515. Endless world, 7

(Rose)

Nightmare taught me what she knew of the conatus. Not a lot, but infinitely more than I did.

And our larva crawled, ate what it found and slowly growing bigger. Living the life.

Some feral animals saw an easy prey of our soft spongy body and attacked us.

Poor them.

As soon as their fangs bite us, they were glued and captured. The pack was rapidly caught and assimilated, devoured alive and whole. We’re a monster really.

We made them die in terror, and only left their bones washed in acids behind. We felt partially their dying terror as we assimilated their brains whole.

R - I feel like I’m similar to Magenta. This makes me feel sick.

N - Rose, you have to remember. Your conatus is nothing like what Magenta’s ambition was.

My broken record of a mind has tripped over it for a zillionth time. I stand back up a little faster now though, thanks to Nightmare’s hand.

We will live. Not just killing everything, but just what we need.

I want to live on again.

~

Our larval body doesn’t have a full blown eye, but does have some photosensitive cells here and there.

So we feel a little whether it’s day or night, and some simple shapes around.

At times, we open a wider and more sensitive perception like a window, or a photographic impulse of our surroundings.

Through these pictures we analyse together, we discuss and adapt our ways.

We munch on indiscriminately on anything organic. We eat everything along our way.

But we have a finite goal, not just an instinct. We have a design, although it’s still incomplete. We won’t grow endlessly thus.

Though the question is whether or when will we find a human to complement our drafts.

Humans are quite rare nowadays.

N - Worst case, I can make us birds.

R - ... That actually doesn’t sound so bad. But I’d rather be human still, If we can.

N - Then we will...

Nightmare sounds quite decided. She’s looking forward to being alive in such a way.

So our monstrous slug body keeps crawling its way to the most nutritious horizons we could find.

~

It’s somewhat easier to be patient when you have no body regulating your thoughts. Although emotions like envy and frustration know likewise no bounds. We’re doing fine though, because we know.

This life in the underworld is so much easier with a guide like we are for each other, and knowledge of what there is beyond.

Days passed like blinks. Our larva very slowly grows bigger meanwhile. We found a tree and proceeded to eat it entirely as we did the small deer at first.

Cellulose and lignin are harder to digest for Nightmare, but still is organic materials, and living cells somewhat. So it still is a good amount of food and building blocks to ingest, though harder to digest.

The tree slowly disappears as we digest it. It takes us a while. We don’t waste anything.

Our larval body is now the size of a pork maybe. We still need more. And we still miss human data.

~

One day, we shivered. Our invisible eyes felt something unusual.

Like a distant murmur or whisper in the wind. A small and thin wave coming from very far in the invisible ocean...

Another daiûa, very far away, did something. And a faint part of its will brushed our skin and mind.

What was that?

We take a picture of our environment in a flash of darkness, absorbing for a short moment all lights coming in our direction. We see ourselves over wild hills in the picture that appears, peaceful and lush. The sky is clear.

And we notice an unexpected glint in the sky.

Fear runs through me like a shiver. Is it the worst possible outcome?

We take another look into reality and wider in the invisible ocean, focusing toward that distant glint.

Something shines. A being-like-us...

Should we hide?

There’s an echo. Like a reply. Like an eye catching our gaze lifted upward for an instant, and now looking right back at us. We’re seen.

Nightmare doesn’t seem to react, while fear takes my heart away.

The bright light is coming straight at us. We see a sunrise in the void, a light appearing inside the depth of our immaterial brains.

I’m petrified for a while. A short while.

The bridges are built almost instantly.

The brain connections are made as if we had begun touching each other again.

Her touch isn’t one of hate nor death. It’s the complete opposite.

I see her. My bright light in this world.

She found me again.

R - Welcome back, little flower...

~

Blume joins us in the other world mostly. There wasn’t much of her body left saving out there in reality. She’s not in great health either on her own.

Just enough to be a bright shape. And to look for us. She’s been patient as well.

She dove back to Earth as she finally found us.

The three of us become a ring of three invisible brains chatting with each other in the void.

B - I’m happy to find you still alive Rose. You have no idea...

R - There isn’t much of me left, but me too... Enough to be alive, and to still identify myself as myself.

B - That’s so much more than I expected to find Rose. I really thought I lost you...

We have to thank Nightmare for that.

We chat, while the slug eats mechanically what comes by.

What Blume had left me as a pendant, and Nightmare’s almost immediate work for self-preservation, as we were being dissolved; it kept enough of my mind and memories in a cohesive form. Actually, no. Nightmare had to reconstruct me from fragmented elements. Even I can remember it.

N - She’s all yours now if you want her.

B - With delight. And thank you!

My fragile jigsaw puzzle of a reconstructed mind is being handed over from one god to the other. It feels weird and terrifying. I feel for a second my inherent fragile and unsteady mind structure on the verge of collapsing.

Nightmare needed me to grow like a biological organism. I needed her to remain stable and whole in that awful place. Blume now takes over the role of a skeleton holding my fragile brain and mind.

She’s holding me dearly and gently. Nightmare doesn’t kick me out, she still keeps friendly blonds with me. I demanded it somewhere in our intertwined minds. She simply lets Blume carrying me now.

R - That felt really weird and scary.

B - You’re alright. I won’t let you go. I won’t let you go...

She has some strong emotion to unwind...

It feels like a deep hug. Eyes shut. A tight and absolute embrace.

It’s an indescribable soothing feeling to be reunited as one. It felt like an eternity of loneliness in cold darkness just ended. This dawn feels serene and warm.

R - I missed you...

B - I thought I lost you...

R - You’ll have to tell us how you ended up with that doomsday weapon out there to end Magenta.

B - It’s a long story, but I thing you will enjoy it, and Nightmare as well.

Nightmare is surprised to hear that.

B - The black rose was as bright as one can be.

And Blume giggles to herself with that.

~

R - Do you... have some data to create a human body?

B - Of course. I created you, remember? I am your God, Rose.

I remember she didn’t keep the full required data to copy me at all times. But she mostly said that to make that joke about being my creator god again. She missed me truly.

B - Once upon a time, I created you Rose... Because the original you once upon a very distant time, gave me a chance to gain a life on my own.

It’s just kind words between ourselves. We’re hugging, figuratively. Happy.

R - Shall we start again?

They both nod. The three of us have what we need.

The larval body created by Nightmare begins a metamorphosis under Blume’s command.

Soon, two bodies will be born.

~