Chapter 2 - Many Paths, Many Unknown destinations.
"Ok specula, where are we? I think it's high time I knew." Demanded Ryss, now that she was done spacing out, and feeling sorry for herself, she got herself back into the demanding mood.
"You are on the continent of 'Impike' Milady." Answered an equally audible voice behind her. It was a rather young boy who looked to be about 7 years old. She was astonished how young he was and using words like 'Milady'. He had blond hair and green eyes. He was about the right size, and it looked as though he was and has been a solder for years by the way he was standing, and for some reason, he looked oddly familiar.
"And who would you be?" She asked, wondering why he used Milady in the first place.
"He is merely your attendant." Answered a third person, male and about the age of 45. "You seem to be at loss of who you are, aren't you?"
"Who I am?"
"Yes, though you know yourself to be Ryss, you are royalty to us. This may be a little too much to find out at once, who you are, and why your being treated this way, but there simply is no time to wait. We have been expecting you to come for sometime now."
"You're right when you say I am at a loss. But I want the answers, I'm not that dazed yet." She said sarcastically. "But who are you?"
"Not important. But you probably would like to have answers about the past, who our enemy is, and other things." Ryss nodded for him to go on. He nodded to the boy to leave, and as he left, the green organoid followed. "First of all, you are the queen of zoidians, it is your rightful place and it will be given to you. You are on the continent Impike, continent of the zoidians. There are about 3000 of us here. You may be wondering why we haven't shown ourselves to you yet, and that would be because we were only released when the Death Stinger had shown itself, so as you can see, its been almost a week now."
"I should probably tell you about Hiltz, and why he was destroying everything is sight. You thought he went insane, correct?" She nodded, wondering if she would be punished by her interference. As if he could read her thoughts, he explained that it was beyond her knowledge and she didn't do anything unforgivable. "The humans on Zi aren't a real threat really, but they are being monitored. According to some of Hiltz's research, there are ships above the atmosphere, containing the real human threat."
She was still very confused; the whole thing was going in circles that really didn't connect to each other. "I'm sorry, I'm doing the best I can to explain this to you, it is very complicated, but if you'll take a seat, I can do my best, and the mission will be so much clearer and you wont have any regrets. Now, I think I should explain the reason we want them dead so much, and that goes all the way back to before Zi was discovered."
"Wait." She said. "What do you mean before it was discovered? How do we know this? And if we didn't discover it yet, that would almost have to mean that -
"Zoidians were once humans? Yes, you're exactly right. We were humans. When the planet Earth was getting to be too crowded, it was about the year 4000 for them, and they desperately needed room, either that, or reproduction would be illegal. Of course, making such a thing illegal is quite impossible with out riots, HUGE riots. So that never became an option until about 100 years later, when a mad man by the name of Dr. Steve Randal got the idea with some high position got the idea that the riots would mean an opportunity of mass slaughter. He brought this up about three times before he was finally assassinated for such ideas. His son was a real intelligent man who was able to discover this planet."
"To make a long story short, they built the first frozen animation pods, the ones that are like ours, and sent about 4 billion people to Zi." After many years of observing life here, one of his 'disciples' took the liberty upon her to discover a chemical that actually manipulated humans to have heightened senses and become much smarter. Everyone on Zi was given the chemical, and that is the birth of the zoidian race." He looked up at her to see if she was getting bored, but she was wide-awake and was hungry for the knowledge of her peoples' history.
"The woman who discovered this chemical hid it from Randal. He never knew, the distribution was very stealthily handed out, and everyone sided with her, and never let it slip. However, nothing can stay hidden forever when under close observation, and she was found out. Afraid that she wouldn't get any credit and probably jailed for her acts of secrecy and distribution of an unknown chemical, She made haste to the laboratory that it was found. It was the only source ever found, and probably is the only source anywhere, though I don't know why, that's just what Hiltz has told us."
"Excuse me," Ryss interrupted, "But is Hiltz still alive?"
"No," he said, "everything about this is from his knowledge, it was just put in a log entry near the capsules of all the remaining zoidians. Let me see, where was I? Oh yes, anyway, so she went back to the only source, not wanting punishment, and probably driven by greed, she plunged into the 'pool' of this unknown substance. The problem was, it was only tested in small quantities, so death was being expected. However, that is not what happened. Hiltz's writings tell us that she turned into a giant statue. Which he believes to be the Zoid Eve."
"What!" Ryss exclaimed, "You mean the Zoid Eve is actually a person?"
