Empire Chronicles

Victor sat in his quarters... again, unable to settle in one place for very long he thought over the situation futher than his current problems. What would happen once all of this was over, would they just drop him off back on Earth and wish him good luck? Would they let him stay somewhere, go his way? Where would he go, what would he do, what about April? Victor had always ruled over his own mind with logic, thought things through without panicking and kept a level head. Sometimes that had its downfalls as well, unlike people who simply dealt with situations as they arose he thought things out. The first thing he had done was to take stock of his situation, options, and resources available to him. Not good, zip, and zilch. He was stuck on this ship waiting to arrive on Asara, for the time being there wasn't much more he could do. His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door to his room opening. Having been sitting on the couch with his head tilted upward, he looked down to see Xiang standing there looking slightly startled. "Um... sorry, I was trying to see if there was a doorbell."

(Don't worry about it, come in.) This was something else he had been anticipating, since it was his fault for getting her knocked up. With his head spinning from everything else that was going on Victor wasn't quite sure how to handle things. The last thing he wanted to deal with was the prospect of a kid right now, yet it wouldn't be right to keep avoiding her. He may have been a morally flexible asshole with an ego the size of California, but he did take responsibility for his actions. That was another thing about him, he wasn't a coward, no matter what may come he stepped up to face the music. Xiang sat down next to Victor which was followed by a long and fairly uncomfortable silence, even without his telepathy he knew what was on her mind. (I need time Xiang, there is so much going on right now that I can barely think straight. I always try to stay calm but even I've gotten frazzled by recent events.) Just to be nice Victor put his arm around her to try and comfort her, this was a hell of a situation for the both of them. “Do you want a child?”

(Honestly, I don't know. I hadn't planned on something like this until later in life, after I was married assuming that ever happens.)

“Will you at least think about it seriously?”

(Of course, a child is not something to be taken lightly.) For a long time the two of them sat there, Xiang with her head on Victor's shoulder, and him staring at the ceiling until he eventually fell asleep. He was woken up with a start by April an unknown amount of time later, glancing about he noticed that Xiang was gone. Once he had gathered his wits about him he looked up at his cousin. “Come on, we've arrived at Asara,” April said. Now that they had arrived at Taras' homeworld he hoped he would finally get some answers to the question he had, and there were a lot of them. Having just managed to stand up he and April disappeared in a bright flash of light, appearing in a small anteroom. The room was a plain steel gray with a set of blue doors that divided in the middle, both in front of and behind him. By now he was starting to get used to being transported without warning, only now everyone was there with him, Taras, Vivica, April, and Xiang. (Where are we?)

“One of the waiting rooms outside the high council chamber, they are assembling as we speak, we will be summoned when they are ready,” Taras said. Victor merely folded his arms waiting, thinking they could have at least provided some music, he hated being put on hold. It was close to ten minutes before the doors in front of them finally opened and he walked in with everyone else. The room was a large dimly lit circular chamber, the floor appeared to be made of some reflective black stone. Ahead of them was the Aseirn High Council, eleven members seated around a long, raised, three-quarter desk that wrapped around the wall. Ralmus wasn't hard to spot, he was sitting directly in front of everyone and the only council member wearing a bright red robe. Again there was a long silence before Victor finally stepped forward holding his arms out, this time he broadcast his telepathy so everyone could hear him, (Well, here I am. So we gonna get this show on the road? I got a shitload of questions that need answering and I'm tired of waiting already.)

“Yes, I am sure you have many questions, but first we have some of our own as well,” Ralmus said, continuing to press some buttons in front of him. Once he was finished a blue circle appeared under Vivica with long streamers of blue light coming up around her, to which she simply looked around curiously. Everyone looked at Vivica in fact, once the lights disappeared Victor looked back at Ralmus waiting for an answer. There was a lot of chatter between the council members as they looked down at the desk in front of them, along with many of them staring at Vivica. “My scan has confirmed that the android you call Vivica is indeed constructed of Aseirn technology, by what means did you come into possession of this?”

(Vivica, tell'em.)

