Roiling clouds drifted over the bright moons, still so full that the planet must have been sitting still in its orbit, the Eastern Time zone cloaked in eternal night. But it was just dramatic overtones—it was only eight at night, and a new day only thirteen hours away.
The sidewalk of the Times Square area was buzzing with activity, freakish and frenzied and frenetic, just as it always was. A group of Japanese tourists were chattering amongst themselves in awe as they passed the 54th Street Broadway theater, then became deathly silent in a different sort of awe as Sarah, dark queen of the all-encroaching chaos, walked past them with a purposeful and powerful gait.
As they snapped a picture of her dominating figure, she flashed a sly scarlet smile and piercing blue eyes in their direction, as if knowing that celebrities had to pose just so for even the chance photographic opportunities.
The mesmeric beauty ruled the pseudo-cobblestone sidewalks without effort as creatures and people alike were taken by her. A young boy riding his bike ran into a light pole and chuckled uncomfortably as he brushed himself off and surveyed the damage of his bike.
She was already half a block long gone when she gave a nonchalant flick of her wrist, and the bike was better than new. All he saw was the swaying curtain of her black, shiny hair as she turned the corner. He would have thought it astounding if his grip on life hadn't been so disturbed already in the last couple of days.
Minutes later, she flew into the new and improved Le Parker Meridien Hotel, all presence and rush, mimicking the flurry of a rich cape in a simple tuxedo-cut blazer.
The gray button gloves that came just up to her wrists were instantly removed, revealing the pitted point of her long black sleeves. She carried the gloves in one hand, eyeing the reservations desk from afar, giving the creatures that worked busily there a nod of business. This simple gesture commanded a sudden flurry of activity.
Her v-neck peek-a-boo collar was trimmed with black silk lapels that teasingly framed the pale dip between her breasts—not completely revealing anything, but making no attempt to hide her feminine guiles with any sort of camisole. Two smart buttons held the remaining matte fabric daringly in check, not shining nearly so much as the silver necklace above them, which was adorned with bits of amethyst cut into organic shapes.
"Dearest Lady Sarah!" a furry horned gentleman in a red silk suit preened as he rolled out of the office next to the reservations desk. "How glad we are to have you staying at our hotel!"
He made a motion to kiss her hand and she ignored it, frowning upon him with no reasonable lack of satisfaction. She frowned because it was her place to do so.
"I assume my room is ready?" she said dismissively.
The concierge shook an agitated hand at an elf-like boy standing behind the counter, a little too earnest and a little too obvious. He turned his falsely untroubled gaze back to Sarah. "Oh, yes, of course. We have only given you the best room in the house! The penthouse suite for your Ladyship, if it so pleases her." He lurched forward in an overly eager supplication.
Behind him, two goblins in suits and sashes were less than generously escorting a well-dressed business-being out of the elevator with pokey sticks.
The concierge gave Sarah a cloying smile. "Ah, I see it is ready."
Sarah's prim eyebrows curved ever so slightly in amusement over her own power. "Very well then. Take me up. And please call NBC studios and tell them I will be arriving in forty-five minutes."
"Anything Her Ladyship desires!" the concierge cooed as he gently prodded her toward the elevator. The click-clack of her high-heeled shoes filled the suddenly quiet room as she walked across the marble floors. Every whisper was enhanced as it echoed off the color-treated maple walls.
As she turned forward and surveyed the wide-eyed stares that had been following her into the elevator, a little smile tugged at the corners of her perfectly made up lips.
"We will be most pleased to provide you with a limousine, and anything else you could need during your stay, most gracious one. Let me just say you look stunning in that number. Who was the designer?"
As the doors clothed, she shrewdly replied, "Me, of course."
"Ah, why yes, I should have known! You are so wonderfully talented!"
Sarah closed the door of the room behind her, glad to be rid of the sloppy quivering of the concierge. She walked purposefully to the northernmost window of the expansive room and drew the curtains open. A sprawling view of Central Park awaited her, trees glowing with a variety of colors in the lamplight far below.She gave the room a once-over, taking in the lovely decor. Most of the furniture used a more modern and sleek Swedish design, low to the ground and not ornately elegant, but careful to details nonetheless. Tones of slate blue, heather green and soft gray added warmth to the natural woods creating a refined, intimate space. Unlike the other rooms in the hotel, the penthouse suite sprawled on for what seemed like eternity, a large open space with many nooks and crannies in a hip-high wall full of tables and custom-inset couches for relaxing. The entertainment center looked over a large stretch of living area, sitting within the smooth polish of a cherry-wood wall with slender doors to hide all the other attached equipment.
Once many years ago Sarah had had the fortune of staying a night in Le Parker Meridien on business for the advertising firm for which she had been working. In most respects the hotel had been perfect for her tastes, so she had left it as one of the few untouched buildings in the Times Square area when she combined worlds.
She put a few hairs in place as she gazed upon her reflection in a large circular mirror trimmed with a rim of frosted glass. A scratch against the north window tore her away; it was the large Spangore bird named Claw flapping mid-air and tapping with his beak. She motioned him toward the newly created patio that hung with menace from the great height at the top of the hotel.
Sarah slid the door open and welcomed the bird inside.
"Claw," she addressed him shortly as she gave a challenging look over the terrace before coming indoors herself.
He gave a look over his shoulder to the twisting, malformed remains of New York City. "Love what you've done with the place."
She nodded her appreciation. "I'm still working on it."
"I imagine it can always be a work in progress," he mumbled as he ambled through the sleek clean space. "Interesting concept of interior design you Aboveworlders have," he said with a sense of deep curiosity.
"I take it you don't object," Sarah said with a smirk. Though she could really care less what anyone thought about her taste in decor, there was no need to be impolite.
