Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - There is nothing. Only warm, primordial blackness. Your consciousness ferments in it -- no larger than a single grain of malt. You don’t have to do anything anymore.

Ever.

1. - Never ever ever?
2. - (Simply keep on non-existing.)

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - An inordinate amount of time passes. It is utterly void of struggle. No ex-wives are contained within it.

1. - This is great!
2. - Gimme some more.
3. - What was that about the *ex*-something?

LIMBIC SYSTEM - An awareness creeps up on you. A mass lies hidden in your dead angle, soaking in some lurid, acidic sauce. There is nothing elegant, perfect, Diophantine about it. No insights spring from it. It’s bloated and shameful, the ball of meat surrounding you...This is a terrible line of questioning, and will only lead to more awareness of the meat-thing.

1. - (Plunge back into the fathomless deep)
2. - No, I wanted to know about the ex-something.
3. - Uh, what was that word that started with a D?

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - Intellectual games, high-minded shite that amounted to nothing. It is foolish of you to resurface to what you never had. Not after all the damage you suffered to get here, some of it irreversible… Stay, sail with me through the Abyssopelagic zone!

1. - Allons-y! Never let me go!
2. - No, I want to get off now. I like pain and burning light and trying to prove myself.
3. - No-- wasn’t there a reason I...got here? Irreversible, yes, but something I was seeking...

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - Did you really believe that?

LIMBIC SYSTEM - You wouldn’t like it if I told you what’s back there. Why do you think you willingly threw yourself at oblivion? Or did you not sense yourself -- bleeding into it, dispersing into vortices with so little sense to them?

SYNTHESIS [Challenging: Success] - A creeping sense of grasping at vapor… you should ask what you were looking for.

1. - Did I destroy myself?
2. - Tell me, what was I looking for?
3. - I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. It’s all shit.

LIMBIC SYSTEM - There’s a shadow-world. Can’t be touched, seen, tasted, smelled, but it’s everywhere. Nowhere. These evil apes, they connect to it, fight each other through it. Fight to describe it best, discover or create entire universes, shadows upon shadows upon shadows.

1. - How do I see the world if I can’t sense it?
2. - Did I create a universe?
3. - This isn’t answering my question.

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - First things first, you had to chase down an animal. See where it was. Kill it by walking. It was vicious, but all the apes around you were walking too, hungry for the same meat .

1. - Did I create a universe?
2. - This isn’t answering my question.

LIMBIC SYSTEM -Got a little lost in it, didn’t you? Shadows on cave walls, you believed had so much depth.

1. - This isn’t answering my question.

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN -Answers, baby. Still asking for answers.

LIMBIC SYSTEM - The part of the presentation you want to take home with you -- there were no answers .

1. - I don’t believe that.
2. - Okay. (Plunge back into the fathomless deep)

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - Somewhere in the sore, bloated man-meat around you -- *a sensation*! Like a fly to the ointment, your consciousness sticks to it. The limbed and headed machine of pain and undignified suffering is firing up again. It wants to breathe in so much dust, choke on it. Straining. Solitary. Dancing to disco music.

PASSION [Medium: Success] - This is worth it. There’s truth to be found.

1. - Mother, help me, there’s a head attached to my neck and I’m in it!
2. - Please, no! Take me back to the formless, disembodied nothing!
3. - No, I am not scared. I am a harbinger of Truth.

LIMBIC SYSTEM - A fiery streak penetrates your skull, trying to force your eyes open. It’s a sound. A clarion call from hell.

YOU - You shuffle up to your feet, an ugly, no, completely destroyed motel room coming into your vision. Bottles litter the floor.

PHYSICAL IMMERSION [Trivial: Success] - Get disco! You need to find some more liquid inspiration. Stat.

YOU - There’s a reel to reel tape player torn out, still spinning in the corner. You shuffle around, picking up pants that fit uncomfortably tight, a white satin shirt that is miraculously unstained, and a bright green blazer.

The necktie that spins ominously from the fan catches your eye. You pull the wrong cord, the bright light searing into your throbbing brain. You take several deep breaths. Then you switch off the fan, snatching the lurid and pulsating patterns close to you.

MENTAL MANIFOLD [Medium: Success] - The folding and twisting sets your teeth on edge, something whirring in the back of your mind.

