by Alex Deva
"I'm not sure. Nine hundred something, I think. Maybe nine hundred sixty something. We just say who the consuls are, it's a lot easier than numbers."
"Good," said Mark, mostly to himself; "now if I could only remember what year Rome was created..." He dug deep into his history training, concentrated for a whole minute, then came up with the answer: "Seven hundred and fifty-three before Christ. I think."
"So what?"
Doina was counting on her fingers.
"Oh, God. This man thinks the year is only two hundred and something," she said.
"That fits -- third century, Romans still in Dacia," said Mark.
"But... how can it be? He doesn't really look nine hundred years old, does he?" said Doina in confusion.
"Believe me, Doina... you don't look nine hundred years old, either."
"What?!"
"When I left, the year was two thousand and fourteen."
Aram and Doina stared at him.
"I know. I'm as confused as you are."
Aram sized him up again, from head to toe. He raised his eyebrows, then said:
"I don't know you. You may be lying, but I don't believe this girl is lying. She knows about Apulum and she speaks Latin."
"Only some prayers," said Doina.
Aram looked at her as if wishing she had kept her mouth shut. "Right. Don't know what those are, but anyway, you're too little to be talking lies."
Mark said, quietly: "The same thing happened to all three of us, Aram. The same light turning into deep black shade, remember?"
"I want to go home," said Doina again.
"Yes, I want to get out of here, too," said Mark placatingly.
"I wanna piss," said the Dacian.
"And I'm hungry," she added.
They looked around in puzzlement. The room was perfectly round, at least three metres tall, and there was no door in sight. The ceiling was arched and dark, but the round walls were radiating a warm, yellowish light. They all turned around searching for a way out, but found none.
Mark stepped to the nearest part of wall, and inspected it closely. On an impulse, he placed his hand on the lighted surface.
Small, black circles sprang from underneath his palm, forming a cluster around his fingers. Each circle had a symbol in it.
He quickly withdrew his hand. After a few seconds, the circles faded back into the light.
He touched the wall again, in a different place. The circles sprang to life again, in the same pattern.
Aram and Doina watched with interest.
"What are you doing?" asked Aram.
"I think this is a control panel of some sort," answered Mark. "I think each of these symbols does something. One of them must open a door." Or kill us all, he continued to himself.
Doina came closer and looked at each symbol in turn.
"I think it's this one," she said, pointing.
Mark looked at her in amazement. "How would you possibly know that?"
"I don't know," she answered. "I just do. I think."
He frowned and looked at Aram. "What do you think?"
"Don't look at me," the Dacian said, wryly. "I'm from the third century."
Mark smiled and looked back at Doina. "Are you sure?" he asked.
"Yes. I think," she answered.
He bit his lower lip and touched the symbol that she'd indicated.
Suddenly, a diaphragm opened in the middle of the floor, about one and a half metres wide. It startled them, as they initially believed the entire floor would disappear, but that didn't happen. They gathered around the opening and looked inside. It appeared that the floor separated them from an identical room, that became lit just as the iris opened.
The room below was also about as tall as Mark and Aram together.
"I can't jump down there," said Doina. "It's too high!"
"You don't happen to carry a rope with you?" asked Aram.
"Sorry," answered Mark.
"Is there another way out of here?"
"Not that I can see, and I'm not about to start touching those symbols randomly."
"Why not? What can happen?"
"Well, I have no idea, do I?"
"So, down the hole then?"
"You really think you can make it?"
"I can try. I'm good with jumping," said Aram.
"What if you get hurt?"
"Don't you know? Dacians are immortal."
Mark thought he remembered some high school text by Herodotus that said exactly that.
Aram approached the opening and prepared. Right before jumping, he turned towards Mark and asked:
"Hey. Did you say the Romans left Dacia? When?"
"I can't remember exactly," Mark said. "Some time during the late third century, I think."
"Well, fuck me," Aram said. "That old Roman bastard Naevius was right."
Then he jumped.
VII.
Aram nearly lost his balance in mid-air when his fall was suddenly slowed down. As soon as his feet left the edge of the round opening, he found himself floating gently. Still falling, but much slower than would've been normal. He touched down lightly with both feet and a hand, just as if he'd only jumped from knee height. He looked up and said:
"Did you see that?! What was that?! It was like falling through water!"
Doina looked at the Englishman in confusion, then down at Aram and then back at Mark. The latter was himself staring down, thoughtfully.
"Where the hell are we?" he whispered to himself.
Aram got up and looked around.
"This place is just like the one you got there, 'cept there aren't any seats," he announced loudly.
From upstairs, Doina gave a yelp. "Look!" she said. Mark quickly followed her gaze and turned around.
The seats were gone.
"What happened?" asked the Dacian from below.
Mark came back to the edge of the opening.
"Seats are gone. Looks like the rooms are identical now!"
"Well, are you coming down or what?"
"How do we know it'll hold us like it held you?" asked Doina.
"Go on, I'll catch you if it doesn't," said Aram.
