We experimented yesterday

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

Because of alex_antonin's pessimism, negativity, anger, and hatred that even HE has told us he doesn't like about himself, we experimented yesterday with something. It was intended to put Alex to sleep until we could remake him. Now, some multiples may call this unethical, but in my system I am not one body sharing many minds, but rather one body with one mind that has many Faces, sub-Faces, and undercurrents. A mind united in its chaos, we all call ourselves "I" and we all consider ourselves part of a greater I. Through these two I's we see the world.

Just before work, Alex imagined a see-through cryo-stasis unit sitting in the middle of the dusty salt plain in my mind (protected from the elements by magic, I assume) and lay down in it. Then he closed the lid and turned it on, freezing himself. It was VERY quiet in my head for about an hour or so, aside from a combo of Tristan and Molly feeling sad about it and tapping on the glass, trying in vain to wake him.

It looked like it was working. Fayanora was at the front, doing Alex's job extremely well. Shao'Kehn even hung around a bit. But as time went on, Alex's consciousness started leaking out of the cryostasis chamber. Finally it got so bad we decided we may as well wake him.

Then we tried a compromise approach... Alex continued to lay in the cryostasis pod with the lid up. Whenever his irritation started to peak, he'd sigh, close the lid, and freeze himself for a little while. This worked very well, except for a buildup of pressure that we couldn't exactly trace. We thought it was coming from him, but he was being perfectly compliant. He went into this whole experiment willingly, we didn't have to argue with him at all, and we barely even discussed it. He just chose it. Still, there was a buildup all night long. Getting out of work relieved the pressure, though.

Or seemed to. Apparently the pressure built up during the night at sleepy time, too. Because even after we got used to the idea of being awake, Alex was no longer in the pod. Where the pod went, even he doesn't know. He was calm, though. I think we made some progress.

We believe we have identified the source of the pressure. A tiny fraction of it was Alex's basic nature, but the rest of it was the dark Undercurrents... the monsters and creatures of darkness that he has identified with over the years. They are not Faces per se... I call them Undercurrents because they all represent a way of thinking but none of them have their own personalities. The strongest of these, though, have something similar to personalities. They are sub-Faces like Fii-Maik the Nothingness (a truly terrifying Undercurrent, in that It is remorselessly cold, has a truly towering ego, supreme control of Its emotions, and considers humans to be "clever animals" like cockroaches who can do tricks). Or "Masks" as I sometimes call them.

Still, progress was made.

Oh, now, I forgot to explain the Nothingnesses.

Ages ago, I started writing stories with a species of shapeshifters called Nothingnesses in them. They are multi-cellular organisms like humans, except that they evolved from a predatory race (and are, themselves, predatory). They evolved on a planet where magic is very real and very powerful and anyone who doesn't believe in it is delusional or lives in a cave. Through a combonation of constant persecution and evolution that was aided by a natural magical ability to change their DNA and their body when necessary, they evolved from simple shapeshifters into something so alien that it's hard to explain. But basically, they have come to a point where every one of their cells is sentient and sapient in its own right, but they still function as collectives. Their intelligence towers so high above normal people that even Leutenant Commander Data would be considered dull witted compared to them. Because they use their cells and their entire body to think, and thus can think about trillions of complex things at once.

Once a peaceful race, the constant persecution finally drove them over the edge and they began to get egos as powerful as their intelligence. They elevated themselves through secrecy and lack of morals into something like living Gods (the evil kind) and started trying to elevate the other sentient races of their world to their level. Because no one ever saw them, but knew their most violent work when it was apparent (killing people who were dragging the species down because of their idiocy), folks started calling them the Nothingness race. They liked the name, and eventually started calling themselves that. And they even describe their philosophy (which basically boils down to thinking of humans and other sentients as domesticated animals they're breeding to try to make them like the Nothingnesses) they explain with the words, "From Nothingness will come Somethingness."

So that is what Fii-Maik is. And he speaks for his people. Thus, he is completely terrifying.

