Happy October! Surprised to see me? I am back, I am not dead, and neither is this fic. The last chapter of this story was published in…July 2021, 3 years of nothing, until today. I didn't want to abandon this story, so for the past several weeks I downloaded all the chapters of this story and another I have and reviewed them, did some changes, not overall story changing, mostly scenes progressions and grammar. So now, every single chapter before this one (1-16) has received some form of rewriting.
Also, please let me know if ya'll received notifications of me updating the previous chapters? Cause I think it did?
Also! I have an AO3 (Archive of Our Own) account. If that website is your preferred fanfic site to read or anything, you can read this story or the other one there too by the same name, and I have the same username there too so it's rather easy to find.
So yeah, this story is back and I want to continue it until I deem it complete, however long that takes. I don't have schedule as to when I update, I simply post a new chapter whenever I feel I'm ready. Hopefully y'all didn't miss this story too much, but if ya did, well, welcome back and enjoy!
Pulse was extensively writing on her computer animatedly. The experience with the small blue crustacean and the biological analysis she obtained from it were quite fruitful.
The data provided helped her get a closer understanding about the planet's biodiversity alongside the yellow petaled creature along with comparing the strange blood from the stumbling creature from before.
The petaled entity and the blue sea creature are most definitely part of the plant kingdom based on the cell's shapes, similar to her own kind and the others as well, but the DNA makeup of her and their biology are significantly different. These plant creatures all have quite the variety, which reminded her of her own planet.
The other DNA sequence from the stumbling biped is closer to the category of the animal kingdom of her world with its rounded cells compared to the more structurally defined ones of the other two samples. Pulse still had a hard time wrapping her head around the properties of these cells, for they looked to be alive, but shouldn't even be alive with the amount of missing important parts.
She felt it's best to keep these samples frozen and intact in order to get them to her home world and give them to biological experts to play around with and see what they say about it. Pulse knows quite a lot, but she is not an all knowing expert.
It was in the middle of her data sorting when she received a message on the corner of her computer screen. This one, thankfully, was in her language.
Pulse turned and squinted to read what it said, but her eyes widened. The message was from her agency, wanting to speak to her via video.
Pulse opened the application and messaged them in the chat that she will be ready in just a moment, hopefully whomever she will speak to isn't the impatient type. Pulse quickly organized her data to the best of her ability in such short order so she can send it to them. She knows the person who she will speak with is likely going to ask for information on where she is and she has gathered. Once they know what she found, a planet with what she most certainly knew had possible spacefaring, or near spacefaring civilization…
Pulse then quickly checked if there wasn't anything on her face and if her spines looked right. It's best to make herself look nice and presentable.
Once Pulse made sure everything was fine, she soon gave a message to the person, and her computer quickly opened to a video call once she sat on her chair. The screen opened to someone, who wasn't one of her own kind, instead, it was a being who her species and several others lived with in the same homeworld. The person on the other side smiled as he greeted the alien citron with a nod. Behind him she could see his coworkers walking around in the background, a few seemed to look at his screen towards her, before moving on to their jobs.
"Hello Pulsaria, I and the rest of us hope you have been doing great so far." The figure had a slight buzz in his voice, but that was because he was what were generally called a Beetle Cactus.
The shape of his body was identical to those instances of beings she referred to as the native cacti that she spotted on the landmass, however his body was covered in a thick black carapace with orange and yellow splotches and some stripes. His arms, which were politely crossed over his keyboard, ended with a long claw with ridges of sharp protrusion along the underside. His eyes were a red orange with yellow sclera, and if she looked close enough Pulse would be able to see the hexagonal pattern of his eyes. Since he was also male, the horn in the middle of his head was elongated and slightly curved back, the said horn ending in the shape of a two-pronged fork. The females of his kind only have a small curved spike instead. His mandibles curved around his snout, which curved even further in his polite smile.
Pulse smiled back at him with a nod–she was especially happy that this person, Luciervus, was nice and polite, unlike some others she had the unfortunate chance to have to converse with. "It is great to speak with you, Luciervus. Before this meeting, I managed to gather data on this planet I have found, both within the confines of my ship and on my own with protective wear. While the files aren't completely finished or organized, I can still send you everything that I have gathered for you to review and pass to everyone else. This planet is full of many things. Also, while I know you will read about it once I send this, I want to tell you now that this planet has intelligent life."
