Ex Lacrima Remnant

Track #4 – New Babylon Groove

“Feathers! Nice feathers for your hair!”

A peddler at the side of the street, her voice overshadowing the chaotic noises of the city, making it almost impossible to ignore her. She cleared her throat, before shouting again.

“Parrot feathers! Hawk feathers! Peacock feathers! You mention it, I have it! Feathers, good feathers! Special price only for today! Just five eas!”

A woman stopped close to her stand, stared at the wares with a mix of annoyance and curiosity. The merchant clapped her hands, greeted the newcomer with open arms.

“Oi, bella signorina! Wanna buy a feather?”

The signorina in question was averagely tall, had long, straight silver hair and looked like she was in her early twenties. Her iris was of a shade of red the merchant had not seen before. Iris, singular. Because her other eye was covered by a makeshift eyepatch. The rest of her outfit consisted in black garments, which more or less complemented her pale complexion. There was some asymmetry in the mix too, since her left sleeve covered her arm completely, while no sleeve at all could be seen from the right shoulder down. Dark gloves, a dark skirt and even darker platform boots with a three-inch-tall sole finished up the picture, creating the impression that colors had simply abandoned her when she was little. If it weren’t for her iris, that is. That red had a magnetic allure, a unique hue that the merchant had seldom seen. However, what struck her the most about the girl was the necklace of feathers already adorning her outfit. White feathers, most likely from a swan. Premium ones too. The merchant bit her lips. The quality of those was superior to what the average street market could sell – they must have cost a fortune. Which meant that the gal was loaded with eas… but also that she wasn’t going to spend them at her stall. So, upselling it was.

“Ai, ai, bella signori’! You are a classy girl, I see! I have even more exotic feathers, but they ain’t cheap, yes? Dodo feathers too! You’d look good in them, yes?”

The one-eyed girl kept browsing the stand, without replying or paying any attention to the seller. Her iris was shifting left and right, among the plethora of colorful feathers of all shapes and sizes. Her fingers moved slowly through the glass containers, caressing them while she read their names. Sparrow. Kingfisher. Hummingbird. Swallow. All of them with an animated holographic miniature of the bird flying around the jug. The girl stared back at the peddler, her eye unblinking. Now, she was certain of it.

“Thanks, but no thanks. You have nothing of value here.”

She started turning around, step away from the stand. Until the merchant clawed her shoulder, almost growling like a wounded beast.

“Nothing of value?! Signori’, these are the best feathers you’ll ever find at Bargain Barricade! You can’t be serious!”

The girl heaved a sigh, stared at the merchant again.

“All of your feathers are fake. They’re completely worthless.”

The seller’s mouth fell agape, as the girl’s finger moved to the glass cases.

“Swallows have a thrice-forked tail. The one in your hologram has only two prongs, like in the old movies. Ergo, you’ve never seen a real swallow with your own eyes, otherwise you would have recognized the mistake immediately. The texture, shape and length of your hawk feathers is the exact same among all samples, with absolutely no variance. If they came from real birds, they would differ even so slightly. Hummingbird feathers should be half that size, at the very least. Kingfisher got extinct fifty years ago, so it’s unlikely you have access to living specimens. Also, those marked as bald eagle feathers are chicken feathers.”

The girl shrugged, freed her shoulder from the clasping hand, turned her back to the still frozen peddler.

“Now, my apologies, but I didn’t come here to waste my time on someone who can’t truly appreciate birds. Try selling your crap to someone else.”

She didn’t even wait for the merchant’s retort – she simply left the stand without a word, as her platform heels grazed the ground at every step. The insults of the peddler slid on her like drizzle, leaving no lasting effects, except maybe saturating her ears with words in a language she could barely understand. It had to be a very old dialect of sorts, which wasn’t unheard of in New Babylon. Every language had the right to be represented, even the most bizarre ones. ‘Words are God’, the motto of the city, reflected this point of view. That multitude of spoken languages was the essence, the true riches of New Babylon – which was why so many people knew so many of them.

Her eye darted around the crowded alleys, filled to the brim with passersby and stalls. Bargain Barricade was the biggest street market she had ever been to. She felt like she had to swim through the herds of people roaming that space, like a seagull flying upwind. Yet, that wasn’t unpleasant, per se. Walking around, seeing the world. It made her feel alive. If only interacting with other intelligent beings weren’t so draining, she would have enjoyed it even more. A colorful poster caught her attention. Red and gold accents, large, majestic letters drawn over the silhouette of a humongous spaceship. The upcoming Turn of the Millennium. She rubbed her eye, looked at it again. It wasn’t a simple printed ad, it was a full-fledged holographic show of lights, music and ever-changing shapes. The only fixed point was the ship, a colossal tower-like structure that reached to the sky. Incidentally, that had to be the same that she could see far into the horizon, partially hidden by the afternoon mist. Lagash, the First Seed. That name meant everything to New Babylon, to all other cities on the Elaim continent. Yet, she knew so little of it – just that it existed and that everyone revered it almost as a divine being, despite just being a construct of sorts, a monument of an era long gone. Nevertheless, she could feel a little bit of fascination too. She took a mental note about researching the topic, when she found a safe comnet connection. Chances were that the Turn of the Millennium festival was an even bigger deal than she thought.

