After the return of the judged trio, weeks passed them by like minutes as the Domo sailed through the void of space.
They did not encounter a single planet with life in the way. It was almost odd. But the Domo 's sensors are never wrong. Only barren rocks, decaying comets and lonely supergiant stars drift past them. They did not even encounter stray space-faring vehicles to signify any hope of leading them to a world of intelligent life. This weighs on Sersi and the Eternals heavily. Even the almost-cliched, rousingly hopeful moment they had had faded away with the crushing tide of life going on. More weeks have passed since then. In addition to the weeks since the Domo took off from Earth for the last time, it had worn on them with a vengeance.
An eerie sense of quietness reigns within the ship. The Eternals spoke little to another. They barely acknowledged the other's presence. Lounging about the lonely corridors, barely looking the other in the eye. Conversations in general were few and far between: either be it the progress of their search or the casual meet and greet. Talk of Earth was even more sparse - all of the best memories of the world they were exiled from only brought them more heartache. In order to keep their minds from going haywire from the isolation, each Eternal kept themselves busy.
Phastos drowns himself in work. Druig takes a nap. Kingo does yoga. Thena goes through every weapon, over and over again, as if in a trance. Makkari reads the entire library on the ship, over and over again.
Sersi sits in a corner and remembers, or at least tries to. She recalls Ikaris saying "I am very beautiful" in Akkadian. She recalls Sprite's many stories, each one more magnificent than the last. She recalls Gilgamesh being as great of a cook as he is. She recalls Ajak comforting her.
She wonders if those memories have now been wasted on her.
Suddenly, she feels small rumblings. Taking a look around, she sees small objects rattling and slowly falling off the pile of accumulated junk in the center of the lab. Soon, more objects topple from their elevated positions as the shaking of the Domo grows more and more violent. Her friends, interrupted from their current activities, stumble around as they try to maintain their balance on their corpsing ark. Then she felt it, the warning systems of the starship's control panels blaring in her mind. No doubt her friends have felt the same. It had encountered something that may destroy them all.
She whips her head to the resident scientist. "Phastos, what is going on?!"
Phastos turns from his hastily created control panel, face pale as a sheet despite his complexion. "WORMHOLE! EVERYONE BRACE!"
Everyone scrambles together until they all form a mass of bodies. Hugging each other as best they can, they close their eyes.
The shaking grows even stronger as the Domo's already lit lighting dims even further.
A tear escapes Sersi's eye. The ship could not even withstand Ikaris' optical beams before. Though repaired and reinforced by Phastos, how could it hold its own against pure gravity?
Maybe this is Arishem's true punishment for them: let the void of space tear them asunder. What better way to wash his hands clean of them?
Sersi shuts out those terrible thoughts. She tries to calm herself down by listening to the heartbeats of her friends, her family. All while the shaking continues, worsening to unimaginable levels. The interior of the starship soon blacks out completely.
She shuts her eyes…
The shaking stops. Sersi dares to open her eyes again.
She is alive.
She looks around. The group huddle she is entangled in tries to pry themselves off individually.
They're alive.
The same cannot be said for their pile of 'relics'. Everything was thrown everywhere all at once. It was a complete and utter mess that would take forever to clean even for Makkari. Slowly but surely, they get themselves and each other to their feet. Makkari and Druig cling to each other like quails, still obviously rattled from the whole debacle.
Sersi does not care. Her friends are safe. That is all that matters. As the rest of the Eternals regain their footing and slowly brush themselves off, she turns to the resident tinkerer, still comfortably cross legged on the floor.
"Phastos, can we have a status report please?"
"Yes, ma'am," Phastos replied. Instantly, on his hands, cosmic energy flows, solidifies and forms a visual console, allowing him to observe everything in front of its forepeak. He quickly activates it only to feel his eyebrows crinkle in shock over what he sees.
"Phastos, you know you don't have to call me ma'am, it makes me feel…" Sersi's tone slowly falters as she sees Phastos' eyes widen to the size of cue balls. "...old."
The inventor, not very known for joviality or humor during work, starts to giggle uncontrollably, tears pricking his eyes. Everyone looked at him funny, including Sersi.
Phastos merely looks back at them, his expression one of eureka-induced delirium.
