44. Better Days (Patreon)

Time sure flies when I'm not under constant, life-threatening stress.

I introduced Hsthressis to the Resonant Gems as two things: an exile from another clan (which is accurate) and as my apprentice (which I guess became accurate when I said so). She's taken my advice so far and not made a ruckus about religion or being the daughter of the True People's chieftain, which I'm grateful for. And, admittedly, a bit surprised by. I guess she just doesn't have much time, since I've been keeping her pretty darn busy doing R&D for whatever random ideas I come up with.

After all, I know how pulleys work, but I'm far from an engineer. It took us weeks of trial and error to make something safe and effective, though if anything I'm thankful for that. Showing Hsthressis how much of a scatterbrained fuckup I am in a safe environment is healthy for her taming her pseudo-worship of me, and more importantly it's the perfect opportunity to introduce her to the scientific process. Which… is going pretty okay, all things considered. She struggles a bit with not latching onto and trying to prove a hypothesis rather than just using the hypothesis as a step on the path of acquiring data, but honestly, who doesn't?

The Resonant Gems mostly treated her as a crazy weirdo up until we actually got the pulley system working, at which point they started paying a lot more attention.

I've made other friends as well!

I've continued chatting with Worker Rshult (the guy that let me sit on him and ask questions while he was poop farming) and I like him a lot! He's nice! Quiet, direct, and thoughtful. I can chat with him and not feel pressured to actually say anything if I don't want to. He works hard and after I helped construct enough pull carts for him and all the other workers to use he gave me permission to ride on his back as much as I want, like a mini, turbo-speed Mooshi! (Being able to sit on and ride Sthrenslians is the best part of being tiny.) Also great: he's pretty much totally numb to all of my weirdo alien questions and just gives me straight answers to the most off-the-wall things I can think of to ask, which is just... exactly what I need, a lot of the time. Rshult is my slice of normalcy on chaos acid hell planet, and I'm very grateful to have met him.

I've also spoken a lot more with Weaver Nsreslisa, and her son Tklikik! Tklikik is one of the adorable little kids I played with back when first touring the Resonant Gems, and now that I've got nothing pressing to use all my bodies for, I can pretty much play with the kids as much as I want. Which, y'know, isn't always; children are exhausting in ways beyond the physical. But the parents seem to like it when I drop by and tucker out all their little ones with sky monster hunts, and it gives me an excuse to hang out with Nsreslisa while she's working.

Nsreslisa is… well, she's a good friend. She's taught me a lot of stuff about her job and what she does so I can weave some basic things of my own, now. And she's just... generally really smart? A lot smarter than almost all the other Sthrenslians I've met. She picks up on my ideas really fast and helps me explain them to other people better than I can once she has a handle on it. She's kind of super serious all the time, though, and can be intimidating to talk to. I think her talents are totally wasted on being a weaver, but... well, conquering the caste system is not a short-term project. I'm focusing on helping the Resonant Gems fill the first two levels of the hierarchy of needs before we tackle any of that shit. Priorities!

The other person I've really gotten to know is Priestess Saslitak. We just… kept hanging out after she finished guiding me around the cave, and it's been pretty great so far. She's quiet, like Rshult, though in more of an anxious-awkward way than a content-confident way, which is top-tier relatable. Our friendship really picked up when I admitted I didn't know what a homewyrm was and asked to see it. Rather than respond with fire and brimstone, she was just super incredibly apologetic, explaining as best she can what the homewyrm is: a giant poop dispenser in the ceiling. The homewyrm never moves, and its giant toilet cavern is a big ecosystem that the chieftain and clergy manage. She still wouldn't let me see it, though she's said sorry about that no less than twenty times and counting. She's easily one of the most genuine people I've ever met. Just hanging out with her puts a smile on my face.

Besides, I didn't need to see the homewyrm chamber. By investigating the area above the Resonant Gem cave, I found one of those enormous clearing-wide thread-trap antlion thingies. Like the one which had a reaper maw trapped a few days after I got here. So… that's a homewyrm, I guess. I'm still really curious about why they don't want me to see it, but I'm being a good friend and not prying too much.

There's been one major problem with me hanging out with a bunch of new friends, though: I can't convincingly pretend to be multiple different people, and at some point I kinda maybe started to lose track of which body I was using to socialize with which person. That isn't really a problem with most Sthrenslians, since all of my ETE bodies are identical anyway, but at this point the people I hang out with most are getting preeeeeetty suspicious and I'm worried they might be a little bit onto me.

