bee sting

From standing still, it hummed as the mighty heart of the beast began to work, driving it forward. From standing still, it began to roll down the long stretch of gravel at an incredible pace, within a matter of minutes. The atmosphere was calm, tinged with a hint of tension. To some people, no matter how many times they had done this, the act still brought them some fear and worry. Very few in the beast were new. A larger number than the uninitiated worried.

The beast jumped off the ground. He wondered now, not always, but he wondered how it jumped off. Bounced off, was it able to somehow look up and take off. He made a mental note to look that up when he got the chance. For now, his phone was in airplane mode.

He closed his eyes, a growing headache in his head. Soon he was asleep. His ears popped and he woke up transitioning from sleep to drowsy wakefulness almost immediately, but not with a jolt. The opposite rather. His body was so confused. It had been in and out of the air five times in the last forty eight hours. He was exhausted. He looked out the window, and they burst through the cloud ceiling. Swirling eddies of white soft clouds trailed the wings of the plane before drifting away into nothingness. Below them was a landscape with clouds as the only defining trait. Soft, snowing, ridges and rivulets. Streams of clouds. White, pure, untouched. Touched, yet still the same. A desert, he thought. It was beautiful. The sun beating lazily on the landscape. Not down, not looking down like it did on those who walked the earth and destroyed her beauty. Looking in, as if at the same level, as if taking a microscope to the clouds, like a jeweler appreciating the beauty of new jewels. He wrenched his eyes away from the beautiful sight, they returned. He ripped them away again, they wandered back. He stared at the sight, taking it all in. He wondered what it would be like to be outside. If he could live in that stratified air. What would it feel like, what would it smell like. Would the clouds feel like anything, or would he just walk through them like he did through mist on chilly winter mornings. Would he feel the wind? Was there any wind?

He took the sight in to his heart’s content, and when he looked away, his eyes did not struggle to look again. They would return every now and then, but just to refresh themselves with the sight. To take it in like a thirsty man in a desert gulps in water.

He was tired, he rubbed his eyes, then knuckles on his forehead massaging it. He picked up his book, an Agatha Christie novel, and began to read. Hopefully it would calm his mind enough to let him go to sleep. Hopefully. He felt a sting. He slapped a hand on his neck. A bee? Before he passed into subconsciousness, he realized that was not possible. Oh shit