After downing some rehydrated oatmeal, Adam looked over the probe’s manual once again. From what he could tell, he had installed the new spectroscope correctly yesterday, but it was still too early in the morning to make that call properly. If Dr. Weiss was complaining of some odd readings, both from atmosphere and from soil, it warranted investigation.
Adam hadn’t embarked the Strauss just yet – hell, he hadn’t even gotten a status update on the new sample. Time to pop the question, he thought. He grabbed the radio and opened, “Zulu-Alfa, this is Tango-1. Did you receive new soil analysis results from the probe? Over.”
He didn’t have to wait long for a reply. “This is Zulu-Alfa,” Commander Darcy’s voice came through. “Weiss told me that results were identical with what she had found before, so if there really is a problem, it could be your installation work.”
Rub it in, why don’t you?
“But if you can rule that out, if you can rule out a second faulty apparatus. . . you might be able to help rewrite science, and not even in your field either. Radio back once you’ve done this. Zulu-Alfa out.”
Not even going to give me a chance to respond? Adam wondered. I think I’m running out of his patience. Better not waste any more of his time. . . nor the agency’s, now that I think about it. He remembered how coldly the clerk treated him for his apparent tardiness – but right now, the Rhyslinger sun had not yet risen, so he had time to get his repairs looked into.
Okay, he thought, breakfast down, scrubber changed, water refilled, garments donned. . . time to go.
He quickly recalled the spectroscope’s functions, gearing himself up for whatever malfunctions could be present from his own handiwork, then went to the suitport to get outside the lander for God knows which time now. But then he noticed the locker’s light was lit red – meaning it had something ready for him. Strange, I don’t remember using this recently. When he opened the locker, he found something inside – something he had never seen before, never mind placed here.
He pulled it out – it was a piece of paper, folded, not rolled, nor sealed. Unfolding it, he saw it was a diagram of two coins – did Antir make this? Though there wasn’t any color to them, he was able to pick out their obverses with ease – and their relative sizes helped, as the gold coins were apparently larger than the silver. Below that, he noted that six of these small coins equaled one large coin – confirming what he had suspected earlier. But thankfully they hadn’t developed further fractions in their currency. Six silver is one gold. Easy to remember. I can do halves, thirds, and sixths, but not quarters.
And right at the bottom of the paper was a rough sketch of a pocket watch, which equaled one hundred thirty of the gold coins. One hundred thirty, convert. . . fifty-four. He wrote it down. So that’s my goal. And I earned three yesterday. . . oh boy.
He left the note on his desk for later. Okay, now let’s get started for real. He hoisted himself into his suit, stuck his arms into those of the suit, and hit the sterile button.
·–·–·
Okay, let’s see about that thingamajig. . . . Screwing the plate cover off was a pain, especially when he tried to get it back on afterward – but once it was off, accessing the instrument was a cinch. Carefully, he traced each cable with his gloved finger, meticulously checking, then double- and triple-checking that each color matched each connector, making sure each lead was correct, that every coil of wire was exactly where they should be.
They all matched perfectly. With a sigh, he started getting the covering plate back on, as it was necessary for its operation. The apparatus was self-contained, only requiring external power and input/output for data, but even it was vulnerable to light contamination.
“Zulu-Alfa, this is Somerset,” he radioed. “The spectroscope has been installed correctly and should be working properly. You can proceed with sample testing again. Please confirm, over.”
“This is Zulu-Alfa,” a female voice responded – Weiss, on station I see. “I am about to submit a sample and analysis order to the probe. Please stand back to avoid injury. Out!”
Her advice was well-founded, he learned – right as he thought he’d given the probe a wide enough berth, he stumbled backwards once again as a heavy tubular arm shot out and pierced the ground behind the probe. Then, much slower, the arm retracted, taking a clump of soil and unlucky biomass with it. The operation had begun, and Adam’s work on RPMR-1 was hopefully done for good.
He got back on his feet, brushed the dirt off his suit – unnecessary, but he wanted to make a good impression – and started down the road into town. Good luck, Dr. Weiss. I hope you find what you’re looking for.
He’d been in the town so often now that it seemed the denizens had now grown used to his presence. That, or word got around that his purpose was to count things – which, while that wasn’t one-hundred-percent true, did at least help acquaint himself with the various walks of Rhyslinger life. From what he could tell from about a week ago, their tongue had at least a few dialects – he couldn’t tell for sure, but he suspected that these were divided along the same lines as their tribes. Could their physiology produce dialectal differences? Adam could only wonder. Would it be due to them having different mouth or tongue shapes? Can normals and pegasi not produce voiceless nasals? Or do unicorns not fare much better, and stubbornly cling onto them out of pride?
