But like the present, the past has a myriad of different routes. What is
true, changes with interpretation. Millennia ago, man believed the earth
was the universe; that it was flat and surrounded by a sphere of twinkly
aesthetically pleasing thingys. In the last few decades, man thought light
was something that made sense and that 'Quantum' was just a word that
sounded rather cool.
History is written by the winners. The losers of battles wouldn't scribe down how awful logistical management and bad weather along with the unlucky loss of one of their finest commanders caused the defeat that caused their capture. They were usually captured, horribly mangled with hot, sharp and dirty metal thingys and executed with a great amount of pizazz and gore. History was then written by the winners, some rambling scribbles, after hurriedly wiping the blood off their hands with a piece of loser's cloak, about how the decadent evil nature of the loser's regime was their downfall and damnation. This is sometimes known as the Oates and Scott hypothesis.
There is also the nature of historians themselves. They're short-sighted, socially inept and, like so many socially inept people, are fascinated by fire.
Through this myriad jumble of varied interpretation and just plain smegging up of history emerges the story of how the Earth we know and love came to become a place of oppression and darkness.
Lots of relevant information was lost. Careful tinkering about with various sources reveals that at some point in Earth's past everyone was marginally happy. Technology flourished, people were content and famine was a thing of the past. Everything was tickety boo.
What happens next was attributed to many things among them a catastrophic theological war, an act of a God people no longer believed in, bad management, revolutions in various nations, a 'revelation' of the way that man should live and giant space ants. Whatever the reason, everything smegged up on a God almighty scale. Economies shattered, power failed across vast landscapes of cities, plunging whole nations into darkness. Anarchy erupted, weapons lying unused for decades were taken up again and the world was torn apart in a completely non-literal yet apocalyptic sense.
Into this scene of disorder factions of people grouped together to claw an existence from out of the ashes of their shattered world. Brutal regimes run by whoever had a supply of weaponry, electrical power or food sprouted overnight like fungi. These factions fought and allied with one another for mastery. These clans eked out an existence amongst the lifeless hulks of once proud cities, running battles occurred in the streets between the groups. Life was cheap, death cheaper.
This vast vacuum of power caused many nations to rise up from clan alliances. Telepaths created before what was becoming known as 'The Time of Madness' became hugely influential. Even those with meagre abilities were hailed as some of the most important people on the planet. With their ability to understand people from the inside outwards a few acted as diplomats and brought the clans together. Over time it became enough and in a few areas relative peace prevailed.
From this shaky start civilisation took its first few wobbly steps after its resurrection. Society developed once more, the clans grouping their ideals together under the umbrella of union. It took time for the ties of intermarriage and the breakdown of stereotypes to work their curious charm on integration and assimilation but charm they did and the unions forged strong.
An early problem that had to be addressed was that of the balance of power. Of course, clan leaders pleaded their cases to the diplomats of their rivals who passed the message on to other clans, all in an effort to seal an alliance against the other unifying clans. (Nobody seemed to question why an alliance against these clans was necessary; this is easily answered by 'because they were there, the foreign bastards') This created an interesting dilemma in the middle of negotiations when all the clan leaders found themselves being convinced to sign strange proclamations and then allowing themselves to be led unarmed into rooms full of angry men with knives.
The hills rang with the news, the leaders had decided that power was too much for the likes of them. They had decided to retire to humble lives to lead lives of contemplation and hand over their territories to their advisors. The council of these reverend Telepaths were to hold a parliament to decide on whom was fit to take control of the nation. Elected individuals put into power by the voters would do the basic running of state. The candidates would have to be worthy of guiding so many and having so much responsibility. They would have to be selected carefully. The parliament would therefore select candidates to be in power, of course.
This is how The Council was formed. Lost to the general public was the very concept of why they were in power. They just always have been. Numbering 8 members, each represented an ancient and long dead clan. Each one the descendant of the original diplomats, their telepathic abilities kept in the gene-pool by a great deal of breeding with other council members and from the tracking down of new Telepaths. Naturally as with any hereditary system of government, there were genetic flaws in the families. Haemophilia, weakness, susceptibility to Parkinson's, large ears. The strength of their Telepathic powers however was something that no one could guess at.
