 
Spackman

Star Gods

Star Gods

By

Anne Spackman

Copyright © 2014 by Anne Spackman

All Rights Reserved.

Cover art by Boris Rasin

Ever in thought returned to me, the days that are no more.

–Manzoni, Adelchi
Chapter One

Death comes to all living things.

The child who knew only her first name, Alessia, would always remember the day her father died clearly.

"Stay away from the sick room!" Her mother Nerena had said in a rough tone many times to her in the last few tendays, as Alessia lingered about her father, who was clearly very ill. Alessia had paid little heed to this order and continued to linger by the sick room of their house, sneaking in to see her father at times, but he was always lying still and unconscious, connected to a life support feed. The android nurses ignored Alessia when she came in to see her father. But when Nerena was there, Alessia had to hide outside the room and just listen to his breathing.

She was very scared. She loved her father very much, and hated to see him like this.

That afternoon Alessia had run home from the lyra forest when a rain shower passed over.

Heavy grey skies hung over the tallest tree-tops. The damp air tasted of the trees, of the smells of the forest around her, long before the first hint of rain fell. Cold drops beaded on her hair and skin as she skidded down the rocky path to their dwelling, an ancient creation of stone once used by the ancients. Their house was very old and had been refurbished year after year with new technology, but it was still ancient stone on the outsde, from an era early in their planet's history. They lived in the Lake Firien province, far to the North, in a territory outside the weather-safe ring.

So the Firien people were provincial, even backward, in their customs and in their lifestyle, compared to the rest of the planet. Lake Firien's province contained vast tracts of untouched forest, here where it was so cold blizzards blanketed the land every winter with masses that kept them housebound. It was even unsafe, with wild creatures called delochs that could find men and children and tear them to pieces, if they had no weapon or protection.

Alessia crouched outside by the open clear window of the sick room, hearing nothing but the rising sighs of the wind in the nearby tree-tops. There was no sign of her mother. She was growing cold, her legs scratched up and itching, but she was too distracted to notice the pain. Alessia sat still for several moments, breathing quietly, then summoned courage and peered inside, her eyes rising just above the rim of the windowsill.

There he was, lying on the bed. Her father. And now, he was dying.

Her father's health had been declining over the past year, but no one knew why precisely, though it was said he had a rare form of anemia that was killing him slowly. The android nurses and doctors had run into difficulty as they attempted to diagnose and treat their patient, for he was an alien, and his anatomy, though humanoid, was not like any they had yet encountered. Alessia didn't understand any of this.

"Come in, come in." Inside the sick room, her mother Nerena was ushering in a pair of stiff-necked specialist doctors on alien anatomy from nearby Firien City. To Alessia, they looked around disdainfully as they gazed around at the bare room. What a bother, having to come all the way out here, into a remote area of the Firien province, their expressions seemed to say. Alessia disliked them on sight, but she positively hated them as the doctors regarded her father with an unconcealed mixture of curiosity and dislike.

Alessia's father was clearly not of their world. He was an off-worlder. Though he appeared like a humanoid of their world in many ways, he was not; his skin was also gray, but he had strange, multi-colored eyes that changed color in the light like a prism, and his hair was white; moreover, his body shape was slightly shorter and more muscular than the average person from their world, which was called Seynorynael.

Why did her mother Nerena always try to bring in doctors when she thought Alessia's father was asleep? Alessia didn't understand. Her mother knew that in those brief moments when he was awake, Alessia's father would always send them away. It seemed that he knew there was nothing to be done about his condition, even if Alessia's mother Nerena wouldn't accept it.

Nerena loved Alessia's father with all her heart, and only wanted him to live. She was doing her best to see that he survived his illness. The man himself, however, seemed weak and wanted his suffering to be over.

Meanwhile, the doctors were talking in hushed tones inside the room.

Why did everyone react so strongly to her father? Alessia wondered, watching as the doctors pulled down the covering and withdrew various electro-scanners and instruments from a portable examination case.

Alessia loved her father and didn't realize how different he was from other people. He had been a strong, well-formed man once, though now in his ailment he had become quite weak.

She loved him so much, she reacted to anything that they did to him with protective feelings; she felt pain and fear each time the specialists drew near him.

Alessia remembered a few times when her father had been strong enough to pick her up and put her on his shoulders to go running around or walking by the lake; Alessia remembered staring down at his shining hair in wonder—he was an alien, with silver hair, not golden like the amber-eyed Tulorians or dark like the raven-haired Kayrians that lived in a nearby settlement.

He loved her so much, his tiny, stubborn, spirited daughter. He had taught her so much in her young life, about science and all kinds of plants and trees. He had spent many long days schooling her in his language, an alien language Nerena couldn't understand except for words here and there.

He had also been the one who first taught her to walk on the shores of the lake, putting her down at a distance from him and extending his arms out to her.

His strange alien eyes were the strangest thing about him. They were multi-faceted and oscillated in color depending on his moods, like a prism—many people couldn't look at his eyes.

The doctor Nerena brought that day paused before the door as he left.

"I don't think there's anything to be done. He has an alien form of anemia and a wasting disease, the likes of which I have never seen before. It is difficult for us to medically treat alien diseases way out here. His color is too pale–"

"Dr. Egref, he's always been like that." Nerena said, shaking her head.

"Indeed?" Egref said, nodding. His eye strayed to the pallid, sleeping form, a creature whose skin was lighter than the pale grey of Seynorynaelians, a creature unlike any other inhabitant of the remote community on Lake Firien. "Still, I'm afraid, Nerena Zadúmchov, that you'd better prepare yourself for the worst. We'll come back tomorrow to see how he's doing."

"Good-bye. And thank you for coming so far out of your way."

"Not at all. No thanks required, for the daughter of General Zadúmchov." Egref said pleasantly and gave a curt nod.

Nerena just stared after him, struck dumb by his words.

Of course they had come to her assistance only for the reason that she was General Zadúmchov's daughter, who had been one of the Council's right-hand men and who was in the upper echelon of Seynorynaelian society.

"Nerena..." Alessia's father called unexpectedly after a few minutes had ticked by.

She rushed to his bedside.

Behind the window, Alessia leaned closer into the clear window pane to hear better.

Nerena knelt by her husband's side, and Alessia couldn't hear what they whispered to each other in those last moments, but somehow she understood that her father was about to die.

Nerena clasped his hand and raised it to her cheek as he mumbled one last word. Then his body stilled, and she threw herself on his chest, grasping his shoulders tightly with both arms and reaching over to kiss his cheek. Her sobs grew wild and unyielding; behind the pane, Alessia's eyes welled with tears that slipped easily to the rain-saturated ground.

Her father was dead.

Then suddenly a bright burst of electricity emanated from the corpse and engulfed him. The body beneath Nerena dissipated into a fine mist of energy, then dispelled into the open air, leaving Nerena alone with her sorrow.

Alessia fell back from the window in horror, aware that she had witnessed an unnatural death, scratching her knees raw on small, sharp stones as she clambered to her feet. In fear, she ran from the dwelling. But her short, rain-splotched legs, spotted with dirt, gave out beneath her, and she fell to the soft mud in the clearing outside the house.

A long time passed before Nerena came out to find her.

"Alessia!" Nerena cried with some relief. "There you are! Honestly, why do you make me worry so much about you?!"

Remorseful and anguished by this reproof, Alessia held up her grubby arms to her mother. They were caked with a few clinging leaves and smelled of lyra tree sap.

The eyes that looked down at Alessia had lost all expression, all of the light of emotion and heart that had been there. Nerena picked her up, but the dried rivers of her tears felt coarse against Alessia's cheek.

"Go inside and wash yourself," Nerena said a moment later, once they neared the path outside the dwelling, running an eye over her daughter's wild, unruly hair. "You reek of rotting leaves." She said, dropping Alessia roughly on the ground.

* * * * *

That evening, a very severe, somber-faced, and finey dressed stranger arrived at the dwelling. Alessia awoke to the sound of voices but lay still on her sleep panel in order to eavesdrop.

Nerena's father had at last come.

"So he is dead? Where is the body?" The Grand Marshall, General Zadúmchov of the Martial Scientific Force, asked. Alessia had only ever heard his voice on announcements over the global information network. He was famous across their world and across the entire Federation.

There was no answer from Nerena.

"Hmmm, nothing to say. Zariqua Enassa—multi-colored eyes, what a strange man! An alien husband with such strange eyes was not what I had in mind for you. Well, it didn't last, after all, for long. So what will you do now? You aren't going to live here alone with that child, are you?"

"Her name is Alessia, and she's your granddaughter," Nerena said quietly.

"Is she?" Zadúmchov chuckled. "She looks like her father. I see only his alien blood in her. She revolts me."

Silence followed the Grand Marshall's remark. Under her covering, Alessia winced, hating to hear her father and she herself spoken so ill of, her pride taking the sharp bite of her grandfather's rejection. She decided to hear no more and closed her ears. Soon she was asleep. In the bright, clear morning, like cold, saturating evening mist, the Grand Marshall was gone.

* * * * *

Alessia had fallen asleep on a bed of dry lyra leaves, listening to the sibilant song of the wind playing through the sheltering branches above her. Lonely ceiras birds added their mournful melody, wheeling inland over the forest from the nearby shores of Lake Firien.

She was jolted awake by the sound of small black aleia birds squawking nearby.

"What's that noise?" Alessia thought aloud.

She looked around, startled, but no one came, and the birds gradually quieted and returned to their business. Alessia started to play in the leaves, brushing them aside and drawing pictures in the dark soil. Some time later, her appetite reminded her that it was time to eat something. She hunted around the area for a piece of sherin fruit that she had picked from one of the sherin trees that lined the nearby rocky stream.

She was brushing it off when she heard footsteps approaching, crunching on branches lining the forest floor; startled by the noise, Alessia accidentally dropped the last of the forest's sherin fruit which she had spent all morning finding in the mostly lyra tree forest near their dwelling. Looking about, she spied a woman lingering on the edge of the clearing just under the farthest boughs.

"Who are you?" Alessia wondered as the odd-looking woman approached her, picking her way over the soft, mossy floor of the clearing. But Alessia wasn't afraid. The stranger, whoever she was, wore an expression that reminded Alessia of her father, who had died a few years before.

"Wait, don't leave," Alessia called as the stranger hesitated half-way. The woman appeared to be deciding whether or not to approach further, then suddenly stepped several steps forward to pick up the fallen fruit that had rolled out of Alessia's reach. The stranger walked with it to the stream's edge, cleaning off the dirt for Alessia, then brought the piece back to her.

Who was the stranger? Alessia wondered. The woman's hair was more blond than white, the usual color of Seynorynaelian hair. Alessia's eyes betrayed her curiosity.

"Sorry to disturb you," the woman said, giving her the sherin fruit. She then sat by Alessia on the log, and they talked of her life, shared the small piece of sherin fruit; Alessia answered the woman's questions about where she lived and about her mother.

"So you've had a happy childhood?" The stranger finally asked after a while.

"I am only a child still," Alessia said, screwing up her nose in confusion.

"Do you like living out here in Firien?" The stranger rephrased her question.

"Oh, yes," Alessia answered bluntly. "But I miss my father." She admitted, looking around. "He used to take me here. He's gone now. But sometimes as I'm walking over here, I can imagine he's waiting for me in this clearing."

"It's a lovely place." As the stranger spoke, they heard a rustling sound of some small creature burrowing in the undergrowth.

"I know. My mother never comes here though."

"What is your mother like?" The stranger asked, peering closely at her.

Alessia shrugged. "I don't know. She doesn't like me to be around too much. She's very proper. And not too friendly."

"Maybe she knows how much you like coming out here, so she doesn't stop you?"

"No, that's not it. She doesn't like to spend time with me. Not since father died. She doesn't touch me unless she wants to punish me for coming home after sunset. She's afraid the delochs will tear me to pieces, you see. Wild delochs don't do that all the time, you know, but she says they do." Alessia added. "Besides, there are none around here."

"What does your mother do while you're out here?"

"She mostly stays inside. She works on things at the house, and sells goods across the planet that we make. She has orders from all over the Federation for lyra sap and sherin fruit jams. But she says she hates doing these things, selling things for a living."

"So she works all day?"

"Yes, but when the sun goes down, she wanders out there by the lake. Sometimes she just stands there watching the waves crash on the rocks. Other times she stares at the sky until both moons have risen. When she comes home, her face is windswept and her hair is a mess. She doesn't talk a lot to me, except to tell me what to do. The android house-keeper talks more to me than she does."

"That is a real shame."

"My father taught me a lot about the land and sea before he died, and I've learned even more at education training." Alessia didn't want to add that she found education training dull in general, that she taught herself more by studying the information available at the center than any instructor had taught her. The instructors, as a rule, disliked her, since everyone knew her father was an alien.

And every time she went to the center, she thought how much she wanted to come back to the forest, where she could be alone with nature.

The stranger laughed, a sad, empty laugh.

"You've got a good memory, I see. That's wonderful. But it can be a misfortune at times when you would rather not remember." She said.

"Huh? Why would you say that?"

"It is difficult to explain, why I said that. Just ignore it." The stranger forced a smile.

"That reminds me. I forgot I've got to go to the distribution office today," Alessia said, rising, then brushed off the leaves from her short, tattered dress.

"Why?" The stranger asked.

"I usually go once a tenday." Alessia explained. "That's where we get our food packets from. It's not really all that hard going there, you know." She insisted, as though long used to shouldering the responsibility of acquiring their food rations, a task which was usually delegated to adults, even out here in the remote Firien settlement. "They have haulers and loaders and everything, and I can take them with me from Firien City on the transport."

The stranger gave her a bittersweet smile. Alessia sensed that she had somehow evoked this woman's pity, and she felt her pride rising in defense.

"I don't mind doing it," she insisted. "I know the way. I go to Firien City for training, too."

Alessia was aware that to the stranger, she was only a five year-old girl by Seynorynaelian reckoning, though by years on some of the other planets she would have been thirty by now! This was because it took a long time for the planet Seynorynael to orbit the star, Valeria. Alessia felt far older than she was at times, especially when she met other children around the settlement. They still played like children, still cried when they scraped a knee. Meanwhile, Alessia had learned how to maintain their dwelling, to take care of herself and her mother.

Alessia was like a little adult. When she wasn't working around the dwelling, Alessia virtually lived in the forest, the only place where she felt truly at home, where she felt safe, free, and happy. But in the last two seasons, she had begun her first years of education training in the nearby cultural center for their area, spending six out of every ten days there.

Now more than ever, Alessia rushed to the forest each morning before leaving, and soon the winter would be coming. She wouldn't be able to stay for very long out in the bitter cold, even though the lyra leaves never changed color, even in winter. The wind sometimes knocked them from their branches, and a few fell every fall, but for the most part the trees themselves stayed green throughout the year.

Alessia adored the beautiful lyra trees, the silvery-gold canopy as she gazed up under them, the pale green glow of the treetops on the horizon as she awoke each morning. They were strong. They needed nothing visible to survive. And they were beautiful. There were other trees, too, that were lovely. Sherin trees were hard to find among them, and lyra bore no fruit to quiet human hunger. Alessia's father had said that they were studied across the Federation for this reason, the strange lyra trees that had ceased to bear fruit but which were thousands of years old. Many years ago, a law had been passed prohibiting anyone killing or cutting down a lyra tree since they were rare and could not be replaced. In fact, the Firien province was the only known province where there still were any lyra trees.

"I have to go now," Alessia said, rising. "If I don't hurry, they'll shut the center, and we'll have to wait three days for it to open again."

"Good-bye–Alessia," the woman called behind her.

Alessia never even stopped to wonder how the stranger had known her name.

* * * * *

Alessia thought she wouldn't see the stranger again, but she appeared in the same place the next morning.

"Allariya Kaleena!" Alessia called out to her, remembering her favorite story, the one her father had read to her, which meant something like "best friends". The woman laughed nervously as Alessia jumped over the stream and collapsed by her on the lyra log. Alessia looked at her, then sensed her hesitation.

"You didn't want me to come back here to see me after all, and you're regretting you came?" Alessia guessed, looking up into the woman's unhappy eyes.

"No, I–I did want to see you, but I shouldn't have come–" she added mysteriously. "You see, I did want very much to see you. My name is Selerael."

"Sill-air-ay-yel? Nice to meet you again, Selerael."

"Well, thank you. Here, I brought you some more sherin fruit to replace the one I ruined." The woman Selerael added, holding out a beautifully ripe orange-red piece of fruit the size of a fist, then put it back on top of a basket full of sherin fruit. She handed the basket to Alessia.

"You aren't from the Elder Council?–no, you wouldn't be," Alessia shook her head.

"Why do you say that?" Selerael was suddenly anxious.

Alessia picked up the largest piece of fruit from the basket and took a bite, wiping the juice from her mouth.

"They came yesterday after I left here, looking for me," she explained. "Mother thought I was still in the forest, but I was hiding behind the transport vehicle they brought. She wouldn't let them inside. She screamed at them to go away. Even when they left, she wouldn't stop. It was awful. I thought she was going berserk. I've never seen her act that way, not since—"

"The day your father died." Selerael nodded. Alessia turned and scrutinized her face.

"How did you know? Did you know my father?"

Selerael smiled secretively at her. "I can see him in you."

* * * * *

The tranquil blue moon Ishkur had overtaken the fiery moon Nanshe in the celestial race. Two long Seynorynaelian years had passed since Alessia first met Selerael. Alessia wouldn't have forgotten her, even had Selerael never returned; Selerael did return, though, a few times each year.

Yesterday, two days after she appeared again, Selerael had hugged Alessia tightly before they parted. When Selerael released her, the older woman's cheeks were wet with tears, but she wouldn't explain why. Alessia didn't like to see adults cry and couldn't help but try to cheer her up, but Selerael had insisted that Alessia should hurry home to her mother; the sun was setting, after all.

Alessia woke early the next morning, anxious to meet Selerael and give her the necklace she had made from the blue and purple stones that bordered the shores of Lake Firien. She hurried to the clearing, but Selerael wasn't there. Alessia finally found her on the path to the clearing where it branched on her left, heading to the lake shore.

"There you are!" Alessia declared, spotting Selerael, who was sitting on the ground, just listening to the forest.

Alessia spent the afternoon swimming in the tepid waters of Lake Firien on the north shore, paddling about as Selerael watched. For a while, Alessia was content by herself. She found a weed floating on the surface of the water and tied it round her finger, pretending it was a bandage and that she was a soldier. But after a while, she wished Selerael would come swimming, too. After Alessia made several attempts at persuading her, Selerael finally consented to join Alessia, and they splashed each other furiously and played various water games.

Alessia and Selerael dried themselves in the blinding sunlight, lying on the bleached rocks stretched out like lounging sea creatures, then raced each other to the clearing in the forest, where the wild sherin fruit were just beginning to ripen. After an afternoon of games and climbing sherin trees, with Alessia climbing and tossing the fruit for Selerael to catch, they sat on the giant log in the clearing and drew pictures in the dirt.

When it was time to leave, Selerael hugged Alessia again tightly.

"Alessia, would you do something for me?" Selerael asked as they drew apart.

"What?" Alessia turned to her, uncertain what to expect.

"Tell your mother that you love her," Selerael said in a suddenly serious tone. "And show her that you mean it."

"All right." Alessia agreed, confused.

"Here–take this." Selerael added, gathering something from under the collar of her dark uniform, then pulled a chain from her neck over her head. She handed the necklace to Alessia.

"What's it for?" Alessia wondered, taking it, her eyes still on Selerael's strained smile.

"Wear it and it will bring you luck," Selerael replied.

"What a coincidence. I have one for you, too." Alessia said, withdrawing the necklace of stones she had threaded on a silver string. Selerael took the rough necklace as though it were the most precious object on the planet Seynorynael and hugged Alessia again. Alessia felt strangely gratified by Selerael's affection, but at the same time, she was unaccustomed to it and stood woodenly in the embrace. A moment later, Selerael left Alessia sitting on the log in the clearing, gazing at an unusual, tear-shaped, lapis-colored pendant on a chain of interlocking silver rings. Alessia held it up and let the stone trace an arc through the air. It was the most beautiful pendant Alessia had ever seen.

Meanwhile, Selerael disappeared among the trees the way she had come.

* * * * *

When Alessia returned home that afternoon, the Council representative was waiting.

Alessia heard voices coming from their dwelling and stopped behind the door to listen. Peeking in through a clear screen to the front room, Alessia saw Nerena sitting quietly in the living area surrounded by officers of the Martial Scientific Force, forced to listen as a small council representative explained why they had descended upon Nerena's home.

"...so what did you expect?" The representative seethed, inadvertently launching a few drops of spittle into Nerena's serene face. "Did you not receive the messages?" He demanded. "Or did you think we only sent them as a suggestion? Did you think the Council would forget and leave you alone if you ignored them?"

"I had rather hoped you would." Nerena returned in a defiant tone.

"Rest assured we only left you alone because until recently we had other matters to attend to." The representative continued, now waving an admonishing finger in her face. "I'm sure you have heard about the return of the explorer mission we sent into space three thousand years ago. As you can imagine, the Council has been busy these past two years simply reviewing all of the new information they have brought us upon their return.

"You should consider it an honor that Councillor Marankeil himself is interested in the welfare of your daughter. Alessia Valeria Zadúmchov will become a high-ranking officer in the Martial Scientific Force once she completes her training. Would you deny her the chance to fulfill her family tradition? Your father, General Zadúmchov, won great esteem from the Federation Council before his tragic death last year."

"He told you about us, didn't he?" Nerena asked in a voice barely above a whisper, her eye straying to an image on the far wall of a boat, docks, and a summer dwelling by the sea.

"That isn't the point." The man shook his head. "You know the family tradition, that you yourself were always expected to join us. But you chose to reject your duty. Your daughter must have the chance to regain her honor for her grandfather's sake."

"I'm no fool, representative Bilka." Nerena spoke up, a bit of old fire returning to her eyes. "You wouldn't have come all of this way just to repay the loyalty of my father. General Zadúmchov forgot he had a daughter once she married beneath her, to an alien from an unknown world. And if my father the great Grand Marshall once loved me, he never held his granddaughter. He scorned Alessia. Do you think that I'm ignorant as to why you've come? For what useful purpose will Alessia be used by the Council?"

"You don't wish your daughter to be abused, I can see it in your eyes." Bilka surmised. "Know then that her status depends upon you and any information you are willing to give us. We know nothing of her father–perhaps as an alien, he managed to secure illicit passage to Seynorynael without registering in our files. But if he was born on this world, no record exits of him."

"So, you came from Ariyalsynai to Lake Firien for a half-race child?! Despite my birth and former rank in society, it makes little sense—"

"Marankeil is willing to overlook that Alessia is a half-race child." Bilka replied with exaggerated magnanimity. "It is common enough to be half-race, though as her father was an unknown alien, his status as a Firien off-worlder was far beneath that of our Federation brother races. Did you have your DNA artificially fused to make Alessia?"

"No, she was a natural birth."

"Strange, indeed. That should not be possible, unless Alessia's father's race was close enough in DNA to combine with our own."

"I don't know."

"And all of this is the reason I am here. Marankeil needs to know what precise race and planet the child's father came from. There are certain things we can't explain. The medical center central computer reported that when your daughter was born, her replication unit count was higher than any known humanoid, and her blood showed high concentrations of certain immunity cells. While it could be that a mistake was made in the test results, other peculiarities have since surfaced, beginning with the incidents at the education center."

Nerena looked up, a bemused expression on her face, but said nothing.

"Has she not told you?" The representative shrugged and continued. "In three hundred years of effort, no one has been able to decipher the symbols etched on the ancient ruins near Lake Firien. I don't know if you've noticed the reconstruction crews that have been moving through this area recently, but the Council has authorized a development plan to rebuild a new spaceship out of the ruins of a starship buried out here. And of course, the education centers have been studying the territory across the Federation planets ever since the explorers returned.

"Then a few months ago, your daughter claimed to have figured out what the word was in the image she had been given. Of course the instructor reported the matter, expecting nothing, but unable to dismiss Alessia's claim. We have since learned why, but I'll get to that in a moment. It might interest you to know that a reply arrived in our regional government building from Marankeil himself."

"The Council Elder Marankeil himself," Nerena breathed.

"Selesta was indeed the name carved into that fragment." Bilka declared, meeting Nerena's widening eye. "The name your child had given, or translated, if we can believe her. Marankeil has confirmed this to be a correct translation, through comparisons with what little we already know of the various alphabets of the ancients and other fragments of writing which have been left behind by them. And because of this, because your daughter was able to break the code of a previously unknown symbolic system of writing, at long last we know that the name of the ruin was once 'Selesta'. Because of this, you see, we cannot allow her to remain here. She is privy to some semi-divine, secret knowledge—"

"Selesta," Nerena repeated, looking away, her expression unsettled as if the word were somehow familiar to her.

"An archaic spelling and pronunciation of our own word discovery–silista." Bilka explained, gesturing with a wave of his hand as though he imagined himself to be surpassingly clever. "However, this is not the first time that your daughter has shown psychic unusual abilities, I hear. What was the word the instructor used?" The representative turned to one of the MSF guards.

"Proto-telepathic?" A hard-faced woman with ice blue eyes suggested. The representative smiled and nodded agreement.

"Yes, proto-telepathic, which isn't to say telepathic entirely. This seems to be an early and rudimentary sort of telepathy as we know it. It's what they call the people who always seem to know what someone is about to say, what they feel, even–yes perhaps even what they're thinking on the surface of their thoughts. From what I've heard, your Alessia may be the most advanced proto-telepath we've ever encountered, and there have been many for thousands of years, with an especially high number of them here in the Firien province. Apparently, there were more of them in days gone by, and they were studied intensely for a time in the distant past, but over time, since there have been fewer and fewer of them, society has largely forgotten about them.

"In any event, in order to tap and develop Alessia's nascent psychic abilities, she will be taken to the Federation Science Building in Ariyalsynai."

"Ariyalsynai?" To Nerena, this was a world away. A world she had once known very well. Ariyalsynai was the capital of the planet.

"One of the returned explorer scientists of our last explorer mission is very interested in meeting her." Bilka continued. "And I'm sure he'll do everything to make Alessia feel comfortable in her new home–after all, our great scientist Fynals Hinev himself is a half-race man. They say his mother was Kayrian." Bilka paused. "Leena, take the guard and go find the child."

Nerena's eyes flashed with dark intent. "You will not take my daughter from me!" Nerena screamed, springing to her feet and rushing to the door. Nerena would find Alessia, and they would leave, her face clearly said, even if it meant disappearing into the wild lands. From beyond the screen, her daughter Alessia sensed her thoughts, but the guards had anticipated Nerena's action, and followed her, grasping her by the arms and pulling her back to the interrogation seat. She struggled several moments with the strength of an impassioned mother defending her child, but the guards at last subdued her.

"You beasts!" Nerena spat at them.

Then Nerena wilted in their arms, her nose bloody and body bruised and exhausted. Her hair was wild and unkempt, and violet blood dripped from her nails. The guards dropped her roughly into the chair. Then one of the guards, a huge, barrel-chested man with a violet gash across his cheek, raised his hand to strike Nerena's defenseless face. She made no attempt to dodge the blow.

Alessia couldn't bear the sight. Instinctively, she tore into the house, making for the room to save her mother.

"Mother!" she cried.

She heard her own steps as though from a distance as she flung wide the door. The council envoy turned their heads to survey the intruder with sharp, cruel eyes. Nerena followed their gaze and met her daughter's eyes but quickly looked away, now wearing a face of shame and defeat.

His face I can see in her—and how it haunts me, Alessia thought she heard her mother say. In the chair, Nerena stifled a sob.

The guards stopped, regarding the child Alessia in wonder. Alessia's pale grey skin matched Nerena's skin tone exactly; between the color of their hair no one could tell much difference, though Alessia's was slightly more silver. And the color of Nerena's sea blue eyes had been almost duplicated in her daughter, if not their expression.

But Alessia had her father's face.

It was a strange but interesting face. The face of the last colonizer of Enor.

Alessia didn't like the way they were looking at her.

"Ah, at last the prey reveals itself." Bilka purred, his eye running over her. Yet the representative was able to compose himself. "Take the girl to the transport." He ordered, "and take the Grand Marshall's daughter in to stand trial for interfering with a direct Council order." Two of the guards nodded, moving to take Nerena's arms.

"No!" Alessia cried. "Let her go," she pleaded, "and I won't fight you."

"My dear, you have no other choice." Bilka's tone was incredulous, as though he did not see that the child was in any position to bargain, but something in her expression, something in her eyes seemed to dispose him to be kind. "And even if I were inclined to humor you, I cannot release your mother until we are away."

"Let her go!" Alessia screamed suddenly, rushing at Bilka with fury. Alessia felt arms grab hold of her before she had taken more than one step. How she wanted to hurt him! she thought. How she wanted to fight, to make him leave them alone! If only she could, she would have forced him to leave. She would have defended her mother. And yes, she would have punished this man for hurting her mother! She would have gladly watched him suffer for what he had done to them!

"Put the girl in the transport for Ariyalsynai, and take the mother into Firien City," Bilka ordered, his eyes flashing, intoxicated with power.

Alessia dug at the ground with her heels, but to no avail. The strong arms holding her fast slowly dragged her away. She tried to struggle, to scratch the guards, wild with fury, but her captors only tightened their grip until she cried out in pain.

"Give up, girl," Bilka said, gloating over her, drinking in the sight of his struggling captive. "You're not strong enough to stop us."

"Never," Alessia said, her eyes narrowing on Bilka in defiance. "I will fight you."

"You know you cannot win."

"Yes."

He smiled at her. "I could break you, child." He warned, eyeing her as though it would give him pleasure to do it. "But I'm afraid that would be overstepping my authority."

"Only a weak man attacks those whom he knows for a certainty he will defeat." Nerena said quietly, speaking as though lost in a dream, her eyes a vacant stare. "My daughter is stronger than you, because she is not afraid of you."

Bilka whirled on her in fury.

"But you should be, Nerena Zadúmchov," he said, with dark intent.

"Mother!" Alessia screamed, her eyes never leaving her mother as she was forced out of the room. "Mother!"

Nerena never answered.

* * * * *

Alessia bent her head to the eyepiece when the door to the laboratory opened. She expected Hinev to return from his private laboratory to help her with her experiment, since he had been gone a few hours longer than usual; she hadn't seen much of the famous scientist since she became his assistant several tendays ago, and most of the time she did see him, he just gave her more mathematical equations to derive or memorize and another mindless experiment to do, like a score of others she had conducted back in training in Firien City.

"I'm almost done, Hinev," she called, looking up. But the intruder wasn't Hinev.

A mechanized humanoid, dressed in a long vermilion robe, entered the room with inhuman speed and silence, surprising her. They were powerful beings, the mechanized units that were a form of super android, and they could crush a human to death with one blow.

Alessia shrank back in her seat, regarding the dark, metallic super-android with suspicion. She had never seen the creature before. However, she recognized an Elder's robes when she saw one. And she had seen other Elders at an interview she had been compelled to attend several tendays before, which had taken place on the morning after she was brought to Ariyalsynai.

The creature's machine-face imitated her surprise as much as a machine could. This machine, though, had a man's soul and former memories programmed into its computerized "brain". Why was it surprised to see her? she couldn't help but wonder.

"I must speak with Hinev, and see what he is doing here," the mechanized unit spoke in a steady, resonant artificial voice. The tone implied a question as to where the scientist might be found, but Alessia hesitated to answer.

She was too surprised to answer.

The unexpected intrusion of the scientist himself reprieved her.

"Elder Ornenkai, forgive me for not receiving you, but I received word through my intra-cranial communicator that you were not to arrive until tomorrow." The machine man had moved aside to allow Hinev to enter the laboratory, but the scientist made a welcoming gesture and followed the Elder to the large specimen table in the center of the room. Alessia, still standing a distance away, followed the scientist and halted a few paces behind him.

Hinev was obviously a half-Kayrian man, a half-alien like herself, only different in his other half-alien nature.

Hinev's hair was black and shone with a bright silvery glint in the light. His deep blue, slightly almond-shaped eyes were nearly violet, almost the very color of Seynorynaelian blood, and his skin was more a translucent white color that made his dark eyes stand out even more.

"Marankeil wishes me to observe your progress first-hand. As you know, it is the only way to make certain that any information is not monitored in cyberspace on this top-secret project of yours." The mechanized unit explained, almost apologetically. "So I have extended my visit to two tendays. Then I'm afraid I must get back to the project at Lake Firien."

"Elder Ornenkai, let me introduce my assistant–" Hinev began, half-turning aside.

"Alessia. I know who she is." The machine's unwavering artificial eyes regarded her so intently that she moved a step further behind Hinev to hide from the glare of it.

"You have met her before–when the Council met at the summer's-end?" Hinev asked, a line creasing in between his dark eyebrows.

"No." Ornenkai replied, his voice unreadable. "I have heard of her, of course, but this is the first time I've seen her. Now I see that the reports were true."

What reports? Alessia wondered. She still didn't understand why she had been brought to Ariyalsynai, why so many prominent leaders and scientists concerned themselves with her, an insignificant child of the rural territory beyond the weather-safe ring and worse–the daughter of an unknown alien. Why was it that everyone seemed to know about her? What was this Firien Project, and why was it so important? Who cared if the fragments she deciphered read "Selesta"? Apparently, though, someone had cared. That someone cared a great deal more than she had ever anticipated, or else she never would have told them that she could read the inscription. Why had her father taught her to read the language and symbols of the ancients? She wondered.

"But I don't wish to interfere with your pupil's education." Ornenkai continued, possibly intending to be polite, although it was hard to discern any emotion in his artificial voice. "I shall call upon you later this evening, Hinev. Be prepared to enlighten me as to your plans for this year, as we discussed. Until then, I'll take my leave of you both," The mechanized android dismissed itself and left the laboratory.

Hinev regarded her critically, and she had that strange sense that he was looking into her thoughts again. He was obviously a true telepath or a proto-telepath. How did she know he was there in her mind, able to read her mind? She felt him combing through her thoughts and remembered the feeling from before. The first time he had looked into her thoughts had been the day she met him, moments after she arrived at the Federation Science Building, when she had first been brought before Hinev for his approval.

He had approved of her, very much. She was glad of this, for she had instintinctively liked him as well.

Then, as the guard had departed, leaving her to his care, she had felt a presence in her mind, sifting through her memories, absorbing her very essence back across the years until it stopped, intrigued by the memories of her father. Alessia had sensed his interest in those memories while his departing thoughts still lingered in her mind–the recommendation had been fortuitous, he concluded. Yes, this girl was exactly what he had been searching for.

Her father had obviously been an Enorian. As many were descended from the Enorians at Firien, and many were also proto-telepaths.

In the present, Hinev smiled at her. "Yes, you were exactly what I hoped for, but you still don't understand why," he said, slightly amused by her confusion.

"No," she admitted.

"I was given permission by the state to take you as an assistant, Alessia, because I needed the abilities of a proto-telepath to test my experiment."

"I knew that." She protested. "But I thought I was supposed to join the Martial Scientific Force, like my grandfather."

"That may still happen, but that is not why you are indispensable to me. Your memories, your very existence proves an idea of mine."

"An idea?" she asked. "What idea?"

"First, dear child, let me explain who I am."

"I know who you are. Everyone already told me. You're Fynals Hinev, one of Kudenka's explorers, sent from Seynorynael more than three thousand years ago to gather knowledge for the glory and survival of our people."

"That's what they told you?" Hinev laughed.

"Yes."

"I should have known they'd keep the nature of my project from you," Hinev said, angered for some unknown reason. "Well, it's true that I was born more than three thousand years ago here on Seynorynael. You'd be surprised how much catching up I have to do. By our reckoning, we had been gone no longer than twenty years, but time dilation occurred on board our spacecraft. Three thousand years passed on Seynorynael before we could return to her."

Alessia laughed. "The world has changed a lot since you left, if everything we learned in history is true."

"Yes, I suppose it has."

"You talk just like that Elder–Ornenkai," Alessia observed.

"I do?"

"Yes, in the language of the ancients, but I can still understand you–well, most of the time. You know, people say those of us from the Firien province are a bit backward. Everyone in Ariyalsynai talks so fast, and they use different words. New words. I think the Federation Enlightenment must have missed us in Firien. Everyone here in Ariyalsynai is so sophisticated."

"I'm glad you've noticed that, too." Hinev agreed, pleased. "I thought I was the only one around here having difficulties fitting in." He confided in her.

"No, sir."

"No more of that 'sir' nonsense. Hinev is my name, and I have no pretensions to any kind of official title in this center anymore."

"But everyone here seems to treat you like a hero." Alessia objected.

"A hero perhaps, but an anachronism nonetheless. I am a relic of a mission long since outdated. Yet Marankeil approved of my project–"

"The head of the Council? He was the one who had me brought here."

"Yes," Hinev admitted grudgingly.

"What does he want from you?" Alessia wondered.

Hinev sighed. "The only thing worth having, of course. Power. Knowledge, too, as long as it can be made to serve his pursuits."

"I still don't understand what you need from me."

Hinev laughed. "Ah yes. Well, I needed you to test a hypothesis of mine. Marankeil and his council appreciated what knowledge we explorers brought to the Federation, but they won't believe any of our conclusions because they do not mesh with the current political agenda. That, my dear, is where you fit in."

"I don't understand."

"Oh, Alessia, your confusion warms my heart. Do you not feel the truth? Can you not already sense that all the humanoid races you have seen here in the capital are connected? Is your very existence not proof enough? How else could you or I be here, we who have alien blood?"

"I still don't understand."

"I don't expect you to–yet."

* * * * *

Alessia woke in the middle of the night to a crashing sound in the adjoining laboratory, as though several crystalloid apparatuses had suddenly fallen all at once. What was Hinev doing now? She wondered. After a moment, however, she heard nothing. The door to Hinev's secret laboratory stayed shut. She decided to go back to sleep.

Whatever it was, she was too tired to investigate the noise.

After spending the entire summer season and half of the fall in Ariyalsynai, Alessia still slept on a pile of blankets that served as a sleeping spot in a small cubicle in a corner of the main laboratory, so that she could be near enough to Hinev's experiments to take data at intervals, even during the night, as though time mattered in her new environment. Of course he hadn't needed her for this, but it was merely something she could do to learn about him and what was going on. All of this was part of her more serious education that was to begin under Hinev's tutelage.

Alessia was something of a wild child, who actually preferred a small pallet bed than the fancy sleep panel she had been given further away in the rooms she had been assigned. She preferred to sleep near the work that was more important, and more important to her young but serious mind. She was dedicated to Hinev and his purpose already. More importantly, however, she wanted to be near Hinev, rather than being alone in her own room!

So she had taken over the pallet Hinev had made in his own laboratory so that he could nap during the many long hours he couldn't leave what he was doing or didn't want to lest something significant happen. He stayed in the inner laboratory most evenings, working on something he wouldn't disclose to anyone.

She could hardly tell that winter was fast approaching in the world outside the Federation Science Building. In all the time she had been in the city, Alessia had been allowed outside only the day before with an escort so that she could meet explorer Kudenka, who worked across the great courtyard in the adjacent towers.

The bite in the air had seeped through her footwear as she crunched across the blanket of snow nestled over the courtyard. Dampness soaked through the thin, black, flat-soled summer-season pair of shoes she had brought from her home; her feet were cold as ice and clammy, and she longed for the warmth of the laboratory, bare and sterile as it was. Her shoes had grown tight in the months she had been here, and now they seemed likely to mildew.

She would have to let go of her pride and ask for some new shoes when she got back.

"Come in, come in. Out of that bitter wind," Kudenka, a round-faced man of a sharp wit and intelligence, bid her and the others welcome into his lab and had food and hot drinks brought for them.

"Here, take this, young girl."

"Alessia," said Alessia.

"Ah, I have heard of you," said Kudenka. Kudenka was in the middle of a discussion with two black-clad visitors called Niflan and Mindier, so Alessia sat listening and tore into a Bilirian cream cake with great hunger. Kudenka and the others laughed, then turned to her and asked for news about Hinev. Alessia dropped the cream cake on a plate.

"Hinev's like a machine, working so hard and such long hours."

They didn't seem pleased to hear that.

"What do you mean, child?" Niflan asked.

She explained that for all she had observed, Hinev didn't seem to be sleeping or eating anymore. Most of the time he spent confined in his private laboratory with the doors barred shut, working well into the night, coming in and out of his lab into the adjoining one at odd times to retrieve one item or another.

They listened with great interest, and then a strange quiet settled over them. Alessia asked them if they knew anything about his First Race Theory.

"That again!" Niflan chuckled affectionately, yet so hard that tears squeezed from the corners of his eyes. "Yes, dear we have. He has been bothering the entire planet about his ideas... seems to think all humanoid races are descended from a single intergalactic forebear. Otherwise how could two different humanoid races have viable offspring? Some say it is only because Seynorynaelian DNA can gain or lose chromosomes in reproduction, when combining with alien DNA, but others say it is because the humanoid races are descended from a 'first race'."

"So then you know about the planetary systems beyond the Federation?" she asked.

"Yes, you could say that," Niflan said, sharing a conspiratorial wink with Kudenka.

"You two are–returning explorers, too?" Alessia guessed.

"And to think that everyone in our time recognized us on sight." Mindier sighed. Niflan laughed.

"Are you a navigator?" Alessia asked suddenly, looking to Niflan.

Niflan stared at her, his laughter abruptly cut short.

"How in blazes did you know that?" Kudenka asked.

Alessia shrugged. "Just a guess," Alessia said, her eye straying to the various objects in the room. There was several odd artifacts mounted in display cases, and picture stills from planetary surfaces on the walls. In one of the stills, several humanoids were clustered around a giant sea vessel that bobbed in a harbor, surrounded by magenta skies and thready pink clouds.

"Hinev must have told her about us," whispered Niflan to Kudenka.

"I see what Hinev meant," Alessia said, peering closer at the picture still.

"You do?" Kudenka asked.

Alessia nodded. "Yes, I can see why Hinev thinks there is a 'first race' that we all descend from."

"Yes." Mindier agreed. "Our findings seemed to indicate that, despite what the council wants to believe. The genetic sequences, the parallel structure of genes, the enzyme groupings all point to a single ancestor race. And one that tampered with evolution."

"You're a scientist, I suppose," Alessia surmised, looking at Mindier now.

"Yes, I was."

"Hinev said that the first race has been separated in evolution for maybe even a million years. Do you think it's possible he's right?"

"Well, maybe even longer than that. But, given millions of years of isolation and the varied climactic conditions of each planet–yes, I think it perhaps possible that original strain of humanoid could have adapted to the many forms we see now. The only thing we haven't figured out is how the races all got dispersed, since very few of them are capable of space travel any more."

"Enough of all this talk," Kudenka waved a hand. "I want to know a bit more about you, dear. If Hinev ever decides he doesn't need an assistant, I'll have you transferred to my department. How about that?"

"I guess," Alessia said, shrugging.

"Have another slice of cake, Alessia. Hinev's been forgetting to feed you, I see."

Alessia nodded and finished her first piece as the discussion returned to other topics she didn't understand. The guards had taken her back to her laboratory about an hour later.

Alessia realized some time later that she didn't want to leave Hinev.

Whatever purpose he had in mind for her when she arrived, she didn't yet know, but she felt that Hinev needed her more than anyone else did. It was so wonderful to know that she was needed, that she belonged, even if Hinev's work left little time for him to pay her much attention at all.

She was such a serious child. Though it would have been good for her to have friends her own age, she really didn't want any.

Hinev was seldom able to spend time with her, but when Hinev was around, she sensed that he had grown fond of her. Nothing could explain his avuncular affection for her. She sensed that some part of him that needed to be understood, that needed the kind of loyalty and love only a beloved child could give, had rendered her a special place in his affections. She had become like a daughter to him. In Alessia, he found that kind of unquestioning, unconditional love and complete faith in him–she knew it and so did he, though they never spoke of it openly.

Hinev had no other living family.

* * * * *

"Alessia!" Hinev shouted from the other room, waking her completely. She flung back her covering and ran to the door of his laboratory, which yawned before her like a dark abyss.

Inside, Hinev was waiting.

Look at it, Alessia! She heard a voice in her mind, for the first time.

She looked above them, where Hinev pointed.

A crystal sphere hung suspended in mid-air, bobbing along as though floating on an artificial breeze.

Alessia's eyes returned to Hinev.

A faint blue light flickered about him and in the depths of his dark violet eyes.

Then suddenly, the ball crashed to the floor.

Hinev collapsed, suddenly writhing like a serpent, in pain.

"Hinev!" Alessia screamed, coming to his side. Now he lay motionless, but for rasping breaths that caught deep in his throat.

Fynals Hinev slept unmoving for the next twelve days.

* * * * *

"I still don't see why I can't go with you," Alessia said, tapping a silica rod against the lab table. Her eye found the big, smooth, hairless scar on her right hand from a chemical burn in the lab more than a year ago; she looked up at him with her best imploring expression.

Hinev sighed affectionately, dropping the last of his personal belongings into a heavy, two-handled bag. "I need someone here I can trust to keep an eye on my experiments." Hinev said, studying her with his steady gaze. "You're the only person I do trust. Remember, don't let anyone in the lab while I'm gone. No one will break in, I hope! And if any Elders come for an inspection, make sure they don't find anything interesting. I am taking all my important electronic data and notes with me. I have never linked my experiment's notes and data into the main computers—thus far, they have remained unmonitored with all my efforts to remain secret, and I intend them to stay that way."

Alessia sighed, surrendering to the futility of asking again. Of course it was flattering to know that Hinev trusted her more than any one, but after three years, she would have thought he might let her go with him on one of his expeditions! She had done her work, learned everything he and his fellow explorers could practically teach her. He had been a demanding teacher, nearly impossible to please; she had spent nearly every waking moment since she became his assistant trying to earn his approval. Hinev had even seen to it that she was becoming as qualified in spacecraft engineering as his friend Niflan, so why not let her come?

"I will miss you," she said.

Hinev was leaving to oversee the project at Lake Firien. How she envied him! Ever since Hinev had told her that the Council had been preparing a lengthy project to rebuild a new flagship out of the ruins of an ancient starship that were located near her childhood home, she couldn't get the project out of her mind. That was probably why he didn't want to let her come with him; he knew she would want to go just to return to Firien. Dared he let her return to that beloved place? His eyes seemed to say. Yet she knew he would have trusted her, if the decision were up to him. He was only trying to soften the blow of her being left out of the project on the Council's request list, even though she was Hinev's assistant. Why couldn't he just take her anyway? she wondered.

Hinev knew she would be a burden to him out at Firien, where he had things to do, so he was leaving her behind.

"I will miss you as well," returned Hinev.

As she watched Hinev clipping his bag shut, she remembered the fire. The fire in the lab that afternoon when she had lost some of the feeling in her right hand and breathed in a few of the noxious vapors. She had been taken away for medical care while Hinev remained behind to take care of the lab. As though he hadn't been burned. As though no power, not even poison nor burning fire, could touch him.

She often wondered that he had no scars from that accident. And in the last three long years, Hinev looked the same as he always had. Alessia was now a young woman herself, almost past her last growing stage, at last only a head shorter than him.

Hinev smiled, as though he found something secretly amusing which he didn't care to explain.

"Kudenka will be coming by some time this tenday to check up on you," Hinev said, turning to her. "Until then, you're on your own."

"As usual," she muttered.

Hinev laughed. "Alessia, you'll be fine. I know you hate to be left out of the excitement, but really this is for the best."

"Of course." She said woodenly. A silence fell between them for several moments; Hinev brightened.

"The name of the new flagship should be of particular interest to you," he laughed, "since you deciphered it."

"Me??" Alessia echoed, surprised.

"Yes, you," he nodded, clucking her under the chin. "Close your mouth."

She closed it.

"Selesta–the name written on the outside of the wreckage. You deciphered it."

"That fragment came from those ruins? Ahh."

Hinev nodded. "One of our top spacecraft engineers, lieutenant Fielikor Kiel of the Martial Scientific Force, is working on the designs, but he sent a request for an assembly of explorer scientists to help with the engine. No one has solved the problem of how to circumvent the effects of time dilation. The faster our ships get, the more time will pass on Seynorynael for every year they're gone."

"Kudenka never stops talking about that." Alessia agreed, secretly wondering what she could do to help. "I get the impression it's horrible to come home and find one's family and way of life utterly gone, erased by eons of time."

"Yes, it truly is."

Hinev grew silent, and then wished her good-bye.

* * * * *

In the long Seynorynaelian year of Hinev's absence, Alessia dedicated every waking hour to studying and trying to grasp the many problems the research team designing Selesta's engines had crossed. Selesta's engine schematics in their many incarnations were now highly publicized in the spacecraft engineering research wing of the Federation Science Building, and she had no trouble securing all of the engine schematics she needed to satisfy her curiosity about The Firien Project.

Alessia was no stranger to strange schematics and blueprints. She had been trained for two long years in spacecraft engineering by some of Kudenka's explorers, mostly friends of Hinev's who allowed her to spend time in their various departments when Hinev was away on short forays. And she had studied the engine schematics of Sesylendae, Kudenka's old spaceship, for so long that she could picture them in minute detail even with her eyes shut.

Now that Hinev was going to be gone for a year, she found she had nothing to do. So, once she had access to the current blueprint of Selesta's engines, she pored over it with equal tenacity, until she had the schematics entirely memorized. And she spent tendays going over the computer simulations, making temporary alterations in the design and seeing what would hypothetically happen to Selesta's operating systems as a result.

For almost a year, it seemed she would never make any more process than any of the engineers: Kiel, Giorlian, Kellar, and Manafries. Then one night, after working so hard on a particular set of alterations for several tendays and thinking she had succeeded in correcting the design until the test simulation failed, inspiration struck her in a dream, as it had only twice before in her life when it really mattered. She woke up agitated, all the while pessimistically certain that the alterations her subconscious mind had conjured for her wouldn't work in reality. She documented the changes, anyway.

When she finished the work at last and ran a test on the computer simulation program, her heart nearly stopped beating.

How, how could it work?!

She ran the program again.

The enormity of her triumph never quite hit her; it still seemed impossible. How could she succeed in solving Selesta's engine flaws, when the Federation's top spacecraft engineers were still stumped on how to make the design work?

Still in a state of denial, Alessia hesitated to show the completed schematic she had altered to anyone. How could her design work? Engine plans that didn't appear functional until she ran them through the simulation computers. Besides all this, she knew no one had asked her to interfere in the project!

She decided not to show her schematic revisions to anyone. They were bound to eventually resolve the schematic's problems on their own. It had to be easy to correct Selesta's schematics after all; the current difficulties had to stem from a simple design flaw that someone was bound to catch sooner or later. Alessia had herself thoroughly convinced of this, never realizing how wrong she actually was. So, before Hinev returned, she hid the data documenting her design change among her personal effects.

However, the memory of her work, her successful alterations, remained fresh in her mind. And it was there that the now fully telepathic Hinev found them.

* * * * *

For a long time after he returned, Hinev continued to send messages back to Firien and the head of the engineering team, Fielikor Kiel. Alessia sometimes heard Hinev over at the communications monitor, discussing the progress being made on the Firien project, she supposed from what she managed to overhear.

Yet when he had finished with whatever they had been working on, she realized that there were changes in the air. Hinev no longer seemed the same man he had been when he left. He moved and spoke like a man possessed of some crippling fever of emotion, though he was more lucid and efficient than he had ever been. He was more intelligent than he had ever been. And because of this, his experiments increased and became infinitely more complicated.

But, could he be on the verge of a breakdown? she wondered. Hinev spent so much time ensconced in his private laboratory that she often feared something had happened to him on the inside.

Only two tendays after his return, she was invited in for the first time since that day long ago, when he had collapsed of some unknown illness none of the doctors could treat. Back then, he had been in a coma-like state for two tendays, while she feared the worst. Yet he had recovered, and never complained of any ailment or physical taxation since, not even when he worked them both to the point of collapse.

"Alessia!" Hinev called, his voice strong but like a chord of music.

"Yes?" She asked, heading towards the door, which swished open before her like a shutter.

"It is now time for you to fulfill your purpose here," he called to her from the other room. She stepped into the room, where Hinev stood across from a long lab table adorned with alien emulsions percolating through flasks and beakers of every shape and size.

His face was unreadable. Several odd apparatuses had been set up all over the room, along with all of the strange solutions she had seen littering his laboratory over the years; by the nearest apparatus lay a vial of purple fluid and a network of intravenous tubing.

"Have a seat, dear child," He said softly, his gaze unwavering, though there was a tremulous quality to his voice. "Our android nurse there will help you."

She didn't know then that the tubing had been meant for her.

That Hinev needed another person upon which to test his serum.

* * * * *

After the injection of Hinev's serum into her veins, which was an experimental blood, brain, and body altering serum he had been working on for years, Alessia drifted in and out of consciousness.

What was her last memory? Lying there in the chair, feeling nothingness and ice filter through her system, cutting off all conscious thought–

And then the screams! By God, the screams! She felt her body lashing about as though it belonged to another being she could not control. Her mind had already retreated far within her, as though in a futile attempt to avoid the all-pervading agony. She heard herself scream time and again, but as if from far away. Her screams were a blood-curdling sound that echoed through her horrified mind, which retreated further into the void.

She found the images there. There, she beheld again the face of her father, only this time in a beautiful city she had never seen. Could she stay there? Her thoughts begged, trying to come closer, reaching out for her father–

When her consciousness was suddenly ripped away.

Now her screams echoed a different kind of pain. Why, why couldn't she reach that place! Why wouldn't her father help her to get there, to be with him again?

* * * * *

She gasped awake.

"Hinev??" She called instinctively, afraid but not alone.

Something was different, she thought, blinking. Very different.

"Alessia–you're awake??" Hinev asked, drawing over her, shock clear in his gaze, relief clear in his voice.

She was lying down in bed.

"What happened?" She said, sitting up.

The pain was gone. All pain was gone.

"I–you–"

"How long have I been like this?" She asked.

"Just under two months." He said, clasping her by the shoulders. "Alessia, I never expected your immune system would hold out so long. I never dreamed you'd fight the serum so long, or I would never have tried it on you–"

"What are you talking about?" Alessia said. Then she remembered the purple emulsion filtering through a clear tube dangling high above her eyes. "Hinev??"

"Yes?"

"What did you do to me?"

Hinev swallowed. "You're all right now. The metamorphosis is over."

"Metamorphosis," she repeated, pausing a moment as she got her bearings. "Hinev, why is that table moving towards us?"

Hinev half-turned to the table in the far corner of his lab, on which he had placed a holo-still; in the image Kudenka and Niflan embraced a woman unknown to Alessia.

"You wanted to look at that, didn't you?" Hinev asked, though it was more of a statement.

She nodded.

"Well, we're going to have to teach you how to control your telekinesis first then," he said, turning back to her with a bittersweet smile.

* * * * *

No! Don't talk to the wall, talk to me!! Hinev said in her mind.

She frowned.

What are you trying to say?? Hinev asked.

"I wanted to know–"

Tell me like this, he instructed. No talking out loud, Alessia. Come on, now, you've only been trying for two hours. It took me almost a year to learn to direct my thoughts correctly.

She's getting it, I think... taking less time than... maybe the others... can be taught... if I can get...

Alessia shook her head to clear it of the random thoughts in the air. She seemed to be picking up everything, like an antenna, without being able to focus on a clear string of thoughts. Hinev could direct thoughts to her, but she couldn't seem to direct anything to him.

I'm going to wipe that smirk off your face, Hinev! Alessia thought, with growing irritation.

Good, Alessia! I heard that one!

Alessia laughed out loud. "I'll master it yet, you see?"

"I never had any doubts." Hinev told her.

After the preliminary blood tests, Hinev had left for almost a month. However, when he returned, he found Alessia's control over her abilities growing, so he had spent the past few tendays teaching her to use her new powers. She had tried to concentrate on adapting to her new identity, as she had always done before, yet she couldn't help but be alarmed by the fact that she no longer ever felt tired, or hungry, or thirsty, or hot, or cold, or so many other sensations that reminded her that she was a human being. She had ceased menstruating as well, permanently. When was she going to go back to normal? Somehow it just wouldn't sink in it that she would never be "normal" again.

She didn't know it yet, but Hinev's miraculous serum had rendered her immortal.

In time, her new power of telepathy came as naturally as breathing; it functioned involuntarily, but at the same time she could control it at will. The trick was not to fight it, not to let it overwhelm her, as she had in the initial days after waking from the metamorphosis. Mastering telepathy, though, was rather like mastering the power of control communicative energy, which was a power very closely related to telekinesis, only much more difficult than telekinesis to control, despite its name.

Control communicative energy was an energy force which used telepathy to communicate with objects; it flooded the molecules in between her and her chosen object with temporary, cooperative semi-sentient waves, making the objects move and do as she wished. Moving the objects around without bringing them directly to her, trying to guide and manipulate them was far more difficult that simple telekinesis, which just used her energy to pull things in a direct line towards her. Though often mistakenly grouped as a purely telekinetic power, control communicative energy always required a supreme effort of concentration, like controlled telepathy.

And by God, it tired her out.

In contrast, simple telekinesis, drawing objects to herself, had been second nature to use. This power seemed to stem from her gut feelings and subconscious, except of course that all forms of telekinesis, including the power of control communicative energy, tended to fail under duress and then had to be directed by force of will; yet simple telekinesis often responded to stimuli almost involuntarily, while other powers, like the more complicated forms of telepathy and telekinesis, replied upon the focus and faculties of her conscious thoughts.

However, telekinetic power proved itself dangerous when she didn't mean to use it; once when she wanted a glass of sherin juice, it came floating over to her before she realized she had been responsible for bringing it. In shock, the glass had dropped and shattered, sending up fragments into her leg. Three pieces stung at her for a moment, but the blood didn't flow as she expected. Instead, the blood welled curiously under the ripped skin. Before she had a chance to inspect the wounds, however, the skin grew together before her eyes, healing in seconds as though the injuries had never existed.

From this, she was sure forever that something very strange had happened to her body. Hinev wouldn't tell her directly, but she was beginning to wonder if he had made her indestructible.

She knew it, knew it deep down. But how had it all happened? How was it even possible?

After Alessia had mastered the simplest powers, Hinev finally explained the "cloak" to her. This was something she would have to learn, and learn about fast. In essence, she had become a shapeshifter, and her power that allowed this was the "cloak".

When Alessia used her strange new abilities, there were effects that other people would notice: the faint blue aura of light that was a hallmark of the serum, a particle wind produced by energy extraction and a sign that the aging process and most other natural body processes had been unnaturally interrupted. Using the cloak was the only way to hide herself among ordinary people; from the simple "veil" that made her appear ordinary, which could be maintained indefinitely to the more complicated "cloak" that could give her any aspect she chose, the power of the "cloak" used genetic restructuring to accomplish.

She could literally alter her own genetic structure at will, in minor ways. To use this power well she would have to learn how to manipulate her smallest cell structures at will, if she hoped to return her outward appearance to a semblance of her former self.

One day many months later, when Hinev was sure that Alessia had mastered the cloak, and had learned to "shapeshift" as it were her own body into multiple faces and forms, he Hinev decided she was ready for a mindlink.

Alessia agreed, but in her private thoughts she had now found her own purpose. She remembered the events that had brought her here, her powerlessness as her father lay dying and the cruelty of Bilka as he tore her from her mother.

Hinev had hidden the truth from her all these years, the truth about what he had intended for her, she couldn't help but realize. And now there was no returning to the girl she had been. One thought alone provided small comfort. At least now, she vowed to herself, she would never be a pawn again!

Hinev had made her immortal—she would never be powerless again!

* * * * *

His surface thoughts were easy to find. It was the hidden that was hardest to reach. And beneath the hidden lay the subconscious mind, memories, and so many things she had never been able to see–

Hinev had helped her somehow into his thoughts, but now she was floating free, unable to find anything at all. Hinev's surface thoughts and mind were nowhere to be found, and so was everything else. Where was she? A part of her still remained in her own mind, connected to her own mind, yet part of her was trapped now in Hinev's mind, searching. And was she going to have to summon every part of her thought and disconnect herself from her own physical form to reach ahead and into the well of Hinev's memory?

She saw an image ahead, a picture of a dark-headed woman beloved to him, a figure that represented a deep and eternal love, but with that love came a sense of despair, fear, and horrible, lingering melancholy.

Back in the laboratory, Hinev met her sympathetic, plaintive stare, but his eyes didn't really see her.

Mother, Undina–and my darling Reneja–

She saw him retreating into the memories already, and he was trying to bring her with him. She could sense his pain and fought to keep her conscious from drowning in the waves of emotion that his anguished mind was projecting.

I am Alessia, she said. Not Hinev.

Hinev seemed immobilized by his unlocking memory; he seemed to lose contact with present reality. He was literally living now in his own past.

What could she do? She had to help him. After a moment, her strong, calm wave of reassurance assaulted his will, and he was once again able to view his memories with detachment. Alessia's body had taken his hand and gripped it fiercely. Strength flowed into Hinev at her touch, and he blinked, staring into her young, bright face with recognition and admiration.

In a moment, all thought would be revealed.

Alessia could hear all of her questions, past and present, echoing in her mind. The second stretched as though it contained infinity.

The second passed.

Now she had passed beyond those questions.

Out of the darkness of Hinev's mind, the part no human ever touched except in dreams, a swirling cloud of oscillating nightmare faces grew larger as they approached her from a point of light ahead; whether they were phantoms of the past or visions of the future, she did not know. As they neared they leered at her, some exploding suddenly like bursting soap bubbles, others imploding like the universe at the point of collapse–only to reform into still more grotesque caricatures. What did these horrific faces know about her Fate that she did not? she wondered. And what were they?

Behind them came a shining light grid with a background of colored stars that drove the cloud of faces away. No, she thought, she had been the one moving towards them. The faces and the light had not moved at all.

What the light grid was or what it meant she didn't know. She had formed no expectations of what she would find here in this realm of non-space, and she accepted all she saw as part of the reality of a dream.

In one square cell of the grid a surreal image appeared, that of a young boy sitting under a tree. Her free conscious, presently unburdened by memories, stared at the movement of him, the colors of him, and myriad diversity of the bizarre reality it observed.

She had forgotten her own memories. Free and unattached, she could now only recall this place between worlds, this light her sightless eyes had once perceived before the constrainment. For now, there was no universal thought or action unknown–the universe was no mystery to her. The only mystery was this world that faced her, and with it, the puzzle of the physical burden, the only journey she had not yet made, the journey of physical life.

In her present state, the stark scene before her aroused a terrifying, nagging recognition in her as she approached it. It reeked of the physical world, all of its confining sights and smells. It made her doubt that she was still a light being. The images disturbed her, mostly because they were familiar. Mostly because she knew she was deceiving herself, that she didn't belong here in the light, not any more.

Haven't you left the light already? the images ahead seemed to ask her.

Left the light? For the constrainment that was physical life, life trapped in a physical vessel that knew only itself and its own confining space? No, she hadn't left the light! The unaware part of her conscious rebelled in fear at the sight of the physical world. Why was it familiar? Had she been there? Did she want to go back to that? No, and yet she was being drawn to it nonetheless. She felt herself dragged closer to the image as the soundless voices she recognized in this, the edge of the tapestry of light, retreated.

The unwilling part of her soul that felt home here in the light finally succumbed to the inevitable journey of life.

At once the window descended rapidly, climaxing in a shattering collision of consciousness as her thought merged with that of the young boy, and she could see the world around clearly and wholly real through his eyes, feel his emotions, remember his memories, hear his thoughts.

It was a maddening shock.

I am Alessia! she repeated, now unsure how she even knew her own name. I can't forget who I am here, or my soul will truly be lost. As she entered the child's mind, her own identity began to come back. She remembered her own childhood, the face of her father and her mother Nerena.

At the same time, a distant part of her mind, almost independent, faded in her memory. Why had she never sensed its regret before? Yet she felt she had, long ago, back when she was a child. A curious child, a child that knew nothing of life yet. She had gradually forgotten, and with that, lost her sense of delight in this new world, lost it to the mundane.

She had forgotten this part of her that had existed in the tapestry of light, but it had never forgotten that dimension.

It was her soul.

Now, aware that as she had once been free, she knew she would never again be reunited with it. It had fled back into the void, the tapestry of light and the darkness, a world of solace and blissful oblivion.

It had abandoned her for the light when the serum took her body...

–Where was she?!! Alessia returned to the present scene, forgetting what had been such recent cause of fear and regret. She had come here for a reason, and now she remembered what that was. This was the mindlink. Of course. For a while, she would be Hinev, the Hinev of the past, Alessia thought. The chirping of birds grew louder in his and her ears. As long as she could remember herself, she would tolerate the separate reality.

For the moment, she would become Fynals Hinev.

And hope that it didn't ruin her mind for good.
Chapter Four

...the young Fynals Hinev was sitting beneath the tree, drawing in the soft, dark dirt with a sharpened stick when his father Jerekkil returned from outer space. Hinev called to his mother about the strange man striding up the path. But his mother wasn't afraid. Undina ran from the dwelling, her eyes brimming with tears young Fynals Hinev didn't understand...

Hinev finally realized that the stranger was his father. Undina had a still of him sitting on a table in the living area of their home; Hinev had memorized every line of his father's face, but he only knew it within the confines of the still. Hinev didn't recognize the moving man, this strange person he should have known better than any other.

Fynals Hinev had never known his father. The explorer Jerekkil Hinev had left long ago on a mission to Gildbatur to ease the tension between the two worlds. With him had come a colony from the city of Urartu on Gildbatur numbering two thousand and a representative to take Gildbatur's place on the new Federation Council, formed by the treaty of the five worlds, signed only days before according to Jerekkil's ship log.

The proposal had been made more than a century ago, but travel among the worlds was slow, and time passed more quickly on Seynorynael than it did near light-speed. People called this "time dilation". To Fynals, it only meant that Time had cheated him out of a father. Jerekkil had been gone only a few days, but several years had passed on Seynorynael by the time he returned from the stars. During which time, his Kayrian wife Undina, Hinev's mother, had lived alone, shortly after giving him a son he had never seen.

Hinev's father seemed not much older than he, perhaps twice his age, more like an older brother than a father. But Hinev soon learned much about their world listening to Jerekkil, hanging on his father's every word, basking in the glow of mystery and adventure that surrounded the space man. Before Fynals Hinev knew it, the same wanderlust had seized him. His child's mind vowed that he, too, would visit the Federation planets one day. He would follow his father's journey to the stars, no matter what...

* * * * *

...Jerekkil had been home only a few years when word reached Seynorynael that a pro-independence group had instigated a small insurrection on Gildbatur. Jerekkil Hinev had been ordered to return there to quell the protesters and persuade them to visit Seynorynael to see all that might be gained in an alliance. Hinev tried not to remember the day his father left...

Hinev gazed up at the star-filled sky the evening the transmission arrived from the capital Ariyal-synai and wondered what it was about the stars that lured men to their deaths out in the void. At the same time, Fynals glared at them, wanting to hate them, desperate to defy them, wishing they would have been more merciful, hoping they had taken enough from him now so that they might one day be kinder to him. After all, hadn't all physical matter, even the living matter that made human beings, been formed in the stars?

Humans were the stars' earthbound children, but they envied their children, for humans could move from one end of the universe to another. And they envied the humans, who, like all living creatures, had a soul. Like the lyra forest around him. The forest had a life and soul of its own, even though the trees, once rooted, couldn't move; trees were like the stars in that regard. Except that a tree's seeds could spread on the wind.

Hinev wondered where in the vast starfield above him he could find the lost soul of his father. Could his father see him now? he wondered, as the stars melted into each other through a wash of bitter tears.

Jerekkil Hinev's ship the Ishkur had exploded in Seynorynaelian airspace due to unknown causes. All aboard the space cruiser had been lost...

* * * * *

...Hinev found himself remembering his father the morning of Sesylendae's departure. After so many long years of training, Kudenka's explorers finally prepared to leave their home world. The council had mapped a journey of unprecedented length for them, calculated to last sixteen Seynorynaelian years on board. Kudenka's crew would attempt to create the very first centipede space tunnels. Yet meanwhile the Sesylendae had been outfitted with a tachiyon and fusion engine capable of an even greater relativistic rate than her predecessors; time outside the ship would pass more swiftly, turning their minutes into years.

The only thing Hinev regretted was leaving his mother.

Undina lay upon the verge of death, stricken by an illness with no known cure. He remembered how she had suffered; he had watched her suffer, watched her waste away, watched her pain, unable to do anything to save her. He remembered the hollow looks, the lost expression in her eyes. Watching death take her slowly. Finally, the time came when there was nothing to do but let her die or halt the disease with suspended animation. Hinev chose to keep her alive at any cost. So Undina's body had been placed in a stasis capsule to preserve her existence until the cure might be found, but the process of suspended animation had not yet been perfected, and the chances of survival across the years diminished.

Hinev had only abandoned her in hopes of bringing back a cure unknown to Seynorynaelian science, a miracle substance possibly already in existence on some planet in the galaxy.

...Hinev couldn't seem to find Reneja. His intended wife, the bio-scientist Reneja, had been included among the crew, and Hinev looked forward to the peace of space travel. Without her, he doubted he could last the oppression of such confinement, the claustrophobic fears, the sense of his own fragility in the void, enveloped by death beyond the ship.

Though a biochemist with a sub-specialization in genetic engineering, Hinev had been given the rank of an officer, third in command of the Sesylendae. All of the small crew had been trained with multiple proficiencies. Hinev had been selected to remain in the ship's laboratory during take-off, where he could prepare the livestock specimens for space travel.

A few hours later, he'd returned to the Observation Window to search for Reneja; they had promised to meet one another after the crew had set Sesylendae's course. Hinev wandered around the Observation Area, searching the crowd that lounged on the deck, enjoying their first glimpse of the nearby Sumar cluster.

Reneja never arrived.

Navigator Niflan found him long after the others had returned to their quarters. As he approached, his eyes avoiding Hinev's gaze, Hinev knew something had happened.

"Reneja and Cernik—" Niflan swallowed hard. "They couldn't handle take-off. They were restrained, but—"

Hinev's eyes glazed over. "They had to be sent back." He said evenly, breaking the news to himself before Niflan could.

"Yes. We put them into one of the shuttles to rendezvous with the Nanshe moon outpost. They will await transferal back to Seynorynael there. I'm sorry, Hinev," Niflan added solemnly. "I know how much you loved her." The ship navigator turned and left him to his grief.

To Hinev, the news would have been no better if he had learned that Reneja had died. For Hinev would never see her alive again...

* * * * *

Away from their own system, Hinev made, rechecked, and confirmed the discovery that those of Seynorynaelian blood aged more slowly in space. Was it the lethal rays of Valeria, Seynorynael's star, that caused them to age on Seynorynael? So that away from Seynorynael, they lived longer? For even he and Fernidon, the two half-race men, showed signs of decreased cellular degeneration out in space, while their Tulorian representatives on board matured at a normal rate.

The problem was that there wasn't enough evidence to prove Hinev's hypothesis.

The march of time pushed them forward, and Kudenka's explorers visited a string of worlds beyond the known territories. Another discovery soon distracted Hinev from any other observations.

The Sesylendae was encountering humanoid races. Lots of humanoid races. Far too many humanoid races to rule out convergence or independent evolution. Far too many humanoid races to be written off as a coincidence in the development of life in their own galactic cluster.

In every terrestrial landing Hinev accompanied the scout parties and envoys; having planned most of the landings for inhabitable systems, they brought speech facilitators and image replicators to attempt contact with all kinds of sentient life. Yet it became clear that one form alone dominated this branch of the galaxy–the bipedal humanoid.

Why? Hinev asked himself. How? He more often asked the universe.

Evolution could not produce the same end results on so many different planets without help. Someone, some force had interfered, had made it possible...

* * * * *

Hinev procured genetic samples at any cost, sometimes after difficult negotiation with groups that saw the explorers as a threat. Other times, Kudenka's explorers and the civilizations they found made attempts to understand one another's languages. The more they learned of each other, the more one unmistakable fact grew clear.

Explorers had already traveled across the universe. There was no other explanation.

So, who had they been?

No one knew. They could have been humanoids themselves or else merely interfered with the humanoids for some unknown reason. Whichever the case, Hinev felt certain they had something to do with the evolution of life itself and the evolution of the human races as well.

What explained the coincidence? He tried to think of as many possible answers as he could.

Perhaps a race had established contact with all of the humanoid races at some time in the distant past. Perhaps the humanoid ancestors had manipulated their genes to resemble one another; though this could only have been possible if one race's level of technology had once been greater than any of the present day. And that technology had since been lost, somehow. And altering the genetic structure of a planet's entire range of species wasn't yet possible, not by a long shot, even on Seynorynael.

There was also a possibility that humans had originated from the same strain of people and had been separated, then continued to evolve according to the environments in which they had arrived.

The last possibility was that a great guiding force had simply decided to cast all forms of life in the same mold. The Great One, as it were, had decided to create a human race on more than half of the inhabitable worlds in the galaxy. And of course, that was ridiculous, Hinev thought.

However, Hinev couldn't limit his work on Sesylendae to proving his theory of a "first race" as the origins of all humanoid life. The small crew's responsibility of attempting to translate and learn the alien languages they had encountered, of learning new histories and scientific methods, new philosophies and cultural practices kept Hinev busy until the very afternoon that the crew once again glimpsed their home world...

* * * * *

Hinev met the Elder Marankeil moments after Sesylendae's landing in the capital Ariyalsynai. The Elders who had come from the Council spoke an older dialect of Seynorynaelian, the same as Hinev and the returning explorer crew. Around them, young scientists and specialists had gathered, throwing out questions in a condensed, quick speech that the explorers understood to be the modern language.

None of the old Council who had authorized their mission remained, but Hinev soon learned that the grandson of a minor representative had taken control of the governing body in the remote past and still lived, solidifying his own leadership and the permanent participation of the other "Elders" as the mechanized council had come to be known.

His name was Marankeil.

The physical appearance of Marankeil's mechanized body and that of nearly every council member who had arrived to welcome them came as a shock to Kudenka's returning explorers, though they had seen their share of miracles and mysteries on their journeys. Kudenka's explorers cast uncertain eyes on the mechanical creatures; suspicious eyes, disbelieving eyes.

These were more than simple androids, these were beings whose mechanized bodies of super-android housed the souls and former memories of living men.

Seynorynael was no longer the world they remembered, the explorers came to realize, their confident, triumphant faces soon reduced to expressions of the lost. And they would have to live out their lives in this other world, this unknown Seynorynael, isolated, isolated among a population whom they would never understand.

* * * * *

Marankeil's genius had accelerated Seynorynaelian technology to the point that the humanoid brain could be imprinted in a machine memory, but he had only transferred his own essence and that of the Elders into a permanent mechanized form; Hinev discovered that few were willing to take the risk of transferal, as Marankeil had as yet found no means of reversing the process. Once imprinted, the machine took on the life of its former being–but only a select few had been transformed into an immortal mechanized entity. As yet only a select few were willing to be transformed.

And, for unknown reasons, scientific progress in other fields had advanced little in the three thousand years since Marankeil had taken over the Elder Council. There had been many great strides in cultural advancement, but much had been stagnation in the years that the lesser races joined the Federation. There had also been many wars against certain species of alien terrorists and dissidents in the years since Kudenka's explorers had set off for the unknown.

