The Musician

AXKZ returned the next day, ready to discover more about the humans. The idea of the last story, the thought of such empathetic sacrifice, was still swirling about in his mind. Maybe this story had been an outlier. Were the humans’ other stories more normal? He would just have to find out. Luckily, AXKZ had started the loading of this day’s story the previous night. It was all ready to go, just waiting on him to give the go ahead. He settled in the chair, took a breath, and pressed the button...

Orpheus possessed a most intriguing gift. By rhythmically manipulating his voice (and other objects, most noticeably strings) into different pitches he could produce sounds that were perceived as far more pleasing than normal. This practice, known as making music (specifically singing if it was with his voice), allowed him to greatly affect others with merely sounds. With no use of violence, no use of power, Orpheus could elicit the strongest emotions in others. While other life-born could do this to some extent, he was by far the best at it. In fact, his talent almost spurred the creation of a whole new life-class, but that’s a different story.

Orpheus inspired many with his “music.” He, too, sailed with Jason for some time, even saving the crew once. One planet had been filled with strange creatures who lured people in with their voices whenever they were close, only to eat them whole. Orpheus was able to use his music to entrance them in return, calming them long enough for the crew to escape mostly unscathed. After the expedition he went around spreading his music to the rest of the life-born on the colony. Man and machine alike were drawn to his unique tones, and great crowds came to hear him sing and play his guitar, a strange thing called an “instrument” which was able to create a variety of tones through the plucking of its variously sized strings. During one of these performances, Orpheus met Eurydice, a quiet cyborg girl. They instantly decided to become a life-pair, two beings who would combine their DNA through a life-giver with the hopes of creating a new being formed using the best of both of their traits. They claimed to base their quick decision on some unexplainable, internal feeling. The humans call it “love.” 

A few days after their meeting, tragedy struck. Aristaeus, a beast-keeper, had long wanted Eurydice to be his life-bond. He planned to kill Orpheus and take her for himself. Under the guise of wanting help tending to some of the beasts, Aristaeus lured the life-pair into the dangerous Beast Wing of the ship. There, he sprung his trap and lunged to stab Orpheus. Managing to dodge the blow, Orpheus and Eurydice fled deeper into the Wing. They entered a large forested area, populated with beasts taken from many different planets. In the hurry, Eurydice tripped and fell down a hill. Upon rushing to assist her, Orpheus saw her already fading. Her body had been dealt some lethal blow (a venomous bite from what was known as a Skragviper), and the system was assimilating her mind and soul to put into a fresh vessel. There was nothing Orpheus could do now. Seeing the fate of Eurydice, Aristaeus gave up the chase.

Orpheus resolved to make the trek to the Assimilation Wing, in an attempt to get his beloved released. For, while she would eventually be revived, she was behind a whole queue of people waiting to be reassimilated. It would be ages before there was a free spot in the colony for her, and she and Orpheus likely would never be alive at the same time again. Those in charge of the Assimilation Wing were generally not fond of visitors; too many times were they begged to let someone out early. No longer could empathy touch them. At this point, most simply attempted to free those entrapped through brute force, which rarely worked. Orpheus took a different approach. He wooed the god-like council with music, stirring their emotions in such a way that they agreed to immediately release Eurydice. However, the process was unstable and if any life-being looked at her before she made it out of the Wing, she would disappear once again. Orpheus took her by the hand and led her all the way to the end of the last hall. He felt her stumble again, unfortunately, and looked back to make sure she was okay. This brief glance was enough to destabilize Eurydice, and she was able to utter only “goodbye” before fading away.

Orpheus pleaded for another chance, but it was not given. He spent the rest of his days melancholy, wandering without purpose. No longer did he spread his gift, choosing to remain silent. Finally, he relinquished his body choosing never to revive. The colony mourned the loss of such a great and unique life-born, but his death was not in vain. Through it, people learned both that conflict can be overcome without violence and that one must be careful of looking back too often. From then on, many tried to simply make the best out of the present, instead of dwelling on the past.

AXKZ was stunned. They praised a man who not only refused to use force, but who failed in his goal? How far did they expect to get without pure power? He must be missing something. Did the computer simply miss the point of the story? Surely it made more sense if Orpheus was looked at as a bad example. Still, the computer never made mistakes. He needed to take time to reconcile all of this. AXKZ fell asleep right there in the chair. Humans were proving more puzzling than he could have possibly imagined.

>>Original Story Source: Greece Myths: Orpheus and Eurydice, Web Source: Greeka.

>>Pictoral Archive Information: Bill Dickinson, Astronauts in Love, 2012

>>'Internet' Location: Flickr.

Author’s note: I changed very little of the original story of Orpheus other than the obvious setting change. Some versions of the myth go into more detail about his expedition with Jason and the Argonauts, but I decided to simply mention that (since Jason was mentioned in the first story) and focus on the most popular trial of Orpheus. In the original, Orpheus is well known for charming man and beast alike (he can make trees come alive) so I had to figure out what could take the place of beasts in a spaceship setting. Although I ended up including actual beasts (from different planets) in the story, I also showed that it had an effect on machines as well; that is, that cyborgs and androids (like the "god-like council") are subject to his music. Still, the point was to emphasize that his music was so powerful that it had an effect over all forms of life. The only part of the story I took a bit of liberty with was the ending. Usually it is depicted that Orpheus is killed by a group of women angry that he won’t return their advances, and then reunites with Eurydice in the Underworld. The whole mob of women thing struck me as a bit odd, so I had him die a peaceful, if lonely, death. Also, I elaborated more on the moral of the story and the consequences of his death than the versions of the myth typically do. Generally, they leave most of it up to the reader to figure out, but I thought it too important to leave ambiguous.