NationStates Jolt Archive

Esperallya uth-Reyad sighed as she gazed out of her window at the endless, star-speckled night... the stars like dust, sprinkled before her; without number or count, the sky glowed with their fierce twinkling light...

Here, far out amongst the stars, far from the Old Home, where the People had begun the Long Journey... here was the New Home, the end of the beginning... or the beginning of the end. The Paradox Debates raged on, as they had for six hundred years, but neither side of the Democracy vs Technocracy debate had ever come close to winning.

And so the Imperials continued. The Great Maneuver, six hundred years ago, had sparked the Paradox Debates; and they had kept the peace.

Her eyes wandered over the stars; three-hundred-and-fifty million of those glints of light housed inhabitants; the Dawn population totalled at somewhere around thirty quadrillion beings; and it had only been six thousand years since Nenyankind and their Quendi and Human brethrin had begun the colonization of this galaxy.

She sighed. Just minutes ago, she had been asleep and dreaming; she had dreamt that she was the legendary Rialla ux-Rihad, consort of the even more legendary Semir-randil - both of whom were still alive, out there, somewhere. Rumours were like wildfire, these days; they were seen in at least a billion different places at once, if the Galactic Mesh reports were anything to go by.

These were great days - or so the propaganda would have the people of the Galactic Empire of the Eternal Dawn believe. In truth, they were days of decay; of decadance and revolt. Thirty thousand worlds rebelled every day; and although the Imperial Guard put them down with little effort, the day would eventually come when one - just one - would succeed.

And then chaos would ripple outwards, enveloping the Galaxy with its disgusting violence and hatred; and then all would be lost.

Thousands of years of regression would follow, she knew. Any intellectual knew, in their heart of hearts, that nothing lasts forever; Esperallya did not consider herself possessing of vast intellect, but she did know that she wasn't stupid, either.

And she feared that the mere subconscious knowledge would be the low pressure front that precipitated the storm, so to speak.

Her eyes lowered from the stars that filled the sky - here, at the closest point possible to the Galactic Core, as close to where the mighty Central Star roared (once believed to be a black hole) as a planet could be and still house life, the stars were like dust (she had heard that expression as a child, growing up in the lush lands of the world-girdling forest-city of Ahm-rigirad, and it had never left her since)... they were so numerous that the world beneath her feet gained some 40% of its energy from the twinkling lights far above; its star dull, red, and old - and supported only by the mysterious Stabilizer inserted at its core millenia ago by mysterious beings who had long since left or died out. This was an old world; history was tangible here, time was touchable, real - an object, a possesion, and not a thing - and indeed, the world was named Ambar-Ilúvenyárë; World of the History of the Whole. And so it had been named millenia ago; the lingual shift that was inevitable had seemingly magically passed it over; the name traditionally and lovingly preserved by its thirty billion inhabitants. It was as diverse as the Galaxy itself; or so it was said. The administrative centre of the Galactic Empire of the Eternal Dawn, it was the glory amidst the crown of Nenyan achievement-

She sighed.

All doomed to destruction. All. Nothing would be spared, she knew; the flames that would come would take all unto their destructive bosom, and Eru (one of the few other words carefully preserved) only knew what would rise from the ashes.

She hoped it would be worth the suffering; even as her inner self sadly reminded her that nothing ever was - the suffering always promised greater things, but all things diminished; all things were lesser than those that came before. Even the GEOTED was weaker, in truth, than the Solar Empire that had preceded it; history lied, and told it in reverse, but she, The Historian, knew better. She had the entire history of the Three Peoples laid out in her mind; she could recall instantly any record or moment recorded; she was the Herilúmequentalëa; the Historical Lady, more commonly called simply The Historian, and she alone knew the trials and troubles that had passed-

Rialla jolted upright in her bed, shocked by the vivid nature of the dream-

"Great Eru," she breathed, her eyes wide and staring into space-

Semir-randil slumbered on, unaware beside her-

-and Rialla stood, moved to her window; gazed at the stars...

The stars like dust sprinkled liberally above her; and for the first time in her years, she was disappointed...

There were so few.

She had silently slipped from the Imperial Bedchamber, slippered feet silently padding across marble flooring with gentle steps. The corridor outside, bare as any other in the vast Palace, was dimly lit with night-lighting; the ceilng above had the same trimensionally-projected glittering vista of stars - the very image visible from the roof of the Palace - that every corridor in the Palace did. It made one feel like one was walking through a maze outside; it leant an air of mystery to a place that those who lived inside of generally knew fairly well - despite the winding, confusing angles that the corridors had a tendancy to run at.

She took a left, and a right, and another left, and ran her hand over the smooth access panel that was nigh-on-invisibley set into the wall.

The wall before her shimmered gently, just a mild alteration of the colour, and she smiled as she walked straight through the wall - its very atoms parting to allow her body to pass through. She never tired of the sensation; it was odd, tingling, but decidedly pleasurable. Her advisors insisted it was utterly safe, too, although she had mild suspicions that they weren't as entirely sure as they claimed - but she had confidence that the device was safe anyway. Nenyans tend to be well in touch with their own bodies; and she did not have a 'bad feeling' about it. That, alone, in truth, was enough for her to trust.

She clasped gently at the tendrils of the dream that had come to her - the night-vision, she rather thought - holding onto it weakly, being sure not to be too insistent; such things had a tendancy to flee if one grasped them too tightly, rather like a greased pig.

The hallowed hall of the Great Library spread out before her; row after row of books, many of them very ancient - many of them often restored, and few of them in their original bindings - and she smiled.

This was her place to think; absolute silence was maintained in here, at all times; speaking was forbidden. It was a place of silent reflection, for the tomes contained herein were histories; many of them, it was true, were fiction - but the factual ones contained horrors that only Imperial Nenyan eyes had ever seen.

Many of the tomes that had once adorned similar shelves in the Old Palace had been burnt in the Great Denial several centuries ago; but enough information still existed to hint at the terrors of the First Empire's past

She shuddered involuntarily.

Quietly, she sat at one of the tables, steepled her hands... and slipped into meditation, allowing her mind to soar wherever it would; answers often found their form this way, she knew. Silent reflection was the food of the wise; and she would feast tonight.

Hmmm! Excellent story, but im unsure as to how in the world to get involved. Have to watch this one. :)

[OOC: Well, it's a storyline thread... but there might be opportunities to get involved later on... I don't know, yet. I'm ponderinating options. :)]

Strange though it was, she had projected into her mind as part of her meditation the very sky at which she had gazed; it served as a memory aid, and slowly, the dream filtered into a reality she could understand; a message from her subconscious, surely, though fascinatingly complex considering its source - her own mind? She wasn't certain.

Yet stars had been involved, she knew. The stars like dust, seemed somehow important... she had heard that phrase before the dream, also; yet not where could she recall.

And so she had slipped into the dreamlike world she had coccooned herself in; slipping beneath its sultry waves with a calm serenity that came more easily, she thought, with every passing year-

Her eyes had wandered as she stood, bereft of motion, at the windowsill. The stars trekked slowly across the sky, movement imperceptible to the naked eye; and she stayed still yet longer. Thoughts whirred through her mind; understanding dawned, as the Sun Herself would shortly make haste to do, and a smile upon her features slowly played.

A silent thrill swept through her frame, as she considered the glints on high; she did not know the how, and neither did she know the why - but one thing alone she knew: the future lay in the sky.

Those stars, she knew, would hold the key. The future would extend outwards beyond them, no matter what choices were made - but what manner in thousands of years, if she could travel forwards, what manner in which would Earth be? She knew not. And yet she knew somehow that space surround would take them backwards not - yet forwards on without too much decay; for all society suffered decay, everything ended or atrophied to disrepair, given time. And time was something they appeared to have in abundance, she saw. Yet not all could be accomplished quickly; some such things would take many years to come to pass-

-but others, today. Space, she saw. Space, she knew, now represented the doorway to the future. The key had been in the lock for years; recently that key had turned, and the lock had clicked, and the people of Earth had truly ventured forth, in relative safety.

She sighed happily, eyes snapping open.

More. She knew there would need to be more.

Much, much more.

Smiling, she titptoed from once side of the library to the other - she did not know why she tiptoed, it merely seemed to be the right thing to do - and slipped through the conventional oak door that lead to the conveniant comms chamber.

She tapped out a combination; a balding, white-haired man appeared on her screen. "Mr. Chairman," she greeted with a friendly smile.

The ancient, sallow-cheeked man heaved a smile to his features, feigning effort. "What can I do for you, Rialla?"

"I want funding poured into IsnCo, Mr. Chairman. You have openly stated your support for the space program, no?"

"You're quite right, of course, my dear," the ancient Nenyan - his faint amber eyes the only remaining evidence of generally percieved vigour of the species - stated with a slow nod. "I've been hoping for your support," his voice was not steady; he was openly excited, but did not dare display it too much, "and we can of course extend the operations. We have a plan for mining, Rialla. A huge extraction operation... just a start, of course, but we want carbon-"

"Mr. Chairman," Rialla hid her irritation at being referred to constantly on a first time basis by the Chairman, but allowing it nontheless out of respect for his advanced age, "it would be appropriate to send a report to my desk on preferred operations. I will want more Solar Orbitals, however. Soon. As fast as possible. But for now... the report, yes?"

