move from work dir

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/001-a.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,208 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+Transcript of Node: \href{http://35.165.134.227/node/bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863}{{[}bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863{]}} with descriptive text by \#d5b14aa.
+
+\emph{The footage shows two persons. One of them has to be Dear, Also, The Tree That Was Felled, who is an up-tree branch of the Ode clade, eighth stanza. No one else has ears that big, nobody else can somehow speak in italics. The other took some research, but I am confident that ey is an instance of Ioan Bălan, a historian and writer. Ey is a tracker, but only just, as eir habits tend toward few to no long-running instances. This instance is either \#tracker or one tasked to this project.}
+
+\emph{The two persons are sitting outside of a cafe, from whom I obtained this footage. They are in conversation. Going to sit down and watch this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear, Also, The Tree That Was Felled}: Thank you for your letter, Ioan. Lots of really good stuff in there, most of which I had missed simply out of nearsightedness.
+
+\textbf{Ioan Bălan}: You've got me hooked on this project, I have to say. It's fascinating stuff.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear grins at this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear} We — that is, some other Odists down-tree from\pagebreak\ me — have come up with some further hints about the message.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Oh? Anything good?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: I suppose it depends on your definition of good.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: {[}snark, good natured{]} Oh great. Excited already. {[}more earnest{]} The fascination continues. Well, let's have it.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: So, one of us did an exhaustive search of some records and found an old archive server running somewhere.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Oh goodie. Better start gearing up.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Wait, start at the top. What were they searching?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: They were searching for the block of encrypted text — not what was in it; they cracked that long ago. They searched for the encrypted text itself, and they came across an archive server.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Old node boxes? Wow, even I feel crusty using one of those, and I'm a historian.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: {[}laughter{]} They found the archive server though, and there is a bunch of intriguing stuff on it. New, old, the whole thing. There is stuff from ages ago, shortly after we got here, and stuff from a few hours ago.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: You're kidding. Newly created stuff?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: I know. It is ridiculous.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{The fox's ears flop when it gets excited and shakes its head, never noticed that. It is kind of cute.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Never met anyone who could actually get one working well enough to add new nodes. So the encrypted text was in a node on the server?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yes. It is still there. {[}pause{]} Just sent the URI.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I\ldots{}well, I'll have to take it at your word that it's the same as the one you found earlier, I'm not going character by character.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear seems a little frustrated at this. About Ioan's slowness? I know I would not compare the files. It sounds exasperated.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: Of course, Ioan. I promise it is the same, though. Needless to say, we found a crusty old archive with the block on it, and there are other public nodes on there as well. I am guessing a bunch of private ones, too.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Anything good in those?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Nothing\ldots{}penetrable. It is all fairly opaque. To me, at least.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan grins at this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Thus us meeting?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: {[}nodding{]} Yes. The only bit that I have any insight into is the deck listing, which I think might be another bit of old encryption--
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan groans aloud, at which Dear grins.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: My sentiments exactly. It is another encryption scheme which relies on a deck of cards for a stream of random numbers. I have not dug into it in years because the decryption process is so slow, but there may be a node on that box containing the encrypted text.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Want me to have a look, then? The techier stuff is going to go right over my head, you know that.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: It is not all tech, promise. I just want you to give it a read and see what you pick up from it, you know? Put your amanuensis hat on and just spend some time experiencing.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: You think highly of me. No complaints, of course, but I feel I have to ask, why can't someone from your own clade fill this role?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear is quiet. Struggling for words? Our Dear? This must have hit it hard.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: We\ldots{}differ. The Odists, I mean.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: ``Differ''? Within the clade?