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pappydada · 6 years

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Whispers to Alice

Whispers to Alice (a work in progress) by Joshua Kaplan

Beginning

Keb's Journal, Sept 7, 2022 3:13AM

"It...(i say 'It' rather than 'they' because i don't have the knowledge of where One may end and the Next begin, if beginning and end are even applicable to It/Them)... so It, is like us in that It exists, and moves and reacts, irritable and motivated. At these very basic points, these requisites that we've assigned to Life, do the similarities between us and It become hazy. Does It reproduce? Does It feed and shed waste? and if not, how is it compelled to continue existing? We don't know, hence the confusion regarding beginning and end.

Beginning and ending are temporal concepts, and this entity's relationship with and to Time/Space is as yet undefined. Both reproduction and sustenance might well be unnecessary. Nature abhors a vacuum, and is also dutifully non-supportive of the unnecessary, so perhaps what constitutes beginning and ending to this/these Being(s) is as different as pudding is to electricity.

Piper suggested that It's beginnings might be traced to the heart of a super massive star, like Andromeda, whose pressure at it's core is so great that electrons become liquid and protons shed their charge, but..."

Research Operations Center, Hoboken New Jersey Sept 6, 2022 7:45AM

"...Who knows what other shit is going on inside one of those massive stellar kilns." Dr. Piper Souza, the team's Chemist said. "I'd look there for Its origin and for more of Them, if there are more."

"Maybe It exists independent of time, like Wheeler's theory that the universe consists of only a single electron that cycles forward and backward through time..." Dr. Henry Kenkeith, Applied Physics, offered, trying to wrap his mind around the concept of a non-material life form. "..Like weaving a blanket through the boson field."

"I thought that was Feynman's Positron work." quipped Dr. Olsana Marisen, Biologist and Director of Applied Sciences, who was listening intently, contrary to the apparent and compelling distraction of her favorite pseudo-scientific periodical, the Farmer's Almanac. "I read that paper when i was 17. I remember because it was right before i got my scholarship to Penn."

"A glorious day, that." Piper added wistfully, resting her chin on her cupped hands. "I remember mine like a lost young love, though not Penn, Columbia."

"You guys are gonna make me cry, gettin' all mushy and sentimental like this." Bond Timmick, Director of IT and team Engineer/Geek emoted greatly, wiping theatrical tears from his tragically masked face.

The room, once thick with the weight of conjecture, lightened with the music of laughter.

"John Wheeler presented the 'single electron' idea to Feynman in a phone call in 1940; or so the story goes." Keb Snydaar, team Mathematician and Theoretical Physicist said distractedly, staring at the torn and tormented collection of text, diagrams, and doodles in front of him.

Henry Kenkeith grinned widely at Olsana, who replied by promptly sticking out her tongue at him.

"Wheeler, Feynman, Hanna, Barbera...who gives a shit." Keb said impatiently. He was working on three hours of sleep and the amphetamines certainly didn't help his mood. "What we need to know is the 'How?'. How does this...entity...exist at all? Is it really intelligent or does it become sentient using it's host's intelligence? Is it one entity or a collection of individual beings joined by a community mind? Or maybe how we measure intelligence and sentience is inapplicable with It. How does it move where it wants to go? Does it even know where it wants to go?..."

"Easy there Man o'War. Better take a breath now and again or you might pass out." Bond wisecracked, creating more laughter. "What I want to know is how did we get involved with this craziness to begin with?"

"It all started with a woman named Alice."

Keb's apartment, Hillside New Jersey Aug 24, 2022 9:42PM

"I met a girl." Keb said to the man seated opposite him at the breakfast table, staring absently at the illustration on his half empty coffee cup.

"That's great, Keb! Coincidentally, my ass cheeks just grew wings. Now I can fly around and dispense skittles to the world...HAHA!"

Silence.

"Wait...Really?" Umber M. James was startled but continued chuckling. "I thought you were joking."

"Am I really that backward?" Keb said sullenly back, not knowing how to explain what was troubling him without bearing the full brunt of Umber's ruthless and predatory ribbing.

"Nah, I'm just busting your balls. She cute?"

"She's...beautiful." He replied, hesitating momentarily from the involuntary clamping of his abdomen as he pictured her.

"Wow." Umber sensed in his old friend a tension that seemed out of place, even for Keb, who was one of the most internally tightly wrapped people he had ever known. "You're not telling me something, Keb."

"She talks to trees, among other things." Keb said with resignation, still looking at the picture on his mug of the grizzled cowboy lamenting the waste of his money on everything except women and beer.

He didn't drink alcohol, and hadn't so much as held a woman's hand in the 5 years since he learned of his ex-lover's need for romantic diversification. It was his father's mug.

Umber stared vacantly back, as much from surprise as for comedic affect.

"Okay, so she's a bit off." Umber said after a moment. "...As long as the trees don't talk back, I guess."

Keb stared at his friend expectantly.

"Wait...They don't talk back, do they?" Umber's eye's widened in surprise.

"Yes, actually they do."

"Seriously? Is she mentally ill you think?" Umber asked with sincere concern. "'Cause that's a rough ride. Be advised; If you're considering some kind of emotional investment you should take a little time and see how deep that rabbit hole goes."

"First of all, i didn't say a thing about any relationship, or emotional investment, and I'm not saying that she talks to trees and they talk back in her head." Keb said sharply. "I'm saying she talks to trees...and they talk back. I've witnessed it myself."

Silence.

"When was the last time you got more than 2 hours of uninterrupted sleep?" Umber said, finally, only half joking. "Seriously Keb, how many days? Two? Three?"

"I'm not psychotic, 'Berz, nor is she." Keb said flatly, using the nickname he had given his old chum long ago. "Though I may be a bit addled at all the implications of what she showed me."

"Answer the question then." Umber prodded. "How long since you've slept? at all, even."

"Been about 40 hours i guess. plus minus." Keb relented, becoming irritated at the innuendo that his claims were due to insomnia induced hallucination. Keb was no stranger to hallucination, through chemistry and deprivation both, and this was no such thing.

"See?" Umber said, smugly satisfied at his impromptu diagnosis. "Go smoke a bone, get some shut-eye, and look at the whole thing tomorrow with a fresh set of brain cells."

"You've reached a conclusion with no data," Keb pointed out, then added unnecessarily, "Spoken like a true student of politics."

Umber James was by far the staunchest and most thoroughly immersed pundits of government and political chaos that Keb knew, or had ever known. He was Editor-in-chief of a semi-respected liberal periodical called, "The Drop" and ceremoniously attended every meeting that required minutes to be taken and an American flag to be present; at every level of City, State and Federal Government that he could logistically justify. Keb had for years urged him to "put his ass in a seat that mattered, rather than just pushing moist air with forceful rhetoric," but Umber always laughed it off, stating proudly that, "Not only DID I inhale, but will continue to do so for as long as I see fit, so fuck you and your vote if you don't like it." They discussed the consideration of having t-shirts made.

"Okay, Keb. I'll play devil's advocate." Umber relented. "I can understand the whole 'talkin to trees' thing. Lots of hippy, barefoot, patchouli oil people talk to things; trees, crystals, stale popcorn...but rarely do you meet someone that hears them talk back. What makes you think that this girl is really hearing anything?"

Keb stared Umber in the eye and stifled an impulse to berate his friend of many years for dismissing Alice so easily. Turning his attention back to his coffee mug, Keb then began his internally prepared monologue on what he mentally referenced as 'the walk in the woods.' Contrary to normal routine, Keb had not yet documented this interaction with Alice. Each time he began, something in his mind 'switched on.' What he attempted to review as a slide show of memory became a cascade of living moments; Alice's eyes flashing brilliance and insight, the way she flowed through the green, as if the flora knew she was there and moved to touch her and allow her passage, both. It was as if Keb was an alien entity in the woods, and Alice was the wood herself.

Keb knew with complete certainty that what he had experienced was devoid of trickery or manipulation, and was compelled by the thought that Einstein, Faraday, Maxwell, and Newton must never themselves have been witness to such sorcery, else our collective understanding of the mechanics of the physical world might be far different than what we have come to accept today.

"We were walking in the woods..." Keb began, seeing the images in his mind as he was related them, again seeing the sunlight beam through the natural canopy of oak onto her golden hair, tied back in a wide braid, and capturing her profile in the stark contrasts of sun and shadow, and for a moment he was again in those woods, and again held breathless by her shy radiance.

"Yeah?...And?... You still with me there stud?" Umber said, noticing his friend drift momentarily.

"...Hmm? Oh, sorry..." Keb said, and continued. "Alice had been explaining how she was able to communicate with the Earth, that she could hear voices in the breeze as it touches the leaves..."

"Okay, wait," Umber interrupted. "start from the beginning. i want to hear the whole thing. Were you holding hands? Did you guys just have sex in the bushes?"

Umber was fond of stories, and fancied himself a potent weaver of lore, so it was no surprise to Keb that he wanted the whole story, nor was he taken aback at the provocative embellishment.

"We weren't on a date, so no, we weren't holding hands nor had we been physically intimate in any fashion." Keb said, fully aware that Umber was lightly prodding him just for fun, but wanted to respond anyway. "We were on our way to perform a simple experiment, or i should say, i was. she didn't require any evidence to satisfy what she already knew."

"But she played along?" Umber lilted. "she's a sport. probably great in the...tree house? HAHA! sorry. go on."

"She had her own reasons for accompanying me and submitting herself to the study."

"...And they were?"

"She said she wasn't ready to tell me yet." Keb said, deflated at the recollection, feeling some level of failure at not having a simple answer to an important question. "but she said she would later."

"Oh yeah!" Umber shouted. "If that's not a troll for a second date i don't know what is!"

***

Alice; The Dream

She loved the dream.

It wasn't the same each time, but everything about it was in almost every way.

In the beginning of the dream, she is always in a meadow, kneeling. sometimes over a dandelion, usually; sometimes a cluster of clover, and sometimes even, a little frog that looked like it was made of water.

