Intention for Succession - Part 1

To whom it will concern,

I’ve been among Enduring for a long time now. Specifically, the Truyian type of Enduring. For those who’ve never met an Enduring, which would be most of us: they’re immortals. Sometimes they are considered gods and sometimes they become a God (effectively) to some group of people if they’re twisted or vain enough. I used to imagine that being a god or God meant that you were necessarily Enduring. I’ve since decided that is completely untrue.

A god has always been described as omnificent and omnipotent. Immortality, even that life is involved at all, was always blindly assumed. That’s the only way us mere Ephemeral can understand it. How could one become omnificent and omnipotent? One must be immortal to be able to accumulate all knowledge and amass such power. And what a mortal perspective that is, disregarding how memory works but still applying the concept to their own functions of mind.

The mistake is assuming that an omniscient and omnipotent God is any sort of living organism. Immortality is mute to the air or the sky, whom does not experience life at all. I like to dispute the concept of existence too, but I shall keep it easy, especially as I do believe in a god or God and it is tricky to explain my belief in the existence of something that both does and does not exist.

Truyians aren’t omniscient or omnipotent, at least not the ones I’ve met. I’m open to consider that there might be some Truyian out there, beyond the grasp of the others, that meets the qualifications and has since evolved beyond. All currently existing Truyians belong to the Museum, my God. Therefore, it is understandable that Ephemeral considered all Truyians to be gods of a sort.

I have had so much time to think about the Museum. The Museum could be omniscient and omnipotent and, to be perfectly honest, there has been nothing to refute the suggestion. Even seemingly terrible acts stemming from the Museum has led to a downstream purity, innocence, beauty, and goodness. All part of ‘the plan’, if there is one. My primary doubt over the Museum has been on account of its affiliation with space. The Museum is referred to as a being and a place, with a much greater emphasis being on the place element.

I’m on Truyu. The Museum is below my feet. An underground maze-like network of secure openings and terminations that could be considered hallways and rooms. It has a physical element to it in this way. I’ve also heard that there is a non-physical element that utilizes these passages and that the physical Museum itself might simply be a map, a set of instructions. A set of instructions in a place, accessed perhaps by the part of the Museum that has no place and so need not care what place it is in. Perhaps, even, the instructions are redundant. Perhaps the physical Museum a piece of what a higher God – or the full realization of the Museum – might call memory or influence. A piece of omnificence or omnipotence.

There is one fun story that I overheard at Intercept that maybe it is a shedding of God, a piece of brain that is now floating about the multiverse inside a planet. It’s a curious thought and anything is possible. So why not?

It should be clear now that I believe in the Museum. I believe that the Museum is the closest to God any Enduring or Ephemeral will ever get, so it might as well be God. Its physical location is an incredible gift. It was designed useable by both matter and energy, together and separate. It was constructed so us limited creatures whom are travelling through space and time in a way we perceive to be linear, can interact with it, can ‘talk’ to it, can ‘touch’ it.

I should be a bit more clear about the Truyians. Truyians are the sort of Enduring that are immortal unless you kill them. It doesn’t sound especially immortal, I know, but it is rather difficult to kill them. Most injuries that take longer than a split second to notice, are negated quickly. This includes poisons, much to the chagrin of many Truyians whom deeply enjoy intoxication. They believe themselves to be extensions of the Museum – constituents - and it is the connection to the Museum that recovers them. And more than that: the ability to morph to look like other creatures, telepathy, dream-reading and a special, controversial, level of existence known as In-thought.

Truyians stole, borrowed or bought most technology from the Ephemeral but they are not devoid of their own innovation. Transport coins were given to them from the Museum: pure Truyian technology. To my mind, transport coins are like magic; physical objects can be summoned to you so long as those objects have no life. Truyians often appear minimalist, no bags and rooms all-but-empty. It’s thanks to these weird coins. You can carry the contents of a full house in a single pocket. Unreal. Years I’ve been here, and I still can’t get over it.

Truyians have a deep Ephemeral history that is deluged in passion and blood and sex that would make anyone hearing of it wonder if they were the most cursed of all creatures or most extolled. They think back on it with guilt. I am biased in my perception of how they think, actually. I reside in the North quadrant. Specifically, Norther Truyians think back on it with guilt.

Now that you know where I am and something about my surroundings. I must tell you the purpose of this letter, the first of many.

I’m writing this because I hope that I will have a successor. I am the most glorious janitor; you could never imagine. Really, please do not try to imagine, as I would prefer no injustice be done. I’m also a bit of a nanny. I’ve been called a yeoman and I believe that, too, to be accurate. The official name for my place is ‘ancillary’. I am an ancillary of North Central. I came during the earlier years of Duc and Roark: the current leaders in the North. I live in North Central station, or castle, or whatever a Museum extension might be called. Oddly, they tend to call both the building and the place around it “North Central”. That includes quite a distance and the university. It’s only recently that I’ve managed to get them to call this place ‘station’.

My position is a wonderful one. The place is huge so I must clean regularly, even though not all rooms are in use. I even go down and dust rooms in the Museum from time to time. Elsewise, I act as conveyer of messages and whatever else: affection, opinions, materials. I’m especially useful as a liar, since the Truyians have such difficulty engaging in the act themselves. I am primary ancillary to Roark, Over of Will and Power of North Central and his Under, whom I will sometimes refer to as [the prince] here to show my own affection. The Over of Knowledge, Duc, has his own primary ancillary and there are a couple ancillaries without primaries. I still address issues and requests from Duc and his Unders, but my loyalty is to Roark and his Under foremost. All the ancillaries are Truyian, except me. I am an Ephemeral and it is my hope that, when my time comes to say good-bye, North Central can have another Ephemeral ancillary. This is also the request and hope of my master, the most tortured soul I’ve ever met.

In this series of letters, I wish to convey this place is further detail and describe what it is I really do and what I get in return for my services. I expect that another human, perhaps a Kray like myself, might read these letters some day, but I also know it is possible that they may fall into the hands of some other Ephemeral. So, I will describe myself and my kind too, so that my perspective can be better understood.

Ludlow, ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

There is precious little about me that is special. The most unusual thing about me is that I’m here on Truyu and I didn’t arrive here through any fantastical means. I wasn’t dying nor did I have some horrific mental disorder necessitating the services of a god. I am not some sort of royal reject, neither king dethroned nor illicit child of a wealthy lord. This makes me uncommon here since, to get to Truyu, you must either come in contact with a Truyian on your home Ground (a near-zero chance) or bribe and network your way here. For most, the summation of their connections, intentions and means is barely enough. You have to have a really good reason to give up your life to get here.

My parents cared about me about as much as any Kray parents care about their children. They both worked on patrol ships. They were traders of goods and information. We had a bout of time when we were grounded at Toy Land due to some bullshit going on up in the sky. It was during that time that I became enamored by the Ephemeral towns. Of course, once you’re on Truyu, running into a Truyian isn’t so difficult anymore. And so I did.

I must back-track just a tad. I’ve mentioned Toy Land now, and in my last letter: Intercept. Toy Land and Intercept are Ephemeral hubs on Truyu. They don’t have direct connections to the Museum. Toy Land is located between South Central and West Central and Intercept is located between North Central and East Central. Toy Land harbors most of the Ephemeral towns while Intercept is a little more governed, has smaller towns and embassies. They’re both ports for trade.

Almost all trade occurring at these hubs is affiliated with mercenary service, drugs illicit on other Grounds, and rare objects. Intercept was best known for the knowledge trade and mercenary requests while Toy Land harbored every drug you could imagine. And all medical equipment. Toy Land also harbored the most skilled of doctors. If you had an incurable disease, it was curable if you made it to Toy Land. In the Ephemeral towns, a medical truck moves slowly down the street singing a little tune. Your kid break a bone? Well, the parents just come out, wave down the truck, and the kid gets fixed right up. It’s all ‘free’, as long as they give up a few minor bodily fluids for study. On Kray Ground, we have medical hubs called hospitals for that sort of thing and you can’t just come as you are and expect to get good service.

