Risks taken, risks avoided. this is the life everyone leads. Crossing a street, walking under a tree, marriage. All of these have an element of risk involved.
When i was first informed that I was selected to travel across the galaxy aboard the Diogenes craft, I felt honored and somewhat afraid. The risk involved. Death in space, swift or slow, is a lonely business.
The government men assured me that the risks were low, at least as far as non-intelligent dangers were concerned. They actually had an estimate of how likely it was I would survive the journey; 94.6%, apparently above that of staying on our planet. But the catch was fairly obvious, and I've always been a skeptic. What if we do contact aliens? After all, that is the point of this whole debacle, right?
I was then told that the odds of contacting sapience out there is 0.025%. That's only slightly higher than my quarterly interest.
But they want to go anyway, because 0.025% is a heck of a lot more than zero in the eyes of the higher ups. To me, that number, which for some reason I believe it to be accurate, is the same as nothing. There's nothing out there.
But here I am, standing on the bridge of the first manned inter-stellar vessel in recorded history. The Suntracker Drives are humming as we decelerate, and everyone but me is busy preparing for planetfall. This world was a whole other risk, it gleamed welcomely up at me, inviting me to come down, to get to know a new world.
The hard metal of the hull vibrated almost imperceptibly, as it had since our departure, except for the brief time in freefall. This place has begun to gall me as much as my old home did.
I winked at the planet below. Sure.
Monday, August 13, 2012
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
The Last of My Kind
As I consign this brief record to the stars, I hope that other races and beings heed this warning, and that our accidental sacrifice is not in vain. I only ask that you who receive this message do not allow it to sap your will to resist alien invasion. They are merely extremely difficult to kill; it is not impossible. If you believe you have the capabilities to defeat them, strike first and with conviction!
But you must weigh your options carefully before you commit yourselves to war. If you can hide from them, consider it seriously. If such is your decision, you must take thought for the future; for someday they will find you and it is imperative to be prepared. We thought we were ready; we should have been sure. You must be. We had become careless in our uninterrupted successes throughout the deep frontier of space. Until we found the aliens, we were the rulers of all we surveyed.
I suppose when we located the aliens, we were scared. No one wanted to face the fact that we might not be the superior beings we imagined ourselves to be. Every species we had heretofore encountered had been obviously baser than ourselves. But these were, in some undefinable way, very different from the others.
I conjecture that this was the underlying motivation when we unanimously decided on extermination even before we had established mutual contact with them. Let this be a lesson to you who read this to avoid hastiness and to make logical decisions, especially as regards the Killers. We thought we knew how to make war. To the Killers, we are but as children in this ancient practice. What we did occasionally they have made into a horrible art. And they have used us to hone their skills at it.
We have not met many other alien races besides the Killers, but our experiences had led us to believe that all advances in science are made gradually and logically, climbing the hill of technology one step at a time. Another well-supported theory we had developed was that all of the alien sciences would not be irreconcilable with our own but still extremely difficult to incorporate. Two races always have very different ways of thinking and problem solving. But the Killers proved us wrong.
In the preliminary stages of our preparations for war, they disabled one scout ship with pure, brute force kinetic weaponry. (They have all the style and subtlety of an animal hitting another with a rock. But do not let their brutishness deceive you; it masks a murderous cunning.) And they exploited this ship beyond our darkest dream. If they had merely used it, there would have been no problem. As well suited as it was to its own specific purpose, it could never have defeated any of our many battle cruisers.
But they took this ship and, impossibly, modified it, cannibalized it, reproduced it. This was an idea that had never entered our lowest thought. We had unintentionally gifted them with interstellar travel and the principles of our military secrets. (We are sorry for this and for the trouble we have caused any who receive this missive. Before wallowing in your just anger, recall who we are who send this: a race being pushed over the canyon edge of our ending. We have paid dearly for our carelessness.)
Thus began what we believe to be the greatest war in history of the universe, and we do not say this lightly.
We anticipated a simple extermination in our first assault, and we did meet with initial success. But then the defenses which they had been building since they had captured our first ship came into play. As yet their models were still imperfect, but they came, and they came, and they came. They were repugnant, indescribable, there were many, they never gave up, and they wouldn't die. You could shoot off a sizable chunk, and they still killed. They knew they were dead, but mortally wounded they fought on. It made no sense and was as repulsive as the way they moved. (And as you value your soul you cannot look into their eyes.)