Rshult, at this point, just seems cool with it. Or at least non-inquisitive? Once or twice I have pretty blatantly talked about the wrong thing with the wrong body, and he did not so much as even twitch. Saslitak just seems confused, which is... entirely my fault, as I have been giving increasingly stupid and desperate excuses for how the ETE she just saw fly away is, in fact, the same ETE that approached from the other direction whom she's been friends with the whole time. It makes me feel terrible, but I'm just terrified of coming clean at this point!  Nsreslisa, though...

Nsreslisa is way too goddamn smart to be a weaver.

"Um, uh..." I stutter, rapidly trying to think of an excuse. "O-okay, you got me! Ha ha! I'm not the same one! We just... um, gossip a lot! Sh-share all the things we talk about! And we've been playing a game to see how long it would take people to find out! You were first!  Congraaaats!"

I give the indignant Sthrenslian woman two—count them, two finger-guns, but she's not amused. Her midsection is flattened against the floor but her forelegs raise the rest of her body high, moustache curled and claws clamped together in front of her body. It was a Sthrenslian pose that basically evokes a mom staring down at her kid with arms crossed, eyebrow raised, and foot tapping.

"And you communicated this despite never actually speaking to the member of your clan I discussed with earlier," she says dryly.

"O-oh, well, you know, it's easy to mix us up–"

"No," Nsreslisa says. "I've been tracking her all day. You know I can hear the entire cavern, right? Anyone could figure this out if they weren't so busy. You are not the person I was talking to earlier today. But you act the same, and you know everything she knows. All of your... what do you call them, 'Ee-tee-ees?' All of them do."

I facepalm with both hands. Fuuuuck, I'm so bad at this. Honestly, it's a wonder I lasted a month.

"Gah, yes, okay! You got me! Why do you pay so much attention?"

"Because if some random person I never met comes by and says they're going to 'continue playing' with my son, I pay attention. The fact that no one else has figured your game out is more worrying than anything else. I thought I was either going crazy or a freak was pretending to be you to get to my son! But it seems like you're all just... identical? You all know what the others know? Or you're all just the same person, which would explain your insane naming scheme. Honestly, Evelyn, why didn't you just tell me?"

"I forgot," I mumble.

"What?"

"I forgot!" I admit. "I forgot which one I used to talk to you! So I just acted like... look, don't tell anyone, okay?"

"Why in Khlasinas' cursed sky should I not?"

"Because the last time I told somebody that 'we' is actually just 'me' they locked me in prison!" I hiss quietly at her.

She flicks her whiskers in a Sthrenslian eye-roll.

"Evelyn, you're half our food income. The chieftain couldn't punish you if he wanted to. Which, of course, is yet another stupid thing everyone else should have realized by now, but I suppose you get to keep reaping the benefits of my clanmates' inexplicable deafness."

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" I say, dropping to my knees to beg. "Just please don't tell anyone!"

"I don't see why not, but fine. It's not like I think you'll take advantage of us. You're the best thing this clan has seen since we lost the war. You can keep doing... whatever it is you do, if it makes you feel better."

"Thank you! Thank you thank you thank you!" I say, flying in for a hug.

"Get off me," she growls, but she doesn't mean it. "Aren't you the one who said that's unsanitary?"

"Not if you wash!" I say, "which is the big important part, really. You guys need to at least wash your food. It grows in poop!"

"So?"

"It's poop!"

I had been trying to keep the conversation quiet enough to be private up until that point, but unfortunately my fecal-related outburst echoed through the cavern, causing multiple nearby Sthrenslia to shudder in discomfort.

"...Sorry," I whisper.

"It's fine," Nsreslisa groans, lightly grasping and massaging her whiskers with her moustache.  "You are... very loud."

"Yeah, my lungs are about as optimized as I can make them for my size," I nod, proud that she noticed.

She gives me a weird look. Wait, fuck, am I going to have to admit to designing my bodies now? Quick, distract her!

"W-well that's it, then!" I stutter quickly. "You've figured me out. Yeah, there's just Evelyn. We all have the same name because... I'm a dumb-dumb who is very bad at lying."

"Yes, I know," Nsreslisa deadpans.

"Hey! Well, okay, fair. But yeah I'm... geez. It's all just me. The ETs are me as well."

"Really? Your guards? Now that's a joke. They have manners."

"Hey!  I have manners!  I just... I dunno, I forget which ETE is which sometimes because they're identical, but the ETs are different and also kind of scary because they're strong enough to rip a person in half and I don't want to worry anyone so I act all polite with them? By now it's just habit. ETs are a fun persona, but... that's totally still me. I can prove it, if you want."

She considers me silently for a moment, then makes a dismissive gesture.

