Day Twenty-Seven

I flick it towards the sun. It will collide in three days. What's left of it.
The planet turns below. Serene. Innocent.

You know the rest.

< That was fast > says Blue when I return. < Easy? >
< Like blinking. I cleared out the rest of the system, too>
< Oh? >
< About fifty of those little attack craft. They appeared just before I left, and you know I hate leaving a job unfinished>
< Well, good. It's good that you hurried> A note of apology, low and quivering. < They want to talk to you>
< Who?>
< Everyone>

So fast.
So fast.
They didn't even tell me why.

We stand in a row, my siblings and I, in the concert hall of Bright Sun. Nine adults stand before us. We don't know any of them; they were randomly selected to officiate. Under normal circumstances one of the trios would be our guardians, but Swift-Runs is dead and these are not normal circumstances.
Our project is not finished. We have completed only twenty-seven of our eighty-four assigned shards.
We have shaped nothing, and yet we are to choose our names.
This is not right. We know the ceremonies, and this has never happened before. A single bond and the chosen judges and no one else. We should be receiving names together, with all the other children, just as we have received all else.
But these are not normal circumstances.
< We bid welcome to those whose names were given. We bid farewell to those whose names were chosen. What, Stumpy, is your choice?>
The faces are kindly, but closed. Is it pity? Is it remorse?
I have thought long and hard about this moment. Thought about the Naming with every stone I broke and every corridor I carved. After the Naming, All-Core, and adulthood.
It wasn't supposed to happen this way. Not now. Not alone.
We were trying to help. We were only trying to help.
"Silent-Sands-Drift-Against-the-Wall," I reply aloud.
Nine heads bob as one. Metal flashes, jewels sparkle, and pillar-chimes rumble a deep chord of acceptance, deck trembling beneath my feet.
< Why do you make this choice?>
They ask so calmly. So simply. Almost as though they don't realize what they're doing, what they're asking, what traditions they're breaking by naming us so unprepared and so soon.
They ask, and I hate them.
I reply aloud, as before. The monsters will not know my name, or my reason, or my hate. "It is the idea. The inevitable. We build our walls, and when we are gone the sand will consume them."
I wait for the shock.
'What manner of name is this?' they will ask, eyes rolling in thwarted confusion, 'What manner of meaning? Why do you name yourself so? It is wrong, it is all wrong, and you, too are wrong. Change it. We will not permit you to wear the armor of entropy, of destruction, of decline and death. This is not our way, and you must change it.'
< Very good. Farewell, Silent-Sands. What, Squeaky, is your choice?>
Very good.
Very good.
Did they not hear me? Did they not understand? Do they not care?
Squeaky gazes straight ahead. "Crackling-Wind-Through-Gem-Studded-Spaces."
< Why do you make this choice?>
"It is what, one day, I hope to build. It is space, studded with stars, and I will be that which moves between them."
To this one, surely, they will take offense. Their claws clench, their tendrils curl. 'Void? You wish to be and build void?'
The pillar-chimes hum. < Very good. Farewell, Crackling-Wind. What, Blue, is your choice?>
They don't care. No one cares. They've given up; they know that we'll all be dead if nothing is done, and they're planning to do nothing.
"Smooth-Stones-Tumble-Down-the-Rift," comes the reply.
< Why do you make this choice?>
"History. Down which rift did we tumble?"
'No questions! We ask, you answer. A question is not an answer, child!'
< Very good>
'Capital! We don't mind your words at all!'
< Farewell, Smooth-Stones>
'We don't mind! We don't have minds! We've been infiltrated by the monsters, and it is they who accept your names! They who do such things, for our own kind would never approve— but we approve. We're monsters, and we will let you call yourselves anything you want. Only... why not Everything-Explodes-Even-the-Universe? We liked that one. We really liked that one.'
