Rogue Galaxy Episode 2: Command Material Page 8

  With his finger he crudely wrote, next to Veela’s markings, the symbols for “ten times three equals thirty.” Before he could even look up at her for approval, she screamed for joy and threw her arms around him.

  In a dim way, he grasped that this had something to do with why she had said zero was the most powerful number. It designated magnitude ... but of course the Jaw had no words for this.

  He was right, but Veela had also meant that the concept of zero served as a gateway from the idea of natural numbers to the idea of integers. But she would have been delighted enough with the Jaw’s insight.

  They called it a night after that. Just as well—Veela wanted to spend time planning the next lessons better. For instance, why had she gone straight to multiplication, without even pausing for addition and subtraction?... The Jaw seemed to have a knack for this stuff, considering that a couple hours ago he’d had no notion of a number as an entity existing independent of any contingent physical phenomena, as pure pattern. But knack or no knack, she should be able to keep him on his toes. Her mathematical background might be laughable compared to Dak’s, but she’d been good at it in college and was confident she could teach someone all the way up to calculus.

  Chert eyed her, where she lay resting in the ash. He suspected she’d played a trick on his son, and felt angry at her on the Jaw’s behalf; he speculated, a little sadly, that perhaps the Jaw’s Big-Brow blood made him gullible.

  The Jaw wandered, almost staggered, through the corridor of ash, head tilted back as he counted the stars. He felt he himself had been cracked open to reveal a beautiful terror within. All of a sudden there was an abstract pattern underpinning the world. The Jaw felt instinctively that it transcended himself, that it transcended all the spirits and people and animals and plants he had ever known. If the universe disappeared tomorrow, that eternal pattern would remain.

  He went to where Veela was resting and knelt beside her. “Thank you for showing me.”

  She smiled, and put her hand upon his arm. Earlier she’d feared that the attraction he obviously felt for her might manifest itself as rape. Now, looking at his grateful, humble, awed face, she knew she wouldn’t have to worry about that. As far as the Jaw was concerned, she called the shots from now on.