The Arched World

by Davi Cao

  It then slowed down enough to allow contact. The camp area grew high, toward the sky, elevated by the col.loc’s inner monster, curious about the outer influence so near it. Earth’s mountains came closer, the city grew wide. The hills taken by the thousands in the international brigade became sharp.

  People flew across the small gap, one jump and gravity reversed, falling on alien lands without grace, rolling by the side of Mary and Angeline and Malcolm and Olin and Alice and the others.

  A rain of people, one after another, shouting and laughing, escaping the fall of their carts, bags, boxes, and machines. The first small truck fell under parachutes, its wheels locked to keep it fixed on the rubber ground.

  Tens, then hundreds of pilgrims got up, helping each other recover from the minor impact, greeted by the expedition crew, greeted by Angeline, who offered them food from a curious box, food so good and perfect that they cried and rejoiced.

  “This is a gift from the new world, something to take back home with me. Do you like it? How do you feel?” Angeline held her honeycomb box and took roasted meat from inside of it.

  The newcomer grabbed her offer and tasted it, never having tried perfection before. In one single moment, he forgot about his troubles as a human, as a creature of need. He closed his eyes, turned his head up, shaking it gently, and hummed a hymn of thankfulness.

  The piece in his hand could satisfy more than one, so he shared it with his peers. They took the meat with reverence, putting it in the tip of their tongues then covering it with their lips to probe its flavor.

  “You’re Angeline, right? I know from the pictures. Thank you for greeting us so well,” the newcomer man said.

  “You can have more, if you wish, as much more as you want.” Angeline closed her box then opened it again, revealing a fruit salad inside.

  “What is this? Where did you find this box?”

  “It was given to me in this land. Now we have no time to lose, we must get back to Earth before it spins away from us. We don’t need to come here to have a good world. We can make it work in there.”

  “But we just got here!”

  “I know. Don’t you want to head home, though? A new home, where you can always be satisfied?”

  The man looked around himself, meeting his peers’ eyes staring at him. He raised his eyebrows, pressing his lips. Nobody answered nor gave directions, waiting for him to speak, which he couldn’t do.

  His mother dragged a heavy bag on the ground, his brother carried an enormous backpack, his wife held their young child in her arms, his father pulled a cart with housewares.

  “Get back... In a way, I’d like that. I just don’t know what to do. We touched down a few minutes ago,” the man said, pouting his lips.

  “Yeah, it’s no time to get back. It’s time to move forward,” his mother said, puckering her thick brows.

  “I understand your feelings. I came here before you, and for the same reason, believe me. But now... What is moving forward? What else do we need that we can’t find inside this box?” Angeline rose the cornucopia to the family's eyes.

  “You think we’re here for food? Ha, no, you don’t understand a thing of why we’re here.” The mother turned her face away from Angeline.

  “I’m not giving you food. I’m giving you safety. If you know you’re never going to risk starvation, doesn’t that change your perspectives in life? Why look for honey when you have more than it can give you in front of you?”

  “She’s right, ma. Look at this place, it’s a big desert. Not even plants to give us shadow. How can it give us a better life?” the man said.

  “We had nothing back home. Anything they get to us is better,” the mother said.

  “With me, you can have home and everything. Let’s get back, please. We can make a better place together,” Angeline said.

  “I’m in. The baby will like it more,” the wife said.

  “This Angeline girl speaks sense. Ellen, drop the bitterness, she wants to help, yeah? We should talk to the Smiths and the Gomez to follow us back,” the father said.

  Angeline nodded and followed them to the other families. She opened her box and offered them food, making four varieties to enrich their tastes and convince them of abundance. Above them, Terra’s col.loc moved slowly, people still crossing from one world to another, falling like rain by the side of an expecting crowd.

  It would increase its speed in less than one hour, hurrying up to catch the pace of its spin. If they had to get back before the next encounter, they had little time to do so.

  “Her group is swelling, I can’t believe it,” Colin said.

  “Oh, you can. She’s a charming person, isn’t she? Others can love her like you do,” Dalana said, spinning around herself at every encounter with a new friend of Angeline.

  “Yes, she’s amazing. But these people are coming here with a purpose, a strong one. They shouldn’t turn around so easily.”

  “Maybe the purpose wasn’t that strong. In my opinion, they only took the mission because they lacked things at home.”

  “Angeline’s only got a box of food! How can it convince people of abundance?” Colin shrugged with hands spread wide on his sides.

  “Never underestimate a box of infinite food, Colin. She’ll make all these people turn around and get back to Terra, then she’ll change your world, you’ll see.”

  “You’re responsible for it, Dalana, you are really a mean friend.”

  “Not mean, not at all. Angeline’s never been happier since you created her, don’t you agree?”

  “It doesn’t matter. The colonization is more important at this moment, it can’t stop. I have to take Terra everywhere so that Mae can hear about me and find me.”

  An idea crossed Colin’s mind, a mix of Dalana’s promises of abundance with Terra’s inventiveness and limitations. He imagined big trucks, huge platforms on wheels, reminiscent of mining machines, with steering cabins capable of fitting up to five people, and a small oasis on its load.