She looked at Mark. He nodded. She gathered her dress in a bunch so it wouldn't lift when she jumped, made the sign of the cross with her right hand, then stepped over the hole.
She floated down with a lot more grace than Aram. He caught her effortlessly, and they both looked at each other in amazement.
"OK... I guess it's my turn," said Mark.
He drew a deep breath and tried to prepare for anything, even an accelerated fall, if need be. Then, he stepped over the edge.
The sensation was akin to being in a wind tunnel, where you have to wear a special suit and high-pressure air is pumped from beneath so you can simulate free-fall, except there was no air rush. He simply drifted down, a lot slower than expected.
Well, bugger me, he said. Low g and normal g, all in one room. Something tells me Kansas is long gone.
He landed with both feet flexed, straightened up and looked at the other two. They moved out of the centre of the room, and immediately the diaphragm in the arched ceiling closed, leaving no sign it was ever there.
"What is this place?" asked Doina. "Where are we?"
"Also, I never thought I'd ask this, but when are we?" added Aram.
"More importantly," said Mark, "where is everybody?"
The others stared at him.
"Someone brought us here in the first place," he said. "Someone put us all in the same room, noticed that we weren't able to communicate, watched us, held us down even, put us to sleep and, when we woke up, the two of you were speaking my language. Then someone let us go, once it became evident that we understood each other. To me, that speaks of motive and purpose. Someone is doing this."
"What if they come looking for us in the room above?" asked Aram.
He stepped to the wall and placed his hand on it. The command circles sprang out from under his palm, just as they
had from under Mark's.
"Hey, Doi," he called. "Which of these squiggly signs opens the ceiling again?"
Doina was taken by surprise.
"How did you know to call me Doi?" she asked. "My mother used to call me that."
Mark looked at her.
"Used to?"
"Yes, she... she died two years ago," she said.
"You live with your dad, then?"
"No," she said, curtly. "He was killed too, with my mom."
Aram abandoned the panel, took his hand off the wall and put it on the little girl's shoulder.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to bring back memories. I'll call you by your long name from now on."
"No, that's fine," she said. "I don't mind Doi. It actually means 'two' in Vlachian," she added.
Aram looked at her in surprise. "It means 'two' in Dacian as well!" he said.
"And I suspect it means the same in modern Romanian," Mark intervened.
They both looked at him.
"Why is it that the moment I think I understand something, one of you says something and I get confused again?" asked Aram, taking his hand off Doina's shoulder. "What the hell is Romanian now?"
He stopped for a bit, introspectively, then continued:
"And what the hell does 'hell' mean, anyway?"
"You don't know what hell is?!" asked Doina.
"Frankly, no, I don't," said Aram.
"Filii autem regni eicientur in tenebras exteriores ibi erit fletus et stridor dentium," quoted Doina in Latin.
"Do you actually know the whole Bible by heart?!" asked Mark in dismay.
"Wait, sons of what kingdom? What outer darkness, and whose teeth are grinding?" asked Aram too, bewildered. "Is that what you call hell? A dark place where you cry a lot because your teeth hurt?"
"Can we possibly not talk about eternal damnation right now?" interjected Mark. "Aram: hell is where some people believe they go to, after they die, if they had not behaved as their God ordered, while they were alive. Doina: it looks like Dacians were not yet Christians by Aram's time, so please try to understand. Aram, again: Romanians are the people who live in the same land where you, Dacians," then he turned at Doina, "and you, Vlachians were living. In my time, they are called Romanians, and their land is called Romania. Is that clear?"
The Dacian and the Vlachian watched him in silence.
"Now who's cross?" asked Aram.
Mark drew a deep breath.
"I'm sorry. I realise that we come from different cultures and we could talk about this for ages, but we have more important things to do right now," he said. "For all we know, every second we waste takes us farther away from home."
"Right," said Aram and quickly stepped away. "Doi, which symbol to open the ceiling?" he asked, hand on the wall again.
The little girl watched the symbols for a few seconds, then pointed at one.
"Are you sure?" asked Aram.
"Just touch it," she said.
Aram shrugged and put his index finger on the indicated glyph. Sure enough, the diaphragm opened above, right in the middle of the arch.
"How do we..." began Doina.
Aram took his hand off the wall, stepped to the middle of the room, and threw himself upwards. He floated for a few seconds, arms next to his body, legs stretched, and was standing in the room above in three seconds.
"...aha," she ended.
Mark looked up.
"Anything different up there?" he asked.
Aram looked around and answered loudly:
"Not that I can see, no."
"You think one of us should stay on guard there, just in case?"
The tall Dacian looked around.
"I'm pretty sure whoever put us here can find us," he said.
Good point, thought Mark.
"Fine. Float back down then."
Aram stepped into the opening and descended slowly; as soon as he cleared the ceiling, he did a back-flip in mid-air, becoming upright just as his feet touched the floor.
"Nice," said Doina.
"Thanks," said the Dacian, smiling.
Mark just rolled his eyes.
