The Secrets' Crusade

[Snowfire]

The truth of the Gysians' restoration was a simple one, when all's said and done. The fleets sent to end their race faltered at the last step, recognising the horror that they were about to commit less than a day before it would've been too late to undo. A day may sound like plentiful time, but it didn't feel like that to those aboard the few, bleeding orbitals that remained habitable following the Shiplords' celestial bombardment. The details of their salvation were far more complex.

"None of us could believe it at first," Entara explained, having led you to a viewing deck deeper within the orbital's hull, this one far more intact. It was spartanly appointed, the walls lined with projection ports and carpeted in an odd green-grey. Feedback from your Masque implied comfort, but nothing decadent. A projection had been formed at the centre of the chamber, the same one you'd disrupted, only accelerated a few hours. The Shiplord formation had shredded, groups of ancient War Fleet craft escorting the vulnerable shipyard complexes towards the remaining orbitals. Two signal patterns warred across that fleet, visible to Gysian sensors, and recordings entrusted to the Sorrow at its creation filled in the detail.

From the ships that remained at the edge of the system came demands of duty, almost desperate in their tone. Calls to remember what this race had done, what they'd risked, what must be done to protect creation. But they were terribly outnumbered by those inside the Stellar Exclusion Zone, who tore into those arguments with a passion that was hard to ascribe to the species you'd rarely seen more than coldness or sorrow from. They spoke of monsters, and the becoming of such, and how this was far enough. They had breached the line of sanity already in their butchery of the system's worlds, and you could feel the tears in their voices without any translations. But not all of those tears were sad. Some were hot, angry, and utterly ruthless as they demanded better of their comrades.

"We thought it was some sort of cruel ruse, a play that we might believe and surrender to without fighting." As you watched, fire flickered out from the remains of emplacements around the orbital closest to the SEZ's terminator, licking at shields that were far more capable than the ones War Fleet craft used today. That group withdrew out of effective range, but no further. A few moments later, the shipyard complex spat several dozen slow-moving cargo pods out towards the orbital at the same time as a transmission, pleading for those aboard to accept the supplies aboard.

"Some of those there on that day would tell you it was one even now," Entara added, "if they would ever deign to remove themselves from storage. I admit, I almost wish they would some days." The Gysian made an abrupt gesture of negation, like a headshake but with the light and shadow around them, twisting it into new forms. "But some of our orbitals didn't have much choice. Last Cry was one of them. Either we accepted aid, or our systems would fail. A few refused even then, choosing death over whatever they thought the Shiplords had in store for us. But here it played out differently."

"Why?" You asked. "Why did they let you live?"

Entara took a breath, their eyes flickering back to the projection. "It was a moment of clarity for many of them. A realisation of all they'd believed and betrayed. But it would be better to listen to their own reasons, I think." A swift, grasping gesture and a new recording overruled the others currently playing.

"...and it is enough, I tell you!" The voice felt oddly familiar, the nanomaterial shell around the Shiplord burning with energy and radiating an almost violent passion. "We have fought and we have died and we have killed for the Authority, to save all reality from weapons that would have ended everything. But that is done now, and it must be allowed to be done. That it comes from the begging of children is shameful, but we must recognise our duty.

"Preservation, my fellows. Not destruction." The voice hardened, the weight behind it chilling you even separated by millions of years of time. "And never genocide. Not for this sin."

The recording cut off, leaving a silence that only deepened as you considered what you'd just heard.

"Who was that?" You asked at last.

"The one who gave you the codes you bear, who we call the Sorrowful," Entara replied. "She was a squadron commander then, utterly unprepared for the weight that her actions here would set upon her shoulders. She wasn't alone in speaking out like this; you can see that from the display." Indeed you could. Of the Shiplord War Fleet, almost eighty percent of it had abandoned their tactical formations.

"But her words struck in a way none of the others did. They turned horror into resolution, and scattered revolt into a movement that still holds power today," they swept one hand out, circling their odd fingers in a gesture that encompassed the entire station. "They're why this place exists. And why I'm standing here, able to speak about the shared past we lost together. And the future my people hope for."

"And what future is that?" you asked. Your Masque shifted around you, cycling between curiosity, concern and more passionate expressions of the same.

"It's simple," Entara replied. "We want peace. Just like you."

For a moment you didn't breathe.

"The Sorrowful wouldn't have given her codes to anyone who didn't believe as we do. I've seen how you've reacted to the truths here, the questions you've asked, and the real ones behind them," Entara continued, seemingly oblivious of your sudden tension. The tactical link that had sprung to life in an instant quieted, though the strategies within remained. It was a little disturbing how good you'd become at producing those.

"And what do you see in us, then?" Vega asked. Her Masque had shifted to a posture of polite curiosity for Entara's sake, but you could feel the intense focus and Focus that she had prepared for the answer.

Entara considered the question, anticipatory lights kindling and shifting around them, the flickering tones a language all of its own. Here shades of curiosity, there ones of worry, apprehension, glimpses of possibility. And through them all, flickers of that most terrible thing you could imagine for such an ancient being.

Hope.

"I'm not sure yet," they told you. "Your perspective is different, fresh in a way I have not seen in centuries. But that would not be a reason for Kicha to give you her own identifier codes. She's never done that. Which means you did something much more significant than look at things in a different way." Stutter-lights fluttered, a Gysian nod. "You did something at the Third Sorrow."

There was a moment, time enough to take a breath, to begin an answer but Entara ploughed through the attempt. "What was it?"

And there it was. The question that you'd avoided and deflected from at the First Sorrow when asked by its Warden. Rinel had seemed sincere, but he'd still been a Shiplord, and trust was a difficult thing to build with only one true conversation after billions dead and decades of silence. Which led to the question - was Entara a Shiplord? Their people were certainly culturally distinct, having held onto something clearly their own despite integration into a population so many times their own size. But it wasn't just that. Entara's people hadn't been driven into hiding by the very nature of their existence, forced to live in a constant state of suspicion or paranoia. They bore scars, that much was certainly true, but they were ancient on the same scale as Kicha's own. And there was something else, a sense of quiet power that shone through them. Not a strength of will, not a presence of authority. No, this was something more fundamental.

It wasn't Practice; you would have sensed that sort of power immediately. But there was a bone-deep certainty that came from living for such a long time. A conviction that had survived millions of cycles, and that didn't seem to understand the meaning of surrender. Was it the same thing that had driven their people to their near-fatal rebellion? Or was it something else entirely?

"You don't know," Entara told you, voice soft and gentle. "But I can tell you that if you want peace, then you have the chance to make it happen."

"You can't say that." Your voice broke under the surge of emotions pouring between your Heartcircle as you spoke, and you looked your guide right in their odd, glowing eyes. "You can't say that to me. Not after everything," you broke off sharply, shuddering as that torrent thundered into you.

You could feel Kalilah's fury, the searing, fusion-bright pain that made it real. You could feel Mir's hope, the implacable power of the man's Focus resonating with words of promised Peace that this reaction made unquestionable. Elil's curiosity, Lea's concern, and from Vega...oh, from Vega. She did what she always did, finding the harmony between all of you. That same treacherous, fragile hope that had started after Kicha and that now saw itself reflected in the Gysian in front of you.

"I can," Entara replied, unflinching. "Because I've seen it happen before."

You squeezed your eyes closed, as if that could shut out the voice. And yet at the same time, unable to stop yourself, you reached out.

:Iris, how secure is this room?: You sent, and the riot of feelings ground suddenly to nothing.

:You can't-: :How can we-: :There's too muc-: It all blended together, but you were only listening for one voice.

:The only audio-visual was outside, and this place has privacy screens.: Your daughter told you. She was worried, but not about her answer. About what your question meant. :Any specific location seems limited to medical scans only. And we're already spoofing those with the Masques, which is good considering how crazy you're driving each other's biochemistry right now.:

:Can we do this?: You asked. There was absolutely no need to elaborate on what 'this' was.

:Can, yes.: Iris confirmed. :Should, we'll have to see. But I think.... I think it's better than doing nothing. Much better.:

You reached out across the connections deeper than thought to your Heartcircle, recovering painfully slowly from the shock. But none of them disagreed, not even Kalilah. Entara and their people had survived, and as much as you hated to admit it, they'd spoken truly just now. They had seen it happen before. And you had...you had to know.

"You did," you said haltingly. It cost you to even admit that. "But what happened afterwards?"

"What about," Entara began, only to halt as your Masque twisted into a harsh negation.

"Please," you said, all but begging. "We need to know, before...anything else. What is the shape of your people today, compared to what was?"

More light flickered, in it motions of confusion and concern for you, but also an acceptance you'd not expected. Then, the same flicker-light nod.

"Very well." Entara raised their hands, sweeping them out and the system holo shifted again. It was still an ancient recording, but the orbitals had been tended to now - all but one that had gone cold and dark.

"When the recordings from the Hearthguard reached the Shiplord Authority, the response was a mess of stellar proportions," they continued. "Some wanted us wiped out regardless, but most saw the truth that the early leaders in this system had reacted to so violently. The Gysians who'd tried to annihilate reality were all dead, and the remaining production capacity of our orbitals would've taken years to produce one of our devices, assuming they could access the required feedstocks, which they couldn't. Of those orbitals that remained, one had already died after refusing any and all aid. But all the others eventually accepted the possibility, however slight, that our would-be killers might have had a change of heart. None of us really believed it then, but when the only other option is extinction, it's hard to argue.

"I'm not going to tell you that we're who we were before the war. We aren't, but that's not entirely a bad thing. I was only a child of that world, but I've read enough about it to recognise what drove us to try and weaponize a universe-ender, and it wasn't anything complicated. It was xenophobia, a belief that only our kind were truly people. Fortunately or unfortunately depending on your point of view, it was subtle with us. I think Shiplords would've taught us differently if they'd recognised it, but I'm not sure we'd have been willing to learn even then."

"What do you mean?" asked Mary.

"I mean that the reason our race was almost destroyed was because, from our perspective, the Shiplords proved themselves liars." You very carefully stopped yourself from asking if that was some sort of joke, letting your guide continue with their explanation. "They said they were teachers, but refused to teach us everything. So my predecessors went looking, and when the Shiplords tried to get them to stop, would've ended everything just so they could be right. I don't think any of them knew; they were xenophobic, not nihilistic. But they still did it. And that subtle way of looking at the world was something that the Shiplords knew they had to address."

"Address how?" Vega's voice was steady, but only just. Hardly surprising, given the topic.

"I think it was the first time they'd ever had to confront the fact that there was no way to 'win' a war with us," Entara said. "Not without becoming the monsters that they stopped just short of becoming, and destroying a vibrant, living piece of the universe that they loved so completely. So they had to choose. Life for our people, but people of a different kind from those who'd come before. We'd always have changed; near-extinction isn't something a race recovers from free of scars. The Shiplords just chose the scars we'd remember. They took us into your civilisation, and offered us a place beside them. Fair representation, support, and security. Everything we'd need to rebuild, and a solemn guarantee that we'd never be threatened with extinction again.

"And it worked. Our planets were rebuilt, our people restored, but it wasn't the same. The Shiplords of the time helped us be better than our ancestors, and they succeeded. But at the same time, they destroyed us." Entara paused, and light leached from the air, casting a pained smile across the comfortable room. And a terrible horror gripped you. "I am Gysian. I am a member of Shiplord civilisation. I am a Warden of the Hearthguard, those who remember, and I was there on the day that this place exists to recall. And that means I can recognise the truth easier than most.

"I am Gysian, yes. But I'm not Gysian as my mother and father were. As my grandsires and greatmothers, or beyond. We live, we are free, but we were never given the opportunity to reclaim what we'd been. The Shiplords of the time considered it too dangerous, and so that was the price of our survival. Don't think poorly of them for this. It was never demanded, but your people never tried to hide it, either. It simply was. And they gave everything they promised. All we had to give up was the part of our psyche that made us threaten everything."

"And that," Entara swept their hand through the system holo a final time, returning it to a modern viewpoint. "Is the truth."

"And do you think," you struggled with the words, "that is the shape of any peace the Shiplords could make?"

"No," they replied without hesitation. "No one they fight today is such a threat. No matter how some parts of the Authority feel. They're wrong."

"And you're sure of that?"

Entara gave you another flicker-light nod. "I am."

"Then let me tell you what we did at the Third. " You grimaced. There was no easy way to give this truth.

:Just be true.: Vega told you. :That's all they're wanting.:

:And I'll just be here, ready to commit murder,: Kalilah growled. The older woman's fury hadn't faded in the least, but it wasn't directed at the ancient Warden in front of you anymore. That was something, but it made the statement she'd made even harder for her. :Make it count, Amanda.:

:I will.:

"We found a way out of the trap of the Sphere," you said. Subtle, subtle light blossomed around Entara's body: energy, wonder and strengthening hope. "One that actually worked, and that had never even been touched before. But doing so cost us something."

:Sidra?: You asked.

:You really are a fan of the grand gesture.: Your Unison replied in the feeling of an amused headshake. :But then, I suppose so am I. You're sure?:

"What?" Your host asked hastily, the light around them spiralling like a mad prism. "If there was a solution, a real one, I'm sure any cost could be easily-"

:I have to be.: You raised your voice in reality. "It revealed us." Whatever Entara had expected, it hadn't been that and the Gysian's speech screeched to a stuttering halt. You kept talking.

"My name is Amanda Hawke. I was born forty-six cycles ago, on a planet my people call Earth. The solution we found at the Third Sorrow drew upon the gift that has allowed my species to rise to challenge the Shiplords in less than fifty cycles since our first contact with them. That gift is how we're here. It's why Kicha gave us codes, and more than that. I've seen the First, Third and Fifth Sorrows, and though I recognise their purpose, none of them have given me an answer."

:Now.: Kicha retracted your Masque, and you looked out with your eyes, brilliant blue meeting the flickering colour of Entara's own, a nimbus of light and power surrounding the ancient Gysian.

"Can you give me one?"

 

[Snowfire]

In the subjective eternity of silence that followed, you wondered if perhaps you'd been too forceful in stripping back the veil of secrecy. Entara stood frozen across from you, bathed in radiance that glinted off the silver of your Aegis. You could feel Iris' presence stretched out around the place, your daughter standing ready to muffle any emergency signals that might alert the enemy.

Instead Entara blinked once, twice, then nodded slowly. "Yes. Yes, I think I can."

Their eyes never left yours, and you didn't drop your gaze either. The brightness was effortless for Kicha to filter away, and your instincts told you that it was somehow important. Those were, admittedly, the same instincts that had suggested such a total stripping of your own veil. But those were your instincts, and you'd trusted them many times, in situations just as crucial as this. A sense for the nature of a place in space, time and emotion. Perhaps it was fortunate that you didn't need them for your next question.

"Will you?" The Gysian considered you, and your question, for a moment longer. Then the light around them died away.

"I will try." Entara said. "But it's no simple thing you're asking."

"If it was, I wouldn't be here," you replied, grimacing. Then, realising that your guide had absolutely no context for your expressions, you offered. "We have a contact package that should be compatible with your systems, if you'd like it?"

"Of course you do," Entara sighed. "Thank you, but no, it's not necessary. News and details of your people have reached us even here. Especially here, in truth, but not because of my species."

"Because you're part of the Hearthguard?" Mary asked. Notably, she didn't retract her Masque. A good thing, honestly. Of all of you, Mary was the only one who lacked truly superhuman capabilities outside the protection of the covert nanoshells.

"Ultimately yes," Entara said. Light pulsed in a pattern of sympathy. "The Hearthguard are an extension of the Sorrows. We are their guardians, and their protectors. It is our duty to see them remembered, and the responsibility we accept in doing so is a heavy one. It used to be heavier, when we were able to wield real power in the Authority. It's been a long time since those days, but if what you gave Kicha is real that could be about to change. And I'll be needed in that."

You cocked your head curiously and Entara chuckled. "Think about it. I don't know exactly who you are, Amanda Hawke, but I know no race would send idiots here if they found a way past the shimmer-shells. We were the success story, but also the moment of monstrosity just-avoided, and that has power even today. If not for the Sphere, it would have been enough to save those we remember at the Fifth Sorrow. But if Kicha can offer a solution to the Third's Dilemma, something no one has been able to do ever since the Sorrow's founding…" They shook their head.

"It's hard to explain because you lack the proper context. But to do this, to be truly heard, Kicha is going to have to call on all the weight of this Sorrow's history in a way that hasn't been done in more than half a million cycles.. The actions that created the Hearthguard, all they saved, and all it proved." Entara gestured inwards, up and down at their body. "I'm a living example of both of those things and a Warden, too. But that's only one answer, and it's not the only one I can offer you."

"You're saying that there are other ways?" You asked, curious.

"Oh, there are always other ways," Entara said, nodding. "But to be effective, they need to be tailored to the needs of the situation. And I'm one of a very few beings still alive who would know how to give you the path to this one. I think that's why Kicha gave you her codes." They paused, tilting their head in a mimicry of you. "Let me guess, she suggested that you come to the First and Second first?"

