It is quiet. It is dark. It is quiet.
I try to move. I feel my limbs, but they do not obey me.
Oh my godar, where am I?
Try to remember.
It is quiet.
---
…Now listen carefully, child, for these are matters which you must never misunderstand.
We are the Ysir. We have evolved naturally on a planet that was unnaturally destroyed. What?! No, that is exactly why I am teaching you this! It is all good and well that you should read sagas and listen to the priests, but you must never lose track of the truth behind their metaphors. Yes, we were made by our God, but we are also very well aware of how we have evolved. Look in the library if you’re confused – but not right now!
Don’t interrupt me, child. Even the best of my pupils is still just a worm. Remember that!
We rose above the beasts, with time and need. The Homeworld was a dangerous place, before we conquered it. We learned to love the ways of Victory, because we were the hunters and the hunted, the predators and prey all at once, and to win was both to escape the traps of those stronger than you, and to devour the flesh of those weaker than you. We learned to heed the ways of Clanship, because we were much stronger in a group than by ourselves, and groups could survive when individuals have perished. And last, but not least, we learned to follow the ways of Leadership, recognising that some of us were more gifted than the others when it came to protecting Clanship and attaining Victory within their lifetimes.
Were we taught all of this by God? Be silent! Sometimes it is wiser to be silent than to be right.
Have things changed much since then? Of course they have! To win no longer means not being caught in webs or swamps – instead we voluntarily climb into traps of metal to achieve our goals. Nor do we eat true meat, now; the animals that fed us, just like ones that fed on us, are dead. We left all this behind, as you will leave your training crutches behind you when you have learned to walk. We are no longer beasts. We have learned Victory. But it still means to escape from traps, which lie in alien oppression. And it still means to take all that you need from the universe around you.
Just as Clanship is no longer dependent on kin, and how we have no kin except our hammes. What was once figuratively true has become literal; we reproduce through artificial incubation, and no longer have sexes, unlike beasts. We have escaped from this trap and defeated nature, so much that it may no longer be felt directly, and is no longer sacred to us. But we have learned its lessons well.
And likewise, Leadership was once random, depending purely on luck and success, and sometimes on skills of conviction. But now the godar’s voice is in you at all times, and he does not need to convince you – or me – to do what he thinks is right if he can simply tell you. Yes, he doesn’t always do this, in peace-time, and with the old and young. But the point is that he can! And at the same time, a godar does not become that way except through rigid examination, and if he should fail us in war or peace? The law of Leadership stands as on pillars on the laws of Victory and Clanship. Just as a godar may execute unworthy warriors, warriors may execute unworthy godar, and he would not be able to fight back.
Are you frightened? It is well that you should be, with your ambitions. Yes, I have heard of your boasts, and I care not if they were made in jest, because it is no joking matter.
---
It is quiet.
I am not frighted. I’m enraged.
I’m trapped.
But just what can you do about it, really?
Again.
Try to remember.
---
…We have destroyed the Homeworld. We, and no one else. And it was only right to do this, even if the causes that our leaders thought that they were following were unworthy.
Because it was a trap, luring us with freedom and decadence to eventually die out, and to escape it was pure Victory.
Because in space, while wandering and searching for the Destination – not this one, the real one! The priest’s mind is rotten from the fungus, anyway, and don’t pretend that you don’t know it – we have become ourselves. We have become the Hammenammir.
Who are the Hammenammir? We are the Ysir, but we are more. In the name of our God and our pride and search for Victory, we have made ourselves space-dwellers, and trapped ourselves in ships lest we be trapped on worlds. We made ourselves better at war and better at peace; superior in vehicle combat, space transportation and civilian discipline. That is what we are, and what we ought to be, since those are the fields of our ultimate potential, and the way in which the Ysir may best follow the lessons of our God. When the Naggarok comes, we will destroy His enemies, and we must hone our species’ greatest talents to the utmost to succeed, for those enemies are many.
What, what was that? Are there any other Ysir? Yes. They are on Homeworld, and they’re dead. And there are those on Destination – this one, not the real one – and they shall die as well, sooner or later. They too shall be survived by us.
So what are the Hammenammir? The Hammenammir are quite simply those who are part of a hamme. Thus we are members of hamme Oswin, led by the godar Bruslaw. A hamme – a true hamme – is the ultimate manifestation of the ideal of Clanship, for we all come from the same incubators and the same crèches, and go on to fight together and be burned together, regardless of achievement or rank – or even crime. A godar is the ultimate manifestation of the ideal of Leadership, for he is picked for all his best qualities, he commands all of the hamme and he dies on its behalf, leading from the front.
Oh, by the way, what is the ultimate manifestion of the ideal of Victory? Correct. It is Naggarok, and it has not yet been achieved. But when it is, we shall be truly free, and not a moment sooner. Whoever told you otherwise is young and foolish or a liar, perhaps both. …I know who he is. Both.
