Fall; or, Dodge in Hell - Neal Stephenson Page 0,250

smudge of the Red Web. Their simple knowledge of astronomy told them that they were headed west. Had they turned around to look behind them, they might have seen the eastern sky beginning to grow lighter behind the crag.

They might also have seen a fluttering light, perched atop one of the larger stones, that brightened as they walked by it, and then took to the air, struggling higher and higher as if trying to keep them in view. It took on a shape vaguely patterned after that of an angel. With this came greater powers of movement. It no longer drifted, but took to sliding and darting in straight lines and compass arcs, pausing after each as if to take stock of what it had just done and to evaluate its altered view of the world. Its general track was ragged and halting but more or less followed that of Adam and Eve. Before long it was flitting in their wake. They noticed it, and saw it at first as merely one more in a seemingly endless series of accidents and curiosities. After a while, though, it became positively useful, as they had traveled far enough from the light of the Hive that darkness was making it difficult for them to find their way. Their new companion seemed to understand this. It rose a little higher and shone a little brighter, giving them a better view of the path ahead.

They saw that their surroundings had changed. No longer were they treading on rubble but on open ground covered with thick grass that grew up above their knees and obliged them either to kick through it or to press it down with each footfall.

“I believe this thing understands our speech,” said Adam, “as we were only just now complaining of the darkness, and now it is lighting the way.”

“Or it reads our thoughts without the necessity of words,” said Eve. She raised a hand to meet a wisp of aura that trailed down for a moment from the sprite flitting overhead. Then she drew her hand back.

“Anything?” Adam asked.

The look on Eve’s face was pensive. “Nothing like what is in the auras of El, or of angels. Nothing I can make sense of. But nothing of what the angel described as hazard.”

They amused themselves by getting their new friend to change the color of its light, which they did by pointing to the Red Web now setting in the west and plucking red blossoms from flowers that grew wild amid the grass. After some time, the thing did begin to glow red, and then they laughed and exclaimed, “Red!” The thing’s hum changed, as if it were trying to imitate the sound.

By the time dawn broke, it could not only be red but say “red” well enough for Adam and Eve to understand it. They moved on to “blue” (for the weather had cleared during the night, and a cloudless sky now stretched overhead) and “green” (for they were in a sea of it) and added more words such as “Adam” and “Eve,” “grass” and “water.” Their companion was less clearly visible by day, but they could sense its general direction from the sounds of its wings and see it as a disturbance in the light.

A hill rose like an island amid the sea of grass. Without discussion they bent their course toward it and climbed to its top. By now the sun was directly overhead. They taught “hill” and “tree,” “sun” and “moon” to their companion. During the morning’s long walk both Adam and Eve had made further connections to the thing’s aura and were beginning to understand it better; or perhaps it had reorganized itself after their pattern. Its powers of speech had advanced well beyond word lists, and they understood in a vague way that it had some ability to get knowledge through means not obvious to them. When they entered into the deep shade of a tree that grew atop the hill, they could see that it had refined its form, with two distinct lower limbs like legs, two arms, and wings like those of El’s host. As well as a head, still just a bright cloud of aura, but beginning to take on humanlike features. “What shall we call you, following soul?” Eve asked it. “As we have taught you various words, we need a word for you.”

“What name would be best?” it asked. “My name is for you.” They understood it to mean that any