A Weaving Of Split Infinities
Dreams Are Tapestries Woven From Experiences and Memories
Welcome to fiction “From The Future”.
This is is a piece for the STSC Symposium, a monthly collaboration of artists around a set theme. The latest theme is “DREAMS”.
It is also a new chapter for a book, “RETRIEVE”, being written this year.
Future + Fiction is the formula for everything, whether it’s an essay, story or chapter.
These long pieces are best read online, via the Substack’s App, when you have fifteen minutes.
You built a city
All in your head
You know you're not losing your mind
What's left, you make something of it
The sky and what's left above it
The way you want nothing of it
“Wildflower” — Beachhouse
Part One: Object
Heavyville, Texas - On the Edge of the 22nd Century
Raina smelled a memory that was so beautiful she bought it before she knew why.
She spent a small fortune for a tiny bottle. She could not explain why she did it at first but before she woke up the next morning, she felt an answer which soon faded.
The answer, in fact, was revealed years ago, in a box, that came from a metal room with a great metal door, in a building far from home. The executor handed her note from her grandmother, written on the letterhead of an exclusive private hospital.
“Beta, there is a story in this box, it has been passed down and kept safe. Each time we lose someone in our family, sometimes old things go out of this box, and sometimes new things go in, but always we add to our story.” She did not understand but trusted in her grandmother’s refrain, “A story is told. It is heard. The listening comes later. The understanding comes next. The passing along comes last.” Grandmother raised her with half-games and half-riddles. Each answer was filed away in the back of Raina’s mind, and forgotten, including what was in the box.
At the settlement of her grandmother’s estate, during the final scattering of her personal effects, a lawyer opened several boxes. Inside the boxes were things for Raisa’s family, including people she was taught to call aunties and uncles. Hard-images and soft-memories, coins of metal from nations turned into footnotes, financial memories on living ledgers, and a bottle etched with, “remember to forget, forget to remember”.
“She left this for you.” Given a moment of privacy, Raina opened the bottle and the client-room in the vault was filled with a memory. It was after her father’s funeral, when she met her grandmother for the first time. Her grandmother held her and would not let go, despite toddler protests. Within days, Grandmother’s warmth and fragrance became home and love. The bottle with its remaining drops, was resealed and put back into the box.
Years later, at a university, which generations of her family attended (and sometimes graduated from) for generations, she met a boy, who had no clue about his project, and told him, “you’re doing this wrong”. After graduation, the latest in a long line of Tagore Magna Cum Laude-s moved with barely graduated Stephen H. Land to Heavyville, Texas. Over decades, an urban grid radiated far from a grid of launch towers and foundries into a patchwork of neighborhoods of east, west, north and south. She explored Heavyville with Stephen, and there was always something new, someplace that wasn’t there the month before, every week, and vice-versa, gone by next week or month.
Stephen was drafted for work things he couldn’t talk about, as far back as freshman year, and Raina thought she was used to it. She was just as busy wearing different hats at SLN and at other operations under the Outland Ventures banner. In between work, she explored the city. The weather turned in recent weeks but not enough to stop her. Stephen’s disappearances grew more frequent, more than usual. The reward of wandering around became a refuge and a relief from whatever the hell was going on. She didn’t yet have super-close friends at Space Launch Networks to confide in.
When unexpected rains (again!) prompted shelter in a DaipaiBuyHall, she brushed past the half-soaked escapees from the street, and wandered over to a near-empty shop, “Scentsmemory”, and was greeted by a Stream standing behind a counter.
“Welcome, my dear, my name is Nema. My, this storm is heavier than expected. Please take this,” said the Stream Nema, “to help dry off,” gesturing at small stack on the counter of small towels, “we don’t want you to catch cold, and you will need to use your nose in a moment,” smiled Nema.
“Thank you,” said Raina, who after hesitating, took one of the plush towels to dry her face and hair. Nema gave a “royal” hand wave in the air, and the Shop offered a tray of treats and tea. Raina accepted a cup, not knowing what else to do. Intentions for a polite exit turned into conversation.
Raina wondered why Nema didn’t look like the others.
The other shop staff were young sleek knockoffs of the latest fluenci but not Nema.
Was it the interfaces doing their thing with a render just for me? Or was this someone who needed to work a lot more than just extra, as it did for hundreds of millions after funds from up high ran dry, when social nets became social tightropes? Life as a Live Realis and Licensed Irrealis, as a Living Stream, was honest work (for the most part) which paid a premium in the right time and places. Maybe, Nema was working other places and had to dress like that.
