The next morning I deviated from my usual routine and took a sharp turn on my way to the square, to walk down a path leading south.

‘Where are we going?’ Miles asked.

“We’ve tried scripting on leaves of small plants and on flower petals. And we can’t get to a tree. But how about a larger plant?”

I made my way to a small garden outside a house that hadn’t been occupied in months. Remembering that the garden had gone unattended, I thought the plants here might have grown a bit wilder and larger.

“That one,” I said while looking at a particular plant with a thick stalk and leaves growing from it that were twice the size of my hands.

Most people didn’t maintain elaborate gardens, because managing them was too much work, and the authorities usually kept an eye on rank growth like this.

When Alarna had only been a small, fortified camp, the first inhabitants started to gradually remove all nearby trees, because they believed them to attract and even produce beasts. As a result, people became wary of forest-like gardens. Whether this was just superstition, because beasts lived in the woods, I didn’t know.

‘This is great!’ Miles said, looking at the plant I had pointed out.

I made sure nobody was watching me as I carefully drew the script on one of the thick leaves. Then I placed a blue stone on it, making sure it wouldn’t just fall off, and waited.

I didn’t expect anything in particular to happen. At this point, I was doing these little experiments for fun. It was interesting to come up with things to test, to develop theories and hypotheses. Not to mention that the headaches would go away when Miles was happily theoryzing.

After the presumed failed experiment, I picked the stone back up. But just as I made to leave, I noticed a few droplets of water forming on the leaf.

Unbelieving, I stared back and forth between the stone and the plant. “Did I just...?”

‘Test it again,’ Miles said, urging me on.

Placing the stone on the leaf once more didn’t do anything. Neither did scripting on another leaf. On a different plant, however, droplets of water did form. Just like they had on the first one.

“I’m not imagining this, am I?”

‘Nope...’

We were ecstatic. “‘We did it!’”

Following the initial successes, I tested the script again and again on various plants. As I did, the stone I was using appeared to shrink slightly, even on all the plants that didn’t show any visible effect.

Only some plants produced water, and apparently only once they had reached a certain size. It also wouldn’t work with a detached leaf. It had to still be on the main plant.

The amount of water they produced would also be entirely useless. You couldn’t do anything with a few drops of water. You would need hundreds of these plants to fill a bucket. However, a part of the theory had been proven. Some living things would react to Omega scripts.

***

‘First, you reproduce. Establish a baseline and determine the requirements. Then, you modify,’ Miles answered my question about what the next step would be. He had wanted to understand the underlying concepts before going further.

There was still a problem though. The plants we had here weren’t suitable for further experiments. The water appeared very slowly, and all we got were mere drops. Experimenting with the script would apparently require more immediate and obvious results.

‘Time to modify the water source,’ he said.

“Wait, what? You want me to change the water source script? What if I break it?”

‘I doubt that’s going to happen. You saw the plants, that proves the script is working. Even if we mess it up, we can just fix it.’

To Miles’ dismay, this was a line I wasn’t willing to cross. Too many people were relying on this water source on a daily basis. If anything went wrong, it would have big consequences. And I didn’t even want to think about what would happen if anyone found out who was responsible.

‘I’m certain it will be fine!’ Miles pleaded, but I didn’t budge.

“No,” I said firmly.

We argued all the way to the water source, going back and forth over our options. Trees in particular would make for an interesting test. Seeing how medium-sized plants could at least produce small droplets, a large tree might actually produce a stream of water. But it just wasn’t a viable option.

‘Hypothetically, how would one get outside the walls?’

“One wouldn’t,” I responded. “The only people that go outside are miners and woodcutters. And only with at least a squad of guards for security. It’s too dangerous to let anyone just stroll around outside.”

Sometimes there would also be caravans coming or going from and to the nearest other town, three days from here. But these were large scale affairs, and you would need a permit and a good reason for wanting to accompany them. Like being a merchant specialized in import/export.

‘What about stones?’ Miles asked out of nowhere.

“What do you mean?”

‘Are they being imported?’

Stones were being sold directly by the authorities, but I didn’t know where exactly they came from. I had watched workers return from outside the walls before, however, and I had never noticed them transporting blue stones. I told him that they probably were being imported. Actually... didn’t my job description say something about “shard acquisition”?

‘Maybe that will be a chance,’ Miles said.

He told me that he had chosen this job specifically because it was the only one directly related to the water sources and the stones. He had seen the potential even when I had first shown him the water source, and he wanted to learn as much as possible about them.

I didn’t know if I’d actually be able to travel out of town for my job, but the prospect was somewhat exciting. I had never been outside the walls. All I had ever done was catch glimpses through the open gates. At the same time, I was terrified. He wanted me to go outside, close up to the woods. He wanted me to go doodle on some trees, in close proximity to where beasts lived. And it would probably have to be done at night, when the caravan stopped to rest.

My response was not a definitive “No,” but I didn’t plan to put my life on the line for this. As I made my way back home, I started to get a little giddy to tell Mother about what we had discovered. With her natural curiosity, she would love this.

***

From his house to the abandoned garden, from the garden to the water source, and all the way back home, Tomar hadn’t noticed that someone was following him. Peeking at him from behind corners and fences. He had gotten a little careless this early in the morning, when most people were still asleep. As a result, parts of his conversation could be made out even from a distance. The parts that were spoken out loud by him at least.

After Tomar arrived back home, the individual made their way back to the abandoned house. All the proof of the experiments had been cleaned up, however. A slight pout on their face, they left.

***

“Mom, we did it,” I said while we were eating breakfast. She could hardly believe it. I told her a little bit about what Miles and I had been doing. About the theories, and about today’s success.

“That’s unbelievable,” was a response I got from here repeatedly. Then her curiosity flared up. “And you think it’s possible to modify the sigils on the water source?”

Not you too, mom...

“Miles thinks so... but I don’t want to risk it.”

My mother contemplated my words, but when it came to new discoveries, she had always leaned in the direction of giving everything a try. I was worried she would urge me on as well, but she understood my worries.

“You’re right,” she said. “If anything went wrong, that would be a real problem.”

Go, mom!

“However,” she continued, ”what about the water sources that are used less than ours’?”

...

Her idea was that it wouldn’t be nearly as tragic if a smaller water source stopped working, like the one on a chain. The amount of water it was able to produce was barely enough for people there to get water for the day. Doing your laundry at that water source was almost impossible, unless you went there early and used up most of the water. And I had heard of instances where that had happened, when people begrudgingly went to our water source instead.

Her second argument made for an even more convincing one, however. If we could manage to research the scripts further, maybe modify them, and apply them to other objects, we’d make history. Not only would we change people’s lives, it could also be very lucrative.

“My son the Water Source...erer?” she said, laughing softly.

‘That’s the plan,’ Miles said with a chuckle.