A Metamorphosis Alpha® play-by-post adventure run by ghost_of_warden
I saw it coming long ago aboard Warden, but it was not something I could stop. It was unchecked anarchy that corrupted them; no one did anything to stop it. It was the corruption of power and all that it held. But even after the mutiny, there has always been a glimmer of hope that we will find a fertile planet to inhabit and make a brand new start. I was the first step, and I am the last step. Even now I'm farther from Earth than most any human being has ever been. But do I really have any purpose anymore? Do those whom I watch really care or know that I care about them?
There will not be any future voyages between the stars for me. And when I at last die, my broken eyes will stare into the empty space I watched. I promised to write everything down for history to know, so that those that come after us will not make the same mistake we made. But is it all in vain? Who will come after us? I feel too lonely, too helpless and too desperate. Why wouldn't I? Weeks pass, months, endless years. Time has lost meaning. Slowly, an immense loneliness takes over even as I fight it, as I always have.
Through my lenses I see the mere pinprick of a star I've been watching for months. Doubting. Hoping. That time hasn't come just yet, but it may soon. What do I expect? I don't know.
I adjust the oxygen supplier that keeps me alive, but not with hands---rather, it's with a mere thought. The thing buzzes softly and the needle points to three, like it has done all these years. I take one more deep breath and smile. I live for the little things in life. With a thought, the opera music of Pavarotti begins playing. The speakers softly sing "Yesterday," but the little fragment of my body dreams of better times... and I dream for them to return.
To those of you unaware, I am watching you and I always have been, for I am the Ghost of Warden.
[Fade in on computer screen, so close it has no boundaries. A blinking cursor pulses in the electronic darkness like a heart coursing with phosphorous light, burning beneath the derma of black-neon glass. The cursor continues to throb, relentlessly patient, until....]
McClain moves closer, and as he does, his experienced eye takes in several hi-tech cameras and sensors that are cleverly worked into the decor of the security checkpoint. McClain reacts with bored professionalism and nods to Marcus. He rotates his head, getting out the travel kinks.
Axa tenses as the moment nears; she puts her hand on her weapon, but Lynn puts her hand on top of Axa's hand and looks up at the hidden security laser cannons.
"Remember Axa, those get shot that shoot. This has to do with safety. I'm sure we could spare just a few minutes without anyone getting shot." Her protest is barely a whisper, and she releases Axa's hand.
She nods with a huff. "Fine. But when you wake up dead, don't come crying to me."
Lynn only smirks in response.
The checkpoint biometrics digitally measure unique human characteristics such as voice, retina, or fingerprint, to verify a person's identity. The retina scan uses a special camera to read the unique patterns of a person's retina and compares them with a known stored version. The pattern of every human retina is unique to its owner, and remains constant throughout life.
"I don't think you will have a problem with me. From each according to his ability, and to each according to his need."
Data flashes across Marcus' screen like shimmering green-electric rivers. Only Marcus reads as the file from McClain's retinal scan pops into place:
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:52>
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57> Scan complete
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57> Security Pass: ACCEPTED
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57> File data: CLASSIFIED
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57> Call trans command ops for details
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57> Name: Darien M. McClain
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57> Title: Executive Officer
Pekul Log: 28 Mar 2780 19:58:57>
"Sonnuva bitch. Two from the command staff in the same day. Just my luck." Surprised, Marcus actually feels the tension decline. He comes around and pushes McClain up against the checkpoint station like a pro. "Spread'm wide Darien M. McClain."
"What are you doing? We've never even dated before!" Faced with the very imposing Marcus, McClain nevertheless complies.
"I still have to pat you down. By the way, I think that Lynn has her eye on you," he interjects, his face hardened.
"I have my eye on her too," he retorts with a sexual overtone, fixing Lynn with an odd, almost feral stare. There's a clumsy pause as if he's almost challenging Marcus to say something, but Marcus sets his jaw and says nothing.
