Old Cities of Amber

Daniel Egger

By Daniel Egger

It was two decades ago when it stopped. Everybody knew that it would happen. We were informed regularly about possible approaching changes, and stories were told. Nonetheless, what we did not expect was the velocity and the impact when it occurred.

It wasn’t a war that normally would lead to such an impact. Neither was it the problem of physical space what turned out to be much more problematic than any water or food crises solved by nano-farming. Also the trigger wasn’t solely the senescence conflict that stroked us hard and rattled society for three long decades, creating a brutal global black market.

Everyone thought that the artificial accelerated evolution of the human being into hybrids would lead to hundreds of new religions or even godlike hallucinations. For years, we tried to understand the gift we received, arguing with ourselves about what this the new purpose of living was.

The majority of society, though, avoided the search for meaning, and fled into “world connections.” This network, which directly links people’s minds, created the most unique and powerful net known. With it came vivid experiences and unlimited potential, allowing us to visit any real or imaginary world. We connected into the crowd, where we became One.

The vicious side effect, however, was a physical degeneration, as we lost control of reality, time, and space. People died in the thousands, connected but alone and forgotten in their spaces. They lost their minds, which are floating forever somewhere, having become a part of you and me. Individuality was questioned, and the hull of flesh blamed for our mortality. Then it started: Everything dissolved, and we regained our uniqueness.

It was a sunny day when we fled the cities. We had created them, inspired by our dreams; they were different, unique, intelligent, and sometimes even beautiful. We squeezed out all possible benefits from the city, unlimited by our imaginations. Everything was integrated, from micro-food production to vertical graveyards. More than 90% of the population lived there—physically at first, then separated from their minds.

So it came to pass that the cities were lost. They turned into relicts of times when we needed physical proximity to create and develop, and of when we searched for a crowd to uncover our individuality. Some groups still live there. We call them Trunks. Those are survivors of a generation who invested their whole lives and material energy in it. They are fragments that cannot break loose.

For most, this reality is gone. It doesn’t make sense anymore. Our mind can be everywhere, anytime. Still, we can die alone and forgotten. By fleeing the cities old, we regained social structures: Family tribes and small communities all over the planet mushroomed. They define themselves by a self-sufficient and self-regulated structure, creating a new society. Governments, cities, and any centralized operating structure lost its necessity.

It was and is, a new beginning of free and unlimited possibilities.

About the Author

Daniel Egger is co-founder of Foltigo, an Idea Agency that aims to create new ideas and practical perspectives by working with multiple contexts, futures, paradoxes, and paradigms of society. Web site www.foltigo.com.