###
“You’ve done well Haronah is it absolutely certain that all them will leave en masse. How are those machines coming on?”
“Of course they will; they never travel separately. They’re very sociable. And by those machines Master Zill I gather you mean those decompression chambers their underwater divers used to have to use if they came up too quickly from a depth.”
Master Zill roared with laughter as Haronah explained the purpose of the machines, “So far not one person that has received treatment from these machines has complained of having the bends.”
Fevers and apparitions still appeared but with decreasing frequency. Then a period of forty- two days passed without any reports of new apparitions or ‘flu-like symptoms appearing. The Platyrrhines insisted that every person from infant to octogenarian have a blood test.”
Blood was taken and within an hour of the blood being taken that donor was fast asleep. A selected few fell into a trance like state unable to move and carry out tasks but all were neither asleep nor awake. If they carried out actions they did so without storing memory of those actions.
###
The Platyrrhines watched the ship start its rhythmic move with its usual small shudder and the whole contrivance gather speed at a rate that was almost unbelievable. It was an awe-inspiring sight. A line of living worlds with satellites circling like annoying insects.
First the nose cone, clad in shiny titanium protecting the gigantic workshops and factories. With a long line of magnetic debris attracted together as tow lines and supports for hundreds of neatly laid cables for both communications and power. Pipe lines for liquid gas, vaporized gas and water transmission lines that ran straight as an arrow and placed equidistant from each other marked with gaudy striped colour coding that indicated various specialised fuels.
Every thousand kilometres a landing platform allowed for personal transport to land.
###
Titan came next with a magnetic debris line laid out the same as the Uranian line and stretching halfway back to Mars. A huge pumping and freight construction was attached to the magnetic debris line which was screened with the densest magnetic screening ever undertaken. One static spark in the presence of the smallest amount of oxygen and Titan would cease to exist.
Just like on Earth there were places where only road transport could function so it was in space. Mars especially had many restricted areas where only restricted transport or security cleared transport could travel. Mars City had grown from a small village covered with a dome to a huge city protected by force fields that allowed rapid growth. Out on the plains small towns were springing up all over the place. Titan’s two satellites buzzed around it like a lonely pair of bees in a field with no flowers.
Last of all came Earth, blue and green and white and beautiful. Earth was the engine room driving the whole machine but in order to keep the Earth beautiful all machinery and unattractive constructions were hidden.
“Master Zill, there’s something wrong.”
“What’s wrong child?”
“We’re going the wrong way I programmed the Solarians to take it out through Lilander 21115 and into drive space.”
“I altered those instructions.”
“But why Master Zill? If they go in that direction, they won’t be able to avoid the Groomsbrige Black Hole.”
“Serve them right,” one of the Dark Robed figures exclaimed, “They came here looking to steal from us. They deserved what they got.”
Haronah rounded on him, “What would you do if you knew your world was about to be incinerated? Well they won’t have to worry about being burned alive now. They only have to worry about being crushed to death.” Haronah said bitterly.
“Stop it you two,” Zill snapped, “They won’t have to worry about being burned or crushed. Since when have we taken life of any sort as a frivolity?”
“That’s easy for you to say, Master Zill. You’re this side of the Black Hole.”
###
“I know something of this particular Black Hole, no matter what side of it I am on?”
The scientists pressed forward keen to hear what he had to say. Haronah you worry that I have sentenced the Solarians to death. Far from it, I have sentenced them to extended life.
“Haronah will you come with me into the black hole?” and Master Zill offered her his hand. Without hesitation she took it.
###
They swirled in a vortex spinning ever faster as the hole and the stem decreased in diameter. At last they were deposited gently onto solid ground, ground, different to any Haronah had ever seen. Stones and boulders with a surface that appeared smoothly polished influenced the soil to pastel gemstone colours hinted at in the presence of the all-pervading white light but it was the light that fascinated Haronah the most.
‘Master Zill why is the light so – so- white here? Its - it’s not fog or mist; it does not swirl. It’s like being caught in an Arctic white out with scarcely seen colour introduced. It’s beautiful.”
“What colour are the shadows?”
“My shadow is yellow, not very strong but yellow none the less. Why?”
“Well white light is made up of red, green and blue light for the most part but here the red light has been removed because of a filtering gas in the ionosphere. Without the red light, this world is cooler than ours but not as cool as it would be if the violet light were removed.”
If you look carefully you will see that this planet; this whole universe for that matter is lacking the same ingredient. It has all the correct ingredients for a beautiful world but is missing the one ingredient to make it a vibrant world, red light.”
“I don’t know if I could live in a world like this. It’s so boring.”
“You will live on this world but it will equal or exceed the world you know.”
“How can that be?”
“The Solarian’s Star-Ship will see to that.”
She looked at him quizzically, “How?”
“Watch,” and he pointed.
Far in the distance the Star-ship Solaria hung over the Planet, New Solaria. Even from this distance and with the naked eye the magnificence of its technology and the beauty of Earth was obvious. It floated like a ship upon water, a lethal creation unknown to other worlds.
