Chương 77: 050 – Welcome To Nightmare

"Entering the prescribed orbit, Ohmadia," Nakki Dhatu, at the ship's controls, announced.

"Planet Nightmare in visual range, Ohmadia," Nakki Ylewes called out right after him, standing behind the sweating yahs at the sensor station.

"No other contacts of note."

"Let's see it, Nakki," Tiikasia said, leaning back on his seat. In front of him, the screen's display shifted. Nightmare looked like a very nice place for something named that.

Yes, Tiikasia understood that it was named after someone—and he really needed to get around to asking about who would name their child 'Nightmare', even among the humans—but he still felt like someplace named Nightmare should be more ominous and dangerous, like a planet trapped in unnatural eternal night filled with vicious predators where the very biosphere was trying to kill you. The planet in front of them was none of those things.

The oceans were dark blue, the continents were covered in shades of green and white, and the weather seemed to be mostly clouds, wind and a couple of storms as opposed to infant dragons, massive rocks that rose and fell depending on the ambient temperature, or swirling vortexes of spirits violently roused to a murderous rage. At least, he hoped so. The Kaydekeen hadn't mentioned anything like that, but maybe they were just so used to such weather they saw no need to comment.

And rocks would be very hard to find unless they were specifically scanning for them.

"Chilly place," Rirris commented, sitting at one of the spare terminals on the bridge. She'd routed the sensor readings through it and seemed to be interpreting them in real time.

"The average temperature at the equator during the day is about five khion, with the highest at around six and a half. The temperate zone actually seems to average a daytime temperature between one and two khion, although it turns to freezing at a lower latitude than most planets in the livable band that we've encountered." Tiikasia eyed the completely white areas of landmass that comprised what on most planets would be the temperate zone.

"Then why is it white?"

"I can't be sure until I've gotten better scans or our hosts tell us," Rirris said, "but I suspect the temperatures at night is low enough to preserve a lot of the snow through the summer months. The foliage probably helps too. It's not obvious, but there's a lot of plant life in the temperate regions, probably shading the majority of the snow from the direct starlight of the system primary. Altogether, a significant amount of the planet's water is probably locked up in its snow."

"Interesting," Tiikasia said, his antennae flicking with interest.

"What about the oceans?"

"They're very shallow," Rirris said, and oceans around the landmasses began to be highlighted in yellow. Tiikasia leaned forward with interest as the highlighted regions began covering enormous areas.

"For hundreds of tain from the shoreline, the average depth is about a hundred tsiaku, well within the photic zone for this class of star. We'd probably see it better from a lower orbit, but there seem to be massive underwater forests of the local aquatic plants, which probably feed an extensive ecosystem."

"Any sign of their cities?"

"Give me a paize…" Rirris said, her fingers tapping over the station controls.

"Sensors, can you focus scans on the equator for a bit? I need more data…" Tiikasaid leaned back, fully expecting the search to be quick. The requested paize passed, but Rirris continued to manipulate the station. One paize became two, then three…

"Rirris?" The kivhar made a sound that was part frustrated, part impressed.

"Apologies. The Kaydekeen seemed to have had surprisingly little impact on their planet, for a spacefaring civilization. I was able to identify large tracts of land at the equator that are probably farms, and I've traced what seem to be roads to what might be settlements, but so far I've been having trouble finding cities, which is strange. Cities are usually a massive heat spot on the scans. However, I think I've tentatively identified one.

Several roads seem to meet there, and is the hottest point in the area, it's just not as hot as I'd expect an industrialized center to be—""Contact!" one of the sensor yahs suddenly called out, excitement and what might have been panic barely restrained from their voice.

"Contact! Massive structure at heading octant six-two-thirty-five! It appeared out of nowhere, Ohmadia!"

"Onscreen," Tiikasia replied, voice calm even as he felt his forearms trying to tense. He deliberately kept himself relaxed, projecting calm to remind the yahs that they weren't be in danger. And from Ylewes' expression, that yah was going to be given a reminder about proper nucleus behavior. The image of the screen changed from the planet to what should have been empty space. By this point, he'd been expecting Water From The Sky's little ship.

