Repurposed 17.15

Interval 17.1
October 8, 2017
1030, Black Mesa NV
Sector E Biodome / Exact Location Unknown

(CONTINUED FROM PRIOR POST)

Noah continued, the mixture of his ancient memories and recent ones filling their minds with images. A kind of bluish-green haze distinguished the old ones from their newer and more local counterparts. In either, bands of Vortigaunts hunted and camped, catching not only Antlions but other creatures which hadn't been seen on Earth. Their culture had been largely nomadic, but with more permanent gathering spots around Nectarium in caverns like these, or above on the rugged landscape.

Vorts didn't swim very well, apparently, but most of the water found in the caverns (new or old) was never terribly deep. The eerie light within the depths was created by layer upon layer of bioluminescent creatures, or some kind of natural crystal energy, but in the more relevant images: by the Antlion grubs and the eggs from which they came.

Because Geoff had visited the place with his girlfriend and wanted a bit of privacy, Paxton hadn't fully tapped into his brother's memories. But now, seeing through Noah's old eyes the expanses of dark caverns illuminated by the star-spots of pale blue might have been underground here in New Mexico, or in a world that could never be reached by any conventional means. It was gorgeous, and Melissa put in her urgent, clear demand that she – someday – see it herself.

That same blue haze was what Melissa had detected in the third room. A chunk of Nectarium had been brought up from the caves outside, to provide Noah with Extract. Eggs within the hexagonal tubes grew into larva, but a few he pulled out and reserved for his more important Vortal work. Noah tried to backtrack a little: in his mind, he'd seen something that he believed would help with Pax's earlier question. Contrary to what impression he gave to Paxton, Noah did get to a point now and then.

He had also been asked to do so, and though that request would have been met with disdain or refusal from any other of his kin, Noah wasn't one to waste the opportunity. They had gone back and forth, for a good long while, hadn't they.

"Ancient writing," Noah said, trying to recall more clearly. Thankfully, the images in his busy mind were sharper than most. The pictograms had made an impression on many Vortigaunts as they entered the caves below the desert; they were signs that Humanity had been there long before.

But hardly ever, since. "I cannot say I know when your ancestors roamed this unforgiving land," Noah said, "I suspect it was when the land was… less hostile." He conjured an even older image than the pair could comfortably get a grip on: from his ancient past, his home world as it was remembered and passed down to him; lush and green. Where the Antlions' colors were different, where tall and elegant animals strode in the distance, unmolested.

"Perhaps their hunts were successful," Noah sighed, thinking on the abstractions of antlered animals, clawed beasts, and disguised hunters he saw on the cavern entrance's walls. "They were skilled, clever like you. As my own ancestors and kin who drove beasts before them. Perhaps… that is as long as it has been. Since your kind decorated those walls, since they herded those creatures. It is difficult to recall, with any accuracy. My tenure on the floating surfaces of Xen makes time before or since seem largely irrelevant."

"Thousands of years ago," Paxton said, not really a question; the idea unchallenged by Noah. Paxton was unsure he was going to retain composure about the answer. It looked by comparison as though he was a newborn, even though by any Human standards he was grown, adult. He certainly felt like a child, just then. Noah merely hummed to himself. That was what he did, Paxton knew, when the Vort was allowing him to absorb the answers he already had.

Pax glanced away slightly, uncertain if his own collection of history books would be accurate enough to place a date. He busied himself, distractions rarely worked, but at least this would keep him from losing his grip on sanity. Within the Sanctuary, he scurried around and found a school book or two, flipping through the pages that he'd committed to memory when he was but a child. According to one, it could mean as little as a few hundred years, and in another, several thousand. But that was only according to the theories about when the local natives had been encountered by their 'white brothers'. There was more to it than just those who were then pushed around, into reservations and all but killed off more recently.

He consulted another book, an archaeology and anthropology text. Something gripped Paxton's attention; he asked again and got a better look through Noah's mind, at a specific entrance's artwork. That, too, was something that he'd hesitated to do, entering the Vortigaunt's mind, but Noah allowed the intrusion into his memories. It wasn't as easy as spotting things in a Human's mind, to say the least. But he could still do it.

What he found was unsurprising, confirming any of the prior minutes' revelations. Not all of the art had been old: some spray-painted graffiti lingered over rocks and mine shafts. There were dozens of such shaft entrances dotting the Ranch's territory and the whole of Black Mesa.

But this one particular entrance had been hidden for a long time by the looks of it. It had a narrow, long path to the surface, which appeared to have been sealed in a rock-slide who knew how long before. Opened once more probably by a Portal Storm, the interior areas were still dark, untouched by sunlight. Carved millions of years before by the trickling water that pooled down below. On the walls though, were all the signs that nomadic people had performed shamanistic rites in this cavern, on numerous occasions.

