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> **Kai Travels the Ultiverse Question 2**
> 
> Last, I found myself in your worlds, stranded, alone and looking for work to get food, water and shelter.
> Well, time to sort of look deeper into this! I've found myself in a settlement of yours.
>
> Perhaps its a big, massive city, maybe it's a small village that I'm hopefully welcome in.
> I have a job, but... what's your currency like?
> What can I look forward to in the economy?
> With the job I've landed, what luxuries could I look forward to?
> Tell me; what is your economy like?


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----

You hike along the now gravel road, approaching closer to the domes of the settlement ahead,
  when you first encounter them.

A group of small humanoids
  labor in one of the fields alongside the road.
They stand about four feet tall,
  and for the most part are wearing insulated fabric cover-alls and sturdy long-sleeved shirts.
Most of them wear wide-brimmed hats of some kind,
  although others wear sock caps or have their heads bare,
  exposing tufts of hair.

This work crew is harvesting the tubers you saw earlier.
They grip the base of the stem near the ground and twist to uproot it, before hacking off the leafy top with a machete.
The cut tuber is then stacked into a pile with other tubers while the tops are discarded to the side.

As you watch, a small trailer pulled by a tractor circles by,
  and two more halflings start loading the piled tubers into the trailer.

As you pass, one of them waves and hails you in an alien tonge,
  calling in a seemingly friendly way.

No reason to be unfriendly back.
In fact, as you wave in response, you realize this could be the perfect opportunity.

You set down your pack and retrieve your knife,
  then step into an un-harvested area of the field,
  and initiate the process you just saw performed.
With your larger size, you're able to pull up the tubers easily,
  and after a moment you've managed to uproot and decapitate a half-dozen of them.

The worker standing in the trailer has paused to look at you,
  uncertain of your intent,
  and so you carry the six you've harvested over and drop them in the trailer.
You could easily carry more than six, but this helps clarify your intent.

Nothing like a bit of free labor to help put any fear at ease.

Despite your size, this is still hard work.
You've been able to adjust some to the low pressure of this planet's atmosphere,
  but you still occasionally gasp for air,
  and despite the chilly temperatures sweat drips down your back.

As you work, you do occasionally see one of the others pausing to watching you.
Perhaps they're simply puzzled by the strange hulking giant that randomly showed up and decided to help,
  although you like to think they're impressed with your strength and speed,
  as the stack of tubers beside you grows.

Eventually, the sun reaches its zenith,
  and one of the workers with the trailer calls out something across the field.
He &mdash; you assume it's a he &mdash; seems to be the crew's foreman,
  and the twenty or so other laborers pause harvesting and congregate by the trailer.

A break?
About time, anyway, you certainly need one.

You retrieve one of your canteens from where you left your bag,
  and drink thirstily,
  before pulling out one of your ration bars.

The foreman calls over to you, again in a language you don't understand,
  but it's clear he's invited you to join them by the trailer,
  and you do.

Many of the crew are nervous with your presence, though,
  and as you sit, they make only muted conversation among themselves.
They all appear to be eating some sort of flatbread,
  and you munch on your ration bar in silence.

Eventually, you break the silence.

"These things must be good eating.
Seein' as you're growing them everywhere it seems," you say,
  gesturing with your ration bar and indicating the stacked tubers.

"Eating?" the foreman asks, with a slight tilt of the head,
  repeating the word back to you.
"Good, good eating!" He picks up a tuber and hands it to you,
  and you accept it, not sure what else to do.

"Good eating!" he says again, with emphasis, and after a moment pantomimes taking a bite out of it.

You're surprised the foreman had managed to deduce your meaning from so little,
  but now the rest of the crew is watching you.
Not much else to do,
  so you take a bite out of it.

You immediately recoil from the taste.
The raw tuber is incredibly bitter.

But as you look around, the crew seems to find this ... _funny_.
Was this some sort of practical joke, played at your expense?

You decide to take it that way,
  and so rather than immediately spitting it out,
  you force yourself to grin.

"Good, good eating! You want some?"
He offered it back to the foreman.
The crew's gaze turned to him, and he accepted it reluctantly, as if they are all now pressuring _him_ into it.

The foreman eyed the tuber nervously.

This _was_ meant as a joke.

At that moment you couldn't hold it any more, and spat out the chunk of the tuber,
  coughing and laughing.
The rest of the crew followed, making a sound that was fairly analogous.

"Good eating!" you state again, emphatically,
  before rinsing your mouth out with water from your canteen
  and spitting out onto the ground.

