The Ninety-Nine
Will you wake up from this whole life-death dream with me?
I think about how I’ve gotten here, to this God awful convergence of my life. Things could’ve unfolded with entirely different creases of the now-experience. I could not be here. And in many ways, that is exactly the case. For one, my thoughts spirit me away. Sometimes I think, what if I had died instead of my Solán’… I’ve definitely wished it more times than I can count. But what if, across the 999,000 possibilities of life and death, I did die, and Solán’ is still alive? I wonder, whether I only think that I’m alive, when I’ve really finished my last life, and Sol O is the one who’s still living hers. What if I’m in limbo, in confusion and perpetual amnesia, lost and roaming the realms? Did I not get to transcend? And if I didn’t, why haven’t I evolved or been born again? I think about what her life is like in that part of the multiverse in which she was spared… And what if we were both spared somewhere? Somewhere, we both live… It’s true.
All of these thoughts aren’t just thoughts, they’re really occurring—or have occurred and will occur. There are other cycles of time where that canon event, as well as others, took different turns along separate routes. There are loved ones in my past, alternate-present, and already-future lives that have my picture on their ancestral altars, talking to me, singing and dancing with me, reading scriptures, burning incense, pouring gin, blowing obi, making me plates, and tossing shells… We already died in order to get here, and we’re already dead, already where we’re heading, or have headed, because spirit moves without regard to trivial notions of time or space—whereas mortal beings anchor themselves to its degradation.
The Tides, The Meadows, realms “backwards” and “beyond”, move on spirit time. Lives one through nine — spirit time. Everything moves on spirit time, which is a very transcendental progression that’s non-linear. And I’ve fallen in love with it, as if it has a soul, a heart that circulates blood, a body. I trace its pulse with my pen as I write. I read the taste of its pores with my brush as I paint. And as sweet, organic dew condensates upon the flesh-filled pink of its lungs, I poise my lips to sing prose of even its most shallow sigh. Deep sigh. My evolutions, when I “die” my big ones, it’s as if I fall unconscious from the most profound experience of exhaustion or drunkenness. I wake up—or come back to life rather—feeling hungover from life itself—head pounding from what feels like breathing too much, nauseous from simply being…too much? So many loops of existing—dizzy from just living. Blacked out from time wasted…spent? Spinning. Forgetting each and every merry go round of beginnings.
And this “each and every” isn’t common. Sure, souls often lose memory of their past lives after transitions; they almost always forget Home—it’s like a factory reset. But for the ninth life, you typically retain most of your past life memories and you almost always remember Home. During the reset for your ninth, there’s a sort of back-up hard drive embedded in you called The 99, hence being “99% aware of our spiritual existence”. It allows you to live your ninth life to the fullest, giving you your supernatural powers to unlock in your own divine time. It’s your all-access pass to seeing the 99 faces (and phases) of God — seeing yourself.
Of course, I was given The 99, just like everyone else. I just didn’t have a factory reset for my ninth major reincarnation—I never do, for any of my big ones. I’m just hungover in my new life, as I described. I get downright trashed and replaced… but it feels like just a simple (though brutal) restart, or depending on the nature of the life I lived, a remarkably hard restart.
Imagine: trashing your 12-year-old computer and getting a new one, but sometimes your new computer gives you all of the same problems your old computer did. One day, it’s operating as it should, then the next, it’s as if the ghost of your old computer possesses it. Moreover, every now and then, it’ll show you apps or files that your old computer had, but that you didn’t backup for restoration on the new computer. In fact, it shows you that the content is there, but you can’t interact with any of it. One day, that old photo gallery won’t leave from the corner of your screen, or that old Skype app is open full-screen and frozen, then the next day, it’s all gone—not one trace. That’s what it feels like having The 99 as an Alkhemist—my past lives or my 99 are the old computer, and my new life (my last life), the new one. That’s what it’s felt like for all of my nine lives, starting over with each new one.
Kind of interesting, right? Yeah, but not cool. I mean, it has its perks of excitement, like anything does when experienced with a novice mind, but it definitely blows. I technically lose much more memory than other souls, but I don’t feel like it.
Amiss. Haunted.
It’s like I’m living an out-of-body experience. I feel memories that don’t exist, but may have, and only sometimes am I able to confirm that they did. I don’t remember Home, because I’m not wired to go to it, so I feel Homeless. Wireless… Everything and everybody can connect to me, but I’m not connected to anything, except something that cannot truly be connected to. In that way, in my own way, I understand Lady Solána… I don’t feel like I’m real either.
Which do I desire more? Death, or transcendence? Transcendence, but death. Death before transcendence. Like everyone else. Home. Like everyone else. Memory. Like everyone else. Connection. Like. Everyone. Else.
It’s not that I want to be like everyone else, I value being different, and I know that even if I were to experience death, Home, memories, and connection, I would experience them in a way unique to me and my destiny. I could never be like everyone else, even with those shared facets of existence, and I thank the gods for that. I only desire those core things that everyone else experiences, in order to masterfully and completely be the type of different that I am (just as everyone else is able to).
They say, “Don’t compare your journey to anyone else’s. Keep looking at another’s path while travelling yours and you may very well go several wrong ways. Then how will you ever find your back? Know your path, know yourself. Keep your path, keep yourself.”
