“I don’t understand Magistrate.”

“There is nothing to understand. The ruling is passed. This notification is merely a courtesy. Your estate and its lands are forfeit. You have seven days to remove yourself from the premises, or you will be removed by the authorities.”

“But Magistrate… I was not even allowed to defend my case. Surely there must be some recourse, some sort of appeal…”

“I will not hear of it Mister Cisneros. What you are dabbling in is unholy. Unnatural. I don’t like it. This Quorum doesn’t like it. And most importantly the Governor doesn’t like it. You are deposed sir. I suggest you spend your last seven days as a member of this city saying your goodbyes and preparing what effects you can carry with you. Because in seven days you will be put outside the walls of this city, and may the goddess have mercy on you.”

The judgement sphere came down with a crack.

Dim Cisneros pushed his spectacles up onto the bridge of his nose and shoved his fists into his longcoat, leather creaking at the shoulders. Dismounting the steps of the Imperial Courthouse he ignored the hansoms parked along the curb, electing instead the long walk home to think.

Deposed. The cruelest judgement that could be passed. Typically reserved only for rapists and murderers. And now he, Dim Cisneros, savior of Heatherdale, would be put outside the dome he created, left to the elements and the constant meteor strikes.

A death sentence.

How had this happened? How had it gone from parades and celebrations, from drinks on the house and his pick of the women? He watched as a passing mother pulled her two children closer to her, averting her eyes.

He had gotten bored. That’s what had happened. Creating the dome and its shields had brought him celebrity. It had brought him wealth. It had even brought him a treasured estate in the much-coveted countryside. But it had not brought him satisfaction.

After the completion of the dome, he had found himself with nothing to do. “A brilliant mind left to rot under the weight of its accomplishments,” was how he had seen it.

A low, resonating peal rang out as a particularly large meteorite rang off the dome’s shields. He stopped and looked up toward the roof, using his hand to shield his eyes from the intense irradiated lamps that served as Hetherdale’s sun and moon. There, in the haze of distance he could just make out the massive gears of the Cisneros Sentry Shielding System. Dim watched as they slowly grumbled to life, pulling the damaged plate away from the exterior while sliding a new plate into place. He knew that high up along the dome’s peak the damaged armor was being drawn by powerful machines into the foundries to be melted down and reforged into a new armored plate.

Conflict swirled within him. He took great pride that his machines worked so well. Indeed, his inventions had saved every life in Heatherdale. The interlocking armor system, inspired by the scaled hide of his golden thorntail lizard ‘Chesapeake’; diverting the river that divided the town to dead-end into a natural fault, giving them the endless geothermal power necessary to run both the entire city as well as the gargantuan machines of the CSSS; using the naturally occurring copper and tin veins running throughout the city’s foundation to demonstrate that bronze, not iron, would be the superior material for the interlocking scales of the shield; and all of these by age 25. And yet it was not enough. He was driven still – to create, to discover, to explore. And so he turned to the only unexplored reaches he could find: the chemistry of the mind.

A hansom drove by, horse hooves and banded wheels clattering loudly on the cobblestones as a half-heard insult drifted from its window. Dim had grown used to this kind of treatment the few times he had appeared in public after he had begun his research. People always feared what they didn’t understand; he knew that. He had long ago rejected the church and its taboos, but the majority of the city didn’t share his distain. They followed the words of the priestesses devoutly, and the priestesses said that dabbling in the sciences of the mind were the holy calling of the clergy alone. To experiment in such things without the calling or anointing of the goddess was the work of warlocks and heretics. And so as Dim’s work progressed, more and more the word began to be whispered around that he was violating the sacred rites.

And indeed, he had been.

The equipment had been the hardest part. Even with his immense fortune he had been unable to persuade any abbey, large or small, to part with their mixing apparatus. Knowing well he had already begun rumors by his inquiries, he turned instead to obtaining a copy of the sacred instructionals. This proved almost as difficult, until Dim had found an old priestess, long out of ministry. She lived in near-poverty at the heart of Heatherdale, forgotten by her younger more imminent sisters. He offered her millions (what was money in exchange for discovery?) and she had turned over the holy writings he would require to create his own sacrament machine, albeit with a warning:

“I urge you to reject the path you have chosen my son. The heart can always be relied on to break; the will to falter, and belief rot to doubt. If not in you, then in those around you. You are beginning a road that can only end in much grief.”

