[font=Garamond]The sphere glided across the silent, untravelled eddies of space. The hard surface of the sphere, no larger than a human’s head, glittered as a nearby sun’s light sprinkled and sprayed leaving an almost wet appearance. For the object was of the blood, part of that which people termed: The Colony . [/font]




[font=Garamond]For centuries, fields of varying sizes of damaged and undamaged carapace, floated in an exacting order, their journey only coming to an end as their "spawning grounds" were reached.[/font]



[font=Garamond]As what was normal for the Colony throughout their instellar journeys, the shells would harness the warmth from the rays of nearby stars. The heat would keep over the long stretches of distance, over the long stretches of time...until they reached the spawning grounds. The carapace shells would then soften in the warmth of a designated sun, having reached their destination system and, not long thereafter, the colony young would hatch. [/font]



[font=Garamond]A planet within the destination system would serve as home for close to a thousand years until the next spawning cycle, until another migration, and the shells would be set adrift for yet another ten centuries.[/font]



[font=Garamond]Inhabitants of planets in systems where such spawnings took place looked forward to the spectacular celestial sights, when the colony shed its shells in favor of an environment less hostile than the vacuum of space. [/font]



[font=Garamond]The Colony was not made up of intelligent creatures as people understood intelligence to be. Those of the Colony merely migrated and lived where instinct took hold. The Colony served a purpose as did most life in the universe. A purpose of doing their part to keep balance with nature.[/font]



[font=Garamond]A typical swarm could number in the millions though ancient records of passing vessels sometimes spoke of vast fields that stretched for many, many lightyears. Their planetary descents were the things that attracted tourists, the Colony’s benign behavior revitalizing a host planet’s ecology a hundredfold during their stay.[/font]



[font=Garamond]That was, of course, until, at the turn of some nondescript century, one spawning ground was reached that would prove to be their last. The Colony, safely cocooned within their shells, had no idea what was happening as ship after ship from what would have been their host planet left the destination system in panic.[/font]



[font=Garamond]The vessels were heedless of the shells as the interstellar ships tore through the vast Colony fields in their attempts to flee.[/font]



[font=Garamond]Still, the Colony took no note for instinct directed the shedding of their shells and the planet with which they would exist for another millenia.[/font]



[font=Garamond]Instinct would not allow the Colony to recognize that the host planet was being evacuated; would not allow it to recognize this flight had destroyed many of their kind. The carapace fields entered the system and, in the time honored tradition of nature, their shells began to soften.[/font]



[font=Garamond]And it was here, at that moment, that perception broke through instinct and something was found to be wrong. Just as an object placed in front of an insect gives the insect pause, so too something gave the Colony cause to recognize that nature was about to break tradition.[/font]



[font=Garamond]Not wrong in the sense of “right” and “wrong” but, rather, in the sense that there was an impediment to the Colony’s carrying out of their instinctual purpose.[/font]



[font=Garamond]And so, as with any insect, the Colony began to devise a way around the obstacle so that their instinct...so that their purpose could be carried out.[/font]



[font=Garamond]Unfortunately, a sun going nova was a rather large obstacle…[/font]




[font=Garamond]..and as the field’s trajectory began to change, it was soon realized that the Colony’s adjustment just was too little, too late.[/font]




[font=Garamond]This realization did not come from any self-awareness to be found within those of the Colony. No, this was a realization that an outside observer might have made had they watched the spectacle.[/font]



[font=Garamond]From the perspective of the Colony, what it experienced…[/font]





[font=Garamond]..simply happened.[/font]







[font=Garamond]The shockwaves vaporized the host planet in mere moments. The grand fields of the Colony, those fields that stretched for lightyears, those fields that journeyed throughout the universe for millennia upon millennia were suddenly…. no more.[/font]




[font=Garamond]And so the universe went on, never giving much thought to the purple shades of color that seemed to stretch from where this particular celestial explosion occured.[/font]




[font=Garamond]“The Blood of the Colony” those early travelers had termed the phenomena. In fact, some burnt out shells had been found adrift in some out of the way system while others were found in the stretches of space between star systems. For the next few centuries no planet claimed to be host to the Colony and it was generally thought that the nova had caused an extinction of this unique species. And soon, the memories of the migration… in fact, the memories of the Colony itself died, relegated to a historical side note in ancient collections of xenobiological knowledge.[/font]



[font=Garamond]However, not everything of the Colony died out. A few carapace shells were thrown into new chaotic gravity eddies caused by the absence of the star.[/font]




[font=Garamond]With the traditional, instinctual route destroyed, there was no longer any tracking of these remnants scattered throughout a space where colors of both black and purple waged war. Many of the Colony still died out as they waited for shells to harden and gravity eddies to take hold setting them on another route .[/font]




[font=Garamond]Still, a few did survive.[/font]




[font=Garamond]With instinct battered, without the simple purpose of balance their former numbers provided, and against the growing coldness of space as many drifted for years before feeling any warmth from stars…[/font]



[font=Garamond]....those surviving few began to perceive the experience in a way they never had before.[/font]





[font=Garamond]Something that changed within the recesses of their minds.[/font]





[font=Garamond]They hurt.[/font]








[font=Garamond]And within the ember of that experience, self awareness took hold. [/font]



[font=Garamond]Took hold and burned.[/font]







[font=Garamond]And so, [/font]

[font=Garamond]The sphere glided across the silent, untravelled eddies of space. The hard surface of the sphere, no larger than a human’s head, glittered as a nearby sun’s light sprinkled and sprayed leaving an almost wet appearance..[/font]



[font=Garamond]Whisps of purple space surrounded the system but aside from the strange color, nothing seemed different. And so life tried to move on… tried to readjust.[/font]



