* a soft entrance (open)

[Embers]

HESPERA

I am born in the wake of a setting sun spilled between tree blossoms, and wonder if, perhaps, the only colors in the world are burnt red and the tart pink of berries. What must those born after dark think of a sun-less orchard, the trees weighted in shadow, and life a silhouette or an impression against a star spattered sky? The surprise they must encounter at a sunrise, how a shadow can implode upon itself in the moment it takes for light to crack the earth into color. And for those born into the slippery, noon-time exhaust, what kind of fear connotes the moon? Who had even once anticipated that the sky was a looping reel of light and lack thereof? There is an anxious and sweltering speculation that is ingrown when tightly swallowed in an unborn blindness; a fear that an expectation cannot be met, that the world is too vast. It is unfortunate to have a mind only to be physically incapacitated and vacant-eyed.

The chrysalis has grown papery and translucent, tearing at its seams, flaking as though boiled. Cerasus fruit is startled in the wind, swept in circles, leaving indentations in the fine, orchard grass. My shoulders are angled, creasing the husk, and I can hear the world opening wide beneath me. The dilute noise is orchestral; the sound of pressed grass underfoot, the soft, plump note of fruit jostling after the breeze, and the slow, crisply satisfying chip of the pod sheathing. My coat chafes back as I sink out of the the chrysalis and onto the back lit twirl of roots. Joints buckle beneath me, but there is a lush, balmy push under paw that is pacifying.

The hills on the verge of the horizon line are dimpled and are symbolic of extent. With my eyes closed, the world is a chrysalis, but opened here is the company of a Utopia.

This table is for use by Embers on A False World only

WORD COUNT 317

[pizza98]

Ghost wandered aimlessly through the orchard while gazing at the vibrant, rainbow-looking sunset. She heard a loud crack interrupt her thoughts. "What in the Kata-Hal tree was that?" She asked herself, saying the name of her tree for the first time. The word sounded neat. "Kata-Hal; Kata Hal....." She repeated. The Tart Cerasus tree seemed much smaller than her tree, so she was confused when she first saw it. She soon saw a feline made of snow among the remains of the pod that had cracked. He looked like he just hatched, because she couldn't make out much detail other than his white fur. She trotted over to the feline quickly, to make sure he wasn't hurt. "Are you okay?" The canine asked. Her black fur seemed to absorb what little light there was left in the day while her white, naturally curved muzzle and tall white hind stocking seemed to reflect it. Her stocky build made her slightly shorter than most canines. She was at least a few says old. "Hello. What's your name? Your name is how you imagine yourself." Ghost barked, the words rolling off of her tongue like a flowing creek.

[Meesh]

Way off in another limb of the Tart Cerasus tree, another pod began to wiggle. Awaken The thought was soft, but insistent, in his mind. And suddenly, he did. Emerald eyes opened to gaze at the soft interior of his pod, and his paws, for the first time, mved of their own accord, pushing against the walls of his home, his pod, his life. Suddenly, his home didn't seem...enough, somehow. It was small and he was big! He wanted to...he couldn't quit think of what he wanted, when his pod was all he had ever known.
The thought finally came to his head. He didn't want his pod. He wanted...something more.
Almost as if the thought was a trigger, the pod suddenly dropped from its branch, falling, falling, until it hit the ground with a muted thud. A crack appeared where the pod had hit the ground, and slowly it spread until the pod shattered with a mere stretch of the newborn within.
He lay on his back, eyes taking in the world around him. Was this the world? He had expected...something, but not for it to be so huge! His mouth opened in a smile, his first smile. If this was the world, perhaps he'd like it!