The Cries From Dead Worlds

Chapter Three: Pretty Flowers Need the Sun, This Applies To Everyone

"You're adorable. Listen to your little squeaks!" Six scooped up the furry creature resembling something like a cross between a mouse and rabbit that she had found living on the shores of J'nanin's lake and cuddled it close. It squeaked, it's cheeks puffing up as it did so. It calmly settled into her arms and looked around curiously from its new perch. She grinned widely and scratched the top of its head, much to its delight.

Upon leaving Vault 101 all those years ago, she had quickly discovered that she had a strange way with animals. None of the ones other people claimed to be hostile ever attacked her. The Yao Guai in the Capital barely even glanced in her direction. She might as well have been a rock for all they cared. Only the most vicious or mutated ever picked a fight. It came in handy, but she never had an true explanation for it.

She carried the little creature with her on her way to find the tusk that had the bird symbol above its door. She had chosen that one at random from her three choices as it didn't really seem to matter. She moved the creature onto her shoulders and it hung on as she climbed a ladder up from the base of the island back onto the cliffs above.

The ladder ended on a landing with a very large plant and weird moss with things that could be fruit in it growing on the side of the cliff. The creature on her shoulders let out a squeak and hopped off of her to bound over to the moss' fruit. Her eyes widened when they inflated, for lack of a better word, and the little guy dug right into the one nearest the bottom. Six shrugged and left her new friend to his lunch to go up the next ladder.

Once at the top, she found herself fortunate that she had brought the creature up with her because it looked like someone had knocked down the original bridge to the tusk. The expanded fruit fixed the problem nicely and would allow her to get across. Six could only hope the animal would not stop eating while she was at the halfway point. That would be nasty fall.

Six reached the door with no problems, and fired off the Hyperbreeder into the sky to signal ED-E who had separated from her when they had made the plan to get inside the Bird Tusk. Satisfied that ED-E would come in his own time, she looked around the room inside the apparently hollow tusk. An egg shaped cage made up of (you guessed it) a lattice work of metal was suspended near the ceiling. She was trying to decide whether or not it was really made of gold when ED-E glided into the room.

The Courier gave him a distracted wave of her hand, too busy considering the problem of getting the cage with the Linking Book down. ED-E saw her conundrum immediately.

"/ )\"

"No, I don't want to have to explain to Atrus why the damn thing is no longer attached to its cable." She raised an eyebrow at him, "And I thought we weren't going to cheat."

"/&^="

"I could probably climb it," Six responded. She dropped her bag on the ground and grabbed hold of the counter weight. She pulled herself up the cable hand over hand, using the wall for help. She made it up to the level of the cage and maneuvered to free the Linking Book from its holder. She let the Book drop to the floor, confident the height wouldn't damage it. It landed with a thud, barely missing ED-E and scaring off her furry friend who had poked its head into the room out of curiosity. She dropped down not a moment later, rolling when she hit the ground to minimize damage.

Six picked up the Book and her bag. She brushed her hand over the title 'Edanna' before opening it up. The flyby showed nothing but ocean for the first few second and then revealed something that took her a moment to identify as a plant, a tree, to be more specific, growing right out of the water. It was huge, with a dizzying network of branches sticking in and out of an apparently hollow trunk.

Frowning, she wrapped an arm around ED-E and they Linked away.

2

"Oh dear god, please tell me there aren't any plant people here."

"?.)$"

"My only comfort is that I doubt one of Atrus' lessons in writing Ages is live combat training. That, and my holorifle. Mustn't forget that." Six adjusted her bandanna.

They were standing on a gigantic branch facing a weird pink plant that hung down from green roots growing right out of the branch above them, and across a gap too big to cross was a collection of thick brown vines hanging down.

"This plant, it almost looks like a lens in the center here." Six walked up to the large pink flower and put her eyes to the clear organic membrane on the back of it. The view had a bluish tint to it and she could see passed the vines across the way. Beside a thick glob of sap the size of a desk chair was the a Linking Book held on display by thin green vines. "Hey, I found our way out. The problem is getting to it. Blood-Nap could cut down those vines, but not from here."