Smiling, and nodding more vigourously, the Chairman replied curtly, "Yes, of course."

Rialla smiled, gave her thanks, and cut off the transmission.

More, she thought again. Vilya Elenosto has been dallying too long. Yes... Vilya Elenosto is the key...

bump

In orbit above Ma-tek, a small frigate (http://screens.relicnews.com/fanart/images/Shade003.jpg), a minnow compared to the blue supergiants of Ma-tek ships (as was learned the hard way in the Fascisimo conflict), floats blithely above earth. It is one of the more famous LRR ships, the Olof Palme class explorer frigate, which has just finished making a map of the solar winds of the Orion arm. It retracts its solar sail, and prepares to make a landing.

"We are approaching Ma-tek territory."
"Let them know we are here, if they don't already."
"Ok. Ma-tek space control, this is the LRRSV Sirius. We are an unarmed science frigate, and have just nearly completed a map of this area of the galaxy. We would like to map your territory. Is that permissable?"

Esperallya walked in the vastness of the Garden of Geometric Cohesion; nay, for vastness did not come to tell just how huge this place was. The Ether, a vaster construction than all things physically built in history, had tendrils that licked the rim of the Galaxy - and the Garden of Geometric Cohesion was inside the Ether, inside that vastness. The Garden - like the Ether - was not real. It was merely the representation of billions of different expressions of code; nay, trillions, quadrillions... a number without count, to Esperallya, despite her great knowledge of the universe around her.

She walked, and as she did, the trees swayed in the cool breeze that came from the north; yet she could not find it within herself to feel the breeze, the way she had in her youth.

No. She no longer did anything the way she had in her youth; it was the eternal truth that no matter how hard you tried, things just... felt... different. Memories intruded on the sensation; if you had lived a particuarly full or long life, and were cursed with a good memory, you felt as if... every new moment was merely a reminder of previous ones. Each step a step taken before.

It was... so similar to the grand scheme of things. The all. The Galactic Dawn was receding; in fact, it had been the Galactic Afternoon for longer than anyone could remember - if they had noticed. Nobody did; nobody found it strange that there had not been an advance technologically in years - nothing but improvements. Improvement was the new science, the only science - and adjustment.

At least things still worked. Except the Empire itself. The Empire was failing; rebellions were so frequent, one would die of shock if there was an hour when a rebellion was not in progress somewhere - the military budget extended further and further year upon year, all in a spin into-

Oblivion.

The whole road... the whole existance of a culture, a dream of eternal glorious expansion...

For nothing.

The beauty of the perfect garden surrounding her brought her no comfort.

[OOC: LRR, I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what you're doing... Ma-tek is on Earth... *looks confused*]

Esperallya walked in the vastness of the Garden of Geometric Cohesion; nay, for vastness did not come to tell just how huge this place was. The Ether, a vaster construction than all things physically built in history, had tendrils that licked the rim of the Galaxy - and the Garden of Geometric Cohesion was inside the Ether, inside that vastness. The Garden - like the Ether - was not real. It was merely the representation of billions of different expressions of code; nay, trillions, quadrillions... a number without count, to Esperallya, despite her great knowledge of the universe around her.

She walked, and as she did, the trees swayed in the cool breeze that came from the north; yet she could not find it within herself to feel the breeze, the way she had in her youth.

No. She no longer did anything the way she had in her youth; it was the eternal truth that no matter how hard you tried, things just... felt... different. Memories intruded on the sensation; if you had lived a particuarly full or long life, and were cursed with a good memory, you felt as if... every new moment was merely a reminder of previous ones. Each step a step taken before.

It was... so similar to the grand scheme of things. The all. The Galactic Dawn was receding; in fact, it had been the Galactic Afternoon for longer than anyone could remember - if they had noticed. Nobody did; nobody found it strange that there had not been an advance technologically in years - nothing but improvements. Improvement was the new science, the only science - and adjustment.

At least things still worked. Except the Empire itself. The Empire was failing; rebellions were so frequent, one would die of shock if there was an hour when a rebellion was not in progress somewhere - the military budget extended further and further year upon year, all in a spin into-

Oblivion.

The whole road... the whole existance of a culture, a dream of eternal glorious expansion...

For nothing.

The beauty of the perfect garden surrounding her brought her no comfort.

[OOC: LRR, I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what you're doing... Ma-tek is on Earth... *looks confused*]

OCC: :oops:

I'll modify that.

The incursion into the small pocket of orbital space known as EOTED Space, situated above Tareldanore (near Sisgardia) and surrounding the Sol Orbital Colony of Vilya Elenosto, was monitored with cool calm by the IDSS Retribution. The mammoth ship sat just under a kilometre away from the Colony, and silently it requested a course plan from the station. Tatya's response was as sharply efficient as ever; she did not provide a course, but merely pulsed her MI field marginally, ejecting the Retribution from the 3km danger zone for maneuvering around the Colony. The course calculation would have taken too long, after all.

Easing away from the Colony under its own power, the Retribution swings around - through all four axis - to face the intruder.

A pulse of communication emanates from the Retribution, with the first transmission being sent via multiple methods, from laser to microwave to simple radio waves. The initial communication is completely ignored.

In addition, the Retribution opens two gunports, revealing rather intimidating looking E-cannons. The so-called fork-like 'teeth' of the muzzle glow faintly white; they are primed.

As if that wasn't intimidating enough, just about every defense satelite in the area exerts an active weapons lock on the frigate. Standard operating procedure.

"Halt. You are five kilometres outside the Economic Exclusion Zone of the semi-sovereign Imperial Sol Orbital Dawn Colony of Vilya Elenosto. Entry into the EEZ will require payment of a small toll fee. Please transmit identification codes; if you do not have a standard EOTED ID code, please transmit the national registration number of your ship, along with details on the origin of construction, date of construction, and general operating efficiency of the vessel. Failure to comply with these requests will result in a one-year bar on entry into EOTED Space. - For those-"

It becomes clear that this is a pre-recorded message.

"-who are entering the EEZ for trade purposes or entry into EOTED airspace via orbital insertion, please contact comms array 422b in grid alpha-two-five for insertion details and microwave guidance. - This is a weapons-free zone. You may be reading active weapons locks. Please do not be alarmed. The high security is for the security of the citizens of Vilya Elenosto, and the security of those who transition through this region of space. - Please enjoy your stay in EOTED Space, and be sure to follow the guidelines prescribed in this recording. I am Tatya, Semantic Artificial Intelligence Director of Vilya Elenosto and Prime Co-ordinator of EOTED Space. - All information and requests in this transmission have been recorded in text form and transmitted alongside this audio transmission."

* * *

Rialla dreamed, still. Semir-randil slept aside her; and his powerful bond to her, and hers to he, and the chance of probability - all these things combined; and with them came the freak eventuality of the connection of dreams. Two minds sought each other, instinctively but with mild conscious awareness, and the dreams merged-

Esperallya sighed heavily. The time was approaching, and she was not calm. She was most definitely not calm. In fact, she was furious at herself. - She had come here, unto this place of utmost calm. And for? Nothing!

Nothing!

She had not found peace, nor calm, nor the answer to the question that burned deep inside her.

Why? Why was the Emperor, of all people, desiring an audience with her? In all her tenure, none of the previous three Emperor's had done any such thing. The uth-Reyad dynasty had held for fifteen generations; a good innings - longer than the brief uth-Nesset's had. They had been the only blot on uth-Reyad dominance in the entire history of the Empire; a glorious, glorious dynasty. The longest rule of any family; and indeed, the most powerful family, beyond all doubt, was House uth-Reyad. The only thing that had not survived, entirely, was the name; what was once ux-Rihad, she knew, was now uth-Reyad. Lingual shift, of course. The letter x was no longer in existance - at least, not as 'ecks'. Instead, it was now generally used to convey mystery, or question. - The so-called 'question addition' to Nenyatti Script - sometimes known as 'Common', although only amongst the Citizenry.

She sighed again, and it was an empty, futile gesture. She was not breathing here. Her body did not sigh. And she desired it to be so. Yet she could not leave; even here, Imperial Guard were watching, waiting. If she left, it would be treason - she was to stay in this place until the Emperor arrived, as of fifteen minutes prior. Not that time had great meaning here - at least, one found it hard to keep track of it. The Etheric Police Force had a massive task to prevent 'unethical misuse' of the Garden - and they usually failed. And nobody cared; all the better for all. In point of fact-

Her line of thought shattered.

Bronze eyes, tall, slender frame; swept-back jet-black hair and a build that, for a Nenyan and to a Nenyan, suggested the ability to throw mountains (that was the accepted expression, at any rate - she had no doubt that he could not, in fact, throw a mountain, no matter how much he wished it otherwise).

She knew this man. She knew him so well that her spirit screamed for the company of his-

-his eyes full of flame, he staggered. Not real flame, of course, but the flame of passion, of emotion. At his stagger, a hundred persons wondered at what they ought do... but the moment passed, and so did the sensation for each.

