Guardians (Æthyrium Rising - Guardians Book 1)

  ÆTHYRIUM RISING

  Guardians

  ZACHARIAH DRACOULIS

  For Kaylee, my firstborn, my miracle, my stars,

  I don't believe there is a power in the verse that can stop Kaylee from being cheerful.

  —MalcolmReynolds, Firefly—

  Author’s Note

  on the Prologue

  Hi, he said, screaming at himself internally for making the first line in what he hopes to be a massive franchise ‘Hi’.

  I just thought I’d let everyone know that if you want to skip the chapter after this you won’t be losing out on anything major, and the content here does not reflect the way the rest of the novel is written. For one thing, the story won’t be from my perspective in an interview studio.

  I know now you’re probably wondering ‘Then why even have it in here?’ and that is a completely legitimate question. The reason I haven’t decided to simply leave it out is because I feel like it is the sort of thing that is missing in a lot of books.

  “What is ‘it’?” you may ask.

  Well, simply put, it is backstory and nothing much more. It’s that little bit extra that I think people deserve that is grossly absent in a lot of quick-to-publish-quick-to-cash self-published, and a fair few trad-pubbed, novels. They [the author] throw you in the middle of some fast-paced scenario without ever answering the question about how the people, society of automatons, or sentient furniture got to where they were, and I don’t think that that is acceptable.

  Of course, I’m not saying all contemporary novels are like that, not at all, but I am saying that I’ve noticed it.

  Now, I know I, as a writer, could drip information about the history of this universe that I’m creating throughout the base narrative, and I have, but I also think that it’s a problem when you’re pulled from the story to have someone explain something from well back in the universe’s timeline.

  So I wrote this little bit of fun, this ridiculous info dump before the beginning of the story that is, again, completely skippable, that will hopefully shed some light on the universe I’ve created as to where these people are, how they got there, and why.

  Don’t get me wrong, there is the hope that more questions will be raised by the end of this, but I want them to be the kind of questions that don’t start with ‘That doesn’t make any sense…’ or ones that are directly related to this novel (or this series for that matter) that could have been answered in the story. I want questions about the franchise, questions about where the [spoiler omitted] went, and what happened to the [spoiler omitted].

  That being said, I invite any and all feedback and questions from my lovely, beautiful readers.

  Anyway, let’s get this show on the road.

  Before Æthyrium

  A Prologue of Sorts

  I blinked at the lights behind Gaige, my brother and cameraman, as he adjusted settings I didn’t understand, for reasons that made no sense to me. The boom loomed over my head like a fuzzy guillotine.

  “Hey Zach,” Elisha, my wife and manager, said as she walked through the set to stand beside Gaige, somehow blocking out the entire audience on their stainless steel bleachers at her back, “are you alright?”

  I rubbed my throbbing eyes, loosened and rotated my jaw until it cracked, and then nodded, trying to hide my anxiety with an unconvincing smile, “I’m good, let’s do this.”

  She frowned, “If you say so.”

  Elisha looked at the other two red armchairs set up across from me and snapped her fingers, blipping the formal military uniform wearing Captain Vyard and the maroon button up shirt and old brown leather jacket wearing Field Master Garrett into existence. They weren’t necessarily the best guests I could have had, not when there were people like Kurleida and Freyja available, but I wanted the world to hear it from two people who had actually lived in the universe, not just changed it.

  James Vyard, for example, proved to be a prodigy at the age of fifteen when he first joined the Armed Forces of the Federation, long before the Federation-Commonwealth War.

  A tactical genius and a cunning warrior, ocean, ground, air, and, most of all, space, all battlegrounds that he ruthlessly held. But he was also more compassionate than he let on, knowing when to bark orders, when to crack a joke, and when to just be there for his troops.

  His eyes were so dark that his pupils and irises were almost indistinguishable from each other, giving them the semi-permanent look of an inquisitive child’s, while his squared jaw and greying hair cemented him as a man.

  When his hair had first started to grey it’d made him anxious, as did a great many things, and he’d considered shaving it all off. He was convinced that forty-three was far too young to start greying, but when his doctor told him it was from all the stress he decided to let it grow. Stress was the mark of wisdom according to his father, and it made him feel more worthy of his position as a high-ranking officer. Since then he’d kept his hair at a brush cut, usually letting it grow out just a few inches too long after forgetting about it under his military cap.

  “Gods!” Vyard cried out in his almost British accent as he gripped his armrests in a panic, “Where am I?”

  Garrett chuckled light-heartedly at his fellow guest.

  Field Master Garrett, or simply... Garrett, was the name the man decided to go with after defecting to the Commonwealth. Whenever anyone asked what his last name was he’d simply say “Up to you.” and proceed to continue speaking about whatever he wanted to at the time.

  His hair was chocolate brown, just like his eyes, with a few streaks of greys sneaking through, indicating the age he had no real intention of hiding, he’d just been lucky enough to look like he was in his late-twenties, early-thirties since he turned nineteen. The hair had clearly been cut in a sort of middle part curtain style by a professional a few years ago, but he’d been doing it himself since. It didn’t look particularly bad, it was just obvious that some spots hadn’t had the care necessary to maintain it.