Suddenly, her left arm started to itch. She scratched it a little, with care, over the black sleeve and black glove completely encasing it. Her left eye itched too, under the bandage. A groan escaped her lips. Allergy. It was her allergy, of course. She felt her nose prickling, as if ready to sneeze. Before that happened, she rammed a paper tissue in front of her mouth, covering her nostrils too. Then, the sneeze came. Twice, three times. The tissue filled with green-ish fluids, as usual. She crumpled it, threw it into a nearby bin with nonchalance, taking care of not being noticed. Then, she started scanning her surroundings. That allergic reaction could only mean one thing. One of them was close. And was pollinating. Her right hand instinctively went for her left wrist, rested there for a while, while her red iris moved around, trying to find the source of her discomfort. Her nose prickled once more. A sneeze. Another one. This time without tissue, spewing mucus on the asphalt. She chewed her words under her teeth, screeched like a caged hawk. That was such a stupid feature of her body, but unfortunately one she was lucky to have.

Passersby. Stalls. People of all colors, shapes, sizes, clothing styles. She went through all of them, looked around to find the source of her alarm bell. Till she finally set her eye on it. Her pupil shrank, turned around, as its shape mimicked that of an eagle eye, letting her zoom in on her target. A group of Peacekeepers, bored to death by their thankless task. And, in their midst, a woman with tanned skin and black hair, styled as two prongs at the sides of her neck. A woman with visible wooden tendrils on her right cheek and branches coming out of her head, much like deer antlers. Yet, they were unmistakably covered in bark. That could only mean one thing.

That woman was a rhizome.

An armed rhizome, in full tactical gear.

The one-eyed girl bit her lips. Too many possible casualties to even think of attacking her now. So, she kept quiet, hoping not to be seen. There was nothing in her appearance outing her, nothing that made her stood out. Except, well, her allergy. A few people were allergic to rhizomes, so that wasn’t even that rare – but also not exceedingly common. The small group of soldiers was so far out of sight that she had to activate her enhanced vision to appreciate the fine details. They didn’t even seem to have noticed her. A sigh. She let her left wrist go. Wrong time. Wrong place. She wasn’t there for them. Her goal was getting in touch with her contact, the person who sent her an encrypted message on the BM. That couldn’t possibly be the Peacekeeper. Her pacing accelerated, leaving the patrol behind, the counterfeit feathers stall too. Deer-antlers was too far to notice her, in that dark mass of people. And, even if she noticed her, she doubted she could recognize her for what she was. Still, it was better to play it safe.

“The end is near! It’s already too late!”

She stopped in her steps. That voice. Those voices. In the middle of the plaza, a group of hooded men and women walked in circles, brandishing flower-scented candles. All of them were dressed in white, except for a man standing in the middle. His cape was red, his face was hidden by a black gas mask with thick, dark lenses. She glanced at the group in silence, with a pinch of curiosity, noticing several panels filled to the brim with words.

“There won’t be a new millennium! Lagash will fall the moment the Last Vault opens! So it is written! So it will happen!”

The man (but was he really a man?) opened his arms, while his distorted voice blasted through the mask. The hooded figures in the circle kept walking, without ever stopping, eerily echoing his words.

“So it is written. So it will happen.”

The one-eyed woman glanced at the cultists, at their strange, macabre procession. Most passersby were ignoring theM. Bargain Barricade wasn’t a place for proselytizing, it was a place for buying and eating tasty food without anyone bothering. So, the cultists were quickly shelved off as crazy people that just wanted to spoil the mood. Yet, she couldn’t keep her eyes off them. There was something strangely alluring in their movements, in their synchronicity. The central figure kept talking, the gas mask turning his (her? Their?) face into a complete mystery, his voice louder and louder.

“This planet enjoyed ten centuries of prosperity, all thanks to Lagash! But Lagash gives, Lagash takes! That was the pact, and the pact is over! So it is written, so it will happen!”

“So it is written. So it will happen.”

In the distance, two agents gestured in the direction of the preacher, the rhizome too. Their expressions turning from intrigued to annoyed to furious. Yet, the figure kept talking to the crowd, as the never ending procession of candle-bearers continued.

“Leave the planet as soon as you can! It’s the only way! We’ll embark, reach for the stars, find a new place! Far from Lagash, but bringing her with us!”

“So it is written. So it will happen.”

The hooded man raised his right arm at the sky, his voice blared almost to the point of hurting the eardrums of his listeners.