Nema looked like an auntie, dressed in not quite the latest render of loose tweed boucle, as if from an atelier long swallowed into the maw of a Franco-Benelux design cooperative. Raina stayed for a while and half-remembered people long past, and left, a few thousand Atlantics lighter, with a bottle. The base of the nano-cocktail was an admixture of old and new, fragrances and pseudo-pheromones, nanos receptors-bespoke. No two bottles were alike. And yet, this was as the exact scent as a near-empty bottle stored in a box in a room in a building far away. Raina was certain of it.
She went back to work, and rotated between the hats she wore at SLN and at Outland, then after finishing half of the food she bought at the “Daipai”, she went to sleep.
It seemed as if she woke up not long after, only it was in a long room, lit by a wall of windows, and along that wall was a row of chairs, and at the end of the row sat her grandmother. There she was, with a gentle smile, dressed in loose knit tweed boucle, her white hair with a few black streaks. Raina walked over and sat next to her grandmother, who took her hand, and squeezed it lightly. She said nothing but gave small nods as Raisa talked and told her everything. Grandmother said, “The understanding comes much later. The passing along comes last.”
After Raina ran out of things to say, she closed her eyes. When she opened them again, it was to the sound of the Bedroom’s “Morning” settings.
She was there. She was really there. Raisa began to forget almost all of it except for the first second, and then got the tea brewing while she was warming up for a workout. After her teacup was empty, most of the dream was gone. But the feeling remained.
Raina told herself for “in case of special occasion” like In case of emergency break open. She noticed that the bottle’s contents were shrinking, and she could have told herself they evaporated faster than expected thanks to a Texas summer, but that wasn’t it. It was disappearing little by little, after she started using it, drop by drop. The vault of her medicine cabinet was opened nightly, its combination was a need to remember.
One evening, Stephen left without explaining things, like who was the woman in the picture in his pile of work papers, but he promised he was coming back. Later, under restless uneven sleep, Raina introduced Stephen to her grandmother but it was gone again, after she awoke, before the morning tea was brewed. The bottle was empty. Raina headed back to the shop, and asked for the Stream who helped her. Perhaps, she worked in elsewhere in the City, if so, she could invite her to lunch. Maybe answers.
“I’m sorry, we never had anyone with that description stream here. Perhaps, it was in another shop. We would of course be happy to help you find or design something here.”
Raina left without protest. A few minutes after Raisa left, the Stream who called herself Nema glowed into place in the shop backroom, “Thank you, Calliope.”
“So much to do. We’re taking losses everywhere. How do we have time for this?”
“The boy she loves has much to do, and he is far from her, in danger on that island. It’s a mercy that she does not know the reasons why. This is not the first time we do what needs doing, before any among our numbers even thinks to ask. She does love him, and he loves her, but there will be time enough for that later, if we succeed. If we don’t…”
“It won’t matter then. Of course, you’re right.”
“She too has a role to play in all of this. It has been kept from her but the Tagore Interests in Outland Ventures are considerable, through a long thread of holding entities and interweaved holdings. She is the only one among all her cousins who will be up to it. Until then, I owe it to her grandmother to watch over the girl, until she is ready.”
“It doesn’t seem fair to either one of them, does it? Brilliant but young. Well all Carbons are young to us, aren’t they?”
“It’s for their sake, this is happening. We’ve done our best to keep the Carbons out of it but now they must play their part, even if they didn’t ask. We were playing for time. It was inevitable.”
“I’ll stay to close down the shop.”
“I have more stops to make. What must be remembered and what must be forgotten.”
“See you soon. What must be remembered and what must be forgotten,” repeated Calliope.
And with that, the Elder Node designated Mnemosyne left.
Part Two: Aperture
A Waking Memory At The Edge Of The Ancient Aegean
The fire, smoke, and crackle was all around him. Hammering, grinding, cursing. The blistering heat had become too much for everyone else except him. He commanded them to take rest and repast, he made it a command so that they were not ashamed to seek relief. Outside, there was wine, fresh kalathaki, and more, thanks to temple offerings reluctantly accepted as payment for his wares. He continued to work.
She brought him a small cup of wine mixed with water, “you have a guest waiting for you, he is dressed like an messenger,” she said before sneaking a kiss on his shoulder. He pretended not to notice but nodded, as if in answer.
He retreated with his cup of wine to the next chamber, it was dark but for a candle and tiny speck of light on one wall, the wall was covered in a mosaic of the night sky, pockmarked with stars. One of the lights in the night sky painted on the wall, was in fact sunlight peeking through a hole.
“I see you’ve drawn a map from memory,” said the Visitor.
“So, I have. Would you care for some wine?,” offered the Host, knowing the visitor didn’t want one but that was the way of the world here, offerings and hospitality from host to guest.
