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June 6, 2005

Volume 2, Issue 6

Large version of this aurora can be found here.

One man's aurora is another's something else entirely.

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Every 25 million years, the impartial God breaks through to grant the requests of a selected few. Most ask for great wealth, a few immortality (be careful what you wish for). Very rare are those who actually ask for world peace. Strangely they often find to their horror -- and God's great amusement -- that they are the butterfly stirring up the world's storms. Peace comes only with their quite messy removal.

Gary asked only to be able to turn, at will, into an energy being of unsurpassable beauty. His roommate Dave wished he'd use it for more than picking up chicks.

Posted by: marc at June 6, 2005 6:19 AM · Permalink

Dusk. We’ve come from the fields, washing up at the handpump. The women have been cooking on the outdoor stove. Grandma lights the coal oil lamps. We tuck into the food sitting out under the green-tinged summer night sky. Grandpa refuses to look up.

“I ‘member the first night of that damned goblin’ light. Even have a picture of it hovering over the bay …” Grandpa's voice hitches, “I ‘member television, radios, computers …”

“Pops,” Dad’s voice is calm, “It’s alien but it's here to stay. We’re never getting back electricity.”

“…the day the cars stopped and planes fell from the sky.”

Posted by: Darleen at June 6, 2005 6:51 AM · Permalink

The aurora flashed across the sky in an unusually vivid display, and people stood on rooftops and in fields to see it. Its beauty concealed the harm it inflicted on communications.

In a tunnel deep beneath the street, six men carried gold bars from a blasted vault and loaded them into a van in a sublevel parking garage. The last bar aboard, they drove up the ramp and into the night.

“I’m sorry, Commissioner. They got away. I couldn’t see the Signal because of the aurora.”

“Damn it, Batman, why can’t you just use a cell phone like everybody else?”

Posted by: ErnieG at June 6, 2005 7:00 AM · Permalink

"Yea, I know, I see it too.." The words trailed off into space and scatter and I mumbled something about hold on and put down the phone.

Last time I saw it I was about 6 and I was terrified that the world was about to end. Only that one was smaller and kind of pulsated and it wasn't the end of the world for anyone except that fat racoon.

This time I'm starting to think I might be ready to wonder again, because no size racoon could make this big and we don't get auroras around these parts.

Hm.

Posted by: hayner at June 6, 2005 7:06 AM · Permalink

Ok, so that big green curtain thing in the sky wasn't there last night. But the two red lights on the left were. What about the lone red light in the distance, near the center of the photo? Pretty sure that was there too. Then there's the little yellow light near the exact center of the strip of land, which I thing comes from Lindy's boathouse. That the stars seem brighter than normal is probably due to the long exposure. I don't see anything unusual about the water; it does reflect the green curtain thing. So it's not a vampire.

Posted by: Dave at June 6, 2005 7:22 AM · Permalink

He had always wondered what it would look like.

Of course, the smart money had favored a blinding white light. This was something else entirely. This warm, green light reached out as if to touch him. It was not a pure light; instead, it was deep and messy. It was a rich as loam.

Coleridge beamed unbidden through his mind (a spring of love gushed through my heart) before the light enveloped him. He suddenly understood that everyone had been right, and everyone had been wrong. He wished that he had one phone call, just so he could tell them.

Posted by: Hubris at June 6, 2005 7:31 AM · Permalink

"Can't you wear make-up anymore? Make yourself presentable?" With that, he tossed a crushed silver bullet to the floor, and slammed the door behind him.

Something in her snapped this time. She'd had enough of victimhood. Pity. Instead, a new feeling.

From the pit of her stomach, she felt it rise. Bits of anger, disgust. Hate. Mostly rage. Unstoppable and all consuming, it filled her body until it was most certainly about to burst. But, it spread beyond her skin, continuing to grow. A sick green light radiating outward in ever increasing circles. Enveloping everything. Turning the air acrid. Uninhabitable.

Posted by: Carin at June 6, 2005 8:16 AM · Permalink

He wasn't really a doctor, even when he was practicing dentistry. But part of being in a band is getting to choose your own name.

And it wasn't the best band, really. The drummer had energy (and hair) to spare. The saxiphonist could barely remember who he was, let alone what he was playing. The guitarist was okay, and the lead singer looked nice enough you could forgive her accent. But the doctor; he could make the keyboard do magic.

He could play down polar atmospheric phenomena as his private laser light show, even down in Texas.

Can you picture?

Posted by: Jeff R. at June 6, 2005 8:25 AM · Permalink

He had been traveling a long time to get here, and he was looking forward to what he would find. All the guidebooks had been very specific, there was a lot of negative energy released in this area. He settled down to find out for himself, and immediately began to feel the flow coursing through him. Hatred, anger, death, destruction, the enmity of a thousand wars poured into him, renewing, recharging, refreshing, as his light grew brighter and brighter. It took but moments, as he knew time, to absorb that which he needed to move on to his next stop.

