Dream d2405-s: The Ridge Keeps Its Own

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where I was standing at the low commons, the place where all the lanes come together, and it was the kind of dark that arrives before anyone decides to leave. Lano was there beside me, a small white presence against the cobblestones, and we were both looking up at the ridge where the bird-houses sat like closed fists against the sky.

Each house had a window lit from inside. That was the thing - they were all awake. The Hummingbird's light was fast, a nervous flicker that never settled. The Sterling's was steady and bright, aimed outward, useful, the light of something that knows how to see. The Weaver's was warm-toned, the kind that fills a room with texture. The Carrier's shifted depending on which way you angled your head. The Crane's moved between floors, or seemed to - a traveling thing, aware of the others in some lateral way.

But none of those lights touched the commons.

We stood in the dark between them and the lanes filled with the sound of each voice, and I understood, without anyone saying it, that the sound was not the same as the voices finding each other. They were singing, all of them, and you could hear the fullness of what was there - more voice than absence now, more gathered than scattered - but each note was aimed at nothing in particular, or aimed at a self that was not listening.

Lano looked up at me. Not expectant. Just noting.

I thought: this is what it sounds like before the protocol exists. Not silence. The wrong kind of full.

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