Krystal's trek back through the jungle this time was uneventful. Electing not to get involved in any more conflicts for the morning, she took a route less densely populated by dangerous bioforms. As she exited the coastal rainforest, the trees gave way to dark green grassy plains sloped in a wide valley cut by winding rivers. A small region of developed land composed of shiny crystalline and marble looking structures was visible directly in the middle of the landscape. The white buildings in this developed region glittered golden over a prismatic sheen in the growing light. The fact of this lonely patch of developed land's existence in the middle of a natural landscape was a reminder of the Cerinian people's commitment to the preservation and respect towards nature, while the quality of the architecture was a feat of great artistry and scientific ingenuity.
Isolated tips like this were like icebergs in that only the tip was visible, and the majority of the buildings extended underneath the visible region.
Time to find out who won the race. She thought, staring at the miniature city.
It was a long run to the center. The struggle in her mind between the repetitiveness of putting one foot in front of the other, the strain of pushing herself to do so as quickly as possible, and the beautiful scenery that changed ever so gradually as she ran down the slope both created a challenge to remain focused, pushed the physical limits of her body, and reminded her to clear her mind of distractions and appreciate the simple joys in life. It was easier to do so with a quiet and serene environment and a cool wind in her face.
On her way down the slope, the flicker of some smoldering flames caught her eye. Changing course towards them brought her to a small campsite with two children apparently rehearsing a dramatic scene.
"It came to me in a dream! The pool of golden scales and shining water spoke from within a cavern of coral!" A young wolf boy spoke.
A panther girl replied to him "Hmm. I see your conviction is strong, young wandering one. But the voice of the ocean goddess speaks to us in many forms. Even with my mastery of the mystic arts, I've learned through my years that one can never be sure of–"
She stopped suddenly as she noticed the wolf glancing away from her in Krystal's direction. She then spotted her listening in from a short distance away.
"Krystal, you weren't supposed to hear that! We're working on our new dialogue!"
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have listened. It sounds better than before though. I was getting invested for those seconds. I recognize distinct traits of your writing, Haka," she said, glancing at the wolf. "It's improved a hundredfold since your last script."
Haka smirked.
"I've been practicing, but the play isn't ready yet. It should be soon, though. We hope you'll come see it."
"I would love to!" Krystal replied. "Harimau, have you come up with any new tricks or special effects for this one?"
"I can't tell you anything yet." The panther girl replied. "I think you'll like what you see though. Do you think you'll have time to watch before you set off on your pilgrimage rite?"
"I hope so. The end of my guardian angel training path is close."
The two looked at each other somberly, then back to her.
"I'm going to miss you when you're gone." Haka said.
"Keep honing your connections to the divine fabric of the All. Once you've achieved synchronization, you'll always have me there." Krystal replied- "If anything, I'm the one who has a reason to feel sad about this. I won't get to see your plays for a long while. That's one of the things I'm going to miss the most when I set out. Speaking of which, this is an odd place to practice a play. Why did you come all the way out here?"
The wolf boy replied: "It's hard for me to think amidst the distractions of the developed parts of the world, as well as find some quiet and peace."
"And I'll be honest-" Harimau added. "We knew we'd intercept your daily route. We wanted to show off our work for you since you're leaving soon, and we're really going to miss you."
Krystal felt touched by their sentiment. Holding her hands over her heart and smiling, she walked over to them.
"Will your next play be ready before I go? I would really love to see one more."
"We've been working on this current one for a while. It's not finished yet, but we're scrambling to get it finished soon so you can come see it."
"I'm excited. Keep up what you were doing, the scene I saw impressed me."
"Don't tell anyone the details yet. We have a rival troupe trying to steal our ideas!"
Krystal winked at them in confidence.
"Your secret is safe. I need to go, but before I do, can I convince you to show me a preview of some of your special effects?"
Harimau looked hesitant, but quickly decided to accommodate her request. After a brief whispered exchange, the two took positions opposite each other and began circling one another in a slow dance. With a wave of their hands and a twirl, the two were surrounded by a thin skirt of fog, which after turning to face one another with their hands outstretched, exploded in a flash of sparks.
