- Working at KSC
- NASA Old Headquarters building on KSC destroyed.
- Flintknapping points
- On going writing projects
- Vampires of Kennedy Space Center and the O&C
- Demons of Kennedy Space Center
- Demons of Kennedy Space Center, corpus callosotomy
- Ghosts of Kennedy Space Center, End of Spiders
- Dreams of Kennedy Space Center, lovers and pyramids.
- Witches of Kennedy Space Center
- Cave Bears of Kennedy Space Center
- Aliens of Kennedy Space Center, uninvited guests
- Remembering Kennedy Space Center
Dreams of Kennedy Space Center Lovers and Pyramids
This is another tale of the Kennedy Space Center's multiverses, both in the distant past and the far future.
Follow ghosts, demons, gods, AIs, tourists, DNA experiments, vamps, and witches as they travel the multiverse only to discover their interconnections as allies and enemies across an endless history or future.
Every story is the true story.
Poster at KSC
Lovers and Pyramids
Mars ship Halcyon
One hundred and two Ophelia hybrids on the Mars ship Halcyon dreamed interconnected in forced hibernation for the journey between planets and the new canyon colonies. They drew their wings in tight and wept at their future on the cold and dusty Mars. They had all been impregnated before leaving the blue planet forever.
The stars blurred indistinct, atoms shed valence orbitals into the infinite fractal curve of night, and a carmine mist obscured their vision to begin another hibernation dream story. Particles entangled in quantum state forever correlated with infinite involutions, non-linear destructive entanglement with another. A moment only of chaos blindness; then enchanting love again, however fragile, proximity permissions of electrical impulses according to the strengths of the double helix.
Ship technicians watched the forced dream recorded on monitors. This historic event, the second release of Ophelia volunteers into the canyons, was an epic step by mankind to settle the universe. If this set of colonists failed to survive, a new mix of DNA would be added until the exact survival mix was worked out.
On the monitors, the new dream played.
When soaked by good rum, Valintine and I were capable of an inexhaustible repository of experiences and reminiscences.
Valentine Evergreen, his broad-brimmed white hat and an emerald-headed cane in hand, often wanted to talk of his curious reminiscences of taverns of the Spanish Main, the verdant Canal Zone, or deep-water Naval adventures.
His stories of the blue ocean often left both the taste of bourbon and salt sea spray on your lips and vivid imagination of the image of flying fish skimming waves crowded with hemp bales.
Or he would tap-tap his cane and speak of musings of the space center, stories of ghouls and barghests in the catacombs of the launch pads.
"Too long on those islands," I would whisper the old song to let him know he was full of BS.
The catacombs were empty, even though no one, not even security with thermal vision goggles and tasers, would enter the launch Pad catacombs. Those prone to gossip would whisper silly rumors, "Gates have opened in those dark tunnels."
We both scoffed at the security guards' cowardice. "Where have all the adventurers gone?" Tap-tap.
"Cowards in this bunch also," I said, gesturing to the Space Station Processing Facility gathering for the fire drill in the west parking lot.
A subdued murmur of discomfort filled the parking lot, a mingling of whispers and hushed voices. The residents of the SSPF, those visiting the snack bar, all caught in the mandatory fire drill were ready to go inside. The fun of ambling down the stairs with the fire marshal and security police looking on had worn off.
"I have to charge my phone," moaned one bioengineer. Another engineer who pretended to be a janitor walked around splayed-footed, talking to himself while carrying his stolen broom.
She stood in the parking lot, biting her lips impatiently, dagger eyes glaring towards the firemen and their drill.
Her real name was Ophelia, but she said the name Olympia gave her a little class. She was taller than average, graceful, and had a smile that made our blood tingle. Never had Olympia looked more beautiful.
She chewed out the fire marshal and twisted her lip with impatience, ignoring Valentine and me and refusing to acknowledge our begging stares.
"The taste of salt tears when she walked away from me," I hissed.
Valentine turned his head and struck me with his jeweled cane.
"Shut up, Marcus! She ran away from you as well as from me."
Bastard, that quip hurt as much as it was factual.
After all, Valentine had only offered gifts and money; well, gifts and that endless powder in the green emerald cane.
I had offered love. Which token was more powerful? I knew I was right….yet she was part of the jumbled chaos of the space center where the same person may appear different in very different roles. And that powder.......?
Fucking Valentine tap-tapped his cane on the parking lot.
Fucking Morse Code, and Olympia paused, with heightened color, to drawback her loosened hair and gave a heart-breaking smile to Valentine!
