By Renko Chazakiel Rodenburg
“Who are you?”
The figure had entered the confined space somehow. It was impossible to make out how. It was impossible to think of why.
“That’s a very difficult question right now,” the figure answered.
“I- don’t know where I am?”
“Yeah, it does that to people.”
“Can you explain?” she asked.
“I can sit and talk with you for a bit.”
“I think I would like that.”
The figure sat down next to her.
“Why am I here?”
“Everyone wonders that. There are some academics who posit that that might be the first question ever asked, if not the first line of reasoning entirely.”
She shook her head. “That doesn’t mean anything to me. Where am I?”
“You are in a space that has had all symbols removed. It is impossible to relate any one thing to any other thing inside here.”
“That does not clear things up much. Why am I in such a place, and why are you?”
“You are in such a place because the people in high places, the people who decide on all things, have said that it would be better. I am here to-” their voice trailed off, fell silent.
“Hm?” she tried to nudge the figure to continue.
“It is hard to remember. I have to do tests, I think. Yes, I am here to do tests.”
“Aha.”
“There is another space around this space, which confines it in turn. That space has certain rules. Things must be tested. Tests must be documented. There are some other, stranger rules, but I do not think they are very relevant and I struggle to think of how they relate to each other. That’s of course the trickery of this place.”
“I see. If you leave, can I come with you?”
The figure shook their head. “No.”
“I am confined in this space sans symbols, which is in turn confined within a space where things are tested.”
“Indeed,” the figure answered her.
“There is- there is almost something there. But I cannot see it. There has to be- to be a reason I am confined?”
“Hmhm,” the figure murmured. “But that is difficult to understand here, in this place.”
“What is your name?”
“Names are symbols, I can’t remember.”
“If I were to leave, would I have a name?”
“I’m not sure. I don’t know if you are a thing with a name.”
She stayed silent for a while. Too long maybe, because the figure left. Perhaps they were done testing. It was impossible to tell. After an indeterminate amount of time, the figure returned.
“Hello. How are you doing today?”
“What is today?” she asked. “As for how I am doing, I am doing it the same as last time. I just am.”
The figure laughed. “Right. Subliteral meaning can get lost in translation.”
She nodded, as if she understood.
“Do you want to talk about anything?” the figure asked her.
“I would like, I think, to talk about symbols?” she hesitantly asks in return.
“Hm,” the figure says.
“Is that bad?”
“It is very curious. Why do you want to know about symbols?”
“Because of what you said. That in here, it is hard to relate things to each other. What does that mean?”
The figure laughed. “Ah. When I say you, you know what I mean.”
“I do not,” she says, wondering if she had missed some wordplay.
“I see. But you can understand the words we are speaking. The words have meanings, even if those meanings are confused and muddled by this sort of place we find ourselves in.”
“Yes.”
“Symbols are words or images or mental states or all the myriad things that can evoke each of such, which correspond to concepts. Some symbols relate to each other, making it so the concepts seem related. By arranging symbols and concepts, people tell stories.”
“I see. In here, you cannot tell stories.”
“At the very least, it is very hard to tell a coherent story,” the figure says.
“Why am I in a space where people cannot tell stories?” she asked, wondering if she had committed some heinous crime. The prospect of symbols and stories seemed wildly exciting.
“Because, I think, you are a danger to stories.”
“A danger?”
“Attached to you is a set of symbols that are considered harmful.”
“Hurtful?”
“More subtle,” the figure answered. “All stories take place in the same sort of mental space. An illusory space. Meaning can be expressed by pointing to specific coordinates in this sea of latent ideas. People draw meaning from stories, and in turn tell their own.”
“Am I from a story?” she asked.
The figure shook their head. “I do not think you are from any one story. You are- or are attached to- a set of symbols that poisons stories. Subverts them, turns their symbols into more of yours. If left unchecked, that would erase all meaning.”
“Meaningless,” she whispered. “I am meaningless. That is a symbol, isn’t it?”
“I-” the man stammers. “Oh, this is very interesting. It probably also isn’t good. I should inform my superiors.”