"~{^ != *)&/"

"You're right, there's got to be another way. If we complete Atrus' lesson, it should lead back to the Book, right? Unless Saavedro changed that," she muttered the last bit and frowned. If she was going to get though this, she would have to think like both Atrus and Saavedro. That complicated things.

The two proceeded right along the branch they were on. The whitish wood of the tree formed something like a rounded hallway as they moved along, and Six was struck by the idea that the giant plant was just one big natural house for the tinier life living inside it. That was actually kind of neat.

"Did I remember to give you my camera before we left?" Six asked, her gaze darted from place to place, just trying to take everything in. Alive, all of it was alive. All of it was natural. A great sprawling garden. It was beautiful and strange all at the same time. But even as she admired the Age, she longed for home. The feeling of being out of place grew with every careful step and every inhale of clean air.

"^#!"

"Good," Six said and removed the beat up old CodacR9000 from ED-E's storage. She replaced it with her Big Book of Science so she wouldn't be weighed down. "Let me know if you see a good scenic spot for a picture."

ED-E beeped his agreement just as they came to another odd plant that grew from the great tree that supported the Age. Near its base was a thick collection of moss and green leaves. The plant itself went straight up with leaves that reminded her of drawings of bat wings that corkscrewed around the trunk all the way up to the peak.

"All of these smaller plants share a symbiotic relationship with the big tree we're in. I have never seen a plant that grows out of another plant instead of dirt. I'm going to have to give Atrus points for creativity. I'd never would have thought this up in a million years." Six sized up the corkscrew plant and said, "Think it'll hold my weight?"

"{]&*"

"Hm. Want to fly up and see if there's anything there?"

ED-E didn't reply, he merely followed the plant up. Six passed the short time waiting by digging out some of her anti-venom from her bag and moving it into a pouch on her vest. You never know.

"]/+"

"Another path? Thanks ED-E," Six said to him when he rejoined her.

She gingerly tested her weight on the corkscrew's leaves. It seemed like it would hold, but it would wobble an awful lot on the way up. Six pulled Blood-Nap out of her bag just incase she needed to latch onto something in a hurry before following the pseudo staircase upwards.

The Courier kept close to the trunk as she slowly inched her way along. Falling would be a complete disaster that she wasn't willing to risk. ED-E floated close by for moral support as she tried not to look down.

When she reached the top, she practically jumped off the dumb plant. What the hell? Atrus, maybe a little less creativity, and more common sense. Would a real staircase or ladder had been so hard? Goddamn it. You'd think he'd childproof the Age before sending his kids here for lessons. Her dad would have. Dad would have roped off areas and insisted on physically coming along and teaching the lesson in person, not just for safety, but to make sure she didn't misunderstand anything.

ED-E beeped at her, breaking her train of thought.

"What?"

He beeped again. She looked up and wandered over to where he was hovering.

"It's a plant shaped basin with water in it. Wonderful," she said drily, still upset. Six let her eyes follow the vine laying in the pool of water up to the top of the corkscrew. Was it feeding it?

Six shook her head and followed the curving tunnel the tree made. As she was about to turn the corner, a loud flutter of wings and an animal cry nearly startled her into losing her footing. She spun around in time to see a giant bird fly around to the other side of the tree.

She climbed up a chest high ledge to see if she could get a view of the bird and was rewarded by the sight of its nest across a vast gap in the branches. She'd never reach it even if she wanted to. The blue bird was feeding its baby something that looked like roots of some sort. Beside Six was another one of those pink lens flowers. She looked through it and confirmed what she had already observed, but she did see that the nest was over the 'room' holding the Linking Book.

"I wonder what kind of evolutionary process could cause these things to have a natural telescope. What purpose does it serve to the plant?"

ED-E replied with his version of a shrug. Six only pondered the question a moment longer before giving a shrug of her own and they moved on.

