Earth
Alwen could have spent a lifetime studying Aunviry DNA, as awful as they were up close, deep within they held the potential secrets to immortality and more. Of course she knew the foibles of chasing after every doctors dream, a cure for death. In Terran culture their ‘alchemists’ had poisoned emperors with mercury in hopes to extend life indefinitely, and in her own culture people had developed acupuncture with the poisonous barbs of sea urchins to try and heal the nervous system. Both Terrans and Torweni understood the dangers in recklessly trying to save lives, and if that same recklessness was used in conjunction with Aunviry DNA then the results could be catastrophic. So when Alwen had realized that both she and Bachir had stayed up for two days straight she knew that they had to put it all away. lock it away in their sample vault and step away to really consider what they were doing.
They had determined with pretty solid evidence that Aunviry DNA had been responsible for a lot of things that ultimately had disastrous results, Vaxis, the birth of the Mammaloids, the life extending drugs that had caused a collapse of the human labor market. This stuff had the potential to do a lot of good for the galaxy, but they already had abundant examples of how bad it was as well. It was like they were splitting the first atom while also having seen the devastation caused by nuclear warfare. Whatever the Aunviry were it was very clear that they were living weapons, engineered to be death and destruction incarnate. The more they studied it the more they found out just how monstrous they really were, and the clearer it became that the only real discoveries they would make was how to cause more death and misery.
The Aunviry were the pinnacle of bioengineering of a hopefully long dead civilization, but they had little hope of reverse engineering any of the advanced bioengineering that went into them, the most they could do is replicate what they were seeing. It was like coming across a bunker full of doomsday weapons, sure they could reverse engineer the weapons and learn the amazing secrets behind what they did, but ultimately all they would learn was how to kill and destroy. Maybe with years and years of study they could find more peaceful and less destructive uses for it, but the immediate results would always be destruction.
And Bachir and Alwen weren’t entirely sure if a small lab aboard a pirate ship was the safest place to unluck the deadly secrets of the Aunviry. Despite having to break her vows of peace Alwen was not comfortable in pursuing a path of research that would only result in death, and Bachir felt the same way.
“We must learn from the mistakes of Oppenheimer; we mustn’t become the inventors a new a terrible weapon, or unwittingly bring it into the hands of those who would wish to weaponize it. If we wish to pursue this it must be under our own terms and free of potential aggressive influence. I love Astarte, but she is a warrior first and a peacemaker last.” He said solemnly.
Alwen thought about the battle on the pirate capital, a conflict Astarte had charged straight into with the only real goal being to destroy her enemies. Alwen knew the pirate well enough to understand that if it came down to a choice between destroying her enemies at all costs or turning the other cheek, Astarte would always choose the violent path. To her, direct threats needed to be destroyed, there were no other alternatives.
And so she and Bachir entered into a secret pact to keep the terrible potential of Aunviry DNA away from Astarte and the other Hellworlders. They would tell her that they were totally lacking the equipment and lab space to further pursue any serious research without needlessly destroying the precious samples. They were the only two medical researchers in the Hellworlders employ who had the right background for research and development, the rest were just doctors and nurses who knew how to patch up a body and diagnose illness. And they were confident that they had cultivated enough trust between them that Astarte would believe them.
And she had.
Astarte had sighed “I should have figured, your only two people and the ship’s med bay isn’t exactly equipped for that sort of thing. Do you think Caduceus would be a more appropriate setting?” she asked.
“Eventually, we are trying to establish a whole new pharmaceutical company so it will take time to reach that point, and of course we wouldn’t want to trust something as pivotal as Aunviry DNA to untrustworthy researchers.” Bachir answered. Caduceus was the medical research and development company that Bachir was working to get off the ground, Astarte and the Hellworlders were helping to support it financially but ultimately it would be under Bachir’s direct supervision. Technically Alwen was also an equal partner in the venture, and Bachir had promised her a direct role in the company whether she chose to take the mark or go home to Torwen.
Astarte looked thoughtful “Alright, I’ll arrange for the Aunviry corpses to be moved off the Astaroth and sent to Caduceus’s main laboratory. Butch will be happy to have her freezer space back.” She said with a wry smile before walking away.
Alwen and Bachir exchanged a quick glance with each other and went about their day as if they hadn’t just lied to their boss.