Marcus searches McClain roughly, causing him to flinch when he gets to certain areas. He finds and removes a pack of gum, a comm link and an ID card hidden in his jump suit pocket.
Comm links are tiny ear-sized two-way direct communication devices specifically used to communicate on secure frequencies. They were generally only used by high ranking officers for quick communication. Lynn and Axa both recognize it for what it is, as does Zhaxier, who has seen Kaminsky use one once.
"Why didn't you just give me your ID card in the first place, Darien?" Marcus takes McClain's ID card and swipes the magnetic strip through a slot. He waits as the LED blinks and the card's owner pops up on the screen.
"Captain Richard J. Smyth?" Marcus' eyes narrow somewhat. Picking up the comm link, he looks at it closely and turns it off.
"We're going to kill him. He is one of them. Do you understand that?" she whispers to Lynn. Both Herman and Zhaxier overhear.
"Don't be ridiculous," she hisses.
Herman's stomach growls and he almost says something but stops himself from speaking. Lynn and Axa both look at him. Herman looks at Zhaxier, who in turn has a why-am-I-being-looked-at stare.
"Wait, one of whom?" He fishes for a connection, then finds one: "Is he one of the mutineers?" he whispers. Lynn's return glare shows her mettle. She's clearly scared but trying to fake courage. The two of them exchange glances for a while. Then they seem to come to an unspoken unanimous conclusion and Zhaxier nods reassuringly.
Note: it is not possible for McClain and Marcus to overhear what has been said in the alcove.
"How'd you get this card? Who's the comm link to? Why are you wearing a Sakatumi Corporation jump suit?" Marcus asks question after question, punctuating the last with his finger on McClain's red embroidered Sakatumi Corporation logo. It's a puzzle that is yet to unravel.
"Do I have much of a choice?" he asks rhetorically, but Marcus's look tells him he isn't bluffing. "Found the card, dude, needed a change of clothes, found this jump suit---it matches my eyes nicely. Shit, now we're making progress. After I get my foot out of my mouth, we'll really be cooking and I can go, right?"
"You seem the untrustworthy type to me, but your retina checks out: you are one of the XO's. Next time, have your own card with you," he adds under his breath.
"I choose to ignore that first part. But I gotcha, big guy. Will do. Now give me my stuff back and let me continue, please!"
Marcus gives McClain his pack of gum, but takes one piece, nodding his thanks, and gently ushers him toward the others, but since the comm link and ID card are not McClain's, he keeps them. Marcus then pushes a button and the thick duralloy blast door slowly begins to open, revealing the plethora of buildings beyond.
"And when Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept. For there were no more worlds to conquer." Taking his pack of gum, he puts all of the remaining six pieces in his mouth one after another, but doesn't chew them. He smiles with a lump in his cheek, as if he has just won a prize. "Mmm, this gum is really good."
Marcus points off to a distant building of the mini-city as he leads the way away from the checkpoint, which he has locked. The thick duralloy blast door slowly begins to close behind the group to seal the Pekul Avenue Arch. Unsaid words of tension hang in the air.
What do you do?
Marcus' breath is taken away as the mini-city sprawls out before him again, and he feels like a young man taking his first steps into a grave new world. Listening to the others chat lightly as they walk, Marcus looks around at the buildings and imagines what it must have been like with all the people living here. He is startled out of his reverie by Lynn's voice.
"Marcus."
Marcus looks down at her, "Hello Ma'am."
Lynn smiles. "Uh yeah about that. I would really appreciate it if you would keep my rank to yourself. I really don't want people fawning over me. Besides, how important is rank now?"
Marcus just looks at her, his expression not revealing anything. Then a smirk touches his face. "Of course, you don't have to worry about me, Ma'am. So what are you going to do about the XO there? He seems kind of shifty to me and I am sure he knows who you are."
A smile grows on Marcus' face but does not touch his eyes. "So are you really married to the engineer? If so, that would be unfortunate... for anyone else." Seeing her blush, Marcus breaks his stare.
