Forget the love of a billion stars as the wink upon the surface of a moons lake. Your blessing brings me my knees to buckle under the weight of the day.
Intoxicated light glimmering feathers upon my face
Soft, and flush, each a kiss from your body to mine
Reaching beyond each nerve to my soul and touching each part to heal it
Growing love, to melt into your body. Push gently, as a creeks first flowing in spring rain. Gulping then the streams supple blessing to my sounds forge.
The Mage
The mage is the card for transformations. Particularly transformations that require a bit of magic. You will need your talents to help you through your next tasks. Anything you are good at and possibly things you are still learning and need to get better at. The mage points at both the sky and the earth and is the connection between the two. Connecting the heavens and the earth is something that requires magic and talent to get the result you are after. You may need to transform yourself, or help someone else make the transformation they need. Be careful though, to much magic can lead you astray. You will note two animals join the mage, the crab and the swift. Both are animals that live on the boundaries of life. The crab lives in both the sea and the earth and the swift lives in the sky and the sea. Transferring between them easily. The mage has learnt how to transfer between these two boundaries easily as well, and you may need to as well. Exploring the mysteries of the places we can’t easily travel without the help of a guide. The crab and the swift both help the mage explore and you will likely find yourself your own guides to help you on your journey. Perhaps they will be kind and wise, perhaps they may be dangerous and scary. Either way, they will have much to teach you and help you on your jouney.
The Mage: Reversed
You have found yourself stuck in a place you do not like. You are unable to transform. You can’t find or do what you want. You need to find your path again. You may need help. Perhaps in a form you do not like. To start to transform yourself you may have to listen to advice you are not ready to hear. It is time to be gather what energy you have left and listen to the advice you haven’t been willing to listen to. It may not all be 100% true. It may not be what you want or like. But listen you must, and use it in your best way to transform yourself back to who you want to be. You can then finally start on your journey again, and be able to look back on this time as a place you have no need for anymore.
A sadness drip we inject
A slippery mess
Mouth full of soons
Popping eyes
Thrusting knives
Rose maze …. Blind
Twice
Twice
Twice
Dies
Dear reader,
Please note a hiatus will be present from the date of this post until possibly the new year, depending. I’m undergoing surgery, quite likely as this post is being posted on my blog (hello future!). It’s possible I’ll not be back of my number of posts for a while so I’m placing this post in case you don’t here from me and worry. I’m probably fine, just recovering.
Yours in art, poetry and singing,
Anne
Gathering
The dust and flames from fast recall
Smothering
All the thoughts and prayers you call
Blasting
Winds through canopy to embers fall
Leaving
Nothing untouched anymore
(Koala)
Nay the last few days had brought her better leaves than ever
Never had it seemed they where growing faster than she could eat
The big ones, with their big stomp feet had helped her find them
Stems, stalk and leaf, they crunched in her mouth, slowly to be digested in her nap
The big ones visited her and brought more leaves, so many she could not believe
How had they found them? It had been such a struggle, all her life
Now, it was like, forests of leaves just for her, it was nice
Silently, cameras capture her subtle beauty, come to visit her, call her cutie
The moon shone upon her enclosure as she was feeling her age
Darkly, the night continues to expose shadows across the leaves
She can’t eat as many, but they bring her more than what seems like whole trees
No more, the next night, they being no more, as she is now in the big eternal eucalyptus tree
And the moon continues to shine upon the darkness left behind
The Seven Moons Oracle is an oracle deck for storytelling and helping with writer’s block. It can also be used as a decision helping tool. If you don’t know what choice to take, the deck can help you revel the choice that is right for you. It might be used for prediction, that is true but that is not really my intention for the creation of this deck. The cards are also a part of my world-building for my modern fantasy universe, The Seven Moons of Aloom. Aloom is a gas giant that helpfully sits in the suns golden ratio zone. Its seven populated moons play host to an exceptionally diverse number of intelligent and non-intelligent species. There is also a magical force called Mai. Technology and those not blessed with the gift of being able to wield Mai, however, have been getting more complex.
Note for all the cards you can supplant the word “You” with “your character” or “your story”, etc., You, in this case, is just the easiest noun.
The Traveler
The Traveler is the card of beginnings. Every journey has a beginning. If this a journey you know has been coming, you are prepared, packed, ready to take any companions you need. You have your vehicle and you know which way the wind is taking you. If it is one you haven’t quite got ready for then it is probably time to prepare as you will be leaving soon and the wind favours those who are prepared. You need to make sure you are going the right way, the map is leading you to where you need to go, the hotel is booked, etc. Any time now you could be off on your new journey and you need to make sure you are ready.
