The capital building was very impressive, in a black and silver ominous kind of way. I decided to take the opportunity to do some digging about the backstory as we were led towards wherever Camaxtli had stashed our airship.
“Camaxtli? Do you mind if we ask questions about this city or its history?”
Camaxtli tipped his head to the side, then said “I cannot promise to answer them all. Operational security of the city and its inhabitants is prioritized over guest guidance.”
I smiled hopefully at him. “That’s fine, I don’t think anyone here wants to actually hurt or damage anything. I’m pretty sure we just want to get our airship back, and maybe learn a bit about this place since it seems to come from… well from before our legends even existed!”
I took a skipping step to catch up. He walked very quickly for someone only a little taller than me! “So, how long have you been working here?”
“I have been operational for 133,865,180,768 seconds.”
There was a stunned sort of silence for a few moments. I glanced at Soriya, then Lakshmi. I could see their lips moving as they did mental math.
Surprisingly, it was Eshaan who spoke first. “That’s more than four thousand years!”
Camaxtli nodded. “In very rough approximation, that is correct. I greatly prefer the precision of seconds.”
“But what on earth have you been doing for all that time?!” Soriya burst out.
Camaxtli paused a moment, then answered “The tasks for which I was created. Operational maintenance. Tending to the city. Repairs. What else would I be doing?”
I felt a stab in my heart, pressing my hand to my chest. “But that’s…” I choked down the next words before I gaged on them. too sad. Oh come on Lily, you don’t have to live the sterotype-
“But that’s wrong!” Eshaan burst out. “You should live for yourself and not just others!”
I sighed. Or Eshaan could be Eshaan, yes. I smiled quietly though. It was a good look for him… and I agreed with it. It really was just too sad that he had been stuck here for 4000 years endlessly doing janitorial duties while those who made him… partied in a timeless eternity!
“Your words are confusing.” Camaxtli responded. “My statement is not incorrect, I am not wrong. I have been performing the duties as I described. I am not even ‘alive’ as you would understand the term.”
Eshaan spread his arms and spoke passionately. “How would you ever know!? How could you know if you’re alive if you’ve never lived!?”
Camaxtli frowned in confusion. “Your words are confusing and make no sense. I am not alive, and thus I cannot be living. And if I were living, then being alive would be living.”
I shook my head at Eshaan, trying to warn him off his course of action, but he wasn’t paying attention to me.
“Being alive is more than just… just existing! Being alive is… is friends! Is purpose! Is laughter and jokes and enjoying fishing by a stream and… and a hundred thousand other things!”
Camaxtli nodded slowly. “If what you say is true, than this merely confirms my previous statement. I am not alive. The participants in the Nocturnus Jubilee are. It is my duty to guard them and protect them until such time as the System fails.”
I felt an ache in my heart hearing these words, followed by a sudden surge of happiness. This was the speech you got from the mechanical boy! He was sure to join us, to learn what being alive meant!
I frowned suddenly. But if he’s going to join us, we’re probably going to have to do something stupid like fight a monster to prove our strength or… or something!
“Camaxtli? The systems that preserve Nocturnus, they don’t always need action from you, do they? Not all the time?”
Camaxtli paused, looking down at me. After a considered pause, he said “That is dangerously close to operational security. But I can confirm it. I am not necessary at all times.”
“So you could, in theory, leave for a while? If something prompted you to?”
“A strange hypothetical, unlikely to ever come up. What is the point of questioning an event which cannot occur?”
I smiled slowly. “Because sometimes, the most unexpected things do occur. Soriya and I traveled the Wake, and met a pirate, and freed their souls. Lakshmi decided that being a princess was a bad deal, and became an air pirate captain. You can’t think those were normal things to occur!?”
Camaxtli was silent for several paces, then nodded. “So the purpose of hypothetical questions is to prepare mental flexibility for challenges outside operational parameters. An interesting exercise.”
He stopped before a bank of doors, which wooshed open smoothly with the most perfect sci-fi special effect I could wish for.
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“This chamber is carried by crystal induction. I judge it beyond your current technological understanding; however I can assure you it is perfectly safe, despite being beyond your current knowledge.”
Eshaan grinned and hopped into the room looking around. “So it’s a magic room that travels places?”
Camaxtli frowned. “That… is not… entirely incorrect…”
“Hey you!” Lakshmi marched up to Camaxtli and poked him in the chest. “I’ve had just about enough of ‘primitive’ this and ‘inferior’ that! I studied with the finest tutors and the best professors in the Imperial Academy! I can understand anything!”
Camaxtli stared at her for a moment, then said “Very well. The room beyond is a floating cab, held in place by elemental energy tuned in balance with a crystal matrix. It rides along shafts lined with crystal lines, matched to a resonating hedron complex, which is tuned to a specific etheric frequency. The frequency is tuned into guide crystals and control linkages which are programmed to the etheric matrix that links to a semi-stable quasi intellect in the cab. This allows the cab to travel to any destination it is commanded to reach, provided the user’s security clearance is sufficiently high.”
I was lost from the first sentence. Eshaan held in there longer than me, at least to the second. But Lakshmi… she was frowning ferociously, gripping tight to his words as though by main force of will.
“Right.” She said, after he had finished. “Ok. Leaving aside what you just said is supposed to be impossible… how do you stabilize the crystals when elemental flux causes a quadchromatic decoupling?”
