Dead Star Dockyards

The Scholar was an interesting individual in both persona and anima.

He was tall, but Diana didn't feel like she was looking up to meet his eyes. Not thin, but still seemed lacking in body mass, and yet he appeared fairly strong. His eyes did not match in color, but it wasn't the irises that differed, Diana couldn't quite get a handle on what color exactly his pupils were, in the time it took for her to register what color they were, she could swore they changed. It took a few minutes to determine this was indeed the case.

While his irises changed slowly following the rainbow's order, the pupils were random, flitting between different shades, hues, and levels of reflectivity at a moment's notice.

His chest seemed too small for his body and his shins were far too short in relation to his total leg length. Long ears, curling upward from about their center in a manner that represented a bull's horns. Diana couldn't tell from his unkempt hair if he was balding or if that was his natural hairline. Physically, the only things about him that gave her a sense of normality were his arms and hands, and they looked like they belonged to a witch.

"Wuai helo theyr!"

Broken English, sure, but his lips matched the sounds she heard. It was a welcome change in the storm of differences she had been faced with.

"I don't believe we have met. I take it you are the Scholar?"

He pulled out a small booklet from his sleeve, and began to rifle through its pages long enough for Diana to wonder how he had gotten it out so fast. The dimensions didn't seem to match.

"No wi havv naught. It is my grate plezure to introdooce myselph."

A dictionary, or some sort of thesaurus, was evidently the identity of that book.

"As much as I am flattered that you would resort to using our language for my comfort, it is currently not my priority to help you understand it. I would have no qualms about such an arrangement in the future, and it pleases me that there is someone here who can at least understand the more complex elements of our language, but there are things that I need your assistance in understanding. An incomplete lexicon will not assist me in that endeavor."

Once again the Scholar turned his nose to his book, rapidly flipping pages to and fro.

"My apologies for that my lady, and I ask that you excuse my overenthusiasm. I am simply extremely curious about how your people managed to communicate without the assistance of Split. If it would not be too much to ask, could you please define two of those words you used near the end. I believe they sounded like 'leckshikan' and 'endebbor'?"

Diana giggled a bit at the suddenness of the change between his extremely silly accent when speaking English and his supremely proper use of language when speaking how he would normally.

"I can to at least that much. The first of those words is 'Lexicon', spelled L-E-X-I-C-O-N, and refers to the vocabulary of a person, culture, or branch of knowledge. In the context I used it, I was referring to your own knowledge of English."

"Fascinating! A word to describe a knowledge of words!"

"We have a few that refer to such a thing. The second word, 'Endeavor', spelled E-N-D-E-A-V-O-R, can have a few different meanings depending on its use, but the most common use as a noun refers to an earnest attempt at reaching a goal."

"So your final sentence was an implication that my lack of knowledge of your more complex words will hinder your earnest attempts to achieve your goals. Is that correct?"

Diana gave a nod of affirmation. In spite of how strange he looked to the eye, Diana felt she quite liked speaking with him. He was enthusiastic, friendly. He was a proverbial breath of fresh air for someone who had been stifled by serious conversations with serious people for far too long. Half a lifetime of stern instruction with only her Grandfather to lighten the mood.

"For that I must apologize, and I will hold off on my attempts at practicing my English," Diana noticed that 'English' was actually a word he spoke, "for as long as it will be a hindrance to your goals. If I may be so bold as to ask, could you please not hold back on the more complicated or niche words that you know of? I may require you explain them, but it would be more beneficial for both parties if I understand that you have a more detailed and complex definition of some things."

He was truly interested in learning English. If Diana had not the confidence in his ability to understand the words she would eventually have to use, then she would not have agreed.

"That sounds reasonable. In that case, I would like to get something from our ship that will help you immensely."

"Immenzli?"

"To a great degree. Would you be willing to stay here and watch over both Donovan and the Dog while I go get it?"

The Scholar straightened up and gave what she assumed was a salute. "It is the duty I was assigned my lady!"

"Thank you Scholar, I will be back shortly."

Diana got up from her seat and traced her steps back onto the deck. She hadn't noticed it before, but the Noah was being suspended in the air by a pair of branches from the Oberlux. She knew that the ship was extremely heavy, There was more metal, ceramic, rubber, and silicon by volume in her structure than open space.

Those fairly thin branches had to be EXTREMELY sturdy to accomplish such a feat.

As if on que, the elevator descended, reaching the bottom just as she approached. Her ascent was fairly swift.

"What is the tool you wanted to give to the Scholar?"

"I brought a few extra tablets along in preparation of such a communication hurdle. Would you be able to reprogram one to limit its functionality to just being a dictionary? I don't think we have to worry about hacking."

"I had come to the same conclusion, Diana. Which dictionary should I upload?"

"Pax Universalis. With it's picture references and simple descriptions should be the most suited for his level of understanding. Remove all references to our history unless they are in common use. Similarly remove all words describing heinous actions and more colorful concepts that could have political repercussions should they be found. I believe there is a document that covers those requirements, but I trust your judgement to remove words that are not covered by it."

