The Nowhere Bridge

Mutualities | Fantasy Short Stories #6

It arrived much sooner than we had anticipated, though I suppose it was odd to configure anticipations around the construction of a miraculous and floating bridge that seemed to erupt from nowhere. The North half of Cleff, ugh, I suppose I mean Lonia, is largely split between the Plielands on the West and Beeley on the East, between them is the Eugen jungle hugging the coast closest to Beeley, and the tapering range of Royson’s Unbound, the mountain range where Gario resides. On the western side of the mountains are the fringes of the Hero’s Respite, a light forest that seems to encircle the gentle farm territories of the Plielands. Outside of the Eugen, most anywhere you are as a view of the Goss, or the Generosity of Spirit, the oceanic waters to the North of the land.

Being of the mindset that we were the only landmass on Cleff proved challenging to many of the more seafaring societies, and we would hear and read all manner of adventurous sorts from Shacaster or Slico taking up sails to attempt to find what else lurked beyond our sight, across the waters of the Fool’s Blue and the Million Depths, but if they returned, returning empty-handed. The Goss was largely ignored for these pursuits as it proved to be the most challenging of waters—terrible whipcurrents and crashing waves regardless of the weather alongside the chilling presence of the Might, a frozen landmass off the coast of the Plielands tended to be enough to deter most, and the lurking shadows of massive aqueous creatures yet-to-be-named deterred the rest.

So when Rump, a catfolk in Beeley who was a part of the Wick Rejuvenation Legion and had the genius of idea of opening a, what they referred to, cozy space for folks to spend time without feeling obligated to catch-up or be productive or think about chores, came sprinting into town to tell people about a structure he was seeing over the ocean when he was looking out over the Oinpo, he wasn’t taken immediately seriously. Beeley was not a town of great change, nor was it a region particularly known for accepting new information with ease, so naturally a discovery like this would fall on, at-best, unwilling ears, and at-worst, would spark something of a chastisement, discrediting Rump from future insights. Thankfully, Rump had largely lost town respectability when it came to his ideas and desires long ago, so there was not much to be upset in the workings of his eyes to being discredited yet further.

The Oinpo was a couple-hours walk outside of Beeley along its imposing walls, a scenic overlook with a couple of seaside graves and a bench. It wasn’t a treacherous hike to path toward by any means, but dedicating a handful of hours to go there, rest, and come back was not often in the purview of the townsfolk who otherwise kept their feet and hands tired. The first to take up Rump on his badgering to come check out this structure on the horizon was Quartz Roamer, also something of a discredited individual in Beeley, but for different reasons: Quartz was a magnificently hardworking individual and well-loved for their effort, but poorly understood as they seemed to bounce between sexes fairly frequently. Dwarves, of course, existed in a fairly intersexed space; however, Beeley, it seemed, was not particularly fond of someone playing around with the performance of these sexes as much as Quartz did.

But, about a week after first sighting, Quartz and Rump sat on the salt-worn bench over the Oinpo, Quartz in some farmer’s overalls with their beard combed into magnificently well-kept waves, Rump in what seemed fairly standard for him at this point: deep purple trousers which were leftover fabrics from one of the Naughton’s Hearthole Inn transformations and a flowing white shirt. Quartz had taken it upon theirself to pursue Rump doggedly for romantic interests, stating it quite directly some months ago, “Ye’r the only one who’s got the audacity to handle me.”

To which Rump responded ponderously, “I’m not sure if I have the audacity to handle me.”

As they sat there feasting over a sharp and fresh radish salad, Quartz nodded vigorously saying, “Yep that’s a thing.” And with a nod, “Big thing at that.”

“Any ‘dea wharit might be?” Rump said.

“Maybe some kinda’ rock? Do rocks grow?” Quartz asked.

“Not sure,” Rump said, “feels like a dwarf thing to know.” Then, “You got some kinda’ ancestral knowin’ ‘bout rocks and things?”

Quartz wiggled their feet, dangling over the bench that they had to hop onto, then sat their staring at a small boulder a few feet away, “Not thinkin’ I do.”

But with two voices affirming that there was, in fact, something large and looming in the distance, more and more people from Beeley wound their way up to the Oinpo to catch a glimpse. This is how Rump began to observe that, in fact, this big thing in the distance, was moving, or growing, or both. What started as a barely visible speck on the horizon had grown fairly sizeable as though it were a massive worm inching closer.

It wasn’t but a few weeks later when, having observed it every day for some time now, Rump declared, “It’s a bridge.”

