Chapter Twenty-Three
Memento/Vivere
The little girl was happily running through the tubular walkways of the park. The place was usually full of strollers and tourists who came to admire the beauty of the place with its exotic plants. Contrary to what happened with the real parks on the planet, the belt ones were very visited. But that was not the case that day. It was a working day and tourists usually visited the place more on weekends.
That didn't bother the girl. After all, she could walk around the place and she had the park to herself and her parents.
The park had been one of the first inaugurations of the Orbital Belt. Hundreds of botanical specialists were brought in, to study the proper conditions for growing plants in an environment far from earth. Certainly no money had been spared in the construction of the massive belt. And even less to accommodate the site in case of a possible new cataclysm that could occur on the surface of the planet. At the same time it was a platform for the development of spacecraft for interplanetary travel, industrial development, defense and scientific research.
The construction that served as a base was carried out during the first twenty years after the war against the Fractus. Then, as the decades passed, the new layers were completed, which served to build a real ring-shaped shield around the planet. It served not only as an ark to house more than two hundred million people, a little more than five hundred fey, and some tens of aeon that were in charge of technical and support tasks in the place.
Over the years a true extraterrestrial habitat for the species of the Earth had been achieved, with the location of vast territories in extension as countries in the huge belt, which had its own seas and even islands.
Hesper Island was one of those places. A highly valued place because almost ninety percent of the place was dedicated to green space. A real forest under a shield of energy. And located in one of the island's spaces was Inoue Park, which was one of the fifteen parks in the belt that had a Gate Tree.
But the history of the park was certainly not what concerned the girl most at the time.
At that moment she was separated from her parents and was looking for them. She had been so distracted, looking at one of the new transgenic species of flowers that had been such a sensation among the tourists that, when she looked back to where her parents had been walking, she found that they had disappeared.
She slowly walked through the labyrinthine corridors of the place, while listening to the sounds of the birds flying on the other side of the glass. The corridors formed a tubular structures that communicated with each other as if it were a gigantic anthill, supported by huge metal structures and giant mechanical arms that had the function of moving the structures in case of any unforeseen event. The place had signs everywhere, but not knowing exactly where her parents had gone, she wasn't quite sure where to go. The Neurowire signal for some reason wasn't sending messages to them.
Through the glass she looked toward one of the secluded islets, there she could see a sphere to which several of the corridors seemed to converge. It was the space of more than two kilometers that contained the enormous Gate Tree. With nothing else to do, she headed there, but what she found was not what she had imagined.
She was entering the huge place when she heard a strange music. The girl had never heard anything like it in all her short life. There was something appealing about the different sounds.
Almost without being able to contain herself, she continued walking until she was only about twenty meters away from the base of the tree. It was a tree of the FMN species. Named after the acronym of the blue flowers Forget-me-not. It produced a bluish glow at night. But at that moment the incredible sight of the tree was not what mattered to her.
There, sitting in the grass, and holding a strange instrument was a man with slightly shoulder-length hair, dressed in black and with a leather jacket. The shape of the instrument was one she had never seen before, though in some ways it reminded her of a harp, the sound produced was very different from a plucked string instrument. The stranger's eyes were closed and his brow slightly furrowed, as his hands roamed over the instrument and the captivating notes continued to flow from it.
The girl tried to approach slowly, but in an oversight she stepped on a branch and the sound of the branch breaking echoed throughout the place, and the music of the strange man was cut off. The stranger looked up at her in astonishment, and almost instantly an expression of sorrow darkened his face.
"Oh little one, you shouldn't be here," he said.
The girl watched as roots sprouted from the ground and headed toward her with terrifying speed. The last thing she caught was the stranger leaping toward her, trying to cover her.
"Sil, honey. Wake up!" Said a woman with a frightened face, along with a man beside her, who also showed the same worried gesture.
The girl sat up on the grass and looked around her. She was in the same place she was before, as if she had fallen into a dream. There was no one there except her and her parents.
Had it all been a dream?
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She was sure she had seen the roots of the tree coming towards her, but the grass and flowers around her were untouched. And the stranger had disappeared.
She had no way of knowing, but that moment would change her life forever.
***
Sil Moore opened her eyes.
The memory of that day again. The music and the stranger. That's when she remembered him.
The strange guy named Black that she had met a few hours ago on her way up to her building. She had no doubt. It was the same face of the stranger she had seen that day. Why she not recognized him before?
