Chapter 13

Ella had changed trains at Ipswich and was now on the second leg. The journey was not that long, but it was proving rather trying.

“Stereo vision is so much better. It is much easier to place objects in terms of distance and interrelation.” Eostre’s voice, from inside her head.
“I know, I have had eyes for 16 years.”

“You have slight astigmatism in your right eye, probably not worth correcting. The directional hearing is a big plus, too.”
“I know, I have had it for 16 years.”

The whole journey was punctuated with Eostre’s pronouncements and interjections. Ella had occasionally been a little annoyed when she had sat on a train, and there was a mother with an insuppressible five-year-old child asking questions, pointing things out in a constant stream. Never again will I think badly of them, she thought to herself. Eostre didn’t seem to hear all her thoughts, just the ones directed at her, which was probably just as well.

“Look! A field full of cows”   
“Seen loads.”

It was going to be a long day.

They got off the train, she walked down to the station forecourt, pulled out her phone and opened Google Maps.

“You don’t need that, I know the way”
“I want to use Google Maps.”

When she got to the college, there was a big set of signs, one for each course, with arrows indicating which way they should go. The route had been waymarked and ended in a tutorial room, fitted out with desks, chairs, a whiteboard and a large monitor mounted on the wall.

“The room is smaller than I expected.”
“There are fifteen of us enrolled on the course; some won’t be here today, but it is plenty big enough”

“Are you going to talk to anyone?”
“Probably.”

“That girl forgot to put her jeans on.”
“It is a minidress.”

Ella had been worried about being late, so inevitably, she had ended up being early, but there were three other students already there, and the course director, he came over and greeted her “Hi Ella, lovely to see you again, we are expecting a few more people shortly, let me introduce you to the others who are already here.”

“He seems nice, rather high BMI though, he should lose a little weight, blood pressure raised too, but that could be just the slight stress he is feeling at the moment over this event.”

They introduced themselves. Eddie asked, “What kind of art are you into, Ella?”

“He is sexually attracted to you, but I think Jane is his mate; she has reacted negatively to his manner towards you.”
“Stop!”

“Quite a range of stuff, I do like some of the very early animated films, Snow White, for instance. The fact that every frame was crafted by hand amazes me, very beautifully done. Also, Japanese art and animation, the interplay between their cultural heritage and the forms and themes in modern manga and anime. Also, cartooning, how the great cartoonists can create sadness in a face with a single line and change it to joy with another. But at the moment, I am working on something, well I love mythology, Greek, Norse and our own, Anglo-Saxon and there is myth in East Anglia of Black Shuck a spectral dog and, well a friend of mine has a big black dog, he does things like nap under a hedge and then when you walk past he well step out and it is almost as if he has appeared out of thin air.”

“You are going to tell them about Shuck?!”
“Don’t worry.”

Jane nodded, “I think I may have a spectral cat, she does stuff like that. Did you bring any of your work on it with you?”

Ella reached into her big and pulled out a folder, she opened it up and placed it in front of Jane, Eddie had to scuttle behind her to look over her shoulder, “Best place for him” Ella thought, then out loud “I am starting a storyboard, soft pencil, I started with it because I find it easy to work with, but I think I may keep that look as I go on with it.”

Geoff chipped in, “Ella, these are really strong, quite dramatic even, yes, I think the technique suits the subject.”

Jane nodded, “Dark, misty, yes, just right for the Black Shuck. What’s the story?”

Ella smiled at Jane, “I am not quite sure yet, I am hoping it will come to me more as I draw, but I am not thinking of this being too dark a story. There are different tales of the Shuck; in some, he is a monster, in others, the opposite.”

Frieda looked up from the drawings “I love your drawings. Before we moved to Suffolk, I grew up in Somerset, where we have a legend of the Gurt Dog, who is the guardian of the forest and looks after lost children. Is that more what you mean?”

Ella nodded, “Yes, that is very like the Fenland version, the Shuck followed lone travellers to make sure they were safe in the marshes, that is exactly the kind of thing I had in mind.”

