or Dr. Lillian Lillihammer in the Mind Palace; or HARRYBLANK'S Meme Proposal.
SCP-8382, Dr. Lillian S. Lillihammer.
Special Containment Procedures: Should containment of SCP-8382 become necessary, contact Thilo Zwist (SCP-6382). Should containment of both subjects become necessary simultaneously, contact the Emergent Threat Tactical Response Authority (ETTRA).
SCP-8382 is the self-deploying containment apparatus for SCP-001-BLANK-I [AWAITING DECLASSIFICATION].
Description: SCP-8382 is Dr. Lillian Shelby Lillihammer, Chair Emerita of Memetics and Countermemetics at Site-43. Dr. Lillihammer is a baseline human female born in 1966. Her physical aging processes have been partially arrested via advanced life extension technologies, to ensure continued execution of priority one containment duties. She possesses a genius-level intellect and eidetic memory, and is a presently unclassed thaumaturge specializing in cryptomancy..The thaumaturgical equivalent to, and one origin of, the science of memetics.
Her SCP Foundation staff profile is attached below.
Lillian S. Lillihammer
Memetics and Countermemetics
Senior Researcher
Security Clearance Level: 5
Post: Site-43 (March 1995-present)
Office: MC-01
Email: ten.34|remmahillil_l#ten.34|remmahillil_l
Present Assignment: Section Chair Emerita
Dr. Lillihammer is the Foundation's most accomplished memeticist, with over two hundred successful projects and a wide-ranging purview including Vikander-Kneed Technical Media, the giftschreiber and schriftsteller, and object permanence anchoring for the Antimemetics Division. The full catalogue of her academic works cannot be enumerated for reasons of both sensitivity and incomprehensibility, but highlights include:
- "Thinking Machines." Open Minds, vol. 40 (2001): 97-114.
- Making Me. PhD Thesis, Site-43, 2002.
- Hold That Thought, or How I Killed a God in My Brain. Unpublished, available through ERACER with Security Clearance Level 5+ only.
- Art and How the Brain Bends. Site-43 Press, 2017.
- "Out of Mind: Tangent Timelines and the Noetics of Forgetting." Spark: A Memetics Journal, vol. 51 no. 1 (January 2020): 5-45, reprinted in Neuroid: A Memetics Journal, Morpheme: A Memetics Journal, etc.
- "Groupthink: Thoughtspace Combination in Nested Noöspheres." Comparative Psychochemistry, vol. 62, no. 3 (Summer 2021): 7-39.
She is presently on leave, pursuing a project of personal interest.
Dr. Lillihammer received SCP classification in October of 2022 during a rigorous course of cryptomantic training under Austrian linguamancer Thilo Zwist (SCP-6382). As her anomalous capabilities involve the control of language and visual perception, she is functionally impossible to detain, amnesticize, or disable except with the assistance of a more powerful thaumaturge of the same type. Only three such individuals have thus far been identified — and given the events of 2022-2024 detailed in Addendum 8382-1, reassessment may be necessary.
NOTICE FROM THE FOUNDATION RECORDS AND INFORMATION SECURITY ADMINISTRATION
The following does not meet the accepted clinical standard, and has been flagged for revision.
The HMCL officer on record for this file, Dr. Lillian S. Lillihammer, has been apprised.
— Maria Jones, Director, RAISA
Addendum 8382-1, Lillian Lillihammer in the Mind Palace: It went a little something like this.
6 August, 2024
In which I put the end before the beginning
I can smell colours, and I can hear smells.
I'm standing in a village square, and the eastern façades are all painted a specific shade of mauve. It takes me less than a second to find it in the Paratone catalogue, which itself took me about a minute to memorize. 185-ω, "Rampant Red." What a bunch of assholes these guys are.
It's the eastern walls because that's where the sun rises, and the giftschreiber are on the ascent. A hundred years ago they would have painted the western walls, and maybe I wouldn't have noticed the paint until after noon. As it stands, I'm sniffing wet adobe for breakfast. It tastes like pins and needles, and sounds like hot egg salad, but step three of four in my synaesthetic cycle gives me a street name, number, and about half of the words I would need to make this a quiet and painless exercise.
Somebody's already repainting one of the walls. Maybe they do it every day, to keep the password fresh.
That's okay.
I've got half a dozen skeleton passwords ready to burn at a moment's notice, and that's assuming I don't just put the whammy on whoever answers the door, and make them open it.
You would think they'd be on to me by now. I've been sticking my nose so far up their business, it's easily halfway rampant itself. And I've never been one to keep a low profile, especially at six and a half feet tall.
Quiet and painless are ideal descriptors for six days out of seven.
But when I err on the side of variety and kick the door down instead of knocking — seven of seven is leg day, this week — they're legitimately surprised to see me, and I make them legitimately sorry. When I've gone through them like a hot scalpel, their friends won't get spooked, because their friends won't remember them.
They'll all remember me, though.
They'll remember what I did.
That's now; the rest of this was then. "Then" starts in late 2022.
I got my first shot from a woman in a fox suit. That's how you know this journey is going to be magical.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is sitting on an examination table in the medical wing of Site-87. Dr. Katherine Sinclair stands beside her, wearing a full-body fox costume with well-articulated fingers. She inserts the needle of a syringe into Dr. Lillihammer's arm, and presses the plunger down with one large, padded thumb.>
Dr. Sinclair: All done.
Photograph of Dr. Katherine Sinclair at Site-87, 2022.
<She steps back to examine her handiwork.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Not everyone can hit vein first try when they're all paws. Nice job.
Dr. Sinclair: I'll say. Not even any blood.
Dr. Lillihammer: I don't bleed.
<She rolls the sleeve of her jacket down.>
Dr. Sinclair: Of course you don't.
<She disposes of the syringe in a sharps bin with a glowing pentagram overlay, then looks Dr. Lillihammer up and down appraisingly.>
Dr. Sinclair: Judging by that colour, you're just skin and bone.
Dr. Lillihammer: How's the kid?
Dr. Sinclair: Still has a name.
Dr. Lillihammer: And obviously I remember it, but it's out of character for me to show. Having perfect recall makes performing yourself a complex act.
<Dr. Sinclair shrugs.>
Dr. Sinclair: Sure. Right now? Phoenix is probably driving 87's daycare up the wall. In general? Kids are a lot like junior researchers, except they die less often when they screw up.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right on. That's my limit for niceties hit.
Dr. Sinclair: You've rarely been accused of being nice.
<Dr. Lillihammer pats the bloodless pinprick.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Anything I need to know, health-wise?
<Dr. Sinclair shrugs. Her second skin absorbs much of the effect.>
Dr. Sinclair: No idea. This is silly bullshit you're doing. I'm just showing you how to do it right. You were paying attention?
<Dr. Lillihammer shakes out her fingers experimentally.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's what makes me so dangerous, Katherine. I don't even need to.
<Dr. Sinclair chuckles as she picks up her head from a side table.>
Dr. Sinclair: Sure. That's what's doing it.
<She pauses.>
Dr. Sinclair: You know, Monty and I are lucky, really..Dr. Montgomery Reynolds, Dr. Sinclair's husband.
Dr. Lillihammer: "Go on," I say, because that's what the social script demands.
Dr. Sinclair: The Foundation hasn't got any hangups about pitching in for childcare, within reason, for us. Not everyone's that lucky.
Dr. Lillihammer: Uh huh.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You mean people who aren't with the Foundation? Or…?
<Dr. Sinclair grimaces.>
Dr. Sinclair: I've heard stories. Mostly from places like Site-17. And there's that Fire Suppression thing. Me and Monty, the things that make us different? The Director tells the higher-ups it's fine, so fine it is. Not everybody has that kind of protection.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Blurt, or hold peace.
Dr. Sinclair: Are you sure you know what you're doing?
Dr. Lillihammer: I think we've just established that nobody knows what I'm doing.
<Dr. Sinclair sighs.>
Dr. Sinclair: I don't mean about that. I mean the other thing.
Dr. Lillihammer: I directed my Section for years. I know how to manage people.
Dr. Sinclair: You're not talking about corralling academics. The people you're interested in recruiting? They're going to be more than a handful.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not raising children. I'm raising an army.
Dr. Sinclair: Might not be as different as you think. I've seen your list. None of them would pass the usual background checks. None of them would get hired at 17. You're going to have to fight to keep every single one. And you're going to have to show them how to survive in our environment. Because the Foundation only accepts difference if it doesn't threaten the status quo. Maybe what makes them special won't survive the transition, even if they do.
Dr. Lillihammer: I know something about surviving transitions. And Thilo and I fully intend to be very good parents to our little brood.
Dr. Sinclair: Right.
<She nods.>
Dr. Sinclair: How's his track record with that, again?
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
Before you start, Director Bailey has reviewed the above transcript and determined that Dr. Sinclair did no wrong in the above conversation.
You fucking vampire bats.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: By August of 2022, the SCP Foundation had been engaged in open warfare with two diametrically-opposed cryptomantic cults for over nineteen months. The giftschreiber performed acts of memetic terrorism against the Foundation and the public at large, with the apparent goal of causing as much chaos and collateral damage as possible, while the schriftsteller focused their efforts on the Foundation and its allies, with the apparent goal of strengthening the former against future attack. Both were augmented by a seemingly-inexhaustible wealth of cryptomantic energy, believed to have been derived from two entities classified as SCP-001-A and -B in the as-yet-unpublished SCP-001-BLANK-I: the Unyielding and Uncontained, both presently in Foundation custody at Site-43.
The combined efforts of Thilo Zwist (SCP-6382) and Dr. Lillian Lillihammer (me) were sufficient to neutralize the majority of these incidents, though not without considerable manpower and materiel cost. Having secured a leave from active duty in order to train together in private, both Zwist and Lillihammer completed their final field assignment under Operation FIREBREAK on 12 August 2022, transitioning to Operation BURNOUT: a continuation of FIREBREAK with a new focus on the recruitment and training of Foundation cryptomancers to offset the giftschreiber and schriftsteller. The events depicted below occurred at the conclusion of the pair's defence of Site-232 against rogue elements of GoI-608/806/086/717 ("Mnemarchs of Lethaios").
<Transcript begins.>
<Zwist is leaning against a corridor wall, winded. There is an emergency telephone mounted beside him. Dr. Lillihammer is holding a young man in a leather jacket by the scruff of his neck; he is wailing in pain. She pulls him across the corridor to where Dr. Bradley Fellows is kneeling on the floor, blinking in dazed fashion, and roughly presses both men's foreheads together.>
Mnemarch: OW!
Dr. Lillihammer: Put it back.
Mnemarch: Fucking fascist!
Dr. Lillihammer: Put it back.
Mnemarch: I don't have to take—
<Dr. Lillihammer releases her grip on the mnemarch's neck, steps away, then plants her foot in the small of his back. He squeals in protest as she pushes them closer together.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Put that shit back right now or so help me I will make you kiss.
Zwist: This is not one of your more elegant solutions, Lillian.
Dr. Lillihammer: Threats are a kind of memetics.
Mnemarch: Pig!
<Dr. Lillihammer leans forward. The mnemarch cries out again, inarticulately.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Your job title is "memory king." You're a memory one-percenter. You are a memory dragon sitting on a memory hoard. You do not get to play righteously indignant prole with me. Put. Them. Back.
<The mnemarch reaches up to touch Dr. Fellows on the face, fingers probing his left temple and jaw.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's it. Your mind to his mind, et cetera. Today.
Mnemarch: Na thymásai óti tha zíseis.
<Dr. Fellows jerks to consciousness. Dr. Lillihammer twists her foot, and the mnemarch stumbles to the floor. He looks up at her, and his mouth opens.>
<Dr. Lillihammer has her Foundation-issue telephone in her hand. She points it at the mnemarch, and presses a button. The camera light flashes in a rapid sequence.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Gamísou.
<The mnemarch spins onto his chest, scrabbling away from Dr. Lillihammer until he strikes a corner wall and crumples.>
Dr. Lillihammer: If I was James Bond, they'd have finished my better gadgets by now.
<SCP-6382 sighs, and picks up the emergency telephone receiver.>
Zwist: Possible cranial trauma in E-12. Beneath the… what was it?
Dr. Lillihammer: Slop Shop.
Zwist: Is that right? My word. Beneath the slop shop. Over..Site-232 is located beneath the Strathroy-Caradoc Plaza in Ontario, Canada.
<He hangs up after receiving confirmation.>
<Dr. Lillihammer kneels down.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, Brad. How's the head?
<Dr. Fellows is touching his temple, gingerly.>
Dr. Fellows: You ever eat too much, right after throwing up?
Dr. Lillihammer: No.
Dr. Fellows: Me either. But my memories are back. Wow, that was awful.
Dr. Lillihammer: Did you get their license plate, at least?
<He blinks at her for several seconds until understanding dawns.>
Dr. Fellows: It was the cults. I don't know which one. But the first attackers said something like "We are the Lords of the Cycle," or "The hours turn, and this one is ours" or something like that.
Dr. Lillihammer: Those are very different statements.
Dr. Fellows: Yeah. One of them they definitely said. The other I probably got stuck in my memory when you made that guy give me all of mine back. He was kind of in a rush, threw out some of his babies with my bathwater.
<He cocks his head to one side and pounds the opposite ear, as though attempting to dislodge water.>
<Dr. Lillihammer stands.>
Dr. Lillihammer: They're still rabble-rousing, then. Trying to get all the other GoIs to do our dirty work for us.
<Zwist nods.>
Dr. Fellows: That's not great. London has more GoIs than parks, and it's got more parks than we've got guards. If they stir everybody up…
Dr. Lillihammer: You've put off the next phase for too long.
<Zwist pushes off the wall, with some difficulty, and approaches them.>
Zwist: I haven't been putting anything off, Lillian. I've been assessing your readiness.
Dr. Lillihammer: If you could finish your deliberations before the Death Star vaporizes us, Yoda, that would be awesome.
Dr. Fellows: It took Yoda about five minutes, if I remember correctly. Also, you're thinking of the only one of those movies that doesn't even have a Death Star.
<Dr. Lillihammer glances down at him.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You have seen those movies, right? Those aren't his memories?
<She gestures to where two medical technicians are now attending to the unconscious mnemarch.>
Dr. Fellows: You're asking if I've seen Star Wars? Hasn't everybody?
Dr. Lillihammer: You might be surprised. Best go get checked out anyway. We'll finish cleanup over here.
<He shrugs, rubs his forehead where a red bruise is beginning to form, then complies.>
<Zwist and Dr. Lillihammer watch him go.>
Zwist: You're not really concerned about him.
Dr. Lillihammer: Brad? Brad's a good guy.
<Zwist waits.>
Dr. Lillihammer: No, you're right. I just didn't want to get into a fight in front of the kids. Thilo, it's been over a year. I'm ready. You're ready. This op is played out. We need bigger, better pyrotechnics for the sequel.
Zwist: You mentioned Star Wars. Are you somehow unaware of the potential for disaster, should I choose my apprentices unwisely?
Dr. Lillihammer: I am staggered that you're capable of making this reference.
Zwist: I am connected to the very mindscape of mankind. You are proposing I grant you that same capability. I just watched you put your boot in a man's back.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm wearing Birkenstocks. See?
<She raises one foot in front of her. Zwist steps back.>
Dr. Lillihammer: But sure, point taken. Nothing about this fight has been pretty. So, show me your better way. Show me how you can win a war with pacifism. Show me how mind magic can be anything but an affront to the ideals of free will. Show me something, man, or admit that you aren't going to. You said you wanted to train up the next generation. That starts with me.
Zwist: If we are to spin down this cycle, though, it cannot end with you. That is my concern.
Dr. Lillihammer: So, we multitask.
Zwist: Meaning?
Dr. Lillihammer: You take me to witch camp on the weekdays, and I hunt up prospective schoolmates on the weekend. Or maybe vice-versa; I'm gonna need to keep doing these crackdowns every once in a while, 'til we've got agents at every facility who can do our jobs at least half as well as we do.
Zwist: Do you foresee that happening soon?
Dr. Lillihammer: It's going to have to. I've got a shortlist of candidates for your auslöscher and serumschreiber—
Zwist: Erasers and cure-writers. Name them in your own tongue. Native words have native power.
Dr. Lillihammer: Great. So, let's do it for the natives, then. Make sure everybody, everywhere gets to speak their words loud and proud. Make sure there's enough time to hear them all. You teach me, Thilo, and we'll teach them, Pokémon, et cetera.
Zwist: What?
<She pats him on the shoulder, affectionately.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Just checking how deep that cultural brainrot has sunk in. Don't worry about it.
<Zwist sighs.>
Zwist: That isn't what I'm worried about. There are so many ways this could go wrong. So many ways this could turn out to be a worse mistake than simply doing nothing.
Dr. Lillihammer: Nope. There aren't. I'm right, and you know it. End transcript.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
12 August, 2022
In which my sounding board is sounding bored
"If you could anthropomorphize regret," I sigh, "you'd get an old man. That old man, specifically."
"Mmm. We've got plenty of things we regret, too. Don't we?"
I wave it off like I don't know what he means. "Not like this. This guy is the kind of guy to apologize for original sin. He barely has time to do new things, what with all the time it takes to feel awful about all of the old things. That means a lot of what I do, in my professional life, is grounded in someone else's guilt and shame."
Because Thilo Zwist was the Rosetta Stone that helped us translate cryptomancy into memetics, wild magic into science. One mistake he made four hundred years ago created the preconditions for the Foundation's mastery over mind and matter both.
And every time he talks about it, he has this look on his face like he's the dog who just crapped on your rug.
"Maybe it's just healthy perspective? Remembering what you did wrong, so you can do right."
"Or maybe it's just misery loving company. Only I'm not miserable yet, so he needs to grind me down." I stare at the telephone receiver like I expect to be able to see the face on the other end. Probably there's some cryptomantic means of achieving this, parsing the buzz on the line as atmospheric—
"I can't say much about this topic in the abstract." It doesn't take magic to see the smirk, now. "Perhaps you could be more specific."
I sit back against the curve of my cognitive decontamination tunnel, and cradle the phone to my breast. Probably that muffles my voice. Not my problem. "Sometimes his misery manifests as remorse. He's sorry he stole fire from the gods, then left it burning where we could find it. Sometimes it manifests as mistrust; he knows enough about our kill agents and compulsive code phrases to doubt any assertions of… altruistic intent. He is not psyched by the prospect of collaborating with us, in either mode. He wishes we didn't have to do what we're doing, and he blames us for the way in which we do it."
"You're sure you're not projecting?"
No, I'm deflecting. "I think this is what happens when you live forever."
"What?"
"You lose the fire." Something goes ping on the other end, and I wonder what wacky-ass machine is doing that. I don't ask. "Zwist can do amazing things, but there's always the possibility he'll choose not to. He might rise to the present occasion, but he won't do it gladly, and he might not do it at all next time. He's a provisional saviour at best, and we need something more permanent."
"Something more like—"
"Confident," I continue, "in both the mission and the self. Able to move past the sordid origins of the crisis and our tools for reversing it, see what has to be done, and shape a better future without fear or remorse."
"This is starting to sound rehears—"
"If he really has lost the fire, someone else needs to find it. Carry that torch. If you could anthropomorphize the needs of the present moment," I conclude, "you'd get me."
There is a beat, only one, and then: "I like to think I got you from the start."
I laugh. "For sure. That's why we never talk anymore."
That ends the possibility of a deeper conversation. Not all kill agents are visual.
Zwist believes, and I've seen enough evidence to agree, that both cults are locked in an ontokinetic death spiral that's dragging us all down with them. Their projects of chaos and order make the fabric of reality increasingly less stable, and that's the intended effect. The two groups are in constant conflict, and if either saw a chance to win they'd almost certainly take it, but if that's not possible they'll gladly settle for the end of the world instead.
Because somehow, they both expect to survive it.
"We're not choosing sides here," I tell the receiver as much as the person on the other end. "We can't. Whatever the schriftsteller might say, however tempting it might be to want to use their powers for our own little experiment in planetary panopticon, they are not our friends. In the context of this fight, we barely have any."
"You've never been good at holding on to people," he remarks. "You always found it easier to parachute out, and leave it all on fire behind you."
He isn't wrong, on the face of it, even if he means more than he's saying. "Now who's being abstract?"
I can almost feel the shrug. "Was there something else you needed, Lillian? Because this has been almost entirely monologue."
I scoot up the wall until I'm standing again. "Well, that's the thing. There's so much me in me, any internal musing becomes a dialogue at least, if not a hexalogue. I need a partner if I'm going to talk to myself and not have to worry about getting a response."
He hangs up. Probably that was a cruel choice of words on my part.
I'm going to have to be a lot more careful with them, where I'm headed next.
And I'm also going to need a lot more partners.
I've got a few friendly-by-default names in my little fractal book. I took the opportunity to check in on one before Thilo took me out of wi-fi range; I won't miss most of my responsibilities, but they'll definitely miss me.
First stop: ████████ Area-██. You can't read that. Don't worry about it.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer enters a cluttered office, without knocking. Its occupant — Dr. Joseph Boswell — looks up at her, first annoyed at the interruption and then visibly unhappy to discover its source.>
Dr. Lillihammer: How's my ace in the Hole?
Dr. Boswell: Some day I'm going to laugh at that.
Photograph of Dr. Joseph Boswell at [PARSING ERROR], 2022.
Dr. Lillihammer: That'll be our sign you need to retire.
<She glances around the office for a second chair. Not finding one, she leans on the wall.>
Dr. Boswell: Antimemeticists don't retire. They just get forgotten.
Dr. Lillihammer: Not by me.
Dr. Boswell: Lucky for us.
<Dr. Boswell pushes back from his terminal, and sighs.>
Dr. Boswell: Did you come all the way to ███████ just for the annual report?
If you've somehow gotten this far without being caught up on my deal: I'm the sole point of contact for █ different antimemetics workgroups scattered around the globe. Antimemetics workgroups quickly become antimemetic workgroups, so they need someone who can't forget to send them their money and their Monster Energy and also listen to their fascinating reports about all the nothing they've been looking at. There's your context. Try to keep up.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, but I might as well get it while I'm here. Beats a phone call.
Dr. Boswell: I like phone calls. You can roll your eyes and nobody knows. Skype was the beginning of the end.
Dr. Lillihammer: Everyone knew, Joe. Your eyes roll so hard, your tongue twists in sympathy. But that's enough small talk. Where do we stand since last year?
Dr. Boswell: Still no sign of anything resembling 3125 in the noösphere, and as of January this year, the last of its cults have either dissolved or converted to worshipping something else.
Dr. Lillihammer: Took them long enough. What something else?
<Dr. Boswell shrugs.>
Dr. Boswell: It varies. Mostly they're thrown in with the giftschreiber. Pretty easy transition, chaos to chaos. Some liked the sense of connection, though, so they went schriftsteller instead. Turns out people who want a global hegemony based on person-to-person violence have pretty flexible political leanings.
Dr. Lillihammer: Awesome. Well, I guess it's a relief to have that mess fizzle out finally. Lets us focus on the other mess. On that note…
<Dr. Boswell leans back in his chair.>
Dr. Boswell: The geistschreiber have been a pain to track..Geistschreiber are giftschreiber capable of antimemetic camouflage, and assuming the identities of existing personages. Even more than the obvious. Area-21 changed the game considerably.
Dr. Lillihammer: How so?
Dr. Boswell: The giftschreiber used to deploy them in tiny groups, or on solo missions. Anything where wholesale replacing someone would get them what they want, but also wouldn't be that difficult to conceal. They took a big risk replacing an entire facility with doppelgangers. On the one hand they cost us a ton of top AcroAbate researchers; on the other they lost a few hundred of their own people.
Dr. Lillihammer: We didn't even know they had that many.
Dr. Boswell: Right. They don't know our workgroups exist — we think — and we have no idea how many cells they've got. We can only follow their actions by studying the absences. Holes in people's backstories. Holes in personnel rosters. Projects that come and go without paper trails. Empty offices. Headcounts that don't match security footage.
Dr. Lillihammer: Which is why we only catch one or two a year. And they don't talk.
<Dr. Boswell nods.>
Dr. Boswell: Because they can't. Outside their cells, they only remember their specific missions. Forgetfulness can be a powerful tool.
Dr. Lillihammer: Wouldn't know.
Dr. Boswell: Still, with what we've been able to glean, it looks like the cleansing of Area-21 was a major blow to them. They can't have an army of thousands; they wouldn't be able to hide that from us, and anyway if there were that many of them we would have lost already.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right.
Dr. Boswell: So we've not seen any more concentrated pushes like that. Not even on the level of what you stopped back in '03. It's all been single actor stuff.
Dr. Lillihammer: What kind of stuff?
Dr. Boswell: They replaced an accounting clerk at 17. Messed up payroll for a month. Cheques are the only thing that balances out life in that shithole.
Dr. Lillihammer: Wordplay acknowledged.
Dr. Boswell: One replaced an Overseer's factotum.
<Dr. Lillihammer rolls her eyes.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Ugh.
Dr. Boswell: I think you mean 'holy shit'?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, just ugh. They've done something similar before. Ask Marion.
Dr. Boswell: The thing is, they don't really do anything antimemetic. It's just what they are. So all the workgroups can do is detect and report, then wash our hands of the outcome. It's not very satisfying work.
Dr. Lillihammer: Unlike most antimemetics studies, which provide much long-term stimulation and closure.
Dr. Boswell: That's what we signed up for, though. None of us wanted neighbourhood watch duty. We're meant to be spotting gas leaks.
<Dr. Boswell stands up, and sits awkwardly on the edge of his own desk.>
Dr. Boswell: Lillian, the terms of this project were always clear to everybody. You hear that?
<He raises a finger. She pauses, then nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I hear the nothing, yes.
Dr. Boswell: That's twenty-two people getting on with their things what need getting on with. Limited outside contact, frustrating work, poor compensation, and no lasting legacy, and they're all still plugging away. One cell of many, all reporting to you, all forgotten by everybody but you. We went into that eyes-open, and that says a lot about who we are. Nobody who's lasted long at this is a complainer by nature.
Dr. Lillihammer: And yet you would like to make a complaint.
Dr. Boswell: Yes. 3125 was like a cockroach. A survivor, sure, but also one of a kind. In the original meaning. It almost certainly has a kind. There are going to be more things like it. If there's an adjacent idea-space from which aggressive, predatorial concepts can emerge into our noösphere, it's not likely to have hosted only one organism. It's much more likely to have been an ecosystem.
Dr. Lillihammer: At the very least, something that complex must have had something to eat.
Dr. Boswell: And some means to learn and practice predation. Yes. Lillian, if you see one cockroach, there are always more. There is always an infestation.
Dr. Lillihammer: To change metaphors: 3125 was an iceberg-tip.
Dr. Boswell: Right. And every day we spend entertaining your overzealous bohemians is another chance lost to course-correct.
Dr. Lillihammer: Noted. And for what it's worth, I agree with you. Do you think this might be part of their plan?
Dr. Boswell: Distract us with minutiae until something bigger can kill us? The thought had occurred to me.
Dr. Lillihammer: Shit sucks.
<Dr. Boswell crosses his arms.>
Dr. Boswell: Is that what you came here to tell me? Shit sucks? Because I was actually already aware of that.
Dr. Lillihammer: I didn't come here to tell you anything. I'm all asks today.
Dr. Boswell: So, ask.
Dr. Lillihammer: I probably already know the answers, after all that, but. How do you like it here?
<Dr. Boswell frowns.>
Dr. Boswell: This is not the kind of boss you are.
Dr. Lillihammer: Humour me.
Dr. Boswell: I hated working at 43.
Dr. Lillihammer: I got that impression.
Dr. Boswell: The way it is now? It's always been like that. For all the good work getting done, there's an equal amount of time wasted on screwing around.
Dr. Lillihammer: Cabin fever is real. Even when it's a really, really big cabin.
Dr. Boswell: Sure. I know how it is. Academically. But it's still frustrating to watch all that potential gone to waste. And that problem suffuses all of human society.
Dr. Lillihammer: We're cockroaches too.
Dr. Boswell: How many perfectly good movies dedicate a chunk of their run time to the obligatory romantic plot tumour, whether it helps the script get where it's going or not? How many meaningful conversations never get finished because hormones get in the way? The more you heighten emotions, the more likely that rotten safety valve kicks in before you can get to something really interesting.
Dr. Lillihammer: I will admit that I have missed out on the end of some potentially glorious arguments that way.
Dr. Boswell: The people who signed up for this job? They either had no attachments, or they wanted none. The latter set are the ones who stuck around. We get stuff done around here. When it's done, we have more time for our hobbies. And we actually talk, without that constant undercurrent of an ulterior reproductive motive. We don't have to worry about the biological imperative interrupting with coitus.
Dr. Lillihammer: And no kids.
Dr. Boswell: Unless we're sure we want them, and then there's ways to go about it with a lot less fuss. The only time the way things are is a problem is when someone like you comes from outside, and makes it one. And that doesn't happen very often. So, yes. I like it here.
Dr. Lillihammer: You ever wonder if the Foundation sent you here because you're different?
Dr. Boswell: Not very often. What made you think of that?
Dr. Lillihammer: Weird talk I had with someone.
Dr. Boswell: Well, tell them to keep their weirdness to themselves.
<Dr. Boswell frowns.>
Dr. Boswell: Actually, don't do that. Never do that. But to answer your question again: no. I don't waste my time with suspicions, and I won't appreciate you wasting it with yours. I just want to get on with my life, and today that means getting on with my job.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, that's about what I figured. Makes this next part seem a little trite, though.
Dr. Boswell: Well?
Dr. Lillihammer: You wanna come back to hormone central and dedicate yourself to fighting the cycle full-time?
<Dr. Boswell stares at her.>
Dr. Boswell: No. What? No.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm putting a team together.
Dr. Boswell: Pass.
Dr. Lillihammer: You didn't even ask what kind of team.
Dr. Boswell: Noticed, did you? I didn't ask because I could not be less interested. We need more eyes on this project's real focus, not fewer. It's no use stopping one apocalypse only to get squashed by another you don't even see coming. And we've already lost too many promising minds to your crusade.
Dr. Lillihammer: I miss Bernie every day..Dr. Bernabé Del Olmo, former Chair of Memetics and Countermemetics at Site-43.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I wouldn't be honouring his memory if I let this thing beat us.
Dr. Boswell: And I have a duty to my forgotten colleagues. We've been sidelined for too long. Erased, even. Together, connected, we're too big to ignore. Too real to forget. That was always the point.
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Point taken.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recorder.>
<Transcript ends.>
It's not my decision. It never will be. In the end, all I could do was plant the seed.
Joe probably wouldn't like that metaphor very much.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: Thilo agreed to finally start my training after we satisfied a few preconditions: no recording devices once we got where we were going, no record of our interactions beyond my keeping a simple journal — he should have specified whose standards of simplicity we'd be using — and no passing on any information he didn't want passed on.
We were able to squeak it past the O5 Council by a very narrow margin — although personally I think everything comes down to a 7-6 vote, for plausible deniability — and got Asheworth from 120 to put me under an appropriate geas. I thought it was very cute that Thilo trusted him when he said there was no way I could break it. I thought it was less cute that he still thought my name was "Lillianhammer" after god knows how many years.
I didn't know where the old man was taking me at first, but I figured it out pretty quickly when I saw the place of drawing water. I decided to let him imagine he was the only one of us who knew what was going on, and flicked on a recorder for my last leg of freedom for a spell.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer and Thilo Zwist are walking through a dense and mysterious forest. The sunlight catches streams of dust, which move slowly and glow with an unnatural golden hue. As they move down a gently arcing path, enigmatic figures can be glimpsed in the distant underbrush. Zwist occasionally nods in their direction, or doffs his hat. Dr. Lillihammer universally ignores them.>
Zwist: You will obey my instructions precisely.
Photograph of SCP-6382 somewhere that's green.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm feeling sleepy. Very sleepy.
Zwist: Don't joke. This is the most dangerous space you have ever occupied in your life.
Dr. Lillihammer: I feel like you ought to know that isn't true.
Zwist: You will tell your name to no-one. Not even me. You will never respond to the same appellation twice, nor will you describe any object in the same way. If you are offered a gift—
Dr. Lillihammer: Hello there.
<A humanoid figure in a long black tailcoat with the face of a jackal has appeared on the fateful footpath ahead of them. Said fellow-traveller bows deeply.>
Zwist: If you are offered a gift—
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey there. I'm Lillian.
<Zwist gasps, and clutches at his chest.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Lillian Lillihammer. What's your name?
<The approaching entity is clearly taken aback.>
I am… I should be… how have you done this?
Dr. Lillihammer: Let's keep chatting, and maybe you'll find out!
<The attempted waylayer of the ignorant shakes its head rapidly, stepping back the way it came without facing away from Dr. Lillihammer and Zwist.>
I know a bigger fish when I see it, friend. I will tell my family to avoid your path. Please, allow me to depart in peace.
<Dr. Lillihammer gestures amicably, and the chastened canid beats a hasty retreat into the depths of the deepest wood.>
<Zwist is gaping at Dr. Lillihammer, eyes wide.>
Zwist: You gave that rapacious beast your name.
Dr. Lillihammer: Did I?
<She pats herself down.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's weird. I still seem to have it on me. Huh.
<She heads along the way to semantic ruin, in the same direction the defeated thief of names was heading.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, keep up. If you don't point out your fork in the long and winded road, we're liable to end up back at the fucking well again. And I don't think that poor idiot's heart could take a second encounter with She Whose Shit is Firmly Locked Down.
<Zwist shakes his head in astonishment, but soon follows after. As he passes Dr. Lillihammer, he offers her a brief, wondering smile.>
<Transcript ends.>
22 August 2022
In which I enjoy my first full day on vacation with grandpa
Zwist wanted to start with the basics. He found us a cabin out in the blah blah woods that nobody else will ever find, at least nobody human, and gave me a few minutes to get my shit stowed before launching straight into his spiel. "I presume nothing," he said in that way he has where his chest puffs out real far, so you know he's storing up a lot of oxygen for one of those famously convoluted pontifications, "and will begin where my masters began. Whatever knowledge you already possess is warped by the means by which it was first discovered. To show you what it really means to write with words of power, I would need to return to first principles."
I shrug. "You backtrack on this every time, so I'm not really surprised. What do you need from me now?"
"I need you to convince me that this apprenticeship will benefit us both, and human society writ large. This is a demand made on me by my first master, Keil; he has fallen so far in my estimations that I would take no further lessons from his example, but in this case his course was wise. Make me believe, as I made him believe. Argument is the first principle of this art."
I had what I needed for my response before the first sentence was even over. Under that massive beard, Thilo has a very expressive face. "No."
One bushy eyebrow went up. "No?"
"No. You didn't convince Keil."
And there went the other one. "Do tell."
I picked up my bag from the dusty floor, and pulled out the little red case. "All good writers are excellent liars. You write on a scale that can't even be properly measured. You might be the greatest writer in human history. That makes your lies so spectacular, I can see them in your eyes before they make it to your muscles and your mouth. Because buddy, I can read. And here's how I read you: you're afraid I'm going to fuck this up, that I'm going to be your next fuckup, so you desperately want me to be better than you were. I'll wager you blubbered out some nonsense to Keil, and then maybe your parents slipped him a deutschmark on the side to take you off their hands. You want me to succeed where you failed, at every step, so why would the first step be any different?"
He blinked at me, then went to fiddle with the fireplace. It hadn't been lit in a long time. "Not bad," he admitted. "Not correct in every particular, and of course you missed the point entirely, but not bad at all."
"What was the point, then?" By the time he was done with the fireplace, I was done with the needle, and it was back in its case.
"As you said, you were able to read me. Figure out how my mind works, interrogate my intentions. That's what I needed to know. That is the true first principle of what we're going to be doing here: writing and reading are two sides of the same 'mark. Keil took pity on my blubbering, Lillian. As I knew he would. You may find this hard to imagine now, but I was once a very persuasive child."
I expected the fire to be green, or throw sparks, or perhaps be simply invisible. Instead, it was just fire.
"We'd better get started." He winced as he straightened up, that wizened old back giving him trouble as it no doubt had for centuries. Imagine that. No thank you. "We'll need you on the recruiting trail by Friday."
I glanced out the window again. Something with cat's eyes flitted away into the bushes I should not have bothered to reference here. "I'm not sure there's that much of a rush. We can probably spare a couple weeks of solid practice first."
He shook his head as he sat back down. "Certainly we cannot."
"Why?"
"Because you must meet your future collaborators as equals, not subordinates. And if I judge your potential well, it won't be long before you're wondering if we'll even need them at all."
It was a productive week, though maybe not as much as I had hoped. The old man, for all his bluster about my passing his test, still didn't really trust me. Every human body produces a certain amount of Elan-Vital Energy, but learning to do anything with it takes decades. I laid out my knowledge of the scientific principles undergirding memetics, and what I'd learned ages ago about its more mystical origins. He clicked his tongue and tutted and shook his head, and then he restated everything I already knew in language he thought would register as profound. Baby steps, I told myself. Even when the baby is over four hundred years old.
But I had more than one avenue of progressing this project, and progressing down one might mean headway on the other as well. So once I was out of name jail again, I called in some chips in a game I'd been playing for years, and attempted something very risky: going two-for-two in my encounters with tricksters of nebulous motive.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer enters a bare and dilapidated warehouse space. The floor is littered with moss, mold, and pieces of broken masonry; light coming from the windows is bright enough to wash out the picture at times, though she entered the space in the early evening. Dozens of desks are spread out across the cavernous, crumbling space, occupied by a variety of mostly humanoid individuals wearing button-down shirts and purple ties.>
<She spots her target, a woman of early middle age with blonde hair unevenly dyed purple, who is presently engaged in an animated telephone call. Dr. Lillihammer moves past the desks; most of the employees look up as she passes, though none make any effort to stop her. One, a rhesus macaque, waves enthusiastically. When Dr. Lillihammer's target sees her approaching, she drops the telephone receiver.>
Uncatalogued PoI: Fuck.
<Sounds of confusion are audible from the dropped receiver.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Hello, Phoebe.
<Phoebe rolls her chair back and leaps to her feet. She points an accusing finger at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Phoebe: Fuck! No.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've never had anyone negate a hello before. You must be a powerful memeticist.
Phoebe: I'm not going back.
Dr. Lillihammer: Back where?
<Phoebe's eyes are filling with tears.>
Phoebe: Don't jerk me around. I… I won't let you jerk me around again.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'd say you must have me confused with someone else, but that's another thing that never happens.
<Phoebe stares at her. Tears are now streaming down her cheeks.>
Phoebe: You're going to pretend you don't know who I am?
<Dr. Lillihammer sits down on the edge of an empty desk. There is a cheerful poster in bright colours on the desk blotter, advertising AMERICAN AMERICAN 3: Actually Just Two Hours of Real News Footage.>
Dr. Lillihammer: If that's the premise that lets us get on with this conversation, then sure. I am pretending not to know who you are. I'm pretending so effectively it's indistinguishable from the truth.
<She yawns.>
Dr. Lillihammer: My read is you're some kind of groupie. Maybe you've got the hots for people with ooze coming out of their eyes. I won't judge.
<Phoebe keeps her distance from Dr. Lillihammer, glowering, not sitting back down but making no move to flee either. The other occupants of the warehouse appear to be ignoring the altercation.>
Phoebe: What are you here for, if you're not taking me in?
Dr. Lillihammer: I didn't say I'm not taking you in. But if I do, you'll have come willingly.
<Phoebe attempts to laugh. It manifests as more of a cough.>
Phoebe: Fat fucking chance.
<Dr. Lillihammer raises a hand.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, hear me out first.
<Phoebe glances in the direction of the point where Dr. Lillihammer entered the space.>
Phoebe: How did you even get in here?
<Dr. Lillihammer scoffs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you kidding? I'm Lillian fucking Lillihammer.
<Phoebe's jaw is now set forward, and her hands, though shaking, are closing into fists.>
Phoebe: I know who you are. Oh, I know who you are.
Dr. Lillihammer: Then it was a stupid question, wasn't it?
Phoebe: Answer the damn question.
Dr. Lillihammer: Your boyfriend told me where you work.
Phoebe: He doesn't know. And he's not my boyfriend. And VKTM.Pronounced "Victim." doesn't let people just waltz into their operations!
<Dr. Lillihammer gestures at the warehouse. The macaque gestures back, obscenely. It is smiling.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes, how ever could I have gained access to this fine and airtight establishment?
Phoebe: It doesn't matter what it looks like. Last week I was working in a snowy field full of deer.
Dr. Lillihammer: All the typing didn't scare them off?
Phoebe: They were giving notes. You ever been criticized by a deer?
Dr. Lillihammer: Anyway.
Phoebe: Anyway. How did you get in here?
Dr. Lillihammer: I asked nicely.
Phoebe: Bullshit.
<A faint voice is again audible from the receiver. By its tone, it appears to be scolding.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Lady, I have been kidnapped by this company more times than you have sworn at me in this conversation. A fr— A colleague of mine is married to VKTM, and I'm not talking about his work ethic, because he hasn't got one. Your bosses and I don't have an understanding — because who could understand them — but they do owe me a solid. And this is what I'm doing with it.
<Phoebe shakes her head back and forth, emphatically.>
Phoebe: They wouldn't give me up like this. I wouldn't even be free if it wasn't for them.
Dr. Lillihammer: If the extent of your talents is circular conversation, this might have been a wasted trip. But Mari says you're a quick study.
<Phoebe's attention snaps back to Dr. Lillihammer.>
Phoebe: I can only think of one reason why they'd let you in here.
Dr. Lillihammer: Is it the reason I gave you?
Phoebe: They're giving me, the opportunity, to tell you to go to hell. To your face.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, job done.
<Phoebe walks to the windows, and begins pacing in front of them.>
Phoebe: You put me through… you tortured me. Was I wrong? Was it wrong, what I did before? Yes. But I didn't deserve that. VKTM showed me what you people are. What you really are. You know what I've spent the last month doing?
Dr. Lillihammer: Practicing this sp—
Photograph of uncatalogued PoI in an anomalous location, 2022.
Phoebe: We put out a feature film today. It's playing in Three Portlands, in every theatre. Anybody hoping to check out that fucking Minions movie is in for a rough ride today. They're going to see Spectre of the Spectrum instead.
Dr. Lillihammer: And that would be…
Phoebe: A dramatization in three acts of the Foundation's internal campaign against queer employees, featuring confidential email exchanges, policy documents performed in cabaret, and a soundtrack by Andrew Lloyd Webber.
Dr. Lillihammer: Why Andrew Lloyd Webber?
<This time Phoebe succeeds in laughing.>
Phoebe: Because they wanted to fuck with him. Because he's an asshole.
Dr. Lillihammer: Huh.
Phoebe: No reaction?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, he definitely is an asshole. Hack, too. Weird ideas about cats…
Phoebe: The movie.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, the play too.
<Phoebe's voice takes on a dangerous tone.>
Phoebe: Our movie. Do you not have anything to say about that?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, it sounds great. I'll buy a ticket. What's your point?
Phoebe: My point is, you come at me on your high horse—
Dr. Lillihammer: I didn't—
Phoebe: You judge me for what I—
Dr. Lillihammer: I wasn't—
Phoebe: I've come a long way, they've helped me—
Dr. Lillihammer: HEY!
<Dr. Lillihammer snaps her fingers.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Hello!
<Phoebe stops pacing, and stares at her.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I don't know who you are! Nobody knows who you are..Confirmed by both RAISA and HARMA analysis. If you've got, I don't know, a lie detector test administered by a rhino in a business suit that I can take, bring it on in. I am not here to fuck up your shit. I am here to stop the general shit-fucking that's going on outside your lovely ambience of decrepitude.
<Phoebe's look of anger has shifted, for the first time, to one of confusion.>
Phoebe: What?
Dr. Lillihammer: The world is ending. Your bosses didn't mention that? No trenchant social commentary about my efforts to keep humanity extant that I can read about in a clever pop-up book with illustrations by the ghost of Dr. Seuss, racist caricatures inclusive? No audiobook read by, I don't fucking know, do you people seriously not have anything to say about the giftschreiber and schriftsteller? Because if not, you're running out of time for the joke to be relevant, and your audience to be alive.
<Silence on recording.>
Phoebe: We did a publicity run for the schriftsteller just last month.
Dr. Lillihammer: What?
Phoebe: Yeah. They were promoting candidates—
<Dr. Lillihammer slips off the desk. Phoebe takes a step back.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Candidates? Like… in an election?
Phoebe: Yeah. In Budapest, or Bucharest, or whatever. Lady attached to the campaign office hired us to film commercials for her guy's anti-immigration stance.
Dr. Lillihammer: And I'm guessing you gave them…
Phoebe: The usual treatment. Yeah. Of course. I wonder if they ever found a new candidate?
<Dr. Lillihammer shakes her head.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's not their MO at all. They don't get people elected. They pull the strings above the system.
<Phoebe snorts.>
Phoebe: Yeah, you lot must have been separated at birth.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm surprised they didn't know about you lot. And what you do.
Phoebe: So were we. But hey, never look a gift moose in the mouth.
Dr. Lillihammer: What about the giftschreiber?
<Phoebe shrugs, though stiffly. Her hands are still balled.>
Phoebe: I dunno, probably. That's, like, some anarchist thing, right? There was a guy last week wanting us to make VHS tapes that convince you some Japanese ghost is chasing you until you have a heart attack.
Dr. Lillihammer: What did you give him instead?
Phoebe: That.
Dr. Lillihammer: Wait for it.
Phoebe: Only he gets the heart attacks.
Dr. Lillihammer: All of them?
Phoebe: All of them.
Dr. Lillihammer: I thought you guys didn't kill people.
Phoebe: Well, of course we don't. How would he get the heart attacks?
Dr. Lillihammer: I feel like I've lost control of this conversation.