Pulse wanted to keep as much of an open mind as possible when it comes to what is considered creations of intelligent life or not. Many of the things she has found certainly imply this is a species with an advanced civilization. The bipeds certainly fall to the advanced race list. She isn't entirely sure about the other beings, the many green and colorful ones, but she wants to find out more about them, but she knows they are also among the list of intelligent life.
Luciervus's eyes widened a bit when she finished. Pulse could tell he had so many questions. "I see, please send over what you have gathered so that we can know what you know."
Pulse agreed and quickly sent everything she had gathered. The citron had several gigabytes worth of information in her files, all of it consisted of descriptive paragraphs, photos, videos, and her input in the samples she has managed to gather and store. Everything was organized in neatly titled folders and sub folders.
Luciervus analyzed everything from a second monitor Pulse couldn't see, but she could see his face change with a variety of emotions from awe, confusion, enthusiasm and concern. He soon types on the other monitor, what it may have been Pulse didn't know, but she was sure he would send what she gathered to the rest of the agency.
Everything she has gone and seen so far she gave it to him, as she doesnt see a reason to lie to him, and doesn't really want to. Her arrival after detecting possible life, arrival to the system, landing on the planet, going outside and many of the things she found and met. The natives on land, the submarine, and the encounter with the small blue crustacean. Everything she essentially did, he quickly read and watched through the documents.
The beetle cactus turned back to her once he finished. "You have provided quite a bit of evidence regarding the possibility of intelligent life on this planet, however we would like to have more, and focus your observations specifically towards the creatures that can be categorized as being sapient from now on. It appears that here, are several intelligent beings, pretty similar to the various peoples of our world of Marinyis"
Pulse nodded, "Yes indeed. Several different intelligent species evolving on the same planet, something that is rarely possible, and we believed our planet was the only one with this phenomenon, until now."
"Correct. However, there is something that worries me that I want to clarify." Luciervus stated, which Pulse motioned for him to go on.
"First, there have been several cases of conflict, primarily between these gray bipeds, and the various green creatures you encountered in these video files. There is also the case with the foreign ocean vessel and the creatures that the gray bipeds had in their possession, as in captured. Them capturing those creatures, or possibly, people if they too are sapient, means they are part of some sort of group, whether its a faction, a corporation, or perhaps they might be pirates. They could be any number of things. Your presence in releasing those creatures is... debatable. While the possibility of crimes that these people may have committed, could be piracy, poaching and the possible animal abuse these people did, it was not within your jurisdiction to do it yourself, especially since this may have revealed your existence to them. Even if they never saw you, they will know something or someone was responsible and try to find out."
Pulse indeed came to those conclusions, as uncomfortable as they may be. She was thinking in the heat of the moment, and hadn't thought about the potential consequences in the long run, even if her intentions were good. She was laser focused on what was happening around her and made whatever decision she thought was correct, while making sure they were still within her policies. If the ones from the submarines were the apex sapient race of this planet, then she hoped what she did didn't constitute future hostilities. It seemed the beetle cactus read her mind as well.
Luciervus continued. "If they are the dominant race on this planet and this group you encountered is part of a corporation, even a minor one, then future diplomacy may be soured since you took part in defiling their operation. Unless it turns out that they are hostile regardless of whatever anyone is, but we don't know. Something we will have to talk about more thoroughly in a bit because there are other things I want to address first."
Pulse stood still for a moment at these implications. This slowly made Pulse feel nervous at the possibilities. She is really becoming aware of the mistakes she had made when she was there, and it's very possible whatever mistakes she made will come back to bite her later. Since Pulse remained silent, he continued anyway.
"This also brings me to the other beings depicted in your files." He brought pictures into the chat to specific ones, such as a short green one with an O shaped long mouth, a red headed, tall one with four long legs, a cape, and floating off the ground, and several others.
There was a lot to think about in regards to them, since several of these beings resemble the different people of Marinyis, it's almost uncanny at the similarities. The orange rotund shaped ones resembled herself and her cousin's species in body shape to the point that it might as well have been traced.
"When others get here, they will be astounded at the comparisons to us and them. We are also not sure what the relationship between the flora people and the bipeds are with their hostilities and the reason why, but that may have to be studied, or later on, discussed with these very people eventually."