"Sire," Esperallya stated flatly.

Essemarit XVIII (full name Essemarit Untoval Edrin uth-Reyad XVIII) was usually referred to, in the media, as His Venerable and Respected Great and August Emperor Essemarit the Invincible, but he disliked that. It was undemocratic, and he felt, like all good Emperors ought, that democracy was all-important. Not to such a degree as people have the choice of who leads them (Eru was not alone knowing where that folly lead), but to a degree whereby he felt he was... giving. Kind. To him, this was democracy. He walked among the people. He loved the people. And, he was sure, the people loved him, in each their own way. And if that included thirteen assasination attempts in nineteen months, then surely this was merely misguided love?

"Esperallya... might We call you by some other name, honoured subject?"

Honoured subject. Esperallya's mind reeled. What? Since when? "Espe will do, Sire."

She did not attempt to embrace him, or to shake his hand; and his hands remained firmly at his waist. In common society, this would be considered most rude; but never, never was anyone under any circumstances to touch the Emperor without explicit permission: to do so was death - high treason carried but one penalty, and all considered were guilty.

"Very well, Espe. - I am in democratic spirit, and so I shall address you as if we are equals, Espe. You may be informal."

Esperallya considered this for exactly five hundred milliseconds. "My great honour to do so, Sire," she responded carefully.

"Good, good," the Emperor stated softly; "bad news is always bad to bring, eh?"

"Yes, Sire," she said softly, lowering her eyes and keeping her feet. The Emperor seated himself; the seat had not been there until he sat, and it had not exactly come into being but rather just... insinuated itself... underneath him.

"You are-"

Rialla and Semir awoke with a start to the bleeping of the Alert System.

[OOC: To be concluded tomorrow. Not the thread; just this post. I'm not quite finished, but sleep overcomes me. Grawr.]

The incursion into the small pocket of orbital space known as EOTED Space, situated above Tareldanore (near Sisgardia) and surrounding the Sol Orbital Colony of Vilya Elenosto, was monitored with cool calm by the IDSS Retribution. The mammoth ship sat just under a kilometre away from the Colony, and silently it requested a course plan from the station. Tatya's response was as sharply efficient as ever; she did not provide a course, but merely pulsed her MI field marginally, ejecting the Retribution from the 3km danger zone for maneuvering around the Colony. The course calculation would have taken too long, after all.

Easing away from the Colony under its own power, the Retribution swings around - through all four axis - to face the intruder.

A pulse of communication emanates from the Retribution, with the first transmission being sent via multiple methods, from laser to microwave to simple radio waves. The initial communication is completely ignored.

In addition, the Retribution opens two gunports, revealing rather intimidating looking E-cannons. The so-called fork-like 'teeth' of the muzzle glow faintly white; they are primed.

As if that wasn't intimidating enough, just about every defense satelite in the area exerts an active weapons lock on the frigate. Standard operating procedure.

"Halt. You are five kilometres outside the Economic Exclusion Zone of the semi-sovereign Imperial Sol Orbital Dawn Colony of Vilya Elenosto. Entry into the EEZ will require payment of a small toll fee. Please transmit identification codes; if you do not have a standard EOTED ID code, please transmit the national registration number of your ship, along with details on the origin of construction, date of construction, and general operating efficiency of the vessel. Failure to comply with these requests will result in a one-year bar on entry into EOTED Space. - For those-"

It becomes clear that this is a pre-recorded message.

"-who are entering the EEZ for trade purposes or entry into EOTED airspace via orbital insertion, please contact comms array 422b in grid alpha-two-five for insertion details and microwave guidance. - This is a weapons-free zone. You may be reading active weapons locks. Please do not be alarmed. The high security is for the security of the citizens of Vilya Elenosto, and the security of those who transition through this region of space. - Please enjoy your stay in EOTED Space, and be sure to follow the guidelines prescribed in this recording. I am Tatya, Semantic Artificial Intelligence Director of Vilya Elenosto and Prime Co-ordinator of EOTED Space. - All information and requests in this transmission have been recorded in text form and transmitted alongside this audio transmission."

* * *

Rialla dreamed, still. Semir-randil slept aside her; and his powerful bond to her, and hers to he, and the chance of probability - all these things combined; and with them came the freak eventuality of the connection of dreams. Two minds sought each other, instinctively but with mild conscious awareness, and the dreams merged-

Esperallya sighed heavily. The time was approaching, and she was not calm. She was most definitely not calm. In fact, she was furious at herself. - She had come here, unto this place of utmost calm. And for? Nothing!

Nothing!

She had not found peace, nor calm, nor the answer to the question that burned deep inside her.

Why? Why was the Emperor, of all people, desiring an audience with her? In all her tenure, none of the previous three Emperor's had done any such thing. The uth-Reyad dynasty had held for fifteen generations; a good innings - longer than the brief uth-Nesset's had. They had been the only blot on uth-Reyad dominance in the entire history of the Empire; a glorious, glorious dynasty. The longest rule of any family; and indeed, the most powerful family, beyond all doubt, was House uth-Reyad. The only thing that had not survived, entirely, was the name; what was once ux-Rihad, she knew, was now uth-Reyad. Lingual shift, of course. The letter x was no longer in existance - at least, not as 'ecks'. Instead, it was now generally used to convey mystery, or question. - The so-called 'question addition' to Nenyatti Script - sometimes known as 'Common', although only amongst the Citizenry.

She sighed again, and it was an empty, futile gesture. She was not breathing here. Her body did not sigh. And she desired it to be so. Yet she could not leave; even here, Imperial Guard were watching, waiting. If she left, it would be treason - she was to stay in this place until the Emperor arrived, as of fifteen minutes prior. Not that time had great meaning here - at least, one found it hard to keep track of it. The Etheric Police Force had a massive task to prevent 'unethical misuse' of the Garden - and they usually failed. And nobody cared; all the better for all. In point of fact-

Her line of thought shattered.

Bronze eyes, tall, slender frame; swept-back jet-black hair and a build that, for a Nenyan and to a Nenyan, suggested the ability to throw mountains (that was the accepted expression, at any rate - she had no doubt that he could not, in fact, throw a mountain, no matter how much he wished it otherwise).

She knew this man. She knew him so well that her spirit screamed for the company of his-

-his eyes full of flame, he staggered. Not real flame, of course, but the flame of passion, of emotion. At his stagger, a hundred persons wondered at what they ought do... but the moment passed, and so did the sensation for each.

"Sire," Esperallya stated flatly.

Essemarit XVIII (full name Essemarit Untoval Edrin uth-Reyad XVIII) was usually referred to, in the media, as His Venerable and Respected Great and August Emperor Essemarit the Invincible, but he disliked that. It was undemocratic, and he felt, like all good Emperors ought, that democracy was all-important. Not to such a degree as people have the choice of who leads them (Eru was not alone knowing where that folly lead), but to a degree whereby he felt he was... giving. Kind. To him, this was democracy. He walked among the people. He loved the people. And, he was sure, the people loved him, in each their own way. And if that included thirteen assasination attempts in nineteen months, then surely this was merely misguided love?

"Esperallya... might We call you by some other name, honoured subject?"

Honoured subject. Esperallya's mind reeled. What? Since when? "Espe will do, Sire."

She did not attempt to embrace him, or to shake his hand; and his hands remained firmly at his waist. In common society, this would be considered most rude; but never, never was anyone under any circumstances to touch the Emperor without explicit permission: to do so was death - high treason carried but one penalty, and all considered were guilty.

"Very well, Espe. - I am in democratic spirit, and so I shall address you as if we are equals, Espe. You may be informal."

Esperallya considered this for exactly five hundred milliseconds. "My great honour to do so, Sire," she responded carefully.

"Good, good," the Emperor stated softly; "bad news is always bad to bring, eh?"

"Yes, Sire," she said softly, lowering her eyes and keeping her feet. The Emperor seated himself; the seat had not been there until he sat, and it had not exactly come into being but rather just... insinuated itself... underneath him.

"You are-"

Rialla and Semir awoke with a start to the bleeping of the Alert System.

[OOC: To be concluded tomorrow. Not the thread; just this post. I'm not quite finished, but sleep overcomes me. Grawr.]


Aboard the Sirius, there was much confusion?

"What do they want us to do, now?"
"Something about a toll, I think."

The engineer takes a 20ningi note from his flight suit pocket.

"Contact satellite-microwave whatzit?"
"Er.....Ma-tek......control......yeah......our regestration number.......hey Herb, do we even have a registration number?"
"Yep. Its 22-80-02-ZZ."
"Ok, EOTED control, our registration number is 22-80-02-ZZ. The ship was built 10 years ago, in the LRR fleet drive yards. Normal construction techniques. We have a slightly damaged mass spectrometer. We would like, er......orbital insertion. We would like to meet the government if possible, perhaps trade them these highly detailed and accurate galactic maps for something."

A rather bored looking comm technician pecked at a contact set into his desk. "LRR vessel, do you have microwave guidance capability? Preferred method of insertion is along a pre-arranged microwave-beam guided path. - If you do not have electronic currency transfer capabilities, then the toll may be paid on landing at Nenya Prime Spaceport."

