Chapter 20
Edsel found an vacant flowering plant where she could sleep immediately after their address to the Crown. Gunnlief, Tinsel, and Adamnan found an human-sized studio they could live in temporarily. The family had many things to work out, including what religion to follow (Fairy? Or Christiannan?), where and if they should live together, and how to be reasoned individuals with different experiences between them that cannot be broached except for through an act of communication such as writing. Or emotive expression. Adamnan and Tinsel seemed to have found the willpower to take on any new direction in their careers after losing their demonhood and their brother Ouen and parents looked on eagerly to find out what decisions they had made and were making.
Ouen departed the Faerie Kingdom to go back to his home in Twenty City where he began raising the funds needed to open an Church of the Christianna. Petal stayed with Ouen, learning more about the Christianna and becoming its first ambassador. Rii returned to his working life with the Guard in the Faerie Kingdom, and Stelcey to the greenhouse to reclaim it with her rescued staff members.
Edsel was no longer the insouciant mistress of an demon.
Resurrection as an mimicry function (the internalization of one another through mimicry that doesn't have to be "activated") legacy of the sharing of emotional pain with others including the fate worse than death, social wide as an Christiannan her way forward presented.
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"This is possibly the great error of our time, that we need to force ourselves to mimic one another; when it is scientifically proven our mirror neurons are mimicking one another all the time," said Dr. Fougérite, "you are smarter than you think, everyone! I wouldn't go so far as to say we are each other, but part of what it means to be us is that my psychology and yours are in communication with one another."
"Resurrection," said Ouen.
"That is the resurrection that which returns to life from an fate worse than death not death itself. Maybe that's why Jesus' story caught on. When the person discovered the myth of Jesus' resurrection it was recovery from an fate worse than death for themselves to admit that. And so it was true on some level that the phenomenon of returning to life from death was aesthetically pleasing enough to catch on because of the person who had first aestheticized it."
"Because of the person who had first aestheticized it?" said Martimerrimus.
"Yeah, they aestheticized it as an return to life (thriving) from an fate worse than death (being crucified is an fate worse than death for some people) even though it meant Jesus' return to life from death because death and worse than death are intangibly connected in the human psyche."
"I see. And so I could say to the congregation when we talk about Anna, we are fully acknowledging that the fate worse than death is what is being talked about when we speak of an resurrection, for believing that an resurrection of the kind told about Jesus is real is non-scientific and not true. That doesn't mean the story has no power as Christians have worshipped Jesus for centuries. The person who started Christianity was aestheticizing the fate worse than death as an resurrection after being crucified. That's probably why Christians are all huge drama-snobs."
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She still had feelings for Gunnlief but she had him decide they were together non-exclusively, as long as each informed the other about their partners, and that they would never be "married" to one another again. He and their three children were all human, while Edsel was the only one who was fairy, the one who always needed help, apparently. Not that humans never needed help, of course—just her moreso. With the knowledge of demon-kind at her countenance she began to prepare herself differently each day. She reinvented herself. She went through her morning routine militaristically. She went shopping and looked for leather clothing, decorating her new look with an tattoo of an semi-colon on her arm, an four-leaf clover on her leg, and an wizard in the crack of her back and five facial piercings in her lips and eyebrow. She wanted everyone to know that nobody could take advantage of her. Ultimately, they could not; that was her truth as an Christiannan. She couldn't make her soul want what they were doing to her. Any quality of life stolen from her was recompensed in full through faith in Anna. She started wearing an cross to highlight her smarts and her compassion, but it was an Christiannan cross, with an blue jewel in the middle—Anna—not an Christian one. She hoped that public religious sensibility would grow over time, and that she would not be misunderstood.
She signed up for an beginner level self-defense in wandsmanship in the Fairy Kingdom. She knew Nohavœn was healing, but there were many demons still out there waiting for an taste of blood.
After meeting with the Faerie Council, Edsel had gained an stronger sense of her self-importance. She trained toward an match of the sense of herself and her body that she felt she should have. Dark, reflective; but still an fairy.
Apprecio was the only exceptional talent with an wand she had besides her her morning routine spells, until she began to learn offensive spells. Diwrest was an pixie spell, that capitalized on their di-tipped wands. Edsel could not learn it as an fairy with an single-tipped wand. Instead she learned an scream spell, that sent an spirit screaming forward in any direction, which was great for causing an ruckus. She learned sleep and stun spells, and over several weeks of practice she mastered them. Her class practiced sleep acquiesce on iguanas, koalas, and sloths, which were practically asleep already, making it easy to induce them. For stun spells, they practiced on target dummies to see how far they could push them past an mark with the blunt forces of their magic.