So, I’m here because I felt like it and I was lucky enough to be born to parents who were coming here anyway. Not very exciting, I know. What’s more, Kray are the most common non-native Ephemeral on Truyu. So not only am I neither royalty nor medical wonder, but I am the most typical sort of Ephemeral here. Really though, you get tired of being around ostracized royalty and that sort after a while. The royalty does too. Those who stay eventually stop talking about it. It just doesn’t matter here.

When I begged my parents to let me stay, I’d assumed I’d be in Toy Land forever and see them every few months, relay them a message every couple weeks or so. It really was like that when I first started out. It was an easy agreement. Getting to North Central is a little more of a story.

My parents were as corruptible as any Kray and with me living in Toy Land, they would sometimes stay for weeks at a time and partake in the vulgar depravity that naturally comes to a place harboring every drug known to man. I was still so enthralled by Truyu itself that I hadn’t latched on to the drug scene, and they wanted it to stay that way. My parents drifted away from each other due to their overindulgences. It is a difficult topic for me to touch on, but it is reality. Watching their partnership fall apart, enabled by my living arrangement, bothered me immensely. Between their discouragement and mine, I stayed away from the darker parts of Toy Land for longer than most. I also looked to Intercept: a place of education and honor.

As I conclude my brief description of Toy Land, I must note that the name is something special. It was not designed to be a place of simply fun and games. But it is meant to be a joke. It is a very dark joke. A Truyian once relayed it in this way:

“All of existence started out with something like a hiccup, a laugh. A running gag. A joke that went too far the instant it was spoken; never-ending. We are part of it. You can fight it, but you can never stop it. Give in. Life is a joke, and we are the comedy. Toy Land is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a laughing stock. It’s a blatant, crass reflection of what it means to exist.”

In every quadrant of Truyu, there is something you cannot have. At Toy Land, you can have anything, and may the Museum save you if you if you proceed to take. Perhaps I am special in one way: I escaped Toy Land. Ever since, when those at Intercept ask me what toys are in Toy Land, I tell them. It’s us. Every part.

If you end up on Truyu, there is a very good chance you will first end up in Toy Land. It’s a largest port and a seductive one at that. It drew me in, even if it did not keep me. Don’t give in there. There will be many more opportunities for you to experience madness and ecstasy. Believe me.

I think you should go to Intercept but, even if you don’t aim that way, it’s hard to go anywhere aside Intercept from Toy Land. This is something tricky that the Museum has arranged to corral us Ephemeral. It might be the most insulting thing the Truyians have been a part of. I must forgive them, for we actually are close to outnumbering the Truyians here and they live very different sort of lives. Therefore, Intercept is the natural progression out of Toy Land. It is the next step towards the Museum and the world of Enduring.

In my next letter, I suppose I will tell you of Intercept. It is a place of great impact for me and is where I learned what I was, how I could be, and what I wanted to be a part of. I was found there. Intercepted, if you will.

Ludlow, ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

Intercept has two centers. One is above ground and the other is below ground. Above ground, the center is a massive field for ship landings. It is a place of scattered grassy bits and empty dirt patches. Pylons surround this landing center for the purpose of orienting the ships- and other reasons pertaining to the retention and limitation of those ships. Beyond the pylons, there is a surrounding tall ring-shaped building with structures raying outward, belonging to Ephemeral embassies. Of course, in between these rays are small Ephemeral towns in perfect circles, because everything must be a circle or sphere if the Truyians have anything to do with it.

Below ground, a series of structures exist that would look like a pile of discs progressively decreasing in size should it have been unearthed. It is here where much of the trade takes place. The absolute center of this series of structures, however, smells of Toy Land. That said, what happens in the center of Intercept is more controlled compared to Toy Land.

There is much about Intercept that would come off as being even more joke-like than Toy Land, especially in its design to lure Northers. Northers have a uniform of wraps that no other quadrant utilizes. It’s considered deeply insulting for the quadrants to mimic each others’ uniforms; it just doesn’t happen. Except at Intercept. At Intercept’s underground center, everyone is required to wear the Norther’s attire: straps bound all over. There are only very rare exceptions. If you have transport coins, you put them in your boot pockets or hidden pockets in the wraps.

Another part of this plot involves us Kray. It is encouraged for the Truyians to use either makeup or morphing to look like Kray, and it doesn’t take much. For being from totally different Grounds, we look very similar when clothed. Kray eyes are a bit more inset. The Truyians who emulate Kray are called ‘Nulls’. Dressing as a Norther, emulating Kray, and going by the same non-descript name is designed to allow Northers anonymity and lower their mental barriers to entry. It has the side effect of permitting anyone anonymity.

While this topic requires much more discussion later, Northers are expected to refrain from most types of frivolity. They are not allowed to consume intoxicants, sugar, fat, or anything at all should they be able to help it. Although they are a very physical quadrant, they are celibate. They are to avoid anything that causes them ‘too much’ enjoyment. They partake constantly, and quietly, in guilt and much more loudly in pride, which they freely promote. This makes them competitive, frustrated, and exclusive. Other Truyians find this compilation of traits make Northers wholly irresistible. They are perfect prey and prize to anyone who can ruin their pristine image. If Northers want a little excitement, they can go to the center of Intercept to be hunted and tried. Secretly, of course. To them, resistance is fame and honor. To us.

Once I made it to Intercept, I was inserted into their education system and a Kray-heavy municipality proximal to the Kray embassy. All education took place on the highest floor of the ring building. Anyone could teach anything they wanted but ‘Truyian History’, ‘Ephemeral Conflict’, ‘Modern Threats’, ‘Hypotheses’ and ‘Algebra’ were requirements. It was a lot of work to hike up the stairs to the highest floor and move in between classes. Elevators, and the like, existed but they were off-limits unless a massive piece of equipment was involved. Each municipality offered medical services, diverse food at public cafeterias, games hubs, and both public and semi-private baths. Instead of paying money for anything, you paid in service. Or rather, you were guilted to contribute via service at some point. The Truyians could have had machines doing nearly everything, but they chose not to- both inside and outside of Intercept- and the Ephemeral paid for that.

I later learned the physical inconvenience at Intercept was completely intentional. Truyians know that they have a society that would be considered ideal or near-perfect by most standards and have done everything possible to decrease the ease by which that society must be received. Northers are known for their pride and ingenuity while the Easters are known for their assertiveness and loyalty. Both value goodness, or ‘progressive life’. Being dead-set between them made Intercept an oddly thorough place where both physical and mental effort were challenged, but well regulated. If you didn’t keep up your sensibilities, you got sucked to the corruptive center. Anyone who’d been stuck in the center of Intercept for more than a few days had a tendency to give up living, for whatever reason.

Unless you died of being an idiot (in the center of Intercept), one’s death was celebrated. It was celebrated with total sobriety, outside-in any weather- on the center, in which a giant geometrical shape was drawn into the dirt, in conduction by Easters. You could plant whatever seeds you liked in the part you drew, though the ships destroyed most of what little could grow there. Afterwards, you could see the shape from the roof of the ring building. Then everyone received a handful of mastic and you could hear chewing for the next few days before it had run out.

I’d lived there for one Truyian year. By then I was about twenty Kray-years old or about two-and-a-half dects. A dect is ten years of Truyian time. Then I met Shine. Based on many years of knowing her now, Shine might be a demon- if there is such a thing. She is certainly a Truyian and is a purported Norther despite her propensity for debauchery and subsequent corruption of her associates.

I was on the roof of the ring building, taking in the sun, totally alone. I was heavily preoccupied by the classes and was thinking about how you can create two spheres out of one sphere by mapping of the one sphere if you did it in a certain way. This has something to do with Roark’s theories and was introduced in the ‘Hypotheses’ class.

Most of us wore black unless we were in the center of Intercept where Northern white wraps were the thing. So I found it odd when a beautiful creature dressed entirely in the white Northern wraps interrupted me. She looked angelic in the sunlight and there is no doubt in my mind that she’d meant to. She started speaking before I could.

