The Gray Planet

 

Shiara pulled the wrinkled door shut—almost—leaving a little slit open.  Geo watched her as she looked back on it.  All that was visible was a jet-black vertical slit, with a beam of the door jamb flanking one side of it.

 

Geo turned and looked at the landscape of the new planet.  It had undulating hills as far as his eyes could see, but no plants or structures at all.  He could see the horizon everywhere he turned.  He could not get a sense of the size of the planet, or how far away the horizon was.  He could not even imagine plants growing in this soil.  The ground was hard-packed earth and small gray rocks. The sky was gray.  He crouched down and touched the ground, picking up a handful of the dismal terrain.

 

“Did the real estate book advertise this as ‘charming’?”  Geo said.  “It certainly is…gray.”

 

“Oh!” said Shiara.  “This is the Gray Planet!”

 

“I’m glad we cleared that up,” said Geo.

 

“No, no…I’ve heard of this place.  I just forgot about it, that’s all.”

 

“It is quite forgettable.” He was resorting to humor to cover a bothersome feeling he was starting to have. 

 

“It’s a sort of in-between place.  I have heard of others, places with grass and trees and such--but I can’t imagine any place that could be as bleak as this.  This is as bleak as it gets, I think.  I suppose it will be okay.  We will only be here for…a while.”

 

“What is a while?” asked Geo. 

 

“In what sense?”

 

"I don't know. What is time here?"  She looked up to the bright patch of sky that she assumed was this world's sun.

 

"Hmm. How does one live here in the meantime?"

 

"We are living..."

 

"Yes, but how do we keep living?  You know, like food and water, that sort of thing.  Do you know if there is any water here?  I haven’t had any water for quite a while now.  In fact, I am quite thirsty.”

 

She looked at him, and suddenly it dawned on her.  Geo was a human.  He could not change form.  He had a body, which, like an animal, required sustenance at all times.  She did not have this sort of body; she could be body or spirit at will, or assume any form she liked.  He could not.  She realized the grave error she made in bringing him along.

 

When Shiara began to fidget, Geo got really worried.

 

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