Three years before the fall of Hathor, Lars was with his dad and two others on a ship filled with cotton clothes. His dad’s name was Jasper, and the two others were Yasmir and Nigel, who owned the ship. They were heading to an island ninety miles off the coast to trade for a highly coveted spice, cinnamon.
The island had a drastically different climate than the coast despite being relatively close, so they couldn't grow cotton, and the mainland couldn't grow cinnamon. It was a situation where the town would profit immensely, because cinnamon was significantly more valuable to those in cities than cotton was.
A problem had arisen when they were just over thirty miles out. There was a very visible storm heading in their direction. Nigel thought they should weather it, so everyone else bought in. When the storm did arrive it was far stronger than anticipated. Nigel was at the helm, trying to keep the ship facing the winds of the storm to keep the waves from breaching the sides, but the strength of the wind was proving too much for him. Yasmir yelled through the thunder, "We need to reef the sails so Nigel can control the ship! Jasper! Help me!"
Yasmir started climbing, but Jasper looked at how the mast was swaying in the wind and wanted no part of it. "I have to tie down the cargo!" And he ran below deck.
Lars jumped up on the rigging without hesitating, "I've got you, Yasmir!"
They climbed and started adjusting the sails, but when a bolt of lightning struck less than a mile away the resulting thunder made Yasmir lose his grip. He fell to the deck of the ship, landing squarely on his back. Lars continued undaunted, finishing one side, and then traversing to the other to finish reefing the sails on his own. After they'd made it through Nigel thanked Lars profusely, saying that he potentially saved the ship.
Four days later Jasper and Lars walked through the door to their house, and Jasper instantly began recounting what happened to his wife. He laid on how tired they were so that she wouldn't ask them to help her with anything. He told her, "The fact is, Yasmir hasn't learned to respect the weather enough. Could have broken his back doing that, you wouldn't see me making that mistake."
*
Lars sat in a basement where they had moved many of the large cylinders filled with viscous fluid. There were 20 cylinders, filled with 19 Haverdash. Lars had just come out of the 20th, and started putting his clothes back on as a bloody Haverdash came from upstairs and climbed into it. Lars had spent next to no time at all relative to the Haverdash, as his injuries were limited to bruises from falling rubble.
The fluid itself had no healing properties, but it caused the one submerged in it to heal themselves. It was a transdermal hallucinogen, with emphasis on extreme pain. Between it's texture, clinging-property, and the pain it caused, it would be impossible to be unaware of it touching you. That was the point, to be a hallucinogen that forced you to think about where the liquid was touching you. Your hallucinations would then be focused on your outward body, and heal your injuries. It couldn't be guaranteed that you'd be healed, of course. Hallucinations are unpredictable, and it was not unheard of for someone to kill themselves inadvertently as they floated in those vats.
A vision, however, is too overwhelming a hallucination to be controlled by the slimy, pain inducing touch of that liquid. While hallucinations in general are directed towards where the liquid is touching, visions were unhindered in their wanderings. Lars had seen a fascinating vision when in that vat, a second person that his massless particles were merging with. It was indirect, but still true that a part of him was blending with this new person.
Strictly speaking, his would only blend with those of that one other person, and that was still true, but then that person would merge with Lars and this new figure. They had moved as well. He couldn’t tell the direction, but he did know that during the attack on Hathor they were very close. Now they were far away.
Another Haverdash opened the top of his vat and climbed out. Some of them would stay there for days, some for minutes. Some could get out on their own, some needed to be woken up and pulled out. The air wasn’t filled with hallucinogenic gas because the fire that is needed to spread it could affect the integrity of the viscous liquid in the vats, but the air was different by virtue of that liquid hanging in the air. That foul humidity would seep into the lungs when breathing, and would have been more than enough to kill a human on its own.
The Haverdash who had just climbed out of his vat stood up, “We should not treat human lives as so worthless." An air of hostility and suspicion filled the room. "Winning a war in pursuit of glory is one thing, and taking them as slaves to help build our wonders is all well and good!" The hostility waned. "That way they see our glory as well! That's what we want! Sacrifices, offerings, torturing them in rituals Haverdash never taught us to do, we should stop those!" The hostility rose again, stronger, and the Haverdash within the vats started to shift and wake from their hallucinations. "These experiments by those such as Moxey, they're wrong! Haverdash spoke to me, just now, in-"
That was enough. Some Haverdash leaped out of their vats, but most didn't have the time to spare, and broke through the glass to get to him faster. They grabbed any glass shards in reach and tore him apart like piranhas. He cried out despite his impending death, “We’re forgetting who we are! We’re not meant to be this way!”
