I waved at the two murrai. “Hello!”
In perfect synchronicity, they each raised a stone arm and waved slowly in reply.
Chapter 26
Murrai are empathically empowered. No one uses empathic energy in Pathia anymore, I reminded myself. Except for the occasional litter service. Where do they get their empathic energy? If the murrai don’t need refuelling, then their owners would be cleaning up in the business sense.
“Uhh… If you can understand me, touch your nose,” I instructed. Neither murrai did anything other than continuing to plod and stare up at me. “Voice command isn’t it, then,” I murmured. With an exaggerated gesture, I touched my nose with a fingertip. Going cross-eyed trying to see past my elbow, I saw the murrai repeat the gesture.
“Physical gestures. Well of course, you are machines. You know, it would be so much easier if there was a control panel or a keyboard, or something that could be used to transmit instructions to you!” I had started waving my arms in frustration. It was embarrassing seeing the two murrai mimic the gesture.
“Fine.” I marched back through the ship. The deck gave me the sense it had been constructed by throwing a pile of scrap wood and leather into a heap and then hammering it all together.
Coils of braided leather rope lay piled in various places. None of them seemed essential, so I took one and waited to see if Goat would voice any concern from his position behind the wheel.
The murrai were still keeping pace with the ship. I explained what I was doing as I prepared the rope. I tied a loop at each end. Then, I tossed each end at the feet of the stone men. They kept walking. The rope dragged through the sand ahead of them. The mid-point of the rope I kept for my demonstration. Lifting it up, I looped it around myself. The murrai followed suit. Now I had two murrai on the end of a rope.
Line of sight seemed to be important, so I climbed around the outside of the rigging—hardly a challenge, as the airship had more places to put your hands than a glove shop.
The murrai dutifully followed, like two massive dogs on a leash. Goat glanced sideways at me as I worked my way past. I waved at him with a free hand and saw the two stone men wave in response. Goat took a second, more careful look. His grip on reality seemed tenuous at the best of times. I hoped he would assume I was just another hallucination and dismiss my odd behaviour out of hand.
I reached the pointy end of the ship. This end had a name, like the back end. Not the same name, of course, and given how this craft had never seen water, the semantics of sea terminology seemed uncalled-for.
“Whagh!” I yelled, and almost fell off the railing. The woman with the enviable black hair was sitting at the end of the ship. Not seeing her for a while had let me think she might have been a hallucination that Goat would laugh cynically about.
I flailed, arms waving in a desperate attempt to regain my balance. She stretched like a cat and casually extended one perfectly pale hand, catching me as I tipped over the edge. Her grip was cold, and it brought me onto the right side of the rail without apparent effort.
“Thanks,” I gasped. Sweeping my own hair out of my face, I blinked. She had vanished again. Unwrapping myself from the cord, I looped it around a protruding bit of wood. The two murrai had caught up with me and were now walking slightly ahead of the ship. I pulled the slack in and tied it off.
The ship twitched and followed the two murrai. Where they were going was up to them. Maybe they were wandering as aimlessly as the rest of us.
“Okay,” I announced. “I know you can’t understand me, but I have a talent when it comes to empathically empowered devices. Which I think includes you. If it doesn’t, I’m sorry for the inconvenience. And now I’m babbling.” I stopped, took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The murrai were still striding along. We crested the ridge of a dune and started down the other side.
The murrai made better time than the desert breeze. I watched them walk and tried not to feel guilty.
“Goat!” I called from the pointy end of the ship. “Where are we heading, do you think?”
“Have you tried turning it off and turning it on again?” Goat hollered back.
There is a suggestion that some people who don’t fit in are in fact geniuses operating on some entire other level. It is not clear if they are geniuses on that plane of perception as well.
If this idea had merit, then Goat might be trying to tell me something. If only I had the smarts to work it out.
“Drakeforth, do you know where we are going?”
“We are going to sit in the moonlight and drink this hot cuppa,” Drakeforth replied. “Less ceremony, more spice,” he added, and handed me a steaming mug.
Chapter 27
By the time we had gone two rounds of tea, night had become dawn, and was getting itself ready for the day. Eade had returned to the hammock and was pointedly ignoring us.
Goat approached, started to say something and then frowned, turning and listening to some hidden conversation. I waited with polite interest, mostly feigned, for him to get back to us.
In the middle of his fugue, Goat wandered off muttering, “Left, right, left, left, right. Wait, was that right, left, left, right? Who’s right? My left? Where did you go?”
“We should get him some help,” I said.
“With what?” Drakeforth asked.
“Working that out should be the first thing we get him some help with,” I agreed, and put my empty cup down with a pang of disappointment.
“The murrai are taking us to Semita,” Eade announced, driving home how seriously she was ignoring us.
“How can you tell?” I asked.
“The angle of the sun—”
I felt an irritated moment of being impressed. Navigating by the sun was the kind of amazing skill Eade would have.
