6. “runs parallel dimensions on a single environment.”
“Shoot!” he shot, simultaneously donning a worn sweater and flicking on his shades.
I considered the best way to put forward Sha-Rronne’s uncanny predicament, and took some time to form the phrase. Jai-I got impatient; he was never known for being longsuffering. In fact, most that know him have tales to tell of his cold icy behaviour and tempestuous tantrums. He’s a hard lover and a heartless fucker. But he could be nice. He somehow warmed up to my presence; but then again, I have a supernatural talent of eerily getting into the heart and mind of others. Though…I think I have no malice for anyone…except when I consciously hate a character in a game. And I have to say that I do play a lot of games.
I’ve seen Jai-I at his worst. I’ve seen the verbal onslaughts with Trekz; it ain’t a pretty sight. I’ve seen how he hammers his subordinates as CEO of Jai-I Incorporated when he is intolerant of their imbecility. I’ve seen how he twists and tortures his creation; more often he is unpleasant and reacting only to his own lack of creative security. With the high standards he punishes himself masochistically, and his morbid fascination with narcissistic qualities, coupled with the plain and brutal fact that the work of others, including his father’s, is more often than not sublime, Jai-I, in divine comparison, only a young god in the making, frequently flushes in flagrant frustration. I am a demigod on the other hand…I’ll like to think; though I still refer to myself as human.
In the eyes of the beings he creates, I suspect they view Jai-I more as an avenging evil rather than a caring paternal benevolence. Jai-I gets a hard-on seeing them suffer. Sometimes he makes love to Trekz, and his harem simultaneously, to video clips of mortals tormented in the hell he made for them. The moans of orgasm mixed with the screams of agony - another hit for DJ Trekz’z career.
Other times he skewers them, impaling them in perpetual kavadi. His pride and arrogance may not admit this, but for sure, Jai-I suffers an unresolved resentment towards Jahr his foster father, one that was conceived a long time ago when he was still a human boy.
As for his quarrels with Trekz, it can be quite comical and entertaining, likened to a retro sci-fi show. They fire each other with plastic lazer guns, the rays destroying everything except for the two divine characters. Other times they fling curses at each other, controlling the elements to discharge awful mayhem at the surrounding. But they always make up. I have to mention that Trekz is a hermaphrodite, a shape-shifter of sexes. You may be familiar with some of his religious and fabled effigies: blue-skinned, green-skinned, eight-armed; but he is much more to many others. Most importantly, Trekz is a god of love. Though he gets under everybody’s skin, it is impossible to hate him for long. He will charm you with Phileo, seduce you with Eros, and unconditionally accept you with Agape.
Trekz has a cock, Trekz has a cunt; Trekz has both cock and cunt. He can give and receive concurrently. But just like the heavens beyond your mind's eye, Trekz’z genitals go beyond male and female. I will leave you with this to get back to the story. But have no worries, no apprehensions, I will return to the topic of enlightenment that is so much Trekz’z androgynous glory.
“Try this out.” Jai-I said, since I could not mouth Sha-Rronne’s dilemma.
“What is it?” I replied, distracted by Jai-I’s action. He removed his shades and handed it to me.
I knew that instant it was some new project he was working on. One of countless he had going all at once.
“I haven’t got a name for it yet, but it’s pretty cool.”
“What is it?” I asked again.
“Try it on,” he repeated, “and for goodness sake, it’s not gonna bite,” he added with sarcastic spice, his intolerance and impatience bubbling out of him.
The sunglasses looked very normal. It was an Oakley Jai-I had modified over. In the transcendence, there followed the rise and fall of businesses. New companies came, old ones crumbled; but there were some from old-Earth that made it to the future. Brand names like Apple and Ferrari are still icons today as they were yesterday, albeit drastic changes in their business model to cater for a society of ultra-instant gratification. You can have anything you want, anytime you want. Even more, you can make everything you think. Super-duper competitive industry; no more are companies competing with other companies, they’re competing with individuals. Apple now, I must say, is only Steve Jobs and a few number twos. He’s an electronic god; nevertheless, so are most of his ex-employees.
I fitted the eyewear to my face, the frame resting comfortably on my ears and nose, and immediately the room we were in was different…though still the same.
I removed it. Jai-I had a smirk ready. “Overlapping technology,” he boasted, “runs parallel dimensions on a single environment.”
I put it on again. A monster crashed through the walls to give me a heart attack. I took it off, gasping; Jai-I laughed. I tried it on again; a club dancing. Chic chicks in revealing outfits grooved to The Nobodies in DJ Trekz’z private room.
I flipped it upon my temple. Jai-I handed me a handphone with unsightly wires jutting out and dangling to a power source. “It’s a prototype, but you can record the alternate universes in it and playback to your liking fantasy and mood for adventure. I hope to perfect it…if I can find the time,” he joked in a self-depreciating manner, “either incorporating the memory space into the eyewear itself or on an external device like this Nokia.
“I think option two is easier, otherwise I have to have storage in the frame. It’s gonna be ugly if there’s some alien hardware sticking out of the glasses…but then again that could be a fashion statement. Anyway, option two,” he reasoned aloud, “besides, you know how everyone just loves to have something cool to hold in their hand.
“I think it’s so strange that we don’t need to have any gadget to operate and access the multiverses, but yet we crave for material. Says something about our species, doesn’t it?”
“I couldn’t agree more.” I added, “We are living in a material world and I am a material girl,” quoting the pop queen.
