'Insane? You have trekked through the stars to me, fought wars and passed through the gate, to call me mad? Ha! You truly are something...an ignoramus, I mean.

I am crazy? The Zhayvin Collective inhabits the dream of a blind idiot god, yet believes creation has laws. But I am insane?'

-unknown. Attributed to Solarex.

* * *

Mocker raised a finger as the datastream between the Collective and the visitor stopped.

'You disapprove of this.'

Mocker half-closed its eyes at the Shaper's unprompted, but correct statement. 'Letting whoever leaf through our records when every human agency worth its name turns us away in the name of operational security? Yes, but you already know that. The way people shouted me down during the debate was somewhat hard to miss.'

'They disapproved of your paranoia as much as you approve of the overworlders'.'

Mocker's grin was amused, but tight. 'Never said otherwise. The reasons differ, though, but I suppose not all of us can hold on to the guilt for atrocities eons past.'

The Unscarred - they had started calling it the Unscarred Prime, in light of the replicas - crossed its arms, pink eyes turning orange. 'We have nothing to lose. Sharing information will improve Earth's wellbeing, and if the overworlders wish to be secretive, let them. We learn enough in the field, and from looted scraps.'

'That's the-' Mocker stopped itself with a sigh. 'Fine. Fine!' No wonder the humans didn't value knowledge more. They probably looked at the Collective picking the hardest way to obtain it while giving theirs away, and decided curiosity wasn't worth the added scholarly masochism. 'Have it your way.' This was directed at the seventy-three percent of the Collective who had voted for allowing visitation of their archives. 'But,' Mocker scratched between its scales with a monomolecular claw, 'didn't you see who they sent? Obviously new.'

At least there wasn't some series of half-baked infiltration attempts going on. Mocker had once heard about a fairly hilarious event concerning a terrorist cell formed of ninety percent undercover counterterrorists, with none of the moles aware of the others. This reminded it of a guinea pig rather than a mole: a rookie, sent to test the waters, allegedly unbiased to neither a country nor the reptilians.

Mocker saw ARC's hand at work here, but that mattered little, in the end.

The Unscarred's eyes became pink once more, its expression turning flat. 'We are perfectly capable of simplifying-'

'Yes, yes.' Mocker waved its hands. 'But you could put up an index while you're at that. Maybe some of those colourful signs to mark records that have been studied, I've heard they like them bright up there.'

'The archives are a work in progress. An "index" would be a sham.'

Mocker rolled its eyes, but it could not deny it was enthused, or pretend it didn't share the Shaper's confidence, if to a smaller degree. Their work in the Realm of Forms that formed the metainformational core of the macrocosm meant that, perhaps, everything could actually be know, and any new events could instantly be studied and added to the reptilian's database. But the First Scientist's perfectionism prevented it from merely starting something. Still...

'You could just make a hologram and update it as needed. And,' Mocker shrugged, 'why not add some definitions to the bottom, as well?'

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

'If you're so opposed to the idea, why do you want to make our data easier to process?'

'So the guests go home faster!'

* * *

Hello. To your right, you have noticed a hardlight construct appear. That dot next to the entrance represents you, and, as labeled, here are...hmm? Why not simply upload the information into your mind? You believe we can do that, despite...?

...Ha. Fair enough. Fair enough, and closer to the truth than farther. Yes. Such a procedure, however, would defeat the purpose of this tour, but would not be truly successful. As has been pointed out to us, with more insistence than politeness, our knowledge changes with the macrocosm, and such updated would have to uploaded into your mind, as well. With the scale and rate of our research, that would require and all but permanent link. Unless you wish to turn back?

We thought not.

Before you continue, we must establish something. If you look to the right, you will see your guide hologram being updated as we speak. We must draw the line between the fruits of science, and what we Zhayvin classify as aberrancy.

Are there laws in the macrocosm? We believe there are. Some argue it is only governed by the perception of its inhabitants, but in that case, it must be orderly, as so many believe it to be. Is there an universally-agreed upon set of laws, then? Of course not. But more similar ones than you believe. For example, most cultures and beings with knowledge of FTL travel agree that is it impossible to achieve something to lightspeed without infinite energy, and that doing so with finite energy breaks physics.

This is just an example of aberrancy. Aberrants are those who deviate from this model of existence, through various means. Humans distinguish between "supernaturals" - beings resembling figures from their folklore - and "paranormals" -beings who defy nature, but do not feature in human tales or myths. The Collective finds this distinction arbitrary and useless. All aberrants are aberrants, no matter what the proponents of anthropocentrism argue. Moving one's boy without propulsion, generating mass from nowhere...these are but some of the most common forms of aberrancy there is. Aberrants are as varied as they are intiguing.

What, then, of science? Is the study of aetherkinesis not scientific? After all, it employs the scientific method. Aetherplasm - "mana" - and those who use it know it reacts to thoughts, and what it takes to have this ability.

That may be so. But the Collective defines aberancy by what could be found in nature on our lost homeworld of Zhay, and there, there was no aberrancy.

But, you will say, our technology seems to break physics as understood by mankind. Does that not make it aberrant? Perhaps it does. Perhaps the abilities we see as unnatural are misunderstood science. Our quest for knowledge is never-ending.

The Collective is aware technology that is unexplained or misunderstood can appear magical, and vice versa. Earthlings and aliens have claimed we use everything from hypertech - something that seems to rely on scientific principles and mechanism to function, yet to advanced to properly analyse, much less understand - to "technosorcery". We have even encountered devices that appear to us the way ours do to humans.

So, what conclusion is there to draw? If reality is shaped by perception, is there truly anything abnormal?

We shall see.