This is the world of now. Carved from the collapse of world order, a nation hacked out from the husks of long dead cities. The nation in which our heroes now live.
*_*_*_*_*_*_*
The severed brown lump made an almost inaudible thump as it landed in the crystal ashtray. The silver cutting device was placed neatly beside it, its surface polished in the way that brass in old cathedrals is polished, marred by time and yet with a subtle gleam.
A light flickered, the small flame lighting up the bottom half of a man's face. A jaw that fate had treated kindly. A nice jaw; well rounded like a child's and with the structure of a man's. The light flicked out, replaced by the angry red of burning tobacco. Smoke curled around the dimly lit face, suddenly giving it a feeling not similar to nice. In fact, a lot similar to not nice.
The small man opposite cringed under the gaze of the man shrouded in darkness and started to scrunch up the small hat in his hands even more. He almost folded in on himself when the man spoke.
'Tell me voter, what information do you regard so important that you would not speak of it to any of my subordinates?'
The small man shivered under the voice, the steel in it almost imperceptible, like a velvet wrapped blade. He stayed silent, his chest trying to lower into his stomach with his head still upright so that his eyes could be lowered submissively and still watch for any 'kill him' signals.
'You must understand that I'm slightly puzzled as to why you are here at all. My guard usually batters anyone into submission who they don't execute on sight that manage to come anywhere near my office unless they have been given clearance so I assume someone allowed you to see me. You are one of the elected. Tell me now, what troubles do you bring now to my door?'
The tiny man now did drop his view towards the floor and even let out a small whimper, a slight tearing noise emanating from his hat as his fingers clutched rigidly on its frail material. The words spilled from his mouth unchecked and accelerating.
'Please Voter Colonel, I wish only to serve democracy. Rumours tell of your benevolence and grace and now I rightly see the truthofsuchanillustriou..'
The Voter Colonel raised a hand stopping the speech in mid flow. A strange gurgling noise of abruptly halted speech came from the cringing form before him.
'I don't have time for your vast oratory, voter. What do you have to tell me?'
Licking his lips in apprehension the small man cracked. He quickly choked back a short sob before his quavering voice began to ramble,
'Voter Colonel, I have reason to believe that my daughter is an enemy to democracy. I came to you in order for her to be brought to justice of course, there was no doubt of whether I would do that, I am loyal and the very thought of not bringing those guilty to justice is undermining that.'
The Voter Colonel rotated his hand while looking directly at the object before him, the universal sign to hurry the hell up. The small man yelped, looking very quickly out of the corners of his eyes and straining as many spare senses as he could struggle under control to try and predict the approach of huge, leather clad guards.
'I want you to treat her well.'
The silence next was audible. Not in the way of exam silence that is the scratching of pens and the click of invigilator's heels or the silence of the forest, the creeping sound of growth as a hundred leaves unfurl and the bark of trees tighten. This was proper silence, the silence of the incredibly terrified and the incredibly scary coming together. The kind of silence that usually ends in a furry squelch.
'That is quite a request.'
This is a common tactic of those in power, stating the blindingly obvious. It intimidates the opposition. They become afraid that you're trying to seem stupid in order to fool them.
'Voter Colonel, enemies of democracy are to be crushed under the heel of the forces of justice, darkness cannot be allowed to thrive, the problems within must be removed like the cancer they are. but can you not give her some degree of mercy? A jail sentence perhaps? A slight maiming before letting her go back into the world?'
The last words were barely a whisper. The attempted 'winning grin' was attached loosely to the face at best, it had no chance of surviving the Voter Colonel's stare.
It tried. It lasted about 4 seconds. Surprisingly long considering the circumstances.
'Do you do know what the penalty for attempting to influence the course of justice is, voter?'
The small man quaked. His body shook visibly, forceful enough to start the clatter of enamel against enamel. He had the look of a man who knows the true meaning of 'brown trousers time'
The Voter Colonel stubbed out the cigar in the crystal ashtray next to it's severed tip, darkness surrounding him once more. The small man continued to shake and mutter inaudible pleading noises.
The multiple squeal of leather boots on institution flooring made the muttering stop. Heavy squeals filled the corridor, spiralling into the room and grabbing the lower brain of the small man. He did the only sane thing he could think of.
