Fanfiction: The Saga of Shavi (ONCE AGAIN ongoing, hopefully)

[grod_the_giant]

I like Jeff's games, and I like to write.  Lately, the two have started to collide, so I thought I'd share the results with some other folks who enjoy Geneforge.  This is the first chapter of what will probably wind up being a novella about a former Shaper apprentice and her struggles as the fires of revolution begin to engulf Terrestia once again.  Lore-wise, it's set a few generations after the events of the games, which--for my purposes--I'm assuming ended with the Shapers mostly victorious but having been forced to make a bunch of reforms and give up some of their political power.  I'll try to keep the setting accurate to the games, but the narrative comes first.  And also my knowledge of the Geneforge series is not perfect.

 

Anyway, I hope you enjoy!  And if you have any thoughts, feedback, or suggestions, feel free to share.

 

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2 (CW: graphic violence)

Chapter 3 (CW: a bit of gore)

Chapter 4 (CW: a bit of gore)

 

Chapter 1

Spoiler

No matter the season, every morning in the village of Greyhame was the same.  Shavi woke up with the sun, brushed her hair, ate two eggs and a slice of bread, and fed her merchandise.  After nine hundred and seventy-eight days, the routine—both physical and mental—was almost purely autonomic.

 

A pinch of dried potato flakes and a drop of tanglewheat oil for each of the living tools, their slender many-tentacled bodies writhing in glass jars full of saltwater.  Yes, she’d broken a central Shaper law, but did things have to happen this way?

 

Six percent hydroxine hyctone brushed along the spines of the thorn batons as they scuttled around their terrarium.  Master Hanlan had been surprisingly understanding of her motives.  Surely there must have been some alternative to this exile.

 

Two hundred milliliters of ornk marrow dissolved in eighteen percent isosenene for each of the tuglings, poured through a dedicated groove in their concrete cocoons.  All those years of training and sacrifice, discarded like yesterday’s trash, even though the Shapers were compulsive recyclers.

 

A seven-point-eight gram pellet of tetrachlorophide in each flask of night-vision potion, for freshness.  She’d do it again.  It was worth it to finally be in the right body, but—

“Learned Shavi!  Learned, please, help!”

 

That had never happened before.  Shavi carefully placed her bottles of volatile chemicals on the nearest flat surface and hurried to the front of her shop.  It was a calculated risk—if the hydroxine hyctone mixed with the Murgath’s solution, the resulting gas cloud with drive her out of the building and kill half her stock—but her visitor’s voice was shaking with barely-controlled panic as he continued to call for her.

 

Only slightly disoriented by the interruption to her routine, she darted for the door.  Inside the thick concrete construction, dozens of mature tuglings sensed her approach.  Starting at their tails, they coiled their long muscular bodies a little bit at a time, slowly lowering the door as they relaxed from their upright pose.

 

Shavi had never worried too much about the appearance of her shop—it wasn’t like anyone else in the village knew how to breed creations—but the typically cluttered space had never looked this bad.  Two burly men in hunting leathers had knocked over half a dozen shelves in their rush to carry their wounded friend to the counter, and yet more had spilled when one of them had swiped the usual clutter aside to make room for the injured man.  Living tools, siphon beasts, inklings, and a dozen other types of small-but-useful creation squirmed around on the floor or squashed helplessly under the woodcutters’ heavy boots.

 

“What happened?” Even before she got close enough for her eyes to be useful, Shavi was examining the injured man with her Shaper senses.  Crude tissue damage, ruptured stomach lining, …

 

“I… we don’t know!”  One of the uninjured men, a red-faced redhead she recognized but couldn’t name, ran a bloody hand through his short hair.  “Gods, Laryn…”

 

“We were out on the south slope, towards the Violet Lady’s keep,” the other man—Nobb, maybe—filled in, although from the way he was wobbling he must have been close to vomiting or passing out.  “We were just working the traps, so we spread out a bit.  I was probably sixty or seventy yards away when the screaming started.  I’ll tell you, miss,” he said, swallowing nervously.  “It took me a few seconds to realize it was Laryn, that’s how bad it was.  Never heard anything like it, even when old Shotin lopped his own leg off.”

 

“Did you see what did this to him?”

 

“No, miss.”  Nobb managed to look even more worried, somehow.  “Just Laryn lying on his back in a pool of blood.”

 

“Please.”  The redhead had tears streaming down his dirty cheeks as he turned a pleading gaze on Shavi.  “You know everything!  Help him!”

 

I hardly know everything, the former Shaper did not say, because one of the things she did know was that no-one likes to hear a doctor admit their own ignorance.  And I’m not allowed to use most of my training anyway.

 

Still, while she might not be able to magic him back together—not without essence and other tools of the art now forbidden to her— she was pretty sure she could save this man.  Shapers knew anatomy like no-one else in the world, and she’d spent years working with her hands before she touched her first drop of essence. 

 

Honestly, it was kind of fun, in a twisted sort of way.  After three years of mundane routine, she was finally getting to use the skills she’d spent years honing.  Her hands darted through the bloody mess that had been Laryn’s torso like they were dancing a ballet as she snipped and sewed and slid everything back into place.

 

More villagers gathered to stare as she worked, but not many—there simply wasn’t enough time.  Barely thirty minutes passed before she stepped back from the injured man and set her bloody instruments down on the counter.

 

“He’ll be okay,” she announced, giving her work one last check with her Shaper senses. 

 

“Gods of earth and bone.” Nobb shook his head in disbelief.  “We knew you were… we didn’t think…”

 

Of course you didn’t know I was nearly a Shaper. That little detail was also to be kept a secret, as per the terms of her exile.  As far as anyone here knew, she was simply a woman who’d studied enough magic and chemistry to breed certain useful creations—hardly the kind of person who snatched victims back from the jaws of death.

 

She didn’t blush; she’d had enough Shaper training to control reactions like that, too.  But she felt the embarrassment straining to reach her cheeks.

 

“What happened to him?” The redheaded hunter stroked Laryn’s forehead tenderly.  “What could have done this?”

