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Vashar walked Norah out of the ballroom to her accommodations, trying his best along the way to ignore the stiffness under his leggings. The attempt did not meet with complete success, and once he had wished Norah a pleasant rest before dinner, he quickly returned to his private suite, stripped off his suit, and relieved himself of the pent-up feelings from the time he’d spent with Norah in the ballroom.
Overnight, the invited guests from other regions of Sarma and other planets continued to arrive, along with chosen members of the media covering the event. The newly enthroned King of Sarma and his new human consort, who were quickly becoming the talk of known space, caused a stir of their own when they arrived by royal floater with the king's guards attending them. The guests, after a formal reception in the dining hall, quickly filed into the ballroom, where most of the attendees filled the tiered seats and the king and consort were seated at the dais. Interspersed across the room and stationed at the portals were Sarmian warriors, fully armored and armed and ready for anything. The king's personal guard stood behind him and his consort at the dais. The anticipation in the air felt almost like the hum of the device itself.
Norah and Vashar joined the delegation of scientists from Sigma Cephei on stage to put the last part of the device in place, and Norah's thoughts turned back to the earlier part of the day. During the proceedings Norah had had a chance to talk with King Dantar and his bride-to-be, Gwendolyn Rush, an Earth woman not unlike herself. Each of them was a member of a scientific discipline. Gwendolyn was an archaeologist, and the story in general circulation—which she did not deny—had it that she had been abducted from an archaeological dig for Dantar to court her. He must have courted her very well indeed, for she had somehow consented, even after he'd had her kidnapped, to be his queen, and she had recently announced his support for her plans to build a new Sarmian University. Norah was especially intrigued to see that Gwendolyn was a woman of her own physical type, full and round of figure. It made her consider further what possibilities might exist for her with a hard and sinewy Sarmian man—perhaps even the one who had so graciously made her his personal guest. Throughout the little gala, Norah continually stole glances at Vashar while he entertained the king and the attending scientists, and had a couple of times found him casting a gaze in her direction. And her mind kept returning to their shared experience of touching the Shaper device.
After the requisite speeches from King Dantar and from Vashar about the significance of their find and the interstellar and cosmic importance of their reason for being here, Norah and the Cepheid scientists—tall, willowy, long-haired humanoid beings with coarse brown and almond-colored skin and eyes that were all jet-black with no whites—conferred about the final linkage of the remaining part of the device and the energy fluctuations that they detected from it and the other segments. The flux of energy in the segments curved higher with all four parts in the same place, as if they were all waiting to be united. After it was ascertained that the buildup was not dangerous, all that remained was the lifting and placement of the last piece.
In deference to the Cepheids, from whose planet the last piece came, Norah stood by and used her linker to monitor their work holographically while they levitated themselves up to fit the segment in place. With Vashar at her side and their distinguished audience watching in a nearly breathless hush, Norah observed the display of the molecules of the last piece knitting themselves together with the pieces to which it was joined. She called out everything that she saw, and her pulse quickened by the second. She had no doubt that everyone else in the amphitheatre was feeling the same way. When she found that the molecular bonding was complete, she and Vashar turned their gaze together to the completed circle of alien technology. Just as the Cepheids lowered themselves to the stage, the hum of the device ceased to be subtle. It rose steadily in volume until it was a rumbling, throbbing, pulsing bass that every being in the room could feel in its bones, cartilage, exoskeleton, protoplasm, or whatever structure its body possessed. Voices began to rise along with the hum. Beings cried out in surprise, fear, anxiety, dismay, even arousal. From the corners of her eyes, Norah saw the king's guards raising their weapons.
The rising hum reached a volume that made it the prevailing sound in the room and remained there. At the same time, the pulsing of light along the circuit patterns of the device became an ever-brightening glow, and its rhythm quickened. Norah remembered how it had seemed like a bloodstream of light, and now it seemed like the racing blood of a heart beating faster and faster. The dazzling shimmer poured out into the ballroom, making those with eyes squint and flinch and raise hands and appendages to cover their faces. The flowing light and the celestial humming became everything... until there was more.
Out of the alien mechanism poured a feeling. That was what it was; that was the only way to describe it. Where the pieces had given off a vibration and a glow, the entire unit now sent a mighty, massive feeling cascading out across everything and everyone. It registered physically as a balmy, tropical warmth, like summer sunshine beating down on exposed skin. But the warmth penetrated body and mind alike, filling all present with a sensation both physical emotional. If Norah were pressed to put it into words, she could only call it the feeling of something first curling up inside her head, then uncurling and spreading out like a blooming rose. Whatever it was, it made her feel suddenly breathless, excited, exhilarated, and almost drunk. It made her want to reach out and touch the nearest living thing. She instinctively held out a hand—which clasped at once with the strong, soft hand of Vashar that was also reaching for her.
