There were abnormalities everywhere. Strange accents and harmonies and screeching pitches that vibrated in her head, destroying her sense of placement. Outside the doors was a world of sound Anise hadn't been prepared for, and overwhelmed but brave, she explored this foreign city of music.
The clothes that hung off her small body felt constricting. Both sleeves coiled around her arms like snakes, slipping past all of her warm fingertips. Brisk air rode up bare legs and played with the material of her flimsy skirt.
Anise slowed to a stop at the sound of music, of a variety she'd never heard before. Crashing sounds, low thumping, high whines. What was it? To her left, something screamed past her, and she let out a cry, backing into someone passing in the opposite direction. Lost. She was lost.
Tears stung at the corners of her eyes as she made her way toward silence. It was eerie quiet, and a hollow crash resounded, echoed as she settled her back into something hard. A wall? The material was strange.
Everything was strange.
One tear skid down her olive cheek, and she didn't have the will to wipe it away.
Yet with the clamorous cars and people aside, the day was bright and mild and clear. Among the fervent steps of the Vesperians on the sidewalks, one was unhurried, even and relaxed. He was a tall dark man, clad in modern (though maybe not so) casual clothes: a gray hoodie, a loose white t-shirt and dark jeans. He seemed unrelated to any sort of subculture and unobtrusive. The archaeologist strolled through the busy sidewalk, adjusting the worn, brown leather messenger bag slung over his back and thumbing a audio recorder in his hoodie pocket. He'd just left his apartment to go and read at the small cafe a few blocks down, listen to his notes from the previous week and sip a warm coffee.
He pressed play and his own voice mumbled into his ears. "Another anachronistic reaction today in patient 3933. Extreme sensitivity to all eras post 1895. I've narrowed down--."
He paused his recording, rewound, and in the midst of the audio static, caught sight of something shaking and billowy. Something like a flower the warm-colored fabric shifting around her. Then he saw eyes, large as a does awash with pain...no, fear. No, a girl. Cyrus stopped in his track. Yes, she looked fearful, something that stirred a cue for him to take action. He quickly made his way near her, taking care not to startle her as she seemed to be quite upset.
"Miss? Miss are you okay," he asked, curious and worried.
She heard his approaching footsteps before his voice, and Anise threw her eyes upward, lashes thick and wet. Caught, in the middle of crying. Shame spreading through her heart, the girl pressed her fingers to her cheeks, smearing wetness.
"Please, do not..." But do not what? Do not tell who, do not say what? Even she didn't know.
What embarrassment.
The man's instinct was to touch her, hold her, make sure she was okay but he restrained himself.
"What's is wrong? Are you sick? H-has someone done something to you?" He waited intently, watching her with careful anticipation and ready to act if she requested anything of him. Through his patient wait to aid her, he found himself examining the girl, guessing her race and origin. Information was an occupation. Yet he found himself looking at her with more than just a goal to obtain surface information. No, there was a lapidary intrigue to the shaking woman.
He gave an anxious huff and leaned forward just a few inches more. "What is your name?"
Had she been able to see, Anise might have retreated from the invasive movement alone, but his voice was suddenly closer, and she gasped, quietly. In her chest, her heart picked up speed.
"It... is Anise. And I am not sick."
Only in the mind, with grief.
The boy made sure to keep as still as possible, slightly confused at how she still never quite looked at him. She was like a frightened ibex, flighty and cautious.
He smiled at her name, nodded and held his hand out to her, still ignorant to her affliction. "I am Cyrus. Cyrus Rostam. Why--" He insecurely let his hand drop a little as it wasn't taken quick enough. "Why are you crying, Anise?"
He frowned at the obvious lie, sighing diffidently. "Okay then, are you lost? Do you need something?" He was suddenly struck by the distance of her stare and the way she was touching the wall, feeling. Sensing. Touch. He stiffened in surprise, slightly annoyed at his ignorance. Impulsively he put a handy docilely on her shoulder. Anchoring and firm. Perhaps it would help gain a perspective on her position, calm her. Maybe.
"Look, lets get you standing," he said softly but didn't move to follow, instead waiting to make sure she wasn't going to scurry away even more than she was trying to now.
Unsurprisingly, Anise did stiffen, but she made no move to push him away or retreat. She was used to touches, professional and intimate. Sometimes, there was no distinction. But she said nothing, angling her damp face away from Cyrus but allowing him to help her to her feet.
She had no shame in that. Only in crying so openly in front of someone.
The man gingerly brought her to her feet, an arm wrapped around her while his other held her shoulder closest to him. She was tucked perfectly in the curve of his chest. She fit so perfectly he almost didn't want to let her go.
"Anise, where were you headed to? Perhaps...I could take you there?" He had a definite sense of duty and responsibility towards this young woman. Towards all actually, a fast fading moral that disintegrated through time. "I would very much worry about you if I did not see you to your friends or family you are going to..."
Respectively, the small girl settled her fingers along his arm, for balance and to better paint a mental image of this stranger, whose voice was kind, and stained with the worry he claimed. It was peculiar, yet comforting.
"I have no destination. Nor friends or family."
