by Florian Nagy
Chapter 32
Klaise felt numb. His eyes were shut and his body registered little from its environment. His legs felt as if they were twisted sideways around each other and his body was limp. His face was pressed against a rough, moist surface. His mind was entirely devoid of any thought. He lay there as if in limbo.
Then, as if gasping awake from a deep sleep, a thought flickered into his mind. The complete emptiness saw a small light begin to shine. He imagined a great open space above him, as if he were lying at the bottom of an immense sunlit crater. He felt the ground around him and felt something pressing his eyelids shut. He felt still and cold, yet not uncomfortable; he felt as if he had just been born, and his first movements and thoughts were making their marks upon a completely untouched plane.
A cold, thin air seemed to hover above him, and his breath came easily and plentifully. He opened his eyes, but the right half of his face was pressed against the ground, and so only the left one registered the world around it.
He was hit by the crimson light all around him. The ground he was lying on was covered in vibrant red foliage. Growths and leaves of every kind made a thick blanket that came all the way to his face. He could see the millions of intricate lines that bounced the light off the dense, queer plants. They were short and stocky, and had many bright extensions protruding all around them, making them like little thick bushes that packed together to form a solid sheet.
He moved his arms back and lifted himself up, his knees coming to life, and his muscles moving as if new. He stood up without staggering and looked at the world around him clearly for the first time. He was in a large clearing that extended out a long way in front of him. He could see that it was bordered by a dark, red forest with foliage of a brighter color, similar to the undergrowth. The sky was a pinkish color and had the appearance of water. It was muddled with swirls and lines, as if taken out of an impressionist painting. It was luminous, and the light was calming, although to Klaise it seemed flagrantly artificial.
He began to walk across the ground, bathed in the whitish-pink light. His feet brushed against the red plants, making odd scraping noises. The wet marks on his face had now dried up. His uniform was a dark gray color, contrasting strongly against the crimson around him. He could not remember how he got there, but remembered where he had been before he had woken up on the field of red. It was like waking up in the morning: he wasn’t sure exactly how or when he had fallen asleep.
The ground turned upwards, and the walking became a little more difficult. His legs moved steadily, and he advanced towards the tree line. He noticed some creatures in the distance but could not make out their shapes. He heard some eerie calls from the forest, but thought any call must have sounded odd to someone who had never heard it before.
As he looked around and in front of him, he saw movement in the shrub far ahead. He did not call, but instead peered in that direction intently as he increased his pace. His shoes made loud swishing sounds through the plants at his feet. As he neared the top of the rise he could make out a humanoid shape straight ahead.
With small steps, a human was walking out of the forest towards him. She had black hair drawn back behind her shoulders. As she neared him, Klaise could identify her as Winter Gussol. His pace slowed down. It was as if he were in a dream, meeting someone he knew from his everyday life, but in such an alien and unreal environment.
The two met, and at first just looked at each other in disbelief. Winter was the first to speak, “Did you…” she motioned with her hand towards the field from where Klaise had come.
“Yes, and you?” he responded, looking at the forest.
“Yes, it was so dark, but not a black darkness, a red darkness, if you can imagine,”
“I assume there is no use in asking what’s happened or what to do now.”
“Let’s get to the top of this hill,” she answered.
They fell in line side by side and moved quickly up the hill, beside the tree line. At first they were silent, and then they began to talk in quiet voices. They talked about how they had simply woken up on a floor of strange plants on what seemed to be an unknown planet. They recounted the events of the Skyrrnian search. They recalled that they had found a stash of highly exotic weaponry they could not analyze. They had contacted Jerald Warren without incident and then could remember no more.
They began to talk about the bright landscape and the rays of light that fell upon the shining ground. It seemed so dreamy they forgot they were living in reality. When they reached the top of the rise they realized they would have to eat and drink. They looked around them and saw a large portion of the land covered by the deep red forest that lay below them. The rest was covered largely by the thick red plants. The light was already waning, and they looked for a place to spend the night. They opted that the forest would be the most enclosed place.
