Chapter 047: Love

Silinruls were a dominant alien species of unknown biology and form that dominated what is currently the Human Space between 12000 BC and 5100 BC. They constructed an empire that lasted for millenia, but did so through conquests and enslavement or extermination of dozens of alien species.

Around 6000BC the Silinruls achieved their greatest feat - a mass-scale virtualization that saw them abandon their bodies of flesh in favour of those of circuits and metal. This turned out to be their downfall - it is believed that mistakes in the transference process caused a creative sterility among their species.

The fall of Silinruls came from the inside. A massive rebellion of organic slaves against their increasingly deranged synthetic masters turned into a war of mutual annihilation when the Silinruls unleashed a self-replicating bioweapon of unknown nature against the victorious rebels.

The result of this war - known commonly as the Darkening - was the extinction of Silinruls by the hands of their slaves… at the cost of their bioplague exterminating almost all forms of life within the current Human Space. The estimated number of casualties of the Darkening varies between ten trillion to five quadrillion of sapients - one of the main reasons behind the total ban on self-replicating weapons within the Confederation of Mankind and Solar Republic.

Encyclopedia Galactica

Book 2, Page 430.

***

Pontifex-II

Day Fifteen

Lieutenant Christopher Hall

It was on the fifteenth day that Christopher began to understand that their temporary vacations on Pontifex-II might be less temporary than he thought.

Fifteen days was a long time, considering the scale on which the space battles were waged. If something did attack the fleet, the battle could end in one of two ways. One was that Keller was forced to retreat from the system, but was going to bide his time - for who knew how long - to return for the lost crew members. The other one was way worse.

Of course, this was just Christopher being increasingly nervous about the situation. There were less pessimistic options. For example the part where everyone up there was working hard on repairing the Seekers’ ships and putting them back in service (while perhaps finding some non-indoctrinated clones alive aboard them to man them), thinking that the lack of contact was a part of the plan.

Still. He could scarcely believe that Keller didn’t try to at least send a probe down to check what was happening.

And there was also the part where he still didn’t know what to do. No angelic visitors. No non-angelic visitors. He at least expected the ‘COME’ guy to send him another message, but no.

Did the angel’s entire plan go sideways because he chose the wrong place on Pontifex-II to land? Did they abandon him over that and conjure another time traveller to try again?

If you exclude his constant head scratching and stress eating up his remaining lifespan, their trip to Pontifex-II was a nice change of pace. It was a tropical island, after all. Coconuts, long treks through the beach, Tiriel and Nekia in swimsuits (the latter was more cute than appealing in the other way, especially the part where it was decorated with images of adorable kittens). Watching the stars. Trying to explain to Cycle that cases of human males accidentally falling onto a human female and groping her in the process are extremely rare in real life.

Some jokes were going simply too far.

Around the early evening of day fifteenth, Tiriel announced that she needs Nekia and Christopher to follow her. The elf was continuing her research routine, though with steadily decreasing ferocity, and needed them to help her in gathering some samples.

They were going into the forest, so they were wearing their normal clothes. In Christopher’s case, those were a combination of trousers and a T-shirt, plus trekking boots. Nekia was actually wearing something rather similar, though slightly cuter.

Tiriel had them pack those clothes to have something to wear while inside of the shuttle if their time on Pontifex-II was prolonged too much. He was extremely grateful for that.

Things got strange a few minutes into their trek, when Tiriel suddenly announced that she forgot something from the camp, and told Christopher that she needed to return there for a moment.

That was extremely suspicious. When Tiriel forgot something, it was almost always staged to achieve some nefarious goal. He immediately understood what it was about this time when he saw Nekia simply standing there, in the middle of the forest - but near a cliff’s edge, so there was a nice view at the sea - and fidgeting nervously.

“Uhm… Christopher, I…” She started to fidget even more. It would be extremely cute - she was really adorable when startled - if Christopher wasn’t panicking internally even more than she did. “I need to ask you something.”