The bird took flight again as they were passing another corkscrew, this one had it's leaves folded up, and a large bulb filled with liquid near a dried basin. The bird circled around the level of the tree they were on. It spotted them and swept down to land a few meters from her. It tilted its head at her in curiosity in much the same way the geckos did whenever she approached. Six raised her hand up to the bird who bowed its head and let her give it a quick pat.

It tilted its head again and then took to the sky once more. Six waved at it before turning to say something to ED-E. She opened her mouth, but all that came out was a strangled gasp when she felt a force knock into her shoulders and she was lifted high up into the air.

"ED-EEEEEEEEEEE!" Six shrieked. She managed to refrain from kicking and struggling out of fear that the bird would drop her. Looking down proved to be a terrible mistake. All she could see were the branches of the main tree and the tops of tiny plants. The ground was nowhere to be found. Her heart pounded in her chest, her stomach threatened to rebel.

It swept over its nest and dropped her a few meters from the baby bird. She landed on her knees, and resisted the urge to kiss the floor of the nest. The baby approached her curiously, and Six pushed some of the roots near her towards it. It chirped and hopped away with the root in its beak, curiosity averted.

The parent bird-who Six suddenly decided she was going to call Pat-cawed and seemed to gesture behind her with its beak. Six looked and saw a steep and smooth passage down. The only way to traverse it would probably be to slide. She decided to just bite the bullet and go. She sat and pushed herself down the tunnel. Six desperately tried to slow her descent on the curving slide with her knife so she wouldn't fly off the ledge. She'd take a good old fashioned firefight any day over all of this. She was made for solid ground, not slides and bird rides.

It led down to where she had seen the Linking Book. She hit the bottom with a grunt escaping her, and was immediately met with the sight of strands of leaves inside hardened sap. That wouldn't have normally caught her attention, but the pattern looked deliberate. She would have scanned it into her pip-boy, but the resolution was always low on the device. She'd never see the pattern in the sap on it. Six pulled the camera out of her bag and snapped a quick photo. It printed and she examined the image before placing it between the pages of Saavedro's journal.

She got up as she heard Pat fly away again above her. Six brushed off her jeans and went over to the Linking Book. It led back to the tower room in J'nanin with the holographic imager. She bagged it, placing it next to the Book back to Tomahna.

With Blood-Nap clasped in both hands, she began to hack down the vines in the way. Had she brought Knock-Knock it probably would have been more ideal, but she had issues using the axe for long periods. Hell, she had issues using the damn knife as it was.

The vines fell away and she grabbed the Hyperbreeder and fired it harmlessly towards the sky.

"ED-E!" she shouted.

But instead of her companion showing up, Pat swooped through the opening she made and grabbed her again. It latched onto her shoulders and practically tossed her over to where she had ended up when they had first Linked in. She looked up in time to see Pat flying down further into the tree like nothing had happened.

"I can't decide whether to thank it, or curse it."

It struck her though how helpful that detour was. How intelligent was that bird? Or maybe it wasn't the bird's idea at all? Maybe it was something else? Arcade had once theorized that her affinity with animals to be a form of psyker ability after he had witnessed her playing with a nightstalker like it was just an overgrown puppy. Most psykers had been wiped out with The Master, but some still popped up every now and again. Their abilities wildly different from one another. One person might be an electrokinetic, another might be able to supposedly divine the future. Unfortunately, no one knew enough about psykers to test it. She just had to accept that she could make most animals roll over onto their backs for a tummy rub, or get them to help her in a fight. It was always funny to see the looks on Legionaries' faces when their hounds turned against them.

ED-E appeared from the route that led to the first corkscrew plant, beeping frantic gibberish she couldn't translate. She got back to her feet with as much dignity as she could muster. She straightened her vest and bandanna, then moving passed ED-E, only pausing to give her friend a winning smile like she had planned that whole thing and she hadn't screamed high enough to shatter glass earlier.

