Of Butterflies and Memories (story)

In the midst of a bustling metropolis, one crafted of concrete and steel, a particular maestro would hone his craft atop a sixty floor skyscraper. Perched against the cage iron fences that bounded the highest peak of the city, the maestro would draw on a canvas, one of the few remaining handmade objects within the city itself. From the grey morning glow of an artificial sun until the moment the cold blue street lamps would turn on, the maestro’s right arm carved swift strokes across the canvas, his mind empty bar constant drone to ‘paint from memory’. What he painted was not the cold, cruel and calculating precision that the city was built on, but rather a more human touch, one of nature. The artist’s canvas was filled with a flurry of warm hues, perhaps memories of a world distant from urbanisation. His feeble, slim hands traced a single, monarch butterfly, its deep orange wings fluttering in a verdant, dewy paddock. His artwork bore no mathematical pattern, plan or technical prow...