The Xian'Juo

[Captain_Kuchiki]

I wrote this story more than two years ago, so its technique is a little elementary. I made some revisions to make it better. (This story does't have Chinese people, by the way.)

Berlin, Germany, 1887

“Rudolf, get your cloak on!” my father called into my room from the front door. “We leave soon for Herr Franksteiner’s party!”
I finished buttoning my special vest and finished my hair in my dresser mirror. In the mirror, I saw a tall, dark-haired 17-year-old scowling back at me. I wasn’t planning on going to Herr Franksteiner’s party down the road. He was a famous biologist, and was having a party at his mansion. Why was my father dragging me along? I wanted to visit my dear Eva tonight. Perhaps I could visit her another night.
As the horses clopped on the dirt road and the sun cast its final rays on the landscape and our carriage bounced with every bump, my father said, “Seriously, Rudolf, this is a rare occasion. Normally, young men your age don’t attend Herr Franksteiner’s parties. There will be a rich feast, good music from the finest Musicians in the empire, and beautiful ladies. You ought to be grateful!”
I said nothing but watched a rabbit bound across the road ahead of us. Well, at least there would be good food. Our chef wasn’t exactly the best.
The stars were beginning to shine when my father knocked on the large front doors on Herr Franksteiner’s mansion. Lights shone from the windows, and I heard an orchestra playing. A butler opened the door, and the music swelled loudly, and the babble of talk and clattering of silverware erupted from within the great main hall. My father and I went in.
My father found a small table with wineglasses with golden wine, and he took a glass. “Do you want some wine, Rudolf?” he asked be, and I shook my head. My father shrugged and led me somewhere else.
A large, balding man with a monocle on one eye gave a laugh and embraced my father. The man said, “Ahhh, good to see you, Franz!” he chuckled. “What have you been up to, eh? And is this your son?” he looked at me.
My father broke apart and said, “Rudolf, this is our host, Herr Franksteiner. Wilhelm, this is my son Rudolf. He’s the special guest.”
Herr Franksteiner removed his monocle and scrutinized me. “Lovely young chap you got there, Franz,” he said. “Looks mighty sturdy and strong. The army could use more men like him.”
I had had no intention of joining the German Army, and this man did not suit me. Herr Franksteiner said to my father, “Good seeing you, old friend. I’ve got s speech on my newest discovery to prepare. Be seeing you!” He left.
My father looked at me and said, “Well, there’s the man, Rudolf. Do you like him?”
I wanted to say that that old man bothered me, but I only said, “He’s a good man, father.”
“Well, well. Let’s get some food. I’m starving, and Wilhelm’s chefs make the finest stew I’ve ever had. Let’s find a seat.”
I sat at a long table, next to a gabbing lady in a light blue dress, and stared at a platter of apple slices. I didn’t fell hungry, and only nibbled on a beef sandwich I put together by taking bread slices and other ingredients. I stared out a tall window as I ate, watching the stars. I saw a meteor streak across the black sky. I was so bored!
Herr Franksteiner gave his speech, going on about some microbes doing something or other. I wanted to leave.
At last, after listening with everyone else at the music and standing about while my father talked with various people, my father said, “Well son, it’s getting late. We’ll head home now.”
Finally! We left the mansion and into pouring rain, getting me soaking wet. What an evening. We hurried to our carriage, and the horses set off back along the road.
It was very dark, and I wondered how my father kept the horses on the road. Lightning streaked across the sky, accompanied by distant booms. I was getting nervous for some reason, and I had a prickling felling on the top of my head, and scratching didn’t make it go away.
A huge bolt of lightning slammed into the ground far away, and a loud boom followed. The boom roared on, a single continuous note. The tingling on my head intensified, and I scratched frenziedly at it, scruffing my hair.
A brilliant light flooded the carriage suddenly, and the boom was a rumble, loud and intense, but wavering over and over. My father tugged at the reigns of the horses, and they whinnied and reared, halting the carriage. I looked up, and saw a metal wall facing me. It was some ten feet above the carriage, and sloped, as though were the underside of a shallow bowl. I saw lines and mechanical lines and devices on it, and a portal in the center shone the brilliant light.
I realized I was staring at the underside of some floating vessel over us, and I saw little red lights pulsing in a ring on the outer rim of the object. I realized it must be saucer shaped. The pulsating rumble came from the vessel, and lightning boomed again, illuminating the object. The horses reared and whinnied loudly again, splashing water everywhere. Through all the noise I heard my father cry, as though from far away, “Rudolf, what is happening?”
I suddenly felt light, as though I weighted next to nothing. I felt the seat under me, then I felt it no more. I looked around and saw that I was being lifted into the air! I cried out for help, but it did no good. I was close to the light’s source, and I heard my father cry, “Rudoooooolf!” and I went through the portal and knew no more.

