Dowdiness was a theme; empty grey streets, dolorous no, because people were smiling, even content with so little. Children hopped down the secondhand cobblestone streets early in the morning, their school uniforms as grey as the houses they were born in.
All this started as a scientific endeavour, until the civil war had it turn into a refugee center. Alone amongst the stars and far away from home, this grand construction served as a sanctuary for many lost Nebari running from the Establishment, and over the cycles it had become a generational ship, separate from Nebari Prime.
There were still those that clung to the hope of returning back home one day. They preached of this promise, made by the very first captains of this newly christened Home Ship, still. Their rhetoric was redolent of unmentionable trappings; it seemed not everything had died along with the old ways. There were those that shouted on street corners that they were going the wrong way.
It was the same story always, but in different packages, different promises with different rewards and punishments for disobedience. Of course it was all about control.
"We will pass through the great shadow!" the old men spoke, their voices shaking with deep emotion. It was something she'd seen before, but never with Nebari. To Chiana, it was as if Nebari had just turned purple. The man's face would turn blue as he'd run out of breath, but it wasn't over the top. This wasn't acting. Sure, he'd memorized his lines and went through his scenes beat by beat, but what others would call a character he calls his life. To think of everything he's sacrificed. He'd probably be proud too.
With tears this man would lead a crowd into the memorial service, and long and dreary speeches, on the first day of the Festival of Tears, and Chiana looked among the congregation as they were connected through their monotonous song, clutching their white banners and pretty waistcoats and shiny buttons polished up for the day, and wondered whether they felt genuine bliss.
As the children sang, she closed her eyes and tried to find the same, but felt nothing. Besides, she'd been home. Nothing had changed and nothing ever would, and she was sick of the lies.
Still, she felt drawn to the children. The men and women in the crowd respectively cheered their offspring in a short burst of encouragement, while the shrilly voices of the children carried across the green pastures, brown hills and paddy fields in the distance. In between performances a murmur of voices rose to unintelligible levels, until the preacher gathered his scripture again. This simple existence... it was almost enough to be offensive.
The touch of melancholy in the old children's songs were hard to get unstuck out of her brain. Reminded her of the soldiers marching past the school fences, chasing and shooting whoever tried to run. Never her. Everyone looked like they had seen better days, but not her.
Colourful banners were passed around to renew hope (and who could resist a narl's smile?) and the teachers started playing their strings, knowing the townsfolk couldn't wait to dance. Chiana'd always wanted to play an instrument, but didn't see the point of learning to play if there wouldn't ever be anyone around to listen to her. When push comes to shove you can't eat a guitar. The copper strings could cut through a man's flesh. She learned that the hard way.
Everyone had gathered underneath a massive white tent, which was covered in little lights to mark the festival grounds and light the way, and as drinks were passed so did the laughter increase. They were told to abide by the rules, but in all good honesty to enjoy themselves and the company of others, for The Festival of Tears was, unlike its name, a festive night. First came the memorial, then came the celebration. Tears of sadness, then tears of joy. For they were spared the horrors of the Establishment back on Nebari Prime, and lived to toast their freedom.
All they got was lucky, Chiana knew, and all of this was just celebrating how lucky they were, she thought cynically, even though really she didn't mind. She didn't plan on staying long. Her plan was to find Rygel and get the frell out of here, but she thought for sure that he'd be here. His multiple stomachs couldn't possibly resist the temptation of all these fine wines and snacks, for when the service ended the real party would begin.
No, Chiana didn't care for this peasant shindig. She looked around for familiar faces, but couldn't find Bellon in the crowd, and figured that was probably a good thing. Suddenly a plate of foods was shoved into her face and Chiana felt like pushing the woman over.
"Are you sure you don't want any?" she asked Chiana, as if she had turned down a fortune.
It wasn't anything she'd seen before (not that she wasn't willing to try). The woman's pale hand was already reaching for the roll of bread stuffed with baked meat, but Chiana wasn't hungry.
"Have it," she said brusque and walked away. The fake smile started to strain the muscles in her face.
Rygel would've probably had a thing or two to say about what she was doing. Back on Moya any one of them would've probably done anything just to be back amongst their own kind again, but Chiana could never stand Nebari. Neri and her had had to train each other to loathe the sight of them, since any one they would encounter on their travels could be an agent of the Establishment; a trained killer sent to track her down and collect her or convert her to the cause. Wherever she went she would always breathe the air of the hunted, and there was nothing this place could do to change that. This was just another cage, and cages were meant to be broken out of.
The tent had been erected atop a cold hilltop just outside the city grounds, and scarcely a light was still burning in the city below when finally the feast officially started. Anything not covered in leaves were muddy patches of grass covered in tiny drops of dew, softly trampled, or the tough woodwork of local carpenters, tainted with muddy footprints, which smothered the grass to form a clumsy and unelegant path down the hill, which Chiana bitterly walked alone.
For a microt there, she almost thought he'd abandoned her, but no, Rygel wouldn't do that. Not again. He had to be back at the Pod.
It was dark. The woodwork groaned underneath her boots, especially when she jumped down atop the next beam, stomping with both feet. Sometimes she could still smell the garbage, and see it when she closed her eyes.
"Maybe that's what life is," Chiana muttered out loud. "One big sewer, and we're all just drifting from one turd to the next. Like bugs. Like weeds."
And she janked a handful of grass out of the ground and threw it up into the air. It landed down the hill without a sound and disappeared within the greens.
She checked behind her whether someone had been following her, mostly because she didn't want to be caught talking to herself.
"It's all junk," she finished, stomping the grass beneath her boots. "...it's all just pointless."
