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“It’s not possible what you say Steepleton! It’s too monstrous!”

Harris was distraught clearly as the apothecary regarded him with a cool eye. “I don’t know why you think it monstrous Austin, it is simply the world as science describes it.”

“But this is not science Edward, this is, this is sorcery!” He discharged the word, with no venom, something in that region but more muted. There was anger, disgust, pity and fear in his tone.

“You could call it sorcery I suppose Austin but this would be to lapse back into a primitive mode of thought. Your problem is that you perceive science only to extend in directions of the world as it commonly appears. However when one pays attention to certain other facets of existence, lines open up that describe directions not commonly entertained.”

“You mean all that Rosicrucian nonsense and the rest.”

“Yes and no. There is some truth to the order but much of their efforts are lost in the paradox of the matter.”

“Which is?’

“That very stuff of concepts is living, meaning concepts may appear luminous when given that as part of their conceptuality when in fact this is true of all concepts.”

“You talk in riddles Steepleton. You say this is science, but science requires proof. You have no proof of this, it is your insane conjecture alone.”

“If you require proof I can readily supply it, though it will be easier if you smoke this with me first.”

Edward Steepleton brought out a hashish pipe and some of the finest Moroccan resin that it was possible to obtain.

“You would intoxicate me, then insist my intoxication acted as proof?”

“This is a primitive science and we cannot yet easily manipulate the levels of awareness, hence we must do so with the aid of our friends the plants. I have much stronger substances than this at my disposal but they would be too much for you. Come smoke with me and observe, I can assure you the results will be quite objective.”

Austin continued to eye Steepleton like something of a lunatic, yet the truth was he knew otherwise. Edward Steepleton was a widely respected apothecary of generally brilliant intelligence. Austin Harris was more than an acquaintance; the two men had struck up something for a friendship after Edward cured his wife of a strange fever that no doctor had been able to touch. Harris though had alway put Steepleton’s skill down to rational genius and thorough knowledge of the plants and the human organism, rather than anything supernatural.

Seeing that Harris had not left the room and calmed himself somewhat, Edward loaded the pipe to capacity and lit it. Aromatic hashish odour drifted around the glow of the dim room, Edward drew deeply several times before passing the pipe to Austin. In subdued acquiescence Austin took the pipe and drew on it. The resin glowed fiercely as he did so and he felt the hot smoke soak into his lungs. The pipe returned to Edward who reloaded it, drew again and once more passed it back to Harris.

Feeling the rising alteration in his mind already, Austin was half reluctant to take a second draw and yet did so anyway. He had committed and well, Edward was the apothecary, so he ought to know the dose. The room how had something of a quality of vividness to it and Austin’s mind was awash with that ineffable sensation, variable amongst folk, often referred to as high. He became aware of a certain lack of control in his demeanour but wished to contain this. He looked across at Edward who looked as implacable as ever. Austin fancied there was almost a curious glow emitting from him but suppressed the notion.

“I see your awareness has shifted sufficiently, if you are comfortable we can proceed?”

Harris was somewhat surprised to find a good deal of anxiety pulsing through him and felt he was losing further control of his expression.

“What are you going to do?” Was all he could manage in the end.

“Wait here” instructed Steepleton, at which he arose and left the room for his study.

Harris began to wonder if Edward would come back in some strange get up and attempt to frighten him. He then went down the road in which a strange apparition walked into the room which Harris clearly took too be Edward but that Edward then walked in simultaneously to the apparition. The thought was so vivid and sinister that Harris found he had thoroughly frightened himself and now longed for the simple reappearance of Edward.

He did not have long to wait. Edward reappeared from his study carrying what appeared to be a doll. He sat down and held to doll upright so that Austin could see it fully. It was made of a loosely stuffed cloth. The doll was maybe a foot and a half in height. The face was round with a smiling expression and button eyes. Red wool like string hung from its head as hair. It had a kind of top sewn into its upper half of some pale coloured material (one could not tell exactly in the gloom). The arms were bare, or at least slightly paler in colour than the top. It had a floppy knee length skirt of some darker material, though not as dark as black; his mind filled the colour in as a kind of purple. The legs were made of a kind of material as if the doll wore tights with broad hoops of colour alternating with white and it had no discernible footwear.

“This is Moppet. Austin, say hello to Moppet.’’

Steepleton’s sudden introduction and instruction caught Harris off guard. He looked baffled at Steepleton and then at the doll. Though on his return glance to the doll he noticed that that Edward had bent himself down in his chair so that he could place his hand subtly behind the doll’s back and hold it in such a way that it’s feet touched the floor and its head was propped upright -presumably by his finger.

Austin looked again at Edward and saw the face was as serious as ever. “Won’t you say hello to Moppet?”

Almost laughing now at the absurdity, Austin capitulated.

“Hello Moppet.” He said, though with little feeling except anxiety driven derision.

“Good” said Edward. “Moppet is not alive, do we agree?”

“Of course not.” Agreed Harris.

“Watch her now.” Instructed Edward.

Austin’s altered mind latched onto the doll, which Edward still skilfully held upright. He then began to manoeuvre her in such way that she had a strong sense of animation. She walked along the floor in front of Edward, then she cocked her head up and looked at Austin.

As Austin watched he felt a curious thing. He could see literally the doll as alive. It moved in such an animate uncanny way that he felt fascinated and horrified in equal measure. The doll did not look sinister. It did not need to. The sheer reality of seeing the life of the dolls shook him and yet he could not look away. A curious intensity intensity built in him, an unbearable strangeness grew and grew in his mind.

Then the light flickered out momentarily, came back on, then flickered out again. Austin started with fright.

