Message from the Moon

Chapter 3

I hardly noticed my surroundings as I hurried after Xethe. The wall had felt like fine, cool mist as we passed through and despite being just a tad preoccupied with stopping Xerat before xe began a genocide, my brain found time to marvel about it.

"How do the wall-doors work?" I asked as I struggled to keep up with Xethe's ridiculously long stride. Though xe is only about a head and a half taller than me, it seems like one of xyr steps equals three of mine or more. "Everything felt solid before."

Xe cast a mildly bewildered glance over xyr shoulder. "Of course it felt solid then. We could not have permitted you to go wandering about the halls before we had time to explain the situation."

"Ok, fair, but like... how does it work?"

"None of the walls are actually solid. They are made of a gas only found several thousand lightyears from this solar system. When we run what is the equivalent of electricity through it, we are able to control who may pass through by markers on their DNA. It is quite simple, once you understand the materials involved."

"Right," I muttered, stubbing my toe and nearly banging my nose into xyr back. "Simple as tracing a line from point A to B." If A was in China and I had to walk to B in Austria, with only directions from the locals to guide me. And I don't speak any languages from over there.

"Anything is, so long as you can grasp the basics."

"Easy for you to say. But hey, if the walls are actually just a kind of gas, how do you keep from accidentally falling through them? Doesn't that cause privacy issues?"

Xethe laughed, a quirky sound that leaped and bucked off of the not-actually-walls walls. "I forget that humans don't have the correct cones and rods to see properly. You see the walls to be opaque, yes?"

When I nodded, xe grinned, shaking xyr head in a way I can only describe as gleeful. "Marvelous. I must study humans more, they really have the most interesting qualities about them, don't they? We can see through these walls with decent ease, and clearly through the section that is meant to be walked through. This eliminates any possibility for threats that could hide behind closed doors."

"But what if you need to change?" I clutched my hands to my chest, trying not to think about how I might have been touched when I was put in the new clothes.

"Change? Change how?"

"Like change your clothes?"

"Why would we need to do that?"

"Because... if you wear clothes too long they smell?"

Xe chuckled again. "Ah, I now understand the confusion. We do not have the same bodily functions, and therefore do not require multiple changes to our clothes everyday. We wear our garments until we are in need of a fresh set, normally due to growth or natural wearing from age. Even then, we do not change ourselves."

"Then how?"

"You are remarkably curious," xe said, a slight sparkle in xyr eyes. "I admire that. To answer your question, we have a machine that we enter that will fashion the new garments around us so that they fit our physique perfectly. The only time 'privacy' is ever needed could possibly be when we partake in populating, but then there is an understanding amongst us to avert our eyes out of respect."

Mind reeling, I gave a noncommittal grunt and tried to focus on the path we were taking before I became overwhelmed. Though it was kind of late for that.

The hallways didn't stretch tauntingly ahead of us; they zipped by. It was time that was playing with me, the hands of the grandfather clock floating around my head sticking for several minutes only to snap forward in a whirlwind that passed when I blinked. There wasn't an in between that I could see.