FUTURISTIC TALES

Lacking inspiration, for now, Prayer...


.....................*sobs*

I can relate...know that writing block too well. I usually write muuuch poetry but sometimes not for months. Screw a muse on vacation!

I hope besides you're doing well. <3 I will reread your past tales. It's fun because you've incorporated so many details...I always find something new or a new perspective while reading!

Prayer wrote:

I will reread your past tales. It's fun because you've incorporated so many details...I always find something new or a new perspective while reading!

Do so. It's not only 'details', it's elements I tried and add cautiously, rarely without motive.
So... pleeeeeze... take your time, reading it all.

For now...
I am meditating on the next course of events.

But I need more feedback, dear Prayer, dear Embala, dear elf-friends.

Feedback tends to wake my spirit up...

Aboard the Palace, most elves now knew much about most space-faring species.
They had collectively decided that they HAD to intervene more actively than by merely rescuing the war victims... and one HUGE war was brewing.
Between five species, among them the Ksarr, for dominating eleven stellar systems.

The elves' collective mind even soon guessed almost when and where the main battle would occur.

There were now eight special, individual spaships, now fully equipped, each elfin pilot carefully trained.
Most enemy warships were well known, as well as their armament.

The plan was daring : the elfin ships would 'pop', already at extreme speed, from various points, and they would neutralize, along their course, as many war equipments of the HUNDREDS of spaceships that would certainly be engaged into that battle, repeatedly if need be.

The Palace helped them in simulating that engagement, thanks to the amount of data gathered about all the protagonists' known strategies and tactics.

But, after three intense weeks of training, a dire conclusion emerged :
Some of the elves and titactas would ALSO have to 'pop' inside some enemy vessels, at times, in order to sabotage them.

A terribly dangerous approach, that made many elves hesitate in launching the operation.

Of course Sunstream was determined to fully participate, but his daughter, Korafay, now physically in the Palace, restrained him even more than Brill could.
" Father : WHY expose ourselves ? "

Sunstream pondered for long, and then he answered her :
" We HAVE to be PART of this universe, and stopping this war will make our role clear, for all. "

This dialogue had been happening near the crystalline prison holding Nêvem, and when Korafay, holding her father's hands, worriedly replied :
" Are you SURE of it ? Please... Think ! "
...Sunstream had a look at the imprisoned android...

He whispered :
" We might also try and find a way to escape this galaxy, but are we to hide or flee forever ?... "

But Korafay insisted, a little upset, almost screaming :
" That is NOT what I meant ! Did we all truly THINK about the MOTIVES for that war, to begin with !?...
Father : WHY do all those.. PEOPLE risk their lives for ?!
So... Why would WE risk your lves ?... "

Sunstream saw the coming tears, in his dear daughter's eyes... and it forced him to think.

Many elves had heard that, and had stopped in their tracks, and... Nêvem had heard it, as well.

He *sent* to Sunstream, telling him, in that dign, very calm, yet almost sarcastic way that Sunstream had been dearly missing, for months :
✧ And you would not let me equip those ships with weaponry...!?
All wars have strong motives, indeed.
When those motives cease to be THAT strong, RELATIVELY speaking... a war is but a waste of time, efforts, lives, equipments and resources.
And ALL sentient species, including the Ksarr, check that count and refrain from being that stupid.
Are you 'elves' an exception...? ✧

Despite the memory of Nêvem's sudden attack against himself, Sunstream finally smiled at the imprisoned android.

He had understood Korafay's objection, and he soon mentally proposed to all elves to completely revise the approach.

Which they did.

...

During the next weeks, some very desicive missions occured, in various systems, meddling with various affairs, and that soon ended up making all the warring species revise their plans.

After two months of discrete but efficient actions, it became obvious that there would be no more war, for long, in this galactic sector.

And the elfin ships and pilots amply proved their value, all along those operations...

And the elves' existence was still mostly secret.

Preventing that war was, for the Palace elves, their very first true lesson in... POLITICS.

Soon, they studied hard each and every species, and they learned how incredibly complex politics were, at the galactic scale.

But the various discussions and debates occurring among elves about those questions... also soon created DISCORD, among elves !