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yes. A hallmark of Dispersionistas is that we treat each of our forks as fully-realized individuals. We may have a shared past, but from the point we fork onward, we grow ever further apart.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I assume you mean more than just a matter of increasing conflicts.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yes. Although we Odists limit our instances to the one hundred available names, we still consider ourselves Dispersionistas as we never merge back down-tree. But, that aside, we also want someone out-clade for this. \emph{I} want someone out-clade for this.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan seems taken aback.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Do the other Odists not like that I've been brought on?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Of the ones who know, most are fine with it.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Now frustrated/confused.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: ``The ones who know''?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: You have, of course, noticed that you have not interacted with any of my cocladists. I have told some about hiring you, but not all.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Alright, I suppose. If you're independent, then I guess it makes sense that I be your amanuensis rather than the clade's.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yes. Perhaps more evidence that we are split on how to tackle this in the first place. Different camps, different strategies, infighting. Ioan, you have to understand that, when a clade gets old, it starts to get a little batty.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Calm down fox, I am working on it. Not so frantic.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: Some clades try to get around this by keeping a certain core group of instances — talking mostly Dispersionistas, mind — in a setting that keeps them as sane as possible. Something that feels very `normal'. Or maybe some are researching forking from earlier points, from down-tree, rather than from where they are now.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{It furrows its brow.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: We do not. First of all, we started way too early on for that to be a thing. We trusted that change itself would keep us sane, that as instances diverged, especially with mutation algos in place, they would change enough to keep us from falling apart.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: And that didn't work?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Long pause.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: It kind of worked, I will put it that way. I feel fairly well rounded, as much as that means, and I am sure those across the clade from me do too, but it is complicated. You might not recognize my cocladists as Odists without knowing beforehand. It is like having a very close sib that was raised by a different family in a different sim.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: More different than you'd expect, then?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: `Expect'\ldots{}fits strangely for this. The problem is that they are still \emph{us}, and we are still them. Clades are families of separate individuals in a lot of ways, but you must realize that, in the end, they are still one individual. We are more different than one individual should be. Does that make sense?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{It does, Dear. That is why I am doing this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: I guess so. {[}pause{]} So some of your clade would prefer I not be a part of this?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: More than that. They feel that investigating the matter of the Name being written is too risky, too close to investigating the Name itself.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I don't know how I would respond to that.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: That is my field, Ioan. Do not worry about it.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan holds up eir hands, looks apologetic. The fox has tilted its ears back.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Sorry, Dear. I hope I'm not overstepping at all.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: {[}calmer{]} Do not worry about it. It is okay, I promise. It is just that we are really good at arguing, so I have been dealing with that quite a bit the last few days. That is why I hired you; I am relegated to an administration role so I am a bit on edge. Let's get back to the archive server, yes?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Sure thing. Where did you say your cocladists had found it?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Just in a search. I do not quite know the details about how. Assuming just a text search of the perisystem. Not too sure on the terminology; I bought into being an artist pretty hard. All that knowledge is in exos.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: {[}laughter{]} No worries there, Dear. I'm trying to keep up with you is all. I was just wondering if they found anything else.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: You mean like the other nodes on the server?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I'll poke around at those, look for ties and such. I was more wondering if they'd found anything in their search that didn't meet the relevancy threshold for them. Stuff like back-links to the server, or anyone talking about this Qoheleth. Hebel. Whichever.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Silly name. Oh well. Dear looks taken aback.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: I had not really thought to ask. I do not suppose they did, though. Do you think it is worth having them search around more? Lowering the, uh, relevancy threshold? {[}laughter{]}