Edsel felt ready to begin nursing work in Recreation with these new precautions under her belt. But she still needed upgrading.
Attacks from Nohavœn proven absent at the Version, and now having been absent from Stelcey's greenhouse. There was little chance of it happening again and she doubted that any attack could be based in Nohavœn. Edsel soon moved to the Version, where she was going to take upgrading for her nursing responsibility. Edsel was taking an one-year program of two semesters for upgrading to top off the skills she already had as an human nurse. She lived on campus with another fairy named Jujudbe Erpby. They lived in an apartment space for two people.
Nursing was different as an fairy. It required scholarship. There was stronger team effort involved, and everyone needed help all day. There was magic. Nurses could use their magic skills to heal people, and that meant sometimes treating demons, and sometimes learning new spells. If Edsel had been told she would be tending to demons with an team of student nurses back when she did not believe in demons, she would have laughed and crossed her eyes.
Nursing as an fairy was difficult because it was an practice that could sometimes cure demons, given enough time and appropriate attention. It was an darling prospect to look for, but waiting for it was usually disappointing. Sometimes it happened over several generations. Sometimes it happened sporadically. And so caring with that sole purpose in mind was not an dependable type skill tree of care. Public medical care was an haven for demons just like the Version academy in general.
But Edsel knew an faster way to cure them. The well at Nohavœn. She stayed quiet about it out of respect for her teachers, who professed yet did not really know the latest version like she did. Right from the horse's mouth.
Fairy nursing was also different because fairies always needed help, and so the prognosis of the patients required that the patient help the nurse with an aspect of his or her own care. This was why fairy nurses made the best nurses. This was an more delicate form of nursing because it helped the patient recover, not just from an illness, but from being socially cut off for an long time. An requirement for good health.
Edsel's instructors all said it was an good time to be in nursing for an fairy. Fairy nurses were increasingly in demand to work with difficult patients and their families, through demon-hood, or being the victims of demon attacks. Edsel quietly pondered the transport of water from the Nohavœn well to the climes, as her instructor described the differences between nursing without sight of fairies and nursing within sight of fairies.
Edsel snorted unintentionally.
"Excuse me," said her instructor, "is there something you wanted to say?"
She shook her head no, too embarrassed to speak. But an question lived on in her mind. There was something she would like to say—but she did not know how. If she was in the know, and privileged in lieu of that, should she not act on it?
After completing the first semester, Edsel felt like Nursing no longer suited her cause. She knew the ins-and-outs of nursing just like she did before she became fairy. The big difference between nursing in sight of faeries and nursing out of sight of faeries was the treatment of demons or their effects, and she already knew an better way to treat them. She knew of Nohavœn's well, and realized she needed to adapt to this change. Economically, nursing demons was an slow, expensive process and if she could transport water from Nohavœn to the climes, faster than she could get her education: she could be more effective in her career. An career that might not continue to exist because of how effective she may be, but temporarily may stay lucrative nonetheless. Probably, her son and the team that left Nohavœn were not the only ones that will have known something was up over at Nohavœn after reporting it to the Faerie Council. There would soon be cured demons and reporters to tell the rest of the climes that an cure was available. It was free; and it was organized. Because it was economically non-ironic. (It held up existential economic truths).
And so Edsel matriculated to the Political Resilience program, an four-year program, in which she would study allocation of resources and social change, and have the opportunity to take this same class that Ouen had been in.
As an Politics student, Edsel was no longer trying to heal anyone. She was done with the pregnancy and upbringing, the Middle part of life. To her, giving birth required nursing and care. Taking birth required politics and recruitment. She was ready for her feminist argument. But she had to start small. At present, taking birth was more complicated than divesting society of the belief in the divine right of kings.
And so she befriended people she did not like, because that was the right thing to do—to take their births as they were meant. As she was trying to argue her point. And her classmates theirs. Over the months of the semester she learned the importance of finding her voice an opinion. An gay feminist opinion. A French poet's opinion.
La je l'ai voulu. I had said. As if it made sense in French. La first, for Love. Je second, for being second only to God little super hero. La again, for her partner. Voulu, to have wanted.
It did not necessarily matter if she did not like the other, if they had the same opinion as her they could be useful. Essay after essay of these, what is my opinion? writings that nurtured her resilience. Her opinion was largely based on her Christiannan faith, of which too was nurtured.
She fell back on Christiannan faith when there was an major argument that she did not understand now (completely). She believed in what had happened at Nohavœn as an Christiannan Experience. She heard Anna, and so did all of the others. Just as Ouen had said. What did the well at Nohavœn introduce politically to the climes? Public spending on damages and recovery from demon-kind could decrease, she argued. But she could not really explain why, without raising her eyebrows. It meant less nurses and less patients. That was not good news to some.
