This is something I'm writing for the Improfanfic Starter Swepstakes,
though if not chosen I'll probably open it up as an Indie Impro. However,
before any of that happens, I need to have someone(s) else read it over
for the various errors i inevitably miss, or which get generated by my
occasionally-malfunctioning keyboard, like that lowercase "I" earlier in
this sentence where the [shift] key didn't work. Yeah, yeah, no one reads
original stories. Well, someone better or I'll ... I'll ... I'll
raspberry in your general direction! Yeah! Each and every one of the
1400+ members of the FFML! MUAHAHAHAHA!
-CrystalDrogn
=======================================================================
Notes and whatnot at the end. READ 'EM, YOU SLACKER!
The Sun and the Stars
Chapter One
How could I forget, how could I remember
(C) 1999 CrystalDrogn, AKA Benjamin Howard
Sunraker and Sterne stood in one of the observation galleries in
the outside curve of the station, looking out at the stars. Each stood
near one end of the massive bank of windows, but not opposite each
other, looking in different directions, but not with their backs to
each other. Both were silent, resolved to talk about this thing that
had developed between them on the last survey mission, but neither sure
how to start. Finally, Sterne boke the silence.
"Do you ever think of the time before your Conversion?" she asked,
her synthesised vioce echoing quietly, as the silent starlight played off
her polished skin.
Sunraker's head spun around on his neck, and he looked sharply at
her profile, the yellow extensions leading down from his optics cheeks
flaring briefly. "No," he said, finality in his voice. The hard lines of
his black, metallic face softened slgithly as he turned the rest of his
body to face the same direction. "What would be the point? Even today,
there isn't any going back. And we have compensations."
She remained motionless, eyes fixed on the stars outside the
crystoplast window. "Compensations," she scoffed. "Like not getting old?
Like being able to replace any part of our bodies that does wear out?
Like being hated by the normals for whom we risk these wonderful
"compensations" to find new worlds? Like being banned from setting foot
on a populated world, even to the point that our high command has to be
non-Converts?"
*Like only remembering emotion, and only feeling it because our
programs are designed to emulate a human limphatic system,* she did not
say.
"Like only remembering the things you think are lesser about these
forms if we choose to," he replied, as if hearing her thought. "Like
being able to erase what we don't want to keep. Sterne, how old do you
think I am?"
Surprized, she turned at last to face him, her own optics wide
behind their clear shield. He was the one touting the benefits of their
robotic existance, after all. "Your hardware is new..." she said,
tentatively.
It was Sunraker's turn to be scornful. He gave a short bark of
laughter, then shook his head and turned back to the stars. "New
hardware," he sighed. "I suppose you might think I'm some new steel,
barely powered up and with eight or nine missions under my belt to be
paid off." His voice lost some of its edge again, as it continued, "I
upgrade every time time something worthwhile comes out, and still have
so much credit I don't bother to count it. I could pay off your own
Conversion debt and buy you this station on a whim."
Sterne gaped at him, while the soft flutter of a secure radio
burst whispered through the room.
"In fact, I just did. Congratulations, you now own yourself and
Wyvvern Orbital Four." He faced her once more, a faint smile on his
lips. "When I was Converted, there had been only five other successful
attempts. I've been to more worlds than I can keep track of in internal
storage, and I own an explorer's share in most of them. In the
thousands of years since then, I've seen so much stupid history repeat
itself I've abandoned keeping track... and I deleted my memories as a
human half my lifetime ago out of shame at being like one."
Sterne believed him. It was impossible... well, certainly
improbable... but his calm, even voice made it impossible to doubt. The
fact that the station's automated systems recognised her command as
ultimate owner to lock this bay and shut down security monitoring only
confirmed it, as she closed the distance between them. Certain
semiautomatic sytems exchanged data over secured low power transmission,
and a data port deployed from her palm. He made no move to counter it as
Sterne slipped it onto the matching port at the base of his neck. "There
is no shame in what we are, or what we were... If you will not remember
your past, I will you remember mine... if only to prove the we aren't
the souless monsters humans would make us out to be."
And, as the station slid around Wyvvern to dayside, they remembered
together.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
103 years ago...
Jeanna made sure she had her homework open in the word processor, to
switch to quickly if her father came to check on her, then connected to
#ec, where she most often found her new freind Skylark. Sky had been on
less frequently lately, as she'd finally been assigned her first mission
for the Exploration Corps, but they still managed to connect two or three
times a week. The channel was busy, with lots of names in EC member gold.
