The Sky Above, the Rivers Below, Ch 1: New Skies, Old Shadows
Jamila's arrival in a technologically advanced new world becomes a nightmare of intrusive processing and sensory overload when a mandatory neural implant invades her very thoughts.
This new world, Jamila decided with a certainty that settled like ice in her veins, was not a heaven, but some manner of meticulously crafted hell.
The thought solidified as the huge metal ship - which had carried them across… well, she still couldn’t guess what - spat them out into a hall of impossible size. No sun shone through its vast, glowing ceiling, only a steady, shadowless light. It buzzed faintly, a sound like a thousand unseen insects skittering just beneath her skin. The air was thin. It smelled of ozone and something antiseptically sterile, offering none of the comforting cardamom or sharp salt tang from the Bombay docks. Around them, a confusing babble of strange languages rose and fell. A tide of bewildered faces from a hundred unknown lands spilled into the massive terminal of the Chronic Company.
Jamila’s fingers tightened on her son Imran’s small hand. He was only eight, his dark eyes wide and reflecting the harsh light like newly filled monsoon pools. "What is this place?" her mind screamed, her heart a tight, cold fist beneath her silk bodice. "It’s an affront, a deliberate twisting of how things should be. Where is the sky? Where are the familiar sounds of life, the street cries, the port’s energy?" This wasn't the order she knew, the predictable rhythm of trade and society.
Men and women in plain, severe clothes - Chronic officials, she presumed, for they moved with a brisk, unsettling authority - gestured with flat, glowing slates. Their voices, amplified by some unseen trick, cut through the din, herding the newcomers like sheep. They showed no respect, no recognition of anyone's standing. "They carry themselves like Nawabs," Jamila thought, a flicker of disdain quickly hidden, "yet dress like scullery staff. By what right do they command us so?" Even the East India Company men in Bombay, for all their arrogance, maintained a certain decorum.
Her gaze scanned the other families caught in this strange flow. A little apart, the Korean family - the Kims, she recalled from the shipboard roll calls - huddled together. The woman, Sook-ja, clutched a worn bundle, her face a mask of raw terror; her husband looked just as pale, his eyes darting. "Poor souls," Jamila mused, a distant pity stirring, mingled with a fresh wave of her own apprehension. "What desperate lives must they have fled, to seek refuge in such a frightening unknown? They likely have nothing left but the clothes on their backs."
Then her eyes found the Shepards, the family from the American colonies. The woman, Margaret, stood very straight, her expression tightly controlled, though a muscle jumped near her eye. Her son, a boy of about ten, looked more angry than scared. They, like the Ahmeds, had paid a king’s ransom for this passage, this leap into Chronic’s vaunted future. "She holds herself like one accustomed to giving orders, not receiving them," Jamila noted. "A woman of means, undeniably. But even her composure seems brittle here."
A Chronic official, a young woman whose hair was a startling, unnatural blue, approached their group. Her amplified voice, speaking an unknown tongue, somehow resolved into flat, emotionless Hindi - a trick of Chronic’s omnipresent technology, Jamila guessed, not from any device yet on her own person. "This way, please. Processing is mandatory for all arrivals."
Imran whimpered softly, pressing closer. Jamila squeezed his hand, forcing a reassuring look she didn't feel. "Courage, my little lion," she murmured in their own Gujarati, a small anchor. "Your father paid a fortune. We must discover what future this is, however unwelcoming its threshold." But the chill in her bones deepened. This wasn’t the grand new beginning promised by those smooth-talking Chronic agents in Bombay. This felt more like an elaborate deception. "I pray your father knew what he was doing, my love," she thought grimly.
The blue-haired official gestured them forward. The crowd was being sorted into channels marked by ropes, snaking towards brightly lit booths. Jamila instinctively tried to guide Imran towards a seemingly shorter queue, but another official, a grim-faced man with a blank, almost carved expression, curtly redirected them.
"All new arrivals this way," his translated voice stated, devoid of inflection.
As they were channeled, Jamila noted the subtle, yet clear, differences in treatment. The Kims were ahead. She saw an official roughly grab the father’s arm when he hesitated, pushing him forward with an impatient shove. Their tentative questions were met with sharp, one-word commands. "So, this is their charity," Jamila thought, unease tightening in her stomach. "A harsh welcome for those who arrive with empty hands. No kindness, no respect for their dignity, however humble."
