300. Colours of earth, 4
(Rose)
We reached the caldera of a molten city. Once upon a time, a city covered this entire area. It all liquefied and collapsed, and melted again. What is left after years of dust gathering is a wide field of uneven aspect and grotesque sculptures.
R - It will be hard to cross this land, there's no clean path.
B - There's the river. It must have a reasonable way through.
R - Good idea.
From what we find around, we quickly craft something that floats reasonably.
The waters of this river are really calm so it should be fine.
And thus we begin a little journey rowing gently along the river.
~
Bleue is rowing this stack of floating wreck she kindly calls our gondola. I'm sitting in front of it, looking for anything that could mean trouble.
Ana is looking at her reflection over the still surface of the water with deep interest. She looks like a cat that is noticing a lost chick or baby bird right below her; her neck is stretched and pupils dilated.
The water is clear, transparent. We can see our shadow on the moss and mud in the river bed.
Dark browns and greens. The bluish tints come from the reflection of the clear sky over the water here, not the water depth itself. The city around us really is reduced to antic ruins, almost to a fossilised level.
Everything melted into rocks with the colours of rusts.
R - I wonder how some rusts are dark green, yellowish or even black.
B - Maybe it's other metals than iron?
Blume would have known the answer.
~
All day long we just sail gently in the field of sharp rocks and edges. Not much grows in there.
I'm feeding Ana pieces of shark that isn't fresh anymore. She doesn't like it, but still eats it.
R - What species is Ana in the end I wonder...
B - She's an Ana!
Bleue just laughs then. It takes me a while to get the pun and sigh deeply instead. Bleue is laughing even more because of that.
I go poke her tummy to shut her up. Then Ana shrieks, or makes an odd sound. She saw something.
I do notice a weird dark but glowing spot in the distance on the side. There's something different out there in the field of ruins. Whatever it is.
R - Should we go see?
Bleue stands up proudly and points in the direction of the thing. She calls Ana with a sharp voice.
The giant bird opens its huge wings and suddenly jumps away, rocking our boat a little.
The sight of Bleue ordering Ana made a shiver run down my spine.
Excitement, worry, admiration, surprise, love. An odd cocktail made me shiver.
I see Ana flying in the distance, and Bleue winking at me in front of me.
R - You're such a tease...
~
Ana returned as we were beginning to climb a relatively safe surface out of the water.
She landed on Bleue's shoulders, and spoke.
A - Hyaa hyaa.
Bleue and I looked at each other and didn't comment.
With ropes and careful climbing, we get slowly closer to the mysterious thing we noticed.
It looks like a dome painted in glossy black. It's shiny.
Nightfall is already closing in on us so we'll spend the night nearby.
We pass by caves where we could settle for the night on our way back.
Finally we reach the thing.
It's as if a giant ball, maybe five metres in diameter, had fallen and mostly sunk there.
Its surface is clean from any dirt as if it was new.
B - What on Earth can that be?
R - Don't touch it, I have a guess.
I pick up a piece of dry fish and throw it at the clean sculpture.
It gets stuck on the surface, and slowly is absorbed inside. Ana looks uneasy. Now that my intuition is confirmed, I'm not quite either.
R - It's not a construct, it's a daiûa. A living being-like-her. It may not be able to speak if it never had the chance to eat a human brain, nor any animal looking body, but it's a living thing nonetheless.
B - Should we try feeding a human brain to Ana?
I sigh again. That's really you and it's hard to follow your leaps. It's not the part I like most about you, even if it shows a form of intelligence I must respect.
R - There's not much to do here anyway. Let's just leave it be, shall we? And for Ana... Maybe not. Otherwise she could get the idea to have a nibble at yours afterward, to check what it tastes like.
B - iih.
~
As we returned to the small caves to set camp, we noticed that the razing lights make a few other glossy spots shine here and there in the ruins. Like a few bubbles of cooling down lava that were just about to burst when they solidified.
We take turns to sleep and stand watch this night, just in case.
~
In the middle of my dream, Bleue wakes me up. Afraid at first, she makes me look in the distance at what first appears as fireworks.
It's like shooting stars going away from the ground and spreading into the sky.
There is a deep rumbling sound like distant thunder as well.
And far out there, a spark in the night that glint and flickers, shooting pieces of light away.
If it's something like the black ball, then it may be more than one being-like-her.
It could be a multitude, like a species of let's say plants, living and spreading itself in the vast area.
We'll investigate, for we desire to know more now.
Meanwhile, it's quite a peculiar show in the night sky.
~
We found the crater of sparks the next day.
It is as we expected. Another black orb thing like the first one, but exploded and opened to the sky, like a ripe fruit or giant flower.
More like a flower. A large pattern with reddish colours is there in this carpet of oddly fleshy petals. Everything bears the smell and marks of what really were explosions.
I notice what looks like a seed left attached somewhere between the ruptured petals of that thing. I recognise that kind of crystal that bends the light weirdly. It's an artefact, Blume taught me about these.
But I can't risk walking on that flesh, even though it looks dead now.
R - You see that kind of glowing fruit there, with the slightly distorted halo around it? Could Ana grab it?
B - Let's try? Ana!
Ana goes without a second of doubt. She struggles a little at keeping a steady low altitude. But she makes it. She snatches the thing away and flies off, taking an easier detour before safely returning to us.
~