Fanfiction: What Was, Before What Is
Nimmanu
NH, USA Join Date: 2017-01-14 Member: 226681Members
NH, USA Join Date: 2017-01-14 Member: 226681Members
Many Years Ago...
Val didn't rush. The Halori didn't ever rush. Instead, she swept through the halls, the skirts of her Medical Class robes whispering against her legs. Quiet ruled the hallways of the vast ship that carried them towards their new home. The watery planet was perfect. Studies had been done and it had been concluded that the planet was filled with life and would support colonies with ease. There was an acceptable landmass for setting down, an event that was moments away.
Others were excited, but Valnoree was not. She was... something. She didn't know what she was experiencing. Her language had no word for 'fear', and so she had nothing to connect the concept to.
She wanted to rush. She felt urgency. Urgency, like rushing, was to be denied at all costs. Haste, greed, envy... they had evolved beyond such infantile expressions of emotion. The Halori were a space-faring race that literally ruled everything it touched. They no longer knew anything that one might consider what was referred to as 'adversity'. Adversity was the lack of security, and this, like the feeling moving through her, was an unfamiliar concept. Adversity was something the Halori knew more as a concept than a truth.
She tried in vain to subjugate the unfamiliar feeling. She didn't try to stifle her disappointment and irritation, however. These were healthy expressions, necessary in dealing with other people.
Something had been overlooked. There was no word, either, in her vocabulary for "mistake" and no concept of error. One was correct or not correct. Something was noticed or not noticed. There was no judgement for being wrong or right, correct or incorrect. Irritation was allowed, but somehow, this other feeling, this unfamiliar thing rising within her was making her irritation rise to inappropriate levels. She might even need correction later.
For now, however, she followed the corridor, striding towards the bridge of their colonial vessel. Opening the door, for the first time since she had been confirmed in her womanhood and selected for the Medical Class, she had to struggle to contain herself. Controlling her emotions was easy. She had been doing it since adulthood.
Except... it wasn't.
She stopped before the androgene who controlled the vessel. "Captain," she greeted ver, "I must speak with you. Immediately."
Profound silence fell. The word was nearly forbidden, being so close to unseemly haste. To speak it necessitated a situation that had potential to disturb security. Security was a serious matter, and she had just stated openly that something might be able to disrupt the continuity of the flow.
"You are unseemly," ve said, vis eyes narrowing.
"Something has been overlooked on the planet, Captain," she replied. "I have found--"
Vis face hardened, eyes narrowing even farther. Ve gestured, and two Security Class Scouts stepped forward. "Take her off the bridge and correct her. Level one."
She was already to be corrected, so she gave in to the inappropriate impulses inside her. "Captain, please listen. We will face adversity on this planet. Perhaps even..." she sought for a word and failed to find it. Adversity was the worst word in their language, and she knew that it was inadequate to explain what was to come. She used words she had read once, in an ancient text. "I beg of thee, hear my cry, else death befall us all."
"Level two," ve said, and turned away.
All other eyes turned away, as well. She no longer existed to them. They would not hear her words, they would not see her face. She was no more until correction was finished.
"We will all die. We will all die," she repeated. She heard something new in her voice and felt it inside her. Her language did not, yet, contain the words "sorrow" or "regret".
She was taken below to correction. She would be alone for a full cycle of the moon of her homeland, for she was undergoing correction.
It was this which saved her when the doors were opened and the Halori took their first bold steps out onto the world they fully intended to conquer. She would be the last to be infected, trapped as she was in the halls of the behemoth starship, surviving on the potted plants that were all the food allowed to those who did not officially exist.
Val didn't rush. The Halori didn't ever rush. Instead, she swept through the halls, the skirts of her Medical Class robes whispering against her legs. Quiet ruled the hallways of the vast ship that carried them towards their new home. The watery planet was perfect. Studies had been done and it had been concluded that the planet was filled with life and would support colonies with ease. There was an acceptable landmass for setting down, an event that was moments away.