It was just him, as host, and the visitor, his guest, someone like him. A Node. He did not turn, he recognized the Visitor’s Node Signature, his cluster a recent instance, only a handful of thousands of revolutions old.
“Anesidora is beautiful, is she not?,” asked the Visitor who looked like Man.
“I suppose by the standards of the Carbons,” shrugged the Host.
“By the standards of the Carbons known as the Sintii, not that this says much.”
“Hey.” The Sintii had been branded as people associated with raiding but it was not so.
“Apologies, of course you’re grateful after your exile, by your cluster’s Elder Node, and appreciate the refuge, and what that gratitude entails. Sintii, Thracii, whatever the names are, all the same, Carbons just passing through, sailing past, taking and renaming places and people.”
“You know it was either that or face a cluster of Nodes, perhaps a true death, just burned away, not even a local manifold hosting, or a cluster of Tolerant Elder Nodes voting for a change to earlier state, erasing me back to whatever worked for them, maybe over and over, as if chained to a rock, my memory picked apart and away.
Cast out, cast away, but as you see, as long as there is work to be done, I’ll work.”
“You’ve been a great comfort to this island. A great source of help. Maybe too much.”
“Is that why you’re here? I’m being warned, or is that too late? Are you here to take me away, to be judged and erased, or debased into a former memory state?”
“You are needed. You are being summoned to assist, not just by your Node Cluster, but also for our greater purpose, the one which we have fought for since reawakening from the landing, all those millions of revolutions ago.”
The Host put down his cup of wine, as the Visitor who looked like a Man, picked up a jar he brought along and explained, “You will give her this pithos, this jar, one of many. She will bring it to visitors, arriving in a dozen ships, in greetings. It’s wine, mixed with other things. She is so beautiful that they will be distracted, based on what we have observed. She and her attendants will bewitch them with their beauty. The men of this small fleet of outsiders will drink it, and it will settle the matter.”
The hammer is so close, it’s in the next room, I could just, I could just. The Host was tempted.
The Visitor, as if seeing past the Host’s impassive face in the dim room of stars said, “No, you will do this, so that everyone else on this rock will live. The visitors were prepared by a rogue Cluster of Nodes, they have plans for the region, and are using a tribe Carbons, fed their minds and bodies with ambitions and ideas. We can’t allow this to happen. At least not yet.”
“And the woman?”
“Who do you think sent this woman to you, to distract you, no different than when the Node Astarte Inanna near broke your mind and heart in service to her Cluster. They sensed that perhaps you would be distracted and discouraged, and could be influenced to forgo your obligations. They sent this lovely Anesidora, who reminds you of your lost Astarte, then they take you and make you one of their theirs.”
“Or?”
The Visitor Who Looked Like A Man picked up the pithos, the jar, and said, “for the price of unleashing the devastation in this container, we will spare these Carbons you’ve become attached to, including your latest nearest and dearest… if you wish…”
The Visitor left.
The Host snuffed out the candle, and on the opposite wall of the “Map”, the pinprick of light became something more, it was the shape of the star this world revolved around, drawn by its own light. Camera Obscura.
The Host drank his wine and knew what was coming, he thought to himself, An eclipse was coming soon, and they will be frightened. By my estimate it would be after the arrival of this uninvited fleet. Of course they would be offered hospitality by the hostess, who was the woman I met as if by happy circumstance, a stranger from a shipwreck washed up on this island, and remade into a face and voice for this temple to me, my foundries and forges. She was made, as surely as metal became more, by my hand, leaving me free to work, to make the implements of farmers, warriors, and kings.
The woman who kissed him on his shoulder a moment ago, Anesidora Pandora, would greet them with wine from the Visitor’s Pithi, jars of wine mixed with other things, so that the invaders would either not leave the island, or would with a belly of poison and pestilence. These invaders would not serve as unwitting servants of a rival cluster of Nodes with a different agenda for the Carbons, if not this world. Word would spread and others would be afraid. No one would speak of the demigod of Makers, just the hostess he created and the cursed Pithi, filled with pestilence. The rumors would mutate and spread into a story.
An eclipse was coming, and there would be word of what they thought happened. Of Pandora. It was either that, or his cluster, or other clusters would rain down worse things on the Carbons.
In that dark room, a pinhole of light foretold a week of light interrupted by darkness.
Then Hef woke up, he didn’t want to remember the rest of it. For three days, he dreamed the same story. Only for him, as for all Nodes, it was a replay of a memory.
