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That was an odd night! Little did I think a short sightseeing trip would have so much impact...
It all started out with a walk to the Great Wall Of Gambino yesterday evening to see the stargate for myself. Much to my annoyance, the boy was right about there being no visible controls. I was tempted to go through it, just to see what would happen, but it didn't seem very wise. So I looked at it, poked around the area for a bit, and went back to Barton to get a bite to eat at the Barton Pub before heading home.
Soon I was deep in discussion with the other denziens about how chips should be cooked (and, indeed, if they should be called chips or fries), while doing justice to a large platefull of the same. Not the most healthy meal in the world, but it was a filling comfort when I stepped back out into the snow. Untill...
I stopped in my tracks, shock and anger alternetly trying to freeze and boil me. At the North Gate stood the all-too-familier pair of Cindy and Leon. How dare he.... Well, I'd soon put a stop to that!
Or would I? No sooner did I storm up and demand to know what Leon thought he was doing, than Cindy snapped, "Dawna, kindly keep your nose out of this!"
"Now just one minute..." I started to say.
"Come on, Leon," she said, and laughed. "Go home, Dawna, this has nothing to do with you." I was too shocked to stop them as they strolled off...toward the hotel, I knew.
I trudged home through the snow, wondering if it was even my home anymore. Eventually, deep in the woods, I sat on a tree stump by the road, and just stared at the falling snow. I just didn't understand this...I'd gotten Cindy out of Leon's nasty little scheme, and now she was walking back into it of her own free will? It made no sense...unpleasant thoughts started to creep into my mind, and I tried not to think of anything at all. I stared out at the snow, and slowly, nothing else seemed to exist...just the snow, not even me, for I had somehow become the snow. Everything in the universe was the same...
Suddenly I did exist again, lying in the snow and gasping for air, my heart pounding so hard I could feel my body shaking. For a moment I stared at the tree branches above me. Then I slowly started to probe my most recent memories, trying to find what had set off the panic attack.
Oblivion. That was what it was. A sweeping tidal wave of blackness that had nearly broken over me as it had...who? I skirted the threatning memory, and the rest of the dream, if dream it was, slid slowly back into focus. I had been talking, or rather conversing in thoughts, with the king of the sea-people. He had said something about how the sea-people were out of danger now, through the help of some beings I couldn't quite grasp the idea of, and that I should help the land-people, and that my subjects would be looked after by the new governer, who was much better than the old one, who hadn't agreed with the mysterious beings...and then the blackness I had barely gotten clear of.
I sat up, feeling colder inside than then snow outside. Either that was just a very nasty dream, which seemed unlikely since I don't have dreams like that, or... I could guess what had happened. It was a very long distance for group-mind communication between me and the sea-people's ship, but how was I to know what distances a soul leaving its body could travel? In my confusion and unhappiness, I must have put myself into a trance, leaving the way clear for the king to send his last message to me. I was pretty sure it was a last message, because what else could that tidal wave of blackness have been? It was almost exactly like the whirlpool of oblivion I'd tasted through the king's mind in the marble palace deep under the sea. I'd pulled him back that time, but this time he'd nearly taken me with him! And why else would he speak of my subjects?
A horn honked, wiping the gloomy thoughts out of my mind, at least for the moment. I scrambled to my feet and turned to see Cindy's blue car stopped in the road. A window rolled down, and Cindy stuck her head out. "Waiting for me?" she asked cheerily.
"What was all that about?" I asked, quite put out. She grinned wickedly.
"I didn't mean to look ungreatful," she said, "but I needed to reclaim some stuff from him. And in case you're wondering, all he got tonight was scolding, threats, and the loss of some of what he thought was his." She examined a jaggedly broken fingernail. "And a scratch down one cheek. Now hop in!" The window rolled back up.
I climbed in the other door and sat down in the passenger seat, happy for the warm darkness. This was an utterly different darkness from the wave of blackness...this was warm and friendly, smelling slightly of soap and perfume, and lit by the luminous dials on the dashboard. Cindy flicked on the CD player as the car started to move down the road.
"All the men come in these places, and the men are all the same..." I nearly jumped as the words slithered their way out of the speakers, and my hand went instinctivly to the switch to turn off the song that Cindy understandably hated. But insted of blowing up, she laughed, although it sounded slightly strained.
"Don't bother," she said. "He always used that CD to taunt me with it. Now I have it though, and I have the power instead of him. Let's hear it all!"
She didn't speak again untill the song was over and another track had begun. "I guess I was his private dancer," she said in the same voice she uses for the news. "I wanted all that stuff too...loads of money, a house by the sea, a loving husband and nice kids, a normal family... Well, I've got a bit of a family now, with you, not that I'd call us normal..."
That got me to ask about a bit of the song that had confused me. "What were all those different kinds of money she said she'd take?" I asked.
"Crash-era currency," Cindy said casually. "You know, the whole economic slump...people made up all kinds of currency that they said would work better thatn gold...of course, it just caused mayham untill our great current admins took over and took control. I guess you were shielded from it in Aekea, but..."
"Yeah," I said, thinking back on the earlier part of my life. "A bit, except for the strikes, sabatoge, shoddy manufacturing, lawsuits...we're better off nowdays. Better competant tyrants than incompetant elected rulers."
"That thought deserves a good meal for the thinker!" Cindy said with a laugh, as we pulled up to the house.
I've decided not to think of that unpleasant experiance I had while sitting in the woods, whatever it was. No point bothering about things I can't do anything about...