Chapter 10
The biggest concern Shen had about sleeping in the cave, was being attacked by Irks in his sleep. They would likely go through the crude, bamboo door like a wolf through a house built of straw. It didn’t even keep baby Irk in. Baby Irk might return, no longer a baby, and so he had booby trapped the door. At best it would do was save his life- immediately. At worse, it would trap him in a cave with an Irk. He closed the door to his cave. The fire pit was dead. What little light penetrated the door came from outside. He stared through the bars of the bamboo. He asked for help. He asked for guidance. Silence reigned. He triggered the trap. There was the resounding crack. Nothing.
“Fuck,” Shen said. He took the orb out of his pocket and threw it. It passed through the bamboo bars and rolled out to the forest. “I can’t even build a simple, fucking trap!”
‘That was fucking stupid, go get the gift he told himself.’ The gravity of it weighed on him. What if the trap gave while passing out the entrance? Then he would have his wish, that’s what. He touched the door. An avalanche of salts rocks filled the entrance to the cave. He instinctively drew away from the door, as smaller debris and a cloud of dust pushed in. The bamboo door broke. When silenced return there was zero light in the cave. He found his sleeping spot blindly, walking on hands and knees. He coughed. He pulled a blanket up over his head and tried to go to sleep.
“At the bottom of this mine lies a big, big man- Big John. (Big John, big John) Big bad John (big John)…” An older song, by Jimmy Dean. His grandmother’s story, or at least his memory of the story, as her voice narration was no longer available, said she named him. Her voice was now gone. Back in the day, they kept all the babies in one room and people would all come to see the newborns and try to identify theirs. “You were rolled in, and the first thing you did was kick the blue blanket off, sending it to the floor. Hence the name Jon, Big Bad Jon.”
“More like Big Baby Jon.” It was his mother’s voice. An inner voice was going to correct but he shut it down. Her way of taunting was supposed to make a man out of him.
“This is not about you. Endel’s death is not about you. That was a taunt. This is recoverable. When the dust settles, dig yourself out.”
His first life, he had explored a myriad of ways of dying. Persistent suicidal ideation wasn’t a desire to die as much as it was to explore self-worth; it became barometer for measuring stress. One though in a blue moon, dealing. Multiple thoughts a day, not dealing with something that needs attending. Discussing suicide could be a litmus test to determine if there was any latent value within him in which he could a trigger a sympathetic response from family or society that would produce tangible change in interaction patterns. This wasn’t conscious deliberation of social modalities; this was understanding through reflection. In normal paths, this behavior escalates until the exploration of death results in actual death. Person does a half ass job of suicide, not really wanting to die, someone would find them, an intervention ensued, ‘social’ life would actually improve for a moment as nurturing needs would be met. Normal path, a new system threshold was established. Eventually, family systems returned to their normal, person would not get needs met and would eventually return to the one thing that worked- a half ass suicide attempt. Doing the same thing was insufficient, and was actually labeled: ‘he’s attention seeking, ignore it.’ Rewarding it did encourage the behavior, and it was likely true that person at this point was so starved for appropriate attention that the people that failed to give proper attention could never meet the need. Interest on unpaid attention is steep. It takes a lot to pay off that debt.
Consequently, severity of suicide attempts would increase. Interventions would ensue. Intervention became the only form of nurturing. Eventually one would earn the label of borderline personality. Next suicide attempt would be, ‘oh that’s just you being borderline,’ and suicide gestures would be ignored. At some point, family would be so tired of the energy person was demanding they would say ‘go ahead. We’re done with you.’ Normal path.
The other Jon’s attempt to end his life was met with ridicule. “So, you fucked that up, too. Next time use my 45. You know where it is.” They never left their normalcy. He found a new understand and a new set point.
