EL-HAZARD : MORTAL ENGINES

                        by Alan Harnum

        Chapter Three - Dialogue du Vent et de la Mer.
           
El-Hazard is a copyright of AIC/Pioneer LDC.  This story, 
however, belongs to me, and I request that you don't publicly
post or archive it without my permission.  

This copy of the story is from my centralized fanfiction archive
at http://www.thekeep.org/~harnums/fanfic.  I can be reached by
e-mail at harnums@thekeep.org

* * *

     "Two nights in a row?"
     
     "Yes, Father."
     
     "Has that ever happened before?"
     
     "No, Father."
     
     "What did you see this time?"
     
     "A terrible king arose from the ocean.  In one hand, he bore 
a spear with seven points.  In his other hand, he held a sword
with seven blades.  A crown with seven points was upon his head, 
and his face, while that of a man, was not."

     "How can the face of a man be not the face of a man?"
     
     "I do not know.  But it was not."
     
* * *     

     "Where are we going, Professor?"
     
     Makoto was beginning to grow nervous.  Schtalubaugh's lamp
threw grotesquely huge shadows of the two of them across the 
damp, pitted stone walls of the underground galleries.  In many
places, the stone archways that held up the vaulted ceiling 
appeared to be crumbling.  The heat and damp this deep under the
palace were almost stifling, and Makoto's breathing was quick and
laboured.

     "The vaults are where we keep things best not accessible to
the public," Schtalubaugh replied.  He turned a corner, and
descended a short flight of steps into a narrow passageway.  
Makoto followed.  Wooden doors so swollen with moisture as to
appear immovable lined the walls, the lintel-stones above them
bearing faded, unreadable script.

     "Like what?"
     
     The professor's reply was cryptic.  "You'll see."

     They paused before one door, and Schtalubaugh looked up at
the writing above it, lips pursed in thought.  "This is it.  Help
me get it open."

     A few moments of shoving forced the door to open inward, 
causing a wave of stale air to wash over them.  Makoto wrinkled
his nose and peered into the darkened room beyond, barely
illuminated by the lantern.  "What's in there?"

     "I think you'll recognize what it is when you see it," 
Schtalubaugh said, and stepped inside.  The beam of the lantern
swept about the walls, showing shelves lined with a miscellaneous
bric-a-brac of metal objects.  And, in one corner, a body.

     A mad scenario flashed for a moment into Makoto's head.
Schtalubaugh was insane, and had brought him down here to murder
him.  Down this deep, no one would hear him scream...

     That lasted for all of a second, because then he saw the
glint of metal upon patches of the body, and realized that
whatever it was, it was not human.  "A robot?"  

     "Possibly," Schtalubaugh said.  "But I believe it to be one
of the Demon-Gods, based on my observations of your Ifurita.  My
teacher, Doctor Saryadin, showed this to me when I was a young
man, and I have not thought of it again until now."

     He licked his lips, and coughed.  "With your ability to
interface with the ancient technologies, I believe you should be
able to... talk to it."

     "Him," Makoto said, crossing the room and kneeling down by
the body.  "It's male."

     The Demon-God, if that was what it was, clearly had been
constructed with a male body in mind.  It was broad-shouldered,
tall, and had the appearance of a heavy musculature.  A 
short-sleeved vest of metallic-blue scales was worn upon the
torso, and a knee-length kilt of silky silver cloth covered the 
legs.  It appeared to have undergone some damage; only the left
arm remained, the other having been torn off at the shoulder; a
tangle of dozens of slender, semi-flexible metal rods protruded 
from where the arm had presumably been attached.  Many of the 
patches of exposed 'skin' were torn away, exposing the silvery 
gleam of an unknown metal beneath.

     Unlike Ifurita, this one had an inhuman aspect to it as 
well.  A barbed blade protruded from the elbow of the remaining 
arm, following the curve of the forearm and terminating at the
wrist.  The blade was tarnished, but the end still had a sharp
point upon it.  There were no eyes or nose--instead, a blank 
visor of opaque white glass covered where they would have been.  
One side had been damaged at some point, and a web of cracks 
spread over nearly the entire surface.  

