Ben Bova - Orion in the Dying Time

Lying in the blind darkness of my cell, waiting for Set to send me on my mission of murder, it seemed as if the heated stones beneath me were slowly cooling. The very air I breathed seemed not as hot as it had been moments before, as if my physical torment was being eased in reward for my capitulating to Set’s will.

I did not feel him in ray mind, yet I knew he must be there, watching, waiting, ready to control my body.

I felt a hollow sinking sensation within my chest, my belly. The floor seemed to be descending, very slowly at first, then faster and faster. Like an elevator plunging out of control. I sensed myself falling through the inky blackness, the stones beneath me growing colder as I descended.

Then came that wrenching moment of absolute cold, of nothingness, when all the dimensions of time and space seem to disappear. I hung suspended in nowhere, without form or feeling, in a limbo where time itself did not exist. A billion years could have passed, or a billionth of a second.

Brilliant golden radiance lanced through me like spears of molten metal. I squeezed my eyes shut and threw my hands over my face. Tears spurted down my cheeks.

I still could not see; first I had been blind from lack of light, now I was blinded by too much of it. I lay curled in a fetal position, head tucked down, arms across my face. Nothing stirred. Not a breeze, not a bird or a cricket or a rustling leaf. I listened to my own heart pulsing feebly in my ears. I began counting. Fifty beats. A hundred. A hundred fifty…

“Orion? Can it be you?”

Weakly I raised my head. The golden light was still blindingly bright. Squinting against the overpowering radiance, I saw the lean form of a man standing over me.

“Help me,” I pleaded in a hoarse whisper. “Help me.”

He hunkered down on his haunches beside me. Either my eyes began to adjust to the light or it somehow dimmed. My eyes stopped tearing. The world began to come into unblurred focus for me.

“How did you get here? And in such condition!”

Danger, I wanted to say. Every instinct in me wanted to scream out an alarm that would alert him and the other Creators. But my voice froze in my throat.

“Help me,” was all I could croak.

The man crouching beside me was the one I thought of as Hermes. Greyhound lean in body and limbs, his face was a set of narrow V ’s: pointed chin, slanting cheekbones, pointed hairline above a smooth forehead.

“Stay where you are,” he told me. “I’ll bring help.”

He vanished. As if he had been nothing more than an image on a screen, he simply disappeared from my sight.

Weakly I pushed myself up to a sitting position. I remembered this place from other existences. An expanse of unguessable extent, the ground covered with softly billowing mist, the sky above me a calm clear blue darkening at zenith enough to show a few scattered stars. Or were they stars? They did not twinkle at all in this silent, motionless world.

I had met the Golden One here many times. And Anya too. That is why Set had returned me to this spot. As I looked around now, it seemed artificial to me, like a stage setting or an elaborately constructed shrine meant to overawe ignorant visitors. A bogus representation of the Christian heaven, a bourgeois Valhalla. The kind of setting that the Assassins of old Persia would have used to convince their drug-dazed recruits that paradise awaited them—except that the old Assassins would have stocked the place with graceful dancing girls and beautiful houris.

I realized that I was seeing this place of the Creators through Set’s cynical mind. He was within me as truly as my own blood and brain. He had prevented me from crying out a warning to Hermes.

The air seemed to glow again, and I squeezed my eyes shut once more.

“Orion.”

Opening my eyes, I saw Hermes and two others with him: the grave, dark-bearded one I called Zeus, and a slender breathtakingly beautiful blonde woman of such sweetness and grace that she could only be Aphrodite. All three of the Creators were physically perfect, each in their own way. The men were in glittering metallic suits that fit their forms like second skins, from polished boot tops to high collars. Aphrodite wore a softly pleated robe of apricot pink, fastened at one shoulder by a golden clasp. Her arms and legs were bare, her skin flawless, glowing.

“Anya should be here,” she said.

“She is coming,” replied Zeus.

No! I wanted to shout. But I could not.

“The Golden One is on his way, also,” said Hermes.

Zeus nodded gravely.

“He’s in a bad way,” Aphrodite said. “Look at how emaciated he is! His skin seems burned, too.”

They stood solemnly inspecting me, their creature. They did not touch me. They did not try to help me to my feet or offer me food or even a cup of water.

A sphere of golden light appeared to one side of them, so bright that even the Creators stepped back slightly and shielded their eyes with upraised hands. The sphere hovered above the misty ground for a moment, shimmering, pulsating, then contracted and took on the form of a man.

The Golden One. I had served him as Ormazd, the god of light, in the long struggle against Ahriman and the Neanderthals. I had fought against him as Apollo, the champion of ancient Troy.

He was my creator. He had made me and, through me, the rest of the human race. And the human race, evolving through the millennia, had ultimately produced these godlike offspring who called themselves the Creators. They created us; we created them. The cycle was complete.

Except that now I was a weapon to be used against them. I would kill the Creators, and begin the destruction of the entire human race, through all spacetime, through all the universes, expunging my own kind from the continuum forever.

My creator stood before me, proud and imperious as ever. Golden radiance seemed to glow from within him. He was tall and wide of shoulder, dressed in a robe of dancing winking lights, as if clothed in fireflies. His unbearded face was broad and strong, eyes the tawny color of a lion, a rich mane of golden hair falling thickly to his shoulders.

I hated him. I adored him. I had served him through the ages. I had tried to kill him once.

“You were not summoned here, Orion.” His voice was the same rich tenor I remembered, a voice that could thrill a concert audience or a mob of fanatics, a voice tinged with taunting mockery.

“I… need help.”

“Obviously.” His tone was scornful, but I saw something more serious in his eyes.

“He seems to be injured,” said Aphrodite.

“How did he get here if you didn’t summon him?” asked Hermes.

Zeus’s eyes narrowed. “You did not give him the power to translate through the continuum at will, did you?”

“Of course not,” the Golden One answered, irritated. Turning back to me, he demanded, “How did you get here, Orion? Where have you come from?”

Instantly I wanted to obey him. With instincts he himself had built within me, I wanted nothing more than to tell him everything I knew. Set. The Cretaceous. I spoke the words within my mind, but my tongue refused to form them. Set’s command over me was too strong. I simply stared at the Creators like a stupid ox, like a dog begging its master to show some love even if it failed to follow his commands.

“Something is definitely wrong here,” Zeus said.

The Golden One nodded. “Come with me, Orion.”

I tried, but could not get to my feet. I floundered there on that ridiculous cloud-covered surface like a baby too weak to stand erect.

Aphrodite said, “Well, help him!” Without taking a step toward me.

The Golden One snorted disdainfully. “You are in a bad way, my Hunter. I thought I had built you better than this.”