argent_bury (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} argent_bury) wrote,@ 2008-01-03 14:45:00 |
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| Current music: | Tarentel - For Carl Sagan |
| Entry tags: | hiking |
Sansara Pilgrimage - Day 6 - Part 1 - New Faces
(Continued from here)
I'm breaking up the days into shorter installments now, although I should probably be editing down the content. It's just that we see so much each day. We must breeze past ten times as much stuff as we stop to see. Anyway, sorry to have kept you waiting and here is the first part of Day 6.
My name is Argent Bury. I was born on the Moon, fought a war on Earth, and live in a Digital world. I thought I had seen everything, until Day 6 of the hike came around...
I was on top of Dragon Mountain after a grueling climb, standing face to face with my friend Natsumi. Only it wasn't the Natsumi I knew. My erstwhile traveling companion had been replaced with a...well...a furry?
"What's the matter, Argent? Why are you looking at me like that?" Natsumi, or at least someone with Natsumi's voice, cocked her head to the side, twitched her ears, and mewed.
She seemed harmless enough, so I didn't bother reaching for my gun. Besides, if she really was Natsumi I had even odds of being orbited before I even drew on her.
"You...you've changed."
Natsumi laughed, "Don't be silly. I've been wearing this all day." She twirled, showing off her skirt.
"B..but the ears...and the fur."
"You've never commented on them before. Do you think they're cute?" Natsumi smiled and winked, just like she always did. Maybe it was her...but I was still hedging my bets.
"Nats, when we first met, what was I wearing?"
Natsumi giggled. "Silly question, but how could I forget. It was at one of Soph's dance parties. You were dressed like Wonder Woman. Why are you asking me stuff like this?"
"Well, you're...well you're a cat, or rabbit, or something..."
Natsumi twitched her ears in a mildly perturbed manner. "I am a cabbit, thank you very much, and have been from the day I was born."
"You don't remember being human?"
Natsumi patted me on the shoulder in an attempt to comfort me, like you would comfort your grandma when she shows up wearing a tinfoil hat to deflect the mind control rays from the government satellites.
"Come on Argent, we have a long ways to go. Natoma is still a good 3 or 4 days away" she said gently, and turned to head down the far slope of the mountain.
I stood there for a while, mouth dropped open, trying to parse it all. Then I finally did what I've been doing a lot lately, shelved the doubt and the questions and kept on walking.
We scrambled down a deep gully between the battlements of the mountain but came up short when we saw the glimmer of water.
"OK, I give up. What is it? Swimming pool of the gods?"
Natsumi leaned closer studying the designs around the rim of the ring, twitching her ears in a thougtful manner
"Not sure...a massively networked wormhole gateway connected to multiple spacial addresses maybe? Seems to be locked in a holding position. I think the symbols are the key." Natsumi leaned in for a closer look.
Next thing I knew her feet scrabbled on the steep slope and she fell face first into the thing, sinking slowly into the pseudo-water filling the mouth of the ring. She stopped, somehow stuck, with her head poking out.
"Natsumi! Get out of there now!" I ran around to the side, grabbing her by the ears and pulling.
"OWWWW! Easy!" Natsumi shouted indignantly as the portal gave her up with a wierd sucking sound. Ignoring her protests I pulled her the rest of the way out and onto safe land.
"You could have been killed...what if the power to this thing cut out with just your head sticking out? Or...or if you went all the way through and couldn't get back? I...can't do this alone. That, and London would kill me if something happened to you."
"You could have just followed me through, you know," Natsumi said, rubbing her ears indignantly. "Who knows, we could have ended up in another galaxy or something! It'd be great"
"Yeah, assuming we could get back and tell anyone about it. And if anything went wrong I doubt we could squirt a message packet back to Extropia from the other side of that...whatever it is," I said, eying the artifact suspiciously. I'm strictly a hard sci-fi girl, superscience give me the willies.
In the end we agreed to tag the location on our map, and assemble an expeditionary force out of Extropian volunteers to send through when we had more time to conduct a thorough survey. Cautious as I was, I confess I found myself looking back at the thing as we left, wondering what lay on the other side.
