Not Quite Time, Not Quite Space

The dust of Codd stirred in thickening waves as Emma and Auden raced towards their shuttle. Emma looked over her shoulder at the valley where Bovem once stood and then down at her hand where the Sword of Bovem waited to be used. Bovem was gone, but that thunderous voice of his still rumbled through the air and electrified the atmosphere. It almost calmed Emma and made her believe all was not lost.

“Come on,” Auden reached for Emma’s hand and she accepted it. The two youths, with free hands covering their mouths, forced themselves forward thankful for the gives in the ground marking where they had come from. Grey dust, charcoal soot, and flecks of white dotted the shuttle and had it not been for the sudden intuition in Auden to throw out his hand, he might have run right into the tear shaped vessel. Inside the shuttle, Emma and Auden dosed the interior with Codd’s leavings as they rushed to their seats. With Emma already preparing for escape, Auden watched Codd’s landscape, the cracking earth, a single waterfall of dust spewing into an ever-widening abyss, and the hazed sun above having no clue what was to happen next. The shuttle’s primary engine fired up just as the cracked earth began to swallow whole Emma and Auden’s only means of escape.

The plummet downward left Emma with a flip-flopped stomach, only soothed when the shuttle gained altitude. Slowly at first, with waves of dust collapsing on it, the shuttle fired upward, passing the cut in Codd meant to collapse the planet. It was awful to think about oneself so close to oblivion, but Emma could only think of the rose-orange pouring from the sky and catching every bead of dust as it dove into nothingness. A waterfall into the unknown, with everything above understood and accounted for, but nothing below even glimpsed at by the sentient.

“Emma!” Auden gripped his seat as he got Emma’s attention. With eyes affixed to the clouds, Emma forced the quad-throttle forward, sending the shuttle into the atmosphere.

“Bovem said ‘if he speaks it, it will make sense when the time comes’.” Auden repeated aloud once he and Emma were far from the collapsing world of Codd and its single sun. Adrift in the middle of nowhere, the youths used the dust collected in their hair and around their eyes as a way to distract themselves from being the sole witnesses of a now obliterated world. Shaking his head, Auden wiped away a single tear, forcing himself to focus. It was not the first time he saw earth collapse from beneath his feet, but no matter how many times he saw it, he never got used to it.

Emma allowed herself to shake, before collecting her thoughts and repeating Bovem’s advice. “First, you need a blessing of Green and then in a dream you’ll find Count Gree”.

“What’s the first place that comes to mind when you think of green?” Emma asked and when Auden’s eyes fixed on her, she corrected her question. “Don’t think about it. What’s the first word the comes to mind.”

“Viridi.” A single answer, but one Emma noted came with hesitation.

“Viridi? That’s a planet, right?” Emma asked.

“Yeah,” Auden turned away and began putting in the coordinates “It won’t take long to get there.”

“What are you not saying, Auden?” Emma asked. Auden brushed the top of his head, allowing another blanket of dust to fall and catch a bit in his eyelashes. “Viridi is a good place. I mean that. The people are good and ancient. If we ask them for something and our intentions our true, they’ll deliver.”

“Then why so bothered by that?” Emma wanted Auden to continue.

“Count Gree is bent on getting all the galaxy involved with whatever he has planned. If Viridi is truly the place we’re meant to go, then it’s possible his intention is to watch Viridi burn. Emma, Bovem said, ‘in a dream you’ll find Count Gree’, Viridi is known as the ‘Green Dream’. It has more species of tree and grass than all the planets of every living planet combined. If our fight with Count Gree takes place there, then it might mean the destruction of Viridi and knowing their leader, Prasinus, she would allow the death of Viridi for the good of the galaxy.”

Emma was mostly quiet for the rest of travel as she thought of Auden’s words about Prasinus. Looking down at the sword she plucked from Bovem’s remains. The grey muck had turned to dust and now fell from the sword in sheets as Emma picked at. Below the muck were hints of silver. At the pommel and all the way to the tip, the dull silver collected Emma’s thoughts. Holding the Sword of Bovem in her hand like a sword ought to be held, Emma felt power surge through her being as if the sword had some kind of adrenergic impact on her. Emma’s mind cleared, her thoughts became crystalized, and she began to see that things were not as awful as they seemed.

Approaching Viridi, Emma understood why the planet was called ‘Green Dream’, despite night’s hold. Leaves the size of cars, blades thin and curling, trunks round as a lake, roots that dived and rose. Viridi was a dream and the moment Emma inhaled the soil’s musk, she felt herself drift as if into sleep. Auden, who had been to Viridi before, led the way until they reached an area where roots molded into a ceiling high above their heads and for the first time, the earth below was just soil leaving an open space.

“This place is usually packed during the day,” Auden remarked, but Emma was focused on the vines several meters above her head that were used to tie living roots together, encouraging them to grow in a certain direction. “How long did it take to do this?” Emma asked.

“A millennia…or two.” A voice answered from further back beneath the roots.

“Prasinus?” Auden asked and as the youths approached, it was to the sight of dwindling firelight before a root-poured throne, but Prasinus was not at her throne. Instead, the leader rested on the soil, with a book open, and candlelight setting aglow her violet face. When Prasinus smiled, it showed her lips to be rich emerald, and when she stood on two legs, the full length of her rich fire hair flowed down her back in a single braid. Dressed in a holey t-shirt and leisure pants, the leader smiled.

“You’re here late.” The leader mused.

“We’re here–” Auden began.

“You’re a hockey fan?” Emma asked, looking at the shirt Prasinus wore.

“Sadly, I’m a fan of the things we can’t have here on Viridi. The trees hate ice.” Prasinus smiled.

“This place is like twenty-five light years from Earth. You get hockey out here? Like Earth hockey?” Emma asked.

“Well, many planets have their own version, but yes, Earth hockey happens to be my favorite.” Prasinus laughed with the confession and something about her humorous calm, the way she seemed to know what Emma and Auden where there for, and her willingness to help no matter what, alerted Emma to just how old and wise Prasinus must be despite looking no older than her.

“We can’t do this, Auden.” Emma said before Auden could continue. Auden shifted his glance from Prasinus to Emma, back to Prasinus. He was going to ask. Prasinus was willing to help, but as Auden went to open his mouth, he paused.

“We need a blessing.” Emma said.

“Are you sure?” Prasinus asked.

“We’re sure.” Auden confirmed and between two youths, an entire planet was spared.

“All right,” Prasinus shrugged and pulled from her pocket a lighter. With the lighter ignited, Prasinus touched a space just above her head igniting her invisible crown that glowed as a green light.

“We are born with our crowns attached to our heads.” Prasinus answered the unasked questions.

“A green light that guides us and moves us forward.” Prasinus said, and Emma wondered how many eons that green light above the woman’s head burned. Reaching out her hands, with her lime green palms facing Emma and Auden, Prasinus spoke.

“Blessings, in truest emerald, in finest sage, in coursing Viridi. This blessing, I construct from passing time and raging space, in both light and dark, in sword and shuttle, from the flying arrow to the used bow. For the abused and manipulated, the lost and found, and the one who thought himself an island. For the love of each other and freedom that comes from union. From the bull to the mother, from the dream to the real, and back again. May Emma and Auden win the war that must be won.”