Duke City

    A morning sun breaks over the parallel horizon of a calm sea. The sun’s warm rays reflect off the surface of the water and are greeted by soaked ports and docks. The fishing wharf directs the rays to rows of modern buildings that get taller with each row that they go by. The unfortunate rays then meet the end of the road as they strike a series of solar energy panels that are installed in the roofs of a couple of sky-grazing, towering structures that are built in the heart of a metropolitan-center.

    The skyscrapers bask in the sunlight of a morning born anew on the city. The sunlight reflects off the many windows that mask the interiors of the obelisk-like structures and pours down onto the streets and building complexes below. From the perspective of the behemoths, ant-sized people begin to flow out of their homes and apartments into the streets to start off their daily routine of work, school, and finding their own places in the world they live.

    A man with shoulder length brown hair in a ponytail and is wearing a pair of tan khaki shorts that go past his knee with a firey-red plaid buttoned t-shirt lazily walks on the cold sidewalk in front of a window display for a relatively brand new line of women fashion apparel. A young girl in the kindergarten with blond pig tails and a blue and white sailor school uniform runs after her family’s blue heeler dog in her dew-covered backyard. A woman with curly brown hair in place behind her head with the help of an orange hair clip walks out of a well-kept apartment building and down the busy street she resides on. Her gray business jacket and skirt almost blend perfectly into the walls and concrete of the city. However, her colorful ascot gives her the necessary contrast to separate herself from the inanimate architecture that are bringing the city to life in the brightening wake of the day.

    This is Duke City.

    It is coastal city that its many inhabitants like to call home. The metropolis is governed solely by itself with its own city hall which is in control of the city’s emergency services, law enforcement, and even the library and archives that contains almost two hundred years worth of dusty history. Duke City is in peace with a minimal crime rate and a growing economy fit for the human race to populate and prosper.

    Every day through the four seasons of the 365 days-long year, from dawn until sundown, the city lives and flourishes as its concrete veins circulate the people in an endless daily cycle. Twilight fills the atmosphere and the city begins to die down as the citizens retreat to their home sweet homes. Multiple, countless switches are turned on throughout Duke City and the electricity flowing through hundreds of thousands of lighting sources revives the many building-shaped organs of the concrete jungle yet again.

    A world comes to rest with the last glimpse of the dying sun going down under the lands in the west. A white, luminous full moon appears behind a grove of cumulus clouds. The milky white moonlight fills the streets and lightless rooms of Duke City. The moon visualizes itself in the lifeless solar energy panels of the skyscrapers. A silhouette forms in the sphere of the moon. It is that of an unknown being that is standing on top of the tallest building.

    A light breeze blows over him as he stands there on the edge of the reclining rooftop. His long, raven-black hair flows with the breeze and the skin of his face and hands appear to be paler compared to the whiteness of the moon. His buttoned, untucked black long sleeve shirt, blue denim jeans, and black slip on shoes contrast with the paleness of his skin. His eyes look down on the army of structures lined up by the city’s streets. His expressionless mouth forms into a friendly smile.

    His smooth voice comes out saying, “Hello there again everyone.” The young man’s foot steps forward and steps down on nothing but the air clinging to the side of the glass-covered building. His body then begins the long, fast descent from the top to the bottom of the universe of a coastal city with two worlds in it which is named Duke City.