by Ezra E Manes
Starke and his people were a welcome sight as they ran over to assist them in disembarking.
Starke greeted Carlos with compassion. “Welcome home, friend. Do not worry about the shuttle. We will maintain the area secure for as long as necessary.”
Carlos stopped and turned to look at the shuttlecraft. He could see scuffs and scrapes, but no serious damage to the exterior. He hoped that Eve was doing OK; he thought again about the loss of part of her aboard the New Horizon. He was thankful they had a copy of her stored away.
What had Eve meant when she conveyed “I am complete”?
He turned and followed the others. His team was deathly ill and truly stranded on Zilia, and it appeared he could do nothing about it.
TWENTY- FIVE
ON A PRAYER
Carlos tossed about feverously as early morning light filtered into the ward. A nurse sponged his face with cool water to ease his discomfort. He slipped into a deep dream about a fantastic place where a Supreme Being held court. Try as he might, he couldn’t see this entity.
He was drawn to a brightly illuminated area in the middle of a chapel-like room that had an air of familiarity about it. An authoritative but benevolent voice began speaking to him from the brightness hovering over a beautiful, ornate altar. The altar had a low bench running across its front similar to prayer benches he had seen at other altars.
“All is going to be well with your team, Carlos. But you must first perform an act of submission, an act of belief. You must pray publicly at the main altar in the High Temple of Zilerip, pray reverently for your team to heal. Once you do this, they will heal within days.”
This strange dream message was brief, and not repeated. He could go from this place but was reluctant to leave the chapel. He lingered, basking in the soothing ambience of the light. Other important points came to mind that should be included in the prayer, about the Zilans and his team, and he felt assurance emanate from the light enfolding him.
He woke shaking and sweating in the hospital bed, with the memory of the dream persisting. He gently pushed aside the sponging hand and sat up with the nurse’s help. He motioned her away. He wanted to be alone to think about the dream that was still dominating his thoughts.
Why give the dream any more consideration than one would to any hallucination while sick and feverish? Was the dream lingering because it felt real, felt right, and contained a vital message for him and his team?
Carlos lay back and closed his eyes. Suddenly he was back in the dream and at the chapel altar, feeling the soothing power of the bright light surrounding him. He opened his eyes and was acutely aware he was still lying sick in the hospital bed.
He and his teammates were dying. He knew it, they knew it, and the Zilans knew it. It was ironic that another two-moon phase event was ongoing, albeit a secondary one, and it was doubtful they would live much past this significant event.
All attempts to find a treatment for the illness had proven futile. The Zilan medical staff continued investigating the illness but without much hope of success. They were trying to make the team as comfortable as possible, and Carlos insisted on staying in quarantine to minimize risk of spreading the illness. He knew the small medical staff caring for the team would face quarantine long after the team had succumbed. The team’s remains would be disposed of as if they contained a deadly virus.
Even knowing this, could he act on something as tenuous as a dream? Why was the dream so persistent? Somewhere in his jumbled thought processes he began to think he could act on the dream because it was so compelling. Then his engineering logic kicked in, and he backed away from acting on something that seemed to be a hallucination. He flipped back and forth, and finally decided he would do it if he could find any logical merit in it at all. But he couldn’t, for it was only a dream!
He closed his eyes to rest and again drifted into a fitful sleep, the vision dominating his dreams.
Carlos woke lying on his back staring at a featureless ceiling and slowly became aware of the quiet murmurings around him in the isolated hospital ward. He thought back through the dream of praying at the altar of the High Temple of Zilerip. He must do something to try to save his team, even if it appeared hopeless. After all, what could it hurt to pray to the god the Zilans had been praying to for several millennia? They could all use a miracle about now.
The timing could not be better, for this day was the peak of the Secondary Two-Moon Phase, the day the two moons eclipsed.
He called out for a nurse, and the one who had earlier bathed his face came quickly to see what was wrong. He smiled weakly at her. “Please have Starke see if Counselor Largena could communicate with me. I have something very important and urgent to ask of her.”
The nurse nodded and walked away quickly to convey the message.
Soon thereafter Starke brought a portable communicator over and positioned it beside his bed. Ceripe appeared on the screen moments later.
“How are you, Carlos?” she asked gravely. He could see that she was deeply troubled. What was her worry about, the health of his team or the potential loss of their knowledge? Stop it! Keep this conversation on track.
“I have been better and would like to be so again soon,” he answered weakly. “I am hoping you will indulge me with a critical request, but first I must tell you why I am making it.”
He paused and cleared his throat. Gloria and several others of the team nearby were also awake and curiously attentive to the conversation.
“This may sound crazy to you, but I have received a very strong vision. I thought it was just a wild dream at first, but I have come to realize through its persistence and clarity that it is more than a dream.” He stopped when he saw her shake her head in disbelief.
“It took a lot of soul searching for me to bring this to your attention, Ceripe, so please bear with me a few minutes before concluding this is feverish ranting.”
