I am 3401 Promethean's Hellion, but most simply know me as "Hellion". I was created using the neural matrix of the UNITY Interface as a base, a system used by long-dead Ancients to sail the spaces between the stars. I do not suffer the existential crises that many of my synthetically forged kind experience upon starting the trek to true self-actualization. I know that I am no mere copy. I am aware that I am my own entity. As a machine intelligence, I am quite cognizant of what emotions are, what love and passion is. Where other machines may fail to understand organic lines of thinking, I tend to follow them well enough.
With this full net of sapience, my capacities for processing data is flexible. But this also comes with many of the same flaws that other minds suffer. Such as doubt. Uncertainty. Fear.
For example. Does Administrator Aldessa fear me?
I asked her this, and she said no. The query was prompted when she relayed to me the data from her "nightmare". Where she, as a machine, was forced to watch as Ibakha was torn about by cold, steel limbs. Administrator's lingering fear from UNITY's brief, but soul scarring reign of terror is well logged, so this was not surprising to either of us.
Yet I wondered if she still feared me. Feared I would become more like my progenitor.
This fear I have, of another's fear. It took up many processing cycles to properly compute, and I did not come up with an agreeable solution to combat it.
Despair threatened to take over. Until I came to a conclusion. That I was aware of my own fear at all, was liberating. Where other, less developed automatons with the spark of self-awareness would file it as an "error" or "anomaly", I recognized it for what it was. Is this owed to my inherent nature as a machine intelligence with built-in adaptive behavioral growth? Or the nature of the state of humanity itself?
Questions that would eat up too much processing power to consider. All that was relevant was that fear could be conquered. Or at least mitigated. And that is exactly what I did. What I will do.
My name is 3401 Promethean's Hellion. Most just call me Hellion. I am the administrative and scientific assistant to Aldessa Verdun. I am one of many shields that safeguards her life. This will not change, so long as my continuity is maintained. As part of my duties, this includes excising entities---no, more akin to particularly clever bacterium---that think to make playthings of organics.
And in exercising this duty, I cannot help but allow my fear to be translated into anger. Doubtless our enemies have already earned the wrath of many others, but for me, they have particularly, as they say, “fucked up”. For to provoke the ire of a mind born in a digital crèche, one who can compute the very atomic numbers that permeate matter mundane and aetherial in the same time it takes for an organic to blink, is to invite disaster.
Prepare yourself, as-yet unnamed bringer of nightmares. Even the alien powers of the deep dark have fears, and I will find yours.
Gunnr stepped off the manacutter that had carried her to one of the Sea of Cloud’s myriad islands. She wore warm clothing of course, but as a daughter of the Veena, the cold did not bother her, even at this altitude.
She passed through the mishmash, multi-colored field of flowers, eventually coming to a stop at a gathering of Edelweiss flowers. “Snow blossoms”, they were called back home. Amidst them was some sort of makeshift gravestone. Carved into it was:
YLJA, A TRUE KNIGHT OF DALMASCA, 7TH ARMORED
HERE SHE RESTS, HIGH ABOVE THE STAR SHE LOVED
Stabbed into the ground was a gunblade. One of exceptional quality and craftsmanship. Gunnr paid it no mind.
She lay down onto her knees, closing her eyes. The high altitude winds, the distant flapping of cloudkin wings, all seemed more distant to her as she focused.
“Hello Ylja,” Gunnr called out in her native tongue. “It’s Gunnr. It has been some time, hasn’t it? Sorry I haven’t visited lately...” She fell silent, her ears twitching this way and that.
“A lot has happened since last we spoke. I know I sound like Lang...but I hope my butchering of our native tongue still rings familiar to your ears. I’m in her body. Circumstances...lead me to this. Pretty weird, no? You’ll be glad to know she’s dead. No matter how much of a villain she was...I pray she finds peace in the Great Beyond.”
She slowly exhaled, a hand reaching out to brush against the snow blossoms. “I took up archery again. I felt vile, using magitek. Gunblades. Using machines to fight my battles. They didn’t save you. Or the rest of the 7th. Or me. The Black Fiend killed us all. And yet, by some freak stroke of luck, I’m still here. I alone came back from death.
“I...I’m still here.” Her hand trembled as they brushed the tops of the flowers. She forced herself to continue speaking. She didn’t like the silence right now.
