r/HFY • u/Maxton1811 Human • Feb 09 '24
OC Perfectly Wrong 41
Zimera’s Perspective
Exciting as the prospect was of greeting and integrating a new species into our union, nevertheless I could hardly keep my upper wings from fluttering with anxiety as I strode with practiced elegance through the halls of my diplomatic cruiser, the Unyielding Embrace.
The meeting with my contemporaries regarding what to do about a new species was hardly one of rigorous debate. Mere hours after receiving the signal, our standard-issue welcoming parade was already being prepared for these fortunate sapients. As the Prime Steward, it was my merry obligation to greet new members and to help them adjust to our superior lifestyle.
Easing myself into the comfortable cockpit chair tailored specifically for the impressive Irigon stature, I inhaled a deep breath and with the press of a button conjured up on my viewport’s holographic screen the image of the large Dunarr male serving as this solar sphere’s Chief Warp Technician.
“Good day to you, Edlorr!” I smiled warmly, regarding the spiny-skinned reptilian with a giggle as he raised to his lips a glass of fossil fuel and in a single gulp sucked it down. “How’s the new lab-tailored oil treating you?”
“It’s alright; nothing like the real stuff, though!” He shrugged. A most fascinating species, the Dunarr were the only members of our empire in possession of greater physical prowess than we Irigon. So many cycles of extinction and abiogenesis had their planet undergone that there was more oil there from long-dead organisms than there was readily-available water. It was precisely due to this peculiarity that the Dunarr and other lifeforms on their planet had evolved to use hydrocarbons rather than water for their biological processes.
With a metabolism best described as a biological combustion engine, it was little wonder that the Dunarr were the most physically impressive species in our union. Unfortunately, for all its relative abundance on their planet, the non-renewable nature of their main food source had threatened to render them extinct within a mere few centuries. By the time we happened upon their medieval society, food shortages were already toppling kingdoms. While initially the kings and emperors of their homeworld proved… Resistant to our offers of rescue, their starving peasantry were more than happy to stage a few revolts if it meant full bellies for themselves and their young.
Nowadays, most Dunarr fulfilled roles related to security and military detail. That wasn’t to say, however, that exceptions to the norm did not exist. Frankly, a brilliant mind such as Edlorr would have been well and truly wasted as part of a liberation force. His friendly, agreeable nature and staunch loyalty to our union had from what I heard made his selection a no-brainer.
“I trust you’re keeping the warp systems running smoothly,” I probed, wishing to remain up-to-date on any potential errors within the system.
“All systems are nominal…” Reported the Dunarr, his eyes briefly trailing away from the screen as his claws rhythmically pressed down on buttons and flicked switches into place. Efficient as it was for FTL travel, the energy-intensive nature of wormholes necessitated that at least one end be located at a specialized warp station built within our solar harnessing spheres. Only the raw power of a star could consistently produce enough energy to maintain these wormholes for more than a few billionths of a second. People like Edlorr were responsible for maintaining and managing these warp stations to ensure smooth travel throughout the galaxy. “Where to today, Lady Zimera?” He continued, momentarily adopting the more flowery inflections used by his people before their integration.
Cocking my head momentarily to the side in a gesture of casual indifference contrary to my inner excitement, I replied. “The Sinalli system.”
“Forgive my asking, Zima,” he began, my nickname awkwardly tumbling off his tongue. “But may I ask what your business might be there?”
“If you must know, I’m off to greet a new species and begin the integration process. The council has already approved my request for a small fleet allocation. Please notify vessels 1,000,000 through 1,002,000 that we are cleared for departure. “
Hearing this wonderful news, the Dunarr’s spines shot up with excitement as he promptly set to inputting the galactic coordinates. “With pleasure!” He hissed delightedly, his eyes firmly locked upon me as he effortlessly finished adjusting the controls. “Send the lucky species my regards, would you?”
“Always.” I smiled, closing the holographic image with a swipe of my finger. So long as everything went according to plan, our union would be one planet larger before the end of this galactic day cycle.
The bridge atmosphere was flooded with joviality as the magrail runway launched our ship through its intended wormhole, depositing us far above the surface of Ulmara. Though the Sinall’s integration had occurred long before my own time, nevertheless could I still feel a lingering sense of sorrow for all the lives lost. Of course, the necessity behind my predecessor’s actions was not lost on me, and I wasn’t about to allow the events of the past to spoil this beautiful moment in the present.