Hinev masked his own feelings as he regarded the mechanized units. Marankeil, yes, Marankeil was a threat to him, but not for the reasons that any one would expect. Hinev didn't show any emotion, but inside, jealousy percolated through his thoughts. Marankeil had achieved Hinev's greatest desire...to become immortal.

A wish, a desire, that had begun long ago when Undina was struck by an incurable disease.

Hinev spoke pleasantly to the Elder Marankeil, while inside he began to wonder if his mother might be transformed into one of these machine beings temporarily, so that he could take her out of suspension while he perfected a cure for her illness. He just needed a little more time. He wondered if Elder Marankeil would help him. Hinev had been working on a cure for his mother's disease throughout the mission. Finding a cure for her had been part of the reason he became an explorer, and he had found the medicinal substances he required on his journey. He was so close now; just a few more years of research, trial and error would certainly bring a breakthrough...

Meanwhile, if Marankeil could transfer Undina's soul and memories into a machine body–Hinev just knew he could find a way to bring her back back to life again!

Some time later, Hinev asked Marankeil if it would be possible.

Marankeil's mechanized laughter sounded like wind clattering through a rusty grate. The Elder's laugher was merely surprise. Hinev judged it to have been dismissive.

Hinev forgot about the insult in the wake of Marankeil's explanation.

In case the disease that had afflicted Undina and hundreds of others had spread into an epidemic, the Council had allowed her to die years ago. The bodies of all the stricken had been burned; their ashes, lest they contaminate the living, had been buried in the Northern snows.

* * * * *

...Kudenka, Niflan, and Mindier agreed. Ariyalsynai had grown and developed into a city of a thousand wonders. It was a hybrid city of new technology and primitive adornments from other worlds, goods and materials collected from a vast new Federation that Kudenka's explorers had made possible.

At the same time, where was the knowledge of the ancients?

No one but the returning explorers remembered anything about it, or about the culture that had been alive when the explorers left...

* * * * *

Hinev returned to the area near the lyra forest where he had been raised.

Here, here in Firien was where he knew he would find the answers to the questions he had tormented himself with throughout the long mission in space. Here was where the legacy of the first race lived on, the Enorians, though he hadn't recognized that fact until very recently.

Here in Firien was where the isolated populations had lived in his youth, groups called "proto-telepaths" who had lived longer than the rest of the undiluted Seynorynaelian race. Some scientist, whose name had been lost to time and failing memory, had suggested that the population descended from an old genetic experiment to increase humanoid lifespans. While Hinev didn't believe that, he had always believed that the proto-telepaths were special.

For their gift was empathy, an ability to read intent in the eyes and face, an ability that Hinev believed bordered on telepathy. They had been dubbed "proto-telepaths", but those that did not understand them doubted their abilities, and the small population didn't mind, keeping to itself, avoiding study and public attention. Hinev's own father Jerekkil had come from that area and had told his son much about them.

Hinev had reflected upon them a lot during the long mission.

As he had wondered why the Seynoryanelians aged slightly more slowly away from their planet.

And why the members of the mission who had come from Firien, including himself, seemed the most affected by this phenomenon.

Now, though, Hinev had learned that the isolated communities had left the area and blended into the larger populace. From what he heard, proto-telepaths showed up now and then, scattered among the few families who remained in the area. An intensive study of the proto-telepaths' abilities had been attempted, but had been abandoned long ago.

Hinev learned that Marankeil had pressured the peoples of Firien to relocate years ago. But why? Hinev wondered. Unless Marankeil hated them, unless he feared the possible organization of a group he could not control.

But–could the proto-telepaths be organized? Hinev wondered.

Could their power be used?...

Hinev vowed he would unlock their secret. Through them, he felt certain that he would be able to learn how to prolong humanoid life, how to tap into the hidden abilities of his father's race.

The transport captain had not lied, Hinev discovered. Nothing remained of the community he had known–the forest had retaken the land, other native trees now filling in the gaps between the original lyra forest. He found the great lyra tree under which he had spent the carefree days of his childhood–but in three thousand years it had not changed.

His father had once told him that these trees were from a mythical place called Enor, according to the legends of the comet riders, the Seynorynaelian ancestors...

* * * * *

Hinev continued to give his review, but it was clear Marankeil was irritated at him.

Hinev smiled at the Elder's vanity. Marankeil didn't like to be wrong, didn't like this little ant telling him that he had made miscalculations.

Marankeil just wanted to be left alone to plan the new explorer mission he had devised, but the mechanized Elder knew he needed Hinev's help. Marankeil hated to admit that, refused to admit it openly, even while he ordered Hinev to help in the plan.

Hinev and Kudenka stayed in Ariyalsynai to advise the Elder Marankeil.

Marankeil had them present their case to revise the entire project. They, in turn, explained the inadequacy of Sesylendae's engine, the need for a better, bigger ship to house and sustain generations in order for a successful long-term exploration mission.

Then finally Marankeil consigned them to gather all of the improvements necessary and outline a plan. If necessary, he could wait–time had lost all meaning to the inhuman creatures of Seynorynael's Council. The Federation had not agreed to support the new venture, but Marankeil was determined to push it through. He was determined to supervise the project himself...

* * * * *

Hinev had retreated to Ariyalsynai's Federation Science Building, where the new learning of the explorer mission was now studied intensively by representatives of the larger Federation. By the time the crew had returned, shorter missions to the nearest new territories had gone and returned with new treaties expanding the Federation of planets.

Meanwhile, Hinev worked on his own, fabricating a thousand different test serums.

The serum he had begun when he left Seynorynael.

The serum that was to have saved the life of his mother.

It had all begun so harmlessly, so simply.

He had been collecting antibodies to fight her disease, strains of superantibodies that numbered in the hundreds by the time that Kudenka's explorers returned to Ariyalsynai.

By the end of his quest, he had traveled to the remotest corners of Seynorynael for enzymes and agents to create an elixir to alter human life, destiny, and fate–forever.

* * * * *

Marankeil's project kept Hinev in Ariyalsynai and working as an advisor during the drafting of the mission. Hinev's own agenda kept him in the laboratory when he was not on leave, traveling across the planet on his own errands.

After two seasons of experimentation, Hinev realized what his serum was missing.

In due course, he went on a short trip to Firien and returned with lyra samples, then formed a base partly composed of the living chlorophyll of lyra trees. The lyra, of course, were crucial to his progress, to developing his serum. The lyrachloroplasts harnessed energy from the very light of Valeria, producing only a by-product of neutrinos and charged leptons, feeding the lyra tree without altering the cellular structure. Lyra were themselves practically immortal, if left alone by human beings, that much he had ascertained. However, injecting the lyrachloroplasts contained in lyra leaves into his system would not miraculously bestow the lyra's abilities on him. He never expected that they would, but he knew that the lyra tree was going to be the key to his success.

The lyra did not function like ordinary lifeforms.

The lyrachloroplasts, taken from cells in the lyra leaf, moved through Hinev's circulatory system without interacting with any of his own. It was as though he had injected dead matter into his blood system, and even his own system paid the invading matter no mind. His own system should have reacted to them, produced antibodies–something should have happened!

Nothing did.

Not until he took a blood sample and removed the lyrachloroplasts.

They began to function on their own, under his microscanner.

He put them back into the dead lyra cells.

The dead lyra cells that had contained them, that had now ceased to function, began to function again.

So, he thought. The lyrachloroplasts were the secret to eternal life.

How they were able to remain dormant he did not know, but he spent uncounted hours searching for an answer.

* * * * *

...Hinev knew that the lyra imitated the very life cycle of Seynorynael, the creatures that survived long periods of extreme sub-freezing weather by a natural form of suspended animation, secreting enzymes to revive the life processes after the spring thaw.

The animals regenerated new cells, as all lifeforms did, all but the lyra tree, that seemed to live by perfect preservation, as though the lyra lived impossibly frozen in time.

Was that why the lyrachloroplasts hadn't interacted in his system? Why his blood hadn't even recognized that they were there?

So, so how could he use them? Hinev's concern was that a functioning human system lived by regenerating new cells, that to maintain eternal youth, cells must be able to replicate new, perfect copies of themselves. People aged because the body failed in this; the body's cells could only replicate inferior copies of themselves, and with each replication, the lifeform came one step closer to death.

So, Hinev sought out stem cells, found in foetal tissue, which could regenerate new tissues, before imperfect replication took over. After an extensive experiment to hybrid the two serums he had produced, Hinev eventually dismissed the line of pursuit, meeting only failure.

He returned again to the notion that the lyra lived by preservation rather than replication and made an expedition to the northern snows to locate Seynorynael's oldest living creatures. He took blood samples from more than a thousand species showing variations in the enzymes responsible for long-term hibernation, a hibernation that was almost like suspended animation. In this blood, he found bio-chemicals that broke down cross linkage in tissues. "Cross linkage" in tissues was caused by free radicals of oxygen; cross linkage itself accelerated the aging process. If these extraordinary bio-chemicals might be made to do the same for human beings...

There were other problems, though. Hinev wanted power. And he wanted to defeat the power solar radiation had over life.

So, in the most intelligent species of creatures, he searched for brain-activity boosters; in others he found chemicals that protected the animals' bodies from radiation by channeling and using the radiation as a heat source. In others, as in Seynorynaelian humanoids, survival depended upon building a reflective barrier in the skin. Even then, most people died from a radiation-induced cancer. Yes, Valeria's light, which was life to them all, was also killing them.

Slowly but surely killing them all.

Hinev's serum had begun so simply, as a search to cure his dying mother.

It had since become Hinev's quest for physical immortality. A quest he only half-believed possible, despite his search.

For a long time, serum after serum, Hinev felt destined to fail...

* * * * *

A controlled cancer–was it possible? Not in remission, not rampant–but controlled? Controlled so that it could replicate perfectly, instead of shortening the replicator caps as normal cells did? A shortening that made human beings grow old and die?

For cancer was cellular replication gone wild; it was precisely this growth that killed the organism afflicted by cancer. The cancer literally ate away the domain of functioning cells, replacing them with ones that grew like a wildfire, that spread like a virus, that killed without mercy.

But controlled cancer? Could it be controlled?

Three years after the return of the explorers, Hinev found that it could in the viedurg animal.

After so many test creatures, the animal's lifespan appeared to increase, and for nearly a year the viedurg remained in its infant stage. Later, Hinev suddenly found that he had made a miscalculation in the serum proportions. The animal died suddenly–after a series of horrible spasms. The controlled cancer had suddenly reacted and spread, growing more rapidly than any natural cancer ever had. In moments the lyrachloroplasts of Hinev's test serum had permeated the animal's tissues and produced an unexpected, bright burst of radiation that left the corpse in cinders.

Nevertheless Hinev's failure was itself a breakthrough.

After appropriately altering the serum, this time adding extracts from the proto-telepaths' brain matter, Hinev reworked the proportions. Then he decided to use himself as a living guinea pig again, as he had when testing the lyra cells.

This time he planned to use electromagnetic waves in conjunction with the serum to try to shock his cells into accepting the serum.

Only the final test waited.

Hinev filled an injection tube with the final serum...

* * * * *

He had nearly destroyed his laboratory, thrashing about and breaking the vials by the time the pain died away. Then, looking about, he felt the distribution of particles and atoms moving about him, in concert with his own body, obeying the laws of the universe, an entity he had finally joined.

The metamorphosis was incomplete, but as he had predicted, his mental abilities had expanded. He didn't know why he felt the process had not yet been completed, but having unlocked new areas of his mind, he calculated his mistakes. He had to control the transformation process within him using this mental energy as he attempted further injections, to guide an even greater accelerated evolution.

The small lyra he had taken from the edge of the forest whispered to him, warning him that he approached a boundary from which he could never return.

Hinev wasn't listening. Relieved that the serum he had created remained intact in its indestructible vial despite the chaos he had recently created, Hinev approached the lyra tree and extracted more of its inner fluid. Opening the serum vial, he watched as the serum absorbed the clear liquid...

* * * * *

Hinev listened to the thoughts around him. His colleague's decisions, concerns, preoccupations, selfish desires–all had been exposed like a raw wound that burned in the air. After three tendays, he came to know just how difficult it was to reject the cloud of thoughts that reached out to the attractive channel of his mind.

Too many thoughts! How could he think clearly?!

He recovered, but there was no stopping now.

The process of metamorphosis had not yet been perfected. Hinev's telekinetic powers remained marginal–he could easily absorb the energy around him but could not assert control over it–and the most massive object he had raised thus far was a small silica rod. When a tone sounded signaling an intruder, the rod fell to the floor and crashed into a hundred pieces.

"Message from the Elder Council," the officer announced. "Report to the Seynorynaelian Council in the Federation Council Building in two hours."

* * * * *

...The unflinching circle of mammoth faces regarded him a long time before addressing him, their metallic faces expressionless.

Hinev was genuinely surprised to find that he couldn't read their thoughts.

Suddenly a rumbling sound broke out across the room, the deep, sardonic laugh of the oldest Elder, Marankeil.

"No, Hinev. You cannot reach us, not as we are. But now we can find you," he laughed again, triumphantly, and Hinev heard an unspoken voice fill his mind.

Did you think I would not perceive what you had done? it asked. Was it not I that made the resources you required so readily available when you needed them, and allowed you time when you would leave?

How are you able to speak to me? Hinev thought.

Until now we could not contact a human, only each other, the voice answered, but you have made it easy for our thoughts to enter your mind. Listen to the others, if you wish. I cannot hear what they say to you, nor can they hear what I have said. We have the power to control brainwaves.

Hinev shook his head and spoke aloud. "Why have I been summoned, Elder Marankeil?" He demanded. How could they hurt him now? He was not afraid. Except–he had not yet perfected the serum. Would they try to stop him?

Marankeil responded by projecting an image to him, an ancient memory deep within its computerized entity of a time when the mechanized being had lived as a human.

Stopping him was not their intention.

* * * * *

Marankeil and Ornenkai stumbled away from the ruins, Ornenkai clutching a small scrap of ancient writing, Marankeil holding a map of an unknown star system. Marankeil had felt his friend's curious eyes upon him on that day; his expression must have betrayed his inner thoughts. For it was then that Marankeil had begun to conceive a way to hold on to eternity, until he could inherit the legacy of the beings that had vanished from the ruins.

The Enorians.

Marankeil had grown dissatisfied with the limitations of the physical form, his own weakness of body that suffered from pain, fatigue, and disease and obsessed with his own search for immortality. Marankeil returned to the Center of Scientific Learning. At last he found a way to transfer his mind into a computer and into a super-android form to preserve his knowledge and being where his real, mortal body would fail...

"Come Ornenkai, my friend. Join me and we guide the evolution of our kind." He had said. The prospect of becoming immortal had also tempted the younger man–the human Ornenkai regarded his newly transformed friend Marankeil and knew that immortality could be his, was only a step away.

"We shall have unlimited time to decipher the Enorian markings and discover our people's past, to raise our culture to its former glory, to help our people take up their destiny and live in a better world." Marankeil smiled, knowing he had already won and that Ornenkai would join him.

Ornenkai soon followed Marankeil, and became a super-android known as a mechanized unit.

After Ornenkai's transformation into a mechanized unit, many years passed before Marankeil found appropriate council representatives to join as permanent mechanized members of the Seynorynaelian Council. Marankeil offered mechanized eternity as a reward for those who would serve him upon the Seynorynaelian Council and elevate him as its informal leader. Those who wished for immortality could earn the right to be rendered into machines by controlling the scientists and the development of technology, by enforcing restrictions upon inferior physical and mortal subordinates.

They achieved a stranglehold on science and technology on their world in the years that followed.

Soon changes to the Federation Scientific Building were proposed and established. Though the Federation council perceived the venture as a gesture of cooperation, Marankeil's secure grasp governed its activities, ensuring that no new discoveries greatly advanced human welfare. Security, the status quo–these maintained a content society.

Time solidified the order of things–and Marankeil's supremacy. A few of the Federation Council found their way into his mechanized elite, though others came and went following the natural law.

But Marankeil's promise to Ornenkai disturbed the oldest Elder with each passing year. Ornenkai had never fully given up the idea of returning to a physical body, though Marankeil openly despised the notion. The truth was that Marankeil himself had become dissatisfied with the limitations of his machine body and yearned for his original desire: immortality within a physical body, as well. His promise to Ornenkai had been his own secret obsession–to regain the power of Enor.

* * * * *

So, Hinev laughed inwardly, drawing away from Marankeil's thoughts, Marankeil does want to possess an eternal life and regain his mortal body rather than the computerized mind that has stored his being for centuries, for milennia. But Hinev found he could not presently reach the other Elders' minds to confide what he had learned.

Still, they might not have been concerned. If Marankeil ever succeeded in achieving a physical state of immortality, each of the others might hope to gain the same: a new, perfect human body. Hinev's efforts had not been kept from them, and they knew his process of transformation, though incomplete, had opened the long invisible path. Yet–what was this Enor? His father had known little of it, but it was a legendary place Hinev had always heard about. Yet it was also the name of the other world beyond death, in the ancient writings of their people.

We will allow your work to continue, support you, grant you unlimited resources and personal glory if you can begin our work. You must find a way to transfer our minds back into a physical form, a perfect physical body that has undergone treatment with the serum. Either clone new ones for us or give us the bodies of your subjects, but we must have life again.

Hinev received an image of the sleeping shells far beneath the council Building, the spiritless matter that had once been Marankeil, Ornenkai, and the others. Their natural bodies slept in suspended animation.

If you can recreate the form that I once knew, then use them, take the replicator information you need, Marankeil perceived Hinev's idea and gave his approval. But experiment upon someone else first, perhaps a group. Test and perfect your serum. Then if you can use our old replicator information to clone new living bodies with minds we can take over, you may take them. Dispose of them then as you wish.

"I still have not tested my own abilities. I'm not even sure I can complete the serum to make all of this possible," Hinev protested.

What do you need? the Elder persisted.

"I should require a living proto-telepath to exercise my new abilities. And an assistant to aid in my experiment."

And test subjects–do not evade the issue, dear Hinev. Children we can control.

Children? Hinev repeated, bemused.

Human beings are all the same to us. Directionless children. But the younger the better. Creatures too young to realize the futility of ambition. And if you cannot perfect our cloned bodies, we will require them as youthful containers to be ready for the transfer, at the peak of their mental and physical powers. Yes–choose the best of our race for us.

"If I refuse?" Hinev hesitated.

You cannot refuse. I see the ambition in your eyes. You believe that you can achieve it all–perfect your own transformation, recreate our ancient forms, transform a group of subjects without the need to destroy their beings, all in the name of enlightenment–achieving a grander society, capable of the depth of emotion and harmony you only begin to perceive with your new abilities.

There is no human emotion left in your heart, Hinev observed.

But you hope to change us. You cannot conceive of us maintaining our views in an enlightened physical state. Marankeil laughed. Where were the Enorian Havens, the ruins of that ancient race? he suddenly asked, toying with Hinev's shifting thoughts. That I will not tell you. No "first race" will exist but us. Yet perhaps after you have completed our task, I will give you the information you seek, as a reward. I see that you are a man who must have answers. You cannot live without them, can you?

How do you propose to control my test subjects once they have been transformed? Hinev's mind formed a question.

We already have that taken care of, or shall soon. Have faith, Hinev. Or do you imagine to comprehend more about technology than I?

What do you mean? Hinev demanded suspiciously.

If you needed to know that, I would have told you already.

And why will I create pawns for you?

You do not believe that we can control them after the serum has been given. And if we join them, will we not see the futility of power?

Where shall I find a test subject? Hinev wondered.

Marankeil's synthesized voice sounded amused. "Let us first concentrate upon perfecting your abilities. But I have already located your assistant. And you will appreciate the choice–she is a half-race child like you."

Who is she?

"She is called Alessia, the granddaughter of General Zadúmchov."

"The great coordinator of the expansion?"

"Yes. While you were out roaming the galaxy. After Ornenkai suggested we rebuild the ruins of Lake Firien as our new space exploration vessel, Zadúmchov was sent to monitor the area."

I hear that after one visit, he refused to return. Hinev thought.

"Yes. The man actually refused to be near his daughter. You seem confused–"

What did she do to deserve that kind of treatment?

"You might be amused. Nerena disgraced her father when she left Ariyalsynai to marry an unknown alien."

A truly unpardonable crime.

"Of course I understand your feelings regarding that issue. In any event, Hinev, reports from the child's school registered Nerena's daughter as an empath, a possible proto-telepath."

Her father...

No, Hinev, the father is unknown. You are remembering the population near Lake Firien, the proto-telepaths. How do I know of them? A remnant remained of that ancient community in my youth as well. And never forget that I also have studied the ancient lore of our world. But the girl's father was an alien, not of Firien, not Seynorynaelian. General Zadúmchov's memory of that is clear. Yes, we are sure of her ability. Do you doubt me?

I wouldn't dare. Why her?

Because at long last she has provided us with a name for the ancient ship.

The name??

"Verify it for yourself, Hinev, but you will find that the symbols indeed read, 'Selesta'."

* * * * *

...Why? Why had he let himself grow to love this girl? Hinev never intended to care for the girl Alessia, but then he had made the decision not to care for her before he met her. And he had never had a family of his own, had never cared for another human being since the loss of Undina and Reneja. With his own telepathy expanding, he was able to read her thoughts and memories. With it, he discovered that Alessia and he were similar creatures.

Both had lost their fathers at a young age, and circumstances had separated them from their mothers. Without any other known family, Alessia was also alone in the world.

Moreover, her very existence proved Hinev's idea that a first race had colonized the galaxies–that without genetic alteration Nerena and Alessia's father had been able to have a child. Hinev had searched his records from the explorer missions but did not find a humanoid race that matched the man from the memory in Alessia's mind. Either she had remembered him incorrectly, or–

He had come to Seynorynael on his own.

Hinev did not doubt that he had been the source of Alessia's strange abilities, her proto-telepathy that in rare moments of an excited emotional state allowed her to break through to his mind without his help. As the time of her complete maturation approached, he would have to begin the ultimate test upon Alessia. The serum had been completed. But Hinev hesitated. Would the Alessia he had discovered and grown to love be no more?

Could he live with himself if her identity or even she herself died with the serum?

* * * * *

Hinev left for Firien at the Elders' summons. It was there that he happened to discover the fate of Alessia's mother.

He just couldn't tell the child, not yet.

Nerena had drowned herself in the sea the morning after Alessia had been taken from her, not far from the very site where lieutenant Kiel and the other Martial Scientific Force officers worked on the infrastructure of the ship Selesta.

Lieutenant Fielikor Kiel, an engineer in the MSF, had shown Hinev around the site. The Elders had chosen well, Hinev thought. Kiel would make the perfect test subject, if he could be made to undergo the serum, and Bilka was already there, trying to persuade him that he would make an ideal explorer for the mission when it was finally launched. Young, energetic, sharp-minded, handsome, strong, a born fighter and leader, Kiel was strong-willed and independent...

* * * * *

When Hinev returned, he knew he could allow himself no time to change his mind. He prepared the serum as quickly as possible, and set up the instruments for a complete study of Alessia's transformation.

He had prepared to guide the process of her metamorphosis with his telekinetic abilities, to help the serum infiltrate her cells and take control of them, but encountered an unexpected barrier. Alessia's immune system fought the invader with an uncanny strength. She held out for two months, delirious, in acute pain. Such acute pain that it made him regret what he had done to her.

Then suddenly Hinev was no longer alone. Alessia finally woke. Her survival after so long was indeed a miracle... Her entity shielded itself from his mind; this was a comfort to him somehow. In his own obsessed pursuit of eternal life, he had not realized that he needed humanity, the challenge of an equal intellect to feed his mind, to progress and refine his own enlightenment...

* * * * *

–Alessia pulled herself from his mind abruptly as she reached his most recent thoughts. She did not need to know what had happened to her. She already knew–

And her mother, Nerena, was dead?!—

Yet Hinev wouldn't let her mind escape him, not yet.

* * * * *

...Alessia seemed to have recovered. And she seemed willing to help him, to allow him to analyze and document her transformation. She permitted him to run tests upon her, monitoring her new abilities, as much as she hated the testing. He could only guess that she had accepted her fate, knowing that regrets served her no purpose. He did not really know, though, for she continued to shield her mind's thoughts from him.

When he examined the results, Hinev forgot to breathe for a moment.

This can't be! he thought, then called Alessia back to repeat the blood test.

The second test only confirmed the results of the first.

Her blood, her half-Enorian blood, had reformed the serum! She had fought it so long, to the point of death. But though it had finally subdued her, the serum had incorporated her immune system defenses. Alessia's cells and the serum cells had transformed one another, creating the flawless cell replicators that Hinev had attempted to create but had not yet perfected, and the cells themselves had finally become sentient.

At last! Hinev felt a wave of triumph. He had at last broken the barrier to eternal life upon Seynorynael. Instead of returning the small vial of blood to her system, he emptied it into the indestructible vial containing the serum solution. He would inject himself again later. Now all he needed was an experimental group...

* * * * *

...Hinev returned from the Council Building only for a moment to retrieve Alessia's engine plans. Marankeil had discovered that Hinev was hiding them in his laboratory and requested that Hinev hurry to deliver his plans to the young Engineer Kiel working on the Firien project. Hinev had protested they were not his, that he was merely reviewing them; Marankeil didn't care. He sent them to Kiel, using Hinev's courier.

After the construction had been completed, Marankeil ordered Hinev to bring Kiel and several of his colleagues as candidates for the new explorer mission. As such, they would need to undergo some testing in the Federation Science Building to prepare them for the new voyage...

...after thirty-one successful candidates had undergone the metamorphosis, Hinev returned to the Federation Science Building to help Alessia. He did not want her to go through the learning process alone, as he had done...

* * * * *

Alessia returned to herself in an instant. Hinev's expression was steady, without a trace of emotion.

"It's too late for them, isn't it?" Alessia said, shaking her head, but Hinev's memories settled back into the deeper recesses of her mind, like a stubborn, clinging root that would not be pulled out, that would take as much memory with it as it possibly could if she tried to uproot it.

"Yes, I'm afraid it is."

"How could you betray them all like that?" Alessia flung at him.

"You know the answer to that question now as well as I."

"I suppose I do." She said very quietly.

* * * * *

"Hinev, I need to know about my mother. Did she leave anything for me?"

"So you're speaking to me again?" Hinev said from the other room, his voice approaching.

Two days had passed since the mindlink.

"Why not? I can't hate you forever." Alessia shrugged as he came in and sat beside her. She had been searching through a file on an electronic holo-notebook, then abruptly pushed it aside on the table.

"Actually you could, and I'd understand why," Hinev said, an audible note of relief in his voice.

"I didn't say I don't still despise you on some level for what you've done, but hate you forever? I don't think I can. Not with your memories and motives floating around in my head somewhere. But I asked you a question."

"I'm sorry," Hinev answered. "They didn't tell me anything more about her."

"I see."

"I'll find out if she left you anything. Alessia–"

"What?"

"I know it isn't easy to suppress the other memories that remain after a mindlink. But please remember that you've got to be cautious. Don't form a deep mindlink unless you have to. Learn to keep to scanning surface thoughts instead."

"Why?"

"Because, let's just say that if you don't, you may find that the invaded mind can became the invader."

"The invader?" Alessia shuddered.

Hinev nodded. "It feels so easy, so tempting, doesn't it? To sink deeper into the memories of another person. But take care you don't sink so deep that once immersed, you can't get out. You'll be left with the feeling that you actually are the other person."

"That happened to you, didn't it?"

His eyes flickered. "For a while I thought I was two different people, but thankfully, the split-personality symptoms wore off. I can't say that I don't have reservations about mindlinks now, though. And sometimes I wonder–"

"If it's possible to cross the barrier and forget one's own self?"

"Yes."

"Hinev–where are the others you tested the serum on?"

"You'll know soon enough, Alessia."

"You're hiding something."

"Yes, I am."
Chapter Five

Alessia would have begged Hinev not to have infected the others with the serum if she had known beforehand that he planned on testing experimental subjects with his serum. But Hinev hadn't told her. She had only learned of it in the mindlink, after it was too late to interfere.

Hinev was soon busy, had new subjects to monitor; he left his laboratory in The Federation Science Building for some time.

And, Alessia had at last been released from her duties at The Federation Science Building as well—that was what her official transfer notice said. Taken from her home, they had left her to Hinev and the instructors at the scientific center for years. She had no longer had any desire to leave, but those in charge of her fate didn't care about this.

The Elder Council had more plans for her than she would ever know. Alessia was soon sent to a cadet training center under the command of Major Ungarn in central Ariyalsynai, to be trained as Bilka had promised years before. She'd been taken from Hinev, her surrogate father, and abandoned in a new world that had no knowledge of the creature she had recently become.

Alessia stormed though the halls like a dark cloud when the Elder Ornenkai ran into her on her way back to her new quarters.

"Alessia!" he called out to her in the corridor. She turned at the sound of the synthesized voice, suddenly suspicious. "Hinev asked that I look in and see that you have adjusted. I trust things are well?" Ornenkai asked, hesitating.

"No cause for any concern," she said angrily, then relented, thinking fondly of Hinev, despite what he had done. "But why would an Elder come to this center for Hinev's assistant?" she asked and narrowed her eyes. Though she knew why, knew that she was immortal, and that someone was bound to find out, sooner or later.

"Hmmm. You don't realize my admiration for him." Ornenkai said, with perhaps a trace of feeling. She couldn't really tell with the mechanized units, though maybe she didn't want to be bothered trying. "And he has accomplished for us–more than I could believe." Ornenkai continued. "But it is not that difficult to pull myself away from the main Terminus. There is too much going on in the world to exclude myself from it. I will concede that it is a pain to transfer my thoughts into the mobile unit–but the time may come when I might be free to come and go as I once did," he added cryptically.

Alessia recalled Hinev's memories in that moment, and the secret cloning and serum group experiments Hinev had planned and executed for the Elder's benefit.

"Alessia?" He asked. "I see I've upset you. I didn't mean–"

"It's all right," she said acerbically, hoping with all her heart that all of the serum tests might fail. The Elders' power had taken her from her mother, and had caused Nerena's death. As soon as she was in a position to end their inhuman reign, she knew she wouldn't hesitate doing it for a moment.

She knew she had to be careful around Ornenkai, lest she betray any of Hinev's secrets.

"I have to go," Alessia said, and left him as soon as she could.

* * * * *

Ungarn had once analyzed cadet Alessia Valeria Enassa with eyes accustomed to harshly criticizing, but now her commanding officer praised her to anyone who would listen. He knew she was a Zadúmchov but had taken her father's name Enassa for training, but he didn't tell anyone else of what he knew privately that Alessia had chosen not to reveal.

Of course Ungarn did not tell her any of his private thoughts, but Alessia knew what he thought of her.

Her ambition knew no limits, but it wasn't a conceited ambition, an ambition bent on self-glory. She had always had a desire to achieve the impossible simply to prove that nothing was.

She took no pleasure out of simple achievements, which now included the thousands of things the metamorphosis had made possible. There was no knowledge she could not secure if she wanted it, nothing she couldn't move telekinetically by force of will, no one she couldn't force into submission, but forcing anything or anyone to do something against its own nature was something that she intended never to do, because it was something that could give her no satisfaction.

Alessia never abused her powers if she could help it. She cared only for those things that a voluntary will offered her, without being prompted in any way. Even so, it was hard not to use the ability of her telepathic power, which required so little effort. Ungarn's mind was open to her; he had not the means to protect himself. He had been skeptical of her talent at first because it was his nature and because she had come to him later than she ought, but time and again she proved herself far superior to any of his other trainees.

Her abilities were miraculous! Ungarn thought. He didn't know that they were also unnatural. He had to admit to himself that cadet Enassa had surprised him more than he thought possible. It had been years since he had been so proud of one of his cadets. After only a few short months in pilot training, favorable circumstances, a gap in the ranks, and a few well-timed successful errands compelled him to place her among the Martial Scientific Force's officers.

Ungarn was pleased to promote Alessia Valeria Enassa and fully certain of her capabilities; his only concern remained her apparent youth and inexperience, but his enthusiasm won out over reservations. Alessia could handle whatever he gave her to do, of that Ungarn was certain.

Cadet Enassa was soon promoted to the lowest rank in the Martial Scientific Force, with the stipulation that she continue her training for another year before active service. During that time, she was to hone her engineering skills, to study and memorize all of the Federation starship designs and analyze them for flaws. Her own starship designs would be judged by the Martial Scientific Force's established engineers.

However, Alessia's career path soon veered into another area. Perhaps it was her own early upbringing near Lake Firien, augmented by the ambition and obsessive search she had witnessed through Hinev's eyes. Her telepathic power had indeed made it easy to gain rapid, comprehensive expertise, though she still felt a taste of guilt about using her powers to gather information that way. Still, she couldn't help but excel with her telepathically-gained knowledge.

For whatever the reason, Alessia had taken an interest in biology and bio-chemistry, the area of knowledge that had forever altered her own life, and in time, she earned herself a position on the research team of scientists as a bio-specialist at the Martial Scientific Force's Lab Center.

During her last year of training, though, the strange headaches that she had begun to experience worsened, waking her from any attempt at sleep. Hinev had said it was no longer possible for her to feel pain, and in truth, the oppressive weight on her mind was in fact unlike any sensation she had ever known. She awoke writhing and howling like a wounded animal, her head throbbing with blinding, crushing pressure.

She hadn't cried or felt such pain to such an extent except for the metamorphosis–not ever, not even in the days shortly after being taken from her mother, not when she was taken from Hinev. Not even when she broke her leg in physical training years ago, or when she was burned in the fire in Hinev's lab. Not even when she went to bed with muscles aching so much from overwork and exhaustion that she couldn't sleep through the night. She had felt pain before, normal pain, pain she could be indifferent to, but nothing like this. It was true all of her external scars were gone, thanks to the power of Hinev's serum.

Yet she was screaming now, despite her immortality, and yes, there was pain!

Maybe Hinev could no longer feel any pain, but she certainly did, albeit briefly, now. The first thing she decided to do was to forego sleeping. Hinev's serum had taken away the necessity almost entirely, so why bother with sleep or dreaming any more? She wouldn't let a nightmare have any power over her!

The headaches diminished but never completely disappeared. And with them came brief lapses in memory. She wondered if Hinev's serum had indeed been imperfect, if there was a price she would pay for unsought immortality.

* * * * *

In three years, Alessia had become a lieutenant in the Martial Scientific Force. After her second year, she had asked permission to be transferred away from central Ariyalsynai, but Ungarn made it clear that such a removal was out of his hands. Someone above him was pulling the strings that kept her there.

Alessia had not seen Hinev since the day she left the Federation Science Building, but on occasion she had another visitor. A year after her caustic encounter with the Elder Ornenkai, he returned to visit her, "observe" her progress as he called it, to deliver news of Hinev to his former pupil.

Alessia tolerated Ornenkai and talked to him as she thought that perhaps Hinev might telepathically read through Ornenkai what she did and thought. Perhaps Hinev would then know that she wished to be returned to the Science Center at the Federation Science Building and join him in his experiments. But Ornenkai never returned with news of her mentor. She had not even a guarantee that Ornenkai ever saw Hinev but had to believe that Ornenkai did. She tried to read Ornenkai's mechanized mindwaves, but the mechanized Elders' minds were safe from her telepathy.

In the past year, there had been excited rumors that the explorer mission neared the departure time of its maiden voyage. A starship selected for the journey approached completion far away beyond the weather-safe ring in the Firien province. And its crew, experienced officers of the Martial Scientific Force, had been training, it was said, somewhere in Ariyalsynai.

Ornenkai brought word one afternoon that the explorers were being sent out to Lake Firien to complete their training before the explorer mission could be launched. Ornenkai answered Alessia's questions about them freely, hoping to please her. But it seemed to her that he was somewhat despondent, as if a great hope of his, a dream he had cherished, had been dashed.

She asked him what was wrong, only out of a casual interest, but he appeared gratified by her concern.

"Too many things that I will not burden you with, my dear," he responded, and tried to sigh. "Disappointments mount like the fallen leaves, but a strong wind sweeps them all away," he added as quietly as a machine could, mumbling an age-old saying.

"What brings you here–do you leave to meet with Hinev?" she asked.

"No–I have seen the last of him for quite some time. But–I had to visit you one more time."

"Are you leaving for a Federation planet?" she asked.

"No. But we may be parted soon. You cannot stay here forever, and I–I am going to be indisposed for a while. Involved in–you might call it an experiment. And now you must forgive me, but I shall take leave of you. I have to speak with Ungarn, and he is not an easy one to locate."

As Alessia watched the mechanized Elder leave, she almost relented in her resentment of him, but in her heart she could never forgive the Elders for what they had let happen to her.

She brought her fingers to her temples, suddenly inclined to massage them as she felt a pressure headache approaching. But this one was slight, and passed in moments. She remembered what Ornenkai had said about Hinev and that his new explorer team were indeed nearby in Ariyalsynai.

Closing her eyes, she allowed her consciousness to extend beyond the walls, beyond the building, across space in a great sphere until she found the agonized mind calling to her.

She hurried from the building, making certain that she was not seen. For the first time in years, she slipped beyond the gateway unaccompanied, into the bustling commercial center of Ariyalsynai. In the distance she could see the Elders' Building and adjoining arboretum museum, rising high above the other white towers of the city. Turning her back on them, she disappeared into the multitudes of civilians.

* * * * *

She found Hinev in his laboratory in the Federation Science Building.

"Alessia," he stammered, "what are you doing here?" He appeared surprised but not displeased that she had come.

"I sensed something was wrong–just after Ornenkai left," she stopped, watching his expression change to bitterness.

"He came to see you?"

"Yes, but–"

"When?"

"Today, not long before I left to see you."

"Yes, I thought that he might." Hinev sighed. Alessia looked at him expectantly. "The planned transplantation–the transferal failed."

"When?" She asked, but Hinev shook his head.

"Recently. But some time ago, I realized it could not be done–at least not as planned. Ornenkai left you, my dear, to begin a transplantation into an imperfect clone–but the process of implanting information takes many months, even years after the clone human's maturation. No doubt he thought he would never see you again. Tell me, did he sound distracted, unhappy?"

"Yes–if any of them can feel anything." She conceded.

"Hmmm." Hinev nodded thoughtfully.

"You mean the serum could not be implemented into their genetic copies?" Alessia asked, dubious.

"I mean once I had grown the new clones using Marankeil and the other ancient Elder's genetic material, the original cloned minds, though fresh and unadorned with memories, refused to be eradicated by the Elders' memory bank. I decided to eliminate some brain functions in a few of them, to see if they could absorb some of the Elder's thoughts and memories, and it was possible, but I noticed strange motor reactions–as though the bodies themselves rejected the artificial memories, even those from the source of their genetic material.

"And I soon discovered that without the native minds being intact, the serum could not take effect. There was some kind of barrier between the two levels of consciousness–voluntary will and involuntary action. The serum could not cross the barrier to the conscious but involuntarily part of the mind that it needed to alter to initiate a metamorphosis."

"What about inducing the metamorphosis before the memory transfer?" Alessia suggested, but saw the flaws in the idea as soon as she had proposed it.

"I tried that," Hinev shook his head. "When I injected the serum into the clones prior to the Elders' transfer, the young creature–as expected–drew close to complete transformation, needing only another telepathic mind and semi-sentient body to help guide the complete metamorphosis. I hesitated to complete the process, though, until the transfer of thoughts took hold. But I found that after the serum had been introduced into the native system of each clone, the native clone mind could not be erased or changed. It could absorb memories telepathically, but always remained conscious of its own separate entity. One of the young child clones fully absorbed Marankeil's memories, forgetting its own independence. But it could not consciously control any of them, and soon degenerated into its own world, losing touch with the reality around it.

"The Elders instructed me to bring the successful explorers in for a transferal, but it turned they could not be 'containers', as it were, for the Elder's minds, either."

Alessia winced. How barbaric, she thought. How disgusting, thinking of using another being's body in such a way, eradicating its natural mind and destiny...

"It seems all grown clone bodies injected with the serum will not accept alien matter without rejecting it. Marankeil finally decided that the semi-permanent clones would be enough. But to tell you the truth, I am relieved the memory-transferals failed."

"More clones?" Alessia persisted. "How are they any different?"

"They aren't much different than ordinary human clones grown ectogenetically–except that after many experiments, I was able to augment the grown clones' physical endurance and hardiness using my earlier serums. They are not indestructible, however, and after maturation must be replaced at least every seven hundred years. Marankeil will keep his computerized entity stored and transfer his active thought into the clones once they have grown, rather than his former mobile mechanized unit. The division between two units–between the mobile android and Main Terminus Center–is similar. The clone memories will also be re-transmitted into the computer at intervals to maintain the memory bank. If the clone should die, another will be prepared from Marankeil's computerized entity.

"It seems unfair not to give the clones a chance at their own lives, a chance to form their own memories. After all, they are human entities–" Alessia interrupted.

"Hmmm." Hinev nodded. "But they have been grown in ectogenetic capsules without exposure to the world to form their own memories." He shook his head. "I only hope that the Elders can learn from humanity again. As machines, they lost all traces of human emotion and suppressed their human memory–perhaps that was the reason the serum transfers failed." He suggested, only half-serious. "They have not been human for many years, and do not remember what it means to be so."

Alessia found Hinev's experiments with the clones gruesome, but said nothing to him about it; there was nothing she could do to stop what was going on.

"Ornenkai told me that the explorers of Selesta are leaving soon." Alessia said. "I suppose they will be allowed to serve their original purpose with the transfers having failed."

"Yes. Marankeil and the other Elders perceive the serum recipients—Kiel and the other explorer candidates—as a threat. If he sends them away as explorers he will ensure his control over them—and that they are no threat."

"How many are there?" Alessia wondered.

"We succeeded with thirty-one, and then I risked no more."

"What do you mean 'succeeded'?" she asked. Hinev stood and took her arm, leading her to the door.

"If you really want to know, then I'll show you," he said.

* * * * *

On the way to the holding cells below the building, Hinev explained that after testing his serum on fully grown humanoid clones, he had begun using real human test subjects, but there had been many failures in those given initial serum injections. In consecutive attempts at a mindlink, some of them had developed a split-personality disorder. They had no longer been able to distinguish between their own entity and the ones they had absorbed telepathically. Hinev had discontinued the serum injections, and the remaining creatures had been left to live out the rest of its unnaturally augmented life in seclusion.

Others had rejected the serum. In moments they had become wild creatures, thrashing about the floor in agonized paroxysms, some scratching their own skin off and others harming themselves, breaking their own bones and running wild into objects as though they felt no pain outside delirium; still others were simply unable to withstand the sudden pain of the serum itself, an elixir of burning fire, that pulsed through their blood and into every small subatomic cell like a purging cathartic fire, only there had been no catharsis, no restoration of the body, and no end to the pain. Hinev had been obliged to constrain them and remove the serum through a blood cleansing unit. Many of the candidates were still recuperating, even though four long years had come and gone.

Others had slowly grown ambitious, seeing themselves as demi-gods that might overthrow the Elders and take their place. As soon as Hinev had read their intent, he had halted their metamorphosis, short of perfection and immortality. It was to the cell of the two of these that he brought Alessia.

"I removed the serum from them, but the metamorphosis has already transformed much of their bodies. They hold on to their telepathic abilities as a lifeline to their ambitions, but their enhanced physical strength and telekinetic abilities have almost disappeared. The Elders wish to study them and hope perhaps they might find a way to use their bodies to succeed where I failed. But now that you have come–perhaps you can end their suffering."

"What?" Alessia took a step back, avoiding the wild, crazed eyes of the two creatures whose faces pressed up into the holding cell windows, watching her, darting over her as though they would have enjoyed the opportunity to rip her to pieces.

"They were created with the altered serum, a hybrid of your own blood and my serum prototype–you may be able to kill the metamorphosed cells where I could not. I removed your blood cells from their system to halt the metamorphosis, but too much had already taken place."

Alessia eyed the creatures, and understood the danger of their existence. And, if the offending partially transformed matter could be destroyed, perhaps their old selves could return.

Closing her eyes, she sent out a wave of semi-sentient waves from her mind and concentrated upon altering the cell, returning them to their original form rather than destroying them. Such a complete purge would have terminated the creatures, leaving them without certain vital functions, even if she were able to do it.

Minutes passed, and the alteration began to work. Hinev said nothing, but felt the process with his own perception. She sensed that he had joined her, that he paid particular interest in examining how she was able to cleanse the few serum-altered cells.

With the alteration a success, Alessia turned away, temporarily drained of energy. Her body began to tingle as though from electric shock as it pulled particles from the air to replenish its energy reserves.

As they returned to his laboratory, Alessia finally voiced the question that had been at the fore of her mind.

"Why did you continue the experiments after such horrors occurred?"

Hinev said nothing. It seemed he could not bear the guilt, not enough to excuse himself with an answer. Was his guilt so great because he had once refused to give it any power over him?

She shook her head in concealed pity, perceiving the answer in his thoughts. Did he let her read them? Or had guilt lowered his mind's defenses?

What she saw was that Hinev had once truly believed that his experiment would be for the benefit of all their people. His motive for the experiment had once been primarily selfish; then, as his perception grew after the serum injections, his thoughts had become muddled with philanthropic visions. So, at first he had accepted the Elders' endorsement to continue his serum research. Yet when he had begun to see the price the serum demanded from its recipients, he had grappled with his own desires, and finally found courage to ask to discontinue his work. The Elders had then, in no uncertain terms, given him no choice but to continue.

Sensing Hinev's guilt, the last, horrible feeling the serum had developed in him, and his hesitation to continue the experiment, the Elders had begun to threaten him with innocent lives if he did not comply. And, they could find other assignments for his candidates if he were not inclined to use them as the experimental group. And then they would select another team. They would take the process out of his hands. They would use Alessia however they could–

No more needed to be said. He could not have them hurt Alessia. Hinev's explorers were born.

Yet Hinev had never told them anything, could not tell them anything. His explorers knew only that they had been selected for a long explorer mission and had to endure certain genetic alteration to survive the long journey.

No, they–we will never grow any older. Hinev remembered, as though this thought kept hitting him again with its fantastic power to shock. But I have stolen one form of immortality from them in order to give them another, for none of us will have any children to live after us. And we will be here, watching, when our civilization inevitably dies. All of us will see everything we have ever loved vanish forever.

Alessia stopped listening to his thoughts, sensing that Hinev had realized the consequences of the serum metamorphosis too late. He knew better than anyone what a curse a long memory could be in a population that had a short one. He knew that the present identities the explorers knew as themselves were doomed to slowly die while their bodies lived on. They would not be the same people after thousands of years. And yet he could not tell them. He could not face them. Or his own shame.

Hinev said nothing for a long time.

"I wish I hadn't done it," he said very quietly. "Sometimes you feel like you don't have a choice even when you do. Now there is no going back."

"What?" she asked, but she knew what he meant.

Hinev ignored her. He paused, his face clouded by unease. "I was just so tired of death. Everywhere we went, Kudenka's explorers, we found war, famine–horrible, premature death. I saw so many men, so many humanoid creatures die. It was painful to see so many of them slip away. To know that it might have been me next–and to be able to stop nothing of the dying around you...

"Well, my dear, I have some news for you." He said suddenly, breaking off with no small effort.

"You're upset," she realized, let this affect her. "And not just by recollections from the past. I know you too well."

"You sensed that, I suppose. Thought you'd come and check on me."

"What is it?"

"I'm going away."

"What?"

"Just look." He managed.

She saw past his composure and into his thoughts. Hinev had served his purpose. The Elders thought they no longer needed him, in view of the light that they had taken his cloning equipment. His grand design for them had failed.

Hinev had received his orders yesterday. They were discharging him from service at the Federation Science Building for a period of ten years, sending him to Eneveh, a small city near the boundary of the weather-safe ring. He could continue his research and return to Ariyalsynai in time. The transfer actually read that they were sending him on a retreat, a reward for his service as an explorer.

Hinev could enjoy his life with few responsibilities to disturb him–but to Hinev the transfer was devastating. Alessia knew that the Elders would always call him back, for they needed him to be on hand in case one of the clones he had created needed to be replaced or repaired, in case they failed to understand or replicate what he had done with his serums. But they would never allow his voice to be heard again in the scientific circles of Ariyalsynai.

Ornenkai had broken the news to him and informed Hinev of Marankeil's other orders, to be delivered to Commander Ungarn some time that day.

"Marankeil has decided to send you on the explorer mission." Hinev said tiredly, leaning against the lab table, his hands stretched out behind him. "I asked what might be done to prevent it, but my word carried no weight, and Ornenkai informs me that Marankeil will not be dissuaded. Oh, Alessia, I don't want you to leave. We will be parted for many years."

Alessia just stood there.

She was going? He was staying? And all of this already arranged.

She looked at him, his unchanged violet eyes, mirrors to his inner turmoil. Dear Hinev, she would miss him! And how could the Elders do it? How could they discard him and send him away into exile? Despite what he had done, he was by far a greater man than they in her estimation. Of course, Hinev could always disobey his orders–what could the Elders physically do to him? They couldn't kill him, but they could banish him from Seynorynael forever and use their humanroids, androids that had been cosmetically fashioned to appear almost human, to restrain him and keep him away.

Hinev would never again be able to show his true face on his home world; the humanroids would see to that. Humanroids were mechanical creatures like the Elders themselves, but had no human soul that could be affected by telepathic suggestions; humanroids were also immune to most of the explorers' other powers, and extremely difficult to move or defeat telekinetically. They had been used in many a war and to control the population at times. But much of society owned simple harmless androids as well that performed many work functions, so the population didn't complain much.

If Hinev left Seynorynael, he wouldn't ever be able to visit any of his explorers when they returned to Seynorynael. So he would stay, and do what he was told—for now.

But to explore the galaxies–to leave Seynorynael behind for a time and witness the wonders of the universe first-hand–and to live among people like her, with similar thoughts, ideals, and abilities–despite her unhappiness over Hinev's fate, Alessia could hardly contain her excitement concerning her own.

"Yes, I understand. A transport will take you to the others at Lake Firien in two days." Hinev said tiredly, pushed himself from the table, and turned away.

Finge datos currus, quid agas? Suppose the chariot were granted to you, what would you do?

–Ovid, Apollo to Phaethon

Chapter Six

Beneath the storm grey clouds of the north, the vast crystal mirror of Lake Firien stretched away from the land. Alessia could almost smell the sea air through the transport window as she gazed down past Firien City to the dim, dark waters below. She could almost taste the salt in the air, feel the light mist of sea spray beading on her hair and skin. A flock of lovely white birds flew past the viewport of their transport.

Years had gone by since Alessia left the Firien Province, but it didn't matter. Wherever she went, she carried vivid memories of this place with her, the most beloved place in all the world.

The transport turned away from the city and towards the southern coast, the site of The Firien Project and the place where the rebuilt ship Selesta awaited them.

"Is that–Selesta?" Alessia said, staring out the transport window at the dark, liquid navy monolith stretching away on the horizon. It was so beautiful, reflecting pinpoints of muted light from a million stars, its hull darker even than the bright heavens around Seynorynael.

Ungarn and the other members of the Martial Scientific Force who had accompanied her chuckled, apart from the two young officers who had never been to Firien. Those two stared at the great ship with the same sense of wonder as Alessia herself. Moments later, the transport headed through a wide yawning air lock and into a cavernous area just inside.

"What is this place?" One of the youngest men turned to Ungarn, who had been to Selesta two times before.

"They call it the Great Cargo Bay," Ungarn returned. "Though they keep more of the extra Valerian fighters in here than any cargo."

Some of the other officers laughed.

"Why is that so funny?" A gangly youth asked, one of the two who had never been to Firien before.

"Because, Sumeidh, the explorers don't need all those fighters, but they won't give them back to the Martial Scientific Force. The people who were working on the Firien Project originally made plans to quarter about a hundred thousand occupants, and the ship ended up with just over thirty. Quite a disparity in the numbers, wouldn't you say?" Ungarn's second-in-command, Major Minart, chuckled.

"Sure is, but what if they have families in time? That will up the crew by a few," Sumeidh returned, quelling the laughter. "And if you want, you can make clones of yourselves as well to perform basic functions on board," he added. "I think you have plenty of ectogenesis chambers."

The transport docked, and the officers disembarked, their boots creating an uneven rhythm on the smooth surface of the transport.

"Alessia," Ungarn called her attention as they headed down the gangway; she looked over at him with an expression that tried to mask the fact that she already knew what he was preparing to tell her.

"Yes, sir?" She cocked an eyebrow and waited patiently.

"You've been given leave to explore on your own for a while." Ungarn explained, moistening his lips in the cold, dry air of the cargo bay. "I've been instructed to deliver the Elders' requests to some of the explorers, and to review the reports of the team's progress before we head back to Ariyalsynai."

"Do they know we're here, sir?" Alessia asked, listening to his answering thoughts moments before he spoke.

"Most likely." Ungarn shrugged. "I imagine they're monitoring us even now. But no one will bother you, so go ahead and take a look around. We'll find you by your communication frequency or send you a message on your intra-crancial communicator when you're expected back here–or wherever it is they decide to meet you. Or, if you go too far away, I'll have your internal cerebral direction sensor re-direct you to where we are."

"Yes, sir." Alessia didn't want to tell him that her mind had not been programmed the way the others' had with as many nano-implants since birth. She was unaware that she had been "chipped" the way most of the population had been.

Alessia waited for the others to leave the Great Cargo Bay and stared around at the gleaming, half-metallic, half-organic looking Valerian fighters a few moments before heading off to other parts of the ship with curious eyes.

She wandered for the better part of an hour among the maze of newly completed corridors. She had heard that a great effort had been made to purify the tons of metallic and crystalloid alloys used in the ship's construction, a fact which was born out by her investigations. The beauty of the interior struck her as wondrous.

There were other things to occupy her thoughts. What would the other explorers think of her when she met them? Would they be anything like her? Certainly far more experienced, but would they consider her an outsider?

A group of nearby minds interrupted her thoughts, their telepathic signals rife in the air as the people whose thoughts she heard worked on something in the other corridor. There were various scraping sounds of metal on metal and heavy objects and instruments being dropped onto the hard floor.

Alessia halted around the corridor, listening to their mindspeech. She froze, her back pressed into the wall, her breathing stopped. Their thoughts did not acknowledge her presence.

Honestly, you two are always either arguing with each other or agreeing with each other! Lierva said, in a tone that managed to be amused and exasperated at the same time. What is it with you two?

Well, you see, either is a sign of respect, Kiel laughed. They were speaking informally, as friends, not as commander and subordinate.

How so? Lierva demanded, responding to Kiel.

I wouldn't argue with Kellar if I thought it was a waste of time, nor would I agree with a fool, even if he were my friend. Kiel laughed.

Just accept it, Lierva, Celekar advised, with an air of indifference. They'll never change.

So who do you think she really is–the young woman the Martial Scientific Force sent to join us? Does anyone know? a woman known as Mindra asked.

I heard that she was Hinev's assistant. Kiel offered. But Hinev never said much about her before she was transferred to us. Kellar, could you hand me that belt there?

This one? There was a pause. Did any one notice how young she was? Kellar teased, with a hint of disbelief.

Kellar makes a study of every female on this ship, Lierva laughed. But he's right. She really is too young for this kind of mission.

Perhaps not, Kellar threw out. Why do you suppose the Elders authorized her metamorphosis to take place separate from ours? Kellar wondered.

Has anyone seen her in person? Lierva asked. I had heard she is a half-race child, like Hinev, but she didn't look half-race to me in the transmissions we saw.

I didn't even notice that, Celekar thought.

I thought she looked remarkably pretty—a sweet girl from the looks of her. Kellar commented. But I suppose we'll find out more soon enough.

Still, I think we know why Hinev chose her as his assistant. Lierva added with a complacent certainty. Of course he'd recruit a half-race girl, like himself—

Lierva–Kiel said in a warning tone.

Maybe now that Hinev has been retired from active duty, the Council wanted rid of her and sent her to us. Celekar took up the argument where Lierva had left it.

How good of them, Mirna laughed. Just our luck to get saddled with a cadet with no practical experience. She'll have to learn fast.

That's enough, Kiel admonished, with a flash of anger. No more conjectures about Hinev's motives. This Lieutenant Enassa wouldn't be here if she didn't deserve to be. And for whatever reason she's here, she's here to stay. Anyway, we've wasted enough time talking. We're already late for the meeting, so hurry up and get everything loaded.

Long after the group had left, Alessia remained sitting in the corridor where she had stood, hugging her knees to her chest, unmoving. She lost track of the time.

Hope was holding out somewhere in her thoughts. She decided to be bright, positive, and happy despite the conversation she had just heard. There was plenty of time to change their opinions of her. She wandered around the ship for another hour, and then was located by one of the technicians on her communicator.

"Alessia," he relayed to her. "Commander Ungarn is looking for you. They finished with the reports an hour ago. He's ready to continue your tour. But you'll have to hurry. Hinev's explorers are waiting to meet you."

* * * * *

Alessia hurried down several corridors that led her further into the interior. Finally she stopped outside a wide entrance that split in the center of the doorway. The door panels retracted; beyond it lay Firien, or so she thought. The same fragrant smell of the lyra trees permeated the air, and the sound of distant waters rushing down a rocky stream mingled with the song of a breeze in the upper branches.

But hadn't it been twilight several hours ago outside the ship?

"There's another entrance on the far side," a technician who had been standing just inside the forest, waiting for her, explained. She was reading his mind even as he spoke, and knew what he would say a moment before he even spoke. But he had no way of knowing this. "This hold stretches all the way to the outer hull. But this is the only internal access door," he gestured as they entered a cavern filled with bright light.

"We're still inside the ship," Alessia said with a note of incredulity as she looked around at an entire forest that had been brought into the ship to fill the enormous hold. Just ahead on the path, she could see Commander Ungarn, immersed in conversation with one of the explorer guides.

"Isn't it remarkable?" Ungarn enthused, half-turning aside as Alessia joined them. "This forest was only installed a few tendays ago, if I'm not mistaken." He looked at the explorer guide, who nodded his assent.

"That's correct. We had a team remove an entire section of the landscape near the ship and bring it through the outer hull before the last hull plates were installed."

Alessia found the explorer's voice pleasant and his clear, blue-grey eyes were bright with kindness at the present moment. He appeared several years older than she, middle-aged, with a nice rugged, face. His dark hair had streaks of white already by the temples, which seemed to highlight his heart-shaped face. He was a thin man, but not gangly, with a jaunty kind of walk.

"Is that a sherin tree?" Alessia's keen eyes descried a smaller tree among the others, far in the distance ahead.

"Yes," the explorer nodded, obviously pleased. "One of our cultivated species of sherin, though I understand wild sherin fruit is by far the best, rare as it is to find wild sherin trees these days."

"Ah, wild sherin trees!" Alessia said. "Yes, they are lovely—and such delicious fruit."

"Yes, but as you can see, the rest are mostly lyra trees, rare as they are—we've raped the local landscape for them." The explorer said, with a trace of sadness. "We will enjoy them, though. They will flourish here without constant care and help us to regulate the atmosphere. And so will the sherin trees."

"Can't understand how you'll all manage to survive," Ungarn commented, shaking his head. "I didn't see anywhere near enough foodstuffs on board."

"We'll make do," the explorer guide said, and we do have the ability to grow food aboard ship if we need more. "Welcome–" he extended a hand to Alessia.

"And you're?" she asked. His mind was closed to her telepathy, and Ungarn was present, so they spoke out loud.

"Gerryls. Rikhsehr Gerryls. Unlike most of the crew, I still prefer to be addressed by my family name. I spent many long years in the Martial Scientific Force." Gerryls shrugged.

"Gerryls was one of our best doctors before being transferred to this post." Ungarn explained. "Every ship in the fleet has at least three." Ungarn continued. "I still think you should ask for doctor Nikol to accompany you."

"Yes, Ungarn. We'll take it under advisement." Said Gerryls, without any serious intent.

"Confound it! I knew you'd say that, man. But even with such a small crew, you may end up with space radiation fever or some unknown new alien diseases and then who will keep the rest of you alive?"

Gerryls laughed nervously. "I guess I'll just have to train an assistant on board, Ungarn."

"Promise you will. I don't want anything to happen to one of the brightest cadets I've managed to turn out in years."

Gerryls nodded. "We'll take care of her. You have my word."

"You're not a medical doctor anymore." Alessia asked, though it was more an observation.

"Not really," Gerryls admitted. "I've returned to my first vocation in life."

"You were a botanist?" Alessia asked.

Gerryls agreed. "Do you find that dull?"

"No, I like plants. Very much."

"You two already seem to have something in common, then. I hope you adjust soon to the life here, Alessia," Ungarn put in, hardly able to keep up with the unusual conversation; he had been surprised by Alessia's guess. "But—I didn't know you had studied the crew's files—or, how did you know Gerryls was a botanist?"

Alessia winked at Ungarn. "Women's intuition."

"Balderdash," Ungarn said.

"Alessia?" Gerryls repeated. "You'll forgive me, but I think this is the first time any one has ever remembered to mention your name–to me, at any rate." Gerryls was looking at her with a deceptively innocent smile; he had been trying but had not been able to read her mind.

"Yes, it's Alessia," Alessia said, clasping his proffered hand. "Biology Specialist Alessia Enassa."

"Well, Alessia, you will find some of our crew not far ahead, busy installing the atmospheric generator. The ship is finished, functionally speaking, but some of us have volunteered to put on–well, the final touches. As a matter of fact we were going to meet them in a moment, but Ungarn here insisted we wait until you got here."

"I should have figured that Kiel was up to something when he didn't show up to meet us. Is that really a breeze then?" Ungarn lifted his palms. After a moment, a cool wind reached them. Ungarn shook his head.

"Yes, but it seems more like a gale now," Gerryls laughed. "I guess they've finally got it running," he said, and led them through the Seynorynaelian lyra forest, past a river and over an dirt-paved stone bridge. Turning left, they continued about ten minutes and came to one side of the hold where the forest ended.

A small circle of men and women had come away from the wall and now gathered their equipment. They turned around at the sound of approaching footsteps and saluted Gerryls with smiles and an uproar of voices.

"You've lost, old man, admit it," Kiel said, a twinkle of mischief in his eye.

"All right, all right. I concede defeat." Gerryls held up his palms.

"It's finished, and with two hours to spare." Lierva added, with a hint of a smile. "Kiel finished well before the allotted time of the bet."

"Lierva, you said you weren't interested in taking sides." Gerryls accused.

"I know," she shrugged. "But Kiel found Kellar and me on the bridge and I decided to watch from a distance."

"Ungarn!" Kiel said suddenly, heading over to them. "You never change. Everyone, I'd like you to meet Commander Ungarn, my former commander."

"Yes." Ungarn said with a laugh. "Hard to believe that he left my unit–seven years ago, wasn't it? He was just a reckless headstrong boy, then–" Ungarn said. "But the finest engineer my trainers ever turned out." Ungarn added, with an approving smile.

"Good to see you," Kiel said, smiling.

"And you." Ungarn returned with equal mirth. "Well, Commander Kiel, before I leave you, I've brought the last explorer candidate with me for your mission. Lieutenant Kiel, leader of our newest expedition of Seynorynaelian explorers, this is Biology Specialist Alessia Enassa."

Ungarn turned aside; the explorers angled their heads in curiosity to get a better look at Hinev's former assistant.

It was Kiel, however, who had captured Alessia's attention. Of all the explorers, his face was the most familiar to her from her last days among Hinev, from her first mindlink. Here was the man whom Hinev had visited in Lake Firien, the engineer who had begun to build the starship called Selesta seven years ago out of ruins buried by the shores of the lake. He was younger than Hinev appeared to be, but not as young as some of the other explorers; however, to her mind his face was unmistakable, perhaps even unusual.

At the moment his dark blue eyes were calm, but with a radiant glare of intelligence and perception illuminating them with the strength of character and intellect.

Meanwhile, Kiel ran a steady, critical eye over her, then held out a hand. "Welcome to Selesta, Alessia," he said pleasantly, and following his example the others came forward to greet her.

* * * * *

"All systems are functional then?" Ungarn asked, lingering as the group headed back out of the forest and towards the bridge, where the last few explorers waited to meet them.

"Yes–we leave within the present tenday." Kiel said, equally somber. Both were painfully aware that the partings made on this day would be forever.

"And the engines–I heard some time back that they had to be redesigned–but I trust they are complete?" Ungarn asked.

"Yes–the preliminary tests show that the engines are operating better than we hoped." Kiel answered, walking beside him. Alessia and Gerryls stood behind them, and the rest followed further behind. She listened attentively to Gerryls' anecdotes, but also intent upon the conversation ahead. Gerryls grew silent, aware of Alessia's mental preoccupation with Kiel's news, even though she divided her thoughts well between them. He shrugged in amusement.

Shortly after passing into an elevation device, they arrived on the bridge.

"Don't worry," Gerryls whispered to her as they stepped forward. "You'll survive."

Alessia counted sixteen male and fifteen female explorers in all once the entire crew had been assembled. Aside from Alessia, the crew were all full Seynorynaelians, with pale grey skin and hair that was grey or white. She saw that unlike her black uniform which Hinev had given her, they all wore the new silvery blue uniforms of explorers, with triangular symbols that represented their number and rank, and an insignia that bore the name of their mission and personal name. Aside from the color, the uniforms were identical to the white ones worn by the Martial Scientific Force.

"You'll receive a case of standard uniforms, too," Gerryls assured her, and she realized that he had been with her, listening to her last thoughts. "Yes, we were all members of the Martial Scientific Force–but in the past few years we trained most of the time at the Federation Science Building. Hinev thought to distinguish us by issuing new uniforms–they don't look much the ones his crew wore on the last mission, do they? Except the explorers' insignias are the same design. Hinev liked that. You see, we aren't really Martial Scientific Force Officers anymore–the Council is calling us 'Hinev's explorers'."

From the tentative reception she received, Alessia guessed that "Hinev's explorers" had been told little about her by him or anyone else. They had no idea of her connection with him, only that she had been his assistant before the serum project.

And though many of them had tried to read her mind for more details, they found that they could not.

After a brief meeting and without forming a mindlink with their newest member, the explorers returned to their heavy load of duties. Alessia returned to the Great Cargo Bay to say good-bye to Ungarn. He would not be returning before the mission was launched, and most likely she would never see her former commander again.

"One more thing, Alessia," Ungarn said, hesitating on the steps up to the transport. "Gerryls tells me you've already been assigned to be his assistant, after letting me go on! Well, don't let him work you too hard."

"Why should he?"

Ungarn laughed. "You don't know Gerryls, pleasant as he seems to be. He said he was a doctor, but he failed to mention that he was head of the Biological Research Division at Ariyalsynai for more than six years. He was the first to work with the returning explorers in their documentation and is an expert on alien biochemistry–a great friend of Hinev's, too. He's not likely to extol his own merits, but he's a genius, and not very tolerant of any assistants who can't keep up with him. I fear there have been but a few who could."

"Thank you–I'll remember," Alessia said, nodding. Ungarn still didn't know that Hinev's explorers needed no such introductions, that telepathy had opened barriers he couldn't even perceive. She wondered if Ungarn had actually understood the fact that she herself had been given the serum. She looked further and saw more clearly. There was some ambiguity in his mind, yet he did know. What exactly the serum had done to them all, however, he didn't know, except that it had been devised to somehow help prepare them for this explorer mission.

"Good-bye, Ungarn," Alessia reached forward to hug him for the very first time.

"Good-bye, Alessia," he said, recovering, with affection. "Now, lieutenant, remember what I've taught you."

* * * * *

"Ungarn is a decent man, and it's very good of him to have come see us off." Gerryls observed as Alessia entered the laboratory.

"You knew I was coming," Alessia said.

"I knew Ungarn would tell you that you were assigned to be my assistant once he found out. I'm still adjusting to the idea myself."

"What are you doing?"

"Stowing supplies."

"Need help?"

"That would be appreciated."

"Hard to believe that we can store so much away, and yet this ship still appears empty," Gerryls said several hours later, wiping his brow out of habit. He looked at his hand, surprised to see that there was no sweat on it.

"Gerryls–do you sometimes forget how it feels to feel things the way you used to?"

"Like pain? Hunger? Fear? Fortunately, yes. But you saw me just now. I sometimes forget that I underwent the serum as well. I flinch, say, or expect to be tired, when I never am anymore. Exhaustion is one thing I find I don't miss, yet it keeps surprising me that I can keep going on day and night without it catching up to me. It's almost unsettling, never to be tired. It's almost as though–"

"We don't deserve any rest, for defying nature."

"That's a severe way of looking at it." Gerryls observed. "There are so many things we'll be able to do now for the benefit of our people, things that we could never even imagine before."

"Yes, true, but I wonder, what if we weren't the kind who tend to be philanthropic?"

"I wouldn't want to know the answer to that question," Gerryls evaded. "And I suppose there's some truth to what you said about punishment for those who defy the natural order of life." He admitted, but chose not to explain himself. "We were recruited for this mission, but each one of us could have said no if we'd wanted to."

"Yes, maybe."

"Alessia–" he said, eyeing her with a steady, keen gaze, "you're keeping something to yourself."

"Yes, I am."

Gerryls sighed. "I thought so. I can't change your mind and persuade you to confide whatever's bothering you with me, can I?"

"I'd like to, Gerryls."

"But you won't."

"No, I'm afraid I can't."

"You're still afraid of the mindlink, aren't you?" He surmised. "You didn't have much of a chance to learn to control your telepathy, did you?"

"Actually, I did."

"Yes, but without others to help you. It's different, linking minds with ordinary people."

"I know. They can't put up barriers, so that makes it easier."

"And," Gerryls said, "ordinary people also can't help you telepathically to escape when you start to sink into their alien identities, either. I never read much beyond what I immediately need to know from them. None of us do. It's dangerous to immerse yourself in foreign memory for too long, unless you learn how to navigate memory successfully. If you don't, pretty soon you'll convince yourself that the other memories are real. That it's who you are."

"Hinev spoke of this to me, warned me. I took his advice, assuredly. I never make mindlinks anymore unless I need to. Most people's thoughts are easy enough to read on the surface."

"So why not tell me what you're afraid of?" Gerryls asked.

"Who said I was afraid of anything?"

"You are, though. I can sense it in you. Wait, let me guess. You're afraid of being an outsider, since we all knew each other for so long."

"And if I am?"

Gerryls laughed, sincerely amused. "You're more likely to alienate the others by keeping secrets than for any other reason. They'll get used to you in time, but not if they think you want to keep apart from everyone."

"I didn't say that is what I want. I just want to keep my own memories private."

"Well, all I can say to you is that it may rouse suspicion in them to hold back who you are."

"And what about you? How would you feel about me?"

"Me? Well, I've had a little more experience in the world. I don't think it's an awful thing to want to keep your privacy. But I can't say I'm not curious, too."

"Curious?"

"It's still a mystery to us why Hinev would have disrupted our number with another crew member so close to departure, and not long before he was sent to Eneveh."

"Well, Hinev never mentioned anything about the rest of you to me, either, until afterward, until it was almost time for me to join you," Alessia returned. "I myself might wonder why he chose not to tell me about any of you."

Gerryls stared at her earnest expression a moment, then gave a short laugh.
Chapter Seven

As the day ended, Alessia headed to her new quarters on a moving corridor; her room lay between the bridge elevation unit and Gerryls' laboratory. Her name and rank had been etched on a silver-colored piece of plating beside the doorway. Most of the crew lived in the same section. The other crew quarter sections, housing thousands of rooms, remained empty but had been built to accommodate a large population, in case Selesta was ever to be used as a Federation transport ship.

Alessia passed nameplates that read Ioka Shiyer then Celekar Calain before she came to her own; on the other side of her lived the woman named Broah Malier. She went in silently to unpack her things and stared at her sleep panel. Sometimes, even though she didn't need sleep very often, she found she still craved it mentally as an escape from everything. And she found that if she willed it, her body could quiet itself long enough for sleep to overtake her, especially in the suspension chambers, the suspended animation chambers, such as the one that Hinev had given her while she lived in her quarters in the Martial Scientific Force center in the middle of Ariyalsynai. There were hundreds of those on board, but not one in her quarters. Hinev said it was in general no longer possible for those who had undergone the serum to truly sleep for long, but resting did help clear the mind. Alessia decided to try a bit of that and crawled under the cover fully dressed.

She lay a long time with eyes closed before giving up on any notions of resting. Where were all the others, and what were they doing? She suddenly wondered, remembering how quiet the corridor had been, yet she was acutely conscious of the life that was stirring all about her. She alone seemed to hesitate, to be estranged from that life by the doubts and fears creeping into her thoughts.

Thirty-one of us... she thought, plus Hinev. The only comrades I will ever keep on this long, unnatural journey of life.

But Hinev, her second father, her mentor, even her friend–how would he fare once they had left him behind, alone of his kind?

She couldn't think about that now. There was nothing she could do to change the situation, and feeling guilty about leaving him didn't solve anything. And, Hinev had only himself to blame for what he now was and where he was.

A tone abruptly sounded that she had a visitor outside the door.

Alessia got up to open the panel doors, already sensing several people clustered outside.

"Illuminate," she called before opening the door; the computer responded with a medium-level intensity appropriate for the evening.

The doors swished open.

"Did you think you could escape us that easily?" A woman known as Broah Malier asked as she and several others passed through the doorway. "The others had to leave for Ariyalsynai to pick up the Elders' revised mission guideline, which Marankeil won't trust with any one else, and Gerryls is late. He was supposed to keep you busy until we finished duty, but–"

"What's going on?" Alessia asked.

"A welcoming party!" Lieutenant Vala exclaimed, holding up a sherinfruit cake.

"How did you know–"

"Ungarn. He sent your file earlier today. There wasn't much on your list of personal preferences apart from a weakness for sherin fruit. Actually, there wasn't much on your file at all. Nor in the global computer network memory. Except that you worked for Hinev a short time before coming to Ungarn. Hinev filled composed your file himself."

"Should we save any cake for Kiel, Kellar, and the others?" Vala asked, motioning to the cake; she pressed a button to slide out the smooth surface of the reading station from the wall, where she could lay it down. Though they no longer needed food to survive, they could still digest food if injested. And they still enjoyed the taste of it.

"Not if they don't get back in time," Celekar said with a hint of mirth, tucking his long hair behind his ears. He was older than the others, in appearance twice Alessia's age. He had a broad forehead and a firm, wide jaw that joined at a small chin, a peak in the center of his hairline, steady, smouldering grey-blue eyes quick to analyze anything they surveyed, a rough, uncompromising face, and eyebrows like two streamlined bird wings. "Kiel used to have quite an appetite in the old days, as I recall."

Lierva choked off a laugh, eyeing Alessia with a hard gaze despite the festive atmosphere.

Don't mind them, Broah thought as Derstan Ekeri brought Alessia a piece, and the others waited around Vala.

"I'm the cultural historian, if you remember." Broah said, sitting down on the chair near Alessia; there were only two, which Alessia had requested be transferred from her quarters in Ariyalsynai, apart from the planes which could be extracted from the walls at the touch of a button. Alessia had brought the two cushioned, vermillion chairs with worn material around the handholds, a gift from Kudenka, long ago; both chairs appeared out of place in the room and would not survive the long journey, but they were exceedingly comfortable.

Ioka Shiyer, a tall, reed-thin woman with straight glossy hair, approached with a piece of cake and sat down cross-legged on the floor beside them. The others took seats nearby on the sleep panel and wall planes, seeming to give Alessia distance, as though they planned to introduce themselves one at a time.