Krystal's eyes went wide, and she excitedly clapped her hands.
"Fantastic! It's incredible you can perform tricks like that so smoothly and impromptu. It was so smooth, I couldn't tell how you did it in the slightest!"
The two bowed with a flourish.
"It all comes with good preparation, planning, and practice–" Harimau replied. "Admittedly it isn't finished yet. Right now it's just an experiment. I feel like it's lacking something."
"What if you made something appear out of the sparks?"
Harimau thought for a second.
"That might work. Actually, you've given me an idea! Haka, we need to get to work." Harimau said.
"I'll leave you to it then." Krystal replied.
"See you at the show!" Haka said as they all waved goodbye.
The rest of Krystal's trek was brief by comparison. Nothing but peaceful atmosphere in the morning run and familiar sites as she passed the city in the middle of the valley.
For someone in Krystal's line of training, being at the end of her path was considered among her people to be a badge of honor for Cerinia. Fully fledged guardian angels were among the most talented and dedicated scholars and warriors on the planet, trained by masters of philosophy, science, medicine, literature, spirituality, ki, military tactics, and martial arts. Many young children on the planet often dreamt of becoming one, but the grueling training and rigorously high standards of perfection in their craft meant that only a handful in a generation could make it all the way to the end. The rest who came close to completing their training but didn't make the cut often went on to become influential thinkers or leaders, or sometimes assisted guardian angels on their rite of passage through the cosmos. The rest simply lived an average life with varying degrees of achievement. Some were content to live a simple life detached from high aspirations altogether, often seeking inner peace through simplicity and smaller scale challenges.
Krystal herself aspired to make her planet proud by spreading its light and love to the universe. She had heard critical remarks from inhabitants on other planets that such a task was ambiguous and pretentious, even prideful in assuming other planets want influence from Cerinian pilgrims there, but she had never fully understood their criticism. Perhaps it was that they didn't understand that the task was never supposed to be specific, as it was believed that doing so took many forms, and required flexibility. Sometimes through love, sometimes through violence when malevolent forces were involved, and even an entire spectrum of different efforts outside of those had their time and place. She wouldn't know hers until well into her departure towards the cosmos.
Krystal refocused her thoughts as the patch of city in the distance grew nearer and nearer, and so, the glimmering lights of thousands of minds did too. This sparkling patch of civilization was like the tip of an iceberg buried in land. A visible tip with a great cavern filled with civilization and architectural marvels buried deep underground. Laws and collective efforts had been enacted to preserve as much of the planet's natural beauty as possible, and in this case that meant keeping a large majority of the surface clear of permanent buildings. The result was this one central hub that served as a gateway between those living below the surface and the world exposed to the sky. In the darkest hours of the morning, there weren't many out and about, but in the golden light of the brightening sky, the streets were beginning to crowd with people, androids, and various swarms of both floating and land-based drones emerging from their respective residences.
"I wonder if Harimau and Okmhaka will perform here?" Krystal thought out loud.
As she continued on her way through the city, she found a pair of familiar green and yellow people, and froze in surprise and stifled a laugh at the sight of something she wasn't prepared for. Kadjre was pinching and stretching Ryla's deceptively malleable and stretchy cheeks chuckling like a madman.
"There she is!" Ryla said, turning to face her. The two trotted up to her side by side, Ryla already having dried off from her swim.
Krystal glanced at Ryla.
"That looked fun. Can I try it?"
Ryla rolled her eyes and sighed, submitting for Krystal's entertainment. Krystal gently placed her hands around Ryla's neck, pausing for a second before suddenly jerking her hands up, changing Ryla's normally dynamic and lean face into a squishy ball of fur. Kadjre burst out laughing at the sight. A handful of onlookers viewed the spectacle with either stifled laughter, or disturbed expressions.
Krystal immediately retreated upon realization of the scene they were making.
"We should get going to the Dawnlight Falls" Krystal suggested, trying to segue the awkward moment.
The Shiba Inu nodded in agreement.
