994. Communication, 1
(Rose)
Much to Tilke’s relief, there were no troubles with the spiders that other time. Nor with other mushrooms. Nor the other odd plants we encountered, stretching nets between trees, further into the woods.
The spiders if anything almost saw us out waving goodbye. That would have been cute, but they simply observed and drank the plates of tea I left them for goodbyes.
Tilke walked faster. She realised she has possibly enough endurance to just run beside me as I walk. Surprisingly or not, she now prefers to jog along my giant way and be a few steps ahead of me; rather than being carried along like a doll or an infant.
The more I learn to know her, the better I meet a strong personality.
Someone a little familiar to me, somewhere...
We made our way gradually through the woods and then slopes of the mountain. We’re going gradually toward the summit, to better see the land around. I wonder less about this than my friend’s persona currently.
Tilke runs and jumps more freely between rocks like a young goat, or at least a nimble animal.
She learns fast. She’s sharp. She grew her confidence fast.
She doesn’t mind my help at all otherwise, and reminds me a little of the one I’ve never really managed to meet, unsure if she ever was.
Now we have clothes to look civilised which is nice.
I tell her my thoughts about all the oddities we encounter and more. She listens quite well.
I haven’t seen her smile yet, but it’s just a matter of time, before she too comes to feel happy being alive around here.
It’s easier for me to talk walking than it is for her while jogging. So she usually stops for one question and resumes running ahead, and I talk while I’m walking.
R - A long time ago, there was the economic rise of a new rich city-state. Somewhere around the turn of the 23rd century I believe. The 24th century and its long draining war was concluded with its victory apparently. The united nations around the world lost the war of Intemporelle.
T - A city-state vanquished all the countries of the world?
R - Ah, summarised like that, it does sound queer that’s true. Well... History is more subtle and complex over time. You see how wide countries and empires can be unified yet be frail inside, facing independentism volitions? After my time, over the following centuries, the balances of power shifted. Unions of the countries and unions of the nations shifted along with rising economic interests. Along the gradual unification tendencies worldwide, there was a rip growing. As a growing independentism volition in an aging empire, there was a slow aggregation of super protectionist interests worldwide. All while on the other end, the most destitute people of the world, without unity, kept sowing anarchy and violence that angered and scared the core belly of society. Against a global union of nations, eventually broke off the informal power that would eventually become that city-state later on. It was apparently more an economical union initially, but in these times apparently companies and guilds could become as powerful and mighty as little countries. However they could grow more detached from the meanings of land’s sovereignty.
T - So corporations became like new competing countries, but without nearly as much a land to defend, only wealth. They were spread worldwide... Almost discorporate against the old countries.
R - Yes. And the unions were a diplomatic game eventually reaching points of rupture. A war against some older nations, and a new kind of union that regrouped a more global versatility and a better hold over technology and wealth. Something older countries struggled a little more to move toward and to unify. It would have been interesting times to live in, or dreadful ones truly. In the end, the richest side won: the more modern elite that had been more adapted than older countries to the new state of things for economy and warfare. The war was delocalised to Antarctica where it eventually ended, and where the city-state of Solaris founded its palace. The century almost ended peacefully in the following new balance.
T - And then it was, the white day.
R - Yes... Does it remind you of anything?
Tilke stops and thinks. She might have traumatic glimpses of a time that a part of her might have lived through.
It’s unclear. She’s not sure the images she gets in mind about it are either true or just fake memories.
T - What happened to you then? If you didn’t live through it.
R - As I told you, I was born originally in the end of the 19th century, and recopied a few years after the white day. The memories of my youth come from a time when the concept of computers and artificial satellites would have been science fiction to me. And the British Empire was the world’s first might. When I arrived here... English was a dead language in my own old land. You speak new European with me, which makes me believe a part of your memories comes from this current era.
I speak a few words of English to her, and she doesn’t understand them; Funnily she does know some French though. It’s an unexpected irony to me, since it also is mostly a dead language since the last century as well. Our tongues that once ruled most of the world were reduced to minorities over the centuries of decay. Other nobilities and dynasties replaced the older imperial ones.
And the cataclysm wiped the minorities clean.
Tilke thinks about her identity in all this. She realised she inherited a lot from someone else, whose identity might never be known.
For one it’s very clear, as we were designed this way... By our respective creators...
We reach a point of view and broken roads along the heights. The forest is entirely left behind now.
She will ask.
R - I was created by Blume, who had kept a picture of the older memories of Rose. I am a hybrid of them both, long after they met down the line...
T - And I... Was created by the one you called Nightmare. Using that body you found me in, and... What else? Where did it even come from?
R - That body was... A part of you for sure. I think, seeing this suit I still wear, that it was someone who died on the moon, probably a rather long time ago. It’s not a set of textiles as advanced as the ones I wore before. So I think it predates Supremacy. So a part of you might come from an older century too a little like me.
T - Nightmare lived on the moon...
R - Indeed... Amazing isn’t it?
T - Did she find the source of immortality up there?
R - Hm, I don’t think so. More like a different priority in her ambitions.
Tilke had a sneer. Did she smile?
T - So you haven’t seen the rabbit up there?
R - W... What rabbit?
T - I’ll tell you about this older tale and pareidolia then.
We make a rest. We can see a crescent of moon in the sky this afternoon.
She shares with me an old story I have never heard before I believe. Some people would have loved hearing it in a much older time.
~
We find a place where to camp. Not much of a shelter around us this night.
Tilke has now heard the main lines of my story with Nightmare. She doesn’t know what to make of it yet. I can understand why.
We’re close enough to each other to discuss as we try to fall asleep.
T - I want to hear more about her and her passions. Since she apparently is in a way my mother.
R - Of course. I will tell you everything. I will help you meet her other children also in time. Nokarlık especially.
T - Much appreciated... And, you said she left. She went away from Earth. But... What do you think will happen next for her?
Oh my...
I feel that shiver again.
I close my eyes. I remember Magenta’s obnoxious dream... But I’d rather focus on our lingering Jovian optimism instead. And until my brain fails me, I try to imagine what might fairly happen next for Nightmare.
~
