Ex Inani, Ad Astra

Elias had been working overtime shifts for his job as a spacecraft technician for smaller ships on the station. In most cases he would come home covered in oil or sweat, sometimes both. At times Elias would be so tired that he wouldn't bother cleaning off before passing out when getting back to his room.

            One night though, after willing himself to clean off before getting to bed, he couldn't sleep. He stared silently out of his window down at the planet the station orbited, Sabit they called it. Sabit was a blueish-white orb, mostly covered in ice and ocean but not untouched by humans. He wondered how many people lived there, millions? Billions, perhaps? It was not his job to care. He watched the sphere for a long while as the torus he resided in completed its endless loops. He did not think much while doing so but couldn't deter from feeling small and fleeting. He turned away from the planet, leaving himself to nothing but his thoughts, of which he didn't much care for.

            Elias, realizing he wouldn't be falling asleep any time soon, decided to walk around the station. By now, it was past midnight station time, and most of everything on his deck was closed. Despite this, it didn't take long for him to find a bar on one of the poorer decks. Perhaps a drink would ease Elias's feelings of insignificance?

            The bar was dimly lit with soft blue underlighting surrounding the tables and bar, and despite being on the lower-class deck, it was well maintained. Elias approached the bartender which to his surprise and relief was organic. The bartender said his name was Bastian, something… something. Elias paid no mind to the conversation the bartender attempted to have, he stood patiently for him to finish so he could place a drink order. The bartender fetched Elias's drink without quarrel. Interesting thing though, when Elias attempted to pay for the drink, the bartender claimed it was already paid for.

            “Pardon?" Elias asked hesitantly, unsure he heard correctly.

            “The drink, it's been paid for." The bartender replied with a curious lilt. He raised his hand slightly which held a towel he had been previously using to polish a glass.

Elias traced the line of the bartender's arm across the length of the bar. At first, nothing stood out, but then just barely outlined against the wall was a Strider. Elias stared blankly, he had never seen one before, but he had heard enough stories to know what exactly it was. The creature turned its gaze from out of a window towards the bar where Elias stood. Elias hastily turned away, hoping the creature hadn't spotted him.

“What?" Elias asked in moderate disbelief. He now stood attentively, curious to what the bartender had to say. Oh, what was his name again? Elias thought to himself, feeling slightly guilty having so easily dismissed his name.

“Well just that, the creature paid for your tab in advance." The bartender returned to polishing his glass.

Elias stood still, watching the ice stir in his drink.

“Well, best to go see what it wants, no?" The bartender rhetorically replied.

“I think I'll just finish my drink and go, that's what I'll do." Elias replied to himself, hoping for the outcome. The bartender set the glass down on the table, towel too. He pressed his palms into the metal alloy of the bar before speaking.

“Look, I've worked here for almost twenty years now, never before has one of its kind come down to this part of the station, let alone to this bar. Go see what it wants." The bartender seemed to be disappointed in Elias's lack of curiosity for what the creature wanted.

Elias swallowed hard. He took a $5 from his wallet and slid it to the barman, before the bartender could reply, Elias had already picked up his drink and left, walking in the direction of the Strider. The creature had returned to looking out of the window.

Elias looked over the creature. Like all beings of sentience, the creature was a biped. It looked to be around eight to nine feet tall if standing, its skin was such a dark shade that he could barely see the outline of it when silhouetting the black of space. It was like the creature was a literal pocket of void. The only hint that it was there was the odd clothing it wore. As Elias crept closer, he began to make out its finer details. The creature had great beaty eyes, its sclera was just as black as its skin but reflected the soft blue table light. The only natural color on its body were the piercing vermillion irises with a pupil the size of a pinhole. Elias reached the edge of the table, standing a few feet away from the being, still it only glared out of the window.

“Um, Hi? I believe you paid for my drink?" Elias cringed as he spoke.

