by Aer-ki Jyr
The hologram reappeared, clapping its hands together slowly. “Well done. You’ve taken your first step into a much larger world. Now it is time to rest and eat. Return to your quarters and the information terminal will show you how to schedule future workouts. You have done well.”
It disappeared and the guiding lights returned. Naisha followed them out of the track and back to her quarters where she was locked in again. Her mind and emotions were still a jumble, but suppressed enough for her to function. It felt better to have something to do, as well as an acknowledgement that she was doing it correctly.
That said she still had a long journey ahead of her, and far more than she could expected. But day by day, little by little, she’d work through the horrors and lies in her mind, slowly freeing herself through knowledge and training, though it would be a painful transition. The lies did not want to die, and clung to her through all the indoctrinational tricks that had essentially glued them to her subconscious. But she wanted to know the truth, deep down inside, and that little light of inspiration was enough to ever so gradually trim away the lies now that they didn’t have any exterior support. She was alone, and while that was scary in and of itself, it gave her mind the freedom to figure things out on her own, making mistakes along the way and not being punished for them.
Had she been amongst other Veliquesh she would not have made the transition, for compliance had been burned into her mind from birth, but without anyone else to calibrate to she had to learn to set her own course. She had to unlearn what she had learned, and eventually the new knowledge and skills replaced the old, permanently freeing her from the past and killing the Veliquesh in her.
She was Protovic know, so the hologram decreed, and gave her the final list of tasks she’d have to complete before being allowed out of her seclusion and into the next stage of her transitional journey.
10
May 19, 2838
Broj System (Bsidd Region)
Onyx
Naisha was nervous and excited as she sat on the bed in her small quarters. There was a countdown on her display screen indicating when she’d be able to leave, not for another workout session but from this place entirely. What was in store for her she didn’t know, but she was ready to move on. As much as she’d come to think of her little cubby hole here as home, she wanted to get out in the galaxy and see some of the things she’d been learning about.
The countdown only had a few minutes left, and was displayed in Star Force numbers rather than Veliquesh. In fact all of her lessons over the past 2 years had been in their language. She spoke English now, somewhat, and could read their letters and numbers with effort. Part of her mind was still thinking in Veliquesh terms, but every now and then she’d have a dream in English. Her lessons told her that it would take time, but eventually she would be able to fully convert over to the Star Force language and she looked forward to the opportunity to actually converse with someone other than the computer.
She’d been here for almost 7 years now, with no contact whatsoever to the other Veliquesh, or anyone from Star Force. There were no messages, no passerbys in the hallway. She hadn’t glimpsed a living creature since she’d been rescued into this facility, but she’d learned and seen many in her lessons. She knew what the ADZ was, how big the lizard empire had grown, who the Humans were and the other races that made up Star Force…and why they had decided to invade the Veliquesh. Naisha had no mixed feelings there, for if they hadn’t she’d have been sacrificed along with the other dupes.
‘Dupe’ was a word she’d clung to, for it fit her situation completely. They had used her since birth, tricking her into becoming the supposedly pure sacrifice they wanted. There was nothing pure about her or the others in the Renval. Purity, holiness, sanctity, etc were just fictious nonsense that she’d been told about so many times she’d just took them to be true without thinking. They’d always discouraged thinking, insisting on acceptance. She’d done what she thought she was supposed to do, bought into what they told her and had been loyal…which was why she was a dupe. She’d fallen for it completely.
But then again that was partially a good thing, for it had kept her alive to the day when Star Force arrived. Had she had questions or concerns during her early years she would have been quietly taken away and killed. Several of her Renval brothers and sisters had been transferred to other locations, and only now did she realize what had really happened to them. Dissent had not been tolerated, which meant she and the others had been born into a trap that they had no chance of escaping from.
But she was still a dupe for having believed it all, though not now. Star Force taught, but they did not force. It was odd, for ‘force’ was in their name, but that ‘force’ was a protective one. Keeping people like her from harm while they thought freely and figured things out on their own. For as much information was available to her in her lessons, she always had to do the hard work herself. Nothing was given to her, she had to achieve every rank attributed to her…and if she hadn’t she’d simply be left alone in her quarters to do whatever she wanted, not that there was much to do in such a small room aside from watch the vids and sleep.
No, Naisha owed Star Force for her life and then some, but she had been the one to earn her departure. A small part of her mind wondered if she wasn’t being a dupe for a second time, but rather than pushing the thought aside she considered it. Her gut said no, that this was legit, but there was only one way to find out. As she watched the final seconds tick off the clock she knew this was the moment of truth and found her insides twisting up in knots of anxiety.
