From This Mouth That Bleeds real

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<<set $gamechapter = "Chapter One">>                                                            [[ENTER THE END|1]]

You taste rot between your teeth. It settles deep into the crevices of your molars as your fingers curl around the lip of the arm rest, pushing yourself up, groggy and slightly irascible. The taste of decay, of ruin, is enough to wake you up from your state of half-consciousness. Darkness envelopes, the recyc-air crystallizing to a stale dust in your lungs. A quick glance to your sides, then to the flickering instrument cluster. The soft analog amber numbers glow back; nothing showing up on the primary radar screen. [[Nothing.|02]]

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From This Mouth That Bleeds / $gamechapter

A C H E I L U S: ? ? ? A F F L I A T I O N: UNITED FORCES OF THE RED REMEMBRANCE D U T Y: TO SERVE, TO PROTECT, TO DIE

a passage for testing the """$return""" function! it returns you to the last visited passage that isn't tagged with 'noreturn', whereas the general back button in the menu simply navigates through all visited passages. helps you avoid getting stuck in a loop! <<link "return to game" $return>><</link>>

<<set $gamechapter = "chapter">>

A pause. Another. You could possibly convince yourself you’re imagining it. Exhaustion weighs hot and heavy behind your eyes, bloodshot and dry as damn. You’ve been in this place for far too long this time around by no fault other than your own stubbornness. If any of your mental faculties were in order, you’d phone to Base, ask for an escort back. Yet… You cannot ignore the lick of saccharine against your tongue, a taste you’ve digested many times before. A mumbled expletive, then the humiliated reach for the comms. It dials once, twice, three times before the signal steadies and connects. “Acheilus to Command Alpha.” Nothing. “Acheilus to Command Alpha, please acknowledge.” “Received, Lieutenant, over.” A crackled low-pitch voice comes to life, human and warm, so different from the chilled depths you've been in for… “Requesting corruption sweep in the fourth quadrant. Approximately one-hundred klicks from the Thoosa Trench,” Rolling out your neck, you mess with the switches on the detection instrument. “Rad detection isn’t picking up anything.” A quick shrug, as if Command could see it. “Could be nothing, just want to make sure.” “Roger.” The line goes dead momentarily as an override connection is made with your ship. Flickering lights that shift from amber to crimson in milliseconds of a blink, an alarm of warning, then back to silence. Huh. From the receiver, dizzy and distorted until it solidifies into reality comes: “This is Command Alpha to Acheilus. No rad detected in the area. You’re being ordered to come home, over.” [[Come Home?|3]]

Your jaw sets, clenching your teeth so hard you can feel the grinding of your molars all the way to the tips of your shoulders. Fuck no. “Put Admiral Thetis on.” A beat passes with no response. “Now, dammit! I wasn’t asking!” A quick shuffle of movement, the blaring of a dial tone before a familiar voice comes through. “Lieutenant this is Admiral Thetis, over.” “Whose idea was it to order me home?” you ask, knowing full well who gave the order, not bothering to hide the fury in these bruise-colored depths. Here, behind the metaled walls of Acheilus there is the dream of being safe, there is the hope of being warm again. Order you home? [[You already are.|4]]

“Lieutenant.” An irritated puff of air through the receiver and you imagine Thetis sitting at a desk in her office, brows drawn, fingers against her forehead like she has a migraine—something only you really had the power to give her. Then, the sigh of a steadying breath. “Lieutenant, it was mine.” Clearly. “You’ve been gone too long. There’s no evidence of corruption in the fourth quadrant and you are needed elsewhere.” You scoff. “No corruption my ass. My teeth are practically tingling with it. It’s soaked into the systems here.” As if to confirm it yourself, you lick greasy rust off your lip, tangy with hints of molding oranges and reds. The color of the end. You’re breathing the stuff in, even now. “Acheilus may not have picked up on it, but any living creature here would have.” “Yes.” Thetis says, patient in all things, even argumentative pilots. “But you forget that mecha Acheilus is not yet finished.” The implications of that statement hang hot and heavy over your shoulders and Thetis lets it sit, lets it simmer. “Command’s detection instruments did not pick up on any traces of corruption, however. It’s possible that because you have been gone for so long —” “I know what I’m talking about, I’m not—” You cut in, deeply shameful suddenly, highly embarrassed. Softer, quieter. “And I haven’t forgotten.” “Lieutenant, you’re not crazy. Just more sensitive than most. Hungrier than most.” Thetis shuffles around, a quick scribble of a note. “Patience in all things. Come home.” [[The comms line goes dead.|5]]

“Fuck.” You hiss, throwing your hands up and over your eyes. “Fuck!” You yell again, this time with a bite more feeling, and the greasy-oiled depths answer you back. The worst thing is waiting Patience in all things. But impatience lies thick under your skin, burrowing into your bones, makes you anxious, makes you dangerous. A breath in, out. Annoyance flickers briefly across your face before it settles into a safe, neutral one. You will betray nothing. “Acheilus,” you say. “Set the coordinates for Base Alpha. We’re going home.” Your mouth twists but Acheilus hums in response, cabin lights brightening for a moment, then dimming. Yes. “Atta boy.” Thetis was right about him not being finished, even if it was a low blow. The admiral, to her benefit, didn’t take the obvious dig at his age — which is old. The knobby switch panel, laden with thick plastics, flickering neons, and analog screens are surface-level evidence of this. If one were to dig underneath his metallic skin, they’d find antiquated engineering and hardware that hasn’t been seen in decades. You, though, had looked and seen something else. Unfinished, yes. So were you. Antiquated, absolutely. You were there are the end of it all, too. But Acheilus had potential, had a greatness that you took stock in. He was hungry, just like you. It had helped that you were the only one he woke up to. Under your fingers, he had come to life. Whirred and buzzed, opened and shut his great maw, and awaited instruction. You settle deeper into your chair, well-worn, the stitching fraying at the edges, but entirely suited to the contours of your body after years of use. Rubbing the cloth of the seat between your fingers, you sigh. It is you, your ship, and the endless ocean stretching out in front of you. [[You remember the end. You remember everything after, too.|6]]

The dark depths churn, slick moments of turbulence, white specks floating in your vision. The ocean had been here for it all. Acheilus’s positioning system shows you along the left side of the Thoosa Trench, heading north towards the Aeschylean Hollows at a comfortable speed. You should arrive at Base Alpha just after the beginning hours. You peer over your shoulder and the darkness of the trench stares back. Somewhere in that baleful cold is an embarrassment of the Red Remembrance. If you squint, you can see it. If you look in the right place, you know what’s there. Flickering lights still pop and fizz bright arcs of blue and green along the walls, oil-slick spills curl like malice from abandoned rigs. Structure metal sits and rots and rusts, the corrosion having fed the coral for a few years before cracking and falling to the bottom of an endless trench. The idea was to create a safe-haven for the young. Hidden far away from the known bases. Here, they thought, the youth would be safe. Here, they would be undiscovered. It had been celebrated at the time of launch, it had been hailed and hallowed. More than fifty percent of their resources went into securing the facility and a project that was set to take five years to build only took two. Less than six months later, five hundred were housed on the grounds that they’d be trained for the UFRR’s military service. [[Vilor, once a sister base meant to produce the next generation of ace pilots, is now a mass grave site for four hundred and ninety-nine children.|07]]

Base Alpha sits in a depressed valley about eight miles long and five miles deep. The campus itself spider-webs across the bottom of this pit in neons of blue and soft yellow. Cramped, closely packed buildings tower together in whispering shadows, tall enough that eventually the light pollution filters out those highest floors, hard to see from the ground. Some of these towers lie empty, having been requisitioned by the UFRR for various projects, but they were originally built with another purpose in mind. You pass one now. It sits like a darkened ghost, slightly older than the rest, specks of algae and biolume film cover the sharp corners, giving it a luminescent, shimmering quality. In the unused, still sheet-wrapped windows, Acheilus swims past, his crescent shaped tail snapping back and forth, glinting in greys and blacks. Five hundred beds, only used by time, will forever sit as a reminder to the Red Remembrance. [[Their ghosts will forever haunt you, too.|08]]

