THE GOLDEN PROMISE

The noise of planetary cracks that resonated daily in the late afternoon made her raise her gaze from the copies that she was correcting. She looked at the flowers on the window’s ledge. Their “new” sun flooded the room with a golden light that she was not yet used to. She had arrived a couple of months earlier for the start of the school-year and, caught under the mass of the administrative burden, she had not allowed herself to release the stress that the voyage had implied.

Despite the preparatory training she had received and the acclimation programme that she was going through, life on that planet was turning out to be destabilising. Emotions surged untamed; she could sense them floating around and filling the air. Someone may call it aura. Her sensitivity expanded beyond her flesh, creating a halo that others could themselves perceive. She could see they were awkward. But the golden light shining there somehow soothed her feelings. She stood up and went to the window, brushing the flowers with her fingers; how are they called, again?

It had been promised: they shall be the ancestors of future generations capable of building new paradigms. That message had fascinated her. She dreamt of glowing days and pulpy skins. Days lasted longer hours there; she could still dwell on that dream for a while before returning to her work.