Far across the
universe, midst an infinity of stars, exists a galaxy teeming with sentient
life. Humanoid in form, their bronze skin glows with iridescent lines of
glittering freckles, as though they were painted with random strokes from an
artist’s rainbow-colored brush. They are an ancient star faring civilization
called the Olomnri. Most members of the species are slender, tall and
beautiful, with bright golden eyes, silken silvery hair and an aesthetic
radiance that seems to resonate as much from their consciousness as from their
physical form.
They inhabit the
galaxy Chronlion, a spiral system where hundreds of millions of populated
planets host trillions of peaceful beings, beings whose lives are not limited
to a handful of decades, but who live on for several thousand years before
ascending from one life to the next. Living such expansive lifetimes at a high
level of conscious awareness, the Olomnri have created a society where there is
little fear of disease or violent death. Lessons were learned from a past where
their people threatened each other to the point of extinction. Such lessons now
serve as the driving force pushing them to create and maintain a near utopian
galactic civilization.
Long ago when war had so nearly led their race into
extinction, a virulent maliciousness ruled their lives. Stemming from fear,
hate and greed it was rooted in their hearts and minds driving them to insanity.
Their extinction seemingly inevitable was fortunately averted when in a sudden
moment of truth as they teetered on the verge of obliteration a great shift in
the minds of all Olomnri occurred. A shift that stopped their relentless
destructive wars before turning their one and only home planet into a cold and
lifeless rock, lost in the emptiness of space.
The shift lead them to discover hidden abilities, inherent
talents that had been locked behind their insanity, emotions that had blocked
them from their true potential. Through finding themselves and breaking away
from the barbarism and savagery they achieved true harmony, rising to a point
where upon death as sentient beings they transcended consciously from one
physical life to the birth of the next retaining their knowledge life after
life. By this retention of knowledge their civilization elevated quickly developing
into a culture of rational intellects, forming a perfectly balanced realm where
life, science and technology flourished empowering them to spread across the
stars.
One of the greatest talents
they discovered hidden away in each of them was that they possessed the ability
to speak mind to mind. With this insight of extrasensory perception they could communicate
instantly across the seemingly limitless distances of space, an ability that
quickly became natural and instinctive for every one of their kind.
Peace and prosperity became all they knew for thousands
of generations never once encountering other cultures of hostility while
colonizing the billions of planets they now inhabit. It had become evident that
they were the only sentient species with intelligence beyond that of the
genetic entity found in animals across their entire galaxy.
As perfect as their civilization had become, non were
ever allowed to forget how close they come to ended themselves more than a
million years in their past. Detailed records of how they had lived in hate and
fear before the times of prosperity are that of scripture. The memories and
lessons from those days are held close to their hearts and symbolized with
monuments constructed on every planet they colonize.
In those dark times before the shift Olomnri killed one
another for sport, greed and pride. Even between those regions considered
allies they held tournaments. Trials of death where battles ranging in weapons
from swords and battle axes of the first days of civilization to the most state
of the art weapons of the day depending on the theme were used to kill their opponents
in the games. Exhibitions between hundreds of combatant’s were held regularly. The
savage killings playing out for the masses broadcast to the public and viewed
by every territory for the pure joy and display of the slaughter. Those who
went to kill and die did so believing their purpose was to prove their peoples
skill in dealing death to their enemy in order to keep the other territories from
invading and decimating their people.
Regions not at peace were in a state of constant war;
fanatical ideologies held by leadership groups perpetually fueled their peoples
hate, driving them in a single purpose to desperately try and kill their
enemies believing that if they did not destroy the threat outside of their
boarders they themselves would be butchered. The state of endless total war
tore the surface of their single known habitable planet apart, nearly to the
point where it would no longer sustain life. If more weapons of mass
destruction were deployed there would have be no hope even for those hidden far
under the surface to survive when the planet's atmosphere ionized igniting in a
fire storm that would burn until there was nothing left. If that happened even
those berried in bunkers prepared to wait it out would die with no surface to
return to, no way to replenish their food and suffocating from their quickly
dwindling air supplies.