Dim had thanked her for the warning, and then left with the manuals.

Abbey bells began tolling throughout the city, and Dim grimaced at the sound. Irritated with himself now at his decision not to take a cab, he looked up from his thoughts to take in his surroundings. He was somewhere near Raven Street and Lakewood Avenue, placing him towards the outskirts of the city proper. Buildings were closer together here, newer built than the city center but much more real estate-minded, growing up instead of out. Alleyways snaked between buildings, constantly dark from the shadows cast by the brick edifices around them.

He had seven days left.

He resumed his walk at a quicker pace, hoping to escape the city confines before too many parishioners filled the streets. He was sure by the evening the news of his deposition would have reached the ears of the whole of Heatherdale. Better to be home before that happened.

After he had collected the books from the old priestess he had barely been able to contain himself. Life again became how it had been in the early days of Heatherdale. Back when it had been a much smaller city of a much larger world. Back when Dim had been young and life was filled with honors school. Back before it was discovered that their moon was dying, and barring a miracle the whole world would die with its destruction.

Seven years. That had been the conservative estimate of the lunar geological society. Life had seven years before their satellite began to break up and rain debris down, pulled into the atmosphere by the planet’s gravity. The impacts would be catastrophic. Dust would block out the sun. Oceans would boil and evaporate creating violent storms and intense climate change. Billions would die unless mankind discovered a way to counteract it. So man began to search for an answer. Every school and learning institution commissioned its best and brightest students to the task. Think tanks formed around the globe, and stratagems set forth. Domes, such as the one surrounding Heatherdale, were quickly set upon as the best protection against the approaching doom, allowing cities and their inhabitants to be enclosed rather than requiring an entirely new form of dwelling to be created from scratch. A few of the intelligensia disagreed, arguing that inhabiting subterranean cave systems and waiting for the violence to subside would be the best way to ensure survival for the species. Both alternatives were hastily pursued, with domes going into construction immediately. As the world descended into chaos and governments collapsed it became clear that only cities that had access to all the materials required would be able to complete the projects in time.

It had been then that an eighteen-year-old Dim, already in his third year of graduate schooling, had proposed the Cisneros Sentry Shielding System to a collection of city leaders and officials, outlining how the city dome could be covered with a series of interlinking armored plates using the abundant natural resources that existed within the city limits, making Heatherdale impervious to the coming destruction. Sweeping change would have to be made to lifestyles of its citizens, but life, at least in one city, would continue. Dim had worked night and day, architecting machine designs on the fly, calculating power consumption ratios, until at last the shielding was in place. Six days later the moon had begun to break up and radio communication was lost with the outside world as all exterior portals were sealed.

But Heatherdale was saved.

And it was all thanks to Dim Cisneros.

There had been talk of renaming the city after him but he had refused, saying he wished to retain what heritage remained in memory of the fallen world outside. He had, however, accepted a sprawling estate in the little bit of countryside that had been preserved within the dome. The rolling fields were the most wide open space that could be come by within the city, and they quickly became a coveted commodity, one that Dim valued greatly. As he had begun his new pursuits the property in the countryside had been a valuable lure to the downtrodden and destitute that he needed for his experimentation.

Yes, he acknowledged, his experiments had eventually required him to take some liberties with Heatherdale’s citizens. None of them had been permanently harmed, of course. And all had been handsomely paid. But the mind had proved a tricky thing, a much greater advesery than Dim had anticipated and there had been some collateral damage.

The parts of the sacrament machine had been easy enough to come by once Dim had re-copied the diagrams from the sacred texts without the accompanying mumbo-jumbo. It had been a simple matter to have each piece fashioned by a different craftsman, thereby keeping rumors and suspicions at a minimum. Once his machine had been assembled, Dim had begun studying how to operate it. This had brought to the surface the first real difficulty with his plan when he realized that unlike the priestesses, he did not have a library of thoughts to choose from. While they moved freely through the hospitals, taking a sampling of the first thoughts of every child born in Heatherdale, he had begun his work with none to work from. And without thoughts: hopes, dreams, fears, desires… he had nothing with which to operate the sacrament machine.