The woodwork groaned again, and Chiana immediately drew her weapon at the shadows. Her heart was racing now. The way she'd pulled it from its holster was clumsy, and someone could tell she was panicky by that motion. There had to be fear in her eyes. She was gonna make up for that.
The wet pedals of grass glinted in the fake moonlight, but other than that there was nothing there. There was a clear line of sight from where she stood all the way back to the festival grounds at the top of the hill. Her eyes traced the darkness and the wooden path that lead back to the white tent, but nothing looked back.
In her mind's eye she had pictured a man following her. Not a Nebari even, not even a squad of soldiers hunting her to put a collar around her neck. Not even Salis. It was like trying to remember a dream and have it slip away, the identity of this faceless entity which she could only hear and smell. It only took one.
"Stay away..." she said to whatever could lay hidden in the brush.
She ran all the way down the hill, ashamed though she may have been, but that could wait for later, and the gun...the gun was for killing only. Anyone who dared to touch her in these narrow empty streets so late at night, alone, would pay the price. Her feet would eventually stop racing, but her heart never did. In the end, she could only sigh a breath of relief once she locked the door of the Pod behind her. Instantly, she dropped to the floor, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
Tired of running from ghosts, she plainly asked: "Anybody in here?"
Nothing. She laughed at how ridiculous she had been, running, but at least she was alive. At least there was that.
When she lifted her hand and let her fist slam down on the floor three times the pain hardly registered. The three dull knocks were absorbed instantly on the rugged floor and didn't make more of a sound than her own heartbeat pulsating through her neck. The cold was almost comfortable, preferable to the sweat, and suddenly it was as if the gravity had increased tenfold and she couldn't get up, as if the floor had molded itself perfectly around her body. Silliness again. The stupor of the really tired.
Chiana could barely call out Rygel's name, but she could already tell something was wrong; it was too quiet. Quieter than it even had been rushing through those windy streets, and Rygel wouldn't have missed out on this opportunity to make some snarky comment about her return.
With a shot of pain down her lower back she forced herself back up. If Rygel wasn't here, nor at the party, she realized, nor at his pathetic suite where they'd said he would be, she sighed, then there was trouble.
If there'd ever been one constant in her life, than it would've been that. The fact that everything that could go wrong would go wrong, when given the chance. She wouldn't ever let it beat her though, and fight it tooth and nail whenever she could. And lose.
On the road, she'd been used to it; her back against the hum of the engine and a weapon in her pants ready for action, but always -always- there was that feeling of dread that accompanied her everywhere, wondering whether the next stop would be their last. One day the fuel would run out and that'd be it. No grace in death then. Just them against time and their bodies turning on itself. And the pain.
That would be the end of their story then, and she'd hate it just like she'd hate every ending to every story ever. Chiana didn't even want to think about it.
It was easy coming up with excuses for herself not to go out there, and a thousand other ways to placate to her fear. It wasn't healthy, she knew, it wasn't right. Like a madman she'd been running through those streets in fear of something that frelling only existed in her mind. They got inside her mind and they had to get the frell out of her. This wasn't her. This wasn't real.
In the ceiling was a hatch and an emergency ladder which lead to the roof of the Pod. Chiana grabbed it and ripped it open and found herself breathing in the booming and dusty air of the docking bay. The sound of the zooming hydraulics of forklifts revealed the presence of people still working somewhere on this level, despite the Festival of Tears going on above. Recon missions were still being flown and supplies were still being brought in on this late night.
It was hard not to imagine herself staring down an underwater tank, feeling like everything was floating in the dark, the imaginary water pressing heavy on her lungs, yet in spite of it her lips were chapped, her throat parched. Reality crept up as she ignored the sounds and moved closer to the edge. It was a long way down. It didn't feel real and she almost thought of testing it. The crushing blow that would follow after the jump would probably feel real enough, but she hadn't come up there to kill herself.
The trouble was to find the right footing. These Pods weren't designed to be climbed. As she lifted her hands to above her head she felt like she was making a mockery of this ritual. It was easy to picture someone laughing at her, but Chiana cursed the voices in her head until they went away. This was something she had to do alone.
She remembered the ways of the cultists on that cemetery planet and remembered taking the stone, but she'd taken that stone for Neri, because he'd died. Except that was all a lie. Did that make her taking the stone a lie too? Did anything she do matter? At all?
Fear is just fear is just fear. What she did was real. It mattered.
Chiana grasped the roots of her hair, willing to rip it all out, but she calmed as she moved to the beat of her own breathy cadence.
The news of Neri's non-death had given her hope, and maybe it shouldn't have. Maybe he should've stayed dead. Maybe things would've been better without Neri's shadow looming over everything, looming over her and D'Argo. Maybe they could've even stood a slim chance together, if it hadn't been for her instincts to mess it all up, to always think two steps ahead. Always looking for an exit strategy.
She'd always seen the possiblities, but never so vividly. Now all she could see was the unrealized potential, the disappointments and the choices she'd made that had her come this far, and there was one that stood out amongst all the others, charred out of her mind by the pain.
That's the only way anyone can get their own place in the universe. You have to scorch it into the sky, like Talyn did, like Crais did.
Naive, that's what she was. That's what she'd always been. But no more. She used to enjoy it, used to let it happen, but that way nothing would ever change and it'd always be the same reactionary bullshit. Even if Neri would knock on her door right now it wouldn't change a thing. Paradise is just a dream. Not real. Just lies.
The world had been frelled up since before she was born and Neri had set out to try and change that. To make a difference, how small it may be. That is why he left. He saw the awful truth of the world, but he knew she wasn't ready to face it yet. She was now.
It was time to stop running.