Her attempt to create a noninvasive method of tattoo removal was mostly finished, in just three procedures Isabela had a completely unblemished back. Which she then promptly covered with a new, much better-looking tattoo of a triumphant eagle. Right now without Aunviry DNA to plague their every thought she and Bachir had returned to one of their earlier projects of creating a more inventive vaccine for the common cold. Part of the issue was that the common cold was highly mutagenic, a traditional vaccine wouldn’t work because it might just change, and all that work would have been worthless. The most Terran medicine could do was alleviate the symptoms that were just merely unpleasant to them, and the most the Union could do was prevent it from ever jumping the species barrier because those ‘unpleasant’ symptoms would be deadly for most species in the galaxy. What they were attempting was to create a virus that wouldn’t touch the hosts body and instead target all bacteria and viruses with certain genetic markers that didn’t change no matter how the disease mutated. This was the first tangible melding of Terran medical science and the comparatively strange biology of Torwen, and it would take many years before they had something ready for the public.
The ship had been in Noctis for only two weeks, and when she wasn’t working in the lab she took some time to watch the repairs on the other Hellworlder ships. It was interesting to watch as industrial drones pulled the ships apart and put them back together within hours as the workers finished their tasks. She had a long chat with one of the foreman on the intricacies that went into building and repairing these ships, designed to both be sturdy as a rock and completely modular for easy repairs.
Gato had made himself scarce around her, and the other marines were itching a lot of their baser needs in Noctis. Isabela had taken her to a Terran dance club, but the pulsing light and alcohol had made her so dizzy that she had collapsed on the floor, Torweni didn’t do so well when exposed to strobe lights. After that she had decided to just stay on the ship rather than further explore the strange alien world around her. Alice had also mostly kept her distance as well; Alwen had heard that after she had stormed out that day Alice had a very loud argument with Gato. No one had any specifics, only that it was bad, and ever since Alice had mostly stayed in her cabin.
But today was different apparently, because today Alice had emerged from her room and knocked on the glass of the laboratory. Alwen pushed the speaker button “Yeah?” she asked.
“Hey, we’re going down to Earth, do you want to join?” Alice asked and Alwen noticed that her mood was certainly more stoic and solemn than normal, and she was wearing her finest looking black robes, the same kind she and most of the crew worn at the memorial service.
“Why?”
“It’s a service for Wraith and the others” she explained.
“Didn’t we have one after the attack?”
“This is different, this is a military funeral, properly laying him to rest. If you don’t want to got that’s fine, it just-“
“No I’ll come, just give me a moment to clean up a bit. When do you leave?” Alwen asked.
“In an hour”
Alwen cursed “that’s not much time, I’ll meet you on deck.”
Alice nodded and left, Alwen sent a message to Bachir before scrubbing her arms and rushing to her room where she changed as fast as she could. Her new robes weren’t finished yet, and a lot of her clothes weren’t really appropriate for a funeral. So she threw on something neutral and black, strapped Makaze and the Wakizashi to her hip and rushed up the deck where all the ship’s marines and a few deck apes had assembled. Gato tried to hide amongst the crowd, but since he stood a head higher than everyone else she was easily able to pick him out. But rather than make the situation uncomfortable for both of them she pretended not to see him, and pushed down the flutter of emotion that burbled to the surface of her chest.
Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
They took the monorail to the city’s spaceport and got onto the huge ferry that took them off Mars and to the Terran homeworld, the infamous class 14 Hellworld, Earth.
Alwen had snagged a seat by a window and watched with intense curiosity. She had seen photos and maps of earth before and knew that what it looked like, but seeing it in person was a totally different experience. The world unlike Torwen was divided into massive landmasses dubbed continents, just north America alone could fit two whole Altorays with room to spare. Unlike in the old images of earth she couldn’t see much ice on either pole, or at least not as much as she knew there should be.
As they got closer Alwen began to notice the thin straight grey lines of the sea walls that kept the higher sea levels away from the densely populated coast lines. There was one that had been strategically placed along a long chain of barrier islands on the eastern coast of north America, and another along the west. Over in Europe long lines divided the Mediterranean and north seas from the rest of the Atlantic, though the northern sea wall went across half of the island of Ireland leaving one half of the country to flood. All across the planet she saw evidence of rampant coastal flooding, from the sea pushing in on the Amazon, to the submerged plains of India, China, and Australia. Chains of coastal islands that would have looked no different than most of Torwens land were also submerged, with the people stuck clinging to the sides of active volcanoes and exposed to super charged storms.
