Some short fiction based in the world of No Man’s Sky
Vy’keen First Contact
The Vy’keen have a terrible reputation for violence, but the first reaction I got from one was laughter.
As soon as my starship was airborne, I criss-crossed the planet I’d been marooned on, looking for other crash sites. The planet was a patchwork of vast, empty snowfields and dark forests. Small settlements were dotted here and there, and I came across some curious ruins and monoliths depicting the ancient history of the Vy’keen; galactic war led by a warrior named Hirk against the ubiquitous sentinels. But I found no other stranded travellers.
My exploration had left me low on fuel and other resources, so I decided to investigate one of the settlements in the hope of finding help, and perhaps even a witness to the crash. The first being I came across was a Vy’keen sentry, on duty in a small trade outpost on the edge of a forest. They regarded me sternly as I walked in, but remained seated at a terminal that showed the outlines of roaming sentinels. The Vy’keen was an intimidating presence, with shoulders broad enough to carry a pair of plasma cannons, and hands that could peel open the helmet of my spacesuit. Their purple-blue head sported four impressive silver blades that jutted from the side of their skull, and a brilliant red jewel was embedded in the centre of their forehead. A cluster of grey metal bands woven into their chin emphasized maturity and authority, and I wondered if this was no ordinary back-country soldier.
I pointed earnestly at myself.
“Traveller.”
I pointed at the sky, then gestured to indicate I had flown here and attempted to land (although I had no idea if I’d flown here or not, but it seemed the most reasonable story to tell). I banged my hand against the desk.
“Crash!” I pointed outside towards the forest. “Crash! I crashed in the forest. Help?”
The sentry clearly didn’t comprehend – or perhaps didn’t care. I repeated the story with more fervour, swooping my hand down from the sky towards the table again. “CRASH! Help?”
Then the Vy’keen snorted. “Zuxingbia amchogawa iyorxung ach kochong alet? Grah!”
They slapped their enormous hand against the terminal, copying me. I got the impression I was being mocked.
“Mynuud iexin alet yub iyorxung!”
The Vy’keen leaned back in their seat and barked enthusiastically, mandibles wide apart and waving rhythmically, lips drawn back to reveal uneven, stumpy teeth. Another Vy’keen, standing at the trade counter at the back of the room, joined in and the outpost filled with a cacophony of seal-like barks and growls. Vy’keen laughter!
When they’d calmed down, the sentry tapped a few icons on their screen and a nearby console lit up. There were films of Vy’keen spaceships hurtling towards the ground, aimed at a convoy of sentinel walkers. Explosions filled the screen. There was little left of the sentinels afterwards, or the Vy’keen ship.
“Turpanq qabgar xalaiw udaobeia zehub iyorxung. Tolinac hul! Yuyao ogz nieharl iastaiseha.”
The atmosphere grew solemn. Perhaps the Vy’keen were only interested in crashes that killed the enemy as well as the pilot. Did they regard me as a failure? Was I an insult to them? I turned to go.
“Ifa iastaiseha.” The sentry stood and walked to the back of the room, barking instructions to the other Vy’keen. They argued briefly, but it was clear the sentry was the more powerful of the two, both in stature and rank, and the Vy’keen behind the counter handed over a box. The sentry passed it to me. A gift? It was surprisingly heavy, about the same size as my helmet, and my visor warned of a low-level radiation signature.
“Irk iyorxung higunsa iastaiseha. Xainbi xalaiw obei alet!”
With a final grunt the sentry returned to their console, attention once more on the sentinels.
Back at my ship I opened the box to find a case of starship launch cells – clearly the Vy’keen wanted me to get back in the air. I just hope they didn’t expect me to follow the example of their comrades.
The Korvax – Techno Paradox
“Entity provide data?”
It was harder than I expected to get the Korvax to listen to techno. I knew they could hear it because they understood my ‘speech process’ well enough, and the radio sounded loud and clear, but for some reason the music, any kind of music, just didn’t register. Eventually their patience would run out.
“Data transfer will commence soon?”
I’d try to explain that the data transfer was already happening, if only they’d listen carefully, but the Korvax would have none of it. Perhaps they thought I was tricking them.
“Korvax echoes teach benevolence to low intelligence species.”
Having a complete blind spot to music seemed odd to me. The Korvax are a highly intelligent electronic life form with an insatiable desire for knowledge. Even if they hadn’t developed a musical culture of their own, I felt sure they’d know about the music of other civilisations. I wanted to know if they recognised any of the tunes I’d discovered so far – the music from the holographic archive – so I kept looking for someone who could help.
I met Scholar Entity Kitotm in the flight terminal of a large trading post. They were sitting on their own, occasionally tapping on a handheld tablet and beeping quietly, probably waiting for transport to another system. As I approached they looked towards me and lights flickered on their shiny black faceplate. I introduced myself.
“Korvax Convergence adores fascinating Traveller. New Korvax research topic!”
I sat down next to Kitotm and asked if they knew about music.
“Yes! Many echoes contain data. Vy’keen music. Gek music. Timestamps from every era. Korvax Convergence overflowing with music!”
Korvax music?