Adjacent to the building, just beyond the sharpened corners, sits a half-domed structure, smoked glass and reverberating screen-particles make it impossible to see up to a certain point. At that certain point, though, you were well into Command’s water space. Command unveils itself the same way a lost city of old would. Large and magnificent, towering and abstruse to the point of unease. It is brilliant, thousand of lights exist within the hemisphere, enough to illuminate even the darkest depths of the ocean, with hundreds of various mechas similar to your own. A fleet of MKIII Stingrays pass by on your approach to the entrance gate — out on a routine maintenance check, you assume. Five or so human-sized mecha suits follow closely behind. One of the pilots salutes you. [[ - Wave back|09wave]] [[ - Do nothing|09no]]

You wave back, half-hearted and aching. You see the soft, happy grin of the other pilot in response. <<include "09">>

You turn your head, fiddling with the landing mechanisms in preparation for the gates just ahead of you. You don’t need to look to see the disappointment on the other pilot’s face. <<include "09">>

“This is pilot 02 with mecha Acheilus,” you say into the comms line, an odd mixture of feeling flooding its way down into your lungs. Some part of you is grateful to be back, that you’ve made it out of the field without a scratch on your ship, but in the same breath, disgust shapes your mouth and curls inside you. It’s with thinly veiled vex that you say, “Requesting board, over.” “Granted.” Then, “Welcome home, Lt.” You suck your teeth. The great jowls of the gate open, its teeth scrupulous lasers that scan you upon entry into the hold. You’re introduced to the harsh white light complimentary of the Red Remembrance and their signature stiff constituents with vibrant vermilions who wait obediently on each side with latches meant to hold Acheilus in his resting place until his next flight. “Be good for me until I get back,” You sigh, gathering data logs, rad calculations of various regions and quadrants, all things Command will want to see immediately. Yes. “Atta boy.” And you turn the key —a key! —and then you are all alone. Underneath, Acheilus’s great engines buck and shutter to a close, his computer systems whirr to a finality. The sounds are comforting, something you’ve fallen asleep to many nights before. You settle back into your chair for a few more moments. A breath in, out. [[Your hands shake|10]]

Admiral Thetis was right about one other thing, too. You have been gone for a long time; you’ve been gone for months. Months of an endless blue that pervaded your eyes, an infinitum of mouthless words and moments to think and move and you please. You’d rediscovered creatures that hadn’t been seen in years, listened as whales called through, and laughed when other sharks circled Acheilus, trying to communicate. It might have been the closest thing to peace that you’ve ever felt. Peace does not exist in the lion’s den— a name you mock Command with — instead, the oppressive nature of fear lies thick along the walls of the hull. Fear is every step you take, it is every beating heart, every conspired whisper. It exists within the hollows of your cells, in every ill-intended look cast your way. You are fear. And they make you believe it. “Lieutenant,” a voice sounds from beyond the hull, cloudy and vague, then a slight rap of knuckles on a metallic hull when there is no response back. “You’re clear to disembark.” Disembark? You close your eyes, a sigh settling deep into the crevices of your shoulders, finger circling the lip of the key in your hand, the jagged edges of well-worn use. Disembark? I’m leaving my whole heart behind. [[ - Leave|11leave]] [[ - Stay for a while longer|11stay]]

You stand, set your jaw. Prepare for war. <<include "11">>

The simple truth of it all is that it’s easier to exist in here, to breathe. If, and only if, you were being truthful to yourself, you’d admit that the outside scares you. Months and months of being gone…the thought of returning to civilization makes you sick. But you shuffle those papers in your hands too many times and they become wrinkled. As sure as your heart beats, you know you’ll have to face the music eventually. <<include "11">>

The light burns your eyes upon first contact, flickering of blues and yellows and reds float in your vision and stain behind your mind. It is moments of import pain like this that you’re reminded just how dark the ocean can be, just how welcoming it is when it’s only you and Acheilus’s antiquated amber lights. Being welcoming is not the intent of the blue-white lights of the holding bay, the cutting crimsons. The lights serve as sanitizers, killing any foreign substance that would prove harmful to Command’s environment if it were to leak past this room. If honesty were the only attribute you possessed, you would admit that it wouldn’t take much to completely collapse the carefully constructed biome of Base Alpha. Everything here rests on contingency; one alien particle unknown to the systems here has the potential to bring everything to ruin. But you would never admit this. Neither would anyone else. A hand comes to rest over your eyes, large enough that calluses scrape against your nose, cover the expanse of your forehead. Another hand pushes something folded into your own. “Day-break glasses, Lt. For your eyes.” You knock away the hand with a huff, that old familiar irritation shaping your mouth into a thing of annoyance. “I know that, Jonah.” With eyes clenched closed, you unfurl the silk plastic against your face, securing and snapping it behind your ears. You wait for the whirr to start up, a sign that you’re clear to open your eyes, a blinking click, then you’re met with an amber world, blue whorls, and poignant purples. REST MODE the top right corner reads. IRIS COMPROMISED reads the top left. CALIBRATION TIME: 5 MINUTES. “Hey there, Lt.” Jonah smiles white and bright, slightly purple from the lens filter. He stands a head or so taller than you, bulkier around the shoulders, thick in both waist and thighs. Sturdy. But Jonah has always been dependable. You knew, ultimately, he’d be the first to greet you in the bay without question. Dressed in the standard sharp crimson ODUs of the Red Remembrance, Jonah is the only one here who you can somewhat stomach for long periods of time. Ten minutes, max. “How was it?” “It was…” You peek to your side, noting the mech engineers circling Acheilus like vultures, holo-pads flickering like the points of freshly sharpened tridents. [[' - "Peaceful. For just a moment." '|12peace]] [[' - "I wish I were back in the ocean." '|12ocean]] [[' - "Glad to be back home. It's good to see you again." '|12home]]

<<include "12">>

Jonah’s smile dims, but a look of complete understanding crosses his face anyway. He knows. <<include "12">>

Jonah’s smile, if possible, highlights brighter. It’s not at all that hard to make him happy. <<include "12">>

You thrust the rad calculations and various colored markers towards Jonah’s stomach by way of explanation. He takes his time to scan the holo-pages, thumbing each sentence, tracing myriad graphs. Jonah’s brows pucker, then, after several long seconds, he shrugs and hands the reports back to you. CALIBRATION TIME: 3 MINUTES. “I don’t really know what to think of that.” Jonah drops his shoulders noncommittally, the red and white cross patch stretching its way across his shoulders, shadows his back. His mouth twists. “It doesn’t make much sense to me but — well, I’m sure Admiral Thetis will want a look.” You sigh, push some at the frames behind your ears. Yes, Thetis will absolutely want a look. Exhaustion lays thick and heavy behind your eyes, cotton like in its dryness and unabating in its ferocity. You are tired, you are so tired and nothing is making it better. Not these ridiculous Day-Break glasses, not the sterile blue-white lights, not Jonah’s happy little smile. You have become exhaustion. And it has become you. “I should probably head there now, speaking of,” you say, shuffling the papers together, a clear indicator — to you, at least — that you would very much like to be left alone, now. CALIBRATION TIME: 1 MINUTE. “Sure.” Jonah smiles all of his bright and glimmering teeth. He’s always been very good about detecting your mood changes, taking a hint, understanding that you’re the sort of person who tends to need a lot of alone time. “Just a warning, Lt.” And he lowers his voice, bends his face closer to your ear. “Fleet Commander from Base Beta is here.” The world starts to brighten, slowly at first, then all at once. Jonah’s dark skin becomes tinged with his true golden undertones instead of the purple of minutes before. His uniform — something you’ll now have to change into — is a stark and bleeding red, deeper hued than you remember it being. Dread kicks at your heart as you fold the glasses back into a spiral, mouth turning down at the corners. “You’re kidding.” Another shrug from Jonah. “He heard you were on your way back home.” [[' - "Fuck me." '|13fuck]] [[ - Say nothing.|13nothing]]

