The Nature of Predators - Sovlin’s Transcript (11/13)

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Memory transcription subject: Cilany, Harchen Reporter

Date [standardized human time]: January 27, 2130

I was uncertain if Captain Sovlin would be a legitimate, fruitful source. It was strange that the paw that pointed me in the direction of Sivkit corruption was from a military officer of the Gojidi Union, but there had been a seed trail to follow from his advice. I wondered what the Gojid was getting out of all of this, especially when he was meeting me under strict conditions of anonymity. The Sivkits turning away refugees didn’t affect his people’s safety, and the rampant devastation on colonies they’d grazed through was on the opposite end of the galaxy. His motivations piqued my curiosity.

“Why are you doing this?” My first question in the interview was an obvious one. “The plight of these refugees takes play well outside your territory. That it’d even catch your notice, let alone prompt you to give a scoop to a journalist, is surprising.”

“Is it surprising? Prey have to be better than that. The Federation holds ourselves to a standard of empathy that separates us from the Arxur. The herd should take care of its own.” Sovlin’s eyes were solemn and certain, and I knew I was looking at a true believer. “I’ve seen what the war has done to too many families. It’s a matter of time before even our defenses fall to those savage predators, and people like me struggle to get their loved ones to a place as far away as possible. What happens when it’s my wife and daughter displaced, and the Sivkits won’t take a soul in? The Paltans can’t take everyone.”

“So you can imagine your loved ones in a refugee’s shoes, and think there should be more empathy for the Arxur’s victims. That makes sense, Captain. Why you’d take notice of herbivores devouring vegetation at a fast pace, rendering a few worlds that didn’t belong to anyone uninhabitable…it escapes me. Readers might wonder what the issue with the Sivkits wandering for grass is. It’s not an Arxur raid.”

“Nature is the gift of the Protector, providing from the dirt that which we need to live. Those planets might be needed, if we get pushed out of our homes; it goes paw in paw. Those are colonies that might one day be the last bastion of entire species. Is that all the questions you have on me, so we can get to the shit that actually matters?”

“I just have one more that I need to have an answer to. Why pick a random Harchen reporter to chase down these leads, instead of relaying a message to someone in Paltan space and letting it sort itself out? It takes months to travel and get the word back, even with FTL travel.”

Sovlin chuckled. “I’ve read your articles, Cilany, ever since your piece on Kolshian doctors deciding to eliminate ‘burdens to the herd.’ That story might not have grabbed a wider audience, but it struck a personal chord with me. That was an important story that people should care about…and you’re the only one who gave a damn. You’re like me. You care about the truth.”

“They say it’s a bioethics issue, sir, whether a child’s quality of life should be deemed a factor, but there's a more sinister admission there; I could’ve dug for more. I barely got my editor’s permission to insinuate that.”

“I would help you, since I know for a fact that there’s doctors who partake in Arxurlike culling, except I haven’t a shred of proof…and even I fear the predator disease facility. It sounds like a mad accusation. It’s a fine line between disrupting the herd and her organizations and protecting it. You must get that term thrown at you often.”

“Of course I do, Captain. I take that as a sign I’m good at my job. I’m going after the predator-diseased; it’s natural that they turn that accusation on me, since they are dangerous and would love to eliminate me. Anything to get the spotlight off their own wickedness.”

“I’ll leave the fending off of predator disease accusations to you. It’s sad to have to worry about the abuse of our institutions, but that’s why I’m keen on staying anonymous. Especially with what I’ll have for you next.”

I leaned forward with intrigue, curious to what Sovlin’s end goal was. “Next? I take it this is some kind of test.”

“You’re passing so far. This could be an excellent partnership. First, I’d like to see how you write the Sivkit article—then, we can talk about certain blue birds that definitely won’t take kindly to accusations about their own predator-diseased behavior.”

“You have a fruit vine to pick with the Krakotl?”

“I guess you could say that. They’ve always been too aggressive for my liking. It’s almost as if they’re meat-eating scum themselves. I’m grateful to come from a species with a lot more character and honor—as you should be.”

I was proud of the Harchen’s oral traditions and long history of passing on legends, something I felt a connection to in my modernized role as a reporter. It was a shame that we’d lost many of the chants, but at least truths exposed in writing couldn’t be lost. That was the beauty of a technological utopia such as the Federation: that I could shine a light on grave injustices, which could never crawl back undercover. If Captain Sovlin was going to help me on that mission, then I could feel myself warming to him already.

[Transcript date changed to October 20, 2136]

My job at Blissful Network, stationed on a Harchen colony called the Blissful Modernity, had been a  quiet life; I could ride along on the reputation I’d received from proving that the Krakotl military threw their weight around, intimidating others with their uncanny aggression. Sovlin had given me the biggest story of my career, and I’d been able to stay on that beat for quite some time. I had a great deal of respect for him, after he rooted out the ugliest elements that festered within the herd. However, I thought the Gojid captain and I had completed our partnership, going our separate ways for good.

And it might’ve been the end, had it not been for a failed extermination of a massive, violence-ridden world of predators that made the Krakotl’s extortion seem as lovely as summer rain. Reporters had a story thrown into our laps with those nasty humans coming back from the dead at the Federation summit. The Terrans lured us out to attack Earth, then sicced their Arxur allies on our undefended homes. There was no ticket off-world with the colony under siege, and Fahl’s military centering itself entirely around our homeworld. I was frightened, hiding with my colleagues, waiting for a gray to burst in and swallow a Harchen in one gulp.