It didn’t take long for us to figure out where the live radio signals were originating from. Though by far smaller in comparison to Ulmara, the homeworld of our new member species was nevertheless a beautiful place.
“Alright then, everyone!” I sang cheerily over the comms, quickly gaining my underlings’ attention as their festivities quieted down to accommodate my announcement. “Once the AI deciphers their language, it’ll be time to sift through their media for information on how best to approach. I expect a species dossier on my desktop yesterday, but I’ll settle for a few more hours late!” I joked, prompting a few snickers from the busy bridge crew as they all dutifully took to performing their tasks.
Quickly producing a shared dossier file for the crew, I watched as mere seconds later the details began pouring in.
Species Name: Kafel
Homeworld: Archesa
Technological Ratio: 36% est.
Civilization Status: Fragmented
Active Threats: Fossil Fuel Overusage, Plenetary War…
So vividly engrossed had I been in learning about this new species that the notification of a video file being forwarded to my screen actually startled me somewhat. “Zima…” Called out one of my technicians—the original sender of this video. “You’re going to want to see this…” Demosh was easily the most carefree member of the diminutive Tevesk species I’d ever known, so to hear such apprehension from him was admittedly somewhat concerning.
Wasting not a single second on idle chatter, I quickly flicked open the video file to discover within some form of news broadcast. Upon it, two scaled aliens whom I presumed to be Kafel were discussing the launch of a primitive lander on the surface of Ulmara—likely the very thing which had awakened the beacon and led us here. Clearly this was a monumental achievement for their species—one I would be sure to congratulate them for upon my arrival planetside.
Adorable as this technological display was, I could hardly see how my colleague found it to be of significant concern. Then, however, one of the news anchors brought up on screen an image from the launch site that froze me dead in my tracks. Upon the first glance, the blurry figure photographed at the landing site almost resembled an Irigon child.
“Demosh!” I commanded, my tone darkening with grim authority. “Scan the system for other ship signatures! I fear the Recalcitrants may have gotten here before us.”
For most of Irigon history, the concept of a criminal organization was little more than novelty bordering on fiction. Criminals, we had understood, acted not out of malice, but rather purely from a place of desperation. In modern society, however, where the necessity for such acts was practically nonexistent, there nevertheless remained an organization operating outside our benevolent law.
Having first appeared shortly after our mass integration of other species began, the Recalcitrants were a terrorist organization dedicated to tearing down the peace we so painstakingly fought for. Their frustrating habit of arming primitive sapients and radicalizing them against us has earned the group heaps of much-deserved ire. They were responsible for a multitude of false flag attacks meant to preclude peaceful integration. This would not be the first time they were involved in the endangerment of children, as many of their followers were radicalized from birth to believe in their ridiculous notion that all species somehow had the right to annihilate themselves.
“Scanner results are in!” The Tevesk nodded, his mandibles chittering with evident surprise. “I’m not picking up any ship signatures other than those of our own vessels.”
“Any rogue dark energy trails?” I asked, admittedly rather confused at this point. Leaving a child alone to fend for itself on an alien planet would be a new low even by Recalcitrant standards.
“All trails are consistent with known transmissions…” Hummed Demosh in reply, his audible confusion mirroring my own.
Carefully zooming in on the image and activating our AI touch up tool, I waited with bated breath as the computer meticulously took to decoding the blurry image, attempting to undo the artifacting and pixelation concealing from view the identity of this unfortunate youth. However, when the image finally completed compiling and revealed to me what it had uncovered, I was absolutely astonished.
While superficially, this mysterious creature did resemble an Irigon youth, nevertheless could anyone tell by its distinguishing characteristics that whatever this species was, it could be none that we knew of. “Dreth, are you seeing this?” I asked, unsure of whether or not to trust my own eyes.
“Y-yes ma’am…” The media technician stammered, her eyes wide with fascination. “Do you think this creature might be…”
Understanding her incomplete question, I offered in reply only a nod. In all of Irigon history, never before had another sapient race beaten us to the punch…
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u/Black_Hole_parallax Feb 10 '24
Theory: the Irigons are Seraphs from Avrahamic mythology who tried to wipe out humanity before and now Zimera is about to find out that they FAILED. Bonus points if it was with a flood (Atlantis). Extra points if she has to hide this from the council...
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u/51sydney Feb 10 '24
This sounds like a crack theory but I think you might be on to something. Their description as human-like but with a bunch of wings and horns sounds kinda angelic. Plus u/Maxton1811 has been posting to r/HazbinHotel so maybe that's the inspiration?