The creature swung its eyes and looked to Elias without turning his head. The two simply shared a stare for a moment before the creature turned to face a chair to its side. It took its arm to one of the chair legs before sliding it up to the table it was seated at, yet again the creature fixated on something out of the window. Elias begrudgingly accepted the silent invitation to sit down. As he sat, Elias could help but notice the surrounding air seemed to chill. The aroma surrounding the creature reeked of ozone, and he his mouth suddenly tasted like that of iron. Elias studied the being; its face lacked a predominate nose and ears. Both were reduced to small holes on the side of its head, and small holes just above its upper lip, respectively. Or at least what looked like its lip, upon closer inspection they looked immovable, like a great beak. Elias reached this conclusion as the upper jaw seemed to wrap over the lower one at a point. Following down its neck Elias noted its arms. One rested on the windowsill, while the other rested on the table with a drink in hand. Its skin looked tough and like that of a reptile. Long scaled fingers thinned to a point around a beverage. The drink looked to be the same as his own, or at the least very similar. It wore nothing on its upper body, and its lower body was draped with a grey silk that rolled off the side of its upper legs. It wore a curios pendant around its neck and as it swang, it seemed to fall in and out of reality. Interdimensional jewelry no doubt, Elias knew how expensive that could get.

As the thought escaped Elias, he wondered if he should speak, but held his thoughts. It was the creature who invited him over after all. Another brief moment passed before the creature spoke for the first time.

In a gargled rasp it said, “That planet has 42 names. You know it as Sabit, others as Donaba Nam, some as a sequence of varying letters and numbers."

 Elias looked to the window, staring idly at the whiteish-blue orb. It sat undisturbed, oblivious to their wandering eyes.

The creature continued, “Yet none are its true designation. Everything in this Universe has a true name. A name that the Universe recognizes you by. From this name one can learn anything about that said object. Its origin, its properties physical and conceptual, as well as its fate." It removed its eyes from the planet and into Elias's, its burning irises burning themselves against Elias's retinas. “Even you have a true name."

Despite lacking the facial complexity of a human, Elias could tell it was smiling in some way. Elias took his first sip of his drink, unsure if he really wanted to see out this conversation any further. “Is that so?"

“Well sure, you are a product of this Universe, therefore you have a true name." Its mouth clicked as its jaws contacted one another in between syllables. “Would you like to hear it?"

Elias took another swig of his drink, the hell he didn't! Still, he offered the creature a more tame response. “Not at this particular time thank you." Elias wondered if the creature had a true name.

“Ah yes, I do." The creature replied as Elias finished the thought. His blood ran cold. The creature waved an arm idly, “But that's not important right now." It then turned to its beverage and quickly necked it, raising a scaled arm in the process as if to hail a cruiser. “The bartender's true designation is not as you know him by, Bastian, was it?" The being side-eyed Elias, Elias nodded in affirmation, the name returning to him now having been mentioned aloud once more. The creature picked up where it left off, “But rather Pincerna. From this designation, one can know that he will die of a stroke in four years, two months, and fourteen days from now."

Elias turned as the bartender arrived with two new drinks, Elias had barely gotten halfway into his own. He stared blankly as the bartender departed, feeling slightly uneasy having gained the seemingly forbidden knowledge. “I'm sorry to ask but, what is it that you want from me?"

The creature moved from its relaxed stature and leaned in attentively. It held its fingers interlocked between one another as its forearms rested on the tabletop. “Do you know what I am?"

Its eyes blinked dreadfully slowly as Elias thought for a moment. “I do not."

“Have you ever heard of something like me? What do they call one of my kind?" It rasped in Elias's direction.

            “I've heard your kind are called Striders… I think?" Elias offered the creature his knowledge of it.

            “And are you familiar with what one of my kind do?" The creature held its rounded maw slightly agape.

            “I've heard stories, some good… some bad." The creature clacked its jaws shut as if it were frowning.

            “Do you fear me?" The Strider asked dryly.

            Elias tensed up at the creature's question. Truthfully, he did to a degree. He could not form a response. His lips parted slightly, only for them to seal shut just a moment later.

            The creature groaned in annoyance. “Stories, that's what they are. People fear what they do not know. It is not my intention to scare you." It nodded its head to something out of the window, beckoning Elias to take a look. Elias peered through the glass down to a docked freighter, at a void-jumper more specifically. The ship was sleek and streamlined, it looked to be unpainted, leaving its natural base layer of reflective steel shining in the hangar lights.

            “I suppose you don't know how your void ships reach the stars?" The Strider asked.

            “I can't say I do." Elias replied, curious as to what the creature was getting at.

            “Well, it's not the simplest of endeavors, and it's made even more difficult that when a ship enters metaspace, computers don't function, and neither do humans. Almost all machinery is turned off save simple life support. All humans must be put into cryo-pods, hundreds, even thousands of humans packed away like sardines. Failure to do so will result in broken machinery, and very broken humans." The creature gasped in another creaking breath. “Even the navigational systems are turned offline if favor of a more archaic approach. The motion fins at the aft of the ship are controlled by a wire that passes over a pulley."