The fear
and hate that held them in this perpetual need for killing had no relief. It
drove them blindly seeking more effective ways to destroy their brothers, their
fellow Olomnri. Larger and larger more destructive weapons were deployed until
they stood on the precipice that would have ended the wars because they had
caused the complete extinction of their entire race and death of their planet.
In the last moments before there was no turning back a
great shift took hold. A single spark grew into a flame of hope from the heart
of one who would quickly be lost to this life. She had in her last desperate
moments unknowingly changed her entire peoples future forever. Dealing with her
pain wile slipping out of the realm of the living her mind had been pushed to
the edge and unconsciously she penetrated deep into minds every Olomnri,
touching their hearts with a song that changed them. At the climax of
destruction because of one desperate soul in the very last moments before there
would have been no reversing the events that were so nearly set into motion an
innocent broke through the madness.
A telepathic mind song from a child shattered the
insanity. She sang to them, filling every mind on the planet with peace and
hope. She had created the link without knowing it, her song of life and love was
heard by all.
It had been early evening and her family was sitting at
the table in their dining room eating dinner as they always would. Her parents
talked about how in the last tournament certain combatants had shown so much
courage and cunning and debated on what regions would defeat the others in the
war while this young girl seeing her people from a different perspective sat
silently, eating the food that was offered her, dreaming of a different
peaceful world. It had been as it always was, dinner, gossip speculation on their
future when suddenly everything stopped.
A neutron bomb detonated over their city.
The blast caused buildings to collapse, entire sections of
the city crumbled to the ground. Her building was one of them and when the dust
settled it was just one of the hundreds of piles of rubble where her city once
had been a beautiful landscape of artful buildings. When she awoke trapped and
pinned under the ruin of her collapsed home there was no sign of her family or any
sounds from the living, she didn’t kid herself they had all died she knew. She
was alone mortally injured and knew that she herself would not have long. As
she drifted in and out of consciousness racked by the pain from her crushed
legs she chose to sing a song of life to help deal with her suffering. She
liked to sing and would have loved to hear her beautiful voice fill the silent
void of her undeniable tomb but she could not. She was pinned by the beam that
had stopped after crushing her legs the very moment before it would have crushed
the rest of her completely and because of its pressure it prevented her from
having the breath to sing or even speak above a short lived croak. As tears
rolled down her cheeks from the unbearable agony unceasingly washing over her she
sang in the voice of her mind and soul.
It was a song born from sadness, pain and disparity, a
song filled with passion and hope for peace, a song one who had seen through
the lies and fear ruling her people could only sing. Her song a fluid rhythmic
melody of all she wished her people could be, it flowed from her, comforting
her, blocking out some of the pain and soon became an extension of her subconscious,
continuing in her mind even when she drifted in and out of consciousness. Her
song born of desperation and empowered by how she had used it to separate
herself from the body that lay dying under the building crushing the life from
her filled the minds of every Olomnri, clearing the fog of rage from their eyes
and releasing them from the iron chains that had for so long constrained them
on a collision course with total destruction.
This chance connection with a hidden ability all Olomnri
inherently possessed saved them all. The instinctive telepathic ability she was
tapping into was one that in the future they would all use as naturally as
walking or breathing but in this moment her mind song penetrate their minds so
completely because no one knew how to protect from it, no one knew they had it in
them to speak to one another through this extrasensory perception. This first
experience of telepathy, this song of peace, forgiveness and love filled the
thoughts of every living soul left on their smoldering planet and the shift
began.
Solders, commanders and leaders of entire regions
stopped in mid motion and mid-sentence, some of them on the verge of turning a
key that would have left no life on their planet. The song released them from
their blinding blood filled rage. They froze as the song of peace and calm
trickled through their subconscious. It washed away the hate and fear that had
driven them to insanity. It took mere moments for the vortex of destruction to
halt. Tears flowed from the eyes of many as they looked upon their fellow
Olomnri across fields of destruction where layers of body’s torn limb from limb
carpeted the ground because of the until now ceaseless battle that had been
waged on those hopeless fields. Needles battle they collectively realized as
the song caused so many to drop to their knees, heads in their hands with the
realization of whom and what they had been up until now. For the first time an
understanding, the truth of the evil that had caused so much slaughter, pain
and suffering was shared by all. Some stood disbelieving covered in the gore
amidst piles of bodies, stock-still as they saw clearly the brutality and
senseless carnage that had for so long been their sole purpose to create.