“Who might you be?”

I waited a few moments. This was a question of variable answers. She was patient.

I responded simply, “Ludlow. And you?”

“Shine.”

I chuckled and supposed I shouldn’t have asked. She was clearly a Truyian and I thought her name had to be a joke on the way she presented herself, the sun framing her and lighting her in such a striking manner.

I responded, “Not Blaze? Not Bright? Not Sunny? Not-“

“All those things, and the inverse.” She interrupted.

She then interrogated me about how I’d come to Truyu, why I’d left Toy Land, and if I’d been to the center of Intercept and what I did when I was there. I’d been to the center three times. The first time, I just watched. The second, I took something that allow me to see the coding inside my brain. The third time, I let Truyians use me- control me using patterns of sound. They had me play child and my father and sister were Truyian Nulls. The mother and aunt and teacher were Kray and a Yaroman was my uncle. We pretended others around us were furniture or mindless pets- and they let us! Truyians don’t have proper families, so they especially enjoy using Ephemeral to get a glimpse into its dynamics.

I didn’t quite understand why I so easily released this information to her. Normally one’s actions in the center of Intercept were kept secret. Perhaps it was because she was in the white wraps I’d associated with the center. Perhaps it was because she was beautiful, moreso with the sun outlining her perfection, and I wanted to keep her there.

She noted that usually the Kray take other sorts of drugs and copulate profusely and asked if I’d do that next time I went. I told her I would consider it, but having seen what happened with my parents and knowing the reputation of my kind, not doing so had been a point of pride. I used that word: “pride”. She liked it. I told her I wished to be used again, that the ‘Family’ game made me feel good, silly, and, even, honorable for days. She liked both “silly” and “honorable”.

I was thinking that I’d like if she used me for something and thought it as ‘loudly’ as I could so I wouldn’t have to say it. If you think ‘loudly’ enough, the Truyians can sometimes read your thoughts.

She smiled and asked if I’d go home with her and be offered as a gift to a Norther she wished to gain favor with. Home was North Central and the Museum under it. She lived in the Museum, but the Norther I would be present to lived in North Central, above ground. She assured me that if I hated the place, I was free to go.

It might sound like this was all quite frivolous but I had thought a lot about my last time in the center of Intercept and the concept of being used, imaginary purposes, and what that means in the real world. I wanted it again and felt like it had started a change in me. Everything, even things that I thought were not relevant to reality in the past, could be experienced as entirely real and the connection to reality superfluous. There was also something special about being connected to the Truyians, being treated as a puppet and giving in to it. I wanted my autonomy, I suspect, but I felt my autonomy all the more after I’d been the puppet. Meeting Shine and her asking me this was a sign; the next step was before me.

So, I agreed to the role. I agreed to be the gift. To some unknown recipient in North Central. From Shine.

Ludlow, ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

I may have deceived you, slightly, in describing my affairs in the center of Intercept. I’m just as attracted to sex as the other Kray but have directed that specific inclination out of the center, for fear of wanting it too much. For fear of becoming like them. Like those that no longer could satisfy themselves outside the center, and now would have nothing less than the complete, pounding, immersion available within.

When I wished for Shine to use me, I was open but I was necessarily impacted by her entire self. Her sleek soft body, her smooth movements, mysterious words, her controlled, ravening gaze- all aroused a perverted empathy. In the first day, she pulled out of me the reason I’d forgone venery in the center: my fear of extremes driving me to madness.

Leaning up against a tree, removing her wraps with exquisite slowness, she told me what she thought of that.

“It is the cumulation of intense want that produces the need. The need becomes the owner. The center is the place. An arrival marks the time. The space and time for needs to evolve, come to a head, be realized and resolved. The place is nothing without the congregation [of people/subjects]. Intense desire crippling into abject need can be made anywhere. Can be constructed. Can be decided.”

I found myself moved to her, nearly touching. I knew the wraps were to be split between us, a poor internal excuse. I disrobed entirely to offer myself up to her administration. I took in her increasing exposure with labored breath, while she tied me in wraps- even before she was done removing them from herself. She pulled me against her in the process. Through considerable salivation, I asked her what she decided.

“I can’t very well gift you away if I don’t first own you, can I?”

I am bound by the way of the North and so must refrain from providing you what happened in graphic detail. Even listing out what I went through would be considered too base to put into a text log, but I’ll do my best within these confines to describe what happened next, and permit ourselves some flavor of touchy detail.

Shine is a consumer. In consuming, she owns. To do it, her victims must be more than willing. They must be needing. Maybe it is due to pride, or perhaps it is a matter of purity, that she must have it this way. She gave me tastes, small samplings that were never enough, commanding me to show restraint while promising that, in the end, no restraint could save me from total absorption. The neurosis, so well evaded throughout my history, was to be sown and grown expertly within me by the professional.

I didn’t say ‘no’. I said ‘please’. And many other things that I dare not embarrass myself in repeating.

For days, we barely progressed towards North Central. Instead we played ‘games’. She pulled me. She struck me with restriction, or complete freedom. She mesmerized me using every form of explicit pain, suffering, and spectacular contrasting carnality. I was disallowed nothing, so long as I was willing to die for it.

The trip could have taken two or three days, unhurried, by foot. It took us ten.

If there was normalcy, I blacked it out. I slept only when I had been exhausted beyond alternative. It turns out, I’d made it through both Toy Land and Intercept never really knowing was ‘need’ was.

On the last day, Shine had me go on ahead alone.

By the time I reached North Central, I looked as I was: totally mad. Some part of me could still calculate and recall life before I left Intercept. None of that part could breach my visage as I passed the pillars that marked the district. I went alone towards the station. My wraps, torn and re-tied to barely cover me, were muddy and bloody. My body harbored scrapes, bruises, half-healed wounds. I smelled intensely of sweat and sex.

If I thought I had some higher purpose in being here- in North Central- it had been lost.

When I’d finally found North Central station- either by Shine’s benediction or sheer luck- the doorman stopped me. Or rather, an ancillary: Turrut. The ancillary stood between me and the door, crossed arms, legs hip width and steel-solid. His face was a progressively darkening moue as he looked me up and down. His disgust turned to fear and then discomfiture. He commanded that I go back to where I came from.

I stood there, unaware of time and so apathetic to it and said, after some mysterious period: “I am here for [the prince].”

“This is an abomination. Base! When Duc comes back, he will murder you or weld you to South Central.”

He wasn’t talking to me. I turned to see Shine, in her near-naked glory. We’d lost a good half of our already paltry straps along the way. Shine managed to clean herself, unlike I, and had marshalled her deliciousness to the maximum.

She backed me, “You’ll let us in. Or get [the prince].”

Turrut ducked inside, shutting the heavy doors behind him. Shine didn’t move. This was her territory, even if the station was not her home. Whatever power she had was known to Turrut. He wouldn’t have budged for me. I went to Shine’s side at her subtle beckoning.

In a short minute, a tall Truyian appeared at the door with wraps weaved to reveal the dark garnet skin of his sides, otherwise extending high on his neck. A stoicism graced his face and emanated throughout the rest of his body. Shine’s pervasive sensuality did not infringe upon the consciousness of this one. By that alone, I assumed his identity: Roark, Over of Will and Power.

Roark spoke simply to Shine, “Your antics: tedious.”

She responded assuredly, “I have a gift for [the prince]. Please fetch him so that I may offer it. It is my right.”

Another peeked out from the doorway. His wraps matched Roark’s perfectly, but his poise gave way to an insecure mind. His thick-lashed eyes were rimmed in a darkness either from exhaustion or excessive rubbing. He was nearly as tall as Roark but, as he stepped outside, his slinky, staggered movements made him seem much smaller. He regarded Shine and I with uneasiness and a strange sort of blindness, as though he could not understand or digest what he saw.

Upon realizing [the prince] was present, Shine brought me up to him.

“This is my Kray, Ludlow. He is my gift to you, dear [prince]. Do you accept?”

