The Captain’s mare jolted him back awake. From under its hoofs a storm of pebbles and desert brambles scratched at his stiff knees, tearing away at his pants and spurring him onward. How long had he been out? He could ride miles asleep, but he doubted it had been long. The night air still felt the same, crisp and far from dawn. His horse was calm and alert. If they neared the rose the mare would let him know, he thought. A flower like that didn’t let itself go unnoticed. Not this rose, so old and wild…

Dammit, he had to keep riding. His men were waiting for him back in the cave, surrounded, low on ammunition, supplies. Six miserable soldiers, sitting around the fire. They were patient boys, his troop, or they were dupes. Captain—they’d asked him—where are you headed? What’ll we do, sir?

Hell if he knew.

There were no answers to their questions so he hadn’t tried any, just left. He’d snuck past the enemy troops, all asleep anyway, and set out on his mission. Maybe he would bring the rose to his men. Why couldn’t he? Dig it out of the desert then shuffle back in that cave and announce in his curt drawl—Here ya go boys!—and hold it up triumphantly, crimson in the firelight. They would turn to him in waiting and he would summon up another breath of air—The Rose of Immortality.

To the rescue. He would take the flower over to Saul first. Saul—he would say—you’re my closest friend, my right hand man; I owe you my life. The rose is our salvation, I want you to smell it first.

Saul would be touched, in his crusty way. He’d lean in and sniff quickly, covering his bashfulness with abruptness. Then the Captain would go over to Garcia—Garcia: you are our best gunman, a loyal soldier. Tomorrow you’ll lead us out of here.

Down the line from there. His men had an order of their own. Leonard would be next, then Brian, and Rory. Finally he would reach Michael, the youngest of the fighters. The Captain’s name was Michael too, but only Saul knew that. Michael—he would say—smell the rose, then take it with you.

Michael would look confused, put upon somehow, but the Captain would have none of it. He would press on—I’ve seen you eyeing that girl in town, Michael. You’re too young to stick it here with us. You’ll have to smell this now, or you’ll never survive tomorrow, but when it’s over…leave us and take this to her.

I think it’s true love, kid.

The Captain chuckled to himself over the wind. The Old Man had cracked, lost it for sure. Unwound. True love and the Rose of Immortality—it was a cruel time to play a joke on his boys, their last night together. But he was a funny man, they’d never appreciated that. When the squad would swap tales, huddled around the fire, the Captain would make sure to tell the funniest one, but the men would take it in somberly each time. Stiffs.

He could say it now, out for the night, under the stars: bless these men—they were loving, loyal, pieces of wood, as good as anything else for the shredder. He would run back to the cave with a damn rose and push it in their faces—Guess what, boys? Guess. Guess! They would guess all night long with sober faces and when dawn came he would tell them: time’s up. Suppose we’ll have to play again.

Something bitter began to rise up in him, but he shoved it back down. Ahh, he would take them the rose anyway, those stuffy laugh-less suckers. That’s the story he should have told them for a laugh: The Beast and Her Magic Rose. He’d always thought it was a funny one whenever his mother would try to tell it to him. Boys—listen carefully now: my mother used to tell me this tale about a flower, and every time I heard it I’d cry like a baby. He would have to set it up that way, trick them, or they’d never laugh.

His mother had told the tale differently each time and now, searching for a clear story, the Captain could only see her hundred variations. The rose grew from a woman lost and forgotten in the desert—that much remained constant. A forsaken spinster, a young virgin, a pale neurotic, a shy girl, one day she made her way deep into the wilderness. Her family had sent her away, too old; her beau had stood her up and she’d wandered out unthinking; she’d gone exploring on a whim, never imagining she could get lost.

It was his mother’s favorite story, not his. She would tell it to his little brothers, but he was too old for it. He’d never gotten much into fairy tales.

Still, he had remembered this one now for a reason. Instincts should be trusted, he believed. The rose was hidden somewhere in that endless underbrush of milkweed and nettles, and he couldn’t miss it. He should have looked for its trail years ago. He’d been too stubborn, perhaps, but why admit to that? He was still stubborn, and it would lead him to what he needed.

His skin felt rough against the cold leather reins and he squeezed them tighter to muster some sensation. He hadn’t thought of the Rose of Immortality for years until tonight, sitting around that fire one last time. The evening was quiet. There was nothing more for them to say to each other; time had dragged them out too far. They were tired, and the enemy outnumbered them now without a doubt. It was ten to one at least, and they were cornered.

But they had looked to him anyway. Captain? Sir?