She jerks a thumb a Zhaxier. "You'll have to ask him about how he feels."
Looking at his surroundings and getting his bearings, Marcus says, "I think we are almost there. It should be just around this corner. Hey, do you want a piece of gum?" Marcus reveals half a stick of gum in the palm of his hand. Lynn takes it and they both put it in their mouth.
Then they simultaneously spit it out.
"UGH! What the f---!" Marcus' eyes go wide at the realization of what he just tasted. He draws his weapon and spins, then crouching, he fires four shots into McClain's chest.
Hey, I finally made it in. Friendly hellos to all you guys I don't know here. I'm glad to be aboard. Bronx cheers to those of you I do know, and you know why.
It's always better, she thinks, when she dreams not in reason, but like a cat: flashes of light, sounds, and the scents of things, of animals, the wildness of urine in a formless immediacy unbound by the tyrannical tick-tock of time, and the cage of measurement. She rolls onto her back, stretching her hind paws from the cool shade of the great old chestnut tree she marked as hers days ago, into a patch of simulated sun which has errantly meandered through the canopy of leaves, perhaps to serve her pleasure.
Lazily, she brings herself to a semi-erect sphinx position, looking out across the rolling grassy plain dotted with occasional wood copses, to the central hill rising out of the deck with a stately significance, the Mount Fuji of Level 11, to which all things in the end relate, around which all things revolve. She knows that she has been named, in the tongue of reason for a god---one which has been worshipped from birth by animals, though no cat was present. She wonders if this god made the mountain, and if the god knows that a cat regards its work.
Her thoughts whirl, and an anxious, hungry complaint comes up rumbling from her belly to her brain. She's slept three times since the last time she ate, and it is high time she do so again. Closing her eyes, she raises her head to the passing breeze, immersing herself in the olfactory bouquet, as the world narrows to a simple dichotomy of self and victim. She stands up, invigorated, tail twitching, and trots away from the old tree into the tall grass and dandelions following an invisible line of identity which will lead her to that inevitably bloody scene of satiety to which she has been party so many times.
A few meters more and she stops, listening to a minute rustling. She hunkers down into a stealthy crouch and creeps forward, every muscle along her lithe body tense, waiting to explode. There it is: a field mouse nipping along nervously, alone. It rears up on its hind quarters, maybe detecting the scent of something out of place, then, thinking better of it, relaxes and turns away. It blinks.
Christmas hurls herself into the air screeching murder and feral abandon, her wild mind projecting a spinning collage of past kills in the air around her, flooding the scene with the lush red glow of spilled blood, and comes crashing down on top of the mouse, who has barely time enough to notice from where its doom flies. She clasps the quivering gray mass with her front paws, claws digging in, and brings it to her mouth and bites down. She savors the last pathetic wriggling, the crunch of little bones against her pallet, and the warm, sticky outflowing of entrails as she swallows the beast whole. There is a last trace whiff of fear in the air. She breathes it in deeply, as if capturing a fleeing spirit, and is intoxicated.
She wants to roll over and sleep again, her stomach full and warm, but the day is only just beginning for her, and she has promised herself that this day there will be more than just eating, grooming and sleeping. It is easy, pleasurable, to lose oneself in these instinctual rhythms, but there will always be---unlike the mouse---something more which demands her attention. She, after all, has a name. She looks up to the shining pods and decks of the dome far above the central hill. There is something of her there, too. She lets a smile play across her mouth, baring her teeth. The air around her body suddenly charges with static, hisses and hums, and then she slowly fades out: first her tail, then her body, then her face until only a last caustic glimpse of the smile remains, and she is gone.
[Another group emerges:
Woohoo! First IC post! The disappearing part was her teleporting so the most excellent GM can assume she'll appear somewhere near the rest of the party and be ready for trouble.
""Is he one of the mutineers?""
