Second Genesis

As the escape pod hurtled through space it scanned nearby planetary systems for signs of life-supporting atmospheres. Eventually it locked on a stellar system a few hundred light years away. Normally in the millennia past, extended travel in short periods of time would have been impossible, but not for the craft of this era which used a number of methods for shortening vast distances in space and time.

Because of advances in the past 10,000 or so years, separation of the fields of philosophy, spirituality and technology had become increasingly unified to the point where they had now become indistinguishable. It was now common scientific knowledge that the universe as a whole was a projection of the consciousnesses that existed within it and that all consciousnesses were simply branches of a single consciousness like spokes extending from the center of a wheel. The first inklings of this appeared many tens of thousands of years prior when scientists discovered that the fundamental particles that make up the universe behaved differently depending on whether or not they were being observed, IE; whether or not consciousness was reflecting their behavior into existence. On a massive observable scale the illusion of physical continuity was maintained, but when broken down to the basic building blocks, the curtain on this illusion was thrown back and there was no place for this elemental truth to hide. The universe was simply the shared projection of its conscious inhabitants; and a conglomerate dream of consciousness itself. This single source of consciousness was the individual consciousness' returning place in the instance of physical or ego death. When one's consciousness reentered and amalgamated with the whole, there was the opportunity for that consciousness to re-project as a new branch, and in a sense, create a new subsection of reality.

This process would have only occurred naturally in millennia past as death and rebirth — where consciousness disappears and then reappears somewhere else in physical space. Or for the spiritually inclined in ancient times it would have been referred to as "manifestation", where upon ego-death and return to "source" the consciousness is then able re-reflect a new pattern in to reality, albeit without the same powerful effect of death and rebirth which allowed consciousness to reposition itself and project a new pattern entirely.

At the present, this metaphysical reality could be harnessed for interstellar travel as well as many other purposes. Put simply, one could describe the process as waking up from a dream and then deciding when, where and how they would like to re-enter; or if they would like to re-enter at all.

This was actually the biggest risk involved with harnessing this kind of technology. After ego death occurs, the subject is often disinclined to want to return back to physical reality which has by this point been revealed as an illusion. The reasons for wanting to have facilitated the process of ego death at all fall away with the stripping of ego. For this reason, over the millennia, to reduce the risk of "enlightenment" scientists developing this technology had also managed a way to preserve the ego and store it away for reintegration later. In the first few centuries of meddling in this field, most who used the technology either ended up renouncing anything to do with their previous physical life upon return to the physical world or simply not returning at all. The worst cases of disillusionment ended in suicide; permanent death on all accounts.

But by now the ancient teachings of gurus on ego death, manifestation and reincarnation had been systematized and reduced to a mechanical science. The death of ego could now be facilitated automatically without harming the subject involved. And even then the ego wasn't actually destroyed but could be stored away temporarily and reintroduced after the whole process had occurred. Mechanically this process looked like what was happening to Miles now.

In order to travel to another coordinate in the physical plane he first had to meld his consciousness with his spacecraft so that they would re-"manifest" together and he wasn't simply reborn in the middle of space with no life support. With his cerebellum and nervous system becoming simply a processing node in the system of circuitry that made up his spacecraft, via the same connective ports along his spine leading up to his skull miles and the craft now formed a single consciousness.

His suit expanded and contracted forcing his diaphragm to produce deep and measured breaths calming the nervous system and preparing it for ego death. The fact that miles was now close to actual physical death also did a lot to help smooth the process. With each breath, layers of his identity were removed from his mind and stored outside of the ship in the form of information-dense and powerful radio waves. With one breath in and out, his name and credentials disappeared from conscious awareness, with the next breath in and out he lost formative memories. The vision of his mother's face, his home-world and all of his conscious and unconscious motivations dissolved until he forgot them entirely. Then with a final two breaths his identification with his own body disappeared, he became simply a locus of conscious awareness and nothing else. There was no more Miles Numan, there was space, time and a body in a ship. It didn't make a difference who it belonged to, it belonged to nobody, it was a facet of this ever shifting pattern of "reality" and nothing more.

From this consciousness a portal opened, it was a portal not existing in this plane but in the plane of pure consciousness. This seemingly-magic trick was achieved by the ship by overriding the quantum computing power of miles' brain. In the same way that the brain makes mechanical use of the infinite potential of the fundamental building blocks of the universe to transmit consciousness and reflect reality, the ship could do the same process in reverse and draw back that reflection. The many faceted windows of the spacecraft which resembled a mandala or window of a gothic cathedral began to reflect colors as the illusion of reality was now being stripped along with the ego. Layers of physical reality disappeared, first color, then shape, then sound, then smell and feeling. Finally there was nothingness. And yet there was still awareness.

The fabric of reality literally seemed to rip apart around miles' craft as a black hole formed in front of his craft. He felt himself being being sucked deep in to a dark and infinite void. Somehow forgetting everything he knew about his life previously. The void was terrifying, it represented every conceivable kind of death, but it was at the same time so enticing that he couldn't turn away. He felt his soul drawn deeper and deeper in to the darkness like a moth drawn towards a flame.

He forgot everything he was consumed by the void and all was dark. There was nothing.

—-

"And in the beginning there was the word" but this time the words were coordinates for a distant planet in some far reach of space. "X-1378097836 Y-289087486267 Z-17408588367". These words were fed from some invisible source and as they rung out far and wide and seemed to illuminate the nothingness.

The same process occurred now just in reverse. First there was feeling, then there was a smell of sulphur and wet soil. shapes blurred in to view and then slowly saturated with color. At first as a grand kaleidoscope of color, shapes, smells and feelings which danced and shifted infinitely. These sensations eventually began to settle themselves in to tangible forms that resembled the reality that we are all familiar with. Space, stars, air. The mandala condensed itself until it formed similar patterns that made up the shape of the front of the escape pod. Awareness became localized to a body. Miles's body, but there was no awareness of what it was called yet.

Then layers of meaning were added to awareness. Memories returned along with feelings attached to this body and hopes and fears for its future. Then a name returned, the consciousness put on a mask called identity. "I remember who I am now" consciousness thought, "Miles Numan." As he looked outside the segmented window and saw the outline of a massive planet.

Miles and the ship, despite having just achieved a miracle of science and philosophy, were both in awful condition. The ship had rematerialized too close to the planets atmosphere and was being drawn in by its gravitational field. Nearly all of its fuel was used when re-manifesting, so it was unable to pull away and started hurtling towards the planet. Miles himself had reintegrated with his ego but he was still on the brink of death without any sanguis dei to feed his suit. His vision blurred as the surface of the ship heated up and turned red and parts began flying off.

Below the red speck that was miles' ship hurtling downward, the world was remarkably blue.