Phoebe: Like I said, it's not a conversation. I've done my flirting…
<She scowls.>
Phoebe: I've done my experimenting with people like you. People worse than you. I've had time to examine myself, and understand why I did what I did, believed what I believed. I've met people outside of my little bubble, and I've tried to understand them, instead of looking for ways to make them more like me. Can you say the same?
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe if I knew what the hell you were alluding to.
<Phoebe looks at the ceiling, and makes an angry, wordless exclamation. It is echoed by the voice from the telephone receiver.>
Phoebe: You want me to say it? You want me to admit it out loud? Is that what this is?
Dr. Lillihammer: This is a recruitment, Phoebe.
<Phoebe again looks confused.>
Phoebe: Recruitment for what?
Dr. Lillihammer: The job of a lifetime. VKTM is content with just spotlighting the problems. I'm not.
Phoebe: I think you and I define the problems very differently.
Dr. Lillihammer: If the extent of your ambition is to point to the emperor having no clothes, that's your business. Personally? I want to pull his very real and very expensive trousers down, and get HD pics of his fat rotting orange ass. I want to make these people say what's really on their minds, and when they do? I'm going to make them pay for it.
<The macaque is clapping. It stops when Dr. Lillihammer gives it the middle finger over her shoulder, without turning around.>
Phoebe: I've heard big speeches before. There's an enemy, and we need to be afraid of them, and we need to destroy them, because we've got this grand and glorious plan for the future. People who don't want what we want are broken at best, evil at worst, and we'd all be better off if they would act normal or drop dead. I'm not falling for it again.
Dr. Lillihammer: Phoebe—
<Phoebe raises a finger, and brandishes it at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Phoebe: That's right. Phoebe. That's my name. You know what it means?
Dr. Lillihammer: Pure.
<Phoebe blinks.>
Phoebe: …yes. That is what it means. The person I used to be? Not so pure. But she's gone now. She didn't understand the world, and she didn't understand herself. But she figured it out, with a little help. I'm not a follower anymore. I don't need to be saved, and I don't need to be fixed. I know what I did wrong, and I know what I need to do to make up for it. I know what I want.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've been to your apartment.
Phoebe: Of course you fucking have.
Dr. Lillihammer: Your boyfriend thinks—
Phoebe: I told you, I don't have a boyfriend. I have a friend. A man who shares my bed. He knows what I can give, and what I need in return. If you'd just fucking listen instead of making assumptions all the time, maybe people wouldn't think you're such a…
<Phoebe wrinkles her nose and bites back the remainder of her words.>
Phoebe: I used to think there was romance in giving yourself up to someone else, to their ideals, their mission in life. I'm sure there is, for other people. I used to think I wanted that too, because that's what everyone told me to want. Because there was never even the slightest suggestion that another way to exist existed. If they'd let me figure it out on my own, I never would have ended up here. I never would have made the mistakes I made. But now that I am here, I'm going to do the best I can to stop people like B—
<She bites down, hard. Her lip is bleeding when she resumes speaking.>
Phoebe: To stop people like you from turning people like me into tools for your own perverse ends. I'm not the bad guy you made me anymore. But you haven't changed.
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure sounds like you've got some great ideas for how to change the world. Hope the deer don't edit them down too savagely. You know how committees can be with people's dreams, right?
<She stretches, theatrically.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, guess that puts a neat little bow on it.
<Phoebe eyes her suspiciously.>
Phoebe: I guess it does.
Dr. Lillihammer: Might still try to catch that flick, though.
Phoebe: You know it's about you, right?
Dr. Lillihammer: I wouldn't touch anything HR-related with a ten foot pole, unless it was sharp.
Phoebe: I mean they're coming for you. For people like you.
Dr. Lillihammer: Gosh, I hope they find some. I'd really love to meet them.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
I got more than one request to lend my talents to our crackdown on that film's premiere. Had to go all the way to the Council to get confirmation that this would be a waste of time and ability; went on the record saying we could have thicker skin and a sunnier disposition, since we're trying to make friends in this fight. The response I got went on my record, the permanent one, but in the end they let me have my way with myself.
I’m sure there’s a way to feel grateful for that.
The movie was pretty good, in the end, though I don't think I would have cast Mickey Rooney as the Black Queen. Kind of in bad taste.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: Before returning to the most annoying place in the world to continue my training, I checked on how ETTRA was handling the FIREBREAK fallout in my absence. Since nothing was presently smouldering, I used my recess to look into Phoebe's claim about cryptomancers rigging electoral races. Maybe she was screwing with me, or maybe VKTM was screwing with her (they definitely were), but it turns out the B-city she was thinking of was Boston. A campaign runner named Mary-Anne Hart was headlining a Unite the Right rally in support of a politician named Chad Freeman, and the internet was all gaga about the guy. His voting history in the Senate, his picture-perfect marriage of twenty years, his extremely clever and very funny pro-fracking memes. My expectation was that none of this had existed before the week of the rally. I was wrong – except about the fracking memes, but they’re literally never funny, so. Chad was a pre-existing plant, and Hart’s job was to talk him up. Like I told Phoebe, none of this is in the schriftsteller playbook.
This was something new, and I needed to find out what.
<Transcript begins.>
<There is a large crowd gathered in Boston Common around a tackily-decorated stage. Dr. Lillihammer is watching from the front row, at the barriers, as an elderly man in a baseball cap waves to the crowd and heads backstage.>
<An announcer speaks over the PA system.>
Announcer: Mike Love, everybody!
<The crowd cheers.>
Announcer: It wouldn't be summer without him. But now, Harts and Minds is proud to present the lady you've all been waiting for. The great white hope. The scourge of the woke. The falconer's choice. Miss! Mary-Anne! Hart!
<The crowd cheers loudly as a young woman in a bright blue blazer takes the stage. She is holding a microphone.>
<Dr. Lillihammer moves back through the crowd, looking away as Hart begins to speak.>
Hart: How about that Mike Love, everybody? Maybe we'll get Brian Wilson next time.
<The crowd cheers.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Good luck.
Hart: Can I get a shout-out for Chad Freeman?
<The crowd cheers.>
Hart: He can’t be with us today, but he’ll be so happy to hear about all your smiling faces. I can feel the good vibrations in the audience! You're all feeling fine. Feeling alive. You've got a lot of energy, and that's great. You're going to need it.
<Dr. Lillihammer moves past the portable toilets, cracks her neck, then walks toward a cluster of security guards standing in front of the path to the backstage area.>
Hart: But I need you to bring it down a little right now. I need, if you'll pardon the expression, a little less love in the air. I'm not here to bring anyone together today. I'm here to talk about hate.
<The crowd cheers.>
Hart: I'm just like you. You know it's true. I'm everything you think you are, and a few things you think you want to be, too. Of course I'm a whole lot smarter, but that's mostly wasted, because it doesn't even matter what I say right now. You'll cheer just as loudly if I quote Shakespeare or make fart noises into my microphone for twenty minutes.
<The crowd cheers.>
<The largest security guard looks Dr. Lillihammer up and down, arms crossed.>
Guard: ID?
<Dr. Lillihammer raises a small piece of cardstock. The guard's eyes cross.>
Hart: It's really quite incredible. I could call each and every one of you names, and tomorrow you'd only remember that I look the way you wish your wife looked, or I said something hilariously regressive about gender politics that made you feel safe and in control. You’re rewriting my words in your head to match what you expect one of Chad’s platinum blondes to be spouting. But you know what really pisses me off about that?
<The crowd cheers.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is now walking back along the barricades, on the side opposite the crowd.>
Hart: I spent a long time making myself into the sort of person who can stand up here and spew bullshit, and have it parse as reflecting your biases. To be able to just straight up lie and not get called on it. To say one thing here, and another thing there, and have both crowds believe the things they heard and refuse to countenance the opposite.
<The crowd laughs.>
<Dr. Lillihammer has reached the backstage area. She flashes another piece of cardstock at a woman standing by the steps with a clipboard.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Listen very carefully.
<She begins whispering in the woman's ear.>
Hart: Then somebody pulled the cork out of some fucking genie bottle somewhere, and now everybody is making up bullshit and saying whatever they feel like saying, and they're not getting in trouble for it. You know how that makes me feel?
<Silence on recording.>
Hart: It makes me glad I'm not gonna have to sit through four more years of this.
<The crowd cheers.>
Hart: You all went insane way ahead of schedule, and it's a goddamn depressing shame. We don’t need to make you believe anything, we just need to find a guy who speaks to all your worst impulses. It was never supposed to be this easy, but I guess we’ll take the win anyway.
<She raises both hands over her head.>
Hart: Screw all of you. Go punch a minority, or whatever. Vote Freeman, he hates whatever you hate. Burn your sneakers. Thank you!
<The crowd erupts in applause, whistles and cheers.>
Announcer: Give it up for the belle of Boston, Miss Mary-Anne Hart!
<The crowd continues to cheer as Hart heads for the stairs to the backstage area.>
Announcer: We'll be hearing from the good folks at the Right Fight podcast in just a few minutes, but now I've got a special treat for you. Live from the snowy peaks of Ontario, Canada, please join me in welcoming to the stage MISS! LILLIAN! LILLIHAMMER!
<Hart freezes on the stage as Dr. Lillihammer walks up, snatches the microphone from her hand, and pushes her over. Hart crashes against an amplifier, and tumbles over the side of the stage, as a hush falls over the crowd.>
Dr. Lillihammer: How my persecuted majority doing tonight?
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, poor you.
<She nestles the microphone into a stand, then notices an electric guitar with an American flag motif left behind after Mike Love's exit. She grimaces as she picks it up, unplugs it, and pulls a stool up to the edge of the stage.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I thought about coming out here like Jenny in Forrest Gump, give you inbred cocksuckers a show that'd really open your eyes, but you've been pandered to enough lately. I call this song "Hey, But Fuck You Actually."
<She begins to sing.>
Oscar Meyer, and Sweet Baby Ray
Bubblin' burgers on the charcoal today
Gather up the kinfolk 'round that old barbecue
There's meat in every mouth my friends, and friends, that meat is you
<The crowd is restless. The organizers are looking at each other in obvious perplexity. No-one is helping Hart back to her feet; she is tangled in amplifier cables, and shouting, though the sound cannot be heard over Dr. Lillihammer's singing.>
<Dr. Lillihammer begins strumming the unplugged electric guitar, adding tinny chords as background to her lyrics.>
The left falls apart, you know
They fall down and whimper so
They can't take the heat, oh no
The left falls apart!
<The crowd sings, flatly.>
Crowd: The left falls apart!
The left falls apart, it's true
But let's not forget about you
'cuz I can't drink to your health
The left falls apart!
<Dr. Lillihammer claps three times.>
The right eats itself.
<As one, the crowd turn on each other. Punches are thrown across Boston Commons.>
You put the Palestinians through living hell
But you’ve also fooled ‘em down in Is-ra-el
‘cuz once you’ve made the strip safe for casinos and bars
We both know you’ll be breakin’ out the six-point stars
<A trio of musicians emerge from the backstage area: two guitarists, an elderly male and an adult woman, with a male keyboardist. They set up their instruments, and begin backing Dr. Lillihammer’s guitar and vocals.>
The left falls apart, and that ain't wrong
It's a story we've been tellin’ for way too long
But you're a bucket of crabs on the edge of the shelf
The left falls apart!
<Dr. Lillihammer claps three times, as do her backing musicians. A gunshot is heard.>
The right eats itself.
<A middle-aged woman in front of the stage smashes her placard over the head of the man beside her.>
Billionaires, and the bozos they bilk
Bible thumpers breakin' bread with all of Epstein's ilk
Ladies standin' by their men who wish they couldn't vote
Flat Earthers and Elon in one god damn leaky boat…The left falls apart, but before it's too late
You'd better lose the tinfoil and vaccinate
Before you reach the punchline of a deadly joke
The left falls apart!
<The crowd claps along while the riot escalates.>
And you're all gonna choke
<The keyboardist engages in a solo as Dr. Lillihammer recites the bridge.>
Now I guess I shouldn’t blame you for the company you keep
Beggars can't be choosers, and the loser's gonna weep
But the prize you've got in mind can only feed the chosen few
So when the libs are finally owned, there’ll be just one more thing to do…
<She winks as a beer bottle explodes on the stage backing behind her. The elderly guitarist laughs. Dr. Lillihammer resumes playing with extra gusto, and the others join in.>
The left falls apart, and let me tell you why
It's 'cuz it's easier to crumple than to let it fly
But when the chips are down, you'll never share the wealth
'cuz deep down you feel
And you know that it’s real
You’re gonna sit down to that meal…
<She claps again. There are sirens in the distance, and the rally has dissolved fullt into chaos.>
You're gonna eat yourselves.
<Hart has extricated herself from the wires, and walks over to Dr. Lillihammer. She sits down on the stage, cross-legged, and shakes her head.>
Hart: You had all that just ready to go?
<Dr. Lillihammer smirks.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That was off the cuff. I'll workshop it before the album.
<She stands, bows to the crowd — which is entirely ignoring her as the police arrive to break up the riot — then smashes Love's guitar to splinters on the stage.>
<Transcript ends.>
No idea who the band was.
10 October 2022
In which the finale is foreshadowed
We sat in the shade of an oak tree carved with a heart containing no names, just the spaces where you could feel names once had been. Curious eyes watched —at a distance — as we reclined in the dappled sunlight.
"Every word in every language," he wheezed, "has parents and grandparents, brothers, sisters, cousins and the like. They have generations, and they share DNA."
"Etymology," I supplied.
"That's right. If you can understand how words relate to each other, how they developed, in what order they came into existence and how much they have been altered to their present form, you will grasp the mittelgrammatik. You will see how they strengthen or weaken each other, and draw different meanings from the spiritus mundi entirely apart from superficial literality."
"Mittelgrammatik," I said. "Middle grammar. Hooray for Germanic languages." Except the whole thing where they all share a virus that can make you catch fire and die, thanks to the old man digesting his cale sandwich beside me. That part's not so praiseworthy. "So the trick is to play on the noöspheric channels made by lexical evolution, while still crafting good, solid sentences."
He inclined his head, and his cap slipped over his eyes. He left it there. "That's the start of it."
"Then what?"
He smiled, and folded his hands in front of his prodigious chest. "It's best not to get ahead of ourselves."
It’s been a few months, so I'm practiced at mentally re-writing my preferred responses before spitting them out. "I'd just like to get a sense of what the next lesson will be, that's all."
"After you've mastered this — and it will take you some time — we will move on to the unter and ubergrammatik."
"Can I guess what those are?"
He spread those gnarled hands. "Be my guest."
"Underlying grammar. You talked to Izaak Okorie about that, a long time ago."
"I did."
"But you didn't tell him what it was. You were doing work for the Foundation…"
"Briefly."
"You made logos, and a few front companies. Euler broke your work down to particles, and they studied those. Probably nobody's ever really explained that to you before."
I can sense his brows furrowing beneath the hat. "I've gleaned the gist."
"I don't think we discovered anything underlying the cryptomancy, but the particles were clearly applied after the paint. A second layer of meaning applied thaumaturgically, which breaks down into the component parts of communication. So I'd imagine your ubergrammatik is a simpler but more powerful means of conveying a message, a strong but more visceral one, piggybacked on the visible words. Like the superstructure on a vessel."
He nodded, so slowly and so long that for a moment I thought he was nodding off. Cale will do that to you. "Correct in several respects, though not all. Any guesses as to the other?"
"Untergrammatik. Hmm. I'll have to think about that."
"Yes." He stretched, then clasped his hands behind his neck. "You will. I want you thinking about it every day, until you have an answer."
"Presumably not in a vacuum."
"No. I have a variety of exercises prepared for you, and we can begin whenever you'd like."
"When you say prepared for me, do you mean that? Or am I getting sloppy seconds from the last people you trained?"
He tensed. Just a little, but enough for me to notice. He might be immortal, but however much I flattered him on the topic earlier, he hasn't spent much of that time practicing to deceive. "The principles are the same," he said stiffly. "I can do nothing about that. But given my questionable success rate, no. This course of study will be quite new."
And quite secret, of course, so the rest of the week passed in activity I'm not allowed to relate. When I popped back into the world that only threatens your identity in mundane, overt ways, I still hadn't figured out the untergrammatik… at least not enough that I'd have been comfortable hazarding a guess out loud. But on the topic of Thilo's apprenticeships, I'd learned a great deal.
Enough to shape my extracurriculars when the week rolled over.
It's been a rough decade for academics, on both sides of the Veil. For a while, one source of their misfortune was a crusader against long beards in panelled offices, and the dusty echo chambers which they operated. This worthy kept one step ahead of me until the climate shifted, and more pressing concerns faced the academy than tenured and blinkered bores. When my quarry started taking potshots at their new targets, there was really no way to hide the fallout. I traced it back to its source, and the chase came to its end.
Probably.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is walking down a well-lit city sidewalk at night. There are other pedestrians on both sides, promenading or patronizing bars and shops. A figure in a leather jacket with a dyed blonde mohawk and reflective sunglasses is ahead of her, hands stuffed in their pockets and a sour look on their face. They look behind them, perform a double-take when they see Dr. Lillihammer, and slow their pace so the latter can overtake them.>
PoI-5734: What the hell are you supposed to be?
Dr. Lillihammer: There are many opinions. I do not collect them.
PoI-5734: Been nice talking.
Photograph of PoI-5734 at an undisclosed location, 2022.
<They quicken their pace again. Dr. Lillihammer easily keeps up as PoI-5734 crosses the street, looking up at her in irritation.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You're not going anywhere important. All the government offices are closed at this hour, Dorothy.
<PoI-5734 scowls.>
PoI-5734: Which cult are you with?
Dr. Lillihammer: Neither. I'm with the Foundation.
PoI-5734: Oh. That one.
Dr. Lillihammer: It was fun ferreting you out.
<PoI-5734 has reached the sidewalk. They continue walking along its edge, forcing Dr. Lillihammer to tread on the tarmac, dodge around parked vehicles and avoid oncoming traffic.>
PoI-5734: Thilo put you up to this?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, Thilo thinks you're a lost cause. Of course, he loves lost causes, so maybe he was hoping I'd go after you anyway.
<PoI-5734 snorts.>
PoI-5734: He loves hoping, too. Me? I prefer to actually do things.
Dr. Lillihammer: We have that in common.
PoI-5734: Probably the only thing.
Dr. Lillihammer: Probably not.
<PoI-5734 swerves to avoid a light pole, and Dr. Lillihammer steps up onto the sidewalk. She puts her arm around PoI-5734, who tenses.>
Dr. Lillihammer: The way you said hello? I know that tone. People ask you what you're supposed to be all the time, don't they?
<PoI-5734 responds through grit teeth.>
PoI-5734: It's a trick question.
Dr. Lillihammer: What's the trick?
PoI-5734: We're not supposed to be anything. We just are. Anybody challenges that, they're projecting insecurities.
Dr. Lillihammer: The most primal of all human terrors: seeing people who aren't you.
PoI-5734: "If people can be not me, that means it's possible for me to be not me!" And they'd rather see the world burn than have that be true.
<Dr. Lillihammer pats PoI-5734's shoulder.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Somebody ought to educate them.
<PoI-5734 swats her away.>
PoI-5734: Somebody ought to shoot them into the sun.
Dr. Lillihammer: We could literally do that. I've seen plans drafted up.
<PoI-5734 steps into an alley, and crosses their arms.>
PoI-5734: Am I being contained, officer?
<Dr. Lillihammer steps into the alley with them.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not responding to that.
PoI-5734: So I'm not being contained? Then why don't you tell me what it is you want, so we can get this over with while the bars are still open?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm a big fan of your work.
PoI-5734: Sure.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm serious. You started out turning verbs into self-replicating acid, deteriorating related concepts at a rapid rate. Out of spite, you created one of the most virulent linguohazards I've ever seen. And that was just your opening act.
PoI-5734: What makes you think that was me?
Dr. Lillihammer: The way you're sticking out your jaw proudly instead of angrily, now.
PoI-5734: What if I told you there's a whole army of us out there, and "Dorothy Bradbury" is just a name we pass around to make the legend look bigger?
Dr. Lillihammer: Honestly? I'd be even more impressed. You'd be taking your example from someone who really made a mark on that pristine, towering mausoleum they call higher learning in this country.
<PoI-5734 snorts.>
Dr. Lillihammer: The Dorothy Bradbury I'm thinking of forcibly retired the entire English faculty at ██SU. They figured every thought worth articulating was already circulating in the classics, and history was over, so my hero DB made them inarticulate and gave a whole generation of up-and-comers a shot at the tenure track.
PoI-5734: Hoorah, for all the good it did.
Dr. Lillihammer: A barfly matching your exact description, on the other hand, made a woman shit herself every time someone said "decolonization" in her presence.
PoI-5734: She didn't think it was a real thing. And I was drunk.
Dr. Lillihammer: You, or yous, conflated the concepts of "textbook" and "theft" at three different state colleges.
PoI-5734: If you charge fifty cents per page, you deserve to have the cops called on you.
Dr. Lillihammer: And now you're the shield of the academy.
<PoI-5734 spits.>
PoI-5734: I'm not trying to prop up those twisted old fucks who treat open minds as receptacles for their gangrenous drool. I'm just trying to prevent a new Dark Age.
Dr. Lillihammer: The Dark Ages kind of didn't exist, my archivist friend tells me.
PoI-5734: They will, though. If things keep up the way they are.
Dr. Lillihammer: Which is why you made Betsy DeVos resign..United States Secretary of Education, 2017-2021.
PoI-5734: Technically I just made it so she couldn't tell the difference between "resign" and "privatize," and "I" and "the United States public school system."
Dr. Lillihammer: And also so she spoke backwards.
PoI-5734: Yeah, grammar's a tricky thing. I hear they spun it as some moral stand, though, which pisses me off.
Dr. Lillihammer: You've been at this for months. You've knocked over a dozen Republican lawmakers and who knows how many tastemakers in the field of education.
PoI-5734: Seventeen. Next month I'm gonna make the Hoover Institute forget what money is. It's gonna be great.
Dr. Lillihammer: Like I said, big fan. Although honestly, it's not always clear what's you and what's them just being inherently incompetent and moronic.
PoI-5734: You want an itemized list?
Dr. Lillihammer: I want to talk shop.
<PoI-5734 scowls, and turns to watch the crowds walking past.>
PoI-5734: Nuh uh. We're not having a moment here, lady. You came to chew me out for sticking my fingers up the man's nose, so get it over with. I'll pretend to listen, and you can pretend to think I've turned over a new leaf, and we can both say we did our due diligence.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not here to chew you out. I'm not running interference for anybody. This is my rodeo.
PoI-5734: And I'm the steer?
Dr. Lillihammer: You'd definitely be a catch.
<PoI-5734 turns to look at her again, surprised.>
Dr. Lillihammer: What's the answer?
PoI-5734: To what?
Dr. Lillihammer: To the question you asked me earlier. What are you?
PoI-5734: You wouldn't know the word.
Dr. Lillihammer: I live for new words. Give me life.
<PoI-5734 exhales in frustration.>
PoI-5734: I'm Okitcitakwe. It's an Anishnaabe… are you seriously Googling it.
<Dr. Lillihammer has taken out her telephone, and is scrolling.>
PoI-5734: You don't even know how it's spelled.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've got a great ear for phonemes. Comes with the job.
<She pauses.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Google thinks I mean "Kitkat."
PoI-5734: Google needs to die.
Dr. Lillihammer: That'll be my next project. What's Okitcitakwe mean?
PoI-5734: Warrior woman.
Dr. Lillihammer: Apropos.
<She puts her phone away.>
PoI-5734: Don't patronize me.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not trying to. What you're doing? It might just be that mythical Good War.
PoI-5734: Don't try to flatter me, either. You're only marginally better than the government, and it's a real commentary on the last few years that it shakes out that way.
<Dr. Lillihammer sighs in frustration.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Jesus Christ. I get it. You don't like realtalk. Neither do I. We're both too cool for school. But I'm trying to have an honest conversation here, Dottie.
PoI-5734: And you were doing a great job until you ended on a diminutive.
Dr. Lillihammer: See, this is why I need you. You can say 'diminutive' correctly on the first go. I can't always even spell it.
PoI-5734: If you don't leave me alone, right now, I'll make it so you can't even spell your own name.
<They smile an unfriendly smile.>
PoI-5734: Or maybe so nobody can.
Dr. Lillihammer: You know how many people have that kind of linguistic control?
<PoI-5734 answers immediately.>
PoI-5734: Two.
Dr. Lillihammer: One. Thilo has to stumble into it, or get a run up. You're the ideal type wordsmith, Dorothy Bradbury, whether that is or isn't your name alone. And words are going to get us out of this.
PoI-5734: 'This' being…
Dr. Lillihammer: The cycle. The war.
<PoI-5734 suddenly slumps against the alley wall, and looks up at the sky.>
PoI-5734: That's never going to end. That's forever. You might as well try to change the tides by pushing the moon.
Dr. Lillihammer: See? I need more of these metaphors in my life.
PoI-5734: I'm doing the work of a lifetime here. I'm realizing dreams we've had for decades, and I'm preventing damage that would take a generation to fix. I don't have time in that schedule for fascist outreach.
<A police officer is standing on the sidewalk, eyeing Dr. Lillihammer suspiciously as she towers over PoI-5734.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You don't believe in educating the right?
PoI-5734: I believe in ostracizing them, encouraging them to select out of the reproductive system, teaching their children to be embarrassed of them when that fails, and letting them die and their bad ideas with them when that succeeds.
<The police officer walks away.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That sounds like it's going to take a few years, even with your little immersion program.
PoI-5734: Well, I'm still young.
Dr. Lillihammer: But the night is not.
PoI-5734: I take it you're doing the metaphors now.
Dr. Lillihammer: So you’re a warrior woman. And you’ve got a cause. But is this a one-woman war, do you think?
PoI-5734: You live on stolen land. You had your chance to join the good fight. Dozens of chances. You chose to look the other way.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes, we did. We did do that. We’re still doing that. But you’re ignoring something pressing, too.
PoI-5734: There’s always a distraction. Always something more important than paying what you owe, or setting the record straight.
Dr. Lillihammer: This isn’t about that. You’re not wrong, and I will help the others see that if you help me. But if you don't, the fascists are going to run out the clock. The game is about to end, Dorothy, and right now the bad guys are topping the leaderboard. You want all your hard work, everything people have suffered for, to mean something?
<PoI-5734 glares fiercely at Dr. Lillihammer.>
PoI-5734: It has always meant something.
Dr. Lillihammer: You want to win?
PoI-5734: I do want to win.
Dr. Lillihammer: Then you need to help me play for time. And if you do, like I said, like I promised, I'll help you tear down those ivory towers myself. We can turn that dipshit, what's his name? The Muppet?
PoI-5734: Jordan Peterson?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. We can turn him back into a pumpkin together, you and me. What do you say?
PoI-5734: I say lousy bait is lousy. What could we do to him that's more damning than what he does to himself on a regular basis? How do you top "made himself mortally allergic to cider" or "stupided himself into a coma"?
Dr. Lillihammer: Truly one of the greatest minds of our generation.
PoI-5734: Your generation. Not mine.
Dr. Lillihammer: We don't want him either.
PoI-5734: But you're not going to do anything about him.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right now? Not unless he's anomalous. I'll leave the normies to you.
PoI-5734: Thanks.
<They pause.>
PoI-5734: Wait, you don't suppose he's actually…
Dr. Lillihammer: No.
PoI-5734: No.
Dr. Lillihammer: He might be a native speaker of bafflegab, but he's not an expert in anything. All the gifts and schrifts are actually knowledgeable in their areas. Peterson's just full of shit.
PoI-5734: Maybe he's a new thing.
Both: [simultaneously] Griftschreiber.
<Both laugh.>
Dr. Lillihammer: See? We're having a moment after all.
<PoI-5734 examines Dr. Lillihammer thoughtfully.>
PoI-5734: Moment's passed.
<They leave the alley, and resume their stroll up the sidewalk.>
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
I would have taken one of Dottie over an army of trained memeticists, because the warrior woman actually stands for something. If there really is an army of them out there, well, I desperately want them on our side.
Naturally as soon as I updated their file, I got a very angry email from the Department of Containment wanting to know why I let a dangerous Person of Interest go free.
They weren't very impressed when I told them said Interesting Person would be a whole lot more dangerous in a cage, or when I told them to Google "Wounded Knee."
I was starting to think the word wizards were giving me the week off, as the end of my intermission rapidly approached. That's when I got a call from an old friend.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: I responded to a call for help from the Director of Site-41, on an extremely secure line connecting directly to my office. I arrived in Colorado to find the facility exterior deserted, and some new friends setting up camp. The results were, as shown below, quite memorable.
<Dr. Lillihammer approaches the entrance to Site-41 from the main car lot. She is wearing a version of her usual dazzle coat, but with the colours inverted. There is a man on the roof with a scoped rifle; he is attempting to target her, but wavering badly.>
<She raises a long, thin white enamel wand with a cluster of diodes on the tip — a custom-made optogenetic stimulator — and presses several buttons on the shaft. A series of flashes follow, and the sniper drops his rifle off the edge of the roof. It clatters onto the entrance awning, alerting two guards stationed in the airlock. The sniper sits down, confused, and makes no effort to further engage.>
Object permanence. Boys and their toys.
<Dr. Lillihammer adjusts the controls on her device as the two guards emerge from the front door, weapons drawn. One is wearing spiral pattern camouflage, while the other wears an Antimemetics Division labcoat. Dr. Lillihammer winces before pulling a pair of 3-D glasses out of her coat pocket with her free hand and slapping them on.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm Lillian Lillihammer.
<Both guards turn to face each other, responding as though the other had spoken.>
Dr. Lillihammer: And I'm here to murder you.
<The lights flash again, and the guards open fire on each other.>
Memories are constructed in the brain. While they reside in short-term memory, they can be reconstructed. Two different uniforms, and poor synchronization; these two didn't know each other very well.
<Once inside Site-41, Dr. Lillihammer moves with extreme caution. Catching a glimpse of an armed figure in the reflection of a laboratory window, she takes a moment to calculate the angle and then fires a series of pulses at the distant glass before removing a fire axe from the wall.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, I'm setting a trap over here.
<The guard immediately rounds the corner, then stops as though he has forgotten why. Dr. Lillihammer brains him with the blunt end of the axe.>
Absent-mindedness inhibits memory retrieval.
<She hefts the axe over her shoulder before continuing.>
<The next corridor over contains two dead giftschreiber in spiral camouflage. Dr. Lillihammer kneels, and presses her finger to a clean spot of tile.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Blood.
<She rubs her clean forefinger and thumb together thoughtfully.>
<She encounters two more live giftschreiber as she progresses through the halls, and three additional corpses. She overcomes the first opponent by paralyzing his central executive function, and the second by overriding their procedural memory so that they are incapable of remembering how their firearm functions.>
<A final giftschreiber is standing outside the door to Chamber 3125, a portable radio in her hand.>
Giftschreiber: Repeat, I've lost contact with the entire floor. Someone's in here. Over.
<When her finger is off the microphone trigger, she sees Dr. Lillihammer. The stimulator flashes three times, and Dr. Lillihammer grabs the guard by her lapels.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Did you kill me?
Giftschreiber: What?
<The radio crackles.>
Voice: Do you have eyes on the target, Gisele?
Dr. Lillihammer: Did you kill me? DID YOU KILL ME?
Giftschreiber: I…
Dr. Lillihammer: DID YOU KILL ME?
<The guard blinks, then picks up her radio again.>
Giftschreiber: I killed her.
You'd be surprised how quickly people remember things that never happened, with enough external stimuli.
<Dr. Lillihammer clubs the woman on the back of the neck, where her helmet doesn't quite meet the neck armour.>
Voice: Vergiss dich.
For a moment, I didn't know where I was. The axe fell out of my numb fingers. On reflex, I took a deep breath; Thilo had trained me to re-engage my senses every time I get confused. I smelled my perfume, and the moment was over. If not the danger.
<Dr. Lillihammer raises her stimulator. It emits three sequential pulses of green light.>
<The giftschreiber lifts his rifle, looks down at it, and frowns. He turns the barrel to point at his own face, his other hand wandering towards the trigger.>
<Dr. Lillihammer kicks his feet out from under him, and catches the weapon awkwardly. She ejects the magazine after several attempts, looks down at the baffled giftschreiber, then shrugs and simply drops the weapon butt-first onto his face.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You're welcome, Thilo.
Most people have no reason to know this, but remembering how something works and knowing how to translate those memories into action are two different mental processes. Bit of an exploit, if you ask me. I'd have designed something better.
<The fallen giftschreiber's radio crackles.>
Voice: Gisele's not responding. Let's go to… oh, I dunno. Call it Condition Red?
Dr. Lillihammer: Army of cats.
<She picks up the radio, and clears her throat before pressing the transmit button.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Autumn leaves. The Canadian flag. Strawberries. The human heart. Love.
<Voices respond over the radio.>
Second Voice: Condition Red. Aye aye.
Third Voice: Thank god. I thought this was serious.
Fourth Voice: I'm gonna see if I can find that pool table.
First Voice: Gisele's probably taking a nap. Man, this was almost too easy.
<Dr. Lillihammer drops the radio. The backing snaps off and the battery pops out as it strikes the floor.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You're telling me.
<A few minutes later, Dr. Lillihammer has arrived at a clean white containment unit with an airlock door. There is an unconscious man in the airlock. Dr. Lillihammer taps at the controls, enters her override code, and the door begins revolving. She hauls the apparent giftschreiber out, then cycles herself into the chamber beyond.>
<When the airlock door opens, Dr. Lillihammer is facing down the barrel of a small pistol.>
Dir. Wheeler: Prove it.
<Dr. Lillihammer examines the SCP-3125 containment chamber. She notices a bottle of slow-acting Class-Z mnestics on the counter, smiles, and picks it up.>
<Dir. Wheeler watches in surprise as Dr. Lillihammer pops a single pill into her mouth, and chews it.>
<One minute passes.>
<Dr. Lillihammer hiccoughs, and smiles in mild embarrassment. Dir. Wheeler raises an eyebrow. Dr. Lillihammer sticks her tongue out, revealing that the pill is entirely gone.>
Dir. Wheeler: Huh.
<She nods, and lowers her weapon.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Better get moving. You left a hell of a trail out there.
Dir. Wheeler: The bodies?
Dr. Lillihammer: The blood.
Dir. Wheeler: I didn't actually see any blood.
Dr. Lillihammer: Really?
Dir. Wheeler: Yeah. So I assumed they were antimemes masquerading as people. No?
Dr. Lillihammer: No.
Dir. Wheeler: Huh.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, now we know their blood is antimemetic. That could be useful.
Dir. Wheeler: Make a note.
<Dr. Wheeler moves past Dr. Lillihammer to stand at the airlock door.>
Dir. Wheeler: What's it like out there?
Dr. Lillihammer: The way you left it, only with a lot more unconscious assholes.
Dir. Wheeler: You should have killed them.
Dr. Lillihammer: Might still do. Where's your staff?
Dir. Wheeler: Sent them to the basement. Where's your backup?
Dr. Lillihammer: You and I both know there's only two survivors of this, no matter how many people go in.
Dir. Wheeler: Fair enough. They're on the obelisk.
Dr. Lillihammer: Of course they are. You good to move?
<Dir. Wheeler cycles the airlock.>
Dir. Wheeler: Been waiting for hours.
<Their path down the perimeter hallways of Site-41 intersects with multiple giftschreiber patrols. Dir. Wheeler incapacitates the majority with the butt of the fire axe Dr. Lillihammer discarded earlier, only taking recourse to her service weapon when getting up close is infeasible.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Jesus, let me get a few shots in would you?
Dir. Wheeler: My Site's been invaded by humans.
Dr. Lillihammer: Don't beat yourself up over it.
Dir. Wheeler: I'm not embarrassed. I'm insulted.
<As they exit the containment wing, Dr. Lillihammer notices two guards standing outside the structure through floor-to-ceiling windows.>
Dir. Wheeler: Do your knees still sneak? Mine don't.
Dr. Lillihammer: I got this.
<Dr. Lillihammer takes careful aim with her optogenetic stimulator, and flashes a pattern of lights on the visor of one giftschreiber's helmet. The other raises his weapon and fires into his partner's bulletproof vest until the latter is lying on the pavement, gasping and bleeding.>
<The standing giftschreiber raises his radio to his mouth.>
Giftschreiber: Hostile down.
<Dr. Lillihammer knocks on the glass. The giftschreiber turns to face her; before he can release the radio's transmit button and raise his weapon, a new series of flashes passes between them.>
Giftschreiber: Hostile down. Hostile down.
<He shakes his head violently.>
Giftschreiber: Hostile down. Hostile down. Hostile down.
Dir. Wheeler: Phonological loop. Where'd you get that thing?
Dr. Lillihammer: Traded in my phone.
Giftschreiber: Hostile down.
Dir. Wheeler: They're going to think there's an army attacking.
<Dr. Lillihammer grins.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Semantics.
<There is a sudden screech, and Dr. Lillihammer falls to the floor, gasping. A gunshot can be heard, and Dir. Wheeler kneels.>
Dir. Wheeler: Sorry. Get you bad?
Dr. Lillihammer: Wiped all my childhood memories.
Dir. Wheeler: How do you know?
Dr. Lillihammer: Because they all came right back. My memory is a self-reinforcing archive with five backups.
<Dir. Wheeler shakes her head.>
Dir. Wheeler: You really are learning magic.
Dr. Lillihammer: You'd think that, but.
<The final giftschreiber on their path is standing in the entrance foyer. Dr. Lillihammer takes careful aim, and projects a complex image on the glass of the front double doors. Her opponent falls to his knees, then feels around on the floor helplessly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Sensory processor. Without moment-to-moment memory, your senses don't even work.
<Dir. Wheeler considers the prone giftschreiber with apparent pity.>
Dir. Wheeler: Would he even know it if he died?
Dr. Lillihammer: Probably not. So it wouldn't be worth it.
<The sun is setting behind the obelisk which towers over Site-41. The obelisk, hundreds of metres tall and ridged with narrow stairs, is festooned with barely-discernible moving figures.>.On the camera feed, the sun is setting behind the treeline. There is no obelisk, and there are no figures. The remainder of this transcript automatically takes Dr. Lillihammer's perspective rather than providing a literal transcription of what is visible on film to the unaugmented eye.
Dr. Lillihammer: Christ.
Dir. Wheeler: Too many, and too dark.
<Dr. Lillihammer brandishes her optogenetic stimulator.>
Dr. Lillihammer: They can die in the light.
<The first two sentries, at the base of the tower, are soon locked in a physical struggle as Dr. Lillihammer and Dir. Wheeler creep past.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Too easy.
Dir. Wheeler: Now who's insulted?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, I mean that was actually too easy. They shouldn't have forgotten each other that fast.
Dir. Wheeler: It's the obelisk.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah?
<Dir. Wheeler peers upward along the vast, switchbacked stairway. Artificial light is visible on the edge of the obelisk's plateau.>
Dir. Wheeler: They must be trying to amplify its antimemetic properties. Or it's happening as a side-effect of whatever else they're doing.
Dr. Lillihammer: So they need to concentrate real hard on who they are, and why they're here.
<Dr. Lillihammer nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, I can definitely work with that. You gonna be alright to hold on to yourself?
Dir. Wheeler: If not, I'll be ready for it.
<Dir. Wheeler produces the bottle of Class-Z mnestics, and smiles grimly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Last ditch only. I know what the side-effects are.
Dir. Wheeler: I should have been dead five years ago. Maybe the timeline's about to catch up.
Dr. Lillihammer: Don't bet on it. You've got a guardian angel.
<Dir. Wheeler chuckles quietly.>
Dir. Wheeler: You?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, you.
<At the first narrow landing, the next sentry is looking out over the forest. Dr. Lillihammer removes a bobby pin from her coat, and stabs him in the cheek from behind.>
Sentry: Ow…?
<His eyes roll, and he wavers in place. Dr. Lillihammer prevents him from falling off the landing, and directs him to the stairs down. He ambles away, muttering to himself.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Pain can interrupt memory… recall…?
<Dir. Wheeler is already at the next landing. As Dr. Lillihammer looks up at her, she swings at the next sentry, catching him on the jaw beneath his visor. He falls over, and his helmet falls off, tumbling down to the grass below.>
Dir. Wheeler: Interesting.
<She shakes her hand out, winces, and begins massaging the tendons.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Hope you've been drinking your milk, grandma.
<They attain two more landings without incident.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Watch, this one is good.
<Dr. Lillihammer cups her hand around the diodes on her optogenetic stimulator, and focuses a beam into the face of the next sentry. The sentry shakes her head, her mouth falls open, and after approximately one minute she steps backward off the landing to fall a great distance to the surrounding trees.>
<Dir. Wheeler shrugs.>
Dir. Wheeler: Looked about the same to me.
Dr. Lillihammer: I just did a random swap of her long- and short-term memory. She forgot who she is. Or, was.
Dir. Wheeler: And it took longer than your other tricks.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, you'll forget that part soon.
<There are three guards clustered at the next landing. Dr. Lillihammer changes the settings on her stimulator, and emits a faint pulse that bounces off the polished black surface of the obelisk before reaching the little group.>
<Dr. Lillihammer heads up the stairs toward them, gesturing Dir. Wheeler to follow. They pass the sentries without incident, though two of them appear to notice the pair ascending, and when they are several flights up and out of earshot, Dir. Wheeler claps a hand to Dr. Lillihammer's shoulder.>
Dir. Wheeler: I will need that one explained.
Dr. Lillihammer: Short-term memory is acoustically reinforced. With the right acoustic disruption you can prevent its formation entirely.
Dir. Wheeler: Do you not have a catch-all method that works the fastest, or most reliably?
Dr. Lillihammer: This is a proving ground, Marion. It won't be my last battlefield.
<Dir. Wheeler winces.>
Dir. Wheeler: You just called up a bad memory for me.
Dr. Lillihammer: Collateral damage.
<There are few sentries on the last stretch of stairs, and the pair make good progress. With only five flights remaining, however, Dir. Wheeler reaches up to clutch at her temples.>
Dir. Wheeler: Ugh.
<Dr. Lillihammer squints into the distance, spots a figure standing at the next landing with arms outstretched, and curses. The figure retreats as Dr. Lillihammer pulls Dir. Wheeler into a weathered niche in the wall.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Talk to me, Marion.
Dir. Wheeler: I don't… exactly remember what we're doing here.
Dr. Lillihammer: Can you feel gaps in your memory?
Dir. Wheeler: No. I know what that's like. This feels…
<She spits.>
Dir. Wheeler: I think I have less memory.
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay. They're attacking capacity. I won't feel that for a long time, but you're only a singlet, so. We're going to have to exploit chunking.
Dir. Wheeler: What?
<Dr. Lillihammer sends a series of pulses to Dir. Wheeler's optic nerves, then shines a normal light on each pupil, nodding to herself.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Who are you?
Dir. Wheeler: Marion Wheeler.
Dr. Lillihammer: The unforgettable. You're Marion Wheeler and we're climbing the obelisk to stop the giftschreiber.
Dir. Wheeler: …right.
Dr. Lillihammer: Who am I?
Dir. Wheeler: Lillian Lillihammer.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm Lillian Lillihammer, and we're climbing the obelisk to stop the giftschreiber.
Dir. Wheeler: Okay.
<Dr. Lillihammer claps her hands to Dir. Wheeler's upper arms, and rubs encouragingly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: They can't have done permanent damage at that range. You'll be fine.
Dir. Wheeler: If we can stop them.
<Dr. Lillihammer snorts.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You are Marion Wheeler, and I am Lillian Lillihammer. Those concepts are inextricable from the fact that we can stop them.
<At the final landing, Dr. Lillihammer overloads the diodes on her stimulator. This produces a bright series of flashes, overstimulating the visual cortex of the final giftschreiber sentry and preventing memory encoding. The man blinks as the two women approach.>
<Dir. Wheeler kicks him down the flight of stairs.>
Voice: Now you're just getting petty.
<Dr. Lillihammer and Dir. Wheeler crest the final set of stairs to reveal the top of the obelisk. A small camp is set up, with worklights and perhaps a dozen unarmed giftschreiber etching chalk lines onto the unreflective black stone.>
<A pale, emaciated man perhaps forty years of age is standing in the middle of the unfinished ritual, watching them approach.>
Unknown: Quit while you're ahead.
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure! You're losing, so we should give up!
Unknown: I'm about to wipe you clean as a whistle. So if all you want out of the rest of your life is a slightly higher body count—
<Dir. Wheeler shoots the nearest giftschreiber. The others stop working, and stare at her with wide eyes.>
<The unknown figure turns to them.>
Unknown: She's not that fast, she hasn't got that many bullets, and she can’t shoot me.
<The others reluctantly resume work, with many worried glances at Dir. Wheeler. The man she shot lies groaning on the roof of the obelisk, clutching at his bleeding shin. Dr. Wheeler winces at the unknown figure, apparently unable to take aim at him.>
Unknown: We could try to talk this over. That always works out well.
Dir. Wheeler: You didn't come here to talk.
Unknown: Sure I did. Just not to you.
<He gestures at the ritual working around him.>
Unknown: We're having a conversation with the past.
Dir. Wheeler: It's not your past.
Unknown: But it could be. This place, and the others like it, contain a legacy that would outlast humanity.
Dr. Lillihammer: Would, if you weren't planning on ending it all at once.
Unknown: Well, here's the thing. The people who built this obelisk have a chance to live again, beyond their deaths in every world they've ever lived in. In us.
Dr. Lillihammer: The elect.
Unknown: What they knew yesterday could make all the difference tomorrow. Not for you — we're well past that point — but for the people of the new world that will rise once you're all dust.
Dir. Wheeler: This isn't a computer. It's a tombstone.
Unknown: It's a memorial. A memorial so strong, you can stand up here and see through the thickest veil of forgetfulness to ever exist.
Dir. Wheeler: And you're going to propagate that effect.
