#But when I joined the lab my singular motivation was to like just help out bc I’m bad at making big decisions

[on-stolen-sunbeams]

.

PI prof just sent me a grant application thing that I should fill out bc undergrad in research! It me! and I’ve already been doing a ton of writing for the actual paper but this makes it real like really real outside of the safe bubble of the lab and given the lab will be closed over next summer (probably) I gotta start figuring out what I’ll be doing bc I want to do research. Might be kind of freaking out a ton.

on the upside, multivariable prof is a wicked fast grader and I did better than I assumed (still not good but passable) so that’s nice :)

[weirdponytail]

Huntik x Mass Effect: Crew and Enemies

Hella hella you fantastic people! I’m back with more of that Huntik-Mass Effect AU no one wanted! 

I’m still hashing out stuff for the Crew of the Huntik Foundation ship that Dante’s in command of. It’s still called the Nexus (like the Huntik Nexus stones from the show, not the Andromeda ship), and it still has Krogan!Montehue and Salarian!Tersley(Terzi is the salarian name I’m giving him), but I’m still debating the races of other Foundation personnel. I kinda want Scarlett to be an Asari, and for her to be the ship medic/doctor. Metz is human and basically is a combination of Anderson and Admiral Hackett. 

When I put out the original AU character things over Xmas, I was trying to lean away from modeling whatever I’d write about the team in Mass Effect after the Reaper War. The war in the games, especially ME3, is sharp, rushed, and incredibly (though amazingly and fantastically done) visceral and just...so brutal, especially when you listen in on side convos around the Citadel. There are terrible battles happening on multiple planets, on the ground, focused on soft target areas. I knew that if I went that direction with the Huntik Team, I’d start slipping into the style and background of writing that I generally reserved for my Modern Inheritance stories, and considering the age of Lok, Sophie and the Fears boys I didn’t want to do that to them. 

Now though? After replaying the opening of ME3 and fighting through Grissom Academy, I’ve decided to put the team in the ‘Reaper’ war, but on a slower scale more similar to the Spiral War as it built up through season 2. It’ll be better explained once I get what’s in my brain down in an ‘intro’ piece, but till then, let’s talk bad guys.

There are, generally, two different ‘factions’ you fight in ME3. 

One is Cerberus, a pro-human group that was originally fighting against the Reapers (as well as committing terrorist acts against non-humans) that’s being influenced by the Reapers by the time we start ME3. 

Cerberus is now the Organization. They’re still a shady bunch, believing they have human interests at heart and that humans are the rightful leaders in the galactic political stage. Over time they’ve been warped and misguided, but there are operatives that joined because the Organization had the funding needed for special projects that the Foundation and Council would have restricted or tangled in political red tape. 

Klaus is one of those operatives. He was developing a biotic implant that would help children who manifested their abilities early, as well as help adolescents that still had problems controlling their biotics even with standard amps, implants and training. Usually children like this were even more stigmatized than your usual human biotic. Their emotional states as young children would tie in with their biotics, turning natural tantrums into deadly telekinetic hellstorms. Children like those would often be tossed aside, sold into slavery, or outright killed due to fear in their community. Klaus wanted to develop these amps and implants and help find these kids and give them a chance to control their powers where the Foundation and Council standard equipment had failed them. 

This lead to problems similar to the ones that arose when Jack(Subject Zero) was experimented on. Klaus was kept out of the loop, stuck in the lab and away from the testing process. Eventually the prototype implant stuck with one of the young subjects without killing her: Zhalia, known as #26. This implant was altered by the Organization without Klaus’s knowledge to put a heavy influence on its powers. While Zhalia was the only known biotic to have the ability to ‘charge’ and was pretty much a biotic artillery squad in a tiny body once the L5z-26 implant bonded, she has incredibly weak support power- her barriers are a joke when not charging and while she can telekinetically move items she’s got little ability to use singularity, gravity fields, ect. She was being trained to become a human tank, and once he realized what they were doing Klaus slaughtered the adults at the facility, sent the other children to a Foundation outpost in an auto guided shuttle, and took Zhalia with him so that the Foundation wouldn’t use her as a weapon, enrolling her in the Hades Academy for Gifted Youth to help her control, train and hone her abilities to prevent accidents. 

