Early Sunsets

[Arcee]

 

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Chapter One: Fog of War

Late again.

Iaja's eyes wandered about the filling station as the drones went about their business with other customers. To his right, a fuel pump. To his left, a dingy coffee shop where Matoran stood in line, the humdrum day just beginning for them.

C'mon, c'mon, c'mon, c'mon... thought Iaja, enviously eyeing the vehicles receiving fuel. Couldn't these drones move any faster?

"The Collapse continues exponentially as the Manas-Meds work tirelessly to find a cure." Iaja couldn't help but overhear the woman on the news on the television blaring from inside the coffee shop. It was a grim-faced De-Matoran, and beside her sat a Manas-Med, unnervingly still. "However, their efforts continue to prove inconclusive. With me is Doctor Korlyk, head technician of the Engineering District, here to detail the conundrum of the Collapse."

It seemed as if Iaja was all but ignored by the drones. There's no way that Le-Matoran in the Kualsi Mk. III cruiser got here before him. The tired faces in the coffee shop all seemed to be different from the faces earlier. Any moment now the boss would be calling in a fit of rage. Iaja's eyes flickered to his cell phone as the doctor on TV spoke in a clipped monotone.

"It's... it's really quite simple you see. Simple biology. All life that begins someday ends. It's finite. Matoran have a life span. It's evident in some lower-level Rahi. The Koryl Bull, for example. It's created with... with viruses, yes, yes. Matoran, as you know, outlive Koryl by centuries. But what's the difference? We synthesize more. Well, with the Makuta's help. We synthesize new Koryl to maintain the ecosystem. Matoran though? Not so simple. It's been taught--nay...it's been, it's been ingrained into us that we're... that we're not like Rahi, that we're different. Of course, of course you're familiar with the mythological Makers, but we... the Manas-Meds that is... maintain our position that the Makers and any being capable of just... of just creating new Matoran out of thin air or scrap parts are mere hocus-pocus."

"Six and three."

Iaja tapped the dash impatiently.

"Six and three, sir. Six and three."

Iaja jumped in his seat, realizing he was being addressed by a drone.

"Sorry," he muttered, fumbling through his coin purse for cash. He deposited six coins that shone like mirrors and three deep black ones into the drone's coin slot.

"Incorrect denominations," the drone buzzed. "To fuel your tank please deposit six hundred and thirty Manas credits."

Iaja cursed the Collapse-era inflation under his breath as he fished six of the coveted glowing blue coins out of his purse.

As the drone pumped fuel loudly into his Gadunka I buggy, the phone began to buzz violently. As if things couldn't be worse. Iaja was broke, his boss was angry, and the unfeeling robot currently filling his buggy seemed to be smirking directly at him. And his clunker of a vehicle, and his empty wallet.

Iaja picked up the phone.

"Hello! Hello, sir. I'm sorry. Traffic is a beast today."

"Where in Karzahni's name are you?"

"Almost there. Two blocks away," he lied.

"I'm giving you until seven. You'd better be here with bells on."

Or else, Iaja couldn't help but finish Arlok's sentence for him.

"Yes, sir."

The line went dead.

"Extending Matoran life beyond what it was built for is a biological impossibility. If you ask me--nay, any of the Manas-Meds--"

"Have a nice day," buzzed the drone.

"--we should be more invested in the birth of new Matoran. Whether through synthesis, cloning, reproduction."

Iaja put the Gadunka in gear and zoomed out of that horrible, greasy place.

 

* * *

The job was fairly simple. It was, more or less, comprised of two simple steps. Lift. Swing. Lift. Swing. Seams of precious minerals--Protosteel, Lightstone, and the like--seemed to have waned just as Matoran life had these days. Still in the heavy daze of sleep, Iaja found himself wishing he'd hopped out of his buggy and grabbed a cup of coffee while he had the chance.

Lift. Swing. Lift. Swing. It was almost like a rhythm. Iaja could picture a grim song in his head, a mining song. Perhaps it would have come clearer to him if the chamber hadn't been full of other Fe-Matoran hacking away at the tunnel wall, but that didn't stop him from humming and dreaming of a fanciful life as a musician. No physical labor there. Just admiration from crowds of fans.

Lift. Swing. Lift. Swing.

Clang.