Camaxtli blinked slowly, then said “That… the… the crystals need to be grown in a stabilized environment, of course, free of elemental influence.”
Lakshmi breathed out slowly. “So you’re telling me… you can grow elemental crystals… without any element in them!? That… by the gods… but then… so…” She spun towards Daniyel to find him already holding out a sheaf of paper and a pencil to her.
Lakshmi grabbed at the sheaf, paper flying behind her as she ran to a nearby wall and started to scribble madly.
Daniyel nodded complacently at the sight then turned to Camaxtli. “Your assistance is greatly appreciated. My ward is very excited by what you’ve just revealed, and if past events are any indication, several prototypes will be forthcoming in a few months’ time.”
For the first time, Camaxtli seemed to be caught off guard by something. “She understood me? For such a primitive mind-“
I stepped up and wagged my finger at him. “No. Enough of that. Uneducated. Ignorant. Primitive implies an inability to rise above. For whatever reason, my friend has not had the education you have. Do not assume that means she is less than you.”
Camaxtli was silent for a long moment, and the nodded once. “I see. This would be an example of the use of the hypothetical we had just discussed then?”
“Yes, exactly.”
“I must think on this.” He said, and then stepped into the elevator cab. “Please follow me.”
Daniyel calmly herded Lakshmi, still scribbling furiously, into the elevator, and then Camaxtli pressed a button on the panel.
The elevator ride was quiet and smooth, though I could feel it change directions a few times. I looked over at Soriya.
“I think this is like a turbolift.”
“A what?” She looked at me blankly.
“Oh come on, you watch American tv, haven’t you seen Star Trek?!”
She blinked. “Oh! The elevators in the ship? Sorry, American sci-fi is not my favorite.”
“What?! What are you saying!? We make great stuff! Bladerunner! Blake’s Seven! UFO!”
She smiled and raised an eyebrow at me. “Ok. You like Black Knight? Krrish? How about Dr. Brain? Ra.One? Train to Busan? Kingdom?”
I blinked, my mouth working. “Oh.” I finally said in a small voice. I could feel a blush building in my cheeks.
Soriya patted my head affectionately. “See? Americans. Nice enough people, but you think the world revolves around you.”
I nodded sheepishly, my blush not completely fading until the elevator-
Turbolift I thought defiantly.
-stopped and the doors opened.
The space beyond was dark, only the light from the elevator spilling out onto a catwalk. Camaxtli strode forward, and as he entered the room beyond burst into light, brilliant silver and white; catwalks strung across a space filled with futuristic looking magitech machinery. It was diametrically opposed to the black and glittering lights in the city… above? Beside? I wasn’t sure exactly where we were in relation to Nocturnus.
“This is maintenance bay 94. Your ship is below us.”
I giggled, looking over the railing. Sure enough, far below us sat the Sparrowhawk, half disassembled with a swarm of mechanical servitors busily probing into her guts.
“Neat.” I said quietly. “It’s got the ship, does it come with a giant slug crime lord too?”
“There is no crime in Nocturnus during the Jubilee.” Camaxtli said bluntly. “Though there are several lords in attendance.”
Soriya smiled at my disappointment. “Never mind, I got it.” She said, patting my arm.
I sighed and nodded. “I’d be horrified if you didn’t. Even if it is just an American movie.”
Soriya shook her head. “I guess that wounded your pride a bit.”
I hung my head. “Yeah, I guess it did. I’m not even really American anymore, and I can’t leave it behind.”
Eshaan came up and rested his hand on my shoulder. “Lily, I can’t say much about where you’re from, but I do know that you never leave where you’re from, it’s part of you. You might be somewhere else… or maybe even someone else… but that past is still real, and so it will affect you, and be a part of you as long as you remember it.”
I looked up at him in surprise, my mouth parted slightly. That was… surprisingly thoughtful… no. Thoughtful is something the dumb-as-a-post boy is always. I felt a prickle of tears in my eyes and wiped angrily at my face. “Thank you, Eshaan. That was… thank you.” And moved by an urge I couldn’t properly explain, I moved forward and hugged him, feeling the hard muscle of his body against mine.
Lakshmi clapped her hands breaking the moment. “Alright, alright, enough with the lovey dovey stuff! I want to find out what they’ve done to my airship, and then get it put back together!” She glared at Camaxtli. “The right way!”
“Speaking of which.” Said Eshaan. “Where are we going, anyway? We tore out of Abellia so fast after we rescued Lily that we don’t even know where we’re going. We are still hunting down the remaining Arcana, right?”
I nodded. “Yeah, we are. It seems like something important is happening to the System, or at least that’s why Soriya and I are here. We need the Gates in order to open the way to the System.”
Camaxtli stiffened and turned to me. “You are a keybearer?! You are gaining access to the system?!”
Ah, there it is I thought smugly as I turned to him.
“Yes. Did you want to come with us?” I smiled sweetly.
“I… that is… my protocols dictate…” he stumbled to a halt.
Eshaan grinned at him, then clapped him on the shoulder. “Let me guess. You’re still working out the fact that an unexpected event is causing you to throw everything you thought you knew in the gutter?”
Camaxtli turned to Ehsaan and nodded jerkily. “I am. How did you know?”
Eshaan grinned proudly. “Simple! That’s Lily for you!”