The Question
Eternal
This is an excerpt from an upcoming short story that will be for sale through Amazon's Kindle Store:
I knew immediately that the world spread out around me could only be a dream world. But I was also just as sure that I wasn’t dreaming it. There were rolling fields that stretched out as far as I could see. And the distance to which I could see was unreal – I could see so far that I could make out the curve of the world.
But even with the distance, everything felt so close. You know the feeling you get in the dark when you’re right next to a wall; you can’t see it – you haven’t touched it – but all the same, you can feel it next to you. The fields felt that way. The gentle curve of the horizon felt that way. Even the sky felt that way.
The sky was all wrong – but, looking up at it, I had the feeling I had seen it before and would again. It was the color and texture of dull steel; there was no sun, but there was light reflecting from that brushed metal sky from somewhere. I knew that it was thousands of miles above me, but something told me that if I wanted to, I could reach up and touch it.
When I looked down again, a lake lay spread before me. I couldn’t say how big it was. My sense of size and distance was so transcended that the lake was at the same time an ocean and a puddle. The surface was broken here and there by blades of grass. Somewhere near the middle of the lake, a folded paper boat bobbed on gentle waves. There was something important about that little paper boat, but I don’t remember what it was now. I think I knew I would forget.
I looked up at the sky again, and saw a face looking down at me. Watching me the way I’d been watching the boat. It wasn’t a human face – except, somehow, it was. Utterly alien, yet at the same time human in so ultimate a degree that it was unmistakable. The lips moved; there was no sound, but a soothing wind washed over the world.
You aren’t the only one. It said. I didn’t hear the words; I felt them resonate in my mind, the way a gong resonates when struck. I wanted to know what the sky meant in saying that. I tried to ask, but I had no mouth. The sky heard me anyway, but it didn’t answer. It just gazed down at me with those eyes that weren’t eyes and smiled a smile that couldn’t be seen.
Then it said something else. Beware.
When I looked to the sky again, there was nothing but flame. I stood there, stood without legs or feet or form, and watched as the sky roiled in billows of furious flame. When I looked down again, the fields had withered. The horizon still curved, but the wrong way now. The lake was gone, in its place a shallow bowl of mud drying to brick, and from the cracks emerged black things that screeched and skittered –
I knew immediately that the world spread out around me could only be a dream world. But I was also just as sure that I wasn’t dreaming it. There were rolling fields that stretched out as far as I could see. And the distance to which I could see was unreal – I could see so far that I could make out the curve of the world.
But even with the distance, everything felt so close. You know the feeling you get in the dark when you’re right next to a wall; you can’t see it – you haven’t touched it – but all the same, you can feel it next to you. The fields felt that way. The gentle curve of the horizon felt that way. Even the sky felt that way.
The sky was all wrong – but, looking up at it, I had the feeling I had seen it before and would again. It was the color and texture of dull steel; there was no sun, but there was light reflecting from that brushed metal sky from somewhere. I knew that it was thousands of miles above me, but something told me that if I wanted to, I could reach up and touch it.
When I looked down again, a lake lay spread before me. I couldn’t say how big it was. My sense of size and distance was so transcended that the lake was at the same time an ocean and a puddle. The surface was broken here and there by blades of grass. Somewhere near the middle of the lake, a folded paper boat bobbed on gentle waves. There was something important about that little paper boat, but I don’t remember what it was now. I think I knew I would forget.
I looked up at the sky again, and saw a face looking down at me. Watching me the way I’d been watching the boat. It wasn’t a human face – except, somehow, it was. Utterly alien, yet at the same time human in so ultimate a degree that it was unmistakable. The lips moved; there was no sound, but a soothing wind washed over the world.
You aren’t the only one. It said. I didn’t hear the words; I felt them resonate in my mind, the way a gong resonates when struck. I wanted to know what the sky meant in saying that. I tried to ask, but I had no mouth. The sky heard me anyway, but it didn’t answer. It just gazed down at me with those eyes that weren’t eyes and smiled a smile that couldn’t be seen.
Then it said something else. Beware.
When I looked to the sky again, there was nothing but flame. I stood there, stood without legs or feet or form, and watched as the sky roiled in billows of furious flame. When I looked down again, the fields had withered. The horizon still curved, but the wrong way now. The lake was gone, in its place a shallow bowl of mud drying to brick, and from the cracks emerged black things that screeched and skittered –