Chapter 3: Year Five

  Vistilia had turned five. It was at this age, that children went to public school. The school that the city itself was rather small. At least, when compared to the schools of Earth, in the rather poputed areas that she lived in her past life.

  Yet, she wouldn’t be going to school there. It was all because of the letter that her father held in his hands. It was about 8:30 in the morning, the sun was just starting to ascend in sky.

  In his hands, her father held a piece of paper. Paper, of course, had been brought over from the southern sve states. Its surface was covered in imperfections, as it was a new technology.

  Vistilia, sitting at the table with her family, looked at him with her solemn eyes, her gaze curious. She, of course, was invested in whatever this letter was. It had been brought in the morning to her home by one of her father’s subordinates. His breath had been haggard, as he had run there from the barracks.

  “Hm,” her father hummed as her read the words upon the page, “an old friend of mine wants me to work as, “Overseer of The Western Guard,” in Vrael,” he said with a brow raise.

  He then set the page down and grabbed his fork to spear a piece of pork from his pte. Her mother had just purchased a pig leg, so they had plenty of to eat. Vistilia didn’t trust pork that much. The taste of the meat is reminiscent of human flesh, too much so for her mind. Though, she ate it to sate her parents’ worries.

  “Why’s that?” her mother asked, sitting down herself as she pted some gravy over her own pork, “If it’s Crainious, then I know he knows that you’re the captain around here.”

  “Well,” Leris said, picking up the page again, “we’ve been thinking about moving anyway, what if I did take this job?” Her father asked, asking his wife for permission to continue; if she pushed this down, then he would ignore the message.

  “What does it pay?” she asked, her tone questioning, “if it’s less than your current job, then don’t follow through, if more…” she said, trailing off.

  The father of the house read some more. His eyes trailing down the page, reading the alien script, as it was the script of this nd. He then whistled, the sound gaining the attention of a bird outside as it whistled back. Her father pyfully whistled back to its retorted, then the bird fell silent.

  “The pay is 32 Ghelt an hour, instead of my current 11 Ghelt and 4 Pech and hour,” he expined, earning a confused head tilt from Vistilia, who hadn’t been taught of the currency yet.

  Wilma chuckled, and reached across the table to pat her daughter on the head. This earned a smile from the little girl, and ugh from the man beside her. hew smiled and spoke, his voice fatherly.

  “A Pech is a 12th of a Ghelt. So, 12 Pesh is one Ghelt. 32 Ghelt is a lot of money an hour,” he said, looking back to the food before him.

  As he dug in, her mother did so as well. Vistilia was still thinking about how the currency of this nation reted to that of the united states. Since Vistilia had died in 2035, the price of USD had stabilized, and was worth to what it had been in 2019.

  Calcuting the price and worth of money that wasn’t there, was rather hard. Yet, after she had finally eaten the rest of her food, she had finally eked out the sum of it. A single Ghelt, was worth about 3 dolrs.

  That was a lot. Looking back to what he had said, that was a lot of money per hour. She would have taken that job in a heartbeat. She was somewhat shocked that he didn’t immediately say that he was taking it.

  “So, you’re taking the job,” her mother said instead, “when is he expecting a response?” she asked.

  Her father looked at the woman who was his wife in front of him, in surprise. He hadn’t been expecting her response to be so succinct. What he didn’t realize was that she had always wanted to live in the capital of the nation, Vrael.

  “He mentions that I should send a letter of confirmation soon, before the 10th of next month, which is a week from now,” he drawled out as he took a sip of water, “you seem to really want this. Much more so than me.”

  “It’s a lot of money, father,” Vistilia mentioned, and Wilma nodded her head.

  “Yes, it is sweety,” she said and looked to her husband, “That much money could get our daughter into a high pce in society, not to mention us ourselves. With that kind of money, we could buy things. Expensive things like the prismatic silks of the sve states,” she mentioned, and her father spit out his water.

  “Oh yeah, I forgot about that,” he said softly, as if that thought hadn’t even occurred to him.

  For those wondering what Prismatic silk was, it was a form of multicolored silk. It was spun from a special kind of domesticated spider, their own exoskeletons colored bcker than night. Their silk, which they used to catch birds from the sky, was all the colors of the rainbow.

  While most of the color was either blue or purple, depending on when the silk was made and harvested, it was still 12 times its weight in gold. The waving patterns was said to tell the wearers of clothes made of this silk the future. Of course, that was utter nonsense.

  “Sweety, while your father writes a letter to his friend saying that he’ll get the job, go and put all your things in that big red and blue box with the handles, okay?” her mother all but ordered.

  “Alright mother,” she said, and hopped off of her chair, “what will I tell Aivan?” she asked.

  “Go tell him, before you put your things away, that we are moving away,” she expined then turned to her husband, “well? Get on it.”

  “Of course, dear,” he said and rushed to their room.

  Vistilia got off of her chair, and rushed to the front door. It took all of a minute to rush from the house, to her neighbor’s home. The sun, as had been stated, was just rising over the horizon. The light bathed the city in a yellowish-orange glow.

  The front door of Aivan’s home was locked, so she knocked on the door rather quickly. The noises on the inside of the home, which had been rather busy and yered, ceased. She soon heard the noise of a person coming towards the door.

  “Hello?” asked the voice of the nine-year-old Aivan.

  “Morning Aivan,” Vistilia said, her voice still, “I just wanted to say good morning and that my family is moving to Vrael. My father has gotten a job invitation to work there. The pay is much better than what he has now, so we’ll be moving soon,” she expined all in one breath.

  “What?” he asked, more confused than anything else.

  …