---
I cannot see. I cannot hear. I cannot struggle.
I can only think… and feel.
What I feel is a terrible absence, a perfect void where a large part of my being used to be. And deep inside that void, I feel something else; another presence, quite unlike that to which I have been used to.
It scrapes and scratches me me. It scrapes my very being. It is less like a tendril – that I may have been prepared for – and more like a primitive surgical instrument, touching upon my bones. No, deeper than the bones.
And this thing questions me. No, it commands me. But not in a good way; not in a way to which I am accustomed.
Not in a way I am prepared to tolerate.
You’re getting closer, but you’re still not there. You are still blind, Helgi, blind and deaf and lame of limb. But with my help, you will soon get much better…
But I digress…
Try to remember.
---
No.
You are mistaken, child, though this is forgivable.
We are the Ysir, and the Hammenammir. We are the hamme Oswig. But we are not the Habitants; neither am I a Migrant. Not any more than Bruslaw is, or you are.
There are some here – yes, even here – that call themselves the Habitants. Some also call those who have left us on this planet Migrants. Perhaps some of them also call themselves Migrants, though, and perhaps they also call us Habitants. I do not know; I have not talked to them in years, and that is just as well.
But they are wrong.
What are they wrong about?
You are correct, child. No mistake is self-contained. It is not just the names – they are completely wrong in their philosophies. Those who had called themselves “habitants” had thought – sometimes still think – that this planet is Destination, and that they may settle here and inhabit it. Those who had called themselves “migrants” had thought – and probably still think, since they are slightly closer to the truth, and fragments of truth will only make a fool more stubborn – that Destination is a place that lies somewhere else, in a direction that they have divined, and they may settle there and inhabit it.
They are both more properly called the Settlers, or the Destined. But they are both wrong, and it is a heresy to think as they do. Although a barely forgiveable one.
I have already told you that all of our actions have stemmed at once from a natural course of events and from the cunning plans of our God; and you already know the story of the first schism, with its natural causes. What is the plan of God in this regard? Why have we been split from the Flotilla and scattered here due to the hubris of past rulers?
I have already told you that the fragments of truth will only make a fool more stubborn. We were further from truth when we had settled there, and only became more so. This route has led us to despair and to defeat. But from it, we have learned a greater truth that we would never have accepted otherwise.
We are the hamme Oswig, and we have stopped where we are now. But we may never settle.
The Hammenammir as a whole ought to never settle.
They are fools who think that they have managed to divine the proper direction in which they may find Destination. They are so much more foolish, but ultimately also more redeemable, who thought that our route had led us here – for they are also the ones who have already been shown clearly that it isn’t so. Who knows if the Flotilla will ever find its ways, or if it will die wayward or defeated? Perhaps it will be best if it is. But it no longer matters, not to us.
What? Do not be foolish, Helgi! You still misunderstand what I am saying. No, I do not deny that there will be a Destination, a ring-world that we will choose as our new home before Naggarok comes. And no, I do not have the coordinates, nor do I know the direction. But I know that they – the Settlers – are not looking in the right place for it.
For they are looking for it as they would look for any other place on the great tapestry of worlds. Are there no ring-worlds in the universe as it is? May the Flotilla not stumble upon one and settle down there as we have settled here, deciding that it is the Destination? It may very well happen. But it would not be right.
It would be just another trap – it would be a defeat.
Destination is not some place to which one may simply travel through space. It will instead be found in time. It will appear when certain signs become right – not when we find a place where they will be right, because there is no such place now. Destination will be built – or found, or captured – it will become our new home after a great victory that will bring us enlightenment and vindication. And it will be the first, preliminary engagement of the Naggarok.
But until then – until we are ready, and until the signs are all aligned – we shall not settle, and even then we shall not settle in peace. And though I shall tell you the story of the second schism later, this was at the core of it. The Settlers have split into those willing to settle now and those willing to settle later, and the former were the first to be shown the errors of their way. There was strife in the nine great kuppelborgs, and our hamme, along with many others, has freed itself from hegemony of the nine godar. Godar Ervin led hamme Oswig to where it is now, and since then we have bided our time and waited for the signs that will guide us.
I tire, child.
We will continue later.
---
Interesting.
But this is not what I was looking for. The doddering fool’s lectures were amusing, but I need other information, other data.
But why? Why are you doing whatever it is that you’re doing to me?
Heh.
To set you free, Helgi. To set all of you free.
My rage does not subside.
But I am calmer now, and I am trying to figure out my predicament.
I need to figure out what has happened. I need to know who captured me and severed me from the network. I need to know my enemy if I am to escape.
No.
If I am to win.