Of course, nobody believed him. You couldn’t build a bridge over an ocean, after all, and if there was a bridge that would mean that it came from somewhere.

Nevertheless, as weeks went by, the structure on the horizon only grew closer. There were a handful of town meetings where the Beeley elderi would try assuaging the curiosities and fears of the town. You know, things like if a bridge was coming from somewhere it would mean there was something else out there, and if it wasn’t a bridge, it was probably some kind of massive beast of some kind that would certainly want to devour anything along the coast line, and that putting a city up along a massive cliff face anyway was rather stupid because it’s not like we were a city of fishers nor were we a port city so this proximity to the water really just meant that we were that much closer to unknowable and indescribable dangers, and even though, granted, the Goss was there to keep the climate fairly regulated, there were on occasion ill-behaved storms they’d be able to witness hunting them and would cause all manner of roofing or fences or equipment to be damaged, and there probably weren’t half as many bad storms over in the Plielands since they had the good grace to build their settlement a respectable distance from the shoreline. Yes, and of course there were others who spoke about how they feared the Eugen only grew on the proximity to the Goss’s powers and each year they swore the Eugen crept a bit closer to the city, and that if they wouldn’t keep up on this encroaching threat then they would be subject to and swallowed by any number of ancient predators that lurk within the deep, invisible vegetation the Eugen held to itself, or how the reason Beeley doesn’t get travelers is because there isn’t any good reason to come to Beeley since most folks will only want to travel to and visit more scenic, beautiful port towns where they can be introduced to all number of curious individuals with ambitious lives, and that being where it is, Beeley has no reason to become more interesting, except to the crazies from Xameryth of course who would occasionally land toward Beeley because it was the closest bit of civilization to them on the mainland, but that should be excluded because who can honestly predict the Xamerythians? And when the meetings would get to a point where all the anxieties were bubbling out and over certainly there would be others bringing up all manner of complaints: why’d you go and cast out the only powersborn folk we’d had, we hadn’t managed to make an attractive, infused good since we lost them, what if the land isn’t happy with how much we’re farming it and it will come for us before the ocean or the jungle, how come some of the smiths in town get to work with the guards and others have to work exclusively on making farming equipment and why do we only have one Tasmito a year when so clearly do we need a second based on how much everybody enjoys it?

The meetings became a regular occurrence as townsfolk would note the loomingness of the bridge, though after it got close enough, Rump and some other folk worked out that the bridge was looking like it would connect somewhere in the midpoint between Beeley and the Plielands, probably off the western edge of the Eugen. This gave the town an immense sigh of relief, even though Rump would laughingly say it was only half a day’s walk away.

Yet, seasons change, life would go on, and though this beginning to the year would give Beeley a sense of life and the anxiety fueled a certain amount of jouissance, as Beeley is want to do, they all returned to their daily lives and activities, falling back into a rhythm that betrayed any possibility for the novel or what would demand adjustments from them. Rump was unable to see the ending of the bridge, as after a certain proximity to shore, the Eugen’s bombastic growth blocked out the distant coastline. Based on what he’d observed, though, some seven months after the first time he was looking out and caught glimpse of an odd structure on the horizon, he set off toward the Plielands with a large backpack full of camping materials, and a large wicker basket full of pastries, sandwiches, hand pies, and butters and jams that he’d accrued from last night’s end-of-day givings from the bakers and chefs of Beeley.

It was pre-morning when they left. They, of course, acknowledging Quartz who was tagging along with a curmudgeonly, “S’not like’m goin’ ta’ letcha’ go’n get killed from weird oceanfolk without me.” With a grin that seemed too enthusiastic and energetic for how early it was, “Migh’ s’well die together if’n they’re goin’ ta’ kill us.”

“Uh, well, thanks,” Rump said, still rubbing the sleep from his eyes as he processed the exuberantly colorful blouse and skirt Quartz had on today, “though ‘m not ‘specially hopin’ to get killed.”

“Ya’ never know,” Quartz said.

“S’pose that’s true.” Rump said.

The walk toward the Plielands was through the dearth, a stretch of tall-grassed plains where all manner of beasties roamed, most of whom herbivorous and though easily startled into some kind of threatened activity, wouldn’t be looking to hunt the pair of unassuming Beeleyians. There was a dirt path mostly carved through it all, though, admittedly it grew overgrown with disuse the further from city walls the pair went. Some years ago, Captain Praelo had suggested in a town meeting that they use some of the guard’s patrol resources to keep the path cleared to ensure that if any travel did desire to come, they would find an easy way. Though it seemed in recent years, the efforts of these patrols were less exhaustive.

