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“This is… to a point…” Jade said, applying lipstick in the back of the limousine. Aventurine was turned to face her, but the pucker she was making into the mirror held in front of her lips made it near impossible to tell what she was saying. He nodded. She lowered the mirror. “What did I say just then, baby?”
“She said–” Topaz chimed in, and Aventurine shot her a look.
“I know what she said.” He scoffed.
“How are those new hearing aids treating you?” Jade said. He assumed she was pointedly sliding past the conversation from before.
“Just fine,” he said, putting on a lazy smile and pushing up his sunglasses. They made the limo darker, but he would be damned if he was gonna give up style for function in front of his coworkers. “Perhaps you weren’t speaking clearly. Lady Jade,” he hissed.
Topaz huffed. “You know, it’s silly that you refuse to use an interpreter. It’s generally IPC policy. They have telecenters for this.” Aventurine shot her another look, but she continued. “Oh, right, I forgot. You don’t know standard sign, do you.”
“It’s a bit late in life to learn, don’t you think?” he said. He looked over at Jade. She was watching the conversation a bit like a hawk zoned in on its prey.
“Our dear Aventurine says he doesn’t need an interpreter, then he won’t get one. You have to take what you want in life.”
Aventurine rolled his eyes, and looked down at his phone. He had gotten a few emails just while sitting there, and while they weren’t pressing, they were far more pleasant than whatever Topaz and Jade wanted from him.
Topaz waved her hand in front of his phone. He looked up. “How did you communicate as a kid? You were born deaf, weren’t you?”
Aventurine shrugged. “I had a lot better hearing as a kid,” he lied. In truth, he didn’t fully remember. He had to have had some way to communicate with his sister and the other people in his clan. Hell, he had to have some way to communicate with people not in his clan. He remembers the words to some prayers, his mouth shaped around them like a hot iron, something shameful and branding. Thinking about how much language he had lost since then made him sick. He frowned. “I read lips.”
“Right, but you guys definitely didn’t speak … back on …” Topaz said.
“Sorry?”
“The language you spoke on Sigonia-IV. It was different.”
“Right. Yeah?” Aventurine swallowed. “What about it?”
“Does the synesthesia beacon change how our lips look to you? Or did you learn to read different languages on people?”
“I…” Aventurine furrowed his brows together.
“Stop hounding him, dear.” Jade flipped her makeup compact closed. “I doubt he even knows.”
“It changes it,” Aventurine said, feeling very naked. He needed a cigarette. “There wasn’t an adjustment period.”
“That can’t be how it works,” Topaz said, rolling her eyes. “I mean, they have such a huge issue incorporating signature language into synesthesia bacon.”
Aventurine took off his sunglasses as casually as he could. “They incorporated Sigonian language into the synesthesia beacon?” he guessed. He felt his heart pounding in his throat. He really, really needed a cigarette.
The limo came to a stop. “Well,” Jade announced. “Shall we depart?”
He was right. The synesthesia beacon was doing something called visual-communicative flattening illusioria, or VCFI. Apparently, it was a similar technology to how it made all languages readable. Instead of visual-communicative flattening bypass (VCFB), (who came up with all these stupid terms?) VCFI changes the visual input of the information as opposed to the output. It was all a bit over complicated to read about, but he got the gist. It was meant to reduce the uncanny feeling that dubbed over TV shows have. There was a paragraph about signed languages that was a bit sparse, but it seemed like the Intelligensia Guild was working on it. Great.
But how did Aventurine’s beacon know what language to approximate? He shot Ratio a text, and got back a sticker that he guessed meant “I’m busy, text back later,” because when he tried to reply, the message didn’t go through.
He threw his phone on the couch. It must have some sort of way to calibrate it? Or maybe it simply sensed what language you were thinking in.
Oh lord. What language did he even think in?