He went on his knees before the Voter Colonel and begged for forgiveness. His rapid speech was almost drowned by the sound of boots and the rustle of purposeful trousers. In the dark he wept as he begged, the tears burning against his face red with shame and the pounding of his heart filling his head.
The ring of cold steel against the back of his head silenced his pleas. He never even thought of resisting as he was dragged onto the balcony and his upper body forced over the rail. He opened his eyes for the last time as he looked over the Colonel's garden. His last thought was of wondering who did all the weeding. Then nothing as the trigger was pulled and the back of his head blasted through his brain, forced by a few grams of incredibly fast lead.
*_*_*_*_*_*_*
He looked down as his fingers flexed. It still fascinated him. You would have thought that 3 million years of human evolution would breed familiarity; 'oh, it's my hand. Cool.' Jake still looked at his fingers in fascination.
He turned his hand over in the dim light of 'his' flat. His fist was even more amazing, the way it curled, the skin fitting snug even when it wasn't clenched. The veins in his hands were a shade of blue. Or was it green? He had spilt enough blood to know how it faded from the pinkish red to the light purpley crimson. Never bluey green.
A yellow wire just below the skin ran along the length of his arm. They were all over his body really, standing naked in front of the mirror he had once tried to see where they all went. It reminded him of those medical textbooks with the cross sections of people, all their inner workings; their endocrine systems, circulatory systems, nervous systems.
He took a swig from the bottle at his side. He coughed almost before the glass had left his lips, the kick like a small burrowing mole on fire wiggling down his throat. He felt like he was having a small seizure, his hands and legs and fingers and toes twitching as black rolled across his vision. Pressure seemed to lump up behind his plate, throbbing into his temporal lobes. The drink continued to burrow, slipping down into his belly where it curled up and smouldered.
Mmmmm, that hit the spot.
He shook the blur from his head as he took the hat from his head and tried to place it gingerly on his bedpost.
He missed. But he didn't notice. He couldn't see. That was mainly because he was finding it very difficult to stay in the present.
Collapsing face down onto the thick carpet he was vaguely aware of a pain that wasn't in his head or the feeling of his gut accelerating towards his feet at the same time as trying to leap out of his mouth. It was getting too complicated, this living business.
Images flashed before him. The faces of the guilty, tried in the great court that was Jake Bullet's, Cybernautics. Theft from vehicles, Grand Theft Auto, hijacking, all were punishable by death now. Damn it, even the holograms had cars now. The giant reactors from before the madness had come online again some time back, nobody understood why. They tapped off what they could from something they didn't understand. Basically it ended up with a load of bloody holograms now running around. Not that he had anything against the dead.
The face of Ryan Carl Fredrikson popped up in his head. He almost puked. It was one of his first assignments and the guy had almost escaped. He almost hadn't finished speaking out his sentence before the guy wrestled out of George's grip. He didn't think, he just fired. The vision of a man's face collapsing as a bullet ripped a messy path through his head was something he didn't want to think about.
But he couldn't help it. He did everything he could to forget. There wasn't an underground drugs lab that didn't know him, he threatened to execute them all in the name of the state if they didn't give him what he wanted. He had tried it all. None helped. The closest was the one that knocked him out for about 4 days. He developed an amazing tolerance for it when he tried it next time though. He still remembered every second of that ordeal. Just like he remembered everything else.
It started when he came online. It came in bits, that first he could only feel. It took a few hours before he could feel his whole body. Then they gave him his hearing. The most painful was his vision. A life in the dark shattered by the blinding light. Even with his eyes closed he never slept, the angry red of everything seared into his head.
Everything after that he remembered.
Apparently he had died. That had surprised him, especially when they were expecting him to remember. His body was his own, rewired and reconstructed so that he could move and feel. He had to learn to walk again, learn to eat, learn to kill. It was amazing how quickly it all came back to him. His brain was already hot-wired to learn it all, it had all been instinctive. It was just a matter of learning again.
Since then he had basically pootled about as an officer in Cybernautics. It involved lots of rooting out enemies of the state as every member of the police department did and of course, traffic control.
This foul liquid seemed to be doing the trick of addling his neural functioning. He could tell by the way his heat vision kept going on and off and the fact he couldn't stop giggling.
