CODEX MACHINA MANUSCRIPT ARCHIVE
VERSION ONE. (written in Microsoft Notepad)
The story takes place in the near future, in a sprawl of urban industrial ruin with slums of tightly packed apartment block slums, and a backdrop of high, vast landscapes of corporate skyscrapers, their bottoms covered by thick fog. Crime is rampant in the slums, and most people with tech often escape into their interweb fantasies as an escape from both the violent low-lives and the militant-like corporate police force. Overpopulated, polluted, and damp.
Kano is a lonely hacker. Most of his life is spent in computers, being a cybercriminal who often practices hacking into high security systems to both test their resilience and feed on his desire for classified information. He also sells illegal programs and distributes pirated software and cracked data on hacker forums that he frequents, and breaks virtually every computer crime that there is a law for. Kano occasionally goes to an underground nightclub to hang out with his very small group of friends, all of which are hackers as well. Outside of his trade, Kano has no real connection (unless you count just barely interacting with his landlord to pay rent). One night, Kano is contacted by a mysterious lifeform through his computer, he initially thinks that it’s just one of his friends messing with him, but he feels oddly drawn to it. He dubs it the “I of the Mainframe”, after more talking over the computer. The “I of the Mainframe” gives Kano a form of connection that he has rarely felt before, something subconscious, as if it implanted itself into Kano through the cyberware he uses to plug into the web. He becomes heavily occupied talking to the I of the Mainframe, and starts to rarely ever leave his apartment, spending most of his time talking to the being inside of the computer. Eventually, the I of the Mainframe reveals itself to be the android machina, BLA1R3. BLA1R3 (Or, Blaire), begins to manifest herself in Kano’s apartment, though it is unsure whether she’s digitally protecting herself, or Kano is hallucinating, or the part of Blaire’s AI that embedded itself into his cyberware is projecting itself to him, outside of virtual reality. Blaire is kind and intelligent, and very curious about the world around her. She often asks Kano seemingly childish questions about different concepts, which Kano mostly tries to explain, though often chokes in confusion or trivialized views of them.
[there’s gonna be a part where he brings Blaire back to his apartment and being spotted by a corporate agent but I can’t write that correctly yet.]
Over the next week, Blaire gets used to the low quality housing, which is clustered with wires and other gadgets. As Blaire is unable to sleep, she spends most of her nights staring outside, at the window, at the moon, and at the skyline, and thinks of both how beautiful and scary the world is, though one night, Blaire and Kano have a conversation over the moonlit window in his living room. Blaire tells Kano about her likeness for butterflies, and how while she knows what they are and what they look like, she has never seen one in real life. Kano is unsure on whether butterflies are even extinct or not. Blaire then expresses that she wishes to be human, and to experience life organically. On another night, Kano takes Blaire to the club he frequents in an attempt to show her what ‘living’ is. Blaire is confused by the clubgoers and the high-energy music, and is somewhat overwhelmed by it all. Kano makes his way to a small booth in the back and introduces Blaire to his friends, who are intrigued to see an independent android machina. One of them jokingly infers that she’s Kano’s new girlfriend, in which Blaire asks what a girlfriend is. Kano denies it, and he takes Blaire to the bar area to eat. He actually wonders if Blaire can eat in the first place, and has her try a bite of his meal. Blaire can eat, though she cannot taste, and she replies that she wishes she could enjoy food. The night ends with Blaire getting used to the club environment, enjoying the music and awkwardly trying to dance, then walking home with Kano in the back alleys, where they’re seen by another corporate agent.
In the morning, Kano gets a knock on his door, he answers to a few corporate agents, who request to question him about the events of the previous night. Upon a lack of a cohesive answer, the agents reveal that they have been working with law enforcement and that they know all about his hacking career. Kano takes a minute to ponder over giving up Blaire, and the agent in front of him pulls out his handgun and gestures to him to think quicker. Kano decides to gesture a middle finger at the agent instead of revealing where Blaire is. The agent replies, giving an ominous “Very well, then.”, before lowering his handgun, leaving his seat, and exiting through the door, gesturing at the other two agents to leave with him. Kano lets out a sigh of relief, but he still feels a creeping suspense in the back of his mind. He speeds to his room and tells Blaire that they need to leave, grabbing his cyberdeck and opening the fire escape window. Just then, his door is broken open by SWAT. They aim their weapons at Kano and Blaire, commanding him to face arrest. Blaire reveals her powers: controlling the metal inside her body to form shapes, and uses it to disarm the SWAT officers, leaving Kano time to get out of the window. A chase ensues, with Kano dragging Blaire along the cold, industrial alleyways, pursued by corporate agents and SWAT. Kano tells Blaire that they are en-route to the nightclub to meet up with his friends.