Instead, the figure that entered was none other than the missing Captain Sovlin, an old friend who I knew was captured by the humans after the cradle. Accounts varied, but the common element was that he wasn’t in a sound state of mind after learning of his homeworld’s fate…and that he was in predator custody. I was beyond shocked to see that not only did he have all of his limbs, but that he had somehow broken free of the unspeakable beasts. Even a hero like him must have his sanity fried after being around them nonstop.

I felt terrible for Sovlin, though I was worried the Terrans were using him as bait; they thought our empathy and personal connections could be used to lure us to them. Living as humanity’s cattle would be enough to break anyone. I didn’t know that there was a prey animal out there who wouldn’t do anything for a second away from there, after looking at those faces. I shuddered, imagining that the hairless bipeds had arrived to join the Arxur raid. I doubted that I should even be talking to a predator-diseased or brainwashed Sovlin, as he tried to persuade me that humans hadn’t harmed him.

However, Sovlin reacted with surprise when I suggested that the humans told the grays that Harchen space was left undefended. It was then I realized that he was mentally there, but had somehow been duped by the grotesque monsters we all despised. I was beyond mystified. In the next breath, he claimed to already know they were pursuing “diplomatic avenues” with the Arxur! 

I know what happened to Hania though. How the fuck did those predators convince him? If they’re that convincing, I owe it to the herd to expose them, rather than trick prey into trusting them; I can see I’m getting through to Sovlin. That’s worth a fate worse than death, if my options are to be captured by the grays as cattle too.

“All I care about is the honest truth…and you might not like what that truth is,” I told Sovlin, not wanting to deceive an old friend who’d been through so much already. “I can’t help you spread human deceit. Not even to save my life.”

Sovlin flicked his claws in agreement. “This isn’t about humans, Cilly. I’m here because the Federation are killing each other over how they voted. It’s going to doom us all. Just please, come with me now, and take a look at the facts. That’s it.”

That I could do. If my final act of truth telling was to make the predators’ obvious lies crumble around them, well, I knew those ugly humans wouldn’t stand a chance. 

[Transcript date changed to October 24, 2136]

The deeper I dug to investigate the monsters’ claims, the less obvious the lies seemed. There was complexity in even the Arxur, contradicting the senseless behavior in the modern times; there were things that the Federation forgot to erase. The fact that such glaring omissions and alterations could be inflicted on the public consciousness in the digital age rocked the very concept of journalism. Knowing that Sovlin cared about the truth, I could understand why he believed the Terrans. The abuse of our institutions that we’d found years ago paled in comparison to the abuse within those constructs, at their very cores. 

Lies.

Corruption.

Cover-ups.

When Sovlin whisked me away from the Blissful Modernity, he assured me that I could stay with the Kolshians; I’d only have to tolerate the predators’ presence for the short ride to Aafa, before I could drop all pretense. However, after what Nikonus had just admitted to me—his fear that “people would start asking questions about predators that we don’t want them to ask.” The Federation was anything other than being on the right side of history: genetically engineering sapient species, turning them into lab rats like I’d recoiled from the humans for doing!

I’d rather go back with the humans than stay on the Kolshian world. At least I knew what they were.

Memory transcription subject: Sovlin, Gojid Retiree

Date [standardized human time]: May 12, 2151

Cilany loved asking questions, but this time, I had one for her. Why Sweden?

The creepy, colorless-skinned humans here were way too happy and full of coffee, and it made me want to claw their binocular eyes out. To worsen the issue, Cilany was spending her elder years writing an entertainment blog, which meant they might’ve rubbed off on her. I mean, talk about predator disease and contamination! What happened to the Harchen who wrote serious journalistic stories? I was huffing with contempt by the time I reached the apartment number she’d given me.

I should’ve called her like I did with Talpin, and pretended that she was on another planet, far, far away. I miss my miserable neighbors.

I knocked on the door with a dramatic sigh. “Cilany, of the nearly two hundred countries on Earth, why one in Pretend-Life’s-Good-inavia? This is what humans would be like if they were cured, and I hate…” 

The door swung open, revealing a tall human with a stupid grin and hair the color of frost. He leaned against the wooden frame, blue irises alight with excitement. This primate looked cheerier and dumber than Tyler. I had to escape, before he launched a Terran’s most predatory trap: an unwanted conversation.

“…it,” I finished. “Right, you’re not Cilany. I’m in the wrong spot. Must be going senile, like Tyler said.”

The human waved me in, to my dismay. “No, you’re not, Sovlin! Come on in.”

I groaned, sinking into the walker in defeat. I forced my legs to carry me into the strange predator’s lair, resigning myself to finally endure the torture I’d had coming for a long time.

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A/N - Chapter 11! We see the stories that Sovlin was a source on from Cilany, and the reason why  he fed her the info and chose a random Harchen reporter in the first place—tying back into the story of Recel’s deafblind brother. We see Cilany’s POV when Sovlin first tried to convince her to come with him during the Arxur raid, and her original motivations trying to disprove human lies. We then come to the present day, with Sovlin not being too happy about the country of Sweden existing.

Who do you think the mysterious frost giant at Cilany’s given address is? What do you think about the closer look at how Cilany and Sovlin first became affiliated, and our Harchen reporter’s motivations during her first NOP appearance?

As always, thank you for reading and supporting!