<J*Star> Hi all. SkyLRK been on?
<ShakN15> Hiya Star! Nah, haven't seen her. Hey wasn't she just assigned?
* J*Star goes to poke her notefile
<Cpt.Nova> Don't bother J*Star. I have it internally stored. Just a tick
while I query EC Search.
<Agent457> So anyway, this team got insystem, everything green & go, and
they start scanning planets. Bang! Second one out from the star, 96%
terra norm. Krypto - he was their comm officer - told me that they just
about broke out in a dance number on the bridge when the readings came
in.
<Cpt.Nova> Oh sparks.
<J*Star> Wait a minute, didn't Skylark say the comm officer on her ship
was called Krypto?
<Agent457> So, they go down to check it out. green, green, green... but
there's these weird little tentacled beasties, a little smaller than a
nat. And it turns out, they don't like big metal scouts coming and
poking around on their little rock. Rodin' things killed half the team
with some kind of energy blasts, like the Vegans can make only more
frequent.
-> <Cpt.Nova> Bad news, Star. That was Skylarks ship 457's talking about.
Details are on News.now... and it's not good. Skylark got really hit
hard, though they did manage to retrieve her OPC core.
Several more lines scrolled by while Jeanna sat in front of the
holoscreen, denying what she'd just read.
-> <Cpt.Nova> Star?
...
<Cpt.Nova> Star!? Come on, she's not dead yet! Core survivability is
pushed all the time on the recruitment ads. You've got to have seen
'em?
<J*Star> Well, yeah. It's just a shock.
<Agent457> What? You mean she's a slimer? Slumming it with us
Frankensteins, huh?
<Cpt.Nova> Get glitched Agent. If you'd show up besides when you have
bad news to tell you'd know she's a symp.
Jeanna's eyes misted over as she blinked away tears, trying to
muffle sobs. She /knew/ that Convert optical processing cores were the
next best thing to indestructile, and as long as they and their small
powerplant remained intact the personality inside was safe, but it was
still a shocking dose of mortality for a fourteen year old girl to face.
Apparently, she didn't muffle them well enough, because her father
apeared in her bedroom door a few moments later. "Honey, what's
wrong?", he asked.
(snifffle) (gasp) "Skylark - " (sob) " - those blobby things - "
(sob sob) " - it'll BE okay - " (gasp) "- core intact... "
Abruptly, her father's face shifted from concern to anger. Her
spun to look at the computer, where Agent457 was ranting about Convert
superiority and Cpt. Nova led most of the rest of the channel in telling
him to shut his rodin' voxbox. He stabbed at the keys, taking out the
anger he refused to dump on his daughter untill she could at least speak
coherently.
<J*Star> Who the hell are you? I don't want my daughter hanging around
with a bunch of Converter freaks!
<Agent457> See, the nat shows her true colors. I'd show you freak if I
met you. There's a reason for celling you skinbags "slimers" you know -
one good stomp is all it'd take!
<Cpt.Nova> That's it, Agent! You're outta here!
*Cpt.Nova has kicked Agent457
<J*Star> YOU"RE A BUNCH IOF FUCKING CONVERTS??
<Cpt.Nova> Whoa, wait a sec! It's not like anyone else here agrees with
Agent Idiot, perental-type person.
*Agent457 has connected to #ec
<Cpt.Nova> I said gone!
*Cpt.Nova has kicked Agent457
*Cpt.Nova has locked Agent457 off #ec
*J*Star has left #ec <RUST IN PEICES, BITHEADS!>
Jeanna had got herself back under control, and was now fearfully
watching her father from the bed. He switched off her computer without
a word, and stood in front of it for a moment, clenching his fists.
Still silent, he unplugged the power and data jacks, then picked up the
unit and carried it to the door.
"Your computer will be set up in the living room, where I can make
sure you're not consorting with those abominations," he stated, in a
voice that was very close to using the [brackets] of [power]. "And I
don't want to hear another thing about them."
Jeanna broke into tears again as her door slid closed behind him.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
<Why show me that? Humanity at its reactionary, panicky worst?>
<It's important, and it's human. You'll see. Remember with me...>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
101 years ago...
Like all youngsters on Eurydice, Jeanna attended one of the
government-sponsored summer camps in her sixteenth year. Like everyone
else, she was given the basic citzen self-defense courses and aptitude
tests, and her scores on those tests gave the "camp advisors" - thinly
disguised Star Navy recruitment agents - extra incentive to work on her.
"For the last time, CAPTAIN Iversson, NO, I am NOT considering
the Navy!"