“We have a few precious days. Let them count.”

A voice emerged from the crowd. Loud. Brash. Angry.

“Alright, alright, enough with this theater.”

The one-eyed girl turned around, breaking out of the trance she had fallen into. Only to see her.

Deer-antlers.

With an active plasma knife in her hand.

Pointed at the masked man.

“Quit it, awright? If you don’t, I’ll punch you till you pass out, before kicking your sorry ass to jail. Got it?!”

The hooded figure shook his head, raised his finger.

“I am speaking the truth, rhizome! You, of all people, should know it! The Corps are keeping us in the dark, right as…”

“Oh, shut up!”

The one-eyed girl couldn’t even blink. Deer-antlers movements were too fast to follow, too precise. Not even a diving peregrine falcon could have been faster. In the short moment the rhizome uttered her words of dismay, a vine bursted out of her left hand, hitting the hooded man like a whip, throwing him to the ground. The air cracked after the hit, a delay of a couple milliseconds. Yet, enough for the echo to be heard, to spread around the square, to the ears of all the people that ignored the chants till one instant before. A second strike, the vine whipping once more, this time hitting the ground close to the man. Breaking a small electronic device, fragments of plastic and metal flying everywhere around. The hooded figures that walked in circle shivered, distorted. Then, disappeared immediately after, as if they had never been there. The one-eyed girl gasped. Holograms. They were simply holograms. The preacher was alone, all that time. There was no cult, only him. The man gasped, raised on his knees, crouched on all four, as Deer-antlers walked towards him. Slowly, one step at a time, in a form bereft of elegance. Each and every one of her movements were more akin to those of a mountain ape rather than those of a deer. As graceless as a kiwi, a turkey incapable of flying but ready to puff out his chest. That was what Deer-antlers looked like to the one-eyed bystander. She glanced at the rhizome’s hand, the hand controlling that vine that lashed at supersonic speed. It was the left one, a complement to the knife. It didn’t look very sturdy, more like a liana than like a trunk. Yet, at that speed, it could have very well cut her arm in half, broken her bones too. She stood still, staring at the downed man from the distance, from the ring of people that formed around him. Nobody wanted to be in his place. Some wished he had been more careful. Many wanted to see what would happen next, with bated breath.

That’s when she saw it.

On his right wrist, the man was wearing a bracelet.

A bracelet made of hummingbird feathers.

True hummingbird feathers.

“Please, I’m just trying to save…”

“You are just trying to get on my nerves!”

Another whiplash, this time hitting his back. The main groaned in pain, as Deer-antlers reeled her natural weapon back.

“One hundred lashes on your sorry back will teach you a lesson, yes?”

She straightened the vine, rolled it, readied it for the hit.

“This is the fi…”

Yet, something was wrong. Something made her stop.

Before the man, stood a girl with black garments, platform shoes and an eyepatch. And one, single red iris, burning with resentment. Deer-antlers groaned, waved her hands in a violent gesture.

“What the heck are you doing, citizen? Get back or…”

“Lacrima.”

“What?”

“My name…”

The one-eyed girl stood still, calm, didn’t raise her voice. It was as simple as stating a natural fact.

“My name is Lacrima. Not citizen, not girl, not bella signori’. Lacrima.”

The preacher glanced at her, glanced back at Deer-antlers. The gas mask covered his face completely, no way to understand his thoughts. Yet, it was clear that he didn’t anticipate that development. He lay down, motionless, waiting for things to move forward, confused by that turn of events. Only to see the one-eyed girl, the one called Lacrima, bring her right hand to her left wrist, closing her fingers around it. Deer-antlers raised her vine arm, growled.

“Whatever, Lacrima. If you’re so eager to get punished in his stead…”

A sudden movement, the vine completely rolled, the anticipation before unleashing.

“…be my guest!”

The whip straightened, cracked through the air, in a wide, precise arc, aimed at Lacrima’s left arm. A hissing sound, violent, metallic. The liana repulsed, recoiling back. Deer-antlers’s jaw almost dropped, her eyes blinking wildly in disbelief. In front of her, the girl, the one-eyed girl called Lacrima, had ripped off her own left arm.

And now was using it as a sword.

A sword of bark and metal, an exquisitely carved blade, shining in the light of the day. Her left arm was no more, her hand turned into a hilt, her sleeve ragged, in tatters. Only for wooden tendrils to emerge from it. Lacrima tilted the blade, let its tip under her eyepatch, started moving it up.

“As I said, my name is Lacrima…”

The eyepatch fell off, fell to the ground cut in half. Underneath, a beautiful red rose emerged from her eye socket, filling it completely. Roots and vines sprouted around it, clinging to her skin, going down her cheek, delving in her jaw. She lowered the sword, before pointing it back at Deer-antlers, her single iris burning with an unrelenting fire.

“…and, like you, I’m a rhizome.”