Chapter 11
Making Rearrangements
During Seymore’s nap Fred returned to sit at the spot where Sarah had last stood. He was facing the door and not moving at all. Seymore had never seen this kind of response to loss in an animal and was both touched and worried about the cat’s wellbeing. He didn’t know what do to, but went over and stroked Fred’s head, gave him a softly spoken pep talk and went through to the office.
As he passed through the library he noticed that Geralty was bent over his journal and notes apparently working on his history of the station and probably making his owns plans and designs for its future; just as he should be. He’d check with him later about what he’d accomplished.
Mesa was in the office but had returned to being just the magic desk and he sat down to begin his own version of the future of Seymore Place. Looking down the lane out the window he decided that his first undertaking would be to expand the cottage to accommodate what needed to be done and provide for everyone’s comfort for the long term. He was becoming accustomed to idea of being at the station and thought less about returning to Middle Mind.
In his mental planning he decided to provide a good space for Geralty and expand his own study into the area facing the alder woods. He would take most of what was now the study and make it into a larger entry for the dome and include a wide hall. He decided to remove the wall between the present office and the library and make it an extra wide entry with pocket doors and to move the big window that looked out to the dome so that there was a better view into the dome and the expanded walkway and entry.
Mesa remained as her dazzling table so he continued his architectural planning. He thought that rearranging the cottage was a good place to start working directly with Geralty so he went back to the library and motioned for Geralty to join him at the oak table. When Geralty was seated, Seymore began, “Geralty, I think we need to make some big changes to the layout of the cottage before we give Mesa the go ahead to make it permanent. I need a bigger study and you will need a space that is to your liking. There needs to be an atrium for the dome that’s attached to the cottage and I think the office near the dome needs more light. What do you think?”
“I agree that some expansion is a good idea. Could we also make a sitting room on the front of the office where Mesa is the lovely desk? I think that’s a good place for it as there would be a nice view of the meadow. We could spiff up the grounds around the dome and add some landscaping too. It’s extra work on top of an already big job, but in for a penny in for a pound. I learned that from Sarah.” He smiled widely and Seymore responded with a soft chuckle.
Seymore had an intuition. “Geralty, do you know how to draw up plans. Nothing fancy, just a rough rendering that we can show to Mesa to see if she has any suggestions and to make sure that we don’t overburden her stabilizing techniques.” He smiled at his little joke, which Geralty missed, as Mesa could undoubtedly stabilize anything if she put her mind to it. Geralty said he could do that and Seymore produced a few large sheets of graph paper. Geralty’s look of disbelief brought Seymore up short. He had forgotten that the station was created before Geralty arrived and he had no clue that he was a terraformer.
Seymore quickly reassured Geralty and apologized for catching him by surprise. He realized that he needed to start now to provide Geralty with a full explanation of everything that had happened before his arrival and the nature of the project overall. He began at Middle Mind and even told him about Psyche’s visit, the Units of Energy and how he adopted Fred. Geralty sat in rapt attention, still and silent, eyes wide doing his best to take it all in.
When he was finished, Seymore asked, “Do you think it’s a good idea to include everything you have just learned in his history of Seymore Place?” Geralty at first looked surprised that Seymore knew about his journal, but then realized that nothing would slip by a personality of many parts such as Seymore.
He simply nodded and said, “I’ll be glad to include it and I would like for you to read it when it’s done.” And with that he stood and said he had things to do and would see Seymore later. He reached out his hand and Seymore gladly shook it. The pact was made. Geralty had a position and Seymore had a protégé.
Seymore returned to the office where Mesa remained as the lovely desk. Seymore wondered if she was even present in the table. He waited for a few minutes, called her name and asked a few questions, but no materializing occurred. He had never known Mesa to leave without saying something. He glanced out the big window toward the dome and its surroundings. He didn’t see Mesa, but he realized that Geralty was right: the field was weedy and unkempt. He decided to go out to the area and look around to get some ideas about exactly what kind of improvements to make.
He passed through the library where Geralty was fully engaged in drawing up the plans Seymore had outlined, went out the double doors and around to the field. Last time he had been here he was with Sarah when they experimented with the misty watchers inside the dome. He thought about their experiments and decided to retrace their path around the dome’s edge. As he reached the edge he began slowly walking and savoring the pleasant memory. To his surprise a small blurry clot of light formed to follow him. He couldn’t believe it. Sarah’s white light had definitely departed; he saw it with his own eyes. But The Watcher had remained.
He continued on for a ways and then abruptly turned around and retraced his steps, this time with fast long strides. The small fuzzy blob didn’t miss a beat. Amazing!
What did this mean? Seymore had lots of think about. He stood still for a moment collecting his thoughts and leaned with his hands on the foundation ledge where Fred had sat the last time he was here.
He felt something under his hand and he moved it to see what it was. It was Sarah’s small silver ring. His knees nearly buckled. His hand was shaking as he carefully picked up the delicate jewelry, looked at it closely and then enclosed it tightly in his fist. It was like he had received a treasure, a gift, of great value.
He looked straight into the dome and then stepped backward a few steps. As he did the foggy eye moved from side to side a few times and then blended back into the atmosphere of the dome as his distance from the edge increased. That atmosphere must also be a remnant of the great white light, Seymore thought. But why had it stayed behind?
His mind overflowed with trying to ferret out what had happened to leave light behind and coupled with the joy of finding Sarah’s ring he completely forgot about beautifying the area around the dome. It would remain a Weedy Field. What he didn’t know was that as he was walking around the dome, Mesa was on her own dome tour from a completely different perspective.