It didn't stop him remembering though. Tears leaked from his eyes, a dull yellow as they hit the carpet in front of his face, fading to the background blue as he giggled, Ryan's face splitting as the bullet tore its way though.
History is written by the winners. The losers of battles wouldn't scribe down how awful logistical management and bad weather along with the unlucky loss of one of their finest commanders caused the defeat that caused their capture. They were usually captured, horribly mangled with hot, sharp and dirty metal thingys and executed with a great amount of pizazz and gore. History was then written by the winners, some rambling scribbles, after hurriedly wiping the blood off their hands with a piece of loser's cloak, about how the decadent evil nature of the loser's regime was their downfall and damnation. This is sometimes known as the Oates and Scott hypothesis.
There is also the nature of historians themselves. They're short-sighted, socially inept and, like so many socially inept people, are fascinated by fire.
Through this myriad jumble of varied interpretation and just plain smegging up of history emerges the story of how the Earth we know and love came to become a place of oppression and darkness.
Lots of relevant information was lost. Careful tinkering about with various sources reveals that at some point in Earth's past everyone was marginally happy. Technology flourished, people were content and famine was a thing of the past. Everything was tickety boo.
What happens next was attributed to many things among them a catastrophic theological war, an act of a God people no longer believed in, bad management, revolutions in various nations, a 'revelation' of the way that man should live and giant space ants. Whatever the reason, everything smegged up on a God almighty scale. Economies shattered, power failed across vast landscapes of cities, plunging whole nations into darkness. Anarchy erupted, weapons lying unused for decades were taken up again and the world was torn apart in a completely non-literal yet apocalyptic sense.
Into this scene of disorder factions of people grouped together to claw an existence from out of the ashes of their shattered world. Brutal regimes run by whoever had a supply of weaponry, electrical power or food sprouted overnight like fungi. These factions fought and allied with one another for mastery. These clans eked out an existence amongst the lifeless hulks of once proud cities, running battles occurred in the streets between the groups. Life was cheap, death cheaper.
This vast vacuum of power caused many nations to rise up from clan alliances. Telepaths created before what was becoming known as 'The Time of Madness' became hugely influential. Even those with meagre abilities were hailed as some of the most important people on the planet. With their ability to understand people from the inside outwards a few acted as diplomats and brought the clans together. Over time it became enough and in a few areas relative peace prevailed.
From this shaky start civilisation took its first few wobbly steps after its resurrection. Society developed once more, the clans grouping their ideals together under the umbrella of union. It took time for the ties of intermarriage and the breakdown of stereotypes to work their curious charm on integration and assimilation but charm they did and the unions forged strong.
An early problem that had to be addressed was that of the balance of power. Of course, clan leaders pleaded their cases to the diplomats of their rivals who passed the message on to other clans, all in an effort to seal an alliance against the other unifying clans. (Nobody seemed to question why an alliance against these clans was necessary; this is easily answered by 'because they were there, the foreign bastards') This created an interesting dilemma in the middle of negotiations when all the clan leaders found themselves being convinced to sign strange proclamations and then allowing themselves to be led unarmed into rooms full of angry men with knives.
The hills rang with the news, the leaders had decided that power was too much for the likes of them. They had decided to retire to humble lives to lead lives of contemplation and hand over their territories to their advisors. The council of these reverend Telepaths were to hold a parliament to decide on whom was fit to take control of the nation. Elected individuals put into power by the voters would do the basic running of state. The candidates would have to be worthy of guiding so many and having so much responsibility. They would have to be selected carefully. The parliament would therefore select candidates to be in power, of course.
This is how The Council was formed. Lost to the general public was the very concept of why they were in power. They just always have been. Numbering 8 members, each represented an ancient and long dead clan. Each one the descendant of the original diplomats, their telepathic abilities kept in the gene-pool by a great deal of breeding with other council members and from the tracking down of new Telepaths. Naturally as with any hereditary system of government, there were genetic flaws in the families. Haemophilia, weakness, susceptibility to Parkinson's, large ears. The strength of their Telepathic powers however was something that no one could guess at.
This is the world of now. Carved from the collapse of world order, a nation hacked out from the husks of long dead cities. The nation in which our heroes now live.