A rather bored looking comm technician pecked at a contact set into his desk. "LRR vessel, do you have microwave guidance capability? Preferred method of insertion is along a pre-arranged microwave-beam guided path. - If you do not have electronic currency transfer capabilities, then the toll may be paid on landing at Nenya Prime Spaceport."

The LRR crew, unused to such rigid control, is somewhat confused. Whereas they would usually slink on into a spaceport with the general flow of traffic, these people actually wanted them to follow a landing guidance beam. Unheard of, to say the least.

"Yeah, I think we have one of those. Yep, we do. So, what did you want us to contact? Some comms array?"
"422b, I think it was."
"Ok. Contacting 422b now."

422b turns out to be controlled by

"...am your friendly Artificial Semantic Sub-Sentient Intelligence Address System, or ASSIAS. Please follow beam fourteen-alpha, marked on the insertion chart distributed to your vessel as an underlying data packet. - Please enjoy your stay in the Empire of the Eternal Dawn."

And, naturally, the insertion chart clearly marks the angle of the microwave beam to be followed.

And no doubt to the immense pleasure of those on board the LRR ship, that was the last stage of traffic control guidance; there are no more efforts on communication all the way down to the ground. Incidentally, the space port grounds (like all of Nenya) are rather... well, forested. It's absolutely impossible to see the space port until you've virtually landed - which might be a bit disconcerting.

422b turns out to be controlled by

"...am your friendly Artificial Semantic Sub-Sentient Intelligence Address System, or ASSIAS. Please follow beam fourteen-alpha, marked on the insertion chart distributed to your vessel as an underlying data packet. - Please enjoy your stay in the Empire of the Eternal Dawn."

And, naturally, the insertion chart clearly marks the angle of the microwave beam to be followed.

And no doubt to the immense pleasure of those on board the LRR ship, that was the last stage of traffic control guidance; there are no more efforts on communication all the way down to the ground. Incidentally, the space port grounds (like all of Nenya) are rather... well, forested. It's absolutely impossible to see the space port until you've virtually landed - which might be a bit disconcerting.

The crew recieves the data packet, and is directed down onto the landing pad.

"AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

The captain jumps onto the floor, covering his head with his hands, worried about crashing into the forest.

Esperallya paced her bedroom with the stride of one who is troubled greatly; her head tilted forwards, eyes down - she was unhappy, and greatly so.

Historically, the Herilúmequentalëa was immune to Imperial interference. Her authority was unquestionable; if she decided that the Historical Records required a purge of useless data, or if they required padding out with new information, or if she decided on any number of actions that were possible, she was supposedly utterly free to do so. Information was valuable, and was the only true freedom; and now...

Now the Emperor was taking that away. It was bad news, and she knew it. The people would be disenchanted by it; the Herilúmequentalëa had never been forced to yield to Imperial command - and this was one of many stabilizing influences in the Empire. Knowledge was power, and power was, of course, important - but the illusion of power was even more important. And her position, her freedom to command her army of scholars - this was the illusion of power that the population was dependant upon. Without it, there was no freedom that the population could touch - freedom would not be tangible.

And this, she knew, would allow chaos to flourish. Chaos.

The old enemy; the Empire had long battled the ravishing effect of chaos, and it had, in the opinion of each and every Herilúmequentalëa in history, performed admirably in that task.

Freedom of the flow of information allowed the population to believe that they were autonomous; it gave them a small freedom - one of many, it was true, as the people were not oppressed or interfered with in any way that would be considered oppressive in the least - and that small freedom was the cornerstone of the satisfaction of the population.

And now... now the Emperor had ordered her to purge all data in The Collection that was even slightly anti-Imperial. She was to be the propaganda machine of the Empire - and she was finding herself sinking into disillusionment because of it. She could not bear it-

And yet she had not refused. She had been unable to; she, like most, was a patriot. She loved the Empire; and the Emperor was the Empire. Yet she did not have to like what she was to do - if she would do it. Refusal would have, maybe, been accepted - although she would still have had no choice but to comply - but to accept and then not do as the Emperor had asked-

That meant death.

Esperallya was not ready to die. She knew this, at least. But what could she do?

With an air of defeat, she sat silently at her desk, the trimensional 'visor of the AI dead and quiet. And as she reached out with her hand to pass her fingers through the activation field, she shuddered; a new thought, a dangerous, frightening thought - more frightening than the thought of the dangers of angering the thirty quadrillion inhabitants of the Empire, if that were possible - hit her: what if the Scholars refused to purge the databanks of all anti-Imperial material?

She shuddered. It was likely; they would not take kindly to the exertion of Imperial control over the supposedly sovereign Galactic Data Guild.

And then there was a further problem: what of her?

She held the data in her mind - in a manner of speaking, at least - and what effect would it have to lose so much of her own being in that way?

Esperallya was suddenly aware that her cheeks were wet; and quietly, half-sobbing, she lifted her head and gazed at the ceiling, letting out a plaintive question to any that would answer her plea-

"Why?"

The stars, sprinkled very liberally across a field of dark, dominated the tiny viewport set into his viewport. It was sparse out here, this far from the Centre. Not a whisper or a murmour disturbed his day, for he was alone; a soul stirred nowhere upon the ship, for none but one was needed. Such was the case with many of the GEOTED warships; the ASI and the Pilot were all that were needed - except on the giant Behemoths.

But this was not a Behemoth. It was a Starseeker, fifteen thousand six hundred ninety-fifth of its class. Such details were not particuarly relevant to Edrett, however. Edrett cared only for his ASI - his Lover - and his Lover cared only for him... And, of course, the Mission. Together, they were one - apart, they were afraid - incomplete, useless, wretched. Any number of adjectives applied. And, as such, Edrett only disconnected his consciousness from that of Eleanor three times a day - three meals, three disconnections. As a result, he did not like food. It was...

...displeasurable. Yet necessary. He could, of course, possibly have been fed via other means. That would have seemed even more undesirable, though. To be ugly in order to be with one's Lover was a contradiction in terms. He had heard that new nanochips had been developed, wetware chips that would be inserted into the cranium - free-floating chips that would allow communication with his Lover, but the scuttlebutt was that those were likely to be reserved for the Warships only.

He was not eating now, however. Nor was he cleansing himself; that was an unecessary task, considering the PGDs that continuously cleansed his skin and clothes with ruthless efficiency, leaving only harmless symbiotic bacteria and a thin sheen of dead skin behind at all times. The dead skin was left behind for a reason completely unknown to Edrett, but it did not disturb him. In fact, he rarely paid such matters any mind at all; his mind was virtually always solely on the Mission... and his Lover.

Currently, the ship - the ship was not his Lover - was carrying them to their latest preferred position. Out here, near the Rim, it was quiet. Not even one per fifty thousand stars had been charted yet; there was always new work, new exploration, new discovery. And Edrett and his Lover revelled in it all.

And yet-

And yet he found he had disconnected without cause. It was... confusing. He was unsure why he would do such a thing, but was certain that it must be benificial... somehow. He never did anything that was not needed, after all - at least, not in the unreality of what the vast majority of other organics called 'reality'. Efficiency was key... or at least, it was a good excuse to spend virtually every single instant possible with his Lover.

He checked the sensors manually, just to be sure. Something... he knew not what... nagged at the back of his mind. Doubt? No, it could not be - there, on the screen, was the evidence of safety. Nothing, zip, zero.

With a low sigh of disappointment at time needlessly wasted, time lost, he 'plugged in' again - although it was not so much plugging into his Lover as it was holding her beautiful, silken hands. His hands sank into the 'desk' - which, to him, felt like warm and greeting palms. Her 'fingers' entwined with his, and he drifted into the world his Lover constructed for him, drawn right out of his own mind and made real-

The beach was calm. Not a bird stirred in the sky, nor a cloud skudded across the open dome of blue. Surf liberally pattered against hardened wet sand, and a crab skittered sideways between sharp and jagged rocks that jutted calmly up from between craggy clefts in the rocky patch that caressed the sea. Or did the sea caress the rocks? Such subjective terms were sometimes difficult to grasp-

Edrett gasped at the sight of his Lover, in awe, as he always was. Her body was perfect, her face wonderous to behold... but none of this made him gasp, nor feel awe. No, it was not physical. She was warm against his mind - somewhere deep inside his mind it occurred to him that, if rocks had consciousness (as some scientists maintained amongst the laughter of their colleagues), then the welling of a summer tide would surely feel somewhat like this - and he felt her love.

"My love," she whispered, as she took his other hand in her gentle grasp...

His world whirled, the emerald eyes of his Lover an attractor state of probability too powerful to resist. All existance dissolved away, drawn into the singularity of soft warmth that the eyes of the being that held his heart in her hands represented. Wells of infinite beauty, he sank into their depths, joy seeping from every pore in his 'body'...

...and then her eyes were closed, and his were, too, and their lips met with a feather brushing of tender delight...

And she was falling away. She screamed, and the sound was as ice against his very soul; every fibre of his being shuddered...

Her eyes burned with terror when they opened, and her lips could find no sound at first...

