The Biospheres where impressive engineering structures, and without them there would be no food, no plants, and no life. Jessica worked in Biosphere 35. There were thousands of wind turbines outside of the spheres that gave power to the electrical grid that gave energy to the climate controls of the spheres. Biosphere 35 was one of the largest and tallest spheres that housed the Muir redwoods that were saved from the national forest near San Francisco. The forest itself was no longer in existence only those that were transferred to the sphere prior to the ecology cascade due to global warming.
Jessica was back in the forest and to the space that she loved. She smiled touching the red texture of the spiraling giant of the redwood. She didn‟t want to take anything for granted with her first day back in the biosphere. She tested the water flow of the sphere and the overall temperature of the atmosphere. Everything was in normal parameters and given standards. She took some soil samples and carefully put them into test tubes to do further testing back in the lab portion of the sphere.
Jessica was wearing the celestial scarf around her neck that was in the brown paper package found in her jumpsuit. It was purple with scared orange religious symbols. It was the same exact one that she had seen in her dream. The symbols sparkled as the sun hit against the silk cloth. She felt protected wearing it around her neck against her white jumpsuit.
She was now taking water samples of the waterfall with a small stream that ran through the entire biosphere and redwood forest. A beautiful eagle nest was located at the top of the fountain. The large birds launched themselves into midair and flew across the biosphere and back again.
Jessica caught two images from the corner of her eyes. She turned and saw two black tailed deer that were frozen like statures, and then started to walk slowing towards the stream to get a taste of the clear cold water. Jessica smiled and hasn‟t seen these two in quite awhile. Dragonflies and bees where also entertaining themselves as they flew by the two deers down by the waters edge.
It was lunchtime and Jessica picked up her samples and walked over to the common area where there were food dispensing machines. She put in her food voucher and several protein bars came out. In addition, a liquid package came out that had her liquid and vitamins for the day. The liquid fluid was not her favorite, but the doctor told her that she needed to take all of the nutritional supplements that she can.
For the rest of the afternoon, she planted new seedlings in the forest. She held each seedling in the palm of her hand and said a blessing and surround it with a field of loving energy before she planted it into the soil.
She heard as if someone was singing a sweet lullaby coming from one of the larger redwood trees that can a open knot in the middle its trunk. Suddenly butterflies were flying out of the darkness of the hole and started to swarm together. The butterflies fused together and created a young fairy girl with pointed ears and transparent wings from the back of her pink dress.
Jessica stared at the fairy and notice that she was blind, but she started to communicate telepathically to her inner voice. “Jessica”, “My name is Arial and I came as a messenger to you. You must follow me at once for our two kingdoms are in desperate peril.” We must leave at once to my kingdom. If you do not follow me, then we will both fade into the darkness that mankind had already destroyed.”
Jessica couldn‟t believe what she was hearing or seeing. She was tired and fatigue from being in the hospital. The last thing that she wanted was to follow a blind fairy into the dark forbidden rabbit hole. There won‟t be a rabbit with a watch, nor a queen of hearts, nor a mad hatter having tea at the end of this trail she thought to herself. “Maybe, I am having a flash back from my childhood. It has been a very stressful week and might be just the side affects of all of the medication that she had taken”, Jessica said to herself.
Jessica closed her eyes. “There are no such thing as fairies. There are no such thing as fairies. Over and over”, Jessica said to herself.
She opened her eyes, and instead of a fairy princess, there was now a doorway that showed images of the future. She saw an image of an explosion by the wind turbines and the cracking of the biospheres. The toxic air had invaded into the control atmosphere like a deadly poison. All trees and plants were on fired and were dying. The image suddenly went blank.
A large lime colored Luna butterfly flew out and spoke to Jessica. “You can change the future, but you must walk through the door now with total love and respect to nature. If you hesitate at all then all is lost.”
Jessica head started to hurt. Stay where I am and see a future turning into a reality of the biospheres exploding, or take a leap of faith into the unknown.
Jessica, took her celestial scarf and wrapped it around her head and neck tightly and took a leap of faith through the transparent door of a future yet to come. She felt as if she was falling through air. She then felt like she was in a tunnel filled with droplets of rain ready to be rebirth into a new creation. She felled into a pile of autumn leaves of maple, oak, and ash. She sat up and saw that she had landed into a land that was full of autumn color and smell of pumpkins and apple cinnamon spices.
Fall was her favorite time of year right before the first winter‟s snows. On a wooden swing next to an old Victorian house was the blind fairy princess rocking back and form humming an old lullaby,
“Ariel”, “where am I”, asked Jessica. Ariel smiled and said, “You are now in my world.
The world of fairies and make believe.” We should start out now before it gets too late.
Ariel jumped out from the swing, and reached out to hold Jessica‟s hand. “You will be safe with me, just believe in me as you do yourself.” “Trust is easy if you are a blind fairy princess”, Jessica thought to herself.