He kept pondering these questions as he passed by the floral shop – which was on his normal route into town. He thought to slow down and wave, but he didn’t see any of them outside, so he decided to keep his pace. Not to mention how impatient his boss would be getting right about now – even though the sun was still barely coming up.
It was so early, in fact, he saw the postal equines just beginning their day’s work – he knew they were postal, since he suddenly collided with one on his way. He tried to help it up – a gray hoof grabbed his hand, and the equine hoisted itself onto its other three.
Its face had the most exaggerated wall-eyed expression he had ever seen. Was that from the collision? Adam started panicking – I’ve really bungled this one up, haven’t I? But then it smiled sheepishly, grabbed up its mail bag, and resumed its duties. Perhaps it’s more of a genetic condition than anything else, he surmised. And it seems this isn’t the first time it’s run into someone that hard – just the first time with me specifically.
He shrugged and kept on walking, hoping he wouldn’t literally run into any more trouble on the way.
··––
Louis poured over the latest batch of surface photographs. He sighed, with his head in his hands. Several thoughts swam through his mind, but two in particular took the spotlight. One: apparently the Indigenous had built settlements in the sky itself, using clouds as their primary material. Two: despite their best efforts to locate one such settlement, even with reliable intelligence from Dr. Somerset on the ground, they had yet to find one.
Not that it would affect the colony, no – they weren’t designed to be built in the sky, nor could they conceivably reverse-engineer the relevant technology in time for their arrival. Though their grandchildren might. . . .
But no, now they had to adjust the spacecraft’s cameras one more time, to test out yet another hypothesis as to its location and altitude. Or rather, he had; Dr. Konstantinov wasn’t trained in that area, nor was Dr. Weiss. But it was at least a simple matter of adjusting the cameras’ focus.
From what he remembered from looking at the Rhyslinger sky, they too had white clouds, just like back on Earth. Finding a floating city should be as simple, though he wasn’t sure if he could recognize the architecture, given that it would likely be less horizontal and more vertical. It was likely that they migrated as well, even if Somerset never mentioned such a phenomenon.
His eyesight was good – good enough that he could see the individual elements in the monitor. But by that same token, it meant he couldn’t see the ‘bigger picture’ – and that could have proven detrimental, were it not for Dr. Konstantinov interrupting him with a “Commander Darcy, sir.”
“Hoo!” He looked away from the monitor. “Oh. Did you need something, Anton?”
“I only wanted to tell you that I will leave the ship,” he replied. “Regular maintenance.”
“Yes, yes of course, you’re cleared.” He returned to his visual search. “Wait a second, come back here. I’ll need a second pair of eyes for this.”
“Ah?” Dr. Konstantinov pushed off the wall and joined his superior’s side. “What are you trying to find, sir?”
“Dr. Somerset told me the other day that the Indigenous have apparently been building in the sky,” he replied. “With clouds too, to boot!” He pointed at one photograph. “This is the settlement where Somerset’s been interacting with the Indigenous. He said he spotted one such cloud structure floating overhead the day he told us, which can help us narrow it down.” He sighed. “But not by much.” He turned to face the cryogenicist. “That’s where you come in. You were able to find the Indigenous civilization before – think you can find a flying city?”
“I can try. . . .”
“Be my guest.” Louis moved aside, giving Dr. Konstantinov room to do the favor.
He fell silent as he looked at the photograph. It was almost a full minute before he spoke up: “Našol!” He tapped the monitor with his finger, the nail making a noticeable tapping sound. “It is there.”
“Lessee. . . .” Louis gently nudged him away so he could get a better look. “Well, I’ll be damned. It really is a city!” He put a hand to his chin. “But what’s its purpose?”
“Dr. Somerset said that they have full control over the weather,” Dr. Konstantinov recalled. “So I think it is making weather.”
“Sound reasoning, you may have a point there – but,” he added, “if that’s the case, we might also need to negotiate weather over the colony like it’s a damned utility or something!” Shaking his head and chuckling to himself, Louis then took full control of the terminal. “Thank you for your help, Anton. I’ll leave you to your duties outside the ship.”
