The Khrn leaders assembled a team to include all the sciences they suspected they might need to analyze this effect, along with a force of marines large enough to repel any reasonable danger. The trip to the event horizon proved uneventful and despite the feeling that there soon would be some effect or force felt from this phenomenon, there was only a slight pulsing wave of energy, barely noticeable by the monitoring and tracking systems. After several weeks of testing the surface, they decided a manned probe needed to enter the shell to determine what was inside this reflective bubble. They equipped fighter craft with a sensor array and a means to transmit back to the science vessel from within the affect (they assumed the craft might slip into the Aether and fighters do not possess a near space drive). The pilot and a member of the science team were prepared and equipped, then sent in to meet whatever fate lie in store for them. A somewhat amusing anecdote, told by Khrn scientists was, tension mounted as they began the last phase of the entrance to the shell, then the stellar scientist and leader in spatial stresses exclaimed, “Feed my Gklaevah!” (Khrn beast resembling a large dog), as the ship passed through the bubble.

Excerpt from my book – “The Fragments of Benito Castinelli”

The post “It feels like it’s watching me.” appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

The gardens below had been known to steal his attention as well, particularly when his father kept him waiting.

The atrium stood within the Citadel of House Sk’ohrehz, Guild headquarters for Sk’ohrehz Near-Spatial Transit Systems. The building itself was only seven years old and had been grown with every technological refinement available at the time.

Joh’Zebb remembered the groundbreaking. More specifically, he remembered being scolded for digging in the ceremonial sandbox. He had been eight. What, exactly, had they expected him to do with a box full of sand? It wasn’t much different from the one he had at home.

His mind raced. Joh’Zebb was accustomed to that. What troubled him was what he saw when it slowed down.

Soon he would attend vocational finishing school and begin studying under his Great Uncle. The thought still filled him with pride, though his uncle had made one thing quite clear.

“Joh’Zebb, never think I selected you, nor allowed you access to this course, because of your name. I have poured my life into you since you could first initiate a link to the systems. You have made it despite your name, not because of it.

“You are a Khr of Khrn, nephew.” Joh’Zebb knew the truth of that.

For his Early Prep Science Fair project, his uncle had permitted him to work with an engine. Joh’Zebb developed a means of tightening its field coefficient and increased the engine’s efficiency by twenty-eight percent.

Then the engineers applied his process to the stellar drives. They gained forty percent more range from a single fuel load. Joh’Zebb had been fourteen. That was when people began calling him a genius. Joh’Zebb wasn’t certain what to make of that. He didn’t think like other Khr.

Things everyone else considered simple could leave him utterly confounded. He could become furious trying to open a container of food, then turn around, look at an engine, and see it assembled differently inside his mind.

The complex came easily. The simple could be impossible. And now there was the Aether. Everyone else seemed to understand it. Joh’Zebb did not. Or perhaps that wasn’t quite right.

He understood the models. He understood the mathematics. He understood what happened when a ship entered transit and watched the Aether fold around it. That was precisely the problem. Something didn’t fit.

“Father?”

Naar’jiles looked up.

“I know I have asked Great Uncle about this many times, but he keeps telling me things I already know. Could you help me with something?”

Naar’jiles Sk’ohrehz was not like his son. He was charismatic, well spoken, and possessed a rather straightforward approach to business. The scientific aspects interested him when they affected such practical matters as how difficult something would be to manufacture—or how much it would cost.

Joh’Zebb’s questions were another matter entirely. They tended to begin simply enough. Then they became Joh’Zebb’s questions. “I will do my best, my son.” Naar’jiles shifted in his chair and tried to make himself comfortable.

Joh’Zebb hesitated. “I don’t understand the Aether.”

His father waited. “What is it?”

Joh’Zebb frowned. “What is it really?”

There. That was the question.

“I have seen the mathematical models. I understand what they say. But when I watch the Aether fold around a transiting ship…”

He stopped. This was the part that sounded foolish. “There is something about it.”

Naar’jiles said nothing. Joh’Zebb lowered his voice. “It is like someone is outside, whispering at me.” He looked at his father.

“Please don’t call me crazy. Myrna’Laya already did.” That wasn’t entirely fair. Myrna’Laya could be blunt with him. She had also defended him in combat. That made her very special to Joh’Zebb.

His father remained silent. Naar’jiles did that sometimes. He would simply stop and consider a thing for however long consideration required. Those who knew him understood that there was little to be gained by interrupting.

Wisdom sometimes required waiting. So Joh’Zebb waited. His attention drifted back toward the engine suspended above the water feature in the atrium. The waves moved beneath it. For a moment they seemed to pulse with the rhythm of some song he had heard before.

Then his father spoke. “You struggle to understand something rather than embrace what it is.”

Joh’Zebb turned toward him. “You analyze when perhaps you should simply accept.”

“I…” He looked away. “I am not certain I understand, Father.”

“Of course you don’t.” Naar’jiles rose. That was not an insult. It was simply the reason they were having the conversation. He walked over to the artist’s bench near his desk, where a large drawing pad rested.

“Come here, son.”

Joh’Zebb bounded over.

His father pointed at the pad. “Smell that paper.” Joh’Zebb stared at him. “Smell it.” Whatever answer Joh’Zebb had expected, smelling paper had not been among the possibilities. Still, he leaned forward and inhaled.

Then recoiled.

The old-world diagram paper reeked of glue. “It stinks!” His father smiled. “Take a few steps back.” Joh’Zebb did.

