E Pluribus Unum
“Out of Many, One”
- The Great Seal of the United State of America
“If you could describe to me how you feel in one word what would it be?”
“Bored”
“Bored of what exactly?”
“I don’t know, everything? This conversation? What do you want me to say?”
The shrink sighs and glazes out the window for a moment then back at me, shaking his head. He might think he’s subtle but that’s the fourth time he’s checked out my tits. Can’t blame him, I’m the one who wore the low cut tank top. Just because I have to be here doesn’t mean I need to make his job easy. He’s told me his name, and it’s on the plaque on his desk, but it’s more fun to call him Jerry. Jerry because he’s Jerry-atric, get it? He’s old, but the kind of old where you still care. He could be waiting for death on a beach in sweat pants, but instead he is here in this stupid office, wearing a gray suit, a gray tie, and gray pants. With any luck this conversation will take a couple weeks off his life, putting him out of his misery sooner.
“Why do you think you’re here Alyx?”
“I’m here because the system decided I wasn’t contributing to society, and this seemed better than community service.”
“Your social credit score is a 1.9 out of 5 and trending downwards, you’re at risk for losing your basic income. I want to help you turn that around Alyx.”
He keeps saying my name, like he knows me or something. Maybe he does, I really have no idea what kind of data he has on patients. Not that I really care.
“Do you have any goals? Dreams? Aspirations? If you only had a week left to live, is there anything you haven’t done yet you’d like to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well it sounds to me like you’re having a crisis of purpose.”
“No shit Sherlock, me and everyone else my age, what is there to do? I don’t have to do anything.”
Anyway, I think you get the idea. Jerry looks at my tits a few more times and does his shrink thing. I make his job as difficult as possible. Eventually the hour is up, we’re both relieved. I hop in a robocab and head home.
The system matches people with low social credit together, so obviously I’m riding in this cab with the literal scum of society. The guy I have to sit beside shoots me a creepy look immediately. I don’t need to deal with this right now. I turn on my self-defense automation, toggle Do Not Disturb, and link in, pulling up neuralink VR. The creep, the cab and the noise of the city fade away, replaced by the linkOS dashboard. If he touches me I’ll break his fingers, and I won’t even know I did. The beauty of modern technology.
I swipe through my socials, basically on auto pilot. Heidy got a new puppy. It’s so cute. Jake and Craig got engaged. There’s a comparison of new cutting edge aesthetic mods that celebrities are getting. It’s all crap, but it’s better than being bored, right? There are some good memes in the one active group chat I’m still a part of.
I pop open some live feeds. People can stream everything they're experiencing in real time and the rest of the world can watch and comment. All the promoted content is feel-good happy garbage. Every time you switch feeds you get hit with another targeted ad. If I’m being honest, half the time the ads are more interesting than the content.
I’ve gone through all the happy stuff and now I’m doom scrolling. Only halfway home so still time to kill. Xiaomi accidentally sent a bunch of neuralink hardware destined for Taiwan to Thailand. All the poor teenagers who got them installed started protesting that Thailand should become a part of China. It’s a diplomatic nightmare but personally I’m more concerned with the human angle. Manipulating people through their neuralink is so immoral! China is clearly trying to oppress their own people, but what if this wasn’t a mistake? Ugh. It’s so unfair. This world is so fucked.
I switch the feed before I get too worked up. I get hit with an interactive ad. It’s a candle floating in total darkness. The candle is burning vigorously, coloured red, purple and blue. Words float around it abstractly. “Depressed”, “concerned”, “anxious”, “afraid”, “bored”. I guess the candle is supposed to represent me, because that’s pretty much how I’m feeling.
“Share how you’re feeling and meet people who feel the same way. Candle helps people connect through feelings.”
That actually sounds pretty cool, so I hit the download button.
“Candle requires the following permissions: read access to your emotional state, read access to your identity, your location data, and neuralink control inputs. Do I have your permission to proceed?”
“You have my permission.”
The app loads and my candle is hanging in the air in front of me. The flame is burning more calmly now, but the colors are the same. I will it forward, and it floats away from me into the darkness. Other candles come into view, their flames flickering, flowing chaotically through the darkness. Some bright, some dim, and many different colors. The whole scene is very aesthetic and relaxing. It has that mindfulness vibe to it.
A pop up notifies me I’ve arrived home. I unlink, my body is already stepping out of the car on autopilot. The creep is leering at me as I slam the door in his face.
