The Outpost

Previously on "The Outpost"...

It's written in Blackblood.

Guardian of the Asterkinj, the moment to awaken me has arrived.

Why do the others of your kind call you the Betrayer?

After I put my brothers and sisters to sleep,

this is where I hid the kinjes,

the keys to our souls, our sources of strength.

My kind do not belong here.

From the seven handprints in the Skevikor room,

it seems all seven are needed to complete their mission.

Are you ready to pay for your sins?

I am ready. Meet me at the Skevikor.

- What have you done? - The end begins now.

You must save them.

Marvyn, we don't have the means

of reviving even one more of your people,

let alone thousands.

We could barely save you with the few herbs we had.

You don't understand.

The Skevikor opens so the Kahvi may wake at the hands of the Masters.

If they aren't woken soon...

Janzo.

Oh!

If they aren't woken soon,

they will all die like this.

We need to get going.

The other six of your kind are on their way to the Outpost.

We need a plan.

It will come.

I don't understand why you can't just put them to sleep like you did last time.

Because I was too merciful the last time.

My brothers' and sisters' hunger for immortality is insatiable.

I should've known their captivity wouldn't last.

Sleep is not enough.

They must die.

Then how do we kill them?

I'm working on it.

What does that mean? Aster?

What's happening?

Talon?

So you wanna tell me what happened back there?

For a moment it looked like you were gonna kiss the weirdo.

It was so strange.

It was like I was peering into his soul.

I couldn't break free.

I never felt a connection like that before.

He's doing some magic mumbo jumbo to seduce you,

that's what he's doing.

It's not like that, I assure you.

That feeling you had,

you've been the guardian of my kinj for so long.

My soul and yours have spent many years entwined in your body.

They are bonded together.

Mm-hmm. Like lovers, I suppose.

More like family.

Do you understand?

Strangely, I do.

I don't trust him.

- I do. - Why?

Well, you heard his explanation.

Yeah, and I don't believe him.

I think he's got you under some sort of spell.

I don't think so. I'm linked to him.

It's hard to explain.

Hmm.

Aster, that's the wrong way.

- Wait here. - What for?

We need to cover more ground before nightfall.

Talon, wait. What if he needs to, like,

relieve himself or something?

I don't wanna know what that's like.

Aster, we need to keep moving.

What are you doing?

Whoa, look at that.

Aster: The being I loved above all others

was buried beneath all of that.

A friend showed me this once.

He told me it was an ancient Blackblood stronghold.

Were you here when this was built?

No.

This was after my time,

but it was built on the site of our first settlement.

The first settlement of the Seven?

No, the first settlement of my offspring,

those you call the Blackbloods.

Your offspring?

The Blackbloods? I don't understand.

How are we your offspring?

Has so much been lost over time?

Aster, what is your relationship to the Blackbloods?

- I am father of you all. - What does that even mean?

I don't understand.

This world, so full of life,

it took me years to find among all the other worlds out there.

When I brought the other six here,

I didn't realize the precious nature of its inhabitants.

- The Blackbloods? - The humans.

The other six didn't care. Only I was fascinated by them,

their ways, their intelligence,

so vulnerable, but with a strength of spirit I had never seen.

Before I knew it, I had fallen in love with one of them.

The lady at the river.

Yes. Tallya.

You said the Masters were endlessly taking life from every species out there

so that we might live forever.

But Tallya showed me the beauty of the first

intelligent species that we had found.

- Humans. - Yes.

To this day, I am convinced that you humans are related to us

in some even more distant past.

It's the only way it could have been possible for me

to father a child with Tallya.

Father a child?

The baby you protected from Golu?

Yes.

That child was your ancestor, Talon.

The first Blackblood.

So all Blackbloods are part human?

Yes. Part human, part me.

Your human friend here is a distance cousin of yours.

That is why I betrayed the Six, Talon.

It's why I won't let them succeed now.

You're more my family than the other six ever were.

If being open makes the Kahvi vulnerable, then we simply close the Skevikor.

Yes, and then maybe we could put them back in their protective sleep.

Right. How do we do that?

- Uh... - Marvyn? Hold this.

You used this sequence to unlock the Skevikor, right?

Do you think if we use it again, it'll close it perhaps?

Maybe all the Kahvi will return to their stasis?

I do not know.

Well, it's worth a try, yes?

Sure, sure. All right.

- Janya. Kultor. - Janya.

Levare. Aster,

- Golu. - Golu.

Tera. Vorta.

Wren: Nothing.

Perhaps backwards.

- Yes, backwards. - Yes?

Right.

- Vorta. Tera. - Vorta.

Are you sure it was them?

The supposed gods? The monsters?

Inhuman they were, all six of them.

And they killed everyone? Burned their village to the ground?

Ankril's Crossing is halfway between the Capital and here.

They may be making their way to the Outpost.

Are you certain there were six? Not five? Not seven?

I know my numbers, sir. It was six.

This is what I was afraid of.

Even burning Golu to ash didn't stop him from rising again.

Yes, but Talon... it sounds like she still has her kinj. Maybe she was successful.

Well, where the hell is she?

So, Blackbloods and us have been at war

forever over whose world this is.

- Aster: Fools. - But in the end, it was Blackbloods

fighting amongst ourselves that led to our near extinction.

I'm just grateful my kinj was kept amongst a clan

wise enough to renounce violence.

Your ancestral mothers were very wise women.

My grandmother and her grandmother were both called Tallya.

That was the name of your first love.

Yes, and you're named after all of them.

But they're Tallya. I'm Talon.

Tallya in Yindrian is the same word as Talon in your newer language.

Tell me, are you in possession of the ahl-kora blades?

The ahl-kora blades?

When we put the Six to sleep, we used weapons of ahl-kora,

a substance not from this world.

Only these weapons can be used to separate

the souls of my kind into kinj form.

I've never heard of such weapons.

If I'd seen one, I'd have stolen it for sure.

It sounds valuable.

How could they have been lost?

They were supposed to be passed from generation

to generation as my kinj was.

Your mother should've had them.

My mother's blade.

When my people renounced violence,

it was the one weapon she kept.

A wise woman, indeed, your mother.

This is ahl-kora.

This is what we need to stop my brothers and sisters.

There should be six more of them.

That's the only one I know of.

But each weapon can only be used once.

But there are six others of your kind.

Then you have to be sure to use it on the right one.

Backwards, forwards, order of the Masters' awakening.

Nothing works.

I thought I was freeing my people,

but I have caused their death.

If we cannot save them,

then perhaps it's better that the Masters succeed.

Better for the Kahvi to be slaves

to the Masters than to die.

Marvyn, the Masters succeeding

would mean the destruction of this world