ScreenWar Excerpt, the Dome

Rita walked through the living area towards the kitchen. Staring, like every morning, straight ahead and upward.

She approached the long smooth stone counter separating the two areas, her attention still drawn to the massive, unique vista beyond that made this residence truly amazing.

Rita paused at the first kitchen counter then decided, as she did most mornings, to continue past and around the low wall of cabinets, counters and pantries opposite the first island counter. Her eyes fixed on the amazing view beyond which she appreciated as much now as the first time she saw it.

From where she stopped and stood on a wide balcony thirty feet above the ground, the clear Dome ceiling sloped again upward, gradually, and as it rose the Earth below kept pushing up to fill the space created, until it was almost a mile high at the summit four miles away. Unseen was the slope back down the far side a mile further.

Set inside this enormous Dome covered expanse, three miles wide side to side, was a deep wooded forest leading to a small mountain range.

She watched and could hear the constant roar of Rice Falls up a half mile and two miles off. Two hundred feet high, the falls provided a faint, soothing white noise here in the living space, day and night. Then a second waterfall itself a hundred feet high was just beyond that, feeding the lower. Both could be seen through dells in the thick tree line off to the left, trimmed by granite cliffs with birds soaring, gliding through the mist coming off the brink of each.

Rita and Link on a hike early in their stay found, far off on the back side mountain slope, a large intake point up high through the Dome which provided fresh air and melted snow that fed the entire ecosystem here. This was the water source for the falls, the rivers, streams and ultimately the small fresh water lake just a half mile east of the living space,

Rita took a deep breath and slowly turned her sights across the scene, surveying the heavy forest treetop cover, the river breaking through here and there. She could make out a small herd of Elk slowly roaming as they grazed across a sloping grassy plain far away at the foothills of the enormous granite backstop.

She could see a few clearings that revealed brooks and streams up high toward the mountains which were otherwise buried under the broad branches of the forest, hidden from where she stood. All feeding the rivers downstream. Stones from pebble to boulder were spread throughout the mountain waterways.

Deer, otter and beaver all enjoyed the clean, cold fresh water. The deer sipping while otters played and beaver worked the wet timber.

The smaller creatures, snakes and butterflies, insects of every type, chipmunks and lizards all filled the forest from floor to canopy. And above all the eagles flew right up to the Dome top and down again.

Panning around further right and beyond the mountains went higher until they scraped the roof, or so it seemed. The summit capping a solid granite monolith with a horizontal profile. Link and Rita had climbed this mountain, Table Top, many times.

All throughout, up and down from side to side their whole time here they enjoyed exploring the Dome and would find each newly discovered space sprawling with life.

The trees everywhere were filled with birds of such a variety as found nowhere else on the planet. Various species coexisting peacefully. Exotic, colorful, toucans and peacocks cohabitating with powerful, majestic bald eagles.

Fish filled the rivers and flowed down into the lake here at ground level just a short walk below the kitchen balcony where Rita now stood. Link would often spend a morning fishing for treats to feed Mutt and Jeff and an occasional fish dinner for the two of them.

Rita, not realizing as if in a trance, began slowly walking away from the kitchen’s cupboards and closets, past the wide wooden stairs down to ground level on the left, out towards the railing at the edge of the balcony. Another day beginning with a grateful morning.

Her gaze still following the roof she was now watching the hawks fly, each taking turns up and down, from the mountain to the lake. Then after soaring low just overhead, wings waving good morning, they flew around and back up.

Link and Rita were living in perfect harmony here with the environment AL had created, and the environment was embracing them in return.

Lost in the moment she did not notice Link sneaking up behind her.

“You’ve gaped at that view every morning for the last two years” Link said as he grabbed her around the waist and buried his face in her hair. “And all I can do is stand by and look at you with the same awe and gratitude.”

He felt this in her, recognizing her feelings as he recognized his own.