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Crash Admin

​by Ray Ogar, 2000

​

demo sits on a square of grass.

yes the sun is shining.

the humidity is rather raw.

and there is actually a ditch or stream near by.

most likely a stream though.

one in which the concrete has been stripped away like a

french lacy chocolate in a dry heat.

demo looks to the grass,

it does extend,

seemingly into infinity.

but, there might be hope.

he picks and plays with a few square inches of

dirt.

a small recess in the ground forms and underneath,

no, not under but coming up, is a small

hard

gray

patch

of concrete.

it is slowly returning.

slowly.

geologic time notions take a hold and

the patch is surfacing.

amazing.

before he sat in some perfect, auto realized supposed replication

of a shared reality,

now it is all erased and folded and degenerated into lush greenness.

demo saw the pixels erode.

he saw the protons and electrons stripped from their

light bouncy paths.

he realizes he has to start from the ground up.

all over.

maybe he can build this entire city again.

he'll start with the chatsubo anyway and

let the others and the other newly spawned ai's create the rest.

it's hard developing a universe and a system of rules and

laws for nature after doing it just 10 years ago.

hopefully this time around he'll backup his reality a little

better so it won't be so self sufficient,

maybe it will rely more on the possibility that others exist,

maybe that is,

maybe others do.

at least he has this small patch of concrete he can garden and

extrapolate.

a few of the right enzymes,

maybe a batch of ferrophilic bacteria and a new foundation can be

engineered from the raw earth around him.

he brushes the dirt off the small concrete patch.

it's actually a gray stoney box.

hmmm.

product?

something left from the corps?

a gift from some post apocalyptic past?

demo breaks the seal and opens the ark.

inside are several silvery packages,

somewhat reminding him of those static guard

bags computer components come in.

he opens one.

a few vials.

the first one has an inscription in biohazard red.

--trees?

--we manufacture those you know.

--you'll have to choose a texture though.

he opens another bag

--grass?

--we also manufacture that, but unfortunately it can only be bread once,

--and grown in small plots of 10ft by 10 ft,

--then you have to buy it again because of the gene licensing.

then another one is opened.

--concrete?

--concrete!

--we can grow that now.

--that's what hello kitty communism is all about.

--we give you happiness in a box, proton, electron, and neutron

--and 57 other varieties of sub atomic specie that you

--can assemble on your own, at your leisure.

--get started today!

demo digs through the box some more and removes a smaller,

enshelled package.

the top slides away revealing a lotus node with spindly

corpuscles resonating warmly within.

air.

nitrogen.

and oxygen specifically.

then a few hundred feet of webby bacterial spray explodes out of

the container like funny party goo,

the mini munchers start to glisten over the grass-scape.

nice

matte

gray

concrete

sprouts in lush corners and specific cavities.

let the paving begin anew.