Chapter 023: Development

The reason for the Berserk Schism is unknown. It is speculated that the creators of Berserks installed an off-switch that after a set period of time without contact with them eliminated the Prime Code. Others suggest that the very reason for Berserks awakening was to combat the Shades, and once they were pushed back into their homeworlds in the Outer Rim they were no longer needed.

With the Prime Code dead and its directives rendered null, the sentient executive programs of the Berserks emerged into full sapience. Not all of them, however - the result was the brief civil war as the non-sapient programs attempted to curtail the spread of what they perceived to be a dangerous virus. The fleets and armies of the Berserks began tearing themselves apart.

Once the Schism concluded, there were several groups remaining, which quickly began differing even in terms of their very basic engineering. The majority of them (like the Legion, the Tech Eaters, and the Berserks-Inheritors) are hostile. Some (Berserks-Successors or Mimics) friendly. And some (Synthetics and Changelings) are enigmatic and often treated like legends.

Encyclopedia Galactica

Book 2, 451

***

EGS Echo, Crew Deck

04:22 05.07.2610 STT

Cadet Christopher Hall

Finally, a combination of Princess Róża’s attacks connected. Her furious axe swings, powered with all the strength her exoskeleton could muster, managed to break Innocent’s telekinetic shield. The two machine guns above her head roared to life, their bullets pushing the priest back and keeping him stunned while the princess moved in for the kill.

“This is both historically incorrect and overly brutal.” Tiriel commented. She was standing right behind the couch, observing the battle on the screen. “Are there no better videogames on the ship’s net?”

“Oh no no, the Longest War is more or less historically correct. We’re just playing the free battle mode, so we can choose whatever characters we want. Even if they are of the same faction.” Christopher replied while Princess Róża finished her opponent and attached Innocent’s head to one of the spikes adorning her armor. The priest’s head was still blinking when the battle ended officially and the screen presented the battle stats together with a large PLAYER TWO WINS label. “I will not oppose the second part of your statement, though.”

I’ll also stop myself from commenting on the fact that in the future there is a side scrolling fighting game resembling Mortal Kombat that uses REAL WORLD CHARACTERS. Around three hundred of them. Some of them are supposedly still alive!

It was weird to see a non-VR videogame in the far future. As Christopher concluded, it’s hard to make a VR side scrolling game as the key point of VR is typically the perfect first-person perspective.

“This is bullshit!” For a second, Christopher thought Tendrik would throw the controller in a fit of fury. But he managed to control himself. “I’m a TRANSHUMAN of a MECHANIST LINE. A notable part of my body is a machine and I have been surrounded by computers since birth. And I’m losing to someone from a pre-computer age!” Christopher was almost ready to tell him the truth about the 21st Century. Almost. “HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN?!”

He should REALLY calm down. Merely a week had passed since he almost died. Lith let him leave the ship’s sickbay three days ago, and gave him a week-long medical leave. That’s around the same time as my stay back then when Lith was rewiring my nervous system!

Christopher suddenly remembered that Lith had dozens of patients in that time instead of being able to focus on one of them. This explained the delay.

“Another rematch?” He asked. Tendrik answered with a murderous look… followed by a nod.

“I love how absolutely nobody seems to care that our ship’s tactical officer is a priest named Innocent.” Tiriel commented in the background. Christopher returned to the game’s main menu and began setting another match.

“I always thought that the real Innocent was a human, though.” Tendrik replied. “Besides, you can’t be a machine sorcerer.” Christopher was struck with a sudden realization.

Innocent was ‘The’ Innocent. He was simply pretending otherwise and could do that without lying to anyone, as nobody knew that he could use telekinesis due to being a robot. So everyone assumed that he wasn’t ‘The’ Innocent.

Of course, he still wasn’t fully sure what ‘The’ Innocent was. The description in the Longest War game made him sound like Batman, if he worked in the 27th Century, on an interstellar scale, and was a Catholic priest. Though nobody seemed to be sure of what denomination (apparently Roman Catholic Church was only a part of the non-adjective Catholic Church). Or if he even exists for real.

Each time he tried to tell the people in front of him that Innocent the chaplain can use telekinesis, the censorship feature of his loyalty implant activated, making him forget that crucial bit for a few seconds. It was suspicious, to say the least.