You nodded along, not even trying to hide the confusion you felt. "That's right. How did you know?"

Entara chuckled, touching a hand to their throat. "Kicha isn't as subtle as she thinks. Few people are when you've known them for more than a million cycles, but this is particularly obvious and– I'm sorry, I'm being cryptic when I promised you answers."

You nodded again, unsure if you could trust yourself not to growl or burst out laughing if you spoke in reply.

"In the interest of clarity, what I'm about to give you isn't an answer. It's only a path to one, and you'll have to walk that without me because it's not in this star system." You failed to suppress a sigh. Of course it wasn't. "But it's also your best shot, if you're capable of what I think you are. All of our best shots, really."

"What are you talking about?" You asked. Surely she couldn't mean-

"How did you know the Sorrows existed?" Entara replied, quite calmly. "As much as I despise their existence, I know that the Tribute Fleet database couldn't have told you. No one except Shiplords have visited these star systems in well over a million cycles, so that rules out the current crop of victims." From another those words would have been pithy at best. From Entara, they cut like knives forged of anguish. "So how did you know how to reach these Sorrows?"

"I-" you began, only for Entara to wave the deflection aside.

"That's what I'm talking about, Amanda Hawke." They reached out and light swelled between outstretched fingers, spiralling into the space like the formation of a miniature star. Sidra stripped away the blinding aspect of the light, and you watched in awe as something formed within the display of theatre and mastery of at least two Secrets. Then her fingers closed around the softly glowing cube she'd...called? Created? It was hard to be sure.

"This will answer any other questions you might have about this Sorrow," Entara said, flicking it into the air towards you. You caught it deftly, recognising a data storage module when you saw one. "For the rest, two things. Go to the Fourth Sorrow and tell Warden Yarin to show you the last memory."

"Why can't you just tell us here?" Kalilah snapped, her tone just above a growl. "It's getting tiring, being shuffled about like this."

"Because some things must be seen to be learned. And," your guide added swiftly, before Kalilah could erupt, "because I don't know what you'll find there. I have guesses, but you need the truth."

That stopped Kalilah short, where almost nothing else could've done so. It rocked you all back on your mental heels, in fact. Something at the Fourth Sorrow, something that the Shiplords...didn't know? But they'd built the Sorrows, hadn't they? How couldn't they know what they all contained?

:Answers only make more questions indeed,: you groused good-naturedly to the rest.

"There would also be the small matter of how I consider the oaths I swore to this place quite binding, and I am not one to easily discard a vow older than your species." Light flashed again, gentler this time, a visual addition to the Gysian's limited smile. They had picked that up very quickly. Kicha had said the same thing, too. That a Warden could only speak of their own Sorrow. "But that would only cause arguments if I made it my central cause."

"But what about," Mary burst out.

"The storage device I've given you will tell you everything about this place," Entara repeated. "But I can answer a few more of your questions before you go, if you are adamant about it. I won't tell you anything about the Fourth, or what I think you'll find there. You should reach that place with clear eyes. Anything else within my knowledge or purview and not restricted by sworn word, I will answer."

You may ask Entara up to five questions. They won't tell you about the Fourth Sorrow, or what they think is waiting for you there, but pretty much anything else that wouldn't be truly restricted information is fair game. This will be a Gysian perspective on any matters, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Please note that asking lots of questions will likely telescope the update and add lag time - that or I'll just split it.

There will be a 12 hour moratorium on this vote.

What must you know?
[] Write-in.

 

[Snowfire]

Spoiler: "Winning Vote"

[X] What purpose does the warning to not linger in the dark between the stars serve, and why is it a warning and not a Directive?
[X] Why do they call themselves Shiplords?
[X] What has become of the Second Secret in Shiplord society?
[X] What is Shiplord governance and politics like?
[X] Can you explain the oaths that the Hearthguard swear?

You looked at the storage device, a relatively tiny thing in your pale-skinned hand. Would it really have all the answers you needed? It was hard to tell. But Entara wasn't just giving you that and telling you to leave. They were offering explanations, education from a mind so old that you could barely conceptualise it. And for all that Insight had given you, everything that you'd found in these Sorrows, there was still terribly much about the Shiplords that was opaque to you.

You could feel that restrained curiosity reflected in those others with you, between them churning to find questions that you needed answered. And from them all, one rose to the top. It was a mystery as old as humanity's first contact with the Shiplords, a warning included within the Directives that none of the Group of Six had ever tested despite it never being explained.

As places to start went, it was an excellent one.

"When a Tribute Fleet passes down the Shiplord directives, they include a warning at the end, something of the Directives but not itself a promise of genocide if broken," you said. The others nodded, and you continued. "It warns of peril to any who look or linger in the spaces between stars. Why?"

"Because it makes you easier to find," Entara replied immediately, a shadow flickering across their face. "You truly didn't know?"

"It's that simple?" You asked - demanded really. After all that, decades of fear, all for nothin- You cut the thought away.

"Not entirely," more shadows flickered as they spoke. "It's certainly easier to eradicate a species if they don't hide away between stars, but it also provides a line of fear that few ever cross. It's a chain that is never cut, and I believe acts as a final barrier to any race attempting to fight for true freedom. The cruel trick is how it's so vague. Placed alongside directives with extermination as the price of breaking them, it suggests the cost to be similar. "

"Is there truly nothing out there?" Mary sounded as disappointed as you'd ever heard her in your life.

"The Neras sometimes meet there," Entara told you. You remembered that name from Insight reports. The only known contemporary of the Shiplords, they were a sentient fungus with seeming innate mastery of the First Secret. Exactly how they had that, no one knew. "But that's all I'm aware of, and I'm aware of a great deal. For all that they did, the Shiplords didn't skimp on the education they offered us. I've spent decades at a time out in the dark spaces between suns, and nothing came for me."

"Well that's...supremely disappointing," Vega said. Entara shrugged helplessly, using the human motion deliberately. It was comforting, but only so much so given how limited you felt on questions. This Sorrow had gone very quickly, no days of time, but every one of them took almost a week to move to and from the Stellar Exclusion Zone. And each week past meant another week that Earth might fall in.

"I'm sorry, truly," your guide said. Then, rallying, she asked: "What about your next question?"

"Why do they call themselves Shiplords?" Mary asked. "That can't be the original name of their species; it's too deliberate."

"Indeed it isn't," Entara bowed their head in acknowledgement. Again lights flashed, this time signifying agreement.

"Then...why?" Mary asked again.

"My people believed it was because they were the first race in the galaxy to unlock FTL travel, but a few million cycles teaches you some things." There was a flash of conciliation, and you restrained a wince. Again, really? "Someone gave them the name, long before they ever met our species. For all intents and purposes, it is the name of their species now."

"Who?" you asked, in the same moment as half the room.

"All I have is a name. Anything else -- who they were, what they were to the Shiplords, what happened to them -- it's all guesswork." Entara took a breath. "But I can tell you this, they were important to the Shiplords in a way that I can't even describe. Like no two races I've ever seen. And they were called the Consolat."

Now that, that was something you might be able to use. An ancient ally or friend, gone for millions of cycles. Had they been killed by the Shiplords? Died? Chosen to go Uninvolved? It was impossible to tell, just as it would be to bring up the matter with any Shiplord you were going to meet at the next Sorrow. And yet... Tahkel had said to look for a path out from war. Could more information about a race that the Shiplords had considered friends illuminate one?

"Thank you." It was the least you could say, and this was new knowledge. If it would end up being useful was another matter, of course, but you'd been told to learn the Shiplords' past. The Sorrows could never have been all of what mattered, and you'd never known what else there might be until now. That was worth, or could be worth, far more than you could know right now. It was frustrating to have to wait, of course, but more points of enquiry were undoubtedly a good thing right now.

"Next question," you said. "The Shiplords ban races from full access to the Second Secret even after finding their freedoms, but what about here? What has become of that Secret in Shiplord civilisation?"

"That is," Entara sighed. "Complicated would be the best description. The Shiplords don't create life like most younger races do. They don't build bioforms to task, and our technological base is firmly rooted in mechanics instead of conventional biology."

"Conventional biology?" Mary pounced on the qualifier like a particularly hungry cat, and you could feel her eyes gleaming behind the veil of her nanoshell Masque.

"Yes," Entara nodded. "The vast majority of Shiplord technology operates on biomechanical principles, and it couldn't do that without the Second Secret. There's a broad level of self-modification within society, but with all the legacy geneware and millions of cycles to experiment it's rare that anyone comes up with something new. The nanoshells we all have are mixed Sixth and Second secret too, but the Shiplords are much more attached to them. They're bonded to the user early on in childhood, using their own genetic structure as a starting point.

"It's actually quite fascinating but," they sighed. "Really, if you want the specifics I'd read the files I've given you. I could explain it, and I'd be happy to under normal circumstances, but..."

"These aren't normal circumstances," you finished. Another flicker of light and colour - a nod.

:Sorry Mary,: you sent.

:It's alright,: she replied. :It'll give me some things to read on our way outsystem.:

"Yes," Entara agreed, unaware of or simply not remarking on your microsecond pause. "Next question?"

"We've heard a lot of references to the Authority," Vega stepped in. "But we still don't know what that actually means, or what Shiplord governance is like. If we're going to end this war, we need to know the system we'll have to work within to get there. I'm not asking for everything, just a grounding in how it all works. We've had our own guesses, but it's good to be certain."

"That, I can help you with," Entara nodded eagerly. How they could do that with just light patterns was astounding to you. "The Shiplords are largely democratic as a polity, with star systems electing delegates to the Authority in rolling votes. Delegates act as the voice of those who elected them and handle primary governance within the polity. Compared to your own political system, we would probably seem to have very few of them at a national scale, but limited telepresence is possible through the FTL communications network the Shiplords began building long before they met us. In truth, the Authority is both its delegates, and all those who voted for them."

"So when you say you will be standing in front of the Authority?" Vega prompted.

"I will be standing in a room with no more than a few hundred sophonts," Entara told you. "With tens of billions of observers watching, and making limited opinions known to their delegates."

"Why limited?"

The explanation to that, it seemed, was bandwidth. The Shiplord communications web was a marvel of redundant engineering, though you'd already known a little of that. But it was limited, in the end, still data limited. Members of the Authority shaped policy, created and passed laws, all with a working group of relatively minuscule size compared to that of Shiplord civilisation. But they did so in an environment of near-total transparency, able to draw upon the collective experience of billions of their own people, many of whom would often have relevant experience to the task. Closed votes did exist, but they were extremely rare.

At the same time, true e-democracy remained beyond them, despite all their technological capacity. It was humbling really. Millions of years of development, and still defeated by the vastness of space. It was a reminder of the awesome scale of the universe, and also a chilling one of how the Shiplords had been acting on that scale for longer than humanity had existed. And still they'd found limits.

Yet for all of those, species-scale votes were entirely within their means. If necessary, bandwidth could be diverted for full debates at a polity scale, the very idea of which gave you a headache. The more important details were how Entara described a civilisation caught in a trap of their own making, with a significant minority desperate to escape but unable to provide a solution. That, it seemed, was why your success at the Third Sorrow was so important. If a possible solution could be found for the Sphere, then surely one would be possible for the rest of the galaxy. On its own, not enough. But presented at the right time...

It was a ray of hope, glimmering through a dark night.

"For any details you'll really have to look at the files I've given you," Entara said at last. You'd transitioned from standing to sitting during the explanation, and the seat had adjusted quickly to your unique - to it - physiology. It was comfortable without that becoming a distraction, which was really quite impressive. "But that should be at least a bare-bones image of what you're dealing with. Was there anything else? I'd rather not keep you any longer than I have to. I'm going to have my own preparations to make."

"One last one," you said. "The oaths you swear, that all the Hearthguard swear, what are they?"

"A bit of an odd question," Entara remarked. But it didn't stop them from continuing. "We swear to enshrine and protect the knowledge of the Sorrows. We swear to guide all those who visit them, an unchanged loophole from times when they were open to other races that I believe is how Kicha will be able to eventually justify your survival."

"Oh," Mary said, in a very small voice.

"Indeed," your host chuckled. "And we swear to answer all questions and to offer no falsehoods, but only of the Sorrow we guard."

"Why prevent speaking of others?" you asked. "Wouldn't it be easier to be totally open?"

"Because it's a journey of discovery." The reply came immediately and without hesitation. "The order is up to the traveller, but each Sorrow is designed to teach a particular lesson. They don't really do so properly, not anymore, but at least some of it still makes it through. It's about preparing our visitors for the world beyond and helping them to understand the sacrifices that have been made to protect it. Our oaths prevent anyone from skipping to the end, and that matters because if you just skip to the truth without knowing how to understand you'll learn nothing. And if you learn nothing, all the sacrifices recorded in these places are worth the same.

"The entire point of the Hearthguard was to try and protect the soul of the Shiplord people. We've ultimately failed, but what we still have is ours to keep. If we gave up, then the last hope of peace would go with it. We never believed that peace would come from within at this point, either. We hoped that one day we'd be able to use what hoarded leverage still remained to make the Authority listen when, well," Entara waved a hand across the room at you and your companions. "someone like you happened."

You took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I think I get it now," you said. "At least a little."

"A little is all you can hope for, for now, I think," Entara said kindly. "But you're almost there, and the Fourth should bring it together. Each story is part of a larger whole, and together they're more than their sum. I believe that, at least. And I think you will too. We failed to in our duty, but the first step to fixing what was broken is to understand it. And you can't without all the Sorrows taken together."

"Then I will hope that what awaits at the Fourth will be everything you've promised," you replied.

"Remember," Entara said, rising to escort you back to the Adamant. "Ask Yarin for the last memory."

"We shall."

The pressure hit you the moment you were back on the Adamant. You could feel it in your chest, the way it seemed to push against the skin of your bones, threatening to crush you. The scale of what you were trying to understand, what you were facing. But it was a battle of mending now, and you knew those far better than any human alive. The Elder First had laid the seeds of humanity's restoration, but it had been you who'd tended to it through its fragile growth. You understood, or thought you did, where this was going.

You still had a great many questions about the specifics, and you would need those to be answered. But if it was truly so simple as offering a solution - a real solution, that the Shiplords could feel safe accepting - then you believed you might be able to handle that. Not now, there were still pieces missing. But at the right time, and in the right place, it was possible.

"Jane, set course for the system shell," you called the moment you were back aboard. Your Masque flickered free of your Aegis, restored only for the walk back to the docking area. "We're done here."

"Yes ma'am." There was a moment of silence, then a question you'd expected. "Were you successful?"

"I think so," you looked between the rest of the team. Iris was still neck deep in her calculations and translations, soon to be finished if the report she'd just transmitted held true. The rest, it would've been hard to tell without the constant presence of the links between your Heartcircle. And Mary, well, you knew her even better. They were all confused, frustrated with the mystery that Kicha and Entara had perpetuated. But answers were finally starting to make their way free of the cloudy mess that had been all you'd really been certain of before.

Although there was an addition to the questions now. The Consolat, the race who'd named the Shiplords. Who had they been? And how had they died? Perhaps Iris would be able to tell you. If not, you could only hope that the Fourth Sorrow would.

 

[Snowfire]

Of all the things you'd been prepared for, Iris coming to your door well into the early morning the second day after you departed Last Cry wasn't one of them. You could tell that she'd been crying, but not the reason. There was a deep sorrow radiating out from your daughter as she fell into your arms, but it was one she'd already survived. You were wise enough to recognise that trying to wrap your daughter up in your arms and not let go until she could smile again wouldn't be helpful right now. But you still wanted to do it.

You settled for holding her while she recovered herself enough to talk.

"I'll be calling a meeting about this tomorrow," were the first words out of your daughter's mouth. You'd seated her at one of the couches in your living area. There was a small table between them, large enough for small presentations. Tonight it was doing double duty as a chair for Mary, who'd taken up a watchful post right across from Iris - close enough to catch her if the tears started again.

"You finished working on it, didn't you," Mary said. Her fingers dug at the fabric of her off-duty dress, creasing it heavily. "The archive Vega was able to recover from the First Sorrow. You found a way to make it make sense."

"I did."

The distinct lack of unprompted explanation was worrying. "What was it?" you asked, settling onto the sofa next to your guest. Iris looked over at you, her eyes utterly haunted, and you suddenly realised that they were also entirely still. "Iris, what did you find?"

"It's…" She made a frustrated gesture in the air, and you felt her access the suite's systems. She tapped into the holographic array, transmitting enough data that it took the system several full seconds to load it all into buffers. Then she swept an extended finger from left to right, and the world around you filled with light. Concentric rings of streaming glyphs spiralled out from a point centred on your daughter's hand, interlocking and criss-crossing like a madman's vision of an atom. The data was constantly changing, taking new forms, and seemed utterly chaotic.

It was funny sometimes, how easy it was to make something seem that way.