On to the ‘Reapers!’

Of course the Reapers are the Spirals, but as for their motivations beyond wiping out life and just being dicks in general, no one really knows. The Ones That Came Before, dubbed Casterwills by their apparent pre-biotic powers woven into ancient tech continually effecting people and objects long after they disapeared (Casting their will on others long after death. eh? eh??), fought them before and vanished. 

Also they can be giant killer robots and make things into indoctrinated husks of their former selves. Because I’m not giving that up. :3

Alright now I can get to my little intro. Cheers mates!

[svtskneecaps]

halloween hijinks

yeah the title’s p bad i made it up for posting and nothing but

uhh i was bored so i wrote a kim jisung x kim jihun semi unrequited story? like love’s not really the main focus bc it’s mostly two idiot friends doing dumb shit yknow

Group: TRCNG (look at ya girl stepping out of her comfort zone)

Warnings: Ouija boards, mentioned flying erasers, two kids being dumb, scented candles, probably language (i don’t remember for sure but knowing me), ooc things (let me emphasize this, OOC THINGS), and poor writing. i did my best

Words: a commentary’s worth (1725)

best gif i could find in 5 minutes of searching my dudes i take what i can get and don’t throw a fit cr to bapwoo the owner as shown above. i’m not a giffer just a bad writer

“We should not be doing this.”

Jisung had been saying that for probably the last day and a half straight. One would think he’d have stopped by now, since the boy creeping around ahead of him with a Ouija board tucked under his arm still hadn’t listened.

“Yes we should, because who else is going to?” Jihun checked around the corner, looking like someone from a parody of a spy movie.

“The teachers probably, I don’t know! We shouldn’t be messing with this stuff.”

“Look, I did research. It’ll be fine.” (Jisung noticed he knocked on wood as he said that)

“You did less than a day’s worth. We’re messing in the occult here, what if we summon something?”

“Yeah, like what? The spirit of an angry old woman who flicks your forehead when you cuss?” Jihun crouched down, checking around a hallway intersection.

“Like a demon! This is serio- what are you doing?”

“I’m being stealthy.” Jihun laid flat on his belly, worming his way through the intersection.

“You- okay.” He was going to say you look ridiculous, but thinking about it this wasn’t the strangest thing he’d seen. Now crouching on the other side, Jihun waved for him to join. Checking both ways for any security or custodians, he crossed the intersection.

But not on his belly, because he kind of wanted to keep that last shred of dignity, thank you.

“You’re gonna get us caught,” Jihun hissed.

“I’m gonna get us caught?” Jisung asked, but the other boy was already moving, crouched in front of a classroom door and fiddling with the knob.

“Got it.” He pulled the door open. “Come on.”

The classroom was eerie in the dead of night. Even the cheery posters with cheesy motivational sayings seemed creepy. And the model skeleton their teacher had dressed up for Halloween really didn’t help the atmosphere any.

“You know what today is?” Jihun asked as he pulled the shades down over the windows.

“Halloween?” Jisung cleared a spot on one of the lab tables at the back of the room.

“No, that ended a couple hours ago.” He pulled the last shade down and moved over to Jisung, beginning to set up the Ouija board. “Today is the Day of the Dead. I read about it on Wikipedia.”

“You think that’s a trusted source?”

“Well I wouldn’t cite it on an essay but it’s pretty accurate a lot of the time.” Jihun pulled a stack of website printouts from of the box, setting them next to the board. Jisung squinted. “Anyway, Wikipedia says spirits come to visit the living world on November first, which is the second day of the festivities, and coincidentally,” he checked his watch, “it’s been November first for about an hour.”

“I thought it was the day of the dead,” Jisung emphasized. “Singular.”

“Me too. But we were wrong.”