You say, slapping the curled glasses back into Jonah’s outstretched palm. “Just my fucking luck.” Palming your face, you press deeply enough into your eyes that red becomes your vision and a leprous heat spreads to your jaw, igniting the edges of your teeth with unbridled fury. “Of course this fucking happens to me.” <<include "13">>

The truth of the situation is that you’re in a shit sandwich where everything fucking sucks and nothing is looking like it’s going to get better anytime soon. You chew on the insides of your cheek, debating the merits of going AWOL and suffering the punishments later on. Surveillance duty would be better than the bullshit you’re about to have to deal with. The look on your face must betray your emotions. <<inlcude "13">>

Jonah’s mouth and thick brows wince in tandem, leaning up and away from you and your emotions. “Look, I know. I’m sorry. But you really need to go decon and change.” He eyes your well-worn boots, your well-loved jacket. “Those aren’t standard protocol.” In that moment, and not for the first time, you decide that you hate your life. “I know that, Jonah.” [[Next|14]]

It is a reckoning every time you look into the mirror. You look and see the semblance of a rotting, after effect of radiation—no better are you than the Corrupted. Your<<cycle "$hair_color">> <<option " - brown">> <<option " - blonde">><<option " - red">><<option " - black">><<option " - bronze">><<option " - dyed">><</cycle>> <<cycle "$hair_type">><<option " - short hair">><<option " - midlength hair">><<option " - box braids">><<option " - locs">><<option " - waist-length hair">><<option " - long braid">><<option " - afro">><</cycle>> looks disheveled even to your eyes which is wholly hallmarked of being underway for so long. Hair care wasn’t as luxurious in the depths of the ocean when you only had the option of a comb and some detangling spray. Your<<cycle "$eye_color">> <<option " - honey brown">> <<option " - whiskey barrel brown">><<option " - hazel">><<option " - sea-foam green">><<option " - emerald">><<option " - slate black">><<option " - light blue">><<option " - dark blue">><<option " - crimson red">><<option " - ochre gold">><<option " - rock grey">><</cycle>> eyes are wearier than you’ve ever seen them, circles and bags so dark and heavy that you might use them as luggage. You turn away from the mirror, critical and wrought from looking at your visage. Your life is easier, you think, when you aren’t around any mirrors. Less eyes on you, less scrutiny—even if it means your own. There’s a mechanical arm somewhere behind you, spraying you down with a sickly-sweet smelling substance — something akin to vetiver and sea-salt. The machinery is as old as you are but operates better than you could ever hope to. It’s only function in life is to decontaminate those few members of the UFRR who have been outside of any Force water space for a long period of time; long enough to track something ugly and snarling back with them, but — ridiculously, perhaps — you think of it as a friend. It hums up the sides of your body, spritzing here and there, focusing longer on the areas that require it. The arm stops on the left side of your neck, just under the corner of your jaw. It highlights with alarm, beeps once, beeps twice, then sprays in that area for several long minutes. [[The screen flickers red. RADIATION DETECTED.|15]]

You had expected this and it does not scare you, you’d known the area of your body to be the most corrupted would be where things tend to settle in the collar of your jacket. Everybody undersea had a touch of radiation in them, in one way or another. The arm circles to the back of your neck and you bend your neck in aid. It sprays there for several long minutes as well. Two beeps that notify the obvious. “Thanks, Althea,” you whisper, refusing to give even another glance into the mirror to confirm what you already know. Horrid. Awful. The little robot is anything but, spinning around in what you can only imagine as joy. You think the arm and screen smile at you, hopes it does. Althea fiddles, a soft whirring that momentarily silences the noise in your head as you dry, the stickiness of the decon-spray having dissolved into a soft moisture barrier against skin. Althea presents a newly pressed, blood-red uniform. She places this on the edge of the sink along with a familiar pair of glistening tactical boots. Your uniform, similar to Jonah’s in the expanse of color and shape. But where he had a medical-cross and staff, you have three shimmering, golden stars. The image of them, the reminder of them, catch hot and loud in the reflection of the mirror and you are forced to look at the hue of them. How, in one shift, they appear a perfect buttery-yellow; in the next a seamless garnet. There are a few ribboned-medal signifiers settled neatly just under your collarbone that don’t mean much of anything to her but would and does to everybody else upon first glance. Above the left breast is the name velcro. What does it say? <<textbox "$first_name" First name>> <<textbox "$last_name" Last name>> [[Next|16]]

Exhaustion fights its way towards the backs of your eyelids, once more. A vicious nausea that swirls and builds, that hits and spits. A dulling ache unfurls behind your ribcage, rots its way into your systems, your blood-streams. It is an ache that tells you this is never going to end. It is an ache that tells you that you will never be warm again. The halls are winding, long and wide. A left here, another left, straight for a few meters then a sharp right. It is a shifty, interesting thing — almost as though the floors are constantly changing underfoot. It’s a momentary comfort to you to know that you’re currently walking the oldest halls of the Red Remembrance, and the yellowing of the linoleum displays the antiquity clearly. When you touch your fingers to the wall, you know that the dust that comes off with it is a history you have grown up with. Your toddling legs stuck in the smallest boots they could find, your toothless grimace. You still holds that same grimace but it has grown, transformed into an angular slash that always seems to point down. You hesitate outside a metallic door, hearing a flurry of obstructed phrases just beyond the seal. You know exactly what’s about to happen, knows the entire play as if it had been already laid out in front of you. You touch one of the medals on your chest — a blackened pin of a shark — and in your mind’s eye, the chess pieces are lying wait, eager and hungry to make a move. [[You’ve never been particularly good at chess.|17]]

<<set $gamechapter = "Chapter Two">> There are three inhabitants of the briefing room you enter. One is a woman that you know immediately, have known your whole life. Admiral Thetis is a broad-shouldered, thick-thighed, and strong-jawed woman with black hair and even darker skin that stretches itself over boundless muscle of a mind-blowing capacity. Her mouth is a stern set, looking as if it has never flinched from a frown in its entire life, but her eyes give it away. A deep brown, flake-less and smooth, kind; it reminds you of the surface. The other two are questions — both men. One is so nondescript that you find it hard to keep your eyes focused on him, his face appearing like an unwanted pop-up. The other is stronger in statue, his face more clear in view. Salt-and-peppered hair shorn mere atoms away from his scalp. He has an arrogant stance to his mouth, an arrogant everything. Briefly, as you are slow on the uptake of saluting, you consider the man who is unmistakably the Fleet Commander hailing from Base Beta — the man who is here to take away everything you love. “Lieutenant.” Thetis says. “You made it home.” “Yes, Admiral.” Your back is stiff at a parade rest. This is, as you understand it, just for show. Your relationship with the admiral is never this strict in private. “Sit.” Thetis offers, nodding at the chair next to the empty and nondescript man whose face evades your every attempt at retention. He, curiously enough, does not salute you. Even though judging by the singular star on his sleeve, he absolutely should. But he doesn’t and instead offers something akin to a sneer. This doesn’t bother you — you can guess what his problem is without having to look at his rank or the missing medals on his chest. Second-gen. “Lieutenant, this is Fleet Commander Driton.” Thetis nods her head towards the man with an arrogant mouth. “And Specialist Ladon” The man to your left doesn’t move at the mention of his name and he doesn’t deign a glance your way. Minutely, you toy with the idea of contacting his Commanding Officer to report him for his blatant display of disrespect, but this is only a fantasy. [[Such things mean very little to you in retrospect|18]]