“Of course. Traveller would like to receive data?”
My heart raced. So this universe was full of music, and Kitotm knew all about it! Perhaps I’d been going about this the wrong way – If I could understand Korvax music first, then maybe I could get them to listen to techno after all. I nodded enthusiastically.
Suddenly a wire shot out from one of Kitotm’s fingers and embedded itself in my neck. My vision went black, and then a pattern appeared in front of me – a simple pattern like the edge of a snowflake that copied itself endlessly to fill my whole field of vision, accompanied by a rhythmic, tinkling sound. Whenever I focused on the pattern it briefly opened out then filled in again, like the foliage of a dense jungle, and the tinkling sound rose and fell as if I was brushing against a million tiny bells.
Abruptly the pattern vanished and I was sitting in the flight terminal again. I just caught sight of the wire retreating into one of Kitotm’s fingertips, and a small aperture closing behind it.
“Low entropy pattern for simple Traveller.”
Whatever Kitotm had decided to share struck me as more of an exercise in mathematics than art. The tinkling music and space-filling shapes were certainly beautiful, like an efficient algorithm, but I struggled to find any meaning in it beyond a pretty pattern. But how would I know otherwise? Perhaps Kitotm had played me the Korvax equivalent of “Twinkle, twinkle little star”, and now I was questioning when the music was going to start.
I asked Kitotm if Vy’keen and Gek music was similarly abstract. Lights sparkled on their face plate.
“Traveller would like to receive data?”
The wire pierced my neck again. There was a moment of pain, but this time my vision didn’t black out. Instead a thick scent enveloped me; muzzy and lethargic, like a roomful of hyacinths in full bloom. Instinctively, I reached for the oxygen control on my breather, but Kitotm waved my hand away. Of course – this was just a playback, but it was so vivid. I took some deep breaths, and then heard music – woozy, undulating sounds like an electronic organ drifting in and out of tune, and a slow melody that riffed languidly around the same few notes. A loud, burbling noise joined in, somewhat like a gargling pelican – the singing voice of a Gek! I got the impression they were terribly lovesick.
The Gek love song ended in a suffocating fug of pheromones and the music tailed off into silence. The wire again slipped back into Kitotm’s finger and the faint smell of starship launch thrusters returned. It would have been enough to hear the Gek song on its own. Instead the potent synaesthesia left me slightly sick and disorientated.
I decided not to ask about Vy’keen music. Instead, I asked if they knew of any other kinds of music, from other beings perhaps.
Kitotm looked away for a moment, as if lost for an answer. “Sentinels?” A ring of red pixels flashed around the edge of their face plate. “Eheu! There are no other kinds. Unless, Traveller, you can provide data?”
Now it was my turn to teach the Korvax about music. I whipped out the portable speaker from my backpack and placed it in front of Kitotm. A cluster of blue and green lights flashed in the centre of their faceplate and they leaned forward eagerly. I tapped the top of the speaker to connect it to the radio, and the steady pulse of techno filled the air. Deep, sonorous drums, snappy percussion, vibrant, metallic synths. The music unrolled like the long tail of a kite looping and diving in a bright, clear sky. I remembered Kitotm’s comment about ‘low entropy’ and the well ordered pattern of the Korvax music. Perhaps techno would appeal to them in the same way – after all, the whole basis of techno was the loop, a regular 4/4 beat. I wondered what patterns Kitotm might be watching inside their mind.
“Data transfer will commence soon?”
I pointed towards the speaker and explained that the music was already playing. Couldn’t Kitotm hear it? I tried turning up the volume.
“Unisensory audio data with a fixed rhythm.” Kitotm sat back in the chair again. The lights in his face plate had gone dim. “Traveller, do you know about music?”
I stared at them, exasperated. Music was the one thing to bring me hope in this strange universe! How could I get them to understand?
Then I realised something – Kitotm admitted hearing the music, but called it ‘unisensory’. Of course, it was just sound my speaker produced. But the Korvax and Gek music was intimately entwined with something other than sound – visual patterns in the case of the Korvax music, and a vivid smell with the Gek. Did music in this universe have to be accompanied by some other sense? I asked Kitotm to explain.
“Traveller, music has many dimensions. Korvax data crosses hundreds. Gek music has twelve. Your low intelligence species only experienced the dimensions that matched your own senses. Unisensory audio is not music. To become meaningful, music always extends beyond sound. Perhaps Traveller understands? What other sense does your audio signal stimulate? What does it make you do?”
I thought for a second. Dance?
I stood up and moved to an open space nearby, then started nodding my head in time with the music. Luckily there was no one else around. I had never been a great dancer, I knew that much, but as I got going the lights on Kitotm’s face plate came to life again, flickering blue and green in recognition of fresh data. It was working! Nervously, I bobbed up and down and swayed my arms back and forth, trying to match the beat, a jellyfish in a spacesuit trying to swim higher, reaching for the surface.
“Traveller, that is… dancing?” Kitotm stood up. “A physical dimension, like Vy’keen!”
Kitotm copied my movements and started dancing too.
I knew the Korvax would like techno.
fresh static :: olaf quintessa 