He could form conscious sentences in his brain in the common Pier Point tongue, which is what he assumed most IPC folks at Pier Point did subconsciously. He tried to put together a sentence in his native tongue, and struggled to come up with a start. He knew the word for sister. He knew a couple of verbs – like bring, have, have not, steal, die – but he had no idea what order to put them in. Did he think in pictures? He tried to picture an apple, but quickly found he had no point of reference for if he did that regularly or not.
There were some words he knew like the back of his hand. Alone in his apartment, he couldn’t bring himself to say them.
“Topaz speaking, you’ve reached the Strategic Investment department. What’s up?”
“You speak a lot of languages,” Aventurine said.
“Thank you?” Topaz said. “I mean, at least I think it’s a compliment.”
“It’s just a fact.” Aventurine rolled over a pen in his hand, staring down at the blank sheet in front of him. “When you think, what language do you think in?”
“Oh, gosh,” Topaz said, and she sounded genuinely taken off guard. “Uh, well. I never thought about it really? Why do you ask?”
“I was just wondering,” he said. “It’s… just a personal thing.”
Topaz was quiet on the other line. He smacked his hearing aid. “Hello?”
“Sorry, I was just thinking. Uh, I guess my native language?”
Aventurine frowned. “Yeah. I guess I do too.”
“You know, I’ve never heard you speak your native language. Do you ever go to the Sigonian interest groups?”
“I don’t think there are Sigonian interest groups at the IPC, Topaz.”
“Oh.”
More quiet. Aventurine stared down at his CapTel.
“How do you say ‘I love you’ in Sigonian?” she said, after a minute.
Aventurine laughed out of shock. “Uh.”
“That’s the sentence I always go to when I’m trying to switch languages in my head.”
“It’s…” Aventurine felt tears prick at his eyes. He swallowed them back. “I love you.”
Topaz laughed on the other end. “That was in Pier Point dialect.”
“Oh. Sorry. Probably a synesthesia beacon glitch.”
“Yeah probably. Hey, while you’re here, I’ve got those papers we need to look at.”
AVENTURINE: Hey can you send me whatever you have on Sigonian languages
RATIO: y
AVENTURINE: Just curious
RATIO: k
Aventurine placed his phone down. There was no use sending any clarifying texts. Ratio would not be bothering to respond. Instead, he opened his computer and typed “avgin sigonian language” into the search bar. A few articles came up about the First Katica-Avgin extinction event that Aventurine had no intention of clicking on. A few profiles of previous congressmen from Sigonia, a few articles about himself (gross), a few blog posts… nothing super solid. He tried going into the video tab. He scrolled a few pages before coming across a video of an old Sigonian man sitting with some stuffy Guild type. He opened it.
“I’m sitting here today with Lennor, an Avgin from Sigonia, here to talk about … with regards to … war.” Aventurine frowned. He smacked his hearing aid again, and rewound the video. “...to talk about Sigonian language with regards to the Great war.”
“Yes,” said the Sigonian man. “Well, to be specific, I was raised Avgin diaspora and in … but I still speak the language.”
“Wonderful,” said the interviewer. “Care to share with us how you came to Pier Point?”
Aventurine rolled his eyes and scrubbed through the video.
“...word in my dialect was somewhat different from my father’s. See, my father was part of the Sigonian independence movement.”
“Ugh,” Aventurine said. “Come on.” He scrubbed through the video again.
“Mr. Lennor, would you share some basic Avgin vocabulary with us?”
“I’d be delighted.”
“Finally!” Aventurine cheered. “On with it already.” He smiled ear to ear.
“So the words to the prayer to the Gaiathra Triclops –”
Aventurine’s smile dropped. He hit the 30 second forward button.
“Fascinating. And some more specific words, then? Like, how about sand? Or sky?”
The Avgin man made an unintelligible noise. Aventurine frowned. He smacked his hearing aid against the desk, then put it back in. It whined at him, but he pressed play anyway.
The words were foreign to him.
