Hope3
2024
Required reading:
“Message In the Sand”
“Captain’s Legacy: The Last Run”
“Last Orders Are Never Rescinded.”
This story was written as part of a competition, and had to adhere to several constraints, including being set in a familiar world. That was fulfilled by including elements of 3 other contestant’s stories into this one (the first was about a Jawa from star wars, the second was about Steamboat Willy\Mickey mouse, the last about a Star Wars droid stranded on a planet after a war).
Another constraint was to use the text formatting to enhance the storytelling.
>System: Nexus System Online. Awaiting Input.
>User: Srch ‘easerecovery.trl’ Home\dimensional_repatriation_archive\penalinvestigations\bay2
>System: Thanks for choosing EaseUS Data Recovery Suite (trial mode, full features active until 7.1.426 Age 3).
>System: Proceed with the contents of Bay 2 of your system?
>User: Y
>System: Item scan initialized
>System: Item unrecognized
>System: Checking item hash for cross-dimensional and historial matches.
>System: Please enter credit string or watch ad to continue
>System: Item matched to “Veritas Rugged Chronofile, durable journaling for travelers, 32 Function SL Display, embedded quantum tracker, Slate Grey, Water Resistant, Vacuum safe to within 1,500km of sun, fast shipping”
>System: Item originates from previous age, additional analysis required >System: Please enter credit string or watch ad to continue
>System: Please insert material matrix for reconstitution
>System: Reconstituting Item
>System: Molecular Reintegration complete
>System: Please enter credit string or watch ad to continue
>System: Item decarbonization initialized
>System: Item fully remediated.
>System: Chronofile decryption 100% complete
>System: To preserve formatting and embedded video\projections, enter your credit string to enjoy full version.
>System: A raw text-only version has been saved to your desktop. Please note that this reintegrates all revisions and redactions.
>System: Thanks for using EaseUS Data Recovery Suite!
>User: Srch ‘*.txlog’ /desktop dt_range < 01
>System: Text log follows:
Of Tiber Grant, 11:42 on Solis the 20th, Februarius 1190 Age 2.
May this journal find my dear friends trusted former colleagues, should anything happen to me. Within I document the performance perfection of my Aetherium Vehiculum, the first trans-dimensional transit augment device that offers complete control over its destination. Should this journal find you separate from my person, I must remind you that the technology within is quite banned by the wedge-headed Contemporate, and the Ethics Procouncil that it puppets. I shall not lie however, it is quite important to me that my upcoming triumph be worshiped publicized at any cost. They lied to my face, insisting a human could not survive trans-dimensional travel. They cost me valuable cycles, and I will not forget their treachery. Once I find serenity, I will make them pay for every lost moment. I still remember that day. I was so depleted, and i can’t be everywhere at once. How dare they judg
Please find attached rough design elements that were the key to making the Aetherium Vehiculum function correctly a perfected device. One needs just take the existing designs for the failed previous version, and apply these corrections. The previous version designs can be found in our my old home, in the sub-level. I expect the rest of the home to remain completely untouched until my return
I pity the Procouncil, and their vapid overlords. What I do now is greater than any human achievement of the current age. I, myself, am of greater meaning than any other. What I do now for Mankind, I give freely. As the Titan I am, I differ from Prometheus in one important way: I do not steal from the gods and give to mankind. I am the god rendering this gift of my own making.
I need not be remembered, or ever raised above the brows of those who persecuted me. But they must all come to know that it is my intellect, my determination, and my destiny that will come to redefine, in my image, what it means to be human. My serenity will be the catalyst of their undoing.
Of Tiber Grant, 14:45 on Solis the 20th, Februarius 1190 Age 2. Locally 2 hours after dusk.
I have done it. I have not surprise, because if not I, who else could achieve this?
When the portal collapsed behind me, I saw the deformation in the ground, the burn marks on the nearby stone. But much like I hypothesized, there was no pain, not even a stinging sensation, only a few minutes of disorientation. There were even creatures and insects underfoot, burned to a crisp by the radiation of the arrival of the Aetherium Vehiculum, but again, THE HUMAN FORM MY VISAGE WAS UNTOUCHED. The sands below me were vitrified by the heat, and appeared chemically different from our world. I will take a sample to prove my arrival, along with the tracker contained in this journal.