     "Is it as I think?" Schtalubaugh asked, a note of excitement
in his voice.  "Is it one of them?"

     "I won't know until I make contact," Makoto murmured.  He
hesitated.  "Doctor... if you could leave me alone, I would
appreciate it."

     "But the lantern..."
     
     "I'll be all right.  When I call for you, you can come back
in... but..."  How to explain this?  He didn't want Schtalubaugh
watching as he tried to wake this ancient being, a being that
might be as conscious and thinking as Ifurita had been.  There
was too much of a voyeuristic quality to it.

     But Schtalubaugh had already left, and the room was in
darkness.  Makoto regretted not taking the time to look for an
interface device, something like the Power-Key staff he held in
his hand right now.  Would he be able to make contact if the
Demon-God was dormant?

     Only one way to find out.  He stretched out his hand in the
darkness, until he touched a surface of cool, unyielding... 
flesh?  He was startled for a moment, until he remembered that
Ifurita too had felt human in every way.  The skin of the 
Demon-God was cold as that of a corpse.  He pushed, somehow, a
synchronized movement of body and mind, one that opened the
channels between him and the ancient technology.  There was no
way of describing it, even understanding it, even for him...

     Like a long fall, a taking-of-flight, a plunge into cold
waters, a passage through fire, a whirlpool of electrons and 
light sucking him down into the otherbeing of the Demon-God...

     There was nothing.  Only blackness.  No power.  But there 
was... a switch?  A staff that is a spear, with a bulbous orb 
placed behind the razor-sharp head.  He grabbed, turned.  Power!

     Flight.  It was flight.  A god of the air, Awarian--what was
an Awarian?--troopships fell from the skies in flames as his--the 
god's--arm blades sliced through their engines, as his--the god's
--spear cast bolts of lightning and flung nets of plasma.

     A face.  Ifurita's face.  It twisted with hate.  He--the 
god--hurled his power against her, and she returned it, tenfold,
laughing as she did, and he was falling from the skies, and 
pain system malfunction entering statis awaiting further orders
(help me master)

     Makoto pulled back.
     
     Four beams of crimson light swept through the darkness, 
illuminating minute swaths of the shelves and the ceiling.  In
the white depths of the cracked visor, four fiery eyes without
pupil or iris glowed and rotated. 

     The link was still there.  He was not touching, but the link
was still there.  He could feel the emotions awakening--yes, this 
one was like Ifurita, he could think, he could feel--the 
confusion, the last memories of pain and falling...

     "What is your name?" he asked, out loud and silently.
     
     The voice sounded electronically distorted, with sharp 
bursts of static breaking in.  Some damage had obviously been 
done to whatever controlled the speech.  "I am Mardruk, master."

     "I'm not your master.  My name is Makoto."
     
     "You hold my Key."
     
     "This isn't your Key," Makoto corrected, holding up 
Ifurita's Power-Key.  The beams of crimson light from Mardruk's
visor passed across it as though they were scanning it.

     "You woke me.  You are my master."
     
     "I didn't use your Key to wake you."
     
     "That is impossible."
     
     Makoto smiled.  "Not for me.  You're free."
     
     "Free?"  Even with all the distortion in the voice, it was
impossible to miss the uncertainty.  Hope, as well.  And 
disbelief.

     "Free."  Makoto nodded.  
     
     The red beams narrowed.  It was as though the eyes of the
Demon-God were closing.  "It hurts."

     In the distraction of the awakening, Makoto had not noticed,
but a pale crimson fluid was leaking from the ruined stump of 
Mardruk's right arm, and tiny forks of electricity played along
the metal rods.  One of the legs of the prone Demon-God was, he
now saw, twisted at an unnatural angle.  "I'm sorry.  I don't
know how to fix you."

     "Please take me to repair facilities."
     
     "There aren't any.  You've been... asleep for a long time."
     
