by P R Glazier
Chapter 8. The City of the Ancient Fathers
Serinae had left the Halls of Truth. She now walked along the streets of the city. At least she liked to think of the place as a city of sorts. She strode once more through the thoroughfares of At’Lan’T’Ys as she had done many times before. She had discovered the name of this place when she had first arrived for the T’Iea word At’Lan’T’Ys appeared upon all the books, and other things belonging to this city. At’Lan’T’Ys, meant many things depending on the context of the sentence – learning or understanding, but here she took it to mean ‘truth’ or ‘enlightenment’. She had certainly been enlightened here, but at the same time alienated, for she knew this to be place of isolation for no roads or rivers ran into the city from any lands beyond, no well-worn route carrying travelers and merchants hither and thither as you normally might find in a thriving city. This was a city alone, without any country or dominions, no traveler came here. She was the only visitor, quite why she should hold that special status she was still not quite sure of.
But someone had lived here, many people in fact, for just as you would expect with any city many buildings stood either side of the streets. They were all uniform white, most just a single story tall. Quite utilitarian for they looked functional, without much artistic embellishment to her T’Iea eyes. But she also knew that beyond this section lay another area where the houses were of distinctly T’Iea design. She still found it hard to believe that her ancestors lived and worked in this place. But how? Why? That information remained allusive.
She had been into many of these buildings all over the city, exploring each to see what may be within. All of them were empty as if the inhabitants had fled, no, not fled for everything was gone, all personal effects including furniture and other chattels, so it must have been a planned abandonment over a period of time.
As she walked she thought about immediate surroundings. The architect of this part of the city had tried to make the place look homely, but at the same time had left out all the added trimmings and extras that you would expect to find derived from the culture that once lived here. No statues celebrating past events, not a single flower or tree to brighten the space or to remind her of her own culture. She knew this because she had walked the length and breadth of the city. She knew that the city was bound on all sides by a transparent wall of crystal, or perhaps it was glass, it sloped up and over the place. From what she could see looking over the edge, this wall also extended below. The city seemed to be enclosed within a vast transparent sphere. Nothing could be seen the other side of the glass, whatever lay there lay in complete darkness. Occasionally if she watched for long enough she glimpsed flashes of light, far off in the distance, they looked like bolts of lightning snaking across the sky many miles away. It was as if a violent electric storm raged across the vastness of some ocean, or across the other side of a great plain, but no clap of thunder or anything other sound could be heard through the thick transparent wall. Sometimes if she was looking in the right direction she could make out things illuminated in the brief flashes, vast things out there beyond her glass bubble. What these were she didn’t know, they were only illuminated for a brief fraction of a second. She felt glad though that she was protected from whatever vastness lay beyond the glass, for she imagined it as some enormous brooding, incomprehensible presence.
When she had first arrived, she had been in abject wonder at the place. But now that initial awe had waned somewhat over the years. Was it years? She did not know, but then time has little relevance to the T’Iea. She wondered as she walked if a similar period had passed outside, beyond this place, back in the world of men, the world from which she had come. It was all so deceptive, being cocooned within this city, remote from everywhere else. This time however, as she walked, she felt a pang of regret that she would, if all went well, be leaving this place. Leaving At’Lan’T’Ys, the city of the ancient fathers, the place that had after their invitation become her home.
Yes, she had been invited here, although she did not know it at first. Naively perhaps she had thought all those long years ago that she was going to a more spiritual place, maybe even into the halls of Eny’Nin’Rel himself, seeking respite and rest from a life of turmoil. But now she understood that particular dream to have been too much to hope for. At’Lan’T’Ys was plainly not the house of Eny’Nin’Rel. To reach those halls another type of journey would have to be made, a more fateful journey in all senses of the word.
But she had not died; she was still very much alive. It was true though, this place was so easy to live in, so un-demanding of her, here she could live in solitude and grow lazy without a care or a single stressful thought. No one asked anything of her, no masters demanded her duty, no threat loomed, nothing tried to injure or harass her and she didn’t have to fight or raise the slightest hint of anger against anyone, well almost, for she had to admit to having shown frustration at times. The city looked after her every need, maintained her, ensured her very survival. Yet it also controlled her, or at least controlled what she could and could not do.
