Renascentia - Memories of a Life Lost 3D Render, Digital Artwork by RedSpartan

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Renascentia - Memories of a Life Lost

3D Render by RedSpartan

She slowly pushed herself to her feet, back against the cold metal of the wall, her eyes never leaving the red gore opposite her. She felt her heart racing, skin sweating cold.

Fear!

She wasn’t supposed to succumb to it, had been trained and conditioned to fight against it. But the experience with the creature below, whatever it had been, and the site of the bloody carnage she assumed it had created, overtook her. Her head darted back and forth, a rising panic welling in the pit of her stomach. This corridor seemed clear, well lit and devoid of the debris that had littered the level below.

What the in hell had been that thing. It felt like nothing that she had ever encountered before. Primal, unnatural. She had a deep feeling that it had not been born to this world as part of the harmonious order of things, that maybe hell had spat it out into these dark and dank corridors to do its monstrous work.

‘Damn it Mya, get a grip’ she muttered to herself, trying to claw back some form of calm demeaner.

Wait! What was that that had popped randomly into her head. Her name! Her name had come back to her.

Mya. Hell’s bloody teeth, that was her name. Mya, Mya Caine.

Suddenly the fear abated a little and she weakly laughed out loud. It had returned, her name, her home, her place in the universe. She wasn’t so cold and alone anymore. Knowledge had risen in her mudded brain to keep her company and give her hope. And then, like a stab to the heart, she remembered Tali and she sank back to the floor, holding herself as an overwhelming sense of grief took her.

Tali, her love, her life. She thought of the tank, of the mission that had sent her here. How much time, how many years had she been away, lost in that cold isolation. Presumed dead? Gone, never to return?
How long had she been lost to her wife? Tali floated in the vision of her minds eye, the curve of her face, her slightly crooked nose, the glorious opal hue of her eyes as the sunlight of Aldain glinted across her body as they had lain lazily on that last day before she had left, both naked and glistening with the sweat of their love beneath the blue sky at Raldon Falls, their favourite spot. A memory made and shared to keep them both warm before her return. Only that had not happened. Betrayal, brutality and torture had followed, and time had been stolen.

She rose back to her feet, standing uncertainly, her momentary elation lost now as every detail came back to her in a flood of emotional desolation. An agent of the Commonwealth, a life of danger and excitement coupled with the joy of her life with Tali. Gone now, torn away from her in violence and blood. If she could somehow leave this place, this facility of evil and degradation, somehow return to her home, what would she find? A wife now changed, equally grieving but having moved on. Tali was strong, resolute. She would have found a way to deal with her loss, of this she was sure.

Damn them all to hell, how long?

She remembered this place now, gleaming and pristine, austere and utilitarian the way The Confederation made such things, but efficient, clean. To render it in the state she now found it would have taken a long time, years of protracted neglect. She had been thrown in that tank after her last session of interrogation, to recover enough for the torturous process to continue in infinitum, as had happened countless times before. Somewhere along the line they had abandoned this world and forgotton her, or left her there with some malicious intent. The people she’d met during her stay here had certainly been capable of such petty cruelty. She had been here, suffering under their brutal scrutiny for well over a standard year before she had been placed in the regen chamber for the final time.

Better to have died than be trapped in an endless limbo as time and her life slipped away from her.

She began again to walk, but now without purpose or goal, the unholy monster behind her now all but forgotten as feelings of loss overtook her. Eventually she came to a row of doors, mostly open. She recognised the rooms beyond as personnel quarters, but most were inaccessible, overtaken with vegetation from beyond the broken windows. This section was clearly open to the elements, and nature had reclaimed it as her own. Finally she found a room mostly devoid of foliage and entered. The ceiling had been pierced in places and shafts of light illuminated the gloom, dust floating lazily in the still, cool air. She shivered uncontrollably, as much with emotional overload as the cold. She quickly found clothes, for the most part civilian in nature, and female. This had been a woman’s quarters. Probably a pilot she mused as she slipped on pants and gloves that would probably have been worn by one in such a profession. Everything was a little tight, but not too uncomfortable. Cleary the regen tank had maintained healthy nutrient flow as her body mass showed no signs of malnutrition. In fact, in places she seemed to have gained a little weight. Tali would have approved, she’d always though she had been a little too skinny.

Someone had scrawled ‘Get Out Of This Place’ crudely across a wall. She stared at it a moment as she slipped on a pair of boots, and wondered again about what had happened here. The facility had been some sort of military base dedicated for the most part to scientific research, but what kind she had not been able to ascertain as circumstances had overtaken her before her mission had really started. Knowing her enemy it would not have been for the greater good of mankind, but for the further enhancements of Confederation military might. Nothing pleasant would have been happening here. The levels the Confederation would descend to to broaden their brutal regime had been seen time and again on the battlefield, on the worlds they had destroyed during their insatiable quest to expand and conquer.

Dressed now, and relatively comfortable, albeit her skin still damp with the filthy water of the lower levels, noticeably dirty and bruised in places from her fight with the mech and her slip on the ladder, she scanned the room once more and her eyes alighted on a set of closed drawers. On opening the last of these she discovered an unexpected prize. She lifted the pistol tenderly in her hands, checking it for wear and tear. Scratched in places and clearly well used she found the barrel clear and the firing mechanism working. A Cybrog P90 if she was not unmistaken, her knowledge of Confederation weaponry limited. She checked the magazine and found five cartridges, 9mm and hollow point. They could cause some damage to the right target, but had their limitations. Her thoughts returned to the creature she had heard. She hunted around for more ammunition but came up frustratingly empty.

She steadied herself, gripping the barrel of the gun as if it were an old friend. It was a start. She’d been in tight situations with less, but she mused, without the total lack of knowledge about what she might be facing as this present predicament offered. As she downed some surprising clear water from the faucet she tried to organise her thoughts.

Memories of Tali, of her old life, of what she’d walked into here, the treatment by her captors after she’d been apprehended, all of that would have to wait. Her plan was simple, if not daunting and unlikely to succeed with current information at hand.

Get herself off this fucking planet!

But first, she needed a bigger gun!

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Had these three pictures to tell the next section of the story, but they seemed pretty mundane in and of themselves, so I thought I'd combine them in one image. I'll probably do this again at some point as I've got groups of images done and in the planning stages that would probably benefit from this type of treatment, but I won't be going full graphic novel on this project as the number of images that would require would be beyond me I'm afraid. I know the narrative is quite lengthy on this one, but I had quite a bit of exposition to get out before the next section. Obviously you don't need to read the story to appreciate the images, but I hope people are enjoying what for me is an unusual experiment.

On a side note I had Daz Studio go a bit mental on me this week and it became unusable, even after a full reinstall. I got in touch with the Daz tech guys and they were really prompt and helpful, even though in the relatively short time I was waiting for a reply I managed to work out a fix myself. Something to do with how Daz works in Windows or something. Anyway, kudos to them...excellent service.

Thanks for looking, and until the next time...