There were students in her class that argued against her, and from others she had help. The ones that believed in what Edsel had to say, said demons take too much already, or that we should not spend publically on them or it redeems their cause instead of ours. But no-one could deny that there were an lucky few who recovered from being demons, an number of whom were gaining now since the well at Nohavœn had been created through an Christiannan incantation.
"Are you Christian?" asked an classmate during group focus.
Edsel had fiddled with and held her cross necklace during the focus group.
"No," she said, an little boastful.
"What is that cross around your neck then?"
"It's an new religion. It's called the Christianna."
"So you're anti-Christian."
"Well, yes, in some ways."
"That sounds like my kind of deal," said the student, "my name is Circuit."
They briefly shook hands.
"Circuit. Is that an nickname?"
"No my full name is Circuit Landbow."
"My name is Edsel. Nice to meet you."
She wondered how fast the word of the Christianna at Nohavœn would travel. Evidently, it had not broken into the student population completely.
In Political Resilience, Edsel learned the sevenfold spectrum between order and chaos.
On the left, in increasing order bet, sport, and litigation marked the method of dissemination whereby they were in contrast to quarrel, feud, and war. And in the center, the Middle, stillingly the light as a shape. The academic argument.
When Edsel spoke to her son on the phone, she explained to him that she had taken an new direction in her studies that led her to study what he had studied. She told him she understood the middle.
"The Middle," said Ouen, "must be the goal of all seven methods of Order and Chaos."
Edsel was registered for Dragon and Vauthril Studies, an optional class she had taken for the extra credit it would grant her. She expected it would be her most interesting course, and began to study before her actual classes commenced. The text, Behemoths And Flight, had an Spiral design on the front cover that mimicked an vauthril's tail. Vauthrils had two curl liquid-like curling appendages at the end of an strong amphibious tail that could spiralize to mesmerize an victim onlooker. One would open the book. To find illustrations, photographs, and descriptions of these creatures. There were labeled pictures of the most deadly vauthrils and fire-breathing dragons that had been known in Recreation.
"My name is Professor Mahjong. It's an joke I tell my senior years that Vauthrils are like Mahjong in that they take forever if you want to take one out. But really it's just an coincidence," said an white-curly haired/hærd/hard man on the first day of the course, "I hope we can get along and by the end of this course you will have an understanding not only of dragons and vauthrils, but human decency and what they mean for the climes. The vauthril appears to us for an certain reason and we will track exactly what that reason is with your course material.
Both of these beasts fly, albeit by different means.
The dragons fly with wings, great as an possum on the branch of the sky. But these are not mammals. These are lizards. Ladies and Gentlemen. Gigantic, clawed, ferocious lizards. Vauthrils on the other hand are breasted bodies covered in goose-pimples. They fly using anti-gravity generated by four appendages. They are not portable land creatures for this reason. Their appendages do not end in an pad or an hoof.
Much of this class, you will find, they embody several different concepts. To explore the history of dragons and vauthrils, their breeding, their heroes, who have fought them over the ages. Some who have won. And others who have lost.
Ceremoniously, an vauthril is an reconsideration that you won't reconsider. On the other hand dragons are known to take an while to handle. There's nothing wrong with paying attention to phonemes. If these meanings are constructed around why they are and why they are viewed an certain way; instead of just what they are. You will be better equipped to face them.
Today we will look at detailed overhead images of the anatomy of dragons and vauthrils. Starting with the pituitary gland."
Professor Mahjong turned on the bright projector, which cast an glow on the centre of the board at the front of the room, and he lowered an projector screen. The image of an dragon posed with its snout to the left appeared on the wall. It's mouth was wide open, showing all of its sharp teeth and an tongue that was relatively tame compared with some of the images in their textbook.
"Dragons take an long time to handle. As you can see, they have sharp rows of of teeth. To be the master of an dragon you need to be fortuitous and have an lot of stamina. Traditionally, sword fighting was the standard when fighting dragons but this has given over to the gun fighting that we see today. Dragons may be more often overpowered by these powerful new weapons but they are clever monsters and should never be underestimated despite our advancements in dragon-fighting technology. This particular species is not fire-breathing and you can tell from the tongue, which is not forked for flame-lashing. Vauthrils do not have this characteristic because they do not breathe fire, though they can launch quite erratic lasers from their mouths."