In specific, one-on-one combat, their strategy was all hot calculation. Yet as a whole, their overall battle plans were cold and incisive. (We theorize a higher and a lower caste. What this is based on we cannot agree: Accident of birth? Age? Width? Mental quirk?) Some Killers actually boarded our two heavy cruisers and suicidally wrought incalculable damage. They have little or no regard for life. They throw the lives of their own beings away with wild abandon. We suspect that the Killers are a hive mind species, though we have never met one before. But there is can be no other explanation as to why the individual beings would be so ready to toss out their lives unless they had no say in the matter. No individual could place so little value on his own survival unless insane; and insane races cannot build space ships. At least that is our hope, but to be starkly honest we do not know.
We tried to study the data we gathered when scouting and when in battle with the Killers, but it is impossible to contemplate for any length of time. It is possible to think like someone else, to put oneself into his place. This can be done even if his motivations are opposite one's own. It is a mere reflection of one's own values. But our type of thought and the Killers' way of thinking (if indeed they do think) are skew. They do not intersect at any point, making research impossible. One cannot understand the Killers without becoming an alien in mind if not in body. We lost many of our best psychological analysts to this alien insanity (as we perceive it) before we understood what was occurring.
They destroyed us methodically and also intuitively. We had bases on other planets. We did not have many colonies, but we did have munitions dumps and refueling/repair stations on or near many worlds. They found them all. It seems they tracked us through the portals we created, or followed us through without our knowledge. Either of those was considered impossible and is still unexplained by our most thorough researchers. There was an early attack on the headquarters itself but it was fended off with only a little difficulty. That is our one major victory against the Killers. However, we recently discovered that it was a mere feint and testing of our defenses. It was when we deduced this that we entirely lost hope.
It is when they are irrevocably doomed that the Killers are at their worst. Never back them into a corner if it can be avoided. If they have nothing to live for the Killers wholeheartedly embrace the coming of death, both ours and their own. They become virtuosos of killing. We do not think that resignation even translates into their atrocious form of communication. In all their tactics of last-ditch battles there is a desperate efficiency. It is for this we have named them the Killers; that is not the name they have taken for themselves.
On their language we have wasted much time and effort, and are back where we began. We have failed to determine for certain whether it is a language or not. They communicate, yes. That much is definite. But how far can communication be carried without becoming a language? Perhaps it is a language to them, with clearly defined rules, but to us it is less than gibberish. Their body movements are strangely limited and apparently contradictory. As usual with the Killers, research was made useless by the very alienness of them. Do they have some sort of cycle that they suit their communication to? We speculated often on this, for even if we observed a single alien its modes of expressing itself changed drastically. Did it know we were watching? Were they trying to confuse us? We do not know. WE DO NOT KNOW. We are being slaughtered like beasts in the pen and still we know nothing, nothing...
For those who regard life so lightly the Killers have an unshakable confidence in their right to live over ours. Yet ours is much the older race, and as far as we understand they have no art or civilization to speak of. If they have any, it is a rough and chaotic social structure. But somehow they excel in the art of war, in spite of a contradiction we have not even begun to understand. If one will sacrifice itself so easily, then why do they not give up and leave us in peace? Death comes naturally to them, so why do they not let it come?
We want to kill them, and for such short-lived creatures they are strangely uncaring of death. On the surface it seems an easy victory for us. Underneath the surface is something we do not understand, and it is massacring us. Even now I hear the news from the headquarters' defenses of the defeat of the fleet and the fall of my world. I am not like the Killers. Though I do not welcome it, I recognize when my death is upon me. I accept it.
I have little time left.
Beware of the Killers. No doubt you will recognize them when you see them, yet I will include their description regardless. When fighting or moving they have their longest side vertical to the gravitational force. They are supported in this fight against gravity by two segmented appendages, with two more jointed offshoots from the upper portion of the holdall containing the vital functions. The offshoots are revoltingly divided into manipulative pieces at the ends. They have a central nervous system with the nexus located inside a very roughly spherical piece perched on a protruding stalk. This also contains the terrible visual sensors. On top of this is a strange repulsive group of extensions that seem to flow viscously in moving fluids. We call them Killers, but they call themselves humans.