Small herds of charias wandered in the grasses, families of vaulters could be seen hopping over the grasses on occasion in their seemingly ecstatic jumps, rootwings in the thin saplings with their wings that looked like translucent flora and with trailing root-like fibers occasionally followed them chirping questioningly. Yet, for the most part, as the morning light came through and the day continued on, Quartz’ incessant chattering and Rump’s seemingly unrelated observations went nonstop until they spotted it: in the distance, an odd, dark stonelike structure that seemed to be resting on the ground, with two clawlike structures at the end of it being actively covered with dirt.

There were people working on it, though they were people the likes of which Rump and Quartz had never heard of or encountered before: all bipedal, humanoid in shape and structure, but some with crustaceous scales for skin, and others with lumping shells of varying sizes along their backs, arms, and legs, like someone had been approximating armor inspired by a tortoise, and some odder yet with six limbs altogether with a short coat of furs, or what looked like relatively expected humans except for a crown of antennae that shot from their heads and glowed in different colors. The view was enough to leave both Quartz and Rump, who had otherwise been occupied in a fairly heated conversation about whether mountains considered their smaller peaks their children, staring with mouths agape. One of the tortoise-like individuals, having picked their head up, was the first to see them.

The whole scene was still maybe a quarter of a mile away, plenty of distance between them if the two wanted to run, but this tortoise began waving their arms and stubby hands enthusiastically in the air, bellowing out a loud but choke-sounding, “HULLO!”

“Sounds phlegmy,” Quartz said, speaking out of the corner of their mouth.

“Maybe they got sick,” Rump said as he continued walking toward them.

Then, not one to back down from a good yell, Quartz cupped their hands around their mouth and yelled back, “ELLO! FRIENDS?”

Rump shook his head, “Obviously they’re not going to say they’re not friends, Quartz.”

Quartz shrugged, “Ya’ never know.”

“FRENZ!” The Tortoise yelled back, the noise of which having attracted a number of the other folk who’d been working and who were standing shoulder to shoulder with the tortoise now, all waving their arms enthusiastically and turning to each other, jumping up and down.

Most of the assorted people had stopped what they were doing and begun to walk toward the pair, maybe twenty-odd individuals with the tortoise leading the pack, though in true tortoise fashion it seemed like moving quickly was not exactly a strength of theirs, their knees refusing to unbend and instead relying on their hips to power each step forward with what looked like great efforts. The group stopped about fifty feet away, and while Rump respectfully also stopped, Quartz paid no heed and continued walking, “Rude bunch ya’re. Put on me prettiest shirt for ya’ t’day too and ya’re goin’ ta’ make a lady do alla’ this walkin’ for ya’.”

The tortoise opened their mouth and then closed it again, furrowing their brow in thought, and then opened once more to say, “Not many speech… like you.” It sounded a bit like they were swallowing each word, “Not hurt?”

Rump hurried to catch up to Quartz who instinctively reached behind for the wicker basket. Quartz, who came up to about mid-torso on this tortoise, shoved the wicker basket toward the individual and said, “Snacks.” The tortoise blinked at them but Quartz continued, “Food. Treats. Not hurt.”

The tortoise held the basket, about the size of their chest, and inspected it quite thoroughly before opening it up. While not nearly as warm and aromatic as these all were the day previously, it still smelled richly of butter and cheese, sweet concoctions and otherwise. Seeing all the food, the tortoise’s eyes, which had previously been fairly relaxed and small, seemed to widen into a bulge. Two crustaceous folk alongside and one of the Antenna’d humans, which upon getting closer also had something of a surface of filament-like hairs all along their body, also eyed the basket edaciously. From somewhere behind, a four-armed individual with a short, dark coat of fur reached between bodies and plucked a lemon-ginger tartlette and pulled it back to them before, moments later, an audible and airy, “Mmnph!” moaned out.

It was like that that all of the individuals descended upon the basket with great and earnest hunger. It would seem introductions would come after a type of feast would be had. The basket itself was quite large, certainly, and had a healthy amount of food for probably six or seven people, or a good nibbling for ten, and could not hold to the onslaught of grabbing hands (or claws, in some cases) from the folk who descended upon it. Judiciously, as they approached the dregs of the available treats, the individuals began to break apart chunks, making sure that the more patient and less grabby would have some bits to savor.