     One red eye flashed.  "Yes.  My internal chronometer says it
has been three thousand one hundred seventeen years, fourteen 
days, fifteen hours, twenty-two minutes, fourteen seconds since I
was damaged by Ifurita."

     Another of the four red eyes opened, and the beam swept
across his face, making him blink his eyes.  "You bear her Key.
Are you her master as well?"

     "I'm not her master," Makoto said softly.  "Or yours.  Like
I said, you're free."

     "There is no freedom for one such as I," Mardruk replied.  
"I am a hierodule.  What is a slave without his chains?"

     Before Makoto could raise protest, the red flares of the
eyes faded until they were mere pin-pricks.  "If you cannot
repair me, let me sleep again.  It hurts."

     "Wait!"
     
     The four eyes opened again.  "Yes, master?"
     
     Makoto let the 'master' pass for now.  "Do you know 
anything about the Eye of God?"

     "The Eye of God?  It is a foolish project.  It will never
work."

     A drop of red fluid fell, sizzling with electricity, from 
the stump of Mardruk's arm.  It hit the floor, and hissed into
the gathering crimson puddle.  A sudden, awful sense of sadness
fell over Makoto, nearly as strong as that he'd first felt for
Ifurita.  Like her, this thing--no, this man--was a relic of an
age long-gone, a slave to war.  

     He reached out and touched the smooth blankness of the
Demon-God's face.  The beams of the eyes were tiny, almost 
soothing, points of heat upon his palm.  

     This time, he was careful not to submerge himself in the
memories and being of Mardruk.  First, he found the staff that
was a spear--the representative icon of the programs and
subroutines that kept the Demon-God enslaved--and shattered it 
into fragments.  Then, he flicked the switch that sent Mardruk
into dormancy again.

     When he rose, he had to use the Power-Key to support
himself.  In the excitement of the awakening, he had forgotten
how tired he was.  Dealing with the wounded Demon-God had left
him drained physically and emotionally.  He wanted nothing more
than to rest.  The darkness of the room was cool and comforting;
no longer did the dank feel of the air bother him.

     "Doctor Schtalubaugh, I'm finished," he called out.
     
     The doctor entered moments later, lantern raised.  "Was it
as I thought?"

     "It was," Makoto replied.
     
     Schtalubaugh's eyes lit up, almost greedily.  "Wonderful.
We can learn so much of the ancient days from such a creature."

     Makoto shook his head.  "I put him back to sleep."
     
     "What?  Think of the knowledge, boy!"
     
     "He's hurt," Makoto interrupted, a note of anger coming into
his voice.  "I think the only thing keeping him alive is that 
he's asleep."

     Schtalubaugh looked nonplussed.  "Surely we could get some
information if we..."

     "No!" Makoto snapped.  He took a step towards the diminutive
professor.  "I won't wake him up again."

     Schtalubaugh sighed and nodded.  "Very well.  It is your
decision.  Perhaps you shall change your mind in the days to
come."

     Not likely, Makoto thought to himself.  "Maybe."
     
     They walked out of the depths of the vaults, at which point
Makoto returned to his room, and slept through the afternoon, the
evening, and much of the next morning.  All the while, he held
the Power-Key in his arms, and in his dreams, he wept.

* * *

     The Great Altar gleamed like molten silver in the light of
the downward-burning flames.  Bare and undecorated, it should
have seemed out-of-place amidst the golden and jewel-covered
shapes of the statues.  Instead, it made everything else around
it seem out of place, ostentatious next to its brutal simplicity.

     Nahato stood before it with his arms folded, unimpressed.
"So what happens now, Lemulla?"

     The priestress frowned and looked down at him.  "What do you
expect will happen?"

     "Well, if history is correct..." Nahato began, tilting his
head back to look at the vaulted ceiling.  The sixteen sacred
symbols were arrayed in a circle upon the ceiling, surrounding
stone carvings of the four aspects of the Lord of Deeper Shadows.
"...the heavens should split, revealing a darkness beyond that of
the midnight sky, and a great wailing as of sixteen thousand 
souls in torment should be heard, and a shape with four heads 
without faces and sixteen arms without hands should come forth,
to slay all our foes and raise us up as lords upon the world."

