The Pearl Fox

With or Without the Dark

The place was far from ruined. It certainly appeared as though it was lived in and cared for. A village just like any village, except that there wasn't any sign of its people. Not far from the city of Starbase, the village Southernville 2 was set on a plateau just one mile away from a cliff top overhang. A subterranean river ejected froma cave mouth and cascaded down a into a pool. This feature was called The Angel Falls, and it was always full of rainbows and small clouds of water vapour. A small island in the pool was a crannog with a shrine of black marble. Remains of food had been left there by a priest. Birds took all of the bread, and what remained were shells of fruit. The inhabitants of Southernville 2 got their water supply from a concrete standpipe water tower. There was a rotating windmill and smoke from the chinmeys of houses. Vandox could smell coffee and yet no one was around in sight. A broom stood against a wall of a house wall, that wasn't there a few minutes ago.

"Hey!"

Vandox turned in sudden fright at the shrill call. There was a blue parakeet bird just perched on a low wall.  "Hey! Hey!" it said, flapping it's wings and shaking droplets of water.

The swirling violet dusk came. He sat in his mechamobile, and ate cheese filled in rye bread, dried fruit and hard cold bacon that his wife prepared for him earlier. The mechamobile was a wooden pedal-carriage with four wheels and a hood. It didn't need a horse to pull it, as it was a machine controlled manually from the front seat in the carriage. Vandox learned how to operate this monstrosity that had been issued to him by Willow to go on this mission. These mechamobiles didn't require food or sleep, and they never bucked out of fear. Vandox found using it easy, on flat roads. But hills were problematic and he found the gears and levers stiffen uphill, while going down any hill caused the machine fly extremely fast. He learned how to manage the speed and at times, he had to get out and push the thing up a hill. The downwards hills brought the mechamobile colliding into rocks and trees, almost crashing dangerously. Vandox put too much of his sleeping hours at nights to take the machine up a slope. Willow promised him that there wouldn't be any hills on the way, so that was something he will report it and demand some compensation from Willow for this. He arrived at the village eventually. But there wasn't anyone here! except for that talking bird.

He felt as though he was being watched. Suddenly the parakeet cried "Hey!" again. Vandox wasn't happy. It became dark now. Then lights came on within the shell of houses, that seemed empty and deralict. Shadows and figures moved across the windows inside the buildings. Vandox left the mechamobile and approached someone in the dark, who was carrying a sack over their shoulders. Vandox had to see, and he put on the light using his tanguin alarm worn around his wrist. Many voices gasped at the bright singular light.

"Whoever put that bright thing on, turn it off!" said the voice of a man close by, once hidden in darkness, but now visible. 

Vandox kept the light on. "I'm sorry sir, but I must ask some questions."

"Only when you turn that light off," replied the man.

Vandox switched off the tanguin light. Now he was in complete darkness, but started to focus on the mere lights coming from the windows of the buildings. He couldn't see in this amount of dark, and he wondered how these people could.

"You're working sir," Vandox had observed.

"I'm carrying malt," replied the man in the dark.

"It's not the right time for working, as its just too dark."

"With or without the dark, we can work and run the village. We can plough the fields, cut grass, milk goats, pick berries, gather up wood for the fires, shovel shit and swim in the pool."

"It would help if I put the light back on," Vandox said.

"No light, no nonsense. Light comes with a price. You're better off visiting the owl abode. There's always light in there. It's good rum, pies and soft bedding, always be respectful as they respect travellers."

"I'm of the Night Patrol," Vandox reminded the children.

"Then you should be used to the darkness."

Vandox had never seen a signpost indicating any such Owl Abode. He entered the largest of the buildings and realised that it was a tavern. It was filled with a variety of people playing games or drowning in their unhappy tales over pints of alcohol. There he  asked people about the missing man who vanished in that very village. "A man called Rebik Helder came this way. Have any of you seen him?" Vandox had to ask. They looked with puzzled expressions on their faces. A serving girl talked about this man being last seen at Angel Falls. Vandox decided there was more to be done here as soon as its daylight.