[OT] - Xenology - Story driven PBW.

[Baron Munchausen]

But when does Othaglot and Cane return?

[dogscoff]

This is the pre-game back story for my empire in the Xenology game on PBW.

*************************************************

Sensing a change in the rhythm of the craft�s grinding progress, Kleesh snapped back into wakefulness. Fragmentary remnants of dreams clung to her mind as the technician called out depth readings, and she barked him a few curt orders. Her courtiers displayed a suitable amount of awe, firstly at the level of coolness required to sleep during such a strange and unique voyage, and secondly at her immediate and absolute authority over the cowering technical functionary.

�We have broken through to the water, My Lady.� Offered the technician.
�Very well. Reverse a few lengths and open the hatch.� She felt a satisfaction that was quite unfamiliar to her: This technology had the potential to solve the overcrowding problem that had plagued her people for a dozen generations. If she could prove its usefulness she would be favoured by her people and her parents, and would almost certainly be selected as heir.

Kleesh slithered out into the darkness of the tunnel gouged into the ice sheet by the revolutionary vehicle. Below her lay a deep, warm ocean harbouring a bounty of exotic life. That ocean covered the entire planet, and it in turn was completely covered by the thick ice layer that Kleesh�s machine had just bored through. Kilometres above, beyond the uncountable tons of ancient frost that encased her, she knew there to be a frozen, thinly-atmosphered vista, lit by a distant sun and populated by only the hardiest flora and shaggiest fauna. She saw nothing irreconcilable in these two extremes, for the ice tunnels that joined these two worlds were home to her and as a princess of the KanesS, she was a mistress of all.

The technicians left the tunneller to inspect the freshly exposed waters while Kleesh�s courtiers gathered excitedly about her, chattering and competing for her favour with their frivolities. She wondered how she could so recently have considered these inane sycophants her closest friends. Although they were her contemporaries, their behaviour seemed so� juvenile. It occurred to her that the responsibilities of her birth and peculiarities of her upbringing must have matured her more quickly.

Irritated by their lack of occasion, she wrapped her tail tightly around the throat of the nearest courtier and snipped sharply at his face. He retreated, wounded and confused and Kleesh almost regretted her harshness. Her target had been Slekell, a friend since hatchling and one of the more thoughtful and tolerable individuals in her social circle. She drove all thoughts of pity out of her mind, reminding herself that the authority here was hers and that she had a duty to assert it.

Kleesh led them all towards the water, talking as she did so.
�Friends, this is a historic event. What we are about to discover may hold the key to the future of our people.�
�Really Kleesh,� piped up ZakleSs, one of the more air-headed nobles in the group, �It�s just a scavenging party, we do this all the time. You can be so melodramatic sometimes.�
Kleesh turned slowly to ZakleSs, and briefly considered tearing her throat out. She might just get away with it now, but ten generations ago it would have been expected. Five generations before that she�d have been entitled to auction off the corpse for meat. People still turned a blind eye if you ate the occasional rival or irritating neighbour, but things had changed since the old days.

�We need to find new food sources, ZakleSs, or very soon the peasants will start to starve.�
�So let them starve. I have plenty to eat.�
�Yes.� Replied Kleesh, �I know that. And so do the peasants. And that�s why, when they get hungry enough, they will come and take your food from you. Then, when they�ve taken your food they will come for you and chew you down into pellets for their hatchlings.�
It was utterly dark in the artificial cave, but each was acutely aware of the presence of the others due to a highly developed sonar sense. Therefore they were all well aware of the long glare she directed at each one in turn, hoping to drive her words home.

�The part of the ocean we will scavenge in today has never been explored before.� She said, breaking the silence at Last. �This won�t be like diving for food back home. We have no idea what we�ll find down here, but you�d better hope it tastes better than you do.�
�It still seems like a lot of trouble to go to for a bunch of stupid peasants.� Whined ZakleSs. �Why can�t we just let them devour one-another? I�m sure they�d prefer it to that horrid farmed food I hear they live on. Imagine that! Having to eat something raised and killed for you on a farm! If I didn�t have scavenging rights I think I�d just die.�

Kleesh turned on her again. �We can�t let them eat each other because that�s how the Red Plague is spread, you idiot. We�d all be dead within a decade. Besides, the only way we managed to stop them feeding on one another in the first place was to tell them that killing KanesS is evil. No-one thought they�d take it so seriously. I heard yesterday that some plebs are raising entire broods to adulthood- they won�t even eat a single hatchling.�

A murmur of disgust passed through the assembled group, and for a moment Kleesh thought perhaps she had got through to them, that perhaps they realised the gravity of the situation. But then conversation turned again to idle gossip and she knew that they just wouldn�t understand. Even if it came to a civil war or popular uprising and these mindless fops found themselves at the wrong end of a tunnel-pick, they would be more confused than terrified.

