The night was stuffy and particularly dark. Exactly the opposite of a fresh piece of lettuce in a bright crisper drawer, I thought. I wandered, almost blinded by the blackness, down a cobblestone street. The air was so thick that it felt like I had to force my way through it, so much so that when I finally came to something that wasn’t air I didn’t realize it and just tried to push through.
When I failed and realized that it was a brick wall I threw my head around looking for any signs of anything. I saw one light, so dim that it was just inside visible, just to the left of directly above me. It looked like it was submerged under thirty feet of murky water. I followed the wall to my left until the light was just overhead and found that the wall turned to wood, and the wood had a handle.
I yanked at the handle, and nothing happened. I pushed on the wood, and nothing happened. I knocked on what I assumed to be a door, and waited.
Suddenly, a hole in the door about six inches across and two inches tall slid open. A beam of bright light from inside the wall shot out into the alley and penetrated about four feet of the haze. It was blinding. The light then subsided as something moved in front of the slot in the door. My eyes were confused and I couldn’t focus on anything, but I knew that it was a face, peering out at me.
I realized that I had fallen into a cowering position when the light came, so I righted myself and looked back at the face, waiting for it to speak.
It didn’t. It just studied me for a moment and slammed the slot shut. A few seconds later, I heard the latches on the door dancing around and suddenly it opened just a crack, flooding the alley with light again. As I pushed the door open, I looked around inside to find nothing but a chair in a small room with another door at the far end. That door also had a slot, to which the face had moved and was peering at me again. As I entered, the door closed behind me. I glanced back, only to see outside briefly, where the light from the room exposed what I think was hundreds of people stacked along all the walls of the alley.
The door clicked shut politely, and silence poured violently into the room. There was nothing but the chair, and the eyes staring at me from the next door. They were big, wet eyes. I could hear them blink.
With little else to do, I sat in the chair. It was wooden, with hand upholstered padding on the seat and back; a royal purple fabric, held in place by brass tacks. The arm rests were just a bit too high to be comfortable.
The room around me blinked out like a light bulb reaching its end. When it came back, it was something else. The tiny room had grown into a huge area. The walls had changed from brick and stone to cold metal. There were tubes and vials of some glowing green substance all around me, and some huge tanks against the walls. The chair had also changed; it was now much bigger and metal, with straps holding me to it. I struggled pointlessly a bit.
A dome lowered from the ceiling, covering me and the chair entirely. I was surrounded in solid black. Somehow, I was calm. Maybe things were happening too fast for my panic to keep pace. A din started up and slowly grew to a deafening roar. As that happened, dome flooded with something. I could feel it creeping up my legs and torso, and eventually my legs and face. Afraid to breathe, blind, and deaf, I did what anyone would do. I passed out.
When I came to, I was in what seemed to be a glass tube. I was several stories above the dome on the floor, which appeared to be doing its thing again to someone else. It finished and lifted, spilling gallons of that green stuff into surrounding drains as it broke its seal with the ground. As the dome lifted past the subject in the chair, I was startled to find out that the subject was me. I looked lifeless and cold. I tried to slam the glass with my fist, only to find that I had no fist. I looked at myself in the chair, and discovered that I wasn’t actually seeing me. I knew it was me, but sight was something I lacked. I sensed it. I had been separated from my body, but I still felt a link with it. I felt it sit in that wet chair. I felt a release under the chair, and I felt my body fall into a tube. I felt it follow the tube all the way down to the alley, and I felt it thud on a pile of other bodies.
At that point, I was just me. I forwent panic and instead studied what I had become. Before I got very far, a man approached my glass tube and grabbed it. He walked me over to a larger glass enclosure and inserted me. I could feel the man. He was the eyes that peered upon me earlier. I could also feel that the glass was not glass, but something special. Almost like as this being of pure consciousness that I had become, I could pass through anything except this glass.
I felt eternal. Living outside of time and sense, if that’s still living. All of time was mine, and I was trapped in a box.
I’m not alone in the box. Countless other entities are in here with me. We have a sort of timeless community. Every so often there’s a new addition, and we welcome it. New topics of discussion are always welcome when you have an eternity to fill.