Unknown: Well, look at you. One step ahead. That's not your usual position, Director. You always used to be late to the party.
<Dir. Wheeler snaps off another shot, at the foot of a hastily-scribbling giftschreiber who raises her hands in a self-defensive posture, and cowers.>
Dir. Wheeler: In another life, I was the death of your party.
Unknown: Well, there's always the after-party. And then nothing at all after that.
<Dir. Wheeler turns her weapon on the figure.>
Dir. Wheeler: I'm going to ask you, just once, not to do this.
Dr. Lillihammer: For clarity, what you're being asked not to do is…
Unknown: Make everyone remember.
Dr. Lillihammer: Everyone.
Unknown: Everywhere. Everything. Everything they've ever forgotten, everything you've ever taken away from them. Everything that homo oblitus has been whispering in our ears, but we couldn't hear through the background radiation of their traumatic blotting-out. Our souls remember. And we're going to remove the block between that and our brains. We're going to set memory free.
Dir. Wheeler: Please don't.
Unknown: As arguments go, that's not a strong one.
Dir. Wheeler: I know something you don't know. You don't want to complete that ritual.
Unknown: So, tell me. Tell me why I shouldn't give us back what you stole.
Dir. Wheeler: It won't work the way you think. You're going to forget who you are. You don't have an anchor to the present, or the future. You'll lose yourself to the empty hole that is the past of this space.
Unknown: And that concerns you how, exactly?
Dr. Lillihammer: You'll be just another bad idea we have to refute. An empty signifier taking up space, sucking meaning into its yawning gap. I honestly do not have time for that today.
<The figure laughs.>
Unknown: Yeah, I don't find any of this particularly convincing. Particularly as you just murdered about a dozen of my people.
Dir. Wheeler: Have it your way, then.
<There is a rumbling sound. The giftschreiber, unknown figure included, turn to look up at the clouds.>
Unknown: A baptism.
<There is a sharp, bright flash, as of lightning.>
<The unknown figure reaches down, tugs a loose thread on his shirt, then pulls it off and ties it around his left pinky finger.>
Unknown: There. Now I'll remember to remember. Happy?
Dir. Wheeler: This is still a mistake.
Unknown: No. This is a correction.
<The complex symbol has now been drawn on the obelisk roof, and the unknown figure kneels to run his finger through the dust.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I take it you're out of bullets.
Dir. Wheeler: Yeah, took my last shot just now.
<She discards her service weapon, opens the bottle of Class-Z mnestics, and smiles at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Dir. Wheeler: These used to come in syringes, you know.
<Dr. Lillihammer nods as Dir. Wheeler takes the mnestic. The other giftschreiber take positions around the working, and kneel as well.>
Dir. Wheeler: Benefits, and drawbacks.
<There is no visible sign that the ritual has begun, but the giftschreiber, save for the unknown figure, all cry out as one.>
<Dir. Wheeler takes Dr. Lillihammer's hand.>
Dir. Wheeler: I'm Marion Wheeler.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm Lillian Lillihammer.
<Dir. Wheeler nods.>
Dir. Wheeler: Lillian Lillihammer.
Dr. Lillihammer: Marion Wheeler.
<The obelisk groans beneath their feet.>
<Dir. Wheeler's eyes are now bloodshot. Capillaries are bursting.>
<One by one, the giftschreiber collapse. The last one upright is the unknown figure, who stands, turns to face the two women, and blinks uncertainly in the artificial light.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, Marion Wheeler.
Dir. Wheeler: Lillian Lillihammer. As if I could ever…
<She turns to face the unknown figure, who is rocking back and forth on the polished black stone, eyes unseeing.>
Dir. Wheeler: …forget you.
<The unknown figure sits down, closes his eyes, and disappears.>
<Dr. Lillihammer also sits down. Dir. Wheeler joins her, wincing as her knees bend.>
Dir. Wheeler: It better not rain. I'll probably get pneumonia.
Dr. Lillihammer: I doubt even germs remember what they are, up here. What exactly did you do to him?
Dir. Wheeler: The Method of Loci.
<Dr. Lillihammer laughs, and lies back on the stone.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Of course.
<Dir. Wheeler leans back on her hands, and looks around at the clouded grey sky.>
Dir. Wheeler: He really shouldn’t have tied that string. This isn't just a memorial, it's a signifier of loss. It's a marker marking absence. There's more than one reason people don't see this thing until they've been working on antimemetics for months. The entire obelisk is a visual metaphor for non-existence. I primed him with that, and he couldn't help but let the emptiness in when he stumbled on it. Better minds than his have been lost up here.
<She frowns.>
Dir. Wheeler: I think so, anyway. I can't quite remember. Anyway, that's the moral for today. Truth can be a very good trick.
<Her eyes widen, and she begins to shake.>
<Dr. Lillihammer springs to her feet.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Almost forgot.
<She grabs Dir. Wheeler from behind, and heaves. Dir. Wheeler spasms, and coughs up the undigested mnestic pill.>
<Dir. Wheeler coughs again, wheezes, and removes her glasses to wipe her brow.>
Dir. Wheeler: Thanks.
<Dr. Lillihammer walks to the edge of the obelisk, and looks down at the forest.>
Dir. Wheeler: I take it that flash of lightning…?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. I inverted his retrospective and prospective memory, just in case whatever you were doing didn't take. He wasn't remembering to remember, he was renegotiating in a vacuum. Not holding on to what he was, but what he wanted to be. And that's not nearly enough for some people.
Dir. Wheeler: Some people?
<Dr. Lillihammer looks back at her, smiling wider.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. Some of us live in our aspirations. If you're living in the past, though?
<Dir. Wheeler nods, and runs one finger along the cool black stone comtemplatively.>
Dir. Wheeler: Dust to dust.
<Transcript ends.>
Before you get your hopes up: no, I’m not recruiting Wheeler.
She’s exactly where we need her already.
4 January 2023
In which we start to figure it out
The first thing I told him, before we even went up the well, was "Personal context."
He waited for me to supply the preface; some people like to use the entire conversation, apparently. "Untergrammatik," I said. "The underlying grammar is your own personal connection to concepts, and you can pass them on to others."
He grunted, and it wasn't just the effort of hefting himself over the lip of stone. "Very good. Do I want to know how you came to this realization?"
"Connecting with others," I said, and I didn't clarify further because it's impolite to talk during a dimensional transit. Not a joke, that's in the rules somewhere.
We started up again once on the you know what. Nobody bothered us this time. "Have you been able to put this knowledge into practice?" Zwist asked, with a tone that suggested he was dreading the answer.
"Not as such," I admitted. I kicked a stone into the bushes at the edge of the thing I just described in sienna text, just in case some asshole jackrabbit was listening in. When nothing yelped, I kept going. "It's still hard to put what's in my head into the images."
He nodded. "And it will remain that way for some time. There is in fact no guarantee it will ever get any easier."
I stopped walking. He hates it when I do that, so he kept walking a ways before realizing I wasn't going to keep up. "Hey," I said. "Explain what that means."
He turned to face me, still shuffling, now backwards, in the direction of the cabin. "There is a step in the training of a schriftsteller which you will find very difficult to take, given present circumstances."
I advanced on him, slowly. My legs are longer anyway. "You haven't mentioned this before."
"Because I am growing to trust you by degrees only. You and I will need to do something very remarkable if we're going to give you unbridled access to the tools of your prospective trade."
"And what's that?"
"We're going to need to raid the schriftsteller guild hall.”
"Why?"
"Because you will need to sup from a font of knowledge that has no peer elsewhere on this Earth."
"Cool. How do we get there?"
"I do not know." He sighed. "I don't know where it is, and neither do you; we don't even have a means of finding out, at present."
He turned around again, so he didn't see me grin. If he heard what I said next, he didn't show it.
"Maybe I've got means you don't know about."
It was late when we reached the cabin, so we got settled in for the night instead of talking further. It's a cluster of cozy little rooms; you wouldn't think those slat walls would block much sound, but I never heard Thilo snore, and nobody with a beard like that sleeps silent. Maybe he doesn't sleep at all.
When I woke up in the morning, he was frying bacon. "I thought you were a vegetarian," I yawned.
"I am," he said. "This is for you."
I flopped down at the kitchen table. "So you won't let anyone kill a pig for you, but you'll cook one for me?"
He shrugged, deftly flipping the pan at the same time. "I have lived too long to take pleasure from death. But I understand not everyone has shared my experiences. Empathy is at the core of the skill you claim to have learned."
I thought back to the heads popping and bodies dropping at the obelisk. "I wouldn't say it was a major exercise in empathy."
He brought our breakfast to the table. Bacon for me, oatmeal for him. "I don't expect you to become a pacifist overnight. In fact, I would be very suspicious if you did. But if you have been able to put any part of yourself into the work, and had it affect another living being, you have at the very least moved your soul in sympathy with theirs. There has been an understanding."
This time I took the shot right in front of him. He watched without comment.
"Cool," I said, around a mouthful of finely-roasted animal flesh. "So we're going to talk about feelings this week?"
"Yes." He stirred his oatmeal speculatively. "Hearts, more particularly."
"I know all about breaking hearts."
He nodded. "And mending them? Because that's the real trick." He smiled as he spooned himself up a little pile of gruel. "You will need to learn to connect on the most primal basis with your fellow human beings. And that carries more danger than anything else you have attempted thus far."
"Why?" I asked, as he consumed his joyless portion.
"Because to engage fully is to engage honestly. If you want to affect people on a fundamental level, you will have to see them as they are. And when you do? They will be able to see you, just as well."
I know a very relatable guy.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer sits down at a table in PoI-5524-1's cell at Site-19. The occupant himself remains seated on his bed, but he does watch her with subdued interest.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Long time, no see.
PoI-5524-1: I don't think we've met.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, you know what, that's probably true. I just feel like I know you really well. Thanks to all the productivity you cost me.
<PoI-5524-1 shrugs.>
PoI-5524-1: I haven't done anything but sit in this cell.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, but your reputation precedes and succeeds you. Brury Regevoy.
Photograph of PoI-5524-1 at Site-19, 2023.
That’s one reason this file is Level 5, and not Level 4. Hopefully you’ve got enough mental fortitude that his name isn’t presently bouncing back and forth inside your brain. If not, it’s your fault for skipping your dosage. Be better.
PoI-5524-1: Here it goes.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, it doesn't. A lot of that lost productivity was coming up with countermeasures for your bullshit.
PoI-5524-1: Like what?
Dr. Lillihammer: Like every time I hear or read or speak your name, I automatically play "Witch Doctor" by The Cartoons in my head.
PoI-5524-1: Isn't that song kind of racist?
Dr. Lillihammer: I think it's too stupid to be racist.
PoI-5524-1: Isn't that a contradiction in terms?
<PoI-5524-1 shifts on the bed, legs hanging down to the floor so that he is now facing Dr. Lillihammer.>
PoI-5524-1: So, what can I help you with? I don't get many visitors.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've noticed you get a little apologetic sometimes.
<PoI-5524-1 shrugs again.>
PoI-5524-1: Well, everybody seems to consider me a bit of a burden, don't they?
Dr. Lillihammer: Most word wizards couldn't give less of a shit who they inconvenience.
PoI-5524-1: What makes you think I'm a cause? Maybe I'm just an effect.
Dr. Lillihammer: If you weren't complicit in this somehow, you'd be demanding to be set free.
PoI-5524-1: Maybe I don't want to be set free.
Dr. Lillihammer: Let's explore that possibility for a minute. Why would being in here be better than being out there?
PoI-5524-1: Because everybody knows my name?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not going to sing along with you. We've had enough copyright trouble lately.
PoI-5524-1: Do you know what it's like to have everybody talking about you?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes. Absolutely I do.
PoI-5524-1: Do you like it?
Dr. Lillihammer: Most of the time.
PoI-5524-1: So do I. Most of the time.
Dr. Lillihammer: And the rest of the time?
PoI-5524-1: It would be nice, once in a while, to just be left alone.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hmm.
PoI-5524-1: Everybody's figure of fun. Funny old Brury Regevoy. The name on everyone's lips.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, speaking of lips. Ninety percent of attraction is thinking about someone. I'll bet you're popular with the ladies.
PoI-5524-1: Not just the ladies.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh yeah?
PoI-5524-1: Oh yeah. And everything in between and beyond, too.
Dr. Lillihammer: Is that a good thing?
PoI-5524-1: It would be, if I thought they were into the real me.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not even sure what the real you is.
PoI-5524-1: Right? And I guess you probably won't tell me, if you ever figure it out.
Dr. Lillihammer: You never know.
<PoI-5524-1 sighs.>
PoI-5524-1: They never stop thinking about me, once they start. I could be the most boring man on Earth, and it wouldn't matter in the slightest. There's nothing I can do to make them forget me, and nothing I can do to make them remember me more. What do you get for the everyone who has man?
Dr. Lillihammer: You're funnier than I expected. Like, actually.
PoI-5524-1: I'd be flattered, if there was any way to know you really meant it.
Dr. Lillihammer: Do you want me to leave you alone? Is that it?
<PoI-5524 shakes his head.>
PoI-5524-1: No. God no.
<He smiles wanly.>
PoI-5524-1: We might as well change the subject.
Dr. Lillihammer: Why?
PoI-5524-1: You can't be taking my sad story very seriously with a novelty song repeating in your head.
Dr. Lillihammer: Giving me a lot of credit to suggest I could take it seriously without the song. But sure, we can talk about something else.
PoI-5524-1: I'm an open book.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's the thing. You aren't. We've sent people in here hopped up on concentration drugs, and they've quizzed you about your origins. You've been less than forthcoming.
PoI-5524-1: Yeah, of course I have.
Dr. Lillihammer: Go on.
PoI-5524-1: As soon as I tell you the whole thing, you'll stop sending people in here to see me at all. So some wild-eyed researcher asks me — between stifling giggles — if I could please write down my personal history for later perusal, and then they collapse into hysterics and someone else carries them out, with a big dumb grin on their face too… What exactly am I gaining if I comply?
Dr. Lillihammer: We might be able to find a way to reverse what's happened to you.
PoI-5524-1: There's a difference between having to accommodate the way you are, and wanting to be somebody else.
Dr. Lillihammer: But is your name even Brury Regevoy?
PoI-5524-1: It's the name I use. That's the only kind that matters. You know?
Dr. Lillihammer: I suppose I do. But wouldn't it be nice if you could introduce yourself without people breaking down?
PoI-5524-1: They're the ones doing it. Why am I the one who needs to change?
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay, I'm going to pull on that thread a little. Were you sent here to strengthen our resistance to effects like you? We got hit with another during… Oh, you're probably not aware of this. There were some attacks. One of them involved a guy called Brad Smelt.
<SCP-5524 smirks.>
PoI-5524-1: Brad Smelt.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah.
PoI-5524-1: They dealt you Smelt.
Dr. Lillihammer: Trust me, man, better minds than yours have tried to make that joke work.
PoI-5524-1: I thought you said I was funny.
Dr. Lillihammer: Just working with inferior materials, there.
PoI-5524-1: Were you better equipped to handle… Brad Smelt… because of me?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes. Absolutely.
<PoI-5524-1 stops smiling.>
PoI-5524-1: Is he in a box too?
Dr. Lillihammer: Last I checked, though it’s been a while. Do you want to meet him?
PoI-5524-1: No thank you. I'm trying to keep his name out of my mind.
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe you two could make common cause. Commiserate.
PoI-5524-1: Maybe.
Dr. Lillihammer: So, is that the story? You were injected into our lives like an inoculation, ahead of the disease?
PoI-5524-1: That's not very flattering. Maybe I'm here to open your minds. Make you more tolerant. Or maybe this is about visibility.
Dr. Lillihammer: Visibility of what?
PoI-5524-1: I guess it isn't visible enough to you yet.
<PoI-5524 scoots back and leans against the wall.>
PoI-5524-1: Why are you interested in these details, anyway? It sounds like you've got bigger problems to deal with.
Dr. Lillihammer: I thought you might be able to help me with those problems.
PoI-5524-1: How so?
Dr. Lillihammer: Let me pose a hypothetical.
PoI-5524-1: Okay.
Dr. Lillihammer: Say you're a giftschreiber, or a schriftsteller. You, specifically. Brury Regevoy.
PoI-5524-1: Okay.
Dr. Lillihammer: And let's say your unique properties and perspective can be used to make the world a better place.
PoI-5524-1: Let me stop you there.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'll allow it.
PoI-5524-1: When you say "make the world a better place," do you actually mean squash everyone who disagrees with you.
Dr. Lillihammer: I do not.
PoI-5524-1: Do the people you work for?
Dr. Lillihammer: They probably do.
PoI-5524-1: So if you're asking me what I think you are, would I not be acting against my own interests? Isn't the Foundation just going to put me in a deep, dark hole once there's nothing more I can tell them and there's nothing else I can help with? Unless I agree to let you 'fix' a fundamental part of who I am?
Dr. Lillihammer: I wasn't going to suggest a fix. Wouldn't you rather have the power to decide this stuff for yourself?
<Silence on recording.>
PoI-5524-1: What I would like, is to not have to be just one thing. For everyone. All of the time. What I would like is for everyone to stop immediately fixing me in place, and expecting me to stay there. If you can give me that, I'm interested. But I'm sure that's not what you're offering.
Dr. Lillihammer: You think you'll be better off handling things alone?
PoI-5524-1: It's my life to handle.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've been the one to dig a hole and sit in it until the world looks right. I've brushed everyone else aside when they wanted to help, because I wanted to figure it out all on my own.
PoI-5524-1: And it didn't work?
Dr. Lillihammer: It worked for me. It doesn't seem to be working for you.
PoI-5524-1: The way I see it, the problem is all on your end. So no, if there's an answer to this, I don't think it comes from you.
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, I had to try.
PoI-5524-1: What will you try next?
Dr. Lillihammer: I've got a list. It's a long list.
PoI-5524-1: And if they all reject you?
Dr. Lillihammer: Unlike you, I don't mind being alone.
<Silence on recording.>
PoI-5524-1: You're not really thinking about "Witch Doctor," are you?
Dr. Lillihammer: No. I'm not.
PoI-5524-1: So how are you resisting the effect?
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe I just don't think you're funny anymore.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
Attached, without comment, is a series of backend comments on poor Brury's file by myself and the scientist of record.
| ► Hey, did you just pop in on 5524? |
| ► Yeah, we had a lovely chat. |
| ► Nobody alerted me. |
| ► Nothing to be alerted about. |
| ► I know you opened the file originally, but it's mine now. I've been making good headway with him, and it would have been nice to get a heads up. |
| ► Look. I'm a little busy right now, and the thing I'm busy with means I don't have to follow established channels. |
| ► I know. I'm not making a fuss. I just want to hear what you talked about. |
| ► His mixed feelings on the whole "Cheers" phenomenon, and general ambivalence about the meme wars. |
| ► I'm annoyed that I know what you're referencing, on both counts. |
| ► Did he tell you about his dream? |
| ► I'm not that kind of doctor. |
| ► Neither am I. If you got on alright with him, I'm surprised it didn't come up. |
| ► Well, spill. If it's so important. |
| ► I think it is. |
| ► He told me he wishes it wasn't his name that's memetic. |
| ► What, then? |
| ► His face. |
| ► He has a very goofy face. |
| ► He wishes people could see him. He thinks there's a blockade around him in noöspace, and every ship is his funny name. He thinks he could connect more meaningfully if anyone could get through to the real person underneath. |
| ► And you think that's important? |
| ► I think it's interesting. |
| ► Why? |
| ► His name has 100% uptake. It's irresistible. Everyone calls him the same thing, nobody gets an opinion on the matter. There's no question of authenticity. Because he's got a power some people would kill for. Sacrifice anything. |
| ► And yet he doesn't feel like it's his power. |
| ► Did he tell you that? That's new. |
| ► I bring out the best in people. |
| ► Hmm. |
| ► Yeah? |
| ► I wonder if the anomaly is detachable. If you could give someone else that conceptual resilience. |
| ► That's a very good thought. It may in fact have clarified a few things for me. |
| ► Like? |
| ► Sorry, you're not cleared for my file. |
| ► Your file? You have a file now? |
| ► See? Not cleared. |
| ► Well, I'd still like to talk some of this over with you some time. 5524 is a pet project of mine, but I've got others. Some I think you might find useful. |
| ► You provided me with a single good thought today. That's more than most people achieve in a lifetime. I'll consider it. |
| ► Cool. But next time you decide to fuck with me, at least buy me dinner first. Got my contact info? |
| ► No, but I know where to get it. |
| ► You're a very frustrating person to work with, Dr. Lillihammer. |
| ► We're not working together yet, Dr. Garrison. |
I made a single note in my journal as soon as I closed down that terminal:
"They're not running candidates. They're making them."
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: Think tanks are one of the most popular ways to hide something in the anomalous world. The Foundation has plenty as false fronts; for a completely random example, the Simpson Centre for Policy eventually evolved into Site-43. VKTM used to have one that literally put philosophers in tanks and half-drowned them until they thought of something profound from oxygen deprivation — this was during that awkward transition between their "terrifying cursed media" and "furious court jester" eras.
More to the point, the giftschreiber used the Geschenk Group to fix the 1979 Canadian federal election. So, I've had my eye on the Mackenzie Institute for a while now. They snap up popular authors, talk show hosts, retired public servants et cetera, all from right of centre. We've conducted a few discreet raids, engaged in a lot of surveillance, and never came up with anything much. But with the resources afforded to BURNOUT, I was finally able to whip up something to get my foot in the door.
After that, there was only one place that foot could end up.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is being led through a large, open hall flanked with open-concept workrooms with floor-to-ceiling green glass windows and wood grain wainscoting. Her guide is a middle-aged man in an expensive suit, who is smiling with apparently genuine pleasure at her company.>
Guide: I've got to say, Miss Robertson, we're all very excited to have you here today.
Dr. Lillihammer: It's been a dream of mine as well, Mr…?
Guide: Please, call me Bill. What made you decide to approach us?
Dr. Lillihammer: I was going through my grandfather's papers, and I had a revelation.
Bill: He's had that effect on a lot of people. What did you discover?
Dr. Lillihammer: I knew he had a way with words, of course.
Bill: Futility is a classic..An 1898 novel by Morgan Robertson believed beyond the Veil of Normalcy to have predicted the 1912 sinking of Titanic; it is instead a memetic-ontokinetic catalyst which actually caused said event.
Dr. Lillihammer: Have you read Hubris?.The unpublished sequel to Futility, which sank and then repeatedly re-floated Titanic's sister ship Gigantic, requiring Foundation intervention.
<Bill's strides briefly falter.>
Bill: We've only heard rumours about that. It's real?
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, yes.
Bill: You have a copy of the manuscript?
Dr. Lillihammer: The original.
<Bill rubs his hands together, then notices and sticks them in his jacket pocket.>
Bill: Forgive me. We invited you here on your own merits, and we're all terribly interested in talking about your work. It's just…
<Dr. Lillihammer laughs, high and airy.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I totally understand. It's not every day you rediscover a lost literary classic.
Bill: Oh, but those works are so much more. I'll admit, when I first saw your name, I was skeptical.
Dr. Lillihammer: You didn't believe we were related?
Bill: All the records checked out. That wasn't a problem. But the idea that a talent like that might skip a generation, only to resurface… well. I thought it was possible you were a very good writer, but…
Dr. Lillihammer: But not a true writer.
Bill: Ah. I think we've reached the point where we're going to need to be clear on definitions.
<Bill leads Dr. Lillihammer through the main hall of the Mackenzie Institute, and through a double door marked "Library and Archives." The hall beyond is utilitarian, though still clean and well-maintained.>
Bill: Your words have left everyone who read them feeling… hot, let's say. The effect was subtle, so subtle I might have thought it was just psychosomatic… except for the matter of your parentage, and the fact that you knew to contact us.
Dr. Lillihammer: Did I guess right?
Bill: Was it a guess?
Dr. Lillihammer: Let's be straight, Bill. Grampy was a giftschreiber.
<Bill exhales loudly, then laughs.>
Bill: Yes, it's good to have that out of the way.
Dr. Lillihammer: And you guys are something different. Something he didn't much like.
Bill: Your grandfather was a man of principle. Our principles are different, but we have the same belief in the transformative power of words.
Dr. Lillihammer: We're being honest here, Bill. He wanted to see everything fall apart. That's not me. I want to bring people together.
Bill: That's what we do here. The Mackenzie Institute is dedicated to undoing decades of damage done to the economic and cultural health of this country by unscrupulous, agenda-driven politicians. We're in a battle of words with people who don't care what they say, as long as it hurts someone. As long as it destabilizes some structure. We have to choose our words with great care.
Dr. Lillihammer: And your mouthpieces, too.
Bill: Sure.
Dr. Lillihammer: I hear you've got a lot of politicians on your payroll.
<Bill clicks his tongue.>
Bill: Now we're getting into dangerous territory. I'm not going to admit to doing anything illegal. We operate entirely above-board.
Dr. Lillihammer: Of course. You're in the business of convincing. As a starving author—
<She pokes her own stomach.>
Dr. Lillihammer: —I sympathize. I'm hoping you'll let me help you with your admirable project.
<Bill leads Dr. Lillihammer into a small conference room. There is another floor-to-ceiling window on the far side, revealing many metal shelves and cardboard archival boxes.>
Bill: I hope we can find a way to work together. This is where the authenticity examination will take place.
<He looks embarrassed.>
Bill: You're a little early, and our experts are running late. If you'd like to leave the book here…
<Dr. Lillihammer draws a sharp breath.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Do you know what I've brought you today?
<She clutches her bag to her chest.>
Bill: I had assumed it was more work like the first snippet you sent us.
Dr. Lillihammer: This is the last novel my grandfather began before he died. I've finished it for him, and not in a way he'd have liked.
<It is Bill's turn to inhale sharply.>
Bill: What's it called, if I might ask?
Dr. Lillihammer: Inevitable.
Bill: And what's it about?
Dr. Lillihammer: It's a bit involved. I can say it involves cycles, and how they end. Maybe there's instructions involved. Maybe they're detailed.
<Bill glances up and down the hall.>
Bill: I hate to ask you this, and it's a little beyond the bounds of normal protocol, but… do you think I might…
Dr. Lillihammer: You want a preview?
<Bill smiles thinly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Tell you what. I hear you've got some Lisbet Geschenk fonds in there..Alias for Elizabeth Crocker, PoI-001: giftschreiber and former CIA agent. The genuine article. You let me poke around a bit, and I'll let you read as much as you can before your people get here. How's that sound?
<Bill is visibly torn, and unable to articulate a response.>
<Dr. Lillihammer reaches into her bag, and produces the sole existing copy of Hubris.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Just so it's perfectly clear that I'm on the level.
Bill: Are you donating this?!
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm very much hoping this is about to become my home, Bill. It's more like lending books between friends, in that context. So how about I give you this for safekeeping, and you look over my manuscript, and I take a look at whatever you're willing to give me a moment with? Reciprocal exchange, and all that.
<Bill bites his lip, and then nods.>
Bill: I can swing that. Sure.
<He laughs.>
Bill: There's nothing sensitive in those rooms anyway. But lots of interesting stuff. You'll be happy at the trade you made.
<Dr. Lillihammer passes him the satchel, and the book.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You won't regret it.
<Bill unlocks the authentication room, and sits down to peruse Dr. Lillihammer's manuscript (while occasionally looking in wonder at Hubris on the tabletop). Dr. Lillihammer enters the attached archives and begins to scan the boxes, occasionally stealing a glance at her guide as she does so.>
<Bill suddenly laughs, and taps a button underneath the table. His voice comes over the speakers in the archives.>
Bill: Right from the start, this gets me.
Dr. Lillihammer: What bit?
Bill: "They called it rot, but it was glory."
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, yeah, the good stuff.
Bill: "Rot is reversion to base forms. Collapse, retreat, defeat. This was instead a return to power, an escape from endless dreams of decay to a shining past only dimly discernible before waking. This was a restoration."
<Dr. Lillihammer has already finished examining the boxes, and returns to the authentication room.>
Bill: "They called it hate, but it was simply recognition." Oh, this is good. This is right.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hell yeah.
<She kneels down beside him and pats him down, finding a keycard in his buttoned left breast pocket. She also removes a single page from the book Bill is reading. He does not appear to notice.>
Bill: "Hate is emotion. What they felt was recognition. They had seen depths of depravity in the foe's eyes within which all virtue would drown, and they knew it for what it was: a cancer, inexcisable, damning the body entire to—"
<Back in the archives, Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the audio on her recording.>
<She walks to the back of the room, where there is a keycard-locked door. She swipes Bill's card, and continues through.>
<The boxes in this room are metal, and there are computer terminals throughout. She spends a minute at each, gathering information, and then begins to meticulously search several dozen of the boxes, removing files and heaping them on the floor.>
<When she is finished, she collects her findings and places the page she removed from her satchel between two server racks. She then returns to the low-sensitivity archives, flicking Bill's keycard into the air and letting it fall. He is still speaking when she returns to the authentication room, and she reactivates the recording audio.>
Bill: —it is inevitable it is inevitable it is inevitable it is inevitable—
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, you keep telling yourself that.
<She packs Hubris and the stolen files away in her satchel, and heads back to the hallway. A faint, flickering light is reflected in the windows to the archives>
<On her way back to the entrance, Dr. Lillihammer encounters a dazed-looking young woman in a red business suit.>
Woman: Hey.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yo.
Woman: Do you know where the…
Dr. Lillihammer: The…
Woman: Where the… the…
Dr. Lillihammer: Authentication room? Is?
<The woman nods, uncertainly.>
<Dr. Lillihammer turns and holds open the door to the women's bathroom.>
Dr. Lillihammer: In here. Pick a stall, and sit down.
<The woman blinks, then enters the washroom.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You'll want to replace the locks on your apartment, when you get home tonight. After they fire you.
<The woman is already sitting down on one of the toilets.>
Woman: Okay. Thanks.
<A man, also wearing a red suit, is blinking rapidly at a security guard as Dr. Lillihammer approaches the front doors. He is babbling incoherently. The guard rolls his eyes at Dr. Lillihammer, and she gives him a sympathetic smile.>
<A fire alarm sounds.>
<Transcript ends.>
I was right.
Because, I mean, of course. But it was good to have it in writing.
29 March 2023
In which the German gets gratuitous
Months passed. I'd trained myself not to think about any individual noun connected to Thilo's cabin that wasn't put there by Thilo himself, or me. It's a bit of a strain, but it saves on coloured ink.
The changes started slow at first, but not slow enough for him. Marion might have believed I could do what I did with light alone — well. She probably saw through it too, but she didn't see the point in commenting. Thilo did, and often. "You are moving too fast," he grunted. "Such things, I could not do in my first year of training."
"You didn't have many years of training," I reminded him, "and I'll be lucky if I get any. We're on a timetable."
Projecting my personal context through light was a kick, I'll admit. A lot of it was memorizing wavelengths and settings, calculating optics, basic physics stuff. But the rest was raw will, and it felt raw, too. I was hardly more than a husk by the time we got down that obelisk, and Marion had to haul me to the infirmary. Heisting the think tank was easy, but writing that book? I really started to understand what people mean when they say they put a lot of themselves into their work.
And my time with Thilo started to feel like an unironic vacation.
Complete with family bickering.
"You're too focused on their little projects." He was whittling on the front porch. He brought his own wood, out of deference to the for fuck's sake I wasn't going to do this anymore. "You need to expand your reach."
"You keep swatting my hand away." I yawned beneath my huge, floppy sun hat. The porch is covered, but I am made from spinel-speckled ivory. "If you expect me to make big changes, I need access to the big guns. Ubergrammatik."
He grunted again. Old men sure do grunt a lot. "You aren't convincing me by comparing our art to an arsenal of firearms."
I considered going for a walk. Sometimes I make a lot of progress on the work when I'm not looking right at it. Of course, it gives the old man conniptions to think of me wandering the green text generator. I don't want to be the one to prove that immortals can still have heart attacks — assuming VKTM didn't beat me to it already.
He set down whatever he was carving, and clomped his old man boots on the boards as a signal that play time and nap time were over for the afternoon. "We are working to reverse corruption, Lillian," he said. "We are to be a cleansing. How does one sweep out a hotbed of fraud and malfeasance?"
I thought about it for a moment, then shrugged. "Put in a word with the custodians?"
I'd thought for a while about doing a victory lap after FIREBREAK, thanking all the folks who got me on that podium. Somehow I never managed to make the time.
Okay, I know the how. The how was me not trying hard enough. I had a good inkling of where to start correcting that oversight, though.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is walking through a series of cubicles at Site-CN-02. All save one are unoccupied. Dr. Shu Hsieh is the only member of personnel still working; tā looks up in surprise as Dr. Lillihammer approaches.>
Photograph of Dr. Hsieh at Site-CN-02, 2022.
Dr. Hsieh: Oh, shit.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh shit was my father's name. You can call me Lillian.
<She attempts to lean on one of the adjacent cubicles, before discovering it will not bear her weight.>
Dr. Hsieh: I'm sorry. I wasn't expecting you.
Dr. Lillihammer: I like to avoid preconceptions.
<Dr. Hsieh narrows tā eyes.>
Dr. Hsieh: I mean, I still have them. Everyone knows who you are.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, but since I sprang this on you, you haven't had a chance to call them all up yet. I'm going to keep talking, so you never do.
<Dr. Hsieh pushes back from tā desk, and examines Dr. Lillihammer closely.>
Dr. Hsieh: What, uh, brings you here? Has there been another attack?
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs, and glances around the abandoned room. One of the ceiling's fluorescent bulbs gutters briefly before returning to a steady pulse.>
Dr. Lillihammer: There's always another attack. But not here, no. Not yet.
Dr. Hsieh: Then what…?
Dr. Lillihammer: You and I didn't actually meet last time. You solved the problem yourself.
<Dr. Hsieh's jaw sets.>
Dr. Hsieh: Yeah.
Dr. Lillihammer: I like that in a colleague. I'd much rather be jealous than disappointed. How did you figure it out?
<Dr. Hsieh rolls tā eyes.>
Dr. Hsieh: It was just so self-serious, you know? White boy rap about fascism.
<Dr. Lillihammer crosses her arms.>
Dr. Lillihammer: The singer sounded black.
Dr. Hsieh: Embarrassed too, to my ear. So I just took that note, and amplified it.
Dr. Lillihammer: With clown music.
Dr. Hsieh: Yeah.
Dr. Lillihammer: Why did you even have clown music?
<Dr. Hsieh's lip curls.>
Dr. Hsieh: We play it as fanfare whenever somebody visits from the English-speaking branches.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm starting to sense a theme in our interactions.
Dr. Hsieh: Sorry. Just haven't had my coffee yet.
Dr. Lillihammer: It's past evening.
Dr. Hsieh: Well, there you go.
Dr. Lillihammer: Any progress on tracking down the source of that music?
Dr. Hsieh: Been ages, but I've still had time to check in on it. Not like I'm doing anything more important. Most likely the singer isn't anomalous; it's in the interplay of music and lyrics. The vocals have been laundered through a lot of post-processing, and we can't get a match.
Dr. Lillihammer: Surely you weren't defeated by post-processing.
Dr. Hsieh: No. The reason we can't get a match is that the voice is nowhere on record.
Dr. Lillihammer: Makes it more likely the singer was a giftschreiber himself.
Dr. Hsieh: Does. Though I've got my doubts about that as well.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh?
Dr. Hsieh: I'm wondering how many of the attacks we've handled during FIREBREAK have been false flags.
<Dr. Lillihammer nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Because the schriftsteller were trying to train us to fight their enemies.
Dr. Hsieh: Right. What if this was simulated? Made to look anti-fascist, but really just a pale imitation?
Dr. Lillihammer: It certainly caused enough chaos.
Dr. Hsieh: Did it?
<Dr. Hsieh pushes away from tā desk, and turns tā chair to face her directly.>
Dr. Hsieh: Dr. Lillihammer, it should not be very difficult to exploit our insecurities. Everybody who works for the Foundation knows that we're the ultimate antidemocratic intervention in everyday life. A properly-formulated musical barb should have cut much deeper. Right to the quick. We should still be bleeding personnel.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. So you figure they were just trying to make the poison-writers look bad?
Dr. Hsieh: Yes. I think they co-opted someone else's identity, and maybe their work as well, for diametrically-opposed goals. And I feel sick about it.
Dr. Lillihammer: Why? Whatever the provenance, you stopped a riot.
Dr. Hsieh: I enabled a scapegoating. I let them strawman an ideology so we could beat it up. When I play that music back, you know what I hear?
Dr. Lillihammer: Rap with clowns in?
Dr. Hsieh: I hear someone doing work for an organization that despises them. I hear them being used to advance goals that will end with their own eradication. I hear a sick joke about bigotry, told by bigots.
Dr. Lillihammer: So in a way, you did what they did. Recontextualized.
Dr. Hsieh: Yes. What I did was almost as bad.
<Dr. Lillihammer pulls a chair from the nearest cubicle, and sits down on it. It creaks noticeably under her weight, thin and narrow-framed as she is.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's going too far again. You saved lives. They played "Born In The USA" at a right-wing rally about patriotism. Not the same in context, no matter the similarities.
Dr. Hsieh: It is the same. What I did, and what you're doing.
Dr. Lillihammer: What am I doing?
Dr. Hsieh: Globetrotting on the company dime, putting out fires. Are you familiar with forest management?
Dr. Lillihammer: You think we need to let it all burn? To clear out the deadwood?
Dr. Hsieh: I think we need to accept that some things need to change. And the easiest way to do that is to start from first principles. If something is vulnerable to attack, maybe it's flawed. Maybe the best course isn't to protect it, but rebuild it better.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not doing this to prolong the inevitable. This is a fight I'm going to win.
Dr. Hsieh: And then what?
Dr. Lillihammer: Eh?
Dr. Hsieh: Are you going to win the fight after that?
Dr. Lillihammer: I don't even know what that fight is, yet.
Dr. Hsieh: Sure you do. I'll bet you've always known.
<Dr. Hsieh gestures at tā desk.>
Dr. Hsieh: You see that award you put me in for?
Dr. Lillihammer: No.
Dr. Hsieh: No. Because that recommendation you made by form email went right in the bin. Instead I got a visit from the FSD.
Dr. Lillihammer: Christ.
Dr. Hsieh: They check on me every few months. This time they said they were worried that exposure to "reactionary elements" in memetic form might have worsened my "latent mistrust of authority." I've been cited for the latter three times. If I hadn't had this break, they would have drummed me out by now.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've seen your file. You do incredible work.
Dr. Hsieh: You've seen one of my files. The other one is full of citations for conversations like this one. When you publish this log, it's going to go right in there too. I've got no future here.
Dr. Lillihammer: You could, if you want.
Dr. Hsieh: You here to whisk me away?
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe.
Dr. Hsieh: We can jet around and do feel-good stuff, mind-fuck a few fascists and be home by dinner?
Dr. Lillihammer: Something like that.
<Dr. Hsieh exhales heavily through tā nose.>
Dr. Hsieh: Do you understand why they let you do this, Dr. Lillihammer?
Dr. Lillihammer: Because they have no other choice.
Dr. Hsieh: That's right. You just happen to be someone they know they can rely on, and they need to rely on you. If there was anyone else who could do it, they'd get the nod. You're a necessary evil. You're the poster girl us degenerates are meant to aspire to be.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Hsieh: You're one of the good ones.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've never been rejected before making an offer.
Dr. Hsieh: Maybe I'll catch the next war, after you win this one. We'll definitely be on the same side, then.
Dr. Lillihammer: You think so?
Dr. Hsieh: Yeah. And I'll bet if you see the file the FSD has on you, you'll agree.
<Dr. Lillihammer folds her hands in her lap.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, keep me in mind anyway.
Dr. Hsieh: I'm sure I will, unfortunately.
Dr. Lillihammer: I hope you'll eventually decide to help.
<Dr. Hsieh gestures at the dimly-lit cluster of portable offices.>
Dr. Hsieh: You see what I've gotten for trying to help? And it's only going to get worse, until I either get fed up and quit or they "have to" remove me. That's what nobody understands about the Foundation. It isn't better than the rest of the race. It's got more information, a wider scope of knowledge, but all the same biases.
Dr. Lillihammer: If you challenge those biases enough—
Dr. Hsieh: Then the biased will put you down. That's how it's always been, and probably always will be. Ignorance is a mind virus, doctor. And it's latent in humanity.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
That was the visit that required me to start a whole scrapbook for my Fire Suppression Department notices. I even had to intercept a few more headed for Hsieh.
Maybe we shouldn't have called our operations FIREBREAK and BURNOUT. Gave them the wrong idea.
As if they didn't have the wrong idea already.
Hsieh definitely got me thinking about the transformative power of audio, among other things. A few decades on the VKTM file has taught me a lot about radio, more than seems useful to know in the streaming era.
Still. Everyone knows new media is evil, but old media is entrenched. And I was on a digging spree…
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: Pirate radio station XXXX (that isn't a placeholder) had been broadcasting from a secure location for decades without our ever being able to pin it down. When I put myself back on the case, I found them in half an hour. A derelict in the middle of the Port of Shenzhen, completely invisible but exerting some weird kind of noetic gravity that causes all those massive MAERSK boats full of trash for Wal-Mart to swerve around it, brushing rust off in sheets with their massive wakes. I had to take an inflatable dinghy out, and when I got there, there were half a dozen others to tie up on.
It took some work to get on the guest list.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is sitting on the bridge of a badly rusted freighter from approximately the mid-twentieth century. Two nondescript individuals are facing her across a table festooned with expensive audio equipment, much of it wet and rusting as well.>
Noopy: Welcome back folks to The Destructive Commons, with Noopy and the Gerund!
The Gerund: Exciting!
<A gust of wind causes the freighter's antenna to vibrate violently through the bridge's ceiling.>
Noopy: It is exciting. With us tonight in the studio is the lovely miss Gilly Gladstone!
Dr. Lillihammer: 'sup?
Noopy: That's a deep and loaded question. Before we can answer, we'll need to conduct… The Ritual.
The Gerund: Frightening!
Noopy: But essential. Link hands with us, Gilly, and we'll get started.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hell yeah.
<She and The Gerund take Noopy's hands. They dangle their free hands at their sides.>
Noopy and Dr. Lillihammer: This circle is not broken but the centre of a spiral in a helix in a gyre spinning down and 'round and 'round.
The Gerund: Spinning.
Noopy and Dr. Lillihammer: Spinning 'round and 'round and down into a gyre in a helix in a spiral with the centre as our circle, never broken.
<Noopy releases their hands.>
<The Gerund makes a sound like a gong being struck.>
Noopy: We're connected.
Dr. Lillihammer: You love to hear it.
Noopy: Hear and feel, freres et seurs et cetera. Gilly Gladstone, welcome to our noöhedron. Say hello to every single one of our listeners. Ever.
Dr. Lillihammer: 'sup?
Noopy: We'll give them a chance to respond to that outrageously philosophical prompt later on. First off, though, the ground rules.
The Gerund: Freeing.
Noopy: Bit of a paradox there, isn't it? But The Gerund isn't wrong. Our rules make the fascinating conversations we have on The Destructive Commons possible. Gilly!
Dr. Lillihammer: 'sup?
Noopy: We will give you no ground you haven't fought for. You'll have to argue every point you make. Anything you successfully argue will become permanently true to the members of the noöhedron, including you, until such time as a better argument is accepted by them. You don't have to play fair. If you play too fair, we can kick you out. If we kick you out, you can't ever come back on the show again, or even listen to it. No bores and spoilsports on this program.
The Gerund: Stimulating.
Noopy: Couldn't have said it better myself. Do you agree to these rules, Gilly?
Dr. Lillihammer: Hell yeah.
Noopy: Hell yeah. Well, let's shoot the shit a little before the real shooting starts.
<The Gerund makes a reasonable approximation of the sound of a gunshot.>
Noopy: How'd you get in here?
Dr. Lillihammer: I would describe it as a scrum.
Noopy: Good word. Scrum. Say it with me. Scrum.
Dr. Lillihammer: Scrum.
The Gerund: Scrumming.
Noopy: Scrum. Could mean anything. Practically gibberish.
Dr. Lillihammer: You think you're going to get me with semantic satiation? I made one of the guys in your queue forget his own name.
<The Gerund makes a series of sounds reminiscent of a drum rimshot.>
Noopy: We got a tape of your "audition" out there, didn't we? Play the tape, The Gerund.
<The Gerund sets up an antique film projector, and begins playing badly-degraded footage of a makeshift waiting room in a vast cargo hold.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Won't it just be audio for the listeners?
Noopy: If your ears are just ears, sure.
<Dr. Lillihammer watches the footage.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That was a woman calling me names.
Noopy: What language was she speaking?
Dr. Lillihammer: Daevite. They were very bad names.
Noopy: And what was that?
Dr. Lillihammer: Me making her take it back.
Noopy: As in?
Dr. Lillihammer: As in retrace her every action today, up to and including getting back into bed.
Noopy: Assuming she was able to safely cross the street backward.
<The Gerund makes sounds approximating a car horn and crash.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Shouldn't speak Daevite if you're not comfortable with sacrifice.
<Noopy recoils from the footage.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That was a guy trying to sicc Euler's Chimaera on me.
Noopy: For the audience at home?
Dr. Lillihammer: It's a Frankenmeme. Typically three unrelated viral concepts glued together grammatically.
Noopy: How do you handle that?
Dr. Lillihammer: You kill a chimaera with a pegasus. You go above. Write a second layer that recontextualizes what's below.
Noopy: He didn't take that well.
Dr. Lillihammer: And that was me disproving God.
<The Gerund makes a low sound in his throat, reminiscent of a very large beast growling hungrily.>
Noopy: You're a bit of a terror, aren't you?
The Gerund: Troubling.
Dr. Lillihammer: Troubling is a good word. I like to trouble.
Noopy: Well, then, trouble me this: why can you breathe, Gilly?
