Extract from Divine Nature
There was smoke on the water, fire in the lower corridors. The gunfire had spluttered to a halt just over two Changes ago. The pained moans and the drumming of boots on cracked tiles continued a little longer. Man and machine blackened beneath bursting bouquets of crimson petals, twisting and crumbling as they feasted the gorging flames that flourished upon them. Butterflies, black and grey, leapt from the fires, fluttering their acrid fumes into trailing swarms that twisted through the halls.
A Section away Meris stretched her legs out over the gentle waves, watching as they lapped against the walls of the great glass canal. Suspended from the vaulted ceiling by a cradle of twisted brass, the impressive network of canals threaded through the Institute like the veins of a vast stone beast.
Meris looped a slender arm around the nearest support, reclining against the taught metal rope that strained under the weight of the magnificent construct of water and glass. Despite the precarious position of her pellucid perch, Meris felt no fear for the massive expanse that opened up beneath her. The vast rubble strewn hall, a tomb of long dormant devices and silent screens was of little interest to the girl.
She leaned over her knees, draped in the thin green shift she had awoken in, and blew an invasive smudge of smoke from the crystalline surface. Her toes skimmed across the water, delighting in the liquid sensation against her pale skin.
It was cool, or was it? She slipped herself in further, joy dancing in her violet eyes as the water twirled about her calves. Her brows knitted. Temperature was one of the many things she didn’t really understand yet. It was fizzy and silky and sometimes popped. Temperature was a funny old thing. She scrunched her face, irritation flushing on her cheeks. Apart from fire, fire bit.
She frowned at the pink burn that sulked between her thumb and forefinger. It was there this Change but wasn’t always. She shrugged; it seemed that everything here was a funny old thing.
A large fish waddled by, its spade shaped fins paddling lazily at the water. The impossible channels nestled amid the rafters contained a bustling ecosystem that thrived above the ruination below, self sufficient System. The fish regarded the watching girl with its blue, plate shaped eyes.
Meris leaned ever forwards, her turquoise hair spreading across the water’s surface like unfurling lilly leaves. She smiled and waved, ‘Hi Fish’. It frowned as much as a fish can, its wide mouth opening and closing rhythmically as it considered the slip of a girl that called to it. The frown became a scowl, a valiant effort on its part and it twisted away; flashing a mottled pattern of browns and gold.
‘Oh’, she waved sadly as it disappeared through the rust haunted portal that separated this section of the canal from the next room, ‘bye fish’. A study of red and white shrimp bustled amid a thatch of russet weeds that bloomed from where two glass panels met. Meris watched for a while, her head resting thoughtfully upon her delicate hands, and hoped for an invite to join in their activities.
A heart shaped face painted with mild melancholy stared at her from the shimmering surface. She pouted at herself, the expression of irritation producing a pointed flower that bloomed broadly at her temple. The long, fuchsia petals with their brightest of white speckles, teased a slow smile across her reluctant lips.
Closing her eyes, she willed one, two, three more into being, delighting as they pushed through her turquoise hair. Leaves too! She wanted leaves; green and hungry and ready to feast on the weak electric sunlight that half heartedly illuminated the hall. She shivered with delight as leaves of all shapes and sizes: long and thin, broad and strong, burst from the nape of her neck and raced down her spine. The pale shift that clung to her, melted before their march. What little warmth it had provided was replaced tenfold as the leaves opened to drink in the dim simulated daylight that strained from a hundred hissing monitors set high on the surrounding walls.
Fizzing with childish glee, Meris marvelled at the grinning bouquet reflected in the rippling mirror. She giggled, drawing the halo of petals down across her cheeks to spread across her neck and chest. There was an audible rustling above the constant babbling of the waterway as the racing leaves climbed over her shoulders and writhed between the curling petals.
She twisted her head this way and that, enraptured by her own reflection as she became more plant than girl. Buds burst from her moss covered fingers as she held them to her face, her mouth agape with fixed delight. More plant than girl, would that be so bad? Her leaves bobbed as she pondered upon this notion.
She stretched and drew one knee to her breast, watching three smaller flowers bloom from a nest of diamond shaped leaves. Tiny rivulets of water trickled past her ankle and across the shelf of glass upon which she perched. The first reached the edge and dithered a moment, light spiralling within the budding droplet, before descending the crystal wall and diving to the dusty floor some two hundred or so feet below.
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