But she remembered something else. The memories were coming back like a flood of flashes. She completed entire minutes of the strange music. She danced for minutes underwater. And then, she died. She saw her body fall, decapitated. She was sure of it.
The memory filled her with horror and she tried to sit up. She was looking at a gray sky where the clouds were circling at breakneck speed. But she was unable to get up.
"Hold still, girl. Hold still," said a childish and somewhat annoyed voice. "I'm almost done."
In her field of vision appeared the face of a girl with blonde hair, tied in two pigtails.
"Oh, she's awake!" Said another voice and almost instantly another face of another girl appeared, with slightly messy red hair and wearing a blouse.
Terrified, Sil tried to move but realized she could not move anything else on her body, besides her eyes.
Where am I? Sil was pretty sure it wasn't a hospital.
"Calm down, calm down," said a deep masculine voice, and Sil beheld a huge face with a mustache trying to put a smile on his face.
What is happening?
She was feeling a kind of stinging in her neck. As if something was burning her. She was feeling some movement coming back into her body. As if it was all part of a sleep paralysis.
The seconds became eternal for her, as she felt that kind of itching growing in her neck and the movement was slowly returning to her joints. After a few moments Sil felt that the suffering was over and she could move.
Nimble as a cat, she sat up, and jumped up from where she was. It was a stone and someone had put a coat on her shoulders. All around was mist but she could see the girl, the huge man, and the other red-haired woman. But soon she could see more. Out of the mist new figures approached. Two silver-haired girls. A tall skinny man with slightly long black hair. Another girl with long silver hair tied in two pigtails. All wore suits, though with different variations, one of the girls wore a pleated skirt, the giant man with the mustache wore an overcoat, another of the girls wore a tweed vest.
Sil whirled around seeing herself surrounded by the strange figures. Who were they? What did they want? Right... she died. Instinctively she reached for her neck and found that her head was still in place.
What's going on?
Then she looked down and saw herself barefoot and still wearing her swimsuit. She didn't understand what was happening.
Is this a dream?
"No, it's not," the skinny man said.
"Just in time," said the silver-haired girl who pulled out a pocket watch from her vest.
One of the silver-haired girls, with a slightly messy hair, approached her. "I'm sorry if I was too rough," she said, tilting her head slightly.
What is she sorry about?
"Here it comes!" said the giant man.
What's coming?
The silver-haired girl who had apologized for something put a hand on her shoulder. "This may be a little strange but try to be calm. Nothing can hurt you."
Suddenly a hurricane wind that had come out of nowhere picked up, and the silver-haired girl held her. Due to the violence of the wind, Sil almost lost her footing, the coat on her shoulders flew off. She looked around and saw how the fog was dissipating and looked up at the sky not understanding anything of what she was seeing.
The clouds accelerated their speed even more, rising and disappearing in less than the blink of an eye. Then she looked around. With the fog almost completely disappearing she could see more figures around. Hundreds. Probably thousands of them on different parts and hills. On top of destroyed buildings, on stones on nearby mountain tops. That's when she realized. She was also on top of a hill. And down there was a dark abyss separating her from an even stranger image.
Towards the horizon Sil saw something much stranger and whose image would forever be engraved on her retinas. The landscape was changing in a strange way. Mountains, cities, razed places, everything was rising and collapsing at an impressive speed. It was like watching a movie in fast motion. Phantom civilizations would rise only to have all their glory collapse in a split second. Monuments rose and were turned to dust and ashes the next moment. Oceans in implausible motion and mountains that were born and died.
What is this place?
"The more correct question would be, when?" said the thin, black-haired man. Sil had realized that somehow the wiry man was hearing her thoughts, but it wasn't through the Neurowire, it was something stranger, as if with his gaze he could pierce her and see into the depths of her mind.
"Everything happens at the same time here," said the girl with the long pigtails, looking at her watch, whose hands were moving at the same implausible speed as the place.
"Miss Sil Moore," the skinny man said, looking at her, almost narrowing his eyes.
His gaze was so cold it almost made Sil shudder. "Y-yes?…"
"Welcome to the Other Side…"
All the strangers in black suits stared seriously at the horizon and Sil very slowly did the same. Somehow she sensed that there was something strange, as if something was calling her in that direction. Whatever it was, it must have been overwhelming enough for everyone to be looking in that direction.
Sil looked and, with her eyes wide with surprise, she saw time and space become one.
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