"Why should I?" The bird arched a brow as he settled into the soft cushions of a very wide and deep couch. He looked as if he was nesting.
She ambled airily behind a large curved wooden wall to the mostly open bathroom and started a shower as she continued to talk to her companion. "Don't get too comfortable. We're only staying here the night. I'm working on our permanent home as we speak. Just a few more bugs to work out."
Claw had become so comfortable it looked as if he had already fallen asleep. "How do you manage the concentration for all of this?" the bird said suddenly, his eyes still closed.
"I'm getting it with a little practice," she admitted while stepping into the shower. "I'm not doing it all alone, though. Funny how people's years and years of fantasizing about the unattainable becomes a subconscious activity."
"What do you mean?" Claw had opened one eye to survey the space again.
"Ever heard of consensual realities?"
The bird answered so shortly, he could have been talking in his sleep. "No."
The shower was over almost before it had begun. Sarah was once again fully dressed, running her fingers through her instantly dry hair. She sat across from the bird, casually draping her arm over the back of the couch, dressed in a cap-sleeve shirt with a deep diamond-cut neckline trimmed in lace. Her hip-hugging sash-belt hung lazily over the iridescent gray of her tapered leg pants. She toyed with the ornate onyx and amethyst-beaded choker that came to an arrow point low on her chest.
She needed to have at least one companion who understood her thinking so that she could execute her plans more effectively. "There's a sort of metaphysical theory that everyone has their own personal reality. Because so much of existence is influenced by perception, and we each perceive the world around us differently, then, for us, that is our own unique reality, our own dimension of existence." She swiveled her hand and was instantly holding a slender chalice of merlot. The burgundy liquid met her lips and seemed to merge with the color of her lipsticked mouth.
She continued while Claw looked at her intently. "A consensual reality is where all of these differing opinions on existence come together. As a whole, we create the world as it is. This idea of existence leads to another conclusion... that, were one to adjust their way of thinking, to learn to harness the power of their own perception, they could influence this world by the sheer power of their mind. This is where the practice of magic comes in."
"Hmm," Claw said with a keen look. "I always thought that magic was the manipulation of energy."
"Well, what is the will but a sort of energy, Claw?" she said pointedly.
He nodded as if thinking on it further. "Continue, this is very interesting indeed."
"Most of these theories," Sarah continued as she sipped her wine, "are ones come to by those living Aboveground. Sure, there are also those Underground who surmised such things, but perhaps they were less prevalent because, on your world, magic was very out in the open. While on my world people mastered science and energy, in your world they mastered the power of the will."
Sarah rose from her seat and looked out the window, as if pointing to an illustration. "What we now have is a world where both exist. A mastery of will and energy. The lines that were drawn are now gone."
"How did you come to all of this?" Claw said as he rose and shook his tail feathers.
"I had a revelation during my research in Kaleb's castle," she said.
"What revelation?"
She smiled broadly, carnivorously. "The mind is made up of the Id, the Ego, and the Super Ego. The Underground and Aboveground are the Id and the Ego. Each world is the dream, the subconscious, of the other. Each reality cannot manifest itself in the opposing world because there is nothing to unify the two. And I have a theory about that, too."
Claw was entranced by the amazing story she was unfolding. "What?" he said almost mechanically, in awe.
"Something happened millennia ago to split the two apart. There's no direct history around it, but there's a hint of stories of a world where the two simultaneously existed. Look at books like Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, for instance"
"Excuse me?" Claw broke out of his trance, confused.
"A book from my world," she clarified. "It talks of a time when magic was prevalent, where elves and man lived in the same world. That is until the age of man, when all creatures of magic went elsewhere—who knows where?" She was heated, caught up in the passion of her ideas. "I think we all have a genetic..." she corrected herself for clarity, "an innate sense of how things once were. This is why each world creates fantasy tales about the other. On my world we write about elves and unicorns, and on yours, about machines and calculus." She arched a brow at him as he digested the new information.
He shivered his feathers nervously. "This is quite a bit to come to terms with," he admitted. "I am quite amazed that you came to all of this on your own."
"While I was queen of Sunset City, I pored over the histories, and I began to come up with this theory. It wasn't until I had full power of the amethyst that I could see that I was probably correct." She smiled with satisfaction over her own genius.
"And so it seems you were." The large bird looked amazed as he gazed over Central Park. "So what does the consensual reality theory have to do with the mental focus required to create all of this?"
"Well, that is the catch. While I can be the guiding will for the world, I cannot control it fully unless I can convince the whole world to buy into this reality. It doesn't take much, just a bit of persuasion, but until I can get most of their consciousness focused on the way things are now, it is going to be very difficult to hold it together."
"Everyone?" he asked, incredulously.
"Not everyone, but a majority," she answered.
"That's still quite a catch," he said in a gruff voice. "What happens if you don't?"
"Well, it will fall apart, of course," she answered nonchalantly.
"Then what will you do?" he said, amazed that she could give such bad news so carelessly.
"It won't happen, so don't worry about it," she finished the conversation with a sharp tug on a new coat that hadn't been there before.
"How do you know that?" Claw asked suspiciously.
She gave him a cool smirk. "Because all they really need is an icon to follow. And I am going to be that icon." She snapped her fingers, and Claw was decked to the nines in his own leather jerkin. She opened the door for him to leave. "We have an appointment now. Our transportation should be waiting for us downstairs."
As they headed out the
door, Claw asked one more question. "You said there was a Super
Ego... What would that be?"
"Well, that would be the part of
the mind in charge of pulling all the pieces, the Id and Ego,
together."
Claw smirked neatly. "And that—of course—would be you."
"You are—of course—correct," Sarah answered, returning his smirk and closing the door behind them with finality.