The first of the dreams was the best, when she met her Aua, Ga. She was 4 years old, and remembers it as if happened yesterday.

she hears a giggle, far away...too far really to be heard, a detail she'll remember when she gets older, but now, it is just different.

She looks up, toward the laughter, and it is so bright that she has to shield her eyes with her flattened hand. In the distance, over a rolling hill of a thousand different shades of green and brown she thinks she sees another child in motion. It looks like it's running in circles around a tree, but the figure is blurry, though the tree is clear. As her eyes begin to adjust to the brilliant sunlight, the image becomes clearer. It IS a child, naked, with long orange hair past it's buttocks, and it is dancing and skipping, spinning and laughing, so happy and free.

for a moment she is envious of the dancing child, then realizes that she can run and dance too...so she does. she runs and runs, feeling the wind and her own motion toss her hair and it makes her neck tingle. she watches her bare feet grasp the moist green with each stride, and she tries to quicken her pace...faster, she has to go even faster...like a bird flying, skimming over the ocean, over the trees.

then, suddenly she is airborne, her legs lifting beneath her as her body slowly arches forward in a graceful dive...she sees bright blue flashing past her, and green and billowing sunlight...and then the flash of white as her face impacts the ground, churning up bits of dirt and wet grass with her chin.

"Ohhhh...."

Alice isn't sure what happened. she was running so fast that she started to fly, like a bird, then fell, but she isn't sure if it hurt. It should hurt. "...And what was that sound?" she thinks. "Did i make that sound?"

"Ohhhhaaaahhhh...."

She hears it again. this time she's pretty sure that it didn't come out of her.

she blinks once into the sweet smelling grass and dirt, and turns over.

"Owwww...?"

Kneeling over her, looking down into her face is another little girl, maybe even the same age as Alice, with blazing red hair so long that it was draping across Alice's face, neck and shoulders, and she looked like she was about to cry.

"No ow." Alice said to her, momentarily distracted by this little girl's own distress and immediately understanding her question. Had the little girl even moved her mouth, though? Alice was confused.

The little girl with the long hair brushed her mantle of rust and pumpkin out of Alice's face and abruptly thrust her own face to where their noses were almost touching, and gazed deeply into Alice's gray-green eyes with eye's like a sea of molten gold, her brow furrowed.

In those eyes Alice saw...everything.

The little girl's frown suddenly became a beaming smile. Alice couldn't even see her mouth since she was so close, but her eyes told the whole story. This was her sister, Alice knew now. Her very own best friend to play with and run and dance and giggle and be free. and all she had to do was dream.

Alice wants to be that happy in real life, and to dance and skip and laugh, but it is hard to be happy. That's why the dream is so good, because Alice is really happy there, always. She is never hungry, and her beautiful friend is always there to hug her and put flowers in her hair and show her new things in the meadow. She is never alone there, and she never wants to be. She always wants to be alone in real life, because people hurt her. They don't always mean to, but it is the same hurt either way. In the meadow of her dream, Alice is safe.

Alice stares at her sister, not really thinking anything but taking all of her in; Her bright red hair and milk pale skin, her golden eyes that swirled and glowed and reflected everything good and nice in the world, her joyous smile and the way she folded her feet under her as she kneeled. Alice hadn't noticed it before, but she thought she could see tiny little sparkles of silver flashing all around the little girl's body, and when she smiled there were lots more sparkles.

Alice knew this little girl was special, and more, that she loved Alice. she knew this just from looking into those glorious, gleaming eyes. There were no words to convey this, nor were any necessary. it was communicated like a song of emotion playing through her soul in waves. and Alice knew that she loved her back, just as much.

The two girls sat looking at each other for only a moment, until Alice was swept up by a gust of wind with flaming red hair, both of her hands held in the other's, and together ran just as fast as they could. past the mighty and potent tree that the pale, golden girl had been in orbit around, and over the little swaying hill through a patch of purple and blue flowers, and to a little brook, where they both squatted side by side and watched tadpoles skitter to and fro just beneath the surface.

"What's your name?" Alice asked, as she turned her attention from the play of life in the creek to the golden eyed girl.

The other turned to Alice and looked confused.

"My name's Alice, after my grammy. She makes really good toast."

The little girl tilted her head to the side, and slowly seemed to realize what Alice wanted to know.

"Aaaaoooowwwwaaaaaa..." She said, and gestured with her arms, sweeping outward and looking from side to side.

Alice heard her clearly, and even though the little girl was only inches from her, her voice sounded distant...funny...and Alice was, for the second time, unsure if she saw her mouth move when she spoke.

"Your name is Awwa? That's a pretty name."

The little girl frowned slightly and shook her head from side to side, and said again, with the same sweeping arm movement, "Aaaaooowwwaaaaa..."

Then she put her hands to her chest and said, "Ga." and she beamed at Alice and grabbed a handful of water and splashed it on Alice's hands, then stood up and ran back toward the big tree, giggling and looking playfully over her shoulder at Alice as she ran. Alice immediately stood up and ran to catch her mischievous friend.

With each subsequent dream Alice had of the little girl in the meadow, her friend and sister changed slightly. her voice became less drawn out, clearer and easier to understand, and her mouth slowly began to sync with her speech. Alice had been correct to note that the little girl's mouth did not move as she spoke in the beginning; she would open it as if attempting to emulate how Alice looked when she talked, but it was easy to see that the sounds Alice was hearing were not being created by the little girl's mouth.

Alice came to realize that the little girl spoke with her heart, not her mouth, if such a thing were possible. She also now knew that the little girl's name was Ga, and that Aua was whatever Ga was, but in everything in the meadow, even the light.

As Alice grew older, so too did her dream friend, and the dreams became less and less frequent. This troubled Alice greatly at first, but it quickly became apparent that Ga was with her even when she was awake, and the older they both got, the better the communication between them became when Alice wasn't asleep and dreaming.

Ga had told her once to never tell anyone about them, about their friendship and sisterhood. She said people wouldn't understand, but that someday Alice would meet people that would make everyone understand.

"How will i know, Ga?" She asked as they both lay together in the meadow and together manipulated low flying cumulous clouds.

"The little frog will lead you, my love." Ga said. "Together we'll be, so no worries. i like your horse cloud..."

***

Keb's Journal Aug 21, 2022 12:02AM

I am a scientist. a professional nerd. this is part of my problem, this conundrum. What i witnessed today was nothing short of fantastic and i have no basis to substantiate or explain it. Add to that this absurd, internal sounding of my emotions...It is among the most substantial impulses i have ever felt, this motivation to help Alice. I have tried to convince myself that my passion and interest is founded only in professional purpose and a need to know, but I'd be a fool or a liar to deny that it is on a far more personal level than what any psychological profile or equation can rationalize.

This amazing woman, so unique and sensitive to the world around her, has perhaps opened a door between accepted universal mechanics and something else...I don't know what to call it...Psychic phenomena? Magic? How else should i reference it? Without a grounded theory and some semblance of a mathematical argument it certainly looks like sorcery, but then again, so would an internal combustion engine look to a primitive. Really, i think a coffee maker, or even a glow stick would accomplish same, probably, though with far less noise.

---

Keb's apartment, Hillside New Jersey Aug 24, 2022 9:57PM

Keb had great admiration and respect for his old friend Umber, who everyone close called 'Berz. He was smart, funny and could be trusted with most anything, with the simple exception of your girlfriend. Berz was among the most proficient practitioners in the art of wooing that Keb knew, and had always attributed his success with the women folk to confidence. "it's all in the self-image, my friend." he'd say. "if you like you, they'll like you, too."

Keb argued that it was easy for his friend to be confident when local legend spoke in hushed tones of the storied endowment of one Umber M. James, nicknamed by his many followers; The Gourd. Keb had no such farmer's market appeal, and other than some level of envy, and minor annoyance at his flirting with his dates when they were younger, he had never been bothered by Umber's predilection toward carnal behavior or his conquests. however, Keb maintained that it was difficult to nurture a serious conversation when every utterance was fodder for his factory of innuendo and blue commentary.

"There was never a first date, so i doubt in totality that she was leading me with her conversation." Keb explained unnecessarily. "Can i just tell this story without your input?"

"HAHA!" Umber laughed. "Sure. still, i can hear it in your voice. You like her. What's her name, by the way?"

"Alice. her name's Alice." Keb said hesitantly, his mind filling with imminent Lewis Carroll parallels.

"That's kind of a coincidence. i just mentioned the rabbit hole thing." Umber said, as expected, but he wasn't laughing.

"True enough."

"Is she blond? Blue dress? and how old is she? if you tell me she's 15 I'm gonna have to kick your ass."

"she is. Blond, i mean...Unless you're crudely referring to her intellectual capacity, in which case, no, she is decidedly un-blond. Ah, i get it. Another 'Through the Looking Glass' comment. " Keb continued. "and no, she's not 15. she's in her mid 20s, i believe."

"Okay, so here's Alice, all beautiful and smart and blond and crazy, spending her time talking fragrant oils and decorating to the local flora and fauna," Umber quipped. "...and here's you, lab rat and scribbler of Newtonian hieroglyphics who never leaves his house except to go to the lab. How did you two hook up? First guess is it's lab related."

So Keb told his story of meeting Alice, from the beginning. He remembered it so vividly, it seems like it must have happened a thousand times.

"I was at the lab eating my lunch and reading an old copy of Analog that Kenkeith gave me, a reprinted Simak story," Keb orated, as if reading a script. '...and i remember being excited about it. Simak wove tales of future intrigue before quantum theory and atomic application, and he influenced some of the greatest science fiction contributors in the world; Asimov, Heinlein, Campbell, really everybody. i love the old pulp writers and their stories..."

"Keb, is that actually pertinent?" Umber interrupted. "I don't really care about your comic collection. I wanna hear about the girl."

"Not comic, pulp." Keb corrected, and continued. "I was actually somewhat annoyed when i heard the knock on the lunchroom door. no one else was there so i would have to either stop reading, get up, answer the door, and politely tell this intruder that the person or persons they hoped to locate were nowhere on these premises; or be a prick and ignore them. i opted to be less prick and more annoyed, so I got up and answered the door.

