Fallen World Read online

  Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

  Seth turned to the rock.

  “Shut up! I’m trying to think!” and he drew the four walls came closer together to stop it from moving around so much.

  Seth the noticed the goo squirt from the opening at the top of the four walls as its prison became too small.

  This creature seems to be made of liquid, so any blow from something solid won’t do anything, but I seem to be able to reshape it. What if I could shape it into something harmless, he asked himself. On top of the four walls where it had volcanoed out of its temporary prison, Seth saw the liquid gathering to begin forming a new creature. He summoned a huge glass globe around the beast. The globe quickly contracted around the thing. As it started to run out of room inside the ball, it started to take the same form as the globe itself. Seth shrank the globe until there was just the tiniest bubble of air inside; the rest was now metallic goo. The bubble of air disappeared and reappeared at the same frequency as the creature’s earlier thumping, but now just made a ticking noise. Seth made the globe a little bit smaller until not even the bubble of air could be seen, nor the tick heard.

  Finally, Seth thought, and turned to give a thumbs up to Red, but Seth had no idea where the Restyard was anymore. He spun in a circle, his thumb held up proudly, knowing Red would see it somehow. He looked at the silver globe that was once a formidable opponent, and extracted a tiny sample of the goo by opening a hole in the glass for a fraction of a second. He encompassed the small sample in another small globe, put it in his pocket, and headed towards his fallen segment now resting in the dirt.

  As the underside of each segment of Swevender was pointed, the surface on which Seth’s small cottage resided was now at a 45-degree angle. He was sure the inside of his house was a mess — well, more of a mess than before. The small pools of algae-filled water had all drained away and a lot of dirt had tumbled over the edge of his segment. Seth groaned at the idea of cleaning all of this up. However, he didn’t want to start using his new matter manipulation abilities for gardening; this would defeat the purpose of gardening. The inside of his house was a different matter. That was finally going to be clean, now that it would be so easy.

  Seth climbed up onto his small piece of Swevender. He thought about casting the three spells from Io, Kern and Marsa to begin flying up into the clouds again. Seth felt more at home somewhere up high, even after his year on the Restyard’s solid ground. He always liked climbing the three trees of his small ‘forest’ when he was younger, and floating up high in the clouds just felt right. But Seth didn’t know the spells well enough. But maybe he had learned enough to figure out a different solution — he just needed to do so before another gooey monster showed up.

  He would need a material in abundance, easily acquired and able to keep his segment afloat. Seth took a deep breath and from the corner of his eye noticed the slight movement of his blonde whiskers. He knew his answer immediately. Air was always available, and used correctly it could keep his segment afloat no problem. One of the things Seth had seen through the bubble Red had identified as a ‘tornado’, and said it was extremely powerful. The world they had been on when he saw the tornado was one of the most colourful he had ever seen. Nothing lived there, but the one second that Seth had to witness the world revealed its multicoloured sky with pink lightning everywhere. The sky was thick with clouds, constantly swirling with the complex airflow. Slithering from the clouds in several areas were towers of wind, spinning at unthinkable speeds.

  In his mind, Seth pictured his segment floating atop an enormous, writhing grey snake of wind, reaching into the clouds. He raised both his hands and the segment started to lift from the ground. Slowly Seth was getting closer and closer to the clouds above. He was going to blow everyone’s mind back home — to the citizens of Swevender, outside the Restyard’s magic sphere, the descent of their city had happened only ten minutes ago.

  Seth’s segment tilted forwards, then backwards, then left; Seth had lost control. He slowly lowered the segment again and it started to stabilise. He realised he would need some practice before he could summon a tornado strong enough to get back up to Swevender’s altitude. At least he was out of harm’s way, so he didn’t have to be worried about long, bony-armed monsters attacking him anymore.

  There were many clouds in the sky now. Seth looked up and tried to guess which one was Swevender, but there was no clue which it was. The clouds were all moving quite fast so it was possible Seth could no longer even see the cloud cradling the central segment of his home. He was a upset about it, but had had a year to deal with the loss of his home already. And he still had his part of Swevender, broken but not lost. Eventually he will be able to raise himself to the same height as the city. He wondered if there was anyone else who wasn’t on the central segment when it all began to fall. Seth kept his eyes peeled as he cruised along on his small tornado, happy with himself for thinking of a way to take his small piece of home on his new adventure.

  ***

  Seth spent the next few weeks floating a hundred metres from the ground on his little piece of Swevender, exploring the barren landscape. When Seth was in the Restyard, Red had spoken of a great shockwave that was responsible for destroying the whole planet, and Swevender along with it. Being so far above the main force of the shockwave protected Swevender from complete obliteration, but it was certainly the reason the cohesion of the city failed. The shockwave most likely came from the one or both of the two element binders — either in an experiment or a fight, according to Red. He had seen the sky open up as massive chunks of moon and mountain rained down, flattening the landscape. He tried his best to observe the whole calamity from where the shockwave originated. At one point he saw something like a giant propellor remove the top of a mountain, but the rest of the interaction was either hidden beyond the horizon or reduced to indistinguishable dots zipping back and forth like duelling mosquitoes.

