Tevun-Krus #100

89 - Blue and Purple Ants - @fuzzicat333 - Parallel Universe

Blue and Purple Ants

By fuzzicat333

"The floor is glowing again, come and look. Why don't you believe me?" Francis whined loudly from the bedroom to Ophelia, his beautiful and youthful looking carer working downstairs.

She scurried about in the kitchen, washing up and cooking several meals, enough to last for the two days before she would be back again that Wednesday.

"Not that again, it's all in your head. I can't come and see, I'm not done yet! Look, I'll check on you before I leave, alright you old nutter." She whispered the last part but Francis had turned up his hearing aid, so he heard her perfectly well.

Sighing, he stared at the line of around twenty small black ants, who walked towards the faintly glowing square on the fake wood effect lino. The edge was sharp and bright as if a trap door had suddenly appeared.

Francis carefully lowered his body to watch as they walked across, seemingly with no harmful effect.

He sat up, trying to ignore what he now believed to be a figment of his imagination. This wasn't the first time he had seen it, always in the same place, glowing mysteriously.

It was half the size of the room which made it hard to miss but Ophelia always came upstairs too late and now everyone thought he was crazy. Last time it happened, he got a little bit carried away trying to prove it.

The tool box had been hidden after the sledge hammer and crowbar incident. Originally the floor had been polished wood but now there was no way to dig through the rubbery lino.

Shaking his head, Francis pushed himself up and took a quick look back at the ants. They looked fine except half their number seemed to be missing. He squinted and recounted them.

As he watched, another one disappeared at the edge of light, as the trail of ants continued over to the other side of the strange square. He frowned and looked towards the door as Ophelia stomped up the stairs.

"What is it then? I have to go soon." Ophelia grumbled as she poked her head around the door.

"The floor was glowing again but this time it took the ants!" Francis exclaimed, pointing at the now perfectly ordinary floor. "Never mind." He muttered.

"Well I'm off now, see you on Wednesday." Ophelia looked around the room for any sharp objects that needed taking away then turned and walked back downstairs when everything seemed safe. The door slammed so Francis peeped through the curtains at her retreating back as she hurried down the garden path.

She snapped her fingers above her head and began waving her hands in front of her face. Francis supposed she was using one of those implants that young people had nowadays. She began talking to someone he couldn't see.

"He's still the same, Milo, why don't you put him in a home or something? Look, he doesn't even have an entertainment implant, he's still using a tablet. What will happen when they phase out touch screen devices next year?"

She walked out of range onto the moving shiny metal edged path leading to the rest of humanity as she spoke, so Francis turned back to his floor, which was still annoyingly ordinary right now. It didn't matter what she said, he knew who she was talking to.

Grabbing his real wood walking stick, Francis made his way downstairs to get the tablet. He refused to get pieces of electronic doodads inserted into his flesh and no-one, not even his great grandson Milo could force him to do it.

The tablet sat on the coffee table unaware that even its high tech presence was not enough for this world. Settling into his favourite brown and green striped, real cotton covered armchair, he stretched the rod shaped golden object.