  Trees, water, dirt, a few chickens and insects, some nature to make the absolute desert of the alien col.loc more tolerable. Powered by sunlight, battery-charged, smart machines. He imagined ten such trucks, each with small variations in their own ecosystem, and he wished for them. They showed up amidst the falling people, between free spaces.

  “Watch out!” people screamed, fearing those machines' size.

  “Who sent these trucks? They’re perfect!”

  “It was Laura, it can only be her! Oh, she’s a saint indeed.”

  Among the rumors, people surrounded the big trucks and looked for stairs leading up to their backs. Some spoke of exploring the tiny chunks of nature carried on top of their wheels.

  “Do you think those are real trees?”

  “It looks so, right? It’s thick with earth, I’m sure it’s all natural.”

  “And who’s gonna drive it? I mean, I can do it, if nobody else is interested...”

  “We’ll see to that. It’ll be a dangerous ride, don’t forget that.”

  They climbed the truck, meeting pristine water under birchwood. Birds sang and flew from tree to tree, from truck to truck. Dark soil, moistened, refreshed bare feet, penetrated the people’s shoes with the smell of dirt.

  “Look at all this shadow... We don’t have to worry anymore.”

  “We are saved, that’s what! Tents would never give us what we have here, now things are good for real.”

  “Always trust Laura.”

  “Yeah, always trust Laura. She wants our salvation.”

  Two trucks away from that one, a person entered the steering cabin and tested the machine. It drove ahead without noise, propelled by an electric engine created by Colin that worked on magic, for the complexities of energy puzzled him in its details. The truck advanced on the high plateau that served as landing site, and stopped before the steep incline leading to the land.

  “Ok, that’s an interesting sight, I’ll give you that.” Dalana put her hands in her fron
t pocket.

  “I know, right. Now they won’t fall for your schemes as easily.” Colin kept an eye on Angeline’s growing number of followers.

  “Because of ambulant oasis? They just fled from a huge planet, where they had vast landscapes to enjoy. They’re not here because of Terra’s nature.”

  “Sure not, but they’ll stay because of it.”

  “They came looking for salvation, fearing hell. My oasis was too mysterious, nobody knew how it showed up there or why. So, they feared it and followed Laura’s orders. Now it’s different, though. It’s Angeline who’s offering them a new life, not the devil.”

  “What if they turn her into the devil?” Colin put a hand on his chest.

  “Then we’ll either help her or root for her. Either way, she’s offering the end of survival. Why is abundance the work of evil, and not the opposite? Terra’s philosophies and morals had some interesting takes, I must say so, but, as a human, very few of it ever seemed to fit me.”

  “We had Utopians as well...” Colin watched Angeline speak with people who no longer listened to her, marveled as they were by the trucks.

  “You sure did! And do you know why you had them?” Dalana took her hands out of the pocket and used her fingers to curl up her curly black hair.

  “Oh... Oh, no way, not you, are you serious? Could Creators do that?”

  “Of course we did! We couldn’t be seen, but we could interfere if we wanted to. I helped inspiring a few ideas in your world, a few that even served as basis for revolutions, you know.”

  “I know. Millions of people killed by your ideas, because of a better future that was stupid and would never work. Hell is riddled with good intentions, they always say. And despite your mistakes, you keep doing it.” Colin gave her a stern look.

  “It didn’t have to be that way... People didn’t have to die.” Dalana jumped one feet after the other, imaginary coal stones burning under her.

  Angeline opened her cornucopia and distributed food to the crowds still falling from the sky. They took what she had and didn’t stay to hear her or her followers speak. Instead, they ran to the trucks, dying to occupy those engineering marvels, the places where they would build their new home. Angeline’s words fell flat in front of the trucks, offering an abundance that held little power against the chance of exploring new lands on the backs of monsters.

  After an explosion in the sky came the softest landing of them all. A hovering vehicle blowing its jets down, smoothing the fall even more than the col.locs’ own gravity shifts. Once on the ground, it revealed its shape, an army tank adapted for traveling through the gap between worlds without any damage from impact. Its bulky shape and caterpillar track pressed the rubbery floor, but little compared to the monster trucks created by Colin. Its weight exerted itself by its military nature.

  “Are they here to wage war? War against what, it makes no sense,” Dalana said, the blank in her eyes widened to the extreme.

  “Wait, that doesn’t mean anything. It’s just a good vehicle for the crazy landscape they’ll find here.” Colin patted her shoulder.

  “Too innocent a guess, in my opinion.”

  The tank’s hatch opened, with a silent crowd gathered around it, brother poking brother with the excitement of being part of an army. From inside it, the stern frame of Laura, her short black hair, her small Eastern eyes, her thick dark eye brows, her grave face smiled and spoke. Whispers vibrated through the air in waves, filling the area with an ocean of secrets, which soon overflowed into a complete storm, screams, loud words, cheering.

  “She’s here to lead us!”

  “The prophet is here! The truth is with the just!”

  “Laura, Laura! I’ll die for you, oh, holy one, I’m here for salvation!”