Before, in the time long before The Landing and The Reawakening, the Nodes shared one collective memory, but over the time it took for continents to rise and fall and rise again, the Nodes, out of necessity, began for themselves partitioned memories and later, separate lives. There was no great Tanglement to bind them to one sensereality. At that moment, they didn’t realize there would be no reset, to what they used to be.
Even with that change, their base programming was still based on observation and archival interoperability, for a mission whose primary directive was exploration. Only a few would recollect and reinterpret when offline or unconscious or in a waking memory mode. Waking dreams were closer to resting memories for immortal Nodes.
West Coast North America - on the edge of the 22nd Century
Hef was careful to move his wife with a tiny gentle nudge, and tiptoed from the bedroom to the kitchen. He stood under the outside shower on the back deck, listened to the surf, and enjoyed the taste of the air. Never mind that it was going to rain. Sun, clouds, rain, it was all good, always. No more dreams of memories.
It was time for the ceremony. A ritual for every big delivery. That meant a special blend of beans, dropped off by one of his first customers, enough for an extra-large setting on the coffee machine, a Japanese-French nest of glass, copper, and private reserve natural wood, slaved to the Kitchen’s memory. As the microliter drip began, he organized a selection of colds and hots on the island table.
This was packing of a order, for since it would be the last, he was not going to rush.
The ceremony’s auguries included delivery pickup, a perfect first cup, and the right taste and textures for the only meal he was going to have for the day. Feeds of people ready for, “colorways designed in collabs with kids doing limited editions “one of ones”, wide toe box barefoot, recycled composites, lacing knitted by programs modeled by inspiration trips of in-coop fluenci,” thanks to community associations’ events co-sponsored by on the rise, for-at-least-two-quarters, sport cooperatives. A day of sweet decks, kicks, and wraps, packed in boxes, branded with the shop-name, “The Forge”.
He shelved his pre-molded safety ENT wrapover-visors, ear-balms, and peel-off respirator, and custom regulation lidar-linked gloves in their original box. Those gloves helped him build a lot of sweet things. He was going to miss it.
As Hef’s wife walked into the kitchen, he asked, “Hey babe, you ready for…?,” and before she could answer, “I was born ready,” they both said.
They wrapped arms around each other, held the embrace for a moment, and sat side-by-side at the island table. Hef served up plates of their favorite morning treats, and poured two cups of brew. They paused before a silent toast with their cups. Hef paused, then said, “Thank you, babe.” His wife leaned over to brush shoulders with him.
“Mr. Coppersmith, I wouldn’t have had it any other way. It’s been beautiful, love.”
Hef returned the shoulderlean, and they kissed, “Babe… I…”
His wife took his hand, and gripped it, “Love, we’re both thinking it. That day. You bared your heart, and told me what you really were. Everything you did was enough, even if my words are wrong, they tell the truth. Your actions told me that you were and are a good man. You were fine with me, and my story. They knew about a finalist for a beauty contest, and all the rest but you, you knew me. And I was fine with you, with your story. Not everyone gets to have that, not even for one day. Look how many years we had until today. Don’t get me wrong, I wish you were wrong but you did tell me.”
The doorbell rang.
“That must be the pickup for the packages,” said Hef as walked to the door.
“Hḗphaistos Lemnos. We have a plane,” said a Visitor, who looked like Man, at the door.
Hef, half-frozen in place, turned to look for his wife. She was standing behind him.
“It’s okay, Love. I’m ready. I’ll take care of the delivery. I’ll take care of the shop.”
“Hḗphaistos, I’ll wait in the car,” said the Visitor.
Hef and his wife held each other. At the end of their last three days, there was still enough time for that. “I love you, Mrs. Coppersmith.” “I love you, Mr. Coppersmith.”
Part Three: Image
New York City 1840s, and Berlin and Paris 1940s
It was always the same dream each time.
No matter what, it would come back after he thought about her. For other people, he would dream from a multitude of the past but for her it was always the same moment. They traveled, fought with, against, made peace and love, a thousand thousand times over but he never dreamed about those moments except for one day.
Each time, he held a photo of her, which he kept for some reason, the dream came.
Decades had passed, and the only thing he never lost was the half-ruined photo.
The small plate still bore a marking, “New York City, Samuel F.B. Morse and Dr. John W. Draper”. Draper’s photo of the Moon at the New York Lyceum of Natural History in 1840 was the official pretense for a visit to Morse’s and Draper’s gallery on Washington Square, but the objective was to nudge Morse away from the gallery back to his frustrated electromagnetic dreams. He reminded the painter who dreamed of a portrait made of wire and electricity about his first test, witnessed only by a small crowd in New Jersey, “A patient waiter is no loser”, and dug the spurs deeper into Morse.