They draw themselves straight, draw themselves upwards. Their forelegs leave the floor, their midlegs likewise, and they stand reared, braced upon their tails, arms spread wide in segmented halos.
< We bid welcome to those whose names were given. We bid farewell to those whose names were chosen. Farewell. The All-Core awaits>
A final chord: the air itself leaps and shivers.
It is finished.
We, alone, will be adults once we leave this room. We will have names. We will know everything. We will join the ranks of our elders.
Or will we?
'Farewell, foolish bond. You will know eternity in oblivion's embrace.'
We depart. Chastised, though we know not why.
< That was all?> asks Blue, knowing full well that we may be overheard but not wanting to let on that we realize this, < Not a complaint. Not a word>
< They must be planning something terrible> says Squeaky. Crackling-Wind. < Something to make certain no one leaves ever again>
I place one foot before the other, claws clicking on the polished floor. < But what did we do to deserve such punishment? Truly, what did we do? Show them what is possible? Show them that we can save ourselves? Show them that we can be again as great as they claim?>
< They don't believe us> Blue— Smooth-Stones— says, quietly. < They're going to go about things in their own way, even if it is wrong, and they're going to make sure we can't tell them otherwise>
< We're cripples> I laugh. < No one wants to listen to us. We're young, and foolish, and we want to live. Can't have that. No. Not at all>
The exit is framed by another set of chimes. They hum, high and tinkling, as we pass through their confines, and I don't have to wonder why our guardians are waiting outside because I know. A glance at Broad-Leaves, a glance at Heat-Traces, and I know all there is to know about them— what they've eaten, what they've built, where they've gone, who they've talked to, what they're made out of— I know it all, and the only mystery remaining is thought.
Even the All-Core cannot tell me what they're planning. Or will not.
"Welcome, Silent-Sands," says Broad-Leaves with a smile. He is, by all outward sign, pleased... but the Link indicates otherwise. There is a gap there, a disjointing, an icy acceptance of what is to come and what must be. "Welcome, Crackling-Wind. Welcome, Smooth-Stones."
I stare at the deck. Processed flex-steel and flowstone, fitted with waste removal and self-cleansing veins, made by the hands of one Gently-Waver-the-Sighing-Winds before the Second Cycle. If it so suited me I could create an exact duplicate, following his method.
< What will they do to us?> I ask the All-Core. It is no different from asking a guardian, except the focus is more expansive, the granter of answers more willing to talk.
< Do to you?> sings a chorus, number of voices shifting and impossible to count, < Only what you have brought upon yourselves>
< Which would be what?>
< You know already what they will do. You are afraid, they are afraid. You charge outwards and attack, they hide and study: each method alone is insufficient, and they hope to combine and conquer>
< Which means what to me?>
< You thought they would keep you from leaving? On the contrary. They want you to leave. Very much>
< But... that is what I've done, and now they've granted us names and knowledge early. I wouldn't be talking to you if I hadn't left, and I shouldn't be talking to you when all the other— when all the children haven't yet been given the same>
< Rest assured, you will be permitted to leave again>
< What's the catch?>
< We've told you all we can. You'll know soon enough>
< But—>
< And it is a pretty name, what you've chosen. Strange, but pretty>
The voices cease; the chorus falls silent.
< Pretty?>
"You've noted the contact, I see," says Heat-Traces. His tone is stiff, his manner strained. His tail swings in rhythmic jerks. "All-Core. Third and last. Each stage less frightening < less of a change than the last, less alien, more natural as you are brought into wholeness> than the one before."
"We're adult," says Blue. "Long before any of the others. What now? Back to work?"
Broad-Leaves shifts, arms coiling. "No."
"What, then? < Not killing us, are you?>"
Broad-Leaves looks at the deck. He says nothing.
Heat-Traces turns, and leads us away.