He nodded firmly. “Yes, sir!”
––
The clerk already had a job waiting for him on the chalkboard. Just the one? he wondered. Either that, or they’re testing me, making sure I can remember a job before moving on to two or more at once. So, what’s on the menu for me today?
The answer was a humanoid figure, the rod-and-sphere arrow, and a broom sweeping up some material. Soil? The icon below that was a comb crossed with a razor blade. Oh, hair! That’s a barber! Then he started thinking: That could actually be a good way of getting to know the Indigenous better. I don’t know if Antir’s pulling strings, or something else’s happening entirely, but that’s awfully convenient for my mission. The red magnet on the metal map was located on the east side of town.
The clerk then pointed to the door, sending him on his way to the first job. Adam bade it farewell, and stepped out. Incidentally, he wasn’t alone – another equine happened to be taking the same route as him, so they went side-by-side.
He would normally find small talk with an impromptu companion, but he found under the circumstances, even absent the language barrier, he hadn’t anything he could talk about. Well, this is awkward. He prayed that the trip wouldn’t actually take that long, or that they would at least part ways at an intersection.
But such fantasies were ripe with that one folly, and of course it had to open its mouth and let forth its own small talk. [ɹiˈɣě zõɡˈzɑ noɣugizɯ̃zl̩ˈzl̩ mozuˈʙu] it said – and Adam hadn’t the first idea how to respond.
The best he could do was a reflexive shrug. Don’t take this the wrong way, buddy, he hoped it would understand, but I don’t know enough about what you said to have an opinion.
But it chuckled in an apparent response instead. [eŋbiˈɹɯ . ʃõˈkɑl ɹeseˈxeɑlɟɑˈmu .. ᵑʘeˈsɤ ɡɑzɑlzũˈʙu . ɹikiˈsɯ̃ mɯl ilxɑsɑɹɟɑˈmu]
Right back at you, buddy. Right back at you. Adam gave up any attempt to communicate at the moment, having only noted some commonly-used words that he had heard – meul and mʘeseo. Are they pronouns? There was a good chance they were – at the very least, they were frequently-used particles in their speech.
But only time would tell ultimately, and for the moment Adam had some work to do at the barber – the site indicated on the map was only a few blocks and turns away from where they were at the moment, and he had to steel himself for a hard morning’s work. At the very least, the equine took a right where he took a left.
·––·–
“Oj, suka.” Anton had spotted a nice dent in the hull of Altair’s bridge module – large enough to hold a golf ball, but he knew whatever made this couldn’t have been any larger than a grain of sand.
“Did you say something, Anton?” Commander Darcy radioed to his Orlan. “Over.”
“Negative, Commander,” he replied. “I talk to myself simply. I am not yet done with my work outside, and will not come back inside for some time. Konstantinov out.” That last part made his heart twinge – if there was one thing he couldn’t stand, it was the sound of his own breathing inside the suit and nothing else to accompany it.
Sighing to himself with a shake of his head, Anton untethered himself from the bridge module and started climbing astern along the hull, towards the fuel tanks. A moment later, the boredom got to him, and he started to sing to himself – softly enough, in his mind, that the microphones would not pick him up: “Rascvetali jabloni i graši, poplyli tumany nad rekoj. . . .”
His singing did well to help him concentrate on each individual handhold along the hull – even improvising with similar micrometeroite impacts to get a better grip and to correct his sternward trajectory.
He reached Fuel Tank 1 within a few moments, and started inspecting it for any leaks. It was a miracle that none had been found in the three-and-a-half years of transit, even moreso with its decade-long orbital construction – so it was especially paramount that they kept such a track record going.
He paused his singing for a moment, waiting for Commander Darcy to chastise him for taking up the frequency with idle chatter. But no such call came. Either he really was quiet enough, he didn’t care at all, or he genuinely enjoyed his performance. Still cautiously quiet, he kept singing “Katjuša” – this was a song he used to hear on the radio back in Leningrad, which comforted him somewhat.
Almost like he was back home.
–·–·
A small bell jingled overhead as the door swung open – followed by more jingling as a titanium chassis brushed past it. Once Adam stood back up, he came torso-to-face with the town barber. Its mane and tail were well-styled, and it even had a mustache. None of the equines that he knew to be mares had facial hair, so this might be a stallion. He wore a white jacket over a mottled brown-and-white coat.