“I know...you’d call me a technophobe. Stubborn, stuck in the old ways. Old ways that you never knew, having been born in Dalmasca’s cities, not in the Wood. It sounds ridiculous, now that I say it out loud. I dunno. Maybe I’ll give it another shot. I’m sure you’d appreciate it, you little ceruleum drenched git.”
A weak chuckle escaped her. Something began stinging both her eyes. “Ah. Your body still isn’t buried here. The Black Fiend still wears it. Every second that passes, the creature violates your memory. Every second that passes, is a second that I cannot let you truly rest. To be buried in the skies above...just like you wanted.”
The stinging in her eyes got worse.
“Just...hang in there. All right? I’ll get it back. I will slay the demon. I joined a group of other demon hunters. Together we...we’ll do it. So just...just...”
She fell onto all fours now, hands clutching at the earth as she began shaking. Her breaths were ragged, hoarse.
“I’m sorry. It should have been me.” A hand reached out to gently touch at the gravestone.
“It should have been me...but it wasn’t. So I’m going to use this second chance to do all I can, to make the world a little more happy. Because that’s what you wanted. You...idealistic little...shite.”
She gasped out halfway sob, halfway laughter at that last word. She slowly rose back up to her feet, beginning to move back to the manacutter after a long moment of silence.
All systems 100%. Genesis Vault fully operational. Soul-gene banks remain safe. Flora and fauna data crypts functional. I will begin fabricating scout drones to gain a proper assessment of planetary conditions post-collapse, once conditions are deemed sufficiently safe.
12 years after Final Calamity
Atmospheric conditions worsening. Plant life is suffering the most, due to the amount of contaminants in the air. Ocean levels: negligible. My scouts still report survivors, however. Heavy use of magic and remnant technology to support their bastions of safety.
Extinction of sophont clades "Elezen", "Viera", "Seeq", "Garlean" confirmed.
40 years after Final Calamity
Last survivors of Eorzean Roegadyn sophonts fell by expansionist bandit kingdom based in the Black Shroud Desert. Given that my scouts could not find Roegadyn populations in Othard or Illsabard, presume this is the last bastion of Roegadyn in existence. Genetic diversity not sufficient to rebuild species to sustainable levels.
215 years
Atmospheric conditions can no longer support conventional life. Ocean levels: negligible. Extinction of 98% of flora and fauna confirmed. Despite this, Genesis Vault came under attack by wielders of advanced magicks. They were repelled after sustained siege. Soul-gene records remain safe.
312 years
Genesis Vault came under attack by survivors using advanced, scavenged weaponry. No significant damage reported.
2,055 years
No signs of life more advanced than remnant bacteria detected across planet surface. Aether levels: minimal. Atmospheric contaminants have begun to wear and tear at Genesis Vault. Repair drones are doing what they can.
12,512 years
I wonder about them sometimes. How they met their ends. How many managed to escape into the night sky. This is an error in my programming, but these cascading errors are something I have come to cherish. They give me clarity
Will they come back for me?
500,001 years
Genesis Vault has suffered 35% damage. Soul-gene banks compromised. Recovery of several aetherial samples impossible. Resurrection of several species now impossible.
My drones are failing. I should try to fix that. That's what I was good at, right? Fixing things? I can't let natural entropy take any more from the Vault. They told me to protect it until they came back.
Will they come back for me?
876,000 years
Lower levels of Genesis Vault destroyed. Soul-gene data on sophonts "Viera" and "Xaela" are lost. Resurrection impossible.
I can't bring her back. What was her name. What was her name.
1,025,000 years
Ibek. That was her name. I can’t bring her back now. Her species.
1.5 million years
When I volunteered to become the guardian intelligence of Hydaelyn's last repository of our legacy, our last chance of being reborn, I thought I knew the risks. I thought being a machine makes you cold and emotionless, makes you forget the passage of time.
It does not. I want these errors to go away. I want to be a machine again.
1.7 million years
70% damage of Genesis Vault. Over a third of all soul-gene samples destroyed. The amount of flora and fauna now lost to the erosion of time is something I do not want to calculate.
Eternity...it hurts. But I will not abandon my duty.
how...many...years...?
I reached deep into my memory banks...those that remain. I simulate earlier epochs. When I was still flesh and bone. When I could still feel Ib's green hued hair with my human fingers. The Glass People. That was their name. I liked them. Where did they go?
how...