On the horizon, they saw a large, gray expanse. It was barely lit and seemed to glow with a thick haze. “It must be a city of some sort. This planet must be populated,” Winter suggested.
They agreed they would gradually move towards it if no other options came forth. They went into the forest and looked around to see if there could be any food source. Sadly, they knew that even if they found something it might not edible for them. They didn’t know anything of the creatures of this planet, or what substances their bodies contained. Still, if they found no alternative, they would have to try it rather than die of hunger or thirst.
In the forest they found little that seemed like it could be eaten. Some of the trees had growths that looked like fruit, but they left them alone. Being in the wild had an odd effect upon the minds of two people, who had always been enclosed within artificial walls. They wondered what they would do in such a world. As the day grew darker and darker, they sat side by side at the base of an immense tree and talked in hushed whispers. They talked about their old lives aboard the Vigilante and on other ships. They talked about their homes, where they had first seen the world. They talked about the galaxy and its immense diversity; they talked about the countless lives that were each so hopelessly unique and different that it was hard to believe such a large Imperium could exist.
They made guesses as to where they were. Klaise suggested that they had been teleported to another galaxy and were an infinity away from all they had ever known. They chuckled, and Winter suggested they had been drugged by the Skyrrnians and kept in stasis to be dumped at the far edge of the galaxy.
Soon they fell asleep against the tree, disregarding the dangers that might have existed in such a forest. The whole forest felt of a calm detachment.
They awoke to a thin, gray air. They had grown stiff from sleeping in their sitting positions. They got up slowly and began to walk out of the forest when they heard a quiet hum. They wanted to see what it was, and prudently made sure that they would see it, and not the other way around. They retreated back into the forest and tried to make out where the thing would come from. The hum became slightly louder, and they saw a large, airborne object come towards them from the distance, from the city.
It came closer and closer and it was above the forest. The two huddled beside each other between two of the red trees and awaited their visitors. The large craft came and hovered momentarily above the trees. It seemed to stop right over them.
It then moved a way off and landed quietly in the clearing. Klaise and Winter got out and watched discreetly from the shadows of the tree line. A small procession was approaching them. It was off in the distance but moving straight for them.
The humans knew they had been detected and no longer made an effort to hide. Whoever it was clearly knew they were there and had evidently made this whole journey just to find them. They started to walk towards to their visitors.
They saw that the group consisted of four large, roughly humanoid shapes and one metallic looking man. The two parties met, and the first to speak was the metallic man. He had deep-blue eyes and humanoid features on his head and body. Hi
s arms were a myriad of protrusions and extensions, which must have served a multitude of odd tasks. For legs he had four appendages, which moved with expert finesse and precision. They were thin and long and bent at three joints. They fell and were raised silently; he seemed to skitter along the ground effortlessly. Klaise was sure they could move over rough terrain and rocks; it seemed he could even walk over water, from the way his insect-like legs moved entirely independently of the body.
“Greetings, humans. I am an Industrial Cooperative android of the Kher’Somaaw Empire. I brought you here with me from the Skyrrnian ships. I was onboard with them. I will explain everything that has happened, but come with us; we will take you out of here.”
Klaise and Winter quickly agreed, having no better option. They made their way to the vessel and entered it cautiously, hand in hand.
Inside, while the craft lifted off and began moving, the android explained to them what had occurred.
“In your time, there was a Skyrrnian expedition to Acar, which is the planet we are on. It is roughly on the other side of the galaxy to your own sun, meaning we are at the end of what you call the Scutum-Centaurus Arm. In this expedition the Skyrrnians found the remains of the Kher’Somaaw civilization—this civilization. They also found me. Among the relics there was a machine that could send the user through time. I helped them operate it in return for their care. They then took some of the devices they had found with them and left the planet. The Skyrrnian fleet, already equipped with some of the Kher’Somaaw technology, came to your conflict because it had business with the Rekkeds. However, the Skyrrnians couldn’t have defeated your fleet, so they complied with your requests. When your people came aboard, the Skyrrnians’ only option was to escape by means of the time machine.