"Thanks, Ioka," Broah tossed over her shoulder, accepting an offering.

"You two have known each other longer than the others," Alessia guessed, taking a bite out of her own piece. At least her sense of taste hadn't been altered by Hinev's serum, she thought gratefully for perhaps the thousandth time.

"Yes," Broah nodded. "Except Onracey and Filaria. They're brother and sister. Ioka and I have known each other since childhood, though. We grew up in the same outlying section of Ariyalsynai, but we only became close friends while training in Ariyalsynai at the Federation Science Building."

"You were there, too?" Alessia said.

"I was taking chemical analysis, and Ioka had begun her training in the Tactics Division as a political analyst, but she diversified into statistical analysis."

"And we were paired in the same quarters a year later." Ioka added.

"When we graduated into the Martial Scientific Force's Specialists' Division, I was assigned to the team that analyzed the cultural discoveries of the newly returned explorers."

"Did you know Kudenka, Niflan–"

"No, I never actually got to meet any of them." Broah raised a palm. "If everyone in Ariyalsynai who'd wanted to meet them was able to get the chance, there'd have been a line outside the Federation Science Building all the way to Firien!"

"So how did you get involved in this mission?" Alessia asked, wondering if Broah had understood about the serum before she agreed to train as an explorer.

"Well, I did get a chance to meet Hinev while I was working. And then after a while, I began hearing reports that the Federation was looking for candidates for another mission, so I persuaded Ioka here to join me, and we went through a screening process. Hinev hand selected us himself, though I still sometimes wonder why."

"You still don't believe what he told you, do you?" Ioka threw up her hands. "Hinev said the other prospective candidates weren't anywhere near as argumentative as we were."

"No, it's not that we don't argue." Broah disagreed. "He liked us on sight, and didn't want to separate us. Our friendship was touching to him, and he said that the explorers have to be willing to risk a lot for each other. Without loyalty, there'd be mutiny–chaos. Plus, Hinev said his own experience had taught him the pain of severing all ties with one's former life."

"What about your families?" Alessia suddenly realized that they'd never see any of their families again. Since she no longer had one, she'd forgotten about how difficult leaving Seynorynael might be for the others.

"That was the last condition." Broah said, serious, stony-faced now.

"What?"

"Haven't you guessed?" Ioka arched a brow. "None of the explorers have families left to consider, or we had to be willing to leave them behind forever."

"You can't all be without families," Alessia protested. "Or—I guess you have had to say good-bye to them? That's rough."

Broah put a hand on Ioka's shoulder. When she looked at Alessia, there was a steely expression in her eyes.

"Yes, it is. As for me, my parents died when I was two, but I was raised by close friends of the family. They loved me dearly but never had great expectations of me, until I applied to the training school for the Federation Science Department. I'm glad I decided to go there," Broah said, in a dry tone. "Or I'd never have met Ioka again."

"It's the strangest thing, but while you've been talking, I feel as though I've been seeing your experiences."

"Of course you have," Broah said, as though the statement were obvious. "I was projecting my memories to you. We don't really even need a holo-room, but the engineers who helped build Selesta couldn't have expected that, of course."

"You loved your younger brother more. Vaiel?" Alessia guessed.

"Let me tell you how jealous I used to be of Ioka."

"Why?" Alessia wondered.

"Well, Ioka here's the only child of a wealthy family from Kilkor. When I was young, I thought she had it all."

"Kilkor..." Alessia thought. "Reputed to be a great city to the West, almost as half as large as Ariyalsynai."

"And one of the ancient cities. It's one of my favorite places to visit." Broah smiled.

"My family moved to Ariyalsynai when I was a child." Ioka said. "My father had become a head of Federation Cordan Imports. And it didn't hurt that the move allowed him to become a city representative so he could further his political ambitions."

"You see, Cordan made their family very wealthy," Broah added. "He could almost buy himself a seat on the city council. I know you know about Cordan, of course, Alessia—the substance prevalent in the clear indestructible windows of Ariyalsynai.

"I always thought that Ioka was lucky, her future so secure, so easy to arrange if it hadn't been already." Broah said. "It's strange, to be so wrong about everyone and not know it. I wish I could show them, sometimes, how bittersweet and amazing it is to understand the experiences and motives of other individuals in a mindlink. To feel their aspirations, share their excitement–I'm not the same person I was exactly after seeing other lives like that–"

"I'm sure Alessia understands all of this," Ioka interrupted.

"Isn't it marvelous, though, how the merging of our thoughts has made us all instant experts in nearly every area of study imaginable?" Broah sighed. "I found it amazing and am very grateful to Hinev for this gift, of course. Very grateful. It is such a great gift—knowledge, and even more so, the power to put it to good use."

Alessia smiled, missing Hinev acutely at that moment.

"I guess first impressions aren't ever accurate," Broah nodded. "The first thing I really learned about Ioka here," Broah continued, "was that she was re-living her father's life rather than her own. All the signs were there before, if I'd really paid attention, but of course I never realized. She was his only child, and to his mind, the responsibility of maintaining her family's honor was going to fall on her. To please her father she had gone into political analysis, but it wasn't easy to excel because that wasn't what she really wanted to do."

"I finally transferred to statistical analysis." Ioka explained. "To an equally acceptable field, as far as my father saw it. Fortunately, I discovered some latent interest in that area of study or else I never could have carried myself through that kind of rigorous training."

"Ioka wanted to specialize in Kilkoran sub-culture and dialect." Broah shook her head. "But of course, what kind of a specialization is that for someone of her background?"

Ioka narrowed her eyes. "What can I say? Kilkor still haunts me, I suppose, because I never wanted to leave that place." Ioka shrugged. "It's a beautiful sea coast province, a bit like Firien. Of course, we had everything we wanted outside Ariyalsynai, but I preferred to be in Kilkor."

"And when you met Broah, who had a large family, a family that didn't expect her always to succeed, you wished you were her!" Alessia perceived.

"The cake's almost gone." Derstan Ekeri interrupted. "If you'd like, I don't mind making a mindlink with you—up to you."

"All right then, I guess–" Alessia said, reaching out through the air for Derstan's surface thoughts...

* * * * *

...Derstan Ekeri, the ship's communications specialist, had lived on Kayria for six Seynorynaelian years, nine by Kayrian years. He had trained there as a child and learned to speak the Federation languages fluently. After his first year of advanced study in communications, his family had moved back to Seynorynael, his mothers' translation project finished. Derstan had gone to the Federation Science Building to complete his training in communication codes and etymology. There Hinev, who was half-Kayrian, had approached Derstan and spoken to him anonymously. Identifying himself only as a technician, Hinev had asked Derstan questions about Derstan's time on Kayria.

Though Derstan appreciated the beauty of his home planet, he had grown to love Kayria! No matter what any one else said to the contrary, he loved the Kayrian character and culture. A few tendays later, Derstan had been invited by the great scientist Hinev to join the proposed explorer project, as long as he was willing to undergo 'physical experiments' to prepare him for the mission. Derstan had gone to the assembly gathering several other candidates, flattered by the honor.

To his amazement, he recognized the half-Kayrian "technician" he had met earlier, but the man was introduced as Fynals Hinev himself! Derstan passed the directive's testing and turned down the commission offered to him by the Martial Scientific Force. He finished his training and joined the experimental group several tendays later than the others.

When asked why Hinev had invited him, the scientist replied that despite Derstan's ability, it was Derstan's personal charm and integrity that had secured him a position in the team. And Derstan had responded enthusiastically to a mere technician, moreover a half-race man. He had not been prejudiced or looked down upon the technician.

Alessia could see what Hinev had admired: Derstan's smile was infectious, and his field of interests broad enough that he would be able to hold a considerable conversation with the appropriate enthusiasm on any subject with any person he met.

Yet Derstan's mother and brother still lived. He had already made his last farewell...

"Don't want to go into that, huh?" Derstan said, kneading his forehead. "I hardly blame you for that. It was a very difficult afternoon."

"I think everyone understands." Lierva called over, listening. "I would also like to share my memories," Lierva said to Alessia, coming closer.

...Lierva Kazenkov was several years older than the others and had been a Major in the Martial Scientific Force. She wasn't going to let anyone forget that! She had been assigned to Lake Firien when construction of the new Selesta began. Even Kiel, then her subordinate, had made several reports to her, and in time she had taken an interest in the explorers and their mission.

Lierva had been trained as a pilot, and she was proud of her various skills and background in scouting and defense tactics, strategic analysis, aeronomy and various other planetary sciences related to the study of atmospheric anomalies. These were things she had earned after hard work and application, things no mind link could render valueless, because it had taught her mind and body beyond the simple facts that could be read from others.

Lierva had once believed in heroes. Did she still? Did she believe in the man she had once thought so heroic and noble and wise? She still remembered her own words, her defense against his surprise when he learned what she kept hidden...

I will not apologize for loving you, Hinev, but I will not tolerate being treated as you treated me–

No, that part is mine, Lieva thought coldly, struggling strongly to pull away her thoughts from Alessia's mind. I didn't mean for you to see that part.

Over by her place, Lierva showed no outward sign of having communicated to Alessia at all, or of having shown the newcomer into her surface thoughts.

"Anything the matter, Alessia?" Ioka wondered. "For a moment, you seemed distracted."

For a moment, Alessia was in shock. Lierva, Lierva had loved Hinev! Had he loved her in return? Alessia was surprised, but realized it was not her business to know the answer, unless Lierva wanted her to know it.

"I am sorry, no, nothing's wrong, I was just letting all of this sink in." Alessia said.

Meanwhile, Celekar Calain gave Alessia a severe look, as though he were skeptical, or just wondering about her.

"Thinking about Hinev?" he sensed.

"You knew him well?" Alessia guessed.

"Very well." Celekar rejoined, watching her.

"You were involved in The Firien Project from the beginning–like Kiel, Lierva, and Kellar."

"Right again." Celekar nodded.

"Celekar and Lierva are old friends." Derstan explained with a wink. "He's a Valerian fighter pilot with a specialization in spacecraft maintenance."

"A highly skilled technician and he worked on the actual construction of Selesta with the teams of engineers, technicians, and constructors." Lierva added, with a hint of admiration.

"Why did you decide to become an explorer, Celekar?" Alessia wondered.

"You don't see me as one who would be very interested in planetary cultures or sciences?" Celekar chuckled secretively. "Well, among other things, I suppose I couldn't let the greatest thing I ever created out of my sight."

"Selesta is magnificent." Broah cocked a brow. "And Lierva was going on its first mission."

"Broah!" Ioka laughed at her friend's audacity.

"Busybodies." The rough-faced Celekar said, scratching his cheek with nonchalance. "But more than anything I was willing to remain with this ship no matter where it might go."

Does Celekar hold a grudge against Hinev for some reason? Alessia asked Broah privately. She had sensed something strange about their relationship just then.

What? Not that I know of, Broah responded.

"Celekar, did you take up painting before or after the serum?" Vala Hanaserov asked from behind the plane, where she and Talden were cleaning up the cake.

Mindra Dvarek had been sitting among the others without saying a word.

"Afterward, of course," Celekar said, shaking his head, not letting Vala's attempt to tease him concern him at all. "I never would have thought I could do it before, considering that I didn't even think about trees except as building material until after the serum metamorphosis."

"Really, how interesting." Vala tried to suppress a smile and failed.

"Now, I am a changed man. I value the trees." Celekar seemed unafraid of anyone, least of all what they thought. What he believed he wouldn't hide, but he didn't always volunteer information. There was an air of mystery about him; he seemed like a giant, unweatherable, unmoveable rock standing alone in a field, where there was a multitude of activity going on underneath.

"I'd like to make a mindlink next." Mindra threw out suddenly.

"I suppose," Alessia agreed quietly.

...Mindra Dvarek, bitter and defensive, logical but unreasoning as far as emotions were concerned, had been born in the Gerren plains southeast of Ariyalsynai. Her father had left her mother when Mindra was young, and Mindra's mother had raised Mindra and her elder brother on her small provisions allowance from the resource center where she worked as a provisions organizer.

Mindra's brother had taken out his anger at their father on her, beating her until dark patches showed up under her skin. She hid the bruises from her mother, partly out of pride and partly because her mother had enough problems to worry about. And Mindra was ashamed to admit that she couldn't take care of herself, that she was physically weak.

Though the androids could have reported the beatings, Mindra's brother had been clever enough to dismantle their neural units, and he also managed to beat her when no one else was around.

Mindra's brother then left home a few years later to join a trader's guild journeying to Tulor. Mindra and her mother had never seen him again. But Mindra had excelled in his absence, applying herself to the study of physics. Where the situation of a humble birth had cheated her, nature had blessed her with a keen, quick intelligence, and she was able to climb her way out of poverty and ignominy to the elite of the Federation Science Building, where she later became a joint officer in the Martial Scientific Force.

There Mindra had become a reasonably good pilot and accomplished mechanics specialist and astrophysicist. When she had heard of Hinev's call for explorer candidates, she knew that it was her chance to escape her past for good. At least, that was what she had hoped. Most of all she yearned for a new life and new friendships. A new life and a chance to regain her spirit was what she had always needed.

* * * * *

"What's she telling you?" Talden asked, drawing beside Mindra and clapping her on the shoulder.

"Nothing you don't already know," Mindra said, exasperated, at the round-faced man with bright, curious eyes.

"Go ahead, Alessia," he said. "I haven't figured out quite yet when to interrupt."

...Talden Faehey, dreamer, artist, idealist, a natural mimic, always thorough and infinitely perceptive, but at times a bungling conversationalist, had been born in a mostly Tulorian settlement in Kilkor, but he was Seynorynaelian. Like his father, he had become a multi-cultural expert in his youth, but at the Scientific Learning Center in Kilkor, he had expanded his understanding of the technological, philosophical, linguistic, and artistic differences between Seynorynaelians and the first three alien races contacted in ancient history.

Talden's expertise secured him a high-ranking position in the Martial Scientific Force, where he was in training to become a cultural attaché to the Seynorynaelian Council Seat on Tulor. Before he had finished his training, Hinev had found him and organized his formal withdrawal to allow him to join the explorer candidates.

Talden had no regrets, or at least chose not to dwell on them; he remained more enthusiastic than regretful at the prospect of so many cultures to learn about and record for the sake of posterity.

"Talden was the only one of us aside from Derstan who stood a chance of leaving Seynorynael any time in the near future, before we were chosen as Hinev's explorers," Ioka added.

"Unless there's something about Alessia we don't know," Vala Hanaserov said, coming and sitting down on the sleep panel. She was a lovely, quiet woman with serene eyes. Her eyes had an expression of one who knows far more than she is letting on.

Hanaserov, Alessia thought. That was definitely a Firien name!

"Vala, doesn't that name mean 'the heavens' in one of the Firien dialects?" Alessia asked.

An uncomfortable silence descended on them; all eyes turned to Vala.

"Why, yes, it does," Vala admitted, surprised, scanning Alessia's face carefully.

Strange eyes, Vala thought, looking at Alessia's eyes.

What do you mean?

Nothing, I didn't mean to be rude, Vala shook her head.

...Vala Hanaserov would endure any trial and never say a word about it. That was the way she had always dealt with problems. Her father had been an example to her since her childhood in Melacre, a large community between Ariyalsynai and Lake Firien, just within the weather-safe ring; he had taught her the power of self-control.

Vala suspected her father's calm disposition had been hard won, because she was sure he was a proto-telepath. Vala's early concern for her mother's poor health, injured creatures, even the decimation of the trees in the way of expansion in the nearby Allatian forest did not go unnoticed by him.

Vala had learned from him how to control her emotions, how to focus her mind to seek out the answer in the thousands of stimuli she received telepathically, how to see the whole clearly and then find the path. But after her mother's death she couldn't stay in Melacre, where the control she had achieved had been threatened.

She entered formal training and found in her love for learning all kinds of things that it was difficult to narrow her field of specialization choices. She read legend lore as a hobby and began training as a biochemist. But four years into her specialization, the year Hinev and his explorers returned, she read the accounts of their journey and switched her specialization to astrochemistry.

The civilizations intrigued her, the chemistry astounded her, but it was the images of far off galaxies and the swirling purple clouds of nebulae that captured her romantic heart. She applied herself with zeal to her new calling and finished in only three years with an astrochemist specialization and sub-specialization in bio-chemistry. That enthusiasm for all new things had not passed by Hinev, nor had her latent abilities as a proto-telepath. When Vala was called in for an interview, she was not told she was being considered as an explorer candidate. Meeting Hinev himself almost broke her composure.

She very nearly shouted when she discovered that she would be going to the stars!

"What about you, Alessia?" Vala asked, studying her carefully. "What about your past, your childhood? Can you tell us about yourself? Your name sounds familiar."

"How so?"

"I've heard it once before," Vala said steadily, but her eyes narrowed with intense interest.

"Why did Hinev send you to us?" Celekar asked, his face stony.

"I presume because I was his assistant in Ariyalsynai, he knew he could rely upon me," Alessia explained, "and then I spent a few years training with the Martial Scientific Force under Ungarn."

"We knew that. What about your family?" Mindra wondered.

"I don't–have one."

"You're a strange one, Alessia." Talden said agreeably.

"Why do you say that?" She turned back to him.

"Because most people love to talk about their lives," Talden laughed, looking at Broah.

"Well, I'm the last person who'd force any one to talk about their family situation." Derstan shrugged. "Anyway, haven't we done enough talking for one day? I'd like another piece of that fabulous cake before it's gone."

Lierva, Celekar, and Mindra just stared at Alessia as some of the others got up to carve up the last of the cake. Alessia was thinking of Hinev.

Hinev, who had seemed so lost and defeated when they parted.

Hinev, a mentor who had been almost like another father to her. No child willingly betrayed its father. What did she owe these people? Nothing yet.

But if they read her thoughts, they would know that Hinev had been a collaborator with Marankeil. Hinev had conspired with Marankeil to create them, risking their lives by doing so. All of the things the serum could have done to them and all of the creatures they might have become–they still didn't know about it all, about the many risks Hinev had taken with their lives.

Would they ever be able to forgive Hinev if they knew he had used them as experimental subjects?

Somehow she doubted they would.

Yet despite what he had done, Hinev had loved and cared for her, and he had trusted her. She could not betray him. She wouldn't. Not for anyone or anything in the world.

She decided to make a conscious effort at being diplomatic. She would have to keep her secrets in order to protect Hinev's. After all, once the explorers conquered their initial curiosity about her, they wouldn't care any more what she kept to herself.

At the same time, she knew she could not betray Hinev's secrets to them, in case they aborted the mission. But why did the mission matter so much to her that she went willingly to fulfill Marankeil's wishes?

She didn't really even know why. All of the explorers were so excited about their mission, so loyal and dutiful to their posts, that they never even considered mutiny and anarchy.

As it turned out, time after time, Alessia didn't make a mindlink with anyone, and kept her secrets to herself.

* * * * *

The ship Selesta's preparations had been made. The take-off date had been set. On the day of the explorers' departure, a day that dawned clear and cold on the surface of the planet Seynorynael, Alessia stood beneath one of the observation windows. Soon, the fading image of the small bluish-white sphere they called home, had always called home, diminished to a bright point in the enveloping sky. Then the Selesta made the final test of its tachiyon density engines and warped away.

The universe permitted no observers to see the force that ripped space-time into a passage backward in time but forward in motion. However, Hinev's explorers could perceive its energy around them and a part of them while they briefly became electrical beings in subspace for the first time.

Then they felt their energy return on the same vector, retracing the pattern of their initial path as the ship approached the real time barrier, where events and motion moved forward again. In the subspace flight, the flow of time had reversed, moving backward as the ship sped beyond the light-speed barrier. While Alessia and the others had free movement until the moment the ship began to decelerate back towards real time, Alessia's own action became controlled as she was pulled back to the physical being standing by the Observation Window; the others were scattered across the ship.

Time had no meaning in subspace. Not even a second had passed in forward time as the ship was catapulted across the galaxy. The moment almost ceased to be, caught in an unnatural loop, but the explorers remembered it; their energy state perceived the intangible world and every microscopic rift in space-time, reaching out to contact them.

Suddenly she blinked at an unfamiliar backdrop of stars. Selesta had warped across space.

Like many of the others, Alessia had never before left her own world, and the departure forever branded itself in her memory. What was out there? She was going to find out! The thought slowly, finally set in.

Now she had committed herself to the galaxy and the unknown.

There was no going back.

Not for an age or longer.
Chapter Eight

"Alessia, take a look out there," Kellar said loudly as Alessia walked onto the bridge. Several tendays had passed since take-off.

"Sure, a moment." Alessia said. There had been nothing but tranquillity for quite some time, almost nine months, since the Selesta left the area of the original five Federation systems. "There's a lovely nebula out there on the left side of the viewport," Kellar said. "The Ironyces Nebula. I've been admiring it for a while."

Alessia looked. "Gorgeous view," she agreed. "I came in to let you know that the lardaks are doing fine, now that I have fed them. Your babies are waiting for a visit."

Kellar laughed. He had been taking care of some of the baby lardaks for a while. It had all started when, shortly after the departure of Selesta from the planet Seynorynael, Kellar had been trying to revive some of the livestock they had brought on board that had been affected by the space warp. The lardaks were ok, but had been penned next to a species of minan-nai that were vocal and clearly in pain.

Then Alessia had become involved. Alessia had been on hand in the nearby ninety-first level botanical gardens and by now everyone knew she'd come to help him when she heard the loud cries of the injured and scared animals.

Both of them tried to show as much compassion and kindness as they could towards the suffering creatures—a few had been euthanized out of mercy, while others were calmed with tranquillizers. Kellar had been rather friendly to Alessia since that day.

"Glad to hear that they're ok. They love feeding time. I'll check up on them as soon as I can." Kellar said. "Some of the babies will need human affection to stay sane, petting, and reassurance."

Maesan Kellar was confident and a bit headstrong; he had trained as an aerodynamics engineer. His friendship with Kiel went back to their training years together under Captain Ungarn.

"Alessia," Kiel called; he had been listening to the interchange.

"I never saw the lardaks." Kiel interrupted. "What are they like?"

"Oh," Kellar shrugged. "Well they are gentle creatures—herbivores, small, and with cloven, hoofed feet. The babies are friendly and cry a lot."

"Are they rare, as I've never heard of them," Kiel added. Kellar said nothing.

"They are." Alessia answered. "But their species tolerates space flight better than some, so we got as many as we could from every corner of Seynorynael. They were expensive. The meat is a delicacy that costs many thousands of fistari. I'm glad you asked me about this. Most of us just accepted the many species of livestock and didn't know why we had what we did. Gerryls informed me of this, actually."

"Tell him to visit the bridge next time you see him. I'd like him to telepathically 'show me' what he knows about the rest of the livestock species on board."

"I'll tell him." Alessia said quickly.

* * * * *

Two months later, the Selesta encountered a runaway star entering the Tarkhan system. Kiel proposed to isolate the star in an artificially created gravitational field and stabilize it below the solar plane. As it turned out, Kiel's idea saved the colonies of the fourth planet from a collision they had not prepared for. The Tarkhans welcomed their saviors and considered the offer of joining a galactic Federation. This was the first group of aliens that Hinev's explorers brought under the Federation's wing.

Selesta had warped beyond the influence of Hinev and the first generation of major explorers, and the Tarkhans, whose level of technology fell far short of those of other member races in the Federation, had never left their own solar system. Nonetheless, Kiel and the others were fascinated by their culture, which maintained a balance between nature and technological progress and emphasized the responsible use of raw materials. They were generally a moral race with good values.

Tarkhan society was a hard-working conglomeration of sub-cultures, who used a system of free trade similar to that found on Tulor. And like Tulor, the Tarkhans had experienced war, but they had successfully kept the peace for more than five generations. They were not a highly advanced race, but still in the beginning stages of a technological revolution.

The Tarkhans were bipeds but not true humanoids. Their skin was a light, leathery grey with splotches of white hair concentrated on the face and feet. The Tarkhans' ears were small like Seynorynaelians, their noses small with one tiny nostril, and they had clear, wide blue-grey eyes, narrow faces and long legs.

The climate of Tarkhan was slightly cold most of the year, though not as extremely cold as Seynorynael's long winter. Tarkhan's trees were like great spiked bushes, with dark olive green waxy branches, but without true leaves. The other land animals of Tarkhan had mostly white fur that allowed them camouflage in the snow fields to the north, but a few near the planet's midpoint ring had skin of varying hues of grey, brown, and a color like sandstone.

The explorers' telepathic abilities would allow them to make contact, and from there, the Tarkhans' own character would have to determine whether or not they chose to trust them and join the Federation.

While the explorers stayed on the surface of Tarkhan, Alessia was surprised to find Kiel talking to a young Tarkhan boy outside their assigned courtyard. She watched the scene from a distance, unnoticed. The curious child had approached the alien emissary and asked to hear stories about his far away land; Kiel had sat next to him and told him in the Tarkhan language as much of legend lore as he knew, embellishing it a little to enchant the listener.

The boy had then asked if Seynorynael knew any new games, and Kiel obliged him with a round of kessel, using one of the tree pods for the kessel ball. After the boy had tired, Kiel listened to the boy's jokes, having come to appreciate the Tarkhan sense of humor in telepathic mindlinks.

Kessel ball was a favorite on Seynorynael.

Long after that day, Alessia remembered the moments when Kiel had stood on the observation deck, believing himself to be alone, lost in thought while he contemplated the alien philosophies they had discovered, testing his own ethical code and beliefs. As difficult as it was, he had told them that no matter the circumstances, Selesta was never to use force against any alien nation. Diplomacy was to be used at all costs.

Hinev's explorers mandate was not to use excessive force against aliens and their territories, and not to kill or injure alien species without provocation.

So, during their planetary missions, the explorers had disguised their physical differences with the matter altering abilities of the cloak to transform their appearance. They could literally shapeshift their appearances into anything. This ability was to be of inordinate value in gathering information about the aliens they encountered and in dealing with them in the preliminary stages.

* * * * *

After many more years in space, Hinev's explorers reached the planet Goeur, a notable planet in a large galaxy that had a large population. Hinev's explorers had negotiated a meeting with the Goeur population as soon as the Selesta made contact with the planet Goeur.

But, on the planet Goeur, a frightened member of the native population had shot Kiel down in his aircraft; Kiel's plane had crashed as he headed to meet the leader and several governmental delegates from around the planet. After being shot down, Kiel had emerged from the wreck several units short of the primitive head settlement, alone in a windstorm among the hostile groups that had attacked him. He allowed the hostile groups to surround him, to take him to their small city in triumph. In time, however, he succeeded in making the Federation known to the Goeur people, and he hoped that they would be interested in making contact with the Federation, and interested in cultural exchange and trade.

Kiel assured the people of Goeur in their own language that he meant no harm to them, that they would know the benefits of Seynorynaelian technology if they joined the Federation, that they might live in permanent dwellings tall and free from the constant threat of windstorms, that they might grow food to support themselves without the danger of erosion turning the land to dust and wind tearing crops from the fields.

Kiel convinced them to take him to the governing leaders once more. There the Goeur people and its leader decided to accept Kiel's offer, and took the beacon that would draw Federation starships to trade and to aid them. Kiel had shared the particulars with his explorer team after they arrived on the surface to collect materials. Alessia and Gerryls had then gone to the wilds to collect small samples of vegetation while the others remained in the city and constructed a dome from Seynorynaelian alloys to protect the land.

It was Kiel who decided to bring the small lyra tree from the forest to plant in the center of the city as a symbol of peace and cooperation. The locals marveled at its beauty and promised to protect it, soon calling it the "sacred tree", believing that as long as it lived there, they would enjoy the munificence and wealth of a great Federation.

Though initially scared by the extraterrestrial contact with the explorers, the people of Goeur had, in the end, seen that they could not stop what had happened. They sensed that the aliens were stronger than them, and knew that they should cooperate lest something dreadful happen to Goeur if they remained hostile against this galactic Federation.

Moreover, there was much to gain in an alliance.

The wind storms of Goeur had killed millions in years past. They were desperate enough to accept any help they could get in their people's survival.

* * * * *

"Could you finish preserving the Lig-ikuri specimen, Alessia?" Gerryls asked two days after the crew left Ba-lla2. "I'm going to take one of the petrified guri flowers to Kiel. He asked yesterday if I had any extra, and I told him I'd bring it by today."

Alessia nodded, telekinetically turning down a musical accompaniment to their work. Gerryls' sudden movement had brought her out of her study on the Lig-ikuri genetic information codes. The carbon-based lifeform had expired only moments before they found it, but Lierva had taken preservation materials with her at Gerryls' request, and the creature was removed to the ship for study, after passing through the decontamination process in the outer air lock.

"Gerryls–" she said, drawing the scientist away from the door, his expression now curious. "What is it that's bothering Kiel when he's by himself?"

"Kiel? What do you mean?" Alessia had not made a mindlik to Kiel's mind, and she was curious about him.

"If you ever happen to see him when he's alone, well–he seems a bit unhappy. I don't think he's homesick–but I do get the impression that he is unhappy—"

"Yes. He thinks about our former lives more than he should." Gerryls agreed.

"Why?"

"You're so very interested in Kiel, Alessia?" Gerryls smiled, then tried to be diplomatic. "Kiel is trying to forget Calendra, the woman he loved. He had wanted her to come with us, but in the end she was not allowed—not to come as a mortal, nor to be given the serum by Hinev. At least I assume he is thinking of her, and I am sure he is devoted enough to our mission to do what he has to without Calendra."

"Calendra. He never mentioned her before."

"I'm sorry." Gerryls smiled apologetically. "I forgot that you never knew Calendra. She is—or was—Kiel's intended partner for life."

"It must have been hard to leave her behind."

"Let me explain. Kiel met her while working on the Selesta. She came from a small city near Lake Firien. Before he left for the explorer experiment, they spent a lot of time together and fell in love. He almost wouldn't leave Seynorynael for his chance at being an explorer, at first."

"Really? What happened to change his mind?"

"Calendra. She got Hinev to agree that Hinev would put Calendra in suspended animation, if Kiel went. She refused to hold him back."

"So she'll still be alive when we return from the mission."

"Yes. Hinev approached me to double-check the suspension capsule he had prepared–"

"But suspension is imperfect!"

"I know."

"Gerryls, then you know that if we're gone too long, the suspension won't be able to keep her alive–" Alessia said, distraught by the idea that something like this had been hanging over Kiel's head for so long.

"Yes." Gerryls nodded, keeping his voice even. "She might not survive. He may never see her again."

"Yet she agreed to undergo suspension to wait for his return?"

"I'm afraid so. She refused to let him stay on Seynorynael, to miss this opportunity. So Kiel promised to return and help revive her."

"Still–"

"It was Calendra's choice, not Kiel's."

"How sad," Alessia said, shedding a tear.

* * * * *

Gerryls' eye strayed from the work station he was using to where Alessia was comparing the main holo-picture screens in the center of their analysis laboratory.

Her eyes carefully scanned the details as she deftly worked her way through the files; in a moment she nodded as though she'd come to the same conclusions he had.

The screens displayed the genetic replication processes of several of the humanoid and non-humanoid biped creatures from the many worlds they had visited, as well as hundreds of plant and animal specimens from across these planets.

There it was: evidence of parallel evolution...

To Gerryls' mind, the mass of evidence showing parallel identical evolution in humanoids, something that should have been impossible, instead hinted at a common origin, the radiation of a "first race" into the many forms across the galaxy, as Hinev had purported.

Hinev had been right, but how had it happened, and where was the "first race" now?

Hinev had proposed his First Race Theory years ago after returning to Seynorynael, but few had listened to him. Gerryls himself hadn't wanted to seem partial to the idea on their present mission, but the bulk of evidence the explorers had found in favor of Hinev's theory was too great to deny.

However, one look at the displays showed that there was also evidence to the contrary. There were differences in the chemical structure of the replication strands themselves, in the organs, and in the many different organisms on the whole. These biochemical differences suggested that a substantial amount of mutation had since occurred even if there had been a first race. It even seemed possible that there hadn't been one.

Because if there had been a first race, the mutations that divided this "first race"'s descendants had created deviations so great and creatures so remotely resembling each other that the resulting organisms did at first truly seem unrelated. The humanoid races might seem merely to have converged to a common form without actually having been related at all. Miraculous as this was, Gerryls reluctantly had to admit that the evidence suggested it was possible as well.

Another compelling piece of evidence seemed to disprove the First Race Theory; the blood chemistry of the humanoid races at times supported a different path of evolution for all of the different human species. The blood chemistry evidence instead supported what anti-Hinevian Seynorynaelian scientists called a "Law of Independent Evolution".

After Vala and Alessia helped Gerryls finish with the blood groups analysis, they had concluded that more than ninety percent of other humanoid races, in addition to the Kayrians and Tulorians and the animal creatures from their planets, possessed a different iron rich compound in the blood. It was this compound, known by more than a hundred different names throughout the Federation, which had a stronger affinity for oxygen than the compound in Seynorynaelian blood and that made the blood of most humanoids such a deep dark red. It was also this compound's affinity for oxygen which corroded the life systems of most humanoids with free radicals of oxygen that ultimately destroyed the living tissues.

Since Seynorynaelians were different from most humanoids in this definitive way, Gerryls couldn't blame Seynorynaelian scientists for refusing to support the First Race Theory. Seynorynaelians, for one thing, died from radiation saturation, when even their own bodies could no longer endure and reflect the gamma rays of Valeria. Their blood hemoglobin was less efficient, but it was less corrosive to the body and kept Seynorynaelians alive longer than the other races.

Also, Seynorynaelian cellular structure bound "free radicals" and converted them to harmless gases to be expelled through the lungs. Seynorynaelian blood, when exposed to oxygen, did not react as much to it, turning red like many of the humanoids'; in addition stabilizing enzymes protected their blood from rapid oxidation.

As a result, Seynorynaelian blood was dark violet and Seynorynaelians needed far less oxygen than their humanoid relations. Where carbon dioxide poisoned other races, the Seynorynaelians were able to break down carbon dioxide in their cell apparatus, extract the oxygen from it to feed the cells directly and use the carbon ion to create some of the unique enzymes that protected them against radiation damage.

Gerryls suspected this was one of the major factors at work in slowing the Seynorynaelian aging process once Seynorynaelians moved beyond the reach of their highly radioactive sun, Valeria, something Hinev had first noticed as a part of Kudenka's explorer team.

Moreover, Seynorynaelian tri-nucleated cellular rings and lyrachloroplasts, anomalies that occurred only in the skin cells, remained interspersed among singular cells, something found in no other humanoid or animal form across the galaxies. The tri-nucleated cells regulated the radiation deflection and absorption, also drawing light into the lyrachloroplasts to produce some food energy. Though not true representations of the chloroplast structures of the lyra trees, the cell apparatus in Seynorynaelian skin had been called a lyrachloroplast for its similarity to the function of that in the lyra tree!

Who indeed would believe that the Seynorynaelians or the living matter of Seynorynael could be related to other galactic lifeforms if they hadn't gathered the evidence in favor of this themselves? If they hadn't seen it with their own eyes?

There was more fuel to add to the fires of the Great Debate.

Reactions between the two kinds of Seynorynaelian cells dissipated energy throughout the Seynorynaelian and provided heat and cellular fuel to combat the long periods of cold on their home planet. In periods of great famine, Seynorynaelian tri-nucleated cells enlarged but did not multiply, though no one seemed to know why, even by the time that Hinev's explorers had left their home. A strange connection had once been noticed by doctors in the smaller ratio of tri-nucleated cells to those with immunity disorders. Did these odd cells have something to do with fighting disease?

Were they helping to fight disease or merely a by-product of disease–or was their presence responsible for immune system deficiencies?

No one knew. Much remained unknown regarding Seynorynaelian biosystems, even to biochemists. It was a fact that Seynorynaelian bio-chemistry was more complex than any other humanoid species; Seynorynaelians were still trying to unravel the mysteries of their own DNA, even while they reached their collective arms around the Great Cluster itself.

With so much unknown about Seynorynaelian cellular structure as well as thousands of other species the explorers had encountered, Gerryls could see how the differences in the humanoid systems could be construed as independent evolution of races, how any one could believe that life had just evolved on its own in many different environments. But then, nothing explained the mass convergence of form.

Why were there so many humanoid races? Why would nature have chosen that form again and again? Gerryls could not imagine that nature had done anything of the kind.

And studying the chemical structure of all humanoids, Gerryls saw that the tri-nucleated cells and lyrachloroplasts were the youngest innovations in Seynorynaelian bio-chemistry, that once their race had relied more upon oxygen and not used carbon dioxide and light energy at all. The sequence of evolutionary adaptations that he calculated had been recent; this once again pointed to a first race that had diverged and been altered after millions of years of genetic isolation. A first race that had been called the "Comet Riders" on Seynorynael, from a mythical place some believed was called Enor.

One more thing disturbed Gerryls; he could see by Alessia's face that the same thing was bothering her.

I know, he thought, wearing a frustrated smile.

Hinev's idea of a first race was the only reasonable explanation, but there were a few major problems with his idea. There hadn't been enough time yet for all of the races to have developed into their present state if they had been related to each other less than a million years ago, or even a few million years ago.

There was also no evidence to suggest that a single race could have evolved millions of years before the others, that is, advanced fast enough to accomplish feats of space travel that had taken it across the galaxies in order to form these lost colonies. For if this race had achieved space travel so long ago, why had it lost contact with its colonies, left them in a dark age, left its own people to evolve into so many races?

If it had existed, the first race itself had since vanished.

Nevertheless, despite all of the complications surrounding the mysterious origins of humanity, in his heart Gerryls himself believed–he felt that the first race had existed.

And it had somehow spread itself across the stars!

* * * * *

"I tell you, Kiel, I'd rather be paired up with Lierva than Alessia," Mindra said, her arms folded across her chest. "I do not like that woman. I will not go anywhere with her." The team was preparing to depart for Yurvec5 for a mission of open contact. Alessia had been passing by Kiel's planning office and stopped when she heard Mindra mentioning her name.

"I saw her, Kiel, disobeying your orders."

"What orders?" Kiel asked, with a barely perceptible sigh. Had it ever occurred to Mindra that someone might not want to go with her, either?

"The orders not to use any violence against an indigenous population, of course! The upetywricons–"

"Oh, that again," Kiel interrupted. "Yes, Celekar explained everything. They did riddle her with laser fire, Mindra. She was alone and surrounded. I'm not certain even I would have been able to negotiate my way out of that one. So tell me, what would you have done?"

"Don't tell me you're condoning what she did."

"No, I'm not."

"Kiel!"

"I know, discipline, discipline. I'm well aware of what she did. She broke an order, and she paid for it dearly, so can we put an end to the issue? After all, the upetywricon agents did murder their own ambassador, a defenseless old man who just wanted to talk to us. And they did ambush Alessia as our emissary, as our representative. I can't say they didn't get what they deserved."

"Then you try being around her when she decides to do something unpredictable, something recklessly emotional, and see how easy it is cleaning up the mess." Mindra continued. "And what about the mission on the planet Karrika? She flew away ahead of the group as if she wanted to find the population center all by herself!"

"It sounds to me like you're looking for an excuse to dislike her, because you already do. Stop being so critical."

"Kiel—"

"All right, Mindra, I'll pair you with Lierva this time." Kiel sighed. "I'm sure Celekar won't mind at all." He added, with a trace of sarcasm.

"Thanks," Mindra said, seeming a bit lost now that her anger had died down. "I have nothing personal against Alessia, Kiel," she added. "But I don't trust someone who keeps to herself. It isn't as though we're all strangers. I still think she has something in her past to hide, and her attitude doesn't convince me it isn't something significant."

"That's enough, Mindra. You're being overly critical again, and you probably know it. If Alessia's behavior offends you, come to me with a specific issue or complaint."

"I've made all of the attempts to be accommodating that I'm going to. No matter what I say, she never says anything back–it's like a slap in the face! Don't deny that you haven't noticed how insensitive and unfeeling she is towards any attempt of friendliness–"

"If that's really what you're making," Kiel said. "An attempt," he added cryptically.

"What?"

"Quite often you make your judgments before you have all of the facts, Mindra, and not everyone finds your overall attitude encouraging, no matter what you might say at any particular given moment."

"What do you mean by that?"

Kiel sighed. "For one thing, I've noticed that you still treat Alessia like she doesn't belong here. But Hinev wouldn't have made her an explorer if she wasn't worthy of it. After all, didn't he also select you?"

Alessia suddenly tore herself away from the conversation and hurried down the corridor until she had reached the quiet peace of the nearest gardens.

She was angry at Mindra's caustic appraisal of her, and trying not to let the humiliation touch her at the same time. Did Kiel share the same opinion? No, that was too awful to contemplate!

Alessia stopped, and almost laughed because there was nothing else that would dispel her feelings. She had just learned a valuable lesson, she thought. To ignore anything that hurt.

She wanted to be angry at Mindra, but she couldn't find ample enough reasons to condemn her, and that failure alone was a blow to her endeavor.

Alessia threw herself down on the seat panel in thoughtful agitation, then stilled to listen to the hum of the light panels above and the percolating water that suddenly broke into a shower over the plants.

* * * * *

One day, without much forethought as to why she had wandered there, Alessia found herself crossing into the ancient ruined infrastructure, the infrastructure that had been a part of the original ruins incorporated into Selesta.

What was she doing there? she wondered as she gazed about.

She thought she was going to the forest when she left her quarters, and then instead her feet had headed right for the alien engine room. She found herself standing before the dense, metallic sphere that housed Selesta's heart, the ship's most powerful generator, the anti-matter containment core itself.

Anti-matter...

When the ship was being rebuilt, Hinev, Kiel and his team had kept the infrastructure, using it as a guideline for the new development of Selesta. However, one "territory" of the ancient ruin had remained entirely intact, a small metallic geometric structure generating its own impervious shield, impossibly hanging suspended in the air, free from the force of the artificially generated gravity on board.

Hinev and Kiel had agreed after several attempts trying to analyze it that the sphere-shaped generator had once created power for the ruined vessel of Lake Firien. Exactly how it had operated and how they might use the device themselves had eluded them. Hinev had been convinced Selesta proved the legends of the Comet Riders he had heard in his youth were more history than myth.

The existence of the ancient ruined ship itself which had turned into Selesta meant two things to Hinev. First, it had proved that their race was not native to Seynorynael; second, it meant that Seynorynaelian technology hadn't developed as rapidly as people believed. What they learned had been passed down to them by the ancients. Those who had disagreed with him claimed Selesta to have been an alien ship that merely crashed to their planet before recorded time. Seynorynaelian technology had developed on its own.

Hinev believed it had already developed elsewhere.

As Alessia stood before the metallic sphere, she felt the vibrations emanating from the field-contained generator. Every particle of her being reached out to it, urged her to attempt communication with the field. How? How could she? she wondered, then stepped forward with eyes open and tried to pass through the electromagnetic barrier to touch the surface, so tantalizingly close. Yet of course she found she could not cross the field.

Still some power buried deep within her stirred to life, the part of her that seemed to be listening to the call of the anti-matter generator against the will of the rest of her. The first half was winning her over, here in this heart of alien technology. She felt as though she recognized the force calling to her, as if it were and had always been a part of her destiny. And she felt sure it had recognized her.

The longer she stood, gazing at the field, the more her vision retreated as something surreal, something she no longer focused on, despite the fact that vision usually connected her to the outside world. She found herself suddenly looking into a memory that was not her own. Or was it? Hadn't she seen it before?...

A gleaming city rose high above a luminous green surface, the entire scene haloed by the white sun behind the towers. A shower of light was upon the buildings; it glittered in the tall trees that enveloped the city, a forest of leaves hewn almost out of greenish silver, leaves that gently caressed the artificial beauty of the city.

She closed her eyes, but the city was still there.

Moving in that waking dream she had passed through the barrier, and stood beneath the sphere, her outstretched fingers almost touching the base of it. The frequency of the vibrations grew shorter and more powerful. Every fiber of her being told Alessia what it was that was contained before her–she felt its infinite power draw upon her.

Here was anti-matter indeed, of the most precious and rare kind to be found in the universe.

The sphere held no exotic matter mined from a black hole, nothing any human kind could have found or extracted from the universe to serve the human race.

The anti-matter that fueled Selesta was no less than a small isolated piece of cosmic string, a force of infinite density, a remnant of the ancient universe from the beginning of time when matter froze out and clumped into galaxies upon such cosmic strings, small tears in the fabric of space-time. It was the ultimate singularity, a region around which no known laws of space or time applied.

It had to be infinitely thin, she realized, if it could be contained in such a tiny container and field, but she did not draw too close. The field, she thought, opening her eyes, looking around the engine room. The field she had disrupted had dissipated to a conductive ring around the engine room. As if she had triggered a switch long waiting to be activated, the energy her serum-induced metamorphosis permitted her to see saturated Kiel's artificial tachiyon density engine, merging its functions to the string singularity.

A space-tearing engine! Alessia thought, then breathed deeply. Thus far, the tachiyon particle chamber of Kiel's engine had been the sole means of travel near light speed and into sub-space. With the charged tachiyon particles, it was possible for Selesta to skip over the light speed barrier and into backward time. Charged particles in forward time became their opposites as they moved across the space-time barrier, and all motion that attempted to move faster than light had to accelerate into the past.

Thus the engine took the ship backward and then forward in time to the exact moment when the ship had left real time while the ship continued to move forward in space. Hence scientists of Seynorynael had termed the phenomenon a space "warp" or "jump". The "jump" was in essence instantaneous, and it was possible to travel through great distances without a second of real time passing.

But after the last warp, the explorers had contemplated not using the warp drive at light-speed when some of their mortal specimens were terminated by the forces of the light-speed journey. And if the ship continued to only travel at sub light speed, time would slow on board, and thousands of years would have passed at home before any of them returned, if there was still a home to return to.

But this engine, a space-tearing engine, made of an exotic matter so dense that it created negative pressure, could theoretically force open permanent "centipede" holes in the fabric of space time! It could allow them to travel from one point to another, even across the universe, without having to stop and calculate the many course adjustments that slowed their travel.

And the passage of time would lose its meaning, for in sub-space, all time and space coalesced. If they could figure out how to use the engine and where to emerge from hyperspace, they could begin a million year voyage and return on the same day they had left!

Wait a minute–she paused, extending her senses. They may not have known how to use the cosmic string consciously, how to bend it to their will or make it an instrument of their will, but the cosmic string was already operating for their behalf!

As if affirming her suspicion, the energy of the string formed a density field beyond the electromagnetic and magnetic fields they had created to protect the ship, letting her feel its power. Then the pulse faded to a weak frequency, but she knew that in its power lay the possibility of invisibility. This string could create an anti-gravitational shield that could mask the gravity waves produced by an ordinary accelerating object, an accelerating spaceship–Selesta. If the string provided such a shield, that would mean that–no other ship in the universe would know they were coming until Selesta was upon them!

She knew Kiel and the others would sense that something unexpected had occurred and would locate the source. They would find her in the engine room–and soon.

She stepped away from the string singularity. The ship's main engine had been built beside it. As she looked from one to the other, she realized that they had been built to complement each other. The string had been contained near the tachiyon chamber. The same energy channels could be used by the string to envelop the ship in its density barrier and to channel the beam of negative pressure it created.

Whatever potential it had, learning to control it was another matter.

Thus far the singularity here had been acting on its own.

* * * * *

No one suspected that Alessia had anything to do with the activation of the ancient singularity and string engine sphere left by the original creators of Selesta. Gerryls and Kellar had been the first to arrive.

"Alessia–could you tell what happened?" Kellar asked her as though she had just arrived herself, as if he thought the transformation had occurred spontaneously, and of all the crew, she had merely found her way there first.

In moments the rest of the crew appeared, having rushed from the nearby bridge and crew quarters. Kiel and Kellar fell into a private discussion, while the others looked about the engine room, measuring the surge in energy output and pondering what might have occurred.

Kiel looked up and glanced at Alessia as Kellar spoke about his arrival; the three senior scientists headed towards her.

"Did you see anything when you got here?" Kiel asked.

Alessia nodded hesitantly. Would they believe that she had been the catalyst–that the memories reaching her had triggered the singularity to expose itself to her? In her own mind she was no longer sure. Perhaps the string might have drawn any of them, and the memories it brought to her mind were merely illusions conjured from her own imagination.

"A surge of energy shot from the sphere in an expanding ring–before it met the tachiyon engine. The tachiyon tube seemed to act as a kind of channel–it looked like the electromagnetic net was being engaged."

"That explains the signals we received on the bridge," Kiel nodded.

"The density envelope?" Gerryls mused. "The singularity would have to be compatible with our engine design for that to be possible. How that might be I can't imagine but–if we can learn to use the string singularity, if we can control its energy and direct it somehow–"

"We may be able to cut our travel time in half." Kellar broke in.

"Can you get on it right away?" Kiel asked Gerryls and Vala.

"Yes. But one thing I'd like to know–when you designed the engine, did you deliberately attempt to accommodate the string?" Vala asked. "How did you know about its potential when you created the tachiyon chamber?"

Kiel looked at them both and shrugged. "I didn't," he said. "No one could get the engine plans to work. We could generate a tachiyon ring large enough to contain her in theory, but the engine would have to be half the size of the ship, and because the crystalloid alloys of the ruins' infrastructure were so strong, the interior skeleton was nearly impossible to alter. And it was clear that this small area had once been the engine room–that it could be possible to create a small engine to carry this great ship.

"Then how–" Gerryls appeared puzzled.

"Hinev and I worked on the problem a long time." Kiel admitted. "We thought we were close to a solution, but it turned out that the speed of the smaller engine we created was compromised–Selesta would be slower than even the Sesylendae, Hinev's explorer ship."

"So what did you do?" Derstan wondered.

"Hinev left and told me not to worry–to continue to build the interior from my original designs, that he would solve the problem." Kiel replied. "And then one day his courier showed up with the engine plan we eventually used."

"Hinev's courier brought the engine plan to you?" Kellar laughed, incredulous. "What a miracle."

"The complexity of it superseded anything I had ever seen." Kiel continued. "But I had to figure out how to transform the design into reality–it took a long time. I thanked Hinev for the breakthrough every time he made a progress visit, but he insisted that I take the credit for it. I didn't understand why he wanted to deny his involvement, but he said it would be for the better if the Federation Council believed the engine was mine."

"Hinev must have known how the string functioned the entire time. But–maybe he didn't tell us about it in order to protect us, to keep it a secret from the Seynorynaelian Council." Kellar suggested. "You don't think–he triggered the string to activate at a certain point in time?"

"Hmmm." Gerryls nodded. "I honestly don't know how he could have known how to do that, but we won't know for sure until we return to ask him. Until then, it only means we have to work on figuring out how the string engine works without his help." Gerryls looked at Alessia, who had remained silent throughout the discussion going on around her. "Alessia, did Hinev ever tell you if he knew about the string engine and how he figured out the tachiyon engine plan?"

Alessia shook her head. "No." She said, using every ounce of will she could summon not to tell them anything else. Kiel had said that Hinev wanted Kiel to receive the credit. Perhaps Hinev had a plan she didn't know about. And he had not deceived them for selfish reasons–he hadn't exactly claimed the credit for the design himself.

She didn't say anything else.

* * * * *

Many years later, as the explorers of Selesta figured out how to use the space-tearing engine, they created permanent "centipede" holes across the galaxies.

After more than a thousand civilizations had been found and left behind, the ship Selesta re-emerged from the enlarged centipede hole far short of where its crew had hoped to be. From the stars they calculated the distance traveled in that moment at only 87 light years.

Kiel, Kellar, Vala, and Gerryls returned to their calculations to look for errors. They had figured out how to activate the string engine, but not how to program the duration through hyperspace. And it appeared that the ship was, at least for now, unwilling to create its own centipede holes anywhere in the fabric of space-time. It had waited several days after they attempted to engage the engine to initiate the negative pressure channel.

The string had sensed an atom-sized mini-centipede hole on its own on their course, but it took them where they hadn't wanted to go. The channel through the centipede hole brought them a little off course, as it took them on a different vector than the one they had been traveling. But the vector lay in a similar direction, and they made a course adjustment, having gained at least a little time over the sub-warp tachiyon engine in the centipede hole channel.

So, it seemed, they had some control over their journey, but not all, and it was impossible to control their journey entirely. It was as if the very universe itself would only permit tears in space-time in certain places.

Kudenka's map of the enlarged centipede holes near their own section of the Great Cluster hadn't proved very useful since they had warped beyond the map's surveyed area, but Gerryls seemed to believe that analyzing the distribution of natural mini-centipede holes might prove useful in making calculations for further attempts at centipede hole travel. Alessia thought that the power of Selesta lay in its space-tearing capabilities. Unlike Sesylendae, which could only enlarge and stabilize natural microscopic centipede holes, Selesta could create its own centipede hole channels in space.

The three scientists were so absorbed in their work that Alessia rarely saw any of Gerryls. He neglected his assistant; this fact didn't upset her, but she did decide to give up her position as his assistant. Gerryls looked up in confusion when she suddenly arrived in his laboratory one day to retrieve her personal experiments, then realized what she was doing, what she intended to do.

"I've been thinking of doing some things on my own," Alessia said and smiled, keeping her eyes away from Kiel, who had not looked up from his schematic. "If you need my help, I won't be far, but I rather think you have enough assistance now," she explained.

"I–" Gerryls returned her smile. "Will you be finishing the genetic information analysis of the Limayan3 world and its main species the lavrikars?" he asked.

"Yes." She nodded. "If you'd like to review them, I'll bring them by when they're done."

"After all of this mess is cleared up," he gestured to the blueprint on the lab table, "we'll compile the data for our report."

"Well, I won't keep you," Alessia said, feeling that Gerryls was anxious to return to his work.

"When you're finished, I'd like to review your complete analysis of its life functions." Kiel said suddenly, his eyes turning from his work to her. "It's good that we can count on you as well as some of the others to continue this kind of arduous work, Alessia." He smiled in approval. After a moment, he returned to the blueprint.

Alessia left the laboratory quietly and headed to her quarters. She had spent little time there and used but one of the two rooms. Dropping her belongings onto the empty floor of the second chamber, she made a decision.

Over the next few hours, she set up her own laboratory, not far from one of the nearest botanical gardens. But once she had set everything to rights, she realized that her heart was not in her work, at least not today. The planetary analysis could wait. She gazed around the room when she had done, content that at least the preparation was finished.

She just wanted to forget the present for a time. The only place where she could do that was in the forest–the forest that reminded her of her home at Lake Firien. No one would be there now–they were all busy on the bridge, in the labs, or gathering specimens from the planet they had come to–an uninhabited planetoid in a red star system.

"I'm going to perform a little experiment," she told the lyra trees around her once she had reached the interior of the Seynorynaelian forest, singling out a sherin tree among them. She closed her eyes and faced the tree, concentrating on the atoms and molecular structure within the sherin tree. When she opened them, a greenish face with stringy green hair greeted her; a look almost of horror had frozen on the face of the plant refashioned in human form. It had a slash of a mouth, brown, leathery skin but a waxy neck and face.

"Well, don't just stand there staring at me," she told it, somewhat alarmed that it didn't look as she imagined. It was humanoid, certainly, but it seemed to be incapable of moving as a human being would, even to blink its eyes, breathe, or stretch its limbs. "Say something."

The green creature just stared with uncomprehending, vacant red eyes. After a moment, its slash-like mouth popped open, but no sound came from those green lips. Alessia felt overcome by a futile sensation, as though she had been trying to squeeze water from a stone.

"You can't say anything because you can't think," she sighed, feeling a pulling sensation in her thoughts as she mentally struggled to keep the tree-creature before her in the shape she had refashioned for it. Its molecules were fighting to return to tree form, and she hadn't the heart to keep it from returning to normal. In a moment, she released the hold her power had over the creature and watched as it morphed slowly back into a sherin tree.

"Sorry, tree," she said, patting the trunk of the tree. The tree of course harbored no grudges. "I wonder, though," she told it. "I couldn't make myself change any of your lyra neighbors," she added, looking about at the undying forest. It was true; no power could compel her to try to impose her power over matter on the lyra trees, though she was at a loss to say why. She thought about doing it again briefly, and found she had to stop, and that she no longer wanted to approach the lyra at that moment...

Alessia left the forest and returned to her room.

* * * * *

Alessia stopped to listen to the scout party's message on her external communicator.

"All pilots, please come to the surface–we're under attack."

After 234 years as Seynorynael measured time, nearing the end of its mission, the crew had stopped on the surface of the fourth planet in a yellow-white star system. From Lierva's earlier reports, the crew had learned that the inhabitants were a variation of type L2ck humanoids, a class of humanoids with skin tones that ranged from pale pink to brown. The planetary population hadn't noticed the Selesta due to the density wave envelope around the ship that had created an anti-gravitational wave barrier, making the ship's acceleration invisible and impossible to detect beyond the visual range.

However, the inhabitants had apparently noticed the scout party from their orbiting space station and the colonies on their moons. Lierva, Celekar, and their team had only entered the atmosphere a moment before a fleet of fighters arrived to intercept them.

Kiel's instructions had forbidden the Selesta to fire upon the planet. Even one blast from her non-nuclear or anti-matter auxiliary guns might start a reaction that could obliterate life on the surface.

However, neither he nor Lierva had anticipated such a hostile reaction from the aliens. Most of the planets they had visited had allowed the small group of fighters to land and observe, long enough for Lierva and the others to read their thoughts and approach them in the least threatening manner and invite them to join the new Seynorynaelian Federation, at the least to extend a peaceful greeting.

Got to hurry, Alessia thought as she hurried to the main fighter bay where the Valerian fighters were located, and joined the other explorers with piloting experience–nine fighters to add to the eight members of the scout party. Kiel and Kellar, though both former pilots, had remained on board the ship with Talden, attempting negotiations over the communications network, hoping to reach an understanding with the indigenous populations.

Alessia and the others rushed to the scout party, using only gravity-wave missiles to disorient the enemy units–small humanoid shaped mobile units with impressive maneuverability. Luckily, however, nothing the explorers had thus far encountered outmatched the Valerian fighter.

It was only the sheer numbers of the enemy, all intent upon destroying the intruders, that threatened the explorers now.

Alessia had almost reached the scout party when she saw a bright explosion. A hundred or more of the enemy had made it through the gravity wave net and converged upon the apparent leader. Lierva's fighter exploded into the silence of space.

The remaining scout members hurried to join the explorers that had come to their aid; the great speed of the Valerian fighters proved an advantage as the explorers quickly escaped, leaving the aliens behind and all but three of their own number.

Alessia and Celekar had stopped. She watched the aliens coming closer, and knew that the others had left her and Celekar, that they had probably reached Selesta by now.

If they attempted to contact her and urge her to escape, she wasn't going to acknowledge them. She had a feeling Celekar felt the same way, but he was flying around in circles, oblivious to her.

Alessia couldn't leave Lierva behind, either.

Finally Kilran's voice reached her from the bridge.

"Alessia! You and Celekar have to leave now! Lierva is gone–what can you do for her? She wouldn't want you to sacrifice yourselves! There's nothing left of her!"

Alessia had no intention of obliging him. Abandon Lierva?!! She felt the energy surrounding her, a field of sentient energy struggling to rejoin the matter of the universe. Lierva was still there, still able to be saved!! She had been immortal—

But how to save Lierva? Alessia wasn't sure, but she'd be damned if she wasn't going to try to help her!

Alessia cut off all communication with the bridge and closed her eyes, trying to help guide and hasten the energy that converged upon her fighter, willing the sentient mass to reform with control communicative energy, imagining drawing the sentient back together, remembering Lierva Kazenkov as she had been.

Slowly the energy was concentrated behind her. Alessia saw the brightness of it without turning around, without her eyes. Her own sentient energy, every particle of her being, recognized the other form.

Then the light faded and was gone. Alessia wrenched her head around and met Lierva's face, full of understanding and gratitude.

Alessia–I'm fine now.

"Celekar, head for the ship," Alessia said.

"I'm not leaving," he insisted, his image forming in the holo-monitor; his hard expression melted into surprise, then relief. "Lierva!" he said, shaking his head. "She's there again!? I guess how would be the question."

Lierva offered him a wan smile.

Together, they engaged the engines of their fighters and sped away, avoiding the rampant shots of the aliens until the aliens were far behind them.

* * * * *

"Come with us," Lierva insisted. Alessia could see that it was going to be difficult refusing her new ally. Lierva had come with one purpose in mind to Alessia's laboratory and wore an expression that permitted no refusals. "This is the last planet on our mission before we return to Seynorynael," Lierva repeated. "You'd better cheer up and stop keeping to yourself–"

Alessia looked up, and Lierva felt her indignation.

"I didn't mean it like that." Lierva sighed. "It's just that you're not happy here. What have you got to lose? We need more scouts. You'll consider it, agreed?"

"Oh, all right!" Alessia erupted, finding Lierva more than a match for herself in stubbornness.

Alessia thought of the image of the planet they had seen, a world the white-skinned humanoid inhabitants called Feiar. The Feiari had promised Lierva's team that they could survey the planet for the Seynorynaelians' records. Their civilization, well advanced culturally and technologically, had already agreed to send delegates to Seynorynael after the scout party finished their survey. Alessia could see Lierva's excitement; the last planet they were to visit was now the first world that wished to send delegates to the Federation right away on board the returning Selesta.

Lierva and Alessia, and Celekar, too, had shared a bond since that day of the disaster on Fu-ni-al-kah. They spent more time talking or going on long runs together in the forest; Lierva had realized that she and Alessia were cut from a similar cloth. Since that day when Alessia saved Lierva's life, Celekar, Lierva, and Alessia had become good friends.

When Kiel and the other explorers seemed reluctant to believe her affirmation that Alessia had helped her body to reform from the energy into which it had converted to protect its being–the first time any of the crew had experienced the ultimate survival mechanism of Hinev's serum-induced metamorphosis–Lierva explained in no uncertain terms that without Alessia, she would have been lost to them, doomed to wander to the universe as a mass of sentient energy if she hadn't been brought back then and there to her physical state.

Lierva wasn't sure how she knew that would have been her fate, but in the state of energy she had felt that she could not escape the energy alone; Hinev's serum maintained their bodies in a precarious balance between mass and energy, for it was a serum that seemingly defied all natural laws. In the moment of her restoration to her own physical body, Lierva felt as though she had died and been reborn.

Reborn, Lierva had seen beyond what the others wanted everyone else to see. Things Alessia hadn't seen.

The experience had been horrible, Alessia gathered, though Lierva wouldn't talk about what had happened to her when she became only energy.

The one thing Alessia knew was that Lierva had also seen Alessia's defining memories in those unguarded moments. Clear and exposed. She knew that Alessia was protecting Hinev, and yet Lierva had also decided not to tell the others, to keep that knowledge from them as well. There was something to be said for peace of mind, Lierva once said. Alessia didn't really want to know what she meant, but whatever it was about, Lierva promised not to say anything about what Alessia hadn't mentioned to the others. Alessia wasn't absolutely certain, but she got the distinct impression that Lierva also had strong feelings for Hinev.

And that Lierva's feelings were strong enough that she was willing to forgive him; at the same time, Lierva didn't believe that Celekar would. The others Lierva didn't know about.

"Oh, one more thing," Lierva said, wearing a furtive smile.

"Yes?"

"Don't forget to pack whatever you'll need for an extended foray on the surface."

"How long are we staying?"

"Who knows? Ten days, a year, ten years, and different years for every planet. Does it really matter?"

"No," Alessia laughed. "Lierva–"

The older, athletic woman stopped and turned around in the doorway.

"You loved Hinev."

Lierva laughed; her laugh held a note of amusement.

"Yes."

"But Celekar–"

"Knows." Lierva admitted, coming back. "He's known since Hinev left Firien." Lierva's tone wasn't bitter, but it was clear that there had been difficulties surrounding Hinev's departure.

"Hinev couldn't stay." Alessia guessed.

"Apparently not."

"But–how can you love two men at the same time?"

Lierva hesitated a moment before answering. "I always cared for Celekar, but Hinev was so different, I was in rapture... I loved what he valued, what he could do, I suppose."

Lierva sighed. "He seemed to know so much more of the answers to life's mysteries than I did. I didn't realize until recently that there is a another kind of love. The love of one who is kind, and caring. Someone who makes us happy."

"Celekar?"

"Celekar."

Alessia was silent a long time after Lierva left her.

Alessia knew at once that she already loved Fielikor Kiel this way.

* * * * *

The view from the edge of the galaxy was unparalleled.

Beyond their galaxy, other galaxies in the Great Cluster beckoned, but the explorer team had reached the end of their journey and now prepared to return to their own world. Their own galaxy filled the sky with bright jewels, but this beauty was misleading. Among the radiant violet clouds and shining pinpoints of light, a thousand perils lay–the black hole singularities, gravity fluctuations, runaway stars and cold, dark matter.

They had traveled more than twice the distance of Kudenka's explorers. Yet after hundreds of years of effort, they hadn't yet successfully tamed the string singularity entirely, nor its space-tearing engine. Nevertheless, Gerryls hoped to try the space-tearing engine again, plotting their return course above the galactic plane, which might allow them to pass unhindered through a great tract of space instantaneously. From their arrival point, it could be a relatively short journey down through the stellar anomalies to Seynorynael if they maximized the use of the engines.

As anxious as they all were to return again to Seynorynael, they had not seen enough of the unknown. That didn't matter. It was time to go home. Their mission directive had pre-determined the time frame in which they were to return to Seynorynael.
Chapter Nine

"So, what did they say?" Kellar demanded when Kiel returned after his meeting with the Elder Council and the chief Federation Scientific Committee. The other explorers lounged in the quarters allocated them upon their return, but now drew around their leader anxiously for news. Only Kiel had been granted clearance to leave the ship; the rest of them still remained grounded at the small astroport outside Ariyalsynai where Selesta had been directed to land. They had yet to receive orders to leave though two tendays had passed.

Two long tendays with little to do but wait. The explorers soon learned about the planet with their telepathic abilities, and how it had changed.

The day they returned home, Gerryls, efficient as always, had immediately sent copies of their findings and ship log by courier to all of the Federation Council Members, in order that the documentation could not be tampered with or stolen by unauthorized parties over the computer grid network.

Five days ago, Kiel had been summoned to meetings in Ariyalsynai after the Feiari talks, where he was to be called upon to explain the compiled report and listen to the Elders' concerns, a report Gerryls, Kiel, Alessia, In-nekel, Wen-eil, Mindra, and Vala had compiled during the last leg of the mission. In it they had presented the genetic evidence of one thousand species of humanoids and quasi-humanoids, evidence which just happened to support Hinev's First Race Theory.

After five days, Kiel had only just now returned.

"They won't accept our evidence that supports a "first race" in any way," Kiel explained tiredly, dropping his belongings on a high-backed, plush black chair.

"I don't understand you, Kiel. Are you talking about the Federation scientists?" Gerryls asked, one eyebrow raised. "What don't they like about it?"

"I'm sorry to have to be the one to tell you this, old friend," Kiel said, shaking his head, regarding the older man soberly. "But I'm afraid they just don't accept anything we discovered as scientific fact—they're going to re-analyze all of the specimens we collected."

"But the reports are all accurate," Vala protested.

"Doesn't matter," Kiel shrugged. "They think we've fabricated propaganda. Evidence can so easily be forged–they aren't wrong about that. They think we've been trying to prove Hinev's First Race Theory." He laughed. "Because we're biased, you see. We were created by him, trained by him—well of course, we'd fabricate lies to support his ideas!"

"Why of course would anyone think that we kept impartiality and just did our honorable duty in collecting and analyzing specimens we collected?" He looked to the viewport, to Ariyalsynai's astroport beyond, where flotillas of exotic ships from the expanded Federation sped by, many of whose civilizations they had invited to Seynorynael in the early days of the explorers' journey.

"How can the scientists accept all of these alien civilizations and not see that there has to be an explanation for the common humanoid ancestry?" Kellar demanded, amazed at the closed-mindedness that Kiel had encountered in the scientific community.

"The Federation–I should say the Seynorynaelian Council has the scientists by the throat, I believe," Kiel replied quietly. "Whether or not they'll admit it. They've all been brainwashed to believe that the First Race Theory is impossible. If you ask me, the Federation scientists, as brilliant as they might be on every other issue," he added, quickly, with a sharp look at Gerryls, "spend far more energy dancing in circles over this one, trying to scientifically disprove what they should know has merit on its side." He sighed.

"Are all those ships merchant ships?" Ioka wondered, her attention drawn away by the view.

"Yes, and you know they've got copies of our tachiyon engines bringing them here." Gerryls smiled as though at an idea he enjoyed.

"How many luxury goods does Ariyalsynai need to have?" Celekar threw out, glancing about the room with eyes that found nothing to his liking. Everything has changed so much.

"It's strange when you think back to all of the worlds we went to," Kellar said, shaking his head, knowing that Celekar was only venting. "How we gave them a beacon to use our centipede holes to come here, and now they're firmly established as part of the Federation."

"And more strange when you consider that they've been taken over—and kept silent," Kiel added. "They're so desperate to catch up with us or keep our favor that they'll believe anything we tell them about their origins and about ours. They'll even believe in the Law of Independent Evolution. Or maybe it just doesn't matter to some races. Some of them believe life is miraculous, and that the Creator is responsible for the races being similar. That the creator willed us to be compatible. Who can argue with that?"

"And a lot of groups know to be quiet so that they can glean the spoils from the merchants and new aliens." Talden said, but not with malice. "Don't blame them, Kiel, for wanting to keep themselves safe, and fed."

"I don't," Kiel said. I blame our council.

You'd better not say that out loud, Gerryls advised kindly.

"Parallel evolution and convergence do appear to exist, sometimes," Vala said judiciously, nodding. "Therefore, since it is scientifically possible, is it any wonder most people chose to believe what would suit them best?"

"No," Kiel sighed. No wonder at all, when the Seynorynaelian Council can forge any evidence they like and threaten any one who disagrees with them.

"Yes, the Law of Independent Evolution is wrong, and to believe it," Vala said, "you'd have to believe that evolution is going to guide every single planet to the same end results, the same form and features, even though every planet is as different as sherin trees and urbin roots."

"That's true," Kiel said. "But the Federation Scientific Committee still thinks we're just trying to vindicate Hinev, that we're trying to deceive them. I think it's going to take some time to get them to listen to us."

"They won't, though," Gerryls interrupted. "If they decide to change their minds, they won't give us credit for it."

"No, they probably won't," Kiel laughed.

* * * * *

Time passed; the explorers kept to their quarters for half a year.

Then, finally orders arrived for them to unload their specimens and experiments for unbiased Federation scientists to peruse. It had been decided that they be posted at the nearby Scientific Center during the day, where they could illustrate their findings for objective study, on the condition that they didn't interfere with the Federation's scientists.

Marankeil refused them permission to mingle with the population at large; the explorers decided to do as he requested, in the event that their disobedience kept the Federation scientists from making a fair appraisal of their specimens, specimens taken from those many worlds still too underdeveloped to have been invited to join the Federation and too unprofitable to draw them any attention.

The explorers didn't mind the isolation as much as they would have in earlier days; three thousand years had passed since they left Seynorynael.

The world was no longer the same at all, and there was no news of what had happened to Hinev.

* * * * *

Kiel, Kellar, Alessia, Vala, and Gerryls were called to attend another meeting after nearly a full year. It became clear that some of the Federation scientists had changed their views and were now convinced from a thorough review of the new evidence that Hinev's old theory really did have some merit after all.

The news brought no satisfaction to his explorers; they knew enough to question why the scientists' views had changed.

At the same time, some of the oldest scientists privately held on to their belief that Seynorynaelian life had evolved by itself, faster than any other race because of the intense radiation of a blue-white star, a radiation that sped up mutations, adaptation, evolution itself. Their city Ariyalsynai was known to have flourished for at least twenty thousand years on record, though the young star Valeria had only burned thirty thousand years. Didn't that mean that their people had necessarily developed faster than any one else?

And if their people and the other humanoids had been part of a universal "first race"–why wasn't there any similarity in their cultures and languages? Why no evidence anywhere of any great spaceships left behind on all these supposed brother planets if the first race had gone to live there? The entire idea was as ridiculous as tales of the Comet Riders!

And since those tales were apparently what the explorers were re-inventing, why hadn't there been more than one ruined starship on Seynorynael as opposed to the two separated groups of wayfarers in the legend?

Last of all, no first race could have survived the crash that had left the original Selesta but pieces of scrap metal!

On the surface, those who disbelieved said nothing, all but a few intractable adherents who didn't know when to keep their mouths shut.

Their opinions no longer mattered. Marankeil's Council had decided that the first race had existed after all, that it had radiated to all humanoid systems.

Those who didn't agree would find themselves in the minority, and Marankeil would simply wait.

He would wait until they died, and replace them with scientists who saw it his way.

* * * * *

"What in blazes is this?" Alessia scrutinized the transmission printout she held in her hands, confused. She squeezed the document more tightly.

A tenday after the last meeting, geneticists from a thousand worlds had been reconsidering the First Race Theory and had decided to call it Hinev's First Race Law.

All over the city, people were talking now.

Some now said that the original intergalactic humanoid race, the first race was three million years old. The Seynorynaelian form had diverged from the first about one million years ago. As Alessia glanced at their report, she felt her features pull into a frown; the explorers' calculations hadn't yielded these numbers.

No matter.

Marankeil had the entire city believing what he wanted. Rumors spread on the wind, settling over the land, seeping in to the thirsty consciousness of all who wanted answers to the unknown.

The Seynorynaelian race had been the civilization that seeded the galaxies!

They, they were the first race!!!

And they were going to let everyone else in the galaxy know it.

* * * * *

"I still don't see why the devil they're sending us beyond the Great Cluster," Kellar said, with a hint of frustration to the explorers on the bridge as they made a few final adjustments to the computers and navigational equipment; Kiel sat reviewing the new mission guideline.

What exactly do they want us to do? Onracey wondered out loud.

"Move a few natural centipede holes closer to the inhabitable planetary systems we encountered. Then we'll to continue to the edge of our galaxy, into the fringes of the Great Cluster and beyond." Kiel replied, not even glancing up from reading a file at his command chair.

"No report yet on Hinev?" Kellar asked; Kiel stopped reading altogether.

"He's in Ariyalsynai, I understand, but I wasn't permitted to see him."

"How is he doing, do you know?" Kellar wondered.

All eyes turned to Kiel.

"I sensed that he remains isolated. He won't support the Elders' plans for us. It is also said–also said that he regrets his actions. That he lives a strange life, with his mind always bent upon the past."

Alessia shivered. Dear Hinev! Would Hinev have told his explorers the truth of their own abilities? Or–did he know something that the Council didn't want the explorers to know? Was that why he was forced to remain isolated? Or perhaps Marankeil feared that like so many of the failed candidates, the explorers would fall to the temptation of their own power and use it, that they would use it against him. Perhaps he held on to Hinev, their creator, to keep them in line and force their hands.

"Well, if we're going to leave in fewer than two tendays, they'll have to begin to transfer supplies soon." Gerryls said slowly. "I wonder why the Council is in such a hurry to get rid of us?"

"I don't know," Kiel admitted, his eyes aglow with calculation. "The worst thing about this mission is the feeling that we're being sent away because we're in the way here, now."

"You said it," Celekar added with conviction.