PASSION [Trivial: Success] - Manifold. Manifold. I know that word.

ANALYSIS - A topological space that is second countable and locally homeomorphic to Euclidean space.

CLARITY [Medium: Success] - Okay. A bunch of other words we’re supposed to “know”. Thanks.

MENTAL MANIFOLD [Challenging: Success] - A stack of maps comes to mind, each honing out to a small ball with a perfect grid on the surface. You catch the ball in your mind’s eye. It settles in your palm, comfortable as an unpeeled orange.

1. - What am I doing?

MENTAL MANIFOLD - Something you've done before.

YOU - “What the hell…” the words mumble out unbidden. You fumble at the doorknob, trying to straighten yourself up to face a world outside of the one in your head.

The scent of nicotine hits you before your eyes are able to catch up, taking in the dim sunlight filtering in through the windows. You're on a balcony indoors, above what might be a bar. A brass ashtray sits beside you, a crushed cigarette smoldering in it

PHYSICAL IMMERSION - That’s a reasonable stop-gap. Natural in your fingers as chalk.

YOU - You pause, your mind skipping over that word.

“Hello, Doctor.”

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) - The young woman raises a cigarette to her lips.

1. - “*Doctor*? Am I a medical professional?”
2. - Turn your bloated face away from her beauty and just keep on walking. [Leave.]

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) - “Not from the lengthy speech you gave me last night. Doctor of Philosophy.” She seems a little unamused.

1. - “Wait, so I’m a philosophy?”
2. - “What’s philosophy?”
3. - “What’s speech?”

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) -“Uh...no?” she seems perplexed by your question.

1. - “So why did you call me Doctor?"
2. - “Actually, this makes sense.” [Leave]

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) -“You ...insisted on it actually. And then you didn’t. I’ve never met a mathematician before, so I didn’t really think too hard about it.”

PROFESSOR [Challenging: Success] - Something about that word makes you stand a little bit straighter.

1. - “You know what, I do seem the right character for a mathematician.”
2. - “That’s insane. That couldn’t be me. Have you seen what I’m wearing?”

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) -She shrugs, “You were trying to explain to me what was on your tie. Calibrated-Yau manifolds? You kept saying it was telling you to treat it with more respect.”

HORRIFIC NECKTIE - For all the damn good that did.

YOU -You flinch slightly, staring at the tie.

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) - She takes another drag from the cigarette, her eyes glittering.

MENTOR [Easy: Success] - She’s actually a little unsettled. You should leave her be.

1. - “Did you hear that? You heard that right?”
2. - “I should get going now.” [Leave]

KLAASJE (ELEGANT LOT LIZARD) - “See you probably never, Doctor,” her hips sway as she returns to her room.

YOU -A peppy music fills your ears as you descend the stairs. A set of keys jingle in your pockets. When you fish them out at the base of the stairs you see the label Whirling-in-Rags, #1 on them.

AXIOMATIZATION [Trivial: Success]- It’s a room key. This is the Whirling-in-Rags.

YOU - You shuffle down the stairs, nausea from the alcohol overwhelming you. The circular mosaic of the floor sickens you to look at. You limp across the floor, entertaining some notion of getting some fresh air.

KIM KITSURAGI - As you approach the door leading out of the hostel, a bespectacled man wearing an orange bomber jacket turns to you:

“Excuse me. I believe you’re the person I’ve been waiting for.” He narrows his eyes and extends his hand in greeting.

L’ACADEMIE [Medium: Success]- No matter how winding or impenetrable the problem, the depths or rigor from which it was sourced, if you asked this man to stand by your side and walk you through it piece by piece until the understanding sifted its way into your breath, your lungs, and finally your oxygen-starved brain, he would help you. You are sure of this -- but why?

1. - Hold on, who is he to me?
2. - Shake his hand.
3. - Don’t shake his hand.

L’ACADEMIE - Something you didn’t think possible, your trisection.

KIM KITSURAGI - “Hello, I’m Kim Kitsuragi,” his grip is firm, “I’m a Professor at the Cycle Universite, local organizer. I study algebraic number theory.”

You realize he is waiting for your introduction.

1. - “My name is Doctor Raphael Ambrosius Cousteau.”
2. - “I don’t really know my name.”
3. - Say nothing.

