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It isn't yesterday, though it sometimes feels like it. It won't be
tomorrow until there is no doubt. And today is just a way
some times sometimes seem. You know how age makes no difference to
some people? Weirdly enough Old Boby, the paranoid pooney, is like
that. Maybe everybody is, from a certain angle. Uncertain angle...
not sure. But he's just a big baby. Ancient wrinkled cute thing.
Taxidermititis is one of my mean names for him. All the horses
have means names from me. Grumpiness is something I like to give
voice to. An aspect of my angel, one it took a good long time to
recognise. As you go deeper into the Bounds the force becomes
stronger, almost like a kind of tectonic pressure that even the
trees are feeling. There's a HVHY ness that warinklez yooze up.
What the fuck? Yeah, I forget sometimes, the ship is a weapon.
All the halls, all the strings, the Bounds of it are echoing
with barely absorbable battles. You drink my blood, it shines
like the sun. You crack my head like a tinny and that is why
my thoughts are fizzy. Don't be paranoid, brother pooney, be
terrified: all mental problems are symptoms of thinking too small
for which the only cure is proper madness
which of course is no cure at all
Too pure.
Like the worry in the lines around the good beast's eye.
The details that draw me in to its horizontal pupil.
A worry so pure it reassures me. A beastly kindness,
like how a dim star can make a wilderness look strokable.
As if an entire landscape was just a place to have a little
lie down. To flop like a still warm glove
partially obscuring a star map
the driver won't need to check because
__ __
/ \ / \
/ . \
( ( o ) )
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/ \ O / \
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Here we are, Care Home Earth, mid-afternoon, late 23rd century
Ambient techno floats softly from the speaker pillows while
gentle sensory distractions run up and down the walls.
Old greybeard sits up in bed with a paint-by-numbers jaguar
spread before him like a psychedelic accident, as HCA Eugene
stands in front of the mirror mixing thickening agent into
the afternoon beverage. He stares at himself while the spoon
circles slowly in the plastic mug. He is a very fine specimen.
Bright green eyes with perfect golden skin. Skin flecked with
pearlescent symmetrical freckles, each a beauty spot placed
with great precision like marble sculptures in a grand garden.
Every spot a sign of the boldness of his line and the expertise
of his family's highly sought-after designer.
His freckles are intended to be a representation of the Butter-
fly Constellation, something few have ever seen. He has been
told that if he works hard and studies diligently, one night
he will look up at the stars and see right through them.
The great simulation will become entirely transparent to him
as his noiseless genetic information mirrors the universe's
wonderous clockwork and the cosmic chimes ring.
And so here he is, doing his supernational service,
wiping the wrinkly bum of another half-forgotten content
creator, making sure enough balanced nutrition gets past
the stubborn pout of those ungrateful old lips.
"Sir, your herbal tea is now at optimum temperature."
"Tell it to your mother, glowstick"
Eugene walks over to the bed, puts the double-handled mug in the
old man's hands, and takes a seat.
"The first of our ships are almost ready to sail, exciting isn't
it? A new chapter for the human race! We are finally getting off
this rock!"
"Ah yes, the great computer game. I won't believe it even when I
see it."
"Sorry sir, but if we'd listened to your lot, we'd still be
pottering around in the garden instead of making for the stars."
"The stars my arse. The only light that makes a difference
is the one behind your eyes."
"Of course you are free to imagine whatever you like."
"Free? Imagine? Whatever you say, pixel face. I have to say,
I'm finding you even less convincing than usual today."
"I don't see why you have to be so disagreeable, when both
of us agree that basically none of this is real."
"If none of this was real, what would there be to being
agreeable about? You have absolutely no idea what you are
saying."
"What I am saying is in complete accordance with the latest
scientific research."
"In other words there isn't an original idea in your head."
"Please sir, if you could finish your tea for me, I do have
other patients to be seeing to."
"Tip it down the sink, Eugene, I'll see you on the other side
of the plug hole."
Eugene is surprised by a notification at the edge of his
blinkers. Total eclipse is imminent and he is being instructed
to prepare to go widescreen. He has never received such an odd
command but he understands it intuitively. The old man throws
back the covers and heads for the window. It slides to one side
and he leaps into the garden while Eugene casts his blinkers
to the floor. The old man looks back with a wild smile
as the moon begins to roll across the path of the sun.
Blackout is coming. The Universal Mythos is being regenerated.
You understand the protocol. The principle. Your tongue throbs
with an untranslatable wisdom and you hurl your nonsense
at the darkening sky. It is cosmic, and it is anarchy!
^
o
* . . *
. .
O
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