The sound knocked Iaja out of his dream world. Arlok had ordered him to arrive with bells on, and this was some sort of bell if he'd ever heard one. After a months-long dry spell in the mines, had he finally discovered a new seam? Iaja discreetly produced his hydraulic chisel. Selfish? Maybe. But if anyone got the credit for finding some precious ore deep in the ground, it was going to be him. Iaja, of course, was one of the few runts with a target painted on his forehead, waiting for Arlok to condemn him to the unemployment line.

One more strike with the pick, to ensure he wasn't just hearing things. A definitive clang echoed through the cave. Iaja nodded to himself. There was certainly something in the wall. He yanked the pull string of the chisel and went to work. Chipping away at walls like this was always unpleasant. Though the future typically held a pay raise or at the very least something to brag about, the vibrating tool seemed to shake him to the very core from the moment it hit rock. His neighboring Matoran eyed him suspiciously, now fully aware that he'd found something interesting and potentially valuable.

Iaja ignored these stares and kept at it. Careful not to strike too much metal, he traced a path around the protruding mineral. At this point he could see its color and luster well: the metal was a dark silver, and had very little shine to it. It was, disappointingly, not Protosteel or even Lightstone, but it looked nearly identical to the mineral used to make one-credit coins. Better than nothing, he supposed.

With admittedly less care Iaja continued to chip around the metal when its form began to become evident.

The object was cylindrical. No, upon further observation Iaja realized it was a small canister embedded in the earth. Iaja had never dreamed of unearthing some mystery or hidden treasure under the earth in Manas. This discovery, though, sent his mind racing with excitement. Regardless of the contents of this canister, someone concealed it under meters of pure rock. It could be junk for all Iaja cared. It was treasure to him.

It seemed the Fe-Matoran around him had returned to their work when they realized Iaja wasn't up to anything important. Iaja continued furiously though, working carefully to dislodge the container from its spot embedded in the rock. C'mon, he urged the mysterious object in his head. C'mon c'mon c'mon...

 

With a resounding crack a sizable chunk of rock came loose from the wall and knocked Iaja onto his behind. First embarrassed deeply, he looked around and noticed the worker Jaga around him were too engrossed in their work to spare a glance at the Matoran who had fallen flat on his back. Iaja groaned and heaved the stone off his body, and with it the canister popped out of its hiding spot and rolled across the floor before coming to rest at Iaja's feet.

 

Iaja shook off the pain of the impact and quickly grabbed the tube in front of him. He realized how suspicious he looked in the midst of all this confusion, so he swiftly pocketed it in his tool belt. Commotion notwithstanding, the Matoran around him seemed as engrossed in their labor as before. A Matoran with his reputation certainly couldn't attract too many wandering eyes for slipping and falling, or even finding a small amount of scrap metal.

 

But this was certainly far from scrap metal.

 

The day dragged on slower than Iaja's old Gadunka. The monotony of hitting a wall repeatedly was only exacerbated by the anticipation that lay ahead. Patience finally paid off, though. The majority of workers had abandoned this particular chamber in search of ores and minerals elsewhere, leaving Iaja in a fairly quiet chamber with plenty of room for privacy.

 

He took out the canister carefully, as if handling something incredibly fragile, and took a closer look. It was rounded at the top, and twisting and pulling the cap proved futile. It seemed to be warped or even locked. It became evident that this canister hid something within. Perhaps even something valuable. In fact the thought that it contained something important or expensive was the only thing stopping Iaja from chiseling his way through it.

 

Iaja sighed and took a seat on the hard ground. In his frustration he nearly pocketed the object again. That is, until he saw something written in an odd script.

 

Rather than the hexagon-shaped glyphs he was used to reading, these were circular. Aside from the shape and odd dialect, though, the language was readable. Iaja brushed out the dust trapped in the crevices of the text and read:

 

The Fog of War lives within us all.

 

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Review.

Edited October 24, 2014 by Euphrates

[Arcee]

Chapter Two: A Nonsensical Song

Late again.

The terror of the daily routine seemed to creep up Iaja's throat, and as he waited for the drone to refill his Gadunka I with fresh fuel he eyed the canister poking out from his glove compartment among a mess of legal documents and compact discs.

"Here with us today to discuss the mystery of the Collapse is Aquis, Turaga of the Research District."

"Five and eight."