"I can't believe I finally get to say it but…"
He holds up the recording for all to see.
"We made it."
The remaining five trample over their scattered junk and over each other to the central room, where the great red statue of their god Arishem stood, swiftly followed by Phastos. Crowding at the nearest transparent windowpane, they finally see it.
A world as blue and green, and above all, as alive as Earth was.
"Land ho," was Druig's ironic closing line. He is right, Sersi thinks.
They have found another world, teeming with life.
Now they will try to save it.
They must try.
"This planet… greatly resembles Earth," Sersi observes. "To an uncanny degree."
"The same type of G-type main sequence star, the same required distance from the planet to it to facilitate enough heat to sustain life… it is approximately equidistant to Earth no less. This must be some sort of coincidence," Phastos remarks in bafflement as he accesses and records the planet's physical characteristics, eyes flitting over the data in complete surprise as they more or less match that of Earth.
"Can we expect life there to be sentient? For all we know we might have as well landed in this planet's equivalent of a Triassic or Jurassic age," interjects Kingo.
"What kind of life even lives here? Is it like Earth or far more alien?" Makkari signs excitedly.
"I mean, does it count as breaking Arishem's judgement to land on a planet similar to the one we've been exiled from?" Druig jokes. "I mean, is he gonna show up out of nowhere and vaporize us if we do?" He earned another shoulder smack from Makkari for that.
"Everyone, one at a time!" Thena ends the conversation decisively. "Sersi, what do you suggest we do?"
Sersi looks at her friend. Leadership is hard, very much so. She had better take this one step at a time.
"First things first, we go down there and see it for ourselves." Sersi declares. "Phastos, prepare the Domo for atmospheric entry. Employ cloaking."
"Aye captain."
Now he's just doing this on purpose.
The starship known as the Domo hums as it enters the atmosphere of this new planet without much trouble. Still crowded at a windowpane; Makkari, Kingo and Druig look on with awe as clouds of various shapes and sizes pass them by in their descent, themselves no different than the clouds of Earth. Phastos, seated near the foot of the red statue, continues to work uninterrupted.
Thena simply leans on another windowpane with Sersi, who fidgets constantly. Thena puts a stop to it by taking one of the younger woman's hands in her own.
"Stop that, Sersi. I know it's nerve wracking, but you have to keep a game face," the accomplished warrior advises. "Once we've looked to Ajak, now we must look to you. Do not lose hope in our mission."
"I know… but it just reminds me of the time we landed on our Earth 7000 years ago… I had so much hope. About the mission, about the people we're about to protect… now, with all that we know, the enormity of it… disheartenment comes easy." Sersi admits.
"We are Eternals. Whatever hurdles we face, we can overcome as one." Thena puts her remaining hand on their already intertwined hands. "Or we can just wait until it solves itself. We have the time."
Sersi smiles at the jest. Among the female Eternals, other than Ajak, Thena was her only other source of maternal influence. Makkari was like a little sister to her, and more often than not, she is absorbed in the moment, and in Druig.
The Domo finally reached an acceptable height, approximately 500m above ground level. The gathered Eternals gasp in wonderment. Thena and Sersi, now joining their friends, could not help but agree with the sentiment.
It was what one could call the countryside: lush golden fields of barley and wheat spread across the horizon, separated by white dirt country lanes. Not too far away, small cottages with thatched roofs lay huddled nearby, their chimneys gently puffing out columns of smoke. On fields yet to be tilled, figures with wide brim hats hack away at the earth with their tools, tearing up the dirt for the next harvest.
Figures, upon inspection, who are undisputedly human.
This of course caused great excitement in Kingo, Makkari and Druig; who tittered happily about the possibilities.
"That's a village…" Kingo states the obvious.
" Full of humans! Humans like the ones back home! I'm sure of it! " Makkari signs, her arms moving way too quickly in excitement.
"Best go down there and check out the place," Druig intones boredly. Deep down, he is secretly ecstatic.
It was Thena who put a decisive end to their antics.
"No, no. Only the Eternal Prime gets to decide if we get down there or not. Right, Sersi?"
The returning "Yeah!" from afar resulted in a lot of sulking.
