The Fog
This Chapter has ~3k Words!
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Within a bustling city surrounded by desert on one and ocean on the other side there stood an old Tree, it was planted by the City's founders hundreds of years ago. In its crown lived a bird, it looked like a normal bird but was even older than the city, on the founders' journey across the wild ocean it began following them and settled with them. But this was something only the bird knew, for the founders and their journey were slowly being forgotten.
The bird took flight and began its daily fish hunt. It flew far away from land to a small group of islands where many fish swarms lived and began hunting. The Sun slowly wandered across the Sky and soon it reached its highest point. Having satisfied its hunger, the bird started to rest on one of the Islands.
The Sun wandered further and slowly it was getting dark. The bird took flight again and circled across the Islands a last time, looking for a nice snack to eat while flying home. In its eye corner (?) it saw what looked like a fishing ship and decided to go there to steal fish.
It was a big ship, and big ships always have large amounts of fish! The bird landed, there were no humans on the deck, a bit strange it thought. The bird hopped down into the insides; many large nets laid there but every single one was empty!
A bit disappointed the bird took flight again and left the drifting empty ship. While the Sun was setting the bird reached its tree and began sleeping, the city quieting down while all too went to sleep.
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A Strange feeling awoke the bird, it was still dark, but something told it to go and fly. From high up in the Sky it saw a strange white and deep fog wandering across the Ocean. Seeing the this made the bird uncomfortable. It decided to circle across the city a bit to observe the strange occurrence.
Slowly but surely the deep, white fog neared the land. The bird watched how it reached the land and began surrounding the anchored ships. Soon the City had been covered too, only the tip of the bird's tree peaked above it.
Cries of pain filled the entire City as the first light of the Sun touched the fog. Scared the bird flew higher, its instincts screamed to go away, but there was a strange fascination watching, or rather hearing the massacre unfold. A few minutes later a deadly silence filled the city.
The bird flew across the coast, trying to see how far the fog reached. It seemed like the strange white deep fog had consumed the whole Ocean, for no matter how far it flew the fog was there. Finally, the bird followed its instincts and flew away. The sandy desert speeding below as the bird went inland.
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Over the course of dozens of centuries what had transpired once happened again: The bird found a group of humans and accompanied them on their journey, they'd settle down somewhere while it did too, decades or centuries later the strange white and deep fog came and consumed it all.
Finally, there was only a single City of humans left. It was a big City, and unlike so many of the others they didn't forget from what they had fled. It was located in a rainforest and the bird had chosen one of the biggest trees as its home. Every day it would watch the humans build strange contraptions. There was also a group digging deep into the ground and bringing up many resources. The bird could only wonder what they planned to do.
One day it watched how many humans came together and pulled what looked like a strange, large cloth out of a building. They moved it in an open space and began working on it. As hunger overcame the bird, it flew away to a nearby river to hunt a bit. Later that day it returned and saw something that shocked it!
The strange, large cloth was no longer lying on the ground, no it was somehow in the air! It watched how a pair of humans went into a strange wooden basked to which the blanket was attached. A few others unknotted some knots and slowly the cloth and basked began levitating! The bird watched with shock how the humans' contraption began flying! Their celebrating shouts woke it out of its stupor, and it flew to its nest wondering if what is had seen was just an imagination.
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Seeing those strange contraptions levitate up in the air had become a common sight over the last few decades, they got larger and larger and could carry more and more. The bird was very sure the humans were trying to learn to fly like it could!
They also had been digging further and further underground bringing up so much earth it looked like a new hill had arisen! Even after all those many years it had lived with humans by its side it still couldn't understand them, why would they dig so deep into the Earth?
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The Warm sunshine awoke the bird, still tired it opened its eyes and looked around. Even so early in the morning the humans were still awake, there was no moment when the city would quiet down. Many had come together near the large cave's entrance, they seemed very excited. The bird saw how a small group climbed out, he recognized them, they were the ones who lead the building of the first flying contraption.
One stepped forward, held a small blue glowing crystal up and began talking. A little later she let go of the Crystal, but to everyone's surprise the Crystal didn't fall down! It levitated where she had let go and was slowly rising upwards!