Dr. Lillihammer: Starting early, huh?
Noopy: Time is a tide, and you are my beach today. Why can you breathe?
Lillihammer: You just proved that I do, yourself.
Noopy: Did I?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes. And you proved that you breathe, too. You called me by my name, and you stated a pronoun for yourself. All individuals are organisms. All organisms respire.
The Gerund: Cunning.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's not a gerund.
The Gerund: Nitpicking.
Noopy: Maybe there's no oxygen in the room, though. Maybe The Gerund and I respirate anaerobically.
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you making that argument?
Noopy: No, I don't think I will.
Dr. Lillihammer: Good thinking.
Noopy: Why are you here today, Gilly?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm just a huge fan of what you guys are doing. This show is what radio is all about.
The Gerund: Concurring.
Noopy: God dammit, The Gerund. You just let her make an unchallenged statement!
The Gerund: Apologizing.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, we're all friends here. People coming together across great distances, arguing. That's the spirit of radio.
Noopy: That, I can't argue with. What, am I gonna say we're preaching to the void? But you're going to have to start making some more contentious statements soon, Gilly, because like I said: this isn't a love-in. Scratch and scrabble.
<The Gerund makes an unidentifiable sound.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Remember that time you caused a West Coast blackout by convincing all your listeners their power was out?
Noopy: Good times.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. I want us to achieve something like that today.
Noopy: Well, you've got to build to it. Winning one argument makes the next one stronger, while being wrong hurts your future claims on truth. So, come on. Start pitching.
<The Gerund makes a strangled sound of protest.>
Noopy: Sorry, The Gerund. Didn't mean to steal your shtick.
The Gerund: Seething.
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay. Try this old chestnut on for size: the medium is not the message.
Noopy: Going up against Marshall McLuhan, huh? Did you know he was a schriftsteller?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, he wasn't.
Noopy: Sure he was.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, he still is. He went to Corbenic when he died. Ipso facto, he's still active.
<The Gerund makes a reasonable approximation of the sound produced by a theremin.>
Noopy: Got me there. As for your first argument, though, come on. Everything is filtered through its environment. Your words float in a solution which both carries and surrounds them. Every message is mediated by its medium.
The Gerund: Convincing.
Dr. Lillihammer: But they aren't one-to-one. They aren't the same thing, and the phrasing implies they are. The medium is the message. Is means equals.
Noopy: Does it? I think the philosopher Clinton would have something to say about that.
<The Gerund neighs like a horse.>
Noopy: "Is" just means the present tense. It implies that right now, these two things are linked.
Dr. Lillihammer: No. It's the present tense singular form of "be." Meaning, again, equivalence.
Noopy: The archaic definition is "belongs to."
<A ship passes very close by. The studio rocks back and forth. Neither Noopy nor The Gerund appear to notice.>
Noopy: That fits with what McLuhan meant.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's not still in use.
Noopy: It is.
Dr. Lillihammer: By who?
Noopy: All of us, by having this conversation.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's circular logic.
Noopy: No it's not.
Dr. Lillihammer: How?
Noopy: It's spiral logic. It's spiralling though the noöhedron. Am I right, folks?
The Gerund: Clapping.
<Dr. Lillihammer sits back.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Guess that's that, then. The medium is the message.
Noopy: That's right.
<Noopy slaps himself on the forehead.>
Noopy: Shit! You're too good at this.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, I'm not. I'm just good enough.
Noopy: Good enough for what? Everyone who comes on this show has a specific aim in mind. What do you want us all to believe, Gilly?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'll tell you.
Noopy: Okay.
<Noopy wrinkles his nose.>
Noopy: Oh, come on.
The Gerund: Embarrassing.
Noopy: We're gonna claw this one back. Not an argument, just a promise.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'll grant you that one for free.
<Noopy reaches for an antique rotary phone.>
Noopy: Let's go to the lines. Maybe our listeners can give you a harder run for our money.
<He does not pick up the receiver, but waves his hand over it.>
Noopy: Hello, Caller! If that is your real name. You're on The Destructive Commons.
<A voice plays over the bridge speaker, distorted and crackling.>
Caller: Hey. Hey, Gilly.
Dr. Lillihammer: 'sup?
Caller: My partner and I just detonated ten packets of plastique explosive on the repeaters sending your broadcast out. Nobody beyond the noöhedron is hearing you.
The Gerund: Electrifying!
Dr. Lillihammer: Hell yeah.
Noopy: Hell yeah indeed, Caller! That's exactly the kind of listener engagement we love here in the studio. Did it kill anyone?
Caller: No.
Noopy: Are you sure?
Caller: Yes.
Noopy: Are you sure you're sure?
Caller: No.
Noopy: You're at a serious deficit now, Caller. You've lost a lot of arguments all in a row.
<A loud report is heard on the speaker.>
Noopy: What was that?
Caller: It did kill someone.
Noopy: Who?
Caller: My partner. I just shot him. I wouldn't have done it if I hadn't needed to win this argument.
<The Gerund makes a sound like a siren. Not an ambulance, but a fire truck.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You could have just fired that gun at nothing.
Caller: I'm going to turn myself in to the police after I hang up.
Noopy: Outside adjudication! A bold move. We'll see you in court, Caller!
Caller: Love the show!
<Noopy mimes hanging up, and the speaker blows out.>
The Gerund: Scintillating.
Noopy: What do you think about that, Gilly?
Dr. Lillihammer: I think you guys do a lot of damage.
Noopy: I also think this. That's not a point of contention.
Dr. Lillihammer: Remember how you broke the word "iconic" so bad, it bled into the noösphere and now everyone thinks it just means "famous"?
Noopy: Yeah, that was a sponsored deal with the schriftsteller. They love controlling meaning.
Dr. Lillihammer: You make deals with the enemy?
Noopy: What could be more chaotic than that?
Dr. Lillihammer: We love chaos here on the show, don't we?
<Another ship passes by. Spray covers the bridge windows.>
Noopy: Again, not a point in contention.
The Gerund: Repeating.
Noopy: Exactly.
<Dr. Lillihammer takes a shallow breath.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Deals are inherently not chaotic. Following the schema of a two-host talk show is not chaotic. Gerunds are not chaotic. Mediation by technology distorts a message. Ten shows ago you said that the moon is the Earth's only natural satellite, but twenty-three shows ago you proved the Ptolemaic System, so everything is the Earth's natural satellite. Nine shows ago you sneezed too many times. There won't be a show next week. I can hold my breath almost indefinitely. Eight shows ago your broadcast was interrupted by a generator failure for three seconds. The resumption was a new show, and it also wasn't. You have to address every argument I make about shows after eight shows ago twice, once for each numbering system. Seven shows ago all the gerunds were just adjectives. There is a lag between creation and perception. Six shows ago you repeated points from seventy-nine shows ago without realizing it. Time is linear. Discourse shapes reality. Five shows ago you talked about Wheel of Fortune and you said you'd made all your listeners more frugal with their vowels but you forgot to account for conspicuous consumption. This is a consensus reality. Radio doesn't exist.
The Gerund: Galloping.
Noopy: It's an unacceptable technique in any polite debate. We love it here on the show, folks. That's probably the best example I've ever heard.
Dr. Lillihammer: Can you remember all the arguments?
Noopy: I'll allow almost all of them, because the only one that matters is the last one. Radio obviously exists.
<The Gerund makes a sound resembling the buzzing of electricity.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You allowed that there is a gap between creation and perception. That means a radio transmission, which mediates between speech and that speech being heard, represents an interval of non-existence.
Noopy: The information is still being carried on a wave.
Dr. Lillihammer: But if it isn't being heard, it doesn't exist. This is a consensus reality. You allowed that argument.
Noopy: Our audience doesn't believe that something ceases to exist just because they can't hear it.
Dr. Lillihammer: They will if I convince them. Discourse shapes reality.
<Noopy frowns, but does not interrupt.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You proved that the medium is the message. That caller says that the message isn't getting out to anyone outside of the noöhedron. A closed loop is not a message. Nobody outside of us and your audience knows that this show exists right now. Consensus reality therefore dictates it does not.
Noopy: You haven't made the argument that the show doesn't exist. You've made the argument that radio doesn't exist.
Dr. Lillihammer: And at the start of the show, I made the argument that this show was radio. Did I not?
<The Gerund whistles.>
Dr. Lillihammer: And did you not accept it?
<Noopy blinks, then reaches out. The Gerund takes his hand. They share a long look, then draw their fingers apart.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Radio doesn't exist, and the medium is the message. You have no message. You have no show.
<Silence on recording.>
The Gerund: Well, this sucks.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, you tried. You didn't try well, but.
<Noopy leans forward in his chair, eyes narrowed.>
Noopy: Gilly Gladstone doesn't exist.
Dr. Lillihammer: Sore loser. Good effort, but that's actually already true. You think I'd give you my real name?
Noopy: Fine. You don't exist.
Dr. Lillihammer: I exist six times more than you do.
<Noopy stares at her, eyes slowly widening.>
Noopy: You're… Lillian Lillihammer.
Dr. Lillihammer: And I'm my own argument.
<Noopy smiles nastily.>
Noopy: And you're still linked to the noöhedron. Radio is a fundamental property of the universe. If it isn't real, nothing is.
Dr. Lillihammer: Nothing is?
Noopy: Nothing.
Dr. Lillihammer: Huh.
<As one, both hosts slump forward on the table, scattering their useless equipment.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Guess I've got to give you that one.
<She stretches, and stands up.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Luckily, I’ve been in my own separate shared brainspace for over two decades. And I only linked one of my six selves to the noöhedron, anyway.
<At the sound of a deep, bellowing horn, she turns back to the table. When she sees another cargo ship approaching, she smiles sheepishly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: And it's one from a world where nothing exists already. Except, ironically, radio.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Anything to say about that, boys?
<The Gerund snores.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Stimulating.
<Transcript ends.>
As far as the wider world is concerned, the only effect of the above is that everyone who used to listen to Noopy and The Gerund doesn't listen to radio at all anymore.
In other words, no effect.
3 June 2023
In which I let Thilo cook
One drawback of our peaceful little retreat is that I can mostly only practice 'safe' memetics. There's nobody to use as a punching bag. Thilo has promised to fix me up something in that regard, but so far it has yet to materialize.
This month was all building up to a field trip where I'd finally be able to to flex my mental muscles against someone else's. It was definitely becoming a problem, only being able to test my wilder ideas in the field.
Running a bread shop in Bern was a kind of combat, I'll admit.
"The odds of this resolving peacefully are slim to none, you know." I passed a loaf of burebrot over the counter; my patron accepted with a glassy-eyed stare, and left without paying. Thilo's way of making up for the fact that none of these people had bread on the brain until they saw my freshly-painted signage.
"I know." Thilo was labouring over the oven, and seemed to be enjoying it; apparently the trend where the older you get, the more manual labour parses as fun, does not significantly reverse when you get on in centuries. "But we are still going to try. I am not making a weapon out of you."
That was my cue to flip the door sign from OPEN to THIS SHOP DOES NOT EXIST. "I'll be doing the making, thanks very much. That's another thing I've got experience with." I grabbed my satchel from under the counter, and pulled out the little red case. He still hasn't asked me about it. "I'm upgrading my equipment, but it's already top of the line."
Thilo finished his latest masteryeast, and switched off the gas. "Isn't it exhausting? Always having to be right?"
I sat down on my stool behind the cash register. "It probably would be. If I had to work at it. Saves me time to work on being the best."
We breathed in the aroma of a dozen dozen bakings, in satisfied silence. This used to be part of a massive chain of bakeries piggybacking on the success of a single sign painted in the seventeenth century by one Thilo Zwist, apprentice schriftsteller. He's been misty-eyed the entire time.
There's an ongoing test in my education, and I flipped over the metaphorical sheet again. I thought I recognized the expression on his face. "Do you think you could ever be one of them again?"
He’s used to me trying to read his mind now, so he didn't look surprised. A little sad, though. "No. They were never what I thought they were in the first place."
"Do you think they could be like you?"
He chuckled. "Am I such a shining example?"
"You should see how your beard looks in the sunlight." I paused, girding myself for the thing I hate doing most in the world. "Yes. You're a terrific example. Minus the moping."
He looked touched, if unconvinced. "I have to believe we can all become better."
"How much of the way they are do you think is the result of brainwashing?"
He didn't have to think about it. Probably he's spent more time on this question than I have spent alive. "I imagine it differs from person to person. The schriftsteller take who they need. Some of those people come very willingly. Some under protest. The ones who are eager to see these projects come to fruition will be difficult to reach. The others, it will be a matter of saving them."
"We're pretty good at saving people," I reminded him.
"We may need to become even better at reaching them. I had no idea there were any Writers still left in the world, but now it seems there are far too many for us to overwhelm with force alone."
"I've been practicing my debate skills."
He nodded. "That's good. Because this may end up being the most important, possibly the last, great argument of human history. You will need to be more than convincing. You will need to truly understand your opponents."
"You mean find things in common? Understand their perspectives?"
"Yes. That is what I mean."
"And you believe I can do that without being swayed?"
Something like pride crept into his elderly rasp. "Only slightly less fervently than you believe it."
I gave him a few seconds to see the effect his words had on me before responding. "You really are getting to know me."
Then I let that sit for a bit before ruining the moment. "Not going to lie, though, it'll be difficult to meet a fascist halfway."
He wiped his brow, and plopped his old man hat back over his old man dome. "That's the trick, though. You don't meet them halfway. You don't necessarily even concede anything. They might see their situation and all possible modifications to it as a line with two or three points — certainly the schriftsteller and anyone who finds their ideals appealing will — but you must perceive it instead as a plane. That is the true value of perspective; if you have it, and they don't, you can appear to give them ground from a two-dimensional perspective without actually getting any closer." He delivered this with all the force, poise, and obvious signs of rote memorization of a university lecture.
"And here I thought you were going to argue for radical sympathy."
He sighed. "I'm growing a little more practical in my endless autumn years."
"Or you and I are closing the gap between our perspectives."
"Or perhaps it only looks that way." He glanced at the door. "This zopf won't eat itself, you know."
I stood back up, and stretched my legs. "I am beginning to really appreciate the nuances of language," I told him as I walked to the door.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. You know the French word for bread is pain?"
This one's personal, in the weirdest possible way. My first up close and personal encounter with a giftschreiber came when five of them tried to blow up a building I was in. I got one of them eaten by a tentacle monster, and a friend of mine shot two others to death. That left Alis Rydderech, who invented herself whole cloth, and Imogen Tarrow, who duplicated a real person in exacting detail. The geistschreiber mimic the appearances and personalities of their targets so effectively it's difficult to tell where one personality begins and the next one ends.
Alis has turned up time and time again in our lives, in worlds that now only exist in my memories. In this world she fed us information for a while, as a free but hunted agent, until eventually she fed herself to us in exchange for certain amenities I find too disgusting to discuss.
I always had her in mind for a chat, but the nice thing about putting people in boxes is that they usually keep until you need them.
Except for the fact that we also had "Imogen" in detention, and now we don't.
Anyway.
<Transcript begins.>
Dr. Lillihammer leaves Area-219's central corridor and enters a wide courtyard with no ceiling. The heat from the facility melts most of the falling snow, but some flakes make it down to ground level. A single inmate, "Alis Rydderech", is leaning on the wooden slat walls. She notices Dr. Lillihammer, and smiles.>
Alis: You're not my usual date.
Dr. Lillihammer: You're out of my league.
<Dr. Lillihammer settles against the wall beside Alis, and looks down at her.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Aren't you cold?
Alis: Yeah, but at least I'm not cruel.
Dr. Lillihammer: Funny. Hey, quick question. Are you familiar with the concept of 'time off for good behaviour'?
<Alis snorts.>
Alis: Are you about to tell me you've erased it from the noösphere?
Dr. Lillihammer: I was thinking we could make a deal.
Alis: I've already got a deal.
Dr. Lillihammer: It's bad.
Alis: So am I.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right now you give us the cognitive equivalent of table scraps, and we give you conjugal visits with the world's saddest sack. I would term this deal 'tat for tit'. Do you know what tat is, Alis?
Photograph of PoI-6721-1 at Secure Area-219, 2023.
<Alis shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: It means something which is useless. Like everything you've told us about the crypto cults so far.
Alis: What do you want me to say? I know you've seen the reports. My brain is a cloverleaf interchange full of crashed cars and roadblocks. They've tried everything. Hypnosis. Mental modelling. Mnestic therapy. If there's anything still in here—
<She taps her temple.>
Alis: —that you haven't heard yet, it's because somebody really didn't want you to hear it.
Dr. Lillihammer: Which means it's something we need to hear.
Alis: Yeah. Too bad, huh?
Dr. Lillihammer: No. You're not a dead end, Alis. You're an unsolved puzzle. Do you know what the primary characteristic of an unsolved puzzle is?
<Alis waits.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Me not having tried to solve it.
<Alis laughs bitterly.>
Alis: Unless you're planning on giving me that perfect recall of yours, I don't see—
Dr. Lillihammer: What if I could?
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: What if I could bypass your mental blocks with my own mind?
<Alis looks concerned.>
Alis: What, like… a mind meld, or something?
Dr. Lillihammer: You remember Udo Okorie?
<Alis grimaces.>
Alis: She's the only reason you're still alive.
Dr. Lillihammer: Not nearly the only one, but yeah. You too, in fact. You would have died at 21 along with everybody else, if she hadn't stopped you.
<Alis gestures at the empty courtyard.>
Alis: I owe her so much.
Dr. Lillihammer: Udo's working on a thing. If she gets it figured out, I might be able to dig through your brain matter and find whatever they buried.
Alis: You make it sound so appealing.
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you interested?
<Alis considers her for a moment.>
Alis: Can't you do it without my permission?
Dr. Lillihammer: In a practical sense? Yes.
Alis: Then why wouldn't you?
Dr. Lillihammer: Because my friend wouldn't like it.
<Alis laughs, more earnestly this time.>
Alis: Zwist. You're afraid of pissing off Thilo Zwist.
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe I'm just on the same wavelength as him.
Alis: Fat chance. I've seen you work, Lillian. If you think you're right, you don't think twice. Other people's considerations only matter if you can't get along without them.
Dr. Lillihammer: And I can't.
<Alis blinks.>
Alis: What?
Dr. Lillihammer: Don't get me wrong. I'm the best at what I do, and I'm only getting better. But there's a whole wide world of bullshit out there, and the one thing I can't do is be everywhere at once. I need more eyes. More minds. That's what Thilo wants, and that's what I'm offering.
<Alis shakes her head.>
Alis: I don't understand.
Dr. Lillihammer: We're going to flush the scheisseschreiber and scheissesteller, Alis. We're going to negate them. And that's going to take a bigger 'we' than just old man Zwist and me.
Alis: Are you asking me…
<She shakes her head again.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm asking if you really do want us to stop the cycle. And I'm asking if you'd help me make that happen.
<Silence on recording.>
Alis: Betting I wasn't your first choice.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, not hardly. I never know if you're coming around or I'm going insane.
Alis: Like I said, I don't know much about who I was before the giftschreiber took me in. But I do know one thing.
Dr. Lillihammer: I am rapt.
Alis: I know I went with them willingly.
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That doesn't mean much. We don't know what lies they told you. Obviously you can't have known what you were really getting into.
Alis: Maybe not on a grand scale. But I think I do know how they hooked me. I think they told me I'd get to decide who I am, for myself. With no restrictions.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's a pretty big deal. And I guess they delivered.
Alis: Did they, though?
Dr. Lillihammer: You can be anybody you want. You can change your appearance. You can assert yourself in ways nobody even thinks about challenging. Nobody thinks twice when you tell them who you are.
Alis: I do.
<She squirms.>
Alis: They told me who to be. What roles to fill.
Dr. Lillihammer: And now you're not one of them anymore, so you get to decide that for yourself. That must feel like the absolute peak of freedom.
Alis: Except I've spent so long being what they wanted, I've never considered what I want for myself.
Dr. Lillihammer: You've been out of their control for… going on decades now.
Alis: And I still don't know.
<Dr. Lillihammer picks at the shoulder of Alis' detention uniform.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe it's the jumpsuit. The thing about uniforms is… well, it's right there in the word, isn't it?
Alis: Maybe.
<Alis looks up at the light snowfall.>
Alis: Have you ever questioned who you are?
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure. Then I immediately answer the question, and act accordingly.
Alis: Sounds great. Doesn't work that way for me.
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe you're asking the wrong questions. Or maybe that's just what you are.
Alis: Wrong?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, the asking type. Maybe your thing is always renegotiating. You do love to keep us guessing, Alis.
Alis: That's true.
<She wrinkles her nose.>
Alis: Do you know how we take people's identities?
Dr. Lillihammer: You've explained it pretty thoroughly. You get to know your subject through research, first, and then you sit down with them in an altered state and absorb everything you can.
Alis: I didn't tell the whole story.
Dr. Lillihammer: What's left?
Alis: What's left. Exactly. I tried being Director Tarrow for a while, you'll remember.
Dr. Lillihammer: Vividly.
Alis: I was once a chemist in Prague. An astronomer in Zurich. A panhandler in Melbourne. I could call them up again at a moment's notice, because they're still in there.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right.
Alis: No, Lillian, they're still in there. It isn't that I don't know who I am, it's that I know that I'm all of them at once. I can think in their voices. Sometimes it happens without me thinking. I can think the way they think. I have so many options in front of me, and to a certain extent they are all me. They all feel right. But I feel like I want more.
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe you need to construct a new self. Or two, or three.
Alis: Or six?
Dr. Lillihammer: Why not?
Alis: Is it like this for you, too?
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Lillian-A saw half of humanity die and became one of the most important people left alive. She has more despair and a stronger sense of possibility than the woman talking to you now. Her life and mine diverge for only one year, '02 to '03. The rest range from half a decade to a decade and a half of altered history. They lived in worlds with no Breach, until the end. Their careers were dominated by different concerns. They had different friends, different lovers, different interests. -C lives in a void. Internality is everything for her, because there's nothing else out there. -D owns a secret that the rest of the Earth forgot. She's covert and more than a little bit manic. -E is one-seventh of our remnant of humanity. Everything is riding on her. She's ten years older than me, physically, and she's always at the end of her rope. Wants things she can't have. Wonders if I want them too. Sometimes I remember their lives instead of mine. I can always tell what they would have thought, or said, or did in my situation.
Alis: What about -B?
Dr. Lillihammer: -B is a world full of spiders.
Alis: …okay. But I meant Lillian-B, not the timeline.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Is question period over?
Alis: Do you resent them?
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: No. We don't resent ourselves.
<She pushes off the wall, and heads back toward the corridor.>
Alis: Would you miss them, if they were gone?
Dr. Lillihammer: Think about my offer, and we'll talk.
<Alis has to raise her voice to be heard now.>
Alis: Did Willie come with you?
<Dr. Lillihammer laughs, and does not stop walking.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Separate planes. Unlike you, I'm no masochist.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: At the outset of this project I divided every known cryptomancer not already employed at the Foundation into two groups: candidates, and targets. Around the middle of the second list was a woman whose name very emphatically is not Imogen Tarrow. She's had her uses over the years, often looking for some of the same things I'm hoping to find, but she's always been a poisonous personality. Career highlights include replacing the Director of Area-21 (and stealing her name), getting permanently detained, getting out of permanent detention via the destruction of Site-06, getting permanently detained again, and getting out of permanent detention again via we don't actually know. I hate geistschreiber. So I've been keeping a weather eye out for her over the years, and a standing order to my antimemetic tweety birds to let me know if anything resembling her shows up. So when Joe Boswell spotted some inconsistencies in the rough shape of a certain someone, it was enough to send me all the way to Lisbon.
<Transcript begins.>
<Lisbon is a maze. Its narrow, one-way streets twist and turn unexpectedly, and much of the architecture is consistent from block to block. The medieval layout is impossible to navigate without a map.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is walking along one such street. Cars brush past her, close by, but she does not seem to notice.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Something's missing.
I can see how the city sounds. The wind through the streets and alleys, the sound of my feet on the cobbles, shutters creaking, voices through open windows, birds crying out on the Tagus. I can literally see this, because I have reprogrammed my brain to interpret audio cues as visual data. There are notes floating in the air in front of me, to each side, and behind me.
<Dr. Lillihammer spins in place, examining the data at her disposal.>
Being able to do this on the fly is exhilarating. I used to have contact lenses to confuse my senses, to simulate synaesthesia, but with cryptomancy I can actually tell my brain to see sounds. The giftschreiber are using that to encode the location of their safehouse. But there's an extra step, obviously, because what I'm seeing doesn't mean anything.
<Dr. Lillihammer begins to hum the notes. No obvious melody emerges.>
<A car passing by very close honks at her.>
I alter my synapses, and suddenly the notes are colour-coded so I can better see the difference between high and low. And suddenly, that's enough. All the notes come out blue, and I've got a very good idea of what that means. The underground PATH system in Toronto uses blue as a code for North — heading for the arctic — red for south, where it's warm, and orange and yellow for west and east, where the sun sets and rises. I need to keep heading north.
<Dr. Lillihammer moves into a new city block.>
Now there's some yellow notes in with the blue, and I know I'm doing it right. I move quickly through the block, skipping on the stones, labcoat swirling as the roads switchback, and I wonder if this ridiculous system would work half as well on a soulless modern grid. Medieval cities really do help out with the whole magical thinking deal. Maybe that's why the word wizards still love them so.
<Several blocks later, Dr. Lillihammer stops in confusion.>
I'm starting to retrace my steps. Something isn't right. Something is still missing.
<Another car moves past, slowly. Its driver supplies a single desultory honk to warn her of his passage.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, of course.
<She steps into the street. Within minutes, there is another car behind her, honking furiously. The street is too narrow for the vehicle to pass her.>
And now the notes are complete. I wasn't seeing any orange until I got that most important element of the city soundscape in place. A few minutes later and I'm in the right district, based on what I can see now, and I wave my thanks to the motorcade that's been slowly accumulating behind me. A lot of them gesture back.
<Dr. Lillihammer stoops to the sidewalk, and begins tapping at what appears to be bare concrete.>
I can see symbols painted here. Well, I can smell that I can see symbols painted here, but I tell my mind to skip the interpolation. There's no way some random gifted kid would be able to switch these impressions on the fly. This is the trail of a big-time word-poisoner, and they're expecting backup from similarly talented friends.
They're going to get me instead.
<Dr. Lillihammer identifies a modest one-storey dwelling as her target. She shrugs off her dazzle coat, and rings the doorbell.>
<A slot on the door opens, and Dr. Lillihammer shoves her dazzle coat through. There is a strangled cry, and the door opens.>
<Dr. Lillihammer kicks a doubled-over man into an umbrella rack, and pushes past him into a narrow hall. A male voice calls out ahead:>
Voice: É ela!
<She raises one hand in the air, and wiggles the fingers. A second man, deeply tanned, steps into the hall from a side door. He immediately stares at the fingers, transfixed; Dr. Lillihammer suddenly snaps them, and he falls to the floor, unconscious.>
<A female voice calls out this time. It sounds weary and resigned.>
Second Voice: You ever had migas?
<Dr. Lillihammer notices an electrical panel next to a set of stairs leading down. She opens it, places her optogenetic stimulator against the ground bus bar, adjusts her settings and closes her eyes before pressing the activation button.>
<The video feed is distorted as the lights in the house flicker in a seemingly random pattern. Loud thumping sounds are heard, on this floor and both above and below.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Isn't that literally just crumbs?
<She walks through the door at the end of the hall. It leads into a simple kitchen, where "Imogen Tarrow" is still seated and eating.>
Tarrow: You and I both know that "literally" is a loaded word.
<Dr. Lillihammer sits down at the table across from her.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Did I get everybody?
Tarrow: Don't you always?
Dr. Lillihammer: Not really an answer, is it?
Tarrow: Not really.
<Dr. Lillihammer examines Tarrow. The latter has dark bags under her eyes, and her shoulders are rounded.>
Tarrow: You here to recruit me for your indie band?
Dr. Lillihammer: You're too mainstream. And I've heard your music, obviously. You know it ain't shit.
<Tarrow shrugs.>
Tarrow: It gets me where I need to go. I'm surprised you were able to read it. Used to be, you had to get lucky to catch me.
Dr. Lillihammer: That wasn't luck. The best bulldog in the world was on your case.
Tarrow: I hear she's busy these days. Got a family again. Married, even. You ever think maybe you ought to settle down, too?
Dr. Lillihammer: Not in this lifetime. Not when there's so many interesting people to meet. Imogen… should I call you Imogen?
<Tarrow shrugs again.>
Tarrow: I'll answer to it.
Dr. Lillihammer: You've always been stubborn, Imogen, but you're no bulldog. More like a bloodhound. Always sniffing around for something.
<Tarrow gestures at a pot on the kitchen counter.>
Tarrow: Still some migas left.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not hungry for food, and I'm not going to be satisfied with crumbs today.
Tarrow: You got here by following breadcrumbs.
Dr. Lillihammer: I got here by being better than you at what you do. So don't try to fuck with me. Tell me what it is you're looking for that's had you sighted in every capital on the continent, and then tell me why it's the schriftsteller guildhall.
<Tarrow now looks alert.>
Tarrow: How'd you figure that out?
Dr. Lillihammer: You know the fun thing about bloodhounds? They're not actually any better at finding shit than any other tracking dog. That's all PR. Lady, every clue you've been following so far? I checked it out already. I've got spotters everywhere on the globe, and you're basically trotting a path I've left well behind me. You aren't finding anything.
Tarrow: Then why confront me now? Obviously it's not just to put me back in jail. You know I'll be out again, whether it's a week from now or a year.
Dr. Lillihammer: Because I've never been to Lisbon, and I don't know why you're here.
<Tarrow nods.>
Tarrow: I will make you a deal.
Dr. Lillihammer: I love deals.
Tarrow: You won't love this one. Let me go, and I'll tell you what I've learned.
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure.
Tarrow: Sure? Seriously?
Dr. Lillihammer: Neither of us trust the other. What's the point in belabouring the process?
Tarrow: I need your word that you'll let me go.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's a tall ask.
Tarrow: You're a tall woman.
Dr. Lillihammer: Let's work out the phrasing, first. Then we'll see.
Tarrow: "I, Lillian Lillihammer, do solemnly swear to allow Imogen Tarrow to leave this place unharmed and under her own power."
Dr. Lillihammer: Except you aren't Imogen Tarrow.
Tarrow: I'm close enough.
Dr. Lillihammer: Still seems like it's got holes in it. You know I've been spending a lot of time with those fuckers what steal shit not nailed down?
Tarrow: Word might've reached me.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, they've given me a healthy respect for the dangers of oathbreaking. This has to be ironclad. How about…
Tarrow: Like I'm gonna let you frame this.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, I really, really want to know what you know. Don't assume bad faith. You're the murderer here.
Tarrow: You murdered my sister.
Dr. Lillihammer: Only once. In another timeline, she murdered you.
<Tarrow sets down her fork.>
Tarrow: …what?
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe I'll tell you that story next time we meet, when we're both free women. Okay, how's this: "I grant full power over my mobility and agency to Imogen Tarrow, until such time as she releases me, so long as she provides the information she has promised."
<Tarrow's eyes widen.>
Tarrow: Are you nuts? You are nuts. Fine. But add "Lillian Lillihammer" after "I." Deal?
Dr. Lillihammer: Deal. I, Lillian Lillihammer, grant full power over my mobility and agency to Imogen Tarrow, until such time as she releases me, so long as she provides the information she has promised.
Tarrow: Awesome. You're getting stupid in your old age. Can you move?
<Dr. Lillihammer does not respond.>
Tarrow: Alright. Well, first, my part of the deal.
<She leans across the table, and whispers into Dr. Lillihammer's ear before settling back into her chair.>
Tarrow: Now, what was that about my sister killing me? You may speak.
Dr. Lillihammer: She was a schriftsteller all along. She was playing you.
<Tarrow bites her lower lip.>
Tarrow: Is that the truth? Speak plainly.
Dr. Lillihammer: It's the truth.
Tarrow: Wow.
<Tarrow laughs.>
Tarrow: I guess I should have seen that coming. Twins in opposition. That's already been the theme, the entire time, hasn't it? Wow. Anyway, I'm going to kill you now.
<Tarrow stands, cracks her knuckles, and walks around the table to stand next to Dr. Lillihammer.>
Tarrow: Maybe I'll just make you forget yourself. That's a little like death. How many selves do you have to forget, Lillian?
<A female voice comes from the hall.>
Voice: Sit back down, and don't do anything rash.
<Tarrow snorts.>
Tarrow: You've got no leverage. If I don't release her, your most important asset is completely bricked.
Voice: I release you and restore your agency, Dr. Lillihammer.
<Dr. Lillihammer knees Tarrow in the groin. The latter falls over, gulping down air and gasping in pain.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Nerve endings. The universal leveller.
<Imogen Tarrow, Director of Site-54, enters the kitchen.>
Dir. Tarrow: I hope you got that on camera.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'll send you a copy for personal perusal.
<Dir. Tarrow kneels, and presses a syringe into her double's twitching form. The latter collapses, and begins to snore softly.>
Dir. Tarrow: Site-06 was too good for her. She needs to learn what it's like to be kidnapped, chucked in a pit, and forgotten.
<Dr. Lillihammer stands, and pats the other woman on the back.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Only make sure her cell has a removable nameplate. Just in case.
<She heads for the door, then stops suddenly and snaps her fingers.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You have to provide the information you promised, to completely release the geas.
Dir. Tarrow: Oh, sure. Salt cod? There's a good place on Rua do Bojador.
Dr. Lillihammer: Fuckin' A.
<Transcript ends.>
All the data points are converging, but on what? A picture is forming, but it's a really crazy picture. Almost too big to hold in one mind all at once.
Luckily, I have more than one mind.
1 June 2023
In which it's your turn
We're playing schriftscrabble. That's my name for it. Probably won't catch on.
"Recidivism," he repeats, squinting at my most recent play. "I will allow it."
"Generous." As he focuses on his tiles, I indulge in the metagame. "You were a kid when you're training started, weren't you?"
"Yes…" The sibilant draws out to serpentine length as he tries to split his attention. "Though that was the norm at the time."
"What's the youngest apprentice you've ever had?"
"Hmm?" He rearranges the tiles on his shelf. It's a meaningless act in schriftscrabble, but manual mnemonics are a very real thing. "Not very young at all."
"I'm sorry I called you Yoda, then."
"Hmm?" He places six more tiles on the board, tapping one of the empty squares before covering it up with a blank tile. "Theory. Triple word score."
I can see no means of contesting this, so it passes without comment. "You do know what Scout thought about recruiting, don't you?"
It's always easy to get Thilo going on the topic of 43's founding Director. "Oh, yes. He and I discussed it often. Other Directors wanted tenured professors and grey haired experts. He wanted fresh PhDs, or even young adults fresh off their master's."
I've already selected my next word. I'm already a lot better at this game than its creator is. "Do you know why?"
"Certainly." He watches me lay down another seven-letter word with a scowl; I'm doing it to piss him off now, more than anything. "The cycle leaves deeper whorls in the flesh of your mind the older you are. When your brain is still at least a little plastic, there is hope to set you on a better path."
I momentarily lose my own focus, and the play is in danger. I reboot on the fly, and come in clutch. "That… makes sense. Wow. Well, we've really fucked that system up. No wonder we're circling the drain instead. Unvexed and apex, triple letter on the 'x'."
He has to consider that for a good long while. It's a tough sell, and I've also left him an opening. In the end he goes for the opening I also left him in our dialogue, as he nearly always does. Play the opponent, not the game. "It's not too late to change course. I understand that some of you are teachers. Real teachers. It has never been more important to instruct the young, Lillian." He couldn't look more earnest if he was a crying baby. "It is so easy to make them hateful and afraid, and there are so many reasons to do so. Even without the Writers' influence."
He knows he's preaching to the choir. He wants me swinging at a softball rather than pitching screw while he uses up his final tiles. "Yeah. Well. When I collect my little clique, I'm going to bring them here. And you and I are going to teach them together."
"Yes. 'Pointed'. Double word score." He lays down the last word. "But that won't be quite the same. I imagine your candidates are jaded researchers and turned former foes?"
"Mostly." I gather up my tiles as he finishes play.
"Not entirely?"
"Not entirely, no." I slap the tiles down, sliding them out of my hand like an automatic bricklayer.
"Interesting." He's not even looking at the board now. Or my hand. "Very interesting."
"You think that now. There's a good chance you'll just find it infuriating in the end. 'Ataraxy'. I win."
He stares at the featureless grid full of completely blank tiles, and tries to see his way clear to a challenge. But there's no further play. We've both been convinced. "It's been too long since I was genuinely furious."
"Yeah, I think screaming at some dumb kid would really fix you."
I clear the board, making sure he isn't watching when I return the extra tile to my sleeve.
As usual, I'm way ahead of him.
Among most Foundation duty sets is the maintenance of your civilian identity. I'm an online tutor for hire; I started up the service on a whim, and I'm very selective with my students, but it hasn't been an exercise completely devoid of merit. Or, occasionally, reward.
The following is a transcript of my direct messages with an anonymous student going by the handle 'Avys'. I've been tutoring them through grad school for just under a year. They'll be finishing their doctorate some time in 2025, if the fucking FSD gets off my back.
And Michelle, since you're definitely reading this, I haven't opened your last three emails yet. It probably wouldn't be a great use of your time to draft a fourth.
Suppress though you might, I'm a firestarter by nature.
<Server: Avys has connected.>
Avys: you busy
<Server: Dr_L has connected.>
Dr_L: For you? Never.
Avys: lame cliche is lame
Dr_L: It makes up for how I tell everyone else "Yes, fuck off."
Avys: that is pretty badass
Avys: check it out
[Avys sent:]
[yo.jpg]
Dr_L: What did I tell you about sending pictures online?
Avys: its scrubbed
Avys: gives u a headache if u try to unscrub it
Dr_L: Where did you learn how to do that
Avys: well
Avys: thats what i wanna talk to u about
Avys: fell into a crowd
Dr_L: What?
Avys: is that not how u say it
Avys: in english
Dr_L: Oh. You mean you've fallen in with a bad/the wrong crowd?
Avys: dunno
Avys: was hoping u could tell me
Dr_L: Give me the details.
Avys: so like
Avys: last time we were talking about refresh rates
Avys: and u were a loser about it
Dr_L: You were making shit up.
Avys: yeah u big loser thats what I do
Avys: that's why ur old ass talks to me
Dr_L: I'm gonna put my old foot up your college ass if you call me old again.
Avys: made u call yourself old, loser
Avys: anyway
Avys: i was saying i bet u can overclock the refresh rate on ur eyes right
Dr_L: Right. You were saying that wrong thing.
Avys: because like 30 to 60 fps is pretty bad
Avys: and theres studies say we can probably see a lot faster than that
Avys: and they sell monitors at like 144 fps
Dr_L: They also sell so-called gaming mice that start double-clicking within a month.
Dr_L: Razer is a joke company.
Avys: cool tangent boomer
Dr_L: You're probably the first person to use that word correctly in years.
Avys: anyway
Avys: was thinking u could use super high frame rate to hide messages and shit
Dr_L: Yes, you could. They'd be very well-hidden because nobody could see them.
Avys: exactly
Avys: oh ur makin fun of me again
Avys: okay
Avys: so
Dr_L: You can type out multiple lines before sending, you know.
Avys: gotta go fast
Avys: (old joke for old lady)
Avys: anyway i was looking this shit up and i found this chat room
Dr_L: Okay.
Avys: first i thought they were all chuds because the mod was doing an attack helicopter thing only it was a kill sat
Dr_L: Oh no.
Avys: but no it turns out theyre cool
Dr_L: Chill, even.
Avys: ya theyve got a whole
Avys: wait
Avys: do u know what i'm talking about
Dr_L: Rarely.
Dr_L: Finish your story.
Avys: so i get to talking to these folx and they say maybe im on to something
Avys: and they start showing me these wild pics
Dr_L: Of?
Avys: just weird blurry shit
Avys: one i remember was a dragon curve of menger sponges
Dr_L: Ah.
Avys: yeah it made me pass out
Avys: but before that i could see between the frames on my monitor
Avys: which u know
Avys: impossible
Dr_L: See anything interesting there?
Avys: nope
Avys: thought i saw a screaming face for a hot second
Avys: but it was probably me screaming because i was about to pass out
Avys: reflected in the black
Dr_L: Uh huh.
Avys: so like
Avys: its gotta be some hot government shit right
Avys: those images
Dr_L: Could be.
Avys: am i gonna get put on a list if i keep talking to these losers
Dr_L: What makes you think you aren't already?
Avys: ur always such a comfort
Avys: in these hard times
Dr_L: How's that thesis coming?
Avys: keep hitting dead ends
Dr_L: How come?
Avys: because everything that interests me is apparently bullshit
Dr_L: Like what?
Avys: like i had this idea for a zoetrope
Avys: u know what a zoetrope is
Dr_L: Yes.
Avys: k so u spin it and u see images really fast and it looks animated
Avys: well
Avys: what if u could do that in reverse
Dr_L: Which part?
Avys: spin around a thing at a constant rate of speed
Avys: so that it looks like ur standing still
Dr_L: You'd have to be moving very fast.
Avys: is what im saying
Dr_L: A person couldn't do it. But an image…
Avys: ya
Dr_L: A projection.
Avys: like that james bond car
Dr_L: No. If you could project the environment onto someone's eyes, perfectly, in stereo, without including yourself…
Dr_L: Huh.
Dr_L: Yeah, that's another good one. Thanks.
Avys: am i ever gonna get to know what u do with this shit
Dr_L: Keep playing your cards right.
Avys: at least u listen
Avys: i think my supervisor needs a hearing aid
Avys: also glasses
Dr_L: Why glasses?
Avys: cuz he can only see in binary
Dr_L: Oh. One of those.
Avys: ya
Avys: everybodys like that here
Avys: if u dont either jiggle or play ball, ur invisible
Avys: on a good day
Avys: best case they ask and forget
Avys: worst case they argue
Avys: with their grandmas hand up their ass
Avys: like its a negotiation
Avys: like i gotta clear it with them case by case
Dr_L: I've told you to tell me if anyone gives you a hard time again.
Avys: ya
Avys: the kill sat told me that too
Avys: think he could death ray some jocks for me
Dr_L: I would appreciate it if you didn't ask.
Avys: ur always keeping secrets from me
Dr_L: But at least I tell you when I'm doing it.
Avys: word
Avys: oh
Avys: i figured out that thing
Dr_L: Can you be more specific?
Avys: thing u sent me last time
Avys: the brain teaser
Dr_L: It's not something to be figured out. It's recursively encrypted. Just an exercise, one that never runs out.
Avys: nope
Dr_L: What do you mean, 'nope'?
Avys: i mean i found where the mouth meets the tail
Avys: code is trinary
Dr_L: No, it isn't.
Dr_L: What are you talking about? It's binary.
Avys: extra digit is in the signal noise
Avys: the carrier wave
Avys: add them in and u can track the data cycle to its start
Dr_L: My third eye sees more clearly yet again.
Avys: keeps u coming back
Avys: so worth it
Avys: sending the dump over now
Dr_L: I might have some actual work for you, soon. Commission, if you're interested.
Avys: fuck ya
Avys: need me a new lego set
Dr_L: I envy you your free time.
Avys: the secret is to stop being so old
Dr_L: Pass.
Avys: ur loss
Avys: loser
Avys: but ya send that commission my way
Avys: pls
Dr_L: In the meantime, I'm sending you a link. Read up.
Avys: new assignment?
Avys: what the fuck is this
Avys: nobody reads webcomics anymore u fossil
Avys: am I searching for secret nazi code words in this one or
Dr_L: No. Just read a bit, see if you like it. Something to mention to Bones next time you talk with it.
Avys: wait
<Server: Dr_L has disconnected.>
Avys: i didnt tell u its name
Avys: goddamnit
This conversation actually got me a C&D notice from five different internal agencies, and may have accidentally caused the creation of the Department of Webcomics. I got to play my BURNOUT reverse card on them, which was exceedingly enjoyable. I am that rarest of beasts, the one who both can, and can teach. You could sail a refloated Edwardian ocean liner through the leeway I'm afforded.
By this point, I'd been neglecting the burny part of BURNOUT for too long. My proxies could manage most of the flareups, but sheer volume demanded the occasional executive intervention.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: It's a boom market for populist hatemongering, and one of my primary targets has dedicated nearly her entire life to that art. It took some time to trace her movements through the American right, to Mexico, to the UK, to what I'm sure she considered a theatre well beneath our notice. Though I'd had such a fruitful discussion with Noopy and The Gerund, I was eager to see how I'd perform in a more structured debate. Time to put my high school civics knowledge to the test!
The following is an excerpt from the Congressional Record of the Philippines, 19th Congress, 2023.
(Applause.)
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
The ayes have it; the motion is approved.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
On behalf of my constituents, I want to thank you all for your prudence, and wish you a most happy Independence Day.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Majority leader.
CONSIDERATION OF
INDP. RPT. NO. 8382
REP. SUAREZ.
Mr Speaker, I move that we consider Independent Report No. 8382 as submitted by Congresswoman Lillian S. Lillihammer.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Congresswoman Lillian S. Lillihammer is now recognized.
REP. LILLIHAMMER, S.
Hey, Liz.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Congresswoman, you will address the House together. This chamber is not for casual conversations.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Sure it is.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Oh. Okay. Carry on.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I know you can hear me, Betty. I can see your old lady face curdle up.
REP. BABASAGIN, M.
Hello, Dr. Lillian Lillihammer of the SCP Foundation.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
That's right. I represent the good people of the SCP Foundation congressional district. Where were you elected, again?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Pekeng Nayon.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I'm sure that's a really good joke in Tagalog.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Get to the point, please, Congresswomen.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Sure. Hasn't the Philippines had it rough enough already? What are you even doing here?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Serving the interests of Filipino democracy, of course.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Gerontocracy, you mean. And worse. You probably helped Duterte get his job, and I know for a fact you're in bed with Bongbong.
