The Worlds of the Sheaf

Embarkation - Part 4

      "It's beautiful!" exclaimed Lirenna, staring around at the simulated forest in wonder. "I had no idea... I mean, I spent two weeks in the test chamber back in the valley, just to see if I could handle the confinement, but this..."

     "The illusions here are a good deal more sophisticated than those in the test chamber," said Sune Shala, the most senior of the shae folk aboard the Jules Verne, although seniority wasn't a concept the shae folk were comfortable with. The shae folk aboard the Jules Verne had to interact with humans and moon trogs, though, both of whom had rigidly structured, hierarchical societies, and they needed to have someone who could act as a mediator. Someone to whom the Captain could give orders and receive reports from instead of having to speak to each shae individually.

     Sune Shala had taken the job because, as a former Captain of a Bird of Paradise, a shayen flying warship, he was the one with the greatest understanding of the concept of leadership, even though it was not a quality he possessed himself. Being Captain of a shayen warship involved weighing needs and priorities. It involved co-ordination, not command.

     Lirenna just stood and stared about her, literally struck dumb. The dwelling tree from which she'd just emerged stood behind her. There was another just in front and another two behind it, each tree home to a husband and wife except for the one she herself would be inhabiting, which she would be sharing with Flinda Luell, an unmarried woman. The trees were the only things in sight that were neither alive nor illusion, having been magically constructed from dead wood and paper.

     Even though they weren't alive themselves, though, their branches were steeped in life, with a covering of mosses and lichen, kept green by the steaming, humid air, and hanging vines and creepers strong enough for the shae folk to climb and frolic amongst in the way they loved so much. The ground was covered by a two foot depth of loamy soil in which small undergrowth plants grew, their bright flowers adding a delicate fragrance to the air, and a colony of snake moles had been introduced to burrow through it, emerging to sniff the air during the night, animal life being an essential complement to the plants.

     The full range of jungle insects had also been brought in, to the considerable annoyance of the human crew members as they found their ways to other parts of the ship. Lirenna spent several minutes watching an ant exploring the green stem of a dobriar, rapt with fascination. This was no illusion. This was no pretence. This was real! There was life all around her. In the air she was breathing. In the soil under her feet. Even in the small pond on the other side of the terrarium where tiny silver fish swam and bright green frogs sat with only their bulbous eyes above the surface of the water. It was beautiful! She could spend years examining all the tiny details. The little nooks and crannies the designers had introduced to make the twenty yard wide hemisphere appear larger than it really was.

     There were illusions, of course. If she looked up she could see a yellow sun in a blue sky, and at night she would see the stars, moons and comets. Around her, more trees extended away to the limit of vision, but they weren't real. The edge of the terrarium would stop her from walking that far, like walking into an invisible wall. Only the birds singing in the trees could see through the illusion, an adaptation deliberately conditioned into them to stop them braining themselves on the walls. To the shae folk, though, the effect created was perfect. They were in a forest! Billions of miles from Tharia, they were in an equatorial forest, deep in the heartland of the shayen race.

     "The Orb of Propulsion is in the central tree," said Sune, taking a step towards it and waiting for the demi shae to follow before continuing. "That is the tree in which Glindia and I live. Our exit from the forest goes down to the bridge."

     Lirenna nodded. The other three trees, standing around the edge of the terrarium, had exits into deck six, the zero gravity shell in which the moon trogs lived. From there they could enter the human decks, if they so wished, using the same connecting corridor that the moon trogs used, on deck two.