 

I don’t know, Shavi admitted to herself, but Shapers weren’t supposed to say things like that any more than doctors were.  Then again…

 

“I don’t know."  She found a relatively clean towel and began wiping off her hands.  “Not an animal, I don’t think.  Or a human.”

 

“A rogue?” Nobb nodded.  “That would have been my guess too.”

 

It was a better guess than most.  A Shaper’s control over their creations wasn’t perfect, and pain, neglect, or poor construction sometimes led to the creature breaking free of their mental control and running wild—“going rogue.”  It wasn’t common, and such rogues were usually killed the moment they turned, but occasionally one managed to escape into the wilds.

 

The injury didn’t look like it had been inflicted by a common creation—not burnt enough for a fyora’s claws, too narrow and deep for a roamer’s jaws, and too penetrating for a thadd’s fists, to name a few.  A glaak’s stinger, maybe, but this was the back-end of beyond.  What would a complicated battle creation like a glaak be doing out here?

 

“Can you…” Nobb began, looking around uncertainly.

 

“I can’t, I…I’m not a soldier or a battle-mage or anything,” Shavi protested, holding up her still-bloody hands.  “I breed batons, I don’t use them.”

 

“Neither are we,” the redhead pointed out.  “Please…”

 

------------------------------

 

After an hour of arguing, cajoling, and outright begging, Shavi had finally agreed to look for the rogue.  Not—she had tried to be clear—kill it.  But if this was a dangerous rogue, they’d need proof before the Shapers would act, and she had to admit that she knew better than any of the villagers what they’d be looking for.

 

Once the crowd was cleared away—and the shop cleaned up, her reagents safely replaced, her hands and forearms thoroughly washed, and her blood-soaked dress burned—she changed into a pair of sturdy canvas trousers, a short tunic and a dull brown ornk-leather jacket.  Then she started at her workshop for a long time, thinking about what she could use.

 

Well, a thorn baton, obviously.  She certainly had plenty of those in stock, and she selected a particularly sturdy-looking specimen.  She’d never really liked the things, wood and metal frameworks supporting a bizarre reptilian creation that spat inch-long thorns with the force of a crossbow, but they made effective weapons.

 

Her knife, yes.  It had been a gift from Master Hanlan to celebrate her sixteenth birthday, and one of the few possessions she’d been allowed to take into exile.  The six inch blade was decorated with intricate etchings, but—more importantly—it was also imbued with enough essence to make it just a little bit alive.  It would never break, never dull, and could slice through flesh and bone like butter.

 

She didn’t have much in the way of useful potions, and she doubted the town would let her take a week to brew up some healing or shielding pods, but she filled one little gourd with night-vision potion just in case.

 

She didn’t have any armor, and doubted that anyone in town did either—and even if she could find some, it was unlikely to fit her slender frame.  No wands or war-crystals, no battle creations, no enchanted cloaks or boots… she doubted she’d get much readier.

 

Except…

 

The old wooden chest she kept her spare bedding in drew her eye like a magnet, and after several minutes of internal debate she knelt and opened it.  One by one, she stacked sheets and towels on the bed until she finally unearthed a dull red gourd the size of a butternut squash.  Even after all this time, her Shaper senses still jumped to full attention the moment she saw it.

 

She lifted the item carefully, feeling the power humming within.  This, she was not supposed to have.  She was, in fact, not supposed to be within a hundred yards of it or anything like it.  She was lucky she hadn’t been implanted with a control tool that would puncture her heart just for looking at it.

 

This was her last resort.  Her contingency plan.  If things went really, really wrong, and her life was on the line, she would at least have a few hundred milliliters of essence.

 

It was the root of all shaping, the essence—ha, ha—of life itself.  It was a little bit chemical, a little bit magical, and more than a little bit alive—a seething, bubbling sea of proteins, acids, and more obscure biomolecules.  In the hands of a mage, it was pure undiluted mystical energy, a single drop the equivalent of a week’s worth of meditation.  In the hands of a Shaper…

 

Shavi stared at the gourd for a long time, eyes distant, remembering all the times she’d worked with essence.  All the times she’d created living, breathing creatures with the wave of a hand.  All creations, from the smallest fungal sensor to the greatest drakon, could be made with nothing but pure essence and a Shaper’s will.

 

Her hands trembled like an addict’s as she thought of popping the cork, of pouring the fluid down her throat and feeling her body burn with the fires of creation.  To ride the waves of exhaustion and euphoria as she brought new life into the world.

 

Why not drink it now?  Essence broke down over time.  That it was still good after three years was a small miracle; by the time the next excuse came along, it would be nothing but toxic sludge.  She could keep it within her for days, weeks, even, just waiting to unleash it at her whim.

 

And be spotted.  And reported.  And killed.  Mustn’t forget that part, she reminded herself for the thousandth time.  For her, even this little bit of essence represented death as much as it did power.

 

In the end, she wrapped a pillowcase around the gourd and stuffed it in her backpack.  She wouldn’t use it yet.  She’d be stronger than that.

 

But she’d have it if she needed it.

 

Edited May 26, 2023 by grod_the_giant

[Amira The Hot Potato]

please make more!

[ultra112]

Please do there are not enough Geneforge fanfics out there

[grod_the_giant]

2 hours ago, Amira The Hot Potato said:

please make more!

 

1 hour ago, ultra112 said:

Please do there are not enough Geneforge fanfics out there

 

That's the plan!  I'm shooting for one chapter a week.

[Painted Lady]

Terrific fun - thanks so much for posting this. Can't wait for the next installment.

[grod_the_giant]

CW: Graphic violenceI

 

Chapter 2

Spoiler

The training to become a Shaper was rigorous beyond all belief.  Spellcasting and alchemy were only the beginning— would-be Apprentices were expected to master mathematics, medicine, rhetoric, engineering, astronomy, multiple languages, and every imaginable field of natural philosophy.  The first three years were dedicated to little more than learning how to learn, and by the time they touched their first drop of essence, would-be Shapers had eidetic memories and could read books faster than they could turn the pages.  Shavi had completed almost all of her training before being caught, giving her a broader and deeper understanding of the world than most "real" sages could boast.  She spoke six languages, could calculate differential equations in her head, and understood anatomy at an almost religious level.