...and then, despite the fear, the terror that occupied those depths of love that were called 'eyes', she spoke three words... even as she faded, drifted away, the terror in her eyes etched into his screaming and suddenly super-heavy heart-

-but she could not quite complete the words, try as she might.

"I love y-"

He whispered to the darkness that slowly formed around him, somehow knowing he would never say the words that his lips mimed voicelessly, reflexively... words that had been murmoured a million times into a waiting ear as he moved with her; for a single instant, memories washed over him, and the words took form - indeed, he shouted them, hopelessly-

"I love you!"

And-

And he never would again say those words to Eleanor. The connection broke, and he was ripped from her, the sound of her scream reverberating through his body, his mind, his soul, spirit...

He screamed.

And he was still screaming when the troops brought him aboard their warship ten minutes later; their attempts to interrogate him failed utterly, for he simply refused to stop screaming - even when his parched lips and throat could only produce a hollow rasp. Eyes tightly shut, a bizarre twitch apparently affecting most of his body, Edrett sank deeper into himself, striving to find his Lover...

...but she was gone. Gone, dead, forever gone.

* * *

Commisar Dupante was, as usual, the definition of apoplectic. Occasionally, he was certain, his troops wondered if he had any other state of mind. Indeed, on one occasion, a trooper had made the error of asking such an impertinant question.

Dupante had answered by blowing him out of an airlock. Strangely, nobody had felt the need to make that inquiry again. - In truth, looking back, Dupante wondered whether - on occasion - he had overreacted a little to percieved lack of discipline.

But he decided against that perverse line of thinking. If the men (and women) beneath him would simply cease being such utter imbeciles, then the body count would not be so high. The loss of life did not disturb him; it irritated him faintly to waste resources so, but, in a Galaxy of quadrillions, it hardly seemed to matter. The phrase 'Plenty more where that came from' had particular merit, he felt.

And so when the screaming GEOTED surveyor had been brought aboard, he had not seen any particular reason not to kill the officer who had decided it would be necessary... until the officer in question politely informed him that this was not a standard survey vessel that they had captured. It had been a simple task, slaughtering the ASI control program. They were, it had turned out, quite vulnerable. Just the right sort of assault... and these lower-tech ships were useless. They weren't meant for armed engagements or electronic warfare, and so the Return to Glory had had little trouble sending its 'circuits into a fit', as the elecop had put it so eloquently.

But now, when no information on the destination of the... he struggled to remember the name of the blasted vessel. Eleanor, that was it... Yes. The Eleanor's destination remained a mystery; no amount of torture had affected the single crewmemeber, who had insisted on screaming in a burnt-out rasping voice the whole damned time he had been aboard.

They had electrocuted him; they had slit his wrists, healing them just before the critical moment and replenishing his blood; they had cut him to ribbons and repaired his body; they had attached the so-called AS to his body, sending agony through his neural pathways and nervous system... and nothing had seemed to affect him.

Until Dupante slit his throat, that is. Although, unfortunately, as Dupante had suspected, the GEOTED surveyor was no more forthcoming in death than he had been in life. It was a waste of resources, frankly.

With disgust, Dupante kicked the GEOTED surveyor. "Pathetic," he intoned quietly, turning smartly on his heel...

...which was when the screaming started again.

Dupante turned, and looked with rising horror at the surveyor, who, beyond all expectations, had managed to haul himself away from death... and sit up. He wasn't particuarly doing anything; just screaming. Still. Dupante toyed with the idea that, maybe, just maybe, he had gone insane.

He refused to accept that. Insanity was a pointless venture; Dupante was far too efficient to be crazy. And then he noticed: the blood was still on the floor, but the wound on the Nenyan's throat had sealed itself somehow.

He cursed under his breath, realising the error of his medical staff: the bastard was Enhanced. Nanomachines pulsed through the dirty Nenyan's blood, and they had probably robbed oxygen from the cells in his lower body to feed them to his major organs and brain - along with nutrients - whilst other nanomachines repaired the damage to his throat and stimulated the production of blood. He had never quite seen the work done so fast, however.

Dupante, enraged (as usual), jabbed his hefty boot in the Nenyan's face. The idiot just sat there. He hadn't moved out of the way, and, as a result, the gristle in his nose snapped, ruining his boyish good looks. Dupante, feeling slightly better, turned and moved towards the iris door...

"Eleanor," the Nenyan rasped, exchanging his screams for sobs.

If Dupante had been one of those lily-livered sensitive types, he would have found the whole situation saddening. As it was, the shift in mood served to irritate him only further. And so he did the only thing that seemed right: he kicked the Nenyan again.

Unfortunately for Dupante, the Nenyan surveyor wasn't actually present at the time. Oh, sure, the boot slammed into his face, aggravating an already bloodied injury to his nose... but the amber-eyed devil just wasn't there; in truth, he was deep inside himself, searching for some trace of his Lover. And so, working on instinct alone, he grabbed the foot and twisted with surprising strength - snapping Dupante's knee cleanly, thanks to the that little friend called 'momentum'.

Dupante howled with agony...

* * *

...and Edrett's eyes snapped back to reality at the sound. It served to remind him; anger, vile bile-like anger bubbled up through his being...

...and as his eyes had burned fiercely a moment ago with the return to 'reality', his spirit was suddenly spiked with white-hot heat. The Hot Fury descended upon him - as it was known back on Edrett's homeworld - and instinctive impulses leant him a hefty advantage over the human before him.

Of course, Edrett didn't see a human. In point of fact, he wasn't seeing anything. All he knew was that he should be alone, because his Lover was gone, and she was dead, and he would kill those responsible... kill them, crush them, grind their bones to dust and sprinkle salt and vinegar on the remnant. And then set fire to them. Although not necessarily in that order.

Naturally, none of that went through his mind, exactly. But it was his intention. He barely noticed the sickening crack as he snapped the human's neck like a twig breaking amidst a hurricane-

Ax-randiri Rihad rarely remembered his dreams.

And so, when he woke up with a startled gasp - at least, he hoped that's what it was, for it would be undignified to wake up screaming - and a full memory of the night's dream, he was somewhat aware of the unusual nature of the dream.

And so he rushed to his terminal... and pecked at the keyboard with rapidly flying fingers, desperate to record the dream before it slipped away; he felt it was imperative...

...but he was less than halfway through releasing his jumbled thoughts to the screen when he, quite suddenly, lost the thread. He grunted with annoyance, settling back in his chair and running through what was left of his soft brown hair with slow-moving fingers...

He didn't know many foreign words, but he muttered one he felt most appropriate, when the dream failed to reform in his mind: it was gone.

Softly, "Merde."

[EDIT - Errors corrected in the last post. - Also, this serves as a -bump-, because, frankly, when you write a post of two thousand two hundred and twenty five words, you kinda want it read as it ought to be. ;)]

The captain of the Sirius waits in the lobby of the spaceport for someone to notice him. He carries several high-resolution photographs and maps of the galaxy, made during the ship's mission. He is inder the impression that he will be granted an audience with the Ma-tek government.

The captain of the Sirius waits in the lobby of the spaceport for someone to notice him. He carries several high-resolution photographs and maps of the galaxy, made during the ship's mission. He is inder the impression that he will be granted an audience with the Ma-tek government.

[OOC: A BUMP, and also an apology to LRR: Sorry. When I last looked at this thread, it said you had posted, but I couldn't actually read your post. I'll respond to your last post when I post the next part of this tomorrow. :)]

[bump for actual later addition - writing still]

His heart screaming in his chest, begging for mercy, his feet pounded the corridor - the echo a counterpoint to the shouts of the crew as they discovered the mangled body. The Nenyan had barely come back to himself, but he was driving on, on to safety, wherever he could find it. Except... he had no idea where he was going. But that thought did not distract him; he would find where he had to be, and when he found it, why, there he was. Wherever you go, there you are.

So he raced on, and when he stumbled through the massive metal door into the fighterbay - dispatching the two guards without really being aware of it, although he did not kill them - he was barely aware of his surroundings. He scrambled into a ship, sighed when he saw the neural interlink cable, and plugged in.

He was immersed in the ship, but it was not like his Lover. Nothing ever would be, he was sure. Nothing could be. He trembled, and the figher lifted into the air slightly, trembling with the conflicting signals that his firing synapses shot into the computer system. The trembling subsided - for both the Nenyan and his figher - and with a wracking sob, unaware of his body's seemingly automatic responses to the strange stimulus it had been receiving over the past few... hours? days? weeks? years?

How did one measure the eternity of time that passed when one lost one's Lover? A single moment could last forever...

Or, at least, seem to. The fighterbay was quite suddenly full of guards, all of them scrambling to gain firing positions-

And with a sickening screech of smashing metal, the fighter let rip against the fighterbay doors. They yielded with all the resistance of butter to a fist; the fighter arced through, out, and into space-


* * *

He drifted for some time. He was not entirely sure when he had come to his senses, exactly, but he did not believe it had been more than a few hours. He wasn't hungry yet, and he thought this was a clue. He knew that he ought to be going somewhere, but... he didn't know where. His home was gone, now, lost forever. A phrase returned to him, from an almost forgotten youth: Home is where the heart is. A face took form in his mind's eye, wispy and hard to grasp; his recognition was slow, but he focused on that face - a woman, a woman who had meant the world to him...