She had nothing here, except emptiness.
Respectively, the small girl settled her fingers along his arm, for balance and to better paint a mental image of this stranger, whose voice was kind, and stained with the worry he claimed. It was peculiar, yet comforting.
"There? Where is 'there', if I cannot say where 'here' is? I... have nothing. There is no one."
She had nothing here, except emptiness.
The boy simply gave a a mild squeeze, his fingers warm against her skin. Her disorientation was telling; the archaeologist recognized the accent and nuances of her words as foreign yet familiar.
"Well, if that is not the saddest thing I've heard in a long time, I don't know what is. Perhaps you need a drink? Or at the very least, you need to get out of this alley. Where are you from, miss?"
"The palace..." she murmured, as though it would answer all his questions.
A still pause.
"... What is an alley?"
"Oh, just a place between things."
He kept cradling her under his arm and began slowly walking forward. The man mused to himself abut this girls' origins. He could not help but consider the girl as a breathing, living artifact. An antiquity with a heartbeat, an ancient codex mind. The boy was fascinated. This city was a gyrovague, a rouge metropolis filled like a candy basket with cognitive artifacts. Eye witnesses that he'd be damned to ever achieve the same insight into their times and lives and locations as they had.
Perhaps he was damned. Yet he glanced sideways at the girl and smiled. She was a testament that he was not.
Even if Anise had been able to see it, she wouldn't have returned it out of a shy nervousness, and feeling it creep over her, the artifact tucked herself in closer, seeking additional comfort. With a quiet sniff, she took in his subtle scent and found he smelled decidedly different, and pleasant.
"Do you take your name from Cyrus the Great?" It was calm.
He furrowed a brow then smiled and nodded, decided it was better to humor her then provide the correct answers. "Probably."
As a past civilian, she would be staggered soon enough without him intensively divulging the complete workings of society nonetheless the complex systems of Vespers. As it was, it wasn't decipherable even by him. He took a few more steps, careful not to drag her but going at her pace.
"So you say you have no one and nowhere to go then? Well you definitely need a 'where', perhaps I can take you to eat or drink?"
To her left, something whirred by very quickly, and Anise very nearly stumbled in fright. She gripped the back of this man's shirt in one hand and her walking stick in the other, unused to these foreign sounds and words and behaviors and aromas.
She blinked slowly, looking up where she knew his face was. "Do you know this place?"
He held her tighter, giving a gentle pat on her arm where it was permanently draped for now. "I do! Don't worry about a thing, okay? It is a noisy city, this one."
They followed the smooth pavement to a small cluster of quiet restaurants, sitting in the back of a row of distinctly different buildings. He sat her in a steel chair which was outside of a small cafe, draping colored fabrics overhanging the entrance. He brushed his fingers on her arms assuringly. "Wait here, okay? I will bring some tea." Anise lifted her eyes and seemed to be looking directly into his own as she nodded in understanding, accidentally kicking one leg of the chair with the heel of her shoe. "Please..." She wrung her hands in her lap. "... do not take too long."
He obliged and was only gone for a minute or so, returning with a square stone tea pot that was steaming from the spot. He rested it between them on the small wooden table and placed cups in front of them both.
He poured the tea carefully, looking up at her curiously. "Hope its not to bitter for you, I have some sugar here..if you like," he said slowly. "I remember when I first came to this city too. Its hard to get your bearing, I know. No need to be afraid though, now that I've found you that is. I'm kind of a...a doctor, you see." He sipped his tea with unfamiliar noisiness.
Curious fingers touched the table, searching for the teacup Cyrus was referring to, and when they brushed ceramic, she gingerly picked it up in both hands.
"Do you heal people?" Anise could feel the steam against her nose, and didn't sip immediately. He slid his hand over his head, scratching it musingly. "Heal? In a way...I help people remember who they are, where they came from. Or I help them forget. Depends on the person"
He slurped his tea again. "Do you know where you come from," he asked quietly.
When Anise blinked, she felt the brush of her long lashes against her cheekbones. She quickly sipped.
"Yes."
The archaeologist nodded agreeably, leading on the arm of the chair and drumming his fingers. He considered her with a mild gaze, questioning the ancient with undeniable curiosity.
"And have you been here long?"
Her face was tilted up toward the sky, and when the girl closed her eyes, she longed to feel the warmth of the sun with such a profoundness that, without her realizing, a tear pooled in her still wet eyes and skid down her cheek. "I wish I could say..." He was taken aback, a disparaging feeling in his gut at the girl's honest expression of whatever she seemed to be feeling at the moment. A woman's tears were bullets to his heart.
"It is okay, the city can be quite overwhelming. You will be fine, just fine!" His tone was light and tireless, trying to be supportive of the lost girl. It was not his place, he was thinking. It was not his place to try and comfort these new citizens. Perhaps she'd soon forget. He knew eventually she would. This, right now, would not hurt.
"How is your tea?"
As though he'd suddenly flipped on a switch, Anise's lips pulled into a small smile, her first of the afternoon, against the rim of the teacup. "It is very good. But this flavor..." She breathed in deep like she was taking in the scent of a blooming flower. "I don't recognize it."