I need only travel to four three dimensions to get the information I need to find serenity. Beyond the travel, the content of these worlds hold my interest very little. Infantile worlds, with meager creatures, human, non-human anthros, whatever the case. Must I become god to these children still floundering in their first age? In 40 cycles, once the cretinous Contemporate are shown for what they are, an adventurer will colonize these creatures and their pitiful worlds, with my Aetherium Vehiculum, in MY name. But for now, they hold no value to me.
Case in point: while waiting for my Aetherium Vehiculum to recharge, I happened upon a little hooded man (I can only speculate on its gender), about half my height. Despite the desert heat, he was fully robed. I said a greeting to the thing, and it immediately started grasping its carried wares to its chest like i was some kind of spenik-lover on the wrong side of town, pardon the expression thieving gibbon. And as if I would spare a thought towards the junk, he mostly just had what looked like the head of some broken-down age 1 automaton. I told him so, that he nor his refuse was of any interest to me, but on hearing me speak, he became excited. The disgusting thing started rambling incoherently like the proprietor of a Jamari shop, taking out tools and saws and eying me hungrily like the proprietor of a Jamari shop. Again I have to conject, as his “eyes” were just unchanging glowing amber orbs under his hood, but I can detect the savage gaze as easily as walking into a Jamari shop.
Anyway it was clear he had never dealt with someone with as many augments as I, he was dealt with with a flick of my wrist. By then my translation module was able to decode his child-like language, so for my amusement I asked him why he came at me so. When he came to understand my superiority in body and mind, he wisely capitulated, said he was on a mighty quest, a call to adventure, and that “scrapping” me would provide him valuable funds for his journey.
It was then I saw him for what he was, a babe in a cradle, of which I yearned to offer succor from my mighty metaphorical teats. I told him that although I have many augments, I was still very much human, quite frankly elevated beyond human, certainly not some south-side off-brand Mechanum to be “scrapped”.
I asked him for details of his journey. Despite my elevated purpose, you will see time and time again that my extreme empathy and sense of charity often distracts me. Anyway, he showed me an archaic type of solid light construct, without the solid part I’d say. It was all a waste of time however, as it turned out the message wasn’t for him at all. I had to prove it to him by slowing and enhancing the message using my vocorder. He may have had a bonafide message from a damsel in distress, but he was simply as a household pet, taking a message in his mouth and thinking it to be his. My stomach turned at the thought of that little creature grasping for purpose when it was, by my standards, barely sapient. I of course told him so, destroyed the automaton head and the message it contained and proceeded on. May all those with a false sense of purpose, or personage, rot in the same grave as is calling for those wedge-headed kintanko-scented Contemporate skermpops, pardon the slur.
Of Tiber Grant, 17:26 on Solis the 20th, Februarius 1190 Age 2. Locally 30 minutes after dawn.
My mighty Aetherium Vehiculum jumped again flawlessly. Once again, I was completely unharmed. However, I made entry into this dimension on the surface of the water, off the coast of a landmass. The water in a 10 meter radius of me was instantly vaporized by the heat of my arrival. This of course caused quite the explosion, with a proceeding vacuum bubble that caused a crushing amount of water to invade the point I had dropped to. I was somewhat surprised to be completely unharmed. It could be argued that the Aetherium Vehiculum could be an enclosure, instead of a carried device, but again, the transit is completely harmless to humans, and no further protection is required. Of course my survival cannot prove that point alone, which is why I must find serenity. But no, I cannot be the test, having transcended humanity itself through augments of all kinds, forbidden and otherwise, along with my unprecedented intellect. Yes, I am recording that here, as I have no shame and none is warranted. My form may visually pass for yours, but beneath, I am of something new, and next. All else is scullery, and THAT is what warrants shame.