     He smirked.  "Is that right?"
     
     A thin smile came onto Lemulla's emaciated lips.  "I see you
have at least read the sacred books of the god.  Perhaps there is
some hope for you after all."

     "Hope?"
     
     "The god has chosen you," she said.  "It would not be my
choice.  But I am merely his servant."

     She stepped forward and pushed the staff down into the
altar.  Nahato watched, vaguely intrigued, as it sank down to 
half its length.  After witnessing the Eye of God and Ifurita,
whatever technology this was did not impress him much.

     "Step forward," Lemulla ordered.  "Place your hands upon the
orb of the staff."

     Beneath his hands, the grey orb was cold as ice.  Nahato was
surprised when Lemulla's ancient hands dropped atop his.  Her 
skin felt like dry parchment.

     "Turn," she whispered into his ear.
     
    One turn.  The staff rotated smoothly as if it were oiled.  
The orb, if that were possible, grew colder.  A black spark
flared in the heart of the orb; a bolt of dark lightning lashed
from its depths, crawling up Nahato's arm.  He nearly cried out,
but there was no pain, only a rippling chill that went through
his whole body.  

     A second turn, his hands working with Lemulla's, and the
tiny bolts of lightning became more frequent.  They formed a
corona around him and her and the staff and the altar, and made
Nahato feel as though he were trying to breath through ice water.

     The third turn.  Black lightning flared.  Lemulla spoke; he
did not hear the words.  His hair stood on end.

     A whisper of voices... The centre of the orb burned blacker
than the midnight sky, pulsing like a heart.  Lemulla removed her
hands and stepped back.

     White-hot pain exploded through his skull.  It felt like
someone was carving out sections of his brain with a rusty knife.
The voices rose until they became screams.  Nahato screamed along
with them.  Detonations exploded through his mind.

     He saw visions.  He saw a sunless paradise, endless grey
crags and jagged mountains, buildings of glass and steel and
stone where thousands of his people dwelt, mines filled with
precious metals, springs of clear, cold water...

     A temple whose sixteen towers scraped the sky, whose four
buildings were adorned with gold and silver and diamonds and 
rubies, whose doors and windows were made of crystal... 

     And at the centre, the four-headed, faceless god rotated,
seeing all, knowing all, the absolute master of the world.  
     
     His eyes--but he had no eyes--focused upon Nahato.  Before
the god, he was a worm, he was nothing, he could be ground 
beneath the god's heel like an insect...

     The god raised his sixteen arms, which had no hands.  Black 
ichor seeped from them.  He spoke; his voice was a peal of
thunder.

     "Serve me and you shall not die."
     
     And Nahato knew that it was true.  He bowed down before the 
god, and awaited his commands.

* * * 
     
     "That's the stuff..."
     
     Fujisawa sank down into the tub with a sigh.  The sky beyond
the tiny window high up on the tiled wall was still dark.  In an 
hour or so, dawn would begin to creep through the blackness; for 
now, though, he was alone in the solitude of the night.

     Most of his day had been spent in the most out-of-the-way
parts of the palace he could find.  He had spent fours hours in a
section of the garden dedicated to an immensely rare--and 
extremely ugly--purple flower that smelt vaguely like rotting
fish.  

     On Earth, he hadn't been a thoughtful man by nature.  The
answers had been in the bottom of the bottle.  Or beer stein.  Or
shot glass.

     But here in El-Hazard, things had changed.  To protect his
students, he'd had to stop drinking.  And now that the threat was
past, and he could start again, he'd realized he didn't want to.

     More to the point, he couldn't.  He'd tried today; sneaking
booze from the kitchens in the palace was easy.  He was fairly
sure the cooks knew he was doing it, but let it go by because he
was one of the heroes of the war.  

