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Adlez smirked. “Wine huh? You’re making this too easy...” She drinks more wine.
"Hey, I would get vodka, but this is a mess hall on a ship in the middle of the galaxy. I think wine is the best we're going to get." Markos says, grinning and downing his whole glass.
"So while we're here in a drinking competition, want me to give you that rundown on Byzantine History?"
"Why, yes, actually," Ariana said. "Most of the upcoming Carolinian presidential candidates have expressed their desires to expand our influence to into different planetary systems, even the Green Party," Ariana said, chuckling at the thought. "I would've begun ventures into space, but I've already tried to complete so many infrastructure projects in general that it'd just be too much at that point. Luckily, most of them are just about finished, so my successor won't have to worry too much."
Ariana then had a brilliant idea. She gave a slight grin and sipped some sweet tea before continuing. "Perhaps we could arrange some joint space research project between our two nations? We could help each other expand."
TRIGGER WARNING: DISTURBING CONTENT AHEAD.
Agent Clarke walked around the loading area, observing the interior of the trucks' cargo boxes. He found more containers similar to the ones inside of the truck from earlier. He could not tell if these particular containers even had specimens inside them.
A thought bugged him, though. Were these specimens artificially created? There's no way they wouldn't be, right? Why else would they have such uniform names? The names were more like numerical labels. Perhaps the specimens were made in numerical order? One experiment after another. How many could there be? Were these organic animals that were experimented on by the Portinabians? Or were these completely new creatures made in artificial wombs? Can DNA even be artificially created?
"Hey! Scientist!" A voice called in german.
Clarke was frozen, afraid. Did they find him out? The most he could do is feign ignorance. Clarke turned around and saw that it was a soldier standing on the loading platform. She was tan with black hair, obviously of Latin-American descent. She carried a standard-issue assault rifle of the Portinabian Military. She looked exhausted and just generally fed up with whatever the world has dished out to her. The way she stared down at him as if he was a mere morsel. All around, she was intimidating. Clarke had to play his cards right.
"What are you doing, digging around the trucks. Someone already came by for an inspection," the soldier said, glaring at him with blazing suspicion.
"Really? Someone told me to inspect the drive trains of these trucks. He didn't tell me how many, so I just figured I'd make myself useful." Clarke responded. He was playing it cool. He had to lest he gets shot.
The soldier muttered something to herself, in Spanish this time. Although he didn't know Spanish, he did know that she mentions something about commanders being idiots.
She switched back to German to address Clarke.
"There's too many of you inspecting the trucks. You don't even look like you know what you're doing."
Crap! Clarke thought to himself. He hoped she wasn't going down the path he thought she was.
"No, not really. I know little about vehicles. They hired me as a... biologist." Clarke said, chuckling. He stumbled over his words, but she didn't seem to notice.
"Oh. You're new, hm?" The soldier said. She seemed to loosen up a bit, perhaps taking some pity on him. "Do you know where the lab is, then?"
Clarke pretended to look slightly confused as he analyzed the entire facility trying to the path he had to go. "Not really. I was originally stationed outside of Galizeland. I don't know why but-"
The soldier interrupted him. "I don't need your life story. Take the elevator behind me down to floor G3. Find the hallway labeled "laboratory." I'm sure the people there will give you a task to do." she said.
"Thank you," Clarke said quickly. If he spent any longer talking to her, she'd probably kill him out of annoyance. She gave her hand out to give him a boost up the loading platform. After hoisting him up, she gave him a blank disapproving stare. Upon close inspection, he could see she had a 1st Sergeant rank. He did not want to have a run-in with her again.
"Don't let me catch you 'inspecting' the trucks down here again," she warned. And without another word, she walked away.
Clarke looked around, spotting the elevator the 1st Seargeant had mentioned. He quickly walked to it and followed the 1st Sergeant's instructions. He took the elevator deeper underground to where the laboratory was. And when the doors finally opened, Clarke was stunned. It was a relatively open area, similar to that of a zoo exhibit. Instead of families happily observing foreign animals, it was nameless scientists, jotting notes and doing weird experiments on unrecognizable creatures.
