Nyla stood on the precipice of disaster. Her engineer job in the Runelab was so boring. She wasn't even competent. That was a place for geniuses! She was on a wall of the campus looking out at the forest and the little stream that weaved in and out of view. The flat plains nauseated her. She kept her eyes on the trees.
Behind her stood the halls and vast chambers of the Runelab of Anish. She was herself Anish, but most of the students were from other parts of the continent. She sighed and knelt with her knees in the air and rested a hand on the end of the ladder she'd designed to get onto the wall. The students were encouraged to design inventions that could solve problems. For some reason nobody had ever wanted to walk the walls. They were not like ballisades. Skinny things really. Her feet nearly reached from edge to edge.
"I'm not going to make it." Nyla pet her shins. They were smooth and she loved the feel. Once she had pet someone else and her smooth thighs.... No. That had been hard too. Instead of think of that past lover she spoke to her imaginary friend. "Nicki I just don't think this is right. I just can't cope."
Nyla's dress was comfortable too. She had changed out of her engineering pants and jacket just for this occasion. Nicki hopped along the wall.
"Let's just sit here and think Nicki. I owe the lab fifteen-thousand Pebbles. I owe mother probably twelve thousand. And Linz I owe even more." She had more debt in credits on accounts in various cities during her transitory years. She didn't want to tell Nicki. He was a dragon sure. They were one with those they could speak to. But Nicki was imaginary.
Nyla stood and forgot bout her debts again. The river was so beautiful. Instead of stay and stare for any longer, she steped down backwards onto the top rungs of the ladder. She leaned backwards. The braces clinked and she nearly lost her grip. She smacked the left post of the ladder. The top section - where she stood - fell several feet. Then another section. It jolted her. Finally after about five freefalls she came to a stop. she let go of her deathgrip and stepped onto the stones of the campus. She looked up.
"Hmm impressive. Fifty feet." She was impressed with herself. The ladder was too heavy to move by herself so she left it there. No other engineers dared test her designs because the Runemaster required a Contract of Release. Any harm that came to the tester would not be the responsibility of the lab.
Nyla walked at a slow pace. "Huh, they never hurt me. Maybe that's why I don't refine them." She passed several people as she approached the eating pental. It was just one of five pentals making up the campus. Two others were used for research. One was for living quarters. One for publidation. That was the only one the public was allowed to. It had its own eatery.
Nicki's claws tapped on the stones of the straight path to the eating pental. His six limbs moved more gracefully than her two. His looong body rose and fell, starting at his head and ending in a bushy tail. He was sage green and lylac. His eyes were opal. Next to them, trees stood tall in a line in the middle. It was considered impolite to pass through them on your way anywhere. Nicki hopped over to one anyway and curled up the trunk with his serpentine body.
Nyla laughed. She stepped up to the divider of stone that framed the grass. She loved seeing Nicki like this. She walked slowly around the tree and observed the juts and curves of the bark. Her friend's body anchored her spacial reasoning in such a beautiful way. She could see the differences of the drawing in her mind as she went to the other side. People stopped and looked at her. There were always people that were shocked that she did this. She wanted to see all the sides this time. Each sliver of vision was a different painting. She came back to the spot on the divider that she had started at.
"Ah well I'm no painter." She walked on to the eatery. Nicki curled down the trunk and followed. Of course they were imaginary. Nobody else could see them. It wasn't as if light bounced off Nicki and only into her eyes. Light didn't work that way.
The two friends entered the Levetator. By runes and ingenuity it lifted them seven floors to the food court on the roof. There they both ate their worries away. At least for that day.