Often this card in a lot of Oracle decks is called The Fool or The Beginner. However, you need not be a fool or a beginner to start a new journey. You can be an expert traveller or even just one who has done this before. Going on this journey may not be what you want, or need, but it is going to happen anyway and that doesn’t stop you from getting ready and trying your best to learn from the trip.
This doesn’t have to be an actual journey. Perhaps a new thing is coming into your life, a new friend or challenge, a new job or even a spiritual journey you are about to go on. Your journey can just be a new year or a new day. Every part of life is a journey.
The Traveler Reversed
This is not a journey you are prepared for. You are already on the road and you have forgotten some essentials. You you can see a storm on the horizon and you are scared. You need not be scared though. The traveller teaches us that we can keep on going no matter what happens and if we can find someone to help us, then all the better. Get your friends, family, whoever you can to help you. You will need them. Get your journey to take you to the shops and get some supplies. Anything to keep you going as your journey is not over and you need to find your bearings at keeping ongoing.
Eastwardly the raspberry bush grows
Anchored, down in the grass with twelve counters
Each day one disappears, taken on travels of mysterious places
I tie my shoelaces, and think of the races
Perfect metaphors for the capitalist people, watching it
The system hits them and as hard, clasping the crop in its hand
The raspberry bush grows nearby, sticking thorns into those taking coins
How many metaphors can you stand? I’m just here, watching the grass and hoping you can know.
They sit on the sidewalk waiting
A set of three green bikes
faintly I sleep on bus
Kicking life inside my tum
Rush, of the fight inside my mind
Is never quite satisfied by all the din
Lilies on my dreams growing like fire
Likes on rushing to play my lyre
Truss upon truss over the rumors
Kite flying higher, blooming consumers
Ring a ding, upon the quick sin
Campus body slopes and upon me
The more you change the more you stay the same
the song goes on and but the track changes
what is the story in your head
was it so wrong to be unfed?
I cannot see into the future anymore
its all just a blurr
I want to know did you lie or did you die or did you sigh?
at the sound of the gun
did we have fun
well thats it really
I want to know these things because I want to know its right
to have feelings like this, feelings like fright
why am I so scared
To say what I believe
To say my parers
To the lack of self confidence that I have held so long and deer
but it seems that tomorrow it will all be better again
at the going down of the sun
and then in the morning
I will remember what it was
to be who I am
to say what is right
in the morning I will fight
I will have the strength and courage to go on
Will the hart of sunrise bring me strength?
If It does not, I don’t care
I don’t give a flying spare
Its all raw
its all the last straw
and well thats it really
I can’t go on like this anymore…
anymore
like a song thats gorn old
like a wrong thats been done
three fold and three fold again taking back what was said cannot be done
its all in the past
its all why i break my fast
take it in your arms
cradle it well
let it grow and destroy you
or let it show and annoy you
take a step in the shoes of a poor man
the former self reborn, you find yourself starting back…
I feel more alive than ever
I am have been able to think again
My mind has come back and forth through the void
whispers tell truth
of all of our ages
it makes us feel like we have stages
this is my last day as a monkey
tomorrow I talk to the birds and the bees
but I will be a man and I will be free
I feel no longer lost or found in a hedge
Its a way to be hidden just resting in bed
being lazy and not knowing who you are
makes you wish apon falling stars
this is my last day as a monkey
how borders and territories
and feelings a mix upon them
this is a day that has more than what songs can bring
I cross a road and follow a path
they restrict us sometimes our own minds aside
try and understand the words and we feel like were absurd
knowledge written down for ages burns to the ground
we feel lost and found
big black stone on a hill
to store all that we can
and in it is life
as we understand
this is my last day as a monkey
citys will be built on this land and we must understand
that is is our land
it is not going to last
if we treat it bad we will fast
starve all the way
beyond our present days
and die we will in our hundreds
so listen to the land, be you monkey or man
because she will tell you all she knows
you have to look after her
and it is your duty
if you do not
folly will follow you
I feel more alive than ever
I am have been able to think again
My mind has come back and forth through the void
whispers tell truth
of all of our ages
it makes us feel like we have stages
this is my last day as a monkey
tomorrow I talk to the birds and the bees
but I will be a man and I will be free
I feel no longer lost or found in a hedge
Its a way to be hidden just resting in bed
being lazy and not knowing who you are
makes you wish apon falling stars
this is my last day as a monkey
how borders and territories
and feelings a mix upon them
this is a day that has more than what songs can bring
I cross a road and follow a path
they restrict us sometimes our own minds aside
try and understand the words and we feel like were absurd
knowledge written down for ages burns to the ground
we feel lost and found
big black stone on a hill
to store all that we can
and in it is life
as we understand
this is my last day as a monkey
Someone’s walking in a shadows footsteps
only looking to be seen
never knew the wishers
were the voices of the reeds
in the wind that flows so slow
down below the waters edge
is a man whose just lost
everything he couldn’t get.
