Hearts of Darkness - Plague of the Void Seeds / 7

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Post 7

Click entered the Deepsee to find Joshua slumped on the floor, ashen faced, with tears in his eyes. It was obvious that the boy had been viewing something he shouldn’t.

Click – “Did I not explain why it was better not to chase mysteries?”
Joshua – “I’ve seen it. The wound in space, surrounded by Void Seeds.”

Click was mildly irritated that Joshua had ignored the warning.

Click – “You lack discipline Joshua. However, you are not alone in that.”

Something in Click’s voice made Joshua look up. He was getting to know Click quite well. It was difficult not to when he was spending so much time in his head. There was resignation and guilt in his tone.

Click – “What did you see?”
Joshua – “Thousands and thousands of giant Void Seeds arranged in slowly rotating concentric rings around a terrible wound in space. A nearby planet was being pulverized and sucked into the wound whilst something was leaking through from the other side. The Void Seed seemed to be harvesting energy leaking from the tear.”

Of course, Click could simply have scanned through Joshua’s memories but that would prevent him from learning about Joshua’s perspective, how the experience had affected him and how he chose to articulate it was sometimes important.

Joshua could plainly see that Click was becoming more and more subdued as he recounted the viewing.

Click – “In a way, I’m glad you’ve seen it…..the gate. I wish only that I might have prepared you better before-hand. It is the Daxiste-agori’s great shame.”
Joshua – “What? You made it?”
Click – “Not the terrible, festering rent that it has become, but it’s precursor, yes. I will try to explain. The Daxiste-agori are ancient, the oldest and most technologically advanced race in the universe. For some of us, the universe began to gradually shrink, to become like a prison. Our towering egos clouded our judgement.

We had long mastered worm-holes for instantaneous travel and the temptation to adapt that technology to enable exploration beyond the boundaries of our space-time became harder and harder to resist. Eventually, we began opening gateways to places beyond this universe. In our haste to satisfy our obsession, we overlooked the simple fact that beyond the boundaries of our universe are infinite realms and beings that should never interact.

There had been several unsettling occurrences and we were about to halt all experimentation with gateways when the last, the gateway to the Void Seed realm was opened. You see, the gateways were all very small…..enough to send through a probe to ascertain something of the nature of the place on the other side. But the very instant this last one came into being, a massive burst of energy was unleashed. It completely incinerated a Daxiste-agorian research vessel and turned our small gateway into the monstrous tear you saw earlier. All communications were disrupted and we believe the first Void Seeds came through from the other side, shortly afterwards.”

As Joshua listened to Click describe what he knew of the history of the wound and the Void Seed, he began to get angry. Very angry. His fists started to clench and unclench rhythmically.

Click was lost in his memories and failed to notice the change that Joshua was undergoing.

Click – “Every attempt we’ve made to reach and close the gateway has been met with overwhelming force from the Void Seed. They are able to feed off almost all forms of energy, rendering the majority of our weapons redundant. The only substance that permanently harms them is Argantuan white bone, which is in short supply. If only we…..”

A spike of pain wrenches Click from his memories. His mind is cast out from Joshua’s. He looks at Joshua and is shocked for the first time in over a thousand years. The boy’s eyes have begun emanating red light and his body has grown. Some kind of black material has begun to spread over parts of his contorted body. Joshua suddenly arches back and roars. With a thought, Click sends a distress call. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be long in answering, because this could get very bad indeed.....

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24 Years ago

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Jayden Carter rubbed his eyes as he stared at the monitor. Anna had finally made contact.

Jayden – “Ok so you want me to request authorisation for a thousand volunteers to join the alien fleet. They will be genetically enhanced, given training and contextual knowledge so that they can come back to Earth and train more of us. At that time, the Alliance will build a permanent base on the moon as a staging post for further integration and involvement in the war effort."
Anna – “That’s pretty much it.”
Jayden – “I’ll see what I can do.”
Anna – “Thank you.”
Jayden – “No Anna, thank you. It was very brave of you to go with the aliens. The fact that you were their choice for first contact speaks volumes. Hopefully, one day, we’ll be able to celebrate it properly.”
Anna – “Thank you.”
Jayden – “I’ll be in touch.”

A Ziff installed communications panel would make contacting Anna far simpler in future. An important step if more humans were to join the fleet.