KIM KITSURAGI - “Okay then,” he’s entirely not sure how to take this remark, “It looks like you missed the talks on Monday. Tuesday too, as far as I could tell. Have you had a chance to meet up with your postdoctoral fellow? He suspected you would be here.”

1. - “My post-what?”
2. - “I’m post-everything, actually.”
3. - “Doctor! I’m a doctor! Not the medical kind though.”

KIM KITSURAGI -“Yes. So am I, Dr. Du Bois.”

1. - “Is that my name?”
2. - “Sorry, I don’t actually know what a post-fellow is, could you tell me?”
3. - [L’ACADEMIE: Impossible - RED] Give him *finger-guns* “Doctor buddies!”

CHECK FAILURE

KIM KITSURAGI - The other doctor stares at you blankly. You continue to gesture helplessly. He continues to stare. You notice he is wearing gloves, dusted with white.

1. - “Is that my name?”
2. - “Sorry, I don’t actually know what a post-follow is, could you tell me?”

KIM KITSURAGI - “Is that a joke?” he raises an eyebrow sharply under his thick glasses.

CITATION [Medium: Failure]-Not acceptable. Flex your knowledge on him!

1. - “What if I told you I’m not really a mathematician?”
2. - “How can you be so sure I’m post-doctor?”
3. - “No. I can’t remember anything.”
4. - “Yes, it’s a joke. I’m fine and definitely remember everything about mathematics. Like the Goldblum Conjecture.” (Lie).

KIM KITSURAGI - He adjusts his glasses, watching you carefully. Then he speaks.

“We all feel that way sometimes. There is no such thing as a *mathematician*, I’m afraid. We all start struggling with the abstract, things as distant now to us as addition and subtraction once were to a child. We are simply people, inclined to see beauty in the strangeness of particular and abstract problems, and who want to subject themselves to them. And we have those to tackle, many,” the gaze he meets you with is at once steely and...kind.

MENTOR [Challenging: Success]- He wasn’t expecting this vulnerability from you.

PASSION - At his words, something in you kindles, neurons firing with old lightning in spite of the dull ache in your head.

1. - “How can you be so sure I’m post-doctor?”
2. - “But. I can’t remember anything.”
3. - “What are these problems?”
4. - “Let’s get going then.” (Move on)

KIM KITSURAGI - “You are a full doctor, not postdoctoral. But you are quite well known within the field,” he frowns, his calm giving way to suspicion.

1. - “So I’m some kind of superstar mathematician?”
2. - “I’m sorry I -- can’t remember anything.”
3. - “Never mind that. Let’s just solve some problems.”
4. - “A field in shambles, no doubt. Decimated.”

KIM KITSURAGI - “I’m sorry, anything?”

1. - “I don’t know what a post doctor is.”
2. - “I don’t know what an algebraic number theorist is.”
3. - “I don’t know what a number is.”
4. - “I know what the Goldblum conjecture is?” (Lie)

KIM KITSURAGI - “I can see that you’ve drank last night, and probably remain drunk. This is seeming more like a medical issue. Which is out of my jurisdiction. I can take you back to the university in my Kineema. Your post-doctoral fellow might be able to assist you.”

KIM KITSURAGI - He gestures to the door. When you walk out into the street, the cold hits you first. You look up. The sky is misty, cryptic above you. It’s threatening rain. You look over your shoulder. In the east, something prickles at your senses. You turn away sharply, looking to the curb out front in the lonely parking lot. A blue car sits in waiting.

You hear your companion let out a sharp gust of air.

MENTOR [Challenging: Success]- He’s relieved -- bone deep relieved.

1. - “...what you were expecting from me was worse than...?” Gesture with your hands at your head.
2. - “Sorry. Sorry again.”
3. - Say nothing.

KIM KITSURAGI - He stares at you for a moment, piercing, “They said you do that. That you're unusually perceptive, for someone in the field."

He opens the car door. "I hope you're not lying. That would be cruel."

1. - “Am I cruel?”
2. - “I’m not lying."
3. - Sit in the passenger’s seat, don’t meet his eyes.

The leather seats are soft to the touch, the interior clean and neat. The only evidence that it’s used is a light dusting of white on the steering levers. When he starts up the car, the engine purrs gently.

PROFESSOR [Medium: Success]- This is a nicer car than most professors can afford, without tenure.