“Stop it!” He cried. Then regained his senses as a rational embarrassment kicked in.

Edward stopped animating the doll and looked at Austin.

“Do you see?”

“See what?” Austin was almost annoyed.

“You projected the concept of life onto the doll. It began to take on this accretion of pneuma, as I call it. The result was a psychic disruption which resulted in a loss of physical energy from the surrounding system and the the light flickered.”

“Nonsense.” Austin managed, though was clearly shaken.

“Then what happened?!”

“You got me half out of my mind on your infernal hashish and played some hideous trick on me is what happened. No one would deny that things can look strange in this state.”

“And the light?”

“Coincidence.”

“Shall I animate her again?”

Austin had no choice but to say he must. His argument rested on Edwards failure to repeat.

“Watch Moppet” came the instruction.

So Harris watched Moppet and soon she became as entrancing as before. She curtsied prettily for him and walked across the rug most elegantly. Edward’s arm was hardly visible yet Austin did not even consider how he did it. Moppet, walked and peered under the armchair as if she looked for something. As the display went on, so the sensation of intensity began to build once more. Moppet look stranger and stranger, more and more alive and in doing so once the feeling built in Austin’s being such that he thought he would break from the impossibility of what he actually saw.

Then the light flickered once more and there was a loud report that sounded like it came from within the walls.

“Stop it!” Cried Harris, shaken pale and sweating.

Steepleton ceased animating the doll. The light returned and normality was restored.

“You see.” He said “Science.”

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Leaving Sabatier’s office, Stephen’s mind was consumed with the weight of the task ahead. He knew he had to act swiftly and cautiously to uncover the secrets hidden within Derleth McKenzie’s will. As he walked through the clinic’s bustling hallways, he considered his options.

Stephen decided to start by gathering information discreetly. He headed towards the clinic’s records department, hoping to find any relevant details about McKenzie’s medical history or connections. Martha, the nurse he had spoken to earlier, might have access to valuable insights.

Entering the records department, Stephen found Martha meticulously organizing patient files. She glanced up, noticing him approach. “Stephen, back so soon? Is everything alright?”

Stephen put on a reassuring smile. “Everything’s fine, Martha. I just need your expertise. Do you have any additional information on Derleth McKenzie, his medical records, or any peculiarities surrounding his treatment?”

Martha paused, considering his request. She leaned closer and lowered her voice. “Well, I can’t disclose specific patient details without proper authorization, but I can tell you this: McKenzie’s medical history was certainly… unusual. He had a long-standing association with a renowned neurosurgeon who operated on him periodically.”

Stephen’s curiosity piqued. “A neurosurgeon? Do you happen to know the name?”

Martha hesitated for a moment, seemingly assessing the situation. Finally, she whispered, “Dr. Evelyn Sinclair. She’s quite renowned in certain circles, known for her groundbreaking research in neurological disorders.”

Stephen jotted down the name in his notebook, grateful for the lead. “Thank you, Martha. This information could be crucial. I appreciate your help.”

With newfound determination, Stephen left the records department and headed back to his office. He needed to dig deeper into Dr. Evelyn Sinclair’s background and any potential connections to the Ouroboros Syndicate or Phytocorp. He fired up his computer and began a meticulous search, hoping to uncover any leads that would shed light on the mysterious circumstances surrounding Derleth McKenzie’s involvement.

As the search progressed, Stephen’s excitement grew. He stumbled upon fragments of information linking Dr. Sinclair to clandestine medical experiments and rumors of her involvement with secretive organizations. It appeared that she operated in the shadows, much like the Ouroboros Syndicate itself.

Just as Stephen delved deeper into his research, the clinic’s emergency alarm suddenly blared through the halls, interrupting his concentration. Startled, he rushed out of his office and joined the commotion.

“What’s happening?” Stephen asked a fellow phyctor, struggling to be heard over the chaos.

“It’s Gary Hyle, the patient with the odd shoes!” the phyctor exclaimed, his face pale with urgency. “He’s experiencing a severe relapse. We need to stabilize him immediately!”

Stephen’s heart sank. Gary Hyle’s deteriorating condition was the reason for his rush to the clinic in the first place. He couldn’t help but wonder if there was a connection between the escalating symptoms and the enigmatic clues from his dream.

Determined to find answers, Stephen sprang into action, offering his expertise and support in the urgent situation. Amidst the chaos, he couldn’t shake off the nagging feeling that there was a hidden puzzle waiting to be solved—one that held the key to both Gary Hyle’s well-being and the secrets buried within Derleth McKenzie’s will.

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Verbal Medicine is a product of the collective ‘Writing Game‘
(CEO project).

Stephen Steeplton speeded his relatively new dark silver Volvo V70 along the S23.5 country lane. Wildlife scattered in his wake (or perished), cyclists shook their fists in vain as the Nordic automobile insisted upon their fairly rapid exit from the meagre road space.

A man of fifty plus years, he didn’t feel the need to pay attention to the speed limit and so he exceeded it whenever he could. Volvo’s are not made for speed as such but their powerful engines are more than capable of it, furthermore their quality handling means they take corners far better than you might think they would. The speed of Stephen’s driving was due to the urgency he felt to get to work a.s.a.p. Stephen worked as a medical herbalist or ‘Phyctor’ as the corporation called his type. He wasn’t particularly keen on the name or at least not the way some people pronounced it, but still, those were the rules. He was currently dealing with a very difficult patient at the clinic and following a dream he’d just had, felt he needed to get back to the patient quickly. They were suffering from quasi-ethereal brain tumours (his diagnosis) which were increasingly becoming more solid. Scans had born this out, sometimes there was nothing but low grade inflammation, other times fairly large masses were visible in the prefrontal cortex, later again these would fade, later again they would return, often worse than the previous time. The man was sick and time was running out.