Driton nods his head and the line of his smile lifts higher by a fraction of an inch. “I’m sure you’re glad to be back home, Lieutenant. Welcome.” You think of Acheilus’s deep groan and stifle a sigh. “Lieutenant, do you have the rad readings for us?” Thetis says and her voice is like gravel against shore. “Yes.” You say and flip the holo-pages upside down atop the transmitter. There’s a dusty buzz, slow to power-up, and then a slow flickering of blue light before it hits the wall opposite to them. In blues and oranges, a shaky projected graph appears, overlaying a topographical map. Months’ worth of data appear as cramped and pointy lines; your own long and sharp handwriting highlighting bits you deemed too important not to mark up. “Riveting.” Ladon says with a steady level of hauteur to his voice, mocking. [[ - Snap back at him. There's only so much you can take.|19snap]] [[ - Ignore him.|19ignore]]

“I apologize, soldier, that you cannot seem to grasp the implications of things that have been so clearly handed to you. I understand that deciphering a simple graph is difficult for some.” You feel your mouth pick up into a snarl; you hope your teeth flash loud and sharp. “I wouldn’t have a problem contacting your CO for some remedial classes, if you find yourself in need.” Interestingly enough, he shuts his mouth immediately after this. <<include "19">>

<<include "19">>

A breath in. Out. Patience in all things. “As Admiral Thetis indicated:” you say, utmost patience. “These are the radiation readings I have collected over the past few months. If you’ll turn your eyes to this line here —” Two pairs of eyes turn to where your fingers indicate. “This axis shows the third quadrant with a stabilized — for the area, at least — rad count.” Your finger continues following the line as it begins to show an upwards trend, reaching its apex as the map shifts into the fourth quadrant. Then, the line stops, disappears completely. “As you can see, the radiation count clears itself completely off the map. Nothing. Not an ounce.” “A dead zone.” Driton says, thick, stubby fingers scratching idly at the corner of his jaw. “Impossible.” Thetis shakes her head, the soft light of realization coming to the edges of her eyes. Those eyes flick up to meet your gaze. “We know, indubitably, that there is a significant spread of corruption near the Thoosa Trench. I must apologize, Lieutenant. I hadn’t quite been able to visualize what was happening out there in these quadrants when we received your comm.” You are immensely grateful, suddenly, for the Thetis and lack of pride the woman possessed— so opposite to your own. [[The art of apologizing doesn’t come as easy to you as it does to the stiff-backed woman in front of you.|20]]

“What then,” Driton says, baleful mouth barely moving, “could account for the hole that we’re looking at now?” Distantly, in some far crevice in the back of her mind, you fee a pawn shink into place. The first move. “Well, Commander.” Ladon says, throwing his hands behind his head. There’s something vicious to the curve of his mouth when he speaks. A smile that is hungry. “I’d say it’s probably a mechanical issue.” A knight’s angled move. “Mm.” The commander makes a non-committal sound, a slow nod to his head, the way he might talk to a child. He already knows the answer to the question he asks next. “And which vessel produced these readings?” Admiral Thetis’s mouth is a drawn line and she says: “That would be the mecha Acheilus, Commander.” Her face does not give anything away but you can read through the mask clearly. The corner of her jaw flickers and a feeling that could only be identified as fright colors the insides of your stomach and makes you ill. The end is coming. The end is coming. The end is here. Commander Driton appears suddenly very interested in his notes before him, periodically flipping through the holo-pages as he speaks. “That’s the shark, correct?” “If you can call that rust bucket a shark.” Ladon says, rueful laugh shaking their side of the table. “That beast is older than the entire United Forces. Doesn’t surprise me his rad equipment shit out mid-mission.” “Acheilus—” you start but are cut off by the admiral’s silencing hand. “Here at Base Alpha we are sure to test each of our mech’s detection and munitions equipment. Mecha Acheilus underwent extensive testing procedures to make sure he was combat ready for the mission ahead of him and his pilot. His tests came back clear and there was nothing indicative of malfunction before he left our bay.” The admiral says, voice stoic and unflinching. If there was anything Thetis was going to tolerate, it would not be the disrespect of implying Base Alpha’s equipment was not up to par. “Still.” Driton folds his hands over his stomach. “Ladon is correct. My notes show that Acheilus predates The End, predates even The Abandonment. An artifact left over from the previous militant force. It might be wise to start thinking about recycling him to put our star pilot in a much better suited vessel.” “You’re kidding, right?” you say, a back-bite of a laugh stuck in the back of your throat, bitter and all consuming. Fear shapes your mouth and it moves quickly without your consent. “I mean, do you hear yourself? Suggesting to take Acheilus out of rotation? You know what enemy insurgents do when they see Acheilus? They turn tail and run the fuck home. It would be suicide for our main branches to not have him in action.” “Lieutenant —” “I have been patient, Commander. I have spilled obeisance from my fucking mouth — updated Acheilus to make him a war vehicle you thought worthy, repaired the parts myself when I was told by your Command that he was not up to code. It never proved to be enough,” you spit. “No more. The fact remains that Acheilus’s numbers are incomparable to that of any other UFRR mechas — especially that of the MKIII Ray fleet.” Your eyes meet Commander Driton’s head on, your mouth a vicious slant. “Let me make something clear. You recycle Acheilus, you recycle me. [[Watch how quickly the tides turn after I’m gone.”|21]]

You aren’t met with the anger you expect; no reddened face, demanding the stars off your uniform. The UFRR maintains a zero-tolerance policy of indiscipline but, Driton’s gaze is cool and in some ways it reminds you of a snake, the way his eyes flicker right before the bite. “You think very highly of yourself.” “Enough.” Those cool eyes flicker over to Thetis, an eyebrow raised. Again, anger is not present within the expanse of his face. There’s a soft light present, baked almost the same way curiosity looks. “You’ll excuse insubordination, Admiral?” Driton says, turning his body away from you. “You’ll protect a bucket of bolts in lieu of one soldier’s outburst, Thetis?” Anger will never be an emotion to grace Thetis’s face, but it will churn in the depths of her eyes, will twist her mouth. “Commander, what I will not excuse is libel.” The admiral says and you feel a grateful flush to the tips of your ears. “Commander, what I will not protect is an opinion from an enlistee who has never seen combat and a leading commander’s demands when he himself has not visited his sister branches in several years.” Driton ignores all of this. “I could outfit your pilot with something worthwhile. The Lt. could have anything, really. Ray, Squid.” He continues on as if the person he’s talking about isn’t sitting mere inches away. “The Lieutenant here the best pilot I’ve seen in my lifetime —” An undignified hacking-snort from Ladon. “Let’s offer something to actually work with here, for the Force.” “What my pilot wants is clear.” Admiral Thetis, Commandant of the United Forces of the Red Remembrance, says. “And that is end of discussion. Trust that my will is for the good of the Force. Do not forget that you are a guest here, Commander.” In one smooth motion, Fleet Commander Driton stands, lean and lethal. “And it’s been made obvious to me that I’ve overstayed my welcome.” Specialist Ladon rises beside him, a look upon his face that suggests unfathomably violent thoughts. “We’ll keep in touch, Admiral.” They leave with the careful hiss of the door sliding shut behind them. You wait several long seconds. "$first_name." A sigh. [[' "What were you thinking?" '|22]]