"I believe it is from Camellia leaves." He examined the cup as he talked, looking over a slight chip that'd scratched at his lip and the illustration of a flower crawling up the side. He placed it down with a tap.
"What did you do when you were in the..the palace?"
She lowered her cup from her lips.
"I satisfied the emperor." Said without a beat of hesitation or bitterness. "And he would offer me to guests when it suited him."
A mistress. A whore. An item.
Judging from her dialect and appearance, the archaeologist and recently blooming anthropologist had guessed as much. In her time, beauties like her didn't get far from the carnal game of desire.
"I see! Well Anise, I should think it right for me to find you shelter, seeing as you said you had nowhere to go. What do you think of that? Perhaps some friends as well...might have to search for a bit though. You'll need a city-wise person..."
Oh, it was confession time.
Anise smoothed her palms along her thighs, thoroughly feeling the material of her skirt. "I had a friend, once..." she began, a note of agony in her words. "But he was taken from me. It was my doing. His blood stains my hands, now." Surprisingly, Anise didn't shed any tears this time.
"This must be my punishment."
Cyrus stared at the enigmatic woman with sympathetic dark eyes. He cracked his knuckles pulled out his wallet, leaving a few Clicks on the table.
"It could be. Or it could be a second chance. Who am I to say though? You are alive though, so thats a positive point." He smiled brightly, not caring she wouldn't see it. His joviality wouldn't be contained, it was a natural as the tone of his voice or his skin or his eyes.
"Hm...who would have a place for you," he mumbled to himself, regarding her with a low tone.
The girl, however, seemed not to have heard him, in the process of bending over to skirt her fingertips over the dirtied cement. This didn't feel like her roads. This was hard, and cold. But it comforted her to touch the ground, because even if Anise had no clue about her whereabouts, it was calming to know the ground would always be beneath her feet.
But on her way up, she rammed the back of her skull against the bottom of the table, causing the Clicks to skitter and her teacup to shudder. There was no "ow", and in its place, there was a whimper.
The boy jerked back at the clattering of the teacups and table and quickly knelt by her, a slight worried smile on his lips. He wasn't very sensitive nor could he sympathize as well as he'd like, yet he wrapped an arm around her again and gently rubbed the back of her head.
"You okay there darling? That was quite the crack."
He stayed besides her on the ground, stroking her head patiently. He was a gentle being, not the manly brute his father had tried to will him to be. He didn't care for that act. It was far more reasonable to be peaceable then forceful.
"Maybe we should get you to a place you can rest..."
Anise whimpered again like a kicked puppy, wincing lightly as he gently pet her. Joining him on the ground, she adjusted herself on knobby knees and tucked herself into those arms, wrapping her own around his neck, nose to shoulder. "You are kind, Cyrus." She spoke quietly. "I did not expect such kindness."
He gulped at her sudden envelopment of him even though they'd been touching the whole time. He looked sideways, back at her, up, down away. He carefully held her waist but didn't hug her back, petting her dark, soft hair calmly.
"Let's go, okay? You'll feel better after a good rest..." Without a word, his ancient discovery nodded and retracted herself, confusion flooding her pretty face as she turned and swatted at air to feel for the table, only for her hand to hit nothing.
Where did it go?
He studied her puzzled expression as she felt for something along the table. "What is it?" Finally Anise's fingers connected with the metal, and she breathed a quiet sigh of relief, soon shifting to reach for her chair. What she wouldn't have given to have her eyesight. She would have given an arm, a leg, her womb. Fingers crept down those cold columns and returned to the ground, soon triumphantly curling around her walking stick.
A turn back to Cyrus. "Where will we go?"
The man dusted himself off as he stood, repositioning his bag across his shoulders and tucking his hands into the front pockets of his hoodie.
"I know of a place that you can stay. It's a small..." He thought to himself what a apartment complex's ancient equivalent would be. He decided he shouldn't elaborate, not yet, anyway. "It's a small group of small houses, they are in the thick of the city but you'll be able to stay there without problem."
It was a complex that had been built by the Observers to instill a sense of order in the city, a half-way house, to assist the newly initiated citizens until they got their bearings. Before, the new citizens would find themselves confused and panicked into a state of time-sick madness. The regulating of them into Vespers was possible but it took time and tending to. She would have to be retrofitted soon.
She nodded once, tightening her grip on her walking aide. "And it is... safe?" Her voice was soft. This world of sound was like a nightmare. These strange smells, these accents, these behaviours. This was not her home. And she was perhaps far from it.
But Anise would be brave, swallow her fear, and hold her head high.
It was the best thing she could do.
He set an arm sinewy around her, the fabric of his sleeve bunching around her lithe shoulders. He smiled a smile at her even though he knew she wouldn't see it; it would radiate warmth, anyway. His entire being did. Yet a dappling of knowing reservation tinted his voice.If his voice was a physical object it would have been a drop of a coin in a well, a hollow ripple and splash. A beginning of hope but the ending: empty.
"Yes it is safe," he said quietly as he took calculated steps besides her. "You'll be fine. You'll adjust." You'll forget.