Sord in Prosperity - Hope Beyond the Apocalypse

EP. 146 - ALCOVE

AFTER CLEANING UP THE mess they left on the table where they first rested, the two started back down the same path they had traversed hours before from the town center. Sord wrapped his father's boot in one arm and held Daisy's hand with the other.

He remained singularly focused: "Find a suitable alcove," he kept repeating to himself while trying to engage in a sensible conversation with Daisy. "Don't give her an indication that I can't get my mind off this. She doesn't want to be seen as a sex object, and I don't want her to think she is. I simply want to feel her warmth, flesh to flesh. Such comfort and pleasure I've had only in dreams."

Daisy was far less encumbered in these thoughts and could hardly stop talking. "Sord, this has been one of the greatest scientific adventures of my life. Don't you agree? Think about what we intended to do here. Could you ever imagine we'd find a clue? And isn't it so odd that a little hand flip behind that bench, my ring covered in dirt and rocks, would lead us directly to this clue? It's as if magic happened here, given the odds. There may have been dozens of people scouring this place, investigating the underlying mystery, and then we arrive here so innocently. With the help of my mother's ring, we locate your father's boot. Sometimes you see things others don't because you aren't looking for them. At least, you aren't expecting to find them. Your mind is open to all possibilities."

Sord inserted an occasional 'uh-huh' whenever given the chance.

Daisy continued. "This reminds me of quantum field potential. You understand? The theory, much of it proven now, that all we know of this universe, from visible matter to dark matter and energy, emanates from the same field. It just coalesces into various forms for a period. Call it God, if you like, or the emanation of God. I love that theory, but do you see the parallels? Does that make sense?"

"Yeah," he replied distractedly. "Just looking for an alcove."

"The parallels. Why is it when you hunt for a thing, it's so easy to overlook it? Why do we create complexity when simplicity will do? I see everything as field potential. All that happens, all we see and do and think, is a momentary collapse of that potential into a point in time and matter. So when I look at today, I consider our innocence, our openness to any possibility. Indeed, the fact we were not thinking of a possibility is what may have created this outcome today, this scientific finding. A boot so oddly infused in bioplas. Not melted into the boot, but somehow merged, as if the two components became one. In fact, the boot could never have taken the heat that would cause bioplas to melt."

"Two became one," he repeated, trying to convince her he was still listening.

"It would have fried to a crisp. And then consider my ring, my mother's ring. You can't go magnetizing titanium-gold alloy any old way. Not in a normal physics world. The ring is at my hand's temperature, and it's still magnetized, even now. Just look at that."

She placed her hand in the air, and Sord stared at it briefly. Then something else caught his eye.

"Alcove!" he yelled gleefully. "I think we have our alcove over there."

They halted to survey the darkened corner of the tunnel.

"You might be right, Dearie. Looks like it goes back a ways and is unlit. Hmm. This might be a good place to rest, if you know what I mean."

"Oh, I know what you mean," he replied emphatically as the two approached the opening.

The tunnel ceiling dropped to just above their headlines. A few steps later, they rounded a corner to the left then another to the right where the tunnel abruptly ended.

"You thinking what I'm thinking?" she inquired.

"Maybe. At first, I thought this might be a maintenance entrance, but it ends right here."