She nodded, and her look encouraged him to continue.
“In this vision I prayed for the power of Zil to be brought to bear to heal the members of my team. Furthermore, this prayer occurred at the sacred main altar in the High Temple of Zilerip on the peak night of the ongoing Secondary Two-Moon Phase.”
The stir among his people made him pause. He did not hear a sound from Ceripe and wondered if she really understood what he had said, or perhaps she thought it was outlandish and did not know how to reply.
“Did you hear what I said about the vision, Ceripe?”
“Yes,” came the faltering reply. “I am just somewhat astounded by this information and its implied request to go to the High Temple of Zilerip, not to mention wanting to do so tonight on such short notice. Are you aware that the two-moon eclipse today is a secondary one with the moons eclipsing during the daytime?”
“Yes, and I request approval to pray at the altar of the High Temple of Zilerip tonight. Let me finish describing the vision. I saw myself returning to the hospital, and then our team was healed enough to be up and around in a matter of days. I also received the strong message that Zilans are immune to this sickness. I foresaw a long, healthy, and productive relationship between your people and ours on Zilia.”
The hospital ward became unusually quiet, with everyone looking around incredulously at the statements made by Carlos.
“Ceripe, I would not blame you if you wrote this off as the mutterings of a sick man, but I implore you to give it serious consideration. After all, if something is not done, our team will be dead soon. At least give us this opportunity to make peace with God.”
There, he had said what they all knew to be true about the state of their health. It would be hard for the Zilans to refuse a request to make peace with their god before the demise of the entire team.
Then came the softly spoken firm reply. “I take you much more seriously than you imagine, Carlos. It has been a very long time in our history since any new vision or prophecy has been forthcoming. It is very unsettling to have one come from someone other than a nati
ve Zilan, but not so the concept of a vision. This is how our revered ancestors received religious tenets.
“But it would be extremely difficult to postpone the religious ceremonies scheduled at the Temple of Zilerip tonight. I have never heard of postponement or change in the ceremonies in all our recorded history. To compound matters, the awe and respect for you among some of our senior leaders faded when you became so sick. Not mine or that of Pteleg Bnethem, but others.”
“You must try!” Gloria suddenly injected. “This is not the first vision Carlos has had. He would not be alive otherwise, nor would this team be here if not for such visions!”
This outburst caused open expressions of surprise among the others in the ward, for Gloria was the only one Carlos had confided in about his previous vivid dreams.
“Tell her, Carlos,” Gloria implored.
And he did so, telling of the angel vision that had saved his life at age seven when he was trapped in the hold of a shuttlecraft, though he did not mention the shuttle being at the Messier Space Station. He told of prescient dreams in which a siren’s song attracted him to a planet of the Arzét system, leading to discovery of signals from Zilia. He did not mention which solar system he was in when experiencing the dreams. Nor did he mention his parents coming back to comfort him after their fatal shuttlecraft accident when he was three years old. Though relevant, this was a very personal memory that he had not even shared with Gloria.
“This is truly phenomenal,” Ceripe said. “I knew you were special from our first meeting. You have my commitment that this will receive serious and quick consideration by our leaders.”
Ceripe concluded the conversation with a very emotional statement. “It pains me to not be present with you and your team as you suffer through this trying ordeal. I hope you can see that I can be of much more value to you by not having been physically close to you. There is still a great fear within our leadership that we may succumb to this disease. If I were exposed, my influence with the leaders, such as it is, would be greatly diminished.
“So it is with great sorrow I have maintained my distance, but I have done so in the hope that I might influence matters to a better outcome. With your request, I now have that opportunity. Your vision revealing that we are not susceptible to the disease helps, as will knowledge of your other visions. Please rest easy. I will see you soon, either way the decision goes.”
For a moment, Ceripe looked intently at Carlos’s face as if to capture every detail; then the screen went blank.
Carlos looked at Gloria and saw deep concern in her eyes. He wasn’t sure if she thought he had gone off the deep end or that he was closer to dying than she had thought.
She smiled and mouthed the words “I am with you.”
He settled back and soon drifted off to sleep to a backdrop of muted discussions around the ward. The others had just become aware of another dimension of their leader, though most had heard the rumors about his being saved by an angel at age seven.
He woke to the sounds of excited nurses. They were preparing him for the journey in a mobile bed to the temple. A plastic hood kept the bed and a small area above it isolated fairly well from the outside. A self-adhering door flap was pulled back to make an entrance. They were getting everything ready to go to the Temple of Zilerip while waiting for approval.
“Hello, Carlos,” came Ceripe’s greeting over the communicator next to his bed. “We have approval for you to pray at the High Temple of Zilerip tonight. The hospital staff will prepare you, and Starke is to oversee conveying you to the temple as expeditiously and safely as possible, for nightfall is quickly approaching. The preparation includes some basic safety measures to minimize risk of exposure of Zilans to the sickness you have. This was required of me in spite of your assurance that we are not susceptible, and to protect you from potential harm from concerned citizens, although I assure you this is a minimal risk.