That cry only fed the anger of the Haverdash as they shredded him into the tiniest pieces they could, and pulverized those pieces into the smallest mash, and when no trace of his body could be seen they scoured the ground for a trace to eliminate.
Lars walked upstairs to avoid the insufferable din of their wailing. Though he had adopted many of their practices, he didn’t understand or care for their religion. He walked out of that building into the ruins of Hathor, which were being remade into a Haverdash image.
The foundation for the cathedral of Nishir was being used for a new cathedral, the largest place of worship the Haverdash had ever had. They were building underground and sealing off locations as much as they could, filling them with hallucinogenic gas.
Lars spotted Moxey a few blocks away, who noticed him in turn and waved him over. “Lars, good morning! I see your bruises are gone. Though you may have been able to remove them yourself, it’s good that you got to experience the healing procedure. What did you think?”
“It was enlightening. I wouldn’t say I had another vision, but a kind of add-on to a vision. So I enjoyed it.”
“Ah. Yes, visions are my favorite thing to experience as well. It’s hard though, you can’t just produce them. Maybe there’s some truth to using a variety of methods.”
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A scream emanated from the building they were standing next to, followed by a series of screams. Lars looked at the door, then back at Moxey. ‘What’s happening in there?”
Moxey opened it, “I’ll show you, come in.”
Once they stepped inside it became obvious that it was a prison. The cells were chalk full of human prisoners There were several Haverdash outside the cells, holding wine bottles and wearing gloves. A few of them opened a cell and grabbed a middle aged man, pulling him out and forcing the cage shut on the struggling captives.
Three of them held him still with his mouth open, and a fourth used a dropper to take a miniscule portion of wine and place it in his mouth. His body shook rapidly, and he made a low moan that increased in volume as his eyes widened. A few seconds later he went limp, and a Haverdash checked his pulse. "Dead." His body continued to tremor after they threw it on a pile in the corner.
"He lasted pretty long. Was he the strongest?" Moxey asked.
"The toughest one lasted almost half a minute, it almost wasn't disgustingly pathetic."
Lars turned toward Moxey, "What's the goal of this?"
"You!" He answered. "If there is the potential for one human to push through by force of will, perhaps there's another? It's an opportunity, and you know that's something I dread to miss."
Lars looked at the dropper they had been using, "I drank way more than that."
"Yes I know, but I figured out pretty quickly that that wasn't going to work. I'm not expecting to find someone else with your natural willpower, someone lesser will do. As you can see, the dropper is too much for them. We'll try inhalation next, and if that doesn't work we'll resort to splashing them. At that point though, living through it might not be anything noteworthy."
They lit a small sample of the dirt that produced their custom air under the nose of the next subject. He was an old man, physically weak, but the Haverdash seemed convinced that it was an entirely mental battle. When the fumes graced his nostrils his mind seemingly exploded. He spewed gibberish, his feet danced, then his head turned 180 degrees and snapped his neck.
Lars flinched at the sight. "I guess it isn't possible. So, put the rest of them to work?"
Moxey looked offended, "Absolutely not, we have to try every one of them. If none of them work, well we'll just have to get more."
"But that old man, for example, he died for no reason. And as far as you know there's no reason for any of them to die, it's just a chance."
"That is more than reason enough, Lars. Don't sympathize so much with a people who are passing away, who you left for a higher state of glory."
Lars protested, "You're changing my words! My family had chickens, and we would never let a chicken die without reason! I had to kill a fox to protect them once, which was a lot harder at the time, and I had to use a shovel. But you can't be bothered to take the same level of consideration for humans, and that doesn't make sense."
Moxey's expression changed to look pleased, whenever he could discuss ideas, he liked to. "That does make sense, but I personally disagree. Perhaps it relates to the vision I told you about. A lot of people have this idea that we should try and preserve as many lives as possible, it's a very human idea, but also a Haverdash idea. Many Haverdash will protect or rescue each other due to whatever philosophy.
