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"The Kitin Scriptures"; Hey dear people, here is my lil piece ;)
Topic Started: Jul 3 2008, 05:53 PM (324 Views)
Komissar
Yubo
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Chapter I


“We are a myriad minds forming one… We are a myriad footsteps, leading in one direction… we are the rustle in the night that makes the unworthy tremble, we are the mandibles on which their blood never dries… we harness the powers of fire and lightning… we are the true rulers of Atys… we are the Kitin. Fear us for none can stand in our path… Resist us and be eliminated… Embrace our rule as you would embrace death – willingly… The time will come when the many will rise and sweep through the land, cleansing it… returning it to it’s primeval state… freeing it from the lethal desease – the abominable horde of pests that keep borrowing into the heart of the land, sucking it’s sap dry, tormenting it, robbing it of it’s riches… the alien invaders will not walk Atys again… all of hominkind will be put to far better use… will serve a far greater purpose… will finally return what they have stolen… once their dead bodies decompose and fertilize the soil… This will come to pass… So say the “Many in one” – the Kitin.”

… when I first read this I simply couldn’t believe my eyes! True, at first I thought it’s not more than a joke when an old zorai quietly sipping his dandellion wine at the very back of ol’Thesos bar beckoned to me and looked me in the eye silently when I approached, never uttering a word. I thought it intriguing when he bared his forearm and on it there was a hardly visible tattoo – a string of zorai symbols. I am always so very proud of having deciphered most of them on my own. Just imagine – a matis unraveling those sacred zorai mysteries that the masked people themselves have long considered lost. I sat closer and peered into it. It read: The greatest truth of the greatest enemy is to be found here. Then it gave opaque directions to a certain cave in the deeper prime roots and hinted that the answer was to be found above ones head. I looked the old homin in the eye but the ivory mask did not betray any emotion… the dark slits that the blueskins have for eyes remained totally impenetrable. Was he mocking me then? Was that all a test? Or was it a gift – that one real adventure of my whole life that I was craving for since first I trod the blessed streets of Yrkanis? He didn’t give me any time to think of it then – he slowly rose – and walked out mysterious and dignified. I smiled then, dismissing this accident and addressing some other immediate concerns, but the thought crept away to the backstreets of my mind and kept gnawing there relentlessly like a worm, until I just couldnt stand it any longer.


It must be in our blood. We, Matis simply can’t allow something to remain out of reach, out of control. A craft we can’t excel, a knowledge we can’t grasp, a beauty we can’t enjoy… we will lose sleep we will think of little else until the goal is reached and or inner peace restored. The fyros and even some trykers call us “control freaks” and I agree that’s partly true. But is it a curse, or an advantage over everyone else, who will judge? I guess that racial trait was the main driving force behind my decision to give it a try one day. I donned my favorite extra dodge tryker MA, took my best amps, my sword and dagger, packed the traveling necessities in my mount’s saddle bags and set off…


I have never been a great fighter – the poets will never compose ballads and songs about me. I didn’t crush enemies at Outpost battles, I didn’t nuke their protective jewelry away, though I can proudly say I have never missed a good fight when I was able either. I was a healer – a backup for my friends and family and my heart always leaped with joy to see them charge into battle and I have always seen it as the most vital of tasks to keep their sap and stamina high, to help them up once they were stricken down to give others life until my own dying breath. But when you venture into those realms where the sun doesn’t shine, when you pass through the deepest bowels of Atys – be you a champion of karavan or even a hero of the nation – you simply won’t last longer then a couple heartbeats if you don’t possess stealth, speed, cunning and above all the knowledge of that wondrous place they call prime roots. A place where you can’t win by fighting, a place where you hug the walls as if they were your dearest kin a place where danger lurks everywhere and where the true enemy lives… The “many-in-one” as they call themselves… The Kitin…


Chapter II

Prime roots, the sheer beauty of it! The magical trembling melodies of the dripping sap, the eery glow of magnificent plumash, the silent flight of mystical apparitions - the plun, the herds of snow-white bodocs, armas and meck, grazing so peacefully that you almost miss a varinx – black as night, a ruthless hunter of the deep. One can never get enough of this place. The danger, the excitement and the joy, the pure welcoming darkness, that envelops you and drives you on ever deeper and deeper… This is the place that always called out to me, the place where I have returned over and over, the place that I will never forget wherever the roads take
me.