            Elias interjected, “Surely that can't be the case?" The Strider shot a glare at Elias as if he had just offended the creature. “I mean, I didn't know, please continue."

            “Well now you do. Humanity will solve many problems down the line, but travel through metaspace will always be done without computer assistance." The creature's beaked maw snapped shut once more.

            Elias took a moment to think. He figured talk of the future with such certainty would mean an extreme amount of bullshit, but he couldn't dissuade the hairs on his neck from standing stiff like steel beams.

            The Strider spoke again, “If you understood time, truly understood it, you would know that time is like a painting already painted." The Strider gave Elias another moment to think before continuing, “As I said, humans and machines can't handle the stresses of metaspace very well, so special minds were engineered back on Earth. One's that can navigate such a ship into and out of metaspace and across unimaginable distances." The creature let the tail end of the statement hang in the air, waiting for Elias to finish it.

“A Strider."

The Strider nodded.

Together they watched the docked void-jumper back away from its port before pointing its nose to some point in the vast difference. It patiently waited to be given clearance from the station. After another moment, space at the nose and fins of the ship began to lens. Great bulges of far off space bubbled into existence and soft purple lighting beamed from its engines. Then in an instant, the ship disappeared, and the space where the ship once was rapidly oscillated until no signs of disturbance were present.

The Strider babbled on, “There is no time, no duration in metaspace. Within metaspace time is a location, and all events occur at once. It is the privilege of one awake during transit, being able to see events ahead in time, and those back in time. Given these complexities, we occasionally arrive before we set off."

“So, you've been to the future?" Elias asked.

“Relatively." It responded.

Elias continued, “And the past?"

“Relatively." It again replied.

“Is that a blessing, or a curse?" Elias pondered aloud.

“I still find myself wondering that at times to be truthful." The Strider quietly responded to itself. “There will come a day where Striders are no longer needed, it is the same day that humans will learn to bear metaspace, but that time will not be for another few thousand years."

Elias had trouble imagining such a far distance into the future. He stared off around the bar, finishing his first drink to help distract his aching mind. He observed a woman walk into the bar over his shoulder.

“Her name is Lillian Gray, as you know her." The Strider mumbled in no particular direction.

Elias turned, “Huh?"

The Strider pointed to the woman Elias had previously been looking at, she had just sat down, immediately burying her nose in a book. “She's lived a rather boring life, one filled with missed opportunities and regrets. She's trying to get back on her feet, but it will all be in vain as she will be killed within a month by a freak accident on the construction deck."

The woman looked up from her book and looked over towards Elias, or to the Strider perhaps. She quickly returned to her book.

Elias recalled a rather famous paradox of sorts, “It's not a preventable thing, is it? In trying to save her, or change her fate, I would only seal it?"

The creature nodded in affirmation. Having already finished its second drink, its clawed fingers grabbed Elias's second and finished it off in a single gulp. Elias watched in mild disappointment. The creature spoke with renewed vigor, “Let's not ramble on any longer. Striders live a very long time, but we're not immortal. Every once and a while we need to recruit. It's not a very pleasant transformation that I will admit, but the pros outweigh the cons."

Elias couldn't help but let out a ginger laugh, Surely the thing can't be serious?

“I am, I've told you how it is, you have the mind for it. You will see the true nature of reality and the names that go along with it. In return, you will only need to pilot a few starships from star to star. All of eternity in exchange for a little bit of shepherding." The creature announced pridefully.

Holy shit it's serious, “What?" Elias replied, now incapable of thinking clearly.

“No doubt you'll need some work done to you, but sooner than later you'll be looking like me in no time. I'll give you a moment to think it over." The creature let the statement fade into the background ambience of the bar.

Elias sat silently for a moment before his laugh resurfaced. Mixed between breathes Elias replied, “I'm sorry but-."

The strider interrupted Elias. “Look, my time is short, so I'll save you the trouble. You're going to say something along the lines of how this is such short notice and how ridiculous this all is. Then you'll politely decline the offer in such a way where you tell me you like your life the way that it is, and that you can't just go bounding off into the universe all of a sudden. You wouldn't say this of course as not to offend, but that's the gist of it is it not?"

