Work Text:
‘Happy birthday, Gulool Ja!!!’
‘Guah!?’
The Backroom was as packed as Gulool Ja had ever seen it — no, so much more. He could not even see the slick violet-accented machines, the grey walls, the holographic screens.
There were only people, all over and around him. All of them were smiling brightly and clapping cheerfully for him. There were red, green and blue electrope balloons clinging to the ceiling, and a big electrope banner stretched across the entire entryway.
Everyone… They’re here for me, he thought, struggling to take in the flood of happiness that surged his way.
Gulool Ja did not have a birthday he knew of. His father had not stored the date in the Everkeep systems. His mother had likely been pressured to act accordingly. Beyond that, he was also not accustomed to celebrating them. Not only had he not had events like that for himself, but out in the wilderness, most folks in the Outskirts had never invited him. Otis had also never celebrated his own birthday, or whatever was the equivalent for a machine with a soul.
In short, Gulool Ja thought that he did not care about it.
However, when Sphene had asked him about this, and about his willingness to have a birthday chosen for him, he had not imagined this would be the outcome.
Wuk Lamat and Koana were there, as well as many Alexandrians and Turali folk. Most of their faces were known to Gulool Ja, some of them very well, but not all. Shale, Nostalgia, Wayakkwe, Genolt, Melancholy, Tassos, Yyopya, Erenville and Krile… And more people…
His eyes naturally landed on the gigantic, two-headed Mamool Ja in the back of the room. His right head, which resembled Gulool Ja’s, looked very unsure of itself, whereas the left one watched the proceedings keenly. His body was a thing of muscle and bulk. Woah… Is that what my grandpa looked like?
‘We took the liberty of designating today as your birthday,’ Sphene told him with a prim tone, ‘but should you prefer to celebrate it at a different time of the year, it can be arranged.’
‘The date was chosen,’ Shale said after stepping forward from the crowd, ‘after running through the data of your parents that was present in Everkeep’s systems. Using the logs we recovered of your mother and the records of Zoraal Ja’s activity, we estimated a likely date of birth. There was, of course, some room for interpretation.’
Gulool Ja blinked twice, realising in the process that he was grinning. ‘Oh, okay. Sure, I don’t mind.’
‘Excellent!’ Krile shuffled forward from her spot between two much-taller individuals. ‘Now then, if you were to ask me, there can be no celebration without a sweet treat to be shared!’
Gulool Ja noticed that, next to Krile, the centre of the Backroom had undergone a dramatic change. Gone was the electrope display that held up a hologram of Everkeep’s twelve levels. Instead, there was an even bigger model of the tower, including the thirteenth floor that remained in the Ninth shard.
But… Why does it look so soft? And colourful?
Then, the smells reached him: a chaos of all the flavours and scents that could be called “sweet”, competing and mixing together.
‘For your birthday cake,’ Wuk Lamat said with music in her voice, ‘everyone decided to chip in! We wanted to make you a cake shaped like the home you knew.’
Koana pushed his glasses up his nose. ‘Each layer of the cake was made by someone different. All of them wish you a blissful day.’
Ooooh…!
The Everkeep cake was not a single structure, but rather, thirteen layers stacked from top to bottom. The layers were not resting on each other either, but held up by swiveling platforms attached to a pole next to the cake tower. Each cake, or cake-alike, was only as tall as the space up to the platform above it allowed. If you spin them, you can make the cake layers go to different places. The bottom-most layer was nearly at his feet, and the topmost was taller than him.
It doesn’t make sense to put cake on the floor. I bet it will go up when it’s time to eat. He glanced at Shale, who winked discreetly. Shale probably put it there so I could see all the layers for now.
‘So!’ Wuk Lamat neared him and turned to the cake. ‘Let’s start going in order, alright?’
Gulool Ja directed his eyes to the top layer, but it was still too far up.
As always, Auntie Lamaty’i was quick on the uptake. After a shared nod, she picked up Gulool Ja and sat him on her strong, wide shoulder.
The sweet occupying the first platform was in fact not a cake, and it wobbled gently at Wuk Lamat’s approach. ‘Ah! It’s the one I told Sphene about!’