That wet eyed bastard has an armchair set up just outside the glass, and he comes to sit with his whiskey and peer in every once in a while. I imagine this is what it feels like to be an ant in an ant farm.
When I failed and realized that it was a brick wall I threw my head around looking for any signs of anything. I saw one light, so dim that it was just inside visible, just to the left of directly above me. It looked like it was submerged under thirty feet of murky water. I followed the wall to my left until the light was just overhead and found that the wall turned to wood, and the wood had a handle.
I yanked at the handle, and nothing happened. I pushed on the wood, and nothing happened. I knocked on what I assumed to be a door, and waited.
Suddenly, a hole in the door about six inches across and two inches tall slid open. A beam of bright light from inside the wall shot out into the alley and penetrated about four feet of the haze. It was blinding. The light then subsided as something moved in front of the slot in the door. My eyes were confused and I couldn’t focus on anything, but I knew that it was a face, peering out at me.
I realized that I had fallen into a cowering position when the light came, so I righted myself and looked back at the face, waiting for it to speak.
It didn’t. It just studied me for a moment and slammed the slot shut. A few seconds later, I heard the latches on the door dancing around and suddenly it opened just a crack, flooding the alley with light again. As I pushed the door open, I looked around inside to find nothing but a chair in a small room with another door at the far end. That door also had a slot, to which the face had moved and was peering at me again. As I entered, the door closed behind me. I glanced back, only to see outside briefly, where the light from the room exposed what I think was hundreds of people stacked along all the walls of the alley.
The door clicked shut politely, and silence poured violently into the room. There was nothing but the chair, and the eyes staring at me from the next door. They were big, wet eyes. I could hear them blink.
With little else to do, I sat in the chair. It was wooden, with hand upholstered padding on the seat and back; a royal purple fabric, held in place by brass tacks. The arm rests were just a bit too high to be comfortable.
The room around me blinked out like a light bulb reaching its end. When it came back, it was something else. The tiny room had grown into a huge area. The walls had changed from brick and stone to cold metal. There were tubes and vials of some glowing green substance all around me, and some huge tanks against the walls. The chair had also changed; it was now much bigger and metal, with straps holding me to it. I struggled pointlessly a bit.
A dome lowered from the ceiling, covering me and the chair entirely. I was surrounded in solid black. Somehow, I was calm. Maybe things were happening too fast for my panic to keep pace. A din started up and slowly grew to a deafening roar. As that happened, dome flooded with something. I could feel it creeping up my legs and torso, and eventually my legs and face. Afraid to breathe, blind, and deaf, I did what anyone would do. I passed out.
When I came to, I was in what seemed to be a glass tube. I was several stories above the dome on the floor, which appeared to be doing its thing again to someone else. It finished and lifted, spilling gallons of that green stuff into surrounding drains as it broke its seal with the ground. As the dome lifted past the subject in the chair, I was startled to find out that the subject was me. I looked lifeless and cold. I tried to slam the glass with my fist, only to find that I had no fist. I looked at myself in the chair, and discovered that I wasn’t actually seeing me. I knew it was me, but sight was something I lacked. I sensed it. I had been separated from my body, but I still felt a link with it. I felt it sit in that wet chair. I felt a release under the chair, and I felt my body fall into a tube. I felt it follow the tube all the way down to the alley, and I felt it thud on a pile of other bodies.
At that point, I was just me. I forwent panic and instead studied what I had become. Before I got very far, a man approached my glass tube and grabbed it. He walked me over to a larger glass enclosure and inserted me. I could feel the man. He was the eyes that peered upon me earlier. I could also feel that the glass was not glass, but something special. Almost like as this being of pure consciousness that I had become, I could pass through anything except this glass.
I felt eternal. Living outside of time and sense, if that’s still living. All of time was mine, and I was trapped in a box.
I’m not alone in the box. Countless other entities are in here with me. We have a sort of timeless community. Every so often there’s a new addition, and we welcome it. New topics of discussion are always welcome when you have an eternity to fill.
That wet eyed bastard has an armchair set up just outside the glass, and he comes to sit with his whiskey and peer in every once in a while. I imagine this is what it feels like to be an ant in an ant farm.
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