I agree. And though,
You can only see yourself when another is your mirror.
I only knew my path needed refinement and adjustment upon noticing other paths. Sometimes, other people’s maps have the keys and roads that yours is missing, and vice versa. Sometimes, I’d rather go further together, than faster alone. There’s a time for everything.
Soulmates come from the same Home.
There’s not a universal Home that everyone goes to when they die one of their big ones. There are a multitude of Homes, 99 to be exact, all shared by a mass of different souls. Remember, there are also 99 faces of God and 99% of our soul is awakened in the Tides. Nine is the sacred number of our world. Nine lives and eight deaths with your “ninth death” being transcendence.
You go Home, there’s a whole ceremony of rituals in which your old lives are put to rest, your new major life and its new realm is decided, and you move onwards.
Again, I don’t get to go Home.
Having a “home” and not being able to go to it… I’ve lived so many lives without going Home that I don’t even feel as if I really even have a Home to go to. I don’t remember it. Am I supposed to? I’ve asked others whether they remember their Homecomings and if they could describe their Homes to me. Some could, some couldn’t. And the descriptions that I did receive, they didn’t trigger any memories for me — not even a little. I don’t know if I’ll get to go Home before I transcend, but it’s my deepest desire. I’m not ashamed to admit, my desire to go Home, to die, is an even deeper desire than my desire to bring back Solána.
As much as I’ve devoted every fibre of my Alkhemey to her, I know that my Alkhemey isn’t my Alkhemey to devote, nor is it whole enough, if I haven’t mastered it, and the only way to master it is to know where it comes from, which is my Home. When I transcend, there’ll be no such thing as a “home” to go to, to lament, to try to remember, to even be aware of on any level. Everything is literally everything, and nothing, all at once — all ceases to exist and matter outside of light, darkness, sound and water. I’ve often thought of that as being my Home after-all, transcendence itself. It sounds like luxurious, Zen torture. I like it. But a stone would be unturned if I were to never experience actual death, if I were to never have a “Homecoming”. Again, I know that all of this will be rendered utterly meaningless once I transcend, but I want to leave my final life knowing that I thoroughly lived it and managed to give some temporary meaning to such Ecclesiastical things—so when it’s all said and done, I hope that I finally die.
Besides, maybe it’s an impossibly possible prerequisite to my transcendence: The immortal Alkhemist must intentionally reverse-transmute their own Alkhemey, in order to experience at least one big death.
I know that my Alkhemey isn’t my Alkhemey to devote, nor is it whole enough, if I haven’t mastered it, and the only way to master it is to know where it comes from, which is my Home.
I’m not ashamed that I desire this more than bringing my beloved Lady Solána back because I believe that it’ll bring me a step closer to doing so—the fact of the matter is that our destinies are fatally intertwined like so.
I’ve recently realised that after several evolutions of their soul, the people I give my Alkhemey to might experience the same unfortunate memory loss that I experience. Upon this realisation, I immediately thought of Baby, so I probed, “Baby, tell me, do you remember your Home? Do you remember your Homecomings?”
“I’m sorry that you don’t remember… But good news, I do! I remember mine! And I think I remember yours too!”
Intrigued, I probed further, “I beg of you, tell me everything. I’m listening.”
“Well, I think you’re from where I’m from… But that can’t be true… Ah… I don’t know, Daddy, I think I’m just… You’re ancient like me, so I think…”
Suddenly, an explanation of conclusive thought barraged out of Baby in a run-on vomit of word-collision ceasing to pause,
“Basicallyyou’refromsomeancientrealmlikeIamandIknowmyHomebutyou’renotfrommyHomeforgivememywordswerefasterthanmythoughtsbutmythoughtsaremywordssoIdon’tknowIsharedthemtoosoon”
I just laughed. Sometimes Baby’s thoughts are so eloquently expressed that he sounds like he’s reading from scriptures. And other times, like then, I’d say he’s free-writing aloud.
It’s always interesting to see which Baby is present from moment to moment. At first, I thought it had a lot to do with my own energy, or that he was showing me the energy of the day overall. Do I have an overflow of energy? Was I confused? Is that why he’s speaking so impulsively and in circles?—or—He’s talking as if he’s an old sage today. Is today’s energy incredibly aligned with mine? But nay, Baby is just Baby. From time to time, he does tune into my aura and foretell the spiritual essence of the day, but he’s ultimately his own person living his own life.
Who else is living their own life that I’ve so lovingly cursed with my amnesiac immortality? I thought.
Light, God, Fathom, and Killa… I’ve learned something about them that has me in the depths of other thoughts… I shan’t go to them, not for this…
I continued to think. Who else?
Interruption. “It’s that time. Let’s go scout for new jobs,” God lovingly wraps their arm around my neck. I shift free from the weight of their embrace and start walking. I feel detached… God is somewhat unmoved as she follows behind me. I sense God’s presence no more. It’s Killa. Anticipating Killa’s touch of teleportation, I consider turning around and screaming right before he reaches me, just to be goofy. I almost always do that. I know he looks forward to it. But I can’t bring myself to do it this time. I don’t feel it. He touches me.
And suddenly, we’re beneath the Tides.
Thinking again. My mother… My father…