He responded in a susurration, “People are not things to be given, Shine.”

It was my turn now. I kneeled before him, head towards the ground.

I spoke, sore but genuine, “I am here for you. I am the gift. If you do not take me, I will be nothing.”

[the prince] nudged me to rise up. I rose to meet his dark eyes, acting as mirrors in the first glance. In them, I saw a reflected terror of myself. What I was before I left Intercept, all the potential to become what I was now, lived in this body. The image of my former self was not alone. There was a vulnerable innocence within his eyes alongside something deprived, disappointed, and deeply wounded. The wounds articulated in the context of an innocent, only half-realized and feeling.

Should an infant be struck, it does not know the source of the strike, only that it has experienced pain. Should it have been older, the hurt becomes a different beast. Questions come to answers, right or wrong. Blame, guilt, resentment, retaliation, or revenge compound the hurt. [The prince] had been hurt very badly. He resided in a twilight, somewhere within that fickle border separating innocence and full-thought.

He spoke knowing that I had seen some of his truth, “You wish to belong to this?”

Belong. That was the most perfect word. I nearly cried. This. He knew he was broken, even if he did not understand how or why.

“Yes. I will protect you.”

The last part came out instinctively, though it seems preposterous in retrospect. How could I, an Ephemeral, protect a Truyian residing on his own turf, surrounded by other Truyians, all with far greater power than any Ephemeral? But I meant it. Whatever bad thing, whatever darkness it was, that I saw, I wanted to stop it. I wanted to make it better.

I needed to make it better.

To this day, I do not know if it was Shine who invented that need, in all that she’d done to me over those days between Intercept and North Central. But I do know that I must have wanted it, even before I left Intercept.

I can say with certainty: this has been my greatest purpose. They call me an ancillary. I am also a soldier.

Ludlow,

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

When I was accepted as owned, [the prince] didn’t know what to do with me. He was not accustom to servants and the ancillaries that already existed were Truyian. He wasn’t sure an Ephemeral could operate as one. There was hot talk over the subject, especially sourced from Duc- the Over of Knowledge, who rarely agrees to anything sourced outside himself.

Over time, they decided to list me as Primary ancillary to Roark and [the prince]. Roark, so that he would take responsibility for any mess I made. [The prince], of course, because that was who I was gifted to. No party knew what sort of Kray I was and whether or not I’d brought rampant hedonism with me. It was a reasonable fear.

My first task, given by Duc and so frequently disobeyed: “behave”. That is, behave as though I am a Norther Truyian. This was quickly disregarded and dismissed as impossible. The second task I received from Roark: ease [the prince]. This, I was amenable to and I found to be most intriguing as assignment. The third task, from [the prince]: “tell me everything”. He wanted information, opinion, projection and whatever else I could find. I had the additional ancillary tasks as well, serving as janitor, messenger, and personal assistant to both Overs and their Unders.

I behaved with great deference to all resident Truyians initially, but quickly leaned back into the candor in my core. That core, being curious at only the most irritating of times but otherwise eager to please, still permitted me to retain etiquette in North Central station. My greatest darkness, pride, matched that of the North. Beyond that, Shine primed me for the rest. It was not long before I allowed myself to be assimilated.

For all their restrictions, Norther mentality is addictive. More restrictions mean more temptations. Mere words can summon up thoughts worthy of admonishment. In this way, Northers are frequently on the edge- the heart about to beat out of the chest, or melt on the spot- and along that edge lies trepidation, thrill, luscious excitement: suspenseful tension. Between all the quadrants, Northers harbor the greatest tension and, to the Museum, tension is power. Tension is life.

There is a pervasive knowing among them that this is something of a game, or psychological ruse. This knowing rises out of the subconscious and into the consciousness of the constituency occasionally. Sometimes in an ironic smile or clandestine motions in private places. The Overs refer to it a little more freely.

Northers don’t surround themselves with temptations. If they did, they might become immune to them and the value of restraint would lessen. Instead, temptations come when the Norther is weakest or in a natural state of hunger, or drawing, and -in those moments- they come as if summoned by name. The entire Norther society revolves around enabling intense desire and using that thirst- the impetus that develops from it- to empower unusual feats. Thoughts become stronger and intentions take on a remarkable potency.

If you see the face of death, a great beast about to maul you perhaps, you become capable of abilities you could never before harness. Your body and mind and soul and whatever else it is you’ve got, are on the same exact page, the same line. Your entity will go about defense in an incredibly pure fashion. Your Need to survive surpasses anything else within your comprehension. Even the Ephemeral are known to portray abilities or powers of the body and mind that would be called “super” in these situations.

That is what the North aims to harness. They foster it within their lifestyle and then direct this power of intensity to ask hard questions, solve difficult problems, and otherwise do things that others can’t. They build internal fortresses, they endure, and then careen through incorporeal barriers within the reality we thought we knew. These barriers are frequently both unseen and unappreciated by the other quadrants.

In the world of the North, kitchens were instructed to be barren and sensitive bodies completely covered. Sugar and fat were either hidden or not available. Herbal tea was one of the greatest permissible indulgences. Yet, the Northers must flirt with their demons in order to exacerbate their condition. The sugar, the fat, the intoxicants – they would come out from time to time – usually by some conniving, smirking Truyian wishing to watch another’s inhibitions cripple and swoon upon exposure to forbidden senses. There were no lack of wraps, but I might have thought there was given the number of times I’d seen portions of them become ‘lost’ or used for other purposes without replacement. After whatever excuse, the originator then wore only the most strategic fragments- somehow perfectly arranged to emphasize their assets, always in proximity of a deeply affected person or persons.

The limitations of the Northers only partly apply to me; I may do whatever I like so long as I don’t become a poor influence: so long as nobody is looking. I’m allowed to eat anything, anything in these near empty cupboards, or whatever I can snatch from Intercept and keep in my quarters. I’m allowed to copulate with anyone that isn’t a Norther, which is practically nobody in North Central. There are Easters here, but all of them take Norther sensibilities when present and tend to be even more strict in the role than the Norther’s themselves. In short: they aren’t interested. I subsist on dough balls, meditation, and occasional trips to Intercept when I feel like I’m going to lose it.

For the Northers, there are loopholes. I am one of them.

Before I get into some of the more indecent ways I’ve made myself useful, I must focus on the state of [the prince] when I’d arrived and really, for the greater part of my existence here. And for that, further context is needed.

Ludlow,

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

Though Truyians are unlikely to admit it, there is something of a caste system here. There are elders or ‘Two-Named’, sometimes referred to as ‘2N’. These are the most untouchable of the Museum’s extensions, and rarely does one come across them. The bulk of the Truyian population isn’t usually referred to in any other way aside from ‘Truyians’ but the term ‘1N’ has sometimes been used. Then, there is the Overship, in which includes the leaders in North-, South-, East- and West-Centrals as well as leadership recognized in Central Proper.

The ‘2N’s are almost completely non-relevant to me and probably won’t be relevant to you either. There is a complete list of known extent ‘2N’s at every Central station and none of them are suspected to be currently residing on Truyu at all. They may be involved in a Museum-powered anti-force, described to me as an evolved opposing Museum-force that keeps past and future existences of the Museum in tension so as to keep it inside-of-time and to allow ‘Museum time’ and a type of time travel called ‘Ensurance’. Yeah, I know that’s a lot.

As ancillary, the Overship is what you need to care most about. Each quadrant has a pair of Overs: ‘Of Knowledge’ and ‘Of Will and Power’. They are selected and trained by Overs before them and, while their mentors are no longer considered Overs after they are surpassed, they are still part of the Overship. Just as ‘Duc, Over of Knowledge of North-Central’, is a title, so becomes ‘Lunare, Master of Duc, Over of Knowledge of North-Central’ for his mentor, Lunare. The Overs are encouraged to take on multiple Unders, though occasionally, an Over may select only one. Only one Under will become the next Over in each line, so there is competition among them. If an Under doesn’t make it to Overship, he or she is still known by the Overship and will be described as ‘contender’ as in ‘Argon, contender to Roark…’. The Overs are of complimentary, contrasting mindsets in many ways that will later become clear in my descriptions of Roark and Duc. The Over of Knowledge holds and collects information expertly, while the Over of Will is involved in strategy and implementation.