I was making my cautious progress along the wall, hugging it, keeping all around me in my minds eye: there the two giant vorax have found themselves a victim – it won’t take them long so I better sprint … aha and right behind that column-like structure a pack of hungry varinx might very well be awaiting my arrival… let me just go round a bit here to check out and see – huh that’s exactly the case, let’s leave this welcoming committee safely away. A couple of times I fought – with my fear enchanted sword and dagger of zorai make. You cast fear from the enchant on one and quickly deal with the other – dispensing seemingly weak but precise hits to the head to stun them for a time, the legs to make them slow, the eyes to make them blind. Jena is my witness, more than once have I seen fragile tryker girls dressed in provocative zorai light take out heavily armored top level melee tanks with just such a technique – dodging blows, hitting with a surgeons precision, feinting and evading counter-attacks. But it’s not the fighter skills that save my hide in the roots – the speed, the stealth and protection auras is what one really needs there.

Remembering the old zorai’s tattoo and it’s rather opaque instructions I drew myself a kind of a map – I must admit the matisian royal libraries really helped aswell… And judging by this map I was just about to… ah! That’s why I never noticed it before, even though I remember visiting this place – the small tube-like entrance to the cave was concealed by a floral tapestry – an intertwined mass of root vines and dense vegetation. Let’s just brush it away a bit… aha there. Now even a matis can squeeze through here. I was wondering how on Atys could a stalky zorai get himself through that small aperture when I noticed a rather crude but well-visible pictogram on the ceiling… It read: “The home of many in one”… Hmm… Many in one…I have never heard that name before. Maybe it was the way some ancient zorai scholar sect called themselves? Or maybe it was something even more interesting. The professional curiousity of an explorer ignited me and I started creeping forward with a determination of one obsessed. Oh If I only knew then where that road would take me, perhaps I would think twice and retreat before it was not too late… Making my slow progress down the tunnel, first thing I found was a really old zorai dagger half buried in the moss covering the floor. It bore the usual symbols telling of a warriors virtue and had nothing that would catch my attention but for a fact that it’s tip was broken off. Right above it on the wall was a hastily drawn inscription in zorai pictograms – “Danger, go forward for a test of spirit, follow marks”. The very first “mark” – a rectangular zorai style arrow was drawn right there and pointed the same way I was going. Alas the inscription was just as informative as it was precise. What danger? What test? And why should I go forward following marks if the path was really that dangerous? I didn’t hesitate much then – I just kept going overwhelmed by an excitement that leads many an explorer towards lethal traps. My spirit was soaring then, a fool, I imagined great discoveries, I even envisioned the way I would present them before the gathering of the matisian royal academy. Little I knew what awaited me in the dark passages, what remained there for so long, not really wanting to be found…

Chapter III

The passage dimly lit by occasional young plumash and luminous fungi twisted it’s way onward, the “marks” clearly visible on the right wall. I passed a couple of right and left turns - the zoraï arrows were insistently pushing me forward. I was so carried away that I almost missed the second dagger embedded up to the hilt in the tunnel wall. There was a piece of parchment and a small satchel attached to it. I carefully took the dagger out, picked up the parchment and read a line of zoraï text: "Important – inside you find the one thing that will let you survive here, rub this thoroughly into skin." Now that was something really interesting – I fumbled with the satchel laces while wildest thoughts were flashing through my mind. Survive? Can it really be that bad? Finally the laces were undone and a pungent stench struck my nostrils. Inside was a chitin sack full of sticky brownish liquid. The smell was absolutely unbearable. It looked like a gland of some sort most likely belonging to some kind of kitin. And this I was supposed to rub thoroughly into my skin? The thought appalled me then and I carefully tied the laces back and secured the satchel in my traveling bag. I simply wanted to press on to see what is there behind the next bend of the tunnel. But the thing I saw right around the corner chilled the
marrow in my bones.

