Strength (15 page)

“What?” Aerigo said without looking at her.

“That... thing. That kulinga or whatever it was that flew by just now.”

“They call it a kulinga.”

Roxie saw more kulinga along the way, along with other hovering vehicles bearing resemblance to buses and cars. The car-sized vehicles looked like nautilus shells, but were more elliptical and had headlights and windows. The buses were similarly shaped to whales and sharks without any tails or fins. Both types looked fit to travel through air or underwater.

Despite the technology, traveling by foot held sway in this city. Women fashioned clingy dresses, with an outer gauzy layer that flowed like water. Both genders’ clothes gave the impression of materialized water, as if declaring themselves people of the sea. Men wore pants that reminded Roxie of Oriental pants that were tied or wrapped at the ankles, and few wore shirts. Some women also wore those baggy pants accompanied by a formfitting shirt that revealed their midsections. They wore scarves of the same gauzy material that covered their neck and shoulders, with the excess flowing behind in the refreshing breeze.

Roxie realized that they were attracting curious stares, and no wonder. Neither had a good tan going, unlike all the locals, but most conspicuous were their clothes. To Roxie’s relief, the natives all seemed to shrug off their differences and go on with their lives. It was too beautiful a day to waste gawking at strangers. Roxie felt grateful for their indifference, not wanting to struggle to fit in on yet another world. Despite her clothing and lack of tan, the locals looked just as human as her. Did all humans look so similar from world to world?

Aerigo led Roxie under an archway of a shorter building and glass double-doors slid open as they approached and they went in. It was a clothing store that felt delectably cool, but there seemed to be no one else present. Aerigo followed a marble pathway to a desk at the center of the store and rang the bell sitting on the counter. One crisp note filled the air and feet scrambled around overhead. A flight of spiral stairs stood behind the counter and a short, heavy man rushed down them and jogged up to the desk. He wore the same pants tied at the ankles and no shirt. His chest and rotund belly were a little on the hairy side and he was almost as bald as Aerigo, though not intentionally. The man looked at Roxie and Aerigo and opened his mouth as if he were about to say something. He did a quick double take at Aerigo and his eyes widened.

“Aerigo?” he said in a gruff voice, “Is that really you?”

Aerigo smiled.

“Gods, I can’t believe it! It’s been decades since the last time I saw you.” The short man slipped around the counter and shook hands with Aerigo, beaming. “What’ve you been up to all this time? You don’t look like you’ve aged a day.”

“You have,” Aerigo said teasingly.

“Hey, no fair! You know I’m only human.” He moved closer to Roxie. “And who’s this beautiful lady?” The man took her hand and kissed it.

“I’m Rox,” she said, charmed. “What’s yours?”

“Rooke, and my store is honored by your presence,” he said with a bow. He turned back to Aerigo and put his fists on his hips. “So, what do you need?”

“Versaton. For Rox. Do you still sell it?” Aerigo waded among the racks of garments toward the back of the store. The store was laid out like a typical clothing store with decked out mannequins, and tables of folded clothes prostrated at their toeless feet. The racks were hung with summery clothes of various styles of what Roxie had seen so far in Phailon.

He hurried after Aerigo with Roxie in tow. “You mean she’s an Aigis?”

Aerigo nodded.

Rooke’s mouth fell ajar and he reached for open air, then looked at Roxie, his eyes watery. He draped an arm over a rack and leaned against it. “I can’t believe it,” he said softly. “I never thought in my entire life I’d meet the legendary Aerigo, but also a second Aigis in my very own store…”

“Legendary?” Roxie said.

“Aerigo helped the humans win Phailon from the Elves a long time ago. Now there’s a story for a rainy day! But let’s find you a nice Versaton outfit first. Please, follow me.” Rooke led them to the back and stopped at some plain clothes displayed on the wall, the clothes looking like they were made out of athletic dry-cloth. “I’m afraid there’s only a small selection. Versaton is expensive, low-demand material. Not much of it is manufactured anywhere.” He smiled ruefully. “Sorry for asking but you don’t mind pants, do you?”

“Not at all,” she said, eying the row of hanging pants.