  He’d probably blame his military lifestyle, but he’d be full of shit. He just felt he had better things to do with his life than get his hair cut by some fancy barber, like eating apples.

  “Relax Jim, we’re just…” he said in his educated southern voice as he looked around confusedly, “A television studio? Ah, it’s the interview one, gotcha. Now, I know this won’t make a lick-a-sense, but you gotta trust me, so stay calm.”

  “Why in the Hells would I trust you? A traitorous bastard who’d sooner sell out his entire-”

  “Gentlemen!” I said as nicely as I could while still being loud enough to shut them both up, “Welcome to the show. Elisha? Hon? Mind filling Captain Vyard in?”

  “Oh, right, yes.” she said quietly from behind the camera before snapping her fingers again.

  It took James a few seconds to settle from what seemed to be intense electrocution, but once he was done he straightened up and fought back the tears caused from gaining absolute truth in regards to his universe.

  “Right,” he said, the word catching in his throat, “right. Thank you for having me.”

  “Myself as well.” Garrett said with a confident smile.

  “So,” I said with my attention locked on Garrett, it wasn’t that I preferred him, I just figured Vyard could use a little more time to accept he was a fictional character, “let’s get right into it. Can you tell me about what humanity is doing so far from Earth?”

  Garrett’s eyes sparkled at the opportunity to talk about humanity’s history, “How far back do you want me to go?” he asked gleefully, “Because I can go right back to when man first stepped on Mars if you’d like.”
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br />   “Heh, maybe let’s start a little later in the story, I’d prefer not to die in this chair.” I left time for the audience and Garrett to finish their little laughing fit before pressing on, “How about when humanity left Sol? What caused that?”

  Garrett leaned back in his chair and chuckled, “Make it easy on me, why don’t you? Well, it kinda came down to a sort of interplanetary turf war. You see, people had populated most every planet in Old Sol. China, America, Russia, everyone, they’d all ventured out and cut out their own little pieces of the system. But then some countries wanted more. Some will say it was the US that started all of it… Most say it was the US that started it, but it wasn’t their fault. They, like everyone else, were running out of room.”

  “And that’s when the Federation-Commonwealth War started?” I asked, knowing full well what the answer was.

  “No, comparably that little squabble was people getting angry at a bus driver for being late. Extreme and ultimately achieved nothing ‘cept for some annoyed glares from the non-participating passengers.”

  The Field Master laughed a little at his analogy before sitting up and continuing on, “While that was going on, though, the United Planetary Corps formed, which was basically the United Nations but, you know, for space. They were working on tech that would put humans in every corner of the universe. At first it was FTL, or hyperdrives, which didn’t work out, then there were Solar Sails that, despite being pretty damn good for short distances, left a lot of people floating out in the big vacuum. Shortly after that they landed on Warp-Tech, and that’s how humanity stretched its wings and really hit the stars.”

  “Warp-Tech? What’s that?”

  Garrett smiled, “I’m so glad you asked. Basically it’s teleportation. Complicatedly, it’s not. What I mean by that is what they were actually doing was ripping a hole in space and popping into the dimension next door before popping out the other side at their destination a few days or weeks later, depending on distance.”

  I gave him an inquisitive look and sat forward, “You say that as if they didn’t know what they were doing?”

  He nodded solemnly, “Exactly. Wasn’t their fault, but they were putting people out into the Void, or Warp, whichever works for you, without knowing about the repercussions.”

  I nodded along politely while mainly focusing on how well the interview was going, “So the humans went from war to explorers pretty quickly then?”

  “Gods no. There were a lot of ‘mishaps’ during the testing for the Pathfinders. Lot o’ men and women went into the Void on that first ship, and I’m talking a five-mile long monolith with 23,000 souls on board, millions if you count the embryonic and cloning stations.”

  “How did something like that happen? Did the Warp-Tech not work?”

  “Tech worked perfectly,” Garrett said with a deep respect for those who developed it, “warp opened up and they went through without a hitch. It was when they were in the Void that things went rotten. A month went by and the ship just never came back. If it weren’t for a rogue smuggler travelling ‘round the edge, they’d never even have known that they had sent something back.”

  I raised my eyebrow curiously, “What do you mean?”

  “A message that read ‘The Void has us’, and… Pieces of Æthyrium.” he just about whispered. “Four stones, roughly the size of a baby’s hand, and each one a different colour. There was a red one, a black one, a blue one, and a white one. Each of ‘em had these tiny screens that, when you ran your finger over them, showed coordinates, or mathematical equations, or straight up maps. Not much was known about them beyond the fact that each one was different in its own way.”

  “How so?”

  “Just little things, things that you could only pick up with specific instruments, like if you got them too close together they started emitting this weird energy, and if you dropped the black one it made you pass out.”

  While he’d been talking I’d been flicking through my notes, trying to find the next topic, so I panicked when he finished and was left there waiting. “Um, oh! So the stones, what happened with them? Were they just intergalactic party favours, or did they serve some immediate use?”