Clearly, this was all meant in good fun, and the foreman joins the laughter,
  relieved he won't be forced to take a bite himself.
Even for them, apparently, these tubers had to be processed somehow before they could be eaten.

In that moment, the ice breaks, and conversation flows freely.
You don't understand their words,
  but you don't need to to understand that you'd been judged and found worthy.
You just follow along as best you can &mdash; you'll need to learn the local language eventually &mdash;
  and comment in your own language as it seems appropriate.

"What's the word for these tuber things anyway?" you find yourself asking,
  holding the one you'd bitten almost as a trophy.

"Word? _tsutssupkan_," replies the workman beside you,
  and points at another of the tubers,
  to ensure you understand that he's giving the name for this root in case he misunderstood the question.

He pronounces the word with a particular emphasis on the _ss_ and a very subtle _k_ sound that you're not quite sure you can reproduce,
  but you nod, confirming that that was what you had asked, and try your best anyway to say it back.

"Tsoo-tsoop-kan," you say.

"Tsutssupkan." He nods back, this time pronouncing it almost exactly the way you just did.
He pauses for a moment, then asks, "word for ... you?"

"Kai. My name is Kai." You point to yourself.

"Small name, for big ..." he motions at you, indicating your large relative size.

You laugh at the joke.
"I guess so," you say. "So what's your name?"

----

You work alongside the ... what will you call these people, anyway?

They group had identified as '_Ksip-pukt-sim-nmi_' or something of the sort,
  using some subtle alien pronunciations that your human mouth couldn't quite articulate,
  but that appeared to be a name for this group in particular,
  and you hadn't quite been able to communicate that you wanted to know their name for the species as a whole.

Whatever, not like it matters anyway.

Anyway, you work alongside the halflings for several more hours,
  until finally the field is harvested.
The trailer is stacked full of the tubers,
  and you retrieve your pack to follow the crew as they walk behind it to the city up ahead.

As you walk, the foreman &mdash; who'd identified as '_Ye-o-ne-e_' and who'd accepted your nickname 'Leon' &mdash;
  poses a question to you.
"Where was Kai go?"

He probably means to ask you what you plan to do, now that the work day is over?
You take it that way, anyway.

"I don't really have anywhere. I guess, with you? To the city?"
You gesticulate to illustrate your meaning as best you can.

You'd expected to need to learn the local language,
  but the fact they seem willing &mdash; and for that matter _able_ &mdash; to pick up this much of yours,
  _this_ rapidly, is certainly a surprise.

He frowns for a moment before attempting to clarify.
"I mean, where was Kai go .. go _before_?"

You sigh, memories you'd rather forget returning, of your old life on Earth.
"I come from a long, _long_ way from here."

"From ... up?" He indicates the sky.

You suppose that's accurate.

----

Finally, you crest the last hill,
  and the city lies before you.

In addition to the large domes you'd seen from afar,
  there many smaller domes scattered around it, to the sides.
Some are isolated, appearing to be connected only by exterior roads,
  while others have small enclosed tunnels connecting them to the larger domes.

At the base of the main dome directly ahead of you,
  there's a squat rectangular building that protrudes from its side.
Waves of both foot and vehicular traffic move in and out of the gatehouse,
  through large roll doors that open and close with each wave.
Your earlier theory that these were air-supported domes appears have been correct.

All the people you see are of the same species as the group you presently follow,
  although there's significant variation:
Skin tones range from deep burnt reds and pale tans to presidential oranges and dark browns,
  and hair color seems to follow a similar gamut, with the addition of whites, greys, and blacks.
Several of them also have a contrasting stripe of differently-colored hair in the middle of their head.

Although, as you look again, beneath the mud and grime your group has nearly the same level of variation.

You continue to follow your group, but rather than going to the entrance straight ahead,
  they instead turn left, following the now-paved road around the dome.
Far above you you're able to spot a work crew performing some kind of maintenance on the dome.

Eventually, you come to a second gatehouse,
  and the halflings drive their tractor pulling the trailer into one of the large roll doors.

As your eyes adjust to the shaded interior,
  a guard pulls on a chain and closes the roll door behind you.
He wears an armor plate carrier over a tan and reddish-brown camouflage jumpsuit,
  with heavy studded boots on his feet
  and a large circular badge on his left collarbone.

He saunters back to a table at which two similarly-dressed guards have remained seated,
  and they await the return of a fourth guard
  so they can resume whatever game is played with the cards and plastic chips thereon.
A handful of halfling-sized assault rifles lean against the wall,
  and helmets with clear face shields lie haphazardly in one corner.

Your ears pop as the pressure in the gatehouse rises, 
  and you find yourself breathing more easily in the enriched atmosphere.