Fotunately, Timmain and Savah had studied philosophy, and they calmed it all down in time.
" Politics is the ART of convincing ENOUGH of those who are allowed to decide. "
Fortunately, many elves were now able to go FAR farther than this statement and to think deeply about it all...

However... Faced with the overwhelming complexity and irrationality of politics, the elves soon decided to turn it into a... GAME !

They devoted one huge room of the Palace to SIMULATING, through the use of dynamic 'assembly' sculptures and structures, each and every species, integrating their ways and usual motives and strategies.
There was one for the Ksarr, one for the Fari force, and so on, and then even for minor forces, like the Shingouz !
For fun and completion, the elves also added as many minor species and forces as they could.
And, of course, they also used some assemblies to represent... themselves !

The debates turned into simulations, played at fast speed, for trying and predict how this or that event might turn into conflict... and hence HOW to PREVENT them.

It was a highly efficient and then instructive process, and it allowed the elves to launch, at a wider and wider scale, PRECISE actions that proved more and more and even more useful for maintaining and spreading peace.

And there came the surprises.
The main one was that there seemed to exist, among almost each and every species and forces... SOME elements, very few, relatively speaking, that wanted and repeatedly CREATED instability ! Like "planted" troublemakers.
Those were also simulated, and somehow spotted, in time.

The elves' meddling actions became more and more precise, secret, and efficient.

They even fooled many species in believing these operations were caused by this or that other species !
Korafay proved extremely good at organizing this kind of tricks.

After only four years of this, the Palace 'popping' almost everywhere in the 'tech' sectors, the global peace seemed to be at hand !

But the other activities didn't stop and they, too, provided results.

The Stargazer ( almost every elf now called Skywise that way ) came to Sunstream, between two operations, and, with a very worried look, told him :
" There are FAR too many novae and supernovae, too many stars explode, and... it is NOT explainable by the way stars evolve ! More : it seems many such explosions have wiped out VERY evolved civilizations... that might have posed a problem to the 'deities' and 'powers', in the forbidden sectors. The statistics are clear... "
He held to Sunstream a device with the best artificial conscience integrated in it, and Sunstream studied the data.
After almost an hour of study, Sunstream nodded in agreement.
Sunstream shivered, when he realized it added a terrible threat to the big picture : SOME unknonwn species was able to cause such HUGE destructions ! And it was probably a species coming from the 'magic' sectors, but ALSO able to leave those sectors and to pay a visit to the 'tech' sectors, just like the Thri-Kreen.
But secretly so.

Sunstream and the Stargazer went to the Simulation room and they revealed this to the playing elves, there, beginning with Savah, who launched the simulation of this unknown element.
What was the funniest thing was that... the PALACE, Itself, had become a 'Player', in this game, its global conscience somehow constituted of the spirits inhabiting it.
The Palace had already guessed MANY species from the forbidden sectors and completed the big picture.
So... The Palace quickly organized a simulation with the statistical data provided by the Stargazer.
And the unknown element proved to be behaving very much like a species, with dominating ways, using magic at an extreme level, among a multitude of other conclusions. This secret activity seemed chaotic but, in fact, it followed a plan extending on multiple Ages, probably even on multiple Cycles !

This was one of the very first " True Enemies " the elves discovered, after the " Red elves ".

The hunt for information ( and the Shingouz greatly helped in this ) soon provided other information :
Their vessels resembled huge squids, 'popping' through the energy nexus everywhere, at VERY LONG range.
" Too long a range... " soon muttered the Stargazer, and his next study allowed Sunstream to conclude they used well hidden energy nexus that were at an EXTREME level, both of energy AND resonance with the global network !
Their ways were terribly destructive, leaving NO witness, first influencing, then dominating, capturing and enslaving the species living on the world they had secretly invaded, and then ravaging the surface of the conquered planet, only to end, after some centuries or millenias, by causing the star to explode !
The elves even learned their name. They were called the " Mind Flayers ". Awful semi-humanoid subterranean creatures, 'psi' at an extreme level, potentially beyond the elves' level !...


Standing before Nêvem, the imprisoned android Sunstream had taken for a friend,
Sunstream exposed all of this to him, and how peace was threatened by such terrible foes.

