Jim Cameron's Wine Cellar

 by Lance Mazmanian





    Small subterranean lake with exposed sandbar in the center. Luminous molds of varied color and brightness paint the walls. A waterfall pours from a barrier vaguely north.

​    On the sandbar is a cube-shaped structure, a geometrically flawless black stone building about the size of an Urth Caffé or Pam’s Coffy. There’s an entrance, but no door.

    Cold here, too.

    Space inside the building is empty, save for a grove of thin, elegant trees growing into and through the floor. The trees are quasi-Aspen, unnaturally smooth and black. Leaves are a kind of living silver foil.

    Lightly flowing stream enters the room from the west. Hm.

    Grove center is a perfectly finished hole, the opening to a vertical shaft. Water from the western stream pours right into it. The shaft has an isolated black steel ladder, going down.

    At the bottom of the ladder is a modestly sized wine cellar. The cellar is colored on a palette of black and crushed greys, with differing sheens and texture. The scheme produces a kind of endlessness feeling.

    Light comes from nowhere. It seems to be in all the right places, or not.

    The wine cellar has six-hundred bottles, all of fine vintage, each perfectly stored.

    If you pay attention (or just get lucky) you’ll discover the single distinctive bottle of the collection, one not like the others at all.

    That particular bottle (an excellent Pinot) originates off-world. And it’s the only reason the cellar is here.

    End Transmission.



Lance Mazmanian has been part of various entertainment and arts since Dr. Smith damned near burned down the Jupiter 2.

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