"Mother?"

Yes, she was his mother. He remembered now. It was what seemed a lifetime ago; she had said that to him, she had said it to him every time he had come home from the training school, when he had smiled that beaming smile she had told him she adored a thousand times-

And his father would sweep him up in his arms, and the little boy would say, "I'm glad to be home." And his mother would tell him that home was where the heart is-

Oh, how he wanted to call across the parsecs! Calling out, You were right, mum! It really is!

But not that home. His home had been with his Lover, within their little coccoon of a world; shut off from the cold hard reality of the universe, with only their own warmth for company and - oh, what joyous days they had been! It broke his heart just to think of it.

And so he drifted, engines killed, reactor lukewarm. He watched the stars, squeezed his eyes tightly shut, took out his Lover's image and gazed at it and gazed at it, begging to never forget, saying out loud, "I will never forget, I will never forget." Yet she was already ragged at the edges, blurry, difficult to see-

Grief was no doubt not aiding his memory, but the inability to focus on her face all but destroyed any self control that remained, and he broke into wracking sobs.

And so he drifted, sobbing to the stars that speckled the heavens surround; numerous as dust, beautiful beyond measure.

Esperallya awoke from a tumultous rest period, having tossed and turned and sweated her way through the night. Tangled and knotted in silken sheets, she broke a longstanding habit and swore all the way to the bathroom. She continued to swear, softly, vehemently, even as she brushed her teeth.

Then, entering silence as she left the bathroom, she ate.

The food tasted awful, like the sound of sandpaper on metal; she ground her teeth and swallowed what she could, but her apetite was clearly elsewhere. Not bothering to dress (what was the point?), she wandered over to her terminal, ignoring a bout of anger that threatened to bubble forth at the mere sight of the Imperial Sigil, and began looking over the daily deeds that were to be done.

The day passed swiftly; minute to minute, hour to hour; she was not present, she was absent. She found time skipping past her; she glanced at the chronometer one moment, and then glanced back what seemed to be just a few minutes later - and three hours would pass! Curious, curious indeed.

And then the days turned to weeks, the weeks to months; the world wheeled past her, and she all along was apart from it, observing it, striving to find sense in the senseless and the rational in the irrational - but no epithany was forthcoming, and her looked-for futures lied in tatters and rags around tear-stained feet.

Well, that was grandiose, she noted to herself - but she felt that way, even if her own mind put a gloss on it that was all too dull.

And then six months had passed, and she had still not performed the Purge that the Emperor had ordered. She could not.

And so, really, the two heavily armed and armoured stoic IPG officers in her living room when she returned from watching a gorgeous sunset that she simply could not concentrate on were not a surprise. She sighed, and barely heard them as they spoke; she waited for the deathblow, as it were, for disobeying the orders of the Emperor. Actually, the death penalty was illegal - but rumours about the IPG had always been rather on the negative side - all the way back into the murky mists of antiquity. Who knew what they would do, what they were capable of?

So she nodded attentively, anxious, trying not to show her anxiety...

And then they left. She was left blinking in surprise, and, when the Emperor entered, she tried not to show her shock. She curtsied, clumsily, despite the fact that such a movement was a archaic and outmoded gesture. It seemd right.

"So," the Emperor said softly, tone deadly, like black ice beneath a tire, "you chose to ignore my request."

"I did," she murmoured, eyes floorbound, demurely.

"And you stand in my presence without clothes, despite the orders of my guards. Do you ask me to imprison you, child?"

Her head rose defiantly; she had forgotten that she had not seen the need to dress earlier that day - she was used to being alone here, in these quarters and her garden, that she had not even realised when the guards had entered. For a moment, she marvelled at their politeness: they had neither stared nor brought overt attention to her nudity, except to inform her that she had better dress before...

The Emperor was to visit. The words became clear in her mind as she remembered them; she had been paying attention, from some distant place in the back of her mind: yet she had not heard the words then. Not really. It was pointless to explain, she knew, and the Emperor - unattached, like many of his predecessors, with no wife or permanent romantic attachments but at least a dozen concubines at any one time - could well misunderstand her nudity: she sincerely hoped he did not believe she was attempting to offer services other than those of her official post.

"I am in my home, Sire, and rarely see fit to wear clothes," she strived to explain, but no further words made themselves clear to her, and she bowed her head, hoping no misunderstanding would take place. To seem to offer oneself to the Emperor, and then to reject him, would most surely cost her dearly - if it came to that. For a moment, just a moment, she toyed with the idea of offering herself actively - just to avoid punishment.

At the very thought, her inner strength returned: she was not but a possession or object!

"And in my home, I do as I see fit," she added with a defiant stare, right in the man's eyes. She had not thought of the Emperor as a man previously, really, she dimly realized - only as the Emperor. As the Empire itself.

But to her astonishment, he cast a glance towards the entrance to her abode, then cast off the robe of his office - a big, heavy, officious thing - and proceeded to sit on her couch.

She stared, unable to comprehend this departure from protocol - for her to omit critical social graces was one thing, but for the Emperor?

"You, like the others, misunderstand, my dear. You have done exceedingly well to reject my command: others, who have received likewise illegal orders, have not done so well. This is why we are destined for doom," he informed her, with a face as heavy as the ancient Calandan Pit; it was clear that his mood was as dark as that most deadly and dangerous of charted near-static quantum singularities. "You of all people know our heritage," he stated softly, his eyes glued to hers.

She respected that his eyes did not drift; she had a rather stunning body, she knew, from much time spent hard at work making it thus. She was sculpted, toned, and proud of being such: body and mind were equally important... both, not one or the other, should be honed.

She founder herself wondering what it would have been like for her ancestors, when her species had possessed psionic abilities. To be able to understand the emotions of others, to not need this rigid social protocol to prevent lies and deceits-

We have become too Human, she thought sadly.

"The Humans have polluted our ways," the Emperor was saying slowly, bizarrely echoing her thoughts, "but we are to blame, and not they, for the stilting of our culture."

"We stretch our hand to a sky full of stars," Esperallya protested weakly, although she did not know why she was supporting the Empire she was coming to despair of.

"Oh, yes," the Emperor replied, frowning, "that is most definitely true, but what do we do? Where are we going? What have we to look forwards to? We have conquered all we can see; we cannot reach the closest galaxies to us, for we do not have the will to reach them. We are dying the slowest, most painful death imaginable: we are dying from the imagination, the spirit, outwards. - Esperallya," his voice became urgent, and he rose to stride to her, his hand reaching out to take her chin and hold it firmly, so she could not avert her eyes, "you of all know I speak the truth. I do not come here to hide behind titles or regulations or social protocols or interpersonal traditions. I come here for answers."

She stared at him. "How can I provide them," she whispered, caught by the steel in those vivid amber eyes, eyes that saw so deeply and vividly that she feared he could see right into her cold, dead heart, a heart unmoved by passion or feeling beyond grief or distress or negativity in so many long, cold years that it beat only to keen, only to mourn the Empire she loved but could see was falling apart-

He did not remove his gaze from hers yet, but he did remove his hand, apparently confident she would not look away. Only her strong desire to prevent herself from failing in the face of the Emperor-who-would-be-a-man - who she had newfound respect for. She had not respected a person of status before; it was a new flavour to her senses.

He stared at her, as if searching her very face for answers, but again his eyes did not stray. She couldn't help wondering fleetingly if he was gay - but the known existance of his concubines seemed to nix that possibility. She further tried not to - perversely - be insulted by his lack of attention to her nudity; she did not wish to be stared at, but the least the man could do was notice!

"I do not know yet," he answered quietly, still staring at her in that intense way that he had, "but the answers are in our history; of that I am sure."

It had been many days since he had gone to Esperallya, to announce the truth. She had been devoting her time to study, he knew, but a part of him much desired to see her again; he reminded her so very much of her. He had not seen his true flame for so many years now, since the Last Expedition, that he feared she had been lost out on the Rim whence she had remained to continue her explorations. That had been fifty years earlier; before he had ascended to the throne for the seventh time in his life.

Semir-randil was his true name, his name of power, and now he was so old as to be weary at last. His days stretched out behind him as the stars stretched out now before him, as numerous and plentiful as the dust upon the old oak table in his spare room, back in his true home. He had not visited that place for so many long years, now, and his visits to Earth had been less frequent as the years went by; Earth had diminished into unimportance in the face of a galaxy of sentients, despite the fact that the fire that forged the Galactic Sentient Empire had burned most brightly there - and first.

Rialla was she who he missed most greatly. She who had borne him children - not a child, but many: nine in all, over fifty years. She had been blessed to a degree that no Nenyan woman ever had; he had been blessed by her to a degree that no Nenyan man ever had.

And he alone, of all those who had been born to this universe of his kind, could say that with certainty.