"Very well. Plug it into the dock."

- - - - -

The Scholar fell in love with the 'Dicshunari' immediately.

"How does this thing work? Is it magic? I thought you did not have access to it?"

Even in his infatuation, he had enough ability to think critically.

"It isn't magic, but I suppose it could be classified as something similar if you were to think about it a certain way."

Already he was tapping away, from the locations he was pressing on, it looked like he was looking up the word 'dog'. Satisfied with the information, he nodded in pleasure.

"This is one of those things that I don't have enough of an understanding of to give you an adequate explanation, and chances are there are concepts involved that you would struggle to come to understand without years of study."

"What makes you say that? I will have you know I am known as the Scholar for a reason." He seemed slightly insulted at the off hand comment, not at all intended to disparage him.

"Allow me to clarify, as I feel you have misunderstood. It is not that I doubt your intelligence. As a matter of fact, just from our short time talking together I have come to understand that you pick up very quickly on new concepts and information. However you have to understand that this does not come from your lack of ability, but from the shear volume of information that is a prerequisite."

A frown and tilt of the head seemed to suggest he still did not understand.

"Let me put it this way, how confident are you in your ability to fight?"

He looked down at his markedly uneven profile. "Not very."

"What of your ability to sculpt a masterpiece?"

"The same."

"Then what makes you think that you will be able to learn what is essentially a similar skill without the prerequisite effort, time, and talent? I am positive your Captain is a genius in the field of leadership, but he did not reach his position in a day. You may be good at your studies and memorizing information, but did you just wake up one day and have that happen?"

"No, I worked very hard to get here."

"This type of information is the same. The path to understanding them is so convoluted and full of walls that it requires skills that in turn take years to learn to climb over that none of our people could truly ever be able to learn it all. Do not be so simple minded as to think that you would be able to understand everything we learned and created without setting forth a commensurate amount of time and effort. You are smart, extremely intelligent even, but my people know from experience that omniscience is an impossibility."

Diana did not mean for it to come off as a scolding, but she couldn't help but feel like she had been talking down to him. He didn't seem to have taken it personally though.

"I am sorry. It was presumptuous of me to think that I would be able to immediately understand everything about your culture when I can barely communicate as you do."

His enthusiasm seemed to have dampened a bit, which was slightly depressing to Diana, but this would no doubt make the conversation much smoother. Still, she should probably offer the carrot after using the stick...

"Your first priority should be to learn our language. I think it will prove beneficial to your efforts to understand separate facets of our lives. Even more than speaking, you need to be able to read it, fluently, to the point where you can process what you have read faster than it would be to speak. There are only two of us left, and all of our historical and cultural records have been preserved primarily in writing. If you wish to see them, you need to be able to understand them."

His constantly changing eyes lit up at this prospect. He was nowhere near his previous high, but the spark was definitely there. Clearly he was extremely passionate about such cultural artefacts.

"You are very wise, lady Diana."

It was a comment out of the blue, one she did not at all agree with.

"No Scholar, I am not wise. I have not lived long enough to be considered that. I am desperate, and afraid. I need friends," she moved her hands to cover Donovan's right. "WE need friends, allies. We are alone in a place we are wholly unfamiliar with. We have no place to call home anymore, and we have no clue what our future holds in store.

Truth be told, Scholar, we are only barely adults by our laws, and we have been burdened with the fate of our species. By all rights I should be sat down on a couch, gossiping with friends about who the hottest boy in our class is, or what dress goes best with a certain pair of shoes. I should be eating dinner with my grandfather, watching movies with him as he sunsets in his old age.

He was wise. My grandfather was the wise one. He led the project which would give us a chance at a future.

I consider myself lucky, Scholar, lucky that you and everyone else on this ship is at minimum not hostile to us. With Donovan asleep like this, I am not sure I would be able to escape death if it came for me.

For us this is a massive risk, Scholar. Everything humanity has done for the past ten years has been for the sake of a gamble that put literally everything on the line, not that we had much of a choice. We weren't even sure if we could trust you, we still aren't mind you, and even if we can we still have to play our cards extremely carefully or else it will all come burning down in flames."

Diana was starting to break, bursting at the seams with stress and fear. Prepared as Diana may have been, the world she was dropped into was proving to be more than a little scary. During her return trip from the Noah one of those streaks of light made contact with a branch fairly close to where she was standing, only kilometers away.

Even at that distance she could feel the shockwave.

She was capable, but in the face of total annihilation she was only just a girl.

"I have trained for half of my life in how to be a proper diplomat. How to communicate, resolve problems peacefully, negotiate, learn, understand, but without any power backing my words or actions, I can do nothing. So no, Scholar, I am not wise. Grandfather would say I'm being quite impetuous, even if I don't have much choice in the matter."

She looked at the sympathetic face of the Scholar, and felt a twinge of regret for going on a tirade against him not once, but twice. Taking a breath to recollect her emotions, she continued.