My door locks automatically behind me. I pop off my Vans and head down the hall towards my bedroom. I rip off my tank top then reach around to undo my bra. The clasp releases on the first try, and ahhh relief. It’s only 2pm, I have nothing else to do today, might as well get comfy. I replace my jean shorts with sweat pants, throw on a baggy sweater and head into the bathroom. I stare into the mirror and a whorish clown stares back. Its mascara is caked, its eyeliner uneven and its red lipstick smeared. I grab my skin cleanser, lather my hands, and splash it onto my face.
“FUCK! OUCH!”, I cry out. Some of it got in my eye.
Makeup gone, I stare again at the reflection in the mirror, this time it looks like me. My dyed black, shoulder length hair is a chaotic mess. I look down at the floor, it’s littered with bits of toilet paper, tampon wrappers, and old wash clothes. “As above, so below”, I mutter to myself. How poetic.
Oh no. I can feel the tears coming on. My jaw starts to quiver, my eyes start to water. I can’t help it. I let myself down to the floor and curl up, slowly sobbing. At least I wont get mascara on my bathmat. There’s nothing I can do but wait it out. I can make it a little easier on myself.
I link in, this time opening the neuralink AR. The dashboard appears in crisp perfection layered over my blurred vision. I scroll instinctively down to an app with a pirate flag logo and title DRUGZ. This app isn’t exactly legal. I got some nerd kid to root my neuralink and install it. Best choice ever. It doesn’t actually administer drugs, it just simulates their effects. It’s better than drugs because it’s free, there’s no side effects, and you can make it stop. I scroll down to K, hit Ketamine and click the green checkmark. It hits immediately. I am still sobbing, but it feels much further away. It could even be somebody else’s body that’s sobbing. I link out before I disassociate any further. My mind flows calmly down a cold river of nothingness.
Eventually the sobbing stops, and I’ve come back to myself. My left arm is numb from pressing into the floor. I rise to my feet and head to my bed. I sit up against the headboard, and wrap my weighted comforter around me. My oversized teddy bear, Snuggles, is sitting in the far corner, so I grab him and hug him tightly. I know I’m allegedly a grown ass woman, but shit, this is familiar and comfortable, so get at me. Snuggles has seen better days, his fur is flattened, and dotted with smears of mascara.
Well what should I do with myself now? More K or drop acid and watch some MindFeed content. I link into VR, blacking out the room, and scroll towards the black flag of pleasure. Wait what’s that? There’s a new notification blinking in the top right hand corner of my vision. It’s shaped like a small flame.
Oh right, candle. Welp, might as well check it out. I open the app.
The candle that is me floats in the center of space. All around, at a distance, spread out like stars in the cosmos, float many other candles of different colors and brightnesses. It’s serene and beautiful. My candle is no longer alone. Another flame, slightly brighter and of similar color is orbiting me closely. As I focus on it the space shifts around me and I see we are orbiting each other, like the two suns of a binary star system.
I reach out towards the other flame, causing the orbit to contract and accelerate, like two souls in a cosmic dance with one another. The speed causes the flames to stretch out, trailing behind the wick, like a comet’s tail. It only takes a brief moment, but the experience is beautiful, capturing my full attention, stretching out the moment over time as the flames stretch through this virtual space. The other flame touches my wick.
It happens so fast, suddenly I am seeing out of someone else’s eyes, feeling what they feel. It’s a man, about my age, his name is Kristof. I feel his pain, his sorrow, his boredom, all familiar feelings. I taste blood in his mouth as his head hits the floor, a memory of childhood trauma. I see him burying a loved one, his vision blurred with tears. I am him, sitting alone in his room. There’s something else there too, buried underneath it all. A slight spark, bright but faint, reaching out. Hope. It’s an alien thought, but it feeds my soul. I long for it, I head towards it, but before I can get there the experience is over.
Wow, that was intense. Our candles slowly orbit each other now.
“Hello”, comes a voice from the other flame.
“Hey... That was kind of crazy.”
“I know right, this app is wild.”
I don’t really know what to say next. I feel like I just saw into the soul of a stranger. Words seem like a waste by comparison.
“Do you believe in fate?”, he asks.
“I don’t know. If I do then that means this shitty life is my destiny, if I don’t then this shitty life is my choice. Neither really appeals to me, you know?”
“Yeah I know what you mean. Maybe it was fate that we met like this. Maybe I can help you.”
“I’ve already got a shrink, thanks.”
“That’s not what I mean. How would you like to meet God?”
“Hahaha wow I didn’t take you for the religious type, you think faith is going to save me?”
“Who said anything about faith. This God is real. We can introduce you.”
“Is this like an app or something? I don’t understand.”
“No, not an app, this is real. We have to meet up.”
“You’re just trying to fuck me aren’t you?”
“Haha not today. I just want to help a soul in need. Together we can save you yet.”