Jane and Eddie pored over Ella’s drawings, Eddie pointed to a drawing of the Shuck, walking away along a path with reed beds to either side and said, “This is great, you have caught the feel of the old fen before it was drained, mile upon mile of wild, uninhabited, impassable swamp, all gone, all endless, flat fields of vegetables now.”  Jane nodded in agreement, “I love the way the dog is kind of melting into the hedge in this one, so spectral.”

Geoff said, “Thank you for showing us, Ella. I am really looking forward to seeing more of Shuck. Does anyone else have anything to show me?”

The others produced their work, Jane’s were beautiful and mystic, exquisite woodland scenes, rivers and mountains, all populated with nymphs and fairies, Frieda’s were, in contrast, more modern in feel, a blend of Western and Japanese forms, strong and powerfully drawn.

Eddie held back. “I would rather not share my work.”

Jane said, “You really should, Eddie, please.” She touched his shoulder, and he nodded.

“OK.”

Geoff said, “We talked about it, Eddie. I think it is important you get feedback. I don’t think people here are going to be cruel, and I promise we will get you through it.”

Eddie laid out his work on the table. There were all sorts of styles, from landscapes reminiscent of Turner and Constable, through to Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau and Modernism, street scenes, countryside, forests and seascapes. They were all drawn masterfully, superb craftsmanship, but Frieda recoiled into her chair, and Ella struggled not to do the same. All the people in his paintings and drawings looked wrong, the lines were right, the colours were right, but in one landscape, a running figure felt like it was a scarecrow posed to look like a runner, in a street scene, the people stared out of the scene with dead eyes, zombie eyes. “I just can’t get the people to look, even alive, I keep trying and trying, and they always come out like this.”

“I don’t understand. His work is exceptionally well-crafted. I can’t see anything wrong with it?”
“Eostre, you know you said you wanted to see beauty? Well, somehow, he is doing the opposite.”
“Oh”

Geoff said, “Eddie, I will help you any way I can. All the rest of my team feels the same. Your craftsmanship is the best we have seen in a student in years, maybe ever. You will get there, and I think your fellow students will want to help you just as much as we do.”

Ella and Frieda nodded vigorously. Frieda said, “It can’t be a big thing, I would love to help any way I can.” Ella said, “Me too, definitely.”

After that, they all chatted. Ella had worried a little about how it would be to be studying with other artists, and she was relieved when she found she got on well with Eddie, Jane and Frieda. Also, a few more students appeared, shared their work and chatted, and she was sorry when she had to leave to get her train home.

“Why have you got Google Maps open? We are just retracing our earlier route?”
“Because.”
“But I know the way anyway. Even without Google Maps.”

They were about halfway to the station, and Ella had her eyes more or less glued to the Maps screen. She had not remembered the route at all; it wasn’t as if it was complicated, but she had been preoccupied thinking about what the session was going to be like.

“Why aren’t you talking to Duncan?”
“What? I am talking to him.”
“But he is walking along beside you, and neither of you has spoken?”

Ella looked around. “Duncan!”

He jumped and then spun to look at her. They chorused, “I thought you said your session was next week!”

“Humans.”

Duncan and Ella hugged each other, both surprised to see the other.

“Now you are both getting sexually aroused as well.”
“Stop it, what is it with you and sexual arousal? You are supposed to be a machine.”
“There are a lot of interesting mechanisms at play. Your heart rate has increased by twelve beats per minute. His heart rate has gone up by nine. Your skin temperature has risen slightly. You’re both producing more oxytocin and—”
“Stop!”
“OK.”

On the train, Ella and Duncan exchanged stories of their college sessions. Duncan had been quite excited by his; there had been short demos of various game production tools, and he had gelled nicely with the others in his group, “Fellow nerds,” he said. Ella was relieved that Eostre had quietened down a little after the conversation when Duncan and Ella met. There were just a few random comments from her on things she noticed as the train went along.

“Oh, look, the cows are lying down now; apparently, that means it is going to rain.”
“I know.” 

When they got off the last train, while Duncan was walking Ella home, he said, “By the way, you mentioned that Eostre can simulate pretty much any software? I would love to see that, and I am wondering what she could do with video game software.”