But you must weigh your options carefully before you commit yourselves to war. If you can hide from them, consider it seriously. If such is your decision, you must take thought for the future; for someday they will find you and it is imperative to be prepared. We thought we were ready; we should have been sure. You must be. We had become careless in our uninterrupted successes throughout the deep frontier of space. Until we found the aliens, we were the rulers of all we surveyed.
I suppose when we located the aliens, we were scared. No one wanted to face the fact that we might not be the superior beings we imagined ourselves to be. Every species we had heretofore encountered had been obviously baser than ourselves. But these were, in some undefinable way, very different from the others.
I conjecture that this was the underlying motivation when we unanimously decided on extermination even before we had established mutual contact with them. Let this be a lesson to you who read this to avoid hastiness and to make logical decisions, especially as regards the Killers. We thought we knew how to make war. To the Killers, we are but as children in this ancient practice. What we did occasionally they have made into a horrible art. And they have used us to hone their skills at it.
We have not met many other alien races besides the Killers, but our experiences had led us to believe that all advances in science are made gradually and logically, climbing the hill of technology one step at a time. Another well-supported theory we had developed was that all of the alien sciences would not be irreconcilable with our own but still extremely difficult to incorporate. Two races always have very different ways of thinking and problem solving. But the Killers proved us wrong.
In the preliminary stages of our preparations for war, they disabled one scout ship with pure, brute force kinetic weaponry. (They have all the style and subtlety of an animal hitting another with a rock. But do not let their brutishness deceive you; it masks a murderous cunning.) And they exploited this ship beyond our darkest dream. If they had merely used it, there would have been no problem. As well suited as it was to its own specific purpose, it could never have defeated any of our many battle cruisers.
But they took this ship and, impossibly, modified it, cannibalized it, reproduced it. This was an idea that had never entered our lowest thought. We had unintentionally gifted them with interstellar travel and the principles of our military secrets. (We are sorry for this and for the trouble we have caused any who receive this missive. Before wallowing in your just anger, recall who we are who send this: a race being pushed over the canyon edge of our ending. We have paid dearly for our carelessness.)
Thus began what we believe to be the greatest war in history of the universe, and we do not say this lightly.
We anticipated a simple extermination in our first assault, and we did meet with initial success. But then the defenses which they had been building since they had captured our first ship came into play. As yet their models were still imperfect, but they came, and they came, and they came. They were repugnant, indescribable, there were many, they never gave up, and they wouldn't die. You could shoot off a sizable chunk, and they still killed. They knew they were dead, but mortally wounded they fought on. It made no sense and was as repulsive as the way they moved. (And as you value your soul you cannot look into their eyes.)
In specific, one-on-one combat, their strategy was all hot calculation. Yet as a whole, their overall battle plans were cold and incisive. (We theorize a higher and a lower caste. What this is based on we cannot agree: Accident of birth? Age? Width? Mental quirk?) Some Killers actually boarded our two heavy cruisers and suicidally wrought incalculable damage. They have little or no regard for life. They throw the lives of their own beings away with wild abandon. We suspect that the Killers are a hive mind species, though we have never met one before. But there is can be no other explanation as to why the individual beings would be so ready to toss out their lives unless they had no say in the matter. No individual could place so little value on his own survival unless insane; and insane races cannot build space ships. At least that is our hope, but to be starkly honest we do not know.
We tried to study the data we gathered when scouting and when in battle with the Killers, but it is impossible to contemplate for any length of time. It is possible to think like someone else, to put oneself into his place. This can be done even if his motivations are opposite one's own. It is a mere reflection of one's own values. But our type of thought and the Killers' way of thinking (if indeed they do think) are skew. They do not intersect at any point, making research impossible. One cannot understand the Killers without becoming an alien in mind if not in body. We lost many of our best psychological analysts to this alien insanity (as we perceive it) before we understood what was occurring.
They destroyed us methodically and also intuitively. We had bases on other planets. We did not have many colonies, but we did have munitions dumps and refueling/repair stations on or near many worlds. They found them all. It seems they tracked us through the portals we created, or followed us through without our knowledge. Either of those was considered impossible and is still unexplained by our most thorough researchers. There was an early attack on the headquarters itself but it was fended off with only a little difficulty. That is our one major victory against the Killers. However, we recently discovered that it was a mere feint and testing of our defenses. It was when we deduced this that we entirely lost hope.
