Ambiente tree / the world of sound / CHAPTER ONE

The Ambiente tree was once a beautiful kingdom of sound.
It rose above sea level as a giant circular island, as a giant rock with all its cracks, holes, and it was thousands of meters high. The outer surface was steep, rough and mostly shaped into little porous valleys, running upwards toward the top. The walls of some of the valleys joined and formed a little mountain, from which small pikes grew. A few hundred meters from the ground, small branches arose irregularly from the body of the giant rock. They slowly changed into a sort of platform and if you looked towards the top of the mountain, you would see many like these. From the top of every platform big roots dropped and disappeared down into the holes and valleys.
The Ambiente tree was the world of amazing ambient sounds. Spikes, scattered all around its body, acted like small, powerful transceivers, able to broadcast all the frequencies of sound that have ever been imagined, from the low tremulous sounds of upcoming thunder to the high frequencies of birds twittering.. Every antenna created different sound patterns on different frequencies but, as a whole and mostly from great distances, you could hear bursts of sound which attracted your ears if you were a patient listener. And these sounds weren't to be left without a response....
Every year, the sounds of the Ambiente attracted thousands of PolyFlies, from the other worlds. The PolyFlies were species with very sensitive hearing and they looked simply splendid - their fairy little bodies were lifted by butterfly-like pairs of giant wings which glowed with colour. Nobody knows where they really come from, but once every year the inhabitants of the Ambiente could see thousands approaching, attracted by the amazing sounds originating somewhere inside the Ambiente tree.
When the Polyflies came closer to the tree, they circled around for a while and, after finding a good spot, they finally made themselves comfortable on one of the platforms. The music that surrounded them was simply astonishing and the PolyFlies loved it. They could sit on the Ambiente and listen to its vibrations for hours. They sat there like statues, unable to move and slowly becoming part of it. Their transformation was beginning. From head, arms and body, small roots arose, going down to their feet and to the edge of the platform, then down along the trunk. Then the Polyflies started to germinate.
The giant and and most colourful blossoms arose on the platforms of the Ambiente. They looked like the most beautiful flowers you could imagine, all formed in a perfect shape, glowing with a freshness and rich colours. There was also mist, a narcotic smell, which surrounded those platforms and you could almost see how the yellow shining liquid came from those extraordinary plants and down, through green transparent roots, disappearing into the holes of giant body of the Ambiente.
Once the mazy veins of the tree had filled with the fresh liquid, it was pumped into the heart of the giant organism, melted in to a viscous Saft and then distributed into thin containers which were carefully stored inside the Ambiene so that it could be properly distinguished among other blends. Every time there was a gathering , the inhabitants of the Ambiente had to carve a new passage for storing the Saft. And in times of great wealth like this, the narrow passages were all glowing with different colours of highly narcotic Saft.
The Saft was the source of survival for the whole kingdom. Not only did the bugs consume it as a nutriment, but it also served another purpose - a blending and distillation process which consisted of mixing Saft from different gatherings. This was done on a giant synthesizer, located in the lowest floors of the Ambiente. Before actually putting the new blend into a synthesizer, the bugs working in lab consumed a little bit of it so they could actually feel the vibe beating in their brains. Every time the bugs felt they had a good blend, they were able to transform the liquid into a sequence of rough sound waves. Once they had the rough sound produced, they blended it again and again to gain the most smooth and vital sounds. They never let the final output sound the same as any previous one - their social philosophy was to create a vibe that would be unique but still rich, smooth and compelling.
Once the sound was perfect, it was transmitted to the Ambiente's Energy core and subsequently to the sharp spikes located on the surface of the Ambiente, which resonated the whole kingdom with amazing planes of sound.
As I said, the bugs consumed the Saft to be able to blend it with the others and, yes, they loved doing that. But they never consumed more Saft than was necessary for producing a new unique sound in the synthesizer. This was their only law and it was soon to be vitiated...