Others were excited, but Valnoree was not. She was... something. She didn't know what she was experiencing. Her language had no word for 'fear', and so she had nothing to connect the concept to.
She wanted to rush. She felt urgency. Urgency, like rushing, was to be denied at all costs. Haste, greed, envy... they had evolved beyond such infantile expressions of emotion. The Halori were a space-faring race that literally ruled everything it touched. They no longer knew anything that one might consider what was referred to as 'adversity'. Adversity was the lack of security, and this, like the feeling moving through her, was an unfamiliar concept. Adversity was something the Halori knew more as a concept than a truth.
She tried in vain to subjugate the unfamiliar feeling. She didn't try to stifle her disappointment and irritation, however. These were healthy expressions, necessary in dealing with other people.
Something had been overlooked. There was no word, either, in her vocabulary for "mistake" and no concept of error. One was correct or not correct. Something was noticed or not noticed. There was no judgement for being wrong or right, correct or incorrect. Irritation was allowed, but somehow, this other feeling, this unfamiliar thing rising within her was making her irritation rise to inappropriate levels. She might even need correction later.
For now, however, she followed the corridor, striding towards the bridge of their colonial vessel. Opening the door, for the first time since she had been confirmed in her womanhood and selected for the Medical Class, she had to struggle to contain herself. Controlling her emotions was easy. She had been doing it since adulthood.
Except... it wasn't.
She stopped before the androgene who controlled the vessel. "Captain," she greeted ver, "I must speak with you. Immediately."
Profound silence fell. The word was nearly forbidden, being so close to unseemly haste. To speak it necessitated a situation that had potential to disturb security. Security was a serious matter, and she had just stated openly that something might be able to disrupt the continuity of the flow.
"You are unseemly," ve said, vis eyes narrowing.
"Something has been overlooked on the planet, Captain," she replied. "I have found--"
Vis face hardened, eyes narrowing even farther. Ve gestured, and two Security Class Scouts stepped forward. "Take her off the bridge and correct her. Level one."
She was already to be corrected, so she gave in to the inappropriate impulses inside her. "Captain, please listen. We will face adversity on this planet. Perhaps even..." she sought for a word and failed to find it. Adversity was the worst word in their language, and she knew that it was inadequate to explain what was to come. She used words she had read once, in an ancient text. "I beg of thee, hear my cry, else death befall us all."
"Level two," ve said, and turned away.
All other eyes turned away, as well. She no longer existed to them. They would not hear her words, they would not see her face. She was no more until correction was finished.
"We will all die. We will all die," she repeated. She heard something new in her voice and felt it inside her. Her language did not, yet, contain the words "sorrow" or "regret".
She was taken below to correction. She would be alone for a full cycle of the moon of her homeland, for she was undergoing correction.
It was this which saved her when the doors were opened and the Halori took their first bold steps out onto the world they fully intended to conquer. She would be the last to be infected, trapped as she was in the halls of the behemoth starship, surviving on the potted plants that were all the food allowed to those who did not officially exist.
Comments
Interesting concept... I think.
Okay, I'm going to level with you, I have no idea what is going on. I don't know how this ties into Subnautica.
Are these the Precursors? Or something else?
Some kind of introduction would be helpful.
Now make a few more s'mores and sit back, story time isn't over yet.
As a Security Class officer, it was his job to feel protective. He understood that feeling, it was natural, it always had been. He understood that 'protection' meant assisting others in avoiding adversity.
He felt protective towards the woman, what was her name? Oh, yes. Valnoree. The woman whom he was not to think about, for she did not exist.
Except... she did.
He stifled a sigh. The Halori did not sigh. Such an outward evidence of perturbation of any degree was reason for correction. He held his weapon loosely as he oversaw disembarkation. the great green and black wheeled carts rolled out of the deep storage, drawn by small droids, overseen by Colonial Class members of the crew. He saw another small, scurrying creature and his gun whispered its song of death. Nothing in Neth's face showed his distaste as yellow blood spewed into the air like a geyser.