Without thoughts his new pursuit would die in its infancy and he couldn’t abide it. So he improvised. Creating a design garnered from reverse engineering aspects of the sacrament machine, Dim constructed a padded table with a “thought extraction apparatus” attached to it. The table allowed the subject to lay face down comfortably and still breathe, while the triple-jointed arm of the extraction apparatus allowed Dim to position it correctly no matter the height of his subjects. It’s surgical forked “tongue” would enter the subject slightly above where the spine meets the brainstem after a powerful local anesthetic was administered. (Having them unconscious would muddle the thoughts that were extracted.) When activated the extraction apparatus would monitor the subjects as Dim read them a series of questions, recording their responses to a chemical mixture that was then labeled and stored for use in the sacrament machine.

His first tests on his house servants went flawlessly. The vials of thought filled up, black and crimson and a purple so deep it was difficult to tell from the black. Dim mixed a small amount from each one, eight in all, into the retaining bowl of the sacrament machine. With trembling hands he had poured the mixture into a newly acquired syringe and then injected it into his arm.

A rock glanced sharply off his head, breaking his train of thought. Dim turned to see five or so boys behind him, laughing and hollering at their success. Another wound up and threw, narrowly missing his ear. Pulling his longcoat up around his ears to shield his head from the projectiles Dim began to run, cursing himself for not taking one of the cabs. After a block the boys gave up their pursuit and he was able to resume walking, head still throbbing form their direct hit.

After he had collected the first samples from his household servants and experienced his first real sacrament, Dim had been hooked. He had quietly gone about the city at night, hiring vagrants and the poorer families to come to his estate. Each spent a hour or sometimes two upon the extraction table, and every one was handsomely paid. The problem, he had discovered too late, was that the destitute were also the most prone to rumormongering. The whispers that had begun during his inquiries about the sacrament machine grew into open questions from the media first and city officials later. As Dim struggled to build his thought library, word began traveling around the city. He had gone mad; His experiments were unholy; Children had disappeared after entering his home; all manner of rumors spreading like a fire. After all, the only thing more exciting than a celebrity to a closed populace is a celebrity’s fall. Volunteers became harder and harder to find as pressure mounted from inquiries.

He broke from the confines of the city onto the wide open space of the country road that would take him home. Conflict swirled within him. Seven days. What could be done with seven days?

And then… inspiration.

The thought darted in and then out, like a pesky insect. He lunged for it mentally.

Comprehension snapped shut, devouring it whole.

His heart quickened. Could it be possible?

He sprinted the last half mile to his soon-to-be former estate, too excited to give thought to his body’s protestations. It seemed an eternity between the key’s insertion into the door and its tumbling of the lock. Still longer to shove the doors of the estate open wide.

“Millicent! Millicent!” Dim yelled.

Millicent Polifunnel, chief stewardess of the estate, came bustling onto the upstairs landing visibly upset. “Mister Dim! What’s happened? Are you alright sir?” She was used to Dim’s typically calm demeanor, and his shouting was very uncharacteristic. She was visibly shaken by it.

“Oh yes yes, everything’s alright. Well…. I’ve been deposed, but that’s not important right now.

“Deposed?!” Millicent’s hands shot to her mouth in surprise.

“Yes. In seven days the magistrate will remove me from the estate and put me out of the dome. But that’s not important right now. We don’t have the time. I need to you get me the following…”

“Deposed! Mister Dim, I don’t understand….”

“Millicent! You’re not listening to me! I can reverse it!”

“Reverse? Mister Dim what are you talking about? Deposed? I don’t understand….”

“Millicent Millicent!” Dim grabbed her by the shoulders, smiling broadly. “Have you ever understood a word I’ve said? Rarely at best. Now I need you to focus, dear woman. I’ve figured it out. Dim Cisneros has done it again.”

“Done what sir? What are you going to do?”

“Millicent, I’m going to reverse the whole process. Start to finish. I’m not going to take people’s thoughts and mix them into a sacrament.”

He paused, distracted by the fiery ache he was just beginning to notice coming from his legs.

“I’m going to mix myself IN. Into the sacrament mixture.”

“I just don’t know, sir. I mean, deposed? You? The hero of Heatherdale? You saved all of us…”

“Millicent, now isn’t the time. I have too much to do. I need a list, er, I have a list of things I need you to get me. I’ll be down in the lab. I don’t have much time.”