It is when they are irrevocably doomed that the Killers are at their worst. Never back them into a corner if it can be avoided. If they have nothing to live for the Killers wholeheartedly embrace the coming of death, both ours and their own. They become virtuosos of killing. We do not think that resignation even translates into their atrocious form of communication. In all their tactics of last-ditch battles there is a desperate efficiency. It is for this we have named them the Killers; that is not the name they have taken for themselves.
On their language we have wasted much time and effort, and are back where we began. We have failed to determine for certain whether it is a language or not. They communicate, yes. That much is definite. But how far can communication be carried without becoming a language? Perhaps it is a language to them, with clearly defined rules, but to us it is less than gibberish. Their body movements are strangely limited and apparently contradictory. As usual with the Killers, research was made useless by the very alienness of them. Do they have some sort of cycle that they suit their communication to? We speculated often on this, for even if we observed a single alien its modes of expressing itself changed drastically. Did it know we were watching? Were they trying to confuse us? We do not know. WE DO NOT KNOW. We are being slaughtered like beasts in the pen and still we know nothing, nothing...
For those who regard life so lightly the Killers have an unshakable confidence in their right to live over ours. Yet ours is much the older race, and as far as we understand they have no art or civilization to speak of. If they have any, it is a rough and chaotic social structure. But somehow they excel in the art of war, in spite of a contradiction we have not even begun to understand. If one will sacrifice itself so easily, then why do they not give up and leave us in peace? Death comes naturally to them, so why do they not let it come?
We want to kill them, and for such short-lived creatures they are strangely uncaring of death. On the surface it seems an easy victory for us. Underneath the surface is something we do not understand, and it is massacring us. Even now I hear the news from the headquarters' defenses of the defeat of the fleet and the fall of my world. I am not like the Killers. Though I do not welcome it, I recognize when my death is upon me. I accept it.
I have little time left.
Beware of the Killers. No doubt you will recognize them when you see them, yet I will include their description regardless. When fighting or moving they have their longest side vertical to the gravitational force. They are supported in this fight against gravity by two segmented appendages, with two more jointed offshoots from the upper portion of the holdall containing the vital functions. The offshoots are revoltingly divided into manipulative pieces at the ends. They have a central nervous system with the nexus located inside a very roughly spherical piece perched on a protruding stalk. This also contains the terrible visual sensors. On top of this is a strange repulsive group of extensions that seem to flow viscously in moving fluids. We call them Killers, but they call themselves humans.
Monday, April 30, 2012
Battlefield
A low flying plane reconnoitered the battlefield. The scorch marks and
craters, the men, dieing and dead. The battle was lost. The enemy seemed
to have slain all of the defenders, each trench was shattered, it's men
lost. Many families would get black letters this day. The army of evil
marched on towards new lands, many detachments stepping onward,
synchronized and organized. The plane disappeared in a column of smoke.
But wait, something moves on the ground below. A lone figure has survived the battle. The rest are dead or fled, but one remains. He is only slightly wounded, some miracle of skill or fortune has left him alive.
The vehicles of the enemies grind slowly over the plain. Tanks of immense size move over the smaller trenches without pause, having difficulty only at the largest craters and blockades. A bridging vehicle rolls forward slowly, it's device held vertically over it. Then the transports and the artillery, their shells spent. It seemed ironic that these engines of destruction were having trouble traversing the land that they themselves had made nearly impassable.There was once grass here, even flowers, but now it is destroyed, nature's work unwrought by man.
The single man wacthed the machines come towards him. He was not done yet, he still had blood to spill for this cause. If he could destroy a single transport, or just one of the giant guns he would have helped his cause.
There had been many traps set by his commanders before the barrage. Mines, triggered by weight or by radio. A bridge that must be destroyed. A pit filled with gasoline that must be ignited. And more, many more plans with no time or men to execute them.
A look of resolve came to his smoke blackened face, as he seized a motorcycle to carry him wherever he had to go.
He would harass these people, these killers, as long as it was granted he should live.