Shit out of luck, boys!—had been his only thought, but he couldn’t let that fall out of him. It wouldn’t be proper. Somewhere along the way he’d drawn his lines too close, but looking back he couldn’t see when or how.

Wait for me until tomorrow morning—he’d told them instead, and left.

The girl’s horse had stepped on a cactus and gone wild, leaving her stranded and disoriented in the dirt. She wandered for miles diligently searching for an end to the desert, but as night neared, panic took hold and she began crying out for someone to find her. She yelled and screamed as loud and as long as she could, but no one could hear her over the wind and the miles. Her voice became harsher as the dust caked her throat and desperation set in, but she wouldn’t stop. Her features became fierce and her resolve thickened as she twisted sound out into the sky with all her might, sure someone would hear it. Her skin cracked with the strain and dehydration. But after hours in the dark she felt her strength fading.

In one last, monumental effort, she reached deep and plundered every capacity in her. Putting it all into the cry, she stripped herself down to a howling vessel and threw her scream as sharply into the air as she could. The terrified wail soared through the sky, unstoppable, finally making it all the way to her village. But the cry had become monstrous in its flight. The villagers shut their ears in horror. Her old beau shuddered at the sound; her callous family closed their windows. No one dared heed the call.

Defeated, the girl crumbled to the ground. Her cry fell with her from the sky and planted itself in the dirt beside her, becoming the Rose of Immortality. So the story goes. Whoever finds the rose will be saved from death and solitude. Both of them.

The Captain had always felt that only the dead themselves could roam the desert long enough to find such a silly rose. It was one of the many ironies his mother had never recognized. He would bring his boys the damned flower, his night find, and he would fling it in the fire. We’re dead, boys, we’ve always been dead! Your Captain has been keeping a secret from you all these years with his poker face…

…But what secrets could there be in this day and age? He’d never found one. There were no mysteries hiding under the thousands of faces. There were no hidden treasures. The world constructed its vaults so carefully no one could sneak back in to place the riches.

Well, they’d forgotten to lock tight tonight, he thought with a wry smile. They’d finally slipped up. Was there a key for his, floating around out there, hiding under some rubbish? Had he dropped it somewhere without thinking? Had he given it to someone not to be trusted?

He would bring them the rose and they would look up. Eh Michael, welcome back. They’d pass him the pipe and he’d leave the rose in his satchel—than you, Saul, thank you. A warm breath of tobacco would tighten his lungs, and they’d settle in around the fire for the night. He would exhale slowly and fill the room with his smoke, remembering its old spaciousness now with the rising wisps of tobacco and the flickering shadows in the corners.

The desert shook violently and he found himself hitting the ground, rolling away from his horse’s frenzied hooves. The sky spun and the crazed mare was gone before he could grab her.

But it didn’t matter.

The rose was near—he could smell it. A perfume of spicy cinnamon, dark roasted garlic, and endless traces of unknowable but familiar scents gathered in a steam around him. The flower’s scent wafted up from the ground, more pungent than he had imagined it in his mother’s home, more frightening. But he realized he never had imagined the fragrance of the rose back then. His mother’s story had always ended with a rosebud, the scent locked up tight. He couldn’t see anymore, the night was too thick. But he’d found the rose now, honing in on its heat then feeling it suddenly, moist and velvety beneath his fingers.

Just like nothing, he picked it, and sat down next to the bush smiling. Have faith and you shall find. He’d always known he’d get a happy ending. He twirled the rose in his hand, letting its aroma fill his chest, then spread through his body. No, he wouldn’t take this flower back to the cave. It wouldn’t be proper, not with his men, not with this laugh. Stiffs. They would have to find their own damn rose, some other time.

The sea kings underground were getting restless.
The floor beneath their thrones had come undone.
The clouds above their heads were getting darker.
But the dread within their hearts could find no step.

Why is the floor beneath us crumbling?
Who calls the clouds towards our heads?
What rumbles in our hearts so lately quiet?
What sound within us creeps without?

Surprise, the creepy crawlers whispered…
Surprise, the land beneath cried out…

Arise, my little kings and darlings.
The day is here, and aching to be met.

(go to: part 1, part 2, part 3)

The unforeseen development was ludicrous but unshakable. Every media outlet on the planet visited the Brothers’ garden to independently verify the news, hoping perhaps for an end to the display—after which there might be room for more reasonable scrutiny. But the tree kept dancing and the Brother kept beaming. Skeptics and rationalists were flown in, but the evidence before their eyes was irrefutable: there sat a man; there danced an oak tree. On sight, the scene was too dynamic to deny. A hoax was impossible.