Adam held his hand up, knowing it was a gesture of friendly arrival. “Nǃapata,” he greeted, making sure to stress the final syllable.
The stallion smiled. “Nǃapata,” he returned. [ᵑʘeˈsɤ xoɑkˈʙ̥u]
The human found a broom leaning against the wall to his left, with a dustpan clipped to the handle – guess that’s what I’ll use. When he made the motion to grab them, he finally noticed how the joints in his gloves had started to loosen up – not enough to break biosegregation, but just enough to grant him more fluid movements. Come to think of it, I think all the rest of my joints have loosened up just as much.
As he turned back, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Seems I could use a trim myself, he thought – he was starting to get some stubble to his chin and jaw, and his head, shaved bald at Cape Canaveral for cryostasis, started to have its brown hair grow back in. Too bad I can’t get one here.
The shop was empty at the moment, which gave Adam the chance to sweep up any loose dust from the floor – and an excuse to get a lay of the place. First, he separated the dustpan from the broom, noting that its handle was perpendicular, something he wasn’t used to. If he had to guess, this was meant so one could grip the pan in the mouth to throw out the dirt. Sweep, sweep, sweep, that corner’s clean. As he swept, he collected the dust in the pan, though he found the perpendicular handle was too cumbersome for his hand.
Before he could throw the dirt out, he noted a doorway before him, one leading to the rear of the shop. Adam had to squint to see down the darkened hall, but clearly the barber also lived here. Adam thought it strange, but then again, maybe their culture permitted such arrangements – or even encouraged them, perhaps outright requiring them. Like how Antir lives in the town library, he realized.
He ultimately shrugged and carried on with his task, deciding to dispose of the dirt right outside the shop door. Back where it came from. But as he opened the door, he nearly bumped into an equine – a pegasus, with lavender fur and a light-goldenrod mane and tail, and laden with a small bag hanging off of its right side. Something about its muzzle shape suggested feminity – which for convenience Adam assumed. Her hindquarter mark was the Sun behind a cloud. Weather-work? Even as he saw such work unfold before him, he still couldn’t believe that they could manipulate weather at all, and with such elegance and precision to boot.
Silently, he let the dirt fall from the dustpan onto the ground outside, moving aside as far as he could to let the pegasus inside. “Nǃapata,” she greeted the barber.
“Nǃapata,” he returned. [ɹiˈɣě ilɑlˈmu]
[piˈse xoˈlo ʃiɦl̩ˈɦɑ . ᵑǁuɹuᵑǂˈɹu] She took a seat in the chair in front of the mirror.
The barber went to work, draping the pegasus in a robe. He didn’t moisten her mane, however – and as Adam took a closer look, apparently both her mane and her tail were already wet. She must’ve taken a dip in the river on her way here, he figured.
But he couldn’t stand idly, not without potentially creeping out the mare nor without looking lazy in general. He busied himself sweeping, just as he was told back at the agency.
He bent down to place the dustpan in the proper spot. As he swept up a large pile of dirt, behind him he heard the barber start clipping her mane. He turned around to see him work. Somehow he had a pair of scissors rigged to his front hoof, with a mechanism swinging the blades together simply by flexing the joint between the hoof and the rest of the leg.
The mechanism mesmerized him. He watched as the blades deftly went through the mane, trimming back the too-long strands and letting them fall onto the floor. Admittedly, he hadn’t swept under the chair yet – but hey, may as well get that and the dirt out in one go, right?
But as fast as he worked, he apparently only did half the job. Next, he moved down to the tail. With the same mix of speed and care as before, he started trimming off the overgrown hair there. Do they not trim their own tails? Do they need trimming at all? And then: What about their fur? Would that need trimming too, or something else?
The tail took even less time than the mane, perhaps owing to its style – less complicated than that of the mane, but nonetheless demanding some degree of coördination, as local fashion seemed to demand – and soon she presented her hooves to him. Out the scissors came, shearing her overgrown fetlocks and letting the clumps of fur gather on the floor. I guess that answers that. What about the hooves themselves? Does he file them down too?
Evidently not – and he assumed that was done at home, or at the farrier – since the pegasus then hopped out of the chair. She plunged her muzzle into her small side-bag, and from it produced two gold coins. Shave and a haircut – two bits. He smiled as he accepted the payment, and deposited them into his pocket while she went out the door.