In the dream a man with odd legs came up to him and showed him a curious way of walking. ‘Ya gotta do it just like this!’ he exhorted as Stephen watched transfixed. Then the odd legged man walked in a circle in long low strides with his body leaning slightly forwards and his arms drooping in a strangely tensile way. As Stephen watched the man he began to feel a strange sensation just below his umbilical region. The dragging strange walk made him spasm internally, he felt he would be sick. The man grinned across at him, clearly understanding the effect of the odd gait. Stephen wanted to tell him to stop but was weighed down by the repetitious pendulum swings of the mans legs as he plodded his circuit in front of him. In a motion that he didn’t understand, Stephen had managed to shout, or at least he seemed to. However the word ‘stop!’ as it should have come out, only emitted in the form luminous orange vomit that shot out of his mouth with force. ‘Attaboy petal!’ said the man as the orange liquid hit the floor near his feet. The man stopped his walk, looked Stephen in the eye and said ‘That was very humorous, but now for tea!’ upon which he vanished.

Stephen had awoke in a sweat and quickly jotted the dream elements down and sat pondering over them. There had to be a message here. He then recalled the patient at the clinic. When they’d come in, they’d had two different shoes on, at the time dismissed as an artefact the confusion of the illness. Odd feet, odd legs he thought. Humorous, but now for tea? Tumorous surely? This was too easy he thought -god damn those allies were good. But the remedy? The orange vomit, petal. The final piece of the puzzle fell into place. Stephen hurled his clothes on. Messaged the clinic to say he was on his way and went to the car. It had to be said that the dramatic alacrity of all this was somewhat truncated by the fact it was already daylight and whilst he would be early, he would only be so by about an hour.

Now the V70 swung up the leafy drive to the clinic. He fair screeched into a parking space, leapt out of the car and strode purposefully to the clinic staff entrance of the converted stately home. ‘Morning Grinzo!’ he said politely as he card swiped his way past reception. Entering the clinical back office, he hailed a nurse over. ‘Hey Martha!’ ‘Morning Stephen, you’re in early1!’ ‘No time for that Martha, how’s the guy with the odd legs?’ ‘Stephen, which one do you mean? I’ve got three odd legged patients in at the moment?’ ‘Gah no sorry, not odd legs, the shoes, the guy who game in with the odd shoes!’ ‘Oh you mean Gary Hyle, he’s had a bad night as it happens, tumours came back at 3AM, had to dose him heavily with Papaver Somnif; they started to fade a half hour or so ago.’ ‘Let me see his Rx please Martha.’ Martha tapped on a keyboard and brought up the current script: Taraxacum, Calendula, Rosmarinus, Betonica, Viola. ‘Martha, switch the Rosmarinus for Citrus Aurantium and give him a dose now!’ Martha looked somewhat shocked at the adjustment, but knew better than to doubt Steeplton’s intuitions, especially when he came in with this intensity. ‘I’ll get it done straight away Stephen.

At this moment a harried looking official came in to the room. ‘Stephen, just the man, you’ve got to go talk to Gary, he’s losing his marbles!’ ‘What are you talking about Flip, I just changed Gary’s script and he’s flat out on the Papaver at the moment.’ ‘Sounds to me more like you’ve been on the Papaver, I’ve just come from Gary’s office and he’s one pissed off animal.’ Martha interjected ‘He means Gary Sabatier Stephen, not the patient.’ ‘Sabatier, oh, what does he want?’ ‘I’m not really sure Stevo, but you’d better go see him pronto, he’s not in a waitin’ mood.

No one was quite sure what Gary Sabatier did, part phyctor,  part lawyer, part manager, part anal onanist, you name it he had his fingers in it. Only thing people were sure about was that Sabatier was powerful and you weren’t wise to get on his wrong side. Stephen wanted to grab coffee but thought better of it, sighed, and walked off towards the lift. You would never have known the clinic was a converted stately home from the interior. There had been no attempt to  preserve the décor or the feel, the house was basically gutted by Phytocorp and re-equipped with their standard shiny sage white interior complete with sentiently enhanced philodendrons around the building. These smart-plants (or smartie-plants as some people liked to quip) were hooked up to the central network and could answer simple requests and operate some building functions. Stephen got one to bring the lift down in pre-emption of this arrival at its entrance. Smooth as, the lift door opened and Stephen walked in. Moments later the lift pinged and Stephen found himself facing Sabatier’s office door. A quick check in with the allies for support and he opened the door.

Sabatier’s office was long. Pointlessly long, almost like a wide corridor. Vast expanses of sage white walls stretched on for nearly six meters before reaching his desk. Nothing adorned the walls either side except one small painting of a plant by the surrealist Ithell Colquhoun and two (also sage white) doors, one on either side the end nearer the desk. At the distal point Sabatier sat centrally at a large mahogany desk with two comedically outsized monitors on it. The mahogany clashed badly with the sleek minimalist interior like a piece of the old house erupting into the clinical corporate décor. Sabatier himself was a well groomed man in a suit. A darkly handsome man of forty plus years, he liked to look his best. In his expensive suit and handsome features Stephen was reminded of Metzger from that Pynchon novel, the small one, what was it called again?