Ariel smiled at Jessica. I know that you have been through a lot, but we get stronger through our experiences. They started down a dirt road that stopped by a small lake that had the name of Stony Lake. The sunlight was making the water sparkly within the cloud reflections that were drifting by. They stopped and rested for a while. The white birch trees were turning yellow and you could feel the fall season had already started to turn towards the snows of winter before long. Jessica, I need to tell you something that is important. I have to go back to my kingdom and you to yours, but I have to show you something first and its deep within the black forest on the other side of the lake.
The afternoon sun had started to fade, so Ariel brushed the sand of Stony Lake from her skirt and started towards the black forest with Jessica following behind. She had picked up a wooden oak branch as a walking stick that had a sharp tip just in case if she and Ariel ran into any trouble. Trouble was starting to be her trade name. They had walked a mile or so to the edge of the black forest. There was a camp site that was already set up with skinned rabbits that were hanging on string poles. The rabbit‟s blood was being drained into small tiny wooden bowls. A small fire could be seen inside of a wooden hut that was made of tree limbs, mud, and grass within the campsite.
Out of the hut, Jessica could hear someone chanting. Jessica turn to Ariel to see if she heard the same noise, but Ariel had disappeared. Who‟s out there, spoke the person from the wooden mud hut. “My name is Jessica, I am a traveler and I have been told that I must travel to the middle of the black forest.” “Not so fast”, said the shadow from the hut” You first need to go through your initiation before the forest will accept you.
“Take off all your cloths off and toss them to me, they smell like they are full of darkness, and not of the true elements of nature.” Jessica wasn‟t sure she should trust this shadow of a figure from the hut that she hadn‟t even met yet. “Come on, Come on” “We don‟t have all night.”
Jessica thrust her walking stick on to the ground, and carefully unzipped her jump suit.
“You must take all your cloths off for your initiation”, said the lady of the shadows.
Jessica took off the last piece of clothing. She crossed her arms and tried to warm herself as an early evening breeze touched her skins. Out of the hut, came the same Apache medicine woman that she met in the Arizona desert at Nothing. “We meet again”, said the Apache medicine women. She smiled at her, as she went to one of the dead rabbits on the pole, and took a hunting knife and cut its head off. She poured the rest of the rabbits blood into one of the small bowls, and told Jessica to come and sit inside the mud hut.
The hut was small and just enough room for them to sit around the fire. The fire came to life as the medicine women tossed more wood twigs onto its amber flame. The medicine women took a jar and pour special herbs and flower petals into the bowl. She started to go into a trance and started to rock back and forth. A musical hum started to come from the fire and all of a sudden she took her hand and reached into her own chest and pulled out her beating heart. She then put the heart above the bowl before her and let her own blood drip into the sacred bowl that she was creating. She then put her heart back into her chest. Jessica was freaking out, she was dripping sweat and thought she was hallucinating the whole event.
The medicine women then went to Jessica and said that she needs to drink the whole bowl. Jessica lifted the bowl and heard a wolf howling to the full moon that was now just rising above the black forest. “Drink know Jessica, this is your destiny and you will be one of the guardians of nature.” Jessica drank the potion and laid the empty bowl beside her. The medicine took her hunting knife and stared at Jessica. Be still know for I must now take a sample of your blood and unite it to the transformation natural element of fire.
Give me you palm Jessica. As if she was hypnotized by the Apache medicine women, she offered her left hand to her. She made a small slash in Jessica‟s palm and let the blood fall on a stems of rosemary and lavender. While chanting, she circle the fire three times and gave the stems to the eternal fire before them. The fire glowed green and an orb came out of the fire.
The orb floated three feet above the fire. It then turned into an image of planet earth with the stars and moons circling it. The earth was beautiful, with blue oceans and green land masses with white clouds above. It then started to turn brown and red devil vines started choking it as if cancer had invaded it. The earth became duller and duller, until it was a blacken ball that exploded before their eyes like a black hole.
“What you have seen is the vision of our precious earth,” unless we change our course.
The earth is our home and we are to be its guardian and not its destroyers.
The medicine women told Jessica to lay down on some deer rugs, and she brushed her naked body with a burn wand of sage and sandalwood. Your destiny is in the middle of the dark forest. You are now ready, and right before her eyes she again transformed into a white coyote. The last thing spoken to her was to follow her.
Jessica but back on her jumpsuit and scarf on. She also draped on a deer skin around her for warmth. She took her walking stick and stepped out of the hut. The moon was now full and bright above the forest. The white coyote was eating one of the rabbits and told her to cook one so she would have strength for the mid-night journey. Jessica carefully cooked the last rabbit and ate quickly and also put a couple of apples that were in a basket into her jumpsuit to eat on the way into the forest.