When the countdown reached zero the door merely slid open, with Naisha seeing guide lights outside like every other day she’d been led to various training rooms. With no belongings to her name she simply walked out and went where directed, passing down familiar hallways until reaching a door that she’d never been through. When it opened there were more corridors like the ones she’d just walked through, but now she was in new territory and her mind seemed to come alive at that. This was fresh exposure rather than the repetition she’d lived by ever since being brought here.
When she walked through the archway the door closed behind her but the lights kept guiding her on through a very long course that eventually brought her to a cupola that had the first living person she’d seen inside the glass casing. The purple-skinned Protovic smiled and opened the clear door for her, allowing her to tentatively come inside the booth that had two short benches in it along either wall.
“Hello, Naisha. My name is Gharris. I’ll be your attendant through this transition period.”
“H…Hi,” she stammered, finding her voice catching in her throat.
“It’s alright. I assume you haven’t spoken to anyone in a long time…or are my words difficult to understand?”
“You sound different than the hologram.”
“That’s because he isn’t me. I am the first Protovic you’ve met with this color of skin, right?”
Naisha nodded.
“And I look the same as the hologram?”
“No. Not the same. I thought you would speak the same.”
“We all have our little quirks. Please, have a seat,” Gharris said, motioning for her to sit down on the opposite bench as he touched a control panel on the side of his.
“What is this room?”
“It’s not a room, as you’ll see in a moment. It’s our ride,” he finished as there was a mechanical shimmy as the pod car detached and began traveling down a dark tunnel. The lights of the hallway soon shrank to a dim speck, but both Protovic were providing enough of their own light to see by, which was why the pod had no interior illumination. Gharris looked at her casually as the pod was filled with a mix of red, purple, and green light from their faces and hands.
“You are being transferred into a city where you will live. It’s not the final destination on your journey, but it will be a big shock compared to what you’ve been living in.”
“A city?”
“Yes. A Star Force city,” he said as a crack of white light appeared on the opposite side of the bubble car and quickly enlarged as they approached, testifying to the speed that they were traveling. A moment later the darkness vanished as they shot out into the sunlight traveling on an elevated monorail through snow-covered mountains.
Naisha sucked in a quick breath and Gharris smiled. “Nice little reveal we have there, isn’t it? Look back and you’ll see where you’ve been living all this time.”
She turned her head to the left and saw a flat mountain covered in snow…only it wasn’t a mountain, but rather the side of a huge artificial building larger than anything she’d ever laid eyes on before, but certainly in proportion to some of the infrastructure that she’d learned about in the ADZ.
“The rest of the Veliquesh are there, in isolation like you were. Or, rather, the ones that have been captured. The fighting is still ongoing and we’re receiving shipments of prisoners in the same manner that brought you here. They’re just starting the journey that you’ve been on, if they want to pursue it. If not they’ll live out their lives in that building or others like it that have been built across the planet. Even now more are being constructed to house all the prisoners, and it’s a race to construct facilities quick enough to hold everyone being brought in. The Archons are quite good at what they do, so we receive regular transports of prisoners coming in.”
“You, however, are no longer a prisoner. You’ve proven yourself to be wise enough that we’re willing to trust you not to repeat the mistakes of the past, and by past I mean the Veliquesh civilization. It dies in that building,” Gharris said, pointing to the quickly shrinking artificial mountain range as natural ones were popping up between it and them as they passed further out across the terrain. “You are Protovic, like me. The coloration of your skin and your past don’t change that. We were born at different times and different places, but we are the same race, now reunited.”
“Thank you,” she said meekly, yet totally in awe at the landscapes around her.
“But,” he added, “this planet will be your home unless you earn your way off it. I’m here because I choose to be, as are a lot of other Axius Protovic, along with a scattering of other races. We all live in the same city, and those of you that earn your way out of that building will be living with us and learning what it truly means to be part of Star Force. You can kick back and relax, enjoying yourselves and making a life here, or you can push your training further and earn the option to leave and go elsewhere as a full Star Force citizen. I think a lot of you will be staying here,” he said, pointing ahead as the first towers of the city became visible over the mountain peaks, “but ultimately it will be up to you what you do with your life.”
The distance was deceiving, looking as if the city was just over the next line of mountains, but it took them nearly 20 more minutes before those spires became huge structures dwarfing the nearest mountains. Naisha’s jaw literally dropped, which Gharris took notice of.
“Big, isn’t it?”
“What will I do there?”
“Whatever you want or nothing at all. There will be opportunities to work for credits or other perks, as well as training for a variety of things. If you want to pursue full citizenship there will be a gauntlet of tasks set before you, but no timetable of when they have to be accomplished. You can do multiple things at once if you choose, and you may reproduce if you wish. There will be other Protovic there.”
She turned her head away from the clear walls and looked at him oddly.
He squinted back at her. “You were Renval, weren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“So you’ve never mated?”
She shook her head ‘no.’