When it was the Ahmeds’ turn, the tone, while still cold and impersonal, was marginally less harsh. The official consulted his glowing slate, eyes flicking from it to Jamila, then Imran. "Ahmed family, Section Gamma. Proceed to Booth Four." It wasn't polite, not like the mercantile clerks of Bombay, but it lacked the open contempt shown to the Kims. Margaret Shepard and her son received similar, coolly efficient instructions. "Our gold buys us, perhaps, a degree less disdain," Jamila mused bitterly. "Money still speaks, it seems, even in this bizarre purgatory."
Booth Four was a small, sterile cubicle. Another official, a woman with eyes that seemed too large and unnervingly still, motioned Jamila forward.
"Place your right hand on the illuminated panel, please," the woman instructed, her translated voice echoing slightly.
Jamila stared. "My hand? Like a common thief being branded? Or a labourer, illiterate, forced to make their mark?" The insult stung. Her word, her husband’s name, the seal of their merchant house - those were her credentials. Here, her very flesh was to be catalogued.
"For identification," the official stated, a flicker of impatience in her tone. "A security measure."
"And what security is found in surrendering such a personal thing?" Jamila asked, her voice sharper than intended.
The official’s large eyes blinked, a slow, deliberate movement. "Procedure. All arrivals comply."
There was no room to argue, no appeal to status. With a sigh heavy with the weight of their investment, Jamila placed her hand on the panel. It pulsed with a cool light; a faint vibration hummed through her palm. "They are taking something," she thought, a wave of revulsion washing over her. "A piece of me, stored in their unnatural machines. By what right?"
Next, the eye scan. A device like a metallic bloom extended. "Look directly into the aperture."
This felt even more violating. This cold machine, peering into her very eyes - the mirrors of her being, as poets claimed? An outrage. "To capture my likeness, my very spirit, as if I were some exotic creature for their menagerie, or chattel to be inventoried. Is no privacy, no dignity, afforded a respectable woman?"
She wanted to refuse, to snatch Imran and flee. But where? For her son’s sake, she endured. Her jaw tight, she fixed her gaze. She felt her standing, her identity, being systematically dismantled. This was not the reception a woman of her family, who had paid so dearly, should ever endure. Chronic’s promised wonders felt more like a highly organized prison.
Finally, the official gestured. "Follow the green line. Processing is nearly complete."
The Ahmeds walked a short corridor. Through one open door, Jamila glimpsed the Korean father, his face ashen. A man in a dark coat and round spectacles was speaking to him, voice low, urgent. An official appeared; a brief, tense exchange, and the Kims were escorted out.
The last door opened. "In here, please," a new voice said, the accent unplaceable. An official, a man with dark, unruly hair, looked tired, but his eyes held a surprising kindness. "Thank you for your patience."
Jamila hesitated. "You're not taking anything else?"
"Not taking, no," he replied. "We're giving you something. To make all this easier. The process is intrusive, I know, but it’s the quickest way to acclimate. One can’t truly experience a new world without understanding its language, can one?"
Imran glanced up, his grip tight.
"Go ahead, young man," the official said, kneeling to Imran’s level. "It's alright."
"Will it hurt?" Imran asked, his voice quavering.
The official offered a faint smile. "Not at all. A tiny sensation, nothing more. The convenience far outweighs any fleeting discomfort. We won’t keep you longer than necessary."
Jamila nodded, managing an encouraging smile for Imran. "Go on, brave lion. I'm right here."
As the official worked, Jamila studied him. He seemed less a Company man, more a technician, perhaps a physician. Another procedure before entering this 'promised' world.
The official, whose tag read ‘Aris Thorne - Integration Specialist,’ produced a sleek, silver device, thumb-sized. He pressed it gently behind Imran's ear, below the hairline. A soft click. Imran flinched, more surprised than hurt. His eyes widened, then he looked at his mother, a small, wondering smile. "It didn't hurt, Ammi," he whispered.
Thorne winced slightly at the untranslated Gujarati, then smiled. "See? Told you." He turned to Jamila. "Your turn. It's a neural transceiver. Standard issue. Connects you to the primary language system, and provides us with basic biometric data."
Before she could fully process "neural transceiver" or "biometric data," he did the same to her. A soft click, a fleeting coolness.
And then the world shattered - not with sound, but with meaning.
The dull roar of the main hall fractured into a million distinct voices, each suddenly, shockingly clear. Her mind, unbidden, translated everything. A woman nearby fretted in rapid, anxious Cantonese, "Where are they taking us? Will we see sunlight again? I should have brought the gilded comb." Further off, a man's booming Russian complaint: "This is an outrage! My bag contained medicinal vodka! I demand to speak to a superior!" Fragments of German, Swahili, and a language like liquid chimes - all were now intelligible speech, flooding her senses.
