let's play instead.
beautiful beautiful beautiful girls
danced under the moon and sang to

       each other played pretending played pretending all the while that they weren't in love that they weren't complete the outsiders Other jealous and intrigued
       I miss blue. I concentrate inward and begin to shine with a soft glow. Reality bends, warps, twists away. The dry fragrant air becomes damp and musty. The forest floor dissolves to yield to smooth concrete, and the lights hurt my eyes. There she sits, just waking up from perhaps a perfect world, back to the harsh reality of the ticking clock, and the Jester slowly making his way down the corridor. He checks his handcuffs, and, realizing that they are working, replaces them to his belt. His mind is blank, as it usually is, although the thought of control excites him, almost perversely. He tries for a second to hold back a smile, but his lips part and he is grinning like a fool, his heavy boots echoing on the hard floor. She knows he is getting closer, his footsteps growing nearer, sharper, a businesslike, crisp sound. His heavy, slow breathing is barely audible, yet it is all she had to hear aside from her own tortured sobs. Her time is up, for now. He slides open the cell. She offers no resistance as he cuffs her and leads down a dark hallway to a cell, also sealed from all light. He hears some soft, muted screams, and his grin widens. He thinks he has won. Back in the cell, she cries herself to sleep

Alexi lay in bed, wheezing and coughing. Crumpled tissues were scattered about his room. He hadn't been able to leave the house in three days, due to a horrible flu which had completely leveled his system. The ensuing depression was making every second seem like days. He hadn't gone three days in absolute isolation for a long, long time. The feeling of being needed was so second nature to him by now that he really had no idea what to do or how to react.

He dialed up Ken's number. His mother answered and told him that Ken was out with his friend Jay. Alexi hung up the phone quickly and closed his eyes. A feeling of panic was setting in. He could identify it, could pick apart every single isolated psychological phenomena, every stressor, but it did no good. The desperation and irrational anger just continued to build. He experienced his emotions from the outside, and was incapable of interacting with them on their own level.

He dialed Samantha's number a minute later. It rang a number of times before he got an answer.

"Hey" she said, out of breath. He figured she had run up the stairs to get the phone.

"I'm not doing so well," Alexi said. It was all he could do to keep from pouring out an endless stream of complaints. Not that he hadn't been more and more prone to do just that lately. Still, he could watch this degeneration with complete passivity, from up on his mountain. It seemed that there was an ever-widening gap between his body and the center of his consciousness. The machine is getting annoyed. "What've you been up to?"

"Nothing much." She hesitated. "I've been hanging around Jay and Ken a lot."

"Right Jay." He felt a sudden flush of heat on his cheeks and neck. "Do you want to come over? I really shouldn't go out, but I could use the company."

"I don't know," she said, after an even longer pause. "I just don't see how I can help you. You need it more and more these days, like you can't exist on your own or something."

Tears almost burst into his eyes. Partially because she was dead right, and partially, Alexi knew, because she was dead wrong. He was degenerating, but it wasn't as simple as that. "I'm losing my faith, Sam. I really am." He couldn't keep his overwhelming feelings of hopelessness, desperation, or frustration from entering his usually carefully monitored voice.

"Your faith?" she asked.

"Yes. How is it that this 'close group of friends' can become 'fair weather' so suddenly? That people can be so fickle as this, that when I'm doing well, they ask for my help, and I give it freely, and then when I need support" his voice trailed off. Something clicked in his mind, a sudden realization that explained at least part of the situation. "Virtue is," he said, a certain rhetorical tone in his voice, "the most misunderstood and rare quality these days. One who caves into fear, into animal desire, may do well to sleep with the dogs and consider themselves no better."

"Well, I usually can get a ride over, but not tonight - tomorrow. I have plans tonight. I'll bring some food, and we can just spend some time together," Samantha said, ignoring his last comment completely.

"I just got this feeling call it an intuition," Alexi said.

"What about?"

"You and Jay."

"Don't be ridiculous. We're just good friends, and you know it. I just enjoy hanging out with him is all," she said. Alexi listened very closely to the quality of her voice. She may believe what she's saying, but I certainly don't, he concluded. Unexplainably, his feeling of despair suddenly turned almost into a light joy, as if the strain had become so much that his consciousness just gave up and disconnected from the body altogether. There was a certain fear underneath the experience, though. He could tell that it was a bad sign. Suddenly the despair returned. "Right, right just my paranoia. Just do me a favor and be honest."

"Just get better so you can come out of the house again, O.K.?"

Alexi's face suddenly burnt red hot with desperation. All of the emotions which he generally kept locked, chained, and barred came forth in a series of staccato, agonizing notes of fury. "Do you have any idea how I feel? Probably not. I've spent months helping you and everyone else in the group. I've been strong. And now it's a time when I'm not strong, when I'm both sick physically and mentally Who's got a shoulder for me, now?" He knew he was being horribly self-indulgent, but the feelings were so true, so dead on target, that he couldn't ignore them any longer.

"You'll get better. That's all."

"Will I? My body will, of course. But the knowledge, that I can be left alone like that, in a second. It does serve me right for being an idealist."

"What?" she was becoming angry as well.

"I had a little bit of hope left, you know, for the goodness of humanity. The will to power conquers all, you know" Samantha could have wiped the sarcasm off the phone on her end. "I don't see anything of goodness. Opportunism, yes. I'm through with it. You won't find anything of goodness in me either. I fold. Another fifty dollars to the cynics. Goodbye, Samantha."

"Whatever," she said impatiently.

<click>

You'll only see my reflection, he said:                             Won't you talk to me?
sprayed on the walls,                              always looking in cracked mirrors
in the dips of my voice,                              Talk to me
everywhere my shadow.                              with your real voice
He meant: her sleeping face,                              He talks in geometrical boxes
eyes softly closed,                              doesn't feel anything
an unnameable need.                              doesn't need anything
Keep trying to repair;                              alwayshidinginboxes
recover,                              alwaysrunningfromwhat Burns.
put on a new face,                              Where is he?
a new name.                              I don't see anyone at all.
For all of the blue-lipped kisses,                             Whysleepingonthefloor?
through pale-lidded mirrors
on my knees, looking up.                              He stared up for hours
For all the cadaverous dreams,                              and cried,
sent my way                              talking in riddles
by predestination:                              voice growing voidcold
I woke up today so cold                              thick barbs
I keep telling her shut up!                              I just want to be safe
I guess that makes you look pretty ugly.
I keep telling her shut up!                              And I just want to be safe
and my genius has slipped away                              every day
I keep trying to recover                             he drains me a little more
I guess what's gone is really gone                             but what could have been?
I keep telling her shut up!                              I just want to be me
Just a moment of purity,
white hot and infectious-                              Killme
and another lifetime of                              he said
containment                              Takeme
control                              I said
removal                              you get
detachment--                              what you ask for.

The bright lights on the ceiling of the Carriage house reflected yellow-orange across the bare wood floors. Everyone was seated, some on the sofas, others on high stools next to the kitchen island. Alexi was sprawled out on a sofa, gazing blankly at the lights on the ceiling, muttering to himself.

"You O.K., man?" Ken asked from across the room. There was an unusual discomfort in the air, even more oppressive than the common billowing cigarette smoke.

No one's listening are you listening? I'm not listening no one's listening in the temple of the temple in the temple

"In all honesty, no. However, I can't tell you what's on my mind, because of present company, and you'll probably write it off as my imagination anyway, and-" Ken opened his mouth to say something. "Eh, don't even bother, Ken. I know you're going to say that you'll hear me out, but in this instance, I can't see any resolution coming from talking about it. Fate will run its course. I already tried to talk to some people about it, and it is, quite apparently, all the delusion spawned of a sick and demented nervous system." Alexi looked over at Samantha, who looked the opposite direction.

"You couldn't help me if you tried," there was a flash in the answer, an answer cold-coated, containing the warm heart of the world.

"You have your answer, my child," the blind girl answered.

"Just call to me -- bring me forth!" although the salvation always ended in pain.

Ken seemed annoyed. "Whatever," he said, turning his back to Alexi. "You think that the issues of the group are central to you, and that you started things. You're wrong."

Alexi glared over at him. "Is that so? Who introduced everything? Who was the workhorse and theorist? Tell me if I'm wrong, please prove me wrong. You have the intelligence, I'll never doubt that, but your apathy keeps you from doing much of anything. I took the risk, by playing the part of the front-man, and now I'm getting the flak. No one is willing to say a word, but we all see it. The dream is gone, and the chance passes us by. Maybe someone else will actualize what we had the vision to at least dream of. But not us. Everyone sees everyone else pulling away and falling apart, but we're all too fucking timid. Maybe we can write if off as a process of growing older. 'It happens to everyone.' Don't you think that it is our own actions that result in our future? Or do you think we can sit around and just wait for our 'promised land' to come? And this is how it ends" Alexi said.

"Whatever," Ken said again, walking away. "I need to go home. I'll catch you all around."

Samantha walked over to Alexi's side, sitting awkwardly on the end of the sofa.

"Yes?" he asked.

"I'm going out to the field, to watch the stars, maybe sleep," she said. Then, almost as an afterthought, she added, "I think Jay's coming along."

"Oh, you think?"

"You can come along," she added after a moment.

"What an honor. I can tell by your eyes that you don't want me to."

"My eyes?"

"Tell me one thing, alright? What are your intentions? If you would just bring this out in the open"

She looked at him for a second, thinking. Then she bent over, her mouth an inch from his ear. "I don't know, maybe. Maybe you're right. I don't know."

His eyes rolled back, almost into his head. "Get out of here then." She hesitated. "Go!" he screamed.

An hour after Jay and Samantha had left, no one could find Alexi. Don headed up the stairs, to go to the bathroom.

Inside the bathroom, Alexi stared at himself in the mirror. Minutes passed slowly, but all that changed was the dilation of his pupils, slowly closing from the bright light, reflecting off of the mirrors and tiles on the floor. Here was emptiness, staring him in the face. And loneliness stood right beside him. A whole world of shattered possibilities, broken plans, and wasted work. How many faces can you wear before you forget your own? It was not a familiar face that returned his questioning stare.

"This is the biggest joke I've been part of. A cosmic joke," he said, watching his lips moving in the mirror, amazed at how much they felt like rubber. Certainly not a part of him at all. The sudden thought of cutting them off flashed through his mind, but he quickly dismissed it as thoroughly absurd.

Of the Holy to her crying she is crying I am crying in the temple in the temple of the temple of the temple of the sun

"I thought I had learned how to be impartial, how to become one with the comedic tragedy and I lost sight of the most important lesson. What now? I've become too involved in myself, the seed has been sewn. It's too late"

There was the sound of dripping water. He looked down at the floor to see drops of blood splattering crimson across the white tiles. His nose was bleeding.

Cursing his bad luck, he grabbed some tissues and sat down, tilting his head back to slow the flow of blood. The red stain quickly consumed the tissues until they too were just giant blood clots in his hands. Still the flow didn't relent.

"When it rains, it pours" he said, still performing to himself in the mirror. The tissue against his face made it rather hard to speak.

A humming sound issued from the floor itself. He looked around, suddenly frantic. The humming grew louder, until it was a deafening roar that blotted out even the sound of his own thoughts. He got to his feet shakily and staggered over to the mirror again, the blood continuing to pour from his nose. There was something about the room that seemed wholly synthetic, like he had been taken out of the real bathroom and placed in an imitation. He looked out the window and heard the howling of the wind, the barking of one of the mastiffs in the driveway sharply attacking and then fading away. Something was certainly not right. It was all brittle, fake, and far away. He could feel harsh gazes burning into his neck - the synthetic bathroom was a display. He was on display.

His entire face was now covered in blood. The walls were screaming. He had to grip the sink for balance. And flowing from the back of his mind, like a serpent uncoiling up the length of his spine into his brain was Samantha's voice, repeating all the things that she had said, and another voice, a dark and yet thoroughly calm voice, even further back, that cursed him for his trust, his stupidity. Never, ever trust again this lesson is coming hard and you'll never want to repeat it. He tried to hold on to another voice from across a chasm that asked, "what of the rest of your life? Is there life without trust or hope?" As his nervous system began to fly apart, the voices continued to raise in volume and tempo. More comments twisting and intertwining with each other, hundreds of voices. But you're still wondering how she really feels, and this is a situation that is similar to those other relationships you had a problem with. It seemed that they would reach a crescendo, and yet they just continued to build, expanding in sheer ferocity and making progressively less sense.

Through this volcanic uproar, there remained a single calm voice, the voice of the commentator. With steely clarity and indifference, it explained the experience to Alexi: "I'm the director. So listen up. You'd be numb except for the feverish impression, burning just behind your eyes-- it's far less than an impression even, maybe a memory of direct experience. This isn't a cry for an 'out,' and it isn't the first deceptive move in my prefigured demise. No, it's your self identification dying, one excruciating program at a time. Every movement of personality, lie within a lie, and gut wrenching emotion is disemboweled from your self before it even arrives. It's like you see a shadow, an after effect, of what really happens, of what is really me. I am you. You are my result."

Alexi was sweating profusely and shaking. He clutched the sink, his knuckles going white. "Me?" he asked hoarsely.