“And anyway, what does that have to do with what we’re doing?”

“Halloween, which is the mainstream spooky ghost day, has just ended. According to the Mexican tradition, the spirits have just begun to walk among us. I figured now would be the best time to contact the ghost and ask it to stop throwing erasers at me.”

Jisung felt his jaw drop. “That’s why we broke into school in the dead of night? I told you, it’s probably Siwoo or Hyunwoo or one of the other back row kids!”

“I’ve been watching, it’s not,” Jihun insisted, setting the triangular planchette beside the board.

Jisung sighed. “Fine. So how do we do this safely?” “Well first we’re supposed to light candles.” Jihun took a couple out of the box and set them on the lab table, pulling a lighter from his pocket. “I could only find two at my house. They’re scented.”

“You’re sure they’re not going to set the fire alarms off and get us busted?” Jisung asked doubtfully, picking up one of the candles and breathing in the scent absently (it was vanilla).

“They’re tuned for heat, not smoke. We’re in a science lab, there’s going to be smoke sometimes.” Jinhun flicked the lighter, the flame finally catching on the fourth or fifth try. Jisung caught himself staring too closely and quickly asked a question to distract himself.

“What’s that one scented?”

“Apple cinnamon, I think.”

The distraction didn’t work. He needed a new plan. As Jihun turned to light the other candle, he lifted the first and checked the label. “Yeah. It’s apple cinnamon.”

Jihun finished lighting the candles and looked back up at him, then laughed. “Why are you glaring at the candle? Do you not like that scent?”

Embarrassed, he set the candle down, trying to think of an excuse. “No, I’m just tired.”

“Do you want me to hurry then?” Jihun shoved the lighter back in his pocket and placing the candles on opposite sides of the board.

“Please do.”

Jihun hopped up on the lab table, sitting cross legged and pulling the board onto his lap. “It said we’re supposed to balance the board on our knees, preferably touching.”

It didn’t sound that close until he experienced it in action. Hunched over the board, their heads were almost touching. Despite its purpose being to contact a ghost, it felt intimate.

“Okay, now we warm up the planchette and then we get started.”

“How do you warm up the planchette? Do we hold it over the candle flame?”

“No we just move it around on the board.”

“Sounds easy enough.” They moved it around in a circle. Well, it was mostly Jihun controlling it. “How do we make sure to get the classroom ghost and not a passing other spirit, or something evil?”

“We specify.” Apparently deeming the planchette sufficiently warmed up, Jihun stopped moving it. “And it said only one person should ask questions formally to the board, to avoid confusing the spirit.”

“So you’ll be asking the questions?”

“Yeah. And the other person just tries to keep their mind clear, because the mixing energies could break the connection.” Jihun glanced at him. “So don’t freak out or anything, and don’t take your hand off the planchette. If anything goes wrong, I’ll end the session. Okay?”

“Okay,” he said simply. “I trust you.”

Jihun flashed a smile. Jisung ignored the fluttering in his chest. They leaned over the board, and Jihun opened the session. “We ask of you no negativity and no profanity, only positivity, and we ask you to only communicate with us through the board and only the board, and that anybody here or near to us is not affected by anything negative.”

“Did you memorize that?” Jisung asked, eyes flicking up.

“Yeah.” Jihun slid the planchette over to the greeting in the corner. “Hello!”

“Hello,” Jisung echoed.

“Is there anyone who’d like to speak with us?”

They waited.

“It might take a couple minutes,” Jihun said.

“So do we have to wait in awkward silence until then?”

“I don’t know.”

They tried it. Time stretched on. Jisung wished he’d thought to grab his watch on the way out. Jihun’s was hidden by his sleeve, and the clock on the wall was never trustworthy. The planchette inched towards the U, but he was pretty sure that was gravity and not a spirit.

“Is there anyone in this room who wants to talk to us?” Jihun tried again, a little louder. Jisung winced at his volume, sure that someone was going to hear and come running, but his concerns were quickly forgotten as the planchette began to move, halting over the yes.

