Empyrean Iris Story Collection

Slang

They ghosted into the city at 500 miles per hour. Sunny had her face pressed against the window looking up towards the sky in awe at the ethereal city of white arches and colorful flying cars rising in hundreds of multilevel platforms thousands of feet into the sky. The forest rolled directly up to the outskirts of the city, a city that reached upwards into the sky rather than sprawling outwards like cities had done in the distant past. Captain Vir leaned back in his seat eyes half closed as the rocket maglev rolled up towards the city. The captain said that maglevs used to be nearly as loud as jet engines, but sound dampening technology along the side of the rails had reduced the sound to almost nothing.

And the people, the humans were so odd compared to the Captain and the humans and Sunny had known. They were outrageously dressed brightly colored. Their hair was died, their skin was died, some of them wore massive clothing that billowed outward feet while others were barely wearing anything at all. A woman walked past as the train was beginning to slow, and, standing next to them, Sunny took sight of an intricate tattoo of a dragon winding up and down her arm in repeated arcs and spirals.

Outside the train windows a tunnel sucked them into darkness lines of lights rolling past the windows. They slowed, and came to the stop.

Please watch your step as you exit the train.

Captain Vir stood up and made his way off of the train with Sunny and Krill following behind him onto the underground platform of dark stone and thick, squat pillars. Bright holographic kiosks lit up the station with blue purple and warm red light. Lines of people walked up and down the terminal passing their wrists under microchip scanners.

They passed through a set of scanners, and Sunny watched in shock as an alien face stared at her from behind the security desk. A humanoid face but of metal and plastic. They moved from there stepping forward, and onto a purple symbol on the ground. Sunny nearly had a heart attack as they were pushed into the air rising up through tunnels in the ground and out into the blinding sunlight and the white city.

A massive holograph bust into light above them.

Welcome to Los Angeles the city of angels. The hologram burst apart and into a set of massive wings which flapped once and then exploded once again sending pixels out across the sky like a daytime firework. The pixels reformed themselves into a large screen a massive add for two people. The new fashion trend from Apple. The clothing was in grey white and black short sleeved, high collared, shirts that hung long about the knees. The look was very clean and organic, the humans depicted were the best of their species. Feed your fashion with Apple.

A few of the humans passing them turned to look on in curiosity at the strange alien visitors, an occurrence that wasn't particularly common yet. They looked up at sunny, some with interest, some with worry, and others with..... with something that made Sunny rather uncomfortable. She sped up to catch the captain as he stepped onto a light rail, which send them rocketing across the city on a pocket of blue light. They landed at a central terminal, and the captain motioned them to follow passing through hundreds of tall and imposing shops before ducking into a tight alley. The bright white lights of the soaring city broke down as they made they tunneled their way into the city's bones. The stark white walls of the soaring buildings and skywalks broke down into thick beams and burbling pipes: veins and innards creeping their way through the bones.

They slipped through another doorway and down a set of metals stairs into darkness. Even in the light of day, this part of the city was dark. They took another turn and cut outwards into another alley. The sound of voices spilled over them as they stepped into the city, and a dark marketplace. Sunny stepped a little closer to the captain eyes passing over the booths bathed in deep red lighting. From behind their stalls eyes peered out at her in interest. The one thing all these humans had in common..... well.... They weren't totally human. Robotic legs, robotic arms, robotic eyes.