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Save Point: Found Memories

Age Of Eversion

Out of a certain laziness, Cleo pulls out a tall, fluted wineglass and pours the thick, rich liquid into it. The mixture is the most potent coffee of which she knows, with large amounts of cream, milk and sugar, and even some cinnamon dark, topped off with an esoteric alcohol liqueur that practically makes her cum. The whole thing is an attempt to reconstruct her favourite mixed drink from the Azatlan waterfront, none of the ingredients for which actually exist anymore. Hey, life is change.

She drinks this when she wants to remember long ago times, the old scent and taste-based kick to the back brain even more effective for someone with the sensory memories of a cat. She has lived a long time, now, and sometimes these days a restlessness comes on her which she cannot answer, a desire to, in some way, move on. Where to exactly she doesn't know, but she still rejoices in the search, purportedly. There are ways out of the world, gates to the west that lead to other places beyond, but she has not yet tired of it. When everything is no longer enough, then and only then will she take the walk out of this world, for just a little bit of forever.

She and Terrowne have seen a vast history, complete with the collapse of the last round of true civilisations and the rise of a whole new set, and soon they will, for the first time, find themselves in unknown territory. That seems to her to be in its own way a sufficient ending, one way or another.

Hand and heart of steel. Mind and soul of steel. She has seen the first two but not the last, at least not her own satisfaction, and only then shall the story be ended. She wonders why she suddenly recalls that, when she has not thought of it in ages.

The glass is empty.

~*~

Terrowne and Cleo stand out together on the balcony, watching the fireworks burst like stars and leave firey streams behind them.

The light of the moon through pale clouds and the intermittent blaze of the fire colours, brighter than blue, gives Cleo's serrated mane a formal metallic tinge, reminiscent of the ornamental necklaces of the cat goddess she reigned as in ancient times, heavy bronze decorated with lapis lazuli and malachite, in overlapping chain linked plates.

"The past is close tonight, my kitten-cat," he suggests, and means it literally, looking backward with the matte lensed eyes of the Dragon.

She nuzzles closer into his shoulder in an embrace that sees them both pressed up against the cold metal of the thick balcony railing. "I love the fireworks," she replies. "They're so transient - a year is just a brief moment for us, and so we'll see them again, but who knows if this will be the last time?"

He feels the warmth of her against him, as the distinctive taste-scent of a streak of gunpowder smoke blows past them. She breathes inward through his shirt, to protect the sensitivities of her muzzle against the acrid tang.

Out in the distance, the fireworks streak upward at random intervals and explode spectacularly. Terrowne and Cleo are paying no close attention, because the shared intensity and rush of the blood as they kiss drowns out the sounds of fireworks, drawn close.

A moment, it seems, may well be enough.

~*~

He walks outside, intention to discard the recyclable drinks containers, and is caught by the day.

Overhead the sky is graceful, not deep but thin and clear, nothing to interrupt the light, like the sky over Aegypt so long ago, when he walked there and they called it Khem, before they raised monuments of stone to the dead gods, when the horizon was unbroken, crisp and perfect, like the single sculpture that was meant to be a tribute to new days. Somewhere nearby, but outside his field of vision, someone is playing music, a strangely haunting theme about the deserts mystery, and how the deserts miss the rain.

After a while she follows outside, to see what has become of him, and finds him standing still, lost to the moment, feeling the cool but not cold breezes brush against his skin inside the day. She hears the music, and somehow knows what has happened, that a little piece of the now has briefly fallen away, time gone full circle. The image of a memory that never actually happened writes itself briefly behind her golden eyes, a vision of herself as the highest priestess of Sekhmet, turning away with amber coloured ochre painted around her eyes in place of the more traditional black kohl, and braided hair slipping over the heavy linked plates of silver-inlaid bronze, enameled in blue and green, and the scented beeswax candles burning.

The dream of scented smoke weighing her eyelids, she breathes deeply of the fresh cool air and slides her hands smoothly round his waist, to lean her muzzle against his shoulder. He knows her touch, has heard the smooth pads of her clawed bare feet approaching across the roughened gravel tread-coat underneath, and so is unstartled by it all.