"No, that's fine. I believe you. I have heard rumors from the diggers that you have positively massive allies up above, too large to fit in most of our caverns. Is that true? Are they also you?"

"Yeah and yeah, although there are way bigger things on the surface than me. ...Unless you count OMNIDOME, I guess."

"Ah-nee-don?"

"Oh! Oh, fuck. Um... don't... worry about it?"

She waves a claw at me in frustration.

"Fine, keep your secrets. As long as Tklikik doesn't get caught in them. But I am curious about what life is like on the surface. Tell me about it. How did you get here? How did you find us?"

"Oh. Huh. Well… um."

At first I try to think of another obfuscation, another misdirection. But I've never been good at that, and before long the whole story is pouring out of my mouth. The story of how I came from a place very far away, with a very different sort of people. Where I had a family, friends, good food, a good life, and no worries of being attacked by monsters or having aliens attack me. And then... something happened. And I ended up here. And I was something else.

I tell her how on the surface there are massive plants made of wood, how in the infinite sky there lay a ball of fire so indescribably massive, so incomprehensibly ancient, that it provided heat and energy for the world since before life itself. How the trees grow to towering heights to better absorb energy from the star, and the other plants huddle below to soak up the rest, and the animals eat the plants and are eaten by greater animals. And I stepped into this world with nothing, weak and alone, and nearly died immediately as a creature hanging in the trees almost bored my neck open with an acid far, far stronger than the greatest Sthrenslian warrior or digger could imagine.

I tell her how I survived and met my friend Mr. Mooshi, of how together we fought and defeated a massive aquatic monster who tore me from the shoreline to devour me whole.  How I ate it, and used its power to make a second one of myself. How I became two, then three, then four then more and more until I was a creature beyond my old imagining. How I fought and grew stronger. How I died again and again, eventually growing used to it.

At some points in the story, I have to stop. To breathe, to drink, to cry. At various points I flew off, replaced myself with a less emotional body and continued where I left off. For I am one girl with many voices, and I now have a friend who knows and doesn't care.

My story is long, but it's worth it. Not even Hsthressis knows this much about me… though I guess what she does know, she's experienced a lot more intimately. In some ways, however, that makes it more difficult for me to deal with her. She looks up to me too much, empathizes with me too well. I'm like… her hero. And I really, really don't like that.

Even after Nsreslisa goes home and puts Tklikik to bed, I speak with her through her sleeping time. It's still midday for me, after all, she's too enthralled to rest. She listens, she asks questions, she believes, and suddenly I have a friend like no other. Eventually, my story ends. There's nothing more to tell. But still, the two of us aren't tired, and Nsreslisa hasn't had enough.

"So you really sat all your bodies in a circle and just pretended–"

"To have a council meeting, yeah. As like, a chieftain and a bunch of stuffy war leaders and nobles and things. Oh, also my pet Mr. Mooshi. It was great!"

"But why?" she chuckles.

"B-because saying stuff out loud helps!" I tell her. "I was getting my thoughts in order! At the time I'd had more than one brain for like... a few days, tops! It was confusing!"

"Right, right, your thing with brains," Nsreslisa says jokingly. "You're sure it's not just the organ that generates blood? Because when you get injured around there the blood just keeps pouring–"

"Yes! I'm sure! Trust me, I am very, very sure about what all of your body parts do! Wounds near your brain just bleed a lot because your brain needs a crapton of blood. Seriously, it's your most important organ. Except maybe like your heart but you guys have two of those, so..."

"And you're sure because you dropped a rock on Hsthressis—who is the daughter of the True People chieftain—and ate her!? She's in her fourteenth molt, she doesn't even have her full name yet!"

"I'm sorry!!! I didn't know! I was starving to death and she just looked like a weasel! Trilobite! Thing!"

"Oh, well," Nsreslisa mocks, barely holding down laughter, "I'm so terribly sorry we happen to look like... did you say a clawless fuzzy animal from your world? That you keep as pets?  Hmm, yes, we sound very similar, must not be that smart, smack-smack, squish-squish."

"Don't! No! Don't! Aaaagh, you're horrible! Nsreslisa, you are the worst!"

She laughs at me as even more blood than the usual high volume rushes to the area at the front of my skull. I instinctively clap my hands over my face to cover up my blush.

"That hand-face thing you do," Nsreslisa hums. "I think I've finally figured it out.  Embarrassment, isn't it?"

Oh yeah, except Sthrenslians are blind and I just did the opposite of covering that up. Good job, Evelyn! Socially skilled as always! I flail around a little, desperately looking for a good subject change.

"...Would you be this amused by me killing a kid if she wasn't from the True People?" I grumble.