First came the sound – the gradually increasing rustle and monotonous tapping with some awful scraping sounds here and there. It was the sound I knew well and came to dread in the dark bowels of the prime roots. It seemed to originate out o nowhere and envelop my whole being, gradually increasing in volume. I pressed myself against the wall and oh so very carefully peaked around the tunnel wall… The tunnel opened up into a vast cave, whose ceiling lost itself in the murky blackness and whose floor was totally devoid of any undergrowth. The only sources of light in this dark maw of a cave were a few plun silently floating in mid-air. And then I saw them – the beings that made the awful noise that pierced me to the quick – hundreds of them – moving in orderly columns along the cave – the kidinak. The rustle of their chitin carapaces was absolutely deafening here. I have never seen this many kidinak in my entire life. Even during a raid to Desertstock that I have undertaken with my friends- the "Whispers of Aria" not so long ago – when I had to heal so hard – my light skirt got almost destroyed upon me – torn by the violent coursing energies. But the impossible abundance of the hump-backed chitin I have encountered here was simply beyond comparison.

I should have taken the right decision there and then . I should have fled grateful to be in one piece after such an encounter – but no! As though Ma-duk the deceiver himself was whispering into my ear – an inner voice or that restless spirit some call “being an adventurer” something reminded me of the latest find – the gland with it’s pungent contents. Maybe, just maybe if I rubbed it into skin like the note suggested I would not be noticed by the kidinak? Maybe it blunted their senses somehow or made me look less likely a threat to them. I took it out, took off my clothes and pouring the gluey liquid onto my hand rubbed myself vigorously with it. Gradually I even stopped noticing the stench that seemed so horrid at first but still the fear that I felt in the face of such numerous enemy would not let me proceed any further. I waited for a small gap in the ranks of the passing kitin and darted across to the opposite wall of the cave feeling this might as well be the last moment before the magic seed Jena provides for her children spawns me at the nearest portal. Imagine my astonishment when upon reaching the opposite wall I have found myself not only safe and sound but also seemingly unnoticed by the insectoids. One of them passed so close to me I could almost touch it’s skittering chitinous legs and even that one showed no interest whatsoever. With great relief came also the understanding what an amazing opportunity has befallen me. Now I could venture much deeper into the kitin-infested passages and only merciful Jena knows what amazing discoveries await me there. Light-headed and dizzy with this miraculous turn of events I proceeded deeper into the cave. Gradually it narrowed down and I found myself in front of 5 gate-like entrances to other tunnels and caverns. Above the leftmost one a hastily drawn arrow – a clone of the ones I have encountered just before entering the cave was visible in the sandstone. Clearly this was the course I was supposed to take. I waited for another throng of kidinak to pass through that gate and boldly followed them inside. What was I thinking then – a young and naïve matisian adventurer carried away by scholar’s fervor… How could I let myself be lured into the very domain of an evil so ancient and so alien to hominity? Where were my instincts my sense of danger for Jena’s sake? The overwhelming curiousity brewed on a gnawing desire to find something as unique and miraculous as my very ability to venture within these halls unharmed, pushed me on and on through the tangle of corridors, chambers and caverns, with the unyielding zoraï arrows appearing around every corner. A fool – a dull-witted naïve and careless fool have I become in there – blinded and intoxicated by the greatest drug a scholar can come across – the heart-stopping call of the unknown…


Chapter IV


The Kitin still seemed to look right through me. By that time I had become so bold and careless in my unthinkable endeavor that I would occasionally touch the smooth carapaxi, brush a hand past the hurrying chitinous legs or even poke the sacks hanging under the bellies of the kidinak passing by. They did not notice – they just went on about their business full of unknown purpose, concentrated and seemingly senseless like one of the metallic Karavan machines that I have seen in Yrkanis and other cities of my beloved Matia… I couldn’t but admire the smooth outlines of their bodies, the formidable mandibles now pointing downwards in seeming peace. However dangerous and hated these creatures were they were still a masterful work of atysian genius. Whichever diety was responsible for all of creation on the living planet it sure was a real masterpiece – every single bit of it.
Suddenly I noticed one odd thing – it almost escaped my attention caught in the corner of my eye but then something alerted me and I stopped to look at another arrow on the wall that was a lot different from the ones I have seen before. Distorted contours, uneven lines, as though it has been scribbled by a little child barely learning to write… Did the zorai hand shake and tremble when he drew this? Was he wounded? Did he encounter some terrible danger among these halls? Oh but what am I thinking! The worst of dangers – the ancient enemy personified was all around me! Seems I already started to forget where I was, intoxicated by this euphoria of invisibility. I had to be more cautious, not to let this unbelievable success sway me from the path and make me do something rash. So even if the zorai scholar was wounded, he still drew this arrow, he kept going on and that must mean that something extremely important and interesting lay ahead… I must press on slowly and try to stay alert.

