Voyage

by E M Gale

  At the entrance was a stall selling all sorts of things, including the conical hats I’d seen some people wearing. I walked up and tried on a hat. It was lightweight, made of fake plastic straw and tied under the chin. I fished out one of the smaller-sized notes and gave it to the shopkeeper. He took it and gave me my change uninterestedly: that, at least, was universal.

  By the benches there were some food and drink stalls. One looked interesting. It was tended by an old East Asian man. His face was wrinkled but he looked kind. I walked up. He had two big vats of something pungent and steaming. Seeing me, he smiled.

  “Eeeeeterash I,” he said.

  I smiled and nodded, leaning over to look at the vats. They contained some sort of dark-coloured liquid. He pointed to them in turn:

  “Hotch, kotch,” he said.

  ‘Well, what the hell. What can’t kill me can only make me ill.’

  I fished another small note out of my pocket and pointed at ‘hotch’ and said, “Please,” in English and Japanese. He ladled out some forest-green liquid into a paper cup for me and whisked it up. I didn’t get change for this, but I did get a smile. I smiled back and took my hotch and sat on a bench under a tree. I turned my back on the nearby stream, as the sun’s reflections almost blinded me when I looked at it. My headache was a little better now that I was out of the sun, but the brightness still hurt my eyes.

  I turned my attention to the hotch. It had a head where the drinks vendor had whisked it up. The head was a light green, almost the colour of malachite, and the liquid underneath was a dark green and thick. The steam rising up from it smelt leafy. I took a cautious sip. The drink was very bitter and thick. I took another sip. It was quite disgusting.

  I was then distracted by a voice I recognised.

  “Hey, Clarke,” called Anna.

  I looked up, and saw my friends walking across the park towards me. They were striding confidently, making no attempt to not stand out. Although I had to admit no one was paying any special attention to them, not even to Rob, who had kept his lab coat on–it was grubby from the forest floor.

  “See, I told you it was her,” he said.

  “Hi, guys, how’s the information-gathering going?” They all looked so relaxed, so I didn’t feel too mad at them.

  “Fine,” said Mark, “but we came to look for you.”

  ‘Too bloody right.’

  They all crowded around my bench and blocked out the sun, which I was grateful for.

  “Shouldn’t have left me in the first place! How did you find me?”

  “We just checked the places nearby with lots of people,” said Jane. She sat down, crossed her legs so she could flick her ankle around, and then lit herself a cigarette.

  “As the chance that one of them was you would be high,” explained Rob.

  ‘How is that logical?’

  “Plus this place has lots of trees and fish for you to stare at,” Jane added.

  I frowned at her.

  She took a long drag of her cigarette and blew the smoke out her nose. She smirked. “Nice hat.”

  “Oooooo,” exclaimed Anna, pointing at my drink, “what have you got there?”

  I handed it to her. “Some alien drink. It’s called hotch, but it’s quite disgusting.”

  She took the hotch from me, took a sip and laughed. “Clarke, this is green tea. It’s pronounced ‘O-cha’, not ‘hotch’.”

  “What?”

  “And it’s not an alien drink, it’s Japanese. This is Japan.” She said it as if it were obvious. In fact, she even shrugged to show just how obvious it was.

  “What?” I said again. They all laughed at me this time.

  ‘A few hours of scouting and they think they knew everything about a place!’

  “This isn’t Earth though, so it can’t be Japan!” I protested.

  ‘The sky is a funny colour, the days are longer and they don’t speak bloody Japanese for starters.’

  “It’s full of Japanese people and they speak Japanese. Q.E.D.,” said Mark.

  ‘Eh?’

  “You can understand them?” I looked at Anna in confusion. She was the linguist and I knew she could speak some Japanese. Of course, I could speak more.

  “Yup, they have weird accents though, so we’re probably somewhere quite rural.”

  ‘But the animals and trees don’t look like any I’ve seen even pictures of on Earth.’

  “And kotch?” I asked, pointing at the tea-stall. “They were selling hotch and kotch.”