"Strange isn't it?" Talden said, looking out the viewport. "We're like relics that don't belong in a new age."

"But why leave the Great Cluster?" Gerryls wondered. "Granted, we may have no choice as far as the centipede hole destinations. But if we can learn to guide them, why bother with the limitations of the tachiyon engines in real space? We'll probably need them if we're forced to find the small galaxy group he has planned for us to visit at the end of our journey, but–I can't see why we've been ordered to go there. It's too far away. Too far, when there are other, larger clusters nearby."

"I agree." Kiel admitted. "And the Federation Council also rejected the idea of going there, but Marankeil was insistent." Kiel commented, thoughtful.

"How did you learn of this?" Gerryls demanded. "Certainly the Council didn't invite you in to their meeting?"

"No, of course not. I ran into Ornenkai outside the Council Building after the meeting." Kiel replied. "As a clone! I almost didn't recognize him. It seems only his machine entity now remains in the Council Building."

"Ornenkai. What is he doing? We haven't seen him at all," Kellar wondered.

"I understand that he now lives at the Seynorynaelian arboretum museum." Kiel said with a noncommittal shrug. "He had hopes of visiting Selesta, but he says Marankeil won't permit any contact between our crew and the councilors outside the meetings, and even he can't get in, not without the proper authorization codes. It turns out–Ornenkai protested against our captivity, but he's the only one who did. The others go along with Marankeil's decisions, since they don't wish to see us, anyway."

"Any reason for our isolation?" Celekar asked, irritated.

"Ornenkai feels that Marankeil is afraid we'll try to influence the people. He doesn't even know what we'd say, and yet he's not taking any chances."

"Why should he care?" Lierva wondered, equally irritated.

"I don't know. What does he think we'll try to do–overthrow the Council and set ourselves up as rulers?!" Kiel laughed.

"Perhaps just that," said Gerryls.

"Well, I'm getting fed up with Seynorynaelian politics." Lierva said. "This mission is the best news I've heard since we came home."

* * * * *

Some time later, Selesta stirred from the air field outside Ariyalsynai and launched into the sky.

Gathered among the others in the observation window, Alessia watched Seynorynael fade again into the infinity of enveloping space. Onracey, Derstan, and Lierva stood around her, the four of them wishing silent farewells to their home world, wondering if they would ever see her again.

At Lierva's insistence, Alessia had sought permission to transfer to the primary scout team and out of the biological specialists' division. Gerryls had asked her to reconsider the transfer, but Alessia knew he didn't really need her. He could always call on her aid in the planetary analyses if he needed it.

Kiel found the group at the observation window an hour after the launch.

"Permission to join scout team granted, bio-specialist Zadúmchov." He said, drawing a few surprised looks from other explorers nearby.

"Did he call you Zadúmchov?" Broah echoed as she and Ioka approached.

"Why are you calling me–who told you I was–that isn't my name," Alessia protested, keeping her thoughts hidden as the others drew around them. She saw what Kiel and the others thought about the idea. Marshall Zadúmchov and his father before him had been the Council's chief officers in their generation's time as part of the continuing hereditary line of Zadúmchovs. Only a Zadúmchov could claim the position of "The Great Coordinator of the Expansion", a title bestowed on the family by Elder Marankeil himself more than two thousand years before Alessia's birth.

If Alessia were really a Zadúmchov, then there was a good chance she was a secret agent. An agent placed among them at the last minute–because of her family status, and for what reason other than to monitor the explorers' activities to report to the Council? Or–perhaps to subdue them if they ever tried to disobey orders?

But–didn't they know that Marshall Zadúmchov had died in relative obscurity, discarded by the Council? Alessia wondered; some of them didn't, it seemed, or else didn't allow that fact much relevance to the present situation.

They were afraid. They were not so far gone towards inhumanity that they were not still sensitive to human motives. They didn't want to believe they had been betrayed, but this news was reason enough to wonder.

Had Alessia been sent to them long ago only to betray them?

She despised it that they were jumping to conclusions; at the same time, an undefinable part of her mind craved their understanding. Had they grown to mean so much to her? Could she live under the yoke of their suspicions?

As Kiel regarded her, she sensed his struggle to give her the benefit of the doubt. He didn't want to believe that Hinev had allowed her to become an explorer at the Council's insistence, that she was some kind of Council spy, or worse, that Hinev had had nothing to do with her arrival, as they had supposed; after all, the explorers had never spoken to him about it before he was sent to Eneveh.

Kiel didn't know why the Council would have bothered to place an agent among them, if only one, but he was struck by a sense of uneasiness nonetheless, as though it wouldn't have been beyond Marankeil to arrange it. Why else would Alessia keep her own identity from them? That was why he had addressed her by the Grand Marshall's name.

She could see that his unformed opinion hinged upon the nature of her answer.

Lierva reached an arm over Alessia's shoulder and glared at the others.

"Don't even consider it," she cautioned. "Alessia isn't one of them. She wasn't even called to the meetings."

"That's true, isn't it?" Kellar said. His face made it clear he at least didn't believe she was a spy.

"Then what is her connection to the Zadúmchovs?" Onracey wondered, a crease furrowing his broad forehead.

"Who says there is one?" Lierva threw back.

"If I've been hiding an identity, it is that I'm a half-race child," Alessia admitted. "My father was an alien. That report has always been true, but it wasn't exactly appropriate conversational material years ago."

"So, it wasn't a rumor?" Kellar stammered; the others were no less surprised. No one would ever lie about such a thing. In their day, half-race children had been shunned by pure Seynorynaelians and other alien races as an abomination of nature. Aliens were tolerable; half-race children didn't belong anywhere, and neither side embraced them. The explorers had heard rumors about Alessia's heritage long ago, but to hear that the rumors were true after all of these years was still a surprise. There were so many unknown consequences to being half-alien, so many strange anomalies scientists had found in the half-race children, so many aberrations that surfaced in character and reasoning when dealing with alien anatomy...

"Well, some kind of misunderstanding must have been made." Derstan shrugged after a moment.

"How so?" Vala turned to him.

"Alessia can't be related to the former Grand Marshall." Derstan replied. "No Zadúmchov ever married outside the elite of Ariyalsynai."

"Not that I've heard of." Kellar agreed.

"Nevertheless, the Council's approval was sent to the explorer bio-specialist Zadúmchov, former Martial Scientific Force lieutenant under Commander Ungarn," Kiel spoke evenly. "Alessia was the only one who fit the description, the only one who requested a formal transfer. If Marankeil himself has made a mistake, then I'll note it." Kiel offered, hoping Alessia would agree.

Instead, she faced him squarely, denying nothing, saying nothing. She felt the others' curious eyes upon her as the silence stretched.

What could she tell them? she wondered. If they knew she was the Grand Marshall's granddaughter, would they assume that she had been raised in Ariyalsynai among the elite, untroubled by the difficulties they had endured to earn their places as explorers? Would they also assume that she had been placed among them to report on their activities and make certain that they didn't stray from their mission guideline? Would they take her silence as evidence that she was indeed an agent of Marankeil and his Council?

She could show them memories, but even then–there was nothing in her mind to prove that she wasn't being used by the Elders for some reason, or that she wasn't showing them memories that weren't hers, memories that she had borrowed from a mindlink with another individual. She couldn't prove or disprove anything. And hadn't Marankeil taken her from home? Hadn't he also insisted she become an explorer? God above! Could it be true?! Was she really being manipulated by Marankeil? The horror of that sudden thought was enough to paralyze her.

"You don't understand," Lierva informed them, to keep the others from mistaking Alessia's silence for an admission of guilt.

"We don't?" Wen-eil turned to her.

"No, you don't," Lierva's voice was cold. "Yes, Alessia's grandfather was Grand Marshall Zadúmchov, but he disinherited his daughter when she married an alien. Alessia's mother lived–" Lierva caught Alessia's stony expression and stopped abruptly.

Kiel was watching the interchange closely.

At least Lierva believes what she is saying, that Alessia isn't a spy, Kiel nodded reluctantly, perceiving that something unspoken united Alessia and Lierva in their faith; he let the others hear his thoughts, whether deliberately or by accident, Alessia didn't know. The others doubt–perhaps they are right to question. But for myself, I have only to consider that Alessia is a member of our mission, and I can't forsake her.

Alessia met his expression with composure as she heard his thoughts. Yet a small part of her wondered if he thought less of her now, now that he knew her heritage. Half-alien and part of the elite that had controlled them. She felt him struggle against his own prejudices against half-race children; it was somehow easier to accept aliens than half-alien creatures, as though to be half of two races was an abomination, yet he tried to envision Hinev, his mentor, whom he had admired. He found it easier to accept Alessia's alien side than the connection with the great coordinator.

For many years, Kiel had hated Marshall Zadúmchov, the man who had been a thorn in the side of all those working on The Firien Project... No, he had hated Zadúmchov far longer...

"I only have one thing to say about all of this," Alessia said quietly. "Enassa is my father's family name, so forget about the orders and let's just get on with our mission, because whoever addressed them to me just wanted to stir up trouble among us. It would be a shame to let that person succeed over something as meaningless as a name."

"Oh, I don't care what the devil your name is," Celekar threw out gruffly, approaching the group. "Just don't go putting on any airs around me just because you come from the aristocracy."

Alessia turned to him and caught the slight expression around the corners of his mouth.

She rewarded him with a smile few sunrises could rival. "I wouldn't dare."

* * * * *

A confession of the soul would do her a world of good, she knew. At the same time, she despised herself for even being here, because she despised the kind of person who would presume to throw herself between two people in love. She knew that wasn't what she wanted to do, rationally, but would he understand that?

Well, she had decided. She was going to tell Kiel that she loved him even though she perfectly understood that it would have to remain unrequited, then tell him everything else that had been bothering her. Maybe he would be able to forgive Hinev and help her come up with a way to break the news to the others. They deserved to know that little bit of information she knew about the experiments, even if it seemed out of place to be mentioning it now.

The true transgression had been to keep silent about the secret circumstances surrounding the serum experiments in the first place, even though she knew the others would be horrified to learn them.

With a sense of relief, she stopped pacing.

She strode to the elevation device with the intention of finding Kiel.

She stopped outside his quarters, sensing a stream of thoughts.

Kiel was remembering Calendra's laugh, a little laugh that had the power to govern his moods, a little laugh that drove away his frustration and doubts. How he missed that little laugh! Yes, and the smile that illuminated her face, her intriguing features, her beautiful mouth. He would always remember her that way–lines of confusion melting away as a smile of comprehension spread over her face.

Why? Why couldn't she have come with them? He wondered again, pointlessly. Who dared to say that Calendra was not special enough for the serum and to become an explorer, not strong enough to be an explorer when he knew otherwise? Hinev had made the decision, Kiel knew, but he couldn't hold it against the man for long. Deep down, Kiel sensed that there were more risks involved in the serum metamorphosis than he really wanted to subject Calendra to; that didn't make his disappointment any easier to bear.

When he thought about Calendra, his mood abruptly changed. In the privacy of his own quarters where no one depended upon him, he felt as though his heart was slowly being ripped in two as they sped further away from Seynorynael. For all of the abilities he had gained in the metamorphosis, he couldn't protect her. And the metamorphosis had separated them, perhaps forever.

No word had come to him of her while they were on Seynorynael, nor of her fate.

The mission had been launched, but he hadn't seen her since the metamorphosis changed his life. He had asked if he could remain behind with Calendra but had been ordered to go, to lead the second mission. Even his request for a visit had been denied. He hadn't even been able to contact Hinev to ensure that her life was still in suspension.

Oh, the torture of not knowing!

And now Hinev's counsel from long ago repeated again and again in his mind.

The longer she lies in suspension, the less likely her body will be able to recuperate. She may wake to find her life over.

Alessia moved away from the door. Some things were better left unsaid.

* * * * *

"How do we know that it will take us only beyond the galactic plane and not to some other remote galaxy?" Kiel asked Gerryls, skeptical.

The entire explorer team had gathered in the tactical analysis room. The Selesta had finished the part of their mission in their own galaxy, to move and enlarge more centipede hole gates between the Federation planets. But though they had counted upon employing the new string engine to take them beyond the galaxy into the Great Cluster and unknown space, they had not yet been able to accurately control the new engine drive.

Alessia watched Celekar's intent face across from her and turned back to Gerryls.

"I don't know. So far, when we've set the coordinates in the tachiyon engine the string engine seems to read along and adjust its energy output to match the tachiyon vibrations. But except for that one time, the string has only activated if it senses a pre-existing centipede hole along our course–"

"What about that artificial tunnel?" Kiel persisted. "It may be possible to rip another hole in space-time to create our own centipede hole passage directly to that galaxy." He pointed to a blueprint, a schematic of the unknown drawn from a picture taken all the way back on Goeur.

"Theoretically, yes, it is possible." Gerryls nodded. "But we can't understand the mechanism which operates the engine. Until we can, there is only the possibility that the engine runs on an automatic level–we will have to find the manual control device."

Alessia studied the theoretical engine schematic in the holo-field. However, the string engine itself had been invisible to the scanner, as it had been to their eyes. Only the metallic sphere and energy field around it appeared in the field-generated facsimile.

"Has the computer terminal been able to contact the energy?" she asked suddenly, drawing the other's attention.

"It receives energy readings." Gerryls answered, curious as to what she had in mind.

"And after the serum we've succeeded in telepathic links to the computer memory bank." Alessia stated. Gerryls arched an eyebrow. "Just as the Elder Council can speak to us."

"What are you suggesting?" Gerryls asked.

"How about a three-way telepathy-telekinetic link?" Alessia suggested, and Gerryls finally understood. If they contacted the computer while it read the energy readings and then sent a wave of semi-communicative energy to the string engine, they could influence the string vibrations, read the energy changes through the computer, and if they activated the centipede hole rending device with a sudden surge of measured energy, they might be able to control how long and how intense the energy activity; they might be able to control the final destination of the centipede hole.

Gerryls smiled at her; the others nodded enthusiastically. Only Kiel watched her without registering any emotion.

"I'm going to attempt it," Gerryls announced. "If we can activate the engine to take us to this point in space–" he gestured to the edge of their own galaxy between Feiar and Gerka2. "We might be able to create a centipede hole near Kilraben1 to take us into the Great Cluster."

"Isn't it dangerous to create a permanent centipede hole there?" Lierva asked. "We'll be exposing the rest of the Great Cluster to the Elders forever. And any other group of space travelers–any hostile aliens that might live in the galaxies of the Great Cluster–well, they'll be able to use our centipede hole to enter our galaxy, to reach us." She paused. "Now, if we could find a pre-existing centipede hole–"

"We have no choice." Kiel realized soberly.

"What?" Lierva demanded.

"When the Elders discovered the string energy activity, they assumed we would figure out the engine's operation in time." Gerryls explained.

"Their orders are clear," Kiel said. Was his honor, his sense of duty strong enough to adhere to the mission guideline, no matter what? They all saw the strange mix of strength of will and uncertainty in his eyes. "We are to map the galaxies using the centipede hole passages. If we use a pre-existing centipede hole and emerge into unknown space and don't return, they will know we've failed. But we must try."

"Yes," Lierva admitted, reluctant.

"Hinev said that it's possible to make the centipede holes as a tunnel between the galaxies, if we're careful to project our course through the calculations of initial mass and gravitational energy." Kiel continued, remembering.

"Well then, that's it. If that's how we're expected to reach the small galaxy group beyond the Great Cluster, we'll just have to master the centipede hole gateways." Gerryls' voice belied the fear in his heart.

He didn't want to tell them that there may be no returning to the time and space they had known if something went wrong.
Chapter Ten

Hinev's explorers left the mouth of the centipede hole behind and found that they had come to another galaxy group.

Selesta and its crew had finally passed beyond the Great Cluster.

Now their own galaxy group, called The Great Cluster, one of many thousand others, appeared no more than a cloud of distant lights behind them, barely visible from the edge of the galaxy group they had come to. No one from Seynorynael had ever been to this galaxy group according to historical record, but if Hinev was right, some traces of the ancient humanoid civilization that had been the "first race" might still be found here. Or not. They may in the future only find aliens of a very different nature, or none at all.

Kiel plotted the course to take them to several star candidates containing planetary systems. The explorers surveyed the entire galaxy group slowly, creating permanent centipede hole gates between the inhabitable worlds. If all went as planned, after they had extended the Federation's greeting, Federation ships would follow the markers through the centipede holes Selesta had made linking the galaxies and send political convoys and trading ships to the worlds that agreed to join the intergalactic conglomeration.

Only a small percentage of stars had developed planetary systems, and of these only a small percentage were even capable of supporting life. Yet in the billion billions of stars in galaxy group two, there were still several million life-containing worlds. Less than a hundred years after they had entered the cluster, Talden received a faint radio transmission on his position on the bridge; layers of future transmissions followed it, transmissions that had spread from the planet of origin in a nearby yellow-white star system, only three hundred light-years away. Most of the explorers had assembled on the bridge where visuals were now being received.

"Such a young civilization," Gerryls commented, a little disappointed. "Only three hundred years of appreciable technology."

"Would you prefer them to be more advanced than us, and capable of anti-matter weaponry?" Lierva teased. Gerryls sighed as though he saw no point in arguing.

"We'll make a centipede hole connection to the space just outside the system and observe their culture for a few days before we attempt contact," Kiel decided, though Gerryls suggested making the centipede hole at the edge of the solar plane beyond the elliptical ring of comets, in order to keep the centipede hole mouth obscured, in case the inhabitants could presently detect its presence.

Days after they arrived in the system, Kiel, Vala, Ioka, Derstan, and Gerryls tried to decipher the emissions coming from the fourth planet to the outlying planetary colonies. The colonies had grown up on the fifth planet, on two of the sixth planet's moons, on the eight and last planet's largest moon, and on a space station at the edge of the system. The images represented a bipedal race of creatures with stereoscopic eyes and four-digit hands and feet, short thick hair over a large cranium and shorter, smooth body fur that varied from white, yellow or orange to reds and browns, and a few jet black, without patches of any other color.

Alessia accompanied Lierva's scout team on a reconnaissance mission near the space station, in order to get close enough to read the inhabitants' language from the minds of the creatures themselves. After the scout team returned undetected, Derstan translated the emissions into Seynorynaelian, to leave behind a record for the Federation on the fourth planet called Eliazan once contact had been made. With the accompanying translation, the Federation would be able to learn the inhabitants' language, and thereby teach Seynorynaelian to them.

"They aren't a hostile race," Lierva reported to Kiel on the bridge when the scout team returned, allowing Kiel and the others to re-read the memories she had absorbed from a young male creature on patrol around the station. "And as you can see," she added, "they appear to be a sentient animal form. There is a distinct male and female division."

Some of the explorers remembered the Kaltarees, whose gender fluctuated throughout life with the secretion of certain hormones in the body. Kaltarees did not gestate their young in the mother as if Seynorynaelians, but externally, in a kind of gelatinous fluid encased in a hard scleratin bag.

"But the primitive ancestor was a carnivorous quadruped hunter," Alessia added. "The present-day Eliazand are omnivorous, and intelligent, and though I wouldn't say they're deliberately hostile, they have inherited a kind of reserve, an impassive attitude towards death. If threatened, they would have no hesitation to kill–and feel no regrets about killing. It would be wise to use their own psychology in our first encounter."

"How so?" Kiel asked.

"I know we're not supposed to use our abilities to threaten alien cultures," she replied, in a cool, logical tone, no longer worrying about what he thought of her temerity, "but we must present ourselves as formidable adversaries if they're ever going to accept us and welcome our Federation. They understand strength, and will only listen to those whom they can respect. Most importantly, they understand a formal challenge of leadership, and if we prove stronger than they are by their rules, I believe they'll accept us. As if we had always been one of their own kind, perhaps, and as faithfully as if there had never been a time when we were not brothers, as it were."

Kiel regarded Alessia thoughtfully. Her point was valid, as little as he liked having to admit that such a conflict was necessary. But who would be the Selesta's champion? Surely any battle for leadership would require an array of talents to be tested–not only physical strength, but speed and agility. No one would want to do it, though, Kiel suspected. For each of them knew how unfair any match would be between themselves and a mortal race; to agree to a match under these circumstances was to partake in deception, no matter how justifiable the ends might be or might seem to be. But what could he do? The Federation would now be coming here through the centipede hole, and if the explorers didn't establish a peace, Seynorynael could have a major intergalactic war on its hands in no time at all. Someone had to open relations with the Eliazand; only the explorers could maintain the peace, as much as they hated having to become directly involved in a conflict.

"Very well," he said soberly, his forehead furrowing as he suddenly hit upon the answer. "As you suggested this idea, Alessia, don't you think you should be the Selesta's champion?"

Her look of surprise melted into an expression of stoical acceptance.

"If you are giving me that order, then I will do my best."

* * * * *

As predicted, the Eliazand accepted the Seynorynaelians' formal challenge.

In time, Kiel and the others came to perceive that if there ever were a simple invasion of their world, the Eliazand would respond by defending their planet with every armor suit and small space fighter plane they possessed. But the formal challenge was happily met by the Eliazand's leader-son. According to tradition, the beginning Eliazand battle was hand-to hand and contained within a ring. The combat rules were very simple. The first opponent to drive the other from the ring would be proclaimed the victor.

The Eliazand didn't seem to mind that a female had been chosen to represent the strangers. The fact was that Eliazand females had been the hunters and leaders of the race as often as the males, and had been even more ferocious in ancient times than they were at present; they were still ferocious, however, even though that ferocity was often concealed by taking the guise of other behaviors. The present leader, Melaca, had chosen her son as representative, for she had grown too old to defend her leadership. She had anticipated a challenge to be soon in coming, though out of loyalty and respect for her insightful leadership and her expansion of the colonies, none had dared to usurp her leadership thus far.

Of course, the strangers felt no such loyalty to her. If her son now won two of the three contests, as the Eliazand expected, he would become the new leader, and all would be well.

The hand to hand battle was set at morning-rise. Alessia stepped into the ring, wearing the traditional ilas costume of the Eliazand challenger that provided ease of movement but no protection. Cut around her legs and arms, the costume exposed lithe limbs, the small hard muscles of her long legs and arms. The simple movement as she steeped into the ring seemed somehow a feat of agility as the spectators watched her move, her gait as fluid as water.

Still, the great muscled creature that opposed her seemed, at first appearance, too much for her to defeat. The Eliazand audience eyed their champion as he stood behind the ring; they were convinced of his superiority, and as much as they admired the agility of the challenger and commented on the speed of her movement not unlike that of their own females, they felt no remorse that she must die. It was clear that she would.

By custom, the leader-son Dirak then entered the center of the ring and the two opponents stepped to the center, facing each other only a foot apart until the deep roar of the Eliazand echoed across the open field, signaling the battle's commencement.

Alessia felt the uncanny speed of her opponent as he raised a hand and sunk his claws into her arm. He had gone for her abdomen, but her own reflexes acted to protect her. Seeing evasion as her method of defense, Dirak began to strike her with jarring blows designed to knock her over. When the blows failed, he attempted to trip her, to knock her to the ground, but she regained her balance and side-stepped the blows from his right leg.

Suddenly she realized that he had pushed her to the edge of the ring.

Her momentarily confusion and unwillingness to use her power to harm the Eliazand defender vanished. His speed of attack and incredible strength as he towered a foot above her would have bested any ordinary Seynorynaelian. Dirak would have already ripped her intestines out by now and claimed his victory, kicking her body outside the ring. He would have had no need to try to trip her, to expose her vital organs.

She was no ordinary Seynorynaelian.

Alessia ducked under the next blow of his powerful arm and spun behind him with impossible speed. With a hard kick to his back, she knocked Dirak forward. The sudden attack brought down the heavy monolith hard. Dirak struggled to get to his feet, but by then it was too late. Alessia had picked him up and hoisted his great mass onto her narrow shoulders as though he weighed no more than a light sack.

The onlooking Eliazand watched in amazement as she spun around and raised their champion above her head with only her arms extended, then threw him outside the ring without losing her balance, still standing upright.

The crowd roared its approval.

* * * * *

The Eliazand were already bringing a draught of refreshment to her. Their self-assuredness that Dirak would win the contest had disappeared as though it had never existed. Their attitude towards her had completely changed. The day before, she had been a stranger, but that was forgotten.

This was their natural Leader. And to her they would always be loyal.

By custom, Dirak would have to leave the settlement as punishment for his weakness. Alessia, however, paid little heed to the expectations of the others.

If any one was unworthy, it was herself. She couldn't get the thought out of her mind, that horrible self-paralyzing guilt. For she had deceived these courageous people who now praised her, even though out of necessity, deceived them into believing that they had something to fear from ordinary Seynorynaelians, who could pose no physical threat to the Eliazand. She knew there had been little alternative than to obey Kiel's order, but she didn't care. Right now she felt like being hard on herself.

She had used her powers to win. Somehow that made her victory taste bitter.

Nevertheless, the Eliazand expected her to join the festivities made in her honor.

She summoned the composure to go, all the while wondering what she was doing. She had compromised her beliefs to win, and it was going to take a while to recover from that.

* * * * *

The explorers stayed several tendays in the palace while Alessia discussed Federation foreign policy with the Eliazand. They all got to know the former leader, who made introductions and kept to the palace until the formal transfer of power; Alessia came to know the wise old leader and her son, Dirak, whom the explorers had insisted remain as a liaison familiar with the policies of the former leadership.

After some time, the Eliazand began to understand that their leader was planning to leave. She and her followers had a long journey to make, the nature of which seemed to be some kind of great hunt. Alessia decided to renounce her leadership in favor of Dirak, who had been raised to fill the position as leader since early childhood, to reclaim the title of leader for his family if another challenger from the more remote colonies returned to threaten the leadership.

Only twice in Eliazand history had there been a peaceful, uncontested transfer of leadership from father to child, but Dirak accepted the transfer of leadership from Alessia to himself with much less surprise and far more stoicism than the explorers might have expected, had they not known that Dirak truly considered his people's interests above his own; after the transfer festivities announcing his leadership so close on the heels of Alessia's ascendancy, Dirak continued to regard his former leader with the respect accorded leaders of his people. An Eliazan leader was to be respected, it seemed, though most of their leaders died in the battle over leadership.

In the matter of the brother-race which the former leader had spoken of, Dirak was determined to meet their leaders himself and prepare the greatest banquet his people had known to welcome them.

As they left the planetary surface, Alessia had a hard time imagining one of the Seynorynaelian elders coming all of the way out here for that.

Later, as Selesta headed to the neighboring star system, Kiel appeared behind her on the bridge.

"Well done, Alessia Enassa. I know this experience hasn't been easy for you. I think the former 'Queen' as it were will be a long time returning."

"I highly doubt she ever will."

"No, and you don't seem disappointed by the possibility," he said, thoughtful. "How did it feel, being the leader of the Eliazand, even for such a short time?" He asked, distracted, but at the same time he seemed oddly curious and listened carefully for her reply.

"I think, Kiel, that I rather dislike too much responsibility," she admitted bluntly.

"Oh?" He said, as though surprised by the admission. "You've no desire or ambition to be a leader?"

"Only if there were a need for me to be one." She amended. "I don't mean that I haven't strong opinions, only that I would rather just rule myself."

"What, and not follow my orders?" His tone lightened; he was teasing her now.

"Oh no," she protested, maintaining her point. "I know what my duty is and who among us is in command. It's just that I wouldn't like to have to force others to do as I wish."

Kiel didn't answer.

"I believe that would be a great deal more difficult than I used to believe." She went on, mistrusting the silence. "I think many of us wish to be in charge of things until the responsibility actually befalls us. It's easy to be a leader, but not to be a good one."

"No, it isn't." Kiel agreed.

* * * * *

In galaxy group three the explorers found another race of blue-star humanoids on the planet Alliar, only the second known to exist in over two hundred thousand true humanoid species. The Alliar-na had become bald over years of evolution, and were thinner and more angular looking bi-ped humanoids than Seynorynaelians.

Their advanced society had reached a stage in technology that enabled them to make manned flights to the closest star–a yellow-white star two and a half light years away. The Alliar-na had terraformed two other satellites in their own solar system and established colonies, but they had thought themselves alone in the universe, since no transmissions of intelligent life had yet reached them. The arrival of the Seynorynaelians took their world by surprise, as did the fact that the creatures were similar to themselves, but most of the peaceful Alliar-na welcomed the strangers, especially after Alliar-na scientists returned from the tour of Selesta.

Namba Ill Leh-di, one of the leading Alliar-na scientists, remained on board for nearly a year and sent information to his people about the vast territories the Seynorynaelian Federation had discovered. Understanding that with their level of technology, the Seynorynaelians could have easily destroyed the Alliar-na had their intentions been hostile, the scientist Namba managed to persuade his fellow scientists to consider the Seynorynaelian proposal.

Namba learned to speak rudimentary Seynorynaelian in the time he spent on board the Selesta. Much of the time he was permitted to spend with Gerryls and Vala in the laboratories, learning selected techniques of Seynorynaelian science. In that time, Gerryls created a cure for a rare skin disease that afflicted many Alliar-na, called gidhda, that dealt its sufferers a slow painful death, a death that lingered as long as five Seynorynaelian years.

Alessia enjoyed her particular assignment, to teach Namba about alien biologies he had never known, and about alien species of organisms resembling the Seynorynaelian categories of "plants" and "animals". She took him to the gardens and to Gerryls' various collection displays and to see the wild creatures they had taken, the old or sick members of species that had been left for dead but found, cured, and transported for future Federation observation whenever the explorers returned home.

The sixth generation squag from Elter-ya5 fascinated Namba immensely, not for its hunting skill, but for the beautiful vibrant colors the chameleon's fur had adapted to camouflage itself from predators in the great Forest of Colors. The "plants" of Elter-ya5 had grown as tall as Seynorynaelian trees but had no bark. At the top of their waxy green stalks grew a collage of all the rainbow colors, great canopies of leaves like water basins and parasols that attracted the erghs, creatures that spread their seedlings.

One afternoon shortly before Namba prepared to leave for his home world, days before the Selesta's planned departure, he stopped and sat down on the forest path, under a tree, watching Alessia.

"What is it?" She turned around, gently removing the fibers of the sherin tree from the ground. She started when one of the fibers tore and looked down to examine the damage before closing her eyes and concentrating on the atoms of the fibrous roots, reconstructing them as they had been a moment before. She saw his expression of irrepressible wonder, though he had grown accustomed to the explorers' unexplainable psychic abilities by now; he had been assured most Seynorynaelians could not control matter as they did, but that didn't explain why the explorers could do all that he had seen them do.

Alessia saw that he was remembering his first impression of them–how strangely muscular they looked through his eyes, how barbaric with their long hair that grew from their heads like the primitive races of his ancient past. Their less angular faces, small, slightly pointed ears and elfin features he had found ugly, their large expressive eyes still too narrow for his taste.

However, as time passed, he had begun to accept the unusual appearance of his hosts. And once he had gotten to know them, learned of their highly advanced culture, seen the beautiful images of their world, he had grown to admire them. Moreover, their skin was not unlike his own–perhaps less grayish blue, but closer than all of the other humanoids he had seen in their archives.

He no longer found Alessia ugly. And once when he had brushed against the hair that had initially repulsed him, he had found it pleasantly soft, not coarse as he had imagined.

Alessia wondered how it was that the Alliar-na had developed different organs in the skin that reflected the blue light of their blue-white star Dela. The skin organs also made their skin appear gray, but the Alliar-na had no lyrachloroplasts in their blood and skin, only skin pigments just under the surface. The Alliar-na lived short lives compared to Seynorynaelians, but the Federation had promised to help them build fortifications against the extreme radiation of Dela.

"I was thinking about how very lucky I am to have been alive at the moment when our civilizations met," Namba said with feeling, though his lip slit could not smile. "After you leave, we will try to use our own ships to go out and meet your Federation. Such a union of all the humanoid, biped, and intelligent races will be an unparalleled zenith in our planet's history, one that we never imagined. We–I–cannot thank your people enough. And someday, if the space tunnels and the suspension capsules you spoke of can make it possible, I hope to journey to your world. I hope very much to meet this man called Hinev who made such a vision possible."

"And I wish you luck on that journey," Alessia said, quite sad when she contemplated the fact that Namba's dream was only a dream that could not come true.

* * * * *

The explorers would miss Namba, they knew, like so many other people and places they had come to know briefly in their long succession of interplanetary voyages. Namba hadn't concerned himself with judging their past but had accepted their histories as he learned about Seynorynael; he'd found the subject of their lives interesting, even though he only really understood their present state. Even knowing very little about them, he had still been willing to call them friends.

Kiel and the others had been enthusiastic to represent Seynorynael when they recognized Namba's curiosity, but it was not until Derstan brought out holo-images and the explorers allowed their memories to leak through to Namba's mind that he saw its wonder. They would not have shown the Alliar-na scientist so much, but his interest pleased them.

She sensed that Namba had envied them, though, because he would have liked to have lived among them. After thousands of years together, the explorers had drawn together, their bond stronger than family ties.

She had almost forgotten that she'd kept anything about herself to herself until Namba asked her about her childhood.

The reminder didn't bother her any more. The explorers had all long since moved on with their lives and present business.As time passed, Alessia became a permanent member of the terrestrial scouting parties, accompanying Lierva and Celekar on forays into many perilous environments. In time, she caught their contagious love of danger and surrendered hopelessly to it.

The three of them headed into the hive of zelathi creatures on Mardagh5 to complete Gerryls' profile on the planet's alien bio-chemistry. One of the creatures attacked Lierva and consumed her arm, but the sentient cells of her flesh became energy that Lierva controlled and reclaimed, reforming her arm as they brought their mental energies to bear on the creatures and control their movement.

Alessia and Celekar had held off the zelathi by freezing them, halting the neural impulses to their limbs, while Lierva retrieved a sample of a gestating creature's body and incubation fluids. But the zelathi posed no real threat, unlike the Eress beings the explorers encountered in galaxy group five.

The Eress were light beings, ethereal creatures composed of energy that came upon the ten explorers of the scout party in the ruins of a colonial outpost of some vanished civilization on the surface of Lariock9. The Eress swarmed about them, permeating their bodies and tempting their sentient cells to join them. The explorers stood frozen for hours, trying to resist the lure of the Eress beings.

Alessia began to sense Talden fading, about to give his essence up to join the beings and rushed to his side despite the agony pulling on her organs and limbs in all directions. She took Talden's hand and sacrificed some of her energy, flooding Talden's body with communicative waves, desperate to recall Talden's mind.

Weakened, the Eress had assaulted the creature that had foiled them, rushing around Alessia, but the other explorers found they couldn't move to help her. Alessia felt the infinite pressure and pain as her body and being were locked into a combat of wills between two worlds. For a moment, she thought herself lost to the void around them as the pain intensified and her essence became numb. Then, from the depths of her mind, she recalled an image.

She hadn't thought of her father since she left Seynorynael, but his smile, his eyes reassured her as a face appeared in her memory, a face of hope, of strength. She thought she felt the invisible touch of his arm fall upon her shoulder and enclose her. At once the beings swarming around her seemed to hesitate, their grip upon her fading.

Her body flooded with a new strength she had never before summoned. Alessia felt a wave of her own mind's energy enveloping them, driving away the last of the Eress who gave up their struggle with a dying wail, a wail which revived her companions who stood and shook off violent shivers, though none of them seemed exactly clear as to what had happened.

In galaxy group five, during an extended stay on Jwulam4, Derstan and Alessia went looking for Cerdko, who had threatened to remain on the planet. The explorers had lived on Jwulam4 for three centuries, a planet that had brought their trip through the galaxy group full circle, while Gerryls attempted to plot their best course back to the two centipede hole tunnels near where they had entered the first galaxy. Using the tunnels on their maps, they had thus far cut down their journey in real time by traveling back to the moment in the past shortly after the centipede hole's creation, though many more thousands of years had passed on board for the explorers.

Meanwhile on Jwulam4, Cerdko fell in love with a native woman. Upon her death, he had rejected the explorer mission and regressed into selfish and destructive behavior, but he would not be found and eluded Kiel and the others, threatening to take over the planet if the others didn't leave him alone.

The explorers had all been shocked by Cerdko's regression in only a few hundred years of isolation. Of course they'd all lived independent lives on the worlds that they had visited, preparing for and waiting for the opportune moment to introduce the Federation's proposal and to observe and document alien behaviors, culture, science, technology, and biochemistry.

Kiel ordered the others not to antagonize Cerdko if they found him, but Alessia was convinced that Cerdko had plans to take over the Jwulam planet and redefine its society and decided to track the wayward explorer down. She contacted Lierva and Derstan, and together they set a trap for Cerdko at his Jwulam wife's grave. After a two-day mental battle, Cerdko succumbed to the invading thoughts of Derstan, Lierva, and Alessia. With their help, he was able to deal with the grief and became again the man he had been, although much less confident, and far more haunted by the memories of the darker half of his nature.

Cerdko was not the last explorer to discover the dark inner demons empowered by the serum Hinev had given them, a serum that had promised enlightenment. To know humanity so well was to know all of its secrets, and though the explorers had rejected most of the generally accepted "evil" behaviors of society, they had seen the minds of uncounted creatures, had witnessed and understood every human feeling, line of reasoning, and action, even the worst crimes of all. Hinev had not warned them how difficult it might be to forget such atrocities and embrace only the good or to keep so many philosophies from filling their minds to the point of rendering them indecisive.

In galaxy group six, Lierva's team stumbled into a conflict between two fledgling galactic civilizations, the Zartran and the Gwardichardarii. The Zartran, a green-skinned class H6yt humanoid race, had developed a centipede hole of their own, though a somewhat unstable one, and had destroyed several worlds occupied by their "neighbors". The Gwardichardarii, squat and broad tawny orange-skinned humanoids had originated in a yellow-white star system two million light years from the Zartran homeland territories, unknown to each other before the Zartan's own centipede hole had linked the two galactic terrains.

The explorers' presence in the Zartan's home system had brought a halt to the horrific war and slaughter as the Zartran reconsidered the threat of a far superior Federation that might have been inclined to punish their greed and side with the underdog. The telepathic link of the explorers had allowed them to discuss plans to reach a compromise on the day they had presented the issue to the Zartran.

From a glance, no outside being could ever detect the traffic of thoughts Kiel sent to Hinev's explorers and the flood of suggestions that he received, the multi-conversations of telepathy going on at the same time. Telepathy gave the explorers the ability to carry on more than a hundred different trains of thought, distinct but also comprehensive, so that at one time, any one might monitor one of their companion's conversation while still speaking to yet another. The explorers had often used this ability to create tactics to fit any particular situation they came across.

When potential hostility had developed among indigenous populations on some of the planets they had visited, the explorers often reverted to speaking telepathically with each other, to keep potential enemies from learning their proposed course of actions, sentiments, or other vital information. Telepathy had been an invaluable tool in preventing disaster as well as the usual function for which they employed it: to gather an instant knowledge and understanding of the civilizations they encountered and be able to exchange language, and thus cultures.

With the negotiations finally set out and with a treaty decisively reached, the explorers committed the Zartran to redressing their past actions before the Federation fleet arrived, following the centipede hole passages created by Selesta.

It was on a Gwardichardarii refugee vessel that Alessia healed a man who had been paralyzed in an assault on the colony on Giar, once his home. Reconnecting tissues and animating his limbs with a stream of her own electromagnetic neural energy, she reconstructed his damaged spine. His wonder and gratitude touched her, and at that moment Alessia felt that no matter what else happened, the explorers' journey had been successful, that it had been worth the sacrifices for all the good that they had done.

Yet none of them could dismiss their growing disillusionment, nor the feelings of regret that they were far from making the journey home. Alessia's eyes traveled across the room to where Lierva was healing a man burned beyond recognition as he barely escaped a nuclear blast and met the older woman's haggard expression. An unspoken communication passed between them.

They were tired, and wanted to go home.
Chapter Eleven

After fifty thousand years had passed on board Selesta, the explorers anticipated the end of the mission with great impatience; however, they had not yet even traveled to their final destination. Already, they had found so many forms of life–the crew's minds were full of information from a million planets. They had long since begun to wonder why their own galaxy in the Great Cluster had so many bi-pedal humanoids in relation to the other galaxy groups–in fact, the galaxy groups further away in the Great Cluster contained fewer humanoid species and more unrelated sentient species, many more violent that human beings, others remarkably less aggressive than even the moderate humanoid races.

Alessia would rather have forgotten many of the creatures they had encountered, and in fact, Kiel had destroyed several centipede holes to the most horrific of all the races in order to diminish their threat to the Federation. Hinev's explorers had survived even the most unimaginable dangers of contact. When all other forms of protection that the serum had provided failed, such as the ability to shield from alien particles and repel them, the explorers could finally dissolve their mass into sentient energy and reform once they had safely escaped any obstacles, even if they were ever overwhelmed by a sudden attack.

Of course, the Seynorynaelians that would come after them wouldn't be able to protect themselves as the explorers had.

Kiel accordingly destroyed the centipede hole passages leading to horrors best left undisturbed. At the next hospitable system, Kiel left a record of the hostile planets and the explorers' encounters for the Federation to find and add to their survey of the galaxies, so that any disastrous contact could be avoided in the future.

After six galaxy groups, the great map of the centipede hole gates had grown exponentially. After they had mapped four galaxy groups, the explorers began to think more of returning home than continuing on, and some, including Alessia, were at times momentarily distraught by the idea of returning to Seynorynael and finding that nothing existed there any more.

However, Gerryls assured them that when they returned from the galaxies using the centipede holes, they also returned nearer to the moment in time that they had left, forming a closed time-like loop. What this meant was that when they returned home, Seynorynael would still exist, with only a relatively few years having passed, though the explorers would have experienced many thousands more years of real time on board Selesta.

Gerryls was more worried about the fact that Selesta's centipede hole-monitoring devices, which kept open the mouths of the centipede holes, had been fitted with a time-check beacon in order to preserve the past; Marankeil's technological barrier devices wouldn't allow them to return to a time before their natural lives began, or even to any time but that range within the specific perameters of their latest mission.

Marankeil was seemingly worried about someone controlling the gates through time—but why? The explorers had no intention of risking destroying the reality they knew by trying to break the strongest laws of time-travel.

* * * * *

Finally, the explorers reached the final stage of their journey: to explore the largest galaxy of the last galaxy group, a small, remote group of two large galaxies and several smaller ones. Somewhere in the largest galaxy was Marankeil's yellow star system of nine planets, where the explorers suspected Marankeil had found a great civilization that he wished to study.

However, the mission to galaxy group seven had always bothered Kiel. At first, back on Seynorynael, they had seen no way to reach galaxy group seven through the natural centipede holes without a long necessary trip through real space. Since they had learned to make new centipede holes, this problem had been solved, but still Kiel feared to leave a permanent way for Marankeil to reach the small galaxy group. He did not know what interested Marankeil there, but Kiel felt somehow that he had to protect this galaxy; his senses compelled him to try.

Kiel had finally decided it was time to make a stand. He wouldn't be disobeying orders, exactly, but he had a trick in mind that would make it hard for Marankeil to profit by their mission afterward.

Kiel knew that they could create a gate to galaxy group seven, and no other ship could follow them if Selesta didn't charge the monitoring device with antimatter to keep the mouth of centipede hole open.

Then again, if the string engine created a centipede hole from their current position and left it charged with exotic matter, the centipede hole gate would be permanent, stable long enough for the Federation to reach it from the centipede hole they had just emerged from and maintain the centipede hole gate.

And from the moment any centipede hole had been created, the future Federation could return through it to any moment in the past that the centipede hole had existed–even to the moment after Selesta had first emerged. Only a few times had the explorers encountered groups from the Federation that had used the centipede holes–the vessels that followed them were part of Marankeil's Fleet, hailing them to ensure that the explorers continued on their mission. Yet strangely, the fleet wouldn't respond to the explorers' transmitted questions, in particular whether or not the civilizations they had mapped had accepted the Federation's terms of cooperation.

The contacts did little to reassure the explorers and convinced many of them that something had happened in the Federation. But it also encouraged them to go ahead to galaxy group seven; they didn't want to remain in galaxy group six long enough for the Federation ships to follow them.

Then, before the explorers set the course for the distant galaxy, Alessia suggested that they look for an existing centipede hole that might take them near the galaxy but far enough to make the rest of the journey unattractive to the Federation.

Yes, Kiel thought. It would not exactly be disobeying orders...  
The logic of Alessia's suggestion that they find a pre-existing centipede hole had suddenly hit Kiel–the Federation would not wish to use an unstable, unmonitored natural centipede hole to follow them there–and they could explore galaxy seven freely.

Even if they had created a centipede hole and sealed it off, as they had done to those connecting dangerous systems, the very existence of an artificial centipede hole at any point in time could have been used by the Federation. An indirect natural centipede hole would make it more difficult for anyone who would follow them to reach the planet in an ordinary lifetime.

And if they traveled years to find the centipede hole, leaving it usable but connected only to a future outside the Federation's interest–well then, the centipede hole connecting galaxy group seven could be kept safe from Marankeil.

For the time being.

As it was, the Tiernan system they had just left was many years, even by centipede hole travel, from the heart of the Federation. No doubt Marankeil would even be pleased to learn how difficult it had been to reach the remote galaxy–it meant that nothing from there, least not whatever it was he seemed to fear, could reach him.

* * * * *

Years away from Tiernan, Hinev's explorers passed an uninhabited greenish-grey world in a white star-system when they discovered a natural centipede hole. Creating another centipede hole gate near the mouth of the natural microscopic gate, they made the jump back to Tiernan, establishing the link from Tiernan to this world so far into the future that no Federation ship would want to come here. Then from the Tiernan centipede hole Selesta again returned to the greenish-blue planet and prepared to enlarge the natural centipede hole gate.

The passage took them to a point outside galaxy group six and the Great Cluster, just outside a small galaxy in galaxy group seven, one of two nebular clouds of stars without a definite shape. Gerryls was able to plot their course and the creation of another centipede hole gate between their present position and just within an interior spiraling arm of the largest galaxy, where they had detected a yellow-star system that fit Marankeil's description.

However, it wasn't until they reached the system, when Gerryls began to make celestial observations of the neighboring universe that he realized what had happened. He could only guess that the natural centipede hole had been the cause, for Selesta had made a great jump into an unknown point in the far-distant future.

* * * * *

"Perhaps you're right, Gerryls. I shouldn't have gotten so upset." Kiel said, at the end of a long silence as the two headed to the bridge to join the others.

Gerryls turned to Kiel expectantly and waited pointedly for the younger man to extrapolate. Of course the others could hear them here, with their sensitive range in hearing; Gerryls could hear them on the bridge going on about various planetary vistas.

"If we hope to return from this section of galaxy group seven, we have to use the centipede holes to take us back into the past we left."

"Yes, we must go back in time, if it is possible," said Gerryls, "by using the centipede gates that allow journeys through time as well as space. Otherwise, Seynorynael might no longer exist when we return to her."

"It worries me, very much." Said Kiel. "I am always concerned lest something go wrong, but first we have our mission here, so I must try to put it out of my mind."

At that moment, the two of them reached the Selesta's bridge; the doors swished open, and they joined the others for a look at the planet they had traveled so far to find. Kiel looked up at the holo-monitor that had captivated his crew and felt an unexpected interest in it growing in him. Meanwhile, several small conversations were going on at once across the bridge.

"The third planet has only one moon." Dazar Kilran commented as the smaller grey, crater-pocked orb rolled into view. His voice brought the others out of their various discussions, and they returned to their analysis of the planet's composition, weather patterns, and ionosphere.

"A beautiful planet, with so much ocean." Kiel stood in the middle of the bridge, still absorbed by the sight of the blue-white globe. I will enjoy a terrestrial landing this time."

"Have a look at the analyzer," Kilran interrupted, pointing; Kiel's eye strayed to the statistics relayed from the planet below. Kiel nodded judiciously.

"Amazing," he agreed.

"You see it?" Kilran said.

"Having such large ice caps means that the planet is protected from runaway glaciation or greenhousing." Kiel noticed.

"I think that's the case. The weather patterns seem milder, no doubt because the planet is smaller and closer to its cooler yellow star than we are to Valeria." Kilran added.

"It is so beautiful. I wonder how far along any indigenous populations have developed, what the vegetation and animals are like, if there are any."

"Kiel likes this planet so much, we should name it after him," Lierva laughed. "If there isn't a name for it already, we'll call it Kiel3."

"We haven't received any artificial radio transmissions, but the bio-scanner reading is high." Kilran interjected. "Visuals from surface coming through."

The crew looked up at the holo-monitor, where the image of a wide green landscape appeared. They peered in wonder at a rocky escarpment covered in vegetation, unfamiliar but not dissimilar to some of Seynorynael's native species. A small stream trickled down the rock cliff, tumbling over smooth grey stones into a swift but narrow river in the wooded valley below; at its edge, a Giant Deer stooped to the crystal water to take a drink, stepping lightly, ever alert for a wandering predator. Low-lying, mist-enshrouded mountains rose behind the waterfall, where an agile, sand-colored creature watched from the shadows of a cave, its yellow eyes focused far below, two long tusk-like teeth protruding down from its mouth...

"Unbelievable!" Derstan whistled. "I've never seen any creature like that before. What does it do—rip its prey to shreds with those things?"

"Would you like to join the scout team?" Lierva asked, and Derstan nodded, to her surprise.

"All right–I'll be willing to go this time, if you'll promise to stop and let me take some holo-stills for the visual report collection." Derstan said.

"Now look what you've done," Lierva pointed an accusing finger at Kellar in mock vexation. "You've corrupted him." She and the others laughed. Alessia looked at her with a puzzled expression, but before Lierva could give her a telepathic explanation, Kiel provided one.

"Kellar found one of those ancient things while we were in training in Ariyalsynai," he laughed.

"No one else but Hinev had much use for them." Kellar shrugged elaborately, playing it up under all of the pleasant attention.

"Yes, I know," Alessia agreed, remembering. The others visibly remembered that she had been Hinev's assistant. "But I don't find the holo-stills primitive. I prefer them to the moving holo-picture frames. The stills allow you to capture a slice of time and hold it in your hand. The others give me the creeps, replaying short, captive image sequences in a frame. Like a broken musical recording, repeating itself."

"You see? She understands," Kellar said with a smile, turning to Kiel.

"Except Kellar kept taking stills all the time, until everyone was ready to strangle him with his holo-stilling unit," Kiel said, laughing. "It's been a long time since he went crazy with the thing, but Lierva's afraid he may have a disciple now."

"It has a purpose, and I enjoy it."

"Let him bring it along," sighed Lierva.

* * * * *

The scout party landed on the surface of the planet, many units south of the northern glaciers in the middle of a peninsular continent. After skimming over mist-shrouded mountains and high upland regions, wide stony rivers and verdant green forests, they came to a particularly beautiful area with many different biomes together: forests, grassy clearings, and river valleys.

From the air they had followed herds of exotic creatures–strange four-legged beasts with long ragged hair and horns, sleek hominoids with long manes and tails, delicate cloven-hoofed creatures with branching structures that grew from their heads. But after they had landed, most of the wildlife disappeared. Only the sound of exotic birdcalls rose above the roaring of a large waterfall near the landing site.

The team split up into groups on foot, three to each party. Each team was delegated a particular biome in which to collect seeds and the smaller vegetation samples unreachable by the android-controlled cargo shuttle that had followed them to retrieve the larger plant and animal specimens. If any of the explorers encountered difficulties, they were to signal the others telepathically. Provided nothing went wrong, they would meet again in three hours.

Alessia, Lierva, and Celekar headed in the direction of the densest foliage, away from the waterfall and wide, rock-bottomed pools. As Seynorynaelians they appreciated the beauty of this wild, untouched wilderness, though they tried to focus on the necessary collections. Still, as they passed through a clearing and over a field of yellow and pink wildflowers tossing in the chill breeze, they could not help but stop and enjoy the symphony of vivid colors across the field.

Alessia looked back and glanced over the rising mountains; great and lesser waterfalls and streams escaped from the snow-capped peaks, rushing into the wide, flat lake, streams now only a small crescent barely visible through the trees. Suddenly she heard a snarl and wrenched back around to Lierva and Celekar.

Near Alessia, Lierva had swerved around a large grass-covered boulder in their path, unknowingly disturbing a creature that rested in its shade to escape the heat of the noon-day sun. The explorers, accustomed to Valeria's brilliance, had not been affected by either the light or heat of the day and had not considered the habits of the local creatures.

The agile creature leapt from the shadows, two long tusk-like teeth protruding down from its mouth. It bellowed an angry snarl and glared at the intruders.

The explorers showed no fear. Lierva took a step forward fearlessly; her eyes never left the beast. Celekar and Alessia both stepped towards the creature.

Time to throw a wrench in his plans, Celekar said.

I can guess what plans, Lierva said to him quickly. Ripping us to pieces or making a meal of us. All of us, probably.

The three agreed this wasn't an acceptable scenario, then together telepathically plunged into the consciousness of the creature to soothe its anger.

The predator stopped in its tracks and blinked at them; at the same time, they imprinted their scents in its sense-memory as friend.

Lierva knelt before the great beast and let go of the creature's mind. Extending a hand to it, the giant carnivore bounded forward as though no more than a cub and sniffed her palm. Its great head lolled to the side as Lierva reached to scratch behind its ears. Then she stood next to the enormous animal and patted its head. She looked sadly at the creature before continuing ahead.

"You know you can't take him with you, Lierva," Celekar said, glancing at the creature that followed them playfully. "I think he's confused. The sense-memory connection we formed was too strong. He remembers us better than his own mother and siblings, but the bond seems to have made him think like a cub again. We'll have to weaken the imprint when we return this way."

"Yes, I suppose so," Lierva said and sent a message to the creature to stay in the meadow. They could not have the mammoth creature following them if they hoped to get any decent samples and animal specimens.

Three hours later, their containers full, the explorer teams rendezvoused at their landing site.

Vala, Filaria, and Onracey were waiting when Lierva's team arrived; Derstan, Kellar, and Talden's group arrived last, rushing excitedly back from the area just beyond the waterfall.

"Where are your specimens?" Lierva asked, seeing that their containers were empty. Kellar shook his head, as if dismissing the question.

"Just take a look at what we found." Kellar said, gesturing to Derstan, who raised a holo-still for the others to see, a broad smile on his face.

"Humanoids," Lierva said excitedly. In the three-dimensional still a group of small, short bipeds wearing fur and leather sat in a clearing by a cave in the cliff-side, oblivious to their silent observers. These long-haired humanoids, probably type L2ij according to their ruddy coloring and varied brown and flaxen hair, were seated on the plain, busy at their daily tasks of sewing and preparing a brown-skinned animal hide.

"Kiel will want to know about this," Lierva said excitedly, as Kellar shared his memories of how the group had chanced upon them, hearing a strange call echoing in the air, like the cry of a bird but one note, hollow and clear. The sound of a crude instrument fashioned by the natives. A single note, like the creatures' voices.

"They are strange," Lierva added, peering at the holo-still again. "Look, Celekar. Their skin tone is like sand or dark soil."

"Yes, yes, I can see them clearly, Lierva." Celekar muttered, seemingly unaffected.

"How primitive they must be—but they have invented tools." Alessia observed, reminding Lierva and Celekar to telepathically show the others their encounter with their long-toothed companion. Lierva nodded, and the others looked to Alessia and Celekar for a memory-explanation.

"You seem intrigued by that useless little holo-still," Derstan teased a moment later, as Lierva peered closer at the image of the humanoids. She stopped looking at it and bestowed a glare on him instead.

"All right," she conceded at length. "I guess the holo-still thing does have its merits," she added, then gave a deep laugh.

* * * * *

"I sense it too, Kiel. Some presence is here, something connected to us, to Seynorynael." Alessia said, interrupting Kiel's thoughts. He stood at the observation window alone, contemplating the view of the magnificent planet below and the news the scout team had brought concerning the discovery of humanoid life.

"How can you be certain?" he asked, betraying only small signs of doubt. "I thought I was the only one who thought this."

"They've been here." Alessia said, her voice low and grave.

"They?" he cocked an eye as though he knew whom "they" were, but he wasn't certain that she shared that knowledge.

"The first race Hinev speaks of."

"Yes. I feel it." He admitted. "I don't know how I sense it."

"I do, too."

"If only there were some evidence here to prove it, aside from the genetic evidence we've found." Kiel sighed, looking back to the view of the planet.

"Yes, I keep wishing for the same thing." Alessia agreed. "But they've been so careful never to leave anything substantial for us to find. Do you think they, the first race, are what Marankeil fears? That they're keeping the singularity of anti-matter here in secret, the one that is rumored to exist somewhere in the universe, something that could destroy Seynorynael?"

"I honestly don't know." Kiel said. "And I don't like to speculate, but of course we should keep our eyes open. Alessia–"

"Yes?"

"We all believe in Hinev's first race theory, but what was it in particular that made you think this world belonged to the first race? Feelings, senses, I know, I know. But describe them to me, please."

"Well, sir," Alessia replied formally, letting her eyes drift to the viewport, wondering all the while why Kiel, usually so analytical and reasoning, wanted to listen to her instinctive thoughts. "Gerryls was admitting that life could have found its way here through some kind of asteroid, an asteroid that contained amino acid cultures and building blocks. The amino acids match up with those found on other ancient asteroids we've found on other inhabited planets.

"Gerryls said that might be why we keep finding so many similar life forms across the galaxies, but of course there is a problem. Again, the odds of so many strands of evolution sharing the same pattern, out of countless possibilities, are by far a long shot."

"Gerryls was talking about his 'life cultures' again? Is that all?"

"No. I was looking at the planet, and it suddenly seemed like a giant greenhouse to me, as though seeds of life had been scattered across the galaxies, and each planet was a greenhouse that grew up from those seeds. I was thinking how Gerryls' talk of life cultures might make more sense to me if I imagined that someone had created and sent the seeds in the first place."

"And?"

"And, nothing grows without care, unless it is wild. And even then, even a wild creature must be maintained by forces beyond its control, as everything in this universe touches everything else. Then there is the fact that I can't believe in wide scale parallel evolution, or write off any evidence my eyes bring to me as monumental coincidence. So, I realized–the first race that brought life here would have come back to tend this planet at some point."

"Perhaps. That isn't why, though, is it?"

"Why what?"

"Why both of us feel their presence lingering here. Maybe there is something to intuition, I don't know, but for some time I've believed that for all we think we know, we Seynorynaelians truly know very little. Most of us subsist on the legacy of a few great geniuses, but that's not really what I mean. I think we keep searching for something we'll never find because we can't face what we are, not knowing. It's only vanity when we talk of searching for our past or our true nature, because we haven't really advanced that far from our origins. Yet we have to try. The same unanswered questions about the origins and purpose of life keep us searching. They've haunted our race since human life began."

"True enough."

"Yet somehow the tranquillity we find here and there–the solace that comes through work, love, and living life—well, we remain ignorant of the grand purpose in some ways, but does it matter? How much can we really come to know in the future?"

"Hmmm, I see your point."

"Sometimes I think that's why I prefer the wild to civilization. It's comforting to live every day with a free heart and spirit in these primitive ways, so that you aren't always wondering what life holds for us as a species, and all of the species of life in the universe."

"I never would have guessed you felt this way, Kiel." Alessia said.

"I feel as though there are times when I wish I had lived another life, but I can't regret what I have known, and that we are here to do something important for our planet. But there are times when I have longed to give up and remain on one of the worlds we encountered."

"Cerdko isn't the only one then," Alessia said.

Kiel turned to regard her, a spark of recognition and comprehension lighting his eyes.

"I know what you mean. I've sensed it, too. There have been times when each one of us has thought about rebellion. Times when we wanted to put aside our wanderings, not just me, but others. I would never relinquish my duty as head of the explorers or let anyone down voluntarily, but I am admitting to you know what temptations I have felt. I'm not sure why, but I am."

"Kiel–" Alessia said. "We have all been through a lot of years of experience that tears us apart. I have to suppress so many years of memories just to be all right. The pain, the joy that is gone—from years of encounters, I know you understand."

He looked at her.

"Marankeil's orders are for us to search for the singularity on this planet." Kiel said. "But I also want to look for evidence of the 'first race' and to see if anything remains of their influence that we can isolate for study. I mean to land Selesta in the middle of the the main continent."

"Why? Why land?"

"Don't worry, no one on this world will ever know that we were here."

* * * * *

"How can we fulfill our mission here?" Kilran asked, once the explorers had reassembled for Kiel's orders on the bridge. "Marankeil's guideline instructs us to remain on Kiel3 until we find something unusual–an ultra-dense artificial object that emits gravitational waves, or anything similar to his description. But for some reason, he expected us to find an advanced civilization here, then scout around a bit further, and then pretty much cut back home. Shouldn't we just leave now and continue on to that white star? It's clear that we haven't found anything like what he thought was here."

Kiel shook his head. "Our orders are clear. Until we find some trace of the object, or until it is clear that none such object exists, we'll just have to remain near this world and document all that we learn for the Seynorynaelian Federation."

"But that should take less than one revolution." Broah protested.

"You don't know that." Ioka reminded her.

"What is the point of lingering here? I say we go home," said Broah.

"I have an idea, but I need all of your approval." Kiel began. The others stilled to listen.

"An idea? This should be enlightening," Celekar said, folding his arms across his chest.

"We're going to use Hinev's mixtures to blend semi-permanently into the inhabitants again." Kiel said firmly.

"Why bother?" Kellar cocked an eyebrow. "If we disguise ourselves with the power of the "cloak", they won't notice us."

"They might, if we use our powers," said Kiel."

"Well, what is your idea?" Kellar said, smiling as he picked up on Kiel's conspiratorial mood. "I haven't been on a terrestrial foray in centuries."

"Of course, Hinev's mixtures won't dissemble our height and slightly different facial structure," Gerryls commented, drawing eyes that had begun to register the possibilities of a long surface recon.  
"Then attempt temporary genetic structure alteration." Kiel countered. "Or, we can cover ourselves with fur cloaks when we travel on foot."

"On foot? I am glad I'm not going down there." Gerryls said. "And yes, we could still use our powers without worrying about disrupting the cloak if we prepare Hinev's mixtures. But what do you have in mind?" Gerryls asked, managing to sound uninterested.

"We're going to live among the natives while we're here." Kiel said. "For as long as we have to. We are going to teach them how to live better lives."

"What are you talking about, Kiel?" Lierva said, upset. "We can't interfere with the indigenous life on any undeveloped world. It's not our place to do anything for them—to change them in any way."

"We don't have an inexhaustible supply of Hinev's mixtures, either," Gerryls commented in a mild tone.

"I thought of a problem. It may be dangerous to absorb so many memories and habits so deeply by mindlinks, if we couldn't shed the new patterns in the course of time." Kiel said.

"Yes, I am getting rather tired and actually overloaded with information in my brain that shouldn't be there." Said Lierva.

"I understand." Said Kiel. "However, I feel that if we try, we may be able to gradually introduce some technological advances that will help this species of humanoid in their development. If we guide them, they will pass on the knowledge they have learned to future generations."

"But why, Kiel? What is the point? Why should we risk a contact that may harm them?" Lierva insisted. "Why invest the time and effort for this particular race?" She demanded.

"Marankeil has taken a great interest in this world." Kiel replied. "I don't know why or what may come of it, but these people are humanoids, like we were many thousands of years ago."

"It doesn't mean we owe them a thing—in fact, we owe them their own autonomy and to leave here without changing a thing." Peilann interrupted.

"Yes, Hinev let's leave them alone," Derstan added.

"You may be right," admitted Kiel, "but Marankeil would eliminate them before they had a chance to grow and develop if he wanted to steal something from their world." Kiel insisted.

"Or if he desired to send a Federation colony here." Gerryls nodded, agreeing with him.

"I honestly don't know why, but I feel that they should have as much of a chance to evolve, to develop a civilization as any of the peoples of the Great Cluster." Kiel said quietly. "Anyway, how much time does it take for some of the simplest innovations to be discovered?" He continued. "I'm not suggesting we teach them anything beyond what they would naturally discover in time. But since we've been ordered to stay here and find this thing Marankeil wants, which might take from now until the supercontinent plates drift to the other side of the planet and form a whole again, we might as well do what we can to help the native population."

"What does 'help' entirely mean?" asked Peilann.

"It means we help them along towards the path to knowledge. Teach them what they might need to know, and be there to encourage their ideas."

"I don't agree with you, but I'll still support you." Kellar said gravely, nodding.

"I don't know what to think about this, but I will also do as you want." Alessia said, surprising Lierva—and herself. "When we give our report, who's to say that Marankeil won't send others here to plunder this world if he can't do it directly?"

"It's clear that Marankeil is searching for something valuable to be found on this world." Kiel said. "And he isn't in the habit of making his wishes clear until he has no other choice–he wouldn't have let us even know of his interest if it hadn't been necessary to make us search for him. Yet he won't tell us exactly what he wants–maybe he believes our knowledge would jeopardize his sole possession of whatever prize is buried here."

"So now our last mission begins," said Kellar.

* * * * *

As it turned out, of all the explorers, only Kellar remained aboard ship to monitor the planet during the first interlude on the surface. Gerryls had designed them all appropriate clothing to match that which was being worn by the humanoids living in the area near the wide river they had found, but instead of heading directly for them, Hinev's explorers set up their own camp by the water, hoping for a random encounter.

Kiel had decided that it was unlikely a group of humans would simply approach each other in such great numbers, not least to ask if they might join their camp and observe them. Kiel was going to have to orchestrate careful contact, in case the humanoids decided to become violent and defend their territory.

From the memories Kellar's scout group had absorbed telepathically, the team set to work to duplicate the inhabitants' daily patterns of fishing, hunting, making tools and clothing, and cooking and preserving meat and other foods.

Twelve rotations of the planet passed when the first human being accidentally burst into their camp.

Alessia, Lierva, Broah, Ioka, Filaria, Peilann, Mindra, and Vala were sitting by the river bank around a grounded fire, cleaning and cooking the fish that Kiel, Onracey, Gerryls, Wen-eil, and Celekar had caught. The five men had gone further downstream to a narrow meander, leaving the women on the banks beside the camp.

"I have to admit," Lierva laughed suddenly, interrupting the silent activity, "that I enjoy this."

Vala looked up at her, her eyes dubious, but only to tease her. She didn't admit it, but she also found the work a refreshing change, though in some way it was just like cataloging dead specimens in her lab. The present environment had a lot to do with her difference in attitude, she supposed.

"You mean you enjoy it here? But Lierva, you hate to sit longer than a moment, and you fidget with anything put in your hands."

"I showed patience enough to make those spears Celekar used this morning." Lierva rejoined. "Besides, what I meant was–it's somehow easier to be at peace here. The rushing river makes such a beautiful song, with the breezes in the forest leaves and those pretty birds that fly, who sing so enthusiastically each morning."

Suddenly they heard a loud cry of a human being under the forest canopy. A man in a fur and leather outfit stumbled from the trees moments later, aiming his spear at his invisible assailant. A large gash on his thigh dripped blood onto the ground, and he limped back several feet, unaware of his audience.

The grunts of some wild creature that had attacked him diminished, and satisfied that he had driven the creature away, the man fell to the ground.

The group of women rushed towards him, ignoring the stench of his unwashed, sweat-soaked clothes. Oblivious to the sensitivities of civilized people, the man turned his head around at the sound, suddenly alert again. He held up his spear as if to strike, concerned that they meant him harm. But he couldn't kill all of them even if he tried. And something in their eyes–the looks of concern–assured him that they were not hostile.

He allowed them to surround him and examine his thigh. One of the women nodded to the other, and the two of them helped him to his feet with amazing strength. One of the others then surprised him by addressing him in his own language.

"We'll take you back to our camp, if you'll let us. Your wound is deep, and requires immediate attention." He nodded, letting the two women lift him under the arms with their tall shoulders and help him towards the fires of a small camp that had never been in this part of the land before.

* * * * *

By the time the man Deloch's wound had been tended, he had seen enough of the camp's activities to be certain that they were some of his own people. He didn't know where their group had come from or why they hadn't been encountered before, but their manner, speech, and ways were as familiar to him as those of his own home. The women who tended him applied a poultice that smelled of the same solution of palliatives his own camp's healer used.

He could of course have no comprehension of the reality that Alessia's bandage also contained some powerful Seynorynaelian medicine, medicine that would heal his skin quickly and minimize the scarring.

After three days, Deloch wished to return to his own camp, but he extended a welcome for them to visit the group in which his father was leader. His father would want to thank the people that had saved his son. The men had been on a small hunting party when they were caught off guard by three wild durvig. They had been separated, and Deloch had been pursued by one of the irate creatures for some distance until he turned to make a stand against the beast. He knew that his camp couldn't have found him so far from the hunting group and wouldn't have known in what direction he had gone. Perhaps Eleg had already mourned the death of his son.

During the three days, Deloch had found certain things about the explorers' camp puzzling: for one, there were no children, but most of the group were young men and women, equally divided. For another thing, only a few had apparently become life-pairs. Deloch began to wonder if the camp were as young as its leader. Perhaps the younger members of a camp had split off from the older to start their own camp. That explained why they had not yet formed life-pairs, and why they had suddenly appeared in the area. They must have just journeyed into this land.

Deloch began to wonder if the woman Ales who tended him would consider leaving her camp to become his life-partner. As son of his camp's leader, any woman of his own camp would be honored to join with him. Ales was tall and beautiful, skilled, and dependably strong, like the other women in this strange tribe. Her clear blue eyes were as deep, expressive, and moving as the river itself. Her children would be strong, he realized and smiled at her, forming brief ideas of their future life together.

Alessia smiled back at him and excused herself to go get some water. But on her way, she stopped to speak with Kiel and Gerryls, who were busy making awls and crude knives.

Kiel nodded his understanding moments later as Alessia left to return to Deloch.

They had not anticipated some of the complications contact had brought. The explorers could not remain among them, nor have children, and the lack of the latter would certainly raise questions. Alessia was right. They couldn't remain among these people for very long, but they had learned from their first mistakes. They would have to live as nomads on this planet.

* * * * *

A small group of ten explorers were invited to accompany Deloch on his return home. Alessia, Kiel, Gerryls, Celekar, Ioka, Talden, Derstan, and the others joined the young hunter as he led them by the river many miles to a small camp under the cliff side, on a high grassy bank above the water.

The explorers were given a feast to thank them for their assistance, and the men were invited on several hunting expeditions. Upon seeing Deloch's remarkable recovery, Madís, the healer of his camp, fell into several discussions with the woman Ales and the man Gerr on the subject of healing and medicine. But their beliefs of the cause of disease and infection shocked her. Of course she knew there were small, evil demons in the air and within the body that attacked and caused disease and death, but how did cauterizing wounds or boiling water make any difference to anyone? Such odd magic ritual, she thought. Still, a woman familiar with the concept of trial and error, Madís did not discard their other suggestions lightly.

Kiel and Celekar showed Deloch's people how they might improve their art of tool making, how to fashion awls, even how to make hunting weapons out of obsidian, a natural volcanic glass that fashioned blades much sharper than worked flint. In the evenings, Vala recounted fearsome stories she had learned, of ancient deeds in the lands of Seynorynael.

Deloch's people accepted the explorers as a member tribe after a full cycle of the moon, but the explorers reluctantly declined the offer to join their camp. They were on a long journey and could not rest–despite their explanation, Deloch's people grasped to understand them, but in the end couldn't. Game was plenty and with the increased numbers the camp might protect itself from its northern neighbors. But when nothing could dissuade Kiel, the natives and the strange young tribe wished each other farewell.

"It's touching," Talden whispered to Alessia as they departed, as though the sense of this had suddenly stuck him deeply. "They're sincerely sad to see us leave."

"Yes, they are," Alessia agreed.

"Though they would kill another tribe of their own race, they accepted us as brothers."

"Only because we deceived them and saved the life of one of their own." Alessia rejoined quietly.

"Yes, but what choice do we have?" Vala added, joining the conversation.

"Ales!" One of the natives called, interrupting. They turned to see Deloch running towards them, something small swinging on a cord in his hand. With a smile, Deloch gave the pendant to Alessia, a beautiful piece of primitive craftsmanship made of polished stones, with a tear-shaped amber centerpiece. Then he turned aside and returned to the camp of his people.

The explorers knew that the gift was valuable to Deloch's people, who believed that the electrical properties of the amber were magical; distracted, Alessia turned it over several times in her hand.

"You can respect them." Kiel said as they turned away for the last time. "They're a strong race, but–"

"No match for any technologically advanced civilization." Derstan finished.

"Yes," Kiel nodded, his eyes hardening. "But I won't let Marankeil conquer these people, or turn this planet into a colony. Into one of our colonies."

"Kiel–" Vala protested, surprised. "How do you know what Marankeil has planned for this world?"

"I don't," he replied, "but something tells me I won't like it when we do find out."

"We can't disobey our orders, no matter how we feel about them personally." Derstan reminded him firmly.

"Yes, of course," Kiel's voice had a hard edge to it, suddenly, strangely. "But it wouldn't be against any of our orders to arm these people with what knowledge we can give them–while we're searching for Marankeil's singularity."

"No, it certainly wouldn't." Vala agreed. "We'd be gathering data all the while, and–and if it helps this population to maintain their freedom someday, I have a feeling you wouldn't regret our part in that." She abruptly turned to Kiel.

"You know me too well." Kiel admitted.
Who, my friends, is superior to death?

Only the gods live forever under the sun.

As for mankind, numbered are their days;

Whatever they achieve is but the wind!

–The Epic of Gilgamesh, 2000 B.C.

Chapter Twelve

The scorching desert sun directly overhead bleached the colors from the dry salty air, washing out the blue sky around the village. Alessia sat on the ground with her legs before her, leaning against a stall made of lashed reeds in a small farming and trading community near the wide river, where keelless papyrus rafts drifted in the nearby waters far ahead down the road.

The sand itched under her homespun robe, but she took little notice; she kept her head bent low, listening to the far off call of birds and the low drone of the merchants selling their wares around her. An elderly man sitting on a mat under the shade, a wise man and tutor who had once lived in the nearby palace of the per-ao, was telling his usual stories of the kings and of far away places to a group of children who had gathered at his feet, when suddenly one of the children asked where the great sages had come from.

"They came from a far off land to the west, where ships of long ago once sailed before our people lost the knowledge of ancient days. Past the mouth of the Great Green our traders went then, to the great island of Atlantis."

Alessia straightened to listen.

"But didn't our ships fall over the edge of the sea?" one of the children asked.

"No, the island lay near the edge of the world." The wise man Khnum replied, showing dark teeth.

"Why don't we go there anymore?"

"I'm afraid we can't, my son." Khnum explained. "We've lost the ships of the first sages."

"Where is the great island, Khnum?" another boy asked, wide-eyed.

"Atlantis, my son, is no more." Khnum replied gravely. "The island sank many generations ago, but Atum, Nut, and Shu saved some of its sages, who escaped and came here.'

"When, Khnum?"

"Well, let me see now." The wise man scratched his greasy scalp. "If I can recall the time correctly, it was... in the time of..."

"A little more than five thousand years ago." A fluid voice interrupted them.

The grey-bearded man and his group of children turned around to the neighboring stall, towards the owner of the voice, where a robe-clad stranger sat, whether man or woman they could not tell, for the owner wore an outlandish head covering made of dark linen that hid the stranger's face in shadow. Two bright, hypnotic, sapphire-colored eyes drew attention away from the dark, dusty face that seemed not unlike one of their own.