Phastos, having long joined his friends, records everything diligently in a cosmic energy created tablet. Fingers moving across the virtual keyboard in quick succession, much of what he sees is recorded down in notes while visual sensors record images, invaluable for further analysis.
"Now that we know this is a human civilization," Sersi remarks. "Phastos, have you ascertained the probable time period this world might be in, compared to Earth?"
Phastos looks up from his tech. "Well as far as I can see, the scene beneath us might have as well been any European countryside from the Middle Ages all the way until the late 19th century. But…" He shows Sersi a still image, recorded by one of the hullside visual sensors. "This tractor changes things. The composition of the smoke shows it is run on diesel fuel, eliminating the steam engine and subsequently the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and putting the time period close to the late 19th, early 20th century with the invention and popularization of the diesel fuel engine. But it seems to me that the tractor is rather old, which means that it may be a case of an old relic still operable in a world 20, even 30 years after it is made, which throws off estimations of the time period completely."
"So, not enough information," Sersi states.
"No, not nearly enough." Phastos is usually blunt on matters of knowledge. "We need a city. It has the cultural, architectural and technological information we need to determine the time period. And that is assuming if this world had the same path of advancement in all three fields as Earth."
Sersi frowns. The new questions the new world poses are not easily answered. However, the next step was more than clear.
"Phastos, set a course for the nearest city. Make sure it has a population of 1,000,000 or above."
"On it."
For some reason, Sersi feels as if she's not going to like what she is going to discover.
The city's name, according to Phastos' newly invented universal translator, was Liberio.
It was nothing less than magnificent. Around the bend of a great river, many houses stand crowded against one another, neatly arranged among cobblestone streets. Taller buildings (of the administrative type, Sersi assumes) sit proudly in a noticeably affluent part of the city, with what seemed to be military bases situated not too far away. From afar, Sersi could see factories from a bustling industrial district, their smokestacks rising high in the distance. The harbour, as she observes, is abuzz with ironclad ships docked and awaiting fuel and/or cargo for the next part of their journeys. The same can be said of their trains, coming in and out of the large station with frequent succession. One thing that catched Sersi's eye however was a walled off section of the city, complete with a heavy military presence at its gate, even nearing that of the bases.
Why is this part of the city walled off like that?
After rigorous debate, the Eternals opted not to personally touch ground and investigate themselves due to the absence of Sprite and her illusions. Instead, Phastos sent drones equipped with visual and audio recording holosensors, capable of cloaking themselves, into the city, giving the Eternals a glimpse into the lives and culture of those living within.
Releasing another such drone into the air, Phastos returns to his large workstation, formed out of his powers. Golden circular holoscreens and interfaces of various shapes and sizes, directly connected to the drones, show the vibrant lives of Liberio citizens, moving along with the commotion of their daily routines. Phastos analyzes the gathered information, growing more and more surprised with every recording he listens to, every image captured and every recording watched. Next to him, Sersi watches intently, trying to catch on with the data herself.
Perhaps humans everywhere are just the same. She turns to Phastos.
"So, Phastos, what have you learned that you could share with us?"
The genius pulls off his spectacles and cleans them, obviously worse for wear mentally.
"Sersi… there are so many similarities between this civilization and Earth I don't even know where to start."
"Just at least start somewhere, Phastos."
Phastos clears his throat as he begins to speak.
"Well to begin with, they speak English."
The proclamation brought commotion to the remaining Eternals.
"Wait, they do?!" exclaims Kingo.
"Good. Now I don't have to read their mind just to get past the language barrier." Druig immediately rubs his shoulder afterwards, courtesy of another smack from his beau.
"Let's hope they have sign language." The last thing Makkari wants in this new world is ableism.i
"I don't mean a dialect, a creole or a pidgin, I mean somewhere near 99.1% correlation… the sentence structures, the various tenses… they're all there. Think the only difference here is the completely different writing system and the fact it's not called… well… English."
Sersi hums. "Okay, that's… good to know. Anything else?"
"As for the culture, it's a complete hodgepodge of various European cultures, chiefly French, German and Italian," the scientist continues. "The architectural designs are a rudimentary form of Second Empire influences… As for the time period, I checked the nearby docks and the military bases. Armored vehicles with mounted guns, armored cruisers and dreadnoughts, machine guns and submachine guns… I spotted a couple of zeppelins in the distance too. That makes the time period… I'm thinking late 1910s, early 1920s. I highly doubt they use the same calendar though."