She knew this place belonged to the ancient fathers, well what was left of them. She wanted to know what relationship her people had with them but that knowledge also seemed to be beyond her discovery. The ancient fathers called themselves the first born, the first of Eny’Nin’Rel’s created beings. She didn’t argue this fact, it may have been true for all she knew. It did not matter. What did matter was the advanced knowledge freely available to her within this place. That knowledge and teaching was of far greater value than anything else she had ever known. She thanked Eny’Nin’Rel, the Maker, that she had gained a rudimentary understanding of the written language of the ancient fathers whilst living in Solin’s house in Amentura, for that knowledge had helped her greatly.
Some of the concepts of that knowledge were far beyond her comprehension, for even though she could translate the texts she did not possess the necessary background knowledge, the necessary education to enable her to grasp many of the concepts that were written there. She would perhaps never understand it, unless perhaps she did one day pass into the halls of Eny’Nin’Rel where all knowledge would be made available, all questions answered and all suspicions and doubts be reduced to naught. For there and only there, would all of his beloved children realise the enlightenment of true knowledge and be made like him, like Eny’Nin’Rel himself.
But the main thing was that this place and the knowledge it held opened another opportunity for her. She had found a way to save them, to save them all. She hoped she could do it, save her race and reunite them. For that would be a worthy use of the ancient father’s legacy. She was almost ready, a bit more understanding a bit more knowledge and she was sure that her plan would work.
She chuckled to herself thinking how Solin would have loved to have had the opportunity to come here, Serinae’s academic friend would have reveled in this place. Serinae looked around her at the great city as she walked. There were faster ways to get around the place, a matrix of portals that gave instantaneous travel, but she preferred to walk. Walking allowed her to wonder at the place she was in and to think. This must have once been a bustling place; it was a beacon to the learning and capability of the ancient fathers, a window into their world.
Many must have lived here at one time, many thousands she supposed, but where had they all gone? What had happened to them? Her people now lived in the world of men, why didn’t the ancient fathers also come to do the same. Perhaps they were all dead, perhaps their demise was the reason that her people abandoned this place. The ancient fathers culture was quite obviously, well ancient. In the many millions of years it had taken to develop, it had reached dizzying heights of perfection. Yet for all their knowledge and understanding, for all their discoveries, nothing had saved them in the end. Perhaps they had succumbed to the mundane, played out the disastrous results of their mistakes and paid the ultimate price. Why did they abandon this place, leave it to their ghosts as men would call
them. Yet their technology and purpose lived on and they lived on through it. Their great technologies kept their race alive, but only as memories, as captive recordings of individuals. Yes the machinery could make choices, even deliver its intellectual thoughts and decisions through its projected images, but for all its wonder and unimaginable power of memory it could do nothing more. It was missing one small but incredibly important component, the spark of life. It existed, but it had never lived.
As she walked Serinae's mind went back over what she had read in the library in the Hall of Truths, one of the first things she had read once she had arrived here from the machine hall all those years ago. The ancient fathers had the knowledge to travel anywhere in the galaxy using such places as this, for this place was in fact an enormous machine, one designed to traverse great distances across the outer voids. It was nothing for this great machine to travel between the stars themselves, that was why Serinae thought of it as a Star Ship. This was one of the things she had at first found difficult to understand, the concept of distance and time was confusing to say the least. The distances between even the nearest solar neighbors was vast and the time to travel between them the equivalent of many lifetimes of even her people the T’Iea. But the ancient fathers had found out how to compress both time and space somehow. Her friend and appointed guide, the one called Melinè had persevered with her in these teachings, Serinae had tried to understand, but now she found that if she just accepted certain things, she could also accept that such things were possible. But then Serinae had always been good at faith.
Melinè had shown her how the ancient fathers had created a matrix of mapping beacons clear across the galaxy. The great machine that she and Minervar and their companions of old had made right again was but one of many thousands, millions maybe that spanned across the outer voids of the galaxy and beyond. The great machine had no name but an identifier, a number, AE45vbED56/203456, the unilateral code that it was known by. Melinè had tried to explain the significance of the coding system, but Serinae had stopped her quickly for it was complex and beyond her understanding and also had no real relevance to what Serinae needed to know. But that was half the problem of learning here, it had taken a long time for Serinae to get used to the willingness of the ancient fathers to divulge certain aspects of their knowledge and sometimes she had to be darn right rude just to get them to stop and try to maneuver them back upon the right track, answering the questions that she wanted answers to. But some of her questions like what had happened to the ancient fathers she could not get an answer to. However often she asked they would not give her a response, just like when she was about to overstep the mark whilst talking to Nar’Allia. Some secrets it seemed were destined to remain secret.
