Explorer 410: How do you know so much?
Sai-ias: I was told it all, by Minos. I have served him for much time. He is a storyteller by nature, he likes to share.
Explorer 410: Are you telling me you’re actually on board the Death Ship? And that you have befriended its captain?
Sai-ias: If by that, you mean the ship that destroys universes with all the casual cruelty of a child cutting an insect in half, then the answer is yes. I am their slave. We are a ship of slaves.
Explorer 410: And where are you? WHERE? Give me the star coordinates. Download a star map. I can find you! I can be there in weeks, no matter what part of the universe you are sailing in.
Sai-ias: We are in the universe full of many stars. Does that help?
Explorer 410: Not unduly.
Sai-ias: I’m doing my best.
Jak: Of course you are. Let me introduce myself properly. I’m Master-of-the-Ship Jak Dural, a male of my kind.
Sai-ias: Jak. I am Sai-ias, a female of my kind.
Jak: I’m the better half of this beaten up old spaceship.
Explorer 410: In terms of intellect, memory capacity…
Jak: Go fornicate with swamp, Explorer. This conversation is now mine.
Explorer 410: Acknowledged.
Jak: Sai-ias-this ship you call the Hell Ship. Describe it.
Sai-ias: It is a horror beyond imagining, a vast and cruel fist of power that inspires all who see it with awe and terror.
Jak: Without the poetry.
Sai-ias: Poetry is not one of my gifts.
Jak: So I just realised. Just tell me what it looks like.
Sai-ias: You didn’t like my description? I tried so very hard.
Jak: It was indeed lovely. Just tell me: dimensions, shape, does it have black sails that catch dark matter and drive it onwards through space?
Sai-ias: It is indeed very large, and it is shaped like a Bugong, you know, the flying creature they have on the planet of the Farla, and yes it does have black sails, and the hull is marked with a single three-dimensional spiral shape known by many species as a helicoid.
Jak: That’s the Death Ship.
Sai-ias: We call it Hell Ship. It comes from a universe where the substance some call “mysterious cosmic stuff” is part of the fabric of the stars, and of every “iotum,” and it gives the Ka’un a power that many species describe as “magic.”
Jak: And you? Why do you serve Minos? Do you do so voluntarily?
Sai-ias: Am I your enemy, do you mean? Am I one of them?
Jak: Yes.
Sai-ias: No.
Jak: What then?
Sai-ias: Slave, I suppose you would say. Or warrior. But know this: I have served the Ka’un, I have done their bidding, but only in order to deceive. In the hope of finding a way to defeat them. And as a consequence, I was able to acquire this “radio” to get in touch with the Ka’un’s enemies.
Jak: I understand.
Sai-ias: I am not a traitor; do not say I am!
Jak: I didn’t say that you were.
Sai-ias: It is hard for me. Painfully hard.
Jak: I understand. Do you Explorer 410: This is Explorer 410 once more; describe the universe where you were born, and which the creatures you call “Ka’un” destroyed.
Jak: Well you really cut in on the poor creature’s grief there, spaceship.
Explorer 410: This is important, we may not have much time. Describe it.
Sai-ias: Describe a universe? How can that be done?
Explorer 410: Describe your world and your people then.
Sai-ias: We were born many millions of years ago on a planet called Hasha. We lived in the sea and we were slaves of a more powerful sea-dwelling creature, the Tula. But we evolved and took to the land, then flew in the air, then flew to our moon and lived there. We can live in regions where there is no atmosphere, our body contains vast reserves of breathable air and we can expand our shapes a hundredfold, or even a thousandfold. And that is how we flew between the stars. Vast flocks of us, for we live long lives and our bodies are resilient and strong, from all those aeons spent living on the ocean bed where vents spat volcanic rock and boiling sea at us daily.
Jak: That’s-whoah. Oh. Sorry, ignore me.
Explorer 410: Your people befriended many species, you did not invade or conquer or seize their land. You merely landed, like angels descending from the sky, and helped and taught and saved many a civilisation from self- destruction by preaching peace and amity and love.
Sai-ias: Yes. But how do you know this?
Explorer 410: A message was inscribed in the reality-ripple of riftspace by one of the civilisations you encountered. They wrote of you with love and awe, they thought you were gods. But when their planet was attacked, they blamed you, they thought that you were demons sent as harbingers of doom. And they died cursing you, but if you read the accounts carefully it’s clear you were innocent parties.
Sai-ias: Oh.
We were not gods; nor were we demons. Nor were we warriors. We did not fight; to do so ran counter to our philosophy of life.
Except that, since then, I have often fought and frequently killed. And according to the morals of my kind, that means I have lost soul. It is a hard burden to bear.
Explorer 410: Leave the signal path open, please.
Sai-ias: I cannot talk any more.
Explorer 410: Leave the signal path open, send a message every day, at least once a day. Just say “Here.” And “Here,” every day, from now until you die. And that way we will know where you are. We can track you through universes and find you on board the Death Ship. And then we will destroy the ship, and you with it.
Sai-ias: There are tens of thousands like me on the ship. Will you kill us all, even though we are innocent, just to destroy the Ka’un?
Jak/Explorer 410: Yes.
Sai-ias: So be it.
Explorer 410: Sai-ias, we have lost you. Sai-ias, transmit please.
Jak: It’s been a month. Why doesn’t she answer?
Explorer 410: We must persist.
Jak: They must have found her out.
Explorer 410: We don’t know that.
Jak: If they discovered what she’s done, her life will be a living torment. They’ll torture her. They’ll Explorer 410: It may be just a bad signal.
Jak: She’s risking everything for us.
Explorer 410: For herself. And for all her kind. Revenge is the motive common to all those engaged in this enterprise.
Jak: You too?
Explorer 410: Oh yes.
Jak: You hate the Ka’un? You want revenge on them?
Explorer 410: Oh yes.
Jak: But how can that be? You’re just a machine.
Explorer 410: How little you know me.
Jak: You’re not just a machine?