Sphene was beaming. ‘Of course! It’s your celebration, so your choice should matter the most.’ She extended her arm towards the translucent jelly. ‘We worked with the artisans of Shaaloani to recreate the fruit and aloe jelly of Tural while utilising some local Alexandrian products.’
‘Oh? So you changed it?’ Once Gulool Ja had tried the jelly in Tulliyolal, his mind had expanded to new horizons.
‘The branchbearer fruits are a rarity even in Xak Tural, so we substituted them with a product of our own make. I know that you really liked the sweet and sour blend, so our food engineers strove to replicate that same balance.’
Hmm… I’ll give it a try, I guess.
‘Next is the layer that I designed.’ Sphene shifted the top layer out of the way with absolute gentleness, ensuring it barely even wobbled at all. Underneath, the second layer shaped like the twelfth floor of Everkeep was a fluffy brown cake covered with dried fruits. ‘It’s a recreation, as close as I could manage with both Alexandrian and Turali products, of an old cake from my youth.’ She pushed a curly brown lock of hair behind her ear. ‘It was called Queen Cake back in the day.’
There was barely any scent, sweet or otherwise, wafting from it, but this pleased Gulool Ja. It’s probably good to eat in-between the sweeter things! ‘It looks yummy!’
Sphene’s face wrinkled with a pleased smile. ‘I’m glad to hear it. It’s not as flavourful as some of the other layers, but it has a charm of its own, in my opinion.’
‘Below that one,’ Wuk Lamat said, rotating the platform away with as much care as the solid cake needed, which was not very much, ‘is my cake! Ta-da!’
The powerful and juicy sweetness of the cake needed no introductions.
‘Pineapple ponzecake!’ Gulool Ja clapped with excitement. His mouth watered for the moist confectionery.
‘And below it,’ Koana said, ‘you shall find mine.’ He nudged the ponzecake aside with scientific precision, unveiling a strange, white bread.
It’s a bit…stinky?... ‘What is it, Uncle Koana?’
‘Most of the other layers are focused on pleasing the palate, not fulfilling your needs as a young child. I thought I would bring something more nutritious and sophisticated.’
‘It’s Archon Loaf,’ Krile said, her smile bent in an oddly sad way.
Wuk Lamat leaned her head towards him and whispered: ‘This is why we made it with layers instead of stacking all of the food on top of each other.’
Although Gulool Ja did not understand the point of her statement, she did not elaborate any further.
Oh, wow! A dessert from Shar… Sharlayan? From across the salt! Gulool Ja’s tastebuds were already dancing and he had yet to eat anything. He rubbed his hands in glee.
His Auntie then looked to the two-headed Mamool Ja in the back. ‘It’s your turn, Bakool Ja Ja.’
Gulool Ja studied the man’s lumbering steps with interest as people made room for him to reach the centre. He had long wondered how someone like that man might talk, breathe or eat. How does a two-headed Mamool Ja think or work with its two heads? It was something from Mamook, from where his father had come from, that Gulool Ja felt exceedingly curious about, but very disconnected from.
He could tell, however, that it was not the right time to indulge his curiosity.
‘Right, er…’
The right head seemed to lack the resolve, so the left head continued in an even-handed tone. ‘This is a gift from Mamook. We hope you know that you’ll always be welcome there.’
Wuk Lamat cleared her throat while alternatively glancing at the Everkeep layers and Bakool Ja Ja.
‘It was our favourite when we were your age,’ Bakool Ja Ja’s right head added gruffly in response to Wuk Lamat’s prompting.
‘Push the platform above so he can see it better, you two,’ Koana said.
‘Oh, right,’ the two heads replied in unison, and jostled the Archon Loaf’s platform out of the centre pile.
The movement unveiled a crispy, golden pie that almost glowed. Gulool Ja inhaled deeply, and he could tell there were many fruits inside of it. Most of all, it smelled tart, which was what he liked about the aloe jelly too. Maybe they used the branchbearer fruits!