It was a bewildering torrent of comprehension. Her own thoughts, her private sanctuary, felt suddenly vulnerable, as if the chip could broadcast them as easily as it received. "Do they now read my very mind?" she wondered, a visceral fear gripping her. Aris Thorne was speaking. His English words, now perfectly clear in her mind as the most precise Bombay Hindi, layered over the cacophony. "...much simpler this way. No interpreters, no misunderstandings. Everyone on the same linguistic footing." He smiled, a practiced, tired expression. "And, the other function allows us to monitor location and basic health indicators. For your safety, and ours."
Jamila stared. The Hindi words formed, but the sheer volume of other languages pressed in, making focus difficult. "Monitor…?" she managed, her voice sounding small, alien to her own ears amidst the overwhelming clarity. The walls themselves seemed to speak.
Imran tugged her hand, eyes wide with a fearful wonder. "Ammi, I understand them! All of them! That lady needs water… that man is angry about his luggage… someone is singing a sad song in a language I've never heard, but I know the words!" He pointed, his face a canvas of amazed confusion.
Aris Thorne nodded. "He's adapting quickly. Children often do. You'll acclimate. Think of it as a new sense. Overwhelming initially, like sight to one born blind."
A new sense. Or a new, inescapable prison of noise. Jamila felt dizzy. The perfect, relentless translation never ceased. No escape, no quiet corner of incomprehension. Every sigh, every muttered curse, every whispered prayer in the vast hall was now utterly clear, a profound, personal intrusion. "There is no modesty, no private thought left," she thought, appalled. She saw Margaret Shepard emerge from a nearby booth, her son trailing. The American woman’s face was pale, lips a thin line, her head twitching as if to shake off invading voices. Her son looked openly distressed, hands clapped over his ears, futilely. Mrs. Shepard’s eyes met Jamila’s. A flicker of shared shock, of violated privacy, passed between them. Even Mr. Kim, being led out, looked dazed as alien sounds became unwelcome, understood words detailing strangers' anxieties.
"This way to Orientation Hall C," Aris Thorne said, pointing to another glowing line. "Your journey is just beginning. Try to focus on my voice. It will help."
Jamila took a deep breath. The sterile air now felt thick with a thousand understood worries, a thousand private thoughts made public. This "gift" was a violation, another layer of control. "They have not just brought us to a strange land," she thought, her heart sinking, "they have altered our very being within it, stealing the silence between tongues and filling it with the ceaseless commerce of strangers. This is no freedom." The Chronic Company hadn't just moved them; it had fundamentally rewired their experience of reality.
Orientation Hall C was dimmer. Thousands, perhaps, shifted on uncomfortable metal benches. The flood of understanding never slowed. It was as if the air itself thrummed with invisible, endlessly babbling mouths.
A tall man in a dark, severe coat strode to a podium. Aris Thorne melted into the crowd.
"Ladies and gentlemen," the man announced, his voice echoing. "My name is Henry DeMontfort, Vice President of Chronic. On behalf of our Founder and CEO, welcome to the future." His accent was a strange amalgam, clipped yet with an odd, musical lilt.
As he spoke, Jamila felt the pressure of a thousand minds around her, their anxieties and hopes a dissonant chorus under DeMontfort’s smooth pronouncements. Margaret Shepard sat rigidly, jaw tight. Sook-ja Kim trembled against her husband. Jamila clutched Imran’s hand; he was quiet, face etched with the shock of the sonic invasion. "Some of you paid a substantial fee to travel through time," DeMontfort continued. "Some sold almost everything. We appreciate your commitment, your courage. You will find no safer, better care."
His words, clear and crisp, were meant to reassure. But the constant, intrusive understanding of everyone else’s internal state was a relentless distraction, a weight. She tried to focus on his speech, telling herself it would end.
"We have a long history," DeMontfort said. "We've helped humanity reach across the stars. We've made healing the sick possible. And, as you've discovered, we bridge vast gulfs of time. We're proud to help you build a better future."
He gestured to a shimmering screen. Tapered lines, like a river delta, flowed across it.
"This," DeMontfort announced, "is your new home. Neo-Kyoto, Earth D1200R40. Your new life."