Mesa had watched Seymore and Fred resting in the big leather chair long enough to know they were both upset and grieving and would probably doze long enough for her to make another trip to the underside of the dome. She did tell Geralty that she was going and he, without hesitation, said he would take care of everything while she was gone. As she left she smiled and noted that his new confidence was really taking hold.
For this trip she chose an image that was agile but tougher all around. She morphed into a large, sturdy black crow. Pleased with her new projection, she headed at crow speed to the outer boundary of Seymore Place and over the edge to the underside. What she saw was pretty astounding. There was a large collection of glistening white light clinging to the underside of the dome. It was much smaller than before Sarah left, but it was still impressive.
She had to make a choice quickly, either keep going across to the other edge of ES360 or enter the dome as there was no place for a crow to land. She bravely chose to fly into the light and up into the dome. It was blinding and she couldn’t tell where she was. She flew around a while in a big circle. The light seemed to have no reaction at all, no motion, no flashing, nothing. She couldn’t tell where the actual dome structure was and was gradually losing all sense of direction. She d
ecided she was in over her head and needed to leave. But how? She flew a few more loops and then realized that to get out she would have to stop moving and hope that she would drop like a stone. She knew that the station had its own gravity, but didn’t know if it extended to the light. She would simply have to stop flying and see what happened.
As soon as she pulled her wings into the sides of her body she began to plummet downward very fast and was out of the light in no time but was ruffled and rattled from the escape. She carefully extended her tattered wings and gradually began to glide away from the light and toward the rim of Seymore Place. She flapped her wings as best she could, but she had so many broken feathers it was not easy to gain control. Finally she made it to the outer edge and landed.
She had plenty to tell Seymore. She flew off slow and low to the alder wood where she landed in the small clearing, changed into the lovely woman with wings and made her way to the cottage.
She landed at the double doors just as Seymore was walking back up the pathway from the Weedy Field. Seymore instantly asked her, “Where are you flying in from?” He was smiling, but she sensed he was not his normal self and possibly a little peevish.
She decided to just state the facts and go from there, “I’ve been to the dome to have a look around.” Seymore looked surprised, smiled and said, “Really? Me too.”
They both fell silent digesting their parallel news, opened the double doors, greeted the industrious Geralty and went on to the office. They stood together for a few moments looking out the big window at the dome, turned to look at each other and then each took a place at the magic table. Neither spoke nor seemed to know where to begin.
They were saved from having to continue by Geralty who came in and announced. “I’ve finished the rough draft of the plans and would like for you to go over them.”
Seymore, grateful for the interruption, enthused, “Oh good, I’d like to see them right away. Mesa, come with us to see the changes in the cottage I’ve outline.” They all moved into the library and stood around the table as Geralty presented his renderings and gave a summary of the new plans as he pointed to the various elements and expanded on how they would be improvements. It was an excellent presentation and both Seymore and Mesa spoke their enthusiasm for the results.
Seymore turned to Mesa and asked, “Is there anything that you would like to add or change and is there anything that might interfere with your stabilization of the station?”
Mesa sat down at the table with the plans and asked a few questions and concluded, “There were no problems in these plans at all and they are a splendid improvement for now and the long run.” She grinned at Geralty, congratulated him, and nodded her approval to Seymore, who was also pleased. He added to Mesa’s endorsement, “Thank you for your good and speedy work, Geralty. You can leave the drawings here and I take them with me when I ready to make the changes and expansions.
Geralty smiled and turned to his makeshift desk among the specimens and Seymore and Mesa returned to the office. As they sat down, Mesa began, “I went to the underside of Seymore Place to see what might have changed now that the great light has departed. I was very surprised to see that a large residual of light remains, fills the dome and extends below and under the edge for a good distance; not like before, but still quite impressive. It is very still and inside it is so brilliant that it is blinding. It was quite a trip.”
Seymore looked her over and said, “You don’t seem any the worse for it.” She laughed and said, “I’m fine, but it will be a while before I can use my crow presentation again. It took a beating on the way out.” Seymore joined her laughter and replied, “I didn’t know you could be a bird! ”Mesa just smiled. Seymore still had a lot to learn about Mercurial beings.
Seymore told her about wanting to check the field for landscaping and his walk around the outer edge of the dome. He frowned and recounted, “The small cloudy eye remains in the dome and it followed me like before. I don’t know what or who The Watcher is. Do you have any ideas? Mesa assured him that to all appearances the inside of the dome was empty of everything except the brilliant light. They both fell silent and thoughtful, looked up and stared at each other. Seymore finally said, “I have believed for a while that the light is alive and I guess this proves it.” Mesa added, “We’ll need to think about this as it means that whatever we plan from now on we will want to consider the needs of the dome resident if The Watcher remains.”
Seymore didn’t mention Sarah’s ring. It was now safely tucked into his pocket and he intended to keep it there until he knew exactly what to do about it. Sarah would no doubt miss it, perhaps she already had, and probably would have no memory of what had happened to it. He vacillated among his options. Should he tell Mesa and Geralty? Could he just keep the ring for now and decide later? Should he find a way to get it back to her? He decided to keep the ring and decide later. His choice was partly selfish he knew, but he liked having the ring in his pocket. It was comforting. Maybe he’d show it to Fred who could use some comforting. Fred would keep his secret since he couldn’t talk.