In a manner of minutes, though, only the tiniest of crumbs were left behind on the cloth bottom of the basket—impressive, to say the least, considering how overstuffed with jam and creams some of the pastries were that they evaded being squished or spilled.

Assessing the crowd as they spread themselves around in the well-trodden soil, there were roughly four races of individuals: tortoisefolk, mothfolk, crabfolk, and some amalgam of others, what must have been half-breeds, but not entirely sure what each half was composing them.

Quartz, boisterous as they are, was the first to break the awkwardness and said, “Boy howdy you lot’re lucky t’was us who ambled ‘pon ya’ an’ not th’ rest o’ town. They’d be callin’ ya’ll sorts o’ monsters like the unduly sorts, runnin’ away with heads screamin’ an’ the what.”

The tortoisefolk who seemed to have been delegated the speaker had been taking some time to speak in a low rumbling speech to the rest, clearly a language but not familiar. Then, turning their head back, said, “We not monster.” And gestured with their hands behind, doing waves with one of their hands and then having another hand burst forth from underneath with a mimicked roar, “We not hurt! We not hurt!”

Rump was quicker on the gesture uptake and beamed, “Ooh, I can do this, Ma’ always had us playin’ charades when we were all still young and around.” And, taking a few steps back, started to make large, exaggerated gestures: pointing to himself, then seeming to point very far in the direction of Beeley, cupping a large circle in front of him and then pointing to both himself and Quartz before expanding his cupped hands outward like a pulse.

Quartz held out for as long as they could before letting out a full belly laugh, “What in the spirits makes you think they’ll unnerstan’--,”

But it was one of the mothfolk with four arms who stepped up and, smiling softly, joined in the gestural communication: drawing a circle around their current group but pointing backwards and showed the same citylike gesture, increasing the amount of people. Then, they did the same monsters breaking from the water motion the tortoisefolk did and pointed it toward the city they’d gestured toward previously. Then they walked fingers forward on two of their hands while the other two of their hands were mimicking hammering and laying down gestures. Finally they noted the connection of the structure behind them to the ground, made an exasperated look on their face, and pointed at the wicker basket with a look of sadness as they did a two-thumbs down. “Tuimahatărel?” The mothfolk asked in a much smoother, confident voice before panicking at Rump’s and Quartz’ blank stare and looked back to the tortoisefolk who shrugged and offered a, “Know?”

Quartz nodded once before saying, “So you’ve got monsters attacking where you come from and you thought to escape to come here.”

Rump, aghast at Quartz, said, “I have so many questions.”

Quartz didn’t seem to acknowledge and said, “How did ya’ build a bridge ‘cross the ocean?”

Then Rump closed his jaw and looked at each of their faces. Planting his palm on his chest, he said, “Rump.” Then, both hands thumbs’ pointing at himself, “Rump,” and did the same for Quartz.

The tortoisefolk attempted first, “Roomp. Rehmp.” A cough, a clearing of the throat, “Rihmp. Rrrehmp.” Then, finally, “Rohmp.” Each time Rump nodded enthusiastically. The tortoise continued a few more times, “Rohmp. Rohmp. Rahhhmp. Rahmp.”

“Rump.”

“Rahhmp.”

“Rump.”

“Rump.”

The crowd, listening to this final pronunciation all looked at Rump with something of a held breath before, grinning widely, he nodded, “Rump.”

And one-by-one they took time practicing each of their names. Quartz tended to get shortened to quart, but they didn’t seem to mind. Some took longer than others to get the names down, the crabfolk especially seemed to have difficulty with the soft letters, the names they could get closest to became more like “Ermp,” and “Corez,” but they got there.

Over the afternoon, the group went through their names one by one. It was an arduous exercise as many of the noises they were making for their names did not have fricative equivalents for the two Beeleyians. But there was an accord reached, and a certain element of pride as Rump and Quartz each could confidently name every member of this party.

