This letter is written on hand-made paper, with elegant handwriting, and strange ink. It was lovingly enclosed in a sacrificial bird and tossed into the maw of a ketoptera, a giant whale-bat of Phytochorosa. It was prompted by a comment on Daniel's blog (http://gobi.livejournal.com/675386.html).
DO: A LOAD OF CRAP Most Honored Pilgrims of the Sun Temple:
I write to you as one Holy Woman to many, and I implore you for your aid.
Long and long ago my ancestors sailed the Æther between the Worlds in great cylindrical ships of wood, bone, and cloth. For many long stretches of days they traveled, cataloguing and exploring the Worlds. On one such trip the explorer ship Rocinante foundered in a storm and was lost within a great sea of plants—spheres of lacy fern-like foliage ranging in size from the smallest of spore-specks to great worldlets with woody labyrinthine interiors. It was upon one of these large planitia that Rocinante crashed and was destroyed. But many of her occupants survived to form a colony here in Phytochorosa, that sea of plant-spheres.
Many generations passed and some of the Dinae—as the people of Phytochorosa came to call themselves—left Primoplanita to colonize others of the larger planitia. They thrived and multiplied, learning to care for and sustain themselves on the flora and fauna that lived within and among the planitia. Chief among the animals of Phytochorosa are the magnificent ketoptera. Enormous cylindrically symmetric beasts like whales with diaphanous wings, they ride the Æther currents between the planitia, feeding upon plants and animals, which they sweep into their maws with delicate pteripalps. They are beautiful and awesome to behold, and we, the Ketopterites, are blessed to live among them and upon them. We care for them almost as herders of old. I say almost because we do not exploit the ketoptera. We seek only to serve and be blessed by our lords.
But the Dinae do not exalt the ketoptera as we do, and seek only to use them for their own gain. Already have we seen attempts to enslave our holy lords, and we have intervened with good success. But these sacrileges were perpetrated only by small, easily dissuaded groups. Now looms an even greater threat.
Many among the Dinae have forsaken the old ways for what they call progress. They ruthlessly exploit the natural resources of Phytochorosa, corrupting and bending the laws of nature to their will. Great hulking behemoths of metal and steam now plough through the Æther where once ships sailed gently upon the winds. This “progress” disturbs the ketoptera and their food sources. As if this were not affront enough, their “natural philosophers” covet and steal that which rightly belongs to the ketoptera and their servants.
Around a generation ago some foul philosopher discovered ketoptera guano—which floats freely within Phytochorosa, aggregating into lumpy coprolitic asteroids, and which we have long used to fashion holy relics—could be processed to release a number of hellish compounds. They now seek it relentlessly, sending expedition after expedition into the vast wilderness in search of these coproids.
We Ketopterites travel great distances with our pods, and it often takes several hundred days to traverse a migration circuit. Because of this, we have not been able to keep abreast of all the Dinae would do and several days ago our greatest fear was realized. The Dinae have discovered Connubilacuna, the vast, open space at the center of Phytochorosa, where the ketoptera gather to mate and birth their young. Here lies an enormous coproid of planetary proportions, aggregated over many tens of millions of days. And here we found Dinae defiling our most sacred of spaces, mining guano, and infesting tunnels of their own creation. They have refused to leave, citing some obscure law of the Dinea. They will not accept that their laws have no meaning here!
Please, Most Honored Ones—help us rid ourselves of this vermin.
The title made me immediately laugh, so good job there. Doesn't quite fit the tone of the letter though. ;)
It took a while before I could catch on where the guano was going to play a role in the story, but I like how you worked that in eventually. It's also cool how you re-interpreted the skies as "ether" and so forth. Very neat.