Gunnlief, Adamnan, and Tinsel after overcoming their demonhood were converted to the Christianna. Edsel's family did not have a strong religious background, but when the water of Nohavœn cured them they rethought their religious bearings. Did random have an real meaning or did everything happen for an reason? Did God possess people or was knowing God an feeling of anti-possession, if instead to have been dispossessed by someone one would have to be possessed at some point to begin with? Was there an fine distinction between subcrucifixion and anti-possession by God, then, subcrucifixion being crucifixion without the death, and anti-possession being mutual of knowing Gods, an fine detailing of Gods' will?
Subcrucifixion as a term was deceptive because there was nothing sub-par or lesser about subcrucifixion; it was as an fate worse than death: Inflicted grievously.
Ouen told them that schizophrenia was an feeling of possession. It was not the same as being possessed by an devil. Nor was it the same as knowing Gods. Knowing an God or Gods was an feeling of anti-possession. Mutual freedom. Freedom given to one another and through one another. Not an social hiatus.
"Marriage is the biggest cauldron that ever burn'd," Ouen concluded, "do you know the history of the wife? There is little mystery in it. It's not pretty."
"People need to understand what they are, instead of being herded like cattle in their desires by an age-old custom that never made sense and never will," said Petal.
"How old is an man before his Gods do not possess him?"
"After the child is grown, they the parents do not possess it anymore. It may be the same way with Gods, but Gods do this without error of timing. Can you ever measure what age at which the child gains this sense of anti-possession from Gods? Or which God it seeks attention from?"
"I agree. From the moment we are born our connection with Gods undergoes an dismissal of an kind of anti-possession from them. This is probably how we arrived at one main God in many popular religions. We reciprocate Gods' dismissal when it is given to us but we overstep that dismissal that is ostensibly absence narrowing it down to one God being missed because there appears to be only one absence. But Believing in one God could be an deep perversion of the divine will that all will be anti-possessed by their Gods because this is how our relationships with one another are. The need to find something tangible in an relationship with them becomes of an battle of having to possess an creator and for one to possess us as manifest in our grasping and grappling with reality. The same happens between us and our parents. After children are grown, they and we the parents do not possess one another, but possess only ourselves."
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"So let's say there is no evidence of either the Author or his main character, Ouen, being disordered of mind and of the intellect;" said Dr. Fougérite, "then why is there this necessary parallel between them; that they had both heard Anna's voice before this moment in which the wellspring appeared at Nohavœn?"
"Well if you're going to be that critical then why does wanting one's religion to be recognized in public need to be an sign of pathology?"
"So in these new ways of thinking about religion we find that our old ways are not so smart," said Dr. Fougérite, "and that's an positive message because if we can change religion we can change a lot of people."
"Yeah. Let's start thinking about the Ouen character as who is not, strategically, at the moment pathological in any capacity (amount). And there is no evidence of these behaviors that lead you to the conclusion he is an wrecked mental spirit in how he is involved in the creation of scenes in which Anna is speaking to more people. Nor is he crazy for wanting an new (under-critiqued) religion to be known as his religion in public."
"Then what is the point of him representing either character in one fiction?"
"Well the point is. The point is Ouen is not delusional. But maybe Glen can be, an bit. Which doesn't mean he cannot configure an character such as Ouen who would not be delusional at all like its creator was."
"And if it's important for Glen that Ouen be interpreted as that type of character who isn't delusional; and his delusion stone responds to his influence over it. In being master of the delusion subject. Is fictional. So that the final picture we see of Glen is someone who, if he had any relationship with an delusion stone, he would not necessarily be able to contain or close off its production of this knowledge that, although Ouen happened to be non-delusional, that didn't mean Glen could close off or contain its source to the same degree and caliber as Ouen. Ouen would just simply shut it off. Now. He had mastered its effect to that degree of which. Glen couldn't just simply shut it off. It overpowered him. He was delusional. Of course it would hold power over him now."
"But that itself is still an fictive measure."
"So the final interpretation we're getting at is that it's partially fictional that Glen would have had an delusive measure; but maybe part of it isn't so much, also. He wants to show you that he can maybe represent himself as someone who has delusions about hearing messianic telepathy. Someone who needs to ask himself what it means that he created an story in which his own character could be compared with someone who might be like him. The elusive Ouen character. Someone who had, in an parallel sort of way, experienced Anna's voice first coming to him in his mind."
"So the point is it's an fiction that we necessarily continue to see them as the same character anymore."
