Isiselyn
Old
- Joined
- Aug 16, 2008
- Posts
- 77
- Location
- St Austell, Cornwall
- Society
- OldTimers
- Avatar Name
- Isis Sissi Innana
It was time...........
Many of us had been drawn to the city. Here we knew we had access to hospitals, supplies, auction houses, and the many tools we would need after. Hunters, miners and craftsmen alike stood together, friends, comrades, even those who were once foes. We all knew we would be needed and that we would have to face the future together in order to survive our past. For in this we will be united. We will fall together and will stand together, no matter what the costs.
In the atmosphere, the very breath of this planet we can sense the anxious excitement, the sense of impending doom, and the fear and intrigue for the unknown. For many of us dying is not a new experience. We have lived here long enough to understand that death is now part of our way of life. We have died many, many times before. But this time feels different....... who knows when, or even to what we will come back to. We have battled for many years and yet the battle is only now beginning..........
It had been two years since my arrival. I still remember my naïve excitement and joy at the chance I had been given for a new future, a chance to join my fellows in creating history. The chance to help the very survival of our species. I picture those faces I sat amongst on the ship, hear the chatter and recall the expressions on their faces: excitement, tiredness, happiness and enjoyment of our pleasant and smooth flight. Of looking across the aisle at the woman sat in the next row talking animatedly to her partner about their life to come. We were so close to our destination. I recall she was the last thing I saw as our ship exploded.
Strangely, this was not the end but the beginning. Perhaps we should have realised from that first experience of death that this would soon be our way of life. We had all known before we left our homes that the life we had chosen would be harsh, laborious, and brutal but we had gathered our belongings and packed all we would need to arrive prepared. Now all was lost. We didn't even have a shirt on our backs. They supplied us with an outfit each- threadbare and worn. These supplies had seen many, many colonists but we were still grateful. We rapidly realised that this was the way life was on our new planet. Supplies from Earth were so limited and infrequent thanks to the robot attacks but locals had found ways to become self sufficient. It was their only means to survival.
Since that time I have learnt a great many things. Not only about my new home, its flora and fauna, the native animals, the 'magic' we have so readily accepted as a normal part of life drawn from the very soil and creatures of this planet but about the people too. We hunt, we mine and we craft in order to ensure that we, as a race, can keep fighting and surviving and maybe, one day, even win this battle.
Some colonists have been here long enough to recall the first few weeks of life here. The first arrivals to a planet deemed to be the planet of dreams for the human race. Our jackpot in the lottery of survival. We had long since outgrown and near destroyed our own planet and, having learnt from our mistakes, had been desperate to find a new place capable of sustaining human life and ensuring extinction would not become our fate. They remember with wistful sorrow the colonists who fell and the cities that crumbled when the robots turned against us.
Such horrors they must have seen and lived, ingrained in their souls and revisited in their nightmares. They have kept up this battle for so many years, passing their knowledge and experience down to each new wave of arrivals so that no information is lost and we remain worthy opponents to the very machines we created to help us.
But these machines are playing a new game. One they must hope will finally destroy us and give them the planet they seem to so badly want. At least what will be left of it.
So while I sit here on this patch of grass with a dear friend, writing this journal in case they actually succeed in their plans, I know that looming overhead is a threat bigger than any we have encountered before. I look around and see the people glancing upwards wondering when the skies will darken as our enemy looms into view and whether they will have time to turn and bid farewell to those close to them when it does. I look and I recall that face sat across from me on the plane and wonder if she too is gazing up at the skies, if she is even here in the city, and I recall her plans for the future and I want to weep.
One day, we may find a time when children play and run under our two suns- laughing and frolicking without care nor concern. But these times are far away and may never be reached. No colonist wants to bring life to a planet where it is so easily taken and so frequently. You do not forget your first death, nor the pain and each one takes a toll on your soul.
The skies are darkening...... there are announcements coming for the authorities thick and fast..... my friend looks across at me with a resigned look, knowing the inevitable is here. At least we know this death will be without the pain...... They say there will be a new planet after all this has come to pass, the whisperings among the crowds and writings telling of this mysterious '10' when we will enter a time of great excitement, euphoria and untold riches- a new golden age! But for now I glance upward and the black shape and lights are too close..........
Amazing what withdrawal symptoms can lead you to do with your morning.......
