Neutropia: New Rise at Bombway

The Chronicles of Neutropia, Volume 1, New-Rise at Bombway



Chapter One: The Leitlief's

In the Name of Allah, Master of Mercy in this life and the next.

The village of Bombway was a tiny settlement, in a far flung corner of Darkenmoor, on the east side of the Netherlands, on a planet called Neutropia, on the outer left wing of the Andromeda Galaxy, part of the Haffi Cluster (note: The Haffi cluster was named after Hafsa Awan, daughter of the Earth based astrophysicist MB Awan).

Bombway village was a rather unremarkable place, in fact everybody there would sit down in the evenings and not bother to have any excitement. In the centre of the village was a large crater; the end-scar. The children of the village, who were forbidden from playing the vicinity of the end-scar, would often wonder what fantastically terrible secrets the grown-ups were keeping their innocent souls from.

The village school was named Multicorn Academy, or MA for short, which was an acronym unsurprisingly named after the thing that almost all the adults in Bombway would earn a living via: multicorn. For the people of Bombway, multicorn was almost too good to be true. A fully grown multi-corn plant is truly an impressive sight, the stalks on average 3 meters high, with a spectacularly large flower, which came in all the shades of the rainbows, which would arch across the sky when Perseus and Maine would glisten after the rains had fallen in the right way.

Lisa and Adam Leitlief were students at MA. Both were due to enter into the final year of junior high, year 6. Lisa was a slender girl, with blonde hair and a wonderful sweet smile, which caused the eyes of even the people she disliked to light up. Adam was a stouter, more thick-set lad, with jet-black hair; the pair of twins shared identically striking green eyes which they inherited from their parents: Mr. Jonas Lietleif and Mrs. Elenor Brankleworst. Perhaps the most unusual of the many unusual features of the Lietlief family, apart from their names, was the fact that Mr. Leitlief had blonde hair and their mother jet-black! Genes are funny things and The Great Source has a most engaging sense of humour!

On the dawn of Perseus, the first day of the third moon, 1438 years after the fall, AF, Lisa and Adam were out with their father, riding back on dul-dul, their favourite steed, back from collective farm number 6, the closest to their home. Mr Leitlief had an unusually sombre expression on his face.

"Are you worried about anything new tonight daddy?" Chimed Lisa and Adam; knowing daddy loved it when they spoke in unison as he said it made him and mummy think they were teleo-matic, sorry telepathic.

"Not particularly, my lovelies; well I suppose there is just one thing: I guess that I'm just over-thinking things again."

"Silly daddy", lilted Lisa as she snuggled in her daddy's arm, wrapping her arms around daddy's ever-changing paunch while gazing at the tapestries of stars glinting off of his thick, horn-rimmed glasses.

"Did you find a new stone for me?" Questioned Adam as he patted daddy's right pocket on his matt-blue overalls, knowing that he could discover evidence which would elicit a response that would please him.

"Well yes! As a matter of fact I did, but we might need to analyse it in the laboratory because it might be radioactive son." Replied Mr. Lietlief; in his sonorous baritone.

"What's nadioactive?" Chimed the twins.

"Radioactive".

"Yes dadwa; Radioactive", quipped Lisa, sounding far too like one of those teenagers that daddy was often complaining about.

"Well, it's well... it's physics".

The children's eyes lit up. It was always super-interesting to hear daddy go on on about physics, particularly astrophysics, but never solid-state physics which daddy said he despised.

"The nuclei of certain elements are unstable, we don't know why, there haven't been any new books restored from the Afterfall archives to clarify that. What we do now is that these unstable nuclei sometimes emit an exotic and powerful bunch of pulses, called quanta."

"What's the plural of quanta daddy?" asked Adam.

"Quanta is the plural; the singular is quantum".

"May The Great Source Reward you".

"And you son. Ah, where was I?" replied Mr. L as their cabin came into-view.

Mrs. L was a woman of great poise and elegance, her Jet-black hair and green eyes were complemented by a compact, yet flowing set of curves that were contained by her plain blouse and loose flowing jeans. She was unsurprisingly sitting on the porch playing with Jabber, the family feline, who was looking particularly satisfied for being rewarded for a long day of chasing after vermin from the local vegetable patch by having his belly rubbed by mama.

"Mama", chimed the twins.

"My star-babies!", beamed mama as she sprang up from the porch, followed shortly by Jabber, who made dul-dul rear up deliberately so that Adam could lop onto his back as Lisa was caught by mama. The Great Source, Lord of Majesty and Honour had indeed blessed the Lietlief family.

Later that night, Mr and Mrs Lietlief were tucked up in bed with Jonas' beard and Eleanor's tresses looking suspiciously ruffled; perhaps they ere engaging in their second favourite past-time again?

"I wrote something new for you my dearest and first", said Jonas as Eleanor purred her approval, as she turned to her side so Jonas could light the candle next to their mattress as he fished out a blue tanned-hide covered notebook that she knew he filled only with love poems for Eleanor:

"I love you,
Without hesitation, duress or self-seeking want,
My love is theoretically unconditional my love.

I love you,
Through the endless epochs,
When The Great Source's Decree Strikes,
Hearts open up as hands are raised high in surrender,
To the fact that I am powerless over my love for you,
But, dearest Eleanor, by your twin peaks I shant complain,
I'm deliriously felicitous that my love for you is insane."

Eleanor had her hands round the small-spark by this point.

I love you,
And,
After 50 years of marriage,
I love to look back,
Three kids and a life finally on track and I thank The One Above,
Most High,
That he placed you,.
A divine gift in Neutropian form in my life.

I love you,
I see you,
You in all your honest glory,
How you have suffered to bear my fruit and I wonder at His Saying:

"The mother carries them in weakness upon weakness and the child's suckling is 24 moons",

And I realize,
I love you,
Totally, unconditionally, always and forever,
And despite the patriarchal facade I portray,
I say with full straight-pride, that:

I love you,
Without reason, refrain, disdain, deceit or shame.

I love you so much my love,
That it's even okay if you,
Don't feel the same.

nts: cut to Barry White.