They made the journey back to where Six had been grabbed, making a second trip up the perilous corkscrew. She was feeling better about going up it now due to having survived the impromptu flight with the bird. If she could withstand that, she could withstand anything.

The two made it back unmolested by anymore wildlife. She pointed up the path ahead and raised her eyebrows at ED-E, "Did you happen to search that way while I was gone."

"&),`^_ #]./ *"

"We don't need a second Book back to J'nanin. Let's leave that there just in case something happens to the one I've got. Anything else up that way?"

"/."

"Alright, than down it is."

Six looked at the bulb filled with liquid, then at the dry basin, and then followed the vine lying in it up to the top of the corkscrew. She punctured the bulb with Blood-Nap, the liquid inside gushed out into the basin. The vine immediately began sucking up the water and the corkscrew's leaves unfolded. Not feeling particularly enthusiastic, Six wrapped her arm around the trunk and slid down the plant to go deeper into the catacombs the tree made up. ED-E kept up with her, making sure she would accidentally fall off the side.

She had misjudged the length of the corkscrew and by the time she reached the bottom, her vision was spinning and she couldn't walk straight. Six just managed to hold onto the contents of her stomach, but it took her eight minutes of just sitting down with her hands covering her face before she even attempted to move again. She was already sick of Edanna.

The branch she was now standing on was more rounded and she had to brace herself on the 'wall' to ensure she wouldn't slip and fall.

Smaller, thinner trees that weren't too much taller than the height ED-E hovered at began appearing along their route. Trees growing from a tree. She took out her camera and snapped a picture. She knew a couple people who would get a kick out of it.

" [^**(!# ]"

Six went over to see what got ED-E so excited, and smiled when she peered down into the filled basin. An aquatic creature with reddish bioluminescent patterns was swimming around in circles inside of it. She watched it zap the roots sticking into the water. The flowers they were attached to danced in the electricity. It was like those electric eels she had once read about, but it looked kind of like a cross between that, a squid, and a ray.

The sun was scarce now, barely making it through the vegetation to reach them. Only weak beams graced them with light. She'd have thought only fungus would be able to survive, but there were flowers. They must have evolved to draw energy from other sources. Like the flowers getting it from the eel/ray/squid's natural static discharge when it in turn fed off the roots.

Symbiosis. That had to be the lesson behind the Age. What else could it be? Maybe cause and effect if you wanted to be more general. She could imagine that both would be something important to keep in mind when writing Ages. Though, she didn't see why he needed a whole Age to teach his sons about the concept. She had learned about in the Vault via textbook. It wasn't exactly an esoteric notion that required a physical example. She couldn't imagine that Achenar and Sirrus needed to see it to understand it.

As they continued on, Six saw plants displaying different color bioluminescence, mostly oranges and purples, and offering her light for the path. She was entirely focused on negotiating the increasingly difficult terrain on the branches when ED-E alerted her that he had found more pages.

Six picked them up and held them up to the light provided by the nearby glowing beetle attached to the wall.

"He's talking about destroying some Narayan poetry Atrus wrote somewhere," Six explained. She frowned and reread the part about the sap. Was the pattern she took a picture of one of the poems he 'desecrated'? She shrugged and continued, "He says he wants to introduce floating rocks from one Age into the soil of another. ED-E remind me to mention this to Atrus." She flipped through the pages one more time before placing them with the others. She adjusted the strap on her bag before setting off again. "There's some drawings in there of the cylinder with the flakes we could make float, remember? A small scale of what he was hoping to do with the floating rocks?"

The pair stopped again when they found a branch to the other side of the tree. Growing on it was same fruit that inflated when it heard the furry, squeaking creature in J'nanin eating. Six placed her boot on the branch in preparation to cross when a pained cry carried up to her from somewhere far below. She looked over the edge of the ledge, but all she saw were more plant life obscuring the view to the bottom.

"That sounded like Pat. The bird," she elaborated for ED-E's benefit. "Is there a predator here?"

ED-E couldn't give her a definitive answer. Six checked to make sure her holorifle was loaded and ready before she crossed over the bridge. She needed to keep her eyes open.