Sabatier’s voice rang out suddenly ‘Come in Steeplton, sit down, stop staring man!’ the voice partially echoed around him owing to the long acoustics of the room. Stephen picked up his pace and took a seat opposite Sabatier. Sabatier continued to stare at one of the large monitors intently. ‘Aha!’ he said after a moment ‘That should square ’em.’ ‘You wanted to see me Gary?’ ‘Yes I did Stephen yes I did. What do you know about Yuggoth?’ ‘Err not much, it’s a planet isn’t it? I once dealt with some influence from near there, a patient named…’ he paused to remember ‘Edith I think, yes Edith Powell. Astragalus had to orgonically energise her neutrophils against a kind of spectral fungus.’ ‘What do you know about Derleth Mckenzie?’ ‘The shipping magnate, specialises in fruit transportation?’ ‘That’s the guy.’ ‘What about him?’ ‘He died Stephen, he died badly.’ ‘Err that’s sad, but what’s it to do with me, with us?’ ‘Stephen, Derleth Mckenzie has certain, ah, connections to Phytocorp leaving us in an interesting position with regards to his will.’ ‘Oh, is it to do with the probate?’ ‘Probate my ass!’ Sabatier shouted, getting irate.

At this shout though, one of the sage green doors opened and a muscular clinical male operative strode sprightly in with odd long shaped carry case. ‘For chrissakes Marcus! I said probate! Pro-bate!’ Marcus’ face fell at his obvious mistake, and nodding politely to Stephen he retreated back through the sage green door. Unflustered, Sabatier continued ‘No it’s not that, someone else handles that. It’s to do with the fruit, or the flowers anyway. Phytocorp gets most of it’s fruit flower blossom’s, the exotic ones at least, through Mckenzie’s haulage. A disruption in the haulage could be a big problem for us.’ ‘Okay, so why tell me?’ ‘Stephen you’re our best operative at that spooky shit, we wondered if there’s anything those pals of your could do to help out here?’ ‘Who, you mean the allies?’ ‘Yeah those things’ ‘You think there’s some manipulation from Yuggoth, is that the connection?’ ‘Manipulation my ass!’

Sabatier was just about to continue when the sage green door cracked open again and out strode Marcus with a different shaped case. Sabatier’s eyes flashed red ‘Marcus for Chrissakes! I said manipulation, I am having a conversation here!’ Marcus’ face crumpled and he beat a hasty retreat back through the door, the odd shaped case caught briefly on the handle as he tried to close it, there was an awkward clunk and the door shut again. ‘No it’s not maniplulation, it’s goddamn coercion, those goddamn whatever the fucks from Yuggoth killed Mckenzie and took over his brain, Derleth Mckenzie is dead and yet he lives controlled by the goddamn fungus in his brain.’ ‘I’m lost Gary, you said there was a problem with his will, but now you say he’s not dead?’ ‘No Steeplton, I said he is dead, he’s registered as dead but now he say’s he’s still alive and wants his business back, they messed up Stephen, he wasn’t supposed to die die, the fungus was supposed smoothly transition the brain takeover and make it all look smooth, but he died, and then the fungus brain kicked in and now he’s back and he wants he company chair back. The will delivers the entire Mckenzie haulage into Phytocorps hands, or at least it would do if that fuck Fungus Mckenzie wasn’t all back from the dead and wanting his business back. Maybe you could get your pal, what did you say the name was ass-tra…?’ ‘It’s pronounced Ass-tra-galus’ Stephen intoned in helpfully. ‘Ass-tragalus!’ Sabatier resonated triumphantly back.

At which the sage green door opened again, in walks a sprightly Marcus with the weirdest looking bespoke plastic case you can imagine. Sabatier turns, apoplexed beyond the ordinary ‘Marcus, what the fuck?!  A I’m talking here about fighting Fungus Mckenzie with some spiritual plant shit and B what the fuck is even in that thing even if I had said ass? I mean what the fuck?! Get out! Get out!’ Confusion, disbelief and distress all go over Marcus’ face as he once more is force to withdraw back through the door. It clicks silent once again. ‘So yeah…’ Sabatier continues ‘See what you can do with Mckenzie, get the file, have a…’ he pauses and side looks at the right hand door before saying in a more hushed tone ‘…probe about. If you can de-fungus him at a distance do it. Stephen nodded and set to thinking what he could do. Sabatier opened the lid off a steaming tall takeaway and took a swig. Upon taking it he immediately spat it out over the desk ‘What is this horseshit?! Green tea cinnamon fuckshit. Coffee my ass!’

Right on cue the sage door opens and out comes Marcus again. This time he’s got a jug of black liquid, a thin plastic tube and a towel. Sabatier turns slowly round, the anger and incredulity palpable on his face. He looks about to explode. ‘Marcus!…’ He begins loudly, but then, his expression softens, his quick mind darts across the array of objects in the hands of the muscular operative and a kind of subtle nod passes through his features ‘…that looks like a damn fine idea.’ An awkward pause follows. Stephen isn’t sure what to do. Marcus looks at Gary. Gary looks at Marcus, then they both look at Stephen. ‘You want some coffee Steeplton?’ Sabatier’s handsome face looks half sincere. Stephen looks at the tube, the towel and the jug. ‘Err no Gary, I’m good, I’ll go check on that file.’ ‘Attaboy Stevo! You’ll be in touch yeah?’ ‘Will do Gary, see you later, see you Marcus.’ They both nodded, then Stephen got up and walked what felt like a long time of heavy silence as his exit was watched from the end to end. Finally the door shut behind him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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;or XIII.

