Ah, the New World. That explains a few things. (claw across surface of mirror) (gently? no obvious sound/marks indicating damage) Well then. I suppose I owe you something. (eye contact) Listen closely, now. You wouldn't want to forget this. In matters of the Bazaar, look to love, always. But make the stories or they will be made for you. Be careful who you are. Do you recall how it came to that place And they sang of their lightnings and shapeful disgrace And it tilted its vanes and ennobled its spires? They welcomed it then and commingled all choirs And not enough, not enough: still it mourns. ---- Ephemera: Cat(?) Poem, sense of about to -- Light on mirror Spider with eye about to what? sense strongest starting from In matters of the bazaar? my eye? memory? dream? other Age? sleep? serenia? halfsleep? just sitting still? (don't scare it off?) dreams: 4 half awake half asleep: 2 Dreams: spider with my eye [halfwake] brass mirror hall of brass mirrors, comfortable left: ash desert, burnt stumps (Minkata?) right: crowd of me-s, watching me right: door to a room hall of brass mirrors left: ash desert, burnt stumps right: (fall out of bed and wake up) but for a moment I thought I saw... [halfwake] strange silver light, like moonlight but not quite the same the floor was silvery liquid, I tried to drink but it ran through my fingers and then I was properly awake standing between two mirrors, following reflection (was reflection?) recurring: brass mirrors, eyespiders check 45th-worlders' avatars, is one of them an eyespider (answer: no) ask Novelty/QH about eyes? means of travel: books mirror OTC door party portal thing Bahro caves star fissure bahro stones OTC delivery? how did the cat get here? poem, mirror seem separate but: poem, books - words? virtual-Selenitic theory mirrortravel: black cat visitor did it bt-memory girl did it, black and white kittens present (get a black cat?) bt: eyespiders in cages with mirrors, someone talking nearby; one spider disappears; from next room, sound of scream and glass-scrape (cat not required? back to square one) bt: man cups match in hands, mutters, touches match to mirror's surface, mirror ignites; shatters as he goes through cat was in the box for who knows how long. eyespiders possibly hunting. matchman looked hardluckish. common thread hunger? twocat girl didn't seem hungry, but maybe she was in the chair waiting for that? cat needed to know where it was? London 'not on the Surface' - is there a Cavern below London? how to get there if so? journey cloths, earth rotation? extremely dangerous, DO NOT DO THIS egg room? maybe-not options: fly to london, look around (or maybe someone has a book to there) ask for help (cavern) ask for help (forum) ??? mail a cat ??? (traditional, why?) ---- "Make the stories or they will be made for you. Be careful who you are." find a way, make a home? contrast: show which side you have taken, when sides are taken (that is /not/ writing your own story, that is accepting what is given, letting someone else say what is possible) perhaps the ending can never be written but there is more to a story than its end. my story is still being written. make sure it's being written by me. but am I a writer or a reader? or is it a deeper thing, am I being asked to /choose/ is this not merely a question of one making or another making, but is this a question of /what shall be made/, a question where all answers entail loss of possibility? or is that too a false dichotomy? if i am given the power to choose, cannot I choose All? I suppose that answers the question of who I am. Do not merely accept. Especially do not accept dichotomies; they cut the world and your soul in two. Take both paths, always. And then create a third. And a fourth, and a fifth, forever. -- 2bt: alchemical lens reveals cyan light. fifth classical element, made from human body?/soul? (ka?) sphere-in-hexagram (astrolabe?); hexagram controls/contains effect? -- Niryl's **Name**: my **Name** you must find yourself call me emptiness [Niryl, spokethethunder] are things this wriggling not-yet-hollow thing is called body vs. soul? identify with collective consciousness / ancestor-spirit / ??? otherworldly magic thing? non-1:1 body:mind phenomena, cf eg otc re measuretwice tied to storm-god? name of storm-god? cf Mikus re shared account tell me my past. tell me my future. amnesia? the bill is almost due clue to secret identity? (pretty vague, but debtor/creditor of some kind?) otc contract? I don't /think/ they sell things that cause insanity, but panacea? for the tomb-bound dead? 