Part 4

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YOU         will attend to         TIME.

That's very         noble of you

and how does one         exactly         attend to

time?

        I extrude it. It it is carried by the aurora

        from heliosphere* to heliosphere. You

        would say kite, perhaps. I loose my thread,

        navigate by solar winds. My strings adhere.

So, you produce silk...

        Time.

Yes, yes, of course. So, you produce time

from your... ar...

        Spinnerets.

Right.

So, logically then

time moves in one direction - it must         flow

centrifugally.

        One kind of time does so.

There are more than one?

         Time also runs parallel.

Oh, oh, oh, the... the... radiating lines...      on a web.

        Spirals.

Yes, yes. I see. So time rotates like a wheel.

        No, that is Destiny.

You've lost me.

        Some strings are sticky, so time clings.

        But time is elastic also. Sometimes it thins

        or tendons. Time moves both fast and slow.

And spirals?

        No, time does not spiral. It is not a maelstrom.

        That is... well... something entirely different.

So what are the radials?

Time that runs parallel. Alternate futures.

Bloody hell and... and... you         eat them?

        Only those that have not come

        to pass.  I must replenish myself.

Ah, so you wait.

        I wait.

And watch.

        Of course.

And hope?    (Arachnic nods)

        But I do not control.

So, who controls?

        That         not even I         know.

.

*The heliosphere is a vast region of space surrounding the Sun, a sort of bubble. Plasma "blown" out from the Sun, known as the solar wind, creates and maintains this bubble against the outside pressure of the interstellar medium.

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