  “‘O-cha’ and ‘ko-cha’,” said Anna, enunciating the words carefully. “Green tea and black tea. If you’d chosen ko-cha you would have gotten normal tea. It’s made in a slightly odd way though. They’ve whipped it up for some reason.” She frowned at the head on the drink, then looked back at me. “But I’m confused, aren’t you supposed to be a quarter Japanese?”

  I nodded. ‘I am.’

  “Don’t you know any Japanese? Surely you must know the words for tea!”

  “They weren’t speaking proper Japanese! They didn’t understand me at all, and they had funny accents.”

  “Well, they do have slightly odd accents. We must be in the country somewhere, far from Tokyo. I only know the Tokyo dialect. But still, Clarke, I thought you could speak Japanese.”

  I blew the air out of my mouth in an annoyed fashion. “I know loads of Japanese, like ‘ahci’, ‘aman’, ‘irankarapte’, ‘kukohkur’.” I shrugged.

  “What’s all that mean?” asked Mark.

  “Uh, ‘grandmother’, ‘rice’, ‘how are you’, ‘my husband’–Ahci called my grandfather that.”

  “That’s not Japanese,” said Anna, frowning.

  “Yes, it bloody is. Ahci taught me it, since she was Japanese, it must be. As Mark says: ‘Q.E.D.’”

  “No, in Japanese those words should be ‘obasan’, ‘inari’, ‘o-genki des ka’, ‘anata’.”

  I shook my head.

  ‘What does she know? She does half a term of Japanese and she thinks she knows everything!’

  “I didn’t know you were Japanese,” said Rob curiously.

  ‘I’m not, I’m a quarter Japanese.’

  “You don’t look it,” said Mark. “You’re much too pale.”

  I smiled awkwardly and pulled the hat down to shade my face.

  ‘That’s probably the vampirism.’

  “I’m not Japanese. My grandma is, though she changed her name and hid it as much as possible.” They all looked rather confused, so I explained. “’Cos she married my grandfather and came to live in England some time after the war. Though what he was doing in Japan, I don’t know.”

  “Picking up a wife, I guess,” said Rob with a grin.

  I shook my head, but not at Rob. “Strange woman. Half the time she wouldn’t speak to me unless I spoke to her in Japanese, especially once my grandfather died. The rest of the time she would tell me to speak English so I could get myself a nice husband.”

  “You must have had green tea before, though?” Anna looked puzzled. I nodded.

  ‘Yeah, it didn’t taste that bad though.’

  “Ahci prefers sake.”

  Anna finished off the drink.

  “But how did you get the hotch tea?” asked Rob.

  “O-cha,” corrected Anna.

  “They don’t take pounds or dollars here,” continued Rob.

  I sighed. “I pawned my stuff. I suppose you guys haven’t eaten then?”

  Rob grinned.

  * * *

  We walked to the nearest noodle bar from the bench. Since the city was like a Japanese one, we didn’t have to go very far at all, because there was one just inside the entrance to the park. The noodle bar was blessedly dark and cool. I presumed it was running something like air conditioning but I couldn’t hear it. It was mostly empty. There were a few small groups of people tucking into their noodles, and one or two patrons up at the bar watching the chefs working. A waitress smiled at us and gestured to the empty restaurant. I suspec
ted that meant sit anywhere, so I led us to a table where I could sit by the window; I had a nice view of the park and the glass was darkened, reducing the glare from the ground.

  “Ah, great! I’m starving!” Rob grinned at me, presumably since I was going to feed him.

  “Me too,” said Anna.

  “How much money you got?” asked Mark. He was of a more practical turn of mind than either Rob or Anna. I suspected that the thought that it might not be enough for lunch hadn’t occurred to them.

  “I can’t read it, obviously.”

  ‘Ahci never taught me to read Japanese. I don’t know if she even could herself.’

  I pulled out about half of my money and handed it to Anna. “How much money do I have?” I asked her with a smile.

  “Wow, well…” She looked closely at the notes. “Clarke, didn’t you look at this? It has Arabic numerals on it as well as Japanese.”

  “Really?” I peered closer. There were numbers on the back.

  ‘I didn’t really look closely at the money; flicking through your cash out on the street is a good way to lose it. And anyway, I don’t need to read my money, since all the prices are in a language I don’t know.’

