372. Beyond the sky, 1

(Rose)

Our work slowly is taking shape.

Over the frame of an old incomplete ship, we've built our own.

One with mast and sail, using pieces we've rebuilt using all our technologies and resources around.

Bleue returned with a stone she called a horn, that allowed us to produce the final pieces of our work. It's coming to a closure.

Meanwhile, I'm training again on a normal sailing ship.

It's really hard at first. It was depressing.

But once you find the wind.

Once you know how to use the ropes to discuss with it.

Then it becomes intuitive, and you just sail smoothly and swiftly, reaching impressive speeds even.

I reached speeds I would not have thought possible without an oil or electric engine.

But I did. I sailed for hours over the sea at dawn and dusk. It is delicious.

I think it's the best adjective to describe it truly.

You taste the wind and maritime air with your whole skin, and it's really nice, though cold.

The trick for evening sailing is to return before it's dark, or to have a lighthouse.

So I actually built one after a few difficult returns.

Mornings and evening, I'm making a nice hobby of sailing.

During the day, I'm building our future ship.

And at night, I'm dreaming of elementary particles.

Hadrons and the others muons are bugging me like a puzzle I couldn't find the solution to. I want to understand.

But one thing at a time.

~

Sometimes Bleue comes to sail with me. She's beaming with happiness during those times.

So am I. Our smiles are grand.

We love our life currently.

It's so nice. She can yell as she follows the wind or dive through it.

We laugh loudly in the wind, over the colourful sea.

We laugh and yell a lot from joy during these times. More than we've ever did.

This could be the happiest time of our lives so far.

We enjoy it so much, sailing over the see, we don't notice how the time is also flying by.

We're just looking forward for every dawn and dusk, for our sailing outside together, when the weather's nice.

It rapidly deviated from training on how to sail. It wasn't about it anymore, as we learn both how to handle such ship rapidly. It was about enjoying life along the shore.

The flying ship will be on the same principles as this one, with a single large sail.

We know the anti-gravitational moulds, like the trees before them try to maintain an altitude once it's set by some parameters that we can trick.

Meaning the ship will most likely keep a roughly constant altitude above the land it sails over. It should do so quite naturally, and not risk crashing or jumping into the clouds just by itself.

Once set, it should not need much to control its altitude.

Still, just in case, I've built smaller horizontal masts on the sides, like fish fins. They're to allow catching some wind upward or downward if needs to.

You never know what could happen nowadays and have to somehow expect the unexpectable to come to you someday, randomly.

I could probably have built a mast below the ship as well, but that would become too complex.

Bleue crafted the ropes over weeks of intense knitting and threading them into cables. I was building the framework of the ship meant to use these fibres.

I'm good at seeing things in perspective, and have a reasonable instinct regarding mechanical arrangement it seems.

It went well.

And after lunch, at the end of a day's work, we would always smile at each other, and head to the normal sailing ship, almost running to it. I have an advantage since she has to drag her wings. Then, we sail.

Another happy time. Again and again.

~

After a while, our friend and his adoptive daughter or student came back to visit us.

A morning, as we returned from our sail at sea, we saw them waving at us from the peer, waiting for our return.

We had our good fun sailing. Neither of them had ever been on a boat before. We grinned, Bleue and I.

And that day, we all went for a longer sail over the sea.

~

Ana joined us after a while and cawed at us that we went too far.

I cawed back that it was fine, I had the experience of such doings.

Our friend was hilarious, seeing and hearing how I could speak crow language now.

Well, I know how to speak this bird's tongue a little yes, but probably not general crow or raven.

We gently sailed back at first, and then went for the maximum speed.

Our friend had to hold his hood over his head. Ana preferred to jump off and fly behind.

And then, using that same record speed, Bleue followed.

She stood up, and suddenly jumped backward but high. She might have cheated a little, one way or another, but holding a rope like a kite, she rapidly flew up, spreading her wide wings while gaining altitude.

Then when the rope became too tensed, she let go of it and flew with the wind, and just went away, yelling with joy up there, quite like the first time.

I did a circle with the ship, tilting it dangerously down to almost 70° on the side, forcing my guests to hold on tight.

We circled back behind Bleue and Ana flying up there and sailed below them.

We just yelled at each other merrily. Bleue even waved at us.

We down there continued sailing ahead toward the shore and the land we know.

~

As my guests were beginning to sit and catch their breath over a square near the port, Bleue made her impressive entrance.

Seeing someone winged slowing down in her flight at head height above ground, and then landing like an angel or a bird, a very heavy bird, It's a very impressive sight.

She does look sort of angelic right now. Maybe not holy, but a little otherworldly that's for sure.

She hardly could walk anymore though! Flapping her wings while keeping her abdomen tensed was exhausting.

Ana came around later, a good fish half eaten between her talons. We roasted the other half she had gently spared for us.

Bleue was then lying in a long chair with an odd shape that allowed her to rest her back and her wings.

We dined merrily together that evening.

I kept smiling till sleep caught me back.

And onto another nice day...

~