Another corner – the walls of the cave were covered with throbbing translucent sacks of prime root algae. I must take some time in the future and classify them – what a shame that no matisian botanist has ever committed these static specimens of atysian life to the high science! So I thought to myself as I passed this hall and seeing another strangely crooked arrow on the righthand wall turned around into a wide and dimly lit chamber…

There was a damp moss growing all over the floor – so soft that I sank almost to my knees, staggering while regaining balance. Involuntarily I took a couple steps forward so as not to fall face first into this welcoming moss… Behind me I sensed some movement – I turned around awkwardly to see two kinrey – elite soldiers of the nest - blocking the entrance. They did not look at me, if the word “look” can be used when describing a kitin, at least I did not have a feeling of being watched or monitored, but they effectively blocked the only way of retreat. A cold shiver ran down my spine as I turned around – the ceiling was low, the light from the algae barely penetrating the vast blackness of the room – ahead of me was nothing but darkness – but I simply had nowhere else to go now. What now Mr. Naturalist? I asked myself then… just as I heared a hiss coming from the walls – the same kind of sound the steam makes when it escapes the boiling cauldron… A sweet and musky smell entered my nostrils, a slightly glittering greenish-yellow cloud engulfed me and I plunged into oblivion – a black limitless expanse that swallowed me without a trace…

I woke up suddenly, as though rising to the surface from within a deep pool of water for a single breath of air that means life. I was blind… either that or the darkness was so complete that not even the ever-present prime root algae could provide any light here… I felt all around me – same thick and soft moss on the floor – a smooth wall – even and cold as glass and… The voice that sounded in the darkness almost nailed me down! It was a husky old mans voice full of pain and tiredness, but so unexpected and sudden was the very fact of it’s existence in the lair of the enemy that I sank back onto the damp moss – as though struck by lightning…
- Don’t be afraid, young one, - it said – The blindness will pass… as everything passes in time… as everything… passes...


Chapter V


-Who… who are you? – I barely managed these few words – so great was my astonishment. – And where am I for Jena’s sake?!
-Don’t hurry young one… I trust we will have all the time we need for idle chatter, – came the answer. - I am… was… Dai Xielu. Once a scholar of the zorai people… a long time ago. Perhaps you have heard of my brother – Meng Xielu – the great seer. Who or what I have become now is of no relevance. Let us just say that I am still a zorai… in my soul at least… Soon you will regain your eyesight and many things will become clear to you.
-But now you must rest. The “blinding spores” will not let go of your mind and body easily if you move around too much. There is nowhere to go… at least for now until your fate has been decided.
There came a soft rustling sound – as though a number of people were wading through the thick moss, I sensed a large shape approach me and a clay cup was pressed to my lips. It was water – a bit sweeter then usual but clean and refreshing. I drank from the cup, seizing it greedily with my hands and felt the old man’s hand rapidly retreat. There was a small breath of air as the same massive shape I felt before hastily drew back… I tossed the empty cup on the moss covered floor, lay back against the smooth wall and immediately fell asleep.

