Heading Weast for the Winter

by Split Scimitar

Big and Bright, Wide and High

It’s a starry night; the moon is full, and the air still. There is the sound of faraway ships and distant laughter. They echo over the houses and through the terminals. Down all the ramps and security checkpoints. You might also hear the sound of static of my handheld chatting. These are the sounds that say the airport is hard at work at the second-largest airfield in America.

This is the sound of my mind palace.

My mind’s a pretty active place, and I know this is a dream. How can I tell? There’s a lot of traffic today, and we haven’t even seen the evening rush yet. No way is the airport this busy during current events.

Tonight, I’m also tending the airport’s largest bar. Sometimes, I sit back and watch it all play out, but this time, I’m taking a part, even if in the grand scheme of things, it is but an odd job.

The bar is in a nice location in the terminal, affording a view straight to two of the airport’s primary runways at their midpoint. This means one can catch an aircraft either really close to rotation, or as they’re on the landing rollout, so one can see the stowing of the thrust reversers and/or spoilers.

I have myself a hearty glass or two of water just to keep my mouth from getting dry, when a shining light eventually flies into view, very much visible even in the midday light. It passes through the window ahead before brightening and instantly materializing into a pony amongst humans.

“Hello Princess Luna.” I call nonchalantly while wiping a glass from the dishwasher.

“Hello Max.” She responds with no effort to hide her confusion.

“Let me explain. Welcome to my subconscious, but you already knew that. This is a world built in the style, but not a direct emulation, of a mind palace. It’s a different airport almost every time. Tonight, it’s Dallas/Fort Worth International.”

I pull an airport directory out of my pocket and lay it out in front of her. Trying not to become completely mesmerized with her mane, I stutter out,

“The… da… airport is arranged sort of like… like so. Uh, we… we are here at the ‘D’ gates. The international terminal. Here we’ll find the most eclectic bunch of traffic. BA, Qatar, Qantas, just to name a few. One of the longest flights in the world operates from here, and… should… be boarding pretty soon.

“Anyway, enough of the superficial/extraneous details.” I then say quickly, replacing the glass in the overhead racks and moving onto the next. “If you have other dreams to oversee, please go ahead and visit them. I’ll be here, hopefully. If you ever need to rest while you’re on duty, we’re always open.”

“I’m sensing some interesting things from your psyche. I shall return!”

---

“Welcome back Princess Luna.”

“I appreciate the gesture, but I am no longer the Princess of the night.”

“You are to me. Not to renounce Princess Twilight. I love her too.

“Unfortunately,” I quickly resume as I notice her blushing, “I think you can sense that I do have some feelings of attraction towards you. Rest assured, those feelings, no matter what you may seem to notice, are purely out of admiration.”

“I’d love to sit down and talk about it.” She says, seemingly trying to play off the fact that I find her beautiful.

“Can I get you anything?”

“Your finest water, please.”

“You’ve led yourself to it, but I won’t make you drink.” I say as I grab a clean glass from atop and fill it in one swift motion. “On the house.” I finish as I slide it down to her.

“Clever. Thank you.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but if you can pick up things my psyche is emanating, isn’t this kind of a one-sided conversation?”

“Not at all. I can sense abnormalities, and I certainly appreciate your upfront-ness. What you tell me is brand new information, that you haven’t told me before. Also, this is your dream. I don’t need to tell you that whatever runs through your subconscious can have some effect on this environment.”

“Lemon?” I ask while simultaneously nodding in agreement with her.

She shakes her head.

“I didn’t really notice.” I then continue. “I’m kind of just doing my thing here. If I’m not watching this operation play out, I usually hop between terminals to monitor the constant influx and outflow most of these gates see in a given cycle.”

“I am familiar with the method of loci technique. I’ve never seen it manifested in this form before.” She says as a throng of patrons, fresh off a flight that just arrived a few gates down, shuffle about the terminal.

“I kind of made it up myself. Obviously, because I am a pilot, and always have wanted to be since I was very little, I have an unhealthy obsession with my career field. Childhood stuff, which is A Whole Different Animal. Not really something to delve into now.”

“I appreciate you providing me with a rest stop.” Princess Luna begins after taking a mighty swig of water.

“Call it a stopover.” I say more off the cuff than serious as I offer a refill.

“Why might the location change?” She asks as she slides her glass towards me to signify yes.

“Depends on my mood, and back when I was actually working, where I went.” I reply as I grab the nozzle and fill her glass.

“And how did the concept of making the method of loci churn out an airport?”

“The concept is quite simple. The basic “objects in a room” principle works for many, but to me, that only really seemed to work for rote memorization, which up to a certain point, is forgotten. The transfer between rote and short-term, and even short to long-term memory is where the concept evolves. In this case, it evolves beyond even the concept of mind palace, since true mind palaces render objects of like or similar disposition as logically fallacious. That is to say, if a concept is tied to an object in the room that is closely related enough, or rather, if a concept and the object matched to it are too similar, it becomes a fallacy.

“Airports are always subject to random change and conditions. That descended directly from the pseudo-instinctive way I train my brain, just reciting what I already know and linking it to concepts or what have you that I don’t understand yet. Applicably, no one gate sees the same flight twice, speaking strictly from the viewpoint of a gate. From an airplane perspective, unless you’re a small presence at a given airport, you’ll more than likely park at a different gate every time. And each set of routes an airplane flies is also pseudo-random, with limitations like range and capacity that can be levied onto an aircraft’s schedule.