If you were a smidge less prideful, you’d admit to your admiral that there was a distinct lack of thinking that went into your outburst, that thought had been replaced by a rabid, scared dog with a severe separation anxiety. You would have apologized and wept your fears out on the table — you can’t lose Acheilus, can’t lose what you have so thoroughly imbedded your identity in. But you aren't, and instead you say this: “I was thinking that Fleet Commander Driton seems keen on taking your job.” The admiral lands heavily into the chair across you, muscles creaking as she rubs her eyes. “I had arrived to that same conclusion,” she admits. “There isn’t any other reason for his insistence. If we were to take out Acheilus and we started to lose ground against the insurgents —” “Which we would.” “Which we would.” Thetis nods her head, darkened eyes staring off into some far distance. “Our constituents would call for my removal, breach of duty. My seat would fall to the next in line and it would be his.” Something bright and full, like hope, flickers along the edge of your jaw and you fight to keep a smile off your face. Victory is the taste against your tongue as you say, “We must keep Acheilus in the playing field, Thetis. It isn’t even about his strength, really — it’s the image he presents. People know what the Red Remembrance is capable of when they see him in the water.” “I agree.” But there is still a blank look in Thetis’s eyes, one that you are wholly unfamiliar with and you settle back into the chair, crossing your arms over your chest, and watch. A slow loop starts to unfold in your mind, deliberate when it rewinds on the upticks of mouths and words, the anxious jiggling of your leg, Jonah’s face with a worried and stressed brow. The taste of this isn’t right. “Admiral,” you start, slowly and you get the distinct sensation that you’re still playing chess. “Admiral, that wasn’t — was that the only reason Commander Driton and Ladon came?” Did you see a flinch somewhere in Thetis’s face? “No, they come to discuss logistics. It was opportune that you were here as well, I suppose.” “Logistics for what?” And somehow, you know before you’re told. Can feel the end before it hits you, something omnipresent like a hushed secret you’ve overheard somewhere in passing. You know exactly what’s about to happen. [[Like it's already played out in front of you.|23]]

“You’ve been gone for a long time, for months.” Thetis says, mouth pulling down at the edges. “You have missed so much.” A steadying breath, like she’s preparing herself for some gruesome rebuff dealt from your hands. “We — fuck, I don’t know how to say this — we received a transmission from the Coalition of The Last Frontier two months back. They sent an inquiry about interest in trading with them. We said yes.” It doesn’t register with you at first, Thetis’s mouth moves strangely and it takes a second for your cerebellum to catch up. When it does, a sorry and hurt sound rises unbidden from your throat before you can stop it. “What.” The sound comes again and you’re forced to taste rot between your teeth, ash at the tips of your tonsils. A phantom touch of corruption curls itself against your back and burns. The safety ship glinting red and yellow against your eyes — it is hot, it is too hot — A dark hands grips into your chest that takes and takes and takes. “You’re fucking joking, right? There’s no way in hell you’d say yes to something like that. Not after The Abandonment. Not after everything.” There are several long seconds between the two of you, silence accentuated by quick pants of anger and something you refuse to name. Thetis, eventually, meets your eyes. Hers are pleading and soft and warm, despite this heretical sin, and her hands are spread wide. “Child, we’re dying.” You furiously blink salt away from your eyes, your face hot — the way it always is when you’re trying not to cry. “No, we’re not.” And it sounds more like: please don’t say that. “Our resources are drying up — we don’t have the numbers to produce the resources we need, and our technology is old… it’s a good deal, $first_name. It was more generous than anything; honestly it feels as though they’re doing us a service.” You grip a knuckle between your teeth and scrape against the calluses that have built up over the years of your incessant gnawing. Your voice sounds hollow when you speak next. “Why would they do that?” Thetis shrugs. “Some of our goods are lucrative to them, I’d imagine. Natural resources are probably hard to come by in the depths of space. Regardless, I need to ask a favor of you.” [[' - "What is it?" '|24what]] [[' - "Anything." '|24any]]

You ask and you are so very, very tired. <<include "24">>

You mean this. You do. You’d give anything, your life, your blood, for the Remembrance. It is all you have. <<include "24">>

“I need you to be there. Please. I know — I know, $first_name, you don’t have to look at me like that. They arrive in a few days, I need you there with me. If I’ve made a mistake, if I’ve doomed our bases and they decide to take advantage of us… I want them to see what they’d be up against.” [[Next|25]]

Seeing your room is not the comfort you were hoping for. It’s small for someone of your ranking and explicitly barren to the point of no recovery. There are several sharpened things in this room that you feel do not quite fit you entirely. Your bed frame, for example, glints a dangerous metal — the kind that promises a plethora of stubbed toes and scratched forearms. The windows to the outside are sharpened angularities that hurt your eyes upon first glance, so much so that you take to covering the pane with a sheet instead. The room is too bright to look at directly and smelling vaguely of cleaning mixtures and linen soaps. This is because you had commandeered a long-forgotten supply closet and mulishly shoved a twin-sized bed into the tight corners. You’d managed to tame a small dresser in here, as well. Admiral Thetis, aghast at the discovery of you having shoved yourself into a janitorial closet, vehemently denied you permission to continue sleeping in some half-remembered hallway of Base Alpha. But you had now been here for over ten years, the space made perfect to the best of your ability. It had been dark, overwhelmingly so, when you decided you couldn’t take any more of the rancorous silence from four hundred and ninety-nine ghosts sleeping above you in beds that have never been unmade and carpets that have never been stepped on. Each hollow crack of the building settling into the forever shifting sand proved to shock your blood to cancerous ice. You had rendered yourself insane by imagining the voices of old childhood recruits whispering next to your bed as they stood over you in sleep. Did they sneer at you? Did their teeth flash bright and loud in the darkness where you could not see? How envious are they of the breath that fills your lungs? One night — so sure that you would have bet Acheilus — you heard a low moan whimper your name, a phantom that glitched in and out of your periphery. You wasted no time in packing a few pairs of stiffened denim jeans left over from Pre-End, your standard issue maroon-hued bomber jacket — laden with thick patches — three uniforms, your busted journal, and stole away to Corridor E of Alpha’s spiderwebbed dome. In some small part of your brain, you admit to only yourself that you’re being ridiculous — weak — those were your dead brothers and sisters you had slept amongst and you should be fervent to honor their memory with your presence and duty. [[Every step you take is five hundred steps. Every breath you take is five hundred exhales of your brothers and sisters. Every kill is five hundred for the Red Remembrance’s safety and prosperity.|26]]

But, in the tight confines of your darkened, warmed closet, the breath that fans across your lips feel like your own. Here, your heartbeat does not signify four hundred and ninety-nine agonized and memorialized souls, it’s just your soft pump of tissue and blood. Yours alone. It is also here with a sick pleasure that you indulge in the temptation of contraband. The indulgence you crave wildly consist of a few funny magazines you’d found secreted away in Acheilus’s engine bay. The old man had blown a gasket or something as equally oily and cumbersome and in his great heart, tucked between greasy rods and an depleted tool box were two booklets of gossamer thin, crinkley paper that drew a soft smile to your face. [[ - One reads as: Gearhead’s Ultimate Guide to Classis Cars|car27]] [[ - One reads as: The Orchestral Bounty: A Guide to the Newest Instruments On the Market|music27]]

It shows boxy looking vehicles flying between two mountainous mesas. The other: Automobile and Road, Power Trio: Cars of the Future which sports a slicked ovular thing with wheels and plenty of neon blue lights. Once, you knew the publication date of each, but it had been rubbed off some time ago. <<include "27">>

The front page features a great beast of ebony and ivory, a piano on four legs that spans the breadth of an entire wall, shadowed by great lights upon a stage. It’s a musical catalog with varying offers of prices for used acoustic instruments and brass alike. Towards the back, there’s a few pages of free music samples. You run your finger over the inked musical notes, imagining the sounds they might’ve once made. Music is nonexistent in the spaces of the UFRR—so little time was allocated to even eating and sleeping; there could be no time for luxuries in the face of war. <<include "27">>