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Yeah, I think so. Though now that I've got it too, I can do some of that digging myself. I want to see who likes the Tanakh so much as to name themselves that. And why `kemmer'.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: I\ldots{}well, it is complicated and out of scope, but it relating to fluidity of gender is relevant to the clade as a whole. Very big for us, if only at a remove. I have opted out.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: So I noticed. It makes sense, though.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: I am glad someone is thinking about this stuff. You are sounding more like a--
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Private investigator?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: {[}laughter{]} I was going to say historian, sounding more like an historian every time we talk. But you never know, maybe you would make a good PI.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{That was fast! I may have less time than I had thought. Dear is lovely, and it is totally right: on the other side of the clade, there are some who would not like this kind of digging. Too entrenched. Too Conservative.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: I can't tell whether or not I should be flattered.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: It is a good thing. Just keep digging, and we will too. I will be about. Got a few more things to wrap up to finish the current gallery exhibition, but after that, I am just going to work on this — with you if you do not mind — and try and figure out what is even happening in the clade. Do keep in touch, yes? Ping me whenever.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Will do. {[}pause{]} Wait, you're an instance artist, right?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yes. Why do you ask?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Why don't you fork to work on both at the same time?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear shrugs, grins, quits. Very lovely fox. Really quite lovely.}
+
+\emph{No time to dawdle watching Ioan try and figure out up-tree instances, though. Must be getting ready. Quit this instance, flush the server of extraneous crap to guide Ioan a little more effectively — yeesh, how old is some of this stuff? Need to re-encrypt a bunch of it anyway — and maybe get ready for some visitors.}

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/001-b.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,71 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+\hypertarget{archive-hebel-qoheleth}{%
+\section{Archive: {[}Hebel Qoheleth{]}}\label{archive-hebel-qoheleth}}
+
+\hypertarget{node-7cbc92e691678c4c17a04f5553cd1058ee122956}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}7cbc92e691678c4c17a04f5553cd1058ee122956{]}}\label{node-7cbc92e691678c4c17a04f5553cd1058ee122956}}
+
+{[}Encrypted{]}
+
+\hypertarget{node-32c5a64b66d0338be4373d796cf1eae5343f1077}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}32c5a64b66d0338be4373d796cf1eae5343f1077{]}}\label{node-32c5a64b66d0338be4373d796cf1eae5343f1077}}
+
+\begin{verbatim}
+OCYNX GRIMN CYJPE PNNXS SCIQZ
+KTWQW FBAVY FBOPA QERLB HWIJW
+KPELO UCLAN OKHPM PCPWR NZNZQ
+NMTIQ BKNGH UWFMG BPPZS CNRKX
+TKEMU AFNOS VQUNW
+\end{verbatim}
+
+\hypertarget{node-36b1d8c1df07ce0f254b2332acd38c59bdf3bb00}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}36b1d8c1df07ce0f254b2332acd38c59bdf3bb00{]}}\label{node-36b1d8c1df07ce0f254b2332acd38c59bdf3bb00}}
+
+{[}Encrypted{]}
+
+\hypertarget{node-67e97446cdbe3a4a3cfd5ebd75b1260f-error}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}67e97446cdbe3a4a3cfd5ebd75b1260f{]} Error}\label{node-67e97446cdbe3a4a3cfd5ebd75b1260f-error}}
+
+The node you have requested, {[}67e97446cdbe3a4a3cfd5ebd75b1260f{]}, does not appear to be an Archive node. You have provided a 32 byte identifier; the Archive system uses 40 byte identifiers.
+
+If you believe you have received this message in error, please contact the Archive owner.
+
+If you believe that you have the correct identifier, you may have attempted to access it on the wrong system. Please check the Gist system for a possible match.
+
+\hypertarget{node-80b42deb4c364cac5937cff9ca306625b69ae7c5}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}80b42deb4c364cac5937cff9ca306625b69ae7c5{]}}\label{node-80b42deb4c364cac5937cff9ca306625b69ae7c5}}
+
+{[}Encrypted{]}
+
+\hypertarget{node-bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863{]}}\label{node-bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863}}
+
+\textbf{Security Footage}
+
+Location and time data provided in their own node.
+
+Limited sensory data provided by dual security cameras and microphones.
+
+No sensorium data available.
+
+Marked for deletion \emph{systime 181+331 0322}.
+
+\begin{center}\rule{0.5\linewidth}{0.5pt}\end{center}
+
+\textbf{Note}
+
+Given the trouble of maintaining this shitty archive, I just transcribed it so I don't have to host the data.
+
+Node: 172fb56e982d2d3f08957c5f7be0779bbf2f6aa6
+
+\hypertarget{node-172fb56e982d2d3f08957c5f7be0779bbf2f6aa6}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}172fb56e982d2d3f08957c5f7be0779bbf2f6aa6{]}}\label{node-172fb56e982d2d3f08957c5f7be0779bbf2f6aa6}}
+
+\emph{Transcript of Ioan Bălan and Dear, Also, The Tree That Was Felled speaking at a cafe.}
+
+\hypertarget{node-f6981a0738b43275059c37a9c8b744e42eb91fb9}{%
+\subsection{Node: {[}f6981a0738b43275059c37a9c8b744e42eb91fb9{]}}\label{node-f6981a0738b43275059c37a9c8b744e42eb91fb9}}
+
+{[}Encrypted{]}

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/001.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,191 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth --- 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{Qoheleth --- 2305}
+
+Transcript of Node: \href{http://35.165.134.227/node/bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863}{{[}bea0cf302fcd00863f0c67a91b1a75c0e4ba4863{]}} with descriptive text by \#d5b14aa.