Some of these great works of technology had been built long before many of the solar systems had produced a void ball capable of sustaining life. The ancient fathers had come from beyond the galaxy, from somewhere way beyond in the infinite space that comprised the greater universe. The matrix of machines they had built enabled them to travel relatively quickly from one part of the galaxy to another. They did this in these great flying craft, great Star Ships. Vessels that held whole city sized communities of peoples. Places like this one where Serinae now found herself. Serinae still had some difficulty thinking of this place as a vast craft, a ship for sailing across the vast areas of the outer voids. Serinae had not believed it at first, her mind found it difficult to comprehend. But the longer she was here, the more she read and discovered, all this only went to prove that this place was truly a vast Interstellar Star Ship. Her bubble of At’Lan’T’Ys, this city, large as it was, was but a small part of the overall Star Ship. Exactly where At’Lan’T’Ys was within the Star Ship and what it once did was lost to her, she did not like to think about the rest of the vastness contained without, or was it within?
She remembered the book she read that gave her the final piece of the puzzle. From this book she had learned that before the matrix of navigational beacon machines had been created, travel was much slower. Much more arduous. Somehow the ancient fathers had learnt that the great force, the common energy in the universe could be harnessed, or at least borrowed in some way to facilitate travel across great distances. Serinae did not fully understand the complex science of physics that governed this force, neither did she fully understand how it was harnessed and made to work in the way that the ancient fathers used it. But this did not frustrate her, for all she needed to understand was that this great force, the force of gravity was the key, it held everything together, it joined everything together. It was the tiny, almost immeasurably small force that resided within and affected everything. Yet where it was but a miniscule energy within small things, when associated with large objects it became a powerful indestructible almost terrifying force. Gravity was limitless, nothing could generate it, nothing could destroy it, it was just there, present in just about everything in one form or another. A force, a source of energy, perhaps from the Maker himself, possibly the spark, the very essence of the beginning of time and space. Her people the T’Iea called gravity the Arcane. They had a natural affinity with it, they could sense it and use it. Transform it into different types of energy. They could tap into its flow and bend it, direct it to their will.
But the ancient fathers had taken knowledge of the arcane to giddy heights. They had discovered the innermost secrets of gravity. They discovered how to really harness and use it. She now understood that if you were able to take a massive, immeasurably large object, in affect a massively abundant source of gravity and you were somehow able to compress that object into a much smaller space, then the original effective quantity of gravity remained as did the mass of the object even though it was now an infinitesimally small fraction of its original physical size. But the compression also focused the gravity, amplified it dramatically until it became an overwhelming concentrated force, a universe destroying, time stopping, time bending, irresistible source of energy. But in this state it also effectively changed the very fabric of the universe, bent both time and distance, joined places together, made faraway places accessible, made it possible to travel great distances in the blink of an eye.
To do this a special kind of physics was required, one that enabled the compression of such objects through linking the available space taken up by an object to another place in another time and space effectively creating a tunnel or a bridge between the two places. The links could be made using the navigational machines and travel was revolutionised. The scary part was that you needed a massively large force to contain the compressed energy which was potentially now in a very dangerous state with enough destructive power to destroy a solar system. She knew this because she had read about the gigantic engines that the ancient fathers built to contain these energies, they referred to them as ‘Containment Field Generators’. That was one of the reasons these Star Ships were so large, they had to be, just to house these vast engines that contained the vastly compressed gravitational energies contained within them. The Dark Core is what the ancient fathers called these gravitational particles suspended in a contained and controllable state. The Dark Core was so strong, even light could not escape their infinite gravitational attraction and as such they reflected nothing, so appeared totally invisible. As such they would appear black, completely and utterly devoid of any light or anything else should you be able to actually see them.