He fiddled with the stylus he had been presented with in his youth by his father; it was perhaps the oldest surviving relic of an ancient Nenyan society that had vanished millenia before - it was utterly priceless to any museum, but it was more than priceless to Semir. This had been given him for his victories in the Games, in The Nest. His prowess with a sword had never been matched by the prowess of his intellect, but the stylus served as a reminder to his father's words: "Time brings wisdom even to the greatest of fools, if he but listens to the words the world whispers tenderly in his ear."

Semir was not a particuarly sentimental man, and so he did not call back across the years; it was fruitless, pointless. It did not occur to him, indeed, but he was sentimental enough to heave a small sigh.

The robes of office were heavier this time than any time previous; he had ascended seven times before, and seven times before he had steered the galaxy down a new path - a path that staved off its destruction for just a little while longer. Destruction was too strong a word, perhaps, but the never-ending struggle against the forces of atrophy - the only truly universal social constant - was forever lost. There could be no true victory-

Only eventual defeat. It was awareness of this that drove him: if there were to be a defeat, it would not be while he lived. Being one of the last mentalically gifted in a galaxy of normals made things very easy for an adept omnipath - the term used to describe one with all three proven, real talents: so-called telepathy, empathy, and that which had always been rarest - telekinetic ability. Semir had all three talents, but each in different quantities. He was a weak telepath, a powerful empath, and a minor telekinetic.

He let go the pen, held it in place for a moment with his mind, then let it drop slowly to the desk. Even such a small act could be tiring - and it was, for he had not eaten in at least twenty-two hours. He had been too busy examining his own records, here in this secret place, to notice the passage of time. It was no big deal: if he didn't eat for a while, he had discovered, his body didn't really notice at all, eventually. Nor did he get more tired - eventually. At first, he felt awful: like now. He suspected that his telekinetic ability was somehow responsible for this lack of need to eat - perhaps he absorbed energy from some other source, electrical or...

He had absolutely no idea, and the distraction served only to remind him that strawberries would be an exceptionally tasty treat right now. Of course, the only place he would get strawberries would be back on the capital - the nearest place, at any rate - and he wasn't about to head back yet. He wasn't finished here.

He had been searching for a particular myth; he could not verify its validity, for he had not been 'on-net' at the time - he had been withdrawn with Rialla and a small colonial group on a planet out near the Rim when the events the myth described woudl have occurred. He read the words, which, according to the abstract had been collected from a faded flexisheet during an excavation on Earth, familiar to his eyes as being written in proper High Nenyan - the old form, not the new, bastardized version:

And unto the place they came whence they discovered that which they had searched for. It was green and pleasant, the world upon which their feet did tread, but a hidden woe it obscured with its paradisical trimmings and coverings.

Hidden beneath this veneer of pleasant harmony they discovered The Stone at-

And that was it. Something about The Stone - and there was only one stone that merited capitalization to a Nenyan of that time. But Semir knew that the Stone had been found thousands of years previous, and discovered to be worthless; the Stone of Nenya had, therefore, either been fraudlent fake...

Or this other Stone was.

Or they were different entirely.

There was, of course, also the possibility that this myth was referring to the discovery; but the wording implied that it had been discovered on some other planet. This did not entirely make sense to Semir, but he did know that the Stone had been sold off to an antiques dealer by the Tek/Turath University when it had been discovered to be nothing more than shaped granite. It was a curious story, but Semir could not quite recall how that had happened-

He poured over the network of postulations and possibilities offered up by sociologists and historians studying the myth down the years; their offerings seemed dim, poorly constructed - and more and more so as the years passed, reinforcing Semir's knowledge that the Galactic Sentient Empire was fading faster and faster.

His eyes began to droop, to grow heavy-

And Semir-randil, High King of Ma-Nenya, of the Illuvauromeni Commonality of Everlasting Light, awoke with a jolt in his bed, with the oddest feeling - for the second time, he recalled.

He carefully peered at Rialla, who was sleeping, and resisted the urge to kiss her exposed neck - it was so very kissable - and padded to the window to look out over the Palace grounds.

The Moon was full tonight, His light bright and vibrant. Semir was already forgetting the dream that had a sense of vital importance, but he ignored the sensation and concentrated on the sounds of the wind in the trees, the way the Moonlight caught the lake, Aelinenya, in the distance; he knew that the dream was important...

And so he knew - or at the least, believed very strongly that he would remember, when the time was right.

Content with knowledge that comes with several thousand years experience with annoying dreams that flitter away upon consciousness only to return to memory later in the day (month, year, century, whatever), Semir slipped back into bed and drifted into a comfortable, relatively dreamless sleep...

[OOC: Hello, lovely readers. I hope you're enjoying so far - but but but, all is about to change!

If you wish to take part, then please do so. Here's the stipulations:

1. All content has to include at least one dream (indicated by text entirely in italics [or bold, if you really prefer that], and seperated from waking time with '* * *' and a return to normal type).
2. That dream must be set in the far-future, with your nation playing the key role in that future. Generally speaking, we're looking for galactic-wide Empire/Republic/Federation/whatever type scenarios - these dreams will be revealed to be something quite interesting later, but it's nothing that's going to harm your leaders or your nation.
3. The dreams have to be dreamt by high-ranking government officials or your leader(s).
4. The dreamer does not remember the dream upon waking: they have a dim awareness that they have dreamed, but this needs to fade quickly, for now. Later on, our dreamers will begin to remember more, and will start to glimpse the ones inspiring the dreams... but not yet. :)
5. The dreams must share one common thread: the Sentient >whatever< of the Galaxy is on the verge of collapse from what appears to be sheer boredom. Unable to expand any further, Sentientkind (meaning any Sentients whatsoever in this Galaxy of the dream-future) is stagnating, and a Fall is 'imminent' (relatively speaking), or perhaps even on-going.

If you have any questions, feel free to TG me with them. :)

Interested? Then please join in! :D]

OOC: Tag 'cos I'm an Asimov fan.

OOC: Tag 'cos I'm an Asimov fan.

[OOC: Heh. Yep, this is a tribute to Asimov, sortof - although I failed to realize where I'd gotten the title from for a while...

And you'll see that it's REALLY an Asimov tribute when...

Well, I won't give away the plot. :x]

(OOC: Mmm. My friend, you always seem to have such -creative- ideas. My own random writings tend to lean towards the time -before- my nation was founded. I never really considered an arc set in the future. Ingenious. Inspiration Strikes.)



The Chamber of the Grand Council of the Supremacy was a decidedly breathtaking sight. A massive blue-tinted crystalline sphere, large enough to hold representatives from each sector of the galaxy-spanning Supremacy. It was quite symbolic, everybody knew that.

It symbolized different things to different people: Stability, Peace, Friendship, Loyalty...

But to the man who had given it reason to be built, it was a constant reminder of his failure. And now, that structure would finally punish him for that failure.

He stood erect, his back straight. Quicksilver eyes shining defiantly as he stared down the newly elected 'Grand Chancellor.' A man by the name of Terrance Wister. Irony.

He did not move before the haughty, arrogant gaze of that man, and that was not due to the chains and other restraints that bound him hand and foot.

"Kazri Kavelis," the man said with a sneer, "You stand charged before this august body of Treason." Terrance Wister waited for a few moments before continuing, as if anybody could be surprised enough to require that period of time to allow the shock to sink in...

"We know of your crimes, and the people know of your crimes. Die."

The executioner stepped forward, holding his massive greatsword clumsily. The black masked man swung, his blade bit, and caught. He struggled with the sword, as blood squirted from the severed arteries of the chained individual.

The condemned man, mortally wounded but still aware, looked out upon the world with dying eyes. He watched, as She stepped out in front of him, aligned her pistol between his eyes...and...


The Changer awoke screaming. Dysaryn Levan Blackstar-Stark, Warprince of the Revenia, shot to conciousness, his powerful, muscular body slick with sweat, matted silver-blonde hair clingng to the back of his neck. His heart was racing, and the covers stuck to his body as he gingerly attempted to move.

He heard footsteps in the hall outside his room, and the door burst open. First through that door was Owen Stark. The unbelievably lethal commander of the Blood Guard wore only a pair of compression shorts, and yet, his Warblade was naked in his right hand.

Tying for second through that door was the Blood Guard sentry who stood guard in the hallway outside his door, and Lady Alicia Stark.

"Dysaryn/Dys/M'lord, are you alright?" Three individuals spoke in unison, with slight alteration of the forms of address.

Dysaryn nodded, slowly. "Just a nightmare."

The two men nodded, and returned to their posts. Allie, on the other hand, crossed the room to slide into the bed next to him. Normally, he would have been decidedly displeased. At the moment, however, he was decidedly not normal.

She pressed against him, and though he did not find her presence particularly reassuring, he was not repulsed by it, either.

She looked at his face, not meeting his eyes. This was merely a safety precaution, it was simply so easy to lose oneself in those quicksilver depths...

"What was it about?"

And at that exact instant, memory of the dream fled him.

"Nothing important," was his answer. Perhaps it wasn't, but he didn't believe that for an instant.

Couldn't believe that.

(OOC: Short. But I'm assuming that you wouldn't have any problems with me building up to an eventual realization. Will go into more depth with the next post. Promise.)