Aventurine stood up, his laptop falling off the couch. He stared down at the video, still playing. “Fuck.” His breathing came heavier now, and he kicked his laptop. “Fuck, shut up!” It kept playing. He yanked his hearing aids out, and threw them at the wall.
Glorious silence. The light from the laptop shone orange and yellow on the wall.
Aventurine rolled over and patted the table next to him for his hearing aids. He declined the call, then fiddled with the connectors until the phone and hearing aids were paired. He hit redial. “Hello, Aventurine speaking. What time do you call this?” He yawned, checking the clock on his bedside table. 2 am. “Whatever this is, it can wait until morning.”
“Well then.” Ratio clicked his tongue. Aventurine’s stomach churned with a vague delight. “If you don’t want those papers on … dial sex… it can wait.”
“Dial sex?” Aventurine frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“Sigonian dialects,” Ratio repeated, slowly. Aventurine sat up straight in bed.
“You found them?”
“No need to shout. I’m sure they’re not nearly as comprehensive as you were hoping.”
“No, no,” Aventurine fumbled with his other hearing aid, shoving it in his ear and turning it on. A high pitched noise rang in the left ear, and he cursed himself for earlier when he had thrown it against the wall. He’d have to get them looked at. “No, I want to see them. As soon as possible. I’m sure it will be enough.” He laughed, smiling uncontrollably. “I owe you, Doctor. Big time.”
Ratio made an unintelligible noise on the other end of the line. “... with a … or two.”
“Come again?”
“Nevermind. I’ll get you copies and email them when I can.”
“Right. Thank you. Really. I appreciate it.” Ratio hung up the phone, and Aventurine was sitting in bed, all alone, in his empty apartment, a long lonely note playing a dirge in his left ear.
There were about one hundred pages of database level vocabulary words in Sigonian, and he had about seven hundred words highlighted from the pdf Ratio had sent highlighted as Avgin specific. There was a little preamble that said something about dying languages, but Aventurine just ripped that out of the printer and tossed it in the paper shredder. The apartment was silent save for the bass vibrations of the printer humming in Aventurine’s chest. He felt dizzy. This was it. He was sure this would jog his memory.
He stared down at the piles on the desk in front of him, sorting out the pages that were mostly highlighted.
AARDVARK (n.) - AARDVARK.
That makes sense. There were no aardvarks on Sigonia-IV, so it must be a loan word. He scanned down the page to the next highlighted word.
BEST (adv.) - BEST
Aventurine frowned. That wasn’t right. He was sure that wasn’t right. Maybe it was just a weird typo or the words sounded similar or something. He looked down the list again.
CONCEAL, CONCEALING (v.) - CONCEAL
That he knew wasn’t right. That wasn’t the word for conceal. He knew the word for conceal very well. He flipped through the pages, looking for another word he knew.
PEACE (n.) - PEACE
PEACEFUL (adj.) - PEACEFUL
Aventurine felt sick. The synesthesia beacon was translating the words. That had to be it. The synesthesia beacon was sensing that he didn’t know this language, and was translating his native language back at him. He couldn’t even look up a pronunciation guide for these words or watch a video of how they’re said because he can barely hear his own coworkers over the phone without captions.
‘May the Mother Goddess thrice close her eyes for you,’ he said. The words felt hot on his tongue. He couldn’t even hear his own voice. ‘keeping your blood eternally pulsing.’
He let out an involuntary whimper. It was hard to breathe. He flipped through the pages. ‘May the Mother Goddess,’ he repeated, trying to say it louder. ‘Thrice close her eyes for you!’ He let out a laugh. Some Avgin he was. ‘Keeping your blood! Eternally! Pulsing!’ He was sure he was shouting at this point.
The flashlight on his phone flickered. He picked it up, hands shaking.
JADE: Going out for drinks tonight with some clients, you’re in
He stared at the message, and glanced back at the papers, illuminated by the rising sun.
AVENTURINE: See you then.
He shoved the papers in his desk.