testament: beneath the collonades

They walked along the dimly lit stone hallway, the low ceiling brushing against their heads; at the end of the hall,  they entered a large pale blue circular room. With twitching fingers Johnson pressed a small circular depression to the left of the entrance.  Floor began to descend at such an accelerated rate that Kit could feel her stomach sluice, while her legs began to tingle.  Johnson smiled gently as there was a slow cushion to the fall and a numb thump that seemed to come from everywhere at once.
​        A round stone door clicked and rolled aside to reveal another low ceilinged pale lit long and narrow corridor.  Kit heard their feet echo in clips and clops while Johnson spoke in hushed tones about the Ulni  but there was something about all of his praise that sounded shallow.it was as if he was covering something up, some darker secret, it was all too unreal
​          ‘…we have known for centuries how civilisations fall, we have the archives on Terra...the rise and fall of Rome…the mediaeval world rise and decline, the British empire, the  collapse of the western state…the little war that followed.
​        Dekkard hrumphed and growled at that. ‘-I thought you professor types had a better definition for that!’ he spat
​        ‘-Everything has a perspective…’ he stared at Dekkard coolly, his forest green eyes glazed as a single tear, swelled up from the his right  lacriminal sac and then slowly slid down the side of his nose. ‘…Mine, differs from yours.
​         ‘Hell yeah, I, I  bet it does!’ Dekkard Sneered. ‘Nothing like a bit of population control eh Professor.
​        Kit saw Johnson’s jaw visibly twitch.  As he looked down and away  
​        ‘Ha!’ Dekkard jibed. His voice barked out in a cold mocking staccato  ‘You fuckin’ people never change.
​        ‘-What’s that supposed to mean?’  Johnson retorted
​        ‘-I mean the times might change, but the argument never goes away. From Egyptian kings and Roman Patricians, who lauded over the poor, from the Celts and their control, from the  Anglo Saxon kings and medieval knights with their  kings queens who despised the commoners, to the rise of  so called lords, who sort equality-
​       ‘-T’that will do.’  Johnson staged smile started to crack,
​       '... except their, their surfs received more inequality and more of the same.  From the French revolution to the rise Napoleon from the so called Christian values  of  Victoria, that led to the rise of the slum’s who were filled with the slaves who made their system work
​      ‘-n, now now-‘  Johnson injected
​       ‘-From the, the, kings who sought population control and a new ratified order  that came out of  the first world war, that, that in turn, led to the rise of socialism and communism. To the Fascists black shirts of Hitler and Mussolini, to the- ‘
​        ‘NOW That is enough.
​         ‘-the the   counter balance of the cold war, whose fall led to the rise of the dark beast yet  again…
​        ‘-I I  said TH TH  that is ENOUGH!’
​         ‘…The rich and the powerful have always sought to control the population. The little death was just that.  A political means to an end.  You might call yourself a new thinker or a neo- liberal or what is it now? Ahh yes, the new Dawn, but you’re all the FUCKING same.  Your wealthy and you want to control the wealth in your favour, and too many people mean a loss of revenue.
​        Johnson looked away
​        ‘Fucking Sloat’s tool, that is all you are.
​         ‘-A, an’d  wh-what would you you do?’  Johnson sneered at Dekker
​          ‘More than you.
​        Kit stared at Dekkard carefully.She had nevermet new earther before.
​        ‘By your argument, revolution has, has always led to, to subjugation, that is not what the New Dawn-
​       ‘Yeah.’  Dekkard scratched at his stubble. ‘Tell that to your kith and kin.’
         Johnson sighed, and was about to rehtort, but they had reached the end of the corridor and another door curled  open revealing another large circular room.