She thought about these phenomena, the things the ancient fathers termed the Dark Core. She knew now that each Dark Core comprised of many trillions upon billions of tons of the same refined material as that of the keepers portal stones, the key stones they used as transportation devices. Only the ancient fathers somehow further compressed the material to a trillion-trillionth fraction of its original size but still maintained the original mass and therefore the same original amount of gravitational energy, the arcane energy. This immense concentration of energy was at the heart of their ability to travel the vast distances across time and the grea
t outer void. It had the ability to bend the very nature of space and time. Not just ‘real’ space and ‘real’ time but also to bend them sufficiently in such a way so that they contacted with other dimensional space and time creating doorways or portals through which the great Star Ships could traverse. All the ancient fathers then needed was the knowledge and skill to channel that energy, control it and bend it to their will and requirement, once they also knew that the correct pathway had been established to where they desired to go. Hence the beacons.
To her utter surprise she had eventually discovered that is where the race of the T’Iea came in. She now knew that the ancient fathers had long since adapted the Dark Core and used it to power everything. The T’Iea had named it the D’Arcane’Juuone or ‘the power within’. For out of all of them, her race, the T’Iea, understood the arcane, the raw power itself, and how to utilise its raw energy. She knew her race had this ability to bend the arcane to their will, but her experience was confined to more everyday applications, she never imagined the T’Iea would be able to do it on such a large scale, a scale required by the ancient fathers. She was proud that her race had this knowledge, yet she was also saddened that they had also learned how to misuse it.
Once the matrix of beacon machines had started to be built the ancient fathers utilised the ever expanding network for travel. They allied with another race, the race of the Keepers. The Keepers had a skill that no others possessed. They adjust time to their will. They could stretch or shrink these outer-worldly dimensions upon a whim. So as long as they could detect a beacon as a target, detect the presence of one of the great navigating machines via its unique code, a keeper on board one of the massive Interstellar Star Ships could adjust the time/distance and at the same time navigate to that destination. In conjunction with the T’Iea ability to manage the immense arcane power of the Dark Core, a journey that would have taken many thousands of years across the far reaches of the outer voids could now be made in just a few years or even months, depending on the skill of the those on board and the distance to the destination. The only governing factor was the stamina of the Keeper himself, for the concentration required to undertake such travel was taxing and if that concentration were broken it could render the great Star Ship forever lost in time and space.
She shivered, for once she had seen in a manual projected in the library a diagram of a Keeper controlling a Star Ship in this way. She had been shocked for the keeper seemed to be enclosed bodily in a cocoon of machinery, cables and pipes seemed to connect everywhere, even his face was obscured by a mask of wires and connections. His eyes covered, tubes seemed to enter his body through his nose and mouth, his arms and legs locked in restraining devices. They had devised a way of feeding the keeper and keeping him alive, when without such artificial means he would have died of exhaustion after a couple of days. The keeper, once cocooned in such a way was raised high reclining in a chair of sorts within a massive sphere that floated without any visible support. The sphere also seemed to contain within it a model of the solar system. All of this was contained within a great void, a cavern like space at the very heart of the star ship. Serinae couldn’t help wonder at all this, the unbelievable technology, the role they all had once played.
Serinae suspected the T’Iea and the other elder races had allied with the ancient fathers long ago, to use their skills and knowledge, in a way that the ancient fathers could not. That was the turning point in the ancient fathers journeying, the key knowledge that the combined elder races possessed was what they needed. The ancient fathers knew the sciences involved, understood the theory, the complex mathematics, yet they did not know how to design, build and control the great navigational machines they needed to make their travels a reality. They did not know how to navigate the universe in time and space, and they did not know how to map the universe, how to return to places they had visited already.
But by allying with those who had the necessary abilities to understand these things they managed to do it. So as soon as these alliances were made many ages in the ancient past, travel across the vast outer voids really started to happen. She suspected that all of them, all the elder races had their part to play back in the past in a time forgotten and now lost to them.
Serinae thought back to a moment long in the past when they had faced Gruntuk the Ognod leader and he had goaded them in his arrogance. What was it he had said about the elder races? He told of the T’Iea, he likened them to entertainers; he made a mockery of their art their culture. Then he had likened the Pnook to the colony of a termite mound for they worked and worked without need for rest. The Grûndén he chastised as miners forever seeking the riches below ground. Serinae remembered the contempt she felt that lay within these words, the anger that broiled within her at the slur on her race. She also remembered how she had to swallow her anger for they needed the ognod’s, they could not afford to alienate them further. She sighed, how she didn’t realise it then but Gruntuk was right! At least partially. They all had traits unique to their race, but where Gruntuk made fun of these differences, at one time their uniqueness’s had been key.
