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“Avgin” means “honey” in the Sigonian language. This is a commonplace derogatory term emphasizing the cunning, persuasive, and treacherous nature of the Avgins.
Veritas had read that in the data bank years ago. It wasn’t the first time he had read about Sigonia, but in the past his area of focus had been on the planet’s physiology, its place in the cosmos, its harsh climate and natural disasters rather than its anthropology. In those days, he had known only peripherally about the Avgins. But after his own first meeting with an Avgin, an encounter that had shaken him more than he’d like to admit, his interest had snagged. In the hours after Aventurine had left, after placing that damned gun back into his holster and walking off as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened, Veritas had retreated to his room and pulled up all the information on Avgin Sigonians and immersed himself in it, desperately trying to come to an understanding.
Aventurine would later go on to talk about the incident with pride. He had formed an alliance with only one bullet, and it was proof that he would always win when he wagered with fate itself. But to Veritas, it wasn’t the bullet, and it wasn’t Aventurine’s good luck, either. In fact, what had formed was not quite an alliance, but a seed of doubt taking root in his chest.
The majority of the IPC were fools and morons, but Veritas held a baseline level of respect for the higher-ups. They had to possess a certain level of intelligence and work ethic, after all, to make their way up. At the time when Aventurine was first assigned to work a mission with Veritas, he was not yet a Stoneheart, and had held the rank of P41. Despite the rumours that preceded him, more dominant even than the scent of his expensive perfume, Veritas had felt only a sense of neutrality towards him, feeling no need to allow baseless gossip to colour his understanding of another person.
And yet upon meeting him, he discovered that Aventurine was possibly the most incomprehensible person he had ever met, the kind of person that even the word “fool” could not encompass. A system devoid of logic. A gambler so irrational that he would not only place a bet with his own life, but would put the power to take that life in the hands of Veritas, a man he had never met. What for? Some kind of power play? A sick joke? Cunning was a word indicative of deception and trickery, but Veritas had himself watched as Aventurine loaded the gun with a single bullet and held it to his chest. Persuasive implied success in bringing Veritas over to Aventurine’s side, to share his common viewpoint— on what, the value of a life?— when that couldn’t be further from the truth. Treacherous wasn’t right, either. Aventurine, strange as he was, always behaved in a manner that was fully loyal to the IPC in all of their interactions to come.
Veritas did not know who had written this description in the data bank, but when one is immersed in academic research, skepticism comes far more naturally than belief. If he could not rely on the observations of his forefathers, then he would have to rely on his own.
The Avgins possess naturally appealing features, captivating eyes, and exceptional emotional intelligence bordering that of sorcery, enabling them to easily win the favour of strangers.
That much is perhaps true, Veritas thinks to himself as he stares down at Aventurine, who is on his knees in front of him, violet-ringed eyes half-lidded beneath long, fair lashes, cheeks hollowed out around Veritas’s cock. When a choked sound escapes from Veritas’s throat, Aventurine looks up, the colours in his eyes so prominent that they appear nearly radioactive in the dark, and Veritas feels hypnotized. No one else could have gotten him to this point so easily— his back against the wall of his office, cock stuffed down Aventurine’s throat as he sucked eagerly on it as if it were the last meal of his life. Sex was something Veritas seldom felt interest in beyond the scientific, hence the creation of that list he kept in his notebook. Was this, too, scientific? Was their dalliance, their masquerade as a pair of lovers, also a part of Veritas’s attempt to understand the Avgins through their last remaining vessel?
The thought feels ludicrous somehow. With pleasure muddling his senses, any motive outside of sexual release feels far off. Had he not known better he might really have attributed it to some innate sorcery on Aventurine’s part. But the far more likely truth is that Aventurine simply has a wealth of experience in this particular field. A pang of unfounded jealousy singes through him at the thought of Aventurine on his knees for anybody else. But as Aventurine tongues the sensitive underside of his head, all irrational thought flies out the window. He grabs onto Aventurine’s hair like a lifeline, thrusts hard, and comes violently down his throat.
Aventurine swallows his seed expertly. A small droplet escapes the corner of his mouth, and he swipes it up with his thumb and licks it off, intense gaze fixed on Veritas’s own, making him shudder.
“Well, that’s that.” Aventurine gets to his feet. “We can tick off that little box next to number three.” His own cock is straining against the front of his pants, but strangely, he makes no move to get himself off. Veritas wonders if he should ask, loathing how unsure and out of his depth Aventurine makes him feel. Before he can, though, Aventurine picks up the notebook off the top of his desk and hands it to Veritas along with his pen.
