Wizards
As I followed Alim through the woods, I pictured a huge city full of people and buildings, the crowded market, a huge temple in the centre, all waiting just over the next ridge. What would the people look like? Did they all dress like him? What was their music like?
But there was no city, no buildings. There was just a door.
It stood between two trees, not attached to anything: a door to nowhere. It shone a little, like metal, but it was painted to look like part of the background, so no one would notice it.
It slid open like a curtain, and we stepped inside... into a cloud of smoke.
The city was even more miraculous than I could have imagined... but it was a hidden city, an underground city. A city of wizards, all in uniforms like Alim's, who went out every day collecting things and studying them back in their rooms using strange tools and machines. There were rooms filled with treasures like the highest Priests back home had never seen - or dreamed of. Jewels, carvings, bottles, fine metal work, books of all kinds, magic mirrors with pictures that moved, and cabinets that made food out of thin air.
And beds, too... so soft, with such lovely cool sheets, and hot baths and soap that smelled like flowers. I was sure I'd died and gone to heaven to live with some even better gods.
We taught each other a few words - "hello" and "eat" and "drink" and so on. It was frustrating, though, and Alim finally asked if I wanted to learn his language (I think "you want talk my talk?" was what he said). I sure did.
So that night I went with him to the Cognitive Centre, where one of the wizards put a cap on me before I went to sleep. It felt like it was washing my head at first, and I wondered if I'd misunderstood... but as I drifted off to sleep I could feel things popping into my brain: words, connections, ideas. I/you/him/her. Go, goes, going, gone, went.
When I woke up, my ears were ringing. It felt like people had been talking in both my ears the entire night, each one saying something different. My head felt full, like they'd chopped up a stack of books and squeezed them into my skull. Every time I looked at something, a dozen words would come into my head, one after another. Vase - red - paint - bird - wing - fly - sky - stars - light. Man - voice - smile - teeth - chew - swallow - stomach...
It was exciting at first - I could speak Standard! I could ask questions, and I did, all day. But by the end of the day I was ready to scream. Everything had a word that came with it, or usually a dozen words, and every time I opened my mouth, all of them would try to come out at once. The next day was even worse - words would pop into my head for no reason at all, words with no connection to anything I knew. Tulip. Multiply. Nitrogen.
The city could move, they told me. They could make that door appear almost anywhere they wanted, and wherever they went, they collected plants and bugs and books and pictures. And sometimes people. They ran all kinds of tests on me to find out how I breathed, what colours I could see, what was in my blood.
I sang for them. They listened politely, but most of them had a look about them as if they were listening to a machine to tell what was wrong with it. A couple of them seemed to actually enjoy it, though.
Then they played some music for me on their systems - wild, crashing rhythms that sounded like my head was inside a huge dolomo drum, and alien noises like flocks of screaming birds, and the melodies like nothing I'd ever heard. It was the strangest stuff... but I listened for hours. At night I dreamt of words falling like giant hailstones and covering me in a huge heap.
But there was no city, no buildings. There was just a door.
It stood between two trees, not attached to anything: a door to nowhere. It shone a little, like metal, but it was painted to look like part of the background, so no one would notice it.
It slid open like a curtain, and we stepped inside... into a cloud of smoke.
The city was even more miraculous than I could have imagined... but it was a hidden city, an underground city. A city of wizards, all in uniforms like Alim's, who went out every day collecting things and studying them back in their rooms using strange tools and machines. There were rooms filled with treasures like the highest Priests back home had never seen - or dreamed of. Jewels, carvings, bottles, fine metal work, books of all kinds, magic mirrors with pictures that moved, and cabinets that made food out of thin air.
And beds, too... so soft, with such lovely cool sheets, and hot baths and soap that smelled like flowers. I was sure I'd died and gone to heaven to live with some even better gods.
We taught each other a few words - "hello" and "eat" and "drink" and so on. It was frustrating, though, and Alim finally asked if I wanted to learn his language (I think "you want talk my talk?" was what he said). I sure did.
So that night I went with him to the Cognitive Centre, where one of the wizards put a cap on me before I went to sleep. It felt like it was washing my head at first, and I wondered if I'd misunderstood... but as I drifted off to sleep I could feel things popping into my brain: words, connections, ideas. I/you/him/her. Go, goes, going, gone, went.
When I woke up, my ears were ringing. It felt like people had been talking in both my ears the entire night, each one saying something different. My head felt full, like they'd chopped up a stack of books and squeezed them into my skull. Every time I looked at something, a dozen words would come into my head, one after another. Vase - red - paint - bird - wing - fly - sky - stars - light. Man - voice - smile - teeth - chew - swallow - stomach...
It was exciting at first - I could speak Standard! I could ask questions, and I did, all day. But by the end of the day I was ready to scream. Everything had a word that came with it, or usually a dozen words, and every time I opened my mouth, all of them would try to come out at once. The next day was even worse - words would pop into my head for no reason at all, words with no connection to anything I knew. Tulip. Multiply. Nitrogen.
The city could move, they told me. They could make that door appear almost anywhere they wanted, and wherever they went, they collected plants and bugs and books and pictures. And sometimes people. They ran all kinds of tests on me to find out how I breathed, what colours I could see, what was in my blood.
I sang for them. They listened politely, but most of them had a look about them as if they were listening to a machine to tell what was wrong with it. A couple of them seemed to actually enjoy it, though.
Then they played some music for me on their systems - wild, crashing rhythms that sounded like my head was inside a huge dolomo drum, and alien noises like flocks of screaming birds, and the melodies like nothing I'd ever heard. It was the strangest stuff... but I listened for hours. At night I dreamt of words falling like giant hailstones and covering me in a huge heap.