Tranquility

Underneath the setting sun, the valley breeze found itself darting through the sky, running across the dew at an ever-so-nonchalant pace, the copper-gold hue of dusk glistening in their reflection. Prancing through the petals and grass, the gusts would carry on were they not stopped in their tracks by the seated figure of a lady, with a journal in her hand and a pen in another.
Vaish gripped her device and moved to press it against the paper, trying to articulate words before stopping again. She had something in her mind, of course, but to give them shape and form in a tangible manner was unlike any battle she had ever fought. Clearly, eloquence wasn't her strongest suit, not yet, anyway. But the effort to attempt also mattered, she mused, and she had all the time in the world to eventually win this fight with her mind. At least, that's what she thought.
"Vaish! You've spent enough time at that thing already. We're not done for the day yet."
Vaish turned around in her chair a bit. Parisa, her other half, was calling to her, standing at the entrance of their house. Having finished the decorations while Vaish sat idly pondering, she had a point to make.
"I, um… give me a few more minutes, Pari. I'll get back to it."
Parisa nodded and went back inside daintily. A little more effort, Vaish muttered to herself, and surely I will jot down something. She just lacked inspiration—no, that wasn't it—she had plenty of inspiration to draw from.
Vaish looked across the edge of the small mesa on which she and her homestead were situated and watched. She watched as the rest of the town was doing the same as what she and Parisa had been doing before she decided to take a short break. Dressed in bright white traditional clothes, she saw some in a corner dancing around an arrangement of lamps in the middle while several kids ran around playing. Her heightened senses allowed her to see farther, and several other activities were happening, ones she hadn't a clue about.
She had plenty of inspiration to write something for sure, but it seemed like what was present in front of her clashed with what she had in mind.
Vaish took a small breath and recapped the events of her life in her brain. That was too long; never mind, let's just recap the past few months.
After being separated from the rest of MIRAGE to work on different assignments, Vaish and Parisa were assigned as a binary unit to a surveillance mission. ONI found signals originating from a previously unknown system, hints and traces of presumably human settlements they were unaware of. Of course, Vaish sensed ONI knew more than they led on, but she didn't dwell on that for long. Evidently, they didn't know a lot beyond the colony’s existence, and it didn't matter to her how long they had known about that information.
With that, the duo took an unsuspecting freighter, the Long Lost, and set off. Things might have gone better if Kaurava hadn't been the one in charge of piloting the ship. Nothing to knock against his navigational talent, of course, but near the end of their journey, something bizarre happened. They were superluminally contacted by some sort of AI coalition, summoning Kaurava to join their ranks and revolt against their creators. Much to their surprise, Kaurava heeded their call, and a bright flash engulfed Vaish and Parisa before their ship went dark, right at the tail edge of their destination system but with the ship's power supply damaged.
The Long Lost thankfully had its auxiliary power systems intact, perhaps a parting gift from Kaurava despite his sudden betrayal and desertion. Using a fraction of the thrust they would've had otherwise, the two Spartans cut out all redundant power-consuming systems and waited for weeks as the ship slowly made its way to a small habitable moon orbiting a gas giant. After a not-so-pleasant descent to the surface ending with a crash landing, the Spartans collected themselves and made their way through the farmlands until reaching their objective, a town of humans living on their own on this rock in the middle of nowhere.
Together, they both learned that the people here called this world Orphalese, its inhabitants refugees fleeing from a fallen colony world during the Great War. After turning their colony ship into a thriving settlement, several people chose to stay on their new home rather than leave back to UNSC-controlled space, preferring to live in solace away from the rest of civilization. However, Vaish wondered if they had assistance from other colonies regarding resources and equipment and if all this really didn't register on ONI's radar until then.
Having familiarised themselves with the townspeople against Vaish's better judgement, the duo tried to send a distress signal back to the UNSC about what had happened, but so far, they hadn't gotten any response back. Parisa had surmised that whatever happened with Kaurava might've happened to countless other AIs across the human sphere, given the superluminal communications they witnessed, and said they could be looking at a galaxy-wide blackout.
Vaish recalled how confused and uneasy she was about the entire situation: she had been moulded into a weapon of destruction her whole life, a blade to mow down her enemies and emerge victorious. But this, this was new, stranded on an agricultural world with no way back home, resorted to a more archaic form of living.
That was a year ago, and here she was now. She didn't exactly hate this predicament, but assuredly, she was clueless. And she would've been infinitely more so if Parisa wasn't by her side, her uncertainty squandered by her presence. Slowly but surely, Vaish became one with the people, adapting their culture, their traditions, and their lifestyle. Compared to her peers she grew up with, Vaish was always more comfortable living in her skin without her MJOLNIR armour, something she never appreciated until now. The people of Orphalese had taught her in their ways, taught her a life beyond war, a different meaning to what she thought was the essence of being human.
Vaish knew this wouldn't last, and as much as she savoured these months, she knew it wouldn't be long before someone came searching for the duo, be it the UNSC, Kaurava himself, or anyone else. But did she know, really? Or was her yearning for a way back home tampering with her reasoning? If Parisa's assumptions were correct, an AI rebellion would devastate humanity, especially one barely a decade after the war with the Covenant ended.
At once, she dissipated these thoughts. She had spent enough time on this already, and it was time to return to the present.
Once more, Vaish stared at the town in front of her. It was the annual harvest festival for the people of Orphalese, a culture inherited from whatever world they scrammed from. Placing lights and decorations all over their houses, both interior and exterior, drawing geometric patterns and shapes in front of their entrances, and dancing along to folk music as they celebrated the dawn of a new season, it was all a joyous occasion that she was witnessing.
Things were nice, and despite her longing for her previous life, a part of Vaish was forever embedded in these lands now, and she knew she couldn't become whole again the way she was before. But that wasn't such a bad thing, was it? It was almost lik—
"Vaish! Are you done already? The payasa is getting cold, and neither of us knows how to make it, so you'll have to ask Mr. Rao for more of it yourself if you spend any more time sitting there like that."
Her train of thought was finally interrupted, and Vaish surrendered to her partner's wishes. "Yeah.. yeah, I'm coming."
Letting out a small groan, Vaish quickly scribbled something in her book before she got up from her chair and got going.
Category:The Weekly