FANTASTIC PLANET v2.0 (3 page)

The little
girl shook her head.

'Well then',
she said, i don't know... perhaps... perhaps I repeated them aloud without
realizing...'

Praw turned
to his wife:

'I thought
the Oms couldn't pronounce certain words due to their mouths' particular shape,
but that's not the reason!'

'What do you
mean?'

Praw smiled.

'Imagine',
he said, 'a particularly dumb Traag on an alien planet. He would be able to
know a good hundred useful words: treat, go out, hunger, thirst. But he would
be incapable of forming sentences.'

'And?'

'He could
well "recite" phrases he heard by heart, without understanding their
meaning. That's exactly what's happening with Terr.'

Wami
shrugged once again.

'So many words for such an insignificant matter!
This Om is very attached to Tiwa and he follows her everywhere. He must
have heard her reciting her infos aloud and he learnt them mechanically without
knowing what he was doing. The matter is closed, let's leave it at that.'

She turned
to Tiwa.

'Which
reminds me: you haven't done any instruction today. Hurry and put on your
headset.'

Tiwa
obediently went to take down her headset. She stopped on her track. The hook
was on the wall but the headset had disappeared. Praw saw his daughter's
unease.

'Where have
you left them now?' he said snapping his membranes.

'I don't
know, Father.'

'Look for
them. You usually sit under the palm leaves by the swimming pool.'

They
searched the grass but did not find anything. Tiwa even dived to examine the
bottom of the pool. They then looked all over the nature room.

'I bet you
let Terr play with them', reproached Praw. 'These appliances are very
expensive; you are not being reasonable, Tiwa.'

Tiwa's red
eyes became veiled dolefully.

'I assure
you, Father...'

'I am not
strict enough with you', the Traag cut short.

'But Father,
Fve never let the Om play with the headset, honestly!'

The father
did not know what to think. 'And yet that would explain a lot of things', he
said... 'Where is Terr?'

'Terr!' the
girl called out. The little Om did not answer the call. 'He is hiding, the
little rascal', said Praw. 'Terr, come here! Terr, look what I have for you!
Terr, come and have a treat!'

The Traag
mother came back into the room. 'What is going on?' she asked. 'What a racket
you're making. This is not the time to play with the Om. Tiwa, I told you to
start your instruction!'

'She can't', moaned Praw, 'the headset has disappeared!
Terr is gone too!'

'No, Fve
just seen him in the corridor', said Wami.

'Terr!'

All three
rushed to the corridor. 'Where was he?' 'Here, on this seat'. 'Dammit!' swore
Praw. He pointed a finger at the chair. 'Why are you gesticulating like this?'
'The headset!' said Praw. 'What about it?'

'The Om
could easily have reached it by climbing on the chair. I bet you he is playing
with it now. If he breaks it...!'

He went to
the omhouse. The door was wide open and the small room was empty.

'Where has
he gone, the little devil?'

Tiwa burst
into tears, thinking she may have lost her Om.

'Instead of
crying', said her mother, 'how about you put on your bracelet, it is the only
way to find him. You haven't lost it, have you?'

'I... I left
it in my tunic pocket', gasped Tiwa.

'Come on
then, hurry up!'

The little
Traag ran to the nature room, searched her gown and put on her bracelet. She
pressed one of the switches and looked up downhearted.

'Well?'
repeated her father.

'He must
already be faraway', whined Tiwa, 'the bracelet draws me a little toward there,
but not very much.'

She was
pointing towards the entrance to the house. The door was ajar.

'He's gone
out! I knew it', said Praw, 'Tiwa, pull on the leash'.

'No', said
Tiwa, 'if I pull too hard he'll hit something and hurt himself.'

Annoyed, the
father took the bracelet from her and pressed on the switch as hard as he could
to attract Terr's collar towards him.

Terr was
running. He had already cleared many of the mounds andwas hurtling at full speed
down a slope when he suddenly felt strangled by his collar. He let go of the
headset and put his hands to his neck. Tugged by an invisible force, he went
back three steps and turned around to counter the pulling with his neck and not
his throat. He was forced to take some more steps and held on with all his
strength to a metal bar sticking out from a railing.

At that
moment he felt a rough hand on his shoulder. He almost shrieked with rage and
turned around, his face twisted by the effort. A big bearded Om was behind him
saying:

'You really
are a nitwit!'

'Help me',
choked Terr.

Sniggering,
the stranger pressed the collar's switch. It widened enough for the little Om's
head to go through. The bearded Om sniggered again, brandished the collar which
seemed to want to fly off, and let go of it suddenly. It flew into the air,
bounced on a mound and disappeared from their sight.

'It'd be
good if it hit them right in the nasal slit!' exclaimed the bearded Om. 'That
would slow them down!'

He pushed on
Terr's shoulders.

'Let's clear
off!'

At first the
little Om followed his new found ally who had taken to his heels, but he then
stopped and retraced his steps.

'You're
mad', yelled his saviour.

Not
replying, Terr picked up the headset he had left behind, placed it on his
shoulders and bending under its weight he caught up with his companion who had
mercifully slowed down.

'Leave it
behind', advised the big Om without losing a stride.

'No, I need
it', panted Terr.

'I knew it,
you're mad. Here, give it to me.'

He grabbed
the headset and hoisted it on his shoulders.