Iversson looked stunned a moment, then deflated as he remebered
how much time one Jeanna S. Tarzak had spent on the SNnet portable
console he'd let her borrow - locked out of the sensitive files, to be
sure, but personnel rosters were a matter of public record - and the
fact that she'd been a given a copy of the holo taken when he'd
presented the Camp Champ in Riflery plaque to her. "I should have
realised you'd know how to do a comparative image search, but I'd
never have thought any kid your age would have the patience," he
sighed.
"All right, Star. I'll lay off of you." Iversson smiled a
bittersweet smile. "I'll let you keep the console for the rest of the
session, even. The Quartermaster finally agreed it's time to issue me
a more modern unit, anyway."
Jeanna managed a smile, though not very well. The next day when
the Independence War broke out in full force and all the newly drafted
teenagers began being intensively drilled and trained, she used up
breath she could barely afford to spare in the infrequent rest breaks
to curse Captain Justin Iversson and the Navy.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
<This is important to you, and it honors me that you share it,
but why? This is exactly the sort of behavior that I deleted my
memories of.>
<It's life, 'Rake. You can't delete it, only turn your back - and
it's still there, even then. You said you're one of the original
Converts, surely you kept your memories of the Convert Citizenship
War?>
<... Yes.> Starraker's mind tightened, the peripheral,
subconscious dataflows of the link fading out. <There are some things
it's better to keep, the better to avoid them in the future.>
<Show me?>
The link was silent for milliseconds.
<Alright.>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
2105 years ago...
Sunraker - then known as Firestorm - dropped his small scoutship
out of FTL in the outer perimeter of the Clarke's Star system, as long
experience had taught him it was better to see what the locals were up
to on the long-range sensors before popping into the inner system. Much
to his surprize, an Empire of Earth Space Patrol minicarrier was in a
nearby orbit, as if waiting for cautious ships to arrive. Almost
immediately, the comm set crackled to life.
"Patrol Carrier CVS 485 Shaolin to Scoutship ECS 3140 Harley
Nebula, you are ordered to heave to and stand by for boarding, by order
of His Terrene Majesty Fintim the Fifth! Any and all Convert passengers
and crew are further instructed to shut down for contraband inspection."
"Like hell!" Firestorm muttered, not bothering to reply. He
turned to the one human member of his small crew, currently manning
the navigation station. "Jakko, you'd better seal your suit and get
in Random's cockpit. I'm about to go outlaw, and even if you don't
join me you can't breath vaccuum."
Blanching, Jakko did just that, his partner Random complaining
for both of them. "What the glitch do you mean, "going outlaw?" And
how can we NOT join you in a ship this small?"
"Simple. I'm going to blow the bridge pressure dome and take
off," he replied.
"WHAT?? Are you out of your socket, you -"
The highly illegal explosive bolts blew, and the upper dome of
the bridge blasted free into space. The bulkhead door to the areas
beyond slammed shut before the rest fo the ship could decompress, and
the blast was too short-lived to throw any of the Convert mebers of
the crew out of their restraints. Firestorm shifted to his delta
winged spacefighter mode, and thundered towards the Shoalin, whose own
fighter bay had barely opened. As the three piloted fighters converted
to their own humanoid modes and took up defensive positions along his
flightpath, he activated his personal comm.
"Prepare for boarding, right? I think I can handle that," he
sourly remarked, cutting through the Patrol comm officers increasingly
hysterical demands to know exactly what the hells he thought he was
doing. About this time, the human spacefighters fired off their
missile racks. Firestorm blasted a hole in the swarm, then pushed
his own engines to 110% output and raced through before it could
close again. The proximity fuses on the nearest missiles exploded,
but by that time he was past them and the shockwaves only further
increased his speed. The huge, longbarreled gun mounted slightly to
the right of center on his dorsal surface spoke, and a human
spacefighter died.
"You Empire of Earth types are always gabbling about how human
research and developement is the best in the universe. Well, here's
some news for you: When Silas Booker "invented" the FTL drive, he was
studying a bunch of files he BOUGHT from an Azulan tradeship. I know,
I was there. And the Azulan weapons science is just as advanced now as
their as their transport was then!" He'd been dodging and firing as he
spoke, of course, and another of the human fighters was no more. Only
one of the original three were left, but another three were launching
even as he targeted the big gun again.
Before he could fire, a hail of beams flew past from behind him,
destroying his opponents. Surprized, he spun his head around to take a
quick look, and saw that his crew had arrived to back him up. Random
and Viper were flying free, as he was, while the Harley had freed its
weapons and was firing, meaning that Trackker must be manning them,
since Snowflake was anti-violence.
