<span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>…  …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “ ”</span></span><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>…  …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “ ”</span></span><div class="floatleft"><div align="center">(https://www.mediafire.com/convkey/cdc1/04s7432n614occi4g.jpg)<br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">Chloe Dawson<br/>  ‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾‾  </span></span></div></div><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… one future closed off with Kimmie’s decision … deep sigh … a future of peace is no longer possible … inside deep down, I feel my contribution to our Isis near the end of her journey in my right fallopian tube … she will arrive in time for Kimmike’s sperm … and then we will do what we must because many do not want her or me or us to live … she is the seed that will save the world …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “Oh Kimmie! I love you so much! We will bring Isis to the world and love her as a family while we can.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>…  we hold each other and kiss and snuggle … there’s a knock at our door …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “Chloe? Caoimhe? It’s Huguette. You Mother has arrive Chloe, with the Eldest. The Eldest wishes to see you in the day room. Please dress skyclad with your robe.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… sigh …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “We’ll be there in a half hour Huguette, thank you!”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… kiss Kimmie one last time …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “And thus it continues. I’ve never met the Eldest though Mother has several times. Mother says she is very wise.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>…  we undress and don our white robes … I retain the vial … I help Kimmie tie the sash properly … a graceful and fairly complex Irish knot … sandals … we walk hand in hand to the day room … Huguette is guarding the door … smiles …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “I told them you would bring Caoimhe. The thought you would protect her by not.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… we remove our sandals … put up our hoods …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “From this moment on, we protect each other at all times. We will always be together.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… take a deep breath as Huguette opens the door and announces us … we step inside …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “Carlotta, Circe, Chloe and Caoimhe.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… we approach Carlotta … stop several paces … I watch her as we approach … a wonderful crone … bird bright eyes watching us from under her hood where she sits on a sofa … a gnarled had slides her hood back … her white hair is braided behind her and tumbles out … squeeze Kimmie’s hand and we remove our hoods … wait for Carlotta …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “Welcome Chloe. Welcome Caoimhe too. Please, sit. Water for our guests please, Huguette.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… when we each have water, Carlotta sips hers … we each do the same … I set mine down …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “Chloe, Circe has been telling me you have some most amazing things to share with us. Can you share with me before tomorrow? I am very well aware of the several camps within our sisterhood and wish to be assured in advance of what you bring. Will you allow your Mother and Huguette to introduce us?”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… I nod … take Kimmie’s hand … Huguette is the first I find and I ask her to let Kimmie observe through her … the Mother … and then a new person … she is a child dancing on a windswept beach with kites flying and flowers in her hair … this is the Eldest … she invites me to show …<br/><br/>… I first show her the genes that have been touched in me … then the ones in her that may be touched if she accepts the gift … I somehow know she will … then I show her our past … our lines meet similarly to Huguette’s … and then I take her back and back … Isis in the Boeotian called abu alhul … the flash of starlight … hear her and Mother gasp … show them the genes that starlight touched … they gasp again … and then back … the myth becomes reality … the goddess and the turtle … and back to before chaos where the breath lay quiescent before the waters …<br/><br/>… ‘this I will show to those you select tomorrow, Carlotta’ … ‘and this is what you three need to know that I will not share nor may you’ …<br/><br/>… I show them Isis as a child … I show them the Shadow gathering in the degenerate pentagram … I show them the autistics growing in wisdom and their new language Mänti (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Tammet#M%C3%A4nti) and how my drug helps them reconcile with their essential gender … I show them the refuge where Kimmie and I and others prepare defenses against the Shadow … I show them the Shadow’s attacks … and there I stop …<br/><br/>… ‘more I may not tell’ … yet … ‘Isis will be ready in time’ … ‘we can assure you of that’ … ‘we all may be transformed to support her’ …<br/><br/>… and there I stop … await her … she too pauses … she lets us all go … we each sip water … then holds out her hand …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “You are right to have shared, Chloe. I will take your gift and tomorrow I will share with you what I know from where I sit. Now it is dinnertime. Will you two lovely children share my table? There will be others there who you need to know and they you.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… I feel her light touch on my mind, asking entrance … I grant that … one on one now … she tells me that as of tomorrow, I will sit in her place and she will become my counselor … I hope everyone else didn’t hear me gasp … I start to protest and her gentle laugh calms me … I am now cursed … she smiles, knowing full well what I meant … she lets us go gently … I stand and help Kimmie up … the look on Huguette’s and Mother’s faces are priceless … I blush … ‘Goddess, I am not worthy’ … and from somewhere beyond Elder Carlotta comes; ‘yes you are, daughter’ … ‘you are our future and your daughter after you’<br/><br/>… somehow, I find my sense of Kimmie’s hand in mine … turn to look at my beloved …</em></span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">  “Let’s take Carlotta to dinner, dear. All is well.”</span></span><br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: Georgia;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;"><em>… and I am cursed … cursed to lead us into this Castle Perilous and tol make way for our daughter Isis to take us into whatever she makes thereafter …</em></span></span><br/>