The preposterousness of the turn sent many people off the edge. The more rigid minds melted to putty under the attack, their capacity for sophistication blown away. Dutifully they had to concede the facts but after that surrender they were lost, never again sure of their own two feet. The loosest minds slipped entirely. The streets filled with trumpeters of all the other ridiculous claims of the ages—aliens again, resurrection, super powers. Only a few people in a clear-sighted middle ground could see it for what it was: a simple expansion of action. And no one but Renault could see its full potential, its disastrous pinnacle.

Jean Paul saw the connection to his work immediately. The Principle of Being—the Equivalence of Orgasm—the Brother’s rapture: the active impulse missing from his thesis, the means of excitation, had been discovered by Brother Edgar. Only the final violence of the act was missing.

While the world reeled, Renault pondered carefully. Was his secret a danger, or a blessing? Should he bury his work forever, or reveal it immediately—and how could he do it? He felt the grimness of his final vision, a vacuum—that what had seemed to him the essence of life was now, very clearly, the destruction of it.

But the more he stared at Brother Edgar’s grinning face in the videos, the less he struggled. He became filled instead with a strange kind of glee which grew and grew. Finally, Jean Paul—he said to himself—you have done it! The glee built until he couldn’t control himself any longer and began laughing, tears streaming down his face. You‘ve done it—he said—finally—you have gone mad! His life-long quest was clearer to him now, revealed, a simple, delightful choice there for the taking: insanity. He had searched for it long and hard. And now here he had arrived—Jean Paul Renault—not just insane, not just any madman, but the luckiest madman who ever lived!

He was a madman in a world of dancing trees and psychic monks! The most educated madman in history—in a world of jugglers and discus throwers—the most interesting world, the last such world! He was a madman in the springtime. The whole delicate spectrum of achievement had unfolded and now rested colorfully, just waiting to be overwhelmed. He knew his task now, his Luciferian mission. The Great Jean Paul Renault! It was fate. Wild but lucid, he sent a post to the press and the academy explaining his behavior and the Principle, then set off to the monastery with a flamethrower.

Renault entered the garden confidently. He had figured out precisely what had to be done. He didn’t approach the oak or Brother Edgar but went instead to the edge of the garden and began slowly setting the enclosing shrubs on fire. The smoke rose and the tree seemed to dance harder, clearing its air. He paused, making sure not to outpace the Brother—it was imperative that Brother Edgar not give up. Renault set fire to the flower patches, one by one, then the bushes and the saplings. He let the smoke gather. He needn’t have been worried—Brother Edgar was intent, and the tree began to swirl violently, creating a vortex of motion to push away the smoke and heat. Renault watched for a moment, letting his smile grow as wide as the Brother’s. Laughing once more, he finally aimed his flame at the tree. A moment elapsed, and then the garden exploded. Ten square miles went with it. The fate of the universe was sealed.

(go to part 5)

(go to: part 1, part 2 )

On May 7, 2298, three months after Renault’s paper began obscurely circulating through the stalest academic circles, The Brothers of Botany discovered—-with certainty—-humanity’s psychic powers. It must have been inevitable given the persistent spiritual rumblings through the centuries, but no one had seen it coming. Psychic powers were down there with purple elephants—unseen and by now untrue.

The Brotherhood had not intended to release anything so spectacular on the scene. They had been established fifty years prior to explore a quiet pursuit: vegetative attentiveness—they embraced the pun wholeheartedly. The Brothers concentrated on vegetation vegetatively, hoping to observe something new about the nature of the plant kingdom through intimate empathy. They were a dedicated sect, a lifelong commitment, and as the end of the century approached their first generation of elders was maturing. For the first time in human endeavors there existed plant-watching adepts, disciples who had spent their lives honing the skill.

Brother Edgar was one of the oldest elders, and the most revered in the order. He was the strictest member and rarely spoke. Unlike most other beginners, Brother Edgar had not started his practice on an eye-catching vine or sapling. Arriving in the first few months of the Brotherhood’s existence, Edgar had situated himself in the very center of the group’s garden and planted a single oak seed. It took two years for his seed to germinate, but he didn’t seem to mind. Everyday he would sit in the center of the garden, waiting patiently, the same before it sprouted as after. He didn’t sing to his plot of land as some brothers chose to, and he didn’t name his tree. He didn’t prune the branches or rake the leaves or stroke the bark. He just sat. For decades he watched as his oak spurted upward, hardened, and slowly twisted outward. Leaves fell around him building a thick blanket of detritus; a few branches snapped. He remained, inscrutable.

