Zollocco: A Novel of Another Universe (4 page)

Not one of Us can speak. We all withdraw into Our own physical entities, forming congruent thoughts and feelings as always. So separated from each other never do We feel more one. We don't pretend to understand the wholeness of the human's dream, but We do feel it means something crucial to Our adopted human. Silently We send Our thanks to that far off Athena of the Lonely Hermitage for sending Us this new being to know Ourselves by. At last a bit of a moonflower speaks up: "What does ark mean?" And none of Us knows. Perhaps another Forest does.

The next morning, when I awoke, I was still up in the tree. I was amazed I hadn't fallen out, and even more amazed I wasn't stiff and sore. On a whim, I climbed up higher in the tree to survey the view. Off in the distance I saw a settlement; a few stone buildings nestled against the forest. A soft breeze ruffled my hair; the leaves of the trees whispered about me. I climbed down and sprinted...

We have told the members of the stone school near Us of Our human. The humans there of course claim her for themselves, but We are not so sure of this. We feel Our human is one of Us; a Forest Being. It will be good for another Forest woman to walk among the neutrals.

CHAPTER TWO: The Remembered Tongue

I saw a great creature loping from tree to ground to tree again. All of this time I have wandered extensively in this forest never dreaming any really big wild animals existed here. You did too dream of me! Where did that thought come from? I turned, and saw far away the shaggy-haired, ape-like bear staring at me. I backed up... the beast didn't move. I continued to back up... still it gazed at me alertly, but without moving. I climbed very high up a tree and watched it. A rabbit bounded by the beast. In one sweeping gesture, the ape-bear grabbed the rabbit, ripped off its head, peeled off the skin as though the rabbit were a banana, and then thoughtfully ate the rabbit in one mouthful like an appetizer. The bear-ape continued to watch me, growing drowsy as it did so. It fell asleep, its great pot-belly, the only unfurry part of it, heaving rhythmically. Trembling, I whisked back to the module. To think that I had spent a night asleep in the forest with such a beast roaming around.

We swear this human is retarded. She comes across Zollocco during her exploration of Ourself, so Zollocco thoughtfully goes to sleep so his ghost can talk to the human without scaring her. And what does she do when his ghost comes out of his body to greet her? She acts as though ghosts don't exist! She runs away from Our sleeping Haetrist as though he isn't aware of what she is doing! She doesn't see Our Haetrist's ghost at all! Zollocco wakes and goes back to his mate and cubs. Zollocco's mate suggests the human is still a cub even though the human is physically full grown. Also, when the human scrambled down from the tree she scraped her hands, knees, and wrists on the bark of the vine entwining the tree. The bark of this vine is poisonous and by evening her scrapes will have pus and she will be feverish. If she isn't tolerant to the poison it may finish her off. As night falls, We suggest certain of Our herbal leaves for her to crush against the sores.

My scratches became infected, and I felt a little achy. I decided it would be best to try to clean the scrapes in the stream. I sat for a time with my feet in the stream's water. The water seemed to oblige me by being quite cold. I wondered how the stream could undergo such extremes of temperature, from frigid to boiling. Sitting there, a little bored but not feeling like doing anything, I unconsciously pulled some leaves off of a nettled shrub and crushed the leaves between my fingers. A pulpy juice oozed down my palm. It had a medicinal smell to it. I started. Just a few days before I had seen a plant just like this twine its thorns around the grasping paw of a vegetarian fox-like animal. Yipping, the fox had ripped its bleeding paw away and bounded off. I eyed the plant expecting it to reach for me. I looked at my hand. The pulp I had mashed had dribbled on to my infected scratches. It felt very soothing. As I watched, the sore's ugly pus began to drain in a yellow trickle. This I washed away with water. It seemed I had lucked-out and found a natural medicine. Murmuring nervously to the plant not to prick me with its intimidating thorns, I tentatively reached out and plucked a few more leaves. These I crushed onto my other sores. The juice caused the other sores to drain. On some of the worse sores the pus stung. What kind of vile poison had gotten into my system? I used some of the leaves to catch the burning drips. The leaves alleviated the burning sting. I looked at the plant gratefully even though I was unnerved. Why hadn't it clawed at me like it did the foxlike creature? Could a plant have a conscious intent? The plant had never been next to the stream before. Was it possible it had come to help me? Since no-one was around to see how silly I was, I sang the plant a little song of thanks to the tune of Beethoven's ninth.

