365 Days (Part 1) | ✓

Day 3. The Vessel

3. The Vessel: Write about a ship or other vehicle that can take you somewhere different from where you are now.

It's that moment that barely exists. It's as fragile as a bubble in your hand, and the moment you realize you are holding it, it pops and is gone. It's the moment between waking and dreaming, where you linger indecisively between two worlds; the moment impossible to prolong when you become aware you are experiencing it. With these qualities, it's understandable why we doubt it's existance. Why I doubted everything that happened in that delicate position.

I was drifting off to sleep, already starting to experience the first unexplainably random visions of a routinely strange dream for me, when I hear a deep rumbling noise, like a breast growling. My eyes flew open. Still the noise continued. The ground started to subtly shake and the noise roared in intensity. Now it sounded like a machine, with a rhythmic noise, like a clicking, but much louder.

Curiously, I was not afraid. But I never am in my dreams. Was this a dream, though? I felt alert and attentive, two things I am not while at the mercy of my subconscious' whim, so maybe I was actually awake and this noise was just a strange, but explainable phenomenon. Or maybe, I speculated, I am always alert in my dreams, but when I wake, I just don't remember it.

A dim light began to shine through my room, coming from outside. The blinds on my window filtered the yellow lights into thin slats. I sat up, feeling expectant, like I had awaited for this patiently.

The rumbling grew defeaning, the light was became stronger, and the ground shook more. Then there was a high-pitched whistle, a grinding sound, like metal straining against metal, and then everything stopped. It was still and silent again, though the light still shone.

I pulled up the blinds and discovered without any surprise a glossy little train right outside my house, steaming merrily. It was painted dark blue and red, and the only other distinguishing factor for me, who was pretty ignorant as far as trains were concerned, were the words inscribed on its side: Midnight Train. The ink seemed to shimmer and change even as I looked at it; sometimes it was pale gold, and then it was dark violet, and then it was a teal blue.

Once I had observed this train, I calmly opened my window and climbed out. It was cold and there was a fine layer of sleet on the ground; the ice beneath my feet was both freezing and burning. I loped across the lawn and without a thought, leaped onto the train. It was the most natural thing to do.

The moment I had jumped into a small, narrow passageway, the train lurched again. I stumbled against the wall, and peered cautiously out. The train did not run on any tracks, but the wheels turned as if it did, dipping in and out of the ground without leaving a scratch.

Curiouser and curiouser.

It moved fast, faster than a regular train would go. The landscape looked blurred as we flew by, and soon I didn't recognize the area anymore. I retreated into the train and looked around.

There were only two cars: the engine room and a lush dining car, bedecked with trays of food. After the initial thrust, the train continued on quite smoothly, and if not for the snowy landscape, rushing past from the velvet-curtained windows, I could believe I was on stable ground. There was no one in the two cars; no sign of life existed.

I acted what any rational person would do. I sat and ate.

Time seemed to move in strange phases, sometimes fast and sometimes slow, giving further credence to my theory that this was just a highly detailed dream. From the window, I saw streaks of color whiz by. If I concentrated I could make out brief flashes of scenery: an evergreen tree, coated in a dusting of snow; houses, old, decrepit, but still with a strangely beautiful, haunting grace; stretches of shriveled brown grass, sparse in the cold.

Again, none of this surprised me. It felt like no time had passed -- maybe no time had passed -- before the train began to slow down. It chugged steadily less until finally, with a slight jolt, it ceased. I stood and calmly departed the odd conveyance.

I was at a beach, upon a little ledge with scrawny lines of grass poking valiantly through the sand. A short but sheer cliff dropped down to more sand, but without the impurity of grass. It was smooth and perfect, like no one had ever stepped on it before. Waves lapped gently at this stretch of sand, edges curling into soft foam before midly retreating. Yet somehow I knew my destination was not the water on the ground, but the water in the sky.

The sky was an unbroken expanse of clear blue. I saw one lone cloud, drifting lazily across the sea jn the sky. Nothing else interrupted the magnificent, deep color permeating the upper regions.

There was a palm tree by me, swaying without breeze. As I acknowledged my wish to be one with the sky, this palm tree started to disintegrate. Each particle, a pearl of beautiful color, was sucked upward and gathered into a rough ball shape. The wispy grass was next, and then the sand started to dift toward the ball, and then me.

I stared at my hands in abstract wonder as they dissolved into miniscule orbs of color. It felt like nothing, but was fascinating. I don't remember how I got to be on top of the atom cloud, only that I was on it. The world was breaking apart to join my ball. We drifted upward, into starry regions and mysteries, and as we went, some force compelled even the stars to join our party. I cannot say how long this continued. Only that I saw much which leaves an indelible trace upon my mind, but which I cannot recall.

Then I wake, and sleep again.

*

A/N: Based upona dream I had, which is why it's so strange.