by Dima Zales
I reluctantly leave my gun next to the one already on the desk. Somehow, I’m not surprised Ariel brought a gun to a place called Tranquility. What’s surprising is that she didn’t bail on this outing altogether when she learned she has to leave her Precious behind.
“Are you all ready to go?” I ask as I begin to suit up. “Do you have the map memorized? Did you eat and use the bathroom? Did you get a good night’s sleep? Did you talk to your shrink? Did—”
“We’re ready,” Felix says with an eye roll.
“I’m excited,” Ariel says inside my helmet once I have it on. “Rehab can be boring.”
Felix puts his visor back down and mutters, “You mean to tell me that knitting isn’t fun enough?”
“Let’s hope there’s not too much excitement on this trip,” I say.
“I concur,” Itzel says as she runs some sort of diagnostic on my suit—which causes the display portion of my visor to flicker in and out like a rebooting PC.
“Let’s go,” she says when the visor’s display is back to normal.
“Hold on,” I say. “I want to make sure we didn’t forget the extra suit.”
Itzel walks up to Felix and makes a circle in the air in front of his visor.
“Yes, I’m the mule, obviously,” he grumbles and turns around.
On his back is a backpack-like contraption that’s much larger than the ones the rest of us are wearing, and there’s a helmet attached to it that makes Felix look like he has sprouted an extra head from his lower back.
“You won’t even feel the weight,” Itzel says and heads for the door. “None of us will.”
“What if we need to eat?” I ask as we walk to the hub. “Did you bring provisions?”
“The tube on the left is food, the one on the right is water,” Itzel says as we enter the hub.
I dutifully locate what she’s talking about and try sipping from both.
Right away, I grimace. “Eww. It tastes like someone made cough syrup from wood chips and chalk.”
“Maybe, but it will keep you alive.” Itzel heads for the fateful yellow gate. “We’re not going on a picnic.”
“Wait a second,” Ariel says. “What do we do if we need to go to the bathroom in this thing?”
“I built advanced recycling into the suit so that no moisture or nutrients are lost,” Itzel says. “Just—”
“Double eww,” I say. I don’t even want to think about this.
“Yeah,” Felix says. “I think I’d rather die of thirst and starvation before I take full advantage of this clearly overdesigned suit.”
“Well, we know there will be a habitable world out there where her father is,” Itzel says sagely. “The squeamish can go hungry, thirsty, and with bursting bladders and bowels until that time.”
She stops next to the gate, and we all quiet down.
This is it.
We’re about to go in, for real this time.
“Ladies first.” Felix gallantly gestures at the plasma-like surface.
“Chicken,” Ariel says and confidently steps in.
I shrug and go after her.
On the other side, everything looks exactly as it did in my vision.
“Depressing,” Ariel says. “Reminds me of Six Flags in New Jersey, but after a nuclear war.”
“Your words didn’t do this justice,” says Itzel when she shows up. “I bet it was humans who caused this—or if it was Cognizant, I bet there were no gnomes on this world.”
“Damn,” Felix says when he finally turns up. “Let’s get out of here pronto.”
Agreeing with him, we all briskly walk over the slime-covered ground until we reach the next gate, and this time, I volunteer to walk in first—this whole trip being my idea and all that.
I step out in the next Otherland cautiously and look around.
Then do a double take and look around again.
Then look up until my neck strains.
Then around again.
“Are you seeing what I’m seeing?” I ask Ariel as soon as she turns up. “I just want to make sure Itzel’s tech didn’t fail to filter some hallucinogen from the outside air.”
“I see the horizon sloping up, instead of down,” Ariel says in an awed whisper. “If that’s not what you’re seeing, my trip is weirder than yours.”
“Wow,” Felix says, joining us. “I think we’re on some kind of ring world.”
I know what he’s talking about. Instead of a planet, we must be on a wedding-band-like structure that loops around a star—and we’re standing on the inside of the band. That would explain the upward slope of the horizon.
I squint as I focus on the dimmer-than-sun star the structure is circling.
Definitely not in Kansas anymore.
“The ring has to be spinning.” Felix jumps up and down. “For centrifugal forces to generate the artificial gravity here.”
I jump also.
Though the suit makes it hard to gauge, I think the artificial gravity must be similar to that of Earth because the jump takes about as much effort as when we were under JFK.
Itzel comes out of the gate next, and we can hear her excited exhale as she takes it all in. “This looks like gnome engineering,” she whispers. “Had I known I’d see this, I would’ve joined you for free.”
“Is this the world the gate makers gave your kind?” Felix asks. “I thought it didn’t have gates leading to it.”
“No,” Itzel says. “I think this was built after that, by exiled gnomes like me.”
“It reminds me of those generational spaceships at the end of Interstellar,” Ariel says. “Only bigger.”
“More like the Halos in the Halo video games,” Felix says, still awestruck. “I thought these were impossible to keep stable. Whoever built these—”
“Gnomes,” Itzel says.
“You don’t know for sure it was gnomes,” Felix says.
“I wasn’t—”
“Look,” Ariel hisses at him. “She’s not talking about the builders of this place. She’s referring to our company.”