The voice continued: "Maybe this is the sound your nervous system makes when I struggle against the constant undertow of entropy. The universe works in waves, giant, voluptuous crests-- and when it pulls down, you can't resist that call. It's the energy of the universe. You don't exist outside it. I stared at myself in the mirror for hours yesterday. Hell, I'm still standing here. The sun slowly set outside, cold wind blew in through the open window, ruffling the curtain one way and then the other, but I couldn't stop looking, unblinking, unflinching, at myself looking at an image of myself looking at myself... I stop that chain in language-- although it continues forever. Somewhere, disengaged in time, who can say that there is not an infinite chain of self-identified images of myself looking at images that it perceives as itself? Why does it determine, a-rationally, a-systematically, that this pale image is itself? This is what I was determined to answer, ignoring the delusions other people are want to impose on my thinking."

Another voice burst in for a moment: "I STILL LOVED ALEXI AFTERWARDS. No, you could have said, 'it's easier to say you love someone before they cut your heart out, isn't it Alexi?' I AM STILL LOVING ALEXI IN THE AFTER WORDS. I am the words that love Alexi when it's after wards. When the wards are after Alexi, there is still love in the loving. Alexi in the worlds that were loving before they became words. Word up, Alexi is showin' props for the love of loving. The love of loving, a new self-help book by Alexi, aka. DR. TEETH. After the words, after the smoke clears, Alexi is still loving. Under the Alexi, there is a love. His address is http://www.Alexi.ITSELF.org"

The commentator quickly overpowered him. "The clock continued to tick, and the fever behind my eyes is a fire now, the thrumming in my head leaping from one ear to the next, louder and then softer, gliding into crescendos and leaping into near silence.

There was an audible popping noise, and an entire story unfolded itself before Alexi's eyes in the course of seconds.

Chapter Fifteen, Grid Three: Intermission, Alexi's Vision.

"What happens when my Hope, my meaning, is transposed upon another, and that other is lost? When the other is lost, the individual can make no reconciliation: he has lost himself, he has betrayed himself for the other, and must now continue through the process in despair."
                      -Aleonis De Gabrael.

The reflection was the answer,
Negation was the key,
Love was the cure,
Trust disintegrating within `stupid kids.'
[Who answers that rebirthing call
               Hoping for recreation;
               Answering through a thralling
               Towering upon a beginning
               Open upon
Itself.]
               The exit,
               a keyhole.

...

"What's the meaning of all this" she asked him ?(do you really mean this?)! They lay close together amidst a mass of tangled sheets and perspiration. (Recent procreation.) Her tone was even-- it was a serious question but didn't involve him. It was impersonal and philosophic. ("What is truth?" Socrates asks. Can I divulge your intentions from your beliefs?) [1. The reflexive question "what is this experience?"/"what is the meaning of this?": language as a sign rather than a symbol is stuck upon itself, that is it cannot reach out of its own closed system, and all language that we use to refer to direct experience is a sign. It is hard to crack language open to what lies within it, that is, what precipitated it, what direct experience was arbitrarily translated into word. By saying "this is that" one is really saying little more than A is B, (A=C, B=C.) The deferment to C is a simplification of the fact that all language, (whether transcribed or spoken), requires other words for definition which in turn require other words until you arrive, eventually, back at the word you started with. All language effectively does for experience is translate, specify and compress it. For instance: "This" (specifying a thing as separate from everything else), "is" (positing the thing spoken of as existing only insofar as the statement is concerned), "that."]

...

Prelude:

1. Picture the astrological symbol of Cancer. Spin it around and around, end over end in your minds eye.

[+ -/ energy natural: unmanifest]

Unending days and nights Meredith walked... The passage of time was unnoticed. Through the desert's sterile heat, through the rains and deep mists of the forests, through the mountains and plains, always turning over the same thought in her mind. Focus. It had started out innocently enough, but something had set in and if she could only remember... Her whole mind revolved around one unnamed central point; pushing, tugging, leading ever on...

Gravity and electromagnetic forces are the result of energy changing vector as it passes though a compression field. The vector changes while velocity remains constant (infinite), creating a force vector which acts with propulsion on the field. If the cumulative actual fields (or field environment), are not symmetrical, the particles will move.

Interlude:

"Damnit, I'm going to be late again!" David thought angrily as he eased out of his parking spot. The huge engine of his Mercedes grumbled politely as he inched his way along the narrow streets. Hard work bought his car. Hard work bought his impeccable suits. Hard work was killing him. The heart attack was a minor one, but it didn't slow his smoking down a bit. 3 packs of Marlboros disappeared into his lungs every day, the majority of the butts being deposited in his heavy ashtray at the Agency. Advertising was a lively career, and David C. Thomas was the liveliest asshole of the bunch, as he liked to put it. Something was nagging him this morning as he nervously rode the elevator up to his floor. He hadn't felt this feeling ever before, but it was vaguely familiar. His stomach clenched as the adrenaline coursed through his system. He was full of nervous energy and all of his senses sharpened. He was also, for the first time in his 38 years, fully aware of the voices in his head.

Dreams of Paradise (Manifestation):

2. The spinning grows so fast that it turns into a sun. Now you See a Knight upon a gold and silver chariot driven by 4 steeds, headed towards the sun.

[Childhood: Parcival: With the cry of 'amour' the youth chases

after the Graal, leaving the castle of his youth...]

Sunrise- She awoke to a crisp Autumn sky shining through the canopy of the forest. Again, the urge pulled her, and she began to walk on. Uneasy, the tension before a strike. The forest, despite the chill, was wondrously alive. Swallows chased each other at dizzying speeds through the undergrowth. The yellows and reds of the leaves shone (almost as if illuminated from within.) She kept on, curious, nervous, and hopeful. Something was drawing together. She felt this, but could not verbalize it. Thinking-thinking in their words and their symbols -- was a chore, the voices louder and louder as the sunrises and sunsets past. She was not one of them. She pressed on, a little faster now. She did not know how she knew this, but she knew for certain: time was running out.

There is no limit to the velocity a particle may travel. We observe light at one speed because it is a significant speed. At "c", light particles have an appropriate amplitude to interact with the particles common to regions at this (our), distance from the center of the galaxy. Smaller and larger amplitudes do not react "visibly" with any significant reliability. The wave motion of light particles is owed to the depth distortion of particle fields in the regions of interaction. In open space they travel in straight lines. This will not be observed because any observational equipment will produce a distorted field.

Paradise Lost:

3. Picture a skinny child, large belly, crouched over a bowl of steaming water. Dark room. Shadows, cars passing outside, the sound of wet tires over pavement. What gender is the child? Who is the child?

Footsteps. Footsteps dying and leading

into a silence

a noise in itself; one could say that she was what was left in the gaping hole left by the echo and reverberations of that silence. (If you want to know someone, then look at their shadow: their result. Follow the footprints...)

Maybe she pondered this for a while, until the swirling eddies of thought were too erratic for even her to follow, and she tried to force her mind to cease.

She had been daydreaming. Something about a forest, and birds-- a feeling of a peculiar nature, almost the essence of the forest itself, the essence of the memory of beauty... Beauty is savage. (You can't put beauty in a box or give it a name. Words are boxes, names are traps, and THAT THING continues to be what it is, defiant of the boxes--)

The thought eddies began again, and she had to stop.

[2. The dialectic between Being in itself and Being-for consciousness, qua dialectic, (not as synthesis but as thesis/antithesis, i.e. as the conflict itself), is existence. Existence is, in other words, the simultaneous correspondence of two things - seen/seer - which neither proves nor disproves their 'absolute existence' separate from each other. The "particular" existence is the same as "absolute" existence. Perception of an object requires the validation of the subject. As the relationship between seen/seer is the only existent thing, then that relationship is universal as experience. Positively said, everything is existence; negatively said, everything is devoid of selfness-in-itself.

a. By "existence," roughly speaking, one is referring to the absolute Being of any being, which is precisely the same ground of Being every other thing subsists in. This is one of the primary reasons that

direct experience is considered higher than philosophical, reflexive thought: being and Being are, in their essence, the same. (and the being in the being of the being was being something not itself for itself was being not itself for its self's sake /I'm full she says, rolling over and burying her head into his chest. Full of what? He asks absently, still sweaty. Of be-ing. She smiles. The sun is coming up.)

b. Being in itself is held in contrast to Being for consciousness, (Objectivity vs. Subjectivity.) This is a distinction created between our thinking [experiencing] of opposed to our thinking as. One creates a reflection in "the mind" to think about the being of a separate object.

3. The dialectic of the world-within-the-self and the self-within-the-world: we find that an "I that can experience something in a certain way" is the entire universe, there is no personal "I." We generally assume that we are being-in-the-world, due to the reflection of our "external" environment and through our ability to think of ourselves as an other in relation to other people. However, direct experience is not being-in-the-world but rather world-within-being. Only within the world-within-being may there exist a being-in-the-world.]

Look:

David's kitchen was oblong, off-white, and certainly not worth mentioning. A clock sat above his square kitchen table, (not a grandfather clock, but sharing in a similar style),

TICK TICK TICK TICK TICK

For a moment he was in class again, Mrs. Wells prattling on and looking like a living skeleton, his hands going white clutching the desk

STOP!

The kitchen wasn't worth mentioning. Another cigarette disappeared into his lungs. Stop: to look around you. Listen: you are a reaction to your environment. Feel: you can change your environment. You can change your self.

She looked blankly at her white apartment walls; years before, they had been white in actuality. The walls had been clean. The boxes had been unquestioned. (In need of a good cleaning. Dear. Everything always needs cleaning!)

"So why bother?" she asked, out loud, flippantly. The walls were a functional audience. She paused. Her mind cartwheeled.

Why did she work, to die? Why was she striving so hard for her own demise? She nodded her head. She had thought this a million times before, but this was unusually lucid. The color of the thought was vivid and it smelled like ozone. Deep and subterranean place to be. Theta waves. "That's it. I understand. I never really fully understood..." She looked across the room and saw her translucent image reflected in the dusty windows of the apartment. Wipe the dust from the glass? There isn't anything there in the first place. For the sake of convenience

        (the collaboration
       of two
        arbitrarily created "points")
               there was annihilation. (And for the necessary
                             procreative
                             sake of BIRTH)
               there was:
                      [pro(to)-creation.]
               For the sake of the necessary
        (the necessary separation
        of two
        arbitrarily created "people"
        is annihilation.
        And annihilation is: sorrow.
        The co-creative
               co-operative
        and
               co-ordinated
        creation of co-ordinates
        is bliss
        for the sake of convenience.)

As energy "travels" its vector follows dimensional terrain, which is determined by dimensional structures. From this point I will limit my discourse on dimensional terrain to the observable universe.

Aside from energy, all existent items are dimensional structures. A basic particle is a spherical plane where at the site of the plane depth is arbitrary. That is, depth (one dimension), is infinitely compressed and distended at the event of the plane. As a side note, electrons and positrons are non-spherical. I believe them to be shaped like collapsed doughnuts.

But look closer: there must be an explanation. ("What's the meaning of all this?" she asked. An Ontological or Epistemological question?)

[4. Why is Ontology necessary for Epistemology?

a. This is not a matter of semantics; the Epis. question "what is this thing?" (it's suchness), is not focused on that it has a nature of some kind, but rather how that nature is known to us, or in other words, how the subject experiences it and how the being of the thing is affected by this relation to result in a particular experience. The question of Being is thus epistemological, even though it's underpinnings are ontological; saying that "I experience this" presupposes there being an "I" that can experience something in a

certain way, and so the question becomes "how do I know (experience) this?" and "what is this separate from my knowing (experience) of it?" The suchness of a thing in itself becomes a problem, as the cognitive

faculty which gives it existence to me is also the fundamental thing that makes me aware of myself as me, i.e. consciousness.

b. David C. Thomas dons his clown suit and make-up and heads towards his car. Bright day. A dog barking in the distance, pulling its chain. With a briefcase full of many late nights and stale coffee breath he experiences the perfect Suburban nightmare. He shakes the fatigue from his head, makes sure his rubber nose is on straight, and almost thinks with half-regret of the lover that the briefcase full of ideas chased away.]

She called up her friend, Marion. "Iste beepe nickto!" She spoke powerfully with the tongue of the ancients.

There was a pause. "Who are you? Why are you speaking gibberish?"

"Why are you, and why are you speaking gibberish?" She responded. "What is the meaning of this?"

"Why am I? ...what? Look. I'm going to leave..."

"Don't bother doing that. You can't leave from somewhere you've never been. You are not here... and you cannot leave!"

"Your logic eludes me."

"Funny," she was enjoying this, "it does the same with me. It's a consensus. Do you care for coffee? or tea? what about sex?"

herback(breaksopen)thelight(breaksthrough) breaks through (THELIGHT)

There was an even longer pause on the other end. Quiet breathing.

Paradise "Never to be Found Again:"

4. Smell of ozone in the air: next room, an older woman crying and rocking back and forth.

[The rain is coming. Can you feel it?]