“Can you still smell it?” Joh’Zebb cocked his head. Something was happening here. His father knew it, too.

“No. Well…” He sniffed. “A little. It is very faint.”

Naar’jiles nodded. “That pad is Near Space.” Joh’Zebb’s smile disappeared. “And you are approaching the Aether.” His father let that sit.

Joh’Zebb looked at the paper. Then at the distance between himself and it. Then back at his father. “You stand within another dimension, son. In fact, you stand at the intersection of many dimensions.”

Joh’Zebb listened.

“The smell is something you carried with you. There is no smell where you are. What remains is the memory of it—and the molecules still within your nose from before you departed into Near Space.”

Joh’Zebb became very still. Naar’jiles watched him. His son looked for a moment like a cyborg that had run out of power in mid-stride.

Then something changed.

Joh’Zebb’s eyes widened. The confusion vanished. His father smiled. Joh’Zebb knew. “Father…” His mind was racing again. But this time everything was falling into place.

“Father, it is Baermaac, isn’t it!”

Joh’Zebb roared until he named the name that must be given reverence and proceeded at a whisper. His mind raced and he recalled thinking on the prophesies of the Soourt’Baek, which his mother had been drilling into him. “HE is adjacent to the Aether isn’t he, father!” he continued in a shouted whisper.

Naar’jiles smiled at his son. He was at the age of acceptance. Soon he would go before the priests to make his first official offering to Baermaac. He wondered for a moment, and he knew in his heart that his son would be the very first one. He would be the Khr of prophecy, the one who would make his very first offering, and it would be an Epoch offering.

“That’s who I keep hearing when we journey, Father! Oh, this clears so much up! I need to go tell Myrna’Laya!” Joh’Zebb was so very excited that he almost tripped over his plans as he came up with them. He was about to head out the door in a rush when his father spoke.

“Son, all our folk must be allowed to learn of HIM as HE would have them. You have your relationship with HIM and HE has another with Myrna’Laya. Always respect that. We must find HIM where HE lives in our own talents. Do you understand, son?” Naar’jiles finished in a peaceful tone. He could see on his son’s face that while he hoped to tell everything he now understood to his fiancé she would respect her relationship with Baermaac and only reveal that he had a revelation. That he was ready for his Transition, to become a full Khr. 

Joh’Zebb thought of his coming days then, too. He thought of Myrna’Laya and how very special she was to him as a shelter.  To perform their Settling Ceremony soon once they had ascended into their place in society.

Relationship is what it is all about then. To know someone or something is a good thing, like a sweet smell up close to the source. However, to build a relationship is to progress into a place that one cannot expect. A place of wonder and joy.

A place where in traveling the universe you may meet its creator. 

His heart turned to Myrna’Laya in a very special way. Soon then! it will be just four short years, following the Settling and then the formal marriage. Then… well, better to not think of Myrna’Laya in that way just yet. She might bloody his nose again.

“Thank you father.” He said as he opened the door to head down to the Portation Arena. “I believe I will tell Great Uncle of my revelation and let Myrna’Laya discover it in her own good time.” 

The post Precocious Revelation appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

The Great Ships of the Sons of Beergaard sped through near space fleeing from Fahl’Khr scout vessels and fell into a negative slipstream. The entire fleet began spiraling out of sync with their time anchor. If they could not regain control and return their ships to near space, the ships would implode to a microscopic dot or rip apart as they expanded out into infinity.

Behind them in close pursuit the suicidal Fahl’Khrin monsters fired upon them, and in doing so pursued them into the failing near space shell they were falling toward. The intense negative energy surrounding their vessels destroyed the smaller Fahl’Khrin vessels, imploding them as they drew too near the shield wash of the rearward great ship. The explosion shifted the regional configuration of the Aether around their fleet, allowing them to escape the energy wash from the exploding marauders.

Just as they spiraled forward into the compression wave from their own shields they slipped into an eddy and began struggling to re-synchronize their Aether-Shell before it collapsed. It looked as if the advancing wave of energy from the exploded Fahl’Khrin vessels would destroy them, but they abruptly returned to normal space and found themselves stationary at the zenith point of the Realms of the Giver, Maenatae’s sun.

Surveying their ships, personnel and finally their position, they discovered that a miracle had saved them in that not only were their ships intact, but their people safe. Better still, their pursuers destroy; lost in the slipstream redux. The crushing return from the Aether should have killed them or aged them a few hundred thousand years, so the Fahl’Khrin command structure would consider them lost and no longer pursue them. When the stellar cartographers mapped the system that they had landed in they deployed passive sensor probes to check for enemy activities in the area.

It wasn’t long before they realized they were farther than any of their kind had ventured from home. The chance that any of their enemies were in this area of space was remote.  Given the relative safety of the area, they deactivated the great stellar drives within their ships to perform long needed maintenance upon them.

Months passed while all the work was taking place on each of the Great Ships. There remained significant damage on each vessel, placed upon them while fleeing their foes, the Fahl’Khr. The Khrn endured and patched the damage over the painful years of fleeing one attempt after another upon their lives. During these repairs, while science teams mapped planets within the system, they discovered there was an anomaly previously unseen.

A powerful negative slip-point, a natural entry access to the Aether, existed within a shell between the third and fourth planets of the system. They could not identify specifics of this phenomenon, for all the low emission scans sent toward the shell reflected from its event horizon. That a natural slip-point existed in normal space was enough of a find to cause a great swell of curiosity amongst the scientific communities, but that it was self-sustaining and shielded by an unknown force sent all but the most stoic of a scientist into a frenzy of rampant postulation upon causes or scenarios.