Our human sings to Our medicine thorn of universal gathering and then it feels--We mean she--She feels solitary, estranged. It is hard to keep up the spirits of an endangered species. Maybe if she finds others of her kind she will feel fulfilled. Humans contain so much consciousness in one small form that they often feel overwhelmed and empty. An owl snorts.

Not wanting to wash the healing plant juice from my scratches, I abstained from swimming for a few days. When I finally returned to the pond, I stopped dead in my tracks watching the most amazing sight. Saplings were uprooting themselves and wading in the pond. Ten to twenty saplings were busily splashing up, down and around in the pond. Could the entire forest locomote all at once if it wanted to? I must be out of my mind, or maybe dreaming. I must be sound asleep, or if not asleep, I needed to be asleep! Two paces from me was a huge, flattened boulder. I climbed up on it, lay down, and went to sleep, certain that the world would be normal again when I woke up. And if not, well then the strolling forsythia could go ahead and eat me.

We are very proud of Ourselves. We have Our very own human in Our midst, a perfectly formed, healthy creature just like everybody else here. What an invaluable part of creation We are
!

"What's the story here?"

Our human seems rather cross. Her ghost is sitting up half out of her body glowering at everyone around her. "What's the story here? What is this with trees walking around, birds with no feathers, raccoons with feathers, and octopi in trees? What am I doing here in a world where everything is so mixed up?"

"You are the one who chose to come here!" yowls a forsythia.
"You prefer the Lonely Hermitage perchance?" hisses a viper,
"I can send your ghost back there sans your body."
Zollocco comes swinging through the trees to join in the healthy fray: "If the human wants to know what the story is we can tell her!"
This wakes up the night lilies. They love looking at probable futures and recommending which one to pursue. "Tell her, tell her!" they sing with their little bell like voices.
The octopi, the whole herd of them, ring the trees above the human. With their many legs waving they cheer, "Let's juggle a reality and determine a course."
"Hey, wait a minute! Nobody decides my life but me!" admonishes the human.
"Then you know what the story is already and can tell Us," responds a willow.
"Not now. I tell my life by doing it. Say, why don't you tell me about the human race? The lost soul always disappears into the woods, or on top of the mountain, to find Enlightenment. So Enlighten me. If I ever leave here, I would like to tell people I found something more than mirnie berries and strange streams. Besides, I would like to know. What is happening to humanity?"
"Yes, let's tell about the human race," chirp the moss.
So Our massive Oak begins. "Well, humans are ready for a new development, for they have grown to dislike themselves as they are. They are trying to commit species suicide in a misdirected attempt to give new birth to a new variation of human. In one universe, there are too many people, in Ours too few, In others the population is of an appropriate size, but all the people are confused. In some worlds, humans choose crazed leaders who deem themselves gods and their citizens sacrifices. One such mad leader flew over his nation in a small flying-can and dumped poisonous chemicals on every settlement he saw. His counterparts in other nations of his world thought this a great idea and they did the same. In other worlds, where the people have managed to greatly lengthen their lives, it is made illegal to have children. Anyone under twelve is considered a child and put to death. This law lasts so long that people become afraid of children and so completely stop reproducing. The people of some planets build atomic bombs and play a global chicken game; in others, the people poison their water; and there are some planets where combinations of death methods are chosen. However, some of the new type of humans have been born or have developed already and they don't want to die."
"What are you saying?" complains the human, "That there is a new master race?"
"It figures a human would jump to such a stupid conclusion," bristles Our spiked possum, "They see things only in extremes: good and bad, superior and inferior, master and servant."
Our Oak patiently explains to the human ghost, "Is it better to be left-handed or right-handed?"
"It's easier to be right-handed in a right-handed world, but not better." answers the ghost.
"As it is easier to be left-handed in a left-handed world. Left-handedness, right-handedness are different ways of being, different ways of orienting and approaching; of `handling' as it were, the world. This is the kind of difference We mean." Our human ghost looks pensive. She looks at her sleeping body, which is twitching its hands. "You know," she muses, "I think I'm really ambidextrous, but I grew up using my right hand because everybody else did."
A treedog leaps from a fruit tree, suddenly changing the subject, "Ghost, you have got to learn to talk to Us when you are in your body! The other day, when you were embodied, you threw a rock at me!"
"Well, you were going to bite me!"
"No, I wasn't, which you would have known if you didn't go to sleep every time your body becomes conscious."
The fruit trees rustle, "The tree-dog is right, the human ghost should spend more of its waking time, when the human thinks itself conscious, being conscious of Us; otherwise, she will never learn about Our ways."
The stream and pond gurgle their agreement.
Our underground waters, which connect all life below the soil, say, "The other Forests think it would be a good idea for this human to become a priestess."
"If she is going to be a Priestess, she has to become aware!" insists the tree dog.
"I'm not going to become a Priestess!" argues the ghost, "I don't believe in organized religion."
Our massive Oak explains patiently to the ghost, "We don't either, but humans need it. We just unite Our consciences and We become more fully aware and so joyous. But people always want an organization to help them unite for greater awareness, so We are helping them form a religion which will embrace all of their best religious concepts, and which will weed out the sickly ideas. Organizations are to people what Forests are to trees, We think.
"Why waste your breath explaining it to her?" complain the vipers. "She won't remember any of this tomorrow."
We start, with hushed voices, the ritual comprehension of languages duet:

