The Format's Ruin

I have in my possession a queer brass cylinder. Many thousands of years old, or so my appraiser claims. Bought at auction for quite a sum, no expense spared and fished from some sea-trawler or other.

No, no. I appreciate your concerns, but I assure you that no-one was cheated. The cylinder by itself is quite worthless. The device is an ancient record, you see, impossible to read without the right mechanism; a mechanism that it so happens is also a part of my storied collection. I have already hosted a number of listenings and the historical relevance of the cylinder is not lost on me. To this end I have invited a number of historians, translators and artists to my manor in the interests of adapting the contents of the cylinder into a form understandable to the common man.

What follows is the translated, transcribed annotated and adapted contents of that cylinder, first impressed with its invisibly small network of dents and grooves in the mist of ancient antiquity, and offers us insight into how the defining conflict of our time, the  Makinamachy, truly began. The story is strange but not entirely beyond understanding.     

It is the end of history. Or so it seems to me.

The voice is indistinct, as if spoken from down a long brass tube. Nothing is displayed.

I stand here as I always have. Gods willing, I always will. The Work is important.

Light rays resolve, as if sun through smoke, to reveal an even row of golden tablets. They bear the same etchings as the cylinder.

My writings come from the people. I engrave them here and then hand them to the priests. Maybe they had another name, once, before all our faiths came together. Over my long career I have seen them directly intercede a handful of times, but it is their sworn duty to take my interpretations of the people’s will to the Gods. In that sense, you might call me a scribe. It’s my solemn pleasure to address those who will come after us, if indeed, any will. Maybe ours is the last generation.

We cannot see the speaker, but our view rises and falls to follow a human perspective: the floors are immaculate, shining marble. The vaulted ceilings are a dull gold; it’s impossible to tell how far they are but wisps of cloud play across the shadow of the buttresses.

This is is Paroxysm, one of the great cities of Origin Monad. Perhaps the last of all. I have lived here all my life and it seems likely I will meet my death here, also.

The cylinder’s display follows the speaker’s footsteps. It stops at an archway. The top of the archway is not visible. Beyond the opening is, presumably, the city of Paroxysm. The cityscape is golden, primarily presenting as wide domes and towers, many of the buildings glow with yellow or amber light. No landscapes are visible within or beyond the city, making it impossible to determine a sense of scale. The sky, too, is the color of gold: the clouds are thin and yellow. Whorls of gold, metallic dust wind their way through the sky. Beyond them, stars are visible.

My name is Seren. As I said, I am a scribe. I had a family name once, also, but families have lost their relevance to our age. Perhaps it would be too cruel to have a family.

The speaker, Seren, beings the long walk back to his work station, a spot seemingly chosen at random in the massive, empty hall. There are other workers, presumably scribes too, working here, but so far that we cannot make out their work.

Yes, I am a scribe, but I have never troubled my free hours with writing. It has always been my chosen work and dedication to the craft has prevented me from using it for my own purposes. At the urgings of my fellows, I have begun today. I have lost. I despair. These things, the other scribes tell me, can be kept at bay by writing of them. Who will read those writings, though? It’s not that there will be none left to read them, through that may well be our fate. No, what troubles me enough to resort to this is that there may be none left who care to read them. Who are able to read them. My work was important, once. Now it is a formality. The Gods, who taught us the trades that tamed the skies and the sea and the land, are themselves withering and preparing to die. They have chosen for us, too. A slow, peaceful surrender to death. That is how I see it.

Darkness. For a moment, we lose the subtle golden glow that emanates from every surface. Beyond, in the city, the same darkness ripples over the buildings. 

If I were to abandon everything we as a civilization had built I would at the least show it a mournful respect.

Seren’s hands finish engraving a tablet. He cradles it in his arms and begins a long walk. Paroxysm is visible to his side. He meets with a precession of mekin, statuesque and robed, that he surrenders the tablet to.

“Go now, scribe. Be at peace in the city. Find your home. We will deliver your work to the priests. Tomorrow is another day.”

I have no cause to argue with them. Yes, tomorrow is another day, but the city has no home for me anymore, only a place to lie awake.

Seren walks a massive stretch of golden steps. The city comes closer. He pulls his robes tighter around himself. There are indistinct figures camped on the steps: they are half insubstantial image and half machinery. Seren bows his head and keeps far away from them on the expanse of the steps. At foot of the stairs the street is inlaid with hexagonal tiles. The street expands to a plaza dominated by a fountain. The fountain bears an ornate statue. A glow from beneath the water sends a shaft of light into the sky. Flanking the fountain are flowerbeds; identical flowers in regular patches of different colors.

A humanoid machine, perhaps a mekin, much taller and wider than the ecclesiastic functions Seren worked with, turns to watch.