It was disconcerting what was happening down here. These creatures looked unholy. Most of them were pigments of white and gray, but that was about all these creatures shared. Most resembled grotesque versions of average animals. One creature, currently being injected with needles, resembled a horse without a tail or mane. It had long legs on which it rested on. Its teeth were perpetually exposed, similar looking to that of a snarling dog. It also appeared to be missing eyes, but you could see empty sockets where eyes should've been. The thing was disgusting to watch.
To his left, Clarke saw weird humanoid-like creatures. They had small bodies complete with stubby legs. But abnormally long arms that they used to drag themselves across their exhibit. Their heads were large and bulbous, with dark blue, insect-like eyes. Their mouths were circular, with a disgusting mix of fangs and flat teeth aligning the interior of its mouth. Clarke stopped to look at these horrible monstrosities. There were three in this tank. One huddled itself in a corner, facing away from Clarke; another was feasting on what appeared to be a Capybara carcass. It used its hands to tear into the Capybara's body and consumed internal organs and red meat. The last creature just simply stared towards the observation area. It didn't seem interested in Clarke at all. It just stared blankly. Clarke could see dried blood along its arms and around its mouth. Its stubby feet had dark spots, perhaps bruises surrounding it. Clarke didn't know how, but he knew this thing was in pain.
He looked at the exhibit, noting the number of this creature. PoI-25. He looked around him. The exhibits weren't arranged in numerical order—what a strange design.
Clarke continued to walk around, discovering more disturbing creatures. They varied quite a lot. Some of the specimens were plants of some sort. Some were insects. Some were disgusting creatures, an actual sin against nature. Others appeared to be normal creatures that were currently being experimented on by scientists.
Clarke couldn't help but be disgruntled and fascinated by the whole thing. He noticed that the higher the numbers were, the more "intact" the unique creatures seemed to be. They were more coherent, some even resembling things that nature herself would've potentially made. PoI-241, for example, was some type of large bird. It stood like an owl-it was taller than Clarke Himself. It was a dark brown color with four wings—two main wings and two much smaller wings that seemed to be extra maneuverability. The bird had two eyes on each side of its head, meaning it had four total. Its beak was a bright red-purple color, and it fed on melons being given to it by scientists dressed in protective suits. It was someone beautiful of a creature. Though it definitely could be a weird hodgepodge of Vulture, Owl, Peacock, Tucan, and whatever other potential birds could be in its DNA.
All of a sudden, a blaring alarm went off. Flashing red lights replaced the fluorescent lighting of the lab. Someone's voice yelled through a loudspeaker.
"Attention all capable personnel. Please report to Sector B, holding 59. A specimen has become aggressive and must be terminated effective immediately."
Clarke didn't even want to even think about what could be happening. As guards, scientists, and other various workers ran in certain directions, Clarke could only stand in a sea of confusion, unsure what to do with himself. But amongst all the chaos, he spotted scientists exiting a room labeled with "Sector C Archive." He could probably get crucial information in there.
Without thinking, Clarke made his way to the door as everyone else rushed past him. He slipped into the slightly open door, making sure to close it and lock it. Hopefully, nobody saw him.
The room was brightly lit and filled with desks, counters, and tall computer cabinets. But what caught Clarke's eye was a holographic map of the world, which depicted various red dots peppered across every continent. Although many countries had no dots, Portinabia itself had potentially hundreds. Portinabia's bordering neighbors also had dots within their territories. Lambrina, Amazonia, Incan Empire, and Darien all had at least 15, although theirs were generally concentrated along their border with Portinabia.
Clarke touched one of the dots, and all of a sudden, a screen of information popped up. It depicted a specimen, complete with pictures, exact coordinates, times and dates, descriptions, and more. From what he could gather, it was a whole world archive of creatures found outside the laboratory. How these creatures could get out of their confinement confused Clarke. Though perhaps it could be primarily through transit or maybe tests gone wrong?
