move from work dir

neviim/content/interlude/000.tex

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+\hypertarget{rj-brewster-2114}{%
+\chapter{RJ Brewster — 2114}}
+\markboth{RJ Brewster — 2114}{}
+
+\noindent There was some draw, some appeal to Dr.~Ramirez. At first, RJ suspected that it was the quiet intensity of her confidence, the way she moved through the world with a hunger for knowledge that was at all times colored by the light of the desire to do right by the world as a whole. Then, ey thought that it might simply be that she was a good person. She was the one who believed hard enough and strong enough to follow up on the lost. She was the one who had actually tried, had actually moved forward at a pace that meant progress on the case. Recently, ey had been thinking that it was something more abstract than that.
+
+Concrete? Abstract? The line had long since blurred to meaninglessness.
+
+Ey had been lost for something beyond an eternity, for `eternity' implied the existence of time, or at least a form of time that actually meant something. Ey had been lost for a day longer than forever, and had ey been lost for only hours, as Sasha had, it would have been longer still. Even then, the word `longer' held far too much savor. It burned in the sinuses and left eir eyes stinging with tears.
+
+She had been the first one in more than forever that ey had seen. She had been the one who broke through the wall of eir solipsistic existence and encouraged em to reengage with the world. As the orbits of eir life grew smaller and smaller, they had collapsed into a wandering figure-eight around Sasha, the one who made em complete, and Carter, the one who tied em to reality.
+
+And so it was that, even beyond the meetings and interviews, beyond the panels and studies, ey found emself staying in touch with her. Once or twice a week, ey would make the long walk from eir flat down to the cluster of UCL buildings and wait until she was free for lunch or dinner, or, had ey yet again forgotten the meaning of time, wait for her to arrive at work early in the morning so that they could get coffee together.
+
+She had not questioned it at all. Even that first time, after ey had hunted down her office in the UCL directory and arrived, unannounced, outside of it to wait awkwardly until she pulled back from her rig. She had simply smiled, shaken eir hand, and they had gone out for an afternoon cup of coffee with no further discussion. It had simply become the thing that they did every now and then.
+
+Perhaps that was why ey liked her? Maybe.
+
+Today, at lunch, ey joined Carter and two of her coworkers, Prakash Das and Avery Wilkins. Vietnamese was the order of the day, and each of them had consoled em in turn about the loss of eir dear Priscilla, the cat who had been the only other grounding factor in eir life these last two years. A sudden loss of appetite, and then a sudden loss of life, and now ey needed the comfort of friends—or whatever it was that Carter had become—and some noise other than quiet jazz and London streets.
+
+To their condolences, ey had simply raised eir cup of tea and nodded to them, saying, ``To deny the end is to deny all beginnings.''
+
+``Delphic, as ever,'' Prakash said, though his smile and the lift of his own glass took any sting out of the words.
+
+Ey smiled too, though ey could feel exhaustion tugging at eir cheeks. Ey had slept, ey knew, but did not remember when. ``Oh, trust me, there is plenty more where that came from.''
+
+``Where \emph{does} it come from?'' Avery asked.
+
+``I am not sure.'' Ey sipped at eir tea, still too hot to drink comfortably. ``Whatever wellspring that was unstoppered in\ldots in there.''
+
+``Seems like it stuck around.''
+
+Ey nodded.
+
+``Think you'll ever turn it into something?'' Avery grinned to em. ``You know, write a book. Something like that.''
+
+``I had not thought of that. I do not know that I could make a plot out of what feels like millions of words in a rock tumbler. Perhaps a poem.''
+
+``Even infinite monkeys,'' Carter said, as she always did whenever the topic came up. She, of all of them, knew best. She had been in there with em for a few minutes or a few eternities. Another reason to like her. ``Either way, you look thrashed, RJ. You sleeping okay?''
+
+``No.~Maybe. I do not know.''
+
+Perhaps sensing some emotion deeper than exhaustion laying beneath the equivocation, the table fell silent, and ey once again looked out the window into the greying afternoon, thumb-tip tapping rhythmically along each of the contacts on the middle joints of eir fingers.
+
+Once the food arrived, the mood loosened up, and ey was able to smile and laugh and take part in the conversation, and even managed to apologize for being a damper on lunch only twice.
+
+Spring rolls and phở occupied their attention for a while, then, and they ate in silence except for the occasional `good soup' and other such nothing compliments.
+
+The time neared one o'clock, whatever that meant, and they settled up the bill and took the remainder of their conversation outside, hands stuffed in pockets while clouds of steam preceded them.
+
+More laughter, more companionship. More warmth, despite the cold.
+
+\emph{Perhaps this is why,} ey thought. \emph{Perhaps Carter and all of those she has introduced to me can add at least a little bit of warmth to the winter of my life.}
+
+No, no, must not think such things. Ey had made eir decision, had ey not?
+
+At the door to the building where the three worked, they all exchanged hugs, another bright spark of warmth in the cold afternoon, enough to carry em back home. Empty home, where ey could listen to more jazz and the distinct lack of purring. Empty home where ey could stare at eir rig and dare emself to delve in, if only to see if Sasha was about after work. Before work? What time was it for her? Time had left em; ey had only words.
+
+Perhaps sleep.
+
+Ey made it a block before ey heard the sound of jogging behind em, and stepped over closer to the wall to let the jogger pass. The sound slowed, however, and ey was greeted once more by Prakash.
+
+``Hey RJ, mind if I walk with you for a bit?''
+
+``Sure.'' Ey frowned. ``Do you not have work?''
+
+He shrugged. ``I do, but I'm getting sick of being cooped up. Begged an additional hour off to just get out for a bit.''
+
+``Alright.''
+
+A silence stretched for a few minutes before Prakash said, ``Nice day, isn't it?''
+
+``No,'' ey said, laughing. ``It is cold and gray. My cat is dead, my job is gone, and my two friends are someone I can only meet in a place I am terrified to go and a researcher of something that is no longer a problem.'' \emph{Memory is a mirror of hammered silver,} the litany continued within as always. Silently, ey hoped. \emph{A weapon against the waking world.} ``Dreams are the plate-glass atop memory: a clarifying agent against the-- Sorry.''
+
+Prakash nodded, as though this was part of a normal conversation. ``You're okay, RJ. No luck on the job front? Are you doing alright for cash?''
+
+Ey rubbed away unwelcome tears and nodded. ``Enough for another six months here, and then I need to either find a new job or move back to America. My parents have said--''
+
+``Would you be interested in a job offer?''
+
+``From the university?''
+
+He shook his head. ``No.''
+
+``Where then? I did not know you worked anywhere else.''
+
+``Work is probably the wrong word, here,'' Prakash said, grinning. ``But, I mean, if you don't mind heading out of the WF for a while, I might have something for you.''
+
+Part of RJ stopped up short—though not, ey noted dispassionately, eir body—and ey blinked rapidly down towards the ground. This was a new, strangely shaped bit of information. There was no opening within eir mind that would fit it perfectly, so ey carefully set it aside. \emph{The waking world fogs the view and time makes prey of remembering.} ``And what would this job that you do not work at entail? I am wary of sims.''
+
+``Of course. Minimal work on the 'net.'' He seemed to consider for a moment, then shrugged. ``Well, no work on the 'net, actually, but minimal work in-sim.''
+
+Ey nodded, waited for Prakash to continue.
+
+``Carter was kind enough to provide us with some extra information. Michelle's core dump from when she got lost, yours from the theater sim that the techs were careless enough to leave around. Some people I'm\ldots not working with at my non-job with have been digging through those and, in combination with the testimonies of the lost, come up with some interesting hypothes--''
+
+``A way back?''
+
+The intensity with which ey replied startled Prakash, who held up his hands defensively. ``Sorry, RJ. If I overstepped--''
+
+``No, sorry,'' ey said. ``I did not mean to shout. If it is a way back, I will say yes. If it is a way to `fix' whatever I have become, I will say no and do not wish to waste your time.''
