-1The day will come when time must be reborn, to bring forth a new era, and to save life in the universe itself.

The stars will be the first to die, going from red giant to white dwarf, and white dwarf to brown dwarf, diminishing light and energy from the seemingly eternal universe.

One day, it’ll all fall to one of another species, one that stands tall and can comprehend, respect other species’ desires, and anticipate a better future. And with them, our people will help, as best they can, to begin a new era.

At that moment, the Timekeeper’s Secret will be awakened, and the power of the black orb released.

Time may seem infinite, but everything must fall, someday...

-Ancient Rannos Legend

Svilka sat alone, silent, on a stone bench in the darkness of the Yatuka night. He let the clean, crisp air brush his light golden, almost white, hair, that hung short and straight at shoulder’s length. His tall and slender body sat rigid, as his violet-blue eyes gazed up into the endless reaches above, through a thinning atmosphere to the dimming stars, which were growing fewer in number each and every night. Around him, on the edges of the valley’s rim, his people, the Sacunians, had built castles that stood several hundred feet tall. They were masterpieces, beautiful works of masonry, built tall and slender, like the people who shaped them. In the dark, they were more like ghostly figures on the horizon, watching over their kingdom. In the daylight, it would be clear that they were built of a rare white rock, heavy and hard, cut into large blocks, carefully piled one on top of another. There were nearly a dozen of the towers, but even they were weakening.

Svilka looked around himself at the rocks and stone structures built by his people, a dying culture from a once great civilization eons ago. The stones were painted, painted accordingly to retell the old stories from all those lost millennia. The paint was done in green, blue, red, purple, yellow, all colors that did not exist naturally anymore. Only the old memories survived, but not of the life forms that had inspired them.

What had happened? Svilka thought longingly to himself, that made the wonders of our people die?

The people of Sacunia lived quietly in this valley… peaceful with the bulky Rannos and the mythological Timekeepers, their dominating and more powerful neighbors. Svilka got up and brushed dirt off his gold and white silk robe, thinking of the Rannos.

The Rannos were, too, a dying race, existing only through a natural, instinctive urge in a species to survive. They were lead by long, loathsome heads with six brown-green eyes, and a large sloppy nose. They had tiny ears that moved around any which way, and small horns, now vestigous to the species. They had flat yellow teeth, once used for grazing before chlorophyll based life forms had died out. And they had huge humps on their backs, slowly shrinking, used for food storage. They had six stubby legs, each hoofed, and their body was covered in a thick layer of wiry brown hair. They were repulsive beasts, but they had survival instincts like no other species, and understanding and culture. Intelligent life.

As a Sacunian, Svilka despised the Timekeepers most of all. They were sleek, blue aqua based creatures that left the sea when it was beginning to shrink away and collect, frozen, at the poles. They were the only native species of Yatuka left, but maybe the most spiritual and intelligent of all. Alone on their mountain peak, they were said to perform magical rituals and held the secret of time: a single dense black orb. The Timekeepers spoke little of the black orb, and very few even knew of its existence.

Svilka knew of its existence. It came in his dream from the night before, where an old Rannos, one he had recognized, recited a short ancient legend to him, and had showed him the way to the black orb. Svilka thought carefully about his dream, and realized he had a role to play in the grander scale of things.

Svilka thought of how feared the orb was, and headed on to a northbound rock trail. The stars were dying, life was rare. Even now, when the sky was at it’s clearest, only a handful of stars twinkled, and only very dimly. The three races of this small planet were barely surviving, and that was only by the light of a nearby quasar, or neutron star. A sun did not shine down on Yatuka, but a quasar, the last power source. Even then, it was producing less energy and light than even the year before.

As Svilka ascended up onto the ridge, he passed many stones, painted and carved, though hardly weathered. Images that would be lost forever, a real shame, thought Svilka to himself. All the knowledge of the past will be lost.

He continued on, over the ridge, and sliding down the loose regolith on the other side. Ahead, the tall, steep sided mountain of the Timekeepers loomed like a dark king. Beyond, past the horizon, the morning glow of Se Abel, the neutron star, grew to a brilliant white. “What would be better, than Abel learning of her fate, too?” Svilka moved on, approaching the mountain by foot.

As he walked on, he noticed several Rannos coming towards him. Svilka stopped and waited for the atrocious monsters to come to him. Svilka recognized them immediately. They were being lead by the Rannos from his dream, called Mud Sky. Svilka also noticed they walked with purpose in their steps, carefully and steady.

“Svilka...” Mud Sky came to the Sacunian’s side. “May I ask we assist you?”

Svilka thought carefully. “You understand what I must do?” he said as he stared up into Mud Sky’s nearly emotionless eyes, feeling a sad aura emanating from them.

