1019. The valleys, 2
(Selya)
T - You’re drooling.
S - Oh my...
I wipe my mouth. I’ve been in bliss as long as the ship was sailing against the wind. Losing a hint of dignity even, as I lost myself in this pleasant daze.
We’ve returned to land, south of the Caucasus lands.
The landscapes are warmer and still as calm. It’s not Europe anymore, but it’s subtle changes.
We climbed the southern mountains there; and made our way south east gently.
From the summits of mountains, I lose myself in the wind when there is a good one.
It’s not as overwhelming as being on a fast ship, but it satiates me slightly.
Now I enjoy a last moment of it before we head down in the next valley.
S - It’s so nice...
Temee chuckles as she packs up. This journey awoke something in me.
T - You remind me of Bhakrat’s festival. It’s nice isn’t it? And maybe we’ll find another city like that further down the road to the valley.
I closed my eyes for a moment. Another peaceful and understanding city, cosmopolite enough that even we would be welcomed?
That would be nice...
That would be so nice.
A city that was gathering people on the outskirts of the last civilisation, just out of reach from the monstrous lands below. Above the valley of poisons that haunted her childhood like the wolf in mine.
We’ll head south, and check the old Mesopotamia basins, see if no other city could have prevailed in their outskirts. And also explore what these places really can or have become.
I want to know a little more, first hand, how the land and life could transform.
Temee has a hint of nostalgia she keeps in her heart preciously.
I open my eyes to the caucasian landscape we’ve been crossing for a while.
Let’s go. To the lower rivers that made the historical valleys of these central lands.
~
We pass by eroded cities and crumbling towns. There’s dust along the roads breaking into rubbles before us.
Feels like a different time.
The air is dry, but the wind remains nice.
Beside some gigantic flowery bulbs here and there colouring the sights, not too much appears exotic yet.
Temee is partially amused to see the anomalies roam free. Some have turned into full-fledged species that are thriving around here.
The flowery bulbs that are like two metres wide brown pumpkins grow here and there. They drain the otherwise empty landscape. Their flesh tastes bad, but their immense flowers above look pretty.
They are like wider and thin agave of lightly coloured petals swaying gently. This modern species is gently taking over the region.
Other fibrous roots and shrubs of kinds we never encountered before follow the roads we walk over, eating the tar of the bituminous roads slowly.
Also it’s hard for me to say if they are new species sometimes.
It reaches levels where the raods have completely disappeared, turned to rubbles the wind has scattered slowly around these new shrubs. But these lines of specific plants draw the memory of a past road they have made their food and body. Now it’s gone, but clues remain.
Like cables across the landscape, some of these lines of shrubs continue neatly and endlessly all until the horizon.
We walk beside for hours on end. We don’t talk much when we progress. More when we rest.
We passed by great lakes and some other lands that were recently flooded. We fished or captured a few weird animals there. New things around here tend to grow big or is it just me? This hybrid of fish and jellyfish we dragged out of the muddy riverside where it was washed ashore was at least a few hundred kilograms.
Dried up, it was just a rucksack of weird meat that tastes like celery though.
I cooked dinner in the next building with equipment we found along. Gradually making our way toward the great historical valley. We haven’t found the slightest of clues about other humans that would be living in the region so far.
We reached cultures that were half abandoned, swallowed by dry earth slowly, but still frozen in time. Half degenerated in between.
Either dying and miserable around desertifying land, or the opposite. Turning spots to lush forests of new bulbs and flora of other kinds.
The ground was tired and old things didn’t grow well anymore in their time frozen state. Many dry bits were scattered, hinting at wider forests now disappeared.
Other ones replacing slowly the old environment still in shock, they changed the landscaped. The more adapted.
Other herbs with less green colour to them were growing like wild grass, which they were. All over the fields, barren or still fertile. What’s one poison’s is another one’s food to some extents I don’t know well.
S - Did it look more like that or Europe in your homeland?
T - More like Europe. We kept the anomalies out, and focused on crops still behaving normally.
S - It’s odd how we have two or three kinds of flora now. The old that froze up. The old that continued without changing much, and all the new.
T - The new... Is what prevails in the fierce competition of all the poisons in these culture broths. A small percentage of new organisms managing to build something that floats better. It’s more that here... Things seem to have had time to settle for a long enough while?
I look at her a little amazed. I still have so much to learn.
S - Time for random things to settle you say? Tell me more, say?
Temee things back and tells me a few more horrific stories. With flamethrowers to burn the poisons from the valley...
In Mirabella and Majbrit, I never heard of that. The boys neither...
Were we really protected so well by the aura of the Aïsshea siblings? When Temee and her people had to fight to survive in this environment far weirder and more hostile...
We dine. The lightly seasoned odd fish fillets are alright.
Temee tells me a little more about the environment she grew in. I listen.
I’ve got no pen and paper to take notes. It itches me a little...
Everyone in Mirabella was devoted to teaching me, and I was meant to learn everything. I had to take notes. Lots of them. I didn’t bother trying to recover any of it...
T - Selya? What is it?
S - Oh... I just recalled I used to write down what I was taught. And I can’t anymore. It felt... A little odd.
Temee realises how her testimonies can be valuable, precious even. She is also teaching me things in a way or another.
~
Another peaceful night under our respective blankets, on not too rotten mattresses. I have a glance at her bubbling dream. I don’t pry. I look at the stars.
I think a little again about all of them I’ve left behind. Dad. Doc. Yalia. Everyone...
I’m carrying a guilt that will not fully fade. But mostly there’s a gratitude that remains.
Caring about me, truly and deeply.
I want again to make the most of it.
Now with other good adults to help me, I will be the best I can be. With further gratitude to them...
Thanks Temee...
Let’s go explore the wider historical valley.
~