You’re beyond cautious as you finger through the well-worn pages, delicate and careful to turn them in a way that they won’t catch on your shirt. You hold it to your chest the way a child might. In some universe — some ruptured timeline — you would have invested yourself fully into this hobby. In a vaguely sacrilegious moment, in some forgotten world, you fantasize about a reality that no longer exists, that never will exist. There is a threatening oblivion, though, that exists in dreams, in sleep. There is a hunger associated with hope, the kind of hunger that gives way to starvation upon first waking from a deluded state of being. It is not every night. In fact, it is not most nights. Most nights see you dreaming of a boundless blue, strapped intimately within Acheilus’s hull, exploring the ocean and all its depths. But there are those rare nights that you dream of more. They come without explanation, in random intervals and bursts. It might be six months or two nights, but they’re always the same with slight variation. The play unfolds like this: It is cold, somehow, even with the sun licking itself along your skin. There is a wind off in the distance, but it does not—cannot—touch you. If you open your eyes, which you does every time, without fail, you’re rewarded with green you can’t possibly comprehend. Thickets of bush, bending trees, stalks of it under your hands. There’s someone in front of you, back turned away, walking away. A foreign figure that you have never seen before, yet somehow knows the taste of. She is the taste of gilted gluttony and the sin of a rising star. Red hair that curls gently to the mid-back, tanned skin golden in the sun. You are reminded that there’s something lovely about the color of desperation when it shades the images in front of your face. [[And you wake hungry|28]]

<<set $gamechapter = "Chapter Three">> “Lieutenant.” “Mm.” You sip protein sludge from your canteen. “I fail to see why this is necessary.” Your jaw ticks but you’ve already resolved yourself to showing the utmost amount of patience today. “I fail to recall asking your opinion, if I’m being frank.” Maybe you can try again tomorrow, actually. A huffy breath through the comms line. “I’m a combat medic. There’s a reason they’ve never stuck me in one of these things.” “Right. Combat medic.” You stress as if explaining a very complex topic to a toddler. “It’s there in the name.” “That doesn’t mean I see genuine combat.” You consider this, mouthing your drink between your teeth and say with no small amount of hauteur: “You’re right, Jonah. How stupid of me. It’s a better idea, next time we’re in the middle of a fight with enemy forces, for me to simply pause our bloodshed, pop my head out the window and say: ‘Hey there! Please don’t fire on our MedUnit! We’re shit out of luck if they die! Thanks!’ and hope they hold up the bargain.” Jonah ignores this but you hear a few other snickers coming from the other cadets on the comms line. Instead, Jonah grunts and you imagine the mass of him crammed inside the small training mecha you assigned him to for the exercises you’re leading today. Today’s schedule offered evasion maneuvers as a topic, but as it stands Acheilus is larger than the average pelagic white shark by at least a multiple of three. Evasion isn’t his forte, combat is. Jonah’s Ray starts to rock back and forth, surprised noises spill out of the receiver. “I can’t—damn!—I can’t get this thing to stabilize—fuck!” The mecha and its pilot lurch forward with a speed that suggests, somehow, Jonah had mistaken the acceleration for the stabilization button. Acheilus, whose talents do not lie in quick, sharp movements, has to quickly roll out of the way, in danger of being hit by a wayward mech. “Easy, Jonah!” you say, yanking Acheilus upright again. “He’s quite literally priceless.” “You should never have put me in this thing!” “Jonah,” you sigh in a tone that suggests patience has long since fled the premises. “The stabilizer is to your right, an orange button— the only orange button— click that. It’s not hard, it’s been labeled.” “Oh.” Jonah says with genuine understanding, no ounce of humiliation present, despite your best efforts. “Oh. Yes, that made everything so much easier.” His mecha rights again, immediately compensating for the turbulent waters threatening to topple him over again. Of course, your cadets were having no such problem with this rudimentary skill. “Jeez, Jonah.” A smaller voice crinkles, almost shyly, through the comms. “We learned that on the first day of training. I was maybe eight!” Cadet Isla punctuates this with a laugh. “You should have seen yourself just then!” “Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up.” Jonah says, but you know he’s smiling with his teeth. “Stick me in an emergency room with no problem. But out here? I don’t know how you guys do it.” “Enough messing around,” you switch Acheilus to an overhead view. It takes a few moments for his screen to flicker from shades of grays into staticky color. A few meters above swim robots roughly the size and shape of a large squid. The deadened heart of the sun glimmers to a pin-prick point through the water. “Those are your targets. Take them out without detection. If you alert them to your presence, they will fire on you. Go.” You mute your comm and shift Acheilus into combat mode. Out from under his pectoral fins, heavy rotary guns shink into place, the windows out of his gill slits thunk over with armored sheets. The cabin lights dim to a crimson, filling your vision with red. “How do you want to play this, squad leader?” Another young voice crinkles through the receiver. You know him vaguely as a convert from the MedUnit—incredibly young, easily molded, but could not get past soldiers throwing up radiation gunk. They transferred him to see if he has a taste for blood, instead. He’s nine, the last you had checked. “Yes, someone please tell me what to do.” “The way we always do.” Isla ignores Jonah on principle. “They’re above us, so we’ll flank underneath. Hit ‘em hard and fast. Make sure they don’t get the chance to retaliate.” A pause. “Jonah, you’re just going to have to stay in my back pocket.” You’re inarguably impressed with Isla— there hasn’t been this much ferocity present in a pilot since, well… Stiffened halls smelling of sulfur and corruption, water bursting through bolts. Bright blue neon fires. Choking, gagging on the smell of burning decay— [[Your hands shake|29]]

You suck your teeth and maneuver silently into position. It’s a situation that only calls for three clean shots, quick enough to be undetected but not too fast as to trigger the detection clusters. Simple enough for Jonah to have been able to understand how to, at the very least, fire a gun and aim. Really, you’d made it very easy for him for his first time out. You thought it generous. In the end, Isla and her squad have something to prove. Isla spins her mech into a tight, spiral roll, fins having rolled into themselves. The other two members of her squad follow suit, slipping into a well-versed triangular formation. Jonah sort of wobbles somewhere behind them. It’s over in a quickened flash, a stun bolt fired in two-two succession paralyzes the first drone. The next moments are masterful, so quick that even you feel a twitch to your mouth. “Up and out!” Isla directs and then drops. At the same time, the other two members of her squad rise and level themselves to the eyesight of the drone. You watch as their skin flickers a yellow, then highlights in an alarmed red. The drones load their guns, clank the ammunition into place. Ping! Ping! And then both drones freeze and die, suspended, weightless. Isla’s crew drops to meet you. “Good.” You unmute yourself. “But you forget something.” “What—oh shit—“ “Who’s covering your MedUnit?” You smile, all teeth, all jaw and flickers, then fires. “Wait! $first_name!” But a stun bolt leaves Acheilus’s hidden canon and slams enthusiastically into Jonah’s toddling-sized Ray. It hits him so hard and fast that at first it ricochets off the armored underbelly and shoots off into some far distance of the ocean, doubtless to remain unrecovered. At first, it looks like it doesn’t do anything to him. His Ray stills into a stance that reads as mildly confused, his angled pectoral wing flapping softly. Then it seizes. It sticks on the uplift, creaks and moans. A hoarse and pained yell comes from Jonah’s end of the line before it cuts out entirely. He starts to roll into soft summersaults. “Then,” You turn and face Squad Six, Acheilus’s great mouth shuttering to a close. “Then there’s a fourth person you didn’t account for. They took your MedUnit. Even if you get away, even if you incapacitate this unknown person, there will be a fifth. There will be a sixth. And you will die because you have let your support fall in battle. You have failed your brothers and sisters because you got careless. Do you understand me?” [[It is three voices that intone back but it sounds like four hundred and ninety-nine. “Yes, Lieutenant.”|30]]

“Good. Alright, let’s get the good doctor back to Base.” You mute your comm again and let out a haphazard breath. Acheilus greets her by way of brightening the cabin lights, dimming them again—their personal secret, the way most people have inside jokes and handshakes. Manipulating the lights is his way of telling her ‘Hello. I’ve missed you. I’m here. I’m here.’ “Hey, boy.” You mess with your hair—it’s getting longer than you normally like to keep it. “I’ve missed you more. I’ve missed you most.” A sudden bout of nervousness rears its ugly head, horns scraping the back of your throat, before you can stifle it again. You cough it away and rub your hand against Acheilus’s dashboard. “What did you think of the training session today? Isla’s getting really good.” A curt, rueful laugh. “She’ll be a good replacement when we fall in battle, huh boy?” Acheilus groans, a deep pinging sound something within him. A question: what’s wrong? “Nothing!” You snap, teeth flashing and you withdraw your hands. But you knew it was much too fast, that you had protested much too quickly. Acheilus says nothing in wake of this. Another nervous tick of biting your knuckles, scraping at them with your teeth. “You know, I—“ A deep breath in, out. “Look—I’m getting… about the Coalition. It just seems… I mean, why now?” Acheilus rumbles a groan. Another question. [[ - Answer it.|31answ]] [[ - Leave it be.|31noansw]]