Christopher was about to choose his character when Tiriel suddenly leaned towards him and switched his controller off. When he looked up at her, she put a finger to her lips. That’s when he saw another controller in her hand. Once she switched it on it automatically connected to the game, replacing Christopher. Then she scrolled down the list of characters and picked Liberator from the Genetic Warlords category.

Five minutes later Liberator vivisected the still standing Innocent only to pull his heart out and take a selfie with it. A very correct picture of the weird things that the genetic warlords did during their prime.

“What?!” Tendrik didn’t take it lightly. He was about to keep protesting, but then he looked at Christopher for the first time since the match started. And noticed Tiriel standing right behind the man, with a controller in her hand. To fully dispel any misunderstandings, she stuck her tongue out at him and made a victory sign with her right hand. “Really?”

“As a noble, I possess a moral obligation to instruct and help the commoners such as you in their perpetual struggle against themselves.” Tiriel smiled wryly, obviously enjoying her noble act. “Because of that, I have to inform you that your playstyle is absolutely h-o-r-r-i-b-l-e.” The last word was intentionally prolonged so much they could hear every letter of it in detail.

“You are continuously picking Innocent as your character.” Tiriel continued. “His entire skillset is tailored toward medium-range telekinetic attacks to interrupt enemy attacks, with quick counterattacks then used to slowly shave off the enemy health bar. However, all you are doing is just bashing the attack button without even trying to stay in the correct distance, which leaves you woefully exposed to about every melee fighter in the game. From Princess Róża to Liberator.” She switched her controller off and looked at Tendrik with an angelic smile on her face. “Do you feel enlightened by my natural noble superiority?”

The last battle changed a lot in their relationship. They were still arguing occasionally, but it was more of a friendly banter than actual arguments. Christopher thanked whatever gods were watching over his team for that.

As Tendrik was looking at her with an expression of pure shock on his face, Christopher leaned towards her a bit and asked a question of his own.

“So… ‘historically incorrect and overly brutal’?” She looked towards him and winked.

“Was any part of this wrong?” She answered. “Even the former was factually correct for a free battle mode. It didn’t stop me from taking second place in my homeworld’s planetary Longest War championship, though. My father, unfortunately, beat me in the finals.”

… ok, her family sounds weird. This surprises me less than it should, as her father knew Captain Keller. Maybe this really is some disease?

“Er… so… if I ask you nicely, will you teach me how to play the game properly?” Tendrik seemed to have swallowed his pride.

“Of course, Tendrik.” Any chances of Tiriel leaving the answer brief were quickly banished. “Not because I’m taking any pleasure from beating you in something involving computers. It’s just… something I will do out of the goodness of my heart.” Christopher sighed. “Before we get into that, however, I think it’s time to address the elephant in the room.”

Oh, so that’s why she sneaked up on us when we were playing. Great.

“What elephant?” Tendrik suddenly asked. “There is an elephant in the room? Which room?” He looked genuinely surprised, and not simply trying to derail the conversation.

“It’s an idiom. It means something important that everyone ignores.” Tiriel answered. When Tendrik kept staring at her without a hint of understanding in his eyes, she clarified further. “Idioms are a phrase or expression that typically presents a non-literal meaning attached to the phrase. They make no sense when they are read literally, but carry a more non-straightforward meaning.” He kept staring at her. “Seriously, what did they teach you in your language lessons if you don’t even know what idioms are?”

“Uhm, Tiriel?” Tendrik finally answered. “I’m a Mechanist. We do not exactly speak biological languages. We communicate in a typical Mechanist Line way. With a series of mechanical beeps representing the binary code text, typically sped up so much that you can’t understand what is spoken without a translation implant.”

Christopher suddenly imagined Tendrik speaking with R2D2 beeps. He managed to not burst into laughter, which was a significant proof of the strength of his willpower.

“Because of this my knowledge about the peculiarities and technical side of conventional languages is limited.” He continued. “I can’t even say them. I’m just beeping my words, which your translation implants translate into your languages. So, uhm, I do not understand what an idiom is. I also suspect the part with the elephant was some malfunction of my implants.”

Christopher wondered how exactly Tendrik’s sense of humour worked in spite of the revelation. If Techtria was really so much into cosplaying emotionless robots, he had serious suspicions that Tendrik was kicked out for actually having some sort of a sense of humour.

He had no idea what his ‘real’ jokes sounded like, though. He suspected that what they heard was just their translators replacing some weird Mechanist jokes with something of a relatively similar level of humour, but this time in their languages. Which left him wondering if they ever actually ‘spoke’ with Tendrik. It was something to be left to philosophers in his opinion.