In the station reside the Overs, their Unders, ancillaries and guests. Ancillaries, like me, take care of the grounds, attend to the wishes of the Overs and Unders, secondarily. Guests can be short or long term Enduring or Ephemeral visitors. Sometimes a Truyian will enjoy the company of an Ephemeral or, in the case of every quadrant except the North, have a mate with which they are preoccupied and want for them to stay in the station with them.

The rest of the ‘1N’ resides in the Museum, in the massive trees that coat this Ground, or at the University. Learning is forever, but 1N Truyians who aren’t part of the Overship eventually find their way out, either becoming scientists researching their own existence- known to go mad- or heading off of Truyu to do the Museum’s bidding. There are other responsibilities as well, including a defensive brigade of six factions outside the atmosphere that defends the Ground from machines that I’ve only heard called “Vir-ships” and any other potential threat. Whenever something gets through the brigade, it’s up to the Overs, Central Proper, and a handful of delegates to deal with it.

There are very few Truyians on Truyu, or at least within the quadrant system. I believe the number now is close to 1,500 between all quadrants combined. The North has the lowest population, accounting for about 15-16% of that number. Toy Land has about 40 resident Truyians and almost 8000 Ephemeral. Intercept has about 20 resident Truyians and 4000 Ephemeral. The city my parents came from on my Kray Ground had a higher population than all of these places combined.

There used to be millions- maybe billions- of Truyians once, very long ago, back when they were all Ephemeral and before the quadrants existed as I know them. After the population peak, for reasons nobody quite understands, procreation became increasingly difficult. The population receded. Eventually the Museum was either found, created, or some seemingly contradictory combination of the two. Around this time, Enduring Truyians started showing up. They were born of Ephemeral and were very rare at first. Once they’d grown to be a recognizable group, they organized. These were the originals, and they had two names. If you find one today, they would be the 2N. Supposedly, they were completely sterile.

According to the lore, Truyian procreation developed into an aggressive, dangerous and time-consuming affair. It was not done casually because of how ironically life-threatening it became. Rooms were constructed specific for the purpose. These rooms were programmed to take reparative measures should one of the participants become receive life-threatening wounds. Before the last Ephemeral Truyian passed away, the Truyians had evolved hyper-sensitivities that had kept them in a state of arousal. This included the arrival of a series of protrusions along their spine that we now call ‘skers’. The age of the 2N Enduring can sometimes be estimated by the number of skers along long their spine.

At that point, there were many thousands of Truyian Enduring. During the next important stage in their history, they came into conflict with another Ground in their system: Truyri. Some known this to be “Yri” or “twin planet”. Truyri had logged and quietly watched the downfall of the Truyians, having been more technologically advanced than Truyu. They noted the Museum and were fearful of it. They became much more fearful once the entire remaining Truyian population were Enduring and obsessively preoccupied with the Museum. In an effort to protect themselves from the influence of the Museum, they started a war with Truyu over the destruction of the Museum. Long story short, the Museum won (Truyu), but almost the entire population of Enduring Truyians had been killed in the process. Truyri had abandoned their intention more than having been won over. The Truyians protected the Museum at the expense of their lives but only confronted the Truyrians peacefully. They would endeavor to defend themselves, tire or restrain their enemies, but they refused to intentionally hurt them. After having sustained losses and seen the nature of Truyian death, Truyrians were overcome with regret and retracted. Those that are the ‘2N’ of today are of the small Enduring population that survived this war.

The arrival of ‘1N’ was a strange matter. Nearly the entire Enduring population on Truyu today were birthed not from Ephemeral, but from the Museum itself. The term they use is ‘come to’ which is a better one, because the Truyians that came from the Museum were Truyians that had been killed during the war. They would only remember some piece or semblance of their name which could be extracted during their ‘generation day’. The generations came in bouts where five to ten Truyians would come to sequentially, one every day until the generation period was over. There seemed to be a generation period at least once every Truyian year and, while the Overs knew when it was about to happen, they might only know a few days ahead of time. The 2Ns received the first 1Ns, sorted them, trained them, established schools and communities and, somehow, the quadrants of today came out of that.

Over the past ten dects or so, there have been some unusual additions to the 1Ns: Disconnects. These 1Ns come through the Museum only to be disconnected from it immediately afterwards. They maintain a weak and fluctuating connection to it, making them Enduring, but they suffer the needs of the Ephemeral and are more likely to die in general. They also tend to behave as it traumatized, have upsetting dreams, and sometimes experience a condition known as “Venting” so far always known to result in the death of the Disconnect and usually the death of other Connected Truyians that get caught up in it.

[The prince] is a Disconnect. He’s sometimes known as ‘Roark’s bolide’ or ‘Roark’s project’ but both those titles degrade his position. I have never seen such a father-son like relationship between Truyians as I have seen with them. Roark was pursuing the theory that Disconnects came about through some mergence of different Truyians and that the Museum would bring back the Truyians with whom they matched, even if displaced in time. [The prince] had a specific image in his head of another Truyian and Roark believed this to have been the one he’d gotten mixed up with. Roark had decided that, once he had the two of them, they could be re-merged or sorted into their original selves.

I talk of Disconnects somewhat casually, but this matter isn’t just hunched up. Roark’s theories are mathematically supported. If you take the “Hypotheses” class at Intercept, Disconnects are the favorite case study.

I need to tell you, [the prince]’s match has ‘come to’ through the Museum. As much as I wish I didn’t need to, I will have to relay to you the story of that day. It will serve to inform you to what “coming to” is like but also lead into a very serious problem of North Central, one that must be conserved in history.

Ludlow,

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

The Generation room, like all functional rooms in the Museum, is a half sphere. Nearly all the rooms and corridors in the Museum appear somewhat bland to the untrained eye, but this is a clear exception. There are luminous stones that crawl up along the walls, getting larger and emitting all the more light. The air is thick and the light that penetrates through the stones floats downwards as heat might rise. The air and light give the room a textured milieu that shifts, moving life-like through triggers unknown to me. The center of the floor is a perfectly reflective onyx. It is the most ornate of all the rooms I have seen. Admittedly, this is the only functional room I’ve been allowed in to. Perhaps they’re all like this.

Four opposite entrances give the sense that some other place- a place of raw, natural stone-studded stucco- had infiltrated the room. The stucco, dramatically different from the remainder of the room but established to the point of seeming nearly natural, surrounds the entryways and eases its way along the room’s edges and towards the middle, but dissipates into the onyx well before threatening invasion into the center. It is from these four entrances, that one Over from each quadrant will enter at the time of Generation.

The Overs can bring others. Usually, one or two Unders will join their Over to watch and learn. When I was welcomed into the room, it was along with Shine, who’d also never been permitted into the room before. I had rarely seen her so expressionless. It was around this time that she started to get notoriety as a prophet, and more. Not as powerful as Bach Nod, whom few can escape (and you will have to learn more about), but she leaned in. She was there as much for [the prince] as she was to see her prophecy come true: that [the prince] would reject his counterpart. It was a pitiful prophecy- Roark and I feared as much and even expected that Shine might be to blame for it- but we kept our thoughts behind tight lips.

A couple days before the event, I found Roark watching a thunderstorm. No rain, just thunder and lightning. The air was thick with ozone. Whenever there was such a thing, he was drawn to a particular balcony extending from the third floor of the station. He would pierce the ominous air with his gaze and breath deep and slow. I asked him if he’d seen [the prince]. After minutes, he said he had not. It had been over a week since we’d both seen him, but he knew where he was. Neither of us needed to speak. We both knew. He was with Shine. The question darkened Roark, though he moved not at all.