Elias shut his mouth in annoyance that the Strider had summed it up so well, but the creature had not yet finished. In a more sinister voice it echoed, “Let me make this easy for you. You have yet to get over your marriage, and you won't for quite some time. You're constantly waiting for a promotion to anywhere but your current position, and you'll get it, two years from now. The work will be hard, and the pay will only be marginally better. It won't take long for you to regret taking the position, but your inflated sense of pride will keep you locked in the profession. You will die-,"

Elias had heard all he wanted to, “Stop."

The strider did not seem to care, “37 years, seven months, ten days, and nine hours from now in a-,"

Elias voiced quivered, practically begging the creature, “Please don't."

The creature paused and held an expression of one it thought, likely wondering if it should reveal Elias's fate to him. “In a decompression incident aboard a void-jumper bound for Andabari. As your blood boils and your lungs explode, you will think back quickly to what a boring life you lived. How fear constantly held you back from pursuing your passions. Funny enough, it won't be until that very moment where you come to realize all of this. This is how events will unfold."

The creature sat back into a more relaxed position as Elias numbly stared into his empty glass. How he wished it weren't so devoid of liquor. “Then I won't get on that void-jumper." Elias pridefully told the Strider.

“Yes, you will." The creature proclaimed.

Elias rebuttaled, “Then I won't go to Andabari."

“Yes… You will." The Strider told Elias confidentially.

“Well, Goddamnit! Why tell me this if there's nothing I can do!?" Elias cried out.

The Strider folded its arms over one another, business like. “Striders see possible futures as well. I said time is like an already painted painting. But it is still not completely prone to wear and tear every now and then. The painting will look the same in the end, but perhaps slightly faded, or bleached by light in some parts. The same is true for anyone. A single decision still has the potential to change the journey to your destination, so to speak. Your death aboard that void-jumper is one outcome, but there is something you can do. I'm leaving tomorrow aboard a void-jumper bound for Omnitasm, come along."

“And do what?" Elias curiously asked the Strider.

The strider replied more emphatically, “And sit up front with me. Catch your first glimpses of metaspace. The ship will jump to Omnitasm and you'll see what I'm getting at. Like I said, you've got the brain to handle it. Afterwards, we will go to Earth and begin your training. Then you'll become a Strider, like me."

“And if I don't want to become a Strider?" Elias harshly asked the Strider across from him.

The strider shrugged its shoulders, “Then I bid you luck with the rest of your life and assure you that there will be no reaching Andabari alive. I'd offer you another drink, but you're about to go to bed."

“I was thinking about it, and the fact that you drank mine." Elias using his words to poke at the resolve of the Strider.

The creature stood as it regarded Elias again, nodding ever so slightly. “If you're so in need of another drink, there will be plenty aboard the void-jumper that I am incapable of drinking as its pilot. It leaves at 10:00 tomorrow, standard time."

“Look I'm really not interested. Thank you though." Elias said, indirectly bidding away the Strider. To which the Strider bowed and turned for the door. As it left Elias's peripherals, the air again smelled strongly of ozone, but the warm air seemed to return.

Elias stared out the window down towards Sabit, then to the docks where the void Jumper once rested. Where had it gone? He imagined, if time truly did not exist in metaspace, that the ship had already completed its journey the instant it had left the station. He imagined the hundreds, potentially thousands of lives voyaging to some far away star in another part of the galaxy. He imagined that during the “time" inside metaspace, when all the robots had been powered down and the humans frozen in deep-sleep, there was a hunched creature in some room keenly pulling and tugging at steering yokes and levers. A creature so foreign to its passengers that they likely had no idea it was the one navigating. To which the navigator would stare in awe at the wonders that passed by it, during its “time" beyond reality.

Elias was curious as to what wonders such a being might see in metaspace. Something occurred to Elias just then.

He spoke softly to himself, asking the no longer present Strider, “Why come?"

“What's that?" The strider replied just beyond Elias's back. The Strider watched as Elias frantically turned around, nearly swiping an empty glass off the table. “You had something to say? Well go on, say it."

Elias recovered from the initial shock of the Strider's return. “Why did you come to ask me what you did? You've seen the future, you said so yourself. If the future doesn't change, then you knew I would say no."

The creature bent down close to Elias's ear; Elias could feel the coolness of the creature's skin sucking the warmth from his own. “I lied. I came to you because you will think the matter over tonight and seek me out tomorrow. We will travel together. I would not waste my time on you otherwise." It placed its scaled fingers on Elias's shoulders, Elias felt the points of them digging ever so slightly into his skin.

“This is only one of the many rituals of us Striders, we may come to our past selves and make the offer. Ten o'clock tomorrow, see you then."