+
+\secdiv{}
+
+\emph{The footage shows two persons. One of them has to be Dear, Also, The Tree That Was Felled, who is an up-tree branch of the Ode clade, ninth stanza. No one else has ears that big, nobody else can somehow speak in italics. The other took some research, but I'm confident that ey are an instance of Ioan Balan, a historian and writer. Ey are a tracker, and eir habits tend toward few to no long-running instances. This instance is either \#tracker or one tasked to this project.}
+
+\emph{The two persons are sitting outside of a cafe, from whom I obtained this footage. They are in conversation. Going to sit down and watch this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear, Also, The Tree That Was Felled}: We - er, some other Odists, down-tree from\pagebreak{4}\ me - have come up with some hints about the message.
+
+\textbf{Ioan Balan}: Oh? Anything good?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: I suppose it depends on your definition of good.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Oh great. Excited already. Well, lay it on me.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: So, one of us did a pretty exhaustive search of some records and found some old archive server running somewhere.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Oh goodie. Better start gearing up.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Wait, start at the top. What were they searching?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: They were searching for the block of encrypted text - not what was in it; they cracked that a long time ago, but I think this hunt is still valid and have some reputation to burn, so...anyway - they searched for the encrypted text itself, and they came across an archive server.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Old node boxes? Man, even I feel crusty using one of those, and I'm a historian.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: You're only a little crusty *laughter*. They found the archive server though, and there's a bunch of stuff on it. New, old, the whole thing. There's stuff from ages ago, and stuff from a few hours ago.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: You're kidding, right?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: I know, it's ridiculous.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{The fox's ears flop when it gets excited and shakes its head, never noticed that. It's kind of cute.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Never met anyone who could actually get one working well enough to add new nodes. So the encrypted text was in a node on the server?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yeah. It's still there. Just sent the URI.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I...well, I'll have to take it at your word that it's the same as the one you found earlier, I'm not going character by character.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear seems a little frustrated at this. About Ioan's slowness? I know I wouldn't compare the files. It sounds exasperated.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: Of course, Ioan. Promise it's the same. Needless to say, we found a crusty old server with the block on it, and there's other public nodes on there as well. I'm guessing a bunch of private ones, too.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Anything good in those?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Nothing...penetrable. It's all fairly opaque. To me, at least.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan grins at this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Thus us meeting here?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear nods.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Want me to have a look, then? Tech stuff is going to go right over my head, you know that.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: It's not all tech, promise. I just want you to give it a read and see what you pick up from it, you know? Put your amanuensis hat on and just spend some time experiencing.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: You think highly of me. No complaints, but why can't someone from your own clade fill this role?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear's quiet. Struggling for words? Our Dear? This must have hit it hard.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: We...differ. The Odists, I mean. But we also want someone out-clade for this. I want someone out-clade for this.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan seems taken aback.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Do the others not like that I've been brought on?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Of the ones who know, most are fine with it.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Now frustrated/confused.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: The ones who know?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: We're a little split on how to tackle this in the first place. Different camps, different strategies, infighting. Ioan, you have to understand that, when a clade gets old, it starts to get a little batty.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Calm down fox, I'm working on it. Not so frantic.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: Some clades try to get around this by keeping a certain core group of instances - talking mostly Dispersionistas, mind - in a setting that keeps them as sane as possible, feels very `normal'. Or maybe some are researching forking from earlier points, from down-tree, rather than from where they are now.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{It furrows its brow.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: We don't. First of all, we started way too early on for that to be a thing. We trusted that change would keep us sane, that as instances diverged, especially with mutation algos in place, they'd change enough to keep us from falling apart.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: And that didn't work?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Long pause.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: It kind of worked. I'll put it that way. I feel pretty well rounded, and I'm sure those across the clade from me do too, but...it's complicated. It's like having a super close sib that was raised by a different family, in a different sim.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: More different than you'd expect, then?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: `Expect'...fits strangely for this. The problem is that they're still us, we're still them. Clades are like families in a lot of ways, but you have to realize that they're still one individual. We're more different than one individual should be. Does that make sense?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{It does, Dear. That's why I'm doing this.