‘Ulni  technology is based upon soundwaves and harmonics, they used  it in various ways, even as a means of transportation.  We are simply apes to them.
​       ‘-that doesn’t explain what occurred. Look at them now-’
​        ‘-in a way it, it does.’
​         ‘What do you mean?
​        ‘I mean, with every step forward there is always a step back… Evolution is a binary process.’
​        ‘Meaning?’
​         '-We regress as easily as we progress. Moreover, we are no different from our ancestors.’
​         ‘Spoken like a member of New Dawn.’
​          ‘-just because I agree with some of their ideology, it does not necessarily mean that I agree with all of it.
​          ‘Ha!’
​           ‘-The reality of the human condition is far, far more complex than the mere notion of human concepts in relation to technology. Technology is the means to establish progress, sure, but, and this is a big but, we forget the first step.’
​          ‘Which is?’ Asked Draz.
​          Johnson stared at Draz. His eyes glistening in the half light of the room. He welsh ragged his long wiry hair out of his narrow  face, as another tear fell down his  right cheek.  
​         ‘What do you consider humankinds first great achievement?’
​         ‘That’s a no brainer. Fire.’
​          Johnson smiled weakly as his eyes shone. ‘No, it’s not.’
​          Kit stared at Johnson unsure where this was going. 
​         ‘Fire was the result of an action.  The word and the means to communicate the action came first. To start with the human had to use the hands, to pick up the flint to make the spark.  He then had to communicate that thought …The ape picked something up and used it creatively.  That is why religious texts use the world creation when considering the birth of our planets or the universe; for it is a  noun that is used to define the making of something, and that stems from the mind of- ‘  and here he paused.  ‘B, but I’ve said enough already.’

Johnson walked over to a console that stood in the centre of the room. He put his palm upon it.  Where there was once a semi darkness a pale blue light filled the room. Galaxies, stars and then planets slowly started spinning around her   Kit gasped in awe as she walked through it.  It rippled as she ran her fingers through it.  it’s as if I’m running my hands through water.  She smiled. Her eyes shone with a giddy light. Her breath came in slow sighs. A huge screen on the far wall suddenly glowed. And a man, his face was neither male or female, yet she sensed a masculinity about it, his aquiline features and tree soft yellow eyes glowed with intelligence and a kindness she had never seen before. As he stood motionless before the screen, Kit became aware of a voice spoken in a beautiful near liquid tongue. She covered her ears and still the words were heard.
​        ‘-It’s an audio holographic mental projection.’  Johnson smiled as he spoke. Its translated into every known language, because it feeds directly into your mind.
​        ‘….Those who are hearing this we welcome you. No doubt you have come to our fertile, yet desolate world and found it hostile to life; we, those who will survive the process that is to come, will be unrecognisable to me now, as to you. For we are a lost species, returning from whence we came from.  The process began long ago, long before we knew it would be upon us. For they, the great elder ones, know how to sow and when to reap the rewards of their hard work.'
​       'We the Ulni were a proud race.  We built vast machines, fought against our better nature and set ourselves to one goal: to find if we were all alone in the evernight of the stars.  We built colonies, survived wars brought peace and thrived. Where life was found, it was always far more primitive than our own.  We had no equal, so we became vain in our knowledge. We the Ulni stood like giants and boasted about our great achievements.  Then, five years ago, from the boiling tides of neverspace they came.  First they attacked our outposts, then, after seducing us and mentally controlling us, they forced us to serve them, turning us against ourselves. We, the great Ulni, are now facing the final night of our collective survival.  Here in this ancient tomb rests perhaps the only way we have to defend ourselves against this Elder race that  rose from the  neverspace…‘
​        Suddenly there was a high pitched whine, the beautiful blue being before her slammed its hand against its head, as the screen went dark.
​        ‘That’s it….Or all we have managed to get to at the moment.’ Johnson looked away as Dekkard stared at him coldly.  ‘Oh there is one other thing.  He pressed another button and a shape filled the screen. It was a square with a line drawn through it from the top right hand corner to the bottom left hand corner.
​      Kit jumped back.  Draz leaned forward.
​      ‘You recognise that?’  
​     ‘it was all over the Waystation on every lost level. Even the ship…. Also…its been found fifty spacials from here’ Kit whispered
​       ‘it’s written here in Ulni blood…. We don’t fully understand its significance.’
​       ‘I see...’ Draz stared at Johnson. His voice coming over tightly  ‘ as we’ve said,  we  have orders to take you with us to investigate a  finding. Looking at this… well… it seems that there is a correlation between your work here, the fall of the way station and the anomaly we are here to investigate. 
        Johnson looked down at his wrist server. ‘ yes… yes I understand this to be the case....’ Kit thought that Johnson’s adenoidal voice sounded distant, ‘…Well… I suppose a small excursion might help put things in perspective.