Titan Dreams | The Linkbond Chronicles

Introduction

Isolda sighed at her link as she shuffled around on the damp stepping stone. At least, unlike the river, it was soft and just slightly damp. Her human link, Alder Moúro, sloshed through the shin-deep water, occasionally smiling at a stray thought.

"How long are you going to be?" Isolda meowed restlessly.

Alder snorted and turned to look at her over his shoulder for a moment. He signed to her, Patience, Isolda. I just need to find the red and black striped lizard and then we can go back.

Isolda sighed at her mute link and mind-spoke, 'I don't see why we're looking for lizards. I eat them every day.'

Wincing, her link broadcasted back, 'And I didn't need to know that.'

'You can't still be so squeamish about it now,' Isolda complained as her link's voice echoed in her mind. They fell back into a comfortable silence, leaving Isolda to think about her link. It was sad that she was the only one to hear his voice. No normal human would ever hear it; they would only see him signing, but never hear the abject warmth he could convey with his voice alone.

Her link let out a soft, warbling whistle, signalling for Isolda to freeze. She stilled her tail, which had been lashing with her impatience, and watched where her link's gaze went curiously. A moment later, her link showed her what he was seeing, before snapping a container down onto the lizard.

Soon enough, they were going back down the river towards town. It would take a while, since they were a few kilometres out, but they would get there. Alder waded up the river, sighing happily as the clear water washed over his legs, while Isolda padded along lazily at the river bank.

According to legend, every river, lake and sea used to be brown and mucky, filled with rubbish and chemicals, but after many thousands of years of decay, the rivers had cleared, only the occasional pieces of plastic floated onto shore. These plastics, people picked up and used as currency. Anything that was from the old world - wires, plastics, strange materials, old bits and pieces of the technology from before.

Isolda only half believed the legends. After all, how could a river become so dirty? And of the plastic she had seen - if indeed, that was what it used to be called - there had not been as much that it could completely covered hundreds of kilometres of ocean, surely.

How could anyone wish to do such bad to the pristine rivers, anyway? How would travellers find drinking water? Of course, those questions would not be answered. While the humans used strange phrases that had developed from old cultures they no longer understood, the knowledge they had of their old world was fragmented at best.

Isolda huffed and swatted at some bedraggled flowers struggling in the river with annoyance. Stupid humans. Well, maybe not all of them...

She glanced over at Alder, who chuckled silently. She sighed as he accidentally splashed some water on her fur. He was so clumsy, gentle and academic. Perhaps he was a remnant of the old world; but no.

What are you thinking of? he signed.

'Your old world. What your people used to be like,' she answered philosophically.

He nodded sagely. Intelligent and ruthless, that's what the legends say. Of course, if our people developed from them, I'm not sure how ruthless they really were, he went on.

'Maybe they were just sharp,' Isolda suggested through the link, her voice echoing on both ends. 'Human legends are exaggerated, anyway.'

Her link shook his head playfully. You are quick to judge, Isolda. We don't know what they were truly like anymore. All we know is who we are now. And that's what counts.

Isolda nodded and spoke no more. It was a long debate that had lasted for generations. In fact, it was such a long-lasting debate that it had created the very beginnings of Post-Rebirth society.

At the beginning after The Rebirth, humans banded together and created lots of little towns and villages. Slowly, they established trade and rebuilt their lives, losing the use of most of their advanced technology in a couple of generations, but quickly using their dwindling access to technology to recreate older pieces of technology to help them with daily chores; wells, fountains, cooking utensils, cottages - Isolda had to wonder why humans still had information about obsolete technology when their supposedly advanced technology already did everything for them. Was it boredom? Frivolity? Curiosity?

A few hundred years after The Rebirth, people began establishing psychic bonds with their pets, creating ripples in the newly forming society. But, after people discovered that not everyone would ever have a link, humans began fighting amongst themselves. These times later became known as The Chaos Years.

The Chaos Years, while a dark shadow on the young history of the new world, were the building blocks for the Linkhoods, the Brotherhoods and the Sisterhoods. The Linkhoods were unfailingly good people. They understood links and didn't begrudge others the privilege. They had many different mottos, but the most common types were something like, 'Welcome and Respect' or 'With Kindness, We Help'.

The Brotherhoods and Sisterhoods were a better ranged but less welcoming bunch. They often became neutral city centres, where people of all kinds dwelled, including links. Alder and Isolda had come from one such place, La Fratellanza dei Leopardi Rossi: The Brotherhood of the Red Leopard. Their motto? 'Hunt Without Fear'.

It was one of the biggest Brotherhoods, and one of the oldest. Its territory stretched over a sizeable chunk of South Italy, and it had its roots in the old mafia. Alder and Isolda had come from the slums of the La Fratellanza dei Leopardi Rossi. Alder used to live in the middle-class suburbs as the son of two doctors. He had become mute after a mugging where his throat was slit, and his voice box destroyed. The cut wasn't deep enough to kill, especially with the two doctors and then Isolda's bond with him, but it couldn't stop his muteness.

Soon after the bond, a link-hater group broke into the house. Alder's parents distracted the would-be link murderers, getting themselves killed to protect their only son. That was the day Alder's name and personality changed. It was the day he accepted Isolda and tried to forget, once and for all, about his origins and what used to be.

As they drew past the fading red metal scaffolds, covered in vines called 'Strongarm vines', which could hold up entire skyscrapers without problem, they finally rounded the river and arrived back in town.

Bright green grass, vines and plants covered the Pre-Rebirth structures, while smart buildings were constructed with strange angles to match the tipped scaffolds and crumbling ruins. The bright red, blue, yellow, green, orange and many other coloured scaffolds and ruins often comprised half the buildings, while wood - spruce, birch, oak, pine, alder - the tree Alder chose his name for - ash, elm and many others - contrasted them, filling in the other walls and rooves of all different sizes.

With the help of the vines and a special fertiliser made of ground bone and various herbs and plants, the buildings were able to uphold their strange shapes and dimensions, and often appeared to grow on top of each other, with platforms, verandas, balconies, washing lines stretched across the roads and bright banners fusing together in a beautiful chaotic mesh of hybrid infrastructure.

It never failed to make Alder and Isolda's breaths catch in their throats, but it was all so overwhelming. The Linkhood towns and villages all shared the Strongarm vine, and if there got too many people, they branched out to a new town.

An affectionate smile slipped onto Alder's face as Isolda followed him to their house. It was a nice, square house, a good five-minute walk away from the main town.

Laeviya was a beautiful town, especially compared to the city centre of La Fratellanza dei Leopardi Rossi, which was all sharp, square buildings and fog and indifference. In fact, Laeviya was a lovely town, but even so, all the bright colours overwhelmed them. Most of the people in town were used to it, but they, and the others like them, were not, and mostly lived away from the town in less gravity-defying, more normal houses.

They walked down the valley and through the long, waist height grass. Alder walked through it effortlessly; Isolda slid and prowled through the grass, occasionally swatting grasshoppers, but not stopping to hunt them.

They were almost back home, and Isolda just had to thank the Linkhood that Alder hadn't found any more distractions.