“Something else for you to experiment with if you wish. However I will tell you, any offspring you produce will go to a maturia and you will not see them again. They will be raised as full citizens from birth, and therefore will not be in this city. They won’t be on this planet, actually.”
“Why?”
“So that we can make sure the Veliquesh culture dies here. Those who never leave prisoner status will, unfortunately, never achieve self-sufficiency. They’ll grow weak and degenerate and die there. I’ve heard that some have actually found ways to kill themselves,” Gharris said with visible dissatisfaction on his face. “We can’t save everyone, and in truth we can’t save anyone if they don’t want to be saved. This planet is our way of destroying the Veliquesh but saving those people within it that want something better. Those who questioned were killed by the Veliquesh, meaning that virtually everyone that’s been captured is some form of crazy. We’re not assuming they can’t be redeemed, but so far not one of the Protovic to come out of that facility has been an adult outside of the Renval.”
“How many of us are there?”
“That have earned their way out? Somewhere around 350, I think.”
“That’s all?”
“Sadly yes, but there may be more working through the system more slowly than you. I don’t know their status, we never see any of that. I was just told you were ready and to pick you up. You’re one of us now, not one of them.”
“What happened to the younglings?”
“They’re treated as prisoners as well, but have a different process to earn their way out. No one that was born into the Veliquesh culture, no matter how young they were, is allowed into this city without earning their way here. The infants are being raised and trained as a group and I expect most of them will be here eventually. All new births here will be sent offworld, so the infant facilities will only have a short lifespan once the invasion is completed.”
“How long will that take?”
“Hard to say. Population wise about 22% of you are here.”
“How many have died?”
“None at our hands, and we’ve kept the lizards away ever since the invasion began. A small number have killed themselves prior to being taken prisoner, plus however many have done so in isolation. We know it is hard to live alone after being with so many people for so long, but it has to be done this way. Each person has to walk their own path, and if we put you together into groups, even of two, one would influence the other.”
“I understand. You can’t let us be forced into anything by our peers.”
“And you won’t be here. It is impossible to describe, but the community you are entering is far different than what you grew up in. I’ll help you get situated and be available for a number of days afterward, but there isn’t much to actually do other than to go around exploring. There are no dangers here, just people to meet and things to do.”
“Do I get my own quarters?”
“Yes, and they’ll be identical to the ones you’ve had…except no locked doors. Well, you can lock it from the inside, but you’re free to move about the city as often as you like, whenever you like. You just can’t leave. As you can see the planet is covered in snow and very cold, not somewhere we can survive without equipment. The spaceport is also restricted, but you’ll hit checkpoints that will prevent you from access without the proper ID so you can’t go somewhere you’re not supposed to be on accident. If you bump into them you’ll be politely redirected, so feel free to walk anywhere and everywhere you can.”
“It’s so big,” Naisha said as the last of the mountains passed alongside them as they shot through a valley and the whole of the city opened up before them. There was a boundary wall separating the icy wastelands, with the monorail track passing over top of it and intersecting a number of other lines. They hit one that continued into the city, with so many buildings interconnected by short tubes and rail lines that it literally blew her mind to see it all…and then there were the massive spires in the center and dotted around the perimeter that she had to look up through the ceiling to see the tops of.
“We are well protected from the lizards and others. There are weapons batteries at the top of some of those spires, not to mention a shield that protects t
he entire city when activated. You’ll never have to worry about them getting to you here.”
“How many of us can this city hold?”
“A lot, and we’ll expand it or build others as necessary going forward. We don’t know how many people will make it out of prisoner status, but we’re going to make sure each and every one of them has the chance to do so. After that it’s totally in their hands.”
“If I’m not a prisoner, and I’m not a citizen, then what am I?”
“Think of yourself as a guest that has a lot to learn about what it is to be part of Star Force, with people like me living here to act as friends and mentors. You can watch and learn from us, but don’t think you’re separate. You’re like our little brothers and sisters from now on, regardless of what your age actually is.”
“Have you attained self-sufficiency?”
“I have.”
“How old are you?”
“Only 72.”
“Wow. Most Veliquesh only lived to be 40 or 50.”
“You’re not Veliquesh anymore. You’re Protovic and Star Force, and you can live as long as you want if you’re willing to work at it.”
“I am.”
“I know. You wouldn’t be here if you weren’t,” Gharris said as the pod slid into the side of one of the many buildings and the cityscape disappeared. They traveled through a tunnel, slowing in speed until they popped out into an internal air pocket that looked more like another world than a single room.
“We’re here,” he said a moment before the pod switched tracks and moved down from the elevated lines to park in a receptacle along with numerous other empty pods. He opened the door and stepped out, waiting for her to do so as well.
Naisha walked out cautiously, hearing so many sounds that it seemed to overwhelm her for a moment. Gharris closed the door and took her by the arm.
“Walk with me. It’ll take some time to get your bearings and I know a good place to start.”