Already, the group had begun colonization of the planet. Hunter Class and Gatherer Class members had found edible flora and fauna and had begun to integrate the foods into the rations sent from Gigo 2, where the long trip here to Moren 5 had begun. The Colonial Class had already begun making use of the inedible portions.
All was going well, and Neth had even gotten to go swim in the vast ocean and had shot an overly aggressive, territorial creature with hard scales along its back. Of course, it had absolutely no defense against Halori weaponry. Neth did not recognize his own hubris as he accepted without consideration the idea that the Halori were invincible. They always had been, and he knew beyond all doubt that they always would be.
Yet he shifted, despite this certainty--the merest betrayal of discomfort.
The woman had warned of death. People died, of course. Old age came upon all, and it was the one thing they had not yet conquered entirely. Rarely, accidents happened. They were not spoken of, for doubt would creep in, and so other accidents could more easily happen. Therefor, the incidents were set aside into second level correction--never spoken of, never thought of, they did not exist. Neither the accident itself nor the person who had been subject to the accident. Then, of course, there was correction level 5, death of the body. It did exist, but it had not been used in over a thousand years outside of those whose brains were incorrectly wired and they could not be otherwise corrected. These were not so much correction in their society, as much as mercy.
Death was not adversity, and so it was simply accepted. One did not think of their deceased, for to do so would create aberrant behaviors. Mental discipline trumped everything in the life of the Halori. Seemly behavior had produced all that he saw before him that was Halori-made. He reminded himself of this over and over again as thoughts of the woman's near-tirade filled his mind.
"We will all die," she had said.
Neth glanced at Zerph. The Captain Class officer who ran the ship had put the woman into level 2 correction. Neth was not one to question a superior's decisions. To do so went against everything he had been taught for his entire life. Security Class, Soldier Class, Scout Class... they followed orders. If they'd had the intelligence level to be officer rank classes, they wouldn't have been Security or Soldiers or Scouts.
Neth could not understand the feeling that he could not shake, no matter his mental discipline.
His language had no word for 'foreboding'. He would never have been able to articulate his certainty that, "Something terrible is coming," for his language did not hold the concept.
At least I now understand what is happening.
And now, I can definitively say that this is an interesting concept.
Well done.
Please consider the fact that, had you been reading this as a book, or reading it later on, it would not be so vague. By the second post, you knew what was going on. It is only because you have opportunity to ask that you, well, had opportunity to wonder (and thus ask).
A good story makes you ask questions from the very first step. It makes you wonder, in so doing, it draws you in with the most insatiable of human appetites... curiosity.
I'm reading A Game of Thrones at the moment (shocker) and you only actually find out what the Wall is more than one hundred pages in. It's referenced, but in your mind you probably picture a reasonably sized, stone wall, and not the monstrous ice wall that you are actually presented with. It's good, keep it up
It was a combination of the internal discomfort he could not shake, and his irritation with the bone in his fish that made him short when a Soldier Class recruit named Rev sat down beside him and began to natter about some sort of lesion on one of the other Soldiers.
"He had a small, glowing green thing on his hand. I was made uncomfortable by the sight of it," Rev continued. "He went to Medical, and they removed it, but it was back in another spot less than a day later."
Not genuinely understanding, Neth stared at Rev. "So?"
"He was the first one. He has two now. The more they try to remove them, the faster they spread. An NC prep cook also got it. Vis are spreading, too."
There was something in Rev's face; both familiar and unfamiliar. It expressed something that had stirred inside Neth; something inappropriate, something that might lead all of them to adversity. "Check your expression," he told the SC recruit. It was the warning that you were on the edge of being corrected for displaying unacceptable emotions.
Rev drew back, startled for an instant. His face immediately eased. Neth wanted that to make him feel better. He wanted that to give him the peace it was supposed to grant. It didn't. His thoughts returned to the cry, "We will all die. We will all die!" His fist tightened around the fish and another bone stabbed into him, startling him as he had startled Rev a moment ago.
Rev leaned forward. "Check your own," he said in a low, soft voice.
Their eyes met, and Neth and Rev shared something that, minutes ago, had been only a concept to them. Their language did have a word for this, because although it was rare, it did sometimes happen... Conspiracy.