After the wars had ended the shift had taken firm hold
of the now unified Olomnri people she became known as Lighna but was never
found. The mind song lasted for three and a half days before her voice in their
minds drifted into silence and the cleanup began. Most believed that she had
sung her song of calm and insight as she died from a terrible wound and they
were not far from the truth. Her body died in the rubble after the first day,
pinned to the ground, short of breath and filled with the pain but her mind
stayed, not aware that her body had stopped, something in her consciousness had
told her that she had to keep the song alive and so she maintained it, clinging
to the lifeless body she had once known as her own while letting the story of
life pour from her soul. Her song of how they had to hold themselves in a state
of peace and work to release the painful energy locked in their minds from
millennia’s of war held every one in place as they listened for the three and a
half days. She repeated over and over every detail on how her people would have
to use the memories of how insanity had nearly ended them. The story that
seemed to come from a place in her mind that she had never known flowed from
her in a continues rhythm laying out every step they needed to take spiritually
and mentally in order to achieve the true potential and greatness hidden inside
all of them. She kept it alive until finally the feeling that she could go came
and so somehow knowing she released her hold on the physical plane moving fully
conscious into the spiritual realm the first of the Olomnri to ever do so. She knew
nothing of the fact that the song she had used to deal with her suffering had
ushered her people into a new and brighter future and not knowing that she had
transcended from one existence to the next she traveled the stars in peace for
eternity.
A state of tranquility became the new reality where
knowledge and life was held as the highest of status. In honor of the voice
that had saved them they renamed there single home world Lighna. It took three
generations before the technology was available to leave Lighna which was still
crippled but slowly healing from the scars left by the wars. From the moment of
the shift all who had survived spent their time nurturing the inherent
brilliance of their people. As a whole they worked to flourish and rise from
the ashes of destruction piled high after ten thousand years of never ending battle.
An age of insightful reflection and ingenious discoveries
arose and soon they discovered how to extend their life spans to multiple
centuries and from there multiple millennia. Olomnrions became incapable of
hostility or irrationality. Their civilization spread like wild fire, leaping
from star system to star system filling their spiral galaxy Chronlion with
their people. Billions of planets were terraformed and populated as they
continuously cultivated and expanded the knowledge that had been locked away
behind the gates of fear and hate for as long as they could remember. And so,
from the start of the shift for more than a million years they spread through
their galaxy, terraforming and multiplying their numbers from hundreds of
billions to trillions completely unthreatened and safe in their perfect Utopian
galactic civilization.
The feeling of utter safety and peace ended as suddenly
as it had begun what now felt like an endless age long ago. Emerging from the
dark reaches they came, a fleet of destroyers from beyond the chronlion galaxy
space. An armada of moon sized ships that had so unexpectedly discovered their Eden,
hidden amongst the swirls of stars for so long.
At once it was evident that this new unimaginably large
fleet of ships was a threat with battle technology far superior to anything the
Olomnri could produce. They had forgotten how to fight with a ruthless abandon
after putting that way of life behind them when the shift had saved them from
destroying themselves. Because of their complete state of peace they had lost
the need for developing advanced weapons systems and battle tactics never
considering it a problem after populating an entire galaxy and not finding any
signs of another hostile race.
Their arrival had been sudden, ruthless and without warning,
a locust cloud of enormous ships all suddenly appearing in the inner zone of a
small solar system on the outskirts of the Chronlion galaxy. Images of the
enormous ships varying in their geometric shapes were broadcast across the
stars to all planets in chronlia. Pictures and video from the inhabitance in
the besieged solar system showed the glossy black swarm of ships floating in
space like small moons in their skies casting an ominous shadow of what was to
come. Some resembled that of huge shelled insects with long legs and pincers while
others where just spheres, towers, pyramids and cubes.
The hostility this armada intended was made apparent as
every ship that fled towards jump points away from the besieged planets were
incinerated as soon as they started moving. The enemy took their time, drifting
to locations around all of the planets in the system. When they had taken up
their assumed positions around the doomed home worlds they sat in the sky for what
felt like an eternity, waiting for no one knew what until without any kind of
warning it started.