They were still colorful; figures, outlined hands and finger-painted creatures in ochre and charcoal, umber and calcite. The fact remained, jumped out at him in fact, that many of that specific wall's glyphs depicted animals that hadn't been alive since the last ice age.

Since the last ice age.

He couldn't bring himself to speak; Paxton's mind was a bit numb as he looked over pages showing similar and extremely old pictograms of those painted hunters emulating their magnificent and huge prey. He located another book, which added evidence in the form of artistic pigments of the era, all in use at that time. There was only so much he could read, in these split-seconds. Paxton wasn't sure whether he was trying to locate evidence for or against all of this.

And though Paxton remained still and silent, eyes unfocused on anything in the room, Melissa did find her voice.

"Twelve thousand years ago?" She blurted out, as Paxton's own scholarly hunting turned up comparable images from European caverns and farther-north historical accounts. "That's…" All she could do was laugh, bewildered.

"Age can be deceptive," Noah gave his own amused and rumbling chuckle. "Our perception of time and its passing… differs."

"No, no it doesn't," Paxton finally said with a grin, breaking his stunned silence, "because even your kind say you're old as fuck, and now I believe them."

Noah would have guffawed, but coughed instead. He held his hand up, pointing it toward his private Nectarium. "Within that chamber, pluck a precious globe. Choose one which comes to your attention, bring it to me, unbroken."

Paxton did as he was bidden. Melissa followed him, but only as far as the narrow entrance to the chamber. It was a beautiful contrast: the rich indigo undercurrent, the brilliant spots of Vortessence that threw their own colors across it. A section of honeycomb-shaped extrusions stood more or less in the center of the room and stuck up onto the walls. Lumpy portions of it had obviously been opened up before, and were now empty.

Paxton, under-lit, gazed over the eggs and larva. Finally he reached down, the edge of the egg chamber held a few small but glimmering orbs. He had to crack the top of it open, doing so with a brief burst of telekinetic energy. He'd seen enough Vorts blasting at things with their own electric, green-colored attacks; that was probably how it was supposed to be done. He felt a strange warmth, smelled something that seemed to tap into ancient memories when he moved over the opening. Through Melissa's eyes, he saw a pillar of blue light: Vortessence rose from the shaft he'd opened.

Within, a warm, slightly gooey egg could be seen. Just bigger than his fist, Paxton lifted it out carefully. He could feel that it was a thin-shelled object, a bit soft but not so much so that it would remain intact if he dropped it. The sound it made when he pulled it out was unforgettable, perhaps it was a Vortal cry. Melissa examined it as he passed back into the more brightly lit main room, and both hoped that Noah would explain all of this.

Inside the egg, Paxton could detect movement, but it wasn't going to deter Noah from his tasks. He handed off the un-hatched Antlion into Noah's eager, slim fingers. "With the Extract…" Noah said, entranced and focused on the egg, "great feats can be achieved… It dissolves the false veils that divide the Vortessence from the physical. Heed well: though we have no specific task before us, Xkah-shuu'vahh should now imbibe the contents of this shell, and allow the senses to blossom. Of all the many useful items the Antlions offer, the Extract is of the greatest importance."

When Noah crushed the egg between his thin hands, there was a rush of Vortal energy through the room, or more accurately, through the trio standing there. Paxton held his hands out, below Noah's, catching a good amount of the egg's contents. He stared at it, face unreadable, before drinking it down as though it was the purest water in the Outlands.

Everything… moved. Expanded? Shrank? He wasn't even sure how many words could apply to this sensation. He watched without eyes, but this wasn't like the way he would accidentally drift to Xen without his body on. Everything looked blue, colors flickering, dancing flame in the shades of deepest water, highest sky. Electric patterns rode the surfaces and deeply into everything around him.

Noah had become more or less translucent blue, as well as Melissa, though Paxton wasn't positive they were actually that shade. It was more likely just his vision. He looked at himself: his hands grew thick with a dark indigo, then an outline of brilliant cyan crawled around them, up his arms, everywhere. He felt the Vortal warmth spreading in his gut, not at all unlike how he'd felt on tasting Melissa's memories.

He heard with distant ears, "ah, there is a quickening," from Noah; when he looked beside him at Mel, her bright yellow eyes were serenely greenish. Paxton made note of the second glimmering shape there: his child in her, alive, connected to him as well as Melissa. He thought his hands were shaking, but Melissa assured him they weren't, as he reached down and caressed her still-flat stomach. The spark of Vortal flame touched him, made him dizzy.

That small portion of himself that he kept in the Sanctuary saw from a completely different angle, Mel's eyes, that they were still just standing in Noah's chambers… But everything was so vivid. Paxton discovered that even with his physical eyes closed, he still saw so much. He felt a bit drunk, flooded with this power. Or perhaps it wasn't coming into him at all. No, he decided more than realized: it was his power, this Extract substance merely allowed him to access it.

