Page 3 of Larz

Her thumb stroked the back of my hand in a silent symphony of comfort. “But look at what we’re moving toward,” she said, gesturing at the expanse before us.

I let out a shaky laugh as excitement seeped through the cracks in my armor of nostalgia. “A whole universe waiting for us.”

“We’re pioneers,” she continued. “Just think of what we’ll find out there.”

The weightlessness crept up on me as we left Earth’s gravity behind — a freeing sensation that mirrored my decision to leave everything I knew for something wholly new. I closed my eyes for a moment, feeling both untethered and boundlessly expansive.

When I opened them again, Earth was only a marble against the vast tapestry of space — a poignant reminder of my past.

“I’ll miss it,” I confessed, a lump forming in my throat.

“We all will,” Adaline agreed. “But remember why we’re here.”

I turned to face her, finding resolve in her gaze. “To grow life on barren planets,” I said with renewed determination.

“To write our own stories,” she added with an encouraging smile.

I looked back at Earth one last time before settling into my seat. The sadness was still there, a gentle tug at my heartstrings, but it was now laced with an exhilarating sense of purpose.

“To new horizons,” I whispered to myself as we hurtled into the unknown, Earth becoming a part of history — our prologue to adventure.

Chapter

Two

Larz

I traced the perimeter of our territory, my footsteps silent in the verdant undergrowth. My eyes, accustomed to the faintest shifts in the environment, caught a flicker in the heavens. I paused, gaze locked on the anomaly. It was a shimmering object, out of place amidst the constellations that painted our night sky—a canvas of cosmic predictability.

I crouched, studying the object’s erratic dance through the stars. It didn’t belong. My hand instinctively reached for the hilt of my weapon, muscles coiled and ready. The air hung heavy with the scent of impending change.

I returned to our encampment, each step brimming with urgency. Our leaders convened beneath a canopy of bioluminescent leaves, their voices a low hum in the evening’s symphony.

“The sky speaks in unfamiliar tongues tonight,” I announced, stepping into their circle.

Elder Zorvix’s silver eyes met mine, reflecting the wisdom of eons. “Speak plainly, Larz.”

“An anomaly cleaves through our night,” I replied. “A vessel from beyond?—”

A murmur rippled through them. The notion of outsiders breached our walls as surely as any physical threat.

“Your orders?” I pressed, eager for direction.

Elder Zorvix shared a glance with his counterparts before returning his gaze to me. “Investigate. But heed caution; we know not what intentions drive this interloper.”

I nodded once, an affirmation of my duty and their command. As I turned to depart, I could feel their collective apprehension like a weight upon my shoulders. Our structured society had little room for unpredictability.

The hunt for knowledge was a silent one as I moved through familiar terrain transformed by the promise of something new—something alien.

I returned to my quarters, a structure molded from the living trees around it, their trunks curving to form walls and a roof. The air inside was cool and smelled of sap and soil—a stark contrast to the sterile environments I’d heard other civilizations favored. My gear lay in wait, each piece a testament to our technological prowess entwined with nature’s design.

I picked up my armor, a weave of fibers stronger than steel yet flexible as cloth, the scales of its surface shimmering with an iridescence that mimicked the skin of our most formidable predators. I slipped it on, feeling it conform to my body’s contours. Next, I chose my weapon—a staff that could extend orretract with a mere thought, its ends capable of delivering pulses that could stun or disintegrate depending on my intent.

The Elder’s command lingered in my mind as I strapped a communicator to my wrist. It was a device so advanced it seemed like an extension of one’s own body, responding to thoughts and gestures with seamless precision. With a flick of my wrist, the device projected a holographic map into the air. The topography of our lands lay spread before me, every hill and river marked with clarity. I traced the path I would take to reach the landing site of the unfamiliar vessel.

The Elders believed in caution with all else with the unknown. We were creatures of solitude; for generations, we had turned our gaze inward, focusing on perfecting our own society rather than seeking others. We had evolved past wars, past hunger—past all things that once made us primal—but at what cost? Our isolationist policies kept us safe, but also ignorant of the cosmos’s vastness and its inhabitants.

As I prepared my rations—packets of food synthesized from plants that held all the nutrients for a Zorvian warrior—I couldn’t help but ponder our way of life. Our connection to every living thing on our planet meant we thrived. We understood our environment as part of us and us part of it.

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