Slip-points only formed in controlled settings and by an Aether-Transit Device. That “engine” had to be active to maintain the slip-point. Naturally occurring entries were very rare, their scientists charged. So they decided that an expeditionary force should move in and analyze the effect and determine the danger to the fleet. No one among their combined crews had ever before witnessed such an anomaly in normal space and the powerful release of this form of energy in near space was always fatal, so the need to determine the danger level was paramount.

The post System Fall appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

                As much of a gateway as it is an engine, the Aethereal Entry & Transitional Interface Device allows the Khrn Stellar-Ships to traverse the fantastic expanses of normal space by entering the realm of “Near Space” which is adjacent to the Aether itself.

                The device, as we know it today has changed greatly from its original form and function. Originally the device was created to provide a means of transporting matter from one location to another. All of the initial testing proved that the device was working, but none of the test objects ever made it to the receiving device.  Some of the test objects would re-emerge at the origin location, but most just disappeared into the void, never to be seen again. Eventually it was decided to send a probe device capable of recording the conditions and available images from the other side of the event. So probes were transported into the realm, but few returned and the those which did seemed to show a very strange and empty void free of any matter whatsoever.

                Finally, a breakthrough came when it was noted that time appeared to be at a near standstill in the void and that all of the probes recovered were done so in a special cycle of time on this side of the effect. So a probe was equipped with a greatly increased capacity recording device and programmed to take its imagery in a 360 degree arc over time lapsed periods of 90, 180 and 360 day increments. When the probe was successfully retrieved the discovery the Khrnaad scientists had been searching for was finally revealed. Within the arc of one view there existed the very edge of the transit device itself. The device was functioning as an anchor source for all of the objects previously sent through the event horizon. The key however was those objects which were not within the arc of the entry event could not be retrieved when the device was deactivated.

                Other revelations showed all of the objects earlier placed into the transit were in ever widening orbits there inside the void. It became clear that someone was going to have to enter the void and collect as many of the objects sent in as possible so that they might be analyzed and tested for the affects that this void may have had on them. Since there was no way to know what would happen to a Khr it was decided that a Series 4 Cyber-bot (S4Cb) would be given all of the data relevant to the void and sent in with the means to pull as many orbiting objects as possible back to the point of entry. The Series 4 was the most sophisticated machine-based worker the Khrn had developed. It was able to work in open space at extreme temperatures and it had a power source capable of lasting 1100 years before requiring replacement.

                The S4Cb was sent in and given the full 1200 cycles (approximately 3 days) before contact was made. Once contact was initiated the event burst with nearly all of the lost objects formerly seen orbiting the aperture within the void. The last object to come through was the S4Cb itself. Full analysis and testing discovered the S4Cb had been inside the void for nearly 1100 years. During that time, it had taken it upon itself to run numerous tests on its own. The most significant of these tests revealing that not only could an engine be fabricated and built on the other side, but it could be connected to the engine on this side of the event in order to propel an object about the reaches of what was becoming more commonly referred to as “Near Space”.

                Over the next few years Khrnaad scientist poured their lives into the project to build a working near space engine. Testing revealed some surprises, some revelations and some horrors. Firstly, it was discovered that the Aether lay deeper into the void than the Transit Devices had been penetrating. It was also discovered that the closer to the Aether one went the more time slowed until one was irreversibly trapped in a state of suspension, frozen in a place where no actions whatsoever take place. It was also discovered that pulling one out of a state of transit or breaking contact with the portion of Near-Space  attuned to one’s entry origin would result in those within the effects of an engine to age instantly to match the difference between the outside and the inside anchors. Obviously, there would need to be a better understanding of just how the effects of this void played out upon any would be traveler before any further “live” testing could be performed.

                Interestingly, there seems in every civilization ever to encounter a scientific crossroad, someone who rises to the challenge and embraces the science. It was no different here, not only in the genius of the young Khr who took on the challenge, but in his being an outsider to common scientific perceptions and beliefs. Joh’vaan NaerRedge was a visionary that could work complex concepts in his head. That alone made him amazing and desirable to most guilds, but his refusal to accept preconceptions made by the leaders of those guilds resulted in his being equally undesirable. So, it was the answers which he held within his powerful mind were not revealed for many years. Not until one of Joh’vaan nephews became guild master of the Sk’ohrehz House, a manufacturer of Near relativistic drive engines and spacing frames. It was Naar’jiles Sk’ohrenz who sat in his uncles shop as a young Khr and marveled at his work. He was always convinced that his uncle was the one to build a successful solution to Near-Space travel. He had determined that someday he would be part of that venture.

                So Naar’jiles went to the priests and opened a request for prayer that would allow his uncle to lead a research guild to build the Near-Space Transit Device. Because of the power, both politically and religiously (which most would suggest are the same thing among the Khrn’naadin) the prayer was answered and granted as an “Offering of the Most Significant Nature”. This placed Joh’vaan in the position of heading a scientific team, of what to most acclaimed scientists seemed like misfits and dreamers, tasked with obtaining the impossible within their lifetimes. If they failed it would shame them, their families and all associated with the endeavor for seven generations.

