Outworld by N. Harold Donley

Author:N. Harold Donley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2011-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter X

Daniel's eyelids opened for the first time in days.

He felt hot, but not as hot as he had been in the Outworld. Here it was appreciably cooler, but still too warm for his taste.

Slowly, he scanned the room. It was small. His bed was built into the outer wall, with the wall next to him arching to a high ceiling. The walls felt smooth to the touch, coated with some type of plaster and finished with light oil. Light came into the room from a small window about two thirds of the way up the wall to the ceiling.

His bladder felt as if it would burst. Stiffly he pulled away the light sheet draped over him and swung his legs off the bed. I have never felt so weak, he thought as he stood, bracing himself against the wall. Spying a doorway to another room he took a tentative step, then another and another.

The doorway did lead to what appeared to be a bathroom, after a sort. The toilet and what he could only assume was an open shower stall sat on a low platform. Without thinking he felt for the light switch and depressed it. A soft illumination filled the room.

As he stood over the toilet it suddenly hit him.

Light! Toilet! Shower stall!

He held his hand up to the light, allowing his palm to eclipse it and the filtered light to play between his fingers. Reaching up he held his palm above the fixture … no heat … he touched it. Plastic. Not any plastic he had ever seen before, but it was smooth and hard to the touch.

He found a knob at the side of the toilet but when it depressed it, instead of a rush of water he heard only the sound of drainage. No flush … with a slight sense of dread he wondered, this is a toilet, right? Stepping down to the tile floor, and now fully awake, he turned to a small basin of water. It appeared clean so he washed his face and hands. It felt good to rinse away the grime of his own sweat.

Savages?

Savages do not have toilets. Savages do not bathe much less have showers. And most certainly, savages do not have lights powered by some form of electricity … and cool to the touch, not hot like the bright lights of the Dome.

Leaning back against the elevated toilet, Daniel ran his hands through his hair several times and brought one hand to rest on his forehead.

They can talk … they have technology … they have a religion, or some sort of ethic, which guides them…

How could we have been so wrong? His fingers tapped against his lips as he pondered. This is not an inferior race of subhumans … non-humans … their technology is different but they hardly live like nomads in the wilderness.

"My, my … we have made progress!"

The voice startled Daniel from his ruminations—turning toward the sound he saw a woman standing in the doorway.

It was not Lylith, at least he knew that much.

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