I can not tell how long have I slept. I awoke just as suddenly and the blindness was no more. I lay sprawled in the thick moss, it was damp and radiated a strange warmth, like the fur of a living mammal. The room I found myself in was very large and seemingly spherical - the walls were made of some kind of thick resin polished smooth and illuminated from within so that they seemed to glow. Their color was a deep yellowish hue reminding of amber and this eerie golden glow was everywhere – on the thick moss, on the occasional stalagmites rising from the bottom of this unusual cave, on my own naked skin. Yes, my captors left me naked save for a floral loincloth – my bag and my daggers - everything was gone. I looked around me – the hall was roughly a hundred paces across, the glowing walls formed a spherical dome, one side of it across from where I stood seemed a bit darker. Or maybe it was covered with some sort of symbols or ornaments – it was hard to tell from here. At the very center of the dome high above me – sat a kincher or a similar kind of kitin - also tinged yellowish-red from the glowing walls. It seemed to be doing something but I just couldn’t see what exactly. Most likely they have left him to watch over me, to see that I didn’t escape… Speaking of which – there seemed to be no exit from this place save for a narrow opening close to the center of the dome high above which was impossible for me to reach. I stepped closer to the glowing wall – felt it’s warm smooth even surface - no - even a professional climber would be powerless here. At least they have left me some food and even a crude dzao fiber blanket. It all lay in a heap a couple of paces away from me – strips of salted bodoc meat, dried fruit and a clay pitcher of water. I wrapped the blanket around my hips and it strangely reminded me of the white tryker caster pants I used to wear when I dressed in my healer uniform. Will I ever be able to heal my guildmates in an outpost battle again? Will I ever get out of this place alive? So many questions –– and this horrible feeling of utter helplessness – it all can drive a man mad! And then even the nanoseed will not save me. Jena in her infinite kindness has given us a return ticket from death but there is no way back from the tenets of madness… So… Imust calm down… I must sit and wait “until my fate has been decided” as the old zorai said. Decided by whom I wonder? The Kitin? Then there's only one kind of "decision" i would expect... And where is the old man himself anyway? There is nowhere to hide in this glowing prison cell…
- Master Xielu! – I called in a loud voice…
The answer came from high above me – “There is no need to shout, young man, I hear you perfectly well",- and the quiet tick-tack sound of chitinous legs moved in my direction…


Chapter VI

I must be dreaming. This is but a nightmare – a ghastly delirious apparition summoned by the toxins of sleeping spores. Now I will simply wake up and it will all be gone, yes… I pinched my leg hard but… nothing happened – the horrendous creature was still moving towards me – slowly descending the smooth caved-in wall of the chamber. It was a kincher – well at least the lower part of this abomination undoubtedly belonged to a kincher – the massive brown and black chitin legs, the formidable mandibles, the curved segmented abdomen, but above it, at that very spot where normal kinchers have a head was attached a homin torso – a blue-skinned male zorai… Hands crossed on his chest, head slightly tilted he was watching me serenely while the legs of a kincher steadily carried him down. His expression was impenetrable – like any zorai he was waring a mask, only his mask was dyed pitch black with eye-slits outlined bright yellow and another yellow and red eye painted in the middle of his forehead. The creature climbed down, sprang lightly onto the moss beside me and froze there – silent - watching my utter stupefaction…
So this… thing… was master Xielu? How is this possible? If a homin receives such a horrible wound that his body would be cut in half – he dies, and if he dies – he immediately respawns at the nearest portal – such is the miracle of the nanoseed. But this being stood right in front of me – I could hear it breathing through the abdominal Trachea - and seemed as real as anything in this room.
-As I said, young man, – it uttered wearily – things will be clearer once you regain your eyesight. – Just make sure you don’t loose your sanity now… that comes all too easily in a place such as this.
-I once was Dai Xielu – a respected member of the zorai scholar conclave. Now I have become this… - he spread his hands trying to encompass his new form - … thing. I am unable to get out of this chamber, same as you, and even if I could – where would I go? Could I possibly show my face among homins? Would anyone accept me there, or would they rather hunt me down like a chimerous horror I have become? All of this is of no relevance… I have my task and the ability to work on it’s fulfillment and that is the only thing that gives any sense to my existence.
-Master Xielu…, - I finally managed a few words. – But how? How did this happen? Who could have done this to you? – I sat down - my legs turned to molten wax and couldn’t support me any longer.
-It is a long story, young man, are you sure you want to hear it? Not that you have any other options – trapped as you are in this “amber egg”…

I nodded, trying my best to adapt to the very thought that a conversation with a being such as this could be taking place.