 

Unfortunately, at no point in her education had she learned how to navigate a forest.

 

Nobb’s directions had proved spectacularly unhelpful, and she’d been wandering around the cold, wet woods for almost three hours now with absolutely nothing to show for it.  Her feet had started to hurt after the first hour, and by this point the ache had migrated all the way up her legs into her lower back.  She’d lost track of how many times she’d fallen, but it was enough to cover her body with bruises, mud, and scrapes that somehow managed to sting even though her skin was numb.

 

At this point, the only things keeping her going were inertia and the thought of a long, hot bath.  She didn’t care how much magic it was going to take; she was going to fill her tub to the brim, heat it to just shy of scalding, and keep it that way until she melted.

 

A stick snapped underfoot when she tried to put her weight on it, and she stumbled and had to grab the nearest tree to keep from falling.  The sound of cracking wood seemed to echo through the forest, kicking off a smattering of startled birdcalls.

 

And a very loud rustle.

 

Shavi froze.  That was, by far, the loudest noise she’d heard while she’d been out here.  And while she might not have much woodcraft, Frostsparrow Island was small and isolated and—like many such environs—wasn’t normally home to anything bigger than a particularly chunky raccoon.  So why did it sound like someone was dragging an entire cart through the underbrush?

 

Nervously, Shavi pulled out her thorn baton and checked to make sure it was loaded.  It was, just like the last three times she’d looked—each of the half-dozen little clamps placed in a ring near the creature’s head held a two-inch long keratin spike.  And from the dull green color, the hemotoxins they contained were still at peak potency.

 

The rustling was getting closer, accompanied by the sporadic cracks of breaking branches.  Gods, the thing must be huge…

 

…and she could almost hear the pod of essence in her backpack calling to her.  She’d packed it in case of an emergency; surely this constituted one.  She fumbled with the straps and dropped the leather pack roughly to the ground, then bent to undo the flap.

 

“Chhhhhhkkkk!”

 

Shavi screamed too, but she couldn’t hear herself over the awful, dissonant screech.  It had the almost percussive rhythm of a grasshopper’s song, but louder than a dozen trumpets and deep enough to rattle the bones in your chest.  And it stuttered; stopping and starting in odd places and hitting nothing but dissonant notes as it screamed.

 

And then the beast burst through a thicket of thorn bushes, and she got a good look at the glaahk.

 

The insectoid creation was enormous, easily the size of a horse.  The only thing she’d ever been able to compare it to was the back half of a scorpion—the creature was little more than a pair of grasshopper legs, a mantis-like head, and a huge curling scorpion tail tipped with a glowing blue spike the size of her head.  Normally they were green, but creative Shapers could easily pick a new pattern for the heavy chitin plates that encased the creature’s entire body.  This one was a distinguished royal purple, darkening to black towards the tip of its stinger and its dual-taloned feet.

 

And it was completely, undeniably rogue.  Its huge red eyes glowed with madness and hunger, and its carapace was splattered with blood.  Human blood, she was pretty sure.  Even if it wasn’t, the thorns and broken blades that jutted from its armor here and there were clear signs that it was a man-killer.

 

Shavi tried to remember her training as the glaahk began to slowly circle her, its glowing stinger leaving short-lived trails in the air as it lashed back and forth.  Sometimes, if a creation hadn’t been rogue for too long, it was possible to re-establish control.

 

She extended her right hand towards the beast, gripping her baton so tightly with the other hand that her knuckles turned white.  Her Shaper senses stretched out across the clearing, feeling for the contours of the glaahk’s—

 

 The insectoid creation screeched again and pounced.  Shavi flung herself to the side, but not fast enough.  The tip of its stinger slashed across her right shoulder blade, and she felt her arm and torso go numb as the glaahk’s magic tore through her system. Glaahks didn’t just put holes in you—their stingers were charged with paralytic energies that could freeze a man in his tracks.

 

“Chhhhhhkkkkk!” Its charge carried it a few feet farther along before it spun back towards her to evaluate the result of its strike. 

 

Shavi did her best to shut out the pain and harmful magic, but it keep creeping back around the edges of her mental walls.  Her right hand was barely responding, and her left trembled as she pointed her thorn baton in approximately the right direction and prodded the little creation in just the right spot.

 

The baton’s head snapped out like a striking snake and swallowed one of the six thorns.  Its nostrils flared and its chest puffed up to twice its normal size before it expelled all the air in a single burst that sent the thorn slashing across the clearing faster than a man could blink.

 

The two-inch spike struck the base of the glaahk’s tail and bounced off.  The creature didn’t so much as flinch.

 

Shavi fired another two thorns as quickly as her baton could spit them.  One missed altogether, and the other hit a leg and lodged in the armor there.  A few of the toxins might find their way into its blood stream eventually, but not enough to do her any good.

 

It took two steps forward and swatted her with its tail, like a cat playing with its prey.  The impact lifted her off her feet and hurled her into a tree a few yards away.  Her vision went black for a moment as something crunched, and she wasn’t sure if it was a branch or her ribs.  Probably the latter; she wanted to scream but couldn’t find the breath.

 

The world swam before her eyes as she fought to stay conscious and think of a way to save herself.  Her knife?  It was sharp enough to pierce the galahk’s armor, but she’d be dead long before she got close enough to use it. Magic?  It had been years since she last practiced, and without essence in her system her reserves with almost non-existent. 

 

She her fingers in the right pattern and focused on the formula, hoping she remembered it clearly enough.  Elemental sigil six, directional sigil two, amplification sigil… eight?  Nine?  No, six again… trigger words…

 

“Ignis fulmine,” she gasped, and a chill ran down her spine as her body temperature dropped several degrees.  The rush of energy leaving her body left her feeling weaker than ever, but a comet of cracking orange flames lashed out across the clearing and struck the glaahk square in the face.

 

“Chhkkkhhhkkhhhkk!”

