Aethera Preview – Iconics: Surestra

Surestra by Erin Frye

The Kickstarter is long behind us and development of the Aethera Campaign Setting continues at full speed. Months ago, when we were first previewing the iconic representatives of the core Aethera races, we promised you five. Well, time came and went and one iconic was late to the party. The iconic infused, Surestra, went through several revisions of her design before reaching the final illustration you see here. Long before Surestra was a fully-realized iconic, Jeff Dahl, one of our intrepid authors, wrote up Surestra's background. This is a story we've been sitting on for a while, waiting for art and word to join together. Like we've said before: the stars have aligned.

Enjoy Jeff's story of Surestra's origins and another sneak peak into the worlds of Aethera! Make sure to follow us at our Facebook page for up-to-the minute news and new artwork!

The crucible of war begets many horrors, and the Century War was the worst conflict yet known to the current societies that inhabit the Aethera system. In humanity's desperation to augment their military forces in the war against the erahthi of Kir-Sharaat, the scientists and sorcerers of the Hierarchy turned to experimentation upon their own people. The goal was to create living weapons that could turn the tide of the war in humanity's favor against the implacable threat the erahthi represented.  Soldiers suffering from terminal aetherite poisoning were brought to off-world labs – volunteers, in theory – and subjected to torturous procedures and experiments to infuse their very bodies with the power of refined aetherite. While a handful of true successes came of this project, the titanic warriors known as the Paragons, far more horrific monstrosities were created. Those who survived the early days of these experiments, prior to the rise of the Paragons, and were spared both death and madness became the people now known as the infused.

According to the official documents that Surestra has regarding her past service in the Hierarchy’s military, she was born to a working-class family on the ground tier of the human arcology called Central; seeking a way to escape that lowly station, she signed up with the military, who by that stage in the war were accepting anyone willing to fight. She served with no real distinction as a private upon the aetheric cruiser Indomitable Spirit defending aetherite mining operations near Seraos. During a small skirmish that is recorded as the Battle of Aegis IV, the Indomitable Spirit suffered catastrophic damage to its aetherdrive, leaving the cruiser a floating hulk in orbit of the world while simultaneously exposing the crew to lethal levels of aetheric radiation. A rescue effort after the battle managed to retrieve Surestra and a score of other soldiers from the ship, all of whom were suffering from terminal levels of aetherite poisoning.

These documents are all that Surestra has to go by, because she no longer remembers anything before the laboratories; the days-long agony of aetherite burning through her blood are her first memories, the knives of sorcerer-surgeons carving binding sigils into her flesh and bones to contain the power, channeling nodes implanted in her muscles to carry that power through her, suffocating time spent suspended in vats of alchemical reagents. This was her birth. Surestra took her first steps as one of the infused, her body overflowing with aetherite in a way that transformed it from a poison to a power she could wield. According to records, she was the only survivor of the Indomitable Spirit to exit the infusion procedure intact.

Somewhere along the way, everything that she was, who she was, faded away; a side-effect of the inhuman experiments performed upon her that was predicted, but never predictable. Pre-surgery memory-loss among the infused was common, but the extent to which this memory loss manifests varied from patient to patient. In later days a more cynical Surestra would come to wonder if it was a desired result rather than a happy accident, to make the new-born infused more easily indoctrinated and controlled.

Confused and unsteady, Surestra was swiftly educated as to the ongoing war and her place in it. As soon as she was judged sufficiently mentally stable, she was immediately placed into a unit with three others who had survived the infusion process. The moment she laid eyes upon her new comrades-in-arms, she felt a draw towards them, a flicker of psychic recognition not of who they were – but of what they were, akin to her.