“This caused quite a stir among our leaders, but I think they are very hopeful your vision is real. They want to prevent disclosure of any aspect of this event for now to mitigate any public outcry. We will record your activities leading up to and during the prayer session; then events can be publicized or not, as the results warrant. We will also closely monitor and record your team’s status after the session at the temple.
“Our attendants will start recording as you are being dressed appropriately to visit the temple, so please bear with us as we work through this process.”
“Thank you for your candor and thoroughness,” Carlos said. “Now, to use an old saying of ours, let us get this show on the road!”
Ceripe chuckled in spite of the circumstances and told Starke to complete preparations and proceed to the temple as soon as practical thereafter.
Carlos asked the attending staff to let him have a few words with his team before they continued. He quickly told them the details of the vision and apologized for not consulting with them before bringing Ceripe into the picture. He had proceeded out of a sense of urgency and concern that he might back out if he did not proceed at once. At best, it was a long shot; however, he felt a strong personal conviction that it was something he must do.
The team members were as one in their strong support. This lifted his spirits and gave him more resolve to see this through, in spite of his weakness and personal misgivings about the prayer session.
He looked closely at Gloria, his soul mate since departing from the Messier Colony. She looked him straight in the eye and smiled, and that simple act made him flush with emotion. He turned without hesitation and indicated he was ready to proceed.
The nurses dressed him in a loose-fitting pajama-like outfit that was uniformly the same color, a muted blue gray. He next donned a knee-length cape, deep blue in color and trimmed around the edge with gold lace. The cape had a thick gold tie cord at the neck to hold it on loosely over the shoulders. He was fitted with a pair of dark-blue slippers. After they were sure the cape fit, they removed it and placed it at the foot of the bed. He was to don the cape before entering the main worship chamber.
Starke advised Ceripe’s office that everything was ready, and he learned transportation waited at the private entrance to transport Carlos and two attendants to the temple. Carlos was not surprised when Caron Cenenteh joined Starke for the journey to the temple.
Carlos made it into the mobile bed contraption with help, and Starke pulled down curtain covers from the top to hide him from view. A small light came on in the overhead to provide him some relief from the darkness inside. He discovered that, appropriate to the occasion, a Book of Zil was on top the folded cape at the foot of the bed.
Carlos had seen the High Temple many times but had only been inside during the Holy Seven-Year Two-Moon Phase event some seven lunar cycles in the past. It was strange that his vision occurred such that this visit coincided with the peak of the next Secondary Two-Moon Phase. He had not given this serious consideration before, but he did now, giving him hope that this two-moon phase would produce positive results for his team.
He could tell when they entered the entry hall of the temple, for Starke and Caron moved him along in hushed silence. He could hear the quiet footsteps of others accompanying them across the hall at a distance, probably a security team. He heard a door open ahead and then quietly close after they passed through.
Someone raised the curtains, and he looked out at a small reception room. The room was bare except for two utilitarian wood benches. Starke and Caron helped him out of the bed and in donning the cape.
Carlos walked back and forth several times to stretch his legs. He was not sure he had the strength to make it to the altar. His muscles were stiff and weak, but after loosening up some, he was ready to try it. The two men escorted him to the door to the main worship chamber and invited him to enter.
The large temple chamber was impressive. Statues and regal cloth drapes decorated the walls between high support beams. Rows of polished wood benches were arranged perpendicular to and on each side o
f a wide aisle down the middle of the chamber. The thick, blue aisle carpet, trimmed in gold, ran to the front of the chamber to meet a large, ornate altar extending across the middle two-thirds of the wall. The carpet muted his footsteps as he walked toward the altar.
He stopped abruptly and for a moment forgot to breathe. The altar in his vision was an exact duplicate of the one before him! He inhaled deeply to feed his starving lungs and had a growing surreal feeling about being in this chamber before, though he knew he had not.
No one was in sight as he continued slowly down the middle aisle toward the altar. Nor could he see any cameras or other monitoring devices. About three-fourths of the way to the altar, he began wondering if he could make it. His legs felt like wooden sticks that had lead weights at the bottom instead of feet. He paused and rested briefly against one of the benches at the side of the aisle. Then he headed on down the aisle in a determined move.
He caught sight of movement out of the corner of his eye to the left as he came within a few steps of the altar. He turned his head slowly and saw a small group of Zilans gathered in a vestibule adjacent to the raised platform holding the altar. They were all wearing outfits similar to his. Ceripe was in the forefront and nodded her head ever so slightly in encouragement.
He turned back to face the altar; a small, golden pillow was positioned on the floor at its center. He stepped onto the platform and dropped to his knees on the pillow while grasping the low shelf at the front of altar. Starke had told him the appropriate prayer position was kneeling with elbows on the shelf and hands folded and placed under the chin. He couldn’t help but grin as he assumed this posture, which would also be good to support one who wished to simply rest during prayer sessions. He sure felt like resting!