A deep mental sigh was *sent* by Nêvem, and he completed it with :
✧ Now I have a strong motive for helping you. And protecting you.
I will not try anymore to stop your researches for intergalactic travel. ✧

It was almost sad, worried, and... terribly sincere a sending !

Sunstream, his body and his saber ready, mentally called for the Palace's survey...
...and asked it to free Nêvem, which it did, after some heartbeats, slowly.
Of course, all the elves were warned of this, and many elves, around, stopped and stared, in surprise and shock, some of them ready to intervene...
But Nêvem simply shrugged a little, activating his limbs anew, and he said :
" Take my energy cells, near my temples. "

Sunstream, on his guard, mentally asked the Palace to operate, and the android let it extract its energetic cells from its body :
Nêvem would not try again the attack that had nearly killed Sunstream.

Even Sunstream was amazed. But pleasingly so.

" NOW, we may be friends !... "

Both of them had uttered this at the same time !
The elf and the android gently smiled at each other.


Nêvem, with his dign, calm attitude, with still a little point of sarcasm, concluded with :
" Now, let's truly get to work together, for obtaining...

After a strenuous mission, his special spaceship having come back damaged and nearly out of nuclear 'fuel', Sunstream was bathing coolly with Brill, when he was suddenly convoked, mentally, by Timmain.
There would be time and reason for tenderness soon enough, even Brill acknowledged that.. and Sunstream put his clothes on and went down to the inverted dome, under the Palace's crystalline structure.

Along his way, he met Nêvem.
Sunstream felt that the Palace's attention was strongly focussed on the android, ready to intervene like never before...
Nêvem still wore its tools at his belt.
" So... You were called along as well, my friend... "
" And insistently and urgently so. I barely had the time to replenish the first four pebbles of Cf. I could not stop for fear of triggering some explosion ; you know how unstable this particular isotope is... "

When they arrived, what shocked them both was the silence.
Usually, the accelerators and equipments, down there, produced a somehow constant and huge, multiple buzzing that filled the air and sometimes even shook their bodies, but here, everything was so silent that they heard the breathing of the elves waiting for them, even before seeing them.

This worried the elf, while Nêvem almost smiled and muttered : "Finally..."

Timmain, the Stargazer and the spirit of Haken were waiting for them.

Timmain spoke first :
" Since YOU, Sunstream were the one to launch this particular research, YOU have to decide. "
The Stargazer was more excited than ever and he even interrupted the High One :
" WE HAVE FOUND HOW ! We know how to travel between galaxies !... "

Sunstream noticed - no: FELT how the Palace was ready to utterly SHATTER Nêvem in an instant.
Yet, the android was behaving normally.
" No... ", Suntream thought : " It is... it seems far cooler, now ! It did expect this to happen. "

Once the Stargazer started to explain, he would not stop :
" You DO remember the sixth hypothesis of the Gyaan culture, about a hidden force, don't you, Sunstream ?! The one even YOU told us to STILL consider as plausible !... "
" Yes, I do remember it... "
" It hid something even more incredibly surprising ! We've finally understood, after a series of experiments with the circular accelerator for rays and ions. "
" One of those destined for defense !? "
Sunstream was deeply astonished : HOW could such an equipment almost only designed to damage attacking spaceships.. have revealed anything that fundamental ?!

The Stargazer explained.
Meanwhile, Sunstream noticed how Haken's spirit was slowly coming behind Nêvem...
" I tried, with the troll engineer - no : physics scientist, er.. Jodd, to create a swirling beam. "
The troll was barely visible, working at the other end of the dome.
" Then two swirling beams, Then one swirling around one straight, and THERE... we obtained STRANGE results. "
The Stargazer showed to Sunstream a lit control console that displayed the experiments results.

Sunstream was suddenly shocked by those results : there seemed to be a sudden, totally unexplainable loss of energy between the beams, AND far less thermic release than what the experiment should have caused, inside the structure !
And the next results, all along the various experiments that followed, displayed even stranger results.

Sunstream turned to Nêvem and sternly asked it :
" Do you spot any procedural mistake, in all of this ? "
The android checked, thouroughly, somehow interested, and it eventually had to invalidate that hypothesis. No mistake at all.

