by Ranger of the North » Sun Oct 16, 2016 3:33 pm
by AriDeZu » Sun Oct 16, 2016 7:32 pm
by BucketORandomness » Mon Oct 17, 2016 4:25 am
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by DeMaizu » Mon Oct 17, 2016 6:07 am
by BucketORandomness » Mon Oct 17, 2016 6:11 am
by BucketORandomness » Mon Oct 17, 2016 7:46 am
by Sciencin' » Mon Oct 17, 2016 9:05 am
Chapter 1
October 14, 7898 CE
Paragon Higher Order Headquarters, Perun, Earth
When Dr. Akyra Andraste Faladon woke up and got ready for work in her apartment in the Sohset district of Perun on the planet of Earth the morning of October 14, 7898 CE, she neither felt, saw, nor thought anything incredibly singular or even mildly unusual. She slipped on her suit (plain gray, of the aerodynamic, form-fitting sort worn by most of her people, adorned only by the insignia of the Paragon Department of Technology); tucked her light blonde hair into her usual ponytail; and slipped a small stun gun into a hidden inner pocket of her jacket. (She carried it out of habit, rather than because she had any indication that today of all days would be the first time she would ever have to use it against a human being.)
She chose to walk to work that day. When the weather allowed, she usually flew; today, however, as one of the government’s current leading systems analysts, she would be required to attend a meeting at Paragon Headquarters to discuss recent developments and possible concerns in the Division of Cyber Defense, the team she had led before her promotion. The meeting started at eight thirty, which gave her at least an hour to get there and another half to get herself situated and make absolutely certain that she would not be late. It was an important meeting; she felt she had to make a good impression, despite the fact that most who would be attending, including those of a higher echelon, had either worked with her before or were at least familiar with her name.
Akyra exited her apartment at precisely seven fifteen, the same time as she would on any normal work day. The early autumn air that trickled under her wings as she descended the three steps to the sidewalk was refreshingly crisp and cool, and the trees lining the city streets were beginning their transformations from green to various shades of surreal reds and oranges, stretching like a stunning living rainbow in either direction. The brilliant azuline rotunda of Earth’s atmosphere stretched unbroken in all directions, clear except for the few trailing streaks of aeroplane emissions.
The sky was one of the many things that still struck her as otherworldly and surreal about this planet, when compared to the eternally cloudy, far less vivid atmosphere of Tor’anis, the planet she’d spent most of her life on. When she had arrived on Earth five years ago during approximately the same time of year, her first impression of the planet had been awe at the bold, vibrant hues that painted every landscape, the realization that the images she had seen of it were not exaggerated or doctored, and a profound new appreciation for the artistic aspect of nature. She had been struck by how alive everything looked, sounded, smelled. Her homeworld paled in comparison, withering to a beautiful but small, sterile, rocky snowball. Even the air here, which still felt warm and humid to lungs adapted to a gelid climate, had a fresh, often almost sweet smell to it. The air on Tor’anis had a smell too, or at least, so she’d heard. When it wasn’t so cold that it couldn’t be inhaled by foreigners, it smelled of winter, Tellurians often said, though this information didn’t mean much to her, as the seasons there were not nearly as varied and clearly defined as those caused by Earth’s tilted axis, and- at least in the area she had lived- ‘winter’ was perpetual. Here, the seasons were in constant motion, approximately two and a half cycles of the planet’s seasons passing for every Tor’ayne year. Earth was a planet of constant fluctuations, all working to balance one another over time into a state which should have been almost impossible for it to maintain. Like a tightrope walker, it balanced gracefully and confidently over a chaotic chasm, holding a steady equilibrium in that hair-thin threshold between fatal extremes. So many tiny hiccups in history would’ve been capable of pushing it off the edge; and yet, it had proven to be adaptable, capable of holding its own in times of turmoil.