I couldn’t help feeling partly to blame. Some years prior, I encouraged Roark to let Shine ‘in’, to let her follow and attempt to ease [the prince] herself. [The prince] had run off, in a raging sorrow one night. It was early morning when Shine came to ask permission. She won through Roark’s guilt and my encouragement. I hadn’t seen any harm in it at the time. Why would I have? Hadn’t I been a good ancillary? Hadn’t I helped, and been sourced from Shine? Even so, the guilt touched upon me. [The prince] had run off and I couldn’t chase him. I couldn’t. Physically. And the trigger had been an interaction between Roark and Duc. Roark should have gone. Oh, I’m so sorry, Roark… I only heard later what had happened!

It worked and I think that killed us a little bit. Roark and I. Shine seemed to succeed where we hadn’t. [The prince] finally stopped being generally miserable, but grew resentful of Roark and though he and I remained close, I felt Shine had taken part of [the prince] away from me. There has been evidence to that effect as I’ve aged more in the past two years than in the past two dects and seen far less of my master.

Roark actually did follow [the prince] that morning, but only after Shine, and when he arrived, whatever deed she’d planned had been done. [The prince] relayed what he could to me, but his memory of the event was poor. Bach Nod was there when Roark arrived, and furious. Unknown to me (at the time) but fully known to Shine, there had been an agreement between Bach Nod and Shine. Roark’s permission placed him in the blame radius for her having broken it. Bach Nod proceeded to take a terrible toll for that. Even today, Bach Nod considers the exchange incomplete. A pact was broken, and Roark was punished in the process. In my entire life, I have only seen Roark cry once.

On the day I stood by Roark and asked about [the prince], I was reminded of that day years ago. I felt that something was coming. Roark confirmed it. He told me that [the prince] had sensed the coming of his counterpart and was doing everything in his power to blind himself to it. He felt his counterpart had betrayed him somehow, that it was her – I only learned then that it was a ‘her’ – fault that he was a disconnect, that she had abandoned him as Roark had. Of course, Roark never abandoned [the prince]; this was certainly a delusion. Albeit one that served Roark a very real, very serious suffering. Yet, [the prince] would have to be at her coming to. Even Shine could not steer him from that fate.

When [the prince] re-appeared, it was the day of the ‘coming to’ and he invited me along without even my need to ask. I tried to be positive. Whomever was to appear held a part of [the prince] within her and was, in my opinion, to be considered just as precious. Roark communicated that she was likely to be in more dire need of protection than even [the prince] himself. If [the prince] was not willing to accept her, his plans could not commence, and they would have to go on waiting. Roark’s plan would have to be postponed and the counterpart would have to be displaced. Of course, Truyians never really wait. To Truyians, ‘waiting’ just means the stage is being set for the next scene behind a thick curtain.

In the Generation room, the Overs and Unders assembled at their corresponding entries. The behavior of [the prince], Roark, and myself had made movement in not-so-subtle discussions. Those present expected that they would be seeing the generation of a disconnect. Rarer still, they would be seeing the generation of a disconnect’s match and watch the two meet each other for the first time. I can only imagine how many Unders fought to be in that room that day.

When they’d assembled, the lot of us looked like a proper cult. The North in our white wraps, myself included. The East in their militant style. The West with the least amount of coverage and the most ostentation. The South, sleeveless, hooded, mostly in black but with a single white strip between the legs. I feel like I understand how all the quadrants came upon their uniforms, with the exception of the South. The Over of Knowledge of South-Central, Buroux, had his hood up. His Under, Plos, was with him. Plos was a good friend of [the prince]. Buroux and Plos were both very serious; speaking quietly to each other. The South harbored another disconnect and I wonder how much this incarnation impacted Plos’ decisions pertaining to her. It was only to be a few months later, that she would Vent and Plos would be the first Enduring to be there and survive it. She was not to be so lucky.

When everyone had settled and focused, the room took over. At least, that is how it felt. The palpable textured air frayed and shifted, and then again. Everywhere but the center seemed to blur and take the semblance of an idea, rather than a reality. In a sudden soundless crack, the world re-oriented. And it re-oriented with the body of an unconscious female coiled upon herself. There was no fading in of the body or fanfare with sparkles and lights. Instead, it was as though she had always been there, and I scarcely recall the moment before when the floor had been empty.

It was the tradition that the directionality of the one coming-to would be detected by the Overs of that quadrant and the Overs whom detected that directionality would come forward and claim them. Rarely, it was an Under who did so. I’d been holding on to [the prince]’s arm. He detached from me immediately when she appeared, transfixed. He stepped forward.

He lifted a hand, “She belongs to the North.” His words were sticky and stagnating in the air. He collapsed his hand and cringed. He had looked forward to this day once with great need and hope. He had gone from blaming himself, hating himself, to hating this unknown creature, whatever part of himself she held. Over the years, in the hands of Shine, it had matured into a black sour. The one who had come to did not recognize him. Shine had said she would not. He felt his disdain validated.

[The prince] is of the North, and so his pride compounded the hurt of not being recognized and he couldn’t restrain himself from its emphasis. Though I wish he hadn’t, he proclaimed, “Let there be no doubt” and spit upon the floor next to her. He stormed out, with Shine following. His rejection was read loud and clear. If there was any doubt that Roark could succeed in his plans to reorient them into their own selves, it might have been multiplied in that moment.

Roark then came forward and confirmed [the prince]’s assertion that she was of the North. He kneeled down and requested her name. A weak sound came from the body. He nodded. Roark gestured to me.

[The prince] had not given me orders to reject her, and the piece of him she harbored owned me as he did. Arguably, the rest of her did too. Did not Shine gift me to both of them when she gifted me to an entity that harbored pieces of them both? I began wrapping her in the white wraps of the North with a smile. I smiled because she needed to see a smile. I smiled, too, because I knew the way of the North and if Roark’s plan was ever to commence, all that was necessary was that they care. [The prince] still cared, or else he would not hate so very clearly. This one had yet the means to care, but Roark would not give up with [the prince]’s rejection.

To my surprise, the Over of Knowledge of West Central stepped forward. He contested! He said that she had the West in her. I did not stop assembling the wraps. It wouldn’t have been the first time there was more than one direction to an entity coming to and I’d imagine that to be common among Disconnects. Still, I was certain she was mostly North, if for no other reason than my trust in [the prince] and Roark.

Such a contest requires an opposition outside of the North and so we had it. Buroux lowered his hood, “I too sense the West – and the South – in her. She will be tortured as the South, regret as the West, but it will be through the means of the North. I cancel your contest.” It is a funny thing, but I believe that every disconnect has had a bit of the South in them, and only a bit. All eyes turned East; they concurred. She hadn’t a drop of the East. The room cooled.

All eyes turned to Roark. They knew. What of his plans now? She’d arrived too late: two years too late I suppose. And so, she must ‘wait’. She must be subject to the behind-the-curtain movements of others at play. Others, inevitably including Bach Nod, and those of Roark’s choosing. Roark turned to the East. Being among her anti-algorithm would prevent her from leaning too much in the peripheral directions. It would keep her North-bound, her distribution the same. Or so might have been the idea. Yet, she was not sent to the East. It was still too close to home. She was sent much further away. Poor kid.

Ludlow,

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

There isn’t a way to get around it and the longer I go without saying so, the greater the pressure. I must tell you about ‘Red’. Pink. Red. Purple. Those are the stages. When an Enduring goes Pink, the skers on their back become inflamed, they disconnect from the Museum, their pupils dilate, and their cuspids extend. During Red, the next stage, the cuspids actively leak a red fluid. They call the fluid itself ‘Red’.

The inclination to bite is extremely strong and most often targets another with whom they have some kind of relationship. For example, [the prince]- should he go Red- would be more inclined to bite Roark over Duc or any of the ancillaries. If an Enduring who is Pink or Red bites another Enduring, that Enduring is likely to Red too, even if they were connected to the Museum.