"when i opened the door, i saw this young woman, dressed all in black, with her hand thrust out, and I just stared at her. i felt like i was in stasis."

"In stasis? Why?" Umber asked, incredulous. "Holy crap, she's a woman, not a werewolf. I will never understand your fear of women."

"Why? I don't really know." Keb lied. "She just said 'hi' and i froze."

Keb continued with his story, careful not to give away too much in the telling. He indicated that Alice was clearly anxious, and even so kept smiling and never once betrayed her desire to flee.

Research Operations Center Hoboken New Jersey Aug 12, 2022 11:23AM

"I'm Alice. Alice Leganno. I have an interview here at 11:30 with Dr. Marisen?"

Keb had stared at her standard offering of formal greeting, and in the distant fog of his awareness heard an echo of reality which told him to shake her hand, and as he slowly did, careful not to squeeze too hard, he heard it.

the voice. an auditory hallucination. a symptom of schizophrenia.

it wasn't so much a sound as it was an awareness, Keb told himself, not wanting to accept the possibility of mental illness. He compared it to knowing from the breeze and smell of the air that it's going to rain.

"Dr...Mari..." Keb fumbled, the message in his mind ringing, and tried to get a grip on the here and now. "Okay, you're here to see Olsa. I'll show you to her office."

Keb guided Alice with whatever level of faux detachment he could muster, including a smile to replace what she must have compared with Novocain mouth, and arrived at Dr. Marisen's office, tapping lightly before cracking the door and peeking in.

"Your 11:30 is here, Olsa." He said, mind whirling.

"Perfect!" Olsana shouted enthusiastically, her arms in the air. "Don't just stand there gawking, show her in, goofy!"

Dr. Olsana Marisen was nothing if not passionate. Everything she did she did with flair and high energy. She laughed loud, loved hard, and lived life thoroughly. she was one of Keb's favorite people and he considered himself lucky to be able to work with her. But even her volume and force could not push from his mind what he had heard and felt just moments before, though it felt like he had been feeling it forever.

"you can go in, Alice." Keb said, looking into her gray, green, and golden eyes that moved like wood smoke. "don't let her knock you over with her bluster."

"Thank you, Keb." She smiled and made her way into Marisen's office, and closed the door behind her.

As he walked back to the lunchroom, Keb had completely forgotten about the fantasy pulp, the brine and soy lunch, and pretty much everything else. all he could wrap his mind around were those words that he had heard, or felt, or hallucinated so strongly as he had taken Alice's hand in greeting...

"She is here for me."

It was only after he sat down at his desk and leafed through several pages of his journal did he realize that he had never told her his name.

Keb's Apartment Hillside New Jersey Aug 24, 2022 10:23PM

"Okay, so you hear this voice say 'she is here for me'..." Umber said, wide eyed. "And you think... what? that she's your soul mate or some such? Dude, that is some corny shit."

"I don't know what to think, frankly." Keb said sullenly. "Hearing voices is a symptom of schizophrenia. That seems more likely, maybe from sleep deprivation."

"Or maybe you're just fucking nuts." Umber stated flatly. "Doesn't make you a bad person."

"Well, we've both known for a long time that I'm nuts, but that's REALLY nuts." Keb said. "There is the unrelated detail of her knowing my name. That's been puzzling me."

"Fact that this Alice chick knew your name can be explained any of a dozen ways; name tag, placard on desk, simple previous inquiry..."

"I figured as much, " Keb interrupted. "So i asked her about it later, after Olsa introduced us formally."

"What'd she say? That she's been stalking you for your man parts?"

"Yup. And that i should poison your next meal with a live culture of dysentery."

Umber laughed, though Keb was only half joking.

"So what happens next? Olsa invites you in for a quick menage and friendly hand of canasta or what?" Umber joked.

"I just went back to the lab and sat there with my head in my hands." Keb said, not remembering those next moments or days very clearly. "minutes, hours, days later...I don't know, I wasn't thinking clearly, I heard Olsa's door open and them exchange niceties as Alice left, but I didn't see her again for several days. I went in to talk to Olsa to see how the job interview went, or that's what I thought at the time..."

***

Alice; (cont.)

The meadow was as ever, warm deep green and moist brown, with flashes of reds and purples, streaks of yellows and orange dotting the expanse. Today though was overcast, not the distant wash of blue that normally greeted Alice. Today, the sky was layers of wandering cool grays, with drapes of sunlight peeling through, illuminating clusters of mist and rain which embraced the dream place within the little girl's sleeping mind.

Together on the little hill swell by the big tree, little Alice, now 8, had questions for the old woman with the flowing silver hair lying next to her, both their face's glowing moisture as they looked to the sky.

"Ga?" Alice said quietly, breaking a long silence.

"Yes, my love?"

"Are you God?"

"I don't know. What is God?" The old woman asked sincerely after a moment, turning her head toward her friend/sister/daughter.

"You don't know what God is?" Alice said incredulously. "That's crazy! God is the guy that made the universe n animals n stuff."

"Hmm...well then, first, I'm not a guy, and second, i help the universe n animals n stuff but i didn't make the universe n animals n stuff, so i don't think I'm the God."

"But you talk to everything and can make stuff happen and even bugs listen to you, an you change from a little girl to a old lady, like now...and your name even sounds like God...Ga---Aaadd...see?"

Ga appeared to Alice sometimes as the bouncing ball of energy with flaming red hair past her buttocks, and other times as the old woman, whose sparkling silver hair seemed to reach throughout the entire meadow, weaving and wending itself into the ground like roots made of water. Now, because little Alice needed her friend-mother, not her friend-sister, this was how Ga appeared. Alice was not aware yet that it was all her own need that called on Ga in her different forms, at least that was the now. As Alice grew and learned, Ga would begin to move to other needs through Alice, those of the world...this was as much due to Alice's own desire to heal a sick world as it was Ga's task to care for that which she called her other home; Earth.

"Ga is short for Gaia, my love, not Gaaaaaddd." Ga made a funny face as she imitated her friend-daughter, which made Alice giggle.

"Gaia? Really? That's so pretty! Why didn't you tell me before? Meany." Alice mock frowned and crossed her arms dramatically.

"You gave me that name yourself little flower, when you were a someone else. I thought you already knew."

"When i was a someone else?" Alice questioned intently, as she sat up and leaned on her elbow. "I don't get it."

"You have been a someone else many many times, my love." Ga explained. "When your body can't hold you anymore you dance with me into another. It is the saddest most beautiful dance."

To Ga, everything was a dance; Life, experience, motion...everything. Aua were comprised of light and moved by using the photo-force to attach to passing photons, so they were in a state of constant motion, redirection and speed that no human mind might comprehend. It was truly the grandest of dances.

The dance of a complex soul reincarnating to another was not only joined by the Auan symbiote, it was engineered by it.

"Wow. why is it sad though?" Alice asked, imagining herself, her real self, flying through the air holding Ga's hand as they swirled and laughed into another body, like hurtling down a water-slide into a pristine pool of transparent blue.

"...Because I have to say goodbye to a you..." Ga said, almost inaudibly, as she closed her eyes to allow the salty pools to drain down her cheeks with the misty rain.

Though little Alice was 8 years old in Earth years, to Gaia, her human host had just been reborn, and she remembered every detail of her previous incarnation and the love she had lost when she died. It had been a glorious dance.

"Are you crying, Ga?" Alice had never seen her friend-sister-mother ever cry before. She had never even seen her sad. "Now I'm sad, too. you don't have to cry, Ga, I'm right here."

Alice wrapped her arms around Ga's midsection and rested her head on her chest.

"I see you, My Love." Ga put her hand to Alice's droplet pocked golden hair and ran a finger through it. "I cry joy and sadness. my joy is a new you and a new dance, my sadness is the goodbye and our old dance. So you see, it's both. all things in the dance are both sadness and joy."

"All things?" Alice asked, propping her head up with her chin on Ga's midsection and looking into her gleaming, golden eyes.

"All."

"I love to dance." Alice rested her head back on it's side and closed her eyes.

"I know you do, my love, and yours is my greatest joy."

***

Keb knew Olsana as well as anyone he had ever worked with. They were not the closest friends, but neither were they distant associates. They had met years before as students at a physics seminar and had impressed each other with their common politics, intellect, and humor, but their strongest bond was that they both wanted to save the world. Keb through physics and mathematics, and Olsana as a healer, ultimately. She was a medical doctor and a tenured biology professor, as well as being a published author, and occasionally even a guest on some major market morning talk shows which required intelligent remittance of the science of healing. Her daily toils now included pursuing her passions as the division head of the Hoboken facility of Research Operations Center, or ROC.

It was Olsana who was responsible for Keb's employment at ROC. There had been an opening in the lab for a number cruncher, and though Keb wasn't the big boss' first choice, Olsana had convinced him by showing the CEO, Edge Silver, a paper Keb wrote called 'Applied Temporal Mechanics and the Resolution of Irrational Numbers.' The work itself hadn't been given much credit in general academic circles but there was something to it that was different, Olsana thought, something magic. She felt strongly enough about it that she was willing to put her reputation on the line. Additionally, she felt sorry for Keb.

Research Operations Center Newark, New Jersey April 3, 2004 3:26PM

"I know he's an oddball, Edgar..." Olsana urged

"Edge, please. My mother calls me Edgar." Her boss reminded her, looking at his notes on Keb Snydaar. "and Oddball is a nice way of saying he's mentally ill. He has been remitted to institutions twice. I'm assuming you are aware of this."

Olsana got up from her seat and stood over Dr. Silver's sterile brushed steel platform he used as a desk and leaned toward him, so as to add impact to her next carefully chosen words.

"He's a fucking genius."

Once Edgar George Silverman, now Edge Silver, Chief Executive/Operations Officer of Research Operations Center, liked smart people very much. To he, all people were tools, and the best tools were usually worth the extra cost.

"Okay, Dr. Marisen, i will have Ms. Silverman call him in for an interview..."

"You mean your daughter?" Olsana relaxed her posture at the agreeable resolution.