Before you could do more than start to parse the pattern -

:Patterns,: Sidra whispered to you, awe flooding your connection to the Unison. :Thousands of them.:

- Iris swept her finger back to centre and closed her hand over her heart. The swirling diorama around her locked in place and translations crept into Shiplord glyphs, spreading from a dozen spots like sparks scattered across tinder.

"What you all recovered from the First Sorrow was impossibly complex," Iris said, adopting a lecturing tone. "Enough that it took me several million iterations to figure out that understanding it couldn't be done by trying to compile it into new data structures. I had to work out how to use the one that was already there."

"And that leads to this," Mary waved a hand about the quarters.

"It does." Iris nodded. "Sunset and the rest of our onboard intelligence section would've found their way to this answer eventually; I know them well enough to be certain of that. But it would've taken them a great deal of time, and I'm no longer sure that's something we have. Insight gave us some pieces and the Sorrows have given us more, but we've been looking at the puzzle all wrong from the start."

That was a statement that needed more unpacking to understand, and you both said so. Iris grimaced. "Shiplord history prior to the First Sorrow was largely opaque to us even after our visit. Warden Rinel told us that the reason it broke their civilisation so badly was that it forced them to choose, but that on its own shouldn't have been enough to trigger the scale of trauma we've just witnessed. Watching all reality almost be destroyed at the mad whims of another is bad, but they had an answer to it ready. That doesn't explain the scale of their response."

"Reality-destroying weapons don't justify a genocidal response?" Mary asked. She shook her head at your look. "Mandy, you know I wouldn't ever want to call for it, but it's...not as unreasonable as we've been trying to tell ourselves it was."

"No, it's not," Iris agreed. "But there is genocidal and there is berserk. The Shiplords in their campaign against the Gysians were the second, mothers, not the first. And that sort of response from a species so dedicated to stability and relative peace until then can't come from nowhere."

You didn't reply at first, letting your mind follow the logic as Iris kept talking. Placing together possibilities from what you'd found at the Sorrows, what each of them had told you, what each person you'd revealed yourselves to had told you. None of the conclusions were certain, but if they were... If they were you could understand why Iris had said you might be lacking time.

"...the Sorrows chart the path of the Shiplords' fall," Iris was still speaking. "But there's a broader shape beneath it, that stretches much further back in time, to the founding point of this gestalt. The amount of direct data on that is extremely limited, but it's more than we had before."

"How sure are you about this?" You asked, sweeping your own eyes across the data labyrinth. "Not just the data as a whole, but the specific pieces you've found."

"I found a name," Iris replied. "The same one we were told here, by Entara: Consolat. And that makes me trust it, and her, far more than we were planning to."

You nodded absently, staring deeper into the patterns around you, trying to make sense of it all. Harmony wasn't your Focus, and though you'd come closer to widening your Focus than any Potential known, you'd never gotten all the way there. But this, all around you? You couldn't understand it as data, but you could feel it. A swirling gestalt of a species older than humanity could properly comprehend; every triumph, every downfall, every simple day.

How much could Project Insight's predictions have been thrown off by the lack of this data? Could they have been thrown off at all? It was difficult to tell. The project couldn't predict how things might change; the alterations to the Second Battle of Sol's Shiplord battle line had proven that. But that was missing choices made after the fact. Could it have missed something from before?

It missed the Sorrows, you noted, but had that truly led you astray? Nothing you'd found so far had implied more than a far more complex fall to ruin than you'd expected. Unless what Iris had found- you shook your head.

"I've gone back and looked since," your daughter added, her silver-hued eyes still frozen. "There's nothing referencing the Consolat in any of the archives I've been able to get into, not even obliquely. I think that means the data is kept in Shiplord personal files, within the Masques. That might be why the Tribute Fleet…weren't willing to surrender."

"But that can't just be all," you noted, cocking your head as Iris nodded agreement. "What else, love?"

"There are references," she said, nodding at the now fully translated data entries filling the air around you. "The archive files here now are the ones that the structure will decrypt if I run it all the way back to its founding point. The data interface is honestly fascinating, even if I had to work out how the Shiplords reference spacetime coordinates to get it to work.

"But the references themselves point to-"

"They're the root of it," Mary interrupted. You looked up at your oldest friend, and saw her eyes very wide, darting between the data points with a swiftness that made you certain she'd activated her perceptual accelerators.

Her words were disjointed and shaky, as if she'd found the thread of some arcane vein of prophecy, but it did nothing to stop her talking. "The root of everything. The trauma, the actions to teach, to protect, to…control. They're gone now, and that made the Shiplords rage against those who would destroy any more of reality. Gone somehow, somehow familiar to the earliest Sorrows. That's why the Shiplords reacted as they did to the Gysians. They could dress it up, make other reasons stick, but it wasn't fear that made the Second happen."

Her eyes tracked back down to you, still so wide. "It was pain."

"Pain," you said slowly. Then much more quickly. "Like loss?"

Mary nodded jitterily, forcing her eyes shut, making herself take a breath. "We've been looking at the Sorrows like they were the cause for everything the Shiplords have done. Like they were the source of what turned them into what they are now. But what if they're just waystations on the path, not the beginning? What if that trauma we've seen in every interaction began with the loss of the race that Entara implied were their oldest friends?

"Do you think we'd do any better, after a few million years?" She took another breath, then another and slowly the shuddering faded. Faster after you placed a steady hand on her shoulder. You'd only seen this from Mary a handful of times in all the years you'd known her, and part of you truly hoped that this hadn't been a similar episode of interconnective genius. Because if she was right, well.

"We shouldn't think too much on what it could be," Iris said, before you could lose yourself to that very thing. "We don't know enough, not really. Mary could be right," and probably was, you didn't say, "but that's only one interpretation. There are others, and they're just as worthy of consideration until we have more data."

You made yourself nod along, though you were certain that it wasn't quite the truth. Not because you didn't believe in her theory, but because you knew you wouldn't be able to stop yourself from thinking about it. You knew you'd be thinking about it again and again, trying to find a flaw in her reasoning, and every time you couldn't you'd have to fight to not become more certain of her rightness.

"But," Iris admitted, frowning. "I think mom's right about one thing: We're not going to finish our journey at the Fourth Sorrow. They might not call it the same thing, but there's another system like these five, hidden so long ago that none of Uninvolved remember it being there before."

"And that's where we're going to have to go," you sighed, bowing your head. "Where would we even begin?"

None of you got much sleep that night and the command meeting on the day proved to be a difficult one. You'd acquired information, but no ability to do anything with it. Just more mysteries on the pile, though Iris had argued that this at least had some pointers to what it meant. That was true, but as Lina had said:

"Until I can point this ship at an answer, I'm not sure how much any of this helps."

The statement hadn't been entirely fair, and she'd apologised for it despite clearly not meaning it with any cruelty. But it had summed up well the issues still facing you, as the Adamant moved steadily out from the Second Sorrow towards the system's shell. Another day and you'd be jumping to the Fourth, and all you had was a direction to ask for something there. You had guesses now of what that question would lead to, and that was something. It just wasn't what you needed.

Until you actually had that, Consolat was a name and nothing more. Mary had a hypothesis, and you trusted her to be very likely right, but that wasn't a certainty. If she was wrong, then what awaited you at the Fourth would be a surprise. No one in the know was quite sure if you wanted that surprise or not. Because if she was right...

Humanity knew the power of loss. They knew it deep, deep down in their bones, where the foundations of the new world you'd helped birth had been placed by the Elder First. You knew it in the memory of those taken, in the pain and love that all who had died were still held with today. And, for just a few from the billions of humanity, you knew the power of loss in one place more: your souls.

The Dragons had given themselves, together with those who flew them, to give your people Practice.

The Shiplord who'd led the Tribute Fleet defeated in the Second Battle of Sol had said something to you: How dare you profane that gift and persist.

It was all conjecture. All of it. But you couldn't escape the possibility that it might be right. What had the Consolat given, with their loss?

A day more to the jump threshold, you told yourself. Maybe two, three more to reach whatever installation existed at the Fourth. Then, you hoped, you'd get some answers.

 

[Snowfire]

Your first impression of the Fourth Sorrow was a vision of the beauty possessed by dying stars. Not the immediate death that a Lumen-class could enforce, but the slow, slow death of a main-sequence star that had bloomed into a red supergiant. Bloody red light washed across the system's planets, none of them living and a massive bank of stations stretched around the star at its heart. It took a few moments to realise what they were for, but the immense energy readings were hard to miss.

Mary's fingers were a blur across her virtual panels as she examined the data, pulling together the field readings until the full picture came into view. "The stations, they're stacked with Third Secret emitters," she breathed, awestruck. "It's like the beginning of a stellar converter, but stopped short to contain the supergiant's mass ejections, keep it at this point of its lifecycle. The scale of it-" she broke off, shaking her head.

"Stellar engineering, to protect this place from destruction." You nodded. If only they were so willing to do the same for the living, instead of the dead.

"There's something else," Mary said, pointing to a distant planet. Once, it would've sat squarely at the centre of a main-sequence star's goldilocks zone. A wire-pattern overlaid itself over the world, flexing organically under the star's titanic output. "The magnetosphere of that world is much stronger than it should be, enough to protect it from the red giant's radiation."

Fingers flicked, another scan began as the Adamant began the long trek towards the system's core. You were met by the same greeting, subtly different as always. This one spoke of those who'd once been here as...it was difficult to be sure. The title Shiplord messages used carried connotations of deep honour and sorrow, but something about this one felt...wrong.

"That's the message we're looking for, right?" Iris asked, voice a whisper.

"It must be," you agreed, reading it again. A single finger stabbed down at the title the Shiplords were using instead of a species name. "I guess we'll have to go down there to find out why the Shiplords called them this. Lina?"

"Course already locked, Amanda," your captain replied. "Three days."

"Three days, then." You looked down at where your finger intersected the message on the virtual screen. "And then we find out why the Shiplord would call a race the Lament."

It wasn't, all things considered, a perfect translation. According to your systems, a better one would've been the Lostguard, or possibly Hopelost. Lament, however, was what stuck aboard ship as you dived into the gravity well for the world that Mary had noted as standing protected from the vast local star. That the Shiplords had found a way to place it on stellar life support wasn't surprising in and of itself, but the resource cost for that had to be significant.

Of course it was significant: the Shiplords hadn't given a title to any of the other races lost to the Sorrows. Not one that they'd shared in the initial messages, at least The planet ahead of you had been heavily colonised, a homeworld, but one curiously absent the signs of battle. And there was something else, an ancient resonance to the system that felt to your soul like a place where enormous power had been worked. You weren't sure what that meant, but the home of the Sphere hadn't felt anything like this, and that had seen the end of a species.

Something else had happened here - but what? You'd never seen an Uninvolved form, but this felt similar enough to the process to guess this might have been a place that had seen one born. Though that just raised more questions - like why the Shiplords would let a race worthy of becoming a Sorrow simply...remove themselves from the board. Especially when your best guess was that the Fourth had taken place less than fifty thousand cycles after the Third.

Passing into the depths of the star system was like walking through a graveyard, all the other planets of the system ravaged by the terrible solar winds of the supergiant at its core. Gas giants stripped away until only cold and dead planetary cores remained. Closer planets burnt and split by radiation far stronger than any natural magnetosphere could've deflected. Moons slowly eroded over hundreds of thousands of years by the touch of a star's frozen death. It made it very easy to see what the Shiplords considered important.

And that was the world before you, where life still blossomed across its surface. Enormous city complexes sprawled across its continents, safe beneath a magnetosphere strong enough that it would have a passable chance of deflecting low intensity laser fire. Mary had deciphered the means of that on your second day in the system: a planet-based Emitter array of tremendous power. You'd known intellectually that stellar engineering was something that the Shiplords had a considerable breadth of experience with, but seeing it in action was impressive and intimidating all at once.

And all of it done in such a way that the life of the world had barely been touched. The high forests of the world were untouched, and the biosphere of the planet was still flourishing, and there was no sign of the sensor clouds that had drifted above the worlds within the Third Sorrow. It had simply been preserved, as close to intact as it could be. Only missing the race that had once called the place home.

Sensor beacons directed you down into low orbit of the world, where the boosted magnetosphere would provide additional protections for parasite craft. The spaceport below seemed to offer berths to ships even larger than the Adamant, and Warden Yarin had offered you one in his initial message. You'd considered that offer, but the danger of detection had felt too high, and there'd been enough other craft in orbit to make refusing seem safe.

The shuttle ride passed in a blur, barely any attention paid to the sweeping presence of life all around you as your focus narrowed steadily with every second closer you got to the ground. The words Entara had said ran through your mind over and over, swirling out into the Heartcircle's network, where it met and merged with matching repetitions. It wasn't that you weren't curious about the truth of this place, you were. But you also had a much more important purpose driving you, and a deadline.

Then you were down, landing in the shadow of one of the planet's vast cities. The monoliths of ancient metal loomed high around the spaceport, and you were surrounded by the bustle of people and silent machines. The air hummed at a level below standard human perception, the feeling of energy being cast up far beyond the planet's atmosphere. And that ancient, immeasurable presence that you'd sensed first on entering the system was far stronger here on the ground. Enough that you thought you might be able to understand it, given time.

You had a moment to take in the sight, and then a Shiplord was approaching you, walking with a slow, deliberate pace. Warden Yarin seemed much more solemn than all the other Wardens you'd met except Kicha, perhaps a result of what this place was. He stepped forward, spreading manipulators to speak a greeting you knew more than well enough by now. And you...you broke through it.

"I mean no disrespect in this, Warden," you said, the perfect translation impossible to notice thanks to the Masques' systems. "But I was sent here with a message. A question for you, that I believe would make the offer you are about to make moot." The Shiplord paused, shifting their nanoshell into curiosity, but also an undertone of concern blended with a curiosity too faint to be certain from where it sprung.

"What do you seek, then?" He asked, expressions stilling back into solemnity.

"We were told to ask for the last memory."

If he'd been human, you were certain that Yarin's eyes would've widened to the size of saucers. It was just the impression you got from the reaction of shock and...was that concern? It was difficult to be sure. And yet for all that, he didn't question it.

"Of course," he said, turning quickly. "Follow me." He was already moving as the second word finished forming, fast enough that you had to rush a moment to keep up. Signals leapt out from the Warden to automated systems built into the memorial, and a transport pad arced down from the viridian sky to land a few steps before him.

He turned, gesturing sharply. "Come."

You stepped onto the pad, and it rose smoothly into the sky before streaking out across the lonely city. The avenues here were large enough to fit a FSN destroyer into them, but they seemed to have been built to handle beings much the same size as yourselves. The size of the streets had been a deliberate choice, one informed by a desire for artistry that the Shiplord had preserved, as sections of parkland and small rivers wove between the roads and sprawling structures.

It was peaceful, and in a way that you'd not expected from a planetary scale grave. As if the world was quietly waiting for the old residents to reappear. You didn't think that could ever happen, but the sentiment was there.

The transport pad carried you in total silence for almost ten minutes, landing at last on the edge of a vast structure of metal and stone with the sun behind it. You looked up, seeing black stone rising into the sky like the peaks of mountains, the walls reaching so high that they seemed to almost scrap the clouds. It was an illusion, you knew, but that didn't make it any less impressive. And yet that was the secondary concern to you and the rest of your Heartcircle. The place seemed to resonate with the presence of the planet, like an enormous tuning fork that your presence had somehow struck to life.

It made concentrating a bit of a challenge, one that made you glad of the stabilising and entirely unaffected presence of Iris and Mary. Fortunately, Yarin seemed to take your reaction to the planetary citadel as simple awe at the scale of it. You thought for a moment he almost smiled, actually, before leading you off the pad and down into the installation. One that, you realised quickly, was still very operational. Targeting systems for an enormous array of security systems tracked your every step as you approached it, and further scanners and weapon systems littered the path deeper into the complex.

It was odd, actually. The place was clearly similar in underlying aesthetics to the cities and more that you'd seen from orbit and then on approach, but there were differences too. As if it had been constructed much later, all at once, and for a very different purpose. And the deeper you went, the more certain you became: this place hadn't been built to defend the planet, but to protect something inside it. And you'd seen construction like this exactly once before, the result of it was back on the Adamant.

:This is the work of an Uninvolved,: Vega sent suddenly, as if reading your mind. :I don't know how they did it - how they were allowed to do it. But this was the work of one of them.:

:You're certain?: Mary sent back, ducking down another flight of stairs sinking you deeper into the planet, and closer to the centre of the installation.

:We are,: you said. :It feels like the drive Tahkel made for us. Just...more focused.:

:What does that mean?: Iris asked.

:I have no idea.:

It took nearly an hour to reach the centre of the citadel, only for Yarin to turn to you at the final door and speak. "This is as far as I go, pilgrims. I know what is beyond, but it is not for me, and has not been for any who've come here since the Lament left the world. I wish you luck. And I will be here once you are finished."

Somehow you weren't sure if he meant that last sentence to be ordered that way. The way he said it felt more like 'once it's finished with you'. Whatever that nebulous it might be. Fun.