"Trackker, you nullbit, get out of here! We're under the point
defense firing arcs, but they'll rip you to--"
Before he could finish, the Shaolin's guns opened fire, carving
away at the Harley one peice at a time.
"No! Trackker you damned fool!" Facing foreward again, Firestorm
transformed and blasted into the open launch bay of the Shaolin,
firing the still-charged Azulan gun at the fighters moving into
position on the catapults, blowing the noses and front landing gear
off all three, dropping them in a blazing wreck to block the remaining
fighters. He ignored the spatter of laserfire from the human bay crew,
as no sidearm could hope to put out enough energy to get through his
heat resistant armor. He swept a low power continuous beam from one of
his arm mounted guns over the most annoying group of them, then started
scanning the back wall of the hangar for a structurally nonvital area
to blast through into the engineering section of the ship. Finding what
he was looking for, he fired the cannon one last time, blowing a huge
hole through the heavy blast shielding into the Shaolin's engine room.
Several engineers were sucked out as the compartment decompressed, most
of them with their pressure suit gauntlets removed for better dexterity.
As soon as he was able to move against the flow of air, Firestorm
hurried into the engine room and began pulling breakers and safety
interlocks.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
<No way! YOU'RE the Hero of Clarke's Star!? People have been
trying to figure out for CENTURIES who captured the Shaolin and stopped
the Convert executions! Why didn't you tell anyone?>
<A hero. Wait untill you've seen the rest, and see if you still want to
call me "hero".>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
With the the engines shut down and all ship's power cut,
Firestorm turned to face Random and Viper, who'd followed him into
the engineering compartment. The sounds of Jakko being sick inside
his suit echoed over the commlinks as he saw what was left of the
engineers through Random's optics. Her face was a reflection of her
partner's misery, and even Viper looked troubled.
"What are you going to do now?", he asked Firestorm, who
shrugged.
"Take care of the rest of the ship. From outside."
The mental imagery speeded up, showing flashses of Firestorm
using his alien cannon to vent every remaining compartment to space,
then stoically waiting for the air in the crews pressure suits to run
out before restoring power. The rest of the Clarke's Star battles were
skimmed over, showing the Shaolin destroying the Imperial Navy space
station, the ground battle to take the facility where removed Convert
personality cores had been taken for destruction, and the famous last
transmission from The Hero of Clarke's Star as the Shaolin prepared to
go FTL. It was all things she'd heard in history classes, anyway.
"I am Jeron Mathison, leader of the CLarke's Star resistance.
Please, will you stay and continue the fight? We've had enough of
Imperial Terrene rule," the voice on the commnet said, the same voice
that had coordinated the Resistance strikes with Firestorm's own.
"What the hells would I want with that? Solve your own problems,
and lead your own people. You seem to have done well enough so far.
Alright, let's Book."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
<Jakko and Random stayed behind. They said they didn't want to be
around me anymore. For quite a while, I didn't understand why not -
it's not like I ever said all humans should be wiped out. Some of them
are worthwhile.>
Sterne's metal frame shuddered, another autonomous reaction
programmed in to make the human mind feel more at home in a foreign body.
<That's what comes of forgetting your humanity, 'Raker. There's
lots of good in us, even the worst have some redeeming spark. Even the
worst traitor of them all, Dar Exeter...>
WHO IS DAR EXETER?
WHY IS HE "THE GREATEST TRAITOR OF THEM ALL"?
CAN STERNE CONVINCE SUNRAKER THAT IT'S WORTH RECLAIMING HIS HUMANITY, OR
WILL HIS MILLENIA OF PESSIMISM STRANGLE AWAY HER OWN CHEERY OUTLOOK?
WILL SHE BE A GOOD OWNER FOR WYVVERN ORBITAL FOUR?
Don't ask me, I sure don't know.
======================================================================
What do you think, Sirs?
Appendix: Pronunceation, dictionary, and miscellaneous notes
Sunraker exists as a toy I hacked together and painted (mediocre-ly) and
stuck a big Decepticon symbol onto. The Decepticon symbol is not carried
over into this story, but most of the rest of the character is. See the
art for more detail. He's almost immune to the effects of heat - if
stars had a solid surface, he could land on one and wander around for
half an hour or so before having to start worrying about getting runny.
