Anniversary

[Ixari Forerunners]

An intense flash of the most pure of white light shone through the utter void of space. A single silver hued Ixari vessel emerged from subspace in an instant and as if it had burst out in complete haste it immedietly hurtled foreward, rainbow like light dancing from its hull, towards the bright globe that was the capital of the Consortium, Beta Alpha.

The ancient Ixari at this moment in time have had precicely fifty years in contact with the Consortium. The ship that hurtled at immense and seemingly impossible speeds (the Ixari had no visible means of thrust, and the Consortium could presumably not decect even with scanners what was pushing them forth) almost menacingly was a completely harmless and served only the purpous as a transport for the Ixari High Chancellor whom was on a fiftieth anniversary visit to Beta Alpha to commemerate fifty good years of peaceful co-existance between the two races.

The strange thing was that these two races werent neighbors. The Consortium did not actually know where the Ixari came from. Whenever visits were arranged, the Ixari came to see them or arranged to meet at some random point in space around the Consortium itself. The Ixari were never too keen on giving away the location of the single world that they inhabited, but cared not if anyone found it anyway. It served only as a luxurious type of planet leave for them. Journiers of the dark.

If whatever being that was piloting the silver starship looked out of any kind of viewport, he would find that it was now completely dominated by the massive disk of Beta Alpha. Responding to the signals and request from traffic control, the uselessly streamlined chrome starship curved effortlessly down towards the planet surface and sailed peacefully throughout the clouds. Scientists guess that the Ixari propulsion method may have something to do with inertia, for Ixari vessels never seem to shudder during entry or even break the sound barrier. In fact they arent known to make a noise at all.

The silver streamlined chrome vessel was a cross between some kind of slick sea creature, and a kind of insect. As it approached a huge field nearby the governmental palace of the Consortium, entirely ornamental insectoid like legs folded out from underneath the vessel in a manner that made the vessel seem convincingly lifelike.

A few short minutes later, and the heavily black robed Ixari High Chancellor was observed to emerge from an opening on one of the gargantuan legs. The vessel was truly massive and the underbelly of the thing bourne seemingly by the spindly insect legs was some four hundered feet in the air above. And there the Chancellor waited, patiently.

 

[Mr Friend]

Veiled beneath dark lingering clouds, unnatural and somewhat manufactured energies present within the contaminated atmosphere, was the industrialised capital of the Consortium, Beta-Alpha. From a distance the planet resembled a colossal gas giant, though beneath the poisonous remains stood the fatherland of the Aftermath Alliance. Industry had consumed the planet many millennia ago, riddling its surface with networks of smog producing factories, draining the planet of its resources. Many citizens were restricted to huge residential complexes beneath the planets surface, built deep within the mantle.

Upon arrival, the Ixari chancellor was greeted upon the surface by a sentient entity:

"Greetings sir, please allow me to escort you to my masters chambers. For you must understand, it is not at all safe upon the surface, we must leave at once.â€

 

[Ixari Forerunners]

With a flash of intense white light a smooth white chair, floating completely free of the ground and large enough to support the massive frame of the Ixari High Chancellor, appeared from dimensional slip directly from the ship. As if in slow motion, completely defying the gravity of the world itself (which was far too strong for the Ixari to manage without injury) the Ixari drifted gently through the air and into the seat. The infra-red goggles concealing the eyes of the Ixari which allowed him to see properly in these conditions were gently taken with a click from his face. This was usually a sign of respect to foreign cultures that extremely rarely were met by the Ixari, usually when they answered distress calls close to their current capital system.

He leaned foreward gently and started to speak fluently in the native language of the Consortium male.

'We do indeed. For a third time, I beleive, in the last fifty years! Thats nothing but the blink of an eye to me, but we beleive to your race that is somewhat more significant! It is of course a pleasure to be in your presence again your highness.

However I am not just here to attend celebration for the ruby anniversary of the alliance between our two nations. It is a pleasure for me to announce that the Ixari's isolationist ways are over and we are ready to enter the surrounding community of nations. However still we will not reveal the location of our capital system, even if it is entirely inveitable that someone is going to find it someday. Perhaps they will come looking for us!