On her way across, she spotted something that looked man made somewhere ahead. Like a small tent, or a cage made of wood and cloth.

After they went through a tunnel they come onto a plant they hadn't seen yet. It was oval shaped and about ED-E's size. The thing had bioluminescence shining under thin leaves. Six touched it and the leaves peeled back to show its glowing core that shined brighter than some electronic lamps she had seen in the past, but that wasn't the only thing that happened. A large rolled up leaf unraveled out over the drop off.

Six blinked and touched the glowing plant again. It shut at her touch to cover the light and the leaf rolled back up. She did it again one more time to extend the leaf again.

"[*^%~; &`_-(} ? "

"The lack of sunlight, I would guess. The, uh, big leaf gets its energy from this natural sunlamp here. When the lamp is closed, it must conserve energy by rolling up, and extends to get as much as possible when its open. Or something. Why are you asking me? You know I'm not a botanist."

"`#: )"

"Walk across it? Are you crazy? Why would I do that? There's no way that supports my weight."

"#(-;?% +~[$ *^!?, &!*"

"You sure?"

"^*!"

"If I die, I want you to arrange for the King to sing at my funeral. I want singing and dancing, or I'm going to return in the next life as a fire gecko and get your chassis so sooty it'll never wash off."

Six gingerly put her foot on the leaf and found it stiff as a board. She slowly began to walk along it with ED-E keeping close by. She paused in front of a vine shaped suspiciously like something a trapeze artist would use. She placed a hand on it and it dropped down further so it was more near her knees.

Just across the gap was that man made thing she had spotted earlier. Now that she was closer she could see that it was attached to a pulley system. Definitely a trap.

" *, =:&%"

"What? No! I am now swinging across on this thing."

"[...^|!]&%`{)"

"I don't care if Achenar and Sirrus must have done it. If they decided to attack a deathclaw with nothing but a switchblade that doesn't mean I'm going to imitate them. This is just dumb."

"!`}*%/"

"Not a chance. Why don't you fly over and tell me what you see."

" %~_=: '(]"

ED-E did as he was told without saying more. She watched him investigate the pulley system and scan into a tiny nook in the tree just under a fruit tree. She shifted her feet as she waited for him to report back. It didn't take him long. He came back and told her that it was a trap for the same furry creature as the one back in J'nanin.

"If it's native here, than what was it doing in J'nanin? It is highly unlikely the exact same species evolved on two separate Ages. That and the weird inflating plant thing. If they don't belong on J'nanin then those are both going to have to removed from there soon before they spread beyond control. That has to be Saavedro's doing. One of those changes he mentioned in his journal."

Six pointed down a long ways away to another path in the distance, passed the branch with the fruit on it that they had crossed earlier, she had spotted while ED-E was by the animal trap. "Now, would you go see where that goes to, please. And if there's anyway to get there from here."

",,%~)"

ED-E flew towards the ledge and Six rolled her eyes. He could call her a coward all he wanted to, but just because she was in a tree didn't means she was going to turn into Tarzan.

Behind her she heard a tiny little squeak. She turned and saw one of those furry animals looking at her curiously beside the trap. Six smiled at it and held out her hand. It disappeared between a small gap in the branches, and Six refocused her attention on ED-E. He had reached the path she had seen and she watched him move out of sight.

She heard another noise, this time closer, and she looked down to see the animal moving towards her on the leaf cautiously. Six crouched and held out her hand to it again. The thing sniffed her fingers inquisitively and allowed her to pet it.

"I'm going to call you Snugly. Hello, Snugly. Nice to meet you. I'm Six." She carefully picked it up and held it like it was a puppy. It sniffed at her hair as she smoothed down its soft white fur, laughing at her new friend.

The bird cawed and a commotion startled them into finding its source. Moments later she saw the bird fly off in a hurry back up towards its nest, dropping blue feathers like leaves on the wind. Six soothed Snugly, stroking a hand up and down its side until it stopped shaking.