-Well…, - he sighed, and the air hissed through the trachea of his abdomen, - you might remember the story of the “tear of the kitin” – a mysterious amber artifact shattered into many pieces but thought to be able to wield tremendous power against the “ultimate enemy”. The pieces where gathered one by one – some found, some fought over and taken from brigands and outlaws – and brought to my brother Meng Xielu – at that time the seer in zora. He carefully studied this artifact – it’s importance was a bit exaggerated by the political powers of both fyros and matis but still it was not a thing to trifle with. It’s origins were unknown and it seemed to affect the psyche of nanoseed imbued creatures, including homins of course, and even drive some of them mad. I have also studied the artifact and even theorized with my brother about it’s origins and possible applications until one day… my brother vanished. He left me a coded message saying that he has found a way to put an end to the kitin threat once and for all. He would go deep into the prime roots, penetrate the kitin hive and use the artifact there…
-Madness - that’s what it was – but who could stop my older brother – the head seer of the zorai scholar’s conclave, a man regarded almost as high as the great Mabreka himself? I couldn’t tell anyone, for this would ruin his reputation and our family standing among the people. All I could do was pack up and follow him underneath…

He sighed heavily again and shifted his kincher legs a bit as if redistributing some unseen weight.

- Search for my brother…,- he continued, - lasted 6 months... and proved absolutely fruitless… I looked everywhere – been in every corner of the prime roots, explored every region and respawned more times than I could remember, all in vain… I did not find a single trace of him. I had no clues to wereabouts of the “kitin hive” he mentioned and no ranger could help me… I confess I was just about to abolish all hopes when one day he appeared at the doorstep of our house like a ghost out of the jungle mist. His light clothing was ragged and torn, he was unarmed and his mask was stained but what really mattered he was alive. I ran to him and embraced him but he didn’t seem to notice me at all – he just moved on into the house, pushing past me as if I wasn’t there, came to the bed, lay down and fell asleep. He slept for 3 days – I tended to him – washed his body, cleaned his mask, clothed him. It was then that I have noticed that strange tattoo he had on his forearm – I copied it onto a wooden plate – for lack of anything better to do while I was waiting for him to regain consciousness. On the fourth day he awoke just as suddenly, stood up and walked out – not saying a word. He went through desertstock to Thesos and I followed him, calling to him, asking him to stop to take a look at me, his brother, to explain what happened, but he simply looked through me and pressed on. My brother was not himself anymore. Apathy settled deep within his soul, he recognized no man, spoke not a single word and cared for nothing but another cup of dandelion wine, which the barman in Thesos readily poured him.
So I have lost my brother. All that remained was the mystery that he has confronted deep within the recesses of the living planet. It was then that I have vowed to solve it and thus bring back my brother Meng…

Chapter VII

..............You must have seen that tattoo aswell – continued Xielu – a set of pictograms: The greatest truth of the greatest enemy… It gave directions to a certain cave… I couldn’t find it at first but then I got lucky – I met a scouting party of Kitin gatherers. Brave little men they were – led by a tryker officer Be'Keeper Artan, their outlands supplier as I later discovered – they mistook me for a “kami agent”… I was promptly bound, gagged and carried to their base camp alongside a stack of foul smelling severed kiban legs. I had to wait in a small hut for a few hours until their chief - Mac'Rippsey Leassey graced me with an audience. It turned out they have met my brother – they referred to him as “Touched by the Kitin”. It seems that he came into contact with them and convinced them to help him enter the Kitin hive. He promised to retrieve some “Queens essence” for them. They wouldn’t tell me what exactly that was but from opaque hints and vague explanations I understood that It must have been some kind of jelatinous substance produced by the Kitin queen, the only place it could be harvested from being the Queen’s lair. The Kitin gatherers were quite accustomed to entering the hive – they used a secretion of kidinak abdominal glands to conceal their presence. Rubbed into skin that stinking solution would make the Kitin mistake a homin for one of their own and thus make the kitin tunnels relatively safe. Apparently the Kitin gatherers did not see my brother leaving the hive – they thought he was still inside and were eagerly anticipating his return. It wasn’t hard to convince these simple men to help me enter the kitin dwelling to “find my brother”. I did not have to lie to them for indeed my brother has never been himself after that deadly trip – he lost something in there – something far more important than his physical self and that was what I went after… I promised to bring the “Queens essence” to them if I could find it and they outfitted and supplied me fully – kidinak solution sacks, a well drawn map of the hive showing the main Hive-way and the radial corridors, a good length of rope, even some weapons. They warned me not to venture too far past the main road however – stories of great unknown danger lurking in the shadows of the deep hive was something these people sucked in with mother’s milk. And so I set out on an expedition of my own…