Although he was unbidden, he knew his cue – Adam grabbed up the broom and dustpan and set to work sweeping up the refuse. He made sure to go gently, to make sure the clumps of hair that had stuck together did not come undone. He even swept up the chair itself, making sure it was somewhat sanitary for the next customer. Eventually he made a neat pile of hair and fur at the front of the chair.
But before he could sweep it into the dustpan, the barber indicated a foot pedal in the floor nearby. What does this do? Adam stepped on it, and a plank opened up, letting him deposit the clippings into a bin below the baseboard – meaning that other dustbin nearby was for other things. I wonder if they recycle these clippings.
He couldn’t help but notice that the other bin was nearly full. Even if the barber didn’t want him to take it out, Adam thought it would do both of them well if he did so anyway. He clipped the dustpan to the broom, leaned them against the wall, and, noticing the thick handle in the middle meant for an equine’s mouth, grabbed it and lifted the whole bin out of the container.
The barbershop kept its garbage in a metal bin in the back, presumably bringing it out to the street whenever it needed to be taken out. Adam lifted off the lid and tipped the smaller bin inside, transferring the contents from one bin to the next. The larger one was only halfway full after the job, he noticed – probably not due to be put out to the curb for another two or three days. But then, he wondered, just how much waste do they produce?
He brought the first bin back inside with him, and placed it back from where he grabbed it. The lid came down with a muted clatter. Adam grabbed the trusty broom and dustpan, awaiting the next customer and the clippings such a visit would invariably produce.
And not a moment too soon: the bell started jingling behind him, and as he turned, he saw a normal equine walk in, one who also carried a light sidebag like the pegasus. This one was brown-furred, with a bright yellow mane and tail, and a hindquarter-mark of. . . . Adam had to pause to reflect on it. A guitar? First a harp, then a guitar – what other instruments do they have? Try as he might, he couldn’t find another purpose for the object the mark represented.
“Nǃapata,” it greeted the barber. [ɡoˈɑ̃ ɹ̩s zenl̩neɹeŋˈmɯ]
[emˈem] the barber replied, indicating the chair. [ᵑʘeˈsɤ zenl̩jˈmẽ]
The customer nodded, and took a seat before the mirror.
Now Adam was in a predicament – the shop’s floor was clean, perfectly spotless save now for beneath the chair. He couldn’t find something to keep him busy for while he waited for the barber to do his job.
Fine. Guess I’ll be the creep. He simply stood himself against the wall, noting his life-support backpack tapping against it, while positioning the broom beside him.
After the barber placed the cape over the customer’s body and got to work trimming the mane, the customer pulled a book from the sidebag and started reading. Adam of course couldn’t read the title, author, or anything else on the cover, nor could he deduce the contents from any other clues there. Which was not to say it was undecorated, no – it definitely was, black lines on grids surrounding the obvious text.
Hold on. . . haven’t I seen something like that before? His memory went back to the farrier. Could’ve sworn it had something to do with that place. . . but what? Nothing about the place itself suggested an answer. And then it hit him: it wasn’t the farrier, it was the customer! That hindquarter-mark had a similar design to the cover artwork: a thick line crossing a grid.
Coupled with the guitar mark he saw on this equine, Adam could immediately draw two conclusions from these findings. One: that the farrier’s customer he saw yesterday worked in music. Whether that was composing it or performing it, he couldn’t say. Two: this was a book about music. This immediately led to a third conclusion: there was a good chance that he could see whatever music notation these equines used.
Admittedly, musical notation was not his strong suit, even though he knew different cultures had developed their own systems and these were frequently tied to their languages – he was barely able to read modern Western notation, and that was nearly universal in the modern world. This was out of line with his mission, as he had no job with music – but curiosity seized him by the collar of his cooling garment, and he couldn’t help but try to figure out what Rhyslinger music notation looked like.
But he had to be subtle. Even though he’d resigned himself to ‘being the creep,’ he still couldn’t do anything that would put the customer at unease – lest he be sent away early, without pay, and possibly drive the customer out of the shop with a half-done job.
Then Adam got an idea. He remembered his days at university – specifically, sharing his dorm room with a Japanese exchange student. Akira Suzuki had flown in from Sapporo, as a computer science student, while he was still refining his knowledge on linguistics – and while it wasn’t her field, she took an interest to that all the same. While he never quite remembered the specific words, he did get his fair share of knowledge on how the Japanese language worked – knowledge that he still retained today, and knowledge that he felt certain would help him in his current mission on Rhysling.