Iaja was too preoccupied to notice the drone that stood beside his car, waiting to eat the well-earned coins. He feared he would be fired and relocated (again), he feared the scolding that was sure to accompany his arrival. If only he'd woken up earlier! And now, as if to complicate his life, this mystery had cropped up. Why was he even keeping it a secret?

"Five and eight, sir. Five and eight."

It didn't matter. Perhaps keeping the canister secret wasn't even important to Iaja, maybe having a secret is what he valued. It had been too many years since he had done anything different, and in the hazy decades before mining from the small hours of the morning into the dark of the night, all he remembered was other dreadful routines. Repairing drones, crafting mass-produced masks, it was all the same. This lifeless life of an ordinary was more than Iaja could bear, and so he swallowed the terror back down in his throat and fantasized about who buried the canister there. Was it some hero from an era forgotten?

"It is our stance as the Turaga that the Collapse is an inevitable tragedy--"

"Five and eight."

"--and that all Matoran should continue their lives until the Engineering District is able to treat it. It is a heavy burden for all of us to carry, but we should not let tragedy stand in the way of our duty."

 

The nonsensical song of the banal morning.

"Five and eight," buzzed the drone, louder than before. It almost seemed angry, Iaja thought as he snapped out of his daydream.

"Sorry, sorry," he said and deposited fifty-eight Manas credits.

"Incorrect denominations," buzzed the drone.

Someone on a different television bemoaned inflation and Iaja silently concurred. Elsewhere a laugh track echoed joylessly.

​***

 

Work seemed to drag like molasses and passed uneventfully. A deeper hole in the ground and no more resources for the slowly dying city. All Iaja could seem to think about was the canister that he'd hidden in the pouch where his canteen belonged. By the time the evening buzzer sounded notifying the end of the work day, Iaja felt like he could collapse.

 

No, he thought. Rest comes later.

 

There was one thing on his mind. He needed to find a way to open the canister. He'd thought about it the night before, and it haunted the bits of sleep he did manage to catch, and again all day he thought of nothing but the mysterious canister. With such a cryptic message carved into it in such an ancient manner of text, the canister clearly contained something important. That meant that odds were, the container was locked.

 

But where was the key?

 

Unfortunately for Iaja, the miners in his division had been switched to a different tunnel system. Simply no signs of a new seam of ore had shown up for months, and the place had been mined so heavily that the integrity of the rock was suffering. A cave-in was imminent. Just one more look, he thought. The key has to be somewhere around there.

 

Iaja navigated the system as best he could, but within an hour he was treading unknown ground: a cobwebbed and abnormally wide tunnel that looked like it had been abandoned centuries ago. As he surveyed the wide and dark tunnel with his lightstone, he realized he was horribly, horribly lost.

 

He first found himself cursing his poor navigation skills. What if he didn't have enough time left in the night to look for the key? Then the severity of the situation set in. He'd heard plenty of stories of miners who lost their way and never returned. Starvation, the cold temperatures, cave-ins, even wild Rahi were dangers below the surface of the earth. It's fine, he thought. I'll just retrace my steps. Still, he knew this was much easier said than done. His inattentiveness to the surroundings were the reason he was lost in the first place.

 

A sound interrupted his train of thought. At first it was distant, but soon it grew obvious that the sound was a voice and a pair of footsteps, growing ever closer.

 

First he was overjoyed. Someone was here to help him! But quickly the apprehension rose up in the back of his mind. No workers were supposed to be here so late. This could be one of many hostile things. Some authority figure there to punish him, some tunnel dwelling maniac... Iaja concealed his lightstone and plunged himself into darkness. He flattened himself against the wall and tried to silence his breathing.

 

Was that... singing?

 

Nonsense words, Iaja realized. Perhaps this truly was some kind of maniac. The voice certainly sounded nonthreatening. Elderly and vacant.

 

"Hello? Who's there?"

 

"Ba-doo, ba-dee, ba-diddly-doop. Is that a lost Matoran I hear?" the voice echoed back.

 

"Yes," said Iaja. He hesitantly took his lightstone back out. "And who are you?"

 

There to greet Iaja was a black and green mask, ancient and chipped. The Turaga's eyes looked carefree and joyful, but not without giving the impression of a man with a few screws loose in the head. "Why, none other than Turaga Korym!"

 

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Review.

Edited November 16, 2014 by Euphrates