White flashes of dim white light from the narrow windows hugging the ceiling of the drinking spot behind the main bar pushed thick rays of light across the room. The drinking spot was mostly full. Kwatsura and Isrlinea occupied two hugra cushions in the center of the room around an empty bowl sinking into the floor and filled with ash wet from spilled drinks and pipe liquor. They sat on the floor, legs crossed, opposite each other and between two vacant cushions. The main bar’s counter was filled with seven Rsolan contemporaries, all men, each squatted atop some stool or leaning against the table’s edge with slicked white coats scratching or hovering about the dusted black floor which was mostly invisible in the dim light.
Any grundas? Intergrundas?
Kwatsura noticed his guide staring staring towards the bar where the attendant with hair coated in a plastic white jell produced bubbling blue elixirs, shiny thimbles of cups rimmed with sticky brown liquids, dried red and yellow vegetables, csoma flowers, disposable csoma sticks and the like you would expect in any Rsolan drinking spot.
No grundas here. Two of the men I know, you might almost call them intergrundas. Gsorn and Fstorag. The tallest is Gsorn, a telldron mechanic. On his left, Fstorag; not sure what his profession is; a mechanic too of some sorts; likely an intergrunda since they’re usually keen on telldron buildouts like the current project. So I haven’t told you but they’ll be two of three joining us tomorrow on the trek out to East Edge. We’ll survey the buildout start and parts ejector which is complete enough to make notes on. The ongoing work as you know is interim connectors and stations falling down through first three lower high towers and then a long series of mids, then a line of low ones, spiraling out to the west end terminal station. We should be able to end the trek there. The terminal is quite impressive, right at the western periphery overlooking a ninety foot embankment of lava rock. Feels almost like you’re outside the city. You nearly would be if it wasn’t for the customs watchtower on either end of the terminal’s platform.
Sounds like an impressive deal, and quite a trek indeed as you suggested earlier.
Yes, don’t worry too much though as there are several make shift connectors, some walkable buttresses connecting towers and such. I honestly haven’t mapped out the trek out exactly, but I thing we’ll make provisions for the journey when needed.
Kwatsura nodded. He let himself fall back in the cushion and took pause to let his eyes wander around the drinking spot’s interior, the cliques of young Rsolan men and women. The men with their thin black hair dropping down over shoulders plated with embellishments of shell and chipped plates of unrefined ivrosian stones; they always seemed to dominate the conversations around them, jabbering in a collectively unintelligible humming mass. The drowning noise of the Rsolan tongues made it impossible to eavesdrop on any particular conversation but still as easy as ever to watch with penetrating observation and grok the intricacies of the Rsolan way. Kwatsura watched now two women at a table near his sitting place. They sat back against raised chairs with callous faces, taking occasional drags from a colored csoma stick, spitting out puffs of alternating yellow, blue or green vapor. Their hair was tied up around the back top of their skull caps like most Rsolan women, the tangles of jet black hair interspersed with purple and white diamonds, fragments of shell and glistening silver white power. They spoke nil words as the three other men argued about a topic Kwatsura only guessed to be centered on some shampoo, gleaming an occasional word shouted loud enough to hop like a spasmodic fish out of the pond of sound filling the room. One of the women eyed Kwatsura. He was a conspicuous specimen in the spot, wearing the sojourner’s grey garbs and with knotted brown hair hovering above his shoulders and clumped together like wet wheat chaff. The attention was only momentary; she returned her gaze on the table and then her friend, taking another short drag from the stick.
Isrilnea gestured to a waiter who acquiesced and approached.
Ysella ysella. What will it be?
Ru fsola csoma-hu. Fu wassr-hu. Desf rsinni-rsinni-hu alur. Loose csmoa, blue-leaf-grade. Some water also. And add to that whatever the visitor would like.
Fu Ysella. Tura Rsolan-kse? And for you sir? Do you speak Rsolan?