 

It reared back, shaking its head from side to side.  Shavi felt a surge of hope—had she injured it?  Was it pyrophobic?—and took a deep breath, preparing a second fire bolt.

 

And then the glaahk lunged, mandibles spread wide, and swallowed her arm up to the elbow.

 

She hadn’t thought she had enough strength left to scream, but the sensation of tearing flesh and chitin grinding against bone managed to pull an inhuman shriek from her battered body.  The glaahk’s insectoid jaws clamped down again and again, trying to bite through her radius and ulna bones and getting closer each time.

 

If it wasn’t for the mental discipline that had been beaten into her during her training as a Shaper, she would have passed out instantly.  She still nearly blacked out as the pain blew away the last remnants of rational thought.

 

The glaahk tightened its grip on her arm, and something snapped.

 

Shavi howled as the world vanished in a firestorm of agony.  She couldn’t tell where she was, what was happening, even who she was.  Her mind burned as she died, her body and the glaahk’s melding together into a single engine for creating pain.  She fell into it, the twin scrolls that defined its being twisting tighter and tighter around her soul.

 

No!

 

Some dying instinct sparked to life, and she yanked herself away with a gurgling cry.  The machine exploded, splattering blood and essence in every direction.  She was screaming; the glaahk was screaming; the world was screaming.

 

And the pressure on her arm was gone.

 

She managed to crack open a single eye and was greeted by a wall of purple chitin.  Slowly melting purple chitin, she realized after a moment, and the shock was enough to prod a few pieces of her brain into motion.  The glaahk’s jaws were still closed around her arm, but they were loosening—even as she stared, one of its mandibles tore loose and fell to the ground.

 

What had… what had she…

 

Shavi scrambled away from the creation’s corpse more by instinct than anything else.  It was dead.  More than dead, it was unmade, in a way that was normally only possible with your own creations.  Somehow she must have forged a temporary link—perhaps because it had swallowed so much of her blood?  However she’d done it, it was dead now, and melting back into essence.

 

Essence.

 

She dropped and used her good arm to start shoveling bits of the melting creation into her mouth.  She choked and gagged, spitting out clumps of dirt and swallowing uncountable biological horrors, but it was working.  She could feel the heat beginning to build in her lower chakras, her heart leaping with every new drop of essence her body could scavenge from the awful mix.  Strength was beginning to return to her limbs, and with it, clarity.

 

Shavi gulped down one last mouthful of essence-laced filth and sat back, concentrating.  Magical sigils swam before her eyes as she fought to move her brain into the right alignment, to remember the details of her biology.

 

“Sana,” she gasped, and the magic sparked to life.  “Maior sana.”

 

The trickle of warmth from the essence exploded into a burning flood.  The magic surged and multiplied as it rushed to her arm, her ribs, her back, kick-starting the healing processes and pushing normal biological mechanisms into overdrive.  Fresh tissue bloomed in the depths of her injuries, crawling over itself with the need to grow, grow, grow.

 

It was one of the most agonizing things Shavi had ever felt.  It was one of the most wonderful things she had ever felt.

 

Moments later, she lay flat on the earth, gasping for breath.  Every inch of her body was soaked with blood and gore, much of it her own—but the tide had stopped.  Her right arm was a tender and withered mass of scars, but that was okay.  She could fix that later.

 

She was alive.

 

Edited May 26, 2023 by grod_the_giant

[grod_the_giant]

New chapter!  Sorry about missing last week-- my passover seder was apparently cursed and everyone who attended wound up getting sick.  The next should be on time.  In the meantime, if you've got any questions or comments, please let me know!

 

CW: A bit of gore.

Chapter 3

Spoiler

After ten minutes of blissful stillness, Shavi realized that she might want to retrieve a sample of the dead glaahk before it entirely dissolved.  Even the most carefully-Shaped creations eventually broke down into the essence they’d been created from—only creatures that were bred naturally, like living tools, left a corpse.  And if she was about to accuse a full-fledged Shaper of letting one of her creations go rogue…

 

Well.

 

It was possible that the Violet Lady wasn’t the source of the glaahk, but it seemed unlikely.  She and her underlings were the only Shapers in a hundred-mile radius, and Shapers with the skill to create something like a glaahk were too rare to go unnoticed.

 

To say nothing of the color, she thought as she picked out a nice chunk of carapace.  Violet Lady, violet creation.

 

While she slowly infused extra magic into the piece to keep it stable, she thought back to the first—and only—time she’d met the senior Shaper, near the beginning of her exile.

#

 

It was mid-afternoon in Greyhame, and Shavi was bent over her chemistry bench, carefully titrating hexedalsine dihydride into a suspension of puccene oil and citric acid.  One drop using a number six pipette, ten stirs with a glass rod.  One drop, ten stirs.  One drop, ten—

 

The grate of stone rubbing against stone interrupted her concentration, and she yelped in surprise as the security door slid open.  If she hadn’t been working with toxic chemicals, she probably would have jumped out of her skin; as it was, she still nearly spilled twelve molar citric acid down the front of her dress.  The tuglings in the door were only supposed to react to her presence, not anyone else’s, and she hadn’t made any keys they might recognize.

 

The first things through the open doorway were a pair of roamers, four-legged creations that looked something like a cross between a mastiff and a frog.  This particular pair had mottled blue and purple skin, faintly luminescent yellow eyes, and an almost palpable air of menace.  The temperature dropped like a stone as they entered, which meant they were probably cryoroamers and not one of the more common variants.

 

The creations took up guard positions on either side of the door, and their mistress followed a moment later.  The Shaper—for she could be nothing else—was a tall, elegant woman in a floor-length purple robe with abstract designs picked out in gold thread.  She had her hood pulled up, hiding most of her face, but Shavi got the impression of a hawkish nose and sleek black hair.

 

“So,” the Shaper said coldly, clasping her arms behind her back.  Four more creations glided through the door and spread out behind her—huge flying serpents with oversized jaws, armored with fine white and purple scales.  They fanned the air occasionally with their bat-like wings, but mostly floated in place.