The phone lay dead in her hands, the lights flashing phosphorescent green once, then twice. She cradled it tenderly (like some broken thing) and realized that a link had been severed. There had been a connection that was now a crack, a chasm. The actual and the ideal. Something was not the same as before. She thought of ancient burial ceremonies, and the confusion prehistoric men must have experienced when life ceased. Hanging up the phone had saddened her, but she couldn't really say why.

Lay it down the floor; off the hook. There was remorse here but fascination too.

she kissesHimexcitedly kissesHhim her neckbendsback her back herbackburstopen lightbreaksthough the light the light everythingislight hermouth(isopen)herbackherfrontherhearthersoulherself(isgoneisopen) and then (andthen) ...(boom)

She should go somewhere
        (she should be something)
        the voices shriek
               /I hung up the phone (dead)/
              (tonight she will not sleep)
DON'T PRETEND
               she looks over her shoulder
               and runs
        (isn't she beautiful?)
               (isn't she?!)
               (boom)
               it was time (apocalypse)
               the world crumbles the
               angry God (pot-bellied)
               chases after her she "loved" him once (?)
               she had to leave she breathes slowly
               (fills her belly) she runs faster
               (she looks over her shoulder and runs.)
(she should be something)
beautiful faces places (minds) quietly descending
       darkness descending
       falls (she's falling)
        spinning spiraling
               coiling to the bottom
               dancing turning holding (NEVER AGAIN)
               the dark is beautiful. She (he is beautiful.)
        when only His face is lit when
                      only HIS face his eyes burn into
       into eyes (she is falling) she sees Him
        in the dark she sees
               she reaches out to touch
               (she reaches) touches
                      touches
        (and in His arms she is
                      free.)

"Rosebud," He whispered. (And one hundred and eleven satin petals encircled the center, serpentine, coiled and unfurling in a spiral.)

"Quit joking around," She said, half joking herself. "This is serious."

"This is dead serious," He said, his emphasis on the word 'dead' arousing her curiosity, "I love you."

"A dead sentiment." Her curiosity would have to remain aroused and unsatisfied. She knew He wouldn't explain, but She pouted anyway.

"Out of dead sediment new flowers grow," He said as if he was explaining something. (Sedimentary is fragmentary, and the old life is linked to the new in the house of its dead flesh. The union of life occurs upon the compost of corpses.)

Kali dances on the bodies of her initiates.

She kissed him lightly but said "you're interrupting the story."

The Pastfuture:

5. You see a large green dragon in the air, sound of tremendous breath leaping in and out of its lungs, then Knight charging.

Cold wind and hail blew across the field,

The long blades of grass pulled back,

Pulled at by a desirous wind,

Down into a river in the crack

Of the concrete and abstract...

It was such a long time back,

All that I can remember is thinking

Forcefully `I just want some answers.'

And in a moment, sitting back, blinking

For an instant, and then, as a cancer,

A black splotch growing...

The walls were stained, she realized. The walls were stained and so were her hands. Stained yellow. She felt dizzy. Confused. Trapped in a corner, with no where to...

A great field stretched in all directions, coated with frost-bitten, knee-high, blades of yellow grass. The sky in the distance was ominous, a bruised shade of purple; the sky was a victim. She could tell. Where was she? Her ears rang again

"Oh God," She said, nausea overtaking her. There was the sound of chains rattling, from somewhere. And dogs barking, dogs at the end of a chain -- viscous, frustrated dogs. The dogs were a deep russet, and spittle flecked their quivering muzzles.

She was in her room again. The phone lay on the ground. Dead. A noise startled her (dead); an ambulance drove by, wailing(dead). Inside(dead), a man (dead) lay dying (dead) upon a stretcher stained (dead) red (dead) with his blood (dead). His wife was (dead) leaning (dead) over him, her hand clutching his -- "You can make it dear! You can make it!" His heart continued to struggle...

...

"Do you think she loves him?" She asks.

Doyoudoyoudoyoudoyoudoyoudoyou(loveme?)

"Does it really matter?" He taps his fingers idly a moment and shrugs. He's more interested in looking at her than talking.

"No, I suppose it doesn't."

...

Journal entry:

1. You look in the mirror and see yourself as a child.

I think dying is more like being plunged under water than an ending; there is a correlation between BIRTH and DEATH; there is a cooperation between BEGINNING and END; if you look around you, you never find anything that has an end: everything moves in circles. The circles are spirals: there is progression, there is a permutation of previous form. We are no exception. We just don't REMEMBER. NOT PAST LIVES. Constant life. The subterranean realms of dreams has always been. I am the dream of myself, who dreamed me in the first place.

Your equations don't work because you always think in terms of there being just one interaction, (x + y =...) within a void. With your thoughts you create projections of everything you experience. Your "tree" is really your tree. Your equations, your future projections, don't work because there is no compensation for external, ambient effects. By all rights, a moon should travel in a straight line, not an orbit. By all rights, the world "should" be the way you create it. You cry because, by all rights, the world isn't yours. You hate everyone because they demonstrate the obvious.

It's the waking world that falls short and sells itself even shorter. You give up before you even begin. The (physiological) disturbance becomes psychological. Every physical object is the predecessor of a thought; every muscle action, contortion, dilation, enervation and upheaval is a movement that finds itself known as an image, a thought. This is digested and regurgitated through symbols, (the world of children.) Lost and then found in an almost unrecognizable form. Lost and then found, this correlation becomes clear, and for a moment you actually remember your dreams as they are, not as you remember having dreamt them, which is a lie. I know exactly where I'm going. My body wrote this script, my body is predisposed to express itself as my destiny. I wrote this script a long time ago. Was it on the way to elementary school, sitting in the back seat with the "badass" kids, gazing out the window and realizing for the first time that not only did there have to be more than this, but I had to make it for myself? I wasn't ready. I died. I slept.

Somewhere nearby, an old man laughed and put down his beer. "Ho ho! That's a good one!" His fat bounced as he spoke, his teeth shone yellow. Clouds of gray smoke escaped between them, hissing like a snake. "Go Phillies! I love this shit. Fucking eat it up!" (From her mouth issued three swords, /no vulgar sorrow, but rather the quietude of melancholy./)

David C. Thomas awoke, startled, to find that his alarm had been blaring for some time. He had set it to a random AM station the night before, and was even more startled when it proclaimed: "You have had too much. Your tie has soaked through. There is no more rawness. You ate everything."

An elderly woman lay in the sun, wrinkled and brown as a raisin. She was completely content. The lawnchair beneath her groaned in protest. "Ah..." she said out loud. The gold about her neck sparkled. She couldn't understand why all of those hoodlums in the slums didn't go out and get a better job -- make their lives better, for christs sake! Always complaining. Lazy asses! That's what I'd say. A bunch of no-good, un-christian and un-couth lazy asses.

A triplet of gunshots: <bang> <bang> <bang> (One E and a two E and a...)

Real life camera directions:

"Shit man! Holy fucking shit! I didn't mean to do it, man! Fuck! Fuck!"

Footsteps.

Police sirens.

Heavy breathing. Waiting. Impatience.

Hushed -- "Fuck... fuck... What am I going to do? He didn't need to

reach

into his pocket like that! He didn't need to fucking reach into his

pocket!"

Sirens.

Another gunshot. Blood splattered on a brick wall.

Silence; the quick sounds of zippers and plastic.

Associations-Meaning-Restructuring-Crying --

`the farm beneath the hill,' a sundering

Twisted cords coiling upon `what was the point?'

Trust disintegrating within `stupid kids.'

(Pre)Generation/(De)Generation:

David C. Thomas peered over his milkwhite bowl of cereal at a wrinkled newspaper (the last bites still crunched between his molars) and he considered Bach

                             "with the same physiological movement"
                                   his jaws used to work on the
                             remaining cereal particles.
                             /integration. dissimulation./
                             crunch
                      "one E and a two E and a... da da dum."

Soon the movement had finished, his mouth was empty, and the clock was dangerously close to 8 am. (I watch the clock /I watch it go/ watch it think for me.)

TICK TICK TICK

The thoughts drip down with an even, unimaginative tempo, the faucet leak strikes the aluminum pot, (I watch the...) 8 am was late to work, he realized. Still wondering which symphony he had just heard, and of how it had moved him, (of ourselves we are not knowers)

What time the clock had struck upon...

He got to his feet (a surprisingly arduous task) and set upon cleaning his empty bowl. Paper towels need. (/What is the absorbency? A movement, the Bach was a movement/)

                             drip drip dripdrip drip
                      /time is cut away water measures my existence by volume/
               The house was empty and sterile.
                      /"Practical," he called it./
               Carefully constructed not to remind him of being
                      /"Practical," he called it./
               Not to remind him of (her)
                             STOP!
!
HOW
DO
Howdohowdohowdohowdo:
I
KNOW?

"Why don't you care about me anymore? I don't expect everything to remain the same. But with you but with you" Little David C. Thomas paced back and forth frantically, his body coated in a thin layer of perspiration, his clothes in disarray. he glared at the pieces of his life, fallen, through blood-shot eyes. he never slept anymore. Sleeping hurt. Living hurt. his "girlfriend" sobbed on the other end of the phone. Is that what she had been? Accidentally, it hadn't been that way. "Girlfriend" is easy. An object, a location: not a person. It wasn't a good day.

from her open mouth issued three swords. Her room was gray and swirling; eddies of mist, shards of glass and the affectation (affection had become affectation, effectively), of three (I, you, us), when the coordination (I/You/), had ceased to connect. Issuing from her mouth is the conclusion

                             long expected
                             for the sake of necessary
                             separation.
I cannot affect
               effect
               gravity.
For the sake of necessary
                      separation
               (and re-birth!)
               He sleeps. He dies.

Atomic nuclei are held together by gravity. At zero distance, the gravitational attraction is infinite. That's not to say a bond like this can't be broken. When basic/complex curves accumulate in an inappropriate manner, an unstable field will be produced and it will rend the nucleus. Also, "reverse" particles like electrons and some light particles have infinite distension of depth at their planes, which can "cancel" infinite compression. However, these particles must possess enough velocity to "break through" the barrier of the distension peaks in the atom's field.

Be well she says falls down one is not one (if she were one, how could she be one?) One is not one one is?

The Past:

2. Through the mirror, you are looking down now on the vastness of an ocean, expanding to the horizon in every direction. There is a whale, exhaling a huge blast of water.

pockets full of religion
he had microscopes and metal devices for measuring
he was my first "love"
little David C. Thomas
              (he put me in quotation marks, I get my revenge),
he was constructed
               FOR THE COMFORT OF THOSE WHO WERE 'FIRST COME':
such are acceptable forms of being served:
               (logic 'Left' 'as good as it gets,' you get there and don't see a piece of cloth on
               a stick, you put one down with your Capitalized Name so we can know who
               you are, know that you are:) MINE.
(I left)
left where? I left (him) where?
(I left) (him) does that mean He will...?
        A ROOM FOR MANY WAS MADE WITH DEVICES FOR CUTTING

The Present:

3. You are in front of the whale, and then... swallowed.

say my name
(say it beautiful)
say it so I know you mean (me)
say it so it means blue
(you won't do what I had to)
I don't want to pretend anymore
i'm tired of the game
being in "", hiding between words,
               the game:
               that we are separate from data
               that we are separate as beings
               that our cells will separate
I am not one
               call it awareness. that we are meat with minds.
I am not one with you I am three
dance with me please dance with me
I found your voice in my pocket
say my name, 'pretty girl'
say it new
say it so I shiver
say it so I fall in love ?(with you)! all over again
smilepleasesmile
smile for me tonight
        andagainandagain
fill my pockets with religion
teach me how to let the spirit breathe
(teach me how to keep you alive)
all of my love
lies at the bottom of a jar
with some leaves
holes in the lid-
                      I am not unaware of earth's Context in space
                      but 'significance' is insignificant
                      there are creatures
                      lifeforms with cells that need 'nature' -water
                             (hydrogen hydrogen oxygen)
                             --air
                             (or H2O and O2)
                             -- and various...
                              self aggrandization is endemic
                             in that things need to be provided
I hear there are millions who have never looked at a "tree"
without calling it that.
intimacy decomposed, rows of trunks recently (dead)
--read what I 'put down.'
        but I do 'put them down'
        there is a distinction.
I want to keep it alive.
(not insects in a jar)
(not quotation marks, wordswordswords)
        does it matter that some matter
        turned into amino acids using oxygen water
        (death)
but with you
               in you...

Chemical bonds are an electro-magnetic phenomenon. Bonds are stable if the combined fields of all particles involved combine to produce values close to the continuum preferred state.

It seems (she smiles) it seems (bursting at the crooked seems the light seeps through she is the light she is in the dark the light is her) that the night will be long today. I am well (she says) from within one hopefully from its pit this is me I am inside the outside is me if it is me I cannot be lost inside I must be it I am well. she is inside the outside is me if it is me I cannot be lost inside it I must be it I am well. (she smiles) she knows the truth the light from inside is breaking bursting it is dark and wet in the well (I will get sick dancing here) she smiles inside outside she is well inside she is her the light it inside and she is outside the well is outside the well is out side and she is within) IT seems. What is IT? At the seams (where the light gets through)

SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

OPEN UP! he (demands) pries her open at the seems sees the light cries out in jealousy (IT ISN'T FAIR) cries out (hits her hard) embraces her gently puts her in his pocket (NOW THAT I HAVE SEEN IT, IT IS MINE) puts her in his pocket (are you well? You are well now (SMILE) you are well now.)

