Alice
Slayer
- Joined
- Nov 3, 2005
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- Alice in Wonderland
Calypso.
Newly-found paradise far away from old Earth.
Very Earth-like, Calypso has two suns, unspoiled nature, and an amazing array of wildlife.
The planet Calypso was discovered by one of the huge automated drones sent by mankind to find more acceptable places to live. Robots were sent by the drone ship, first to build a base-matrix which controlled and updated the software of all the robots, and then to build houses and an infrastructure in preparation for the first settlers. The drone ship itself departed for another close star system; the reason for that departure is still unknown.
I am Marius Cromwell, and I am writing this report on board the Exodus, a colony ship which brought the first settlers to this planet, and from which I now look down upon Calypso as the ship orbits high above the surface.
My report contains some impressions of the life I had here, and should give an idea of the time the early settlers had, especially regarding the problems, danger and horror we all faced. It is indeed an eyewitness report of one of the few early settlers to survive at all. The report will be chronological, although the time between the incidents differs—mostly without any information regarding how long this time was, since the times were too rough to make precise notes, at least for me.
I start the report with a short summary of how it started back at the old Earth and what happened since our arrival. The overpopulation of the Earth caused massive riots as food ran scarce. This made it easy to apply for this trip, as our family farm was raided and we lost everything to the mob. Our application was approved and my father, mother, and I gratefully took our few remaining possessions and boarded the Exodus along with hundreds of other settlers, ready to begin a new life.
Although the robots had been preparing the cities for some time, most of us didn’t fly down to our new home right when we reached Calypso. Our family had decided to farm again so we could provide food for the growing cities, but the farms still had to be built. Many other settlers had similar waits, so the Exodus remained quite full for the first few weeks. Our farm was incomplete but habitable when we decided we just couldn’t wait any longer to move into it.
It was Flight #4 from the Exodus down to Calypso in a smaller shuttle which seated 40 people. At first the shuttle was abuzz as the settlers chatted excitedly about visiting the planet at last. Yet the whole shuttle became silent as soon as we entered the atmosphere.
The view was simply breathtaking!
A wonderful blue sea, kilometers of gleaming beaches, trees with leaves brighter green than we had ever seen, and great herds of strange animals grazing on wide plains.
As the shuttle descended deeper we could see the one herd of animals better. We saw huge, but apparently peaceful, grayish animals with big round heads. From each head rose a number of protruding sails, and these rose and stood straight in the air as the shuttle came closer.
We landed in a town near a great crater formed by what we hoped was an inactive volcano. A welcome committee awaited the passengers, and we were directed toward our final destinations. Those, like us, who had decided to live out of town, were directed to the “taxis,” which were floating robots—basically flying platforms with a rail, seats, and a place for our suitcases. Before flying to the farm, we decided to have a little exploration trip as the robot took us away from the city.
The taxi-bot brought us to a group of animals sporting tiger-pattern skins. As frightening as the great beasts appeared up so close, they seemed to be peaceful herbivores. Though a few stretched their throats, they seemed pretty uninterested in us.
A bit farther on, we discovered the herd we had seen as we flew overhead. Again the sails rose as we approached, but dropped again as soon as they realized we weren’t a threat and the animals went back to grazing.
The next group of animals we watched from the top of a small hill. That the robot held quite some distance from them compared to the herds before suggested that these must be a more aggressive species. Using our binoculars, we got a better look at them as the robot hovered. They were more compact animals, with four legs and grayish as well, with horns on their head and a tail that was used to keep balance as well as being a formidable weapon.
Although most of them had only small horns, five had a great rack of spiked horns on their head, and large mace-like tails. These had a more greenish look to them. Those five positioned themselves into 2 lines between us and the herd they obviously protected—the two largest in front followed by three more in a second line. After a few minutes, they too realized we didn’t want to attack and went back to a circle around the herd, each one watching a portion of the landscape so as to guard the herd. For wild animals, this display of tactics amazed us.
That the guards did their work pretty well soon became apparent to us. The whole behavior of the herd changed immediately when a hopping two-legged animal with four sharp claws appeared out of the blue, followed by another one, and another. At a deep warning cry, which cut us to the quick, all the heads of the herd rose and even the three beige-colored predators backed off momentarily.
As the attackers recovered, they faced the same defense line we saw, except with the three biggest in the first line now, to match the number of attackers, with the other two behind. The following fight was brief.
While the defenders had to deal with the sharp claws of the agile animals, the attackers suffered strong tail strikes and vicious ramming attacks from the horned plates of the defenders.
The predators tried an attack from three sides, forming a semi-circle more or less. Yet the action actually started with the defenders, as the first three stormed out of their line to face their foes. The rightmost one was hit by the head of the largest of the horned animals, maybe the alpha of them. The impact must have broken many of its bones immediately and threw it several meters through the air.
The other two attackers had more luck, evading the storming animals and to our collective horror slicing deep and fast-bleeding wounds into their legs with their sharp claws. But neither of them saw the second defense line running towards them at that very moment.
As they turned to attack the now-wounded animals the great tails of the fresh defenders hit them at once. One flew towards a rock, and we could hear the cracking of its bones even at our safe distance. The other managed to get up after being hurled to the ground, but 2 of its arms were hanging lifeless. Stunned, it turned around and hopped away, ignoring the gray animals which already stood in a line again to counter the next attack. We barely suppressed audible cheers at this point.
Seeing the threat retreating, the defenders took care of their wounded. The bleeding had stopped already and scars had started to form. We noted that there were many older scars as well; it wasn’t the first fight for these animals. We had been informed about the immense healing ability the wildlife here possesses, but seeing it with our very own eyes was another thing.
The guardian circle around the herd was re-established, with a suspicious look toward us to see if we wanted our share as well. We didn’t, and told the robot to take us to our farm.
During the flight to the farm we were silent. We all thought about what we experienced and were still impressed by such defensive tactics and by such a violent scene in the paradise we expected.
We flew over a plain covered in short grass and entered a dark forest with huge trees. As nice as it looked from above, from inside the forest looked ominous. It seemed a treacherous idyll: a beautiful place disguising the real threat that was lurking for you. Even the robot seemed to fly a bit faster since we entered the forest. As abruptly as the forest ended, we were just as grateful to escape that eerie place.
Blinded by the sudden sunlight, it took a while until we recognized the building we were heading for.