Over the rigorous training to come, they would become close to one another; at first out of fear and confusion, all but one of the others having lost their memory as well, and later out of mutual bonding through training and forced closeness. They were trained as living weapons, and while the others of her team were trained in firearms or sorcerous assault, Surestra was taught to kill with nothing more than her bare hands and the innate powers awakened within her by the infusion process. Surestra swiftly rose to become the most dominant personality in the team and was officially designated team leader. What few non-infused could understand, however, was how closely in-tune the team was with one another – ‘team leader’ was a formality for the sake of the military hierarchy.  Their camaraderie took on a new level as they bonded on a psychic level , and while it was at first frightening to share one another’s dreams and anticipate one another’s movements and thoughts, in time they worked through that fear and came together closer than ever. Fireteam Archon became a substitute family for Surestra – an anchor to hold onto, to trust, and to believe in without any memories to support her. Over the years of battle that followed, they would become her lovers as well, the four of them sharing alike without jealousy or concern of misunderstanding. The bond between infused transcended understanding by most outsiders.

The war was at its most brutal at that time, with the erahthi carrying out suicide attacks against cities on Akasaat,  and as soon as Fireteam Archon was deemed ready for combat they were immediately deployed to the front lines.  The next few years are a blur of blood and battle in Surestra’s memory, as they faced off against the worst that the erahthi had to offer. After surviving their first few missions without any casualties, Archon was designated an elite commando unit and given even more dangerous assignments.

At first, Surestra and her team took pride in the missions that she and her team were assigned – hazardous missions with little back-up or contingency plan in case of failure. As time passed, though, and the infused shared what they had experienced with one another, they came to realize that they were simply considered expendable by the Hierarchy command. Inquiries about promotion paths were politely side-stepped, and more than one member of the team had noticed the disgust and horror in the way that non-infused looked at them with when they didn’t think they were being observed. Discontent began to stir as Fireteam Archon realized that they only ones they could truly count on for support were themselves, and occasionally other infused squads that they were assigned to work with.

In time, that cynicism may have grown into insubordination, but the war ended with an abruptness that prevented that from occurring. Archon were fighting a boarding action over Kir-Sharaat when the Gate Hub flared to life. It was the moment when the Taur poured forth like locusts to assault both human and erahthi vessels without discrimination. The infused and their enemies both paused mid-battle in shock as they realized what was occurring, and after several tense minutes – both sides wordlessly withdrew in order to turn their attention to this new threat. By the end of the battle, the Taur had been driven off into space by the combined forces of two worlds, but not before they claimed the moon Thycalese as a trophy. It was the end of the war, although true peace would not be declared until the accords were established in the aftermath.

What place did the Hierarchy have for their ghoulish creations without a war to be fought, though? It was a question that Surestra had never allowed herself to consider, as even her parents had never known a world without that war. Archon was in mourning having lost one of its own, the sorceress Iona, in the final battle. It was a loss they felt all the keener having relied for so long on the psychic bond between the team. None of them wished to continue serving the Hierarchy military, and so the remaining three were discharged at their request following procedures put into place after the signing of the accords.

While the phalanx were specifically granted citizenship after the war the infused were being swept beneath the rug. Those who signed up for the new ‘Slot Process’ being put into effect ended up in menial roles scrubbing aether filters in processing factories or working in off-world mines, while those who refused but remained within the cities of Akasaat were looked down upon and often harassed by the authorities as potential dissidents. With her team – her family – broken apart by their loss and the end of the war, Surestra consulted what records were available and sought out the blood family that she didn’t remember. She was met with horror and denial that they were her family, and could see the disgust in their eyes as they saw what their daughter had become. She turned her back on the frailty of blood and walked away from everything.

Adrift, but unwilling to surrender her destiny to the Hierarchy, Surestra fell into depression and drink. She had no purpose and was alone in the world. Even her ‘creators’ wanted her and her kind to simply disappear. It wasn’t until she heard a radio broadcast about Orbit Aurea and the Paragons that now ruled that world that she was dragged from the darkness that might otherwise have consumed her. A world under the reign of those created by the same experiments that changed her kind into what they were – perhaps there, she might find a new life.

The remaining stipend from her military days was spent to gain passage on a ship heading to the colony of Wighthaven, then to sign on to serve with Paragon Lietka and start over. Here, perhaps, she might find a way to make her existence matter. 

To burn bright against the night before it fell once and for all.