But subtly over time he did begin to smile at the tree. It was imperceptible at first, but every year the smile grew a tiny bit. For awhile, his smile reached an appearance of beaming serenity. Was he enlightened in some fashion—-the brothers wondered—-had he seen something they could see? They pondered in awe for a few years.

But Brother Edgar’s smile continued to widen, until it looked more goofy than serene. Then it got wild…gleaming, knowing…almost naughty. If anyone asked him what he was doing he would reply—-waiting for the right moment. His left eyebrow began to rise suggestively and his breathing became heavy. It was a curious energy to be around, and a few of the brothers gave up their own plants to sit with him around the oak. They breathed heavily too, trying to summon whatever arousal had hit Brother Edgar.

One day, out of nowhere, the right moment came. Brother Edgar sat down without ceremony, as he did every morning, but this time he sat a little closer, looking up. He sat and he waited half the morning. The brothers were tense with expectation. Then with a sudden intake of breath, Edgar’s nostrils flared and he whispered to the oak, “Dance for me.”

It was as though the tree had suddenly un-paused. The natural curves of its limbs began to carry throw in a hypnotic flow of motion. Its trunk swayed towards and away from the brothers, guiding the weight of the branches. The tree danced.

(go to part 4)

(go to part 1)

For the next fifty years, ecstatic union remained dormant as a cultural theme. The subject had become bloated and ungainly with the movement, and anyone approaching it was easily dismissed as a ‘hopeless One-Lobe’—–no one bothered with the mess. It took the millenium’s best and last metaphysician to resuscitate it.

The great Jean Paul Renault was French, with a German mother. Raised on rotten cheese and the memory of German spirit, Renault never felt comfortable in the 23rd Century. The world was a strange place then. People would later view the time as a calm before the storm—a bubble between the listlessness of Before and the drive of After—–but within that bubble there was such a sense of stillness it seemed permanent. Having survived the 21st Century, humanity had drifted into prosperity and, as though given a second chance, wonder. Monklike organizations, splintered sects of extreme interest, cropped up in dedication to every imaginable pursuit: fire spinning, glass arts, dancing, architecture, memorization, food preparation, jumping, computing, screaming—–everybody seemingly fell into something.

Gradually, the world had become more fantastical, and Jean Paul sensed that from the quiet of his small mountain town. But something in the practical devotion of his peers distanced him and turned him inward. The multitude roared, but the call of any one vocation felt faint. Jean Paul, painfully observant, felt he perhaps tendered the last flames of frustration, ineffectiveness: the last blocked dam, the only one left with any pressure able to wish for release.

There was an idea out there they were missing, he thought. Things were settling without a piece of the puzzle. He’d wander the woods in the morning and read in the fading afternoon when the bellowers practiced in the hills. The diligence and practicality of his times were his only tools, and so, with the kind of dedication that can only expect death, he pursued his atavistic longing for explosion down every dusty register of philosophy, through the overlooked byways, the forgotten digressions, the concealed corollaries—-searching.

After thirty years of study, with a stream of circuitous convolutions only his mind could hold in entirety, Jean Paul Renault was finally able to prove The Grand Principle. It was a Principle of Being, he said–—a principle rather than a truth. It was at once a declaration and a creation. The Grand Principle stated:

If every element in a universe is excited together into Pure Moment, said universe will explode.

His dense work would surely have been ignored had it not been for the most spectacular coincidence in the whole course of reality.

(go to part 3)

Lois Lane read her own headline one more time.

SUPER ROBOT AGAIN: SAVES 8 FROM FIRE

It was spare. Informative. Like Bot9 had been on that windy night. “Lois,” he had said gravely, “it simply cannot be. The force of my mechanism is too much for your human form.”

“I can’t bear this, Bot9!”

“Lois. I have done the math. I don’t think we should see each other again.” And with that, he had flown off, disappearing into the night with his super robot speed.

There was a knock on the door. Lois sighed in frustration—-it was Robotta, caked in makeup, ready no doubt to gossip about her latest frivolity. “I’m busy,” Lois snapped, perhaps a bit too harshly.

“Are you sure? You look…I heard about Bot9.”