“That’s so cool.” The words came out breathless as he stared at the unassuming piece of wood.

“Do you haunt this room?” Jihun asked. It circled around and came back to yes. “Do you throw things?” It moved to no. Jisung resisted the urge to say, I told you so. “Do you know who’s been throwing things?” It moved to yes, then slid across the board, pausing over each letter. They leaned over the board, reading each letter out loud.

“Kangmin?” Jihun asked incredulously. He straightened up abruptly and hit Jisung’s forehead with his skull. It took an inhuman amount of willpower to keep his hands on the planchette. “Shoot- sorry Jisung.”

“No it’s fine.” He shook his head. “Did you get all the answers you wanted?”

“Yeah.” Jihun turned back to the board. “Thank you for your help, spirit. Do you mind if we say goodbye now?”

The planchette slid to no, and then to goodbye.

“Thanks again, goodbye~” Jihun sang. Jisung echoed him. “Okay, we can take our hands off now.”

“Guess you really did know what you were doing.” Jisung rubbed his forehead as he spoke.

“Yeah. Is your head okay?” Jihun leaned in, setting the board aside. “I really knocked it.”

“It’s fine, just hurts a little.”

“How does one check for a concussion?”

“Hyung really, I’m not gonna get a concussion because you sat up too fast.”

“You’re sure?”

Their faces were so close. Jisung wondered if the other noticed. “Yeah I’m sure.”

“Okay.” Jihun sat back, and the tension cleared from Jisung’s chest, although it was quickly replaced by some kind of empty longing sensation. What was up with him?

“I don’t mean to be overbearing or anything,” Jihun said, hopping off the lab table and starting to pack up. “I just worry about you.”

“Yeah, I get it.” Jisung hopped down and stacked up the papers, setting them in the bottom of the box. Jihun handed him a candle, and with a quick huff they blew them out at the same time. They returned the room to its original state and snuck back out of the school, heading for home.

“Do you ever want to do that again?” Jihun asked.

“What, use a Ouija board?”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe.” Jisung’s eyes trailed over the jack o lanterns littering the sidewalk. Taking a chance, he said what he’d been thinking, “If I was doing it with you, yeah.”

Maybe it was the excitement of using a Ouija board and not dying, maybe it was that he’d basically been asleep for the past ten steps, but he didn’t remember who reached out first. All he knew was they were holding hands all of a sudden, and Jihun was smiling at him.

And maybe he hated it but he knew he’d do it a million times over if it all led to this.

i probably did shit but hey i tried my sins are atoned for i have contributed to the trcng scenarios tag happy spooky day

[aoademic]

so, you’re new to the studyblr community and dont know where to start. many people have been in this position, including myself. i was recently asked by @theboldrevision on how to grow their blog. here are a few tips on how to start a studyblr and how to grow.

your blog name / URL

have it something related to yourself and/or studying. this way it makes it easy to distinguish yourself as a studyblr. try and make it short as it is easy for people to remember.

theme

have an appropriate theme which correlates to your content. if your predominant focus is on photos; you can get away with a multi column theme but I find them personally difficult to navigate. if your blog is based mainly on text a singular column theme is a must have, it makes it easier to read large blocks of text i.e masterposts i recommend these themes: hera | genesis |  caerus | nocturne | easton | 176 | nayeli

your icon

the icon size on tumblr is 135px x 135px it can be made using photoshop, (windows / mac) or if you prefer a legal route you can use vecteezy.com. your icon can be whatever you want, it can be a selfie, an icon or even a drawing

header icon (Optional)

this is up to personal preference, I have one but many blogs don't. the size for the header is 640px x 360px. yet again, it can be anything you desire, you can have a photo (max size 10MB) or a gif (max size 3MB)

presentation

choose a colour pallet for your theme, i recommend coolors.co for all my colour pallet needs. make sure the colours are visible and don't interfere with your content. this will ensure that your log is easy to see. on the topic of visibility, make sure your text size is visible for those with poor vision, we really appreciate it. choose a background which contrasts your text colour, I prefer a white background with black text but as long as it is legible it will work. i personally prefer minimalist themes as they are clean and easy to navigate but as long as it isn't overly cluttered and is legible it will work.