But it was to be expected. Most of the old ruling class were stuck in a mindset that should have died decades ago. Kleesh was unusual in that she was one of the few enlightened individuals within the nobility that actually recognised the precarious nature of their current domination. Ironically, her superior understanding stemmed from a supposedly inferior education. With over six hundred royal offspring to raise, the current monarchs had sent some of the more difficult princes and princesses- Kleesh included- to middle-class schools. As it happens, only the industrious middle class- the social grouping immediately below the nobility- were at once educated enough and close enough to the real world to stand any chance of appreciating the true state of KanesS society. Rather than sink into a pit of shame and depression like many of her similarly exiled siblings, Kleesh had studied hard, listened carefully and learned a great deal. Now that she was an adult with a unique combination of perspective and position, she saw herself as the Last chance for the survival of her society.

Once it became clear that the Red Plague was spread by cannibalism, laws and social engineering were introduced to clamp down on the practise, effectively eliminating the two biggest causes of KanesS mortality in a single stroke. The inevitable result was an immediate and dramatic population explosion.

Population density rocketed in every populated area, and with the KanesS� reliance on carefully crafted ice-tunnels, new living space simply could not be constructed quickly enough. These crowded new conditions meant that it was no longer practical for everyone to go out and scavenge their own food- the local eco-systems simply couldn�t support it- so mass-distribution systems had to be developed practically overnight to bring in food from more remote areas. Suddenly, individuals had to actually raise currency in order to eat, and on several occasions it was only a brutal and well-disciplined military that prevented the starving masses from tearing society back down to a state of anarchy.

Fortunately, the KanesS are a resourceful people, and the middle classes capitalised on the cheap and abundant workers to provide a range of profitable solutions to the problems of the new social and economic structure. Tunnel-digging machines were a particularly successful industry, and several generations of development had led to this newest model, funded by Kleesh herself, which could breach even dense polar ice and consequently open up new areas for living space and food production. With an unregulated new economy to exploit, a vast workforce to draw from and a massive market to sell to, the highly competitive business sector made incredible technological advances in a very short time, and the KanesS raced through the industrial age in the space of just a few generations.

Of course, not everything can progress so quickly. The social structures on which KanesS society had been built since the dawn of their civilisation were hopelessly inadequate. The attitudes of the sheltered nobility were outstripped by social and economic change almost as quickly as food sources were outstripped by snowballing population growth. They held on to their power and opulent lifestyle by simple rule of force and a dangerous misconception of their own superiority. The industrialised middle classes were growing in wealth and influence, while the working classes grew in numbers and discontentment. Food levels would soon be insufficient for the planet�s population, and sooner or later the soft, ignorant nobility would find itself pushed out of the equation.

Kleesh understood all this, and that was shy she was determined to find a new source of food and ease the pressures on her crumbling society, and in so doing secure her own future as queen. With this broad agenda on her mind, she led the scavenging party into the cold, lightless polar waters.

*************************************************

An old bull surk limped across the ice plains, each laboured breath steaming before it in the thin atmosphere. His shaggy, blood-matted fur hid thousands of scars, most of them acquired in his prime when he had ruled this territory with absolute confidence, the most ferocious predator above the ice for a hundred kilometres. However the more significant scars, the ones causing him to limp and occasionally growl with pain, those wounds had been inflicted only recently, and they were killing him. After a reign of almost a hundred seasons, this king of the wilderness had been finally usurped. An upstart rival- younger, fitter and faster- had fought him for his lands and females and won. Now, with a painful wound to his hind midleg, he was unable to hunt and was gradually fading away, hobbling painfully to the fringes of his old territory. Finally, exhausted after days of hungry walking, the old beast lay down to rest for the Last time. It would be a slow death, but at least it would be peaceful one, its life gradually ebbing away beneath the settling snow.