"Speaking of the two, there are also these." The insectoid cactus then sent Pulse several images from her files. They were photographs of various machines she found, there were oblong shaped mechanical machines and cross shaped fast flying vehicles. There were also machines on the ground, there were two with wheels, and ones that didn't have wheels, and would float instead. She also spotted two bipedal machines that looked like they were being piloted by something small on the inside. There were also the images of the submarines that she was dragged into with the trapped creatures.
"Do you notice something similar to all of them?" Luciervus asked. Pulse looked at the images closely, all she saw were vehicles and machines that really intrigued her, but couldn't discern anything. "Not...really… only that they would belong to the same faction based on their appearance."
"Yes, but that's not what I was thinking. All these machines look to be of military purpose. I can see various places where they have contraptions attached that are likely to be guns based on their shapes. This oblong floating vessel is heavily armored, and not just it, but also the two buildings you have photographed along with the submarine. Those bipeds were also carrying objects very similar to guns we use. They look very different, but making a long object with a hole at the end and a handle on the back is no coincidence, it is merely optimal construction for a claw held weapon. There are dozens of other things I could tell you that support my suggestions, but this is more than enough. In conclusion, I believe that you may have stumbled into some sort of military base."
Pulse stiffened. Why didn't she think that was a possibility? She may have been too busy to notice anything like that. She wasn't very observant. Now that Luciervus pointed it out, she suddenly feels she has been truly careless on her ventures. The green sunny building doesn't look like anything like a military base, the purple metallic one under the purple clouds definitely looks like it could be one, but who is she to determine what is considered one thing over another, especially since she is on an alien planet. Some things are universal and others aren't. "A military base... I can only hope they don't take my intrusion as some sort of act of war..."
"While that is something to be concerned about, there is another thing. This place has two large buildings, but they... completely contrast each other." He pointed to two buildings that towered over everything in the photograph. That picture was taken when she made landfall, and she had to agree that the two constructs aren't made by the same people, or company, or faction—whatever or whomever built them.
One was a lush green gated property, with a large brown tower inside. The other was composed of gray and purple metal, and in her opinion, it looked scary. If Pulse was to go into any of the two, she would prefer the sunny sided part of the area. That place genuinely looks more like a gated private garden for someone with someone who has money.
Pulse tilted her head. "I'm unsure why these buildings are completely different, but the best I can guess is perhaps two factions working together, and built these places close to each other as some form of collaboration. Otherwise, I can't think of another reason as to why they are there."
"That's a good theory, but we can't know until we get more data."
"There are also several things I wish to tell you. First, not too long ago, I received some sort of message. It wasn't in Marinyan, and from what I saw, it's not any language that I recognize. Also, the message has some coordinates and a location depicted on it." Pulse then sent him a copy of the message.
It seems to me that someone, or perhaps several, know I am here, and sent me a location to them, or somewhere to meet. I haven't gone there yet, and I do not want to. I do not know just how genuine this is, or why they want to try and meet me. I haven't deduced if this was some message I unknowingly intercepted, but I haven't received anything electronically from this planet directly except for this, so I believe this is specifically for me.
"However, I would like your input with this, since this could be a First Contact scenario. I am not entirely sure that I should be the one to do this." Pulse admitted
Luciurvus was in thought, before he gave her an question, "You didn't answer it or go to the location?"
Pulse shook her head. "No I didn't."
"Perhaps… that's good. While it's likely people, we don't know what their intentions are until we can decipher the message and their language. I can only hope that ignoring their message won't offend them too much until others come here, but that will have to be left for a future time. Right now this information you have provided will give us a base of operations we can work on. Anything that depicts a language during your trip, I want it sent to me." Luciervus declared, skimming through some of the files he has received.
"I will do so sir." Pulse nodded.
"Next thing, I would like to know from you, what do you gauge is the technological advancement of this planet and its people, based on all that you have seen so far?"
Pulse paused to think. When she arrived over the world, she saw a few pieces of material nearest to her orbiting the planet. She didn't get a scan of what those were, but likely some form of satellites. From that, she could tell they are advanced enough to have sent machines out of their planet.
"Either they are about to reach space flight, or they already did. I found objects over their planet, probably satellites. I didnt get details as to what they were. I haven't found anything yet that would be considered a spaceship. It's possible they haven't done anything like that yet or they already did and I haven't detected any. Which is concerning. Nothing stopped me when I was over their planet or when I entered their atmosphere."