Lois was too tired to wonder how she knew. “Oh, Robotta…”

 (to be continued)

On Dec 12, 2703 humankind finally blew up the Universe. Their devastating success can be traced back to the formation of a small sex cult in the early 21^st Century. The One-Loves, rallied by charismatic British guru Bhagavan Lito and inspired by an indecipherable blend of pre-millennial traditions, proposed—–for the first recorded time in history—–an all-powerful Preeminence of Orgasm. Adherents to the doctrine believed that if the instant of orgasm were spread to every living being on Earth at once, a fantastic event would occur. The nature of the event varied: implosion, transcendence, enlightenment, eternal life, and alien revelations were major theories. Though the movement was largely incoherent, eventually collapsing under its own confusion, the original pronouncement of Bhagavan Lito was shockingly precise:

THE ULTIMATE CONVULSION IS THE EQUIVALENCE RELATION THAT BRINGS EVERYTHING TO NOTHING.
BOM SHIVA.

The One-Loves carried on for around a century after the death of Baba Lito, thriving in the political and social upheavals of the time. Followers reveled in public nudity but kept their impassioned fornication rituals strictly private. New members were drawn in by the mystery, especially alluring to the curious, confused, and adolescent. For a few generations traditional culture watched, appalled, as the familiar counter-cultural arc of youthful rebellion burning to middle-age dissolution played out with unprecedented overtness. The most vital and enthusiastic were worked into gibbering, unbearable sexual and superstitious frenzies. Mimicking the previous century’s calls for a ‘politics of ecstasy’ and riling them up to new heights, they would repudiate their old society with unforgivable masturbatory acts and disappear for a decade of underground orgies. When their juices ran dry, they would reappear on the streets—-swollen, middle-aged orators, continuingly drawing in the impressionable with their irrepressible ramblings and provocative wrinkled nudity. The spectacle of their jiggling, exhausted elders eventually smothered the appeal of their mystery, and by the mid-22^nd Century the One-Loves had mostly dissipated.

(go to part 2)

Ben,

Of course, you’re completely correct. But you’ve forgotten—-if there are robots there are X-Men.

–Luki

Dear Luki,

I have no illusions of a hippy victory on this front. The ratchet of progress is irreversible. Gradually, no doubt, we’ll all become robots, the more so for having an entrancing artificial scent.

The next step in our transformation will occur when people start saying that thick, flamboyant layers of makeup are themselves an indispensible medium for self-expression, that the bare face in daylight is a Gorgon to behold. Nevermind cases already where it takes 15 minutes and a scouring pad to discover the landscape beneath.

As for gesticulation and poetry. A gracefully witty expression, improvised on the spot, is worth a thousand exquisite bottles of commercially-bought perfume, in a million creative combinations.

Ben

Dear Ben,

Thanks for sharing. I generally perfume myself through shampoo–the options provided to a woman in that market are the most manifold and supremely fruity.

Right now I’m just transmitting the overflowing juiciness of late summer with my Mandarin Balm, a moderate whiff for anyone to groove on, but I’ve been known to be more insistent. It’s important to project, ya know? People are starving for that, and artificial fragrance is one of humanity’s most well-developed means of expression. Its potential for nuance and the ease of its dispersion rival any modern form.

Everything is a matter of communication–which is a giant matter. Gesticulation and poetry are crude and culturally enmeshed. Instead, my guess today for the human soul smell: orchids and coconut milk. My guess floats across the room. It puts the talkers to sleep and triumphs over the senses of the male beast.

Now maybe you could ask: “Well. Isn’t your natural born stench a good and clear guess of the soul smell?”

Of course it is, you fucking hippie, but then what’s the point of anything? You go ahead and worship your armpit as the godhead in your own damned house. We’re out here in public to have some fun.

Best of Wishes,
Luki

Dear Luki,

The first two drafts of this letter, despite the fact that they each discussed entirely different topics, were unsatisfactory and I tossed them both.  This draft will concern something yet again completely distinct.

The story of deoderant.

By the end of this story, you will know why I put deoderant in the same category as Islamic veils.

There was a time when each person not only had a face, but a smell.  Some people, like many young women, had good smells.  Other people, like annoying dorks, had bad smells.  Smell was just another way to transmit information about a person.

The problem arose when people started living crowded together in cities.  Now smells didn’t just waft around and blow away.  Instead, they collected and overwhelmed.  If you smelled bad, you were screwed.  Therefore smelly people soon figured out that a bit of perfume could change their social life completely.  Soon, the somewhat less-smelly people also used deoderant, and eventually everyone had to, because even the smell of sweat marked one out as unconscientious or poor.  Meanwhile, expensive perfume marked one out as rich.

It took me a long time to figure out that the natural smell of some women is actually quite lovely.  But a few stinkers, plus technology, has ruined everything.  Now all women smell like the same fruity shampoo.

Yours,
Ben