“I was built by Victor ten years from now to serve as his bodyguard and assistant. He was attempting to create an artificial quantum singularity in a laboratory when there was an accident. The singularity began to grow out of control and I was damaged badly enough to force me to shut down. Once my self-repair systems had restored enough of my functions for me to reactivate I found myself on Earth. That's when I sought out Victor.” Again there was a low murmur among the council members, many of them seemed curious while others weren't quite sure what to make of all of this. Victor remembered Taras saying something to the effect that even the Aseirn hadn't had any luck in developing time travel, no doubt some of them thought this was all a load of bullshit. “Time travel is impossible,” one council member said.

(Hey, that's what Vivica told me, and from what I've seen she's not really the type of person to lie, in fact I'm not even sure she can lie.)

“Is there any way you can confirm what Vivica said?” Ralmus asked.

(Vivica?)

“I still possess all of my memory engrams from the moment I was activated, you can view them if you wish.” With a nod Ralmus began to tap buttons if front of him again. Not long after what looked almost like a small podium melted out of the floor behind Vivica. Everyone looked as she walked around the front of it, apparently the only one who had a clue what to do next. She reached down pulling what looked like a small cord with a metal tip on the end of it, without having to be told she inserted the cord into her wrist. For several second nothing seemed to happen, Victor was about to ask a question when the wall behind them, over the doors, lit up like a gigantic view screen. As the group turned to look at first there was nothing but garbled information dropping across the screen at incredible speed before it finally cleared up. Now things were about to get interesting Victor thought. There on the screen a small blue box began to blink before finally spitting out several lines of words in matching color. Next the screen flickered a few times before another image appeared.

[IMG]http://i1114.photobucket.com/albums/k531/morganite2112/screen.jpg[/IMG]

After several seconds the image finally stabilized enough to see, what came next was even a surprise to Victor... he saw himself. The image reflected in Vivica's eyes was considerably different from the young man standing in the high council chambers. The future version of Victor had a full beard and mustache, he was dressed in normal clothing for a human. The only thing that could be seen from the current angle was a white tank top, there was also a strange metal band around his neck with a smooth orange gem in the center. “Don't be scared, I realize your first moments of consciousness will be the most frightening but I assure you, you have nothing to fear.” Although Victor spoke he never moved his mouth, instead the jewel on the neckband lit up, producing a calm and gentle voice with each word. After a time he held his hand out, when Vivica took it he helped her to sit up slowly, “Your name is Victor.”

“That's right.”

“Who am I?”

“Your name is Vivica and you're an android, I built you.”

“Who built you?”

“I'm human, I was born not built. Allow your database to finish loading and you'll find a lot of useful information there.” The memories continued to play out for several minutes showing Vivica coping with her first few minutes of consciousness before Ralmus finally deactivated the view screen. “That was an Aseirn laboratory, how is that possible?” another council member said.

(Hey don't look at me, that's the first time I've seen that myself.) The one thing he didn't notice about his future self were his eyes, they seemed so... empty. It was like all of the life had been drained out of them, his movement was mechanical and it looked like he was just going through the motions. The future self he had seen was only ten years older, but his face looked almost twenty years older. Now he wondered what had happened to him in the future, he also wondered if it would still come true because Vivica coming into the past had already altered the timeline. “The high council will need to confer in order to authenticate these memory engrams before we proceed, if you would step back to the anteroom please,” Ralmus said. Rolling his eyes slightly Victor walked out of the room with everyone else, once again waiting while the high council took their bloody time talking amongst themselves. “Do you think they believed her?” April asked.

(How the hell should I know, I'm not even sure I believe it and I saw it with my own eyes.)

“Is there a point to me even being here?” Xiang asked.

“You would not have been allowed to attend this high council meeting if there were not,” Taras said.

“So why am I here?” Xiang asked.

“I was not told why your presence was requested,” Taras said. The party continued to wait, unsure of what to do next. Several minutes later Taras was teleported out of the anteroom, although there was no announcement Victor had a fairly good idea of where he had gone. He reappeared after a time and before anyone could say anything April was teleported out of the room. After another long wait April returned before Xiang disappeared. (What the hell is going on Taras?)