                Within four short year the team tested its first engine. Most felt that, at best everyone would be killed and at worst there would be a rip in space that would suck everything within 12 light years into the void. House Sk’ohrehz was compelled to run its landmark test in a void of space 18 light years outside of the galactic plane. All of the monitors were setup, the equipment and the ship were towed to the location and the media were informed Joh’vaan NaerRedge would be in the ship for its maiden test voyage, he and his principal team. This seemed to cause as much of a tumult among contemporary scientists as the notions he had espoused as a young scientist, but Joh’vaan had planned well and there was quite literally no one to stop him nor his chosen team. They brought the ship and its engine online, forming a great and shining sphere about it until it seemed to evaporate into the darkness of space.

                Minutes passed into hours and hours into days. Many were saddened by the loss of what they now deemed as a great scientific mind, but Joh’vaan’s nephew was not to accept any of it. It was as if Naar’jiles knew the future. Calmly he sat at his place in the Hall of Leadership there within House Sk’ohrehz and said that his uncle would not be back for another year and a half so people needed to go on with their lives and ready themselves for a future beyond their wildest imaginations. Sure enough, nearly to the day of his nephew’s prophesied date, Joh’vaan and his crew returned, appearing at the Zenith point of their own home world system. They returned with a most startling revelation. They had traversed some 2211 million light years to map out a galaxy that the Khrnaad Scientists had been observing closely for many years. They had data that catalogued an entire arm of that galaxy and proved a number of theories about potentially habitable worlds there within that galaxy. Indeed, there were some 114 worlds ripe for settlement listed there in the archives of the ship. When asked how so much scientific data could have been obtained, analyzed and catalogued Joh’vaan pointed out one of the benefits of his new machine.

                “When we travel through near-space, we can set ourselves into a march of time that allows us to virtually live forever.” He began with an obvious pride in his work and his team. “We had about 118 years to work on the data as we returned home, but overall the trip itself took us a little over one month in real time.” Joh’vaan said as he waved an arm into the air above his head.

                Overnight Joh’vaan and his team became heroes to their people and House Sk’ohrehz began building the engines and shipping that would propel the Khrn’naadin to reaches heretofore undreamed of. It was the dawn of their empire and they all knew it. Colonizing 114 new worlds in the next 18 years they expanded faster in that brief period than in all of the history of space travel to that point. Everything was changing. Everything had changed. It was the dawn of the Golden Age of Growth and Reason.

The post Khrn Aether-Transit Device appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

“Ancient proverb of the Dales”

“No way!” Vinnie growled, in response to Stephen’s suggestion.

“I was the Elf the last time, it is your turn to be the enemy.” He continued, bringing his cold grey eyed stare to bear upon Stephen.
The two boys, though friends and co-combatants in every sense of the words, had decidedly selective views in respect to the other races about the Sardist Realms. The Khr’n, while hardy and formerly allied to the Scarlottis were no longer the trustworthy, dependable fellows they once were. Since the War of Fellows they had become withdrawn and seemed to have abandoned the works they once pursued with the men of House Scarlotti.

The Elves, on the other hand, had always been the secretive guerrillas who, from the edges of civilization, surgically strike, killing the odd and seemingly random foe regardless of how well protected they seem. The Silent Enemy. Despised by Scarlotti forces who embrace frontal combat and hand to hand conflict over all other forms.

But then from aside and unexpected came wisdom well known, yet embarrassingly unwelcome. “Perhaps the history of your people, and the true nature of the world in which you live has eluded you, my son.”

Deirdre Scarlotti, though foreboding, held an air about her which drew others in. Mystery and great wonder were harmonized into her soothing voice. While Vinnie loved his mother, he was afraid of her in a strange way. Not that she would harm him the way that his father might, were he to disobey his father’s word. Yet she, despite her proven love and devotion, had a way of making his his hair stand up on his arm and a chilling shudder run the full length of his body. She could make him feel like she was sifting his mind for the secrets he held while, at the same instant, making him feel so very comfortable and loved. He was certain she was aware of his knowledge of her powers, but she never acknowledged it to him and that made her even more mysterious.

With a dry mouth and eyes widening in her smiling gaze, “I, I am not certain of your meaning, mother? Our… history?”

Her eyes narrowed and he backed away ever so slightly toward his friend, Stephen, who even now would have ran were it not for some force refusing his legs their motive energies. “You forget your ancestors. You forget Antoni and then you forget the grace of Duchess Gabriella Dulccinae, and her strength of character during the War of Fellows.”

Deirdre did not wish to embarrass her son in the presence of his friend, but when he disrespected the Mae her blood began to boil and she felt driven to address the attack personally. Not simply out of respect for the Mae’n people, but that Vincenso might not grow up ignorant of those things which defined his family, and that she might work to form his destiny. She knew that even at fourteen he should have a far greater command of the history of all three races upon Maenatae. She knew that her sons would all be thrust onto the field of combat soon enough. She would have them armed not simply with strength of will and martial prowess, but with a mind full of the things of this world; prepared to make decisions based upon all of the facts available.

And so she beheld her son and his friend now caught in her tale for they began floating back into her grace, with looks of curiosity and perhaps wonder upon their faces. They moved with a mechanical grace as though their movements, while not their own were somehow desired by them, and resisted. The two young men, moving at the very edge of her gaze slid past her and seated themselves upon a nearby bench there in the wide garden of Demon’s Wrest. That garden which she herself tended.

She longed to tell her son of the wonders within the Great Tree. Of how there shone the light of the Lunactris tree on a scale not witnessed outside within the bare and open world. She would tell him of running water and brooks that did flow and sound and splash. Perhaps even the grand celebrations which were held by royalty aged across such a span of time that mankind might scarce fathom the wisdom held within those fleshly vessels. Her own long life too would she divulge, but such could never be while reason prevailed. Even now she felt the change taking place; her body was beginning to age. She would have Vincenso informed of those things that mattered to her. Those things too she did bless upon her niece, Yylyssa as was the custom of her mothers, but there was a part of her that said within, “He must know”.