He could have given her a reply before the question came. He knew what she was going to do, and he could cut her moment of crippling anxiety short. But after she finally managed to gather the courage to do it, the least he could do is to let her do it.

“What is it, Nekia?” He said, playing his role in the scenario. He had planned for this moment many, many times. For some reason all the plans he made vanished from his mind when the time came.

“I… uhm…” Nekia decided to prove that she wasn’t a manga character and seemed determined to reach the conclusion. Without something unexpected happening. “I like you. I like you… uhm, very much.” She took a much deeper breath, while her face began to turn red. She wasn’t even looking at him - she was staring at her own feet. “Would you like to be my… boyfrieeeeee…” The last word didn’t end. The volume went down so much that he didn’t hear the last two letters, only the awkward silence.

Alright, Chris. She did her best. Time for you to do the same. You owe her that much.

“Nekia.” She looked up at him. He could see - and feel, through the meta-empathy that didn’t feel like a blessing right now - her hopes suddenly getting extinguished when she saw his expression. “I like you. As a teammate. As a friend. But… I think of you more as an adopted younger sister. I don’t think I can be what you want me to be.” He ended up in a rather improvised and bad way. But he had no idea how to make it sound better.

Besides, was there even a way to make a rejection not sound bad? Especially when it was an infatuation of this magnitude.

“I… I see.” She said, her eyes meeting her feet again. But this time she was no longer blushing. Instead, she felt… wounded. “I’m sorry.”

She ran away. In the direction of the camp. Probably to have Tiriel console her.

Christopher kicked a branch lying on the ground and cursed. Meta-empathy only made dealing with love harder.

***

When Christopher arrived back at the camp, Nekia was already there. Sitting on the beach a few dozen metres away from their beddings, facing the sea. Judging from the slight jerking motions and waves of sadness he could feel from his position through meta-empathy, she was most likely crying.

Christopher had no idea what to do. This was the first time in his life that a girl confessed to him. His first time he ventured onto the field of romantic relationships as a whole. His resolve was a wavering one, but he blamed his meta-empathy for it. He felt her pain so well that part of him wanted to change his answer just to make the pain go away.

He sent a message to Cycle, telling Sidhe to make sure that Nekia won’t do something strange or wander off and get lost in the forest. Then he wandered off himself. The plan was to go around the island before the sun set, just to cool his head off. While leaving the effective range of Nekia’s emotions.

To his surprise, he found Tiriel watching the sunset ten minutes of march away from the camp.

He planned to walk past her and continue his journey, but she didn’t let him.

“I guess I do not need to ask how it went.” She said, her head turning to face him. “She wouldn’t let you leave her so quickly if the answer was positive.”

The place was calm enough. His passive detection of emotions didn’t extend that far. He could as well stay here for a while.

“Yes, Ms. Machiavelli.” He replied. “I turned her down. Then I left the camp because my meta-empathy almost made me retract my answer just to make her less sad. This power is as much a curse as a blessing.” He sat on the sand next to her. She didn’t comment on that, and her emotions didn’t feel unwelcoming.

“I beg your pardon.” She replied, faking outrage quite well. “Machiavelli? What did I do to warrant such words? I just left you two together at the right time.” Which, in other words, meant that she knew that confession time was upon them. But she hadn’t warned Christopher.

He wasn’t in a mood to point that out. They simply watched the sea together for a while. The atmosphere was rather solemn.

“I should probably confess about something I did.” She suddenly spoke at some point. Her emotions were much more restrained, but he was close enough to know that something changed. “Something almost enough to earn such a moniker.”

At this point, Christopher’s vow to not use meta-empathy was pretty much a dead one. Sure, he didn’t interface with them directly. He couldn’t feel any details. But merely by being next to Tiriel - or by seeing her face from afar - he knew much more than she was letting out. He disliked that.

“What is it, Tiriel?” He asked.

“I made an agreement with her.” Tiriel replied calmly. “That she would confess before me, to not hold it against me if you said yes to me. She fell for you long before me, after all. And she knew that I was aware of it for most of that time.”