"Yes, five thousand years." Khnum said slowly, a look of suspicion and intrigue passing over his face. "Who are you? How do you know that? Are you a sage?" The man asked, noticing the fine quality of the stranger's garment; though dirty and torn, it had been made of exquisite, foreign linen.

"No, not exactly a sage, but I do know of Atlantis."

Should you really be telling them about it, though, Alessia? A mirthful voice interrupted her thoughts.

"Kellar!" Alessia smiled, lapsing into Seynorynaelian. The group of children before her stared at her as though struck mute. She threw aside her outer garment, letting out a tumble of long, dark, grey-streaked hair. "What are you doing here?" Alessia called out, then ran towards the figure across the market place, a nearly bald nobleman wearing a fine white garment clasped by a scarab at his shoulder.

"What are any of us doing here?" He returned, speaking in the native language of the area.

"I meant that it is good to see you," Alessia said, ignoring the critical glances coming from the merchants and farming traders around them.

She had seen no trace of him in years, not since the last time the explorers had all lived briefly together in the young city of Eridu more than a thousand years earlier. There the explorers had lived more than a year, establishing their own tents and trading collected goods in the rough market place, growing their own crops.

She remembered how Kellar and Celekar had built a wagon of stone wheels for the barley harvest near year's end, a wagon that was adopted by the local population. One of the neighboring farmers, an elderly man who had given the explorers some seed, begged their assistance and that of their strange plow in his harvest once they had finished.

However, the explorer's unusual habits had soon called undue attention to them. Though Kiel had devised false attachments between them, after a year they had no children; moreover, the strong alliance among fifteen apparently unrelated young couples equally struck the Eridu population as peculiar.

After a year and a half, Kiel decided it was time to leave the population and move to the southern continent. After Eridu, however, the explorers had separated and traveled among different the humanoid populations, some going to the areas nearby, others heading over the ocean. Their rapport had been the subject of suspicion, so from that time on, they had again forged on.

And from there, each had made his own plans to modify and guide another chosen culture or cultures for patronage as he might, until they were called together again at the next rendezvous; if the singularity and/or evidence of the 'first race' hadn't yet been found, there they would make a decision either to leave or continue the search.

Kellar had been seen heading northeast as they separated from Eridu. Alessia had heard no news of him in all the time since, and though the next rendezvous approached, it was still a few years away.

"Well, Alessia, it's good to see you, too." Kellar admitted, looking her over. "Age suits you, you know."

She broke into laughter, seeing his point, then let the artificial veil of Hinev's cloak fade somewhat; the aging features of the woman known as Naunet, a leathery, dark-skinned woman with grey-streaked hair grew youthful before his eyes.

"This is as much as I'll do, in front of all these people, these remet en Kemet," she shrugged.

"Actually, I'm looking for a man named Shatrevar," he admitted, suddenly seeming distracted. "A murdering deloch of a man. I've been searching for him for the past few years."

"Can I help you to find him?" She asked, ignoring the whispers across the market place; just who was the female magician speaking with the noble Khaldun?

Now Kellar strained to form a smile. "No, this is something I've got to do on my own. And I'll find him. And when I do, he will pay the price for the life of someone I once held very dear. I have sworn to find him."

"Kellar–" she began, sensing the vein of fury behind his smiling eyes.

"No, Alessia. I won't rest until I do find him. He got away from me once, but only once." Kellar's voice was hard.

"You're not staying here, then."

"No, not even though you're here, my dear."

"Don't worry about sparing my feelings," she gave a thin laugh. "I'm leaving soon myself."

"Alessia–"

"Yes?"

Kellar paused, perhaps thinking of Kiel's orders, lifetimes ago. "Don't think badly of me for what I'm doing. Shatrevar may not have the power to defend himself on equal terms with me, but then neither did Chione."

"Your wife?" Alessia guessed.

Kellar nodded. "For a time."

"I understand what you're doing, Kellar." Alessia said gravely. "And believe me, I have no intentions of standing in the way of justice."

"No, Alessia." Kellar sighed tiredly. "This is revenge, not justice. I know it, but I don't care. Not after what happened. And I won't let anyone stop me, not even you."

"I heard of a Shatrevar to the northeast of here, in a kingdom on the road to the northern Silver Mountains along the Great Green. Head North from old Jericho and then follow the coastline until it turns West." Alessia directed, searching her memory. "It may not be the same man–"

"Thank you, Alessia." Kellar nodded. "Take care of yourself." He said, embracing her once, with ancient feeling now subdued but of such depth that she sensed it was still there, underlying his present state of mind. Then he turned and marched away down the road, away from the sea.

And you, my friend. She thought after him, watching until he was lost in the dust.

* * * * *

After a few years living in the city of Jarmo, Alessia traveled south to the territories between the north-south Rivers Buranun and Idigna, where the Unsanni and Akkadu people lived on the plain of Edin. In Edin, "the open country:, there were two main kingdoms: Ki-engi in the south and the land of Ki-uri in the north. They lived in a handful of farming communities and city-states mostly situated along the changing banks of the western river, Buranun, or Purattu in the language of the nomadic tribes, the Akkadu. Fewer communities thrived along the swifter eastern river of Idigna, which the nomads called Idiqlat.

Alessia had passed through the territory last six hundred years ago before heading northeast to the tin mountains and the inland sea and then to the wide plains beyond. After a brief return to Selesta and a visit to the two continents over the great ocean, she had returned to the arid center of flourishing cultures, where the Ki-engi and Ki-uri people worshipped half-human, half-sea creature gods who had, legend said, given the people agriculture, metalworking, and most recently, writing.

It was near the new city of Kish that Alessia found Ioka and In-nekel traveling among a nomadic tribe of southbound traders, or so she surmised judging from the wagons of fine multi-colored pottery, glass, and blue faience jewelry from Kemet, unworked ivory, copper, and obsidian bowls they brought with them. Ioka and In-nekel had met them on their southward journey, and the strangers had spoken their own language and understood their culture so well that they allowed them to be accepted among them.

The nomads surrounded Alessia by a well in the desert and made ready to attack her; sensing her presence, In-nekel and Ioka had hurried from the rear of the company towards her, but not in time to prevent one of the tribe's warrior's spears from being hurled at her, where it pierced the homespun cloth and cut into her shoulder.

Ioka screamed, alerting the leader, Egal, who came forward to observe as In-nekel explained that Alessia was one of their people. Ioka knelt beside her; Alessia wasn't in pain, but the attack had surprised her. Without a word, she pulled the shaft from her shoulder. Without bleeding, the wound began to close on its own, forcing the small spear-head from her skin to fall on the hard ground by the well and roll to the edge.

The nomads stared in open wonder at the woman who had healed miraculously before their eyes; those that had doubted it before were now convinced that the new friends who walked among them were gods, and that the woman they had attacked was also a deity.

The man who had thrown the spear stepped back in fear, and several of the men around him moved away from him. The women at the back of the train watched in silence as the men were pushed back by the fear of the two creatures that embraced by the well.

"Inanna..." the man's voice trailed off, as he caught sight of the pendant of a gold lion that dangled from her throat. "Inanna!

She had forgotten to hide it again, the gold amulet she had born with her since the destruction of the sunken volcanic island, the amulet that seemed to convey the names Inanna and Ishtar to the minds of the people of this region. Yet what were these people, so finely dressed, doing out in the desert? Alessia wondered. Seldom did the Sag-giga people of Ki-engi travel in nomadic groups as the people of Ki-uri did. Alessia reached to their minds for an explanation.

They were nomads, nag-gar artisans, sab-gal herdsmen, mostly kinsmen and others of the house of an influential but petty ruler who had traveled north to check his new holdings in the region of Subartu to the far north. After a recent accident, the nomads in his train now believed Ioka to be an incarnation of a goddess. Her physical strength alone had convinced the men that she was not a human woman as much as her odd beauty and unfeminine self-assurance, her intelligence, her skill at hunting, and her strong will. As for In-nekel, the nomads had first called him "apkallu", making him one of the seven immortal sages.

Ioka had become a favorite story-teller among the nomads, retelling Kilkoran legends she had learned in her childhood, using the nomads' language. Her extensive background in Seynorynaelian culture helped her reconstruct tales from the seven regions of their home world.

In-nekel had become a favorite of the nomads' middle-aged leader, Egal, whose own grown son had been killed in a dispute with a nomadic tribe of Amurrû from Martu, to the west. In-nekel had been teaching the nomads how to improve the metal alloys they had begun to develop. Now, more and more, the leader Egal's young son Mes-anni-padda had begun to follow In-nekel with the admiring eyes of a student and to imitate every least thing In-nekel did.

"Alessia, oh, it's so good to see you." Ioka found herself speaking Seynorynaelian, perhaps overcome by surprise at the chance meeting. She spoke with an odd sensitivity; they had not seen each other in several centuries. "Where have your journeys taken you?" She asked, compressing her lips to subdue a smile. The nomadic tribe looked on, listening to the unaccustomed music of three voice-boxes in awe and confusion, sure that what they all heard was the tongue of the gods. Several of the train covered their ears, but others stood, entranced by the sound, their eyes wide.

"I went to the north, to the far west, and then to the lands on the other side of the planet." Alessia replied, trying hard not to let the nomads' gazes distract her attention. 'Some time ago I returned to the joining of the three continents." She explained. "Uruk has grown since the flood."

Ioka nodded. "Yes, it seems that the people of Ziusudra have recovered from the deluge. In-nekel and I have been in the lands to the south, as far as on the tip of the great continent of the Punt. We encountered the animals Gerryls is so taken with–the families of clawed hunters. One of them tried to eat In-nekel! Then the animals with stripes and long necks..."

"I went to the last remnant of the great island to pick up some specimens with Gerryls and Ri-ari after the last rendezvous–"

"Alessia," Ioka said slowly and shook her head, letting a wistful expression pass over her face. "Remember the hot springs of Eria? I often think about them out here in this desert, in these violent times. But that was a long time ago, wasn't it? This race seems to rise and adapt civilizations rapidly only to fall backward into ignorance and barbarism again. It's frustrating, but we have to be patient. Civilization is a slow experiment, like evolution, and eventually the strongest takes hold. Alessia–"

"Yes?"

"I'm sorry. I can see I reminded you of Diraovedas."

"I assure you I'm fine."

"Alessia, you couldn't keep him alive any longer. It was his time."

"I am aware of that, Ioka." Alessia said quietly. "I came to terms with that a long time ago." She shrugged away sentiment, here on the plain, under the bright desert sun. The best way to honor Diraovedas was to remember him well. "But I doubt he would have accepted the gift of eternal life, even if I had been disposed to break Hinev's decree not to use our blood to immortalize other beings and offer it to him." She added, betraying a fond smile. Even back then, even before his sudden death, she had never even considered risking his life by offering him the thin hope of immortality their blood serum promised.

Diraovedas hadn't even let her restore his sight. She still remembered his face, the beaten nose, the dark, dark hair like two crow's wings, the sightless, staring eyes over crooked eyebrows, eyes long ago blinded by fire; his face had never been handsome or noble-looking, but it had become handsome to her. Diraovedas, slight-boned but fast, fast like a shadow, seer and sage, historian of his people, had been far more noble a man than she had ever thought could exist. Blind though he was, he–his knowledge–had led his people through the wilds when the world fell into another dark age. Diraovedas, a true hero in a world that didn't yet understand what the word meant, had died well more than five thousand years ago.

"Well, I am surprised you went back to the rendezvous." Ioka said in a sober tone. "In-nekel and I missed it. It's been so long since we've seen you, or Kiel."

"He wasn't there."

"No? Well, I can't say I'm surprised about that. The moment we're all together again, there is always talk of leaving this planet..." she said, hesitant.

"You almost sound like you don't want to leave."

"I don't," Ioka laughed. "Oh, I know most of the women have a difficult life on this world, and I know we aren't supposed to interfere with any native customs or beliefs, or even in their wars against each other, but I'm not subject to their laws, so I don't suffer under them. Whenever I want to leave, I know I can. And I have the power to alter my appearance to suit my mood, to change my life here whenever I want. And if I resent the way I'm treated as a woman, I can even present myself as a man–creator above, I can transform my chemical structure, make myself a man temporarily if I want!

But I don't have to fear starvation or pain, or death at the hands of conquerors, priests and their barbaric sacrificial religious rites, or at toil in the field. I'm only here to try to make a difference when I can–and I think we have, Alessia. We've helped those we could. We've healed them and we've tilled their fields to yield grain for their food. After a while, it–well it becomes hard to stop trying to help, to make yourself want to stop. This philanthropic lifestyle, this slow alteration of civilization for the better of all–it becomes almost an addiction to stay involved in the process. Of course, In-nekel and I did try to make it to the rendezvous, but...and after the last big battle between Kilran, Talden, and Cerdko and Sharratu—I mean Sar-a–"

"You don't need to make an excuse to me, remember?" Alessia winked. "I try not to think about the few times when we explorers have fought here. I tried not to take sides, either. It can't be permitted for us to fight each other."

"So, whose turn is it to take care of the home fires?" Ioka asked abruptly.

"Vala stayed on Selesta this time for the analysis." Alessia explained. "She said Gerryls and I should return to the surface, to give him time away from that laboratory of his. We stayed together a short while, but then I've been wandering ever since we parted ways. You two are the first explorers I've seen in four hundred years."

"Well, then there is a lot you don't know, then," Ioka said. "In-nekel and I met Jir-end and Peilann more than a century ago on the southern continent across the ocean, then we encountered Broah and Derstan, Wen-eil, and Nal-ayn only twelve revolutions ago, near the great delta, in Saqqara.

"Nal-ayn's stirring up trouble you know, with her talk of building monuments in the sands, giant statues of sphikayas and delochs of Seynorynael for the per-ao! There have been a lot of arguments and battles between our faction and Cerdko's friends I don't even know about, I gathered from Nal-ayn. Anyway, we stayed with Nal-ayn and Wen-eil a year before traveling on northward to Martu, where someone got the idea we were some kind of watchers–then we came here."

"The great delta of the river Iteru aa isn't very far from here." Alessia said, mentally calculating the distance. "I spent a considerable time there. I'm surprised I didn't meet anyone." She was beginning to wonder how many of her fellow crew had deliberately disguised themselves to avoid meeting up with other explorers.

"Yes, the journey wouldn't be far, but not if you travel with nomads from Ki-uri." Ioka laughed. "It's taken us months just to get from Mosul back to Ki-engi. We left them outside Babil and joined these people heading south, though I doubt they're traveling much faster." Ioka turned around as In-nekel appeared and tapped her shoulder.

"We won't be able to stay with them as far south as Ur," he said and shook his head. "They still believe we're gods, or sages. I tried to convince them that we aren't deities, but they don't believe me. They think we joined them to set them on some divine path, to reveal their destiny to them, to tell them about the visible world around them and the shadow world and of abzu and how they can best serve our needs so that we will in turn protect them..."

"Oh no," Ioka said, genuinely frustrated. "We must make them forget, eventually. Honestly, Kiel should never have allowed us to come back here after the Flood. But In-nekel has some strange fascination with their buildings. He likes helping them to build their temples."

"I remember the first buildings, round reed and mud huts. Even baked clay. They are improving."

"I miss trees in all of this mud! I miss the forests. I may head north-west soon. I should be going, anyway." Alessia shrugged.

"Actually, if you want to stay with us a while, Alessia, the leader welcomes you." Inn-nekel broke in. "He thinks he can bring us back to his city. He thinks his people will rise to power over Ki-engi if the powers of three gods are with them," In-nekel shrugged. "To tell the truth, though, I think it would be best it we all parted from the nomads and dull the memories in their minds of our intrusion. But, I was beginning to enjoy their hospitality," he added, half-wistful.

"What he means is that he'll miss little Mesanni over there." Ioka said. "Just like the boy Meskiag-gaseir. So far In-nekel and I have been fortunate as to live undiscovered for several years in each place we've lived together. We even stayed long enough to foster a child in Uruk once. Then as usual something happens to disrupt the cloak on one of us–"

"What about Hinev's–"

"We ran out of Hinev's mixtures a while back, and as you know we haven't been back to Selesta in a while to pick up more. Anyway, somehow our friends and foster children discover who we are, and we eventually have to move to another city. You know, I just can't understand how, all this time, none of us has had any children of our own. I never cared about it before, and to tell you the truth, I find that strange, that here, of all places, I wished for something I never wanted before. It's true we can foster children and love them, but I can't help but wonder why the serum in our veins prevents us having children of our own." Ioka shrugged.

"It's hard to remember our former lives while we're here. Even Seynorynael seems so distant in my memory, here in the heat. But the desert sun–the people call it blinding, but In-nekel and I are at home in it. I have almost forgotten our own home, though, in all these years."

"How long have you been traveling alone, Alessia?" In-nekel asked suddenly.

Alessia paused, as though pondering an answer.

"Too long." She replied after a moment. "Before I went to the island I traveled a while with Lierva and Celekar to the lands on the other side of the ocean."

"Well, stay with us a day or two. Then you can decide."

* * * * *

I've come to stop this madness, Kellar. You have to stop. Now.

The man in the crude brick temple turned about, his iron sword swinging at his side like a pendulum around his thigh. As the sun set outside, the torches within the temple began to color the brick walls with an orange light.

Kiel. Friend, I cannot. I will not.

Then you force me to stop you.

The guards heard nothing but watched the ragged stranger who had suddenly appeared step forward into the temple. They did not stop to wonder why he was there or to question him. Instead, they drew their swords and stepped forward to protect their leader. Then suddenly, a faint ghostly light illuminated from the creature before them, growing to a blue flame. The man that stepped forward from the bright sphere was no human; a remnant of the light followed him, surrounding him, while the bright sphere dissipated into the air.

In a panic, the guards grasped at their swords frenetically, then circled around their leader to fend off the unnatural creature who approached.

The stranger's silver clad arm flicked towards them. There was no sound, but a blast of compressed air suddenly struck them and threw them back against the walls, hard enough to knock them all but senseless.

I came here to stop you, Kellar, before it is too late. Kiel thought, in a voice that was steady as stone, yet with a hint of regret that he had to do what he threatened. You can't continue this war against the descendants of Shatrevar. The man who raped and murdered your wife has been dead for more than a thousand years.

Tortured, Kiel. Kellar corrected. He tortured her while I wasn't there. All because she chose me. All because I had her–and he didn't.

That was long ago, my friend, Kiel thought reasonably, and Shatrevar is dead.

The dark-eyed man at the alter ignored him and raised an arm.

Kiel was struck by an invisible blast of air that hit him in the lungs.

I don't like your tone of voice. Kellar returned, with an air of authority. Alas, can it be so easy to disempower the great leader of our mission? What can you do to me now, Kiel? Now that I no longer follow your orders?

As if in answer, the walls began to vibrate around the alter. Bricks tumbled from the highest walls down upon the bejeweled warrior, burying him in a heap of hardened clay, but only for a moment.

The warrior broke through the rubble like a stubborn shoot of life breaking its way into the sun, as several of his warriors burst into the temple to investigate the noise.

A paltry trick, Kiel. Kellar laughed, shaking the dust and dirt from his lustrous dark hair, letting the power of Hinev's serum course over him, automatically removing all of the dirt from his body and attire; though he maintained the cloak of a warrior from the north, a faint aura of light now wrapped about him like a living flame, capturing the astonished eyes of his followers. You should know that it is useless to fight this way by now.

Before Kiel heard another word from the man who had once born the name of Maesan Kellar, Kiel felt a searing pain strike him like a bolt of lightening in the chest. Flame erupted in no more than a fraction of a second after the impact, engulfing him, searing his body. At the same time, violet blood dripped from the hole in his body where the intense beam of that unnatural fire had struck him. A violet pool spread over the hard ground, coloring the stones, before the body of Fielikor Kiel suddenly turned entirely to energy.

The faces of the onlooking warriors went white as a sheet.

But the warrior on the dais laughed, watching as the flames disappeared. His laugh was a maniacal sound, not quite human. It held a ring of triumph nonetheless, until he heard the scream.

It was the scream of Kiel in the state between life and death, mass and energy, facing the oblivion beyond Hinev's serum; the words were Seynorynaelian, out of time and out of place here in this alien temple across the galaxies, words that faded into primal fear and horror, the blood curdling cry of a creature who saw his own death and beyond, who had been trapped for eternity in that moment of transition.

"Kiel?" The voice at the dais ventured, finding again the music that had all but faded from its lips. "Kiel!" The warrior screamed, stepping towards the fire as his sword clattered to the ground, useless.

Remember, Kellar? Remember Firien? Do you remember the childhood days we spent in Ariyalsynai? You were more than a brother to me... His inner voice called to him from the depths where all was calm, where his heart remained noble and pure, a place he had not visited for many long years.

"Kiel!!" Kellar's voice was strange, but it was his own once again. "Kiel!"

Already Kellar felt his own body half-turning to energy in that flame, voluntarily plunging into the fire to save the lost soul of Fielikor Kiel.

A moment later, the man emerged, back in the humanoid form that was Fielikor Kiel. But his eyes were never the same again.

* * * * *

"Ur-Inanna, most exalted entu, why don't you answer?!" A voice shouting at her brought her back to her present surroundings.

"Where–?" Alessia turned abruptly at the alter, feeling the weight of the headdress of gold on her brow. It was daylight, and the mosaic-patterned, recently restored ceramic walls of the god Enlil's temple within the city-state of Nippur surrounded her. A fine layer of bone white limestone had been plastered on the walls, further decorated by the lustrous reliefs of glazed, chevroned stones and noble animals in procession. One of the robed sal-me priestesses, Bau, searched Alessia's face curiously, her eyes narrowed in alarm.

"You must have had a vision." Bau judged after a moment. "The sanga priest will want to know what you foresaw."

"No," Alessia returned harshly, with a commanding chill in her voice.

"A dream perhaps?" The aging priestess pursued carefully, her dark brows joining.

"I do hope it was only a dream." Alessia replied, quietly now. Her mind kept reviewing what she had seen. Kellar, from the looks of the environment, had ensconced his army to the northeast, in the small temple of a desert city, perhaps as near as the kingdom of Tuttul or in mighty Ebla. And Kiel, was Kiel truly in danger? she wondered. Had what she seen truly happened, or was it a premonition of something yet to happen? Kiel... Yet could any of the immortals be lost? The thought terrified her.

"I'll go get the priest–"

"No, it does not concern him." She waved a hand dismissively, with a heavy sigh.

The priestess hesitated anyway.

"Just leave me," Alessia ordered, this time in a voice long used to shouldering authority. "The scribes or weavers may require some assistance. You'd do better to join them." The other priestesses nodded and left; the priestess Bau lingered a moment longer, more out of concern than disobedience, then finally withdrew as instructed. Alessia numbly removed the gold headdress and lapis and carnelian jewelry from about her limbs and cast them to the ground, then sat down on the dirt floor before the altar, her knees drawn up, her head resting on her folded arms. It was mid-morning, but she did not stir until mid-afternoon, when shouts abruptly reached her ears from the city outside. A moment later, one of the boys being tutored at the temple cantered in, kicking up dust with his heels.

"Lady Ur-Inanna, they've brought the fallen king to the gate!" He sang out in excitement as she came lithely to her feet. "King Sharru-kinu has defeated Lugal-zaggisi, son of the grain goddess Nidaba, patesi of Umma, and former King of Uruk!"

"Thank you, Elim," Alessia said tiredly while readjusting her headdress. Former king? The reigns of kings were short indeed, she thought...

"They're binding him to the gate of Ekur!" The boy chirped and headed off to spread the news.

Ekur?! Alessia reacted after he was gone, standing alone by the alter. Lugal-zaggisi was being bound to the gate of the temple of Enlil!? The air in the Ekur temple seemed suddenly stifling in the mid-afternoon heat as she realized that the spectacle was going on–just outside!

The city-state of Uruk, the former king of Ki-engi's seat of power, now seemed so far away, yet she knew the city well. It was one of the oldest, most civilized cities in the world. So, Uruk had fallen when Lugal-zaggisi was defeated. Was the city of Nippur to be next?

Sharru-Kinu, King of Kish (a title which often gave a king lordship over Akkad, or Ki-uri, and sometimes even Ki-engi), had become King of all Akkad to the north fifty years ago. Afterward, he had slowly captured first Tuttul, Mari, Yarmuti, and Hahhum. Then he had struck a treaty with Ebla and secured all of the lands up to the Cedar Forest and Silver Mountains, the plain of Taurus, Purushkanda, his armies marching and conquering all the land to Elam and the eastern mountain peoples.

In the course of his wave of conquest he also took Der, Barakshi, Dilmun, Magan, and Meluhha in the far eastern lands; finally he had returned from this circular journey to take Akkad back under control. Word had it he had even once taken the western land of Kemet, conquering part of the remet people of the delta of Iteru aa and their temples of Nut, Ptah, Horus, Anubis, Atum, and Amun-ra, their giant pyramids to dead per-ao in the afterlife, their cities of Mimpi, Men-nefer, and Saqqara.

Recently, however, Sharru-kinu had turned his attention to capturing all of ancient Ki-engi to the South, this land with its rich trade, its refined culture and religious superiority, that strongly wielded a cultural influence over Sharru-kinu's once nomadic Akkadians. After all of his conquests, Sharru-kinu had had one remaining ambition, and that was ousting Lugal-zaggisi, the King of Uruk, who had boldly claimed kingship over all the city-states of Ki-engi, the territory which bordered Sharru-kinu's native land of Akkad. Sharru-kinu had left Ki-engi and the South alone while he campaigned across the rest of the known world, conquering cities and nations and earning a remarkable reputation for himself. But at the end of his quest as a self-made emperor stood Lugal-zaggisi, who seemed to be fashioning himself into an emperor at Sharru-Kinu's back door.

Lugal-zaggisi's defiant political act was a direct sign of rebellion against the Akkadian King who had become the world's very first emperor-conqueror, and Sharru-Kinu had gone to Uruk to crush that rebellion.

The rebellion had been crushed.

It might have seemed strange that the Un-sanni people of Nippur had taken the defeat of Lugal-zaggisi, their former king, so well. However, Ki-engi and Ki-Uri, also called Akkad, together formed "the lands between the two rivers" and shared a common culture and two main language groups, the languages of two races evenly dispersed over these lands; for many centuries, there had been no territorial boundaries delineating the countries into north and south, only territories of the city-states, each with its own king.

Sharru-kinu had just become the first king to rule them all.

The city-state of Nippur itself lay between Akkad and Ki-engi but enjoyed something of a neutral position in the wars over control of the region between the rivers and the desert of Edin. Nevertheless, Lugal-zaggisi had once claimed Nippur for his own, bowing to the tradition that a legitimate king of Ki-engi had to be crowned by the sanga priest of the temple of Enlil, the chief sky-god of all the gods in heaven. That was, of course, why Sharru-kinu had dragged Lugal-zaggisi there, to depose him and set himself up as ruler over Ki-engi in the former King's place.

Yet Lugal-zaggisi couldn't command the people's sympathy in his misfortunate fate because he had deposed the reforming king Uruinimgina in his own campaign to conquer Uruk and Ki-engi twenty-four years earlier, during which he had destroyed the city of Lagash and the temple of Inanna in Uruk. Many of Nippur's inhabitants had long anticipated that it was only a matter of time before Nippur peacefully surrendered to Sharru-Kinu, leader of the greatest empire the world had yet seen.

Alessia heard the cries outside the walls of the people clamoring to see the former king humiliated; she turned and headed through an arch into an inner chamber to set about writing a tablet to the sanga priests in Uruk. Some time later, a voice echoing in the temple interrupted her.

"Sal-me! Where the devil have all the priestesses gone?" The male voice thundered in Akkadû, then submitted with a hint of amusement to the futility of trying to be heard above the noisy crowd outside.

Alessia crept quietly from the inner chamber and peered around the doorway at the man kneeling before a small figurine at the altar; a copper helmet lay beside it. The man had cast his axe and bow to the ground thoughtlessly, letting them fall by a group of ceremonial alabaster jugs that contained holy waters and linseed oils; one of the jugs had fallen over, but it had been stopped by a seal to protect the contents.

The man at the altar wore a short chiton, yet more a kilt than a statesman's robe, over which a fringed shawl had been carelessly draped over his left shoulder and drawn under his right arm; his garb was dirty, as was his face, and there was no outward sign on his person to indicate that he was a warrior other than the copper scimitar hanging at his side with its glittering golden hilt. His angular face, like polished bronze, was attractive in an unusual way; his eyes shone as though amplifying the light of inner ambitions.

A mark across the curling crown of hair at his brow betrayed that he had recently been wearing a ceremonial headdress of some sort, rather than the helmet he had brought with him. Yet it did not even occur to her to read his thoughts to determine who he was. He had already spied her by the open doorway.

"Thank Enlil. I was beginning to think all of you had gone to look at Zaggisi." He said in accented Emegir now, looking at her.

"I had no desire to watch."

"Yes, of course. Because Zaggisi was once a priest here at the temple," he guessed.

"Exactly."

"Well?" he said after a moment's pause, apparently upset that she kept standing in the doorway.

"I am not one of the sal-me priestesses." She informed him. "You'll have to seek elsewhere for your pleasure."

"A pity, then," he returned with an air of boldness, his steady dark eyes running over her as though still contemplating the possibility that she was one of the sal-me. "Because you, whoever you are, are surely more beautiful than even Ishtar herself."

She wished he hadn't said that.

"Isn't that blasphemy, to revile or humble a goddess by comparing her to a mortal?" She returned, all the while wishing he would go away. If he was a soldier, he had no business coming into the temple uninvited and unannounced. "You should pray that Inanna won't hear you and have Lamashtu send a daimon to curse you with disease."

"Inanna harm me?" He laughed, aghast; his manner made it clear he found the idea ridiculous. "By your name for her or by mine, the goddess Ishtar protects me," he declared with a shrug. "Perhaps my ignorance of dreary Un-sanni spiritual matters exempts me from arousing her anger. You see, I was raised but a poor gardener's foster-son before I became cup-bearer to a king. I don't know much about priests or gods, though some say my mother was an entu, a high priestess. I only know that the goddess Ishtar saved my life when I was but a child–"

He stopped suddenly, while watching her closely, and his sharp eyes narrowed critically. "I see my shimtu is at work here, as the dagil-issuri predicted... perhaps the birdwatchers and augurers of your people can predict the future. Tell me, what color are your eyes? Come here," he demanded curtly.

"No."

His eyes suddenly flared, but he kept his temper. Nonetheless, he stood and marched towards her, but she held her ground against him; muscled like one of the great cats, he was nonetheless more like a bear in gait. He stopped but a step from her; his body smelled a little of sweat and dust, but also of perfumed oil.

"When you speak, lady, your teeth seem white as bone bleached by the sun," he declared, looking at her mouth a moment, then upwards. "And your eyes are like lapis lazuli," he remarked in wonder. "Just like the priestess of Inanna in Uruk, or so I hear."

"I am that priestess. They call me Ur-Inanna."

"Oh?" He paused, processing the thought. "Ur-Inanna herself? So you're not a sal-me then... and more's the pity. The gods keep you entu for themselves." He reached a dirty, callused hand up to stroke her cheek lightly. Then his eye turned upward, towards her clean, ebony hair.

His breath was perfectly steady but audible, marking the passage time in the silence.

"Yes." She said calmly after several moments, noticing that his teeth were also intact and of a shade still close to ivory, when most people his age had a mouth half-full of rotting black teeth. His age... contemplating this thought made her vaguely unsettled, but she couldn't think why. "The penalty of defiling an entu priestess is severe," she reminded him.

Meanwhile, he laughed heartily at her temerity, dropping his hand. However, there was a familiar quality to his laugh that made her triumphant smile vanish.

"Who was your father?" She asked carefully, unwilling to read too much from his mind. Could it be–had his father been one of the mythical Enorians Kiel believed lived here on this planet? There had been no trace of the Enorians, the "watchers" a few of Hinev's explorers believed kept vigil over this planet even though no trace of them had yet to be found. Could it be that the Enorians didn't want to be found? She had begun to wonder...

The man frowned. "I don't know." He admitted, crossing his arms across his broad chest. "For all I know my father was a fallen angel of the gods, a watcher, the false claimant La'ibum, or no more than a farmer. Yet I am Sharru-kinu, the rightful ruler." He added in Akkadû, almost angrily, but his anger wasn't directed at her.

"So, you are the new emperor," she breathed, surprised that she hadn't realized who he was.

"You speak in Akkadû, too, now, Ur-Innana," he laughed. "I didn't think any of you Un-sanni could get your tongues to work so fast."

She just stared at him.

Sharru-kinu... They had met before, long ago, before he became King of the civilized world.

Since Sharu-kinu's rise to fame, she had heard the rumors surrounding his birth and early life. Ishtar had drawn the child once called Nimrod from the waters of Buranun, from the reed basket his mother had placed him in before abandoning him to the river. Then later, she had placed him in the house of King Ur-Zababa of Kish in northern Akkadia.

Alessia knew the rumors were true, for she and not Ishtar had been the one who had saved him, never suspecting that his shimtu, his destiny and character combined, would lead him to become the first conqueror-emperor of the world.

"I thought you'd show your years more, to have three grown children already." She said.

He couldn't be Sharru-kinu. Sharru-kinu had ruled Akkad for nearly fifty years already, and this man appeared but half the age the emperor should have been.

He laughed. "Yes, I am told the gods smile on me, and not only Ishtar. But you should also be dead by now, high priestess of Uruk."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that if you are the same Ur-Inanna who was an entu while I was a child in the house of Ur-Zababa, you should be twenty years older than me, or long since dead. Unless you are Inanna herself, which I would believe if you claimed it. I hear you are a magician, an asu. Can you cast your spells on kings as well as crops?"

"Of course not."

He took hold of her hand. "But I believe you already have." He declared, squeezing it so hard that the blood flow would have been cut off, had she been human. Apparently, he was not used to being corrected.

Instead of weakening under his threat, she laughed. "Spells that feed the people are worth far more."

He broke a feral smile but held on to her hand, then suddenly wrinkled his nose.

"Priestess, I believe you have no smell," he said, inclining his nose towards her arm. "There is no perfumed oil on your skin, yet–no odor, either."

"And that displeases you?"

"I find it unnatural out here in the desert, in these months of drought and heat." His expression was abruptly thoughtful. He appeared to be contemplating what he had rashly suggested, that she was an incarnation of Inanna, his beloved Ishtar, the restless goddess.

In the silence, the clamor of the legionary voices outside echoed like a distant thunder.

"Inanna–or not, I would like to meet you again." He said and let go of her hand. "I shall have you visit me at my new capital Agade soon, once I have returned from my conquest of all of Ki-engi and Umma. I'll introduce you to my daughter Enheduanna, also an entu. And Rimush and Manishtusu, my sons."

His expression showed that he was more than conscious of the honor he had extended to her, and what it entailed. Agade, the capital of Sharru-kinu's empire, boasted a feasting table of more than five thousand men.

"You sound certain of victory over Umma." She observed.

"I have never lost a city," he told her, with oblivious arrogance. "I always win, you see. The first defeat of my life will be my end." He spoke seriously, leaning forward. Then he straightened, and a bare smile formed around the corners of his mouth. "After Umma, I'll send for you. But take care, priestess, for outside holy walls, you belong not to the gods but to your king."

"I belong to myself."

He looked at her but did not take offense at her defiance; he was still smiling.

"However," she added, judging his reaction, "if you request me to come to Agade, then I will."

"Splendid!" he pronounced, folding his arms across his chest. "And once I have conquered Umma, next I shall conquer your heart, mistress of the temple of Enlil."

For a moment, she just looked at him, marveling at the integrity and fearlessness behind his dark eyes. He was unafraid of any man, which was natural for a great leader, yet by some greater miracle, he also seemed unafraid of anything.

"Yes, perhaps you shall," she said at last, in wonder. "Perhaps you shall. But tell me, how do you know you'll win Umma, or that I'll fulfill my promise–"

"Ishtar has favored me all my life. Why should she turn against me now?"

"What has Ishtar got to do with me?"

He gave a conspiratorial smile.

"Well do I remember her. Her eyes were lapis lazuli, and her skin held the perfume of the river in it. And only she, the goddess of both love and war, would ever dare to battle with me so fearlessly—as you have just done."

At that moment, the doors to the temple swung wide, and a lu-kasa courier sprinted in.

"Lugal-Sharru-Kinu!" he cried and delivered a cuneiform tablet to Sharru-Kinu.

The new emperor cast a glance over the tablet and handed it back to the lu-kasa courier.

"The fleet of ships from Dimun has reached Akkad. Now my armies are entirely assembled," he told her as the messenger left. "I leave tomorrow. I wonder..."

"What?"

"Is Ishtar is planning to accompany me?"

"Has she never abandoned you before?"

"Never." He stared hard at her, then waited a moment for an answer.

"Then she never will."

* * * * *

The rain fell lightly on her hair, falling softly on the darkened land. Raindrops broke loudly on the stone lintels above her head, but she listened to the constant, distant whisperings beneath this intermittent sound as the rain met the trees away on the plain, a plain that stretched three miles in all directions from the standing circle of stone. The luminous moon above shone with a ghostly light behind the veil of clouds; there were no stars.

In the great circle of Myrddin's standing stones, once only an earthen temple more than two thousand years old, Alessia crouched under a pillar within the newer, inner circle of stones, with only a dark woolen garment to keep out the elements. Yet she couldn't feel much of the creeping cold in her limbs or joints, or the chill in her nose and throat, nor weariness enough to help her rest against the stones. The pressure of the rain on her skin and the sounds of the primal wilderness around her reminded her that she was alive.

"Somehow I knew I 'd find you here," a voice echoed in the dark, in a soft speech, but she recognized it from another time and place. The last time she had heard it speak to her alone had been on the great island before it sank beneath the waters eight thousand years before.

"You're alive!" she cried, clambering to her feet, but then she just stood still, staring at him.

"Why shouldn't I be?" Kiel laughed, stepping forward under the arch. A fine woolen cloak of the invading Keltoi hid him, but as he moved, she saw through the billowing folds bronze greaves over his shins. At the archway, he dropped a long, leather shield to the ground which landed heavily not far away, then discarded the sodden woolen cloak. Beneath it he wore the bronze cuirass and breastplate of a foreign soldier over a kilt made of bronze plates.

A silver-studded sword had been belted at Kiel's side. He paused a moment under the arch, discarding other weapons outside the temple. Last of all he withdrew a fine dagger, inlaid with linked spirals, silver lilies, and a gold lion hunt, his eyes lingering over it a moment. He tossed it on the wet ground behind him, surrendering it to the dark.

"I thought I saw you in Taruisa, but I couldn't be sure. I was afraid for you. I had a vision—you had died, or been lost somehow." She said as she watched the dagger sail away into the night. "I couldn't be sure it was you just now." Alessia laughed, tasting the rain as she spoke, blinking back the drops of water blurring her sight. There was relief in her laugh.

"I was looking for you. It's time, Alessia," Kiel said quietly.

"Yes. The world is changing, I know." She said quickly, as though to dispel her surprise at his news, as though just remembering it herself. "At least, the changes seem to be coming faster."

"Yes." Kiel sighed, leaning against one of the standing stones, crossing his ankles and folding his arms across his chest. "Although, not always." He amended with a self-conscious shrug. "That's why you left the East, isn't it? You saw the dark age coming."  
"I suppose. We've done what you hoped to do, but I feel guilty for our interference here, and tired, and I long to go home."

"I know." Kiel nodded. "But the people of this world have taught me more than I expected. We found no sign of the singularity, but I was sure, on more than one occasion, that I saw signs of a 'first race' in the progeny of the population. I wonder—where are they, the Enorians that might be living undetected here."

"I don't know. I am not sure, either, that they are here, watching us all, but I wonder. And god himself, can he be pleased about what we did here? Or shall we feel our guilt to the end of our days for all that we have done to control the course of human fate and life?"

"What about the Enorians, as well, do they also do what we did, and guide the course of human life, and if so, why? Are they human themselves, or emissaries of the greater power of the universe? Who knows?"

"We must leave soon, as you said, before our interference is known." She commented.

"Yes," he agreed, then sank to the ground, feeling weary, indifferent to the chilling water beneath him which began to soak through his armor. She suddenly felt very awkward standing, but she didn't want to follow suit, so she just stood, looking down at him, letting the rain run down her face.

"Yes," she said, returning to his earlier question. "Yes, I left because of the dark age."

He turned to her.

"Not long ago." She continued. "Well, a few hundred years ago. Just after the volcanic eruption on the island of Thera sent the entire land of the Green Sea into chaos, I met some of the seafarers of Keptiu—"

"I do not like the Kemet speech, Alessia." He threw up his hands in jest. "You mean you met the Kaptaran sailors?" he asked, knowing the answer all along.

"Yes, Kaptarans, from Minos' isle." She replied. "I met several of them. Ever since the Mycenaens subjugated their island, a lot of Kaptaran sailors had turned piratic. But they tried to save the inhabitants of Thera when the volcano erupted, to bring the survivors to safety, every bit as much as I. The pirates told me there was a lot of rumor around on Kaptara, rumor about things going wrong, the people dissatisfied with the King–and I knew there would be trouble."

"What kind of trouble?"

"Civil trouble of course. I just couldn't let it go, Kiel. I wanted to stop the civil wars and put out the fires of madness however I could. I sometimes wonder if I can control myself here anymore. I get too involved, and feel I must control the population before they destroy each other, destroying what we have worked so hard to help them build–"

"I know," Kiel said. He removed a gold-winged helmet, put it down; it rolled up against the stones. "I knew that another dark age was coming, too. The world lost its main mariners and traders when Knossos was sacked, when Kaptara's beautiful capital was lost in fire and the entire island embroiled in civil war. Your pirates are likely the last of that great first race of skilful sailors. I hoped it wouldn't happen, but—as I feared, the lands bordering the Green Sea lost their main trading fleet," he shrugged. "Fewer traders, fewer kingdoms negotiating for goods from each other. It wouldn't be long before they were all fighting one another instead."

"But all the better for your up and coming friends in Mycenae to take what they could get!"

"You aren't supposed to take sides against me!" Said Kiel, conjuring an image of the massive-walled imperial city of the Achaiwoi nestled between the mountains. The Achaiwoi were a tribe in the land of Hellas; many of them belonged to the political power of the city-state Mycenae. The Hellenes had long depended on wealthy people in Khatti and Kemet and Canaan to buy their pottery, iron wares, and weapons. This trade had made the brigand tribes of Hellas rich and their conglomeration of city-states a world power, and, now that the Hellenes had stopped fighting each other for the moment, the older nations of Khatti and Kemet had been forced to acknowledge them as equals.

"Your friends the Achaiwoi managed to take Kaptara while the city was burning and make themselves the new masters of the sea, but they killed so many to do it!"

"I only joined the Achaiwoi of Mycenae to look for you." He replied calmly. "You weren't in Ugarit or Babylon, and I needed to find you so that we can leave–"

"I had gone north to Khattu-sas."

"The capital of Khatti!" He shook his head. "Then how did you end up in the lands of the Achaiwoi in Hellas? In the Achaiwian city of Amyklai?"

"Would you believe me if I said curiosity?"

"No."

"I suppose I was tired of the affairs of kings. I wanted to do whatever I could to help and heal ordinary people, an enslaved and poorer people that truly needed my help–"

"To heal and dispense justice as you saw fit." He corrected her, as though he knew all she had done in the long years.

"That is harsh. I wanted to help people who had no other champion–"

"You know you overstepped what we are supposed to be doing here." He shook his head. "You can't force people to stay civilized or make them behave as you would. But I have heard rumors that you did—that you have forced the hands of the natives at times to bend to your will, through mind control."

"At least I kept my hands clean of war until I was forced to interfere. I have heard rumors of you as well, my friend—rumors of your involvement in several wars and political debacles you shouldn't have been involved in.

"At least I didn't ever kill anyone–"

"Until Troia." He said.

Then he wished he hadn't said it, reading her face. He knew that expression. She had been protecting someone, possibly more than one specific person; it hadn't been fair to call the death of his Mycenaen friend at her hands anything more than justifiable self-defense. And was he one to judge?

No, he would not let her hear those thoughts. So, she had killed one man that he knew for certain, a Mycenaen, back during the siege on Troia—during a war, and he had been her enemy in that war. After all, the Mycenaen Achaiwoi had attacked the province of Wilios and its capital of Troia, Alessia's allies at the time. Yet he could see that what she had done, even as an act done in a protracted war, still haunted her. Most likely, she hadn't given the Mycenaen the chance to defend himself, or to escape. She had used her powers to her own advantage.

"Alessia, how exactly did you end up in Ilios, at the defeat of Troia?" He asked, trying to be diplomatic once more.

"Defeat?" She laughed.

"How?" her mind took her back, mercilessly. It took her back to the seaside city of winds, Taruisa, the capital of Wilusa kingdom in the greater Khatti Empire, before the war. Taruisa, alone on the alluvial plain, a grand, fortified city of fine towers and lofty gates, surrounded by greater Taruisa and many outlying, smaller villages; a city of treasures, of electrum, carnelian, ivory, and priceless bronze, a living city of potter's kilns and bronze smithies, chariot workshops, craftsmen, and weavers.

She returned to the steep land of Taruisa, a land that bred the harmless foal and trained the war horse, also a pastoral scene of quiet, drifting sheep whose fleece was spun into fine woolen garments, a seaside city where both war boats and fishing boats bobbed on the waters of the bay. She remembered the grandeur of the southern gate when she had first entered the city and rode past the many terraces lined with houses, up the main street, past limestone towers so finely jointed that they needed no mortar, up to the royal palace of Paraimu and his son Aleksandus, the dark, uncompromising warrior, a veteran of battles from Tyre to the Aegean.

And then her new people, the Taruisha, trying to fortify the weak western wall with soldiers after the Ahhiyawan scout scaled it in the dead of night. The fishing boats had fled, the horses had been taken, the people within the walls cowered in fear. She remembered the thunderous sound as the invading Ahhiyawan armies rammed down the broad, outer walls of the city with the siege engine, the battering ram of Poseidon, Ahhiyawan god of the sea and god of horses.

And she remembered how the beautiful grey potter's wares crashed to the floor in the megaron hall of the palace as the artificial earthquake shook them. She remembered the sound of the women screaming in the women's hall. Then the triumphant Ahhiyawans who called themselves Achaiwoi had dug the walls down and overturned the stones, killed the defenders whose blood flowed like a river that seeped into the horrified ground; the victors poured into the city, looting, seized the women they called Toroja, brought her among them back over the Green Sea...

"Yes," Kiel abruptly admitted. His mind also took him back, but to another morning. He kept the fall from his thoughts, remembering only the long journey to Troia when the winds finally changed in the Achaiwoi's favor, the calm blue sea underneath the Achaiwoi ship and flat to the horizon, the smell of the olive groves on the shore, the bright silence of a clear day, silent except for the sonorous rhythm of the oars tearing into the still water.

She shook off his invading memory, trying to hold on to her anger, even though she knew it would be brief.

"I knew you were there," she said. "I heard stories about you, in the camp–"

"I sensed you were nearby," he said. "In warrior's guise?"

"I wanted to do something, but I knew you were there, that you'd stop me from doing anything. That–neither of us would leave until it had ended, one way or another." Her present words were contrite, contrite because she had disobeyed orders more than once. "And Aleksandus wouldn't allow me to interfere, either. Nothing was worth the price of his honor, you see. So I let Taruisa fall. I stood there, as I had promised. And I did nothing–"

"Until the Achaiwoi tried to kill the children in the megaron hall." He finished.

"You knew?"

"I wasn't there when it happened, but I knew about it–"

"You," she said, her eyes widening with a realization that hit her. "You were the one who led Aineias and the other group of survivors from the city to the boats."

He nodded. "When I came back to the city, you were gone. How did you know?"

"I returned to Troia before I came here, to Clas Myrddin. Some of your survivors had returned and rebuilt the city. There were still stories of the siege all over the area."

"I thought to find you on the copper isle of Alasiya when the people of Ugarit fled there. I don't know how much you know about what happened after Troia fell. The empire of Khatti fell soon afterward, and there was a great migration of their feudal subjects to the south, towards Sidonia, Caanan, even to Kemet." He explained. "Everything was such a mess! I found Lierva and Celekar on a boat of Lukka from the territories of the former Khatti Empire. They were on their way to Kemet to launch a sea battle against per-ao Rameses. For he had done many wrongs, and they felt he needed punishment."

Alessia turned to him with an expression of interest.

"My Achaiwoi friends as you call them were there, too," Kiel continued. "All of Hellas has been conquered by illiterate peasants from the north, all of their fair palaces razed to the ground, and with the Khatti gone, they couldn't depend on a living of trade anymore, so the heroic kings of Hellas took to the waters."

"I know." She laughed. "Joining piratic fleets with their former enemies, the Taruisha, and all of the other peoples of Khatti they once fought with, the Lukkans, the Shardana, even the Kaptarans..."

"Seems such a crazy world," he shrugged. "Friends become enemies and enemies become friends."

"You might say that."

"I went everywhere looking for you, too. But then, I suddenly remembered Diraovedas. When I didn't find you among the Galatoi people of Dana on the mainland, I came on one of their ships to Clas Myrddin, land of the dead–now a complete island itself, I see."

"It feels safer here, now, now that no one can march across the marshes to get here."

"Yes, there was once a land bridge to this island, I had forgotten. Yet even now, a small stretch of water is nothing to a sturdy boat. The Phoinikes have visited this island looking for precious metals, and even sailed beyond the pillars of Melqart to the south."

"Well, the red people of Tyre—Canaanites—or Phoinikes as you call them, would have stayed where they were on the cedar plains in Canaan and left this land alone if the pirates of Kaptara and Hellas and Daneland hadn't joined them and given them their chance to take over the seas..."

"I don't want to argue with you, Alessia."

"I'm not arguing," she insisted. "Merely pointing out a fact. Don't think I'm bitter about the fall of Kaptara and Khatti or that the Taruisha have fled to the northern desert of the Great Green. I'm not bitter. I felt sorrow for the losses of the people I knew, and that is all."

"Strange that you mention that. I found Talden, Vala, and Mindra in a new Taruishan colony in the lands of the Villanovi west of Hellas. When Rameses defeated the sea pirates, they came west looking for land while their land armies settled in Canaan. Gerryls was living in a colony on Shardina–"

"I feel terrible. If we leave the world now, we leave it in a dark age little better than when we arrived."

"Not true, but if it is, there is nothing we can do about it. Slow progress has been made."

"Kiel, I wonder why it is that we never crossed paths before Taruisa–Troia, in all those years, outside of that rendezvous at Eridu." She pulled the cloak tighter around her. "Maybe you were always one step ahead of me." Her face broke a half-smile.

"And yet I find you here. I see the priests of the sacred oak still memorize knowledge of the ancient days," he commented; she supposed he had already been to the villages, or duns, looking for her. "Even the things they don't understand."

"They are a superstitious people."

"I agree, but they are who they are." He added as an afterthought.

Alessia stirred, watching him, watching his silence. He pressed his back against the stone, so comfortable against the stone...

He didn't want to leave, either! But he knew they had no choice, she realized, as she saw his thoughts again after so many years, after so many years estranged from him and from their Seynorynaelian past.

She still loved him, and all of the explorers, though some had become enemies to her briefly on this world, divided over their fostered "children"—now, it was all over, and they must apologize to one another and return to their own spaceship and mission home.

"Kiel, I don't want to leave this planet," Alessia said, overcome by a sudden pang of despair.

"This isn't our home," Kiel said quietly. "And we must now go home."

"So where are the others?" She asked a moment later.

"You're the last to return, since you missed the last rendezvous." He replied, his eyes unaccusing, only stoic. "The rest are waiting on the isles of springs past the pillars of Melqart."

"And you? For all your talk of honesty, you'll keep your secrets, I suppose."

"We all must." He said, his lips a thin line. "We must bury them in the past, leave them on this world. We must start over again, and return to our own people and its way of life."

Without a word, she stood and picked her way out onto the rain-drenched plain, never looking back at the misty quiet of the stone temple behind her.

Never again, she vowed to herself, I will never invest so much emotion in a race not my own, or a planet not my own. After a moment, she summoned composure, enough to safeguard herself from suffering any more pain.

But first she bent down to the earth and took a dark stone from the ground as a symbol of this era come to an end. She rose again, fingered the cool, smooth stone, then clenched it tightly in her hand.

Good-bye, Kiel3. I must leave you now, and I will never again return. She vowed.

Rain blurred the trees ahead, to the south, where the transport shuttle would be waiting, ready to escort her and Kiel back to Selesta.

She never looked out as the shuttle ascended, bearing her away from the planet below.

The henge of stones was still with her when she closed her eyes.

After eleven thousand, eight hundred, and seventy-nine revolutions, the explorers finally left the planet they had named Kiel3, having found no sign of the "singularity" in all the time they had been on the surface, though that didn't mean that it wasn't still there. Already they had been too careless, and tales of their intrusion lived on, though diluted by myth and time, documented in the language of the planet's humanoid population. However, they had made efforts to cover their involvement so that none of the human race would ever suspect that their world had been visited by aliens.

They would never know how the planet flourished after this day. As Selesta turned from the blue-white world of Kiel3, its explorer crew could only hope that humanity's curiosity led them to the stars so that it might view the world as they saw it now, so that the human race might one day behold the rare and tenuous wonder of their planet, so that they might learn to take the explorers place and protect it for the generations to come.

* * * * *

The great ship Selesta was now homeward bound, though there were likely to be a few more stops on the way on their journey home.

Life had returned to as close as normal as possible, though few of the explorer crew had spoken of Kiel3 since their departure from that planet. They knew that the planet was lost to them for all time.

Kiel had set the tachiyon engines to take them back to the centipede hole that linked galaxy group seven to the Great Cluster, that they hoped would return them to the time they had left when they had come to the Kiel3 system. If they were successful and re-emerged near the edge of the galactic plane of galaxy group six, they had decided to travel outside the galaxy. From there they would chance a long space warp around the Great Cluster to the far side, closer to Seynorynael but on the other side of the territories they had visited in their initial mission guideline.

Gerryls seemed certain that the explorers could protect the live specimens they had collected from adverse reactions in the space warp, though none of the explorers looked forward to it.

According to their mission guideline, the explorers were to rendezvous with the settlement that had probably been founded on Gilned2 by now, though it had only been a proposed colony when they left.

However, before they reached Gilned2, they had plans to explore the edge of the lai-nen territories near the other side of the Great Cluster, taking advantage of the lai-nen's own centipede hole gates. Near the lai-nen Empire, reports showed a cooler blue-white star than Valeria. A star that had twelve planets in its system.

Marankeil had outlined a guide for them to travel to this star system, to the class 4 star Rigell. Rigell was so far the only known blue-white star system, other than Valeria and Dela, where a great planetary system had evolved. And if reports from the lai-nen Empire's emissaries could be trusted, life had evolved on three of the planets, on the second planet and the binary planets a little further from the star.

Marankeil's plan was for the explorers to make an outpost on the binary system, called Celestian one and two. Though he had no real ideas of outfitting a colony as yet, he had intended to make it known to his only great rivals that Seynorynael had intentions of galactic expansion, even to lai-nen's very borders.

But who knew? By the time Hinev's explorers arrived, perhaps the two galactic rivals may have signed a peace settlement. Seynorynael did not need the remote territory, so far from any other humanoid systems. Between the lai-nen systems and the Federation territories few centipede hole gates operated, making real-space inter-stellar journeys too long for most travelers.

And the lai-nen had not really wanted the planets in the Rigell system, either. When the explorers left, no one had yet known whether or not the lai-nen could survive the intense radiation of a bluish-white star. Perhaps the lai-nen had even agreed to join the Federation. Perhaps they had at last accepted the invitation that Kudenka's explorers had extended the wandering lai-nen spacecraft so long ago, on Seynorynael's first great voyage of discovery.

Feeling the ship make its final turn towards the Great Cluster, Alessia couldn't wait until they could return home to Seynorynael. Only the sight of their home world would be able to cure them of their stay on Kiel3, rid them of the memories from that place. However, it would take several more thousand years before they completed their mission, but much of that time would be spent in the confinement of Selesta through the deep space between the lai-nen territories and the Federation with few planetary detours.

We've done it, Gerryls' excited call interrupted all other thoughts on the ship. We've returned to our own time!

Moments later, the bright collage of stars of the supercluster of galaxies swung into view above the observation window and merged as one; now there truly was no going back.

* * * * *

As Selesta emerged from the centipede hole to the Rega system, the radiation of the blue-white star dissolved the last of the Hinev mixture in their bloodstream for type M6oc humanoids, the mixture they had just used on their exploration of the planet Kuac.

After some time, the Selesta approached twin planets in the system, Celestian one and Celestian two; Celestian two, a giant planet with dark, reddish, arid continents, reddish because of the fissures of fire that spidered across them, presently obscured their view of the smaller, blue-white world of Celestian one.

"Such a shame that world has such a small water supply." Broah pulled at Alessia's shoulder, pointing at the ominous image of Celestian two outside the observation window. Alessia stopped analyzing the data from Kuac on her electronic book to follow Broah's eyes to the view.

A minute later, a message from Kiel called them to the bridge. Celekar, Ri-ari, Derstan, Jir-end, Wen-eil, and Vala had joined them in the elevation shaft by the time they arrived.

"...and then we'll send a team down to Celestian two to scout out a possible position. How about you, Kellar?" Kiel was saying as they stepped from the elevation shaft. "Anxious for a trip to the surface? Because here's your chance–"

"Somehow I knew you would suggest that, Kiel," Kellar sighed, looking up as the others gathered around them at the holo-monitor.

Neither of them had said anything that might shed light on the vision Alessia had had back in the temple of Nippur. Had Kiel really died, as Lierva once had? She wondered. She didn't know, though at times, such as now, she still wondered. Yet if anything, Kiel and Kellar's friendship had seemed stronger than ever since the reunion of the explorers after their long sojourn on Kiel3. And the explorers had returned to their old ways and habits the closer they came to their journey's end.

Meanwhile, Alessia's eye strayed to Lierva standing by the data display; an irritated expression had taken possession of the intrepid woman's face.

"Kellar's right you know, Kiel," Lierva interjected, her eyes never leaving Kiel. "Celestian one is much nicer."

"I know, Lierva. But you know I have no control over the mission guideline," Kiel responded calmly, watching the schematics of the surface change, registering a great planetary earthquake.

"What's going on?" Broah asked, disliking the argumentative tension, and Kellar pulled her aside, pretending to whisper in her ear, but gave her a telepathic run-down instead. Alessia still stood by Lierva, watching the interchange in confusion.

"Can't say I'm excited about it," Lierva persisted, with signs of resentment. "What's the point? No one will be able to live on the surface–if that was the council's intention," she added.

"Actually, it should be relatively easy to make the atmosphere breathable," Gerryls said.

"But why should we want to do that?" Lierva asked, more rhetorically than seriously. Nevertheless, Kiel responded to her.

"The Federation wanted us to prepare the way in case they decide to send a colony here–"

"Yeah, only to keep it from the lai-nen Empire," Lierva said.

"That may be true," Gerryls conceded, "but the explorers who follow us might need a temporary base on Orian to supply them with raw materials and supplies–"

"You know that's not true, Gerryls," Lierva interrupted hotly, then relented a little, conscious of the fact that they were all subject to the same miserable orders. "You know the Federation is anticipating conflict with the lai-nen. And don't tell me you don't know that this planet is full of raw materials and surface metals for spaceship production, that the black hole just outside this system doesn't make it the ideal place for black hole mining and anti-matter weapon production–"

"Perhaps–" Gerryls began half-heartedly.

"Why would the Federation build a base here for any other reason? Why would they need such a colony? What other explorers would come all the way out here?" Lierva shook her head. "This system is too far even by centipede hole travel for any profitable operation. No, they would only need it as an outpost to launch an offensive against the lai-nen."

"It does seem odd that the Federation would want to build a scientific base here," Onracey said, thoughtful. "Or use it for a human explorer station. They should have considered a more permanent site. Like Gerryls said, this planet's volcanism will eventually reshape the crust again–and our work here will be undone."

"I've fed a future scenario into the analyzer." Lierva said, astonishing them with her unusual thoroughness. "Even that beautiful planet–even Celestian one won't survive the upheaval someday without some kind of artificial preparation. Now why do you suppose the Council didn't suggest we use Celestian one to create an explorer station, since that planet is already livable–or else avoid the problem of planetary take-off altogether and create an artificial station in orbit around either planet?"

"I agree with you, Lierva," Kiel admitted after a moment. "But what do you expect me to do about it?" He asked, looking Lierva in the eye. Suddenly, she hesitated. She hadn't anticipated that Kiel already understood, that he felt the same way.

"You know, we haven't heard anything from the lai-nen since we got here," Broah commented, drawing their attention.

"She's right," Kellar added, shaking his head in confusion. "You think they'd have anticipated us coming here after our stop on Kuac2. Strange that they didn't try to stop us then."

"Well, I for one am glad." Gerryls shrugged. "I'd rather not come to a confrontation with the lai-nen, especially since we haven't been given authorization to break the peace."

* * * * *

"Alessia, I need you to do me a favor," Kiel said as the scout party boarded the landing shuttle to descend to Celestian two.

"What kind of favor?" Alessia asked, wondering what it might entail, pausing before she drew on her helmet.

He shook his head, distracted by a sudden thought.

"It's funny, isn't it, how you can know a person for so long and never really come to know them? Sometimes we just don't see what's staring us in the face."

"What?" Why was he saying this now?!

"What I mean is that when you think you've got all the time in the world–I guess you don't really pay attention to things. And you don't allow anything to change, not in your own mind, even something that doesn't really match your first impression of it."

"I suppose it's easier to revert to the same old patterns, rather than to accept the change," she shrugged, trying to understand him. "Old patterns are hard to break, or rather, hard to break free from. Sometimes you can't escape them, or else other people won't allow you to."

"Yes," he looked her in the eye, then remembered himself. "Well, I want you to stay here and monitor the surface from the bridge." He said, watching her reaction. "Actually–the truth is, we need someone to watch for the lai-nen. If you detect their presence in this system, I want you to take the ship into the Great Red Nebula. They won't be able to find it there."

"I don't understand. Why do you want me to stay? Why not Kellar?" She asked, removing her flight helmet, then laughed, remembering Kellar's laments that ever since Kiel3, he was always the one getting left behind.

"Because I trust... your judgment, Alessia." Kiel replied gravely.

And my sense of duty? She wondered, thinking back to the many battles the explorers had waged against each other on Kiel3.

"So if while we're gone the lai-nen decide to attack and pursue the ship, I want you to be here to outrun and outmaneuver them."

She just stared at him, unable to respond.

"Don't worry." His face cracked a slight smile. "If anything happens, we'll catch up with you after we've finished the atmospheric transformation. Please understand, Alessia. There are things about the lai-nen that we don't fully understand. But whatever else happens, we cannot allow them to take the ship."

"How could they do that?"

Kiel shook his head. "They know the secret of anti-matter production." He replied gravely. "Ornenkai informed me of this, shortly before we left. So you see, there is a chance that the lai-nen could breach Selesta. But–" he paused. "Not if one of our best remains behind to protect her."

Alessia nodded, suppressing her enthusiasm to go to the surface. "I understand, Kiel. I'll stay on the bridge and keep you informed."

Kiel smiled approvingly. "If nothing goes wrong, Alessia, you can lead the scout party to Celestian one." Alessia's eyes widened, but then she shook her head.

"Kiel, after what you've just said–are you sure we have time to tarry in this system considering that the lai-nen are near?"

"Maybe not," he conceded, studying her. "But we were ordered to, and we do what we must."
Chapter Thirteen

At long last the fragile orb of Seynorynael appeared in the all-encompassing and infinite field of distant stars that created the Great Cluster. The explorers watched as their home world grew in the view monitors throughout Selesta, until the planet's boundaries curved away on the unseen horizon.

As the ship completed its final arc above the sky, daylight descended, baring the land beneath the misty threads of atmospheric vapor. Those who had been watching the final approach into Aryalsynai's largest spaceport noticed the infinite array of space craft coming and leaving; the planet and its two moons, Ishkur and Nanshe, where interracial colonies now thrived, hosted a collection of these vessels in permanent orbits. It proved difficult for Kiel and the others to navigate through the narrow window that allowed them to reach the surface through all the space traffic, but they did so without flinching, used to far greater crises than that of a hectic spaceport.

Moments later, an image appeared in the holo-field on the bridge. The cold image of Marankeil's human clone materialized, glaring down at them with unmoving eyes and careful detachment. Alessia felt suddenly paralyzed by that glare, as though she had reason to fear or remember that gaze, even though her mind tried to reassure her that she had no solid, logical reason to feel as she did.

"Hinev's explorers are welcomed home after their long journey. I extend greeting and invite them to an audience with the Elders." Marankeil's mechanized voice said, then stopped.

Alessia held her breath, but then she realized that the image and the greeting had only been a recorded message. What? she thought, almost insulted. After all that they had done and considering the importance of their mission, yes, even to the Elder Marankeil himself, he hadn't even bothered to contact them personally! He could very well have prepared the transmission for general use eons ago, she thought, adding insult to injury.

Yet she had to admit that the Selesta had returned unexpectedly, and without contacting the Federation yet, so it could very well have been that Marankeil and the Federation Council were otherwise occupied and just couldn't receive them yet but wished to assure them that no insult had been intended, that their return had not been ignored, by sending them a congratulatory message.

The explorers themselves hadn't expected to return as quickly. Yet the last centipede hole had taken Selesta quite near an untraveled vector close to their own section of the Great Cluster, and they had warped to Seynorynael from there by traveling through a free vector. The others were just as shocked by the message as Alessia was.

As the explorers used their telepathy to look around them, they realized in shock that—

Seynorynael was now the leader of an empire.

* * * * *

Shortly after Selesta's landing in Aryalsynai, officers arrived to lead the explorers from the ship that had been their home uncounted years to the Seynorynael they had never known.

Hinev's explorers shared a moment of concealed reservation, then allowed themselves to step across the threshold from Selesta into the Aryalsynai spaceport.

The truth had already began to seep into their minds from the sense of ongoing life around them. They had tried to keep themselves detached, yet a few oddities gradually drew out their natural curiosity.

The guards wore odd new purple and green colored uniforms unknown since their las departure. The explorers would have asked the guards if any representatives of the Federation Science Building would come to take their data, or if the Martial Scientific Force had yet sent representatives to debrief them, but they had already discovered that the Federation Science Building no longer existed.

How could the planet have changed so much? The explorers wondered, for though many hundreds of thousands of years had passed on the ship, their guide had informed them that only fourteen and a half thousand years had passed since the last departure of Selesta. Part of the reason was that the explorers had journeyed backward in time through a centipede gate on their way home.

Alessia and the others looked into the superficial thoughts of their guard, who turned out to be an officer in something called the Martial Force.

And the Seynorynaelian language itself had changed, dulled through the years and outer world contact. Many of the syllables they used sounded drawn out and lengthened to him in contrast to his own terse and rather harsh enunciation.

Then, as though she had been struck by lightening, Alessia's feet ground to a halt.

The others came to the same thought in less than a moment.

Their guide was leading them to the Imperial Palace.

The Imperial Palace?

The guide felt the sudden pressure descend upon his mind, then shrugged as it quickly departed.

The guide shrugged again, glad he had been chosen to lead them to the Imperial Palace. The other men, his own family and friends would not believe he had come so close to their explorer ancestors!

Where in the Imperial Palace was he taking them? she heard Kiel's mind push the man towards more relevant thoughts.

To accommodations in the Imperial Palace, of course. At Emperor Marankeil's order...

Emperor Marankeil?!!

Keil stopped and closed his eyes, then opened them again with pain. There had been little other impediment than Hinev preventing Marankeil from taking over the Federation.

How? Alessia demanded.

The main guard's understanding of history was rudimentary, so they each searched further, to the minds inhabiting the astroport, Seynorynaelian and alien alike, no longer reluctant, but entirely resolute in their action.

There was information to be had, and they were going to find it.

There was much to learn, as they discovered. It seemed that Marankeil and his Council of Elders, in their embodied clone forms, still governed the planet. But shortly after the explorers had been sent away again, Marankeil had taken over the Federation by force, using his new space fleet. He had subjugated the old conglomeration of planets and created a Seynorynaelian Empire. The oldest constituents had succumbed, seeing the profit to be made by an alliance with the new Emperor. After all, Marankeil controlled the Grand Fleet and all of the system's trading ships, as well as the centipede hole monitors. The rule of the Seynorynaelian Empire led by Marankeil had continued undisputed these past nearly fifteen thousand years.

In contrast, the changing population had advanced in the explorers' absence. Though the proto-telepaths of Alessia's youth had vanished, the general population lived two hundred or more Seynorynaelian years more on average, unless they were of mixed races. And many were. The stigma associated with being half-race children no longer existed because such a great portion of the population was of mixed parentage.

Rather, the prejudices against old constituencies had been re-channeled against new territories and those races who had fought to keep their independence against the Empire. Pure Seynorynaelians still considered themselves slightly superior to all others, for varied reasons: if not for their form, then for their intellect, or for their unusual longevity.

Despite the unparalleled abundance on Seynorynael, a few Marankeil permitted had left that planet to join colonies where their lifespan increased to a thousand or more years, and where they might play a dominant role in their new planet's social and political activities as a reward for their loyalty; the trading ships alone had special passes to all worlds, and moving from one world to another was strictly controlled for ordinary citizens, not least by the cost of such journeys.

Nevertheless there were countless illegal aliens living across the Empire despite the use of capital punishment for any caught illegally living abroad for periods longer than a visiting pass allowed. But the privileged few Seynorynaelians living abroad used their precious visiting passes to return to visit the home world as frequently as they could, to enjoy the bright light of day and rugged beauty of the mountains and the sea, the vast expanses of sacred lyra that had been preserved. Off-world visitors with special occupational all-world passes were also common, as the traffic of a million space ships above the planet suggested.

The spaceship construction that permitted such an amazing number of interplanetary travelers had greatly accelerated shortly after the explorers' second departure. Realizing the danger of the unpredictable natural centipede holes, Marankeil had long ago stopped production on any engines resembling that of Sesylendae, and in time the technology to create an artificial negative pressure singularity engine had been forgotten–deliberately obliterated; only a few of the old ships remained in the Grand Fleet.

However, it did not matter to the Empire–the Grand Fleet's sub-light tachiyon engines were sufficient for travel through and between the centipede holes created or discovered by Selesta. Alessia saw that the military, commercial, and transport vessels' engines had all been based upon the original tachiyon engine design, updated and mass produced for smaller ships.

Only a few merchant ships had attempted the black holes and passage through the black hole gates. The theoretical gates linking black holes to other galaxies and universes had not even been risked by Selesta, but most of the merchants willing to enter them had done so hoping to pass through the time-channels of the black hole and into the past. For profit? Alessia wondered. To tell their past selves what goods would set the fashion?

Or, or perhaps in hopes of changing the past...

The reason no longer mattered. The nearby black hole Kai-rek had mercilessly swallowed all who entered its event horizon or ring singularity. So far, no "black hole gate" had been discovered.

The conquest of the lai-nen civilization while the explorers were gone had provided a wealth of information about the black hole and centipede hole maps and explained why the lai-nen had not appeared to challenge the explorers in the Rigell system; the lai-nen's centipede hole knowledge overlapped some of the explorers' knowledge, but the lai-nen's understanding of the black holes surpassed theirs in a few ways. The lai-nen had also been intrigued by the black holes long before and had lost uncounted ships to its lure; they had discovered the hard way that the centipede holes were the only method of safe space travel.

The explorers discovered that Marankeil's Grand Fleet had followed their footsteps to claim the six galaxy groups so recently discovered by them. As soon as they had left, he had found their connection between Seynorynael's galaxy group in the Great Cluster and galaxy group two, where millions of non-humanoid and humanoid races had thrived until the Seynorynaelian Empire arrived.

Many conquered peoples willing to join the fleet found their own status elevated in the new Empire, though at a great risk. The rebellious native ships that attempted to pass the unmonitored black hole gates near their own systems, back into a time where they could destroy the Empire before it began, simply vanished, lost to time, or space, or the power of the black holes.

And the Seynorynaelian Empire was able to maintain its grip on its infinite worlds with the rapid growth of spaceship technology controlled by Marankeil.

Alessia wondered if the explorer crew's findings about the existence of natural temporal centipede hole fluctuations would disturb the Elders, and Marankeil, once they found out. If someone could discover a map throughout time, they might assault and erase the Empire—before it could begin!

But, for all the advances in everyday technology since the Selesta had left, the Empire had never been able to recreate a ship as great as Selesta. Millions of tachiyon-engine ships traveled among the closer Empire worlds of the Great Cluster and galaxy group two regularly, trading and bringing supplies to Seynorynael.

The explorers began to perceive that what they had done to protect the centipede hole gate leading to Kiel3 would likely keep Marankeil from ever reaching the planet, not unless he regained Selesta.

Yet what had happened to Hinev? Had he done nothing to stop Marankeil from subjugating the universe?

It took them a while to find a mind which knew the answer.

* * * * *

One man on Seynorynael had protested against the subjugation of the Federation. During their first mission, he had been called back to Aryalsynai to recreate clones for the Elders, that much they already knew. But it was said that the first return of "Hinev's explorers" had changed him once they departed again, that their departure had infected him with defiant behavior uncharacteristic of a respected citizen, one blessed by the Elders, no doubt given clone incarnations that had allowed him to live so long.

He must have gone mad, the present people thought. For in their histories they learned that Hinev had denounced Marankeil and the Elders and had withdrawn from civilization. He had left Aryalsynai to live in the untamed, dangerous wilds beyond the weather-safe ring, to establish his own colony in the remote province called Celestian, after the planets of the Rigell system.

Legend had it that his descendants still lived there.

Alessia remembered the Feiari delegates they had brought to Seynorynael on their last return and searched for information on their world's reception. She discovered that their planet had been destroyed by a collision ten thousand years ago, and the only survivors were those who had been forced to immigrate to Seynorynael long ago, aristocrats and political leaders held hostage on the Emperor's home world to cripple the planet.

The Elders had practiced similar means of coercion on other worlds, sending governors to rule in the place of the native leaders. Many planetary delegates lived on Seynorynael as exiles in order to ensure loyalty to the Empire.

Almost a thousand years ago, the descendants of the many exiles and the rest of the population of the lost planet Feiar, with some Seynorynaelian-born Tulorians and Kayrians, had sought out the small Feiar-Seynorynaelian colony of Celestian and reverted to its simple way of life. Not a word had been heard of them in all that time.

Most recently, a hundred years before the explorer's return, rumors had it that a large section of Seynorynaelians had left Aryalsynai to join the Ayan colony. People had called them eccentrics for their protests against Imperial practices. Many said good riddance to them. Like the original settlers, they had disappeared in the rural colony of Celestian.

"...you'll find none other like it across the Empire," the guide continued to explain, but Alessia had not been listening. Something about the luxury of the accommodations provided for them until their next meeting with Marankeil, she guessed, as he gestured around the wing of the Imperial Palace that they had entered, a central room that radiated rooms in a spherical cluster around it. "I hope that you will be comfortable. I'll return to lead you to the council tomorrow." The guide added, and left them on their own.

* * * * *

"What have we done?" Celekar finally broke the silence no one else would. "This Empire. All that has happened—it's our doing!"

