I leaned forward and spoke over Ragna's shoulder. "What's the average population of those things?"
"Oh, several of millions. They were being very crowded even with respect to their immensehood."
Tivi said, "We were not meant to be living in this manner that is to say, we of our species. Yet Ahgirr are the very few of whom it may be said that they are in agreement with this statement."
"Yeah," I said, and sat back.
"My God," Susan whispered. "If they have this kind of population level on a colonized planet, and on a backwater one at that"
"Right, think of what the home world must be like."
"Look. There are more of them on the horizon. Tivi told me there were at least fifty faln complexes on this world alone."
"These people couldn't have stayed in caves," I said. "They would've been trodding on each other's faces."
"And ganging together into arcologies was the only way to keep from totally destroying the environment."
I noticed Ragna eavesdropping as he drove.
"Sorry, Ragna," I said. "Susan and I were just speculating."
He laughed. "Oh, all of what you are saying is being of indubitable truth, partly. Ahgirr have always been believing in rational control of the population. Not so of many cultures. Alas and shit."
We came to the edge of a vast parking area crammed with vehicles. Ragna swung off the road and entered it.
"Now we are being faced with the heartrending task of finding a space in which to insert this conveyance for purposes of parking therein. I heave a great sigh."
I was surprised how crowded it was. "Where do all the people come from?"
"Oh, all from over the place," Tivi said. "Many aliens too. This is being a major shopping and commercial faln."
"A shopping mall!" Susan laughed. "I haven't walked a mall in a coon's age." She turned to me. "It's in my blood, you know. I spent my childhood as a mall brat."
"Oh, you're a maller? You never told me."
"Didn't think it was anything special. There are millions of us.
"You were born in one?"
"Born and raised. South Gate Village, very near Peoria, Central Industry."
I sat back. "You know, at one time people only used to shop in those things."
"I know. Then they became arcologies, just like these. Lots of factors contributed. I can go on and on about mall history. Every mall brat learns it in school."
"I'd be very interested in hearing about it."
"Right." She gave a sarcastic grunt. "It's history. Terran history. Who needs it."
Ragna swerved to pull into an empty slot but was cut off and usurped by an electric-blue, beetle-shaped gadabout. The occupants, their purple lizard faces impassive behind darktinted ports, nodded in what seemed an apologetic manner. Sorry, but every being for himself, you know.
"Nasty slime objects!" Ragna shouted, then grumbled to himself in his own tongue.
But a little farther along, another unoccupied slot presented itself and Ragna slipped in, cackling triumphantly. "We are having luck for once, by gosh."
The faln complex was still some distance off, titantic mushroom-shaped hulks baking in the fierce desert sun. They were a striking salmon pink in color. I counted six separate structures of varying heights, all linked by a web of walkway bridges with transparent polarized canopies. Service buildings, tiny by comparison, huddled about the bases of the larger structures.
"Do we have to walk?" I asked. " Looks to be a good hike from here to the base of that nearer one."
"Ah, no," Ragna said. "We may be taking the girrna-falnnarrog, the underground conveyance below the faln. What is it called?" He tapped his blue headband. "The subway. Over there." He pointed right to a descending stairwell. It looked like a subway entrance all right.
Steps led down to a landing from which we took a descending escalator that was at least ten meters wide―sort of a moving grand staircase. Other people and a few aliens had come down with us, and we found a crowd waiting for the next train. The station was well lighted, clean, expansive, and looked spanking new.
I noticed something while we waited. Compared to their brethren, Ragna and Tivi were rather drab figures. Most Ahgirr, male and female, seemed to dress alike, favoring tight-fitting tunics of gray or brown cinched at the waist with a white sash. The other Nogon flounced around in garish, flamboyant gowns and robs, all brightly colored, elaborately designed, busy with embroidery and woven and printed patterns. Hairstyles ranged from the highly imaginative to the entirely outrageous (judging by human standards in general and mine in particular, of course). Ahgirr, it seemed, were the Plain People of their race.
The train was a beauty, levitating along the track on magnetic impellers. Bullet shaped, gleaming white with pink trim, it whooshed into the station and slid along the platform, coming to a smooth stop. Doors hissed open, and the crowd began to board. We entered a nearby car and ensconced ourselves in comfortably overstuffed seats.
I asked Ragna, "If you can get from faln to faln in these things, why does anybody drive?"
"These are people who are not living in faln. No, they are living outside and waiting to be permitted to live in faln. There is no room for them."
"Oh, so there are some who live out on the land besides you people," Susan remarked.
"Yes, many," Tivi answered, "but they do not wish to be living there. Residential privileges in the faln are being passed from parents to children. Privileges may be bought and sold, but there-is being great competition for them. Many legal fights and also violence resulting. Oh, my."
"Funny, we didn't see any small communities off the road," I said.
"Oh, few have been built on this planet. It is desert, phooey on it. They are coming here from planets which are more hospitable. This commercial faln is being usually less congested than others. More parking, too."
Susan and I looked at each other.
The train started forward, gaining speed in a smooth, powerful surge, then shot into a tunnel.
"It's always somehow disconcerting," Susan told me, "when you realize that alien cultures are just as complex and screwed up as ours."
