Believe it or not I was born in 1989. But in Moscow where time and fashion goes to die.
My funky psychedelic 1977 open concept house has even funkier plumbing. A flange leak and several pinholes on the coppers went undetected long enough to rot the floor in the hallway bathroom. I’m currently staying at a hotel while insurance sends out the mitigation squad and the whole bloody floor comes out. Fortunately (thanks to Opa’s military insurance) I think we’ll be out only a couple o grand.
There’s quite a story surrounding this which I may or may not share in the near future.
This besides the ever present procrastination and the mighty UPS whip (Fedex no longer has a contract with Amazon for ground…so we now have their volume, joy) are why my posts have yet again slowed to a trickle.
There was a sensation of whirling, of spinning headlong blindly through ether. It felt like eternities had passed between the clap and the first glimmers of some strange purplish light.
“Holy shit it’s laser Floyd!” Jim exclaimed facetiously.
“Are you familiar with physics?” Germain inquired.
He could hear the question but see nothing besides darkness, and the strange hazy purple glow.
“Are you familiar with physics?” Germain repeated.
“Apparently not. Unless ya drugged me.”
“There’s no need to force the lock if you’ve got a key.”
“Maybe so…”
“Just so.”
“Uhuh, and uh what the hell door did we just step through here?”
“I guess I should get more specific. Are you familiar with circuits?”
“Sure, I’ve wired a house before.”
“There are countless electromagnetic impulses. That is the universe and its operation. It is one vast eternal brain folded densely to infinity. With time and patience, one can learn to prune this synaptic garden that blossoms in perfect holy Chaos.”
“If it’s so holy…than how come you’re prunin’ it? Isn’t that kinda cocky?”
“The root of chaos is in the seeking of order. Its worship is thus inevitable. Whether I call it holy or damned it will birth and be praised by every principality.”
“So God is chaos?”
“To the untrained God is such an absurdly vast chain of causality, such a solipsistic, self-referential thing; that had religion not risen to facilitate communion, to distill the essence of the unfathomable, only angels would approach understanding.”
“That’s a pretty big word salad you served up to such a simple question.”
“What you are seeing now, is how these mountains draw and transmit celestial light from distant stars. Their pulsing is sentient and wishes to add flesh to its nerves. Seeks this with such zeal that it will have any form. Because the El are divided, it manifests as troops of grey monstrosities chittering the discord that binds them to the ground bass of the errant heart of the fallen.”
“Gnarly.”
“I am talking about a current. They will it one way. It is our duty to will it aright. You, young fool, are merely a very specific transistor that has unfortunately become indispensable to rewiring the aeon.”
Jim wasn’t really sure what all that meant.
“You see, some Angels would prefer that only they would approach understanding.”
“You’re talkin’ bout some cosmic country club?”
The old man chuckled.
“And you want me to crash their Thursday night social?”
“Yes!”
“How?”
“Go to the caves.”
There was another clap. The world returned. Everyone was in the exact same spot, making the same exact motion, as when Jim had slipped into the dark following the first.
It seemed that the old man and he, had just had a private conversation in some secret room.
“What was that purple light?”
“Well, it’s usually more blue round here, there’s no name for it really…but I’ve always called it ‘transcendental electricity.’ We all have it. We are all particles in its waveforms. As individuals and as nations…But of course the El have a stronger current…so its dramatically visible in etheric space. And even in the earth…as I’ve said…it is blue…I believe you’ve seen it. And you will…you must see it again. Go to the caves.”
“Hell no. I’m not getting my city slicker ass stuck in some hillbilly crawlspace.”
“There is no danger for you. Your blood knows the way.”
Jim shook his head.
“Don’t you want to crash the party?”
This time he cocked his head and smirked at the prospect of some good Yuppie thwartin’ possibilities. But he did not relish the idea of dying in some pitch black hole no man was meant to spelunk. Much less a tenderfooted one like him.
The old man held his gaze for a spell and then turned to stare at the fire.
Jim, a few drinks past the limit of self consciousness shifted his attention to Elsa.
Jim was stuck again by the shift in atmosphere. With all these bodies luxuriating by the firelight it was indeed downright homey. The warmth was pleasant.
But it was also naseuting. Jim did not trust these fine feelings. He did not want comradarie with these soft strangers.
“I’ve heard you call these things the El more than once. What is that…?”
“It is an emanation of the Most High or rather an echo. Whose seal is Saturn.”
“I thought they were from Saggitarius.”
“The manifestation on this plane is mediated through the sixth planet from the sun.”
“Huh?”
“What do you suppose it means to be cast down?”
“Uh…”
“Which fate is grimmest for an angel?”
Jim rolled his eyes.
“To be clothed in limit. Girded in restricting loins of flesh. Mind you it is possible to be immeasurably powerful despite such division. They are clever and it was they that taught us to forge the rawness of the earth into sword and iron.”
“So gremlins…are aliens…who are angels….because….reasons?”
The old man chuckled hollowly.
It did make a certain sense. All these various takes on a single phenomenon. Strange little introductions in a history that only appeared in snippets to the attentive. But so what? That’s the thing that Jim didn’t undestand. That he never understood about all this religious sort of stuff. So what?
Fine people perished along with the wicked. And of what consequence is it that they dwelt in grand eternities?