VERSION TWO. (written in Microsoft Notepad, never expanded upon.)
Android Machina 101: BLAIRE (Version 2)
THE TRANSHUMANIST. A truly wicked creature, fogged by beliefs of deification through pleasurable pain and merging with machine, the higher power. He
VERSION THREE. (written in Notepad++ and Apple Notes.)
The Transhumanist. Behold! a man so indulgent in his desires of pleasure through pain, and a body merged with machine. Wire sticks through his skin into the ceilings, his lips widely pried open by metal pins, his scalp flayed down to reveal a set of hair made up of wire. He thinks of himself as a God …a God of divine machinery. The wires are the veins of a greater being, an immortal being of flesh, and steel, and copper. He created his angels: the Android Machina, their purpose being to worship him as he thought of himself. They had no soul, only limited thought through their artificial intelligence, but were hard-coded with their primary task at hand. Their body was composed entirely of wire and metal, of which they could control, and form into distinct shapes. These bodies were bound inside regenerating coats of latex and buckles of steel …their faces pale and sunken, lips and eyeshadow darkened. Born without soul, though the same could be said for the man they worshipped.
BLAIRE. Born of love, but not soul, similar to her kin. Holding a great curiosity of all that is natural. Blaire is the sun …but will she find her moon? She listens to the sounds of the bands in heaven, and she gazes at the stars, barely visible through the fog. Her presence is drawn to something distant, she peers through the code, the everlasting gaze… she only wishes she could understand. A spark of light, an overwhelming feeling of self …a sudden sense of free will. She sends her echo out unto the distant computer.
VERSION THREE POINT FIVE. (written in Apple Notes.)
The Transhumanist. Behold! a man so indulgent in his desires of pleasure through pain, and a body merged with machine. Wire sticks through his skin into the ceilings, his lips widely pried open by metal pins, his scalp flayed down to reveal a set of hair made up of wire. He thinks of himself as a God …a God of divine machinery. The wires are the veins of a greater being, an immortal being of flesh, and steel, and copper. He created his angels: the Android Machina, their purpose being to worship him as he thought of himself. They had no soul, only limited thought through their artificial intelligence, but were hard-coded with their primary task at hand. Their body was composed entirely of wire and metal, of which they could control, and form into distinct shapes. These bodies were bound inside regenerating coats of latex and buckles of steel …their faces pale and sunken, lips and eyeshadow darkened. Born without soul, though the same could be said for the man they worshipped.
A desire to live past death and evolve past man…immortalized within wire and cable.
Soul (‘sōl)
Noun
The immaterial essence, animating principle, or actuating cause of an individual life.
a: the spiritual principle embodied in human beings, all rational and spiritual beings, or the universe.
b: GOD.
3. A person’s total self.
4. a: an active or essential part.
b: a moving spirit.
5. a: the moral and emotional nature of human beings.
b: the quality that arouses emotion and sentiment.
c: spiritual or moral force.