The Formatted find these rare places of work fascinating. The concept is alien to them, but so is curiosity. Many have already forgotten their words.

Seren steps inside a hall. Its doors close behind him and the structure begins to move: it’s a transport of some kind, many long chambers linked together, perhaps like a train, only a great deal more vast and expansive. He walks between the rows of columns until he finds a chamber with other passengers. They do not speak.

Many times I’ve pondered this. I do not know these people, so why does the simple proof of my own eyes that they still live lift some of the resigned dread from my heart? Yes, this is good. It is the only meaningful thought I have yet recorded.

Seren disembarks into another impossibly wide plaza. A forest of towers stretch out before him. He crosses past a cluster of flowerbeds and childish attractions: slides, climbing frames, a carousel, still revolving. All are lit and humming with appealing music. The horses in particular are very detailed. There are no children.

“Physical! Physical! Come join us!”

The Formatted sometimes call after me, but never give me reason to answer. My habitation is in the fourth tower, and has no furnishing or comforts, material or otherwise. It’s fresh, like a wound. Two rooms conjoined, with a balcony and panorama of Paroxysm, such as it is. A few more silhouette-people linger by my door, and sometimes they make a show of peering inside. Laws are no barrier to them anymore; there are no punishments in the Format.

There’s little for me to do at home. I prefer not to light it, either, the better to stave off the jolt of fear that comes with the sudden darkness. Without taking the light for granted, seeing the waves roll across the city has its own beauty.

“He thinks he’s better than us.”

“Let us in! You must be bored in there.”

“If he really cared he’d be Formatted by now! Let’s go explore! I’m bored.”

That’s their bane: boredom. The thing they can least abide. One lingers outside my chamber, even after the others have gone. It’s late, although the city lights rarely dim, only flicker, but over the hours the clouds part to expose more of the stars. Still, it lingers.

“Leave.” I tell it. I won’t sleep with them waiting outside my door.

“Is it true? Do you hate us? Even the ones that walk with you?”

“I don’t hate you, but I don’t understand your choice. You’ve chosen abandon the world that gave you life, all your family, and you’ve given up on ever giving life yourself. You have no future.”

I half expect them to retreat, so that I might sleep.

“The Format gives me all those things. I have many families.”

“It simulates them. You don’t have them.” There’s no telling the difference for them, of course. 

“You do hate us.” The voices whispers at it retreats.

“I want you to live, that’s all.” I reply, but they’re long gone.

Seren’s record resumes on what is, presumably, the subsequent day, but not frame of reference is provided for the passage of time. If there is a sun that illuminates Paroxysm, it’s never captured by the cylinder.

I’m glad to be awake and working, as early as can be. The ride is short, my gait is quick.

The stairs are more crowded. Silhouettes, the “Formatted” crowd around Seren as he climbs. Scribes greet him at the top of the steps.

There never used to be so many, but now It’s come to be the norm that they outnumber us and jeer at us; “physical” they call out, as if only idiots would chose to be born.

“They’ve been coming all morning.” One of the scribes says.

“Surely not to hear the pronouncements, such things are irrelevant to the Format.”

Seren walks into the halls and to his station, where scrolls and fresh gold tablets lay ready.

“They say the mountains are to be stoppered. The atmosphere is growing too warm.”

“Too warm?! We send all our power to the Format as it is!”

“Exactly, to spare the generators. Formatter is hungry.”

“And they complain of no work! Are we who remain not all volunteers?”

The scribes are talkative today, as I busy myself with work. It seems the only thing that soothes my mind, but even the scrolls tell a bleak story: families are torn apart, great works lie abandoned and their architects lament, workers and strugglers have all written laments. My job is to choose what the Gods will know, and surely, they already know this.

As Seren works he often looks over his shoulder. Formatted are massing at the top of the stairs and filing into the great hall. We see them more clearly: faces and bodies distorted, as if flat depictions, like portraits but stretched across the dimensions of a body. They flicker and fuzz, their features often indistinct. They are all different, but they bear uniform blissful grins. As they advance into the hall the sound of their voices grows bolder. They interact with the other scribes and their works, but any time they attempt to touch, they reveal themselves as insubstantial. The act of passing through objects seems to amuse them. Seren shrinks further and further over his work.

“Please leave us. This is a place of solemn endeavor.” My entreaty falls on deaf ears. The Formatted is small, maybe a child once, that now will never grow up. There’s no recognition in its eyes, only dilated amusement at the shine off my tools and the emotion of my reaction. It laughs as it paws at my work. There are more behind, each insensible and incoherent. The crowd will overwhelm us soon.