When an Enduring bites in Red, they will grip their subject and pump Red into them. I’ve seen this happen. The pumping of the Red comes with full-body convulsion. It is considered a very intimate thing to do and even before I was given further background, it was clear that this was something left over from the mating behaviors of their Ephemeral ancestors. The Red itself can affect other human-types too. Whether or not it can affect non-humans, I’m not sure. Some combination of dopamine and endorphin release ensues. That said, non-Truyians are not designed to take loads of the stuff pumping through their veins, and you’d better avoid being bit directly if you don’t want to experience a wonderful, but near certain, death.

If somebody goes Red, there are white rubbery satchels that exist to collect it. Apparently biting into something that isn’t another lifeform is painful - the satchels are agonizingly so- but it is the only way to be certain somebody in Red isn’t going to fail to resist their urges. If a Truyian does bite another, the worst possible thing that could be done is to remove them before they ‘finish’, that is- run themselves out of Red. If they’re removed, the urge to re-bite is stronger and they’ll bite again and again which, as you can imagine, could do a lot of damage to the, now disconnected, subject. It can kill them. This is part of the reasoning behind the mating of old times having killed. Once the Red is over, they reconnect to the Museum, the Sefrei returns, and their wounds are healed. Not so for their Ephemeral ancestors.

Purple is considered very bad all-around. Pink is sometimes used as a means to disconnect from the Museum and can be done intentionally. Red is considered embarrassing, not necessarily deadly, but is rarely intentional. Purple means there is blood mixed in with the Red and you are probably going to die if you don’t bite your subject. Satchels will not do. Nobody tries to go Purple. Ever. A Truyian will always go Red before they hit Purple.

Early on, I thought going Red was exclusively associated with strong lust. It can be a factor, but extremely strong feelings of love or hate can trigger it. The more a Truyian is exposed to somebody who triggers those feelings in them, or accentuates those feelings, the more likely Red will occur. Given the restrictive behavior of the Northers, their emotions are buried deep. When those emotions surface, they’re starving and Red is on the table. Purple is most likely when a person is triggered Pink or Red by another repeatedly and there is always a specific subject doing the triggering. The one in Red will make it very clear that they need that specific person before they’re Purple, and they’ll refuse anything else.

And I’ll add just for sake of clarity, Truyians have all the human facilities in addition to the skers and cuspids; Red accommodation only requires the bite, but in Purple, expect it to be all out. Of course, what people do in Red when nobody is watching? I can only assume. It is mating behavior after all.

I had to bring this up. Not because you’ll necessarily ever even see somebody in Red or Purple but because you need to know the terrible things that Bach Nod does. To everyone. And with this background, now I can tell you.

He thrives off Red. He receives all that ends up in the satchels and drinks it (or bathes? Who knows). He forces the constituents into Red and is there to direct it. After a constituent comes to, it is only a matter of time before Bach Nod takes their Red. They might not ever know it. They’ll be sitting by a tree, enjoying the sunrise, lose a few seconds and feel funny. Bach Nod is the only one who can pause- or substantially slow- time and he uses it to collect. Once he has your Red, he can connect to you in ways others can’t. He can read your thoughts from afar.

So, it’s a pretty big deal if Bach Nod doesn’t have your Red.

And herein lies a particularly interesting detail about Roark. There had been an agreement between Shine and Bach Nod and, adjacent, there happened to be a deal between Bach Nod and somebody else. Bach Nod agreed to leave Roark to his privacy, to his autonomy, at least so far as any connected constituent can have it.

When Roark followed Shine and [the prince], he was prepared to buckle under Bach’s will- whatever it may be- to atone for the trespass that was Shine’s allowance. Roark didn’t know about the other deal. And when he offered himself up to Bach, he found that he was protected by that separate contract. And Bach Nod still needed to be paid.

Ludlow

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it will concern,

Shine and Bach Nod. Toasty, that’s what I call Enduring like them. Shine’s a pull. Bach is a push. There’s been a tension between them ever since forever, I assume. What’s funny is that Bach Nod is incredibly, blatantly, powerful and I am not entirely sure why he cares at all what Shine’s doing. Shine has power in the North, but Bach has power everywhere. Bach Nod bares his teeth and if you live on this Ground, you will feel them if you get within his purview.

I call a strong tension between a pull and a push ‘toasty’ because it is delicious and intense and dramatic and all the things you might want in a great story that comes to crippling crescendo. One that brings you to your knees and makes you cry. But Shine and Bach’s toasty tension is strange and I haven’t the faintest idea what sort of crescendo it can end in. They don’t love or hate each other. Instead, they interact with each other through other constituents. Shine pulls on [the prince]. And so what should happen next? Bach Nod pushes on [the prince]? Or [the prince]’s counterpart? What would that even look like? Shine is North-West. Bach is South-East. I’m being real here: I genuinely don’t know. It may be a mystery for the next ancillary (you).

Let’s investigate a little bit just for fun. Shine pulls on [the prince] but who did she have to pull on before that? Now, I fancy I am smart right now, but truthfully, I just happen to have a bit more information. It wasn’t me (not wholly anyway); I’m not an Enduring. I played a role and was put into position, but it wasn’t me. It was- had to be- Roark. I might hypothesize that to get to Roark she had to have done something during his Undership. I wasn’t there but I know he did a few things that you might never expect, to see him now.

Aside from being renown as a stoic during his Overship, he was a bolide as an Under. He took risks, wanted only things he absolutely could not have and, like a proper Norther, played as close to the fire as he possibly could. He knows everything there is to know about push/pull. I have that information from Duc, who describes Roark’s capacity in that regard with awe. And as far as I can tell, there is very little that awes Duc.

I have no doubt that Roark knows more about Shine’s maneuvers than I could ever imagine. He can see the culmination of a push/pull years, dects, or more, in advance. What if [the prince] had accepted the kid? What if he was happy? What if he hugged her and said he was glad she arrived? It wouldn’t have been nearly so intense and impactful as what he really did. If there’s anything I’ve learned on Truyu, it’s that what can be done with love can also be done with hate. If Shine hadn’t interfered, [the prince] might have welcomed his counterpart, but would he have loved her? I doubt it. Instead, Shine did interfere, and he met her with hate. But in this place, all that matters is magnitude.

Roark has been methodical with his communication about his ‘plans’ to reorient [the prince] and the kid. Although I’ve sensed sadness and disappointment in how he is treated by [the prince], he’s acted in a very unfeeling way towards that actual exchange between [the prince] and the kid. She must wait. Be sent far away. That’s it? Perhaps his plans weren’t really postponed by the rejection. Perhaps that was the plan. Or even a plan accelerated.

And why send her far away? If she stuck around, might [the prince] gradually warm up to her? What a terrible turn that might be if you’re looking for magnitude. But if she’s not around, he has what he needs to stew and continue his resentment. Shine can continue to do whatever she is doing that fostered that hatred in the first place. He knows she exists and has something of his. He knows he’s avoiding something serious. And if his hatred was driven by some concept affiliated with the kid not having pursued him in some weird- perhaps- imaginary past, he’ll have every reason to stay angry and get angrier. She’ll most certainly continue to fail to pursue him while she remains unaware of his existence.

Another matter: what about her magnitude? She doesn’t know the relevance of [the prince] at all and has no reason to feel anything towards him. How in the world is that going to be manufactured? As far as I’ve heard, they have no intention of telling her about him, or at least not for a long time. I was explicitly told I would not see the day when she discovers her connection to [the prince]. I guess that’ll be after I’m dead. A pity. It strums the strings of my mortality a little.

So my point: I think Shine pulled on Roark before and if she is a prophet like Bach Nod, then she might have done so knowing the [the prince] was to come. Knowing that another was to make a deal with Bach Nod over Roark, to be tested when Roark found himself at the point of trespassing into Bach’s realm- into his feud with Shine. Maybe I had barely anything to do with it at all. Perhaps, Roark knew it had to be done, because he knew that [the prince] didn’t love but also wasn’t anywhere near hate. She – ‘the kid’ - was coming, and he had to fall into one of those categories. A little bit of madness might do the trick. If anyone was going to make somebody crazy, it was Shine.