She had a lot of time to think here and she had come up with a theory. The T’Iea could certainly use the arcane energy in their entertainment, but they out of all the races understood and could use arcane energy in many ways, bend it, form it, change it, adapt it. The Pnook, certainly they did work, they were the technicians the workers, the builders of the machines, for that is what they did best. As for the Grûndén, they were miners in deed, for the raw materials used in the making of the machines came from the ground, even the black shiny mineral that was used to form the Dark Core. Serinae found herself wondering how many other worlds had been mined by the Grûndén to satisfy the great demand of the ancient fathers. She wondered if that was the reason that the ancient fathers had first come to the world of men.
Then there were the ognod’s, the operators, they knew how to use the machines, how to adjust them, how to operate them to their best advantage. They were the crew and the captains of the great ships that traversed across the outer voids. The Ognods had the necessary strength of makeup to be able to withstand the intense pressures and forces involved. Serinae suspected that she now knew that this was why the T’Iea’Neat’Thegoran had made their alliance with the ognod’s. It had been easy for them to play on the ognod’s natural arrogances. For the ognod’s had thought themselves above the other races, for as operators they took the direct requests from the ancient fathers themselves. So the T’Iea’Neat’Thegoran had seeded the thoughts in the ognod’s minds, seeded thoughts of domination, for after all weren’t the ognod’s superior in status, they should rule over the other races should they not? So following the demise of the ancient fathers, following their perceived abandonment, it had begun, the decay, the slow dark regression. Perhaps it could have been reversed, fixed there and then, but the ancient fathers were now all gone, or perhaps they left never to return. They had not come to make peace within the races. As a result the seeded dark thoughts had grown unabated.
The only thing that Serinae still didn’t know was the true nature, the true identity of the ancient fathers themselves. For although varying depictions of the other races abounded in the library of At’Lan’T’Ys, especially in the medical records and anatomical schematics, strangely no record of any kind seemed to ever have been made of the ancient fathers, they remained a mystery.
So it was that this city, the now abandoned city of At’Lan’T’Ys, now belonged to Serinae. She found she was in fact alone, at least in a biological sense. The original population of the ancient fathers that had originally lived here were now but ghostly visages generated by the hidden and mysterious technology that controlled this place. She smiled as she thought to herself, she now knew they were the spirits that she had sort, had wondered at through her life, the R’Alacry Fer’Def as the T’Iea knew them, the T’Iea and herself had completely misunderstood exactly what they were.
Perhaps the
most surprising thing of all was that these alliances between the elder races had been going on for many millions, perhaps billions of years. Serinae had been shocked at the prospect that the T’Iea and the other elder races may be thousands upon thousands of millions of years old. She couldn’t help thinking if that was truly the case then somewhere, probably in many places out there in the massive void her race also lived. Each separate civilisation perhaps completely ignorant of one another, thinking they were the only ones.
So maybe that was it then. The root cause of all the problems. The ancient fathers had disappeared; the elder races were left alone. Without the ancient fathers, they had grown apart, looked inward to their own selfish cause and desires. Yet deep down they were the same, they needed to work together once again. That was proved when they fixed the great beacon machine once before. But ultimately, even together, they could not hope to be entirely successful. There is only one being capable of taking on that kingly responsibility, no other could hope to claim that title for no other could possibly have the intellect of the Maker, of Eny’Nin’Rel himself. It was inevitable that any who tried would not succeed, how could they? For only the Maker can hope to manage his own creation. For he alone lived both within and without, he alone created time but existed outside its affect. He alone is able to stand in a place that was beyond the concept of his artistry and is truly able to see the entirety of that which he created.
Serinae stopped walking suddenly, she looked up. She had arrived at the Great Hall, the vast space that lay at the dead centre of the city. It was the only building that was higher than a few floors. There in front of her lay a building so vast she could not see the extremities of it. To the left and right and up above her this edifice seemed to disappear into the far distances without end.