The fourth guard is directing the workman driving the tractor to move onto a set of truck scales,
  while Leon speaks with another halfling seated at a desk covered in papers.

This halfling is dressed in a curious outfit that marks him as some kind of official.
His dark green robe comes down to his knee,
  embroidered with geometric patterns in a similar dark green thread,
  and a comically short cape barely a foot long drapes behind,
  extending along the length of the garment's short sleeves.
Under this he wears a black shirt with tight-fitting sleeves that come to his wrists,
  and on his head sits a cap the same color as his robe,
  with a circular design similar to the guard's badges embroidered on the front,
  and a short thin red tassel at the back.

The language they're speaking is very different from the one the crew had used among themselves earlier,
  though there are some similarities.
You pick out the word _tsutssupkan_ again, but the way it is pronounced is quite different from the version you'd learned

After a moment though, the conversation starts becoming more heated.
Both of gesticulate towards you, and you hear your name used.

You're not sure what's going on, so you walk up near the desk,
  and after a moment Leon breaks off and stalks back,
  wearing an expression you interpret as frustration.

"The ... " he gesticulates, and you fill in.

"Official?"

"The official, he wants ..."
He indicates the ring you wear on your finger.
"Or not give ... not let you in."

The meaning was clear.
The official expected a bribe in exchange for allowing you into the city.

"Is there anything else I can give him?" you ask,
  and begin looking through your pack trying to find something you'd be more willing to part with.
As much as the memory associated with that ring pains you,
  it still isn't one you wish to give up.

As you search, though, the other members of the work crew start becoming much more agitated,
  and two more of them start arguing with the official,
  shouting what you can only assume are varying profanities.
One of the others spits on the floor.

For his part, the official has returned the invective tit for tat,
  and as the guards gambling in the corner pause to watch, ready in case there's trouble,
  you realize that this may be about to turn ugly.

No.
This wasn't worth getting in trouble over.
You hold out your hand and slip the ring off your finger.

"It's ok, I'll pay the bribe," you say.

You hand the ring over, and the official slips it into a pouch inside his robe.
Standing up, he opens a filing cabinet behind him,
  and retrieves and hands you an official-looking form covered in alien hieroglyphics.

Seeing your confusion, Leon waves the rest of the crew ahead,
  and one of the soldiers stands to open the large roll door leading into the city.

Crisis averted, for now at least,
  although several of the workmen call out parting profanities as they leave,
  which the official returns in kind, hollering after them.

Leon takes the form from you and pulls you over to a side table,
  and starts filling it out for you.

You're no judge of halfling penmanship, but Leon handwriting is incredibly neat and tidy,
  in perfect vertical columns with straight lines and precise circles.
If it wasn't for the small dots of ink and the fact you were watching him write it,
  you might have thought it typewritten.

After a moment, he stops and slides it back to you.

"How you ..." he pantomimes moving his pen.

"Write?"

"Write." He nods. He points to one of the remaining empty boxes on the form, and then to another.
"How you write name of Kai; how you write where from Kai."

He hands you the pen.

His meaning is fairly clear,
  and you write out 'K-A-I' as neatly as you can in block letters,
  then 'E-A-R-T-H'.

Leon looks over the form,
  then hands it to the official.

The official pulls out a white plastic disc about two inches across,
  covered on one side with another colorful geometric seal similar to that on his hat or the soldiers' badges.
He flips it over, and scribes something on the other side,
  then hands it to you,
  saying something that you take to mean "don't cause any trouble."

You nod. You don't want any trouble.

As you step away towards the city entrance,
  Leon calls your attention back one more time.
One of the guards has approached you,
  and holds a small cable padlock in his hands.
He taps it against the rifle you have strapped to the side of your pack,
  saying something you don't understand.

Are weapons not permitted in the city?
You'd spotted several firearms stowed in the back of the tractor's cab,
  maybe the prohibition only applied to foreigners.

In any case, you weren't sure exactly what was going on,
  so you remove the magazine from the rifle and lock the bolt open,
  then offer it to the guard.
Rather than take it from you,
  the guard simply loops the cable lock through the magazine well and locks it closed,
  leaving you holding the weapon.
  
Ok, fair enough.
Presumably they lock will be removed when you leave the city.

Not wanting to fall afoul of the city's laws,
  you pull your handgun out of your pack and allow them to lock it as well.

At last, you're able to exit the gatehouse, and enter the city proper.

----

You thread the plastic disc the official gave you onto a lanyard around your neck,
  through the small hole near its diameter you assume is for this purpose.
You're not sure exactly what the importance of it is,
  but you certainly don't want to lose it.