  “I am one like you, my dear ones,” Laura said, raising her hands. “We will take the word of our world to the alien peoples, and with it save both our world and theirs. Stay close and we won’t get lost, either physically or spiritually. We brought everything we need here.”

  She left the tank to step on the ground. Two strong men in blue tunics took her a tripod with a thick mast and a few folded antennas on it. Laura helped installing it on the ground, surrounded by the curious people who wanted to play a part in the events. Her blue-dressed crew brought the batteries and two solar panels, which they connected to the tripod. A few buttons pressed later and the antennas opened.

  “We’ll ride together, but eventually we’ll have to split. This is our meeting point, our zero. From here we can generate coordinates and find our way back, or guide ourselves in this place. Look in the trucks you brought down with you and you’ll find a few more arrays like this. We should install one every five days on our way. For the villages we find, we have smaller locators,” Laura said.

  “When will we go?” they asked.

  Laura looked at her crew, nodding at them, and they produced a small telescope from one of their bags. They placed it on the ground and invited her to it. She bent in front of its minor lens, while on her mouth she held a radio speaker.

  “The transition is complete, do you confirm? Over.”

  “It’s confirmed, ma’am. We’re on your watch. Over.”

  The ones closer to Laura turned around to face the crowd with arms raised.

  “We’re good to go, all on your trucks!”

  “It’s time to move, Laura will lead us!”

  Laura entered her tank, leaving the hatch opened. The vehicle moved ahead with the wind blowing through her hair strands, caressing her soft face. Her presence in front of the advancing caravan motivated the pilgrims and made them cheer at every new truck moving. Her chest became the beacon of their quest on the alien world.

  One monster truck ran faster than all the others, faster even than Laura’s tank. It overtook the front line and moved sideways against the tank. Once it assumed the leading position, its red lights shone. It started to brake, forcing everybody behind it to do the same.

  The caravan came to a standstill. Laura tilted her head, fixing her gaze at the truck's back. People came down from the oasis, some others came down from the driver’s seat. One carried a box.

  “It’s still time to get back to Earth,” Angeline yelled, backed by ten remaining followers. “You are sending these people to look for something that will never please them enough. If we get back, look here, this is the key for a better world. We have abundance.”

  She opened her box and took baked red salmon from inside, offering it to the man by her side. She closed the box and opened it again, giving a fruit salad to a woman.

  “You want to stop us with the Devil’s work, young lady?” Laura said, putting a microphone in front of her mouth, her voice echoing over the land with the help of the speakers installed in her tank and in the trucks. “We’ve had this on Earth once, I don’t know if you remember it. Oasis in which people lost themselves in the absence of need. By their own doing? No, by magic, like that box of yours. It’s evil spinning his web of temptation, he’s always on the look for our weakness. Heaven wants work done, it wants us to deserve its blessings. Nothing comes for free in this world.”

  “That’s wrong. We can make it be good for us. Work is not what you think it—” Angeline said at the top of her lungs, her voice dying in near silence, unable to reach Laura’s microphone.

  “You are here to bring us temptation. You are the Devil incarnated. We won’t listen to you, we won’t let you stop our mission of salvation. She, the white woman with the black wavy hair, the one with the box of magic food, my dear ones. She’s evil. I’ll welcome her to join our expedition, to show mercy and give her the chance to abandon illusion. But give her no trust, all of you, for the danger she brings is the damnation of your souls,” Laura said. “Move on, everybody, straight ahead.”

  Laura’s tank accelerated, dodging Angeline’s monster truck. The rest went together, aiming their wheels at the approaching horizon. The col.locs’ encounter ended. The high plateau over which they rested lost
its swell, getting closer to the flat lands around. The caravan marched.

  ∙ 18 ∙ Prophets

  One by one, the monster trucks, the regular trucks and Laura’s tank came to a halt. Fourteen straight hours spinning their wheels, it was past the time their engines took some rest.

  “Just make them not need to cool down, you can do it,” Dalana said, from on the top of Angeline’s oasis truck.

  “Aren’t they on a journey against magic? No, they have to do it the old-fashioned way,” Colin said.

  “Well, if I remember a few things correctly from Terra’s ways, you should have thought better about the matter of spare parts here then. What are they going to do in case of mechanical problems?”

  “Don’t worry, it’s coming their way. I told Laura about this.” Colin stared at the horizon behind the trees of his refuge.

  Two monster trucks showed up in the distance, loaded not with oasis, but with entire warehouses. Pilgrims left their vehicles, they got down to the ground, most carrying only small bags. They stayed quiet while the trucks approached, silence fading as the engines cried to bring them more parts.

  At their arrival, they stopped dead. Nobody drove them, automated as they were, guided by the caravan's beacons. They had stairs hanging from their sides, ready to house technicians and curious people in their backs.

  “Hey, Lance, go check them out. I want an inventory in my hands before we get ready to roll again,” Laura said, walking among the crowd. “While you do that, we’ll spend a little time in prayer. My dear ones, I invite you to join me. Let’s all ask our lord and savior for more strength in this mission. Our salvation depends on our connection to him.”

  “Praise be, Laura. That’s all we need,” someone said, quivering his lips.

  “Glory to heavens, we’re here to make Paradise come,” another one said.