“Wonderful! Now let’s see…” He began filing through a rack. “The factories don’t make shorts or skirts, but at least the female style is more complimentary to her figure. What’s your favorite color?”

“Blue.”

“Try these on,” Rooke said, handing Roxie a pair of navy-blue pants. He led her to the fitting rooms and Aerigo sat in one of the chairs nearby. A minute later Roxie emerged and scrutinized her appearance. She liked them a lot, and the pants were downright comfortable. The strange thing had been that when she put them on, the material molded perfectly to her body, tightening and loosening in all the right places. Roxie wished all her clothes were made out of Versaton.

“Rooke?” A female voice called from near the spiral stairs.

“Down here, love!”

A beautiful woman padded down the steps. She was a bit taller than her husband, had a solid feminine build and a heavy tan. She wore a flowing outfit, like other women of the city, lots of bangles, big hoop earrings, and her voice was as rich as her stylish appearance. “It
is
Aerigo! I thought I recognized your handsome voice.”

“And you’re looking beautiful, as always,” Aerigo said.

Rooke plucked two metal bands next to the pants from the wall, and handed them to Roxie. “Here. These clamp on around your legs the way Aerigo wears his.”

“What are they?”

“The brains of the material. Computers with one task.”

Roxie glanced at Aerigo to help herself line them up properly and looked at the inside of the bands. “Which way is up?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Aerigo said.

She wrapped it around the middle of her thigh, the thinnest part on the inside, and snapped the ends together. It felt like the metal had velcroed itself to her leg. Roxie stamped her heel on the ground and the band didn’t shift in the slightest. She put on the second band, although it corrected itself to line up with its mate.

“Who’s the pretty young lady?” Gem asked, moving closer.

Roxie introduced herself and Rooke described her as an Aigis.

“Well, aren’t you two a cute couple?”

Roxie almost broke the chair as she set her foot back on the ground. “He’s not my boyfriend!”

“Close enough.” Gem smiled, her green eyes wandering in Aerigo’s direction.

Rooke added a white tank top, some undergarments and socks to Roxie’s outfit. Roxie voiced concern about white being a stain magnet color for her, so Rooke grabbed a black tank top, along with a light blue one. He also gave her a pair of boots that looked just like Aerigo’s, only newer, and they too had matching bands wrapped around the arch of each boot. She changed into her new apparel, packed the extras, and left her older clothes behind. She didn’t want to give away these possessions, but Aerigo pointed out that she didn’t need them, nor had the spare room in her pack. Once she was done they joined Gem upstairs and sat down to a delicious breakfast. There was scrambled gull eggs, toast, and walrus bacon and sausage. Gem was a great cook, but Roxie personally believed that her grandmother was still the best.

***

After bidding each other farewell, Aerigo took it upon himself to give Roxie some more jogging conditioning. She gave him only one complaint.

“You need to get in better shape. Now get moving.” Aerigo tightened the strap to his pack and led them toward the Twin Falls District.

Roxie understood that she had an immense amount of room to improve her fitness. Their jog to Phailon had made that obvious, and their current trek under the midday sun wasn’t any gentler. It felt like it had gone from sixty five to eighty while they’d bought her new attire and some breakfast. Roxie started sucking wind several blocks into their jog. Aerigo, on the other hand, kept up his moderate pace with ease, breathing steadily and building up a minor sweat in the small of his back.
At least I’ll sleep well tonight.
Roxie envied Aerigo’s stamina.

The path to the Twin Falls District was straightforward. They’d turned once to head east for a handful of blocks, and then a second time to go south, which brought them to their destination about a million blocks later. Roxie wiped the sweat off her forehead.

They left the towering, mangrove-like buildings behind for more squat, whitewashed stone homes, which ended at a fifty-foot wall, and they passed under it through an arched tunnel. Many footsteps, bare and shoed, echoed off the shaded stone, and the cool air that zipped through the tunnel helped revitalize Roxie.

