Chapter 8:
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
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They were eventually allowed to board their Simoun. All ten of the Lumiere's crew were there. Lieutenant Scott's expression was unreadable. The captain, Aer thought he was called Ting, was stoic. He said, "Don't worry about us. Do what you have to do."
The pair nodded and left the hangar bay. The ship had descended to one hundred thousand feet; Aer drove the Simoun down to thirty thousand, then started the Emerald Ri Majon.
They recovered quickly this time. They had decided to try to get as close to their own time as they could. Aer thought she had a direction to go, a fix on a few Emerald points, and tried to head there.
Something passed close by, just visible outside the canopy. Against the flash of colors, she thought she saw another Simoun. She dismissed it as another ghost image, an overlay of something else.
The controls began to fight her. It felt like they were being drawn along by something. Aer realized the Simoun outside might be real, creating a wake and pulling them along.
"Neveril! I think there's someone out there!"
"I see them. Try to follow them."
"Right!" Aer stopped fighting the controls and aloowed them to drift for a short time, then adjusted to get closer to the other craft. She could almost make out the pilots...
They emerged over a town. When they had stablized, Aer looked over the buildings. They had seen better days. Some of the central ones seemed to have been refurbished. Several Simouns were landed on a grassy field nearby. Aer headed there with the other one that had emerged with them.
They set down near the other Simouns and climbed out. Several figures, some in strange gear, were standing nearby, sitting on ruined structures, broken columns and masonry. They climbed out and slowly walked toward them.
Aer scanned the faces. One she recognized from a photograph she had seen. Sitting on a fallen column, lavender hair, blue eyes. She and Neveril were staring transfixed at each other.
"Amuria..." Neveril said.
"Amuria?" Aer asked. "That's Amuria?" This felt awkward. Aer wasn't sure what she was supposed to say.
"Good to see you, Neveril," Amuria said.
"Amuria... I - this... this is Aer... "
"I know. Always difficult when the old girlfriend meets the new one, isn't it?" She regarded Aer as if passing judgement. Neveril was sure Amuria was seeing her as unworthy.
"I thought you were dead -"
"Technically, we are. All of us. Including you. Come one. We can let our personal problems wait. There's a lot to tell you." She started walking into town.
Neveril found it hard to register anything that had been said. Her emotions were jumbled. *Just why did I want to meet Amuria again?* she asked herself. *What did I hope to do? How did I think I would feel? That SHE would feel?*
She suddenly felt ashamed at not having thought that far ahead. She had violated a basic rule of sybillae life: Always focus on others, their needs, their feelings, their impressions. This was not her, not the girl who had become known as Sybilla Aurea, most accomplished Simoun Sybilla in centuries.
Amuria was doing better remembering her principles. "I know this is all confusing," she said. "You want to know where we stand, you, me, and her. It's going to take a while for you to figure out your feelings. Right now you should just get to know everyone and learn what's going on."
The group of sybillae walked into the center of town, where tables had been set up in a grassy park. Some had maps or diagrams. One had tea and cakes. "Help yourself," Amuria said. "You probably still feel the need to eat. That will pass eventually."
Aer dove right in. "Hey, these are good!"
"All of these sybillae have performed the Emerald Ri Majon?" Neveril asked, indicating the rest of the sybillae gathered in the park. All eyes were on the new arrivals. She was used to such attention, mainly from trainees; her fellow sybille she had always regarded as equals, but some had regarded her as superior to all others. All of those around her now, however, had every reason to regard her as an inferior. She hadn't felt this way since shortly after her assignment to Chor Tempest, when her reputation had started to grow.
"You probably have a million questions," a brown-haired sybilla said. "We'll try to answer them. First off, you should start getting to know everyone. I'm Fraisie."
Other syabillae named themselves in turn. Durem, Lethaenon, Valaron, Rhidach, Jarmila, Rill, Arle, Algrem, Kapono, Valatari, Tanaru... the names kept coming, more than one person could remember immediately. In all there were forty-eight, including herself and Aer.
"Right." Fraisie took a beep breath. "Overview: Four thousand years from the first writing systems to the first Industrial Age - the time when the Ancients first invented the technology and industry that other nations were re-inventing in your time. A thousand more years to the Fall. A thousand years from there to the First Sybillae. A thousand years from them to you. Eight hundred years from you to the death of the last Daikurikan. She could have lasted centuries longer, but after some point it's all about will, and where's the will when you're alone? Couple of centuries after that the aliens come to pick over our bones.