It took Christopher a few seconds to understand that what he just heard wasn’t a joke. Tiriel just confessed to him, albeit in a roundabout way. How was that even possible? Sure, he kind of suspected her to be interested in him once or twice. For example after the trip to the enviro section. But he didn’t believe in that, despite the thoughts crossing his mind.

“I…” He didn’t know how to answer her. “Why, Tiriel?”

“You must be the only man aboard the Echo who replies to a love confession with ‘why’.” Tiriel, despite being a raging bundle of emotions that he had no idea how to untangle, was extremely calm on the outside. “You don’t look half-bad and you are pretty close to my type, but in the end, I think it was mostly your honesty. That and the fact that despite being sent into the future, one that was completely alien to you, you still did your best.” She remained silent for a few seconds. Christopher was still too stunned to interrupt it.

“I think it started on Texia.” She finally said. “When you announced that you did not know that I’m a noble because reading my personal file felt wrong. It was both incredibly dumb and impressive. But I have not fully accepted my feelings until that time when you ran into me getting drunk after Rukh’s death.”

He remembered that moment. He also remembered what came after it.

“Tiriel.” Finally, she looked at him. She was smart enough to figure out - or read on the shipnet - that his meta-empathy worked the best when it had something to work on. Even something as basic as the look on her face. Her feelings were reaching him much better. “I don’t know what you take me for, but… I was an emotional wreck back then. When you were gone, I broke completely, and cried. A lot. I’m not sure who you are taking me for, but...”

“But you still, despite all that, did your best to console me.” She replied. “You only broke when there was no one in sight that needed support more than you did. If anything, that one’s on me. I should have noticed what state you were in.”

Nekia probably told her what happened in Rukh’s quarters. How long was she looking down on herself for not being there for him? Or was she perhaps more busy being proud of Nekia for being there for her?

Trying to become a noble - one doing their genuine best for those under their care - had to be taxing. Especially as she kept her moments of weakness to herself. To protect the image that she was so proud of.

Christopher was busy trying to sort out his feelings. She probably understood that and remained silent. Giving him time.

What did he feel about Tiriel? What he said back to Tendrik and Rukh was true. She was an ideal girlfriend. Beautiful. Funny. Someone that would support you no matter what, someone to share your grievances and pains with.

He liked spending time with her. Playing games with her. Eating the food she made. Joking with her, even when he was the subject of said jokes.

Was he in love with her all that time? In a love that he denied because he kept seeing himself as someone incapable of measuring up to her? Because he thought that she would never see him in ‘that’ light due to being too… too what?

So many things had changed ever since his arrival in the future. Despite all that he did thus far, he was still looking at himself through the same lens. A lens tainted by all the failures and problems of his old life.

He finally came to a decision. Like many important decisions, its taste was that of pain.

“You remember what you said to me aboard the Cutlass about having to choose between loyalty to the RPC and your religion, and your friends?” She nodded. “I think I’m now forced to choose between my love for my family and my love for you. And I don’t know what to choose.”

Done. He said it. What next? He didn’t know. What about her?

“If a decision to abandon your family for love was an easy one to you, I would not fall for you so hard.” Tiriel finally spoke. “The root of my dilemma. No matter what your reply will be, you lose something important, and it is all my fault.”

Setting the bar high had its downsides.

“What is your family like?” Tiriel suddenly interrupted his thoughts. “You never said much about them.” Now that she said that, he noticed it too. Why? Was this subject too emotionally complicated ever since he began to consider staying in the future?

“Parents. Both scientists, both teaching in the local university.” He replied. It was a welcome diversion. Something to make him stop smashing his head into the bundle of emotion that he had no idea how to untangle. “Older brother. Younger sister. No one besides that. Father was accused of molesting a student and fired from work. Everyone turned their back on us, and most of them stuck to that even when it turned out that the accusations were a lie. We moved out soon after. Staying there was too painful.”

He felt her hand meeting his. He answered in kind.