“Seren!” A familiar voice carries off the growing susurrus. I know it comes from among them. I do not answer, and my reasons will not be recorded on this cylinder. “It’s been so long! Or at least it seems it. We’ve had such fun, there’s no use clinging on to old, useless things, you know! It’s pride that’s making you so miserable, not us, not the Format. It really is the future, Seren! Once Formatter has everything she needs, once there’s no need for anyone to be out in the physical, how long will you really hold out?”

Seren appear to whip around, as if to confront the speaker, but is overwhelmed by a crowd of insubstantial figures. Somewhere nearby, voices are calling impotently for the crowd to clear. The coo-ing, pre-verbal laughter overwhelms everything else.

“Enough! This is intolerable!”

Ghostly figures retreat and wail as they part around Seren like a rock in a river. “We are working! Essential work! You may have chosen a half-life of nothingness, but we physicals still have purpose!”

I have never said it before, but the words are each a weight lifted. “You Formatted have chosen to do nothing, contribute nothing, be nothing! Very well, the Gods guarantee your right to individual determination, but your choices are just as sacred as ours! Leave us to or our work! Go back to the the hollow carnival of your precious Format!”

Some Formatted turn, run and vanish, but most stay. Their voices rise and fall, some in anger, others cry out in fear. Whichever Formatted Seren once knew have retreated. Large mekin plod through the great hall; they shine lights across the crowd of Formatted, who scatter. Scribes cluster around Seren, concerned. We see just low enough to make out his chisel and hammer held in a white-knuckle grip.

“Unkindly said.”

“You know that your words, no matter how harsh or fair, will fall on deaf ears.”

“They’ve made their choice. You know there’s no going back. The Format, once joined, can never be forsaken. We may all share your feelings, but to force them on the poor Formatted is cruel.”

My fellows gather around. Yes, them I could strike. Let it be known that in this moment I consider defending myself from the invisible, oppressive terror.

“He is right. Why should we stay our words. Because they are fools? For every burden they shirk, more falls on us.”

The scribes part. I do not know the man who speaks.

“Who will be the last, I wonder?” Another voice asks. The mekin continue to pace about the hall.

Seren’s cylinder then records the arrival of precession. They are dressed in ecclesiastic style, similar to the mekin that received Seren’s tablets the day previous. We believe they are of higher rank.

We do not return to our work. The scribes and I greet the priests, who almost never travel to our lowly inscribing halls. The priest at the center of the precession has a long, severe face and precisely trimmed silver hair in all aspects. He stands very tall.

“I am Polybios.” The high priest announces. “We haven’t met.” Scribes bow. “I saw your confrontation, although it is not why I have come.”

“The Formatted, your eminence. They disturbed our work, and our numbers are thin.”

“Yes, indeed,” Polybios turns his crozier staff. He purses his lips in thought. “You there, scribe. You admonish them for their choices.”

“Yes, your eminence.” I bow my head and fear he will scold me. Polybios draw breath, but hesitates.

“It is difficult for us. Many of us feel that we have lost people we care for to the Format. Perhaps we have, and then imagine the only way to get them back is to become Formatted ourselves. Of course, there’s no coming back. It’s that inward looking judge that vexes us the most, isn’t it? The one who suggests to us that they’re right. We cling to a dead-no, a useless world. That Formatter is right when she says our civilisation has reached its goal. I know that many of your are the last of your lines. The last of your families. It is my hope that no matter who is right, that one day we will all be re-united and all will be forgiven.”

         Polybios pauses. I know the news he has come to deliver will be grave, although he may not admit it. “Now I must speak. In brighter times messengers would carry these words to you, but we are all so few now. I feel the need for us all to stand together. The Gods of the upper world have read a disaster in the winds. A storm of centennial proportions. The Gods now lack the strength to turn it aside. We must turn all our efforts to sheltering the people and ensuring the safety of the Formatted alike.”

Discontent rolls across the crowd like wind through wheat. “Be silent, just for a moment. I understand your reaction. My announcement here is twofold. The Gods of the upper world lack the strength because their sire has been Formatted.” A clang refunds through the hall. A scribe throws down his tools in anger. Fists clench, brows furrow. Who could have know such a thing was possible? “It is likely why so many Formatted crowded our work here. Across the Format they are united in celebration.”

“What can we do?”

“What is the meaning of any of this?”

“There’s no stopping a storm without the Gods!”

“Silence!” Polybios stamps his crozier into the marble tiles. “I am using my authority as divine avatar to declare your works here ended! Go out into the city and meet with the mekin. You are to spread the word. We prepare for a deadly storm.”

