Part 50: Victory Conditions
Victory Conditions
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This is the main presentation hall of the research complex. This is where the most valuable, most exciting creations and inventions were kept and showed.
This is not a ruin. This area is still very active. You can hear the humming of crystals and power spirals, and the growls of creations. There is a hint of ozone in the air.
This is the center. Whatever Sucia Island's true purpose was, it is here.
You steel yourself against fear and excitement. The demands of your kind and perhaps even the world mean that you must remain in absolute control of yourself, even in the face of great danger and even greater temptation.
The nearby obelisk says, "PRESENTATION HALLS." Rather than forge straight ahead, you follow a smaller hall to your left.
Those who dwell here are at least as bad as Goettsch. There are used canisters, broken power crystals, and barely functioning spires everywhere. At least most of the glass shards have been swept out of the center of the halls.
You don't see any patrols here, but you can hear creations and sense even more...
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You step into the main presentation hall. It's a huge stone hall with a high, arched roof. The most significant and impressive developments were given their first viewing here. Even centuries later, the air crackles with magic.
In the center of the room stands a lone figure. He's not a large man. He has visible muscles, but he is nothing like the charged, augmented behemoths you've seen elsewhere. His eyes are calm, not arrogant or deranged.
This must at last be Trajkov, leader of the Sholai who have invaded your lands and stolen your secrets. He makes no move to attack you. He simply waves you forward.
He wishes to parley with you. He seems unafraid of an attack. Considering the size of the massive, fierce creations which stand around the perimeter of the room, you can see why.
A large tome on an ancient marble pedestal stands between you and Trajkov. More importantly, so do three of your creations. Trajkov's battle gammas are impressive -- enough that you also keep the other half of your team behind you, in case this is nothing more than a trap.
When you get a close look at Trajkov, you can see that the augmentation and changes he has received have improved him, but not controlled him. He is calm. He glows with immense power, all of it at his immediate control.
"I am Trajkov, Shaper." He speaks to you in his own tongue, but at a measured pace and with clear enough pronunciation that you can understand him without much struggle. "I brought you to this island. I want you to help me. When you hear what I have to say, I believe you will help me. Everything you have done to hurt or help my cause is now forgotten or forgiven.
"Now, at last, we may begin on the path to power and justice. If you will help. Will you hear me my story?"
We could say, "I have heard enough of your madness. Now we will do battle, Trajkov!" But I think you'll all agree that's not Solution's style.
"I would like to hear your story," you reply in earnest. You know what the Shapers would demand of you, but their only other representative here is hopelessly compromised. You don't think it's arrogant to think that he is even worse off than you are.
"There is not much to say, actually. We Sholai are a people of traders, explorers, we sail the seas and find new lands. We were an expedition to cross the great sea, to find out if there was anyone here.
"Harsh weather made us land on this island. And it was here we learned of you, and of your secrets," Trajkov says.
"And then you learned as many of those secrets as you could."
“Who would not? I could not, despite my efforts, learn your tongue, but others did, and they read your books and learned of you. And they learned how jealous you are.
"They learned that your secrets are not to be shared with anyone. But you are a Shaper. You cannot understand how much a poor outsider can want what you have, you take for granted.
"I learned. And we explored. And we came to the Geneforge," he says.
"You want to use the Geneforge, yes?" You wave your hand as if to say get on with it.
"Yes. Yes. I do," he says, nodding. "I will get to my reasons soon. First, the story. We could not understand your instructions. We could not understand how to use the Geneforge. So I had a plan. I had a Shaper brought here.
"I confess, we kidnapped a Shaper. His name was Goettsch. We brought him here. He gave me some information, and learned some himself. And he betrayed me. And fled. But I still did not know all I needed to know. I needed a new Shaper."
You know all this from other sources. "Me."
Trajkov doesn't try to prevaricate. "Yes. I need your help if I am to use the Geneforge. You must be asking yourself, though, why should I help this outsider become so powerful. I have reasons. Will you hear me out?" He waits to see what else you have to say.
You can challenge him here, too.
"I would like to hear your arguments."
"First I will appeal to your moral side. You have wandered this island. You have met the serviles. You have seen the things your people have done. I hope you have seen your people with fresh eyes.
"Your people do horrible things, and you have done them for so long that you have come to see them as normal." Trajkov isn't exactly wrong.
Still, what he considers horrible might merely be necessity. You want to understand him better. "What are these supposed horrible things we do?"