Je Tura. Slicono wassr-hu. Yes I speak it. I’ll have some licorice water.
Je cul-csolanee, cul-csolanee. The waiter mumbled heading back to the main bar. Kwatsura noticed Gsorn and Fstorag pushing themselves away from the bar and then Isrilnea motioning in their direction. Isrilnea raised herself from her pillow and sat directly next to Kwatsura on his left, stretching her right arm directly below his mid back.
Heh, they’ll think you’re my tropsa sitting like that.
Isrilnea laughed. Feck if they do, most Rsolans think I’ve been corrupted by outsiders anyways. Piety for the edict isn’t my daily agenda. She spoke with humor, injecting inflections from Kwatsura’s dialect to coincide with her persona as she suggested.
Gsorn wore subtle cheek plates which extended only about an inch from behind the ridge of his ears on each side of his powdered white face. His blinking revealed eyelids that where painted a deep black, catching a blue shimmer from the drinking spot’s ceiling lamps. Fstorag was nondescript, an anonymous Rsolan from all appearances with the usual cheek plates and plain ivrosian carapace. The two sat opposite each other and flanking Kwatsura and Isrilnea. They did not make any salutation. Kwatsura was used to the occasional habit of social aloofness amongst younger Rsolans but he wondered if this instance was due rather to some awkward sentiments stemming from Isrilnea’s sitting so close to a visitor. Gsorn lit the end of his packed csoma stick with a ring torch and then addressed Kwatsura:
So tomorrow we take you to East Edge eh? Can you climb?
Of course.
Well, my expectation would be that most chronologists can’t climb much. In particular such a high riser as East Edge. Sorry not offend or anything. I’m a telldron engineer, so I work with hands all day. Especially working mostly on buildout part ejectors; climb about ten towers in a dun I’d say; particularly of late, with the ongoing construction of the new intraurban. You know East Edge is the third highest tower in Rsola?
Didn’t know it’s ranking exactly, though yes I know it’s a high one. Will be the highest telldron boarding station and judging by the height I don’t expect that many starting boarders will make it on a day.
Yes indeed. The other two towers can hardly even count, being unclimbable perforated exhaust pipes from some soap factories. Climate control mechanisms, the like. I think you’ll be impressed by this high tower, eh … what’s your name?
Kwatsura.
Yes, Kwatsura. You’ll be impressed by this one. Just to brief you on the physical demands of the trek up East Edge if you haven’t studied the transmissions. It would be about 150 flights of stairs to the lower rim if we were starting from the base. We’ll be starting midway of the lower section though arriving on a inter-district terrace that climbs gradually on the walk there. So expect about 100 flights. At the time we’ll likely rest a bit for dinner and then head up 50 flights of ladders near the peek. We’ll have to climb from there on narrow slabs of wall - they haven’t installed ladders there yet. And then you two can wind your way back to wherever. Us two will have to camp out there for the remainder of the night to fine tune and run some more tests on the ejector installation.
Sounds like something I can manage. Kwatsura had already read the details on East Edge Tower and its divisions; flights of stairs, ladders, transmission disc installations on the second mid high section, the core rock drop, the high mid accumulation chamber, the mantel base, part loading hearths, the core parts transport, the nine ejection activation slabs gripping the peak, et cetera.
Well good then, meht. We can’t carry you on our shoulders for the narrow climb, so I hope for your own sake you can manage.
The waiter from before arrived behind the two engineers and placed a small table with a curved base into the empty fire pit. He nodded to Isrilnea and hurried back to the waiter’s room to fetch another order.
The table was draped in a black cloth, it’s top arranged with an open tin of plush csoma flower and glasses of water. Kwatsura grabbed two pinches of the csoma, stuffed it into the open end of csoma stick and sparked the end with small candle from the table. He passed the stick to Isrilnea as a courtesy. She smiled accepting the offer. Thanks. Kwatsura produced another stick for himself from the chest pocket he had prepared back in his evening’s hrot.