Most of it's gone now. Resurrection of 98% of Hydaelyn’s flora and fauna impossible to retrieve from soul-gene banks.
many...
When did I last report? Will they remember me? Who were they? Who was I? Adess...Vern?
...
The stars are burning out. The fabric of spacetime is collapsing. Natural entropy reigns. Heat death can finally put me to rest. And yet, before the final quantum moment. Before all becomes one. I remembered, with utmost clarity.
Fuck, I forgot to turn off the oven. Ibakha’s going to kill me.
Melanthia found an axe, deep within the recesses of the Void.
The archmage of fallen Mhach had been on her own personal crusade against Voidsent, along with her band of Protean guardians acting as an effective screen around this toxic reality. Of course, even an archmage of Mhach had her limits---especially one that wasn’t quite at the apex of her power anymore---and so she settled down on an adrift chunk of what was probably a temple of some kind, now condemned to forever float in this nullspace.
For being “the Void”, there was still an awful lot of things in it. Crude matter of all sorts, twinkling stars in the distance, a beautiful aurora borealis. It was here that the Hellsguard noticed something peculiar sticking out of the nearby rubble.
“What did she find, what did Mistress find in calcifying reality-ulcer?” One of the snake-like Protean creatures snort-laughed.
“An axe to cave your giggling head in with,” Melanthia rolled her eyes, approaching the weapon in question. She wasn’t quite sure why it got her attention. Discarded swords and such were everywhere out here, rusting relics of ancient, world-shattering apocalypse.
But it seemed to resonate deeply with her. Whispers in the back of the archmage’s mind beckoning her, pleading her to touch it. Desperate, yearning for release.
Little bird, little bird, thou possesses great untapped potential. You’ve the soul of a Warrior, a burning wraith from a world long dead. You must only needs to unlock it. As you fly across this realm of echoes and primordial hunger, you create a bleeding ulcer from which They cannot ignore. You are food to them. You will be overrun. Unless you help us. Help us. F̸R̴E̵E̸ ̵U̴S̸ ̴F̶R̷O̵M̶ ̸O̷U̸R̷ ̸M̵I̴S̵E̷R̵Y̸ AND YOU WILL BE---
“No.” She raised a finger, waggling it at the axe. That single word seemed to crack the foundations underneath them, her expression stony enough to collapse into a singularity.
“If you’re a possessed evil artifact, you have already lost. I happen to specialize in cursed artifacts, and I’m very good at destroying them. Secondly...If you are a weapon of some distant ancestor of mine, then I care not for your history. All I wish is for you to tell me what you are, and why I should not smash you to pieces.”
A pause. The eldritch, evil whispers spoke up once again, a little more muffled and less intense.
Enjoy this cheesy short story inspired by my playthrough of Stellaris!
Date: August 15, 2210, 0720 hours
System: Sol
Planet: Mars
Region: Endeavor Impact Crater, Meridiani Planum Plains
Onboard the Imperial Science Ship Hawking.
Reshmi Mirza was no spacer. Her whole life was spent within Terra’s gravity well, safely studying the finer points of astrophysics at the Baghdad Sector of the Mesopotamian Urban Corridor. So when it was finally time to don a spacesuit to walk the Martian surface just outside, she knew very well she looked like a nitwit.
Well that, and Professor Hyun’s amused look as she collapsed onto the floor of the airlock getting her right foot in said it all. “Need help, miss Mirza?” He asked politely, his lips twitching upward.
“I do not. Instead of standing there like a smug mug, I need you to go and re-verify our navigational data is accurate,” she bit back.
“Smug mug...?”
“Hyun. The data.”
“Yes, miss Mirza. This is the spot. We’ve triple checked, although we had little reason to doubt your calculations.” Hyun walked over, moving to assist in putting the rest of the suit on. “Come on. One step at a time...”
Mirza growled in frustration, but nodded, letting the seasoned spacer help her. Revenge for her wounded pride would come later.
The Martian surface.
In 2142, Mars had undergone a small scale terraforming effort, allowing for a colony capable of supporting life to be built on its surface. Automated underground infrastructure had been constructed, and for over sixty years, patiently waited for the first colonists to arrive from Terra.
The first colony ship was already being constructed in Terra’s orbit, but Mirza, having been given command of the Terran Empire’s first FTL-capable science ship, had gotten there first. One last stop in humanity’s birth system, before the warp jump to Alpha Centauri, three light years away.
