rix_scaedu | Entries tagged with atlantis

I wrote this to lilfluff's third prompt, "What changes in the world will the Atlanteans notice the most?"

“I suppose,” ventured Archduke Josef in Atlantean, “you and your companions have not yet had time to assess all the changes that have taken place in the past two thousand years.”

“Atlantis is no more, fallen beneath the waves,” replied Hzoreda!. “All other changes flow from that, surely?” She was leading them to the Navigator through corridors that were considerably tighter than they would have been on an airship of the same size.

Archduke Josef reminded himself that they had to fit all those colonists in somehow and the suitability of the cross corridors and niches for ambushes was a side effect of the design, not a driver of that design. “My Imperial master thought you should know the value of your time,” he handed her a folder, the papers inside written in Atlantean, “because every scholar on the planet who’s built a career and reputation on the study of Atlantis is going to want to confirm their theories by talking to actual Atlanteans. You need modern resources and there is no need for even your lowest, common pool labourers to give their time to these people. We have also taken the liberty of providing the names and contact details of several legal firms specialising in patent law in each of the major jurisdictions – your guildsmen may be able to obtain protection for some of their processes.”

“Why are you helping us this way?” She was slightly puzzled. “It cannot be in your interest to see us come to power again. We would displace you.”

“Neither is it in our interests to see you starve or be cheated,” replied the Terrencian Archduke. “I am under instructions to demonstrate the Emperor’s intentions to deal fairly with you.”

Naturally that was when the ambush hit them.

Five minutes later the attacking Atlanteans were groaning on the ground. One of them had a broken arm, another was probably concussed and there was a scattered serving of fractured ribs among them.

“How?” The one who’d led the Atlanteans down the ramp when it had first opened really looked as if he couldn’t understand what had happened. “We are Atlanteans, you are barbarians. You don’t have our advantages…”

“We’re at least as well fed as you,” Archduke Josef told him while his body guards loomed over the downed Atlanteans and the Kongoese Flight Lieutenant collected their weapons, “and we have been all our lives. Plus while you were sleeping your way to the stars and back we had two thousand years to get better at unarmed combat. Besides did you really think that no-one would ever duplicate what you did to your bodies?” The Archduke smiled and the Atlanteans cringed.

For unknown reasons the ancestors of the Atlanteans, also known as the mitochondrial haplogroup L7, migrated west to the Atlantic coast of Africa instead of taking the northern route out of the continent. They lived there for a relatively short period of time, the Casa 5 site has the longest period of habitation discovered from that period at just under one hundred years, and then they crossed the ocean to reach Atlantis. The abandoning of the African settlements has been dated to 110,000 Before Current Era (BCE). No archaeological record of their people remains in Africa from then until the beginning of their First Colonial phase.

Atlantis was fertile with abundant resources. What we have of Atlantean writings describing their early homeland depict an earthly paradise. However there were sufficient challenges that they were driven to develop tools and weapons rather than remaining stagnant. The seismic event that destroyed Atlantis put all archaeological evidence for the long period when the Atlanteans were confined to their continent at the bottom of the mid-Atlantic trench. However by the time the Atlanteans began establishing their first colonies on the Atlantic shores of the other continents they were generally more advanced than the peoples they met there and they excelled in the skills and sciences of metallurgy, crystallography, piezoelectrics and biological modification and manipulation.

The Atlanteans did suffer some initial colonial failures and it is telling that in his memoir Nga!mbe gave revenge against the savages as one of the reasons for his first African expedition. However by 4,000 BCE the Atlanteans dominated the African Atlantic coast. From there they spread north to the European coast and west to Arawak Coast. Settlements beyond the coastal fringes and in the north western Atlantic were tied to the locations of strategic and luxury resources, the emerald mines on the Itoco being a case in point.

