[all over taxon]
At around noon, the silence was broken. The Extras resumed their idle nonsense chatter, and any citizen checking their tablet would note that voice and video transmission are available again. After a little experimentation they will also realize they have their voices back
( Read more... )
[He judges that more people speak Mandarin Chinese than any other language he has yet encountered; so he starts with that.]
[Mandarin] It appears we may speak, although I personally am finding English so difficult as to be near impossible. Please allow me to offer my services as a translator if anybody desperately needs to speak to someone else and if, of course, I speak mutual languages. I am reasonably fluent in most languages of Earth circa the 20th century and previous; I am afraid I cannot yet reliably converse in such tongues as Klingon, Galactic Base, and others. This is Mayland Long, please do not hesitate to contact me if I may assist.
[A slight throat clearing, and then he repeats himself in Spanish, as he's sure he's seen that several times on the tablets so far.]
Parece que podemos hablar...
[Long repeats the gist of his initial message, then methodically and calmly runs through the same offer in Russian, German, Swahili... by the time he gets to Arabic, he stops for a sip of tea; this is thirsty work.]
[But it's just the sort of thing he secretly loves-- an orderly task, one that he can approach methodically, working through language groups by family to increase the odds of people hearing something they may be loosely familiar with at least. He can get more specific as needed, once he's made the first round through.]
[OOC: So, because Long's canon has him as a ridiculous languages-Sue, if your character speaks an Earth-native-tongue, he likely knows it. Anybody who wants to tag on, feel free to assume he either got to it eventually, or just have your character yammer at him. <3]
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Hello! Ek hoef nie vertaal, ek wil net...ah. Ek kan verstaan dat jy! En so ek het gewonder of jy geweet het wat daar gebeur het? Omdat...
(translation: I don't need translating, I just wanted...Uh. I can understand you! And so I was wondering if you knew what was happening? Because...)
[It goes on for a little longer (he's entirely too thrilled to have his voice back, evidently), and by the end it's mostly just self-conscious babbling no matter what language it's in, but the gist (of what can be deciphered) is that he thinks it might be the aliens and he's just confused and looking for someone to explain everything and/or do something about it.]
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[He waits politely until the man stops to take a breath, then interjects. His own Afrikaans is not perfect, as it is a language he has rarely had use for and, truthfully, only learned it as a footnote to Dutch in the first place because he is nothing if not a completionist-- but it is comprehensible.]
Goeie dag. It is a pleasure to have the talk understood, isn't it? Forgive my little problems with the talk. This is your first gebroken ding, yes?
[He can't think of either an Afrikaans or Dutch word for 'glitch', and settles on 'broken thing' instead.]
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No, no you are doing very well! Really, I promise you. It is nice to be able to talk to someone without having to push the little buttons to get things across. But yes! I heard that they do these things sometimes but I have never actually seen one. Or, been through one. Are they like this often, with the speaking in tongues?
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[Yes, apparently Long's biggest priority in a glitch like this is 'ooh, I could get better at [Insert Language here]!']
This is the first one I have had that has the talk altered. They are normally on one person, I think, and show as a change with body or mind. Such as, one may become a child, or not remember part of life.
Some are more trouble or danger than others of course. I think you came after the--
[A little pause, as Long tries to think of a word for 'zombies'. He settles on the closest he can think of-- the Dutch for 'the corpses'.]
...de lijken.
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[That and it would make him feel useful. He is worlds of okay with helping if it gets him that.]
That is horrible! Why would they do something like that, that is...very bad.
[Understatement of the year, Wikus.
Not that aliens don't ever do anything bad; the Prawns destroyed things like trains or cars with people in them for fun, changing what makes a person fundamentally them if in possession of the technology really shouldn't surprise him. And humans themselves aren't a whole lot better.]
De lijken?
[Cue a moment's thought as he compares.]
Ah. Lyke.
[Another moment's pause, because while dead bodies aren't really normal to have around they're not exactly strange either. Morgues are full of them, after all.]
Lewende lyke? Soos die wandelende dooies?
(translation: Living corpses? Like the undead?)
[And it's worth noting to point out that the idea makes him more than a little worried, even if he's chuckling. It's a nervous chuckle. He's seen the movies.]
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Personally I believe they perform these things for entertaining. A thought of bad comfort, that.
[Though Wikus can't see him, he nods at the question the other man asks, a slight frown on his face.
'Lyke,', ja. Baie dankie. Lewende lyke. The people of the city-- the-- kunstmatige mensen -- had a sickening, and became like living dead. A few of us, they killed. But all was restored and the dead with life again. A bad time, but they could be fought, hurt.
[baie dankie - thank you; kunstmatige mensen - Dutch for artificial people]
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[A pause as he thinks things over, then]
What do you mean, people died? And then...were okay again? That...How is that even possible?
[meganiese - mechanical]
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The killed people were alive again, yes. I do not say I have answers for the how.
I have learned this, to be of comfort-- the broken-things do not last so long, they are not always. A few days, is usual.
I remember you from your hello-- Mister Van de Merwe, yes?
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Maybe they were not as dead as they seemed...?
[Not that he seems particularly convinced by this; dead people are pretty easily identified and not easily confused with the living. But it's one possible explanation, and it makes more sense than 'brought back to life' like some kind of Frankenstein's monster.]
What kind of broken things? Like if you crashed your car it would not stay that way, or...or other things too?
[Not that he's broken exactly, but he does need to be Fixed, as far as he's concerned. And if the aliens fix the things that aren't how they're meant to be, well...it's worth a shot, and asking loses him nothing.]
[He nods to the question, only belatedly realizing that Long can't see him]
Yes, yes that is me. [Does he sound pleased that Long remembered? Yes, yes he does.] Ah, but you can just call me Wikus, there is no need to be so formal. We are all neighbors here, eh? [A self-conscious chuckle] Nice to meet you...again.
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I did not go close to examine the dead. Perhaps it is as you say. Although I do not think so.
The... the broken-things, the things-that-go-wrong--
[So Frustrating, why can he not speak English? Glitch, glitch, it shouldn't be so hard to say. He settles for the German word for the same.]
Spannungsspitze-- the things like this, they go back to normal. I do not know about crashing a car here, for I have not tried to crash a car.
[He knows nothing, of course, of Wikus's personal investment in the question.]
We are indeed neighbors, ja. Strange bedfellows, the saying is. It seems foolish to ask under this situation, but are you adjusting alright?
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[He seems vaguely disappointed, but it's short-lived; he's rarely been the type to dwell on the bad longer than necessary, he'll just...make do for now. Instead he opts to focus on the question; it promises to be a much more pleasant conversation.]
Yes, I am managing okay, thank you for asking. It is much quieter, for one thing, even with all the strangeness. [There's another laugh that doesn't seem to quite belong] I miss...many things, of course, but under the circumstances it is really not so bad here, yes?
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Well, there are to be certain worse prisons in the world. I have been in situations that are not as make for comfort. So.
But a cage is still a cage.
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Even a very nice one, yes. [He sounds commiserating; it isn't as if he can't relate, even if his own incarceration was only for a matter of hours.]
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Amusing as a parlor game. Frustrating as the only way to speak. I myself make a prize of the clear talking-- I have tried to learn many talkings for this reason.
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...How many do you know? [Cue awed tone; Wikus only knows two well, a third so-so and mostly only because it makes for good curse words, and a fourth only enough to understand but not speak himself (not that he could make the clicking sounds even if he tried).]
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