"Then let's get this done," you said, flicking your nanoshell through a soothing expression of solemn appreciation. "Our thanks, Warden."

The door vanished as you stepped up to it. Not retracted, not slid aside: literally vanished. It left nothing behind but an empty frame and the sense of being watched. But that wasn't going to stop you now. Not when you were so close. Looking through the darkness beyond you saw a low pillar or table, perhaps eight metres across. It was carved out of the same black stone as the rest of the enormous structure. You looked right and left, feeling the presence of your fellows.

All of you stepped through the doorway together.

The moment you crossed the threshold your senses were full of the enormity of presence of an Univolved's actions, seemingly unaltered by over a million cycles of history. You didn't know how you knew that number so perfectly, but somehow now you did. You took another step, another, and emerged from the line of darkness into a gently lit chamber beyond. The circular construction resolved itself into a recessed column with a single rune engraved on its surface, one you didn't recognise. A moment later you felt the door materialise again behind you. As if the curtain of shadow hadn't been enough?

"Everyone alright?" you asked. Your Heartcircle was still all there, cycling the energy of the room between you in a constant circuit to keep it from becoming overwhelming. It was extremely intimidating given how old this had to be, but what was almost worse was how you could tell it was affecting you less than the other Potentials here.

"Fine here," Mary and Iris said, the former already several steps ahead of you and examining the central column of the room. A haze of micro-sensors swept out from her, scanning everything and feeding the combined image back to her nanoshell. That had been an upgrade she'd managed to add with the Trailblazer systems aboard the Adamant. You'd not used that nearly as much as you'd hoped to, but for tweaks to personal nanoshells it had proven more than capable.

"I'm not picking up anything," Iris reported a moment later. "Nothing my avatar can connect to, or any general signalling."

"But there's something here," Vega said, confirming what all of the Potentials in the room could feel. "Something very old, but also incomplete. Like a remnant?"

You only had a moment's warning as the energy around you suddenly spiked. The circuit between the Heartcircle splintered, almost breaking for a moment before you could channel enough of it away into the space around you. The rune at the centre of the column flickered blue-white like an electrical spark, like it was reflecting the sudden surge of discharge.

Then a shape of curved light and bare colour filled the space above it. It reminded you a little of Vision, the same evershifting patterns contained within a simple ring, but this felt...it was just like Vega had said. Ancient, powerful here in the centre of a citadel seemingly constructed purely to protect it, but also intensely limited. Incomplete, compared to the AI the Elder First had left behind.

"Not like." The room rang with a voice in Shiplord standard. "Exactly as you have said. A remnant, a memory, of those called Lament but who were truly the Teel'sanha peoples. The last who remained who'd witnessed the horrors of the Sphere, and the only with the will and potential to oppose what we could see our mentors becoming."

Images flashed across the walls, moving from speeches before grand galleries full of armoured figures to the flickering movements of War Fleets in full flight. Planets lost, planets won, and all through it a wish that was less than a demand but more than a plea. That had driven these people to fight, even when they'd known their enemy was beyond them. But they'd tried all the same, and the Shiplords hadn't killed them for it. Why?

"You will have to be more specific," the voice replied, and you flushed beneath the nanoshell as you realised you'd asked that last question out loud. "This system was never fully completed, and despite certain conversational routines, is not a full AI."

"I see," you said carefully. Looking up at the walls, you found them already back to their mirror-bright black sheen. You glanced about the room, checking for consensus. No one objected. "Would direct enquiries be better?"

"They would."

"Very well." You took a breath, and started to ask.

What will you ask a-
[X] Who were the Consolat?

Oh. Ok then. Pick two additional focus points?
[] The Teel'sanha Peoples - Will cover the details of who the Teel'sanha were, and how they became the Lament.
[] The Lamentable War - Details of the war fought between the Teel'sanha and the Shiplords as well as how it ended.
[] The Last Memory - The creation of this place, clearly the work of an Uninvolved.
[] Write-in?

 

[Snowfire]

Context is the foundation to understanding. Without knowing the surroundings of an image, there's so much that even the brightest minds can miss. Which was why you restrained yourself. You needed to understand what was said next, and the only way to do that was to ask the right questions. Build towards the answers that Entara's chip had made you desperate to learn.

"This place isn't a memorial, is it?" You asked. The walls had cleared back to glossy black as the images faded, but they weren't what you meant, not entirely. "There's too much here to just be that, too much invested to just be a citadel to guard the Teel'sanha's bones."

"No, no it isn't." The answer was what you'd expected, but it didn't stand alone. "This place holds the memories that we couldn't bring ourselves to leave behind in the great museums outside. Why we laid aside our weapons after taking them up, and much more."

There, a place to go from here. That would do. "Why did you? What could they have possibly said to make you stop?"

The walls shimmered and new images formed there. Two War Fleet detachments flickered across space, one Shiplord, one clearly not, engaged in the deadly dance of FTL hunter-killers. Spits of light marred the endless starfield as the recording played out, bereft of any reference points but for whirling, unknown constellations.

Then the Shiplord craft, reduced to a third of their number, stood back from the field. And a craft in the same model as the diplomatic craft you'd seen in the recording of the First Sorrow appeared in their place. The Teel'sanha War Fleet retreated too, and a - presumably - diplomatic vessel of their own flickered into being beside the Shiplord one.

The two ships approached and silvery nanotech formed a connection between the two, a neutral space reliant on both vessels to maintain integrity. You glimpsed a Shiplord form approaching from one side, a Teel'sanha delegation from the other.

"The Shiplords told us the truth," the system said, disrupting your examination of the meeting. "The whole truth, for maybe the first time in their history, and certainly the last."

"What truth?" You asked. You wanted to denounce anything that the Shiplords had said, refuse the answer this place had been created to protect. But if it truly had been created to do that, you couldn't afford not to hear it. Tahkel had said, and you'd agreed, to try and find the truth of them.

That didn't mean you had to believe anything you were told here, but you still needed to listen.

"The truth." Energy surged from the walls, cascading through the chamber in a way that felt somehow familiar- like the touch of a hand you couldn't quite remember. "The only one that really matters."

"But what truth?" Your repetition ground to a halt, and the world slid into glacial slowness around you as the power rippling in the wall arced invisibly into the room between them. Sidra had triggered your perceptual accelerators the moment the leashed energy had formed coherent branches into the chamber, and Iris had brought Mary's online for her in line with standard protocol.

:I get it now,: Elil sent into that near-stillness. You felt the wonder and the soul-deep curiosity that had made him an Insight Focused in the words. :Why it feels familiar.:

:Is it dangerous?: Kalilah replied immediately. :To any of us?:

:I don't think so,: Elil sent, his attention shifting towards the youngest member of your Heartcircle. :Mir? Any clue from your Focus?:

:I can't feel anything dangerous from it, but you know that isn't perfect,: the younger Peace-Focused sent in reply. :But why is it familiar, Elil?:

:It feels like Project Insight,: Elil said, and for a moment the feeling of leashed energy doubled, tripled, memories flickering across the link between you. :I tested with the project before I became a Unisonbound, and since then I've felt it every time the Project cycled. It's hard to miss for those close to it.:

:Not a geographical closeness, I assume?: Lea asked. Affirmation flowed back from Eli, mixed with thankfulness for the recognition. :So what does that mean?: She added.

:It means that if it's not flagging as an immediate danger from anyone here,: Vega said. Swirling energy had pooled around the Harmonial, reflecting your own, greater, instinctive gathering. :Then it should be safe. And we should see where it takes us.:

:Even for Mary?: Iris asked.

:Even for Iris?: Mary asked, at almost exactly the same moment.

There was a moment of expectant quiet, then you felt the curious attention flutter beyond the control of those around you, focused on your lack of response. Laughter bubbled inside of you, so strange, to find that here.

:I know better than to ask.: You infused the sent words with a fraction of the love and trust you felt for those around you, a warm breath of companionship whispering above the worry that still gripped you. :And it's not as if there are any exits here. We do this together.:

:Like we should be.: The chorus answered you.

You and the other Unisonbound moved, taking up position in a loose ring around the more fragile members of the group. And as the energy arcs inched steadily closer, you reached out to touch the closest one to you. The point was simple: diffuse the energy around the Unisonbound, to protect those less experienced with soul manipulation.

The one you'd reached to split apart as it touched your hand, reinforced as it was with the presence of your Aegis, twining around your hand. Then it pushed deeper, past your Masque, past flesh, to the ephemeral you that existed beyond.

:Oh heavens,: you breathed. Because you recognised this. What Elil had said was true, the familiarity, the connection, but the source of it wasn't what he'd thought. Not that it was his fault for making this error, anyone but you would have.

Despite all attempts to the contrary, you were the only human alive who'd ever spoken directly with an Uninvolved. Lea's work with Project Insight to connect with Tahkel had been lucid, but not personal. Yours had been, deeply so, and that gave you experience that no one could match.

:It matches.: Sidra's words were calm, but the Unison's presence around you was more tangible than you'd felt them in weeks. :This is the creation of an Uninvolved. The power left behind would be theirs as well. And that means-:

Your mind flashed ahead of the thought-words, and for an instant you almost did something incredibly unwise. The strength of an Uninvolved was orders of magnitude above the powers you'd wielded at the height of the Third and Second Battles of Sol, and you didn't know if anyone here could survive that. What stopped you was a simple realisation, met in concert with your Unisonbound.

:Anything built here would have been built for those without Practice.: It had to be true. Nothing else would make sense. No Secret had ever suggested the ability to peer into the future; the creations of the Seventh at the Third Sorrow had been simulations of a past the Shiplords had lived.

So instead of throwing your strength against the creation of one so vastly your greater, you welcomed it. You grasped the crackling ribbon of power firmly, wrapping your fingers around it, and brought it to breast, just above your heart. It was like holding a live wire, blurring your vision and making your body shudder. You'd no words that could explain why you were doing it, just instinct. Instinct and that strange, fragile thing called faith.

:Ready?: You asked. You felt the flickers of worry from the others, Lea's most of all, feeling the pain that you were suffering from holding what they were all trying to diffuse.

Sidra's reply came with the feeling of a tired smile, yet as resolute in their support as ever. :Ready.:

:Mandy,: Vega began.

:Harmonise us, Vega,: you said. You turned your head to the younger woman, and you knew she could see the entreaty on your face through the nanoveil hiding you from Shiplord detection. :Please. We need to see, and I can take us there.:

:Lea?:

:Keep her alive,: Lea agreed wearily. :Not my first time.:

:I'll be alright,: you added quickly, mostly to the two most important people out of the group. The two without Unisonbound senses, and therefore the link of the Heartcircle to the whole. :I can see what we need, and it doesn't want to hurt us.:

:You'd better be.: Iris had no give in her tone, and Mary's silence made it clear she spoke for the both of them. Fair enough, you could manage that. And if you couldn't, your Heartcircle would keep you safe.

So you closed your fist around the blue-white arc of Uninvolved power. It came apart into tiny streamers, each of them racing past your hand and into your body. They slid through your Aegis like it simply didn't exist - perhaps to them it didn't - digging down through the barriers of space until they reached the core of your being.

You hissed in sudden pain as it found it, the touch of impossible lightning playing across the fabric of your soul. You'd felt worse, when Kalilah had almost killed herself at Third Sol, burning herself out into a vengeful and defiant star. You'd survived that, and saved her besides; you'd survive this too.

The pain abruptly vanished.

The other ribbons of light snapped out of existence, leaving only the one you'd taken, feeding out to the others through Vega's abilities.

And, swelling inescapably before you, the shifting image of the Shiplord and Teel'sanha delegates enveloped you. Emotions tore through you, thousands of them, but two resolved out of the whirlwind above all. A mournful pride in the peerless performance of their navy, and a terrible sorrow for what their loss must now require. The conflicting viewpoints made it clear: Teel and Shiplord.

"The terms of the agreement are very clear," the Teel delegate said calmly. Their mouth didn't move in anything close to Earth Standard, but it was perfectly understandable. "We understand that you didn't want this, but we have proven ourselves, old teacher. A promise was made, it must now be upheld."

The Shiplord looked down, and you'd never once seen one look so vulnerable. Not even Kicha presented with the truth of the Third Sorrow, or proof that it could've been avoided.

"It is understood," they said. "And you are right, a promise was made, and you have proven yourselves. I just wish…

"It matters not," the Shiplord shook their head. "You will see what is true, and I hope that you will understand, even if you cannot forgive what we are becoming."

"We never said we couldn't forgive, teacher," the Teel replied, and something in their posture seemed…hopeful. "There are ways back from this. There must be. Sometimes it is the duty of the student to educate."

"Perhaps," the Shiplord said. They keyed a sequence on the panel before them, and you took a moment to survey the room. It was largely featureless, a table with several chairs - none of them in use. There were two transparent panels looking out into that starlit void, with no star close enough to distinguish from the others. And on the table, a panel. An actual one, with buttons marked with Shiplord glyphs. That was unexpected.

"You have asked why our methods are shifting," they continued. "Why we've taken actions to tighten the use of the Secrets by younger races. That was the initial agreement, and I want to know that it hasn't changed."

"It has not."

"Very well," the Shiplord touched a final button, and a display projected itself into the air between the two. A moment later, they stepped around the table to stand beside the Teel'sanha delegate. "This may well be my last lesson to your people. I hope it will suffice.

"What you're looking at," they gestured to the image of a very familiar galaxy, "is our galaxy as it existed three million cycles ago. When only a handful of races were known to exist. One of those was us, and as now our people looked ever outward, struggling forward to discover and chart the wonders of our universe.

"This much you know already, I know, but you don't know the whole story. Other than us, only the Neras do now, and they'd rarely speak of it. Because this galaxy, this universe that we charted, we did so without the Secrets."

:They did what?: Mary's voice was incredulous, but also impossibly excited. The surge of emotion from your viewing partner was almost enough that you missed the next sentence. A reply from the Teel.

"What do you mean?" They asked.

"I mean that before this empire that you know, before we were teachers, before we could step between stars at the flick of a switch, we were explorers of a universe that chained our explorations to the speed of light."

The Teel simply stared, no doubt as stunned as you all felt, and the Shiplord kept talking. "We learned how to extend our lifespans, splicing and changing our genetic structure until we could enter a form of cryptobiotic stasis for millennia, waking only when our ship systems required us to do so. And one day, we found a species that we'd come to know as the Consolat.

"They looked inwards as we did out, searching for answers to the universe amidst a deeply philosophical science that we never properly understood. Perhaps if we had, ah," the Shiplord sighed. "They were the first race we met who we found a connection to, young one. The first race that sought to understand us, to talk to us, and in time to come and live among us. We were close enough in evolution to do that, and modifications made by our own sciences allowed us to bridge the gap further.

"They looked at our wonder for the world, our desire to seek distant wonders and far-flung stars, and they smiled and gave us a name. A name that all except the Neras call us."

"Shiplords," the Teel said. They took a shaky step back, and almost fell into an odd-looking chair. "That's why you call yourselves that?"

"It is hard to explain even now how deeply the Consolat touched our race, even millions of cycles later." The old - somehow they felt old - Shiplord chuckled. "And we'd never realise it until it was far too late."

"What happened to them?" the Teel asked, and the Shiplord sighed again, an awful sadness gathering around them. They touched another button, and the image jumped, the orientation of the galaxy shifting. You weren't sure how far it had gone, though.

:A little over half a million cycles.: Iris reported. :Closer to six hundred thousand than five.:

"We shared the universe for over half a million cycles," the Shiplord said sorrowfully, wistfully. You felt Iris' surge of satisfaction, but she restrained it well, focusing on the now. "We came together, learning, charting, showing them what we'd found and learning from what it told them. But no matter how much we learned, we couldn't breach the chains of light's cage.

"We could only ever explore so much, only ever see so much of the endless beauty of the galaxy. It made us sad, and that made our friends sad. So they set out to find a way to change it," the Shiplord's voice cracked with emotion. "And they succeeded."

:Wait a second,: Elil sent. :Did they just-"

The Shiplord continued. "They promised us an answer, a solution, a way that we could see more of reality and understand it. We thought little of it at first, perhaps it would be another way of seeing the world, a philosophical framework that could satisfy our wanderlust. If only it had been so simple…

"Instead," the Shiplord paused, marshalling their words. "One day, a few decades short of five hundred and seventy centuries since our first meeting, every single Consolat life ended. One moment they were there, across the few worlds we'd come to make and share as our own. Then they were gone. And with their death came the Secrets."

The Teel started to speak, asking a question, but it was forgotten in the roaring of blood in your ears, and the stunned silence of your fellows. You'd started to guess that something had made the Secrets, maybe someone, maybe an Uninvolved of some type, billions of years ago. But if this was true…you shoved the logic chain away, trying to force it to continue running in the background for now. Later, later.