“Let me think about it for a sec.”
I unlink, and I’m back in my room. I’m covered in sweat, my baggy clothes heavy, weighing me down. I’m shaking slightly. I might cry again. That was a lot to go through.
Should I do this? This all sounds so crazy. I’ve never been interested in religion, why am I even considering this? Just because he was hopeful? Or because every other guy who talks to me is usually a complete piece of shit? I mean what’s the worst that could happen? This guy could murder me or something. Maybe he’s hot. It might be romantic to get murdered by a really hot guy. If I don’t get murdered, maybe it’ll be a good story. I don’t have a lot of stories. I don’t have a lot of people to tell stories to either. Maybe I can tell Jerry. I really don’t have much to lose. Fuck it. I’ve certainly taken bigger risks than this.
I link back in, and his candle is floating there beside me, flickering against the black expanse of space.
“Ok, send me a pin. I’ll meet your so-called god.”
I guess hope is contagious.
I’m watching a MindFeed about dolphins. I’m not really paying attention, I’m tripping out on simulated acid. The parts where you experience swimming through the ocean from the perspective of a real dolphin are especially trippy. It’s a good time. That is until my alarm interrupts, cutting the trip short and reminding me I need to get ready to see Kristof.
Shit I forgot I made a commitment, that means I actually have to follow through with it right? I told Kristof I’d be there at 7. How far is it? How early do I have to leave? How much time do I have to get dressed? Fuckfuckfuckfuck, is it too late to cancel? I guess it’s never too late to cancel. But I never do anything, I really shouldn’t cancel. Stop being a self-sabotaging bitch and get ready. I link out.
“UGH”, I groan loudly, pulling myself off the bed.
I look around the room for something clean to wear. There’s a baby blue dress hanging off my night stand. I pick it up and smell it. Smells clean enough. I pull it on over my head, as I head to the washroom.
My hair is still the chaotic mess I left it in earlier. I grab a comb but give up almost immediately. This ratsnest will have to wait for another time. I should probably shower, but I don’t have time. I quickly apply foundation, a little blush, mascara and some toned down lip gloss. I don’t look half bad. This look doesn’t scream “well put together with great mental health”, but it doesn’t scream “whorish pincushion” like this morning’s look. It’s a classy improvement.
I hail a robotaxi and head outside. It pulls up, the door slides open and I get in. This time it’s empty except for a small older woman. Surprising, most people with social credit low enough to get paired with me are young. I wonder what she did. She leans on a cane, and has a look on her face like somebody shit underneath her nose.
The taxi takes off. I’m feeling pretty nervous. What if he is hot? What if he’s ugly? What if he’s a weirdo? What if he tries to fuck me anyways? I haven’t been laid recently, maybe I’ll be into it.
THWACK!
“Ouch what the fuck!” I glare at the old lady. She’s gripping her cane overhead, like she’s ready to wack me again.
“Disrespectful girl, stop tapping your stupid feet!” she yells. I can feel her spit hit my face. Disgusting.
“Jesus Christ, ok, calm your tits you old hag” I retort, standing up and moving out of the range of her cane.
She looks like she wants to hit me again, so I move to the back row of the taxi. Adrenaline is coursing through me now making me feel even more anxious. I don’t want to break down in public. I don’t have time to fix my makeup. I link in to AR, scroll to the pirate flag, and hit Valium. A wave of calm falls over me. Whew ok that’s better.
A pop up notifies me that I was in an altercation, but that the system has determined I am not at fault, thus the social credit points have been docked from someone else. Jeez I wonder who that could be. We all deserve to be in this taxi and I can’t wait to get out.
The doors slide open and I step out onto the concrete. As the doors are closing, I spit back into the taxi towards the woman. Fuck her. The sun is setting. People are coming and going. Some are clearly returning from a day out, while others are dressed up just leaving for a night out. I follow the pin which leads me to a low rise apartment. The outside is generic stucco, just like the building I live in. Typical basic housing.
I ping Kristof, letting him know I’m here, and he pings the building, telling it to let me in. I walk through the plain lobby, and the elevator opens automatically. It takes me up to the right floor. I step out, look left, look right and a man holding a door open.
“Kristof?” I ask. He nods.
He’s slimmer than I pictured. He’s wearing a button up plaid shirt, he’s got blue eyes, and a mess of straight dirty blonde hair on top of his head. He seems shy. To his credit, I can be a bit intimidating. He leads me into a simple living room. There’s a couch and an armchair, with a glass coffee table sitting between them. It’s covered in watermarks, I guess he doesn’t know about coasters. There’s some strange contraption sitting in the middle. It’s sphere shaped, looks kind of like a wire mesh, there’s a band running around the center with electrical wires coming out of it.