Comments

[our-menagerie.livejournal.com]

Now, some multiples may call this unethical, but in my system I am not one body sharing many minds, but rather one body with one mind that has many Faces, sub-Faces, and undercurrents.

We dont think that is unethical but I think we understand because some people in our system started out that way. Sorry it didnt work exactly as you planned but if you feel it was progress that is good. I think it would be sad & hard to hmm "lose" anyone even if they not considered a seperate mind.

abby

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

Well we never had any intention of losing him, just of remaking him. Leaving his positive attributes intact and getting rid of his less savory aspects.

We at least calmed him down some, which is great. Lately he'd been in a towering rage that had been cut into pieces and jumbled up throughout the last several weeks. So he'd been worse than usual. So bad, in fact, that even he hated his own behavior.

I think the most I can really expect from him is to have him recognize when he's putting himself in a bad mood or expressing his negativity too powerfully, and stopping himself. Can't stop the momentary outbursts of cussing in gibberish, but at least that's preferable to actual words that could draw their effects towards us. He still hates dogs (because he fears them), and when they bark at him he barks back with gibberish. Still, it's an improvement, however slight.

[sethrenn.livejournal.com]

and considers humans to be "clever animals" like cockroaches who can do tricks

...however, many of them allow themselves to be just that. The fact that I am one in no way precludes me from making this observation. ^^ I might enjoy a chat with this Fi-Maik fellow sometime. Does he like pie and coffee?

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

Please read the edit I made to the original post.

I feel I have to explain Fii-Maik a bit more. After reading the edit I made to the original post, continue here:

The Nothingness race are unusual egomaniacs. Most egotists, Alexander included, use their arrogance to hide their pain and their feelings of inferiority. It's a facade. But with Fii-Maik, even if it is a facade still, you can't tell by looking. He probably doesn't even know it. None of his race would. Because their ego became so massive that it crushed all their other emotions and now they don't just *try* to think of other sentients as insignificant... they *do*. Young serial killers probably have more compassion for the animals they torture and kill than the Nothingness race has for other sentients. Except that the Nothingnesses "torture" the "animals" they do for a different purpose. They derive no pleasure at all, nor any displeasure, from hurting other sentients. They simply see what they do as a means toward an ends. They lack not only compassion but also malice.

Good Gods... now that I put it that way (and that IS how they are, and always have been)... I don't WANT Fii-Maik to be an Undercurrent. (Shudders)

Thank Goddess I only met him once. I only let him speak directly to someone else once. And it scared the fuck out of both of us.

[ksol1460.livejournal.com]

Curious: What's the difference between F-M and the product-testing scientists -- the ones that do things like the Draize rabbit eye tests and so on? (We get anti-vivisection bulletins in the mail, they talk all about it) Except that he and his people do their tests on humans, sort of like the guys who used to run Germany?

Also, if I can get this straight... You sort of create this universe and these beings yourself, right? So, aren't you sort of creating things that are against yourself and the rest of you guys? Why create enemies instead of allies? (I understand about something starting out as a story and then it comes to life)

Also, Gabe says to tell you: "I got put in stasis a couple times for my health. I kept waking up in the chamber. Got bored of it and released myself. It ain't for everyone. ;)"

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

These creatures I came up with ages ago, when I was still mostly off in La La Land.

One of my friends suggested Fii-Maik might be the personification of my suffering. And it makes sense.

I've been thinking about Fii-Maik over the weekend. I've come to the conclusion that, scary as he is, he isn't evil. His people may be, if they exist somewhere else for real... but HE is a part of me. He lives, and has always lived, in my mind... in Mindeodean. And the number one rule of Mindeodean has always been this: nothing in Mindeodean is truly evil. Misunderstood, or in pain, or whatever... but not evil. Scary he may be, but he's not evil.

[leto-2-atreides.livejournal.com]

That shall be fun, yes. I really like talking with those "you are but a clever animal" types. Agreement with Ruka of Sethrenn here...