     So, by a fountain in the garden, he'd poured himself a cup 
of wine, and drank.  And spat it back out; it had tasted foul 
and rotten.  At first, he'd thought it was just a bad bottle.  

     But it wasn't.  He'd tried wine, beer, hard liquors, 
digestive liquers, and anything else he could get.  It all tasted
vile.  It had occured to him that last night's banquet might be 
the last time he was ever drunk.

     He raised up his submerged hands and flexed his fingers.  
He could feel the power in his body like a charge of electricity;
all day he'd been fearful of accidentally breaking something with
his strength.  

     Schtalubaugh had surmised that the passage through the
dimensional walls had somehow given them their powers.  That the
powers might change hadn't occured to any of them.  But the
evidence was before him.  And it frightened him; in a way, it was
like having an unknown disease.  There was no telling what it
might do next.

     The door of the small bathroom opened, and Miz stepped in, a
fluffy towel wrapped around her waist.  As she wasn't wearing
anything else, it was something of a shock to him, even though
the bathroom was so dimly lit that it was hard to make out many
details beyond shape.  He was so surprised that he plunged 
entirely beneath the surface, and shot up a moment later gasping
for air and trying to spit out the water he'd swallowed.

     "Hello, Masamichi," Miz said nonchalantly.  She took a step
forward and sat down on the marble lip of the tub.  "Found you at
last."

     His mouth worked faster than his brain.  "How?"
     
     "The palace's water supply," she replied.  "I told it to 
watch for you."

     "You can do that?"
     
     Miz smiled and kissed the ring upon her finger.  "Of course
I can.  I am a Muldoon Priestess, after all."

     Her eyes narrowed, and she scowled.  "So if you want to 
avoid me, you'd better never take a bath again."     
     
     "Umm..."
     
     "Are you staring at my breasts?"
     
     "No!"
     
     A wounded note entered her voice.  "Why not?  Is there
something wrong with them?"

     "Umm... no, they're very..."
     
     "So that's it.  You think I'm an old maid."
     
     "Gahh, no!"
     
     Miz sniffled and drew an arm over her breasts.  "Don't look
at me.  You think I'm hideous."

     "No, I don't.  And you're not old."
     
     "I'm twenty-six."
     
     "So?  I'm thirty-four."
     
     "It's okay for men to be older.  It makes them dashing."
Miz buried her face in her hands.  "In four years I'll be
thirty!  I'll start to sag, then!"

     "Miz..."
     
     "I _waited_ for you!  I saved myself until the man who was
right for me came along, and when he did, all he wanted to do was
avoid me!"

     "Miz, you're beautiful!"
     
     She looked up and blinked.  "What?"
     
     "I don't think you're hideous.  And... okay, I was avoiding
you, but I had things to think about.  I'm sorry."

     "Well..."  She frowned.  "I suppose I can forgive you."
     
     "Please?"
     
     Slowly, Miz unwrapped the towel from around her waist.  
Fujisawa watched, mouth hanging open, as she slid into the water
across from him.

     And screamed, leapt from the tub, and landed on the floor in
a sodden heap.

     "It's ICE COLD!" she shouted.
     
     Fujisawa blinked.  "Cold?  A little brisk, maybe, but
refreshing..."

     Miz's teeth chattered, making it hard to understand her.
"It's ice cold.  You're taking a bath in ice water."

     "It just takes a little getting used to."
     
     Arms wrapped around herself, Miz stood up.  Strands of wet
hair were plastered to her shoulders and back and face, and she
looked absolutely bewildered.  "Ice water..."

     "It's not so bad."
     
     Miz fixed him with an incredulous stare.  "Shayla was 
wrong," she said.  "You're not all jerks.  Some of you are simply
insane."

     She grabbed her towel and left.
     
     Fujisawa looked at the door for a few moments, as if
expecting her to abruptly burst back in.

     "Women are strange," he said finally, and sank down so that
only his nose and mouth were above the water.  The water wasn't
that cold.

     Pretty soon, he was going to have to figure out what to do
about Miz and getting married and all those other things.  For
now, though, he could simply sit and soak.