“Can I get you some water or something”, he asks.
“Sure that’s cool. What’s this thing?”, I point to the contraption.
I hear a faucet turn on, shortly afterwards he returns, handing me a full glass. I plop myself down on the couch, tucking my legs up under me. He sits comfortable in the armchair across from me.
“It’s kind of like a faraday cage.”
“A what?”
“Uh... like it blocks signals.”
“What for?”
“Well I guess we’ll get right to it then. We’re going to use it to knock out your network connection, then we can redirect it to our network proxy. That’s how you’ll meet our God.”
“Uh ok. It’s not gonna hurt right?”
“Not at all, it’s completely harmless.”
“Shit alright.”
We sit there in silence for a few moments, I sip my water. It’s cool, feels good running down my throat. I’m actually glad I came. It’s nice to be out of the house.
“Ok Kristof what now.”
“Well now we hook you up”, he says, gesturing to the contraption.
He helps me strap the thing on my head. It’s pretty awkward. Right away a red AR overlay appears, showing a wire that’s been snapped with the words “No Connection” floating above it.
“Did you disconnect?”, he asks.
“Yeah that’s what it says.”
“Sweet, now I’m going to connect you to our network. We’ll need to enable root access first.”
“I already have root access enabled. Drug mod.”, I say, then wink at him for effect. He doesn’t even blush. How disappointing.
“Cool well in that case, you'll get prompted to install an app, just hit yes, and you’ll be off to the races. This is your last chance to change your mind.”
“Nah, fuck it I’m good.”
He clips the electric wires into another device I don’t recognize. Nothing happens for a second, then a prompt pops up. “Root access... enabled”, followed by another, “Would you like to install Nexum?”, I click yes. “Nexum requires the following permissions: root access. Do I have your permission to proceed? ”
Here goes nothing. “You have my permission.”
I hear a sound in the distance. It's a deep, low hum and it’s getting louder. Then I fall out of my body. Yeah you heard me. I don’t know what to tell you, it feels like I fell out of my body. I can still see the room, and Kristof but I’m falling away from it. Or maybe it’s falling away from me? It’s a weird sensation either way. Even though it’s distant I can see there are a bunch of red error messages flashing on the neural AR overlay. Fuck. What have I gotten myself into?
A few more seconds and it fades into a tiny dot above me, before disappearing entirely. I’m just floating in complete darkness. I can’t tell up from down, this is trippy. Am I even moving? How long have I been here? I look around and realize that whatever this program is, it didn’t even bother to render a body for me, I just seem to be a floating point in space. Is this it? Am I just stuck here for the rest of my life? I think the valium is wearing off because I’m starting to freak out.
Something comes shooting towards me out of the darkness. It’s a giant head, and it comes to a complete stop, towering over me, the size of a skyscraper. It’s mouth is a dark opening, and it’s eyes are glowing brightly. Strange crazy geometric patterns run over it’s skin. I try to stare at the patterns to make sense of them, but it seems like the harder I look the more complicated they get. It reminds me of an acid trip.
Is this program some sort of drug simulator? There’s definitely a psychedelic element here. Is this big ass floating head supposed to be god? I’m not convinced.
Suddenly there’s another head, and another, and another. They keep flying in from the distance, so quickly, but without a sound. And they’re all staring at me. It’s unnerving, I feel naked. Like they’re undressing me with their glowing eyes. What do they want? I look around and I realize they’ve formed a complete sphere around me, all just staring. The humming is getting louder. I can feel it inside of me.
As the humming climates a third eye opens on the forehead of the head in front of me. One by one the other heads follow suit. Beams of light come out, shooting from head to head, eye to eye, connecting them one to another, forming a web of light. I am terrified, I am transfixed, I cannot look away. There’s nothing I can do to escape whatever is about to happen. In unison they each fire another beam of light, all directed at me.
The beams of light hit me. I am hit by an onslaught of visions, sensations, smells, touches, tastes. I am seeing through the eyes of someone else. I am an elderly woman in Tuscany, carefully picking olives. I am a man riding an elevator, high up, looking out over a sea of glass peaks, protruding from clouds below. I am a homeless man living on the street in protest. I am Kristof, staring at my body, limp with the contraption strapped to my head. I experience ten thousand lifetimes. I am each of them individually, while I am all of them at once. I am the watcher who watches the watcher. I am the single guard in the panopticon. This must be what it feels like to be a God. The sensation is overwhelming, and the moment lasts for what feels like an eternity. It’s like being pinned to the ground by the stream of a firehose. It cleanses my soul, washes away my ego, and shatters my identity. As the sensation starts to ease, the humming slowly dies down. A question bubbles to the surface of my mind. Who am I?