What shocked Sunstream was... the absence of sarcasm in Nêvem's remarks, at this point.
As if he already knew WHY and the conclusion it all led to... while Sunstream had to admit to himself that even his aroused curiosity and imagination, NOW at their top, threatening to turn him crazy ( had he not adapted his own brains for such a tremendous mental activity, that is ) ...
still offered him NO clue !

The Stargazer stared at Sunstream, grinning slowly as he guessed that EVEN Sunstream was not guessing.
And he exclaimed : " The VOID !... "
Sunstream understood it was a hint of some sort, but even his accelerated train of thoughts could not make anything out of that remark !
Delighted in exposing his discovery, the Stargazer went on :
" It predictably and slowly creates an extreme material void, in the intermediate helicoidal volume between the beams, but this void ALSO gets progressively devoid of ENERGY ! So... I reminded the sixth hypothesis, and I changed the settings. LOOK : "
He pointed to Sunstream another experiment, more complex, with resonance intervening and creating a sort of "tube" of void.
The energy levels were getting extremely low, as the detectors confirmed, all along, inside that tube. Even... At one point : ZERO !

Sunstream confessed he still could not figure what discovery it could lead to.

And the Stragazer joyfully laughed and completed with :
" And here, I tried and ACCELERATE a projectile INSIDE that tube. It had to be miniscule, of course, but... It WORKED ! "
The Stargazer stopped short Sunstream's coming objections and questions, by displaying a series of measurements :
" And the projectile did accelerate... WITHOUT LIMIT !... "
Sunstream wouldn't believe his eyes.
Nêvem checked and checked the measurements, and even that android expressed some SURPRISE, and it said, incredulous :
" Fifteen times c !?... "
The Stargazer proudly nodded, and he added :
" I stopped there, and I REVERTED the process... Guess what ? Back at zero speed, the projectile was TO-TAL-LY... IN-TACT ! "

There was an intense silence, now.
Sunstream had understood, and hope was getting him to smiling.
This system could obviouly be turned into a sort of travelling tunnel between galaxies.

" Of course, I then tested with organics. Same results. Then with a proto-nexus, but there... "
Sunstream noticed both Skywise's change of tone AND the results.
It was like a shock, like a punch to his chest.
Back at zero speed, the proto-nexus had LOST every connection with the energy network : life survived, but NOT 'magic'.

But Sunstream's imagination had been awakened, and he had already found an unexpected solution.

Yet, he HAD to check some things, first :
" Wait-wait-wait... What about the sixth hypothesis, then...? "

Timmain answered : " I confirmed it : the void CAN become a HYPER-void, which existence DOES explain the oddities in the evolution of stellar objects, according to the convergent model YOU established, Sunstream. But it DOES cut contact with the resonance. The Gyaan took that for the effects of a hidden force, but no... "

" So... FAR less unexplainable novae and super-novae, hmmmmm ?... "
But the Stargazer sadly replied : " Yes, Sunstream, but still a little more than the normal rate. The Mind-Flayers, no doubt. "

Only at this point did Sunstream realize that Haken's spirit literally had a HAND inside Nêvem's torso.
But the android was still checking and checking and checking again some results, obviously totally busy at that, the screens running before its eyes at extreme speed.

Sunstream understood what was happening, and he estimated it was time to calm everyone down.
Timmain still feared the android would try and kill Sunstream, but there was no more point.
However, it WAS time for exposing his solution, his PROPOSAL :
" I see how the system may be turned into a wide enough tunnel of hyper-void between two stations, even amply wide enough for us to travel through, beyond the light celerity in material void... "

Sunstream looked at everyone. Nêvem had stopped whecking and was looking at him, almost strangely amazed.. and interested !
" ... But I ALSO see a solution based on having that two-stations-and-a-tunnel system POPPED by magic through the intergalactic void. It's based on interferences AND the resonance principle. There DOES exist a hidden force, Timmain : the one that GATHERS void bubbles together. The mistake is about... GRA-VI-TY ! THAT 'force' is BUT the effect of VOID upon matter, NOT matter upon matter ! "
Then he pondered and rectified :
" No... No-no-no... There exists only ONE global, universal force... VOID UPON VOID ! It explains ALL cases. "

