Alpha Centauri
By Brian Biswas
It was just a short hop from there to Alpha Centauri. I approached on a beam of light and was amazed by the grandeur of the galaxy which unfolded before my eyes: blue planets, gold planets, blue and gold planets, planets shrouded in mist, naked planets, gaseous stars, compact stars, giant stars, stars giving birth to stars, stars spiraling into stars, dark clouds of dust and debris. I came to rest on one of these planets and found it not unlike my own Earth, or rather, an Earth from long ago. I saw green fields and tall pine trees that swayed in a humid breeze. Gently rolling hills dotted with red-and-white wildflowers off in the distance. There were clouds in the sky but they were lime-green in color and translucent, unlike any I had seen before. Two suns were overhead--circling each other in a deadly embrace--their disks of a golden hue, and I recalled that this sector of the galaxy was home to several binary star systems, into one of which I must have ventured. Swarms of yellow butterflies rose before me and I followed them for nearly a mile over a winding dirt trail to a waterfall that overlooked a magnificent valley. I saw no creatures of any kind in the valley and it was then I realized how deadly silent it was out here in this no-man’s-land on a planet in a binary-star system of the galaxy Alpha Centauri. And I was overcome with grief. Alas, this planet was long dead. A land of nevermores. But--no!--even then I was mistaken. Off in the distance something was moving. I saw a dust cloud rising up and a line of horses led by a woman on an Arabian stallion making its way towards a ring of fire. A holy caravan on its way to one of the pyramids of Ishtar. I shielded my eyes from the light of the blinding suns and the image vanished. Sadly, it had been but an illusion. Or rather the memory of an illusion for at that moment I realized this was an image from Earth’s past, when the planet was young and teaming with life and death was an unknown word.
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Brian Biswas has been published in the United States as well as internationally. His most recent publications are in Weirdyear, Cafe Irreal, and Iconoclast, He lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina with his wife and two children. You can read more of his work at http://www.brianbiswas.com
By Brian Biswas
It was just a short hop from there to Alpha Centauri. I approached on a beam of light and was amazed by the grandeur of the galaxy which unfolded before my eyes: blue planets, gold planets, blue and gold planets, planets shrouded in mist, naked planets, gaseous stars, compact stars, giant stars, stars giving birth to stars, stars spiraling into stars, dark clouds of dust and debris. I came to rest on one of these planets and found it not unlike my own Earth, or rather, an Earth from long ago. I saw green fields and tall pine trees that swayed in a humid breeze. Gently rolling hills dotted with red-and-white wildflowers off in the distance. There were clouds in the sky but they were lime-green in color and translucent, unlike any I had seen before. Two suns were overhead--circling each other in a deadly embrace--their disks of a golden hue, and I recalled that this sector of the galaxy was home to several binary star systems, into one of which I must have ventured. Swarms of yellow butterflies rose before me and I followed them for nearly a mile over a winding dirt trail to a waterfall that overlooked a magnificent valley. I saw no creatures of any kind in the valley and it was then I realized how deadly silent it was out here in this no-man’s-land on a planet in a binary-star system of the galaxy Alpha Centauri. And I was overcome with grief. Alas, this planet was long dead. A land of nevermores. But--no!--even then I was mistaken. Off in the distance something was moving. I saw a dust cloud rising up and a line of horses led by a woman on an Arabian stallion making its way towards a ring of fire. A holy caravan on its way to one of the pyramids of Ishtar. I shielded my eyes from the light of the blinding suns and the image vanished. Sadly, it had been but an illusion. Or rather the memory of an illusion for at that moment I realized this was an image from Earth’s past, when the planet was young and teaming with life and death was an unknown word.
- - -
Brian Biswas has been published in the United States as well as internationally. His most recent publications are in Weirdyear, Cafe Irreal, and Iconoclast, He lives in Chapel Hill, North Carolina with his wife and two children. You can read more of his work at http://www.brianbiswas.com
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