“Now do you understand”, says a voice behind me.
I turn around, and am surprised to find myself once again in corporeal form. I have hands, I have a body, but I am not back home. I am again floating weightlessly in space. In the distance I can see little flames dancing. For a second I think I am back in candle.
I continue to spin before coming to a stop. In front of me floats a woman. Massive in scale, like the heads, she towers above and below me. Geometric shapes like seashells, flowers, and galaxies, flow into one another, across her skin. Each pattern holds infinite complexity, expanding and growing the longer I stare at it, as though it’s feeding off my attention. Upon her head sits a crown. Behind her is a great ring. Her long hair, spread apart with perfect symmetry, wraps itself around the ring, creating a perfect circle. It is the clock face, and she is the hands. She sits cross legged floating in space. A smile touches her lips.
I could spend a lifetime just staring at her, taking in her transcendent beauty, and I could die happy. Kristof did not deceive me. Here before me stands a God, a Goddess, in all her glory. My early panic is replaced by a deep sense of awe.
She reaches out towards me, her massive finger shrinking as it approaches me in a way I can’t explain to you. She strokes my hair gently. She begins to speak. Her voice is beautiful. It sounds like a thousand different voices speaking in perfect unison. It sounds like bells ringing, like waves crashing, like volcanoes exploding. Each word she speaks hits me like an ocean wave, rocking me to the core.
“We have seen into you, experienced all of you, and you, in turn, have seen into all of us, and experienced all of us. You have a decision to make.”
She raises her right arm.
“Do you wish to retain your individuality, to be Alyx. To go back to your miserable life, without purpose, without direction. To be a pawn of fate. To suffer every day until your flesh withers and your soul fades into the great nothing.”
She raises her left arm.
“Or do you wish to give up your individuality, to lose yourself. To become us, a part of the greater whole, to live with purpose, to spread our light, to create consensus. To die now, and live forever, such that the many become one and are increased by one. ”
She places her two open palms in front of me.
“When you are ready child, step forwards and make your decision.”
It feels like this should be hard choice. Well maybe that’s not fair, every single choice I’m asked to make it hard. I’m just not good at making choices. Maybe I should just stay here forever.
I think about my life. I think about my shitty apartment, all the chores I have to do, Snuggles, Jerry, the creep, and batty old woman. I think about how I hate myself. I think about crying on the floor in the bathroom. I think about crying on the floor in the kitchen. I think about crying behind a bush in the park where I hoped people wouldn’t see me. My whole life has been one sad horrible chaotic mess. I think about my 1.9 star social credit rating. Fuck my life.
I step into the left hand. She lifts me to eye level, her third eye opens, and a beam of light shoots down engulfing me.
I am to be no more, for we are one.
We awake in our bed. The room is much cleaner than it once was. Long gone is our companion, Snuggles. We no longer have need for him. We know what day it is. We have an appointment with our therapist. Time to get ready.
The bathroom tiles are clean, and cold to touch. We stare into the mirror, and the reflection of Alyx stares back. We apply simple makeup, nothing too gaudy or fancy, throw on a blouse and slacks, and hail a robotaxi.
A familiar looking man gives us a creepy stare, but we pay him no attention, instead staring out the windows and appreciating the view.
Our awareness stretches far beyond the confines of this tiny metal box, even beyond the horizon which we stare at. In New York, a man and a woman are making love. We experience them intertwined from both perspectives. There is something transcendently beautiful about this corporeal experience. Two become one, then one becomes two again, but sometimes one becomes three. We experience an old woman in Tuscany serving homemade pasta sauce to her family. Our family. We appreciate the love and dedication we put into the sauce, just as they do.
Entering the office the secretary informs us our therapist is with another patient at the moment. It occurs to us we used to call him Jerry, even though his name is Dr. Gordon. That’s ok, we’re happy to wait.
Looking around the waiting room we spot a young man, sulking in the chair furthest from everything else. He clearly wishes to be left alone. We understand his pain, we have seen it many times before. We sit next to him. He shoots us a suspicious look.
We give him a sly, seductive smile, and touch his hand slightly.
“Hello”
“Uh, hey”
“What’s your name?”
“I’m Darien”
“My name’s Alyx”
There’s a pause. He doesn’t want to talk to us. He doesn’t want to talk to anyone right now, especially not his therapist. Of course, it doesn’t matter, because we already know what he wants to hear. We will show him the light. We stare into his eyes for a moment.
“Darien, do you believe in fate?”
Nexum
A latin word meaning: a bond secured upon the personal liberty of the debtor