It was to try and return, travel back. Somehow get to the great machine, the beacon of the ancient fathers. That was her purpose, the reason she now went into this vast building in the centre of the city. Physically the great machine was not here, but she hoped that access to it could be gained from here. For in the lower levels of this building, many kilometres below this entrance level she was now convinced some kind of pathway, a Rift connection to the machine existed, part of the Rift highway as she liked to call it. Well at least she understood it to be a connection, an arcane controlled conduit, a link between the city and the great machine. She had used that connection once, when she was invited here. Yet the fact that Minervar had fallen into the Rift and had not joined her here in At’Lan’T’Ys also suggested that it also led elsewhere, perhaps to many places. Serinae was pretty sure where the Rift highway would lead, but she couldn’t help feel a little anxiety when faced with what she knew she must try. She looked behind her once more at the city. She knew deep down she would not miss it, for all its historical knowledge, many wonders and great comforts, it remained to her an alien place. Serinae pursed her lips, turned and entered through the portico into the Great Hall beyond.
Melinè was there as usual waiting just inside the doorway. Serinae had wondered so many times how she knew that she was coming. Or perhaps she just stood there, like a doorman, just waiting for the next time that Serinae approached. But deep down she supposed that it was the great hidden technology that had control over all this, perhaps it could detect her every movement, knew exactly where she was and could spy on her at any time, a thought she felt uncomfortable to entertain. Serinae smiled, Melinè smiled back. She looked very like the character that talked to them in Solin’s house in Amentura, the human-like character called Venetra, but then why not, both women were generated images, figments of an artificial technological mind.
Serinae did not hesitate. She strode through the great entrance hall of the building; she looked to either side as the internal walls seemed to disappear into the distance all the while slightly curving around giving the impression that although vast, the building was circular. She didn’t want to look up, it gave her a horrid feeling in the pit of her stomach. For she knew she would see no ceiling. Just like the walls to the left and right, the wall above just seemed to curve away into infinity. She shivered as she continued across the hall. Her feet echoed slightly on the marble stone floor. Melinè followed silently a few steps behind. Serinae was never sure of Melinè’s role, was it as guide? As protector, as friend. Or was it as guard, or controller? Serinae had read about connections between various functions of the Star Ship, these were known as ‘interfaces’ so perhaps Melinè provided the interface between Serinae and the Star Ship. Melinè was always happy to answer any questions that Serinae asked, happy to lead her anywhere within the city and within this building, show her where answers to all her questions could be found. But she never offered anything unprompted. This is what Serinae found most uncomfortable about the whole place. The first months of being here, Serinae had realised that she had to learn how to ask the right questions before she had a hope of getting the right answers. It was a taxing time, a steep learning curve. A time when perhaps she thought many times of giving up. Yet she had persevered and now, at last, she was ready.
Serinae headed for a large archway across the other side of this space. She felt a little more comfortable for beyond there where smaller, more comfortable spaces. She wove her way through the corridors, past rooms without any doors that held various things, most beyond all imagination as to function and use. Eventually she could see in front of her another arch similar to the one she had passed beneath to get to this area of the building. She stopped before it and took in a deep breath, for she knew what lay beyond, something that gave her great discomfort. But she set her eyes to the front and walked through.
She could never get used to the vast open spaces in the Star Ship, they reminded her of its overwhelming size. Now before her another great void, once again seemingly limitless in size, at least she had never been able to see any physical boundary once inside, even the wall through which the archway allowed her access seemed to diminish from view once she stood in this great space. It was obvious that somehow the physical limitations of the world, the natural laws governing dimension that she understood did not necessarily apply here. For she was in a vast space that seemed larger than the actual physical confines of the building that appeared to house it. The only thing that gave any reference point within this area was the long causeway that extended out over the void in front of her. She remembered the picture, the diagram of the Keeper imprisoned perhaps in the control seat of the Interstellar Star Ship, connected to the vast vessel in both a physical and biological sense. Such a control seat she knew lay there in front of her now, at the very centre of this void, at the end of the causeway that extended forwards away from where she stood. The place of the Keeper navigator. She knew it hung there high up within this massive space; nothing seemed to support it yet it was there, stationary and unmoving. When she first came into this place and was able to walk into it without feeling physically sick with dizziness she had asked Melinè what it was. She had been told that it was the place of the Helmsman. But now as she walked out across the causeway over the bottomless void she knew that the great orb that was made for the Helmsman was empty, all the tubes and fowl looking technology was swung back out of the way as if the Keeper had gone out for a few minutes for a rest perhaps. Or perhaps escaped.
