Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 4

Here we go again

A green light blinked slowly across a great distance.

Once

Twice

Adam lay in blackness spinning slowly in the cool dark, not void dark, but the soft dark of a quiet bedroom during a snowstorm as the wind lashes the side of the house, but a fire burns somewhere to warm the darkness. The green light is the only thing that disturbs that darkness pulsing once, and then twice in and out.

In the darkness he can see flashes of color and shape but they hardly make sense.

He sees light as if he is looking up from the bottom of an ocean floor. Schools of fish swim around him and little bubbles trail upward towards the surface. The sun seems distant under the water, but the diffused light is calming. Little patterns of refracted light roll over his face and body.

It goes dark again, and the green light continues to blink in the black.

He sees the movement of strange alien shapes; they swim above him like sharks in the darkness.

In the sky there is a large white ring that vanishes as it cuts down towards the horizon, obscured by atmospheric haze .

And then he spirals downward, back into the cool darkness, to where the green light pulses steadily. Once annoying, the green light is now a comfortable companion, one he recognizes as he falls in and out of the black. As he sleeps images flash through his thoughts, miles and miles of open water, a shining city on a distant island, marble floors, fountains, artificial waterfalls, and then the visions fade, and he sees nothing of particular interest.

He spirals down slowly again, but he does not meet blackness . This time he sleeps.

***

The council of Shanshara had been convened, the council of Zealots under watch of the Theocrat had been immediately informed of the situation. Messages had been sent with some urgency.

Oh, great Theocrat, Shanshara has given sign from the heavens by way of an unknown variable. With respect we ask an Auditor be sent to evaluate the situation, with praise to Shanshara and her great light, your humble servant the Overseer.

The letter was sent and received immediately by way of chain warp communication, to the sacred hall of the Zealots, atop a steaming moon with a molten core and burbling hot springs. They said the warm water could keep one youthful and that the steam stimulated the minds of the zealots, but it was the strange geological architecture that made it holy, glistening white rock rising upwards in great arches and pillars over a thin filmy layer of porous white stone.

There an Auditor was immediately dispatched as there was always several on standby to deal with any major problems reported to the conclave and its council of zealots.

The Auditor arrived in his ship: sleek and three pointed with gentle curves and sleek amber accents. The Overseer, representative of the conclave and figurehead ruler of the city waited at the base of the landing pad, which jutted out as a great circular slab over the water. His body was swathed in long silver robes, and around his shoulders, supported by the skeletal structure of his chest and arms, there lay of structure of some sort, a rigid cage of coral than fanned out from his shoulders and head like a sort of baroque ruffle seen in old paintings worn by kings and queens.

Like the others of his planet he stood on two legs with a long wide, flat tail poking out from under his robe. He had two arms with three webbed fingers and a sleek triangular head.

The auditor, when he appeared was clearly no denizen of this planet.

He was remarkably thin and very small, not coming past the knees of his taller counterpart. He had a sort of gargoyleish appearance with large ears and a hunched posture unfamiliar with walking over long distances. His little body was rather furry and bluish. His feet were made more for climbing or gripping onto branches than they were suited to walking, and his incredibly long, thin arms boasted a set of seven fingers. Four of the fingers were almost as long as he was tall, and were webbed like the hands of the Overseer, though instead of for swimming they were used for flying. The other three fingers were short and protruded from the same place as the other four fingers, but they were not webbed and were primarily used for manipulating objects.