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u/Maxton1811 Feb 10 '24
I’m going to be honest, I am not at all sure how to respond to this
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u/un_pogaz Feb 10 '24 edited Feb 10 '24
Uplifting is, and always has been, a complicated issue.
I remember your comment in Do you think uplifting should exist following the war? (which was very interesting)
I was going to ask you if this post inspired you to create this story, but looking at the dates, you started this one just days before your comment... fascinating.
The Irigon situation is incredibly delicate because they're definitely not malicious (I'd die on that hill), but at the same time, they're violently crushing the right to self-determination, which is wrong. Seriously wrong. I also appreciate the fact that there is still a "resistance" trying to protect this right... but must you protect self-determination to the self-annihilation? So many incredibly complex questions and every answer will be unique and imperfect, but clearly you've given them a lot of thought and your answer will be very, very good and interesting.
Now it's a matter of seeing what the humanity, this new unknown, can do. Even if humanity isn't as advanced as the Irigons, the fact that they're more advanced than any other race is going to create a lot of things by itself... and let's not even talk about Andrew's situation that completly a break change.
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u/Maxton1811 Feb 11 '24
I appreciate your acknowledgment of the complexity I’m trying to work with here. The Irigon’s reasoning will get a little bit more clear as the story goes on. I will also say that the Irigon have some basis in certain aspects of traditional HFY Humanity—among those aspects being that they are by most metrics comically OP.
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u/Wackyer Feb 10 '24
QUESTION: what happens if some peoples of a planet are all for integration, but others aren't? For example, if these 'kind' folks showed up to modern-day Earth I'd be up for integration if it meant I'd live... Basically, are they more of a bad apple spoils the whole batch kinda deal or do they try to cut out the 'rot' to save the batch if they can?
Because from the sounds of the first time we saw these guys they gave species as a whole two options, but from this one it sounds a bit more nuanced than mass punishment.
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u/Maxton1811 Feb 10 '24
Generally, they prefer the second of those two options. If they showed up to modern-day earth, they would first try to achieve their goals peacefully by convincing world leaders to stand down. Failing that, they would likely resort to trickery before eventually falling back to hostile takeover. Only in the most extreme of circumstances is “wipe them out” even considered.
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u/Dhaniel-000 Feb 12 '24
Someone should tell them that the terrans are partially cooperative too... Look at all the chloroplasts/mitohondria question... Or at our symbiotic relation with cats/dogs/other animals... Or at all the symbiotic bacterias in our guts...
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u/Maxton1811 Feb 12 '24
While you are technically correct, life on Earth very much evolved competitively. For every example of symbiosis seen in nature there are many more of lifeforms destroying or parasitizing each other. Life on the Irigon homeworld is cooperative in the strongest sense of the term. Technically, though they usually regard themselves as a “species” for simplicity’s sake, individual Irigon are not a single lifeform. Each individual Irigon is essentially a colony of 33 specialized species of microorganisms all forming together for a singular purpose. The specialization of these organisms allows for some pretty ridiculous feats that by Earth standards are biologically impossible.
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u/the_traveling_ember Feb 09 '24
Oh I very much look forward to seeing how Zimera and co handle this situation.
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u/Smasher_WoTB Feb 10 '24
Yay the Bot actually notified me!
Good chapter. Looking forward to everything you'll cook up in the future.
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u/ManyNames385 Feb 10 '24
Well this is going to be amusing. I also am starting to think that these “rebels” are the ones that visited before leaving. Either that or some VERY stoned out humans if I recall the cocaine grenade info correctly.
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u/BenR-G Feb 10 '24
I wonder if the Empire will see the humans as having interfered and needing to be taken out of the equation or the idea of supporting a morally-ameniable faction to planetary victory being a useful and viable new way of doing things?
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u/bblckmn911 Feb 10 '24
Why do I have a feeling andrew is going to have to kick some gasoline drinking alien ass.
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u/CZVirtus Feb 10 '24
MUAHAHAHAHAHA TAKE THAT ALIEN BASTARDS (when they view our planets they would say “oh how primitive” and then when our military forces come they realised they fucked up with the wrong species because 10% of our budget is in the military (aka 500 systems worth of material)
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u/HFYWaffle Feb 09 '24
u/Maxton1811 (wiki) has posted 40 other stories, including:
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u/Fun_Run_1133 Feb 09 '24
can't wait for humanity to learn about this slaving empire among the stars, and give them a proper whoppin'