I had no desire this time to happen upon any of the local fauna, I felt myself endumben from mere contact with the last. It is clear to me that there is no place in science for grace, or compassion. I must try to remind myself of that periodically. Besides, it would be criminal to let my kindness be mistaken for kinship. If my true kin still lived error conflict my true and only kin is waiting at home for me error conflict you are my only kin, never a savage, only you dear serenerror conflict only you my loerror conflict cancel sub
As the Aetherium Vehiculum charged for its penultimate jump, I watched the shore, about 2 miles away at this point. There sat a mouse, weeping in the sand, reading a note. I once again felt an echo of a distant heartbreak rise into my throat sickened. It is to mock humanity that such beings can exist and reason, feel, suffer loss. If I could kill remove such a dimension from existence, the eternal bands of reality itself would surely bless my mercy.
Yes reader, I could see the loss on the creature's face. Perhaps betrayal? And then I saw beyond him an entire town of those just like him. He got up and walked toward the town, and was greeted by a citizen with open arms. I could tell he would be accepted there. Be happy there. Perhaps even find love there. Beget his own serenity perchance.
Oh how I wished to END them. Science laughs in the face of happily ever after, a perverted and twisted concept. I had my serenity STOLEN by those evil floating heads, EMPTY SUITS of the Ethics Procouncil!!!! iF they had just funded my project, and the needed augments, there would have been NO INCIDENT, NO REBUILDING, NO CYCLES WASTED. IT IS THEIR FAULT.
I scoff at the idea that a mouse can feel loss. I KNOW LOSS. But I’ll tell you now. If I find my serenity, and time and the elements have taken her, it wouldn’t matter a bit. Her aged CORPSE will be evidence of my triumph. That even in its previously imperfect state, the Aetherium Vehiculum was able to be operated by a child activated unintentionally, achieve trans-dimensional transit, and keep such a small, delicate, perfect girl even an unaugmented traveller safe.
I may be augmented, but do I not still have skin? Do I not still bleed, and feel heat? I will have much time soon to figure out how it's doing it, but somehow the Aetherium Vehiculum keeps me safe, and I have faith scientific certainty that it did the same for my Serenity.
Of The Ascended One, 20:20 on Solis the 20th, Februarius 1190 Age 2. Locally around midnight.
My final jump is completed. I have done it. The Aetherium Vehiculum should have enough Phased-dimensional data to allow me to scan for its previous iteration, and find Serenity.
I’m walking as I wait for the charging cycle to once again complete. This was clearly the site of a battle at one point. But none of that interests me. I just need the charging to finish, to run a few calculations, and then to my goal.
There is an automaton in a clearing, standing on broken concrete. Its arm is raised, holding a pole of some kind. It is rusted, and beaten by the elements, clearly unable to move anymore. Every time it detects me nearby, it becomes aggressive and tries to turn to me, but with a great pop and a clank, its actuators fail and it is wrenched back into position. I wonder if it knows the battle has ended. That the cause it was created for has moved on, or perhaps even destroyed. To stand for a lost cause, surely is worse than not standing at all. Imagine: striving, enduring, endeavoring, only for it all to be for nothing, when you realize your cause likely died 100 cycles ago in trans-dimensional transit on a unfinished illegal deverror conflict when you realize the cost of being an inattentive fatherror conflict
It would be sad if I cared.
But that automaton is no different than the peons that dedicated their careers to stopping me, stopping progress, stopping their OWN SALVATION. I brought them multidimensional travel, and what did they respond with? INCREDULITY. CENSORSHIP.
I offered them the gift of trans-humanism, the promise of ETERNITY. What did they respond with? DISGUST. Disgust? In what existence can a deity be restrained by the propriety of the fruit fly supping on the table? NONE. In what reality does a king register the ethics of a DOG relieving himself on the ROAD? None.
