The Withered Land, THE EMPIRE FALLS: HELL'S AVATAR

HELL'S AVATAR -- PART SEVENTEEN

The Ventriculum, outside the Megacosm, in the arterial non-space between Realities...

Aboard the colossal shiftcraft called "The Glide", Uhzaysuhl sat staring through the infraspectrum portal at the omnidirectional fractal metaflow through which the vessel glided. His powerful form was cradled by the high back and arm rests of a massive encephalo-cybernetic pilot's chair to which his flightsuit was neuro-linked. The metaflow eddied around and slid over the quantum surface shielding spherical supercraft as it swept past sub-frequency slip-torrents and turbulent Time-rapids in the Ventriculum, providing Uhzaysuhl with teasing glimpses of Multiversal reflections, of What-Is, What-Was, What-Could-Be and What-Could-Never-Be in discordant, unconnected alternate universes.

Most of what he saw was horrifying.

Uhzaysuhl gradually steered The Glide across the bubbling expanse of an erupting Extant Aggregation, a volcano-like quantum extrusion that rocked the Ventriculm's border membranes as it created a hole, like a reverse gravity well, from which spouted a liquidic geyser of Chronal Instability. An Extant Aggregation could destroy anything in Creation, forever erasing it from all possible existences in the Megacosm. Not a single scientific theorist from any dimension could predict when and where the things would appear, wreaking havoc like vast interdimensional sinkholes, or even why they occurred at all.

The Prime Template Pilgrim, for such he was, Uhzaysuhl was following the event-thread for the drama playing out on Teshiwahur. The Withered Land was a difficult place to through which to plot or track the course of predictive inter-sequenced events, no matter how much complex computing power you threw at the effort. And that was no doubt a side effect of occupying astrophysical space with The Wound.

But he had seen it.

The Scrying Gate had isolated and locked onto the sequence and Uhzaysuhl had seen it.A non-biologic, unhuman, sentient cosmic entity had entered into Teshiwahur's sector of human-populated space. The entity was one of eleven such god-like life forms.

They, these non-human sentient mutations who were anthropoid representations of the essential Multiversal Elements, were known as the Xherim'efarr or "The HyperLords" and they were the creators of the Celestial Empyrean Host. A race of ageless, alien, ultra-cognitive, telepathic and telekinetic travelers and manipulators of the space-time continuum, the Xherim'efarr rarely directly interacted with any biological species. Each of the HyperLords embodied a higher cognitive cosmic constant, a force, like Analysis and Calculation, Experimentation and Implementation, Biogenesis and Xenogenesis, Chaos and Order. They lived, if alive they actually were, within the envelope of the Ventriculum, which was an impossibility, but the location or name of their homeworld, if they had one, was a mystery. Like many others who had attempted to uncover their secrets, Uhzaysuhl was frustrated in his investigations by the lack of any real hard knowledge about the mutant xenomorphs. The only thing anyone could be certain of was that the HyperLords, both individually and collectively, were possessed of enormous power and technology.

And, it was rumored by various cosmic xeno-biologists, one of them was psychotic. Its name was Dessimathiah, also called the Dreaming Executioner.

And it was he who had merged his material form into the planetary megaspace of the Withered Land.

Behind Uhzaysuhl there was suddenly a rushing sound hinting at the abrupt displacement of air accompanied by the faint tolling of a broken bell. A tingling sensation danced across the flesh of his neck. He wasn't alone. He could feel a cool presence emerge from where there previously had been emptiness. There was a disturbing sense of familiarity about that feeling...

Atu'ihma.

As recognition dawned in him, an old and frequently misquoted Earth-human saying came to the forefront of Uhzaysuhl's buzzing mind: "If the devil should, so softly, stroke your cheek, you will be his forever". He didn't recall who had said it or when he had heard it, but he deeply felt the truth of it. He would never be free of the haughty, sardonic Rimworld alien.

"I did not call you here," Uhzaysuhl said. He slowly turned the chair on its rotating base to face the Empyrean Messenger. He crossed his muscular arms across his chest as he regarded the alien.

"No, you did not. But I'm sure you are aware that I have a large degree of independence in my comings and goings, even here in the Ventriculum. I need not be summoned to a place to go there," the Celestial Empyrean said. "I notice you pilot the Glide with the surety of purpose. Have you a particular destination?"

Uhzaysuhl had no patience for fencing with the Messenger. "Dessimathiah."

Floating above the floor, the creature practically purred in response to the word. "Ah yes, one of the Cosmic Multiversal Guardians, the Xherim'efarr, whom your kind call 'HyperLords'. The Great Dessimathiah. This name refers to the one described as 'the Dreaming Executioner', does it not? Many of you carbon-based, simian-spawned life forms expend far too much time and energy creating, re-discovering and re-imagining the mythologies of creatures such as him. I admit I've never understood the fascination."

"Don't play games with me. You know who and what he is. As a matter of fact, you know more than most, since the Xherim'efarr were the very race who created you Celestial Empyreans."

Atu'ihma cocked his head to one side and his thin, bloodless lips twitched in a misguided and embryonic attempt at a patronizing smile. Despite the alien's best attempts, he could not quite get a handle on the subtleties of human physical expression. He looked like a beautifully-sculpted, decorative mannequin pretending to be alive.

"Did they now?" he said mildly. "So my kind are children of the HyperLords, are we? And how would any mortal human possibly possess certain knowledge of that?"

"I said 'creations' of, not children of," Uhzaysuhl clarified.

Atu'ihma's eyes went dead and threatening, like those of a malevolent doll, for just a moment before reasserting their normally lackluster, non-committal stare.

"I stand corrected," was all he said in response.

"So, anyway, the Scrying Gate revealed the strange and unique pattern-frequencies particular to the HyperLord species upon scanning encephalo-radiant organic wavelengths in the territories of the northern continent on Teshiwahur. The ship's encyclopedic life form recognition catalog pulled the name 'Dessimathiah' from its database as being the most likely candidate for originating that pattern-blip. Now why would a computer do that if the creature were only something defined as a 'myth'? Why would these mythical Cosmic Multiversal Guardians even be in a database collecting the different sentient species active in the known Megacosm? And, more, why would that entry in that database have originated from no less than your friend, the Autonomous Administrative Command Node of the planet Teshiwahur's Central Analytics Inquisitive Data Reactor?"

Atu'ihma did not answer.

"I mean, after all, very, very few planetary computer networks actively track the physical movement of myths across the surface of their worlds," Uhzaysuhl concluded.

"He's going to slaughter all of your kind," Atu'ihma said breathily, closing his eyes as he spoke. His facial expression gave Uhzaysuhl the impression that the Celestial Empyrean was enraptured at the thought. "He'll kill your species by the tens of thousands. The Withered Land will be ushered into an age of endless murder. And I may myself die from the sheer joy of watching him do that."

The Messenger's words slowly faded on the air as he disappeared from sight, leaving Uhzaysuhl alone sitting in the pilot's command chair on The Glide.

He cybernetically reconnected with the giant shiftcraft's directional reconnaissance scanning system and resumed his search of the planet's vast Western Hemisphere. He was hunting for the location of an ancient necropolis called "Shi'draih-Hakaba".

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