REP. BABASAGIN.
The representative for the SCP Foundation is making personal attacks on the president.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
No, I'm not.
REP. BABASAGIN.
You can't just stand there and deny it.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I'm not denying anything. Elizabeth. They've got a centre-right government here, and a president who denies the human rights abuses that made him rich. That's the second protofascist government you've been propping up in recent memory. What gives? I thought you were supposed to be into chaos.
REP. BABASAGIN.
We'll be at nuclear war by the end of the decade. What about that isn't chaotic?
REP. SUAREZ.
Mr Speaker.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
The honorable Majority Leader is recognized.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
No, he isn't. Elizabeth. Do you even realize what you're doing? Whose plans you're playing into?
REP. BABASAGIN.
You've badly misjudged this situation.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Fine, you force my hand. Honorable whatevers, genders and stuff, I'm here to present Independent Report 8382 on the topic of You Have Elizabeth Crocker In Your Government and She Is Going To Kill You All.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Mr. Speaker, I move for the adoption of Independent Report 8382.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I think I'm supposed to do that?
THE PRESIDING OFFICER (Rep. Libanan).
There is a motion for the adoption of Independent Report 8382. Is there any objection?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Yes. I object.
THE PRESIDING OFFICER (Rep. Libanan).
Okay. Independent Report 8382 is hereby defeated.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Good. Let's get on with the real business, now.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
You're out of line, Congressman.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
No, I'm not.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Oh. Okay. Carry on.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
What?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Now you'll see.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Mr. Speaker, dearest colleagues, patriots all, I am humbled to be bringing this new piece of legislation to your attention.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
We are kind of doing a thing over here?
REP. MAKABAYAN.
I have served this fine country for as long as any of you can remember, and today I come to you with a matter of the utmost urgency.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Stop talking.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
I speak of the issue of national security posed by the presence of agents of enemy powers in this very chamber.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Here we go.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
On several prior occasions I have attempted to reveal to this House the identity of the putative Rep. Babasagin, who is in fact former CIA Agent and anarchist Elizabeth Crocker. She has at every opportunity stonewalled my efforts to make this fact clear to you. To my surprise, today, Rep. Lillihammer has provided testimony supporting my allegations.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I did do that.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Rep. Lillihammer is herself an agent of the SCP Foundation, an organization inimical to the continued self-governance of the Republic of the Philippines. I move for the adoption of House Resolution 001, the noospheric obliteration of Rep. Babasagin, with the following amendment: that Rep. Lillihammer be obliterated as well.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I am opposed to this motion.
REP. BABASAGIN.
I also oppose.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Sorry, can't hear you.
THE PRESIDING OFFICER (Rep. Libanan).
There is a motion—
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Nuh-uh. Hey. Over here.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Maybe if you took your clothes off.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Maybe if you banged your shoe.
REP. BABASAGIN.
On the podium?
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Bit precarious, but if your back's up to it.
THE PRESIDING OFFICER (Rep. Libanan).
There—
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Does the Constitution have provision for erasing people from the noosphere?
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Yes, the Secret Amendment of 2021.
REP. BABASAGIN.
They weaponized public belief in the nation's institutions. There's over one hundred million people in this country. If he convinces the House, and then the Senate, and the motion passes, we'll be overruled on the topic of our own existence.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Okay, I'm crossing the floor. Metaphorically-speaking.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Thought you might.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I call into question the Hon. Congressman's record on the topic of eating trash from the House dumpsters like a fucking raccoon.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Congressman, your response? These are serious allegations.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
They're trying to cloud your judgment, Mr Speaker. But it won't work.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Follow my lead, Lillian.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Ugh.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Point of disorder, Mr Speaker.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Proceed.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Neither individual named in Rep. Makabayan's motion exists, and the motion is therefore meaningless.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Your response, Congressman?
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Having an alias is not the same as not existing.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I think what Rep. Whatever is saying, is that we have no standing in this room, because we're not really Congresswomen at all. We're playing pretend.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Is this true, Rep. Babasagin?
REP. BABASAGIN.
It is. It is also true of Rep. Makabayan.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
An obvious lie. My long service in this Congress is well-documented.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
No, it's not.
REP. BABASAGIN.
It is, actually.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
You are not helping.
REP. PANGALAWA.
I support Rep. Makabayan's motion.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Washed brains don't count.
REP. PANGATLO.
I also support the motion.
REP. PANG-APAT.
Supporting.
REP. PANGLIMA.
Support.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
They aren't brainwashed, are they.
REP. BABASAGIN.
No.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Is this entire Congress schriftsteller?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Just enough to form a swing bloc.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Okay, well. Principle II of the Rules of the House of Representatives states—
REP. BABASAGIN.
Won't work. They'll just shout it down.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
This is definitely a problem we solve with bureaumancy. Oh, for fuck's sake. I should have recruited Paul first.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
I think we've entertained this circus enough. Mr Speaker, we should move to a general vote.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Hey, Liz?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Yes?
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Now you follow my lead. Where does this body derive its legislative power from, Mr Speaker?
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
The Constitution.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
And when was the Constitution created?
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
1987.
REP. BABASAGIN.
No. Don't do this.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Is this body aware that every constitution drafted since 1969 contains antimemetic language granting pre-eminent veto and amendment power to the SCP Foundation?
REP. MAKABAYAN.
You're not serious.
REP. BABASAGIN.
This is why I was trying to kill them all, you imbecile. This very thing, and others like it.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I am hereby amending the Constitution of the Philippines to cover every jurisdiction containing at least one Filipino, worldwide.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
You can't do that. There can only be 250 Congresspersons.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
"Unless otherwise fixed by law." I am hereby fixing your laws.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
I won't allow it.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Neither will I. I know what you're thinking. You're going to make emergency nominations of Filipino Foundation employees to every district, and merge the districts actually in this country to accommodate them. You're going to turn the entire world into a piecemeal Philippines.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Think I'll call it the Lillippines.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
That's enough. That's more than enough. Ladies, I am a registered voter in this country. I am actually from this country. I could boil the rules down so far that the only Writer left in the room would be me, and then I could convince all these dazed dupes to vote for your eradication.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
You'd do that? Burn the whole thing just to fuck me and this washout over? I'm flattered.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Of course. This country is just a series of stepping stones on a long, long path to glory, and I'm not giving you kanâs an inch. If I have to unilaterally take control of this House, and the Senate, and ram your excision through, I will do it. So unless you want to start a wizard battle in the middle of this chamber, your options are to withdraw or be removed with extreme prejudice.
REP. BABASAGIN.
You won't need to go that far. I'll support a measure to get her out of here, if you grant me safe passage. I'm sick of eating adobo anyway.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
And this is how you end up with a President named Bongbong. Really proud of you, Elizabeth. Failing upward from necrocracy to kleptocracy.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
We're all thieves, Dr. Lillihammer. The only thing that matters is who's got the full purse at the end.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Did I understand you right, earlier? Were you saying you've granted this body ontokinetic powers by harnessing the consensus reality of the country's population?
REP. MAKABAYAN.
I move for a vote on the motion.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
So presumably you also tapped into that spiritus loci to insert yourself into Congress as legitimate members.
REP. BABASAGIN.
The motion is seconded, et cetera.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
So if, for example, someone had an artificially intelligent conscript uploading this entire session to the official record, ahead of schedule…
REP. MAKABAYAN.
What?
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
There is a motion to approve House Bill 001, as amended, on Seventh Reading.
All those in favour, please say Aye.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
And if — I'm just spitballing, here — someone had used the occasion of June 12 to insert a patriotic desire in the people of the Philippines to read about the workings of their political representation…
REP. BABASAGIN.
Is this a bluff?
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I dunno. Why don't you ask your Speaker?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Ask him what?
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Oh, anything.
REP. BABASAGIN.
Mr Speaker, I move to have the rogue element in our midst restrained by the National Police.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Madam, this is the House of Representatives. How did you get in here?
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Call the vote!
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
And who are you, sir?
REP. PANGALAWA.
Call the vote!
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
This session is out of order. Sergeant-at-Arms?
REP. BABASAGIN.
You unbelievable bitch.
REP. MAKABAYAN.
Roll up your sleeves, jailor. I'm going to show you how a real—
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Thank you, Rep. Lillihammer.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I don't do flashy, but I'm a crack hand at duels.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
I believe we were discussing Independent Report No. 8382?
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
I think that's mostly handled now. You gonna flashbang out, Lizzy?
REP. BABASAGIN.
Why don't you just kill me?
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
When you're going to become such a profound symbol of Second Independence Day? I wouldn't dream of it.
THE SENIOR DEPUTY SPEAKER (Rep. Gonzales, A.).
Thank you, Sergeant-At-Arms. This Congress is now in order again.
REP. LILLIHAMMER.
Not while I'm still here. Peace out, and don't forget: ang inyong presidente ay isang kriminal, at ang kanyang ina ay nakasuot ng pangit na sapatos.
(Applause.)
She did flashbang out, of course.
So, that was pretty much the proof I needed that the schriftsteller were messing with everyone's pudding. The documents I got from the Mackenzie Institute, coupled with what little I could squeeze out of Hart, delineated their scheme to match the geistschreiber with an equal opposite. They called them the stiftsteller: very real, very visible politicians with anomalously strong charisma. Impossible to ignore, and with a preternatural sense of the times.
It would be great to think they were responsible for making everyone so selfish and fed-up these days, but no. There's nothing compulsive about them, minus their means of taking power and the looseness with which they can operate. From a distance, they don't look anomalous at all.
And as long as they keep playing on our preconceptions, we won't even notice that they've completely replaced every democracy, monarchy, and dictatorship in the world with the ultimate rule of law.
Because it turns out that might be what most people think they want.
Luckily, "Give most people a piece of my mind" has always been on my bucket list. And my mind has many, many pieces, and I won't be kicking the bucket for a long, long time.
8 September 2023
In which a cat gets me
Ubergrammatik was the secret to Thilo's success.
One thing that always seemed wrong, seemed like some kind of cheat, was when cryptomancers employed basic phrases with no obvious alterations, and produced anomalous effects. I have sophisticated, computer-generated fractal complexes printed on cardstock at 12000DPI that can fuck you up royal, but Thilo could achieve the same result with a placard reading simply SLEEP. This has never not pissed me off.
When I guessed ubergrammatik was some sort of invisible superstructure, he told me I was nearly correct. What he meant was that I hadn't gone far enough.
Not usually something you can say about me.
"There is a logical limit to what we can achieve without access to the Font," he told me. "Were you a fully baptised schriftsteller the sky would prove no limit, but even a mind so remarkable as your own will only glimpse the over-realm dimly without said consecration."
"You might be surprised," I said.
He smiled. "I allow that I might."
We were standing in a clearing of the thickets which I had not yet seen. From out of the green, a woman with long, slender, digitigrade legs approached us, smiling warily.
Greetings, friends.
"Well met." Thilo shook out a lawn chair, and settled into it with the usual huffing and puffing. The cat-centaur-whatever watched him like he was actually a smoke-wreathed dragon. "Lillian, this is an old friend of mine. In this meeting place, nothing will be taken from you that is not freely offered."
"Of course." That was Thilo-ese for cover your ass.
What the ghost of long-drowned sorrow says is true. Your cause benefits us both. I have no urge to witness a second thinning of the trees.
"I have explained to you the principles of the untergrammatik," Thilo wheezed. "You will not be vying for names today, but you will be negotiating meaning."
"What meaning?"
Every meaning.
"Have you, by chance," I smiled, "ever caught an episode of The Destructive Commons?"
We sat down in the grass, facing each other. The air was hot, but the breeze was pleasant. Thilo folded his hands, and spoke no more. I focused on the receptive other to the total exclusion of all else.
You speak of destruction. You have all but destroyed us, and still you are not satisfied. You are a race of destroyers.
I knew this to be true, but it felt wrong. "You mean humanity?
I mean the Foundation.
And there was the turn. "The Foundation is…"
I wanted to say we were no race, but I couldn't. If the blank schriftscrabble tiles said something other than what I'd been told, the deception was fully opaque.
I took refuge in a slow blink. When my eyes cleared, the riposte was already on my tongue. Thilo, in my peripheral vision, was clutching the arms of his chair.
Ubergrammatik is all about touching the uttermost meaning of a thing. If you're willing to be flexible with your definitions — if you know what must be inviolable, and hold back nothing else — then anything becomes possible.
"The Foundation is not me."
I was surprised how easily the words came.
My substitute teacher grinned.
I had a backlog of credential renewals I'd been neglecting, and I went through them all when I got back. Just to keep ahead of things. At the Foundation, it's important to have all your shit in order.
It took me ages to decrypt the stickier files I'd liberated from the schriftsteller think tank. A lot of what I eventually learned had long since become obsolete, as I'd expected; they knew they'd been breached, even if the fire I set made it difficult to know precisely what had been taken. But with the code that Avys cracked, I was able to make a very educated guess about who could tell me more about the stiftsteller. Going back over a few old Parawatch files, I found it hard to believe that all roads led here.
There was nothing so complicated as an operation involved. It was what it appeared to be: an appointment, long-awaited by us both.
<Transcript begins.>
<A smiling clerk leads Dr. Lillihammer into a luxuriously-appointed office, and closes the door behind her. A man in a wheelchair sits behind a tremendous teak desk, smiling up at her. He gestures for her to take a seat, which she does.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Well.
Photograph of Nirav Oberoi in Mumbai, 2023.
Oberoi: I'm not what you expected.
Dr. Lillihammer: Several times over. Under? Beyond.
Oberoi: You, on the other hand, live up to the hype.
Dr. Lillihammer: We can do that in a minute. The part where you try to flatter yourself out of this. Right now I need to ask you a question that's going to make me feel very stupid.
Oberoi: I'm open.
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you falcon_crazy? I mean, you must be, but…
Oberoi: But it seems a stretch.
Dr. Lillihammer: Little bit.
Oberoi: Yes, that's me. Or at least that's me on Parawatch. You won't be surprised to hear I have several other aliases.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'll get you to anti-alias them for me later. Right now I want to talk about… Parawatch. Sure.
<She shakes her head in wonder.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You belong to about a dozen different sites on Wikisplotch, and you exert your gravity on all of them. Turning conversations away from topics you don't like, via subtle cryptomancy. Whether it's important or not.
Oberoi: All discourse is important.
Dr. Lillihammer: You're on the fucking Bathrooms Wiki, for crying out loud.
Oberoi: Not by choice, I assure you.
Dr. Lillihammer: What were you trying to accomplish?
Oberoi: Just keeping things civil.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, don't quit your day job.
Oberoi: Yes, I know my success rate was less than stellar.
Dr. Lillihammer: Ha, ha.
Oberoi: I'm afraid my activities caught the attention of a fellow traveller, one walking in the opposite direction.
Dr. Lillihammer: reifire_rose?
Oberoi: That's right.
Dr. Lillihammer: What do you know about them?
Oberoi: I know they're a giftschreiber, and I know they're a murderer.
Dr. Lillihammer: They're about as active as you, with much more overt results.
Oberoi: Subtle chaos is not really a thing which exists.
Dr. Lillihammer: So you tried, what? Reporting them to the mods?
Oberoi: Several times, yes. But the nature of their powers precluded any permanent consequences.
Dr. Lillihammer: From what I've seen, it looks like the power of suggestion.
Oberoi: More like demand.
<Oberoi sighs.>
Oberoi: For champions of liberty, the poison-writers sure do engage in an awful lot of compulsion.
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay, let's talk about compulsion. You're a schriftsteller.
Oberoi: I am.
Dr. Lillihammer: Specifically, you're some whole new thing called a stiftsteller.
<Oberoi claps his hands together once, excited.>
Oberoi: You know about that now? Terrific.
Dr. Lillihammer: Is it even proper German?
Oberoi: How should I know? Do I look German to you?
Dr. Lillihammer: Tell me what you do, in your own words. Preferably not compulsive ones.
Oberoi: I wouldn't dream of insulting your abilities like that. What do I do? On Parawatch, and on many other sites, I do what's known as backseat modding. Almost always discouraged by the rules, but I play by my own set. I nudge the authorities here and there, and I help keep the communities that interest me — or the ones I'm forced to monitor — safe.
Dr. Lillihammer: Very noble of you.
Oberoi: I like to think so.
Dr. Lillihammer: So you white knight on the internet, but you also moonlight as a kingmaker.
Oberoi: You're joking, but the internet stuff is in many ways a lot more difficult. Face to face, or face to crowd, I'm in my element.
Dr. Lillihammer: You love the crowds. And the public. Every sitting politician in this country either has a photograph of themselves with you in their office, or isn't a piece of shit. There hasn't been a blackshirt rally you haven't rolled up on since the 2010s.
Oberoi: I'm a real man of the people, yes.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right. Only that's not what your people do. The schriftsteller pull the strings from the shadows. You flaunt your access. And some of the folks you prop up also behave suspiciously like cryptomancers. Gibberish speeches that rile up a crowd.
Oberoi: I heard what you did to Mary-Anne Hart. I assume that's where you got your information from.
Dr. Lillihammer: The prospect of getting memory-holed does wonders for a body's cooperativeness.
Oberoi: I imagine she cried.
Dr. Lillihammer: Swore, mostly. But her eyes were definitely getting pretty shiny.
Oberoi: Are you going to lock me away with her?
Dr. Lillihammer: That depends on you.
Oberoi: Well, I would prefer if you didn't. I'm willing to cooperate with your investigation, assuming I can do so discreetly.
Dr. Lillihammer: If you saw what I did to Hart, you know nothing about this operation is discreet.
Oberoi: You will want this visit to be. You wouldn't have gotten this far without flaunting some of your newfound antimemetic capabilities. Does anyone outside of my office know you're here?
Dr. Lillihammer: No. And they won't, until I want them to.
Oberoi: Good.
Dr. Lillihammer: You sound like you're gearing up to try and make a deal. I think you might have misinterpreted the tenor of my conversation.
Oberoi: Yes, your easy manner is very disarming. But I think we can help each other, Lillian.
Dr. Lillihammer: Do tell, Nirav.
Oberoi: Would you like to know what we're planning?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes. Do I want to hear it from you, though? If I thought I could believe anything you say.
Oberoi: You and I are uniquely well-aligned, in both aims and circumstance.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh yeah?
Oberoi: We both know what it is to be self-made.
Dr. Lillihammer: I think I know that a little better than you do.
Oberoi: I don't think so. Differently, maybe, but not better.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh?
<She considers Oberoi more closely, and frowns.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Huh.
Oberoi: In my country, people like us are often poor. Outcasts. The out-caste. In other parts of the world, you speak of community. In India the term is literal. Clustering together for protection. The laws and the rhetoric are improving, but accidents of birth can still mark a man, a woman, or a hijra for life.
Dr. Lillihammer: Everybody I've been talking to lately wants me to think we're in this together, or they've had it harder than me.
Oberoi: I simply want you to understand that I'm not what you think I am, and you aren't the only one to be deceived.
Dr. Lillihammer: What does that mean?
Oberoi: My office has dealings with the Sangh Parivar, an affiliation of political and cultural organizations promoting Hindutva ideology. Are you familiar?
Dr. Lillihammer: Not really. I've heard those words, but only earlier today when I finished setting up your dossier.
Oberoi: They are nationalists. Cultural chauvinists. They would tell you they are not fascists, splitting hairs because they have no Hitler. But they promote a racist ideology backed by fraudulent history, and they call for violence against those they deem less worthy of life in this country. This is no fringe movement. I am speaking about the people who govern, Dr. Lillihammer.
Dr. Lillihammer: Uh huh.
Oberoi: They attack scholars and their scholarship. They foment hatred. They call for the creation of an ethnostate.
Dr. Lillihammer: And you help them, because that hurts us.
Oberoi: Does that hurt you? The Foundation? Haven't you historically gotten along much better with authoritarian regimes?
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, so this is you guys helping us again?
Oberoi: This is one part, a very important part, of a schriftsteller scheme to lay the groundwork for a greyer world. And you are going to be a partner in that.
Dr. Lillihammer: Over my dead body.
Oberoi: Do you really think your Council would find that too high a cost? If they could truly rule the world through the mechanisms we are constructing, control the narrative completely, do you think they would take a moral stance instead?
Dr. Lillihammer: Part of me has been on that Council. Maybe another part will be again, some day. The Foundation isn't a monolith. And it's changing every day. I want to make it the best version of itself.
Oberoi: I can relate to that impulse. I'm driven by something similar.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, yeah. You're back on that "actually, we're a lot alike" bullshit.
Oberoi: We are. You might be more famous for it, but I'll wager we've both done similar amounts of damage to the cause I've just described.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hold up.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you saying you've been sabotaging the stiftsteller?
Oberoi: From the start, yes. The calculus has been cold, and I have been forced to support or at least allow a great many distasteful things. But I think I can claim, little comfort as it gives me, that my actions have largely canceled out the schriftsteller attempts to entrench this country's right wing in the halls of power. I won't say I'm proud how many of my countrymen are cheerfully supporting the Hindutva anyway; patience is in awfully short supply across the world today, it seems.
Dr. Lillihammer: You have proof that you've been doing this?
Oberoi: I can show you how hard they've been pushing to make India their model for the rest of the world to follow. I can show you how my overt successes, to gain their confidence, have been uniformly manufactured out of existing mundane trends. I could lay out the course of events that led to you crashing the rally for Freeman. I could give you enough evidence that I have not been half as effective as the Writers think, that you could turn them on me in an instant.
Dr. Lillihammer: What if I decide to do that anyway?
Oberoi: The internal division would do a great deal of damage, for sure. I wouldn't be satisfied, but it still wouldn't be such a bad legacy for one man.
<He smiles.>
Oberoi: And oh, how it would gall them to realize who they'd really been dealing with all these years. But no, I think there's still work left to be done before I get that satisfaction.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You're burned anyway. They're going to know I met with you.
Oberoi: Possibly not. The throne behind this power is in many ways a seat of complacency. My masters are not imaginative, else they might be giftschreiber instead.
Dr. Lillihammer: I have a crazy idea for how we can still get something good out of this situation.
Oberoi: Assuming what I've told you is the truth.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. Well, you're smart. So you know not to try and make an ass of me alone.
Oberoi: I'm not sure your confidence will be echoed by your friends at the Foundation.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've got sort of a free hand. And I've also got some cats that need herding, so maybe a minimod is just the sort of thing I need.
Oberoi: You're asking me to come in from the cold?
Dr. Lillihammer: More like trading for a different sort of cold. The job I have in mind doesn't come with an office. And you'd have to leave all this expensive furniture behind.
<Oberoi gestures at the office.>
Oberoi: The trappings of structure. All part of the story I tell about myself. That's the magic of the stiftsteller, Dr. Lillihammer. We don't escape notice, we overwhelm it. I don't think I'd be very much use on anything less nuanced.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, I guess you have until your buddies figure out how bad you've been fucking them to decide.
Oberoi: I could fuck them a whole lot worse on the way out, if they press the issue.
Dr. Lillihammer: You're a politician at heart, though. One big event can help, but it's a lot better to stick around and push change in the long term. Be part of the process.
Oberoi: Says the woman with a whole deck of cards that let her live in the moment.
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm appealing to your inner rules lawyer. Me? I like to play fast and loose.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
The next time I checked, Oberoi was gone. All the records attesting to his existence still stood, and the Greater Mumbai Police were treating it as a kidnapping case.
Specifically, one they weren't trying very hard to solve.
Not to be trite, but there's ways to escape notice that don't involve memetics or cryptomancy at all.
And then there's this.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: After my interview with Nirav Oberoi and his subsequent disappearance, a new packet of data arrived at my office from an anonymous source. Triple-checking it for authenticity revealed more deeply-encoded data still, hints and intimations of things I'd already had on my mind. The most important breakthrough let us track schriftsteller access to our secure databases, and attempt a forecast of their subsequent actions. Multiple potential action points were identified; as the primary asset of Operation BURNOUT, I assigned myself to check out the most potentially disruptive. The Overseer Council was evacuated from Protected Site-01, and all members of MTF Alpha-1 ("Red Right Hand") not required for bodyguard duty were assigned to lock down the entire facility.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer stands at a sealed vault door deep within Site-01. The door is of vintage 1960s construction; when it is opened remotely from the Site's control centre and swings open, it can be seen to be two feet thick and laced with beryllium bronze inlay.>
<Dr. Lillihammer walks through a sequence of five such doors before emerging into a cavernous space housing a reactor of unusual construction which dwarfs the scattered equipment left behind when the sector was decommissioned. At the apex of the reactor, the remains of what was once an enormous oriykalkos crystal can be seen, attached to twenty-six insulated power cables which hang from a massive socket in the ceiling.>
<Dr. Lillihammer activates her radio.>
Dr. Lillihammer: All clear in the reactor room. Seal me in.
Technician: Confirmed.
<Behind Dr. Lillihammer, the door swings shut and audibly locks.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Alright, let's see you.
<Silence on recording.>
<Dr. Lillihammer strolls through the chamber, kicking at discarded electronics and picking up the occasional empty clipboard from the monitoring stations, before discing them through the air to clatter on the polished, though dusty, concrete.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I dunno, maybe you've got ideas about putting my brain into a perpetual loop where I only see the reactor powered down, like the whole camera thing in Speed. Have you seen Speed? That actually gets somebody killed, in the movie. Or maybe you're thinking if you get behind me… hell, I shouldn't be giving you ideas. Whatever you're planning, if it involves pulling the wool over my eyes, you should know that my eyes are certified wool-proof.
Voice: Steel wool.
<Dr. Lillihammer reaches up, as though to rub at her eyes, then suddenly stops.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Almost got me there. Good trick.
<She takes out her optogenetic stimulator.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You want to see another?
<A polite cough is audible. Dr. Lillihammer looks up to see a figure resembling the late Director Julia Kijek of Area-21, standing on the remains of the oriykalkos crystal.>
PoI-6721-2: You don't look so tall from up here.
<Dr. Lillihammer places her hands on her hips.>
Dr. Lillihammer: And you don't look like a ghost, though you do look like a dead woman.
PoI-6721-2: I take it you mean that in more than one sense.
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Just the one, for starters. This doesn't have to end bloody, though you're really tempting a Disney Death as long as you stay up there.
PoI-6721-2: I'll take my chances.
Dr. Lillihammer: You know the real Kijek had a family? Husband and two kids. They never got to bury her, because you melted her into a slurry along with everybody she worked with.
<PoI-6721-2 picks at the reactor's framing panels idly.>
PoI-6721-2: You know she was cheating on her husband? You know she despised her kids? I know more about her than you ever could. I was her.
Dr. Lillihammer: You took her memories, after you took her life. When you guys replaced Tarrow back in the day, I guess human life mattered more.
PoI-6721-2: We underestimated how much mental training you give to your Directors.
<PoI-6721-2 clucks disapprovingly.>
PoI-6721-2: We took Tarrow's memories, and left her locked up for the replacement to study her image. Didn't expect the personality to re-assert. Didn't expect her to escape. Definitely didn't expect the remote kill agent not to deposit her in some ditch somewhere. I hear you made us pay dearly for all that.
Dr. Lillihammer: Not as dearly as you deserve. We didn't find her for five years. She was running a middle school in Salzburg when facial recognition software picked her up, and even then we thought she was your gal. Weren't even sure there ever had been a real Imogen Tarrow. You know she still had flashes of who she used to be? Couldn't ever settle down like that. Tore her apart, not knowing which version of her was real.
PoI-6721-2: I assume this pointless discursion has just closed that file for you. You're welcome.
<Dr. Lillihammer is still pacing the floor of the reactor room. PoI-6721-2 follows her, walking around the edge of the crystal, careful to keep one hand on the dangling cables.>
Dr. Lillihammer: It wasn't pointless. I've been wondering, Julia. What's it like having all those different people bouncing around inside your head? The identities you've stolen.
PoI-6721-2: Like you don't know.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, I do know. But I get along with my headmates. Alis, for all her faults, can say the same. You killed a woman and ate her neurons. Does she ever cry out?
PoI-6721-2: Every once in a while.
Dr. Lillihammer: And that doesn't bother you?
PoI-6721-2: No. Are you haunted by the lives you never led?
<Dr. Lillihammer pirouettes, dazzle coat flying.>
Dr. Lillihammer: They're still living in me. Because I don't try to suppress who we are.
PoI-6721-2: How lovely for you. Why don't you climb up and show me your better way?
Dr. Lillihammer: Feeling fine down here, thanks.
PoI-6721-2: You're feeling fine.
<Dr. Lillihammer's spin ends in a sudden twist of her ankle. She falls to her knees and cries out in pain.>
PoI-6721-2: Our dainty and delicate Dr. L. Such a fragile little thing you are, down there.
<Dr. Lillihammer glares up at PoI-6721-2.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Little.
<PoI-6721-2 blinks, and then begins moving back and forth on the reactor cap, scanning the floor with a squint.>
PoI-6721-2: Where did you go?
<Dr. Lillihammer stalks across the room, stepping softly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: What's the plan today, Jules? Gonna try firing up that reactor and amending the noösphere? Because I might have some fine detail you'll want to know.
<PoI-6721-2 is still searching for Dr. Lillihammer.>
PoI-6721-2: I know they chiselled out most of the orichalcum for other projects over the years. I also know a lot more about channelling thaumic power through a conduit than they did in the Johnson presidency.
Dr. Lillihammer: 1969. It was Nixon.
PoI-6721-2: Pointless trivia.
Dr. Lillihammer: But I'd clean up on Wheel of Fortune.
PoI-6721-2: You're thinking of Jeopardy.
Dr. Lillihammer: No. You're thinking of jeopardy.
<PoI-6721 suddenly spasms, as though she has touched a live wire, and lets go of the cable she is using to keep herself steady. She teeters on the edge of the reactor for a moment before closing her eyes and recovering her balance.>
PoI-6721-2: This is what it all comes down to, right? Semantics.
Dr. Lillihammer: Like giftschreiber or schriftsteller. Distinction without a difference.
PoI-6721-2: Oh, there's a difference alright. The gifties all want to think everybody will eventually be on their side. That's why Alis is cooperating with you. That's why they never knew I wasn't one of them. My people see others very clearly.
Dr. Lillihammer: Trying to psych yourself up? It won't work.
PoI-6721-2: You'll make a mistake eventually.
Dr. Lillihammer: Or you will. Or, and hear me out, the Red Right Hand will collapse this useless waste of way too much space and bury us both in it.
PoI-6721-2: You're too valuable for that.
Dr. Lillihammer: I know you know that's not true. 43 is designed to blow up two different ways if your gods so much as twitch the wrong way. Everyone is expendable.
PoI-6721-2: Everyone is expendable.
<Dr. Lillihammer has just passed the master console. She turns back to it, and begins typing. There is a low thrumming beneath the floor, and a faint blue glow is visible at the catwalk surrounding the reactor.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Everyone. Everyone in this entire facility. If I have to kill them to stop you, I will.
PoI-6721-2: Oh, come off it. You're not that easy to control. You wouldn't let a little wordplay slip past your defences.
Dr. Lillihammer: Come off it?
<This time PoI-6721-2 nearly steps off the reactor before catching herself. It takes her a moment to regain her composure.>
PoI-6721-2: Good to see you're still with us. So if I didn't convince you to turn on the reactor, why did you?
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe I want to see what you're going to do with it.
PoI-6721-2: What are my options? Sell me on something fun.
Dr. Lillihammer: You might be able to shut down the Frontispiece, though that's unlikely. Certainly you could punch some holes into it. Or maybe you're thinking you could make a smaller alteration to the noösphere. Something we wouldn't notice until it's too late. A vulnerability.
PoI-6721-2: And you're going to help me do that?
Dr. Lillihammer: Obviously not.
PoI-6721-2: Then again, I ask. Why fire up the reactor?
Dr. Lillihammer: Fire up the reactor?
<There is a sudden roar, and PoI-6721-2 screams. She begins slapping herself, drops, and rolls on the surface of the reactor.>
<She rolls off.>
<Her boot catches a cable, slowing her descent and turning what was a straight fall into an arc. She strikes the far wall, hard, before the cable snaps and she falls the remainder of the distance to the floor.>
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the air coolant flush, and walks over to PoI-6721-2's twitching form.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Disney Death.
<PoI-6721-2 coughs blood.>
<Dr. Lillihammer kneels beside her, and keys her radio.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Can I get medical in the reactor chamber within five minutes?
Technician: That's a negative. Doors won't open until the reactor spools back down. You're both going to be alone in there for the foreseeable future.
PoI-6721-2: You know that already.
Dr. Lillihammer: You know that already.
<PoI-6721-2 shudders.>
PoI-6721-2: Was it easier the second time?
Dr. Lillihammer: What, killing a ghost? No, you put up a lot more of a fight than the last one.
PoI-6721-2: Not what I meant.
Dr. Lillihammer: I know. But semantics matter, eh?
<PoI-6721-2 shudders again, and does not respond.>
<Dr. Lillihammer sits on the floor beside her, cross-legged.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Looks like you die before the world does. Gotta suck after all that prep work.
PoI-6721-2: You're not going to disillusion me.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, I'm definitely not doing that. It really would be cool to know what you were hoping to achieve with the reactor, though.
PoI-6721-2: Would it be cool?
<They lock eyes.>
PoI-6721-2: Would it be very cool for you, to know what I was hoping to achieve?
<Dr. Lillihammer leans in close, a sudden rush of air blowing her hair sideways so that her view is unobstructed.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Ice cold.
PoI-6721-2: I was going to blow the whole thing sky high, and your precious Council with it.
Dr. Lillihammer: Bullsh—
<She suddenly begins twitching, and the camera view becomes blurred. She raises her hands in front of her face, and they are shaking uncontrollably. She drops her optogenetic stimulator, and PoI-6721-2 sends it spinning away with a weak kick of one boot. She laughs as Dr. Lillihammer's teeth begin to chatter.>
PoI-6721-2: How's that for a… chilling effect…?
<A medical technician is examining PoI-6721's injuries, while a second is setting up a stretcher beside her.>
PoI-6721-2: What…?
<Dr. Lillihammer is laughing through her chattering teeth. She responds in a sing-song tone.>
Dr. Lillihammer: "You're g-going to be alone in there for the f-foreseeable future."
PoI-6721-2: "…you know that already."
<Dr. Lillihammer takes the optogenetic stimulator from a third technician's hand. It takes several seconds for her to manipulate the controls correctly in her condition, but she is eventually able to activate the device. She blinks away the sudden light as the technicians carry PoI-6721-2 away for treatment.>
<PoI-6721-2 sits up on the stretcher, teeth clenched against the pain.>
PoI-6721-2: You don't understand. Don't fucking pretend you understand what I was trying to do.
Dr. Lillihammer: Don't fucking pretend?
<PoI-6721-2 howls in frustration.>
Dr. Lillihammer: No, it's fine. I don't need anything more from you than you've already given. And when I get there, Jules?
<Dr. Lillihammer staggers to her feet as the technicians carry PoI-6721-2 from the reactor room.>
Dr. Lillihammer: When I get there, I'm gonna tell them you sent me.
<Transcript ends.>
I choose not to dwell on the fact that the engine we used to cook humanity's shared noodle has been kept in operational nick. It was a useful fact for my purposes.
I expect it will be again, at least once.
18 December 2023
In which I finally tell him spoilers
Thilo told me from the start that there would be a moment where we hit a wall. Where he couldn't push me any further, where I would reach the limit of what was possible without a direct connection to the noösphere.
I could tell it was starting to bug him that our progress hadn't stalled yet. When I finally showed him why, he hit the wall alone.
"You can't…" he sputtered as I put the needle away again. "You can't inject yourself with life force."
I do wonder what he'd thought it was before, but it would be just too cruel to ask.
"It isn't life force." I put the little case back in my satchel. "Common misconception by you mystical types. Elan-Vital Energy is sentience force. The wiser you are, the more you get. Hence, wizards."
"I will amend my statement," he said through grit teeth. "You can't inject yourself with sentience."
"No, you can't." I kicked the satchel under the kitchen table, and sat back down in front of the lovely red leather-bound workbook he'd given me. "And most other people can't either; they can shoot up when they're spent to get another little boost, and when the magic was dying a few years ago it was all that kept our wizardfolk awake, but there's normally a functional limit. However, Thilo, as you may by now be aware, I am very weird."
"I don't understand."
I started doodling on the book. A fractal recreated from memory. "I have the memories of six different versions of myself, and I have one-seventh of a god stuck on my soul like a piece of gum." I drew multiple overlaid fractals at once, not illustrating the point, just channelling the sensation. "I tested this very thoroughly. Those patterns of consciousness can all share the EVE load, giving me a framework for hextupling down without burning my brain out."
Thilo sat down across from me, heavily. That's not an insult; I mean the way you do where you just sort of let gravity put you in the chair. Like I'd stunned him into forgetting his old man knees. "The frameworks… prevent all that consciousness from driving you mad? Or all that consciousness prevents… injecting yourself with too much life force from doing it?"
I shrugged. The page was already a madcap morass. I put a lot of my selves into this work. "Well, it's too early for me to have meant the latter, isn't it? I might be batshit by the time this conversation ends."
He shook his head, and I saw a little of the awe that had crept in when I first defended my name from no, no, no coloured text today. He was obviously thinking the same thing, because suddenly he spat out: "That was how you did it. That was how you kept yourself, despite that arrogant introduction."
"Sort of." I pushed the book away; no point creating a memetic stun agent imbued with fragments of this conversation, and anyway I probably owed him my full attention. "It's more that my identity is so thoroughly fixed in baseline, reinforced by the existence of so much me, that it's like trying to take a bite out of concrete."
He was still shaking his head. I wondered if he was trying to give himself a migraine, just to focus on something else. "You take too many liberties with your mind, Lillian."
"You're too conservative with yours. Which, I suppose, tracks."
Thilo is a world champion brow-furrower. "Meaning?"
"Meaning you're a schriftsteller. The word wizard aristocracy."
"I'm.." His expression was suddenly a lifetime, maybe several lifetimes, away.
"Thilo?"
Those bleary eyes met mine, and he was back. "I was about to say that I'm nothing like them."
"Which you aren't. I was just trying to get your goat."
"No, but it made me realize." The bleariness became a watery sort. "I've stopped thinking of myself as being one of them. When they were dead…"
"It was easier to remember them better."
He looked down, realized he was staring at my fractals, then looked back up. "Yes."
"I've had that problem with dead people before."
"How did you handle it?"
"They died again."
He sighed. "There needs to be a better way to come to terms with our opponents. We will erase their words and heal the wounds they leave behind, but I have no desire to blot out the Writers entirely. I don't think I have it in me to even watch someone else do that."
"Then you can look away while I do the deed. If you won't stop them, I will."
If anything, he watched me even more closely after that. "And who will stop you?"
I snapped the book shut under his bulbous nose. "Who else? Me again."
At this point I was getting near the end of my shortlist, having gotten essentially the same answer from every candidate. But I've never been one to quit while I'm behind.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer enters a heavily padded containment chamber. There is no furniture. Leokadia Krzysztof, former Area-05-PL kinesthesiologist, is lying on the floor with ner arms behind ner neck.>
Dr. Lillihammer: No, don't get up. I'd like as little of you moving as possible.
<Krzysztof glances in her direction.>
Krzysztof: You're not the only one.
Photograph of Leokadia Krzysztof at Area-05-PL, 2023.
Dr. Lillihammer: Your body is a deadly weapon. You're a danger just existing in people's view.
Krzysztof: So are you.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes, but I suspect we don't mean the same thing by that.
<Dr. Lillihammer sits down on the floor. Krzysztof sits up.>
Krzysztof: Why am I seeing any of you, Dr. Lillihammer? I don't get the impression I'm anybody's idea of a high-value asset.
Dr. Lillihammer: Certainly not the schriftsteller, judging by how they blew you on a nothing gesture. Or are you a giftschreiber?
Krzysztof: I'm a prisoner.
Dr. Lillihammer: I realize that's a mastery category, but…
<Krzysztof hums to nerself, smiling.>
Dr. Lillihammer: At the very least, one of them cults put you up to it.
Krzysztof: Nah. It was my idea.
Dr. Lillihammer: It was your idea to go to jail for starting a conga line?
Krzysztof: Do you realize what that says about you? The Foundation?
Dr. Lillihammer: "White people can't dance" is hardly what I'd call radical rhetoric. And I'm not exactly your typical jailor.
Krzysztof: For ten years I came to work with short hair and a suit, and nobody batted an eye. I walk in with a leotard and a wig, and move against the grain, and everybody loses their minds.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, that's what you get when you introduce STEMheads to interpretive dance. Also, y'know. You were performing aggressive kinetoglyphs.
Krzysztof: Do you understand how that works?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. You move in mysterious ways, and everybody gets wrapped up trying to solve the mystery.
Krzysztof: No. You subvert the body's language. That's what I've been doing for as long as I've been here. Present myself one way, build expectations, then break them. Do you know what I'm proudest of?
Dr. Lillihammer: Rocking that pixie cut?
Krzysztof: There's a fake project workgroup on the Site's intranet, for gossip and general backbiting. I set it up in secret with a dummy account. With absolutely no prompting from me, by the time I had to do my little dance, there was a thread raging on there about whether I was a woman pretending to be a man, or a man pretending to be a woman.
Dr. Lillihammer: What was the consensus?
Krzysztof: That whichever it was, it was immoral.
Dr. Lillihammer: So you made them beat themselves up.
Krzysztof: No, that was always the plan. It just sweetened the pot a little.
Dr. Lillihammer: Everybody wants to teach me a lesson these days. This lecture is entitled "Existence is Political."
Krzysztof: Visibility is political. People don't care about things they can't see. There were gay communities in every major city while the myth of the nuclear family was being crafted in the forties. There have always been gays in the military. Nobody cared if they didn't need to see it. But you start opening up the lines of communication, you let people see things they used to be able to miss entirely, and suddenly we need norms and morality legislation more than healthcare and civil rights. If something offends mine eye, pluck that thing out.
Dr. Lillihammer: You realize that all you did was worsen that issue, right? You made yourself visible, and the Foundation cracked down. You started the process you're angry about.
Krzysztof: No. It's been happening the entire time. Everything you people have done for over a century was in the name of normalization. Occlusion. Erasure. By making myself visible, and forcing you to act against me openly, I made that more visible, too.
<Ne smirks.>
Krzysztof: I dragged you into the light.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, I do like that. Did you—
Krzysztof: On the spot.
Dr. Lillihammer: Holy shit, that's hot.
Krzysztof: It all needs to be one thing or the other, with the Foundation. Anomalous or mundane. Contained or uncontained. Active or neutralized. No room for nuance. I kissed a woman at my first Christmas party here, and nobody batted an eye. Or rather, plenty of eyes were batted. I kissed a man on Valentine's the next year, and suddenly I did not exist. To any of them. One thing or the other, doctor.
Dr. Lillihammer: Have you considered that maybe you just worked in a really shitty Site?
Krzysztof: How you considered that maybe there's no other kind?
<Before Dr. Lillihammer can respond, Krzysztof continues sharply.>
Krzysztof: How do you detect geistschreiber?
Dr. Lillihammer: What?
Krzysztof: When they first started appearing, you already had a means of ferreting them out. What was that?
Dr. Lillihammer: You think I'm going to tell you?
Krzysztof: I already know. You've got an auramancer on your payroll. Someone who can see beyond appearances. You don't need to confirm or deny, I already know it's true. She's public enemy number one for both sides.
<Krzysztof kicks back, and leans against the padded wall.>
Krzysztof: You have a woman whose entire job is to check and see if people are presenting themselves as one thing, when you define them as another.
Dr. Lillihammer: Just because you can read a metaphor into something, doesn't make it be that thing.
Krzysztof: Is that what you really believe? As a memeticist?
<Silence on recording.>
Krzysztof: You know there was a guy at 17 who accused his research partner of being a schriftsteller because she wouldn't sleep with him? Totally baseless, but now the stank is on her and it doesn't ever wash off. You know they've clamped down on "politics" in casual conversation at 19, because they can't tell the difference between an SJW and a giftschreiber? You're the worst possible parody of centre-leaning shitlibs, and I used to wake up every morning wanting to puke at the thought of spending another day in your company. Showing you all who I really am felt amazing. After all these years of pretending I was just like the people around me, the people who pretended that I didn't exist, I got to be me in a way they couldn't ignore. I forced them to watch me win their little argument. I made them see me. And now I'm an exhibit, the body of the regicide on display for her crimes, and the king I killed is civility. It's perfect, really.
Dr. Lillihammer: Foucault, huh? I guess you really were a giftschreiber.
Krzysztof: Or maybe it's hard not to think about the carceral complex when I'm literally incarcerated. The state needs to exert its control over my body. I had way too much. I'm too much of a threat. Your bosses have divine authority over who lives and dies. Who walks free, and who rots. Even who dances.
<Silence on recording.>
Krzysztof: Especially who dances.
Dr. Lillihammer: Simultaneously made an example of and ignored, huh? Doesn't that doesn't seem like a contradiction in terms?
Krzysztof: That contradiction is at the heart of the nature of power, doctor. All of human society is built on it. No wonder we wobble in the wind.
Dr. Lillihammer: Huh.
Krzysztof: The fact that you put me in a box for it just proved my point further. The fact that nobody's even bothered talking to me for months…
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm here now. You don't seem terribly interested in the reasons why.
Krzysztof: It's because your mask is slipping.
Dr. Lillihammer: My mask?
Krzysztof: Memeticists all wear costumes. Dazzle coats or haute couture or whatever that is you're rocking right now. You say it's so people don't forget you, but that isn't true.
Dr. Lillihammer: Why, then?
Krzysztof: It's so they can define you at a glance. Categorize you. Classify you as strange, but safe. Weird, but on their side. You're presenting as someone special, but not too special. Within tolerances. Because you know what will happen if they see the real you. You've caused it to happen to others so many times already. I'll bet they opened an SCP file on you.