  “Oh yeah, they helped the UPC perfect their Warp-Tech, and not long after the Pathfinders were on their way out into the universe, leaving the still warring Old Sol to fend for itself.” he said almost gratefully.

  “You keep mentioning the Pathfinders, who were they?”

  “’Who are they’,” he clarified, “they’re still out there, I know it. But they were the ones who first ventured outside the Milky Way in their four ships, the Elythian, the Kaither, the Redali, and the Morthian. Each one held a piece of Æthyrium and was about ten miles long, carrying building supplies, the means to mine, terraforming devices, 65,000 live humans in cryo, and enough embryos to populate Earth five times over, they counted on most not surviving. Originally they planned to expand within our old galaxy, stay close to home in case they needed to go back, but the information in the pieces lead them to Andromeda. That… was a mistake.”

  “In what way? Was it barren or..?”

  “Not by a long shot,” Garrett said with a weak laugh, “in their excitement, the Pathfinders found the first habitable planet and set down. Turns out, what is habitable is usually habited. As the Pathfinders fled, the Andromedans pursued, taking down the Redali and capturing the blue piece. Apparently, the remaining three stones got the rest safely out of there and to Triangulum.”

  I looked at him confusedly, “You say ‘apparently’, why?”

  “Because I don’t think stones can save people. I think humans like to think that there’s an almighty power out there in one form or another, but I think the Pathfinders were saved by people, men and women who did their part.”

  “Right,” I said, finally finding what I was looking for in my notes, “you also said that you think they’re still out there, what did you mean by that?”

  “They left. After the UPC helped build us up in New Sol with towns and cities and the means to do more, they, and the Pathfinders, left to explore the universe. Maybe even retrieve the lost piece of Æthyrium, leaving the other three to us, the people who got off the ships and the clone-ish people from Old Sol.”

  “And no one knows where they are?”

  “Not a clue. You want to know the worst part though? It wasn’t even a few years before we started butting heads. What happened was-… You know what? This is more your field Vyard, and I think I’ve talked enough.”

  The audience laughed and clapped at the tiny bit of witty humour, and Vyard waited patiently for them to settle down before showing that he was back to his formal, calm self. “Thank you Field Master Garrett, and I’m sure the rest of us will agree that you could never talk enough.”

  There were a few scattered claps and whoops before I got my chance to ask my first question. “So, what would you say started the war?”

  “And Garrett thought you were being tough on him, heh. Well, I think I’d have to say it started shortly after the Pathfinders left, like the Field Master said. What happened was the core planets decided to take it upon themselves to push everyone who didn’t meet their standards out. Whether it was low socio-economic status, disability, or anything else. The core didn’t want them ruining the system so they sent them to work on the outer planets as farmers and such. I, of course, was not born at this time, and had nothing to do with it.” he said in response to the few tuts and angry whisperings throughout the crowd.

  “What changed? With what you’re saying it sounds like the core planets had the outer colonies under their thumb.”

  Vyard nodded, “They did, for a very long time, nearly a decade I’d say. But there was a man named Matthew Hieblenschtien, a scientist from the core planets,” I noted the emphasis on the clarification that he was from the core, but let him continue, “he went to the outer planets and started really helping. Within a year the birth defects were all but extinct, and those with physical disabilitie
s, as well as most mental ones, had been cured.”

  “How did that help though? Were people just healthier and that was enough?” I asked with the slightest bit of disbelief.

  “May well have been, but the doctor didn’t stop there. He helped create amazing scientific facilities which worked on amazing projects that made the outer planets not only independent from the core but also made it so they could start exploring outside of New Sol with the power of their own incorrectly named warp drives, which would later be called hyperdrives, but that’s one to talk about with an engineer.” he said with a clever smirk.

  The crowd laughed, and I will say I chuckled a little too, but I was also very tired. “That actually brings me to my other question, why wouldn’t they just use Warp-Tech? Isn’t it more effective?”

  Vyard gave a half sure nod, “Well, that would be because the Pathfinders had some of the best scientists with them when they cracked it for inter-galaxy travel, and they had bigger ships that could store bigger engines. It also helped that they had a much better understanding of the pieces than we do.”

  “So you don’t have Warp-Tech then?”

  “We do now, actually.” he said in a slightly offended tone. “When the ‘Commonwealth of Outer Planets’, which is what they started calling themselves once they had their own government, started exploring the stars, the core worlds went into overdrive to try and crack Warp-Tech. It took them a little while, but they did eventually get it. It was nothing like the Pathfinder’s version though, not quite capable of travel across the universe, but more than able to traverse the galaxy.”

  I waited for him to continue, but he was obviously giving me the time to ask more questions, which I was grateful for. “Did the core leave it at that? Exploring like the Commonwealth?”

  Vyard sighed as if he were ashamed of what he was about to say, “No. The core planets were very… strict. Shortly after they started their travels they found a solar system and named it Novasem, a place that they made an absolute no fly zone for the Commonwealth. And that’s how the Federation of Novasem was born, and some would argue the war as well.”