"I have no problem with letting a Haverdash die, I have sent many to their deaths just to give you practice, have I not? And naturally if Haverdash death doesn't bother me, neither would human death. Recall that the vision I told you of was of the end of all things. I ask you then, if life is sacred, if it is important at all, why does the universe disagree? And recognize that your opinion doesn’t matter at all, for the universe will have its way.”
Lars turned away, “Well, I didn’t have that vision.”
“That’s fair. You never told me, actually. What vision have you seen?”
“I saw everything united, all having the same essential makeup, and blending with each other so that each thing shared itself with what was around it. You can see how that would lead to a very different perspective.” Lars stared up at Moxey, almost daring him to respond. He didn’t respond though. He had a disappointed look.
A Haverdash ran in from outside, “Mad- Moxey. You know the workings of fairies?”
His eyebrows raised, “We have some?”
“They’re attacking us outside the city, tell us how to kill them!”
He pushed the Haverdash to the side, “We don’t kill them, leave this to us. Lars, follow me.”
Despite their disagreement, Lars instinctively followed. The Haverdash who had come to find Moxey walked next to them, “We have to kill them, we have a job to do that comes from someone higher up than you!”
Moxey stopped walking and grabbed the Haverdash’s shoulder, “All orders come from someone higher up than me.”
He was confused, “...Yea… yea exactly!”
“Get out of here. I’m going to solve your problem, so don’t bother me. Lars! Let me fill you in on what the issue at hand is.” They left the other Haverdash behind, as he bitterly stayed out of the way. “But first, what do you know about fairies?”
“I was pretty sure they didn’t exist. Now I’m curious.”
“That’s very little, but I can tell you why you thought that. Creatures like fairies achieve a balance with the world around them. The more consistency in the world, the less likely people are to spot fairies because they’ve found their niche that is otherwise uninhabited.
"We are changing the world, and so the fairies are shaken. There will be many cases like this, where hidden things in the world are pulled from their burrows. That’s just what war is like, and all we need to do is capitalize on it. I had strong suspicions that there were fairies in this region, basking in the light of Nishir. Now that we’ve brought the City of Grace down to the dirt, they’re furious. Can you guess what our solution will be?”
“I would have guessed ‘killing them’, especially after that conversation we had, but you said we aren’t doing that.”
“No, we are not. We are giving them a new light, the glory of Haverdash.” He checked Lars’s belt. “You didn’t grab a bottle after finishing the healing process. That was forgetful of you.”
“I never worry about grabbing one because everyone nearby is sure to have them.”
“True, but get in the habit. Thankfully I have more than enough to share.” They went to the edge of the city, and Moxey opened a bottle of wine for them. "They can be seen or unseen, be watchful, and hopeful to hallucinate their locations."
"Will we have to defend ourselves?"
"Possibly, and if you do hurt them in doing so, do not worry. I would simply like to avoid killing them, and hopefully they will work with us in the future, if they aren't too shy."
They spotted where the attack was happening. There was a basin by the city that was being turned into a quarry because of the iron found there. There were Haverdash in the basin with swords and shields raised. They had their backs to each other, waiting for the next attack which could come from any direction. A Haverdash outside the quarry holding a bow walked over to them. "Finally! Moxey, send your human down there and take them out!"
"Order all your men to leave the quarry, captain." Moxey and Lars walked down the basin, and the captain resentfully did as requested.
They stood in the midst of the fairies, and Lars felt their hostility encircling them even though he couldn't see them. Moxey let go of his rod and had it encircle him, and he saw pulses like magnetic waves coming out of it that were heavy with fear.
Lars raised his sword, and saw all the light of the basin suck into it so that it glowed.
They saw the fairies, who were watching and waiting. They made eye contact and stared them down, and the fairies fell back and cowered. Then they drew close, and examined the metal rod and the spine sword. Then they fell away, and disappeared.
Lars lowered his sword, "That's it?"
"Fairies are not strong of will, like us. They will fall in line after us, just as they had done for humans before. It was quite easy, wasn't it? I hope you've been reminded to trust me."