“The high council is speaking with everyone individually asking what they know about Vivica.” The whole tele-swapping people was starting to get on Victor's nerves, he was about to say something about it when the doors to the council chamber opened for a second time. Xiang was standing in the middle of the room, she turned to look at everyone as they walked back in. The round of questioning she had been through didn't seem to bother her very much, her expression was impassive as it had been for some time now. The group gathered in the middle of the room and Ralmus started to speak when he was interrupted, (Alright, hold on a minute, I think it's time for a little quid pro quo.)

“Quid pro quo?”

(It's an Earth term, means you ask a question then I ask one. I think it's about time I started asking some questions of my own.)

“What would you like to know?”

(For starters I want to know about Kalindaric Station. Taras made a stop there before coming here to finish a business transaction, while he was tending to matters we walked around the station to explore. While there a terminal displaying a map of the station spoke to me in English. Next when I bought this translation device, the snake merchant who sold it to me had to use a chip or something so his translator could decipher English meaning it's a known langauge. Finally when I went to a bar to get something to drink the bartender helped me translate the menu into English. That's three separate times I encountered my own language which I find quite odd. I know for a fact humans are incapable of deep space travel, hell we haven't even gone to Mars yet, so why do I keep encountering English in alien settings?) The Aseirn High Council didn't seem to react well to that question, that much was obvious as they began talking among themselves using a form of guarded telepathy that Victor couldn't understand. Things appeared to become quite animated physically which really peaked his curiosity, it was obvious there was something they weren't telling him and he wanted to know what. When things finally calmed down Ralmus looked back to Victor, “You question is... complicated.”

(Yeah, that's what Taras said, told me to ask you so stop holding out already. I know the Aseirn won't lie so I want full disclosure. No don't ask don't tell, all of it, the truth.)

“What do you know of the history of humanity?”

(The history of humanity, that's a pretty big subject care to be a little more specific?)

“The origin of your species.”

(Not really, there are a lot of theories but no one knows for certain. It's been a subject of debate for thousands of years. Some think we evolved from lower lifeforms, others think we were created by a higher intelligence. Those are the two mainstream theories currently.)

“Neither are correct.”

(Say what?) Instead of answering Victor, Ralmus pressed several more buttons activating the view screen behind them again. Upon turning around he didn't understand what he was seeing until he read the caption under the photo. Even in the face of everything that had happened to him recently this was something he almost couldn't handle. He was already dealing with enough as it was, but this... this was just unreal.

[IMG]http://i1114.photobucket.com/albums/k531/morganite2112/human01.jpg[/IMG]
Graldac Venon, Emperor of the Second Human Empire.

(Are you fucking serious?! You're telling me there's a human empire out here in space somewhere?)

“There was, the second human empire was destroyed more than a five-hundred thousand years ago in the last Great Galactic War.”

(W-What, that's not possible, humans are from Earth!)

“No, we gathered the survivors of the war and took them to Earth. There the Aseirn hid the last of the human race from those that sought to exterminate them.”

(Then... where are we from?)

“No one knows for sure, humans appeared in the Milky Way settling the world called Gaia more than ten million years ago, where they came from before that we do not know. The world of Gaia was however, where both the first and second human empires rose, and fell.”

(What the... what the fuck happened?!)

“Contrary to the belief of modern science of Earth, humanity is not one of the younger races within the galaxy. In fact they are one of the oldest, even predating the two elder races that exist now. The last Great Galactic War took such a toll on the known galaxy that not many historical records survived from that time. The exact reason the war was started is unknown, we do however know that the second empire came into conflict with one of the elder races, the Thendacians to be precise. The human empire was winning the conflict against them as well as fending off several others, near the end when the Thendacians feared they would be defeated they released a bio-weapon into the empire. Within a month's time the weapon wiped out most of the human race, when the tide of battle turned they did not seek to defeat humanity, they wanted to exterminate them.”

(So that's where you came in?)

“Yes, we helped the remaining humans escape to a relatively unknown part of the galaxy. There we resettled them on Earth so they could continue to live and prosper.”

(Hold on, wait just a damn minute. If humans were supposedly to technologically advanced where's all the tech now?)

“Destroyed by your own people through countless wars down through history.”