"Yeah. Must have been all that fiction that was written in the twentieth century. You know, superbeings in silver spaceships saving the collective butt of mankind-that sort of thing."
"Must've been. Of course, I haven't read much of anything that far back."
"Ideas like that tend to stick in the mass mind," I said.
"That's me all over," Susan lamented.
I clucked. "You have a habit of putting yourself down did you know that?"
"Just one of many bad habits," she said, "which is why I'm down on myself so much. Ipso facto, Q.E.D., and all that."
"That's quite a hole you've dug for yourself."
"Got a shovel?"
I kissed her on the cheek instead and put my arm around her. Ragna and Tivi smiled appreciatively at us. Weren't we cute.
Some of the Nogon were staring at us. Most of the aliens weren't. Ragna had said that word of our arrival on the planet had been spreading and that there was great interest in us. It looked more like a detached kind of curiosity, to me. I couldn't imagine the general public getting worked up over the discovery of yet another alien race, no matter how interesting.
We passed through three stations, each progressively more congested, before reaching the end of the line, by which time the train was packed with passengers standing elbow to pincer. The train slid to a smooth stop and we joined the crush to get out.
The next hour or so was a succession of visual, aural, and perceptual wonders. Susan and I walked goggle-eyed through a series of spaces that defied description. The scale was immense. It was a shopping mall, yes; it was also a vast strange carnival with attractions at every turn―here, street musicians and acrobats, there, some sort of sporting event, here, an orchestra pouring out ear-splitting cacophony… and everywhere all kinds of activity that anyone would have a hard time describing. There we
re festivals within festivals, there were celebrations and ceremonies; there were public meetings with people up on platforms shouting at one another―politicians? Or a debating society? Maybe it was drama. There were sideshows and circuses, pageants and exhibitions, shows and displays. There were flea markets and bazaars, agoras and exchanges. There were stalls, booths, rialtos, and fairs, with hawkers, wholesalers, vendors, jobbers, and every other variety of merchant in attendance. You could buy anything at any price. You could eat, drink, smoke, inject, or otherwise assimilate everything imaginable into your body, if you so chose. You could purchase hardware, software, kitchenware, and underwear. There were trade fairs of strange machinery, appliances, and unidentifiable gadgets and gizmos. Salespeople demonstrated, prospective customers looked on. Huge video screens ran endless commercials extolling the virtues of myriad products. There were presentations, parades, dog-and-pony shows, and every sort of inducement.
And all of this took place in a nexus of interpenetrating spaces whose complexity was overwhelming. There were levels upon levels, series of staggered terraces, promenades and balconies, all connected by webs of suspended bridges, cascades of spiraling ramps and stairways, escalators, open-shaft elevators, and other conveyances. Walls and floors were variously colored in soft pastels and metallic tints. Surfaces of shiny blue metal formed ceilings and curtainwalls, stairwells and platforms. There were hanging gardens, miniature forests, waterfalls, small game preserves, lakelets, parkets, and playgrounds. Hanging mobile sculptures wheeled above, towering alien monuments rose from the floors. And everywhere there was activity, action, color, movement, and sound.
And noise.
"Plenty loud, eh?" Ragna said.
"What?" Susan answered. "Oh, Jake, it's all so familiar yet so utterly strange. I can't get over it."
"What I find strange is all this chaos contained within a controlled environment."
"Maybe this is how they keep from feeling confined."
"Hard to realize we're indoors. Where's all this light coming from?"
"I'd swear that's sky up there," Susan said, pointing to the distant roof.
"They must pump in sunlight through a series of mirrors," I guessed.
"This is being true," Ragna said. "Quite a neat trick, but it is also being much too damnably bright in here."
Neither of our guides had bothered to take down their protective hoods and both still wore wraparound sunglasses. I wondered if their aversion to sunlight was more psychological than physical. The other Nogon seemed to be at home, though I did notice some wearing wide-brimmed hats and some with dark glasses.
"What do we do first?" Susan asked. "Where do we go?"
"You said that you were being desirous of equipment by which one lives in the wilderness, making camp and suchlike," Tivi said.
Susan laughed. "Well, I'm not exactly desirous of the stuff, but―" She put a hand on Tivi's sloping shoulder. "I'm sorry: Yes, I'd like to buy camping gear. A backpack, maybe, if I can find one that fits my all-too-human frame. And a good flashlight… and, um, I'll need an all-climate survival suit―hell, I'll never find one that fits me. Forget that."
"On the contrary," Tivi said, "they are having makers of clothing here who can possibly be accommodating you."
"Really? Designer fashions, huh?"
"Pardon?"
"You've convinced me. I'd really like some new clothes…
"Oh, wait." Susan turned to me. "We really should go get that electronic stuff you need first. Right?"
"Nah, go ahead and have fun. We've got a little time."
"Oh, good." She suddenly frowned. "Rats."
"What?
"Now I feel guilty that the others didn't get to come along."
I nodded, looking around. "Yeah, they are missing some sights. But I thought they'd be safer in the caves."
"You were right. We shouldn't take chances."
"Good rationalization."
"Creep. Let's go."
