Perspective [Nov 2013]

At long last, I have found them!

Since the dawn of our memory we have searched in the solitude of infinity; looking, and hoping that we are not alone.

For eons, we scoured even the vast expanses between galaxies, between universes. Our song is one of sorrow. We thought ourselves small and feeble, then sophisticated and strong, then awesome and perfected…., but we were alone. Like a single thrumming star, keeping a beat in an empty expanse.
In our ancient times, eons ago, we crafted hypotheses of creation which might justify the emptiness of infinity; resigned to accept solitude. Perhaps we were alone; even though that could not be possible. Maybe it was against that resignation, some made efforts to insist that this was as it should be. For what could possibly compare with our Utopia of the real? Anything we might experience, we could master. We no longer were subject to externalities in any way.

Then we toyed with the idea that we ourselves were the makers. Alas, we made so much for no real purpose. We simulated ourselves in all manner of mediums; only to find that ultimately, none could enter reality as anything other than a shadow of the spark that made our consciousness real.
We churned and roiled at the impossibility facing us. How could we be alone in this endless soup of reality? The idea that conscious existence was nowhere else in the cosmos was mathematically disharmonious, anathema!

More and more it became a given that we had reached the apex of our development; our civilization had become timeless; our fusion of what we call mind the universe, the mindverse, transcended all forms of physical and energetic elements. As we collected our consciousness we approached the limits of the universal expanse…

But still, not one information-bearing photon, not one purposeful impulse of mind, ever reached us. Nor could we coax reason out of the formless infinite…, it was simply a mechanical wonder of complexity. We had filled the cosmos with our understanding of the dance of time and space.

Entropy at last was reversed, and we then truly became the children of infinity. But where were our siblings? How did we come to be made? Reason demanded there was a totality beyond this; a separate but embraceable construct outside of our own. Yet alone we continued.

The vessel of reality is now mapped; the mysteries and unanswered questions few. Our reason tells us that the discovery of the ‘other’ will unleash the wellspring of renewal. We have searched for eons.
We are few now; most having succumbed to the weariness of ages, releasing themselves to the void; some in sadness and disappointment, some with blissful resignation. Some have devoted themselves to simply wait. I and my sharers have set out, with finality of purpose, to find what we truly desire to be out there; a new, different consciousness with which we can take the next step beyond.

…. And so I continued, searching, looking for any sign that conscious existence is the ultimate destination of the agency our primitive and unsophisticated forebears thought of as “life.” I scour the framework for something new, something that can prove that there is another intelligence we can reach. I have watched stars form and dissipate into the cosmos; I have endured past the coldness, and bathed in furnace of physical creation.

My own form had swirled and spun to accommodate any manner of expression, and yet… there are no expressions being made outside the mundane churning of infinity.

But now all things change.

A new intelligence has been found! They are not as we are, nor even as we once were. They are the spontaneous affirmation of the dream our collective has cherished for countless eons.

In all this infinity, in this timeless expanse of reality, consciousness has risen.

At first it seemed not; for these are beings of the infinitesimal.

They come into their minds and vanish like the tendrils of the stars. It seemed unfathomable that they could truly be conscious; they were as the briefest wisp of sentient breath.

But then, an age passed, and I found my suspicions, and thus those of my sharers, confirmed. They left a permanence of reason upon which their progeny built. I marveled at the immediacy of their perspective; and their apparent incapacity to see a larger universe.

Everything for them was microcosm; all things seemed imminent, they may yet end their journey; but something in them drives them to endure beyond the immediate. This is them! I watch in utter fascination as the embers of a consciousness to match our own.

I see now, the true nature of order and reality.
There is a balance between infinity and the void.
It is not where we dwell.
It is where we are….

-end-

reply to post by Maxmars


THanks Max! I enjoyed your story.

reply to post by Maxmars

I see now, the true nature of order and reality.
There is a balance between infinity and the void.
It is not where we dwell.
It is where we are….

WOW. I am truly in awe. I knew you had the gift of words, but I had no idea of the depth of your creativity, Maxmars. This is my favorite story so far. Incredibly rich and provocative. Sadly, words fail me to articulate just how much this story touched me; it's like a journal of those who came before us, those who crafted the cosmos, and yet they -- even being omnipotent as compared with ourselves -- sought the same universal question of "why?"

Excellent read.

ETA: there is a novel or two lurking in you. Please let it out to breathe.