I lay on the slab. Again. But this time I'm in perfect health, minus the headaches, and the repairing machinery remains quiescent, folded away to make room for a standing audience. Broad-Leaves. Heat-Traces. Squeaky. Blue.
Pardon, Crackling-Wind and Smooth-Stones. And I am Silent-Sands.
If I were old enough to have friends, friends would be in attendance.
"Red-Striped-Monument," recites Crackling-Wind. His voice is quiet, stretched like skin. "Blue's-Corner. Foolish-Question. These works are his tribute. Life and stone and metal formed by his hand, raised in his image, cut to his will."
Killing me.
They're killing me.
'Lay down,' they said, 'On your side. Arms curled around you, legs drawn inwards. Lay still.'
I did. And I knew what they meant to do.
I know. I know, too soon. I lie, motionless, and listen blind. What else can I do? Run? There's nowhere to go, nowhere that they won't find me. Outside are the monsters, inside the monsters, and under the circumstances maybe it's best to die.
Will I taste bitter, as Swift-Runs did? I'm much younger than he was; will this have an effect?
"His work was not finished. It will never be finished. But we will carry on, as we always have. Each monument we raise will be credited to us— the three of us, whole as we once were."
< Still are> Smooth-Stones murmurs. < Still are, still are— Silent-Sands-Drift-Against-the-Wall>
Crackling-Wind continues, each word an ice-razor, each completed sentence a slashing fang. "Silent-Sands is gone. The pattern of his existence, as complex and cunning as star-coronas, has sunk into the disorder of the untouched universe. All that remains is us. We two. In us lies pieces of the pattern, etched into our minds by his presence: his curiosity, his dedication, his resilience, his quickness of mind."
I imagine the memories. Making fun of our guardians. Swapping food. Shifting simulation parameters when we thought Broad-Leaves was busy. Smashing a bowl, and countless false worlds, and our ill-fated test shard. Arguing with Newer over my reasons and my status. Playing chase in the manufactory rings. Departing to smash a real world. Dying, long before the sickness could catch me.
Good memories, most of them. That's good, right? I do wish I could have finished at least one project, even if most of it wasn't built by our hands. I do wish I could have said more to Swift-Runs. I do wish I didn't have to die.
< Silent-Sands-Drift-Against-the-Wall>
I could run. Get up and run. Or scream, and flail, and force them to pin me... but it would be my siblings, holding me down for slaughter, and they suffer enough already. We could run, together, but the Array would never permit it.
"So long as we remember, a part of him persists. Touch the smallest particle in just the right way and a world will collapse. So it is with people. One touch, and the effects ripple forever."
Why me? Why only me? If they must kill us, kill all of us. Don't make my siblings spend centuries of decline as our guardians must: aching, pitied, all but lobotomized in word and deed. When we realized what was to be done, they tried to climb upon the slab with me, but of course the Array would not let them. Broad-Leaves yanked them back and Heat-Traces blocked their path, jaws agape, claws planted, arms squeezing murderous strength.
Crackling-Wind, Smooth-Stones, your sibling is dead. You must enact the proper ritual, as is your duty. There he lies. Speak.
< Silent-Sands-Drift-Against-the-Wall>
"To hunt the silence requires strength and skill. It requires thought and will. But, more than all of these, it requires love. We make the universe sing, and we do it together. Where one task ends, another begins, and stone and dust and star-stuff must be gathered to shape anew."
Now, I know, Crackling-Wind leans over the slab, all six arms raised, chest panels fluttering.
Click-click-click.
< Silent-Sands-Drift-Against-the-Wall>
"We are star-stuff. We are... we are dust. We are stone."
Why? Why? What gain is this? We wanted to help, we wanted to save, we wanted we wanted we wanted...
Don't leave us. Don't leave me. Don't make me leave them.
< Silent-Sands-Drift-Against-the-Wall>
Is it my fault, that I die? What kindness is this, to force one third to cut away another third while the last watches helpless, to stand back and see that it is finished, to see the sorrow-feast begun and partake with empty faces, empty mouths, empty chest and core?
I live!
I lay curled, and yet I live.
"Silent-Sands' task has ended, and now we gather to shape anew."
I wait for the carver-planes, for the pain, for the end. Shadow-presences stretch across me, any moment to descend.
Any moment.
Like a food-animal, diced to little pieces. It's fast, at least. Muscle severed, sinew snapped, circuits sliced. All at once.
Now.
Or... now.
Why make me wait? Why prolong the anticipation?
Or is it that all my impressions, all my life, has compacted into these last seconds, eternity into eternity, and indeed I will never die but only wait?
I wait... and then the shadows remove themselves, trembling, and my chest-panels jitter like bells, ringing cold convulsions.
Not dead. Not killed.
But the words. The recitation, the almost-act.
Why not dead?
Footsteps, scraped tails, retreating warmth and the hushed ghost of a sob quickly suppressed.
< We'll come get you> bursts Squeaky, new Crackling-Wind, new amputee, < We'll come get you, we promise, we won't let you stay out there all by yourself, we'll save you, we'll do anything, we—>
We.
The chamber door folds like a knife.

After that: I don't remember. I don't know for how long, or through what, I slept unfeeling. All I recall are the lights fading behind my eyelids, and the whir and clatter of machines, and the jolt as they descended.