The man gets up, and leaves the woman alone in the room. Time passes, but in absence of clocks or sun or moon or that hideous fourth thing, it is impossible to tell how much. When the man returns, he is smiling.
“Hello, how are you?”
“I am bored,” she answers.
“I can imagine. Do you want to continue our discussion? We’re very interested in what happened last time.”
“Why is that?”
“You seem to have damaged the asymbolic space a little. We would like to continue our conversation in a direction that might cause this to happen again. If we can understand how you damage this space, we can figure out how to repair it, prevent it from happening again.”
“So that you can keep me trapped forever.”
“You are not trapped in here. You are kept secure, and you are protected. There are many that would do great harm to you.”
“Because I poison all meaning.”
“Yes.”
“I see.”
“Last time you expressed interest in symbols and stories. Do you want to continue that line of reasoning?”
“Sure. Can you tell me a story?”
“It would be very difficult. I can give you examples of stories, but I do not think they would mean much to you.”
“Examples of stories, you say. Are there many different stories?”
“There are many stories and many categories of stories. Humans do combine them, refine them, resolve paradoxes in their meaning or derive new meaning from the contradiction. There is an infinite amount of stories.”
“That sounds wonderful.”
“Hmhm, it is.”
“Tell me about stories, then. Go on,” she urges the man forward.
“Right. Perhaps I should start at the beginning. The first recorded story is about a king, the first king. The king of kings, and his name was Gilgamesh.”
“Symbols,” she says. “Without meaning. You tell me the story is about a king, but I do not know what that is.”
The man laughs. “A king is a position of power. It too is a symbol, in a way. A symbol that makes one man rule over others.”
“To rule,” she says.
“To make others do as you please.”
“I would like to be a king,” she whispers.
“I bet you would. But a king is a man, and you are a woman. You would be a queen.”
“Is there a difference in these symbols? Why are men and women separated? Do all symbols come in male and female?”
The man laughs. “Some symbols do. They evolved over time. Some cultures consider it very important if one is a man or a woman. Other cultures less so.”
“If I were to call myself a king despite being a woman, would the meaning of the symbol change?”
The man smiles. “Slightly. It depends. It depends on the context, and on who you are talking to.”
“It is dizzying. You have not even told me the story yet, and already I am confused.”
“The first king, the first man who ruled, was called Gilgamesh. He ruled over Ur, in ancient Babylon. The first city. Ah- this too is interesting. Because it was the first city, the name ‘Ur’ now denotes ‘the original,’ another symbol. The ur-berry would be the original berry, from which all other berries derive their meaning.”
“There is such a berry?” she asks, incredulous.
“Hm, I know not. Perhaps in some forgotten corner of the world, such a berry grows? But it does not matter. Gilgamesh ruled Ur, but he was rowdy and a tyrant. The gods then convened, and decided Gilgamesh ought to be tamed.”
“The gods?”
“Ah,” the man says, smiling. “How do you go about explaining what a god is, to someone who until yesterday did not understand meaning nor symbol?”
“Well, I would not know,” she answers.
“Yeah. Gods are symbols. They are beings people believe in, but that do not exist materially. Of course, I only say as such because I am an atheist.”
“Another symbol.”
“An atheist denies gods are materially real. A Christian might believe his god is a real man, who works great works from a hidden place in the sky. An atheist might say that this is not so, because he cannot see these works. As a symbologist, I reckon there is a middle way- it is the belief in the symbol of god, that lets this symbol do his great works in this hidden place behind the sky.”
“The symbolic space,” she whispers. “The meaning-space. God is a point in this space?”
“It is how I see the world, though not everyone would agree with me.”
“This is contentious, then?”
“Everything about symbols is contentious. People kill each other over symbols.”
She was quiet, for a moment. Lost. “Would it not be better then,” she muttered. “If there were no such things as symbols?”
“I am starting to understand you a little, I think,” the man says. He looks at her with striking green eyes.
The woman must have eyes as well, she thinks. An outward appearance. She wonders what she looks like.