It was Kleesh�s keen senses that first noticed it. A whiff of blood on the wind, an intangible sense that somewhere close by, something was helpless and dying. She called Shkimsk back. The elder KanesS looked puzzled for an instant, then raised his snout into the air, scenting the wind. No further communication was necessary- the two of them and their servants lowered serpentine bodies to the ice and slithered upwind, stopping occasionally to sniff the air and confirm their direction.

It took them a considerable amount of time to find the surk, by now just a snowy mound with odd patches of exposed brown fur. They stopped some distance away to evaluate the situation.
�He�s obviously been there for some time.� Said Kleesh. �And he�s definitely wounded.�
�Yes, Princess.� Replied her companion. �That�s why we should be careful. If he�s wounded, he won�t be able to hunt down prey. He might resort to trickery to catch his food.�
�You think this could be a trap, Shkimsk? Are they really that intelligent?�
�Some of the older ones can be. One snap of those jaws and we�d both be behind his teeth.�
They watched the monster for a while, noting the shallow breathing and staying carefully downwind at all times. Eventually, they decided it was worth the risk.
Shkimsk insisted on going first, not wanting to endanger the Princess unnecessarily. He slithered cautiously toward the predator, ready to flee at any moment. He stopped, just out of the animal�s reach, taking time to study it more closely. Its eyes were half closed, glazed and insensible. A pool of spittle had formed under the massive head and the stink of death was unmistakable. Shkimsk circled the Surk, carefully selecting the safest angle of attack. This animal was hundreds of time heavier than he was. Its head alone measured a greater length than an average KanesS from nose to tail. Shkimsk struck, biting the prone animal on its foot and darting immediately away. It flinched slightly and made a small noise of discomfort.
Kleesh came quickly to his side, and they exchanged a look. They both bit at it this time, inflicting deeper and more painful wounds before springing to safety. Although the Surk stirred again, it clearly did not have the strength to resist them. Hesitating only to exchange another quick glance, they dived into the soft belly with abandon, burrowing through fur and then flesh, causing rumblings of pain from their dying victim.

When they had eaten their fill, they allowed their servants to feed and then called back to the nearest city. Such an animal could easily feed hundreds of KanesS, and a collection team would come out to haul the animal back to the tunnels. By rights, Kleesh could have kept it for herself to hold a feast for her aristocratic friends. As it happened, she didn�t like many of her aristocratic friends, so she sold it for a very reasonable sum to a distributor, who would auction shares of the carcass to the working classes.

Kleesh and Shkimsk curled up atop the beast, nestling in its thick coat and watching the stars. They had been friends ever since Kleesh had met a few of Shkimsk�s sons at school. He was more than three times her age, a successful entrepreneur and a keen investor in new technologies. He owned a number of mining operations on the sea bed, three digging firms, some farming interests and he also had a couple of theatres in Narrowhead, one of the larger urban tunnel networks. With Kleesh�s funding, it had been Shkimsk�s newly-formed research division that had developed the high-density ice-digger that had recently allowed them to explore the polar areas of the ocean. Unfortunately the yield from that venture had been slight. There was precious little food to be found there, although the ability to dig living space in the previously inaccessibly dense polar depths had at least paid for the cost of development.

�Thankyou for this opportunity, Princess.� He said, finally breaking a satisfied silence that seemed to have Lasted for days. �Even a person of my wealth and influence finds it hard to get scavenging rights without help from the nobility.�
�Not at all, Shkimsk. I�d prefer the company of one worldly industrialist like you to the yammering of a dozen egotistical nobles any day. Besides, I wanted to talk to you about another business venture.� She nestled further back into the warm fur and began turning, rubbing herself against the carcass to clean the blood from her lithe body.
�Really Princess? I sincerely hope I can be of service.�
�I have a friend- well, an acquaintance really- anyway, his name is Slekell. He�s a little vain, but he can be quite interesting at times. Tell me, what do you know about astronomy?�
�Astronomy, Princess? Only that it is the study of the sky above the ice, little more. As I understand it there are no practical uses for such knowledge- it is a simple curiosity.�
�That was exactly my understanding until I began talking to Slekell a little while ago. You see, he�s interested in this astronomy business, and he gave me an idea.�

Kleesh ordered her servants to bring forward the telescope she had borrowed from Slekell. As they struggled to haul it up onto the bull surk's violated body Kleesh coiled herself into the fur again and stared ambitiously at the richly speckled sky. As she stared she talked and her companion listened intently, learning for the first time about the other worlds in their star system, the empty void between them and the possibility of the KanesS people escaping their own fragile globe.