"You'll need to know a bit more detail about the Fall. The hundred years before the Fall was full oof war and civil strife. All kinds of tensions and hostilities - racial, nationalist, ethnic, religious, Newtypes against naturals. People were starting to live centuries, but they still bred like they would die in decades, leading to a pileup of population. The world is only so big, it can feed only so many people. From a peak population of over ten billion we sank to around three billion at the time of the Fall, and bottomed out a century afterward at less than a million.
"The Final War lasted seven years, and saw a lot of research into the real time- and space-bending technologies and Ri Majons. The Emerald Ri Majon was worked out theoretically, but the government was hesitant to try it. The equivalent of six choirs were used to hide one of our emergency nanite fluid reservoirs in a pocket universe - think of an island just away from our universe's mainland, with a small bridge of space connecting. That effort killed several of the sybillae involved, so it wasn't tried again. That emergency reservoir would save us; it would become the Spring.
"The war caused catastrophic damage to the world; large regions became uninhabitable. We worked on ways to reverse the damage. We devised Ri Majons that would send large numbers of people back in time. The largest of these was the Grand Ri Majon, which you saw. It partially worked - it would have been a miracle if it had gone any better, and caused any less damage. But from a physical standpoint it certainly didn't help. The whole system was devastated. An interstellar probe thought we had gone nova. But there was an upside - more than half of us here came from there - we were the performers in some of the Simouns used."
"You... were in that?" Aer said.
"Over five hundred Simouns were involved. When it was done, twenty-eight of us found ourselves... beyond mortality. We had become transcendent beings. One with Time and Space. The 'gods' of Tempus Spatium."
"You're saying you're the gods?"
Fraisie smiled. "Gods aren't so awesome when you're one of them, eh?"
"We..." Aer was suddenly speechless.
"We are not without our limits. The big one is that we can't change our own past, the events leading up to us. We can't stop the Fall, or decide the wars quickly and with less damage to the world. We became stewards, watching over the world, protecting it from destruction.
"The First Sybillae, Dominura and Rimone, didn't fully join us. They did train a number of other sybillae in the Emerald Ri Majon, and our numbers grew. After Rimone died, Dominura went into seclusion, then emerged as Onasia. Records were sealed away; many things were forgotten.
"About fifty years before your time references to the Emerald were re-discovered. The descriptions were promising, tantalizing. The special research choir, Chor Dextra, tried it, with mostly the same results as your first try with Amuria. There were only two successful efforts - our last four members before you. Dominura and her pair managed to survive their attempt and decided they weren't going to be able to do it, and stopped. Dominura was allowed to remain in service on Onasia's orders - obviously setting herself up, what they call a time-loop, which can get complicated. Her pair... was Granisie."
Aer found her voice again. "My grandfather? He was Dominura's first pair?"
Fraisie shook her head. "They'd had other pairs before joining Dextra. It was a special research choir, remember. All the members were at or near retirement. One last service to the Temple before going to the Spring. He chose his fate. You would know why."
"Life is about making choices," Aer said, rembering her grandfather, "and some of them, when you've made them, you can't go back."
She looked at Neveril. The pink-haired sybilla seemed as amazed by everything as Aer was. Amazed and conflicted. What they had just learned was a direct challenge to her faith. Faith had always been her strength, she had worked hard to be an exemplar as a priestess, but now she was finding things weren't what she had thought they were, what ANYONE had thought they were.
"It's a lot to absorb, I know," Fraisie said. "Let's rest a bit. It's getting near bedtime anyway. You'll need to learn a lot more stuff, like history and languages. We have crystals and readers from Ancient times. It will be a long few months."
"Months?" Aer said. "What about Argentum? Are we just going to leave them to destroy the tunnels to the Spring and let the world die?"
"Oh, they will be the first real roadblock to clear. Don't worry, you'll get your payback for the friends you've lost. Remember, though, the future of the world after your time isn't set. You may find it different when we're done. Your friends from Chor Tempest may suffer... or benefit. There are hard choices ahead, and the future isn't what it used to be."
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Aer found it hard to sleep that night. She woke up and left the refurbished house she and Neveril had taken. *At least no one bats an eye at us sharing a bed,* she thought as she stepped out into the moonlight.
Amuria was there, sitting on some masonry, staring at the moon. She noticed Aer in the doorway to her home and motioned her over. After a moment Aer came and sat down next to her.
"You've haven't been to the moon yet, have you?" she said. "A pretty lively place, if you land at the right time."