(I can believe that. That still doesn't explain how modern English was on Kalindaric Station, the language my friends and I speak is nowhere near as old as our time on Earth. How do you explain the numerous languages we speak?)

“The language you speak now is the dominate language your world speaks because it is part of your genetic memory. Even as your race develops other languages English will continue to surface, it did once before about two-hundred thousand years ago but all record of it and the people who spoke it was eventually eradicated.”

(What about all these Neanderthals and other variations of humanity. That still doesn't explain you guys. There have been rumors, reports, and sightings of alien spacecraft of Earth for thousands of years. Theories about alien influences on ancient cultures, abductions, kidnappings, alien babies, what the hell is going on?)

“What you speak of is true, we have been interacting with humanity since your resettlement on Earth. At first we met with humans openly, but over time as you fought amongst yourselves destroying your history and culturally devolving to a near stone age society, we were forced to severe contact following several violent encounters. The Aseirn saving the human race wasn't entirely an act of mercy, since nearly a thousand years before the great war our fates have been intertwined.”

(You've been experimenting on us haven't you.)

“Yes, the Neanderthals and other species you speak of were failed experiments.”

(Why?) Victor asked, starting to become increasingly angry by what he heard.

“Nearly a millenia before the war our world was stricken by a plague, killing our people by the thousands. For years we tried to find a cure before we realized finally discovered it wasn't a sickness... it was evolution. Our genetic code was breaking down and we were dying. In time we were able to finally stop the breakdown and save our people, but by the time we did there were too few of us left to sustain our race. The only means we had left to us was cloning.”

(So now you're DNA is still breaking down because you're the clone of a clone of a clone of a clone, right?)

“That is correct, we knew we would not be able to sustain ourselves in this manner forever, that is why we first asked for the help of the human empire. They were the only race in the known galaxy that shared enough genetic compatibility to help us.”

(Well it's a half-million years later, apparently something didn't go right.)

“Yes, the Aseirn are so mentally advanced as a species that we require more than simple genetic compatibility. We also require psionic compatibility.”

(And click, click, click, go the pieces. You've been tinkering with humanity since you transplanted us on Earth trying to create a viable genetic and psionic donor.)

“Yes, we have been guiding and monitoring the evolution of humanity for this reason. That Taras chanced across you when looking into the situation with Vivica was fortuitous timing on his part. Now that you're here we would like to ask that you donate a sample of your DNA.”

(Ask, you want to ask? Why start now, you've been ass raping humanity for hundreds of thousands of years anyway, why the sudden change of heart?)

“We did what we did for the survival of both species. The methods used to achieve this goal were long debated by this council, while not widely accepted it was deemed to only viable alternative to extinction. We have also chosen to ask for your help because the abilities you have manifested were considerably stronger than we had anticipated. If a... disagreement were to take place it could prove disastrous for both sides.”

(So what you're saying is that I'm so damned powerful you're not sure you could take what you need from me.)

“In a manner of speaking, yes.”

(Okay, let me get all my little ducks in a row here. Despite everything everyone on the face of the Earth thinks we're not really from that planet. We're actually one of the oldest races in the known universe that was nearly wiped out, so you rounded us up and stuck us on Earth. Then you spent who knows how long genetically raping humanity for your own ends regardless of what it meant to us.)

“Victor, please try to understand. We always tried to be as benevolent as-”

(NO! You listen Ralmus, if you think I'm going to help you after what you just told me you're out of your little gray fucking mind. Furthermore if any of you so much as try to lay a hand on Vivica...” Holding his arms out to the side Victor watched the Aseirn High Council as the entire room began to shake with a deafening rumble, soon the floor began to crack and shatter save for a small circle around them. He finally stopped when the roof and desk began to crack. Silently pointing a finger at Ralmus in warning he lifted everyone up off the floor moving them towards the door. With a wave of his hand both sets of doors were ripped off the tracks sending them flying into the room beyond. Setting them down he began to storm out of the building so mad he could barely see straight. The council member sitting to the left of Ralmus started to call security when the high councilor stopped him, “Let him go, he needs time to calm down and come to terms with what he has just learned.”