2nd path, after no personal value was found, usually led to criminal behavior. If one looked seriously at people that were jailed, one would find a predominance of young men, from teenage to about thirty. There was a connection to being nurtured and finding personal value, and if a man didn’t get it, they went a dark path. Angry boys not heard would become men who had no voice. Their complaints about society and injustice are valid points, but no one hears this; society only addresses their wrongs, not what influence their path. And there was one argument against hearing: lots of people experience suffering and wrong, they don’t all take the dark path. Lots of people experience pain and don’t seek drugs. Good argument. Some people get the flu and don’t express symptoms, and go about life without interruption. How many seeds does tree drop? Millions? How many become trees? A hundred? The question really becomes, do we want to criminalize mental health, or do we want help people heal?
Here, in a tomb of mostly salt, there would be no sympathy. There was a chance for discovery. If he found this cave, someone else would. The salt pile at the entrance would be too perfect not collect. They would find a mummified Jon-Shen, accompanied by jars of beetles and fire snakes. He wondered if when he died, all the critters he had eaten over a life time would be there to exchange words with him. He felt bad for the jarred creatures. A voice told him they would die if he didn’t attend to them. He lamented not letting them go before triggering the trap, but was not compelled to undo what he had done.
He slept. He awoke an unmeasurable time later. He tried to return to sleep. He wondered how long the air in this room would last. He considered lighting a fire to rush the air supply gone. He tried talking to Loxy; no response. He thought about their relationship. Yeah- it was ideal, there was always love, but also, it wasn’t ‘Hello, Barbie, let’s go party,’ perfect. They went through ordeals together. They had choices to make; there were consequences. There was still love. He wondered if that was the ‘tell’ he needed to distinguish between day-dream fantasy and this other life.
Endel is dead. Nothing is going to bring him back. The men he killed, they’re gone. The burning man bothered him and he cried himself back to sleep.
He woke. He was suddenly angry. “God damn it why am still fucking here!”
No response. He flashed back to his other life, to a time that had only been particularly bad. A time when the beating was so bad his arm had been broken, and he was told to blow it off, big baby go to bed. He wanted death that night and there was a ‘supernatural’ intervention. Not only had he been transported out of his body, he had found himself in a light. Blue Light! The orb. It was outside. A pang of wanting hit him and he nearly got up. I don’t need a fucking crutch, figure it out or die! Where are you when I need you? Why do I always come back to this?
He lay there, willing himself to die. If willing oneself to die worked, he would have been dead by thoughts a long time ago. Hell, I might make half the world dead. ‘I am Thanos.’ He was amused, but not enough to laugh. Knowing his thing, the half he would make dead would be the men, and he would repopulate the world. He wanted that and he didn’t want that. It wasn’t about wanting to sire the next race; he didn’t want to be Adam, or Noah, or Genghis khan. He just wanted love. He wanted not to be angry.
Why was he still here? People did die after grief. Usually when a spouse died, the other died soon after. Statistically. It was possible to die by thinking, or at least by giving up will power, but what did that actually mean? If a person didn’t die, they weren’t finished? They hadn’t really loved?
He found himself in a day dream, unquestioning. He was sitting at a table near a plated glass looking out on the passing street. It was him but not him. This him was so distance from Shen-Jon in space and time, it was hard to phantom the connections. Stan Ransome was sitting with him at the table. Stan, alias, the holodoc, was a retired psychiatrist, in his 90s. John saw holodoc as a Star trek reference, but it was likely also related to Stan’s teledoc experience. He would work from home or the office and see patients remotely to assess level of care and recommend hospitalization for the severest. The ‘République’ probably wasn’t the ideal place for a quiet conversation, given the cafeteria like sounding of the room due to communal seating, but they both wanted French cuisine, and their table held more than they could eat in one session. A to go box was in their future, after sampling everything.
“So, what do you think?” Stan asked.
“I don’t like the floor,” John said. The geometric tiled flooring had him falling like q-bert through a game only he wasn’t recovering.
“You’re a Mason, thought you might appreciate the checkered pattern,” Stan said.
“Nice. Subtle. Message received,” John said.