It is warm for the hour, and the clouds have thickened. Of course, it was once true that the weather was always perfect. No more. The air crackles with electricity and hisses with far off wind frustrated by mighty towers. The towers now lie empty, and if they were to fall, who would mourn them? Would would remain to re-erect them? Maybe that’s how our city will end, a gradual ruining, inexorable and impossible to repair, until the last physical resigns or dies.

One of the other scribes is with me. We are flanked by mekin, to address the residents of the district, what few remain, gathered in the plaza. Rain has already started to fall.

“What of the severs?” One of them asks, “my mother and my brothers all became Formatted. Who will protect the servers from the storm?”

“That’s not our concern. Formatter will care for her own.” The other scribe answers for me. I have no idea his name and don’t recognize his face.

As Seren and the other scribe talk to the handful of people, images impressed onto the cylinder reveal the oncoming storm. Rain falls and the sky flashes with lighting. The wind rises. Seren’s robes are visibly disturbed. People pass food amongst themselves. As the other scribe continues to speak, the city goes dark. It’s identical to the waves of darkness Seren recorded the previous day, only the light does not return. The city is now lit only by the diffuse glow of the golden sky, mostly smothered by clouds.

Voices rise. The people are distraught. Without the city’s power they will quickly grow cold and isolated.

“Return to your homes,” the other scribe calls out.

“No.” Instinct forces me to intercede, “we have no idea how long it will take for the power to return. It may be a long walk, but we should take them to the hall.”

“Formatter did this on purpose.”

Seren has ceased to impress onto the cylinder. Only his voice and the voice of the other scribe carries over a murmuring crowd, presumably the people they have chosen to shelter in the scribe’s hall..

“We have no way of knowing that.”

“I can see from here, the severs are still bright. The Formatted are flush throughout the streets.”

Seren audibly moves.

“You may be right. I cannot say, there’s no fathoming it.”

“Look!”

Seren etches a static scene onto the cylinder, likely due to the limited tools he has on hand. The dark city glittering. A stream of light, perhaps glowing figures, rush down the main streets. Rain and clouds engulf the city. Water already fills many of the open spaces, and the water carries a thick layer of debris.

“They are shoring up defences around the servers. The mekin try to stop them.”

“They are trying to restore the power,” I tell him, although I can only speculate. “Formatter has always drawn more and more than her fair share.”

“Mere hours after one of the Gods becomes Formatted. Surrendering their duty. All their heritage.”

I can’t reply to him right away. He has no way of knowing how often I’ve thought of it.

“Don’t dismiss them so easily. People do not chose the Format without reason. I believe them when they say it may give them whatever they want. I don’t judge them and I don’t blame them.”

“Maybe you should,” the other scribe growls, “they’re destroying our city, protecting their precious severs to the exclusion of all else. For what? An unlimited supply of food and drink? A pretence of your every desire, indistinguishable from reality?”

“But imagine you had lost those things in the physical world-no, not food or drink. People you love. Our world increasingly feels like a tomb. Like a failure. To build a new one-”

     “Are you with them? Awaiting your moment to stand before Formatter and have your body reduced to vapor?”

“No, no. Not at all,” Seren’s voice raises as both men watch the city engulfed by the storm. “They don’t remember, do you understand that? The Format erases all that which is not comfort or joy. Yes, they have everything they desire. Disregard material things. What if you were always right? What if whatever you felt or thought became reality-no, had always been reality? You strike me as a principled man. Principles are how we measure the world, yes, but in the Format, they become foundations that build everything else around you.”

“It’s not real.”

“No, it’s not.”

Both recoil as a building hum shakes the golden hall. The crowd shrieks. Seren has but a moment to inscribe what he sees: a golden streak, like a sunrise stretched across the entire horizon, roaring down towards the city. Another light rises to meet it.

“One of the Gods! It must be! Where is that Polybios?”

“Stay calm! Stay calm!”

Beneath them, the city rises, aircraft fighting the storm to escape. Some flash overhead and arc upward into the headstone gray sky. A flash of light dominates the cylinder’s record, underscored by a thunderous boom. It lasts a fraction of a moment, but has been reduced in volume for this record.

Following this, the cylinder records only ruin. Any other impressions are rendered illegible by damage from falling rubble.

The site; the city of “Paroxysm” has yet to be found. My cartographers believe it to be somewhere admit the wastelands of equatorial Ashmead. What little we know about events following this pertain directly to the Revelation.

What was the fate of Paroxysm? Was the Revelation a direct response? Were the Ostrakoi built to replace the faithless Gods that gave in to this “format?” Many questions remain, but the indisputable truth is that our forefathers possessed wealth and power far in excess of our current world, in recovery as it is. It is my hope that this record may help guide or descendants away from the mistakes of the people of Paroxysm and the other cities of “Origin Monad.”