I am inside again (she cries) no I am I am (I swear I am) she puts on a sweater it is cold she is cold (inside) she smiles I am this pocket inside I am the speacesinbetween he is the words and I am the spaces between I am (I swear) promise me that I am (she reaches into her pocket and crushes what is inside) DON'T LOOK AT ME (I AM POWERFUL) she cries (she smiles) don't look at me don't look at me

She is well (the well is dark and cold) she will get sick dancing here.

Rain on the windshield:

Black shattered into a million globes of color,

His hope, realizations, pulled down to the field

Where all of the results were to Black revealed.

(she) hears him falling sees them falling the ground opening swallowing (she shouts.) (she) knows his name, but not his middle name. angry at (her) brain for thinking that (she) mourns him absently and quietly. "Goodbye, David." (she) isn't shocked. the (gun) falls from her (not hers, his!) hand and hits the (ground.) (the ground is dirty she thinks, irritated. I should get someone to sweep. she picks at her nails and turns her attention elsewhere.) (she) looks down and waits for the police to come rubs her swollen jaw (I) loved him (I) (I) (I) (she) smiles (her face hurts) rubs (her pregnant belly) (she) never told him (empty) the ground swallows (her) w(hole).

From inside her room, and inside her head, she could see it all.

"Please! Take me back to the forest. To the forest... I was content in the... the..." She fell over, clutching her head.

"Goddamnit!"

Tears dripped to the floor.

A clock ticking, slowly. (One E and a two E and a) Students quickly jotted down notes, waiting for the bell to ring, to release them. There was one in the back who wasn't watching. His hands clutched the desk, turning them white. No one noticed. His heart was about to burst, but no one noticed. (One E and a two E and a...) What was more important, no one cared.

Integration:

4. You see a pool, lit only by moonlight, filled with lotus flowers, each containing an amber gem, floating gently upon its surface.

The quiet [                ] she is happy she knows it lies there in +[                ]- there in the spacesinbetween its all there its all there its all +[                ]- where all the words and worlds and souls are born: in silence.

[                       (boom)                       ]

She rubs her belly [                ]

She looked down at herself in confusion, wiping tears from her eyes as fast as they came.

"Who am I?"

The walls didn't answer today.

When two continua become tangent (collide), there is an explosion in each to disperse the momentum of each having to travel at infinite speed for a period of no-time in order to become tangent. Those explosions become galaxies (in time). Our continuum is a particle. We're in the nucleus of an atom. (Boom!)

She laughed out loud. A rain coat for young children. The protection was best when you were small. Laugh, lose yourself, release, and don't ever remember. Put everything in the big black box and don't ever remember. Laughing makes you little. The last time I heard someone laugh like a hyena, I (she) vomited. (Hyena's are pitiable animals.) I cannot decipher your code nor can you decipher mine. I don't care. Please re-instate normal communication. I don't care. I'm not sure how to respond to that without further investigation of her cranial structure. Laugh with me or laugh at me. I don't care. We loved each other we loved ourselves; I hung up the phone. I don't care. Wipe the dust from the glass? She laughed at Zen and she laughed at herself. (How do you get the goose out of the bottle?) I cannot decipher your code. I don't care. I am I am I.

She laughed out loud. It felt good, so she did it again.

...

"Frankly," He said, turning to his trusted companion, "I don't give a damn." Embracing, they returned to sleep.

5. Looking up at the moon, you see a child curled within it.

[Dissolution (-+)]

Chapter Sixteen, Grid One:

Anti-Climax.

The nail.

Alexi groaned weakly. He just wanted the voices, and the pain, to stop.

There was a razor, lying on the sink. A straight, sharp, perfect edge. Alexi blinked the tears and sweat from his eyes, as he prepared to cut himself open. "Only one way to find out where I really am," he said, feeling like he was preparing to dissect a frog in biology class. One piece at a time.

A moment later the door opened and Don peered in.

"Well dear," he said. "Put that thing down, it won't do you any good. You can't get out that easy. You read the script right, but you mistook the symbol for sign. A metaphor is subtle, a razor is not."

Alexi looked over at Don and smiled almost bashfully. The razor fell to the sink with a small clang, a noise that also echoed and then died away unnaturally quickly. Suzanne came up the stairs as well and stood behind Don, a look of absolute concern on her face.

"How about you clean yourself up, and we'll go for a walk. I'm new to this whole scene, and so you can't expect me to understand any of these dynamics. However, like most people, I'm a most biased ear, and if you're lucky, you might just bias me in your direction." Don smiled sweetly at Alexi.

"All all right. Give me a second. The nosebleed seems almost gone," he said, pulling the mangled tissue away from his face, gingerly touching his nose. "Yes, it's done." Don waited, his face completely serene. He just stood there, smiling ever-so-slightly, his eyes glittering intelligently. Suzanne was becoming progressively more anxious.

They headed out across the field, but didn't find Samantha or Jay. Alexi led them down into the valley, right up to the factory, retracing steps he had grown so familiar to. On the way, Don and Alexi talked.

"You're often mentioning 'the Group.' Could you explain to me what that is, or was?" Don asked.

"Was most definitely. I mentioned Gabrael a few moments earlier he gave me the blueprints, although I didn't realize it at the time. I put them into action. A perfect union of all capacities, a collective organism that can learn, protect, and operate completely on its own, that can trust itself and borrows from each individual member. A group that can trust one another-" Alexi noticed a look of confusion on Don's face, and so he stopped.

"Trust? You expect human beings to do that without infantile strife? A person is smart. People are stupid." Don said, curiosity in his voice. That's why we have to keep up this silly Mother Hive Brain game, he thought.

"I had hopes. We've all failed. Every single one of us. And what the immediate future holds, not only do I know that it isn't good, I can also say that it makes no difference. Still, I am terrified of it, now. I shudder at the thought of the future potential becoming me, or me it. I have found the source and definition of loneliness, and it is this: none of us can ever experience life as anyone other than ourselves, and with that limitation, we are completely bound to react to others as objects. Even any knowledge which we encounter contains a fatal flaw that says 'if it has happened to me, it has happened to everyone else.' One cannot be purged of it. The desperate urge to unite is also the urge to annihilate, and although it is acted out in sex, it is a mockery, a farce upon the hope of being someone else. Being a woman, in Ken's case. It all amounts to the same thing. I want, I dream of being anyone or anything but myself, I run from myself and hide in my vices, hide in my virtues, and know myself least of all when the play is through. I hate none of them. I am incapable of hating them; even my pretense of hatred is really just a movement, a deception, of my love. But I hate this entrapment, this cage." He viciously motioned to himself. "It is not my self that I hate, I am in every way completely in awe of him, because I am not him. I am forever not myself because I am forever limited to my shell, and it I hate, I hate with every fiber of my being. When one struggles against these bonds, one knows all frustration; then, when one gives up the struggle, the spider pulls you even closer to an end, cradled in its arms. In such matters - one cannot win! And that is how the spiders keep themselves going, sucking out the juicy bits, riding their own guilt-waves in self-created sin. With thought, you will know what I mean, when I say spider I want to run, I want to jump through a pane glass window, I want to kill -- because I am loved. I want to rattle my cage bars louder still... And through it all, I am nothing but this shell, right now. Don't you see? I am like a moth pulled to the flame that it is charged to trespass, which beats and bloodies itself knocking against the thick pane of glass which bars its entry. I may knock and knock until the very flesh falls from my bones, and I'll be not one step from where I started, having chased my own shadow in circles across the sun, that burning inferno which I necessarily must enter. The sun where my self is burned away as it unites with its opposite. And here, that which showed me the way in the first place has turned her back upon me. What I learned from Gabrael was nothing-I learned all of the real lessons from my experience. What can I do to aright this? Fight?!" his monologue was reaching a fever pitch. He had lost himself in the speech, but were he looking, he would surely find a look of understanding in Don's eyes, although there was something hard there too. An animal scuttled noisily through the underbrush. A long, squat, black streak shot in front of them and disappeared again in a tangle of bushes.

Only momentarily startled, Alexi continued. "Oh, yes. I 'fought.' I fought so hard that I lost sight of what I was fighting for, and possibly, although I can barely dare to admit it to myself, I was blinded in the blazing inferno of the sun. Maybe I am not so much betrayed as betrayer, as I drove away her affections in my feverish, blind and stupid charge for our future, a future only imagined, dreamed of, and then frightened off. It was only myself, my dreams, and my hopes that I loved, and in that, I have betrayed them all. Here it has become a fight against 'society,' when we are the real enemies and the real barriers against our safe passage. 'Society' is too cattle-like to be cognizant of being the opposition; they haven't the skulls for that, they haven't the worth to be on the other side of the ring with anyone with heart.. One layer of mask is cut away merely to reveal another, as every 'perfect idea,' every utopian dream of ours becomes little more than a cage, revealing nothing other than the very nature of our most base desires and fears. This novel I have committed myself to, I fear, is a tragedy, and I am too immersed in it to write myself any ending but that which is expected: all tragedies end in death. And yet, paradoxically, with the knowledge that this is merely a novel, one is sure, with a little introspection, that there is nothing to lose and nothing to gain. None of us contain anything but words and the paper they are written on, and it is those words which allow us to define our rising and falling action, our enemies, and even the character that we are to play. There is no escape from the forces of equilibrium, the silent and deadly gravity which forces you to live your past over and over again. That web pulls you in sure as that gravity and much more potently than any society, any woman... In other words: what is there to do? Listen to the sound of the sucking void as all dreams, hopes, and aspirations are ground to dust? Don, I feel that you speak my language, and that's why I'm telling you this. I don't see any reason to believe in 'truth,' nor any blemish or flaw in a world without certainty, yet I must say that all I have said to you tonight is a lie that lies closest to my heart, and whether it proves itself foolish or false, I still call it 'true.'"

They continued on towards the factory.

"What's the deal with Jay?" Don asked.

"How do you mean?"

"I mean, first, why is everyone gravitating towards him more now? He seems like a nice guy, but not I can't find the words for it. His strong sense of humor seems to undermine the possibility of anyone really seeing anything serious in him." Don was getting more amusement out of what he was saying than Alexi realized. Humor's one of the only things that keeps you intact. "I don't know," he continued, "I'm also talking out of my ass, since I really don't know him. You know, Alexi, that 'group' you told me about sounds a lot like what a complete individual should be."

"Oh, you're pretty right, on both accounts. Maybe, were we older, were we complete people who could truly stand on our own, none of this would be necessary at all. But who am I to say what is necessary or not, and what purpose does it serve, talking about a future that will never happen? About Jay, I don't think they can't handle the search any longer, and they seek refuge. I never told them the search would be easy. Never. But it's all we have. A process. Because that's all we are. The world is a verb, right? I suppose when things were going well, it somehow looked glamorous. Now it is an ugly thing to them. What Jay offers, without even realizing it himself, is an escape from that search, and escape from me, and an escape from the pain of introspection. It is a path that I cannot leave, one that I wouldn't choose to leave, if I had the choice." Alexi paused. "The irony here is that I don't think Jay knows about any of this. If I try to explain it all now, he'll just think I'm crazy." He paused, and then laughed bitterly. "And maybe I am. I am, at the least, the first to realize my grandiosity, and the last to even consider it a failing."

Don stopped and looked at him. "There's no such thing as 'insanity' or 'madness.' Anyone who listens to such nonsense is possibly the only true kind of lunatic left, the consuming lunatic that's all ears, and no brain; the kind who believes anything, what is worse, who buys what is sold to them... Anyone who is truly crazy, in my book, wouldn't be able to understand the dialectic of crazy and not-crazy."

Alexi nodded. "I have a question for you, Don. How do you manage to appear so happy about everything? I can tell it isn't a lack of intelligence - you can't hide that, so ignorance isn't your trick."

"I don't have a trick," Don said, "one could say that I'm thoroughly miserable, and not be lying. But the opposite is true, too. Or maybe I'm so completely and utterly cynical that it can't affect me anymore. Or maybe I'm just a good actor. Maybe I am also, underneath the indifference and the acting, truly happy but also too polite to let on to it when you're feeling like you are. These are all viable." He smiled and nodded his head very agreeably.

"That's what I was afraid of. You know they all think I'm crazy," Alexi said, softly. "And none of them seem to really be listening to a word I say, any longer. Yes, it's over. Let's find Samantha and Jay."

Don and Suzanne shrugged at each other and followed Alexi up the hill to the field.

They found them, lying next to each other on a blanket, talking under the clear night sky. The bitter cold seemed to make the stars that much more precise, like tiny holes in a blanket, just feet over their heads. When Alexi saw the pair in the distance, he motioned for Don and Suzanne to stay behind. Without a sound, he strode right up to the side of the blanket.

"Hello," he said, rather loudly. "I fear I may be interrupting?"

Jay looked up. Samantha spun around.

"Uh, hey man," Jay said. Then he looked closer and saw the bags under Alexi's wild eyes, the blood stains on his shirt "You don't look so good. What's up?"

Alexi looked at him hollowly, but didn't say a word. He pointed at Samantha a moment later.