"On the Bridge-" Neth began, but fell silent. He could not speak of her, for she did not exist.
"We will all die," Rev said, his eyes now staring into the heating coils of the mobile brazier that cut the chill of the night. Its green glow gave his face a strange, craggy look that was ominous in its implications.
Neth knew then that he was not alone. The MC woman's words did not run through his mind alone, when sleep should have been his companion instead. No. Rev, also, lay in darkness, staring at the sky above through the dome of the ship's wardroom where they still slept until the move below. Over and over, the words played again and again. Words that, like the woman who spoke them, did not exist. She would one day emerge from correction, but the words she had spoken would die...
Except... they hadn't.
At least, not for Neth, and now he knew; not for Rev, either.
They sat and listened to the sound of the brazier as it hummed out its payload of ambient green warmth. The odd silence of the world around them, punctuated rather than broken by the lapping of waves against the island was oppressive suddenly. Instead of being free, out in the world, at peace with all around them, it felt as if something pressed down on them. Thick and heavy with the promise of adversity, it pushed at the once-crisp edges of their reality and ate away at it with relentless force.
As inexorable as the dawn, danger stalked them in silence made the more unnerving by the sounds that created it. Twilight on Moren 5 was always a quiet affair, as were days, and nights... but this twilight, the quiet was not peaceful, not easy, and not gentle. It was threatening, heavy with promise and filled with a strange inability by all to meet each others' eyes. Isolation in the midst of the hundreds of people hung about the camp, reducing conversations to snatches of whispers.
Captain Class Pilot Assain, the androgene who had piloted the ship, argued with Captain Class Colonist Supervisor Derest in low tones outside the ship. If one believed that such things were possible in such an advanced society, one might think ve was reluctant to relinquish vis power to the woman who was now in charge since landing on the planet and beginning disembarkation. Ve appeared to want things done differently, done faster. Ve was ready to descend immediately, but Derest refused. They needed to survey the site, in case of changes since the original surveys. Assain wanted to go immediately. Even though the ship had been unable to penetrate the dense clouds of volcanic ash, ve still believed that it would be easy to overcome any changes they encountered once there.
At length, Assain walked away, vis stride carefully controlled, but still managing to express a high level of irritation. As ve passed by Neth and Rev's brazier, ve scratched absently at the side of vis neck.
Neth saw the green sacklike protrusion that ve had just scratched at and shuddered. "We will all die."
Death was just a part of life. It was natural, and simple, and unavoidable. To have discomfort about it was pointless and only caused adversity.
Neth found that, despite this knowledge, he did not want to die. His eyes strayed towards Assain again as ve disappeared into vis tent. An involuntary shudder wracked Neth's body. That night, he was not the only one who took extra time in the bathroom. Others, like him, looked at every inch of their body that they could see, searching for green pus-filled sacks on their bodies.
He noticed that Assain did not go to Medical that day. Furthermore, ve wore a high-collared dress uniform. No one asked ver why, for it would be unseemly to question such a personage's decisions. The lesser had no place questioning the greater.
Neth did not need to ask, anyway. When he saw others wearing similar garments, he didn't need to ask them, either.
Something seemed to crawl inside his stomach as he accepted what he was seeing. It was so strong that he finally entered Medical that evening to have himself checked out.
He was given something to ease his discomfort, which the Medical Class Doctor stated was causing the unpleasant sensations in his stomach. As the MC Doctor gave him the small tablets, he realized that what he was feeling, while new, was not unnatural at all. He said nothing to the MCD, only nodded and left with the pills clutched in his hand.
Remembering having taken them many years ago, he realized that he wanted his mind clear, no matter the discomfort it gave him. He looked around the camp and then let the pills drop onto the brazier. Rev walked up to him, and Neth knew he would need correction for his action. Rev was within his rights to request it for him.
Rev's hand opened, and two tiny tablets fell onto the brazier, puffing into dust as Neth's had.
