Microfiction
Mar. 18th, 2009 10:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vaxjediHere's a bit of microfiction I've had sitting on my hard drive for a while. Nothing polished in any way. I'm not a writer, I just come up with weird ideas for fictional backgrounds and try to describe them. That's why almost all of my microfiction ends up being a monologue ;)
Anyway...
The man pulled back the cowl on his cloak and once again reflected on how he was out of place. He looked at the people around him, young men and women, not one over 20 years old, gathered around a campfire. He was different from these people, to be certain. For one, he wore a cloak, which stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the collection of gaudy and over-revealing outfits that those in his audience wore. But more importantly, while he looked not past his 20s himself, he was twice their age. He brushed his hair out of his eyes and his cloak shimmered, like only an object of its type can.
"You've asked me to talk about how everything changed, since I've taken it upon myself to be a bit of a historian. I know some of you know this already, but please don't interrupt so I can get through this quickly." He sat down on a log.
"It all started with a professor, Dr. Terrance DellaCosta. He was a brilliant physicist who decided that he wanted to see the wonders of the world before he died. It was his undoing. When visiting Egypt to see the great pyramid, a small group of radicals managed to hear that a nuclear physicist was among the tourists. What they didn't realize is that he wasn't really a nuclear physicist, but rather a quantum physicist with some rather radical ideas on quantum entanglement and zero point energy."
He waved off some questions before they began. "No, it doesn't matter what that exactly means right now. Anyway, they also didn't know just how fragile his mind was. Nor did they believe him that he knew nothing about building a nuclear weapon for them. He cracked under their torture, and eventually told them he'd build them a bomb of the likes the world had never seen before."
"Of course, he was right. He devised a machine of the type that can only be the child of a brilliant mind with all of its limitations stripped from it. And the group decided to detonate it after sneaking it into Tel Aviv."
He paused. "It worked, but not in the way they expected."
"The bomb did explode. But not physically. Energetically. On a level that was too subtle to affect crude matter. So Tel Aviv was not destroyed. But the world was."
"You see, the blast was... well, people argue about that. Some say it was bioenergetic. Others say it was pure quantum information. I'm not sure I understand any of that. But what happened is that it affected consciousness. It blew out people's minds, clear out of their body. And it had an amazing range - even astronauts in the orbiting International Space Station were affected."
"Most of the people in the world became, for lack of a better word, soulless. Their consciousness was blown completely out of them. They retained their intelligence, but lacked any independent will. The majority of them quietly died, incapable of summoning the motivation to eat and care for themselves, unless directed."
"The interesting thing that the survivors discovered was that as long as these people, empties you call them in these parts, were fed and given adequate care, they never seemed to grow old - their bodies just continued to rejuvenate themselves. It was as if they forgot how to age when they lost their minds." He grinned. "The scientists have been tearing their hair out trying to figure out how that works."
"The survivors were still affected, however. Their minds were blown out as well, but not completely. They remained attached. And they manifested themselves as other things, animals, tools, items, pieces of clothing." His pointed to his cloak. "Somehow our minds became a sort of solidified mental energy."
He stood, "We retained our will. And we too, if we care for ourselves, do not age. But if our minds are destroyed, we become...empty just like the others."
"Few, like you, were unaffected." He paced around the group. "The unborn. Either still in your mother's bodies or conceived after the event by survivors. Your minds were in tact, and in place. Of course, many of you died. Your soulless parents couldn't care for you any more than they could themselves. And there just weren't enough survivors left to take care of you, nor keep civilization from crumbling, except in small pockets, Those of you that survived have been raise by those enclaves, but mostly have raised yourself while the survivors have had to rebuild."
He stopped pacing and looked over the crowd. "And now you've come of age, and can help rebuild the world. Maybe we can get it right this time." He put out his hand. "But there is more. One more bit to your legacy. Even though your minds are in tact, they are...loosened. Trauma, or training, can unhinge your minds like ours. If that happens, you become one of us. You cease aging. Your mind manifests and becomes a powerful tool. And an easy target." He sat back down on his log. "That's why your villages and enclaves have sent you here, to this compound. We have learned how to harness these freed energies of our consciousness. We may be able to free your minds and teach you as well."
He stood and turned away. "Come back tomorrow if you want to begin to train. Be careful though. You can just as easily detach your mind completely, and become empty as well. If that's they case, we'll probably keep you alive, as a worker of some sort. But you, who you are, will be gone. That's the potential price."
