the sleeping human

I miss Steven Moffat's Doctor Who. Everybody's thinking it, I'm just saying it. The latest season is positively disgraceful. It's so unfortunate that they should switch writers JUST as they decided to make The Doctor female. Now, it looks as though the series is weakened by this gender switch, which is not the case. Perhaps I will write a post on this to get my feelings out.

But for now, I have written something that reminds me of good ol' Doctor Who. There is a very special balance of the magic of fairytales, myths or legends, and the intense and baffling mystery of sci-fi in every episode of Doctor Who. That is what I tried to capture here. The concept (which I gave .3% thought to) is that some humans left to live on Mars, while others stayed on Earth. Eventually, the "Martians" returned to help Earth with their new knowledge, etc. to find that all the Earthens were dead except one. That one is asleep in Camber's living room. When things got very bad, the Earthens attempted to preserve their lives by sleeping in the pods until the Martians could return and save them; however, something went wrong (villainous sabotage? a fluke in the system? I don't know) and only the sleeping woman is left. I never finished it, but I imagined they would go on a great adventure together.

(quick note: I had an OBNOXIOUS time getting this to paste into blogger without all of the text going into one longggg line across my blog and into the white abyss of the internet. So if some of the formating is messed up, it is 50% because of Google Docs and 50% because I'm stupid.)

 

The Sleeping Human.

There's a woman asleep in my living room.
She's been there for a while. So long, in fact, that most days, I don't even see her. I rest my oatmeal on her face, and mother sets her tea on her knees. Before you call us names, you should know that she's in an immovable case made of titanium glass. It's basically indestructible. My family should know. She's been here for decades. Centuries probably! My parents have tried everything, but here she stays, asleep amongst all of our history. Sometimes I wonder if she's listening. If she can hear me through the glass. I put my face right next to it, and see if I can catch a flicker of an eyelid or a finger twitching. But she's always as still as stone, save for her chest rising and falling in a slow breath. A breath as slow as death. 

This morning, my parents kissed me goodbye and told me for the billionth time how to use the food dispenser, and not to forget to turn the solars on. They are going on a tour of the Old Landscapes. They're historians, and that means everything in our house is historic too. Old chairs, old paintings, old gadgets, and collectibles. We even have a sink! I like it. It makes me feel like an Earthen.
(Long story really short, my people are descended from the humans who were brave enough to venture to Mars, but years and years and years later, we came back to find that there were only a few Earthens left. We tried to help them, to heal them. But, they all died. Every one of them. Except the one in my living room.)

"Camber?"
I pull my eyes away from the sleeping woman's hypnotic breathing.
"Why don't you cover it up, or something?" My friend Lux says, standing at the edge of the living room, her feet rooted to the ground. I smile. Lux is terrified of the woman in the box.
"Because," I pause, thinking about it. "Because, I think she'd be lonely," I say.
Lux doesn't stay long. She and I play around with my projector, making shadow mustache's on Earthen art, and I think she's forgotten about the woman. But, when we eat our food packs, she continues to glance over her shoulder at the case until she mumbles something about homework and rushes off. I don't mind that Lux doesn't like the sleeping woman. Perhaps I would find her scary too if I hadn't grown up with her.

It wasn't until late that night, the eve of an old Earthen holiday called Christmuse, that I noticed something strange. Yes, it was very late. Yes, I ate close to ten A.M. food packs, but I know what I saw.

My head was bobbing as I sat slumped in the armchair watching the holovision. Flakes of snow cast shadows on the wall, like dozens of shadow fairies, (something I love about Earth is the seasons! There are four of them!) I followed one with my eyes as it danced down the wall, over the couch, and onto the sleeping woman's face.

That's when I froze.

The woman in the box. There was something different about her. Something very different. I squinted. In the dark, her hair looked dull, her clothes pale. Her chest rose and fell as it always had, but then I saw it. Her mouth. She was... smiling. A small smile, yeah, but she was smiling. I jumped up and tripped over the chair. My mind felt numb. I always imagined what it'd be like if she woke up, the things I'd ask her. But now, I just felt… scared. I didn't have time to think about it though, because no sooner did I stand up, than a hissing noise fill the room and the top of the case slide in on itself like one of those elveator doors. I think I screamed, but let's pretend I didn't. I know I stood there, rooted to the spot like Lux. A sort of mist dissipated from around the woman, and I could see her face clearly for the first time in my life. You could've heard my heart beating from the street. She was still, so still. Her white hair was long and twisty, her lips a purplish red. Nothing happened. She didn't move a micrometer. I looked at her clothing. She was dressed in jeans and a sweater that I was pretty sure was made of actual animal fur. Snowflake shadows twirled over her face, and as if they tickled her awake, her eyelids began to flutter. Okay, I admit it, I started to panic. I stepped back to the wall, hiding behind the solar lamp (not my best hiding place, I know.)

Her silver eyebrows fell into a frown.

"Oh…" she spoke. She actually spoke. Then, she coughed, "My mouth is so dry," She blinked, staring at the ceiling, swallowing millennia of dust bits. I considered running for it, but I honestly couldn't move. I was transfixed by her. Then, like a spring from a box, she sat up with a woosh, and looked right at me. All I could think was that her eyes were green. I'd always wondered what they'd be. Earthen's had a high rate of brown I think, but I'd dreamed of blue.

"Um… Hello," she said.

Imagine if your pet or your favorite doll just stood up and started talking to you. Something that you've known for a long time, but that's never known you. Now multiply that by one hundred. That's how I felt.

"H-hello," I stuttered from behind the solar lamp's pole.

"Sorry," she spoke with a strange accent. (If you're wondering how I could understand her, all students have to learn Old Earthen, A.K.A the single most boring subject I've ever taken. Now, I wish I'd paid closer attention. I hate it when school comes in handy.) "Could I have a glass of water, please?" she said.

"H-have at it ," I said in a tone at least two octaves higher than usual. I was actually afraid I was going to faint, "The kitchen…" I pointed weakly to it. The woman lifted her legs over the edge of her case and stood. She was taller than I'd expected. That is, until she fell over, sending an end table flying.

"Sorry! It's been a while," she pulled the table upright again, adjusting the now broken petals of mother's onyx mechrose. Then, she used the wall to stand again. She began bandy-legging to the kitchen, but I stayed in the living room, too shocked to move. The sleeping woman. She'd woken up! What would Lux say? What would my parents say? I watched the woman search through the cupboards. They would probably tell me she was dangerous. But they weren't there. I was. So, I followed after the woman, who had given up searching the cupboards and had placed her head under the faucet, gulping water.

"Yes, hello!" I said again, sounding stupid. "I've been waiting for you to wake up for ages!" She came up for air, the tip of her nose dripping.

"You? Waiting for me? What ever for?" she said, the wrinkles around her eyes deepening. I frowned too.
"Well, you've been asleep for a really long time, and I've been watching over you, I guess."
"Oh, I see. Are you a volunteer, then?" she said and then suddenly, her face darkened and her eyes darted to and fro as if she were seeing everything for the first time. "This isn't The Hold…" 

"No… It's my house," I answered. Without a word, she wobbled past me, looking up the staircase, out the windows, and up the chimney. She then began inspecting every inch of her case. I joined her, eager to see the inside.

M.