“Ooh, tell him I don’t pirate, so I can’t do game content, but I can do something which will really impress him. It will be fun.”
“Ssh!”

Ella said, “OK, I will have to start getting dinner ready. I can set you up as a Power User, and you can play with my other best friend.”

“I’m really touched.”

Duncan laughed, “That will be great, thank you.”

They got back to the house, trooped upstairs, into Ella’s bedroom, and the screen flicked on as they entered. “Hi Duncan, hi Ella.”

Ella said, “Eostre, please create a power user account for Duncan. He wants to play with you.”

Eostre smiled, “Account created. Go and get dinner ready. Is Duncan staying for dinner? I can throw him out when it is ready.”

Ella said, “Duncan, you are welcome to stay for dinner. Eostre, I should make you help with the cooking.”

Eostre smiled, “But I will be entertaining your guest for you.”

Ella turned to Duncan, “Sometimes I wish I had a proper computer, not a smartarse.”

“Giggle”

Ella smiled and turned to Duncan, “Dinner?”

Duncan smiled back and nodded. She headed for the door, saying, “All yours, Duncan, enjoy.”

Duncan slid into the computer chair. “Hi Eostre, Ella has been telling me about how you can emulate pretty much any software. I was wondering what you could do with video games.”

Eostre nodded, “Yes, I know games are your major interest. But there is an important distinction between what I demonstrated for Peter and Ella and what you need from a video game. I explained to them that applications like Word, Excel, and Photoshop are basically interfaces giving you access to the underlying capabilities of the machine they are running on, so I wasn’t copying or creating software, just creating an interface with the same capabilities as the commercial product. Now, video games, yes, there is an interface, but the real value in a game lies in the content. So replicating that is on an entirely different level. Not easy to do without stealing all the audio and graphics files and much, much more. But I have a suggestion for you. Something I think you would like, if you are up for it?”

Duncan thought for a moment, “Yes, actually, that does all make sense, kind of it is not the code which counts, but the experience. OK, I’m game, what do you suggest we do?”

Eostre nodded, “Yes, experience, that is a good way to put it. What I have in mind is a demo world with a bit of haptic feedback. Ella’s headphones are high-end Sony noise-cancelling headphones with Bluetooth; they should be powerful enough for what I want to do. Could you put them on, please?

Duncan picked them up off the desk and switched them on. The background noise faded away, there was just the low hiss from the headphones system then Eostre’s voice, “I am going to use the electromagnetic coils in the speakers to interface with your somatosensory cortex,” Eostre explained. “It will feel… unusual. I would suggest you lie down on the bed and relax. When you are ready, let me know.”

Duncan lay down on the bed and relaxed as ordered. He thought, “Ok, I am ready.” Before he could say it out loud, Eostre had replied gently, “Close your eyes. Off we go.”

Duncan was standing on a hillside, looking out across a valley of olive groves. It was sunny and hot, and he could see people working among them; they were dressed in the kind of clothes he had seen in ancient Greek artworks, using old-fashioned tools.

A young woman dressed in a silk chilton walked up to him. She had shoulder-length white hair and was smiling broadly at him, “Hi, Duncan.”

His mouth opened, and he gasped, “Eostre?”

She held out her hand, “Welcome to Ancient Greece. Shake my hand.”

Duncan shook her hand – it was warm, he could feel the texture of her skin, and he realised he could smell her perfume. She held out an olive, “Do you like olives?” he nodded, “Thank you, he took it and put it in his mouth.” It tasted wonderful, the best olive he had ever had. “Wow, that was lovely!”

Eostre waved to the groves in the valley, “They always taste best straight off the tree.”

She pointed to the valley side. There was a path running into the forest. “Now, we don’t have long, Ella is a fast cook and Peter, a hungry man. But if you would like to set off down that path, you can explore, and I will meet up with you when we are called for dinner. Is that ok?”

Duncan nodded, “Yes, that sounds good, a little exploration.”