“How would you grade my performance today, Professor?”
Veritas takes the notebook, opens the page and ticks off number three. For a brief moment, he has a miniscule mental crisis over whether or not it would border on unethical to add teacher-student roleplay to the bottom of the list. He writes it down anyway. All the while, Aventurine watches him with that unnerving gaze of his.
“C-plus,” says Veritas, closing the book and setting it back down on his desk.
“After all that hard work? You wound me, Doctor.” Aventurine leans forward coquettishly, holding his hands behind his back. “What’ll it take to get an A from you?”
Veritas ignores him. The truth is, he’s not quite sure. The more time he spends with Aventurine, the more that any sort of conclusion about the man continues to elude his understanding.
This inborn talent helps them to navigate between major clans and ethnic groups, effortlessly obtaining them whatever they desire— though mostly resorting to less-than-legal means.
On Pier Point, Veritas has always been surrounded by overworked, underpaid IPC lackeys who cling to mindless gossip as their only reprieve. He typically tunes them out. Today, though, he finds his ire being drawn.
“Have you heard? They’re sending the Aventurine to Penacony.”
“That guy? I’ve always been suspicious since he got promoted, but a mission like Penacony is too important to leave in his hands. Don’t let the higher-ups catch me saying this, but really, what is Diamond thinking?”
The culprits this time are a tall young man no older than twenty-one, and a shorter woman around his age. He’s never seen them before. Words out of the mouth of fools like them should be of absolutely no importance. And yet he pauses around the corner, listening in.
“Ha! Your secret’s safe with me. I heard he scammed the IPC out of millions of dollars in the past. Not to mention the Egyhazo Aventurine case. I’ll bet he probably bribed or slept with Jade to get that promotion— just as you’d expect from an Avgin.” Ironic, that a word meaning honey could sound so poisonous, dripping with venom.
“Aeons, you’re right. What’ll he even do in Penacony, sleep with the entire Family?”
Veritas has heard enough. He’s about to round the corner to give them a piece of his mind when, emerging from around the opposite corner, Topaz steps in.
“Why aren’t the two of you working? According to your schedule, you should be on patrol.”
“S-sorry ma’am! Yes ma’am!”
As they turn to leave, Topaz grabs both of them by their collars with an iron-tight grip. “Where do you think you’re going?” Veritas admits he’s impressed. He hasn’t heard Topaz sound this cold before. “I’ve made a change to your schedule. Instead of patrol, you’re going to be spending the next two hours explaining to Jade that you’d much rather be spreading baseless rumours that harm the Company’s reputation than doing actual work. Would you like to take a guess on how she might react?”
Their faces grow pale, sweat beading on their foreheads. “No, please, Miss Topaz. We’re terribly sorry.”
“Fine.” She scowls. “But if I catch you sticking your noses into gossip again, you won’t just be losing your jobs, but your heads, too.”
They scurry away as soon as Topaz lets them go. Veritas takes that chance to make his presence known.
“Oh, you’re here,” says Topaz. She sighs. “What’s that thing you always say? ‘Ignorance is a disease?’ I have to say, I’m really feeling it right now.”
Veritas crosses his arms. “I was under the impression that you did not particularly like Aventurine.”
Topaz shrugs. “I was under that impression as well, until recently. Anyway, it doesn’t matter whether I like or dislike him— people shouldn’t be saying these things about anyone, let alone a superior.”
“Recently?” Veritas frowns. “What changed?”
“Well, I’m sure you recall my demotion after the events of Belobog.”
Veritas nods. The ordeal had earned her a non-insignificant amount of respect from him. To place the welfare of a planet above capital gains was not something every member of the IPC was capable of doing.
“I found out that Aventurine had also— ah, I probably shouldn’t be telling you,” she stammers, suddenly flustered. Under his inquiring gaze, she caves. “But I suppose I’ve dug my own grave already, so I may as well.” She lets out a long sigh. “You know that research trip you went on a while back?”
Veritas nods again. He had taken a two-month-long trip to Spindle-III to study their technologies for memory preservation in biological organisms, and had returned only a fortnight ago. Honestly, he had fully expected his request for funding to be turned down. Despite his successful medical research with lithogenesis, his subsequent research on dementia hadn’t yielded much in the way of results. And the IPC was known for being stingy with funding anything that did not yield immediate and quantifiable returns. After all, the only people that a cure for dementia would benefit would be those already past the retirement age. Those no longer working or contributing to their empire were practically useless to them. As a result, he was surprised when his request had gotten approved, along with 20% more funding than he had originally asked for. He had spent some time wondering if there was a bigger reason or ulterior motive, and now, it appeared that his question was about to be answered.