And so he began. Dim didn’t sleep at all the first night, or the second. By the third day the only way Millicent and the other servants convinced him to rest was with the argument that he was losing his edge. His mind raced; new ideas crawled from every recess of his brain all begging for a chance to be borne into the world. He workshop became more and more cluttered has he worked feverishly, discarded brass housings and sealing screws creating a dissonant symphony as he shuffled through them from workbench to workbench. It was the old days reborn, with the fires of creation burning bright in his eyes as Dim flew from test to test.

The fourth and fifth days rose and fell. On the morning of the sixth day, Dim pushed himself back from his workbench with sleep-dry eyes and beheld his handiwork.

“This is it, Millicent. This could be the greatest thing I’ve ever done.”

Millicent, asleep with her husband in the servants quarters at the rear of the house, didn’t hear him.

He stroked his fingers lightly along the brass scrollwork of the outer housing of the cylindrical body of his invention. Dim had sacrificed his best brass fireplace screen to make it, but he had not had another container large enough and of similar dimensions to create the proper housing, so he had heated the screen until pliable and then wrapped it around the entire device. One halved brass banister sphere now formed the domed top and bottom of the casing to complete its armored shell.

“What to call you?” Dim mused to himself, scratching absently at the stubble threatening to claim his face.

His fingers traced the top cap, caressing the hose that protruded from the end and following it up to what he called the “harness,” a wide leather collar that contained a tight round collection of needles set on a small brass housing. One side of the collar was much longer than the other, allowing the wearer to cinch it tight around the neck with only one hand. The needles were positioned on its interior so that when the collar was tightened, the needles would penetrate the skin and sink partially into the brain stem, making the vital connection.

“The think tank?” Dim snorted at himself in amusement. “Ah well, maybe another day. We’ll have all the time in the world to think about it, wont we? And now, to fill you up.” He set the container back onto the workbench.

Dim unhitched the heavy lock he had kept on his thought storeroom. Only half of one of his twelve shelving units were full, bringing a disappointed frown to his face. He had hoped to crowd the room from top to bottom one day.

“Dreams best left undreamed,” he sighed to the storage room.

He began checking each laboratory tube label, casually hoping something would jump out at him, occasionally scribbling a note onto his clipboard. He was still thusly engrossed when Millicent came and announced that brunch was ready.

“Its an impossible question,” he told Millicent between bites of ham steak. “How can I possibly choose? I have one day to to create the perfect mixture, my own personal heaven. And yet, What will I need? Its agonizing.”

Millicent nodded, dusting a bust near one of the dining room windows.

“Do I simply fill it with happiness? Then what of triumph? And if triumph and happiness, what of love? And if happiness and triumph and love, what measure of each? AAAHHHH!” Dim threw his knife and fork crashing to the china in frustration. “Its impossible,” he said again with finality.

“Begging your pardon sir, but impossible or not you’ve only got till tomorrow morning,” Millicent reminded him. “The magistrate said…”

“Oh I know what the magistrate said,” Dim growled at her. Then he sobered. “I’m sorry Millicent. I know you’re only trying to help.”

“What if you mixed in equal amounts of each? Minus the bad?” She asked.

“I suppose thats what I must do,” he conceded with a sigh, “yet I can’t help doubting its the right mixture.”

“Course, with NONE of the bad, there’s nothing for you to conquer,” Millicent, clearly lost in thought now, said.

Dim considered that. “You’re right of course. What do I love more than a challenge?”

“Then maybe that’s it, sir? Mix this moment. Right now. Everything you’re feeling and each in its measure.”

Dim looked at Millicent, speechless and dumbfounded.

Millicent, seeing his look, cast her eyes down. “Begging your pardon sir. Just the ramblings of a foolish old woman.”

“Millicent….I….thats…” Dim stumbled over the words as his mind raced.

She was right. His nirvana didn’t come in the form of euphoria or wealth or power or past successes. It came in the fight; in the conquering of foes to great to be beaten by anyone else. He was Dim Cisneros: Master of the Impossible; he would only be happy if he had problems to conquer.

“…That’s brilliant.”