Leon leads you through the city,
  winding your way through a number of streets.
  
The city appears to be a strange mix of chaos and order,
  with neat, straight main roads passing between large blocky buildings that look as if they've been stacked atop one another.
Narrow alleyways extend off either side,
  many opening up into courtyards full of unfamiliar plants.
None of their construction appears to be particularly sturdy,
  but you suppose it doesn't have to be, given that it's protected from the elements by the dome.

A thousand and one unfamiliar smells assault your senses as you make your way through the city,
  and all kinds of sounds echo down from the cavernous roof.
Vendors hawk their colorful wares,
  portable carts dispense various kinds of street food,
  and children play loudly in large open squares.
The machinery that keeps the air fresh is a constant low rumble in the distance.

As the sun begins to set,
  you cross from one dome into another,
  through the wide partially-buried tunnel that connects them.
Many of the noises of the city gradually fade as the light dims,
  and you spot denizens of the city starting to light lamps of some description in their homes and storefronts,
  the cheery yellow glow replacing the flat diffuse light from up above.

This new dome appears to be slightly more run-down than the other,
  with streets swept slightly less often and a few more cracks in the pavement,
  but eventually you arrive at what you assume must be Leon's home.

----

You spend most of your first week in the city working in the fields outside the city and adjusting to the city's norms.

Unlike humans, these halflings curiously don't seem to form nuclear families,
  but rather live in much larger clans of usually ten to thirty-odd adults members.
The _Ksippuktsimnmi_ clan you've fallen in was in fact one such;
  and the building you'd arrived at last night was actually home to the entire clan.

This clan seemed to be about twenty adults, most of whom you'd met working in the field the first day,
  but there were a few others you hadn't met, and nearly a dozen children of varying ages.

To your eyes, it's fairly difficult to tell the difference between men and women of this species.
You'd happened to guess right that Leon was male,
  but that had been a rather lucky guess:
  in fact, nearly two thirds of the clan members &mdash; and of the city population as a whole &mdash; were female.

The one difference you're able to make out between the sexes is that it's _usually_ men
  who have a contrasting stripe in their hair, but that's definitely not a hard-and-fast rule.
There's apparently some kind of difference in their facial structure that makes the distinction blatantly obvious to them.

While most of the city's adult population are part of similar small clans,
  there is also another class of people in the city,
  a sort of "migrant worker" class composed almost entirely of younger adults.
You're not entirely sure what the distinction is or what makes an individual a member of this class,
  but it seemed to have something to do with whether or not you were a member of a clan.

In any case, these 'clanless' halflings lived in a separate area of the city,
  and importantly, you yourself were apparently considered a member of this class as well &mdash;
  while Leon and his clan had graciously allowed you to sleep in their courtyard that first night,
  they'd made it abundantly clear that you were not welcome to stay at their clan-hall long-term.
They did, though, still feed you and the four other migrant workers on the crew at the end of each work day,
  inviting you to join them for dinner,
  and you are glad to not have to worry about food.

For the moment, you were staying in a tiny apartment with two of the aforementioned migrant workers,
  from whom you'd managed to coerce the nicknames "Jerry" and "Morgan".
Even without a third occupant of your size the apartment would've felt crowded,
  and you've already hit your head on the door frame more times than you can count,
  but you make do, and are grateful for it.
Apparently unemployment and homelessness are common among this migrant worker class,
  and many of the alleys you pass contain lean-tos and make-shift shelters.

Hopefully you'll be able to find somewhere else to live before too long.

Crime, though, &mdash; aside from the petty corruption you'd experienced firsthand &mdash;
  doesn't appear to be common, but what does happen is punished severely.
Public executions and floggings aren't exactly frequent,
  but you still remember going to see the commotion in one of the squares,
  just in time to watch as the firing squad put a bullet through the head of a condemned thief,
  and you don't think you'll soon forget the smell of blood
  as they dispensed twelve lashes onto the back of another accused of being her accomplice.

Almost as disturbing, was how quickly the atmosphere returned to the same cheery babble you encountered on your first day.

Needless to say, you do your best to stay out of trouble.

One thing you do have significant trouble with though, is the language.

It is often said on Earth that the English language is really three languages stacked on top of each other wearing a trench coat.
That it regularly pursues other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifles their pockets for new vocabulary.

If that is the case, the ... _languages_, if that was even the right term for what these halflings speak,
  is some kind of eldritch abomination wrested from the elemental chaos and given flesh.