"Dance with me," she suggests huskily in his ear, curling her muzzle about his neck. "You know which one I mean."

He lets her lead, one of those slow dances where they sway gently in each others arms. The music is already advanced, but here, outside of time for a brief while, none seems to pass.

After what feels like a long, long time, the music fades. Cleo blinks, and twists in his arms to kiss him. The moment ends.

"Something is wrong with time," he finally says, enunciating what they both already know. Things like this have happened before, but it's been stranger than usual lately, and the general synchronicitance is through the roof. This summer is burning hot, whilst in the rest of the world, snow falls in the great cities, a combination of unnatural weather and earthquake season. "We'll probably have to do something about it."

She returns inside, and he gets on with the task in hand.

~*~

"I have been in the city, where it is so hot and humid that the fish themselves have climbed up out of the waters of the harbour, grown legs and gone walking around the streets. I walked with them, as they sought the lighter air of the shallow hills, and the people followed after in awe and amazement, as they saw the impossible happen. 'Go giant fish!' the people cheered, enviously, thinking 'how cool it would be, to be in the entourage of the giant fish.'"

_ _

~*~

Confronted with the likelihood of extreme action, Cleo is updating their will.

It might seem unusual that immortals would require a will, but a brief consideration of some of the things they own would suggest that leaving them lying around could be just a little dangerous. So she keeps it up on principle, correcting it every few decades in case of the worst, which in her case would have to be something pretty extreme.

She skips through the standard clauses she dreamed up long ago, to cover the possibility of their confirmable demise or unaccountably fatal absence, throws out an obsolete page or two and then starts scribbling in copperpoint on a new blank sheet designed to be slipped in to replace them as her part of the document.

"My pet panther Niphur, to be given into the care of Maggie Reed, of uncertain address but last seen in Manhattan, along with the deeds to such other properties as are presently administered by WolfenCourt Trust, also of Manhattan, and annuities therefrom.

"Our home address, the property held in New Zealand, to be given directly to Dimitri Drakkhaan, currently owner of Drakkhaan Pharmaceuticals, for reasons of the care and maintainence of the plantings in the garden attached thereto. These are labeled 'Cinnamon Dark' and comprise part of a research project nearing completion which will, under these circumstances, become an associated subsidiary of Drakkhaan Pharmaceuticals.

"My miscellaneous personal possessions such as are not otherwise dispersed, including the contents of all strongboxes and secure vaults held by various banking and financial institutions, and all items cached at locations as indicated by the accompanying maps and documents, are to be given into the care of the DeWeire Corporation of London, who are adequately informed as concerning various matters to ensure the appropriate disposal thereof. DeWeire will send their representatives in person to handle this matter, and nothing is to be touched until they arrive.

"My jump bike, kusarigama chains, personal memory music player, personal computer, swords and armour, and all other technological devices and tools to Huitzuil Heavy Industries, registered in Mazatlan, South America.

"The contents of my bank accounts and all other intangible monetary wealth such as stocks, shares and bonds, as well as tangible monetary wealth in the form of coins, gems and bullion, are to be distributed and administered as follows -"

She updates the long list of names, friends and associates and people she has met, business corporations that are fronts for the ever living, money too for places and researches and secrets, for causes she upholds and against problems that have not yet arisen. Although the amounts are easy enough to sort out (she just adds up the percentages to make a hundred and one) she is not sure whether instructions as to how it should be used would actually be a good idea. It would get far too complicated, and the people on the list presumably know what she has in mind. In the end she settles for a brief personal note added to the last page.

"Help out the cats and all things feline, whether they're long lost cat goddesses or endangered species or some stray cat that suns itself out on the driveway. Save the fishes and the frogs too, because they are beautiful. Do whatever you think is right. Love is rare but lust can be fun too. I've said enough, I think. You'll understand."

There is more that she could say, but it could be misconstrued, and she is too wise to make that mistake. And so, at the bottom line, she signs.

~*~

The synchronance is definitely worsening, as Terowne find himself in the city, distracted by the general hustle of the street, and the passers-by. The sound of metal grating on metal as a poorly fitted delivery van door opens makes a noise exactly like the cry of an enormous bird, trilling its song from some abandoned roof ledge, where it has made a nest in the overgrown rafters of condemned desolation.