The Atlanteans did not found any colonies east of the Pillars until 1,000 BCE however Atlantean trade goods have been found in Egyptian sites dating back to the First Dynasty, Mycenaean sites and in the iron trading settlements of Noricum. Evidence indicates that they also conducted gunship diplomacy with the Han. This attitude was typical of their dealings with other peoples and no doubt contributed to the rapid dissolution of the Empire after Atlantis was destroyed.

I wrote this to kelkyag's first prompt. This follows on from The Atlanteans' Return - Part II and is followed by The Atlanteans' Return - Part IV.

“I will inform my kinsman the Mwene that you have accepted his hospitality and of your numbers.” The gracious words flowed from his lips, meant like water offered to parched earth.

“I, Hzoreda!, thank you. May I have the honour of your name, Mwene’s kinsman?” The woman with the tightly plaited hair was equally gracious.

“I am Nkruma, First Lady of the Hzore.” The words went back lightly and the woman gave a tight little smile.

“You are wise as well as gracious, Nkruma,” she responded. “We will go back into our vessel to await word from your Mwene.”

“I am sure he will send word of a place you can settle yourselves shortly. May your gods smile upon you until our next meeting.”

“And yours upon you.” Hzoreda! shepherded the rest of the Atlanteans back into their ship and the door closed behind them.

The diplomatic party withdrew and the military tightened their perimeter. As the Atlanteans were the Mwene’s honoured guests none of the air defences in that perimeter were pointed at the Atlantean vessel.

It took the Mwene less than a full day to send instructions. The Atlanteans were being provided with a grant of land in the Huila District, if they promised and agreed to conduct themselves in accordance with Kongoese law. The Mwene’s kinsman presented the Atlanteans with a copy of the Kongoese legal code. He went on, “The other question is whether your vessel could fly you there or whether you will have to wake your people and have us transport them there.”

“We will have to read your Book of Law before we can agree to abide by it,” Hozoreda! was doing the talking again today and the Mwene’s kinsman wasn’t sure if that was because she was in charge or because she’d been delegated the task. “As for flying there ourselves, I would have to consult with our engineers and the Navigator to know if that is possible.”

“There are many differences between our laws and our records of Atlantean law,” he agreed. “Some principles are the same but some are very different. As for flying to your new location, if distance is an issue, I have brought an aerial navigator with me.” He indicated the tall, young Kongoese man in civilian clothes and carrying maps. “He has relevant maps and a distance conversion ruler to assist you in your decision making.”

“Thank you,” Hozoreda! accepted graciously. “He will need to come aboard to meet our Navigator. Perhaps you would wish to send companions with him to view the glories of our vessel unimpeded by other duties?”

“As it happens,” the Mwene’s kinsman smiled genially, “the Terrencian ambassador has petitioned the Mwene for just such an opportunity. Would he and his two aides be acceptable? They are here now.” He indicated the three fair skinned men standing to one side.

“Terrencians? They make goat cheese, do they not? Certainly. If the four of them would like to come this way?” Hzoreda! issued a pleased invitation.

As the four men disappeared into the Atlantean vessel an aide stepped up to the Mwene’s kinsman. “Sir, why did you allow that? It’s just handing the Atlanteans hostages!”

“I’m sure the Atlanteans think that too,” answered his superior reassuringly, “but Archduke Josef volunteered to go along to protect the Flight-Lieutenant. The Archduke is a solider, his bodyguards are helots and they all fight dirty. The Atlanteans might be in for a surprise.”

I wrote this to kelkyag's first prompt. It leads directly on from The Atlanteans' Return and it is followed by The Atlanteans' Return - Part III.

The kinsman of the Mwene took a deep breath and answered in his best classical Atlantean, speaking as a noble to a noble of equal rank, “There has not been an Atlantean governor anywhere since the Empire fell, two thousand years ago.”

“You assume airs unbecoming to your station, ape!” The leader began to thrust his staff with its crystal topping forward and the globe shattered. The crack of a rifle hung in the air. The Atlanteans gaped.