"Yes," he said, "and no. Hiltz thinks that the thing isn't really a creature of flesh. But that is uncertain. It is completely soulless, or so we are lead to believe. Anyway, to make another long story short, the Zoid Eve made many of the first zoids, and compared to other combat vehicles and planes, they were stronger, faster and better 10 to 1 easily. We drove back all the forces of Dr. Randal, but he was able to get a whiff of the zoid technology and fought back. More and more zoids were made, and as you can imagine, the solders from earth were pretty much limitless. It was a losing battle for either side; a technology verses numbers. Zoidians having superior technology, but were being overwhelmed."
"Finally, in a last ditch effort to stop and crush the humans once and for all, the Death Saurer was made. It took years, but finally it was complete. And they launched a.s.a.p even though it wouldn't accept anyone as its pilot, it was just too proud of its power. It was able to sense zoidian from human, and crushed everything sent at it. However, the human's technology rose. They began using electronic missiles to completely jam the circuits of the Zoids they hit. The sent so many flying at the Death Saurer, It finally shut down."
"However, the Humans had pretty much used every missile they had left, and somehow, the Death Saurer rose again. However, the reason it is called the Death Saurer to us, is because those missiles messed up it's programming and changed it to wanting to destroy everything, even us. We fled, and put as many of our kind into pods as we could, we only had 3000. We used everything against it, even the guardian scorpions. THEY were finally about to take out its core. But by the time they did it successfully, everyone on the planet was destroyed, and-"
He stopped for a while and took a breather. It was sure a mouthful. But Ryss wanted more, but also waited patiently.
"That is why we hate the humans, because Dr. Randal wanted our technology and the source of our intelligence. He wanted power, and we were treated like lab rats. I think I also read that he wanted us dead. When we attacked him, we were ferocious and merciless in his eyes. He probably thought we would be a threat to everyone on earth. However, if we were to ally ourselves to them, or even a peace treaty would be made, we would still be segregated because of jealousy, and I think both sides know that one or the other must go. However, the third side is rather clueless to what is going on. The Humans on Zi are unknowingly giving away technology that will lead to their downfall, and ours. Putting it in the hands of the doctor's descendants."
"Anyway, About 200 years later, after the face of Zi regained its natural self to a certain degree, the humans sent more of their kind. However, this time, this batch was unknowingly building over war stained lands and the scientists that sent them knew very well that the next generation of humans coming could be annihilated in the blink of an eye if the Death Saurer came. Pretty much, these humans have only been here for about 100 years. The time when the planet was barren was about 300 years, just a little side info incase you were wondering."
"I think that will be all for now. What time is it?" asked Ryss
"About 10 pm, need to rest? I doubt it, you only woke up about an hour ago, but I am sure beat, I'll tell you everything else tomorrow, goodnight."
He led her out of the building, and for the first time in a while, she felt the cool air of the night, and she decided to go on a long walk and talk everything over with Specula.
* * * * *
"Fiona, is everything ok?!?" Asked a very worried Thomas.
"I-I'll be ok." She stuttered.
He put his arm around her. He hadn't seen her cry since Van decided to stay and fight the death stinger while the Ultra Saures swam slowly away.
"Please Fiona, I know I'm not Van or Moonbay, but I care about you too."
"I know.Van and I don't share the feelings for each other that we used to. It is kind of hard to explain. But I think that the reason is because." She broke off.
"Why Fiona? Why?" He asked again.
"Tell me something? How can you be so worried about our relationship if you are jealous of it? It occurred to me only after began to think of this failing one. So how can you feel sorry?"
"Fiona, I admit it. I was extremely jealous. I was so jealous I would sulk in my sorrows sometimes. But if there is one thing I want, above all else, it would have to be your happiness, even if it wouldn't work out between us, understand?"
She nodded, and continued what she was about to say. "The reason we cant really stay together is, well." Again, she trailed off, but this time it was a lack of knowing what to say, rather than sadness.
* * * * *
Van began to make his way back, he didn't know how long he had been out there, but he guesstimated an hour. However, he just didn't care how long. He had tried to think of all the reasons possible that he and Fiona would stop talking to each other like that, but nothing came to him, all he had accomplished was shedding tears. "It feels good to cry every once in a while, I guess." He thought. He wondered if it really had mended some of the wounds inside of him. Really, the only thing that comforted him was the fact that it wasn't either of them WANTING to break away from the other. "What went wrong?" He asked himself again.
He had put the liger into a sprint; he wasn't in a hurry to get back anytime soon. He spotted something ahead of him in the desert. It was only a speck of light at first, till he zoomed in, it was Zeek. They soon found themselves conversing with one another.