[The prince] and the kid are key players in the game of Bach Nod and Shine from a long line of players and pawns. I have every reason to believe that game started before Roark even thought about [the prince] and his counterpart. Will it end with them? Or are they just a couple stepping stones on an infinite stairway that leads in on itself. Bach Nod takes a step up, Shine takes a step down, vice-versa, ever the same distance away from each other. Ah, I need a break.

Ludlow

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************

To whom it may concern,

I mentioned that I saw Roark cry only once. It was after Shine had eased [the prince]. He discovered the pact with Bach, the one with him as the beneficiary. It was because of who that benefactor was and what they were subjected to on account of the permissions he gave to Shine.

I also mentioned that Roark was a fireball when he was younger, and I thought Shine might have pulled on him. I’ll have to give that a little backing. It has a lot to do with the pact, though I still don’t fully understand it.

Duc’s Over before he won Overship was Lunare. Whenever an Overship passes, the previous Over gets a very dark title, voted on by their peers and the Overs that came before them. It is supposed to be a part of a comedy, but I’m not sure it is that simple. Lunare is now Lunare, Over of Deception. I swear to God- the Museum- that she earned that title a long time ago, way before anyone knew about what I’m about to tell you. Nobody I’ve ever talked to, not even Duc himself, has any idea why she received that title. Or even who proposed it. I admit I have not been so privileged as to have been able to ask her directly. We can only speculate, and there is a lot to speculate on as you’ll see.

She has visited North Central a handful of times while I’ve been ancillary and I can verify: Lunare is glorious. Something about Lunare says she was born of Gods. She behaves stoically, as Roark, which has led me to wonder if that is who he got it from. She was hard on Duc and the most physically detached of all Overs that have ever been. Truyians are contact-heavy; she didn’t touch anyone. I expect that deprivation has something to do with how rough Duc turned out.

Roark first met Lunare when he became Under to Elsevaan, the Over of Will at the time. Lunare never made eye contact with him. Not once. She was short when speaking with him and would avoid him whenever possible. By all accounts, she didn’t know him, but shunned him anyway. She didn’t convey anything to Elsevaan, who never received explanation for the behavior.

One of Roark’s dastardly deeds as an Under was to respond to Lunare’s absolute rejection by falling madly in love with her. He kept it secret at first, but he failed to do nothing about it. What he chose to do was not very Northerly at all.

He found ways to watch her. He drew pictures of her, wrote about her. He burned most of the art and the writings. Until one day, he decided that he required everyone else to be just as triggered as he was, and through his hand.

It’s a tradition for Unders and Overs to make cards of each other and even their friends outside the Overship. Back on my Ground, there are similar types of cards for sports players. They have a photograph and statistics affiliated with the scoring of the sport. Here, it’s a photograph-quality but certainly not an actual photograph, and they don’t always include any kind of stats. I’m not sure how they manage to effectively get photograph quality without taking a photograph. All I know is that it’s a lot of work so a person might spend a handful of years making only one. After that, making copies is easy, but the first one is a lot of labor.

He made one of those cards of Lunare. I’d like to note that it was a comment that Shine made that sealed the deal, made him sure he wanted to do it.

It was as closest thing to a pornograph I’ve seen in the North. Nudity, inflamed skers, suggestive positioning. Somehow the image still held Lunare’s trademark unwavering elegance. He made tons of copies and distributed them as extensively as he could. As subtle in the distribution as he tried to be, eventually he was found out. Lunare found out. She didn’t attempt to stop it. Once they were in circulation, they weren’t coming out of circulation.

A long time went by until one day Lunare managed to sneak up on Roark while he contemplated his handiwork. Roark remembers this day acutely. He was sitting in the lounge (all stations have one of those). There is a high top ‘bar’ of sorts with stools. Of course, no food or drink in the Norther one though as the bars at Intercept might have. He was slouched over the bar on one of the stools. Yes, I think that is what he said. Or what [the prince] said he said.

She put both her hands on his shoulders. As soon as she’d done so, he knew it was her. He froze. She never made physical contact with anyone before but, somehow, he’d gotten the sense that he’d better not push it- not try to make eye contact. She drew a hand up his neck and through his hair on one side. On the other side, she whispered in his ear.

“How much better would the real thing be?”

She spent another couple moments caressing him into Pink before she left. Exacerbation. That’s what they do here. It didn’t happen again. It didn’t need to. The making of the card might have been an effort on the part of Roark’s subliminal to release his desires into the populous, maybe subduing them in himself in the process, but that just couldn’t be allowed. Roark never turned to look at Lunare. It could have been somebody else mimicking her. My opinion: the act has more ‘Shine’ written all over it than it does ‘Lunare’. Regardless, he had thought that he could recover before that moment.

The path of Overs who have moved on varies, but Lunare went to Central. Central-central. That just so happens to be where Bach Nod runs the show. Nobody asked any questions. It was a powerful place to be. For somebody who looks, acts, feels like a god, why not? It is expected that her presence brings Norther influence into Central.

Now let’s return to the morning that Shine took away [the prince’s] pain. Roark followed and met Bach Nod when he arrived. Roark offered himself up. In response, with a wave of Bach’s hand, (who but!) Lunare appeared. She was disconcerted but it was clearly not the first time she’d been summoned. She reprimanded Bach briefly.

Dear future ancillary, Truyians don’t have the ability to just wave their hand and summon another like that. Maybe only Bach and maybe only Lunare. That’s something to really think about.

It became immediately clear that Bach Nod could take nothing from Roark because of an agreement with Lunare. He said that she had been protective of him for a very long time. He then proceeded to softly dissect their history. He commanded that Lunare make eye contact with Roark.

He couldn’t make Roark do anything, but he could make Lunare make Roark do something. And it was perfectly sound in the mind of Bach that she suffer in his place. They did as he requested. It was the first time they ever looked into each other’s eyes. He saw that Lunare had been chained, held back, for a very long time and that he had never known her in a free state, even while they lived at the station together. Beyond that, a great depth, more than he could take in.

Bach instructed Roark to grip Lunare. He did so. There was no choice. Then it proceeded. The exacerbation. With Bach Nod’s orchestration, Roark went Red. Lunare followed. Bach Nod instructed Roark to drink her Red, from her cuspids. This is a thing that can be done by Truyians with enough self control, but it is a tease at best. Remember that Roark is a Master of Will and Lunare is an exceptionally god-like Master of Knowledge. They handled themselves.

What happened next was appalling.

Bach Nod pulled them apart at the exact perfect moment, the moment where they both were on the verge of failure. A second more and they would have bitten each other. Roark, shoved to the ground through some force he could not see, was held there. He could only watch.

Bach Nod went Red yet remained connected. He then forced Lunare down. She choked and fought helplessly against him. He dug his teeth into her. She screamed but quickly went silent as he pumped Red into her. Red, that was most certainly the product of the Red of many others outside of himself. Many others, with the exception- of course- of Roark. Her mouth was agape, still dripping Red, but her deep eyes now stared into nothingness, her breath weak or absent. She did not bite him back. The dopamine and endorphins associated with such biting was absent. Bach Nod, though convulsing as they all do when they bite, was procedural. He wasn’t doing it for fun.

Once Bach had taken his toll, the absolute direct suffering of Lunare and indirect suffering of Roark as she was invaded, Roark asked if he was satisfied. What Bach Nod took had seemed neither fair nor equal. Or else what Roark had allowed to happen between Shine and [the prince] meant far more to Bach Nod than he could ever imagine.

Bach Nod responded. I even have his exact words, as [the prince] remembered them acutely, right before he blacked out.

“What Shine has pulled from him, shall be pushed back, and in the system of the act will be fulfillment. My role has commenced. It has not concluded.”

When Roark had returned with Shine and [the prince], he was devastated. Tears streamed from his face in currents parallel to the remnants of the Red that coursed down not long before. He cried in total silence.

That account is largely what I have from [the prince]: memories and his discussions with Roark that followed. I have never dared to ask Roark about it myself.

Ludlow

Ancillary of North Central

**********************************************************************