“—shines through the holes in this bug-bucket of a vessel, and illuminates the screen on my mobile phone. Which is equipped with a navigation app,” Eade continued.
“Annoying, isn’t she?” Drakeforth’s grin showed all his teeth.
“No, she’s fine. Really.”
“Good idea, getting the murrai on a leash,” Drakeforth said.
“Thanks.”
“It’s that kind of lateral thinking that indicates a clear sense of direction.”
“It just came to me; one of those ideas that might be just crazy enough to work.”
“And yet, not crazy enough to make your friends and family concerned for your mental health.”
“Speaking of concerns for my mental health, I saw her again.”
Drakeforth nodded, still smiling and giving no indication he had heard a word I said.
“It seems like the sort of thing I should mention, to a friend. Casually, I mean. Something like, ‘I appear to be having the oddest hallucinations’.”
“Quite right,” Drakeforth replied, and patted me on the shoulder before pushing past and heading to the front of the ship.
“Great. Thanks!” I called after him. “That was really not helpful at all…” I added quietly. The woman with black hair nodded with an expression of genuine sympathy.
Chapter 28
The outskirts of Semita appeared to float above the drifting dunes. My guidebook patiently explained that this was because the outer buildings rested atop stone pillars. The sand flowed around them, like the tide around the pilings of a pier.
The murrai turned Goat’s sausage ship and skirted the city. People stopped and stared at us as we drifted past.
“Where are they going?” I asked. “We want to go there!” I waved at the city. A few gaping locals gingerly returned my wave.
“Don’t tell me, tell them,” Drakeforth replied.
“Hey! Murrai! Turn that way!” I made semaphore waving gestures and strode across the deck in the right direction. The two stone men ignored me and k
ept marching. Traffic came to a standstill as we sailed over a four-lane highway. Motorists seemed unfussed by two murrai crossing in front of them. Like giant whelks migrating, it was safer to give way to the unstoppable force.
The famous pyramids of Pathia shimmered in the desert sun and the murrai bore down on them at a steady pace.
“Why are we going there?!” I yelled at the stone men. They ignored me, which I expected. I wasn’t yelling at them because I wanted a response. It was more a general outburst of frustration at the Universe.
Drakeforth appeared, sipping tea and watching our progress with the curious introspection of the casual observer.
“I should have put reins on them. Some kind of harness for steering the dashpot things!” My frustration was still on the rolling boil.
“You appear to have stumbled on another reason murrai are no longer used extensively as a labour force for anything,” Drakeforth commented.
“I feel like I tripped and fell flat on my face. How can they be so, well, useless?”
“They are articulated stone machines. They almost look like people. So we start to relate to them like people.”
“Oh, they remind me of people all right. Only people could be so perfectly annoying.”
“There was a time when violent crime against murrai was so common they became endangered. Many of them were destroyed by people who found interacting with the machines to be incredibly frustrating.”
“I can see why. I’ve had computer users with more sense than these things.”
“Of course you have. A toddler has more brainpower than every murrai ever created. Just because a thing looks like it should be intelligent, doesn’t mean it is.”
My anger faded. Frustration was exhausting and in this heat, it could kill me. I took Drakeforth’s mug and finished his tea. “I feel sorry for them. They’re just hammers on legs. You don’t expect a hammer to follow instructions. Even if they are empathically powered.”
“The idea of empowering hand tools with double-e flux was considered. There was an experiment in the early days which concluded the lack of productivity from such tools after being infused with empathic energy was only because they were inherently lazy.”
“Someone actually did that?” I regarded Drakeforth with suspicion.
“Yes and as a result the development of power tools took on a new urgency.”
“Did the ancient Pathian’s have power tools?”
“Of course not. They had murrai.”
We watched the trudging figures in silence until they reached the shadow of the pyramids of Pathia. Luckily, it was still mid-morning. If we had arrived at noon, they might have never found it.
Chapter 29
We floated next to one of the pyramids of Pathia while Eade and I sat in the shade of a thousand goat-intestine balloons and she offered unsolicited opinions.
“It seems obvious,” Eade explained in a tone that made it clear that while it was obvious to her, she had no doubt the rest of us were completely clueless. Which made my brain clench, because she was right.
“You seem quite confident about that,” I said.
“Completely confident,” Eade replied.
“So explain it to me, then. Right now.”
Eade actually looked up from her phone. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.” The Pylian Juncture I got in to that phrase would have elicited an audible gasp from Bowmont the appliance salesman.
Eade sat up and put her phone away. “Well, it’s the connection of things. The sum-total of the Universe. It means we’re all just fumbling around in the dark. Nothing matters. This conversation. Your romantic obsession with Vole. Our mad escapade through the Pathian desert. Nothing has any purpose.”
“Wait… My romantic obsession with Drakeforth?” A thought dawned with the full spectrum of sunlight and harmonised chorus of birdsong never seen outside of a sensie soundtrack. “You’re jealous?” I blinked and said it again. “You are jealous. You are burning up because you think that Drakeforth and I are romantically involved?”