“We must, or it will be the end of time, and the old legends say it must be so.” Mud Sky said, and turned his bulky body towards the peak. “I had the dream, too, Svilka. My grandfather was telling me a tale from ancient times. I was only a calf, but he felt it was an important prophecy… one that would change my life forever.” Mud Sky looked down at the ground below his hooves. “It is part of my species’ destiny to help you release the black orb’s power. Please let us follow your lead.”

Svilka knew the Rannos had an oral culture, and told old stories from generation to generation, with the young Rannos calves gathering around their elders in wonder and awe. They really are more intelligent than they may seem, sometimes. “If it is part of your story as a species, you have no choice but to join me.” Svilka spoke, and Mud Sky allowed the young Sacunian to climb onto his back.

“So what must we do, Svilka?” asked a smaller Rannos, a little female.

Svilka then spoke of his plans for them.

It was nearly dawn, Se Abel was making the horizon glow, and its white light shone on the ragged coats of the Rannos, and on the fair skin of the daring young Svilka, determined and focused. The Timekeeper’s mountain was tall, and near the top of it all, a golden shrine. Svilka pointed up to it.

“That’s where the orb’s lair is.” Svilka spoke to the small group of Rannos.

“I see it!” said one of the Rannos. “Can you, old Mud Sky?”

“I cannot, Shale. My eyes are old and aged. But it may not matter for much longer, anyway.” Mud Sky said sadly, though he knew that even young Shale won’t see for much longer.

A Timekeeper lookout stared down from a higher chamber of the fortress. His sleek blue skin shimmered in the light of the rising quasar. His small and vigilant predator’s eyes gazed down to see the troop of Rannos approaching, and a familiar Sacunian, the one he had found staring at the black orb’s lair, was riding on the largest of them, proudly in the lead. The Timekeeper did not speak, but gave the alarm to all the guards on the mountain. He then grabbed his spear, and came down. A battle was looming.

“What’s going on up there?” Shale called out to the others.

Svilka looked up ahead. He saw that the Timekeeper forces were readying themselves at the base of the mountain in front of the entrance to their city beyond: a majestic silver gate with designs of triangles and spirals. Though he never could enjoy the Rannos’ company, he knew he couldn’t let them get slaughtered by Timekeeper weaponry and magic.

Was it worth it? To kill off all of the remaining life forms in the universe, because of an ancient fairy tale? Yes. Yes it was. “Stay together!” Svilka commanded. “Quicken your pace!” Each of the Rannos’ six legs pounded the ground below them, and moved as quickly as they could. Svilka knew he needed a strong charge, and the velocity of these Rannos would become an unstoppable wall of flesh and fur. They would be able to break through the Timekeeper’s lines.

The Timekeepers held their spears out from their thin ranks. They, too, were suffering from massive losses of individuals. Life was dying in the universe, but it must go on.

This might just work, Svilka thought to himself. “Charge!” Svilka’s battle cry was heard by all participating in the battle. The Rannos, for the first time, trusted the Sacunian boy. It was not just with their lives, but for the future only he might hold.

Crash!

The Rannos broke through, breaking the bodies of many Timekeeper warriors and magicians. The rest flung themselves at the invaders, stabbing into the backs, bellies, and faces of the Rannos. They were backed up against the gate into the Timekeeper city.

“Svilka.” Mud Sky spoke up to the Sacunian on his back, bleeding black blood from the loss of two eyes. “Go on into the city. We’ll hold them off for you.”

Svilka gave one final look at the sorry creature whom he never really knew, and he realized that maybe, maybe these creatures weren’t that bad after all. “Good bye,” he said as he climbed down from Mud Sky’s back and to the gate, “Good bye, my friend.”

Mud Sky looked at him, and a once emotionless face seemed to smile back to Svilka. Then Mud Sky lifted his head to the sky and bellowed a loud war cry. Then all the Rannos began to fight, without any hope of surviving. Svilka saw the Timekeepers try to get to him, but their fragile bodies were knocked away by the muscular Rannos.

Svilka found his way up the spiraling stairways to the top of the highest point of the Timekeeper city, to the top of the Timekeeper mountain, to the chamber of the black orb.

The constant running up the stairs was tiring and hard on Svilka’s light build, but it was the quickest way up to the top. He must get there before he was caught, or possibly slain, and then it would be the end...

Almost there. Svilka couldn’t hear the battle anymore. Was it over? Or was he that far away now? Ahead, a light. Svilka was feeling fainter and fainter as his heart beat faster and faster. He broke out into the light, above the Timekeeper city, and he could see the room ahead in the light of the rising quasar, the lair of that dense black orb. He paused, to take it all in.

The black orb’s lair was different than what he remembered. Lit by Se Abel above, it was lush and full of green chlorophyll based organisms, the kind in the most ancient of his race’s legends, on the rocks back in the valley and the paintings of times long past. It was here. Water trickled from a quick little stream, and small aquatic creatures swam, gobbling up even smaller flying creatures. Small and spindly trees grew up around him. At the center of all this lushness, he saw a small building. It was the room of the black orb.

