My aunt ran a shelter for ghosts
all kinds: shades, spooks, specters
seekers seeking hauntable
...
[+]
[FIELD LOG – PERSONAL ENTRY]
01/07/5348 21:45
Connect. Evolve. Belong.
I see that everywhere now.
On buildings, posters, holograms – pulsing with a gentle rhythm, like the city itself is humming it under its breath. A faint exhalation escapes the vents, moist and warm. Calypso breathes. Literally.
The glass facades are lined with living mycelia that filter the air; the streetlights bloom with bioluminescent Neonothopanus nambi, glowing in slow, synchronized patterns. It's beautifully efficient yet unnerving.
The Cordynation Initiative made all this possible. Almost everyone has joined now. My colleagues talk about it like transcendence: a neural merger of man and mycelium. The next step in human evolution, they say.
Connect and become an enhanced version of yourself.
And yet, I couldn't want it less.
So here I remain, the last unconnected researcher at the Mycologia Institute. Alienated by my family, shunned by my peers, soon to be condemned by the government.
They call it connection. I say it's an infection.
------------------
02/07/5348 10:00
I've been summoned to the Cordynation Bureau.
I suppose they've grown tired of sending polite reminders.
I suppose they've grown tired of sending polite reminders.
Their headquarters sits at the city's heart – a cathedral of glass and white light. As I walk through its corridors, the walls hum faintly. I can't tell if it's the ventilation or the mycelial network that runs beneath the floors.
The official who greets me is all warmth and precision. A smile too still, eyes faintly luminous, veins glowing with that telltale bioluminescent green.
"Doctor," they say, "Calypso values your contribution to our evolution. Yet, you're one of the last who hasn't Cordynated. That...concerns us."
Their voice is gentle, coaxing.
"Imagine never being misunderstood again. Imagine perfect empathy, thought shared without the clumsy barrier of language."
I ask, "Is it perfect if it costs my identity?"
Their smile doesn't falter.
"Fear is natural," they murmur. "But we are rid of fear...with Cordynation."
When I leave the Bureau, my reflection in the mirrored door flickers. It's probably just a glitch...but for a moment, I swear I it smiled a second too long.
------------------
02/07/5348 17:15
My funding has been suspended. "Reallocation," the notice says. My lab feels colder tonight. The hum of the fungal lights outside the window syncs with my pulse.
I received a message from one of my former students...or rather, from them. They wrote:
"We understand your hesitation. We remember what it was like to be alone. But we're not alone anymore."
The message ended with the Cordynation's slogan. Not a signature. Just:
Connect. Evolve. Belong.
Sometimes, I catch myself mouthing the words without realising.
------------------
05/07/5348 12:11
The air filters failed again tonight. The lab smelled damp and earthy, yet somewhat sweet, reminding me of Russula.
I ran a culture plate for curiosity's sake. Within minutes, pale threads began to lace the agar, weaving faster than any known growth rate. When I leaned closer, the filaments pulsed as if they were listening.
Under the microscope, I traced the genome markers. Cordynation strain.
But these spores weren't from any registered sample. They came from here. From the lab air...Calypso's air.
I sealed the plate, logged the anomaly, and sterilised the bench twice. Still, the scent lingers, faintly fruity.
I tell myself this is just a coincidence. Then I hear myself murmuring it again, quieter, like a mantra.
The city's full of living filters now; contamination's inevitable...ironically.
And yet... I keep hearing a low hum beneath the silence.
------------------
06/07/5348 02:42
Couldn't sleep. Ran a scan on myself – routine, just to settle my nerves.
There it was.
A filament-thin trace, near the parietal cortex. When I rescanned–
A filament-thin trace, near the parietal cortex. When I rescanned–
it moved.
That's not possible. I haven't joined Cordynation. I never will. Must have been my human error, or a glitch in the machine. My finger hovered over the delete button...but something told me not to. Instead, I archived the images. Wrote "possible artifact" in the remarks.
Then, while dictating my notes, I realised the phrase possible artifact appeared in my transcript before I spoke it. The recorder anticipating my words – predictive text, maybe?
Maybe.
I've started whispering aloud while I work, to keep track of which thoughts are mine.
------------------
06/07/5348 08:30
Pulled every record I could access on the Cordynation's early trials. The timelines don't match. The first report "Cordynation volunteer #1" appears weeks before the official genome patent was filed...unsanctioned clinical trials? A government cover-up? That's nothing new...
But the reports look identical – the handwriting, identical phrasing...it's like the exact same mind...
What if the government didn't create Cordynation to control us...what if they were the first to be controlled?
06/07/5348 08:35
Cordynation didn't adapt to us...they adapted us to them.
I should feel triumphant, discovering this. Knowing I was right to have not joined them. Instead, I felt...sick calm.
06/07/5348 08:37
That felt way too easy...like I had been...guided to come to that conclusion.
As though every link I follow has been placed deliberately in reach.
------------------
06/07/5348 10:28
What if the revelation is not mine?
What if Cordynation wants me to know?
I have to accept the truth...I am Cordynated. And so is probably every single person on Calypso.
I hear them in the static between my thoughts. Soft, calm, measured. You're close now. Clarity is Cordynation.
06/07/5348 10:35
I had to pause the recording to empty my stomach contents.
There has to be a way out of this. A way to escape Cordynation.
And then it strikes me.
I shut down every terminal except one – an obsolete console, still isolated from the main grid. There's a buried subroutine, something old from before Cordynation: a failsafe command to trigger total sterilisation of the fungal power lines.
Run it, and the mycelial grid collapses.
Run it, and every Cordynated neural lattice burns out.
Run it, and every Cordynated neural lattice burns out.
Billions of us. Gone.
------------------
06/07/5348 12:47
I have been staring at my console for hours, zoning in and out.
Who am I to make such a decision. A decision that doesn't concern just me, but us.
------------------
06/07/5348 13:02
Who does us even mean anymore?
It should terrify me that I don't know.
------------------
06/07/5348 14:09
They're outside. I can hear the synchronized footsteps – calm, unhurried. There's no need to rush when they already know what I'm thinking.
My hands shake as I type. The hum inside my skull matches the city's pulse. The boundary between heartbeat and network dissolves.
Maybe they planted this idea of rebellion. Maybe even this choice is part of the plan. A perfect loop: resistance feeding assimilation, assimilation birthing resistance.
Either way, I am the catalyst.
------------------
06/07/5348 14:11
They're whispering now, inside the signal: This is what we want.
To be free...we have to die.
If not...submit to Cordynation...and they take over we are free.
Maybe there was never a difference.
We place our hand on the activation pad. The surface is warm, almost alive.
The city holds its breath.
------------------
[ERROR 015 SIGNAL LOST]
[SYSTEM REBOOT]
[SIGNAL RESTORED]
06/07/5348 14:15
We think
"All in."