On the map, there were dots in places as far away as Asia. And some were dated to have been found as far back as the 20th century! But the thought dawned upon him. North America. Quickly, Clarke brought the map of North America up on the main screen. The digital borders rendered before his eyes revealing a surprisingly small amount of dots on the continent. However, what caught his eye was the New united carolinas. He was relieved to only find one specimen within the nation's pistol-shaped borders. Though he was curious about what the specimen is or how it got there in the first place. He clicked the dot, which pulled up a more detailed depiction of the area where the specimen had been found. What Clarke saw next terrified him.
Morehead City, Carolinian outer banks. Earlier this year, in March 2152. The specimen was simply PoI-003. This particular specimen was created in the late 20th century by the original occupants of this lab. The creature was like a worm, only branded with what appeared to identification numbers. These worms carried a particular pathogen known to cause intense aggression in any animal they were to infect. Before the government took over the lab, the previous occupants had created these worms and then released them into the wild with no discernable motives. However, they have had plenty of time to spread and reproduce, albeit it a slow process for these artificially created creatures.
A dead shark had washed up on the shores of the Carolinian Outerbanks. Scavenger animals had their fair share of the shark carcass, which would eventually be found by local animal control. However, upon autopsy by animal control, pathologists found these tapeworms and the infected bacteria they hosted within the shark's brain and other parts of the shark's body.
That was most of what Clarke could gather. There was still more information, but he decided to download the whole file into a portable flash drive, among other examples of specimens this lab had lost and recovered. There was no doubt the Carolinian government had to hear about this. It had been many months since this incident has passed. Who knows how far the disease could've spread by this point?
Once the download was finished, Clarke snuck out of the Archive Room. The hallways were empty. Everyone seemed hyper fixated on whatever happened in Sector A. Now was Clarke's chance to escape. Quickly he retraced his steps, trying to find emergency steps. He doubted that after such an emergency, the elevators would be working. He pulled his lab coat over his head to hide from potential cameras, considering he was no longer among a sea of scientist personnel. He couldn't stop running.
In time, he found emergency evacuation steps and began climbing up them. It was suspiciously quiet in the stairwell. How could there be nobody? Upon reaching the first floor once again, he opened the door and snuck towards the loading bay. But before he could think of his next step, he heard the faint whizzing of a security drone behind him.
The drone had a small machine gun as an attachment. It was watching Clarke from behind.
"Scientific personnel. There is an emergency in the laboratory. State your reasoning for being outside of your appropriate sector during a time of crisis." It demanded. Clarke didn't move nor speak, but he was analyzing the drone's voice. AI didn't control the drone. The voice inflection through the speakers was too natural, too human-like. Did a human control this drone? If so, it'd have human-like reflexes.
"Scientific personnel. You have 10 seconds to respond, or I will shoot you." the drone warned. "10, 9, 8-"
Instantly, Clarke turned around, unholstering his pistol, a silencer attached. He shot the drone directly through its center with pinpoint accuracy, ultimately rendering its internal components useless. With that, the drone fell to the ground. But that would be the least of Clarke's problems. The drone pilot was going to announce an intruder alert. He had to think fast. Quickly he ran to the docking bay, desperately trying to think of a plan to escape. He couldn't hotwire trucks, and even if he could, they'd likely have tracking devices and just be too slow to make a successful getaway.
Alarms started blaring again, this time to announce an intruder was in the base. Even though most of the scientific personnel were gone, many soldiers on the first floor and other essential workers like medical staff, physical laborers, and more were still around. And they were on red alert.
Clarke has been in few situations like this, but never to this scale. But a saving grace would ultimately come to his rescue.
A nearby janitor riding an ATV, hauling a laundry trailer behind him, was approaching, the driver worried about an intruder. Clarke ran out into the open, gun in hand, and aimed it at the driver. The ATV rider stopped out of instinct and yelled for help.