Fire rained down from the skies as trillions of Olomnri
watched live from across the entire galaxy. They viewed the real time video
feeds from satellites still left un touched by the invaders. Every broadcaster
had a feed and every station displayed the news casts and footage of the
destruction that was raining down on the planets from above. The video feeds
lasted only a short time though before the real time communication satellites
in the system where destroyed. At that point only thoughts could be felt and
heard by those who were telepathically connected with the few Olomnri left on
the planets still able to communicate. Their connections lasted only brief
moments after the video was cut though, leaving the last thoughts lingering in
the minds of those who had heard them. Thoughts describing how their entire
planet was being ripped apart and of how there was no hope, no hope, despair,
fear, panic and then there was nothing. All of the minds living on the worlds
in that star system went silent; a silence that held every Olomnri in the
Chronlion spiral frozen in disbelief for a considerable length of time after
they had witnessed the destruction of entire worlds. They were filled with
shock, disbelief and confusion. After the video and mental connections had been
severed they were left only with the images that had been captured, lingering,
still framed and repeating on every video screen, on every world, everywhere.
Slowly the mental silence was broken. It started with a
trickle of saddened harts expressing their remorse before opening into a tumult
of emotion and confusion that permeated the mindscape of these peaceful and Zen
like beings. Shock and fear spread across the galaxy as Olomnri who had been telepathically
connected to those trapped on the doomed worlds shared the last thoughts with
their friends and family members. The fear was amplified when it was identified
that the star system under attack had completely disappeared from the galaxy
star map that every home world had displayed in their city centers. Even the
star had disappeared from the map displays. There was only one possible way this
could happen nearly everyone knew. For the star to have been removed from the
maps data base it would have to no longer exist. That star system, moments ago
under siege and only a day before existing in peace had in less than a full
cycle of galactic standard time been erased completely. Every trace of the
solar system had disappeared. Some hoped for the best thinking that the
subatomic sensors that kept track of every star in the galaxy continuously
updating the map in real time were simply out of whack, but the truth could be
felt by everyone. Deep down the feeling was in their hearts and they knew what
had happened, whoever they were had completely wiped that star system out of
existence and no one knew where they would strike next.
The fear grew as the thought of where the enemy would appear
next percolated the subconscious highway of thought they were all tapped into.
It took no time for the fear of who would be next to became a viral idea
jumping between individual minds until it had reached nearly everyone. There
was no sign of where those huge enemy ships were, if they had left the
destroyed star or where they would appear next, no one knew and every one
waited, wondering, speculating and dreading the possibility that it would be
their system falling victim, caught under the destructive gaze of this
unstoppable swarm next.
Three cycles passed before another system sent out the
alarm, ready this time all of the news and video broadcasters put out a
distress call streaming images just as before but this time they had been
watching the sky and captured the sudden blasts of light as each of the
hundreds of ships jumped into the systems space. It was immediately noticed by
the broadcasters that it appeared to them the armada had grown in number from
their last encounter. Tendrils of plasma lashed out from the dark glossy ships
destroying the defense installations that had been stationed to protect these planets
from dangerous space rocks that threatened the systems home worlds quite regularly.
The meager defenses proved of no concern to the ships of the armada, some of
the huge ships taking direct hits with no evidence of any kind of damage
revealing that there energy weapons meant for pushing asteroids off course had
no effect. Then as if the enemy had learned the Olomnri were watching they
destroyed all of the real time satellites immediately cutting off the live
feeds that would have otherwise shown the attacking fleets hovering in the
skies of this doomed systems worlds. Only the links between the minds of those who
knew Olomnri on the worlds in the system were able to communicate with one
another until as suddenly and as brutally as before their connections were
severed and all went silent.
The dark threat, unknown as to who or what they were,
slowly cast a shadow of death and destruction over the far outer reaches of
Chronlion. They moved from star system to star system leaving only clouds of
lifeless dust, particles of the resources discarded by these planet eaters. It
had become apparent that they were sucking the mass right out of the stars in
the systems leaving tiny remnants of suns no longer with enough output to be
recognized as stars in the galaxy map data bases. Unsure of their enemy’s true
face or reasons for hostility the Olomnri assigned this swarm of destruction a
name they had given to the most evil of destroyers from long ago. They called
them, “Sethrey”, the gods of death.