The multitude of discoveries immediately put the Eternals into deep discussion, Makkari, Druig and Kingo chief among them.
"I thought it resembled Weimar Republic-era Germany quite a bit. I used to live there for a while during the 1920s. Nice place." Thena reveals.
"Are the rumors true? You had a fling with Marlene Dietrich?" Kingo asks her excitedly.
She merely smiles, sending Kingo into fanboying mode. On the other hand, Makkari and Druig continue their conversation hushedly.
"I keep up with the news while in the jungle, 'Kari. It's too much of a coincidence," spoke the mind master. "All the weapons and technology Phastos showed us… the time period kinda fits too. This place is on the cusp of war."
"You must not lose hope," Makkari signs, obviously distressed. "We are here to save them."
"Yeah, but not from themselves," Druig states, ending the conversation. Makkari tries to comfort him with a hug.
Sersi did not join the chatter. Her eyes are trained at the walled off section of the city, obviously disturbed by the implications.
It reminded her too much of a time when she wished she had interfered when she had the chance.
"Phastos, why is that section of the city completely walled off?"
"I have no idea," Phastos replies. "But I really hope it's not what I think it is. But the fact that here it is called an 'internment zone' doesn't exactly help." His worry was equally written on his face.
"I'd like to see what's inside of it. Send one of the drones in."
"Sersi…"
"Do it." The rough tone her voice took on surprised even her.
"Okay."
Sersi turns to Thena, having joined the scientist and her leader. "Call everyone in. They need to see this."
The warrioress quickly beckoned the rest of her friends to join in, as one of the drones quickly moved itself over the wall, taking in the scenery.
It was utter squalor.
Compared to the rest of the city, the citizens of the 'internment zone' live in abject poverty. The terraced housing, already made from cheap materials, is layered in soot and grime, lined up along poorly refurbished roads in high need of repair. Not a single car was seen inside of the internment zone. The entire area looked not out of place in an England factory town at the height of the Industrial Revolution. The guards at the entrance and on the walls look poised for a reason, any reason at all to commit deadly force on the citizens they are ordered to guard.
"Phastos, zoom in on the residents," Sersi commands, her voice stiff.
The drone complies with Sersi's wishes and Phastos' controls. The Eternals can only stare at the enlarged image in stupor.
Every resident of the internment zone was wearing armbands, each emblazoned with a 9-pointed star.
The implication was clear.
It can't be true… it just can't… not again…
The Eternals say nothing. They (barring Druig, who just looks disgusted) only think back to the time Ajak had to yell them down - yes, yell them down - the last time this happened.
Back when they tried to directly intervene, Sersi chief among them.
"This is no ordinary slum," Phastos breaks the silence. "You all know what this is right?"
"A ghetto," Druig grimly confirms. "If history ever teaches us anything, the gas chambers are not too far away."
"It can't be…" Makkari signs, her every formed word cloaked in distress. Druig pulls her close into his arms.
Kingo, despite feeling the weight of the truth, has a funny joke coming but opts to not say.
Thena tries to say something but could not. She turns only to see her leader gone, already halfway down the hall.
"Sersi! SERSI!"
"SERSI! Don't do this!"
Ignoring her sister in all but blood, Sersi strides down the halls of the Domo in guilt-stricken anguish, tears streaming down her face. Never again. Never again.
It was 1939. All of them, barring dutiful Ikaris, already opting out of the issue entirely and Druig, still remaining in South America, the Eternals gathered at Ajak's home in suburban New York to discuss the coming war. Appeasement was obviously not working and the beginning of the next Great War was just a matter of when. The Eternals feared the loss of life would be as severe, if not worse than the last one. Ajak reminded them sternly of the stricture of non interference. Sersi did not stand down. Harsh words are exchanged. Finally, Ajak had yelled at her and the remaining Eternals to stand down, lest she would command Ikaris to ship them to the South Pole and strand them there, before sending them packing from her home.
