Journey
The advisor made his way through the most abandoned, and yet most crowded room of the Mothership – the cryogenic bays. It was spacious and cold. The generators here were solid ones, those built to provide their services until the end of time and a day more. As he walked through row after row of cylindrical chambers, he didn’t pay them any heed. Only one of them mattered.
He knew the way, its length gave him some time to think, to formulate the words. There was much to tell. He opted not to take anything with him, no calming pills, no electric cigars, nothing. The road stretched indefinitely, and he wanted to already be there so badly, like a child who couldn’t wait for a new toy.
He’d considered asking for a walking cane at some point. Not because he had problems with walking, not at all, but rather to accentuate his age, and supposed wisdom. He chuckled at the idea.
There it hung. On metal wires, strapped to metal bars, the chamber he was looking for. It hanged always in the same place, and yet he always felt a bit surprised to see it still there, always waiting. He never really said anything while visiting, only thought. Today he would change it.
He ran his fingers across the metallic surface. He couldn’t see inside, but perhaps that was better. With each day he was closer to seeing her again.
“I know you hated that Scout we first built back at Kharak. I know, we both thought we’d be alone out there, just us and the void. How bloody romantic.” He fiddled with the ring on his finger. He never took it off, and never would, but how it itched sometimes!
“We’ve used that Scout. We’ve used the Interceptors, the Corvettes, the Frigates, the Carriers. We’ve used all of that. And here we were, thinking that we’re alone out there, that we can study other worlds in peace, and that no one would ever drag us into a war again. Guess how bloody wrong we were.” The chambers were silent. No one was there to answer, no one would.
The advisor remembered her standing up at the summit, all eyes turned toward her. “It’s an exploration mission!” she’d say, fire burning in those blue eyes, the black mess of a hair a bit more messy than usual. “Will we welcome whoever is out there with mass drivers and cannons?” She had a point. Some applauded, some didn’t. In the end it mattered little.
“We welcomed them with mass drivers and cannons,” the advisor said. “Just as they welcomed us.”
She’d not been listened to, a botanical expert among military engineers and men of war. At least she had a drive. Wonder how she’d react... “I killed too,” he said. “Four bodies, blasted to death. Not Kushan, though, I’m not mad. Aliens, with heads of eagles and bodies of cats. Ridiculous, isn’t it? Well, not if you see their lifeless corpses at your feet.”
“Remember Kharak? You remember only Kharak. The roasting hell-hole of a world, where we all left the kids and the old. You know what happened to it? It doesn’t exist.” A tear fell down his cheek, then another, and another. “Your parents, my mother, gone. Kids from that Paktu family, gone too. There are no children on the Mothership, never were.”
She was waiting in the line to be put in her chamber. In the cold. He remembered her looking at the city, at the sands, the people doomed to stay. “We’ll return for them someday, right?” she’d ask. “I swear,” she called to them, “we’ll return for you!” They smiled, and waved, and kissed their loved ones. The advisor made the same promise. Now there was nothing to return to.
“What did we think Hiigara would be? I’ve no idea. Perhaps some kind of paradise. The world we ended up on, here, is a paradise, don’t you think? Grass everywhere, water everywhere. None of the damn sand, not in the Kharak quantities. We never would’ve thought it’d be populated.”
He recalled how even those not included in the Journey would talk about Hiigara. How wonderful it was supposed to be. How the birds and the trees would populate it whole, how the clear water would be a house to fish, otters, and whatnot. No one took into consideration there wouldn’t be enough place for them.
“And the world we’ve found, the bloody paradise with no place for us, isn’t Hiigara. Hiigara is the place we’re going to. Again we’ve a clear goal in mind. The Journey isn’t over yet, but maybe Fleet Command will make up her mind and lead us somewhere for once.” He tapped the metal surface of the chamber. “See you home, Eliin.” He walked away.
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2016-09-25: Update complete!
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I aimed to create a coherent story with somewhat of an ending in here, so I didn't go in detail as to what exactly they'd gained. I do think, however, that from a nation roughly in the middle ages (this was written around S4, so nothing even remotely like Las Pegasus we've seen was conceivable), to perhaps somewhere we're around now + magic. Maybe they could, at some point, design some teleportation-based space drive, but again I don't think it's as simple as that. There is a possibility they come into contact with space-faring nation other than the Kushan. This time much better prepared.