 

Shavi swallowed, her fear redoubling at the sight of the wingbolts.  A cryoroamer was dangerous, to be sure, but wingbolts were one of the most powerful creations the Shapers were allowed to make.  They could fire bolts of energy powerful enough to punch through stone walls and vaporize all but the most well-made war creations.  The two roamers could probably kill everyone in the village, if commanded, but the four wingbolts could raze it down to the bedrock.

 

“My, um, my lady.”  Shavi went to curtsey, then realized she was still holding a pipette and a beaker of caustic phosphates.  Flushing, she put them back down as fast as she could, but in her haste she knocked over her best glass alembic.  Lunging to catch it left her so far off balance that she nearly fell, and she instinctively grabbed at the table behind her for support.  Several containers rattled threateningly, and a handful of immature living tools squealed in distress.

 

The Violet Lady watched, and Shavi had the feeling she was smirking at her fumbling.  It took her an embarrassingly long time to get everything settled so that she could step away from the workbench and sink into a proper curtsey.

 

“So,” the Shaper repeated.  “You’re Shavi.”

 

“Yes, my lady.”

 

“The former apprentice.”

 

“Yes, my lady.”

 

“Why are you here?”  From the tone of her question, it was obvious that the Violet Lady already knew the answer.  Shavi took a moment to think about her response, trying to figure out a safely neutral way of answering the question.

 

“My former master, Warden Harlan, grew up in this region, my lady,” she said carefully.  “When I was removed from my position, he—”

 

“Why?”

 

“I’m sorry?”

 

“Why were you expelled from the academy?”  The senior Shaper tapped a foot, and Shavi sighed.  So much for misdirection.  Marshaling her courage, she looked the taller woman in the eye.

 

“I constructed a mutagenic canister and used it to reShape myself so that my body that matched my gender identity.”

 

“A fully functional canister?”  It was impossible to read the Violet Lady’s face beneath her hood.  “Capable of Shaping magical abilities into the user?”

 

“Theoretically, my lady,” Shavi admitted, though perhaps not quite as humbly as she would have liked.  Canisters like the ones she’d made were in large part what had allowed fighters in the Great Rebellion to match the power of fully trained Shapers, and merely knowing how they functioned was severely forbidden.  Successfully reconstructing one before she’d even finished her apprenticeship had been, if nothing else, an impressive demonstration of technical skill.

 

“And could you do it again?”  The Violet Lady’s voice gave no clues as to what kind of answer she was hoping for.  Shavi had to be careful; the question reeked of politics, and she had a suspicion that the wrong answer here would get her killed.

 

“No, my lady.”  Shavi bowed her head.  “The materials I worked from have since been destroyed.”

 

“Hmm.”  Again, it was impossible to tell if the Shaper was pleased or upset with this answer.  “And the hexedalsine you were playing with a moment ago?”

 

“I breed tuglings, my lady, and I prefer to brew my own reagents whenever possible.”  She took a deep breath.  “Alchemy is one of the few skills I can still enjoy.”

 

“I see.”  The Violet Lady stood silently for a long moment, almost inhuman in her stillness.  The perfect image of Shaper control.  “You may continue to provide your current services.”

 

“Thank you, my lady.”

 

“I will expect you to volunteer your laboratory assistance whenever one of my subordinates or I require it.”

 

“It would be my honor, my lady.”

 

“That is all.”  The Violet Lady still didn’t move, but her creations began to neatly file back out of the lab.  “And Shavi?”

 

“Yes, my lady?”

 

“If my agents catch so much as a sniff of essence.”

 

“Yes, my lady.”

 

“If I even think you are dabbling in Shaping without my express authorization.”

 

“Yes, my lady.”

 

“I will have you strung up and fed to your precious tuglings bit by bit.”

 

“I understand, my lady.”  Shavi swallowed nervously, trying not to think about the gourd full of illegal essence just a few yards away.

 

“See that you do.”  The Shaper finally turned to go, but paused in the doorway.  “And Shavi?”

 

“Yes, my lady?”

 

“I will arrange to have some level three protective gear sent to you.  You’ll do the village no good if you drop dead in a lab accident.”

 

#

 

Although Shavi had never seen the Violet Lady again after that, every few months she would receive a shipment of old laboratory equipment—a set of partially corroded sublimation pots, a cracked rotary kiln, a magically-powered centrifuge with no longer capable of reaching its highest speed, and so on.  Things that were flawed enough that they might interfere with delicate Shaping, but still useful for more mundane chemistry.  There had never been any notes, but she’d always taken it as a sign that the senior Shaper approved of her presence.

 

Shavi supposed she was counting on that approval when she made her report.  Otherwise it would be all too easy to take offense at her apparent accusation and have her killed for disrespect.  Not that such sentences were legal these days, but this far from civilization there was no-one to stop the Violet Lady from making up evidence of a crime that still carried a death sentence.

 

Heck, she wouldn’t even need to make up any charges, Shavi thought to herself.  I just used essence to heal myself.

 

It was tempting to run home and bury her head in the sand, but there was no guarantee that the glaahk she’d just fought was the only rogue in the area.  Greyhame was a tiny village, and Frostsparrow Island in general was one the safest Shaper territories out there—the people she’d come to know over the past few years had never had to deal with so much as a wolf.  Something like a glaahk could tear through the settlement like a wildfire.  No, there was no other option.  She’d have to make the report and hope for the best.

#

 

Fortunately, finding the Violet Lady’s keep was much easier than tracking down a single rogue.  Shaper strongholds tended to be full of magic, both stored and active, and she knew a tracking spell that would keep her pointed in the right direction.

 

It still wasn’t a pleasant journey.  Shavi had been having a hard enough time dealing with the rough terrain before she’d confirmed there was at least one man-eating rogue in the woods--after nearly dying, her pace slowed to a crawl.  She felt like she was hyper-aware of every sound as she crept through the trees with her baton in one hand and her knife in the other, afraid that any moment she would run into a swarm of deadly rogues.

 

Finally, the trees began to thin, and she could see the ocean and the spire of the Violet Lady’s keep in the distance.  She breathed a prayer of relief as she hurried her steps, finding a bit more courage with such a symbol of Shaper dominance in sight.