"He was from Eretae4," Lierva said, shaking her head in disbelief. "When was it that we left them–two hundred and thirty-seven thousand years by our time, but somehow only twelve thousand have passed in this galaxy!"

"How did we return to Seynorynael in such a short time?" Vala interrupted. "I know the centipede hole gates disrupt time–but how could we even be here by that account? We can't be two or more places at once! Can we?" She shook her head, paralyzed by all of the paradoxes her scientific mind told her were impossible, miracles she had nonetheless experienced or witnessed with her own eyes. Was there something to Fate? She wondered suddenly. Was there some guiding force in the Universe that could break its own rules when it suited itself to do so? A guiding force that made pawns of them all?...

A guiding force that perhaps followed some as yet unknown, undiscovered universal law...

Alessia started, suddenly feeling as though a part of her, a shadow of her still existed in many more places than she currently existed, even perhaps–even on its way to Kiel3?

Could that have been what the singularity was about? Was it really created by the people Marankeil feared–and had it or its creators prevented them from going to Kiel3 in their own time? Had it made their journey there into the future possible?

"The time-loops we created make me nervous. Talking about them doesn't do us any good." Celekar's voice held a definite chill in it.

"All I know is that I was the one who stepped first on Eretae4 with our banner of truce and peace," Lierva bit out. "Only to lead our armies there so that it could be conquered." Agitated, Lierva stood up and paced a bit. "We gave them our word that they would join our Federation. Our kindness lowered their resistance."

"Lierva–" Celekar said, but she wouldn't listen.

"Celekar, you know it's our fault! We enticed them into slavery!" She cried.

"The slavery of untold millions," Derstan added, with growing distress.

"Kiel, in the time it took the Empire to reach them–could they have prepared for an uncertain encounter, if we hadn't been so convincing?" Lierva resumed her argument, turning to Kiel. "Our telepathy–Hinev's gifts–we overwhelmed them with our power, our so-called spirit of cooperation, our telepathic lies!"

"We didn't know," Kiel said, his lips tight, but his voice betrayed nothing.

"Yet those populations prepared for the Federation and peace, not an Empire and its greed," Gerryls put in unexpectedly. "How could they not but fall easily to our advance?" He was not given to such outbursts, but in that moment he had expressed the feelings of them all, the unbearable guilt that had fallen upon them in the last few hours.

Kiel's face was like stone.

He was their leader.

"Will they blame us for the deception?" Celekar wondered. "Or have we already lived with the mark of their hatred for years?"

Alessia shuddered. If what Celekar had implied was true, then Hinev's explorers had long been branded as deceivers–throughout fifteen thousand long years of history.

How could they ever forgive themselves for what they had done?

* * * * *

Marankeil waited several days to call some of the explorers to his meeting. Kiel and several others left the Imperial Palace the second day after they had arrived to try to find anyone in the city who might not support the Empire and was willing to admit it. The glimmering tall white buildings of the Seynorynael they remembered, built from expensive but exquisite Cordan, had been replaced by a technological sea of hard plastics and metallic and crystalloid alloys. Even pedestrian traffic no longer existed–the trees and parks between the city streets and buildings had been uprooted long ago.

The clear skyway passages above the city had been rendered unnecessary–the buildings were connected underground and above, by spokes of horizontal corridors built into the structures. Traffic above the city had been regulated to control the flow of small transports, but to Alessia the entire scene she observed from the Imperial Palace seemed a regression into disorder and inefficiency, an open submission to avarice.

When Kiel and the others returned, Lierva and Vala came and tapped her shoulder. She picked herself up from the lounge panel and headed across the large, well-furnished room, a step behind Vala.

Kiel led them to the Headquarters of the Martial Force, where their presence went unnoticed for some time. Kellar had suggested fooling the officers into believing that there was no one there–a telepathic illusion of invisibility, so to speak.

The explorers' telepathic messages seeped into the minds of those around them, imprinting a suggestion that nothing was there, though the peoples' eyes would have registered the presence of visitors, if they had been able to recognize what they saw. Instead, invisible to detection, to the minds all around, Kiel and the others watched and wandered about, listening and gathering information about the Empire and its history.

Nevertheless in time, one of the Advisory Council Elders appeared, seemingly by accident, and discovered them in the Martial Force Command Center. Kiel had received no orders restricting the movement of his crew and protested against any punitive measures, yet he was unduly warned not to leave the Imperial Palace again.

Kiel responded with an unprecedented action.

He wasn't ready to leave, not until he had said what he wanted to say.

Without a word, he activated the receivers of the Martial Force Command Center telekinetically; he was going to address the people himself, the explorers saw with a sense of wonder.

Rallying behind him, the gathered explorers added their mind force to his, preventing the isolated Elder and the other officers from touching them as Kiel set up the receiver to broadcast a message to the people. Kiel's own fury and bitterness at being made Imperial pawns had finally swelled beyond his powers of self-control to contain. He was lost, lost in the tempest around him, but he knew what he had to do to steer his conscience clear.

With eyes keen, glowing with the power that is truth and conviction, he appeared before the Empire peoples, identifying himself as one of the ancient heroic explorers of legend, whom, rumor had it, had at long last returned. His appearance alone left no doubt, even stirred a general feeling of awe. Kiel explained what the explorers' mission had been, conjuring images of glorious wonders they all knew. He appealed to the people to understand that the intended purpose of their ancestors' explorations had been cooperation; even in the Empire, they might still allow that spirit to guide their actions, if they wished, if they chose to let it guide them. Each one could do his part to keep alive the ancient legacy of an honorable Seynorynael.

After a while, Kiel came to realize that his words were falling on deaf ears.

Too much hate and bitterness ruled the Empire in the hearts of the human races.

* * * * *

Later that day, back in their chamber, the rest of the explorers learned from the guard in the Imperial Palace that brought them supplies that discussions concerning Kiel's broadcast from the Martial Force building now swept across the city. Despite the people's initial rejection of his words, curiosity it would seem, had begun to work its magic on the people's subconscious, and speculation began to arise as to what the explorers' purpose could have been in making the broadcast and what they now hoped to change.

What was this "Federation" the explorer spoke of? What had it been about? So few of them aside from the bitter off-worlders knew the answer. Yet at the same time, they were afraid of knowing. They did not want to give up what they had. They feared Marankeil as much as they revered them—he had slaughtered millions of beings by now in retaliations against those who did not accept his rule.

And would this explorer's words bring rebellion and civil disorder? Perhaps even to Seynorynael herself? It was a difficult enough task quelling rebellion on the new worlds they would have had join the Empire, worlds which fought to maintain their independence and would, without a doubt, take this Seynorynaelian explorer's words as inspiration, as long as they never discovered it had been this man's explorers who brought their land under Imperial subjugation in the days of antiquity.

Yet from what the leader Fielikor Kiel had claimed, his explorers had not known that they were to be the major instruments used in orchestrating the beginnings of Marankeil's Empire. The explorers claimed that they had been betrayed by a long-ago Federation Council.

What did any of that matter now? The population wondered. The Seynorynael the explorers had known was no more; moreover, how could the explorers reasonably have expected the world to stand still until they returned?

After years of wars and rebellions, Seynorynael had at last established some semblance of intergalactic peace.

If the explorers didn't like what they found, the people concluded, they had only themselves to blame for outliving their own era of time.

* * * * *

Alessia, how good to see you again, Marankeil's voice feigned politeness.

She glanced around at the others, at Kellar, at Lierva, to gauge whether or not Marankeil had directed his thoughts to her alone.

The twisting coils around the columns holding up the Imperial Throne Room had caught Kellar's attention.

She guessed that Marankeil hadn't spoken to anyone else.

Marankeil, among the other Elders, ostensibly listened patiently to Kiel's protests, but Alessia heard nothing. How had Marankeil mastered telepathy, living as a clone? Or did he direct his thoughts to her by linking to the nearby Main Terminus, where his electromagnetic, telepathic mechanical entity lived on, synchronized to the cloned creature in human form that occupied the lavish throne before them, at the head of a ring of Advisory Council Seats?

The ancient Seynorynaelian Council had indeed become Marankeil's Advisory Council, and all of them had been transferred back into humanoid clones, or so she assumed; Ornenkai, the Vice Emperor, was conspicuously missing from the present interrogation.

Alessia shifted from one foot to another, conscious of Marankeil's unflinching gaze studying her, staring past Kiel at her. If only she knew why! she thought. She had only ever met him a few times in all her life, after all!

The moving mechanized unit attachments to the main memory terminus had been replaced by humanoid clones; yet as a clone, Marankeil seemed even more intimidating to Alessia, for the youthful face tried to take them off their guard–as though they might judge the philosophy of its inner soul from the human shell they observed. Marankeil had not lived as a human form for many long eons; returning to that form could not change that fact. Alessia sensed the inhumanity, the cruelty, behind his cobalt colored eyes, human as he appeared.

Human he was not.

"What exactly did you hope to accomplish by that little display at the Martial Force Center?" Marankeil turned his attention to reprimand Kiel and the others, speaking for the first time.

They stopped, stunned into silence, not by Marankeil's words but by his voice.

The voice of the Emperor addressed them in the same ancient variation of Seynorynaelian that Hinev had used; it was an unspeakably beautiful voice, composed of deep resonating chords, slow and unhurried, like the enchanting whisper of a sun-warmed stream in summertime.

How? Kiel thought, in a state of shock. How could such an evil being create such a magnificent sound? Marankeil's former mechanized voice had conveyed the sense of the unfeeling creature that he had become. Yet the clone's voice would have tamed any man or beast who stilled to listen to it. Kiel had no intention of listening, however.

"Did you believe that you could win over my Martial Force?" Marankeil laughed. "They won't listen to you. They know that their loyalty to me will be worth more than anything you could possibly offer them."

Alessia almost believed him, but then she thought she sensed a trace of irritation behind the emperor's outward composure. Marankeil's eyes suddenly flicked in her direction for a moment, as if he had registered her unexpected presence in his mind. Neither she nor anyone else had never broken through before, not even for a moment!

In that second, though, she had seen the truth.

Marankeil did fear Kiel. He feared that Kiel's words would spread like a poison. Any epidemic always began with a small isolated case! But Marankeil had made plans to heal the damage as soon as possible and eliminate the threat once and for all.

"However, if you will swear loyalty to the new Empire, I shall overlook it." Marankeil continued, his eyes on Alessia again. "In either case, you have no choice–if you do not," he paused, "I shall have to arrange some circumstances which might persuade you." He returned his attention to Kiel. "Many of the territories you claimed for me are, so very–precious, yes, so very pure. So easy to corrupt or destroy."

Kiel looked up at the Elder with venomous eyes but said nothing.

"We wouldn't want anything to interfere with these precious–defenseless–sweet little children." Marankeil added in a disturbingly dulcet tone.

Marankeil–Marankeil knew them well!

Whether or not Hinev's explorers' names lived forever in history branded as deceivers, Kiel knew that he could bear this injustice better than to know that his own stubbornness, his own pride had cost billions of beings their lives or freedom, billions who might now be threatened because of the empty promises he and the other explorers had made long ago.

The explorers' ignorance of Marankeil's intention to seize an Empire was no excuse; at least, Kiel would not let this ignorance excuse him, as their leader, from any culpability in having helped the foundation of Marankeil's empire. He would bear the responsibility, though he knew it was only a step towards making amends, even if the Empire never knew what he now sacrificed to atone for his crimes.

"I cannot speak for the others," Kiel said, in a quiet, steady voice, detached from emotion, "but for my part, I swear loyalty to Marankeil, Emperor of Seynorynael and the Great Cluster. I will raise no hand in open war against him, and shall endeavor to fulfill his wishes even to my dying breath."

Kiel spoke only to protect the innocent lives of the beings he had enticed into slavery.

The explorers bristled at his words, fitting as it was that Kiel had repeated the last lines of the age-old Pledge of Seynorynael's ancient line of Great Leaders. The Great Leaders of ancient history had been replaced by a democratic council and then the Federation Council even before Hinev's youth, finally to be replaced by a regression towards the ancient tradition of imperialism.

Why had she lived to see this reality? Alessia wondered. The barbaric treatment of non-ranking off worlders and the regression in Seynorynaelian culture, the decline of tolerance towards the newest incorporated cultures and disregard of evidence that proved the First Race Theory all added up to her previous conclusion that Marankeil had as firm a control over his people and their development, or lack of it, as the ancient Great Leaders had.

But where the authoritarian control of the past had been designed to protect the people in times of necessity, when threats against human survival had rallied the people around a leader, Marankeil's regime had been formed solely to promote his own glory and the wealth of those loyal to him.

In the moment of Marankeil's weakness, Alessia had also seen a glimmer of his thoughts–no matter what Kiel promised, he would always fear and distrust Hinev's explorers.

For they also were immortal. And they alone knew how to use Selesta.

She saw the truth, suddenly. Marankeil was evil, but also lived in a kind of semi-state of terror. He could assuage his own fears for long lengths of time, but he did fear being overthrown. He had good reason to fear that Hinev's explorers might have returned to unleash some secret force that might depose him, she admitted, for perhaps only they could ever possibly pose a threat to him.

Marankeil couldn't allow it. Or that their technology and knowledge of how to manipulate the centipede hole time tunnels would lead to another world's erasing his empire before it began. That knowledge could not be given to an enemy.

As much as Marankeil wished to seize the Selesta for his own and as much as it irritated him to lose the great ship, Selesta was the only ship that could rid him of the explorers for good, that much he knew.

Though the explorers would betray him and warn new territories of his empire–of this he was sure, no matter what Kiel swore–it no longer mattered. Sending them far away again was the only way to be sure that they could not ally themselves with another nearby empire world or surrender the Selesta to an opposing faction that could be of any immediate threat to Seynorynael.

The Selesta alone threatened all he had achieved, but if it should be destroyed?! Marankeil somehow knew that his empire would fade. He believed this firmly, or else he would have had the ship destroyed by any means necessary, long ago. At the same time, he absolutely detested the hold the ship and its explorers had over his own destiny. So, for ten thousand years he had planned his crushing blow–he had devised a final mission for them, to banish them from Seynorynael—

forever.

Alessia shuddered. Then, after a moment, she came to a bittersweet conclusion.

She no longer cared.

Why should they be reluctant to leave? Was there anything left of the Seynorynael they had once known? They were tired of coarseness, of vulgarity, of cruelty, which seemed to strike at every opportunity to set the human races back into ignorance, yes, and tired of seeing that coarseness and ignorance would always prevail over truth and beauty.

And at least in spaceon board the Selesta, a part of the past lived on, even if that past was now only an illusion.

* * * * *

"They all say he's crazy," Derstan shook his head, standing on the stationary ledge in the wide, bronze-colored corridor outside the explorers' rooms, where the traffic of armored guards, planetary delegates, and other officials was highest; asynchronous shuffling steps marked the passage of hundreds of feet passing swiftly in the moving corridor beyond. "I can hardly believe that. 'Kilmachi hiurthd-ei ma?'" Derstan asked another passing guard, a man with black hair and amethyst eyes wearing the bronze and imperial purple of a sentry. The question had been in ancient Kayrian. Derstan checked himself and repeated its more modern equivalent.

The guard stopped on the wide, half-moon ledge, his amethyst eyes widening; the second question erased the crease of confusion that had formed between his brows. This Seynorynaelian man spoke fluent Kayrian!? The guard couldn't seem to understand that fact at first, even though Derstan's accent and execution were flawless. Finally, he answered. The two spoke for a brief moment.

"They've heard from a man who claims to be Hinev, but he thinks he must be Hinev's descendant." Derstan said a moment later, directing his speech into the room in their older Seynorynaelian dialect. "Everyone in the Palace knows that the Hinev pretender has tried to contact Hinev's explorers–but the guards all think he's crazy. He refuses to give up his claim that he is Hinev himself. Only a few of the guards even knew who the Hinev pretender was, but some of them have heard that there was once such a man."

Everyone stopped to listen to the Kayrian man. The explorers used their telepathy to understand him, even as Derstan translated for them.

Of course, the conversations were all monitored, here in the Imperial Palace; there were few secrets in this, the highway of information. Moreover, there was nothing much for the explorers to do, and interacting with one of the guards actively was a great deal more interesting and satisfying than taking thoughts from him without his knowledge. Whatever the reason, or perhaps for many reasons unknown to themselves, the explorers sat at their own business, allowing Derstan to conduct this investigation for them.

As for the Kayrian guard–he probably also spoke Seynorynaelian, but hearing perfect Kayrian from an off-worlder seemed to have enticed him to speak more openly with those so interested in his culture! His face was aglow with a sense of this compliment that came from a Seynorynaelian 'brother', and an explorer no less, he realized from the nameplate Derstan wore!

"The messages are actually coming from the Celestian colony." Derstan said in surprise, then listened.

"This guard saw the Hinev pretender's last transmission in the communication center." Derstan continued. "The supposed pretender said he was Hinev. A moment later, he was asking who Hinev was. His voice had changed, and he called himself Jerado of the planet Tulor, then asked them why they had contacted him. He seemed about to terminate the signal but then suddenly shouted at the screen, as though he had remembered himself, asking what trick they had played to make him want to give up so easily.

"The other guards told this guard that the Hinev pretender had been like this in each of his transmissions. They say he's playing Hinev well–legend has it Hinev suffered from a multi-personality disorder before his retreat to Celestian. But they haven't let the man through. Marankeil's orders are that no one outside the Palace is to contact the explorers."

Derstan thanked the guard and came into the room, allowing the door panel to swish closed behind him.

"Who would have thought that Hinev would have suffered from the serum like those others–the ones who failed–" Broah's voice trailed off.

"We had our suspicions," Onracey reminded her.

"Still, I never imagined it, when we left last time, did any of you?" She asked.

"He didn't have anyone like us around him–to keep him normal and to ease his lonliness. No private thoughts unrevealed. Scary to think that it may have happened to any of us if we had not been so many." Vala added. Alessia's eyes flickered almost imperceptibly, but Kiel noted them.

Kiel's heart doubted she had ever opened up completely with any one. What did she continue to hide, and why? One thing he knew–Hinev's condition had bothered her more than she let on at first, more than he had thought it would. He had been thinking of his own sentiments and his own memories until that moment–that his great mentor, his dear friend had come to such an end.

Kiel looked at Alessia, and for once, pitied her. Alessia saw his feelings, since he never cared to conceal them, but she paid no attention. Her mind was on Hinev, her one-time mentor, her teacher, her surrogate father.

Of course, isolation among the population, whose thoughts he could read so easily, had caused the multi-personality disorder. After thousands of years of loneliness among mortal Seynorynaelians, he had been unable at last to disconnect himself and his own entity and experiences from other people's lives, the lives he had "read". Immortality had been lonely for him, and he had paid the price for it–he could no longer control his own mind.

* * * * *

Alessia decided that if Hinev couldn't reach her, she would have to find a way to contact him. He had been trying to contact her. She knew that, though she didn't know how she knew. She felt him, felt him trying to reach her. She felt his presence as close to her now as he had always been, no matter where in the universe they went, or how much time separated them; neither could affect the bond between them, a bond that had grown as strong as a root buried deeply in the ages of the past.

When the others returned to conversations about what to do now that they had returned and where to live once they were given permission to leave the Palace, she thought of what she would say to Hinev, to let him know that she understood his guilt and forgave him, that he should forgive himself.

At the same time she was disturbed by the scraps of conversation going on around her–she had not told the others what she suspected–that Marankeil had no intention of allowing them to stay on Seynornyael.

"Alessia–you're going to love Lake Firien. Don't you think she will, Kiel?" Kellar said, trying to draw Alessia out of her depression. He knew better than to believe she felt nothing at that moment, as her face suggested.

"I already love Lake Firien. I grew up there." Alessia said frankly.

The others stopped their conversations, regarding her with shock. There was a hollow noise as something fell to the floor.

As long as they had known her, they had assumed she came from Aryalsynai.

"I grew up north of Firien City, but that was before Hinev brought me here to be his assistant," she added, in an attempt to mollify their surprise. But Kiel saw her comment as a sign that concern for Hinev engrossed her at that moment. He eyed her with a new appreciation and wondered briefly why none of this had appeared in the bio that the Martial Scientific Force had sent him long ago.

So, Alessia had grown up by Lake Firien–like Calendra, he let the knowledge sink in. None of the others had come from Firien–they had all come to Selesta from across the planet. Kiel began to wonder what had brought her to Hinev's attention and why he had taken her so far from her home to be his assistant. It couldn't only have been that she was half-race like him. That was too simple, so that couldn't be it. And there'd been other half-race children in Aryalsynai in those days, even half-Kayrians, any one of which would have been easier to find and to train.

When had she been taken from her family? She had been young when she arrived, and the serum bore immortal testimony of the last natural year she had reached. Yes, Hinev would have let her grow to maturity before he gave her the serum, but barely, as though he'd been impatient to try it on her. Had she been taken from her home as a child, then? Taken from her family to a far off city, to live alone without others of her age?

He suddenly understood her initial seclusion and recklessness, two halves of the all-or-nothing coin that had been her nature in the early days.

And afterward? It hadn't been haughtiness because she was a Zadúmchov, stubbornness, or indifference that kept her quiet, secretive. She had been secluded from other human contact during her developmental years; naturally, it had taken time to recover from that seclusion, to learn to trust other people. At the same time, Hinev had been her only family, and now he was no longer even able to recall his own identity.

Kiel came to several conclusions.

Hinev hadn't chosen her because she was half-race, but still she was, and of course she'd been hiding that fact when they met her. She had to have been aware her whole life that she was lucky to appear entirely Seynorynaelian, at a time in history when half-race children were scorned. Had she ever trusted anyone, allowed a friend too near, a supposed friend who turned on her later? Perhaps Hinev had understood her, being half-race himself. Perhaps that was why she feared the explorers wouldn't.

Kiel pictured Hinev's sharp but steady eyes. His heart wrenched again for Hinev, their mentor. How could they have left him alone, knowing about the consequences of unchecked mindlinks? How could they, who alone of all the world had received the gift of his serum, have left him alone to face the power of the eternal machine Marankeil?

Kiel tried not to let himself be overpowered by immobilizing guilt; that would be unproductive now, here, where he was needed to be a strong leader.

Then something gnawed on his thoughts–something about Hinev's eyes stirred a strange realization. What other race formed Alessia's racial component? Of all the races he had seen in the universe, it suddenly occurred to him that he couldn't imagine which it could be. He tried to recall the others he knew, other half-race children. One of the guards outside was a mixture of Tulorian and Seynorynaelian. He didn't look at all alien, except that his thoughts betrayed his family heritage, his Tulorian grandmother. However, Kiel could tell a half-race child. Half-Tulorians didn't always have amber eyes–some were blue–but the shape of their ears–much larger than the small Seynorynaelian oval-shaped ones, ended in a sharper point visible even in the half-race children.

Half-Felnians had dark eyes and heavier features, like their Feln brothers. And many more half-race children could now be seen, guards on duty at the Imperial Palace–he could name the race by a distinctive feature in all of them.

But Alessia? For a long time they had dismissed the rumor that she had been half-race, and then, only her own confirmation had convinced him to deny what his eyes saw.

If Alessia's mother was the daughter of Marshall Zadúmchov, who had her father been? And more importantly, what race had he come from? Even with a serum-induced, infinite memory bank, Kiel couldn't find the answer. Something, something after so long yet remained a mystery to him! This came as a wonder to him. He knew of no race that resembled Seynorynaelians as closely as Alessia's father must have in order for Alessia to appear as one of them.

And now he had discovered that Alessia had come from Lake Firien. Could it be that perhaps her father was no alien at all, only one of the proto-telepaths that once lived there in isolation? Calendra had told him about that small group of people, long ago, a group so isolated that to many they did seem as though of another race. So, perhaps Alessia was not half-race at all, though she may have been given reason to believe it.

Perhaps Hinev had known her ancestors in his childhood at Firien, and remembered them from his own childhood there. Perhaps he had sought her out upon his return from space and needed a good reason to justify his bringing her as his assistant to the Elders–maybe he had told her she was half-race like him so that the Elders would read no lie in her thoughts as she told them what she believed to be true. Being half-race would then explain why Hinev had taken an interest in her in particular, why he had brought a girl so far from her family.

Kiel realized that he was in part allowing her to see his revelations and his present thoughts in the faint hope that he might draw the truth from her by attesting his faith in her and reaffirming his understanding of her situation; revelations of the last few minutes also caused him to examine his own blindness. What had Hinev seen in her that his own blindness had kept him from acknowledging? And what had Lierva discovered? What had Alessia permitted her to know?

What was this sudden desire to uncover something new, something hidden for so long? Something he knew he couldn't have, not even if he willed it so.

Alessia kept her secrets from him, had done so all these years.

He looked at her. He felt as though he had never really seen her before.

Alessia tried to pretend she hadn't heard him, in order to keep from complicating things any more; yet, she realized, none of the explorers had been able to intuit so much about her, about her strange father and her proto-telepathic ability. But there was much Kiel had mistaken–she was a half-race child, and Marankeil, not Hinev had found her, because she had foolishly led them all right to her.

Hinev. Her thoughts returned to Hinev. She decided to open the communication channel in the room and send a message across the Celesitan province–one he would know came from her. In it he might determine her personal frequency. As she got up to cross the room, none of the others stopped her, though they knew immediately what she had planned.

Kiel watched her head to the receiver, thinking only he, apart from Lierva, could understand how much she loved Hinev, and why. He looked away and felt ashamed that he had held Calendra's plight against her, all in the name of gaining the elixir of immortality that was as much a curse as it was a blessing. Hinev's serum was a gift for those whom the scientist had chosen, and Hinev had known what he was doing, Kiel realized, even if Kiel himself did not.
Chapter Fourteen

After two tendays of silent isolation, a transmission arrived unexpectedly in the explorers' Imperial quarters.

The bright blue sky had given way to long violet shadows in the pale light of late evening. Alessia had been seated by the window on the panel, watching the soundless wind driving a single leaf through the city, no doubt caught on a transport and released into the air as it sped along, to sink unaided to the depths of the city below. Only the wind had taken pity and broken its fall.

She looked away, the hair of her arms bristling with an unidentified excitement. A signal was heard. Kiel, Celekar, Lierva, and Kellar paused in their game of kessel ball; Wen-eil put down a lapis lazuli piece on the game board he and In-nekel had situated between them for their latest re-match; the others sat around the lounge panels, reading, then looked up at the sound. Onracey put down a half-eaten slice of Bilirian cream cake and rose from his chair.

Alessia recognized her frequency and leapt to the communications console across the room. Kiel and a few others followed her, while the others listened from the other side of the room.

Hinev's haggard face appeared in the screen. At least, Alessia thought, his expression gives the appearance of it–but he looks the same, she thought. Exactly as he did the day he gave me the serum.

Despite his appearance, Hinev was like a ghost of his former self. The deep, luminous violet orbs of his eyes spoke of a hardship of many years he alone had borne–the grief, guilt, and loneliness of a man half out of his mind, always misunderstood, and tired–tired of living.

After a moment, they saw that Hinev's call had not been directed to them alone. Hinev had addressed another signal to the Council of Elders themselves. Alessia gasped as she recognized the adjoining frequency monitoring the call–it was that of Marankeil himself! What was Hinev doing?

The half-Kayrian man in the monitor's eyes sought out Alessia's face among the assembled explorers; it was to her that he addressed himself.

"Dear Alessia," Hinev said affectionately, with a sigh that tried to lighten the years, as though the sight of her face were enough to accomplish that for him. "It has been–too long," he smiled deep and wide, his teeth still hidden, but his violet eyes bright with a spark of memory.

"Hinev!" Alessia cried, letting natural feelings surface unchecked as the others clustered around the monitor, submitting to curiosity. "Oh–Hinev, you don't know how much I've missed you all this time." She found herself laughing and crying at the same time. "I never knew that it would be so long."

"And I wouldn't have continued my work had I known it would take you away from your home all that time," he vowed, leaving little doubt in their minds that he meant what he said for all its sense of hyperbole. "Forgive me." He said quietly. "I didn't know." His words held nuances of meaning Broah didn't understand, and she looked to Alessia beside her, but she was certain from Alessia's face that Alessia had understood the great scientist.

"Dear girl, my child, I feel–I want to say so many things to you, but–"

"I understand, Hinev." Alessia said, blinking furiously. "I feel the same way."

"Why must it be?" He laughed.

Hinev breathed a deep but strained breath, then a crease took form on his fine brow. The other member of his audience had addressed him, but the explorers could not hear the emperor Marankeil.

Finally Hinev responded to whatever the former Elder had said, firing a string of vitriolic words that barely resembled the Seynorynaelian they knew.

"If you believe that then you are wrong–terribly wrong–as I was wrong to do what I did. I should never have helped you..." He looked down, as if forgetting his train of thoughts or else somehow distracted by them.

Hinev stopped, silenced by an argument they could not hear.

"Marankeil, you need have no more fear of me–" Hinev began but was again cut off by the other screen. After a moment, the once composed scientist began to shake his head wildly, like the failed serum creatures he had once been forced to contain in holding cells.

"Why?" Hinev asked, as though repeating a question. "Because I knew you would be monitoring and I have a request to make–

"Yes, I saw the reports of the worlds they visited... from Felkar, of course. His transmissions were easy to decode. The binary planets in the far off system, away from the center of the Great Cluster–Blue-white G3–"

"Yes, of course Rigell." He added after a moment. "I wish to have them for my colony."

Another silence.

"I would move our Celestian settlements there, of course. Therefore I come before you to formally request the Council's permission to establish a colony. We are a simple people–we can be of no threat."

Hinev listened attentively, then shook his head at the answer and ignored it.

Hinev swallowed, disconnected the transmission with a command.

"What was that all about?" Alessia stated the question.

Hinev looked up at her. "Dear girl, how I've missed you." Kiel and the others were surprised that he took the rejection from Marankeil so well, that his first returning thought was again of Alessia. "You have returned at last." He said, savoring his own relief after years of anxiety. "I began to fear I might not see you again."

"How could that be, Hinev?" Alessia asked gently, afraid in his memory-overload he had forgotten that there would be no escaping from life for any of them. "Even if Valeria had failed before we returned, you know we would have come back. Though I am glad the journey was not so long. It would have been difficult to bear the isolation much longer."

"It is indeed, much to bear." Hinev's eyes clouded with memory.

"We're home, now."

"Yes. I trust you saw much of the universe."

"There is much to learn, and we did behold many wonders beyond description."

"Yes, and horrors, too, I've no doubt," Hinev said, letting through a note of reserve. "The universe can be a miserable place. In space, life is the exception of the rule and the only treasure worth seeking. As great as our need to explore the unknown is, to thrill to discoveries to come, in the end, it is... regret for what we miss that calls us home."

In that moment, she understood him, remembering the long years on Kiel3 and other worlds, thinking of the past and the sacrifices each explorer had made never to see their beloved ones again. She knew Hinev had never forgotten how his own journey had separated him from his love, Reneja. But the deeper meaning struck Alessia, and she glimpsed the cost of immortality through his eyes, and his regret for attaining it–like him, they would live forever, trapped in a sphere of the physical being forever, whether they desired an ending or not.

"Do you remember the legend of Narae and Hernendor?" Hinev asked suddenly.

Alessia smiled, remembering the story he had told her once in the laboratory as they worked, a story he had picked up as an explorer on his own voyage of discovery.

"Yes, I do, a little. They were a brother and sister, from the planet Malddain."

"And their father, Durr-aiyan had traveled from Seynorynael at the end of the first contact missions and crashed on the planet." Hinev reminded her.

"I remember," Alessia said, nodding.

"But the Malddains were racially similar to us," Hinev continued with his story, "and he had lived among them as an off-worlder. They remained suspicious of him as a man who had fallen from the heavens."

"Yes, I remember. The woman of their race who had helped him recover fell in love with him and married him. He called her Attorea, after the yellow flowers of our world."

"Yes," Hinev said. "Then a conflict between the many nations of Malddain destroyed the small province of Guk-inak-ra where the family lived. Durr-aiyan and Attorea were killed by the Jevkladdesh armies from over-sea in a bombing raid of the city Daehnyd, and the children barely survived the ravaging fires that swept over their tiny homeland. They walked south, to the border of Guk-inak-ra, a province that had been conquered by the large, neighboring country of Hestillih. Left alone to wander the streets of the great Guk-inak-ran city Ki-lam-vera, they were outcasts, the first known half-race children."

"I imagine they found little help."

"No, indeed, they didn't find any." Hinev agreed. "Oh, the Malddain people on all sides paid them much attention, but though they stared at the wandering pair, they refused to help them, instead wondering what disease these strange children had that they didn't appear normal."

"Narae managed to care for her younger brother for many years, until a civil rebellion broke out in Ki-lam-vera, where they now lived."

"That's right," Alessia broke in, remembering. "The Jdevkladdesh had eventually conquered Guk-inak-ra, but most of the inhabitants of Ki-lam-vera were still Hestyllihi immigrants and loyalists. The Jevkladdesh victors established their government in the great city Ki-lam-vera, but a strong native Hestyllihi faction rose up to try to expel their conquerors."

"Yes, and Hernendor, now a young man, was conscripted into the conquering Jdevkladdesh armies. The Malddain people didn't know where Seynorynael was when Hernendor wrote the name of his father's homeland on his conscription form. As a likely non-native of Hestyllih, however, the Jevkladdesh gave him a high-level commission in their army. He left Narae in the city, promising he would return to take her to Jdevkladd, where they could live in peace at last, with a respected place in society."

"What happened to him?" Kellar asked, interrupting.

Hinev's eye strayed to the second-in-command, vacillating between him and Alessia.

"Hernendor left for Jdevkladd to train for a short time, where his skill and intelligence made him a favorite of the army hierarchy, and though still quite a young man, he was soon given a commission as leader of one of the Jevkladdesh legions." Hinev replied. "The unit they gave him lay in the safe, permanent position in the armies of the northern boundary between Jevkladd and the country of Veiaupeknad, but remembering his promise to Narae, Hernendor refused to leave the lower ranks that were being sent to Ki-lam-vera, so that he could try to find her."

"Such loyalty," Celekar said, shaking his head. "Compelling story."

"War had broken out in the city when he returned, a war between three countries who claimed the city and all of Guk-inak-ra for their own." Hinev continued. "Hernendor's plane was trapped by a raze of Hestyllihi gunfire over the city and crashed to the edge of the sea. But Hernendor, though mortally injured in the crash, climbed onto the beach and made his way into the city to find the sister who had raised him.

"When he arrived, Narae was dead. On the table was a message she had left for him written into her daily record. She had never known if he would find it, if he would ever return, but she had addressed the words of her last entry to him. When we arrived, my explorer friends and I were taken to a museum that held the diary. The Malddain peoples had never been able to read the final words, because they were written in Seynorynaelian, but they knew that Hernendor had come to rescue his sister, and that the two of them had been found together by the victorious Jevkladdesh when the fighting ceased." Hinev paused.

"What did she say?" Kiel demanded, strangely affected.

Hinev smiled. After a moment, a document appeared over the transom receiver.

"Read it yourself, Alessia, aloud, if you please," Hinev told her.

Alessia nodded and stepped forward to read the message.

"'I was dreaming of Guk-inak-ra, Hernendor, the way it was before the Hestyllihi or Jevkladdesh came, when we were free.'" She began. "'I think of our family and wonder if you remember how our mother used to laugh and smile, if you ever saw our father's face bright with the memory of his homeland as he told us songs and stories of its wonders. Even I had forgotten, to convince myself that it was only a dream, to make the present bearable. But now it seems that the nightmare is coming to a close, and those dreams are what remains with me, are what I remember, and are my only comfort.

"'It cannot be long now. The siren sounded a while ago, and the vapor clouds must be near. At least it will be a quiet death, and quick, not the hell of burning fire that took our beloved mother and father. Hernendor, I feel their presence surrounding me as I have not felt it since they lived. I can almost see mother's arms reaching out to hold me.

"'My hand wanders, Hernendor. My mind has gone into a fog, and though I cannot smell it, I fear the vapors have come.'" Alessia stopped a second, but she hurriedly continued. "'Oh brother, I cannot bear it that I shall not see your face again! But I am glad you are safe in your new home. I wish you only happiness there, away from the ruin that is all we have ever known.

"'And yet I continue to dream, that one day you will come home and we will travel to a new land together where we will be welcome, that we might make a journey through the stars to our father's world. I know it is only a foolish dream, but mother did always call me stubborn, like father. Oh, Hernendor, I can hardly believe I will be joining them soon, but I am afraid. The darkness approaches, and still you have not come–'"

Cruel, betraying tears coursed involuntarily down Alessia's cheeks, but Hinev smiled.

"Don't cry, Alessia." Hinev said.

"What happened to Hernendor?" Kiel demanded suddenly, with urgency, as he shifted his weight from one foot to another; he stood beside Alessia and the others in the transmission sphere Hinev could see, though they had remained silent as Hinev spoke to his pupil.

"Hernendor?" Hinev's brow furrowed. "When his Jevkladdesh comrades found him, he had removed his helmet and placed it beside his sister's body, to die as his sister had–from the bio-vapors that swept the city. His arms held her in an embrace–he comforting her, wishing he hadn't left her alone, I suppose. Comforting her, when it was she who, when he was but a boy, had been there to ease his sorrows." Hinev shook his head. "But in death, the entire Malddain civilization pitied them more easily, as no one group had done in the children's lives. That is the real tragedy."

Suddenly Hinev seemed to remember something; his brow furrowed as he regarded Kiel.

"I'm sorry, my friend," Hinev addressed Kiel for the first time. "But–Calendra has died. There was nothing I could do..." Hinev's eyes glistened, but Kiel saw in that unguarded moment that Hinev had tried his best to protect her. In the end, her life nearly spent in the flawed suspension chamber he had never been able to perfect, Hinev had opened her capsule and allowed her to live her final twelve years among the people of Celesian. Kiel saw that she had been loved and respected there, that she had even known moments of happiness among them.

Hinev had been with her in her final moments, had listened as she sent her love across time and space to her beloved Kiel, and surrendered her essence to the unknown. Calendra had passed, but Hinev carried her memories to Kiel.

His dear one had loved him to the end, and at the end wished him only happiness.

* * * * *

"Fynals Hinev conspired with you to escape!" The Martial Force's commanding officer thundered across the communications room when he heard the explorers enter.

"Now wait–" Kiel began.

"You knew he would steal the two starships Narae and Hernendor and the small cruiser Attorea to take his colonists to Ayan one and Ayan two!" The man persisted, the vein at his temple swollen and throbbing faster than a pulsar.

Kiel's expression was, at best, dumbfounded.

"This can not go unpunished. You knew what he was planning!"

"Even if I did, what do you expect me to do about it?" Kiel offered, with mock pleasantry.

"Take Selesta out to stop him, of course!"

No one had to tell them, yet the explorers knew they had been summoned to speak with Hinev, to try to convince him his flight was useless. Alessia held her breath. So that's why Hinev had told them the story, she thought, remembering his last cryptic words.

"Calm down," the cool resonating voice of Marankeil sounded behind them at the monitor, and the officer whipped around, his hair like limp reeds fluttering about him. He bowed apologetically.

"Forgive me, Lord Marankeil. We did not realize Hinev had left the colony." The officer said, in dulcet tones. "Hinev arrived at the Celestian outpost this morning, surprising Felkar. But we are attempting to solve the problem, now. Shouldn't we–send out Selesta?" The officer asked hesitantly.

"Surely the Grand Fleet will be enough. I do not wish to risk... losing the Selesta." Marankeil's image disappeared, and the officer took a step forward.

"Don't," Kiel said, a chill bite in his voice, and the officer stopped to regard him, his nostrils blazing with anger at the sudden crisis. Just who were these explorers named after that traitor–descendants of the original Seynorynaelians? Surely they had a hand in this–Hinev had contacted them here after all–surely then it was their fault that all of this was happening!!

And who were they anyway to order him around? He eyed them, livid, wishing Marankeil would order him to dispose of them. That might provide a moment of worthy amusement. Who was this Kiel to be giving orders to his superiors in both rank and age?

The officer, a certain Major Gilkan, did not notice Kiel's eyes, rippling with the hypnotic and telekinetic power that coursed through his veins, not until the powerful eyes fell upon him.

Gilkan felt a tight sensation growing in the back of his eyes. From that fire, he felt pain traveling down his spine like melting ice; it brought him to his knees, stooped his shoulders in a cringing gesture Gilkan had never suffered in all of his days.

Through his pain, Gilkan stared at the inhuman creature his soul knew had brought on this punishment, and he hated Kiel. Hated every inch of his face, hated every inch of the man who seemed to have been undeservedly blessed by luck and by an alien power, it seemed.

The momentary pause was enough; the woman in league with him moved to the side and manually pulled out the communicator. No one would be authorizing Felkar to launch an attack, Kiel thought in triumph. Marankeil had left the duty to Gilkan alone, and Gilkan was, to put it kindly, indisposed.

At the same time, Alessia wondered at Marankeil's decision not to involve any of the Elders in this matter, Elders who were better equipped to challenge the power of Hinev's explorers. Did Marankeil really want Hinev to escape? Why else had he seemed to let him escape so easily?

A signal flashed on the screen. Alessia activated the console without moving her hands, using her telekinetic power. Gilkan, still unable to move, stared at the sphere of light surrounding her, watching in mute confusion as the terminal activated itself.

"Alessia," Hinev's voice was followed by his image that appeared in the holo-field.

She saw what he had done. He had brought the ships back to the Celestian colony for boarding. Then he had locked in the coordinates in Hernendor's and Narae's computers to take them to the new worlds. But they would be traveling across space alone. In the monitor, she could see Attorea's self-destruction warning light flashing. Only moments now remained.

The relay satellite view in the adjoining holo-monitor showed Hinev's position. He had cleared the planet and its moon colonies, and had drifted further into space. The other starships had launched past him, now only small glowing lights among the stars.

Hinev had to call Alessia one last time to wish her a farewell, to say that he loved her and to take care of herself. To convey his regret for the abuses he had caused her to suffer. And yet he had not time to speak it; but the warmth of his gaze, the mingled pain and love, conveyed it all.

"Alessia, promise me you will–try to make amends for what I did. I am so tired, so very tired. Oh Alessia, I would have it all be over." He said, his strained voice rising. "You see, I have found a way at last, and now the time passes too slowly. Death calls out to me, and I look forward to meeting her at last." He said, his voice bittersweet.

Alessia saw his memories from so far away, as if he were already a part of her, near her, and not about to leave her forever. He was remembering her ability to destroy the lyrachloroplasts of the half-transformed creatures. They had been the key that led him to another revolution. He had continued patiently thirteen thousand years on Ayan until he found a way. Then another two thousand until Alessia returned.

Somehow, she had given him the idea, but he kept that knowledge from her, afraid she might use it before she could set things to right.

Alessia nodded her understanding.

"I will," she whispered, but he heard her clearly, as though she were close enough to embrace. She smiled as he terminated the signal. He would at last rejoin the universe, and his dead love, Reneja.

She felt the explosion before they saw it; like a sharp pain it stabbed into her, as if pulling a deep-rooted part of her soul away with it.

As Attorea exploded, Fynals Hinev, greatest scientist of Seynorynael, her father, channeled his mind energy, forcing his atoms to lose their conglomeracy and the semi-sentience that compelled them to resist change. Alessia felt the instant his will fought his own body as though time stood still–or simply began moving again. It wrenched her heart as he struggled, and then it was over. Finally, the soul of the great man was at peace.

And now they knew that they could die.

* * * * *

Alessia awoke from her dream with a shiver of horror.

Her pulse raced. She glanced around, but the comforting walls of her old quarters aboard Selesta did not shut out the lingering memory of the strange visions her dream had shown her. To sleep, to dream–to think she had at last been able to, only to find her dreams haunted by echoes of the living world.

Ornenkai, she remembered Ornenkai. In her dream, he had stood before the Selesta in the spaceport's empty cargo hold on the outskirts of Aryalsynai, a humanoid once again, but a shadowed figure; his face remained darkened, turned away from her, out of her reach, though she felt drawn towards him against her will. Ornenkai himself was entirely distracted by his own actions, taking no note of her presence, yet meanwhile she rebuked her own masochistic curiosity that compelled her closer. Why was she suddenly powerless? Why could she not turn and run away from this place and from him?

Then, as her thoughts centered on Ornenkai and what he was doing, she became Ornenkai. Or, at least, she saw him clearly, saw his thoughts, knew inexplicably somehow what he felt, as so often happened in dreams.

What he felt? She could hardly believe it, but here, in this dream, she sensed nothing that would indicate that the Elder had lived years as a mechanized being. His feelings, his thoughts, they were as human in nature as anyone's, and at the moment, some unknown decision was tearing Ornenkai in two. Nevertheless, though his heart seemed unable to register any emotion beyond its own misery, Ornenkai's conscious mind refused to allow himself any moment of self-pity.

After a moment, frustration overwhelmed him with its directionless chaos. Vague thoughts of the other Elders filled his mind; that was when his thoughts shifted–to Hinev. Hinev! A secret concerning Hinev was there, something she couldn't reach. Hinev had succeeded, if only with him...

With what? Alessia demanded to know, but Ornenkai's thoughts abruptly shifted.

Some other presence was there, in the astroport, a presence that had caught the Elder Ornenkai off his guard.

"I cannot stay." He said, as though talking to the air. "I see now what I must do. If I am foolish, then let me be. But I will never succumb to your will again, my friend. I have ignored my own conscience, and my own destiny, for too long."

The presence faded, but then, after some time, Ornenkai again looked up, only now it seemed as though he was looking directly at her.

She saw the image in his mind's eye, of a suspension capsule, similar to the one that had contained Calendra. But how had he known–

Ornenkai had been there when Calendra was released! Hinev had contacted him, had sought the help of the other great scientist of ancient times so that the two of them might attempt to restore Calendra's life. As though Hinev knew Ornenkai had other reasons to wish that they might succeed. As though Hinev knew how much it would mean to Ornenkai if they could restore a body from imperfect suspension after so many years. For there was another suspension capsule in Ornenkai's mind's eye.

As Alessia looked closer, she saw the depth of the sadness that lingered around him. Even though–his wish had been granted! Yes, though years had passed after Calendra's death, and the discovery came too late to revive her, Ornenkai had at last found the key to restore the ancient body of one in suspension.

Yet he hesitated, even though time was short, and the window of opportunity to restore the crippled body of his own first human body in suspension diminished as time passed. He would have to act soon, or that body's decay could not be reversed.

Yet he hesitated. The explorers were leaving, perhaps never to return. He knew they would never allow an Elder to join them, in any recognizable form.

What, what else could he do? He could not bear to be parted from the one he loved, the one whose life had restored meaning into his own. No, he thought, facing the truth, there was no other way. The body would have to remain in suspended animation, even though it would not survive the long years.

Instead he chose to be near her, though she would never know, and if she discovered him, he knew she would see him as the mechanized creature he had always been, or something worse, for now he would have to sacrifice all mobility. Yet, it was the only decision he could live with. He would guide and protect her, no matter what the cost. He would reveal the Enorian legacy that Marankeil had hidden and lead the explorers to fulfill their destiny.

Love left him no other choice.

At the same time, he knew exactly what it was he sacrificed. Never to be seen as human again, to know human love again, to have the power of life which is movement, he who had been the all-powerful Elder and Vice-Emperor Ornenkai. Yet what, what was Elder Ornenkai doing? She wondered, for she could no longer see.

Then, moments later, she heard a scream, a scream of terror, and of pain, pain that had not been expected, terror that had not been anticipated, and all the while a knowledge that there would never be an end.

She woke suddenly, away from the horror of it.

She was glad that it began to fade, back into that place where nightmares remained buried in the light of day. Yet now, as she glanced around at the room, the walls of Selesta seemed charged with electricity, with a sentience and energy she had not sensed before.

* * * * *

"Bring me that last batch of urbin roots, will you, Alessia?" The indefatigable Onracey said from the top of the loading ladder, bestowing a smile on her.

"One moment," she said, lifting the heavy preservation unit and carrying it to the loading belt.

The explorers worked in the echoing cargo hold, helping the mechanized androids load up the smaller, staggered holds of Selesta with provisions for her third voyage.

The past three days had been busy, but at last the launch time drew near. They had assembled before dawn; now beams of natural light fell through the open air lock. Only a few more hours, and the Selesta would be cleared for departure. As the explorers were finishing stowing the last few supplies that the technicians had overlooked, the access door on the far side of the hold activated, and a mechanized unit in a vermilion robe entered from the central corridor that connected the spaceport to the city center.

"What's Elder Ornenkai doing here?" Talden asked, in suspicious tones.

"Let's give the Elder time to explain himself," Kiel said, his tone reserved.

Kellar nodded. Hadn't Ornenkai once been Hinev's colleague, and deeply involved in the Firien Project?

Kiel himself wanted to trust Ornenkai, for all the help that Ornenkai had given Hinev's explorers, but Ornenkai was, after all, one of the Elders. They could never allow themselves to forget that fact.

When was the last time she had seen Ornenkai? Alessia wondered at the same time. He hadn't been present in any of their interrogations in the Main Terminus. And, she thought, didn't rumor have it that Ornenkai preferred his clone form? Why had he decided to pay them a visit, then, through the medium of his ancient mechanized unit?

"Greetings, Hinev's explorers," the artificial voice of the ancient mechanized unit rasped as it approached. "I bring a message to you. Will you hear it, Fielikor Kiel?" His voice seemed strangely stilted, even for a mechanized unit.

Alessia cast a critical eye over the machine. Something was wrong, her intuition told her–but what? Her nightmare, those clouded visions–they had been wrong, by all appearances. So why did she feel so reluctant to accept the mechanized unit for what, or whom, it appeared to be?

"We will," Kiel replied, flicking his eyes to Gerryls, who also wondered why Ornenkai's voice held such small range of feeling, when they knew Ornenkai, unlike the other Elders, was still capable of some emotion.

Alessia felt less inclined towards giving him the benefit of the doubt on that issue. She had never forgiven Ornenkai for the simple fact that he was an Elder, and therefore, partly responsible for taking her from her home, the event that finally destroyed her mother, Nerena. After Alessia had been taken, Nerena could no longer bear living and had drowned herself in Lake Firien.

Nevertheless, Ornenkai's attempts at kindness had not been lost on Alessia, as much as she hated to admit it, and she still wondered why he had bothered, especially considering that he could not be ignorant as to her opinion of him.

This was not the Ornenkai she remembered. There was no spark, no trace of feeling in the mechanized unit. Only the superficial shell reminded her of him; the manner and attitude were indeed machine-like, not Ornenkai at all. It had said it brought a message, as if it had been programmed, she observed.

However, Kiel and the others didn't seem to notice that.

The mechanized unit gave a gesture reminiscent of a nod. "Then listen well, explorers." It said, with perfectly even intonation. "I would help you on your mission."

"Oh?" Celekar and Onracey hopped down from the loading ladder to listen.

"I know that you are not intended to return, that you know this is Marankeil's order and that perhaps you might feel inclined to comply, if only for your own sakes, so that you can escape beyond the regions of his control, away from where his orders might lead you." Ornenkai continued.

"Perhaps," Cerdko admitted, his eyes flashing.

"Yet I also heard Hinev's transmission to you, and if the esteem you feel towards him is as great as I expect it to be, I am certain that you will endeavor in any way to rectify his contribution, and yours, to the founding of our Empire." Ornenkai continued.

"Why should that be of your concern, Elder?" Vala demanded, when even Lierva kept silent; that group, Lierva, Kiel, Kellar, and Celekar, all from the Firien Project–none of them said a word.

"Why would you help us?" Derstan asked. "Even if we wished to honor Hinev's request, I doubt anyone could find a way to do it."

Ornenkai moved closer. "Perhaps your intentions are to warn the civilizations of the Great Cluster we have not yet reached, to prepare them for war. Listen when I tell you that you will accomplish little in that effort. There is a better way to bring down Marankeil's council, to keep his touch from contaminating the entire supercluster."

"Even if I believed you knew of a way to stop Emperor Marankeil, why should an Elder help us to do it?" Kiel asked, eyeing Ornenkai closely.

"That I will answer in a moment. But will you hear my news? Will you take my counsel to heart?" Ornenkai asked, his voice sounding as far from threatening as a mechanized unit could.

Kiel looked at the others, and sensing their accord, nodded marginally.

"In my youth, just as in Hinev's, remnants of knowledge from our ancient past still lived." Ornenkai began, as though on cue. "Scattered clues of our history remained across the planet, of days when the human races on our world had not lived as we know them now."

"You speak as though there were more than one," Gerryls commented.

"Indeed." Ornenkai nodded. "Though at first we did not understand how the pieces of the past fit together. Since my youth, I had searched for answers, for evidence of some ancient golden age of our people. I never did find what I sought in Ariyalsynai–

"Suffice it to say that I did not understand the implications of what I observed, and I was unconsciously trying to prove something that had never existed. I thought that the Seynorynaelian relics of the past had decayed as radiation destroyed our bodies, leaving few traces that any great civilization had once existed and fallen into decline.

"Only after some time did I begin to see–that a greater story buried in our past did exist but it was not ours alone. With that revelation, we–my friend Ilika and I–set out to find a place called the "Havens" that had only existed in children's tales and in ancient lore, a place that had been turned into myth and legend because the Havens had never been found. The ruins by Lake Firien seemed the only likely connection to the comet riders of legend, our ancestors that supposedly rode the white tails of a flaming comet that crashed on our world. Tales of the Havens sounded, if anything, more entrenched in groundless myth.

"I cannot say why I felt so strongly that they must have existed. Puzzles seemed to taunt me in every direction I turned, even in the very mysteries of the origin of our language. I felt sure they must have had some solid historical foundation in order to have entered our one language, from Firien all the way to the Kilkoran Sea.

"After I finished my specialist studies in science at school, my closest friend Ilika and I searched together, until at last we found the Havens of Enor."

Kiel's eye flashed. Was it true? Had Ornenkai found the ancient ruins of the legendary ancestral race?! Enor was a name that he recalled hearing maybe once or twice in his childhood, but the very echo of that word had always sent a strange shudder down his spine. To those of his time, it was a sacred name, surrounded in mystery, having something to do with their origins. Some thought it another name for the Great One's paradise and that its creatures, its haven-masters, were His messengers, or angels.

"Ilika and I discovered the legend inscribed by the Enorians, one I have never repeated until now, and never will again."

Ornenkai now had their undivided attention.

"It was written by one of the haven-masters that a singularity would come from Kiel3 to destroy the ruling Council of Seynorynael forever. Therefore," he said, facing them squarely, "you must return to Kiel3 if you hope to end Marankeil's reign."

Return to Kiel3?! Alessia's thoughts froze at the words. Return? Search all over again, only to–yes perhaps only to fail?

"Whatever happened to your friend Ilika who found the Havens with you?" Kellar asked.

"Ilika still lives, though none call him by his personal name, and it has been lost in time to all but me. However all know him by his more familiar family name. He is the one whom you would disempower. Ilika is the Emperor of the Council–Marankeil."

Kellar nodded, wishing he hadn't asked. But was that why Ornenkai had remained loyal to Marankeil so long, despite the rumors they had heard from Hinev that he was not content with the policies of the other Elders? Could Ornenkai really be a creature trustworthy on his own, and could he be trusted?

Kiel found himself willing to believe the Elder. It would be hard to betray a former friend of so many long years, he thought, even if all traces of his humanity had been corroded by time. And one who could destroy so many if threatened, he reflected.

"Was Marankeil always as corrupt as he is now?" Lierva asked. Apparently all of the explorers were thinking the same thing.

"No, he was once a good man. But I believe his obsession with the Enorians got the best of him. Though there are times—I do not know why we fell to such great evil. Perhaps it was absolute power, that slowly took all feeling from us, and turned us to evil."

"I don't understand. Did he think the Enorian legend would add to his power and make it absolute?" Broah suggested, but the android Ornenkai shook his head to the side once with the slight whine of sliding metal.

"It was more complicated than that. Marankeil knew from the lore that the Enorians saw that an Empire would emerge, that it was in our destiny to rebuild. Marankeil wanted that ruler to be him. And for none other to emerge but himself alone, he tried to deny Hinev's First Race Theory so that no one else would seek to become that leader.

"To him, only Seynorynaelians could be descended from a great race and destined for glory–with few legitimate heirs, his chance of being selected as the leader of the Federation turned Empire increased. And he refused to disclose the location of the Havens or tell its legend to anyone. He even managed to suppress any interest in the ancient lore and legends, to keep us all in ignorance." Ornenkai looked down.

"That was what caused the great culture of our race to dwindle. That is why our descendants have no idea who they are, why they are content to be ruled by him as long as they can rule the galaxies. What little any of them knows of Enor or of the various eras of our post convinces them they are better off now than ever before. They do not realize that the exploitation of the misfortunate and the pursuit of selfish pleasures were not in the Seynorynael ideal of our past. Nor that we can maintain a stranglehold over trillions and trillions of lives forever. It must all come to an end. For our evil, it must all come to an end!"

"Why then did Marankeil send us to Kiel3 before, if he thought something from that world would bring about the end of his Empire? You said he knew the legend–how could he authorize a mission that might fulfill that destiny?" Kiel demanded, his eyes flicking towards Kellar.

"He knew that a threat to his reign existed on Kiel3, but he sent you there to determine what that was, for him to destroy it. Perhaps that had been and was the Enorian home world, he did not know. But he had to find out. When you reported nothing was found there after your return, he began to fear that you explorers had discovered the singularity of the legend and were hiding it, that you were learning to use it to destroy him, or else were in league with some remaining Enorian force that would depose him. So he will continue to send you away forever, to keep your power away from him, to prevent you from taking away his absolute control.

"He knows there is a time-loop somewhere in our destiny. He knew it before you proved it to be true, when we first began to amass the Grand Fleet. We lost many trading ships around the black holes. One of them emerged back into the same point in space after thousands of our years, after only seconds by the crew's accounts. And other shifts in the temporal dimension occurred. Marankeil hopes to escape those who would return to the past to destroy him and to escape the supernova of Valeria, and the end of our empire. He believes the time-loop will be over when he escapes the destruction of Seynorynael and finds another world from which to rule.

"But he also fears you may return to destroy his Empire only a short time after each departure and that at any given second his existence will simply cease to be."

"He does?" Gerryls asked.

"Yes. You see, though on your ship a million years might pass, he is terrified of these untamable time tunnels. With your powers, one of you might learn to control them, to bypass the encoded signal in the exotic matter transmission device that prevented any of our ships from entering the past. When he sent you on your mission to galaxy group seven, he thought you would retrieve the untamed singularity and give it to him before you knew what he planned for our world. Now he fears you will use it to try to destroy the empire before he has had a chance to expand it, before he has moved to another world and consolidated his eternal reign, or even that–as I said, you might decide to return to the days of the Federation and attempt to alter his future."

"That's an idea," Onracey whistled.

"And as for the future," Ornenkai continued, "he knows Valeria will supernova in perhaps less than twenty thousand years. Before that happens, Marankeil plans to escape by orbiting the natural ring singularity of the black hole Kai-rek and emerge from its companion white hole into the future, where you cannot harm him."

"Thank you, Ornenkai, for your information," Kiel said, after a moment.

Ornenkai nodded, his eyes straying to Alessia, though they seemed to scan her with a vacant expression.

He fears you, child of Enor, she heard a voice in her thoughts. It was Ornenkai's voice, the Ornenkai she remembered. He fears you, now that Hinev is gone, that you will know how to use the singularity from Kiel3. Yes, for some reason, he fears that you will indeed return to his past. That only you can.

She stopped, struck by a panic. Why? Why after all of this time did Marankeil imagine her to be a threat to his power? She had never learned anything that might harm him from her father, even if her father had truly been from the land of Enor.

Yet now he believes he has won–that he can control your unconscious mind and prevent you from attempting it. At the same time–he never predicted what I might do to stop him!

So, Ornenkai lived, after all; her dream had been only a dream, Alessia concluded as the mechanized unit dismissed itself and withdrew, leaving the explorers to discuss his news.

At the same time, for the past few hours she had sensed the new entity surrounding, permeating Selesta, as though the dormant soul of the ship had been wakened–a benevolent presence, but cold and strong as well. Its sadness moved her, but she sensed its power with trepidation. This was no simple entity, but an ancient creature of complexities beyond her present understanding. It called out to her in some way, tried to contact her–and yet in the end it said nothing and grew quiet.

Had Hinev somehow tampered with the computers? she wondered. Who else might have lived on Selesta while they were at the Imperial Palace in order to imbue its memory with a new depth of character, memory, and an authentic program of human feeling?

Or had that been what Ornenkai was doing in her vision?

Ornenkai must have overseen some of the remodification, she concluded. He was a brilliant scientist himself, and had probably imbued the computers with some aspects of his own personality as he programmed information into its memory bank. Or–perhaps Ornenkai had been living here until the explorers returned from the Imperial Palace.

Why else would she sense his strong presence coming from the ship?
Chapter Fifteen

"But Kiel, are you sure we can make it to Kiel3 and back in time to stop Marankeil before he escapes to the future?" Gerryls asked, making no attempt to dissemble his lack of faith.

"What do you have in mind?" Kiel turned to him.

"Well, as you know it's a long journey, even if we use the centipede hole passages the lai-nen discovered between galaxy two and the Edge of the Great Cluster."

"And?"

"And if Marankeil orbits outside the event horizon of the black hole Kai-rek and escapes us we may not be able to find him. We won't know where and when he may emerge." Gerryls showed him open palms.

"He can't return too far into the future," Kiel protested. "He'll be relying upon the fact that when Seynorynael is gone, the Empire worlds will be thrown into chaos."

"Yes, I know. By the time news reaches the fringes of the Empire that Valeria has supernovaed, he will already have put his plans to reclaim the territories into motion. The question is, Kiel, where will he establish our new home world?"

"I don't know," Kiel shook his head. "On Goeur perhaps?"

"Or Kayria, or Eretae4..." Gerryls added.

"Gerryls, I have faith that we'll be able to find him. He won't go far from Seynorynael, or else risk losing all that he has conquered."

"Kiel, there's something I don't like about any of this," Wen-eil said, his face twisting in concern.

"What?"

"Who's to say he won't lead our people to an uninhabited world?"

"I hardly think he'd care to rebuild his power from scratch," Kiel replied. "Not when he can convert one of the governmental outposts."

"Yes, yes, I know," Wen-eil continued. "But there won't be room for all of Seynorynael's citizens in any one of the territories."

"The Council can always divide the population among the Fleet and disperse them across the territories," Mindra suggested.

"Yes, but then, without a strong Seynorynaelian coalition, our people will be assimilated in only a few generations. We'll be the minority, you see, so any trace of Seynorynaelian culture will die out among the planets." Wen-eil continued.

"I thought Marankeil planned to move Seynorynael to another orbit–around the white star Filna." Vala interrupted. "The Imperial Palace scientists spoke of generating an electromagnetic field to take the planet from Valeria long before the supernova approaches."

"No one knows if the field will be able to move and protect such a large object as a planet." Kiel shook his head. "But even if they succeed and Seynorynael is spared from destruction, it will take time for the planet to arrive in its new orbit, and even longer for her people to reestablish their dominance. Any changes in the empire's order are likely to tip the balance of power. The revolutionary groups are likely to take advantage of Seynorynael's vulnerability."

"That has me worried, too, Kiel." Gerryls said quietly.

"Are you sure we need to worry about the supernova now?" Celekar asked. "The Empire has twenty thousand years or more to prepare for it. Don't you think we could be back by then?"

"You can never be certain, with time dilation. It took us much longer to reach Kiel3 and return the last time." Kilran said. "We only managed to cut the distance by returning through the centipede hole and into the past again."

"But we also stopped to visit half a million worlds, and we didn't return directly. We orbited the galaxy to check on the lai-nen system first." Celekar protested.

"True." Kellar nodded.

"But just because we have twenty thousand years before the supernova doesn't mean that Marankeil might not transfer his government to another world before then. We don't necessarily have much time," Gerryls said.

"Gerryls, you know we've been given orders to go to the Fringes to pick up tributes and shuttle them to the section worlds. It will take some time to finish all of the supply routes–before we even get to Kiel3. And Kiel3 lies in the opposite direction."

"Explorers, indeed." Talden muttered derisively. "Marankeil has made us his drones–no, worse than drones. I know you swore your allegiance Kiel, and I respect your honor, but do we really have to consider following Marankeil's orders?"

"We don't," Lierva said, her eyes hard. "We could just go to Kiel3."

"Yes, we could, but the Grand Fleet will soon know we have abandoned our mission if we don't arrive on Nepheria." Onracey shook his head.

"And what could they do about it?" Lierva demanded.

"They could take punitive action against innocent lives. And you know how much we love to carry excess baggage on our consciences," Derstan said. Lierva's face appeared momentarily crestfallen.

"Unless–" Broah's eyes lit up mischievously. "We send a distress beacon that we were caught in the Bageros nebula and could not navigate our way out until we passed the centipede hole."

"What would that accomplish?" Hilden's mercurial eyes narrowed out of curiosity.

"They might decide the delay is too long and send another cargo ship to take care of the supply routes. Then we would be free of our obligation and we could continue on the exploration route. Then no one would know if we altered course for Kiel3." Broah explained.

"What could the Empire do if they knew we had abandoned our mission?" Alessia asked after a brief pause. "Once we've reached Tiernan, Marankeil won't be able to send anyone to follow us. He won't be able to choose a faction to punish that he wouldn't already, since no one across the empire is supporting us, or has a reason to feel anything but hatred for Hinev's explorers. So why are we worrying about what Marankeil will do?

"All he can do is further malign our names in history, but is that any worse than what he has already done in naming us responsible for coordinating his conquest of the Great Cluster? We must reach Kiel3 and return before he escapes us, this much we know. Why not go there now–with no delays?" She asked, her teeth clenched. She didn't want to go, despite what she had said.

"If Marankeil guesses what we are trying to do, won't he disappear from Seynorynael until he knows he's safe?" Mindra protested.

"Yes, he might," Kiel conceded. "But I still don't think he'll be able to go far. We can catch him, no matter where and when he emerges again." Kiel looked at Alessia with a spark of amusement and gratification that she agreed with him. "I agree with Alessia–we should head for Kiel3 right away." The others nodded, though some only reluctantly.

At the same time Alessia shrugged off a strong desire to retract her own suggestion.

* * * * *

Selesta had only passed out of the Valerian system a few hours when the Grand Flagship appeared behind them. The Grand Flagship, Marankeil's oldest ship in the Imperial Grand Fleet, was one of the few that possessed an engine which contained the exotic matter necessary to create negative pressure and enlarge natural centipede gate holes.

Its appearance changed the explorers' plans; there could be no escaping to Kiel3 with the Grand Flagship following them, because if they did, it would follow them there.

"What is the Grand Flagship doing following us?" Celekar seethed, but in his heart he knew the answer, as they all did.

"It looks like Marankeil has anticipated that we might be planning to divert from his mission for us," Filaria commented.

"But why the Grand Flagship?" Cerdko asked gravely, though his atypical features had been crafted perfectly for irreverence; he had the reputation of being something of a scrapper, a loner, and a hothead, but today his manner was thoughtful. "I wouldn't think he'd want to risk losing it."

"He knows us too well to worry about that, Cerdko," Wen-eil pointed out. "He knows we won't open fire on one of our own ships, no matter what they do to threaten us."

"Perhaps Marankeil has sent his android units on board–or one of his back-up mechanized units. I'll bet the commander has orders to follow us." Kellar suggested, folding his arms across his chest.

"Can he really do anything to us?" Loussya wondered aloud, turning her attention to Kiel, who had said nothing in the interchange; usually, it was she who remained silent.

Kiel sat quietly, contemplating their situation. But there was only one solution that came to his mind–only one way out of the trap Marankeil would have set for them, only one opportunity to escape on their present flight path, much as he disliked the idea. They would have to chance an orbit around the rotating black hole Kai-rek that lay between Valeria and the neighboring Kayrian system.

Kai-rek, the ancient remnant of another powerful blue star, long since dead, had been transformed into the universe's darkest creation where the known laws of physics collapsed and matter became infinitely dense. But it was precisely the unusual properties of space-time around a black hole singularity that created the black hole dimension gate across space and time, connecting infinite black and white holes across the galaxies.

It was the only way to get away from Marankeil's Grand Fleet, the only way to ensure that they could reach Kiel3 and return before Marankeil had escaped Seynorynael. Only one thing gave Kiel cause for concern, but it would certainly ensure that the Selesta was not followed.

No one had ever successfully attempted the passage through a black hole.

* * * * *

"It's the only way, and we have to decide soon." Kiel advised; a long silence had followed his suggestion.

"Hmmm, you think the negative pressure of the string engine we possess will keep the gate through the ring singularity open?" Gerryls reflected, considering. "I suppose hypothetically speaking it should work," Gerryls admitted reluctantly. "But there are complications–"

"Gerryls is right. The black hole may take us into another part of the universe, even into another universe–" Vala protested. "It might even bring us into the future instead of the past, even if we try to predict the coordinate planes, the quadrant containing the past–"

"We could be launched a million years into the past, and then what would we do?" Peilann protested, feeling as though the majority was going to override those who disagreed with the idea.

"Well, that would certainly give us enough time to collect this singularity device from Kiel3 before Marankeil knows about it," Lierva broke in, dispelling the tension with her hearty laugh.

"Can it be done, Kiel? Can we predict the right coordinates?" Ioka looked to Kiel, whose face was turned away from them, looking out the lowered forward viewport at the familiar backdrop of stars.

"Hypothetically, it is possible." Kiel nodded. "The lai-nen had extensive theories on it which they might have proven, hard to say. We know that the black hole Kai-rek is paired with a white hole singularity, a past singularity if you will, and perhaps many others throughout our universe. The black hole and white whole are one and the same–the white hole emits matter as the black hole consumes it. Some say as soon as it is created, the white hole is immediately covered by an event horizon and turned into a black hole. But that does not mean the whites holes do not exist."

"Yes," Gerryls interrupted. "The negative pressure of our string engine should allow us to pass through the ring singularity, through the throat of the black hole, and allow us to escape from the white hole by keeping the channel open. But it would be imperative that we get the entry coordinates right," he said gravely, "or we will be consumed by Kai-rek."

"You mean we could die, even with Hinev's serum?" Nal-ayn's face paled.

"I don't know," Kiel admitted. "But if we don't attempt this, I don't know how far the Grand Flagship will go to drive us away. I'll understand if none of you want to take the risk, but–that means we'll have to give up the mission to Kiel3."

"We can't do that, Kiel," Lierva protested. "If we allow Marankeil to stop us, all those lives are on our head–the present ones, even future generations–"

"How is it our fault?" Celekar asked. "We weren't even here when the Empire was formed. And no one alive now believes in our innocence, anyway, no matter what the future might learn to the contrary. They don't expect anything from us."

"Yes, Celekar, but we formed it for him," Lierva's voice was cold. "And who else can stop Marankeil if we fail?"

"All right then... I'm willing to accept the risk." Celekar said.

"We'll put it to a vote." Kiel said. "If we decide to do this, any of you who object can take Sesylendae and fulfill the mission as you see fit."

Kiel waited as each privately decided, then sent him telepathic confirmation, so that they would not be swayed by the decisions of the others.

It was unanimously decided to take the ship into the black hole.

* * * * *

Almost an hour later, the explorers had set the course according to their best predictions in the short time allowed them.

After a long approach, the ship headed into the dark, primordial, haunting quiet of Kai-rek. For some time nothing untowards happened. All was calm. Then several of them on the bridge were jolted to the floor.

"Registering unusual fluctuations in the cosmic string density engines," Ioka cried out in a flurry of words. "Ship acceleration detected. We're approaching the event horizon in an elliptical orbit short of the pole. Our calculations are off. Engaging side thrusters–I'll try to correct the orbit before we pass into the event horizon. Hopefully we can slingshot around it and try again."

The explorers waited fearfully as Kellar, Lierva, and Alessia hurried to Ioka's side and struggled to gain control of the ship and check its descent towards the event horizon.

"Take us out as soon as you can," Kiel commanded, glancing among his crew, whose stoic faces masked their terror.

"Yes." Ioka moved her fingers over the navigation panel. No other sound could be heard on the cavernous bridge but the soft responses from her panel.

Alessia's thoughts turned to the engine room. An image formed in her mind's eye, an image of the string singularity density engines. The energy flickered, and she felt a slight vibration rippling across the ship.

"That's it," Ioka sighed, with audible relief. "We're coming away from the event horizon." But her relief quickly dissipated. "Oh no," she said, cut off by shock.

"What, what is it?" Kiel demanded.

Ioka didn't respond, but Kiel and the others came to her side to assess the situation.

They had traveled near the event horizon only a moment, but not as planned. The view of the stars surrounding them assured them that they had returned to the territory around Kai-rek.

Meanwhile, Ioka struggled to regain her composure. Perhaps her growing fears were unfounded. Perhaps they had turned back before they passed too close to the event horizon where time and space became distorted.

"Do we try that again?" she asked, unsure what to do.

"Can you determine what caused the fluctuation in the density engine energy output?" Kiel asked, suppressing his own uncertainty.

"I'm not sure," Ioka replied, her voice cracking. "I may have to go to the engine room to investigate. I don't know–one of the sensor connections to my monitor might have been the problem. We may not even have crossed into the time-influenced area around the event horizon. If a malfunction occurred, the readings might have been false."

"It doesn't look like we went anywhere," Lierva observed. "That's Tileden there–and Yestaval–we're in our own solar system." Lierva avoided mentioning the real concern, that they had not re-emerged into real space at the same time they had left it.

A strange vibration shook the ship again.

Alessia said nothing, but she had the feeling that some lingering sub-atomic energy had escaped the black hole behind them, released by the attractive forces of the density engine, or else an anti-pair remnant of the engine's energy that had headed towards and been absorbed by the black hole. The anti-particle ripple passed through the ship but sent a chill to her heart.

Something very, very wrong was happening. And they all knew it.

* * * * *

A few hours passed as the crew followed Ioka in an attempt to determine what had caused the malfunction in the density engines. After a hundred energy tests, Kiel decided optimistically that the anomaly had been caused by a rare energy surge, caused by a small course miscalculation that drew the cosmic string singularity into too close proximity to that of the black hole. With the course readjusted, they could try again.

Then a message from the bridge interrupted Kiel's final checks and manual alterations.

"I'm reading massive gravity waves coming from coordinates je-1, ila-8, di-4–most likely point of origin from Valeria." Derstan said in a panic, his voice suddenly thick.

"Can you–"

"Oh my God!" Derstan exclaimed. "It is Valeria–she's about to supernova!"

"Take us to Seynorynael–now!" Kiel shouted into the communicator.

"The string engine isn't responding, Kiel!" Broah screamed, helplessly trying every single one of the controls.

"Then engage the tachiyon engine!" Kiel ordered. "Warp us, but for God's sake get us there!"

They initiated the drives without hesitating. Selesta's engines condensed space and time, ripping a centipede hole into the fabric of space-time and sending them through to the Valerian system before even a second of forward time had elapsed. But every member of Hinev's explorers knew it was already too late. They could not return to the past through the centipede holes; only the string engine had permitted them to control the centipede hole gates and evade Marankeil's time check monitors.

Their mistake was beyond monumental, beyond hope of correction or redemption. In their haste, they had passed too near the event horizon.

