To the Future: Finish the Story Contest #43

This is an entry into finishthestory contest, run by @bananafish. Finishthestory is a collaborative story-writing exercise that takes place just about every week. This week the first part of the story, Sharp Clouds in Eden, was written by @f3nix. The second half, To the Future, represents my effort to pick up the story where @f3nix leaves off. This story was so visual and so rich with background that I found it hard to confine myself to the 500 word limit. However, I think I made it, pretty closely. Here goes, the blended story-telling of @f3nix and @agmoore.

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Sharp Clouds in Eden

by @f3nix

As the seasons went on, she had not yet accustomed to that sight.

The expanse of clouds unfurled just beyond the edge of the plateau like a harmonious and yet restless carpet, woven from ranks of industrious angels. Only the blue condor, curious to taste the rarefied ozone flavor, occasionally tried to pierce the milky diaphragm.

An unnamed and timeless plateau. It had always belonged to that celestial ocean, cradled by its waves like the head of a gigantic primeval tortoise, asleep for thousands of years.

The woman sat absorbed on the black basalt edge. Lying on her knees stood a tablet with elusive colors. Her tapered fingers danced over it decidedly, following the counterpoint of secret music. A warm upward current ruffled her thick brown hair until she was forced to give in and stop the dance, hastily moving the curls from her forehead.

She procrastinated, holding back her knowledge on the tips of those solitary fingers that, slowing down, now left room for memories. Now the memories were transmuting, stretching in long meditating axons, which she watched parading before her eyes at the capricious rhythm of the clouds.

The plateau had no name and, at the same time, kept all the names, including those that she wanted to forget.

The fingertips resumed drumming on the iridescent surface of the tablet to stop almost immediately. As always, before even hearing him approach, she had felt his eyes on the back of her head.

"I'm almost done, Heitor." It was not true, but she tried to comfort her husband as her fingers flew frantically, receiving small luminous epiphanies from the device.

“Debes beber, mi amor. Al menos esto.” He sat close and gently pushed forward the cup of muña until the mint's scent convinced her to stop and take a couple of quick sips. Hidden among the gestures of daily care, she could not ignore a note of concern in her husband's voice.

"We were fine here until it lasted, weren't we?" The words came out crumpled, making their way slowly through the wood of thoughts. He raised an asymmetric smile and winked at her the way she used to like.

Her distinctive wrinkle of concentration formed between her eyes, two delicious hazelnut drops, while she sighed.

"You know it does not help us, mi vida. I'll join you as soon as I can." At that moment, the importance of what she had to do was the perfect alibi not to raise her gaze on him. She silently kept repeating to herself that this wasn't a goodbye.

The vibrating bark of the imperial ship came suddenly. As it emerged, the clouds frayed around the cobalt metal frigate like impotent fingers, in the last desperate attempt to hold back a blind, deep-water fish.

She watched her husband run back to the house, as planned.

"Let the show begin, bastards." She thought while the ship's jaws already spewed out a black phalanx, heading at a steady pace in the direction of the woman.

"Kalliska Pan, Imperial Master Grower, you're under arrest on evidence of desertion and high treason. Do not resist and follow us spontaneously or I will not hesitate to order coercive measures against you. "

"The Empire has no sovereignty over this soil. Be careful what you do, Colonel. "

"Master Grower, you have lost all diplomatic immunity. I repeat: do not resist. "

"I know the reason for your visit, Colonel. And I regret having to point out that you are not in the position to order anything. We could save time if you left your pathetic bluff right away. "

In an abrupt gesture toward the guards, the black leather of the colonel's glove stood out against the diaphanous sky. "You all. Back to the ship now."

The warm upward current strengthened, making the imperial frigade's hull resound like a grim stork. They were alone. She held the Colonel's stare.

"There's still time to fix this, Kal .."

"Since long already you have lost any right to call me like that, Musashi"

While even the clouds seemed to stop, the fingers of the Master Grower continued to dance.

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To the Future

by @agmoore

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"Master Grower, it's time to go." A command, not the invitation Colonel yearned to offer. She had been sent into exile for insurgency. But a way back was now open to her. Because the Grain Authority needed her skills.

"Give me time to collect myself?" she asked. Thick in her voice was the presumption that he would want to oblige.

The past hung over their conversation. It was as compelling as the battleship that loomed on the lifeless basalt plateau.

"Remember the terms," he cautioned. "Resistance will bring destruction to this colony. Everyone in it, every worthless insurgent, will meet the end they should have received years ago."

It was important that he not know she had married. It would be dangerous to arouse his jealousy. She had met Heitor in exile. Since there was no contact between earth and the colony, the Colonel could not possibly be aware of the marriage.

"Come, we must go." He was impatient. A man of his stature should not be kept waiting.

He reached for her arm. She recoiled.

"Surely, Colonel, you and I are beyond such a gesture. Is there not room for grace in what must happen between us?"

A calculated reference to a particular moment, to the night they had consummated their love affair. He declared then, in the throes of passion, "I feel as though all the grace in the universe has been gathered and given to us."

Her allusion to grace had the intended effect. He pulled back sharply. The promise implicit in her rebuke stirred a long-simmering desire.

Meanwhile, out of view, beneath the cover of her shop smock, her fingers worked at the tablet. She needed to finish the code before she boarded the battleship. This code would thwart the Grain Authority's scheme to seize control of the world's wheat supply.

All their bright geneticists, working round the clock, had not been able to create a perfect strain of wheat that could dominate the market. Her resistance to this plan had led to her exile.

But without her, their Master Grower, they were unable to achieve their goal. And so she was recalled.

She agreed to return, because that was the only way to defeat them. Her tablet would carry a discrete bit of malware, undetectable except by the cleverest of coders. Most of these had also been banished by the Grain Authority.

The Colonel was growing suspicious about her delay.

A few more strokes. Almost finished...the last string complete....hit it...

Enter.

"O.K. I'm ready".

They searched her as she boarded the ship, and confiscated the tablet. They hooked it up to the mainframe to learn its contents.

Perfect. Now the code would be downloaded. The mainframe would bring the corrupted program back to earth. It would connect with the network in the Grain Authority and the infection would spread.

How long before they learned that the way forward was hopeless? Would she be implicated? Perhaps not.

As she watched the exile colony fade from view she whispered to Heitor, across the yawning space, "A nuestro futuro, mi amor".

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