*_*_*_*_*_*_*
The severed brown lump made an almost inaudible thump as it landed in the crystal ashtray. The silver cutting device was placed neatly beside it, its surface polished in the way that brass in old cathedrals is polished, marred by time and yet with a subtle gleam.
A light flickered, the small flame lighting up the bottom half of a man's face. A jaw that fate had treated kindly. A nice jaw; well rounded like a child's and with the structure of a man's. The light flicked out, replaced by the angry red of burning tobacco. Smoke curled around the dimly lit face, suddenly giving it a feeling not similar to nice. In fact, a lot similar to not nice.
The small man opposite cringed under the gaze of the man shrouded in darkness and started to scrunch up the small hat in his hands even more. He almost folded in on himself when the man spoke.
'Tell me voter, what information do you regard so important that you would not speak of it to any of my subordinates?'
The small man shivered under the voice, the steel in it almost imperceptible, like a velvet wrapped blade. He stayed silent, his chest trying to lower into his stomach with his head still upright so that his eyes could be lowered submissively and still watch for any 'kill him' signals.
'You must understand that I'm slightly puzzled as to why you are here at all. My guard usually batters anyone into submission who they don't execute on sight that manage to come anywhere near my office unless they have been given clearance so I assume someone allowed you to see me. You are one of the elected. Tell me now, what troubles do you bring now to my door?'
The tiny man now did drop his view towards the floor and even let out a small whimper, a slight tearing noise emanating from his hat as his fingers clutched rigidly on its frail material. The words spilled from his mouth unchecked and accelerating.
'Please Voter Colonel, I wish only to serve democracy. Rumours tell of your benevolence and grace and now I rightly see the truthofsuchanillustriou..'
The Voter Colonel raised a hand stopping the speech in mid flow. A strange gurgling noise of abruptly halted speech came from the cringing form before him.
'I don't have time for your vast oratory, voter. What do you have to tell me?'
Licking his lips in apprehension the small man cracked. He quickly choked back a short sob before his quavering voice began to ramble,
'Voter Colonel, I have reason to believe that my daughter is an enemy to democracy. I came to you in order for her to be brought to justice of course, there was no doubt of whether I would do that, I am loyal and the very thought of not bringing those guilty to justice is undermining that.'
The Voter Colonel rotated his hand while looking directly at the object before him, the universal sign to hurry the hell up. The small man yelped, looking very quickly out of the corners of his eyes and straining as many spare senses as he could struggle under control to try and predict the approach of huge, leather clad guards.
'I want you to treat her well.'
The silence next was audible. Not in the way of exam silence that is the scratching of pens and the click of invigilator's heels or the silence of the forest, the creeping sound of growth as a hundred leaves unfurl and the bark of trees tighten. This was proper silence, the silence of the incredibly terrified and the incredibly scary coming together. The kind of silence that usually ends in a furry squelch.
'That is quite a request.'
This is a common tactic of those in power, stating the blindingly obvious. It intimidates the opposition. They become afraid that you're trying to seem stupid in order to fool them.
'Voter Colonel, enemies of democracy are to be crushed under the heel of the forces of justice, darkness cannot be allowed to thrive, the problems within must be removed like the cancer they are. but can you not give her some degree of mercy? A jail sentence perhaps? A slight maiming before letting her go back into the world?'
The last words were barely a whisper. The attempted 'winning grin' was attached loosely to the face at best, it had no chance of surviving the Voter Colonel's stare.
It tried. It lasted about 4 seconds. Surprisingly long considering the circumstances.
'Do you do know what the penalty for attempting to influence the course of justice is, voter?'
The small man quaked. His body shook visibly, forceful enough to start the clatter of enamel against enamel. He had the look of a man who knows the true meaning of 'brown trousers time'
The Voter Colonel stubbed out the cigar in the crystal ashtray next to it's severed tip, darkness surrounding him once more. The small man continued to shake and mutter inaudible pleading noises.
The multiple squeal of leather boots on institution flooring made the muttering stop. Heavy squeals filled the corridor, spiralling into the room and grabbing the lower brain of the small man. He did the only sane thing he could think of.
He went on his knees before the Voter Colonel and begged for forgiveness. His rapid speech was almost drowned by the sound of boots and the rustle of purposeful trousers. In the dark he wept as he begged, the tears burning against his face red with shame and the pounding of his heart filling his head.