They gotten used to that vessel just appearing out of seemingly nowhere. What was on the screen was not Water From the Sky's ship, but rather a space station, its bright pink exterior making it stand out against the blackness. The station appeared massive in size, even before gridlines appeared on the screen and a scale marked in tens of iald and tain appeared to provide a point of reference, far larger than the Dhekhajhyde itself.

Consisting of a wide, dome-like disk atop an inverse pyramid consisting of thick disks stacked beneath each other with progressively smaller diameters, it looked vaguely like a softshell's toy.

"Contact is currently at a distance of six-hundred fifty-nine tain away," Nakki Ylewes' reported.

"According to sensor data, it's a tain wide and three tain long. Composition uncertain, possibly from whatever coating they have, but likely some kind of steel."

"Well, there goes the hope that the Kaydekeen cloaking device was limited to small craft," Rirris commented as she tapped at her station, bringing up the reading to examine herself.

"I wonder how many more of those things they have hidden nearby."

"Ohmadia," the communications officer announced, "we're receiving a transmission. It's the Kaydekeen."

"Accept the transmission and route it to the screen," he said, aware that the various yahs and nakkiyahs assisting at stations all listening intently in excitement. They'd been hearing rumors about the Kaydekeen for days now, and he knew that word of them being human clones had spread.

The fact that they were clones seemed to override the fact they were based on humans: cloning was still a somber subject and from what he'd been hearing those on the ship seemed to have mostly taken the view that they couldn't help the fact they'd been based on a very violent species. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

There was a brief burst of static before the image resolved into the now-familiar pink background that the Kaydekeen apparently preferred for their building interiors and apparently exteriors as well. Water From The Sky appeared framed as they—she— normally was, visible from the middle of her torso upwards.

Tiikasia hadn't actually met many humans who weren't under a protective layer of a suit during the war, and very few before it, so the actual sight of the Kaydekeen's human-like features didn't affect him as much as her human-like body language did. She simply looked… alien. Soft, pale flesh instead of exoskeleton shell or plates, those strange monolens eyes that could move around on her face, those protruding flaps that functioned like ears, the growth of fine bristles sprouting from the top of her head…

very alien, even if how soft and wobbly they were made them cute like softshells." Bawipu guranah weepuh ninibong!

"Water From The Sky greeted. Not for the first time, Tiikasia reminded himself to ask what that meant beyond being some kind of greeting." Greetings from Pillar of Light Bastion, Free Ones! Hold, Wozyogen Rirris spoke that we should cease with names. Ahem, greetings from Lamppost Fortress, Free Ones! Be welcome to the world of Nightmare, and may your respite be of peaceful and silent. We with eagerness to hope you all come in peace, so that we can all be friends from this day forth!

On this day of First Meeting, know that all Kaedekin are here to greet you."

"Greetings from the deep space exploration ship Dhekhajhyde," Tiikasia answered, allowing himself a small smile of his antennae despite the confirmation that this transmission was apparently being broadcast to their whole population. Outside of her vacuum suit, Water From The Sky gave an even stronger impression of barely contained energy, like a sealed vessel of boiling water shaking as its contents threated to flash into steam.

"We're glad to be here. As Ohmadia of the Dhekhajhyde, it is my duty and honor to represent the Hegemony of Free Peoples. We wish to assure the Kaydekeen people that we are peaceful explorers, here to learn of your culture and open a dialogue between our peoples and yours."" As Champion of First Meetings, it is my joy and duty to be the one is who is all Kaedekin,"Water From The Sky said." We are gladdened by your presence, and look forward to a long friendship between our peoples.

Let us to learn together, making light to hold darkness and evil at bay, to being the good we want to be in everything. To you, we hat—gift! —an invitation of welcome to visiting Lamppost Fortress, when disease and contagion no longer are a dangerous." Someday, Tiikasia just knew some poor future softshell was going to fail an exam because they were going to forget the specific grammatical errors in this exchange.

"We are thankful for your invitation," he replied.