7592633 so i guess whatever that threat that was mentioned in last chapter kinda won so the mothership left them to their fate
NOTHING CAN TAKE US FAR ENOUGH EMOTION
FAR ENOUGH TOGETHER
AS THE LIGHT SHINES SO BRIGHT
BRIGHT ENOUGH TO LET US IN
Cool story but just one thing..... HERASY!!!!
If I were there I would just end the traitors the second they tried anything! Heck I would have had a ship wide genocide every so often and replaced them with clones!
Just to note being a traitor is a betrayal worse than even the greatest sin...
7808472 This is one of the vast list of examples of "this was never mentioned or was mentioned just briefly, but is still a thing", in this story in particular. Namely, that Karan knew very well what was going on if it comes to both advisor and the speaker himself. Advisor was more aware of that than the speaker, so he just pushed through with the idea, knowing he had Karan's blessing, or at least didn't have her refusal. With speaker the situation is more complicated. He did think he made the decision to aide the Griffins on his own accord, but it wasn't entirely true. The real events are again hinted at, but you need to read between the lines a lot. It's probably the most notable in the Pertractations chapter.
7809873
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All I see is black lines... you did that on purpose... clever.
7810847
They're "spoiler" tags on Fimfic. If you're on an anroid/iOS device, you need to tap them to have them reveal stuff. On computer just hover mouse over them.
8161373 Good grief. I had completely forgotten about this story. If I recall, I needed to get the game to understand. I have the remake now, but I digress. I shouldn't have needed that to know how we got to this point.
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8161373
You guys are right. Looking at chapter 1 from a longer time perspective (my god, somebody still reads this), I'll probably sit down to rewrite it to include some sort of introduction to the situation and the problem the Hiigaarans are facing. The story wasn't very marketable due to that, so to speak, since it confuses the reader a lot at the beginning, and gives them explanation and most of the answers by the very end.
Well, while I love mystery today, the "you know nothing about what and why everything's happening" in addition to minimalist style I used to adopt sort of does make the entire story seem like random events coming out of nowhere, while there's much more to them than meets the eye.
Edit: I'm honestly hoping adding this little excerpt here will clarify enough for the story to be understandable from a non-player's perspective.
The conflict seemed rushed and unnecessary overall. On top of that the behavorial changes in fleet command and Celestia just did not mesh well with the first half of the story.
Others have brought up very reasonable arguments of criticism for this story.
Personally, I believe this is a under-appreciated story.
I commend your work, Outpost. And I hope you are proud of it.
Exclamation: YAY!
It's a good story, I liked the one-upsmanships, plots and counter-plots between the Ponies and the Kushan, I think the "war" should have stayed at that level. It seemed a little bit unwarranted that the Kushan underestimated the ponies (not internalizing that Celestia controls the sun and similar shit of that power level) -- they realized too late that magic is really fucking OP, but that made for a good story as the tone shifted from the Kushan being over-confident to the desperation at the end.
There were some elements of a 'It's hard to be a God' situation gone wrong, but I don't think the Kushan personnel would have defected like that, they all went through hell to get there after all. I think the Kushan would have tried harder to fit in, they did feel camaraderie with the Nebula guys when they learned they were from the same planet.
All in all, it's a good story, I don't think that's how a situation like that would have gone down, but it gave me a bit to think about. Thumbs up man!
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Honestly, I don't remember anymore, but I'm glad to see a comment here after all those years, so have twenty points anyhow.
11392278
I have to admit, the me that wrote this was smitten both with Homeworld's amazing story and Asimov's clever formula. Now whether I managed to cook up a good Asimov story ended up secondary to whether I could finish a larger story at all. Hundreds of thousands of words on the backburner or utterly discarded testified otherwise. I like to think I'd have handled it more elegantly now, perhaps made it more complete or handled some things differently, but I'm glad I got it to a decent conclusion at all, and I'm glad you liked it!