"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 were 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.