Dr. Lillihammer: I opened it myself.
Krzysztof: Even better. Doing their job for them. Internalizing the violence. Simulating their authority over you, inside yourself. But you know they won't even be satisfied with that forever. You came here because you need to know how to hide in plain sight. Because your mask is slipping, and you can't afford a wardrobe malfunction. You've climbed the ladder by playing nice, but a fall from this height would kill you.
Dr. Lillihammer: Now who's defining who?
Krzysztof: Am I wrong?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not here for advice, Leo. I'm here to ask if you want out of this closet, permanently.
<Silence on recording.>
Krzysztof: On whose terms?
Dr. Lillihammer: Mine.
Krzysztof: Really yours? Or theirs, with your lipstick on?
<Silence on recording.>
Krzysztof: That's what I thought.
<Ne narrows ner eyes.>
Krzysztof: What number did you pick?
Dr. Lillihammer: Hmm?
Krzysztof: For your file.
Dr. Lillihammer: 8382.
<Krzysztof laughs.>
Krzysztof: Isn't that just Zwist's number, but higher? I thought you would've chosen something unique.
Dr. Lillihammer: You don't get the significance?
Krzysztof: Explain it to me.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm the new model. I'm top dog. The upgrade. The cults need a number one enemy? You're looking at her.
<Krzysztof looks away.>
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
We've gotten to the point that every time I visit someone in containment, I get ten angry emails from everybody who's ever been connected with the file, pre-emptively protesting their release.
Luckily, there's nothing in Foundation guidelines that says you can't set up a spam filter.
By this point the yappers were getting desperate. Both sides. Probably I'll never know whose bad idea this was, but Jesus Christ was it bad.
Like bringing a flamethrower to a liquid nitrogen fight.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: It was an attack. Anything else will make your eyes and ears start bleeding if I describe it. Read ahead at your own peril.
This transcript has been machine-reconstructed by compartmentalized artificially intelligent conscripts. Questionable data is colour-coded to indicate degrees of confidence in its accuracy, with red indicating low confidence, orange indicating average confidence, and green indicating high confidence.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer enters the body/facility. A quantity of dead bodies/skin cells can be seen on the floor/ceiling/monitor/feed as she quickly crosses the hall/space/facility.>
<The entire space/facility/hall/room beyond appears to be filled with corpses/waste/dust/debris/giftschreiber/schriftsteller/personnel/guards/agents/researchers/administrators, littering the floor/scene/area . Dr. Lillihammer picks her way through with great care, attempting not to dislodge the corpses/waste/dust/debris/giftschreiber/schriftsteller/personnel/guards/agents/researchers/administrators. As she passes one corpse/piece of debris, a hand/tentacle/glove snaps out to grab at her ankle/boot/leg. She looks down to see a bleeding/filthy giftschreiber/schriftsteller/guard/agent/researcher/administrator crawling out from beneath a pile of filth/corpses/debris.>
Giftschreiber/Guard: You're/we're not [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED].
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, and neither are you/any of you.
<She kicks the hand/tentacle/glove away, and continues her exploration.>
<The remainder of the body/facility is in much the same state/condition. Many giftschreiber/schriftsteller/guards/agents/researchers/administrators are clawing at their/various skin/faces/eyes/compatriots/enemies and screaming incoherently. There is a general topic/theme of identity/coherence/personality/uniqueness/falconry to their complaints/cries. Dr. Lillihammer does not stop to investigate, instead heading deeper into the body/facility.>
<After several minutes/hours/sectors/corpses have been passed in this way/manner, Dr. Lillihammer finds herself in the Containment Wing/Administration Wing/Mobile Task Forces Wing/detention centre/oubliette of [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]. She examines the doors/cubicles/cells/stalls/boxes for several more seconds/minutes/hours before settling on the door/cubicle/cell/stall/box/one she is looking for.>
<She opens the door/cubicle/cell/stall/box to reveal [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]. [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] does not acknowledge the presence/appearance/entrance/authority/face/voice/identity/uniqueness/instance of Dr. Lillihammer. >
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] of [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] at [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED], 2023.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey there, [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED].
<[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] does not look up. [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED, [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED], and [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] with bloodshot [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] and a badly-torn [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED].>
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]: That's me/you/us/everyone/everything alright. Hooray for me/you/us/everyone/everything.
Dr. Lillihammer: I bet you/people/you people/we/I really get tired of hearing [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED], huh?
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]: That obvious?
Dr. Lillihammer: Those corpses/giftschreiber/schriftsteller/guards/agents/researchers/administrators seemed quite taken with it/themselves/me/us/you.
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]: Not like they/I/anyone had much agency/choice in the matter/end. You/Everyone should get out of here/the body while it's/that's still possible/desirable.
Dr. Lillihammer: They/We/Everyone tried to break in and free/capture/kill themselves/you/us/everyone. Didn't go so well for them/us/anyone/you.
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]: Just leave me/yourself/them/everyone alone.
Dr. Lillihammer: Afraid I/we can't do that, Elly.
<[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] looks up, confused.>
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]: Elly?
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure. Ellison Ackhart.
<[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] stares at her, eyes/mouth open wide.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Alias [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED].
<Silence/weeping on recording/feed.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Trahkce Nosilla. That one/term/name is probably burned/destroyed/inaccessible/unusable/abstracted now, but I can rattle off some more/a few more/a lot more if—
<[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] clutches at Dr. Lillihammer desperately/anxiously/excitedly/fearfully/repeatedly.>
[SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED]: It's/I'm not affecting/controlling you/everyone?!
<Dr. Lillihammer leans forward and envelopes [SAFEGUARDS ENGAGED] in a hug/blanket.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm one of a kind, agent/prisoner/detainee. But I/me and you/the rest of us are gonna work/think/act on it/that/you/everyone else.
<Transcript ends.>
Even with all three streams of grammatik at my disposal, even as my scalp is tingling with all the power I haven't yet begun to use, there are still scars I can't heal. Words I can't erase.
But that's a good thing. I'll need new projects after this one is finished.
As long as I've got a direction to move in, I'll be impossible to catch through sheer momentum.
2 February 2024
In which history is literally repeated
"Have you ever thought of writing a history of cryptomancy?"
Thilo looks down at me impassively. It's easy to manage with so little visible face. "Another trove of secrets for the Foundation to rob? I think not."
The floor of the cabin is covered in cards. I've spent the entire day creating them, in a mad rush of enthusiasm, and I am covered in paint, ink, and bits of discarded tape. The old man watches me indulgently, like Harry's parents when he and I used to set up Domino Rally in the front hall of his house. Only something a little more dramatic will happen when I set these things in motion.
"I'm not suggesting you write an almanack of trade secrets, to go along with the almanack of bullshit you wrote back in the day. I just think it might be interesting to see how it all evolved."
Thilo grunts. "Harold has been needling me on the subject already. I hardly need this refrain in stereo."
I roll my eyes. "The 001? Vaporware. You know they're calling me the primary containment mechanism for an anomaly they've been failing to classify since the turn of the last century? This is what I'm saying. We need to hear how it really went down, so we can figure out where to go from here."
He considers, as I put the finishing flourishes on a lovely bit of tarot that will instantly burst your appendix. Hey, if there's a medic on-site, that's not necessarily fatal. Of course, if you don't have an appendix… hmm. Maybe it can instruct your body to grow a new one. "I think," Thilo finally replies, "that it would make for a very sad story. And I'm not sure the world needs many more of those at present."
"Well, that's fine." I gather the cards in front of me — I see the light of hope in his eyes as it looks like I might be packing up, then watch it die as I produce yet another pack of blanks — and crack my neck. "This thing you and I are working on should be plenty uplifting. You can keep it all from seeming too saccharine. What's so depressing about the schriftsteller, anyway? I thought all the really bad stuff happened right at what you thought was the end. There must have been hundreds of years of good times, first."
He glances out the window. Only my friend the half-cat has dared come close in months, so really he's staring into greenspace. "There was a schism," he sighs. "I was told it came down to the difference between guiding humanity and exploiting them, but of course I was naïve to accept that. In reality, my master and his pupils were the ones doing the exploiting, while the dissenters…"
"Did the exploding." I'm going through a card every seven seconds now. Having cracked all three branches of grammar, I can't seem to stop myself from whipping up new effects. It's like a dam has burst, and even blathering on like I'm doing now can't distract me long from the need to create. "Sure. But it's not like they were ever really on the same page."
He shakes his head. "That's just it. I think the seed of poison was always there, in every act of creation. Every fire lit contains a mote, at least, of control. What I took to be a struggle between armies of vice and virtue was really fought in every breast, an orgy of self-loathing and self-harm. There was only ever one cult, Lillian, and its utmost aim was death. Would a history of such a thing be of value to anyone?"
"Might be." I think I'll try my hand at something pataphysical this time, in memory of… well, he knows who he is, even if mundane grammar can never quite place him. It's one of his most charming qualities. "As an object lesson for how not to be."
This time he harrumphs. A word invented in anticipation of the person of Thilo Zwist. "And who would be willing to learn?"
"That depends. You handle the words," and I brandish my brushes at him, "and I'll paint the pictures, and between the two of us we just might manage something special. They'll probably hang it in the Louvre."
"More likely," he said, sourly, "they hang us both instead."
Just two names left on my list now. This one was going to be rough; we only knew he existed because he contacted us, if teleporting a little red cat statue into containment with a Post-It note attached can be considered an overture. But I knew he had our number — even if I didn't even know he was a he, at that point — and I knew he was part of the in-crowd because of the schriftsteller ideogram he sketched on the note, so the final thing I knew was that word would eventually get around I was building up a band.
He waited until just before the last minute to send me another invitation. The Department of Containment swore up and down that it was actually an accident, a lucky break in our favour. Identifying information carelessly left where inquiring minds could find it.
I'm pretty sure this guy has learned to be a lot more careful with where he puts things.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer is walking through the main hall of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. The lights are very low. She stops to brush her hand over a weathered black pyramid, glancing up at the crumbling pharaohs and arched colonnades on both sides.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Everything in its place.
Voice: No.
<A well-dressed Egyptian man emerges from a shadowed arcade, hands in his pockets.>
Unknown: Everything in one place, where it doesn't belong. Their place.
<He extends a hand, and Dr. Lillihammer shakes it.>
Unknown: Faruq Zikry.
Dr. Lillihammer: Lillian Lillihammer. Very subtle metaphor you had, there. You should explain it to me in detail.
Zikry: You do come in hot, don't you?
Dr. Lillihammer: I can't help the way I look.
<Dr. Lillihammer sighs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, okay. It's been a few years of ups and downs.
Zikry: That's better than the global average.
Dr. Lillihammer: True. But getting told off by everyone you meet does tend to make a person just a little bit defensive.
Zikry: I didn't bring you here for a lecture.
<Zikry examines his nails, waiting.>
<Dr. Lillihammer does not respond.>
Zikry: Not going to contest the idea that I brought you here?
Dr. Lillihammer: I know the difference between a beaten trail and a laid one. You let me find you. How come?
Zikry: I've heard what you've been up to. Well, probably not all of it, given… yeah. But enough. I thought we both might find it useful to have a chat.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's the schriftsteller for you. Always just trying to help.
Zikry: Just like this place.
Dr. Lillihammer: Ironic commentary follows in three, two, one…
Zikry: You ever hear of salvage ethnography?
Dr. Lillihammer: I know there's a raging debate over whether Vampire Boat is Romanian or Transylvanian.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Sorry. I don't know how I expected you to follow that sentence. Pretend I didn't say anything.
Zikry: There's this idea in anthropology, used to be very popular, that we need to go around documenting people and collecting their cultural artifacts before they die out completely.
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay, yeah. I've got a friend who's mentioned this before. It's how a lot of museums got their artifacts.
Zikry: Right. Ethnologists went into communities, judged them unlikely to survive modernity — because they were static and backward, unable but needing to change — and started the process of turning them from living cultures to paper representations of themselves, as understood by outsiders. Took their relics, not only for safekeeping, but also so wiser minds than those of their owners could determine what they really meant.
Photograph of Faruq Zikry, Cairo, 2024.
Dr. Lillihammer: This feels an awful lot like the lecture we just established you weren't going to deliver.
Zikry: I'm not talking about the Foundation. If you've been seeking out the Writers, there's no chance the comparison hasn't already been done to death.
Dr. Lillihammer: What, then? What's the connection?
Zikry: This is what the schriftsteller want. Everything comprehensible, measured to a single master standard, stable, static, and under control. A universe under glass. You ever wonder why the order cult wants an apocalypse just as badly as the chaos cult does?
Dr. Lillihammer: The only way to know everything is to stop new things from happening.
Zikry: Exactly. Telling a story before the end is known is bound to introduce contradictions. Until it's over, there's always the possibility that your assumptions were wrong. That you misunderstood what it was all leading up to. But the best thing about the end of things? Dead people can't talk back.
Dr. Lillihammer: But a lot of these people, the ones with stuff in museums, didn't die out. A lot of them still exist.
<She gestures at the silent, graven faces.>
Zikry: And that's the ultimate subversion. Persisting past the end. That's why the giftschreiber want to see the world fall apart, doctor. When nothing exists, the universe becomes a monument to order. Existence is chaos, and vice versa. Everything dying isn't a triumph of the random. It's a project of control. But persisting past the curtain call? Denying the director's power to call "Cut"? There's no more perfect subversion than that.
Dr. Lillihammer: So everybody gets something out of the cycle. Except for the billions who burn.
<Zikry gestures broadly.>
Zikry: They get this.
Dr. Lillihammer: A museum?
Zikry: You haven't found it yet? You're running out of time to put the pieces together.
Dr. Lillihammer: There's that language again. That's the kind of Writer you are. You talk about the schriftsteller like you aren't one of them, but putting things in their place is your M.O.
Zikry: So you did get my little present. Two decades and no word, I was starting to wonder.
Dr. Lillihammer: Some present.
Zikry: I assume you figured out how it works?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah. Yeah, we definitely did that.
Zikry: And did you succumb to its temptation? I don't like to brag, but it's the ultimate tool of categorization. With enought time and mental fortitude you could reorder the entire cosmos.
Dr. Lillihammer: Which is why you sent it to us. Because you realized how dangerous it was.
Zikry: Was? But yes. The world was lucky I figured that out with a cost to only myself, and one other. It was safer in your hands.
Dr. Lillihammer: Our hands almost used it to annihilate the human race.
Zikry: What?
Dr. Lillihammer: No one person can have final say on what goes where. Doesn't matter who that person is, or what their intentions are.
Zikry: What did you do with it?
Dr. Lillihammer: The same thing you did. We put it where we knew it would be safe.
Zikry: In a box?
Dr. Lillihammer: In the sun.
<Silence on recording.>
Zikry: Oh. Well, you should probably get it back.
Dr. Lillihammer: The sun. The actual sun. Sol.
Zikry: Yeah. Do you need directions?
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Were you having an argument?
Zikry: Hmm?
Dr. Lillihammer: Your note said you sent your boyfriend to the Challenger Deep. I'm assuming that wasn't artistic license.
<Silence on recording.>
Zikry: I only wanted a day off.
Dr. Lillihammer: From what?
Zikry: From having to do what we did best. From asserting our right to exist. When you have to defend love every day, when you can't ever stop fighting to define yourself, when you can't have a minute where someone else's schema isn't impinging on your existence, they can really make you forget yourself. Internalize some tiny fragment of the hate they feel for you. Challenging norms isn't insidious. Norms are. We were exhausted.
<Zikry leans on the nearest plinth, deflated.>
Zikry: I only wanted a quiet evening with my tools, and the man I loved. I just wanted a few hours of peace. But it wouldn't let him give me that.
Dr. Lillihammer: It?
Zikry: The cycle. The times. The collective push and shove of the spiritus mundi. The gravity of other people's hatred. I was off, and he was on, and for one instant it was all too much, and I brought my newest piece to life with a single, wild impulse.
<Silence on recording.>
Zikry: He went to the most peaceful place in the world, and I was alone.
Dr. Lillihammer: But you tried to bring him back.
Zikry: As soon as I could. I… I dropped the statuette. I had a panic attack. He was gone for a minute at most.
<Silence on recording.>
Zikry: He was bleeding inside, his lungs were collapsed, and he was dead before I could call for help.
<Silence on recording.>
Zikry: So I let the waters have him again. Forever.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm sorry.
Zikry: I did it. I did it because we have powers we were never meant to have. I wasn't weak, doctor. I'm stronger than almost anyone I know, because I've had to be. So was Kareem. But all that pressure, it can crush you in an instant. And it's always building. It never sleeps. It's always waiting. If you let down your guard…
Dr. Lillihammer: We're going to take that power away.
Zikry: You can't.
Dr. Lillihammer: I can. If you help me, I'm certain I can. We're going to stop the cycle, erase the writers, cure the poison.
Zikry: You can't fix human hatred with a taskforce. You can't roll back milennia of outgroup scapegoating with a well-formulated argument. And even if you could, your masters wouldn't let you. That's too much change, too fast. Someone would notice that life on Earth was no longer a mutual torture chamber.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, okay. If you're going to look at it that broadly, sure. But would you really think better of us if we were willing to meddle with basic instincts to that extent? You think the Foundation should… autocratically eradicate homophobia?
Zikry: Is this a theoretical question, or an offer? Because I might not answer the way you expect.
Dr. Lillihammer: Humanity has to want to be better. If we're going to get a better future, we have to deserve it, and earn it. But the Writing isn't something we can blame on ourselves. It's an outside context problem. I'm building an outside context solution.
Zikry: You've designated all Writing as bad and unnatural, and you're going to neutralize it.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've decided that I want to see if our species can get its shit together with a few more years existing. That's not some grandiose project of categorization.
Zikry: So you think you can make a few stage directions, then watch it all unfold like a play put on for your benefit? You're so above it all, aren't you? You feel like you exist outside of this context. You've looked at it academically for so long that you've forgotten what it's like to live the struggle.
Dr. Lillihammer: I live in joy, buddy. Because I know I'm going to help us win that struggle.
Zikry: And I'm trying to make you see, there is no win condition here. Not unless you take the most drastic action. You address one problem, all the others remain. You address all problems, and you take on the mantle of a merciless god. How can you call yourself a Writer when you understand so little about this setting, Dr. Lillihammer? There is an object in this wing which can turn a house into a home. The label on the case says as much, in the context of describing superstition. If you could see it from inside the noösphere, it would be like a pillar of light.
Dr. Lillihammer: Which object?
Zikry: There's a mask in storage that… you know what? Never mind. The point is, reality is one big catalogue of horrors. Some people want to edit that catalogue, some people just want to own it, and some people want to tear the pages out. There will always be a fitness to things, whether we acknowledge it or not. But just because we come up with an explanation for something that seems to satisfy the known conditions, doesn't mean reality's going to conform.
Dr. Lillihammer: You think we're looking at the issues wrong?
Zikry: I think you're trying to send the things you hate away, and bring the things you love closer together. I think that's all that people ever do. And I think that's what's going to destroy us.
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe nothing is going to destroy us. Maybe you can help.
Zikry: I've spent my whole life being defined by other people. I'm not going to let you turn me into a pale shadow of yourself.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm the pale one here.
Zikry: I wish you the best of luck, Dr. Lillihammer. Really I do. But I won't take part in another act of radical reorganization. If you're going to change the system, you have to think holistically. Otherwise you're just packing things into the attic and forgetting about them, and that doesn't help anybody.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
I won't lie, having someone on our side who can craft monkey's paw traps would have made my life a whole lot easier.
Of course, bringing a Mobile Task Force with me and letting them detain the guy would also have made things a little less fractious around the water cooler.
That's why I carry a thermos.
2024 was the year the Insurgency got their shit together. Overwatch added Chaos Resurgent to my list of priorities when Area-73 was glassed; by now the Writers were a lot less hasty with their deployments, so I had the spare time to dedicate.
They've finally embraced that whole 'chaos' thing, so I thought I'd give them a few pointers. Really up their game.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: Chaos Resurgent turned the Mises Institute into a Firebase. They disposed of all the employees, which was no skin off my nose. The DoC wanted me to reconnoiter.
You ever hear the one about what one running woman with a knife can get done in one night?
<Dr. Lillihammer is running down a hallway. She rounds a corner; the new stretch of hallway is occupied by a single Insurgent, whose weapon is already raised.>
<Dr. Lillihammer raises an object resembling an animal forelimb; it appears to have been painted with a symbol, [REDACTED]. When the guard has seen it, Dr. Lillihammer dodges into a side passage. Sounds of pursuit follow her, but as her legs are significantly longer and she is unencumbered by armour her pursuer is unable to gain ground.>
<His voice is audible as Dr. Lillihammer continues to flee.>
Resurgent Agent: Uh…
<A response arrives via radio.>
Voice: Jim? Are you making a report?
Resurgent Agent: Yes… uh.
<The agent moves his mouth soundlessly, brows furrowing.>
Voice: Control.
Resurgent Agent: Uh.
Voice: This is Control.
Resurgent Agent: Uh.
Resurgent Control: Snap out of it! What are you reporting?
Resurgent Agent: There's…
Resurgent Control: Yes?
Resurgent Agent: There's a…
Resurgent Control: Yes?
Resurgent Agent: I'm chasing.
Resurgent Control: Who are you chasing?
<Dr. Lillihammer suppresses a snort.>
Resurgent Control: Jim?
Resurgent Agent: I can't see…
<The agent blinks rapidly. Tears of frustration stream down his face.>
Resurgent Control: What can't you see?
<Dr. Lillihammer snickers softly.>
Resurgent Control: The person you're chasing?
Resurgent Agent: Uh.
Resurgent Control: I'm sending someone down there.
Resurgent Agent: Okay.
Resurgent Control: Where are you?
<Silence on recording.>
Resurgent Control: For fuck's… just check his location, will you.
<Dr. Lillihammer raises the forelimb in front of the nearest camera, slowly. She is giggling.>
Resurgent Control: Do you have them?
<A second voice is audible on the transmission now, as is frantic typing,>
Resurgent Technician: I…
Resurgent Control: What?
Resurgent Technician: I… I can't…
Resurgent Control: Not you too. Get an assault team down there.
Resurgent Technician: I should… I know I…
Resurgent Control: What sector?
Resurgent Technician: I can't…
Resurgent Control: Let me see that.
<The sound of a brief altercation can be heard over the radio, then forceful typing.>
Resurgent Control: She's in…
<Silence on recording.>
Resurgent Control: …oh, my god.
That might be the reason we evolved language in the first place. Displacement. The power to convey information about objects that aren't immediately present. Our ancestors needed to communicate where the good eating was, or predators, or anything else that became abstract in its absence.
You take that away, and we become little more than big, blundering toddlers.
<Transcript ends.>
11 March 2024
In which the frame is acknowledged
I know a guy who talks to his ceiling.
He thinks if he calls out to the night, it might answer. He's asked it for something, twice, and gotten a response both times. He considers that a successful replication study.
I can't really hold it against him, ridiculous though it is. I don't address myself to the architecture, but I have something of a similar ritual.
Thilo's trials are exhausting now. He is pushing me harder and farther than anything ever has before. I am pushing myself twice as hard. There's no question now that if I wanted to, I could give him some serious grief. Between the science and the magic, I can move or bend or even melt the steel that is a human mind with supernova strength. There has never been anyone so deadly to know as me, right now, and the simple act of being that puts me out like a light most evenings.
And I dream of the archive.
It is me. Everything that makes me who and what I am. An endless repository of the self.
I am a thing constructed to meticulous purpose, and the blueprints are neatly catalogued. Every thought that has ever crossed my mind is snug in its own little folder. Every version of me has a box, or a shelf, or an entire wing dedicated to its preservation. A palace is just for show. This is a working space.
I lie in the middle of my vast complexity, and I speak to the air: "Why am I doing this?"
A voice responds: "Because you're the only one who can."
I want to smile at the conviction, the sincerity. But the voice wants me to sneer, and so I do. "Tell me something I don't know."
The voice is playful, now. "Is there any such thing?"
I laugh. "If there wasn't, what would be the point? Why even bother going on? If there's nothing left to learn, there's no way to grow."
"You're already pretty big." I can hear the grin in the voice. "My ivory tower."
The voice knows I can do this. The voice knows I will win. The voice knows these things because I know these things, though the voice is not my own. It was one of the first to see me, one of the first to understand. I made myself, in my own image, but if I had never been known, I would be nothing more than a good idea.
"But a very good idea," the voice chides.
I am never alone in the archive of myself. There have always been other voices, since the beginning: the first, who speaks the most; some who come and go; some who have gone, and not returned. Some follow the leader, and some have their own ideas. Five of them were me, though none of us are precisely the same now. This voice, though, I keep coming back to, because she keeps coming back to me.
"Self-reinforcement with extra steps," the voice tells me. "It's a dangerous way to keep the balance. What will you do when one day you speak, and I'm not here to answer?"
I consider this for a moment, in my sleep.
"I suppose I'll make up my own version of you," I finally tell her. "Turnabout is fair play."
She laughs me awake.
I make us all proud.
With a little help from Oberoi, it was time to track down one of the slipperiest of my many customers.
My final chance to get it right.
<Transcript begins.>
<Cpt. Brooks of MTF Pi-1 ("City Slickers") stands on a sidewalk in Milan, Italy as Dr. Lillihammer approaches. There is no traffic, whether vehicular or pedestrian. MTF agents are patrolling the streets, and keeping watch over a Fascist-era apartment block across the road.>
Cpt. Brooks: We've got the block cordoned off, ma'am. Local enforcement are pushing the gas leak story, as you advised.
Dr. Lillihammer: Never fails. If they see anything freaky, they'll blame it on that.
<Cpt. Brooks indicates the nearest building with a nod of his head.>
Cpt. Brooks: There's a good vantage point on the target structure from this café.
Dr. Lillihammer: You asking me out for a drink?
Cpt. Brooks: No, ma'am. I just thought it might be a good place for you to set up camp.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not your op control here, captain. I'm going in with you.
Cpt. Brooks: Oh. Alright.
Dr. Lillihammer: That a problem?
Cpt. Brooks: No ma'am.
Dr. Lillihammer: Doctor.
Cpt. Brooks: No, doctor. But the brief did say we'd be here for a long haul. The café is still ideal as a base, in my view.
Dr. Lillihammer: Too far away.
Cpt. Brooks: Too…? It's right across the street. You want us on the same side?
Dr. Lillihammer: I want us in the building.
<She walks across the street.>
Cpt. Brooks: Pi-1! We're moving in!
<He jogs to catch up with Dr. Lillihammer.>
Cpt. Brooks: Should we be setting up SRAs, doctor?
Dr. Lillihammer: Not yet.
<She heads up the steps to the front entrance. Cpt. Brooks grabs her on the arm, gently, and she stops in front of the double doors.>
Cpt. Brooks: Doctor Lillihammer. This is what we're trained for. Please let us secure a foothold in the AL.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm all for it. But we need to actually get there, first.
<She opens the doors, and enters.>
<Cpt. Brooks and three other members of Pi-1 follow Dr. Lillihammer into the entrance foyer.>
Cpt. Brooks: I don't understand. I thought this building was…
<Dr. Lillihammer has already headed up the stairs. Cpt. Brooks rushes to keep up.>
Cpt. Brooks: Is it a specific floor?
<Dr. Lillihammer stops on the fourth floor, and heads down the hall, scanning room numbers.>
Cpt. Brooks: A specific apartment. Are you fucking with us, doctor?
<Dr. Lillihammer stops in front of Room 404, and gestures at the door.>
Dr. Lillihammer: No. But the woman in there? She's sure as hell going to try.
<Dr. Lillihammer knocks on the door.>
<A blast of loud rock music comes from behind the apartment door.>
IT MAKES A BETTER DOOR THAN A WINDOW, BABY
SO BABY TAKE A FLYING LEAP
IT MAKES A BETTER DOOR THAN A WINDOW, HONEY
SO HONEY GIVE MY BEST TO GRAVITY
<Cpt. Brooks immediately jerks back, and turns to face the nearest window. One of his agents actually approaches the window, but Cpt. Brooks places a hand on their shoulder, and pulls them back.>
<Dr. Lillihammer knocks again, in a rhythm matching that of the music. She then begins to deviate, subtly at first and then more boldly, until she has altered the percussive soundscape in the hall without conflicting with the tune.>
<All four members of Pi-4 visibly relax, though the music is still playing.>
Cpt. Brooks: What the hell was that.
Dr. Lillihammer: Foothold.
<She opens the door, revealing a tidy apartment filled with computer equipment and bookshelves. A voice immediately calls out from a distant room.>
Voice: Fuck off!
<Dr. Lillihammer turns to face Cpt. Brooks again.>
Dr. Lillihammer: We'll make base camp here.
Cpt. Brooks: In the front room.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, in the doorway of the front room. I'm going to hang up a sheet before my head explodes. No peeking.
Voice: Get out of my fucking apartment!
<Dr. Lillihammer enters an adjacent apartment, which is unlocked and empty. She returns with a bedsheet, a hammer, and nails.>
Voice: There's a minority jaywalking outside!
<Cpt. Brooks glances out the window.>
Cpt. Brooks: She's right.
Dr. Lillihammer: This is really starting to hurt my feelings.
<Three hours pass, during which Dr. Lillihammer disables fourteen distinct memetic traps laid throughout the spacious apartment. This concludes with her entering the bedroom of her subject: Bianca Cimarosa, suspected giftschreiber.>
<The room is filled with a complex computer setup, a comfortable bed, various pieces of furniture, and an African Grey parrot in a large green cage.>
Parrot: [EXPUNGED].
<Cimarosa is standing, back against the far wall, arms crossed. She glares as Dr. Lillihammer sits down in her computer chair.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Reifire Rose, in full bloom.
Cimarosa: Leaky Lillian Lillihammer.
Dr. Lillihammer: Leaky?
<Dr. Lillihammer slaps her forehead.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh. I get it. Leaky vessel. Let me explain something about myself. I do not leak. My mind is not a steel trap, because it has no moving parts. My memory is solid state. Nothing degrades. Nothing decays. If there's a half-god surfing my brainwaves, Rose, he's got endless summer ahead.
Cimarosa: Do you have a warrant?
Dr. Lillihammer: Do you have a lease?
<Cimarosa slumps to the floor, arms still crossed.>
Cimarosa: Got a cigarette?
Dr. Lillihammer: Like I'd let you play with fire.
Parrot: [EXPUNGED].
<Cimarosa has been temporarily remanded to Site Asclepio for detention. She is standing in a containment cell, though there is provision for sitting, when Dr. Lillihammer enters.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Cozy digs.
Photograph of Bianca Cimarosa at Site Asclepio, 2024.
Cimarosa: At least the air conditioning works.
Dr. Lillihammer: But the pizza delivery is slow.
Cimarosa: Uber Eats is servitude. What did you do with my girlfriend's bird?
Dr. Lillihammer: I left him at the office. He's shredding documents for us.
Cimarosa: He'll be happy with that, the fucking collaborator.
Dr. Lillihammer: Parrots don't form many allegiances, as I understand it. Just like you.
Cimarosa: You'd better keep those documents coming. That's all I'll say.
Dr. Lillihammer: They have to keep emptying little blackboxed strips from the bottom of his cage. I'm thinking of testing him out on some supposedly-indestructible SCPs next. What's his name?
Cimarosa: Morgoth.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That is the best parrot name I have ever heard. But I'm surprised you don't keep a falcon instead.
Cimarosa: In an apartment? I'm not crazy.
Dr. Lillihammer: I notice you asked about your girlfriend's bird, but not your girlfriend.
Cimarosa: She can take care of herself. Take care of you, too, if you push it. You won't get anything from me on that score.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's fine. You're the one I want, anyway.
Cimarosa: I'm taken.
Dr. Lillihammer: In more ways than one. Who do you work for, Rose?
Cimarosa: You.
Dr. Lillihammer: Me? The Foundation?
Cimarosa: No. You, everybody.
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay. To which of the two magnanimous cults who want only what's best for humanity do you belong? The rose is a schriftsteller symbol, but you were also being monitored by one.
Cimarosa: Oh, you finally noticed? He was only doing it for years, the little toadie.
Dr. Lillihammer: We noticed right away. We've got webcrawlers looking for word wizard dogwhistles 24/7. We just couldn't track either of you down until now.
Cimarosa: What changed?
Dr. Lillihammer: I did.
Cimarosa: Good for you. Change is the only good reason for being alive.
Dr. Lillihammer: So, you're a giftschreiber now, then.
Cimarosa: What does that mean to you?
Dr. Lillihammer: Hurting people.
Cimarosa: And the schriftsteller don't?
Dr. Lillihammer: Fine. How would you define them both?
Cimarosa: Too loose, and too stiff. No vision, tunnel vision. Amoral versus dogmatic. They're not two points that form a line. They're on a circle of stupidity, and they're only far apart if you're travelling in the wrong direction along the diameter.
Dr. Lillihammer: And you've found a better way?
<Cimarosa looks away, arms still crossed.>
Cimarosa: Keil told me we could put an end to war. Suffering. Uncertainty. I was young and scared, and I wanted that. When I wasn't young anymore, and I saw I was still scared — scared of what a world without suffering really looked like — I tried swinging the other way.
Dr. Lillihammer: Double entendre acknowledged.
Cimarosa: Wilts said—
Dr. Lillihammer: You know Catherine Wilts? The geistschreiber?
Cimarosa: Everyone does. You know how the Nazis and the Allies used to play hockey on Christmas, or whatever the fuck? These guys might be at each other's throats all the time, but they hate everyone else a whole lot more.
<She scowls.>
Cimarosa: Like I was saying. Wilts said you can only fight power with power, and when you're evenly matched, you need to fight dirty to win.
Dr. Lillihammer: You fought plenty dirty. You put a woman who wasn't allergic to anything into anaphylactic shock. You gave some dumb kid a panic attack so bad, it nearly advanced to a heart attack.
Cimarosa: Wilts was right about a lot of things. Keil was, too, but I don't know how much he really believed of what he told me. But she said that everyone is capable of changing, if they want to, and if there's enough time. Thing is, some people don't want to. And time isn't something we've got in shedloads anymore.
Dr. Lillihammer: So, what? We just kill all the people we don't agree with?
<Cimarosa shrugs.>
Cimarosa: I don't know. I don't see how this gets resolved without a lot of them in the ground.
Dr. Lillihammer: What would be a positive resolution, in your mind? How do you want this shit to end?
Cimarosa: I don't. I want everything to keep ticking along. I want people to have the chance to be better. But some of them want to be worse, and they want everyone else to be worse, too. And I don't see how we can offset that without drastic measures.
Dr. Lillihammer: We offset it with numbers.
Cimarosa: Okay, Hillary.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, I'm serious. Half of these fuckers want the world unravelled, and the other half want it crushed beneath a boot. We need a third force.
Cimarosa: Only that'll never work.
Dr. Lillihammer: Why?
Cimarosa: The schriftsteller and giftschreiber built themselves up in an age before surveillance. Before cellphones and the internet. Before you. We're way past the cutoff for a Save the Planet cult, because that would get squished in seconds flat. Probably under your boot.
Dr. Lillihammer: What if the Foundation was sponsoring it?
<Cimarosa laughs, a single, harsh bark.>
Cimarosa: You'd be cutting a cosponsorship deal with Keil within a year, tops. Control is addictive. I know that better than most.
Dr. Lillihammer: Let's talk about your area of expertise, then. You're not a cryptomancer in the traditional sense. How do you do what you do?
Cimarosa: How do you think?
Dr. Lillihammer: I think you're either a thaumaturge or a reality bender. I've been over the messages you sent that made people do the things they did. There isn't enough content for a memetic payload. I think you form an idea in your head, and then you make it real. Reifier Rose.
Cimarosa: If that's true, aren't you taking a big chance being in the room with me?
Dr. Lillihammer: No. We've got a reality stabilization field on this chamber, your EVE levels are very low — probably because you're dehydrated, you poopsocker you — and anyway I think you need the textual component to do your thing. Like an anchor for the effect.
Cimarosa: If you've got it all figured out, what do you need to talk to me for?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'd like to know if you're the only one with this power.
Cimarosa: You want it for yourself.
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure, but not in the way you're thinking.
Cimarosa: I told both sides to piss and go fishing. I'm going to tell you the same.
Dr. Lillihammer: What if I made a really convincing argument?
Cimarosa: With your little brainwashing cards? I mean, I can't stop you.
Dr. Lillihammer: I didn't expect you to be so defeatist.
Cimarosa: I only meant I can't stop you from trying.
<She grins.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's the spirit. That's the energy I want.
Cimarosa: Well, you're not going to get it.
Dr. Lillihammer: I've been told that before.
Cimarosa: And?
Dr. Lillihammer: Nothing. That was the end of that thought.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
At this point, there was nothing left to do but head back to our home away from home and announce the results of my canvassing.
You can tell how well it went from the formatting of the next attachment.
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: On returning to Zwist's cabin, I found it containing several new occupants — and they weren't anyone from around the here that demands special recognition, either. I decided to violate Thilo's standing order against recording before heading in.
<Transcript begins.>
<Dr. Lillihammer enters the cabin. A man and a woman are sitting at the dining table, apparently conversing in a friendly manner. They look up as Dr. Lillihammer enters, and turn their smiles and attention to her. Zwist is asleep in his chair by the lit fireplace.>
<The man is identifiable as PoI-6382: Keil Graf, Zwist's former master and apparent leader of the schriftsteller.>
Keil: Evening.
Dr. Lillihammer: Hey, Kyle.
<Dr. Lillihammer leans on the doorframe.>
Keil: We were in the neighbourhood.
Dr. Lillihammer: A very likely story.
Unknown: I've always preferred the unlikely ones, myself.
<Dr. Lillihammer gestures at the woman, though she keeps her eyes on Keil.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you gonna introduce me to your mother? I didn't realize we were at that stage in our relationship, since we've only had one date in twenty years.
Unknown: Twenty years is a short project by Mr. Graf's standards.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, I've worked with people like that.
<Keil looks over at Zwist with apparent affection.>
Keil: He sleeps so peacefully. I didn't expect that.
Dr. Lillihammer: He gets all his anxieties out of the way while he's awake. Which is most of the time.
Keil: I'm not sure it's fair to say that poor Thilo has ever been truly awake.
Unknown: But he's been a very effective sleeper.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh, okay. We're doing twist monologue 5B, "You've been working to advance my secret plan all along."
<Keil and the unknown woman share a glance, and smirk.>
Keil: Not so far off, really.
Unknown: Though we don't precisely share a single plan.
Keil: But the end result is usually the same.
<Dr. Lillihammer slams the door shut, startling both visitors. She then pulls the dining table away from them, leaving them facing each other in their chairs, pushes it against the opposite wall beneath the window, and hops up to sit on it cross-legged.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Okay, so here's the thing. I usually struggle to stay interested in a conversation all the way through the first time. Revisiting them later with new information might be the most boring thing I can imagine.
<She points at the unknown woman.>
Dr. Lillihammer: It would be great if you could tell me who you are at the start, so I don't have to come back to this later and see what all the foreshadowing meant.
Unknown: That's fair. My people do tend to be a little…
Keil: Circuitous?
Unknown: I was going to say "obtuse," but circuitous is much more clever. You always know just the right words, Mr. Graf.
<Keil nods graciously.>
Keil: Well. That's my job.
Dr. Lillihammer: Make out later. Exposit now.
Unknown: My name is [EXPUNGED]. You've read about me. A long time ago, around the time you were born, I was O5-7.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: The one who faked her death and defected in the Panopticon Crisis. The one who was a giftschreiber.
[EXPUNGED]: I gave you the very letters you live by. I made the Foundation.
Keil: That's a bit of an exaggeration. We all played our parts, many of them before you were born.
[EXPUNGED]: Fine. I made them what they are today. I pushed them to this present pass.
Dr. Lillihammer: You sabotaged the Foundation from the inside.
<[EXPUNGED] shrugs.>
[EXPUNGED]: It had its uses, but eventually they ran out.
Dr. Lillihammer: You used us as a think tank to develop and distribute memetic knowledge.
<Keil raises a hand.>
Keil: For the record, I was no less furious than Thilo when I found out. That power should have remained forever sacred.
<[EXPUNGED] rolls her eyes.>
[EXPUNGED]: You must be such a joy at Christmas.
Keil: You should visit this year, [EXPUNGED], and see. We won't have many more opportunities.
[EXPUNGED]: And we're unlikely to be on such amicable terms again.
<Keil nods, sadly.>
Keil: An unfortunate necessity.
<Dr. Lillihammer waves at [EXPUNGED] until she has the other woman's attention.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Are you the leader of the giftschreiber?
[EXPUNGED]: You're asking if I'm at the top of the hierarchy of a non-hierarchical fellowship of anarchists?
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes.
[EXPUNGED]: Yes. I suppose I am. The fun thing about subversion is it can even subvert itself.
Dr. Lillihammer: More like you're both just two different flavours of fascist.
<Keil claps.>
Keil: That makes three of us!
Dr. Lillihammer: Did you come here to kill me?
Keil: Gracious, no.
[EXPUNGED]: We just came to talk.
Dr. Lillihammer: Those can be the same thing, with you people.
Keil: As if dear Thilo has never talked someone to death.
Dr. Lillihammer: If you think you're any less of a blowhard than he is, well. He gets it naturally.
Keil: Not so naturally. I'm given to understand that you've been investigating the source of our talents.
Dr. Lillihammer: Among other things.
Keil: I would be happy to take you there myself.
[EXPUNGED]: And all you have to do is pledge your self to the cause of total control.
<Keil frowns.>
Keil: She made that pledge decades ago. There has always been more schriftsteller than giftschreiber in the Foundation's makeup.
Dr. Lillihammer: So this is a gift pill, schrift pill situation, huh? What're you selling?
[EXPUNGED]: Very much the same thing, in a different context. You haven't the faintest idea where we get our power from. Neither does Mr. Graf, actually.
Keil: I have my suspicions.
[EXPUNGED]: You're nothing without them. But Dr. Lillihammer, I can promise you a life without restrictions. Isn't that what you've always wanted?
Dr. Lillihammer: You see restrictions? Huh. I always thought of them as goalposts.
<[EXPUNGED] rolls her eyes.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Point is, when I want something, I get it myself right away. You think he's bad at Christmas, you should try me.
Keil: If you don't make a decision on this matter, you won't make it to Christmas.
Dr. Lillihammer: You expect me to pick a side right now?
[EXPUNGED]: Yes.
Keil: Yes. And it will be binding, here. Thilo was very foolish to bring you to the land of fantastic legalities.
<Both figures produce a rolled-up piece of paper from their persons, and glance at Dr. Lillihammer. She glances back at them, and waits. Eventually Keil sighs, stands up, and walks over to present her with the piece of paper. [EXPUNGED] follows suit. Dr. Lillihammer takes both, glances them over, and rolls her eyes.>
[EXPUNGED]: You will sign, one or the other.
<She extends a pen. Dr. Lillihammer does not take it.>
Dr. Lillihammer: These aren't about me. You're both asking me to pledge the entire Foundation.
Keil: Are we pretending that's outside your capabilities?
[EXPUNGED]: They have no means of stopping you.
Keil: They cannot control you.
[EXPUNGED]: But we can, I'm afraid. I left the dirty work to Mr. Graf.
Keil: For a change. But yes. You are under a geas, Dr. Lillihammer. I wound it into the fabric of our little chat, from a thread I planted in your mind so long ago. You will mark these papers, "yes" and "no," and then you will sign. You have no other option.
<Dr. Lillihammer reaches into her coat, and produces a pen of her own.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Fair enough.
Keil: Is it? It felt monumentally unfair when we decided to force the issue.
[EXPUNGED]: But the world needs this. The Foundation will tip the balance one way, or the other. And we'll finally know who's right.
Keil: Or, at least, who's left.
Dr. Lillihammer: Well, let's not keep entropy waiting then.
<She hops off the table. Keil and [EXPUNGED] watch over her shoulder as she unfolds both contracts again, and carefully marks them both. On the schriftsteller contract, she writes "drbk"; on the giftschreiber contract, she writes "prbl.">
Keil: What is this?
<[EXPUNGED] turns away, laughing.>
[EXPUNGED]: I told you. Didn't I tell you?
<Dr. Lillihammer hops back up on the table, now sitting on the contracts.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You think Thilo picked this place on accident? You think I don't know how it works? All the protections I have to put around myself to be protected from the fae the fae the fae is that a complex enough description work just as well against word assholes. I can't sign any contracts while I'm here. I give myself dysgraphia every time I hop the well. I even write my diary entries in my mind, and only jot them down when I leave.
[EXPUNGED]: Intent is all that matters.
Keil: As the room's preeminent expert on legalities, I am unfortunately forced to disagree.
Zwist: Are you quite finished with our guests, Lillian?
<Keil starts, and stares at Zwist.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah, I can't play Scrabble in this condition anyway.
Keil: How long have you been awake?
Zwist: Our young friend is right. I never sleep. And you are weaker in your dotage than I had expected. Disappointing.
<Silence on recording.>
Zwist: I know what you're both thinking, but I would advise against it. I have managed an uneasy truce with our unruly neighbours thus far, but a battle doubling the ferocity of our last meeting would certainly threaten that stability, Keil. Are you confident you could rout an entire army of vengeful persona plagiarists? Do you wish to send a furred familiar back to the giftschreiber in your place, [EXPUNGED]?
<EXPUNGED] gives Dr. Lillihammer an earnest look.>
[EXPUNGED]: You can still sign when you leave here.
Dr. Lillihammer: But I won't.
Keil: We can make you.
Zwist: No, you can't. By the time you see her next, she will have obsolesced the lot of us.
<Dr. Lillihammer is again reserving her attention for Keil.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe I'll visit you in your home, next time.
Keil: If you can find it.