“That’s ridiculous,” Eade sneered, without conviction.
“Egg yeah it’s ridiculous.”
“Totally,” Eade gave a firm nod. “Doesn’t mean you’re not romantically entwined, though.”
“We are not romantically involved!”
“How would you know?” Eade asked.
“What kind of question is that?”
“The kind that I’m asking because you can’t answer it.”
“You do know I have a degree in dialectics, right?”
Eade nodded.
“Therefore answering difficult questions is what I do.”
“Is that your final answer?” Eade elevated one eyebrow.
“What? No. I already said Drakeforth and I are not romantically inclined.”
Eade leaned forward, her elbows hugging her knees, “Why not?”
“It’s obvious. Isn’t it? I mean, of course it’s obvious. Isn’t it?”
“You tell me.” Eade seemed to be enjoying herself immensely.
“I am telling you. Repeatedly. There is literally nothing going on.”
“Okay,” Eade straightened.
“Okay,” I agreed. We sat in silence for a minute. “There’s just one thing.”
“Oh?” Eade’s other eyebrow climbed up her forehead.
“You don’t believe me.”
Her face exhaled and relaxed. “Of course I don’t believe you.”
“Well, as long as we are clear on that.”
“Now, what was it you wanted to ask me?” Eade asked.
“Why did the murrai bring us here?” I repeated the question that she clearly hoped I had forgotten.
“It seems obvious,” Eade started again. We were interrupted by the sound of Drakeforth’s hand slapping on the rail of Goat’s airship. The retired god of Arthurianism came into view as he pulled himself back on board.
“We found the entrance,” he said once he stood on the deck.
“Great,” Eade said, and rose to her feet.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because it was there,” Drakeforth replied. “Come on, I’ll show you.”
Chapter 30
According to the guidebook, the pyramids of Pathia had no known purpose. Theories about their origin and purpose were common. Various researchers claimed they were built as temples, or tombs, or navigational guides, or as transmission beacons for some kind of interstellar radio system. What the guidebook did know is that the murrai were the primary workforce for the quarrying, transportation, and eventual placement of the thousands of blocks of stone that made up the massive structures.
At one hundred and fifty metres high, and two hundred and thirty metres along each of their four sides, the three largest pyramids were visible for miles. There were five pyramids left in the country. The rest had been demolished over the centuries to make buildings that are more practical.
We climbed down a ladder of knotted leather rope and stepped onto the sand. Drakeforth marched off immediately towards the pyramid.
I hesitated, as Goat was getting a ticket from a woman in uniform. Probably for parking his airship in a no-parking zone.
I watched as the officer moved upwind of Goat and tore a sheet off her citation pad. The information on the paper was probably worth more than the fine.
She handed it to him. Goat looked startled, accepted the offering and hugged the woman. She immediately dropped him to his knees with a swift kick and laid him out with a follow-up strike to his shoulder.
“Oh, no. We should help,” I said, and hurried forward.
“Why? She’s doing just fine without us,” Eade called after me.
“Excuse me, officer? I’m sorry for my friend. He’s not used to human contact
.”
Goat writhed at my feet while the woman in uniform eyed me suspiciously.
“Is this your vehicle?” She gestured at the airship floating like a conversation starter over our heads.
“This old thing? No. I’m just a passenger.”
“You should know that assaulting an officer of the lore is a punishable offence.”
“I can see that,” I nodded, and helped Goat to his feet.
“You can pay this fine at any Lore Office in Pathia. You have twenty-one days to pay, or further action will be taken.”
“Right, good. Uhm… You spelt pedestrian wrong.”
“What?” the officer frowned at me.
“P-E-D-E-S-T-R-A-I-N,” I spelled out.
“Pedes-train?” the officer looked at her copy of the ticket and screwed up her nose as if it smelled awful.
“Yes, from the Ancient Gherkin. Pedes, meaning to clump together, and train, meaning to annoy the caviar out of everyone else trying to use the sidewalk.”
“Madam? Attempting to subvert, or otherwise disrupt the actions of an officer of the lore, in the conduction of their sworn duties, is a punishable offence.”
I was in the swing of it now, so I kept going. “Officer, a spelling error in their notes would be acceptable for most people. But for someone who clearly takes as much pride in all aspects of their work as you do, such a black mark is unforgivable.”
“You can accept the ticket and walk away now, or I will arrest you.”
“Great idea. Okay, then.” I had been smiling so widely for so long my mouth had gone dry. I backed away, dragging the whimpering Goat with me.
“All sorted?” Eade asked as she dropped to the sand beside us.
“Uh…yes,” was the easiest thing to say.
“Vole is having some kind of seizure,” Eade commented.
I shaded my eyes and peered into the desert glare. “Or he’s waving at us and indicating we should join him on the pyramid.”
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