bunch of questions to try and figure if I was from a world they’d had a stray from before. They call people who accidentally wander through wormholes ‘strays’. Sa Lents is some kind of anthropologist and he says that my description of Earth doesn’t match up to the lost worlds previously described and he’s looking forward to learning and writing about it. Good for him, I suppose.
Anyway, I guessed right when I said they weren’t at that town to rescue me. There’s a particular kind of Ionoth called Ddura (massives) which are really rare and from what little I could make out are something like the whales of the Ena. REALLY massive, if that was what was making the incredible noise before I was rescued. They’d detected one on Muina and rushed out to try and study it, but were too late and only got me instead.
I find it hard to believe that the people from Earth are from some other planet. For one thing, you’d think we’d have legends or stories about Ionoth and this Ena place and Muina. And though they talked about this happening thousands of years ago, ‘modern’ humans have been on Earth for at least tens of thousands. So, not convinced, though since Tare people look just like Earth people there’s probably some connection.
Strays count as a kind of refugee, and other than representing a slight curiosity for being from a ‘new’ world, I’m not particularly unusual. Fortunately, it doesn’t seem like Tare has a refugee policy like Australia’s, since I wouldn’t enjoy mandatory detention. Although they are trying to find all the worlds that the Muinans went to, and so are already trying to find Earth in a way, they didn’t seem to think I should get my hopes up about it. Apparently the Ionoth have been really bad lately and they’re doing a lot more defensive work than exploration.
Sa Lents is going to be my sponsor. After some more quarantine and testing I get to be integrated into society, and that means a couple of years at least of living with Sa Lents and his family while I learn the language and enough skills to get a job, and he conveniently does a little research project on Earth. He has two daughters – one older and one younger than me – and the older one has just left home.
They started talking about how long it would take me to learn to use the ‘Kuna’ (a word which also seems to mean ‘spaces’), and we had a really confused discussion for a while until I finally figured out what the injection to the temple was for. I don’t quite understand the whole ‘spaces’ thing, but the nearest I can make out the people on this planet are several steps ahead in terms of computers and networks and virtual environments, and before they could give me this internal dictionary, they had to set up an interface in my head.
I’m a cyborg! The Tarens use nanite technology and my head has been exploding the last few days while a computer built itself in my brain. And I’m not hallucinating the dot in the middle of the room or the floating words. That’s just the default display of the computer in my head. Before I get sent off with Sa Lents I have to pass basic interfacing-with-virtual-environments training. And currently I have no access rights to anything, so all I can see is a dot.
I just reread all this big long entry and it sounds nothing like the explanation they gave me, which involved showing me pictures obviously meant for children and saying in their language: “Muina. Home. Planet. Home. Lantar. People.” And me sitting there looking puzzled, as my injected language tool triggered concept recognition, not words. I’m not sure how much of what I’ve written down matches what they were trying to tell me. The pictures were more helpful than what they were saying.
It was only when I was taken back to my room and had had a shower that I started crying. Because being rescued and going home are worlds apart. And, weird as this sounds, because I’m not a surprise to
Anyway, I guessed right when I said they weren’t at that town to rescue me. There’s a particular kind of Ionoth called Ddura (massives) which are really rare and from what little I could make out are something like the whales of the Ena. REALLY massive, if that was what was making the incredible noise before I was rescued. They’d detected one on Muina and rushed out to try and study it, but were too late and only got me instead.
I find it hard to believe that the people from Earth are from some other planet. For one thing, you’d think we’d have legends or stories about Ionoth and this Ena place and Muina. And though they talked about this happening thousands of years ago, ‘modern’ humans have been on Earth for at least tens of thousands. So, not convinced, though since Tare people look just like Earth people there’s probably some connection.
Strays count as a kind of refugee, and other than representing a slight curiosity for being from a ‘new’ world, I’m not particularly unusual. Fortunately, it doesn’t seem like Tare has a refugee policy like Australia’s, since I wouldn’t enjoy mandatory detention. Although they are trying to find all the worlds that the Muinans went to, and so are already trying to find Earth in a way, they didn’t seem to think I should get my hopes up about it. Apparently the Ionoth have been really bad lately and they’re doing a lot more defensive work than exploration.
Sa Lents is going to be my sponsor. After some more quarantine and testing I get to be integrated into society, and that means a couple of years at least of living with Sa Lents and his family while I learn the language and enough skills to get a job, and he conveniently does a little research project on Earth. He has two daughters – one older and one younger than me – and the older one has just left home.
They started talking about how long it would take me to learn to use the ‘Kuna’ (a word which also seems to mean ‘spaces’), and we had a really confused discussion for a while until I finally figured out what the injection to the temple was for. I don’t quite understand the whole ‘spaces’ thing, but the nearest I can make out the people on this planet are several steps ahead in terms of computers and networks and virtual environments, and before they could give me this internal dictionary, they had to set up an interface in my head.
I’m a cyborg! The Tarens use nanite technology and my head has been exploding the last few days while a computer built itself in my brain. And I’m not hallucinating the dot in the middle of the room or the floating words. That’s just the default display of the computer in my head. Before I get sent off with Sa Lents I have to pass basic interfacing-with-virtual-environments training. And currently I have no access rights to anything, so all I can see is a dot.
I just reread all this big long entry and it sounds nothing like the explanation they gave me, which involved showing me pictures obviously meant for children and saying in their language: “Muina. Home. Planet. Home. Lantar. People.” And me sitting there looking puzzled, as my injected language tool triggered concept recognition, not words. I’m not sure how much of what I’ve written down matches what they were trying to tell me. The pictures were more helpful than what they were saying.
It was only when I was taken back to my room and had had a shower that I started crying. Because being rescued and going home are worlds apart. And, weird as this sounds, because I’m not a surprise to
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