Luciurvus gave her a look, but didnt say anything. He motioned for her to continue.
She saw plenty of lights, thus they had quite some expansive metropolises. While it would be interesting to go see what they would be like, It's better to go towards isolated places and avoid their attention.
"They have cities based on the amount of lights some of the areas had, so they are at least industrious. The area that I encountered looked more like a suburban area. There were buildings that looked like they had at least a floor level, or maybe two. The type of place a person or family could live in comfortably. It sort of reminds me of my neighborhood."
Pulse then thought of something, a curious thing that she noticed while she was over their world, their moon.
"There was also something else. When I was over their world, I saw their moon, which, strangely enough, its geological features bared the face of the bipeds. It was like someone carved a face on a piece of spherical rock. The… moon face covered the entire side of the surface, that's like… almost half the surface of the moon, but I think it takes up more space."
Luciervus looked incredulous, until Pulse showed him where a picture she took of the moon decided within the files she sent him. The bug man looked incredulous at the sight.
"This is… quite the geological transformation. It's one thing to carve a face on a mountain, it's another to carve a face on the surface of a planet-like object that's easily visible from space."
Pulse agreed. "I was just as confused about this as well. I personally don't understand the point of carving something this big, either this is the biggest art project they made in their civilization, or a way to show superiority to others or their advancements. I don't know if the face on the moon is a reference to an important figure in their world or if this is just the general face of their species, the bipeds I mean. It could be against the green people, since I have seen a group of those two fighting each other, rather violently, even fatally."
Luciervus then spoke."This also proves at the very least they are advanced enough to make something like this. It is not a coincidence that the face on the moon looks like the face of a species. Nature builds many things, but something like this is not one of them. It proves they are capable of space travel, thus a space faring species in their own way."
Pulse nodded. "Yeah, this brings me to ask, if there is anything you want me to do about them? Do you… want to try and talk to them? Send them a message? I know its too early for proper communications, and I am only here to gather information, but sending them some kind of message would let them know we are diplomatic if they know I am here."
The beetle cactus shook his head. "No, not yet at least. We need to have proper information, particularly in their language, to have conversations without inciting some misunderstanding. For now, don't go to places where civilization is likely, simply continue exploring the planet as you have been doing. While you are out there, gather any information about their language, or languages, so we can decipher them and start to build a translator."
Pulse nodded. She can do that. Simply gather data without interacting with anyone or anything.
"Now, I have an objective for you." Luciervus said, and Pulse looked at him in anticipation. "I would like for you to explore other areas away from your location. If that area with the two bases is a military installation, then it's better for you to not be present there anymore and avoid raising any suspicions or tension, especially since your presence was already noticed, and the last thing I want to happen is for you to be captured if you were to return and turns out they were expecting you."
"Now then,I have been looking at the map, and I suggest that you should explore this area of the world."
The insectoid man soon showed Pulse an image. The image was of the planet she took when she arrived, except that a section on the top was circled in red. It was an area coated in white, likely ice and snow, located close to the upper pole of the planet.
"I would like for you to explore this area, as these places are often vacant of living beings, but it will give us insight as to what the different environments of the planet are like. While you go there, I will discuss with the rest of my colleagues about what the next course of action should be regarding the race, or races of this planet."
Pulse analyzed the location, and soon agreed to the new objective. Pulse was curious what she may find there, but she was also giddy to go somewhere with ice and snow. Their home world was very tropical, and barely had any ice or cold weather.
It's been years since has gone to any place that is cold, and while her biology isn't fit for such cold temperatures she enjoys the ice and snow in the few places where she did inter each with such weather. Besides, her suit will protect her just fine as it did in her previous outing.
Before either could say or do something, Pulse's computer sent her an automated message. Pulse glanced to the side and pulled a side tab to see just what it was. Her ship's proximity alarm was telling her that several entities were close to her ship.
Pulse flinched. Just what was it? Was she found by the people on land?
Luciervus heard the sound. "What's going on?"
"The proximity alarm, several objects appear to be approaching me." Pulse quickly brought up the outside cameras to find what they were. Her nerves were somewhat calm, when she realized they weren't monsters nor battleships, but ocean critters that she had seen before. There were about two dozen of them total, and there were several species at that.