Vinnie saw his mother falter; he felt her hold weaken and her gaze he witnessed move off to the distance. Yet he remained, “Father mentions only and always of the great leadership and fighting prowess of Lord Antoni”, he spoke in a reserved tone, almost as if it were a question.

Turning and realizing that they remained despite her releasing them she responded, “My Duke is wise and with that wisdom he does rule his people, however Lord Antoni was compassionate and above all men he possessed a humility and grace that we have been desirous of, though we knew it not, for a long count of seasons”. She saw on their faces wonder and disbelief moreover confusion, though it quickly departed as her gaze was directed upon the young men as she set one eyebrow up, ever so slightly.

Struggling to respond with some fact which might be seen to agree with the points which his mother had made Vinnie responded, “Lord Antoni planted the great tree in the garden there in Merriccia!”.

Smiling at her son and considering his desire to please her she continued, “Indeed he did, but with the aid of the Mae; the very elves which you despise as enemy.” Looking upon the young man she could see the first waves of regret, and perhaps some element of sorrow, upon his face. Perhaps her message was awakening knowledge that already lay within. Perhaps his open disdain for the Mae was simply an outward show of adolescent bravado and nothing more. Then her mind wandered and she allowed herself to wonder if the entire war and the great losses to all sides could be attributed to such a foolish display of insecurity? Men can be childish, she thought.

She allowed silence to work it’s good upon the young prince. Waiting patiently for him to speak. Knowing that he did not wish to do so, but realizing that some lessons which are learned by men they must teach themselves. She noticed him, for the longest time looking at the floor and then about the room, but always avoiding her gaze. He didn’t even look at his friend, rather he avoided his eyes also. Not that looking to Stephen would have helped for he had been practicing his best at remaining invisible to all in the room.

Vinnie knew what was going on. His mother was waiting for an answer, and not just a few words to pacify, but the actual thing which should be said. She waited on some notion that, while within his grasp remained on the very edge of it. When she did this and entered one of these, “teaching moments” as she chose to call them, she would stand him up and they would be locked there in mental combat until that answer came forth. That one thing which best described not only an answer he understood, but a concept that she wanted him to understand. And she was relentless. He knew that, should it be necessary, his mother would sit there looking at him until the full week spun out to its end.

Looking over, he noticed Stephen asleep there on the couch and a thought came to him. He offered his notion quietly, “We are young, mother. Perhaps we do have much to learn”.

Without yet blinking she responded, “I look not for excuses, Vincenso”.
He’d guessed her response and smiled ever so slightly, causing her to raise an eyebrow. “Mother, I mean all of humanity. We are just kinda like, well, we aren’t grown up just yet.” Upon his face there was the beginning of an answer and he, struggling to get it out, was, even now, teaching himself. “The el, er… the Mae. They live so very long and we so very short of a time. By the time we get the idea we don’t know what we are doing we die and go on”. He looked up into her eyes, “it isn’t fair, mother. We will never get our selves under control in such a short lifetime.”

Dierdre smiled and moved across the span to her son and embraced him, “I am very proud of you, Vinnie.”

“Whew, that’s good, she only calls me Vinnie when she is indeed very happy with me.”, he thought as she held him close.

She continued her thoughts, “however, while you have answered my question you have raised another and incorrectly applied an answer”. She could see the shock on his face and the fear in his eyes.
“Yet, we will not address your suggestion that humanity has been dealt with unfairly in their span of life”, she responded in hopes of easing his fears. “That is a lesson that will require more of life’s days to pass over you before the true answer might be attained”

Featured Artifact

Vincenzo Marcuso Scarlotti – Killing Time

“Few who know the Prince Regent misunderstand the irony.”

The post Discourse of Disrespect appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

Caev’eya Nah sat quietly in meditative repose, her daughter at her side. She knew that so much of her father was in Sehles’Ah Selef that meditation nor patience were qualities easily came by. She had extended her umbrage over her daughter as a help and not a simple avoidance of the moment. Caev’eya Nah knew better than any other Mae the impatience of humanity; of their need to make a mark in such brief of an existence. Jean had been with her a long time, by the standards of his people, but despite her elixirs and serums he asked her to let him pass to Gaael and the rewards of his people. It had been merely a moment in the span of time, but since his departing some 14 seasons hence time had crept to a most disturbing crawl. He left at only 208 years of age and without seeing Sehles’Ah Selef reach the fullness of her growth. His last words and instruction for their clan were received by all in the grand room of his clan’s abode. His great nephew, holding the kingship of the people did grant a week of mourning following the solemn event.
“Always smile, my love, for I will be looking down upon you and will be most distressed if you should weep or even should you frown.”  A sharp gasp to her side and Caev’eya Nah was reminded that those within the umbrage had full and complete recall of the thoughts of their benefactor. Releasing the wheel she turned to a tearful Sehles’Ah Selef and smiled, “Papa wished we both might smile, daughter.”
Composing herself and dabbing her eyes she whispered most urgently, “I saw him mother! As if he were right here, right now!”
Caev’eya Nah studied her daughter for a moment and reasoned that she was only 220 years of age and yet required further development. She would not yet have been subjected to such a transfer of thought within the umbrage of her Crèche Master.