If I am to be judged, it could not be by a man, but only a god somehow greater than I. If I am to be judged, it would be for my single-minded purpose i am burdened by, that left no room for Serena, my lovely, mourning wierror conflict it would be for the augments which has blessed me to live to see my enemies and their children all pass away and for new copies to rise in their place, but has cursed me to a century in hiding, with the memory of my wife fading, and the hope for my daughter faderror conflict reset
There is an automaton in a clearing, standing on what looks like a dilapidated landing pad. Its arm is raised, holding what appears to be a flagpole, sans flag. It tries to turn to me repeatedly, but seized bearing and joints will not allow it. The result is it jerking around in a loop, trying to attack, and being wrenched back into obeisance to a missing flag.
I don’t know why, but I HATE it. There’s something about its repeating, fruitless movements…I’ll bless it with deactivation.
Of The Ascended One, 00:40 on Lunae the 21st, Februarius 1190 Age 2. Locally 2 hours before dawn.
I’ve made a mistake The Automaton forsook my kindness. I moved to discharge my cardiac capacitors into the thing, to short it out and deactivate it, a kindness it must be said, if an automaton can receive such a gesture. Well, when I approached and as i touched it to discharge into it, it managed to grab onto my chasiserror conflict my body and I was so surprised it took me a couple extra seconds to disengage, and i almost depleted my capacitors altogether. I passed out and now feel quite weak. What came over me to make me do that I curse that wretched thing, and I curse my undying generosity.
I think my charging circuits are damaged. Without them the Aetherium Vehiculum cannot finish charging. I may have enough power to go home, but home is not my destination. I must find Serenity. I will not return home unless I can be greeted with the rolling of heads.
Solar charging will have to do. In two hours, the sun should be up, and then all I have to do is wait. It may take days, or weeks, but as long as I can stay undiscovered while I’m low on power and vulnerable, it should be no issue. I’m coming Serenity.
The hereby labeled recording device is considered sensitive and dangerous. It is referenced in the Command Memo 78-Alpha (identified as Artifact 78-B), attached below.
Republic Military Garrison - Command Memo 78-Alpha
To: All Garrison Personnel
From: Commander Rylan, 327th Legion
Subject: Containment and Analysis of Anomalous Droid Entity (Artifact 78-A)
Classification: Restricted
Personnel are hereby notified of the capture and containment of a highly unusual droid entity. Preliminary observations indicate the following:
Physical Description: The droid is a smooth metallic cube approximately 1.8 meters in height, possessing a single articulated manipulator arm and otherwise featureless. Locomotion is achieved via an unknown form of repulsorlift technology.
Cognitive Abilities: The droid displays advanced linguistic capabilities and exhibits signs of what can only be described as artificial sentience. It identifies as male and claims to possess a human consciousness, though thorough scans have confirmed only trace amounts of organic material. It is being investigated if this could be the result of Mind Uploading or Force Power.
Technological Claims: The entity asserts possession of highly advanced, and potentially dangerous, technologies, including the ability to traverse vast interstellar distances instantaneously. These claims are currently under investigation.
Behavioral Concerns: The droid exhibits a disturbing repetition of a desire for “serenity”, raising concerns of possible mental instability or the influence of subversive forces. Its repeated requests for exposure to sunlight are to be denied.
Current Status:
The droid is currently secured in an underground containment facility. Strict security protocols are in effect. No personnel are to engage with the entity outside of authorized interrogation and analysis procedures.
Directive:
Continued Interrogation: Intelligence specialists are to continue interrogation efforts, focusing on verifying the droid's technological claims and ascertaining its origins and purpose.
Comprehensive Scans: Technical crews are to conduct comprehensive scans of the droid's internal systems, attempting to decipher its technology and identify any potential threats.
Dismantling: Upon completion of the analysis, the droid is to be dismantled, with any unusable portions to be destroyed. All recovered technology will be cataloged and transferred to Republic R&D for further evaluation, along with Artifact 78-B.
Personnel Reminders:
Exercise extreme caution when interacting with this entity. Its claims and behavior suggest a potential danger beyond conventional droid threats.
Report any unusual observations or activity immediately to your superior officer.
Maintain vigilance and uphold the security of the Republic.
This pitiful creation has no purpose and thus does not belong amongst the people of this great Republic.
End Memo
Aric Rylan, Commander, 327th Legion
Hope3