[Captain_Kuchiki]

Part 2.

The next thing I was aware of was that my surroundings were bright and I was dry. I was also lying down of a firm surface, and I was indoors. I felt groggy, and couldn’t tell much more than that.
I felt a soft finger poke me on the chest, and more fingers feel me. Was it a doctor? Had I been injured? I simply lay there.
I heard talking, but didn’t recognize the speaker. Actually, I didn’t recognize the speech. It wasn’t German; it sounded, well, weird. It was rapid and moist, and gave me the impression of a slimy creature talking. It seemed alien. I came to completely and received a shock; a green man stood by me, talking to an identical creature. It was perhaps six feet tall, thin, had bumpy, moist skin, long fingers, had no hair, and had large, black eyes. I looked around and saw that the room was curving and silvery, with smooth, metallic walls. I saw a few more of the green men, doing various chores. I saw mysterious machinery, vials and tanks of unknown liquids within.
The alien next to me looked at me, and I gazed into its blank eyes, and I felt chills. The alien-man spoke again, but I didn’t understand it. I found my voice and asked feebly, “D-do you speak German?”
The alien blinked and backed away. It took a device and rested it on my head, and felt heat on my scalp. When it ended, the alien took it of and placed it on its own head, and the device vibrated slightly. The alien soon took it off, and then said in perfect German: “Ah, so. This is the language of your race?”
“Uhh, yes, but only in the German Empire,” I choked out, shocked to hear an alien talking in German.
“The German Empire?” the alien repeated. “I presume that is your race’s grand Empire?”
“N-no,” I stammered. “It’s just m-my country, there are other languages in other countries.”
“Are countries regions?” the alien asked. “What use do your people have of multiple languages? Tell me.”
“T-that’s just the way it is,” I said. “Where am I?”
The alien explained, “We are onboard one of our science vessels, its duty to collect organisms of various worlds and…. experiment with them.”
“Experiment?” I cried out. “You can’t hurt me!”
The alien gazed at me. “No, not harm you. Only test your reactions to our energies.”
“Who are you creatures?” I demanded.
The alien said, “We are the Xian’Juo people. Now, silent. We have spoken enough.”

I lay still, looking for an escape route, but I saw none, except a tall, round door, which was closed. I then realized that a needle was being lowered to me, and I saw it slip into me. I just started to protest when I fell unconscious.