Jessica was slightly out of breath as she was keeping pace with the white coyote in front of her. They were now passing the town‟s cemetery next to a row of apple trees. She stopped next to a grave stone and read its inscription: Killed by the Car.
Another grave stone said U.S. Calvary with the years worn away and unable to be read.
She then saw a large statue of St. Patrick holding a Shepard‟s curved staff and a celtic cross. The statue was the only one in the small grave yard, and stood as if it was the protector of all of its departed spirits. There was clover growing besides the statues. She saw a four leave clover. She stopped and picked it up and put it in her pocket. I may need all the luck I can get for this journey of the night.
There was an actual iron gate that was the entrance into the black Forest. The coyote got up on its hind feet and pushed the gate open with it front paws. It gave a loud bark as if to remind Jessica that it was time to get going on their quest. As they came into the forest it became darker and darker as the tree canopy was blocking most of the moonlight from above. Jessica could hear the noises of the nocturnal creature of the forest. She felt like something was looking at her and saw pink eyes glowing from the trees around her.
She could see that they were just bats that were hanging upside down that were trying to get some rest before their midnight flight.
They came to an open glen in the middle of the forest where there was an old tree stump in the middle. The coyote jumped onto the stump and tapped on its surface rings three time with its left paw. Like a hidden door, the stump open up and out came a being that Jessica had never seen before. It looks like a man, but it wasn‟t one.
It was more like a tree, but in human form.
Leaves were where skin should be and vines and tree limbs were growing directly from the individual face. “Good evening my dear friends. I am the green man of the black forest. I have been its guardian since the becoming of time itself. I am the protector of the seasons and the lord of nature itself.”
The green man sat down after making this introduction. “What brings you into the forest Medicine women and why did you bring me this women.” A thin mist has now entered the glen like a blank to take cover in.
The coyote transformed back into the Medicine women. “Green man, we have came to seek your wisdom. The woman next to me is named Jessica, and she has come from the future. A future that is bleak and dark for all the beings of nature. Nature is dying and is being twisted upon itself by the greed and ill will of mankind..”
The green man looked sad for a moment. He then gave the Medicine women and Jessica, a gently smile.
“ All things do they not have beginnings and endings, and then new beginnings. What you say is troubling to you for you are the ones that are being transformed, and therefore it is hard to see the beginning, from the middle, from the ending.”
“Like you can‟t see the forest from the trees” said Jessica. This made the green man laugh. “That is truly a very old saying but one that has been tested by time itself.”
“Jessica, go to that stream over there, and you will find a dead dragon fly” “please pick it up and bring it to me”, said the green man. Jessica walked over to the stream, and there was a yellow and green dragon fly that was laying dead between two branches as water was flowing underneath. Jessica picked up the dragon fly in the cup of her hands and walked over to the Green man. The green man body was almost transparent and seemed to have a shimmer to his leaves that were attached like skin to its body.
“Place the dragon fly into my hands.” The Green man held the dead dragonfly and suddenly sparks started to flow through its body. The Green man softly blew like a kiss on to the wings of the dragon fly and it immediately turn back to life. It lifted into the air and circled around the head of the green man as if to personally thank him for the gift of life again.
“You see my child, what was dead is now alive.” “The spark of the divine is in all of us and in nature itself.” Jessica, started to cry. She feel into her knees and the Medicine women came to her and helped her back up to her feet while comforting her.
“Why are you crying and so sad?
“I come from a world that is destroying itself, its people, and the nature itself. There is no longer respect for nature or the inner divine.” Exploitation of our treasure resources for greed and self interest”
The green man gave a serious concern eye on Jessica.
“Suffering is like heat to the skin. You take only so much of it, and then you either turn off the heat or pull your hand away from the burning flame.”
“You must remember that your physical nature may suffer, grow old, and die, but your true nature of your true eternal flame will never fade and never dim. It will be eternal as your soul is and it will evolve into the most beautiful element of nature itself, and as grand as any star in the heavenly skies above”.
Jessica look up and saw the milky way with its blanket of stars shinning brightly. She wiped her tears away.
“I am glad that you are feeling better. I have a present for you Jessica, and you must remember to keep it and protect it with your whole being and heart.”
“Close your eyes and reach your hands out.” Jessica felt something dropped into her hands. She opened her eyes and saw a small tiny acorn that started to changing color of the rainbow. “What is this that you have given me, Green man”
“It is the force of creation itself. Keep it guarded it at all times. There are people and lower energy beings, who would love to get their hands on this and use it not for creation but for their own agenda and the total destruction of the world you live in”.
Jessica felt an inner tension again in her stomach. “Don‟t worry so much”, said the Green man.
“When the time come you will know what to do, there is a path for each and everyone of us isn‟t there. Some paths are more challenging then others, but all are worth its own journey and pleasures.”