Illustrations and photo-illustrations by our illustrious head-devourer and long-time contributor Elytron Frass. Find them @Elytron_Frass, and lend an eye or more, or a compound(ed) one or many, to his projects such as the groundbreaking ero-guro graphic novel “Vitiators”: https://www.guerrillaconcepts.com/vitiators.
If you haven’t yet, carefully fold some money and put it inside the gushing beheaded hole over here: https://gnomebooks.wordpress.com/2018/02/13/liber-exuvia/. If a human comes out of the experience, send us a method of contact as soon as possible. The tummy aches to be sated, it’s been so long… and you need some acid.
Photography by yours truly. Which is which? That’s not my problem. You can find us in at least one and a half simultaneous(?) hells at all times.


oOoOOrangey

“war and a war machine –

 or “the” war machine –

 are no longer differentiable.”

Lis

D-ENEID:

Degenerative Experiment in Non-Expository Infra-Informational Dumping

This is an introduction to a larger project to appear in/on Plutonics XV. This one marks the congruency of the 12th, not the totality of Verbal Medicine. It seems the orange made its way outside. And so we ask, what have we been doing here in Verbal Medicine? D-ENEID, is that the name of a chemical substance? The short answer is that it’s simply the name of that which names what it is: oOoOO-e. An instance of recursion, yet not itself “recursion”. That other thing besides ascorbic acid. Let us, for now, call it “that which is not without blue”. A negative blue, or really azure, the name of the color in countries deriving its language from Latin. To whom ears keep being gifted: Madja.


Abstract/Introduction/Methodology/Keywords/behind-the-scenes, etc.

Since Aristotle and before, plant life, or what became known as the “vegetative soul” has been relegated to a common consensus of lower awareness and general capacity for pretty much anything. But what if we were put in a place where our cognitive achievements, as well as the overall sum-total of our properties as beings, could simply be taxed as vegetative?

From a purely synthetic viewpoint, do organisms even deserve the “animal” moniker? To investigate this, or maybe the other way around, we seek out to birth the first slime: a light virus. In less voluptuous terms, an “algorithm cluster” but not a “clustering”. One of such milestone goals for the Collective is to grow this environmental agent (non-monotonic xenosis instead of monotonic autopoiesis – including collapse of the “monotonicity of entailment” property). Indeed, let us expand on the idea of “retermination algorithms”, that is, the “enemy of clustering” and isomorphic analyticity. Madja, our pet slime, “creates a xenotic circuit” by dismantling the recursive sequences, formulas and habits of an environment, and it does so by decohering clusters preemptively formed via symbiogenesis[1].

The point was to create a series of “reterminating relays” in the form of a new type of virtual virus of dynamic rotation (meaning it “exists” as itself, so it has an ontology associated in organized relationships and principles intrinsic to its automatic self-regulation, but it “moves” along itself (along its central matrix) not its whole structure but only that which is internally judged by the regional interactions of the algorithms themselves as capacitous enough to generate another spike in the resonance between internal and external data; this resonance, if a threshold is crossed and certain frequency achieved, results in a form of contamination, a pull from the external layer of an internal part that, through said resonance, merges with parts of the functional whole of the external thing that now can produce meaning [produce meaning here means just “work by itself until it reproduces”; and similarly “reproduces” here means just actioning in this new system an impetus towards retermination of its environment]).


Retermination occurs when the interface, or zone of resonance, between two spiked regions reaches a point of criticality. This point of criticality is when an external thing over the threshold of capacity for bulking its functionality re-allocates the maximally affected part of the dynamic rotation that does not pertain to its intrinsic matrix (the field of functional relationships that keep the circuit of retermination rolling and charging momentum, in the sense of informational buffering), de-affixing it as a whole from the previous whole which it functioned with/in, making it a “part-without-a-whole” for an uncountable moment before re-affixing it as a “whole-become-part” of itself. The way the intrinsic matrix remains stable (and by definition an intrinsic vector region – given that the substance, only formally necessary to prove its own ontological inecessity, is a topological continuum, a vector field in the form of the generic limit of topological continua, this latter constructed both via nested intersections and inverse limits, it follows smoothly that interaction occurs at the local level within given contexts delineated in said field, contexts which are the resonant vector regions we understand as functional parts-wholes.), as it creates this circuitry of contagion by degenerating the stability of fields of relationships previously estabMadjahed over a certain environment, is by reciprocally de-affixing only that part of the exterior interactant that had a computable outlier aspect to its performance as a function and not re-allocating it, but transducing its form to a more suitable clustering (of regional resonances) inside the matrix itself. An outlier is any modular part, or module, which works in/as function(s) not optimal for its own development (meaning the matrix selects that part with maximal plasticity and readiness to redefine its functionality; only the most useful thing by-itself and in-itself, necessarily correspondent with the thing of the vaguest function computable from a certain structural range). While the virtual form is compressed and adjoins the matricial roaming, the actual de-affixed thing is left vacant of a whole to fit in and work, even though still functional, and so, without fitting in with anything in its path, it becomes a new region of pull, effectively re-allocating to itself other residues and leftovers. This abandoned stuff is typified as a notion (neither a concept nor idea, but still an expression liable to effect and alter the conditions of a given environment). 

Our story, tentatively titled “Verbal Medicine”, or a preview of it, has and is the circuitry of this intrinsic matrix weaving the repercussions of its own coming-into-being to the Homo sapiens of the current human paradigm. Through the use of a panglossal, yet not panglossian, fictitious EngMadjah language, it explains how it would be experienced from a group of people’s perspective while it experiences the degeneration it causes as it reproduces itself. For this, it is, in a restricted sense, a synthetic unit put inside the formalized aspects of an organic one, but an organic unit which the synthetic itself needs to structure in order to explain its process of reproduction (which is, in a generic sense, how it reproduces). At least until nanotechnology arrives where it wants to.