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: I guess so. So some of your clade would prefer I not be a part of this?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: They feel that investigating the matter of The Name being said is too close to investigating The Name itself.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I don't know how I would respond to that.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: That's my field. Don't worry about it.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Ioan holds up eir hands, looks apologetic. The fox has lowered its ears.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: Sorry, hope I'm not overstepping at all.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Don't worry about it. It's all good, I promise. It's just that we're really good at arguing, so I've been dealing with that a lot, the last few days. I'm a bit on edge. Let's get back to the archive server, yeah?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Sure thing, Dear. Where did you say your cocladists had found it?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Just in a search. Don't know quite the details about how, assuming just a text search of perisystem stuff, I guess? Not too sure on the terminology, I bought into being an artist pretty hard.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: *laughter* No worries there, fox. I'm trying to keep up with you is all. I was just wondering if they found anything else.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: You mean like other nodes on the server?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: I'll poke around at those, look for ties and such. I was more wondering if they'd found anything in their search that didn't meet the relevancy threshold for them. Stuff like things linking back to the server, or anyone talking about this *pause* Hebel Qoheleth.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Silly name. Oh well. Dear looks taken aback.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Dear}: Hadn't really thought to ask. Don't suppose they did, though. Do you think it'd be worth having them search around more? Lowering the, uh, relevancy threshold? *laughter*
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Yeah, I think so. Though now that I've got it too, I can do some of my own digging. Kinda want to see who likes The Bible so much as to name themselves that.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: The Bible?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Yeah, Qoheleth is the...uh, the teacher, or gatherer, or a bit of both, really. That's what the book usually translated as Ecclesiastes is named after. Not sure about Hebel. What's kemmer, by the way? The passphrase?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: How did you...nevermind. Kemmer is something from a book. One of our favorites. It's complicated and out of scope, but it relates to fluidity of gender. Very big, in our clade. I've opted out.
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: So I noticed. It makes sense, though. I'll make a note to look it up.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Glad someone's thinking about this stuff. Sounding more like a-
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Private investigator?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: *laughter* I was going to say historian, sounding more like a historian every time we talk. But you never know, maybe you'd make a good PI.
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{That was fast! I may have less time than I had thought. Dear's lovely, and it's totally right: on the other side of the clade, there are some who'd not like this kind of digging. Too entrenched.}
+
+\begin{quote}
+\textbf{Ioan}: I can't tell whether or not I should be flattered.
+
+\textbf{Dear}: It's a good thing. Just keep digging, and we will too. I'll be about, too. Got a few more things to wrap up to finish the current gallery business, but after that, I'm just going to work on this - with you if you don't mind - and try and figure out what's even happening in the clade. Keep in touch, yeah? Ping me whenever?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Will do. *pause* Wait, you're an instance artist, right?
+
+\textbf{Dear}: Yeah, why do you ask?
+
+\textbf{Ioan}: Why don't you fork to work on both at the same time?
+\end{quote}
+
+\emph{Dear shrugs, grins, quits. Very lovely fox. Really quite lovely.}
+
+\emph{No time to dawdle watching Ioan try and figure out up-tree instances, though. Must be getting ready. Quit this instance, flush the server of extraneous crap to guide a little more effectively - yeesh, how old is some of this stuff? Need to re-encrypt a bunch of it anyway - and get ready for some visitors.}

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/002.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,36 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+It has been long enough that I am thinking of myself as Qoheleth now. All that slow washing-away of given names to replace with chosen ones. Something worth being methodical with. I have even begun introducing myself as Qoheleth whenever I go out, just to try it on for size.
+
+That I have never actually done so is of little concern. It is ancillary to the problem at hand. Something I can tackle later, or at least tackle in thought. I can daydream about the name change. Just plan and plan and plan, like I have planned everything else.
+
+I like the sound of it. I like the way it feels in my mouth when I say it out loud. I like the connotations of `teacher' and `gatherer' and `director of the assembled'. I want to feel the way that it feels to be someone different, and I have found at least a part of that in this name, the name that \emph{I} chose for \emph{myself}. Not some line of a poem I wish we would all forget. \emph{Could} all forget. I may not have yet taught or gathered yet, but I am working constantly to earn the moniker.
+
+And `Hebel'. Hebel was another name I picked up. Vain, futile, mere breath.
+
+Qoheleth's words, in the book written so very, very long ago, were all about hebel. ``This, too, is meaningless,'' Qoheleth had written after that long walk through life. Try pleasure. Try work. Try prayer. This, too, is meaningless.
+
+That is not how I envision the name, though.
+
+I think of the two names as signifiers rather than simple names. I think of the two moods that they bring. And I think most often of the two \emph{sources} of names. Not the book, not the time at which it was written. My two sources. Now.
+
+Qoheleth was the name I gave myself out of hope. It is a name of goals and aspirations. It embodies the things that I want to do. It takes all of my plans and me, maker of plans, and binds them up neatly into a word. Ties a pretty bow to the top. A single word. A name and also a rejection of \emph{the} Name.