1. - What’s tenure?
2. - Can I afford it?

CONCEPTUALIZATION - Well, what does it sound like to you?

1. - A pyramid scheme.
2. - An outdated monarchy that entrenches power.
3. - A meritocracy.
4. - The only reason I still have my job.

PROFESSOR [Impossible: Failure] - :-(

ADMINISTRATA [Trivial: Success]- You really shouldn’t annotate important documents to peers and students with sad faces.

MORALE -1

YOU - You shake yourself out of your reverie, noticing the city fly by you. Your companion hasn’t said a word since.

MENTOR [Medium: Success]- He’s concerned you’ll do something erratic. You should make conversation.

1. - “So. What is it that we’re supposed to be solving.”
2. - “I think you should know that I can’t remember *anything*.”
3. - “Uhm. I want to talk about *you*.”
4. - Just look out the car window.

KIM KITSURAGI - "Does the phrase 'abc conjecture' ring any bells to you?"

1. - "Not at all."
2. - "Like a theory of numbers but for the alphabet?"
3. - [Conjecture Legendary 18: RED] Pull something out of your ass.

CHECK FAILURE

CONJECTURE [Legendary: Failure] - Ah, my namesake, my dear boy! Yes, the letter a, elegant, primary -- the letter b following it, and then a trifecta, obscured by something unspeakable, untouchable.

1. - "It's a theory on the entroponetics of letters."

KIM KITSURAGI - His eyes flicker from the road and back to you.

MENTOR [Easy: Failure]- Uh, by me, maybe ask him what he means?

1. - “It is. I know this. I have a conjecture in my soul.”
2. - “No?”
3. - “What’s that supposed to mean?”

KIM KITSURAGI - "I'm sorry to say none of those words make any sense together."

1. - “Oh.”
2. - Insist that they do.

YOU - “Yes, they do.”

KIM KITSURAGI - “They do not.”

He turns a corner, crossing over a bridge with an ugly, polluted river.

1. “What is it that we’re supposed to be solving, again?”
2. “I think you should know that I can’t remember *anything*.”
3. "Uhm. I want to talk about *you*.”
4. Just look out the car window.

KIM KITSURAGI - “Yes. I don’t see what your reputation would gain from lying there.”

MENTOR [Easy: Success] - He believes you are the one that has far more to lose.

L’ACADEMIE [Medium: Success] - Dr. Jean Vicquemare, pacing with vicious intent back and forth in front of a blackboard covered with words, arrows, esoteric symbols. He attempts to add something with a cigarette, rather than a piece of chalk, swearing as it burns his fingertips.

1. - “I don’t remember what a post-doctor is either.”
2. - “Do you think I’ll remember it?”
3. - “Do you think people remember me?”

KIM KITSURAGI - “A post-doctoral fellow is a doctor who assists a more experienced researcher with their work. So they are themselves independent, but they are still in a close relationship with a mentor figure."

1. - “I must be a superb mentor to this post-doctor. Astronomical.”
2. - “They let me do that? I feel bad for my post-doctor.”
3. - “Ah yes, the transmission of knowledge via apprenticeship, a time-honored practice.”
4. - “Does this mean I’m experienced? I suppose I am experienced.”
5. - “Mentorship is meaningless in the face of the impending swallow.”

KIM KITSURAGI - “It isn’t,” his voice is sharp.

1. - “What do you mean?”
2. - “No, it is. I’ve seen it.
3. - Say nothing.

KIM KITSURAGI - “You -- I’m not going to get into this. If anything, you should be the one taking my position. And historically, you have,” his forehead crinkles with concern. You feel the hair on your neck stand up.

DEBATER [Trivial: Success] - Don’t push this shit. You’re not ready to hear it.

PHYSICAL IMMERSION [Challenging: Success] - Hell, was anyone ready? It was go time, baby! We got it!

CLARITY [Trivial: Success] - What we got was nothing but mangled tripe where our mind is supposed to be.

1. - “What is it that we’re supposed to be solving, again?”
2. - “I think you should know that I can’t remember *anything*.”
3. - “I want to talk about *you*.”
4. - Just look out the car window.

YOU - The rain has started to pick up, pattering gently on the roof. Your colleague shifts the gears of the car smoothly, the environment soothing to your pulsing headache. You press your head against the glass. Your breath fogs up the window.