Almost seventeen thousand years had passed in a moment in Kai-rek's embrace.

* * * * *

As Selesta approached the Valerian system, the explorers picked up the signals of a thousand ships passing them by, fleeing the system. Their transmissions of warning to any ships heading to the Empire's home world gave the impression that the ships had launched in a hurry, as though the planet had been caught unprepared for the impending catastrophe. But the explorers did not stop to make contact or confirm the identity of the starships. They continued to speed towards Seynorynael, oblivious to the warnings, until they came within sight of the small bluish-white orb. The nighttime view faced them, a crescent of light glimmering beyond the horizon in the left side of the viewport.

A swath of clouds danced across the darkened seas and ice caps. The blinking lights of artificial satellites and the abandoned space stations flashed red and green beams into space. Seynorynael looked so fragile to them, so vulnerable and forlorn alone out there in the void, a small jewel in enveloping space. The view of the dark side of the planet seemed to portend its impending doom. Twilight had fallen for the last time, and they would never again behold the bright day on their home world.

The small group of Seynorynaelians on the bridge of Selesta watched the ring of light blast from Valeria, expanding towards them, eating all of space as it approached, swallowing the three inner planets of the system without a sound. The shockwave's destructive energy began to fade as it neared the tiny sphere of rock and the two planetoids in their timeless orbit around the fourth planet.

It did not spare Seynorynael. Alessia, Kiel, and the others stood in mute horror facing the blinding light no human eyes could withstand, as their beloved home world was engulfed by the wave of radiation. Ishkur and Nanshe vanished; Seynorynael lasted a moment longer. The shock wave then began to taper off, and a mild blast of the radiation buffeted Selesta, but her shields held fast against it.

The explorers could not take their eyes from the now empty wash of light where Seynorynael had been a few precious moments before. Her beautiful vast blue seas were no more. The great reflecting ice caps north of the weather-safe ring that had heralded the welcoming sight of home were gone, finally absorbed by the light that had been the source of their splendor.

Alessia thought of her childhood home of Lake Firien. Her mind refused to accept that its beauty was gone. The lyra tree forest that bordered the lake and the ice-capped mountains that rose beyond the shimmering sea of trees filled her mind with false scents and sensations; she felt again the cool spring breezes that brought the first hint of the ripening sherin fruit to her home on the shore. Her mother, singing in their dwelling, her father, running down the beach with her on his shoulders. She heard the mournful cry of the Ceiras birds wheeling above Firien that made her heart ache to fly with them over the waters.

She would not believe that it was gone.

The explorers did not cry. In the depths of their souls they felt the terror and loneliness and emotions they had never known rising with uncontrollable force.

There was permanent and stable in the changing universe; they were beyond solace and beyond help–they were alone. The universe with its great emptiness had surrounded them, and there was nowhere they might hide. For as long as eternity would last, they were left to its care, to writhe under its unfeeling glare, to find no peace, to wander, to search for the unquestioning security they would never know again.

All they had known and all they had been had gone and left nothing. And the universe didn't care.

"I don't feel the Elders anymore," Broah said finally; they did not know how long they had stood in silence.

The others extended their thoughts beyond the ship, now heightened by their bereavement. Alessia realized she was right–the ancient minds that had long surrounded the planet and this section of space had vanished. There was a great calm in the air–and the solar system seemed callously unaware that billions of beings had just perished.

That pain was only beginning to hit them, but their minds continued to struggle against it, to refuse the reality of it.

The group began to move away from the observation window. Kellar went to peruse the transmissions they had received for any information as to what had happened. He suppressed the urge to dissolve his entity into energy and leave the ship, to beg the light to take him with all that he had loved. But he turned instead to the communications console, taking over for Derstan, and steeled his guts for the work they had to do. The Elders were not here anymore, but that did not mean they hadn't known the end was coming, that they had been caught unaware.

His voice interrupted the others a moment later. "The Grand Fleet sent signals across this area warning the merchant ships to turn back," he said in a stoical tone of voice, reading the transmissions. "The warning explains that the supernova came nearly a thousand years earlier than calculated. They don't know why the estimations were off. But apparently by the time they realized what was happening, they had only a few hours to prepare for the end.

"The Grand Fleet claims they sent a signal across the planet to try to get people to evacuate." Kellar continued. "They report that many people refused to leave. They felt they would not be welcomed on other worlds if the Empire was gone and the Grand Fleet scattered, prey to the opposing sovereignty factions on the Empire worlds."

"But they must have taken the millions with them who were willing to leave." Kiel tried to convince himself. "Perhaps we can rendezvous with the survivors and help take them to another planet. And what about the Grand Flagship? Can we catch it to get a full report?" Kiel asked, and Kellar nodded. Selesta's engines engaged, drawing them away from Valeria for the last time. Alessia and Lierva stood side by side, watching the star fade. The entire scene still seemed surreal.

Time passed uncounted, and the explorers sensed that life was near.

"Grand Fleet within two million space units." Kilran said, reading the console and sending an image forward to the viewport imager holo-field.

The presence of human beings drew Alessia from her stupor. She was already sensing emotions and thoughts from minds not too far away, but the number was startlingly low. She could feel the vague thought signals–this was not the rich overwhelming assortment that a full planet of inhabitants might provide. A sick sensation welled in the pit of her stomach, and she shuddered.

The Grand Fleet, the Martial Force, had fled. Leaving the people behind. There had been room to evacuate the entire planet's population, but they had rushed to save themselves, fearing the passing of every moment.

"There's a small flotilla of ships following," Kilran added. "We passed them on our approach."

"Try hailing them," Kiel said.

"We're receiving more signals from them in that direction," Kellar interjected. He activated the communications console, and the explorers stilled to listen. Private vessels and merchant ships alike, and a thousand small cargo ships hurled accusations directed at the Grand Fleet. How could they have left the planet without evacuating the entire population?

Celekar sank to his knees, wrapping his elbows around his head in an attempt to drown out the truth. Mindra stifled a sob that had escaped, a small mournful cry like a wounded animal. Vala stood frozen, her eyes glistening. Derstan's expression was hard, his brow furrowed; horror as great as though someone had torn his heart out and shown it to him, still beating, struck him. Even Kellar began to falter, his eyes glazing over in a state of catatonic denial.

"Someone hail them and ask the survivors if they will join us," Kiel repeated in a voice that tried to be assertive and failed.

Alessia and Lierva moved to the communications console, and Alessia laid a reassuring arm on Kellar's shoulder. He looked up at them, and seeing their concern, gave a slight nod.

"Message to all Seynorynaelian survivors. Starship Selesta extends a welcome to all those who wish to join us. Those of you who would accept our offer are free to remain on the ship as long as you wish, or until we have arrived at an acceptable planet for disembarkation. Please respond if you are willing to accept." He repeated the message twice as the explorers waited for acknowledgment.

The Grand Fleet, as if afraid of the Selesta's reaction to its cowardice, entered the mouth of the neighboring centipede hole, fleeing the Selesta's signals for unknown destinations. The explorers did not particularly care where they went. News would eventually reach the Empire of Seynorynael's demise, and they doubted the Grand Fleet would be welcome anywhere. They would have been safer to remain under Selesta's protection. But they had not realized that the explorers would protect them. They thought only of what they might do if the situation were reversed, and so they fled from their visions of the punishments that justice demanded.

A signal flashed in the holo-monitor, and Kilran patched the visual communication through.

"Are you truly the Silerista?" A man in a strange green uniform asked hesitantly. There was no doubt he was Seynorynaelian, but the language he spoke hardly sounded like the one they knew. Kiel reached his thoughts to the nearby vessel, trying at least to glimpse some of the modern constructions of their native tongue. But it was a simple and direct speech, one they understood, now.

"Yes, this is Syler–Silerista." Kiel stepped forward in the projection sphere. The man registered the sight of the strangely clad explorer, and his eyes widened.

"You have returned," he breathed. "I never thought it would happen in my lifetime. Many said you were lost in ancient times. Some say you never existed at all, but the council records show your departure, and they cannot be refuted." The man shook his head in wonder and stared openly as the other explorers came into the projection sphere.

"How long ago was our last departure?"

"Nearly seventeen thousand years ago," the man responded automatically, still trying to convince himself that he was not hallucinating. He eyed their uniforms, the ancient garb of the explorers, and shrugged. "But the Council assumed you had perished in the black hole Krek when you didn't return." His face was suddenly transformed by grief and regret. "What a pity that you have returned at such a time, in our people's darkest hour! And the Grand Fleet–they left us helpless," he said with sudden venom.

"I am Ordeg, a trader. I waited in the capital of Ralsin after they sent the message. I took as many as my small Trader's vessel would hold. We had to close the doors. I'll never forget the sight–thousands of desperate people pressing against each other to secure a spot on one of the escaping ships. We were listening to your communication." He explained. "The Grand Fleet lied! No one wanted to stay! The masses rocking my ship almost kept us from taking off. But I couldn't do any more for them," Ordeg protested, shaking his head with guilt.

Kiel sensed that he struggled with his own conscience, but in truth, he could have done no more. The scene Ordeg had witnessed would no doubt haunt the man the rest of his days, as the image of Seynorynael's last moments remained behind Kiel's eyes, burned forever into his memory.

"Don't torment yourself. You did all you could. You're a good man, Ordeg." Kiel's unwavering eyes looked directly into the man's gaze. In that moment, Ordeg seemed subdued, and he blinked, feeling the picture blissfully dulled in his mind. "Will you join us on Silerista?" Kiel asked again.

"We will gladly." Ordeg answered with a nod. "My ship can't support so many and would take many years to reach the next Sinanailian Empire world with our present fuel supply. We cannot accelerate to a relativistic rate of sub-light speed, or risk our capacity to alter our course direction."

"Then follow the location beams to our Great Bay. There should be plenty of room for a number of trading ships. We will see to your comfort and plan our course after all who will join us have arrived." Kiel smiled, hoping others were monitoring the transmission and would feel secure in the aid of Hinev's explorers; more than likely, the last thing the survivors were worrying about was the identity of their saviors.

"My thanks to you. May you flourish as the sacred lyra," Ordeg intoned the most formal of parting blessings.
Chapter Sixteen

Take it easy, there, Jir-end! Celekar jumped back, glaring hotly at the lanky explorer who piloted the small trading shuttle into the Great Bay, following Celekar's signals to take it to the other side.

I am trying my best, Jir-end replied.

Just take it to the other side, will you? Celekar thought. The four of them, Jir-end and Celekar, Lierva and Alessia were trying to guide in the trading vessels that had agreed to join Selesta until the great ship could bring those that wanted to return to the Empire worlds to a reasonable planetary spaceport and the more cautious refugees to another new home.

Of the more than a thousand ships that escaped Seynorynael, most had been filled to capacity, and these willingly accepted Kiel's offer. The ones that had fled from the supernova without picking up many extra passengers continued on their way, ignoring the Selesta's transmissions.

Alessia and Lierva followed the last of the merchant vessels which Jir-end had gone out to maneuver into the Selesta's Great Bay; they glided to a smooth landing on the empty, near side reserved for Valerian fighters. Alessia glanced around at the assortment of spaceships gathered in the great hold as Lierva dismounted from her plane behind her.

Is that everyone? They heard Kiel's mind call from the other side of the hold, where he and the other explorers had begun to welcome the refugees; Alessia could see Broah motioning them to hurry over.

It better be, Celekar replied, already on his way, or else Jir-end here is liable to kill me with this thing.

By the time he, Lierva, and Alessia reached the far side of the Great Bay, the passengers had begun to emerge and cast wondering gazes around the hold.

Could this be Silerista? their faces seemed to say, regarding their new environment in a state of delight. A ship of the miraculous and mythical had saved them when all hope was thought lost.

Alessia now noticed Kiel and Talden talking to a richly dressed Kayrian, though he no longer resembled the kind of Kayrian they remembered, owing to the evolution of the species; many of the merchants who had taken pity on the Seynorynaelian peoples and rescued them from the planet were from other Empire worlds. The worlds of the conquered, and yet they had saved the last few people of Seynorynael. She felt the irony acutely, couldn't help but wonder–would those Seynorynaelians have done the same for their rescuers if one of the Empire worlds had been destroyed?

After Derstan, Talden, and Broah had organized the survivors into their temporary quarters sections, Kiel, Kellar, Vala, Ioka, In-nekel, Gerryls, and some of the other explorers wandered among them discussing their concerns and wishes. Alessia listened to Lierva and Celekar joking about how difficult it was going to be to lead them through the ship until they got used to its maze of corridors and levels, and how strange it would be to live among so many after their long isolation, for Selesta had never known any permanent occupants aside from the thirty-one explorers.

Thirty-four thousand refugees had escaped the destruction of Seynorynael; a third of these were half-race or non-Seynorynaelian. Many of the off-worlders expressed a desire to return to their own planets; some offered to secure their own passage home if only they might be left at one of the major transport centers.

The Seynorynaelians, however, had nowhere to go. Most were still in shock and uncommunicative; many did not care where they went. Others were already worrying about how they would be received by the territories. None of them wanted Silerista to leave them unprotected. If it was indeed a Sinanailian Empire vessel, some argued, then it was obliged to safeguard the refugees.

The Sinanailian Empire... even the name of the race and planet itself had changed over time before the planet Seynorynael's destruction.

An older retired officer of the Enforcers, the empire's former regulators and descendants of the Martial Force, wove his way through the crowds and addressed Kiel boldly.

Lierva noticed the interchange and pointed. "I wonder what's going on over there?" She asked Alessia and Celekar, and the three explorers tuned their minds to Kiel's to sift through the intervening noise.

"...think it would be wise to let them know you have returned and that you will protect us, as soon as you can. Your reputation as the precursors of the empire's power is still known throughout the galaxy supercluster." The Enforcer said. "They would do as you request, if only from fear, a fear that has been ingrained in Empire children for more then twenty-five thousand years.

"You explorers have been gone seventeen millennia, so long that none thought you had survived." He continued, his keen eyes working over his own memory as thoroughly as he could. "Even I learned The Emperor's proclamation in my education in Ralsin–that you had been lost on your voyage and were, no doubt, doomed to wander space forever, never to return to Sinanail. I guess He was correct on that account." The Enforcer added in a tone that did little to hide his distaste for the Emperor.

"But since you have returned upon our world's demise and will help us, please allow me to explain the difficulties I can foresee."

"By all means," Kiel said, his arms crossed over his chest, his face respectfully alert.

"You may not understand our current situation, but the Empire was not ready for the supernova." The former Enforcer explained in a manner that conveyed he himself had not yet recovered from the shock of it. "We were certain it would not come for a thousand more years. This premature disaster has–well, it has all but destroyed us as you can see, and it also gives our enemies the chance to eliminate the survivors of our race one at a time. I have no doubt–chaos will soon reign."

"And what of Marankeil?" Kiel asked.

The Enforcer flinched, as though it were taboo to speak that name aloud.

"I don't know, exactly," the man replied. "I was on the bridge of the trader ship Thessalgrika and heard in a transmission between the Imperial Fleet ships that the Emperor and the Elders had disappeared–I believe that was why the Fleet fled. Without their masters, most of the Enforcers are like mindless children–I of all should know. But the fact remains that until the Emperor returns, when he does, there is no force left to bind the factions that would war upon each other.

"The pro-empire regulators will attempt to maintain control for the Emperor, but no one can say what those who accepted the Empire only for the stability it brought to their lives will do, whether or not they will side with the regulators or the independence groups." He shook his head solemnly.

"There have been independence activist groups growing all over the galaxy for the past several thousand years, anticipating the upheaval that Valeria's supernova might bring. And any one of those leaders might see himself as the new Emperor. Our society seems now unable to function without an Empire; we seem unable to imagine life without the concept of imperial power, as much talk of insurrection as there has been. However, if the activist groups work together, we will be worse off but at least that would ensure galactic order. If they war upon each other as I suspect–this should buy us a little time for this ship to save our people, if you can.

"My guess is that no Sinanailian will be welcome on any of the former territories–no doubt the regulators will be well protected from retaliation, but there are thousands of civilians and colonists who will not be safe once word reaches the territories that the Empire is no more. I suggest that your explorers send messages with the traders to all of the planets that Silerista will accept all Sinanailians and part Sinanailians. Someone must look for a new world for our kind. Otherwise we will truly be the last of our race."

"Are any of the Empire territories still loyal to the Empire who might help us–Miran Difano?" Kiel asked. The former Enforcer officer's eyes widened.

"I did not tell you my name," he said hesitantly, his eyes now narrowing in scrutiny. "It would seem the legends of your powers are not exaggerations, if you can tell me my own name. That could be a valuable asset," he added thoughtfully, "if the independence factions will not give up our people willingly.

"But in answer to your question–yes, Tulor and Kayria are still closely bound to the Empire and will not likely challenge the regulators–many of them are half-race, anyway. They may even try to begin the reorganization in preparation for the Empire's return, but we may still expect some conflict among the colonies from other off-worlds. There will be those who would help us with supplies and sending the messages to our people to keep our presence secret, so as not to alert the independence factions, but using caution is advisable. We may not be able to recognize friend from enemy."

Don't worry, Difano. Kiel told him, startling the man. Hinev's explorers swore an oath to the Empire never to interfere with the thoughts of our people more than necessity demanded, but the Empire is no more. And I, Fielikor Kiel, will not allow the innocent to perish on either side. I will send your message, but not only to those of Seynorynaelian blood. Any victims of the conflicts to come are welcome on Selesta. If we must travel to the edge of the supercluster, we will find peace for them.

Difano shook his head as Kiel's thoughts left his mind, but the look in the explorer's eye convinced him he had not fabricated the message himself.

"Kiel, isn't it time to take these people to their accommodations?" Kellar approached, and the man called Difano swallowed hard.

Who are these explorers? he thought, not for the first time. How can these ancient creatures still exist, to descend upon us like fallen angels, angels of mercy in our people's time of need?

"Set the course for Kayria," Kiel patched his message through to the bridge, where Kilran had stayed behind.

A moment later, the ship's tachiyon engines engaged.

* * * * *

"Do you think Marankeil escaped to the future?" Broah asked as she, Derstan, Alessia, and Celekar returned to the crew quarters several hours later.

"I don't know," Celekar offered. "It seems likely. The Grand Fleet wouldn't have left if they could reach the Elders. I'll bet they knew they'd been abandoned and panicked."

"How far would he have gone then?" Derstan wondered aloud. "When will he come back to claim the Empire? We can't just forget our mission. Doesn't Kiel worry that we may not have much time left to stop him? His power has been weakened by the collapse of the Empire–but won't he have re-established his reign by the time we get to Kiel3 and return with the singularity? Doesn't Kiel think we should be considering leaving as soon as possible?" he sighed. "I don't know–maybe he's right. But why did he suggest going to Celestian first?"

"That surprised me, too." Alessia agreed.

"It makes sense, though," Celekar shrugged. "The freed planets will be attempting to rediscover their heritages. We'll be collecting the thousands of Seynorynaelians remaining on the Empire worlds unwilling to risk the animosity of the Empire's subjects. They can't wander space forever. Kiel knows that there are already Seynorynaelians on Celestian one and two–it is only natural that we should bring the survivors there."

"But they won't survive the journey." Broah insisted. "Celestian is so far away, especially now that the string engine has failed us. Some of them will want to find a new world closer to the galactic center. And even if some are willing to stay, and we bring their children's children to Celestian, we will have wasted valuable time." Broah objected.

"Not any more than we will in picking up the Seynorynaelian survivors." Celekar shrugged. "I don't know. Kiel's suggestion to postpone the mission makes a lot of sense. Think how long we were in the black hole–only a second, and yet seventeen thousand and more years passed on our world. If Marankeil left before the nova and used the black hole passage, then it is likely he will be gone for at least as long as we were. I think Kiel is right–we have plenty of time to make the journey to Kiel3. I will vote tonight in favor of the postponement."

"What about you, Alessia?" Derstan asked.

"I'm not sure I can agree with Kiel," Alessia admitted. "But I won't abandon our people now. I will vote to protect them–as long as we do not take too long. The mission is important–but we cannot leave our people, as different as they seem to us."

"No, we can't," Broah agreed reluctantly. Her eyes unexpectedly welled with tears. "I wish I had never lived to see this day."

"And I," Celekar agreed.
Usque adeone mori miserum est? Is it so hard a thing to die?

–Virgil

Chapter Seventeen

"Kiel, what are you doing here?" Alessia said, entering the holo-room, twelve tendays after the explorers picked up the surviving Seynorynaelians on Malddain, but she was immediately distracted by what she saw. Kiel sat in thought, elbows crossed on his knees, as though on the shores of Lake Firien, surrounded by the life, the sounds, and smells of the shore, but the deep blue water that sighed against the pebbled beach would have disappeared at their touch. "Kellar and Sar-a have been looking for you."

"Alessia?" Kiel looked up with a start.

"I surprised you."

"Yes."

"I can leave, if you want."

"No. Stay. I'd like to talk to you."

She sat down beside him, and waited for him to collect his thoughts.

In the twelve years since Seynorynael's destruction, the explorers had just passed beyond the ring of the first explorer mission, where Hinev had encountered the humanoids of Malddain before the Sesylendae returned to the Federation. They had taken in thousands of refugees before word had reached the local systems, but their concerns heightened the further away they traveled from the Valerian system.

The older constituents were more loyal to the Seynorynaelian Empire and some of their people had remained, confident that they might live unmolested. But in the outer territories they had yet to reach, their people would not fare so easily. Still, the explorers could not travel as fast as they wished. They could not risk the tachiyon engine warp again for themselves because the engine might have adverse affects upon ordinary humanoids, as it had once terminated some of their specimens on the first explorer mission.

"It's my fault," Kiel said after a moment, his eyes full of guilt.

"What is?"

"It was me who suggested that we head directly for Kiel3." He continued. "I ordered us into the black hole. If I hadn't, Seynorynael wouldn't have exploded. Our people would still be alive... " his voice trailed off, and it took all of his effort to control himself from succumbing to his anger.

"How is it your fault?" Alessia demanded.

"My decision caused Valeria to explode before its natural time." He protested, his eyes full of pain, shouldering the sole responsibility.

"How?"

"The shockwave Selesta created caused the premature nova of Valeria, I'm sure of it," he looked down, his eyes hard.

"You don't know that."

"But you feel it, don't you? It's the truth."

"No, Kiel. We have no idea what caused the nova so soon. Maybe our calculations were always off. Maybe the shockwave had nothing to do with speeding up the rate of collisions–"

"Alessia, stop trying to protect me. You felt the shockwave, didn't you?"

"Yes," she admitted tiredly. "But that still proves nothing."

"It proves that I failed miserably as our leader. It proves that I am responsible for the death of our people."

"You can't blame yourself for everything," she told him, understanding now why he had become obsessed with saving all of the scattered Seynorynaelian survivors, obsessed with preserving the very survival of their race, why he had postponed the search to look for the singularity on Kiel3.

"Maybe not," he conceded, "but I take responsibility for what happens under my command." He said. "Selesta failed to return in time to save our people because of my decision."

"Kiel, you have to forgive yourself," she said.

He turned to look at her.

"You don't understand," he said, sounding more sincere that he felt. "You haven't been given the responsibility of command. And it wasn't you who was responsible."

"Maybe not, but I understand that you're trying to make amends. Just as I am."

"You are?" He echoed. "Why? What have you done?"

"I interfered with evolution, with the natural order of life," she said.

"Hinev. That was Hinev," Kiel said. "And I'm not certain that's the best way to look at it."

"I helped him, Kiel. So, with Hinev gone, in a sense I am responsible for what his serum has done, for the very existence of the Seynorynaelian Empire."

He looked at her, his eyes sober, pondering her words, recognizing something kindred between them.

"Forgive me for changing our course to Celestian," he said, shaking his head. "I imagine you want to hurry to Kiel3."

"No," she sighed. "We should make sure the survivors are safe and settled, no matter what Ornenkai said. Can't it wait, after so long?"

"But I'm preventing you from the mission that would clear your conscience. And Hinev's, wherever he is. He did entrust you with the responsibility of making amends for him."

"Perhaps Hinev would have appreciated knowing that the people lived free of Marankeil's Council once again. And perhaps, well perhaps our journey to the Celestian worlds is also a part of my penance. At the very least, we'll be able to safeguard Hinev's lost colony."

"Yes, let us hope they're still alive."

"Why shouldn't they be?"

"If the lai-nen realize that our people are there, their days are numbered." Kiel replied. "Especially once they hear of the end of our Empire."

"Kiel, do you ever wonder if Ornenkai was wrong about the singularity? What if–there isn't one?"

He shrugged. "We still have to try to find it."

"Yes, that's what the computer keeps saying."

They laughed.

"It's too bad that the computer can't take control of the ship," Kiel shook his head.

"Can't it?"

"No. It has control over the automatic navigational and guidance systems and access to the crew logs, but I deactivated the computer control system so that the automatic system activates only when there's no helm control. Until then, the computer has no power in any of the other shipboard systems."

"Why did you do that?" Alessia wondered.

"Because I couldn't listen to it anymore, telling us what to do all the time," Kiel laughed. "And I was beginning to think it had a mind of its own."

* * * * *

"...I don't know, Kiel, and I'm beginning to wonder." Gerryls said, as Alessia passed his laboratory deep in the ship on her way to the specimen museum. She had promised one of the children from Tulor to bring her a kachi bird to study but hesitated as she caught fragments of conversation.

"Perhaps we shouldn't be tampering with Hinev's solutions." Gerryls continued.

Alessia's feet ground to a halt.

"Enough of that talk now, Gerryls. You didn't have any reservations before."

"Yes, I know. But none but Hinev knew how the serum came together–the mixtures, the amounts, the order they were added–there is no documentation."

"How can we give up now?" Kiel asked. "We're so close, man. You know it."

"I know, but should we be doing it?"

"Without risk there can be no reward."

Gerryls laughed.

"What is it?" Kiel asked.

"You need to tell that to yourself. Learn to take risks that involve other people."

"What are you talking about, Gerryls?"

"You think I don't know? Kiel, it's obvious to everyone but you and Alessia that you're in love with her."

"Gerryls–" Kiel stopped. "How do you know?"

"Call it intuition. I know what you're doing. You feel guilty about Calendra. Maybe you don't want to risk losing love again, for whatever reason; you're keeping your heart safe, because it's easier. No, I don't think you're afraid, or overly selfish. Just human, Kiel, just human. Maybe you haven't admitted it to yourself because you don't know if she feels what you do, though if you don't know by now that she loves you and always has, I'd say you're blind, man."

"She loves me?" Kiel echoed, as though he couldn't believe what he heard.

"For as long as I've known her."

"I can't believe it."

"That's half of your problem, Kiel. The other half is admitting how you feel. Stop following her around all over this ship and talk to her."

"How could I possibly change the way things have always been between us?" Kiel was incredulous. "What would I say?"

"What do you want to say, when you imagine talking to her? What is it that you keep to yourself? Tell her that. It would be a start."

"Gerryls, you're right."

"I am?"

"I do. I do love her, and I mean that. Even though we're all closer than any people have a right to be."

Alessia staggered back from the door and hurried away down the corridor and through a security wall at the end; it closed again behind her without a sound, cutting off the rest of Kiel's words.

Kiel loved her, after all of these years!

It was some time before she returned to her senses. By then, she had reached the specimen museum.

As she looked at one of the creatures of Kiel3, she suddenly thought to wonder what the two scientists had been talking about before she heard Kiel's confession.

Hinev's solutions? What were they doing with Hinev's solutions? She didn't think there were very many left. Most of the serum-integrated mixtures that allowed the explorers to temporarily alter their pigmentation to blend into a planetary population of humanoids were gone, but for a few. What would experimenting with them accomplish?

Were they nearing a planet, so soon?

Kiel–Kiel loved her?! she thought, forgetting anything else, forgetting to be afraid.

* * * * *

"This is by far the best piece of tiragh that I've ever tasted," Celekar said, sitting in one of the mess halls of the maze of crews' quarters. "My compliments to the chef."

"I'm sure that the food facilitation unit appreciates your enthusiasm," Ioka said with a laugh.

"Oh no, Onracey's heading for the cake," Kellar laughed, pointing. "Honestly, how do you keep your figure, Onracey?" he asked with a flash of mirth, as Onracey returned to their table with a peaked mountain of white that nearly subdued his plate.

"Ok, ok."

"That's my brother for you. When we were children he used to eat my sweet rations." Filaria sighed.

"My family used to spend the Summer Solstice Day in the mountains near Kerrai," Derstan said suddenly.

Loud, garish laughter sounded from one of the nearby tables, where a group of mixed Seynorynaelian and half-race Seynorynaelians were carousing, singing, and drinking spirit rations in celebration of the ancient holiday. It was a different group each night, with more than fifty thousand Seynorynaelians on board and hundreds of mess halls, each of which could seat nearly a thousand; the explorer crew now often dined among the Seynorynaelian survivors, at first to make their transition easier, then because they enjoyed the company of the people who had joined them.

However, twelve years had passed, and many of the Seynorynaelians kept to their own ways and their own lifestyles, which the explorers themselves couldn't adjust to, and a new generation had grown on board the ship, a new generation that held the attitude that Silerista belonged to them.

Many were friendly and grateful to the explorers, in particular the elder generation, but some of the younger refugees didn't even recognize their benefactors; there were thousands of garbs and uniforms floating around the ship, and only thirty-one of Hinev's explorers.

"Where did Alessia go?" Kellar suddenly asked, looking about the room. She heard them from the other side of the mess hall, where she was now waiting for some sign of Kiel. Figuring he and Gerryls were still working on their secret project, she turned aside to return to the others.

"Hello, fellows, will you look at this?" One of the Seynorynaelian youths, a young man with a body like a strong steel wire, said to his group of friends, his eye straying to her. He stood and made himself an obstacle in her path. "Look at the pretty bird I've caught." He laughed, pleased when she was forced to stop in front of him.

"Ask her to dine with us, Weiorgn," one of the others shouted to him.

Alessia stared at the youth, reading from his eyes that he thought she was near to his own age.

"Well, my beauty, would you care for a drink?" Weiorgn said, bowing to the table. She cast it a skeptical eye.

"I think that you've had enough there already." She said, thinking about how very little actually changed in humans, given superficial changes of time and place.

"She's going to sit with me!" Weiorgn laughed, drawing close to her, clucking her under the chin. "Come on," he said, taking her arm.

She pulled it away, accidentally drawing a line of blood on Weiorgn's bare, muscled arm with her fingernail.

"So, beware of this one, she might scratch you!" he cried, sporting with her, while the others hooted and laughed in encouragement. "Come, have a drink, my lovely. It will cure you of your temper." He said, taking her by the arm, his other hand falling on the small of her back to lead her.

"You would do well to stop there."

"And why is that?"

"Because you won't like it, sir, if you force me to defend myself."

"I think, rather, that I would." He said, the hand on his arm moving to stroke her hair.

"Watch where you're putting your hands," a dark voice threatened. Alessia's eyes flicked past Weiorgn to Kellar. "You've just crossed the line, there."

"Go get me another drink, lovely." Weiorgn said, pulling her behind him. "I'll meet you in a moment," he added, turning to face the silver-clad man.

"Watch out, Weiorgn, there are two of them now," one of his friends called out to him.

"I'll wipe the floor with that smile–"

"Easy Kellar," Celekar said behind him, clasping him on the shoulder.

"Alessia is an explorer, friend. She isn't here to fetch your food." Celekar said, standing, his eyes flashing.

"That girl? You're lying. She's one of us, not you." Weiorgn laughed, his playful manner subjugated by a malicious sneer.

"Apologize to her." Celekar ordered firmly. "Now."

The Seynorynaelian youth smiled. "Why should I?"

"Celekar, don't bother," Alessia said, stepping around him slowly. "He's just a snotty kid without anything else to do."

"But–"

"No," Alessia said, sensing what Celekar was about to do. "Don't try to force him to see what you see."

"I wouldn't treat a woman the way that man spoke to you," Kellar put in, agreeing with Celekar.

"You don't know how much I appreciate how you feel," she said, glancing between them, "but at the same time, I think we just need to go."

"They call themselves explorers, and they're afraid to fight me?" Weiorgn said a moment later. "Cowards all, aren't they, fellows? I'd make a better explorer myself!"

A chorus of cheers sounded at his table.

"I doubt he'd even have made it into flight school," Kellar said, turning away.

* * * * *

The next morning, Alessia was finishing routine monitoring of the tachiyon engine energy level output when Kiel found her.

"Alessia," he said, pleased that he had startled her.

"What?" she cried, narrowing her eyes at him, then sighed and directed her attention back to the monitor.

"I have something to say to you." His voice was grave, but furtive, also.

She turned around.

"I–that is–what do you say to a picnic?" He suggested, breaking a self-satisfied smile.

"I'd be delighted." She replied. "But can the ship spare you today?"

"I think everyone will manage without me."

"All right then–today?"

He nodded. "Gerryls and I are going to be busy with some research in the labs until the evening meal hour, but after that, I'm free to go wherever luck bids me."

"I'll be finished with my duties by then, I'm sure."

"Good. Then I'll stop by the meal facilitation units and pick up something for us." He nodded, content that all was going well; his eyes, however, held a rare glimmer of excitement.

"Then I guess I'll see you later." She said, smiling.

"Alessia," he said, his features darkening. "I want to confess something."

"You do?"

"I know you heard about Calendra." He explained. "In many ways, she was my first love. The truth is, I held her death against you for a long time, because I wanted her to be one of the explorers–rather than you."

"Oh."

"You probably never knew it, but I had to clear my conscience. I just want to say that I was wrong, to admit how unjust I was to you. And I wanted to thank you for all you've done for the refugees these past few years. It hasn't gone unnoticed."

"Well, thank you."

"I wanted to say that I'm sorry I misjudged you, all these years. I–can't imagine what my life would have been without you in it."

Her smile faded into surprise.

"Alessia?"

"Yes?"

"I look forward to our picnic."

She nodded numbly, then nodded again.

"You're going to the tutorial center today?"

"I don't know."

"Stop by the laboratory then, if you do."

He took a step closer, as though hesitating over something; she looked at him expectantly, but he appeared to have decided not to interrupt her work.

"Well, I'll see you later," he said.

She watched him leave, wondering about all the time he had spent with Gerryls in the labs, working on their secret project over the past few years. She knew that his sense of guilt over Seynorynael's destruction had fueled his desire to make amends, but she trusted him, even though she had seen this kind of behavior before, first in Hinev, and then in Marankeil and Ornenkai. She even saw it in herself, and had struggled to conquer it.

An obsession had all but taken control of him.

* * * * *

"Explosion in the ninth level laboratory." The computer's even voice interrupted the tranquillity on the bridge later that afternoon.

Alessia, Kilran, Derstan, and Broah were on duty for an hour longer; the rest of the explorer crew were busy around the ship, or else heading to an early dinner. Kiel was supposed to come to the bridge to meet Alessia in just over an hour.

The ninth level laboratory? Alessia stopped to listen, feeling dread creep over her limbs like a cold shadow approaching from behind.

Kiel was working in the ninth laboratory with Gerryls.

What kind of explosion?

"Kellar," Derstan said. "Contact Kellar."

Yes, that was it, Alessia thought. Kellar, Mindra, In-nekel, and Vala would know what was going on–they were in the adjoining laboratory.

They never got the chance.

"Something's happening," Derstan realized, shuddering, sensing the remote pain of others of their kind, as they were struck by some unknown catastrophe. All of the explorers on the bridge felt it, heard mindcalls that echoed from the depths of the ship, mindcalls that struck fear into their hearts.

Before they could react, the intercom suddenly came on. A desperate voice, cracked with pain and the strain of failing vocal chords sent a chilling message to the crew.

"This is Kiel–ordering all explorers to get away!" Behind him they heard blood-curdling screams, screams of terror, screams of panic.

Alessia recognized the sound. Kiel had made that kind of scream long ago, only this one, this one–the agony of it was beyond anything they had ever heard.

The first collective entity faded, disconnecting its thoughts from the explorer group, and they knew one of their number had somehow perished, perished beyond any powers of restoration.

Maesan Kellar was dead.

Without thinking clearly, defying Kiel's unthinkable command, Alessia rushed to the ninth laboratory, hearing nothing but the screams, the run of thoughts of her dearest friends. She saw memories and experiences floating around her like ghosts. The air was saturated by telepathic electricity, as if a great catalyst had driven out the memories of the dead explorers out all at once. The billowing spearhead of a great greenish-yellow cloud rapidly flew past her, dissipating into all corners of the ship.

Explorers? Yes, now Gerryls, In-nekel, Vala...

She heard the screams fading and resolved to dissolve her body into energy, to recollect herself in the laboratory and save the precious moments that slipped by, but found she could not harness the energy to transform her cellular structure. She could barely just compel her feet forward.

A dreadful silence descended, and the screams were no more. But she ran on, determined to find Kiel. She would save him from whatever had happened even if it cost her her own life. That much she promised herself.

Alessia reached the ninth laboratory, coughing in the air that was contaminated with a concentration of the acrid yellow-green vapors. Kellar, In-nekel, Vala, and Mindra had rushed in after the explosion to help Gerryls and Kiel.

A cry escaped her lips as she saw their lifeless bodies, staring up at the ceiling in an expression of horror.

Beside them, the weakening leader of the explorers was gasping for breath, as though his lungs could no longer hold air.

Kiel was still alive! her heart pounded heavily with relief. She rushed towards his body stretched out on the floor and then saw what he had done.

If only she had listened more carefully to what she had overheard that day! Kiel and Gerryls had been secretly following Hinev's experiments, hoping to perfect his serum and trying to grant immortality to the mortal Seynorynaelians on board without the risks and pain involved with the blood transfusions. Hinev's explorers had been created that way, but though Kiel had heard of Hinev's failures, he had not known that the integrated serum might only metamorphosize half of the survivors, as it had done with Hinev's candidates–the others would no doubt become shells of their former selves, suffering dementia, memory loss, delusions of deity, or split-personality disorders, and all of them the most extreme pain.

Kiel had thought that if he used the mixtures once integrated with Hinev's serum, he could extract the serum component and purify it, strengthening the lyra and tri-nucleated cells artificially in the hopes that he could re-create Hinev's life-giving elixir. He had avoided the transfusions, hoping that his own new serum might ease the negative effects of the metamorphosis, the pain he and the others had felt before their transformation.

But their experiment had backfired as they reached the end result, releasing a noxious anti-serum vapor cloud and artificial "virus" into the atmosphere. The stronger lyra and tri-nucleated cells had unexpectedly attacked all serum-altered cells. By the time the explorers realized what to do, it would be too late to stop the cloud that spread throughout the ship.

Their days were at an end.

Kiel lay dying, stretched out on the floor. Alessia felt his mind reaching to her, lost, afraid, unable to comprehend what was happening.

"Alessia, I see you now. Yes, I see you at Firien," he smiled, and his smile was like that of a content child. She dropped to her knees before him, reached out to gather her hand behind his shoulder support him up as he followed her with his eyes. "Bilka–why Hinev wanted you. I see the leaves in your hair, the mud on your feet–" He laughed, looking past her now, looking to a day in the past, while the look on his face in the present was of one not long for this world. He had no use for decorum any more, only pure honesty, the honesty of his heart, but he had no time to rationally process his thoughts. His feelings merely escaped from him, slipping unfiltered from his soul when he had no more energy to repress their power.

"It was you, you who made it all possible. Why, why did you never trust me with your secrets?" He blinked, confused. "I–I would have understood. You should have given me that chance."

"Kiel. Kiel, I'm so sorry–" she cried, trying to hold his hands steady in hers. "It's my fault this has happened. If I'd only said something before–"

Perhaps you wouldn't have tried to recreate the serum.

"Hush," he said, rasping for breath, shocked to see how much he had meant to her, and that with her hopes so close to being fulfilled, it was he who had taken them away.

Forgive me, Alessia. It was my folly, not yours, and I take full responsibility for it. He looked at her, remorse in his eyes, hardly able to speak aloud now. I thought to give Hinev's gift to all Seynorynaelians–to preserve what little remains of our race, our civilization. I see now that Hinev didn't perfect his serum alone–perhaps it is not too late for some of us to survive the vapors, but you must flush out the vapor cloud–get away from here at once!

"I won't leave you, Kiel. I won't. I can't. I can't just leave you here!" she cried, cradling his weary head in her arms, lowering her own head to the thick wash of vapors that swirled just above the ground. She could hear his breath, a precious sound beneath her, and was conscious of the fact that he also heard hers, her head now so close to his own.

Leave him? Never!! she vowed. She wanted to die here, here lying beside him, not somewhere far away.

Please go, Alessia! I would hate to see you die for my mistake.

She pulled back, let him go, turned aside, because she wanted to see his face. Yet he also turned his head to the side, and horrified, saw Gerryls' lifeless body; in a moment, he squeezed his eyes shut and turned away, looked back at her.

"You didn't work alone, Kiel," Alessia reminded him. He seemed just to stare at her, as though wishing for things that could never be.

"Alessia, please, try to survive," he croaked. "Save the others, and survive for me–" he coughed, unable to finish.

"I promise, I will," she nodded, "I'll flush out the vapors, Kiel. I will try to save the rest of us."

Dear Alessia, I am sorry. His thoughts interrupted her; he knew full well that he was beyond hope. His eyes were clouding, no longer piercing or radiant, perhaps looking inward.

Stifling a sob, she bent her head to kiss him gently, but Fielikor Kiel had gone. When she raised her head, his face had taken on an expression of serene calm, unlike the others, but there was something unsettling in his eyes, as though the truth of the beyond did not surprise him.

Had he joined Hinev in a far better place?

Then why had his body, like Hinev's, not faded into energy?

* * * * *

Alessia hurried to the intercom, her eyes never leaving the body of Kiel.

"Explorers," she said steadily, "This is Alessia, reiterating Kiel's orders. Get away from the ninth level laboratory. An anti-serum vapor cloud is spreading like a biological weapon throughout Selesta. Head for the uncontaminated areas of the ship and seal them off–it is the only thing for our survival." She pushed in the videocom and tried to reach the bridge.

"Broah?" Alessia asked after a moment of silence, but no one responded. "Visual," she called into the computer for a video link since the explorers on the bridge had not patched her signal through.

The air on the bridge had a sickly green cast to it. One of the explorers lay on the floor, moving in spasmodic jerks–Derstan, she thought. Kilran had slumped in his chair at the communications console–that must have been why they hadn't responded. She did not see Broah, but the door to the crew quarters had been left open.

And it had let the serum virus cloud in.

Alessia picked herself up, feeling a light-headedness and left the laboratory, wondering how she had the energy to continue and expecting every moment that she would fall dead to the ground as the others had done.

In the corridor, she passed several untouched mortal Seynorynaelians. Through the mist in her eyes, she saw their shocked expressions, their terror that paled in comparison to what she had just been a witness.

Alessia felt she had to locate Broah, but in her heart, she wanted to die, now that Kiel was gone. When her time approached, she would make it back to Kiel and take her last breath at his side. Her mind longed for that moment, when the torment would be over, but in the mean time she intended to struggle, to try to fulfill her promise to him. The burning sensation in her lungs grew stronger as the moments passed, but she kept going.

She had been exposed long enough to the full concentration of the vapors that had killed those in the laboratory; nevertheless, she reached the bridge.

She found Celekar in the corridor on the way, catching his breath in painful, ragged gasps.

"Alessia," he called out, reaching a weak hand out to her.

"Celekar!" She cried, holding his hand; the strong, noble-hearted man that clung to her fingers had not even the strength of a child.

"Please, Alessia," he cried, turning to her with an expression that defied Death humbling him, turning him into a writhing animal, as he had witnessed in the others. "End my pain! Alessia!"

She knew that his body had deteriorated enough that he could be killed. A quick and painless death would be preferable to the agony she had heard in the ninth level laboratory.

She didn't know what to do, but stopped in a nearby quarters to retrieve a laser gun. Many of the doors she passed had been flung open as the explorers, like her, rushed out to see what had happened before receiving the message for quarantine. Some had made it to the bridge, she guessed, but Celekar had collapsed a few steps short, unable to move, and leaned against the wall.

Lierva– he thought sadly, remembering the long gone days of The Firien Project, before Hinev's serum changed his life forever.

Lierva! Alessia stifled a sob. Lierva, dearest, bravest Lierva, was already gone!

Alessia lifted the nozzle and looked away, firing one wide, painless stream of light through Celekar's chest. When she looked again, he was dead.

Broah had fallen on the bridge near the doorway, but she was still alive. It seemed that further away from the source of the vapor cloud, the explorers had been spared from its full potency, only to linger longer in the horror and the pain of the anti-serum.

"Alessia!" Broah cried out, incredulous. "How have you returned?" she asked, seeing the grief in Alessia's eyes. Broah couldn't even approach a mindlink before she shuddered and closed off her own thoughts. She didn't want to know that way. Glancing into Alessia's eyes was enough for her to understand that nothing would ever again be the same. They were doomed, and the universe did not care.

"Who is here?" Alessia asked and glanced around, counting and identifying the crew that had instinctively fled to the bridge.

Ioka was there, still standing on her own, and Nal-ayn, Onracey, Cerdko, Hilden, and Wen-eil.

"Kilran and Filaria are dead." Broah said, but not without compassion, even as she tried to be calm. "Of the rest of us, Ioka, Loussya, and Hilden are the least affected–except for you, Alessia. I can hardly believe you returned. My legs no longer hold me–I don't know how we'll get out of here." She added, looking at Alessia as though she expected her to take on the role of holding the group together, as she had tried to do in the last few moments.

"Did anyone make it out?" Alessia asked.

"There's been no word from anyone–except your message." Broah replied. "I couldn't make it over to the console–and Kilran was already gone. The others hadn't arrived yet. Ioka would have gone to respond, but no one else has contacted us."

"We have to contact the Seynorynaelian refugees on board–Kiel said we've got to flush out the vapors." Alessia said. "They can't breathe in the vacuum, so we'll have to divide the ship if they wish to stay. Until then, we should have them find the rest of the explorers and bring them to the bridge. We'll seal off our crew quarters nearby and the botanical gardens. The refugees can have the rest of the ship until we work out a better arrangement."

* * * * *

Of the original thirty-one explorers, only five were sill alive. Alessia's worst fears had come true–none of them had escaped the vapor cloud. After years of fearlessness, secure in their own immortality, they had each acted selflessly to find each other before hearing the message urging quarantine.

The last group of three had been found together in the crew quarters corridors, two alive and one dead–Elta, Talden, and Sar-a, Talden and Elta trying to carry between them the dead body of their friend. The Seynorynaelians who had become the explorer's closest friends had immediately responded to Alessia's message and brought their companions to the bridge, after which Alessia divided their ship and opened the unsealed contaminated areas of their section to space to flush out the anti-serum cloud.

Many of the other Seynorynaelians, fearful after what had happened, and unconvinced that they too would not be affected by the strange virus, kept away–in the Great Bay and areas on the other side of the ship. Some saw the death of the immortal creatures as a sign that the ship and the explorers had been cursed by the Elders. Alessia sensed that they would want to leave Selesta to take their chances on the Empire worlds.

They could take the trader vessels and many of the starships the explorers had retrieved at great cost for when they had reached a suitable planet–leaving the attached Sesylendae behind, its unknown ancient guidance systems rendering it useless to them.

After two days, it became clear that the explorer's optimism about escaping had been premature. The rest of the crew that had lived became more affected by the virus as the hours passed, slowly suffering from the burning sensation that had affected their lungs and organs or coming down with the anti-serum convulsions or fever-illness and dying. The second day, Onracey begged for euthanasia, but he died before it could be given.

Alessia gradually came down with the illness that sent her fevers and chills, but she continued to administer to her fellow explorers as long as her feet would hold her. Broah finally called out to her early the third morning.

Her faint smile tried to comfort Alessia, even to the end. Broah's thoughts told her there was no more need for concern. She was grateful for what Alessia had done in keeping them together, and for trying to save them. But it was all over now.

Ioka followed soon after. In less than a week, all of them had passed but Alessia. The bodies on the bridge, and the others of Kiel and those in the labs that Ordeg had brought to the crew quarters could not decay in the void, even if they could after the metamorphosis, for their deaths were unnatural, and even in the break-down their bodies had fought the virus. The affected explorers could still communicate with each other with their minds, live without a breathable atmosphere–even to the end. It was the uncontrollable struggle of the serum and anti-serum cells that killed them, and caused such excruciating pain.

Hilden had been the last to die, and his departure left Alessia alone.

Tendays passed, and Alessia lay on the bridge unmoving, battling the anti-serum as she had fought the serum itself. Then, after time uncounted had passed, her vision began to clear and the fever finally broke. Days went by, and she found she had strength to stand, then to move around. Finally, the time came when she knew she had recovered. She could hardly believe that she had survived. Why had she been the only one? Why had she been left alone?

Then the answer hit her–as Hinev must have realized, her immune system was strong, stronger than the serum. It had survived the serum itself, though why she did not know. Her own immunity had been present in integration with the serum system, had adapted itself, but it had never succumbed completely. That had been her lifeline, the force that enabled her to defeat the anti-serum and heal her own body.

And now it was time to go on alone, to finish her mission. But loyalty to the only family she had ever known came first. She would take Kiel to Celestian, as he had wished.

Alessia called out to the computer and instructed it telepathically to stay on course for the Celestian worlds. Turning aside to connect the last atmosphere pack to speak to the Seynorynaelians on board, she ignored its protests.

We must go to Kiel3, it droned again, but she refused. Very well. We shall go to Celestian first. But then we will depart for Kiel3, it paused, as though reluctant to succumb to her orders, but what else could it do?

Alessia, it is–a miracle, a miracle that you have survived. She started, wondering why it had added the last remark. To her mind, there was a trace of feeling in its voice that should not have come from a machine.

You won't get any response, the computer informed her after a few moments, when she tried to contact the population on board. They have all left.

All of them? she echoed, paling.

Ordeg was the last to go. He thought you had died. He didn't want to leave, but he couldn't reach you through the sealed corridors. The others took the ships and headed for Goeur, I think, or one of the other colonies, I'm not sure. They weren't sure, either. But they took plenty of supplies to last the journey–three of the colonies aren't far from here.

Alessia stood motionless for a long time.

Flush out the rest of the atmosphere in the ship, she said stonily, more to fulfill her promise to Kiel than anything else. She was sure now that the anti-serum virus could not harm her again.

And could anything else ever harm her again?

* * * * *

Alessia closed the door to the room that held the preserved bodies of her fellow explorers, her companions throughout the long voyages from their home. She said good-bye to her closest friends, laying Lierva by Celekar and then put Broah beside Derstan, Ioka, and In-nekel.

Kiel, Gerryls, and Kellar's bodies were the last three she brought into the room. Even the bodies from the laboratory held no trace of the anti-serum vapors that had killed them. She permanently sealed the room located in one of the most remote sections of the ship not far from the laboratory that had ended it all.

Someday she might bury them on Celestian, she thought.

But it would take a long time to get there. The space-tearing engine was not working, and there were few centipede hole passages between here and Rigell.

Even her warp-tachiyon engine could not be used to reach Celestian without stopping frequently to plot a new course avoiding large stellar objects such as stars, pulsars, and planetary systems.

But she was in no hurry. She alone had an eternity to live, and nothing left to live for.

* * * * *

After five hundred years, she set the suspended animation capsule to hold her. At last she had tired of the waiting, the solitude, and could not bear the anticipation until her arrival on Celestian. But perhaps it was for the best that so many years had passed since Hinev's colony departed for the Celestian worlds, she told herself. If she had arrived too soon they might have seen her as a representative of the Empire and the life the colonists had rejected.

No matter what, she would persuade them to accept her, that she was of no threat, that she would help them and care for them as Hinev once had.

She allowed a glimmer of hope into her thoughts as she lay down for the long sleep.

The Celestian people were the last of Hinev's beloved colony. And they were all she had left.

As she slept, one and a half thousand years passed before the computer wakened her. She had returned to Rigell's system. She had come to the Celestian worlds...

Outside Alessia's thoughts, on the bridge of Sesylendae, Derica took a step forward as Selerael flinched in her mother's arms.

What was going on? she wondered.

She watched him fall, and almost did nothing.

She watched from the shadows of the cave as the injured pilot crawled from his downed plane, tumbling to the ground when his legs failed him. His crisp white flightsuit was torn in several places; gasping through the broken shield of his helmet, he struggled to relieve himself of it, tossing it away from him with his one good hand, letting it skid over to the edge of the cliffs.

In the aperture, Alessia stared at him. The pilot's face, the wide-set blue eyes, the layers of short blond hair, damp with sweat and clinging to his brow and neck, captured her attention. Her gut clenched, but she couldn't understand why. Why, why did she feel as though she were exposed with him out there on the ledge, with five Orian ships circling overhead, searching for their prey? Why did it seem so wrong that his life should end out here in the sand? She had seen many men die. One more could hardly affect her, could it?

She almost did nothing. Moreover, he could easily be a Orian spy, she told herself. His face was more Orian, more Seynorynaelian, than most Tiasennians.

Meanwhile, defying death, the pilot had summoned stubborn energy to drag himself away, scraping himself along the sandy ledge, despite the line of dark violet dripping from a deep rend in his abdomen. He kept on, though his face bore the mark of delirium, a sure sign that he would never reach the safety of the aperture in the cliffs. He was dying.

Still, he clawed his way forward, struggled to live.

Then behind him, the plane exploded. The pilot struggled to protect his head from the fragments of shrapnel raining on him.

After that, he did not move. The Orian planes circled above. In moments, they would be upon him.

Alessia conquered her indecision. With a desperate air conscious of the few precious moments she had, she hurried to the pilot's motionless body, a Seynorynaelian cloak billowing about her ankles, and gently lifted the injured man above the ground, then carried him back to the safety of the aperture.

A moment later, the five planes skimmed low over the area. Satisfied that they had annihilated their prey, they took to the skies once more.

She took him into her cliffside retreat, into the medical room she had prepared when they had found Korten years ago, floating in the sea, barely alive after being shot down by his own squadron.

She had but seconds to repair the damage to his abdomen through telekinetic healing. The damage to his intestinal system was so severe that she marveled he had survived thus far as she concentrated on restoring the systems to a functioning level, while at the same time using her telekinetic power to keep him from losing more blood. At the same time, she prepared medicines and the support systems that might help restore him, using stores of preserved Seynorynaelian blood, not her own, in transfusions that she hoped would save his life.

There was no guarantee that he would live, she knew, even with the power of her telekinetic healing and the medicines of Seynorynael, the few she had left, not unlike those she had used to cure Deloch on Kiel3, long ago. The pilot had lost so much blood and had suffered so much damage; telepathically, she checked to see if he had incurred any brain damage and repaired a few minor injuries there.

At first it seemed he wouldn't survive. She could not register that fact with detachment, she realized, watching as his life signs fluctuated. Several times over the next few days she contemplated giving him a transfusion of her own blood. Yes, that would heal him! Hinev's serum would save his life!

All the time, she was conscious of the fact that she had made that mistake before. Was she ready to accept the consequences again? Could she really accept the responsibility if he rejected the serum, as so many had in Hinev's laboratory? She had not had much time to contemplate before, with Sargon, whose life would certainly have ended had she not saved him with a serum transfusion, and her long attachment to Sargon had quelled her reservations against risking the serum metamorphosis.

While she vacillated, the pilot's condition improved on its own. After a tenday his eyes fluttered open, and he began to move in his sleep panel, though slowly, then raised his head and torso.

"Who are you? What am I doing here?" he demanded when he sensed her presence, his voice like an injured animal fending off a predator.

The cloak she wore hid her reaction from him; she was glad it did, for he might have mistaken her smile to mean something other than what it did. She found her heart soaring with the sincerest relief, and a sense that she had been saved from a terrible mistake by his fortitude. In all the years she had been hiding from Sargon to avoid facing her own conscience, her spirit had slowly been suffocating under her guilt. Now, however, the unconquerable spirit of the man before her restored her to her own. Now, she found, she also wanted to live!

"Hush. Rest. Save your questions until you have recovered," she told him, seeing that he needed more time to recuperate, that he was falling back towards the oblivion of sleep despite his struggle to keep from it. Now, however, she was certain that he would at last recover.

At the same time, she knew she deserved his mistrust of her. What had she ever done that had not caused more harm than good?

For a long time, her duty had been keeping her alive, reminding her what she had to do to avenge the explorers and Hinev, reminding her that she had been given great responsibility to use her power to protect the innocent, to do all she could to win back her soul.

* * * * *

Ekasi Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov left her several months later, sent out on an errand to create a rescue fleet and negotiate a peace. After the deaths of Seynorynael's doomed population, Alessia had no intention of losing the people of Tiasenne and Orian, no matter what she wanted for herself.

She watched sadly as he climbed to the top of the cliffs and waited for the rescue ships to hone in on his frequency, then boarded a Tiasennian fighter sent to retrieve him and disappeared in the vast emptiness of infinite blue sky.

* * * * *

Alessia's mindlink with Seleral was over.

Standing on the bridge of Sesylendae, Selerael gave a start as Alessia's memories of what had happened on Rigell–among them memories Selerael vaguely remembered from her own early childhood–flashed through her mind. They had forgotten the presence of the others.

At long Selerael knew the identity of this man who had followed her all her life, Sargon, Great Leader of the Orians. A haunted man, a tormented soul, that had been an instrument of the evil that coursed through his veins.
Chapter Eighteen

Selerael staggered back a little, disoriented by the sudden shift of thoughts, time, and place as the artificial reality of the mindlink faded. Her mother's memories now faded, and she was back in the present, on the bridge of the starship Sesylendae, which orbited the planet Tiasenne near the star Rigell.

Only a moment had passed on board the Sesylendae since Selerael had hugged her mother Alessia. The others from Selesta stood at a little distance behind Selerael, watching the strange reunion between mother and daughter with an uncertain curiosity. As Selerael pulled away from Alessia's arms, she looked into her mother's eyes and for the first time truly saw the connection between her mother and herself.

What a strange and wonderful gift this was, to know another human being so completely. In some way, the mindlink had made up for all the years she and her mother had been separated.

I see now, why you want to leave the world, mother, Selerael thought. And why it would be so very wrong of me to ask you to stay with me.

Alessia gave her a bittersweet smile, then made a slight gesture to welcome the others inside.

"You must help the people of Tiasenne escape this system." Alessia said in the Earth tongue of English. For Selerael's comrades were all from the planet Earth.

Selerael laughed at her comrades' reaction; after all her Earthling crew had witnessed, Alessia's ability to speak their language had still surprised them.

"Selerael will explain." Alessia continued. "The Seynorynaelian Empire thought the lai-nen system had died out, but a handful of survivors remained. Now the civilization has flourished again, with one purpose in mind. To eradicate the seeds of a fallen empire, to repay an old debt. But the people of Tiasenne are innocent of Seynorynaelian wrongdoing. I don't doubt a costly war will come, and Tiasenne could lose billions of people again. Thus far I could do nothing to help them. Sesylendae could not hold them, but Selesta can."

"Will they leave?" Adam, Selerael's son, asked, looking at his grandmother, and recognizing an undeniable trace of himself in her face.

"Some might, young Adam." Alessia nodded, surveying him with keen eyes that judged his worth. For a moment she was distracted, measuring his character and coming to satisfied conclusions regarding him; she had known who he was since he entered her chamber: Adam Dimitriev, her grandson. "But you must take those who will," she continued, "starting with my loyal retainers here. Find a system untouched by the Seynorynaelian Empire, and begin again."

"Won't you lead us?" Specialist Derica asked, looking towards the woman she knew now as Selerael's mother and instinctively trusting her.

"No. I won't leave Sesylendae." Alessia shook her head firmly; they knew she meant what she said. "But you can contact the Tiasennian government from here. They will not doubt the truth of any message sent from Sesylendae. Whatever they decide to do–either to remain and defend themselves or take your offer of evacuation, you must lead away those who would leave."

Selerael looked at her mother and nodded. "I'll protect them, mother. I swear it."

Selerael, I'm sorry that it was you, and not me, not me because of my weakness, who made the journey to Kiel3. Alessia thought. It seems that you are the one whom the Enorian legends told of, the one who must bring about the end of the Empire, and not me. Promise me that when you have found a world for all our people, you will return to the Great Cluster galaxy and find Marankeil, that you will end his evil reign.

"While there is breath in my body," Selerael said, her eyes hardening.

"Oh, Hinev," Alessia cried out unexpectedly. "I couldn't do it. I wasn't able to atone."

"Yes, you were, mother!" Selerael shouted, trying to calm her.

Alessia stopped, now looking at her daughter expectantly.

"How?" She dared to ask.

"Through me," Selerael replied, with the same integrity that had been Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov's. "I'll take up your mission, the mission of Hinev's explorers. And I'll stop the eternal Emperor, you have my oath." Selerael vowed. "No matter how, no matter what I have to do. The Seynorynaelian Empire will die with me."

* * * * *

Why the devil had no one tried to stop him? Sargon wondered as he reached the Sesylendae without resistance. The uncanny quiet of the ship disturbed him.

"The end and the beginning"–the meaning of her ship struck him with its irony. For here his long journey had ended, and yet he hoped for a new beginning at long last, with Alessia at his side.

Alessia, did she remember those peaceful days so long ago on Tiasenne? A flood of memories came back to him. He was surprised to hear the cry escape his lips, a cry that voiced the regret he did not know he could still feel. Wasn't he immune to guilt's power?

He had anticipated reaching her again; now so close, he could no longer sense her presence, though he now knew she had remained on board the Sesylendae. The unknown Seynorynaelian woman was also nearby.

He disembarked and hurried to the main observation window where he knew he would find them.

* * * * *

As he approached, he spied the body on the floor under the canopy of stars beneath the far viewport.

His steps were loud; time seemed to be standing still.

He sucked in his breath, as he approached his greatest fear and looked upon it.

The hardened shell of omnipotence that he had grown, layer by layer over his heart, crumbled to dust.

No! He thought, overcome by despair. No!

It was Alessia lying on the floor. Alone.

His feet picked themselves up of their own accord; he found himself running.

He knelt beside her, took her hand. A pulse.

Alessia was still alive!

He forgot all of his anger and resentment towards her, his hatred; the cruelty and bitterness left him, dissipating into the air, where he now looked upon them as though they had belonged to another being, even as his own soul cried out in remorse. The knowledge of what he had done in his blind obsession struck him with rage and frustration. He had to force away the memories that urged him to despise himself and who he had become.

There was only time for Alessia now. He couldn't seem to think of anything else.

He knew, somehow he knew she was dying.

As she stirred beside him, strands of her thoughts became clear to him. She was losing control of her mind-shield. So, he was able to see an image of her in his mind's eye, when she at last found the secret of Hinev's suicide. She had waited for one thing only before introducing herself to Death: for Selerael to return.

The answer was so clear, simple...

What was it? He tried to pry that thought from her mind, but it remained barred to him.

Something about Alessia herself, something about her physiology could defeat Hinev's serum, if she wished, if without hesitation she at last desired Death to come to lead her back to Enor, the tapestry of light...

Something about an anti-serum death... Hinev's anti-serum...

The semi-sentient particles of her body now prepared to give up their energy to the universe...

Sargon wasn't willing to let her go! He held her against his chest in a tender embrace, willing the life-force from his body to sustain her, willing her to live...

Then, drawing upon the last of her dwindling energy, Alessia opened her eyes and looked at him, registered his presence. He carefully released her and pulled himself upright enough so that he could see her face.

"Sargon," she said in a gentle voice, the voice he remembered from childhood. That voice loved him, cared for him.

She looked into his bright eyes. There was relief in her eyes, no longer defiant and unwavering, as she saw that the obsession and frenzied ambition that had seized him like a madness after the serum had retreated. "Terin, you've come back for me," she said.

"Yes?"

"I feel so cold. So..."

"Alessia–"  
"You see, I'm dying. I'm leaving this world–finally leaving it."

"No, Alessia—"

Suddenly, he stopped. Alessia struggled to remain awake, pressing her shoulder into his leg. She opened her eyes again, but the lids were half-shut.

"I'm so sorry for what I did to you." She said, in a voice that was tired and thin.

"Help me," he insisted.

"I destroyed your life. I am sorry. I would help you if I could, but—"

Dear Terin, remember long ago I told you not to cry.

She sighed, clutching his fingers, feeling the warm touch of his lips on her forehead as he bent down to kiss her.

Then Alessia, daughter of Enor, died.

Sargon cradled her to his heart. In the midst of his embrace, her body disintegrated in a burst of light energy.

When Sargon came to himself some time later, he looked about himself and saw nothing but emptiness in the vast universe and a long eternity of exile from the reality he had known.

But then he saw that in death, Alessia had released the silver vial hidden in her hand.

Her last gift to him.

The anti-serum.

* * * * *

In the communication center, Selerael telepathically saw her mother die.

With Alessia's death, Selerael knew it was now her duty to take up the responsibility of leading the people to a new life; at the same time, all she wanted to do was scream, scream to a fate that had been unfair to her, to time that was unfair and indifferent to all.

When Alessia left the world, she felt a horrible cold shadow falling over her.

Even though she had known that Alessia wanted to die, her mother's death was no less a devastating shock to Selerael. She found herself wishing she could go back and prevent it somehow, futile as the thought was. And she felt horribly, utterly alone and naked in the eyes of the universe.

Then she heard Sargon's silent lament and excused herself from the others. In the end, near the end, all of humanity, even Sargon, had no thought of dissembling his emotions. The ancient man-relic of Tiasenne's past still lingered as Selerael entered the observation room. Sensing her presence, he turned quickly.

"Who are you?" He asked in Orian, a language she now knew as well as any.

"I am Selerael."

"You–" He stopped, his eyes wide. "You're Alessia's daughter."

"Yes," she said.

"Then you must forgive me–or not," he said, swallowing, "for I did you a great wrong–"

"I know." She said. "I know all about what you did to my father. I also know–that there is no sense in judging you now."

"I don't understand."

"Should I blame my mother for making you what you are? After losing so many dear to her heart, should I blame her? Should I blame Hinev, for not having the foresight to understand what evil his serum gift might spread? Or shall I blame myself, for refusing to see the truth about myself for so long, when I might have spared countless lives sacrificed to protect me? I no longer believe in absolute good or absolute evil, you see. I do not even know what constitutes these things any more. I only know that anyone who inflicts injury has already endured it, and that we must somehow live with ourselves as best we can."

"You are Alessia's daughter," he said, smiling at her, seeing that the same multi-colored light danced in her blue eyes; the same beautiful, unwavering face met his gaze. His face was calm when he finally looked away.

Then Selerael saw the anti-serum device he had received from Alessia, a vial with two silver, twisting snakes writhing over clear metal. He had grasped it in his own, but Selerael had interrupted his decision.

Now Sargon's eyes returned to regard it, and he brought it to his own arm, releasing the anti-serum Alessia had created, not unlike the virus that had destroyed Hinev's explorers. Sargon felt the anti-serum in his veins, moving up his limbs like burning ice, but he didn't care about the pain.

Sargon turned to face Selerael one last time–and abruptly released her father's memories, memories he had carried buried in his mind for more than an age, never knowing that when he robbed them from Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov in that deep mindlink that he would never be rid of them; they had taken residence in his mind, and to uproot them would have destroyed his own.

Selerael felt them hit her and staggered back. She saw the memories, felt them, but without a mindlink they could do her no harm.

They were the greatest gift Sargon could have given her. Sargon–she saw him in a tragic light, despite what he had become. She found she could no longer hate him.

Now, Sargon's eyes found the viewscreen, where Tiasenne returned in a crescent, driving away the fading light of the stars. He took in his last breath with great control, and exhaled a deep sigh, as if a long nightmare had ended. Feeling himself slip away into a deep, unconscious sleep, he sank to the floor. His last thoughts were of Alessia and of their past together long ago on Tiasenne.

Sargon died.

* * * * *

Selerael quietly returned to the others in the communication center. She heard her steps and thought of how far she had yet to go in her life.

"Are you all right?" Toriso asked, his dark brows peaking with concern.

Selerael didn't answer; she had nothing to say. She had no concept of what his question truly meant or how to answer it. "What have the terrestrial Tiasennians decided?" she asked.

Toriso sounded disappointed. "My Tiasennian is bad, but I think they've chosen to stay. They don't think they need us–they believe the danger is real but–they don't know what Selesta is. And they don't want to leave their homes."

"Do the people know what's happening?" Selerael asked the head Tiasennian, Sorbin.

"Not all of them, but the Council did distribute the main beacon." He answered, wondering why she was looking at him with such respect.

"Well, Sorbin, that isn't good enough for me," Selerael shook her head. "I promised I'd warn them, and so I'm going to," she added in Tiasennian and in an iron tone. Sorbin regarded her with an expectant look, as if anticipating something significant. The daughter of Alessia could do nothing less.

The only problem was, he hadn't a clue what she planned to do.

Selerael was silent a moment, then, a pale light grew around her, growing so bright that they were forced to look away despite their curiosity; she knew they were curious, but they would understand everything in a moment. They heard a message, a message she sent to the world below and out into space, where it would take several minutes to reach the other nearby colonies.

All Tiasennians, hear me. My name is Selerael, and I speak from Sesylendae, the guardian of Tiasenne, now, and for so many long years. I have come far to bring you this warning: war is coming to this system, a war that could destroy you. There is but one certain way that you will survive, and that is to escape. I have a ship that will carry you all to a new world, if only you will put your faith in me. I will be waiting for those who are willing to put their faith in our integrity aboard Selesta.

"Mother," Adam said. "What about the Orians aboard Enlil? Who will lead them now?" He said, meeting her gaze with steady cobalt eyes. "I know, mother. I saw what happened to Sargon–and Alessia."

"What should we do?" She asked, looking to him, seeing that he already drawn together a plan.

"Well, if you're asking me, I think we have a story to tell them. It begins a long time ago in this system, a story about two brother races that never knew they shared the same origins. Isn't that why Sargon gave you your father's memories? So that two peoples could live once again as one? So that a dream of peace could be brought to a divided nation?"

"Yes, Adam," she said, admiring her son's perception. "Yes, I suppose it is."

* * * * *

A few days later, transports arrived in Sesylendae's vicinity. Selesta had received Selerael's message to send out the Stargazer and other small vessels to retrieve those Tiasennians that would join the crew. Word reached them from Orian, from a man called Mirotos, known among his people as the newest Garen, what the crew understood as some hereditary title.

The Garen had become temporary commander of his people with the death of the Great Leader. His signal announced the Orians' willingness to leave the system with Selesta and follow the Zariqua Enassa's daughter to a new world where they could begin to learn to live peacefully together. Unlike the Tiasennian refugees, the Orians felt little remorse leaving the Rigell system–their home world Orian had been lost ages ago.

A week passed, and finally Selerael and the others made ready to lead the vessels into Selesta's twenty-odd cargo bays. Sesylendae prepared to re-dock onto the surface of Selesta where it had once remained throughout the Seynorynaelian explorer missions. Selerael and the others from the Selesta had spent the week there, getting to know Alessia's small crew and devising a means of coordinating the disparate cultures and languages of the many races on board. The main problem at hand had been solved by Sorbin.

Sorbin had always been interested in the ancient history of the Rigell system and had studied the dimensions of Selesta and Enlil as recorded in the Sesylendae's computers.

Predictably, Sargon had constructed his vessel to resemble the Selesta in both size and structure, but that wasn't all. Computer schematics showed that if the Enlil were brought underneath the Selesta, the two ships could be held together within Selesta's electromagnetic field, allowing the Selesta's anti-gravitational field to encompass both ships, thus compensating for Enlil's inferior engines. Apparently the Great Leader had given some thought to designing his ship so that it might be possible to do so, with the salvation of his people on his mind.

At the same time, the arrival of more than two million Tiasennians cramped living conditions on board. However, the technicians prepared new rooms and wings for their occupation, rooms which, according to Selerael and Adam, had remained sealed for generations until they returned from Sesylendae.

Selerael knew why they had been able to gain access to the sealed sections at long last. The entity she now knew had been Ornenkai, that had surrounded her since childhood, comforted and even once frightened her, that breathed life into the metallic structure of the ship, had disappeared.

They found thousands of objects belonging to Hinev's explorers through the long-closed chambers. Works of great scientific innovation, art, pictures and holo-stills, terrestrial transport explorers, supplies, and provisions, a production site that manufactured food materials for the meal selection units, and hundreds of operations for life aboard the ship as it had been. With these objects, more cargo bays housing alien museums that Hinev's explorers had kept after their debriefings and several more spaces holding botanical preserves and non-lyra forests still thrived, functioning according to a system code imprinted before the fall of the Seynorynaelian Empire.

From these areas, space was created to house many of the Tiasennian refugees, a number of which were transferred to Enlil.

Though much organization remained to be done, the inhabitants of the new Selesta were hasty to depart in search of a new planet, away from the threat of the nearby lai-nen system. Toriso and some of the other specialists and scientists asked Selerael if they should return to one of the worlds Selesta had encountered on its recent journey to Rigell. But most recognized that attempting to colonize an inhabited planet could present problems with the local population.

Selesta had not taken them to many of the uninhabited worlds that now appeared on the computer star charts. With the new maps and ship log open, it became clear that this particular galaxy held more non-humanoid lifeforms than humanoid, and few inhabitable worlds.

However, the galaxy group near the center of the supercluster that had held the Goeur and most of the humanoid variants they had come across showed an incomparably high proportion of humanoid life and inhabitable planetoids.

It had also been home to the planet Seynorynael.

Without a better plan, the consensus was to return in that direction, in hopes of finding a world similar to Tiasenne. However, shortly after the engines were engaged, the computer registered a pre-set flight plan, programmed into the computer after the ship achieved orbit above Tiasenne.

Ornenkai's gift to them. Where would it lead?

Selerael decided to find out, putting her faith in Ornenkai, now that she knew he had been trying to redeem himself for all the evil that he had done.

Adam had gone for an outing in the Seynorynaelian forest when he sensed the tachiyon engines engage.

Child of the Zariqua Enassa, who brought us from Enor long ago, the trees whispered to him, swaying in the wind. Our journey across time is almost at an end.

"What?" Adam called to them. "No! No, I don't want you to go," he said, thinking back on his friend Faulkner, the only other human being he knew who had been able to hear the lyra trees.

We must return soon.

"Why? Why do you have to go now?" He demanded, not even certain why the thought distressed him. Perhaps it was because the lyra had guided him his entire life; perhaps it was because as long as they were safe, here, he felt their power like an invisible shield that protected him out in the world.

Instead, Ornenkai's words echoed in Adam's mind, the words he had overheard when the great entity departed the ship and became human for the last time.

It is not my destiny to see the end of the Empire–it is Selerael's. She is the one, the one I saw in the arboretum that day, the one who created the time-loop. Tiasenne will thrive in the future–but mine, ours, hers ceases to be outside the circle of time.

We are not merely fragments of Enor. We are the inheritors of its doomed legacy.

* * * * *

The ship jumped in and out of hyperspace, maneuvering around large stellar obstructions and resetting its path. After a long period of deceptive quiet, all of the alert systems on board activated at once, sending shrieking sirens throughout the ship.

Selesta had just plummeted at maximum speed towards the pole of a rotating black hole. Before the crew could react, Selesta passed the event horizon, beyond which not even light might escape.

There was no going back.

They were all going to die.

The black hole would erase them from the universe without even a trace.

The impending darkness, horror, crept over Selerael as she stood on the bridge, watching the light and refracted colors swallowed by the dark exotic matter before them.