  Anna shook her head in consternation and counted the money out on the table. I looked around to check for would-be muggers. No one was paying us any undue attention: we seemed safe.

  “Ten thousand yen,” she said. “Huh, you didn’t get a great price.”

  “Next time you can sell one of your possessions, then.” I snatched back one of the notes. On the front was a typical picture of someone I didn’t care about and some pretty building, so presumably an architect or a politician. On the back the words ‘one thousand pelfre’ were written. With the stuff in my pocket, I had roughly twenty thousand pelfre.

  “Was that all of it?” asked Mark.

  I nodded. “Yeah, pretty much, other than what I spent on my lovely hat and the hotch.”

  “O-cha,” corrected Anna.

  I gave her back the thousand-pelfre note. “Are you sure it’s yen? It says pelfre on the back.”

  Anna looked closely at the note. “Yeah, I noticed that too,” she remarked. The waitress walked over. “Oh, chotto matte kudasai,” said Anna, waving her away again.

  “Argh, I was ready to order as well!” said Rob. “Anyway the food’s really cheap here.”

  I picked up the menu and flicked through it. There were pictures of noodles swimming in soup with Arabic numerals in the menu. The meals were only about ten pelfre. And then it struck me that I didn’t feel that hungry–I hadn’t all day, but I really ought to have done, having had only half a panini about fifteen hours before. I suddenly felt cold with terror.

  ‘I am turning into a vampire, aren’t I? Why the hell did he lie to me?’

  “Everyone ready?” asked Anna.

  “Anna, can you just order for me?” I said. “Get me something like beef and noodle soup. And sake. Hot sake.”

  ‘Lots of sake.’

  She sighed. “You sure you want sake?”

  Suddenly, I really, really did. “Yup. Make it a large one, would you?”

  Anna called the waitress back and ordered several bowls of noodles, tea and sake. I turned my head away from them whilst they talked again about how hungry they were.

  ‘I have to face facts. Every day I am slowly, but surely, turning into a vampire.’

  The sake arrived, and I breathed in its vodka-like aroma gratefully. The alcohol could fight with the sun to see which wanted to be the cause of my headache. The little ceramic bottle came in a small bucket of boiling water, with a cloth over the top to pour the sake out with. Since none of the others were drinking I guessed I would have to pour my own sake. I removed the cloth, folded it up on the table, and picked up the scalding hot bottle and poured the steaming sake into the small cup provided for that purpose. Lifting it, I sniffed in the vaporous alcohol and grinned at Mark, who was sitting across from me.

  “To the gods,” I said, then knocked back the sake. It scalded, my throat felt raw, but I saw no reason to let that stop me and poured a second cup.

  Mark nodded and raised his glass of tea at me. “To your health.” I laughed at that.

  I let my friends’ conversation wash over me whilst I drank my sake. Out of the window I idly watched the people walking past, until I saw something odd. A… person walked through the crowd. I say person because this was my first time seeing a genuine, non-human alien. He–well, he was obviously male–was around seven feet tall, broad-shouldered, about two and a half feet wide at that point, and, oh, yeah, completely green. A deep leafy-green colour, actually. He had a rather large, squareish jaw, with oversized canines sticking up about an inch above his bottom lip, an overhanging, sloping forehead and large, bushy eyebrows. His eyes, however, showed a quick intelligence despite his brutish appearance. That was my two-second impression anyway.

  I watched him walk past the window with hidden curiosity. Once he was out of sight I looked back into the restaurant, expecting to see my friends in shock, but somehow they hadn’t noticed the alien.

  ‘Does their apathy about trees also extend to green aliens?’

  All conversation on our table was killed by the arrival of food. I still didn’t feel very hungry, but I thought I ought to try eating.

  ‘After all, it’s not as if I’ve felt any desire to drink blood.’

  ‘Well, other than Rob’s at the pub…’

  My breakfast seemed to be a pale, thin, yellow soup with a fishy aroma. The noodles floated there in the hot water like a swimming blonde’s hair. I stirred the soup slightly, and cloudy miso soup residue floated up to the surface. The strips of meat on the top were perfect though. They had been ever so barely cooked round the outside, but the inside of each strip was practically raw: succulent and red with a melt-in-the mouth texture. The meat I ate quickly.