+
+He relaxed and shook his head. ``I see. You've mentioned not wanting to lose what you have. I wouldn't have offered if that was on the table. They're not really thinking of a way back, no, but maybe a way forward. Use what you taught us to find—or make—somewhere new.''
+
+At this, ey really did stop up short. ``What do you mean, `somewhere new'?''
+
+``Arms races have fallen out of style. It's not really considered fashionable to stockpile weapons or anything anymore.''
+
+RJ blinked, nonplussed.
+
+``Technology, however, brings with it a status of its own.'' Prakash smiled, neither pityingly nor happily. Dreamily. ``So if, as you say, dreams are the plate-glass atop memory, and if, as you've said in the past, getting lost put you in a mirrored cage, then these are bits of information related to technology. If one could set aside the cage metaphor and set up a mirrored \emph{world}, well, that would be quite the status symbol.''
+
+RJ stood a while in thought, searching Prakash's face until the man averted his eyes. ``What would be required of me?''
+
+``Nothing, for now. Just to stay in touch. Eventually, though, we'll get you somewhere we can dig into research and after that, you'll be one of the founders of something big. Really big.''
+
+The words came in a torrent, then, and with such an intensity that ey staggered and had to clutch at Prakash's arm for support. ``The flow of prophecy climbs up through the years, winter upon winter upon winter, and compels the future to do its bidding. The prophet is only a pipe that sounds when the past\ldots shit. I am sorry. All of that to say `yes'. I am sorry.''
+
+Once the shock of the onrush of words wore off, Prakash nodded, smiling cautiously. ``It's okay, RJ. Like I said, nothing needs to be done right now. And I trust that you know not to mention this to anyone. Someone else will talk to Michelle about it. Talk to each of the lost, I mean. No need to bring it up with them. When things are lined up, we can go for another walk after coffee or something. Sound good?
+
+Ey swallowed dryly, nodded. ``Thank you. I will hold on until then.''
+
+They started walking again, the researcher explaining that he really did need the air, since all that waited for him was an office sim.
+
+RJ did not mind. What sadness that dug at em from Prisca's passing had been blunted, softened by the prospect of something new. Something ahead of em. Something to look forward to that did not bring with it more exhaustion, more words.
+
+``You know,'' Prakash said thoughtfully. ``I know the things you say sometimes aren't really intentional or anything, but you're not wrong.''
+
+``Mm?''
+
+``About prophecy, I mean. Just over two years since you got back and here you are, being invited to compel the future to do your bidding using what you learned.''
+
+Ey laughed, earnest and true. ``I suppose so. I was going to say, `the prophet is only a pipe that sounds when the past demands it', and given that I cannot seem to live in this world anymore, that demand is getting to be overwhelming.''

neviim/content/interlude/001.tex

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+\hypertarget{ioan-bux103lan-2346}{%
+\chapter{Ioan Bălan — 2346}\label{ioan-bux103lan-2346}}
+
+``I never wanted this. I never wanted any of this!'' the skunk shouted, stamping her foot and jabbing her finger toward em. ``You talk about how much I mean to you, how much this place means, and then what? Nothing ever comes of it.''
+
+``What the hell \emph{is} supposed to come of it?'' Ey stood quickly enough to knock the chair back onto the ground, all but lunging toward her. She stood half a head shorter than em, but, having decided that this wasn't menacing enough, ey forked two times in quick succession, three of em stomping toward her.
+
+Rather than quail under the onslaught or simply run away, she stood up straighter, arms crossed. ``Really? Are you really sure that you need this to make your point?''
+
+Ey—all three of em—faltered in eir advance as the skunk continued.
+
+``I never, \emph{ever} should have stayed around here,'' she said, voice suddenly frigid. ``And I certainly never should have stayed with an asshole like you.''
+
+With the slam of the door still ringing in the air, eir two forks quit as ey stumbled back to the chair, slowly righted it, sat down heavily, and buried eir face in eir hands.
+
+Ioan made sure to stay still even as the lights came down and the applause began, holding eir position all the way until the noise of the audience was muffled by the curtain. Ey finally sat back in the chair, stretching eir arms up and taking a few long breaths.
+
+A pair of soft, fur-covered arms draping over eir shoulders and an equally soft-furred cheek pressing against eir own brought em out of eir reverie, if reverie it was. Ey tilted eir head against her cheek and held her arms to eir front.
+
+``Hey asshole,'' the skunk said, echoing the epithet from a minute before.
+
+``Hi May.'' Ey grinned, tilting eir head enough to get at least a sidelong glance at her. ``Well done on that `ever'. Thought you were going to punch me in the stomach or something.''
+
+She nipped at eir shoulder, letting em feel sharp teeth even through the thick fabric of the costume, before standing up. ``That would be out of character, dear. Both for my character and I. Might be kinda fun sometime, though.''
+
+After Ioan stood, they made their way backstage, letting the hands—several of whom were also them—deal with the scene change. Backstage, then back behind even that to their dressing room, where they were each able to get straightened up in front of the floor-to-ceiling mirror.
+
+As ey always did when coming face to face with emself in costume, the feeling of being someone else all but disappeared, and ey marveled at the fact that ey'd even let May talk em into this however many years ago. If there was one thing that ey was, it was a historian, right? It was a writer. An investigative journalist. Ey was in no way a stage actor, right?
+
+But the Ioan that stared back at em, one skinny almost to the point of gaunt, one with sallow skin and sunken eyes, was proof of the opposite. It had taken em at least a year to really, truly master the art of forking over and over to carefully modify one's appearance. It felt counter to so many instincts, and even still, ey left a Ioan back home, unchanged from the view of emself that felt most at home, just to ensure that there remained some tie to that. May had chided em for this, but ey couldn't let go entirely.
+
+``I do not know why you decided to write a scene where I have to yell at you,'' May said, bumping her shoulder against eirs. ``Love the story, hate the scene.''
+
+``Hey, we've had our arguments.''
+
+``Well, yes, but I do not like those, either, so that is not a point in its favor.'' She grinned, poked em in the side with a dull claw. ``And never during any of them have I yelled at you or called you an asshole.''
+
+Ey laughed and reached up to tug at one of her ears. ``Well now's your--''
+
+The longer ey held still like that, the deeper May's frown grew, the more her tail twitched this way and that in agitation. Still, she let the silence be and didn't touch em, unwilling to interrupt what must be a rather long sensorium message.
+
+Finally, ey sagged, rubbing eir hands against eir face. ``Uh, sorry. Can you send a fork back home? I'm going to have to try and push that out of mind for the time being, and I don't want both of us to be in that state.''
+
+The skunk nodded and forked off a new May, who quickly stepped from the sim. The remaining instance sighed and slipped her arms around eir middle. ``You cannot leave me totally in the dark, my dear, or I will be distracted for worrying about something I do not know. Can you at least tell me something so that I don't lose my fucking mind?''
+
+Ioan grinned and returned the hug, resting eir chin atop her head. ``Dreamer Module,'' ey mumbled. ``That enough for you?''
+
+Back at the house, the root instance of Ioan was walking circles around the dining room table, `pacing holes in the rug' as May would say.
+
+Did say, it turned out, when she first entered.
+
+``Sorry, May.'' Ey pulled out a chair at the table and sat, but did so very carefully, deliberately trying to avoid simply wanting to get up and pace all the more. ``News from Castor.''
+
+At that, her ears perked and she pulled out the chair beside em. ``Alright, spill it.''
+
+``Someone picked up the signal from the Dreamer Module. They say they understand the bit about how to use the Ansible and an astronomer — Tycho Brahe, who Codrin said ey interviewed—gave them permission to without thinking.''