Returning to his lab, Dim cleared away everything on the workbench except for the sacrament machine, his new device, and a single sheet of paper with a pencil. Perching on his work stool he began to write, noting each emotion he was feeling and in what amount he though best represented its intensity. Using this as a recipe, he began shuttling back and forth between his storage room and the workbench, carefully measuring each amount of thought mixture into the receiver of the sacrament machine. It took him until dinner time to complete the concoction, and when it was done he carefully poured it with shaking hands into his new device, sealing its airtight container shut with clamps. Millicent joined him briefly to help hold the device upright while he poured. When he was done, he wiped away the sweat he hadn’t realized was there from his forehead and stepped back to regard his device.

Millicent patted him on the shoulder, “Dinner’s ready sir. Shall I keep it warm for you?”

“No, no,” he started towards the door and then looked over his shoulder at the device once more.

“I’m coming.”

Banging on the door woke him, and the thought came before he opened his eyes.

“Today is the day I die.”

Dim climbed out of bed, listening to the muffled voices downstairs as he got dressed in the clothes he had laid out the night before: his favorite gray suit with matching vest; a freshly pressed white shirt; a thin tie the color of ripe apples; his best loafers; and, of course, his spectacles and brown leather longcoat.

Millicent knocked on the door gently just as he finished adjusting the knot of his tie in the mirror.

“Come in,” Dim said.

“Magistrate’s men are downstairs sir. They say they’re here for you,” her eyes were already filling with tears.

Dim walked over to here and took her by the shoulders.

“Thank you Millicent. And thank you for putting up with me these past years.”

She quickly threw her arms around him in an embrace, a choked sob escaping her. She let him go just as quickly, face red with embarrassment and sorrow.

“Twas always a pleasure serving you sir. You were a good master.”

Dim tugged at his jacket to straighten it out.

“Right. Now then. Lets see to my guests.”

The magistrate and a few members of the Quorum stood waiting in the foyer as Dim descended the staircase. A constable stepped forward with irons, but Dim waved him away.

“If its all the same to you Magistrate, I’d like to go willingly,” Dim said to the gathered men.

The constable looked to the Magistrate who nodded an affirmative to him.

A stalemate of sorts hung in the air. The Magistrate crossed his arms in front of him. A member of the Quorum coughed nervously. A constable fingered his baton absently.

“So… what happens now?” Dim asked with raised eyebrow.

The Magistrate cleared his throat.

“Dim Cisneros, you’ve been found guilty of sacrilege and questionable actions taken towards the people of Heatherdale. The time allotted for you to prepare your affairs has passed and it is now time for the judgement of deposition to be enacted. You will be carried from the estate in a constabulary hansom to the dome’s edge where you will be escorted outside the protective walls of the city as punishment for your crime. At this time you are allowed one final request, should you choose to make it.”

“I have chosen my request, Magistrate,” Dim said with no hesitation. “I request that my final invention be allowed to accompany me outside the dome. It is neither weapon nor treasure and has no value to anyone save myself.” Dim motioned to his new device which sat on an otherwise bare entryway table.

The Magistrate eyed the contraption warily, focusing on the cluster of needles protruding from the collar.

Dim saw his trepidation and continued.

“If you like I can wait to put it on until we reach the dome, and it can ride under the care of the constables.”

The Magistrate nodded gruffly.

“Very well. Your request is granted.”

The constable who had sought to put him in irons stepped forward again.

“Constable Furler will take your invention sir. If you’d please follow me?”

Dim followed the constables out into the drive where several hansoms sat awaiting their passengers. Constable Furler took Dim’s invention up with him to ride next to the driver while the other took Dim around to the rear and opened the barred door.

“Inside if you please, sir,” the constable motioned to the sparse interior. “Any bench will do.”

Dim climbed in, stumbling over one of the thick eyelets sunk into the floor.

“Those is for the chains, when need be,” the constable explained, hoisting himself up after Dim and taking the bench opposite.

“Didn’t see them,” Dim replied. “Its my first time in a constabulary wagon.”

“And your last, as I understand it,” the constable retorted, making a show of removing a gold charm on a chain from under his collar where it hung hidden and allowing it to lay across his chest.

Dim noted the charm was a common one amongst Heatherdale citizenry: the Hands of the Goddess.