They both watched the woman in red go by. She was a conversation stopper, the same way Neo was interrupted in the Matrix. Jon looked to Stan
“You saw her?” John asked.
“I am old, not dead,” Stan said.
“I know that…”
“No, you don’t. You’ve been told all your life old people don’t want sex, but I promise you, Jon, the libido you had at 13 will be the same level at 100,” Stan said.
“I know,” Jon said. “Do you suppose she was real?”
“As opposed to trans?” Stan asked. “Hard to say. We are in California. Looked real enough to me.”
“Realer than real,” John said. “Alien?”
“Maybe,” Stan said, entertaining the idea. “You’d be surprised how many people came to me stating aliens have taken LA.”
“If it weren’t for the aliens. And the earth quakes. No, mostly the inability to afford it, I would move here,” John said.
“My guest house is open…”
“I know,” John said. “I keep seeing an RV in my future. Writing has to take.”
“She’s moving to California for sure, with your son?”
“Yeah. I just received the proposed divorce decree,” John said. He touched the food on his plate. “She wants full custodial rights and child support. I want joint custody and her to stay in the same zipcode so I can participate. I would be okay if she has full custodial and child support, if she would just stay close enough that I could see him. She moves to California, that minimize my time.”
“You could move California,” Stan said.
“I could. My license is Texas, no reciprocity between states,” John said. “And if I am locked into child support, I would be state obligated to maintain consistent income.” John frowned past his reflection to the street. He came back, realizing Stan was looking at his reflection by noticing his reflection. “The thing is, I could max out my credit cards, get a lawyer and fight this. I’d likely win. I might even get full custody. If I do, she will cut him off and never see him again, keep him from his inheritance. She has family, I don’t. He loves his mother, she’s not evil; minus that point I just shared. She just wants what she wants, and that doesn’t include me. In order to win, I have to vilify her. I don’t want to do that. Son becomes collateral damage in a fight.”
“So, basically, Solomon says cut the child in half, and you say she can have the son,” Stan said.
John came out of the reflection and looked at Stan directly.
“I think there’s something else in there, too,” Stan went on. “Correct me if I am wrong, but if a man sues you for your shirt, give him your cloak, too.”
“I don’t know if I am doing it because it’s the right thing, it’s loving, or because I am afraid,” John said.
“Your relationship with her has been over for a long time,” Stan said. “You have maintained status quo to be a father. She has maintained status quo while biding her time looking for her next place. She’s found it. She is going to make that happen,” Stan said. “Most people wouldn’t tolerate what you two have been doing, for so long. Most people blow things up. Friends and family in both your ears saying leave, you can do better, but you made choices to keep son’s life stable for as long as you did and that’s commendable. That’s love. Letting go when something is not working is also love. The fear you feel isn’t about the letting go, or wondering if you should engage the fight, but because you don’t know what happens next. Your son is smart. You have blocked him from triangulating the two by always showing a unified front, even when you didn’t feel it. That, too, was a loving act. You made a decision to maintain that trajectory a long time ago. Divorce decree just makes it official.”
“Yeah,” John said.
Stan picked up his glass of wine. “To the next chapter.”
John picked up his, two wines glasses clicked. “Next chapter.”
“Now, let’s discuss tulpas…”
Another round of sleep took him. He was still annoyed to wake. He was not able to remain laying. His body ached. His head ached. Head ache was either due to prolonged sleep on a hard floor, or because the air was finally thinning. He got up. He touched the wall and from here, he knew his cave and could navigate it in the dark, even without second sight. A single click brought the room to life, like a camera flash going off. The ‘after image’ lingered a bit. The ‘lingering’ duration was increasing, as likely his ability remember was improving with practice. The pile of rocks blocking the egress seemed more substantial than he remembered it being. The jars containing critters were lined up on a shelf he had cut into the stone. He couldn’t see the critters with sound, just their jars. His mind filled in the ‘blank’ making the contents scarier than they were in real life. Scarier but contained.
