Heard of the Shadow Shells Reflections, an appropriate place for those fearing eviction from their homes and unable to remunerate for their accommodations, they desire to migrate to such areas. A fantasy?
I’m Tielia; during my days of youth, I was itinerant and restive, experiencing leagues of exotic places few Seyians had trodden in their journey through life. I stumbled upon a once discovery by the shores where my navigation where that paradise was located had failed. There were curious people residing in nautilus shells secured from the elements. Rarely did these people venture outside of the shelters. They had no occasion to desire or do it; several nautilus shells were contained in a larger translucent one, so a whole world was probably there. It had natural sections for bedrooms, kitchens, living, and bathrooms. What was not to want everything was for the offering for me. Those nautilus shells were theft-proof; the natural material it was made of encased the burglar until the authorities came to arrest him. I forgot to say a nautilus shell surrounded by a barrier that embraced and protected in impenetrable cubes. When I touched a cube, what I thought was glass, immediately echoed like a drum. I knew the audibility of glass. I pondered its material and decided it was a waste of time. I questioned the possibility of people living in such a shell, were they transformed to the size of insects? You see, those shells must have been small and were grown to a large extent to accommodate people. Actually, these are a large variety of Nautilus. I’ve seen them. Opinions say these shells are built to imitate the ones in nature. Numerous concepts raced through my brain, and I acknowledged defeat.
Faint voices, I swore of their authenticity; they are barely auditable callings. A vision emerged in my mind; a man beckoned me, signaled with his index finger, as if woken up. I was on a shore, yet not the same place, peering up at a slight pale magenta, cerulean and orange-yellow sky. He said, “Welcome traveler from the other world.” I asked how did I get there. An answer, “You wished yourself here.” I swallowed my own words. With a smile on the man’s face, there was no reply. Apprehensive at his peculiar manner, I readied myself to run. Then I asked myself, “Where am I?” He led me to his home; at the entrance were recessions in the walls containing that jars and undignified things. I assumed I would walk up along a curve of the nautilus shell; it didn’t seem that way; bizarrely, the interior was flat. He beckoned me to a small room all white, minimal, cushions, and things across the floor. A woman sitting on the floor, introduced as his wife, hidden by a white veil, did not answer me and kept on with her activity with the baby. In some places, I observed the curve of the shell; sometimes, it was translucent. I saw the endless shore and hundreds of shell structures. Outside, the faces of children peeked in curiosity. An elderly woman walked by on the upper level; the man said she was his mother. She came through the entrance staring at me, then smiled. I knew she welcomed me. She must have been someone famous, the man said nothing concerning his mother.
The man explained beings from the stars constructed shells out of natural ones from the sea. Those resembled squids. The man felt they were machine-like, yet he couldn’t prove it seemed mechanical, yet they were also biological. According to legend, the squid beings had compassion for the homeless people on the beaches, so they devised to create these shell buildings for them.
A door appeared in the air, an extraordinarily beautifully tall woman in exquisite raiment, the compassion on her face brought tears to the people’s faces. She spoke no words; the assembled people immediately understood her purpose. As she told, the people listened attentively; they looked at one another, oohing and awing. I discovered she was their leader. She resided in a shell on the hill a bit beyond the beach. Its pink residential body is distinctive and more significant, fitting a leader. She walked down from the high point and smiled at the people she was escorted by the administration. They walked to shell-like structures and disappeared. Like, see some religious figures. People dispersed to their homes. A silent man touched me on the shoulders; he pointed to a shell where I was to live. He gave me a key, said nothing, then left. As I entered, I felt the tall woman observing me. It had amenities of life, but there were ten bedrooms, a massively huge kitchen stocked with food, large flowing living room. A refugee like myself finally arrived. What to do, just live. There was an urge to look out the window; the tall woman seemed to stare at me from the distant hill.
It’s been years since that journey; in my own world, I, too, reside in a Nautilus, except there was no cube around it. I moved from that giant shell to a humble one; it was better if I was one person. The size of the body was moderate two rooms, a tiny kitchen, hardly any living room, and an inside garden. I discovered that the shell I’m presently in was formed naturally on the beaches without the animal. Cities now line the sea, and people aspire for hope; they can dream.