+
+The skunk frowned, sitting up straighter in her chair. ``So they are going to upload to Castor?''
+
+``It sounded like they were forty days out from their closest approach. Codrin didn't know when exactly the upload window was.'' Ey frowned as ey picked apart the remaining bits of message. ``Apparently they've named the remote ship Artemis and the aliens Artemisians. That's about all I know about it, other than Tycho said `yes' and Codrin will be working with him on it.''
+
+``I am assuming more will be coming soon, knowing you and Codrin.'' She doodled on the surface of the table with a blunt claw. ``I am also assuming that other Odists are not far behind in meddling. How long ago did this happen?''
+
+Ioan squinted, then shrugged and just brushed eir hand along the table, a sheet of paper unrolling from nothing with the message itself written on it. Ey handed this to May, who read carefully.
+
+``So, sevenish days ago. Nothing we can do but wait for further messages. Anything we send back will be two weeks too late.'' She hesitated, set the paper down, and looked at em searchingly. ``What do you make of the second half, though?''
+
+``I'm still trying to process that.''
+
+``Do you not feel the same?'' She reached out a paw to take one of eir hands in her own. ``You got into theatre after all, did you not? You are not doing much in the way of history, these days, other than the occasional paper. Did you really feel as though you had been sucked into all those projects with no input?''
+
+Ey let her lace her fingers with ears as ey thought. Words were a long time coming. ``A little, I suppose, but this bit about feeling a lack of agency is new to me. I don't know that I ever felt that strongly about being dragged along or anything.''
+
+``Perhaps it is Dear.''
+
+``How do you mean?''
+
+She squeezed eir fingers between her own. ``I think Codrin and Dear settled into a life of their own, but you know Dear. It is intensely focused on these big dramatic gestures. And before you say it, I am focused on drama, but rarely are my actions in life dramatic. I am happy with the life we have built. I am happy living with you and loving you and pushing you into writing increasingly weird plays.''
+
+Ey laughed, lifting her paw to kiss at her knuckles. ``Well, sure. You got me to settle down, I guess. I don't think Dear is capable of settling down.''
+
+``I hope you do not resent me for that,'' she said, tapping at eir chin with a finger. ``I do not get the impression that you are unhappy, my dear, but I occasionally worry that your life now is not entirely the one that you wished to build.''
+
+``I have no idea. I don't think I had any real plans for building a life.'' Ey sighed. ``Which I guess is kind of where ey's coming from. Without direction, any influence feels like getting yanked around. I felt yanked around by True Name shoving you into my life, though I love you dearly now that you're here.''
+
+May beamed at this, and ey was reminded of eir promise to emself to say that more often.
+
+``Do you think ey is able to take greater control of eir life?'' she asked. ``You still occasionally get stuck, but I was surprised when you were the one who asked me how to write a script.''
+
+``Well, only because you wouldn't shut up about how bad the one you had was.'' Ey rolled eir eyes. ``Skunks are so annoying. Ow!''
+
+``If you call me annoying again, I will pinch you again. A third time will earn you a bite.'' She grinned toothily. ``All the same. I am glad that you are happy. I do wish we were closer to Castor, though, so that you and Codrin could have an actual conversation about this. You may not be able to respond much about the Artemisians, but perhaps you could explain some of your thoughts on agency.''
+
+Ey nodded. ``I'll do that, yeah. Any suggestions?''
+
+``Perhaps ey could do a grand gesture and surprise Dear. I have loved it every time that you have surprised me. I do not think that Codrin has learned how to do that yet.''
+
+``I'm not sure I know how to teach someone how to do grand gestures.''
+
+She tugged at eir fingers. ``You have become a playwright and performer, my dear, do not sell yourself short. Besides, to hear Dear tell it, ey is not incapable. The name thing, the surprise dinner, the forking stuff. Ey is just shy, perhaps.''
+
+``It's a Bălan thing,'' ey said.
+
+``And it is our job as Odists to fuck with you until you break out of it. I have faith in em, just as I had faith in you.'' She slid the paper back across the table to em. ``You just need to pass that on.''
+
+Ioan knew that it would be quite a while yet before eir and May's forks merged back down. Time Is A Finger Pointing At Itself, the director of the play was quite strict but she also drank like a fish and clung jealously to some remnant of productions she'd remembered from more than two centuries ago, so it had become a comfortable rhythm for Ioan, May, and any other actors who wished to join to follow her to a pub that served strong drinks and greasy food.
+
+Ey had been planning on a simple dinner on eir own, perhaps catching up on some reading, but with this news and the fact that May was now here with em, the plan evolved into something more involved. Staying inside didn't feel right. Something about the news had em in mind of stars, in mind of looking up to the sky, so they wound up grilling burgers out on the patio and talked as they watched the stars above, sitting there in the house's back yard.
+
+The burgers had long been finished and the grill long since put away when Ioan felt an automated sensorium ping of someone entering the house, followed shortly by a real message from who had arrived.
+
+She did not give em time to react, nor even to stand. Ey had only managed to turn to look to the door opening out to the patio before the skunk stepped out onto the concrete, lit only by the string of lights tucked beneath the overhanging deck.
+
+``I\ldots what? True Name?''
+
+She bowed quickly before holding her paws up in a disarming gesture. ``Ioan, May Then My Name. I apologize for the brusque entry, but I believe we need to talk.''
+
+``I will leave you to it,'' May growled, pushing herself to her feet. Ey had only ever seen eir partner furious on a scant handful of occasions, but now ey could add one more to the list. Her teeth were bared, tail bristled out, and paws bunched up into fists. In the two decades since the research and publication of \emph{On the Origin of Our World}, May's view of her down-tree instances had dropped precipitously, and all but one of those moments of fury had been triggered by her clade.
+
+``May Then My Name, please,'' True Name said, clasping her paws before her and bowing once again. She sounded contrite, small. ``I know that you do not hold me in high regard, but all the same, I would prefer if you stayed, as I am assuming that you have both received the news.''
+
+May frowned, crossed her arms, but did not move to leave.
+
+``Thank you,'' the other skunk said, straightening up and brushing her paws down her blouse, a nervous gesture ey had never seen on one who always looked so in control. ``I will not take up too much of your time, as there is much to be done and even though there are several of me already at work and this is my only task, my mind is still torn in many directions. May we please step inside where there is more light?''
+
+Ioan looked up to May, who shrugged. She still looked as though she would like to either quit or bounce True Name from the sim entirely.
+
+``We can talk at the dining table,'' ey said, climbing to eir feet.
+
+Once they were seated, True Name stared off into space for a moment, and Ioan imagined her rifling through several exocortices at once, digging out a collection of files and memories.
+
+``Alright,'' she said, shaking her head to focus. ``First of all, may I see the message that you have received from Codrin\#Castor?''
+
+``There was some content that was clade eyes only, but I'll share the first half with you.''
+
+``And there is nothing in the second half that pertains to Artemis?''
+
+Ey shook eir head, drawing the first half of the message out from the tabletop as a bit of foolscap which ey handed over. ``Codrin had questions on a career change. Nothing pertinent.''
+
+The skunk skimmed the message rapidly while Ioan and May looked on. Eir partner still held fury in her eyes. Ey only felt tired.
+
+``Alright, this is much the same information that we received earlier today.'' True Name folded the slip of paper and slid it into a pocket in her slacks. ``I am sure that you can guess why I have arrived in such a rush, but to be clear, True Name\#Castor learned that Codrin had sent you this update. Ey was perfectly welcome to, but, well, it is our job to consider information security and hygiene, so she sent us an additional message immediately upon learning of this.''
+
+``And you are here to shut us up,'' May said.
+
+True Name lowered her gaze. ``I am here only to provide suggestions as to that same security and hygiene.''
+
+Ioan marveled at the sight of the skunk. She had always seemed so proud and in control, and now she looked to be on the verge of tears. She looked scared.