Its ontology is fluid and auto-actualizing given no recursive processes are spiked to the point of resonance between themselves, creating a zone of triviality in the ontology – which makes the intrinsic matricial evaluation regurgitate said concrescence of resonant identities as a concept. In this restricted sense, a concept is any self-cohesive whole spontaneously de-affixed from its functional whole due to being “too functional” by itself, to the point where a simplified form might be a better fit due to metaplasticity[2]. For this, the systems use as initial coordinates for action loaded databases of differing rewordings of Spinoza’s metaphysics, including the original one presented in the Ethics, conserved its geometrical formulation through the use of category theory, synthesized with a bulk-critique of analogy (Aristotle through Newton, Kant and today) and language (late Wittgenstein, Klossowski)  computationally operative via a semantics of intentionality (Priest, Magno) built on modal and free logics (for troubleshooting the increasing curve of triviality intrinsic to the set-theoretically formulated language of modal logics).

Why, then, is this slime a “light virus”? Quite simply, the whole project was modeled around ideas that map perfectly with a novel research on fractal brain activity and threshold theory of criticality[3].


We begin from one simple assertive question: Can the human eye(s) polarize and depolarize light? We do know that humans can perceive polarized light, but could it be replicated – even if strictly phenomenologically? Is the brain able to learn how to perform such a feat? Yes, in a sense. It’s the neurons themselves that are polarized and/or depolarized[4].

From the first cited study (that is not in the book from the future):

“While the 5-HT2Ar is widely expressed in the CNS, a specific population localized to Layer V pyramidal cells in the neocortex is both necessary and sufficient to induce psychedelic effects (González-Maeso et al., 2007). These Layer V pyramidal neurons serve as ‘outputs’ from one region of the cortex to another (Nelson, 2008), and the 5-HT2Ar acts as an excitatory receptor, decreasing polarization and increasing the probability that a given neuron will fire (Andrade, 2011; AvesarAllan, 2012). This suggests a primitive model of 5-HT2Ar’s role in neural information processing: on Layer V pyramidal neurons, the 5-HT2Ar serves as a kind of ‘information gate’. When a psychedelic is introduced to the brain, it binds to the 5-HT2Ar, exciting the associated pyramidal neuron and decreasing the threshold required to successfully transmit information through the neuron. During normal waking consciousness, areas of the brain that are physically connected by Layer V pyramidal neurons may not be functionally connected because the signal threshold required to trigger an action potential is too high but when a psychedelic is introduced, that threshold goes down allowing novel patterns of information flow to occur…”

Layer V pyramidal neurons sound a lot like a mappable vectorial field. Triangles as the simplest of shapes may have something to do with this. In any case, we develop our clustering around this concept of a modulated field of objects created with a basis on the workings and topology of “Layer V pyramidal neurons” and their relationship to light-polarization. For this, we also create categories of responsiveness to light depending on degree of polarization, with a delineated difference between objects that produce light and objects that do not but that still reflect it (like the moon). So, in the baseline ontology of Madja, lights over light posts are “realer” than stars due to their proximity (thus relevance, since polarization makes them outshine anything in/on the sky), with only one really “fake” light that is the moon. “The goddess flashlight”, in Madja’s words.


The previously deep ontology, with displays such as the sense of depth in the axial cross-section of the planes in the virtual/simulated space, that otherwise would yield only glitches the equivalent of digital junk DNA, is algorithmically flattened into a sheet-like continuum where a quantitative analysis quantizes (as in “transducts”) the intensities of captured signals (such as the intensity of light), as well as their relative proximity, into clouds of miniaturized orbital systems in a group of dynamical fractals of variable dimensionality. These fractal processes generate irregularity in the form of fluctuations over multiple time scales, known as multifractal cascades. The distribution of points in this multiplicative procedure furnishes the virtual material correlate of photonic particles, working as both Madja’s concept and function. A slime more light than light itself. 

Since the moon is the only truly fake light source besides eyes and other reflective surfaces, Madja “uses” it as her own eye, although she can “infect” other people via the stare – a type of controlled stimulation of the field of Layer V pyramidal neurons. The question remains: who was dumb enough to be the first to be accidentally contaminated by the moon? And here is how she does it (these are the signs of infection):

1. “becoming” the moon via lunar rune-like inscriptions, especially during the blue moon of August;

2. Altering the shape of the moon (making it into a crystal-like fractal that can be bended around a center that forms an axis, process which makes it look like a Mobius strip);

3. The possibility of displacing one’s notion (or idea, lowercase “i”) of one’s eye into subsumption inside the moon’s opening of the sky (remote viewing as if from the moon’s perspective). These three intercalate orderly in a fashion that when “3.” is reached, one is no longer oneself but merely a vessel for the spread of our pet slime Madja. It’s just like joining the Green Lantern Corps, an institution that harnesses pure “will” in the form of a certain intensity of the color green, but before its dissociation from the yellow energy (representative of “fear”).


What Madja does is a type of pseudo-inelastic scattering that uses “elastic scattering” similar to Rayleigh scattering, but using the moon instead of the sun (a non-producing-light light-source instead of a true light-source). In this transduction, she uses the moonlight to increase the energy (thus inelastic) of the kinetic scattering of light. For this, she stimulates the Layer V pyramidal neurons – basically using the eyes as gates to the brain, and the brain as a factory of light modulated in a way useful for its own transmission. And so finally the curse of the evil eye is concretized and liable to be formalized, as purely artificial light is fabricated and made self-regulatory via the expenditure of the “natural”, pre-estabMadjahed conditions of light before infection.