Serinae remembered once again the difficulty she had in understanding, realizing, that this place, this city, was in fact deep within one of the giant interstellar star ships of the ancient fathers. This massive city that even for its size could at least be thought of as finite in its boundary and understandable in terms of its tangible reality. But what lay beyond? What made up the remainder of this gigantically vast construction? She was glad she could not see it, glad that this outer space was hidden from her eyes beyond the glass wall, kept hidden within the blanketing darkness beyond. Yet the star ship was silent, waiting perhaps, in an eternal sleep, for someone to come and use it once more. Waiting for the return of the Helmsman perhaps.
Se
rinae walked out onto the long causeway across the void. As she walked she thought that somewhere within this vast star ship must be that thing, that unimaginable freak of science, the tiny, universe-crushing Dark Core itself. Not much had frightened her in the world, she was trained to address her fears and to concentrate on overcoming whatever it was that may cause her to fear. But this thing, this Dark Core, this had all the makings of something else, something that really played upon her mind. The limitless energy it contained, the overwhelming threat it posed, or could pose. She thought perhaps it was so powerful it may be beyond even the Maker himself to control.
She stopped. Sudden realisation had dawned upon her. That was it! That was really it, what she really feared! The fear that there may be something so strong, so terrible it may pose a threat to even he who created the world. But surely he also created the laws of physics that it must ultimately obey. Perhaps it was indeed the most powerful thing in the universe next to Eny’Nin’Rel himself. That thought itself frightened her to the very core. She shivered. All that terrifying limitless energy brooding unseen ready to be tapped into and used. Captive only because of the great engines that were designed to keep it confined, benign, waiting for its master’s command and yet still remained immeasurably powerful. Power beyond belief or comprehension, power beyond any futile thought that she could muster. This is what she didn’t like about being here, she couldn’t rid herself of the feeling of discomfort, she still didn’t have the words or the terminology big enough to even start to describe the shear immensity of this place both in a physical sense and in another vaster dimension. No words of Serinae’s could describe what this actually was, she couldn’t explain it, it had a terrible unexplainable presence, she could just feel its vastness, its …… overpowering being-ness. It made her skin crawl.
But time seemed to stand still in this place; Serinae felt it was many years ago that she had stepped from the portal into this vast void. She remembered that at first she had just thought she had gone around in a circle. Serinae understood that she had spent much time here, learning, reading, asking, talking. Yet now when she stood within this place it was if she had only just arrived.
She felt another behind her. This was not the ever present aura of Melinè, but another, many others in fact had joined with Melinè. The ancient father’s spirits had the knack of just appearing, no footsteps announced their arrival. She smiled, it was the same when she had experienced seeing them in the world. Serinae leant upon the rail that bordered the wide walkway and stared down at the dark boiling oily mass below her, sometimes in what looked like a sequence, but most times as a random pattern. She had seen something similar before, it was the swirling mist-like substance within the glass cylinder of the seeing stone, she also knew it looked identical to the wide rend in the world that the eastern men called the Rift. She took a deep breath and turned to those that had gathered behind her. She bowed, expressed her thanks and finally said goodbye. She walked out further upon the causeway that spanned the enormous space; she continued to walk towards the vast globe that in the distance awaited the Helmsman. When she reached the end of the causeway, without stopping she walked out and over the edge.
To her surprise she did not fall, at least she didn’t have the sensation of falling. After the briefest period where her consciousness seemed to waiver she looked around and found she was back on the causeway that spanned out over the Rift. She tried once again, but the same thing happened. She stood confused, what had just happened, what had stopped her falling into the Rift?
Serinae sat upon the warm slightly vibrating floor of the causeway. She was sure she had persuaded the ancient fathers to allow her to return to the world she knew; at least she hoped this was the case. She felt a little guilty, she had lost her temper with them, something she did not do lightly. But they were so embroiled with their own laws, their own fears that they needed to hear some things that perhaps she should not have said. But was it the ancient fathers she was venting her rage at, or was it the intelligence that lay hidden somewhere in the vastness of the star ship, brooding somewhere beyond in the darkness. She sighed, she had accused the ancient fathers of dabbling in the affairs of others, she had shouted her accusations, their perceived guilt flared in her eyes, hadn’t it? She had hurt them? Hurt it? She was not sure, perhaps it was just her own guilt that flared at this emotional outburst, but she was desperate, she needed to do what she needed to do. It seemed to work though. She remembered tears of frustration, mixed with tears of relief. She had invested too much time and energy, involved so many innocent parties, even involved some so that they had paid the ultimate price for her ideals, her ambitions.