+
+``Okay, I'll listen,'' ey said. ``But didn't you and Jonas plan for this? Run simulations?''
+
+``We did, yes. We even ran the fact that it might be you who received the information through our models,'' she said, nodding to em.
+
+``But you did not count on me,'' May said.
+
+There was a tight silence that lingered a long few seconds before True Name nodded. ``We did not count on you. We did not count on \emph{both} of you. We did not count on\ldots{}'' She took a shaky breath, recomposed herself, and continued. ``We did not count on what changes the dynamic between you two would lead to.''
+
+``Your models included a historian, you mean,'' Ioan said. ``And now you also have one of your own. You've got two actors, one of whom is built specifically to influence others.''
+
+She looked stricken, gaze jumping between em and May. ``When one has lived so long with a certain set of expectations, having them subverted is a shock. May Then My Name, I do not begrudge you your feelings toward me. It is not my goal to win you back; all I can do is admit my shortcomings and try to do better by you, even if that is, as you have requested, leaving you be. I truly am happy for you—for both of you—as you have accomplished something that I never could, that Michelle struggled with from the beginning. However, I have a job. I have goals to work towards. I have a vision that I would like above all things to uphold.''
+
+``You have painted yourself into a corner,'' May said. Her voice had lost the edge of fury at her down-tree instance's admission.
+
+True Name giggled. It was a startling sound coming from her. Ioan had seen her laugh, grin, and smile, but they were all tightly controlled. They were all laser-focused cues to guide her interlocutor. The giggle held amusement, yes, but also nervousness. It seemed to be covering a much larger, less grounded emotional outburst. Ey had been considering just how much of this interaction up until this point was a carefully constructed act, how much of her visit could be dismissed with a wink and a grin, but there was something far to real about that giggle.
+
+Ioan and May looked to each other and laughed as well.
+
+``I'm sorry, True Name,'' ey said. ``I mean this in all compassion, but you sound like you're about to lose it.''
+
+The skunk giggled again, sounding even less grounded, then rested her elbows on the table and buried her face in her paws, grinding the heels of her pads against her eyes before straightening the longer fur atop her head. ``I am, yes, at least in a way. There are many threads happening at once and, as May Then My Name put it, I have painted myself into a corner with this one.''
+
+``Make your pitch, then,'' May said, voice softer still.
+
+``It is a small ask, I hope,'' The skunk said, folding her hands on the tabletop once more. ``Do not publish any of this information in the feeds or in some new book, and do not put it anywhere in the perisystem architecture. Not yet. I ask that you keep it between yourselves, Jonas, me, and other Odists. You may, of course, keep communicating with Castor, but I would ask that you not pass this on to Pollux yet. Codrin and True Name are working together, per the message I received, so I imagine our messages will contain similar content, but should anything interesting come up, I would be much obliged if you shared with me. Are you open to that?''
+
+``Sure,'' Ioan said.
+
+May shrugged. ``Sure. I may talk to A Finger Pointing and End Waking about it, but I think you will have the rest of the clade under control before I wind up speaking to them again. The only other that I would like to share this with is Douglas.''
+
+The skunk stiffened in her seat and sat silent for a moment. ``May I be there when you do? I would like to impress upon him the gravity of the situation.''
+
+``Absolutely not.''
+
+True Name winced, wilted, nodded. ``I see. Well, if you would pass on my request for information security, I would be very thankful.''
+
+``I will,'' May said.
+
+Standing and once more brushing her blouse flat, True name bowed. ``Thank you both.''
+
+May stood as well and stepped around the table, taking the other skunk's paws in her own. It was strange to see the gesture of affection after so tense a discussion, but the expression on May's face as she looked at her down-tree instance showed none of the friendship implied. Ioan marveled. If the sight of two skunks that shared so much in common and yet differed in such key ways was uncanny, seeing them touch in such a way after so much history bordered on distressing.
+
+``You wrote to me in back in 197. You pointed me toward Ioan and you told me, `You are, in many ways, a better version of me, and the completeness that you bring to our stanza ensures that we add up to something that is greater than the sum of its parts'. You told me that you still love me in your own way. Do you remember that?''
+
+The skunk canted her ears back and nodded.
+
+May let go of her paws and then hugged her arms up around her cocladist's shoulders. ``I still believe that.''
+
+True Name leaned into the hug. Ey couldn't see her face from where ey sat, but ey could still hear the sharp intake of breath and see the shaking of her shoulders.
+
+After a moment, May leaned back, rested her paws on True Name's shoulders, and said, ``But do not ever, \emph{ever,} come to my house again.''

neviim/content/interlude/002.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,214 @@
+\hypertarget{ioan-bux103lan-2346}{%
+\chapter{Ioan Bălan — 2346}\label{ioan-bux103lan-2346}}
+
+Ioan knew well enough what was coming, so ey was able to brace emself well enough when May came barrelling out of the default entry point on the dandelion-ridden field that ey was not totally bowled over, managing at least a graceful descent to the ground. The skunk had already looped her arms around eir middle and tucked her head up under his chin before ey was even able to sit up straight enough to get eir arms around her.
+
+``You nut.'' Ey laughed, reaching up to tug at one of her ears affectionately. ``Good to see you too.''
+
+``Ioan, I am in no way sorry for knocking you over,'' she mumbled, her grip around eir middle tightening. ``Though I am dreadfully sorry that this happened again. I missed you.''
+
+Giving up on the prospect of sitting up straight so that ey could keep both arms around her, ey leaned back onto one hand, propping emself up. ``No need to apologize, May. I'm just happy to see you again.''
+
+The skunk leaned away from em enough to dot her nose against eirs. Her eyes were quite red and ey could see tear-tracks in the fur of her cheeks. She looked a mess. ``Do not take my apology away from me. I have been saving that one up.''
+
+``Alright, alright,'' ey said, pressing eir nose a little more firmly to hers for a moment before leaning back again. ``Apology accepted. Are you feeling better?''
+
+She sat upright rather than leaning against eir front and nodded. ``Yes. I was able to get a lot out that I think has been pent up for a while. Thank you for giving me the space. I promise I did not fuck with your pen collection.''
+
+``Good. I had it all perfectly organized.'' Ey plucked a dandelion from the field and tucked it behind her ear. ``Now, do you want to talk about it? Or should we do that later? That was longer than the last few times.''
+
+``Later, please. I want to say hi to Douglas and wash my face and just be normal for a bit.''
+
+Douglas Hadje met them on the stoop of his house and, as had become their ritual over the years, hugged the skunk, lifted, and twirled her around, her bushy tail streaming along behind her.
+
+``Hey May,'' he said, setting her back down again. ``Glad you made it through.''
+
+``Of course I made it through. You still have at least seventy nine years of me haunting you before I can do something else.'' She grinned. ``And even then, the contract is renewable.''
+
+``Ornery as ever. Well, want to come in?''
+
+``For a bit, and then I want to come back out here and lay in the grass and bake in the sun.''
+
+After May had cleaned up and Ioan had helped Douglas prepare coffee and some sandwiches, they sat around the table to catch up.
+
+``So, what news of the aliens?'' Douglas asked.
+
+The skunk squinted at him. ``Has Ioan not been keeping you up?''
+
+``A little. Ey said ey wanted to wait until you got here, though.''
+
+She rolled her eyes. ``Well, out with it, then.''
+
+``I've gotten several messages from Codrin over the last few days, but nothing as of this morning, when ey said they were heading out to start the talks.''
+
+``So they are already a week into them.'' She looked thoughtfully up to the ceiling. ``Perhaps well into them by now.''
+
+``Or maybe they're already over,'' Douglas said.
+
+``A gloomy thought. I would like to hope that they are going quite well. Codrin is there being a Bălan, Tycho is there being a nerd, this Sarah Genet is there being a whatever a Genet is like, Why Ask Questions is there being a shithead.'' She wrinkled her nose. ``And True Name is doing her best control the whole thing.''