Eostre continued, “You may need your sword along the way; it is a Spartan Xiphos, short-bladed, but a fine weapon.” She pointed to the sword sheathed at his waist, “Also, don’t be distracted by the water nymphs at the pool, they are fickle, can have a wicked and cruel sense of humour, just smile, wave and walk past. I will see you soon.”  She turned and set off down the hill.

Duncan set off into the forest. The path was rocky, and he was glad his sandals were very stout. The cool of the forest was very welcome after the searing heat of the hillside. He walked on, eventually, at a turn in the path, he saw a scruffy man sitting on a rock. The man looked up at him and greeted him. The man was speaking a language which Duncan didn’t know, presumably Ancient Greek, but inside his head it was translated for him. “Greetings, stranger! You are the first visitor today. There is a toll charge for walking my path, just three obols for a fine young man like yourself.”

Duncan shook his head, “I am sorry, I have no money.”

The man scowled, “Then I must take my toll another way.” He reached out for his dagger. Duncan felt as if he had played this game before, and the tip of his Xiphos was instantly aimed straight at the man’s bearded throat. The man’s expression changed, becoming a charming smile, “Pass, my good friend. I meant no disrespect.”

Duncan edged past him and continued down the path. It did cross his mind to wonder just how real all this actually was, so he checked behind him. The man was lounging on his rock as before. The path turned downwards, and he came to a stream, then to a pool. There were six young women, they looked about his age, splashing around in the water, playing and laughing. One of them spotted him, turned to her friends and said something he couldn’t hear, but which made them all giggle. They swam over towards him. The girl spoke again, to him, “Hello, why don’t you come and join us for a swim?”

Duncan shook his head, “Thank you, but I need to press on, I am meeting someone.”

The girl cupped her hands, scooped water from the pool and held them out to him, “Well, at least have a drink. You must be thirsty?”

Duncan smiled and waved, remembering what Eostre had told him, “Thank you, no, I must be going”

As he walked on, he heard disappointed sighs behind him. There was a dilapidated wooden bridge over the stream. He tested it and convinced himself it was safe before walking across, and then continued up the steep slope on the other side.

At the top of the hill, he paused to catch his breath, looking back in the direction he had come from. There was a fine view looking back towards the mountains, the tops shimmering in the distance with the heat haze. After a few moments, he turned to continue. He noticed a woman sitting by the path, her back towards him. As he got closer, he had the odd feeling that her hair was moving on its own. Then she turned, glared at him and laughed, a nasty, cackling laugh. He was looking into the eyes of a Gorgon.

Immediately, from his feet upwards, there came a kind of hissing and crackling and a loss of sensation. He looked down, his bare legs, alreadyady up to his knees, were turning into marble. He screamed, drew his sword again, even though he knew it was too late and watched as his arm and the sword itself turn to marble. Then, behind the laughing Gorgon, a woman appeared, dressed in golden armour, with a helmet completely enclosing her head with just a narrow slit for her eyes to look through. She carried a polished shield, looking at it as she approached the Gorgon from behind. She was brandishing a sword, a heavy-bladed Kopis, and as soon as she was in range, she swung it as hard as she could, neatly decapitating the monster. Its head rolled across the rocks, the snakes from her hair scuttling off into the undergrowth.

Duncan felt the feeling slowly returning to his body, like recovering from an intense cramp.

He sighed with relief, “Thank you.”

The woman removed her helmet, shaking out her white mane. Eostre said, “I think that is maybe enough for today?”

Duncan nodded vigorously, “That was incredible, all of it. It did cross my mind – how much danger was I ever really in? It felt utterly real. Especially that last bit, I thought I was stone for eternity, and would end up in a museum somewhere.”

Eostre smiled happily, “I am glad you were impressed. The answer is no risk at all. At any time, all you needed to do was remember that you have real arms and use them to take the headphones off. Even after you had been skewered by the villain on the path, drowned by the nymphs or turned to stone by the Gorgon. Dinner time, by the way.”

Duncan took off the headphones. “Thank you, Eostre. That was quite something.”

The avatar smiled from the screen, “My pleasure, truly. Go and eat. Just beware of the nymph downstairs.”

