Word: Bergschrund

bergschrund

American  

[berk-shroont] / ˈbɛrk ʃrʊnt /

noun

1. a crevasse, or series of crevasses, at the upper end of a mountain glacier.

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                The first thing Dave felt was the pain. His entire body hurt, but his legs most of all. Then came the cold, but that was to be expected, given where they were. Finally, the last thing to come was the feeling of claustrophobia that came from walls tight against both sides of his body. He allowed his eyes to flutter open. He was facing upwards, given that he could see the sky. It was distressingly far away.

                Sheer walls of glacial ice rose up on either side of him, showing Dave that he was at the bottom of a crevasse. That was not good. He had some climbing gear, but not much. Not enough to scale the walls of this place. At least he did not see any open wounds on himself. There was no blood pooling around him, and no bones were sticking out. Although he was in considerable pain, so the odds of injury were distressingly high.

                He heard a groan coming from behind him. That was good. Lisa had survived the fall as well. Had she died, he did not know what he would do. Plus, she had the satellite phone. At least, provided it had not broken.

                “Hey, you okay over there?” He asked, trying to keep his voice as steady as possible. He failed, but at least he could still talk.

                “No.” Lisa said. “Every part of me hurts, I don’t know if I can move, and I’m pretty sure some of my clothes are ripped. So yeah, all in all, definitely not okay.”

                “Well, at least you’re alive. That’s a start.”

                The torn clothes would be a problem though. In the cold they were in, even a slight rip could be a disaster. At least they were shielded from the wind.

                “Yeah, sure. Alive is good.” Lisa said. “But what do we do now? Think we have enough climbing gear to get out?”

                “Between the two of us? Maybe.” Dave said, looking up towards the surface. “How’s the sat phone?”

                “Hang on, let me check.”

                Dave heard Lisa wincing in pain. The fact that she could move enough to get to her back was a good sign though. He heard her rummaging though her gear for a few moments.

                “Good news and bad news.” She said. “The good news is the phone is in one piece and working. The bad news is that it’s not picking up anything. We must be too deep to get a clean signal.”

                Dave swore under his breath. The didn’t have a way to extending the signal either, so they were out of luck on that front. And with any injuries they might have, climbing might not be the best idea. Plus, Lisa would need to deal with her cold weather protection before they could get anywhere.

                “Okay, we have a few days worth of food and water.” Dave said. “Looks like we’re sticking put a few days to rest and recover. Maybe I can help fix your clothes too while we wait.”

                “Yeah. Yeah, that sounds like the only plan we currently have.” Lisa sighed. “I guess we technically don’t even need to get to the top here. Just high enough to get a signal and call for help.”

                Dave nodded. “Yeah. That sounds about right. Until then, we just need to survive as well as we can. And hey, look on the bright side.”

                “Bright side?”

                “Once we get out of this, we’ll have one hell of a story to tell.”

Word: parsimony

 

parsimony

[pahr-suh-moh-nee]

noun

1. extreme or excessive economy or frugality; stinginess; miserliness.

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                   Ben hated talking to his parents. He hated having to ask them for anything. But it was the only way he was going to get what he needed to. He clenched and relaxed his hands repeatedly as he approached the oversized house. Why they needed such a big place, he would never know. Even when he was still living there, most of the space had gone unused. He imagined that most of it was dusty, considering how cheap his parents were when it came to anything they did not directly care about. Like the cleaning staff.

                   He took a deep breath and rang the doorbell. It let out an obnoxious chiming sound. Ben hated that sound. He had heard it far too much growing up, and it rarely lead to anything good happening. Still, he tolerated it. A few minutes later and a young woman opened the door. She was dressed like a maid combined with a Playboy bunny. And she was the kind of plastic infused eye candy that not even that magazine would accept. Obviously, Ben’s father had hired her. He dreaded seeing his mother’s hires.

                   “Yes, sir? May I help you?” The bleach blonde ‘maid’ asked in a voice that matched her looks.

                   “I doubt it. I’m here to see my parents.”

                   “Your...parents? I don’t know who you’re talking about, sir.”

                   “Of course you don’t. Why would you. I bet they never told you they have kids at all, did they? I’m talking about Mr. And Mrs. Levaile. I’m their son and I need to talk to them.”

                   “You’re their son?” The thought looked like it was causing the poor girl physical pain. “Well, I suppose I could show you to the study.”

                   “Please do.”

                   He followed the maid into the house. He already knew where the main study was, of course. But he imagined telling her that would break something inside her.

                   “How much are my parents paying you?” He asked suddenly.

                   “Um...well, they give me room and board.”

                   “Yes, but how much do they PAY you?”

                   Once again, her brow furrowed in thought. “Um...I think they said it’s enough to qualify as a paycheck?”

                   Which meant minimum wage. They could afford to pay her more in a month than most people got in a year. But of course they were doing the exact legal minimum. That’s what they had always done. Even while he was a kid, everything he got was used or second hand. It was like they tried to get him to believe they were poor while living in a three-story mansion.

                   They reached the study and Ben entered. On the surface, it looked great. Fine furniture that looked antique. Rich books covered bookshelves. Even the decorations screamed of wealth. It was all a facade. This was the study his parents used for guests, so naturally everything was fake. The furniture was all cheap knockoffs. Most of the books were blank. The decorations had likely been bought at a thrift store. No, all the good stuff, the stuff that actually was as nice as it looked, was in a much more limited area that only his parents used.