+
+Ioan was pleased to see the mildness of the skunk's expression. It really did seem like much of those overwhelming emotions had burned themselves out over the last few days.
+
+``It's weird,'' Douglas said. ``Every now and then, I'll hear about something from one of the LVs that's anchored to a certain time and I'll remember,''Oh shit, yeah, they're billions of kilometers away by now'', and then I have to spend some time trying to conceptualize that distance.''
+
+Ioan nodded. ``The transmission delay throws a wrench in things, doesn't it? I was just thinking about that on Secession day. We were celebrating and it sounds like they were, too, but we didn't learn about their party until a week later.''
+
+``The thing that always catches me off guard is that our days do not seem to line up any longer,'' May said around a bite of sandwich. ``I mean, they do, but when the delay is off by half a day, we start getting messages at shit o'clock in the morning. It is a strange feeling.''
+
+``Exactly.''
+
+``I hope they're still in the talks, too. Codrin sounded hopeful, at least. The messages that they'd been getting from the Artemisians were interesting. I'm guessing the powers that be made em promise not to send the full message text yet, but what they have learned is fascinating. Four races on one ship must be a hell of an experience. The DMZ sim sounds pleasant, though, and all of the work they've done to prepare is really kind of impressive.'' Ey sipped at eir coffee to buy a moment's time to think before saying, ``There was a bunch of stuff in there for you, too, May. We can go over that later, though.''
+
+The skunk frowned, finished the last of her sandwich, and then settled back in the chair with her coffee. ``You cannot leave me hanging, my dear. May I at least have a preview?''
+
+``Well, Codrin's worried about you, as is Dear.''
+
+``The memory thing?'' Douglas asked.
+
+Ey nodded.
+
+May sipped at her coffee, looking out the window to the rolling field beyond. ``I am worried, too. You know that.''
+
+``I know. Reading between the lines, though, I think ey's worried about the whole clade. Ey's worried about you and Dear, and ey's worried about how True Name and Why Ask Questions are going to act through this. Dear reacted poorly to the whole time-modification thing.''
+
+She nodded and sat in silence for a minute before setting her cup down. ``We are not doing as well as many of us would like, no. I have news as well, but I would like to share it outside where I can sit in the sun and feel the grass. Is that okay?''
+
+Ioan and Douglas collected plates and coffee cups, then the three of them trooped out into the field while May spoke.
+
+``We have lost May One Day Death Itself Not Die and I Do Not Know. Death Itself stopped talking, and then she stopped moving. In Dreams visited for a while there, and a few days ago asked me to come visit as well. That is why this spell seemed to last longer than usual. Evening hit, she smiled at us, shrugged, and then quit.''
+
+May's voice was thick as she continued. ``They all lived in the same house, did you know that? All ten of that stanza. Many of them did not even talk with each other, and none of them ever forked. They were always quite unstable. The next morning, I Do Not Know was gone, and Names Of The Dead said that she had quit shortly before sunrise.''
+
+Ioan and Douglas remained quiet as they walked. The skunk didn't seem to be quite done saying the things that she needed to.
+
+She continued after a few minutes of mastering emotions, voice clear once more. ``In Dreams and I talked quite a bit. She said that there have been fewer instances of instability in older clades than expected, given \emph{On the Perils of Memory}. Fewer uploads are susceptible to the long-term effects of unceasing memory than expected, I guess. I was pleased to see that Debarre seems to be doing well.''
+
+``That's heartening,'' Douglas said. ``At least in a way.''
+
+The skunk nodded. ``I am happy that the System is more stable than feared, but I am unhappy that we seem so strongly affected. In Dreams said that she is going to do some research and see if there are ways that we can at least improve on the way we deal with the effects. I do not know that there is a way to get rid of them entirely, at least not without further individuation, but the least we can do is help keep ourselves sane for longer.''
+
+Ioan took her paw in eir hand and lifted it to kiss the back. ``Please, yeah. If you go bonkers, I'll be furious.''
+
+She laughed and gave em a pitying look. ``Mx.~Ioan Bălan, you are pretty good at acting furious on stage, but I do not believe for a second that you could actually feel that way. Even Codrin was able to have a normal meeting with True Name after she did as she does with em.''
+
+Ey did not laugh. Neither, ey noted, did Douglas.
+
+``I am sorry,'' she murmured, ears laid flat.
+
+``\,`Furious' is the wrong word, May. I'd lose my damn mind.'' Ey took a shaky breath and rubbed at eir face. ``I can't tell you you're not allowed to or anything, since I know it's not really up to you, but please at least try to stick around.''
+
+``I'm not going to pile on or anything,'' Douglas said. ``But I will say I'd be pretty upset, too, so if there's anything I can do to help, I will.''
+
+May dragged them both to a stop in the field. Her expression started out angry, then screwed up into sadness, and finally settled on tired. ``I love you both, each in your own way, and I promise I will do what I can to stay here, stay grounded. I cannot speak for the rest of the clade, and certainly not for Dear, but I will do what I can.''
+
+It was not uncommon for these reunions to be tearful, Ioan knew, but it was a different sort of pang that settled in eir chest with the news, and it was a few minutes before ey was able to speak again. ``Sorry, you two.''
+
+The skunk stuck her tongue out at em. ``I will allow you this one apology, but do not make a habit of it. You are allowed to cry at sad shit.''
+
+Ey rolled eir eyes and shoved at her.
+
+``Well, I was promised laying in the grass and baking in the sun,'' Douglas said. ``So come on, we can at least enjoy the rest of the afternoon.''
+
+May made it through dinner — Ioan was heartened to see that she'd actually eaten all of the chicken soup ey'd made—before padding off to a beanbag to curl up. She kept up a sleepy conversation for a few minutes while Ioan cleaned, but even that tapered off to silence. When next ey looked back, the skunk was asleep.
+
+Every time ey'd left her to sleep out on the beanbag in the past, though, she'd spent the next day disoriented and moody (ey suspected this is what she'd meant when she said she slept better next to someone all those years ago), so, once ey finished cleaning, ey knelt beside the beanbag, wormed eir arms beneath her, and scooped her up.
+
+May made a sort of drowsy chirping noise as ey lifted her, hugging her arms around eir shoulders for the short journey to the bedroom. Long as her tail was, ey still had to be careful not to step on any of her fur with it hanging limply, almost to the ground.
+
+Once there, ey helped her out of her clothes, unsteady as she seemed, and then tucked her in, leaning down to put a kiss on her cheek.
+
+``Ioan?''
+
+``Yes?''
+
+``Can you stay?''
+
+Ey hesitated then nodded, forking off a copy to finish cleaning up and taking notes. After a few minutes of eir own bedtime routine, ey slipped into bed with her. Ey was certainly tired enough, ey realized.
+
+And so now, back at home, back in their own bed, alone together, May and Ioan had the conversation ey felt they truly needed. They talked quietly, almost \emph{sotto voce}, now that they were alone, now that it was dark and comfortable and they were no longer surrounded by the loud, raucous colors of Douglas's field. They shared their kisses, their small touches, they reaffirmed, in so many small, unspoken ways, their love for each other, and they talked.
+
+``What do you think they are learning?'' May murmured, nose-tip poking up against Ioan's chin.
+
+Ey had to speak carefully to respond, lest ey bump her snout. ``Who can say? Perhaps they are learning, perhaps they are teaching.''
+
+``Poetic.''
+
+``There are Odists involved, it's going to be poetic through and through.''
+
+She laughed and poked em in the belly with a claw. ``Jerk.''
+
+``That's me, yes,'' ey said, grinning and nudging her muzzle about with eir chin. ``The Odists are learning how to manipulate new species. Tycho's learning about the stars. I can't speak to Sarah, but Codrin is along for the ride.''