"Samantha, I need to speak with you. Please."

She glared at him, and turned to Jay. "I'll be back, O.K.?"

The two of them walked back to the carriage house in silence. Once inside, they strode upstairs and went into the guest room, next to the bathroom. Alexi sat on the bed.

"Can you do something for me? At least do this, to ease the pain on me," Alexi said.

"What's that?" Her voice was cold and forced, as if she was holding in any feelings she was having.

"If you do want to leave me, go back on your word, and be with him, at least tell the others. At least admit it to me and more importantly, yourself. I can see how they're all looking at me, Sam. They're convinced that I'm making this up. It all sounds so infantile, and intellectually I suppose it is, but emotionally, it is. It just is."

She looked at him. "I am interested in Jay."

"Then tell them!" He pounded his fist on the bed.

"I can't."

"What?! Why not?" His eyes bugged out of his head. It seemed almost likely that they would leap out at any moment.

"I just said I'm interested. Look, we're going to be okay, alright? I promise," Samantha said.

"You promise? What good are promises?" Alexi's eyes were full of tears. He looked away.

"Hey, look at me." She moved his face to look at her, a little more emotion in her voice than before. "It's just a little disturbance."

Alexi spun on her. "You're driving me insane, do you know that? You tell me one thing, and then reverse it the next second. It's a 'little' thing, it's a 'big' thing, whatever you want to call it, you're spending all of your time on him."

Her eyes went cold again. "Well, whatever."

Alexi screamed absolute nonsense. Blood began pouring from his nose, and he collapsed into a heap on the bed. The stain continued to grow larger and larger.

"Shit I'm going to get my mother, okay? Don't move. She'll know what to do." Alexi didn't think that movement of any kind was in his near future. Suddenly finding complete comedy in the whole situation, he chuckled to himself and looked out the window. The deep, velvety black of night was giving way to the unreal, neon hues of early morning.

"It's a shame you can't 'go get your mother' about everything, maybe make up your mind about something." He still couldn't shake the feeling that he was an actor on a stage. Only through observation, he realized, did anything hold any meaning. The man alone in a room may as well not exist. As usual, his thoughts continued unabated, even during times of such extreme emotional duress. This too he suddenly found perversely funny, although his laughter turned to a gag when a stream of blood poured down his throat. He fell back to the bed and lay still.

Dawn and Samantha entered the room shortly thereafter.

"Alexi" Dawn said, kindly, non-judgmentally. She helped him roll over. "Alexi," she said, this time slightly more firmly, looking right into his eyes. They were like two dull marbles, soulless balls of jelly.

"Well," she said, looking at Samantha, "he's breathing fine, maybe even hyperventilating a bit. It looks more like emotional shock than anything else. Do you know what happened?"

Samantha shrugged.

Dawn produced some rags and held them over his nose. It was many long minutes before the bleeding stopped.

"Let's all go downstairs, alright? I want to get you something to drink," Dawn said.

She went ahead.

"What did you say to her?" Alexi asked Samantha.

"Nothing well, that you got a bad bloody nose."

"Ah. I'll change that, then." Alexi said. "I need someone to know, or I'm going to explode."

"Don't" Samantha pleaded.

"Please. It pains me to see that you value losing face over the truth. Although," he added, mock-thoughtfully, "perhaps I will agree someday."

You told me the price of

An orphan

We keep her tied in the basement

And if you hear her speak for herself--

Once downstairs, the three of them sat on a sofa.

Alexi turned towards Dawn.

"I think I should tell you what happened"

She nodded, looking intently at him over a mug of hot chocolate.

Alexi quickly paraphrased the situation with an absolutely calm and controlled voice, and then, towards the end, suddenly exploded and fiercely slammed his fist into the wall. Although Samantha seemed frightened, Dawn didn't even flinch.

"This one," Alexi said, pointing at Samantha, "has backed down on every promise she has ever made me. Can I handle that? Perhaps. However, add that to her unwillingness to admit it to anyone, and the situation becomes more complicated. And then, there is always the fact that the rift between us all grows greater with each day."

Samantha sat in silence, fuming. On the inside, however, she was completely wracked in confusion. She hadn't intended any of this to happen, and had no idea what to do.

"You could do something that you almost never do: let it out," Dawn said.

"There's so much held in-- I'm like a walking, pressurized tank walking about in a circus of the grotesque and absurd."

Dawn decided not to mention that he had horribly mixed his metaphors.

Over the next week, Samantha continued to persuade me, trying to convince both of us, I think, that things between us weren't really 'all that bad.' Well, she nearly had me convinced by the time we decided to go to Virginia beach during spring vacation.

I had caught a fever of 103 two days before, and was still very sick when we headed onto the road in Jay's Volkswagen van. Truthfully, I didn't want to go, but I couldn't trust Samantha and Jay going together. I knew, deep down, that it was ridiculous, having such a lack of trust in any relationship and expecting it to work. Despite my rationalizations, I had to go.

The trip down was hell. In fact, I remember little of it, just the uneasy swaying of the vehicle and the horribly piercing sound of their laughter. The delirium was a thick cloud that enveloped me in the back, lying wrapped in a blanket, shivering on a wooden plank. Less than one hour on the road, I realized that I never should have come. They danced about and listened to music. Occasionally they turned to talk to me, their voices all seemed slowed down and distorted beyond comprehensibility. It seemed to me at the time that they were taunting me with their nonsense intentionally, laughing at my inability to do or say anything. I felt absolutely forgotten and useless.

We rented a hotel to stay for the night. When I went to the bathroom to wash my face, I found a washcloth that read "THE ABYSS HAS COME: prepare to meet your maker!" in bold, black print. It made absolutely no sense to me, so I decided not to wash my face. I slept that night next to Samantha. However, she insisted on rolling as far away from me as humanly possible on the double bed. I tried to sleep, but could not. I must have spent an hour or more in that bed, looking over at her familiar face. I felt as if I was looking back at this time, this time right now, from some distant time in the future, remembering what she looked like, reminiscing. Her face had been permanently engraved upon my memory, it may as well have been my own face. Eventually, I was granted the purgatory of sleep.

All of this agony was setting me up for the events of the next day, although I couldn't have known it then. We set off to the shore, and Samantha was right on Jay's heels the entire way. I tried to explain it to him. He thought I was crazy. I tried to beg her to tell him. She held firm to her silence. I went so far as to try to scare her into it. But both of us knew that I couldn't do a thing, my validity slowly whittled away to nothing over the past month. There was barely anyone who would listen to a word I had to say. If there was anyone with an ear to listen, who wasn't too self indulged for compassion, they weren't with me on this trip. And yet, wasn't it my own lack of compassion that had put me in this position in the first place? Even though Ken and I still shared a degree of trust and intimacy, he was plagued by his own problems, on this day especially. Nowhere reminded him of the harsh reality of his physical body as much as the beach. I had become so used to being depended upon that without that feeling of need, I didn't know where I stood.

I went back to the van to be alone, although I couldn't be, constantly haunted by flashes of memory, the sound of voices - some her voice, some Ken's, some that I could not place. The sun glared at me as if it were a hostile sentient being, intent on cooking me any way it could. I was being watched by everything and everyone. I hid under blankets to try to avoid being watched, but even that was just a part of the play and somewhere, deep down in my impassive recesses, I knew it.

I found a CD under my foot, the Downward Spiral. I took it out of the case, and looked at it closely. The sun danced off the lines in the form of rainbows. The white spiral on the front seemed phosphorescent. I shattered that CD into as many pieces as I could with my hands, and drug the shards across my arm lightly, small red lines left in the wake of those sharp edges. It was purely symbolic, representing a change of direction. At least, that's what I was thinking at the time. I realized, in a sudden clear epiphany amongst all the noise and dirt, that it was on my own virtue that I would survive. Which meant it was time to practice what I had been preaching and transcend myself. I had been right, that night in the carriage house - transcendence meant death, to make room for new life - and that's also where I had gone wrong, by concretizing the realization. It was strictly metaphorical, like the death and rebirth of the Christ.

Calmly, I walked to the beach, listened to the waves beat slowly and calmly away at the tightly packed sand, and let the life I had lived wash away with the remaining shards of the music, devoured hungrily by that eternal tide. When it had taken it all, I turned and walked away. I didn't know where I was going or why. I just walked.

The next thing I knew, I was walking through deep grass surrounded by swamp, surrounded by a chain link fence at least five or six feet tall. Without even a second thought, I leapt over it, and looking back now, I have absolutely no idea how. My memory beyond this point is very hazy, but I will remember what I can. The sky was a deep shade of orange, I remember that. And birds, huge water birds, flew by - calling out. They were calling my name. But it was no longer my name. I was to die.

I took my shoes off, and continued barefoot through the warm muck, reveling in the feeling of soft, wet mud under my bare feet. There was no litter or glass, which meant that it was probably a wild life reserve.

The sun was beginning to set, and the crickets were singing. So I sat down and listened to the crickets. Tears were streaming down my face, but I couldn't remember why. In fact, for a short while, I couldn't remember who I was at all. The concept of questioning was beyond me. Something happened because it happened. It either was, or it wasn't.

When my self-awareness returned, I wasn't myself any longer. It was like returning to your home after a war, a burnt out shell of what had been. Love had passed through hate and become absolute, ineffable indifference. What returned to take my place was something hardened, more powerful and resistant to the secret gravity of life. I had become my defenses, a passive, steely lens that, in doing nothing but watch and wait, is nothing. And to this very day, although I can remember those distant memories of being someone wholly different, someone who could reach out, touch something and really feel it, even the most mundane aspects of life a convulsive, overwhelming undertow, I remember them as someone else's memories. As I write this now, with mixed feelings of fond remembrance and deep sorrow and regret, I close the final page of this story, this life, and must continue on without looking back.

When I returned home, I checked myself into a mental hospital. And it was when I was there that I received a message in the mail from Aleonis De Gabrael.

Dear Alexi;

I trust you have discovered by now that dedication to the Great Work is possibly the only endeavor one can undertake that contains any potential meaning. Actually, that's the kind of thinking that leads one onto the path. It's completely untrue. The 'truth' is in some ways far more wonderful, although she's a dirty whore.

I would like to sponsor you into an organization known as the Order of the Hidden Path. Study the following document, do research on your own, and investigate your own potential. I'll be sending your first assignment to you in a few months.

O.H.P. Document

Agent Classified Information:
Reality-Grids (I.)
I. Individual.
II. Area Specific (micro-Cultural.)
III. Area Specific (Cultural.)
IV. Earth Grid (Terrestrial.)
V. DNA (Time grid.)

I. The Individual, living within a system of reaction to his culture, environment, and genetics uses what Leary, Lilly and later, Wilson would call The 1st-4th circuits. This is just a metaphor for the corresponding domains or centers of consciousness we use when experience the world as an individual. Without going into the nature of the circuits themselves, which are most useful when speaking of Metaprogramming, (handled in the publication entitled Metaprogramming I-III, as well as Leary's Exo-psychology), manipulating the self to change the world, which will be outlined later. The point is that the Individual sees himself as a distinct, separate entity, a view which may be generalized as solipsistic.

II. The Area Specific (micro-Cultural) consciousness is the consciousness energy grid created by a number of individuals with vaguely similar ideas within a limited geographical area. Of course, when an individual physically moves from one area to another around the globe, he is slowly re-assimilated into the grid of consciousness working within the new location. For a practical, every-day example of this, pay close attention to the specific quality of your own consciousness as you move from one location to another. Even a temporary movement into a new grid creates a disturbance in the individual consciousness. This may be connected to the 5th circuit, in that one may access this information more readily when in the "blissed-out" state created by a 5th circuit rapture.

III. The Area Specific (Cultural) consciousness is most like the micro-cultural consciousness, except that it is the grid created by the entire culture as a whole. At this stage of evolution, through use of the 6th circuit metaprogrammer, one may witness this when fully detached from personal ego, possibly blearily accessing what Jung called the collective unconscious.

IV. The Earth Grid is, quite obviously, the grid created by earth as a whole, and works through the 7th circuit much the same way as the Cultural consciousness works through the 6th. The Earth-Grid is the current manifestation of the DNA library; each specific Area-Gird may well be a manifestation of what Jung called an archetype. The entire grid may be accessed through any individual member of that grid in a non-Euclidean manner.

V. DNA (time grid) consciousness is, quite obviously, the goal, accessible through the 8th circuit. It is premature to say that this is the highest stage of development possible within our race; at the same time, with the current stratification of higher and lower forms, and the absurd removal of the upper from the gene pool as a whole makes it seem quite likely that we will be incapable of assessing any state above this for quite some time.

DNA contains all memory from the "beginning" of evolution. The history of all terrestrial life is stored, ROM style, in the DNA of each our individual cells. It is the time consciousness grid.

Jumping through the reality grids: all of the above, from Individual to DNA consciousness, is contained within the individual, creating an infinite regress of largest within smallest. This was, of course, understood by Lao Tzu more than two thousand years ago. Realizing all of this, an Agent may change the world by changing himself. The world as it is immutable, its components unchanging, as every distinct reality-grid is bounded; rather, another reality is entered (or may be considered to have been entered.) This agrees with our current understanding of Quantum Physics; the Everett model realizes that every jump off or split of realities in time occurs at right angles, and one must remember that there is no possibility of direct time travel unless if one could somehow go back to the point where the Quantum Decision was made and change the decision. The time line seems continuous, because at every Quantum Decision, the universe splits, and the time line one has committed to becomes "reality."