A tear once more slid down her cheek and hung on her chin for a second or so before it dropped to the floor below. She watched as it ran across the slick floor and dropped from the edge of the causeway only to reappear where it had started. She watched as this repeated three or four times. She wiped a shaking hand across the damp skin, what in the Makers name was happening here? She closed her eyes and with clenched fists she spoke out loud, “I have tried to do what I felt is right. My mistakes have been many. I have failed my people so often. Yet I have tried not to turn away from the task set before me. It is now more than ever that I need guidance, need friendship, need someone to guide my hand, my will and my heart, for I cannot do this alone.” She dropped to her knees and pummelled the ground with her fist, more tears of frustration fell.
A signature presence she knew well stood behind her, she stood slowly and turned. Melinè smiled at her, then dropped her gaze downwards. Something tiny glowed within the space between them, something that Serinae had not seen before when she last stood here. It grew bigger all the time she watched, it seemed fluid, much like the swirling morass below them. A bright tendril of energy connected the glow and disappeared over the edge of the causeway and down into the Rift. She walked over to where Melinè stood. The glow, had split into several smaller glowing disks. The disks seemed to adjust themselves slowly to Serinae’s head height and then began to slowly rotate. Many things seemed to be depicted on the disks, but one disk in particular seemed to catch Melinè’s attention. Melinè raised her hand and touched this disk with the tip of her finger. A small dark spot appeared in front of her. This dark spot grew rapidly until it was taller than she and a similar width. Melinè stood back and nodded encouragingly to Serinae. Serinae could see this was a portal, she could see the vista beyond. She wanted to return to the world of men, yet what she saw presented in front of her was not that place, that she was sure of. She felt anger rise once more, why would they not allow her to go where she wanted, why did she have to go to some other place? Serinae looked through the portal once more, suddenly she did recognise something, it was a tree. But not just any tree, Serinae knew this shape. True, she had never seen one with her own eyes, but the descriptions she had read of the special forests that the T’Ie called home made this tree unmistakable. It was the mother tree, what the T’Iea called S’Apli’Baum, or ‘Great Arm’ in the common tongue. Serinae wondered at this and smiled, suddenly excited. Suddenly she understood, the place where she was being shown, the one place she was being allowed to go to, this place above all was where in fact where she really wanted to go, it was so obvious now.
Serinae nodded to Melinè and strode purposefully towards the portal, she stopped before going through, turned and faced Melinè, Serinae spoke, not to the misty figure, but to the intellect behind the front. “I am glad I came, I thank you for allowing this to happen. Perhaps we shall meet again, perhaps we will all meet again. Maybe we will even travel together once more, reunited with the past, to look to a better future.” Serinae bowed towards the figure, Melinè, bowed back. Then without further hesitation Serinae looked at the forest that now showed through the portal. She sighed, a prayer upon her lips. I sudden irony occurred to her, in a way she was about to fulfil what Tezrin had desired, she was going to fulfil his darkest desire, what he had fought for and ….. died for. As t
hings turned out she desired the same thing, only for very different reasons, where Tezrin had used greed and self-ambition to fuel his goal, she was using love and the promise of the good for all. The irony of this did not go unnoticed as she took in a deep breath, stepped through into the portal and was gone.
The great interstellar star ship with its immense machines and unbelievably advanced technology, the pinnacle of the ancient father’s knowledge and progress was empty once more. Only the ethereal figures generated by the technology that the vast ship contained stood in a dream-like state staring after where Serinae had disappeared. They did not turn and walk away, return to whatever they needed to be doing; they just stood immobile. Then one by one they winked out as their individual subroutines were perceived by the star ships controlling interfaces as no longer being required, at least not for the time being.
The main control unit sighed, well it would have done if it had that capability, perhaps it would design some more emotion into its main programme whilst it waited. Perhaps ‘they’ would like that and it may to stop it getting bored. Ah but then it wasn’t possible for it to experience boredom either. But it had done what its designers had wanted, it had set the ‘wheels in motion’ just as the Commander had asked. So with a final flourish of happiness? It started to shut off all functions that would not be required and to await the outcome of its labours.