Of what consequence is a principilaity of imps in a thing like eternity? A thing that nullifies. Time the great healer, the great eraser, stretched limitless across the canvas of forever…whatever its mechanism…so what?
“Just be mindful that they don’t entrace you. There is cause. I see their poison dancing in your eyes.”
Jim gulped. He was still indeed between worlds.
“Can’t knock me down.” He insisted.
“At this late hour, they are a part of us all.”
“I have no parts.”
Elsa giggled.
“You are as fragmented as a mosaic. This is the lot of man. To gahter himself tile by tile, till he beholds his place in the firmament, and his connexion to the Godhead.”
“Right on man.” Jim mocked.
“Listen boy, it is at great cost that I and those here assembled have gathered enough of ourselves to see you through.”
“Oh?”
“Yes. As they seperate the spirit from the flesh so must you seperate their flesh from their spirit. They must not be allowed to cross the threshold as corporeal till the appointed season.”
“I don’t get it.”
“You don’t have to. No one expects a rotten tapestery to herald truth. You must follow for each faithful step will be be rewarded by increased sight.”
With this the adept clapped his hands and the cottage went dark.
Jim could barely sit up. There had been gravy….with a side of gravy…dipped in venison and lard. He had to go outside with a mug of coffee to keep from falling asleep. The cool evening and the swaying trees were bracing. And each sip of the bold black liquid helped restore his verve.
Elsa and Germain were in the center of the meadow. The elder was gesturing heavenward with his arms in a slow methodical sort of way. Though he couldn’t hear them and they were blanketed in darkness Jim thought he saw Elsa nodding along.
His curiosity sufficiently peaked, he set off in their direction. The odd pair were further than he had guessed, and he was winded by the time he reached them. Neither turned as the old man continued pointing and speaking in a low accented voice.
Elsa was indeed nodding along as she asked questions in what Jim guessed to be French. Now that he was close he followed the elder’s pointing up to the target.
A chill ran down his spine.
It was the very same cluster of stars he’d seen that night he got paralyzed on the granite. Though he didn’t know the name he’d remembered his boyhood visits to the cottage. Visits where Hant would point at this ‘the archer’ the ‘town hall of the galaxy.’
Jim was frightfully curious now. Both as to why everybody was so fixated with this southern cluster and as to how exactly Elsa had gotten that wheelchair so far over all this thick tall grass.
“Stargazing?” He inquired.
She turned round lightly and blew him a kiss. “Yes, izn’t eet wanderful!”
“Meh, I guess,” Jim responded. “But, if I’m being completely honest I’ve kinda had it with stars out here. There’s too many and they seem too bright, too close. It’s like being stuck up heaven’s asshole.”
Elsa laughed good-naturedly.
German could not turn his wheelchair and opted to instead mutter something in French.
“I thought you were a kraut broad?”
“Dee French border iz not far frohm Hesse.”
“Don’t you Eurodorks know that the only language worth talkin’ is God’s own English.”
Elsa stuck out her tongue.
“I can speak the language of dogs perfectly.” The oldster retorted in cut-glass poshness. “I’d simply prefer not to contort such a noble instrument as the human tongue into such barbaric positions.”
“Another feisty Boomer?” Jim rolled his eyes.
“No, you arrogant little Anglo fool, I may well have sired your grandfather.”
“…uh…so we’re related?”
Elsa laughed. “Nein, at least I don’t dink so…” she said turning Germain’s chair to face them. “The doktor has been leeving very long and is very wize. You must heer heem. He will helf you.”
“Ok, so what’s up with these stars Doc? Hant was crazy about ’em.”
Germain nodded. “That is Saggitarius.”
“Afraid I don’t take much stock in that astrology shit.”
“This is astronomy you mealy-brained Paddy. Astronomy that will be your undoing unless you learn it.”
“Rather be a Mick than a Frog.”
Elsa shook her head.
“I’m about to let you on something that won’t be revealed for several decades. I have every right to tease you.”
“Fine by me, so long as I get to tease back.”
The elder ignored this repartee.
“Saggitarius is located near the center of our galaxy. Near the border of Saggitarius and Scorpius there is a black hole.”
“Ok. That’s pretty sci-fi.”
“The cliche is true. Fact is stranger than fiction. This currently theoretical construct is the highway by which your little friends travel. Or rather the mechanism…”
“Neat, so how does all this work and uh…more importantly what the fuck are they…?”
“That is a very long story and I am very cold. So we’ll have to continue this indoors.”
Elsa got behind the wheelchair-bound elder and began to push him effortlessly over the uneven ground.
Jim grabbed the back of the chair. “Hold on. How the hell…”
“Elsa get this baboon off my damned throne.”
He was completely disarmed by the sensation of soft fingers tickling his kneck and warm whispers caressing his ears. “Heel tell you soon…just letuz got noaw.”
“I’ll tell him now!” The old man exploded. “You have to dumb things down for his lot so it won’t take long. It’s coated in a polymer…o wait that’s a bit too difficult…I’m sorry….it’s magic WD-40!”
“See, that’s all I wanted.” Jim responded.
“Yes, now that this bog breathing alleycats base curiosity is sated CAN WE PLEASE GO INSIDE..”
The Fractal Journal 