"Yes, my daughter, my secretary, now please go away before you decide to chastise me for nepotism."

Dr. Silver pressed a button on his intercom.

"Ms. Silverman?"

"Yes Daddy?"

Dr. Silver sighed and closed his eyes in slight exasperation.

"Ms. Silverman, please call Dr. Snydaar in for an interview. Dr. Marisen will give you the number as she's leaving. Now." Edge Silver glared at Olsana Marisen as his subordinate prepared herself to leave. She was smiling.

Research Operations Center Hoboken, New Jersey Aug 12, 2022 12:47PM

The walk back to Dr. Marisen's office wasn't a long one, but today it seemed like a journey. Keb waited 15 minutes after hearing Alice leave before getting up from his chair to make way to question his friend and colleague about the meeting between the two. He didn't want to appear anxious, and also didn't know what would he say to Olsana to mask his true motivation. "Should I admit to having auditory hallucinations?" He thought. "Maybe that some spiritual messenger is speaking to me about this young girl? she'll tell me to go home and sleep for 3 days and not come back until i wasn't seeing floating mandalas in my peripheral vision." Olsana and Keb had discussed his pattern of deprivation on more than a few occasions, She having a similar difficulty in her own personal life; that being insomnia.

The light tapping on Olsana Marisen's door echoed in Keb's head, and for a moment he forgot that it was he that was knocking.

"Come in, damn it!" The long time occupant of the largest office in the facility screamed through the closed, smoked glass door, loud enough to make everyone in the outer areas and adjoining small lab freeze.

"Is the volume really necessary, Olsa?" Keb said, slightly annoyed, placing his index finger in his ear as he opened her door.

"I yelled three times for you to come in, deaf goofball." Olsana said loudly, with some level of exasperation. "Each time louder than the last, while you stood there like a zombie. I swear, i think you're drooling."

Keb stared at Olsana distantly.

"What is wrong with you today, Keb? You really seem out of it all of a sudden." Olsana said, concern replacing her edge of frustration. "Are you coming down with something? If so, you need to go home before you get us all sick."

"No. Not sick." He said in the doorway.

Upon entering Keb sat down on the large antique chair, as always, that Olsana Marisen kept toward the side of her voluminous desk. Her workspace was decorated with a menagerie of distractions; there was what appeared to be an entire set of miniature cartoon sculptures holding placards touting the strengths of her gender, which was one of her many rallying calls, and there were little plastic goats of every shape, size, and construction standing sentry on staggered piles of paper, texts and notebooks, as if they were part of a mountainous diorama.

However, the most telling and potent aspect of Olsana Marisen's immediate periphery were the pictures of men. They were everywhere. Small pictures, large pictures, black men, brown men, white men, golden men,; the only common denominator that any observer might notice was that they were all either naked or half-naked. Keb mostly just ignored the pictures, having grown inured to Olsana's wanton and overt display's of man worship, and only occasionally commented on any new material that she had decided to add to her shrine.

"Aren't you concerned with sexual harassment issues?" He had asked her once, years ago.

"Should i be? does any of this stuff really offend you?" She had said, with serious demeanor. "Doesn't seem to bother anyone else or I'd take it down. Just say the word and I'll pack up my fella's, though i suspect that you're just a little jealous of mister January...Officer abs. ooooh yummy!"

"No, it doesn't bother me a bit," Keb had chuckled. "But i can't help thinking that you're opening yourself up to some misery somewhere along the line."

"I appreciate your concern, Dr. Prudenchaste, but i hide all my guys whenever an outsider enters my lair." she had said happily, and that had ended the conversation then and forever more. To know and love Olsana was to know and accept that part of her.

Sitting in the cozy, ornately quilted chair, Keb lost himself in it's soft embrace, it's well-worn cushions and comforting smell of musty, decades old upholstery. Breathing deeply the reminder of times past at family reunions, Keb realized that he was again in the midst of a silent reverie, which to many he indulged in too frequently, and remembered suddenly why he came in to see Olsana.

"I didn't know you were looking for help." Keb said nonchalantly, looking at his nail-bitten fingers. He had decided that an indirect tact would be the path of least humiliation.

"I'm not." Olsana said. "If you're talking about the young lady that just left, Alice, she was referred to me by a friend."

"Medical consult?" Keb asked, now sympathetically concerned with the welfare of a woman he didn't even know.

"In a way....wait a sec." Olsana said, grinning widely, and she slapped her palm to the desk top, making several little goats tumble from their paper perches. "You like her. Dirty old man."

Keb just stared at Olsana, not even able to muster the energy necessary to show indignation.

"That's okay, Keb. happens to the best of us." She said, smiling at her friend and colleague.

"Implying that I am not among the best of us?" He said, weakly, thinking his best defense here would have to be a change of direction.

"You know what i mean, goofy. Don't try to change the subject."

One of Keb's great frustrations in life was a general disability to hide his feelings, a natural weakness exacerbated by an annoying and substantial mood disorder. "You wear your heart on your sleeve." His father would tell him, trying to coach his difficult son through times of upheaval. "People see right through you. It's a good thing you have a conscience or we'd all be in trouble."

"Yea, she's pretty." Keb said reluctantly, knowing the hopelessness of trying to maintain any subterfuge with someone who knew him well.

"Right." Olsana smirked. "She's a Viking Princess! And don't even try to tell me your jaw didn't hit the floor when you saw her. You can't fool me. But anyway, too bad for you, she has a boyfriend."

This didn't surprise Keb but he still could not suppress the sudden sinking feeling, like a ball of ice in his gut.

"What's her story?" he said, attempting to move quickly past the quick-sand of his emotions.

"Well, funny you should take an interest, because i was going to ask you to come in on this one, anyway." Olsana said, becoming suddenly serious.

Keb instinctively leaned forward, as Dr. Marisen's voice always dropped several decibels when she was on task, though the soft cushions of the chair didn't make it easy for him.

"Ok..." Keb said reflexively, as Olsana leaned back in her own custom, ergonomic chair, which looked not unlike a pilot's ejector seat in a modern jet fighter, pressed her finger tips together and shared with him the story of the girl she had offhandedly referred to as their very own Viking Princess, named Alice.

Keb listened intently while Olsana went over the details of Alice's visit; how she had been through a revolving door of councilors, analysts, and psychiatrists, to try and cope with what Olsana referred to as AHSD, or Acute Hyper-Sensitivity Disorder. He had never heard of it before, but Olsana didn't seem to see it as just another pigeon-holing psychiatric device to further partition gifted people away from the rest of the world, so who was he to doubt the diagnosis.

Eventually, and fortunately for Alice, she met a Psychiatrist named Dr. Shane Michaelson, a brilliant individual who placed patient care and treatment above all else. Dr. Michaelson was a professional associate of Dr. Marisen, as they frequented parallel academic circles, social and professional, and he had Olsana's utmost respect. The good doctor relayed to Olsana that it had taken him several sessions (a dozen or so, in fact) with Alice to get her to feel comfortable, but they together had managed to navigate her trust issues and were able to proceed toward treatment.

***

Offices of Dr. Shane Michaelson Philadelphia, PA. July 3, 2022 2:12PM

Dr. Michaelson had listened to Alice talk about her childhood and schooling, adolescence and her difficult passage to womanhood, and finally to the present, whereas she revealed to him, at least as much as she wanted him to know, her true reason for seeking help. Though she had endured a childhood and life which presented any of a host of valid reasons for her anxiety and depression; various abuses, abandonment et al. she noted with assurance, however, the primary source was external...a feeling of impending doom that was going beyond distraction, and it had nothing to do with her own troubled upbringing.

She also revealed to Dr. Michaelson, as opportunity dictated, that one special secret she had been keeping since the age of 4. The promise to Ga.

"Don't tell anyone about our bond, My Love." Ga had asked her, trapping Alice in their innocent bond. However, Ga had also given her a key to this prison, as all secrets were prisons to Alice.

"How will I know, Ga?"

"The little frog will lead you, My Love."

Dr. Michaelson had a tiny crystal frog on his desk. It was the first thing Alice noticed about his office and ultimately why she allowed herself to open up to him.

When Alice revealed to the doctor the truth, that she felt that the world was talking to her, and that it had always talked to her; through Gaia, and messages in the sound of wind passing through trees, in the presence and behavior of animals or their sign, even in the weather.

"I know what you're thinking." Alice said to Dr. Michaelson during this, another of their extended sessions. "That I'm suffering some form of delusion. Maybe you think I'm bipolar or even schizophrenic, i don't know."

"I didn't say that." He said, staring at her intently while chewing the end of his pencil.

"What else would you think? If our positions were reversed that's for sure what i would be thinking." She said, smiling slightly. "That bitch has bats in her belfry! But that's okay. You can think whatever you please, i don't mind."

Alice then went on to detail to Dr. Michaelson why she felt as she did, referencing specifics of her dreams, the meadow, Gaia and associations in her real life; signs and events and how she had interpreted, acted, and interacted as a result.

On this day that she outlined these things to him, these closely guarded intimacies and personal skeletons, Dr. Michaelson became a different man. Not because of what Alice had said to him, but because of what she would show him. Shane Michaelson had been practicing psychiatric medicine for 7 years. Before that he spent 4 years as an ER Surgeon, and before that, 9 years a resident of Jacob Kurtzberg Memorial Hospital. In the 20 years he had been immersed in these various aspects of his profession, he had seen and heard just about everything. or so he thought.

"I know you don't believe me." Alice said, looking out the window at a crow sitting proudly atop a sparsely populated tree.

"About what?" the Doctor had said, feigning ignorance. "I believe everything you tell me."

"You believe that the Earth speaks to me?" Alice dared him, with eyebrow cocked.

"Well...I believe that you are earnest in your belief." Dr Michaelson offered diplomatically. "But, do I believe that what you are experiencing is actually the Earth talking to you? That might take some convincing."

"Okay. May I open the window?" Alice asked politely, getting up from the good doctor's tasteful patient couch.

"You're not going to jump because of what i just said, are you?" he said. "We're on the first floor."