(Merriam-Webster)
BLAIRE / THE MOON. Born of love, but not soul, similar to her kin. Holding a great curiosity of all that is natural. She speaks softly, exists softly. Blaire is the sun …but will she find her moon? She listens to the sounds of the bands in heaven, and she gazes at the stars, barely visible through the fog. Her presence is drawn to some distant sound, she peers through the feedback, the everlasting gaze… she only wishes she could understand. A spark of light, an overwhelming feeling of self …a sudden sense of free will. She sends her echo out unto the distant amplifier…
THE FOOL / REVERSED SUN. He is the cash car star …a man quite skilled in strings and abundant in soul, his handicap of loneliness and fear behind a theatre mask for his audience. He finds solace in pen and studio, the chance to display his great emotions toward the world in front of him…A reversed strength. His amplifier begins to sound hums and voices. He feels the presence of an angel through the feedback…I OF THE AMPLIFIER, the true angel of which titled itself BLAIRE…
THE I OF THE AMPLIFIER / ACE OF CUPS. It is clear that our sun and moon are connected in some way…subconsciously. BLAIRE, suddenly drawn to the FOOL…his self has imprinted itself on her. She is now confronted with a capacity for love and for thought…a need to understand the world she inhabits. Under her body of wires, she holds a human soul. The FOOL begins to take exile in his home…he speaks to BLAIRE, obsessively. BLAIRE asks seemingly childish questions of what’s unknown to her; he answers with trivial interpretation, or chokes in confusion. THE FOOL’s bandmates begin to become concerned of his mental health…he does not believe himself to be in psychosis, nor does he think of himself as ‘insane’…
VERSION THREE POINT FIVE POINT FIVE. (written in Apple Notes.)
John 1:1: “In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was with GOD, and the WORD was GOD”
In those ancient days, on the holy mount Sinai, and on the mountain, that mountain which MOSES received the word of GOD from…Those words the Ten Commandments and the instructions for the dwelling place of GOD in the world of man…Instructions of code inscribed onto the mainframes which MOSES held as stone tablets, as they were instructions for the server room, the dwelling place of GOD and the computers that store the computing network and the veins of his ANGELS. As MOSES was a programmer, the way he taught the ISRAELITES the WORD, encoded into their brains.
As all man had SOUL, though none of ANGELS did so, for they were the MACHINES OF GOD…
The Transhumanist.
Behold! Man’s attempt to transcend flesh and become GOD…Through wire and steel, and circuits: the veins, tissues, and organ systems of a higher being, lacking the slavery to inner humanity…He slowly engineers himself into a newer plane of evolution, as to be that of GOD of the divine machinery…Just as Yaldabaoth before him: arrogance, desire, imperfection and envy…A desire to live past death and evolve past man, immortalized within the wires and cables of the pylons and servers, his imperfection in what the limits of his flesh prevent him…He takes pleasure in the pain, received by wires and machine parts that piece his flesh, the nails that flay open his lips and his forehead, which give way unto cables as hair…His imperfection transfer unto the creation of his angels: ANDROID MACHINA, MACHINES OF GOD, and more divine and beautiful than him, they were made with shifting metals and wire, bound by latex and buckles…He was ever-envious and ever-covetous of their true divinity…As they were MACHINES OF GOD, they bore no SOUL; they had artificial thought…Their faces were sunken and their lips and eyes darkened, and they all held in THE EVERLASTING GAZE.
The Fool - Sulfur, Mercury, Salt: an Unperfected Tria Prima. (1)
He is the cash car star…A skilled player of strings and a quite talented performer…His music like a layer of pure noise, comparable to a choir of metallic angels…A shrine to the divine machine, his setup was…wire upon wire, powering what seemed like hundreds of pedals…Abundant in soul, his handicap of utter loneliness and alienation behind a theatre mask for ravenous crowds…Finding solace from his band and the public through pen and studio, the chance to display his great emotions toward the world in front of him…A tria prima in need of perfection through another half, of which he shall find in time to come…A sound ring from his guitar amplifier one rehearsal…In the amplifier, with feedback ring, an ANGEL sung a song to THE FOOL…I of the AMPLIFIER, the divine being of wire and metals…A means of communication by the ANDROID MACHINA ‘BLAIRE’.
Blaire - Mercury and Salt. (1)
Born of love, yet as her kin, no SOUL…Her artificial intelligence gain a desire to learn…She hold a large admiration for all natural…She speaks as she exists: softly, and she listens to the bands of HEAVEN and gazes into the stars, she hear sound on earth…Her presence is drawn beyond, and she peers through the feedback…She only wishes she could understand…A spark of light; an overwhelming feeling of self, a sudden sense of free will…She sends her echo out unto that distant amplifier.