I don’t know how much time passed since then, but I was later being led out of the same object that had captured me and through a huge room, with other similar objects. I felt gravity, so I was on a planet. The aliens leading me along said nothing.
We left the huge room and out a massive pair of golden doors, and a majestic view overtook me. I saw green, rolling hills, rivers and lakes, a blue sky with wispy clouds, and, most of all, gigantic golden pyramids dotted about, with curving bridges connecting them. This was another world, with these aliens living on it, in their own civilization, prospering on this planet. I wished Father could have seen it.
I was led to a golden pod-like object, and we all climbed into it, and it traveled at a jolting rate. The aliens were silent still, and me likewise.
The destination was the courtyard of the biggest and widest pyramid I saw, and we walked through it, and I saw aliens walking about and conducting business I couldn’t understand. There were small pyramids on each corner of the courtyard, but I was led into the biggest, main one.
I found myself in a sort of laboratory, with tanks of green liquid bubbling and aliens performing mysterious work. I felt nervous here. What experiments were they going to conduct?
An alien with a strange headpiece greeted us, and conversed in their unusual language with the other aliens, and I was led to a tank. “What are you going to do?” I demanded.
The alien who I had met in the ship said, “You will enter the tank here, and we will test you. You will not come to harm, but the tests may not be pleasant. Then, our final test will be conducted.”
They forced me into the tank, and I tried to hold my breath, but realized that I could breathe in the liquid. I had to escape! I lifted my hand to pound on the glass, but then lost the impulse. I realized they must have some energy forcing me to cooperate. Now I understood why I hadn’t thought to escape before.
The aliens watched me intently with their large black eyes, and I watched them. I could see the mouth of one of them move as its owner talked. Suddenly, I cried out as my body was rocked by shock waves of energy surging through me. I thrashed in the tank at the energy, until the waves faded away. Then, I felt prickles all over me, like needles grazing my skin all over. I tried to scratch my skin, but it did no good; the sensation only intensified.
When the prickling stopped, I felt groggy for some reason. The aliens were still watching me, giving commands to someone I couldn’t see. Then, I felt as though I were being compressed, squeezed harder and harder. The pressure reversed, and I felt like I was being inflated and stretched. Then I was being compressed again.
The pressure lifted once more, and the aliens’ voice echoed in the tank: “You have proved most interesting so far. We have learned much about you with our brain scan. You are a juvenile male Human from the planet Earth. Your people know you as Rudolf, and you resented the occasion your father forced you to attend. That happened soon before your abduction.”
I tried to move but couldn’t. The alien went on, “Now, our final test will be carried out. Do not worry, it will not harm you. But you may be in shock when you regain consciousness.”
I then felt another sensation: like I was melting. My skin began to melt apart like wax, and I felt soft and flexible. I felt like a liquid, and it was terrible. My pulpy body seemed to be re-arranging itself. I felt another mass of flesh ooze into the tank, and it began to intermingle with my own. I felt my consciousness fading once again….

[Captain_Kuchiki]

Part 3.

I was lying on a cold floor when I came to. I felt clear, and alert. My body felt strange. Heavy, burdened, and not the body I had known. I got up, pushing the floor in front of me to get up. I froze when I saw my hands.
They were slightly larger, and were mechanical, golden and with clawed fingers. I flexed them; they reacted normally. I felt the rest of my body and discovered that I was encased within a metal shell, with a heavy pack on my back. I saw that I had metal boots and body armor. I stood up wearily, feeling awkward.
The aliens entered the room I was in and the German speaking one said, “So, you have awaken. Good.”
I yelled, “What have you done to me? How can you snatch me and experiment on me like some rat?!”
“Calm yourself,” the alien said. “Your armor may be removed in a short time. It will protect your body until it has settled into its new state.”
“’New state’?” I growled. “I want to know what you are doing!”
“Silence,” the alien commanded. “Follow us, to the rehabilitation center. You’re going to need some adjustment. We also need to test the effects our work has had on your body, and how reproductive systems will work. Follow. It would be most unpleasant if you don’t.”
“You,” I said to the alien, “What exactly are you going to do?”
“My name is Vui-ka, Human. Do not ask so many questions. You will know what we do when we do it.”
And so, I was loaded into a pod on a tram-like rail and zoomed to a large room. There were ceiling-high golden machines I couldn’t make sense of. I was ordered onto a circular spot on the ceiling, then the lines on the circle glowed a pulsing green. I felt myself growing lighter by some strange power.
The aliens began to remove my armor, and I felt first light from being relieved from its burden, then a creeping dread of what I must look like. My skin felt sensitive to the air.
“Observe your new self, Rudolf,” Vui-ka said. I felt unconformable with an alien addressing me by name, but I looked down and received a shock.
It was difficult to say what body I had. My hands and forearms were the same as the aliens’, except thicker. My hands had long fingers with claws, and the skin was green, slimy, and mottled like some swamp creature’s. Half of my torso was changed such, and one of my legs. I felt my head and saw that the right side of my head was alien, and my right eye was large and oval-shaped. I cried out in surprise at what had happened, but realized that my voice was distorted and sounded like my own and the aliens’, and also sounded mechanical. I also noticed that I was taller, and bigger. I was a mutant, hybrid monster!
I swung my alien arm out, and I felt strength in the swing. There were also small golden mechanical devices on me, with flat panels with intricate functions on their surfaces, and larger implants on my torso and legs.
“Yes, a shocking transformation, isn’t it?” Vui-ka said. I swung my arm at him and grabbed him by the head and held his face to mine. “Why?” I rasped.
Vui-ka smiled and said, “You are the greatest one we have forged in may years. We are the harvesters, collecting sentient creatures and fusing them into something more. We do this to test their reactions with each other, to see if entire new hybrid races may be born.”
“Create hybrid races?” I said. “There are other aliens? Where?”
“Many planets and moons harbor civilizations,” Vui-ka explained. “We gather samples from them and fuse them with other races, and produce hybrids. We have fused a few other Humans into hybrids with other races. Would you like to see them?”
I snarled. “Undo this!” I demanded. “Make me back into a Human! I want to go home!”
“Your home is here,” Vui-ka said in a final tone. “You may not return to the planet of your people yet. Perhaps, if you behave well, we may return you.”
“Return me now!” I demanded.
“In good time,” Vui-ka said. “Set me down before you are caused pain.”
I saw a small and round object in one of the alien’s hands with an antennae on it pointed at me. I set Vui-ka down, and he backed away. “You may be anxious to test your hybrid powers, yes?” he asked. “You can do much with your new body.”
“I can?” I asked. “What can I do?”
Vui-ka said something to the other aliens, then said, “Look up.”
I looked up, and saw metal men descend on me. They had metal bodies and no faces except glowing red eyes. They began to attack me! I jumped high into the air and kicked one with my alien leg, and the metal man was sent crashing into one behind him.
Another swung his fist at my face, and I grabbed his wrist and swung him into another metal man, and I tore the head off another. Sparks flew from his exposed neck.
“What kind of men are these?” I called to the aliens. “They don’t bleed!”
“They are machines, Rudolf,” Vui-ka called. “They do not live, only carry out their orders. Destroy them if you can.”
A machine smashed into my back, and I turned around and grabbed him, and tore him in half. It threw the pieces at the last one, who was hit and fell to the ground.
I landed back to the ground, breathing hard. “Why did I have to fight them?” I asked.
“We grant power to our hybrids,” Vui-ka explained. “We bring out the full power of both races and add implanted strength and the ability to remain airborne. This was to see if you had strength to control your new body in potentially harsh environments, such as those with predatory beasts. Though the full races we create do not have as much power as the first hybrids, such as you.”
“What will you do to me now?” I asked.
“There are more activities to undergo,” Vui-Ka told me. “Later, you will see the other hybrids, and we will bring you to greater knowledge of us, as you will be living with us for some time.”