But we were out of the mountains and the road was before us now...stretching off through the heart of the mainland. Further on lay Isabel SIM and the Shelter, which by all accounts was a welcome place for new entries to this world, and one of the more famous sites in SL. And still further, although only a few days off now, was Natoma and the statue of the Man. We were close now, the strangeness had grown stronger. It had already changed Natsumi, and I could only wonder what it might do to me, and what more we would see on the way...
She seemed harmless enough, so I didn't bother reaching for my gun. Besides, if she really was Natsumi I had even odds of being orbited before I even drew on her.
"You...you've changed."
Natsumi laughed, "Don't be silly. I've been wearing this all day." She twirled, showing off her skirt.
"B..but the ears...and the fur."
"You've never commented on them before. Do you think they're cute?" Natsumi smiled and winked, just like she always did. Maybe it was her...but I was still hedging my bets.
"Nats, when we first met, what was I wearing?"
Natsumi giggled. "Silly question, but how could I forget. It was at one of Soph's dance parties. You were dressed like Wonder Woman. Why are you asking me stuff like this?"
"Well, you're...well you're a cat, or rabbit, or something..."
Natsumi twitched her ears in a mildly perturbed manner. "I am a cabbit, thank you very much, and have been from the day I was born."
"You don't remember being human?"
Natsumi patted me on the shoulder in an attempt to comfort me, like you would comfort your grandma when she shows up wearing a tinfoil hat to deflect the mind control rays from the government satellites.
"Come on Argent, we have a long ways to go. Natoma is still a good 3 or 4 days away" she said gently, and turned to head down the far slope of the mountain.
I stood there for a while, mouth dropped open, trying to parse it all. Then I finally did what I've been doing a lot lately, shelved the doubt and the questions and kept on walking.
We scrambled down a deep gully between the battlements of the mountain but came up short when we saw the glimmer of water.
"OK, I give up. What is it? Swimming pool of the gods?"
Natsumi leaned closer studying the designs around the rim of the ring, twitching her ears in a thougtful manner
"Not sure...a massively networked wormhole gateway connected to multiple spacial addresses maybe? Seems to be locked in a holding position. I think the symbols are the key." Natsumi leaned in for a closer look.
Next thing I knew her feet scrabbled on the steep slope and she fell face first into the thing, sinking slowly into the pseudo-water filling the mouth of the ring. She stopped, somehow stuck, with her head poking out.
"Natsumi! Get out of there now!" I ran around to the side, grabbing her by the ears and pulling.
"OWWWW! Easy!" Natsumi shouted indignantly as the portal gave her up with a wierd sucking sound. Ignoring her protests I pulled her the rest of the way out and onto safe land.
"You could have been killed...what if the power to this thing cut out with just your head sticking out? Or...or if you went all the way through and couldn't get back? I...can't do this alone. That, and London would kill me if something happened to you."
"You could have just followed me through, you know," Natsumi said, rubbing her ears indignantly. "Who knows, we could have ended up in another galaxy or something! It'd be great"
"Yeah, assuming we could get back and tell anyone about it. And if anything went wrong I doubt we could squirt a message packet back to Extropia from the other side of that...whatever it is," I said, eying the artifact suspiciously. I'm strictly a hard sci-fi girl, superscience give me the willies.
In the end we agreed to tag the location on our map, and assemble an expeditionary force out of Extropian volunteers to send through when we had more time to conduct a thorough survey. Cautious as I was, I confess I found myself looking back at the thing as we left, wondering what lay on the other side.
But we were out of the mountains and the road was before us now...stretching off through the heart of the mainland. Further on lay Isabel SIM and the Shelter, which by all accounts was a welcome place for new entries to this world, and one of the more famous sites in SL. And still further, although only a few days off now, was Natoma and the statue of the Man. We were close now, the strangeness had grown stronger. It had already changed Natsumi, and I could only wonder what it might do to me, and what more we would see on the way...