She also showed him how to play the piano – naturally, he was terrible at first, and improved only slightly. But she didn’t seem to mind him making mistakes time and time again – no matter how frustrated Adam got, Akira simply giggled. Whether that was meant to calm him down, or she was genuinely amused by his countless attempts, it worked to take the edge off. One of the first songs she showed him was a folk song from her nation – “Sakura.” It was about the spring’s first cherry blossoms dancing in the morning breeze – though of course she had to tell him that. Playing it on the piano was trivially easy for someone like her, who grew up practicing it, but for Adam was. . . an appropriate challenge. And an exercise in reading sheet music.
When Akira left Santa Barbara at the end of her two-semester stint, he missed her greatly – but he would treasure the times they spent together. While he hadn’t practiced his piano skills in a few years – and no, the cryostasis for the interstellar voyage didn’t count – he at least still remembered how “Sakura” went. And this was true, even now on Rhysling – so if indeed they could demonstrate musical ability, judging by what he had seen so far, why not show them he could do the same? Not to mention that he did notice some more specks of dust and dirt on the lower walls of the room, so why not be a little more conspicuous about it while he was at it?
He stepped away from the wall, broom and dustbin in hand, and started sweeping the wall. The dust easily gave way to a gentle force, falling onto the ground, but the dirt took a bit more effort to be persuaded to do the same. In either case, there they lied on the floor, where he proceeded to sweep up into a pile, leaving it alone once he was done there. And as he worked, he started whistling.
Whistling was simple. It required no physical instrument, save for the lips and tongue, both of which a person had at birth. Many people whistled idle melodies to pass the time by – admittedly, Adam was no exception, though he tried to keep it to a minimum, a habit carried over from his college dorm, which came in handy when he taught at MIT. Melodies varied by person, typically based on music they had already heard, even intermixing them as they grew bored of the same one. Adam, naturally, had “Sakura” in mind – and that became the melody he chose to whistle as he worked.
He started with a few notes, A4 A4 B4, these three twice in a row. A mundane way of starting a folk song – then he arched from A4 to C5, and back again, followed by a B4-A4 glide, finishing the measure with an F4. Next he wavered around E4, going down to C4 and up to F4, like a sine wave. Another glide, F4-C4, then B3. He repeated the last four measures, just as Akira had shown him, taking more care than he should have to repeat the notes exactly. Perhaps he felt that she was by his side, making sure he got those notes precisely right. After the next B3, he repeated the first two measures, A4 A4 B4, A4 A4 B4, then the finishing arch from E4 up to a B4-A4 glide and back again. “Sakura” was a simple folk song, one that typically took less than half a minute to whistle or sing in its entirety, and Adam was able to memorize it within a few weeks, even as his college professors burdened him.
He rounded the corner and started sweeping down that wall, letting the dirt and dust settle on the ground before. Naturally, he swept them up into the same pile as the first wall, taking care not to soil any more of the floor than he probably had. He turned around, mainly so he could sweep down the opposite wall, but really so he could gauge their reäctions.
To say they were surprised would be an understatement.
The barber simply stood there, staring at the alien, having just clipped some hair from the customer’s tail. The customer, too, could not take his eyes off of Adam, even leaving the book open on its current page.
Once Adam took note of how they saw him, he simply carried on with his cleaning, beating down the lower wall with the broom, dislodging the dust and dirt to sweep up into a pile. Once he finished with that, so did the barber with his job, letting the client hop up and pay another two gold coins for services rendered.
But the customer didn’t leave just yet. Instead, before Adam could get a chance to sweep up the clippings, it tapped him on the hip. The human turned around, to see it handing – or mouthing, rather – the music notation book.
Setting the broom against the wall, Adam took it from his jaws. This one was thin and light, more like a booklet than a proper book – does it teach music lessons? It would certainly be a useful application, and this booklet was printed cheaply enough for mass distribution – like, say, giving students their own practice music. I guess I’m its latest student, in a sense. He opened it up to the exact middle of the book, where he could see the metal staples that bound the booklet together. What he found surprised him.
It was remarkably similar to western notation, yet the differences between the two immediately made themselves obvious. Rhyslinger notation did not rely on lines, as the western tradition did, but on grids, just as he had suspected. On some of the leftmost grids, he found a glottal-stop-like symbol – on others, the same symbol upside-down – on others still, figure-eights. How interesting,he thought. But what do they represent?