The farm was just around twenty minutes from the city. It was flat, beige-colored, and consisted of four rectangular rooms, arranged in a “T” pattern. The area around it was divided into two fields to seed corn to the east and south side of the “T”. The western part, from where we approached, was our courtyard, with a small shed for our farm robot. The northern side had an enclosure, which was itself divided into two pens.
The proximity of this enclosure to the forest worried me, and I was proven right sooner than expected.
The farmhouse had windows on each side and the roof, as well as good blinds to block the sun out while we slept.
The enclosure held a little surprise for us. There were already some cute looking animals in it. One pen held grayish animals with four legs and two short trunks, while the other pen held a black and brown animal with two legs, two long trunks and a bluish backside.
Our first guess, that the pens separated females from the male, was right, as we learned from the little brochure from the government left inside our house. According to the informative brochure, the animals were called “snablesnots” and are able to spit acid when provoked. They would also give milk, and supposedly taste good as well. To collect milk while protected from the acid we were given some special suits.
The brochure also informed us about the automated blind mechanism and how to clean and use the rifle provided for self-defense, which we found stowed in a gun cabinet.
The first day we spent moving into our new home while keeping safe distance from the snablesnots, which seemed a bit frightened of us as well. During the next days, the snablesnots became less and less shy, and never even tried to attack us with acid. Only the male was a bit more aggressive. The snablesnots even started to pet us with their trunks after a while, especially me since I was in charge of taking care of them while my parents seeded the corn and kept their distance from those weird animals whenever they could.
We activated our farming robot a couple of times as well. Its torso was carried by a platform with four legs to keep its balance, and was able to rotate. It had four arms, each with four “fingers” for holding and using human tools.
My father and I practiced with the rifle, just to be on the safe side.
During a day while I was just milking the snablesnots my father came to me with another man following him. This stranger wore a black coat and shades, had a quiet but clear voice and carried a strange-looking bluish device, a bag which seemed to glow from the inside, and some bottles.
He introduced himself as Steve Jacobs, and told us he was sent by the “Institute for Human Development.” We had heard about this facility before; even got a brochure from them with the headline “Discover Your Abilities!” and found it quite funny. So a smile appeared as soon as I heard where he came from. The smile grew even bigger when he started to tell us that we could extract “vibrant sweat” from our snablesnots. A picture formed in my mind of a snablesnot running around the pen at full speed while we ran after it with towels to get its sweat!
The smile disappeared immediately when Steve suddenly had green glowing hands and then established some kind of green tunnel between his hands and a snablesnot. At his hands some kind of liquid appeared, dripping copiously into the bottles in front of him.
With our now-arrested attention he explained that this sweat can be refined with a specific enmatter using the device he carried to create something he called “mind essence.” He took some shiny things out of his bag, placed it on the refiner, poured the sweat into it, and pressed a button. A cover opened and we could see some very small spheres that glowed from the inside. Steve took them out, and as his hand approached the balls, they lit up even more.
“While we found that many people have the ability, after some practicing, to gather vibrant sweat without need of any tools or helps,” he said, “only some of us are able to channel their mind powers toward other areas, and that requires this mind essence. But I guess it is easier to show you.”
He looked at one of our snablesnots, which was still suffering from a fall down a hill a few days ago and also had a broken leg. The looking became staring, and the mind essence he still had in his hands started to shine in a bright light now and was absorbed by his hands one by one, giving both hands a bright pink shine. He put forth his hands toward the snablesnot, which was now surrounded by a pink aura that disappeared after two seconds.
And the leg was instantly and completely healed.
“This we call ‘Biotropy,’ which allows us to heal beings from distance. As you can see, the mind essence has quite some value for us, so if you could provide my Institute with vibrant sweat or mind essence we would be very grateful.
“I suggest you try sweating by yourself and also to keep some mind essence with you most of the time, to see if you have an ability you don’t know of yet, or that even we don’t. This whole mind force is still in development and we try to study it as well as we can.
“However, don’t place any mind essence near you when you sleep. There is no need to burn the house down just because of a nightmare, so beware a bit. Generally most information regarding mind force is classified, so I can’t tell you more than this really—just beware, mind force can be stronger and more devastating than you might think.”
Needless to say, we tried to gather vibrant sweat everyday after then, but only I seemed to have any knack for it; my parents weren’t able to establish the beam or to hold it long enough. I also carried some mind essence in my pockets with me all the time, though without something interesting happening.
One day we opened the blinds and were surprised to see our enclosure was empty. A second look, however, showed that it wasn’t completely empty. There were just no living snablesnots around, just some torn to shreds pieces of them—a trunk here, a leg there. We also found a fang, a big one.
Shocked by that slaughter, we kept our rifle handy, and decided to find out what kind of animal would be able to do that. We built a little shelter, camouflaged with some leaves and wood, and put snablesnots in our enclosure again and waited.
The very next night we saw it already. First there was just a shadow moving in the forest, a glimpse of green leather-like skin, something dangerous lurking and sneaking closer to the farm.
The breakthrough came all of a sudden. It crashed out of the forest and ran amazingly fast towards our snablesnots. It was some sort of dinosaur! A green dinosaur with four arms brandishing long claws and a vicious set of teeth.
My father reacted faster than I had been able to, bringing the gun to position and shooting. Although four of ten shots hit, the fearsome beast didn’t become much slower. In fact the rifle seemed to have no effect but one: the beast turned and now headed directly for us, not really fooled by the camouflage or simply running to the place the place from which the bullets had come.
I stood there pale and paralysed, not able even to shout, as a green mass of strong muscles, sharp claws and fearsome teeth closed on us fast. Surprised that the monster didn’t even seem to have noticed the first shots, my father needed a few seconds to aim the next volley.
The dinosaur was now running in a straight line to us so the next bullets hit better. The first one hit its left leg, which made it slow down, and the second hit square in the chest, which made it stop.
But it didn’t fall. It was more like it was deciding what kind of animal can attack from such a distance and what to do next. It stood there for what seemed to me like minutes. Actually it must have been more like just three seconds. Then it ran again. And I saw the furious twinkling eyes coming closer and closer.
It was 10 meters away when my father hit it with two shots directly into the head. Although these must have been fatal hits, this kind of mass with that kind of speed cannot be stopped easily. It took just a millisecond for us to realise that as well, and we jumped out of the shelter.
The dinosaur stumbled and crashed right into the place we were a second before. Coming immediately to our feet, we waited a while before we approached the greenish body below the shelves and leaves of our former shelter. It didn’t move anymore.
