(no subject)
**WARNING** i actually did write a short story about people who live in a bubble. No, really. It is so very very random. I think sleep deprivation may have something to do with this...
Dramatic Change
The clear bubble was not cold, but not warm either. It was just there. It was the exact temperature of skin, so that when touched, it was like touching nothing, like swimming in water the same temperature as blood. Swimming through nothing, the ripples the only feeling against your skin. This was only from the inside. From the outside, it was too hot, or too cold, it was never easy to tell...well, whichever it was, scalding or freezing, it was almost impossible to touch. Unfortunately for those inside the bubble, they were not aware of this burning quality of the bubble's surface. They only felt the hard nothingness, the impenetrable air. It was, as you can imagine, the cause of much upset. Any who came near the bubble would immediately jump away, their faces contorted with pain and fear and confusion.
Were they so repulsive? Those inside the bubble would ask themselves. Well, it couldn't be the way they looked, for each would peer into the face of their neighbour and decide that yes, the nose was a little long, but not unpleasant; that actually, the mouth was quite pretty in the way it turned up at the edges. No, no, it could not be their appearance. Perhaps an odour? Now this was embarrassing, was there some pungent odour that radiated from every pore of their skin, which offended those who were near it? Once again, each turned to their neighbour, smelling, straining, sniffing for any remote trace of a smell. Of course, if they delved deep, unpleasant smells could be found, but none of them strong enough to affect anyone who did not have their nostrils firmly lodged under the armpit of the offender. So, not their appearance and not their smell. Perhaps their voices? Maybe their fashion sense?
This wondering went on for weeks, the tireless stripping and investigating of every area of themselves, only to find that they were, as they had earlier liked to believe, perfectly hygienic, aesthetically pleasing, warm, friendly and well dressed people. Then why? Why did strangers look with such open horror at them? It did not take them long to reach the inevitable conclusion. It was their bubble. Their home. The very thing that sustained them was preventing them from interacting with outsiders. Of course, they did not know that the heated, or was it cooled, surface was in fact caused by a natural, if cruel, chemical reaction between Carbon Dioxide and a rare element found only in yellow tissue paper, (a substance which the people of the bubble used an impressive amount of). Instead, the people inside the bubble believed that the bubble was in fact a conscious being; that instead of protecting the people inside it, was in fact stunting their economical and social growth, by imprisoning them inside itself, and creating some hideous deterrent to those outside the bubble.
Anti-bubble campaigns began, and before long there was talk of a 'door'. This 'door' would be drilled into the nothingness on one side of the bubble, and the people would be led out to a world of freedom and light. Needless to say, as soon as the plan was realised, and the surface of the bubble punctured, a major flaw in the idea was realised. Not only were the people within the bubble unable to breathe the outside air, but once punctured, a reaction not unlike that of a popped balloon took place, leaving the people of the bubble short of breath, and without a home.
The moral is, of course, that things are usually the way they are for a reason. Dramatic change, in the most severe of cases, can often lead to homelessness and eventual death.
Dramatic Change
The clear bubble was not cold, but not warm either. It was just there. It was the exact temperature of skin, so that when touched, it was like touching nothing, like swimming in water the same temperature as blood. Swimming through nothing, the ripples the only feeling against your skin. This was only from the inside. From the outside, it was too hot, or too cold, it was never easy to tell...well, whichever it was, scalding or freezing, it was almost impossible to touch. Unfortunately for those inside the bubble, they were not aware of this burning quality of the bubble's surface. They only felt the hard nothingness, the impenetrable air. It was, as you can imagine, the cause of much upset. Any who came near the bubble would immediately jump away, their faces contorted with pain and fear and confusion.
Were they so repulsive? Those inside the bubble would ask themselves. Well, it couldn't be the way they looked, for each would peer into the face of their neighbour and decide that yes, the nose was a little long, but not unpleasant; that actually, the mouth was quite pretty in the way it turned up at the edges. No, no, it could not be their appearance. Perhaps an odour? Now this was embarrassing, was there some pungent odour that radiated from every pore of their skin, which offended those who were near it? Once again, each turned to their neighbour, smelling, straining, sniffing for any remote trace of a smell. Of course, if they delved deep, unpleasant smells could be found, but none of them strong enough to affect anyone who did not have their nostrils firmly lodged under the armpit of the offender. So, not their appearance and not their smell. Perhaps their voices? Maybe their fashion sense?
This wondering went on for weeks, the tireless stripping and investigating of every area of themselves, only to find that they were, as they had earlier liked to believe, perfectly hygienic, aesthetically pleasing, warm, friendly and well dressed people. Then why? Why did strangers look with such open horror at them? It did not take them long to reach the inevitable conclusion. It was their bubble. Their home. The very thing that sustained them was preventing them from interacting with outsiders. Of course, they did not know that the heated, or was it cooled, surface was in fact caused by a natural, if cruel, chemical reaction between Carbon Dioxide and a rare element found only in yellow tissue paper, (a substance which the people of the bubble used an impressive amount of). Instead, the people inside the bubble believed that the bubble was in fact a conscious being; that instead of protecting the people inside it, was in fact stunting their economical and social growth, by imprisoning them inside itself, and creating some hideous deterrent to those outside the bubble.
Anti-bubble campaigns began, and before long there was talk of a 'door'. This 'door' would be drilled into the nothingness on one side of the bubble, and the people would be led out to a world of freedom and light. Needless to say, as soon as the plan was realised, and the surface of the bubble punctured, a major flaw in the idea was realised. Not only were the people within the bubble unable to breathe the outside air, but once punctured, a reaction not unlike that of a popped balloon took place, leaving the people of the bubble short of breath, and without a home.
The moral is, of course, that things are usually the way they are for a reason. Dramatic change, in the most severe of cases, can often lead to homelessness and eventual death.