Ample sunlight and a lovely ocean breeze greeted them on the other side. Once Roxie’s eyes readjusted, she saw a huge, open-field park. Tall, slender fruit trees were scattered all over the short grass, and lined the few sidewalks here and there, as if the sidewalk had been laid out to compliment the natural growth of the foliage. Picnic blankets and stone tables lay sprawled at the base of almost every non-sidewalk tree, and the sidewalks were lined with endless rows of tables laden with home-packed food, drinks, clothes, jewelry, fishing gear, plants, blankets, shoes, ornamental weapons and trinkets, and many things Roxie couldn’t identify. Locals in their flowing clothes crowded every table, and many others were spread out on the grass, throwing balls and Frisbees wherever buskers weren’t doing gymnastics, theatrics, playing music, and whatnot.

Aerigo scanned the tables and resumed heading straight. Roxie followed in his wake, taking everything in. She forgot about feeling tired. She wanted to stop to watch and listen to the performers, but she sensed Aerigo’s eagerness to just do their business and move on. That, and the frequent stares they received encouraged her to keep walking. Thankfully, these people just stole glances before going on with their day.

Aerigo stopped at a table full of traveling mugs, bowls and containers with watertight lids, water bottles, canteens, and smaller containers meant to hold silverware, as a setup displayed. “Pick a canteen.”

Roxie sidled up to the table, the suntanned vendor smiling away on the other side.

“Vandico!” he said to her.

“He says ‘welcome,’” Aerigo said and began speaking in the local language.

The vendor smiled at her again. She waved.

There were a dozen canteens leaning against each other in tidy rows. She picked up the nearest one. It had a stainless steel rim with a durable grey fabric tightly tucked underneath the metal, and a matching nylon shoulder strap. Roxie had no idea how to tell between a quality canteen and a flimsy one, however the one in her hand felt sturdy enough to stand up against her enhanced strength. She gently prodded Aerigo in the arm to get his attention. “This one works for me. Just needs some water in it and I’ll be all set.”

He shrugged off his pack and began fished out some coins for the vendor, who took them, thanking him over and over in his native tongue.

Aerigo bought some trail mixes, food bars, and some cookie-like biscuits along the way to the edge of the cliff. He walked a little faster once his pack was full, but they paused every now and then, whenever Roxie asked to look at items that caught her interest.

The rows of tables, along with the presence of grass and trees ended a hundred yards away from the cliff edge. A stone dais replaced the grass, its face laid out in alternating strips of cobblestone and marble like the bands of a rainbow, ending at a three-foot high stone wall. Atop the entire length of the wall, which stretched for half a mile to either side, sat a carving of a snakelike dragon that reminded Roxie of ones she’d seen depicted in Asian art, but this one had many short, muscular legs securing it to the wall with its five-clawed paws. Dozens of people looked out over the ocean or watching seagulls flit around in the breeze. More people sat cuddling up to each other on the scattered benches. A few salespersons wandered from person to person, trying to sell the multitude of necklaces, bracelets and rings blanketing theirs arms, necks and fingers like metal wings.

Aerigo led them along the dragon wall, passing more people that stared from time to time. They stopped at the end, where it connected with Phailon’s fifty-foot wall, and the sculpture finished with the dragon’s serpentine head looking out over the ocean, like a sentinel.

From this corner they couldn’t miss the roar of the waterfall. It drowned out the wind whistling over and under the stone dragon. Roxie gingerly set her hands on the dragon’s spine and peered over the edge. Vertigo drained all the blood from her face and she cowered back. The drop looked like it went on for miles. The ocean below was lost in a thick mist.

Aerigo set his pack, dagger and canteen on the dais. “It’s time to teach you how to grow.”

“Okay,” Roxie said nervously, placing her pack and new canteen on the ground beside his. “You sure our added weight won’t break the cliff?”

“Half the city lies on top of the part that sticks out. A few more tons won’t make a difference.” Aerigo led her away from the cliff edge to an open area free of benches. “Growing is fairly simple, but it helps to close your eyes when learning this. What you want to do is picture a newborn infant in your mind—people grow fastest just after being born and I find it to be the best thing to focus on. You want to imagine that infant growing visibly, and then you’ll feel a pull on your mind. Try it.”