The smell of humid dirt was enough to wake Frederick up, let alone that fact that he probably inhaled three tonelades worth of dirt if he was in that position for god knows how long, just sleeping.
Which was unusual, as he is usually a very light sleeper, and the hens were enough alarms to notify him that a new day had just started and work needed to be done. But he still didn't opened his eyes, yet he knew something was wrong. As there were no dogs barking in the distance, the scent of Madame Pauline's food was nowhere to be detected, Marco wasn't fighting with his mother, and the sound of Mr. Revenoco's highly expensive cars, that were imported from all over the world, weren't making those annoying and completely unnecessary noises. Something was missing.
Something was missing, but it wasn't his body, he could feel every limb and extremity, every hair fiber. So that wasn't missing. He could hear bird chirping, although they made strange sounds, and he heard it so clearly, it was obvious his sense of hearing was intact. As for his eyes, he opened them and realized he was still lying down with his face in the dirt, but he wasn't feeling like moving, so he slightly rotated his face and saw leaves that were apparently very proud to be leaves, as they were showing off how green they were. So now he inferred that not only did it rained a few hours ago, but also that his sense of sight was perfect. As for the other three, he decided to pass them as unharmed too, as he was feeling the dirt with his body, he smelled the scent of wet wood and wasn't, under any circumstance, sticking his tounge out to taste the dirt.
"So you're finally awake." Said the voice of a gentle, kind man. "Can't move? Don't worry, it's normal. You haven't moved in what?" To what Fredrick thought 'Two days? One?' "I'll approximate it to four hundred years." Said the man. Frederick didn't believed it, how could anyone? But, he was now starting to worry about he's inability to move almost any part of his body. He also thought about the possibility of this being another of Marco's pranks gone wrong.
"Nah, I'm joking." Replied the man as he felt Frederick's unbelief. "But you do have been inmobile for about three to four weeks. I'm sorry I don't have the exact number, there's a huge gap in between the time zone of Earth... and everything else outside of it. "
Frederick tried to say something, but he was horrified when he discovered he was speaking, but only said a bunch of nonsense. He opened his eyes wide and released a small cry.
"Don't be afraid. You're all right." Said the man between laughs "I apologize, but it's that I know what's going on, as I've been through your place, but I never thought it would look this stupid." He started laughing once more. "Again, I apologize. Don't worry, it's okay you speak nonsense. You're speaking in a language you've never spoken before, so it's normal that you get surprised when you listen to yourself speaking that way. So, the bad news, is that no matter how hard you try, you will speak nonsense. The good news, though, is that you will be able to understand it after talking it with another person. Like right now!" Frederick clicked his mouth in dissaprovement "Yeah, yeah, I know you think this is whatever the language you think it is, but that's the beauty of Paradiso! Almost everyone speaks the same exact language, can you imagine?"
"No." Mumbled Frederick. Although it was more like a mweh.
"Oh, my bad. I apologize, once again, for my rudeness." Frederick felt like if a bulge of air hit him in the stomach. "It's a trick the fairies of Ganesh taught me some years ago. It's used when a being is badly harmed and needs rapid healing. I mean, you're not badly injured, but you weren't supposed to be awake, just yet. But now that you are awake, it would be horrible not being able to do anything."
Frederick started, In fact, to feel better. He felt his blood pumping from his heart to the rest of his body with fierce energy. He thought the first thing he needed to do, was press his fist. Clear. It was fully functional, so he tried even further and tried to move his wrist. Clear. He was now feeling confident, so he went and tried to put his legs together. Clear. He now knew that if he went body part by body part he would finish testing himself probably in about two centuries, so he simply stood up, and never had he experienced so much feeling of self-fulfillment as he did then. He stretched his arms, legs, and spinal cord. But then, he opened his eyes. And although he wanted to, he now couldn't unsee the view.