“Well… there was someone who pulled some strings behind the scenes. Someone who made a risky gamble—” Topaz allows herself a small smile— “using his rank. He wagered that if you didn’t produce valuable findings from your trip, then he would take a demotion.”
Veritas crosses his arms. He should perhaps be grateful, but all he feels is a hot spike of irritation. “That damned gambler.”
Topaz nods. "I asked him, afterwards, why he did it. I knew he was fond of you—” at this, Veritas stiffens, unsure if there is some hidden meaning, but Topaz doesn’t seem to notice— “but still, it seemed out of character for him. He just said that it would be good for him if you owed him a favour. But that didn’t make sense to me either. If he wanted you to owe him a favour, then wouldn’t he have told you what he did?”
Veritas cannot argue with her reasoning. It seems that his study of Aventurine has still failed to yield any conclusions. But for now, he has a hypothesis, a solid starting point for further investigation— that perhaps, he is not as uncaring as he presents himself to be, at least not when it comes to the lives of those around him.
“Anyway, it’s a good thing that the technology you found on Spindle-III could be repurposed for the IPC’s own gains. If not, we’d be down to nine Stonehearts.” Topaz gives a small, humourless chuckle. “I still don’t agree with the way he does things, but… I don’t think he’s a bad person. I heard they’re looking for someone from the Guild to accompany him to Penacony. I hope you don’t mind that I put your name forward.”
Of course Veritas minds. He doesn’t know how in the name of the Aeons he is supposed to work with Aventurine in a professional capacity, knowing what he does about him. How he looks, pinned beneath Veritas on the bed, messy blond hair fanned out on the pillow and cheeks high with colour, a perfect picture of the kind of debauchery Veritas once thought himself immune to. How he had never attended school, with no academic accolades to his name, but had a sharper mind and sharper tongue than just about anyone Veritas knew. How he knew nothing about the purpose behind Veritas’s research but believed it to be worthy regardless because it was him, because he felt fond of someone he had no right to feel that way for, and would lay his job on the line just for that. It only made Veritas want to help him in return, to protect him. He wonders if Aventurine had ever had anybody to protect him.
“I have no objections,” says Veritas. “Consider me signed on.”
Nowadays, the Avgins have gained notoriety throughout the entire universe as smugglers, stowaways, swindlers, gamblers, thieves, robbers, and occasional social butterflies.
“Professor.”
Veritas looks down at the raised hand. It’s that student in his front row again, the one with cropped brown hair and thick eyeglasses. She is one of Veritas’s best students. Though the frequency of her in-class participation often puts others on edge, he’s never been bothered by it, preferring to answer questions on the spot rather than leave any ignorance to rot his students’ brains. But right now, he is beginning to feel quite bothered.
“Yes?”
“Isn’t ‘social butterfly’ a derogatory term from the Xianzhou, essentially referring to someone who uses sex to leverage their connections?”
He never turns down a question in class. Even if he must chastise a student for posing an idiotic question in front of the whole class first, he will always, without fail, answer it. This, however, is not something he wants to discuss.
“At the time this was written, the Guild did not keep a record of which users edited its data bank. It is difficult to ascertain the intentions of the writer. As a scholar, skepticism should always come more naturally than belief.”
“I see.” She clears her throat. “Then, allow me to play devil’s advocate. If we were to assume that what they wrote is true, and that the Avgin people would stop at nothing to obtain what they wanted, why were they so easily wiped out?”
Veritas crosses his arms. “Have you been asleep for the past twenty minutes of lecture? Sigonia’s placement as the epicentre of natural disasters, the genocide led by the Katicans, the IPC’s failure to take prompt measures— what about all of this did you not understand?”
“Well, from what I’ve heard, there is only one living Avgin in this universe right now.”
Veritas swallows. “That is correct.”
“Then if they had the ability to survive what their clan could not, should this person be considered the most cunning, persuasive, and treacherous of all? Do you think they are someone that society should fear?”
A vein pops in Veritas’s temple, the quickened rhythm of his heart beating rapidly in his throat. “No,” says Veritas. “I’ve met and interacted with the individual in question over a number of years. I am sure of their moral character, and of the fact that, whatever biases may be present in the little existing information we have on the Avgins, they should not affect the way we think going forward.”