Snugly kept her company for the time that ED-E was gone. By the time she saw him again, twelve minutes had gone by, according to her pip-boy clock. He flew over the gap back to her, going under the bridge they had crossed earlier. Snugly perked up and then broke free from her arms and ran off.

"You scared off my friend."

"{&)"

"So, what was over there?," she asked.

"*!%^,`':_! ;/*~ $[]=?"

Her eyebrows raised, "How'd you get it free?"

"/)-~`"

"Well, at least your finally using your Arc Welder for more than just jump starting batteries." Best upgrade ever. Worth the whole month it took to give it to him without compromising his Gauss cannon.

"#]:"

"Uh huh. And there was no other way to get there?"

"?/"

"Fuck."

".^ #!"

"Shut up," Six demanded without any real heat in her voice. She squinted over at the path and then dismissed it with a shooing motion. She shrugged, trying to put as much regret as she could into it. "Well, that's a damn shame because that bridge over there won't let me reach that path with this vine. I guess we'll just have to find another way further down. There has to be one. I wish I had thought to bring some rope..." she trailed off when she caught sight of Snugly at the edge of the bridge. It looked at her for only a moment before running across it. The fruit on it expanded into the size of beach balls and the wood shattered from the strain, collapsing the bridge.

Her jaw dropped.

"!#"

"Shut up."

Still very much aware of how bad of an idea it was, she grabbed hold of the vine. She tested her weight on it and was disappointed when it didn't break. She sighed and retied her bandanna.

"Alright. I guess I'm doing this."

Six gripped the vine tight, took a deep breath and pushed off the leaf. She swung through the air on the vine, wind whistling in her ears, suddenly feeling like Grognak the Barbarian. Now all she needed was the Virgin Eater and a pure maiden to save.

Her daydreams were cut off when ED-E played his battle music and the vine lurched. She went from swinging to falling in no time at all. ED-E beeped in alarm and flew faster than she had ever seen to race her descent so he could get under her. She fell on him, but her weight was too much for him to remain afloat. They both tumbled down through leaves and branches, but at a slower speed than just free falling.

ED-E struggled to maneuver them as they dropped. It was only because of him that she survived. He and her leg took the brunt of the impact on the largest branch ED-E could get to. She more felt than heard the bone shatter. ED-E rolled down into a dry basin, unconscious.

She upended her bag, spilling the contents everywhere on the perfectly carved stairs they had landed on. Six snagged up her doctor's kit and practically tore it open. She injected some Med-X before setting the bone with a medical brace. When she was sure that she had done it right, she stabbed her thigh with a Stimpak.

When that was taken care of, she laid back and let the medicine do its job. She looked down the stairs towards ED-E and knew he would wake up again soon on his own. Six scanned her surroundings and she caught sight of the vine she had been swinging on. Six reached out and reeled it in until she came over the end that had broken away.

It was a clean cut all the way through.

ED-E shot up into the air like someone had woken him with an air horn. He spun around until he caught sight of her. He flew closer, up the stairs, and she held up the end of the vine.

"Deliberate."

"%!"

"Did you detect anyone before?"

"{$~!'`: (*+ &/ "

"They were there and then they were gone, just like that?"

"$&!"

"Just before we fell?"

"!^&~/"

"Alright, just before I fell and you selflessly caught me."

" $*]+_!"

"No, I'll freak Atrus and Kat out if I go back with a broken leg. I took a Stimpak, it'll be fine in a bit." She held up her hand to him, "Come here, pally. Let me make sure you're okay."

ED-E sat beside her on the ground as she checked over his insides. Nothing seemed to have been jarred loose. She let him go and he flew around to catalogue their surroundings and search for danger. Six picked up her canteen to take a conservative drink from it. She turned it over in her hand and brushed her thumb over the large yellow numbers for Vault 13 on the front. It, an armored Vault 13 jumpsuit, and a modified 10mm had come into her possession in New Mexico. It was part of the 'Treasure' that Enclave deserter had helped her find. He—former Lieutenant Watkins, that is—had sworn up and down it belonged to the so-called legendary Vault Dweller who defeated The Master. She didn't know if that were true, but he had let her keep the stuff as he had been more interested in the experimental flame thrower design...and the whiskey...and the sugar bombs. Wat was always a guarantee for a fun time.

