Cosmocopia by Paul di Filippo

weft, and loafcake hat, tipped slightly askew. His caul was the color of the mingled shadows when both Watermilk and Zarafa were high.
    Palisander’s eyes were shut in meditation on the ineffable, and he inhaled a long plume of incense smoke.
    “Palisander,” called out Crutchsump mildly. “You have a questioner.”
    The noetic opened his eyes, which were almost the same shade as his caul, thus producing an odd effect of merged fabric and flesh.
    “Ask away.”
    “My companion here is a being from far away, and has never heard of the Conceptus. Can you explain?”
    “Of course.” Palisander directed his attention to Lazorg. “Did you see the model of the Cosmocopia outside?”
    “Yes.”
    “That is the shape of the universe.”
    “How so? Literally?”
    “Yes. The mouth of the horn is a spreading, widening wavefront. As it sweeps out a path, new planes of existence are born, new dimensions that imagine themselves unique, whereas they are really just the latest accretions of the living eternal process that is the Cosmocopia.
    “You can conceive of the Cosmocopia as a finite stack of universes, each one slightly larger and hence more attenuated than its predecessor. Working backward down the length of the Cosmocopia, the universes grow smaller and smaller, until finally we reach the endpoint—or, actually, the origin, the Omphalos, which is simultaneously without size, yet infinite, since it contains the seed of all that was to come. At this point resides the Conceptus, he who gave birth to the Cosmocopia and continues to inform it. The Conceptus manifested the Cosmocopia as an expression of his will and nature. Everything we see, everything that will be, on all the planes, is inherent in the character of the Conceptus. So, by studying his creation, we come to understand the creator. Do you comprehend?”
    Lazorg was quiet for a moment. “Except for the personalization of the Monobloc, it’s just like the Big Bang. The spacetime lightcone. … And your stacked universe are just parallel worlds.”
    “You can employ any terms you wish, but the truth is incontrovertible.”
    “Then I must have somehow been cast out of my own universe and wound up in this one.”
    “Quite likely.”
    “But how?”
    “Please describe the circumstances attendant on your last moments in your native universe.”
    Lazorg winced. “I—I prefer not to. They are hazy, and I—”
    “Did they involve intense emotions, and perhaps a derangement of the senses?”
    “Yes, yes they did.”
    “These factors occasionally open up a noetic hole in the fabric of the Cosmocopia. A hole which one can easily fall through.”
    “Can I return the same way then?”
    “Unlikely. You see, for one thing, there is a gradient to the Cosmocopia. All-that-is wishes instinctively to return to the Conceptus, to unite with its ultimate source. Therefore, travel through noetic gaps is always inward, from younger, more primitive and attenuated planes to older, more dynamic and powerful ones. Travelers are caught in an irresistible psychosomatic current. Do you note any changes in your constitution since the transition?”
    “I was old and feeble before. Now I’m not.”
    “Certainly. Because you are now marginally closer to the Conceptus, inhabiting a plane of richer, more elemental forces. Many of your old paradigms will not apply here. You would be wise to learn the ways of your new plane, and settle down.”
    Crutchsump regarded Lazorg and saw his shoulders slump in defeat. “So I can never return to the plane of my birth?”
    “Never. The gradient will not permit it. Even if you were able to open up another noetic gap—and such moments come rarely to anyone; once in a lifetime is the most anyone can realistically even hope for—then you would find yourself just plunging deeper into the Cosmocopian chute.”
    Lazorg turned wearily and wordlessly away from the noetic. Crutchsump hastened to make a proper farewell.
    “Thank you, Palisander, for