Truth be told

Illia Kondratov
Aug 8, 2017 · 4 min read

Image by edavid0817

Historians say many thousands of years ago a word spoken and a soul were the same for people. The word — the breathe — the soul. So people believed in what one have said always.

Funny.

Ardam FTL ship was about to come in three days. Three long days. It’s nothing compared to three hundred years of waiting.

Vrdishek said about it. Calm as always, came by: “Ship’s tuesdayning”. Like a pebble polished with a water. The one who knows the price paid for his every word spoken.

Hope he didn’t catch my shiver. Found me surprised, that’s all. Hope so. He’s too specialized on texture analysis after all. Tactificius on his fingertips. Oculas on his cheekbones. Able to see and feel a micrometer scratch on a surface. He’s a good specialist but not in human reactions.

He has left. I was on my own with the feel everything is too good to be true.


We’ve claimed Helimas five hundreds years ago. The crew of a generation ship willing to get back to the ground. Some were only able to live in a zero-g, some simply got used to this life. But most of us left the ship.

Colony was not that bad, to be honest. Until Home exploded.

I think nobody will ever know who was a victim and who was a villain. Accident? Someone’s attack? Revenge of our brothers we’ve left behind? Half the planet turned into a desert same second, and a huge hurricane started its march in a thinned atmosphere, when the starship turned into a blast.


We are not about a chit-chat. Words are a limited resource. One word is enough to say where, when and how long when I rent a lumb. Ardam crew will be surprised.

Two days to cross Sunny Mountains and to reach the capital. Lumbs are the only way.


Most people died in the first few minutes. The wind strike destroyed all but the most reinforced buildings. Lucky there were many people inside. The cold coming after the hot hurricane — dust have covered the sun light. Day after day survivors watched a winter without the snow behind windows of their shelters — radiation have ripped water vapor molecules. Hydrogen to be mostly thrown away by the shock wave.


Ardam has arrived on time. From the capital’s uptown I watched the shuttle landing — huge vehicle descended silently in a pillar of a zero-g field projected by geosynchronized FTLer.

Barter was going when I reached the downtown. Guests showed samples and some trinkets. It’s hard to say how much we’ve fallen behind Ecumene but we weren’t savages so monomolecular knives and gas-blasters were put aside in a bilges’ dusty corner.

Guests had their vac suits on — no chance for them to survive otherwise. It was hard to find we are of the same kind but it’s true.

You must not ask for silence when you want to talk to the crowd here.


We’ve survived. We had nothing. Dead planet, arid, crushed with a light of a thousand of suns, covered with a dust and ashes. Just a few specialists left alive.

But we’ve survived.

For every fault there was a punishment now. Not a death but a life. Other’s life.


I watch the people of a half-dead planet. Inoculated with modifications to protect them from a heat, a cold, a thin air, a radiation. This armor is based on living beings, not on hundreds of years of technical progress like guests’ suits.


We were the only thing we had. We’ve build everything from what we had. You draw a bad lot — and you’re cutted apart to give other people a chance. Not a bit wasted. We had a few good doctors.

Eyes to face the sun unblinkingly. Lungs to breathe in the atmosphere thin enough to see stars during the day. A thick skin. Tactificius, oculas. Lumbs able to bring three hundreds of kilograms through the desert and across the mountains.

Protein in cauldrons.

I don’t know why we’ve lost the ability to speak. Was it a side effect or a hand of God? Was it a way to hide deeds no one was proud of? But it happened suddenly and touched all the records, books, archives. People being used to jabber found they’ve just spoken or written their last word. Brain just ceased to continue. You can sense, you can think, but you’re not a part of a history from this moment. You can’t tell about the price we’ve paid at the beginning of it — and the first hundred of years of a Helimas’ history is covered with silence. Silence that was so hard to break through.

I know the words to share the truth.

But should the truth be told?

Futura Magazine

Futura Magazine is an electronic publication for speculative fiction content based on Medium’s platform. We publish fine Science Fiction, Fantasy, and other fictitious stories from a wide range of ethnic-cultural background. (Image credit: “The Verge” — © Lightfarm Brasil)

Thanks to Gehazi Bispo

Illia Kondratov

Written by

Yet another Android developer. Sci-fi/cyberpunk fan when off duty.

Futura Magazine

Futura Magazine is an electronic publication for speculative fiction content based on Medium’s platform. We publish fine Science Fiction, Fantasy, and other fictitious stories from a wide range of ethnic-cultural background. (Image credit: “The Verge” — © Lightfarm Brasil)

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