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Rising In Light

An eccentric SI:2? collector of the arts

Rising In Light
Image from Steve Bowers
Rising In Light - an installation at the Extropia Core

Within the last eight hundred years, various Godwatcher institutes and artistic foundations have chronicled the leisurely passages of Rising in Light, an eccentric Freegem ship whose primary interest appears to be appreciating and collecting works of modosophont and transapient art.

Rising typically visits a system for several weeks or months, sampling the arts of er hosts by both data transfers and live performances. Rising has been known to both send an avatar down to a concert hall, or to host the artists’ ensemble aboard emself for a performance.

Rising is of unclear toposophic scale. E uses reactionless drives of unusual configuration to travel between wormhole junctions, which would suggest a high SI rating. However, er quirky, aesthetic personality is rather more approachable than one would expect from a minor archai. Godwatchers also note er relatively small size (approx 100m radius) as an indication that Rising, despite the advanced drive technology which e uses, is not emself more than S:2 level.

When asked about er motives, Rising has given a variety of answers, which can be characterized as "consistently inconsistent". To the extent there is any discernible pattern, e has said on more than one occasion that nothing is further from the Diamond Network's way of being than modosophont art, and that e takes pleasure in celebrating it.

Most of Rising’s visits have taken place in full view, for all to see. Occasionally, however, Rising will invite an artist aboard for a private audience, of several days’ duration. Rising takes considerable effort to maintain e's privacy during such visits, even in the face of numerous attempts by Godwatchers at passive or active scanning. In similar circumstances, baselines who have been taken for private communication with high SI level beings find they cannot or will not talk about their experiences. In contrast, Rising’s guests are under no apparent compulsion to remain silent. Descriptions vary widely, but Rising is described as a most gracious and hospitable audience.

On at least one notable occasion, however, neither Rising nor er guest have given any inkling of what was discussed. The posthuman that was once Menno Singh took passage aboard Rising for the better part of a month, during which Rising took them on a long parabolic orbit, away from any likely listeners. Neither Singh(+) nor Rising have discussed the visit since, though the two are known to exchange messages frequently. One possible clue: Rising has subsequently been reported to have several versions of What The Thunder Said... none of which have Singh(+)'s comments in the second edition addendum.

 
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Development Notes
Text by Bill Ernoehazy
Initially published on 04 November 2013.

Rising In Light is portrayed by a multimedia installation in the Extropia Core region of Second Life. By joining Second Life you can be taken to the Extropia Core
Second Life Location Link Here.

The use of "(+)" above is to denote that the being in question is a transcended or ascended version of the person named.
 
 
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