“Soon you will begin the final awakening of your mind, daughter. You will see things that will seem impossible and you will do things which are unforeseen.”  Continuing Caev’eya Nah suggested, “Take hold of your senses, as your father taught you, for we will be going before the Matriarch Ma-Primae very soon.” Caev’eya Nah considered her words and hoped that her true amazement with that statement was not indeed impressed upon her face as she revealed it to her daughter. Indeed Gaiae, as the Humans called her, had not requested an audience with anyone in over 420 seasons and while Sehles’Ah Selef was indeed the longest lived of Mae and Human pairing there had to be more. Much more.
Concern upon her face Sehles’Ah Selef turned to her mother and suggested boldly, “Certainly she has forgotten our appointment mother for we have been here for two-hundred fourteen hours and thirty-eight minutes!”

“The mind of a human imposed upon the psyche of a Mae? Or perhaps more than we are prepared to know?” Came a voice from above and to the right of the two Mae’shael. Vaesah Fleas’c Ah came gliding down upon the winds floating with such grace. Seated in a restful pose she lighted next to Sehles’Ah Selef, smiling. Her robes, while lovely did pale in the grace and light of her presence and she held within her smile the hope and the heart of her people.

Sehles’Ah Selef froze in place and looking upon the figure of the matriarch she could do no more than wonder. Wonder at the waves of so many unequaled traits all emanating from a single source. Such beauty as was hers, yet it flowed from her not as if it were hers alone, but it was as if the beauty itself possessed a life and a destiny of its own. Indeed, every nuance of this fascinating Mae’shael held its own sway, was alive, took life and energy as if that trait itself lived and breathed alone. Her charm. Her poise. Her obvious wisdom. Yet more impressive than any other was the embodiment and aura of her unparalleled wisdom coupled to the hoary age beyond imagining. There was no need to ask how old this ancient Mae was for the ages sang and spoke of lives and times past to any within the reach of her intoxicating presence. To look upon her was to hear the whisper of the many storied histories of the Mae’n people. Sehles’Ah Selef felt herself spiraling into these myriad of stories with no desire to release from their grasp.

Caev’eya Nah saw it upon her daughter’s face. She was taking The Journey within the vast repository of the memories of Vaesah Fleas’c Ah. It was a journey that she was not yet prepared to take; her mind not yet capable of processing the dream from reality nor physical from mental. But to interrupt the matriarch would be a dreadful breach of protocol and of faith. For it was known that she held the attentions of Gaael and he spoke through her having rescued their people on more than one occasion. Yet, Sehles’Ah Selef was a unique child and certainly such were rare enough that such an interruption by her matron would not be considered forward.

Breaking the gentle gusts of wind and the whisper of storied past Vaesah Fleas’c Ah spoke, “indeed she is unique and you are wise to be concerned with her link to the memories of our people, but it is I who determines what I release from our past.” Turning, she took the young Mae’shael’s hand and elevating her and then her mother to the air beside her. They felt the waft of the breeze and immediately began climbing upwards in the cavernous main chimney of the colossal tree.

“She has a gift which is unique among our people, daughter”, replied the Ma-Primae as she spoke calmly to the two, mother and child. Clearly she was speaking about Sehles’Ah Selef rather than to her, but that did not bother the girl as it did when others did such, for there was a compassionate feeling of concern and wonder in the voice of the matriarch. “We have much to cover, Sehles’Ah Selef and I, we have much indeed to discuss.” The ancient matriarch seemed to have a new feeling come over her, one that she had not felt in a great span of time. It was so long since forgotten and its patterns so far removed that she almost could not discern what it was, at first. Save for the look upon the young Mae’s face she may not have understood; yes, despite the thousands of years experience and the combined record of her people still she would be sifting through the memories of record. She felt wonder and newness of purpose. She felt a growing feeling of promise and the whispers of the coming of a prophesy given her and shared with a king so very many eons hence.

Turning to Caev’eya Nah she spoke with a most resolute gaze, “I will take her into my training and she will crèche within my household”.

The post Memories Beyond Memory appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

Jean smiled at his daughter and brushed her long white locks to one side of her face. She was nearly 80 years of age and her mind was beginning to open up and develop its connection to The Well. In many ways she held a strange power that he had struggled to understand, but felt eluded him as if that power was aware of his surveillance. He worried for her sanity, for joinings between Mae and Humanity often resulted in defects to the children. Defects that could be seen as anything from subtle to grotesque. She seemed intelligent and bright and her form was as lovely as any of the maids in the community, but he could not allay the fear that some malady lurked on their horizon. Some defect of terrible consequence which he could not be permitted to correct nor engage by the Council and their oversight.

“And this troubles you, my dear?” He replied in a calm and soothing tone.

She looked at her feet not making a sound as if her disconnection from the conversation was enough to allow an escape from her father’s question. But he sat, waiting upon her as if the ages held no sway over him. His waiting grated against her, yet it was folly to spoil the truth; in this she gathered her strength. “Members of my crèche have suggested that you cannot be my father since you are not Mae?”, she said boldly yet with great pain.

Jean studied his daughter for a moment, and considered his words that they might not bring pain to her. He also considered how she would certainly relay his response to all future challengers of her linage and her sovereignty. He turned to her and took her hand and as she looked up he said, “Of course you are my daughter, it is the fool which denies our similarities. Do we not have the same hair, for instance?”, he concluded smiling in his wry fashion when he was up to something.