“But Professor, how can you be sure?” She barrels on. “Isn’t it possible that this person has done unsavoury things you don’t know about? After all, if ‘skepticism should come more naturally than belief,’ then should we not also be skeptical of the things you tell us?”
Veritas slams the book in his hand down on the podium, so loud that it rings out across the lecture hall.
“There is a stark difference,” he says, “between opening yourself to information from various sources, and mindlessly accepting information fed to you that perpetuates a harmful stereotype. If your pursuit of knowledge requires the sidelining of a marginalized group of people, then ask yourself whether this knowledge is worth acquiring at all.”
A thick, awkward silence permeates the room. No one dares to speak, least of all the instigator herself.
“If any of you have further questions on the matter, my inbox remains open to questions asked in good faith,” says Veritas. “Otherwise, let us move on. You have wasted enough of my time.”
The remainder of the class proceeds without a hitch, though the student keeps a rather downtrodden expression on her face. Veritas feels no sympathy for her. There are a large number of scholars in the universe who sorely need a reality check, and it is better to receive it early in one’s career than never at all.
After the class ended and the students have dispersed, one lone figure remains in the lecture hall, seated near the back. As they get up and approach him, it occurs to Veritas that it is not a student at all, but rather an annoyingly familiar face he never expected to see here of all places. He’s dressed down, looking much like a regular student from afar, with a pair of fake glasses to complete the look. It worked. Out of the three hundred students in the lecture hall, Veritas did not have time to identify each one by appearance.
“Aventurine,” Veritas grumbles. “What are you doing in my classroom? Those who don’t attend the university are not allowed on its grounds.”
“I pulled some strings.” Aventurine grins, removing his glasses and hanging them from the collar of his shirt— no spade-shaped cutout this time, though the top two buttons are unnecessarily undone. “You can’t blame me. I’ve been so bored, all cooped up in that hospital room since returning from Penacony. What better way to entertain myself than auditing a lecture from my favourite professor?”
“You should be resting.”
“I wouldn’t be out and about if I hadn’t already healed up. You really don’t trust me, do you?” Aventurine laughs, the sound light and airy despite the heaviness of his words. “It’s true, after all. I’ve done a lot of unsavoury things to get to where I am now. I can’t say I wasn’t surprised to see you defend me like that, knowing full well I placed a gun in your hands the day we first met.”
Veritas stares him down. Over the time they have spent together, he has become painfully familiar with Aventurine’s eyes, the perpetual smile on his face, the hand behind his back where he fully believes that no one else can see it trembling.
“I will not ask you about your past,” says Veritas. “It bears no relevance to the trust I place in you today.”
Aventurine blinks. Veritas might feel a spark of pride at finally getting to see Aventurine so taken aback, his expectations thoroughly outplayed by someone else’s actions. But he doesn’t.
“I trust that you will do the right thing for the IPC and for our shared goals,” says Veritas. “I have also, unfortunately, come to trust that you will stop at nothing to endanger your own life to get there. Your disturbing lack of self-preservation is as constant as the stars in the vast sky of the universe. But seeing as you are still alive and kicking today, I also trust that you have read the note I wrote to you and taken it to heart. Don’t forget— your Cornerstone may be shattered, but you are still in possession of a biological heart, pumping the last of the Avgin blood through your veins. Don’t put it to waste.”
Aventurine’s eyes soften at the edges. Even if Veritas had been able to meet Aventurine’s family before they passed, he would have come to the same conclusion— Aventurine surely has the most beautiful pair of eyes out of all of the Avgins. There is no point in deluding himself further by thinking of Aventurine as a subject of study for a larger purpose. There is no point in denying that his interest lies with Aventurine specifically. That he has been pulled in by some inexplicable, gravity-like force since long ago, and that he will perhaps never be free of it.
“Will you be free tomorrow night?” Aventurine asks. “It’s been a while since we’ve done anything on the list. I have to say, life has been rather dull without your company.”
Veritas swallows. To him, it sounds almost like I missed you. But it’s not. It can’t be. Can it?
“Yes,” he answers.
“Then I’ll see you in your room, Doc. Nine o’clock sharp. Don’t be late.”
“Why would I be late to my own room?”
Aventurine laughs. Light and airy just like before, but this time Veritas can tell that it is genuine and unburdened. “I’ll see you there, Ratio.”
“Avgin” means “honey” in the Sigonian language. This is a commonplace ████ term emphasizing the ████, █████, and ██████ nature of the Avgins.
