Zach Hughes - The Legend of Miaree

Bertt spoke to her in the language of the Artonuee, a mixture of thought and sound undetectable to the alien ears. He chose his words carefully, not using sounds which could have given any clue to his meaning. His words were old, old language, bringing with them a glow of pride. Even in defeat, Miaree saw, the Artonuee were great.

"It is time, Mother Miaree."

At first she thought that he was speaking personally, for his face was gaunt and strained. His physical movements were slow and tortured. For weeks he had seemed to live on will alone, long past his appointed time, far from the ravaged world of the ifflings.

But, no. Speaking now in Delanian, he said, "I require a measure of the field of the fleet. My flyer is based in Scout Bay Five. Board it. Remove yourself to a distance of—"

"Hold it," Argun said. "That can be done by a man."

"Can the eyes of a man see a magnetic field?" Bertt asked. He turned his back on the tall man. "When you are at the assigned point, we will communicate."

She looked toward Argun for confirmation. Her heart pounded. Although Bertt had not explained his reasons, she sensed that the time, the time he had promised, was near.

"We must hurry," he said. "Hurry, my daughter. I fail."

"Speak Delanian, damn you," Argun said.

Ignoring him, Bertt caught himself, lest he fall in weakness. "You will teach them, my Mother Miaree. You will return home."

"Stop that damned squeaking," Argun said angrily.

Miaree bowed respectfully toward the leader. "He is old, Lord. His mind rambles."

"Then move, bitch, before he dies on us," Argun ordered.

As she turned, her eyes flashed across his face. There was a coldness there. The coldness was ice in her heart. The flyer to be used for scouting was an old Bertt, Class VI, improved. Conversion had been so rapid that time had not allowed for removal of its sails. After it was expelled from the lock of the star ship it handled beautifully.

She had not been in a flyer, alone in space, for many years. Space was dark and warmer than the hearts of the Delanians. It was familiar. It was loved. With deft fingers she burned the fusion engine, took her position. She saw the fleet through the viewer, individual ships magnified to the size of her fingertips. The units of the fleet covered volumes of space, each squadron separated by a distance which once would have taken days to, travel. She activated her communication system.

"I am in position," she said.

It was Rei’s voice. "The old man is ill."

"God," breathed Miaree silently.

"Wait," Rei said. "I will hold the communicator to his mouth."

"Tell them," she heard in Artonuee. "Tell them." There were shuffling sounds, Bertt’s voice, weak, quavering, speaking Delanian now, "Hold me to the console."

"He is standing," Rei said.

"Expanding," Bertt mumbled. "Read, daughter."

With tears in her eyes, knowing his terrible pain, she read the field of the fleet, her eyes opening to see. She reported.

"Jump... one-tenth unit." He was speaking Artonuee.

She heard Argun’s harsh voice. "Now wait a minute," he said.

She jumped. She turned the flyer. The fleet was now distant, tiny in the viewer.

"Time." she heard the weak, tired voice say. "Tell—"

"He has fainted." Rei said. "What else did he want, Miaree?"

"I don’t know." she said. Was it, then, to end like this?

"He speaks." Rei said. "Wait."

"I cannot." Bertt said, his voice weak. "I fail, Mother."

"You cannot fail," she said, Her voice musical, sweet, in the native language. "Bertt, hear me. There is one thing to do. You alone know. Speak. Move, Bertt. Stand for one last time."

"I cannot, Lady. But the power is also yours. On the expander controls you will see. a switch."

"Bertt."

Silence.

"He is dead, Miaree."

"God rest," she said.

She was an old flyer hand. She had noted the switch. And the tiny symbol engraved on it, the ancient, religious symbol denoting God’s Fires. Hidden under an overhanging bank of controls, it would have defied a casual glance from any but Artonuee. And she had guessed.

She, too, had the power.

Before her, the fleet stretched, its squadrons ordered. Six billion beings

breathed and felt fears and knew hopes and enjoyed the love which was now denied her.

"Miaree, you may return. He is dead."

Rei’s voice.

Rei’s living voice, living after him.

The lag of long seconds as his voice came at light speed brought his last words to her just ahead of the birth of a thousand new stars in the velvet blackness of intergalactic space. Rei himself was gone before his words came to her, was nothing more than scattered particles before the fires blossomed.

The old male, knowing well the forces trapped within his cold plastic holes which led into a space not known to the universe, knowing the destructive forces of unopposed electrons in the millions of cubes of soft metal which were a vital part of all the fleet’s expanders, knowing all this, and knowing, too, his long, logical hatred, the old male had planned well. Unchanneled, the incredible forces of unopposed electrons had, with the touch of her finger on a tiny switch, returned sanity to a universe gone mad.

The vast explosions had imparted motion before total disintegration. The vectors were random, scattering the electrons of the fleet in a flaring pattern which moved away from the home galaxies in the direction of the expansion of the universe.

The released energies rushed out toward her distant flyer at sub-light speeds, giving her moments to watch in awe as the final construction of Bertt, the builder, avenged the Artonuee.

Yes, she would tell them. She would tell her people that they did not face doom in vain. She would tell them that their betrayal by those who had used love against them was avenged. She would say that the God of the Artonuee, although vengeful, was still God, allowing this one last gesture by Her doomed people. She would return to the ravaged planets and await, with her people, the Fires, knowing that the Delanians had howled themselves into oblivion before her.

Proud, straight in the control seat of the flyer, she watched the growing

bloom of fire. She allowed herself only one moment of sadness. In that moment she saw his face, as he had looked that first night on Outworld.

Rei.

But nothing had changed. God had promised Fire. The coming of the Delanians had not changed, had only seemed to alter the inevitable. The Artonuee had seen the coming of an alien race, had loved with its members, had hoped; and there were still the Fires.

Miaree, proud Artonuee female, sat with exposed wings, with straight back.

God was God and was triumphant.

But there remained one final moment before she went home, there to muse, to repent, to communicate with that silent, all-powerful God.

In the early days, an ancient sister Artonuee had flown in space, using the wings of a sun, committing the original sin and exulting in it.

In the moments of the last days, a large-eyed, beautiful, prideful Artonuee female once again defied God. There were no tears as she watched the spread of the paroxysm which, in the wink of an eye, destroyed a race. There was a selfish, very Artonueeistic glow of exuberant joy as the debris of a fleet and of six billion Delanians and one old, tired, dead male Artonuee swept out toward the Bertt flyer, sails set, waiting to ride the whirlwind of the most titanic storm since the birth of the universe.

Ahxender has prepared some figures for us, my young friends. Perhaps they will be of interest even to those among you who, according to my informants, are having difficulty in electronic theory. Although I, being merely a literature teacher, have difficulty comprehending the theory of electricity—for the life of me I don't understand how something can move without anything moving—Alaxender sports the highest marks in his classes and he assures me that there is small chance of error in his figures.