My father went closer and poked its foot with the rifle. Nothing happened. Aiming at the torso he went closer and touched it again.
The arm twitched around and cut a deep gash in my father’s right thigh, while the head tried to reach his other leg. Most likely out of pure reflex my father emptied the rest of the magazine into this monster, literally shredding its breast area.
I called my mother and we bandaged our hero as fast and well as we could, and called a doctor from the town as well. While I stayed with my father, a hand on his leg, my pockets suddenly lit up, then my hands glowed as well, and then the air around my father’s leg.
The doctor arrived fast, and was surprised that the wound wasn’t deeper and had in fact already healed, since several of these creatures had been spotted lurking around the city and the wounds they caused had been severe. The creatures were given the name “atrox.”
We were exhausted, and it was still around “midnight” (strange to say that with a sun in the sky), so we went to sleep after the doctor helped us to take my father to bed. He promised us to send some workers from the town to build an electric fence around the farm for us.
The next day the workers didn’t just install a fence, we got a defence turret as well. Nearly twice as high as the farmhouse, it was programmed to scan the environment and shoot any attacking animals, except snablesnots of course. This kind of turret was now installed around most of the cities, to prevent animals such as our atrox from preying upon the townspeople.
To avoid a sudden power failure or problems with target assessment, the turrets were all given an independent program and power supply, not connected to any network whatsoever. Thus they were built as independent units, which saved many lives later on.
We also dug some smaller pits in the forest to trap any atrox that might happen by.
Some days passed, and we got news that the drone which discovered Calypso had most likely travelled to a nearby planet system, but never sent any further information. The government would send a small communication probe to shed light on why the drone disappeared first. Three weeks later the exploration probe arrived, finding a dark and eerie system of two planets.
What we didn’t know at the time was that both planets were inhabited by the robots, each planet hosting a base matrix to control them. The probe tried to communicate with the base matrix from one of the planets, and the signal it got was sent back to us, and sent to the base matrix of Calypso to be decoded.
When the message was given to our base matrix I was out on the field with my father, our robot working along with us. A sudden outcry from my father made me spin around. One hand of the robot was gripping my father’s head, another hand tightly grasped his shoulder. The sound when my father’s neck broke I will never be able to forget.
My mother came running out of the house to see what the noise was and was immediately thrown back into the house by a hayfork cast like a javelin by the robot. The second it took for me to realise what was actually happening seemed to last hours, during which the robot slowly turned towards me, capturing me in its glare.
Without a real plan I turned around and ran to the forest, the robot coming fast behind me. I literally jumped into the forest, with no other thought than running away from the murderous threat. While the branches lashed into my face I heard the robot behind me, breaking through the wood. I became winded and stumbled. I heard and felt its menace as it drew closer, but could not force my body to move another inch. Then came a rumbling, tumbling sound and after that a mechanical squeaking.
After a minute to recover my breath, during which the robot moved no closer to me, I slowly and carefully walked back. I found the robot in one of our atrox pits, unable to crawl out with its arms and legs, which weren’t designed for such a situation.
My parents came into my mind and I ran back. When I arrived back at the farm I saw I couldn’t do anything anymore. I tried, but my healing abilities were of no help and it was too late. For some time (how long I really can’t say) I sat crying. I was lost, confused and shocked, and didn’t know what to do.
But here I couldn’t do much, so the only real option was to go to the city and try to find help. After I laid my parents’ bodies into their bed and tucked them in, I took the rifle and ammunition and all my mind essence and headed out.
However, before I could go to the city, I had one last meeting with the robot, since my misery was now turned into anger. I assured myself it saw the bullets coming, and at least I took my revenge. The anger wasn’t over yet though.
I turned towards the city and ran. I hadn’t run much before I heard the gunfire from the city.
The great volume of firing suggested that something must have gone terribly wrong.
The first building I saw when I left the forest was the church. A bit outside the town, the church had open space around it. Presently the church was defended by a group of seven settlers armed with rifles, standing behind a low barricade constructed in front of the church.
Incoming robots from the town were shot down without any mercy, as the Right Reverend urged on those defending the place. His cries I could hear when I approached the church, “Destroy the soulless demons coming for our lives.”
I was fortunate that they recognised my human form and welcomed me behind the barricade, from where I helped them to defend an attacking wave of robots. Then we rested. Reverend Alexander “Alex” Anderson gave me the latest information he had.
Robots throughout the town had suddenly turned against humans, slaughtering men, women and children alike. A few families found shelter in the church, guarded by hunters who heard the gunfire and headed to town, which was defended only by Alex at first.
Alex was used to give orders from his time in the army of old Earth. But he had since vowed never to fire a gun on any living being again, and so had turned to religion. However, robots aren’t alive, and he quickly took command, using his experience to successfully hold the robots at bay.
The gunfire in the rest of the town ebbed away and finally stopped completely. Clearly the humans had not won; there were no cries of elation in the streets or people coming out of the town.
“Hmm, things are gonna get nasty for us now,” Alex said and looked at the next hunter. “Son, we have a couple of miners in the church. Ask them to get their bombs and probes and whatever explosives they have, and place them between the town and the church, ready to detonate them with remote controls.”
While the hunter went away Alex turned to us: “We will see a large scale attack on the church most likely. I want you to get all the ammunition you can find as well as additional weapons. There should be some in the shelter near the church, left by people who visited the church. Also, get any stuff you can find to build a better barricade, and place some of that in the church as well, in case we have to withdraw within. In the forest we won’t have a chance, not with those animals in it. This will be our fortress; if it falls, we fall.”
We built a small barricade inside the church, fortified the outer defences, and waited. When you looked in the faces you could see fear, shock and misery. Just Alex kept his courage, and he was the one who shouted, “Incoming!”
He was right; it was a large-scale attack—lots and lots of robots running, driving, hopping or floating in our direction.
The miners detonated the first row of bombs, and many robots were ripped apart. Even more were shredded by the second. The third and last row of explosives left just around 150 robots moving.
We started firing with everything we had, and decreased the robot numbers rapidly. Although just one bullet doesn’t stop a robot any better than an atrox, together we provided a hail of fire that proved fatal to so many bots.
Although we sent many robots to the eternal scrap yard, our ammo was being depleted fast as well. When there were 20 robots left, the first gun stopped firing; mine went out of ammo at 15, and we were all out of ammo with 10 robots left.