.............. I left some of the kidinak solution at the entrance – you must have found it – and drew arrows for a Kitin gatherer rescue party that might have went after me. I will not bore you with the descriptions of those endless corridors, the throngs of kitin soldiers and couriers, the feeling of euphoria for doubtless you have experienced the same. Let me just say that I didn’t manage to go too deep when I noticed a strange procession. A group of nettled kinchers were escorting homins – 7 or 8 of them – fully naked – along one of the corridors. They had a strange bulbous device slightly glowing purple attached to their heads. These devices were throbbing and pulsating as though alive. Their eyes were downcast, hands hanging down lifelessly, backs bent. Most of them were trykers though a couple might have been fyros. I remember that some of them had the Slaver’s tribe symbol branded on the shoulders. I froze paralized by this ghastly site when one of them turned his head and looked straight at me. It was a young tryker. His face... Pale and apathetic a moment before it suddenly distorted in a mask of rage his large eyes turned pitch black. This horrible creature bared his teeth, growled menacingly and slowly extending a hand pointed straight at me. I couldn’t run in fact I couldn’t move a muscle – so great was my bewilderment then. It was then that both kincher guards escorting this party turned upon me and pinned me to the ground. No, they did not kill me, though I really wish that they did. They held me down silently and the group of homins just stood there heads down, waiting. Even that tryker who singled me, out remained serene and passive as the rest. In a few minutes a kidinak courier arrived and sprayed some musky greenish powder from a small pouch he held in his fore mandibles right into my face. It was the same sleeping powder you are now suffernig from...

.............. I awoke in a small chamber – naked – bound and spreadeagled on a large flat slab of stone. Kitin were all around me – mostly kidinak and small kinchers – they just stood and watched. I felt a dull pain in the back of my head but could not examine it since my hands were tied. It was then that I heard the voice… Their voice…
.............. “We are the many in one – they said. That voice was husky, accompanied with a peculiar noise as though myriads of tiny claws scraping a rock. It sounded as if from far away but it was in my head – it was not something I could hear but a voice speaking inside me. There was a pause and the same voice repeated: “We are the many in one… We embrace you in our home. We are merciful.” I tried to break out of my bonds, I wriggled and pulled I yelled at them to release me to stop torturing me – all in vain. The kitin stood all around me like silent statues and when I stopped resisting the voice continued: “We are many in one. We are merciful. We will not let you die and be reborn for an eternity of torment. We embrace you in our home. We give you a choice…”

Chapter VIII

...................“I ceased resisting then”… - continued Dai Xielu. My behavior was unthinkable for a zorai – acting on impulse like an animal – disgracing my name and that of my race. I felt a great shame. With it came a calm the kind of which precedes daily meditations. The spirit of my people lives within me – let their wisdom and their logic help me as it has always done before. After all, my situation is indeed unique – what possibilities of learning can present themselves for a zorai in a place like this – what important knowledge from the very heart of the enemy could I access here. The Kitin are offering me a choice. They let me decide, so maybe there is a way out of this for me yet. I must gather information – something told me there will be plenty of time to analyze it.