"What is it?" the beetle asked again. "Multiple ocean critters, several that I have documented." Pulse looked on at her screen. They were swimming together, and seemed to be passing by her ship, but couldn't discern why they were here. There was just open ocean everywhere, unless there is a coral reef under her, but Pulse checked a while ago and there is nothing.
Suddenly, the group made a turn. They were now heading straight for her ship. Pulse's eyes widened.
"The creatures just made a turn, and are heading towards my direction…"
"Is your ship cloaked?"
Pulse nodded at the inspection cactus. "It has been since before I landed on the planet. I have checked multiple times, the cloak is still active even now."
"It could just be coincidence that they are going towards your direction, is there anything of interest that they could be heading to on the other side of your ship?"
Pulse shook her head. "As far as I know, no. If there is, then I haven't found out what there is."
Pulse magnified the camera lens to get a closer look. There was a variety of creatures she saw at that reef of various shapes and sizes. A few of them weren't even ones she recognized. However, upon closer inspection, she saw that every single one of them had some form of injury or something stuck to them on their body.
She saw a few seemed to have objects pierced into their skin rather painfully, such as sharp looking objects protruding outwards from limbs, tails, or from the center of their bodies. Others had strings or ropes stuck to them, making it hard to swim. The rest had injuries, some more painful than the last. Indications of burns, slashes, bite marks, and even missing limbs were visible.
"Every single one of them is injured."
"Injured?" Luciervus asked.
"Injuries, stuck objects, missing limbs, all of that." Pulse said, her camera switching between each of the individuals.
"Hmm, there is no indication of some underwater civilization is there? They would have to travel from the sea towards the land for something akin to a hospital." The beetle cactus pondered.
As Pulse looked over the individuals, and it was then when she spotted a familiar face. A little blue guy was swimming in front of the group, looking around.
Now Pulse began to understand. She helped the little blue creature, and now brought its friends and family so they can get help too. It was just like back home, feed a land shark some food and they will come back with others. This one could simply be some other of its species, but Pulse recognized the injuries on its tail from her camera.
"I think I know what this is about. In my files I have documented my experience as I obtained biological data with a subject of one of these aquatic races who was injured and had netting stuck to it. I made sure to understand if my medication would cause it harm before using it. I removed the net and applied foam on its injuries, injected antibiotics, and made sure everything was properly disinfected, before letting the creature go. I spotted the same creature among this group, so it must be leading them to me to try and help them as well." Pulse explained.
Luciurves seemed to be deep in thought as he placed a claw under his chin. Based on what he has been given, Pulse's existence has already been compromised. He wasn't entirely sure if the people of the planet knew where she was from or if they would blame her for anything she had done.
There will be a lot of talking when she returns to them, but for now, if they are already aware of her existence, and by extension, the rest of Marinyis , it would be good to promote good relations with them in some way and dissuade hostilities in the future.
"Pulse, are these beings one of the intelligent races of this planet?" He asked the pink and white citron.
"They look like some of the green and colorful ones in the suburban area with the two buildings, but the ones there didn't have aquatic features from what I remember. These ones here could be different races from the ones on land."
"From the looks of things, they appear to be so. So, Pulse, I want you to postpone going outside to explore. I would like for you to instead help these aquatic natives."
Pulse looked from him back to the camera showing the group close by.
"Helping them would give us a positive response, and possibly the beginning of diplomacy, show us in a good light to them and to whichever faction, group, nation, so and so."
Pulse did see the logic in that. "I can do that. What happens after?"
"Try to learn as much from them as you can, such as language, customs, what kind of civilization, or civilizations are present, anything. Figure out if you can communicate with them, record their speeches or anything they write, we need some kind of basis for a translator. If you are to somehow come in contact with a leader, I want you to contact us, don't make important decisions yourself in our place. If you are questioned, simply tell them some general information about us such as our culture, except about coordinates to locations in our territory or technology."
"I will, sir." Pulse nodded firmly.
"I will need to converse with my colleague over the information you have given me. There is a lot to go over and what the next step will be. So, I consider this meeting over." Luciervus declared, in which Pulse said her goodbyes, and the beetle cactus severed the connection from his end.
Now that she was on her own again, she sighed, "guess I get to play doctor now."
And that's that, a tea spoon of world building, but there will be more on the way, I can promise you guys that. I will be checking my chapters from time to time to see if there any inconsistencies. Happy Spooktober fellow undead-
Chapter Published: October 6, 2024
Chapter word count (Docs): 4.9k