"After twenty years, why reach out now? Why not in the beginning when we were starving, when our people were dropping dead in the middle of the night? I don’t—I don’t, it just seems so… I mean, what the fuck? What the fuck!” <<include "31">>

You don’t say anything—it’s just not worth it. But Acheilus knows you better than you know yourself. <<include "31">>

Patience in all things. “I know.” You drop your head into your hands. “I know.” You don’t have to be scared. “Really. I’m not scared.” You explain it away, flicking your hand in the air as if brushing the issue away entirely. “How could I be when I have you? I’m uneasy, I suppose.” Just that morning, Admiral Thetis spilled from her mouth the news, like rotted blood, over the daily announcement hologram. She was stiff-mouthed and firm-jawed, eyes betraying nothing as she spoke words you knew would rock the very foundations of the Red Remembrance. It came like an avalanche, all cold and shocking sores with whispered agonies that set people’s teeth on the knife thin edge of fury. From your place behind the projector, you watched as Admiral Thetis’s hands closed into a fist. You remember the end. You remember everything after, too. Old enough to remember the district sting of radiation blooming against your skin, old enough to remember the dead smoldering beneath your feet, kicking away the skulls of people you had once known—but, still, you were so young. There are still those who exist, like Admiral Thetis, Driton, various other high-ranking officers who had lived Pre-End. They had lives, once; happy, little homes that opened themselves up and lovely families who had hopes and dreams beyond their spouse’s military career. You had made the lone mistake of asking Thetis about her life Pre-End, about her family, about the crow’s-feet markings on her face that suggested she had, at least, let out a guffaw twice in her life. The look that ghosted over Thetis’s face is one that you still see in your night-terrors. You are first-gen, but not in the same way your seniors are. They remember the end, but they remember everything before, too. Losing a home you had never known did not hurt as bad as losing a home you had only ever known. Thetis made that distinction very clear to you. There was, of course, extreme upset at her news. Some outspoken denials stemming from the first-gens who had suffered The Abandonment. Those who had bore very real witness to the people who now call themselves the Coalition of the Last Frontier packing up all their safety-ships and fucking off to space with the remnants of humanity left behind. You had, on purpose, avoided the chow hall earlier that morning as to not be bothered by unnecessary questions, or worse, calls for Thetis’s immediate removal of office. Most vitriol coming from the hateful mouths of the second-generation were vaguely funny to you, but the loyalty was commendable, to a degree, just not when it encroached on their loyalty to Admiral Thetis. [[Next|32]]

“I know some of you are probably very upset with the news.” Thetis had explicated an understatement of boundless capacity. “However, I will need your trust now, more than ever before. Trust that my will is for the good of the Remembrance, trust that my decision is for the safety and prosperity of the Remembrance and its people. If you have any questions, please feel free to visit me to discuss them. For now, and always: Forsaken but free.” Forsaken but free. But where did freedom live in these hollows, a space forever more being permeated with rot and radiation? Where was the sense of prosperity when you sign off on a hundred dead of your own nearly every week, bodies too infected with corruption, too malnourished? It occurs to you that it makes sense the Coalition has goods to trade—they stole everything when they left the surface. They have the numbers, have the resources to build an empire in space, completely untouched by radiation, untouched by the horrors of starvation and gore and death. They’re probably all corruption free and you rot at the thought, your hands clenching tight around Acheilus’s control column. It all makes sense now, they’ve come to gloat, they’ve come to claim victory in this war of survival, offer a mocking hand to the dying UFRR out of pity— pity like how a dog is offered half-rotted meat from behind a dumpster. [[Admiral Thetis just offered them supplication, showed the Coalition their belly, ready and waiting for the knife.|33]]

You would have understood, perhaps, if the UFRR had declared Dark Times, if there was a launched distress beacon for immediate aid and the Coalition—out of some semblance of guilt—came to their aid. If it were only Thetis and a handful of cadets left and Base Alpha was under attack from pirates and you had given your life in battle in the name of the Force—maybe you might, then under those circumstances, understand Thetis’s acceptance of the Coalition. But, as far you’re aware, none of those things have occurred. So why? Why open the Remembrance’s veins at the feet of the galactic titan? Trust that my decision is for the safety and prosperity of the Remembrance and its people. [[Forgiveness is easy, trust is something else entirely.|34]]

It is much later when you resurface your face in the halls of Command Alpha. You sat with Acheilus for a long time in that warm dark and tell him stories of before, stories he’d heard countless times but never denied you your remembrance. You had flipped through crusting magazines and told him of the research your father did, of your mother’s careful and cautious hands. Of their love, of their sacrifice. You told him things he already knows with such a great frequency that his computers can predict the words coming from your mouth, and he lets you because are nothing without your memories. In return, he shared some of his: old video archives he’d found somewhere along the main-frame of his computing system — a relic of long ago and nothing at all familiar to him. He threw it on the holo-screen when he felt you growing distant talking about your parents, when you had mused too long about how they would have liked the ocean, how you hoped they’re proud of you now. It was him, in some other life, some other time, when his eyes weren’t as clear as they are now, when he didn’t hold so many weapons on him, when he wasn’t outfitted with sonic-boosters and armored plating. When his pilot didn’t know the taste of blood. It’s him and another person — a man he no longer recalls— near the bottom of a bright-blue ocean, tropical reefs and purple and orange hued fish that have long since been labeled extinct. Your eyes reflect the ultramarine and turquoise blues, eyebrows devoid of any sadness, mouth soft. You watched the golden and black striped fish flinch away from Acheilus’s mouth, watched as he takes scans of this old world that no longer exists. Then, towards the right bottom of the screen, a shadow appears. It’s small at first, innocuous, but grows steadily into the frame. A shape very much like his own appears. Blackened, empty eyes. Wide opened, bloody mouth, viscera trailing as little remora desperately grasp for the crumbs. You, always and without fail, sucked in a breath when the great white appears. The man in his cabin, in his memory, sucks in a breath along with you. It moves like a phantom, the quick and vicious snap of her caudal tail reading almost as irritation, the warning curl of her teeth and gum, the quick slide of eyelid over her obsidian eyes. Acheilus is too close, too strange for her comfort. [[ “Okay, girl.” The man in the video chuckles. “Okay, we’ll leave you to it.” And the video shuts off|35]]

“Do you have any more?” You asked, an empty feeling leaving its residue behind—a mix of relief and heartache. Acheilus will never understand why you don’t voice what you want. He knows you really mean: please show me more. The screen flickers back up, slow to start up. Different colors take shape in the darkness of your eyes, soothing, calmer ones. Look. And instead of a gasp, you let out all the air in your lungs, as if punched. Acheilus has watched this film many times on his own, when he’d been left in idle mode while others cleaned his teeth of gore and wiped the blood clean from his guns. It’s a man, curling hair dark and thick pushed up by horn-rimmed glasses. His smile is soft, teeth barely showing over the edge of his lip. Brows that always seemed to show sense of urgency, of latent sadness. His jeans are dirty, t-shirt afflicted with baker’s collar, but his hands hold steady a child no older than two years of age. They’re in a cabin that is all too familiar — thick beams of metal, industrialized flooring, the very same analog nodules and control columns that exist within him now. Acheilus watches the inside of himself from decades earlier, when the technology inside his guts were groundbreaking, state of the art research equipment, larges screens that shone as futuristic then that now stands decrepit. “Look, $first_name.” The man whispers to the child in his arms. Acheilus has long forgotten who he is. “His name is Acheilus. Can you say that? Try, love.” The child bubbles and giggles, tiny, fat fist grabbing at some buttons on the dashboard. Your eyes were brighter then, less haunted, less tired, less hungry. You are always hungry. The recording stops, pauses on your father’s smiling face, the dimples cleft in his chin that matches your own to a startling accuracy. You sit. You stare. [[And your shark, your only friend, waits, lets you be still, lets you simmer.|36]]