* * *

     Rain fell gently upon the Holy Mountains of God.  In the far
north, it fell as hail.  Over the Crystal Mountains, it fell as
snow.  It never rained over the Crystal Mountains.  It simply
snowed.

     In the remote pass that the Bugrom survivors had retreated
to, the rain fell softly on the sleeping forms of the Bugrom,
glistening upon their carapaces and turning them into jewels.
Purple became amethyst; green became emerald; red became ruby.

     Jinnai stood in the shelter of the overhang and watched.
Dormant, they were still beautiful to his eye, at least in an
artistic sense.  Whoever had designed them had a fine sense of
aesthetics; even on Earth, he had admired the insectile form for
its symmetry and functionality.  

     Occasional changes in the direction of the wind would blow
scatterings of raindrops against his face, but he did not care.
His clothing was getting rather wet, but he had more of that.
There was a caste among the Bugrom that did nothing but weave,
all day and all night.  The first few attempts at duplicating the
crisp appearance of his beloved school uniform had been rather
shoddy, but they seemed to have got the hang of it now.
     
     Behind him, Deva slept on the dais, head pillowed on her 
hands.  She looked peaceful.
     
     "Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks; rage, blow," he 
murmured.  That brought back a memory.  He had _deserved_ to be
Edmund, damn it.  But no; that role had gone to Makoto.  And he'd
been stuck as Lear, chewing scenery and shouting at the wind.  
Damn Makoto!

     Nanami had made a good Cordelia, though.

     He clenched his fist and raised it beyond the shelter of the
overhang.  Rain studded his fingers.  "Hear me, Makoto Mizuhara,"
he snarled.  "You will _not_ beat me this time.  I will be
triumphant.  If I must, I shall storm the gates of Hell itself to
defeat you."

     "Katsuhiko?"
     
     Deva's voice sounded sleepy.  He turned around and looked at
her.  She had swung her legs off the dais and was blinking her
eyes at him.  "Why are you up so early?"

     "I had another dream," he whispered.  A step forward brought
him fully out into the pelting rain.  It ruined the neat comb-job
he'd done on his hair upon waking, but he didn't care.

     Deva slipped up behind him and put her hands on his 
shoulders.  "What sort of dream?" she whispered into his ear.

     "God sent it to me," he said.  And he believed it; like the
dream of the night before, it was so vivid and real that he knew
it could not be merely a product of his own unconscious mind.
"He has shown me the way."

     "He has?" Deva asked softly.  He felt her chin come to rest
upon his left shoulder.  There was a vaguely sweet scent to her
hair, a mix of honey and spices.

     "We must go alone," he murmured.  "Taking only a small
number of Bugrom with us.  Do you know if you have any boats 
left?"

     "We can make them quickly," Deva replied.
     
     "How?"
     
     "The Bugrom are based upon a modular system.  Twenty of them
will be sufficient to form a boat to carry us and a few others.
Where are we going?"

     Jinnai's eyes glittered.  He stepped away and turned to face
Deva.  The rain had made the armoured clothing she wore glitter,
just like it had the carapaces of her subjects.  "We shall travel
down the Holy River of God.  Near this place, there is a great
waterfall that falls from between two rocks.  The rocks are twice
as tall as a man, and as sharp as needles.  Behind the waterfall,
a great cave stretches deep into the mountainside.  That is where
we will begin."

     "The Fangs and the Maw of God," Deva said.  "They are near
here."

     Jinnai smiled.  A tiny, secret smile, meant only for
himself.  It truly was from God, then; he knew nothing of the
geography of this land, but he had seen a vision of that place as
clear as day.

     "But we cannot sail down the River of God," Deva continued.
"It passes by many small towns of the Roshtarian Alliance, and
several of their largest cities.  You yourself know that; you
crossed the river to the country of Gannan, when you attacked the
port city Balam.  They will spot us, and destroy us."

     "But they will not."  Jinnai's grin grew larger.  "For I saw
two angels, who sheltered us beneath their wings as we travelled.
So too shall the hand of God shelter us."