 

That confidence lasted about twenty minutes until she saw the plume of black smoke rising from the tower’s base.

 

She broke out into the fastest run her exhausted body could manage, which at this point was really more of a shuffle.  Had there been a lab accident?  Were people hurt?  After a few endless minutes of anxiety, she shook off the last of the trees and staggered to the top of a small rise where she could get a good look at the situation.

 

No movement.  That was the first thing she noticed—nothing was moving.  There were no guards on the walls, no sailors in the harbor, no creations patrolling the grounds, not even a turret swiveling back and forth as it looked for a target.  Instead, there was rubble.  Rubble, and corpses.

 

The outer gates had been blown open by some kind of powerful battle-magic or Shaped explosive—fragments of splintered wood and twisted metal littered the courtyard, alongside dozens of blood-soaked corpses.  Some were creations, and some were human.  Some wore armor and carried weapons, but the majority did not.  There were dead servants in their blue and white livery, dead courtiers in their expensive gowns, dead sailors and merchants and craftspeople and children.

 

Shavi froze, struggling to accept what she was seeing.  Someone had…there were… kids, they’d just been… her stomach churned, and she barely had time to get her hands out of the way before she was vomiting.  Bile and dirt and a final few traces of essence spewed out of her mouth as her body tried to purge itself of the overwhelming horror.  She’d been a Shaper, almost; she’d seen blood and guts and all manner of biological horrors, but this kind of slaughter was just…

 

Her muscles tightened again, and she found a little more vomit to paint the ground with. 

 

The feeling is not me, she reminded herself.  The feeling is my body.  My body is not me.  A deep breath; the smell of death and pain and—was that sulfur?—tickled her nostrils, but she carefully pushed the sensation aside.  The feeling is not me.  The feeling is my body.  My body is not me.

 

The mantra grounded her, as it had generations of Shapers before her, and she slowly set aside her emotions and settled into a state of mild dissociation.  The exhaustion of her journey, the horror of her surroundings, the aches and pains filling her body…she knew they were still there, could catalogue the source and magnitude of each sensation, but she knew it in the same way that she knew she was wearing pants, or had black hair.  Aware, but removed.

 

She took another deep breath, and this time the scents were facts, not feelings.  People had died here.  That was bad.  She couldn’t see anyone moving.  That was worse.  But this wasn’t everyone who’d lived here.  There might be survivors hiding in the ruins.  They might be injured.  They might have fled.  Whatever had happened, she needed to know.  And to help.

 

A third deep breath, this time accompanied by a decisive nod.  She stowed her weapons, wiped her mouth, and started towards the broken gates.

 

Edited May 26, 2023 by grod_the_giant

[Amira The Hot Potato]

hi @grod_the_giant! hope all is well. will you continue this?

[grod_the_giant]

On 5/6/2023 at 10:06 PM, Amira The Hot Potato said:

hi @grod_the_giant! hope all is well. will you continue this?

 

"Well" might be taking it a bit too far, but things are on the mend.  Hopefully I'll have a new chapter soonish.  I appreciate your concern, though-- it's nice to know someone is following this.

[Painted Lady]

You are quite a talented writer. Thank you for this fan fiction!

[grod_the_giant]

In the words of Granny Weatherwax, "I ain't dead."  I am, however, done with finals, and back with a new chapter.  Sorry about all the delays--among other issues, it's been a long time since I've had a piece of writing fight me as hard as this section did.  On the plus side, serviles!

 

CW: A bit of gore.

 

Chapter 4

Spoiler

Shavi’s confident stride lasted for all of thirty seconds before slowing—first to a cautious walk, then to a nervous shuffle.  The gateway seemed to loom over her like the mouth of some sort of giant predator, with teeth of broken iron and a tongue of bloody splinters.  She shuddered.  Shaper architecture was meant to be imposing, but she hadn’t felt like this since she was a child first arriving at the New Greenwood Academy.

 

With her attention fixed on the gate, she almost stumbled over a pair of deep ruts in the earth.  Narrowly avoiding injury from her own knife as her arms windmilled for balance, she took a deep breath and felt her lungs fill with the harsh scent of burning sulfur.

 

What was that?  Sulfides were a staple of Shaper chemistry, but the wasn’t any sign of a laboratory.  Nor—she scanned the area and sighed in relief—were there any large reptilian tracks that could have belonged to an outlaw dryak or drakon, the only creations she could think of with that sort of smell.  The ground was soft and the footsteps of human fighters were blurred, but either one of the forbidden draconic creatures would have been heavy enough for their trail to be visible for days.

 

The only thing that stood out in the area were the ruts she’d almost tripped over.    There were two of them in perfect parallel, about three inches wide and two feet apart.  If they’d been farther apart she would have assumed that a heavy cart had been dragged up to face the gates, but what was the point of a two-foot wide cart?

 

More mysteries.

 

Shavi set her shoulders once more and sidled up to the broken gates.  She strained her ears for the sounds of voices or movement, but the only thing she could hear was the buzzing of the flies still enjoying their unexpected feast.  The smell of so many corpses nearly made her gag, and she repeated her mantra as she gingerly entered the courtyard.

 

The feeling is not me. The feeling is my body.  My body is not me.

 

She forced herself to observe the scene dispassionately.  The fallen soldiers were still mostly on the walls, brought down by arrows or thorns or battle-magic.  The ground was littered with the corpses of blue and purple creations in early stages of decay.  The ten-foot tall humanoid forms of battle alphas had died much like men did, limbs akimbo and dense fur stained with blood.  More glaahk, scattered like broken toys.  A handful of lizard-like kyshakk, every bit as big as a battle alpha and armored with thick bony plates, made for a more dramatic display.  In life, the beasts were armed with electricity-generating glands along their spines and bellies; in death, the glands tended to explode and pelt everything nearby with viscera and shattered bones.

 

Sheathing her knife and baton, Shavi kneeled down next to a dead glaakk and pulled out the plate she’d recovered from the rogue that had nearly killed her a few hours earlier.  As she suspected—a perfect match.