Both Felix and I tear our gazes from the sky and realize Itzel indeed wasn’t talking about the gnomes who may or may not have created this thing.
She was pointing out a disturbing fact: we’re surrounded by armed gnomes.
Chapter Thirty-One
At least, I assume these are gnomes—they have features similar to Itzel’s. None are wearing breathing masks, all are male, and all are trying to look fierce—and succeeding admirably.
Also, they’re holding odd-looking spears instead of something more appropriate for such an allegedly technologically superior people—like ray guns. Their clothes consist of tiny loincloths made of some shiny material, and they have war paint on.
The smallest—and thus likely the oldest—of the gnome tribe shouts something in a language that sounds completely foreign to my ears and gesticulates angrily with his spear.
“It’s a hodgepodge of languages,” Itzel tells us. “I think he said something like, ‘You shall not pass.’”
Ariel takes a step forward. “Tell Gandalf to put that stick down, or someone might get hurt.”
The small gnome thrusts at Ariel with his spear, stopping a quarter inch from her chest.
“If he pierces your suit, you won’t survive the trip back,” Itzel warns. Putting a hand on Ariel’s shoulder, she says something through external speakers.
Hearing her talk agitates the tribe more than Ariel’s threatening behavior, and they narrow the circle around us, spears outthrust.
The small one shouts something, and the gnomes stop.
“He either said, ‘Don’t hurt the nasty beast,’ or ‘Don’t ruin the tasty bee.’” Itzel faces me, but all I can see is the reflection of my visor in hers.
“Can you ask them what they want?” Felix says.
“I think it’s obvious,” Itzel replies. “They want us to come with them.”
She’s right. The tribe herds us toward the middle of the hub
, and as soon as we start walking, they seem less ready to turn us into kebabs.
“Where did they come from?” I ask belatedly.
“I think they hid behind the gates,” Ariel says. “Speaking of that, isn’t that our destination gate?”
It’s true. As luck would have it, we’re passing by the gate that we need, but we might as well be on the other side of this world for all the good it would do us. There’s no way we can run for it without ruining our suits, and maybe some internal organs too.
“My best guess is that somehow these gnomes have gone feral,” Itzel says.
“What gave it away?” Felix asks sarcastically. “Was it the spears or the lack of personal hygiene?”
We pass by a ravine, and they both shut up at the sight of the mighty hunt going on there.
A giant herd of mammoths is stampeding down a grass clearing. A small band of gnomes in garb identical to our captors is chasing the poor creatures to the edge of what must be an artificial cliff.
The mammoths realize their mistake too late, and a couple of them fall off the cliff with loud thuds.
The remainder of the mammoth herd turns and stampedes toward the gnomes in a panicked gallop.
The hunters disperse. The fallen creatures must be what they were after.
The small leader of our captors screams something.
“He said, ‘move it,’” Itzel says.
“We could’ve guessed that much,” Felix grumbles.
“Then walk faster,” Itzel says. “I think he also suggested they might kill one of us to show the others he means business.”
Itzel’s motivational speech makes us walk in a brisk jog for a while—and thanks to the suit’s help, I don’t feel even a fraction of the tiredness I should, given the distance we end up covering.
“These gnomes don’t seem to have respiratory problems,” I say as we pass a herd of grazing bison sharing the field with the mooft creatures I just learned about.
“The air outside seems to have been artificially formulated with extra oxygen,” Itzel says. “Have you not looked at your readings?”
“I was too busy worrying about survival,” I tell her. “And I still am.”
Glancing at the readings in question, I see that the air composition here is indeed oxygen rich. Does that mean things are more flammable on this world?
“What do you think happened here?” Felix asks when our captors force us to climb up a tall hill. “Why build something so majestic and go feral?”
“Maybe not all of them did,” Itzel says. “This structure is millions of times bigger than the surface area of your Earth. There could be millions of cultures and civilizations out here, some of which may be quite different from these savages.”
“Wow.” My head spins at the scope of what Itzel is saying. “If you’re right, that’s crazy. Alternatively, could it be that most of the smart ones went into space and left the dumb ones back here?”
“Or maybe these are the descendants of some back-to-nature cult,” Ariel says.
“That seems unlikely,” Itzel says. “But you might have the right idea.” She scratches the top of her helmet. “Maybe the rest of the gnomes made themselves artificial bodies, and these guys are the descendants of the people who refused to undergo that transition?”
No one answers because we can finally see the view from the hill, and we don’t like it.
Not one bit.
There are miles and miles of metal cages with a huge assortment of animals and Cognizant inside.
I see orcs, elves, and a ton of other types I’ve only previously seen on Gomorrah, as well as most creatures Hekima covered in our Orientation and some I’ve never heard of, in addition to a bunch of Earth species such as bison and elephants.
“I wonder if this ring world was designed to be something like a Noah's Ark for the Otherlands,” Felix whispers. “Somewhere in this vastness might be every creature and every Cognizant type.”
“And what’s this, a zoo?” Ariel asks as she scans the place.