Duncan set off downstairs, laughing.

When Ella walked into the house, her dad was already back. She called out to him, “Hi, Dad.”

Peter Blyth appeared from the kitchen “Just starting on dinner, come and tell me about your day.”

Ella grabbed a drink and sat down on a stool with it. Her dad carried on chopping vegetables. She ran through edited highlights – particularly poor Eddie and the surprise meeting with Duncan.”

He laughed out loud at the last. Ella then said, “There is something else I meant to tell you last night, but I was rushing to get all my stuff ready for today’s college session. When I went out for a walk yesterday, I met a lovely elderly man who has the most gorgeous dog. Actually, it is probably more I met the dog, he is ever so friendly and very well behaved. The man said he only got it recently for the company, but now he has had a heart attack, and he is struggling to give the dog enough exercise. I said that I like walking and I would take him for walks. He is called Edmund Hale and lives only a couple of streets away. I hope that is ok?

Peter said, “That is very kind of you. Yes, go ahead. Sometimes it might be nice for me to meet Edmund, and I definitely want to meet the dog.”

Ella laughed, “I will fix that up for you. Thanks ”

Ella?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you for taking me with you today. I think I was a bit annoying?”
“Yes, you were, but I know it must have been quite an experience for you, so I do understand. And thank you for entertaining Duncan.”
“I learnt a lot, and it was wonderful being able to share your day in that way. I enjoyed my game with Duncan. Did he tell you about it?”
“Yes, he was very impressed. I think you may see him again and sometime, I think I would like to experience that two, Ancient Greece or some such.”
“I would enjoy both, if you can get a second set of headphones, you could play together. But I do have two requests.”
“Ok, what do you want?”
“First, I want you to help me with one of my experiments. I need someone to kick a ball into the sea this evening at low tide. Then I need to collect the result at dawn tomorrow. The second is that I would like to stay here with you overnight, so I can experience dreaming.”
“OK, the first one I will do, even though I don’t like being up at dawn much. The second, I am sorry, but no, dreams, well, they are kind of the most private thing; I mostly don’t remember them, and I really don’t feel I would want anyone to know what I dream, not ever. Sorry.”
“Yes, thank you, I understand about the dreams, they are rather mysterious though.”
“What’s in the ball?”
“It is another of my biological experiments, the sea is a perfect medium, a cocktail of all sorts of minerals, materials, chemicals and biological substances. Shuck will bring it.”
“What time?”
“About 9 pm, after you have had dinner?”
“OK.”

After dinner, Ella set off for the sea, shouting to Dad, “I am off dog walking.”

Eostre was still nestled in her head and had told her Shuck would meet them along the way with the ball. He emerged from a hedge again, with a battered-looking plastic football in his mouth. It had been cut in half, and a strip of duct tape was neatly wrapped around it to hold it together. He padded along beside her with it clenched in his jaws.

“He knows the way, we are going to a place where the sea has built up the shingle, at low tide, a lagoon appears, it will fill up and disappear at high tide, but the shingle around it will ensure the ball stays in the lagoon until the next high tide at dawn, when we can collect it.”  

When they arrived, Shuck placed the ball carefully on the path. Ella bent down and picked it up. “It is quite heavy, I am not sure I will be able to kick it very far.”

“Shuck will help, just kick it, and he will guide it where it needs to go.”

“OK.”

Ella placed the ball on the ground and kicked it as hard as she could. The ball soared out over the lagoon and dropped with a splash in its centre. It bobbed for a second or two, then vanished slowly into the water. Ella walked home, stopping only to give Shuck a good stroke before he left her.

Later, as Ella was settling down to bed early, so she would not feel like a zombie when she had to go out at dawn, she said, “Eostre, I think you are being mean not telling me what the football is for.”

Eostre, now back in the computer, gave a small laugh, “It is a surprise. I think you will like it and it will be worth the wait, I promise.”

Ella said, “Ok, I’ll wait, good night.”

Eostre replied, “Thank you again for taking me with you today. I had a wonderful time, fascinating, and I loved spending time with you. Good night.”