 

She straightened and took a deep breath, about to call out for any survivors, only for an unseen assailant to tackle her to the ground and clamp a calloused hand over her mouth.  Before she could protest, she found herself pressed back into the dirt with a pair of wild brown eyes staring into hers from an inch away.

 

“Shh!” The figure hissed, eyes darting nervously around the clearing.  “Creations not all dead!”

 

What? Shavi tried to say, but with her mouth covered it came out more as a mmmph!

 

“More hiding in ruins. Lost minds from battle and Shaper deaths.  Don’t alert!”

 

Her captor leaned back, releasing her hold and giving Shavi an opportunity to study them.  They—she—was a Succian woman, her trunk-like nose twitching side to side in alarm.

 

“What?”

#

 

The Shapers had been in power for hundreds of years, and over the centuries they’d committed many atrocities.  But their first and greatest sin was the creation of a slave race.  The serviles were shorter than their creators, with hunched postures, pointed ears, and ten inch long elephant-like trunks instead of noses—but in every way that mattered, they were human.

 

For generations, the line had been that serviles were inferior beings.  They were seen as almost childlike in comparison to humanity, too dull and weak-willed to survive without strict guidance from their masters.  Only capable of simple labor, they were nevertheless the engine that drove the early Shaper empires.  Serviles grew the crops that fed their armies and war-creations; serviles built their cities and forts; serviles dug their mines, forged their swords, and carried their supplies.

 

Things began to change around two hundred years ago, when the Shapers and their human subjects fled Succia Island and abandoned thousands of serviles to what they assumed would be a slow death.  Instead, the supposedly childlike creatures simply picked up the pieces of that had been left behind and went on with civilization.  The thriving societies they built were ultimately destroyed by fearful Shapers, but their legacy could not be erased.  The serviles would ultimately join the dryaks and drakons—powerful, intelligent draconic creations—in beginning the Great Rebellion.

 

For more than a decade, Shapers did battle with their own creations.  Succia Island had also been the place where reShaping was discovered, and the rebels took full advantage of the now-forbidden practice to provide the magical muscle they needed.  Both sides used Shaping arts to field armies of increasingly deadly war creations and unleash ecological devastation on their foes.

 

In the end, the drakons became convinced that they were superior to all other beings and threatened to wipe out humans and serviles alike.  An uneasy alliance was necessary to prevent a mass holocaust, and the Shapers were forced to sign a series of treaties known as the Astoria Accords where—among other concessions—the serviles were acknowledged to be the equals of humanity.

 

Now free to chart their own destiny, the former slaves chose a new name for themselves.  They were no longer serviles—instead, they would continue the legacy of those first independent souls and call themselves Succians.

#

 

This particular Succian was on the tall side for her race, a hair over five feet, with a tan face and a powerful broad-shouldered build. She had long black hair, braided and pinned in a bun at the back of her neck, and rich chocolate eyes.  And she looked far, far more at home on the battlefield than Shavi—she wore her hunting leathers and mottled brown and green cloak like she was born in them, and carried the arming sword at her hip with unconscious grace.

 

“Told you,” she whispered back.  “Keep attacked, Shapers killed, creations gone rogue.  Some ran off, others still in keep.”

 

While Succians were fully capable of normal speech, many choose to keep the peculiar stunted cant that had once been a mark of their race.  As they saw things, it was a way of reclaiming their dignity and honoring their ancestors—who was Shavi to argue with something like that?  It was easy enough to fill in the missing articles and pronouns.

 

“No, not--” She took a deep breath, feeling sick.  “Did you see who it was?”

 

“No, just returned from border patrol.”  The Succian frowned.  “Arrived two days ago, bodies dead at least five.  But only Shaper bodies.  Attackers must have retrieved dead.  Left no clues.”

 

“Okay.  Okay.”  Shavi took a deep breath and buried her hands in her hair as she tried to think.  She had too… had to…

 

“Why you here?”  Her new companion bent to pick the baton and offered it back without a hint of shame.

 

“Glaahk.”  She swallowed, clutching her weapon.  “There was a rogue glaahk in the forest near my village.  It attacked a hunter.  I came to ask for help.”

 

“Glaahk?”  The Succian frowned.  “Can deal with one glaahk.  Problem if not alone.”

 

“You?” Shavi blurted out, then winced.  Why not her?  She looked like a warrior, and she’d said something about a border patrol.  “Err, I mean, that’s okay.  I fought…I killed it on my way here.”

 

“You?” The stranger replied in the exact same tone.  “Hah.  Thought I smelled glaahk blood.  And human.”  Her trunk extended towards Shavi, nostrils flaring as something caught her attention.  “And essence.  A Shaper?”

 

“What?  No.  No, no, I swear.”  Shavi’s face couldn’t get any paler, but she held up her hands in desperate denial.  “No essence.  No Shaping.  A little magic, but no Shaping.”

“Hmm.”  The Succian didn’t look convinced, but smiled grimly and held out a hand.  “Sergeant Hestra.”

 

“Learned Shavi.”  She hesitated, looking at the dried blood still caking her hand, then gave a mental shrug.  Her new companion didn’t seem like the time to mind a bit of blood.  “I don’t suppose there are more soldiers around here, do you?”

 

“No, was solo mission.”  Hestra shook her head.  “Will escort you home.  Doubt you have enough blood left for traveling alone.”

 

“I—no.”  Shavi stared at the bodies surrounding them.  “If there are survivors, I need to…”

 

“None.  All dead.”  The Succian looked grim.  “Ships gone too.  They used bombs, fire.  Not even salvage left.”

 

“Damn.”  Shavi sighed and pushed herself back to her feet, still shaking.  Their little island was more than a thousand miles away from the mainland.  There were a few more small islands nearby, mostly uninhabited, but the nearest settlement of any size—and the nearest resident Shaper—was on Larshak Island, a voyage of at least six days.

Which would have been the point, wouldn’t it?  Kill the Violet Lady, destroy the ocean-going ships here, and the island would be completely isolated.  The attackers could plunder the survivors at their leisure.