                   “Benjamin! What a surprise.” His father said as he entered the room a few minutes later. He wore clothes that reeked of wealth. And unlike the cheap stuff Ben had worn growing up, the older man’s clothes actually did cost more than some cars.

                   “Yeah, I’m sure it is.” Ben said.

                   “Well, to what do we owe this surprise visit.”

                   Ben clenched his knuckles so hard that they turned white. He did not want to do this. But he also knew he had no choice.

                   “Lauren is sick. Really sick.”

                   “Lauren?” The older man asked. His forehead would have creased in thought had it had the capacity to do so.

                   “Lauren. You know, your granddaughter.” He was not surprised his father did not remember her.

                   “My...oh! Right, right, right. Well, that’s a shame.”

                   “She needs treatment or else she won’t survive. Very expensive treatment. Treatment my insurance doesn’t think is necessary.” Ben said. His breath hitched in his throat as he spoke.

                   “Oh, that’s terrible.” His tone did not convey any sense of worry, or even the slightest concern. “I don’t see what that has to do with this visit though.”

                   “She’s your granddaughter and she needs money to survive. Why do you think I’m here?”

                   “I’m not following you.”

                   “I’m...” He took a deep breath and spoke through clenched teeth. “I’m asking you to pay for her treatment.”

                   “Oh, I’m afraid I can’t do that. Your mother and I simply wouldn’t be able to afford it.”

                   “Bull!” Ben shouted. “You know you can. You don’t even need to know how expensive the treatment is. It doesn’t matter, because you and I both know you can afford whatever it is ten times over. You wouldn’t even notice the amount missing!”

                   “You don’t know that. We’re in a very rough time financially, your mother and I.”

                   “Oh no. You’re only making ten thousand dollars a minute instead of twenty thousand. My heart bleeds for you. Seriously, just pay for her treatment and I won’t bother you again.”

                   “Now, now. Don’t be like that. The economy is hard on everyone. We all have to pinch pennies you know.”

                   “Oh please, you’ve always been stingy, money hoarding misers. Ebenezer Scrooge wasn’t even as bad as you and mom. You’re just making excuses because you don’t want to spend money on something that doesn’t directly affect you. Including your own granddaughter.”

                   “How rude. If you’re going to have an attitude like that, you can just leave.”

                   “Fine. I knew I shouldn’t have bothered. Getting money out of you is harder than getting blood from a stone. Just know that if Laura dies because you don’t want to help her, I will not let it go easily.”

                   With that, he got up and stormed off. Ben’s mind raced. His parents might not care about his daughter, but he did. Now he just had to figure out another way of saving her life.

    

Word: Orthoepy

orthoepy

Older Spelling, or·tho·ë·py

[awr-thoh-uh-pee, awr-thoh-ep-ee]

noun

1. the study of correct pronunciation.

2. customary pronunciation (cacoepy ).

 

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                “Hey, we just got the latest transmission. This one’s all text.” Dr. Keller said.

                “Great. So instead of incomprehensible words, we get incomprehensible text.” Dr. Opal replied. “Please tell me it won’t be in their alphabet.”

                Dr. Keller opened the file. It was using English letters, but the contents were pure gibberish. The linguist skimmed the data before he said anything. “Looks like we got a transliterated version.”

                “Great. So we have a complete guide to the unpronounceable. That’ll help.” Dr. Opal said. He slumped deeper into his seat as his colleague transferred the file.

                Both of them examined the document, pouring over the provided guides. They did not seem to match up with the letters, and many of the sounds seemed impossible to make with the human tongue.

                “How in the world are we supposed to talk with them?” Dr. Keller asked. “I don’t think we can even make half of these sounds.”

                “Hopefully that means they’re having just as much trouble with our language as they are with ours. That way we’re not the only ones sounding like idiots by trying to speak the other’s language.”

                “Yeah, right. Maybe they’ll have some kind of universal translator and they’re only gathering data to make it work for our language.”

                “That would be nice. Although given the amount of effort being put into translation, I doubt that. And even if they did, the odds of them giving us such a valuable technology is pretty slim.”

                “We can hope. I mean, they came who knows how many light years to get to Earth. I would think a translator would not only be necessary, it would be easy to make. It’d be like us giving a dictionary to an uncontacted tribe. Easy for us, invaluable for them.”

                “We can hope. But for now, let’s assume they don’t have that kind of translation tech, and if they do, they won’t share it with us. We still need to find a way for the human mouth to pronounce words consisting of sounds that it was never meant to make. And that’s on top of trying to translate those words into something that actually makes sense for us.”

                “Yeah. I know.” Dr. Keller said with a heavy sigh. “A guy can dream though, can’t he?”

                “And a fine dream it is.” Dr. Opal agreed. “Just not a realistic one.”

                The two linguists grumbled at their workload. Neither man thought that trying to uncover an alien language would be so much impossible work. Both had thought it would be a deep, exiting thing to attempt to bridge a gap that spanned star systems. One that would involve interacting with alien beings and their wondrous technologies. Instead, they were shut in a room with a few computers. The process of making both the translations and the pronunciation guide was a dull, tedious affair. But it was one that would, hopefully, get them recognized for their contribution and lead to many wonderful things for humanity as a whole. That was one of the few things that got them through their frustration and boredom.     *******************************

Not my best work, I admit. I wasn't sure how to end this one, so it just kinda...does. Maybe next week will be better.