"Now. With that out of the way, let us start with the most important topic, how is the food onboard the Oberlux?"

- - - - -

"What are your impressions of them?" The Captain was seated on the bridge, keeping an eye on the situation and giving commands that would serve to shorten their time in combat.

"She has incredible potential." The Scholar, standing at attention to his side, gave his honest assessment of Diana.

"And the boy?"

"I have not had the opportunity to talk with him, but if Diana's description of his lifestyle and achievements are anything to go by, then he also has the capacity for greatness."

The Captain gave a short order to the Helmsman to adjust his course slightly before placing his hand on his chin and thinking. He was silent for a period of time, contemplating something with unfocused eyes.

"What leads you to your assessment?"

"I cannot give a rational explanation for my assessment of Donovan, but I feel I can adequately justify my rating of Diana. For one she is very intelligent, perhaps surpassing me, though whether that comes from a vast quantity of knowledge or a superior quality of knowledge I have been unable to determine. I am fully prepared to admit it may be a combination of the two. She understands the precarious position that she is in, and her ability to act calm and collected even though she may be panicking is a rare occurrence by our standards to say the least.

She also possesses an acute awareness that the secrets of her society are powerful cards, and that the more information she can gather on our world the better her chances of survival are. I can tell that she was able to glean far more about our society from our conversation than I had intended to let off from the progression of her questions.

It pains me to admit this, but I was put into a situation where she was able to speak down on me in the field of academia and politics."

"You were beaten in a debate?"

"Calling it a debate would be an insult. It felt more akin to a lecture from my mother or professor than a conversation between equals."

"Interesting. What makes you so confident of the boy, Donovan?"

"While most of the information I received about him was secondhand, from Diana, I took the liberty of analyzing his injuries and came to a few conclusions about his ability to pilot that ship of theirs.

From Diana, I learned that he is her counterpart in more ways than one. Her skills are far more oriented towards peace and diplomacy. Donovan was groomed from a very young age to be a master of war, and it would appear he exceeded their expectations. She did not say much about it, but his theories on the construction and deployment of warships were put to use almost immediately upon their reviewal.

From the injuries he sustained, I am led to believe he has an astonishing level of willpower and vitality even accounting for the 'painkillers' in his blood. He may not be the trained to any significant degree in hand to hand combat, but the injuries he sustained and managed to stay conscious with would be enough to kill or disable even the most veteran and sturdy of our warriors. The Healer corroborated this assessment, adding that those injuries unrelated to split likely occurred a few hours before she had the opportunity to treat him.

Among those were several broken bones, a shaken brain, and extensive internal bleeding.

According to my knowledge of the greatest physical specimens of varying species, few if any would be able to remain combat capable under the combination of Split decay, fractured bones, head trauma, and poison."

"I thought the same." The Captain had wealth of knowledge, perhaps not enough to rival the Scholar, but what he lacked in information he made up for with experience and his ability to make accurate assessments.

The biggest difference between the two was their jobs, one to lead, and one to learn.

"What do you think the best course of action to protect them will be Captain? Geniuses though they may be, there are only two of them. They lack allies, resources, and reputation. They don't even have a planet to call home."

"I have been thinking hard about this. I know just as well as you or position precludes us from a great many options. I learned much of their moral and legal codes from my later discussions with the good Doctor Helmsguard. I had been thinking that perhaps it would be best to suggest they enter the protection of the Holifanians."

"Holifania? Those recluses? Why do you think they would be the best option?" The Scholar seemed shocked, as if this was a bad suggestion. "They may be unlikely to take advantage of them, but I can't imagine they would offer their assistance either."

"I have my reasons. For one, I think their proclivity towards keeping to themselves is something that would be beneficial to Diana and Donovan. So long as they do not go out of their way to interrupt Holifania's peace, they would likely be free to develop and expand as they please. Their ethics seem to match very closely as well.

If, and this is a very shaky if, they manage to get into the good graces of their council and parliament, it would not be out of the question that they receive material and military benefits as well. Should negotiations between them go exceptionally well, Holifania might even be convinced to give them control of one of their many exclaves.

Perhaps the biggest reason is that they are true to their words. If they say they shall protect them, then they shall receive protection. Holifania may not be particularly aggressive, but they are certainly a force to be reckoned with militarily."

"Those are all excellent points, but what will you do if they don't agree to make them a protectorate?"

"I do not think there would be any other option than to bring them into the Sanctum."

"You would ruin their hopes at a future?"

"From the little history of theirs I have had the pleasure of learning about, I know the Holifanians are the only ones that wouldn't end up killing them."

"Is it because they are a peaceful race?" The Scholar had only learned of their language, not of their past.

This lapse in thought was uncharacteristic of the Scholar, what peaceful society would prioritize Militancy in one of the two people chosen to succeed them?

"No, Scholar. It is because they are the only ones smart enough to realize it wouldn't be worth the effort."