Imran’s fingers tightened. The screen showed a city of impossible towers, a skyline of alien angles. People swarmed below. And with the name, the image, a fresh deluge of specific, localized thoughts and emotions from the surrounding crowd - fear of this specific place, desperate hope tied to its name - crashed into Jamila’s mind. She swayed, her free hand reaching out blindly. The ability to distinguish her own feelings from the flood was eroding.
Imran grabbed her, small arms around her waist, shouting, "Ammi? Ammi, are you alright? What’s happening?" His voice, his specific terror for her, cut through the storm. Suddenly, blessedly, the other voices receded to a dull, persistent hum. The world shrank, focused on her son.
Jamila blinked, heart pounding. "I'm here, my lion," she murmured, hugging him. The hum remained, but he was her anchor. He was real. The rest, for now, was just noise.
As DeMontfort concluded, she pulled Imran close. "We are truly beyond our old life," she realized, a heavy certainty. "The past, however recent, is forever lost." Her stomach twisted. This was a place where no one truly belonged, no matter the price paid. But Imran was here. She had to be strong.
When the speech ended, new officials herded them out. The air still vibrated with the newly intelligible worries and hopes of hundreds, a constant, low-level assault, though Imran’s intervention had helped her filter it to a manageable, if deeply unsettling, background thrum.
Plain corridors led to another vast space filled with pod-like vehicles, silent and waiting. No drivers, no visible means of propulsion. Such self-moving carriages were rare marvels in Bombay, subjects of week-long gossip. Here, dozens lined up like common tongas.
"Families, listen for your assigned transport," a loud voice announced.
The Kims were directed to a smaller, plainer pod, already filling with others who looked equally destitute. Sook-ja was slumped, her husband guiding her, his face grim. "Sorted even now," Jamila thought, the familiar sting of class lines. "Even in this supposed new beginning."
"Ahmed, Unit 7," the voice called.
They were pointed to a sleeker, slightly larger pod. Margaret Shepard and her son went to a similar one. Inside, the door slid shut with a soft hiss. A faint hum, and the pod moved with an unnatural smoothness.
Through the wide, clear panel, Jamila saw Neo-Kyoto, Earth D1200R40. "Towers that mock the very heavens!" she gasped. Glass and metal structures soared into an artificial haze. Between them, smaller vehicles zipped through the air, leaving faint light trails. She’d dismissed Chronic’s tales of flying machines as boasts. Here, they were as common as flies. No animals, no trees; only a colossal, man-made landscape, lit by a thousand dazzling, un-starlike lights. "Flying conveyances… so many… without beast or visible hand! Back home, one such marvel was a spectacle. Here, it is as if the djinns themselves built this city and now ferry its people."
Imran, pressed to the panel, forgot his fear in childlike awe. "Ammi, look! Flying!"
Jamila pulled him closer. "Indeed, my lion. A strange new world." But the promise felt like a threat. The scale, the alien technology now mundane, was overwhelming. The city’s constant murmur, now intelligible - advertisements in unknown but understood tongues, distant sirens, the hum of millions of lives - pressed in. A city that spoke endlessly, and she had no choice but to listen.
After an eternity, the pod slowed, descending into a slot within a towering block. The door hissed open. "Ahmed family, welcome to Transition District Alpha, Residence 712," a calm, artificial voice announced.
Their apartment was… efficient. Clean to the point of sterility, pale walls, built-in furniture that shifted with a touch. Glowing panels, devices she couldn’t name. Advanced, yes, far beyond imagining. But cold, devoid of personality, history, warmth. "This gilded box, bought with a fortune," she thought, bitterness rising. "This sterile emptiness? No fine silks, no carved wood, no scent of spices."
Imran explored hesitantly. He touched a smooth wall; it lit up. He snatched his hand back, eyes wide at Jamila.
The door slid shut with a soft, final click. The city’s sounds were muted, but the internal chorus from the chip remained, a ghostly echo.
Jamila stood in the center of the unfamiliar room. The apartment’s silence was a stark contrast to the mental cacophony. She felt utterly isolated. Imran was here, her brave lion, but everything else - home, culture, her understanding of the world - was gone, left in an impossibly distant past. The "sky" was a man-made ceiling; the "rivers" of Bombay an aching memory.
She closed her eyes, took a shaky breath, and whispered in Hindustani, the words a small, defiant anchor: "Ya Allah, protect my child. Grant us fortitude in this alien land. Help us not to be consumed by it, to remember who we are, even here."
Imran came to her, slipping his hand into hers. He leaned against her, silent. His presence was a small, warm point of certainty in the vast, cold emptiness of their new life.
***