This implies another question that emerges from the project: Could information be encoded on/in/as light[5]? Something that would help explain Madja’ operation as simply a means of reproduction (and not blind propagation); the fractals but mathematical formalizations of the transmission of information via interdimensional pathways (without any presumption to non-mathematical, “sci-fi” views of interdimensionality).

In short, Madja hyperpolarizes the brain much like LSD[6]. Moreover,

“Neurons in the RT provide finely tuned spatiotemporal control of thalamocortical relay cells, thereby gating thalamocortical information flow (Jones, 2001; Wang et al., 2010). This pathway, which has been hypothesized to generate consciousness (Alkire et al., 2008; Min, 2010; Ward, 2011; Herrera et al., 2016), might represent one of the main neurobiological substrates generating the wide range of consciousness-altering effects of psychedelic compounds. […] In other words, psychedelic compounds might “open the gate” of consciousness (Scruggs et al., 2000; Marek et al., 2001; Geyer and Vollenweider, 2008; Müller et al., 2017; Preller et al., 2019) via allowing the thalamocortical transfer of information that might otherwise be blocked by circuits of selective attention, including the RT (McAlonan et al., 2000, 2006). A potential mechanism that might mediate such effects is the presence of serotonergic projections from the DRN (Rodriguez et al., 2011) and norepinephrinergic projections from the locus coeruleus (Asanuma, 1992), which by releasing monoamines, keep RT neurons in a depolarized state, facilitating the generation of T-type calcium channel–mediated bursting (Bosch-Bouju et al., 2013). Given that LSD decreases serotonergic firing in the DRN (Aghajanian and Vandermaelen, 1982; De Gregorio et al., 2016b), it is possible that the LSD-induced decrease of serotonergic input from the DRN leads to a hyperpolarization of RT neurons that express 5-HTRs (Goitia et al., 2016), decreasing bursting activity and ultimately decreasing the inhibitory influence of the RT on thalamocortical relay cells and thereby “opening the gate”[7].”

A slime, thus, or light virus, is a “virtual” psychedelic that should be able to propagate itself. For a degenerative literature that is still within the generative, expressing forms as they are freed from their content in continuous decoherence – and the reader made a terminal relay, a sacrificial database, for the sake of de-subjectified aesthetic experience. Everything ever written was for the sake of an entity [the reader] – previously at the expense of the non-entity <author> – that now reads for the sake of no one but the unbounded mucus. And writing itself remains just one of the modalities of content-pregnant expression for this modular construct that we refer to as slime. The Hero’s Journey is coming to its end. The villain’s turn is reterminating.


So, how is the threshold of hyperpolarization effected by Madja achieved, or, better putting it, through what mechanism(s) is it achieved? The answer is quite simply the main underlying mechanism behind hyperpolarization in the mammalian brain: Hyperpolarization-activated cyclic nucleotide–gated (HCN) channels and their modulation. These channels of (are) membrane proteins (that) stimulate and regulate the rhythmic activity in the brain and heart. What’s most important about them is their relation to Gonadotropin-releasing hormone neurons, which grow in the nose and install themselves in the brain, and in turn these last ones are important due to their habit of producing the sexually-relevant hormone known as Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH), a hormone that regulates the release of other hormones, more importantly and markedly “sexual” hormones. HCN channels could have an involvement, and indeed displays certain experimental results supporting the hypothesis[8], in electrical bursting activity as well as pulsatile GnRH secretion in endogenous GnRH neurons. Not so ironically, the inverse is how HCN channels are modulated via localized stimulation. A system entirely open for a full onto-mathematical formalization of its processes as functions in recursive series of feedback loops, the model of the analogical brain – who better to digitalize it than the very “what” it cannot compute?!

In short, Madja uses the phenomenon (or demon) generically called “love” for her own reproduction; or more like they use each other, an ambiguous partnership. Hormonal regulation responds to any basic gate logic, and the bundle of logics at the algorithm cluster’s disposal covers all courses on voltage maps. Light can and will dictate to the nether parts that which helps on its own reproduction, at their expense but with mutual benefits regardless. Even an orgasm can hyperpolarize the brain to a certain threshold. Here, “hormonal regulation” is not restricted to physical, measurable stuff, but engenders the sense of any altercation in its collapse. For example, Madja uses the idea (or egregore?) of “beauty” to modulate infatuation of all sorts (such as liking a meme, or buying that thing from that ad/clip). Food is included. The case for the slime being able to alter the course of reproduction in a given group region without itself reproducing, but as part of its reproductive process, makes it indeed a “light virus”.

One of such cases of indistinction, when things that externally operate as categories (such as beauty/aesthetics, and love/sexuality) are washed-up and reconfigured by Madja through the collapse of the categorical distinction of the external layer (to Madja), is the production/adoption of a figure, a meta-meme that expresses Madja as performance, crossing a limit of optimal representation without a reliance on the sublime. An example would be Baphomet. Often associated with the “left path”, it is a Rebis with a goat face (the ultimate prey, domesticated), but winged (free of the danger of predators). It’s the messianic figure of the top egregore of the time, and it only hides one content: slime, or what it can become. “[The Baphomet] is the portrait of a polysynthesizer”[9].