He remembers seeing such a bird, once, long ago, with a cry exactly like that, shortly before it become extinct. A sort of giant heron, he thinks, although even then it was rare, and there was no-one to name it when it swept between him and the setting sun on vast flapping wings, low above the delta. But he recalls its song, and the reed boat drifting, and the piping of frogs, whilst Cleo prowled through the rushes, leaping after startled flights of lesser birds to catch their dinner, being her own swift personal hunting leopard.

The sound of an argument and the angry striking of horns breaks through ('What was that? A giant fish? What the fuck! Go giant fish!') and Terrowne continues on his way, unaware that in his contemplation of the deep past he has worked a small magic, and _remembranced_the giant heron. All around and quite unnoticed, the people look up to see the memory of the vast-spanned avian sweep past, each believing that it is only something they themselves have imagined, a brightly feathered daydream present only in their own minds.

Its brief appearance over the black basalt sidewalks and neglected rooftops of the city goes unremarked. Its flight is only a short arc, cut off by the rooftops like the briefness of memory, but one that by unspoken agreement continues onward, into some unknown place.

The moment of stillness that results could never be enough, as they all remember what they have never seen, and walk in the places that never were.

~*~

"The Dragon was looking out of my eyes again," complains Terrowne, who is home from doing the shopping.

"What caught its fancy this time?" enquires Cleo, who is busy sorting out the paperwork on some arcane and morally questionable business interests involving kitsune erotica.

"Shiny consumer electronics of the worst kind. With glossy plastic surfaces and brightly coloured glowing LEDs. I think they match up with its personal aesthetic sense in some way - assuming it can be said to have one," sighs Terrowne irritatedly.

"So buy it a nice ZEN player or something," persuades Cleo. "Go on, you know it wants you to."

"Not really the point......"

"Oh, come on. I've been much happier ever since I managed to hack the filesystem on my old Azatlani music player and write the whole thing to MP3. Every time I play the music, and its outside my own headspace, it reminds me of all those little things it's so easy to forget. It's like my whole culture came back again. You can't blame the Dragon for being in search of something similar."

"It hijacked my eyes," complains Terrowne, more definitively this time. "Sure, I could still see through them, but it was in charge. Then it dragged me up several centimetres taller than I usually am, like it always does, and slithered imperiously around the store intimidating everyone in its path, including the staff, with a display of disturbingly impossible silence and grace. Then it went and had an icecream. I'm not sure what exactly that was all about, but it let go of me at about the same point at which it got down to the icecream cone. It may have had something to do with the crunchiness - it doesn't like crunchiness."

"Have a talk with it the next time you're asleep," suggests Cleo, refusing to be disturbed. She pauses to examine a trading card engraved with a nine-tailed fox spirit. "You know it hardly ever does that."

"You should hope so. If it loses personality integration the results are likely to resemble an act of dog - only without the fun, light-hearted frivolity of our favourite werewolf - you know what I'm talking about."

Cleo reviews memories of herself and Jon in their infamous live-sex performance of 'The Wolf and the Whipping Cat' and remembers the civil disturbance that followed. Now that was an act of dog. "Buy it a set of virtual fuzzy dice," suggests Cleo, changing tack.

Terrowne is confused.

"It's a piece of shiny white glossy plasticised cardboard that has printed on it the words 'Virtual Fuzzy Dice' and a picture of two stylised dice," explains Cleo. "You hang it from your rear-view mirror to, and I quote, 'Achieve deodorisation with all the retro coolness but none of the scuzzy dicey fuzziness.'"

Terron is stunned by the brilliance of this idea.

"That might just work," he concedes carefully. "It combines glossy plastic surfaces with a certain existential pointlessness. I like it very much. In fact," he adds as he becomes carried away with ever greater enthusiasm, "it's almost as good as the ultimately irredeemable deed to land on the moon that you got me last year for my birthday. Although not quite. That was the ultimate existential present - the Dragon loved it. Thank you, you're brilliant."

"See, everything is fine," smiles Cleo, as he gives her a quick embrace around the shoulders and heads out once again in search of virtual diceyness.