Somethings eating the beginning
of the story thats so long
so it becomes a shadows footsteps
a simple thing to ignore
the voices of the long dead
become those of the newborn.
There is a creek
a simple stream
that flows down a hill
and standing their is
is a women who borne everything
and shes walking
she walking in the shadows footsteps
Intro:
Be sure to check out that roundabout
I’m sorry to ask but did you hear
News, come in and gossamer tears
The world has heated beyond our cope
I’m asking you, is their any hope?
Chorus:
Are we, bad guys?
The bad guys?
The ones on the TV?
Are we bad guys, bad guys?
We have blood on our hands, and knees
1.
We can’t beg her
Negative talking
Argue snorting (virtue signaling)
Grasp or forking
2.
I just can’t believe
She’s gone and we talked
And argued on TV (no one believes)
About how to get it done for cheep
3.
She gave and gave
And we spewed it all out
It’s now without doubt (dipped our snots in the trough)
That we are
End:
The bad guys
The bad guys, the ones on our own TV
We can’t fix it
Not with words
But only
Only
Action
Act
Act
Act
Accepting the truth
Only we can undo it
If we want
Her to allow us
To live
Live
Act
Only
(Repeat till fade: Live, Act, Only, Save)
How about a sip from my cup boy,
A simple little thing
You need not think that I am trying to real you in.
Its made from the peel of an orange and a little courage,
Not a thing you need worry about, I have no doubt
Drink it up, see its just like stout
Just a sip, thats all it takes, for the thing to have its grasp
You can’t give it a name, but it owns your soul
Give into its lure, line, hook, and in the cold
It will warm you up
Keep you high
then send you down to sigh
and start singing the simple line
How about a sip from my cup boy,
A simple little thing
You need not think that I am trying to real you in.
Sin upon sin
from within you mind
comes this desire for you to get higher
drink a little more from my cup
and you will know more about yourself than anyone could ever like
just a sip thats all it takes
will you break, will you shatter
against all the odds, will you not matter?
you try and fight it, but you soon find that another sip is all you need
you can’t deny it
just try it!
and your gone, never to be found, down into the ground
it in you now, and you can’t let it go
one thing alone can set you free, and I doubt you can pay the fee…
We wade out the way, to the ocean blue
I have been there way out on the ocean blue
Swimming I was, between these banners bright
Lost in the ocean, but to come back means we don’t
Sucking us down the rip in in the waves comes as suddenly
Grasping for air we see the lights
But then again we ask for a kiss
And then we are on the beach, and feeling dirty, unclean
Please note this is not meant to be a comprehensibly researched and proved economic treatise. It’s technically “fiction” but I suppose if you can find ways to show these ideas have merit, please do reference. Thanks. — Anne W.R.
Introduction:
An economic system that marries the laws of physics with economics.
Adam Smith directly applied the idea that every individual renders labour to society. As we know, this model starts with an assumption that can no longer be said to be entirely true. Especially since labour and society are both economic models of their own with complex relationships which can be modelled but not ever be perfected. With the needs and wants of society being finite, but the ability for provision of labor within that society and their for the benefit of product from labor must also be finite.
However if one was to imagine for a minute that these assumptions are wrong, what would one come up with? Marx and Engles would argue that our Labour is the only thing that any person is truly able to control and that a worker can control one’s output to the profit or detriment of a labour holder. This labour holder is then of course forced to use means to make sure that a worker continues to output at a profitable margin, using either social, psychological or physical methods to keep output at a rate that remains to ensure labour reaps a reward that the labour holder feels sufficient to continue. Such continued relationships have led to both the corporation and the labour union both of whom will continue to push against each other to get better outcomes for the regard of their interests and a inherent conflict in a capitalist system that lies between them.
Communism has its own view of capital and does get some things right. The labor holder that is collective, in the end, has to be the responsibility of the collective, or be placed on someone who acts on the behalf of the collective be it democratic or via consensus. However, it does not render the individual immune with the issues that may come from technology change.