Shouting: “Use your weapon as club!” Alex jumped in front of the barricade. Surprisingly I followed him immediately, taking the farthest left position of the semi circle which now developed. Considering that I faced some kind of lumberjack robot with 2 chainsaws instead of hands that obviously wasn’t the best idea I ever had.
The robots stood 5 meters away from us, waiting. We awaited them with our rifles grasped in both hands, ready to give them serious dents, or whatever. The robots started running; I raised the gun over my head, ready to strike.
The others said they saw sparks coming out of the robots; what I saw is hard to imagine. At one moment I saw this robot striking out with one of his chainsaw arms, the next moment I saw a red glow from inside the robot and felt an intense heat. One wink later the robot wasn’t there anymore, just a fuming puddle of metal and in the next wink I saw before me a woman with red hair streaming behind her, and red glowing hands.
She was the first who spoke: “Targets neutralised, HM!”
“Well done. Actually, that went better than I expected.” The voice sounded familiar. The next moment I saw Steve, the man from the Institute, standing in the middle of six people, all with black coats, who now turned toward us. “OK guys, since we are still alive, I guess it is time to barricade ourselves in the church. We brought some more ammunition for you as well; it won’t last too long though.”
Steve quickly took the command and Alex didn’t complain at all, the presence of this black-coated guy was hard to withstand. “Guys, barricade the entrance. The walls will hold the robots at bay a bit, but the entrance is vulnerable. Reload your weapons as well.”
“Yes, HM!” the black coated guys answered, and were helped by the people in the church.
“Jessica, get going.”
“Yes, HM!” a small woman with total black hair answered and went to the opposite side of the room, placing two rows of mind essence in a circle around her.
I went to my life-saver to thank her, but she started the conversation first. “Seems we came just in time, huh? I am Melissa. Although my nickname is ‘Firestorm,’ I am more often called simply ‘Mel.’”
A bit confused about that fast introduction, and somehow suddenly weak-kneed, I started a bit to babble: “Err, Marius Cromwell, no nickname yet. What the heck just happened?”
Smiling she said: “Well, since you carry mind essence in your pockets, I guess you have heard of mindforce, by the HM.”
“HM?”
“Oh, that is short for “high mindtropian.” He is our leader actually. We are the current team of mindforce specialists, trained at the Institute for Human Development. Usually the HM shows off a bit with his healing powers, but there is more to mindforce than just healing. The robots that attacked your friends were destroyed by an ability we call nerve blast. This is a strike of electric power from the mind of the user to the brain, or in this case the circuit, of the target. It tends to be fatal.
I attacked your robot, using an ability that has not officially been given a name yet, since I am the first person who seems to be able to cause an intense fire on the location in my mind. I create more or less a small sun that lasts less than a second at the place I want it to be. That tends to be fatal as well. But it might be named after me, since my nickname matches so well.”
Steve heard our conversation as well and was quite amused by my amazement. Grinning, he said “Mel, stop flirting and get ready, the robots are coming.”
“Yes, HM!”
Steve came to me, whispering, “Usually she is quite cold—quite the opposite of her ability, but that she went to help you immediately and even told you that much in the first conversation is quite funny, might even be a crush.” I doubt my head has ever been that red before, but the first strike when a metal hand hit a metal door of the outer barricade made us aware of the real problem.
The kneeing hunters with their rifles in the first row, the mindforce specialists behind, with bluish and red glowing hands we awaited the robots.
Steve gave the orders for the coming fight: “Ok, guys, this is the plan. My mindforce group will attack first, one after another, starting from the right with you Mel. Since we need a while to be ready to attack again, the hunters will fire as soon as the all mindforce people are charging again.
“That will be the start. If there are more robots, and more than one of you have the chance to fire, attack the target on your side, so we can divide the fire a bit. If the robots break through, the mindforce people will attack the second and third row of robots, to hold their advance, especially since the hunters can just hit the first two rows or so.
“That’s it, good luck guys.”
“Before I forget, are you sleeping Jess?”
The answer was silent but sharp: “I try to concentrate, HM, which is hard enough with all you guys spreading testosterone all around, and soon the gunfire will make it worse. If there is something I don’t need, it is someone who tries to tell me what to do and how. Now let me do the sensitive work and I leave the devastation to you.”
“Alright sweetheart.”
Right then the door burst apart and the first robot, which was stupid enough to stand there, was reduced to a metal puddle, the following ones suffered electric attacks and then bullets.
It first seemed like we could hold them forever, but I ran out of ammo way too soon. Slowly but surely the gap in the door became bigger, and our defence line stepped back
“Got it, HM!” Jessica shouted over the noise.
The balls of mind essence were shining brightly and flying around her. Suddenly they flew all together, forming a glaring ball and the ball created some sort of maelstrom.
“Everyone walk into it, and hurry, I can’t hold it open forever!”
We were momentarily stunned by the glimmering portal, but as each person recovered and stepped into this thing, there were drawn inexorably inward and then disappeared altogether. The hunters with ammo left and mindforce specialists covered our fallback and were the last that jumped into this portal. I stayed longer as well to help the people around to get into it.
As he moved around, Reverend Alex was pierced by some sort of improvised robot spear and thrown into the portal; he must have died immediately. Steve and I were the last ones who jumped into it quickly after the last settler was through.
The journey through the portal was less exciting than the opening. I was in the church the one moment and the next moment on green grassland with the other people gathering around Alex’s crumpled body.
Steve made his way to Alex, kneeled next to him, put one hand on his chest, the other on his head and closed his eyes. Energy seemed to stream from his arms into Alex’s body, and Steve took a deep breath, the wound was closed.
He inhaled and exhaled again.
Again he inhaled and then Alex did as well, while Steve fell over, breathing hard.
“That’s why he is the high mindtropian, I guess,” I thought to myself.
We were all baffled, and after a few minutes Steve spoke again, although he was still exhausted. “Jess, where did you bring us?”
“Well, I brought us to the only place where I didn’t feel dying beings—or rather, no dying humans. You remember the secret research station we have in the south of this continent?”
“The one with the security belt of animals around, which attack anything moving near them?”
“Do we have that many secret research stations that you really need to ask?”
“Never mind. How close are we?” Steve said with a sigh.
“Hopefully close enough to avoid animals”
“Seems it isn’t over yet, huh, sweetheart?”
“Guess it has just begun.”