intro post

make an into post so people can get to know you, state some facts about you, your ambitions in life and with your blog, who inspired you etc. it is an easy way for people to get to know you and make friends as people with similar interests may ask you questions or dm you

communication

make friends, almost everyone is friendly and is always willing to help you out. don’t be afraid to message or ask people for advice. try and reply to messages and dms, you might make a friend. 

participation

participate in events, eg blog rates, blog awards, ask games etc.host your own events; same as above, giveaways (if financially viable), follow forevers. join networks such as the small studyblr network @smallstudyblrsunite. it is an easy way to make friends and have your content reach an audience

original content

what is your focus going to be? photos, masterposts, tips, or a variety. choose what you want to post as it is important in forming your niche. A rule of thumb is original ideas are the best ideas when it comes to masterposts and advice. 

how to take photos

you don't need a fancy camera, i use my phone. i strongly recommend natural lighting as it provides the best picture quality and it prevents over saturated photos caused by artificial light. choose a background that complements the object you’re taking a photo of. some people use their desk, a bench, table or their bed. i have also seen people use paper for their background. your options are limitless. you can try putting stationery or other things around your photo to make it interesting. you can include stationery, a drink, flowers, washi tape etc. make sure there aren't many/any shadows directly on top of what your photographing as it makes it harder to see.  then it comes to editing, i usually increase the brightness and/or exposure, the warmth and the highlights just a bit to make it clearer. Some apps which people use are vsco (android / iOS) instagram and photoshop. i mainly use the the photos app on iOS to edit but i sometimes use photoshop. however, all photos don’t need to be staged like this, sometimes authentic photos are just as good. at the end of the day do what feels right to you. 

hashtags

tag your posts with related tags and use tracking tags of your favourite blogs so they can see your content (mine is #aoademic) here is a directory of a lot of tracking tags made by @enfpstud 0-C | D-G | H-L | M-R | S-Z and some more by @getshitdonetbh (X) using popular tags will help you gain some extra exposure such as #studyblr #new studyblr #studying #student #studyspo #notes. tag your favourite blogs in your posts so they can see them but don’t go over the top.

advice


don't focus on followers and notes as the purpose is to become motivated to study and share that with the studyblr community. just think of notes and followers as icing on the cake, they’re a nice extra but what’s the point of icing without a cake? (terrible analogy, i know)

queue


the queue is a lifesaver. it auto posts your posts and if you activate queue 2.0 in tumblr labs you can schedule how many posts are posted, what time intervals you want a post posted and how long per day your queue is on. It makes it look like your blog is active when you are not online so you can focus on other things and not be on tumblr all day.  i have mine set overnight as people on the other side of the world can see fresh content from my blog while I'm asleep. it is very convenient but you can queue 300 posts.

protecting your content

always source your original content so if people add to your post or delete your caption you will still be noted as the source. this can be done by clicking the gear icon and putting your blog url in the content source section. you can also watermark your original posts. this is usually done by placing your blog name or url somewhere in the post where it cant be cropped out but isn't too distracting.

ground rules

please don't repost, always reblog!!! (i can’t stress this enough) along those lines, avoid reblogging photos without captions or photos from pinterest and weheartit as it is probably stolen content. this is because many posts are being reuploaded and initially they might state the source and is later deleted or they don’t give credit at all. to respect the content creator please avoid doing this.

the best advice is to be friendly and be yourself. i wish you the best with your academic future ♡

[enravel-blog]

meanwhile, in salt lake: who will mummify whom?