Since most energy weapons do damage by flash-heating, he's well
protected against them, taking only minimal damage from anything smaller
than a corvette unless it's firing physical bullets. He tries to keep
this out of the official eye, however, lest some research center get
covetous enough to send extraction teams after him - something he's faced
before with the various alien tech he keeps turning up, and something
nearly all CETC members have to face at one time or another. His alien
cannon is still functional, but also still installed in the Firestorm
body, probably aboard the Shaolin wherever he stashed it so long ago.
Sterne - "Stair-neh", anglicanisation of the German word spelled the
same way and meaning "stars". Sterne is /almost/ like the transformable
version of the mecha "Cora" I drew for the Mekton fansupplement Virtual
Mekton, but with some slight modification, mainly just to make the
"flying gun" mode a little more streamlined. Also, she's more brightly
colored than Cora, having a Transformers-style instead of real-military-
style paintjob, and has seperate optics behind the shield and a face
instead of a Macross-like faceplate. Again, see the art for more detail.
She's been on four or five CETC missions, enough to have about half paid
off her Conversion fee, before the story begins. She's actually almost
five times as heavily armed as "Firestorm" was, but as armor technology
has also improved it's less effective - it would take her two or three
shots for every one Firestorm fired to do the same damage to the modern
equivalent of the Shaolin. The apurture of this weapon is the lens on
the chest in robot mode, and is mounted on the front of her flying gun
mode.
Wyvvern - "Why-vern" a mythological creature having the body and head
of a viper, the wings of a bat, the sting of a scorpion, and
occasionally the talons of a hawk. Wyvvern Industries is one of my
"stock props" for high-tech manufacturers of vehicles and weapons, but
may not appear if they don't fit in.
CETC - typically pronounced "set-see", stands for Colonial Exploration
and Terraforming Corps, made up almost entirely of the robotic Converts.
Replaced the Exploration Corps of the Empire of Earth after the
Independence War, when the colonies finally broke the control of Old
Earth and New Terra (formerly known as Mars) over them, but effectively
it was little more than a change of name and the top eschelon of officers.
nat, slimer - derogatory terms for natural humans, nat being the less
offensive of the two.
roding, rodin' - slang for "corroding", a Convert expletive. Sparks and
glitch have similar meanings, all denoting malfunction or shoddy
construction. "Get glitched, ya roding sparkshaft!" is about the same
level of insult as telling a natural human "You're an inspiration for
birth control, freak!"
symp - A natural human who's sympathetic to the Converts, generally
meaning anyone who just treats them like a normal person instead of
more or less of an oddity or abomination.
bithead - a human supremacist term for Converts, and one which is
blatantly inaccurate since their neural nets are fuzzy logic optical
systems and generally located in the chest at that.
Eurydice - "you-rid-a-key" the Muse of lyric poetry, IIRC. The planet
Eurydice was the first to be settled after the "invention" of the
Booker Drive, and hence the first to have actual colonists arrive.
Some of the generation ships that decided not to upgrade their drives
are still in transit, most of them to worlds that have already been
settled by Booker Drive ships. Eurydice is basically Europe as a whole
planet, having originally been colonised with a small fleet of ships,
each having their own ethnic enclave aboard.
illegal explosive bolts? Yaright - Only in this application, that is,
illegal to have a major area of the ship able to be opened to space
with them, as it's a safety risk. What if they were to accidentally
activate due to combat damage or just crossed wires?
The Harley Nebula - One of the Hubble photographs has a picture of a
nebula that looks just like a Harley Davidson inignia. I'm not sure
which one, and the nebula probably only has a number at most, but I
thought it was kind of a neat name for a spaceship.
Booker Drive - How could I turn down the opportunity to have a starship
captin say, "Let's Book!" instead of "Make it so" ?
The relevant art may be found on
http://www.sover.net/~merryhwd/detour.html
The way I've envisioned the format of the story, this would be an
atypically choppy episode - most would be set in one of the three
relevant time periods, either Firestorm's memories, showing the
foibles of humanity and thier tendency to repeat them, Sterne's
memories, showing both sides of humanity but focussing on the good,
and showing what led her to become a Convert in the first place (no,
the Star Navy didn't do it to her... unless they did), or thier
present day with the CETC, with only a little mention of the other
times in each episode.
--
_____________ ___ ___ _____________
\_________ \ \ \__/ / / _________/ turned into living crystal in a
I'm \______ \__~o\/o~__/ ______/ terrible accident involving sour
the \_________\ /_________/ cream and salsa pork rinds.
winged A A R D || V A R K "Hmm. What's this do?" - my epitaph-to-be