They rode to the dome wall in silence. As the hansom jerked softly to a halt, Dim noted the quiet murmuring of voices outside; like he was two doors down from a cocktail party. The heavy lock turned and the door swung open revealing Constable Furler and Dim’s invention. But the Constable was far from the only one there.

In addition to the Magistrate and the Quorum, a large crowd had gathered around the airlock. Dim saw several members of the press, flashbulbs beginning to fire even before he exited the hansom. Faces young and old met him everywhere he looked; a sea of people, all owing their lives to him, and all come to see his ended. It was a rare day indeed when a celebrity was deposed; much less the savior of Heatherdale.

Dim climbed down the steps of the hansom, ignoring the questions shouted from the press, opting instead to take his contraption from Constable Furler and slide it on. He tightened first the leather straps that went around his shoulders and his chest, and then the collar, grimacing as the needles dug into and then through his neck.

Two constables stood at either side of the pressure wheel to the airlock door. At the Magistrate’s signal they deftly spun it open and slowly pulled the thick door open. The constable who had ridden in the handsom with Dim took him by the elbow.

“I’ll be walking you out, sir.”

Dim nodded at this and walked with the constable toward the portal. The sound of the crowd grew louder as they walked.

“Any last words?” one reporter shouted.

“How do you feel?” shouted another.

Dim paused at the threshold to the airlock and turned, looking at the crowd. Quiet descended as they strained to hear what he would say.

“Its been a long time since I’ve seen the sky. I’m looking forward to seeing it again.”

The constable pulled the inner door shut behind them and stepped to the outer door, twisting the pressure wheel until its locks released.

“This is it. Off you go lad,” he said with a grunt, shoving the outer door of the dome open.

A fog of dust blew in with a howl, coating them both instantly. The constable made a vain lunge for the outer door as the wind caught it and threw it open to crash into the bronze outer dome. Dim threw his arm over his eyes in an attempt to shield them from the grit that whipped around them.

“Go on then! Out with ya!” the constable yelled over the wind, grabbing a woven strap from the wall that was attached to the outer door. The strap was designed to allow someone to pull the door closed without exiting the relative safety of the airlock.

Dim coughed and pressed himself into the wind, striding forward in what he hoped was a courageous manner. He could hear the zips of small meteoric debris falling from the sky at incredible speed. This close to the dome’s edge the millions of tiny impacts sounded like it was raining bells. He passed the threshold of the airlock and the constable began the arduous task of pulling the door closed.

The wind tore at his longcoat, throwing it out wildly behind him. Dust choked his nostrils. Through squinted eyes he could make out the bleached and splintered bones of those who had been deposed before him littering the ground; none had made it far from the door.

The world was the color of rust; The ground, the sky, almost seamless in its separation. The dust and the wind obliterated everything from view. There was no sun; only a dull glow dimmer than the UV lamps of Heatherdale. Dim could make out no horizon, the blowing dust formed an impenetrable wall only yards from him. He remembered the mountains that surrounded Heatherdale before the breaking of the moon, but they were nowhere to be seen.

He knew he had only moments; flaming stones fell from the sky all around him, each singing its own demise. Dim raised his arms to the heavens, pulling in a breath choked with dust, he screamed in defiance of the sundered world around him.

His shout cut short as a meteor blazed through his skull, cauterizing the wound even as it tunneled through him. It happened at such speed that Dim was aware of the impact as his body began to fall.

He was gone by the time his body hit the ground, already riddled with holes.

“I don’t understand Magistrate.”

“There is nothing to understand. The ruling is passed. This notification is merely a courtesy. Your estate and its lands are forfeit. You have seven days to remove yourself from the premises, or you will be removed by the authorities.”

“But Magistrate… I was not even allowed to defend my case. Surely there must be some recourse, some sort of appeal…”

“I will not hear of it Mister Cisneros. What you are dabbling in is unholy. Unnatural. I don’t like it. This Quorum doesn’t like it. And most importantly the Governor doesn’t like it. You are deposed sir. I suggest you spend your last seven days as a member of this city saying your goodbyes and preparing what effects you can carry with you. Because in seven days you will be put outside the walls of this city, and may the goddess have mercy on you.”

The judgement sphere came down with a crack….

Cover Image originally by Jennie Faber. Used with Permission.