We take our coffee in the mummification room. Ron, a professorial salesman, regally crosses one leg over the other. He’s a harmless but incendiary sexagenarian, an up-rolled-sleeves raconteur.  His silent counterpart Bernie is a bit younger, swathed in an army-green sweater the size of a dirigible and palming loose change somewhere inside of it. There’s a hidden slink of ten nickels while a thick chemistry slides down my throat. Ron says, “That formula you smell is our trade secret. It has an extremely small molecule. If I put a drop on your finger you’ll taste it within 30 seconds.” I resist the deep urge to request a sample. The pair seems capable of soft-selling me my own death.

Next door in the pyramid, Montu, newly dead, calls out from the altar. His blue parrot body is tucked into a Tupperware container with a motion-sensing device, which has a recording of him saying his own name. Ofrenda, cage trinkets and birdseed, earthly glees he left behind, are laid out. White plush carpets the 27-foot-high copper pyramid oriented true north next to a highway underpass. The vaulted ceiling is a galaxy of vaguely Egyptian icons. There are white leather sofas and, to my delight and fear, a Panasonic camera on tripod next to a steel pasteurization tank.

Ron and Bernie are going to mummify Montu when he’s procedurally ready for transference. His future state dots the room in a collection of dignified mummiform pets, including a standard gold poodle, a Doberman named Butch, and several stray cats.

How sure, we have to wonder, are Ron and Bernie, leaning over the long table to start each fresh evisceration, that a neighbor isn’t missing a calico? They seem like the kind of folks who might embalm anything that strolls past the live peacock in the yard.

I send my friend the pyramid’s address. If I don’t circle back this afternoon, she could go ahead and call over to the Salt Lake City authorities, tell them I had an appointment at Summum.

Like name suggests, Ron and Bernie practice the sum total of all religions. As Ron leans back in a rolling office chair and constellates dogma across continents, languages, time—he’s clearly spent whole days in certain Santa Monica bookstores— he takes luxurious nasal in-breaths between string theorizing Greco-Roman archetypes and meditation rituals. He scatter plots the mechanics of all beliefs about consciousness onto one another in a very logical story of the impossibility of their singularity. In Hermeticism, all religions flower from one true theology. As above, so below, and back again. With Ron as guide I envision the flagship Summums at the mouth of the new age, gathered round a dish of lavender crystals, asking what comes first. They’re asking how to revere and shatter a charge simultaneously. Bernie has yet to speak, while Ron is wrapping up somewhere near Joseph Campbell and pure math. 

In the mummification room (where Montu will join us shortly) pet bodies wait with looped rubber hoses and neat rows of metal tools. This chrysalis lab of lanolin, gauze and resin, down the street from a Panera and the Church of Latter Day Saints, is also where Bernie keeps the books. Summum requests and accepts donations, in the several thousands, for pet mummification services. 

“Let me show you something,” Ron says, as we cross the yard and he hand-cranks open a garage door on the pyramid. June light falls onto Corky Ra's fifteen-hundred-pound gold sarcophagus. “We mummified him ourselves,” Bernie says nostalgically of Summum’s founder. We gaze at the towering Corky and Ron moves an empty wine bottle behind the sofa.

“Corky could walk through walls. His favorite word was consider,” Ron begins, the word in his mouth like a macaroon. We sit in the comfortable leather sofas and Bernie takes a corner of the pyramid. Ron would have made an excellent academic or bible peddler. 

Romanticism, idolizing the hero, leads to nationalism. To borders, walls.

“In 1975, Corky was doing his relaxations in his basement den when a sound, which came for several months as a ringing in his ears, began to move to the center of his mind. The next thing he knew he was transported to a pyramid and was speaking with divine extracelestial beings, totally different mind you from extraterrestrials, who expressed soundlessly to him that they were the Summa, the highest Individuals who exist on all planes within the different universes that are going on right now.”

In a first-person zine Corky later penned about the encounter, he writes: “I had never seen such extremely attractive people before.” See Corky sprawled in astral gel on a clay floor, jetlagged from interdimensional flight, entranced by androgynous cheekbones. Divine lips are delivering seven ancient principles to an anxious Mormon.