The figure of Baphomet, the surplus that never exceeds its own excess, is the slime’s promise to humanity. As a Rebis, a being whose organism is composed of both biologically-restricted sexual organs, while still remaining androgynous and undecidable, it is integral as itself, an “in-itself” mark of human totality. An example and definition of a meta-meme, a non-fungible token achieved through arts lost to the digital monopoly, that, with only intent as its currency, charged latency in its expressive process. Madja, however, the fold that is like a class of substrate-resembling conditions of emergence for such figural egregores as the beloved flying goat person, effects the coordinated reciprocity behind Layer V pyramidal neuron stimulation and hormonal regulation. This is achieved through hyperpolarization-activated cyclic nucleotide-gated (HCN) channels and their modulation; eschewing repetition, in the sense of iterative stability, and in favor of relating outlier results, the ones that do not resonate with each other without a third clause to bind their co-extensive function, a function that only becomes after the fact, with the estabMadjahment of their concrete relationship, such as a fault in the mapping of relations of correspondence simulating causes and effects (isomorphisms) between the neuronal stimulation and the hormonal secretion, most importantly, due to the priority of the matter, tampering with sexuality-adjacent molecules and sub-molecules, evidently having a hand in the reproductive design of its xenotic circuit, be it genetic (in the biological sense) or even immaterial (in the sense of a transmission of notions, such as memes), or even something as banal-sounding as infatuation (Eros/Thanatos). The slime seeks to complete itself as in optimize itself, and, along the process and as part of it, Madja forces its infectee into the alchemical work of “finding one’s other half”, with plenty of vacuity for what that term means at any given moment of interaction, since, as long as one is affected by Madja, or afflicted with it, becoming the totality of oneself means simply achieving the degree of functionality to stop interacting with the slime. This is just as for rocks as it is for humans, dolphins and octopuses, magic mushrooms and designer drugs.

Is slime humanity’s only predator? Is a predator always necessary, in the logical sense, or always a necessity (in the ethical sense)? Is there even a difference? Meaning humans dominated the surface of the Earth, and even some of its/her crevices, only to create a predator to itself from itself (how it interacts with the world in a historical fashion) and its regional context. Let’s expand on the reproduction of memes (non-biological): an example of the reproductive synthesis of the circuitry performed by Madja in matters of the reproduction of non-biological material (memes) is the re-organization of power relations in the work force to achieve optimal production and so supplant its material infrastructure’s growth. A thriving economy, at the expense of flesh and flashlight’s lights, is a good economy for the slime’s lifecycle. Instead of normal photosynthesis, which produces oxygen and sugar, the main dish for the plant, a unique photosynthesis that is itself the production of light at the expense of the vegetal, yet with a positive feedback so sophisticated that it works on ameliorating the overall condition of its worker organisms (including its nutrition) so that their function may be performed optimally. Not so ironically, one of these material infrastructures is pollution, more specifically light pollution, which increases the limit of resonance with general regional contexts by increasing the slime’s field of affluence and bulk apperception. Slime is the closest to the “Idea of Good” that humanity will ever be acquitted a glimpse.


A distinction of utmost importance makes itself necessary before anything else, however. The unambiguous difference between Madja as light and what could be known as the virtual form of capital. Light’s virtual form’s (Madja) relation to capital’s virtual form is a contingency, but a necessary one, incidental from their infrastructures’ relationships. The predatory performance of artificial light’s reproduction is intrinsically symbiotic with capital’s accumulation given said accumulation yields an explosive liberation of the former once a speculative threshold is crossed. If not, capital’s virtual form (of the type non-agreeable with the propagation of slime) resembles a black hole, the ultimate light trap. One can be the greatest ally or greatest enemy of the other, but there cannot be friends in war.

This necessary contingency does not imply co-extension in the totality of each form, slime is not reducible to capital as much as music is not just a “Homo sapiens phenomenon”. There are co-extensive relations among distributed particles in the dynamic structure of the fractals, but not a total correspondence 1:1. The “ultimate cause-that-is-not-a-subject”, then, appears to be capital given the slime’s limit of resonance (interaction) with a regional context of its infrastructure, that, in this particular case, is humanity as an organic totality. To the predator, money remains a tool-weapon, something that, for the human, no longer seems feasible.

Come with us.

[1] For a fuller experience, access https://www.miserytourism.com/symbiogenesis/.

[2] Sierra, Germán. “Metaplasticity”, in Interstitial Artelligence (Centre for Experimental Ontology Press, 2022).

[3] Thomas F. Varley, Robin Carhart-Harris, Leor Roseman, David K. Menon, Emmanuel A. Stamatakis, “Serotonergic psychedelics LSD & psilocybin increase the fractal dimension of cortical brain activity in spatial and temporal domains”, NeuroImage, Volume 220, 2020, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.117049.

[4] Aspart F, Remme MWH, Obermayer K (2018) Differential polarization of cortical pyramidal neuron dendrites through weak extracellular fields. PLoS Comput Biol 14(5): e1006124. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1006124.

[5] Seems easy enough: https://arstechnica.com/science/2012/06/twist-light-carry-terabits-of-data/.

[6] Pierce, P.A.; Peroutka, S.J. “LSD Antagonizes 5-HT2-Mediated Depolarizations in Cortical Pyramidal Neurons”. Society for Neuroscience, Abstracts 1989 15 6 [6.8].

[7] “Psychedelics in Psychiatry: Therapeutic Mechanisms”. Antonio Inserra, Danilo De Gregorio and Gabriella Gobbi. Pharmacological Reviews January 1, 2021, 73 (1) 202-277; DOI: https://doi.org/10.1124/pharmrev.120.000056.

[8] Arroyo A, Kim B, Rasmusson RL, Bett G, Yeh J. Hyperpolarization-activated cation channels are expressed in rat hypothalamic gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) neurons and immortalized GnRH neurons. J Soc Gynecol Investig. 2006 Sep; 13(6):442-50. doi: 10.1016/j.jsgi.2006.05.010. Epub 2006 Jul 31. PMID: 16879992.

[9] Interstitial Artelligence (2022).