As capital is gained, by any means, to any possession, technology will eventually improve. In both systems a more effective, efficient, progressive system or set of systems ultimately benefits a whole. The worker, however, they are employed, always will have a maximum output. Technology though, will have a maximum impact but new impact can greatly effect old systems. The land that one works will always have a maximum yield and that can decrease with time if it is not looked after correctly. Much like a worker has a maximum yield given current technology and processes will decrease if not looked after. Technology needs maintaining and if not improvement then other change may easily make it no longer useful.
These are, to many fundamental knowns. Improving the land or the work with technology gives a certain level of gain until again a point is reached that a worker, or the land, or technology itself is unable to be improved by any means.
We have seen this in a capitalist system tends to lead to greater monopolisation of a market, as technology allows both workers, supplier and individual consumer become within themselves products that are worth value to a corporation or collective whom then gains profit more easily by predicting consumer or collective behaviours. The corporation can through this process become more powerful than the government, if not synonymous with it.
In a communistic system, it tends to allow the system itself to gain greater autonomy, greater power over an individual worker until the system itself becomes so powerful it acts as if it was a capitalistic corporation. This is of course if, and only if, the communistic system belongs within a world were other systems exist. It cannot be a true communist system and hope to survive in trade against capitalistic predators. At least all current examples have shown as such if they were actually communist. A communistic system that is holistically encompassing the entire world is difficult to predict as no such example has ever existed. A lack of property and individuals, money and such have a strange, almost impossible dream within only existence in our fiction.
Both systems will reach a point, regardless, that is unable to grow. In a capitalistic system this can feed growth beyond the system if it can, or corruption if it is not, often both. Communistic systems do not need to grow continuously and thus may only seek growth as a means of greater technological improvement for all workers in such a system.
This is based on a simple premise, that is, even economics cannot breach a law so fundamental that nothing can do: the first and second laws of thermodynamics.
Any society wishing to reach beyond into the the steps of the Kardashev scale will need to begin to realise that the economics of workers and corporations, of cultures and systems all, reach a point that they are fundamentally energy users, storers or creators.
Part one:
Simple examples
The base 0 economic development would be any society, that has been only using any economic system were physical value is exchanged. That is both barter and capital monetary systems.
Of course, the value of either system helps create trade and commerce in them. They are not in any way inherently without value. This is to say they both exist in single and multiple world economic systems. Especially when commerce of one value system is hard to compare with another. However, the ability of one of the traders to take advantage of or affect the entire system if the other is very apparent. One can see this in any culture that has had colonization forces.
In neither, of these systems, however, is it possible to trade in a way that is placing value as a constant. It’s impossible to do so.
Base 1 economic system
In a Kardashev scale, a base 1 civilization must be one that has the ability to gather and store as near as to as close as possible too all the energy available on its planet or moon. Or be able to gather the equivalent amount of energy within all its environs.
It’s without a doubt that such a civilization would have to go beyond a monetary or barter system. Why?
Barter as it is, has the issue of the fundamental disagreement of value. Value is a issue that none will always agree upon, a bushel of wheat might be worth a chicken today but be worth two tomorrow. It may also be worth more to a starving person than it is to a person who has plenty. A tribe may attempt to control this economy but it will always have this issue.
Money as it is, representing a value of a thing at its heart, trying to be better at finding a common value among other things. A bushel of wheat is worth two copper coins, which can buy one Chicken. Again value changes over time, and the actual coin itself has a value that can also change over time. Then a market will have value in itself that changes over time.
This however, can lead to terrible economic policy. One does not have to look hard to find forests full of biodiversity being destroyed and replaced for a single crop as to the value of that crop is seen as greater, or more liquid, than the biodiversity of the forest. Yet no less than a few years later the land floods, as none of the trees are there to stop it. Or a disease spread through the crop-destroying it all. Or maybe the forest has an animal that could have been keeping an insect away. This insect now swarms in never seen before numbers. Killing all the crops and causing widespread famine.
The intrinsic value of the crop is not seen as valuable now? The money is no use in a world without the means to use it. Its value becomes worthless, and it should be noted that this money can’t really be real, if the path to create it caused more damage than its actual value. Yet the value is just placed on the item itself and not the path that is used to make the item or its continued Impact over time.
A base 1 economy goes to the next step beyond money. The idea of money isn’t intrinsically bad in a sense, but it fails to completely appreciate all the goals that money might be said to have. Not only does it become burdensome, it eventually gets to a point that the value of money no longer appears to have a basis in reality.
Money in effect, a base 1 economic system will find, is in fact a representative of energy. It must realize this to overcome the restrictions of money itself. In this system, there is no means of reducing the actual value of a unit. A unit is always going to be a unit. A joule is a joule.