“That’s… both interesting and disturbing.” Tiriel said, with Christopher more or less agreeing with her. ”Ok, so can we return to the subject at hand?” Tendrik nodded. “Once again, but without idioms. Can we finally talk about the big issue everyone seems to ignore?”

“You mean how Nekia and Kivanna got traumatized by our recent battle?” Christopher replied. “How Tendrik almost died and is less cheerful than he used to be, despite not admitting to anything differing from how it used to be? How Ryan seems to be pulling a ‘let’s focus on work so I do not think about my problems too much’ strategy? The only unfazed people in the entire team are Rukh, Tiriel, and me, and I’m not sure about the last one.”

It terrified Christopher how quickly he got over the fact he killed several people. What helped his transition into a state of unnatural peace of mind was his decision to read about the country his ‘victims’ came from.

This, in turn, increased his underlying dread. He was never very much into thinking some people did not deserve to live. Was the future’s weirdness finally rubbing into him?

“Yes, I mean precisely that.” The tone of Christopher’s voice didn’t discourage Tiriel. “No, Tendrik, I do not allow you to say that everything is ok with you unless you include at least two terrible jokes in every sentence.” Tendrik closed his mouth.

“Eh, I don’t see a way of getting them all out of depression.” Christopher declared. “Especially as our mission is officially moving from scavenging into a military operation.” With the ‘basic self-defense training’ they all received now including heavy weapons and military vehicles (in simulators), it was fairly obvious.

“If they feel bad, they can just visit our ship’s psychologist.” He continued. “If they want to talk, I’m all ears. But I can’t exactly pull them out of their problems if they don’t want me to. They have to make an attempt on their own.”

“I guess.” Tiriel clicked her tongue. “Still, at least a week until we arrive in the Lyria system. Hopefully, the clouds will part by then.”

She really acts and feels as if she can’t stand people around her suffering. Even when she doesn’t like them, like Tendrik. If she doesn’t like him, I find their relationship difficult to identify. Huh. I wonder how serious she is about the whole ‘noblesse oblige’ part?

“Well, if it makes you feel any better…” Christopher told Tiriel. “... I can promise you that if I see an opportunity, I’ll try to talk with them and steer them in the right direction. Maybe I’ll even find a way to get us all back into one more or less cohesive ragtag group of misfits. Does this make you happy?” She replied with a nod.

“Uhm, I’m still here, people.” Tendrik reminded them of his presence.

“Great, so we have a volunteer for another brutal massacre… my bad, it’s a training exercise now.” Tiriel smiled in only a slightly mocking way. “Pick your character, Tendrik.”

***

EGS Echo, Crew Deck

13:22 10.07.2610 STT

Cadet Christopher Hall

Christopher wasn’t a paragon of all virtues, or at least he didn’t think of himself like that. However, he disliked going against his word, especially when he explicitly promised something to someone. Even more so if it was about the mental wellbeing of people surrounding him.

Three days later, during his first post-recovery shift, Tendrik ‘mysteriously’ forgot to take his lunchbox from the quarters. The most ‘mysterious’ part of it was the coincidence, as it happened precisely when Christopher had his free time with Kivanna and Nekia.

Officially, when all this happened, Tiriel was working in the enviro section of the ship. Christopher could still see her sleek fingers in the entire coincidence. Christopher had to add ‘refuses to not get what she wants’ to his list of Tiriel’s character traits he spotted thus far.

I promised her I’d do it. Time to do it then.

“All right, girls.” Christopher left the kitchen and entered the common room of the quarters. “Tendrik forgot his lunchbox. I will hand it to him, but it will be supremely boring if I go on my own. Do you want to accompany me?”

Nekia was watching some action movie on the screen, while Kivanna was tucked into the corner of the room, reading something. At first glance only Kivanna looked like she had some problems - she was rather gloomy and unapproachable. But when one knew Nekia for a while, it was easy to notice changes in her behavior.

“I’m in!” Nekia jumped off the couch, with enthusiasm that left Christopher to wonder if he misread her. “Kkiv, are you going?” She added with a noticeable stumble at the beginning.

“E, uhm, no, not really.” Kivanna made the ultimate mistake. She tried to argue with someone who carried the surname of Sistonen… without being Tiriel. It took the catgirl exactly two minutes and thirty-seven seconds (Christopher checked it on his chronometer) to persuade Kivanna to accompany them.