"When those who'd been left behind on Origin found our worlds a decade later," the Shiplord said, answering a question you'd missed about how the Shiplords had reacted, "travelling on First Secret drives so primitive that you'd barely credit them with the word, they found us cast adrift. Lost, until their messages brought us understanding. Our friends had left their archives behind, all their work, and those of our people left behind had been able to find some answers.

"Never a full one, never one to the greatest question of why they'd vanished. But enough to unlock the beginnings of the Secrets, and to recognise the dangers and vast responsibility we'd been given. It was only the initial dangers, not the real ones, not yet. But it was enough of a purpose for the people we were then to grasp it with both hands. We were the only race other than the Neras with First Secret technology for several centuries, and we used that time wisely."

"But how does that explain what you're doing now?" The Teel demanded. "We didn't fight and die for a history lesson, teacher. We did so for answers."

"And I'm trying to give you them," the Shiplord said. "But you need to understand the background first. You've been to our Sorrows, you've seen our mistakes, and you fought to help us contain the last one. But you never were able to understand them, because we hid some of the truth. I know you've wondered why the First Sorrow was so destructive to us at a cultural level, and the Second doesn't really answer that question."

"No," the Teel agreed. "It doesn't."

"Then allow me to rectify that," the Shiplord said. Another gesture and the space around them filled with stills. Nebular clusters, young stars, the roaring hunger and hawking fountains of black holes. Life flowering across hundreds of worlds, the barren mountains of those that would never feel its presence.

"When the Consolat were taken from us, they left behind a legacy that could shatter creation. They gave us the ability to break the cage of light, to seed life on dead worlds and to tap the very stars. But those very same things were also capable of becoming weapons. With the Consolat gone we were the only race with real information on how their Secrets worked.

"Perhaps we could've shared that burden better, in the early days, but we weren't the people you knew then. For all our age, we were terribly uncertain what the right choices might be. All we could agree on was the need to protect the reality we'd always seen as so beautiful from the unintended - we hoped - side effects of what the Consolat had given their existence to provide."

"That's why the War of the Sphere's ending affected you so deeply," The Teel said. "You'd seen something like it before."

"Yes." You barely heard the reply, it was so quiet. "And why we reacted so badly to what the Gysians tried to do. The Secrets had been given to us, to reality, through sacrifice. And they were going to abuse them at the cost of everything. And then the Sphere did abuse them, and one of those we'd taught hundreds of thousands of cycles before today stepped in to prevent it."

"Wasn't that a good thing?" It was a good question, and the followup made you like this long-dead Teel more. "Wouldn't more guards, more protectors, have helped you?"

"That would have required us to trust them," the Shiplord sighed. "It was my hope, young one, that one day we could've shared it with you. But the Authority has already voted, and that amendment never made it far."

"I'm sorry to hear that," the Teel said sadly. "What now, then?"

"You will be given leave to explore the truth of our beginnings," the Shiplord said. "To visit the Consolat Origin and read the archives there. I hope and would pray for you to find something there that we have not, for that is the only way that the Authority will turn from the course that has been decided. You sought a challenge against us to find answers, and that will be given."

"But you won't turn away?"

"I'm not sure we can." The Shiplord turned away, tapping a final sequence on the pad. "But if you think you can succeed where we have failed, then this is the place you must go."

A set of coordinates formed above the table, parsed in Shiplord standard. And around it formed the shape of a star system. One star, five planets and two asteroid belts. Surprisingly mundane really, for a system that had reshaped the galaxy.

And now you knew where it was.

"Then go there we shall," the Teel answered.

The vision of the meeting broke apart, shattering into streamers of light, each one lancing out across the stars. One dove towards the coordinates you'd just seen, full of fragile hope and desperate curiosity. Two more retreated back towards feelings of home, full of regret for a universe descending into madness.

The rest split away too fast for you to track, except for one more, that descended down into the straining foundations of a terribly wounded nation. It took root there, growing and bringing those around it closer, a desire for resistance and a will to have hope for the future even if there was none for them.

Belief that a better day could come, and that all they had to do was leave behind the tools to make it real. And acceptance for how they'd never be alive to see it. The Shiplords couldn't be healed by the Teel'sanha, but one day, there'd be someone who could.

Maybe that was meant to be you. You weren't sure how you'd be able to do that, there still wasn't enough time. But maybe…

:They were waiting for someone who understood the science of the soul,: Mary sent. A singular focus had overwhelmed her usually boundless curiosity. And you…felt something in that sending. A flicker, and then another, below the measure of normal awareness but just within your own.

:Someone who could see something they only glimpsed,: your friend continued. :Enough for them to build this place, but not enough for them to do anything with it.:

:But what?: Vega asked, and you felt Mary's impatience well before her words.

:Something in the archive that the Consolat left to the Shiplords,: she replied :Something that the Shiplords never found, and that the Teel'sanha couldn't do more than realise was there. This place was made to wait for someone who could see in a way that neither of them could. That's why it let us in.:

:What do you mean?: The world took shape around you again, the dark panels, low table and tangible presence of ancient power. Like you'd never left.

:The Shiplord delegate said it,: Mary pointed out. :The Consolat looked inwards like the Shiplords did out. They searched the world inside of them, whilst the Shiplords explored everything that was beyond that. I think the Teel'sanha must have been similar to the Shiplords in that, but wouldn't that make sense? They'd been taught by them, moulded, even if it wasn't entirely deliberate.:

:Just like everyone else the Shiplords would ever trust in the Sorrows,: Kalilah's voice was sharp with pain. :Anyone who might have been able to see the deeper meanings never made it that far. Or just…didn't exist.:

:Until now,: Iris said, voice small as the scale of this started to sink in. :They believed there was a chance that someone might find this place, one day. And now we're here, and we know. And we aren't like the Shiplords - none of us. We look out at the world, at its wonders, but the greatest of them have always been said to lie within. Look at our literature, our culture, everything that we treasure at the deepest levels. It's inwards facing. We look out to extend it, to defend it.:

:We're like the Consolat,: you finished for your daughter, and a surge of fierce agreement flooded through you. :Not as old, not as wise. But how we see the world is similar.:
Just
:I think so,: Iris said, nodding minutely through her Masque.

:Then…: you trailed off, and in that moment the interface spoke again.

"Further data required?"

:We should ask for information about the Teel'sanha, and this place.: Vega said quickly. :It's what we need most, to understand them and their reasons. To make sure that we're right.:

:Agreed.: The affirmative pulsed from all across a fluttering moment. :But then what?:

The answers to the immediate questions came in the form of the informational posts you've already read. What would you like to do after receiving those answers?
[] Ask more of the interface?
- [] Write in (ping me for approval)

[] Return to the Hearthguard memorial to
- [] Witness
- [] Remember

[] Return to the Adamant to assess and plan your next move.

If you return to the Adamant you will not be able to return to the Last Memory.

 

[Snowfire]

With your questions answered, you were left with the matter of what to do next. There was so much you wanted to know, but the limits on the system left behind by the Lament were quite clear. Perhaps there was another way to answer some of the questions that still remained. You'd spent very little time among the Shiplord population at the Sorrows, encounters with particular Wardens notwithstanding.

:You sure you want to do that?: Vega asked, as the light and energy around you broke apart.

:I think we have to,: you sent back. :We're still missing things. I don't expect the civilian population to be able to answer all of it, we'll need to visit the Archive for that. But it's worth trying - and maybe we can look for other answers whilst we're there.:

:Answers to what?: you felt the twisting contempt from Kalilah. Not directed at you, never that, but at the idea. Yet it was less than it would've been a year ago.

:No matter how we feel about the Shiplords,: Iris sent soothingly, :the question of how they feel about this place is still a valid one. We've seen the Hearthguard's opinions, and we've been willing to reveal ourselves in exchange. I'm not suggesting we walk into their galleries and pull off our Masques, but knowing how an 'average' Shiplord feels about even one of their Sorrows could help us a lot.:

:Iris is correct,: Vega agreed. A surge of the same emotion flooded out from Elil and Mir, entwining the words. :Kalilah, none of us are saying you have to like them. But how else are we going to find out how respected the Hearthguard really are? If what Kicha promised could be real?.:

:You don't believe them?: Kailah asked. You guessed her next question before her thoughts could begin building it. :Then wh-:

:I believe she believes it,: you replied precisely. :But we don't know if she's right. And I'd prefer not to leave that unknown, no matter how much access she appears to have.:

:And their civilian population could give us a viewpoint that we've not had before,: Kalilah continued, the words coming slowly, feeling out the logic despite how much she disliked it.

:Exactly so,: Vega nodded. :Project Insight never gave us a proper, internal view of their culture and the Sorrows as they happened are only one piece of the puzzle. If we're going to understand how much the Hearthguard actually could do for us, we need more data. How well respected are the Sorrows? What fraction of the population still cares about this place?:

:We're not asking you to talk to them, Kalilah,: Mir said, voice soothing. The far younger Peace-Focused usually didn't directly interact with Kalilah for fear of accidental conflicts. That he did here said a lot about how important he thought it must be. :Just that some of us need to.:

::I get it.: The words gusted across the link between you, their touch a hot wind against dry grass. It carried the utter clarity of how much Kalilah truly did not like this, the sparks of frustration that could easily catch into fury, if only she let them. But she didn't. :One question.:

The response was utterly wordless: a swirling blend of relief and acceptance, respect and expectation. Kalilah returned them with the feeling of a faint smile, cut sharp as a crescent moon.

:What do we tell Warden Yarin?:

:Simple enough,: you and Vega said, in the same instant. Laughter flitted at the edges of the link, the exactness of the timing just too perfect.

After a moment of shared consideration, Vega continued. :None of them know what's in here. With the acceleration we've been operating under, we've not been here long. We could walk back out and say we didn't find anything we could understand. Or just not say anything at all.:

:Something would be better than nothing,: Elil suggested, drawing your focus to the Insight Focused. :If we give nothing, it'll just make him wonder, and that curiosity will spread. If we give him something, it'll deflect anything further. At least at first:

Better to trust an Insight in his speciality than quibble. :Done, then.:

:I'll need Vega to make it work,: he started to say, only for the Harmonial to drag him into a secondary link, their signalling accelerating to full combat acceleration. That would handle that nicely.

:Anything else?: You asked the conference of minds. Nothing presented itself, except for Elil and Vega snapping back out of their conference link a breath before you finished. :Then let's go.:

You left the matter of the Warden to the ones who'd taken time to prepare for it, making your way out through the shrouded doorway a few steps behind them. It made it easy to avoid the conversation, focusing on the data cycling across the links between your team as the two Unisonbound exchanged words with Warden Yarin.

Much of it was hard to parse even for you, Mary having Iris run calculations through the shared processing power of your Unisons. Which raised an interesting question.

:What are you looking for?: You asked as the conversation with Yarin trended towards a close. :I know enough to tell that that isn't a coordinate parse,: you added, mentally highlighting the calculations. :So what are you trying to find?:

:Trying to confirm what I can with what I have,: Mary replied shortly. She didn't mean anything by it, you knew. This was simply how she was: always searching for answers and never willing to wait. Not the easiest person to share a life with, but you'd made it work.

:Which is?: You gave her a breath, then poked again. :I can ask Iris, you know.:

:The Secrets,: she said. If there was exasperation in her tone, it was at least affectionate. :You know they were considered too complex to be natural almost since first discovery. I don't have much more to work with than humanity did back then, but this place gave me somewhere to at least start.:

:How far do you think you can take that?: You asked, curiosity kindling with the implications. :Just knowing who made them doesn't give you that much, does it?:

:You'd be surprised,: she said, a fierce smile bleeding through the words. :We've tried to guess how the Shiplords knew of something like Practice ever since Project Insight told us they did. And then there's this.:

A file streamed across the link, unfolding into a composite recording that you knew very well. You were one of the sources, after all. The bridge of the Calypso, humanity's flagship during the Second Battle of Sol. Vega and yourself, each wreathed in the fullness of a Unisonbound's Aegis, fighting against Shiplord combat chassis.

An exchange of words, demands, and fiery condemnation that only now you realised you could start to make sense of.

"How dare you profane that gift and persist!" The voice of the first Shiplord you'd ever spoken to. You still wondered how Kicha would have reacted to that recording.

:Oh,: you breathed. :I see.:

:Yeah,: your friend agreed. :Not so complicated when we know enough, is it.:

It wasn't a large leap, not anymore. But it brought things into focus.

:You're trying…to simulate how the Secrets could have been made?: You asked, mind whirling as the formula and their responses snapped into place to form a picture far deeper than anything you'd imagined possible with so little time. Unless…. :Mary, how long have you been trying to do this?:

:About as long as we've known each other.: She sounded surprised - had she expected you to already know? :But I never had data to narrow it down. What the Lament left behind wasn't much, but it was one more datapoint. Not the crucial one, but it's another step down the path. And with that-:

Her words cut off as the next formula resolved, projecting phantom light on the walls around you as if inscribing them with truths of the universe. It wasn't entirely hyperbole. You weren't sure when you'd learned about these, but there was something, niggling in the back of your mind. Some odd certainty that what you were seeing meant something.

:Progress!: Mary hissed the word with a satisfaction deep enough to be vicious. :Not much. Only a beginning of what the Consolat must have done. The things I could do with more computing power…:

She'd have more for the Adamant's computing core when you got back there, you were sure. But you knew what you'd just seen. You knew the process of research from your time as co-lead for Arcadia, the way a problem felt when part of what made it one fell away. It wasn't always that simple, another problem could be lurking just beyond it. But it was, as Mary said, progress.

:Something for the Adamant's lagless core, maybe?: You suggested - putting words to the thought. :At least for further refinement.:

:Yes.: Mary agreed, the feeling of a nod. Then, quieter, almost beneath your mental hearing was something else. :Wonder when I taught Mandy about that…:

Odd for her to wonder, her memory was usually stellar. But these weren't exactly lab conditions, and there was a lot more to focus on. Including the successful bypass of your guide, who Vega had asked to take you to where the Shiplords would Remember their once-friends.

The trek up out of the depths of the Memory was not a long one, but it reinforced the feeling of the place upon you as you walked in silent contemplation of it. A creation forged by an Uninvolved, it resonated with an energy familiar to Practice, and yet so very different. It took you until you were back on the air transport back to the Sorrow's centre to realise why that was.

The Uninvolved born of the Lament had seen the creation of the Last Memory as their last act upon reality. Its presence was one of endings, lending it a weight and terrible finality utterly at odds with anything humanity had created with Practice. Your creations could be desperate, but that made them a surprise. The only place you'd been before that had felt like the Last Memory had been the archives left behind by the Elder First, and the two just didn't compare.

Maybe that was time, the endless march having thickened the presence of sorrow around the Lament's final creation. But maybe it was something else, too. The Elder First had been certain there'd be a humanity to inherit what they'd left behind. Had the Teel'sanha? You weren't sure.

The spaceport that formed the heart of this Sorrow came into view through the ancient towers and broader buildings of the Teel'sanaha's capitol, and your transport arced down towards one of the latter on the far side of it from the Memory. Electronic signs and idents flickered around you as you passed through them, and the translation software painstakingly created by the Ministry of Security took the glyphs and returned something you could understand.

Some pointed away, where you assumed one would go to Witness, but perhaps not. They led towards museums, great complexes of art and culture and history that…you checked again. Yes, the idents were very clear. Complexes created by the Teel'sanha, and maintained ever since by the Hearthguard. Would the exhibits still be same after all this time?

Thoughts for later.

Before you rose a broad, sloping structure that the glyphs translated to be a grand forum of some kind, and if nothing else the size made the term fit. At your best guess, you could have fit the Adamant inside of the structure a half-dozen times over. You could see steady streams of Shiplords moving freely in and out of tall, arching halls with no physical doors. There was a faint shimmer of energy around them instead, a protective field of some kind. And-

:I can feel that place,: Iris said softly, your daughter having come to your side as you landed. Her gaze was fixed on the building, and you could almost see the flickering motion of her pupils as they snapped from point to point of a vast information web. :The datasphere there is packed. So much being said, I think I'd struggle to catch it all.:

:Then we'll just have to focus on specifics,: you said, injecting the words somehow with the idea of ruffling your daughter's hair. She responded with the feeling of a look you knew rather well and that made you smile, Masque shifting in the motions of gentle laughter.

Then Warden Yarin was leading you forward, their steps calm and sure on the path, one they must have walked so many times that being able to do so with their eyes closed likely lost meaning. He beckoned you with a simple motion, yet there were shifts in his frame, as if still confused, contemplating. Unsure, in other words, and not sure how he felt about it.

Interesting.

:What did you tell him?: You asked the Insight and Harmonial of your small group, legitimately curious.

Elil surprised you with a rare chuckle. :Enough of the truth to make him believe. Anything else is up to him.:

:I suppose that's fair,: you sent, flickering curiosity fading as your guide led you towards the forum. You could ask later. You had other things to focus on, the building strength of Vega's presence between you all the greatest of those needing attention. The last time she'd felt like this had been close to another place of Shiplord remembrance, and it had almost killed her.