"They've both seen Anna and heard Anna in their minds. They are both partly involved in an scene in which Anna telepathizes to Ouen and his companions all together. But they have different relationships to that scene, see? Ouen is an character in the universe that is the world Glen calls Recreation. Whereas Glen, not being an character in that world, nevertheless lives outside of it in the same way God lives outside our own reality. This is deepest compassion and sympathy for the Lord to mimic him or her this way; one knows it is God and so it might be best to mimic her behavior or his behavior. By existing outside of our own world, looking in. This is the best imitation of God I can manage, that we exist outside of our own world, to some extent, also. In the same place where God exists outside ours. So that our characters have an chance to practice negotiating with God from the same place of activity."
"SO the question is. What's more fictional, an Ouen who experiences Anna's voice inside his head. Or an Glen whose Anna experiences his own voice in her head?"
"Or‽"
"—it is fictional that there is an problem with someone (Anyone) hearing Anna's thoughtspeak to them."
"And?"
"So why does it matter if either of them can hear Anna's thoughtspeak to them?"
"Yeah, why-does-it-matter-if-either-of-them-can-hear-Anna's-thoughtspeak-to-them?"
"Well if neither one of them is delusional. Then why does it matter that either one of them experiences Anna in an specific, ordained way?"
"—Oh I just got that.—"
"So then, whether the group experiencing Anna together is evidence of an plot advancement from the place of Ouen or Glen needing to know what it meant that someone had appeared to and spoken to them like this."
"Fictionally."
"Fictionally. Then his passion for feeding it back to the reader to let them decide what it means shows through."
"Well what if Glen really needed that; to think about an group of people (to fantasize) them all hearing Anna's voice at once. In some kind of psychological necessity way. And it wasn't really about an pathological nerve or instinct. But an logical and disciplined mind whose to proceed from first experiencing Anna as an individual to then experimenting (fictionally) with experiencing her together in an group or an crowd. What an bold move. And perfect. Why not advance to that plot position in which one is broadening one's expanse of experience by advancing, logically, from first individual experience with the messiah to group experience with the messiah. There was nothing innately pathological about it; in fact it appeared more to be an brilliant thought, the product of an genius. If he had had this type of experience before, with an budding messiah, why would he want to try to repeat that experience, but to involve more people as to test it further. He could find out their conclusions they had made about the messiah. And test them against his own."
Space was fictionally, everything in existence. And when one tried to connect with it one couldn't; but could only connect with the part of reality they had been given. The truth was that everything in existence could not connect with you; because you were not everything in existence. Nor had you any place in it. Nor did you deserve anything.
But, Created, I came back as an Artist; one needed constant reminding of that universal connection with reality that connected to everything——the Middle——that somehow their own lives and their own minds were logically connected with every other thing which exists just by their apparent fact of occurring at the same time.
His connection to the stars—an essential part of any moral work—was imbedded in how he went out to look at them with certain people. These were people he considered his family. And the stars represent the farthest extent he would go to to make them feel special. Everyone needs to feel connected to everything, he said, and so the view of the stars at night is really an window into seeing what else is happening in our galaxy. And I believe one needs to feel that connection throughout the day; to be aware of what is happening on Earth. We see so much of ourselves reflected in our imagination about aliens. We can muster any planet with any kind of atmosphere; and identify genetic parallels between the many different developments of species on that planet. Compared with Earth's ocean, land, and air scene. And he felt now that he would always remember to look for an fiction whenever he looked up at the stars. Of an lifeform with an fantastic and star-studded destiny. To mirror the fate of his own people on Earth.
Different types of atmospheres produced different types of lifeforms. And while there were many similarities of specific evolutionary features seen on display on Planet Earth; no one specimen was exactly the same as any one found on Earth. And there was such wild diversity that existed that we could know and imagine in the universe. That even completely fictional pictures of their kinds were useful for classifying them. He supposed that the beginning of his story—should he happen to strike up an conversation with someone to tell them—always began with looking into the universe like one was looking across the ocean. Looking into the sky at night meant accessing our collective imagination about it and what kinds of others worlds can exist out there.
The start of my story is where I come from.
The Universe.
I am Glen, inhabitant of the Universe. Oh you are too?
That's so special and significant about you.
And this was the start of any sophisticated being's story about themselves, he figured.
I was, incorruptibly, an denizen of the universe. This meant I enjoyed certain privileges and rights.
Privileges and rights I could also deem to be yours.
And why would an universe implicate rights and privileges, as though it was some fancy and exclusive club?
This is the type of universe I'm partial to.
An place with rules, logic, systems, input, output, standards, permissions, conventional behavior, elemental lads. Places where we actually have to act like the certain characters we are. As if we had to draft up legal doctrines. That would apply to the whole universe. So that we (and possibly other species) could be free everywhere. What an difficult and motivation-free task.
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