Rose Blumen ~ Exogignesthai

601. Beyond the stars, 3

(Rose)Day after day, Nokaranlık learns of the ways of the world. What is at times odd to me is that nothing she experiences compares itself to the old world I remember.

There is no older world to her.

And when I refer to differences with my fabled past she will never experience, it is odd to her instead...

That makes me feel a little weird.

As we find flowers that change colour as the temperature of the day changes, from deep red to yellow, green and blue, they look normal to her, and amazing to me.

Well, they look amazing to her too, but less surreal. We kept some of them in a bouquet until they dried.

My hollow chest still itches at times. Blume smiles when she sees me scratch that bone. I kind of miss that flower growing close to my heart.

We hold hands sometimes instead.

B - You’re a selfish Rose.

I don’t understand why she says that. I can see she’s somewhat melancholic too.

Her hair grows in a magnificent golden fur, while mine goes more grey and light every day.

Nok’s pelt doesn’t change. It’s hard to wash that mess. But Blume’s hair is gorgeous and fluffy. And it pushes some triggers of my... tastes.

R - Stop winking, evil temptress.

Now she laughs uncouth. She enjoys teasing me. I can’t really blame her. But I do so anyway.

~

What is nice around here is the landscape changes greatly every day.

The coastline is completely haphazard, sprinkled randomly with jungles, reefs, woods, beaches, dead cities in very varied situation of decay, and other more or less barren or ruptured lands. Every day is nicely different as we progress.

We can still fish in the sea with ease, and often find edible plants if we head inland. It’s a rather nice place to travel so. Also, no monster ever came after us here. It is nice.

In the least damaged or ancient cities, Nok could get her sights of other buildings and areas reminding her of Nue’s town. We didn’t meet any cousin of the cute necromancer slug though.

I promised my daughter she would meet new friends, but so far we haven’t been lucky. Nothing as intelligent as Nue appeared yet.

I gave to Nok a copy of a map we’ve made together that shows where she was born and where Nue lives roughly.

The most recent cities we go through still have cars in their streets. The flora is taking over, but many structures can remain.

We explore artificial caves. Underground parkings. Some cars still shine cleanly down there.

We camp for a night in one of them. It’s not the first time I’m doing so. They smell different and are just as comfortable.

Nokarlık meets there her first computer screens. Unfortunately they wouldn’t switch on.

She understands these dark tiles are some kind of sleeping animals. But it’s hard to find electricity to feed them around here, or more precisely around now.

Still, given how these cities are wide and this one preserved, we decide to give it a deeper try. We leave our equipment in that parking as a camping site. We’ll settle in this city for a short while and see what we can find.

~

The port and shipyard of this agglomerate of a city does have boats, still floating even. Unfortunately they are the kind of tankers or other giant structures there is no way we would be able to sail with.

We do look around for the smaller modern yachts and cruisers of the noble kinds we used in the Mediterranean. Without luck.

Nok only finds some weird ship that is two small and thin ships attached together with a net between them. Mast and sail look alright but the design is alien to me.

It would take us months to go through every room of every building still standing, so we focused on the shipyard.

How many humans lived on Earth to leave so many cities so wide and big after them?

And lucky enough, we ended up finding in a remote workshop an engine with fuel that hadn’t decayed and could switch on.

The ruckus spooked Nok and countless stains along the walls. We didn’t realise they were alive as we were looking around. The colours of the walls simply rushed away and out when the engine begun its roar. They looked like a similar life form to the creeping shadows in England, but colourful and less prone to flee when we were around but quiet.

Anyways, we generated some electricity there. Bulbs exploded everywhere like fireworks. We even had a fire from sparks over dry papers and leaves.

The next day, I did it.

I managed to plug in a computer that still worked.

Then another, for the first one was stuck onto some screen in a language I don’t even recognise.

Then another...

It got quickly boring for Nok, but I kept trying computers we found around.

Until finally one started onto a more familiar layout for me. In a mix of languages including English even. Lucky!

I couldn’t connect it as openly to the network as my past friend could.

Blume had some experience too and tried as well. She found something else.

The global machine network humanity built was decaying fast, away from sight.

But some things remained.

Some other levels of connections were still in existence.

B - I guess some satellites still fly.

R - How long can they?

B - I’m surprised they haven’t all fallen yet... If they were launched not long before the white day and are efficiently autonomous in maintaining their orbit, fuel consumption could allow for maybe up to ten more years? It depends on many factors.

Eating scientist’s brains sure seems helpful sometimes. Even if the answer isn’t definitely conclusive.

Anyway! I put new stars inside Nokarlık’s eyes.

I sat her in front of the screen and launched the video about Earth, the solar system and deeper space.

I lost her in a trance.

The video was looping back after it was over, and she kept watching it again with the same intense focus as if it was the first time and crucial to fully observe.

She looked lost though, gawking and agape. She couldn’t even hear my voice anymore.

She’s my daughter alright. The shock of knowledge and experiencing advanced display technology was high and mighty.

The most impressive of ancient sorceries is this kind of technology.

Blume held my shoulder sympathetically as I was looking at my lost daughter, completely frozen in stupor in front of the screen. The sound was bad but we could hear the educational speech as well, over and over.

In this derelict workshop, in a ghost town abandoned for decades... My daughter was struck with a taste of what humanity really was. For the first time really.

The odd feeling is...

To her, in this present world, this right now is the most surreal thing she ever experienced.

Humanity is no longer normal.

~