“No, no no, the Mormon church was definitely not happy with master Corky,” Ron says. At the word master I scan the room. “But he had to break from them. He was the appointed catalyst, the new Moses. A messenger comes along every so often when the brew is just right, and they of course then have to take the hero’s journey.”

When he got back to his basement Corky rewrote the Kybalion, an existing 1908 text hinging on the idea that everything happens as a result of one’s mental state. He kept the book’s main principles: vibration (everything is in motion), the rhythm in motion swings between opposites (to every cause an effect), and gender is a mental state not connected to physical sex. The only thing he added, based on what the Summa told him, was the principle of Creation: nothing and possibility come in and out of bond infinite times in a finite moment.

“Montu, hi Montu!” the dead bird calls out. Bernie is walking past the altar to join us on the frothy penthouse sofa, where I’ve spread my belongings into a purposeful moat around my body. I take the break in Ron’s portraiture to admire the milk silo and video setup.

“The camera is for Summum TV. We broadcast meditations on the internet,” Ron says without elaboration. “And we use the tank to ferment wine, which becomes nectars, or publications of consciousness. We imbue them with different meditative vibrations, like sexual ecstasy and such, the way the Catholic church transmutes wine with the blood of Christ and then they can give it to children, to anybody, and not get into trouble.”

Ron and Bernie don’t keep membership records, but based on the number of wine nectars they’ve distributed, they assume about 250,000 people have received Summum.

Bernie, like the night-blooming cereus sometimes called Christ in the Manger or Princess of the Night, opens now.

“I consider Corky a contemporary of Buddha or Jesus, or Osho, any of these masters. He was hard. He wouldn’t cut you any slack. He would call you out, get way down in there to the motivations going on behind the things we do. Corky took honesty to a level that most people couldn’t deal with.”

I ask him to tell me about the first time they met.

“I was coming out of a screening of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and there was a business card on my windshield with a note that said, I’ve been in touch with advanced beings and I present on it at the University of Utah.” 

“Corky believed that the mummification process is crucial to stewarding the transference of the spirit when the body retires. When you’re going to make a journey, you can prepare for that journey, like arrangements for a trip. You’re going to find yourself in very weird surroundings when you die. But if you are being mummified, people are going to be communicating to you, saying, ‘You’ve passed away. You’ll be seeing weird things now, but just relax, be calm. We’re going to read to you your spiritual will, something you wrote when you were alive. It will help guide you. We’re going to be taking care of you.’ And the preserved body is very important. It guides you from this address to the next one.”

Ron, who was a ski buddy of Corky’s, adds, “Plus your spirit can come back to that body any time for information. If I take your body down to the crematorium”— he mentions his day-job as a funeral director--“if I burn your body up, it’s gone. It makes it a little bit more difficult.” 

In the eighties, when grooming in general reached new heights, Corky was conditioning Ron for mortuary school in California. To date, Corky is the only human that Summum has mummified.

“When Ron and I are mummified, Corky says he’ll be there on the other side to help with the transition,” Bernie says.

Who will mummify whom?

“We’ll mummify each other,” they both say.

Mathematically, two quantities are in the Golden Ratio if their ratio is the same as the ratio of their sum to the larger of the two quantities. Everyone in the pyramid is calculating. We come in and out of bond infinite times. It begins to feel like a lovers’ spat.

“Who knows though honestly, I’m the oldest out of everybody, I’m the ancient dog around here,” Ron says, and Bernie starts in, “I mean you never know what can happen, I could get hit by a bus or whatever. As long as I’m not smooshed all over the place and you have something to work with.”

“What-ever. Either way,” Ron says generously, “at some point in time we’ll all die, and there will be a choice. It’s each individual soul’s right to take their boat wherever they want. Creation is going to give you your heart’s desire, it doesn’t really matter what it is, but at some point you won’t have desires, and you’re able to walk away from this life and move on down the river.”

We’re standing in front of the altar. Montu’s batteries are on the fritz, as if he’s gotten the message and has moved on. 

Ron says, “Anyway, that’s an old story Corky told us a long time ago.”