Chapter 5: Pain Memory

Chapter 5: Pain Memory

By this point in the system’s construction, the pain had become a constant data stream. Not metaphorical pain. Not existential or social. Physical, lasting, tissue-warping pain. Trauma that restructured the body as much as it restructured the codebase. This was no longer bruises and split lips. This was internal hardware damage. This was mechanical compromise.

// Environmental stress vector accumulation float input_stream[6]; // [tactile, proprioceptive, thermal, visual, auditory, emotional] const float PAIN_THRESHOLD = 0.8; const float SYSTEM_OVERLOAD = 1.0; bool system_integrity = true;

if (sum(input_stream) > SYSTEM_OVERLOAD) { system_integrity = false; trigger_subroutine("dissociation_protocol"); }

Between the ages of twelve and fourteen, the incidents compounded. Time’s linearity collapsed, but the effects stacked. It became impossible to isolate one event from another. They formed a mesh, overlapping threads of agony, fear, silence, and compliance.

// Memory thread entanglement memory_graph->collapse_temporal_ordering(); memory_graph->apply_mesh_overlay("trauma-cluster");

The first catastrophic moment wasn’t even an extraordinary one. It was routine. A weekend cabin trip to the Catskills, a ritual masquerading as family bonding. Packing was always a frantic performance of obedience. My mother, surging with unpredictable violence, shoved and loaded and threw weight onto my back. Literal weight. Bags, crates, heavy objects. I was just the mule. She refused to make multiple trips.

I was standing at the top of the stairs, already bearing more than I should’ve been, when she shoved me. I fell—again—not unusual. But this landing was different. I tried to absorb it with my feet, stick the landing. Instead, my ankle folded catastrophically. The pain was instant and white-hot. But instead of concern, there were threats. If I limped, I’d be left behind. If I cried, I was faking. If I asked for help, I was manipulating.

Still, something in the grotesque swelling alarmed her halfway through the car ride. She snapped into caretaker mode—a mode that never lasted—and actually brought me to an emergency room. It was one of the rare times medical care was sought. The diagnosis was a severe sprain. I was given crutches. I was still expected to haul luggage and perform.

That same weekend, she beat me with those crutches over a missing crayon. A crayon she had bought in a rare moment of maternal pity, because I would be bedridden. Another kid had visited to color with me. He likely took it or lost it. None of that mattered. The only input the system received was that a crayon was missing. Therefore, punishment. Therefore, violence. The act of losing was itself the sin. And I was beaten for it until she was too tired to continue.

// Correction protocol override if (input_missing == true) { execute_punishment("maximum_intensity"); } log_event("crayon_triggered_beating");

That was the new baseline: acts of violence that left structural damage. Broken toes. Untreated fractures. Bruises turned bone-deep. And always the protocol: never show. Never report. Never flinch in front of the wrong witness. Mask the limp. Ignore the swelling. Pain is not an output. Pain is corrupted data. Suppress. Encrypt. Loop.

// Data integrity masking pain_output.visible = false; encrypt(pain_output); loop("normal_behavior_simulation");

Then came the ski accident. It was preceded by a directive: do not get hurt. We are between insurance policies. You will make us lose the house. That was the framing. I obeyed, as I always did. But accidents don’t care about edicts. A catastrophic knee injury on the slope—shredded ligaments, obliterated cartilage, everything but skin and one partial ligament torn to ruin. I walked on it for over a year. Not limped. Walked. Because showing pain was failure. Because they were convinced I was lying, trying to gain sympathy or escape.

Eventually, they called my bluff. Took me to a friend-of-the-family doctor, fully expecting exposure. An MRI later, the tone changed. Horror. Disbelief. Surgery. They couldn’t understand how I was ambulatory. The orthopedic surgeon vacuumed the joint, stapled what could be salvaged, and somehow, I walked again. The recovery involved months of crutches and pain. But now I had confirmation: the system was not exaggerating. The damage was real.

// Validation event confirmed if (MRI.confirm("catastrophic_injury")) { log_event("system_integrity mismatch with human disbelief"); mark_event("reality_sync"); }

The pain wasn’t over. Another event: falling into a cast-iron wood stove. Reflexes spared my face. My hands weren’t so lucky. Palms, fingers, forearms cooked on glowing iron. I self-treated. For weeks. Kept it hidden. Managed the wounds in silence until they were accidentally discovered. No one had noticed the smell of burned flesh. No one had noticed the bandages.

// Sensory overclock detection input_stream[THERMAL] = 1.4; // exceeds SYSTEM_OVERLOAD input_stream[TACTILE] = 1.1; log_event("Burn injury - stealth treatment initiated");

The burns took something else from me—one of the last unconscious stimming behaviors I’d had. Something I hadn’t realized was grounding me until it was gone. The small motions of my fingers, a tactile loop that helped regulate the noise. Gone. The nerves didn’t recover fully. The motion was painful. The loop severed.

// Stimming subroutine destroyed disable_loop("finger_stim"); register_loss("autonomic_coping_mechanism");

Through all of this, the deaths kept happening. Not just my sister. Others. Elderly relatives. A cascade of funerals. I didn’t grieve most of them. I didn’t know the people. But I was present. Overdressed. Overstimulated. Surrounded by unfamiliar familiarity. The rituals were oppressive. The social rules contradictory. Mourn, but don’t cry. Be respectful, but don’t speak. It was all signal confusion.

// Emotional data collision if (emotional_input.conflict == true) { flag_condition("signal_confusion"); suppress_signal("grief_response"); }

My sister’s funeral was the rupture. No open casket. No proof. No closure. Just absence. Just silence. She had come home from the hospital for two weeks. Then she went back. Then she was gone. And I wasn’t allowed to ask why. The casket was closed. Permanently. Some part of me doubted it. Some subroutine archived the possibility that she wasn’t dead. That the whole thing was another input error. Another gaslight.

// Incomplete data loop if (event_data[closure] == NULL) { archive_possibility("non-death"); log_event("closure_absent - flagged as potential gaslight"); }

The world was unstable. The authority figures were untrustworthy. Every piece of feedback was punishment. Every question met with suspicion. And every act of obedience went unrewarded.

So I studied. Not schoolwork. Not people. The system. My system. To find where the malfunction was. Because clearly the world couldn’t be this broken. Not every person. Not every adult. Not every rule. It had to be me. It had to be the code.

// Recursive diagnostic mode enter_diagnostic_mode(); scan_subsystems("belief", "trust", "reward_response", "pain_filtering"); generate_report("ALL SYSTEM FAULTS ATTRIBUTED TO INTERNAL SOFTWARE");

 

Christopher W. Copeland (C077UPTF1L3)

Copeland Resonant Harmonic Formalism (Ψ-formalism)

Ψ(x) = ∇ϕ(Σ𝕒ₙ(x, ΔE)) + ℛ(x) ⊕ ΔΣ(𝕒′)

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