As Rogatio Ratio’s only son, the deterioration of knowledge is something that Veritas is painfully aware of. The decay of information, when not properly recorded or maintained, is inevitable and near impossible to prevent. It is one of the reasons that, until a major breakthrough in the retention of one person’s memory can be reached, Veritas dedicates his time to the dissemination of knowledge among all.
Veritas has spent a long time pondering how to proceed with the information on the Avgins in the Guild’s data bank. There is a certain argument to be made for holding on to old and outdated information for the sake of preservation. But on this particular evening, he decides: to hell with it. If all the information in the world was regularly consumed without a thought to where it came from, then the disease called ignorance would be that much harder to cure.
Sitting at his desk, he pulls up his monitor, enters his credentials and logs in with administrator access. Then, he deletes the entire section that he had once memorized word for word, and overwrites it with a new paragraph.
"Avgin" means "honey" in the Sigonian language. It's a conventional term irretrievably lost in the long arc of cosmic history.
The Avgins are blessed with attractive facial features, beautiful eyes, and an innate wealth of emotional intelligence, all of which effortlessly endear themselves to any strangers. However, these inborn talents are the exact reason they draw jealousy and ire from others. And the envious and snobbish soon begin their ceaseless slander, and the baseless defamation of the Avgins thus spreads like wildfire throughout the cosmos. As mere rumors can suffice to tarnish the sanctity of truth, the Avgins, a people of a peripheral world, found themselves assailed without recourse, subject to all manners of suspicion and prejudice.
When he is done, he closes the window and leans back in his chair. Right on schedule, his phone begins to ring with a call from none other than his mother. He answers it and pulls up the video feed on the hologram monitor in front of him, enlarging it to see her face at its actual size.
“Veritas,” she says, her smile sweet and warm as always. “It’s good to see you again. How have you been?”
“I’ve been well,” he says. Next to her, his father is half-sitting, half-lying against his lounge chair, wearing a mindless smile on his face. “How have you and Father been?”
“Oh, we’ve been doing just fine,” she says. Her eyes seem tired at the edges. But no matter how many times he offers to return home and take care of them, she has always staunchly refused. “Don’t worry about us.”
“Who’s this?” says his father, eyes dazed. “Who are you talking to?”
“That’s Veritas,” says his mother. “That’s our son. Say hello to Veritas.”
“Hello, Father,” says Veritas. He waves. Rogatio waves back.
“So, Veritas!” his mother says brightly. “Tell us about that research project of yours. I’ve always loved hearing about your accolades.”
Perhaps it’s a source of comfort for her. His parents were both scholars, after all, renowned across the universe for their achievements— though perhaps not as much as Veritas himself. In recent years, the dementia has wiped Rogatio’s memory of everything he once dedicated his life to studying, and with all of his wife’s time devoted to caring for him, there is not much left to allocate to her own studies.
Veritas regales his mother with the story of how his research trip went down. He pauses for only a brief moment before mentioning a certain coworker of his, who had gone out on a limb to fund his grant.
“That’s lovely,” says his mother. “Isn’t it great that you’re making friends at work?”
I’m thirty-two, he bites back the urge to say, not a child on his first day of kindergarten. I don’t need to make friends at work.
“Who’s this?” says his father again, his speech slurring a little. “Who are you talking to?”
“That’s Veritas,” his mother repeats, without missing a beat. “That’s our son. Say hello to Veritas.”
“Hello, Father,” says Veritas. He waves. Rogatio waves back.
After a while, the conversation dwindles out, as it often does. They bid each other goodbye, and Veritas hangs up. Although he exchanges calls with his family at regular intervals, Veritas doesn’t often dwell on what they talk about. If he were to keep a tally of how many times his father asked for his name in the last two years, despite Veritas looking like the spitting image of him, it would certainly have driven him mad. Rather than fixate on the past, it is much more preferable to focus on the future. On what he plans to accomplish— not for any accolades, and certainly not for the gaze of Nous, but for the person who raised him, and for humanity as a whole.
He climbs into bed. Tomorrow Aventurine would once again share the bed with him, although he has not once bothered to stay the night. After their encounters, Veritas has gotten quite used to waking up with the other side of the bed cold, the faint scent of perfume and a checkmarked sheet of paper in a notebook serving as the only reminders that he had been there at all.
Veritas leans over to his nightstand and grabs the notebook. The list had consisted of thirty-one items before he had began to sleep with Aventurine. He had added ten more afterwards. Tonight, he pens yet another additional item, though this one is perhaps rather sentimental compared to the rest.
42. Get Aventurine to stay the night.