He pulled the cowl of his cowl over his head, and walked away into the darkness.
Anyway...
The man pulled back the cowl on his cloak and once again reflected on how he was out of place. He looked at the people around him, young men and women, not one over 20 years old, gathered around a campfire. He was different from these people, to be certain. For one, he wore a cloak, which stuck out like a sore thumb amongst the collection of gaudy and over-revealing outfits that those in his audience wore. But more importantly, while he looked not past his 20s himself, he was twice their age. He brushed his hair out of his eyes and his cloak shimmered, like only an object of its type can.
"You've asked me to talk about how everything changed, since I've taken it upon myself to be a bit of a historian. I know some of you know this already, but please don't interrupt so I can get through this quickly." He sat down on a log.
"It all started with a professor, Dr. Terrance DellaCosta. He was a brilliant physicist who decided that he wanted to see the wonders of the world before he died. It was his undoing. When visiting Egypt to see the great pyramid, a small group of radicals managed to hear that a nuclear physicist was among the tourists. What they didn't realize is that he wasn't really a nuclear physicist, but rather a quantum physicist with some rather radical ideas on quantum entanglement and zero point energy."
He waved off some questions before they began. "No, it doesn't matter what that exactly means right now. Anyway, they also didn't know just how fragile his mind was. Nor did they believe him that he knew nothing about building a nuclear weapon for them. He cracked under their torture, and eventually told them he'd build them a bomb of the likes the world had never seen before."
"Of course, he was right. He devised a machine of the type that can only be the child of a brilliant mind with all of its limitations stripped from it. And the group decided to detonate it after sneaking it into Tel Aviv."
He paused. "It worked, but not in the way they expected."
"The bomb did explode. But not physically. Energetically. On a level that was too subtle to affect crude matter. So Tel Aviv was not destroyed. But the world was."
"You see, the blast was... well, people argue about that. Some say it was bioenergetic. Others say it was pure quantum information. I'm not sure I understand any of that. But what happened is that it affected consciousness. It blew out people's minds, clear out of their body. And it had an amazing range - even astronauts in the orbiting International Space Station were affected."
"Most of the people in the world became, for lack of a better word, soulless. Their consciousness was blown completely out of them. They retained their intelligence, but lacked any independent will. The majority of them quietly died, incapable of summoning the motivation to eat and care for themselves, unless directed."
"The interesting thing that the survivors discovered was that as long as these people, empties you call them in these parts, were fed and given adequate care, they never seemed to grow old - their bodies just continued to rejuvenate themselves. It was as if they forgot how to age when they lost their minds." He grinned. "The scientists have been tearing their hair out trying to figure out how that works."
"The survivors were still affected, however. Their minds were blown out as well, but not completely. They remained attached. And they manifested themselves as other things, animals, tools, items, pieces of clothing." His pointed to his cloak. "Somehow our minds became a sort of solidified mental energy."
He stood, "We retained our will. And we too, if we care for ourselves, do not age. But if our minds are destroyed, we become...empty just like the others."
"Few, like you, were unaffected." He paced around the group. "The unborn. Either still in your mother's bodies or conceived after the event by survivors. Your minds were in tact, and in place. Of course, many of you died. Your soulless parents couldn't care for you any more than they could themselves. And there just weren't enough survivors left to take care of you, nor keep civilization from crumbling, except in small pockets, Those of you that survived have been raise by those enclaves, but mostly have raised yourself while the survivors have had to rebuild."
He stopped pacing and looked over the crowd. "And now you've come of age, and can help rebuild the world. Maybe we can get it right this time." He put out his hand. "But there is more. One more bit to your legacy. Even though your minds are in tact, they are...loosened. Trauma, or training, can unhinge your minds like ours. If that happens, you become one of us. You cease aging. Your mind manifests and becomes a powerful tool. And an easy target." He sat back down on his log. "That's why your villages and enclaves have sent you here, to this compound. We have learned how to harness these freed energies of our consciousness. We may be able to free your minds and teach you as well."
He stood and turned away. "Come back tomorrow if you want to begin to train. Be careful though. You can just as easily detach your mind completely, and become empty as well. If that's they case, we'll probably keep you alive, as a worker of some sort. But you, who you are, will be gone. That's the potential price."
He pulled the cowl of his cowl over his head, and walked away into the darkness.