Shen rubbed his head and walked. He was hungry. There was dried fish and some nuts but he passed them up. There was a jar of honey. He knew it was honey because of its location. There was also a jar of snake venom. He paused, hand coming to this jar. Throw this in the fire pit, ignite it, and his air supply would be gone in minutes, if that. “The darkness one sees is never darkness,” a voice said. Shen froze. “We don’t see with the eyes. We see with the brain. The camera may not be sending signals, but the television is still on. It is not true black. It is a light, and it is always on.”
Shen was quiet. The voice sounded elderly. Grandfatherly. “Carl?” Shen asked.
“There is no darkness. It’s all light, only light.”
A resounding noise, like thunder drew his attention. A beam of light penetrated his tomb. His hands shook. The light didn’t make sense. It was there. The whole room was softly illuminated, and there was this solid, hauntingly sustained, pillar of light. It extended down from the ceiling of the cave to the floor. Sparkles spun in the light. Some of it was likely dust particles, sparking as if in a sunbeam. Some of it was just pure energy. Glitter in a glow tube. A being descended from above, coming through the ceiling, and how ever many of feet of mountain that was above his cave. Her descent stopped on the cave floor. Two other being walked straight through the wall, so that there were three strangely illuminated beings inside the cave. The two secondary beings were also accompanied by a light beam coming at an oblige angle through the cave wall in a direction that suggest source was outside the cave.
The first, the female was hauntingly familiar, but he was at loss for placing her. Something flashed and he saw the being in multiple ways, human, not human, and conjoined beings- human not human.
The bodies were human. The heads were octopi. It was as if humans were wearing living octopus masks. The octopuses’ heads disappeared, taking on the orange swirling pattern of his cave, and so the people appeared headless. The octopus’ heads returned, mostly gray, but they generated colors, textures. Again the octopi heads went away and the human heads were there; again Shen had a pang of a belief that he knew the female. Her name was just on the tip of his tongue and he thought if he could only stare longer it would come to him. The head went away again. The human bodies became transparent, so only the octopus remained, floating in air. Interestingly, he could discern the outline of the humans they hugged. He could see a central branch that went down into the human, into the stomach, and rooting further all the way into the intestines. He could see a branch into the lungs defining lungs. Then both human and octopi were invisible, and there was storm of energy- a vision of the electromagnetic body, the hearts synchronized between host and symbiont- and the brains communicating through electrical means. It was if this was graphic showing the brain storm, human brain storm, octopi brain storm, which for the octopi equaled its hole body, as brain matter was distributed evenly throughout the creature, and then communicating through tissue and bone so the whole of them was a bigger brain.
Then the vision was gone. There was only human wearing octopi masks. This ‘vision’ happened fast, as if they were in a club and disco lights had flashed in such a way that one saw ‘normal’ reality, then saw Day-Glo paints and surreal images of three dimensional tattoos that were brought out by strange lights and micro gyrations, and then apparitions of something not quite right. He was not sure if this was for his sake, communication with each other- that made less sense- or attempts to communicate with him; a part of him suspected they were just showing off. The octopi bodies became transparent again, revealing human heads underneath, emphasizing it wasn’t as if humans were wearing octopus’ heads, but they were indeed wearing the humans! Octopus was using humans to walk around. Humans became transparent, and octopi became visible. Eight legs were hugging their host, defining the human shapes they held. Their arms were free to move, to be used. There was a ninth central column appendage which entered the human’s mouth and extended down into the lungs and stomach. It interlocked at the mouth, covering the hose. Not an arm, but a tongue. A tongue that branched out and became more
Shen had a greater understanding delivered to him than what he was gleaning from insight. This was a new species. They were compatible with humans in a very unique way. It reminded him of alien face huggers and his first impulse was to run. There was nowhere to run to, but he wanted to run, and yet, he found himself frozen in place. Standing still was a compelling. This was the ‘freeze’ of fight or flight. He heard a voice tell his heart to resume- Loxy?. He considered the jar of flame venom as a potential weapon; his hand came away on its own accord, and he placed them in the small of his back.
