Interlude: I'd Wished upon a Falling Star…
16 Mar 2023Astraeius
I'd wished for glory, I'd wished for wealth,
I now quietly wish for something else,
I wish for peace, for calm, for love, for rest,
As my previous wish proves quite the test.
I'd long to see that childhood smile,
On these parched and weary lips of mine,
For though greatness might beguile,
In humbler berths the cheers do shine.
Perhaps my instructors were right, and I do complain as only a much older man should be allowed to. My instructors! Truly, I am ill suited to speaking of anything humble. And perhaps that is the issue: all these things that I think I desire, I am simply not made for.
I tried, gods know I did, to take a step back. When Aegis asked for pilots to help patrol around the Orunmilla, I jumped at the chance to move away from the frontlines. To find some other, albeit perhaps less glorious, way to make a difference. Certainly a safer one. Once you've been caught in the crossfire of multiple interceptors, once you've had to land under a hail of torpedoes as your hull burned with caustic acid... well, the gatling cannons of some would-be pirate do not feel like much of a threat.
And who knows, maybe we did make a difference. I saw the images coming from the Maelstorm explorers. Brave men and women all. To those who say these are not motherships... no, I say nothing at all. Because, against all reason, I still hope that you may be right. I still blame Wycherley for our current predicament, but if Azimuth had a few canisters of the Mycoid laying around... well, at lest now we know it doesn't kill a whole species. I shouldn't joke of such things.
As I was saying, perhaps I am not meant for a peaceful existence. Aden Tanner had me realise this, bless the man, with his call for a search party. For Subject D-2, Seo Jin-ae. And it felt like a call to adventure. One I could not, and will not, refuse. The merry chase for her lost ship left me, and those others who were assisting Aegis, with more questions than answers. I can only hope that she is safe from Azimuth's - or whoever else was on her tail's - claws. Tracking a ship through space is difficult enough, but miss Seo seems to be special beyond her skills at evasion.
But the logs she did leave behind... Nemesis. Could it truly be? Wytcherley survived, in mind if not in body, and now we should fear as Nemesis what once we were made to call Salvation? Curses, perhaps the true risk is that there are yet those that would not fear, but cheer him, by whatever name he goes by. Because, after all, only children truly learn their lessons. I’m sorry, miss Seo, it seems I won’t be the one to rescue you. But I’ve spent too long in this peaceful world of secrets and dangers. War still rages. And it calls on.
And on these weary lips of mine,
I'd long to see my childhood's smile,
But in my heart the truth does shine,
That now, the time is to snarl.