Sersi was not present when the Eternals met again 6 years later at V-Day. She was watching the newsreels of liberated concentration camps while crying her eyes out at the sight of burnt, desiccated corpses of human beings ordered to work and die because other humans consider them inhuman vermin.
"Sersi, STOP!"
A pair of strong arms spun her around and slammed her against the nearest wall.
"Stop this. I know you want to put a stop to this. But we just landed here naught but hours ago. We have absolutely no idea what led to this."
The other Eternals, having been hot on Thena's heels, appeared not long after.
"Thena, you saw it… the armbands, the walls… it's too much the same…" Sersi chokes out. Thena immediately sits her down and holds her close, allowing her to weep into her shoulder. The remaining Eternals have gathered next to their fallen leader, trying to soothe her pain.
"We can't act rashly now. When and only when we know the whole context of this, it will be your call, Sersi, I promise you."
Sersi rubs her red eyes. There is only one place left to go.
"Phastos, can the Domo track Prime Eternals through their communication spheres?"
The question came out of nowhere, catching Phastos off guard. She managed to come up with that while emotionally unstable. Amazing. "I think so, yes."
"Have the Domo track for the communication sphere signal. Once the location is established, set a course towards it immediately." Sersi commands, still recovering from her breakdown. "We need answers now."
The starship's trackers found the Eternal Prime's comm-sphere signal emanating from a small seaside town called Eberne, located just 100 miles south of Liberio along the coastline (as Phastos discovered, this world still uses common units of measurement, including for distance).
Looming above the town on the Domo , the gathered Eternals watched as it was nearing dusk. The villagers are on their way home after a long day's work. The lights of their homes are slowly becoming more visible from above as the sun gives up its position. Out in the wharf, fishing ships comfortably dock themselves along the shore, bobbing to the rhythm of the waves. All was calm.
The same cannot be said of Sersi. After what she saw, she is nowhere near done.
"Sersi, calm down." Thena's warm matronly voice cut through her leader's frayed nerves. Putting a hand on Sersi's arm, her eyes widening at how hard Sersi was clenching her own hands. "Dear god, you are so tense. This is definitely not helping you. We are going to meet a Prime Eternal, much like yourself, and if you're going to convince him of a world-ending catastrophe, you need to keep a level head. That's all I ask."
Under Thena's caring touch, Sersi feels her hand slowly unclench. The foul taste of what she witnessed still remains in the dredges of her mind.
"It's terrible sometimes Thena, the truths we learn," Sersi admits. "But I need to know. I have a feeling what we saw back there, only the Prime Eternal could give us answers."
"But the conflicts between mankind are their own," Thena presses on. "The law of non-interference remains. How could he possibly have known?"
"I don't know Thena," Sersi replies. "I just have a feeling he does."
The Domo soon approached an area of hilly terrain lined sparsely with trees. On it they could see a modest cottage, chimney puffing, sitting next to farmland enclosed with fences.
This must be where he lives.
"Land the Domo, Phastos. We'll go uphill by foot."
Disembarking their cloaked starship one by one, Sersi and her Eternals walk until they are at the bottom of the hill leading up to the house. The sea wind whistles softly between the smell of salt and blades of grass.
"Now what do we do?" Kingo tries to jest. "Do we yell really loudly or knock really loudly?"
"Stop goofing around," Makkari signs. "He might just…"
The creaking of a door catches all of their attention at once. Heavy footsteps thunder their way through the oak wood porch, down the steps and onto the grass. The owner of the farmstead, standing in the grassy slopes of the hills, pulls on the straps of his dark suspenders. His wild red mane flows in the direction of the wind along with his mighty beard, stopped only by his wide brimmed straw hat. His beady eyes scan the scene before him, the rare sight of visitors causing a raise of the eyebrow.
"Now," the old man speaks for the first time. "What do we have here?"
AN: Comments, follows and favorites please. Also, having the Eternals experience culture shock because they are VERY familiar with many aspects of the AoT world as opposed to UNfamiliar is mainly my friend's idea. Give credit to Chris, everyone. Kingo was meant to make an "I did not Nazi that coming" joke but I cut that out. Too quippy.
Fic is also crossposted to Ao3 under the same title and author name. Be sure to check that out please. Thanks!