:It's alright,: she sent in immediate, preemptive reply. You wondered if she even knew that she was doing it, sometimes. :This isn't like the FIrst, that was a cyclone that wanted to draw me in.:

:What is this, then?:

:A seeking. With no right answer.:

---

The inside of the sprawling complex was an exertion of spartan beauty, stone and wood painstakingly protected by energy fields, and the first place you'd seen using staircases. It could have been a replication, a construct, but something in the presence of it all felt all too real. It wasn't that the other Sorrows hadn't been, but this place had been something else before the Hearthguard had chosen to make it part of their memorials.

Exhibits towered within alcoves cut through the broad spaces, historical stands in the languages of the Teel'sanha expressing their significance. Here, surrounded by the history of a race that they'd driven to suicide, thousands of Shiplords moved and spoke. Some pointed, discussed what they thought the stands might mean, wondered, curious. Others strolled between the stands, or stood back, trying to take in everything. And through it all, there was the sibilant presence of constant talk.

All of the other Sorrows had been so quiet.

Stepping through the doors brought you face to face with more Shiplords than you'd ever seen in your life, at any Sorrow, and all of them in one place. The airwaves thrummed with invisible radiation and simpler vibration, communication taking place across dozens of levels at scores of different speeds.

Before you could take in any more, Warden Yarin stepped to the side, one arm extending into the room in a courteous gesture shot through with twisting spirals of his own unfamiliar curiosity. How long had it been since he'd felt like this? A thousand years? Ten thousand? More?

"Welcome, to this remembrance," he said, his voice surprisingly soft. "It is our hope, my hope, that you might find some peace here. Whatever the Memory gave you, whatever you have witnessed, this is the other side of the coin. Here is a place to speak and listen to those among the living, about how the past of this Sorrow might shape our future."

"I hope you find what you're looking for here. And that you can use it, in whatever you believe comes next." Gravity rippled around the Shiplord's feet for a moment, Fifth Secret manipulation of truly breathtaking accuracy. Then he leapt casually to the second floor of the structure, and vanished into the swirling crowds.

:Well, that's ominous.: Kalilah noted a moment later, with all the elegance of a sledgehammer. Interestingly, she didn't immediately suggest killing the Warden as a potential security risk. Though thinking about it, there wouldn't be much point now. :Where should we go?:

:Mary will want to see the exhibits,: you noted, entirely abusing your accelerators to do so before she could say so herself. :I'm not having any of our non-Unisonbound going around alone in case we need to evac, so one of us needs to go with her.:

:Bodyguard duty again?: Kalilah asked in the tone of one much put-upon.

:You did say you wouldn't want to talk to anyone here.:

:There are some interesting patterns on the first floor,: Vega sent through the laughter that followed. One of the Harmonial's feet tapped impatiently on the stone, as if already trying to walk in that direction. :They feel young in a way that nothing else here does. I want to see what that means.:

:These are places that their youth are apparently brought to, or at least what passes for youth among their culture,: Elil added. It was hard to miss the surge of curiosity about and faint concern for what you might find there. But the man was too much his Focus to turn away from that. :We should see what they're like. If nothing else, it could be a factor for the future.:

:I'm more interested in that one,: Iris sent, her message carrying vector data pointing towards a small crowd of Shiplords on the ground floor. The flickering motion of nanoforms made it clear that the ongoing conversation was a passionate one even by the standards of this place, and no less for the one at the centre of the discussion.

:What's so interesting about them?: You asked, struggling to decipher the personal ident codes from the sea of others cluttering the forum's dataspace.

:I'm not completely sure,: Iris said, artfully calm, :but I think they're a former Tribute Fleet officer.:

:And they came back here?: You asked incredulously. It was difficult not to be distracted by the sudden, seething presence of Kalilah's focus on the individual, but you did your best.

:So it would appear.: You could feel the infectious chaos of your daughter's smile, but tempered in a way she'd never have managed before the Third Battle of Sol. Before she'd killed for the first time. :I'd like to see what he has to say. Maybe ask him a few pointed questions.:

She…wasn't wrong to suggest that. Any interaction would be a nest of truly vicious conversational land mines, but the potential perspective could be helpful too. You knew that the Shiplord held Tribute Fleet personnel in high regard, but the reasons had never been made clear. Actually talking to one of them, though…

Your stomach twisted as you remembered the moments that had preceded an instant of then-unprecedented power. Where humanity had unravelled the truth of what happened to the people the Shiplords took as tribute, in the screaming outrage of your own soul.

:That,: you sent, swallowing once, :could be a difficult conversation.:

:It's why I want to have it.: Any threads of amusement drained from your daughter's tone as she felt the undertones of sick horror beneath your words. But, credit where it's due, it didn't stop her. :I'm the youngest of anyone here. I understand what the Sorrows did, how the Tribute Fleets are terrible, awful things, but I never had to live that reality. It lets me ask questions that I don't think any of you could with coming a little too close to breaking cover.:

:What did we do right to make you so brave?: You asked.

The connection pulsed with warmth and gentle pleasure before Iris answered you. :Raised me.:

:I'd like to go with Mary too,: Lea, the other Mender of the team offered in the silence that followed. :Seeing the exhibits could be interesting, and it'll let us see how the Shiplords feel about them.:

And that was everyone. Everyone else, at least. :What about you?:

Where do you go?
[] Exhibitions - Go with Mary, Lea and Kalilah to see the exhibits and talk with those around them. Discover how the Shiplords feel about this Sorrow, at the very least, and those who it remembers.
[] Youthful Patterns - Normally talking with the youth of a race wouldn't be much help. But there are other factors here, and knowing how the youth feel about the Sorrows could help you understand how important they really are from a very different perspective.
[] Past Tribute - A former officer of the Tribute Fleets, there is a great deal you'd like to ask them but also much you cannot. Even so, Iris has a point, and going with her could catch things your daughter wouldn't. Probably best if you let your daughter ask the questions, though.
[] Write-in?

 

[Snowfire]

:I want to see what Vega does,: you said, after only a moment of consideration. You'd not sensed the difference that the Harmonial had clearly keyed into, but you couldn't fault her judgement. :You mind a third?:

The question had more weight than it might have. Vega was clearly deeply drawn by the feeling of youth within the great museum, and the last thing you wanted to do was to get in her way. The sudden twitch of movement as you asked the question would have made you worry, if you hadn't been able to feel the impatience that drove the frustration behind it.

:Not at all,: she replied. It was odd to see her like this, really. Usually she was so calm, something she'd likely copied from you during your time in government together - or even before. And even when excited…you'd never seen her like this. :Come on.:

Then she led you into the crowds. She never seemed to move a step faster than the countless Shiplords around you, yet you crossed the ground level of the building like the passage of an invisible scalpel, reaching the ancient, sweeping stairway up to the middle levels in less than ten seconds. Exactly how she managed that you couldn't tell, but the Harmonial dragged you along like ripples in her wake, somehow keeping you by her side through will alone.

It was enough time to wish the rest of your team luck, though. You lingered a little on Mary and Iris, as you always did, but your daughter had surprised you here. You weren't sure you'd have been able to stand beside her in going to talk to a Tribute Fleet officer and that made your daughter's courage all the more profound. Some of those feelings must have bled through in what you said to her, though.

:It's not that sort of bravery, mom - not like you see it,: she sent in lieu of acknowledgement. :You only have hopes and we need some of those to survive for you to carry them. I just believe in the family you gave me.:

:And I know,: she added, turning towards the circle of curious Shiplords around the officer. :Most of humanity wouldn't care. 'M not sure I do, either. But one of us needs to try. We'll never get a better chance.: You felt the smile on her face without ever needing to see it. The little, thinking one that rarely lasted long, but always led somewhere interesting.

You wondered what she saw this time?

The stairs vanished beneath a drumbeat of footsteps, each one stretching the limits of local gravity and propulsion systems, until at the top of the stairs Vega tensed a moment, then leapt straight to the level above you. She caught the side of an opening with an easy motion, and you followed her up.

This level was less crowded, scattered with smaller exhibits and seating to observe them. Some of them were recordings, art, but the movements of a handful of the groups implied some were music, too. Nothing you could hear, which tracked – humanity could do that simply enough, too.

Vega led you across the level with an utter disregard for the exhibitions around you, largely examples of artistic culture drawn from the entirety of those who'd made up the Teel'sanaha Peoples. Portraits in strange paints and colours, sculptures in scores of materials and styles, musical compositions that you couldn't stop to hear, but dearly wished to. Some exhibits seemed to be entirely based on texture, if the extended manipulators of the Shiplords around them were any clue, brushing across the surface of ancient creations with delicate care.

Snapshots from the tens of cultures who'd joined together to create the unique existence that the Peoples had represented. And, here and there, what you guessed to be fusions born of that shared creation. Proof that the Peoples had not just been many races bound by convenience, but a single vast nation made up of all its members.

It made you want to stop to take even a fraction of it all in. To look, listen and weep for the death of a nation that had been everything you wished humanity could become. To take this opportunity to learn and remember, to do what these Sorrows had been built for according to the Gysian Warden of their own world's death cry. But you couldn't.

There wasn't time.

Perhaps one day you could come back and see this place in its entirety, but that wouldn't be today. Vega led you on with focused steps, through a twisting route that made no sense whilst you were walking it, yet led seemingly inevitably to the Harmonial's goal. Without the links of a Heartcircle, you'd never have known how close you were without being told.

But it wasn't hard to tell when you got there.

A great sculpture of matter and photons filled the centre of the room, twisting through impossible angles and spliced curves to create something as unique as anything you'd ever seen. A small display, easily accessed by your Unisons, narrated the tale of the piece's creation, and the many artists who'd collaborated to complete it. The design had been sketched by a pre-space master, who'd looked to the stars and dreamt of what wonders might be possible up there. They'd died long centuries before their species had reached those stars, but the design had outlived them to kindle inspiration among the Peoples.

It was just another of the countless rooms of this level, with a small group of Shiplords taking a moment to rest on an open square of long couches. There was almost nothing about the physical appearance of the group to make their difference obvious, all in the same sheath of nanotechnology, glittering silver and gentle pastels in the dim light of the display. It was all in the smaller things. How they moved, how they sat, the way their veils shifted in ways you'd never seen before.

It did raise a question, though; how much of Shiplord society were actually children? Though to answer that question, you'd have to ask another. In a society where immortality was the right of every citizen, what constituted a child?

"Hello," Vega said, stopping just past the open arch of an entryway you'd come through. "May we come in?"

The informality of the question was almost shocking after the stacked formality that had overshadowed most of your interactions with Shiplords so far. No one here seemed worried, though.

"It's a free room," one of them said, veil flicking an indication towards the empty couch across from them. Welcoming, but there was something else there…as if they were distracted by something? Vega caught it too, clearly, given her next question.

"We'd not want to intrude," she began, and another of the Shiplords laughed.

"Don't fuss on our account," they told you. The veils of the group flicked between them, carrying the feeling of an exasperated eyeroll at having to repeat the answer. "There's space, you're looking. Nothing more to it."

"Well, in that case," Vega started forward, her Masque flaring out curiosity and soothing smiles. She flicked her datalinks open, closed, open again at the same time. A moment later, you felt the young Shiplords reply in kind. Your IDs were all set and ready to go, but it would probably be better if you didn't have to answer any specific questions.

"It's good to meet you," a slightly taller Shiplord in the centre of the group greeted. "Sorry about the first impression; it's rare that we find people close to our own ages, and everyone else here seems infected by Sorrows formality."

"It's so boring," another – the datalink informed you that their use-name was Everan – said. "Seeing this place is good to do, and being here right now is better, but it's nice to not be the only ones who can speak normally."

"That's alright," Vega said, her veil twitching in laughter, hiding any sign of confusion. Some formality, yes, that you'd guessed. But all of it? Maybe your experience had just been more unique. "There's enough to think about here without dressing it up."

"Stars make it so," the first Shiplord to speak, the oldest apparently from the shared interaction data, replied. It felt almost like a prayer, and wasn't that interesting. "So, how have you found your stay?"

"Krea, you know that's meant to be offered," another of the group scolded, their veil a picture of laughing scandal.

"Do they feel the type to take offence?" Krea shot back. "I already know how half of you react, but they're new."

"Well," you said, entering the conversation for the first time. It was odd, not having the formality to fall back on. But you'd wanted to see who the Shiplords were, and here was a chance to find out. "I wouldn't take offence, but I'd hope a trade would be alright?"

You'd layered your Masque with meanings in asking the question, hoping to make clear that you were only curious. A surge of vindication rushed across Krea's veil and she scooted a bit closer over one of her fellows. No awkward movement either, the change in position as smooth as gravity manipulators could make it.

"Of course!" She said happily.

"Careful there," the older one, Niden, warned. "They've a lot to say about it all, and not all of it can come out nicely."

"It'll come as it does," Krea replied. "Not my fault I have my own opinions."

"Radical," another tsked jokingly. "What would we do without you."

"You mean you don't agree with these places?" Vega asked, and Krea shook their head.

"That's not it." They sketched a pattern of light in the air, five rings, connected by a weave of lines that drew them closer. With each new connection, the shape at the centre of the pattern became smaller.

"I see the connections, I understand how we got here. But I'd hope," they paused. "Is it wrong to hope we could do better? That the circle in the middle of these lines didn't narrow every time."

"I can understand that," you said, trying for warmth. It seemed to work.

"Well, at least we're not the only group thinking so," Krea sighed. "That helps. Seeing the bigger picture, it's good, but it highlights things. Gives me ideas to strive for, maybe things we can all make better, one day."

"Dreamer," one of the quieter Shiplords sang gently. It wasn't teasing, you realised a second later. Simply a recognition.

"We all have something," Krea replied. The words were touched with sadness, but also resolution, and a hope so pure it was hard to recognise coming from a Shiplord. All the others had seemed so lost to endless time. But here, here it seemed different.

"Not happy with what the Peoples failed to fight, then?" Mir asked, his own voice modulated to a steady tone. Only a Third could've asked that so easily, you thought. Not really fair, as immediate assumptions went, but not entirely wrong.

Krea winced, but straightened quickly. "Not particularly. It's a big responsibility we're raised to take, even if it'll be hundreds of cycles before we touch any of it properly. But legacies are bad enough when they're just from my parents. The one these places were built for, that's worse."

"Hey." Everan reached over, brushing their veil against Krea's, the two mixing at surface level in a display of intimacy you'd…never seen before. "None of that. It's not static, no matter how long it takes to see things move sometimes. Remember why we came here now."

"Why did you come here?" You asked, jumping on the latest reference to something before it could slip away. Confusion rippled across the veils around you, and you made your own respond with tentative embarrassment, touched by your own confusion.

"Have you been keeping your out-links blind?" Niden asked at last, several realtime seconds later. "I know people talk about making the Sorrows a pilgrimage, but it's rare to meet anyone who takes it seriously."

Silence seemed the best reply to that, and the Shiplord's veil flickered into a grimace. "I've probably said too much in that case, apologies. We can g-"

"No," you said quickly. "I'd…if it's important enough, I'd like to know."

They looked between each other, veils flexing and flickering between emotions too fast for you to keep up. Then the one who'd called Krea a dreamer spoke.

"The Sorrowful is going to address the Authority today," she said. You caught her name from the link this time: Thalim. "Very soon, in fact. It's why we all came here, to see her do it from a place of the Hearthguard, to make it…a memory. And none of us had seen the Sorrows before, so it seemed time."

"Helped give us some context to it," Everan added. "All the commentators say it's a historic occasion, won't stop talking about the reasons, but it's not the same as seeing them here."

"We can extend our link if you'd prefer to keep yours down?" Krea offered. "Make up your mind quick, though, they're getting the chamber back in order after the latest address."

"Did Bikant have anything reasonable to say this time?" Thalim asked. "I just muted it."

"No," Niden said wearily. "But that's, well."

They stopped themselves from going further, and you guessed it was for your own sake and not wanting to cause any offence.

You glanced at the other two humans in the room, and realised that this really wasn't a question. If Kicha was going to speak today, if she was starting to take action as she'd promised, you wanted to see it.

:Yes, we can handle the dataflow.: Sidra added, before you could ask. No excuse, then.

"We'd like that, please," you said. No sooner had you said it before a link query pinged against Sidra's firewalls. Everan blinked through their veil.

"...damn, that's some security," they muttered as you opened the connection. "It's a full link from one of the floating bots. Standard controls and walkabout through the integration, but I'd be careful using that here. The place is pretty packed."

"Of course," you nodded. "Thank you."

The world flowed into a blur, then you were blinking through sudden bright lights as you looked out into your first glimpse – the first non-Shiplord glimpse in hundreds of millennia – of the Authority. It rose through multiple levels above you, each one draped in exquisitely understated finery, all of them spiralling subtly in around a surprisingly spartan speaking position.

Just a circle of bare stone, with hovering mics outside a direct field of view. You had little time to take any more of it in, before a figure flickered into being on the dais. You didn't need the datacodes flicking up in the stream to recognise the figure. The air of ancient sorrow around her made it very clear.