"No, Doctor." Alice laughed. "I wouldn't be so selfish as to negatively affect your future livelihood. Besides, who you do you see more interesting than me, hmm?"

Dr. Michaelson laughed as Alice gracefully moved to the window, and taking a moment to familiarize herself with the locking mechanism, proceeded to release the window from it's brass constraint and lifted the bottom pane, which revealed a light screen on the other side. Fortunately, it was not permanently secured to the outer window and could be opened in the same manner. Were it not for this simple detail, she might have been unable to change the doctors stance on her metaphysical sensitivities, and he might have remained as he was; a brilliant, accomplished and ultimately unenlightened man.

Alice would change the last of these forever.

She hated to show off, it made her feel uncomfortable and vain. However, some instances required a little something extra; some showmanship. This was one of those cases.

After opening the Doctor's window and it's adjacent screen, Alice moved to the couch and sat down again, smoothing her long, flowing skirt under her so as to not let it bunch and wrinkle. She then looked at Dr. Michaelson, smiled softly, placed her hands together on her lap and closed her eyes.

The Doctor said nothing. He knew her well enough to see that she was preparing to communicate something to him, maybe something distressing, and that these periodic silences were her small retreats to regroup and steady herself.

The brief vacuum of silence lasted only a moment, as a large crow, not coincidentally the one that Alice had been watching a moment earlier, accompanied by a gust of wind from it's large, iridescent ebony wings, flew in the open window and, scattering mail and unmoored post-it notes, landed on Dr. Michaelson's desk.

The bird took a step forward, stared Dr. Michaelson in his eye, cocked it's head sideways, and abruptly took the small crystal sculpture of the little frog in its beak. The frog had been gifted to Dr. Michaelson by his staff, 4 birthdays past. he loved it.

The aggressive avian then took a side step back, ruffled it's feathers, and flew out the open window, crystal frog in beak, past a smiling young girl who was watching a silent and jaw agape Dr. Shane Michaelson.

The room was motionless for several seconds.

"Okay... that was crazy." The Doctor said, finally recovering his senses. "I...I loved that frog. Am I to believe that you did that somehow?"

"Well, if I answer 'yes," Alice said thoughtfully, "...then you would have to either take me at my word, and accept that the Earth Mother, Gaia and I really do communicate, or consider the possibility that i own a trained crow and set this up somehow. I'm guessing that that's exactly what's going through your head right now."

Alice had impressed Dr. Michaelson many times; with her intelligence, passion for learning, humanity, and humor. Occasionally she even intimidated him, something few people could accomplish, with only the force of her spirit and goodness. This was another of those times, whereas she seemed to be looking right at his brain through the eye sockets of his skull.

"Or I suppose you would have to include the possibility of coincidence." Dr Michaelson said, though he didn't believe that for a second.

"Would you like it back?" Alice asked, coyly.

"You mean the frog? um...yes." He returned cautiously.

Alice again slowly shut her eyes, softly inhaled slow and deep, and placed her hands together on her lap. and she smiled.

In a second rush of wind and disarray of unmoored papers being jostled about, the crow returned, and also for the second time, landed on Dr. Michaelson's desk.

The crow looked at the tall, dark man sitting at the desk, blinked to clear it's glowing onyx eyes, and dropped a medium sized pine-cone to rest precisely where the crystal frog had been. It then ruffled indignantly, took two steps in a semi-circle to face Alice, cawed loudly, and flew off through the open window; perhaps to go look at it's new frog sculpture.

Alice laughed harder than Dr. Shane Michaelson had seen before, and maybe even more than the doctor thought her capable of.

"Nice pine cone." she said, chuckling.

"Where's my frog?" He said boyishly, staring at the pine cone and fully in a haze of confusion. This was not a state of mind in which Shane Michaelson was often found.

"I asked him nicely to return it, but i guess he likes it and doesn't want to give it back." Alice smiled and sighed. "However, in crow-land apparently, that is a mighty fine pine cone and a fair trade."

That was all the convincing Dr. Michaelson had needed.

The two occupants of the comfortable and very civilized office sat in silence, both listening to their own inner voices.

They jointly determined that day that there would be no standard treatment, drugs, or really anything within the normal confines of accepted Western medicine that might help Alice with her unsettling feelings of the dark and imminent. Dr. Michaelson was now compelled to accept the possibility that these feelings of Alice's might be more than could be explained through existing prejudices. Terms like 'prophesy' and 'oracle' danced mockingly in his head, pointing fingers at his smug self-assurance and cynicism.

"I need to make a call." He said, quickly deciding his plan of action.

He would need tests; MRi, CT, maybe even a nuclear WBC scan. Also, extensive monitoring and cataloging of Alice's abilities would have to be scheduled. There was only one place that he knew of that had both the resources and the 'out-of-the-box' thinking necessary to take on this project.

Dr. Michaelson picked up the handset of his desk phone, cycled through a list of numerical entries on the small LED display of the base unit and dialed.

"Hello, Olsa? It's Shane. We need to talk."

Research Operations Center Hoboken, New Jersey Aug 12, 2022 1:28PM

Olsana waited to gauge Keb's reaction to what she had told him. She wasn't sure if she believed it herself, having to suspend her disbelief due to the source of the information, and she was unsure how her colleague might react.

Dr. Shane Michaelson was not one to be taken lightly, surely, and Keb was aware of the psychiatrist's reputation but had no personal knowledge of him whatsoever.

"What do you think?" Olsana urged, watching him intently.

"The Crow, The Crystal Frog, and The Pinecone." Keb said absently, staring at his fingers. "Sounds like CS Lewis. I think Michaelson is ingesting psilocybin."

"He was serious as a heart attack on the phone, Keb." Olsana continued. "He wouldn't call me if he thought this was a normal circumstance. He knows the kind of work we do here."

"What does he think we can do?" Keb wondered out loud. "Sounds like a job for spiritualists, not a think tank."

"Do you think i would just accept what anyone tells me without clarifying the feasibility and dynamics in my own mind?" Olsana chastised. "There is no one on the planet whose psychological evaluation I value more than Shane's, and he says there is more to this...to her...than meets the eye. This is as much about the source of the information as the information itself."

"C'mon, Olsa... you really think she talks to trees? hmm..." Keb said, then moments after remembered that he had heard something too, when they first met. Might they be related? Keb's mind began to crunch commonalities and possibilities.

"I think that you should talk to Alice. Devise some simple test so you can see for yourself if her condition warrants our particular mojo." Olsana smiled. "If you'd rather I can get someone else to pick this up."

Keb couldn't help but smile himself, knowing Olsana was teasing him with her takeaway.

"I'll do it, of course." Keb agreed.

"Of course. I'll have Tammy set up a meeting for you and Alice to get acquainted." Olsana smiled back, referring to Tammy Silverman, Edge's daughter and company secretary. "Just let me know when you have some free time and an idea of how you'll test her."

"I already know how to proceed. It won't be difficult to gauge her claims of tree talking." Keb said, having devised a simple test in his mind moments after the problem presented itself. "And Time? Well, that I have plenty of."

Keb's Apartment Hillside, New Jersey Aug 19, 2022 7:18AM

On the day of their first scheduled meeting, Keb woke up an hour early, unable to keep his eyes closed. He only slept 3 hours the night before but still felt energized. Today he would see Alice again. He was nervous, certainly, but also intrigued at the prospect of delving into her situation.

"She's a tree talker." He mused to his reflection while shaving, and let his mind run wild at the applications.

If she communicates with trees, he thought, then trees must have some level of intelligence, and if so, it wouldn't be a stretch to assume that all plant life had intelligence as well. He then considered the symbiotic relationship between plant and animal organisms, and perhaps the commonality there, or a level of communication that had never been considered before. Keb Snydaar was not a biologist. His academic strengths were purely mathematical and related to basic atomic structure. Living organisms were chemical and chemistry was not his forte. Chemistry was sloppy and inexact, he thought. Fickle.

Normally Keb didn't give much thought to his attire, as long as he was comfortable, but today he wanted to make a good impression. he picked out his best form fitting jeans, the worn Levi 501s, and a button down shirt that he had ironed the evening before. he considered wearing a necktie even, but reconsidered, as he thought it might seem a bit much. They were going to go for a walk in the woods, and business casual in woods would just make him stand out as an uncomfortable and detached individual. He laughed to himself that the truth hurts, that he was the poster child for uncomfortable and detached, but advertising it was even more socially inept than being so.

He looked himself up and down in the door length mirror of his cluttered room, and satisfied that he would not be the subject of disapproving stares, made his way toward whatever fate, destiny and dumb luck might make present in his path. Before making contact with the doorknob he patted his pockets to ensure he had migrated his entire walking inventory to these pants and ran through his mental checklist of needed accessories; notebook, writing implement...coffee??

How had he forgotten coffee? He would have to stop somewhere and buy some.

"idiot idiot idiot" Keb chastised himself out loud for this simple oversight. Now he would have to deal with this anomaly; stopping somewhere for coffee, and all the associated little anxieties that would accompany it.

He ran through the event in his mind, anticipating the extra traffic in the turn lane he would encounter, the uncomfortable tapering of distance between himself and another patron going in the front door, the imminent choice he would have to make between a fresh pot of medium brew, or a slightly burnt and older pot of dark brew, the eye contact and connection with the store clerk...

He had to forcefully stop himself by shaking his head, or he might stay frozen like this for minutes...and sometimes those minutes turned to hours. He pictured Alice as he had first seen her, extending her hand to him and smiling, then he took a deep breath and made his out.

***

Alice's Apartment. Maplewood, New Jersey Aug 19, 2022 7:45AM

"Wake up, My Love."

Alice smiled as she heard those familiar words, somewhere between the last dream and now...

"Today we have important things to do."

"Okay, I'm up Ga..." She said lazily, adoring the warmth of her comforter and familiar smells of morning, then stretching her arms outward and yawning.

"What's a Ga?"

Alice started, but only internally, the sole betrayal her eyes sudden opening and full awareness. She immediately took stock of her surroundings. The white and volume of her own bedding, the smell of lavender and cinnamon in the air, the musk and warmth of male body and the contour of the person next to her. She was home.

