Goodbye Blue

This is the piece I read at the Parellel Dimensions 'meet the author' event in West Kirby library on Saturday 11th July 09. If you weren't there, you missed a good afternoon.

There is silence now. And stillness.  Severed by steel from the constant thrust of movement, the incessant inescapable babble of conversations, of a thousand different songs and voices, the blazing bombardment of multi coloured neon and corporate logos; life beyond the seal goes on in its unremitting rush to be somewhere else, to get one more thing done for such is this Babel, this bubble of life miles above the mother globe. 

But here peace reigns.  And the soft hum of the machines.  Here, beyond the conventions of required politeness, is a world of white, soft grey and dull metal where the outside can be gazed upon for real not from the safety of giant plasma screens but through a small circle of tri layered strengthened glass.  This is a world where credit cards have no value, where movement is controlled with iris prints and tiny sub dermal implanted chips. 

A hiss fills the void, jangling nerves; a reminder that the twin skins are all that stand between you and the vast nothingness out there.  There is nothing welcoming about the corridor, just harsh light and uniform whiteness where footsteps echo ominously and are joined by the sounds of metal on metal and hydraulics in motion.  A shudder inducing screech of a door being dragged from its resting place rends the silence, swiftly followed by another nerve shredding hiss and scream of compliance as the door changes direction while the vibrations and aftershocks rumble through both corridor and occupant. 

You wait in the cold, ears tortured by the change in pressure, and silence.  A silence so solid it hurts.  The air in here is clean, sterile of everything but that strange faint mechanical odour of the scrubbers.  Then the whole cacophony begins again as the second door groans open.  No welcoming faces just a blank white wall greets you.  A little to the left a small oblong panel blinks green indicating the direction in which you are expected to travel, there is no choice, the way to the right is closed off, the door behind you closing. It seals with a clunk and hiss together with the hum of pumps in action; it will not open again for you for another six months.  There is no way back.  The floor slopes downward in the indicated direction, another incentive to go that way.

The blinking green light leads around the corner, a snake back to the other side of the still plain wall.  Another door opens like a flower bud unfurling but just wide enough for you to pass through then closes with an airtight hiss.  Here, in the peripheral range of hearing is bird song, it is supposed to calm, it sounds absurd.

Registering your presence here is simple, just stand on the black floor pads, pull the two black handles of the machine down, it glides on hydraulics trailing multicoloured intestines of wires and tubes, until your chin rests in the cold black cup, stare at the red dot and grip the handles, not that you can let go until the machine dictates, fingerprints are read, weight taken, as the bluewhite light scans across both eyes.  You know it is coming, it always does, that stinging jab in the pad of the middle finger, there is no escape from it.  The puzzle is how anyone can change identities in enclosed transit and what would happen if you were no longer you? 

You are you; the machine decides, releases your hands with a sigh and returns to its starting position.  Behind you a white on white door opens onto a small square space and an orange notice reminds you to remove all articles of clothing before entering.  The door behind closes: you are trapped.  An opening reveals itself and an arm thrusts toward you.  Once more you perform in the cold metal bowl, it disappears whence it came and then, small orange lights flicker on and off.  If you were not you, would this be where the removal took place?  Instead of a bioshower … 

The wash is cold, it always is, and smells of fake flowers and pine, the jets leave no crevice untouched.  Finally a wall folds away and there awaiting you is a towel and a one-piece suit.  There is time to dress before the next green light blinks with insistence.  You make three steps on the solid metal floor then bounce along the oversized umbilical cord into a small metal box and sit.

The only window is in the door.  Through this you watch the connections sever; pull back to the white ball that hovers against the impregnable black void.  The soft hiss of jets push you away from the transit station, the vibrations of the burn come and go, you seem not to be moving but you are.  The machines are in control, there is nothing to do.   Now you can sleep, truly sleep washing away some of the deprivation experienced in the last six weeks meanwhile the mother’s orb slips further away.

Vibrations build in quantity and volume, your little world rebels against the change, it roars then groans and the specks of light that became visible in that tiny square once you were clear of the transit station’s glowing bulk slow to the stationary.  Then silence returns only to be shattered by a clang that vibrates through bones and the harsh hiss and throb of pumps as they fill the extendable walkway with air.

The door opens and the green light at the far end flickers into life as other sounds clunk and rumble though the metal skin of your transport vehicle.  The walkway is not solid; it sways with each step.  Visible through the wall a stream of dollies follow their leader along their metal strip to the ship and return in neat formation along the higher artery fully laden.  Watching them is probably not the ideal point on which to fix your vision.  That small green square is the better option; it takes ten maybe fifteen steps to reach it.  Two steps short the wall below it slides away.  

          As soon as the door closes the walkway retracts. The last oval door opens; the lights behind you are blinking off as you step over the high sill.  The darkness beyond evaporates as sensing your movements lights activate.  The observation lounge, with its single row of windows set into the curved white wall, the only four windows here, is silent. Its padded seats wait for occupation but are ignored.  A hasty glance out of the windows confirms conventions are being maintained’ the sky is black, the ground shades of dust grey depending on how the light falls and when it does not everything vanishes. The lounge is twenty feet in diameter.  This is not the place for the outdoorsy type or the claustrophobic.  The crescent of a blue green pearl hangs tantalisingly almost touchable in the bottom quarter of the fourth window, home 250,000 miles away, but can it really be classed as home if only three months of a year is spent there?  Yet it will always be home, home of the species. 

        Another black pad, larger this time but just as stark in the whiteness, stand on it and you descend.  Through the seal, not a door exactly more a mechanical iris so normal that you no longer think about it, that with a sigh shuts off your sanctuary from everything above: the burning sunlight, the sub-zero darkness, the vast void in which you float.  In front of you lights switch on, machines have no need of light. To the right a train of packages, all uniform in size, x rayed, gamma rayed, sniffered and thoroughly inspected should something somehow have slipped into one between the departure point and here, trundle in neat procession into the darkness beyond, lead by a mouse with the single red eye.

Softly, creeping through the filtered air, the aroma caresses you; fresh ground coffee.  The hologram flicks on, ”Welcome home Commander, I trust you had a pleasant leave.  The station is running normally.  All the filters were changed while you were away.  The Leonids are due in the next twenty-four hours, I suggest the outer section is depressurised as a precaution.”

“Yeah, sure.”

You kick one boot off and watch as the spider scurries from its hole to collect it. Wait until it has put it away then kick off the other one.  Robotic service minions do not complain if you leave something on the floor.  Drop your jacket, another minion, barely half your height slides soundlessly across the floor arm lowering from head height to scoop up the offending item.  The jacket is on a hanger by the time the silver cylinder reaches its hidey-hole.  There is no one here to complain if you are not dressed correctly, or even dressed.

“I think I’ll have carnations today, red ones.”

A flicker and there they are vibrant against the surrounding white.  A slight hint of fragrance begins to seep into the air.  The silence presses painfully on the ears. “And something lively, bright. Vivaldi. Not so loud.” 

No one to complain if you sing loudly.  A far cry from down there, the burning neon, the never pausing frantic pace of the choking, teeming cities where escaping sound is impossible.  It takes a day to adjust to the silence, then the silence is full of its own constant melodies.  Black into white you pour yourself a coffee and sit on the couch.  No one complains when you kick the cushion and rest your feet on it.  Your socks are white, trousers white; the couch is white.

“Turn the lights down by a third.”

Close your eyes to soft shades of grey.

“Oh and off.”

“As you wish.”

The watery blue figure vanishes.   

Alone.

At home.

At last.