“What you’re seeing on the ramp is more or less what one could describe as stimuli interacting with information both permanent and transient. Gate changes happen all the time, and I can get dates mixed up, to provide a specific example. Gate changes could also be representative of my brain reinforcing things, like learning things backwards, forwards, and inside out. Likewise, I’m here in the D gates because this is the international terminal. I assign international terminals to my love for aviation, seeing as how the traffic it usually receives is the most eclectic, and the largest aircraft depending on where they’re coming from. If we were to, say, hop over into another terminal, you might get the other areas of my life that see less “foreign” information and more personal stuff. For example, since the dominant carrier here at DFW is American Airlines, and we’re seeing a lot of domestic operations heading to the terminal regarding… let’s just say, personal care. Quite a few times in my life, I’ve gotten signs from the universe that I need to improve self-care. Since this here is the most prominent terminal, my love for aviation is obviously going to be the cleanest, the neatest, and the sleekest profile here. However, I cannot say the same for this terminal, which has been, in the words of Los Angeles International Airport, “continuous major construction [on airport] daily.” I dedicate most of my resources away from self-care because I pride myself on being flexible, chill/cool with almost anything, and to a point, considerably self-sufficient, but even I have my limits. It’s still there, because 1. The terminal still exists, and 2. As much as I would like to, I can’t ignore the fact that I’m human. There’s no getting around that. So, despite looking disused on the outside, it is for the sake of airport operations, an overflow area.”

“That sounds to me like you should dedicate more to it. I know your friends say you like to make you seem like you’re a never-tiring, always available to help kind of pony, well, person, but even the strongest and most resilient of creatures have a support system behind them.”

“I know. Look at what I said happened in the time leading up to my trip here with Sunset. I failed to utilize the one I had and it almost cost me my life. What’s more, I have to constantly conquer the urge to suppress any feelings of abnormality or asking for help because I was raised to always presume any problems I have are my own fault and can be done without the help of others. I just impose on and waste others’ time.”

“Attention in the terminal,” the intercom suddenly booms, interrupting our conversation, “due to passing thunderstorms, all flights are delayed for at least an hour.”

“Oh great.” I grumble. “See what happens when I start hemming and hawing? I talk about myself and get bit in the flank.”

“You’re quite hard on yourself. Some credit is due to you. You are quite tough, but you needn’t show it all the time. My sister and I, along with our counterparts in your world saw it from day one.”

“Be that as it may, understand this whole airport of a mind palace is pretty ambiguous and convoluted. Any given day, the status of the various terminals, ground operations, or even the air traffic control could mean two totally different things, both on different nights and the same night. It could be said that it’s a matter of personal interpretation, but it nonetheless works for me. This mind palace as you see it isn’t likely even a true mind palace. It is at face value more of a metaphor, except instead of randomly assigning information to a given piece or article in a room, it’s a cluster of information arriving, thus transferring to the appropriate connection here in the mind palace.”

“Well, it all makes sense to me, but what amazes me is how intricate this hub is. So many cities, so much information, how do you not overload?”

“Well, that overflow terminal is always handy, but sometimes it does. That usually happens though when we’re at a smaller airport. Depending on the day, I’ve found a correlation between my tolerance for anomalies and the size of airport generated in my mind. The process of randomly assigning an airport is obviously influenced by my conscionable memory, but if I’m mellowed out or had a good day, that night’s airport will be a major one, like DFW. The days I get a small airport, I know it’s usually because I am or have had an off day. I can say with confidence that spending time with you and your sister has increased your chances of getting a big airport, especially because I know you did say you really did want me to visit. If you had seen my dreams when I was at my worst, you probably would have seen a bunch of passenger jets trying to operate out of an airport so small, it was in danger of, and did, shut down.”

“My goodness. I’m very glad you didn’t depart us… as such.” She says as a large bolt of lightning lights up the sky. “That may have been a poor choice of words.”

“I enjoyed it.” I laugh as the thunder booms right behind the lightning, giving some of the visible patrons a good scare or two.

“Well, my time to patrol dreams is soon up. Sunrise is approaching.” She says taking one last eager sip of water.

“Of course. I hate having have held you for so long, especially when you have fillies, colts, mares, and stallions who are likely suffering much worse than I am.”

“Worry not. You were my last stop.”

“Are you going to try and depart in this storm? The airport’s closed.” I say as I load our glasses and start the now-full dishwasher.

“I don’t need to negotiate some storm clouds to get out of your head.”

“Very well then. My salutations, my thanks, and my apologies: for my hemming and hawing. I don’t have very many people I can vent to.”

“You have plenty. Be not afraid to ask them. I may only speak for myself, but I think it hurts them that you’re suffering in silence more than you think.”

As she makes her way out, the door to gate D25 opens, with a bright, almost blinding light from beyond the jetway. Just as she steps through, it closes behind her, to which I teleport to the gate desk and make the following announcement.

“Dallas/Fort Worth is paging all passengers on the following flights: British Airways flight 192 with service to London Heathrow, Qatar Airways flight 730 with service to Doha, and Qantas flight 8 with service to Sydney. All three flights are now in final boarding. British Airways passengers boarding at gate D11, Qatar Airways passengers boarding at gate D14, and Qantas passengers boarding at gate D16. Once again, British Airways flight 192 with service to London Heathrow, final boarding call at gate D11; Qatar Airways flight 730 with service to Doha, final boarding call at gate D14; and Qantas flight 8 with service to Sydney, final boarding call at gate D16.”

Author's Note:

This was written during a layover. Hence the [odd] specificity of gate D25, where I was to depart.

The idea struck me when I saw my first 787-10 (of British Airways) and A350-1000 (of Qatar Airways).

As for the Qantas? One of my uncles flew on Qantas flights 7 and 8 for a conference down under.