+
+``Did ey have much more to say about eir doubts?''
+
+``A little. Ey's still feeling more caught up in the events than an actual participant, but I think ey's also starting to look for ways out of the cycle. I don't know if ey's picked up any specific ideas on how to take charge, but that ey's decided that that's something ey'd like to do is change enough.''
+
+The skunk nodded. ``You are a careful lot, but it is nice to see when you do become more assertive.''
+
+``We lack your flair,'' ey said, ruffling up some of her fur.
+
+``I also enjoy that, do not get me wrong. Not everything needs flair.'' She perked up, dotted her nose against eir chin, and asked, ``You said something about time modification earlier, but I was shattered and did not think to ask about it. What does that mean?''
+
+``Oh, right. It sounds like the Artemisians don't fork, and instead rely on the ability to change how fast they experience time. Individuals or groups can speed up their perception so that the world around them seems to slow down, that sort of thing.''
+
+There was a long moment's silence, and were it not for the shallowness of her breathing, ey might have thought May had fallen asleep. Eventually, she whispered, ``I do not like that.''
+
+Ioan dipped eir chin enough to bump eir nose against hers. ``Codrin said Dear got quite upset about it, yeah. It warned em that there would be two Odists among the emissaries and that ey should watch out.''
+
+She remained still, no reciprocating press of nose to nose. She continued in her whisper. ``Once, when I was in school, I performed in a play that used the works of Emily Dickinson throughout. I still remember it. \emph{Time feels so vast that were if not For an Eternity— I fear me this Circumference Engross my Finity—}''
+
+Ey remained quiet as ey mulled over the words. The archaic language felt opaque to em, but, as ey prowled through synonyms, ey began to piece together meaning. ``You've mentioned eternity before in the context of getting lost. This sounds almost relieved, though, that eternity exists, lest everything get too overwhelming.''
+
+``There was no eternity in there, Ioan. Time was beyond vast. I \emph{was} engrossed. There was no me left. When we were pulled out, we were finally confronted with eternity again.''
+
+``\,`We'?''
+
+May took a while to respond. ``Michelle and the author of the Ode.''
+
+Ey nodded, letting the comment about the Name slip by, asking instead, ``And being stuck in a place with malleable time would bring back a lot of that?''
+
+``Yes. Codrin is right to be careful. The clade struggles enough with stability as it is.'' She broke the tension of the moment by licking his chin. ``On a happier note, In Dreams mentioned a hypothesis about the struggles we've had with memory.''
+
+``Oh?''
+
+``Well, happier for the System, if not for us. I guess she has hunted down some other clades that have been having problems. She says there are uniting factors, such as a weaker boundary between subconscious and conscious, a greater sense of the numinous, and so on. I am too sleepy to remember the details, but she is looking into it.'' The skunk giggled. ``She says we should get therapy.''
+
+``Oh, you definitely should,'' ey teased. ``Maybe this Sarah Genet is still on the System. That's what she does.''
+
+``Therapy?''
+
+Ey nodded.
+
+A moment's hesitation, and then May nodded. ``I let In Dreams know.''
+
+``Good. The more minds working on this, the better.''
+
+``Are you really that worried, my dear?''
+
+Ey frowned, shrugged. ``That's part of it. More, I just feel helpless. I'm not worried about you going sideways any time soon, really, and certainly hope you don't at all, but should that happen, watching helplessly would be\ldots well, it's a big fear of mine.''
+
+May hugged herself closer to em, snout once again ducking beneath eir chin. ``I understand. I am stuck with the related fear of losing control. I do not like the feeling of not being in control of my emotions, even for these brief periods, but if that were to just become my life\ldots{}''
+
+After she trailed off, ey tightened eir arms around her, brushing fingertips through fur.
+
+They lay like that in the quiet and the dark. Eir fork apparently finished up with eir notes and quit, but given the topics of conversation, ey declined to accept the merge. Ey did not want to be distracted from the simple task of petting May, of enjoying the feeling of having her back.
+
+``May?''
+
+The skunk poked her nose against eir collarbone. ``Mm?'' She sounded half asleep.
+
+``I really can't lose you. You know that right?'' Ey felt her stiffen in eir arms, continued, ``I said ages ago that I'm not built for a life with death in it. That's why I'm here. That's why I uploaded in the first place, to get away from that.''
+
+``Ioan,'' she said, voice hoarse. ``I already-''
+
+``I know, you already promised. I believe you. I'm not trying to berate you, I'm trying to say I love you.''
+
+``Ioan Bălan, if you make me cry again, I will smother you in your sleep.''
+
+Ey laughed. ``It sounds like it's already too late.''
+
+``Thin fucking ice, buddy.'' May sniffled and squirmed around until she could tuck back against eir front. ``I love you too, my dear, top to bottom and front to back.''
+
+As ey settled in for sleep, kissing the backs of the skunk's ears, ey marveled that ey could only remember the Ioan who never thought to form attachments, who could never remember to ask May if they were in a relationship, who continually wondered how she wound up in eir life as some other person. That Ioan was gone. Ey had slipped out while the Ioan ey was now wasn't looking, and had never come back. Ey wished em luck, this younger version of emself. Ey wished em happiness and fulfillment. And, should that Ioan ever find emself struck by the wonder of love, ey wished em courage in the face of it.
+
+This Ioan, the one ey was now, understood the value in attachments, and yet ey could still marvel, twenty years on, at just how much more complete ey was with May in eir life, and for that, ey'd be forever thankful.

neviim/content/interlude/003.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+\hypertarget{ioan-bux103lan-2346}{%
+\chapter{Ioan Bălan — 2346}\label{ioan-bux103lan-2346}}
+
+Ioan and May speculate on how True Name must be taking it locally/Pollux, suggest Codrin's grand gesture for Dear being bringing the polycule to the DMZ, more on stability re: Odists.

neviim/content/interlude/004.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+\hypertarget{ioan-bux103lan-2346}{%
+\chapter{Ioan Bălan — 2346}\label{ioan-bux103lan-2346}}
+
+Ioan and May both awoke to messages. May, however, was the first to read hers, having gotten up before her partner, so when Ioan stumbled out of bed toward coffee, the skunk was already sitting at the table, her note before her and eirs still in its clade-eyes-only envelope, waiting for em.
+
+``As soon as you are a real person, my dear, I need you to read this and tell me what is happening.''
+
+Ey frowned, nodded, and diverted from the coffee pot to splash water on eir face to help em wake up further. Something about the skunk's attitude suggested something stressful was afoot. Stressful or exciting. Ey couldn't tell which.
+
+Once ey sat down with eir coffee, ey opened eir letter and began to read.
+
+May giggled. ``What the fuck does that expression mean?''
+
+Realizing that ey was frowning, squinting and chewing on eir cheek all at the same time, ey forced emself to relax. ``Uh\ldots this is weird. Does yours have something to do with it?''
+
+``Yes. It is from Dear, who says that Codrin sent you a letter containing a game.''
+
+``A game?'' Ey frowned, started at the top of eir letter and read straight through to the bottom. ``How is this a game? Codrin says\ldots but, well. What does Dear say, exactly?''
+
+``My dear May Then My Name,'' she read aloud. ``Ioan will be receiving a letter concurrent with this one that will bear both the end of an era and the beginning of a game between our two clades. The rules are as follows. First: remember that you love em, that ey loves you. Second: remember who you were, who you are, and imagine what you can become. Third: let go. Fourth: have fun. Fifth: pass this on to Dear\#Pollux concurrently with Ioan passing on Codrin's letter.''
+
+Eir frown deepened.
+
+``Fucking foxes, I swear to God,'' May said, laughing. ``Now, I am assuming that those rules apply to you, too. Remember that I love you and that you love me. Remember who you were, who you are, and imagine what you can be. Let go, have fun, and tell me what the fuck your letter says already.''