“You are not our masters, our owners or our betters,” corrected the Mwene’s kinsman in the same status mode as before, “but if you obey our laws and our rules then you are our honoured guests.”

“Honoured guests? When you have somehow destroyed my staff of authority?” The Atlantean was dignified indignation personified.

“Honoured guests,” confirmed the kinsman of the Mwene, “despite your attempt to use the staff of authority’s weapon on me.”

“We have other weapons.” That was almost a hiss from the Atlantean.

“So do we.” The Mwene’s kinsman stood firm. “Now, are you and all who travel with you our honoured guests or will you refuse our hospitality?”

It was the woman with the small, tight braids who spoke, “It cuts us deeply to accept hospitality in the house that was once ours, but accept it we must for we have others to think of.” The Mwene’s kinsman turned his attention to her and she went on, “Our ship could not find our departure point to land there. This is supposed to be the city of my birth but anyone can see that there has not been a city here for a long time. You say that the Empire fell two thousand years ago. Everything I have seen since waking from the long sleep agrees with that.” She glanced at their leader, who looked as if he might be fuming in dignified silence, “The welfare of the colonists until the point of foundation is my responsibility and this is my decision.”

“May I enquire how many colonists and where you were going?” The Mwene’s kinsman tried to keep his eyes on both her and the leader.

“We sought to colonise the high plains of heaven and dwell next to the gods.” She sighed. “Including all nobles, their house seeds, guildsmen and the common labour pool, we number twelve thousand.”

I wrote this to lilfluff's second prompt. This is is set in the same world as my Solstice stories, my Samella Clyde stories and the Terrencians in general. It occurs twenty to twenty-five years after the Solstice stories, their equivalent of our period.

Timing is everything. A century earlier and it would have been considered the wonder of the age but now, when the atmospheric barrier had been breached more than a generation ago, the wonder was not in, “What?” but in, “Whose?”

It descended slowly through the atmosphere, its shape and size reminiscent of an airship designed for the cruise trade. Its journey to the surface was watched by the entire planet and dissected in minute detail. Its original heading was the southern Atlantic Ocean and everyone wondered if the crew were aquatic, then it changed course and landed on the western coastal strip of Africa.

It came to rest, in fact, near the shore in the lightly inhabited southern reaches of the Kongo Empire. The Mwene, being a sensible and experienced man, sent a diplomatic party backed by the military to greet the arrivals. The University of Kinshasa archaeologists already at the site hurriedly taped off the interesting areas in the hope of dissuading people from parking anywhere they wanted.

The diplomatic delegation, including a number of foreign diplomats such as Archduke Josef the Terrencian Ambassador, and their supporting military contingent arrived five minutes after the space vessel landed. The leader, a kinsman of the Mwene, used the half an hour before any further sign of life to compose himself. His attendants and the foreign diplomats did the same. Much further away the Kongoese Airforces were using the same time preparing to sortie if required.

Finally the largest, most ornate portal on the vessel opened and a ramp descended from underneath it to the ground. From inside a group of five beings descended the ramp, carefully aligned in a V-formation with the most richly dressed of them in the centre and at the front. That being carried a staff with a coloured crystal globe set in its head. The military looked at that globe and narrowed their eyes in recognition.

The new arrivals were humans with skin the colour of darkest honey when you look at it in a glass jar. Their hair was black and shorn short on all of them except for one of the two women whose head was covered in tiny, tight plaits. They were all six feet tall or more and their clothing was richly coloured, although at this distance it was impossible to tell what the fabric was.

The leader spoke and only training prevented a visible reaction from the diplomats. They all had some grounding in classical languages and so recognised Atlantean when they heard it. Those who’d had a Classical education, like Archduke Josef and the Mwene’s kinsman, understood exactly what he said, “Bow down, you servile scum, before your betters of the master race. We, the flower of the Atlantean people, await the attendance of your governor.”