The Transcension of the Naturals — Chapter 6: Borealis
A science fiction novel set in Berkeley 100 years in the future
“Isn’t it awfully hot today?” asked Teanna. Julia found herself on the shore of a lake, standing near Teanna and her sister Maddy, and realized this was Teanna’s dream, which instantly snapped her into a lucid dream. The three of them were standing on the beach looking out over the water.
It dawned on Julia that something was wrong with the Sun — it was so much larger and hotter than normal, and the Sun seemed blindingly bright. Maddy started walking slowly towards the lake, and when she got to the edge she turned around and said ‘Come on in Julia, the water’s fine.” Teanna followed her in and disappeared into the water behind Maddy.
It was so hot out that Julia tried to follow Teanna into the cool lake too, but her feet were stuck in the burning sand and she could not take a single step. She tried to yell out ‘Wait!’, but no words would come out of her mouth. She fought and struggled and tried to jump out of the sand but she could not budge and no sound escaped her lips.
Julia tried to wake herself up, but could not. She looked up at the Sun and saw it was getting brighter, and even hotter outside. Up in the sky, Julia saw thin blue-green tendrils of color streaking through the sky, coming from the North, and she recognized this as the Aurora Borealis. As the colors whipped through the sky in a mesmerizing way, Julia found herself staring up at the intricate swirling colors, when a purple tendril of color shot down right out of the sky and struck her like a bolt of lightning, entering right through her heart chakra. At that very moment, she felt a nameless foreign presence enter her heart, a Colour Out of Space.
Julia finally awoke in a jolt and found herself standing next to her bed, very much awake, very much trembling, feeling oddly violated. She felt something inside her, injected by that purple tendril of energy, centered somewhere around her heart. Something foreign.
Trying to shake it off, she walked into her bathroom where she splashed water on her face and stared at herself in the mirror for a long moment. Her reflection stared right back, looking just like her, yet still someone oddly different was staring back at her in the mirror. She couldn’t shake the feeling of jamais vu — the feeling that the familiar was now foreign — as she walked over to the kitchen to start her morning routine.
She was deep in thought making coffee when Tynee called her on the Augmentarium, the sound jolting her back to reality. “Hi Jules, hope I didn’t wake you up. I just had the strangest dream about Clark. Can I tell you about it?”
Without waiting for Julia to answer Tynee continued. “I was surfing right off Adeline Beach with Clark; we were both on this totally tubular curl when this freaky purple bolt of lightning came out of the sky and hit me and woke me right the fuck up. The funny thing is, I still feel like I got electrocuted, or something, like the dream was real in some way”
Julia’s eyes opened wide. “That is so weird. The same kind of thing happened to me last night, only my dream was so different. I feel like I was in someone else’s dream.”
“Whose dream were you in?” asked Tynee.
“I saw this great counselor at the eternity center after Clark Transcended, this woman named Teanna, and she told me about this dream she had about her sister after she transcended. You’d like her Tynee. I was in her dream. Maybe Clark’s transcension is affecting us more than we thought. Maybe we…”
Tynee interrupted, “Jules, let’s call it what it is. Clark didn’t transcend yesterday; he committed suicide. Clark is gone. We have to face that. Do you honestly think your brother is still alive and thriving somewhere? I wish he were smoking a joint of blue dream weed right now somewhere in their computer on an electric Adeline beach, but I don’t think that’s happening.”
“I don’t really know whether he is still alive in those computers or not, but as far as I’m concerned he might as well be dead — I’ll never see him again.”
“We have to do something about this Jules. This afternoon Charrington is speaking at the Berkeley Eternity Center, speaking out against transcendence. I think we should both go and support him and try to prevent other people like Clark from throwing their lives away. That’s the least I can do for my best friend. If I could stop just one more person from transcending, just one…”
“I don’t know Tynee, I’ll have to think about that. Clark was totally convinced it works and I’m not sure he’d like it if I fought against transcension, if he somehow could see what we’re doing.”
“Well you think about it Jules, and if you decide you want to go, let’s go together. I think I’m going to join the Berkeley Naturals too. It’s just a short speech, come join me, please?”
“Oh OK, I’ll go with you Tynee. It’ll be interesting to hear what Charrington has to say. I just don’t know whether I’m ready to be a card-carrying Natural just yet. How about if I pick you up at 11 and we’ll head over together?”
“Deal!” said Tynee enthusiastically.
Author’s note: As a science fiction fan I hid many easter eggs in this novel as hidden references to famous bits of science fiction throughout history. Did you catch the reference to H. P. Lovecraft?