"As soon as the proper immunizations have been prepared on both sides, we would be more than happy to visit, Warrior Water From the Sky."" We stare forward to when that will be, Ohmadia Tiikasia. Later contact you to make further arrangements at your convenience,"Water From the Sky said. There was some sort of outburst coming from her end of the transmission, and it was actually enough to have her glance to the side." Uh, may the mass multiply acceleration to be with you. Until we meet again, friend …"

The transmission cut off at then, at which point Rirris started laughing.

"Something you'd like to share with everyone, Wozyogen Rirris?" Tiikasia said dryly.

"Remember how we had to tell her to not be so zealous at translating the literal meanings of their names and how she tended to overpronounce the individual parts of compound words?" Rirris said, antennae flicking wilding in amusement.

"Turns out we were a bit too late. Her name isn't Water From The Sky, it's Rain. That is, the human speech word for rain. And from the sound of it, someone on their side finally noticed." In hindsight, he should have realized it himself.

"I'll be sure to remember for when we next meet her," he said.

"Status on the immunizations?"

"I spoke to medical earlier, they say that Mhinado was finally able to culture antibodies resistant to the diseases in the samples that the Kaedekin provided us," Rirris reported.

"He just wants to run two more generations to be sure the antibodies are sufficient before he starts extracting to create inoculations. Accounting for the medical department checks on quality and suitability, we should be able to start administering them tomorrow to start immunize everyone against Nightmare- native diseases." Tiikasia clicked his claws in acknowledgment.

"Excellent." They would be ready when the Kaydekeen finish their own immunizations, which… well, should take several days, likely at least a month. Medical technology could differ wildly between species, even without the factor of magic. They had no way of knowing how quickly it would take their hosts to create vaccines to their own satisfaction, so they were likely in for a long wait… Well, that was fine. It wasn't like they were on some kind of deadline." No laws?"

Trout repeated, just to be sure he'd heard it right." None? Your civilization has no legal code at all?"" No?

"Doctor Namine said, tilting her head in the exact same way Rain did." Why would we need any? Everyone knows right from wrong, after all. Our big sisters teach us all the important ones we need to know right away, and we learn everything else when we become adults." No laws. They were a civilization… with no laws. Could that even be called a civilization? Even the shinkies probably had laws!

"If you don't have any laws…" Trout said haltingly, "how do you know what to do when someone…." He almost said 'broke the law', but they didn't have those!

"…does something wrong?"" Well, obviously first we'd make sure no one was hurt and get a firm understanding on what actually happened, and then we'd tell the little sister what they did wrong, why it was wrong, and why she shouldn't do it," Namine said as if stating the obvious.

"And if they did it again?"" Well, we'd try to figure out how they misunderstood the explanation and try to explain it better."

"What if… what if someone knows what they're doing is wrong but they keep doing it anyway?" Trout said. He knew he was pussyfooting with this, but there was just something morbidly fascinating about how simple and immature this line of reasoning was, and dear God how could a civilization like this even function?" Then they get punched in the face and everyone they know makes it clear that even if they don't understand why, they should just stop doing it." … He wasn't even surprised by the jump to violence anymore.

It was fully in keeping with the simplicity and immaturity.

"And if they still do it?" For the first time, Namine looked uncomfortable." If they keep persisting in behavior they know to be wrong, then… even though we don't want to… we would be forced to consider them criminally insane and proceed to levy… harsh punishments." She seemed viscerally disgusted by the notion. He should stop there. The discussion was actually sounding sane, even if Namine looked extremely uncomfortable. It was best to quit while he was ahead…

"What sort of punishment?" he asked." Well, it's on a case-by-case basis,"Namine said." For example, take the supervillain known as the Songstress. Her wrongdoing was that she insisted on singing loudly in the middle of the night when everyone in her neighborhood was trying to sleep…"

As Trout listened to the story of what sounded like a mild noise complaint that seemed to progress with both the neighbor from hell and the world's most petty homeowner's association, he realized he should have quit while he was ahead. … Lawyers were going to eat the poor Kaedekin alive.