  The two element binders did not get along very well for a long time now, Red said. His master was Iselle. She had a very volatile temperament but was a brilliant element binder. It seemed likely to him that she had once been known as Marsa, one of the conjurers responsible for creating Swevender. The other only element binder that Red had known of was a male called Cobus. He was also a brilliant mind but Red was never so close to him to witness how he applied it. Red never remembered any third element binder being present.

  Anything left alive on the surface of the planet was most likely created by the two element binders, otherwise it would not be sturdy enough to survive the shockwave. The creature Seth had encountered was most likely one such creation, explaining its survival and bizarrely durable fluid nature.

  The small glass bauble containing the creature’s gooey essence started making a small tapping noise. Seth looked at it and noticed that it was now half full, whereas before the small bead had been pure silver. At Swevender University, Seth learned about the expansion and contraction of materials due to temperature. As something got colder it would shrink, sometimes significantly, or sometimes barely unnoticeably, depending on the material’s properties. The opposite was true for materials being warmed up; lead, he remembered, had some of the most significant expansion and contraction rates known, and was a material rarely found on Swevender. Water was the one exception to this rule. As it got colder it the vapour condensed into a fluid, but grew bigger again as the liquid further transformed into ice. This unique reaction to temperature gave the residents of Swevender extra reverence for their most holy element.

  Seth looked at the ticking silvery bead and realised the creature back on the planet’s surface would most likely escape if it also contracted at his sample’s rate. Any drop in temperature could provide the gooey creature with enough room to swing its giant arms and smash its way out of its crystal prison. Seth reminded himself that he was safe and sound, up high on his small concrete platform, and needn’t worry anymore.

  The garden on his segment was now back to norm
al, but the water was now crystal clear. Seth had managed to save a lot of his vegetable garden, making sure he had something to eat. Seth allowed an exception for the use of his abilities when it came to fruits and vegetables. He used them freely to create some of the tastiest crops he had ever grown. The inside of his house was also much cleaner now, but there was still one corner where all the mess had been pushed; Seth didn’t want to throw anything away for fear that it would contain a material he could use to his advantage someday. Rather than actively searching the pile for useful samples during his free time, he preferred to avoid the situation. His new abilities made it extremely easy to create — like a whole extra floor on his house, giving Seth more room to create a new mess.

  In the beginning Seth felt almost omnipotent thanks to his new found abilities, but his fight with the liquid metal beast quickly made him realise there was much more to learn. Now Seth was mostly just feeling lonely. He hadn’t seen anybody for weeks now, nor any movement on the world beneath him since his descent from Swevender. So Seth tried to occupy himself by honing his abilities. During the day he would sail his ship across the landscape atop a mini tornado — hopefully in the right direction. He used the sun as his guide. During the night he would dock his concrete ship on a smooth, towering column of concrete almost two kilometres high. Seth found it hard to breathe at this altitude and had to create a small bubble around his home for the night to provide himself with enough oxygen. There was clearly more to raising his small ship up to its original altitude than he initially thought.

  It was getting dark now, so Seth decided to park his ship on its concrete tower for the night. He decided to test out the sample of the creature before getting some sleep. He had neatly placed the small bead containing the creature’s essence into a ring of silver. He held up his hand and focused on using this essence as a source of energy. He began sweating a little from the intensity of his concentration. Suddenly the world around Seth seemed to be getting further and further away. Within seconds he was a few centimetres from the ground, then his surroundings turned dark, and he felt himself falling, tumbling in nothingness.

  “Why does this keep happening to me?” shouted Seth as he fell into oblivion.

  Chapter 4

  Giant blue spheres filled the surrounding darkness. There were hundreds, as far as the eye could see. The texture of each sphere was so smooth they looked unreal. The light was so low that the huge globes almost looked like flat circles, only defined by their movement upwards. Between some of the orbs, lightning could be seen snaking around as if it was struggling to break free from confinement. Everything was getting closer and increasing in size — smaller creatures became visible on the surfaces of the great globes. Each one was a bipedal creature, with two arms and two legs, but also made up of globes of varying colours. Some orbs were extremely rich in colour with sapphire and ruby reds dancing across their surfaces, while others were a plain grey with delicate imperfections.

  The orbs actually resembled planets, something Seth had learned about inside the Restyard that had intrigued him greatly. According to Red, people lived on planets — in fact, Seth lived on a city floating above a planet. Seth had found it hard to understand a planet’s spherical nature, since his short experience on the planet gave the impression it was flat. For him, the general rule was “what goes up, must come down”. Surely if everyone lived on a ball, then half of them would be hanging on for dear life at all times... But Seth learned that planets were absolutely humongous, beyond his comprehension — but these creatures were made from them! These ones looked almost as tall as Seth.