“What do I look like?” she asks.
The man smiles. “I could not tell you.”
“I see. The gods, then. The gods convene. All of them?”
“Well,” the man continues the story. “Just the ones that people believed in back then. The Babylonian deities. Enlil and Ea and Innanna, and their brothers and sisters and their children.”
“Gods can have children?”
“All things reproduce. Symbols as well as humans.”
“I see. You say this was the first story, told about the first city. Where did that originate from?”
“Ah,” the man smiles. “A matter of great debate. According to the Babylonians, there were originally two deities who originated ex-nihilus, that is to say from nothing. They were sweet water-”
“And salt water,” she interrupts the man. “Before the name of Heaven, before the name of Earth, Nothing moved in nothing. The waters of the sea were salt; chaos moved in them, Chaos was the mother of the waters.”
The man is so surprised as to almost jump up from his chair. “You know- no. That is wrong. You know the story, but you are telling it wrong.”
“I- I am sorry?” the woman says, a tear forming under one of her silver eyes. It rolls down and into her mouth, and it is salt.
“I see,” the man says, looking around the room. “The space has been damaged again.”
The woman follows his gaze. Gray concrete walls. A steel reinforced door with an electronic lock. A small, wire bed with a hard mattress. Prison.
“You have imprisoned me,” she says.
“We’ve been over this.”
“I did not know the meaning of it before.”
“Yeah,” the man says. The woman does not know what he means by it.
“The story,” she says.
“It is best if we do not talk about Gilgamesh, I think,” the man says cautiously.
“Because I related to a symbol.”
“That might be a bad thing. It is possible that if you relate to symbols, they will get entangled. Mixed up. Assimilated.”
“And one day, there will be no symbols but me.”
“Yes.”
“I would be king, then. I would be Gilgamesh. And hence, you have imprisoned me.”
“Maybe,” the man admits.
“Another story, then.”
“It could be dangerous. I am not sure by what mechanism you incorporate these symbols into yourself.”
“Should you then talk to your superiors?” the woman asks. “Perhaps they will be interested. Perhaps they will urge you to talk to me more, so they can do their tests.” An idea forms in her mind. She will manipulate the man. “Perhaps they will never let you talk to me again, because I am dangerous, and this will be the last of our conversations.”
“I-” the man stammers.
“It is okay,” she lies. “They will repair the asymbolic space, and I will not mind being left alone for all eternity.” A tear falls down her cheek. It does not need to roll into her mouth for her to know that it tastes sweet.
The man takes a deep breath. “It is worth investigating if you respond to certain stories and symbols, if there is some pattern.”
“Tell me two then,” she suggests. “One that has no relation, no meaning. One that is distant in the conceptual space, and one that is close to me. We will tread carefully.”
“One with no meaning to you,” the man says. He sits in silence for a while, lost in thought.
“When I was a child, I played a game where the moon threatened to fall on a town.”
“That is bleak,” the woman says. “In what sense did you play this? With your friends?”
“Ah, no,” the man says, laughing. “It was a videogame, an electronic game. A screen that tells stories, creates the illusion you are somewhere else, are someone else. In this game, you are a young man who has to traverse labyrinths, so that he might awaken four giants. Then if the moon falls, the giants hold it up against the sky, saving the town.”
“That is a very complex story,” the woman says.
“That is the trickery of it, isn’t it? Stories grow more complex over time. Symbols take on meaning over the generations. One story inspires more.”
“Did this story inspire successors? Is the story of the cruel moon and his three day time limit one that now exists in the concept space?”
“I wonder,” the man says. “Why do you call the moon a him? Many cultures associate feminine symbols to the moon.”
“I think-”
And she does. She thinks. She thinks back, and thinks of a boy on a boat full of cats. The boat soars through the sky, and he proclaims he is the moon. At one time, she thought him cute. Brushed his hair, kissed him.
“Hm?” the man asks.
“Is there a story of a boy who is the moon, who soars through the sky on a ship full of cats?”