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first, i hope i got it all from the word document
second, big thanks to coop_ who actually edited the story and read over it to correct my grammar and some weird sentences as well
Newly-found paradise far away from old Earth.
Very Earth-like, Calypso has two suns, unspoiled nature, and an amazing array of wildlife.
The planet Calypso was discovered by one of the huge automated drones sent by mankind to find more acceptable places to live. Robots were sent by the drone ship, first to build a base-matrix which controlled and updated the software of all the robots, and then to build houses and an infrastructure in preparation for the first settlers. The drone ship itself departed for another close star system; the reason for that departure is still unknown.
I am Marius Cromwell, and I am writing this report on board the Exodus, a colony ship which brought the first settlers to this planet, and from which I now look down upon Calypso as the ship orbits high above the surface.
My report contains some impressions of the life I had here, and should give an idea of the time the early settlers had, especially regarding the problems, danger and horror we all faced. It is indeed an eyewitness report of one of the few early settlers to survive at all. The report will be chronological, although the time between the incidents differs—mostly without any information regarding how long this time was, since the times were too rough to make precise notes, at least for me.
I start the report with a short summary of how it started back at the old Earth and what happened since our arrival. The overpopulation of the Earth caused massive riots as food ran scarce. This made it easy to apply for this trip, as our family farm was raided and we lost everything to the mob. Our application was approved and my father, mother, and I gratefully took our few remaining possessions and boarded the Exodus along with hundreds of other settlers, ready to begin a new life.
Although the robots had been preparing the cities for some time, most of us didn’t fly down to our new home right when we reached Calypso. Our family had decided to farm again so we could provide food for the growing cities, but the farms still had to be built. Many other settlers had similar waits, so the Exodus remained quite full for the first few weeks. Our farm was incomplete but habitable when we decided we just couldn’t wait any longer to move into it.
It was Flight #4 from the Exodus down to Calypso in a smaller shuttle which seated 40 people. At first the shuttle was abuzz as the settlers chatted excitedly about visiting the planet at last. Yet the whole shuttle became silent as soon as we entered the atmosphere.
The view was simply breathtaking!
A wonderful blue sea, kilometers of gleaming beaches, trees with leaves brighter green than we had ever seen, and great herds of strange animals grazing on wide plains.
As the shuttle descended deeper we could see the one herd of animals better. We saw huge, but apparently peaceful, grayish animals with big round heads. From each head rose a number of protruding sails, and these rose and stood straight in the air as the shuttle came closer.
We landed in a town near a great crater formed by what we hoped was an inactive volcano. A welcome committee awaited the passengers, and we were directed toward our final destinations. Those, like us, who had decided to live out of town, were directed to the “taxis,” which were floating robots—basically flying platforms with a rail, seats, and a place for our suitcases. Before flying to the farm, we decided to have a little exploration trip as the robot took us away from the city.
The taxi-bot brought us to a group of animals sporting tiger-pattern skins. As frightening as the great beasts appeared up so close, they seemed to be peaceful herbivores. Though a few stretched their throats, they seemed pretty uninterested in us.
A bit farther on, we discovered the herd we had seen as we flew overhead. Again the sails rose as we approached, but dropped again as soon as they realized we weren’t a threat and the animals went back to grazing.
The next group of animals we watched from the top of a small hill. That the robot held quite some distance from them compared to the herds before suggested that these must be a more aggressive species. Using our binoculars, we got a better look at them as the robot hovered. They were more compact animals, with four legs and grayish as well, with horns on their head and a tail that was used to keep balance as well as being a formidable weapon.
Although most of them had only small horns, five had a great rack of spiked horns on their head, and large mace-like tails. These had a more greenish look to them. Those five positioned themselves into 2 lines between us and the herd they obviously protected—the two largest in front followed by three more in a second line. After a few minutes, they too realized we didn’t want to attack and went back to a circle around the herd, each one watching a portion of the landscape so as to guard the herd. For wild animals, this display of tactics amazed us.
That the guards did their work pretty well soon became apparent to us. The whole behavior of the herd changed immediately when a hopping two-legged animal with four sharp claws appeared out of the blue, followed by another one, and another. At a deep warning cry, which cut us to the quick, all the heads of the herd rose and even the three beige-colored predators backed off momentarily.
As the attackers recovered, they faced the same defense line we saw, except with the three biggest in the first line now, to match the number of attackers, with the other two behind. The following fight was brief.
While the defenders had to deal with the sharp claws of the agile animals, the attackers suffered strong tail strikes and vicious ramming attacks from the horned plates of the defenders.
The predators tried an attack from three sides, forming a semi-circle more or less. Yet the action actually started with the defenders, as the first three stormed out of their line to face their foes. The rightmost one was hit by the head of the largest of the horned animals, maybe the alpha of them. The impact must have broken many of its bones immediately and threw it several meters through the air.
The other two attackers had more luck, evading the storming animals and to our collective horror slicing deep and fast-bleeding wounds into their legs with their sharp claws. But neither of them saw the second defense line running towards them at that very moment.
As they turned to attack the now-wounded animals the great tails of the fresh defenders hit them at once. One flew towards a rock, and we could hear the cracking of its bones even at our safe distance. The other managed to get up after being hurled to the ground, but 2 of its arms were hanging lifeless. Stunned, it turned around and hopped away, ignoring the gray animals which already stood in a line again to counter the next attack. We barely suppressed audible cheers at this point.
Seeing the threat retreating, the defenders took care of their wounded. The bleeding had stopped already and scars had started to form. We noted that there were many older scars as well; it wasn’t the first fight for these animals. We had been informed about the immense healing ability the wildlife here possesses, but seeing it with our very own eyes was another thing.
The guardian circle around the herd was re-established, with a suspicious look toward us to see if we wanted our share as well. We didn’t, and told the robot to take us to our farm.
During the flight to the farm we were silent. We all thought about what we experienced and were still impressed by such defensive tactics and by such a violent scene in the paradise we expected.
We flew over a plain covered in short grass and entered a dark forest with huge trees. As nice as it looked from above, from inside the forest looked ominous. It seemed a treacherous idyll: a beautiful place disguising the real threat that was lurking for you. Even the robot seemed to fly a bit faster since we entered the forest. As abruptly as the forest ended, we were just as grateful to escape that eerie place.
Blinded by the sudden sunlight, it took a while until we recognized the building we were heading for.