"Would you have ears that know bird-song and beast-talk?"
Our human responds, "Like sorceresses and saints of old?"
"Would you have lips that know bird-song and beast-talk?"
Our human responds, "Alas, I am neither sorceress nor saint."
"Would you have senses that know windwhispers and flora-words?"
And she responds, "Would that I could be part sorceress, part saint."
"We would have you know bird-song and beast-talk. We would have you know wind-whispers and flora-words. Listen carefully; listen carefully; listen carefully. We shall instruct you. Our human-she."
She responds, "Have I found Your Grace? I shall listen. I shall learn. I am grateful; I am grateful."

The human sings her answers back. She has a sweet, high voice, much like a bird herself. She will learn to understand Us when she is awake as well as asleep.

I woke up feeling quite disoriented, jarred as though from one reality to another. With the advance of the day, the sun's heat beat down oppressively upon me. The discomfort of being too hot had awakened me. I squinted up at the sun, trying to fix myself in my wakeful reality as firmly as the sun was fixed in the sky. At least my long sleeves and pants had protected me from being sun burnt. I went for an invigorating swim to wash away the feeling of displacement such abrupt awakenings often gave me.

The placed me back in physical time; the water soothed and settled me. Contentment restored, I gathered nuts and vegetables and took them back to my module where I prepared a fine feast of roast rabbit and salad. That evening as I watched the colors of day wash away into the silhouette of evening shapes and shadows, I saw and heard great flocks of migrating birds flying overhead. Within a few days, it seemed as though all the birds of the entire world had come in migration to this forest. Each tree held hundreds, perhaps thousands of birds, each species of bird favoring a particular species of tree in which to roost.

The birds, through the timing of their calls, marked the day with a musical semblance of themselves. Dawn, midmorning, noon, sunset, and midnight were each in turn celebrated in bird-song. The birds, then and now, also sing, chatter, and chirp to comment on the events of their lives. One set of birds screech and make an enormous clatter when they mate in mass-frenzy. Usually silent birds, red in color, tweet when they pluck a beetle from the soil to eat. When the sun comes out after a rain, all the birds, except the crows and jays, sing out in glorious chorus. When the crows invade the territories of others, the invaded birds protest the encroachment with particular screechings. When jays invade, the protest is made with a different clamor.