“But papa,” she replied frowning and glancing at him sideways and from her left, “your hair was black until some 14 seasons ago. It only recently has turned white like mine.” A question on her face with the tell tale mistrust that she was being teased in some way.

“Sae’sa, while the people of your mother and those of my line are indeed two people we have bound, in our love, something which is one.” A tear, ran down his cheek as he took his daughter’s hand. He ran his fingers between her long thin fingers, her hand so very lithe and graceful to be larger still than his own. He knew the question that she truly had upon her heart. He had avoided it for all these years. For while she had grown to nearly half a foot above his own stature her mind yet had over 200 years of development left to complete. She was a child and when he was dead and gone she would yet be a child. He longed to impress what he might of mankind and her heritage and connection to the people of the Earth.

“In you I will live on. My thoughts and my family’s history. I know that they will one day be yours. I …” He trailed as, meeting her eyes he saw a desperate look of some understanding within her and he retreated, for the moment, not wishing to overwhelm her with too much, too soon. She must understand before I am gone that we are not lacking in our short existence, rather we go on to a greater service and a place where pains and sadness cannot prevail. He smiled.

In a flash, as though another world opened up she saw a very little boy, scared and fearful of some thing. It was all over his little face. He was looking at her and crying. There were people all about the room whispering, some crying, hugging, some singing songs. It was very confusing outside of the exchange with the little boy.

“It is ok Jean-Jean, Gammy will be looking down upon you. I will remain here in your heart, my love.” An aged hand reached out. The hand brushed the long dark hair back and she knew then. The boy was her father. She gasped as the image departed as quickly as it had appeared.

“Jean-Jean, Gammy will be looking down upon you.” She whispered, crying in a disconnected stupor. Her hands shaking, sweat lining her brow, her eyes red as if there were a change in the well.

Jean looked at her. Stunned. He did not recognize it fully but knowing something was wrong and that he recognized the words which she spoke. He, leaping to his feet and taking a stance of protection, evoked the form of mental shielding to protect her from the well and it’s power till she might revive. She had not been trained and at a mere 79 seasons of age she did not yet posses the nodes in her mind to protect her from a shifting well. If she was indeed using the energies then it could be very dangerous for her.

He held her in his chant and shield. Radiant energies flowed over they two and a soft blue globe circled. Outside of the shield the air crackled and loud booming thunder claps issued from the contest between well and shield. It was then he caught a glimpse outside of the shell of his wife forming The Refuge and extending it over they two. It’s soft, even hues and graces slipping ever so slowly into the protection of his shield. Ever did it expand until completely within she gave him the stern, yet loving look to drop his protection of their daughter who rested now at his feet.

Jean bent down, pulled back her eyelids and looking into her eyes saw she no longer had the red lights within. He nodded to Sehles’Ah Selef’s mother and she lowered The Refuge.

“Caev’eya Nah! She has the vision! At just 79 she has the vision!”, he cried in a whispered shout, tearful, at wits end.
“Yes, my love. We all have the vision, but indeed she is the youngest I have ever seen to display it”. Caev’eya Nah looked intently upon her daughter worried that this malady might cut short her existence. They would need to place her at the side of a guardian all hours of the day or she may indeed be crushed by an advancing well. Lists formed in her head. Plans began taking shape.

“No!” Jean barked, in the same whispered tones, stern and most serious now. “She has the genetic memories of MY people!”

The post Memory for Humanity appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

“So, Kg’Brennt, tell me about your women.” Jorg said, in the most matter of fact voice he could muster.
“Women? Weh don’t ‘ave women, weh ‘ave khr’ah, fool! You ‘ave women an they be a might fragile if ye be knowin’ me well.” The squat, muscular Khr snorted as he pried against the reinforcing timber, snugging it into place.
“So, do you mean that they aren’t a fit partner or what?” Responded Jorg, almost afraid to hear the answer.
“Ah main they canna support mah weight an they canna take mah,” pausing, the squat yet hulking fellow looked about to make certain there were no others of his ilk within ear-shot. “They canna take mah stehr’gk,” he rasped in a strong whisper loud enough only for Jorg to hear.
Jorg kept working on the rail tie in the floor of the mine roadway. He let out a sigh out of desperation. Not to indicate his dissatisfaction to his friend and arms-brother’s response, but his response did give him away for his actions around Kg’Brennt’s cousin, Pahrg’jah had been obvious to everyone who saw them together..