Notes – at least, he thought they were notes – were marked not with the characteristic staffs of western notation, but with lines. If he had to guess, these lines determined not only the pitch, but the exact duration of each note. Rather than rely on several different symbols, the performer need only watch the lines go up and down as they progressed across the page. Many lines ran parallel with each other, and many more ran diagonally – are these ties? Beams? Something else?
Bars were punctuated with a bolded vertical gridline – at times, new bars started with the starting symbols – glottal-stops, right-side-up and upside-down, and figure-eights. Adam didn’t even try to guess at what those signified. But clearly all of these symbols were optimized for stomagraphy, which was his guess for how everything else was traditionally written on Rhysling.
Even if it bore no impact on his language-finding mission, he simply found it fascinating. Music notation systems varied far and wide back on Earth, though nowadays the modern western staff notation was the global de facto standard. Here was a similar system, developed independently from Earth. He had to have a sample.
Lemme test this one real quick. . . . He opened an empty pouch, partially rolled the booklet to fit inside, and started inserting it. Then he looked up, with an eyebrow arched up, to imply a question.
The equine nodded firmly.
Yes! Adam slipped it inside the pouch, and clicked it shut. But won’t I need to pay for it? He next opened the one containing the coins, and pulled out a silver one. Again he raised an eyebrow.
But the equine closed his eyes, raised a hoof, and shook his head.
So. . . he’s just giving it to me, Adam concluded. He’s either generous, or these are that cheap. Or both. Either way, he was gracious – so he slipped the coin back inside with a muted clink, then clicked that pouch shut.
But this equine wasn’t done with the human yet. He tilted his head, one eyebrow arched – before straightening it back out, puckering his lips, and started whistling. No, not just any melody – he was copying “Sakura.”
Now it was Adam’s turn to be surprised – a feeling that quickly evolved into regret. He wanted to observe the Indigenous culture and language in situ, without human interference. Yet here he was, listening to this stranger whistle a tune from his homeworld. Way to go Adam, way to go.
The apparent musician turned to leave, still whistling “Sakura” as it went along. Adam, meanwhile, still had work to do. He grabbed the broom from against the wall again and, detaching the dustpan, started sweeping up the piles of dirt from the three walls around the shop, and after emptying it into the dustbin, started sweeping up the musician’s clippings.
–·–––
Three more customers later, Adam was let go for the day. He was surprised to see that the barber was closing up shop only halfway through the day. Is there something I’m missing? Public holiday? Barber’s hours? Regardless, he received his pay – three silver coins, only half of what he had earned for inventory work. But then again, sweeping up hair was a much easier job that took hardly any skill.
He didn’t mind.
He slipped the coins into one of his pouches, and started making his way to the door. He held up his hand, to gesture goodbye, then ducked underneath the doorway, jingling the bell as he ducked beneath the frame.
Okay, now what? Right, you need to head back to the agency. Gotta check in for the next job, after all. He cleared his throat, feeling a bit of phlegm in his throat. Let’s go.
Adam started down the road. How do I get back there again? He knew it was the same way as when he got to the barbershop, just in reverse, but that wasn’t very helpful at the moment. He searched his memory thoroughly, trying to pick out any details that could aid him on his journey. Any streets? Landmarks? Nearby buildings? Nothing came to mind for a few minutes of walking, not until he turned left at the next street – a broad main street, one that fed the rest of this side of the town. And then it struck him: the magnet was hovering near this main street. So all he had to do was stay on the main street, in the current direction even, turn right at the central square, and sooner or later he’d come across the agency. Can’t be simpler!
Yet things were about to become difficult. The further along Adam strode, the closer he got to the central square, which before he even got there he could see that it was unusually crowded. Almost like. . . yep. It was another market, just as busy as the last time he was here. To make matters worse, the western main street terminated here – and the southern main street a good distance to his right, whose view was blocked by the large tower in the center.
Here we go again.
This time, he made sure to step slowly through the throngs of equines, making sure no misplaced step could harm them. Not to mention he had a few coins in his pouch, and he didn’t want to be pickpocketed or swindled.
Remember, Adam – don’t put your hand over your pouch. This was a lesson he learned in his childhood in Tacoma, thankfully the easy way: it was how a pickpocket could tell which pocket held a person’s wallet. He’d seen how the unicorns could use telekinesis – how they could easily lift his pouch away from him without him ever noticing. They were in the blindspot of his suit’s helmet; he had to feel them out whenever he needed them.