This does not rule out other "you's" in as of yet unrealized realities, which you may just as easily enter, effectively jumping into "their" shoes as "your own." Needless to say, you always experience this jumping as a straight line, assuming that no change has occurred. It is important to note that many of our Agents have entered reality grids where, somehow, they met their corresponding selves in that reality. We are incapable of explaining this phenomenon, as it conflicts with our current understanding of this process. We are also unsure at this point if individual consciousness must be sacrificed for interface at the Earth or DNA level.

This was an excerpt from the O.H.P.'s archives on the subject. I hope you enjoy it Alexi. At some point in the future, perhaps I could enlist your aid editing my thesis. I've heard rumor that you have a powerful critical eye.

0=11.

Static. Unchanging, day after day. Just sitting, waiting for the sun to rise in my cell, and never seeing it come. She sits on the cold concrete, crying now. Softly. Because she knows that there is no more. The story is told and the actors have all departed. So she sits, curled into a ball, fighting against the cold and the damp and the dark and the depression. She waits, hoping, asking, begging the Fates to be kind and cut another piece of string. And it can be done, but she doesn't know how to go about it. And the Spiral rotates slowly but steadily, sucking away minutes until all that is left of her is a memory in one persons mind. Only one. But for now, she waits for the sun to set and the lights behind her eyes to slowly fade, barely daring to hope that her male counterpart will arrive. She waits for the show to be over. For the perception of time to grind slowly down to an empty black void, softly echoing "could have" and "would have."

The jeering crowds pass them by. They rock back and forth and hold each other close, waiting for the curtain to draw. As they close, their clear blue eyes gaze upwards, and the disabilities of the mundane are no more, the separation of male from female, and indeed of all the passions from existence, are lost in the light beyond darkness...

Appendix: The Mother Hive Brain Documents.

The Mother Hive Brain Syndicate

Grand Lodge

Document LVX

"Nothing is true; everything is permitted."

MISSION STATEMENT:

The MHBS is a brotherhood of emancipation. All Agents will do what is in their power to free rather than enslave others, (Agents and otherwise.)

We acquire information and supply it to those who want to know. It is our express belief that although there is not an active conspiracy against the public, (via. the FBI, CIA, Aliens or otherwise), there is a cloud of unknowing conveyed through programming which intentionally or unintentionally creates robots who neither desire or are capable of dealing with the responsibility or repercussions of being a fully functional individual/biot. (Information and evidence of existing conspiracies are of interest to the Agency, however.)

Due to this, we do not confirm or deny the truth of any of the information which we provide. However, we do hereby state that all of our missions, if followed to completion, will indeed lead to increased evolution and the potential of heightened consciousness frequency.

There are two classes of Agents in the Syndicate: active and non-active. Active agents are responsible for missions as well as recruits, but have access to all information related to those missions upon request. Non-active Agents are responsible to make recruits at their leisure.

AGENT RESPONSIBILITIES:

To awaken others in all manners, be they covert or otherwise, using methods such as pranking (reality tunnel manipulation), consensual drug induced psychonaut travel, tantra, etc. We define "awakening" as the state in which one has been cut off from ego and belief models to the extent that they are capable of manipulating belief and ego manifestation at their will.

Agents that do not supply recruits in a reasonable amount of time and refuse to follow through on any assignments will be terminated in whatever way we deem necessary.

Information that the Agency considers 'Confidential' must not be conveyed in any form without the consent of the Agency.

Increase chaos in all systems in your vicinity.

AGENCY RESPONSIBILITIES:

The Agency has no legal liability in relation to the actions of Agents outside of their express mission statements.

The Agency is required to fulfill requests for information from all active Agents. If an Agent desires, for instance, a contact that is learned in Celtic Rune Magic or how to clean an M-16, the Agency will find said contact within a reasonable amount of time.

Agents may feel free to resign at any time, except during a sensitive mission, in which case they may resign at the completion of the mission.

"Everything is true; nothing is permitted."

DO YOU AGREE? (Y/N)

Mother Hive Brain Document 11: FAQ:

"It is our express belief that although there is not an active conspiracy against the public, (via. the FBI, CIA, Aliens or otherwise)" -MHB Mission statement.

Interview with Agent 139:

L: "Just because you're paranoid, it don't mean they're not after you." I think uncovering conspiracies is actually a very good motive, If only because these 'conspiracies' must be draining valuable resources if they do exist. I don't want the government, the Illuminati, and extra-terrestrial beings taking a piece of my pay check just so they can rule the world...

A: Of course. I certainly believe a great deal of information is kept from "us," however, I find it impossible believe that any one person or organization has the capacity to deal with all of the information that flies by every day. And even if there was, that organization would be impossible to detect, supposing they had absolute control.

L: "Mother Hive Brain Syndicate" itself sounds like some sort of conspiracy name. What exactly does MHBS want humanity to be in the end? A happy-shiny place, a chaotic crazy place, a bubbly Nirvana place?

A: I don't know if the annihilation of Nirvana is exactly bubbly Well, to be honest, the only thing I think the people who are in or who are drawn to MHB have in common is a certain stubborn individualism, creativity, a hatred of stagnation, a vague boredom with the status quo... I can't speak for anyone else, but I'm not really expecting there to be any "eventual outcome" for mankind. I suppose I'd like a libertarian society, but that seems incredibly unlikely. Even "pure" political systems don't remain "pure" in practice. For myself, I really like the idea of the small commune, as well. A religious commune. Wait? Did someone say cult? Not in the way that recent cults have been handled. Far too restrictive, too Christian and not devout enough. (Laughs) Seriously though, cults don't know how to have fun these days. The Greeks knew where it was at, man.

L: Is stopping cultural pre-programming a goal? If so, which kinds are "good" and which "bad"?

A: Not stopping cultural pre-programming, you can be sure of that. Not only is that impossible, it'd be an absolute catastrophe. I think the French Idealists were idiots. The "sin" is that people aren't taught to know that they can program themselves at will. Maybe I'm making it seem too easy. Reality isn't completely malleable, there are certain constants-- but it's certainly more like clay than stone. It's when people are stuck in one personality paradigm that problems begin. I just want people to know what the possibilities are. What they do with it is up to them. Of course, my opinions are not necessarily those of the syndicate. I can't speak for other people.

L: What does a mission entail? Learning something new to spread knowledge? Pranks?

A: It depends on what division you'd want to get involved with. It also depends somewhat on which agent gets assigned to you. You can get involved with magick, etc. in which case at the moment you'd be working with me and some other people passing around rituals and other related information, trying things out and keeping records of results, sending the results in... I've heard some talk of rituals for the sake of spreading the MHB S conspiracy. You'd have to talk to someone else about that, though. Or you could do propaganda, which involves more pranking, making absurd pamphlets and spreading them, leaving dead fish all over the place, etc. Either way, getting new agents, even if you blatantly lie about the inevitable results, is a good thing. It's kind of "anything goes," right now. To be honest, we like to spread the feeling of paranoia a little. So if you join, you can always feel free to give people missions without anyone else's knowledge. Once we attain critical mass that may change a little.

L: How does agent numbering work? You just pick one for yourself, huh? I need to learn more numerology before I'd feel comfortable choosing a number for myself.

A: Well, it started out that way, but now we have Agent 1-111 or so filled out, and a few above that, (agent 506 for instance), so the options are getting smaller.

M.H.B.S. Document:

Basic self-training: Mysticism and Magick I.

Because there is no means of quantifying subjective experience, we intentionally avoid grades, levels, or other forms of external hierarchies. You must consider your work a virtue unto itself. Of course, one can expect results to generally follow from the amount of effort invested.

First, you must ask yourself in all seriousness why you want to explore your own nervous system from the inside out. (That is precisely what you're doing with any serious "spiritual" practice.) Again, the results of your practice will follow directly from your intentions, especially when the dynamic inverse law is considered. The theory is that every statement, every event, etc. contains its own opposite within itself. This statement will most likely have little or no import until later, at which point it will seem simple common sense. No more on this, except a final note: if there is any virtue at all, it is in the pleasure of walking. A destination is an ideal, a center point, and not an experience. You can hang Foucalt's Pendulum anywhere.

Second, you must realize the importance of repetition. One does not learn to walk in a day. Similarly, any act that is done consciously has not yet been learned; only when the program runs itself at your Will is it perfect. We may consider Hagbard Celine's advice: "Never whistle while you're pissing." Learn the virtue of work in itself, and success will not be far off. The process is usually as follows: one begins with other people in mind. On some level, the urge is to impress or control others through one's virtuosity. This is inevitably overcome as consciousness raises above the strictly biological, and one functions for the sake of ones self. When you reach the point that you do the work for its own sake-- but first, before even worrying about this, practice every single day. Set a routine time and place if necessary, but do not stop once you have begun for any reason. Constant stopping and starting not only complicates the process, it can actually be quite dangerous.

This introductory practice guide should take at least three months to complete.

I. The first goal is to connect to your material body. Begin with the practice of Asana. What this comes down to is sitting very still for extended periods of time. The body should not be relaxed, but neither should it be overly tense. Practice will show the proper state. Eventually, one can expect severe cramping. This must be overcome. There will come a point where the position you've been doing your Asana in is the most comfortable place in the world. Sitting in that position, you feel rested and secure. You may find plenty of more detailed information about Asana postures in any good book on Yoga. We recommend Aleister Crowley's Yoga for Yellowbelly's. It is enjoyable as well as informative. Personal experience is, never the less, the only form of validation. Test different postures out. See what works best for you.

Ia. Once you feel comfortable with this, you may move on to focusing your attention acutely on different body parts. Spend 15 minutes putting all of your conscious attention on your hand, for instance. If this is done with the proper amount of "insistence," you should have the overwhelming feeling that your center of consciousness is in fact in that part of your body. It is a very old hermetic saying: "energy goes with the imagination." There is a secret here, but that is for you to discover on your own. Enjoy.

Ib. Next, follow the practice above while staring at yourself in a mirror of some kind. This may seem unnecessary at first, but will eventually lead to great results in later practices.

II. Concentration: after entering a deep relaxed state through slow breathing, etc. focus your attention on one idea, picture, or sound. This is far more difficult than it appears. Every imaginable kind of past experience, hobgoblin, and piss poor radio song will assail your conscious state. It is very important at this stage that you do not cease practicing, but continue on through it. After a month of practicing this daily, I would often break out in a sweat and begin hopping about uncontrollably in my Asana. Although not a goal in itself, it is actually a sign of progress. The ability to focus upon a single point is absolutely necessary for quick invocations and conjurations, (which we'll get to later.)

IIa. Having mastered this, one may turn attention to energy. There is a great deal of literature, both scientific and esoteric, about the correspondence of "energy" and "matter." However, since the intention of this paper is purely pragmatic, we may assume that experience takes precedence over theory. First, with your eyes slightly unfocused, hold your hands facing towards each other and look between them. There is a certain way of seeing that cannot be properly expressed, but like riding a bicycle, once you get it, you don't forget. With a little persistence, you'll begin to see thin strands running from one hand to the next. This is something that everyone can do with the most microscopic amount of patience. I personally recommend playing with that energy at this stage, running it into another part of your body, seeing what it feels like. If you can, find a partner and bounce energy off of one another. You may also notice, during your previous work in meditation, that there is a certain correlation between breath and this energy. The two somehow pulsate as one. This will be the focus of the next series of exercises.

IIb. Now, as get into your Asana and practice breathing in and out very slowly. There must be no jerkiness in the motion, because that will distract your attention. As you breathe in, focus on your energy being rejuvenated, as you breathe out, expel the stagnant energy that most likely is clogging up your system from blocks and psychological imbalances. As a change of pace, you may also do a breathing exercise with a mantra, focusing on the mantra as your 'one point.'

IIc. Putting sigils into energy. With a partner, give energy as in IIa, but focus on a symbol or an idea of your choice. I can assure you that this will have surprising (and probably, at first, unexpected), results. I warn against trying this on people that are unaware, especially at this stage of practice. What you invoke upon another you invariably invoke upon yourself. This isn't some form of transcendental morality, it's simple physics.

III. At this point, most of the actual methods of doing invocation, enchantment, etc. have been practiced, but you have not learned what to put within that form. Personally, I have found that years of trial and error are the best means of testing what works and what doesn't, but you may want to supplement your practice with literature. There are three especially potent means of acquiring similar results. Each of these methods has drawbacks and benefits, and you'll find that some work better with your disposition than others. These three methods are Qabbalistic Magick, Chaos Magick, and Neurolinguistic Programming. Of course, there are countless traditions, I have simply found these three to be the most effective. Books on Buddhism, especially Zen Buddhism, Celtic magick, Carlos Castaneda's Don Juan series, Timothy Leary's Exopsychology, and even Robert Anton Wilson's Illuminatus! Trilogy contain useful information about ritual, meditation, and altered states of consciousness.