Kicha.

Now what would she have to say?

---

The world flickered around you, then realised itself into an image of a world so very far from your own. It overtook your reality in a brilliant display of networked systems that had been built to span the galaxy. To allow your people to come together and decide the future, a task that had grown ever more terrible as the endless train of centuries passed into millennia and beyond.

It made you wonder, for a moment: how long had it been since you'd stood here? More than a million cycles if you counted it in person. A few hundred thousand since the last time like this, at the final vote that had condemned the Zlathbu to inevitable extinction. A vote that had, you'd thought, snuffed out the flames that had long since sustained you.

"Honoured members of the Authority." Your voice shook a little as you remembered that vote. You'd fought that battle, harder than any you'd done before, and all of it had been for naught. "You know my name, but for those watching today who might not, allow me to introduce."

The veil of merged Secrets around you flickered through motions of sincerity, of pain, overshadowing the spark that you'd been hiding ever since you sought out this moment. It had been easier than you'd expected, really. The Authority was still split, unsure of what action to take against the rising tide of chaos around them. The wisdom of elders was rarely refused in these moments, and there were relatively few among even the highest of the Authority's stations who could match your own now.

It had made connecting something of a challenge, in fact, finding those who could remember you beyond the title you bore. Stories begun thousands of cycles past had only grown in time within the halls of the Authority, and it was hard to breach the towering influence of those legends. Harder still to pull away from them, but you'd made yourself do it.

A signal flickered from the seat at the centre of the grand, vaulting chamber, granting you that which you'd requested. It would be expected by those who could remember, a setting, a marker to many. But that wasn't what it was, what it ever had been, for you.

"The name I use in this now is Kicha, and I am Warden of the Hearthguard." you said, feeling the shape of the words to come, and casting out a wish for them to come steadily. You needed that. "But to this place, to all those now who watch from nearby and the furthest corners, you might know me by others. I am Kymri. And I am the Sorrowful."

A rustle swept the chamber, as much true sound as signal noise felt through the datasphere, as those present recognised the statement for what it was. Some, the young ones, stared in shock as strings of authentication codes unfurled from your implants like some ancient heraldry, bringing the vast hall to a reverent silence.

It wouldn't last, you knew that. It could only bring you this moment. Anything more was up to you. And you felt it now, dancing behind the eyes that few ever saw. Of those among the chamber today, only a handful had seen it speak. Now, you hoped, more would.

"I don't like to use these names," you admitted. A wave of sorrow accompanied them, the memories that had made you that figure, a piece of Shiplord legend in your own way. Tarnished, as all living legends became, but still. "But today, I feel that I must."

"A vote stands before you today, as it has in the days and weeks since a fledgling race struck a War Fleet from their skies. A vote, to decide what comes next. What path our people take into the future, and what lessons we chose to learn from history. Many of you, I know, don't see it that way. But it's here, and what you are deciding now is far more important than you might imagine."

You saw glimmers of recognition in the motions and stillness of scattered veils all around you, reflecting silver and gold and colours true and impossible through optical outputs and network wizardry. Saw the first sparks of realisation in the micro-responses of those who had seen you speak before.

"I know that many of you see the events of the past months as a terrible danger to our people. I know that many of you here, and beyond, will have been told that it threatens the galaxy so painstakingly protected across more cycles than many of you can even imagine. And I don't need to turn on the relays, watch the feeds, to say that. Because I've seen those messages before."

A request signal flared in the datasphere, and you smiled slightly at the identity behind it. An old ally of sorts, and perhaps one still, but not someone you could relinquish the floor to. Not yet. But there was no need to be rude. The denial you cast back was a gentle one, caught with grace.

"I ended our war with the Gysians before it became a genocide. I stood beside the fleets of our own, and our allies, in the war against the Sphere. And I stood here many times since, fighting to preserve those that we had sworn in those moments to teach and protect. Until the Zlathbu Alignment drove me from this place, for I could not stomach the walls that sheltered our people after what we did to that young and terrified race."

Already there'd be groups reaching out, working in steptime to assemble arguments that would disarm what you were about to call upon. All, they believed, that you could call upon. The weapons of the Hearthguard were those of your people's history, after all, and that made them impossible to hide. But did they recognise, did they know, how many of those you still held?

"I abided by the decision of the Authority then," you continued, in a steady tone. "And it has haunted me for a quarter of a million cycles for what it represented. For the failing it represented. I am called the Sorrowful for what I did, how I created what would become known as the Second Sorrow through my actions. The Third…the Fourth…I did not believe they could have been prevented. Not as we were."

You took a breath, for all that they were unnecessary, and your voice hardened. "But the Fifth? The Fifth should have been different. It was a chance to change, to rise past the fear that had begun to define us, and instead of doing so we embraced it. In facing something new, something that could not be immediately controlled, we chose the hammer instead of the veil.

"There are many things I wish I had done differently in that time, but none of it matters anymore." You tilted your head, wondering if that had thrown calculations aside. It was certainly different to those few addresses you'd given before retreating totally into the role of Warden. "Because I have found that we were wrong. And that's what makes me weep."

You lifted a hand, made a casting motion with it, letting it carry the data that you'd so carefully enshrined within your personal storage into the open spaces of the Authority's chambers. And an image formed, an image that any who'd chosen to Experience the Third should recognise. The vast wall of almosts and could-have-beens, not one of them enough.

Simulation born of the Seventh Secret, and as perfect as it could ever be, had created this archive of failure. But now it held something new.

"There was a solution," you said, reaching up, expanding the vision, letting the marker within the archive become clear. The simulation that those humans – those leaders among humanity, now that you'd read the files – had created.
There was no silence now, and more request markers burned in the infospace, voices rising in protest against your words. But only some.

"And so what, some of you will ask. What use is a solution to a problem a million cycles put to rest? But the rest, you already know." Again you saw it, the reactions, the movement. Recognition and response, thousands around you trying to piece together the direction of your address.

Deep within the twilight of your soul, something ignited. Returned or recognised, it mattered not, because it was a quarter of a million cycles too late for those you should have saved. Yet it was, it was here, and it was now, and maybe that could do something.

"It's hope. A million cycles past where we needed it most, but it's hope. And we can't ignore it, because it shines on everything we've done to beg the question: was any of it necessary? If we could have been wrong in our approach to the Sphere, then what else have we been wrong about? What else have we closed our eyes to, and let pass in the certainty that we knew what had to be done?"

Shouts rose from sections of the assembly now. Outrage, support, all of it noise and none of it mattering. A flaring signal carpeted the infosphere, the hand of the Authority's speaker, dictating order. A voice bellowed from the middle levels, demanding the right to be heard, that the sacrifices of a thousand fleets lost to time be honoured and you thundered across it.

"I led a battlegroup through the hell of the Burning Line. I watched as the Teel'sanha overcame the strength of our best, only to be broken by our weakness. And I have watched for longer than I could believe I ever would as our race has spiralled into darkness."

More codes flared out from your presence, unfurling like banners, unsheathing like blades, to stand and cut the maelstrom of confusion, anger and hope too that you'd unleashed.

"But no more. I fought against our descent until I was forced to retreat, to become what the Gysians named me." Your veil was a barely-kept storm of seething emotions. "But in this, I find that I'm not broken, only wounded. And now, you will listen. I have the right, and I will be heard!"

Data and sound railed against your words, but you'd had spoken no mistruths, and in this the Authority's rules worked to your advantage. It took time for order to assert itself again, as well as several temporary mutes of certain members to make it clear that, in this, the rules most certainly did apply. But many, on further examination of the idents you'd flared, had quieted of their own accord.

You couldn't blame that. You'd lived a long time even for a Shiplord, and time rarely came without benefits. It better not, given all it took in exchange.

"Order is restored, Sorrowful. But I would ask that you keep to the matter of this vote in your further discourse, inasmuch as you can." The speaker clearly didn't like asking me to do that, but it was their role, and I could respect that.

Your own veil had calmed, and through it you offered that respect in the clearest manner, before turning back to the matter at hand.

"You know who I am. You know what I have seen. You can see what I have brought here, and you know that I'm right. You have your own gifts, your own knowledge, but mine is of our past and in that only three of you could challenge me." And of those, only one would dare.

"I am a Warden of the Sorrows of our people. I helped create them, I walk them, and I know them. But I sometimes forget, in my own sorrow, what they were for. That they were to make us better, not be constant reminders of what might have been. And now I find that two of them might never have needed our tending."

Even the best outcome of the humans' simulation still led to war, but it was a war that my people would've been ready for, and able to win with far less bloodshed. Still a Sorrow, I had felt, but for all they'd taken instead of what it had cost to destroy them.

"And I cannot let that pass. I looked away for millennia, I kept the Hearthguard intact, I told myself that I was doing all that I could until something changed. Until you were ready to change. Maybe one day, one day, you might have found your way to that path on your own but I'm not so sure. I look at the columns around this place, and I see nothing that I did not see a million cycles past, the last time I stood here in person.

"I see nothing that has made our galaxy better, nothing that has improved beyond our ability to destroy, our skill to oppress. And I know what some of you will call me, I know that they will say that the time I'm from was a luxury, one that was proven we couldn't afford. That we must close our eyes, shoulder the pain, and move forward in hopes of…what, exactly?"

Your eyes swept the room, flashing up at the ones who'd heckled before, and you saw one of them drop their gaze away from your own. And you realised that you'd missed this. Not the fighting, not the pain that came with it. But the intensity. The clarity of focus when the whole world shifted and became clear. When you could look at the path before you, and know that it was right.

How long had it been since you'd felt that?

"There is too much at stake now for us to lose any more of what we once were," you said, lowering your tone to a soft thing, remembering what you'd learned a long, long time ago. One need not scream to be heard, need not shout for others to listen.

"And now here we are, facing a galaxy that has rallied against us at last, and who could blame them? We've let the pain of our survival fester in the heart of our culture, and now I'm not sure that any of them will listen when we try to say that killing us isn't the cure. Maybe it's not too late, maybe we can still salvage what we once were. I hope so.

"But if we do, will the galaxy listen?" You asked, barely above a whisper now, forcing them to lean forward to hear. "Do we have any right to demand that they do, when the last time we truly stood against a threat to creation was a thousand centuries past? When the lifeblood of trillions stains all of our hands, those who carried out the sentence, and all those who let them."

You raised a hand, pulling in towards your chest, and the images you'd cast into the gathering space vanished. "I know many of you hold the Tribute Fleets in honour, for what they do, for how they are said to protect us. But I remember a time when those fleets were called something else. When we looked to the stars for life that we could welcome into the galaxy beside us. And I have to believe that some of what made us protectors once is still there.

"Because we aren't them anymore. Once upon a time, what would become the Tribute Fleets served a purpose. In the aftermath of the Third Sorrow, much was lost, and much was left to drift between stars by the Sphere. We needed to be able to be sure that nothing of the Hjivin would return, but that only required presence and power enough to protect it. Not what it's become."

"So as a Warden of the Hearthguard, I tell you all this." Your eyes swept the room again, and this time delegates flinched away from them. "We know, now, that we tend to two more Sorrows than were ever necessary."

"We shall not abide a third."

---

Coming out of the link was a weird feeling. Your own experience with telepresence was quite limited, and this had been far more in-depth than those rare occasions. But that oddness was swallowed entirely by the thoughts racing across your mind in reaction to what you'd just see. At least you weren't alone in it, and that extended to both you and the humans in the room.

The younger Shiplords – Shipteens? – seemed just as taken aback by Kicha's declaration of intent, though exact reactions appeared varied. Not that your response wasn't being torn in at least four different directions, mind. It was just that you had a different perspective on what you'd just seen. You were one of the relative handful responsible for Kicha doing this, and that…

For one of the only times you could remember since adulthood, you weren't sure how that made you feel.

What does Amanda feel about what she just saw? This choice will affect how she interacts with the rest of this Sorrow, as well as how she judges some future decisions:
[] Hope – "Maybe there is a way out of this. Maybe what the Uninvolved told us was true."
[] Worry – "...is making this a point about us, about humanity, really a good idea after what happened to the Zlathbu?"
[] Doubt – "This is…certainly something, I guess? But can it really do anything to help us?"
[] Shock – "She actually did it. She did what she promised. The heck."

 

[Snowfire]

:Maybe…: The word flickered out into the link that had made you and Sidra into a Unisonbound. There was still fear, still doubt, but below and beyond it all was the terrible hope that had driven you to accept this mission in the first place. Sidra knew it better than anyone except maybe Mary, and with your dearest friend otherwise occupied at the moment, you turned inwards to the everpresent companion born of Practice and your own soul.

:Maybe?: Sidra's voice was a gentle thing of melded tones, the Unison Intelligence clearly just as thrown by what you'd witnessed. The prompt wasn't really necessary, but the question gave you something to attach your swirling thoughts to. Just as they must have intended. Why did that feel different somehow?

You let the thought slide away for now, but left a mental pin in it. Something told you it was important, or could be later. For now though, the world reasserted itself in a blur of crisscrossing conversation.

"Surely you can't think-" Niden was saying, his veil drawn tight around him, restraining emotion to terse outbursts flowing through his words.

Whatever else he'd meant to say was cut off by Krea, her own veil swirling with colours as it swam into patterns like fans or feathers all around her. There, you realised. There was someone like you. As separated as you were by oh so many things, there was no mistaking the vibrant passion of her movements, or the intensity of her hope.

"I know how impossible it seems, Ni." The gentleness of Krea's words surprised you, but the reasons couldn't be clearer. The other Shiplord had pulled in on himself even tighter in response to the most obvious display of emotion you'd ever seen from their kind. Could this be what shouting looked like for them? Not the sound, but the motions?

"I know, we all know, how unlikely it was that anything could come from this. The Sorrowful speaking. Ignore all the commentators, no one really thought we'd see something new. But now?" Fluttering motions tugged at her veil. "Now there is something new. Something none of the Authority could've seen coming.

"And maybe, maybe that'll come to nothing in the end," Krea sighed. "But I know you've watched the Zlathbu Condemnation; we did it together during our out-transit. The Hearthguard never talked like this then-"

"Don't you think I know that?" Niden snapped. His own veil surged into a thing of sharp angles, pain, fear for a future he could see playing out behind his eyes. "I know you mean well, Krea. I know you want this to be something good. But…you all heard the Sorrowful's words, right?"

Silent nods shifted veils in reply, and his own shifted from the closest thing to a panic attack you'd ever seen from a Shiplord to something a little more stable.

"Then please," he continued, "think about what they mean. The Hearthguard withdrew after the Zlathbu Condemnation-" there was no mistaking the capital letters this time "-because they recognised they couldn't win the argument with words. They weren't willing to take the step their Warden just committed them to, because if the Authority had stayed the course even then-"

"We understood, Niden," Everan's voice was soothing, a match to the patterns of his veil. Though looking closer, there were ragged edges there. "But there has to be some sort of middle ground, no? Something between hope and… and civil war."

Niden's veil spiked a few more times, as if fighting his attempts for calm, and you did your best to give the small group their privacy. Difficult enough when sitting together, even harder when your Focus could recognise the break in his thought process that had led him there. But you didn't get to follow that further, or find a distraction in Mir and Vega's silent conversation.

"What do you think?" It took you a moment to realise the question had been directed at you, or at least at your group. The question of how to reply circled your segment of the Heartcircle – none of you had caught the others up yet. The answer was simple; why not the truth?

"I think," you sighed. The tight hold you and Sidra had been keeping on the Masque's translation suite relaxed. "I think there's hope here, no matter how I wish it hadn't had to come to this."

None of that was false, though the reasons might be a bit more than the true Shiplords here would've been able to handle. You did wish it hadn't had to come to this. But mostly you wished that the Shiplords hadn't made this exact situation inevitable. You'd played a part in this exact result, but all the pieces of the scenario had been there for hundreds of millennia.

"Even if the cost," Niden started to say, but cut himself off. You made a motion analogous to a headshake.

"This was always going to be the cost," you replied. You didn't need to act out your sorrow for that, either. There had been better ways, all of them. "If this is what leads to us being better than what we've been for millions of cycles…I'm not sure I could object even if I wanted to."

"But-" Niden began, but Krea hushed him.

"She gave you her reply, Ni," she admonished gently. Something else passed between the two in those words, but you didn't clock any specifics. "What about the rest of your trio?"

"Much the same," Mir replied, a little hesitantly. He'd interacted comparatively little with any of the Shiplord envoys at the Sorrows and was still feeling his way through the odd courtesies and terms used even in an informal situation like this one. His Masque leaned a little towards Vega, and the Harmonial shaped hers into a smile, brushing one hand down to rest on a forearm of the younger Third.

"I worry, of course," Vega admitted easily. "But someday the Hearthguard were going to break. Maybe it's better to have that happen now. Pain is difficult, but the only way out of it is through. And if they're still as powerful as you think, then who knows. Maybe we could see some actual change."