Timiat.
The pillars in the hall shook as fire and thundering energy crashed down from
the sky. Rippling waves of crackling plasma rolled across the landscape.
Buildings toppled filling the air with shattered glass, chunks of concrete and
clouds of dust. As far as the eye could see the ground shook, fire and smoke
billowed up from the destruction. Plasma shrieked through the air, ripping
sections of the planet apart, hurtling mountain sized chunks of smoldering,
disintegrating earth into space.
On the Horizon Timiat could see flashes, tendrils of
flame lashing and arching down to the planet's surface from beyond the sky.
They were up there he knew, he had seen the videos from the other planets that
had all ended in the same fate. Death was getting closer he thought. He looked
up into the sky cursing the attacking ships that orbited his planet, those
enormous ships flashing randomly, each sending tongues of scorching plasma to
the surface. Hundreds of them incinerating everything they targeted, there was
no where he could hide he knew, nothing he could do but prepare for the end.
Timiats planet, a lush water world located in the outer
reaches of the Chronlion galaxy was under attack. These past hundred solar
cycles had made apparent to the entire Olomnri people, everything had changed.
Whole solar systems of civilized, cultured planets were now wiped away; leaving
no doubt that there was in fact once again a real threat to their entire
existence.
He questioned how it could be that no one had any idea
of who they were and why they were so hell bent on destroying and killing his
people and destroying their planets but like everyone else he did not have the
answers. His people throughout their home worlds had felt billions of souls
winking out of existence as the gods of death, the destroyers, the Sethrey as
they were now referred to made their way across the out-skirting solar systems
of their so peaceful galaxy.
On Timiats planet three moons and the large purple world where huge mining
operations had been active for hundreds of years would normally have filed the
night sky. This season was the time for festivals, gatherings, warm humid
nights and the long hot days of summer. People spent their time at ease,
relaxing, celebrating and taking in the climax of the warm summer season. Each
night the aligning nearby planets and moons crested the horizon drifting across
the sky, huge and colorful. Normally it was more beautiful than words could
describe as the two suns of this solar system illuminated brilliantly the array
of moons and planets each night. Today though, it was not as it should be. In
the sky half visible through the smoke fire and debris choking the air he could
see the remnants of shattered planets and among them huge glossy black ships
raining death down on the people who lived there just as they were doing here
on his planet.
Timiat stood on his balcony watching and listening as
buildings off in the distance fractured crashing to the ground. He had stood
there for what had seemed this day an entire life time as the destruction of
his world first came into view. After watching the huge mining planet shatter,
spilling lava and debris out into space as it lost all gravity before being
atomized, he knew for certain that this day would be the end of this life for
him. The wave of destruction on the surface of his planet swept closer without
pause, closer and closer over the lands that had once been so plentiful towards
where he patiently waited, standing on his balcony watching it approach. He
kept himself in a state of complete calm, waiting for what he knew was
inevitable and impossible to prevent. He had felt it, a constant outcry from
the minds of his people as millions of Olomnri died, passing from the physical
plain, ascending to the spiritual strata of existence as they had always done
since the great shift long ago. Or so he had assumed would be the case for all
those dyeing this day. Of course they were all safely passing into the sentient
plain he thought. Again, Boom!! Like thunder from an impossibly evil storm, an
arch of plasma rushed down from the sky, the sound wave from it shattering any
and all structures left standing in that area of the city at that was at least
one hundred kilometers from where his building still stood here on the top of a
hill overlooking it all. It ripped into the ground to close this time he
thought. Fire slashed the air screaming its destructive joy. He was bracing
himself, white knuckles gripping the railing, shaking, barely containing a
furry that could well up and consume him for what was happening to his beloved planet
and its people if he did not maintain control. He stood stalk still, watching
as huge boulders and clouds of dirt lifted into the sky. Each plasma impact
slashing open huge canyons tearing apart the planet’s crust, it was as though
all gravity was lost where the plasma ripped earth into the sky. He looked out
over his city as it was consumed in flames. Once a utopia of tall slender
buildings made from white stone, buildings that had stood near on ten thousand
years were now being reduced to a landscape of rubble, smoke and fire. Worst of
all was the shear amount of death. It could be felt thick in the spiritual
landscape as each and every life was being incinerated. Not a soul lived where
the shock waves hit, all were consumed. A shattering impact just off the
coastline caused the sea to ignite. It rose up in columns of fire reaching
towards the sky, the wall of steam and fire were heading for the coast. Up the
coastline, closer to where he stood he watched another tongue of plasma touch
down, hurling chunks of earth as large as buildings strait up into the air. The
wall of flaming water spread fast an unstoppable curtain of death and
destruction falling upon the mainland, wider and wider it grew, closer and
closer it came, expanding, fork lightning lashing out from its sides, it was as
if the air itself was igniting, ionization he thought. Tears dropped from his
eyes as he watched flames wrapping around the chunks of his planet as they fell
away splitting apart and drifting into space.