"Well buddy, I've thought about it for a while, and I have decided to let you go with Fiona. You really aren't mine you belong to Fiona. It is the only solution for me not to be selfish, even though it was a hard one to go with. It would seem like I would never say this, but I don't want you to stay with me. Fiona is your real owner."
That was the only way he knew how to explain it, and it made him shutter every time he implied Zeek as a piece of property.
"I understand Van, it is rather hard for me to except, I want to be with both of you, but sometimes, choices have to be made. Thank you for understanding." Replied Zeek, he had come all this way to say the same thing.
"Goodbye, my friend, I doubt we will ever meet again. Thanks. Thanks for everything." Van had a hard time saying it, but was relived it was over. He climbed back in, and headed west, toward the Wind Colony, his home. He looked over to his right to see Zeek going back toward the Red River base. It was after he disappeared behind a cliff, that he began to reflect all of the good and bad times with the three of them, and also began to weep again.
* * * * *
Irvine and Moonbay had been in their zoids for about three hours, side by side, and yet said nothing. It was Moonbay who broke the silence.
"Do you think that those two hate each other all of a sudden? I couldn't understand why they were ignoring each other." She asked, almost half-mindedly.
"I don't think they hate each other, I think it is just that they don't love each other. The reason behind such an unexpected out come is probably because they were always together, looking for the Zoid Eve, but now that it is found, and there is no real danger, the excitement is gone. Another part of the reason is because they really are different people. Fiona is more of a researcher rather than a pilot, or a strategist. The only reason that Van wanted to help her was that it was an adventure to him, and a search for her. He wanted the pleasure of fighting and action, she wanted the pleasure of discovery."
That was rather astonishing for Moonbay; Irvine showing wisdom about things like these was like getting her Gustave to jump. "Since when were you so knowledgeable about these things?"
"Since when did you start using words like, 'knowledgeable'? I just know, it seems pretty obvious; there can't be another reason, not in my mind. And anyway, I've seen something like this before." That would have been a true statement if he had said 'Experienced' something like this'. "Take care Moonbay, it was nice knowing you, and I cant say every time was a good time but -
"Yeah, sure were some good times and bad times." She interrupted "but over all, sure was worth it. Besides, I think it should be you to take care, and don't get into to much trouble."
"Yes mom." He sarcastically blurted out, and they each went in a different direction, one east, and one west.
"Ok specula, where are we? I think it's high time I knew." Demanded Ryss, now that she was done spacing out, and feeling sorry for herself, she got herself back into the demanding mood.
"You are on the continent of 'Impike' Milady." Answered an equally audible voice behind her. It was a rather young boy who looked to be about 7 years old. She was astonished how young he was and using words like 'Milady'. He had blond hair and green eyes. He was about the right size, and it looked as though he was and has been a solder for years by the way he was standing, and for some reason, he looked oddly familiar.
"And who would you be?" She asked, wondering why he used Milady in the first place.
"He is merely your attendant." Answered a third person, male and about the age of 45. "You seem to be at loss of who you are, aren't you?"
"Who I am?"
"Yes, though you know yourself to be Ryss, you are royalty to us. This may be a little too much to find out at once, who you are, and why your being treated this way, but there simply is no time to wait. We have been expecting you to come for sometime now."
"You're right when you say I am at a loss. But I want the answers, I'm not that dazed yet." She said sarcastically. "But who are you?"
"Not important. But you probably would like to have answers about the past, who our enemy is, and other things." Ryss nodded for him to go on. He nodded to the boy to leave, and as he left, the green organoid followed. "First of all, you are the queen of zoidians, it is your rightful place and it will be given to you. You are on the continent Impike, continent of the zoidians. There are about 3000 of us here. You may be wondering why we haven't shown ourselves to you yet, and that would be because we were only released when the Death Stinger had shown itself, so as you can see, its been almost a week now."
"I should probably tell you about Hiltz, and why he was destroying everything is sight. You thought he went insane, correct?" She nodded, wondering if she would be punished by her interference. As if he could read her thoughts, he explained that it was beyond her knowledge and she didn't do anything unforgivable. "The humans on Zi aren't a real threat really, but they are being monitored. According to some of Hiltz's research, there are ships above the atmosphere, containing the real human threat."
She was still very confused; the whole thing was going in circles that really didn't connect to each other. "I'm sorry, I'm doing the best I can to explain this to you, it is very complicated, but if you'll take a seat, I can do my best, and the mission will be so much clearer and you wont have any regrets. Now, I think I should explain the reason we want them dead so much, and that goes all the way back to before Zi was discovered."