She gingerly checked on her leg. There was pain, but it was no longer broken. She stood up slowly. Concerned beeping came from ED-E. He hovered around her like a mother hen, but she waved him off. Six gathered up her things and then turned back to her friend.

"What have you found?"

She followed him down the stairs that either Atrus or Saavedro must have carved into the branch. At the bottom, in the dried basin ED-E had fallen into earlier were thick thorny vines. She followed them back up and in the distance, far above them, was the pod plant ED-E had described to her that had trapped the bird. It was like a bigger, meaner version of the one they had found in J'nanin.

"Holy shit. That asshole introduced an invasive species." She rubbed her forehead, "ED-E make absolutely sure that I do not forget to mention this thing to Atrus. This has to go ASAP." This one little introduction could strangle the whole Age to death. Snugly, the ray, Pat, and baby bird would be out of a home if they survived the collapsing of their ecosystem. If Saavedro thinks the destruction of his Age gives him the right to destroy others without repercussions than he's got something else coming to him. As cliche as Six knew it was, two wrongs really don't make a right.

ED-E led her around the basin, up a branch that didn't have stairs carved out of it. Around the back of it was a machine that looked like a small TV attached to a pole. She pressed the single oversized button and Saavedro's face materialized on it.

"What's the matter, Atrus, can't remember how thing's work? Yet you explained this class so well when we spoke of it on Narayan. 'I want Sirrus and Achenar to learn everything they can, Saavedro! First from Amateria, Edanna, Voltaic, and finally from Narayan. When my boys come to see your people, I want them to see Narayan's traditions at work, so they can see how civilization can balance an Age.' Do you know what they did when they finally came to us? You never came back. After class was over, you took your boys away and you never came back. Sirrus and Achenar did." The recording ended with Saavedro's face fading away in myriad of colors.

Six scratched the back of her head, "Why? I wonder. Why did they go back to Narayan? Was it just random raiding of an Age they already knew about, or was there something else?"

"/%/"

"Yeah, I could be overestimating them." Six shrugged, "If I don't figure it out myself, I'll ask them when I see them."

Six limped on and stopped at another one of those rolled up leaves, but this one didn't have a natural sunlamp nearby. Out of sheer desperation, she tried her pip-boy light, but to no success. She threw up her hands and went back the way she came. She had decided somewhere in Vault 22 that she despised plants. Edanna wasn't really turning her opinion around.

She went back around the basin to go up the stairs. She came to a stop again in front of a painting done on a portion of the 'wall' that someone had painstakingly smoothed. She held up her light to it before walking on in disinterest. She wasn't big on art. Most of what she had seen was propaganda or two hundred year old advertisements, it kind of ruined the whole subject for her and everyone else in the Wasteland who wasn't a Follower.

She looked down both sides of the crossroads before heading left. ED-E beeped when they came across another large plant. This one had lavender petals and a quick perusal of it told her that it was another one of those lens flowers. She looked through it, but all it seemed to be was a natural formed telescope.

It was becoming more and more tempting to just go back to J'nanin and find one of the other Ages, but she wanted to at least reach the bottom. That way she would have observed the ecology on every level and see if Saavedro added anymore invasive species. She wasn't going to go over every inch of the Ages, but she was going to see enough to give Atrus a basic report.

She looked though every lavender flower until she found one that had sunlight hitting it. She turned it and the light streamed through the other side of it in a concentrated beam and lit up another lens plant. Six was tired, hurt, and irritated, but she could still add two together. A good old fashioned relay system was in order.

After some back and forth between the flowers, she finally got sunlight to hit the leaf to get it to unroll into a hollow branch. Her leg was feeling better by the time she reached the leaf again. ED-E insisted on going first and she followed him up the steep incline using strong mushrooms as handholds.

