PRELUDE - NOMINATIVE DETERMINISM


The Naufragium, transversing the Deep Dark

In the Deep Darkness where nothing lives a great iron-clad steamer swirled and blurred as it rolled through on a thick cloud of smog that wasn't - and couldn't - be there. Interlopers in the incomprehensible, migrant vagrants in the impossible void of nothingness that ought not exist but does, because somewhere we know there to be a vaccuum to rival all other vaccuums, a deep, dark emptiness that is as unending as it is unbeginning. It is the place we fear as we cloak ourselves in shrouds of religion and ritual, the dark blackness that is without colour (and thus cannot be blackness) and without space or being or canny of reasonable mind. It is the place we delude ourselves with visions of paradise (or even eternal torment pits of fire and ice) for.

It is the netherland, the hinterland of non-being.

And yet here this iron leviathon ran, roaring slow and lazy on impossible currents.

It was bloated. Not forged with grace or beauty in design, it was an industrious beast of strong blackened timbers and thick heavy plates of metal. All along the sides stout funnels protruded, belching out great swathes of black smog as blazing furnaces deep within the heart of the thing raged and spat, meaty sooted hands shovelling a constant rush of coal and sweat.

It was a great, metal and imperious fist, jutting aggressively in the void-space where no ship was ever meant to tread, punching the aether in its brash defiance. An iron hulk of science and endeavour and furious manpower.

And across its blunt prow it read Naufragium, and underneath, in a smaller and neater print, Empyrean Trading Company.

The ship rolled on in the void space, and then slipped through a tall wobblying rift; a tear in the aether as incomprehensible yet as exploitable as the one it had come through.

And it emerged floating high on lilac clouds about the New World.


The Detective and Lemuel Carter, Captain's Quarters on The Naufragium

"They're saying it's some sort of devilment on the part of the natives, you know."

The captain mulled this over, carefully. He was a tall, broad shouldered man, with the same blunt look of muscle as the ship he commanded, and yet he looked painfully awkward stood pacing about his own quarters, hands clasped tight behind his back.
The middle-aged man sat lounging on a velvetted chaise pretended not to notice his discomfort. Rather he 'hem'ed and 'hah'ed over his lengthy paper dossier, in what the captain felt could only be a pointedly exaggerated manner.

"Well," the seated man said, throwing his hands up theatrically (Exaggerated, the captain was sure now. Mocking him?). "I suppose natives will be natives, savages will be savages. You needn't look so worried, captain. The Crown cannot hold you or the Company to blame if there are a few bad eggs about in the jungle making things a little...ah...difficult for the settlers coming over. Colonization never was a peaceable business, no matter how hard the civilized party may...try. Mm."
The captain stopped, looking out through the grimy port-hole across the room. It was not large, as such, but was the largest window anywhere about the ship. Void-travel meant reinforcement everywhere, and a little light on the journey over could easily be sacrificed to keep the aether getting in...

"You are with us to make an inspection of the Company's stations in the New World...Detective. We are coming out of the entry point now, somewhere over the inner jungle of the territory the Company is looking to make base on. Perhaps you'd like a brief look from the window to get a better idea of where you'll be visiting..."
The captain spoke formally, but tentatively. As an agent of the Crown, the 'Detective' (as his supercargo had asked to be addressed) was of ambiguous but certainly threatening authority. Quite where he stood in relation to a steamer captain of the Company was not clear, but the seated man's confidence gave reason for the captain to suspect it was only unclear to the captain.
"If you would be so good as to describe our position, I believe I have a map here. Aha. Yes. It was under another despatch from our journalist friend Dean. Perfectly insane, poor fellow. Spent a little too long in the jungle, one suspects. Aha. Mm. You will describe the ship's current locale, please?"
The Detective sat with map on knee looking at the captain expectantly.
The captain looked to the narrow porthole and coughed, nervously.

"Well...we're coming in over the inner jungle. On the ground there's the River Whisky-"
"Such a colourful name!" the Detective thrilled. "No doubt a moniker attached by your cheery privateer army boys, yes? Aha. Missing home comforts, I'd imagine. Aha."
"I...yes," the captain agreed, slowly. "On the north bank of the river we have our Inner Station, where most of our privateer armed forces are currently engaged establishing a clear ground. Further south, which is where we'll make landing in a few days, is the coastal region, with the civilian colonies along the bay and the Company head-quarters of Keruwark...you'd see the golden dome from here if you looked-"
"Some sort of...mm...leftover from the native settlement there before you chaps built up your pretty camp over it, yes?"
"An altar to a savage god, I believe. Yes. And between where we are now and the southern coast and our base, miles and miles of thick inner jungle. A few Outer Stations, which you can reach by following the river up from the coast before it bends, but otherwise rough going indeed. Sir."

The Detective nodded, smiling. He wore a simple suit affair, in dulled tones and styles, while the captain wore the usual steamship officers' attire in the Company, a wealthy array of golden piping over a deep navy blue jacket. He had his elaborate tricorne under his arm, and fiddled with it, occasionally.
Both men carried sabres strapped to their one thigh, and a revolving pistol on the other. But whilst the captain's was more ornate than usable, the Detective's was plain and without finery.

"And to the north of the Inner Station and the Whisky River, captain?"
"Nothing. Nothing but endless jungle wastes. And savages we haven't even met yet."

"A horrifying prospect," the Detective said, simply. He was smiling. Broadly.

And then the ship juddered. Suddenly. A grinding and screeching of metal and rope and timber strained and waning. And someone began to shout.