There was a great amount of talking, all blending together into an indiscernible mass of speech that he didn’t have a chance of understanding. Were they talking to him? Clearly they’d be talking about him, but to his knowledge none of it was directed at him.
Thankfully the trek through the marketplace didn’t take very long – before he knew it, he was walking along the main street, on his way to the agency.
This street he knew quite well, despite being here for only a few days. I guess being desperate does that to you. He kept his eyes on the left, looking for the next correct turn. Was it the third left, or the second? No, definitely the third.
He took the third turn, and found it was the right one. He ducked under the doorway to his destination, and stood back up. “Nǃapata,” he greeted, with a wave of his hand.
“Nǃapata,” the clerk returned, rather curtly going off of the tone in voice.
Whatever. Adam turned his attention to the chalkboard – only to find it was empty. No description of where to go, no hindquarter-mark for which to look, no magnet on the metal map, nothing.
Then he had a thought: maybe market days are half-days. Would make sense – get only half as much time, devoting the other half to buying and selling.
He shrugged and walked out, waving to the clerk as he ducked below the frame again. I guess that makes me free for the rest of the day. Good time as any to walk back to the lander and start with further studies on the Indigenous language and culture. It was high noon at the moment – not even a glimmer of gold to suggest the setting of the sun.
But that didn’t bother him one bit – he flipped open the chest monitor, and found that while his scrubber capacity had dropped to a mere fifty-eight percent, the water supply had nearly run out. Not to mention that he was about halfway through his nutrient stick. I guess a hard day’s work will do that to you, he thought. Better get home to refill and change.
But of course, that meant walking through the central square again – and by extension, the marketplace. Let’s hope I don’t run into any trouble there. Adam crossed his fingers in his head, hoping the Indigenous wouldn’t take the opportunity to mug him. Three meager silver coins, but they were his.
·––·–
Being weightless inside of a spacecraft was an interesting feeling, but the novelty quickly grew old. Even transitioning from gravity to the lack thereof, as part of one’s routine, eventually became stale, as the heart came to adjust quickly between the transitions. Perhaps it was the fact that one was practically guaranteed a stable pressure within a spacecraft.
So when one steps out for the maiden spacewalk, the safety and comfort of the interior disappears entirely. Some enjoy the thrill – others abhor the experience.
For Anton, it was something he refused to think about. It was a mission necessity at times, nothing more. At least Commander Darcy put on some music for him as he worked – it did wonders to take the edge off, to take his mind off of the dangers of nothing at all and to let him concentrate on his work.
And thankfully, there wasn’t much work for him to do. Other than noting a few impact craters along the thick hull of the spacecraft, nothing he saw outside was cause for alarm. But then, it wasn’t likely for the Indigenous to develop a space program of their own, nor did Einstein nor Zodiac-Altair spot any rings around Rhysling – so Rhyslinger orbit should be perfectly clean.
Leave it to mankind to litter it with their technology, however.
Anton unclipped himself from Gemini and started making his way back to the airlock. It was a long way away, and even with such a relatively clean and tidy orbit, there was still the risk of floating off and away from safety.
He shook his head – that wasn’t something he wanted to think about, especially now of all times. Meanwhile, he held onto Gemini, waiting for the bridge to rotate back into view. Once he spotted it, he pushed himself off that end of the module and made more or less a straight beeline towards his destination.
He sighed – with still some air to spare. Safety was in his reach once again. Just a little further. . . .
With barely any effort, he overshot the bridge – but thankfully, he planted his boots right on the heat shield of TPRU-4. Turning himself around, he saw the airlock. He leapfrogged a second time, putting up his hands in front of him, and braked himself against the outer door of the airlock.
It was still a vacuum inside of it, so he simply opened the door and let himself in. He closed the door, sealed it, and started filling the airlock back up. While this was happening, he parked himself by the rack of spacesuits, to make disembarking that much easier. “Zulu-Alfa, this is Konstantinov,” he radioed. “I have returned from my duties outside. Acknowledge, over.”
“This is Zulu-Alfa,” Commander Darcy responded. “Welcome back, Anton – we were starting to miss you. Did everything come out alright? Over.”
“Affirmative,” Anton answered. “The spacecraft has the expected wear and tear, but otherwise is perfectly functional. Over.”
Darcy laughed over the radio. “That’s beautiful, music to my ears!”