Movement from the room ahead caught Svilka’s eye. A slow moving Timekeeper stood there. He was old and fragile, and his skin was iridescent, shining blues, greens, and yellows and reds. He had a great large and colorful frill that hung down from the back of his head. Who was he?

Suddenly, a pain struck Svilka’s right shoulder from behind, and he fell forward to his knees. A long spear protruded out from where he had the pain, and blood began to turn his gold and white robe into a deep red. He turned his head to look behind and see the Timekeeper lookout that had raised the alarm of the attack. He was poised, and satisfied with his aim.

Svilka didn’t move. He was defeated.

To his surprise, the old Timekeeper came and knelt down beside Svilka. You have finally come. he said, but did not move a muscle while he spoke. He speaks into my mind, thought Svilka.

The old Timekeeper stood up gracefully, and with only the slight movement of a single small hand, the lookout fell down and lay still on the ground. Dead. Svilka looked on in fear. This Timekeeper had immense power. “Why,” Svilka spat blood, “why were you expecting me?”

It is your destiny, to be here, Svilka of Sacunia. The old Timekeeper used his mind again. He then pointed slowly to the black orb. Release it’s power, now!

Svilka put all of his last bit of energy into getting to his feet and moving himself over to the chamber where the black orb was kept. Dripping blood as he walked, the old Timekeeper looked on. Svilka was slow, but steadily came to the room. He walked inside. There it was, the orb, floating over a stone pedestal, detailed in every way by cultural designs and religious symbols, like the triangle. A short way away, a glowing blue ball, large enough for Svilka to sit in, glowed. All around him, designs and all kinds of artwork decorated the finely made walls and ceiling. It was so surreal to him, but the injured Sacunian came to the orb, and reached out carefully.

Touch it, Svilka. Then move. Move into the time orb!

Svilka obeyed. He held out a bloody hand to the black orb, and he grabbed it quickly, almost as if it was trying to suck him into oblivion.

Release it!

Svilka pulled his hand away, and the orb floated up on it’s own, and broke into the once noble ceiling above.

The time orb, Svilka!

As the pieces of the ceiling and walls began to fall, Svilka moved himself weakly to the blue ball. It was clear, and to Svilka’s surprise, he fell comfortably right in, almost as if it were meant to be. Was this to be his final resting place?

All around, the stones and rubble from the collapsing room fell, and the bubble of blue protected him.

Good-bye, Svilka. Now you must take on my legacy. Protect the black orb from future generations...

Then the voice vanished from his mind, and Svilka’s world grew dark. It was the end of an era, but it would allow for a new one, someday...

The atoms in the universe suddenly grew attracted to a new gravitational pull, a small, dense object at the edge of the stars. The stars entered blue shift, and the universe itself began to fall inward. Se Abel, the last source of energy, fell in first, soon after the small lonely planet that was home to the last living creatures of the stars. Two nearby white dwarfs came in soon after, gaseous bodies colliding. The two stars merged into one, and turbulent air currents made the newly created star unstable.

Further out, planetoids and lonely asteroids came in close to other stars, falling into their gravity well. And a small black hole, once all alone in the depths of space, came in close to a brown dwarf, warping it into an egg shape. The dim and dying galaxy, stars and solar systems scattered, was torn apart by the sudden closeness to many new masses.

And beyond, the last stars, asteroids, pulsars, quasars, planetoids, and black holes, were becoming victims to the orb.

Nothing would escape the black orb’s pull. Nothing. It was all falling, falling into place...

With the sudden mass being enveloped by the orb, all was moving too quickly. It couldn’t take all the new weight anymore. The black orb imploded on itself, collapsing, all into one, very little space, the size of a young Sacunian’s fist. Then, it all burst outwards, fast. Electrons found fellow neutrons, protons, and joined to make atoms. Then they joined with other atoms, to become compounds, and joined yet again, to rebuild the stars. A shudder, like a bang, carried out on all the atoms, universally. Time was reborn, and space became anew.

13 billion years later...

A lonely blue ball floated alone in space, carrying a blood soaked passenger. He opened his violet-blue eyes slowly and carefully. The universe beyond looked fuzzy at first, but his eyes cleared and he realized he was still alive.

He turned his head in all directions, not knowing which way was up or down, left or right. But below his small sanctuary, a world with winds of turmoil and an abundance of volcanic activity was calming down. And if he could see below the layer of clouds, to a microscopic level, simple single celled creatures began to grow and survive in a harsh environment., born from complex proteins.

The space traveler smiled to himself. “It really is like new again.” and he looked out into the stars and wondered if other worlds, too, were beginning to sustain life.