The city of Perun, too, held itself in that sort of Goldilocks zone between order and chaos. The abstract buildings that swept towards the clouds around her were mostly finished with reflective glass, sometimes in the form of distinct panels, sometimes in a way that made them look like giant individual glass sculptures that had been transformed into residential or office buildings. They arced in complex geometric or bizarre organic configurations, decorated with spars, trellises, and complex latticeworks like spiderwebs strung across gaps or overhangs as supports. The structures all appeared mostly the same blue as the sky whose light they reflected, though near the bottom the blue was tinted with green, gold, and amber overtones of trees on either side of the wide street. The trees themselves were distributed at regular intervals, but ranged in size and species, their canopies allowed to form themselves into whatever disposition the plants fancied. Overall, there was most certainly a sense of order and intention, and yet at the same time a measure of comforting imperfection and asymmetry permeated it all. The human brain functioned best in a structured environment, but if this reached a certain extreme, the results were negated by the innate sense of unease in the face of perfection that afflicted the entire human species. The interesting side effect of the city’s imperfect design was that, rather than appear neglected, the unsullied network of streets, skytram rails, and skywalks between buildings felt, and to some extent operated, like a self-sufficient organism. The city, per se still and and silent, stirred around her, vibrations of its heartbeat bubbling up below the surface through some hidden, almost tangible medium. Despite the time, the streets themselves already teemed with the Sohset District’s morning commuters, but the city was far from what one would consider crowded. Just looking at images of ancient Earth cities had made her feel claustrophobic, but whoever had designed Sohset had thankfully left her plenty of room to spread her wings now that travel speed was no longer an issue.
She stopped to grab a coffee at her favorite cafe a few blocks away from her apartment- the real motivation for her detour- and then, over-sweetened beverage in one hand, panel case tucked under the other elbow, continued towards the quartet of black glass spires that dominated the city skyline from her angle: Paragon.
An hour later, after passing through a surprisingly swift security examination, Dr. Faladon stood at the foot of the polished black marble steps which led up to the palatial array of gleaming towers that made up much of Paragon Higher Order Headquarters. The highest of the turrets lining the main building put its height at around eighty stories, nowhere near the highest building in the city-state, but its presence was commanding, unwavering, and, despite its authoritative aura, quite benevolent. It was simpler and more geometric in design than many of the other structures, and thanks to the black transparent aluminum which made up all of its outer walls, far darker. If the city had a heartbeat, there was no doubt that this building was the heart.
Thirty minutes later, she was one of the first to enter the conference hall.
The meeting passed without incident; her role in it was rather minimal, and about two hours in, she had to keep herself from instinctively propping her head up with her hands. No matter how bored she was, no matter how much she hated the endless hours of discussion of every minor detail that bureaucracy brought with it, it would not at all do to allow others to notice.
At 10:45 am, in a single harrowing, heart-stopping moment, the meeting was silenced as the sky outside was washed out by a brilliant white flash. Frozen, for a moment the room seemed to hold its breath as everyone at once tried to convince themselves it was just some freak bolt of lightning or a stray comet breaking up in the atmosphere, anything except what they knew to be true. These hopes were shattered an impossible eternity later by a low, flat, thunderous bang, heavy as a mountain, followed by a slight tremor in the foundation of the skyscraper they stood in.
They sat in shock, staring out the windows, barely daring to breathe.
Smoke was billowing from one of the other Paragon buildings a few blocks down.
As they watched, the roof sank into the building first as the interior walls and floors crumbled. It meant the explosion had come from the inside: the exterior was built to be blast-proof, though as far as she knew there had been no such measures taken on the interior, and what they were seeing was it collapsing from the inside out. Several seconds- or was it minutes? milliseconds?- later, the outer walls at the base of the building bulged, straining against the pressure like a cripple trying to stay upright on broken knees, before it finally buckled. All at once, the entirety of the outer walls shattered, whole and unbroken explosion-proof alon glass sheets falling through smoke and now visible tongues of fire to the ground in a deadly obsidian rain. Though no more sounds made it through the windows of the room they stood in, Akyra’s imagination filled in the blanks and she could almost hear the sounds of alon-glass shattering and the metal skeleton screaming in protest to the forces being exerted upon it from below. The skeleton bent and warped, before it finally crumpled, and, with one final, anguished exhale, a billowing cloud of dust and smoke rose to mask the scene from view.
by Ranger of the North » Mon Oct 17, 2016 10:01 am
by Woogwoo Wren » Mon Oct 17, 2016 11:31 am
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