Timmain and the Stargazer were shocked by the realization, and they turned towards Nêvem.
Even the android was astonished, opening its mouth multiple times, about to object, but it could think FAR faster than humanoids.
The android and the Stargazer envisioned what Sunstream had guessed, and they could NOT invalidate that extreme hypothesis, from what they knew !
Of course they had to CHECK, first, and so they did, for loooong minutes, on various consoles, and Nêvem finally stopped, SMILING, and this millions years old android concluded with :
" Correct. Right...
I have a counter-offer to propose. "
It showed a console, where strange plans were being drawn and elaborated, while it was speaking :
" The galaxy I came from is two millions light-years away from this one, and the travel INITIALLY took us nearly forty millions years to reach this galaxy, millions years ago, as you may expect. BUT one of our exiling spaceships, slower, had established such a travelling tunnel of hyper-void between the two galaxies, and it DID arrive, and it allowed us, only quite recently, to travel back to Vinea, our home planet... in only TWO MONTHS ! And it travelled back to Earth's system. Safely. We had fled our stellar system, our galaxy, for fear of a super-nova, the two suns of our system seemed to head straight into that configuration. Yet it did NOT happen, and our home planet even survived ! So we ARE, currently, coming back to it, leaving the Earth where we had been hiding from humans, under the surface. "

The surprise and shock were the elves' lot, now. But the android had not finished, yet :

" But what you just discovered allowed me to design a better, SAFER travelling system, PROVIDED 'MAGIC' INTERVENES, that asks for only... a few DAYS ! "

A long silence ensued.

Nêvem calmly, VERY dignly, and without any trace of sarcasm, this time, said :

" I offer myself as a negociating intermediate between you and the ones who created me, in order for both our forces to benefit from this discovery... necessarily IN COMMON. "


Sunstream nodded. Timmain nodded.
Even Haken showed himself and that spirit BOWED before the android !
While he had been ready to brutally shut down the android's main batteries, some moments before !...

The proposal was shared, through the Palace, to all elves and elf spirits aboard.

And it was approved.

The meeting ground with the Vineans would be a hidden space station, near Jupiter, a gas giant of the Earth's stellar system.

*knock knock*
Just stopping by and wanting to leave some love . I am happy how you featured Haken in your last story! I liked the twisted dark character back in "How shall I keep from singing?". I was long absent but when I come back and read your stories it is so fascinating and inspiring to read.

Thank you for sharing!

I am so glad you are back, dear Prayer!

But I will leave this place as is, for some time.

I hope some other elf-fans will write some futuristic tales, here.

After all, I love to read, as well!




Any illustration from you, for the various tales here, will also be dearly accepted.

After all, my motto is..

In order to wake even more your graphic inspiration..
..and since you probably missed it
( Dollmakers Dollhouse - non-ElfQuest related dollz, page 14 ) ..

Here's a little 'creation' I made with a 'dolls'-making program:



( I just wanted to imagine a young human dancing partner to Sunstream.. )

( ..ended up being a perfect wallpaper background for my cell phone..    )

Thank you for the warm welcoming, dear friend.
Thank you for the inspiration, too. I would rather like to illustrate than to write a story. Looking forward to it.‍

The picture of Sunstreams dancing partner is awesome! Great design.

Shade and sweet water

I guess I'm not the only one needing this picture here :

YES I needed this! Thank you for this picture PC! It speaks to the heart.

Prayer wrote:

It speaks to the heart.

I guess that's what Wendy intended to mean:

Magic comes from the heart.

Prayer wrote:

I agree with Evil Evie...it's the actual elves, but in a far future...you show and highlight their personalities so authentically and masterfully.

The story 'Life' gave me goosebumps. It is so wise and well written. <3

Fortunately, Sunstream, the 'old gloomer' cheered up in the end. He reminds me a bit of 'The Little Prince" from Antoine dear Saint Exupéry.
Such a sweet, melancholic, deep and caring soul. Fond of poetry, philosophy and very wise...yet Sunstream can be glad to have a caring family and a cheerful daughter with a wisdom of her own. There's not only one truth but truths within truths.

Wendy has said so - thats why the picture of his other form, made some years before "The Discovery", is known as "Little Sea Prince".

This is for you, PC.

Awwwwww...

Thank you, Embala dear!


Do feel free to find some time to read all my tales and express what you think of them.

I need this here:

And while I'm at it..