Chapter 7 More Discoveries Once I had calmed down, my problems seemed funny.
I thought about how hard I had worked to travel to the future, and now all I wanted to do was go home.
I shook my head and laughed out loud.
When I returned to the white building, I felt as if the little people were staying away from me.
Maybe it was because I had tried to get into the statue, or maybe it was just my imagination.
But after a day or two, things went back to normal.
The Eloi were friendly again, and I tried to learn more of their language.
It seemed to me that the little people used very few words.
I learned the names of different fruits and how to say things like run or hungry, but that was all.
Their sentences were also very short. with only one or two words.
Because of this, I found it difficult to talk about anything but the simplest things.
I explored the countryside and tried not to think about the time machine too much.
Everywhere I hiked, I saw the same gardens, grass, flowers, fruit, statues, and buildings.
I also saw more of the wells that I had seen before.
There were many of them, and they seemed to be very deep.
They were all made of metal and had small roofs to keep out of the rain.
I couldn't see any water when I looked down them, but I could hear a sound coming from below, a steady thud thud, thud like the sound of a big engine.
I discovered that air was flowing down into all of them.
I tossed a scrap of paper into one, and it was sucked quickly out of sight into the darkness.
I also discovered what I would describe as chimneys near each well.
At the top of each chimney, the air shimmered.
It looked as if hot air was coming out of them.
I decided that fresh air must flow underground through the wells and bad air must rise to the surface by way of the chimneys.
But I had no idea why.
It reminded me of how little I knew about the world of the future.
Yes, I had met the Aloy and eaten their food, and I now slept with them in the white building.
I discovered the wells and the chimneys, but there was so much I didn't know.
I was really only guessing at what the world of the future was truly like.
It was the same as if a caveman visited London.
He would see buildings and cars.
He would eat our food, but he wouldn't really know how anything worked.
The railway, factories, telephones, and radios would all be a mystery.
He wouldn't understand why we live the way we do.
That's how I felt, and that's why I can say what I saw.
But I can't say anything more than that.
For example, I never saw any graveyards.
Why?
Perhaps they were in another part of the country, or I just hadn't seen one in my travels.
I don't know.
I also never saw any sick or old people.
Again, I don't know why.
I also began to wonder how the fruit got from tree to table.
I never saw the alloy pick any.
I wondered where their robes and sandals came from.
Never saw any factories where clothing or shoes can be made.
Someone must be making these things, but where?
There were no shops that sold food or clothing and no boats or trains to carry goods.
The little people spent all their time playing or bathing in the river or eating and sleeping.
I could not imagine how things got done.
There was so much I didn't know about this world.
Who had taken the time machine, and why?
What were the wells and chimneys for?
I had spent three days in the future, and there were so many questions I still needed to answer.