Shock filled everyone and she again grabbed the Crystal before it rose too high. In all its life the bird had never seen such a strange Crystal. Slowly at first the humans began cheering, it seemed like they had thousands of ideas all at this moment.
The bird took flight and shot down the cave, it was so fast the humans didn't even see it. The cave had many many side tunnels but there was only a single large one the humans had excavated. It led the bird down a long path until it stopped to land. In front of it was a giant natural cave with tens of thousands of crystals touching the cave's ceiling and many more levitating in the air, all giving of a blue glimmer. It was magnificent to look at.
The bird just sat there and watched for hours before leaving. Many humans were streaming down the cave to get a look at it too.
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Over the last seventeen years many things had been built with the crystals at their core. Each and every one of them impressed the bird, it was like the humans had a never-ending steam of ideas!
The threat of the Fog was still far away, maybe it would be another century or two before it too reached this city, but they were already preparing even though they could just live a normal life and push the problem off to the next generations. Many other cities had done that, and it had cost them their existence. It was a bit sad that those who experienced the terror of the Fog were those that couldn't do anything anymore, while those that could didn't do.
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Three decades ago, the humans had begun building something; what it was the bird didn't know but the time spend alone said it that, whatever it may be, it was something great. They had pulled hundreds of thousands of crystals out of the tunnels and caves. All became a part of the massive construct. Large Chains of metal were used to tie it down to the ground, so large was the lift of the Crystals.
Tens of thousands of humans were walking across the construct, building things as well as carrying more resources onto it. It looked like a small city was being built on it. Some children were running around and throwing seeds for all kinds of plants they collected in the surrounding rainforest across the construct. The bird wondered what they wanted to do with it.
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The Construct had grown, quite literally, and was nearing completion. It's size now similar to that of the city, millions of crystals had been buried in it and a solid foundation of metal surrounded the bottom. How they had made so much metal was something the bird didn't know, but it also didn't care to know.
Thousands of houses were built on it, it even had a large lake! For this they had by hand taken water from a nearby river and carried it to the construct. It took them a few months; the cyclic rainfalls of the rainforest had helped them greatly. The bird liked this as now it didn't have to fly that far to get something to eat.
The humans had also brought many different animals they farmed onto it; it was as if they wanted to life on the construct!
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The bird watched how all the humans came together on the construct, they had finished building three years ago and then had begun to settle down on it. Today it seemed like it was the day to go. They counted to make sure every single one of them was on it, before they let the chains, that had tied it down for nearly a whole century, go.
*CRROOO*
The massive chains slid down the slowly rising construct. Slowly a few centimeters at first, but with each passing moment it rose higher. A few minutes later it already had reached a meter in height. Happiness filed the humans; the hard work of the last few generations had paid off! The construct was flying!
The bird was quite surprised, but it made sense. The Fog would come on way or another and no attempt to fight it had ever worked, so simply evading it was a good choice.
It circled the construct multiple times before returning to its nest and falling asleep.
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A new day arose, and the bird awoke. At first it was confused as everything near it was covered in darkness, but then it looked up and saw the gigantic floating island rising slowly up into the skies.
It thought about it for a few moments before deciding to go and see what they were making up there.
What awaited it was a large festival; countless songs were sung, and everyone was merrily dancing. What else was to be expected? They completed what their great grandparents begun and had made their goal in life.
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Over the next days and weeks, the island rose higher and higher before finally stopping thousands of meters above the ground. The humans' festival continued on for months to come and the bird decided to resettle.
It had built a nest on one of the newly grown trees and was enjoying flying at such heights, long ago it would often fly so high that even the greatest mountains would look no larger than a grain of sand.
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Over time the floating island would drift along the skies, slowly wandering from place to place.
Years passed and the humans became accustomed to living there, only a few generations later there was no longer anyone how had walked across the earth. Thou the stories of their ancestors were still being giving from old to young.
Every now and then someone would fall off, down to earth. It was always a tragedy for nearly everyone knew at least the fallen's friends' friends or families' family and more often than not it was children that fell.
