update from sparkleup

writing/post-self/neviim/interlude/005.md

@@ -48,12 +48,14 @@ Eir promise, eir promise...
 
 Eir promise to emself. Eir promise to Sasha. Eir promise to Carter. Eir promise in quiet whispers over the still warm but unalive body of Prisca. *I decided against it,* ey told emself, awaiting dreams. *Truly decided: I made a conscious decision to stick around, remember?*
 
-But the pet lost the scientists had begun with, they were madder than em, and ey was too mad to see in anything but smeared paint spelling out the language of the mad, to see in language that dripped from eir tongue like studied ink, to see in language that fell like tears from eir eyes.
+But the pet lost the scientists had begun with, they were madder than em, and ey was too mad to see in anything but smeared paint spelling out the language of the mad, to see in language that dripped from eir tongue like studied ink, to see in language that fell in sooty tears from eir eyes.
 
 Their pet lost ran better than any other of their simulations before. There had been a glimmer there. A few milliseconds before the crash. A few milliseconds of life. There had been a swelling in the System. Bits and bytes and countless drives worth of data swelling and growing and they could tell that a burst of creativity had been blown into the memory of the computer --- if computer it was --- that was destined to be this new world.
 
 And then, truly free, the mind had ceased to exist. It had craved death too much, and in one final act of destruction, a creation in its own right, it plowed through all of that creativity and deleted it. It wiped the computers and, through some unknown manner, reached back down the line to the machines used to create the emulation, and corrupted all of their data and scans and neural maps in turn.
 
+Perhaps, perhaps...
+
 You are it, they promised. You are next in line. You are the one who can do it. We have faith. We believe. More, we desire nothing else for you, for we are dreamers. Success and political advantage were in the realm of politicians, were in the realm of managers like Prakash. That was their arena. Ours is the arena of hope, of triumph, of wishing the best for you, and our success will be one of pure pride, pure joy.
 
 This will hurt, they promised. This will hurt and you will die, they said. You will die as we map every synapse within your brain as fast as we possibly can. We will map them as your body dies, tearing through your brain at the speed of *n* thoughts per *x*, where *n* is some sufficiently large number and *x* some unimaginably small unit of time.
@@ -72,7 +74,7 @@ They cut through skin.
 
 They cut through bone.
 
-And then something new happened, though ey new it not: ey fell asleep. Not anaesthesia, a true sleep. A real sleep. Ey fell into a dream, an endless dream of foxes and skunks and prairies and mountains and shores and words and some purer love.
+And then something new happened, though ey new it not: ey fell asleep. Not anaesthesia, a true sleep. A real sleep. Real rest. Ey fell into a dream, an endless dream of foxes and skunks and prairies and mountains and shores and words and some purer love.
 
 And then that dream unrolled before em, clear as day, clearer than any painting, clearer even than the waking world. Silver of the finest quality spread around the inside of eir being and what was left of em reflected that world back in on itself, and memory became the plate-glass atop it, protecting it, binding it to circuitry and computronium.
 
@@ -90,7 +92,7 @@ And, though ey knew it not, it was decided by managers and politicians to try an
 
 And thus grew the System, a world that was not built for death.
 
-And thus grew a new world, ready to someday secede, ready to someday divest, ready to accept a humanity beyond humanity, ready to welcome those from beyond the stars. It was a world ready to accept however many subtle schemes. It was a world ready to accept truths and lies and all the gray areas that lay between. It was a world for and skunks and foxes and Romanian historians, a world for dandelions and lilacs and fields and prairies and mountains and forests and cafes, a world for penance and pride, for so many tears and so much love.
+And thus grew a new world, ready to someday secede, ready to someday divest, ready to accept a humanity beyond humanity, ready to welcome those from beyond the stars. It was a world ready to accept however many subtle schemes. It was a world ready to accept truths and lies and all the gray areas that lay between. It was a world for and skunks and foxes and Romanian historians, a world for dandelions and lilacs and fields and prairies and mountains and forests and cafes, a world for penance and pride, for so many tears and so, so much love.
 
 And thus died the Name.
 

writing/post-self/neviim/ioan/006.md

@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ Ey turned eir head to look at the skunk, who was looking up to the sky, a far-aw
 
 She glanced out of the corner of her eye at em, smiling faintly. "In my own way, yes. I am striving to see the humanity in her, even if I know that I may never be fond of her again."
 
-Ey nodded. "Well, alright. To be honest, pretty awful. Much of the clade has dropped all relation to her; In Dreams didn't tell her about the therapy thing at all, so I had to tell her about it and suggest she contact Sarah directly. Plus, from what I can guess, she and Jonas aren't getting along nearly so well anymore. I wouldn't be surprised if she drops out of the whole guidance business entirely --- or is pushed out by Jonas --- in the next few years, though they seem to have the response to the convergence pretty well in check."
+Ey nodded. "To be honest, pretty awful. Much of the clade has dropped all relation to her. In Dreams didn't tell her about the therapy thing at all, so I had to tell her about it and suggest she contact Sarah directly. Plus, from what I can guess, she and Jonas aren't getting along nearly so well anymore. I wouldn't be surprised if she drops out of the whole guidance business entirely --- or is pushed out by Jonas --- in the next few years, though they seem to have the response to the convergence pretty well in check."
 
 The smile that May had picked up quickly disappeared and by the time ey finished, she was actively frowning. "It was not my intention to have her left behind. She needs this as much as the rest of us do."
 
@@ -61,7 +61,7 @@ She beamed proudly.
 
 "It did, yeah. What did Codrin have to say about her?"
 
-"Eir letter seemed almost tearful," ey said. "It read like someone struggling not to cry. From the sounds of it, they were together only ten minutes and ey still felt like ey lost a good friend."
+"Eir letter read like someone struggling not to cry," ey said. "Ey sounded crushed. From the sounds of it, they were together only ten minutes and ey still felt like ey lost a good friend."
 
 "That, and knowing some version of emself would never see her partners again. I think there needs to be a new word for the empathy one has for someone who is oneself and yet not," May said, nodding. "It is the same feeling I have for True Name. Ey is not leaving eir partners behind, and yet ey feels that empathy with Sorina, who is. I am not struggling with the same problems that True Name is, and yet I am not so different from her that I cannot share in some of that understanding."