"Get off the ATV! Now!" Clarke yelled, his face still being obscured by the lab coat over his head. The janitor fell off the ATV and scrambled away, running to the nearest approaching soldiers. Clarke unhitched the ATV from its trailer and revved it up. He had to move now. He set it to drive and sped off, flying off the loading deck and back onto the truck bay. The alarms were still blaring, and many soldiers had moved towards the first floor at this point. As Clarke weaved through all of the oncoming trucks, bullets started flying in his direction. The good news was that the soldiers couldn't get a clear shot thanks to his speed and the sudden, scared movements of the truck drivers, who began swerving their vehicles upon seeing the intruder. The bad news was that more soldiers were coming on top of their ATVs, followed by more security drones.
Clarke reached the main tunnel to the surface, though a line of soldiers followed in pursuit.
"You're gonna get what's coming to you!" one soldier yelled. They hand handguns.
Bullets started flying at Clarke, causing him to wave some more. He could not get shot here. He had to keep going.
With all that was happening, it felt as if the tunnel lasted forever. Clarke was dodging bullets with an inch of his life against soldiers experienced with combat. But then, another oncoming truck, presumably the last one let in before lockdown, noticed Clarke flying at him like a rocket. The truck driver freaked out, causing him to swerve in an attempt to avoid Clarke. As the truck veered left, Clarke went right, managing to slip past the truck. Unfortunately for his pursuers, the top-heavy truck tipped over due to the sudden turn. Clarke didn't dare look. All he heard was a loud crash followed by intense screaming. He hoped to whatever higher power was out there that they all survived.
Eventually, he reached the tunnel's entrance. The giant door meant for trucks was closed. But there was a smaller door nearby. The door's purpose was just in case people on foot, or in Clarke's case, ATV could still go in and out of the tunnel without having to reopen the larger door. Clarke shot the door lock and rode the ATV through the doorway. He rode past the guards from earlier, completely surprised that one of their ATVs was escaping the facility. As Clarke drove past, there was confused screaming and gunfire coming from them. But it was in vain. Clark rode along the dirt path into the darkness, leaving the whole facility in his dust. He was home free. And now he had to report his findings to the homeland.
“Sure, why not? Better do it now before you pass out.” She finishes her glass as well.
"Heh. Alright, let's do this. So there was once this pretty cool ancient nation called the roman empire..."
For the next few minutes both drink their wine glasses and Markos gives his very oversimplified rundown of the history of the Byzantine Empire and Republic.
“Sounds like a hey grew too big and couldn’t keep themselves sustained,” Adlez replied as she started on her third glass.
"No idea what a Hey is, but the rest sounds about right." Markos says, halfway through his own third. "So yeah, after the Arab invasion, the Byzantines lost the Levant, Egypt and North Africa.."
“So...Earth was it called? It has a lot of different religions I take it?” Not surprising, though it sounded like these ‘Arabs’ had some similarities to the Leitandi as far as religion.
"Yep. The Byzantines used to be part of a religion known as "Orthodox Christianity.", but now a decent amount of the population is non-religious." Markos says, sipping out of his wine glass.
“I take it you’re not a religious man?” She wasn’t bothered by that prospect but she was curious of his reasons.
"You could consider it that. I suppose we'll have to work on a body that's capable of processing food at some point, so that we can have that dinner... but that's for later. For now, yeah, I'm ready to go."
She gets up, and stretches her arms out.
"This time, I'm prepared. I'll fasten my metaphorical seatbelts, and hopefully not panic."
“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t even think about letting go.” Penny then picked her up, a lot more gently this time before she lifted off and headed back towards their apartment.
"Yeah, not really. The idea of a god doesn't really make much sense to me. It's tough to explain, but I guess one of the reasons is that most of the myths surrounding them don't exactly match up with what science can tell us about our universe. What about you?"