He was unaware of the tears streaming down his face. He knew he would need to
be at peace as his end fast approached in order to transcend into the spiritual
plane in a state of full consciousness. He stood on his stone patio, arms outstretched,
his hands on the rail, the thick acrid heat washing his face. Standing in body
and reaching in mind he awaited the end to this long yet shorter then wished
for cycle of life. The ground shook. Pain and suffering could be herd and felt
all around as soul after sentient being transitioned from the physical universe,
their physical bodies floating in the air nothing but ash. This cycle of time
would mark yet another world in the merciless campaign of destruction being
waged on his people.
It was obvious to him now that this destroyer race was concerned not for life
but only the raw materials they could forage from the atomized planets. He was
sickened as he thought of how they mercilessly decimated whole worlds only to
collect the minerals and resources before moving on to the next unlucky star
system. He knew that his people had continuously tried to make contact with the
attacking armada but there had never been a reply. They were sweeping all
resistance aside, taking no damage, totally unimpeded and multiplying.
With his mind he reached out using all of his inner
strength and awareness to his family and loved ones. Farina his fifth born
daughter who had left their home world years ago came to his mind. She had gone
to pursue scientific research in pulse matter disruption on a planet renowned
for its scientific schools of higher learning. All of his family had long since
headed to the stars. She felt him, and he her, a sentient mind to mind connection
spanning countless light years of space. He knew as did she that her and the
rest of their family would be safe for long after today. He could also feel
that she knew he was about to die. Suddenly a flood of emotion swept over him.
He felt all of his children, friends and lastly with a great wave of strength
his wife who was off world visiting her mother millions of light years away.
They were all there, in each other’s minds, a cloud of sentient consciousness,
sharing thoughts, words and emotions. Confusion and fear were at the fore front
as they all expressed their initial reaction to the situation at hand. He
reassured them that they would re unite in the next life as it had always been or
the one after that. His feelings to them where of tranquility and calm, he felt
them fight to hold onto the knowledge that he would ascend this day from the
physical plain and return in mind as a new birth taking a new body on a new
world. He would carry all of his knowledge with him and continue the cycle of
the Olomnri. His family would all live for the time being on far off planets
and moons, living for many turns of their stars. Then a silence held them and
they all had the same thought together, this unstoppable evil, the Sethrey
armada would reach their home worlds in time they all thought together, maybe they
were all doomed to the same fate! What if this evil scourge could not be
stopped! Fear swept through the connection, he could feel their panic as their
link filled with turbulent emotion. He calmly issued a farewell and
disconnected his mind from the group, returning to the present where in front
of him there was nothing but fire and destruction.
He had to fight with all of his inner strength to hold
onto his wavering state of flittering calm. With the end approaching he began
deeply searching his emotions and analytical thoughts, preparing himself for
what was to come. He accepted that he and the rest of the Olomnri on this home
world would perish. Nothing was going to change their fate. An observation came
to his mind; it was strange he thought how the Sethrey had destroyed the matter
transmitting stations on the outskirts of the solar system preventing the
escape of any living Olomnri in the very first moments of their arrival. They
had knowingly trapping everyone and everything in the system destroying every
means of escape before sitting back and organizing their strike. Then they had
destroyed a few of the planets allowing those on the more populated worlds to
watch the entire mass of each planet under attack get pulled and devoured by
the enormous ships. Following the destruction of those moons and planets they
had taking up positions around the last few planets in the system and waited as
if feeding on the panic that had spread like wild fire throughout the
populations before commencing their murderous destruction.
