Chapter 7 — The Tag
And thus begins Chapter Seven.
Now, children.
There I was.
On the back of the Impulse.
Arms around Nyx.
Wind in my face.
And the entire world
had changed.
The council looks around.
Not literally.
Probably.
But children.
The colours.
Gods.
The colours.
Everything had become so
committed.
Green was not merely green anymore.
Blue was not just blue.
Every surface seemed to have discovered saturation overnight.
Trees.
Walls.
Clothes.
Signs.
Vehicles.
The sky.
Everything looked like reality had gone into settings
and dragged the colour slider violently to the right.
The council nods.
And I loved it.
Not:
Interesting.
Not:
Huh, weed is kinda nice.
Children.
Loved.
I sat there behind Nyx,
wind pressing against me,
the Impulse moving beneath us,
and I was having what can only be described as
a divine moment.
The council grows quiet.
There was no great philosophy attached to it.
No revelation about the universe.
No secret truth.
I was simply
happy.
Overwhelmingly.
Sensationally.
Absurdly happy.
The world looked beautiful.
Movement felt beautiful.
Wind felt beautiful.
Even sitting on the back of a motorcycle felt like some sacred event bestowed upon me by benevolent gods.
The council smiles.
And we drove.
For hours.
The council checks a clock.
Possibly twenty minutes.
Irrelevant.
Children.
Time had begun behaving badly.
The ride stretched.
And stretched.
And stretched.
An epoch.
Civilisations may have risen and fallen.
Empires could have formed,
developed agriculture,
invented currency,
collapsed into ruin
and Nyx was still driving.
The council nods solemnly.
Twenty minutes.
Perhaps.
Eventually,
the Impulse slowed.
And we arrived.
Not merely Kanyakumari the town.
Children.
The Kanyakumari.
The part people actually mean when they say:
“We went to Kanyakumari.”
The tourist side.
The busy side.
The place with people,
shops,
trinkets,
movement.
The council looks around.
Story Nuo?
Absolutely enchanted.
Because the world was still glowing.
And Nyx
had a reason for bringing me here.
We stopped near a market.
The Impulse parked.
I climbed off.
The ground remained obediently beneath me.
The council applauds.
Gravity update:
stable.
Ahead
a trinket shop.
Children.
Now this,
I understood.
Small things hanging everywhere.
Necklaces.
Little objects.
Souvenirs.
The sort of shop where my future crow instincts would eventually become a recurring liability.
But Nyx did not wander aimlessly through it.
He went in with purpose.
The council watches.
He looked through the hanging necklaces.
One.
Another.
Moved a few aside.
Examined them.
Then
selected one.
Paid.
Turned toward me.
And held something out.
The council grows quiet.
A necklace.
I took it.
And at the end
a tag.
A bone tag.
Silence.
Children.
There it is.
The relic that betrayed the chronology years later.
The one that returned to me while I was looking at the bracelet.
The one that made me stare at the entire established Archive and say:
Oh, for fuck’s sake.
The council laughs.
Karkala
dethroned.
Again,
with caution.
Not:
the definitive first tag.
We no longer use such dangerous language.
The memory gods have heard enough arrogance from me.
The council updates the plaque.
EARLIEST CURRENTLY REMEMBERED BONE TAG.
There.
Safe.
Probably.
Nyx handed it to me.
And said:
“Something to commemorate your first high.”
The council grows still.
Children.
I had not asked for this.
This was not part of the quest.
We had come for weed.
The objective was complete.
Everything after that was extra.
And yet
Nyx had thought:
This should have a marker.
A physical thing.
Something you can keep.
I looked at the necklace.
The bone tag hanging from it.
And I put it on.
The council smiles.
Not bracelet.
Not yet.
No skulls.
No collection.
No sacred system.
No:
Every wandering gets a relic.
None of that existed.
It was just
a necklace.
A gift from Nyx.
A little souvenir from Kanyakumari.
Something to remember the day by.
The council nods.
Years later,
I would commit violence against the necklace.
Remove the tag.
Separate it from its original form.
And attach it to the bone bracelet with the others.
The council gasps.
Mutilation.
Archival repurposing.
Same thing.
But at that moment?
It rested around my neck.
Simple.
Complete.
And somehow,
without either of us knowing it,
one of the strangest recurring rituals in the Wanderings had just acquired an origin older than the origin I had previously crowned.
The council raises a finger.
Present Nuo observation.
Correct.
Story Nuo just thought:
Cool necklace.
The council nods.
Archive law respected.
I probably touched it.
Looked at it.
Liked it.
And then
Nyx said something extraordinary.
The council leans forward.
“Go have fun.”
I stared at him.
He continued.
Something along the lines of:
“Do whatever you want.”
The council becomes concerned.
And then:
“I’ll stay near you.”
Pause.
“Make sure you don’t die.”