This energy can be spent (a negative joule), or stored (a joule that eventually reduces over time depending on the efficiency of the storage system). There is, in theory, ways of still spending more joules than one is able to gain, but energy, unlike money, always gains negative interest. Entropy can not be beaten.
This makes two fundamental changes to any economic development. One, “energy money” becomes the representative of work done, and spending energy money is slightly better value than storing energy money. This encourages, in general, more spending of energy money than keeping it. It also reflects the reality of physics in that the system will regardless return to an absolute zero point. Of course, this is a very long way off, it does mean a economy only has limited growth opportunities within an enclosed system. Again representative of reality, continuing to attempt to work against the impossible unreality that ”continuous economic growth” represents and has inflicted upon the earth through the media of the homo sapiens.
Furthermore it can no longer be true that a area of production, such as land can be made more valuable to a area of buildings. Production should, always be, the primary source of economic growth after the generation of energy itself. As land food products are a way of creating greater level of energy than land that is consumed in building and becomes suburbia.
Equity will exist in a energy based economy, it can never be true that a area of productive land can be bought for any less than not just its current value but the potential value of the land over the next period of time, given average yields of the energy the crops would store and invigorate into the consuming market.
This Base 1 economic system looks different to a capitalist or communist system. Money, in the joule credit (JC) would exist. Always it would have to be tied to actually created energy. Be it from a effective efficient power source or from growing crops or other means.
The JC could then be used in the same way that a capitalist system may use it, except their would only the the concept of negative JC. Actually having negative JC wouldn’t entirely possible. Additionally any industry that doesn’t produce or store energy would have other means to make JC. Mainly if the industry improves upon the economy by improving health, education, or creatively inspiring, their is no reason that JC can’t be earned from these activities. Although actually not producing energy the JC would be credits, (Hence joule credit). The value of the product is transient but definitely improves the economy as a whole.
The economy could not “grow” in the same way. Energy can be stored and used, but the system cannot exist without loss. The overall loss of energy from any activity would be a value that could be used to help design a interest or in this case efficiency of system value. As each value credit (JC) is used it would loose a amount of value given on the efficiency of the transaction. Clearly some transactions are of higher efficiency than others. Effectively eventually a JC would have to loose value. This would drive any economic plan to greater energy effectiveness, and also discourage economic plans that destroyed the effectiveness of the whole system.
A primary example of a whole system effectiveness loss would be the destruction of land that comes from mining. The product that is mined needs to have a whole value life that is greater than the environmental impact and development impact that it would create. This sometimes is attempted in our capitalist system through environmental, and social impact statements but these often fail to fully comprehend the future potential impact and very rarely prove to be fully effective. Reclamation of land can be successful, but how much damage has that coal done to the world as a whole? Was it really worth a few more dollars for investors? Was it really worth the lives that cyclone took? It was boosted by the climate for change caused and some may say that coal company should have been accountable for that. Indeed they should. Each Joule of energy in this economy must be justified as effective and not cost more in future impact than its generation.
A base 2 economic system would take this even further. Now attempting to gather the entire energy system of a solar body it must now deal with energy systems greater than our current systems can even comprehend. Waste would be unthinkable. Everything must be designed to be reused as infinitely as possible.
A base 3 economic system would be attempting to gather the energy of a entire galaxy and thus be well beyond our current understanding of energy and economics.
I did sing to you, your dreams (long)
As the moon did shine upon us
Come hither, to the grove
Deep inside the big Forrest
I did sing to you, your dreams
I did sing to you, your dreams
You did sleep upon the leaves of autumn
And woke upon springs first rain
The fires of summer did come again!
And thats how we met,
In time again and times that pass
We meet again, and then we part
Four of us will meet again,
Four of us when sleep began
I did sing to you, your dreams
I did sing to you, your dreams
Well meet again and meet to part
Feet will take to the path
March upon the winters ground
And thats how we met,
In time again and times that pass
We meet again, and then we part
and then we part…
Cuddles are nice, and good for you too
Cuddles thrice, with food in your belly
feels and good as it could
I wish I could cuddle all my life
Cuddles make me feel,
all gooey and good
they change my mood
and hold me to you
Cuddles make me and you so happy
so lets have some cuddles tonight!