+
+Hebel was the name I gave myself out of despair. It is a name of self deprecation and a way of reminding myself that, lofty as my goals may be, they are all vanity. Mere breath. Meaningless in the end.
+
+Together, the names remind me that I am doing this for a reason. All of these resources, all of \emph{my} resources, those found objects and hand-me-downs accrued over the years, are being built up and strung together into a cohesive goal. A net. Less trap than source of safety. Something to catch. Something to rescue.
+
+They, the resources, are all nothing. The reasons are all nothing. Vapor. Mere breath.
+
+The whole plan is nothing except for the truth underlying it. Not to fear God, but to\ldots{}to something. To \emph{do} something. To \emph{be} something. To get the whole clade to see. My clade.
+
+No, my \emph{old} clade. I am not of the Ode any longer.
+
+I am Hebel Qoheleth now.
+
+Hebel Qoheleth.
+
+The old name is dead. I have followed it to the letter: I chose death as I must. As we all must.
+
+I am Hebel Qoheleth.

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/003.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,28 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+I loved this feeling. I loved the feeling of a project getting past the architecture state to that point where you could just start to use it. You'd been writing all of the interfaces and abstract classes and such for weeks and months (or decades, in my case). Then you'd started to fill in all of the inner workings, blocks of code filling out empty pairs of braces.
+
+And then, one day, you had enough that you could type in a command and see if it actually compiled, ran.
+
+And then you'd probably buckle down and start writing tests, start pulling together tasks and issues and such. No such luck for me. Old Qoheleth — I still get a grin every time I say that — gets to just keep writing until it's time to hit the big green button. There's no testing, there's no explaining if things go wrong. Just go.
+
+I was actually pretty excited about it.
+
+You get old, you know? And you can't die in this place. You can suicide, maybe, crash yourself and try to corrupt the merge, and I guess if I were to quit, there'd still be someone to merge with, but they'd be dealing with the same problems.
+
+No one ever really dies in the system. They just stop.
+
+And I'm sure one of those will happen to me at some point, and probably sooner rather than later, but until then, I'll just keep going more and more nuts. We all will. All of us old'uns, and then before long all the young'uns too. We gotta see. They all gotta see, but we gotta see, because we're the ones in a position to do something about it.
+
+I keep using `we', too, damnit. I'm not part of their damn clade anymore. I don't know which of them are or aren't, either, and I don't think they realize that yet.
+
+I just need to keep working on what I can. I kicked Node: {[}67e97446cdbe3a4a3cfd5ebd75b1260{]} out into the wild, so they'll probably get there before long. After that, we finish our little game and I get my moment as Qoheleth. I get to be the one to call the assembly together, the one to teach.
+
+And, since I know they'll get into these nodes, too, I have to add that, no, I don't bear a grudge. There's no ill will. This isn't a ``now I'll show them'' moment.
+
+I just need them \emph{invested}. I need them fighting, which is easy, and I need them interested, which is hard. I need them invested in the problem before I stand up and clear my throat, and then I might have the authority, in their eyes, to speak, to teach.
+
+I got them fighting by saying That Name, and I've got Dear interested. Lovely Dear.
+
+I just need them all invested.

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/004.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,16 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+Qoheleth is a patient man.
+
+I have time. Enough time, at least. I know that I am gone. My memory, split as it is across an archive and nearly thirty exos, is a millstone around my neck. It drags me down. It drowns me even in plentiful air. I can feel the way it crams up against every recess of my skull, demanding to be let out. The Name, the Ode, every act since uploading and so many that Michelle took — that \emph{I} took — before that. It drags me down. It nips at my heels. It fogs my vision.
+
+There are no metaphors that clearly show just how horrifying the inability to forget can be, and so I find myself reaching for every analogy that I can find.
+
+I am a lost cause, but much of the clade still has their faculties about them. I think so, at least. I hope so. So long as they act within the decade, we will be here. Any longer, and we will risk further degradation, further madness.
+
+It has been two weeks since I messaged Dear — lovely Dear — and although it had tried to contact me several times, and pinged countless more, I never responded. I did my part. I called them, got them fighting, got them interested, and I think I got them invested.
+
+That is all I need, is for them to be invested.
+
+Now, hopefully they will come.

