Eleven's Ghost

Chapter 9: Knowledge And Misinformation

The others stared at the balloons, puzzled. They saw Yayis waving at them from one of the air balloons. They all landed on the plains, and Shams and the others ran towards them. “What all this?! There are like twenty of these things!”

Yayis jumped on the grass and grinned. He was carrying a ton of books. “I found so many things!”

He blinked as Shams slapped him. “WHY WERE YOU GONE FOR TWO YEARS AND NOT ONE? DO YOU KNOW HOW WORRIED I WAS?”

Yayis raised his eyebrows. “But… I mean… Um…” He blushed a bit and looked down. “I didn’t think you would actually miss me. I’m just a tool.”

“OF COURSE NOT!” Shams hugged him tightly. “You’re the only one I have. Don’t you dare do this again!”

Yayis smiled and hugged him back. “Sure. I won’t.”

Un picked up a book. “The language is… very similar to ours. What is this one called?”

“Arabic.”

“What about this one?”

“English.”

Yayis folded his arms. “I heard dad once saying that Arabic is much older than English. It witnessed a lot of changes over the millennia, but Arabic was there ever since Adam was created. It’s the first language he uttered. Many languages came later, and even Arabic changed to meet the needs of the ever-changing society. I found books in many different languages, but most of them are English. I found Arabic ones, but they date back to six thousand years or a bit less. In the recent years before the old humans perished, most valuable books were written in English or other old languages. The books released to the public were in English anyway. Since most of us can speak English, it won’t be an issue to understand.”

He showed them pictures of megalopolises and different places of the old worlds. “Apparently, the old world was a trash can. Worse than the one we lived in up until this point. I never saw it, but it seems very polluted and disgusting. They have videos too. Football games. Concerts. They had a tendency to make stupid people famous, people who don’t deserve their status or money. Oh, they also used paper as money, not gold or silver. I don’t know why. They had really nice things, but most of their world was fake and dirty. The crime rates were also terrible. They had people that are awfully rich because they were underpaying their employees on one side of the planet, and people unable to get through the day because of starvation on the other side. They colonized countries with military and then claimed they were defenders of human rights. They later colonized their minds and penetrated their very souls.”

Un glared. “What a dark world the old humans used to live in.”

“They also used to pay for their electricity.” Yayis shrugged. “It’s to fill up the pockets of more people, obviously. Their world was filled with greed and evil all covered up with unrestrained irresponsible freedom and fake human rights. There was too much corruption. Those humans were beyond help. Only a miracle would have fixed them.” He smiled faintly. “Or a second flood.”

He patted the air balloon. “They had things they called planes. They used them to bomb people and also transport them. I discovered after reading more books and seeing videos that the planes are not eco-friendly. I found this model. It’s much slower, but I brought a special rock from home and used it to make it fly. It doesn’t pollute the air at all now, and this rock can last for a few centuries. Very durable.” He sat back in the air balloon. “We discovered models for things they call airships. They can carry hundreds of people at once if we design them right. I… I can call my friends… I mean…” Yayis started hesitating. “If humans… don’t mind jinns… We can… work together… It would be easier to move around, and it won’t pollute anything. We learned from the mistakes of the old humans. Jinns no longer hate humans after… the split. I’m sure there will be no problem…”

The woman in red smiled and patted his shoulders. “You were very helpful. Indeed, this is a lot of information. However…”

She clicked her fingers, and a white-haired jinn jumped from her shadow. “We have our own jinns, remember?”

Yayis’s eyes widened, staring at the jinn. “Ah… Another… jinn?!”

The white-haired glanced around, surprised. “Oh! We’re back to the surface again!”

“In Sirkus, one of the things they train you to do is to summon your jinn. There are different methods to do that. Jinns are generally a permanent summoning. You can choose not to summon them though.” The woman in red started. “When a human is created, they are assigned two angels that write their good and bad deeds. They are also assigned angels that protect them from death before their times. Just as they’re assigned angels, a jinn also accompanies them for as long as they live and doesn’t let them go until the soul leaves the body. In Sirkus, they teach you to bring the jinn out. If you fail, you’re given a domesticated jinn. Some people fail at this stage because to see jinns, you need to have certain mental fortitude. It’s a very challenging test, even for students in advanced levels.”

The white-haired sat on the grass and smelled it. “Ohhh…” He looked impressed.

“Tomato,” the man in pink spoke, “We don’t need you here. We have our own jinns, and they can help us. For now, we only need to study the old civilization and learn from their mistakes. We want to preserve this greenness and cleanliness. We have much more to work on, but we will get there.”

“I agree,” a man in black spoke with a smile. He had no aura coming from him and seemed like a normal human being, except for his closed eyes. He folded his hands behind his back. “We don’t need to feel pressured by this information. May I ask…?” he paused, “Where did you find these books and recordings?”

“In an underground village. It was buried in sand. We had to dig for days.” Yayis sighed, tired, “I might need some food to refuel.”

The man grinned. “Certainly.”

He walked ahead towards the citadel. They found people studying the different plants outside and farming the different new seeds they acquired. Un glanced at Yayis. “We already told Shams a bit about Sirkus. We will head to the military district and discuss things further.”

Yayis gazed at the man in black sadly. Shams squeezed his hand. “What is it? Are you okay?”

“That man…” Yayis looked down. “He seems… sad. Just looking at him made me… feel too much sorrow. I don’t know how to explain it.”

Shams blinked and glanced back at the man. “Un? Wasn’t he with you at the academy?”

She shook her head. “I heard he graduated long before us and came here as a governor of the entire planet. Many people challenged him to take over his position, but nobody managed to win. The fact that he’s human is certain, but we don’t know anything else about him. He never showed us his powers.”

“But I heard… that he was into some dark stuff,” a man dressed in yellow spoke, “The forbidden fraction in Sirkus. He worked there before being sent to Earth.”

The others’ eyes widened. “Really?”