The crabfolk were Builbung, Cobuimo, Cuairputarl, Gnàt initno, Doimdalapen, Sgregary, Tarragangkcia, and Lòpunm. They were all mostly of a similar build and height, though vastly different colors between them - Cobuimo and Sgregary, for instance, were almost shimmeringly purple, while Cuairputarl and Tarragangkcia were so red they reminded of wildflowers. The halfbreeds took the longest to get introductions from - in the case of Ainguda duho, a vaguely human-looking individual with five legs, antennae, and mounds over their shoulders, didn’t seem to know how to move their mouth for our inflections. Rugafana phuv and Mhuiketur moro, who each had four arms and were otherwise softly furred, seemed rather meek and shy, not wanting to speak much noise. One would wonder if these folk were ostracized in whatever society they hail from, too. There were Creag-batuder and Soldalo who were two other tortoisefolk who seemed to hang back behind the group and observe rather quietly, though didn’t take much effort at all to announce themselves. The mothfolk or vaguely insect-like in their appearances seemed rather boisterous once they were given the spotlight and spoke rather quickly. Gealulàro had a gorgeous pattern to their hair with an array of black and white colors, Aodaїrza seemed rather meek and plain by comparison but spoke quite loudly, Siotreź was the quietest of the bunch, and with a near albino visage, Piobricali and Tirimaros were both rather bulky compared to the rest of their kind and dark-haired, and Brat-arpòri who seemed to be able to blend in with the dirt. Finally, after all the rest of their party introduced themselves, our first contact, the tortoise Ionragritèto went through the motions.

For what it’s worth, the process was incredibly revelatory. Yet, in the quiet satisfaction of acceptance and knowledge, the two parties looked at each other with the implicit question of: well, what now?

Rump, looking at Quartz with a furrowed brow, concern lingering in his words, asked, “Who do ya’ think from town would be best ta’ introduce ta’ them?”

Quartz kicked one of their feet into the ground saying, “Ehm, I’unno Rumpers. Prob’ly can find someone though.”

At this Rump shot into the air and looked around to find a sturdy twig. Then he set into the dirt, drawing an, admittedly, quite rough map: at the center was a circle with two long lines from it over the jagged line signifying the cliffs and the ocean. To the right was Beeley with a large circle and a jagged simple line connecting the landing point to the city. To the left Rump drew a jagged line for the edge of Royson’s Unbound and Gario’s mountains, and much further another circle for the Plielands.

Then Rump drew two lines with little circles for heads, tapping them each and saying, “Rump. Quartz.” Followed by two arrows, one to Beeley, and then one returning to the party. Thinking how to explain his town’s reticence to anything new, Rump settled on, “Beeley,” tapping the big circle, “If hurt, if monsters,” crossed out the whole right side with an X and then circled the pair of Rump and Quartz along with the landing party and drew a bigger arrow to the Plielands, saying, “No hurt.”

Quartz laughed once more, “Are you sayin’ if’n Beeley won’t have’em we’ll take’m ta’ Plielands? ‘Ave ye’ver been dummy? Dumper.” They snorted.

“Can’t just leave’m here!” Rump said.

“Wasn’t sayin’ we would, just, you seem cool s’all,” Quartz said, fluttering their eyes at him as he swatted her affection away in the air.

Ionragritèto, having watched the whole affair in their quiet acceptance, placed a hand on Rump’s shoulder to say, “We thank Rump and Quartz. For know. For no hurt.”

Sgregary and Piobricali each came up and, with a little shoving between each other, first spoke to their tortoise leader. However, after a few back and forths, Piobricali looked at Quartz with an intense smile, “We connect,” then looking back at their creation, “bridge? Yes. Trust connect frenz. We trust Quartz-and-Rump.”

Twilight had begun to drift its amber hues across the sky and the group shifted its way back to their makeshift camp. It was little more than some crates stacked around in a semi-circle with something of a campfire set in the middle, a large cauldron of some kind of stew bubbling from within. There weren’t tents for everybody, only a few for whom seemed particularly sensitive to changes in light. The pair of Beeleyians settled down in their own ways, trusting in the safety of a group despite the relative openness they faced in the relative wilderness: having been taught from a young age not to spend nights outside of the city walls because of the dangers lurking out there, the predators, the possibility of being stolen away and devoured, the ease with which they slipped into this evening after such a profoundly tiring day certainly startled Rump, at least, and perhaps even Quartz though they were rather fast asleep with their head on one of Rump’s thighs as soon as it got dark.

It dawned on Rump that this must have been one of those circumstances that, even upon first observation of the bridge coming toward the coastline some months ago, his brother Anin would have said, “You just know you’ll never be able to go back to how things were after knowing about it.” And certainly, after learning the names of twenty odd individuals who he could barely understand, and beyond that promising, even if they didn’t understand the full weight of his promise, that he would try his best to find aid for them, there was not much point in trying to entertain some semblance of what had been normal. There were so many stars when all the lights had gone out. So many stars and so much song.