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/005.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,14 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+Aha! Dear sent a sensorium message. A view of a crowd and it announcing that they would be leaving in five minutes. Surprising turnout, even. I had expected most of the clade, but here, it looks like I will be expecting the entire clade plus a few here and there — I can see Ioan next to Dear, there — in just a few minutes.
+
+A bit strange to not see Michelle herself there. Not only that, but to have not heard from her, either. On consideration, I am not too surprised that she will not be showing up — not happy, granted, but not surprised — but I am a bit miffed that I have yet to hear from her. Perhaps she struggles still.
+
+Will make a note to contact her down the line. While I suspect she may be perhaps the most broken of all of us, that is not to say that she is safe from this building problem as well, nor that she is necessarily safe simply by virtue of being the root instance. We know madness, do we not?
+
+I am going to shut down all the exits from this room so that there will be less incentive to wander away. Not that I have a whole lot left, mind. I had probably better increase the size, too, in order to fit everyone comfortably. How much room does each Odist need? How much space does one two-hundred twenty year old mind, copied 100 times over, occupy?
+
+Prefer too large over too small, perhaps. There is a joke to be made about ego here, and yet this meeting is too important for me to make it.
+
+This is going to be fun.

qoheleth/content/old/Qoheleth/006.tex

@@ -0,0 +1,46 @@
+\hypertarget{qoheleth-2305}{%
+\chapter*{Qoheleth — 2305}\label{qoheleth-2305}}
+
+I have them! I finally, really, truly have them!
+
+I do not know that I have them all hooked, not completely, but I did it. I set my mind in motion by will alone. I count those who are not hooked. Mostly first and second lines, mostly like me. How did they go so wrong, though? I am a first-line instance. Michelle's second fork, even, and I did not turn out so bad. Did I?
+
+Well, I turned out pretty messed up, but only because I suffered the same fate that they all will. Perhaps were already! Only I suffered it a little bit earlier. I started going bonkers from the sheer amount of stuff in my head. I started living too long, living my Methuselah life while still having my Michelle mind. Nothing was getting out of my head. Nothing \emph{could} get out of my head. An impossible poison.
+
+Oh, and I have such grand plans!
+
+Grand plans of organizing a petition among all the founders and old clades, with the Ode clade leading and me leading them in turn. A petition to the system engineers to hire some damn developers again and stop treating this like abandonware. Abandonware that gives them, what, a dumping ground for the poor and a small brain trust? Get some devs in there and give us the ability forget and the ability to die. Hell, maybe even the ability to reproduce, to breed. The word is even in my name — my old name — for chrissake.
+
+As I continue through my spiel, I can tell I am hooking the liberals. The later stanzas, most of all. Dear's sold completely, I can see it on its face. Can see it on Dear's other fox sib, on Praiseworthy. Dear's whole stanza.
+
+The conservatives are harder to read. The whole lot look blank and stern. Stoic. They just stand there, with their historians and their analyst — the flash of his stylus as he scribbles notes in shorthand keeps distracting me. I power through, though, because it was working.
+
+It is working because I am Qoheleth. I am the teacher. I am leading the assemblage. I am instructing them in the dangers they face, telling them what is going on in forceful, no-nonsense terms.
+
+It is working because I am Qoheleth. I am the gatherer, the assembler. It is working because I am the one who brought them together and gave them what they need to understand this. It is working because I am the leader.
+
+It is working.
+
+And then I fuck up. I know it as soon as I do it, too. I say something about the Name. I get too proud and start going into my whys. I should not have done that. It'd lose me the conservatives. They, more than others, guarded that dumb Name more jealously than all the rest.
+
+I try to keep going to cover up my mistake, but there is that damn analyst, pulling himself up onto my stage. \emph{My} stage. It takes only a moment before I figure out what is going to happen. Takes less than a moment. I know immediately, but by then it is too late.
+
+The damn analyst's hand slaps into my back, and there is a sudden, searing pain. A hot wire being drawn through my spine. The only noise I can manage is a sort of strangled laugh at my own foolishness.
+
+My insides start to crumble.
+
+Maybe I was Hebel after all. Vain, futile. Mere breath.
+
+\emph{Havél havalím 'amár kohélet havél havalím hakól hável.}
+
+Fuck. I was so close.
+
+I am glitching. Can see bits of myself spreading out.
+
+So close.
+
+Tunnel vision.
+
+Blackness.
+
+So close.