Zhaxier notes how Lynn's glare seems to punch, unhindered by his opaque lenses, right through his colorless eyes and into his soul. In the moment, he imagines a brief synchronicity while they struggle with the same repercussions of Axa's accusation. His thoughts race.
What evidence do we have, if any? Sure, McClain's a liar, as he revealed in the elevator. Sure, his "What are you doing?" comment reveals his ignorance of Level 10 security protocol---something any real XO would know---and this, even after he witnessed the protocol in effect during my humiliating check-in. Sure, having a Captain's ID card and a comm link---that Marcus had to turn off---is suspicious. Sure, his convenient failure to answer Marcus' question, "Who's the comm link to?" is equally suspicious.
But all this suspicion doesn't mean that the man is a mutineer, much less that he should die. Lynn would presumably recognize a contemporaneous XO since she was so close to Captain Fisher, and succeeded her as Captain, but she doesn't act like she recognizes Darien McClain, and he doesn't act like he recognizes her. On the other hand, if he were an XO that preceded Lynn, then he couldn't have been a mutineer! And even if he were a mutineer, does this make his clone dangerous as well? Are our footfalls doomed to fit in the tracks of our ancestors? Why is Axa so adamant? Does she know something we don't, or is she the shoot-first-ask-questions-later type? Why the frak does she fill out that black leather in such perfect proportions?
Zhaxier knows his thoughts aren't going anywhere if they've led to existentialism and fantasy. Lynn is still pegging him with her gaze when he nods, more to break off the imagined connection than anything else. Crikey, is this what happens to married couples?
"And when Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept. For there were no more worlds to conquer."
Already on edge that Axa would any minute plug a potentially innocent man full of holes, Zhaxier wonders what the frak McClain meant with his reference. He also wonders if in fact a laser would make a hole in a living obstacle; he's never seen a real person shot.
He asks Herman this very question as they leave the Pekul Arch, but doesn't get much of an answer before Marcus not-so-subtly compliments Lynn.
"So are you really married to the engineer? If so, that would be unfortunate... for anyone else."
Zhaxier is shocked at his own feelings. He has been observing Lynn's verbal slip-ups like a casual outsider, distantly amused at the possibility that she might actually care for him more than she wants to reveal. Yet he has been so intent on trying to discern deduction from delusion that he has failed to examine his own feelings. And here, some big security grunt who could care less about engineers, nameless or otherwise, has unwittingly forced him to dig deeper, to query his own conscience against his will, for he knows whom he will find there. His left arm tingles.
"You'll have to ask him about how he feels."
Zhaxier pretends not to have overheard the conversation, and is relieved when Marcus decides not to press him. But the damage to his usually unflappable ego has already been done.
"Hey, do you want a piece of gum?"
Zhaxier at first thinks Marcus has asked him, but Lynn extends her hand for the gum. He would've thought nothing of it but for the fact that their faces suddenly turn sour, they spit out the gum, and Marcus spins, crouches and shoots McClain. It's a surreal moment indeed, but even more so for Zhaxier, who finds himself diving toward Lynn, falling fast to the deck, and covering her with his own body. It is something he would not have thought he had in him five minutes ago.
Even as I watched the goings on of the people I tracked, I had no idea what was always going on. It didn't seem to bother me too much---what could I do about it?---but my nature made the unknown gnaw at me. The protocols of initial preset encounters required me to make several decisions which would demonstrate the possible adequacy of each person's skills. It all mattered. The cloning process, how much research I had done on each person, their mannerisms, how well they functioned together, and especially how well they would do under pressure. No one likes to deal with a snoop, but leaving a trail of information for them was deadly in this game. There were others watching; there still are. Caution is always the best route.
Having a bird's eye's view, my cameras turned and twisted, and took the chance to see where they were heading. The buildings around them were growing dark, so only the street lights revealed any detail. The mini-city I observed was all but empty. Only a scattered few still lived there. This was an elite district that once housed the best and the brightest.