[ June 03, 2003, 08:31: Message edited by: dogscoff ]

[dogscoff]

Soon, probably. My writing fingers are getting itchy again, and so I will probably have another spasm of O&C production soon.

I'm also working on something else, but that's top top top secret.

In the meantime, what do you think of this? Do you think it will be possible to sympathise with a race of cannibalistic ice-snakes?

[Stone Mill]

Nice work, 'scoff. Are we to refer to the Amon-krie(sp?) racial portrait during this tale? I can put aside the dozens of times I obliterated them... and try and sympathize with them. They need to find new beings to eat. No big deal.

[sachmo]

Excellent story, Dogscoff. You are a master storyteller.

[dogscoff]

Thanks guys.

Are we to refer to the Amon-krie(sp?) racial portrait during this tale? I can put aside the dozens of times I obliterated them

Actually, it's more like this:


[ May 29, 2003, 08:42: Message edited by: dogscoff ]

[primitive]

Great stuff as always Big Dawg.

What is it not to love about a race of cannibalistic ice-snakes?

[civ2buf]

Xenology pbw game
Pre-game backstory

Warning, translator has made every effort to translate this historical account into Terran, but nonetheless, some items will not translate well. Remember, this is merely a Terran translation, which must suffer the flaw of leaving out any ideas inexpressible in its language. Nuance is the most unreliable thing to translate, while facts are the easiest.

Robotia Foundation
2396.8 years, Creators' Calendar

"Citizen, you are on the property of
3x's89029x's Road Conduit Company. You must express your intent to use us as your travel conduit, or leave this property, within 25 seconds," the sales officer for the Road Conduit Company intoned. He looked at the young citizen and potential customer closely. "You have 15 seconds."

"What is your charge for pedestrian access through to the capital city?"

"Five seconds. The charge is .003 Mineral dolars, citizen. Citizen..."

"I accept you as travel conduit."

"Good, please authorize this charge of .003 Mineral dollars. Recharging stations are at one kilometer intervals along the capital pedestrian access road."

The traveller presented a recently printed identification card. The officer read it as follows,
Name: 15x's12907x's9383676x
Informal Name: Zelleck
Date Created: 2383.7

Current Information

Age: 13.1
Phase: Early Post-Factory
Wealth:
Access Authorized to view

.010 Mineral dollars
15x's12907x Factory Bank

END

The officer interlinked with the financial account for 3x's89029x's Road Conduit Company. THe charge was taken, and the Young Citizen was shown to the capital road with travel access in the conduit for .008 years.

Zelleck, or 15x's12907x's9383676x, found himself outside for the first time, when he had been accosted by that sales officer. Time is money and money is virtue. Zelleck remembered that slogan from class at the Citizen Factory. Zelleck was created in a Factory owned by 15x's12907x.

Zelleck began his trip down capital road, noting he was at 82 percent energy. The stress and shock of suddenly being a free and full member of the Foundation had taken a bit of a toll on him. His identification was now returned to a storage compartment at the center of his torso frame, which supported manipulator "arms" in four directions, as well as tripedal locomotion.

The Factory was quite a bit warmer than out here, Zelleck thought with pleasure. The pedestrian road to the capital was empty of others, but the roar of travelcraft engines far above was noted by him.

"I've got to conserve energy until I reach the 83rd marker. Need to turn off high level cognitives until then," with that thought he turned off his cognitive faculties, and plodded along the road by low level thought, finally reaching the 83rd marker after .005 years of this.

He only had .007 Mineral dollars, .003 years left of road access, and 13% energy. Zelleck recharged his energy at the 83rd marker, leaving him with .002 Mineral dollars, and an estimated charge time of .007 years to empty.

He pondered the task in front of him during the Last few hours of his road travel. As he approached the capital city, advertisements were placed for view of the citizens, and they were targetted to the young, like Zelleck himself. Pedestrian roads were rare outside of factory to city routes. Most citizens bought or rented air transit once they were past the first year or two of freedom (13-14-15 years old). One sign promised excellent compensation for work onboard a new space vessel planned for construction in a few years. The advertisement billboard said, in large print,

_________________________________________________
Young Citizens?
Want a quick way to earn your way to the top?
Visit the 13x's78x's Spaceliner recruitment center for information on a job in space transit to and from the upcoming new planet development projects.

