#fourtyone

Day 90

I don’t know if I’m allowed to say this, but the devastation we’ve witnessed in this phase of our lives makes me want to have a long conversation with the big man upstairs.

Though I try to remain stronger than the flesh, the buildup of mold and moss and cracks on the sidewalk wear on me. Things don’t work anymore. Most of my apartment in the government district is destroyed. Everyone else can’t even get to their homes. It’s nice enough here, but it doesn’t feel like home, and it’s starting to grate on me.

It’s starting to grate on everybody. What’re we doing here, where should we be going?

I mean, 3 went on the expedition. It spooked the devil out of him.

Corpses and feral animals and buildings growing dank and musty from a lack of use. The fetid, decaying corpse of a city, ravaged by us as desperate scavengers to bring ourselves to what is left of human dignity. The city’s not just out of power - it’s been ravaged by desperation. It’s been destroyed, the utopia truly gone. Solaris feels dead, outside of this one restored corner we’ve been kept in, blind to the true extent of the damage. 

3 was rattled. The rest of us are nervous to see what’s out there.

Solaris was so… grand. I remember when the buildings gleamed and greenspaces were well tended and beloved. I remember the days when every automaton’s ceramic mask face was shined to perfection. Nowadays, 23’s is dull, flowers fading and eyes looking more and more hollow - considering they were hollow in the first place, it isn’t much of a help. 

The sheen of the apocalypse has ended, friends. It is now the mundanity of waiting and hoping and rebuilding; perhaps, we become something like what we remember. Or maybe we just claw at the dirt until we can’t claw anymore. 

Speaking of dirt, the garden is doing well. It’s the bright green patch we possibly control, and occasionally take mint and cherry tomatoes from. I tend to it more and more, learning things from 8. The others are good teachers, and good listeners too - I’ve been keeping a study, to keep my own cool. A few of them are indulging me, but some of the others believe. 

14’s been working on the radio, sometimes in the middle of the night (yes, dear, I’m aware). I’m glad she’s keeping busy. It’s hopeful, what she’s found so far. I’m proud of her, it’d be good to find more human survivors; I’m amazed there’s more of us.

Being down for 2 years was a blessing as much as it’s been a curse - I wish we’d had those years to get used to us all. Now all we have is 90 days worth of electricity, maybe more or less, depending on how 1’s expedition goes.

Imagine, the power district back - the light rails up and running. Freely charging all of our helper bots, getting the other automatons up and running, being just… happier, I guess.

I’ve got a guitar scavenged from out there, some music to keep my soul, but we need more than that, you know?

The automaton and the other bots are fine like this. Well - they’re a little off, different from how they used to be, more likely to leave you alone and do their own thing unless asked something. But they’re fine, better than we are. Unsurprising. 

It was fascinating to talk to 23, the radio interview. I remember the long conversations we’d have over the automata - are their souls our obligation to save? To try to save, if they even have souls? Do we love them like we love our neighbors? 

There’s no doubt that 23 loves us. That it cares for us and wants to fulfill its duty to us. Do we owe 23 for this? To paint its mask back to perfection? I can’t paint. Maybe someone else can.

Theology was easier when we only had extensions and augments, to simply consider them parts of us. 23 enjoys humor, has memories and a sense of self. Does it have a soul? Is it one of us? Did it have a soul when it was a prosthetic arm, leaning into the needs of the person it was attached to? 

Did we simply not have the ears to hear what it would have said?

I don’t know. I want to do something about this.

I’m sorry, whoever’s reading this. It isn’t much of a history of Solaris anymore, so much as it’s a eulogy for the city, an update on our lives.

We’re all trying our best, right now.

delayed but whatevs

A picture of what you wore today

^ sweater

I'm wearing a red sweater, jeans, and slippers.

too lazy to take a picture.