And still our dreamers dream. Far from Earth, far even from Mars, in terms that Humanity has understood for millennia, lay a man who would be king - or Emperor, rather - but who had somehow been denied that task in life.

And did not care.

He dreamed...

And perhaps not entirely of the same time as the others. Perhaps, it could be, that his thoughts lingered a little further on, and a little deeper in...

Darivia was a small world.

It was not small in the sense that it was lacking in landmass; nor was it small in the sense that it was not populous. It had both in abundance, as well as large, fertile oceans, and abundant wildlife.

Neither was it economically small, or, truth be acknowledged, militarily weak - it was, in fact, stupendously rich, and equally powerful.

Nor was it slight in stature in the eye of the public - far from it. But it was a small world in that it had no cities; no large gatherings of people; or, rather, no cities in the typical sense.

It did indeed have cities, however. Massively vast sprawling things - but empty, dead, cold, barren. Lifeless. Only the great Machines did their work here - except when people came to fix them - and the 'streets' (in fact just the gaps between buildings, sterilized carefully to allow machinery to hover on through said gaps) were quiet and dark at night.

Wanar Xibeg sported a scowl as he crouched low beside the manufactory; it was cold, dark, and damp. Damp because he had managed to spill cold coffee all over himself earlier; dark because it was night; cold because... well, that was obvious.

Wanar's first name was not unusual, at least; but Xibeg (with the X, of course, pronounced as a Z, even though some continued, regardless, to pronounce it as a G - the reason for which was a complete mystery to Wanar), his chosen name - chosen by himself - was distinctly so. Most chose something rather more ordinary, or reminiscent of Earth, like 'Smith', or 'Sequoia', but as the concept of family was rather different here on Darivia, the names had no real meaning beyond style. Fashionable names came, fashionable names went.

Xibeg was not a fashionable name. Actually, Wanar mused, he'd never met anyone with anything even remotely similar for a last name - but that was the appeal.

The scowl, now we return to it, is somewhat more lengthy to explain than the dark, cold, and damp parts; Xibeg, naturally, had no business being in the city in the first place.

Only criminals came here, especially at night, as the technicians only visited twice or three times a year - most of their work was verification, as well as teaching the new technicians how to operate the machinery properly, as well as fix it. The teaching hall, in fact, was only a couple of miles away from Xibeg, but it was locked and had nothing of value stored inside anyway...

A thief. But not just a thief. Xibeg was a -good- thief - of the old school of thieves, the honourable ones. He shook his head sadly - the end of the Guild had meant the end of such concepts. Now he was to steal for personal gain - something which was distasteful at least - and although he could cover that distaste with the fact that he did -need- the funds, he still felt a little twist in his gut. He would have cursed out loud, but he wasn't the only one who took advantage of the silence of the cities to do unsavoury work - most of the others who did (who he had never encountered at close range) were far less pleasant than he.

Far less pleasant.

But he cursed inside, cursed the name of the Royal Family of the Sphere of the Nine Principalities until he ran out of oaths and curses to fling at them. It was their fault - the Crown Prince of the day, specifically, who was the selfsame Archibald IV who now sat on the High Throne. There was no actual sitting involved, of course, at least not on what would be called an actual throne - only peasantry on backwater worlds were foolish to believe there even -was- a throne, beyond the figurative - but the metaphor held. Barely.

Xibeg grunted, then wished he hadn't. But then, he was always grunting. It was why his Guild dues had been so high. He had just cured himself of the habit when-

A moan. Stars, he was out of practice, to be making such a racket! Except, of course, he wasn't. He frowned. If he hadn't...

"Say," a voice whispered feebly, "how long have you been there?"

"About an hour," Xibeg answered truthfully. Inwardly, he kicked himself. Why own up to existance at all?

(A question he asked himself most often on Firstday mornings, which tended to result in groaning, cutting himself shaving [still possible - there had been an outcry when the razor industry had eradicated that difficulty from the process: sonic razors had been outlawed pretty quickly], and a kick to the lift computer at his office. It usually objected, strenuously, until he realized that there was a switch to turn off the damned voice. -That- had been satisfying, the first time...)

But naturally it was done now. Xibeg existed, with all the benefits and dangers inherant to that particular status. The voice didn't seem to care one way or another.

"Wasn't talking to you," it remarked, not seeming to care one way or the other.

It was at this point that Xibeg noticed something rather odd about the voice. Firstly, it was feeble. That was odd in itself. Nobody had faulty vocal equipment in this day and age - even the woefully poor could afford cosmetic vocal enhancement. Cosmetic surgery was dirt cheap, mostly because the research level in earlier centuries had been so high that it was an entirely 'resolved' science. Not that that stopped many women on certain worlds buying face cream by the ton, of course. Face cream was a collectable item, after all. A symbol of the lack of need to use cosmetic surgery - obviously.

It was also odd that the voice appeared to lack a body. Usually, this was the sort of thing that one would notice immediately, but in the dark, and with the shock of realizing he had been being observed for some time already, we must allow for the fact that Xibeg was not exactly at his best. Still, given time to recover-

He blinked. "Aren't you, well, uh, a bit small?"

Even he had no idea what made him say it. Still, it made a sort of sense.

"Well!" the voice huffed, not impressed. "Small, is it?"

"We prefer the term spatially challenged," another voice put in.

By now, one might safely presume Xibeg was utterly bemused. So his stuttering will be passed over, with no further ado. No, we shall not dwell.

Xibeg stuttered with confusion.

"Well! Clumsy big things, aren't they?" The third voice was distinctly feminine.

"Uhm," Xibeg noted, quite logically.

"We really should let him think," the second voice suggested. The others agreed readily.

Xibeg stuttered some more. "W-w..wha..."

"Not very intelligent, are they?"

"Doesn't seem like."

"Maybe we should find another?"

"Could be better ones out-"

"You're in my ear!" Xibeg's sudden exclamation caught everyone off-guard - including several local beasties similar to moths while of course being utterly different, who keened in ultrasound with alarm, and dove away from their hiding place on the wall next to him.

There was silence for a moment. Then, First Voice - "Gosh, he's not that clever, is he?"

"Now wait a moment," Xibeg began. He only began because he didn't finish, really, because the Second Voice interrupted. "Yes, we're in your ear," it droned, irritably. "We're spatially challenged, in your ear, and talking to you, mmkay?"

Xibeg promptly passed out.

* * *

Despite the general temptation of the universe to move people while they're sleeping - a phenomenon discovered and fully catalogued by the Delari of Eridani Epsilon 5 millennia ago, although unknown to humans primarily because the universe tends to play with the Delari in retribution ever since - Xibeg did wake up right where he passed out. Gingerly, he poked his ear.

Nothing. He poked his other ear.

Nothing still.

With deep meaning and sentiment, and great intellectualism, he grunted.

"Smart, isn't he?"

He groaned. "You're still there."

"Of course," came the swift answer, "but now it's just me. The others had a terrible time getting down, you know. You should trim in here. We've been trapped for days. Only the fall dislodged some hair, and we got free. But I thought I should explain a bit. You're quite mad, you see. Quite, quite mad."

Xibeg blinked. He'd heard of this sort of thing. The cities were haunted, it was rumoured - amongst the old womenfolk, who had nothing better to whisper about. So his friends had said, back in his exceedingly tiny, insular home village, all those years ago. But he knew better. Darivian Madness was quite real, although there hadn't been a case since-

"Bollocks," he retorted, sensibly, if not in a fashion one could say was utilizing the full scope of his vocabulary.

One might mistakenly believe that Xibeg was, in fact, quite clever, and had deduced the reality of the situation from some small clue - some hint, some subtle guiding word or -something- that had tipped him off.

Unfortunately that same one would be wrong. In fact, he'd decided he wasn't mad purely on the following reasoning: if he, Xibeg, had gone stark raving bonkers on the eve of his greatest triumph, which would lift him off of this ludicrously crazy rock and into the big wide galaxy beyond, where riches awaited a skilful thief such as himself, and had thus lost his chance to escape, he would be indeed very angry.

In order to understand the next part of the reasoning, it must also be known that Xibeg is not prone to anger, and perhaps even avoids the emotion whenever possible. Not exactly timid, but not at all brave with it, Xibeg prefers the quietly comfortable life of a thief constantly in peril but never required to actually do anything about it beyond run away.

Therefore, he refused to be angry. By refusing to be angry, it therefore followed that he had nothing to be angry about.

Ergo, he wasn't insane.

"Are you going to support your statement with evidence?"

The voice was a lawyer?

"No," Xibeg decided. Silence.

"Oh," came the voice.

Really, at this point, there wasn't very much to say. An uncomfortable silence developed, into which was inserted a small cough on the part of Xibeg, and a grunt from the... eardweller. The one tended to lead to the other, and the silence shattered: "Damnit, keep still."

"No," Xibeg decided, and proceeded to shake his head from side to side rather vigorously, no doubt intending to dislodge whatever it was that was proving to be such an annoyance. Naturally, the annoyance itself protested strenuously, and secured it's position by virtue of an ear hair. Tug.

"Yow!"

A fitful awakening - a message light blearing...

The Nenya shushed his dearly beloved, and clambered out of bed to investigate...