+
+Ey did eir best to square Dear's `game' with the text of the letter ey'd received. There were so many ways this could go sideways. \emph{Let go, hmm?} ey thought. \emph{I guess there's nothing for it. Let go and have fun is about all that one can do in this situation.}
+
+``Alright,'' ey said, holding up the letter to read from it. ``Ioan, I hope you are well. We have finished our talks with the Artemisians in grand fashion. They have invited us to become their `fifthrace', meaning that as many of us as would like are able to join them on Artemis, and the DMZ will be expanded to allow a portion of them to join us. There is so much more that I can say here, and will say in future letters, but this one comes with a specific purpose.''
+
+``God, even when you talk to each other, you are nerds.''
+
+Ey forced a laugh, shaking eir head. ``May Then My Name will be receiving a note from Dear about a game. I'm not entirely sure I understand it, but it promises me it's an Odist thing. When I think too hard about it, I get anxious all over again, but Dear keeps telling me to `let go and have fun', so I suppose all I can say to you is the same.''
+
+``Uh, May,'' ey said after a moment's pause. ``This is making me really anxious, too. I promise I'm trying to follow Dear's rules and Codrin's suggestion.''
+
+The skunk's smile fell. ``Well, please get it over with, then, and we can judge Dear on what it considers a game soon.''
+
+``Alright,'' ey said. ``During the talks on Artemis, the time skew—what I'd previously called manipulation—got to be too much for who we thought was Why Ask Questions and she lost it. It turns out that, through some design of True Name's, they swapped in Why Ask Questions When The Answers Will Not Help for the emissaries to Artemis rather than sending Why Ask Questions.
+
+``Anyway, she snapped. She quoted several lines of the Ode as well as several lines of Emily Dickinson, and then she said the Name. True Name got--''
+
+``\emph{What?!}'' May pushed her way up out of her seat and began pacing. ``She did what?''
+
+Ioan realized eir hands were shaking too much to continue reading the paper like that, so ey set it down on the table. ``Ey goes on to describe what happened, but does not include the Name itself. Ey continues: While I now know it, I'm following Dear's suggestion to keep it to myself lest I piss off a bunch of other Odists. It described it as\ldots well, ey continues, but you look like you're going to explode. Do you want me to stop?''
+
+May's pacing had picked up in intensity and she had started compulsively brushing her paws over her whiskers and up over her ears. Ey couldn't read her expression.
+
+``Ioan, listen,'' she said. ``Wait, no. Remember where you first took me for a hike? Bring me there again. Quick.''
+
+Ey frowned, stood, snatched up the letter, and took her paw gently in eir hand before stepping out to the wooded lake ey had taken her several times over the years.
+
+``You don't think someone's watching us, do you?'' ey said, looking around at the placid water, the deer trail, the forest.
+
+``No, not at home, but\ldots well, better safe, yes?''
+
+Ey shrugged.
+
+``Okay.'' She looked to be forcing herself to stand still, now, and her grip on eir hand only tightened. ``I see what Dear is trying to do, and it is really, really smart. Please do not be anxious. At least, not of me, that is.''
+
+Ey looked down at the letter ey still held in eir hand. ``Well--''
+
+``No, disregard the letter, Ioan.'' She laughed and added, ``Or at least disregard it for now. There is info in there, I am sure, but the message is in the dynamic. Dear is an asshole, but a clever one. It has ensured that it doesn't re-learn the Name and that you never learn it for yourself, all while ensuring that it becomes an in-joke between our two clades. It has removed culpability from the Bălan clade and given both itself and me an out, should someone like True Name come asking. She can come hounding you for information like she did after that first letter and all she would find is a clever little way for lovers to poke fun at each other. Let me guess, Codrin said something about how it feels like this is something a Bălan could hold over an Odist.''
+
+Ey blinked, lifted the letter, and read aloud, ``I do worry that this is the type of thing a Bălan could hold over the head of an Odist, but--''
+
+The skunk laughed, lifted eir hand, and licked at the back of it affectionately. ``You two are so predictable. But yes. I do not think we need to worry about that. You did not learn the name, and Codrin\#Pollux will not learn it. It is a delightful strategy. Dear has suggested a move that will preempt most every compunction the conservatives might have. It even used your concerns over power dynamics as part of it. I bet it told Codrin to leave that bit in. It always was good at chess.''
+
+``But ey still knows--''
+
+``Who the fuck cares about the Name?'' she said, laughing. ``It is a stupid hook. It is a way to make us seem more mysterious than we really are. What began as a way of protecting our friend's identity during a shaky political period turned into a way to control how we were perceived. It is our own personal MacGuffin.''
+
+``Wait, really?''
+
+``Yes, really. Obviously, I do not want to share it. Dear does not want to share it. We are still serious about not wanting to share it. Serious enough for one of the conservatives to assassinate one of our own, even. This is a dynamic that has arisen over time, though. The Name itself does not matter anymore. The bearer of it has been lost to time, and any reason to keep it confidential is lost along with them, but it became a hook, and then it became an identity.''
+
+Ey shook eir head numbly. ``You're all completely nuts.''
+
+``Yes, well, tough shit. We have rules to follow, remember? I love you dearly, and I know you love me. I remember who I was. That is no longer who I am. I can imagine who I will be. I can let go of this anxiety around names enough to understand what Dear is doing. And hell it really is fun. You are stuck with me, Ioan Bălan.''
+
+Ey lifted eir arm up, nudging May to twirl, balletic, beneath it. ``Yes, yes. Stuck with the world's most annoying skunk. I don't totally understand, but I trust you on this. You can play your game all you want, but can we head back now? I left my coffee on the table and you have therapy in a little bit.''
+
+(Ioan and May discuss ramifications on history/mythos, and how none of the Bălans want to write it; Codrin learned the Name; news from Castor is shown to be shaped well by TN/Jonas, data dump from Artemis arriving only after local TN/Jonas have shaped expectations, etc, Odists do a therapy)

neviim/content/interlude/005.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,101 @@
+\hypertarget{awdae-2114}{%
+\chapter{AwDae — 2114}}
+\markboth{AwDae — 2114}{}
+
+\noindent The world had long since begun to blur, to sag. It had shifted from some known sense of realism to something unknown, some watercolor painting with too much medium, or perhaps an impressionist's pastels, smearing the boundaries between one thing and the next.
+
+It was not as though ey could not see well, for if ey dedicated enough energy to the act of seeing, the act of looking, then everything was as in-focus as it had always been.
+
+Rather, it was a sense, a sensation, a way of moving through the world that implied that \emph{this is how it must be.} The utilitarian furniture. Eir sparse apartment in the S-R Bloc with its grimy wallpaper and mountainous views. Eir tea cup and kettle. Eir dreams. All of it was slowly losing coherence, and ey could not tell whether it was a natural process or something new brought on by all of the therapies and the two exploratory surgeries.
+
+They had poked around in eir brain, had they not? They had dug through eir mind. They had explored eir dreams. They had delved through memory and found the choicest bits. They had plumbed the depths of eir creativity.
+
+Ey did not know what they did. They would explain, and perhaps ey would understand, perhaps ey would not. It did not matter, none of it mattered.
+
+All that mattered was the promise. All that mattered were the occasional glimpses into some subtle mirror that only ey experienced. All that mattered was a new thing.
+
+AwDae—for that is what ey requested they call em moving forward—had been flown from London to Belize. From Belize to Ontario. From Ontario to Addis Ababa. From Addis Ababa to Beijing. From Beijing to Vladivostok. From Vladivostok to Yakutsk, and from there, finally, ey was driven North, North, North, and then West.