The farm was just around twenty minutes from the city. It was flat, beige-colored, and consisted of four rectangular rooms, arranged in a “T” pattern. The area around it was divided into two fields to seed corn to the east and south side of the “T”. The western part, from where we approached, was our courtyard, with a small shed for our farm robot. The northern side had an enclosure, which was itself divided into two pens.
The proximity of this enclosure to the forest worried me, and I was proven right sooner than expected.
The farmhouse had windows on each side and the roof, as well as good blinds to block the sun out while we slept.
The enclosure held a little surprise for us. There were already some cute looking animals in it. One pen held grayish animals with four legs and two short trunks, while the other pen held a black and brown animal with two legs, two long trunks and a bluish backside.
Our first guess, that the pens separated females from the male, was right, as we learned from the little brochure from the government left inside our house. According to the informative brochure, the animals were called “snablesnots” and are able to spit acid when provoked. They would also give milk, and supposedly taste good as well. To collect milk while protected from the acid we were given some special suits.
The brochure also informed us about the automated blind mechanism and how to clean and use the rifle provided for self-defense, which we found stowed in a gun cabinet.
The first day we spent moving into our new home while keeping safe distance from the snablesnots, which seemed a bit frightened of us as well. During the next days, the snablesnots became less and less shy, and never even tried to attack us with acid. Only the male was a bit more aggressive. The snablesnots even started to pet us with their trunks after a while, especially me since I was in charge of taking care of them while my parents seeded the corn and kept their distance from those weird animals whenever they could.
We activated our farming robot a couple of times as well. Its torso was carried by a platform with four legs to keep its balance, and was able to rotate. It had four arms, each with four “fingers” for holding and using human tools.
My father and I practiced with the rifle, just to be on the safe side.
During a day while I was just milking the snablesnots my father came to me with another man following him. This stranger wore a black coat and shades, had a quiet but clear voice and carried a strange-looking bluish device, a bag which seemed to glow from the inside, and some bottles.
He introduced himself as Steve Jacobs, and told us he was sent by the “Institute for Human Development.” We had heard about this facility before; even got a brochure from them with the headline “Discover Your Abilities!” and found it quite funny. So a smile appeared as soon as I heard where he came from. The smile grew even bigger when he started to tell us that we could extract “vibrant sweat” from our snablesnots. A picture formed in my mind of a snablesnot running around the pen at full speed while we ran after it with towels to get its sweat!
The smile disappeared immediately when Steve suddenly had green glowing hands and then established some kind of green tunnel between his hands and a snablesnot. At his hands some kind of liquid appeared, dripping copiously into the bottles in front of him.
With our now-arrested attention he explained that this sweat can be refined with a specific enmatter using the device he carried to create something he called “mind essence.” He took some shiny things out of his bag, placed it on the refiner, poured the sweat into it, and pressed a button. A cover opened and we could see some very small spheres that glowed from the inside. Steve took them out, and as his hand approached the balls, they lit up even more.
“While we found that many people have the ability, after some practicing, to gather vibrant sweat without need of any tools or helps,” he said, “only some of us are able to channel their mind powers toward other areas, and that requires this mind essence. But I guess it is easier to show you.”
He looked at one of our snablesnots, which was still suffering from a fall down a hill a few days ago and also had a broken leg. The looking became staring, and the mind essence he still had in his hands started to shine in a bright light now and was absorbed by his hands one by one, giving both hands a bright pink shine. He put forth his hands toward the snablesnot, which was now surrounded by a pink aura that disappeared after two seconds.
And the leg was instantly and completely healed.
“This we call ‘Biotropy,’ which allows us to heal beings from distance. As you can see, the mind essence has quite some value for us, so if you could provide my Institute with vibrant sweat or mind essence we would be very grateful.
“I suggest you try sweating by yourself and also to keep some mind essence with you most of the time, to see if you have an ability you don’t know of yet, or that even we don’t. This whole mind force is still in development and we try to study it as well as we can.
“However, don’t place any mind essence near you when you sleep. There is no need to burn the house down just because of a nightmare, so beware a bit. Generally most information regarding mind force is classified, so I can’t tell you more than this really—just beware, mind force can be stronger and more devastating than you might think.”
Needless to say, we tried to gather vibrant sweat everyday after then, but only I seemed to have any knack for it; my parents weren’t able to establish the beam or to hold it long enough. I also carried some mind essence in my pockets with me all the time, though without something interesting happening.
One day we opened the blinds and were surprised to see our enclosure was empty. A second look, however, showed that it wasn’t completely empty. There were just no living snablesnots around, just some torn to shreds pieces of them—a trunk here, a leg there. We also found a fang, a big one.
Shocked by that slaughter, we kept our rifle handy, and decided to find out what kind of animal would be able to do that. We built a little shelter, camouflaged with some leaves and wood, and put snablesnots in our enclosure again and waited.
The very next night we saw it already. First there was just a shadow moving in the forest, a glimpse of green leather-like skin, something dangerous lurking and sneaking closer to the farm.
The breakthrough came all of a sudden. It crashed out of the forest and ran amazingly fast towards our snablesnots. It was some sort of dinosaur! A green dinosaur with four arms brandishing long claws and a vicious set of teeth.
My father reacted faster than I had been able to, bringing the gun to position and shooting. Although four of ten shots hit, the fearsome beast didn’t become much slower. In fact the rifle seemed to have no effect but one: the beast turned and now headed directly for us, not really fooled by the camouflage or simply running to the place the place from which the bullets had come.
I stood there pale and paralysed, not able even to shout, as a green mass of strong muscles, sharp claws and fearsome teeth closed on us fast. Surprised that the monster didn’t even seem to have noticed the first shots, my father needed a few seconds to aim the next volley.
The dinosaur was now running in a straight line to us so the next bullets hit better. The first one hit its left leg, which made it slow down, and the second hit square in the chest, which made it stop.
But it didn’t fall. It was more like it was deciding what kind of animal can attack from such a distance and what to do next. It stood there for what seemed to me like minutes. Actually it must have been more like just three seconds. Then it ran again. And I saw the furious twinkling eyes coming closer and closer.
It was 10 meters away when my father hit it with two shots directly into the head. Although these must have been fatal hits, this kind of mass with that kind of speed cannot be stopped easily. It took just a millisecond for us to realise that as well, and we jumped out of the shelter.
The dinosaur stumbled and crashed right into the place we were a second before. Coming immediately to our feet, we waited a while before we approached the greenish body below the shelves and leaves of our former shelter. It didn’t move anymore.
