Dream: The Door of Queens
Tuesday, September 5th:
After my father died, I repainted one of our house's external staircases a uniform shade of pink. My large extended family was offended by this, as expected, but I didn't care.
I had lost my job, but needed to talk to discflamingo, who worked at the same place. I showed up in the guise of a repair man (wearing my tool-laden fishing vest) to find him. I kept dodging around corners during our conversation; I didn't want to risk getting discflamingo in trouble if anyone recognized me talking to him.
Eventually I convinced myself that I could feel my father pulling on a sheet when I held it in his old room and thought about him. Alyssa had begun repainting the room. The Door of Queens appeared on the far wall (it had always been there, but now its concealing plaster flaked away.) My father's spirit manifested visibly, and lucidly explained that, in a few days, the Door would become a portal to Earth's sister planet. (Recently arrived, the sister sphere followed in our orbit half a year behind us.)
Alyssa spoke to my father herself. An accomplished scientist, she had long been Earth's foremost defender against global dangers, but these had usually been environmental pollution. Once she left for the sister planet, the complex rules of succession meant that her position would pass to my father (who had held a similar role earlier in his career). Normally this couldn't happen, but his spirit had become solvent and he could fulfill the duties of the post. He told her, though, that he would accompany us to the sister planet to advise us during the difficult period of settlement.
"Earth is lost," he said. No human artifice could compete with the cosmic forces which would soon destroy our home world.
After my father died, I repainted one of our house's external staircases a uniform shade of pink. My large extended family was offended by this, as expected, but I didn't care.
I had lost my job, but needed to talk to discflamingo, who worked at the same place. I showed up in the guise of a repair man (wearing my tool-laden fishing vest) to find him. I kept dodging around corners during our conversation; I didn't want to risk getting discflamingo in trouble if anyone recognized me talking to him.
Eventually I convinced myself that I could feel my father pulling on a sheet when I held it in his old room and thought about him. Alyssa had begun repainting the room. The Door of Queens appeared on the far wall (it had always been there, but now its concealing plaster flaked away.) My father's spirit manifested visibly, and lucidly explained that, in a few days, the Door would become a portal to Earth's sister planet. (Recently arrived, the sister sphere followed in our orbit half a year behind us.)
Alyssa spoke to my father herself. An accomplished scientist, she had long been Earth's foremost defender against global dangers, but these had usually been environmental pollution. Once she left for the sister planet, the complex rules of succession meant that her position would pass to my father (who had held a similar role earlier in his career). Normally this couldn't happen, but his spirit had become solvent and he could fulfill the duties of the post. He told her, though, that he would accompany us to the sister planet to advise us during the difficult period of settlement.
"Earth is lost," he said. No human artifice could compete with the cosmic forces which would soon destroy our home world.