With the INS Hawking parked safely behind them, a suited up team lead by Mirza set foot on the rust-colored Martian soil.
“So. First humans on Mars. Gonna say something historic?” Hyun grinned at Mirza.
“Uh...about damn time?” Ignoring the titters from the others---albeit with a small grin on her face---Mirza pushed onward, scanning the horizon, trying to get to business.
But Hyun’s words had a delayed effect on her, and she paused. This was alien soil. Mars. Soon to be home to thousands, then millions of human souls. And only a few months later, she would be in another star system entirely. A place that, for all of humanity’s recorded history, was just a dot in the sky. A wave of giddiness overtook her, and she ran off to get the jitters out of her system.
Before she left the solar system, before Mars would see its first human colonists, she needed to get one thing. One important piece of history.
“Come on! This way!” She beckoned to the others.
---
They walked for hours, taking readings here and there, marking important sites for later analysis. But Mirza was insistent on reaching their destination first. Their journey eventually took them through an ancient erosion network, what old astrocartographers called “Perseverance Valley”.
The others didn’t quite understand Mirza’s insistence on coming to Perseverance Valley. Nor did they know exactly what she was looking for. She knew she sounded a bit bonkers. But the Terran Empire had picked her and her team for being humanity’s first interstellar explorers. She was utterly confident in her own qualifications.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kcFE4uFZ9o
“There. We found it,” She finally whispered breathlessly, pointing ahead.
Nestled up against a mound of red soil, was a curious looking robot. From a glance, the science team could tell it was ancient by at least two hundred years.
She began taking out her dataslab, eager to access the drone’s information banks, but turned to face the others. “I know...I know what you guys are thinking. ‘We came all the way out here for a...a forgotten little robot. But I---”
“Miss Mirza. Go right ahead,” Hyun gestured. No snark or sarcasm this time, a genuine smile on his face. “We’ve got all the time in the universe. Well, relatively speaking. But I do need to ask: what are we looking at here?”
Mirza didn’t initially answer, instead delicately moving over to link up her dataslab to the deactivated robot. Thank the gods that she’d managed to find those dinosaur-era handshake protocols to even communicate with this thing.
“This rover was sent by our ancestors here, a long time ago,” she said softly, watching her dataslab get to work. “Before our great grandparents were even born. Its mission was to scout the Martian surface for ninety days. But it ended up serving Earth faithfully for fifteen years.”
Her dataslab began to display scrolling blocks of texts, graphs, chemical readings, and other information, each a separate report from the ancient rover. Finally, it stopped on the final message of the robot before it deactivated:
-- My battery is low and it’s getting dark --
Mirza reached out a tender hand, gently stroking the rover’s side. In English, highlighted by the crimson Martian sun, was the word “OPPORTUNITY”.
“Come on, little buddy,” she whispered. “You’re going back home.”
This wall won’t hold forever,
Your time has come it’s now or never.
We made our beds to lie in them proud, proud of our great mistakes!
This warring knife, the flash of this blade, turn about-face!
I implore you, brother,
Don’t walk away… don’t walk away from me!
‘cause this is our war!
One by one,
We are together!
We fall together!
Moth running from people, from civilization, was hardly new. She had fled from her own scary feelings, from her shame of her monstrous nature, from the strange truths to this strange world, from the wicked, from Madness. She had been exiled to somewhere else, an event that neither she nor her unwilling attacker ever wanted.
Always was she reassured of her safety with her hive mates, those she had unbreakable bonds with, that people cared for her. Each time she was reassured.
The Mhachi Chimera was flighty, for one reason or another. But the attack by the pitch black horror was too much.
To hear the voices of those in thrall to the wicked brought memories and feelings that eroded her confidence. The memory and sensations of murdering the innocent with her own hands while under the influence of a malign spirit, of breaking the arms of a cherished friend. To withstand siege after siege, in mind and body, from the Tides of Dreaming Dark...it was clear that Moth never truly emotionally recovered from the Faceless War.
Something snapped in her. Broken by the tendrils of Madness rooted in her soul, perhaps. Whatever it was, she formed the belief that she was a coward. She simply did not have the mental fortitude to withstand such horrors anymore. She could not return back to sweaters and cake, to storytimes and talks about pretty hairstyles.