Reaching out with his mind once again, he projected the hope, that someone, one
day, could stop this plague of death that was so inexorably creeping across his
people's galaxy. He put a seed of purpose out into the universe that somehow one
day an end would come to the plague of merciless death that had befallen them.
Death was getting closer and fast, an even hotter current washed across his
face, his tears dried instantly as everything around him engulfed in flame,
vaporized!
He felt himself drift away from where his body had been. Where his physical
body had stood seconds earlier was now a swirling mass of flame and melting
stone. Feelings of tranquility and peace closed in all around him. The
transition to fully sentient existence was always so comforting and natural to
his people. Long years of training and experience in the sentient mind had
prepared him for this moment, a moment he had experienced many times before.
This time though was early and tragic; this cycle of life was being cut short
by brutal force.
As he ascended he could feel something was very wrong. A strange imbalance felt
in the plane of souls, thick and all around him. He could feel the beings just
like him, transitioning from the physical plane into the sentient realm, drifting
up away from the planet that was being torn apart below them. A tug in the
spiritual weave pulled at his being-ness. He could feel some terrible
disturbance in the ora of souls but could not place where it was coming from.
Something was different, strange and unfamiliar from when he had moved between
physical life cycles in the past. As the moments passed he felt more and more
that something felt profoundly wrong. He could feel some sort of sharp
frequency, extremely turbulent, a static energy pulsing from where the sky had
enveloped his planet. It was pulling at him, ripping at his consciousness
trying to take from him his calm control. He sensed the others, a cloud of
souls all rising up, drifting, millions of Olomnri who moments ago had been harshly
separated from the physical plane, now rising, ascending but at the same time
being thrashed upon and buffeted by some vast evil in the sky. The feeling
rippled through the spiritual consciousness again and again, he could sense
that everyone felt the disturbance and as they rose up getting closer to where
the sky had been a shrieking of souls filled each of their minds. Again,
Strong, he felt the unnatural pull deep inside his conciseness and the
shattering scream filled his mind, blocking him from his thoughts. High above
where the sky had encircled his home world, his people in their spiritual form
were being consumed, feasted upon by a huge blanket of other worldly awareness,
a layer of evil surrounding his once beautiful planet. Something out there was
trapping the sentient beings, devouring each and every one of them. Not only
were the Sethrey taking the materials from the planets but it seemed they were
also destroying and consuming the sentient life. What kind of devils could be
feeding on souls he thought as the screeching once again pierced though his
mind.
When Timiat was a boy of this life, he had learned from a great philosopher
that in theory, a fully sentient being was not restricted by space and time but
only in mind. One could not cause an effect in the physical universe unless
connected but at the same time while sentient, one would not be restricted by
those same atomic laws. Yet, there was still a thread of connection between the
two. Not knowing but willing to believe he focused all of his energy and winked
himself away from the end to his sentient existence waiting for him in the sky.
With
all that he had left of his awareness, he snapped from his position relative to
his now decimated home. He flung himself as far as he could reach, and farther.
Out! He reached past everything he had ever known, past the concept of space
itself, stretching his mind, expanding. He reached out past everything and then
stopped to look back at the entire multiverse, the Universe! Every galaxy,
every solar system, every quasar and black hole all now just a cluster of
bright and dark glittering crystals in his mind's eye, the decimation of his
home world had vanished, there was no frequency but his own and he felt safe.
Letting himself be carried along he drifted on the currents of attraction until
from out of no ware it came to him, a feeling of hope, unmistakably clear and
without hesitation he was at once traveling towards it. Not knowing why he was
doing so or where he was heading he just allowed his attention to travel, his
spiritual body leaping across the universe in an instant pulled by a glimmer of
hope. It pulled at him as if he was meant to go there, a small grey galaxy with
a simple and unique solar system. There was just one blue planet and from it he
could feel an adolescent form of sentient life. He reached out with is
conscious mind and was instantly above and all around it. What a beautiful,
small and remote place he thought. A place he would want to spend some time
investigating. Then, everything went blank.