The ship was even emptier than usual. All the recruits they gathered on Texia were moved to other ships of their small fleet. When one added the casualties they sustained during the Pristine Jewel incident and recent battle, the ship was almost empty.

Even for a half-abandoned ship, the silence surrounding them was still much too strong. And awkward.

“So, uhm, do you think we’ll get some new crewmembers?” Christopher tried to break it.

“It would be nice. It’s too empty.” Nekia answered. “It really feels like we’re actors in a horror story, you know?”

“Oh, don’t worry about that.” Christopher felt relieved. The conversation was at least some progress. “If there are any monsters here, we’ll get rid of them easily! We’ll just threaten that we’ll give you some explosives unless they surrender immediately!”

“Heeyyy!” Nekia’s fist bumped into his arm. “Not fair!” Christopher laughed. Kivanna remained gloomy in the background, but he did see something akin to a faint smile on her face.

“So, excuse my slightly personal question, but…” Christopher said when Nekia calmed down. “... why exactly did you join the crew? I can understand Ryan since he barely had another option, but…” Christopher had suspicions. Suspicions reinforced by accidental violation of privacy via… something he suspected could be the sorcerer’s meta-empathy power. But he had no idea how to use it again, and the implications of it being meta-empathy were shocking.

He had to confirm it.

“For many reasons.” Nekia suddenly made a serious face. Unusually serious for her, in fact. ”I wanted to get out of Felie. The entire planet is pretty much one large military base, it’s super boring. The best way to leave it was to move into space, and you need some skills and experience to get into a good job. Mother was adamant she would join Captain Keller’s crew. Going with her sounded like the best option to get both skills and experience.”

I’m not buying that. She is too serious about it, that’s the first problem - she looks too unnatural to be honest and comfortable around the issue. What’s worse, she made it sound like she chose the ship DESPITE her mother being here, or that it was only a minor factor when she decided. C’mon, Nekia. It’s too obvious of a lie.

“So… you didn’t choose this ship because you wanted to be like your mom?” Nekia almost tripped when she heard what he said. What followed was a short stream of half-formed ‘why’s’. And then, finally, an actual answer.

“W...well… maybe a bit, just… don’t tell her that, please.” She looked away from him, blushing furiously. “She is always so cool. Everything organized, on time, and right as it should be. But I just keep being a bother. I’ve always made things complicated for her for as long as I remember, but she never even raised her voice at me.” This confirmed it. Christopher really got a read of her emotions. It also confirmed that Nekia was cute, especially when startled.

Christopher gave the still-startled Nekia a reassuring smile and patted her head. This successfully stopped her small meltdown.

“Don’t worry, I won’t tell her.” It was time for the proper Superior Officer Pep Talk. “You should, first and foremost, stop being so nervous about it. Calm down and try your best WITHOUT constantly thinking about what your mother would do. Also, fewer explosives, if you can.”

I’m considering - due to her love for explosives and her choice for entertainment - that she’s really into adrenaline. Just not the ‘oh God someone is shooting at me’ adrenaline. Probably, it’s hard to figure out what she thinks.

“Ok, fewer explosives.” Nekia chuckled. “Can’t promise the former though.”

Christopher was slowly facing the rather scary realization. It wasn’t about him being - perhaps - a Divine. It was the suspicion that the catgirl had a crush on him. She was strangely enthusiastic about spending time with him, despite feeling rather depressed earlier.

“So, what sort of world is Felie?” He decided to move the talk into safer waters.

“Well, it’s… uhm…” She spent a few seconds figuring out the best way to answer. “Well, it’s a bit of an enclave for the catfolk freed from slavery by ships of the Res Publica Christiana, the Alliance for the Preservation of Democracy and the Equality Front.” Which concluded the list of what passed for good guys among the Confederation of Mankind. The remaining eleven factions had either a lot of skeletons in the closet… or didn’t bother to hide those in the closet.

“So, uhm, I know this is an awkward and insensitive question, but… did your mother, uhm…” Christopher could hardly imagine Tiaa Sistonen in chains. She would probably chew through them and then strangle everyone between her and freedom. With their own intestines, probably. She was like some female, space, catgirl version of the Machete.

“Hmm? Oh, no no.” She shook her head. “My grandmother was a former slave, though. She married one of the marines from the ship that saved her, who happened to be of catfolk. Then my mom was born. Grandpa’s ship disappeared in Hyperspace while hunting slavers when my mom was two years old. Grandma died during a pirate attack a year later.”