A rock face looks at the sunset beach
As I climb towards your love
Each place to hold my hands, to drop would be certain death
Breath, and hold me tight upon this country facing jade
My cave heart, it’s gentle beating heard from eagles to insects wings
I reach you, up upon this place we always meet and love
Gently as the other moons rise and deep into the night
Our love is beyond the reach of anyone with spite
(to the tune of Creep by Radiohead)
I can’t hear you breathing. I can’t hear my thoughts. I am close to panic. It’s all out of sorts. The poison on the water, and flames in the sky. A crane hanging dangerously, one day it will fly.
I can’t hear my heartbeat. I can’t hear your sigh. Square cogs in my engine. The hell of reality, the heaven of the night. A sunset of a civiliation, one day it will die.
It’s all a dream. A horrible nightmare. Tell me I’m going to wake soon. Tell me I’ve already died! It’s just to much to bear. This ignores all the facts. We aren’t the only ones here, but we will take them with us when we go. Go. Go. On.
Glory sprung from frosty life. I weep as flowers spring to life. Whispers flapping in my wings. Teeth of memory, racing the clock. Imagination tired of these methods, metaphors of effort.
Weekly capsule to the skyline
Astrology given bylines
Moon is silent, quiet peace
Robot friends, little beeps
Sea of tranquillity filling me with dark hope
”40” posted the hog, his snout elongated and sniffly
Nursing a cold like a new witch nurse’s a baby familiar
He looked at his accounting books from the milk crate factory
Beeswax slipped slowly down the morning milkshake
Shining yellow wattle light upon the poster on the wall
His old friend’s monkey and fox, and him, and the band they used to play in
Monkey had what? Gone to be a chef at that restaurant, in where? the London grotto?
Fox was Vixen now and made silk scarves and could she still forge the fakes?
Back to it, working, in the old accounting books, no cooking these he thought, taking a sip and trying not to sneeze
Clean now. Could the band still play? After all we were called
Crime’6 D0 Pa7
that was it! 60. The hog typed the answer into the log and decided to take a break.
He would give the old band a call, as soon as this cold passed.
Sniffling and wiping the last of the shake off his bristles, it was snowing again and time to go
Boiling hissing floating sickly
Made collision tongues simple
Them through flick enimies
Class sections airs become
For its all a war
Car park replication sit
unproductive upper filters eat
Thing Moment past farts
Waits potential apes died
Boiling made them class
Hissing collision through sections
Floating tongues flick airs
Sickly simple enemies become
For it’s all for war
Car unprotective thing waits
Park upper moment potential
Replication filters past apes
Sit eat farts died
Pricks of starlight frothing from the formidable sky. Grey clouds smothering the moonshine. Down warmth from the old fur knitting. It’s just soft enough to sleep soundly.
Blue sun rises on frosty plains. I wake and begin the day. Warmth coming and kissing the ground. Softly melting, and bringing a hope for spring.
Finally, beyond our baggage claim and into the brief halls of many whereabouts, there were only shops full of knick-knacks and thoughtless things such that one might find for waiting for people. Jumble’s of gears and wires made up the walls that seemed unending and all but an afterthought in the construction of this place. A place that seems, senselessly to only exist in these between places. These spots, that people wait in for other things to happen. Such as a name, or flight, or number to be called out. Yet that did not happen.
It seemed as I went on people who had been here longer had started to build things out of the bits that seemed to just pop into existence every day. More wire and gears and nails, pens, magazines and for some reason guitar picks. Each a new strange thing that had a purpose that has more permeability than the original. Not a transient, effervescent existence, but a real tangible thing that had more realness built in. These new things ranged in their complexity from simple to the very complex. Some were instruments, like a long pole made of melted wires strung with guitar picks that shook as you stamped it on the ground. Another was a made of gears, wires and bits of plastic and made an odd but not unpleasant series of noises. There was also a number of people who had taken bits of piping that always seemed to repair themselves and made them into all sorts of different blown instruments. Eventually, whole bands got together and one of the more popular ones would play at what everyone called Grand Intake Central. The sort of area where people came from the strange sterile machines that got them here.
Each person came off a vehicle, what they called them, as blank as clean wall. No one knew exactly where they came from or what this place was. Only to get their baggage from the carrousel that seemed to continue bringing new bags every time a vehicle arrived. Like regular clockwork, they came in every morning, and once everyone had got off them they seemed to shut the doors and there wouldn’t be a new one until the next morning. None had a memory of anything but that, and sometimes people seemed to know they were related by blood to another person who was already here. That was all they ever knew other than their name.
Everyone’s bags would have the same content in their size and always in black, red and blue. Five shirts, four pairs of pants, twelve pairs of socks, thirteen pairs of underpants, a wash at with toothbrush, toothpaste, a comb, a brush, a bag of disposable tampons and pads (regardless of their own gender identity or presentation), a small plastic cup and a towel which had a series of numbers on it. Each seemed to be randomly assigned to the person and no two were the same. It was almost as if someone had read what clothes a person could want but not actually really have any actual experience with travelling or being a person.
