Many lives - IV

Colours decided there was a conspiracy. There must be. All the shades were turning into grey. It was quite inexplicable really! Maybe it was something Black and White were planning together...

Those two! Colours had just about had enough with them! Always waiting in the shadows and outside. Stealing the shades away. Washing them into one or darkening them into the other.

Colours felt as though pushed into a corner. Something had to be done. But what?! If only... Black had deceiving depths and hollows, dark veins of mystery and hints of terror. And White! White had a different but just as deadly deceptiveness. And that ability to blind and misdirect. And what did Colours have? Just hope and happiness. And sometimes wildly frustrated anger. What use were those in these matters of light-bound intrigue?

In a moment of desperate inspiration Colours resolved to do something rash! An effort to end all efforts. One last burst to launch a great assault against the hearts of Black and White. One last gasp attempt to splash joy into all the shades of the universe.

The trouble with last resorts is that one usually cannot count on being around to find out how it all worked out. Which is a pity. Colours would really have liked to find out how this one turned out in the end.

Many lives - III

On the darkest days of winter, the stars seem the brightest. The cold air makes the eyes smart and eyesight somehow sharper, once you've wiped the tears away. Jahangir knew this. He told his grandson to watch his step as they made their way across the vast blackness that was the frozen river.

In a different lifetime his father had be called Great and his son had watched his last days drain away like the waters of the river that separated him from the tomb of his beloved. Or so they said. But here and now the sky was mightier, the people beneath it, less ignorant of their station.

The distant fires in the sky slowly turned in their cold sleep. Some even more distant ones woke up in an instant of supernova brightness to begin their journey into the farthest reaches of the universe. A universe where things weren't meant to come together, to stay, they were meant to go forth and discover.

The large cat, nigh invisible with its velvet coat the colour of midnight, bared its sabre teeth and waited for the conqueror of the world to step into a trap of ice and claws.

Many lives - II

There was fire on the horizon. Not a blaze, embers. It seemed as if the edges of the night had caught fire. Maybe they had, the heat was beginning to singe the old woman as she looked on. She couldn't remember ever having seen anything prettier in her whole life!

It had been months since they had been out in the open. Not out of choice, you understand. But now the wait was finally over. As the rest of the world let the strangeness of the light entrap their attention, the two children crept from shadow to shadow, and finally melted away into the darkness. To freedom.

They'd said this might happen. But he had paid no attention. People were always predicting the end of the world, they hardly ever believed their own predictions, so why should he? There were more important things to worry about. Like the next poker night. Maybe he'd win back some of the money he'd lost last week.

Gant signalled to Kaspar 209. The planet's surface was reaching critical temperature. Soon most of the indigenous life forms would have their organic components disintegrate. It was showtime. He always loved this part.

Many lives - I

Beats drumming through his body like it was stretched taut, vibrating to every pulse.

He felt his eyes see and heard the sounds his ears funnelled to his brain from time to time. But his senses were often more misleading than not. Confusing, blurred and baffled, he mistrusted them, choosing to trust in everything most of us consider unfaithful.

The boy believed in the figments of his imagination. They had no basis in reality, and thus, never tried to mislead him. No false pretences of representing truth.

He had such imagination too! Beings and worlds, vast and varied, with stories unfolding within them, sometimes surrounding them. Ah! Such colours played through that universe, melodies of such heart wrenching tenderness.

Delirious in the throes of a fever, he lay on the corner of First and Amistad. One world, unseen and unseeing, passed by. Another, also unseen, continued its fantastic journey, unknowingly hurtling towards a spectacular end as the life that sustained it slowly ran out of sustenance.

After the storm. . .

I should quit complaining about things piling up. It's about to get a whole lot worse :). Barely a week at home is hardly a lot. Add to that nagging illnesses and a massive amount of driving in Kolkata traffic. Hardly makes for the most relaxed of times /:). So now I'm left with a day and a half of relative peace and quiet before I'm off again. As if to emphasise the fact, there's a state-wide bandh tomorrow :D.Short as it was, the memories I carry of this trip back are heavily loaded with joy from my few days in campus :). It's probably not a good sign that I'm beginning to reminisce about my measly couple of weeks off the way I used to think about my time on the ship about a year back, as a break from the regular scheme of things. I think I actually told someone the other day that I was looking forward to getting back to the ship, and some peace and quiet =)). In my defence, I had a bad cold and a headache at the time :P.
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...the dust is beginning to settle finally. He looks on, one eyelid tipped half open. The last passing gusts make the faint brown clouds swirl. A pretty girl pirouetting in a sandy frock... He twitches his nose as a fly buzzes too close. He's getting old. Why does everyone think they have to keep the whole world's secrets locked down in their little minds, he wonders. Not like they can. Everything slips out eventually, like grains of sand from a tight fist.

Feeling: tired, mostly...
Listening to: Suzanne Vega - Bad wisdom