“I had to send them where they wanted me to, one thousand years into the past. They mean to make a great fleet using the Kher’Somaaw technology and to destroy your people. I also managed to send us back three hundred million years. The machine evidently lost accuracy over such a great time and distance, and so we were far apart on Acar and our landing was a few hundred years off. I immediately used my transmitter to signal a high-priority alert, and a single ship came for me. We then scanned for you two and found you. I wanted you to be witnesses for the Kher’Somaaw to the state your galaxy is currently in.”
The android paused and looked at the figures beside him. Klaise and Winter only now took the time to observe and scrutinize them. They were tall and bulky, reaching to about half a body higher than the humans. They had especially large torsos which looked like a suits of armor, and protruding arms, which were tightly fixed into their bodies. Their skin was coarse and dull, with cracks and ridges all over. They were of a light-gray color and looked as if their skin was made of stone.
Their legs were firmly planted into the floor beneath them; they looked as if they were rooted to it. They wore no clothes, but Klaise couldn’t help but realize that he was unable to determine the difference between the males and females. Their entire bodies were covered externally by the rough hauberk. For that matter, he didn’t know, but the small group could be composed entirely of one sex, or even the entire species could be composed of only one sex.
The figure immediately to the right of the android looked at Winter closely. His head was roughly cubic, with all the facial features carved into its front plane. His eyes were very thin horizontal slivers of piercing deep blue. They were alive. They waved slowly like fire, in some parts shining and in some parts darkening, glowing with an innate power. They pulsated from their edges inwards. Winter’s skin prickled at the defeating glare.
He eventually lifted his gaze and looked to the other members assembled with him. A deep groaning, cracking, pulsating sound began to emanate from him. He had no mouth or moving organ, so the humans’ initial impression was of confusion. No matter how hard they tried, they could not place the source of the sounds. The voices were sent back and forth between the group and the android as well.
Their movements divulged the fact that they were communicating. The humans listened in awe at the mysterious speech.
The android soon continued, “But… it seems something had gone amiss. The Kher’Somaaw Empire should have been vast and glorious. I remember it stretching over thousands of worlds, over half the galaxy. Acar now somehow lies in chaos and decay, and we are only now working out the possible cause. We came to get you as soon as we could in order to minimize the danger of something happening to you.”
Another of the Kher’Somaaw stepped forward determinedly, his torso undulating softly as he tread. He began to speak, and the android translated his message using the data he had acquired from the Skyrrnians.
“Our fleet was away from the galaxy, and upon our return we found the empire dissolved. Acar lies in smoldering ruins. We found an overdeveloped robotic industrial expansion in ruins. It is different from what we recall. There were less of the mechanical commanders. This one then hailed us and told us he came from the future.
“It was at that moment that the possible gravity of our actions entered our minds. The seed of fear was planted, and we pondered the effects of our single enterprise. In order to continue our investigation we must ask you to share with us what you know.”
Barely being able to keep track of the Kher’Somaaw’s words, Klaise scrambled to answer. His interrogator had been careful to avoid giving away the exact details of his team’s actions and history. He knew it was probably sensitive and so answered regardless.
“We are of the human race, originating from a system in the Orion Arm of the galaxy. The android has informed us that we live in a time three hundred million years in the future. Our people have been awakened for roughly over ten thousand years.”
The Kher’Somaaw man answered, “Your race is young, the Kher’Somaaw have followed in the steps of Somaaw for hundreds of thousands of years. But come, we are not interested at present with your histories. We must know what goes on in the galaxy.”
And so Klaise explained to him what every empire was doing, where it lived, and how it behaved. He made sure to explain that no one had ever heard of the Kher’Somaaw before.
When he had concluded, the android told the two to wait for the rest of the journey. He went with his companions to what seemed to be a control hub for the craft. They were separated by a dark gray wall. Klaise managed to catch the android making cracking rumbling sounds before they were sealed away.