"May I be suggesting," Ragna said, "that we may be having perhaps a parting of the ways at this point, Tivi going with Jake and I myself escorting and otherwise leading Susan?"
I said, "Let me get the feel of this place first. It's big, and if we get separated―"
"There is little need for the fear you are feeling, Jake. Unfortunately, Ahgirr are very familiar, with this den of iniquity and other foul doings, being that they are coming here to purchase many necessary essentials which are, rats, unpurchasable elsewhere."
"Well, I'd rather tag along with Suzie first. Then we'll see."
Ragna made circles with his forefingers and elongated thumbs, throwing his arms out. We had come to interpret this as a shrugging gesture, though it had other meanings. "As you are wishing, so shall we be tagging."
We set out into the tumult.
We went down several levels and walked through a parklet. Children played there, running about and screeching just like children do all over the universe. There were lots of imaginative objects there to climb and swing from, monkey bars and that sort of thing. Parents seated at benches looked on. Susan was right in that everything was familiar in a way―but every object, every aspect of the design of this area and all the rest was totally nonhuman. Everything said alien.
Something odd was transpiring on the other side of the park. A crowd of Nogon was gathered in the middle of a large expanse of green tile floor. Everyone was jumping up and down, facing in the direction of a platform upon which were displayed a variety of nutty looking objects. Household wares, maybe. Maybe objets d'art; who knows? As they jumped, the participants threw small balls of various colors into the air and caught them. As we passed, I asked Ragna what was going on.
"This is of much difficulty to be explaining," he said, tapping his headband.
"Oh. Is it an auction?"
"Auction." He brought his hands up to reposition the headband. "Auction. No. It is in the nature of being a protest."
"Protest? What are they protesting?"
"Again, this is of much difficulty."
"Right."
Language barriers are one thing, cultural and conceptual ones quite another.
We entered another commercial area. The merchants here seemed of a distinct ethnic group, wearing their cornsilk hair in braids tied off with bright ribbons and floral bows. Their costumes were much more molest. Susan stopped to look at some pottery. Some items were quite attractive, though hard to identify.
Ragna was chuckling. "It is being centuries since these people are living in anything but faln, yet they construct their traditional objects and sell them quite speedily. Making much money into the bargain, too."
"Indians selling beads and blankets," I said.
"You will be pardoning me?"
"Well, it's difficult to explain."
Susan managed to blow fifteen minutes deciding what she wasn't going to buy.
"Susan."'
"Sorry, right. Let's go."
Next up was a sunken arena where a sporting event was being held. The game looked like a cross between rugby and motorcycle racing. If that sounds confusing… well, you'd have to see it. We stopped briefly to watch, but I didn't bother to ask Ragna to supply play-by-play commentary.
We went on. After taking a path through a small forested area, we came out into another marketplace, this one bigger and offering all sorts of products―furniture, vehicles, foodstuffs, clothing, you name it. It took about ten minutes for Tivi to find the stall of a merchant who could possibly fit Susan. It was an alien, a slender little yellow-furred biped who looked somewhat feline.
After conferring with the merchant, Tivi told us, "Yes, it has seen your species before. It can be accommodating your physique in the style of your choosing. But it says its merchandise is of so poor a quality that you would hardly be wanting to waste your money or your time."
I said, "Ask it… er, him or whatever―ask where he saw creatures like us."
She did. "It says it has traveled to many planets and has seen many cr
eatures-your kind to be sure, but it is fearing that your ire will be aroused when it is telling you that the exact location of this sighting is not being remembered."
"Was it recently?"
The alien made apologetic gestures.
"It is saying also that this memory is not fixed with respect to a time element. It craves a thousand forgivenesses and begs that you not kill it."
"Well, tell him he's safe for now. He was probably fibbing about seeing humans. Just wanted our business."
Tivi went on as the alien continued mewling: "It still is insisting that you could not possibly be interested in the worthless articles of apparel that it is dealing in. In matter of fact, it is willing to be paying person or persons to take the junk off his hands."
"Tell him he doesn't have to go through Nogon dickering rituals with us," I said.
"As long as I am interpreting for you," Tivi answered, "it will be afraid not to be doing this dickering and ritualizing."
"What's his name?" Susan asked.
"It protests that an obviously high-born female such as yourself, one who no doubt is in possession of uncountable husbands and slaves, would not be interested in inquiring as to the name of so low-born and abject a creature as we see before us." As an aside, Tivi added, "I am thinking it is also a female―and also that this is being part of her own type of dickering and ritualizing."
"Tell her that I'd be interested in buying everything she has, and would be willing to pay her handsomely for the privilege," Susan instructed.
"Again she is protesting that such a wondrously beautiful creature such as yourself would be ill-served by―"
This went on at some length, and I got bored. To kill some time, Ragna took me on a little tour of the area. We watched what he told me was an actual auction, but strangely enough, it looked more like a protest meeting. After that we browsed through a fast-food section. Some of the stuff looked edible, even good, but I knew that, while I wouldn't be poisoned, I'd get sick as a pup if I had any. We had found that we couldn't eat Nogon food, even though its peptide configurations weren't too far divergent from Terran ones.
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