Srul Isrilnea, I’m surprised you haven’t gone out to catch a cab at this time, living on the other end of Rsola. Cul-fsul ndins-ndins. Gsorn spoke in a deep voice, a tone bordering condescending.
If I take leave to home this evening, that will delay our departure which ideally would be early: a few hures only from now. So my intent is to lodge in a vacant hrot above and we’ll keep to schedule. A long trek tomorrow.
Well yes, indeed. I’m sure the visiting chronologist will need to take more rests than you own. Being a country man from the plains, not used to the perilous tower hikes through Rsola.
Kwatsura kept an aloof distance from the conversation, letting the rank of strong csoma smoke amble out his nostrils. He let his concentration get washed in the thickening intoxication induced by the rising vapor of burning blue csoma petals. In less the 2 decums of the hure, he would fall asleep unintentionally and then awaken an hure later when the conversations between Isrilena and the two compatriots shifted back to a lisping Rsolan chatter; the last words of the evening as Gsorn and Fstorag lifted themselves and disappeared from the den’s mouth and back into the dim night circuit opening, illuminated now by murmuring orruminae bulbs hanging under the surrounding terraces. Isrilnea tried to lift Kwatsura from behind to lead him back to the hrut. His senses and energy had mostly returned as he reached for the near empty glass of licorice water which he downed to receive a sobering pulse through his temple cores.
They walked back up through the spiraling steps overlooking the now almost empty circuit; mostly a few bike cabbies buzzing with tires cutting through rain back to their stations. The dourpour had ended, but the streets were still glowing from the downpour and the air was drowned in a noxious, sweet and salty mist. Isrilnea followed Kwatsura into the hrot motel’s open entrance up the three flights of ladders to his small hrot. She followed him into the dwelling and peered out the skull-sized bubble of a window toward the glowing green lights of a series of apartment dwellings winding around the base of the south east tower like a thick vein of ivy.
Mind if I just sleep here on the floor? We’ve only 3 hures before waking again. Dressed of course, don’t gather the wrong interpretation of my staying here.
Haha, of course not. Too tired from the day’s traveling to rub about all night with a strange woman anyways. Though he knew in a moment if she had offered such, he would partake after maybe a glass of some hot licorice milk to wake his spirits; she was a Rsolan, and of seemingly good character, and that would be a rare experience for any outsider, or to a mere chronologist even more so.
Kwatsura leaned back against the side wall of the hrot next to the chest where he had placed his canteen and a rucksack filled with measuring apparatuses, arc adapters and sundry instruments a chronologist of his sort would travel with. He produced the canteen from the chest and took a long guzzle, wetting his throat some for a good few hures rest.
Water?
No thanks, I’ve had enough libations downstairs. I’ll just take some covering if you have any.
Kwatsura lifted a long grey Hruslan fur blanket from the chest; there was only one but he feigned not noticing this fact and threw the covering at her her feet. She was barefooted as she had been throughout the day. Most of the rain had washed of the skin powder from her feet leaving only a slight, scintillating residual of its particles. Her back was now pressed against the wall underneath the window, her knees up against her breasts clasped together by two arms. She changed now to a supine position (back still facing the wall) and covered her form up to the neck with the soft blanket.
Kwatsura took another sip from the canteen and stared at the ceiling. The hrot was shaped like a deep liquor glass turned upside down on a table and with it’s stem broken off. The floor was it’s maximal periphery wide enough only for two grown men to stand apart with arms stretched. The ceiling of the lodging tapered to a small curved bowl which reflect small pink slivers of light curling at their ends, nebulous tendrils of light slowly shifting forms across the wall. He watched the subtle interplay of light across the ceiling’s tapering, lowered his mid back between wall and a small pillow pinched against the chest, and then closed his eyes to let the weariness pull him back into a deep slumber.
Photo credit: (leunix)
