Still more things to do while transitioning off mandatory bed rest, but not quite ready yet: watch weird documentaries with your wife between attempts, and find out that you are one of the many stars of the show, but one of the few who survived.
The picture above is actually a green object. Work with me here as the narrator explains …
“The Green-Glory Guillotine House, as it is known in human parlance, is still somewhat in operation on Verdis 7, a thousand years after the house of death was built as the crown of Verdisian jurisprudence on that planet. It is not actually a guillotine, but its operation reminds humans of the action of a falling blade. In reality, it is a efficient crushing machine, the great stone portion of the house representing the weight of the society crushing incorrigible evil out of itself.”
“I've toured that place between runs,” I said to Mrs. V.T. Kirk. “The weather was contrary for a takeoff, so we stayed over a day and they gave me a tour, and although it doesn't look green from a distance, it turned green just as we got up on the porch.”
My wife looked at me with eyes that got bigger as the narrator explained.
“Executions were relatively rare among the ancient Verdisians, as they had an elaborate system of restitution for various crimes that were not capital offenses. They were more rare because of the delicate physiological and psychosomatic sensors built into the house's design, something like a much more keen version of an Earthly lie detector.
“If when the accused was brought up on the porch of the house, and he were innocent of the crime o which he was accused, the house turned green, as it would sense that all humanoids present were not of the body of criminality.
“As a failsafe – for it might occur that an official were corrupt and the accused were not – the great crushing dome of the house would turn green while the porch turned dark, indicating an innocent man had been railroaded by corrupt officials.
“A millennium later, methods of jurisprudence and of execution have advanced, and yet a man condemned to death may appeal to trial by the House of Green Glory as a last resort and have his appeal granted. The house is also used to test humanoid statesmen and businessmen who visit; a tour is always offered and if the house turns green, cordial relations are established and cherished, for it is judged that there is nothing in the man that would do harm in his work to the body of Verdis.”
Now I understood why my wife's eyes were so big. I had passed a test I didn't even know I had been taking!
“According to our research, the owner of a human-based intergalactic shipping company was the latest humanoid to turn the House of Green Glory a bright, radiant green – whoever he is, his company has a millennium of recommendation, in the eyes of the Verdisians.”
No wonder people throughout Verdisia – all nine inhabited planets – had RUN to give all their contracts to Kirk and Dixon Shipping, so much so that we had to start an outpost on Verdis 7!
My wife wiped tears from her eyes.
“You see why an admiral passed over a galaxy of men to get one who has a millennium of recommendation?” she said. “I knew this about you, without knowing it!”
“Heck, I didn't even know all that!” I said, “but it's nice to finally find out!”
This is still another version of our crystal feather fractal, pushed out a little further ... the last variant was my challenge to myself to work within the green gradient of the second fractal and isolate the green to the dome area while taking almost all of that color out of the porch ... still advancing my new color skills!