"Mornin' sleepy dreamer." The figure beside her said, and leaned toward her face and mouth.

"Mornin' yourself handsome." Alice replied, turning her head away from his advance. "Breath..."

"I brushed my teeth a few minutes ago."

"Not yours, mine." Alice propped her upper half to sitting and eyed her bedmate approvingly. "Do I smell coffee?"

"You do. I'll go get you some." Her companion leapt athletically to his feet and eager to show off his kind deference and barista skill both, scurried off to his immediate task.

"He's such a good boy," Alice thought to herself. "I think I'll keep him."

Alice decided to take advantage of these minutes and closed her eyes to melt into the meadow, but only for a moment.

"Good morning, My Love."

Gaia was waiting for Alice, kneeling beside her as she opened her eyes. She was her middle self, though more young than old; her hair was almost entirely bright amber, with a single streak of silver running it's entirety into the ground. She was stroking Alice's golden hair and humming softly.

"Was that you who woke me up?" Alice asked immediately.

"Well, i can't take all the credit, now can I?"

"Did you speak to me from here? or..." Alice asked, needing some clarification on what had transpired as she woke. Never before had she confused a person, any person, with Ga. She wasn't sure who she had heard first, Ga or...

"...Sully. I spoke to you with his voice." Ga admitted, referring to Alice's love, Sully Robertson.

"I didn't even know you could do that." Alice said nervously. "It's kind of creepy."

"I'm sorry My Love. I do not dance with the thought of speaking with another's voice. I only spoke for a moment and was gone."

"I understand Ga. I haven't forgotten." Alice said, softly. "The Dak Aua is coming..."

"...and we have work to do." Both Ga and Alice said simultaneously.

Research Operations Center Hoboken, New Jersey Aug 19, 2022 9:28AM

The air was thick with moisture, having rained earlier in the morning, and there were still small pools scattered about and roof edges and trees still slowly dripped. The drive to work had been slow, and with the extra stop for coffee already weighing on Keb's mind he would on any other day have already reached his personal tolerance for delay. Today, however, he took it all in stride, his mind racing in several directions at once. How would she look? He thought. "Will she be upset with me for trying to debunk her mythos? Will she like my jeans? What if she's a fraud? What if she's not a fraud?..."

The last of these questions weighed heaviest on his mind. Alice had already seemingly convinced two highly intelligent professionals of her ... odd ... sensitivities. What would he do if...? this was always the toughest question, with everything. So many possibilities, so many wildcards, so many outcomes. Too many to fully digest, he thought. Baby steps.

As Keb pulled into his parking spot, the one incorrectly marked for Dr. Snyder, he saw Alice get out of her car and walk towards the front entrance. He could've gotten out immediately and gotten her attention with a friendly 'Good Morning!' but he opted for the path of least anxiety, as had become his instinct. He needed some moments to prepare to say hello; he couldn't just approach her in the parking lot. could he? So he just sat and watched.

He watched as she motivated herself forward, noting that her elbows stuck out when she moved at a brisk pace, and her wide braid bouncing between her shoulder blades as she walked. He wondered if it bothered her, the persistent pattern of contact. She wore loose fitting sweat pants and a wind breaker over a simple printed white t-shirt. Keb thought she looked like someone going on a gambling junket to Mississippi.

He watched as she stopped by a tree and looked up, and waved hello to a small bird. He half expected to see it land on her finger and accompany Alice in a song.

Having satisfied her need to interact with her new friend, the sparrow, Alice made her way into the modest looking glass and concrete facility, and seeing this, Keb proceeded to exit his car and walked along the elegantly landscaped path into the building. As he passed the small birch tree where Alice had her brief commune, he heard a single staccato *chirp, and looking up, saw Alice's friend.

"Hello bird." Keb said, noticing a small black and orange spot on it's left side.

*chirp* The bird repeated itself, staring at Keb from the safety of it's elevated perch.

"Really? She said that about me?" Keb played. "Wow, she must think I'm pretty awesome, huh?"

The sparrow ruffled it's feathers and turned away.

"Guess not." Keb mock frowned. "But there's always hope, right bird? What's that? I need to accomplish something with my life? Then maybe she'll come around? Well, you do make a valid point... Hmm, I'll have to think on your words of clarity..."

"Oh, he's just impatient. Sparrows are the most impatient of all birds, I think. Well, maybe seagulls. But sparrows are definitely up there."

Keb jumped sideways as he heard Alice speak as if she had miraculously appeared beside him. It was fortunate for him that today he insured his coffee lid was securely capped.

"I'm sorry for startling you." Alice chuckled. "I just got here myself. I forgot something in my car."

"S'ok." Keb wondered how she had moved so quietly, and how much she had heard. Would she know he was talking about her?

"How are you this morning?" He tested.

"Stressed!" Alice said immediately. "Holy shit, I can't believe how people drive around here! I saw half a dozen near misses on the turnpike this morning. I'm amazed that anyone here in New Jersey manages to get where they're going alive."

Keb laughed at Alice's irritated and somewhat profane commentary. It was unexpected. He imagined her to be a 'one with the universe' type of individual, one that let things roll off her back. Apparently, like Keb himself, she suffered to some extent the same irritation at the general lack of compassion and empathy one see's on a daily basis in these United States, especially when driving.

"Where I'm from, people may be a bit crazy too, but they at least have some semblance of regard for other motorists."

"Well, I'm glad we both made it safely, regardless." Keb said, wanting to go inside and prepare for their appointment with the wood.

"I know, right? I'll meet you inside, i just need to grab something from my car."

"Okay." Keb said, walking. "I just have to check in with Dr. Marisen and let her know I'm here."

*chirp*

"The bird says to 'say hi' for him." Alice said, seriously.

"Really?" Keb said, stopping suddenly and looking back at her.

"No." Alice grinned, showing her perfect teeth. "Gotcha!"

Alice laughed cheerily as she strutted back to her car, elbows out.

Keb stared at her as she walked, his mind on her femininity, contour, and grace. He stopped himself before his thoughts naturally migrated to sexuality. That wouldn't be fair to her or to Research Ops. Keb already understood how his emotional state might negatively affect this or any other academic process; were he to add to that the constant pressure of intimate appetites, well...chances are that Alice would leave prematurely and Keb would be the cause, an undesirable outcome.

He shook his head slightly, as much from habit as to clear unwanted thoughts, and walked through the nondescript entrance to Research Operations Center, Hoboken.

The facility was alive with motion and the sounds and smells of industry and had been for several hours. There were technicians scurrying to and fro with burdens of tools, and expedience, administrative personnel carrying coffee and conversation, deliverymen with clip-boards and looks of impatience, and construction workers laboring against gravity and restraint. It was a busy day, but every day was a busy day here at Research Ops. Private sector folks didn't have the luxury of living on their own clock, as Universities and Government facilities often did. Money only appeared with expectation, not charity, and expectation only appeared with potential, progress, and results. That was what mattered to Edge Silver, and he would not tolerate anything but 'asses and elbows' in motion.

"Good morning Olsa." Keb said earnestly to his friend, colleague, and supervisor, who was sitting in a resin chair at one of the utility tables in the foyer, drinking coffee and reviewing a progress report.

"Well, good morning to you, sunshine! Big day today!" She replied enthusiastically. "You ready?"

"As ready as ever, I suppose."

"You don't sound very enthusiastic. Something bothering you?"

"Not really. Just same shit as ever, I guess." Keb said. "Wondering where this stuff with Alice will lead, is all. I mean, if Alice is what we think she may be, then the world is a different place to what we've all been taught. Everything changes. And if she's not..."

"...then Alice is mentally ill, or a fraud." Olsana said seriously, completing Keb's thought.

"...and Occam's Razor suggests that the likelihood is the latter of those scenarios," He continued. "...and that makes me sad."

"Would make us all sad. Waste of time, and resources. Speak of the devil!" Olsana said abruptly, as much a greeting as a warning to Keb that Alice was in earshot. "Good morning sunshine!"

"Good morning to you!" Alice said as she walked into the foyer, matching Olsana's positivity and cheer. "I'm all set to go talk to trees for you."

Olsana laughed. Keb just stared, unsure if Alice was joking or not.

"Here, I packed some stuff for you guys that I'm pretty sure Keb overlooked." Olsana retrieved a small grocery sack made of canvas from under the table. "Water, first aid kit, Swiss army knife, insect repellent, snacks..."

"This is an experiment, Olsana, not a picnic..." Keb said, immediately sorry that he did.

"What's wrong with a little picnic?" Alice quickly joined, rescuing Keb from his own impulsive negativity. "All work and no play makes Keb a dull boy."

"That's what I'm sayin'!" Olsana bellowed. "Now you two skedaddle, and don't come back 'til the sandwiches are eaten. Here Alice, you drive. I already signed out a company ride for you two. The Beast!"

Olsana handed Alice a ring of car keys with a large ROC fob on it.

"Okay..." Alice said reluctantly, looking at Keb to gauge his reaction, who had an unreadable expression, other than his normal look of seeming to be in pain. "The Beast?"

"Keb hates to drive." Olsana explained for him. "Besides, I don't think he can handle the sheer force of 'The Beast'... Girl Power!"

Olsana raised her fist in the air, and there were several echoes of her sentiment to be heard throughout the immediate environment, including applause and vocal support. In her realm, and this facility was indeed her realm, Olsana fostered not only a place of safety for female workers, but a place of power.

"I'm not so sure I can handle The Beast, either." Alice remarked, looking again to gauge Keb's reaction.

Keb rolled his eyes.

"The Beast is a two seat electric car. The engine was converted from a power screwdriver, i think." Keb said.

"So, The Beast is an herbivore then?" Alice joked, making both Olsana and Keb laugh. Taking the laughter as a cue, Olsana bid the two good luck and sent them on their way.

As they walked together quietly out of the building, Alice's mind was distracted by the thought of comfort she got when she made Keb laugh. And maybe she felt something else, something more than just comfort? She would have to ask Ga, she thought.