The walk through the city external hub was short and tranquil. As the morning light illuminated the architecture with a golden glow, fountain streams and garden paths surrounded the walkways, and upon entering the central gathering plaza, a familiar massive corpse was seen near the middle. Now surrounded with flowing clouds of chilly steam from the cool air it was giving off, the genemod the three had killed earlier was in cold storage, being constantly bombarded by energy beams from three cooling units surrounding it. It was being closely inspected by two distinct groups of individuals, both in gloves and sleek white coats. One consisting of a couple of prospective chefs hoping to prepare it for the local populous, but also by a handful of forensic scientists and doctors conducting an autopsy, assisted closely by white robots scanning and analyzing it.
"Interesting." Krystal said. "Usually it doesn't take this long to check it for hazardous chemicals. Do you think there's something else wrong with it?"
Ryla cocked her head, narrowing her eyes at their inspection.
"What would be wrong with it? Do you think there are excessive toxins in it's meat?"
Kadrjei began to probe the spectacle with his mind.
"There's something unnatural about the genemod. Well, aside from the obvious."
Some of the forensic analysts picked up on their presence and glanced back at the three.
"Were you the ones who hunted this?" One asked.
"Yeah, it was a nasty one. Check out this wound on Krystal's arm!" Kadjrei replied, pointing to the artificial body tissue that sealed her wound.
"You three are nuts" Another one chided. "Why do you risk your lives to hunt these using melee weapons again?"
"Don't change the subject! What's wrong with the one we killed?" Kadjrei asked.
The forensic scientist looked perplexed as to why he was accused of changing the subject.
"You didn't answer the first question he asked." Krystal chipped in.
"Quiet your mind and listen, you might notice things like that more often." Ryla added.
The doctor looked annoyed for a second before shrugging their comments off.
"Its morphology is a little different from some of the previous ones we've seen. We're taking scans and samples, and we'll fill you in on some of the details later. For now, it should be safe to eat, but in short, we're a little worried about how fast they're evolving."
The three exchanged glances with each other. It was strange that this would be a cause for concern given how much control Cerinia had at it's disposal concerning threat defenses and the ecosystem. Could something be going haywire with local environmental controls? Unlikely without someone who knew how to fix it becoming aware before it spun out of control.
Krystal felt worried about the implications of having a possible outbreak of genemods evolving and spawning at a breakneck speed, but as Ryla's master Zahyres would sometimes say: "It's pointless to feel fear towards things you can't control."
Kadjrei put his hands on their shoulders, and gestured his head to their path forward in a prompt for them to move on. He was right, they would have to just figure out what to do about this possible troubling news later.
The space inside the city center was mostly indistinguishable from its natural surroundings. One wouldn't notice from a shallow angle and long distance away, but the center inside all of the buildings contained a steep underground complex that led to the true center of the city. It took the form of a massive spiraling angular ramp like a giant bismuth crystal that blended seamlessly with both nature and the architecture on the surface. These tunnels led to the main portion of the city. They were carved of stone, plated sporadically and artistically with various multicolored metals, covered with vines, and decorated with glyphs that in the Cerinian written language spelled multiple different poems and philosophical quotes. The inscriptions seen depended on which of the numerous pathways any given person chose. The metallic surface was a smart material with sensors and variable surface topography that allowed it to change its colors, designs, and inscriptions daily, and interact with people's touch and emotional reactions. Today, the three were entreated to a poem that read:
Purpose etched in thought and sound
On journey deep beneath the ground
As rumbling ruminations wist
'tween step and breath of silver mist
To and fro this path you trod
To peek beyond the pale façade
For prized agape and insight,
Or else to tread in lifeless blight?
Be not afraid the void that calls
Of comfort's grasp nor man's pitfalls
Where darkness spreads, hark coming dawn
And from despair clutch hope that spawns
A golden glow upon the lands
Rewards new mindful machined hands
They draw the veil from
working parts
And breathe new life with beating hearts.
Krystal smiled at the writing and shivered from the chilly atmosphere.
"This seems like something Haka might have written."