“Or, spirits in the material world.” Jai-I interjected with that The Police song, throwing the discourse into new light.
Jai-I and I are fans of philosophy. We can debate the whole night through. We’ve even encoded our private dimensional space in Syurga. Technically, there are only two entry points, one from the closet in my abode, and the other from Jai-I’s oven at his home. But of course we can enter by remote spilogical (spirit biology) password from anywhere.
It’s a simple interpolated spatial reality in ordinary 3D. In its spartan setting, it has two chairs, a table, and free flow Starbucks coffee. Due to its simplicity, we named it Sparta. Entering only requires the spirit mind, which conceptualizes an image of being that is then mirrored in the molecules that make up this analogous world. I can therefore be in another part of the galaxy but exist simultaneously in Sparta. Omniscience is as common as caffeine.
“Everything has to take form, otherwise it’s just a massive void of nothingness,” I said, “Eternity cannot exist if it’s everything. Opportunity cost. It has to choose to be something, and when it does, it is not another thing. But good thing is that we can be more and more things all at once. An eternity of eternities.” I said.
“You always have to fucking complicate things up,” Jai-I butted, “the simplest explanation is that it looks cooler to be something rather than nothing, to hold something compared to nothing. What’s the use of being this invisible god floating around in space?” he mocked, “I’ll rather be this cool dude you see in front of you anytime.” Jai-I displayed his arrogance like a peacock and laughed out loud.
“If Nirvana was merely nothingness…pooi!” he coughed, “where would all the glam be, the designer brands, the hot toys, fast cars, luxury yachts, teleporting spacecrafts, etcetera, etcetera? Where would be the bling-bling, the bootie shakin…hahaha?”
He was right. We weren’t disagreeing on any counts, but I just felt a zest of envy that he was describing it better than I could. It tasted like I was biting into a slice of lemon.
“Let’s take this to Sparta; there are other things I wanna talk about here.” I suggested.
“Ok,” Jai-I agreed.
We mentally punched in our password and we were sitting at the table in our simple universe. At that same moment, we were also on the verge of another conversational topic in Trekz’z room.
Jai-I remarked immediately upon appearing in Sparta, “We have to do something with this place. It’s beginning to look like a shame. And it’s fucking boring too with just the two of us.”
A spark of genius hit me, I had an eureka, the light bulb blinking, or more like a high-def TV with its wide array of colours. “Why don’t we open a Starbucks franchise, and we can invite those likeminded in. I’m sure we can come up with some sort of an agreement with those Americans.”
“Yah, it’ll be quite a cool marketing campaign for them,” Jai-I contributed his thoughts. He was getting excited with the idea. “Intellectual debate and coffee go together, caffeine spurs the brain cells.”
We started planning our modus operandi, our business model. “This is gonna be one fucking interesting dimension we are talking about. We can even franchise the working model to others. Wow, this is great!”
Back in Syurga, I said, “I met someone in ZOOL.A.ND. She told me something interesting. Was just wondering if you could enlighten me?”
“Sure, go ahead,” he replied.
“Have you heard of anyone born in ZOOL.A.ND?”
“Countless times. It happens every nanosecond.”
“What about those that...er...just wake up, without a childhood or past?”
“It happens,” he shook it off casually.
“Would you know the creators?” I questioned.
“I could; or it could be me. I’ve done lots of stuff like that; but then again, I may not, unless I dig. ZOOL.A.ND, as you know, is created with anarchy in mind. It’s my experiment; I don’t hold much control of what goes on in there. I created, and opened it up to all the gods in my database, and advertised it as a wild land of freedom so that I have a place to go to to feel inspired. There are a zillion things going on that I could not have thought of. Cool thing is that it’s all caught in my mainframe for future projects.”
“So you can trace someone if you wanted to.” I persisted.
“Of course I can, but maybe not to full comprehension.”
“Meaning?”
“It depends on how the creator or inventor designed the being. If it’s clearly within ZOOL.A.ND, then I shouldn’t have any problem; however if the creation is a hybrid of ZOOL.A.ND and other programming platforms, it could be more difficult, especially depending on how technically adept and agile the maker is. It could be some hot-shot deity behind for which I’m no match, or even from an unknown portal…since I advertised ZOOL.A.ND far and wide, transmitting its waves across celestial zones.”
I sat silent. Pondering.
Jai-I horsed in, “You got de hots for someone, eh?”
I sat silent. Pondering.
“She must be some kinda goddess to get you all gentlemanly. Careful, she may be charming you.”
“I don’t mind” I replied cunningly, my hands crafting the shape of her hips in thin air.
“Ha ha.”
“Thing is, she said she’s stuck in ZOOL.A.ND. She says she can’t exist outside of it. Sure, ZOOL.A.ND is great, with all respect, it’s got a zillion things going on…but it’s still just in ZOOL.A.ND.”
“You just want to fuck her out of ZOOL.A.ND. Fuck her in Syurga, I’ll say. Heavenly.” Jai-I closed his eyes, fantasizing inside while he puffed on a cigar.
“Well, I can fuck her in ZOOL.A.ND anytime,” I prided.
“Yah, but you wanna fuck her out of it too. Lover boy.” Jai-I slid on the Oakley. After a moment’s silence, he added, “I’ll see what I can do after figuring this fucking memory system out,” he tapped on the shades and picked up his dissected Nokia, and escaped to an alternate parallel reality.