No!
A single jewel burned at her throat, suspended on a delicate gold chain, and matching earrings set in silver leaves flashed in the intense Florida sunshine. Where had those talismans come from?
Valentine's arms half circled her, and she laughed gently, pointing at the crowd working their way back to the SSPF entrance. Olympia giggled; her hand lingered on the cane.
Perhaps I had not been sensible. But how many more whiskey beach nights of deterministic chaos with the wild chameleon could I take?
Between whiskey shots, I tried to explain the tragedies of my life, the elan of great loves that had branded my soul.
We had wept together. Had I mentioned that?
The lively creature had bitten me! Did I tell you that? A draw-blood bite no-less.
My heart was crushed again when she smiled at him, my defeat demonstrated by the carmine blush across my face and neck.
"Oh, a sunburn again," I mumbled.
Eileen punched me.
She was looking down, her fingers twisting a braid, her face a burning crimson at her behavior,
Everyone on the space center knew Olympia had also turned down Eileen's overtures.
"Give me a break, Marcus!" said Eileen. "Are you going to whine all day because you're a cheapskate drunk who prefers misanthropy over hot babes?"
I stuttered at the unfair attack.
"At least we can pass the drug test," I sputtered.
Eileen's face turned crimson again, and her eyes quickly shifted to the parking lot, then to Val and Olympia as they disappeared through the electric doors.
"Alone in rebellion," said Eileen.
For the briefest moment, I thought Olympia glanced at Eileen-she was looking at me, of course.
"We are in control of our impulses and preserve our dignity," I said.
Eileen turned astonished blue eyes towards me.
"You suffer from chronic anxiety and fear of love? You are a fucking coward," she dared.
"I wanted that heat so bad," I admitted a little sheepishly. Who had given Olympia that love charm?
"Do you Want to get a beer?" Eileen said. Her eyes were saddened, and she thought about her gift to Ophelia and the promise.
"How about some Ayahuasca tea?" I asked. "Shamanic communication that channels inner healing energy in a healing ceremony wild visions.
"Sure," said Eileen. "Whatever you just said."
Above us in the shade tree of the Space Station Processing Facility parking lot, a mockingbird sang for a mate, its eyes flashing carmine.
Temple of the Holy Ecdyses, KARS Park.
The Continuous Improvement Process facilitator/shaman collected the cups of our second drink of Ayahuasca tea and checked on us periodically.
We had a weird flash, and I could no longer tell the difference between her thoughts and mine.
"Telepathy?" we said in unison.
The shaman smiled a knowing smile of satisfaction.
"All Humans have the ability of telepathy, a survival mechanism left over from the hunter-killer pacts of Homo Erectus pre-humans," she explained. "With the advent of improved language skills and the requirement for smaller hunting pacts in northern latitudes, the need for telepathy was suppressed. Psychedelics can disable the default mode network of the spoken word."
Together, Eileen and I trembled and shook late into the night, sharing the quantum entanglement of multiple hypnagogic experiences.
In the pre-dawn, Eileen dreamed of herself older, as a director of Heliophysics, a vision somehow true, but how could she be older and young at the same time?"
Eileen, the director of the Heliophysics Division, discovered a disturbing trend in the constantly flowing solar wind around Earth and the nearby planets.
The data was unmistakable; with each rocket launch, the solar wind created eddies and whirlpools, micro wormholes that yelled silent invitations, "Step in!"
Translucent flickering gates, if you may.
She stepped through one of the translucent gates to meet a man wearing a brown incrusted feathered headdress of a temple priest. He chanted, holding up a red-stained obsidian dagger and beating heart.
She retreated from his approach, "This is love, the flake of holy stone craves to possess, to bleed and feed and absorb, this is love," chants the man, a priest of the feathered serpent.
Her training and faster-than-human reflexes take over, and the obsidian blade is twisted and easily finds the man's heart.
"This is love," they say in unison.
She laughs gently, eccentric electric, for other visions were telling her to lick the blade, just a taste, a puerile and absurd idea; however, her tongue stretched out for a flicker as light as the opening of a flower.
Her fingers twist a braid in contemplation; the blood taste, a time-honed petition to the gods in decorous exegesis.
Mixed-Dimensionality, new madness. The blood is life and power, power and life.
She walks out of the dark space to see that she is standing on a vast pyramid, surrounded by cheering crowds demanding blood.
The other priests look upon her with astonishment, a Goddess of heavy brow ridge and weak chin, impossible corn silk colored hair flowing around her like a halo.