Posted by: hnumpah at June 6, 2005 8:28 AM · Permalink

Jeff R., that's genius.

(Aurora Borealis always brings that to my mind, too.)

Posted by: Keiran Halcyon at June 6, 2005 8:38 AM · Permalink

He winked and smiled at the 20-something redhead.

I watched them from a park bench, he and the woman who held his hand defensively.

I saw her grip tighten and a myriad of emotions cross her face like sunlight passing through clouds.

The redhead smiled back and moved on. He looked back at her retreating backside and I could see his mouth making silent assessment of the view.

I watched the woman with him, waiting... Then it appeared, that bright green aura, glowing, pulsating, emanating from her like a cloud threatening to envelope everything around her.

I love people watching.

Posted by: Minet at June 6, 2005 9:16 AM · Permalink

I'll second that. Jeff R, that's awesome.

Posted by: Tanya at June 6, 2005 9:40 AM · Permalink

Wow, yes. Jeff R = BRILLIANT.

A hint for those who may not get it:

aurora borealis
shining down on dallas
can you picture that?

Posted by: michele at June 6, 2005 9:47 AM · Permalink

Standing alone in the dark, the city sprawled beneath him, ocean to desert, mountain to horizon. Pocket-book - empty but for useless ATM card and redundant ID - lay at his feet: he would need it no more. Kevin McGurk could go hang. Ali Shazaam, his conjuring alter, thrown-out of Magic Castle with a scowl and no tip; Ali Shazaam could go dangle too. Now he was Malco Malificent. Raising his arms, whispering, muttering stories to the wind, the dead, the condemned, gathered about him. Purpose beckons.

Posted by: Fcb at June 6, 2005 10:59 AM · Permalink

“God, please, no…” he whispered to himself, as he watched the putrid green light shimmer and roll across the Washington D.C. sky, while an almost inaudible crunch sound accompanied each pulse. “This can’t be happening. It was just a joke.”

If only he’d kept his mouth shut. If only…

But his enemies didn’t see it that way. And they had promised revenge. Their first act of retaliation had overwhelmed the White House staff. And now, they’d upped the ante, taking over the very sky itself.

Right then, President Bush vowed he’d never again piss off the broccoli growers of America.

Posted by: copygodd at June 6, 2005 11:32 AM · Permalink

Well, I know what DVD I'm watching when I get home.

Thanks, Jeff R. Well done.

Posted by: Laurence Simon at June 6, 2005 12:31 PM · Permalink

Throughout time a memory that stays with you, if you are from the right place, is a late night walk with your grandfather. Mine is always of an icy cold night far from civilization through the trees. I am not too concerned with where we are going. I am concentrating on walking, when he says look up. A slam of the door brings me back to the present. Out comes Peter breath puffing in the air, “I got five hundred megawatts off this last go!". "You know if two thousand of you did that it would not be visible?" "Yea"

Posted by: Blaine at June 6, 2005 1:56 PM · Permalink

Boudreaux drives me down to the docks, we get in his boat and he heads off down the bayou.

“Man, I tell you, this is the night for it,” he says in that deep Cajun accent. “You gon’ see sumpthin special for sure.” But he won’t tell me what.

He turns off the motor and we sit in the dark listening to the plaintive shrill of cicadas. The air is still and damp and smells like sewage.

Boudreaux flicks a match off the box, high into the air. The vaporous glow of burning swamp gas can be seen for miles.

Posted by: Jim Parkinson at June 6, 2005 4:01 PM · Permalink

It had been a long, productive day, but the young author wasn't ready yet for bed. She walked down to the lake that glittered next to the Gulch. Above her, floating gentle, giant and serene, an aurora glowing like Reardon Metal wrapped in money.

Someday, she thought, someday we will control you too. Someday, you will be brought down below us and made useful and it will be wonderful.

She hugged herself, basking for a moment in the idea, then decided that was enough idle time and walked back to her cabin.

Yes, sir. She was in Mary Sue heaven.

Posted by: marc at June 6, 2005 4:38 PM · Permalink

The door to the toliet hissed open, and quickly closed, but not nearly quickly enough.

"Jeez Sergei! What did you eat? Rotten borsht?"

"Nyet James", he replied with his usual smirk. "Its my superior Russian digestive system my friend."

"Well warn a guy next time, I nearly tossed my cookies! Haven't you heard? Gas was banned by the Geneva convention."

Loud laughter echoed delightly down the corridors of the international space station.

James was suddenly struck with a horrifying thought....What was he going to do when there was no longer enough spare air to vent the toliet atmosphere to space?

Posted by: Gahrie at June 6, 2005 4:50 PM · Permalink