 

“Nothing left.”  Hestra’s trunk curled up on itself as she thought hard about something.  “You only Shaper left on island.”

 

“I told you,” Shavi protested, “I’m not—”

 

“Am not fool, Shavi.”  Hestra prodded her with a finger.  “You smell of essence.  Clothes soaked with blood, no wounds on body, means healing magic.  Healing magic is Shaping.”  She poked the smaller woman again.  “And was second in command of Violet Lady’s scouts.  Know about former apprentice in Greyhame.”

 

“I…I…” Shavi trembled, too terrified to even cry.  She’d been caught.  Should she run?  Fight?  Beg for her life?  There was nothing she could do to stop this grim-eyed Succian, not if she wanted her dead.  “Please, Hestra.  Sergeant.  Please, I didn’t mean—I had no choice, I swear I’ll never do it again.  I don’t want to use my powers, I just want to go home to my lab.  I’ll do anything, please just don’t—”

 

“Stop!” Hestra pushed her pleading hands aside.  “Ancestors’ bones.  Not going to hurt you.”

 

“You—you’re not?”

 

“Past crime doesn’t matter.”  The scout put her hands on either side of the other woman's head and forced her to look into her eyes.  “The people here need you.”  She took a deep breath, switching to human grammar to emphasize her point.  “They’re going to be terrified, and they’ve spent their entire lives looking to the Shapers for protection.  Right now, that’s you.”

 

“But…I’m no leader, I—I can barely run my shop,” Shavi protested, tears beginning to fall.  “And Shaping…they’ll kill me if I even think about it, Hestra.  I can’t, I can’t, I—”

Slap!

 

“Shavi!” The Succian snapped.  “You not stupid.  Think.  Attackers will return.  How many die if you do nothing?”

 

“I…” Shavi touched a hand to her stinging cheek, eyes wide with shock.  “You hit me, I—”

 

“Was sniveling like child.  Think!”

 

She swallowed nervously.  There were almost a thousand people in Greyhame, and a few hundred more scattered across the island on isolated homesteads and small mining claims.  What would they do when they found out the Violet Lady was dead?  When they saw the burning keep and wrecked ships?  When they realized they were cut off from the rest of the world?  How many would suffer and die in the chaos?

 

And Hestra was right.  Whoever attacked the keep would be back.  There wasn’t much wealth on the island—the only real industry was mining certain inorganic salts that wouldn’t be of any interest to non-Shapers—so they must have been after more than mere gold.  If they were bent on conquest, they’d soon be storming the beaches; if they meant to send a message… well…

 

An entire island of dead citizens was a much stronger statement than a single burning keep.

 

They might even come back just to get rid of any potential witnesses.  The Shapers would catch them eventually, they’d have to be idiots not to realize that, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t be worth it to buy time. 

 

Shavi felt a chill run down her spine.  Nobb.  Laryn and his red-headed lover.  Sloan and his venison pies.  Jiroma and delicate needlepoint.  Hansu and Claudia and Tekri and Varil and Brill…

 

No.  Hestra was right.  The people here cared about her, and she’d spent the last three years caring for them in turn.  She couldn’t turn her back on them, not now.  Not even if it meant her death.  She might never have sworn her final oaths as a Shaper, but that didn’t mean she didn’t respect them.

 

I will honor my fellow citizens, she thought, echoing the words she’d come so close to speaking.  I will face the truths that they will not.  I will bring them to greatness on the shoulders of my craft.

 

“You… you’re right,” she said slowly, closing her eyes.  “I have to do this, don’t I?”

 

“Yes.”  Hestra nodded once, as if that simple word settled everything, and gestured towards the broken guardhouse where she must have been hiding.  “Have scavenged what I could from labs.  Time to work.”

 

Edited May 26, 2023 by grod_the_giant

[grod_the_giant]

Now that they've made their first on-screen appearance, what do you folks think of my take on (post-rebellion) serviles?  Despite how central they are to the series, it feels like the games barely scratch the surface of what they're like as a race.  I'm having fun developing their culture and biology in new ways, but I'd love to hear your thoughts and personal headcannon.

[JDubkins]

On 6/1/2023 at 7:24 PM, grod_the_giant said:

Now that they've made their first on-screen appearance, what do you folks think of my take on (post-rebellion) serviles?  Despite how central they are to the series, it feels like the games barely scratch the surface of what they're like as a race.  I'm having fun developing their culture and biology in new ways, but I'd love to hear your thoughts and personal headcannon.

I'm enjoying your take on it! I haven't seen any other fanfiction works set after the war, so it's great to see your interpretation of what the post-war/post-oppression servile culture might become. Obviously you yourself have only begun to probe how that manifests, but I like the direction you are going. (Also, nice job walking the line between having to satisfy the pro-servile and pro-shaper readers, so props there.)

[Amira The Hot Potato]

On 6/1/2023 at 8:24 PM, grod_the_giant said:

Now that they've made their first on-screen appearance, what do you folks think of my take on (post-rebellion) serviles?  Despite how central they are to the series, it feels like the games barely scratch the surface of what they're like as a race.  I'm having fun developing their culture and biology in new ways, but I'd love to hear your thoughts and personal headcannon.

I hope you are doing well. will you continue this when you have time?

[grod_the_giant]

On 12/14/2023 at 6:55 AM, Amira The Hot Potato said:

I hope you are doing well. will you continue this when you have time?

 

Crap.  Um.  Hopefully?  Grad school has kept me pretty busy for the last few months, and this was one of the projects that kind of fell by the wayside.  I'll see if I can sink my teeth into it again (pretty sure I still remember where I was going) but... When I started on this, I was about two-thirds of the way through a replay of the series, and my brain was pretty firmly embedded in Terrestria.  If I'm being honest with myself, meaningful progress might have to wait until Infestation comes out.

 

Until that point, I can offer you some books I've actually managed to finish?  One's a superhero origin story influenced by (but much less depressing than) Worm, and the other's a high fantasy set at the bottom of the ocean.  Fair warning on the latter, though--it's the first in a trilogy and ends on something of a cliffhanger.