1. - [Conceptualization: Medium RED] Draw something in the fog.
2. - [Symbolic Language: Legendary RED] Explain this entroponetic alphabet conjecture to yourself using pictures.
3. - Continue to lose yourself in thought.

CHECK SUCCESS

YOU - Your hands trace out a simple form. Five points, then framed by five more. A star, housed comfortably in a pentagon. The rain asks you: What is this?

PRIORS [Medium: Failure] - It’s a symbol of devil-worship. Followers of Mephistopheles and young people with something to prove scrawl it on everything.

1. - “Kim, am I a follower of Mephistopheles?’
2. - “Hey, check this out!”
3. - Draw a small devil with horns next to it.

KIM KITSURAGI - “Khm. Sorry?”

YOU - You gesture at the drawing.

KIM KITSURAGI - His eyes flicker over it, “Ah. No. That’s a Petersen Graph. It comes up in a surprising number of problems, and is a key piece in the field of graph theory. Probably something you remember.”

1. - “Graph. Like the x and the y lines?”
2. - “Graph theory. Am I a graph theorist?”
3. - “Okay.” [Move on]

KIM KITSURAGI - “No, no -- more like nodes, connected by edges. It’s simpler than what you’re describing,” he considers this statement for a moment, “From some angles.”

ALGEBRA [Challenging: Success] - Certainly. There’s quite a bit of depth in those peculiar little sketches. They lift naturally off the page into a world of criss-crossing connections, suggesting an ever more intricate underlying structure that you can lift, reposition, drape like a tapestry over any number of imperceptible ideas.

ANALYSIS -To be perfectly honest, I felt better off thinking about the x and y thing.

ALGEBRA - Well. You would.

1. - “Good. That other one sounded boring as hell, anyways."
2. - “Oh. Darn, the letters x and y mean a lot to me.”

KIM KITSURAGI - He surprises you with a bark of a laugh. When you look at him, he shakes his head, “You’re right. Very right.”

MENTOR [Trivial: Success]- It’s nice to hear him laugh, even if it’s a bitter one. Something other than smooth calm and tense concern.

1. - “What is it that we’re supposed to be solving, again?”
2. - “I think you should know that I can’t remember *anything*.”
3. - “Uhm. I want to talk about *you*.”
4. - Just look out the car window.

KIM KITSURAGI - “There’s nothing to talk about.”

MENTOR [Easy: Success] - This time, you detect a note of sadness in his voice. Tread carefully. Let him pick the topic.

1. - “You could tell me about your...work? Maybe it’ll jog something.”
2. - “It can be anything. Tell me something about your life.”
3. - “Okay, I guess you’re one of those boring bino mathematicians. Whatever.” [Move on]
4. - “Okay.” [Move on]

KIM KITSURAGI - “There is -- nothing to talk about.”

CITATION [Easy: Success] - You’ll hurt his pride if you push this angle.

ALGEBRA [Medium: Success]- An old memory stirs, constellations of points gathered up and compared by height.

1. - [Algebra: Challenging - WHITE] Try to remember something about the name Kitsuragi...
2. - “It can be anything. Tell me something about your life.”
3. - “Okay, I guess you’re one of those boring bino mathematicians. Whatever.” [Move on]
4. - “Okay.” [Move on]

CHECK FAILURE

ALGEBRA [Challenging: Failure] - The definitions evade you. You’re not going to find what you’re looking for in his face.

1. - [Algebra: Challenging - WHITE - LOCKED] Try to remember something about the name Kitsuragi...
2. - “It can be anything. Tell me something about your life.”
3. - “Okay, I guess you’re one of those boring bino mathematicians. Whatever.” [Move on]
4. - “Okay.” [Move on]

KIM KITSURAGI - Your colleague taps his fingers against the gearshift, leaving a trail of dust there. The road winds ever further from where you were staying, until he finally pulls up in the shadow of a grey, hulking building, its windows like an ominous grid.

PRIORS [Challenging: Success]- The building style is an homage to Graadian mathematicians, back when this particular style was in vogue.

KIM KITSURAGI - “Are you ready? This is where the conference is.”

1. - “It looks ugly.”
2. - “I’m scared.”
3. - “Well. Let’s go get disco.”