"Had we the foresight to arrange some form of task," Noah spoke, "it would have been completed with the utmost ease." He paused, turned his attention to another portion of the room, and grunted out a Vortigese greeting. "And here is the unnamed, attracted as a moth to a flame, perhaps?"

Wilson had teleported into the chamber the moment he noted that distinct rush of energy, implicitly feeling that it was Paxton's. He knew that the Vorts also detected it, but they hadn't done more than look up and mutter to one another about it. The Vorts all around Black Mesa used this technique to communicate to each other, or do whatever else. To Wilson's Vortal ears their use of it was a lot like hearing people in another room suddenly burst out with louder chatter. This… Paxton wasn't like that. Paxton's sudden expansion of Vortal activity was more like the building next to you being demolished.

"Don't let me… interrupt," he muttered, eyes just as wide as Melissa's and equally unable to pry themselves free of the vision that was Paxton standing there.

Paxton was burning, with this power. Not pyrokinetically, not with flames. Those tendrils he had that wafted around and sought out his Replicas flickered, blue now rather than that steely-white shade they normally looked. Like his blood pulsing through his body, the energy he extended throbbed with a distinct rhythm into those long distantly-reaching web strands.

Though he stood still, Paxton had a faint sensation of vertigo. He had to dismiss it; if he let it consume him, he might just fall down or fly off. He felt the motion of the universe, perhaps, swirling around him. Paxton had to remind himself that he was not the center of the universe, no matter how good it felt to believe that he was.

A few moments of this was all he could really take. But now he knew: as he was, it would never be enough. Conflicted, he glanced at Wilson, and realized that Earth-bound flesh still had its uses. Not the least of which could be: preserving sanity. "Listen," he said to his sire, but spoke no more words. Instantly he transferred the things he'd seen, learned, and thought. Instantly, Wilson leaned back into the wall with a baffled, overwhelmed expression.

If Paxton had been a different man, just then, if he had never experienced the delicate touch of a lover, heard the delighted laughter of a child, been deafened by that bullet his brother fired, felt the tears from his own eyes mourning a loss… He might have consumed the world with lust for access to more of this power. To become purely Vortal, to desire only the speed and freedom of unbound existence. Why would he ever keep a body on, when he could be like this?

Why? He had to know. Every one of the Replicas he had at his command lit up with this wonder. Grey matter connected to him via Vortal cords if not neurons. Stunted though their brains were, he could use them to think. If he didn't have those: what was he? A mess of energy and desire? If he didn't have this body, would that spark between his daughter and himself still exist? Could he content himself to being, if he couldn't touch her as she was born? Or hear Mel's chiding Vortigese curses? Or get smacked upside the head by his brother's hand and have to be healed once more by Sandy's expert power?

In that moment of realization, he chose flesh. The faintest of fear had spiked into his mind and grown steadily. How easy it would be, to lose himself like that. To lose himself as he had in consuming flesh and blood, to forget what made up what he was.

Paxton abruptly manifested the Sanctuary, replacing his kernel-form and bringing those nearby into it. With luck he could clear his head there, think more slowly and deliberately. And hopefully, not be glowing so brightly.

Noah stood far more steadily than he had before, on the grass; he gazed around the place, though he didn't say anything. Wilson availed himself of the nearest marble pillar at the entrance, still leaning heavily on it as though he simply couldn't stand any more. Melissa smiled, and though she couldn't say that she expected any of this, she certainly accepted it as she walked over to Paxton and seated herself on the ground near him.

Paxton looked from the gazebo's shade, into that of the entry area and nodded to kallah-vahh, who had either been there already, or arrived when the Sanctuary was manifested. "If that didn't attract undue attention, I don't know what will," Paxton said, but he was smiling slightly.

The statement prompted a chuckle from the man, whose expressions Paxton noted in quick succession as concerned, amused, impressed, resigned. It was so much easier to read him, now. "It may have," kallah-vahh said, pausing beside Wilson with a genuine worry. "But it is equally likely that it will be dismissed as a fluke. As it was not exactly my doing…" He added mentally, I am still not at liberty to discuss this matter openly, Paxton.

"I know," Paxton replied, "you don't have to. I understand now." What, exactly, he understood, was shared only between them. None of this had answered most of his earlier questions, and Paxton had yet to tap into the Mystery's actual mind. But the concepts he'd found within himself were enough to go on for now.

He knew why Nach'lih kallah-vahh could be spoken as skin-walker. It was a name that only Melissa had spoken before, and he wasn't certain that even she understood it the way he did now.

He still didn't know who would punish them for anything, couldn't understand why it would be breaking rules. But for what it was worth, Paxton was ready to break those rules.