internet and printed; there were about forty of them.
I picked one, and each of the students took one. I told them I wanted a story by the end of the hour. I sat down and wrote “Weariness” on my portable Olympia typewriter, clacking with two fingers, 120 words per minute sans typos as I’d been doing for something like 50 years at that point…as they labored around the big table with their electronic doodads.
It was my state of mind at the time. I was not well. I did not like being at the convention.
Weariness
V ery near the final thaw of the Universe, the last of them left behind, the last three of the most perfect beings who had ever existed, stood waiting for the transitional moment. The neap tide of all time. The eternal helix sang its silent song in stone; and the glow of What Was to Come had bruised itself to a ripe plumness.
The ostren fanned itself. Melancholia had shortened it, one entire set of faculties could do nothing but sigh. And it had grown uncommonly warm for her, in sight of the end.
The velv could not contain his trepidation, peering out around the perplexing curvature of space.
But the tismess, that being who had summoned the helix, knew boldness was required, here and now at the final moments. And it stood boldly forth, waiting for the inevitable. All three—there were no others—were at the terminus of uncountable multiple trillions of eons, and weary.
Heaviness hung, a dire swaddling.
“What is there to fear?” the tismess said, rather more nastily than it had intended. Reify , it had thought, urgently.
Heaviness hung, undiminished.
“What is there to fear?” Again, trying to flense the tone of nastiness, chagrined at its incivility.
The velv whimpered and stared at the great helix, receptors clouding as the brightness fattened. The point of alarm had been reached and abandoned long since. “I am the last,” it said.
“As is each of us,” thought the ostren. “We are, each of us, you and you each, we are, each of us, the end of the line. Out of time, all time, the last. But why are you frightened?”
“Because…it is the end. The question at last answered. There will be no more. No more I, no more you, no more of any living species. Does that not terrify you?”
“Yes,” thought the ostren. “Yes. Yes, it does.”
The tismess was silent.
And the great helix solidified, its colors steadied, and the last three stared as only they were able, looking into the future, for the past and present were now gone, looking to see what would overwhelm them as they were vaporized, gone like their kind, gone forever, not even motes, not even memories. And they saw, the three last, absolutely perfect, beings; they saw what was to come.
“Oh, how good,” whispered the velv, her tissues roiling most golden. “How wonderful. And I’m not afraid…not now.”
The ostren made the sound that very little children had once made when they had truly learned where the puppy farm is. But there was no fear, either, in the ostren.
For the tismess, as it was all coming to an end, suddenly there was what there was to be seen.
What was on the other side.
Before him, immediately before him, was the darkness. Heavy, breathing yet silent; it seemed to go on forever. But that was the other side. And beyond that darkness was something: something he could call the “other side.” Could he see it, could he even imagine it, there had to be another side beyond this side. He reveled in the moment of knowledge that all there had ever been would go on, would start anew perhaps, would roll on through the final night, no matter how long. There was an “other side.”
But, of course, in truth, what he was seeing was only another aspect of the only darkness; and not even darkness; nothing.
What he was seeing was every thought he had ever had, every song he had ever sung, everyone he had ever known, every moment of his trillion aeons never knowing he had nowhere else to go, all and
I picked one, and each of the students took one. I told them I wanted a story by the end of the hour. I sat down and wrote “Weariness” on my portable Olympia typewriter, clacking with two fingers, 120 words per minute sans typos as I’d been doing for something like 50 years at that point…as they labored around the big table with their electronic doodads.
It was my state of mind at the time. I was not well. I did not like being at the convention.
Weariness
V ery near the final thaw of the Universe, the last of them left behind, the last three of the most perfect beings who had ever existed, stood waiting for the transitional moment. The neap tide of all time. The eternal helix sang its silent song in stone; and the glow of What Was to Come had bruised itself to a ripe plumness.
The ostren fanned itself. Melancholia had shortened it, one entire set of faculties could do nothing but sigh. And it had grown uncommonly warm for her, in sight of the end.
The velv could not contain his trepidation, peering out around the perplexing curvature of space.
But the tismess, that being who had summoned the helix, knew boldness was required, here and now at the final moments. And it stood boldly forth, waiting for the inevitable. All three—there were no others—were at the terminus of uncountable multiple trillions of eons, and weary.
Heaviness hung, a dire swaddling.
“What is there to fear?” the tismess said, rather more nastily than it had intended. Reify , it had thought, urgently.
Heaviness hung, undiminished.
“What is there to fear?” Again, trying to flense the tone of nastiness, chagrined at its incivility.
The velv whimpered and stared at the great helix, receptors clouding as the brightness fattened. The point of alarm had been reached and abandoned long since. “I am the last,” it said.
“As is each of us,” thought the ostren. “We are, each of us, you and you each, we are, each of us, the end of the line. Out of time, all time, the last. But why are you frightened?”
“Because…it is the end. The question at last answered. There will be no more. No more I, no more you, no more of any living species. Does that not terrify you?”
“Yes,” thought the ostren. “Yes. Yes, it does.”
The tismess was silent.
And the great helix solidified, its colors steadied, and the last three stared as only they were able, looking into the future, for the past and present were now gone, looking to see what would overwhelm them as they were vaporized, gone like their kind, gone forever, not even motes, not even memories. And they saw, the three last, absolutely perfect, beings; they saw what was to come.
“Oh, how good,” whispered the velv, her tissues roiling most golden. “How wonderful. And I’m not afraid…not now.”
The ostren made the sound that very little children had once made when they had truly learned where the puppy farm is. But there was no fear, either, in the ostren.
For the tismess, as it was all coming to an end, suddenly there was what there was to be seen.
What was on the other side.
Before him, immediately before him, was the darkness. Heavy, breathing yet silent; it seemed to go on forever. But that was the other side. And beyond that darkness was something: something he could call the “other side.” Could he see it, could he even imagine it, there had to be another side beyond this side. He reveled in the moment of knowledge that all there had ever been would go on, would start anew perhaps, would roll on through the final night, no matter how long. There was an “other side.”
But, of course, in truth, what he was seeing was only another aspect of the only darkness; and not even darkness; nothing.
What he was seeing was every thought he had ever had, every song he had ever sung, everyone he had ever known, every moment of his trillion aeons never knowing he had nowhere else to go, all and
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