Where?
At 18908764, 98286708, 209 in the Capital City Region.

See you there, hotshot!
_________________________________________________

Zelleck arrived in the Road Conduit Company's Capital Central Station, which was extremely busy, he noted. .0005 years remained on his property pass. But he noticed in the incoming transport arrivals area there was a parked microjet with the same emblem, Spaceliner Recruitment Center.

A citizen stood near the jet and saw Zelleck approach. "A lot of Citizens, Young Citizens even, are reluctant to have living quarters on a ship instead of on land. We are always looking for the eager and the young, because this is a new program, and we need pilots, technicians, customer service personnel. We need many positions, working on a full time basis on our new spacecraft, which has a complete design, and is awaiting construction in the next few years. We plan to have everyone trained for utmost quality of service to our passengers, by then. If you would like, you may come along and sign up yourself without the hassle of finding your own way to our facility."

Zelleck agreed meakly, and the Spaceliner representative helped Zelleck into the microjet, pressed the autolaunch key, exited to craft, and finally said, "Welcome, Young Citizen, to the future.", before Zelleck and the microjet zipped out of the station, and to the Spaceliner center, arriving there within a few minutes.

Zelleck stepped out and the microjet returned to the station. Zelleck thought to himself, "expensive recruitment that."

The Spaceliner center was desperately short on personnel, compared to what they would need to man the spaceliners, and recruiting the young had proven to be the best strategy. Most older citizens were too entrenched in the social life of the big cities of the Foundation to be willing to live on a ship.

Zelleck entered the reception hall of the center, and this time there was no agent to tell him to leave in 25 seconds like at the Road Conduit. Instead, the group of Citizen workers motioned to him to approach the desk. "Apply for training and testing in up to three of the positions on this form. Then we will direct you to accomodations in this facility. All accomodations are patterned after your eventual crew quarters on board. Do you understand?"

"So, you will pay for my room and board then? And I get trained and tested for a ship? Wow. Sign me up for pilot and onboard warehouse officer. And, do my quarters include recharge?"

"Once you get to your quarters, turn yourself off for a few hours, and we will wake you when the training starts, recharge will be available then. This Citizen will now take you to your quarters."

The mentioned Citizen announced to Zelleck that he was already selected for Captains' assistant, Employed Citizenry management. "Warehouse tech seems a bit dull for us Youngs. Too similar to the Factory I think. But I like your choice of pilot. Thats tough to qualify for, but they want nine pilots per spaceliner in three levels of qualification. And once they have the first built, the rest are supposed to be be built within a few months of each other. Four or five spaceliners they plan. All of the captains' to be selected are senior members of the center, picked before they began all the recruiting. Here you go, your quarters and .00036 years turn off and we will awake you for training. By the way, I've only been out of the Factory for .015 years myself. Already got a great position, good luck."

While Zelleck was turned off, the Capital City's party atmosphere continue unabated in the club district, and in a specific club the Anarchist Alliance members were having a celebration. Two members with informal names Ruc and Alaf were discussing recent events. "The construction center promises they can built us a ship, and we'd have a small planet with all our own political ways, getting rid of a few repressions that exist in the Foundation on this planet," Ruc was saying.

Alaf interrupted, "The starliner center says they plan to have up to four starliners' within three years, and they would give us exlusive rights to put only our passengers on three seperate runs of a starliner. That should be about three million Anarchists on our world, a good number. But I hear Political Control Alliance plans to have their own disgustingly messed up colony. That group is the only thing I'd like to destroy, I don't mind this planet, except for them. Defilers..."

"But oh well, with our own planet, and the Foundations' blessing they've given for us to try our ideas, we should do well. When Citizens realize how poor and mismanaged the Control Alliance colony will be, the little moral support that group gets will end."

[Raging Deadstar]

Very good story dogscoff, and civ2buf. This is an interesting tale. I like the idea of cannibalistic ice snakes, and the fact that i do sympathise with them is credit to your excellent story telling technique. Civ2buf, i can't remember too many people writing about a robot race so here's a chance to show everyone your talent, your first chapter has me intrigued. This is going to be a great story

[civ2buf]

And have you ever heard of a Libertarian robot race? thats the extra twist, with two other small political Groups also vying for the hearts and minds of the Robot citizens.