Humans had dangerously exploited fossil fuels that released CO2, methane, and sulfur into their atmosphere. And even when they finally got their act together and switched to less destructive means of power generation it was already too late, increased global temperatures and more acidic ocean waters had led to millions of tons of naturally sequestered carbon being released uncontrollably into the atmosphere. It was slow and unnoticeable at first, but eventually it began to snowball out of control. Terrans had seen the fall coming and took out massive loans from the Union to build the sea walls as fast as possible, they built them in stages to accommodate for the rising levels, and even built ingenious locks to allow shipping in and out of the protected seas. But those loans had come at a great cost, and the Martian representatives were forced to allow a lot of unregulated industry to set up shop on earth. Those industries had choked the skies with smog and heavy metals that made breathing a painful chore.
It was all incredibly sad to see in person. Alwen had been horrified to hear about on the ship from the other sailors, but seeing it for herself was something else entirely. What was worse was that all the preventative measures and stop gaps the Terrans had built weren’t enough, researchers predicted a total collapse of the ecosystem which meant that their would be no more trees of plankton to recycle the CO2 into oxygen to breath. Leaving 10.5 billion people trapped on a world rapidly running out of breathable air. Attempts at colonizing other worlds in Sol had only increased the insane amount of debt they owed Union banks, and as crime, riots, piracy, and terrorism drove off Union business, the Martian government had less and less money to try and repay those loans.
With a homeworld like that it was easy to see why so many Terrans had turned to piracy. Astarte had dominated the waters the cutthroat world of piracy and had used that money and power to build an ever-expanding industrial empire, turning the blood money into lucrative ventures that gave back to the economy and generated a lot of stable jobs for many people.
The ferry docked with one of the three massive towers that stretched out from the planets surface to the edge of Earths atmosphere called a space elevator, and they were allowed out. Even then Alwen’s throat felt ragged as she puffed in slightly fowl breathes of heavy metal and sulfur rich air, but one long elevator ride later and Alwen began to miss the air at the top. The moment the doors opened Alwen began to cough and hack as seemingly poisonous air tried to claw out her throat.
“How do you live like this” she wheezed. She noticed that she wasn’t the only one suffering.
Alice was also wheezing “Its technically still ‘breathable’ despite the burn, it doesn’t kill you on contact. Takes maybe twenty or thirty years for the health complications to become fatal, but the Union provides hospitals that rehabilitates your lungs, its not a perfect solution but they keep you from dying. You get used to it.”
“Maybe not” Gabriele said as he gave Alwen a concerned look“She’s not Terran, her lungs might not take it like ours.”
“She could handle Vaxis, she’ll handle this as well” Alice said.
Despite the callous nature of her comment Alwen could feel herself slowly recovering, just enough to stand and move. It wasn’t comfortable, but she could manage. However the moment she got back on the ship she would have Bachir scrub her lungs clean.
The space elevator was the central hub for getting both passengers and cargo to and from the surface of earth, and as such it was in the center of a vast network of rail and naval shipping. Located in the famous city of Manhattan this tower received cargo from both Americas, Europe, and the western side of Africa. Terrans of every shape and color bustled through the busy tower on their way to far flung corners of this poisoned world of theirs. They boarded a packed train that screeched out of the station as soon as the doors closed to the old capitol of the United states, Washington D.C.
The ride to D.C. was only thirty minutes, but it allowed Alwen to see an endless spawl of highways, skyscrapers, and abandoned rusting factories. The train was on an elevated track and Alwen couldn’t see an end to one city and the beginning of another. She would have believed she were still in Manhattan when the train stopped if the announcer hadn’t told them where they were. They were hurried off the train by hordes of people and were out of the station before she knew what was going on.
Supposedly this had once been a very wealthy and beautiful city, but as the wealthy left Earth for Mars the old luxury apartments got subdivided into tiny rooms and had several ugly extensions slapped on top as droves of working-class people filled up the city. Alwen could see the crumbling remains of a once gorgeous building buried beneath the grime and drab extensions. Other parts of the city had been just flat out bulldozed and replaced with massive concrete blocks of apartments, all looking identical to another. As they pushed through the throngs of people rushing from one place to another under the grey overcast sky Alwen felt a prickle down her back, as if she were entering the den of some great beast. A feeling she recognized from the pirate capital, nothing concrete, just a feeling that she was somewhere dangerous.
“Stay close to me” Alice said lowly “Earth aint a nice place, specially to aliens. Lot of xenophobes who are desperate to prove something.”
“I can see why the Union calls this a Hellworld” Alwen whispered back.
“Its not all bad, it’s a lot better around where I grew up in the Rockies. Fresher air too.”
“Where are we even going?”