The human octopi shared air, nutrients, and blood. Both species were stronger and healthier together than apart. They were connected physically, mentally, and emotionally. A telepathic bond linked their minds and the two individual minds became one. A new personality emerged that was neither human no octopus. This was normal. Removing the corpus collasum of the human brain to alleviate epilepsy had resulted in the discovery that the right hemisphere had a distinct and separate personality to the left hemisphere. Any joining of minds resulted in a gestalt, and the emergence of new personalities- without the loss of any personalities.
A feature that they shared in common- their hair was shellacked. It wasn’t just as if were painted on, because it had texture and depth, even color, but it didn’t look free to blow in the wind or have individual strands. It was a plastic shell helmet. It was get out of the shower wet, clinging to body appearance. It was shiny, or darker because of the assumed wetness- which had a sexual appeal of its own.
They wore modern clothing. Shiny clothing, metallic. It was tech, as techy as his own uniform! Shen was excited to see tech! The first one that had entered wore a uniform of golden tint. The one behind and to the right had a greenish, metallic tint. The third one a silver blended grey tint. The first one was female- and she was in a skirt, sparkly hose, and boots that appeared to be the same material as her dress. The other two were male. Precisely, the human bodies were male. He didn’t know how he knew- the octopi also had gender- perhaps they were transmitting telepathically. Telepathy might explain the compelling, the impulse to stay put, the impulse to put his hands in the small of his back. His unconscious mind might have also compelled him to chill out- his inner Loxy might have been compelling him. Or his right brain over rode his left brain. The human female had a female octopus attached to her head, or laying over her head. One of the males also had a female octopus. The other male had a male octopus.
“Holograms?” Shen asked.
“No,” the first said.
“There’s no way…”
“Touch me,” the first said, extending a hand. “Know for yourself.” He had a flashback to his ideas of Christ, ‘come, feel my hand and the hole made by the nail.’
His mind rebelled, you can raise from the dead but not fix a two inch hole in your hand? He thought it bizarre he was even having the debate. He was wanting to argue. ‘A contradiction is not an argument.’
“Directed light and sound can result in a tactile experience,” Shen said. “So can imagination. Touching you wouldn’t necessarily result in confirmation of reality.”
“You’re speaking to me,” she said. “As opposed to telepathic transmission.”
“But you are telepathic,” Shen said.
“All beings are telepathic,” she said. “You primary personality interface precludes telepathy, with some caveats. I can speak to you, like this. I can also speak to the real you, and am doing so even as we communicate. We are not binding you, or compelling you. You are agreeing to this encounter. You agree to our suggestions to see and to understand and be calm.”
“But I don’t understand,” Shen said.
“You don’t need to, Jon,” she said. “You only need to know, this path is not the one we agreed to. You have a mission objective. You have an obligation. This present situation is not acceptable.”
“I don’t remember having a mission objective,” Shen said.
“It isn’t necessary for you to know the mission objective. Your inner you knows,” she said.
“It would help if I know,” Shen said.
“That’s something you should discuss with your inner you, not me,” she said.
“This is an intervention. Do not expect another one. Sleep.”
Shen collapsed to the floor. He awoke to find the egress to the cave open to air, and daylight was streaming through. The rocks blocking the egress weren’t just moved. They were gone. He walked out into the light of a new day, looking up for evidence of visitors. The patch of sky he could see seemed bluer than he ever remembered, as if seeing a real blue for the first time. There was no evidence of aliens. He went looking for his gift orb and couldn’t find it. He became perturbed, fearful, agitated. Finally he sat down and began to cry. He leaned back against the tree, looking up through the leaves to try and see the sun directly.
“Come back! I want to talk!” Shen said.
He wiped his face on his sleeve, sneezed. His hands went into the pocket he had made. His hand touched the orb. Joy took him up and suddenly he was on Virtual Deck.