Dear General,
It is true that your soldiers may outnumber mine.
But the ocean runs deep.
I am certain that you will run out of men, before the ocean runs out of space. -- Anon Guest
It only looked like a Graveworld. There were all the signs. Ruined buildings in the midst of assorted plants run amok. Domesticated animals turned wild, creating an ecology of their own. There were even apocalypse journals left where they might survive until discovery.
More Graveworlds were caused by monoculture abuse than war. This one was one of the former.
Those resettling the world wondered about the occasional references to "the underpeople," but could not find any tunnels or signs of subsurface habitation. In retrospect, they should have looked further than the land masses.
The oceans were abundant and net fishing looked like a viable option for dietary supplementation. Little did they know that all it took to declare war was one net gone too deep. One child snared in the catch.
They didn't even have time to wonder where the kid had come from before the torpedoes hit.
The child, tail and all, returned safely to the waves. The new settlers, however, had a new problem on their hands. How to make peace with openly hostile merpeople who thought you had broken a treaty you weren't even aware of.
At least the whole "underpeople" thing made sense.
This world clearly lacked enough arable soil to support a stable long-term population and house them. Indeed, all the old ruins were on land that couldn't grow a dandelion, and there were signs of hydroponic facilities even then. Immense hydroponic facilities.
Half the settlers had decided on a submarine lifestyle, taking the abundance of the sea as their chosen habitat. It was clear which one had worked. What wasn't clear was whether or not they had completely adapted to a marine environment.
Were the tails real? If so: how, where, and when could they possibly negotiate? Would a white flag even work in a realm where light was optional?
All these questions would eventually be answered. It took a long time to work out at least the how.
One lone dinghy on the open ocean, piloted by a settler with their SCUBA gear prepped and ready. They had already decided that going in an armoured livesuit would send the wrong message[1].
Over a suitably deep portion of the ocean, Settler Verrin Marda added their air line and tipped themself into the water. With enough luck, and the white flag attached to their belt, the Underpeople would understand.
If they didn't understand sign language, they would understand pantomime.
They rose from the depths like ghosts. Staying just within Verrin's field of vision. Verrin could see the Underpeople pointing at the weighted white cloth.
Verrin quickly showed their empty hands, flapped the white flag, and indicated that they didn't have a knife. This included a little twirl to show the Underpeople their entire body.
That was the moment they swam closer. They spoke an old variant of one of the Asian signs[2], and Verrin had some trouble understanding it. The field of linguistics is an interesting hobby for the deaf. Verrin had volunteered for this because of their knowledge pool.
"Slow, slow," she signed. "Hands old. Understand me trying."[3]
They had larger eyes. Larger pupils. One swam close enough for Verin to identify an Osmosis kit, and artificial tails as well as webbing gloves. They had adapted to life in the water, but not that much.
It would have been cool if mermaids were real. Everyone agreed on that later.
They looked more like the Inuk than any other old Terran ethnicity.
The new ambassador for the Underpeople kept a wary distance all the same. "Treaty break you," they signed. "Why? Nets not longest time."
"Treaty people dead long time," signed Verrin. "People new us. Knowing not. World dead thinking us. You looking not us."
"Surface come us. Talk long needing."
They needed a different linguist once the Mer came the shallows. There was so very much to explain.
[1] The Galactic Alliance took one look at the Human saying, "If you want peace, prepare for war," and rolled their collective eyes. If you want peace, you must first establish that intent.
[2] Terran sign language is not universal, though some individual signs are common.
[3] This is, as far as this author understands things, correct sign language grammar. Object first, everything else clarifies. I am perfectly willing to learn more about this if I've got it wrong. And I bet I got it wrong.
[Image (c) Can Stock Photo / badjaw]
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