'Where are
we going?'

'Don't you
worry!
'

A faraway
voice shouted: 'Terr! Come and have a treat!'

But Terr
could not hear. His ears were ringing. He
tottered
forward and fell unconscious, shattered by the effort: his life as a luxury pet
had not prepared him for this.

His
companion stopped, looked around and saw a shaded spot beneath a cement landing
where he hid the headset. Stooping, he then picked up the senseless boy and
veered cautiously across the small built up area.

He slipped
into a ditch surrounded by tall grass and, walking in the undergrowth for a
good half an hour, reached some wasteland where numerous disused spheres

were
rusting away.

He put Terr
on the ground and slapped him roughly. At the third slap, the young boy gasped
and came to his senses. He opened his mouth and breathed noisily. 'Feeling
better, are we?' enquired the bearded Om.

'Yes...
Happiness onto you...' 'My name is
Brave
.'

'Happiness
onto you, Brave... I... but who are you?'

'I'm an Om!'

'I mean to
say... you can talk!' 'And so can you, little one.' 'I thought I was an
exception. I thought I was the only Om who could talk.'

Brave ran
his fingers through his beard. 'You're not the only one, but it's quite rare.
Usually an Om who talks can't bear servitude.

'Some of the
words you're using... I can't understand them. What does servitude mean?' asked
Terr, surprised.

'I'll
explain. Do your owners know you can talk?' 'No... Well they were starting to
suspect it. I just learnt like that, by listening to them. And I could also
hear Tiwa's infos."

'Who's
Tiwa?'

'My young mistress.
I could talk but they carried
on speaking to me like... like I was a dog. Have you ever seen dogs? They're
funny, aren't they, and even smaller than Oms! So cute
!...
What was I saying
?...
Oh yes, I didn't dare to speak
other than to say: treat - me happy -hungry... And then today they overheard me
speaking normally. They were pulling faces and didn't look at all happy. I got
a little scared
!...
'

'And then?'

'Then I said
to myself that I wouldn't show them anymore that I could talk, otherwise they
could whip me, like they did when I stole a sweet from the kitchen.'

'And so you
left?'

'Not
straightaway. I must explain to you there is something wonderful, something I
love above all else: The info headset. It shows pictures and says things. And
once you know these things, you feel... how
can I
say... stronger. Yes, that's right, stronger!'

'So you
stole it!'

'What?'

'The headset!'

'Oh! Yes, I
thought they didn't want me to carry on listening when Tiwa was doing her
instruction, which would have been terrible to me... yes, I stole them.'

He suddenly
sat up straight, his face all red.

'Where is
it? Did you lose it?'

'I hid it',
said Brave, 'we'll find it again.'

Terr looked
disconcerted.

'Are you
sure?'

'Yes, and only to make you happy.
Because to me headsets are horrible Traag things, and I don't see
their use.
But don't worry, I'll go and get it for you!"

Brave once
again ran his fingers through his beard.

'So, you
left just like that, without knowing where you were going, how you were going
to live, what you'd be eating and drinking?'

Terr became
sheepish.

'I didn't
think about all that!'

'Well then,
let me tell you, you were lucky to come across me.'

'What do you
mean?'

Brave aped
him, faking a small voice:

'What do you
mean, what do you mean? Hey, you luxury Om, you've got everything to learn,
things your headset isn't telling you!'

'I don't
understand you sometimes', said Terr scratching his ear.

'I know, I
know. Anyhow, come. Without me you're doomed. And you'll obey me, I'm the gang
leader.'

'Gang?'

'Yes, the
Big Tree gang.'

'Oh!'

'Oh what?'

'What
bothers me is that... I'm afraid Tiwa might be unhappy that she's lost me.'

Brave
clapped his hands impatiently.

'You're
talking nonsense, little one. Once you've spent time with us your feelings for
Tiwa will change, believe me. Come on, you're not tired anymore. Let's go,
we've got a long walk ahead of us, and it's getting dark.'

They walked
throughout the night, for so long in fact that when Terr woke up he could not
remember falling asleep.

He found
himself lying in some kind of nest set amongst a tree's forks. All around him
branches were trembling gently in the breeze, letting through shimmering
patches of light from the starry sky.

Used as he
was to cushions, his fragile skin was irritated by thousands of stings from the
blades of dry grass making up his bed. He propped himself up on his elbow
scratching his legs furiously with his spare arm as he called out softly:

'Brave!'

Something
moved beneath him; he lowered his eyes which were now used to the dark and saw
an Om he did not know.
An old Om with white hair and a beard.

'Brave isn't
here', said the old man, 'he's gone back to the Traag city. He lost time
because of you, little one, but he was really happy he saved you.'

'Who are
you, old Om?' asked Terr.

The old man
waved him down. Terr, who was shaking from vertigo, used the wood's cracks and
knots to slide down towards the old man. He soon found himself next to him in a
slightly more spacious nest.

'Who are
you?' he repeated.

'My master
used to call me Faithful. And I truly deserved my name. He was a good Traag and
it was impossible not to love him. But one day he left for a long trip and he
entrusted me with neighbours who beat me and didn't feed me properly. So I ran
away at the first opportunity. That was a long time ago. And you, little one,
what's your name?'

'My name is
Terr.'

'It doesn't
mean anything...'