The dining facility is mostly empty save for a few soldiers that turn their heads away from you, cadets you know that are trying to get into the pilot program, and Jonah. Jonah bolsters a smile your way, hand raised in a semblance of a hello. You head his way after grabbing a few nutrient bars off the heat table. “Hey there, Lt.” Jonah smiles again, protein sludge and algae pulp mixed together on his tray. He spoons some into his mouth. “Food’s not that great today.” You snort because the food is not great any day. “So, just how bad is it?” “Oh.” A sigh. Another spoonful of muck. Jonah pops a few carb pills before settling back onto the bench. “You know. Not super awesome.” A pause. Two. A beat that stretches out, out, out and snaps back violently. “There’s been… several calls for her impeachment.” “Oh, but we knew that already.” You punctuate this with a laugh that aches. And all at once you become a wound, salt packed into the sides of a thickening laceration. Your teeth rot with betrayal, blood running hot with an anger you don’t know how to name. Horrible, awful thoughts solidify briefly into your head before you shake them out. It’s easier to give way to loyalty, to obligation. In the end, you will be there to support Thetis no matter the outcome, no matter the decisions made in the absence of thought. You owe Thetis your life. But before you give it, the least you can do is offer devotion. Jonah looks at you then. For a long, long time. His eyes follow as you pick at the crumbs of a vaguely gray nutrient bar, rolling the crumbs between your fingers but never taking a bite. You never look up to meet those black-pit eyes, eyes that remind you of soil, of dirt of the surface, but you feel their burn, cataloging your every move. Eventually, slowly, he asks: “How did the meeting go?” You flick the bar from your hands. It falls against the foil packaging. “Oh. You know. Not super awesome.” You cross your arms over your chest, jacket bunching at the elbows. “I knew exactly how it would play out—could feel it— Fleet Commander Driton made his distaste of Acheilus very clear.” “You know why they want him gone, right?” “Of course I do.” Acheilus represents an uncontrollable. A variable they never accounted for in the early days of the establishment of the Red Remembrance. Found in a forgotten hallway of some off-coast research facility, Acheilus sat and dusted with age. They’d found blueprints for his skeleton, data reports of his power and speed, change logs authored by someone who had, hastily, slotted guns and munition storage inside the walls of something once meant to blend in to deep waters. But he didn’t work. He refused to power on, even with keys in the ignition, power flowing to his battery stores. Another year of trying to discover the secret to powering on what could have been an incredible asset to the newly-born militant force had hallmarked failure to an embarrassing degree. Eventually, the shark was marked up to be torn down for scrap metal. Nobody had expected this beast of old to resurrect at your five-year-old soft-palmed touch. “Without you, they can’t pilot him. Without you, they’d lose this war. They cannot control you both. I think it scares Driton to no end knowing that when you die, Acheilus will, too.” “It’s more than that.” You shake your head. “I was mostly joking when I brought it up to the admiral but—well, I’m not so sure it doesn’t have merit.” “What do you mean?” Jonah says, mouthing more sludge-concoction. “He wants Thetis’s job, Jonah,” You say. “He’s playing this—this game of chess with her. Trying to get her to slip, trying to initiate a fall. Maybe that’s-" [[ - “why she’s pulling such drastic measures,” you frown, shrugging. “Lord help me, but I don’t understand why we’ve reached such lows, here and now. We’ve done fine so far without the help of the Coalition.”|37]] [[ - “why she took the deal. It makes so much sense. He must have made Thetis accept, knowing it would end her reputation.”|37]]

Instead of the excitement and outrage you were expecting from Jonah, his face shutters over to a careful blankness, devoid of any real emotion you can parse out. Dread kicks at your heart from the expression, confusion shaping your brow. “I never do expect much from Alpha soldiers, but you too?” “Jonah. Speak clearly. Use your words.” “Have you ever been out to the outer bases, Name?” Jonah says, arms stiff, fingers splayed out. “Upsilon? Omega?” At your silence, he continues. “They’re hurting. Bad. You think our people here at Alpha are in trouble? You have no idea—no, do not interrupt me— you have no idea the kind of hurt they have going on out there, so far away from everything, everyone.” He stands, shoving his half-eaten tray towards you. It sloshes over the sides and sticks to the table. “Nobody here cares about the wealth Alpha sits on. I had expected better of you, more of you.” [[ - Guilt floods and rots in your chest, shame bursting against your cheeks.| 38]] [[ - Anger flushes through your system, rotting you from the inside out.| 38]]

Jonah walks away and you sit under the flickering cafeteria lights for a long, long time after that. [[Next|39]]

howdy there! thanks so much for checking this out <3 this is currently a work in progress, and I only have the first three chapters to proffer to you; if you liked it, please let me know! and if you liked it enough, find me on my [[tumblr|https://blood-teeth.tumblr.com/]] to follow the project and ask questions.

Thetis stands tall in a room of ten. Broad back to the flickering blue holograph projector. Your eyes catch on the slow frames that shiver each second. Buzzt. It sounds, static along the walls. Buzzt. Buzzt. “Here’s how it’s going to play out.” Admiral Thetis is saying, but your eyes are glued to the projection. It’s a picture of earth, the surface. Holy whirls of greens and blues glisten in your eyes—a visage you’ve never experienced before. It is beautiful in the way the sky spins, how the stars darken and reappear every few moments. It is beautiful in the shake of the leaves on the tree, the bend to their branches. “We’ll be here,” Thetis continues. Ten red figures appear on the screen, near a dock of some sort. They’re denoted by rank in symbols above their head. You watch the one with the three stars move to stand next to the character with a rhombus backed by a leafed corona. You and Thetis were to take the front, introductory row, it seems. “They’ll come down from the cluster of Leo.” A blue, ovular shape descends from the stars, settling a several yards away from where the Remembrance’s claret tokens stand. “Now, I don’t know how many of them will be attending,” Thetis admits, motioning the blue oblong. “They had been rather vague… but what is for certain is General Gallagher will greet us at the borders.” Buzzt. The projector flicks to a new screen. A man with kind, russety brown eyes accented with laugh lines and a strong jaw fill the wall. Red hair graying at the temples, a mouth that never seems to point down. General Seamus Gallagher frames the bottom of his picture alongside the crest of the Coalition of the Last Frontier. “We’re familiar with each other,” Thetis says. “We served together during the War of the Red End.” His eyes are kind, you think. His mouth looks like he’s smiled before. A few sucking breaths, several signs of the cross. The War of the Red End. The War of the Red Death, the war to end humanity. Most of the first-gens flinch at the name, smoke filling their lungs, a shake to their hands. They remember the end, they remember the war that took everything from them. You sit carefully still and your cadence is carefully measured when you speak. “Which units will be in attendance?” Was the twist to the admiral’s mouth nervousness? “The MKIII fleet, for sure. Their data has been improving over the past several months. We’ll have the Goliath convoy, too.” The other nine of the inhabitants of the room suddenly look everywhere else, far away from you and the dawning horror, away from the stubborn clench to Thetis’s jaw. They flip through booklets, the meager dossier of the Coalition, whisper low to each other in the long seconds it takes for your mind to process what you’re being told. “Acheilus.” It’s supposed to come out as a question, without the acerbic bite on the end. It doesn’t. It comes out hot and fast and rushes, flitting anger behind your eyelids. It comes as a demand. “Will not be in attendance, Lieutenant.” [[End of demo!|enddemo]]