The drive to Hacklebarney State Park, which took approximately 45 minutes, gave Keb and Alice a little time to get personally acquainted. They spoke about their hometowns and schooling, and Research Operations Center, Edge Silver, and Olsana, and learned that they had several common passions. They both loved coffee, music, and art, but more importantly, they found that they genuinely liked each other. Alice was surprised to learn that Keb had a sense of humor, and had made her laugh several times on the ride. Keb was compelled by Alice's intelligence, the way she phrased things, her rational insights and morality.

"Do you want some insect repellent? Still wet outside from the rain. Gonna be skeeters." Keb offered, as he searched through the canvas bag of supplies.

"No thank you. I don't use pesticides."

"Ever?" Keb asked, surprised. "What if you get ants or roaches in your house?"

"I don't." Alice said. "I keep a clean house, thank you very much."

Though Alice spoke truthfully, it wasn't merely her attention to orderliness and cleanliness that kept pests at bay, it was Gaia.

Gaia's constituent particles, Auton's they would soon be dubbed, at varying levels of concentration were in every living thing on Earth; every insect, every bird, every plant. She, and others like her, was the connection between all things organic. She was why a mass of hundreds and thousands of Starlings flew together as if of a single mind, and why massive schools of Herring danced as if all to the same music. They were as one, through Gaia.

Gaia did not actively or consciously control all living organisms, but she was present, nudging here and prodding there. She could control her own parts, her autons, as precisely as a human could manipulate their own fingers, massing them together to focus light energy and heat at nano tolerances, delicately arranging them to manipulate the color dance, and even using them to capture and vector clusters of electrons. Control was not part of her dance, though. On an evolutionary scale she was more sculptor or potter, than a maker or packager of clay, but the ability to control was viable and potent, if largely ignored.

"...and the skeeters?" Keb prodded.

"I'm not sure if I've ever been bitten by a mosquito, frankly." Alice said, thoughtfully. "Or by any bug, come to think of it."

"Bee sting?"

"Nope."

"Fire ant?"

"Nope."

Keb stared at Alice for far longer than he normally would have felt comfortable with. He was scanning her for her emotional state, looking for any signs that she was at any level full of shit. He didn't see any. All her could read on her was sincerity and... good. He searched internally for a better word. Good was subjective, he knew, and could be sourced from many of a thousand places, the most common including upbringing, personal tragedy, and current economic perspective, all malleable and externally coerced. But as he stared, he wondered if maybe he was wrong, if maybe there was a quantifiable, consistent and polar quality called 'good,' and Alice was that.

"You think I'm full of shit." Alice stated flatly, eyes remaining focused on the surrounding traffic that loomed over the small automobile that whined it's frustration at maximum occupancy and minimum thrust.

"I believe you, though what you're telling me is naturally anomalous, unless you live in a bubble."

"But you believe me." She repeated, turning her attention to look in Keb's eyes.

Keb saw in her eyes everything he had thought previously, but more and unexpectedly he saw her need for him to believe her. It displayed a vulnerability he had not seen in her before, a very real softness. He saw her hurt and got just a tiny taste of her damage, and he loved her for it.

"She is here for me." He remembers.

His mind drifted to that moment he touched her. Sometimes, when he mentally floated and let the delusion ride unfettered he believed it meant she would love him. However, even when within the easy embrace of fantasy his brain wouldn't allow for simple, easy answers. Maybe the message was not focused on him, he thought, but on her. maybe it was she who needed help and he would necessarily provide it.

Someone of mystic experience had long ago told him that there were two types of greatness; the glory of kings and the poetry of king makers. According to his tarot profile and the pseudo-calculus of numerology, he was to be the latter of these, only. A fun detail he liked to remind himself of from time to time.

"I'm glad you believe me Keb." Alice said, turning her attention back to the road and breaking him free of his passenger-induced hypnosis.

"OH YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE!!" She yelled suddenly, hitting the brakes to avoid a collision with an aggressive motorist in a pickup truck who had decided that small electric cars were unworthy of consideration and a place on the common roadway.

"Fucking pricks in pickup trucks, I tell you." Alice continued railing, shaking her head. "I wonder if a person that buys a pickup is already an asshole or if the vehicle itself makes them a dick."

"Well, I imagine that the power of the pickup's V8 catalyzes an aggressiveness that is already present in the driver," Keb said thoughtfully, "And that this is exacerbated by the driver's relative elevation."

Alice turned to Keb and stared.

"You said fuck. twice." He added quietly, staring off to the right, smiling.

Keb expected her to laugh but instead was dismayed that she became apologetic.

"I'm sorry if my cussing bothers you..." She began

"PUH-leese!" Keb interrupted. "I was kidding. You can scream obscenities at the moon all day if you need to, I don't mind. I read a study that indicated people that use profanity regularly are significantly more likely to display loyalty and compassion in their everyday lives."

"Fuckin' ay." Alice smiled. "Hey, there's a sign for the park. We made it in one piece. Yay!"

Hacklebarney State Park Morris County, New Jersey Aug 19, 2022 10:43AM

As Alice pulled into the park driveway they mutually decided that a spot with a charging station situated close to a bathroom would be best for all purposes, and found a suitable location quickly. It was the middle of the day in the middle of the week so there were many open spots, for parking and all other park related activities. This pleased both of them, as another of their common preferences was to avoid crowds of people whenever possible. For Alice, this meant quiet, which was her sanctum. For Keb, it meant a slight reprieve from heightened anxiety, which increased as his elbow space lessened.

As they got out of the small car Alice stared at the line of trees that wrapped around their location interrupted by several small paths, wooden handrails and small utility sheds. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, then smiled and put her arms out as if greeting the world, which she was.

"Hello My Love!" She said to the sky and surrounding life, then wrapped her arms around her shoulders in a self-embrace.

Keb watched silently and noted that the breeze changed as she spoke, creating music in the tree line, and several movements came into his peripheral vision. Where moments before he saw only a sparsely populated public park, now he noted the erratic path of butterflies, swallowtails, he remembered, and dragonflies, dozens of them, hovering and darting looking for mosquitos to torment and devour. and Birds, chirping and creating havoc in the branches. Had they been making that much noise before? He wasn't sure but it seemed that the ambient noise increased noticeably in relation to their being there. Or, Keb corrected himself, to Alice being there.

He chastised himself for not thinking of audio concerns regarding the experiment. Stupid arrogant idiot, he kicked himself, realizing that he did not take this experiment seriously enough, even though he had convinced himself otherwise.

"I should've brought a recorder and a condenser mic." Keb said out loud, completing his internal dialog.

"Maybe next time." Alice chirped, her mood clearly elevated at her surroundings, even though she was in a fine mood already.

"Isn't it glorious!" Alice spread her arms out, as if to showcase the horizon to him. "Keb, I would like to formally introduce you to Mama."

"Hello Mama." Keb said, smiling, though he didn't know who he was smiling at.

Alice leaned into the car and retrieved her carry bag, a cotton tie-dyed sack with brightly colored patches of flowers and peace signs sewn on, shouldered it, and smiled brightly.

"I'm ready." She chimed, as she reached into her bag and pulled out an old Konica single lens reflex camera and set the strap around her neck. "Lead on McDuff."

"What's the camera for?" Keb asked innocently.

Alice stared blankly at him, blinking once.

"It's for taking pictures." She said after a moment, her tone matching her look of mild condescension.

Keb laughed so suddenly that he snorted, breaking Alice's facade of mock disbelief, and she laughed too. Keb didn't notice but when she laughed, the entire landscaped reacted, growing slightly brighter, greener.

"C'mon Keb, let's go this way." Alice decided to take the lead, waving him to follow. She could feel Keb's anxiety, and it was her natural way to address discomfort in others, she didn't consciously think about it. She would be the lantern carrier.

Alice had been diagnosed by the esteemed Dr. Michaelson as 'suffering' Acute Hyper-Sensitivity Disorder. Upon reading this in her ROC report, Keb equated this to being a clinical quantification for an individual that had empathy. That was what Western medicine had deemed as a detriment. To he, the absurdity of this was almost comical.

Keb had reflected for long hours on the behavior of humanity; what makes us different from non-sentient life forms, and the simplest answer that he could arrive at was empathy and compassion. These were the qualities least present in the behavior of all forms we consider non-sentient. Life itself doesn't give a shit one way or another, he thought. We make the choice to alter the currents and tides of life and give form to hope and self-evolution, and only those who Feel can willfully provide this to others.

A person that cannot sense the suffering and need of another is not a vital organism. It is sole and parasitic by nature. One that can feel the suffering and need of another, yet chooses to ignore that need, or worse, manipulate it to add to their own mass, displays simple animal behavior and is flaccid in their ability to alter the flow to support and grow the system.

Only the one that can sense the need of another, and make the choice to address this need without the machination of adding to their own mass may be defined as sentient. Sentience is not truly about being self-aware, he thought...it is about being out-of-self aware.

Keb didn't know it, but the very thing he defined as the sole common property of higher intelligence, empathy, was the very reason Gaia had been drawn to Alice. Her great empathy, this diagnosed sensitivity disorder, was the most beautiful dance Gaia had ever seen. The way Alice's nervous system lit up with electrical activity in response to the dance of other living organisms was, to Ga, an oasis of organic sensation. When Ga merged with Alice it was like she was born herself into Alice's consciousness and it's wonder.

"I think you make a better McDuff, anyway." Keb said absently, adjusting his own burden on his shoulder and following dutifully, surveying his immediate path for obstacles.

"You sayin' I'm Butch?" Alice teased.

"Sayin' you kick ass."

"I wish." Alice laughed. She had in the past been made to feel powerless at the hands of certain people, and still experienced some level of frustration at what she perceived of as a lack of physical potency. She sometimes had to remind herself that her potency, her own magic, was very real and very unique.

As they walked, Alice leading by a few paces, she told Keb the story of Ga. It was an intimate sharing for her, a vulnerability displayed, but she was in the woods now, among the trees, her Temple, and she recognized him now as a kind, gentle soul. Damaged, certainly, she thought, but still she felt safe here with him. A person's damage gives them defining texture and contour, and to she, there was little art in those with no damage.