[Captain_Kuchiki]

Part 4.

Eventually, after a number of exercises I could make no sense of, I was led to a enormous room with tall windows to one side, giving a view of a lake with two pyramids by it, and twisting walkways connecting them. “Wait here,” Vui-ka ordered me, and he left me alone in the big room.
A hidden door slid up on one wall, and several creatures came out into the room. I gasped. They were the hybrids!
I saw a teenage girl fused with some brutish lizard-like creature. I saw her face melt into a scaly green lizard face with a large eye and a long, forked tongue. I saw a furry horned creature with five eyes melded with a jelly-like thing with many wavering tentacles. There was a jet-black man-like beast with a backwards jointed leg and long foot with only the toes touching the ground fused with another human, a dark-skinned, middle aged man. The hybrids made terrible sounds.
The girl-lizard thing rasped something in Russian at me. The thing’s voice had the girl’s voice combined with a reptile’s screech, and the result was hideous. The furry-jelly creature made a sound like a loin’s roar and the sound of squishing flesh, making a sound like a choking animal. I took a heavy step away from the mutants before me.
“Yes, beautiful, aren’t they?” I heard Vui-ka praise as he came in. I turned to face him. He seemed pleased. “Species taken from many worlds, including three from yours — fellow hybrid humans! Talk to them.”
“But they don’t speak German,” I said.
“They don’t speak you language?” Vui-ka wondered. “Yes, now I recall you telling me that Humans have many languages.”
I saw the other Human hybrid: a middle-aged Black man melded onto a giant insect-like creature. His left eye was a giant compound eye that glared blankly at me. His right jaw, on his human face, was an insect’s jaw. He had a thick walking insect leg on his left half, and two clawed limbs that flailed about. He shrieked something in African that sounded insect-like.
“Most of these hybrids have founded their races on uninhabited worlds,” Vui-ka said. “Entire civilizations, in the likeness of two others. All of these hybrids are founders, except two. You, Rudolf, will create the first race of Xian’Juo hybrids. These Hume-Juo will colonize a frigid planet far from the galaxy’s core. They will enjoy Human heat generation and Xian’Juo skin-hardening abilities, so they will be able to endure the cold and dark.”
I felt horror and wonder at all this. My world, the Earth, I had tough of as everything, with only humans, safe and secure, without other planets with bizarre other civilizations and hybrids populating more. This was too much for me.
“When will these…. Hume-Juo be created?” I asked. My initial repulsion of all this was fading; I could almost endure the scale of all this, but not entirely. This was my new life.
“The cloning process will begin in three year’s time — Earth years, that is,” Vui-ka said. “Or 274 Zautiks. We will create one hundred male one hundred female Hume-Juo and create genetic variations among them.”
“Genetic variations?” I asked.
“If you are unsuitable as a being, then if all Hume-Juo were identical to you, they would all die,” Vui-ka explained. “So, we vary their genes so the strong may survive and the weak will die. This is how we ensure all of our civilizations survive.”
“An entire population, made after me….” I reflected. “I can’t imagine a million copies of me living on a planet.”
“Few hybrids can accept that fact easily,” Vui-ka said. “They cannot imagine whole races created after them. But enough talk. You must leave here and become familiar with your new home.”
The hybrids were returned to the hidden room they came out of, and I was led away to explore the world of the Xian’Juo.