KASAI RIVER | Aszaryin
"It has been a pleasure to meet you Varist. My name is Dr. Argyris Vlachotis, but you may call me Argie." the anthropologist replied.
Throughout the night, the two men conversed over brandy and lamb chops while the 2 infantry squad leaders made banter with the other 2 Yonai tribesmen. Argie hypothesized that, through Varist cryptic manner of speech, that the Yonai and the rest of the Aszaryin hivemind operate through the pheromones of their respective queens which are in-turn "instructed" by queens of higher order who are possibly all controlled by a High Queen (OOC: correct if I'm wrong lol). With the relatively warm welcome by the Yonai and their martial prowess reminding Argie of his time among the Erimoans during the initial colonization of Erimos, he figured it would be worthwhile for Cymiopolis to pursue deeper relations with this faction of the Aszaryin.
"Varist, my friend, would it be possible you to lead us to your settlement so we may extend this friendship to your Queen and the rest of the Yonai? Perhaps you and your comrades may ride along our ship if it would be faster."
“The Goddess Hylia is said to be described as a young woman with long blonde hair. It’s said she united our people against the Demon King Demise. Her champion, a young man who people say she fell in love with, died in the grueling battle after slaying the Demon King. In her grief, Hylia gave up her immortality and was reborn as a mortal. As for Demise, they say his spirit can never truly be destroyed and every few generations he manages to take on a new form, his only purpose to destroy the Goddess and her champion...”
Markos sits there for a second, thinking.
"..is it just me or does your mythology sound like the lore of a famous video game on earth?"
He thinks for a second more, downing the rest of his third glass.
"Ah whatever, it's probably a coincidence."
"Wow, we got off track with this. Uh, so after the Arab Invasions, the Byzantines were subject to Arab Raids, with their forces sieging Constantinople twice. This went on until the rule of Leo III, who managed to hold the Eastern Line against the Arabs. However..."
Adlez wasn’t sure what a video game was but he didn’t seem that impressed. She shouldn’t have been surprised though.
A few more minutes go by with Markos continuing to summarize Byzantine history, and both competitors drinking their next glasses of wine.
"So now we come to the reign of Basil II, and the apex of Byzantine Power during the Medieval Era." Markos says, now on his 5th glass.
“Um Markos...I don’t think we’re gonna make it all the way through at this rate...”
Heidrun didn't start shouting this time, and merely took the time to get a look at Arcburn from above as they flew. It was a view she hadn't seen often, and while being carried through the sky by an ambassador who was also a robot built for combat wasn't the way she'd have expected to see it, she was happy that it was. At the very least, meeting Penny had given her a chance to let loose a bit more than usual, what with the karaoke and rooftop dancing.
It was a good time, and she hoped there'd be more moments like that in the future. Which was likely, considering they were going to be living together for who knows how long.
A strange setup, but it'd work.
"...great view from up here."
“Indeed. You want to stay up here for a moment?” It was strange in a way she was being so open to someone, but maybe it was because Heidi wasn’t a normal person, she was a lot like her and they had a lot in common. It also made her wonder if she was going on a little strong, if she was making her uncomfortable.
"Yeah, I'd love to. Seeing what I've helped flourish from up here is an experience I don't want to miss, like I did the first time. And you're able to stay in the air for a while, right?"
“Mhm, do not worry, I’m able to stay in the air for hours if needed. As long as you’re okay being up this high.” She had to admit, she was kind of enjoying this herself.
"Hmm.. alright, I'll go faster."
Markos starts talking rapidly, and gives brief summaries of Manzikert, the Kommenoi, the disastrous 4th Crusade and the ensuing wars, the reclamation of Constantinople, the rise of the Ottomans, the many sieges of Constantinople throughout the Renaissance and Early Modern Period, the reclamation of Anatolia following WW1, Byzantine Victory in WW2, participation in the Cold War, remaining neutral during WW3, and finally, getting to the period of Byzantine Space Colonization and the modern day.
"So, what do you think?" He says, finishing his glass.
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