SPARKLER - TIMELINE #7200165673

(Timeline Tuesday #98)

Sparklers are a species of mysterious energy-based lifeforms from a distant timeline. Unlike the carbon-based lifeforms we’re accustomed to, sparklers do not maintain a physical body to house their sentience. Instead, these creatures exist as a floating cluster of colorful, blinking lights that dance and sway in air. They appear in a variety of hues, ranging across the whole spectrum of visible colors, and this hue will remain the same throughout the lifecycle of a sparkler. Typically, young sparklers will shift hues very slightly from the color of their parent, and across several generations a whole rainbow has been created.

Because they do not maintain an organic body, sparklers need little sustenance to keep themselves healthy and active. However, the reproduction cycle of a sparkler is dependent on seeking out and consuming energy. The particular energy these creatures feed on is quite specific: the emotions of awe or wonder.

Sparklers spend most of their time drifting around without any illumination, tiny sparks of energy that are barely detectible and certainly not within the visual range of other creatures who inhabit our reality. However, when the evening arrives a herd of sparklers will begin their dance. A cluster of the creatures will illuminate, then begin to swirl and dance, using a vague psychic connection between the herd to produce incredible visual patterns in the air.

Onlookers will often be drawn to this beauty, pulled closer by the sparkler dance. The closer these human watchers get, and the more awe they experience, the more these sparklers are psychically fed. When a sparkler is ready to reproduce, it will overload with energy and evaporate, but this process will leave one to four young sparklers in place of the original—a bittersweet ending to their lifecycle.

Humans travel for miles and miles to visit well known sparkler habitats, laying out the blankets on warm nights and gazing skyward to experience the beauty of these majestic creatures.