“Arlington, used to be where the US honored those who fell during wartime, now its Arlington base. A while after the US disbanded some assholes wanted to cover it in concrete and build more shitty apartments. So the military clans from across the country came together and forced their bulldozers off the land, after we kicked them out we dug in. Stockpiled weapons, built barracks, and fortified the area. They tried to get the Union to kick us out, but some clever networking made our cause go public and we got a ton of worldwide support, people everywhere began to occupy the cites of their national monuments. Nowadays its protected land, maintained by the US veteran and descendent association, or the Vet clans as we call’em. And when one of us dies in the line of duty to the clan they get a service here, they arrange a date, invite the friends and family of the deceased, and inter their ashes with honor. Just a heads up, don’t mess with the honor guard. Those guys take their job very seriously, and will not hesitate to shoot you if your not where your supposed to be.”
“I understand, before he became a pirate captain, Modius was a high-ranking member of our navy, he brought me to a few memorial services. Though our involved a pyre and a night long vigil”
Alice made a contemplative noise “Ours sound cooler, we shoot guns and have an honor guard musician play the bugle.”
Alwen looked at Alice and decided that the Felinoid must have been joking or exaggerating.
Terran military funerals and Torweni military funerals had one quality in common, strict unflagging professionalism. The honor guard wore perfectly tailored suits, kept fastidiously clean and polished, marched in perfect order with every movement being perfectly measured for precision. Alice hadn’t been lying about the bugle, or the guns, but unlike Alwens mental image of a bunch of Terrans going wild and shooting their guns recklessly into the air, they moved with the exact same professionalism they did everything with. The forlorn cry of the bugle and the precise coordination of the gun salute was somber despite the general raucous associated with both.
They folded the striped flag of the old American republic without a care in the world that the nation it represented was long gone, and passed it to a women with similar skin and facial features to Wraith. She accepted it and Alwen felt said as she saw that the women was stoically holding back tears.
Alwen herself had been holding back tears as well, it had been half a year since Wraith’s death, but only now did she realize that she had been holding on to the ghost of his memory this whole time. Something about this incredibly formal funeral helped her let go of that ghost and helped feel like she could finally begin to move on, not forget but let go of the pain and remember the fun times.
When the funeral was over Alwen broke from the group of marines and approached Wraiths mother, the women was wearing black like everyone else and was chatting with Captain Astarte softly. The women looked past the captain as Alwen approached “Can I help you?”
“I’m Alwen Djani, I was with Wraith when he died, he gave me these and I was hoping to return them.” Alwen said as she withdrew Makaze and the Wakizashi from her belt.
The women stared at the two blades and reached out to take the Wakizashi but not Makaze. “This one was his, the other belonged to someone else, we have his sword at home.”
Alwen nodded and returned Makaze to her hip, to be honest she had been hoping the woman wouldn’t take Makaze. She had grown attached to the blade and didn’t want to part with it, but offering it to his mother had been the right thing to do.
“Tell me, Alwen, what were Iosefa’s last words?” his mother asked.
Alwen felt her lips prickle a little with the phantom memory of his kiss, but decided to keep that part to herself “He was telling me about his home, Tutuila. It sounded beautiful.”
The woman smiled “Not as beautiful as it once was, but my boy could always see beauty wherever he went. Thank you, and thank you Captain Astarte for getting retribution for my boy.” The women said before she left.
Astarte watched Alwen appraisingly “that was a good thing you did” she said quietly.
“It was the right thing, what did she mean about retribution?” Alwen asked in confusion.
“I was telling her about the battel on the capital and how you got the killing blow on the leader of the pirates who attacked us.” Astarte explained.
“I… I didn’t though, Ah’ared escaped didn’t he?”
“Yes, but we have broken the Aunviry faction, scattered the remnants to the winds, and ended the reign of a tyrant. We did a lot of good that day, and I doubt Ah’ared will ever show his ugly head again.” She said serenely.
“I guess, just kind of wished we got him as well.”
“My, how bloodthirsty of you” she teased
“I’ve been among you people for to long.” Alwen said flatly.
Astarte smiled and glanced to the group of marines, “Did you have any pressing plans tonight?” she asked.
Alwen frowned “No, not really.”
“Would you like to accompany me to my hometown then, I have something to do there and I’ll need your help?”
Alwen was curious about what Astarte had meant, she looked back to her marine friends “Sure, let me just tell Alice where I’ll be.”
“Take your time” she said unhurriedly.
Alwen walked back to Alice and told her that she was going off with the captain, Alice nodded and Alwen followed Astarte out of the cemetery.