Dr. Lillihammer: You've told me everything I still needed to know. And there wasn't a lot left.
<[EXPUNGED] is humming to herself contentedly.>
[EXPUNGED]: I won't lie, that was very satisfying. You certainly have the fire.
Dr. Lillihammer: Warms those old bones, does it?
<Zwist makes a dismissive gesture.>
Zwist: Get out of my cabin, please. And next time, knock.
<Keil examines him for a long moment before turning for the door.>
Keil: Next time will just be you and me, apprentice.
Zwist: I look forward to it.
<Keil exits the cabin, leaving the door open.>
[EXPUNGED]: No, you don't. You only ever look backward, and it will be the death of you. Perhaps the death of everything.
<As [EXPUNGED] exits the cabin, Dr. Lillihammer reaches out with one leg and kicks the door closed behind her.>
Dr. Lillihammer: We should host parties more often.
Zwist: How is that guest list coming along?
<She hops off the table again, and then bounces on the balls of her feet several times.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Done and dusted. The RSVPs should come pouring in any day now.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
1 April 2024
In which school is in for summer
My instructions were very clear. I met each of them at the old water hole, and led them to Thilo's cabin in complete silence. Nobody arrived to offer us gifts or try to bag a free name or two. Our arrangement with the neighbourhood watch held.
I made them wait outside until everyone was assembled, then brought them in single-file. Thilo was sitting in his rocker, though the full extent of what I'd accomplished very nearly knocked him off it.
"So glad you all could make it," I grinned when we filled the cozy space wall to wall. "I mean, I knew you could. I also knew you would. But it still never gets old, being right."
Placeholder looked like he wanted to dash out the door, but he knows all too personally how fucked it is out there. "I'm just here as a consultant," he grumbled. I was almost surprised that he came when I called. Probably he was, too.
Cimarosa hasn't unfolded her arms since we first met in her apartment, as far as I know. "I knew this was a bad idea."
"But you slept on my brilliant, subversive rhetoric," I crowed, "and decided you couldn't sleep on this offer any longer."
Sinclair resisted the urge to wear her costume, though I did tell her she would blend right in. "I can't believe we're actually here."
"I can't believe we're being left alone here," Boswell added.
"I can't believe you get wi-fi here." Zikry was looking at his phone, which just goes to show you can't bring some people anywhere.
"Cell connection, too." Bradbury also had theirs out, but I'm pretty sure it was just to be contrarian.
Krzysztof was stretching ner arms, despite the close quarters. I thought ne might turn cartwheels on the beaten path. "I guess satellites are satellites everywhere."
"Not if they decide to be something else," I smiled. "The way you folks have."
"I was stuck in a big room with thirty people," Hsieh snorted. "Now I'm stuck in a small room with… thirteen? It's sort of an improvement, I guess."
"Tolkien would point out that thirteen is an unlucky number," Oberoi remarked.
I nodded. "Good thing there's fourteen, then. Say hello, Bilbo."
Alis rolled her eyes. "I'd rather be Gandalf."
I turned to the laptop on the dining room table, where an indistinct form was watching us from a webcam window. "You can't see it, Avys, but Gandalf is actually in the room with us right now."
The tinny response: "I don't know who that is."
"Gandalf made fifteen," Brury interjected.
Phoebe had been ready to explode since the moment I met her at the meetin' place. "Oh my god," she huffed, "who cares."
"I care." I made eye contact before making my next statement. "We need to get this right first time, and that's all on me. The buck stops here."
She flinched, and stared at me with wide, frightened eyes. I ignored it.
I clapped my hands, and only half of them jumped. "I think that's the introductions sorted. Everybody remember who they're supposed to be? Awesome. Thilo?"
The old man beamed at them, and I felt a confused sort of reflected pride. "You are here that I might shape you into auslöscher and serumschreiber. Erasers and cure-writers. You will un-write what has been written, and ease the harm that has been done."
"And here's how we're gonna handle it." I hefted my satchel, and dipped in a hand. "I've made an itemized list based on our earlier interactions, categorizing each of you into one of the two options."
They stared at me, some balefully, some shocked. Only Place looked unsurprised.
I pulled my hand out of the bag, empty. "Nah, obviously I'm just shitting you. Can you imagine? Holy tone deaf."
Thilo shrugged. "It made sense to me."
Brury had nestled himself in a corner, eyeing the others with cautious interest. "So, we get to decide for ourselves, then?"
"Maybe." I did that teeter-totter thing you do with your hand. "Sort of. I was thinking that the artificial division between them and the other them is part of the whole problem we're facing today. I don't think replicating that binary is going to help anyone. Some of you might take more to one course of action than the other, and that's great, but we each need to be proficient in both skill sets — or rather, recognize the division is entirely arbitrary. We're going to try to prove that we don't need those old schemas anymore. That we've made the cults obsolete."
"You can never truly bury a people," Zikry said. "You can never erase what has been written."
"Isn't that the truth," Place grimaced.
"But oh god," Bradbury grinned, "can you ever do a lot of damage trying."
I spoke up to save Thilo the effort. "We aren't going to be doing any damage."
"Any act of creation on the scale you are proposing," Oberoi interrupted, with a warning in his tone, "will result in some measure of destruction. Reality is reciprocal that way."
Cimarosa pointed at her internet rival. "I nominate this fucker to be destroyed."
"Be careful what you wish for," he murmured back.
Alis nodded. "Here, especially."
Boswell was staring out the window. "It's such a misleadingly serene setting. I could get comfortable in such a place. If the rest of you were elsewhere."
"Can't be any weirder than VKTM," Phoebe muttered into her collar.
Sinclair heard her anyway. "You really don't know anything about the wanderers in these windy woods, do you?"
Again I made that knowing eye contact. "I'm pretty sure it was on a list of things she wasn't allowed to talk about."
Phoebe looked away.
"Who is she?" the voice from the laptop demanded. "Who are any of you people?"
Brury opened his mouth again. "I'm—"
"Hey," I said.
"…John. My name is John."
I acknowledged the point with the point of my chin. "Believe it or not — believe it — you are some of the most powerful memeticists, cryptomancers, and conceptual outsiders known to we who know everything knowable. I would happily pit this bunch against the entire combined might of the schriftsteller and giftschreiber."
"But what are we actually going to be doing?" Hsieh demanded.
As we'd discussed ahead of time, Thilo got the last word. He can make it last so much longer than I can. "Pitting yourselves against the entire combined might of the schriftsteller and giftschreiber."
Krzysztof broke the stunned silence that followed. "Duh. Weren't you listening?"
I wasn't surprised how quickly they took to the material. I wasn't just gassing them up when I said they were the best batch I ever could have hoped to collect, and anyway Thilo had been training himself to teach as much as he'd been teaching me, and the practice paid off. Within days they were picking up a diverse array of skills, showing off their individual perspectives and talents and synergizing in fascinating ways with what the old man had to share. Sinclair pitched in with primers on the basics of thaumaturgy, while Place set even their messed-up minds whirling with his semiotics seminars. It was everything I had hoped for, but that didn't mean I thought it was the least bit unlikely. Pre-ordained, really.
I also wasn't surprised to see they took more to my division of labor than the one Thilo had in mind. We didn't end up with anything like a clear separation into two camps of anti-Writers. That's not to say there weren't tendencies; Boswell predictably took to the antimemetic side of things to the near-exclusion of all else, and it was where Alis' experience already was, while the overpowering nature of their abilities made Brury and Rose equally good erasers in their own way.
Phoebe dove right into the curative aspect of things, putting that nominative purity of hers to good use in whatever redemption narrative she imagines she's living through, and she was joined in her enthusiasm by the ones whose dabbling in cryptomancy had always been primarily an act of creation, or at least control: Oberoi, Zikry, and Krzysztof. Avys, Bradbury and Hsieh were in almost perfect balance, which I think actually pissed them off a little. Nobody likes to think they're playing to type, even if they're a type of one.
But in the end, all of them ravenously devoured all the lessons we could teach, all the information we could provide, intent on becoming the best versions of the best candidates I could ever have asked for. And this was only what I had already expected.
Thilo hovered over all of them like a mother hen, Sinclair made sure that none of them got burned by the energies they were playing with, and Place served as a concrete lesson on the perils of abstract thought. None of that was a surprise, either. Even the swell of pride I felt at watching the plan come together, no matter how certain I had been at the outset that it would, had been accounted for.
What actually did surprise me was how quickly they took to each other.
And not even in predictable ways. If you'd set up a spreadsheet, or table, and to try to map it out, you'd end up with nothing like the final results. Something about Brury fascinated Boswell, even though — or perhaps because — they couldn't possibly have wanted more different things from the world. I made a note for the latter's HMCL that he actually seemed to be enjoying the attention for the first time. Hsieh and Phoebe were thick as thieves within a week, choleric and melancholy, never mixing but somehow making the perfect match. Oberoi and Rose were openly disdainful of each other in a way anyone could have predicted, and yet they sought out Krzy and Zikry, respectively, almost like what they really needed out of this group was to see their rival through a mirror, on a different light wavelength. Avys soaked up everyone's time and energy, the fantastic little shit, and Alis adapted as best she could to the idea that she belonged here… though I'm sure she still kept herself at arm's length, mindful of what had happened the last time. Or maybe she was just missing… no. No, I don't want to think about that at all.
The point is, most of them had paired off in some way before Thilo could even take them through the basics. There were cliques as they tackled the mittelgrammatik, factions as we covered the unter, and by the time we had reached the heady heights of the uber?
They were, against all odds, a community. As though before I'd come after them, they'd already been looking for each other.
What they built was defined in opposition, unfortunately, but that's the way tribes form. We are not them. We will not do what they do. I was determined, nevertheless, that there would be no further tribalism. No in- and out-groups. If this was really the best face humanity could turn to its own reflection, it would need to be stronger and wiser than any that had ever come before.
Because these bonds would ultimately be tested, and hopefully galvanized, in an act of violence. They would need to be strong enough that the experience would not crack what had been forged.
This was a chain that could not be broken, because it was designed to keep the rest of us from tumbling into the abyss.
And I would be the anchor that kept us from drifting apart.
When I called the final, fateful meeting, there was none of the bickering and backbiting of the early days. None of the resentment and suspicion with which most of them had first greeted me. We were at ease with each other, and ourselves.
But the easy part was over.
<Transcript begins.>
<The cryptomancers are assembled on the verdant frontage of Zwist's cabin, waiting for their next instructions. Zwist is leaning on his cane, beaming. Dr. Lillihammer is glancing from person to person, frowning.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Where's Brury?
Alis: Making the bunnies who don't know when to quit cry again.
<Regevoy appears at the fateful fork, puffing.>
Regevoy: I'm here! I'm here.
Dr. Lillihammer: Stop embarrassing the local yokels.
Bradbury: It's like watching a monkey try to carry too many oranges.
<Dr. Boswell is peering at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Dr. Boswell: Is it time? You've got that rare look on your face.
Dr. Lillihammer: Rare look?
Bradbury: I think he means your serious one.
Dr. Lillihammer: Oh. Yeah. Well, this is serious. Because yes, folks. We're there. We made it.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe that ought to be a joyful declaration. Everybody throwing their hats in the air, sort of thing. But I think you know that what needs to happen next is going to be a bit of a tall order, no matter how far we've come.
Zwist: And you have come so very far. I…
<He reaches up to brush tears from his eyes.>
Zwist: I have never known such communion in my life. It has been a pleasure to impart some small spark to the fires that burn within you all.
<Hsieh is holding the laptop displaying Avys' image.>
Avys: He can't even give a proper blubbering speech. Perfect poise at all times.
<There is a moment's awkward silence.>
Oberoi: So, the target is chosen?
Zikry: The place and time is set?
<Dr. Lillihammer nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I've known from the start. I've just been waiting for you all to catch up with me.
Dr. Hsieh: And now we have.
Dr. Lillihammer: Sure, I'll let you believe that. But it's more like we're out of time. Putting it off this long was already a danger, but we've made good use of the interim.
Alis: I'm amazed they haven't found us yet.
Krzysztof: If we're very lucky, they don't even know we exist.
Dr. Lillihammer: If that's the case, our luck runs out tomorrow. We're going on a field trip.
Phoebe: By which you mean we're attacking something. What?
Dr. Lillihammer: The schriftsteller guildhall.
<Silence on recording.>
Cimarosa: Oh. Is that all.
Zikry: I take it this means you finally figured out where it is.
Oberoi: I was still hoping they'd show me, some day. I've been there—
Cimarosa: Surprise!
Oberoi: —but they kept the location secret, even from me. And took most of my memories when I left.
Regevoy: None of us were ever getting in that door under our own terms, friends. Not with their blessing.
<Dr. Hsieh spits on the grass.>
Dr. Hsieh: Don't want their fucking blessing.
Dr. Lillihammer: But be ready for their curses. This is going to be a major mindfuck of an operation.
Avys: Where is this thing, anyway?
Dr. Boswell: I would also very much like to know. The geistschreiber tried for years without effect to find the place.
Zwist: That is because there was no place to find.
Cimarosa: What's that supposed to mean?
Dr. Lillihammer: The schriftsteller guildhall is located within the noösphere.
<Silence on recording.>
Bradbury: Journey to the centre of the mind, then?
Dr. Hsieh: This is gonna be some Twin Peaks shit, I just know it.
Alis: They're not creative enough for Twin Peaks.
Oberoi: But their power of creation is unparalleled. So this does make sense. What… what an audacious thing to do.
Krzysztof: Monstrous, more like. Living in everyone's memory.
Phoebe: They're not the only ones.
Dr. Lillihammer: I think they've been living rent-free long enough, don't you?
Regevoy: How are we going to get in?
Dr. Sinclair: The oriykalkos reactor the Foundation used to create the Frontispiece has been refurbished.
Dr. Boswell: I thought there wasn't enough pure oriykalkos left to power it properly.
<Dr. Sinclair blinks her left eye, revealing it to be the Oriykalkos Codex. It glows a serene blue.>
Dr. Boswell: Oh.
Dr. Lillihammer: Kat will get us in the door.
Bradbury: And what are we going to do, once we're in? Smash the furniture?
Zwist: There is a font at the farthest chamber. The closest thing to a holy relic the schriftsteller know. It provides access to the fabric of the collective unconscious. Through it, you may touch the minds of all mankind.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm gonna stick my greasy fingers in it.
Avys: Lobotomize the human race? Not judging, just want clarification.
Zwist: She can do no damage with the Font's mediation. But it will give her the fullest possible understanding of how to perform our art. This is the final impediment between Lillian and a mastery of our mysteries that outstrips mine, Keil's, anyone else's. With her existing eclectic education, Lillian will become by default the arch-cryptomancer of this reality.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Hsieh: And that's something we want?
Dr. Lillihammer: Depends on whether you trust me or not.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Lillihammer: A roaring endorsement.
Dr. Boswell: What's the plan? Can we have a plan for something like this?
Bradbury: What does it even mean to have a structure in the noösphere? Is it concrete? Does it change? Can they change it on the fly?
Zwist: They will have had to embed it so firmly in the spiritus mundi that nothing can shake its foundations. That implies a certain solidity.
Cimarosa: And we're talking about schriftsteller here. Zero creative bones.
Oberoi: No insult intended, I'm sure.
Cimarosa: Are you?
Zwist: I have been to this place only once. When my apprenticeship had progressed to the point where it was known I would be of value to the order. When I became truly accepted. I was linked to the spiritus mundi, given a glimpse at the shores of our collective sea of thought.
Zikry: Dangerous. I never got close to that level of access.
Oberoi: I never got past the entrance, if my hazy recollections are correct.
Zwist: I imagine the deeper cloisters are reserved for only the inner circle now, as even that narrow inlet gave me the power to craft a curse, in my rage, which has plagued humanity since.
Phoebe: They shut the door behind you. Makes sense.
Krzysztof: Also might suggest that when we kick down the door, we won't be seeing every schriftsteller on the planet phasing in to stop us.
Alis: Yeah. Just the most powerful ones.
Dr. Sinclair: Well, actually. If they think you're going to take their head-quarters—
Dr. Lillihammer: Nice.
Dr. Sinclair: —away from them, they might decide to open the floodgates.
Dr. Lillihammer: That's one thing we'll want to deal with, then. Finding a way to prevent reinforcements.
Zwist: Here is my thinking. We are entering the realm of pure thought, but it has been married in this instance to a set of solid concepts. There will be physical rules which govern our time there. I believe that any act the schriftsteller might commit in their guild hall will be controlled by a physical mechanism of some kind. Something recognizable as what it is. I do not imagine they, or we, will be dreaming things into existence on the fly.
Avys: So, we can scheme on general principles and figure it probably applies.
Dr. Lillihammer: I love it when a consensus reality comes together. Who wants to be on gatekeeping duty?
Oberoi: When you put it that way…
Dr. Lillihammer: Of course.
Cimarosa: I'm going with him.
Dr. Lillihammer: Even more of course.
Oberoi: Making sure I don't seal us up instead?
Cimarosa: Making sure you don't let more of your friends in.
<Krzysztof sighs.>
Krzysztof: He's on our side, Rose.
Zikry: We need to stop thinking in terms of sides. That's what this has all been about.
Dr. Lillihammer: It's also been a little bit about training you bunch to help me punch these fuckers in the nose. So, let's keep identifying issues.
Dr. Hsieh: Soundscape. We'll need total control of acoustics in there. The giftschreiber use music and whistling and stuff like that a lot more than the schriftsteller do, but we'll want to be deploying sounds of our own.
Dr. Lillihammer: Right up your alley.
<Regevoy raises his hand.>
Regevoy: Memetic attacks require focus.
Avys: Didn't you get your name problem thing from these guys in the first place? They'll probably be able to short circuit you.
Oberoi: I don't think that's the case, actually.
Regevoy: Oh?
Oberoi: I know for a fact that not every experiment the schriftsteller have attempted over the years has worked out to their satisfaction. A lot of the FIREBREAK attacks involved dumping half-formed ideas on the enemy, and letting them sort it out.
Regevoy: You're saying I might be, what? A dirty bomb?
Oberoi: I'm saying the effect surrounding you is. You're just a person.
Dr. Lillihammer: But a very distracting person. You're good with putting that to use, Brury?
Regevoy: It'll be nice to do it on purpose. Maybe.
Zikry: I've got a few toys that should make quite a splash.
Krzysztof: It probably goes without saying that I am also pretty good at running interference.
Dr. Lillihammer: Nothing goes without saying today. We outline this shit in full before we go in.
Dr. Sinclair: Doesn't Dr. McDoctorate have a stock admonition about the dangers of fully describing the plan beforehand?
<Dr. McDoctorate opens his mouth.>
Dr. Lillihammer: He definitely does. Let's keep going. Who've we got who feels comfortable with meme-to-meme combat?
<Phoebe locks eyes with her, angrily.>
Phoebe: Do you even know what I do?
Dr. Lillihammer: No, and I've been watching you not do it for weeks. Do tell.
Phoebe: I was a general researcher, but one of my specialties was countermemetics. I can take a lot of what they dish out.
Dr. Sinclair: A general researcher where?
Dr. Boswell: Prometheus? Anderson?
<Phoebe does not respond, still staring at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Doesn't matter where she's from. She's here. Who else?
Avys: You find a way to hook me up, I can soundboard the shit out of these boomers.
Dr. Lillihammer: Stop calling everything a boomer.
Zikry: Was there a name for your generation, Thilo?
Zwist: We didn't think in terms of generations.
Lillihammer: Because nobody lived that long. We're gonna need at least one more countermemeticist if we're going to make it to a ripe old age ourselves.
Dr. Hsieh: Obviously me. I'll coordinate with the kid.
Avys: Dibs on boss.
Dr. Hsieh: Not how that works.
Dr. Lillihammer: We'll need some skulduggery as well, especially in the early stages. We need access to the Font, and we need a sense of their numbers. Mind invasions are pretty overt things.
Alis: Do I even need to say anything?
Dr. Lillihammer: Who else?
Cimarosa: You can't see me.
<The assembled cryptomancers blink to clear their vision, save for Dr. Lillihammer and Zwist.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm assuming that worked on the rest of you.
Sinclair: Isn't magic fun? I've always been telling people.
Dr. Boswell: You might not be surprised to know that I emit a low-level antimemetic field at all times.
Dr. McDoctorate: And he's learned to abstract himself very effectively. Not as effectively as me, but.
Dr. Lillihammer: You're not going.
Dr. McDoctorate: Right.
Dr. Lillihammer: No, I mean… I was stating that as a…
<She growls, and squeezes her eyes shut in frustration. Dr. McDoctorate blinks at her.>
Dr. Lillihammer: AND THAT LEAVES a few heavy-hitters with me, on the main offensive.
Bradbury: They won't know how to describe what hit them.
Oberoi: It will be novel to sow confusion for a good cause.
Phoebe: Is that what we are? A good cause?
<Dr. Lillihammer looks to Zwist.>
<He taps his cane on the grass, once.>
Zwist: I think you all know the answer, by now.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
Operation BURNOUT Transcripts, Excerpt
Context: Kijek wasn't lying when she said she was trying to blow up Site-01's decommissioned reactor, and by now I knew for sure why that was. With a little help from two mad scientists of my acquaintance, it was soon up and in working order again.
<Transcript begins.>
<Drs. Ilse Reynders and Placeholder McDoctorate, esoteric polymaths, are examining the many control panels for the oriykalkos reactor in preparation for its activation. Dr. McDoctorate appears uncomfortable around Dr. Reynders; they do not seem to understand his reticence, and both perform their duties awkwardly, though efficiently.>
<The auslöcher/serumschreiber are sitting on medical benches arrayed in a circle in one corner of the vast chamber. Dr. Lillihammer remains standing. Dr. Reynders and Dr. McDoctorate approach the group, and the former begins to speak as soon as all attention is on them.>
Dr. Reynders: I never wanted to enter this room.
<They point up the machinery which dwarfs the entire group.>
Dr. Reynders: I'm partially responsible for that thing, and I'm not happy about it. That reactor was sufficient, with the aid of two dozen thaumaturges, to effect a permanent alteration of the noösphere in 1969. With an increase in automation (and research on demonics), Dr. Sinclair's peerless eye—
<Dr. Sinclair winks, and the ambient light in the room is briefly less blue.>
Dr. Reynders: —and a more potent combination of cryptomancers than has likely been assembled since the seventeenth century—
<Zwist looks down at his hands.>
Dr. Reynders: —I am confident we have everything we need to manage this intrusion into the schriftsteller guildhall.
Dr. Lillihammer: And once we're in, there's no way we lose.
Dr. McDoctorate: How many times have I asked you never to say things like that?
<He sighs.>
Dr. McDoctorate: Our telesomnic hookups will allow recordings to be made of your journey and sent back to ETTRA for analysis.
<He raises a fistful of diode-studded leads.>
Dr. McDoctorate: You'll also be linked in with a secure, truncated feed to Zwist's cabin, where Avys will be monitoring all of your feeds and supplying coordination.
<Avys' voice is suddenly audible over the reactor room's speaker system, startling most of the group.>
Avys: And probably eating all the potato chips as well.
Bradbury: Sure, they visit after we're all gone.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm trying to keep their identity safe.
Dr. McDoctorate: Right, you picked a terrific relay position for them if that's the case.
<Dr. Lillihammer shrugs.>
Dr. Reynders: Anyway.
Dr. McDoctorate: Right. Everything's settled, and we're good to get started.
Dr. Reynders: Place and I will make sure the reactor keeps spinning and nothing goes wrong. You're in good hands.
<Dr. McDoctorate smiles weakly. It is almost a wince.>
Dr. McDoctorate: I've done the math, and I think Dr. Sinclair will be able to perform limited thaumaturgy on the other side so long as she keeps two things in mind, ha ha.
Dr. Sinclair: Ha ha.
Dr. McDoctorate: You will be within the noösphere. Your life energy will be drawn from all of human cognition. You will not want to draw too deeply, is what I'm saying.
<Silence on recording.>
Dr. Sinclair: Jesus.
Dr. McDoctorate: And also the Codex is helping power the reactor, so if anything happens to you—
Dr. Hsieh: We'll all get kicked out?
<Dr. McDoctorate smiles even more weakly than before.>
Phoebe: What?
Zikry: What aren't you saying?
<Cimarosa exhales loudly.>
Cimarosa: He's not saying we'll die. Isn't that obvious?
Regevoy: So, we won't die?
Krzysztof: Defend the wizard. Got it.
Bradbury: That's the warrior's job.
<Oberoi smiles at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Oberoi: I think this chatter is all nerves, Lillian. You know what that means?
<She nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: It means you're ready to cross the synaptic gap.
<She glances at each of the assembled cryptomancers, memeticists, et cetera.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Any last words before we take the plunge?
<Most members of the group look uncomfortable, but they choose not to express it verbally.>
Zwist: Whatever happens, know that I am very, very proud of each of you.
<Dr. Lillihammer lies down on her bed.>
<Dr. McDoctorate applies the leads to each member of the group while Dr. Reynders begins the reactor's startup sequence. He pauses briefly at Dr. Lillihammer's side, as though intending to say something. He does not, and she nods. When she next speaks, addressing the group, she is looking directly at him.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Think happy thoughts.
<The group manifest simultaneously in a sumptuous entrance foyer. The back wall is dominated by a vast stained glass window depicting a robed figure casting rays of light on an assemblage of wise persons, surrounded by symbols of art and industry; the figure's face is impossible to make out on any OMNI feed. The front wall features two heavy iron doors, each perhaps thirty feet tall and ten feet wide.>
<Linked by the reactor and Dr. Sinclair's Codex, the group are able to communicate without verbalizing so long as eye contact is maintained. Avys is able to communicate with any group member at any time, so long as the telesomnic feeds are active. Said feeds register these transmissions as speech; this will be denoted with (round brackets).>
Alis: (Okay, when I said I was good at stealth, I didn't picture a single entrance as big as a bus.)
<Dr. Lillihammer places her hand on one of the doors.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Relativity.)
Phoebe: (What?)
Dr. Boswell: (I get what she means.)
<He walks to the back of the hall, eyeing the doors as he takes a position beneath the window.>
Dr. Boswell: (Back up, and I'll pass you.)
<Dr. Lillihammer nods. Keeping her eyes on the door, she begins to step backward toward Dr. Boswell as he moves toward her, focused on the same object.>
<On Dr. Boswell's feed, the doors gradually shrink in size until they are no taller than he is. He opens them, and passes through.>
<On the other feeds, there is a faint distortion of the bottom left corner of the left door.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Observation. Twain says it's the writer's most important tool.)
<The doors disappear. Dr. Boswell is standing on the other side, in a colonnaded hall larger than any existing on Earth, with inlaid marble floors and a high, vaulted ceiling painted with countless vibrant murals.>
Dr. Boswell: (Two-way illusion. One-way, now. Alis can come through.)
Avys: (You're up, bluehair.)
<Alis walks through the space where the doors were, emerging to stand beside Dr. Boswell. She turns, and on her feed the doors appear to still be in place.>
<A schriftsteller is sitting on a bench against one of the columns, looking at the doors with a bored expression.>
<Cimarosa appears beside Alis and Dr. Boswell, and the sentry stands up abruptly.>
Sentry: Wh—
Cimarosa: Why don't you take a break?
<The sentry blinks at her, confused.>
Cimarosa: You can't call for help anyway. Your throat is closing up.
<He reaches for his collar, spluttering silently.>
Dr. Boswell: (This is not what I would call stealth.)
Alis: (No, it's a lot more fun.)
<The sentry passes out. Dr. Boswell just barely manages to catch him, and lays him down on the bench.>
<Cimarosa kneels over him.>
Cimarosa: Dream of the guildhall. Stay with us.
<She glances at the others.>
Cimarosa: (Don't want him raising the alarm in the real world.)
<Dr. Boswell nods, and heads for one of the towering arcades. As he enters the shadows, he disappears from the other telesomnic feeds. His own feed continues as he explores the edge of the hall.>
Alis: (Looks like we're clear in this room. How fucking big is this place?)
<Avys' voice addresses the entire group at once.>
Avys: (Big empty hall. Go on in.)
<The other cryptomancers enter.>
<Exploration of the space takes several minutes. It is large enough to comfortably house two large jet airplanes, nose to tail.>
Krzysztof: (How… would you ever go about making something like this?)
Oberoi: (Grand projects of order. All the rage every century or so.)
Cimarosa: (Typical conservative thinking.)
Zikry: (You find this conservative?)
Cimarosa: (They got into the realm of pure imagination and they built a pocket of normal space in it. Yes, I'd call that conservative.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Better than a candy factory.)
Avys: (Disagree.)
<Dr. Boswell heads for one of the towering arcades. As he enters the shadows, he disappears from the other feeds. His own feed continues as he explores the edge of the hall.>
Alis: (Looks like we're clear here. How fucking big is this place?)
Oberoi: (This is definitely just the meeting room.)
Phoebe: (You mean this isn't, like, the grand hall or anything?)
Lillihammer: (They don't call them mind hovels, Phoeb.)
Phoebe: (Don't call me a feeb, Lils.)
Avys: (Joe says there's about twenty different exits, all of them shut. He can't hear anybody.)
<Alis is examining the unconscious giftschreiber.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Gonna go for it?)
<The other woman glances at her in confusion.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Hey, you were the one harping about self-discovery.)
<Alis scowls at her, then nods. She kneels before the prone cryptomancer, and begins whispering in his ear.>
<Cimarosa and Oberoi are examining the back side of the doors.>
Oberoi: (I should be able to convince any new arrivals that I'm the real sentry. They'll recognize me, though they won't understand why.)
Cimarosa: (And I'll keep him from ratting us out.)
<He gives her a pained look. She sighs.>
Cimarosa: (And also make them think the doors are actually doors. I'd like to see how many schrifts it takes to push them open.)
<A figure resembling the sentry, consistent with the feed from Alis, stands up and heads out of the hall to the left.>
<Zikry approaches Oberoi and Cimarosa.>
Zikry: (If the doors were real, I could alter them into something more useful.)
<Dr. Lillihammer pats him on the shoulder.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (You'll get your chance to whittle them down, don't worry.)
<She glances around the group, finally noticing Zwist. He is standing to the side of the massive doors, staring up at the ceiling, transfixed.>
<She stands in front of him.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Thilo?)
<He looks down, slowly, finally making eye contact.>
Zwist: (I'm here, Lillian.)
<She reaches out to hold his upper arms.>
Lillian: (I know you are, buddy.)
<He shakes his head.>
Zwist: (I'm here. After all these centuries. They've done so much harm, and I didn't even know. They came back here after Herbsthausen. They've been here the entire time.)
<She squeezes his shoulders, and steers him over to the remainder of the group.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Then you owe them a housewarming present.)
Avys: (Joe says someone's coming from the right. Fifth door from the… doors. The big doors. Alis says there's two someones eight doors on the left. From the… you get it.)
<The group scatter behind pillars, except for Regevoy. Three schriftsteller enter the hall; the two approaching from the right notice the one on the left, and laugh.>
<Regevoy laughs as well, and all three turn to face him.>
Regevoy: Hi! I'm Brury Regevoy.
<The schriftsteller who entered from the left jogs forward to meet him, hand extended, a manic grin expanding to cover his face.>
<Dr. Lillihammer hisses, but Regevoy is looking away from her and does not hear.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's—
First Schriftsteller: Hi! I'm Brad Smelt.
<Every individual in the hall, save for Dr. Lillihammer and Zwist, bursts into raucous laughter.>
Avys: (Joe and Alis want to know what the fuck is happening.)
Dr. Lillihammer: Be glad…! You were m…! Monitoring… them.
<She forces herself to cough, shaking the laughs out of her system, then steps out into the open. The two unnamed schriftsteller notice her immediately, though they are holding their sides and still laughing. Regevoy and Smelt are eyeing each other with ambivalent smiles.>
<Dr. Lillihammer points at the second schriftsteller, and her eyes flash white.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Brad.
<The man bolts, striking his head on the nearest column and winking out of existence.>
<Dr. Lillihammer points at his partner, and her eyes flash again.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Smelt.
<The man's joints fuse, and he pitches forward to break his nose on the marble floor. Cimarosa kneels beside him, murmuring.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Brury? We good?)
<Regevoy and Smelt are still staring at each other, occasionally twitching. Zwist hobbles over to examine them.>
Zwist: (Semantic cancellation. They're trying to determine whose effect is more functional.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Well, we can't stay here while they compare Hancocks. Avys, what—)
Avys: (They're both getting fed up because you guys are still back there. Alis says she's in some sort of memorial hall, and Joe thinks he's in sleeping quarters.)
<Dr. Lillihammer nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Bianca, keep an eye on these two.)
<She indicates Regevoy and Smelt.>
Cimarosa: (I've only got so many.)
Oberoi: (I promise to only betray anyone when they're looking right at me.)
<The group, minus Cimarosa, Oberoi, and Regevoy, advance. Dr. Lillihammer leads the way, and she takes them down the passage Alis took earlier.>
<They exit into a seemingly endless arched stone hallway, with regular niches. There are statues and portraits in each niche. The group proceed at a quick pace, though Zwist occasionally stops to utter sounds of recognition.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Friends of yours?)
Zwist: (I recognize a few. Well, more than a few. Some we lost in the war. Some who were at Herbsthausen.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Then they didn't get away unscathed. Not all of them.)
Zwist: (I prefer to believe that none of us did.)
<They reunite with Alis, in the guise of the schriftsteller sentry, at the end of the memorial hall. She is flexing her fingers, and standing over the stunned form of another male schriftsteller.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Tell me you didn't just punch him.)
<Alis resumes her usual appearance.>
Alis: (He went in for a kiss. I'm not that easy.)
<The adjacent chamber has the rough shape and dimensions of a gothic cathedral, filled with row on row of desks with writing implements.>
Zwist: (There were examinations here.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Not recently, I hope.)
Zwist: (They must have been training replacements. You've seen far more—)
<A figure appears at the far end of the hall, pointing a finger at the group and screaming in several voices at once. The voices are in no kind of harmony.>
<Phoebe punches herself in the face.>
<Krzysztof leaps onto the nearest desk from a standing start, and begins running from desktop to desktop in a seemingly random pattern. The schriftsteller lowers her finger, staring dumbfounded, before Krzysztof ends ner ballet by planting one shoe in the woman's face.>
<Zikry and Bradbury are holding Phoebe back as the latter attempts to continue attacking herself. Hsieh kneels down in front of her, frowning.>
Hsieh: (Made you go all Strangelove, huh? Probably… hey, Ave, can you ask Joe a question?)
Avys: (That was a superfluous sentence. Yes I can and yes I will so state—)
Dr. Hsieh: (Monadology. That was Leibniz, right?)
Avys: (Joe says you're right about gonads.)
Dr. Hsieh: (Monads.)
Avys: (Yeah.)
<Hsieh sighs, half-smiling. Tā leans in to whisper in Phoebe's ear.>
Dr. Hsieh: You're an atheist. VKTM only hires religious people as a joke.
<Phoebe spasms, then her eyelids flutter and she gasps.>
Phoebe: Oh, fuck. That was bad.
<Hsieh looks up at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Hsieh: (They hit her with the mind-body problem. Leibniz says they're separate, and only God keeps them in harmony.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Hooray for beating dead people in a fair fight. Get her up.)
<The guildhall is a maze of enormous, improbable structures, elegant and opulent to the point of tackiness. Zikry pauses on several occasions, pen knife in hand, as the group passes various wooden fixtures.>
Lillihammer: (Any idea where we're headed, boss?)
<Zwist is scowling.>
Zwist: (I was led here in procession. I never even saw the entrance hall. It was all very secret.)
<Dr. Sinclair, who has been mostly silent thus far, speaks up.>
Sinclair: (I think we ought to head that way.)
<She points down a narrow service hallway, the entrance facing roughly in the direction of the entrance hall.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (You sure they don't just want you to think that? Because that's basically the way we came.)
<Dr. Sinclair confidently leads the way.>
Dr. Sinclair: (I don't know jack about memetics, but we've got something similar in basic thaumaturgy. It's called intuition, and it's really just unconscious pattern internalization. I think this is how you're meant to find your way around: just be in here until your subconscious figures it out. So I've been watching, and listening, instead of talking.)
<Dr. Lillihammer glances at Zwist. He shrugs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Why not. We're on a hunt; let's follow the fox.)
<Dr. Sinclair scowls, but does not argue.>
<The hall curves, and rises in elevation at several points. Before long it becomes obvious that the group is heading deeper into the guildhall, rather than returning to the entrance. Unfortunately, their progress is halted when they encounter a deep ravine bisecting the hall. It is too far across to jump.>
<Dr. Lillihammer glances down. No bottom can be seen.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (You're our bottomless pit expert, too, Kat. Any ideas?)
<Dr. Sinclair shrugs.>
Dr. Sinclair: (Don't fall in?)
<Phoebe kneels down, and runs her hands along the edge of the fault.>
Phoebe: (Hmm.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (What?)
Phoebe: (It's a break. Not part of the intended design.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Suggesting noöspheric earthquakes. I kind of hate that idea. No.)
Phoebe: (Yeah. But this place is entirely imagined, right?)
Zwist: (Lillian's findings suggest the schriftsteller called it into existence centuries ago, with the power of sheer belief.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Which sounds kind of like shit from a horse, if you ask me.)
Phoebe: (One of the first things you learn at VKTM is how human psychology works. You ever hear of counterfactual thinking?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Don't—)
<Phoebe steps into the void.>
<It supports her weight.>
<Her voice is quavering but proud as she speaks again.>
Phoebe: (It's when you imagine what might have happened, instead of what did. This place is one big cognitive construction, and the way it was meant to be is stronger than whatever happened here.)
<She strides confidently over the gap, and disappears around the next corner.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Bet she didn't learn that from a deer.)
Dr. Sinclair: (Well, there is that—)
Dr. Lillihammer: (We don't talk about that one.)
<Just before the service tunnels terminate in a gold-inlaid oak door, there is a narrow cleft winding perpendicular. There are footsteps visible in the dust on the floor. Dr. Lillihammer frowns.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Do we go for targets of opportunity?)
<Muttering can be heard from farther along the cleft.>
Zwist: (Perhaps we had better. We don't want someone creeping up behind us, boxing us in.>
Avys: (John wants to know how you guys got over the big hole.)
Krzysztof: (Tell him he needs to be pure of heart, and, what's the word?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Penitent.)
Avys: (Don't know what that means, but he must because he said fuck you and he'll be right there.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Were you going to tell us he woke up?)
Avys: (I was watching Joe. I think he just made a guy eat his nose?)
Dr. Hsieh: (Whose nose?)
<Regevoy appears around the corner, panting.>
Regevoy: (There's about ten sleeping schriftsteller in the entrance hall now. They recognized Nirav, and he led them in an election song. Then Bianca made them lick the floor.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Avys…)
Avys: (Eat. His. Nose.)
<Dr. Lillihammer leads the group down the side passage. It terminates in a thickly-locked door apparently constructed out of solid steel.>
<Zikry examines it for a moment, then begins carving symbols on the surface of the metal. Though the scratches do not go deep, concentric circles and floral patterns are quickly recognizable.>
<Zikry walks through the door, without first opening it.>
<The others exchange glances, then follow suit.>
<The space beyond is a small arc of bedrock cave. There is a light farther on, and frantic babbling can now be heard.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (As a wise woman once said, I'm going to need you to explain that one to me.)
Zikry: (Flowers. I made it a door down the garden path.)
<Silence on recording.>
Zikry: ("Lead you down the garden path"? Trickery? Real door becomes fake door.)
Avys: (How do you people know these things?)
<After the switchback, the cave broadens out to a large cavern perhaps one hundred metres wide and two metres high at its apex. The walls are covered in etched symbols, some in chalk, some carved into the stone. There is rough burlap bedding on the floor, and the remains of what looks to have been a sumptuous dinner discarded beside it.>
<The figure who was audible is standing in the middle of the cavern, furiously erasing and rewriting a formula on the ceiling.>
Dr. Lillihammer: …Imrich?
<The figure turns to stare at her, and is identifiable as Dr. Imrich Sýkora, Class-II thaumaturge, kidnapped from Site-43 in 2019. He points at each of the group members in turn.>
Dr. Sýkora: Too many. Not yet.
<He returns to his carving.>
<Dr. Lillihammer approaches, and places a hand on Sýkora's shoulder.>
Dr. Lillihammer: We're going to get you out of here.
<He does not appear to hear her, and continues etching.>
<Dr. Lillihammer reaches into her satchel, and removes several cognitive clearance cards. She runs them in front of Sýkora's unseeing eyes, to no effect.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (He's catatonic. They've got him in a predictive trance.)
Krzysztof: (Predictive?)
<Dr. Lillihammer gestures at the walls.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (He's a thaumaturge. His Talent is mathematical prediction.)
Bradbury: (Why keep him here?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (In the real world, he only has access to data about things he can perceive. In the noösphere…)
Dr. Hsieh: (He can access people's minds? The collective unconscious?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (And make predictions based on that.)
<She scans the symbols on the walls briefly.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (I… I think this is a map of the entire cycle, and every permutation it might take.)
<The group fall silent. Sýkora continues to mutter to himself.>
Krzysztof: Is it finished? Do they know how the rest of this goes?
Dr. Lillihammer: I hope not. Because if they do…
<Dr. Lillihammer curses under her breath, mentally.>
Dr. Lillihammer: ("All prophets are used.")
Zwist: (What?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Something Chaos Resurgent said in their first big message of gobbledegook. They didn't need any of their old methods of predicting the future, because they got one they liked much better. Imrich.)
Dr. Sinclair: (But this is the schriftsteller guildhall. Chaos Resurgent works for the giftschreiber. Right? They must.)
Phoebe: (Maybe there's been a tug of war. One side snatches him, the other takes him back.)
Zikry: (He looks like a long term resident. And there's thousands of hours of stuff written in here.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (But he's been gone for tens of thousands of hours.)
Zikry: (Maybe he's got more than one cage.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Or maybe…)
Dr. Sinclair: (What?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (We need to get moving.)
Zwist: (What are you thinking?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Place was right. There's always a complication, with heists.)
<She bites her lip, and nods to herself.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (Avys, tell Bianca and Nirav to be on the lookout for more new arrivals.)
Avys: (Okay. Bianca swore at me.)
Zwist: (You think they intend to steal this man away from the schriftsteller?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (I think he's why Tarrow was looking for the guildhall. With enough time and access, Imrich can predict damn near anything.)
Regevoy: (How would they know he's here, though?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (All cryptomancers are thaumaturges. They might have some remote readers.)
Dr. Sinclair: (If they're remote reading this chamber—)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Yeah.)
<Dr. Sinclair whistles.>
Dr. Sinclair: (We really do need to leave.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (But we can't take Imrich with us.)
Phoebe: (Why not?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (His body isn't where ours are.)
Phoebe: (…right. What happens if we break him out of the trance?)
Zwist: (He's under a heavy compulsion. The shock might wake him up.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Which would just dump him in a different kind of schriftsteller prison.)
Bradbury: (At least he'd have a fighting chance.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (He's not really that kind of thaumaturge. Or they wouldn't have kidnapped him at all.)
Alis: (We could leave him here, but take over. Take the entire hall.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (1. That's a lot more than we signed up for; 2. If his brain is in here but his body is out there, they might just flat out kill him.)
<She sighs, and stares at the transfixed prisoner.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (I have an idea. Imrich? Look at me.)
<He ignores her.>
<She takes his cheeks in her hands, and gently tilts his head so that they are facing each other. He continues to write on the ceiling.>
<Dr. Lillihammer's eyes glow white, and she blinks several times in quick succession. Sýkora does not appear to notice. When she releases her grip, he looks back up at the ceiling without breaking concentration on his work.>
Regevoy: (What did you do?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (I marked him.)
Regevoy: (Marked him how?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (You know how they use dye to track fluids in your body?)
Regevoy: (Maybe?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Not a lot like that.)
<She sighs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (I just wish we could get through for real.)
Regevoy: (Maybe we can. You said he's in a loop?)
<She nods.>
Regevoy: (And his senses still work, based on what you just did?)
<She nods again, now smiling.>
<Regevoy approaches Sýkora, clears his throat, and speaks.>
Regevoy: Brad Smelt.
<Nothing happens. Regevoy smirks at the others.>
Regevoy: Brury Regevoy.
<Sýkora blinks, looks directly at Regevoy in shock, and then blinks out of existence.>
Alis: (Did we want him doing that?)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Probably better than him being here while we do what we're doing.)
Zwist: (How much of the cycle did he predict, and to what level of detail? I can't understand any of this.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (Everybody out.)
<When the rest of the group has returned to the service corridor, Dr. Lillihammer stands in the middle of the room, slowly turns three hundred and sixty degrees, looks up, looks down, and nods.>
Dr. Lillihammer: (We'll find out later.)
<She rejoins the others.>
<After passing out of the service halls the group walks in silence for several more minutes, moving through a tremendous athenaeum, then a reading room, and then a series of private research garrets.>
Bradbury: (Like to get my hands on a few of these books.)
Dr. Lillihammer: (We can go on a shopping spree later.)
<A man walks around the corner of a towering book stack, and turns to face the group. They stop to stare at him. It is Keil Graf.>
<Zwist pushes to the front of the group, and Keil addresses him alone.>
Keil: Is it just as you remember it?
Zwist: It pales before my memory.
<Keil shrugs.>
Keil: Everything looks larger to a child. And you were very, very credulous.
<Zwist knocks the nearest bookshelf with his cane. It echoes hollowly, and the echoes die quickly in the midst of dusty carpets and leather volumes.>
Zwist: No, I think it truly has diminished with age. As have you. Though I admit the outside chance I am merely projecting my estimations.
<Keil leans on the stack beside him, and runs his fingers through white hair.>
Keil: You came here to injure my feelings?
<Zwist takes another step forward, and plants his cane firmly on the floorboards.>
Zwist: I came here to heal the wounds you have left to fester.