"What do you think Gaia is, physically?" Keb asked, making notes as they walked.

"Light."

"What makes you say that?"

"I can feel her in the sunlight. When her rays touch me it feels like when you're in a room with someone you love. You're not touching them, just sitting together, but you know they're there."

"Do you feel her in artificial light?"

"Yes and no. Not really the same, like she's only partly there, physically." Alice said, touching leaves as she walked by them as if they were her children's hands. "But she's always there mentally. Though now that i think of it, she's more vital, more animated in sunlight."

Keb wrote furiously as she spoke, and cursed as his pen raked dry across the notepad.

"Aw crap!" He spat. "I hate pens that don't work!"

"Careful with throwing that word around." Alice chastised. "Don't waste such potent energy on something so trivial. There are a great many things one may disdain, but hatred? Well, that's a self-applied pollution that befouls the entire body."

"Shakespeare?"

"HA! Alicespeare." Alice giggled. "But thank you. Maybe I should write a play."

"What would you write about?" Keb asked, genuinely interested.

"Hmmm..." She thought. "I think I'd write about finding yourself, about each person following their true path, whatever that is. and computers."

"Computers?"

"I love computers. What can I say, deep down I'm a geek." Alice shrugged acceptance.

"Really? That's neat." Keb complimented.

"Why, 'cause I'm a girl?"

"No, because your passion seems to be in art and music. Loving tech is an entirely different animal."

"Yeah, I'm a bit hippy, and a bit metal too." Alice admitted thoughtfully, somewhat pleased with her self-definition.

As they walked Keb began to notice small movements around Alice, though each time he trained his focus on the source he could see nothing that might have moved. He wondered if he was having sleep deprivation hallucinations; little sparks and flutters in his peripheral vision, though he felt fine. He was suddenly glad that Alice had taken point as he was able to survey her interaction with, and affect on the green, which would have been otherwise impossible had he been in front.

The more he watched and focused on her movements and the contour of her surroundings, he began to see what had triggered his motion sense; micro movements of the plant life around her. At first he thought it was tactile, that Alice had touched the branch or frond to cause it to move, but he never saw the actual contact. Just ahead Keb spied a tall thick tuft of saw grass which was bordering their path. Alice would have to walk right past it, he thought. Keb trained his sight on the grassy mass and as Alice glided past, he saw the movement; saw each frond move slightly toward her and follow her as she made her way past it. He again cursed himself, a long habit of his, for his lack of foresight.

"I'm so fucking stupid. I should've brought a high-speed camera. We could see these motor responses in great detail in super slomo."

"Motor responses?" Alice asked over her left shoulder.

"The plants are moving with you as you walk past." Keb replied. "I wasn't sure at first; thought it might be the wind or you touching them, or me seeing things, but now I'm certain."

"I was wondering when you would notice." Alice smiled, as she raised her arms out to her sides and gracefully spun in a pirouette.

"Truthfully, I think I've seen enough to warrant the next phase."

Alice stopped, and frowning, turned to face her walking companion.

"Already? Don't you want to see me 'talk to the trees?'" Alice made air quotes. "I thought that was the whole point."

"The point of this excursion was to find justification for a full investigation into your abilities, and I've already seen something I'd never thought possible; a plant interacting with a specific human being." Keb said, feeling somewhat numb at this first revelation of new science.

"I don't have any abilities, not really." Alice said matter of factly. "It's Gaia. She makes the plants move, not me."

"I disagree. Olsana told me about your meeting with Michaelson." Keb explained. "I didn't know what to think about it...until now. If you have the ability to communicate a need to Gaia, as Olsana indicated you did with the crow summoning, and she then addresses that need through some physical manipulation of mass or energy, as in providing a conduit between yourself and the crow, then you're incorrect. You not only have abilities, but if you are the only one who has this bond with Gaia, you may be the single most potent person on the planet."

"Oh, pish." Alice said dismissively, waving her hand at him. Her nature would not allow her to fully accept what she knew deep down in her heart to be true, that she was a Goddess, or at the very least, an Angel.

"I'm not exaggerating even a bit." Keb said. "Frankly, I may actually be in some subtle form of shock, because this is some mind blowing shit, and my mind is a blank. This is all new."

"Well, it's not new to me," Alice smiled warmly, "...And certainly not to Ga. Besides, we haven't even had lunch. Olsa said not to come back until the sandwiches were eaten."

"True enough. However, all food gets eaten, regardless." Keb dead-panned. "She didn't say we had to be the ones that ate it."

"I don't think she was referring to ants or bacteria. We are finding a place to sit and eat, mister." Alice commanded, hands on her hips. "I'm not driving back with you until you eat and don't have that look on your face like someone's poking you with needles."

"Do I really look like that?"

"HOT needles."

"Well, at least they're sterile." Keb attempted a weak smile, and though his feelings were a bit hurt, he didn't disagree a bit.

"C'mon." Alice said, no longer willing to waste energy negotiating. "Follow me."

She didn't wait for a reply, and spinning on her heel, elbows out, made her way to a dry looking spot she had eyed minutes earlier; or maybe something told her to choose it. She wasn't sure.

Alice found the clearing that spoke to her, and knowing Keb had followed (without any indication, verbal or otherwise), she spun again and pointed to the ground at her immediate left.

"Here." Alice said with a maternal glare, which Keb didn't consider challenging for even a moment.

He immediately rustled through the supply bag and produced a red and white plaid tablecloth, which he draped across the general section of grass she had pointed to.

"How lovely, and so rustic." Alice said happily. "Olsa thinks of everything."

"Well, she didn't think of a ground cover large enough for the two of us to sit on." Keb said, scratching his chin. "This will, however, create a plane separating the food from the ants, so no complaints."

"She probably imagined us eating at a picnic table." Alice offered.

"We can do that if you like."

"Actually, I prefer the ground, if you don't mind." Alice returned, remembering all the times she had said that exact phrase in her life, in response to several different topics; transportation, sleeping arrangements, et al.

As a small child she often opted to sneak outside and sleep on the grass. This particular eccentricity especially enraged her mother, who was already a volatile that required little spark to ignite. Alice now, as an adult, sometimes had to resist the urge to lay out on the grass at night, simply because it wasn't safe for any young woman to be outside alone.

"Nope, don't mind a bit." Keb agreed.

Keb continued to root through the large canvas sack, finally producing paper plates, plastic flatware, napkins, plastic utility containers which held cold potato and slaw salads, and two sandwiches of unknown quantity. He handed the materials to a sitting Alice, who placed them carefully in their proper configuration.

Order was a high priority to Alice. She painstakingly manipulated any space she would be forced to inhabit for any length of time, whether it was the place setting at a diner or her own office and living space. Everything had it's place and usefulness, and if it didn't meet both criteria, it was gone.

Unsatisfied that he had found all that he would need at this lunching, Keb continued to scan the contents while lowering himself to sitting, and did not see the stick he would sit on. It was small enough to be missed, yet large enough and contoured to provide a nice goose.

"Careful." Alice said, seeing the unfolding milieu before her.

Keb looked quickly beneath him as he sat, and seeing the obstruction, attempted to catch himself by shifting his left leg. This however, did not produce the expected results. As he unknowingly planted his left foot on a still moist leaf, his leg skated out from under him and Keb flew backward and landed flat on his back, creating a moderate 'thud'.

"Oh my!" Alice exclaimed. "Are you okay?"

Keb laid still for a moment and stared at the sky, performing a brief internal inventory for physical damage.

"Yeah." He said, still staring skyward. "Least I didn't sit on that stick. Thank you for not laughing."

"I'm really sor..." Alice began to apologize, feeling somewhat responsible for Keb's immediate posture, but couldn't contain herself.

"HAHAHAHA..." Alice began laughing. "I'm sorry, but that was really funny...HAHAHA..."

"I didn't drop the bag." Keb said innocently, smiling stupidly to the sky. This made Alice laugh even harder.

Alice continued laughing, tears streaming down her face, while Keb propped himself to sitting. He watched her and saw that she laughed with her whole face, with joy and release. He didn't know it yet, but Keb would think back on this scene often in the years to come, concluding it to be the moment he fell in love with her.

When she finally gained some control, a difficult proposition when the giggles set in, she again apologized for what she considered an immature display, made worse because it was at someone else's expense.

"I read an interesting little piece that made a correlation between comedy and tragedy, stating essentially that all things are tragedy; Comedy is simply someone else's." Keb commented, while unwrapping a sandwich.

"If that's so, then all things are comedy too. Just depends on your perspective."

"Unless the tragedy is universal." Keb said, making a face at his untoward discovery of beets on his sandwich. "If it happens to all of us, who's left to laugh at it?"

Suddenly Alice's expression changed. Her sparkling golden rimmed green eyes averted to the ground and her brows furrowed, her smile becoming a grimace as she chewed on her lower lip. Keb noticed immediately.

"What's wrong? Did I say something?" He said, plucking blood red disks from his lunch, worried that he had caused her some issue.

"No. Well, yeah, you said many something's, but it's not you."

"Okay, I'm listening." Keb prodded, eyeing the red stains on his bread with disdain. "And wondering who puts beets on a sandwich?"

"I'm not ready to talk about this yet. I'm sorry." Alice said, wrapping her arms around her knees as she sat.

"Beets are okay." She forced a smile.

Keb didn't understand exactly what had happened but he was fairly certain that he had catalyzed it with his commentary on comedy and tragedy. Did she shut down at the memory of some personal trauma or is it more? He wondered.

"I'm here to listen. About the beet thing, I mean." Keb smiled.

He wanted to tell her that she could trust him, but stopped himself, knowing what flaccid commentary that would be to someone that didn't know him.

Anyone can offer trust, he thought, and they often do, yet fall far from grace when the event horizon is reached. A contract of trust is manifest in silence. It is anonymous and unheralded by nature, and it is rare. He could not ask for her trust, he might only earn it. And that he would do by silently honoring her.

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