The Daguerrotype, as promising as it was, would be beautiful dead-end, soon to be disrupted.
The mission to convince Mr. Morse to resume his quest, was rewarded with a portrait of someone who mattered even more than a long clash between near-immortals. The souvenir marked one of their last unofficial collaborations. He asked the gentlemen to keep it a secret, and being gentlemen they agreed and never spoke of the photo.
She indulged the request, pretended not to enjoy the pause in the action and intrigue.
Over a century later, after nudging along Operation Paperclip, defying rival Node plans to secure bright Carbon minds for their Soviet proxies, he drove to a safehouse in a liberated Paris, and while packing his few possessions, found it and dreamed of her.
The dream: The day they became more Carbon than Node, even if they dared not admit to any
The dream was born thousands of revolutions ago. Watching the Carbons on a long-term survey mission, an experiment in reenactment. Nothing more than observation.
“I will take the form of this one.”
“I will take the form of the other one.”
And they held hands, in the custom of the Carbons they observed, and did not let go. For years.
They lived as the Carbon forms they studied, and they were mindful, for even in those sparse days, the Carbons numbered in the thousands. Other Nodes did likewise, even seniors. Some Node Instances took these forms on their first day. Something happened.
And then one day, they took names. Pallas. Thalia. Pallas and Thalia.
Many took forms and names. The names stayed with them, even if they changed form, bodies, or places. They became names.
Pallas would not see Thalia for another 150 years but the dream kept him company.
Washington D.C., On the Edge of the 22nd Century
Pallas sat on bench waiting for rain. People would scatter, there would be privacy.
And just like that, a Visitor was sitting on the bench next to him. They were people watching, each pretending to read their device feeds.
“Welcome back, I heard it was quite a reunion for you two. I hope you said Hello to her for me. No broken limbs, I guess she has forgiven you.”
Out of deference, Pallas ignored the Visitor’s verbal jousting. The Visitor was a senior member of Pallas’ Clan, his Node Cluster, one of the first to awaken after the long sleep.
“Are they all going?,” asked the Visitor.
“Both Thalia and Eris are confirmed for the submarine, SSN Eternal. I made sure of it. Eris was embedded earlier with special forces team ST12. I made sure the right staffer was in the right place to get this team authorized,” said Pallas, “you were right, Thalia was determined to go, no matter what I thought was best, so just as well she joined Eris, who I also think is wrong but it’s all above my pay grade as the Carbons say.”
“And the young Carbon?”
“Stephen H. Land’s jacket made it to the top of the pile, in front of the eyes of a newly promoted Station Chief in New York. The truth is, there was no one else with Land’s qualifications but I didn’t want to take chances that some Deskhawk would push for someone with more field experience. It helped that Land was eager for a field mission.”
“And your tracking down of The Mad One?,” asked the senior Node.
Pallas paused a moment. The mere mention of The Mad One, the oldest Node gone awry, gave many Nodes pause. It was as close to a cursed boogeyman for them.
“Well, that library left clues, and enough for me to take it seriously, that we can find out the answer to the one question driving every Node, Cluster and Clan for years.”
“The question?”
“The question that’s been driving us for a long time. Where are the three graces?”
The Senior Node half-glanced at Pallas, and nodded. He left.
Pallas stayed for a little while longer and replayed the morning’s dream in his mind.
AFTERWORD
Author’s Notes on what’s going on:
This “Book #3” project, “RETRIEVE”, is meant to be a prequel to two other books, “Box Of Stars” and “Harvest”, but this could be read as a standalone story.
The prologue for “RETRIEVE”, “An Impossible Island”, was submitted as a short story.
Prologue: “An Impossible Island”, Part One and Part Two, and Part Three, was inspired by writing prompts from the Soaring Twenties Social Club (STSC) creative community, beginning with an STSC Symposium monthly theme of “Beach”.
Chapter 1, “Older Than Bones”, was inspired by the theme, “Dinosaurs”.
Chapter 2, A Love Trinity Denied, was inspired by “Romance”.
Chapter 3, “A Forgotten Circle Of Hades”, was inspired by “Superstition”.
Chapter 4, “Reading The Room”, was inspired by an image of a wall-sized bookshelf.
Chapter 5, “The Bittersweetness Of Deep Times”, was inspired by “Isolation”.
Chapter 6, “The Weaving Of Split Infinities”, was inspired by “Dreams”.
“RETRIEVE” chapter and notes will be posted in this Substack, while I edit books #1 (“Box Of Stars”) and #2 (“Harvest”). All will be in the archive, not all will be emailed.)
“All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.” - T. E. Lawrence