The council goes completely silent.
Children.
Do you understand what this meant?
The man had accepted responsibility.
Officially.
Nyx had become
Survival Department.
The council erupts.
Oh no.
Exactly.
Until that moment,
I had still been managing myself.
Poorly.
Very poorly.
But still.
If I floated away?
My problem.
If the ground disappeared?
My problem.
If colours became too colourful?
My problem.
If the world began spinning again?
Also my problem.
Now?
Nyx had volunteered.
The council looks horrified.
He said:
Go have fun.
I’ll make sure you don’t die.
Children.
Freedom.
Pure.
Absolute.
Freedom.
Because if I floated away now
Nyx would handle it.
The council collapses.
How?
Irrelevant.
He had said he would.
That was enough.
Perhaps he would grab my ankle.
Perhaps he had experience retrieving airborne novices.
Perhaps there was an emergency rope.
I did not require details.
The responsibility had transferred.
The council writes:
NUO SURVIVAL:
OUTSOURCED.
Exactly.
And something in me immediately relaxed.
More than relaxed.
Expanded.
Because I no longer needed to monitor myself.
No sofa required.
No armrest.
No constant internal calculation:
Am I okay?
Am I about to leave Earth?
Children.
Nyx had it.
That was his problem now.
The council looks toward Nyx.
Poor man.
He knew what he had agreed to.
Probably.
And so I looked around.
Market.
People.
Colour.
Movement.
Kanyakumari glowing around me.
Bone tag against my chest.
The weed humming through every part of existence.
And one instruction:
Go have fun.
The council smiles.
I needed no further briefing.
Now
this is important.
Because until that point,
the entire first high had been guided.
Sit here.
Smoke this.
Watch this.
Eat this.
Come outside.
Get on bike.
Follow me.
I had been an apprentice.
A novice being escorted through a new state by someone who already knew the terrain.
But now?
Children.
Field test.
Nyx was nearby.
But the leash
metaphorically
was gone.
The council becomes uneasy.
Perhaps “leash” should have remained.
Too late.
I stepped away.
Maybe slowly.
Maybe immediately.
The Archive does not preserve the exact first movement.
But the feeling?
That survives.
Freedom.
A very particular kind.
Not independence.
I was not independent.
Quite the opposite.
The freedom existed because someone else had taken responsibility.
Children.
There is a profound stupidity in how comforting that was.
You mean I can just
exist?
And you will prevent death?
Excellent.
The council laughs.
My favourite arrangement.
I looked at Nyx.
Perhaps he nodded.
Perhaps smiled.
Then I looked at the world.
The bright,
oversaturated,
impossibly interesting world.
And suddenly
everything was available.
Not to buy.
To investigate.
The council leans forward.
Every stall.
Every sound.
Every person.
Every object.
Every path.
Children.
I was high for the first time,
in a place I had never properly explored,
wearing the earliest currently remembered bone tag,
with absolutely no assigned objective
and a designated adult making sure I survived.
The council pauses.
Nyx was barely more adult than you.
Technicality.
He had experience.
That made him senior management.
The council refuses to certify this.
And standing there,
I think some instinct already familiar to us began waking up.
Not yet named.
Not yet examined.
No map.
No checklist.
No:
What are the tourist attractions?
Just
go have fun.
Do whatever you want.
Children.
Those are dangerous words to give Nuo.
The council nods.
Very dangerous.
But for Story Nuo,
there was no symbolism.
No Wandering philosophy.
No future bracelet.
No thought that this moment would be excavated years later and placed into a numbered Archive.
There was only
a necklace resting against my chest.
Nyx nearby.
And Kanyakumari in front of me.
Bright.
Soft.
Vast.
Interesting.
I inhaled.
The air itself felt good.
The council smiles.
The quest for weed had succeeded.
And somehow,
without me noticing,
the quest had changed.
There was no objective anymore.
No marker telling me where to go next.
No dealer to find.
No thing to acquire.
Nyx had given me the only instruction remaining.
Go have fun.
The council opens the quest log.
MAIN QUEST:
COMPLETE.
NEW OBJECTIVE:
???
The council waits.
No objective.
Exactly.
Children.
Freedom.
And if I floated away?
Nyx would handle it.
Thus concludes Chapter Seven.
The Twenty Minute Epoch.
The Saturated World.
The Real Kanyakumari.
The Trinket Shop.
The Earliest Currently Remembered Tag.
The First High Necklace.
The Appointment Of Nyx As Survival Department.
And
Freedom.
Children.
I had travelled to Kanyakumari looking for weed.
I found it.
Nyx gave me a relic to remember it.
Then he looked at a man who had spent the previous hour clutching furniture to avoid becoming airborne
and said:
“Go have fun.”
The council sighs.
A questionable decision.
For Nyx.
For me?
Best sentence I’d heard all day.