Gasping in a wonder beyond expression, Norah turned from the glowing, humming device to the face of Vashar gazing at her, seeming to radiate back the same warmth that the machine was pouring into both of them. And amazingly, astonishingly, delightfully, she felt as if she were standing at the same time in her place and in his, and as if he were feeling the same. Suddenly, she was both herself and Vashar, and Vashar was both Norah and himself. There was no division between her being and his, no place where she left off and he began. There was no difference between them. They were one being, as if they had always been and would always be so.
In this moment of one-ness, there was total understanding. Every joy, sorrow, fear, love, hope, and pain of one was known to the other. Vashar knew what it was to be Norah, to be so curious about the workings of the universe and so fascinated by the mechanisms that enabled humans to harness and command nature that she would make it the calling of her life. Norah knew what it was to be Vashar, a warrior in spirit, yet called to lead not in battle and conquest but in the making of laws, which was a kind of warfare all its own. She discovered the pride that he took in a newly drafted proposition, hammered out in hours and days of debate, and in presenting it to the king to be made law. The power of the device glowing and humming near them made it possible for Norah and Vashar each to live the life of the other, just by holding hands.
The feeling was so wondrous, so amazing, so transcendent, that neither of them wanted it to end. But slowly it faded, as did the hum and glow of the alien machine. With a dream-like feeling, the engineer from Earth and the Lord of Sarma let their hands slowly slip apart. Even as they did, a chorus of voices human and alien welled up in the ballroom as a reaction to... something. As if coming out of an intoxication, Norah and Vashar looked from each other to the machine and were as dumbfounded at what they saw there as they had been awestruck at what the finished machine first did.
What had been the inner, empty space of the circle was now filled--with an image, like a hologram. It was a picture of a planet, its surface studded and patterned with trails of light like the glowing circuits of the machine. The planet sat in space, amid the stars—until in a sudden, shocking moment, its circumference glowed like the corona of an eclipsed star. Cruel and terrible bursts of redness erupted up and down the face of the planet, spilling red light like blood over the surface. In their wake, the planet, once ripp
ling with light and life, turned grey and black and cold.
Gasps and murmurs filled the room, with all eyes fixed on a sight that none had ever before witnessed, an entire world caught in the moment of its death. It seemed almost a mercy when the image of the planet's grey and smoldering corpse disappeared, and another shimmered into view where it had been.
The face of a being, unlike anything that anyone in the room had ever seen, now sat in the circle like a reflection in a mirror. The being had three dark eyes and shiny, rust-colored skin with a ridged, grooved texture. Its voice had an undertone like an electrically powered flute or saxophone. It stared out from across space and time and spoke: "Your thoughts give us the name 'Shapers.' That is how you know us—or how some of you may know us again."
The murmur persisted and the air retained a nervous charge. Stepping away from the stage and back down in front, Norah could swear that the questions on everyone's lips were swirling around her like living things. Is this really a Shaper? Are they still alive somewhere? Will they return? Are they more powerful than we are? Will they demand something of us? What do they want? Will they expect to become our masters?
Norah reached a position where she could almost look the Shaper's image right in its shiny, coal-like eyes, and it continued. "The psychic intrusion that you experienced was our machine teaching itself to communicate with you. Each of you now hears this in your own language. Our species was very old, and with age should come maturity and wisdom. Yet we deemed ourselves more wise than we truly were. We thought ourselves the masters of the galaxy. We saw the galaxy and the other life within it as our possessions to treat as we saw fit. We even intervened in evolution itself, transforming species to serve our purposes. Some of you may be the result of our tampering with other life. In our arrogance we made you what we wished you to be. It is our hope that you found your own way after we destroyed ourselves. Civilizations fall when they make one single obsession their reason for being. For some it is greed, for others superstition or fear. Our obsession was power."
There was a swelling of the murmurs in the room, and the image of the Shaper paused as if it knew there would be. Her eyes still riveted on the visage from eons gone by, Norah could make out the voice of Vashar from up on stage, admonishing the group, "Silence, all! Please be silent! Listen! Hear it out! Please listen!"
The voices of the gathering subsided and the Shaper began again. "We lived not for life, but for power. And it was the thing for which we lived that killed us. When our power surpassed our wisdom, we died. It is the oldest story in the universe, one that you may know from your own histories. At the twilight of our species, we took apart our technologies and scattered the parts across space. You are even now discovering what we left behind. Each device, every part of each device, contains this warning we leave to you. Whether or not you are the result of our intervention in life, you have it in yourselves to be greater and wiser than we. Do not go the way our species did. Do better than we did. Live not for obsessions or pride or arrogance. Live for life. From the universe from which we took so much, we leave this one last gift, this final warning. You will discover other things that we left. Do not worship us. Do not emulate us. Simply live and be better."
Now the voices in the room faded until the murmur was a collection of barely audible whispers. The Shaper repeated its final words as if they were a prayer: "Live and be better."