That seems to sober her schadenfreude. I've poked around a bit about the war that's apparently going on, and it's… not fun. The basic conflict is that the big, awesome cavern that the True People live in right now? The Resonant Gems are the ones that actually built it. Hell, it's where their name comes from! It's all the pretty geodes and crystals that were all over the place! But the True People suddenly swooped in one day, started slaughtering everyone, and forced the Resonant Gems to retreat to this much smaller homewyrm that supports the community we're in right now. They've been scraping by ever since, saved from starvation only because their population was absolutely gutted by the unexpected assault from the True People.

"...Which yeah, I get was bad," Hsthressis sighs. "Heresy isn't a good reason to slaughter people. But thinking back, I bet the real reason wasn't that simple."

"What do you mean?" I ask.

"Well, I wasn't alive at the time, but it's my understanding that we never liked the Resonant Gems," Hsthressis explains. "Mom had all sorts of rants about why their beliefs are dumb and wrong. But that was the way things were for a long time. We probably didn't commit to killing them and taking their home for that reason. And I know we don't have like… two homewyrms, yeah? So what happened to the homewyrm we had before? Maybe we only drove the Gems to starvation because we were starving. You'd have to ask mom, though."

It's callous to say, but part of me hopes the True People didn't have a good reason like that. Not that I think mass murder is a justifiable response to hunger, but it would certainly be easier if the True People were just inconsolably awful. I guess life is rarely like that, though. Besides, even if they're the worst, I don't have any intention of going over there and forcing them out of their ill-gotten homes or whatever.

After all, the Resonant Gems are doing great where they are, thanks to me. My OMNIDOME not only finished growing by the river, but was so successful as a base and point-defense system I decided to plant another one near the Resonant Gem's homewyrm… except up on the surface, of course. From there, I got permission to tunnel down and create an easy-access point where I can deliver meat from my hunts and nuts from my Ivylyn farms. I've also sampled and created improved-yield versions of all the main Sthrenslian crops and, since doing so might fuck with their soil, I've been monitoring that as best I can as well.

Suffice to say? No one is starving anymore. Aw yeah, go Evelyn! Humanitarian crisis… I mean, Sthrenslianitarian crisis averted! Gain ten trillion xp! Advance to level… I dunno, a gazillion. I'm definitely epic-leveled by now. Like, when you think about it, I've straight-up slain three out of four horsemen of the apocalypse at this point! Death shmeath! Pestilence is barely a pest, and Famine ain't no fam of mine! I'm lining myself up for the quadra kill, and all that's left… is War.

War might be a problem.

"No, honestly," Weaver Nsreslisa admits. "The fact that you killed the daughter of their chieftain is a big part of what makes it funny. I admit, Hsthressis is a gag a minute. I like the girl. But seriously, fuck the so-called 'True People.' Are you sure you don't want to help us kick them out of our home?"

"I'm a pacifist," I answer firmly. "That means—"

"You don't use violence against people to achieve your goals, I know," she sighs.

"Violence is always evil! The whole reason you guys hate the True People is because they used it on you. War does nothing but make—"

"More suffering, yes, I know. You've mentioned it a few times, Evelyn. But even if you convince everyone that it's not worth it to go win back the home we built, we're still going to end up fighting. No matter how peaceful we are, sooner or later? Someone will come after us."

"It's true," Worker Rshult agrees from the other side of the cave, in a completely different conversation. "War is a part of life."

"The teachings of Sss do encourage cooperation," Priestess Saslitak hedges, "but they also encourage readiness. The stories are full of holy wars. We, too, will likely be called to fight again alongside our brothers and sisters. Violence is not good, no, but… it is the proper tool to deal with the violent."

I get the same response everywhere. Some people want to storm the True People's home and slaughter them all. Others just want to be ready if they're attacked a second time. Nobody likes the idea of straight nonviolence, not even as an ideal. It just seems stupid to them. Over this whole month I've been wracking my brain on how to deal with the problem, but mostly I've just been procrastinating. After all, there isn't currently any fighting going on. I've been having a great time hanging out with the Sthrenslians, at least by Acidsucks standards. Sure, I'm no closer to getting home, but I'm way closer to maintaining my sanity long enough to figure that problem out. I even think I've struck a good balance at improving the health, safety, and general quality of life for the Resonant Gems without completely fucking up their culture… though part of that is just how most of the Gems don't attend when I'm teaching classes for Hsthressis, even though I've made it clear it's open to everyone. Still, though! Three out of four horsemen isn't bad at all, and… well, it's probably not healthy to try and solve every single problem on the planet by myself anyway. Life is good.

Yet for some reason, I still always get nervous every time I think that.