"We didn't exactly have control over that," Aer said. "I'm guessing you guys did."
Amuria chuckled. "Yeah, it should have been pretty obvious. We could have pulled you in immediately, given you a guided tour, but we figured you should see things firsthand for yourselves, and figure things out on your own. I guess we could have designed a better itinerary. And we thought you should get time to be together."
"What about you? Were you okay with that? Have you given up on her?"
Amuria looked down, staring into the distance as if looking inside of herself. "Part of me will always love her. But I realize now I wasn't right for her. I admit it, I was a fool. I pushed her into trying the Emerald. When that drop fighter was sucked up past our canopies, and we could see into the cockpit, I warned Neveril not to look. She was too empathetic. Good quality for a priestess, but in this situation we had to be soldiers, and I knew she couldn't kill the enemy if she looked them in the eye, as you or I could."
"So that was how she lost you..."
Amuria shook her head. "No. When I found myself falling through time and space, I thought it was her. Tempus Spatium's punishment for daring the forbidden. Separation from her, loss of her love. But then I wound up here, and the others explained things to me."
She looked Aer in they eye. "It was me. The sin was mine. The records said the Emerald would 'bring us closer to Tempus Spatium', it would 'open all doors' and grant us whatever we desired. I wanted power. I thought the Emerald would make us more powerful, give us the ability to win. That wasn't what the Emerald was about. I was completely missing the point of the descriptions.
"When sybillae try the Emerald Ri Majon, frame of mind matters. Your focus, your intent. I was focussed on power, so Tempus Spatium dumped an atomic bomb's worth of energy into the area. You were focussed on going to another world, and so was she, so you found other worlds."
"Ah. You wanted power. Isn't that just being greedy? Not good for a priestess, isn't it?" Aer had ended up getting almost sick of priestesses telling her what qualities to cultivate.
"Well, I was never the best priestess. Even Paraietta and Roatreamon were better than me. But when I was a child I lost family in one of the invasions. Later, as a trainee, I learned how many people had suffered as I had, how much they depended on the sybillae and their Simouns. I learned how important it was to be strong, to protect the ones you love. I decided I wanted to keep getting stronger, so that nothing would be able to hurt my friends, my family, my country."
"I hear that. We had to protect the country, and we tried our best, and we just weren't good enough. We needed to be stronger. All of us."
"Stronger as soldiers, not as priestesses," Amuria said. "And it didn't help that the elites, the rich and powerful families, kept a lock on the flight slots.
Class conflict had already caused revolutions in other countries. We were becoming a prime candidate for that.
"Really, though, I don't think now that the Emerald Ri Majon would have helped, in any way. It's not for fulfilling sybillae desires. It's best used for love. To express it, consummate it. You should focus on love when you're trying it. That's what Dominura and Rimone were doing when they did it."
"Look where it got them! And it didn't last. They split."
"Well, then, you better watch out," Amuria said mischeiviously. "You wouldn't want Neveril to get away from you." She cast her eyes to one side. "Speaking of which... we have company."
Aer turned around. Neveril was sitting in a seat at the table behind them. She hadn't even heard her come up. "How long have you been there?"
"Almost as long as you two," Neveril said. "Don't you find it chilly out here?"
Aer reddended. If she had heard all of that... "Let's warm up, then. Care to come back inside?"
They made their way back to bed. Aer went to sleep wondering if their talk had helped Neveril get a grip on her feelings. If they still had work to do, the last thing they needed was a sybillae who didn't know where her heart lay.
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AN: This is what I have right now. It may be a while before I can continue, with RL concerns to deal with.
If I had the inspiriation and/or skills, I would do another fic tracing Neveril, Paraietta, Kaim, Alty, and Rodoreamon from early childhood, about age five or six, through their years in training up to graduation. They wouldn't all be together until they are assigned to Tempest. Early on we would see how the Ri Majons used to delebrate major holidays would inspire them to become sybillae; scenes in the training program would show the discipline and social character of the program; and we would see some background on the sybillae's families. the main block is that I would need at least a dozen original characters.
About going up against Comanches or Raptors... seems inappropriate to me. You could DO it, but you'd need to specify loadouts and electronics suites. Seems to me if those things are equal, the Simouns might have the edge against Comanches but thei rlack os supersonic speed will doom them against Raptors.
A better matchup to me is to place them in the world of Last Exile. Vanships and sky dreadnoughts... one choir is probably worth the whole Anatoray fleet.
(Also, you may want to know: I haven't taken orders form the military in 18 years... 8^P )