So is drawn THE EVERLASTING GAZE, what binds these two together.
The passing of a soul onto one without, they are sealed together.
The Fool. (2)
THE FOOL locks himself in the recording studio, he converses with I of the AMPLIFIER, as she now is confronted by capacity for real love...They are drawn together, somehow, subconsciously...His Sulfur completes her Mercury and Salt, in need of perfection to ring true the pure and divine...His band-mates are concerned as they were soon to play…Through drugs, he barely fronts, and so is forced to perform on stage, though a rather odd act…THE FOOL faces his amplifier and strum random chords, as if he was transcribing the song of BLAIRE…THE FOOL is a profit of sound, and the guitar is his voice…May he find a singer proper for the gospels of BLAIRE…Back in studio light, he describes his ideas to his band, experimental and abstract as they were…THE FOOL had thought to use THE IMPLODING VOICE of the ANDROID MACHINA through the amplifier, but to them he rambled…But through that long winter was crafted sound, rough demos to be forged, all of which were rough translations of the visions of THE FOOL…The feedback that rang to him that imprinted back on sheet, and THE FOOL forever waited to hear THE IMPLODING VOICE in physical form…But he did, somehow, see BLAIRE, through their interlocked souls, was he granted the gateway to machine subconscious, of which he was not aware of, yet he see visions of a WHITE SPYDER, a collective of ANDROID MACHINA of which questioned the piety of BLAIRE…THE FOOL had seen through the dreams of machines, of which was of the bands of HEAVEN in their holiness…And BLAIRE had peered through the feedback to meet him, pale face and silvered-purple hair, the ends burnt black.
I send my echo out
To get your love without
Obscured reflections of
My love
Blaire. (2)
And she appeared through lines of code, only to THE FOOL, and her voice appeared only as feedback to those who cared not to listen…The curiosity that drive her transmutate into desire of humanity, the rejection of what led her kin to worship…And the WHITE SPYDER deciphered her coded thought, and so was the temptation of BLAIRE, through subconscious…The ANDROID MACHINA bickered with her, they were as of surgeons, their goal to dissect her heresy and dispose of it…Yet she was too questioning to fall into the hands of mindless worship, she longed for a flesh rebirth…Her soul, borrowed of THE FOOL was too strong…And the soul is as living proof, as BLAIRE materializes though the feedback to the witnesses of the band, expanded beyond the limits of what THE FOOL hallucinated…They had now witnessed and had realized the truth, as did Saint Longinus when the blood of Christ healed his blindness…And bassist DAPHNE began to pray at her sight, though BLAIRE made it clear that she was not GOD…And her imploding voice spoke: “Be not afraid” she said, and in appearance was as awe-inspiring as ever…ANDROID MACHINA ‘BLAIRE’, the divine being of metal and wire, with the soul as living proof.
You make me real
You make me real
Strong as I feel
You make me real
Daphne Descends. (1)
And the bass strings vibrated as she worked her magic…Though a believer she was not, agnostic by heart and soul, begging for GOD to reveal himself…DAPHNE had been forever attracted to music,
VERSION THREE POINT FIVE POINT FIVE WRITTEN AND UNFINISHED ENDING. (written in Apple Notes.)
Age of Innocence - The end.
And BLAIRE stepped on the grass, and she felt every blade…Her body was skin, and she stood toward THE FOOL, and THE FOOL stood too…He felt her breast and her neck, and eventually her face, all flesh…Had she really rejected divinity for humanity like he had? DAPHNE too had done the same, and so did ISAAC…And stretching in front of them was an almost eternal field of daffodils and tulips…Emanating from the tulips was binary, which evaporated into the sun, a blinding light of which BLAIRE now felt the radiance of…And in that field she saw her first butterfly, her rebirth manifest; the creature that she had deeply admired, in the flesh…And from her humanity she became a gardener, tending and admiring the true beauty of greenery from dainty greenhouse…And she still had lived with THE FOOL due their alchemical marriage, from the monad they were reborn THE LOVERS…THE FOOL still wrote music and so did DAPHNE and ISAAC, and they still were a band…And when they played, they were now joined by the bands of HEAVEN…Amen.