The three proceeded down through the tunnel, and traversed through a network of underground caverns. The world below the ground looked alien. Massive caverns with walls lined with a plethora of crystalline materials and multicolored metals stretched several miles in all directions, and most of the buildings and architecture were partially transparent and phosphorescent, their walls and structures resembling blood vessels, roots, and shimmering crystals in fractal patterns, often draped and interspaced with exotic plants of all types and sheets of flowing water that poured down in expansive waterfall networks from the surface. The tunnel ceilings were transparent, or at least it appeared so since it projected images of the sky above them using the same frequencies as natural light. It was designed such that it appeared to shine through and illuminate the city. Digital displays on the buildings' clear surfaces were flashing with lights like visual representations of nerve pulses alongside computer displays and readouts. Machines of all materials and functions could be seen speeding through and working in enclosed corridors, exiting every so often to these kinds of areas. They came in all manner of different forms and materials, such as gelatinous floating orbs, shapes covered in white plasma, and aerodynamic crystalline robotic drones. In the designated enclosed tunnels, they could be seen through the transparent sections zipping by at hypersonic speeds. Clear warning signs cautioned against entering whilst the robotic tunnels were active. Some buildings and structures were made to look like giant twisting crystalline trees with branches leading into housing that looked like giant fruits made from frosted and colored glass based on their shape and placement. At this hour, people could be seen emerging from their homes. Anthros of all species wearing clothes that could have been from dozens of different cultures were proceeding down passageways through the colossal branches and trunks. It was common knowledge that they were made of a highly versatile and modular semi-organic material that could be manipulated to grow and change its shape, strength, thickness, color, thermal properties, luminance, electrical conductivity, and transparency. It was the quasi-living popular building material commercially referred to as bioglass.
Large swaths of people coming out of the giant fruit-like living spaces were socializing or greeting one another, some of them making their ways towards either an assortment of different transportation vessels, or towards openings in the surface. A few individuals among the crowds walking towards the three nodded or waved, familiar faces among them. The brainwaves of the crowds talked like flocks of songbirds. Some individuals were in a meditative trance, and a few among those projected soothing sounds of mantras and musical chanting. There were stark concentrations of thought patterns and brainwaves like these clustered in nodes in various city centers.
Here below the ground, artificial life ran the majority of operations and maintenance, while a few natural organics, androids, cyborgs, and many others of varying machine, genetic modification, and natural composition directed and organized the major changes and decisions.
The three boarded a public hanging monorail line with clear inner walls, which allowed them to see the city as they rode. The views alternated between cybernetic and visually stimulating from intensely digital looking lighting networks, to rustic and elegant, filled with lush trees, stone sculptures, and exotic flowers, where people could seek peace to meditate or exercise. Active construction zones were concealed behind barriers that looked like giant bubbles, and metropolitan zones were sleek and complex. Rays of light shone from the ceiling periodically in places that led to the surface to allow natural light and provide escape routes.
Krystal looked around with curiosity and wonder.
Interesting.
She recollected in her mind the condition of Cerinia's civilization ten years prior.
It's incredible how far we've come in a mere ten years. Perhaps this explains why so many are content to live down here now, but I still prefer my home. Still, could there be a price for progress of this speed? I find changes like this rarely come without a price to pay.
I don't know. Another voice chipped in. Often times progress comes at a price because people get careless, greedy, or impatient.
Krystal looked behind her to see Ryla staring at her with a thoughtful smile.
You forgot jealous. There's a price for all this, but probably smaller than in days of old.
"Personally I just think it looks cool. Still, it's no substitute for being outside."
Kadjrei finally added.
Must there be a tradeoff? Krystal replied.
One of the things that scares me about the task we're being set with is how we would face an impossible situation. Not everyone is willing to change, even when it's in their best interests.
Ryla looked somber as she thought about it.
I'm not sure what we'll do either.
Kadjrei draped his arm over their shoulders to get their attention.
"I'm not too worried. If anyone can figure out how to reach others, who better than our Deep Blue?"
Krystal felt her confidence rising at his remarks. She supposed as long as her friends were there, she could find way to overcome any challenge.
