Seaport 2035

a multi-authored online speculative fiction set in Royal Seaport Stockholm

2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
2027
2028
2029
2030
2031
2032
2033
2034
2035

Mark
Again with the commands? I’ll bark from my stomach. Ao Ao Ao

Ah please; domestic? Me? Who came running out of a blaze, yes into your arms, sure, but where else could I have gone? As for those rabbits, I’ll be extra loud, my small joy in a day! Now let me rant.



From the perspective of a cloud, she would appear as a small beige arrow triangle, slowly drifting along the walls, corners and towers erected from the ground. A modernist grid of silver, white and black -transparent but dark- reflecting glass, reflecting metal and to the reader drone; a model. South of the harbor, north of the radio tower – a set for the scenes to come play. The darkness keeps things on
hold and the firm sleeping concrete surrounding the streets +++ is nothing but markers on their route. Dog was running ahead of her, only recognisable as a black punctuation the tip of a pen and in motion a swirling doodle. When rescued from the summer fires of 2027, she had been spotted guarding a house, eaten away in flames – stubborn as a mule, free as a bird, but a true blue. Their nightly walks in the area had begun been introduced when the hole in the fence was discovered last spring. At the edge of the district unconscious Dog had turned and looked at her as if saying ‘your thoughts on this?’ Ever since, they had gotten all the more comfortable roaming the area, exploring the shrinking piles of junk and materials, looking at the block as it gradually assembled, picking poppies in the summer. Always having to keep a watching eye on that brave creature of hers, careful of the cameras love.



Oh, how would they know my name?



Upon turning a corner, at the one she quietly referred to as ‘the giant’ -where Dog always continues for the bushes- a deviating mark peculiar sighting appeared. Placed on double pallets, standing on the asphalt which was covered in shards of glass and grit, it almost seemed to have fallen from the sky or emerged through a violent explosion. Nearly 5 meters away from its assigned entrance in the south facade, they still related loud and clear. A trembling paper slip tucked halfway underneath the textile wrapping read: ’Tuscania Statuario’ and a signature by someone who’s writing she could not decode: 11:45 / 08.10.2029 receiver.



Glancing over the knife-sharp edges of the staircase, with grey veins entering and exiting the steps, she remembered a story she had read as a child, about an earthworm, grinding its way through stone – leaving miraculous little dark holes behind. At that time, she would sometimes imagine the liver coloured pieces of rope to be pulsating forward inside of pavements, headstones or polished kitchen counters – breathing the world through their skin. Devotedly carrying this one thing in mind: to plow the ground. Unlike the contractors, an earthworm gives a nutritious soil in return smell of birth and ground water instead of underground sensations and mirror walls. In retrospect she understands it was a simple book about reality and fiction, teaching one when to laugh and when to go with magic. She imagined the shoes to be walking up those levels, the sound of hard or soft soles and a slow, slow grinding wear it will need to move through. ‘Apples of gold in settings of silver, is a ruling rightly given’[1]… of course she thought, an ivory sculpture for the perfect maquette. Placing her right foot on the pallet and her left on the lower step laughter “Oh please, give them a brush and be careful with those lemons while you enter – impossible stains!”



wow, don’t lose it mama and what’s so interesting over there? It has no smell, no warmth, zero movement Solid; Solidly boring is what I say! I’m in a gap between the moment expiring and the one that is arising! Look! Luminous and empty while the real city falls through your mind in glittering pieces[2]. No! Come, come pee with me inside this bush, she is full of flowers![3]



Standing there, frozen between the ground floor and first step, she had this feeling of unbelonging – neither exclusion, nor longing but simply a ‘not here’ – it rooted in her. Looking to the sky for possible eyes, she realized Dog had gotten worryingly quiet. Reality is not for me – I need those dark little holes and badly so. When approaching her little garden, a rattling sound of twigs and grass disclosed her presence tail and messy black fur on the back “Hey you little fortune teller – who would want to live in this fortress you reckon?”



Ah so I’m the oracle now? Then trust my nose when I tell you plenty will and the rabbits too.



Moving backwards back towards the fence, along the edge of the grid to their secret doorway – crawling through and continuing with the radio tower green red green as their leading star. Looking back they see someone walking behind them, as the tall silhouette does a little bow, allowing the head to sink towards the thighs, the character slips into that same open curtain; darkness.



“Just a matter of time before they sew up that fence, the way we’re running around at night” 



Puddle - poppies - rock - rock - rabbit!





Endnotes



Creator;                      A person or thing that brings something into existence.
                                   Used as a name for God.

Constructor;              A person or company that builds, designs, or makes something.

Contractor;                A person or firm that undertakes a contract to provide materials or labor to perform a service or job.





[1] 25:11 / God hates injustice, and he loves justice, especially in a ruler, who of all people, has the power to be unjust, and the position to be seen as representing the Creator. 

[2] Laurie Anderson The heart of a dog(2015)

[3] Easter Better (‘She is warm’ - 2019)