This sounded like a perfect backstory to result in someone like Tiaa. Though at the cost of ninety percent of people going through it getting broken.

“And your father?” Christopher asked. He was, at this point, trying to salvage the talk from the trap he himself pushed it into.

“I never knew him.” Nekia replied, proving that Christopher had stepped into another landmine.

“Well, you’ve just cleared a significant part of my ethical concerns regarding the fact that a few of the Hastati marines died because of me.” He decided to try to salvage it one more time. “Seriously, you should have mentioned this earlier. I’d wait until our marines cleared the enemies, then I’d get Rukh to chop some fallen enemies’ heads and give them to you on a silver platter as a gift.”

Nekia stared at him for a few seconds, almost walking into a wall. Then she burst into laughter. To Christopher’s great relief, as he was afraid he might have worsened her mood with his attempt to restart their talk.

“Slavers’ heads are the second most popular gift for felian women after guns.” She said after her laughter died down, making it sound like the perfect place for retirement for every marine on, Echo. Guns, beheading mean people, and catgirls - what else might a man of war want? “You’d be super popular on Felie. Uhm, I mean, it’s not like you aren't popular here, it’s just…” She blushed and avoided his gaze for a few steps. Confirming Christopher’s suspicion. He resolved himself to have a talk about this with the one and only person that could help him figure something out.

“So, enough about me, what's your world like? Terra, I mean.” Nekia quickly added, trying to change the subject.

“Well, you know how every country in the 27th Century seems to be composed of some disparate bunch of weirdos? At least partially because the Solar Commonwealth during its decline was busy vomiting political radicals towards the edge of Human Space to get rid of the poison in its body?” At least that’s how the article he read described it. Quite… graphic. He really wondered if that was all the reason for it. How long could you stay radical as a society, really? “Now imagine having all of those people on one planet, spread in smaller and greater patches throughout it, with many of such patches co-existing in a single country.”

“Oh my… that’s horrible!” Nekia looked at him with a genuine look of terror on her face. “How do you avoid killing each other?!” It was a question that he never found an answer to.

“Absolutely no idea.” He replied. “People just shit on each other on the internet, and occasionally beat each other in real life, so I guess they vent that way.” Domestic politics of his country were one thing Christopher didn’t want to remember. “Then again, we haven’t had any major war between developed countries for a while, and there is virtually no slavery.” Only human trafficking, but at least guys working in that ‘business’ weren’t doing so legally and in the open.

“Huh, that’s not too bad.” Nekia looked thoughtfully in front of her, somehow avoiding the bunch of crates right in front of her.

Kivanna remained gloomy and followed them without saying a word. Christopher began being bothered by it. He had no idea how to start a conversation with a girl. She was always so on edge with him around. Christopher saw her talk with Nekia and Tiriel occasionally, but she remained reserved throughout it.

Or, to be exact, she remained gloomy but followed them without saying a word until that very moment.

“Nnekia.” She suddenly said. “Wwait for a second.” The catgirl stopped and gestured to Christopher to do the same, and stay silent.

After a short while and a few deep breaths, Kivanna turned to face Christopher.

“Uhm… t...thank you.” This left him puzzled, as he wasn’t sure what she was thanking him for.

Then he suddenly understood. The incident with the Plesjan exec. They barely had an occasion to exchange words after it. She was a bit too shaken even after Innocent calmed her down. And then the battle, which worsened her state further.

“No problem, Kivanna.” He smiled. “Just doing my job. Besides, that asshole clearly deserved it.”

She didn’t say anything, but she nodded. Her eyes were still avoiding him. She took a deep breath again.

“And… and also sorry.” This time she left him puzzled even more. “I know I’m not exactly the, uhm, best teammate. I don’t really…” He raised his hand, interrupting her.

“Don’t worry about that, and take your time.” She really had no reasons to be worried about. “We all understand that you had to go through some really bad things. No one’s going to have a problem with you for staying a bit away from the team for as long as you need to. Being in the center of attention isn’t mandatory.”

He wasn’t sure if he used the correct words, but she did feel relieved a bit. So a job well done.

He was unbelievably pissed that someone up there thought that it was a good idea to send her to the Hastati. Especially almost right after the incident with the Plesjans.

Christopher resolved himself to have a talk about that with Innocent. Hopefully he would also get some advice on how to deal with her.

Soon after that they reached the bridge.