We hoped that you would come join us in this search for a wider influence in things, and contacts with the rest of the community around us. We also hoped that you could provide us with any information that you may have about nearby nations. We admit that we know where most of them are but we have not taken advantage, and spied and probed like many other races seem to do. It seems that it is a major breach of privacy to us.

Anyway..could you be so helpful?

 

[Mr Friend]

The individual rose to his feet with difficulty, some of the conduits breaking from his flesh and spilling thick fluids onto the marble floor. The Consortium had dedicated everything to the economy, there hearts, their souls, even their bodies.

"Unfortunately, I do not share your opinion of the lesser beings inhabiting this galaxy. They are no more than assets to the empire, to the economy.â€

 

[Ixari Forerunners]

The thin, tiny lips of the bleach white Ixari councellor gently pulled into their equivalent of a smile, and not far from a human one either. The Ixari thought a bit before answering the statement, looking for a way best to describe why the Ixari dont use their techology as much as they do, or perhaps should.

"Like every individual, ever race has ambitions. We fulfilled our ambitions two billion years ago. Since then, we have kept going with our lives and sought ways to make them more comfortable. Now we have a new ambition, and this new need to find and catalogue as much alien culture as possible is it.

It is not our way to use our 'power' to the disadvantage of others. We prefer to use it to help others as long as it does not result in the harm of something else.

We have in the past learned that to use other nations and cultures as assets for 'power and the economy' has only lead to unrest and collapse in the end. We have seen it in our own culture and the cultures of others. It is a phase every race must go through."

If the old Ixari had known any great deal about human history, he would have saw fit to use the United States of America from the mid-late 20th Century through into the early 21st Century of Earth. Their dominant, bullyish ways towards other cultures, using them as assets for profit, only lead to a massive proportion of mankind having a problem with the nation in the end. At least the Consortium head of state was not talking about forcing Consortium culture on other races.

"Your thoughts betray you. No mortal, or no group of mortal beings, can ever have true power. True power is only something that can belong to a being such as a God, not that our culture HAS a God. But we know to some that we Ixari seem like Gods.

For example, we could influence an entire race to whipe itself out by means of genocide. We could change their environment into any way we wanted aswell. We would not, of course, but its a wholly possible prospect. True power is just that, the ability to do ANYTHING you liked but on a much grander scale.

Thats something you just cant have."

 

[Mr Friend]

‘Such a waste, to ignore ones true potential and compensate with an aimless pursuit for knowledge, such knowledge could be taken by force, swiftly and with little effort, but you choose to mix yourselves with lesser beings. No matter, the way of the Ixari are not for the Consortium to question, but do not humour yourself in thinking we stand among those creatures as equals, the alliance grows even as we speak, as does our economic supremacy. Our only rival my good friend, is that of your people.'

A frail individual entered the chamber, clothed only in a ragged tunic and tattered vest, the sort of clothing you'd expect from a common slave. The being motioned to the Consortium ruler, his eyes fixed upon the marble floor at all times.

‘Please don't misunderstand however, I greatly favour our peoples prospering relationship and admire the Ixari in certain aspects of there unique culture, but do not expect the Consortium to bow as other would, or be treated as underlings, it would be somewhat, unprofessional...wouldn't you say?'

The slave knelt, opening a small valve in its left arm; this valve had been cut from the slaves very flesh, and had been closed and reopened many times. The slave poured a blue liquid from his arm into a small crystal glass and offered it to the ruler with much respect; he took it gladly and began to sip the unnatural concoction.

 

[Ixari Forerunners]

'You see not even your race as an equal.

The ideals of this nation do not cater for our tastes. We shall have to keep close tags on you in the near future to make sure that if you do conquer other worlds and civilizations that their people are treat equally and with respect. If they are not we will enforce this as part of our well known mandate.'

The tall and slender Ixari being bowed to the slave. If it was his way he would have taken him away with him, and the rest of his family and friends and given them a better life elsewhere but he knew he could not do that. Slaves are currency, to take them is theft.

The Consortium leader gained no such bow.

A flash of white light took the Ixari away onboard the startlingly huge silver ship which elegantly lifted into the heavens and sailed effortlessly into space. As soon as it left the planet atmosphere it dissapeared in a flash of white light into subspace.