"Wait." She said. "What do you mean before it was discovered? How do we know this? And if we didn't discover it yet, that would almost have to mean that -
"Zoidians were once humans? Yes, you're exactly right. We were humans. When the planet Earth was getting to be too crowded, it was about the year 4000 for them, and they desperately needed room, either that, or reproduction would be illegal. Of course, making such a thing illegal is quite impossible with out riots, HUGE riots. So that never became an option until about 100 years later, when a mad man by the name of Dr. Steve Randal got the idea with some high position got the idea that the riots would mean an opportunity of mass slaughter. He brought this up about three times before he was finally assassinated for such ideas. His son was a real intelligent man who was able to discover this planet."
"To make a long story short, they built the first frozen animation pods, the ones that are like ours, and sent about 4 billion people to Zi." After many years of observing life here, one of his 'disciples' took the liberty upon her to discover a chemical that actually manipulated humans to have heightened senses and become much smarter. Everyone on Zi was given the chemical, and that is the birth of the zoidian race." He looked up at her to see if she was getting bored, but she was wide-awake and was hungry for the knowledge of her peoples' history.
"The woman who discovered this chemical hid it from Randal. He never knew, the distribution was very stealthily handed out, and everyone sided with her, and never let it slip. However, nothing can stay hidden forever when under close observation, and she was found out. Afraid that she wouldn't get any credit and probably jailed for her acts of secrecy and distribution of an unknown chemical, She made haste to the laboratory that it was found. It was the only source ever found, and probably is the only source anywhere, though I don't know why, that's just what Hiltz has told us."
"Excuse me," Ryss interrupted, "But is Hiltz still alive?"
"No," he said, "everything about this is from his knowledge, it was just put in a log entry near the capsules of all the remaining zoidians. Let me see, where was I? Oh yes, anyway, so she went back to the only source, not wanting punishment, and probably driven by greed, she plunged into the 'pool' of this unknown substance. The problem was, it was only tested in small quantities, so death was being expected. However, that is not what happened. Hiltz's writings tell us that she turned into a giant statue. Which he believes to be the Zoid Eve."
"What!" Ryss exclaimed, "You mean the Zoid Eve is actually a person?"
"Yes," he said, "and no. Hiltz thinks that the thing isn't really a creature of flesh. But that is uncertain. It is completely soulless, or so we are lead to believe. Anyway, to make another long story short, the Zoid Eve made many of the first zoids, and compared to other combat vehicles and planes, they were stronger, faster and better 10 to 1 easily. We drove back all the forces of Dr. Randal, but he was able to get a whiff of the zoid technology and fought back. More and more zoids were made, and as you can imagine, the solders from earth were pretty much limitless. It was a losing battle for either side; a technology verses numbers. Zoidians having superior technology, but were being overwhelmed."
"Finally, in a last ditch effort to stop and crush the humans once and for all, the Death Saurer was made. It took years, but finally it was complete. And they launched a.s.a.p even though it wouldn't accept anyone as its pilot, it was just too proud of its power. It was able to sense zoidian from human, and crushed everything sent at it. However, the human's technology rose. They began using electronic missiles to completely jam the circuits of the Zoids they hit. The sent so many flying at the Death Saurer, It finally shut down."
"However, the Humans had pretty much used every missile they had left, and somehow, the Death Saurer rose again. However, the reason it is called the Death Saurer to us, is because those missiles messed up it's programming and changed it to wanting to destroy everything, even us. We fled, and put as many of our kind into pods as we could, we only had 3000. We used everything against it, even the guardian scorpions. THEY were finally about to take out its core. But by the time they did it successfully, everyone on the planet was destroyed, and-"
He stopped for a while and took a breather. It was sure a mouthful. But Ryss wanted more, but also waited patiently.
"That is why we hate the humans, because Dr. Randal wanted our technology and the source of our intelligence. He wanted power, and we were treated like lab rats. I think I also read that he wanted us dead. When we attacked him, we were ferocious and merciless in his eyes. He probably thought we would be a threat to everyone on earth. However, if we were to ally ourselves to them, or even a peace treaty would be made, we would still be segregated because of jealousy, and I think both sides know that one or the other must go. However, the third side is rather clueless to what is going on. The Humans on Zi are unknowingly giving away technology that will lead to their downfall, and ours. Putting it in the hands of the doctor's descendants."
"Anyway, About 200 years later, after the face of Zi regained its natural self to a certain degree, the humans sent more of their kind. However, this time, this batch was unknowingly building over war stained lands and the scientists that sent them knew very well that the next generation of humans coming could be annihilated in the blink of an eye if the Death Saurer came. Pretty much, these humans have only been here for about 100 years. The time when the planet was barren was about 300 years, just a little side info incase you were wondering."
