《Illusory》ocean

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The girl and the boy began to travel together. Where the girl went, the boy followed. Sometimes they would share food. Sometimes they would chat.

"Where did you come from?"

"I'm not sure... but it was an enclosed space. It was completely surrounded."

"Oh! I know, it must have been a cage. I grew up in a cage."

"What is a cage?"

"A cage is a beautiful enclosure, with straight silver bars surrounding you on all sides in a cube, with only a small gap in between that you can fit your arms through."

"A cube? So the top was covered?"

"Yes."

"That can't have been it. There was nothing above us except a warm sizzling and gentle harp melodies. We could run freely. Except we were surrounded on all sides by an unending symphony."

"A symphony?"

"Yes. You cannot cross the symphony without a thrumming wooden vessel this big. If you tried to cross it with your bare feet you would get wet."

"I know! It must have been the ocean!"

"The ocean?"

"The ocean is big and blue and contains all the water of the world! I've heard it can be calm and beautiful, but sometimes there are terrible storms and the waves are higher than three men combined."

"Exactly! Sometimes the song is slow and alluring, but sometimes the music grows so intense that we all have to go inside, or the water would spray everywhere and soak us through."

"I would like to see that."

"Well, you can't."

"Why?"

"I haven't the faintest idea how to find that place again."

The girl began to think more, and observe more. The whiteness that had surrounded her began to fade, and small flickers of

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flame occasionally caught near her chest, threatening to blow out at the slightest hint of a wind.

"What did they call you, on your island?"

The boy thought about this one.

"A failure."

"What's that?"

"I don't know, but I wasn't the only one! There were a bunch of us."

"Oh!"

"I think us failures had it good. We had free run of the place, and we got to play with each other whenever we wanted. I used to lie on the sand for hours and hours and listen to the song of the sea. I don't know what the others did, but they were always talking about tests and they sounded like switches, buttons, and levers. Us failures sounded like dolphins and chirping birds."

"I want to be a failure, too."

The were lying on white sand in the nothing that the girl had created and staring up at the 10 feet of nothing above them, and the slight pitter patter of rain on ruined concrete above.

"I think this is why I like it here so much," confessed the boy. "It reminds me of the ocean."

"But there is no music," said the girl.

"Oh, there is," said the boy, under his breath.

"What?" said the girl.

"Nothing," said the boy.

"What is it outside that is so noisy it hurts your ears, anyway?" said the girl.

"Oh, you know. Just - things." The boy paused for a long moment, then said brightly, "I would like to see the colors of water. Does it truly change from blue to clear, as you describe?"

"Of course!"

"Tell me about something else that changes colors."

"Well, as the sun sets, we call it dusk, and the sky changes from orange to purple..."

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