  Each creature was made from ten planets. The central sphere of each was at least double the size of its adjacent planets and resembled a sun. The legs of the being were each made from two planets, sticking out from the bottom of the central globe. The two arms were also made from two planetoids, but they were sticking out from the side of the central globe. One last sphere on top gave the idea of a head on a big round body. These strange beings were slowly moving along the surface of each tremendous blue orb, without walking or really moving their bodies at all, just slowly gliding along in a petite, choreographed ballet.

  Seth had been so engrossed in observing his surreal environment, he realised he hadn’t taken a breath for quite some time. He found his attempt to breathe in to be ineffective. Seth tried again, but still nothing. There did seem to be a lack of wind despite Seth continuing plunge, so he surmised there was no air in this place — wherever he was. He would need to make an air bubble like the one he used to sleep at altitude. Seth looked around vainly for oxygen.

  He didn’t know how much air was left in his lungs, so he knew he had to solve this problem soon. But not much air left in his lungs meant there was still some. Seth took a risk and breathed out what could be his last breath. He held his hand in front of his mouth to give him some perception of the breath, then manifested more air in his immediate vicinity.

  Seth tried breathing in and found it wasn’t quite the right proportion of oxygen; he was able to breathe again but each breath was getting increasingly difficult. Beneath him a colossal blue surface was coming towards him, now at an accelerated rate. Seth used his ring with a water-filled bead as the catalyst for creating a small propeller beneath, slowing his descent. It was hard to tell how close the smooth surface was — except for the small being on the surface now growing larger. Seth felt like he was finally falling at a safe speed when he hit the ground suddenly, knocking precious air out of his lungs.

  Seth stood up and saw the strange being, made of planets, skating across the surface towards him. He wasn’t sure what had just happened. It seemed like the sample of the gooey monster had teleported him to another universe. Nothing looked familiar here and the lack of oxygen made it seem like nothing alive was supposed to be here either, unless it was one of these strange planet people. Most of the beings gliding along the surrounding blue surface had an incredibly bright central section and could be seen from very far away. Seth reached out to the one approaching him now and felt intense warmth coming from the bright burning centre of the being. He decided against touching it due to the fact that it resembled a small sun, which didn’t have a reputation for rewarding people for physical contact.

  “Hello, I’m sorry, but where exactly are we?” Seth asked the approaching being, it froze suddenly a few metres away from him and slowly turned towards him, but said nothing. Seth attempted some more verbal interactions with the ball being, but it remained silent as it became stationary. Seth sighed and thought he would have to teleport again. Then hopefully he could get a bearing on where he was… He looked at the ring on his finger containing the metallic ooze and concentrated on the small bead once more. Behind the bead, he noticed that one of the globes of the catatonic ball being was different from the rest: it had brilliant blues and greens scattered across its surface. Above those small islands of colour, white spiralling smoke spread in a flat layer just above the main surface of the globe and cast a small shadow onto its surface. A stripe in the middle of the planet was the most colourful area, while the side closest to the ‘sun’ of the being’s central sphere was bathed in bright light. The opposite side was almost pitch black. Seth looked back at the silver bead on his finger, returned to concentrating and once again his surroundings suddenly changed.

  He was falling again, this time towards a scene that looked more familiar to him. The ground was covered in long, green grass, and tall twisted trees sporadically sprouted up across its surface. Seth gasped, and found his breathing felt normal now; apparently, he had teleported to a much less hostile environment. It reminded him a bit of Swevender, with its emerald grass and the occasional tree. With ample air around him, Seth was able to manipulate the air flow to lower himself steadily to the ground. He noticed he was having some difficulty with the manipulation and hit the ground just a little too fast, leaving him short of breath.

  He took in his surroundings: all the trees around him had a dark, almost bl
ack bark covering their trunks. Only a few small branches were sticking out below the fifty metre level, while higher up the tree’s growth thickened significantly, blocking any sun from reaching the ground directly below. Each tree had a bare dirt surface around its base with only a few small green sprouts poking up. However, the grass beyond the trees’ shadows was extremely thick and would prove difficult to navigate. Seth breathed in deeply through his nose, then summoned his water scope and held it up to inspect the distant surroundings. He saw an extremely odd structure jutting out of the ground higher than any of the trees around it, its form clearly not natural and therefore indicating some kind of civilisation. The structure was a few kilometres away. Seth started walking in its direction, hoping it wasn’t populated by non-responsive planetoid beings.

  Halfway to the building-shaped object, Seth had begun travelling via sharp bursts of air allowing him to make huge leaps through the air when the grass became irritating to walk through. Plus, he was sure he had seen some strange creatures slipping between the blades of grass earlier... As he travelled, he noticed again that his powers felt weaker, or something was hindering them, making flying rather difficult. The faster he went, the less control Seth had over the surrounding air. Seth lost control and tumbled a few times. He attempted to lift himself with air again after a small stumble, but now there was not even enough power to lift him. Seth was puzzled. He tried creating a propeller of water using his ring, which seemed to work fine, so Seth continued forward in this manner. He did reflect on how he should try not to let his abilities make him lazy, but in this case it was a matter of safety and time, he justified.