Continue all of the practices above, especially IIc. Begin a cause and effect diary where you note which symbols or ideas you focus on during energy transferals, and what the immediate and long term effects appear to be. You may also begin practicing this with talismans, following the same practice as above but with an inanimate object, (a ring, for instance.)

IIIa. Mirror meditations. Staring at yourself in a mirror, use whatever means necessary to completely empty your mind of chatter. Slowly begin the mantra: "I AM HERE" with increasing volume and intensity. Without intellectualizing, search for that voice. Although results may vary, generally one rules out all body parts first, (I am not this face, I am not this arm, I am not this), and then feels an overwhelming sense of ego detachment. Continue this practice daily, changing the mantra to "I AM THIS ILLUSION" with every breath in, and "I AM NOT THIS ILLUSION" with every breath out. The ability to manipulate or annihilate belief is necessary for later, more advanced reality manipulation experiments.

MHB S Document: Aspirant Training II:

Now that the aspirant has completed the introductory curriculum on controlling ones faculties, a short exploration of basic mythological and magickal theory would seem productive. Although many have accused "pure theory" of being a useless waste of time, experience has shown that in finding the practical application of theory, one may learn a great deal. And it keeps new practitioners from getting themselves in trouble. Those without the patience to learn theory before practice should consider another line of work. As one last note before you begin, remember that everything is bullshit. We're just concerned with the bullshit that works.

Introduction to the tree of life.

The tree of life is a tool that may be used to understand any idea whatsoever through comparison with other related ideas. Although it is arguable that the original intention of Qabbalah was strictly theological in nature, it has since been taken up by various esoteric traditions as a theosophical and practical device with little relation to the God of Israel. Put briefly, the progression of the tree allows for understanding in two different manners:

The metaphysical and mathematical: The progression from nothing to something, with an emphasis on almost Hegellian dialectics as well as alternative transitions from thesis to antithesis. The process of gematria and Notariqon, which is generally too advanced to explore here, fits into this category. The theory lying beneath this interpretation of Qabbalah is contained within the Essay on No-thing-ness.

The mythological: where every letter, number, sign and experience is a metaphorical relation to an underlying idea or form which may be ascertained through analysis of said letter, number or sign. There are numerous methods of practicing this. For instance, one may practice self analysis, (looking for the "YOU ARE HERE" sign within ones own reality map), by paying close attention to colors, numbers, and general patterns that become apparent to you during the course of the day. A materialist may point out that one will only notice those things which his nature is prone to discover, that this says nothing of the "universe" itself. This is precisely the point. There is no Qabbalah in the world. It is merely a ruler one may use to measure and qualify the psychological realm of experience which may not be measured in terms of arbitrary "meters," "kilograms," or "seconds." One may also reverse this process, (the invocation), and through charging a particular number or sign, witness the shift of ones reality as it becomes harmonious with that empowered symbol. Number and letter may be considered in this way as:

Symbol. In Paul Tillich's terms, a number or letter, (or series of numbers and letters), is a reference to a reality behind the concrete signs, i.e. the letters and numbers themselves.

Identity. Every number is an identity unto itself. Much like a person, it's properties cannot be ascertained in any way except as a relation to other numbers. And the interaction of numbers is hard to predict. For instance, if you look at 1 in 1+8 and 1+9, you would be lead to believe that the quality of 1 is different in each case. An allegory may be useful: Na+Cl=NaCl. The quality of sodium and chlorine both interact in a way that they create a compound that is completely different from their original qualities. Na interacts with other elements in completely different ways; however, there is a quality inherent to Na that makes it Na and nothing else. The interaction of people may also be considered synergistic in this manner. It may be noted that it is this synergistic principle, (including the coincidence and attraction of opposites), which Crowley termed Love, (111, AMO.)

Hieroglyph. The actual shape of a number or letter may give away something of the reality inherent within itself. Consider 0 and it's association with the yoni.

The 10 Sephira: The tree is composed of 10 spheres, (Sephira may mean "number," "letter," and "gem," thus implying that reality may generally be broken into quantity, quality, and light, and that all three are one in the same and may be discovered through unearthing the symbol within the sign), and 22 paths, (each path corresponding to a letter in the Hebrew alphabet), which connect the 10 spheres. One may think of each sphere as a reality unto itself, although each Sephira and path exists in no way but as a relation to the other paths and spheres. Some of the meanings of each of these spheres and paths will be entered below, although you are encouraged to explore the reality behind each of these potential realities.

Ein Sof (0): Inexpressible; containing all number and form within itself. Nuit.

Keter (Pluto): (1) The point arising from the infinite. Without quality, it may still be considered infinite: it is definite infinitude. The Unity, the line derived from 0 by extension. Hadit. The Divine name AHIH, Ehieh, "I am." It signifies existence, etymologically meaning "out of Being." (i.e. manifest out of 0.) Illuminatus! fans may be prone to consider this the Eye in the pyramid.

Chokmah (Neptune): (2) The Dyad, derived from 1 by reflection, 1/1, or by revolution of the line around its end. The divine Will. This is force without form. Yang. The All Father.

Binah (Saturn): (3) The triad, the solid, derived from 1 and 2 by addition. Matter and the divine intelligence. This is form without force. The All Mother.

[Daath: The abyss: Without number or true name. This is the false crown of reason, the barrier between ideal and actual.]

Chesed (Jupiter): (4) The Quaternary, the solid existing in time, matter as we know it derived from 2 by multiplication. Mercy, and the quality of giving ones self, giving ones ego to the flame so that the nameless, quality-less self underneath may raise to the surface. One of the stepping stones across the abyss. The tendency to come together (Love).

Geburah (Mars): (5) Force or motion. The interplay of the divine Will with matter. Derived from 2 and 3 by addition. The tendency to break apart (Spite).

Tiphereth (Sol): (6) The Senary, Mind. Derived from 2 and 3 by multiplication. The implication here is of the selfless self, the "true" self, also referred to as the Holy Guardian Angel, (or Atman in Hindu lore.) This is the son formed from the union of Mother and Father. From the union and annihilation of Daughter and Son, one may awaken to ones "face before the time of their birth." In other words, the union of ones self and ones conception of ones self results in a very real transformation; upon the funeral pyre of ones desires ones will is born.

Netzach (Venus): (7) The Septenary, Desire. Derived from 3 and 4 by addition. (There is a second attribution of 7, too esoteric for this introduction, which makes it the holiest of all numbers.) Animal emotion.

Hod (Mercury): (8) Animal reason. Derived from 2 and 3 by multiplication, 8=2E3.

Yesod (Moon): (9) Stability in change, the reflection or interface between conscious and subconscious worlds. The stepping off point for vision quests. Derived from 2 and 3 by multiplication, 9=3E2.

Malkuth (Earth): (10) The decad, the end. The daughter. Represents the one returning to the zero, and, in another manner, the conscious mind. Derived from 1+2+3+4. Also the solidification of all numbers 0-9 into one. The esoteric saying "Keter is Malkuth; Malkuth is in Keter" is easily understood in light of this.

Right Pillar: All of the male (+) qualities: 2, 4, 8.

Left Pillar: All of the female (-) receptive qualities: 3, 5, 7.

Middle Pillar: The pillar of mildness: 1, 6, 9, 10.

The 22 Paths:

11: Aleph: Fool. Means an Ox, principally because the shape of the letter suggests the shape of a yoke. There is also a reference to the mildness and patience of Harpocrates: indeed, to his sexual innocence. (Refer also to the myth of Parcival as well as the divine fool Dalua in Celtic mythology.) This is the divine, aetheric breath, the path which joins Keter and Chokmah. (Note: 1+1=2. The blind force of Chokmah is here expressed in its most subtle form.)

12: Beth: The Messenger, Prometheus. The house, the letter showing the roof, floor, and one wall. It is the dwelling place of man in the world of duality and illusion. Note that all houses are generally boxed shapes, while wilderness is not. This is also the Magus, the dialectical opposite of the Fool. One attains power through knowing, while the other attains power through not knowing. (Note: 1+2=3. There is a subtle correlation between this and the reflective, wise aspect of Binah. There is also a strong Mercurian influence upon this symbol.)

13: Gimel: The Virgin and the Camel, reminds us of the position of the path on the tree of life as joining Keter and Tiphereth, and thus the means of traveling through the wilderness of the abyss. Travel lightly (1+3=4. The secret to passing the royal arches, crossing the abyss, may be found within the virtue of 4: mercy and self sacrifice. The easiest way to annihilate ego at this stage, to ensure positive momentum towards the HGA, is to give ones self whole heartedly to some endeavor. The work itself is a worthy cause, so far as the aspirant realize that the virtue is not within the work itself, but rather in the result of giving ones self wholly to the aspiration, whatever it be. One may also note that to become ones self, ones self must die. This idea is fully cogent with all mythology from the age of Osiris, the Slain and Resurrected God.)

14: Daleth: Alchemical salt. A door, refers to the position of the path as joining Chokmah and Binah. It is the gate of the Supernals, (the Sephira above the abyss of duality.) Again, it is the letter of Venus, and shows the sexual symbolism. The shape suggests a porch or doorway, or perhaps a tent-flap. One may also give some thought to the initiation rituals of primitive societies, all of which involve entry into a long, dark cave. (1+4=5. This is both the door which allows and bars entry into the non-duality of the supernals; the Martian severity is expressed in a feminine manner, and may be rectified with the proper death and resurrection.)

15: He: The mother is the daughter; the daughter is the mother. The window, reminds us that understanding (He being the letter of the Mother in the Tetragrammaton YHVH), is the means by which light reaches us. Also a reminder of the "otherness" of word-knowledge, something that can only be understood properly through deep meditation. (1+5=6. Notice the light, informative nature of Tiphereth. There is also a practical correlation between this and the genius of the HGA. Ones knowledge is conveyed as if through a portal from elsewhere.)

16: Vau: The sun, redeemer. The son is but the son. A nail, suggests the fixation of the universals within the particulars, (the supernals in tiphereth.) In other words, thou art that, and that art thou. (1+6=7. Buber's I-thou relationship, a true person to person, is the way to interact with another-- and ones self-- as divine. This may also imply that the means of passing through the gateless barrier is within Venus. See also the man on 42nd street and it's notes.)

17: Zayin: The twins. A sword, refers to the attribution of the letter to Gemini, the sign corresponding to intellectual analysis of opposites. The sword is, of course, the magickal implement of discrimination. (1+7=8, the intellectual aspect of Hod.)

18: Cheth: The Chariot continaing life, in pursuit of the graal. A fence. More properly, the holy grail. (1+8=9. Consider the reflective quality of the moon, and the common folk myth of a knight being led far into unknown territory by a stag or animal of some kind. There is also some correlation with the sign of Cancer and it's corresponding Tarot aspect, the Chariot.)

19: Teth: She who rules the secret power of the universe. A serpent, as is obvious from the shape of the letter. (1+9=10, the tree repeats itself within itself, and the serpent sheds its skin.)

20: Yod: The virgin man, secret seed of all, etc. A hand, indicates the means of action. The doctrine is that the Universe is set in motion by the action of indivisible points, (Hadit.) The hand being the symbol of creative and directive energy, is the polite equivalent of Spermatozoon, the true glyph. (Industrial fans may want to listen to the PIG song "Shit for Brains.")

21: Kaph: The palm of the hand is the hub of the wheel from which the force of the 5 elements spring. (2+1=3. Binah is the formless form from which the world manifests.)

22: Lamed: The woman justified, by equilibrium and self sacrifice is the gate. An ox-goad, is once more principally a matter of the shape of the character. There is, in particular, a relation between Lamed and Aleph, a matter too profound to discuss right now. Deep meditation upon the meaning of yoga, (to yoke), will eventually unearth gems. (2+2=4. Consider the Christian ideal of love, Agape.)

23: Mem: The secret is hidden between the waters that are above and those that are beneath. Water suggests a wave; a breaker by its initial form, and still water at its completion. Note that the letter NUN, meaning fish, is not attributed to Pisces but rather to Scorpio. (2+3=5. Consider the severity of Geburah, and it's surprisingly water-like qualities as a feminine aspect. It is not so much the devouring quality of fire as the rhythmic and yet rapid, blind force of water.)

24: Nun: Initiation is guarded by death on both sides. (PAN/NOX. See later.) A fish, is that which lives and moves in the water: which is here a symbol of death. It therefor indicates the forces of Scorpio, generation through putrefaction. The final form suggests a tadpole.

25: Samech: A prop, refers to the fact that the path connection Tiphereth with Yesod and therefore serves to connect the individual self with the universal self in its lowest form. The shape may suggest a pillow, stone, or other object which is thrust under another object. (2+5=7. Venus again as a means of alchemy. Solve et coagula.)

26: A'Ain: the eye, refers to the great goat who speaketh, and he speaketh thusly: "BAAAAAH!" The secret of generation is death.

27: Pe: A mouth. The Crowned and Conquering Child emerging from the womb.

28: Tzaddi: The fish hook.

29: Qoph: The back of the hand.