Each day food also appeared, cooked and processed in the cupboards and freezers that according to those I had asked had existed since they got here. Every person I asked didn’t know how they got here. The food cupboards and freezers would only ever seem to have just enough for the people present. If you tried to hoard or keep your food, it would almost as quickly rot and be useless. Thrown into the bins that seemed to automatically empty every day.
Eventually, people started to think about staying up, to see what happened at night. The seats that were around were not uncomfortable to sleep on but also seemed to stretch back to allow you to lie down and snooze. When the lights went out, only a slight blue glow remained. Those who had decided to stay awake tried hard to keep awake. Slowly though each one of us nodded off to sleep. I tried to run on the spot, hum, click, walk around the areas of the place we were in, but to no avail. Eventually, I fell asleep. I woke on the hard cold floor and everything had replenished just like it always did.
Boredom started to become a problem, and we seemed to need to come up with new ways to entertain each other. Walking, running around the complex only provided slight relief.
We started to theories of why we were here. Some decided that it was just the Will of the Bag Carousel and that we should not question such things. But like a itch, you can’t scratch it dug away at you.
Privacy was one of the things people started to crave. The lavatories seemed to provide some but not really enough to make you feel alone with your thoughts. There was no real outside to get to. The rooms just connected together in a large circle. A woman who called herself Port made a map. Soon it was clear we have only ever enough space for the people we had already and any more who came had a new room added onto the honeycomb of rooms. Grand Central Intake and the Carousel area took up two whole hexes. Then one he was the space you could walk through to reach the next hexagonal set with the two other closest hexes taken up by first eating and sleeping hexes. As you went each hex seemed to have one eating, two sleeping areas one area full of spare bits that we had either gathered or made or new ones appeared in. Then each would also have a smaller connection hex that allowed for you to pass to the next five hexes and its connector. The whole pattern seemed to repeat itself a number of times till it doubled back on itself leading to a vast open circle.
Port calculated that their whereabouts twenty more sets of people to be coming from the ships until no space would be left and the circle of hexagonal areas completely full. After such time if more came we would have either to hope whatever force kept us here would help us by giving us more food and space or find that it wasn’t a priority for them, and that we should starve.
Down on the dark soiled plains
Grassy plateau frosted with marshmallow flowers
An occasional Bittary tree, glowing under the deep full moons
The giant planet would rise soon
Blue, dark in places, white clouds streaming across is
It was a sight that never grew old
It would rise every Friday, not setting for a whole week
Are they even Friday’s here?
Scuttled under the Bittery tree, I would wait until sunrise to move again
The flock of red, cow like animals that I pretended to look after would sit nearby. Most of them heavily pregnant
Then at midnight, or whatever it was here… a noise
I woke from the daze like meditation I had entered to see a pack of cat like beasts in the long grass creeping up on the flock
I had to alarm, squeaking in a noise that would wake even the heaviest of the sleeping dead
Run
Run
Run
To escape
Pain. In the darkest places. Seeping, dripping, seeking, eating all it can.
Ice. Falling. Hail from the sky down to the frost covered ground. White, pure, but killing any hopes for spring.
Longing. I’m hearing you speak. Say words at a coffee table. Knowing that you will return to this moment. Knowing this is the moment I will remember in the weeks…
Ducks. Snow. Tamed memories.
Little things I remember.
Your presence. Essence. The place in the world your had.
Eclipse. Moonshine.
Water. The lake. Roaring waves. Iceland. Dark smiles.
Juxtaposition, and it’s still a hot coffee I’m drinking. Another morning. I’m here. I can still here you. It doesn’t feel fair. But since when was the goddess fair? She made both the grass and the snake hiding in it. Or just perhaps the precursors. The soup that makes our reality. The memorial service.
The ducks. The lake. The Lacertae.
Screamed hot pain
Boiler seas
Higher nose
Inbleem
The cycrone
Has spoken
Lies
Rip, rip the water apart
Wind screams of a ancient past
Knives of hail, knives in your hearts
Cycrone came for our heart
Bones stuck out at odd angles, dripping from the fresh rainfall. Each marking dead ancestors of the Tile clan. Everyone that had died, once they had become a clan member. Everyone celebrated here, therefore, had passed this test. Each bone tattooed with the name and life dates of their clan reign.