  ‘It would have been even better if they hadn’t decided to season the meat, or, well, sear the outside. Really it oughtn’t to have touched a pan at all.’

  I drank the soup easily, but I only ate a mouthful of noodles. Somehow the slimy texture didn’t appeal to me. Then I sat there wondering if vampires could eat normal food as well as blood.

  ‘Mr. Does It Matter didn’t have any food in his flat. Is this going to be my last meal?’

  The door opened. From my vantage point I couldn’t see it, but I saw the looks on Rob’s and Mark’s faces and turned around in my seat. The seven-foot-tall alien was walking through the door. The waitress indicated that he sit anywhere. Neither she nor any of the other patrons of the noodle bar seemed perturbed by his presence, only my friends, and they all stared at him in wonder and amazement.

  ‘So much for subtlety.’

  He couldn’t help but be aware of their reactions. Walking past our table, he stopped and stared down at us. I stared back. Admittedly, he was big and brutish–as I found out later, like the rest of his species he was built that way–but that didn’t mean he was violent or unreasonable. His expression didn’t seem to indicate excessive nastiness.

  I felt I should say something to break the ice. “Nice fangs,” I said. Thinking back, perhaps it wasn’t the best of choices.

  “Thanks,” he replied. I hadn’t expected him to speak English.

  Then he looked shocked, his brow furrowed. “Kotargralok?”

  It sounded like a question.

  He was scrutinising me for some reason, then shook his head. “My mistake.”

  As it was the first time we had met someone who could speak English, I should have asked questions, but I couldn’t think of any. Luckily, Anna could.

  “Ano, er, excuse me, can you tell us where we are, please?” she asked sweetly with a smile. Politeness worked, even on aliens. He turned his attention to her.

  “Uh, yes. Spirit’s Park, New Kyoto on Ragnarok IV–how much did you have to drink last night?”

  “Oh, thank you very much,” she said. The alien smiled. He had a wide smile.

/>   He nodded. “My pleasure.” Then he walked on to sit down at a table.

  The others were now looking at Anna. “Wow, you’re brave.” Mark looked impressed. “I thought he might eat you!” Jane rolled her eyes.

  “Well,” said Anna, “I thought I ought to ask, since he spoke English.”

  “Amazing. He looked just like the description of those… Uruk-hai things, y’know, from that movie, Lord of the Rings,” said Rob.

  “Orcs,” said Jane drily. “They’re called orcs.” She shook her head.

  “Yeah, that’s it,” said Rob. “He looked like an orc.”

  “But”–here Anna looked confused–“there aren’t orcs in Japan…”

  “Well, maybe it’s a cosplay thing,” said Mark, desperately trying to avoid the obvious conclusion.

  “He did say we were on Ragnarok IV… that sounds like a planet name to me,” mused Rob. “Probably the fourth planet of a star called Ragnarok.”

  “And New Kyoto is not a place name in Japan,” Anna informed us. “There’s a Kyoto, but no New Kyoto.” She looked at Rob. “We’re not in Japan, are we?”

  “So maybe it is an alien planet,” said Rob, “that just happens to be populated by the Japanese.” The others mused this over for a bit.

  “Ahem,” I said. They all looked at my raised eyebrows and expectant expression. “Well…?”

  To begin with they looked confused. Then Mark got my hint, rolled his eyes and said: “Yes, OK, Clarke, you were right, this is an alien planet.”

  I grinned. “Thank you.” I leaned back in my chair and held my index finger up. “And that is why you should pay attention to trees.”

  * * *

  Tourist Information or Nearest Cultural Equivalent

  Once we had all been fed and watered, and I had paid our bill, it was time to explore.

  “Well… now what?” asked Rob, looking to me for direction.

  “I think you should all pawn your stuff for noodle money.” I was only half joking. “Anyway, I think we need to do more scouting. Since we now know that this is an alien planet, we really need to find out why it’s full of Japanese people, how to get back and, well… I really do think we need to get more money.” They nodded.