Erenville was the next to speak: ‘From the Shetona, we bring you some navel orange cookies.’ He spun the platform above and revealed an assortment of orange-coloured, doughy cookies piled up inside a container on top of the platform. The container’s transparent walls retained the shape of the Everkeep level. ‘They are sweet, yes, but also aromatic and somewhat citrusy, which helps cut down the sweetness.’
Gulool Ja was as much a fan of cookies as the next person, but at this point he was beginning to be overwhelmed by the amount of sweets on display. He started to focus more on who was presenting what, and what it meant about their culture. I already know what I want first. That tart smells so good!
‘Next, below it, you’ll find my layer.’ Shale knelt down to rotate the previous layer and reach the seventh one, which was quite lower compared to her full stature.
‘Together with my helper,’ she said while sharing a look with a woman behind her, ‘we’ve prepared something based on modern Alexandrian cuisine.’
The layer looked like something made out of purée, jam and jelly of the Solution Nine style, shaped into a cake of sorts. Gulool Ja was not impressed, but he smiled at Shale like a happy King should, nonetheless.
Behind Shale, the woman she had identified as her helper also smiled back. ‘It has all the nutrients a growing fighter needs,’ she told him with a self-assured contralto voice.
I don’t know her, but she’s Alexandrian. Shale’s friend was a Hhetsarro with light-violet ponytail and hair braids, who wore a black-and-white Alexandrian top and bottoms that showed her tan skin.
When they moved back and made room for the next people, Gulool Ja glimpsed the woman’s tail swishing, and heard her whisper to Shale: ‘Really, a helper? That’s what you went with?’
Yyopya stepped forward from the rear, guiding her wife Taapu so she would not have to use her cane in such a packed room. ‘We made you something using ingredients from the Outskirts. It’s not a recipe we taught Otis or that he taught us, but it’s one that we hope you would have enjoyed to share with him.’
This time, rather than hungry, Gulool Ja felt a pang of sadness. It was one he was grateful for, however, because it meant that he still remembered Otis. He swallowed the feeling down, and hoped his smile had not grown too sad. ‘Thank you.’
It was a bright, white, traditional cake that had some vegetable slices on it. Gulool Ja could not study it as closely as the previous ones because he was busy picturing what Otis would have said. The vegetables, they’re probably because Yyopya studies plants, I guess…
It’s a good thing Genolt didn’t make a layer, he realised. It would probably just be made with energy tonics.
‘Perhaps fittingly for the ninth layer,’ Krile began as she stepped closer to the remaining central platforms, ‘mine is a gift from the former neighbours of Alexandria. They hope that this relationship will be maintained moving forward.’ She started to stand on the tips of her toes to push the previous layer out of the way, but Yyopya and Taapu helped her.
A sort-of cake came into view, whose shape only mildly resembled that level of Everkeep and whose colour hovered somewhere around light-yellow. ‘Treno’s very own Sweet Corn Pudding Cake! I’m told it’s delectable and energising both.’
The comical sight helped to reel Gulool Ja back from his memories. ‘It looks funny.’ His eyes widened. ‘In a tasty way, I mean. Thank you, Krile.’
‘It’s a pleasure, Gulool Ja.’
The last three layers were described by representatives of the societies in Yok Tural. By that point, Gulool Ja's physical and mental limits had been exceeded. He made small mental notes: Yok Huy, stone cake, Pelupelu, torta matera, Moblins and Hanuhanu, cheesecake…
In the end, just as he had guessed, a hidden platform rose from the floor and brought the entire cake up to the average person’s chest level. This was well above Gulool Ja’s head, but he remained perched on the Vow of Resolve’s shoulder, so it was not a problem for him as much as it was for Krile. The platforms holding the various layers of cake redistributed themselves automatically at equal angles, ensuring there was ample room to access each of them.
‘And that’s all of it! Sorry for taking so long, Gulool Ja,’ Wuk Lamat said, noticing his drowsy eyes.
The strength of his Auntie’s steady shoulder flowed into him. No, I can't fall asleep now. I’m the King of Resolve. He forced his eyes wide open and straightened his posture.
I must be strong!
He raised his arms, and bellowed: ‘I’m ready! To eat!!’
And so, with laughter, all of those in the Backroom were ready too.