And with this last pronouncement, the picture of the Shaper faded like the voices of those viewing it, and was gone. The ancient machine returned to its former state. Its humming grew fainter, the lights in its circuits grew softer. It had, if not shut itself off, at least put itself to sleep.
Norah stood still, continuing to watch the now-empty space in the ring of the alien machine as if a picture were still there. She turned the Shaper's words around in her mind, measuring their meaning and their import. All around her, what had been an anxious murmur of voices from a dozen species now thundered up into an excited din of more emotions than anyone could name. Beings rose from their seats, exclaiming things that Norah could barely make out, arguing with each other. Behind her, King Dantar and Gwendolyn Rush pulled together in a silent embrace, and behind them the royal guards stood mystified.
Somewhere in the midst of all this, Norah felt a presence at her side and a strong but soft hand clasping hers. She looked beside her and up into the gentle, handsome, and reassuring features of Vashar. He said nothing, only gave her a little smile and a little squeeze of the hand. Words failing her, she only smiled softly back.
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The estate staff had thoughtfully put out plates of the remaining food from the reception in Norah's guest suite. Bereft of sleep after the display of the Shaper, Norah welcomed the distraction of food from what would otherwise be a long night of pacing across her suite and perhaps up and down the halls of Lord Vashar's house in her nightgown. There were still so many questions, not the least of which was what had finally destroyed the Shapers, or whatever they really called themselves. The being in the hologram said that they fell by their own hand, but did not name the power that had brought them down. He said only that their destruction was of their own making. This, thought Norah, was perhaps all to the good. If the Shaper had said exactly what it was that destroyed his people, she could predict what Earth, Sarma, and other planets would likely do next. In all probability they would go looking for it, or try to recreate it: for there are few powers in the universe to rival the curiosity of intelligent life. The Shapers, Norah thought, surely knew what they were doing. By keeping the nature of their doom a mystery, they were preventing the doom of others—at least until the time that another race stood where the Shapers themselves once did.
As she finished a pastry and a glass of wine at her table, she heard a whirring at the portal. Her brow wrinkling, she look up and called, "Yes?"
"It is Vashar," said a voice from right outside. "Am I disturbing you?"
Now here, she had to admit, was a distraction of a different sort, and one she found as welcome as the food. She stood up from the table, adjusted her nightgown while wishing that there were less of her for the silken garment to flow over, and went to the door. She pressed the handle and let the portal slide open, and there he was on the other side, clad only in a satiny robe discreetly tied at his waist, of the same burgundy hue and gold filigrees as his formal clothing. Lord, but this Lord Vashar was a beautiful sight to behold.
Norah could see on his face and hear in his voice the same restlessness as she felt. "You couldn't sleep, either?"
"After what transpired this evening, I expect there must be an outbreak of insomnia everywhere. May I come in?"
She stood aside for him. "Of course," she said. "Please, I welcome the company."
"As do I," said Vashar, stepping into the suite and letting the portal slide closed behind him. "Much of the memory of your life that the Shaper device gave me has already faded," he said. "I suppose it is for the best, though many feelings that I sensed from you still remain. For example, the mysteries of the universe have a way of arousing your appetite." He glanced over at the table and the thorough job she had done with the reception leftovers.
A bit embarrassed, Norah admitted, "I think science and food have always been my most intimate relations."
Vashar smiled, his complete lack of judgment also remaining from when their minds were together. "We all have our distractions." At the moment, he was grateful that the tying of his robe concealed his own stiffening distraction below. He pointed to the wide picture window a few steps from the canopy bed that was big enough for four Sarmians. The window had a deep and generously cushioned sill, which was obviously meant for sitting. "Shall we at least attempt to relax and talk?"
Norah nodded and joined him in the window, outside of which lay the grounds of the estate, lit with night torches and overhung by the spread of stars in the night sky.
Vashar said, "I also expect that the shared experience of beings from very disparate world
s joining minds this evening will be spoken of for a long time yet. Along with the shared interest in the sciences, there were many old misunderstandings and animosities in that ballroom. Though not all the worlds have been at war, there have been quarrels and disputes of all sorts in the galaxy. Some things long-buried may come anew to the surface after this night."
"I'll bet," replied Norah. "But if they do, I hope at least people will remember what the Shaper said about living for life, about doing better than the Shapers did. I keep going back to that point about growing older and stronger, but not wiser. And I keep going over all the things the Shaper said can destroy worlds: greed, superstition, fear. Earth went through all that and more."
"And yet, here is humankind, out among the stars," said Vashar. "And here you and I are now, to think upon it all."
"I'm glad," said Norah.
"As am I," Vashar said. "And I think I see something more in what the Shaper device did; another purpose beyond the mere processing of languages and delivery of a message. The translation of languages need not come with such intimacy, such empathy. I think it was meant to do more than that alone. Think of what happened among us here. Then think of what the Shaper said. There is, I believe, a direct relationship between the medium and the message."
Highlander's Pride: Winter Solstice (Against All Odds Series 1) Page 47