The ring of cold steel against the back of his head silenced his pleas. He never even thought of resisting as he was dragged onto the balcony and his upper body forced over the rail. He opened his eyes for the last time as he looked over the Colonel's garden. His last thought was of wondering who did all the weeding. Then nothing as the trigger was pulled and the back of his head blasted through his brain, forced by a few grams of incredibly fast lead.
*_*_*_*_*_*_*
He looked down as his fingers flexed. It still fascinated him. You would have thought that 3 million years of human evolution would breed familiarity; 'oh, it's my hand. Cool.' Jake still looked at his fingers in fascination.
He turned his hand over in the dim light of 'his' flat. His fist was even more amazing, the way it curled, the skin fitting snug even when it wasn't clenched. The veins in his hands were a shade of blue. Or was it green? He had spilt enough blood to know how it faded from the pinkish red to the light purpley crimson. Never bluey green.
A yellow wire just below the skin ran along the length of his arm. They were all over his body really, standing naked in front of the mirror he had once tried to see where they all went. It reminded him of those medical textbooks with the cross sections of people, all their inner workings; their endocrine systems, circulatory systems, nervous systems.
He took a swig from the bottle at his side. He coughed almost before the glass had left his lips, the kick like a small burrowing mole on fire wiggling down his throat. He felt like he was having a small seizure, his hands and legs and fingers and toes twitching as black rolled across his vision. Pressure seemed to lump up behind his plate, throbbing into his temporal lobes. The drink continued to burrow, slipping down into his belly where it curled up and smouldered.
Mmmmm, that hit the spot.
He shook the blur from his head as he took the hat from his head and tried to place it gingerly on his bedpost.
He missed. But he didn't notice. He couldn't see. That was mainly because he was finding it very difficult to stay in the present.
Collapsing face down onto the thick carpet he was vaguely aware of a pain that wasn't in his head or the feeling of his gut accelerating towards his feet at the same time as trying to leap out of his mouth. It was getting too complicated, this living business.
Images flashed before him. The faces of the guilty, tried in the great court that was Jake Bullet's, Cybernautics. Theft from vehicles, Grand Theft Auto, hijacking, all were punishable by death now. Damn it, even the holograms had cars now. The giant reactors from before the madness had come online again some time back, nobody understood why. They tapped off what they could from something they didn't understand. Basically it ended up with a load of bloody holograms now running around. Not that he had anything against the dead.
The face of Ryan Carl Fredrikson popped up in his head. He almost puked. It was one of his first assignments and the guy had almost escaped. He almost hadn't finished speaking out his sentence before the guy wrestled out of George's grip. He didn't think, he just fired. The vision of a man's face collapsing as a bullet ripped a messy path through his head was something he didn't want to think about.
But he couldn't help it. He did everything he could to forget. There wasn't an underground drugs lab that didn't know him, he threatened to execute them all in the name of the state if they didn't give him what he wanted. He had tried it all. None helped. The closest was the one that knocked him out for about 4 days. He developed an amazing tolerance for it when he tried it next time though. He still remembered every second of that ordeal. Just like he remembered everything else.
It started when he came online. It came in bits, that first he could only feel. It took a few hours before he could feel his whole body. Then they gave him his hearing. The most painful was his vision. A life in the dark shattered by the blinding light. Even with his eyes closed he never slept, the angry red of everything seared into his head.
Everything after that he remembered.
Apparently he had died. That had surprised him, especially when they were expecting him to remember. His body was his own, rewired and reconstructed so that he could move and feel. He had to learn to walk again, learn to eat, learn to kill. It was amazing how quickly it all came back to him. His brain was already hot-wired to learn it all, it had all been instinctive. It was just a matter of learning again.
Since then he had basically pootled about as an officer in Cybernautics. It involved lots of rooting out enemies of the state as every member of the police department did and of course, traffic control.
This foul liquid seemed to be doing the trick of addling his neural functioning. He could tell by the way his heat vision kept going on and off and the fact he couldn't stop giggling.
It didn't stop him remembering though. Tears leaked from his eyes, a dull yellow as they hit the carpet in front of his face, fading to the background blue as he giggled, Ryan's face splitting as the bullet tore its way though.