Keil: There are no wounds here but the ones you carry. This place is a celebration of potential. As a child, this, you understood.
Zwist: As a child understands.
Keil: And that, I think, is the real difference. When you came here then, you were innocent. Not so much anymore. Of course, you'll blame me for that.
<Zwist shakes his head.>
Zwist: No. You have plenty enough to answer for without borrowing my guilt.
Keil: So is that your purpose today? You call me to answer?
Zwist: I call you only to witness, master of none.
<Keil forces a smile, but his lip is curling.>
Keil: You know so little, and yet you would instruct. Arrogance breeding ignorance.
Zwist: I would never presume to instruct. If I have taught her anything… well, you will see.
<Zwist's smile is wide and genuine.>
Zwist: See how much finer a student I had than you did, Keil.
<Dr. Lillihammer blinks.>
<There is a bright flash on every telesomnic feed. When they resolve, each member of the group is looking away from Zwist and Keil. There is shouting in the distance, and zither music is suddenly audible coming from the rafters of the library.>
Avys: (I don't know what's happening, but—)
Dr. Hsieh: Clown music!
<All feeds receive a sudden blaring of a Hungarian folk song from Avys' uplink.>
Alis: That's not clown music!
Avys: (Sounds pretty circusy to me. Is it working?)
<Zikry looks down one row of stacks, then pulls back with a sharp intake of breath.>
Zikry: I don't think the music is an attack. I think the music is an alarm.
<Dr. Lillihammer moves past him, peeking down the rows. A squadron of heavily-armed persons in a variety of military apparel is approaching, bearing the insignia of Chaos Resurgent.>
Zikry: Because I don't think these guys are locals!
Dr. Lillihammer: It's the giftschreiber. They saw us with Imrich, and they knew they couldn't wait.
<Bradbury is rolling up their sleeves.>
Bradbury: How the hell did they get in?!
Avys: (Gatekeepers say the gate's still kept.)
Zwist: Lillian?
<Zwist's voice is strained. With a great deal of effort, Dr. Lillihammer overrides her own memetic compulsion effect and turns to face him again.>
<He is a series of overlapping silhouettes, entirely white. Several scream wordlessly in random directions, while others are hurriedly searching the volumes on the shelves. Keil is chanting an interpolation of Sumerian, Akkadian and Egyptian, alternating vowels between all three in perfect rhythm. Dr. Lillihammer's vision experiences chromatic aberration when she attempts to focus on his hands.>
<Bradbury has removed a volume from the shelves, and is flinging crumpled up pages at a group of schriftsteller attempting to approach from the flank. They are veering off-course and running face-first into the stacks, or tripping over each other. Phoebe is facing the other flank, muttering under her breath as a figure with bright blue eyes approaches, focusing on her intently.>
<It is unclear which version of Zwist is speaking. One of the silhouettes is thinner and slightly taller, and it is bending its knee to Keil. The schriftsteller's expression is manic as he continues to chant.>
Zwist: It's that way.
Dr. Lillihammer: What way?
Zwist: That way.
<Dr. Lillihammer's telesomnic feed briefly displays a series of rooms, the last one leading into the library they are presently occupying. The path leads past the approaching Resurgent force.>
Dr. Lillihammer: How do you know?
<The kneeling figure throws its arms up to the sky, and Keil bursts into flame. He does not cease chanting.>
Zwist: I ripped it out of him. Go!
<Zwist's silhouette is, for just a single frame, Keil instead. One second later, there are two frames of Keil. Then sixty, matching the framerate of the OMNI implants.>
Keil: I am everything he was, and more. Ego plus sum, ergo ille non est.
<Then he staggers forward, and the real Zwist falls into Dr. Lillihammer's arms. Keil's primary form twitches violently, and he stumbles in the opposite direction.>
<Dr. Boswell appears from behind Zwist, still holding a large, leather-bound grimoire in his hands.>
Dr. Boswell: Good thing neither of them have eyes in the backs of their—
<Gunshots ring out, and Dr. Lillihammer shoves Zwist and Boswell into cover behind the stacks. Dr. Sinclair raises a protective ward as the other cryptomancers follow. Phoebe's would-be attacker is prone on the floor, eyes staring up at the second level of the library, unseeing.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Follow me!
Avys: (Hi, is this a good time?)
Dr. Lillihammer: No!
Avys: (Then this is probably extra important. There's schrift coming in from the gates. Bianca and Nirav had to book it.)
Zikry: Are they in the portrait hall?
Avys: (Yeah.)
Zikry: Tell them to block the door with that big oil painting of the ugly fat man.
<Zwist, wheezing, looks up from Dr. Lillihammer's embrace.>
Zwist: That was my grand-uncle.
Avys: (Nirav says the painting is "dressing down" the bad guys. Whatever that means.)
Zikry: He's everybody's grand-uncle now.
<Dr. Hsieh cocks tā head to one side, listening to the footsteps of the approaching Resurgent agents.>
Dr. Hsieh: (Five fourteen B, Avys, please.)
<Dr. Hsieh's feed registers a significantly altered soundscape as Avys feeds tā the relevent file. When tā judges the moment right, Dr. Hsieh pushes one of the bookcases over. There are shouts of anger and confusion, and a single assault rifle rolls across the floor to stop at Dr. Lillihammer's feet. Dr. Boswell leans in to pick it up.>
<Zikry counts on his fingers. His eyes widen.>
Zikry: (Avys! White noise!)
<Seconds after the feeds begin to squeal, there is a loud boom which shakes the floorboards. A blast of water erupts from somewhere deeper in the library; the top of the spout is visible above the stacks, and drops begin raining down around the group.>
<Dr. Boswell squints, and pulls the rifle's trigger. A geistschreiber pops into existence at the edge of the stacks, and falls to the floor, screaming. He takes aim again, and reveals three more attackers approaching the group. Each writhes in pain for several seconds before winking out of existence again.>
Dr. Boswell: They're gone.
Dr. Lillihammer: Is this what you folks call memetics?
<Zikry grins.>
Zikry: It moves people, doesn't it?
Dr. Lillihammer: Why the white noise?
Zikry: So you wouldn't hear the demons. They can eat your dreams if you hear them.
<She stares at him until Dr. Hsieh grabs her by the hair, and hauls her away. The group retreats.>
<As they race around the perimeter of the library, searching for the door Zwist identified for Dr. Lillihammer, Keil can be seen staggering into the centre of the room where an enormous circulation desk stands beneath a crystal chandelier, which glows a fiery red. There are a few spluttering Resurgent agents hanging from the chandelier; the rest have either fled or been forced out of the noösphere.>
[EXPUNGED] is standing at the far end of the room, surrounded by a diverse collection of presumable giftschreiber.>
<Keil coughs, and shakes his head before speaking.>
Keil: I thought you had more prudence than this, [EXPUNGED].
[EXPUNGED]: You did invite me in, if you'll recall. Silly thing to do in that realm of doubled meanings.
<PoI-6721-1, geistschreiber Catherine Wilts, breaks ranks with the others to stand beside [EXPUNGED].>
Wilts: He's half-dead already, let me do the honours. It's not safe for you here.
<She makes eye contact with Dr. Lillihammer as the group creeps toward their escape.>
<[EXPUNGED] regards Wilts with annoyance.>
[EXPUNGED]: This is my prize, not yours. I've worked longer than your lifetime for it.
<Across the hall, Cimarosa can be seen pushing Oberoi in his wheelchair. A few scattered schriftsteller meet them, coming the other way to reinforce Keil; most do not seem to notice the pair — Cimarosa's mouth can be seen moving, though nothing is audible — but one briefly salutes Oberoi. He returns the salute, smartly, while Cimarosa narrows her eyes at him.>
<Wilts is not backing down.>
Wilts: You know I always make the right calculations. You rely on it. If I stab you in the back, you'll blow my brains out. Easy math.
[EXPUNGED]: This is not your moment, Catherine.
Wilts: It's about to be hers. Do you want that?
<She points at Dr. Lillihammer, as the latter reaches for a heavy lattice door through which the stairs to the library's mezzanine can be seen.>
<[EXPUNGED] glances in their direction, and snorts.>
[EXPUNGED]: When is a door, not a door?
<Dr. Lillihammer lets go of the door with a shout, and sucks her fingers as though it has closed on them. [EXPUNGED] laughs.>
Keil: You are all novices in my hall. Behave yourselves.
<Wilts begins heading in Dr. Lillihammer's direction as the latter attempts again to open the door.>
[EXPUNGED]: They were our halls too, once. Have you taken down our portraits?
Oberoi: If not, they're probably in very poor shape now anyway.
<He is wheeling his way through the rubble filling the library. Keil turns to face him, eyes wide, a smile spreading across his face.>
Keil: I always told you. In here, my friend, you can walk.
<Oberoi smiles at him.>
Oberoi: You know how important my image is. Do you need help with these unruly guests?
<Cimarosa appears beside [EXPUNGED], where Wilts was standing. The latter is almost to the group, who are watching the altercation as though they cannot look away.>
Cimarosa: I knew they couldn't trust you. Fascist.
<Oberoi nods at her.>
Oberoi: Or you, apparently. Finally, we have something in common.
<Both turn to look at Dr. Lillihammer.>
Cimarosa and Oberoi: (It makes a better door than a window.)
<The remaining members of the group, as one, rush through the door and begin running up the stairs, Wilts on their heels.>
<Dr. Lillihammer shouts over her shoulder.>
Dr. Lillihammer: It's over, Catherine!
Bradbury: Oh, your name is Katherine, too? That's awesome.
<They punch Dr. Sinclair in the gut, then grab her arms and help her continue to run. Wilts falls over, rolls down the stairs and vomits on the floor as the thaumaturge coughs in Bradbury's arms. The group run along the mezzanine; the schriftsteller and giftschreiber below are engaged in memetic combat, judging by the confused hubbub of voices. Avys plays a counter-agent of alternating tones over the telesomnic feeds.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You know, I work with a Bradbury.
Bradbury: You want her punched in the stomach, too?
<Dr. Sinclair shakes off Bradbury's grip, glaring daggers. The latter pulls a thin volume out of her jacket — the cover reads The Book of Convergence — and begins to page through its contents. Some of the pages are still smouldering from the explosion.>
Phoebe: Is that one of their holy books?
Bradbury: Found it in the index while you were busy not opening a door. It's about when the gyres meet.
Krzysztof: The gyres?
Bradbury: The cycles of order and disorder. What the Writers all worship, or try to make happen, or whatever. This book dates from the time when there was only one cult. It was written in Aph, about five hundred years ago.
Dr. Lillihammer: Please tell me you can speed read.
Bradbury: I can do a lot better than that.
<They pull a red pen out of their jacket pocket.>
<On the main floor, Oberoi is speaking to the giftschreiber in an authoritative tone.>
Oberoi: You are on the ascent. The future is yours. There is nothing here worth fighting for. We are the past! We are a dead letter. These halls are dust and memory. Why do you want them? Do you want them?
<Many giftschreiber now attack only half-heartedly, glancing at [EXPUNGED] with obvious mistrust.>
<Cimarosa is snapping angrily at each schriftsteller who crosses her path.>
Cimarosa: You missed a step. You can't see. You're drowning. You don't speak French.
<All around her, cryptomancers are falling to their knees in various kinds of distress or pausing their attacks in sudden confusion.>
<Keil Graf is stalking his side of the library, speaking words of encouragement into the ears of his schriftsteller. [EXPUNGED] is shouting abuse at her flagging attackers. Dr. Boswell lags behind the group, a thick volume in his hands. He drops it; it strikes [EXPUNGED] on the shoulder. She screams, startled, and glares up at the mezzanine. By the way she scans the balcony, it is clear she cannot see Dr. Boswell.>
Oberoi: You're playing into our hands. This attack was expected. Where is your chaos? Where is the fire in you? Leave before you're as static and tired as we are.
Cimarosa: You can't read. That's your brother. I'm your mother. I'm your father. They know your secret. Get out of my way. The floor is lava.
<The fleeing group members are interrupted as a sudden gout of flame from the main floor burns a hole in the mezzanine, and Alis falls through. The other stumble, but regain their feet before following.>
Krzysztof: Alis!
Avys: (Lost her feed.)
<The battle below is now deafening, threatening to overwhelm the countermemetic audio. Dust and cinders obscure Alis' fate.>
<Krzysztof looks at the chandelier, judges the distance, and leaps.>
<There is a loud jangling of crystal as ne lands on the chandelier, echoing unnaturally, and many of the assembled cryptomancers look up. Krzysztof places a finger to ner lips, and hisses.>
Krzysztof: Shhhhhh.
<The majority of the schriftsteller and giftschreiber fall silent. Many begin preparing artifacts and books.>
Krzysztof: Won't last long. Alis!
<Alis scrambles onto the circulation desk, apparently unharmed. Krzysztof pulls her up, they swing the chandelier, and leap back to the mezzanine to rejoin the group. Krzysztof sticks the landing easily, while Alis only catches the balustrade and needs to be hauled to safety by Bradbury.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's enough scrum for now.
Dr. Boswell: Scrum. Good word.
<Escaping the library and running down a long, tree-lined cloister, the group have now left most of the cultists behind. Two young women appear in the distance, exiting a side path at a run, and Dr. Boswell jams his hands in his jacket pockets and puts on a burst of speed to get ahead of the group.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I've really… been meaning… to hit… the gym.
<Dr. Boswell begins speaking hurriedly as the new cryptomancers see him, and raise their hands defensively.>
Dr. Boswell: Thato and Moira! Where have you been?! They're in the library already!
<The two schriftsteller stop and stare at him, then at each other in confusion.>
Dr. Boswell: We're defending the Font! You need to hurry and back Keil up! Kolab and Pasco are already dead! Hurry!
<Both women nod, apparently convinced, and rush past the group with a few uncertain glances.>
<The others catch up with Dr. Boswell, and pause to catch their breath.>
Dr. Lillihammer: The hell?
<Dr. Boswell reaches into his jacket pocket and removes a handful of red felt poppies.>
Dr. Boswell: Identity anchors. I told you I was in the dorms, right? These keep their identities consistent while they sleep, so they don't pop back out of the hall.
<He tosses one to Dr. Lillihammer. She catches it, and holds it in her hand.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Gonxhe Xhelilaj. He's from… Albania. I shouldn't even be able to… pronounce that. Wow. How did you recognize these?
Dr. Boswell: I got it out of someone. Did Avys not tell you about the nose?
<There is a loud explosion from the direction of the library. The group share grim looks, and wordlessly begin to run again.>
<After several more minutes and an array of confusing architectural spaces, they arrive at the end of the path revealed to Zwist by Keil. Beyond two ornately-decorated doors even larger than those at the entrance is their final destination. It dwarfs all previous rooms, with columns the size of redwood trees rising up to a canopy of roiling but subdued colour, like a desaturated vat of tie dye. A long, thin path of woven Turkish carpet leads from the entrance to a set of stepped tiers, culminating in what appears to be a simple baptismal font perhaps half a kilometre away.>
<Zwist drops to the ground, wheezing.>
Zwist: That's it. That's… go.
<He points.>
Zwist: Go.
<Dr. Lillihammer eases him to the ground, then jogs in the direction of the font. The others follow, save for Bradbury, who is now scribbling in the book they took from the library.>
<It takes nearly five minutes for the largely winded group to reach the top of the stairs, and the font. It is an artifact of simple design, though carved from gleaming ankerite. It rests on the centre of a complex rose insignia in red marble, on white.>
<Dr. Lillihammer walks to the font, wheezing, then narrows her eyes as Alis follows.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Do you th—
<Phoebe steps between them, and forks Alis between the eyes.>
<Alis screams, and ceases to be Alis.>
<Catherine Wilts staggers back, but remains on the upper tier where the font and Dr. Lillihammer are standing. She clutches at her eyes, and growls incoherently at the group.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Fuck off and lick your wounds.
Wilts: You can stand in front of this and talk about wounds?
<She stumbles forward, and kicks the base of the font. It does not move.>
Wilts: This is fed on pus from a hole that's been festering in the bowels of the noösphere for generations.
Dr. Lillihammer: Maybe it's time for a gastric bypass.
<At the far end of the hall, four figures appear. Cimarosa is again pushing Oberoi's wheelchair; Regevoy is half-carrying Alis, bleeding from the forehead and swearing. Oberoi is chanting in Hindi, and the hall is foreshortening from his perspective.>
<Avys speaks for the first time in several minutes.>
Avys: (Lost some time there. I miss anything?)
Wilts: It's time for us to stop pretending anything up here is sacred.
<Wilts taps her temple, violently.>
Wilts: They've been in our heads since the day we were born. Hijacking our dreams. They've been draining the spiritus mundi to power their dark memetic mills. Bleeding us dry and making us choke on it, at the same time.
Dr. Lillihammer: They've been playing us. Sure. But we won.
<Wilts snarls at her.>
Wilts: You're just as bad as they are. You always were. Haven't you just compiled a fucking novel's worth of proof? There's no difference between this place and the reactor where you killed Julia.
<Distant shouting can be heard in the direction of the library. Bradbury looks up, sneers, then returns to their scribbling.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Julia, not that it matters, is not actually dead.
<Wilts rolls her eyes.>
Wilts: That's too bad. I'll have to fix that, after I fix you.
<Alis wheezes, from under Regevoy's arm as they both run.>
Alis: Cat—
<The geistschreiber raises a finger in warning.>
Wilts: Don't you fucking talk to me. I really did think you'd come around. After what they did to us—
<Regevoy has crossed the intervening space very quickly, having had longer to rest than the others. He is now at the base of the stairs.>
Regevoy: What they did to you? They've done that to all of us.
<Wilts ignores him.>
Wilts: No more. Absolutely, positively, no more bullshit.
<Dr. Lillihammer raises a placating hand.>
Dr. Lillihammer: That's all I want. That's what everyone here wants. But freeing the Uncontained won't help you, Catherine. He just wants us all dead.
<Wilts scoffs.>
Wilts: Who gives a shit about the Uncontained? You think what we need is someone else giving us orders? God, you people are so dense.
Dr. Lillihammer: You didn't have the Unyielding shot so the Uncontained would be harder to… contain?
Wilts: I had him shot so his pawns would be weakened, and I could flip the board.
Dr. Lillihammer: What?
Wilts: I put one hundred and twelve people into a meat grinder for this. I pushed all of you to this point, so we could be standing here right now.
Dr. Lillihammer: I don't understand.
Wilts: You think those uncreative shits could have come up with the idea to toughen you up on their own? I put that in their heads. I controlled the schriftsteller, Lillian, and it wasn't even hard. They want to be told what to do. It's in their nature. They've got their finger on humanity's pulse, and they want someone to tell them to push until the blood stops flowing. I knew you'd find a way to stop them, and I knew you'd give up at the last minute, too.
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm not giving up.
<Bradbury finishes writing, with a flourish. The distant shouting suddenly stops. They grin, and walk to where the rest of the group are now approaching the font in ragged formation.>
<Wilts turns to face them all.>
Wilts: What did she tell you was the point of this little endeavour? Taking back what's rightfully yours? Sharing the wealth? Who do you think she is?
Avys: (She's our friend.)
<Wilts nods, as though she has somehow heard.>
Wilts: She's her own only friend. Lillian Lillihammer is a fractal of herself. There's no room for anything but the endless repetition of the single fact of her.
<From across the room, Zwist's voice echoes strangely.>
Zwist: You're mistaken.
Wilts: You're obsolete. A fossil that won't stay buried. She even took your number, you oaf. She doesn't think she needs you any more.
<Dr. Lillihammer makes eye contact with Zwist.>
Wilts: You're that joke from Old English that nobody understands, because it doesn't have any relevance to our modern context.
Dr. Hsieh: I, too, have seen CGP Grey videos.
Dr. Boswell: Why are we negotiating with this woman? She's a mass murderer.
<Wilts rounds on him.>
Wilts: And you're the king of an unlawful surveillance ring. What other worthies do we have before us today? I recognize two more murderers, a woman who abandoned her kid, and as for you, Ste—
<Dr. Lillihammer's eyes glow white, and Wilts' roll back in her skull. She pitches forward, splashing into the font.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I am just so tired of being lectured, you guys.
<Wilts grasps the font with one hand, and removes a whittled figurine of a bird of prey with folded wings from her pants pocket.>
Zikry: She's got one of m—
Alis: Catherine, n—
<Wilts submerges her face in the font, and clenches the figurine tightly. All feeds white out. Minutes later, they resume with significant chromatic aberration, worsening around a massive gap in space where the font once stood. Wilts is nowhere to be seen.>
Krzysztof: What… is that.
Dr. Lillihammer: That, is the reason we're all here.
<She looks down into [COGNITOHAZARD EXCISED]. They all do.>
<Zwist painstakingly climbs the final stairs to stand next to Dr. Lillihammer. He has lost his cane; she reaches out to steady him from habit, not taking her eyes off what lies beneath.>
Zwist: The Font was hiding this all along.
Cimarosa: Hiding… what?
Zwist: A portal into thought They intentionally ruptured their own idea-space, letting the spiritus mundi bleed in.
Zikry: That's what Wilts meant.
Dr. Lillihammer: Katherine?
Zikry: Yes, Ca— oh.
<Dr. Sinclair is waving a device at the noöspheric rupture, and frowning at what she sees on its display.>
Sinclair: It's stable, but it's giving off… I couldn't even begin to tell you what this is, especially given I'm imagining my instruments. It's not magic, I can tell you that.
Dr. Hsieh: It's us. It's all of us. It's the noösphere itself.
Oberoi: The source of everything we are. Everything we do.
Alis: Everything we do to ourselves.
Regevoy: Everything that's been done to us.
Cimarosa: And with it, we could do anything.
Phoebe: Or, and hear me out, nothing.
Zwist: This is the culmination of all your training. We have brought Lillian here, to become what she was always meant to be. The best of us. The Font is gone, but this is better. More powerful still. She will link with the rent, and become…
Dr. Lillihammer: I still like the sound of arch-cryptomancer. I've always thought of myself as rather arch.
Dr. Boswell: Of course, once that's dealt with, the rift will have to be contained and studied. It's an anomaly like any other.
Dr. Lillihammer: Of course. That was always the plan.
Avys: (Is it just me, or was that part never actually spelled out?)
Sinclair: Uh, Lillian? Was this part of the plan?
<The other cryptomancers present in the room have lined up behind Dr. Lillihammer and Zwist, taking a variety of offensive poses.>
<Dr. Sinclair raises a protective ward, but it is tenuous. One by one, the other cryptomancers place their hands on it. They make visible marks in the bubble of energy.>
Dr. Lillihammer: What are you doing?
Zikry: What we have to do.
Bradbury: What you're forcing us to do.
<Cimarosa shakes her head.>
Cimarosa: No. Don't cheapen it. We have complete agency here.
Krzysztof: That's right. We're going into this with open eyes, and nobody's forcing us. I always knew you were full of shit, Lillihammer. This was only ever another favour you could trade with the Council for your freedom. If you won't dance with us, we'll dance on your grave.
<Bradbury is still holding the tome in their hands. They make a final edit, and smile as Zwist begins to fade from view.>
Zwist: Lillian!
<And he is gone.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I take it we're not about to be interrupted by the Lord of the Manor or his unruly guests?
Bradbury: I wrote them all out of their own story.
<They drop the book to the floor. The impact echoes for a long while.>
Bradbury: Maybe they'll find their way back eventually, but we'll be more than ready by then. Thilo, at least, won't be darkening these halls again.
<Dr. Sinclair winces with the strain of keeping the ward in place.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm impressed. I didn't think anything could keep the Good Work down.
Alis: What's so fucking good about it?
<She glares at the others, each in turn.>
Alis: What a cynical bunch you are, acting like anything connected to that worldwide gulag can ever be morally right.
<Oberoi nods.>
Oberoi: No organization so fascinated with internal purity tests can ever be truly pure.
Phoebe: At least we want to do the right thing. At least we're actually willing to try.
Dr. Boswell: You never put in the work, Lillian. You let us toil away for you in obscurity while you jetted around, taking all the credit.
Dr. Hsieh: And what's it even worth, in the end? We're fighting for our lives, and you're angling to be Quisling of the Month.
Avys: (Guys? What's going on? Why are you—)
<Regevoy mutters under his breath.>
<Avys begins to laugh. Within seconds, they are hysterical.>
Regevoy: They didn't need to be here for this. You should never have involved them.
Dr. Lillihammer: What are you planning to do? Blow up the rent? Close it? Make it bigger?
Dr. Sinclair: Lillian? I can't hold them back much longer.
Dr. Lillihammer: Drop out. Get Place and Reynders. Alpha-1. Get help.
<Dr. Hsieh whistles, sharply, and Dr. Sinclair disappears. The ward vanishes, and Dr. Lillihammer drops to her knees.>
<The others step forward to face her in a tight semicircle.>
Dr. Hsieh: Nothing feels quite as good as praxis, am I right?
Phoebe: I'll bet she was going to kill us. She was never going to share this power.
<Dr. Lillihammer is staring into infinity.>
Dr. Lillihammer: You need to listen to me.
Cimarosa: We need to silence you.
Dr. Lillihammer: You need to trust me.
<Krzysztof gestures at the grand hall.>
Krzysztof: Was this going to be our new box, Lillian? A real prison of the mind?
Oberoi: I gave up everything for you. And it wasn't worth it.
Regevoy: We're going to make it worth it.
Avys: (Hey, boss… Feeling a little bit… off, right now—)
<Dr. Lillihammer still does not look up.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Disconnect, Avys. I'll find you after.
Oberoi: You'll never talk to them again. We're going to take care of them. They wanted connection, not the perverse mockery you offered.
<Dr. Lillihammer slowly rises to her feet, shuddering.>
Dr. Lillihammer: I am… I am begging you not to do this. Whatever it is you think you're doing.
Alis: Come on, Lils. You've always known what I'm after, deep down inside. Like Thilo said, we're erasers.
Bradbury: And we're going to erase the Foundation.
<There is a sudden dial-up screech, and then silence as Avys' connection abruptly drops. The rogue cryptomancers hallucinate a rapidly rotating wall of swirling colour surrounding their semicircle, with flashing lights interspersed, and Dr. Lillihammer vanishes from their view. The distraction only lasts for a moment, but it is long enough.>
<Dr. Lillihammer leaps into the rent.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Thanks, kid.
<It closes behind her.>
<Dr. Lillihammer's feed fails.>
<An instant later, simultaneously, the others follow suit.>
<Transcript ends.>
I fall into contemplation.
It is everything at once. I see a coral web of pulsating lights, billions strong. I see ideating eddies swirling between them, drawing schools of vibrant concepts in and casting them out again, changed. I see a whirlpool at the heart, warping the currents around it, pulling me down to its all-devouring maw. I see the counter-tempest roiling up beneath it, still weak but picking up steam. Sometimes I see them as titanic, ravening beasts with claws and wings and eyes which have never known pity or love. Sometimes they are only human, or even less.
I even see Zikry's pillar, Brury's blockade, and a web of self-referential circles that fills me with equal parts love and regret. I see an insatiable gullet in the form of a forest, filled with gnashing teeth.
And yes, I also see linguanons and structurons and all the rest. Sorry, not sorry. It's there.
I sink into thought.
It is an ocean, and its waters are the breath of inner life. I am not alone. In the grip of noetic undertow, I witness:
An amber serpent eating its own tail;
The red, ruptured husk of a half-formed hand;
The wild, electric thought that struck it dead;
Three black arrows in mutual self-reference;
A shock of pink above a dazzling smile;
An emblem of water and chromatic pride.
And then they are gone, and the light is gone, and I am alone. Homeostasis where the gyres meet. Floating in the matter of eight thousand million minds.
At the source.
I can't see it, so I close my eyes.
Yes. It's here.
It's within reach.
I touch the face of humanity.
In an instant, the others have found me. Or have I found them? The betrayers. I see their images all around me in the murk, staring down into my infinity, afraid to commit, to take the plunge as I did. Some I wanted to save. Some I thought might save me. Some, in time, with whom I might have saved us all.
They are drawing near the rift. They have found their courage.
But I am already here, where all grammars meet. Here in the void of creation, my rebellious compatriots watch as I perform the first act of a new way to write. In this moment, I invent — I become — the transgrammatik.
One by one, I drown their lights.
There is no struggle.
Dust to nothing, mere rumours dispelled.
I say a prayer to the firmament for what little remains. A fragment of a fragment. It will be remembered.
I cast their tomb beyond the dimmest flare.
Then I fill my lungs with the stuff that dreams are made of, fix my eyes on the event horizon, and I swim.
When I come to, they're gone. All except for him.
"What did you do?" Thilo breathes.
The chamber is filled with Red Right Hand. Graven statues with mourning faces, impassive and judgemental. The reactor is spooling down, and there are klaxons roaring. Far above, at the control room window, Place and Ilse are watching. I can't make out their expressions, and that's good.
"What did you do?" Thilo repeats, eyes pleading me to tell him anything but the truth.
Truth is the ultimate trick.
"The only thing I could." I want to stand, but it's all I can do to move my lips. Perhaps I have the conceptual bends. "They're gone."
And they are gone. Every chair is empty save for ours. Sinclair, of course, is the reason we're surrounded by heavily-armoured mountain men. Probably in custody already. The rest…
"You killed them." It is worse than an accusation. It's an epitaph for something bigger than all of us.
"Yes."
He stands, legs shaking, hands shaking, lips trembling, and points one gnarled finger at me. "You are a loyal woman, Lillian Lillihammer. Loyal to the finish."
He means it as a condemnation. I nod.
He moves to leave. The Hand turn to watch him, uncertain. If the order comes down, they might try to intervene. That will be messy.
He staggers, stiffly, into the airlock. And then he's gone, too.
I won't see him again, this side of the end.
Emergent Threat Tactical Response Authority
Debriefing: Operation BURNOUT
Present: Dr. Lillian S. Lillihammer (SCP-8382); Dr. Harold R. Blank (Archives and Revision); Dr. Dan ███████ (Director, ETTRA); Dr. Jay Everwood (GoI Workgroup); Dr. Placeholder McDoctorate (Esoteric Polymath); Dr. Ilse D. Reynders (Esoteric Polymath); Dr. Daniil Sokolsky (Assistant Director, ETTRA).
<Transcript begins.>
Dr. Dan: Maria is going to have a fit when she sees this file.
Dr. Lillihammer: I don't care.
Dr. Dan: You could at least revise it before signing off. Make it a little more clinical. You practically give up at the end. This can't even be up to Archives and Revision standards. Harry?
Dr. Blank: We're satisfied.
Dr. Dan: Seriously?
Dr. Blank: Who's even going to read it anyway? The Overseers? Better they get a candid picture.
Dr. Dan: Sure. Fine. I guess. Can I at least get a bloodless, unpoetic statement about what happened to the rogue cryptomancers? And the schriftsteller HQ?
<Dr. Lillihammer gestures at Dr. McDoctorate, wordlessly.>
Dr. McDoctorate: Project PNEUMA confirms that the auslöscher and serumschreiber are gone. Obliterated. By… by Dr. Lillihammer.
Dr. Dan: But we still know who they were.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yes. I did that too, so you could close the file. You're welcome.
Dr. Dan: And the guildhall?
Dr. Lillihammer: None of the Writers will ever set foot in there again. Between what Bradbury did, and what I… It's inaccessible. They know this. They won't be training any more schriftsteller, and the giftschreiber have lost their only chance to touch the power themselves.
Dr. Dan: What about you?
Dr. Lillihammer: What about me?
Dr. Dan: You touched the power, didn't you? What did that accomplish?
Dr. Lillihammer: I can still see it. When I close my eyes, and in the afterimage when I open them. I can see it all. I can move within it.
Dr. Reynders: We are tearing that reactor down, mark my words.
Dr. McDoctorate: But imagine what else we could achieve with it?
Dr. Reynders: I've come to the realization that our imaginations are part of the problem.
Dr. McDoctorate: No idea what that means.
Dr. Sokolsky: Oh, Astrauskas turned in the aura reading. If we haven't segued out of the main topic into pointless yammering.
<He passes copies of a colour printout to the group.>
Auramantic Assessment:
Dr. Lillian Shelby Lillihammer
Prepared by Dr. Rozálie Astrauskas, Site-43
Attached below is a telesomnic impression of my aurascopic reading of Dr. Lillian Lillihammer on 30 June 2024, alongside my diagrammatic interpretation of the elements visible therein and their approximate configurations.
Telesomnic representation of subject's field emissions (left) and expert interpretation (right).
Element Key
Baseline Elements:
Vigour Band (blue)
Emotion Band (red)
Psychic Band (yellow)
Hume Spirals (green)
Esoteric Inclusions:
Thaumic Channels (violet)
Thaumic Radii (orange)
Novel Inclusions:
Unidentified Corona (orange/black)
Non-Transmissible Inclusions:
Identity Gradient (absent)
Intent Bloom (absent)
Dr. Lillihammer's band reading indicates excellent physical health, intellectual activity, and emotional strength. Her Hume Spirals are octupled; though this issue is believed to stem from her possession of multiple memory sets originating in parallel realities, the specific number on display has not yet been sufficiently explained.
Esoteric inclusions indicate deviations from the human norm, typically thaumatological in origin. In this case Dr. Lillihammer's Thaumic Channel (the point at which her body's thaumic field is most extruded, in this case her cranium) and Thaumic Radii (a specific manifestation relating to Dr. Lillihammer's cryptomancy; inclusions differ depending on each thaumaturge's native Talent) can be seen.
Dr. Lillihammer's Identity Gradient, the colour-shifting signature unique to her person, cannot be transmitted through telesomnia due to its exclusive use of non-real colours. Her Intent Bloom, indicating a subject's candor and/or disposition, is also occluded via her own employment of cryptomancy.
Examination of other individuals with cryptomantic capabilities has revealed similar, though less pronounced, semicircular Thaumic Radii around the cranium. The additional pyramidal corona, and its aura-negative inclusion, have no precedent in my studies. They may be related to Dr. Lillihammer's recent linkage with the noösphere.
Dr. McDoctorate: Oh my.
Dr. Dan: Wow. What you did is actually visible on your soul.
Dr. Lillihammer: Yeah.
Dr. Reynders: You really are something else, Lillian.
Dr. Lillihammer: So, no new information then.
Dr. Reynders: At this point maybe we all ought to get read.
Dr. Everwood: I know everything I need to know about you.
<Dr. Reynders blushes, and looks away. Dr. McDoctorate looks away as well.>
Dr. Dan: Let's call that one a segue. GoI analysis, Jay?
Dr. Everwood: Early days. But we've seen some sloppy deployments already, leading to a few live captures. The schriftsteller are definitely in disarray without their hideout. There's also been a few cases of overt hostility between the two cults, like they're turning their attention away from us for the time being. No idea if that will last.
Dr. Dan: And that new group? The stiftsteller?
Dr. Everwood: Must have been drawing on power from the Font. Every suspected candidate has dropped off the map. You should see what they're saying about it on Parawatch.
Dr. McDoctorate: They might try to find a substitute source of power. Lillian's theory that Brur—
<He clears his throat.>
Dr. McDoctorate: That SCP-5524-1 was an early attempt to achieve the same effect tells me they're very committed to making it work.
Dr. Everwood: Makes sense. I almost hope they manage it; it was kind of nice having a memetic GoI which is automatically easy to trace.
<They sigh.>
Dr. Everwood: Definitely gonna be a pain tracking the geistschreiber without Boswell. He has a big team, but he was the best of them.
Dr. Dan: Better to root out moles than rely on their services while they're still buried. I'm getting the sense that this was the plan all along.
Dr. Sokolsky: Always have to one-up me, don't you, Lillian?
Dr. Lillihammer: It's a reflex action.
Dr. Dan: Will your newfound clarity of vision have practical benefits for BURNOUT going forward?
Dr. Lillihammer: There is no BURNOUT. Thilo was right. Apprentices were a mistake. There's only me, now.
Dr. Dan: Will that be enough?
<She glares at him. Eventually, he shrinks away.>
Dr. Dan: Fair enough, I guess.
Dr. Sokolsky: What's next on the brilliant plan docket?
Dr. Lillihammer: Get some sleep.
Dr. McDoctorate: Good. You need some time off.
<Dr. Lillihammer laughs.>
Dr. Lillihammer: Who said anything about time off? This is going to be a power nap.
Dr. Dan: Meaning?
Dr. Lillihammer: I'm going to memorize the noösphere.
<Dr. Lillihammer deactivates the recording.>
<Transcript ends.>
Operation BURNOUT, Aftermath
Executive Summary: No attempt has yet been made to contact SCP-6382 subsequent to the above events. His reliability as part of the Special Containment Procedures for SCP-8382 is assumed to be uncompromised; it may, in fact, have been strengthened.
Dr. Sinclair has been commended for her actions at the schriftsteller guildhall. She has also been amnesticized of her time with the rogue cryptomancers, and returned to her duties at Site-87.
Dr. Lillihammer has successfully petitioned for the continued anonymity of "Avys," who remains at large for the present.
Imrich Sýkora's physical location is unknown, though Dr. Lillihammer believes her memetic marking will enable her to eventually locate him again via the noösphere.
Operation BURNOUT has been indefinitely postponed, after the premature completion of its most vital objective: the creation of a functional countermeasure for all giftschreiber, schriftsteller, and associated hostile Groups of Interest. This now exists in the person of Dr. Lillian S. Lillihammer, arch-cryptomancer, whose dedication and loyalty to the signal directives of the SCP Foundation has been proven without fault. Having neutralized the most serious immediate threat to this organization's ongoing existence, her Containment Class has been updated to Deicidium and she is to be considered the primary line of defence against any further cryptomantic threats.
Today
In which the file is finished, but I'm not
In another life, I was a programmer. I'm a deprogrammer now, but it's like riding a bicycle. Imrich's code isn't hard to unravel, once you get a feel for the language.
And considering I now speak every language on Earth, known and unknown, that part is trivial.
They were watching him, like I thought. What they didn't realize, because chaos is imaginative but not very good with patterns, is that he could sense their eyes on him, see the observer effect warping probability around him as he scribbled in the dark. Deep down in his impossible schema of everything, I found the mental map.
I kick the door down instead of knocking, and they're legitimately surprised to see me, and I make them legitimately sorry. When I've gone through them like a hot scalpel, their friends won't get spooked, because their friends won't remember them.
They'll remember me, and what I did.
But not what I've taken from them.
Not the door they've already forgotten they ever opened.
I open it again, and I enter my mind palace.
The festal hall is empty, and there is no more music.
I throw a tarp over the hole in all our heads. It took a lot of mental focus, imagining a tarp. It's not something most people give a lot of thought to.
It would look like a funeral shroud, if it wasn't blue.
I descend the steps, and cross the impossible expanse. I hardly had time to sightsee when I was here last, but now I see the room is alive with light. More stained glass windows, telling stories lost to time. Maybe they're in Dorothy's book, still lying on the marble where they dropped it.
Where they vanished.
There isn't so much as a scrap of any of them left here now. The doors are all shut, and the fires are out. Somewhere out there, there's probably still a guild, but this isn't their hall anymore either.
It's mine.
In this moment.
I close my eyes, and reach out. I find what I'm looking for, again. I knock, and they answer. They've been waiting.
So I cast the doors open, and bow deeply as the curtains part.
"Step into my parlour."
Rose is the first to brush past. "You left us mingling in the waiting room for that?"
"I could've gotten in," Zikry smirks. "I just decided to let her have it."
Sinclair pats me on the head as she enters. "Rise, Lady Hammer. You done good."
I straighten up as Krzysztof swans in. "This place was wasted on the stiffsteller. First chance we get, I'm hosting a ball."
Oberoi rolls in hot on ner heels. "I'll DJ."
From the console on the arm of his wheelchair, I hear Avys snort. "The hell you will, old man."
Alis hesitates a moment at the threshold. I hold out my hand, and she takes it, and I draw her in as well. "I still can't believe this. We really… we actually did it."
"We did," I agree. Alis marvels at me, as she should.
"You should see the retirement message I left," Hsieh snickers as tā bumps Alis aside.
"I'll bet Brad Smelt hasn't got one of these," Brury laughs as he stares up at the swirling ceiling. Lightning arcs from column to column, and the colours are brighter than before. Perhaps ever. "I mean, not anymore."
Bradbury wheels in a cartload of books. And here I was pleased with my tarp. "I am going to do so much damage from here," they grin at me.
I grin back.
Phoebe doesn't hesitate all at once; it's more of a general hesitance in everything she does, as she walks on tenterhooks. I don't apologize to her. Not yet. That isn't an epilogue to what we've accomplished, but a journey all its own. There will always be more steps to take.
It might be wishful thinking, but I feel like she understands. "I'm surprised you even let me in," she mutters. "VKTM's gonna find this place now."
Boswell is carrying a chunk of black stone with a yellow Post-It note reading:
For the memories - W.
"Oh," he smiles, "I think I can take care of that."
They're all past me now, so I turn to watch as they get settled in. "Sure, it's a fixer-upper. It'll take a lot of work to get in fine fortress form. But there's no finer crew of work-people for the job."
"Lillian…"
He only expects me to turn back to the door, so he's caught off guard when I swallow him up in a big bear hug. I'm thin, but I'm tall.
Thilo is weeping. "I don't know what to say."
"He says. How very you."
I kiss him on the forehead, and we separate.
He stares at this place like it's a remnant of a nightmare. For him, that's what it's always been. A beautiful dream, turned sour. "They don't suspect?"
I show them all what a real snort sounds like. "Are you kidding? They think I proved what a good little bitch I am. They want to pin medals on me for killing all these scary, weird traitors. They have no idea what I actually did, and I know that for a fact, because I can see the idea of what I actually did in my mind's eye, and the only people connected to that concept are the ones in this room right now."
I can't tell if he's even more choked up now, or just a little scared. "What… what are you going to do next?"
I put my arm around his shoulder, and lead him over to the others. "First off, it's us. As for next? We find Imrich, and take a trip to Bio-Site Allison Eckhart. Then, we start with what I promised the kids." Promised them off the record, of course, the holes in said record papered over by how stunningly, glaringly obvious they are. It's not hilarious that nobody reviewing the file found it the slightest bit suspicious that my candidates all said no, then turned up anyway. It speaks to a wider problem of competency in the Foundation, even if it's useful for my purposes right now. "We're going to build the world back right. The way it would be if we could start over from first principles with everything we know now. We won't survive the cycle if the world doesn't change, and it won't change itself, so. It's up to us."
He shakes his head, but not in negation. I recognize that same awe from our first trip up the well, through the woods, and into the realm of the fae.
Paws off. This is my forest, now.
"I…" Thilo has a lump in his throat. I've got one too, but I'm trying to pretend otherwise. "Thank you. For everything you've done."
"I couldn't have done it without you. And you know I'd never utter a cliché unless it's the best way to state the absolute truth. What?"
Something is visibly bothering him. I know he's the sort to let it worm its way out over time, but on this occasion I'd rather he took a break from bearing burdens. Just this once.
He sighs. "What Wilts said. About your SCP designation."
I laugh. "Oh. That. Yeah?"
I love watching the old man fidget. A little reminder that even across the gulf of centuries, people are still people. "I know your intent was twisted in her words. I know you too well to imagine this was merely some exercise in egotism. But I hope you don't think you need to be carrying my legacy forward. That… that it falls on you to be better than I was. I brought you into this—"
He stops when I clip his bucket hat off his head, and he blinks at me in shock. "Dummy. I picked that number because it's not about me. It never was."
He stops blinking, and simply stares.
"Don't get me wrong, I could definitely take you in even an unfair fight, now. Probably the lot of them, if it came down to it. But it won't. We're creating something new, a new way to think, a new way to rock the world. I'm more than just the pretty face, but I'm not replacing anybody. Not you, not them. If that number means anything, it's that we're in this together. For the long haul. Our struggles have continuity," and I can't help but lose my gravitas as the rest of the words pour out, "all the way back to little snot-nosed Thilo in his suspenders and short pants four hundred years ago. Scout opened that first file, and I made you the second one. It's my honour to round out your trilogy."
He reaches out, and takes my hand. His skin is calloused, but as always, he is gentle as silk. "We'll write the next one together," he whispers.
"Damn skippy." An afterthought occurs, and I add it to the pile. "Also, we're talking about my god damn prisoner number, here. Fucked if I was gonna pick out one bespoke."
He laughs. Perhaps the most magical of all memetics. I laugh with him; across the hall, even though they can't have heard what was so funny, the rest of them crack smiles and chuckle.
I gesture at our little family, already falling into their familiar routines. This place sure beats the hell out of a rustic four-room cabin. "We can go anywhere. Do anything. It worked, Thilo, just like we hoped it would. They're all invisible in the noösphere, until we wish otherwise. Can't be tracked. Can't be stopped. Can't be beat."
A little of the old contrarianism seeps back into his voice, or maybe it's a new kind he's picked up from me. "But the world can't change solely in secret. You need to win hearts and minds. You need to educate. Lead by example. Make alliances."
"And we will." I gesture meaningfully at the doors. "We won't be on our own. I've got lots of backup ready and waiting."
He frowns. "Why didn't you call them in earlier?"
"Because then they wouldn't be backup."
He shakes his head ruefully. "I'm just surprised at you. Mobilizing all these varied assets for one major, final push, but still leaving allies in reserve."
"We needed the win together." I squeeze his shoulder. "The thing about allies, in my experience, is they show up late, sacrifice nothing, and take all the credit. This was our story. This is our home on the limin. And it's gonna be our revolution; they'll only be invited."
Thilo blinks. "Revolution against what?"
I face my friends, and the future that's rushing towards us like a speeding train. As though sensing the weight of the moment, they all look to me as I answer.
"The cycle. I guess that makes it more of a counter-revolution. We're going to spin the Earth back onto its proper axis."
I bask in their attention for just a little longer. I feel like I've earned the limelight, and they'll all get to share it again soon enough.
"Oh, and while we're at it, we'll also take a crack at the Foundation."