     "And I must come?  I cannot.  The danger is too great?"
     
     He let a slight note of anger into his voice.  "Do you trust
me so little, Deva?"

     "It is not that I do not trust you, Katsuhiko.  It is that I
cannot risk my safety.  Think of what would happen to my children
if harm were to befall me."

     Anger rose higher.  "And you trust God so little?  If I say
His hand shall shelter us, then it shall."

     Deva closed her eyes.  "I trust in God," she whispered.  
"And yet I fear for myself.  I do not know His ways so well as to
believe that my life is indispensable to him."

     "Has He not sent me to you?" Jinnai said sharply, taking a
step forward.  In response, Deva took a step back.  "Has He not
sent a messenger unto you?"

     Another step forward.  Deva stumbled, slipped on the
rain-slick ground, and fell down.  Jinnai loomed over you.  "Was
it not predicted that I would be sent, to lead you to victory?
And now you shall not follow me?"

     Deva's eyes were wide.  She looked terrified, as if he were
God Himself come to judge her.  Again, he wondered at the
sophistication the ancients of El-Hazard must have had, to create
beings that could mimic human emotions so realistically.

     "Katsuhiko..." she said, almost pleadingly.
     
     Jinnai knelt down and seized her by the chin with one hand.  
"Do you defy the will of God?"

     Deva tried to shake her head, but could barely move from how
tight he gripped her.  

     He released her, abruptly, and stood back up.  "We will 
leave when the sun rises."

     Deva said nothing.  Jinnai looked down at her and frowned
slightly.  The rain kept on falling.

     Truly remarkable.  A machine that could cry.
     
     He leaned his head back, and hurled his laughter at the
weeping sky.     
     
* * *     

     It swam faster than anything mortal could have.  The wake it
left behind swamped a tiny fishing boat.  The frightened cries of
the fisherman and his son as they tried to keep themselves afloat
echoed in its ears as it sped away.

     As it swam, the debris of three thousand years buried at the
bottom of the sea sloughed off into the water.  Seaweed and muck
fell away from the gleaming, dolphin-quick body.  

     A school of sharks decided to try and make a meal of it.  
Their bodies became food for the seagulls, and for the smaller
fish.  
     
     The beams of the rising sun hit its body, and the silver 
hand shone.
     
     It killed a pair of mated whales and their newborn child,
because it had been made to enjoy killing.

     Deep within the vast, cold logic of its mind, a face shone
like a thousand suns.  And a faceless god went to meet its new
master.
     
* * *

     Flying down the labyrinthine shafts of the Eye of God,
Ifurita thought only of Makoto.  Her heart was free now, no
longer a slave.  And she loved him.

     And she wept.  Tears fell from her eyes and sizzled out
against the endless arrays of overheating circuitry.  Bolts of
electricity flashed back and forth between the diverse machines
within the Eye as it malfunctioned; she barely managed to avoid
them.  Tiny distortions in the dimensional walls were opening
everywhere within the corridors of the Eye; voices howled and
screamed beyond them, a cacophony that threatened to drive her
mad.  

     She had seen his memories.  They would meet again.
     
     Up that shaft.  Nearly at the core now, at the dark heart of
the machine.  The central chamber was tiny, barely big enough for
her to stand upright in.  Like the Eye, it was a perfect sphere.
A waist-high pillar rose in the centre, and flowered into four
columns, and each column burst into four spheres the colour of 
summer sky.  She remembered summer skies, now, summer skies not
filled with the smoke of war.

     Through the staff, she felt him.  He told her what to do.
     
     Her hands touched the spheres.  They glowed and flashed.  
     
     With a sigh, sounding almost regretful, the Eye of God shut
down.  The spheres turned black as pitch.

     And the gaping maw of darkness opened, and swallowed her 
down.  It should not hurt so much.  There was no wound upon her
body.  

     Ifurita closed her eyes, and fell into sleep.  And woke up 
in a grey land, beneath a sunless sky.

END OF CHAPTER THREE