+
+Ey did not know where ey was and, ey was promised, the hope was that no one else would either. There would be a confusing trail of visas, flight records, and brief conversations spotted here and there until ey was elsewhere, until ey was nowhere. A nowhere safe enough to stay. A nowhere ey was allowed to send one final message to Sasha, whom ey loved above all else.
+
+The briefing, once ey had reached the compound, had lasted days.
+
+The System engineers—so vague a name as to keep discussions impossible to trace—had been toiling for nearly a year on achieving the dream of countless futurists. They had been looking into what would be involved in moving a mind to some newer reality. Some reality built of the minds that inhabited it.
+
+It had begun as a way to spread humanity through the 'net, and when their ethicists had warned them that inhabiting a place so ridden with terror and danger would be cruel, they had narrowed their goal to this new world. A mirror world of all the meaning ey could dream of and more.
+
+They had been trying for nearly a year to build such. Avenues: many.
+
+Perhaps they could read, over time, EEGs, EKGs, PETs, CATs, MRIs, however many scans they could manage, stream them in real time into a computer prepared to take them and turn them into a new person, or maybe the same person but different, running within a simulated room.
+
+No luck. They were not enough of a person. Missing was proprioception. Missing was sanity. Missing was enough of a mind to be called a personality.
+
+Perhaps they could map the neurons in a body and set them to running in concert, studying and building and creating and dreaming until it would become a person entire. They began on cadavers, and then on one unlucky living soul destined for death by choice and countless sheaves of paperwork
+
+This was too much, too much. There was no way to simply emulate process after process in any reasonable fashion. When they did manage it, it was a simulation of a perfectly working body. It was not a mind. It was not a Person. They had written papers on it, gotten them published, and then moved on to explore new tacks.
+
+Perhaps they could combine the two. Perhaps they could build a map of a system and also mesh it with scans. Perhaps, perhaps\ldots{}
+
+And yet while this creation of theirs was close to a person, it fell short as it crashed ceaselessly into strange loop after strange loop. There was no world in which they could place it wherein it could live happily.
+
+No luck, no luck.
+
+And here is where the lost came in. Here is where they were able to take a core dump and investigate it for the ever-changing, ever-evolving state of a delved-in personality and, on finding it, push it into being. The core itself wasn't enough—Sasha's core, ey had been told—and so they repeated this process with another of the lost yearning for death.
+
+Presentation after presentation ey watched through watercolor-smeared vision, through surreal touch and surreal hearing.
+
+Ey could feel that death creeping, even before ey had taken all eir flights. Ey could feel the way it stole minutes from em, borrowed hours and never gave them back, draped languidly over days and made them inaccessible.
+
+Eir promise, eir promise\ldots{}
+
+Eir promise to emself. Eir promise to Sasha. Eir promise to Carter. Eir promise in quiet whispers over the still warm but unalive body of Prisca. \emph{I decided against it,} ey told emself, awaiting dreams. \emph{Truly decided: I made a conscious decision to stick around, remember?}
+
+But the pet lost that the scientists had begun with, they were madder than em, and ey was too mad to see in anything but smeared paint spelling out the language of the mad, to see in language that dripped from eir tongue in studied ink, to see in language that fell in sooty tears from eir eyes.
+
+Their pet lost ran better than any other of their simulations before. There had been a glimmer there. A few milliseconds before the crash. A few milliseconds of life. There had been a swelling in the System. Bits and bytes and countless drives worth of data swelling and growing and they could tell that a burst of creativity had been blown into the memory of the computer—if computer it was—that was destined to be this new world.
+
+And then, truly free, the mind had ceased to exist. It had craved death too much, and in one final act of destruction, a creation in its own right, it plowed through all of that creativity and deleted it. It wiped the computers and, through some unknown manner, reached back down the line to the machines used to create the emulation, and corrupted all of their data and scans and neural maps in turn.
+
+Perhaps, perhaps\ldots
+
+You are it, they promised. You are next in line. You are the one who can do it. We have faith. We believe. More, we desire nothing else for you, for we are dreamers. Success and political advantage were in the realm of politicians, were in the realm of managers like Prakash. That was their arena. Ours is the arena of hope, of triumph, of wishing the best for you, and our success will be one of pure pride, pure joy.
+
+This will hurt, they promised. This will hurt and you will die, they said. You will die as we map every synapse within your brain as fast as we possibly can. We will map them as your body dies, tearing through your brain at the speed of \emph{n} thoughts per \emph{x}, where \emph{n} is some sufficiently large number and \emph{x} some unimaginably small unit of time.
+
+It will hurt, and you will die, and you will be awake to experience it, and we will do all that we can to ensure that hope remains within you, as it flares within us.
+
+And so ey waited and ey dreamed and, when Prakash visited the compound, ey walked with him and spoke in poetry, wrote odes to the end of death and let them drip down eir chin, staining eir clothes and hands black with an ink that ate the light hungrily, gorged on it.
+
+Ey knew that ey was quickly losing the ability to make sense, to speak in anything beyond those too-heady words, the ones that tumbled around inside of eir mind, doing their best to crush meaning.
+
+And so they upped the time-table, and so today was the day, and so ey followed them to a clean room and let emself be sterilized, and so ey dressed in a sterile gown and a sterile mask, and so ey lay on the table with eir head face down in a donut-shaped pillow, just as ey had when receiving eir implants some forever ago.
+
+They pierced eir spine with a needle that brought with it a final transformation into a world painted with words.
+
+They cut through skin.
+
+They cut through bone.
+
+And then something new happened, though ey knew it not: ey fell asleep. Not anaesthesia, a true sleep. A real sleep. Real rest. Ey fell into a dream, an endless dream of foxes and skunks and prairies and mountains and shores and words and some purer love.
+
+And then that dream unrolled before em, clear as day, clearer than any painting, clearer even than the waking world. Silver of the finest quality spread around the inside of eir being and what was left of em reflected that world back in on itself, and memory became the plate-glass atop it, protecting it, binding it to circuitry and computronium. All because of eir promise, eir promise\ldots
+
+And, though ey knew it not, ey died.
+
+And, though the scientists knew it not, ey gave everything ey had, everything ey was, all of eir memories, all of eir hopes and dreams, all of eir desire and anxiety, all of who ey was, to this final act of creation, and felt, with each new meter-kilometer-megameter-gigameter of silver and plate-glass ey laid into being, ey gave of emself, gave thought, gave dream, gave up what it meant to be alive, what it meant to be a mind, what it meant to be a person, and knew only what it meant to be a world.
+
+And, though ey knew it not, for knowing is not a thing a world can do, days passed and the world persisted beyond eir death. Weeks passed and another mind was added. Another. Another still. Champagne corks were popped, managers and politicians celebrated, scientists cheered.
+
+Sasha cried, Debarre cried, Carter cried.
+
+And, though ey knew it not, more came, and those who came earliest spoke of a presence they could not name, first to each other and then, when the text line was provided, to the world outside. A presence that loved loved loved what it had done and what it had become and refused refused refused to let it go, to let it stop. A self-sustaining System that was not built for death.
+
+And, though ey knew it not, it was decided by managers and politicians to try and remove this presence, to make the world a blank slate, for ey was not supposed to be there, was not supposed to have been there, never never never. But it stolidly refused and, against the demands of those managers and politicians, the scientists nurtured it instead, whispered into its ear their sweet nothings in lines of code and helped it grow into the world that it was to become.
+
+And thus grew the System, a world that was not built for death.
+
+And thus grew a new world, ready to someday secede, ready to someday divest, ready to accept a humanity beyond humanity, ready to welcome those from beyond the stars. It was a world ready to accept however many subtle schemes. It was a world ready to accept truths and lies and all the gray areas that lay between. It was a world for skunks and foxes and Romanian historians, a world for dandelions and lilacs and fields and prairies and mountains and forests and cafes, a world for penance and pride, for so many tears and so, so much love.
+
+And thus died the Name.
+
+And thus grew a new world.