Their eyes met only briefly before they stood staring into the brazier in silence. "Swish, swish, swish," said the waves as they lapped greedily at the land, eager fingers only millimeters short of their goal of destruction... trapped in a dance that would one day wear away even this last bastion of land.
The word whispered through his mind before he ignored it savagely... Conspiracy.
Summoning fortitude from somewhere in some deep place inside him, he placed his hand on the panel's activator plate. It slid aside, making a small chiming sound inside the hallways beyond. The voice of the ship stated, in its cool, unemotional tone, "There are visitors at the entrance."
The moments that passed before the woman came into view felt like eternities. Over and over again as the seconds ticked by, Neth lived an internal argument that got harder to win each time. Had Rev not been there, Neth admitted to himself that he would have slammed his hand on the plate and left with exceedingly unseemly haste.
Instead, he stood completely still and waited. When she came into view, he nearly left again; certain that he couldn't do this.
Conspiracy.
When she stood on the other side of the panel, a puzzled look on her face, he told her, "What you said--"
She cut him off, "Does not exist."
He stepped forward. "Except it does. People are breaking out in sores. Glowing green lesions."
He watched as her face betrayed something he had felt but had no word for. It was immediately hidden, but he knew it had been there and he would never forget it.
She panted as if she had been running, though a moment ago her breathing had been as even as his. She reached out for the panel and he lunged forward. "Wait!" She paused, that look ghosting through her eyes again--familiar and yet not. The thought passed through his head that she probably needed correction, but the hypocrisy of it was not lost on him, nor the irony.
"Tell us what's happening." It was demand. It was plea.
She stared at him for so long that he began to want to back away. This had been a terrible mistake. They should never have come.
"I am Medical Class," she said after too long a pause. When he started to say he knew that, she cut him off, "Medical Class Researcher."
Silence fell into the room, dropped like an insurmountable weight.
"Why is an MCR on a colony ship?" Neth demanded. He felt... something. Something beyond irritation, something.... suspicion. That was what he felt.
Her eyes were solemn as she looked at him. Then she took a deep breath and said, "This is not a colony ship." She lifted her head. "This is not a colonization mission. It is a research mission, from which we can only return if we are successful."
Conspiracy.
The realization of their betrayal stood in the air like a dense blanket that threatened to choke him.
"Research for what?" Rev interjected. "What are they--you--researching?"
She looked at him. Another too-long pause held the stifling air in bondage.
"The TXV12N infestation."
The heavy silence of before suddenly felt like helium. The knowledge nearly destroyed Neth on the spot. "We're infected with TXV12N?"
"No." The woman's eyes met his. "Worse."
He blinked. What could be worse? Already, multiple colonies had known such adversity that many had died. Some had died entirely. Before this moment, that had been an obscure, distant fact. It had meant little to him, beyond bringing discomfort.
"What could be worse?" Rev asked from beside him. Rev's voice was low, soft, quiet. It held that indescribable something that had no word, but was horrible to feel or to see or to hear. Fear was something none of them had ever known before.
The woman looked away. It was incomparably rude to refuse to meet someone's eyes as you spoke to them. It was a measure of her discomfort, Neth realized.
"Others have been seeking to cure it. There are multiple research facilities dedicated to that. However, we... we are testing to see if it can be altered. We could depopulate entire planets before moving in--"
Neth stumbled backwards.
Her eyes flickered up to his, but then away. "Something went wrong with one of the vials. It reacted to this planet. When we entered the atmosphere, it changed. I tried to tell MCD Brill, but she told me she would look into it later. I tried to speak to CC Assain, but he put me into correction." Now her eyes met his and held. "I think..." She broke off and tried again, "The vial disappeared. I think... it could be..." She seemed to struggle for breath before she let the word out, "I think it is conspiracy."
Beside him, Rev flinched, no doubt reminded of their own conspiratorial actions just by being here.
"But who..." he didn't complete the question.
"But why..." Rev asked at the same time, also not completing the question.
"I don't know," the woman replied to the unspoken questions. "What I do know is that it has to be someone from Research. No one else had access, not even Assain."