Here's part one: http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=301044
Changes In The Wind – Prologue pt2…
Dark and decaying… the spaceport had once been a shining example of a new age. Talos was a system in the Tiarga sector which was once the newest community of planets colonisation effort but the Supernova changed everything. The nano robotic neural interface systems that controlled everything from lights to space navigation of capital ships overloaded catastrophically. While the nanos themselves immediately repaired themselves but with no other instructions they then fell inert and with it so did all the technology that they supported. In the aftermath engineers and technicians managed to jerry rig manual controls and systems and regain limited control over technology but the nanite network was beyond them. It seemed dead. In the decades afterwards most people abandoned the factories and spaceport for a simpler life free from malfunctioning technology and food rationing. My father and mother had joined the Argon exodus into the plains and valleys of the south. My father’s farm was considered to be ridiculously far north! Many cattle farmers scoffed at his lean muscular cows. That is until they tasted their meat and drank their cream… if my father had settled further south few would argue that he would be a cattle baron by now. My mother was different from everyone… it wasn’t just that one day she got up out of her chair and simply walked out never to be seen again… it was what she said.
When I was growing up going to school was hard! Everyone knew of the ‘blaze of madness’ my mother’s crazy psychosis was well know, they say she was once a navigator and that her consciousness was connected to the nanites when the shockwave hit… they also say she didn’t disconnect and ‘weathered’ the storm to land safely where so many others crashed and perished. They say she was a hero but what sort of hero loses her mind? What sort of hero do people see and walk the other way to avoid. And then as I grew up my hair moved further and further from reddish blonde into deeper shades of blood red until it was unmistakable. It might be unique… but I hated it. I had seen pictures of my mother from her youth… she her hair was a rich dark brunette, but within days of the supernova her hair began to change… as if the supernova was showing itself on her. When I was born people said I was an abomination... Now I stood in the dirty entrance courtyard to a broken city of desperate spacers and fanatical engineers. The great spires that lead up to the docking platforms looked almost derelict with only the lower levels still in use. Everywhere seemed to be caked in a muddy black substance, within a few steps my shoes were filthy with who knows what! While at home I could expect to attract attention, here despite my hair I seemed to blend in. As I stepped towards the trading quarter I revelled in my anonymity. The silvery towers may have fallen but the city was very much alive!
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HA! This one was crafty! My shift had passed like paint drying! My thoughts drawn back again and again to the redhead and her shimmering nanites, the more I thought of her the more questions came into my head. I had seen Split females dye their hair that colour but that colour was no mere dye job it was unmistakably natural, I had checked the ID database… none had any colour like it. Not even close. Then there was her moving nanites… lots of people had nanites in them. Yes common… so long as you’re over fifty and not born on the planet. This Argon was young, or else she was very pretty for her age... my instincts told me that something was very wrong with this picture. I hadn’t taken much to track her passage through the space port… a beggar will tell you anything for a few credit chips and no one could miss seeing a redhead walking through the slums and towards the trade quarter. When I caught up with her, she had rented a small room in a small Teladi boarding house, she was certainly no trader! The dumpy landlady had extorted from her a pretty credit for was little better than the slums that she had walked through. I sat myself in a café overlooking the door and settled down for a long wait.
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The sea shimmered a slivery light quietly whispering softly as it washed over me. I lay on a beach of grey sand letting the wispy smoky liquid wash over me. The sky was full of colourful stars of all shapes and sizes from glittering sparkles to fiery balls of plasma that seems to singe the very corners of my consciousness. It was very cool and clear, there seems to be more clarity than looking through my own eyes. The dream seemed endless. As I awoke the bed seemed to swirl into existence around me but that clarity didn’t seem to fade right away, I slipped out of bed and into my clothes, then as I reached the door I realised I should open my eyes, the clarity vanished replaced with my seemingly less colourful mundane vision I tried to close my eyes again but that clarity of vision was gone.
As I slipped down for breakfast I was greeted by Mrs Tomacot IV, her green scale plate fluttered kindly as she fussed about me handing me a small mug of sweet tea and a little plate of eggs on toast. At first I was sceptical but I found myself suddenly hungry. Just as I had emptied my plate Mrs T. rushed in carrying a half wrapped bundle of tartlets and cheese scones fresh from the oven, “jusssst a little snack for when you are ouuut exxxxporing the ccssccity!” as I slipped my coat on I noticed that it was clean and beautifully mended. I thanked her for her hospitality assuring her as she I would be back at 6oclock sharp for dinner. As I slipped out into the chilly morning air my breath hung heavy on the air, my plan was to head towards the memorial museum. On all my other visits to the spaceport I had been too busy with my father at market to actually sight see and seeing as my father had pressed almost a whole years salary into my hands as he had pushed me out the door I was determined to enjoy myself at least slightly he owed me at least that considering the stress he’d caused me! As I stepped into the grand old building it’s fine lines and twisting spires reaching up into the sky I couldn’t help but be awed by the intricacy of the architecture.
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The Redhead seemed dither her way round the city! Walking aimlessly this way and that looking at things! At first I thought she may have been drugged by the grumpy old Teladi maid! But then she finally made her way to the museum to the supernova. At last! Something understandable! Virtually everyone who visits the city eventually ends up here! Then as she walked into the nanite exhibit it happened…
What do you think? Better?