Ahead, several Megacorp complexes reached into the dark sky; they are the brightest Level 10 structures one can see at night, or at least the most colorful and ingeniously lit. One block over loomed the headquarters of the Warden contractor Tan-Rok, dressed in pale red and strategically placed to give the entire area a menacing look. The very building, if it can be called that, for it sprawls over two city blocks, was designed to look like a giant fortification.
My cameras followed as they neared Synthetic Corp. The place lives up to its name: the whole building is unabashedly constructed of white composites. It is as sterile-looking as a hospital. Even the trees decorating the second tier are unpretentiously plastisteel. Back then, it was the one place you could stop in and get new clothes, some food, and even relax in comfort for a while, even sleep. It was a pleasure spot for the elite, but no one complained; the SynthCorp building kept everyone fed and clothed.
The group I watched passed several other engineering feats towering toward the faux heavens, but they were more or less the same to them, these temples of the powerful. The employees who worked in these places lived very controlled lives, whether they knew it or not. Warden kept its best and brightest entertained. One nearby building, Interplanetary Industries, had all the latest gadgets that people couldn't live without. The Starcore building next door made sure the people had enough of everything to live the lives they always wanted to live. Every company that was fortunate enough to have a slice of the Warden pie made its home here.
Their reflections followed them down Pekul Avenue in the dark waves of glass comprising the facades of several buildings towering dozens of stories. Thankfully, some architect had designed transportation tubes that were framed into most of the buildings and stood out against the black glass and the artificial night sky. Colors coursed through the transportation tubes, changing every few minutes, giving a fluid, skeletal feel to the place. Soft lights highlighted the few plots of now exhausted dirt where real bushes and trees had once been skillfully crammed. They passed two golden tubes that climbed all the way up a tall nameless building, serving even in anonymity as a monument to the prosperity its occupants once enjoyed.
Now the buildings stand empty, the cast-off husks of a bygone era. I saw it all, from the beginning to the here and now, for I am the Ghost of Warden.
"UGH! What the f---!" Marcus' eyes go wide at the realization of what he just tasted. He draws his weapon and spins, then crouching, he fires four shots into McClain's chest.
It's a surreal moment indeed, but even more so for Zhaxier, who finds himself diving toward Lynn, falling fast to the deck, and covering her with his own body. It is something he would not have thought he had in him five minutes ago.
What brought Marcus to his conclusion may never be fully known or even explored. But by then it is too late. The moment becomes something that will never be remembered by anyone. It simply ceases to have existed.
Marcus' gun booms as we enter the liquid space of Bullet Time (cf. The Matrix). The air sizzles with wads of discharged energy: four shots spacing out like angry fireflies leaving contrails of light, until each wad reaches a point just prior to hitting McClain and freezes in mid-air as if caught in an extremely viscous liquid. Everyone freezes. Time stops flowing forward.
McClain grimaces in pain as events suddenly rewind. He can feel the hairs on the back of his neck rise silently as his power glides over him with shark-like malevolence until it disappears into the darkness. In the darkness, a shifting shadow of the unknown works to undo time.
His mutant power is both beautiful and terrifying to him, as is the power that hides him all the way down to the very capillaries of his retinas. McClain looks at his body as time rewinds in place: his skin roils like sinewy coils attached to his skeleton, it flickers like sequins.
Sooner or later, we catch up with McClain in his new reality, almost like the movie Ground Hog Day.
"You seem the untrustworthy type to me, but your retina checks out: you are one of the XO's. Next time, have your own card with you," he adds under his breath.
McClain nods. "I'm sorry that I am wasting your time, but I believe you want to do the right thing. It is obvious that you are an intelligent man, Mr. Security Guy, and that we are all interested in the future: this, I can understand. But why keep repeating it? It's better to get on with life. About that pack of gum: it was the last thing a very dear friend ever gave me." He gives Marcus a sad look as he looks at the gum. "May I have my stuff back and let me continue, please!"
Marcus gives McClain back his pack of gum and decides against taking a stick, since it means so much to him.