I don’t say anything, but I doubt this is a zoo.
Each person and animal is in an individual cage, and they all look way more miserable than zoo denizens usually do.
“I’m afraid the truth is much worse,” Itzel says, her voice hollow. “Look there, by the edge of the cell on the left side.”
I see it right away, and my insides knot in terror and disgust.
What remains of an orc female is roasting on a stick over a giant pile of coals, and a bunch of feral gnomes are munching on chunks of the poor woman’s flesh.
“This is a meat storage facility,” Felix says, his voice barely audible over my panicked heartbeat. “They’re planning to eat us.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
I fight the urge to throw up and faint at the same time. “How about we fight them here and now? I’d rather have a hole in my suit than become dinner.”
“Hole in the suit is the best-case scenario,” Itzel says dryly. “More likely, they’ll spear us to death, and we’ll end up as dinner anyway.”
“Even so,” Ariel says, sounding as repulsed as I feel. “I’d rather go out fighting.”
“Violence might not be necessary,” Itzel says. “The cages look high tech, which means they can be hacked.”
“Hold on,” Felix says, his voice quivering. “If by high tech, you mean the tech of the people who built this ring world, what makes you think it can be hacked?”
I’m impressed he’s even able to speak coherently.
Or that any of us are.
“I’m guessing the gnome builders wouldn’t have bothered to create these cages,” Itzel says. “It must’ve been some other civilization.”
She’s clearly distancing herself from what we saw by being over-analytical.
“You’re guessing,” Felix says with uncharacteristic nastiness in his tone. “That’s just great. I’ve always wanted to risk my life based on the guessing of a gnome.”
I want to remind Felix how psyched he was when he first heard he’d be working with a gnome, but decide against it, as it would only highlight his inexplicable dislike of Itzel specifically.
“What does my being a gnome have to do with it?” Itzel’s voice turns belligerent. “You’ll risk your life even more if you fight.”
“Can’t Sasha look into the future and tell us if we’d win the fight?” Ariel asks.
“All the gnomes will mess it up,” Felix says, pointedly facing Itzel.
Of course. That’s why I didn’t see a vision of myself entering this world—the presence of all the gnomes blocks my powers.
“I think Itzel has a point,” I say. “But I think we should put this to a vote.”
“I vote we fight,” Ariel says.
“Fine,” Felix says reluctantly. “Let’s give hacking a try.”
“You’re the deciding vote,” Itzel tells me. “I obviously vote for my idea.”
“I vote for the hacking,” I say after a moment of consideration.
I’m always up for the sneaky solution when one is available.
“So be it,” Ariel says. “But don’t come crying to me when they eat you.”
We keep walking, and as we get closer to the giant meat-locker prison, it looks like Itzel was right.
The cages appear to be operated by sophisticated electronics—so much so that I wonder if these gnomes might be less feral than they seem.
Turns out they are as feral as they seem.
A lady gnome dressed like a shaman spots us from the distance and starts dancing next to one of the empty cages.
“That thing she’s holding as a staff looks like a device to open the doors,” Itzel says.
Yep.
At the end of the ceremony, the half-naked shaman lady touches the screen-like lock with the wand, and the door opens.
As our captors herd us toward it, the shaman repeats the same rigmarole with a cage for each of us.
“You better hack us out of this place,” I tell Itzel
as I’m pushed into my cage. “If they eat me, I’ll come back as a ghost to haunt you.”
“They would eat me too,” Itzel says. “So you won’t get to haunt me for long.”
“They might not eat you,” Felix says. “Once they take off your suit, they might see you’re a gnome—and we have no evidence that they’re cannibals.”
“We don’t?” Ariel asks. “How about that cage on your two o’clock?”
She’s right.
There’s a miserable and naked gnome in the cage in question—which means that either these are cannibalistic gnomes or they use the same place for prison.
With another song and dance, the shaman locks us in and leaves with the gnomes who’d captured us.
I pace my tiny cage and see Ariel and Felix doing the same.
A giant orc male in a nearby cell looks us over and says something in an unfamiliar language.
Itzel replies to him in what seems like the same tongue, and they carry on a long conversation.
“He says they ate the rest of his family,” Itzel says, and I cringe, recalling the sight of the orc female we saw getting eaten a few minutes ago. “It sounds like he’s a native here and just as feral as the gnomes, the only difference being that his kind live far away from here. All he wants is to get revenge on our captors. In that, he seems to be just like the orcs I’ve met on Gomorrah—they’re all about family values and vendettas.”
“I can’t blame the guy,” I say. “If someone killed—let alone ate—my family, I’m sure I’d also be obsessed with revenge.”
“Let’s focus on escape,” Ariel says. “I think the bad guys are now far away enough to try.”
Nodding, Itzel walks up to the lock and fiddles with it for a while. “I don’t see how I can do this without taking off the gloves,” she says.
“The air outside might be especially designed for your kind,” Felix says. “Besides, wouldn’t you rather risk microbes than end up in fellow gnomes’ stomach juices?”
Moving with reluctance, Itzel takes her gloves off and waits a few moments.