“Nor will they ever see again,” The Master said to Haronah, “Such a vehicle must never again grace any dimension of the universe. It brings with it power that no life form should ever think of possessing.
We will decommission the ship and all the machinery, equipment and technology aboard her to a non-active atomic particle state.”
“But what of the people? You can’t just erase them, that’s murder. No worse; its genocide. Even more than genocide it is cold blooded slaughter on a scale never known,” Haronah was indignant.
“Child, you will have to stop thinking in the way you are or you will bring harm to this new dimension, this is your world now. The Grand Masters of Giclac have guarded it for millennia, awaiting your arrival. Entrance to this world is allowed only to a selected few.
You and the Governor will settle this world and it will be your duty to found a new race made up by mingling your genes with the governor’s genes. It will be a strong race and an intelligent race and a race that practises fairness and justice for all. That will be programmed into your children’s genetic code. Does that suit your high standards?”
“Don’t you think that is a little too much to place on the shoulders of only two people?” Feminie-like she changed the subject and the Master smiled at the thought of the Governor trying to keep up with this marvel of human-kind.
“No, because the two of you will live as the founders of a New World and a New People living on this planet only. If a time should come when you must face the ending of your world you will face it with fortitude. If you leave your world i
t means, that sooner or later you will have to steal someone else’s world and upset the status quo of the constellations, bringing war and pestilence, hatred and death.”
“We come back to the question of all those on the star ship,” another subject change.
“The humans are already settled on other planets in the system, but humanoids will have to be sacrificed,” he could see she was visibly upset with that news.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because they are neither machine nor human and that is an abomination. In time, your descendants will learn how to build a complete serving machines. Now watch.”
“No wait! Does that mean that anyone with a prosthetic limb will be sacrificed?”
“Of course not; they came to life as complete humans and not hybrids, part laboratory grown human cells and part engineering workshop machinery. They have served their purpose and they understand that. No more questions watch and see what happens.”
He pointed a box with an exposed wand sticking out of it and pressed a button. “He turned to her. Whoever said we were without technology?”
For a while nothing happened. Then a rolling, twisting sound louder than thunder cracked into the atmosphere with a bright flash of lightning psychedelically bright infusing the landscape with its colours.
Haronah was awed she had never seen colours like that before. They spread across the white land and sky like an adjusting kaleidoscope and the sound rolled on for what seemed like forever finally fading into the distance. Haronah closed her eyes and blocked her ears for fear her eardrums would burst under the sustained sound.
The sound purged itself in colour, Green and blue and all the colours of the rainbow including red spread across the full spectrum of the sky and land. The daylight changed and became clean and clear. Behind the explosion everything changed; wondrous fluffy white clouds like cotton wool slotted into the magnificent sky.
Mountains and hills and forests and streams and fields and flowers and forests sprung out at her and across a green field the Governor ran calling her name as he ran.
She looked askance at the Master and he nodded with a smile. She started her run with her heart beating like a humming bird’s wings. The two of them fell into each other’s arms and kissed passionately. A great introduction to the New Solaria.
“My gift to you, Haronah A constellation and a universe for you to mould and shape and to create into a perfect world. Can you? Many have tried. Many have failed but I suspect you won’t,” the Master smiled to himself, his duty done, he breathed his last.
###
One hundred and thirty million light years away in a different dimension amidst a murky and fiery atmosphere the surface of the liquid hydro-chloric fluid broke into ripples and distorted the rugged mountain reflexions on Its surface. A large fat bellied fish with short stubby legs crawled out onto the muddy land and began grazing the blue algae that grew on the rocks. It paid no attention to the crashed star-ship nearby.
The ship lay with its nose pressed into the mud and its wide winged tail assembly high in the air. The skeleton inside the ship was dressed in fine swirling gossamer gowns.
The high dark sky was threaded with jet trails of comets and meteors, their brightness hiding the stars. One meteor the size of a South Pacific Isle changed direction and made straight for the crashed star-ship.
The contact released a huge force and when the flash of that massive release of energy died down a little glow started that quickly increased in size until it was the equivalent of the Solarian moon and began a fussionable action.
###
For many years’ astronomers tracked the light of the new star they named Jezebel. The queen of Israel whose story was one of intrigue, romance and ultimately the fall of a nation because she continued to worship Baal a nature god.
A new sun was born and one day new feet would tread new paths on new planets orbiting that sun. How different would life be when that time came?
###
EPILOGUE
He walked on two legs… And somewhere it was all happening again.
THE END
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Chris Round; a good man to have around computers. No pun intended)
I’ll never know how he managed to keep that old box of unrecognizable components, I called a computer working until I finished writing. Thanks Chris.
Trevor Herron
Especially for my: 6 children
10 Grand children
6 Great Grand Children
Please forgive me if I forget a birthday or anniversary it only means I’m getting old.
The Final Sunset Page 14