I hope you wouldn't consider it too impolite for me to ask, Fayanora folk, though, do you have any kind of inner hierarchy in work, or is that solely an occurrence of mixture between various "energies" of which the masks/facets/undercurrents go?

[fayanora.livejournal.com]

There is a lot of mixing that goes on, but there are also ground rules. The liquid nature of my mind means I rarely know who is an influence and to what degree, because we're not seperate like those with D.I.D. are. We share memories, experiences, we always know what the body is seeing and sensing through our own perspective, even when we're not influencing the whole.

It's almost like we're The Founders from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, when they're all melted together on their homeworld in The Great Link. Different individuals can have more influence at various times, but we all melt together.

However... there IS some order. Tristan is the omni-personality, the one in ultimate control. Sometimes he seems a bit slow simply because he's trying to decide what words the collective wishes to speak.
The Undercurrents are thus because Tristan makes it so. His basic nature being good, he largely suppresses the ones that aren't. He wants to heal them, but also doesn't want them to be in control. Alexander has been his greatest challenge, because he is Tristan's link to the Undercurrents, it seems, and is also apparently their link to the outside world. And yet Alexander is ultimately an ally of the side of good... helping give Tristan strength and self-control, which Alexander usually has in abundance. Internally, and online, not so much. Or he didn't, anyway. That is changing.

Ultimately, though, it's kind of like a combo between a Democracy and a Monarchy. Tristan was not elected leader, but ultimately is, and would be re-elected if there were ever an election held. Though he deeply values the input of all the rest of us... the rest of himself.

The way Tristan views things, people with D.I.D. tend to be divided, but s/he is multiplied (http://fayanora.23ae.com/BOS/FABLES/Of_That_Which_Multiplied.html).

Trust me, Fii-Maik is NOT your typical "you are but a clever animal" type. Most of those types at least recognize that something is different about humans. Fii-Maik sees no difference at all between a human and a goat... or a human and a termite. The fact that humans build cities? Meaningless: termites do the same thing. Science? Dolphins and chimpanzees could be said to have science, too. Philosophy? Who says animals don't have that. Art? So humans have spare time from the struggle of survival to make pretty designs in materials. Love? Fii-Maik would understand the concept in abstract, but would not know it experientially. He would certainly never lower himself to feeling something so base, so primal. To Fii-Maik, who is not human, watching humans go about life is akin to a seventeenth century scientist watching termites: he considers them to be nothing more than machines with just enough awareness of self to want to survive, made by some higher power... and considering himself to have been appointed by that higher power to be lord and master over all those insignificant creatures. That is why I have only let Fii-Maik speak once, and once only. Speaking directly to him, you get the overwhelming sense of being completely without worth or value except as an object, a rat in a maze. That scientist who did cruel experiments on baby monkeys (like forcing them to be raised by wire mothers, which was the kindest of his experiments) would have found a kindred spirit in the Nothingness race... and they would have done to him the same kind of things he did to baby animals without a second thought. And without the purpose being to disprove their notions about humans, as his experiments were to disprove the notion that animals don't know love. Compared to them, he was a nice guy.
Speaking with Fii-Maik, I think even serial killers would be scared of him.

And no, I am not letting him speak again. Shao'Kehn had an Aspect of Herself She was once ashamed of (http://fayanora.23ae.com/BOS/FABLES/Of_That_Which_Is_Savage.html)... and Fii-Maik doesn't shame me, but he terrifies me.

[sharpsight.livejournal.com]

N) Imagining the brain and its reactions as a whole: the concept of anger not healthily released (repressed anger, in other words) building up dangerously comes to mind: perhaps since the 'pessimism, negativity, anger, and hatred' (or at least the anger and hatred) that may be a response to your outside situation/facets thereof is no longer being handled by his thought processes, less easy-to-deal-with entities/Faces are taking advantage of it.

This raises the question: can anger ever be eliminated entirely, other than by years of meditation and the like? *considers* ...Probably, though it may be harder than flipping a switch. At present though, it appears that the same emotions come to pass in whatever way they're able to be channeled. *hypothesises*