Across even _this_ small city of twenty thousand,
  there isn't just _one_ language, or even a dozen.
There are literally _thousands_ of distinct languages and dialects, in _regular use_,
  all bleeding into each other in a horrible convoluted mess.

At least within a single clan,
  there are usually one or two reasonably-consistent languages or dialects used within the clan for _most_ purposes.

And, as far as you can tell, there _are_ a half-dozen pidgin 'greeting languages' that most people in the city know.

But, these are basically only ever used when initiating conversation with a total stranger,
  or as a starting point for when two speakers aren't sure what else they had in common.

Yes, _starting point_.

Interactions between strangers might _start_ in one of these 'greeting languages',
  but by the end of the conversation it will have morphed into a kind of ad-hoc 'best common subset' language,
  one that might possibly be _unique_ to _that specific interaction_.

It was a blessing, then, that nobody really cares if you speak any of it _correctly_.
And those you frequently interact with are also, most of the time, _perfectly willing_ to use
  whatever English they'd _somehow_ managed to just _pick up_ by interacting with you.

All things considered,
  you've done a remarkable job getting a handle on the most-commonly-used pidgin language and some key local vocabulary.
You can even make yourself understood,
  most of the time.

But the fact you can only really speak that minimal pidgin subset
  marks you as a foreigner in a way that even your large relative size doesn't.
And the lack of a sort of 'linguistic reciprocity' in most of your exchanges
  generally leaves others with the impression that you're somewhat dim-witted or perhaps childish.

Dammit, you _try_.
When someone introduces one of their own terms in a conversation,
  you do your best to try to infer the meaning and remember it, at least for that conversation.
It at least shows you're _trying_ to reciprocate;
  'dim-witted' is certainly a step up from 'intentionally rude'.

Your brain just isn't _built_ to handle this sort of linguistic insanity.

----

It's the end of the halfling work-week,
  and you sit beside the other migrant workers at large table in the _Ksippuktsimnmi_ clan hall courtyard,
  putting away the soft, slightly spongy flatbread that forms their main dietary staple.

The bread is made largely from refined _tsutssupkan_ starch,
  and isn't incredibly flavorful,
  but it is filling, and today there's an unusually large assortment of other dishes along with it.
There are no utensils; 
  you simply use a piece of flatbread to scoop or grab some filling directly from the communal dishes,
  and then eat it and the flatbread together.

This is something of a luxury, at least among poorer clans in the city like _Ksippuktsimnmi_.
Most of the time the bread is simply eaten plain,
  with a minimal amount of other food simply for nutrition and variety.
Today though, there is more than enough even for you,
  and you don't have to worry about receiving reproachful looks for eating too much.

Many of their spices and flavorings aren't really edible for you, unfortunately.
None of it actually smells unpleasant, and mostly the inedible spices simply taste somewhat bitter,
  but you steer clear of anything that's even remotely yellow, 
  still remembering _that_ acrid taste from two nights ago.

But salt, fat, sugar, and acid are universal.
The leafy green things with the mild citrus-y flavor are pleasant enough,
  as are what looks like some sort of stewed melon-y gourd thing,
  and the greasy gelatin noodle thing.

You really need to start growing some of your own Earth vegetables.
While you're able to get enough calories, you have no idea whether these foods contain all the nutrients _you_ need,
  and your vitamin tablets are going to last you only so long.

Your thoughts turn to the rover you left at the far side of the canyon.
Most of the equipment you'll need is still there,
  and as far as you've been able to discern there's no way to actually drive it here without going thousands of miles out of the way.
Perhaps you can rig a rope across the canyon and bring it across in pieces with pulleys,
  but you'd need to acquire those things first,
  and doing it purely by yourself would take a very long time.

There was also the risk of being attacked or having it stolen in the process:
  while you'd avoided any altercations coming here,
  likely due to your imposing size and the fact nobody knew you were coming,
  banditry was apparently common out beyond the limits of the city.

Hidden as it was on the far side of the canyon, the rover was likely still safe where it was,
  but even if you weren't attacked you would very likely be followed if you tried to return to it,
  and if you tried moving it across the canyon on a pulley by yourself,
  it might very well already be stolen by the time you managed to get back across yourself.

Difficult problems to work around.

Things come to a close with the meal, and Leon approaches you and the others beside you.
He hands each of you a stack of plastic chips similar to the one around your neck,
  and you're able to get the gist of what he says.

Apparently, today is also payday. 

----

[First][first] | [Wiki][wiki] | [Next][next]

[first]: https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/comments/cfeyrd/kai_travels_the_ultiverse_q1_planet_kemhe/
[wiki]: https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/wiki/series/wheels_within_wheels