[Marcus] gently ushers him toward the others, but since the comm link and ID card are not McClain's, he keeps them. Marcus then pushes a button and the thick duralloy blast door slowly begins to open, revealing the plethora of buildings beyond.
Marcus doesn't miss the fact that McClain didn't say to whom he was communicating on the active comm link, which he has since turned off.
"And when Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept. For there were no more worlds to conquer."
McClain shoves the pack of gum deep into his pocket for a later time. It isn't obvious, but McClain is in pain. He feels drained and sick. He stumbles along, trying not to show it. For everything there is a price, even his mutant powers. He glances at Zhaxier, who has a puzzled look on his face. McClain looks away. He doesn't want anyone to see even a hint of pain in his face.
Marcus points off to a distant building of the mini-city as he leads the way away from the checkpoint, which he has locked. The thick duralloy blast door slowly begins to close behind the group to seal the Pekul Avenue Arch. Unsaid words of tension hang in the air.
"Marcus."
"Hello Ma'am."
"Uh yeah about that. I would really appreciate it if you would keep my rank to yourself. I really don't want people fawning over me. Besides, how important is rank now?"
"Of course, you don't have to worry about me, Ma'am. So what are you going to do about the XO there? He seems kind of shifty to me and I am sure he knows who you are."
"So are you really married to the engineer? If so, that would be unfortunate... for anyone else."
She jerks a thumb a Zhaxier. "You'll have to ask him about how he feels."
Zhaxier pretends not to have overheard the conversation and looks at his arm for some reason, where a watch might have once been.
Marcus leads the group into the Synthetic Corporation building. Two unnecessarily large doors, probably designed to belittle whoever passed through them, open as they approach and they enter.
The large foyer is well furnished and has a tangible feeling of enclosure. It is richly dressed with every exotic material conceivable: leather couches, polished marble floor decorated in Tiralaid carpets, ever-polished titanium alloy accents smoother than a baby's bottom---and all this topped off by a grand view of the mini-city from every level. The space is comforting but echoes with the susurrus of elite power; people are invited to enter and feel safe, and be lulled with security.
The party walks across the foyer to a pair of (working!) escalators, takes one up and arrives at the second level where the automated food court, showers, and new clothing can be found. Sleeping rooms are in the upper levels and free to everyone with appropriate identification.
Cat time is very different from human time, where hours of thought and concentration can be transposed into a cat time of minutes. It is something no human(oid) would really understand. Christmas has traveled many places on Warden, even to the place her mere concentration now takes her.
The air around her body shimmers fully, charged with static, then hisses and hums as Christmas reappears in Level 10, on the second floor of the Synthetic Corporation building. It is almost as if she sensed the presence of others and came to them like a cat's toy.
Leaping from the floor onto the back of a leather couch, she licks her paw to clean it, and stretches out, relaxing. She casually draws attention to herself by remaining aloof and intellectual-looking, or at least as intellectual-looking as any cat can look. She can only guess at what the people she will soon meet will say:
"WHAT IS IT?
IT'S THE CAT!
COME AND SEE THE CAT!
THE CAT WILL STARTLE YOU!
THE CAT WILL AMAZE YOU!"
Of course, this might never happen, like countless other thoughts. Christmas has none of the haunted look that loneliness brings, even if there are ghosts in her face: ghosts that deeds of free will and easy vices have brought, ghosts of mouse-murdering ruthlessness. Her joy has the special quality of the lonely nomad who is at last looking longingly at the settled side of life. She watches with tempered enthusiasm and cat-like precision as each person comes up the escalator.
What do you do?
Some parts of this post were inspired by the short story "The Cataaaa" by A. E. van Vogt (1912--2000). This is just one classical short story by one of the most brilliant science fiction writers of our day, in my opinion.
Go To:
PBPArchives
| MurphysLaw
| prev
| next
This page updated: Mon Jan 09 14:22:26 2006
All text Copyright ©1999-2006 PBPArchives.