“It says a lot that despite the accusations you stood by him.” She replied. Christopher had to agree. He still remembered how people looked at him at school when he said that it was bullshit. They all wanted to hear him saying what a horrible man his father was. Those shocked stares when he dared to disagree... “Where did you move to?”

“Some small town in the Midwest.” He replied. “Father and mother were done with the university work. They never wanted to do it again. They both found work as teachers at a local high school. But merely two days later I fell asleep and found myself centuries in the future.”

“Midwest?” Her mind changed. He wasn’t sure what happened, but there was a sudden vortex of emotions in her. “Wait a second. What year are you from again?” A strange question. But she was agitated enough that he decided to answer.

“It was early 2020.” He replied. The vortex calmed down. “What happened?”

“Have you… have you ever read anything about the history of Earth?” She said. She was now once again her own, calm self. But there was something under that, something that he didn’t know how to read. “The 21st Century, to be exact. I thought that you did, that is a pretty obvious thing to do, but I also thought that you read my file, so perhaps…” She paused. He didn’t make her wait for long.

“Well, I avoided that subject.” He said finally. “It wasn’t easy, but I figured out that I don’t want to know too much. There was always an option that if I knew too much, angels would have wiped my memories before sending me back, or even not send me back at all.” At some point he figured out that it was stupid… but somehow, through some mental inertia, he continued onward that road.

Tiriel laughed.

It wasn’t her normal, dignified laughter. Nor her mischievous giggling. This was a decidedly non-noble explosion of uncontrolled laughter. Her hand slipped out from his - she needed both of them to cover her face with.

“Tiriel, what’s happen…” Once again he lost the read on his emotions. It didn’t work well when there was something complicated involved. What was it about? He never saw her like that, and…

“Oh Eru.” She finally managed to calm herself enough to speak. She still had to make a few deep breaths after her religious invocation to be able to continue. “The answer was there all around, and you failed to spot it simply because you can be as stubborn as a donkey on the strangest of things.” She looked like she was about to break into laughter again, but somehow he managed to restrain herself.

“The Days of Fire, Christopher.” She said. He had heard the term once or twice when he was binge-reading through the shipnet, but never really checked it out. “A period of political chaos, economic crisis and societal collapse during the first half of the 21st Century. Which started on the 16th of October 2025… when the caldera of the Yellowstone Supervolcano erupted.”

He opened his mouth to say something… when things started to click in.

Disaster in the near future of his times. His family, recently abandoned by all, with next to no one left by their side. The last words of the first angel he met. The ones when he told Christopher that he can give him his old life back, but only if he ‘knows what to ask for’. Keller’s comment that something from the past showing up in the future doesn’t have to involve time travel - but going to the past requires it.

Christopher finally understood. Both what Tiriel figured out seconds ago and her reaction to it. He spent months with an answer lying in front of him, but he was too busy being stubborn to notice it.

“Angels either can’t or do not want to return me to my times.” He said. Tiriel nodded. “The reward isn’t reuniting me with my family. Sending me back, if it’s even possible, would mess up the timeline, probably rendering all I achieved null. From the beginning it was all about having my family join me here.”

He could feel the weight on his heart lifting up. Something he was worrying about for months was just resolved. And in the best way possible.

It also opened up some… options.

“Uhm, Tiriel?” She gave him a questioning look. “I think I can give you an answer to the confession. I just need to know if I’m not gonna get flogged for it after we get off this rock. My knowledge about the customs of nobility is a rather limited one.” Now he regretted not reading deeper about this subject.

He didn’t need a meta-empathy this time. The smile on her face was honest and heartwarming. No acting this time. Was she going to act in front of him ever again?

“Well, there are some rules that we will need to observe.” She replied. “Thankfully there is this handy law that states that it is completely alright for a noble to marry a non-noble provided that at least two other nobles and a priest will vouch for the non-noble’s character. The reputation of these three is at stake, so they have to have a reasonable degree of trust in you. I think I have some candidates in mind, so this should be easy to achieve.”