'in the interests of science' 'needing less sleep would be very useful' sleep deprivation, esp. dream deprivation, can cause hallucinations; could dyne abuse do this? 'Send your aid. I will keep the rain from your roof and stop the wind from gusting through your house.' imprisonment marks the mind imprisonment seems clueful must go NORTH hint at location? we hunger so 'we' suggests non-1:1 above 'hunger' seems clueful sometimes italics, sometimes not? italics only in more recent posts? brief italics in older posts might/might not be a different thing surrounded by glass, my, will, Did you hear what the thunder said?, grow, f o g, needing, wants NORTH, Name, [Foolish] also s p a c i n g seems stylistic/other change also some older posts unitalicsed, but poetry-style what happened in between? check timestamps Dr. Explosions? would have to investigate relevant tariffs tariffs possibly related to bill due? Did the fleshy-thing speak to the dragon? It did. **Foolish** fleshy-thing. fleshy-thing: me? Niryl? Storm? dragon: Storm? actually this sounds almost 45thish, could the dragon be Chimaera? no, Chibisilian called Storm a god/dragon/enforcer spirit; dragon=Storm I will regain myself. cf. Niryl-Storm splice thing questions/mysteries/clues: Name [X] Niryl [X] spokethethunder [X] Storm style shift [ ] normal [ ] Niryl, Storm [ ] Niryl, Storm, Emptiness [ ] panacea [ ] dr. explosions [ ] Meletiti Entelecheiai and/or Chibisilian [ ] hallucinations from dyne abuse, dream deprivation [ ] successfully regained themself [ ] unsuccessfully tried to regain themself soul-count is Emptiness a third person besides Niryl and Storm? bill imprisonment north italics s p a c i n g -- barrayar lost contact when planetary link lost. is d'ni linking network robust? lots of books have only one known 'main' book. relto bookshelves, but magic=irreproducible=unreliable (get more blank books, ink!!!) extra linking books v. important damage to descriptive books = unfixable possibly useful, cutting off travel limits spread of problems diaspora biodiversity vs. monoculture but also lets bad stuff go unfixed also forum, forum worlds' magic may limit usefulness can partyportal etc. (see above) reach debooked worlds? presumably forum can, dunno why wouldn't? why are linking books dependent on descriptive books? you clearly don't need access to the db to write an lb, that would be stupid and the ronay presumably could write lbs to garternay limitation of flawed understanding of the Art? did the d'ni have this limitation? decaying technology - we need plans in place for when ancient d'ni tech eventually fails great shaft collapse? fresh air in cavern? lake ecosystem? (not great currently, but could probably be worse, e.g. toxic air) architecture? (already some crumbling/ruins) Cetagandan Empire sounds like sort of thing i want to avoid BE experienced with dealing with issue? military-expansionists got smacked down: good sign for treatment of us BE seems to have instability/troubles of own, not necessarily best stabilizing influence political dissent: no protests except rare riots beta colony more democratic? feedback seems limited to official-ish channels allegedly they actually listen, which nice if true, but am reminded of china 'The poor are a troubling issue that is becoming steadily less troubling.' somewhat ominous phrasing clarification seems ok (as claimed, /possibly/ adapted to my perceived politics) otoh if lack of internet access is a shocking rights violation that's a /huge/ potential improvement over current surface conditions, like, zeroth world level quality of life examples of 'barbaric' punishments? (unclear what standards are in comparison to us) various methods of execution 'unwritten precedents' makes me wary (though we're not exactly doing great either) nuclear policy/capabilities sound /extremely/ promising may be separable but not reproducibly so immortal emperor somewhat worrying branch emphasizes barrayaran empire option as largely hands-off potentially promising, though doesn't really fix the gehn problem though that's maybe less crisis-urgent-ish? dystopian, but not apocalyptic -- RETCONNED AWAY: damage to descriptive books = catastrophic possibly this should be prioritized over literally everything else? consider scope of potential harm no redundancy possible terrorism possible (and psychologically plausible; cf. d'ni plague) possible mitigations: evacuate to garternay, use offworld tech to find habitable planets there can offworld magic create backup/RAID descriptive books? other forum worlds: where are their descriptive books? do they need evacuated too?