Tete a Sisukiro · Track 144 · middle

L'Ivresse

nitrogen narcosis — the rapture of the deep, intoxication under crushing pressure

Lyrics

[Intro]
Case file… call it… The Rapture.
Subject descends. Air is seventy-nine percent nitrogen.
A harmless, inert constant.
At one atmosphere.

[Verse 1]
At thirty meters, the pressure triples.
We call this Martini's Law. The first glass.
A simple calculation on the wrist-slate takes… a moment too long.
The tether line, a reassuring fact, now seems… amusing.
A private joke.
The subject reports a feeling of well-being, disproportionate to the task at hand.
Data point one: a predictable euphoria begins to bloom in the dark.

[Chorus]
L'ivresse des grandes profondeurs.
Cousteau gave it a poet's name.
I call it nitrogen's little joke.
The anesthetic kiss of a gas you breathe every day.
It's not a rapture. It's a failure of the wiring.
The mind, under duress, choosing bliss over precision.

[Verse 2]
Fifty meters. The wreck of the 'Argonaut'.
The numbers on the depth gauge swim like silver fish.
The subject’s grip on his torch is loose. He believes his movements are graceful, efficient.
He reports solving the problems of the universe.
He feels the impulse to remove his helmet. To share the solution with the moray eels.
He is, for this brief, fatal window, a god.
A clumsy, laughing god in a heavy brass helmet.

[Bridge]
It’s a simple transaction. The partial pressure rises, the synapses slow.
The brain’s executive function is politely asked to leave the room.
And what rushes in to fill the space?
Not terror. Not logic.
Just a warm, foolish grin.
A profound and deadly sense that everything is perfectly, wonderfully… fine.

[Outro]
The ascent protocol is initiated.
The pressure eases.
The god dissolves.
By the time he breaks the surface, he will be just a man again.
Cold, and with a gap in his memory.
The universe's problems, once again, unsolved.