30: Resh: A head reversed. The seat of the human consciousness, which is Solar, pertaining to Tiphereth. In shape it is merely a big Yod, implying the brain as an expansion of the spermatozoon. Leave it to the Jews to come up with these symbols. The fighting of Set and Osiris

31: Shin: A tooth, plainly exhibits three teeth. Refers to the element of fire. The suggestion of devouring, eating, or eating into is also given.

32: Tau: a cross symbolizes the element of earth as a solidification of the four elements. The slain God. The universe is the Hexagram.

For a full library of correspondences, refer to Aleister Crowley's Liber AL 777. (Some of the previous correspondences were also taken from that work.)

Introduction to Reality Manipulation.

"Reality" is the most fascinating substance there is: like water, it fits, it adapts to its environment, (a cup, for instance), without changing the nature of its self one bit.

Reality manipulation merely helps us actualize our capacity for adaptability. It is, in a sense, the opposite of acting; any good Reality Surfer will tell you that, like the glass of water, they may change roles to match the environment, but what they are never changes in the slightest. No matter what solvent you apply to the Self, it won't go away, (Psychonauts and drug abusers alike are familiar with this.)

How do you do it?

Reality manipulation is also about changing the environment through ones own reality map. There is no one method, but there are some guidelines.

1. Explore and exhaust your current reality map. This consists of beliefs, emotional and rational domains, experience, etc. If you don't have a map for your current reality, you'll get utterly lost, (possibly for good), if you jump ahead to step two.

Reprogramming faulty programs: the subconscious does not work in terms of "no's." If you discover a problem, (an unhealthy sado-masochistic program, for instance), the last thing you want to do is immerse yourself in it. This is unhealthy and unwise. Instead, choose another program to put in its place, and re-enforce that while you negatively re-enforce the other program. (Reward and punishment.)

2. Construct a system that you'll use to navigate different belief models. I recommend the Qabbalah for a number of reasons. The intelligent observer will notice that in learning Qabbalah, they are in fact programming a reality map rather than discovering something in the "real out there." This is always the case. However, the Qabbalah is so complete a system, and so open to subjective interpretation, that it is possibly the most effective measuring tool for psychological phenomena. As you continue to explore the Tree of Life within your life, you are exploring the boundaries, associations, and tendencies of your nervous system. What you think you are is not your self. Every conception you have about "what I think" and "who I am" has absolutely nothing to do with the water that you are. We must discover our self from the outside, in how we project upon our environment and how we make sense of our world. Everything you know is wrong. Also, the method of correspondence between symbols, due to the symmetry of the tree of life, allows us to communicate with one another even when within completely different reality grids.

3. Begin to explore these symbols within your life. The easiest means of doing this is through invocation: for instance, to invoke Daleth, begin through active visualization-- opening a door, for instance. Continuing from there, one may explore corresponding symbols, re-enforcing them through repetition and banishing those symbols not congruent with the energy of Daleth. Further study of conjuration and magickal theory in general is recommended, esp. Magick In Theory and Practice, Book IV by Aleister Crowley.

Man on 42nd street considered as a Qabbalistic Document:

The Man Upon 42nd Street, Part I:

MALKUTH (Waking up):

From the sleep of day and the dreams of night, a man, but a shadow of his Self, climbed upon the Universal height, Foundation; set himself into the reflected light of those four nines and from the dream of waking awoke. He stood on 42nd street, wandering around as if he were lost, holding his head in his dirty hands, never looking up.

NUN AND THE MOON (Shadow):

The sky was headed for sunset, doubly guarded by Anubis. The dweller under the waves, the man standing on 42nd street, walking unsteadily, had met a message borne from mournful now into the rainbow hues of possibility; a cup overflowing, filled with the divine light ascended through imagination-yet now there was nothing to him but the shards of broken yesterdays, the waking dream awake. Nothing but a fitful sleep.

YESOD to NETZACH (Awakening to division):

And in our shared sleep, bubbling up from the dreams of our childhood and the memories of our future, a counterpart forms. >From this mold of our eternal opposite, cast down to the world as a star, clothed in a body like marble with eyes like fire-is you. And it is you, our reflection, the embodiment of everything through the dance of these opposites, that I call life.

Waiting on 42nd street with my breath hanging in the air, deep down I know that he is lifeless and cold, this man without a mirror who, without the gnawing ache of absence, this hollowness deep in the chest, would surely pass on. He is waiting for you, love, and were you to ever come, he would surely die.

The Man Upon 42nd Street, Part II:

THE FIRST ABYSS (The Mirror and the Clock):

I dropped my Soul, the Emperor of Princes, shining like the Sun, upon 42nd street. A palsied elopement, my self to my Self wed and brought up to the starry firmament for the eternal moment with you- then nothing. Nothing as 13 cold and unending moments of clock ticks and resounding chimes of the hour cast my fate to the wind, reflecting myself in the cool water of the Moon, the weight overhead waiting, lying above me as I too lie to keep to my body, to keep it moving in the frigid night air on my way to 42nd street.

QLIPPOTH: THE SHELLS (The Search Unto Death):

Pound into the hard concrete O searcher, ground to dust 4 times and forever - the desperate search for release in your arms. In your arms 139 times to forever before I slowly drown in the shattered mirror of the Moon. Before I find my way to 42nd street.

THE IDEAL AND THE ACTUAL:

For centuries a man stood before the decadent memory of being, those old words, long since crusted over on the gate of Iacchus. Standing beside me is this man upon the path who said 'here is a man who tried his all and lost, who has tasted the sun and can now no longer taste.' Speaking in tones I cannot dare comprehend, 'here is a man, desperate in his cage cell- desperate upon the point of nothing- to be anybody, so as to break through a hole, a pinpoint, and Unite with myself.' This he said to me, his voice cracking, sliding through the vowels of Water and breaking on the rocky consonants of Earth, the Pleasure And Never-ending pain of complements, uniting as One in his intonation; his Pleasure, his Pain slowly bleeding into the silver lake of the Moon.

THE NIGHT OF PAN:

Still, here stands this lunar creature, beautiful in exile, burning in the twilight of the soul, desperately waiting for the sun. Crouched under the earth, he is waiting for the sun, clothed in garments of deep purple and blue, waiting for the few people, the lost amber people of the sun. The taste of death in the mouth of the living, the liquid, vowel sound 'IAO' shattered upon the rocky breaks of 'NOX.' He thrice knows 'All must end as he the great, the small, the infinite and the absolutely finite-' It is the taste of waiting, for he is waiting, he is waiting for the sun. The taste is his foreshadowed death, this man waiting beside me on 42nd street, who sees O in the mirror of life, 139 days lusting after O, with the X for the supreme feminine Unity, who sees I in the light of his Self, and A duality of spirit, blowing as an invisible wind into the world as darkness and light, in the illusion of self; O, which still comes out to nothing, in his 139 days of woe.

As he stands beside me, maybe still a lingering audacity in his eye, I see that he is slowly dying as he too is waiting for his son.

The Man Upon 42nd Street, Part III:

LOST IN THE IDEAL: THE MEMORY CONTINUES:

Still I walk on, past the man on 42nd street, one last Hope blazing brightly in my head. Still, I am bereaved of myself, bereft of anything but the sound of your name, echoing to me across the water, cast down from the wind; I can smell fate in the concrete and see the color of those eyes in the sky. But make no mistake, Love, you are me and our union, our annihilation of one and one in One, will last forever

I turned my face towards yours, to read my thoughts in them; I plunged into those forests of orchestral architecture and the moon, pouring forth the grace of fathomless night, thinking 'how incommunicable thought is, even with ones self.'

As I turn my face towards the light of your reflection, the last time, the first time, never again, and forever, I can't help but feel that the roles are somehow reversed, that I am looking at me through you beneath the canopy of our desires, concealed in chess moves, clairvoyant parlor tricks, and an unquenchable Hope which weighs itself down; every tremor of thought and convulsion of feeling suddenly has meaning. A subtle interplay -- a dance -- evolves from these 7 veils, these actions which we make not to conceal ourselves from each other, but from ourselves; that bodily trembling ascends and overtakes every particle of spirit, dancing madly, frantically now, for to lose the other, the dance, the convulsions, means the death of our self.

I turn my face away but for an instant; there is fear in that dance, softly whispering to itself: it is Eros, the love of death, which entwines us together in the physical consummation of opposites. The spirit must be the sanctifier and devourer of this madness, this fever, for it to truly be that revolt against the inevitable, the gravitational force of entropy, as it ascends to a new plane which reflects the lower: Love.

Has the hope resigned itself to at first flutter (in accord with the heaving breath), and then cease to be at all -- or does it instead devour itself and, suddenly, magically, the two are one?

In an eternal embrace, preceded by an agonizing squeal, where the lovely eyes are momentarily tired, and the flesh cannot bear to go on; when the process of creation has suddenly become too painful, the labor of the two in one feverish, confused and oddly silent, there is suddenly three. And none.

And, when there is that screaming silence, from my single self there is three: I, you -- us; then you can be sure that, looking at me, you are somehow within yourself outside, and there is no turning away, as we both enter an even darker night. Together.

Editors Key for the man upon 42nd street:

"He": The Man waiting on 42nd Street. The self perceived by the self as a constant other.

"I": The self perceiving the other as self, and unable to find self in itself.

"You": In this case, the object of Love, the eternal opposite. (13.

"Us": The Union of "I" and "You" represented by the formula 0=11 and, in another way, the number 139. (See below.)

"...Bereft of anything but the sound of your name" A reference to the Islamic story of the devil, who loves God so much that he refuses to bow to man. God casts him out of the garden, and the only thing that sustains the devil's existence is the sound of God's voice as he says "go to hell!"

42nd street, 4+2: pursues ideal of Self in the Other.

Sun/Son: Wishes to reproduce through union with the Other in a non-material way. (Also see Vau, the nail.)

IAO: Taken to be the manifestation of the world in our experience. IAO=IO=10, i.e. 0-9

I: Isis. The pleasurable first stage of any undertaking.

A: Apophis: the dark night of the soul, which this piece is primarily about. (See also below.)

O: Osiris: the final condition, superior even to Isis, and yet also nothing. O becomes 0, i.e the ideal comes to nothing; he remains alone. O = 0. Osiris is slain and scattered to repeat the process, just as the crop is cut every year, eaten, and grows anew before harvest. (See also below.)

PAN

P: II, duality, Mars. Also the letter Pe.

A: Dynamism, trial, the pentagram of the body. A movement. Aleph, the Ox.

N: Death, the lords of the gate of death. Nun, Fish.

NOX

O: The yoni, naught.

X: The phallus, the cross.

PANNOX: A glyph for the cyclical nature of life/death, both of which mirror each other, and neither of which is a 'true state.' Being but dialectical opposites, the truth of the dialectic is to be found in the rectification of the opposites, and in how the opposite of each proposition is found within itself.

42: The sun, in this case alluding to the consummation of self through union of son and daughter, thus raising the daughter to the throne of the mother and the self to the Self. Also an allusion to the Great Work which has this as part of its goal. 4+2=6, Tiphereth, as well as the mystical number for Binah, Understanding (1+2+3.) This number is also associated with the Rosy Cross, union of O and X. The top three points of the cross correspond to 1 (Keter), 2 (Chokmah), and 3 (Binah), respectively. The union of these 3 results in 6, the son, which is represented by the bottom of the cross. However, also note that 42 is one of the most cursed numbers, being literally "the Great Number of the Curse." Close reading of these pieces should explain clearly why this is the case with one who clings to ones self rather than being a whore to every moment and a virgin forever.

13: Waiting for the force provided through the union of opposites, the 'long dark tea-time of the soul.' (Then representing the absolute feminine unity and the Vision of Love.) Also the passage through the abyss, and the guide to that journey, The High Priestess. (Meredith is a stunted version of this symbol.)

139: (The eastern river of Eden, the self on the path to 42, unity with the eternal feminine.)

1: God, the three-in-one. Iacchus. Union with the object of love. The Fool.

3: Saturn, time, Vision of Sorrow. The High Priestess.

1+3=4: Deep purple and blue, I in the IAO triad, Vision of Love. The Empress.

32, 9=9: Yesod, the moon. Lust.

1+9=10: Shekhinah, in this case, feminine qualities manifest into the world. The Hermit.

1+3+9=13. (See above.)

Seven Veils: 13, 12, 10, 9, 4, 3, 1. This is the process followed upon the path of 139, expressed within the whole of the novel. Also the number 7, Netzach, ruled by Venus.

0=11 equation: Explained allegorically throughout the piece: 0 is the absolute monad, God conceived of as a singularity, although even that conception is subject to the false division of duality. This monad is cast into the world as two direct opposites, the 1 and 1, through the quality of spiritual air/prana, etc. As opposites are merely two phases of the same thing, we may simply express these two as 11 rather than (1)+(-1) although that equation, decidedly more Taoist than this, is adequate in its own way. It is 11 in the sense that it is all that may be manifest, that is, 0-10 and all of the permutations one may create in a base 10 system. The metaphysical realization in the equation occurs when the two, convinced of their separation as metaphorical agents of the God and Goddess, suddenly unite again back into their original form as One. A possible interpretation of this piece is that the seemingly endless torture of waiting for that opposite to appear, or possibly, to see it pass away is the first trial of 139. However, this is only one possible interpretation.

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