"I think that will be all for now. What time is it?" asked Ryss
"About 10 pm, need to rest? I doubt it, you only woke up about an hour ago, but I am sure beat, I'll tell you everything else tomorrow, goodnight."
He led her out of the building, and for the first time in a while, she felt the cool air of the night, and she decided to go on a long walk and talk everything over with Specula.
* * * * *
"Fiona, is everything ok?!?" Asked a very worried Thomas.
"I-I'll be ok." She stuttered.
He put his arm around her. He hadn't seen her cry since Van decided to stay and fight the death stinger while the Ultra Saures swam slowly away.
"Please Fiona, I know I'm not Van or Moonbay, but I care about you too."
"I know.Van and I don't share the feelings for each other that we used to. It is kind of hard to explain. But I think that the reason is because." She broke off.
"Why Fiona? Why?" He asked again.
"Tell me something? How can you be so worried about our relationship if you are jealous of it? It occurred to me only after began to think of this failing one. So how can you feel sorry?"
"Fiona, I admit it. I was extremely jealous. I was so jealous I would sulk in my sorrows sometimes. But if there is one thing I want, above all else, it would have to be your happiness, even if it wouldn't work out between us, understand?"
She nodded, and continued what she was about to say. "The reason we cant really stay together is, well." Again, she trailed off, but this time it was a lack of knowing what to say, rather than sadness.
* * * * *
Van began to make his way back, he didn't know how long he had been out there, but he guesstimated an hour. However, he just didn't care how long. He had tried to think of all the reasons possible that he and Fiona would stop talking to each other like that, but nothing came to him, all he had accomplished was shedding tears. "It feels good to cry every once in a while, I guess." He thought. He wondered if it really had mended some of the wounds inside of him. Really, the only thing that comforted him was the fact that it wasn't either of them WANTING to break away from the other. "What went wrong?" He asked himself again.
He had put the liger into a sprint; he wasn't in a hurry to get back anytime soon. He spotted something ahead of him in the desert. It was only a speck of light at first, till he zoomed in, it was Zeek. They soon found themselves conversing with one another.
"Well buddy, I've thought about it for a while, and I have decided to let you go with Fiona. You really aren't mine you belong to Fiona. It is the only solution for me not to be selfish, even though it was a hard one to go with. It would seem like I would never say this, but I don't want you to stay with me. Fiona is your real owner."
That was the only way he knew how to explain it, and it made him shutter every time he implied Zeek as a piece of property.
"I understand Van, it is rather hard for me to except, I want to be with both of you, but sometimes, choices have to be made. Thank you for understanding." Replied Zeek, he had come all this way to say the same thing.
"Goodbye, my friend, I doubt we will ever meet again. Thanks. Thanks for everything." Van had a hard time saying it, but was relived it was over. He climbed back in, and headed west, toward the Wind Colony, his home. He looked over to his right to see Zeek going back toward the Red River base. It was after he disappeared behind a cliff, that he began to reflect all of the good and bad times with the three of them, and also began to weep again.
* * * * *
Irvine and Moonbay had been in their zoids for about three hours, side by side, and yet said nothing. It was Moonbay who broke the silence.
"Do you think that those two hate each other all of a sudden? I couldn't understand why they were ignoring each other." She asked, almost half-mindedly.
"I don't think they hate each other, I think it is just that they don't love each other. The reason behind such an unexpected out come is probably because they were always together, looking for the Zoid Eve, but now that it is found, and there is no real danger, the excitement is gone. Another part of the reason is because they really are different people. Fiona is more of a researcher rather than a pilot, or a strategist. The only reason that Van wanted to help her was that it was an adventure to him, and a search for her. He wanted the pleasure of fighting and action, she wanted the pleasure of discovery."
That was rather astonishing for Moonbay; Irvine showing wisdom about things like these was like getting her Gustave to jump. "Since when were you so knowledgeable about these things?"
"Since when did you start using words like, 'knowledgeable'? I just know, it seems pretty obvious; there can't be another reason, not in my mind. And anyway, I've seen something like this before." That would have been a true statement if he had said 'Experienced' something like this'. "Take care Moonbay, it was nice knowing you, and I cant say every time was a good time but -
"Yeah, sure were some good times and bad times." She interrupted "but over all, sure was worth it. Besides, I think it should be you to take care, and don't get into to much trouble."
"Yes mom." He sarcastically blurted out, and they each went in a different direction, one east, and one west.