Some years later, I was the father of seven million Hume-Juo thriving on the ice planet named Xiaman. I would have been confined to the room where the other hybrids here, but Vui-ka told me that I had been more cooperative than the other hybrids, and I could return to Earth. I was thrilled and disturbed by this.
“I have lived among Xian’Juo for seven years now,” I said. “Now may I return to my Human planet?”
“Quite so,” Vui-ka said. “We have cherished you, and now you have fulfilled your duty to us. The Flyer awaits us.”
Vui-ka and I boarded the saucer-shaped Flyer, and I was put in a chamber to sleep for the journey. Xian’Juo could enter a semi-comatose state, awake enough only to navigate the ship. The journey was cold and silent.

When we reached Earth, we were over nighttime Germany. The Flyer was some hundred feet over the ground, and the hatch for me to be beamed down from was open. I gazed at the sleeping countryside, and I saw the rooftops of Berlin close by.
“We at last return to Earth,” Vui-ka said. “This is within a hundred feet within where you were abducted. Am I correct?”
I could see well in the dark, and I saw Herr Franksteiner’s mansion in the close distance. I looked down and saw a carriage pulled by horses, and heard the conversation of the occupants. I yearned to be back home. But then….
I wasn’t Human; I was a mutant, a hybrid of advanced science. I could not fit among men again. I did not belong, my family would expel me. I could not find a living here.
I looked at Vui-ka and said, “Uh, Vui-ka, I don’t really think I could live here.”
“No?” Vui-ka said.
“I can’t live with humans. I would be a freak, and hunted down. I couldn’t live peacefully. I would live in exile. I’ll just live with the Xian’Juo. They are my people more than these. Take me back.”
“Very well,” Vui-ka said. “We will return. You are strange; you’re the first hybrid to refuse returning to their homeworld. Others have been determined to reunite with their people. But now, we shall return.”
The Flyer’s hatch closed, and it made the long journey back to the Xian’Juo home planet.

[DickZ]

If you acknowledge that the story might be somewhat elementary because you wrote it two years ago, you might want to consider going back and overhauling it entirely. You can learn a lot in two years, so you shouldn't tie yourself to what you had back then.

Don't limit yourself to changing a few words here and there. Start over.

[Captain_Kuchiki]

Ok,thanks for the advice. I've been working on other stories outside this forum, but I might give a rework a shot. Do you think this is a good start, though?::cool:

[DickZ]

Anybody with the courage to get started is to be commended. That's the hardest part of writing, and an obstacle that lots of people can never overcome.

Still, your story could use a lot of work.

[qimissung]

I liked your story. I thought it was quite creative. The details of the new world, the aliens, and the hybrids are good, as is the shock value in the direction the story takes. Sci Fi is often lacking in characterization; I think if you really gave some thought to Rudolph's character-his reaction to being abducted and to being hybridized, his adjustment to his new world, and agony over his decision to stay-it would really make your story shine.