My father went closer and poked its foot with the rifle. Nothing happened. Aiming at the torso he went closer and touched it again.
The arm twitched around and cut a deep gash in my father’s right thigh, while the head tried to reach his other leg. Most likely out of pure reflex my father emptied the rest of the magazine into this monster, literally shredding its breast area.
I called my mother and we bandaged our hero as fast and well as we could, and called a doctor from the town as well. While I stayed with my father, a hand on his leg, my pockets suddenly lit up, then my hands glowed as well, and then the air around my father’s leg.
The doctor arrived fast, and was surprised that the wound wasn’t deeper and had in fact already healed, since several of these creatures had been spotted lurking around the city and the wounds they caused had been severe. The creatures were given the name “atrox.”
We were exhausted, and it was still around “midnight” (strange to say that with a sun in the sky), so we went to sleep after the doctor helped us to take my father to bed. He promised us to send some workers from the town to build an electric fence around the farm for us.
The next day the workers didn’t just install a fence, we got a defence turret as well. Nearly twice as high as the farmhouse, it was programmed to scan the environment and shoot any attacking animals, except snablesnots of course. This kind of turret was now installed around most of the cities, to prevent animals such as our atrox from preying upon the townspeople.
To avoid a sudden power failure or problems with target assessment, the turrets were all given an independent program and power supply, not connected to any network whatsoever. Thus they were built as independent units, which saved many lives later on.
We also dug some smaller pits in the forest to trap any atrox that might happen by.
Some days passed, and we got news that the drone which discovered Calypso had most likely travelled to a nearby planet system, but never sent any further information. The government would send a small communication probe to shed light on why the drone disappeared first. Three weeks later the exploration probe arrived, finding a dark and eerie system of two planets.
What we didn’t know at the time was that both planets were inhabited by the robots, each planet hosting a base matrix to control them. The probe tried to communicate with the base matrix from one of the planets, and the signal it got was sent back to us, and sent to the base matrix of Calypso to be decoded.
When the message was given to our base matrix I was out on the field with my father, our robot working along with us. A sudden outcry from my father made me spin around. One hand of the robot was gripping my father’s head, another hand tightly grasped his shoulder. The sound when my father’s neck broke I will never be able to forget.
My mother came running out of the house to see what the noise was and was immediately thrown back into the house by a hayfork cast like a javelin by the robot. The second it took for me to realise what was actually happening seemed to last hours, during which the robot slowly turned towards me, capturing me in its glare.
Without a real plan I turned around and ran to the forest, the robot coming fast behind me. I literally jumped into the forest, with no other thought than running away from the murderous threat. While the branches lashed into my face I heard the robot behind me, breaking through the wood. I became winded and stumbled. I heard and felt its menace as it drew closer, but could not force my body to move another inch. Then came a rumbling, tumbling sound and after that a mechanical squeaking.
After a minute to recover my breath, during which the robot moved no closer to me, I slowly and carefully walked back. I found the robot in one of our atrox pits, unable to crawl out with its arms and legs, which weren’t designed for such a situation.
My parents came into my mind and I ran back. When I arrived back at the farm I saw I couldn’t do anything anymore. I tried, but my healing abilities were of no help and it was too late. For some time (how long I really can’t say) I sat crying. I was lost, confused and shocked, and didn’t know what to do.
But here I couldn’t do much, so the only real option was to go to the city and try to find help. After I laid my parents’ bodies into their bed and tucked them in, I took the rifle and ammunition and all my mind essence and headed out.
However, before I could go to the city, I had one last meeting with the robot, since my misery was now turned into anger. I assured myself it saw the bullets coming, and at least I took my revenge. The anger wasn’t over yet though.
I turned towards the city and ran. I hadn’t run much before I heard the gunfire from the city.
The great volume of firing suggested that something must have gone terribly wrong.
The first building I saw when I left the forest was the church. A bit outside the town, the church had open space around it. Presently the church was defended by a group of seven settlers armed with rifles, standing behind a low barricade constructed in front of the church.
Incoming robots from the town were shot down without any mercy, as the Right Reverend urged on those defending the place. His cries I could hear when I approached the church, “Destroy the soulless demons coming for our lives.”
I was fortunate that they recognised my human form and welcomed me behind the barricade, from where I helped them to defend an attacking wave of robots. Then we rested. Reverend Alexander “Alex” Anderson gave me the latest information he had.
Robots throughout the town had suddenly turned against humans, slaughtering men, women and children alike. A few families found shelter in the church, guarded by hunters who heard the gunfire and headed to town, which was defended only by Alex at first.
Alex was used to give orders from his time in the army of old Earth. But he had since vowed never to fire a gun on any living being again, and so had turned to religion. However, robots aren’t alive, and he quickly took command, using his experience to successfully hold the robots at bay.
The gunfire in the rest of the town ebbed away and finally stopped completely. Clearly the humans had not won; there were no cries of elation in the streets or people coming out of the town.
“Hmm, things are gonna get nasty for us now,” Alex said and looked at the next hunter. “Son, we have a couple of miners in the church. Ask them to get their bombs and probes and whatever explosives they have, and place them between the town and the church, ready to detonate them with remote controls.”
While the hunter went away Alex turned to us: “We will see a large scale attack on the church most likely. I want you to get all the ammunition you can find as well as additional weapons. There should be some in the shelter near the church, left by people who visited the church. Also, get any stuff you can find to build a better barricade, and place some of that in the church as well, in case we have to withdraw within. In the forest we won’t have a chance, not with those animals in it. This will be our fortress; if it falls, we fall.”
We built a small barricade inside the church, fortified the outer defences, and waited. When you looked in the faces you could see fear, shock and misery. Just Alex kept his courage, and he was the one who shouted, “Incoming!”
He was right; it was a large-scale attack—lots and lots of robots running, driving, hopping or floating in our direction.
The miners detonated the first row of bombs, and many robots were ripped apart. Even more were shredded by the second. The third and last row of explosives left just around 150 robots moving.
We started firing with everything we had, and decreased the robot numbers rapidly. Although just one bullet doesn’t stop a robot any better than an atrox, together we provided a hail of fire that proved fatal to so many bots.
Although we sent many robots to the eternal scrap yard, our ammo was being depleted fast as well. When there were 20 robots left, the first gun stopped firing; mine went out of ammo at 15, and we were all out of ammo with 10 robots left.