"Wander this island. See how you have treated, do treat the living things you make. You make living things, capable of thought, reason, pain, and you make them your slaves, destroying them when they displease you." You don't think that's very different from how his people have treated their own creations.
But Trajkov continues as though he can read your thoughts as well as your genes. "The other Sholai, they only care about the wealth and power your secrets give them, but I see the disease beyond. I am moved by the plight of the serviles, and of your creations. I want to end their torment.
"That is what the power of the Geneforge will give me. I should also say what it will give you."
"Very well. What is in it for me?" There's no reason to set yourself up as an enemy of the Shapers if you can't defend yourself, not even if it means siding with someone morally upright. Though you're not entirely certain you can describe Trajkov as such...
"Power. If you help me, I will make you my second in command. I will give you great wealth and power in return for your helping me to get justice. You will help me remake the world. And, in return, I will give you more than your precious Shapers will ever give you," he says. In this moment, he almost looks like a magnanimous overlord.
But you can't quite convince yourself to believe. "What do you mean by that?" Maybe it's because he seems to speak from both sides of his mouth. Maybe it's because you're tired, paranoid, and slightly mad.
He spreads his arms. "Look around you. This island is Barred! Yes, I know that much about your people. This is forbidden land! Everything you have seen? Secret! And those secrets taint you!
"Kill me if you want. Destroy the Geneforge if you want. When you return home, you will know too much to be safe. The Shapers want the secrets here buried. They will bury you with them." You know that he may be right; you might be too dangerous to the Shapers for them to let you live. You might be irredeemably corrupted -- your death or imprisonment may be the only ethical option, let alone the only expedient option.
"That is my argument. That is my cause. I wish your help. What do you think?" he asks, dropping his arms in a moment of vulnerability. You don't know if it's real or calculated.
Once again, we have the option to reject Trajkov: "I think you are an outsider, and a mad one at that. I will not help."
You can play along for now while you reach your true decision, you think. But this situation, the entire puzzle of Sucia Island, this precariously stacked pile of circumstances and poor choices, is rapidly coming apart. You can't put this off forever. "I think that you speak sense. I agree. I will help you."
"All right. The first thing I will require from you is your assistance." He points to the book next to him. "That book, I believe, contains instructions to use the Geneforge. Read it and tell me what I need to do. But beware. If I ever suspect you are trying to trick me, betray me, or slay me, I will destroy you. I will not make the mistake I made with Goettsch again."
You shrug. Trajkov isn't the first to threaten you, though he is a more credible foe than most.
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You flip through the book. It was left behind by the Shaper researchers here. It's a collection of notes, equations, schematics, and instructions, all related to the Geneforge.
You skim through the tome. Most of the details are irrelevant or too esoteric for you to understand. Finally, near the end, you find a reasonably concise and helpful entry:
"It is unsure whether we will ever allow one to adopt the mantle of greater being and welcome the changes that the Geneforge will make. Who has the courage to allow themselves to be rewritten, remade?
"Should one ever accept the challenge and the danger, they must don the gloves. There are two pairs, though one of them was damaged in an early experiment and might not be repairable.
"Donning the gloves, the chosen shall caress the surface of the pool lightly, slowly, letting it works its magic a tiny bit at a time. Speed will be lethal. The body must adjust. Do not, whatever you do, put your hands far in the pool.
"Then, when the chosen is rewritten, the pool may do no more. The changing will be done and no more changing can have any effect. The user may swim in the pool safely. Such will be the power."
Your thoughts spin as you close the tome. Mad, brilliant ideas spin through your thoughts. You need some time to compose yourself. Trajkov says nothing as you wander off.
The glowing rune outside the door prevents whatever lurks on the other side from shattering the stone or forcing it open. It looks like the Shapers who sealed this place paid a dear price if the bones are anything to go by. There's even the more recent corpse of a Sholai. You wonder why Trajkov chose to let this place be the tomb of one of his companions.
A little magic on the nearby control panel lets you in.
A maddened drayk lunges out, abandoning the brittle dry bones of its captivity for the fresh juicy flesh of your creations and (it hopes) you.
The trio of terror vlish proves too much for its fragile mind, though, and your glaahk duo corner it and tear it to shreds.
The drayk must have sustained itself on the magic of the equipment lost by those who trapped it here. A laudable effort, but a futile one. The drayk's body long outlived its mind.
In time, you may face a similar end.
Next time: Wander and Ponder\