But wait, something moves on the ground below. A lone figure has survived the battle. The rest are dead or fled, but one remains. He is only slightly wounded, some miracle of skill or fortune has left him alive.
The vehicles of the enemies grind slowly over the plain. Tanks of immense size move over the smaller trenches without pause, having difficulty only at the largest craters and blockades. A bridging vehicle rolls forward slowly, it's device held vertically over it. Then the transports and the artillery, their shells spent. It seemed ironic that these engines of destruction were having trouble traversing the land that they themselves had made nearly impassable.There was once grass here, even flowers, but now it is destroyed, nature's work unwrought by man.
The single man wacthed the machines come towards him. He was not done yet, he still had blood to spill for this cause. If he could destroy a single transport, or just one of the giant guns he would have helped his cause.
There had been many traps set by his commanders before the barrage. Mines, triggered by weight or by radio. A bridge that must be destroyed. A pit filled with gasoline that must be ignited. And more, many more plans with no time or men to execute them.
A look of resolve came to his smoke blackened face, as he seized a motorcycle to carry him wherever he had to go.
He would harass these people, these killers, as long as it was granted he should live.
Sunday, April 29, 2012
The Search
"The name Quinton Pendant is likely unknown to you. It is the name of the greatest artist that ever lived.
"I have never seen any painting by him, neither has any living man, to my knowledge. For he only made on work, one masterpiece. It is apparently not overstating it to say that it is the masterpiece of the human race.
"The work was described by the (very) late Leonardo DaVinci in one of his many notebooks. The legend that DaVinci's teacher once, upon seeing DaVinci's latest effort, throwing down his brush and never painting again is an evolution of the tale of Quinton Pendant. The main essence of the story is apparently accurate, a great artist did throw down his brush never to paint again. But this artist was not DaVinci's teacher, it was DaVinci himself. And the painting, was the greatest work of man, Quinton Pendant's life work.
"Very little is known about Quinton Pendant. His name suggests an English background, and he is referenced by several alleged contemporaries. But the name may be assumed, and the references are vague. There is the air of the supernatural about this man and his work.
"Apparently Mister, Monsieur, or perhaps Senor Pendant was a simple man. No direct references are made to his lineage, but it is hinted to be of a low nature. A son of a shepherd, or of a trader who sailed the seas.
"But how did he create such a masterpiece? That which geniuses and super geniuses had spent so long striving for, and failed to reach? Leonardo DaVinci, when death was upon him was heard to say 'I have offended God and mankind because my work didn't reach the quality it should have.' Pendant's work was all it should have been, all that it could be.
"But his work, alas, was lost. Stolen? Destroyed? Lost in some mass of confusion? I don't know. But I know this, gentlemen.
"It must be found. And it is worth all the effort, all the toil, all the destruction and cost that it is possible to spend on it."
"I have never seen any painting by him, neither has any living man, to my knowledge. For he only made on work, one masterpiece. It is apparently not overstating it to say that it is the masterpiece of the human race.
"The work was described by the (very) late Leonardo DaVinci in one of his many notebooks. The legend that DaVinci's teacher once, upon seeing DaVinci's latest effort, throwing down his brush and never painting again is an evolution of the tale of Quinton Pendant. The main essence of the story is apparently accurate, a great artist did throw down his brush never to paint again. But this artist was not DaVinci's teacher, it was DaVinci himself. And the painting, was the greatest work of man, Quinton Pendant's life work.
"Very little is known about Quinton Pendant. His name suggests an English background, and he is referenced by several alleged contemporaries. But the name may be assumed, and the references are vague. There is the air of the supernatural about this man and his work.
"Apparently Mister, Monsieur, or perhaps Senor Pendant was a simple man. No direct references are made to his lineage, but it is hinted to be of a low nature. A son of a shepherd, or of a trader who sailed the seas.
"But how did he create such a masterpiece? That which geniuses and super geniuses had spent so long striving for, and failed to reach? Leonardo DaVinci, when death was upon him was heard to say 'I have offended God and mankind because my work didn't reach the quality it should have.' Pendant's work was all it should have been, all that it could be.
"But his work, alas, was lost. Stolen? Destroyed? Lost in some mass of confusion? I don't know. But I know this, gentlemen.
"It must be found. And it is worth all the effort, all the toil, all the destruction and cost that it is possible to spend on it."
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