This did not reassure Jubér. They had yet to pass the test. This meant they belonged to their birth clan still. This meant if they reached puberty they would have their gender chosen for them, would have their tribe role chosen for them. Two things they did not want.
The first thing any clan member got to choose was gender, then role, and a proper Troll name. Jubér would, if they passed the Tile test get a Tile name. They knew what role, name and gender they would choose.
The dark entryway to the Tile tribe test was covered in grey slime. It was from the Troll leather that baked in the sunshine and then washed in the tropical rains. It was old. Warn. It was still strong though. Made from Trolls past who had the glory of becoming a Tile leatherback. Slime dropped from it as Troll skin was full of minerals. Even after death, they kept seeping out for years, even centuries after.
Trolls are natural herbivores, but ate dirt and rock as well. They needed minerals to have strong bones and skin. For in ages past, Trolls and their moonkin, the Orcs shared blows. Orcs natural carnivores saw Trolls as almost prey until the Trolls had fought strong enough back. Ever since they shared their moon, an uneasy peace kept.
Juber walked on as Tile clansman had to be brave, their only protection skin, their only weapon a small knife which they held in their left hand. It was carved from his grandmothers left thigh bone. Her life’s years carved on the handle. Jubér wondered what the Misfit clan test was. Grandma had belonged to that clan. She had done so to gain the ability to choose to be female. To choose to be a Misfit, and a warrior-woman spy.
Jubér was choosing a different clan. For a different reason. Tile clan was the clan for creators. Artisans, Musicians, Storytellers. Trolls took this job just as seriously just as they did any other. Anyone who wanted to be a Tile has to be brave, strong of spirit and true of heart.
A leatherbound manifesto was on the door of the next corridor. The dark and the slime were all that seemed to curse this corridor except for the small sheet of paper.
On it was the first test. It would say something.
It was one word.
make
This was not unexpected. Jubér had to make something that would let them get past the test. They noticed that the ground was no longer soil. Ancheint Troll tooths. So many that they where like tiles. Tile Clan. Jubér looked, staring in the dark for the one that wasn’t from a troll. Their. That one. A goldhound throat pouch. Then nearby a dogfish bone, and then a bit further back a bit of the leather was loose. It was dogfish leather. Probably from the same dogfish.
Jubér got to work.
The path beyond was darker than previous, it was beyond even their sight to be able to see it. It was clear that the task was to make a useful tool. In this case a torch. Binding the leather to the pouch and bone and making them into a torch. The goldhound pouch would light up when it was shaken. The night hunting insectivores loved to attract and eat every sort of insect that they could. Barking and yipping happily as they did. Most trolls had goldhound pets to chase the insects away from crops and protect their abodes.
A few shakes and it started to glow. Within seconds the path beyond was clear. More tiles and leather covered the wall. With each step now literally on their clanmates, it was hard not to feel like they were watching.
Then a door. A big black door. Made of Stonewood. Harder than iron, twice as heavy. This door was made to last anyone trying to just knock it down. Stonewood grew slow though. The tree that made this door must be older than the clan itself.
Barely carved, just a single handle and lock. Jüber tried the handle. As most would predict, the Stonewood door was unopenable. There would be a key, or perhaps they needed to make one.
Looking around, there was no key hidden, but then Jüber noticed the tiles on the floor were different slightly. One just had the letter O on it. Then another with the letter G and finally one with the letter H. Hog. Jübee knew this was a puzzle now.
In a few seconds they realized it was a bad pun. And poked the dogfish bone into the hole. A click sounded from the door and it slid easily to the side.
”Dogfish key, key fish dog, hog fide key. Puzzle pinning. I like it.” Jüber knew that there would be one last thing they had to do.
The dark spaces got tighter. The teeth tiles, sharper. Blood now seeped a bit from their feet. There were leatherback coats from the first hundred years of Tile clan trolls. Then bones. Full skellingtons from those who had dedicated their wholeness to the clan. This each had their name and what they had done to warrant such great glory.
Finally the last test. A somewhat morbid piano made of bone and hardwood. The keys of which had the letters ”Play”. Inscribed upon them. Jüber bet that the strings inside were made from Troll intestines. What to play? Anything? No. The Tile Clan song. The song that every Tile Clan member must know.
With a minute of key playing, the piano opened. There was a bit of paper and a dogfish bone pen with ink already on it. The paper had:
Name:
Chosen gender:
Tile clan path: leatherback, stone mason, bone poet, musician, creator
Jüber filled them in, and left the paper on the piano. Knowing the way back was to go the way they came in. It should be very interesting, being who I am for the rest of my life.