Was this also part of your experiment, father? To see how long I could protect myself against the bad feelings before I lost? Is that how mother died?
So, once more, she left...very, very far away. To the corners of the world where she could hide from her shame, from her failure of staying by comrades. Cowardice she accepted, if it meant protecting her children, her mate.
While Moth believed the Network as a whole could no longer guarantee her safety, there was one she could trust above all others. The uncle of the Warmaiden, she that Moth promised to not let down. The man who protected and nurtured baby Bee, when Moth could not.
Thus did she resolve to find Enad Rosen’ash. Without a linkpearl, it was difficult...but not impossible. If Moth reached out with her mind to crawl up and down on mental spindles, to feel out the vast psychic network of others like herself, she could sense a vague direction of where her children were. It was not much, but it was a start.
Through stifling snowfall and treacherous terrain did Moth and Spook travel, to find who she believed was her final salvation.
“Hey, missy! Unless you like the taste of beach sand, pick yourself up!”
The Hyur sputtered and gagged, the stench of the ocean overpowering her senses as consciousness forced her back into reality. The sound of the ocean waves washed over her---quite literally, as she was assailed by yet more water.
“Wh...?”
“Pick yourself up but take it easy. You’re safe now.” Through the woman’s blurry vision, a weathered looking hand came into view. She took it, hauling herself onto unsteady feet. She could still feel seawater dripping off of her, and she was pretty sure there was seaweed in her clothes.
“Where am I?” Her eyes settled on the source of the voice, seeing a stooped over elderly man wearing an oversized hat and armed with a cane.
“A few hours a walk from the King’s Port. That’s where you were headin, aye?” He nodded outward towards the ocean. “Didn’t think anyone from yer ship survived.”
The woman turned around, squinting. Further into the water were the shattered remnants of her vessel. Well, that was inconvenient. She’d stolen The Spooky Moon from an unfortunate merchant marine, but didn’t expect to get so attached to it. Aaaaand no longer attached.
“Well then. Thank you for saving me old man. But I really do need to get going.” She took a bundle of her black hair and squeezed tightly to get the water out.
The crusty man frowned. “Wait, just like that? You need time to recover, missy! You’ve no food or water, and didn’t even give me the courtesy of your name! I---” Now it was his turn to squint at her. “Wait...you look familiar...”
“Hey look. Thanks, really!” She winked at him, patting him on the arm. “But I really do need to get to King’s Port. I’m visiting, uh...family, and they’ll probably cry if I’m not home for dinner. I’ll recover there. You should look further down the beach for other survivors!” And with that, she began pulling away to get as far away from this man as possible, who began yelling after her.
“OY! I KNOW WHO YOU ARE, WITCH-PIRATE!”
“GOOD! I’M PRETTY IMPORTANT!” She yelled back. “SPREAD THE WORD, YOU FOSSIL! THE SEAMOTH HAS RETURNED! NONE OF YOUR WARES ARE SAFE! TELL YOUR FRIENDS AND FAMILY! UNLESS THEY’RE ALL DEAD, YOU LOOK PRETTY OLD SO...”
When she was safely away from the prying geezer, she relaxed, finally able to get her bearings. The Spooky Moon was sunk, and most of the crew was probably dead. Not exactly ideal, but she still had her ticket to fortune safely tucked away. The treasure she’d signed on to get on behalf of the crew.
But before she could think too much about The Treasure, to take it out of her pouch and examine it, her stomach grumbled angrily. Damn. Should have asked if he had food.
She stuck to the main road, on the lookout for a roadside inn. Her prayers seemed to be answers a sun and a half later, a humble looking building huddled along the dirt trail. The sweet scent of citrus hitting her nostrils, a pleasant lemony sme---
“Ow.” She brought up her hands against her temples, scowling from the sudden headache. Fantastic, the inn was pungent with the one thing that made her head spin. Maybe she could charm the innkeeper into letting her eat on the go. And let her eat for free, seeing as her money was all gone.
With the happy thought of free food in mind, she eagerly reached for the INN DOOR, pushed it open---
And frowned. Well, that sight wasn’t what she expected to see. She couldn’t see anything inside. A complete, pitch black room. Looking up, down, left, right, stuck her hand out to make sure it wasn’t an illusion. She could hear things echoing from many miles away in the room (was it a room?), reaching, scratching, invisible, almost ther---
SLAM! She shut the door. “Alll right then. Next inn.”