Of course she was prepared for that. Who else but Tiriel?

“That sounds very handy indeed.” He admitted. “Is it used often?”

“No, but it is still there.” She replied. “Something to not exclude good people who had the misfortune to be born in the wrong family. But that motivation is not stated in the law, so we can use it to achieve our own goals.”

If Christopher was way too stubborn sometimes, Tiriel was sometimes way too focused and diligent. Then again, seeing her beaming with enthusiasm and pure, concentrated happiness was a lovely change.

It could also be his own enthusiasm and happiness. He was too overjoyed and relieved to keep track of that. He was pretty much planning his own marriage, and with Tiriel to boot. It was unbelievable.

“Alright.” Christopher suspected that her list included Innocent and… perhaps Colonel Nowak? He had no idea who would be the other noble, though. “I’m sure that this will make you tease me to no end, but I have to ask. What about the times before marriage?”

Christopher expected her to tease him with words. Instead she leaned towards him and kissed him. Deeply. He could feel her hands on his back, pulling him towards her. He replied in kind.

She smelled like a forest, but tasted more like strawberries. She probably had Cycle recover some secret package of cosmetics from the shuttle when he wasn’t around. Just how far did she plan ahead?

At some point - Christopher was in no mind to measure the flow of time - she pulled back. Her cheeks - and ears - were adorably red.

“And that, Chris, is how far we are going to go before marriage.” It was truly the most brutal form of teasing she could go for. But he expected that. “I am going to be adamant on that field, I am afraid. Consider this a test of character. If you can hold it in now, it means that you are ready to hold it in if work separates us for a few months after the marriage. It… goes both ways, I guess.”

She was extremely flushed. Either happiness, or… she enjoyed the kissing as much as he did.

“I think I’m going to pass that test.” Christopher replied with a proud smile on his face. “So when will the wedding happen? Tomorrow? The day after tomorrow? Can’t promise anything after that.” She laughed.

“Ah yes, men, those lustful beasts.” She didn’t look any less lustful than he was, but he wasn’t going to call her out on that.

He briefly wondered what she was going to do if they didn’t get to leave Pontifex-II. This was an option that was looming on the horizon - they could ignore it, but it was still there. But it wasn’t a good moment to ruin the mood.

They could worry about it tomorrow.

“Alright, enough of this.” Tiriel announced and suddenly stood up. He remained on the sand, while she quickly straightened her dress. Her face was still red. “I need to cheer Nekia up. And check on Cycle. As much as I like its enthusiasm, I don’t want our team’s alien to try to do the cheering part without my supervision.”

She even used a contraction. Did she use a less official form of speech? For the first time ever?

“That might be a good idea.” Christopher replied while standing up too. “I told Cycle to have an eye on Nekia, but it might have… creatively redefined the order.” Wouldn’t be the first time in their brief history together.

“Yes.” Tiriel said. He looked at him for a second or two. “I should go. No, we should go. My bad.” The elf appeared heavily distracted. Christopher really enjoyed watching that.

Tiriel made a few quick steps, leaving him behind a bit. He was about to start running after her when she suddenly stopped and turned to face him.

“I need to ask you something first.” She seemed to be worried by something. It was an unexpected change. “If you knew about your family getting to join you in the future when answering Nekia… would that change anything?”

Despite all that happened, she still didn’t want to feel like she stood between her friend and him. Taking a step back on the relationship wasn’t an option at this point. Especially as she made it clear earlier that Nekia knew about her feelings and they agreed to confess to him in chronological order. She asked to not have her sleep disturbed by guilt.

“No, Tiriel.” Christopher shook his head. “I refused not because of my family, but because I simply can’t think of her that way. Too immature. It wouldn’t be an equal relationship, and… well, she resembles my younger sister way too much.” Expect the ears and tail, of course. “Do you think… do you think that she will…”

“Hold it against us?” Tiriel replied. “I think you’re in for a surprise when we return to the camp.”

What now?!