Gradually less and less came near the massive islands' edge and instead lived their entire life sheltered within the comforts of the centuries old city. But the city alone would never be able to sustain itself, so countless villages formed around farming food and livestock, harvesting trees and bushes, all in all supplying the city with what it needed.
Conflicts arose between the city dwellers and the villagers and what was once a grand utopia became a brutal kingdom plagued by famine and death. Finally, their predecessors' struggles and goal were forgotten and only the remotest villages kept their stories.
Unnoticed by all but the ever-observing bird, their greatest fear had come true: The strange white deep fog had now once and for all covered the whole World. No human or animal was still down there, the fog had consumed them all.
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Nothing can stand the test of time, and so the floating island decayed over the centuries. Parts of the outer edge broke off and the crystals lifting its weight slowly shattered under the constant force. The humans didn't notice, for they had other problems. Thou the bird did, its worry was that there'd be no place for it to call home once the island broke apart.
And so, it did what anyone in its place would, it tried to get some humans to find out and do something about it, the bird knew only those that could construct such a marvel would know how to repair it.
But there was no one that knew, this knowledge had been lost to time. And even worse, the bird didn't even manage to lead someone near the Island's edge, too great was the fear of falling those countless stories had engraved in them.
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So, after countless centuries naturally the only thing that could happen did: One crystal too many shattered and just like the drop of water that sunk the flooded ship many more crystals followed, some shot up to the stars while others became nothing more than specks of dust. The massive island that had cruised along the clouds was finally returning to where it came from, pulling tens of thousands with into the deep embrace of the earth and all present fog.
There were some that survived the initial fall, it were those that could fly but they still needed food and rest and so died of exhaustion. A few days later only the bird was left.
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The bird didn't neither food nor rest, for its life was endless. But such and existence was boring, there was nothing to do to spend time with, no delicate food to enjoy, no paths to follow, no stories to hear, no dreams to explore.
It was reliving its memories following the humans and lost track of time. Many times, the bird relived the long centuries, but then it had extracted every detail to extract, thought about every sentence the humans had said and the memories became just some other ones in its path through life.
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The bird flew lower and lower, its wings began grazing the upper edges of the all present deep white fog.
strange new old other different curios blue more
Surprised the bird rose again. What was that?
After it calmed down it sunk again.
again stay keep be green meet talk you
There again it was. This strange… thing. The bird decided to stay this time.
thank good nice hello green we you come
talk help friend green song listen dance guide
So strange… is this the fog? Such a… random… thing? Never before had the bird seen something like this.
strange question orange no fall dice bring up
Was whatever this is trying to talk to it?
we you green speech sound think higher grow
The bird thought for a moment before directly thinking a certain thought: listen thoughts speak
apple is understand good green embrace us help
Huh… help? The bird focused on some words: help you me how when what why
for higher we help greeeeeeeeeen change purpleeeeeeeeee all
how why higher
higher better you we grace one all purpleeeeeeeeee other join
And so, the strange conversation went on for a while and slowly the bird started to get an Idea that it may never think for it was too low.
join me you ready now
the bird finally thought, for what was there to lose? And the fog answered its call:
green join think fuse purple open gate higher
purple move higher we We WE ONE ALL
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This chapy was more of a recollection of events as the Main Character, the bird, didn't really do anything and just 'observed'. (well, the bird does not really even qualify as a protagonist as it doesn't do anything other than observing)
Another thing I noticed was that after the first parts I began writing more like I did in SOH, not sure if that influenced the story in a good or bad way.
Ps: Yea, I like birds. :D
Pps: Everything before the start of the "construct" I had written in Juli-August with only minor edits by present (October-November) me so yea… what comes after may not feel like before.
Ppps: And yea, I think I made the island a tiny, tiny little bit too laaaaaaarge… was not intended to become what it finally did when I first wrote about it…
Pppps: I probably should stop adding new pss, this final comment takes up 196 words! Thats 6.5% of this chapter's total!
Ppppps: Maybe I should have split this into multiple chapys? There'd be a couple good opportunists.
Pppppps: So, yea… don't know if I made the ending tooooo mysterious or just right, tell me please!