"Dreamerkin," a voice sang, the same one that had called Krea much the same. You focused on the speaker, accessing the idents. Raine, apparently. "I worry myself. Making this now, making it about the current complications, I wonder if it'll not make FleetCom move faster. We've seen similar things before."

"Never with something like this," Thalim replied gamely, but there was a lack of fierceness in the reply. Their veil shifted towards the reconciliatory. "But it's easy for me to say that when nothing like it's happened before."

"Perhaps," you found yourself saying. "But that doesn't make the statement any less true. It just gives it flavour. And maybe…maybe that's what's needed?"

"What do you mean?" Everan asked.

:Mandy?: Vega asked carefully. It was far more than just a repetition of your name. Concern surged across the links between you, and it wasn't just Vega's, you realised. Mir was part of it too. You reached back, opening yourself.

:Trust me,: you sent, entwining a gestalt within the words. Enough to give them the picture of your intentions, at least. Nothing too far, you promised, but you'd only get so many chances to explore this. And only once whilst the reactions were this fresh.

"Maybe," you continued, Masque shifting tentatively. "Maybe what's needed is exactly what Thalim has called it. Something new, that forces exploration of a changed existence." You wondered for a moment how much these children knew about the war that had to be erupting across the galaxy at this point. Raine had mentioned complications, but what did that mean?

"Even if that exploration means," Niden's veil shook for a second, as if the very idea of internal conflict was beyond his ability to speak.

"I don't think the Hearthguard wants to fight the rest of Shiplord society." In truth, you weren't sure at all. Kicha's knowledge at the Third had spoken of deep wells of influence within Shiplord society, but there was no baseline for you to measure it against. "But these Sorrows, do you really think they're working?"

:Careful, Mandy,: Vega sent. This was a risky line, but you wanted…you needed to see what they would say. The sudden silence spoke volumes, and every passing second deepened it. Network traffic between the small group of Shipteens had exploded upwards, and that was just the sections you could detect.

"No," Everan finally said for the group. His Masque had tightened like Niden's, but it felt more like resolution than panic. You hoped they'd forgive you for what you realised you'd just done. They'd all been circling the realisation, but you'd shoved it into their faces. That something truly was broken inside the civilisation they called home. The only civilisation they'd ever known.

"No," Everan repeated. His veil shimmered with something like moisture, flares of colour you struggled to track. Deep wells here. "If they were, the Sorrowful wouldn't have done this."

"I take it back," Raine said softly, her veil darting into a trio of points, one levelled at each of you. "Dreamerkin only dream. Changers. Wishers."

"Is it wrong to wish?" You asked.

"No." She gave the reply no emphasis. "But wishes can be dangerous. The Consolat taught us that."

The admission sideswiped you. You'd known that the Shiplords had to know the truth of the Secrets, and likely far more than you. But for their youth to know…

"No one's arguing that," Vega said as you grappled the thought aside. Not now. "Change is a risk, we all understand that. But sometimes it's a risk that needs to be taken."

"Whilst that can be true, it'll need confirmation first," Everan pointed out.

"Yes, yes," Krea said quickly. "But that doesn't change how important the action is on its own, does it? How much it means. I know we don't all agree on what it means, but surely the scale is something we can agree on."

"That, yes," Niden agreed. Curiously, there was no reluctance in his acceptance. "I'm not sure anyone really knows how much power the Hearthguard still has left, and that's a statement of it in itself."

"Don't forget." Raine's veil moved as she spoke, paling as it formed a rippling overlap of uncertainty. "There are many sleepers."

"You think this could rouse them?" Thalim was the one to ask the question, but they weren't lone in the shift to their veil. There was anticipation there, but touched by something very close to fear.

Raine nodded with her veil. "Some," she added a moment later. "Many? Hard to know."

You noted that statement with silent interest. Ever since the presence of large-scale Storage operations had been confirmed, you'd wondered if there were enough to actually make a difference. The hesitance here told you a lot. Most simply that yes, there were enough whiling away the endless millennia in quiet sleep or virtual dreams to matter.

"Change either way," Everan said. His attention had turned back to his group, but some of it remained on you. "Maybe necessary, but who's to say what necessary will mean in this case. Or how long it'll take for it to be determined."

There was one bright side. The Shiplord military would, no doubt, have few compunctions about deploying in full force against rebellions sweeping across the galaxy. But what Kicha had done in binding her and her faction's compliance to that broader crisis would delay any true decision. And if they refused to listen…

Niden's fear felt very real. He was young, you knew that, but that didn't make him stupid. If he truly believed that the Hearthguard were capable of escalating their resistance – and none of the rest had disagreed - you had to weigh the possibility seriously.

But it still left you with a much more important question. What did you do now?

Vega and Mir wanted to stay and continue the conversation, and you could sympathise. There were more questions that could be asked, you were sure. But there were also the others here, and their tasks. How a Tribute Fleet officer would react to this, for example.

No best option. But you had to pick one.

What next?
[] Ask the Shipteens more questions.
-[] Write-in questions.
[] Return to another group within the forum
-[] Mary, Kalilah and Lea, who were wandering the enormous central galleries of the museum.
-[] Iris, who'd gone to speak with a Tribute Fleet officer.
[] Leave the forum
-[] To ask more of the Last Memory's interface?
--[] Write-in questions
-[] Return to the Adamant to assess and plan your next move.

If you return to the Adamant you will not be able to return to the Last Memory.

 

[Snowfire]

Part of you wanted nothing less than to remain here, to talk with these relative children of a society that had dominated the stars for a time which exceeded the age of your own civilization by orders of magnitude. But discovery like that was a path that you knew you'd struggle to step back from, once you began. From a question of how they felt would come more, a search and struggle for understanding that could all too easily sabotage the identities Kicha had provided for you. You couldn't be sure of what that would do to her, the Hearthguard, or what she was trying to do within the chambers of Shiplord government. But you were sure that it wouldn't do anything good.

That thought sparked another, making you pale beneath the integrated nanotech of your Masque. You knew what you'd taken from this, how it had added more fuel to the hope that kept pushing you forward. But that was you, and you weren't the only human here, or the most likely to have an extreme reaction to what Kicha had just defied the Shiplord Authority to do. That dubious honour went to Kalilah, no matter the progress the elder Potential had made in the months since Third Sol. And you'd left her with Mary.

:And Lea,: Sidra pointed out, their tone surprisingly calm. Perhaps because the Unisons could sense each other more easily. :She's not you, Mandy, no one could be. But she's still a Mender, and I'm not sensing any unusual energy spikes from Asi.:

:That…that helps,: you admitted. Kalilah's Unison had taken his name from his wielder's culture, the personification of the first weapon of their broad mythos, and had found ways to live up to the example of his namesake in a way few of his kind could match. Kalilah could still do incredible damage without him, but she'd not start something on a Shiplord world of any type without his help.

:Good,: your own Unison replied gratefully. :But I can still feel how worried you are. I think that makes your choice simple, no?:

:I suppose it does,: you agreed wryly. The easy admission felt light somehow, like sunlight through a clouded sky. :Thanks, Sidra.:

:Always.:

That word resonated as you made your excuses and said your goodbyes. Vega and Mir understood of course, how could they not? But you felt like you should be polite to the Shipteens. They hadn't needed to be so welcoming and had told you a great deal. Little of it was what Marcus would've called directly actionable, but there was more to understanding a species than knowing where to hit to hurt them.

Of everyone you'd met since beginning this mission, they were the brightest threads of hope for a future that didn't end in genocide. They didn't know that, couldn't know that, and so were a little confused by how deeply you thanked them.

"It was only a link," Krea protested, though the set of her veil oozed contentment. "I'm sure anyone would've offered."

"Perhaps," you smiled, trusting Sidra to translate the expression. "But you were the ones who did."

And you left it at that. They'd just have to be confused for now. One day, you hoped, you'd be able to properly explain what they'd done. For now, you wanted to check on your friends, and share Kicha's broadcast if they'd somehow missed it.

You took a calmer route back, however, feeling little need to match the blistering pace Vega had set to bring you here. If there was a problem, they'd reach out, or Sidra would warn you. Until then, you could see a little of the Forum as you descended.

Vega had cut a path through display room after display room in a straight-line path to the Shipteens. You took a gentler route back, through arching galleries filled with artefacts and immersive displays, each of them a fragment of the ancient federation's history. Vibrant murals depicted scenes from the heyday of Teel'sanha civilisation, littered with intricate carvings and inscriptions telling stories of unity, exploration and cultural exchange between the diverse species that made up the Peoples.

For part of your route, one side of the gallery opened into a vast hall that stretched up past your floor to an arching ceiling. Below you could see the breathtaking central exhibit – a meticulously recreated cityscape of the Peoples. Miniature buildings of a hundred different architectural styles, all designed to accommodate any variation of the unique needs of the People's populations, nestled amidst lush greenery and flowing waterways. It looked rather like the one outside when you looked closer, but not quite. Nevertheless the detail of the model was astounding, with everything from the minutiae of daily life to grand celebrations captured in frozen moments.

Shiplords moved respectfully around the exhibit, and Sidra's senses let you see where they were accessing datafeeds built into the static model, turning it into a diorama of living memories. To the sides, smaller displays showcased ways that the People had found to live together, important festivals, even faiths born of the melting pot of dozens of races.

You took note of the location, knowing there'd be some among your party who'd find the place fascinating if they had the time, but followed the curving gallery down through a gentle descent leading out into a wider, single-floored hall. Virtual displays filled the chamber in a shimmering array of designs, with a few physical models set against the walls. And every single one of them was a starship, or a piece of one.

You paused at a few of the displays, examining the virtual models in a way that was entirely not playing. You wanted to see how detailed they truly were, with the answer being nearly total, to your considerable surprise. It would be difficult to completely replicate a ship from these files, but a determined individual could come very close.

It was hard not to feel envious of what you saw, and though you fought it, melancholy. The Teel and their partners had built all this, had been able to build all this, in a peace that had died over a thousand millennia ago. What might you have made, given the chance?

:What might we still make,: Sidra pointed out. :We're not done yet.:

:No,: you agreed, moving to a different display. This one a detailed examination of multispecies design philosophies. :But it's hard to imagine any of the Group of Six creating so freely even if we win. And that's sad, Sidra.:

:We'll just have to teach them then,: your Unison replied. :And-:

Whatever they'd meant to say died as you skimmed the description of one of the physical wall displays, a model with the vast, sweeping lines of a Teel'sanha hybrid craft: one designed with both civilian and military purposes in mind. Less important for the moment, though, than what the description opened with.

Begun half a century before the War of the Sphere, the Farthest Stars project was one that personified the curiosity of more than a dozen member races of the Peoples. The project was begun in the aftermath of several experiments conducted at the Galactic Rim (documented in Gallery 172C) and continued for nearly two thousand cycles. Before you now rests the fullness of their work, designed to chart the most distant stars.

:Checking.: Sidra sent, preempting your sudden request to make sure your translation software was still functioning properly. You took a step closer to the display as they did, not wishing to stand out among the gently moving figures of Shiplords all around you. :All green. It says what it says.:

:They didn't lack ambition, did they?" You breathed, tracing a holographic scale set before the model with an extended finger. If it was telling the truth, and everything else so far seemed legitimate, the true dimensions of the craft had been better suited to a continent. And yet that made sense, given where they'd wanted to send it. :Distant stars, hell. They wanted to go and explore Andromeda.:

:I wonder if they succeeded,: Sidra mused. It was an interesting question, you could accept that. Just - :Not right now, I know,: your Unison accepted. :But when this is done, we should check.:

:Add it to the list, then. Along with why they wanted to build it so big.: There wasn't, quite, a thread of hopeless amusement in the words, but you couldn't deny that you were curious. And not just about if they'd actually built the damn thing. But you still had people to check on.

:How much were you able to scrape?: you asked, slipping out one of the doors into a downwards sloping ramp. :I saw the virtual access points.:

:Enough to make a great distraction for Mary, or Jane's intel section,: Sidra replied. :The security here was built to preserve data integrity specifically for the purpose of sharing. So long as I'm not trying to remove or overwrite anything, it doesn't really care.:

:And if you did?: You asked. The walkway was lined with vivid paintings, many in colours human eyes couldn't see. Each painting was a collaborative work, reflections of the diversity of culture and experience that had epitomised the Teel'sanaha nation.

:The caretaker AI for the planet would flick me off of the network like a bug,: Sidra replied. Here and there knots of Shiplords gathered in alcoves clearly designed to allow better viewing, and you wondered what they felt. Their own nation had rejected this way of existence hundreds of thousands of years ago, but there was little of the rejection you might have expected.

Instead…most of them simply looked sad.

:Maybe don't do that, then,: you advised knowingly. Sidra's response was an entirely wordless expression of exasperation and amusement that splashed across your mind like a balloon filled with icewater.

:I'll consider it.:

The corridor came to an end, opening into the wider vaults of the ground floor. This one was far quieter than any of the others you'd seen, with relatively few Shiplords currently present. Columns stretched up towards where they anchored an enormous window of stained glass, cutting the light apart to flood the room in gentle shades. Plinths of polished white stone rose here and there, granting the place an odd harmony as light danced and reflected on their surfaces. There were shapes on their surfaces, images of a history a hundred thousand years long, made real by light and crystal and stone.

:Oh my-:

To Feel The Memories: 91

It hit you all at once as you stepped into the place, a blow so unexpected and true that it sent you stumbling. Your eyes flickered from place to place, trying to drink in everything as you forced yourself to stabilise. The columns around you were adorned with script in dozens of tongues, yet you didn't need Sidra to translate any of it. You knew what they'd be, you could feel them. The words of leaders, philosophers, scientists and artists of the Teel'sanha Peoples, immortalised in a hall of shifting light.

The place was a memorial of the most deceptive kind, one that exalted the past that had been against the future that would be lesser for the loss. And that was the only reason that the weight of a hundred thousand years of history didn't smash you flat.

:Careful, Mandy,: Sidra warned. You fought to gather yourself back under control, pull back from the memories all around you. Here in this place of serene contemplation and memory, you found yourself connecting to the memory of species more than a million years gone at a level not even Vega's foray into the spiritual nexus of the First Sorrow had matched.

And Remain Untouched: 32

It was as hard as anything you'd done in your life to pull back from the feeling of the hall, above all for how familiar it felt. Unity, cooperation and shared purpose had stood at the heart of the Teel's dream, and the Peoples had embodied them in ways that were painfully similar to your experience of humanity. Which was what made it so difficult for you to stop. It felt familiar.

:I wish we'd met them,: you murmured. Your Masque absorbed your weeping effortlessly, but didn't stop you from feeling the trace of tears. It could have, but Sidra could recognise how you needed that, and your Unison had never been one to deny you your reality. Comfort you in it, or one of a hundred other shaping actions, of course. But never deny.

:So do I,: they sent, :and we're not the only ones.: They tugged at your head through the Masque, turning it until your gaze found three figures cloaked in nanotech nearby. But they didn't stare, or stand like you expected Shiplords would. Sidra's words resonated for a moment, as one of the figures stepped towards you, flickering motions of concern. And you recognised the identity flags a moment before you stepped back.

:Amanda? Are you alright?: Mary's worried voice flooded into the link. You struggled not to laugh, knowing that if you started, the tears would come in force.

:I came to ask you that,: you sent, weeping laughter dancing at the edge of the words. Mary took another step and slid the arm Masque into your own, grasping for the fingers of a hand buried beneath.

:Oh Mandy,: she sighed. :Why wouldn't we be alright?:

:But,: you stuttered, confusion sweeping over the pain and laughter. :Didn't you see the broadcast? What Kicha said to the Authority?:

:We did,: Lea said, entering the conversation. Your fellow Restorer's tone was compassionate, and very calm. :We have our opinions, but there's little we can do with them right now. And we came here to try and explore.:

:I…I see,: you agreed, not entirely sure if you actually did. :So everything's okay? For now, at least.:

:Yes.: Lea.

:We're not glass.: Kalilah.

:Of course.: Mary.

You slumped a little, tension you'd not realised having been there bleeding away. They were alright. Maybe they wouldn't be once you returned to the ship, but for now, yes. That was enough.

:What did you find with Vega?: Mary asked, following up on her reply.

You were considering a reply when Lea added a question of her own. :And is there anywhere you'd like to go next? We found a map.: She flicked a file across the link, which bloomed into a well marked map of the Open Forum. It was much larger than you'd thought.

Where would you like to go now?
[] Stay here, to examine and feel this memorial more deeply.
[] Back the way you came, to
- [] the Star Gallery, where the starcraft designs of the Peoples were displayed.
- [] a Living City, that showed all the ways in which the Teel'sanha overcame their differences in living.
[] Somewhere new?
-[] The Farthest Stars exhibit mentioned Gallery 172C and experiments at the Galactic Rim. What did they mean?
-[] Write-in? The Open Forum is a collection of the sum total of Teel'sanha knowledge. You could find almost anything about them here.