Shouting: “Use your weapon as club!” Alex jumped in front of the barricade. Surprisingly I followed him immediately, taking the farthest left position of the semi circle which now developed. Considering that I faced some kind of lumberjack robot with 2 chainsaws instead of hands that obviously wasn’t the best idea I ever had.
The robots stood 5 meters away from us, waiting. We awaited them with our rifles grasped in both hands, ready to give them serious dents, or whatever. The robots started running; I raised the gun over my head, ready to strike.
The others said they saw sparks coming out of the robots; what I saw is hard to imagine. At one moment I saw this robot striking out with one of his chainsaw arms, the next moment I saw a red glow from inside the robot and felt an intense heat. One wink later the robot wasn’t there anymore, just a fuming puddle of metal and in the next wink I saw before me a woman with red hair streaming behind her, and red glowing hands.
She was the first who spoke: “Targets neutralised, HM!”
“Well done. Actually, that went better than I expected.” The voice sounded familiar. The next moment I saw Steve, the man from the Institute, standing in the middle of six people, all with black coats, who now turned toward us. “OK guys, since we are still alive, I guess it is time to barricade ourselves in the church. We brought some more ammunition for you as well; it won’t last too long though.”
Steve quickly took the command and Alex didn’t complain at all, the presence of this black-coated guy was hard to withstand. “Guys, barricade the entrance. The walls will hold the robots at bay a bit, but the entrance is vulnerable. Reload your weapons as well.”
“Yes, HM!” the black coated guys answered, and were helped by the people in the church.
“Jessica, get going.”
“Yes, HM!” a small woman with total black hair answered and went to the opposite side of the room, placing two rows of mind essence in a circle around her.
I went to my life-saver to thank her, but she started the conversation first. “Seems we came just in time, huh? I am Melissa. Although my nickname is ‘Firestorm,’ I am more often called simply ‘Mel.’”
A bit confused about that fast introduction, and somehow suddenly weak-kneed, I started a bit to babble: “Err, Marius Cromwell, no nickname yet. What the heck just happened?”
Smiling she said: “Well, since you carry mind essence in your pockets, I guess you have heard of mindforce, by the HM.”
“HM?”
“Oh, that is short for “high mindtropian.” He is our leader actually. We are the current team of mindforce specialists, trained at the Institute for Human Development. Usually the HM shows off a bit with his healing powers, but there is more to mindforce than just healing. The robots that attacked your friends were destroyed by an ability we call nerve blast. This is a strike of electric power from the mind of the user to the brain, or in this case the circuit, of the target. It tends to be fatal.
I attacked your robot, using an ability that has not officially been given a name yet, since I am the first person who seems to be able to cause an intense fire on the location in my mind. I create more or less a small sun that lasts less than a second at the place I want it to be. That tends to be fatal as well. But it might be named after me, since my nickname matches so well.”
Steve heard our conversation as well and was quite amused by my amazement. Grinning, he said “Mel, stop flirting and get ready, the robots are coming.”
“Yes, HM!”
Steve came to me, whispering, “Usually she is quite cold—quite the opposite of her ability, but that she went to help you immediately and even told you that much in the first conversation is quite funny, might even be a crush.” I doubt my head has ever been that red before, but the first strike when a metal hand hit a metal door of the outer barricade made us aware of the real problem.
The kneeing hunters with their rifles in the first row, the mindforce specialists behind, with bluish and red glowing hands we awaited the robots.
Steve gave the orders for the coming fight: “Ok, guys, this is the plan. My mindforce group will attack first, one after another, starting from the right with you Mel. Since we need a while to be ready to attack again, the hunters will fire as soon as the all mindforce people are charging again.
“That will be the start. If there are more robots, and more than one of you have the chance to fire, attack the target on your side, so we can divide the fire a bit. If the robots break through, the mindforce people will attack the second and third row of robots, to hold their advance, especially since the hunters can just hit the first two rows or so.
“That’s it, good luck guys.”
“Before I forget, are you sleeping Jess?”
The answer was silent but sharp: “I try to concentrate, HM, which is hard enough with all you guys spreading testosterone all around, and soon the gunfire will make it worse. If there is something I don’t need, it is someone who tries to tell me what to do and how. Now let me do the sensitive work and I leave the devastation to you.”
“Alright sweetheart.”
Right then the door burst apart and the first robot, which was stupid enough to stand there, was reduced to a metal puddle, the following ones suffered electric attacks and then bullets.
It first seemed like we could hold them forever, but I ran out of ammo way too soon. Slowly but surely the gap in the door became bigger, and our defence line stepped back
“Got it, HM!” Jessica shouted over the noise.
The balls of mind essence were shining brightly and flying around her. Suddenly they flew all together, forming a glaring ball and the ball created some sort of maelstrom.
“Everyone walk into it, and hurry, I can’t hold it open forever!”
We were momentarily stunned by the glimmering portal, but as each person recovered and stepped into this thing, there were drawn inexorably inward and then disappeared altogether. The hunters with ammo left and mindforce specialists covered our fallback and were the last that jumped into this portal. I stayed longer as well to help the people around to get into it.
As he moved around, Reverend Alex was pierced by some sort of improvised robot spear and thrown into the portal; he must have died immediately. Steve and I were the last ones who jumped into it quickly after the last settler was through.
The journey through the portal was less exciting than the opening. I was in the church the one moment and the next moment on green grassland with the other people gathering around Alex’s crumpled body.
Steve made his way to Alex, kneeled next to him, put one hand on his chest, the other on his head and closed his eyes. Energy seemed to stream from his arms into Alex’s body, and Steve took a deep breath, the wound was closed.
He inhaled and exhaled again.
Again he inhaled and then Alex did as well, while Steve fell over, breathing hard.
“That’s why he is the high mindtropian, I guess,” I thought to myself.
We were all baffled, and after a few minutes Steve spoke again, although he was still exhausted. “Jess, where did you bring us?”
“Well, I brought us to the only place where I didn’t feel dying beings—or rather, no dying humans. You remember the secret research station we have in the south of this continent?”
“The one with the security belt of animals around, which attack anything moving near them?”
“Do we have that many secret research stations that you really need to ask?”
“Never mind. How close are we?” Steve said with a sigh.
“Hopefully close enough to avoid animals”
“Seems it isn’t over yet, huh, sweetheart?”
“Guess it has just begun.”
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first, i hope i got it all from the word document
second, big thanks to coop_ who actually edited the story and read over it to correct my grammar and some weird sentences as well
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