Doina approached the wall and raised her hand. She looked tentatively over her shoulder at the two men, then returned her gaze ahead and touched the lighted wall.
At least three times as many circles erupted from under her small palm, occupying a space about half a meter wide around it.
"Whoa," said Mark.
"Fuck," observed Aram, equally impressed.
"How did you do that?"
"Don't know," said Doina. "I just did what you did."
They came closer. The ceiling closed as soon as Aram stepped out of the centre.
"Can you understand any of these symbols?" asked Mark.
"I don't know," said Doina again.
"How can you not know?" asked Aram. "You either understand them, or you don't."
"If you ask me which one does something, like you did with that... floor-door, I can tell you which one it is. But I can't exactly explain what each of them does."
"Floor-door, I like that," said Aram.
"There are so many circles now," said Mark. "I wonder why you get so many and we only get a few."
"Jealous?" asked Aram. "Doi, I'll be happy if you find the one that says hot meal, the head and back home."
She looked at the circles in earnest.
"Sorry, none of them say that."
"But again, how can you know?" asked Mark in amazement. "For instance, what does this one do?" he pointed at a random symbol.
"It reverses the... I don't know how to say it. But please don't touch it. It's not good."
"You can tell that?"
"I can... I think I can feel it. I don't know how to explain."
"Some are good and some are bad then?" asked Aram with interest.
"I don't... feel that about every symbol," she admitted.
"Is there one that says call or ring or take us to your leader?" asked Mark.
She took a few seconds.
"I guess it'll be this one," she pointed at a symbol that was on the outermost area, towards the top.
"What does it say, exactly? Can you say?"
"Maker... by itself... of judgements...?" she tried.
The two men looked at each other.
"Autopilot?" ventured Mark.
"I don't know what that word means," she said. "But I think this one translates as three words, not just one."
"What words?" asked Mark.
"Let her think," said Aram. "Give her some time. We've only been speaking English for a little while." And then, to Doina:
"Doi, I know exactly how you feel. You know the word, but you're not sure how to say it in English, because you don't know what half the English words you've just learned actually mean. Just take your time."
Doina frowned, and dug deep into her newly acquired lexicon. She shut her eyes, and after a few seconds opened them again, and said:
"Automatic Decision Maker."
"So, autopilot," said Mark.
It was Aram's turn to roll his eyes and dig into his own fresh English vocabulary, immediately coming up with:
"Smartarse!"
Mark gave a quick smile.
"Doi, does it also say enable or disable?"
"No. Just that."
He sighed. "OK. Let's summon the ADM then."
Doina touched the symbol with her small index finger.
"Can you tell me what this is?," said a voice out of nowhere.
VIII.
They were all badly startled. They looked around for the source of the voice, but it seemed to have come from all around them. Doina, who had been quite confident so far with the strange technology, took a frightened step back towards Mark, who put his arms protectively on her shoulders. Aram was tensed, turning around as if bothered by the idea of not having a safe place to back into.
Mark was the first to speak.
"Where are we?" he asked.
"Can
you tell me what this is?" insisted the voice.
"What what is?" asked Aram in annoyance.
Doina nudged Mark and pointed at the wall. Near the agglomeration of symbols that her palm had made appear on the wall, there was a new, big circle, glowing softly, about a half metre in diameter.
"I think it's talking about that," she said.
Aram turned towards the diagram on the wall.
"It?" he asked, noticing for the first time that, indeed, the voice could not be immediately attributed to either gender.
"Can you tell me what this is?" asked the voice for the third time.
"Yes," said Mark. "It's a circle."
Immediately a diameter of the circle appeared, and then the circle itself unraveled its circumference as a straight, horizontal line.
"Can you tell me how many times this," and the diameter glowed, for a moment, brighter, "is smaller than this?" said the voice, making the unraveled circumference glow after that.
It's talking about the number pi, realised Mark. He thought for a second, then answered:
"Three point... "
Again, he found himself straining his memory to remember something from his school days.
"...one four one five nine," was all he could remember. "It's an infinitely long number," he added.
"Then, in your words, you are using a decimal numeral system with fractions represented as divisions by powers of ten," the voice said. "I knew the numerals you use, but not their meaning. I shall henceforth convert all numbers to reflect your conventions."
"Who are you?" blurted Aram. "Show yourself!"
"I am an Automated Decision Maker. I am already manifesting myself."
"Where are we?" asked Mark.
"We are on an elliptical orbit around your planet of origin, travelling at zero point nine nine nine nine nine nine nine nine five eight times the speed of light, out of the star system plane, currently approaching it."
There was silence.
Doina raised her eyes at Mark.
"Is that far from home?" she asked.
"What's an orbit?" asked Aram.
Mark had a sudden vacant look on his face.
"Oh... shit," he answered. "So it wasn't the Yanks."
* * *
Aram moved in front of him, trying to catch his gaze.
"Hey," he said. "Mark."
No reaction. The taller Dacian seized the wiry Englishman by his shoulders and shook him gently.