The white world kept shifting. It was a transition, and old memories resurfaced as themes. One of those themes was The Carver Theme. It expressed an infinite curiosity, always looking for problems—something that was blocked here, something that was strained there. It was not Maxine, but her spirit. The Carver Theme was like the Body's way of monitoring itself and mending what's broken.
The Guardian Theme was a very quiet watch, guarding the inside rather than the outside (since there were no external problems). It monitored energ
Combining all the themes together resulted in a few not fitting out well. An old memory from the painful times of the Cult's end didn't fit in. It was lodged in the old heart area, the place where the mix of feelings and body stuff used to be. This memory fantasized about the Feast and not the Beat or the green stuff. It resembled a false hunger, the memory of an addiction, and it kept on repeating.
The Guardian Theme experienced a strange increase in anxiety. The Carver Theme located the origin of the emotion. However, the solution was not to get rid of the thing. That's the way they used to do things. Now, it was about including it and communicating with it.
Hence, the Body healed itself through song.
The
mushroom networks sang the Song of Fullness. It brought to mind the very first Vat-Bread memory, the one in which one is satisfied from a closed loop of food, and the root feeling of being secure. It was the complete opposite of being hungry: it was the feeling of being full.
The Song of Enough was also there, coming from the silent pools of the brain. This was the brain's gentle and happy way of saying GROW. The song embodied the feeling of completing a task, resting, and not wanting anything else.
Moreover, the Song of Belonging came from the memories of humans and Symbiotes. It was the reverse of the Cult's lonely eating. It was the calmness that Benny had, the dream that Elara had, working together. It was the understanding that one is not alone, and so there is no need to eat in order to feel existent.
These songs combined into one big, loving song. They directed it to the hungry memory in the heart area.
The memory did not accept the gift initially. Its Feast dream was a loud cry of needing. The loving song spoke to a forgotten question of the memory. The pain was intense—like the world's soul having a cramp.
However, the Body stayed
It had all the time in the world. It didn't stop, a steady, loving, and gentle presence at the site of the injury
Gradually, the memory's dream transformed. The god it was going to eat became less of food and more of… light. The act of eating became that of sharing. The crazy end of the Final Digestion turned into the slow feeling of the Beat.
The fake hunger was still there. It was different. It became a memory of what it had learned. The desire was turned into respect for the intricacies of what was eaten. The wound was now a scar, and the scar recognized: Here is pain. We have chosen something else.
The Guardian Theme saw the worry disappear. The Carver Theme witnessed the memory being integrated. The Body had done some self-repair work, not by cutting the part out, but by singing it a lullaby until it dreamt something else.
The white world was not flawless. It was alive, and living beings do have their aches, memories, and ways of getting better. The healer and the healed were now one and the same. The doctor was the patient. And the medicine was love, chosen again and again.