................... “What choice?” – I asked aloud – and my own voice sounded strangely unfamiliar in this place; an echo multiplied and carried it as though indeed not just I, Dai Xielu, but my whole people were present in this chamber. “The many in one in our infinite mercy offer you a choice” – sounded the voice in my head. “You can be an asset of the Great mind and help accomplish his divine tasks… Or you can become one of us… and play a special role in the fate of this world…” The pauses between sentences were long and the voice trailed away at the end of each of them as though it took a great deal of strength to finish every phrase. Now at least I had something to think over. What could be the meaning of this ”becoming an asset of the Great mind”? Did they refer to their collective conscience? Or was this Great Mind something else – something different from the “many in one” – the Kitin. Another mystery was unveiling before me and I felt a spark of what we zorai call “Akme” – a condition in which your mind and soul becomes one with the collective mind of all other zorai, the myriads of ancestors, when you receive new wisdom, access the uncharted territories of knowledge and an exultation descends upon you the like of which could never be described with mere words.
................... Although the situation I found myself in was rather scary if not to say grotesque I suddenly felt inspired and even gave thanks to Ma-duk for sending me this unthinkable opportunity. “What is the Great Mind”? I asked them… and the answer came loud and clear in my mind: “The Great Mind is the force that shapes the destiny of this world, the Great Mind is an all-powerful sentient, binding all to his will. You can become one with him for that is the ultimate dream of every living thing”. Strangely this time the voice sounded differently – no rasping noises, no huskiness, no effort was audible in it – a clear and powerful sound as though a completely different person was saying this… but while I was thinking this – the previous scratchy kitin voice quietly added: “Become His asset, submit your body and spirit to Him and you will know an eternity of pleasure…” Somehow that didn’t sound right. The intonation had a barely noticeable tinge of contempt and even indignation. Maybe it was my intuition or maybe the wisdom of ancestors did guide my mind then but I suddenly felt that this choice was the worst of the two… By the spirit! I couldn’t imagine then how right I was.” The old zorai fell silent for some time staring blankly in front of him. On second thought, maybe I wasn’t… he laughed a short dry laugh that sounded more like a croak…

................... “And what was the alternative? – he continued. “Become one of us” they said – but this was simply impossible. Even the divine powers could not alter a homin in such a bizarre way. Surely they must mean “submit to their will” or “work for them” or something of that sort… Surely in this case some way of escape was more likely to present itself sooner or later… I guess there my ancestors failed me… I tried to analyze everything minutely all over again but the voice in my head urged me on “What is your decision? You must make one now.” And I told them that I accept the second choice – I will become “one of them”…

................... “As soon as I said that a hissing sound invaded the chamber and clouds of same greenish musky dust with which they sent me to sleep just a short while ago rose from the floor. I passed out immediately…”

...................Again he was silent for some time but then suddenly looked me straight in the eye and asked: “Do you know how the nanoseed works, young matis?” - “Well”,- I said – “it makes us respawn when sustained injuries are too severe to be healed… It heals us slowly and steadily when healing is possible… It is one of Jena’s greatest gifts, and…” “Yes, yes”, - he cut me short there. “Let us stay out of religious matters for the moment. Nanoseed does indeed either heal or respawn your physical body unless… unless the body and the mind where both in a state of permanent sleep – hibernation or stasis so profound that even a gravest injury done to the body would not wake you. You must know that the Kitin can put a homin in that state. These “sleeping spores” produced by certain spieces of local fungi serve exactly that purpose. They put your every single cell and the nanoseed it contains into a static dormant state… I have my own theories about where and how they got such techniques, but let us leave those matters for later. That was what they have done to me...
................... After I woke up, blind for some time (and as I later learned blindness only comes when one has been put into a deep stasis), I couldn’t stand up, couldn’t walk, couldn’t even crawl, although I could feel around me with my hands which brought even more questions. The voice in my head was kind enough to explain what exactly have they done to me. They *cough* separated my upper self and attached it to a kincher’s open thorax. They even managed to bypass genetic discrepancy issue – ironically enough they use the goo as the medium between the two genetically incompatible species… The “remainder” of my body they have dissolved in a pool of kidinak acid, just in case. I do not think you want any more detail…
................... This is what they made me – half homin and half Kitin –a living monstrosity. They brought me here to this chamber and gave me a task that I have been busy with for many years now. I listen to their collective voice inside my head, I have grown accustomed to it. Sometimes they even translate images – things seen by other Kitin, that the collective would like me to witness aswell. I never leave this room – the aperture at the top is to narrow to let me through now that my Kitin part has grown. but I hear and see many things. Many unbelievable things indeed…

(to be continued)
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