Tied on the stone altar is a single man, a conquistador by his ancient clothing.
"Cut me free!" hisses the man; he speaks in old Castilian.
She recognizes Marcus, the ship pilot who left for Mars, or-no, the Castilian was another variation on the Marcus character.
She uses the black and crimson knife to cut the man free.
"Gracias," said the Conquistador, who picked up a club and another holy knife that feasted on beating hearts.
The knife screams in protest at the defilement and weeps carmine tears.
Priests object to the release of their sacrifice, and Marcus swings an obsidian-tipped club to offer more blood to their god that is never satiated.
From four corners of the pyramid comes the roar of rage, and ten thousand believers charge up the slippery temple stairs in a transmutation of forces, from obedient slaves to blood-mad warriors.
She met his gaze, her perfume elusive, her touch light as the fall of a rose leaf or blood drip.
"Escape if you can, yellow-haired witch," said Marcus. "They want blood. I will show them a sacrifice that will put me in legends."
The Conquistador swings his obsidian razor club, and the dying warrior knocks five hundred warriors back down the steep temple slick stairs, and yet more warriors step up from the stairs.
"Save him!" pleads the Marucs, who shares the vision via telepathy.
Eileen dances away in a shimmer of beauty, an elemental phenomenon of energy and wonder and tears.
"This Marcus, this conquistador cannot be saved," she whispered tensely in her mixed-dimensionality madness.
Marcus wails and seeps into his own vision, a vision shared with a god.
"This is me," said Horus the Demon, son of a god, towering over Marcus of the Ayahuasca tea.
"It is me, a very emasculated copy, but me nonetheless. I can see my essence in this weaker copy."
An aura of disappointment and disgust floats around the god.
Eileen, also sharing the vision, winces. The beauty of Demon's hawk head is difficult to look at, pain, pleasure, and awe. A God.
"I mean god-damn," said Eileen. "A true 6EQUJ5 Wow signal revelation."
Marcus of the Ayahuasca tea makes water in terror.
A demon.
Other tails of the Space Center:
Vampires of Kennedy Space Center
Demons of Kennedy Space Center
Demons of Kennedy Space Center, corpus callosotomy
Ghosts of Kennedy Space Center
Dreams of Kennedy Space Center
Aliens of Kennedy Space Center
Director of Kennedy Space Center
Hitchhikers of Kennedy Space Center
Witches of Kennedy Space Center
Cave Bears of Kennedy Space Center
Chimeras of Kennedy Space Center
Gods of Kennedy Space Center and the Nile
Dinosaurs of Kennedy Space Center
Kayakers of Kennedy Space Center
Remembering Kennedy Space Center
Shadows of Kennedy Space Center
Starman of Kennedy Space Center
Gate Jumpers of Kennedy Space Center
Allies of Kennedy Space Center (Pt 2 of Gate Jumpers
Savants of Kennedy Space Center
Ferals of Kennedy Space Center
Return HOME from Dreams of Kennedy Space Center
For pet lovers around the globe, "It's a Matter of Luck" is a collection of heart warming stories of horse rescues from the slaughterhouse.
Available on Amazon:
It's a Matter of Luck: Inspirational, Heartfelt Stories of Horses Given a Second Chance.
by Kim Ryba & Lina T. Lindgren
Warning: This book may cause your eyes to water in a good way. (speaking from experience after reading it)
Please give Kim and Lina a heartfelt review on Amazon!
Author Bruce Ryba at Kennedy Space Center Launch Pad 39B & Artemis 1. "We are going to the Moon!"
Author's discussion (that's me) on You Tube of a book review on Amazon
For the video versions of information, please check out my YouTube Channel (Turkeys, Flintknapping, dive stories etc.)
My fictional series/stories on Florida history:
Freedoms Quest (book one)
Struggle for the northern frontier and other lost tales of old Florida.
Available on Amazon
Desperate times call for bold action.
In a desperate move to retain Florida and protect the treasure-laden galleons on their dangerous return journey to Europe, the King of Spain issues a royal decree offering refuge to all English slaves who escape Florida and pick up a musket to defend the coquina walls of Saint Augustine.
In another bold gamble, the King offers refuge to the dissatisfied Indian nations of the southeast who will take up arms against the English.
Clans, traumatized by war and disease, cross the Spanish Frontier to settle the cattle-rich land and burned missions of Florida.
Follow the descendants of the conquistador Louis Castillo in remote Spanish Florida, a wild and swept by diseases, hurricanes, and northern invasions.
Book Two: Available on Amazon!