“As for me my dear child and friend, it is also my time to say goodbye and good journey for you as you journey back home.”
“I have so many more questions to ask you green man”, but the green man was already started to transform into brilliant autumn colors. The pink, red, gold, and yellows all vibrated with color within and around him. He was then gone. Gone into the autumn colors themselves unlike a morning frosted starting to sparkle and then fade in a morning Irish glen.
Drone Lab 1
Joseph was his name. Joseph had many scars left from the chemical biological wars. His scars were more then skin deep. and touched the very marrow of his bones and being.
He worked quietly over his work table of various pieces of drones that were sent to him for repair. In his spare time, he collected and repaired pocket watches and had several in various stages on his workbench next to him.
Even simple pocket watches were illegal in the industrial city, but pocket watches to Joseph was what life was to the average person. Each tiny gear was different, but when place and put back together in their proper place, they worked as one glorious time piece function and as if he was creating time himself. The authorities didn‟t want the people to own their own time. Time was not theirs but was for the greater good of the industry.
His shift was almost up. He rubbed the chemical scar on his forehead for the burning sensation came and went. Joseph was at the age where it no longer matter to him on what the final outcome of each day was and what the final count was in the game. There was no longer any winning or losing, just being. He knew that this state of being wasn‟t a healthy one in the Industrial City complex where everything was measured and counted for and results had to be met or else.
“Someone had to keep the dammed droids working”,he said to himself. The droids needed more and more maintenance over time. Spare parts have been harder to find.
Joseph occasionally had to deal with the black market to fulfill his productivity measure and to meet the given repair schedule. Humanity never changes, if there is a need to be filled, than the market will open and find a way to meet demand. Regardless, if the market was a legal one or one that is under the radar.
It seemed to him that more repressive the government is, the more inhumane the culture becomes. It seemed to him that one of the important gears was missing from this society, but you can‟t mess with city hall. City hall has all the power and he was just a simple worker and even an honored cripple from the wars.
Joseph picked up one of the pocket watches that was recently give to him by one of the miners to fix. He carefully picked one of the tools and opened the silver metal backing.
What he was expecting to find was to see the inlay of beautiful tiny silver gears. What Joseph found was a simple piece of paper carefully folded. He took his tiny tool, and careful took the note from the case of the watch. Joseph place the note under his magnifying glass.
The message was in a language that only few individuals knew.
It was Native American. Joseph came from the Hopi tribe, but knew several other different tongues, Apache, Navaho, and Cheyenne.
The note said. Our time has come, and our tribes must be reborn. Our birth culture can no longer be oppressed, by machine, or technology. Our ancestry way is not their way. We must transform and recreate our own destiny. Mother earth is calling us to act now.
Meet us at the mining grid portal under South Mountain on the night of the new moon.
“Night of the new moon is this night”, Joseph said to himself.
Joseph was no rebel, and at his advance age he was no threat to anyone. What was this meeting about? The authorities already caught another traitor last night and executed him on the evening news. He was just a tired old man and this fight was not his to fight.
“Conflict is never the solution”, Joseph thought to himself, as the scar on his forehead started to burn into his thoughts again.
Joseph packed up his things to go back to the living quarters. He slowly made his way to the Tram station. He got in and the first stop was the mining facility at South Mountain.
The tram doors open. At first he hesitated, and then he got up and walked out on to the platform of South Mountain. Why couldn‟t he leave well enough alone, he didn‟t need any more drama in his life.
Joseph took off his respirator unit, and peered into the dusty mining portal. No one was there but he could see the footprints of the miners that have left their mark behind. He took his pocket watch out and it was a little past nine. He knew that he could never be a part of the rebel movement, but he wanted to meet the man who put the note into the pocket watch. He wanted answers.
He started down the mining shaft, when two large pit bulls came out of the shadows. He never liked dogs much, and he wasn‟t a fan of the pit bull breed either. “What‟s wrong with you Joseph?” “Don‟t have any fight left in your old bones any longer ” Two large men were smiling at Joseph while holding the pit bulls back on chains. Foam was coming out of the pit bull‟s mouths, and one of the men said, “They look hungry, don‟t they”.
“Don‟t you two worry yourselves about little old me. I have plenty of fight left in me”
“We been waiting for you and our boss doesn‟t like to be kept waiting” One of the larger man came over to Joseph, and made sure Joseph didn‟t have any concealed weapons.
“He‟s clean”, said the man. They told Joseph to follow them and not to say or make a given sound.
The shaft they were walking down became smaller and smaller. The shaft then shifted to the right. Instead of going to the right, there was a coal wagon in which they push to the side. They then crawled through a narrow opening to their left. Joseph wasn‟t use to this type of exercise and his shirt was soon soaked with sweat and his breaths became short.
“Don‟t die on us, old man” said the man in front of Joseph leading the way. Soon the shaft opened up into