It was well that he had given the warning, because the wagon shifted and seemed to be falling. But Burgess prevented himself from making a blast of air to right himself. In a moment the wagon found a new equilibrium, and moved on forward. It was on top of the wall. Darius heaved, making an adjustment to the rear wheels, and then the motion stopped.
Burgess was now on the wall, off the end of the ramp. Seqiro and Colene were beyond him. Darius and Nona were behind him, also on the wall, which was now covered by wood panels. But how were they going to move the ramp? It was too big and heavy for them to lift from their awkward position on the wall.
“You watch for enemy action, Nona,” Darius said. “I’m going to conjure the ramp to the other side.”
Darius held something in his hand. It looked like a tiny man. He stepped onto the ramp, and lay down on it. Then he moved the little figure he held.
The ramp disappeared. So did Darius.
Then his voice came from near the wall, beyond Colene. “It’s secure. Lead him down.” What had happened? Without direct contact with the man, Burgess could not tell.
The horse resumed motion. Burgess followed, borne along on his wagon. Then Darius was there, quickly updating by touching a contact point, then helping the wheels over the ridge. “It’s clear, Nona!” he called. “Get off the wall!”
The wall disappeared. They had crossed into the next Mode. Now they were coming down a ramp from nowhere. The remaining stones in the box were gone, as was the sand; it was completely empty.
Nona appeared, floating beside the wagon. “I don’t think they could do the same kind of magic,” she said, touching a contact point. “That’s why they used the wall and dogs. But I’m sure they were dangerous. They were bringing up some kind of device.”
“Maybe a cannon!” Colene said. “It’s a good thing we got out of there.”
“A cannon?” Nona was as perplexed as Burgess was. To understand this he needed direct contact with Colene.
Colene made a mental picture of a huge metal tube, which Nona received and relayed to Burgess. From that tube flew an object like a giant cup with a sealed, pointed front, spinning as it flew. It crashed into a mountain, and the mountain became a ball of flame.
Burgess still wasn’t sure what a cannon was, but concluded that he did not want to encounter one. It seemed like an enormous outtrunk with no intrunk, primed with stones that exploded.
They reached the base of the ramp. Then Nona used her magic to reduce it slowly to a size she could carry in her hand. She also reduced the wagon, so that Burgess did not have to be lifted off; he floated off when it was low enough.
“How did you move that ramp?” Nona inquired of Darius. “I thought you conjured only people.”
“I conjure living creatures and the things they carry,” he said. “Otherwise I would arrive naked when I conjure myself. In this case I had my icon embrace a sliver of wood representing the ramp, and then I embraced the real ramp myself. So when I activated the icon and moved it, the ramp moved with me. But this is a tricky, fatiguing device, and I wouldn’t care to do it in other than an emergency.”
Burgess realized that there was still much he had to know about these aliens. He hardly grasped what Darius had done, except that it was magic akin to Nona’s, and that it had enabled them to cross the wall before the Mode creatures had overwhelmed them.
“Let’s find a place to camp,” Colene suggested. “I’ve had enough strenuous escapes for today.” Burgess agreed.
They moved on through the Modes of the Virtual Mode. Burgess followed Colene’s thoughts as they traveled. They saw other walls, but none got in their way. The one had just happened to be in a position that blocked them. Probably the creatures of that Mode had not realized that the party was foreign to that Mode. The wall must have been part of a prison complex, or possibly the border of a military zone.
They crossed a low, grassy hill and a river came into sight. It looked broad and deep. Along it were animals, standing in fields. Those were probably horses or cows, Colene thought.
“Neither,” Seqiro responded with his thought. “Their minds are other. But they are passive, and will not bother us. We can ignore them.”
“That’s good,” Colene said. “I wouldn’t want to meet up with your kind. No offense, horsefoot.”
“My kind would be dangerous.”
“Yeah.”
The animals appeared and disappeared with each boundary crossing, but the river remained constant, shifting only in minor detail. They approached it, and finally stood at its bank. It seemed to have two channels, which interwove. The water was clear, and red creatures Colene thought of as fish were visible. “Are those safe? I mean, can we ignore them too, and go wading?”
Seqiro’s mind reached for the minds of the fish. “No. They are what you call piranha, or similar.”
“So much for sweet nature!” Colene exclaimed, laughing. Her mind clarified that piranha were vicious predatory fish, much like the shears of Shale or the dogs of the walled Mode, but in the water.
“Is that an island?” Nona inquired, peering across the water.
“It seems to be,” Darius agreed. “It looks uninhabited.”
“Why don’t we cross to that island?” Colene suggested. “Then maybe nothing will bother us.”
That appealed to Burgess, and to the others. They were all tired of having to be constantly alert for weird menaces.
Nona got ready to expand the wagon into a boat. But Colene had an idea. “See if you can make those fish afraid of us, Seqiro. Then maybe we can safely swim across.”
The horse focused on the fish. Even without contact, Burgess felt the unease of fear. After a while the fish swam away. Burgess floated out on the water, and found no fish near. He dipped his intrunk and took in water, finding it sweet.
“Hey, you can’t have all the fun!” Colene cried. She got out of her clothes, waded into the water, bent down, swept her hand across the surface, and splashed at Burgess.
Even without contact, he understood her intent. She was pretending to attack him, in what in her thoughts was a game. This was one of the intriguing alien concepts he was learning. So he aimed his outtrunk and splashed her back, but without force.
“Oh, yeah, squirtface? Take that!” She splashed him harder. He responded by splashing her harder, but still not with force enough to hurt. That was important.
Then the others removed their clothing too, and waded in, splashing. Soon they were all making such a commotion that the fish should have been frightened away even without the fear the horse was sending them.
Burgess became aware of a peculiar emotion. Then Nona touched him, and clarified what it was: fun. He was having fun. They all were. It was a pleasant experience.
Then he floated and they swam across the river to the island. The Modes changed several times, and the horse had to refocus each time to put fear in the fish, but otherwise there was no difficulty. When they reached the island it was still uninhabited, and still guarded by vicious fish. That was ideal.
They had their evening meal and made a shelter. They decided that this night they would not have to keep guard, because it was unlikely that anything would intrude on this island. In any event, a Mode boundary traversed the length of the island, so they could quickly cross it if they needed to. They felt as safe as it was possible to feel, on the Virtual Mode.
Burgess, despite the awkwardness this travel through hills and forests entailed, and the problems occasioned by organized alien species, was coming to like it here.
CHAPTER 7—CHAOS
COLENE woke refreshed. The past two days of travel had been wearing, but they had succeeded in getting out of Shale and most of the way to Julia, and maybe two more days would bring them to Darius’ home Mode. If they were going in the right direction. She suddenly realized that they might not be, because they had come from Julia to reach Provos’ Mode, and that had been replaced by Shale. They should have gone the other way to reach Darius. This direction might be leading back to Earth. If the arrangement of the anchors was the same. There was no guarantee of that, because everything changed when an anchor did. So they would just have to keep on traveling, and if Darius wasn’t the next anchor, well, maybe it was for the best. Because she was in the throes of an emotional impasse. She loved Darius and Seqiro, but she also liked Nona, and Burgess too; they were all good folk. She didn’t want to give any of them up.