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Introduction
2030
Monday, 7th Jan
Splint was walking home from the laboratory in the industrial district. The buildings were
stereotypically grey and brown and the fog that hurts your lungs to breathe comes from
the huge melting towers and also from below through the intricate sewer systems and
grids. Everything is cracked and faded and worn.
His storm issue rain coat sheltered him from nothing on the walk home. He had gone to
work in the dark, and was now walking home in the dark. Daylight doesn't shine through
the unopenable brown windows, obviously.
But once he was home he went straight to the fire and stoked a flame. He picked up the
book from the side and began reading. It was about magic. Yeh, he has an interest in
the occult, so what? The flames invoked a feeling of childhood. Staring at the flames for
hours in a cottage in a big field. Splint remembered. So what?
He lit a cigarette and watched it burn next to the fire. Splint thought he might be a bit of
a pyromaniac. But he neither chose to accept it or reject it so everything was OK for a
while.
Must've been asleep for a while, Splint coughed as he regained consciousness. Today,
they had been 'sampling' potentially toxic mushrooms found on the surface of the New
Planet. The minute portion Splint took had almost worn off. This was essentially all that
Scientists did these days. The government of Earth was a sneaky one. NASA became
officially 'uninterested' in building space ships and built nuclear bombs instead. 'Science'
became the study of poisonous substances, chemical weapons, all manner of potentially
life threatening stuff. But Splint already knew this, he just kept repeating the same
things in his head over and over.
Splint knew that his role as a completely under-qualified, mostly drunk 'Scientist' these
days involved sampling the fruits of the government's latest 'acquisition', the 'New
Planet'.
Splint also knew all about the gravity of the situation he was in, which involved a mixture
of office politics and an overtly anti-government disposition. His 'friends' didn't really
understand him most of the time, he figured they were all robots anyway. No human
could take that much New Planet Peyote and still write sentences about how 'spiritual' it
was.
But then again, Splint had a look through his notebooks and realized they pretty much
made no sense either. All he could do was think objectively and that sounds crazy when
it's written down. Any forms of hallucinogens no matter where they are in space have
the same effect, the same highly personal effect should he say.
This was the manner he had become accustomed to. 'Work', write, 'eat', write, dream. In
between that there was 'drugs' 'drink' and 'field notes'.
The writing was indecipherable nonsense to the untrained awareness. Even then, it was
pretty sloppy and bad. Full of plot holes and bad punch lines.
Splint had been travelling in his dreams to places he had been before and some he
hadn't. He had always been told that dreams were just dreams, but the evidence is
otherwise.
Splint had found things in his dreams which were there in real life. He couldn't argue
with that kind of proof.
Sure, it throws your whole perception of reality into question. For example, Splint would
examine his beliefs. Nonsense. And yet, beliefs were exactly what he was acting upon.
He never realized he could act upon his will. For example, Splint believed that there was
a God, but he couldn't prove it. He had managed to overcome his belief that dreams
were just dreams and proved that they were not just dreams. To him, those dreams
were just as real as the world around him was when he was awake.
But then again, Splint knew all this and he was bored. He had remembered something
someone had said to him, "intensity beats boredom" and in a second he was writing.
He wrote down self-help sentences like "Just remember; your eternal chakras are
balanced in-line with the sun, therefore collect your memories and off they shoot off into
an explosion of wisdom" they made no sense. They helped no-one.
Splint realized that the rest of the world was dreaming when they were awake. He called
it "dreaming when they're awake". He told his dog all of this, because his dog wouldn't
turn him in.
Splint had decided that we don't actually perceive the world first hand, we assemble our
perception and then filter it, therefore everyone has their own description of the world-
which is not the world, but merely a description/interpretation of reality, and therefore all
people's problems stem from their description, if you alter people's description of the
world then you can solve anyone's problems. If people realised that they were just
seeing a description and not reality, then that would give them the impetus to challenge
their perception and make an effort to perceive true reality. But who has the balls to do
that?
"What you goin to the New Planet for? Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"
"No, I don't really know why. I'm a scientist, well was, and I wanted to study the
mushrooms down there and get my work published on science websites"
"That's a pretty stupid goal"
"Well, I have to put my goddamn heart into what I do and believe with a passion that I
can make a difference"
"We have a word for you people, they're called idiots"
"I didn't come here to be insulted"
"Ok, sorry, please tell me more about how you want to change the world, ha! You're
pathetic, see these people here?"
"The barkeep, I see him"
"We're all going to die"
"Well yeh, that's true, so what?"
"Well you're not ready to die"
"And you think I'm going to die on the New Planet?"
"Well, yeh"
"But I'm a scientist, it was what I was born to do"
"Cut the crap man, the New Planet is no place for idiots"
"Who says I'm an idiot, I could kill you in a second"
"What with test tubes and mushrooms, ha, you're weak. You are facing a challenge of
the spirit, and you're going to wind up killing yourself if you act so fearless"
"But isn't that what Jesus would do?"
"I don't know"
"Oh right..Natives"
"Would you shut the hell up for a second and listen? I'm trying to make a damn point.
You have strong beliefs in this science thing right?"
"Well, yeh"
"And are you willing to die for your beliefs?"
"Like Jesus?"
"I don't know"
"Yes, I guess"
"No guessing dumb ass. Are you willing to die for your beliefs?"
"YES"
"Ok, that's a start. But you still have no idea, if you go tomorrow, you will die on that
planet. But not in the way you understand it. You will die and become total. You will find
your true purpose."
"Is it sampling mushrooms?"
"Go home, it's late. Idiot"
The New Planet was where his life would begin, properly this time.