Following his family’s cue, Liam unbuckled and slid from his seat, maneuvering from the car with a speed reminiscent of a sloth, his eyes glued to the house with every movement. It had been quite a while since he had been here, seen this house, walked on this ground, breathed this air.
He paused after closing the car door, leaning against the vehicle as he took a deep breath and allowed his eyes to fall shut with the action. The air rushed in through his nostrils and filled every crevice of his passageways, filling his lungs entirely as they expanded. His nerves relaxed almost immediately with that first breath. The first breath that reminded him where he was, that helped his mind to unwind and set into the plane of constant, soothing voices that were always running in this land. The voices were different than everywhere else. They were knowing voices, voices that knew they were being heard but at the same time were not afraid to be heard. They were voices of confidence, voices of intrigue and interest, voices of curiosity, of creativity, of thought and progress. They were spoken in gentle tones, warm and welcoming. Inviting.
The voices welcomed Liam home in a comforting embrace. Home, to Lomnivo.
Lomnivo, Liam’s senses tingled as he opened his eyes and glanced around with a renewed outlook, one compacted with a bundle of almost childish exhilaration at the world that awaited him.
Lomnivo was what the Maeroksigne called the northern parts of the continents located in the northern hemisphere of Earth. For the past century, older generations of Maeroksigne had migrated to parts of the land nearly uninhabited by humans and tacitly claimed the regions as their own. It was not so much an organized plan as a subconscious group effort of their people, a spark of an idea that was silently followed through with in years to come. The Maeroksigne were able to withstand the temperatures and harsher climates with knowledge they had gained second handedly—thoughts and ideas that they had mistakenly overheard. But some ideas humans did not trust enough to work, and they never put enough faith into some thoughts to execute their plans. Maeroksigne had never been like that. If an idea held even a glimmer of a future, they went with it. They worked on it, day in and day out, collaborating with one another until it did. The ideas that humans threw out, the Maeroksigne devoured.
In the past few decades they had effectively constructed clothing that would help the basic body withstand extreme cold; medical advancements to shorten the length of a common cold (and ones for influenza and pneumonia in the final testing stages) to mere hours; technology that would allow cars and pipes to continue proper function even in the most harsh of conditions. Even though they could not deceive Mother Nature, they could fight her. They could resist.
And that is exactly what the Maeroksigne were set to do in Lomnivo.
Lomnivo was their second chance, and not only against Mother Nature. It was their chance at a new home, a land to call their own, to live amongst their own kind in a world utterly unaware of their existence. It was a place where they could relax, without having to constantly catch their tongues around humans. A place where Maeroksigne could feel a sense of security. Of belonging.
Though only a few hundred-thousand spanned Lomnivo across the continents, it was a place many were beginning to call home. As older generations came to stay, new generations of Maeroksigne were born and raised within Lomnivo. They even had a self-sustained institution set up for younger individuals, ones who still needed an education, who wanted to blend their adolescent Maeroksigne training with the other matters they had yet to learn. These individuals were prepared and willing to live a life entirely within the confines of Lomnivo, perhaps without ever having human interaction if they played their cards right.
Maeroksigne who were born in the human world, however, had trouble committing to a life in Lomnivo. A life among Maeroksigne. Many young Maeroksigne were used to the life of humans, having been born in human hospitals, raised with humans, educated in human schools, befriended humans. Like Liam, they were comfortable in the human world.
Lomnivo was far from the human world, though it may not look as such to the human eye. Trees, houses, cars, electronics—basic things found in the human world could be found in a simple search of its lands. But all of these things were different, even if only slightly, within the regions of Lomnivo. The electronics appeared at a first glance identical to those of some human inventions but held, sometimes, such very different intentions. Their phones, for example, were rarely ever used for verbal communication, for they found little use in wasting simple words aloud. It made too much of a ruckus. It disturbed the pureness of the air. Their phones allowed them to send messages by letting them make a momentary connection with the mind of the individual they needed to reach, no matter where the person was, within Lomnivo or not. If the person being contacted was exceptionally busy at the moment, the message could be kept in a temporary message storage base, similar to the likes of an answering machine found in the human world.
The whispers that the leaves of the trees seemed to make in the wind were more than an illusion to the Maeroksigne living in Lomnivo. Those whispers held words—words sent along great distances. Some messages were purposely sent, others picked up mistakenly.
Like the whispering of the leaves, there was a constant humming of voices drifting in the air. A human passing through could not hear it, not unless conditioned to actively search for it. (Human spouses and relatives of Maeroksigne who claimed residency in Lomnivo could sometimes make out the murmuring of voices, but they could never quite decipher the exact words they heard. Accounts say they were only garbled mumbles and rather unpleasant to the ear.) Maeroksigne did not have to search for these voices; they came with the swiftness of the wind, flowing freely in the air. They were always heard.
The voices welcomed Liam personally, and he knew before his mother even opened the front door to the house that she had told everyone she had run into the past day that her children were coming home. Voices that Liam did not even know greeted him personally, reaching his mind in a one-on-one meeting.