In a moment, their bodies would be destroyed by that force, before Selesta ever reached the black hole itself.

Then, out of nowhere, she felt a silent scream welling inside her, but this scream was power. Raw power. Power she had never known she possessed, that she had never known how to harness.

Her mind, struggling somewhere to conquer fear and accept what it perceived was about to happen to them all, separated from her; she ceased to pay it any further attention.

Already frightened and despairing cries could be heard over the ship as the crew felt themselves being compressed by the black hole's power.

Selerael was no longer with them. She was alone with the cosmic string, aware of it and nothing else.

She reached the engine sphere, having gone nowhere. She was everywhere at the same time in this place, aware of all that occurred and yet she was detached from all she observed at the same time.

A sound echoed within the depths of the ship near the main engine, where the centipede hole rending device, the cosmic string that had ripped holes in space-time to propel the ship through subspace, had responded to the tremendous pressure and forces of the space near the black hole.

Already their surroundings had taken on a surreal quality–time and space seemed to merge, but those within continued to feel the force of the black hole ring singularity and were terrified.

Mass to energy, Adam heard the words in his mind, but where were they coming from? It seemed as though some energy around him was trying to warn him, trying to save him, trying to tell him what he had to do in order to survive certain doom.

He sensed that energy around him; it belonged to his mother. At last he understood.

Selerael was going to turn them all into energy with her. Her entity had flooded the twin ships with fully-sentient waves, persuading all mass within and of the two ships to join her, to become one with the energy as the ship neared the black hole. Synchronizing with the singularity in the ship, the descendant of the last colonizer of Enor had awakened the full power of the Enorian singularity and the power in herself.

As the living mass converted to sentient energy, Adam felt the presence of several other sentient beings with him. Who? Who were they, these sentient creatures trapped in this world between life and death, between mass and energy?

The flow of their energy rushed excitedly past him as if preparing to leave the ship once it had passed into the ring singularity and the gateway between universes and time. As they passed him, his heart was filled with such primal joy that he forgot his fear. He had been forgiven, and now, now he could return to the land beyond; his soul restored, he could now return to the tapestry of light.

Meanwhile, within the event horizon, the density and force of Selesta exceeded the small black hole, allowing the cosmic string attached to the tachiyon engine to catapult them through the ring singularity and back through subspace to an orbit around the event horizon, accelerating into an elliptical orbit that slingshotted the ship from the event horizon and away from the black hole.

Eternity had passed in the black hole and no time at all. Passing that eternity, the ship emerged from a small white hole in space, a white hole which was a past singularity of the black hole, a black hole moving backward in time. Once they emerged from the white hole and into forward time once more, the white hole that had been their salvation instantly became a black hole once again.

Away from the black hole, the ship decelerated, solidifying back in forward time, back into real space, mass once again. In that moment, Selerael released her hold upon the energy contained within the ship and allowed the humanoids and creatures within to resume their native forms, to take shape as material beings once again.

She found herself standing on the bridge.

No, it hadn't been a dream, she realized, for the space field around them belonged to another galaxy.

The bridge crew stared about themselves in incredulity, wondering where they were and how they had suddenly arrived in this unknown area, wondering how they were still alive, when their last thoughts had been of the approaching darkness...

Yet a new galaxy now greeted them with its unfamiliar envelope of bright, dense lights, seeming to observe them disinterestedly.

"Selerael–" Derica began, pointing.

One of the closer stars grew brighter as Selesta skirted it; it had the blinding glare of a blue star. Then, as the light dissipated, they found themselves ready to impact the beautiful blue-white world that had sneaked up on them while the tried to get their bearings.

"Where are we?" Toriso shouted as they neared the planet. Two small moons were passing over the surface, one at the edge of the port view, the other not far away to their right. The planet before them bore an unmistakable resemblance to Seynorynael.

There was no time to dwell on it. Selesta was plummeting into the ionosphere.

* * * * *

Selesta's crash split Enlil and Selesta apart. Sesylendae broke off, skidding in a ridge of soil. The pair of larger ships had come in on their sides and landed with Selesta's Great Bay doors in the air. The artificial gravity on board fought to maintain its control, but the power reserves had dwindled. Some of the interior functions were still operational, but the ships were in their death throes.

The gravity generators, however, had been miraculously unaffected.

The black hole had been hard on both ships, though the sturdier Selesta had fared better than Enlil. At the last moment as they neared the planet, it became clear that the tachiyon engines had failed, though the ships continued at the same speed as when the engines failed. Meeting the friction of the atmosphere, stabilizers and thrusters engaged themselves to slow for re-entry. Selerael exerted as much controlling force as she could to decelerate the ships and augment the interior stabilizers that protected the inhabitants on board, but it was a bumpy ride to the surface.

Crippled by the recent warp through the black hole, Selesta and Enlil plummeted to the land below, skimming to the edge of a lake. Enlil's inhabitants had fled to the interior of the ship. Most of them survived the crash, though the exterior of the ship itself was damaged; the hull plates had begun to rain onto the land below from as high as the ionosphere, the last few plates dropping into the nearby lake seconds before the crash.

"We're going out," Selerael said to Sorbin, as Adam appeared on the bridge, his face ashen. Specialist Derica had already established that the atmosphere of the bright world was breathable. "Meanwhile, Derica–"

"Yes?"

"Send someone to check on Enlil's crew."

"Will do."

"Mother, I'm coming with you," Adam said, standing in the doorway.

"I know."

* * * * *

Under the bright light of day, arcs of silver cut into the giant lake that swept away to the far-off horizon. On the other side of the fallen Selesta lay a forest, a line of green that diminished over a rise of neighboring hills. A lyra forest.

Selerael's face was as pale as her son's.

"You know where we are," he said.

She nodded.

"Firien."

As she said it, she became aware of the ocean melody playing on the tides. Overhead, several Ceiras birds wheeled about, circling over the crash.

"Who is that?" One of the scouts cried, pointing, and all eyes followed his arm.

Across the charred plain, at the edge of the forest, a man stood watching them.

The man approached them slowly, allowing them to weigh his intentions. He appeared careful to show that he was not hostile, spreading his arms wide. As he neared them, they saw that he wore a tight fitting silver garment over his body, not unlike the shiny material of their own Seynorynaelian uniforms.

His eyes and hair were glowing silver, his skin translucent white–even the veins in his neck and hands had no color. He was a walking ghost, a creature that had stepped over time and space and into the real world. He stopped short of them and regarded Selerael a moment, an expression of uncertain recognition on his face.

His words, when he spoke, were in the tongue of the ancients.

Selerael and Adam listened, while the others struggled to understand a language that hardly resembled the Tiasennian they knew.

"He's going to help us?" Sorbin asked as the man listened to him curiously.

"Yes–there are many of his people nearby." Selerael turned to Sorbin. "The others are on their way. They have offered to help strip Selesta and help us build a settlement beyond the scorched plain Selesta created in her crash–over there, in a clearing by the north shore of the lake where the trees end."

The man suddenly spoke to Selerael again.

"What was that?" Toriso asked Selerael in broken Tiasennian, for Sorbin's benefit. Toriso had most likely understood none of the strange man's speech.

Selerael turned her attention to him, with a face that hadn't yet adjusted to what the man had said.

"He wanted to know which planet we came from." She said, her lips tight. "He asked how long was our journey into the end of the universe. He asked for word of the others. They have been waiting millions of years for any word of the other escape ships. But there have been none." She paused.

"So who are they?" Kesney interrupted.

Selerael swallowed. "They are survivors of Enor 97."

* * * * *

"Where do you think we are?" Specialist Derica wondered aloud to the bridge crew, gazing through Selesta's forward viewport at the calm, clear blue-grey waters of a mountain-fed lake. Suddenly, she jumped in her seat. A small group of humanoids wearing furs to protect against the cold had joined the group led by Selerael and her son. "Enlarge," Derica called without thinking, but the computer was still working and responded with a magnified image in the holo-monitor.

The pale grey-skinned humanoids reminded her of the Orians. Only one of them caught her attention; a man clad in silver stood among them, speaking only when the others addressed him. Derica felt the communications Specialist Kirya stumble beside her to get a better view, suddenly animated by the image Derica had enlarged.

"It's–a colonizer!" Kirya—who was Enorian herself—shouted, rasping for breath, her storm grey eyes widening. Derica turned to her, a deep crease forming on her brow.

Kirya's family had arrived on Selesta among the strange grey-skinned humanoids suspended in time in their long marooned ship's capsules, the Enorian refugees. Only a child when Selerael had found them, she had grown to young adulthood in the intervening years, her past only a blurred memory. Nevertheless, the shock of seeing the silver-haired man brought back a dim recollection.

"What's–a colonizer?" Derica asked.

"A colonizer?" Kirya echoed, struggling to hold on to the ideas that had returned in that brief moment of recognition. "...He reshapes the universe. He–is the genetic pattern of all races. He makes the universe–one."

"Say that again?" Derica prompted, waving her hand before Kirya's vacant stare.

* * * * *

The colonizer stared a long moment at the grey-skinned members of Selerael's crew. They stared at him in turn. The grey-skinned Enorians had no memory of Enor, but they knew him; somehow, they knew his face, as one of them had recognized Selerael, years before.

Selerael explained how they had been lost in hypersleep for billions of years; his own ship and fellows had been lost in the same cataclysm.

"When did you come here?" Adam wondered, though inside, he was more interested in why the colonizer hadn't lost his memory. However, his guts told him something was at work that he didn't understand, a force he didn't want to understand. He decided not to ask the other question.

"We awakened a million years ago."

"A million?" Adam stared at him. A million years? By what standard of time? He decided he didn't want to know that, either.

"Yes," the colonizer replied. "We called this world Igraeilen, back when it belonged to the red star, before the blue star formed."

"Valeria?" Adam asked.

The colonizer smiled. "If you wish to call it that. Yes. Valeria is only a few thousand years old."

Adam immediately stared up at the sky. But how–how was that possible?

"What about the people here?" Adam asked.

"The native people of this world had already evolved to nearly their present state when we met them. So the answer is no, we are not all Enorian," the colonizer replied.

"But–the transition–"

"Yes," the colonizer nodded. "When the planet was drawn by the great gravity of your Valeria, there was a horrible period of climactic upheaval, an upheaval that did not end for many years. As they had helped us when we arrived, we in turn aided them to survive."

Selerael met his eyes, sensing that the colonizer had tried to forget those events, so recent in his memory. Already the world had healed itself, in only a short time. She did not doubt that the people had progressed with the aid of Enorian technology.

Meanwhile, a low groan sounded from Enlil, the sound of great hull plates grating, underneath the sound they heard several hundred approaching human voices; one of the twisted, burned hull plates clattered to the ground.

Hundreds of grey-skinned humanoids began to emerge from the aperture, gathering on the charred field around Enlil and Selesta. The large Orian population emerged, a slow trickle that crawled out to meet the Enorian emissary who had joined Selerael's party; then, growing into a river, thousands followed the venturous few out onto the open plain of upturned soil. The coloring of the Orian skin, similar to the natives', brought forth many low whispers from the colonizer's small train.

Their words formed into a collective whole.

"What are they saying?" Toriso asked. "What is ferai-lunei?" He added, looking to Selerael, but it was Sorbin who answered. He should not have been able to comprehend anything they said, he told himself. And granted, he couldn't understand much of anything they said, but the hum that formed into the two words ferai-lunei exactly matched those words in his own language.

"It means 'comet riders'." He breathed.

* * * * *

Adam had never met the lom-vaia people, but he found himself thinking about their story in the days that passed. They had spoken of "a creator" that had metamorphosed them into a humanoid form, a man who had come alone to their world and seeking companionship, had recreated humanoid forms like himself from the sentient plant species he had found.

The crew had spent several days unloading supplies from the two ships. The colonizer had called in the natives to help move some of the supplies to the proposed community by the lake, but he discouraged them from interacting with the crew.

While the unloading was still going on, the colonizer at last met with Selerael, Adam, the bridge specialists, and a few representatives of the Orians–the Garen and some elite officers, as well as Sobrin and Alessia's other scientists. The meeting was called in Selesta's largest intact conference room.

The colonizer had brought his own wife and young daughter with him but none of the other natives. His only explanation had been that the others were not ready to come into contact with the advanced civilization they were to find here on Selesta.

* * * * *

"Certainly you came from an Enorian colony," The colonizer said, his steady eyes fixed on Selerael.

"No," she protested, silencing him.

"Most of us are from the binary planets known as Tiasenne and Orian," Adam explained, "but there are many of us who came from other worlds, the third largest population having come from a planet called Earth." The colonizer regarded him with a glint in his eye, as though he doubted the truth of Adam's words.

Or else he knew something different that they didn't.

The colonizer sighed, wondering why they refused to see the truth. He could recognize the descendant of a colonizer, for he was a colonizer himself. He looked down at his own daughter, Falia, who had taken on the characteristics of her mother–the same gray hair and eyes, but she had his face–and that was Enorian.

"What do you call this planet?" Kesney wanted to know.

The colonizer shrugged, returning to the present. "The inhabitants now call it Narana."

"And these people," Toriso began," the ones that are helping us move our supplies to the territory you've found for us–are they your people?"

The colonizer took a deep breath. Should he tell them? he deliberated a moment. Though they had forgotten their heritage; he could see that they had, though he knew this was for the best. However, they had all been shaped by Enor, perhaps by another ship of colonizers that had escaped the end.

He decided to tell them what he could.

"No," his voice was like a beautiful chord of music, but his words were in English. After only a few short days, he had learned much of Earth and its history from Adam and Selerael. Now it was his turn to represent the history of this planet.

"I'm afraid they are yours."
Chapter Nineteen

"When we arrived on this world," the colonizer began, "there were already several groups of emerging bipeds."

"Bipeds?" Adam echoed.

"You might call them humanoids, but they weren't quite that, not then. The strongest group more closely resembled us, having less body hair and a larger cranium. All of the bipeds stood erect, walking on two feet among the animals, but these were more intelligent than the others. They already lived in communities, farming on the land, protecting themselves against the weather."

"The cold?"

"The world was different back then." The colonizer shook his head. "We calculated that in earliest history, the planet had begun as a hot planet, then cooled off to a moderate, sub-tropical climate giving rise to a variety of life over millions of years. Yet, as you say, by the time we arrived, the planet's temperature had grown relatively cold all year long.

"Only the hardiest plants flourished in the coldest territories, those that had adapted to the cold. There were no sharp seasons, but the one period of increased warming allowed certain species to endure, adapting to a short flowering period marked by a long period of dormancy. Many land animals likewise adapted to hibernate."

"The same evolutionary pattern we see today," Selerael deduced.

"The beginnings of it." The colonizer agreed. "The nearest orange star was far away, but the planet's internal volcanic activity kept the surface warmer than it would have been. And yet the temperature was falling with every passing year as the magma core cooled. When we arrived, we knew life on the planet was doomed. But for many thousands of years, we watched the early bipeds develop on Narana; we watched as they flourished from the life cultures of our Enor and became more like us every year.

"Our excavations of ancient burial sites revealed to us that some of the first intelligent bipeds had been similar to us in many ways. But none of them were humanoid as we knew it. After some time we decided to help the most intelligent branches to flourish over the earlier species with whom they competed for the planet's few materials. Some of us remained in our ship, but many of us left to aid the strongest group of bipeds.

"For years the Enorian outpost existed independently from the native peoples, but when we knew for certain that they could not survive in the changing climate as they were–we began our project to alter the newest species."

"You changed their cellular structure?" Selerael guessed.

"Yes," the colonizer admitted. "Afterward, a few older varieties of life, though related to the other forms of life on the planet through years of shared evolution, would become something also unrelated to the natural lines–a by-product of genetic manipulation, an artificial race."

"So essentially, you tampered with evolution," Selerael interrupted.

"Yes, we interfered, but not out of malice." The colonizer shook his head solemnly. "We would not have done it had we not wished to be of help, to make up for interfering in this universe. But–now your destinies are linked to ours, whether or not you admit it to yourselves, no matter how you feel about it. What has been cannot be changed. Many of you are here because of us."

"What do you mean?" Kesney demanded.

"After altering the most intelligent race," the colonizer explained, "we gradually began to intermingle with this native people, guiding their knowledge a little at a time. Some us were content to live out the remainder of our lives among them, to marry and raise families; thus we accidentally accelerated the evolution of the strongest race. After many thousand years, most of us Enorians had been completely assimilated, and Enorian now represents about 37 percent of the genetic material of each humanoid individual here on Narana. So, you see, you are all children of Enor. Your fate began there, as ours did, long ago."

"How is it possible that you could raise families here, with the native populations?" Derica asked, her voice highly skeptical of what she heard despite all she had seen on Selesta.

"Well," the colonizer said, "unlike civilian Enorians, colonizers were specially created to have a genetic pattern that can change. We were designed on the Enorian home world to blend our traits with the local population of a planet, and pass on to their children certain tendencies and characteristics from the Enorian race."

"I see," Derica said. "Not terraforming, but human-forming. Very clever. Yet perhaps a bit vain?"

"Perhaps," the colonizer admitted. "But we colonizers had nothing to do with our creation. I am merely explaining why we were created. However, even as colonizers, we cannot alter a race as easily as you might believe. You see, the creatures of this world were not human like you or me–only after many long years were we able to shape their evolution, which unsurprisingly turned them towards a more Enorian form. At first, yes, we questioned whether or not we had the right to interfere–but there were few of us, and we were lonely. Forgive us, but we thought we alone had survived, from a civilization of trillions, and we wished to know again the company of those who might be our equals in thought and action.

"And we knew that without our aid, the creatures of this world were doomed to extinction. When the blue star–Valeria–began to form, we realized that its intense gravity would draw Narana from the orange-red star. The radiation would eradicate all life–if anything had survived the upheaval as the planet was pulled across space. Those of us colonizers still living among the populations almost gave up and left to return to the Havens.

"I should say my fellows almost left." He paused. "For I was among those that remained in our Havens, suspended in time, and all that had happened, all that I now relate to you, happened in the time of my predecessors, in the time of colonizers who awakened before me."

"You had nothing to do with any of it?" Adam almost laughed.

"Setting up the conditions? No. It was my time to awake shortly before the upheaval of the planetary transfer occurred." The colonizer explained. "My fellow colonizers had been preparing the population, developing the trait they had inherited directly from us–the ability to reflect light without its being absorbed. But for them to survive we had long exposed the creatures and humanoid population to simulated light, developing among them organs in the skin that absorbed the blue light and channeled it before causing cellular damage.

"By the time the upheaval occurred, the creatures had already adapted, and the humanoid population, though once red or brown-skinned, had begun to change, to appear as they do now–blue eyes and gray skin, reflecting the light and other radiation. Some of the more primitive species of bipeds that endured adapted white fur, but began to specialize after the upheaval and became different species with the rapid evolution that followed."

"And the other colonizers?" Kirya asked.

"There are a few that still sleep who will not leave the Havens. But the others I mentioned have passed on. As Enorian colonizers, we know the moment when our expiration nears. It was not always so, but billions of years of our evolution has given us this gift." His eyes drifted to Selerael's face.

"Unbelievable," Derica breathed.

"No," the colonizer countered, still eyeing Selerael. "We colonizers do not always live long lives–some of us as long as a million years, others as short as a thousand. But most of the Enor did not wish to live beyond a natural span. We did not seek eternity. We knew the foolishness of it."

"My time also approaches its end." He said, to all appearances indifferent. "I knew when I would die the moment I survived the Great Collapse, when I came to this universe. I will remain among you long enough to help establish your colony here, almost another hundred more years. And then I will go. As Enor, we upset the balance by entering this universe. We feel the necessity to leave it, and when we die, our energy returns to another place, to another dimension. You may say we feel all the years pulling upon us when our time nears its end."

Silence prevailed. At length, a messenger entered the room, wearing the maroon and grey uniform of an Orian.

"An emissary among the natives has told some of us of a far away city he came from where we might live." The Orian emissary reported. "They say the nearby forest cannot support us all, for there is no food and the trees do not bear fruit. However, I am told there are a great many resources across the forest. The emissary has contacted the city and they are sending transports to take those of us willing to go."

"Why would they do so much for us?" Derica wondered.

"They're all calling us brothers," the emissary replied. "That seems to be why they've volunteered to help us in any way possible."

"What has the Garen decided?" Selerael asked.

"He feels that we should go there." The emissary replied, still regarding her, still half-afraid to speak to the one his guts told him was the Zariqua Enassa for whom his Great Leader Sargon had searched for so many years. "Many of the Tiasennians are considering joining us as well." He continued, then turned to address the colonizer. "We wish to extend our thanks to the colonizer for offering his home to us, but the Garen feels that there are too many of us here to remain."

"If they all intend to leave this area, once they have removed all of the supplies from the ship, you must destroy it," the colonizer advised him and the others present. Several of the assembly gasped, turning questioning gazes upon him.

"Yes," he said. "We of Enor are guilty of interfering with evolution and tampering with the natural order of the races, but at least we have never disclosed the location of our grounded ship, what some call 'the Havens'. It was much smaller than your vessels, and we hid it from the inhabitants–but your Enlil, and even Selesta–they cannot be left for the future to discover."

"Why does it matter?" Derica asked. "Won't they be covered over in time?"

"You must be more thorough than that. Do not make assumptions and expect all to work out as you intend it to," the colonizer advised.

"Despite the aid we gave the people of this planet, we have left them to their own further evolution and their own history since the time of the planetary transfer." The colonizer said. "They must be allowed to develop on their own now–please. Any more tampering would be imprudent. Power gained too quickly–it has a tendency to corrupt what once was good. We hoped, despite our interference, that–the harshness of this world would give them a strength of character to rectify what we had done."

"I understand." Selerael said. "We'll be sure to clean up the area where Selesta fell. Meanwhile, I'll have our communications network send the message across Selesta that those who wish to may join the transports to–" she stopped, turning to the emissary. "What is the name of the city?"

"They call it Ariyal-synai." The messenger answered, and withdrew to send the word to the communications center.

"Ariyal-synai," Selerael laughed.

There was no questioning that they had returned to Seynorynael—the Seynorynael of the past. The black hole singularity, the point of infinite density at which the natural laws of time and space collapsed, had been a gateway through time, had brought them back to their past. They had passed through a black hole from which not even light might escape to emerge in a transient white hole that ejected matter, before it became a black hole–the black hole Kai-rek. The porthole they had taken had brought them across the Great Cluster and into their own past.

"Mother–are you all right?" Adam's brow furrowed in concern.

"Yes."

"About the colony here–may we still join you if we wish?" Adam asked the colonizer.

"Yes," the colonizer nodded. "We have but a small community here–mostly colonizers that joined the people just before and after the transfer such as myself, their wives, and children. We call it S'enor-inn-ayel, which means 'rebirth of Enor'. The people of our colony have already begun to build dwellings for you closer to Lake Firien, between a clearing in the trees. Selerael–" he turned to regard her suddenly. "I meant what I said about Selesta. She must be dismantled. Remember not to leave anything. From what I could see, her interior systems are still partly intact, but the outer hull plates were ripped away. By the way, can you tell me–why did you not slow more in entering our atmosphere? And tell me, what truly caused such a vessel to be damaged to this extent? No ordinary force could damage her."

"We passed through a region of great pressure." Selerael hedged. "A distortion in space," she added quickly. "We barely escaped–"

"Very strange," Adam interrupted quietly.

* * * * *

Selesta, Selesta–to lose the ship was like losing a part of herself.

After the meeting with the colonizer, Selerael wandered about the ship aimlessly, lost in recollections.

She wanted to restore the ship, to save it. Instead, she would be the one to destroy it.

Before she did, she decided to remove the bodies of the explorers, to rebury them on Seynorynael. For a moment she hesitated, considering leaving them, here where Selesta had fallen. But wouldn't they have wanted to sleep under the light of the Seynorynaelian star's-rise?

She threaded her way to the dark corridors at the bottom of Selesta, where she had discovered Fielikor Kiel and the others so many years ago, preserved, frozen in time. Quietly, reverently, she entered the crypt, now able to imagine the day that her mother had brought them here to rest.

The bodies were gone!

The suspension capsules remained as Colonel Kansier had left them, clear blue-paned coffins with crystals of ice pressing on the surface from within, yet now there was nothing in them. All thirty explorers had disappeared.

Why?

After a minute, she remembered what had happened in that moment within the ring singularity of Kai-rek when all of the living mass on the ship had become energy. She had felt a living energy with her, sentient beings like herself swirling around her, freed, rejoicing, rushing past her and towards the oblivion.

But the explorers had been dead, she reminded herself, not living energy!

Yet when Alessia and Sargon, both of them serum creatures, had died, their bodies had turned into energy, an energy that faded into another place, another existence.

Why had the others remained in body for her to find?

No, her mind fought the horror, the recollection of her mother in the temple of Nippur, the recollection her mother had faced when she remembered her fallen comrades.

They had been trapped between the physical world and the tapestry of light all those years! And Alessia, she had feared the same ending, a universal punishment for those who would have dared to live forever, prolonging the physical burden forever without any of its joys, and keeping their souls from returning to the energy from which they had come.

The explorers alone of all the children of Enor were kept from returning to the tapestry of light, the paradise where Enorian souls returned at their journey's end. They alone were barred the way back, neither in body, nor as souls freed of their earthly temple.

Until, in Kai-rek, they were allowed to find their way home.

Selerael left the mausoleum and wandered the ship, deeply immersed in her own reflections, until at last she found herself near the hold that contained the great Seynorynaelian forest. The trees, she had almost forgotten that they would have to be moved. She plunged through the doorway, looking around, but the illumination that had been cast from high above was gone, and she could barely discern shadows in the gloom.

A bright blast of light flicked from her finger at her will; she directed it upward towards the ceiling–

The forest was gone!

Selerael peered around, but there was nothing, only an empty cargo hold.

Of course, the mass-energy transformation! As they headed into the black hole, she had been unable to protect them. And now the beauty of that forest was gone, around which so many lives and memories had depended for the strength to go on.

When finally she emerged into the corridor outside, she was ready to let Selesta go.

The time had come to say farewell.

* * * * *

The colonizer found her sitting on the shore, watching the spindrift, heedlessly letting the mist saturate her skin.

"I know how difficult it is for you," he said; she followed his gaze to the Selesta. "But it will be re-born."

"You know?"

"About the time-loop?" His silver brow arched. "Yes. We could not mistake it. I did not tell the others of this world, but we of Enor came here before."

"Before?"

"When we first awoke there was no life to sustain us in this universe. We landed on this world, but it was barren. I cannot be certain, but I believe that was when some of the life cultures escaped from our ship and began the development of life on this world, or accelerated it."

"Life cultures?" Selerael echoed. Life cultures?–Gerryls had been right! Then–was the Earth also a fragment of Enor?! "Poor Zhdanov, Vereda, Cameron–they searched and searched for answers and never knew. Your life cultures must have seeded the galaxies with life, but you yourselves interfered with the grand experiment where it seemed about to fail."

"Yes," the colonizer replied. "Every ship of Enor carried thousands of life cultures to develop the planets we found and make them livable. We did not often use them, only when we could find no viable planet.

"When we left, our ship's contained string singularity that had ripped space-time for our entry into a new universe drew us towards a nearby black hole singularity. The ship had calculated that for our survival it would orbit the event horizon, catapulting us into the future. With its success, we might return to find life flourishing by itself in the galaxy and a new home to sustain us.

"The ship did succeed, but at a great cost."

"I don't understand." Selerael protested. "You made it to Narana."

"Yes, because we were forced to." He saw her confusion, and continued. "It was not mere vanity and loneliness that made us willing to transform the race that had developed here. We could not reach another world."

"But surely there would have been other worlds upon which life flourished by the time that you emerged from the white hole." She insisted.

"Perhaps. But as I said–we could not reach them. For while the ship emerged from the white hole, the cosmic string singularity that had brought us safely in and out disappeared. And with it, the skeleton, the anti-gravity thrusters, and some of the infrastructure of the Enorian flagship also disappeared.

"We thought perhaps we had made miscalculations, that the ship had passed within the event horizon and that by only a miracle and the efforts of the Zariqua Enassa we had managed to escape before being crushed. With our ship crippled, running on auxiliary engine power, we could not make it further than this world. When the ship crashed here to become our Havens, it was clear that it would never fly again."

"But where–" she asked, and stopped. Where had the heart of the Enorian ship gone? She didn't need to ask any more.

The Enorian colonizer's sad gaze had drifted to the Selesta.

The Selesta–and the cosmic string now within it.

The Enorian cosmic string had not gone anywhere in the black hole, but it had warped to another time!

It had warped to the Selesta, to the loop in time that contained the ship, from the beginning of the ruins to the end of their journey in Kai-rek.
Chapter Twenty

In the few short years that followed, the Enorian descendants and crew that remained by the shores of Lake Firien completed the task of stripping the ship. The hull plates that had survived were used as building materials for the new settlement, as were the other surviving analyzers, holo-monitors, and other ship innovations.

All of the botanical life and animal specimens on board the ship had disappeared with the Seynorynaelian forest. Even Vereda's cherished hydrogardens had vanished.

Once everything had been removed from the ship, only the metal skeleton that had once been a part of the Enorian flagship remained in memory of the great ship that had once dominated the galaxies around the Great Cluster. Selerael had used her telekinetic power and energy to blow the remaining interior apart until nothing but the barest remnant of infrastructure remained. Then she buried the unusable fragments under the sands, next to the few remains of Enlil and Sesylendae that had already been interred.

The settlement by the shores of the lake thrived, though only a few thousand of the crew had remained by Selesta, forsaking it to the lure of the great city Ariyal-synai. After a year had passed, the survivors' story of the strange woman who had brought them from their home world spread among the inhabitants of Narana, though, like the Enorian survivors of Lexcar, the black hole Kairek seemed to have moderately dimmed their memories of their former lives. With her mental abilities, Selerael had helped them to adopt the way of life of their new home as she had so often before.

A generation would pass before their children grew to adulthood, and the older generations themselves never really learned to speak the language of Narana, similar and yet different from their own. But from the newcomers, a few words entered the Narana language. The influence of English, Russian, French, Japanese, German, Norwegian, Chinese, and the other Earth languages found its way into the language through the descendants from Earth; most noticeably, the human names endured, for the people of Narana had gone by only one name before the coming of the Ferai-lunei–their brothers from the sky.

The confused histories of the many newcomers, however, did not survive the language barrier very well. So many stories were told and repeated that in time the accounts mingled, and after many generations, were to be remembered only in children's stories.

But for a time, rumor of the former leader Selerael flourished, and the city of Ariyal-synai sent word that they wished the leader of Selesta to become the leader of all people. Yet Selerael declined, insisting that her people had not intended to disrupt the Narana way of life. The inhabitants reluctantly accepted her refusal but were determined to honor their new brothers and sisters.

Their common belief, though its origins were lost to history, was that the Naranans had come to their world in a similar way. Their ancestors had told the tale eons ago of their journey, and their descendants had long awaited the arrival of their brothers and sisters, lost in the galaxy. The Naranans thought that their own future would include a flight to the moon Nanshe, that the moment neared when they would reach out and seize it for their own, and a time would come when the entire race would again reclaim the stars.

For now, they made a gesture to honor the newcomers, and their leader. Sobrin had told them that when they had found this world, it had reminded the leader of her ancient home.

The Naranans wanted to rename their world after the great leader's land, but no one had been sure what it had been called. So the Naranans chose the name of the settlement where she lived and renamed their world S'enor-inn-ayel.

* * * * *

Ah, the open air! The freedom! The abundant beauty that knew no ends, no bounds, and lived here under the open sky! Adam and the others who had spent their entire lives in Selesta reveled in it. Firien seemed as familiar as the Seynorynaelian forest, but there was almost no end to it, as there had been no end to the stars throughout his life. Here, he dwelt between both worlds, able to glimpse a thousand stars he had passed while firmly rooted in the solid earth beneath his feet.

After a few years, he carved out a place for himself within the land itself, a dwelling on the outskirts of the settlement, by the northern shores of the lake, beyond the weather-safe ring. His mother often visited, but lately she had begun to disappear for brief periods of time without word to anyone. The colonizer, his friend, also visited, but the Enorian continued to avoid his questions of Enor's past and its achievements. "The more answers I give you, the more questions you'll ask," the colonizer always replied, ending the matter. Nor would he speak on the subject to Selerael when she accompanied Adam on visits to the colonizer's home. Enor's legacy had to fade–or there might be consequences to pay.

* * * * *

"You're happy here, Adam?" Selerael asked one evening, having made the journey north from Firien City to visit her son.

Adam nodded, looking out on the dark waters.

"I've found home." He said, with more feeling than he intended.

"Home, Adam? Are you certain this is what you want?" She asked, drawing alongside him.

"Yes, mother," he laughed. "This is home. I see it, I feel it. You don't need to worry about me–I know you'll leave soon."

"As long as I know that this is what you want."

He laughed. "Never certain of who I was, where I was going, or where I truly belonged. But, mother, I don't need an answer for all of the questions any more. I've found contentment at last."

He put an arm around her and held her near, wishing she could do the same, knowing that she could not.

* * * * *

I don't want to go, but now, now I must, Selerael thought.

Adam and Falia had been married. Selerael tried not to feel out of place, tried not to feel that her son didn't need her any more because he had Falia. She knew that her son would always need her as she would need him, but both of them knew that Selerael had to leave. Like it or not, they had both more or less accepted that Selerael had a greater destiny yet to fulfill; as resentful she might have been about her duty, Selerael took care never to show it. And she managed to muster only happiness for her son on this, his wedding day.

At the same time, she had mixed feelings about it, about the necessities of life that pushed everyone further away from whatever it was that people really wanted to do.

It seemed not so very long ago to Selerael that the colonizer's daughter had grown to adulthood, when Falia's Enorian heritage had begun to make itself known; time had little effect upon Falia's youth. The guests saw a woman young in form and in heart, but not in experience or in years.

Falia and Adam had formed a slow attachment only after half a human lifetime. His stories of travels across the galaxies had always fascinated her and the other young children; as she grew older, they had for a short time drifted apart, before Adam had ever developed any partial feelings towards her. For a time, Falia had gone off to the Kilkoran Sea but returned several years later to Firien. Then, some time after she had returned, Adam found her image and conversation gradually taking hold in his most serious thoughts.

Nevertheless, when Adam realized he cared for Falia, he had pursued her with a determination that didn't fail to kindle her heart; Adam's love for Falia had nothing to do with his past regrets and more with a clear understanding that he couldn't live his life without her.

For one thing, she understood him better than anyone else could. Adam's companions from the time when Selesta crashed to Seynorynael had grown old. Their children now had families of their own. Falia had also begun to understand what it was to be a living anachronism, as had all of the half-Enorian children. Only two now remained, yet Falia was the youngest, and perhaps the last.

The colonizer seemed pleased that Falia and Adam had fallen in love. His own wife had passed on, and he had feared he might not live to see Falia settle into another life. His own time had nearly reached its end.

Selerael was immersed in thought as Adam approached her, so much that she did not notice his presence.

Mother, am I destined to destroy the Seynorynaelian Empire–an empire yet to be born? Or–or will I fail, as so many others have before me? She wondered, leaning against the balcony of the colonizer's home where the wedding had taken place. Her eyes reflected the bright lights of the evening sky. She heard laughter from below, where friends who had come to the ceremony continued to dance and celebrate.

Does the singularity truly exist? Or was it no more than a symbol? A symbol of knowledge, or truth, or understanding, or the will to survive?? Where had the legend of the singularity come from?

And can I–can I destroy the time-loop if I must when the time comes?

"What troubles you, Selerael?" The colonizer suddenly interrupted her thoughts. She half-turned to watch him, but he approached and stood with her at the balcony, smiling benevolently at the pair below, his daughter and Selerael's son.

"Your destiny approaches," he said softly, his eyes unwavering but sad.

"Yes, I feel it catching up with me." Selerael lowered her head to rest her chin on the balcony. She understood that he would also be leaving.

"Both of us must let go of the present and move on," she added.

"Yes."

"I want to stay here."

"I know, child."

"There are so many things I don't understand. Things that make no sense to me."

"Selerael, why do you still wish to maintain that time must always be linear?" He asked, shaking his head, seeing that she still questioned so many things, just like a human being, as though she didn't accept that she wasn't one of them. "There is no real end and no beginning, even though your own perspective forces you to believe this. The universe moves on and begins again. There is only Time and Matter, which need each other to exist."

"I–know that."

"Yes, I see your thoughts. Time does betray us all in this dimension in taking life from our bodies. Does it not seem fitting that it must make its own amends in another, and be a friend to us there? You still doubt, clinging only to logic, to your rigid beliefs concerning scientific impossibility. The universe ends and is reborn in a circle–it ends again and returns to the same beginning–why do you not suppose that smaller loops exist in the fabric of space-time outside what we recognize as the normal flow of forward time? Do you deny what you have learned because they have no origin or end known to you? Mass and energy are the same–where one disappears, another is born. Mini-singularities and centipede holes permeate time and space–even control the lives of human beings–

"So, tell me, Selerael, are you even sure that the Selesta that emerged from the white hole is the same as the one that entered the black hole? No one can control the universe–no one can know all of its secrets."

"How did you know all of this–all that was on my mind?–of the white hole that brought us here?" Her eyes narrowed. "Are you a telepath?"

"Do not presume that we of Enor ignore what surrounds us." He replied quietly. "So much in life is obscured, but as we retreat from our active role, some things become clear. We usually no longer attempt to impose our order on the universe. We have learned our mistakes, and the futility of presuming that we could control destiny. We do not flaunt our knowledge if we can, or exploit it, stretching our capabilities to a maximum. But there are many things I can see, without needing to be told.

"I know that you depart tomorrow. The people of Ariyal-synai continue to change. Perhaps one day–they will hear of a woman who never grows old. Unless she leaves all she loves behind–to embark upon her destiny. Yes, I realize that we should never have interfered here, but we did. Fate exists, but so does choice. Then, once set into motion, the chain of events escapes us. And another must come to rectify damage done, to maintain the balance of order, the balance of life. That one–you."

"Why me?!" She took a step back. "Why would the universe bring me back here?"

"How can the universe tolerate such a loop in time?" He smiled.  
"That is not the real question. What is not meant to happen cannot be, or nothing exists. No, the answer lies in another question. What did the universe create from its infinite energy to redress the imbalance that we of Enor began?"

Selerael watched as the sunlight failed, and the waters of Lake Firien shone with the light of many stars. The cool breeze that rose from the waters passed through the leaves of the lyra trees and filled her ears with their song.

"Good-bye, Selerael." He turned away. "May we meet again, beyond this world," he said and then was gone.

* * * * *

He returned to the Havens to die. After him, only three would remain. The last of the first six had passed on in obscurity, and now only the three and master of the Havens remained. The super-colonizer, the Zariqua Enassa, last and greatest achievement of the home world of Enor before the end, the creature sent to the colony of Enor 97 to warn the colonizers, had indeed saved them. Upon his shoulders so much had rested. He bore the responsibility of it all–their escape, the future repercussions. Now he slept. And when he awakened, he would discover that he was alone.

The colonizer spent his remaining hours wandering through the Havens, recalling the days of Enorian glory in their own time, that might still exist somewhere, in some reality of another universe. The brightness of a billion worlds of knowledge and harmony had vanished into nothing, and yet he remembered. As the end neared, he sat among the relics. He thought of Selerael and pitied her. And he regretted leaving the Zariqua Enassa alone, without taking his leave.

Before succumbing to his own fate, he took out an engraving plate and drew a map of Selerael's world.

He then left a message to any other Enorians who might find the Enor 97 Havens. Others had come from this small galaxy, and with them an immortal woman who hoped to destroy an empire that had yet to be.

Was she the one the Zariqua Enassa had spoken of? The one from the Enorian legend? He didn't know, but he couldn't help but believe that she was. She had already broken the universal law of Time, bringing back Enorian-shaped humans from the future and into the past. No universe allowed anyone to break its laws unless this was what Time and Space wanted, except perhaps a true child born of their own energy.

Was Selerael the one? The one with no ending and no beginning, with a physical body that had merely chanced to pass within this loop of time? Was she the one who would save the Enorian race? The guardian who had been sent to keep the balance in the Universe?

Was she the one, even though she still refused to accept her own identity?

He would never know for certain.

Yet he did know that she, Selerael, born of Enor and child of the Zariqua Enassa, was sworn to prevent her Emperor and his Council from escaping into the future, no matter what the cost, and she alone had the power to do it. She would see that their reign came to an end, even if that meant she must thwart destiny and destroy the time-loop, leaving nothing of the existence they had known.

What would she do? He already knew, but he was surprised that she did not.

# * * * * *

Selerael admired the view a few minutes longer, until the nightly aurora appeared and shone its beacon in the north, obscuring the light of distant stars in an arc of radiant color growing on the horizon. The age-old conflict between the two celestial entities, the stars and the aurora, had begun again for another night on the planet Seynorynael.

"The most beautiful planet in the universe, it is said." She sighed, glad to be alive.

"I guess they are still at it," she laughed a little. Selerael could still hear the undulating voices engaged in the revelry going on, merging with the mournful melody of pipes in the nearby clearing. There the guests of her son's wedding were celebrating, singing, and dancing. She leaned numbly against the balcony of her dwelling which overlooked the lyra forest, reluctant to leave this hallowed ground for the city, where there was no night view.

The remote Firien province was truly a wonder. She had on occasion seen comet-tails send brilliant bursts of sparkling light into the sky, making twilight seen like another dawn, until the white lights finally settled into the violet backdrop of night.

This was only another, ordinary stars' rise, just after sunset. But to call it ordinary seemed unfair. Star's rise—a moment of fleeting beauty before the onset of evening, when the pale purplish glow cast over the planet by the power of the celestial lights reached down to claim the land with the last, fading blue rays of the setting sun. It was a beauty that could move the hardest of hearts. It was a moment when beauty conquered the untamable wild and shaped all of its moving beauty into one transient vision.

And the very moment when night predators stirred. Soon, legions of predatory nocturnal creatures would be scouring the land for unwary prey, creatures such as wild delochs, who would tear their own injured kind to pieces.

"This land is still wild," she thought to herself. "Still very dangerous."

She stared up at the familiar sight of the two moons, remembering how clear and white the Earth's moon seemed in comparison, so pure. Not at all like Ishkur and Nanshe, two moons forever in conflict, the ethereal against the dark, like the history and character of the great civilization born under their protection.

Ishkur, the larger of the two moons, created its own miraculous spectacle that could be seen from Seynorynael's equator. Dark red storm clouds and volcanic plumes swirled about the planetoid that was too close to the planet Seynorynael to remain geologically stable. But Ishkur's thin atmosphere, an atmosphere created by the gravitational forces of Seynorynael, was slowly lost to space, since the small planetoid's gravity was too weak to contain it. The weakness of that moon was the source of its vivid splendor. While lovely Nanshe, a small, opaque blue moon, was the sustenance of the Seynorynaelian soul, for it was the muse of young love.

"Was it so long ago that I once gazed up at the moon of Earth this way?" she thought to herself with a sigh. It had been aeons since then.

Time was passing, and the world was changing. The humanoids of Seynorynael had built their cities primarily in a small equatorial band called the weather-safe ring, located between a north and south line of equal distance from the equator, about two thousand Earth miles in either direction. Lake Firien was not safe. Located to the north just a few hundred miles outside the weather-safe ring, the area suffered from the severe winter storms, and the land was slightly colder even in the warm season, but the aurora seen from the Firien province were considered the most beautiful.

Because of the lyra.

Beautiful, eternal, and deadly poisonous to most of humankind...

Selerael looked across at the darkened lyra forest from the balcony. An eastern wind that had descended from the mountains slipped through their branches, sending an eerie call to the inhabitants of the Firien settlement once called S'enor-inn-ayel. As the wind swept towards the water, it passed over the balcony, where she felt its mordant chill.

Without warning, Selerael heard an entity calling to her, no more than a whisper. She lurched around, her heart racing.

...sssssssss..... There was no real sound, no audible word. The call was a chilling force itself, a horrible creeping cold that descended upon her like a shadow. This was nothing like the urgent voice of the computer named Ornenkai who had haunted her through youth, or the haunting, warning wind-whispers of the sentient lyra trees, whispering to the living like lost souls trapped on Seynorynael against their will. This was the cold chill of Death that was also Time, and she had heard it contact to her before.

She heard an echo of distant laughter.

"Yessss..." she felt its approval.

No, she told herself. I will not be moved by that power, not here, not yet...

The bone-chilling call did not oblige her protest by retreating or fading away.

Her fear caught her in the open as she realized she had heard this entity long ago on Earth. But, she had mistaken it for the voice of the computer Ornenkai. All along, it had been Time whispering to her! Time, like a creature, like an Entity, with a will of its own.

She turned to face it, expecting a shadow or a face, but the haunting chill stayed behind her no matter what direction she turned. It was enough to make any mortal skin crawl.

She knew what it wanted from her. It had a task which she could not refuse. Or could she? She was supposed to play her role in securing the destruction of all Enorian life at the end of the Seynorynaelian Empire... For though she was the guardian of Enorian life throughout its alotted time in existence, she was also the one destined to ensure its ultimate extinction. The living singularity of Enorian legend, a living force of anti-matter itself.

Creator and destroyer—

She felt a pang of horror. I have always been Time's creature. I have never been able to break free of my destiny—

The thought was horrifying. For so long she had thought she was only the child of Alessia Enassa Zadúchov, one of the last children of Enor, and Eiron Erlenkov.

But, there was another possibility: that she was not entirely a child of living matter at all. That she had been born of the infinite energy of Space and Time itself, from the kind of exotic matter that also formed black hole singularities, but born to seem human in form. If so, she was an energy being of the universe itself, and a power that would re-balance the universe.

The Enorian legends had long foretold that the guardian would appear to break the cycle of the Enorian interference, to make amends for the Enorian crossing into this universe, for their part in seeding the universe with the children of Enor who had been fated to die at the end of their own universe's collapse. Selerael, if the legends were true, was the One.

But how? And why? The unknown why was tearing at her. Would she ever know why? She had become more human through her upbringing long ago on the Earth. But now, she knew, knew it to her core, that she was rapidly changing into her own most true self. And it frightened her.

Crunch....

She hadn't noticed the footsteps behind her. Her son Adam suddenly appeared beside her, leaning his folded arms against the smooth wooden rail. She flinched, then turned to look at him; his expression was fixed stoically ahead to avoid her questioning gaze.

Meanwhile, that other haunting power had retreated; Selerael felt safe again and she thought she would like to have stayed there on the balcony, in Firien, in that moment. Forever.

But both she and Adam knew she was leaving. He had come to say one final good-bye, even though he had to admit he still wasn't ready for this moment, even though his logical mind told him he should have been prepared long ago.

Selerael wasn't ready to leave either, but that changed nothing. She could have stayed a few years longer, but she dared not live much longer among mortals as she was, lest she herself became responsible for tampering with their fate and destiny. In any case, Adam had his own new life to begin. He had just been married that evening.

Selerael knew she could not put the weight of her ultimate destiny on his shoulders. He was mortal, and deserved to know mortal happiness.

The silence stretched between them, but their unspoken feelings were clear to each other. They had known each other longer than an ordinary human lifetime.

"Good-bye, mother," Adam said at last. Then finally, Selerael embraced her son lightly, with a dissembled anguish she fought to master, but her eyes let down her guard; they couldn't stem the pain, and she clenched her jaw tightly to hold back a surge of feeling welling from the hollow in her body.

"I love you, son. I will miss you. Be well."

Adam was the last living link to her former life and the beloved dream of the bright, faraway Earth, the son who had unknowingly been the source of her courage when her own failed her, the son who embodied everything she had ever believed and everything she had hoped for the future, whose achievements she took more pride in than her own, whose happiness and vitality meant more to her than any comfort the world could offer her.

They pulled apart, looked at each other. Her face betrayed nothing.

Selerael finally turned away.

The wind should be howling, she thought, but it is just another calm summer evening.

Adam watched his mother leave for the last time; he watched, his face inured to emotion. He was happy to have married Falia, one of some Enorian colonists' daughters—but his heart felt heavy as his mother left.

He had never known a time without her. And though he was mortal, he had lived more than four hundred Earth years. Now, he felt alone for the first time.

The darkness of the night stretched around him. It seemed to be closing in. He reminded himself that he had to let her go and to live for her sake as well as his own. She had no more life of her own. She had her duty to fulfill. As time passed, he had noticed her changing, becoming less and less human, and more and more a creature, not without feeling, but harder and more remote, a sentinel tied less to life than to a single overriding duty.

Adam shuddered, as the trees rustled in the wind.

Meanwhile, Selerael put a deft hand on the rail and soundlessly leaped over it, then continued into the shadow of the forest, vanishing among the sylvan curtain of lyra trees. Adam watched her from the balcony where she had stood the moment before until she was out of sight. He knew that she would make only one more stop, to a small nearby cemetery where the oldest crew of an Earth spaceship had been laid to rest long ago. There, she would leave behind the memories of her human life behind.

Adam knew that he would never see his mother again.

Their halcyon days were almost at an end.

"We shall endure, until the universe ends and begins again..." she heard his words again, after so long. Her mind flitted through past and present.

Selerael sped away from the Firien settlement, fled madly from Time that always seemed fast on her heels.

She was heading East, away from Firien, hiking across the thick forests of the wild lands towards the southeastern cities when she abruptly turned slightly northward; why she did not know, though afterward, this unanswered question would continue to pursue her.

After several days of wandering, for all purposes in aimless turns, all at once she saw a curved disk protruding from a mountainside ahead, glints of sunlight sparkling off of the metallic alloys through the hillside. The side of the starship that had brought the Enorians to this planet S'eynorynael had been grown over by grassy turf, fallen soil, and trees that hid the ruin from the air to all but those who approached it on foot. It stretched almost half of a mile, a smooth earthen disk set among the jagged line of neighboring peaks.

Selerael almost dismissed this apparent mirage, remembering that in the legends of the Havens told by the local population at Firien the ancient place was believed to be a ruin, if it still existed. Many believed that the mythical place had never existed at all.

She stood staring in open-mouthed wonder at the Enorian flagship.

"Good Lord, I feel as though I have seen this place before...." She thought out loud. "As though all my life, I was searching for it..."

She could not stop herself from approaching it. This ship had crashed after emerging from the rotating white hole not far outside the solar system; this was the Enorian vessel whose engines had been lost and found again on board the spaceship Selesta. Impossibly. Selesta had brought her to this planet, just after that ship's own brief trip through the white hole, Kai-rek.

Suddenly the rocks to the right of her began falling down the cliff side. The roots of a small tree were ripped apart as the plates underneath moved apart, and a yawning entranceway appeared before her.

She jumped back. Why, why was the Enorian ship itself welcoming her?

Her curiosity demanded answers, but the force that had activated the ship had no way of answering her.

She went inside.

Despite the dark, Selerael could see inside the ship down a long corridor. As she entered, soft blue lighting illuminated the walls, where the swirling designs of blue alloys made her feel as though the ship had been submerged under water. After an hour wandering among the corridors, she felt that she was being guided towards a large circular chamber at the center of the ship. On the floor several open man-sized crystalline metallic-bottomed cylinders with tinted grey faces and swirling ornamental alloy designs had been arranged, spaced about three meters evenly apart, each on a raised dais. There was a small alcove on the far end of the room.

Selerael explored the vessel to learn the secrets that were still intact after the crash, to decipher the records of Enor she knew had been preserved within the alien vessel. Then on her way to the alcove, she saw that one of the coffins had not been opened.

Selerael approached slowly and stared at the face of the dead man preserved within. The sight of him struck a chord deep in her; she felt as though she were looking at herself.

He had been a tall man, a human, not unlike the Seynorynaelians in height, but his skin was not cloud-grey like the other true Enorians—he looked more like a colonizer, one of those who had brought life to the universe, but somewhat different from those she had known, for in the thin ray of her beacon, his silver hair reflected colors that varied as she turned her head to look at him in a different angle.

Was he dead? She wondered.

Her mind said yes; her bio-scanner read "no life signs". Yet her senses objected.

This was Zariqua Enassa himself—the last and greatest colonizer created by Enor—he could not be dead! The colonizers had escaped the death of Enor and come into this universe more than 17 billion years before. Long-lived yet mortal, all but a few remained on Seynorynael and throughout the galaxies.

She stepped back, feeling her skin crawl in unexplainable fear. The further she stepped away, the safer she felt.

Selerael took one last long look at him and turned back the way she had come. She decided to leave the Havens undisturbed. As Falia's father, a colonizer, had once said, the Enorian way of life and all traces of Enor must be left to fade into oblivion. And she would do all she could to ensure that that happened.

Before she left, she blasted the upper hillside with a concentrated beam of telekinetic power, letting the stones tumble down until nothing could be seen of the Enorian Havens. Before she left, she ran a battery of scanning tests and continued to blast the upper cliffs until she was positive there was no way of detecting that the ship existed.

Satisfied, she descended the hill and headed for the capital city of Ariyal-synai.
Appendix: on histories in the novel

On Troia, or Troy, Greece, and the Hittites:

Taroisa, Taruisa, Troisa, Taruiya, Homer's Troia—such were the names of Troy. Troy was an ancient city in the region called Wilusa, Ilios, or Ilion in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) long before it was sacked by the Achaians (Greeks) and made the subject of Homer's great epic, the Iliad. Troy was sacked many times (even once reputably by Herakles!) along with other coastal cities in Asia Minor; Troy was also frequently destroyed by earthquakes, later to be rebuilt.

Alaksandus of Wilusa/Alexandros of WiIios or Ilios may be the historical Paris of Troy, prince of Wilusa/Wilios. The land of Wilusa, called Wilios by Homer, was perhaps once a remote state of the Hittite Empire to which it was loyal (loyal to the Hittites rather than the Greeks probably because the Greeks had sacked Troy before), though Troy could have been an ancient, lost Greek colony rebuilt on an old site in Asia Minor which fell under Hittite influence. Or, most likely, Troy was a separate smaller kingdom loyal to the Hittites but caught between the two powers. (This latter hypothesis is the most likely to have been relevant, considering that there were many other smaller kingdoms of western Anatolia sandwiched between the two major political powers.)

After the fall of the Hittite Empire, the Hittites vanished almost entirely from history until the discovery of their ancient capital at Bogazkoy in Turkey in the nineteenth century. Until that time, only a few references of the Hittites in history bore testament to their existence, but even less was known about them or their culture. The mysterious Hittites were known mainly through references mentioned in the Bible (such as the wife of Esau and Bathsheba's husband) and Egyptian texts were found to mention them. But the Hittites ruled a vast Empire a thousand years before Alexander the Great swept through Turkey, before Moses led the Jews from Israel. The Hittite Empire called itself "Khatti", ruled from the capital Khattu-sas, rivaling even Egypt in greatness in its day; the two kingdoms were also united by royal marriages. The Hittite King Hattusilis III even called the Egyptian Pharaoh Rameses II "brother", according to the ancient tradition of High Kings to call each other "brother" and their subordinate kings "son".

Who were the Hittites? Some scholars claim they were a combined race of indigenous Semitic tribes who had been conquered and assimilated with groups of nomadic Indo-European tribes from the shores of the Caspian and Black Seas. The Hittites were certainly an Indo-European speaking group of people, as their Greek neighbors (Germanic, Greek, and Celtic grew from the Hittite branch of the Indo-European languages), and their empire stretched over much of modern-day Turkey and Lebanon; their civilization was possibly closely related to the ancient Minoan civilization of Crete (which gave us Minos and the legend of the Minotaur, similar to the Hittite bull cult).

Taruisa, or Taruiya, likely the Troy VI known to modern scholars, was a royal chief's citadel (perhaps of Paraimu and Aleksandus) and also likely Homer's Troia, which was probably destroyed around 1260 BC (some scholars place this later). The historian Georgiev even suggested that Aineias (Aeneas) and the surviving Trojans who fled Trusia, or Troy, made a brief stop in Northern Africa (Carthage) before journeying to Italy. He suggests that their descendants came to be known as E-trus-ci, the Etruscans who founded Rome. Herodotus claimed that Tyrrhenians (Tyrsenoi) settled central Italy (The sea west of Rome is called the Tyrrhenian Sea). Julius Caesar later claimed to have been descended from Aeneas, or Aineias, reputedly the son of Aphrodite who had fled Troy and stopped safely in Northern Africa (Carthage, the Phonenician or Tyrian "new city") before landing in central Italy.

On Greece, Hellas, Achaiwia:

Achaiwia, or Greece, was peopled by Achaiwoi in Homer's Iliad. The Mycenaen Greeks or Achaiwoi, a tribe of Hellenes (Greeks) from the legendary city Mycenae (in modern day Greece), were led by Agamemnon, High King of Hellas (Greece) and son of Atreus, who featured in Homer's Iliad. The Achaioi or Achaiwoi are known to us as Achaeans, Achaians, or Greeks. The Hittites called the lands of the Achaiwoi "Ahhiyawa", which we know from records of the Hittite Empire's Foreign Office; Paraimu, a Trojan that could be Homer's King Priam, also features in Hittite texts. The Hittites likely traded with or claimed Troy in the years before the fall of Troy VI.

Keftiu, also called Kaptara or Kaphtor, was the ancient name for the island of Crete, and was home to a civilization in full bloom before the modern Greek civilization rose; the Kaptaran culture is known to us as Minoan because of the mythic priest-king Minos, and their home of "the Green Sea" which of course is the Meditteranean (or specifically, the Aegean boundaries of it), was recorded by the Egyptians, with whom the Minoans traded. Shortly before the fall of Troy, the island was likely conquered by the Mycenaen Greeks. The Minoan language was lost, and the meaning of their pictographic alphabet and inscriptions remains unknown to this day. Some scholars find similarities between the Minoan civilization and the Khatti (Hittites) while others find affiliations to Semitic groups.

The "Pelasgoi" people of ancient Greece, or Hellas as it was known then, were perhaps from the city-state of Pylos, akin to Mycenae. They were the heroes of the Illiad and expert sailors, and may likely have fled after the "dark age" brought in by the invading, illiterate Dorian Greek highlanders from the moutainous fringes of Greece. Forced to flee their native land as the Doric Greeks swarmed over Hellas burning cities to the ground, the displaced Mycenaens and Pelasgoi could have taken to the water. Perhaps they then became a part of the piratic and warring "sea peoples" mentioned by Egyptian records in the years of upheaval following the fall of Troy and the fall of the entire Hittite Empire not much later. The Pelasgoi may have joined with other sea peoples such as the "Lukki" or Lykian (Hittites or Achaeans from Asia Minor) pirates of the Bible, which conjure parallels with later Viking raiders; some scholars even claim that the people of Denmark invaded the Hittite Empire at this time and perhaps became a part of the Phoenicians in Canaan. Some of the diverse "sea peoples" of that cataclysmic age might even have been the Etruscans (Trojans?) who founded Rome. Moreover, some of the Hellenes are also thought to have joined groups of Semitic tribes of Canaanites in modern Lebanon and taught them to master the sea. Together this new group likely formed the Phoenicians, also called Sidonians, Tyrians, and Phoinikes. The Phoenicians then ruled the seas as traders for nearly a thousand years (along with their colony Carthage); they, not the Greeks, invented our modern alphabet; aleph means "ox" in Phoenician, while bet means "house", early symbols from which these letters derive. The Phoenician alphabet made widespread education in dark age, illerate Greece possible and indirectly influenced the rise of modern Greek civilization.

It is also probable that the "Philistines" of the Bible (I Samuel ) who supposedly came from Kaphtor (Crete) are derived from the Greek Pelasgoi, such as we might deduce from descriptions in the Bible of the bronze, "Mycenaen" armor of Goliath who faces David. This would mean that the Pelasgoi were the people who gave their name, a Greek name, to "Palestine."

The Phoenician Carthginians (part Greek themselves) and Greeks later fought over colonies on Sicily and Sardinia; the Carthaginians were sometimes allied with the Etruscans and Latins who became Romans, until Rome destroyed Carthage in the Punic Wars, burying it utterly so that it would never rise again. From this destruction of Phoenician Carthage we derive the term "Punic" and the word "punish". The Carthaginians were punished and forgotten, the Eastern Phonecians having been destroyed by Alexander the Great. But one famous Carthaginian came afterward: Saint Augustine, author of "Confessions".

On Britain and India:

"Clas Myrddin" means "Myrddin's enclosure" and is an ancient name for Britain, the druids' "isle of the dead". It belonged to Iberians first, then also became the land of the ancient goidelic (Gaelic) speaking Indo-European Celts; some sources say Britain only became a complete island around 1800 BC. Myrddin was a solar deity worshipped at Stonehenge, built to read the position of the sun and moon. The name "Myrddin" bears no coincidental affinity to "Merlin".

The Celts, ruled by warrior kings and an intellectual caste of druids (a word which might mean "oak knowledge"), themselves lived across Europe by 1000BC and even moved into areas that are a part of modern-day Turkey; they were the Galatians of Asia Minor in the Bible, to whom Paul wrote his great epistle, and many Celtic colonies still lived under the Roman Empire; for example, the great "Roman" poet Virgil, who wrote the Aeneid, was only a small part Etruscan; he was in fact a Celt from Cisalpine Gaul.

I have taken liberties using the root "Vedas", which are the religious myth-hymns of the Indo-European Aryans who came to Hammaran India in 1500BC and from which modern Hinduism in part derives; I use "vedas" in conjuction with an abbreviation of the word "druid" or "oak" to recognize the similarity between the Vedas and ancient Celtic tales, no doubt the most ancient surviving legends once common to all the Indo-European peoples of Europe. ( An example of this can be seen in the Hindu god "Agni" or fire; the latin name is "igni" from which is derived "ignite".) The connection I make of "Diraovedas" between Celtic and Vedic culture reflects the fact that one culture believed in rebirth, the other in the transmigration of souls, but both ideas might have developed from similar shared religious beliefs, lost before recorded time.

On Egypt and Palestine:

Kemet, or Kemit–the ancient name of Egypt which meant "black land", a land rich and fertile that had sprung up around the ever-changing Nile River, which they called "iteru aa". Its people were the "remet en Kemet". Shu, Nut, Ptah, Horus, Anubis were among the ancient gods of Egypt. Egyptian blue faience, used in making valuable "paste" beads and to fashion ceramic animal sculptures in forms such as the hippo, were a commodity in the ancient world. Bronze was also a valuable commodity created from highly prized tin alloyed with copper (of which a good source was the isle of Alasiya or Alashiya, now called "Cyprus" after the copper for which it was famous).

At the same time, the secret of iron was for a long period a prized monopoly of the Hittites, whose secret was only dispersed when their Empire fell, shortly after the fall of Troy. The Hittites probably moved south to their remaining territories in the region of Syria (references to Hittites in Canaan occur in the Old Testament). Around this time, Moses of Egypt led away the "Aperu" or "Hapiru"–likely the Hebrew slaves of the Bible. The Hebrews, a nomadic, monotheistic, Semitic race returned to Canaan, where they mingled with their ancient polytheistic Canaanite brothers: the Sidonians, or Phoenicians who called themselves Canaanites.

This was the situation when the Hittites and Philistines, perhaps Trojan and Greek refugees, arrived from Syria, once a part of the Hittite Empire, to the north of Canaan, and from the sea. The Pelasgoi may have been the "Pelesh", a tribe of the Sea Peoples who attacked Egypt by land and by sea; thus the connection between "Pelasgoi", "Pelesh", "Philistine", all the same race by different names. The "Pelethites" in I Samuel are likely Pelasgoi (with some Luwian, or Hittite, connections) and the "Cherithites" are Kaptarans, and the "Denyen" or "Danuna" people of Khattti (a Greek-Hittite kingdom) may have become the Israelite tribe of Dan (whom the Bible mentions changed their religion to Judaism).

By 1050 BC David I, a shrewd Hebrew leader who had once been a mercenary for the Philistines, appeared as king over Israel. His son Solomon then contracted Phoenician builders to build a magnificent temple for the people of Israel, and the two peoples traded for several generations, until religious strife drove a wedge between the two races (which remains to this day between the people of Israel and Lebanon). Centuries after the reign of King David, around 700BC and after Israel fell internally and then to outside Assyrian conquerors, ten tribes of Israel were taken to the lands of the Assyrian King Sargon II, never to return. They became the lost Ten Tribes of Israel. The two tribes of Judah were later taken in exile to Babylon shortly afterward, where Nebuchadrezzar (Nabu-kudurri-usur) II reigned.

On Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, and Assyria:

The Sumerians called the land of Sumer (in modern-day Iraq) Kalam, Ki-engi or Kengir and themselves Un-sanni, and possibly Sag-giga or Uku. To the North, Ki-Uri, or Akkad, bordered Sumer, and in ancient times, their histories closely overlapped. Sumerian culture was mostly adopted by the Semitic Akkadian conquerors (though they were not actually conquerors in the traditional sense, as Akkadians and Sumerians had co-existed in the same lands for thousands of years). From this merging of Sumerian and Akkadian culture, which incidentally gave us Noah of the Bible (called Ziusudra and later Utnapishtim), the later mighty kingdom of Babylon and the feared Assyrian Empire grew. (Babylonian and Assyrian are both Akkadian languages; Assyria developed to the north of Akkadia and Sumer, while Babylonia eventually encompassed both Akkadia and Sumer, creating a new North-South division of two larger ethnically linked Akkadian kingdoms: Assyria and Babylonia).

Babylon, whose famous "hanging gardens" were one of the seven wonders of the ancient world was the home of Hammurapi, given credit for creating a famous code of laws, although he merely documented tradional Babylonian law already in practice. Babylon comes from the word "Bab-ilani" meaning "gate of the gods" and the older Akkadian form "Bab-ilim". In the Bible it is "Babel" and famous for the tower, a Sumerian ziggurat, but the meaning of the city's first name "Babil" is unknown. Babylon was sacked by Hittite invaders around 1595 BC, but for various reasons the invaders immediately left it (an epidemic being a factor); Babylon was then taken by a Sealand invader king. Babylon fell into a dark age for more than a century, until being captured by the mysterious invaders from the eastern mountains, the Kassites. Four centuries later Babylon was captured by the Assyrian Empire around 1225BC, shortly after the fall of Troy. It is likely that the Hittite King, Emperor Hattulsilas, and Pharoah Ramses II, who reigned at the time of Troy VI, were worried about the rising power of the ancient Assyrians (which soon swept like a tide over the ancient world, defeating Israel and even mighty Egypt within a few centuries); Hattusilias had his eastern border to worry about as well. Therefore, as Hittite Foreign Office records do indeed tell us, the Hittite emperor regarded his city-sacking Achaian (Greek) neighbors as equals, perhaps because, by ackowledging the Achaian Kings as equals (though he wouldn't have believed they were), the Hittite King Hattusilias hoped to keep a peace with them.

Incidentally, Eridu, Uruk, Nippur, Kish, Jarmo, Umma, and Ur did exist. It is in these cities that writing and the first real civilizations on Earth began.

The Sumerian religion spoke of a paradise between two rivers reflected in the Bible as the garden of Eden (Abraham, founder of the Israelites was from Ur, in Sumeria, which bordered the Chaldaen land.) Sumerian religion permeated the Akkadian culture that followed and its children, the Assyrian and Babylonian religions. The bull-cult of Baal may have originated in Sumer and Akkadia; it was transmitted to many kingdoms in the ancient world, including the Hittite Empire and Canaan. Through the Hittites, the "people of a thousand gods", Sumerian religion even influenced the religion of ancient Greece. "Ishtar" became "Astarte" in Phoenicia, and "Aphrodite" in Greece. "Baal-Adon" became "Adonis", and "Melqart" became Herakles, Cadmus of Phoenicia became a Greek legendary figure... (observations of this were made by Roman historians). The Hurrians (who lived in Mitanni, beside Assyria) gave the Hittites the legend of Kumarbi, father of the gods who was deposed and castrated by his own son; this became Kronos and Zeus in Greece; the Hurrians also transmitted religious ideas and tales to the Hebrews.

The Dark Age of 1200 BC:

For many reasons, a dark age fell over the Meditteranean world around 1200BC. The Hittite Empire fell (about 1180BC), possibly due to another sack of Troy (VII) and Achaian sea pirate raids against Anatolia, to internal political turmoil (the emperor was inexplicably betrayed by someone close to him) and by the final attack of Phyrgians and Gasgas from the North.

The Hittite Empire fell to invading Phyrgians and Gasgas. There was a mass exodus of Hellenic tribes from Greece and Hittites from Anatolia, which created vast numbers of wandering "sea peoples" and displaced tribes on land. Both of these factors led to what might be called "World War I of the ancient world". The Near East began to change hands among would-be emperors left, right, and center. From Rameses' records, we know that Skelesh (later Sicilians), Shardana (later Sardinians), Ekwesh (Achaians), Teresh (Trojans), Denyen (Danuna—Danaans? Tribe of Dan incorporated into Israel? (in Judges) Danes?), Tjeker (Teucri? Teucer? Likely Hittites), Lukka, (Lycians or Lydians, former Hittite kingdoms), Meshwesh (Mycenaens? Phyrgians?), Weshesh (Hitties from Wilios?), and other "Sea Peoples" formed a league with Libya in an attack on Egypt at one time or another, and that some later some of these groups joined Egypt against their former allies.

The Hittite Empire remained unknown to modern times but for fragmented passages in the Bible, its cities undiscovered until 1834, its forgotten texts untranslated until the First World War, more than thirty-two centuries after the Hittite texts were recorded.

During the dark age, Greece also forgot that it had once even been literate. Peasant Doric Greeks had swept the land, and the ancient palaces of Agamemmnon and his lesser kings were destroyed by fire, war, pirates, and still unknown catastrophes, turning many fleeing Greeks into wandering vagrants, traders, and pirates looking for new lands and treasures (as evidenced by their later appearance in Egypt and Palestine). Greek civilization as we know it didn't rise again until about the seventh century BC, with the borrowing of the Phoenician alphabet, the rise of Athens, democracy, and the polis. (Greek democracy is still reputed to be the first form of democracy, though the council of the Hittite Kings ten centuries earlier was very probably a democratic body.)

Most Greek heroes and myths still belong to the lost age of civilization before the fall of Troy.
Dramatis Personae and places in Star Gods:

Achaiwoi—a tribe on Kiel3, also called Ahhiyawans or Achaians (modern day Greeks)

Alessia Valeria Zadúmchov—Uh-LESS-ee-yuh Vuh-LAIR-ee-yuh Zuh-DOOM-chav—daughter of the last Enorian Zariqua Enassa and Nerena Naliya Zadúmchov; Hinev's assistant and the last survivor of Hinev's immortal explorers

Ariyalsynai—Ar-ri-YAL-sinn-eye–"white mountain" or "star mountain"; ancient capital of the planet Seynorynael

Broah Malier—BRO-uh Muhl-LEER—cultural historian; one of Hinev's explorers

Celekar Calain–SEL-i-kar (harder "s") Kal-LAIN–a taciturn technician, one of Hinev's explorers

Clas Myrddin—the idle of the dead, "Myrddin's enclosure"; a region on Kiel3 (Great Britain)

Derstan Ekeri–DERR-stun Ee-KAIR-ee–communications specialist; one of Hinev's explorers

Diraovedas–Dihr-oo-vay-duhss–chief seer of a nation that escaped the Great Isle, a blind priest, or druid, of the planet Kiel3

Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov–AIR-on VAI-kyure ER-lenn-kahv–a Tiasennian soldier and pilot

Enor–EE-nor–a legendary planet

Fynals Hinev–FAI-nahlss HAI-nev–the bio-geneticist who created the elixir of immortality known as "Hinev's serum"; one of Kudenka's explorers

Great Green—or, the "Green Sea" on Kiel3; (now called the Mediterranean Sea)

Goeur–Gerr, like the French "coeur"–a lost colony; also a planet

Ioka Shiyer–EYE-oh-kuh SHEE-yer–one of Hinev's explorers

Fielikor Kiel–Fee-YEL-ee-kor Keel–chief engineer of The Firien Project; later the leader of Hinev's explorers

Firien—a city and region on Seynorynael surrounding Lake Firien; north of the weather-safe ring

Kaptara—also called Keftiu; an island (now called Crete)

Kemet—"the black land" of the river Iteru aa on Kiel3; (now called Egypt)

Khatti—an empire on Kiel3; (now called the Hittite Empire); also refers to the region of Khatti (lands in modern Turkey)

Ki-engi—a region on Kiel3 (Sumer)

Ki-uri—a region on Kiel3 (Akkadia)

Kudenka–Koo-DEN-kuh–scientist who led Kudenka's explorers

Lake Firien–Lake FEAR-ee-enn–large body of water on planet Seynorynael and the name of a remote province; Alessia's childhood home and location of The Firien Project, a project to rebuild an ancient ruined spaceship that the ancients called "Selesta"

Lierva Kazankov–Lee-AIR-vuh KA-zan-kov–commanding officer of The Firien Project; later one of Hinev's explorers

lyra–LEER-uh–the beautiful, mysteriously undying trees of Seynorynael; a formerly abundant, seeded, but now fruitless tree that can no longer be replaced once destroyed

Marankeil–MAIR-enn-KEE-il–the mechanized Elder who became the eternal Emperor of Seynorynael

Enlil–Mai-LENN-var–the Orian space battleship designed after Selesta

Nerena–Ner-EE-nuh–Alessia's mother, daughter of Grand Marshall Zadúmchov

Nippur—city-state on Kiel3

Onracey–Ahn-RASS-ee–one of Hinev's explorers

Orian—OR-eye-an—second planet of the Celestian worlds, whose leader is Sargon

Ornenkai–OR-nen-kai–Elder of the Federation, later Vice-Emperor of the Seynorynaelian Empire

Rega–REE-guh–white star of the Ayan worlds, Tiasenne and Meilarr

Rikhsehr Gerryls–RICK-zair GAIR-rilss–a botanist, a part of The Firien Project and one of Hinev's explorers

Sargon—leader of the Orian people

Selerael–Sel-AIR-ay-el (softer "s")–daughter of Alessia and Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov raised on Kiel3, or Earth

Sesylendae–Ses-ILL-enn-day–explorer spaceship of Kudenka's explorers

Seynorynael–Say-NOR-i-NAY-el; originally Seh-nor-i-NAY-el–a planet which formed an intergalactic Federation that became an Empire

Selesta–Sye-lerr-ESS-tee-uh–the greatest explorer spaceship ever to be built by the Seynorynaelian Empire, with a computer that seems to have a mind of its own; the spaceship of Hinev's explorers

Sharru-kinu–Sharr-oo-kee-noo–an ancient Earth king of the land of Ki-Uri (or Akkadia) who conquered the land between the two rivers; the first emporer of the known world; possibly the son of an Enorian

Taruisa—Troia, Taruisha, now called "Troy"; a city-state in the Khatti Empire on Kiel3

Tiasenne–Tee-uh-SENN–first planet of the two Celestian worlds

Tulor–Too-LORR–one of the first two planets to join the Seynorynaelian Federation

Ur and Uruk—"Ur" and "Erech" in the Bible; city-states in Ki-engi (known to us as "Shimar" or "Sumer")

Valeria–Vuh-LAIR-ee-uh–blue-white star of the planet Tiasenne

Zariqua Enassa–ZAIR-ee-kuh or ZAR-ee-kuh Ee-NASS-suh–last colonizer of the planet Enor

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