Now Khr females are indeed short, generally four and a half feet tall, and they are very stocky. Yet where they lack grace, they make up in their striking facial features and overly voluptuous form. Indeed Pahrg’jah was even more striking and overly than the average kehr’ah, or so she seemed to Jorg, and he found himself staring at her when she was about.
“Ye fool! Ye love-sick fool!” Kg’Brennt laughed as he sat his pry bar down against the now righted timber. “Yer ne’er gonna get ‘er in the sack by strainin’ an makin’ that silly face ye men do to yer females!” He continued, in a quieter, yet stern tone as he strode over to where Jorg was doing his best to act invisible.
“Don’t let their beauty fool ye, brother. Khr’ah respect strength and power and force of will.” He said in his most studious voice, continuing, “Yet do they strive to ensure the capacity of their sons to forge a place in our future”.
Jorg turned to his friend and, placing his hand upon his chest in a Khr salute walked over to the side of the cave and sat, legs crossed awaiting counsel. Kg’Brennt, recognizing the serious turn that the conversation was taking came over and place his right hand upon his friends head and spoke, “I recognize your request and accept your need for counsel,” as he seated himself directly across from Jorg.
“I do want her, brother, but I recognize her position and,” he paused, “I don’t think I can satisfy her if she would want me.” Jorg said trailing off.
Kg’Brennt looked as sternly and seriously upon his friend for as long as he could then he burst out in a signature Khrn belly laugh. The fact he was seated made little difference to the force of his laughter. “Oh such a one you are, my friend! Oh such a one! We Khrn worry about providing for residence, for sustenance and for such trifling things as attackers from the ranks of the soulless ones and you worry about tickling her pahrrf!”
Jorg looked about to confirm that they were still alone, though he was certain that the sound had carried, for echoes of Dwarven laughter wafted back up the cavernous halls nervous moments later.
Rage overtaking him, and a dose of embarrassment to boot, Jorg growled at his friend, “Kg’Brennt! I am a grown man and a combatant bloodied by dozens of fights! Speak not to me as you might a child, or a fool!”
The young dwarf realized that he had personally embarrassed, or perhaps even insulted, his good friend. Against all that it was to be a Khr it was to insult one’s brother or to diminish him before others. Looking upon Jorg and seeing a man he had forgotten to behave as a Khr, he had behaved as a man. Realizing his offense Kg’Brennt offered the only solution he could, “Brother, I will act for you to assist as your Sh’nareth Narghal in this matter. You will have her hand when the falling maul strikes the gavel”.
This oath and its telling brought a smile back to Jorg’s usually cheerful face and gave him a renewed hope. He joined arms with Kg’Brennt and replied, “Brother, I really appreciate your help! I just hope that her father doesn’t choose a champion rather than accept my offer”.

The post All for the Love … appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

The Dark Sisterhood. Loveliest, most alluring of women. Timeless beauty upon ageless bones. Hateful core of wickedness embracing sin as a craft wrapped in such wanton, gorgeous feminine grace. Despising that form which poses as woman, giver of life, a blessing to mankind. Pillar and support to he which would aspire unto greatness. They do curse, and she above all, the form and the function of man. For their weight is too great to bear and it has severed them from humanity and the graces of Mindanto.

Mindanto creates. Mindanto loves. Mindanto gives hope unto all that call upon His name. He is blessed above all in His capacity and His certain desire to elevate and disperse love over all. But she cannot love. She cannot hope, despite her timeless ages within that hoary psyche. She cannot … create. None of her sisters can create. They are a dwindling race of super – sub humans, doomed and blessed by their own choice, steeped in regret. Minds spinning wildly out of sync with all that is right and proper and good and just. Pain in all that falls within their view. So they release that pain in the giving of pain and the destruction of all that is decent. Having crafted wickedness and deceit through maladies too numerous and horrific to bear. Each act of focused and deliberate venom another dagger through the heart of a soul long dead, tortured in a life of unlife. For even if death would come it is not possible to embrace it any longer for in order to truly die one must have a spirit to give up in the first place.

Shouldn’t I?

Featured Artifact

Moirah. THE Darkest Sister

“Some visitors insist this is the first shirt they purchased. Others refuse to own it.”

The post She appeared first on The Border Aethereal.

    I wrote to you earlier of a time long since passed, and of a man that carried the burden of mankind’s redemption and hope for salvation to the new world. You see, Samueal T. Glenn was not a man unaware of who or what he was. In a time when others denied such things as angels, heaven or hell Samueal was fully aware of much more than any man in a very long span of time; of just how real these concepts were. Samueal was the first aquiescence made by the handlers and management study group of specimen AR2163G-L2R (Better known as Azerbaijan release 37) .

Azerbaijan, referred to by most as A-Z-J, was the latest in a long line of experiments to achieve what would be a means or transiting mankind from one location in space to another using focused thought. Up until this point the creations which enabled such travel were greatly limited in the capacity in which their fields might embrace travellers. Additionally these former creations were unable to individually transport a subject safely without a similarly configured con-struct at the destination. It was hoped that AZJ would be able to transport specimen to locations across the vastness of space not only without a destination portal, but without having already been there. All of the testing and analysis up to this point had been successful, but the closer that the team came to their goal of independent unobserved transit the more mysterious and difficult he became.

    “He goes someplace during those tests. I don’t know where and from the looks on his face I don’t think I want to.”

                                 Daniel Khar’nefellin, Senior Genetic Analyst, Awakener class II

      So at some point along his journey AZJ refused to continue any further testing until he was allowed to meet with one Samueal T. Glenn. Once it was determined who Samuael was, and where he was he was brought to the facility 58.7 km west south-west of Astara with all possible haste. As imposing as AZJ was at 15 foot 8 inches in height and some 618 pounds, Samueal walked into his chamber, sat down opposite him and asked if it would be a problem to shake hands with him. Never after that moment did they ever speak to one another where any could hear them.

It was well known that AZJ could speak to the mind of others, however it was believed that he could only speak to them and not hear them speak back. Many who beheld the two staring at one another for hours upon end felt there was a problem with the two of them, and it was not until almost the very end that the handlers discovered that they two were communicating on a much more advanced level than simply speaking thoughts of sentences to one another.

      “Samueal, there is a God.”

       “Yes, my friend I am aware that there is a God.”

       “No, Samueal, I mean I have seen God and I know that he exists”

                               Telepathic exchange caught on the scan monitors in the room of subject specimen AR2163G-L2R

                                               5886:218/0921 – monitor date

The post Its all about Sin, Suffering and Redemption (part 2) appeared first on The Border Aethereal.