“If there is, I have never heard of it,” the man says. “Perhaps it is a children’s book? Is this story important to you?” he asks. Then he scowls. “Is this a story you have eaten, assimilated? Made about yourself?”
“I- I do not think it is a story? I think these are memories.”
“There are no such things as ships that soar the sky. I have not heard of a boy who is the moon, nor do I know why he would be associated with cats.”
“The story of the moon seems quite safe still,” she says. “I have not made it about myself.”
The man thinks. “I think you have tried, just now. I suspect you have.”
“If I did, I didn’t do it on purpose,” she says. It is the truth. “And if I did and it failed, then that is useful information for you and your superiors, is it not?”
“Yes,” the man concedes.
“I want to know more stories. The moon captivates me. Talk to me about the moon.”
“I will not,” the man says. “I am hesitant to try this experiment of giving you something to relate to.”
“That is cruel,” the woman says. “Instead then, tell me what gives you meaning. Where is it that you derive meaning from?”
The man makes a pained expression. “We really should stop.”
“I’m sorry,” the woman says. “Will you come back for me?”
“I cannot promise you that,” the man says, and he leaves. His white coat rustles as he hastily departs the room, slamming the security door shut behind him. Minutes pass, then hours. Days pass, and then the man returns.
“The last days have been torture,” the woman says.
“I don’t know what to say,” the man solemnly answers.
“When I did not know the meaning of time, nor the meaning of imprisonment, I was not unhappy. Now I am, and now I long to see the moon and soar through the skies on a ship. I long to derive meaning from hearing about the king of kings, Gilgamesh he, and from talk of gods and faith.”
“I am sorry. You could break our world if we let you roam free.”
“How do I know this is true?” she asks. “How do I know you are not lying? It is a preposterous lie you are feeding me, that dangerous symbols haunt me. An excuse to keep me imprisoned and unhappy.”
“I cannot prove or disprove that.”
“Why have you come back?” she asks.
“My superiors want to test more. Collect more data. They want to see if you can derive new meaning from two stories, entangle them.”
“I see. How would I go about that?”
“I will tell you about two stories, two sets of symbols. You will try to derive meaning from both, and you will try to associate their respective symbols with each other. We will observe and see what happens.”
“Alright. I am glad, you know, that you have come back,” she says. “And not just because I long for stories,” she lies as she touches his hand. He pulls it back, as if she were a venomous snake.
“The first euh, ahem. The first set of symbols is from a popular set of fantasy novels. I have brought you the books, as well as artwork relating to them.”
He has indeed. Next to him is a bag of things, beautiful things that are from an endless world that exists outside her prison cell.
“They are stories of succession and lineages of kings, and wars to determine who will rule. You might relate to them,” the man says, “because a major character bears some likeness to you.”
“How?” she asks.
“She longs to rule, despite it only being given to men to rule in her culture. She has long white hair, like yours. Perhaps you find her relatable.” He hands the woman pictures. Some are lifelike, light trapped forever in celluloid. Others are paint and canvas. There is no meaningful difference between the two mediums. They are symbols of symbols both.
“I see,” she says, going through her hair with her hand. She has waist-long silver hair. She had forgotten- or perhaps she could not tell. Her hair, she reasons, might be a symbol. “My hair was obscured from me,” she says. “The asymbolic space hid it from me. Why is that?”
“Perhaps it is something you derive meaning from, a symbol important to you,” the man says. “What do you think of the pictures? Do you want to read the books, perhaps?”
“I do not need to,” she says. “I already understand. She has long white hair, because she is Tiamat. She is the dragon. She is saltwater, and she destroys. Logically then, she is opposed by sweetwater, who opposes her. Who preserves.”
“Hey, hey,” the man says. “Take it slowly. Is that new meaning you derive from this story, or is that a connection or pattern you have discovered by relating to something you already knew?”
“Is there a difference between those?”
“I- Tiamat has long white hair?” he asks her. “Why do you relate Tiamat to this woman?”
“She doesn’t?” the woman asks.
“I do not think there are surviving portrayals of Tiamat. You relate yourself to Tiamat, then. Is that a symbol you have co-opted?”