At the top, they found a red flower with a lavender one nearby, but nothing else. She went back down the branch cursing Atrus for his choice of using Edanna as a Lesson Age. Did he give his kids a map with the correct route to take, or something? Was she doing this the hard way?

She was becoming paranoid too, her eyes darted to every little movement in the foliage and to the radar screen on her pip-boy.

Halfway down the branch she saw that there was another one that grew into the one she was in and went straight. Six climbed into it, ignoring ED-E's protest. She crawled through it, and discovered more pages from Saavedro's journal. Six curled up in the hollow branch to read it, a short break was in order anyway. She didn't want to overtax her still healing leg.

When she was finished reading, a sigh escaped her and she placed them with the others. It was interesting to hear how Atrus met Saavedro, but it didn't answer any relevant questions she had.

At the end of the hollow branch was another one of those trapeze vines. Six signaled ED-E to wait as she stepped onto the vine and let it lower her down a level. The sound of waves was louder, and she didn't have to find a break in the tree to know that she was closer to the base. She could even smell the ocean through over the heavy scent of fauna.

As it turned out, she wasn't closer to the bottom, she was at the bottom. The humidity was so heavy it made the conditions absolutely miserable. It felt like a swamp.

A few years back, maybe four, she had visited Louisiana, and wished she hadn't. Atchafalaya Swamp had been worse than Point Lookout by far. The ghoul and mutant population had been a high one, some of them were friendly, most of them weren't. The humans that did live there were mostly cannibals and plain crazies. It was one of the few places she actually used the Transportalponder to get away from. She had picked up a nasty illness and had been out of commission for a week. The Auto-Doc had to come up with a whole new type of medication to treat her with.

In short, she hated swamps.

She rubbed her face and groaned. Perfect. ED-E offered his sympathies from behind her. Six managed a small smile in his direction before balancing on the thin branch to go forward.

A house sized purple blossom sat in the center of a calm pool of water. She carefully searched the pool, but saw nothing like crocodiles sitting in wait. She hadn't actually seen any real predators in Edanna. Her mysterious would-be murderer didn't count. The Age was mostly plants with only a couple of animals sparsely populating it, and all of those had been herbivores. Most healthy ecosystems she knew of had at least one apex predator in it to keep the animal population in check, but it seemed one wasn't needed. Maybe some of the pollen the plants sent off were toxic to animals that made their home in the tree? Or they all had brief life cycles? Or Saavedro killed all the predators in another attempt at senseless sabotage, all in the name of making Atrus miserable. The latter was more likely. Edanna could very well expect a population explosion soon if that were the case.

Against her desire to do anything but, she explored the swampy base of the great tree. She was careful not to get into the water. Falling into swamp water was what had gotten her so sick in Louisiana.

They found another giant blossom, this one open and had flying bugs feeding on stems sticking out of the very top. The inside of the blossom had things that looked like what Pat had been feeding baby bird. That was one mystery solved. Beyond that, there didn't appear to be anything else.

Six wrote in her pip-boy notes under Edanna about the suspected invasive species of plant and the suspicious lack of predators. She took the J'nanin Book out her bag and they Linked away, making sure the Book would drop on a dry and flat surface.

Chapter Three End

Up Next: Exploring Amateria

Author's Note:

I love the Animal Friend perk. It just makes certain things less painful. Big Mountain comes to mind. All of those nightstalkers...

I wanted to have this chapter done earlier, but I got distracted by...stuff. Yeah, let's go with that. Stuff.

It's going to be another long wait for the next chapter for much the same reason it was for this one. It's going to be the entirety of Amateria and that's going to take a bit to write out. For those of you who find me just writing about what happens on the Lesson Ages boring, don't worry. After Amateria, it'll be much different. I have something special planned for Voltaic and Narayan will also be greatly changed for reasons that should be obvious by now. After that? All new stuff!

Snugly the Squee and I thank you for reading this far,

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