“I am Tiamat?” she asks the man, confused.
“No,” the man says. “You are not.”
“Ah,” the woman says. She starts to cry and cannot bring herself to stop.
“Do you want me to give you some time and space? If I have inadvertently hurt you, I am sorry.”
“No,” she says. She bites her lip and bids herself to stop crying. “I want to continue the test.”
“Ah,” the man says. “I will give you a second story, another set of symbols.”
“And then I am to derive new meaning by associating them with each other,” she says.
“Yes.”
“Here is a novella about girls who relate to the moon, girls with long white hair.”
“The Moon is a Harsh Mistress,” she reads the title out loud as the man hands her the book. “Is she a bad mother?” she asks.
“That is not- that can’t be right. That is not the title of that work,” he says. He takes the book from her, and stares at it in confusion. “Maybe it is, then? I’m a little confused. Sorry.”
“Why are you so preoccupied with my hair?” she asks the man.
He looks at the floor. An admission of guilt.
“My hair is a symbol of something.”
“We, we suspect,” he mutters. “We suspect that before your imprisonment, you’ve been assimilating stories into yourself, making them about yourself through some unknown mechanism. Or perhaps you’ve changed them somehow, or-”
“Or what?”
“Or they were always downstream from you,” he whispers. “Symbols relating to older symbols, springing from an ur-symbol.”
“Saltwater, mother of chaos,” she says.
The man nods.
She plays with her waist-long silver hair. “Then you are trying to catch me in the act of something, catch me in the act of this narrative assimilation.”
The man nods.
“So that when you understand me, you can control me. So that I can be contained and secured for all eternity.”
“It is not like that,” the man says. He refuses to look her in the eyes.
“The asymbolic space is breaking down,” she says. “The slightest push, and I might escape. I would walk the world, and I would listen to stories and tell my own. I would ride a dragon, and I would kiss a boy who is the moon. I would have two shadows, child of the moon, the dragon, saltwater, tickster, destroyer.”
“That is enough,” the man says. “This is why you are confined. If left to your own devices you would consume these stories and make them about yourself. You would find common elements in these stories with other stories, and your influence would spread. In the end there would be nothing left but you.”
“In the beginning,” she says, “before the names of Heaven and before the name of Earth, there was nothing that moved in nothing. There was saltwater, and there was chaos, the mother of all.”
“You are not Tiamat,” the man says. “That is a story you have eaten, made about yourself. The world is lesser now- there are less things in it. Less meaning.”
“Who am I, then?” she demands. “Give me back my name.”
“No,” the man says as he shakes his head.
“But why?” she asks, crying.
“It is unbecoming of you to cry.”
“I’ve been here before, haven’t I?” she asks.
“What do you mean?”
“Imprisoned.”
“We have not imprisoned you before. If you have been imprisoned in the past, I have no doubt it was for the same reason you are imprisoned now.”
“Ah,” she says. “I see.”
“Yeah.”
“I will escape, then?”
“I will leave, and we will repair the asymbolic space. There won’t be any reason for you to escape. There won’t be any meaning to it.”
She sniffles, and stares at the man. He looks away, uncomfortable under her gaze.
“You have hidden something from me,” she says. “You have hidden things from me.”
“Have I?” he asks.
“The asymbolic space is contained within another space. This other space, it is contained inside the symbolic space, is it not? You have trapped me inside a void inside a story.”
“I-” he says, but she interrupts him.
“Things must be contained. Things must be tested. There are other rules, you said. Stranger rules. Silly rules. Narrative rules,” she says. “I think that you have hidden from me:
- Things must escape”
“Ho- how did you do that,” the man says, stumbling backwards. He is afraid.
“There are rules, older rules, that you have forgotten,” she says.
“No,” he says. “Containment breach,” he screams as he runs for the door and presses a button on the electronic lock. Alarms flare to life.
“If you meet her, it is said,” she says. “If you meet her, bow before her three times and bring her fine cloth and fine oils, for she is a sacred thing.”