[font=Garamond]A planet that would never have come in contact with any species from the Colony were it not for the nova soon came into perception.[/font]



[font=Garamond]The carapace seemed to recognize the existence of the planet. It seemed to know, on some inner level, that it was to remain there for a time and that it was to multiply. It knew that the planet was inhabited and it also knew that for its purpose to be fulfilled (such as it was) it needed to survive.[/font]




[font=Garamond]Early instinctual needs soon became the foundations for a rudimentary emotional base.[/font]



[font=Garamond]And as the planet loomed closer, one emotion prevailed over all…[/font]

[font=Garamond]Present[/font]

























































































[font=Garamond] [/font]
[font=Garamond] [/font]
[font=Garamond] [/font]
[font=Garamond] [/font]
[font=Garamond]Reaver House[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond] [/font]
[font=Garamond] [/font]
[font=Garamond]“The news is not good.” Came the envoy but the old Lord Reaver merely laughed. “Not good for House Varriathorn, you mean.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The envoy from House Stannes inclined his head slightly at the correction. “Be that as it may, Lord Stannes believes a move for the throne is premature at this point.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]These were words master of House Reaver did not want to hear. “Wait?” he spat back with unconcealed contempt. “His august Lord did not, perchance, inform his faithful servant what we were to wait for? Space to turn purple? Wolves to fly? A comet to bleed?”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The envoy shifted uncomfortably. An irritated Lord Reaver and an unpleasant message were things one never wished to mix. [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Lord Stannes did not see fit to inform me, my Lord. However, he did impress upon me the desire that you consult your Star Mages towards the Black Rim.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“And what would his Lord have me find?” the old Reaver shot back, the unspoken connotation: What would your fool Lord have me find?[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Why that it’s name should be changed to the Purple Rim.” The envoy answered back.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]And Lord Reaver’s eyes grew heavy suddenly. The import that Lord Stannes seemed to place on renaming an area of space seemed nothing more than an excuse formed at whim for delaying (yet again) the Triumvire’s rise to the throne of Themos.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Leave me, cretin!’ Lord Reaver rasped out in disgust and the envoy fled from his presence.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“I should take my Blades and raze House Stannes to the ground!” he barked out descending from his throne.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“We could do it, my Lord.” Came an intruding voice and Lord of House Reaver turned in surprise though his consternation seemed to dissipate. [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Krel, my son! I was not informed of your arrival.”[/font]




[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Before his father’s stern look began to cloud his face, Krel Reaver stepped in on behalf of his father’s men. “Forgive me father. I presumed upon them to allow me to surprise you.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]And the clouds vanished. “And what a delightful surprise you have made. [/font]


[font=Garamond]Tell me, what news from my old friend, Lord Craes?”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Vikar Jerad Varriathorne will not live beyond the week, it is feared.” The son said walking over and pouring them both a glass of wine set aside for functionaries. Lord Reaver’s eyes lit up at the news and gladly took the glass saluting his son, “To the bearer of glad tidings.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“I take it the envoy from Lord Stannes bore ill news?”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“He petitions us to wait. Wait!” the exasperation in the Lord Reaver’s voice was readily evident. “Apparently, the Black Rim is now the Purple Rim and Lord Stannes takes it as a sign of something even he doesn’t know.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“And so we wait until he can figure it out?” Krel asked ruefully but his father only nodded in anger. [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Fool of a man! How did his House ever rise?”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“The new ore deposit on Stannes Moon had much to do with it, I am sure.” The son answered rather good naturedly, “Nine Blades are something only House Varriathorne can boast of openly it seems.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]"‘It would have been grand,” his father finally said in dismay as he stared out into space from the gloriously decorated balcony to the right of where his obsidian throne sat. “The nine blades of Stannes and the eight blades of Reaver! Seventeen Blades and enough to challenge even the vessels of Varriathorne and become Lord of Themos!”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“We have seven and a half blades and more than likely, Lord Stannes would hold the title being the more powerful of our little scheming society.” He son quipped.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“To see Varriathorne pulled down, it is a sacrifice I would gladly make. Stannes is second in power to Varriathorne and if Stannes takes the throne, we would be second in power to him, the old fool.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“A thought that no doubt comforts him.” Krel said dryly.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“It can happen,” the Lord Reaver insisted stubbornly.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“No, it ca not.” his son said gently. “Father, Craes has gone over to Varriathorne.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“WHAT!” the old man exploded. [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Krel nodded. “That puts Varriathorne strength up three blades with twenty to our seventeen, should Stannes wish to do his part in this alliance.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Varriathorne bladeships are very well made. I had gambled on our outnumbering them and on the prowess of our Blade Leaders as opposed to Varriathorne strength.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Guile over strength. A weak gamble at best, father.” Krel chided but his father would have none of that.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Still,” the old man contemplated, “Craes does put women up as Blade Leaders. That has to count in our favor.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“The only thing that means is that Craes made the best of the situation of having only one daughter and no sons.” [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Bah! Women are good bedding, nursing and home tending.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“And forging alliances,” Krel grinned. “I hear you tried to marry my dear [/font][font=Garamond]poor sister Shayles over to House Barrador.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The Barradors were a minor family that added their fealty to Blade Lord Hark. Rumor had it that the Barradors were the reason Blade Lord Hark had seven blades and not six.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Krel continued, “The Barrador boy is rumored to be a bastard.” [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The father chuckled lightly. “No, he only looks like a bastard.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Krel grew serious, “Has Shayles done something to deserve your ire?”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Lord Reaver frowned, “Your sister is doing her duty to House Reaver and to you, unlike that "woman-turned-man" spawn of Craes. Another blade to our House would push our strength very close to that of Stannes.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Pushing his father's dreams aside, Krel chided lightly, “Still, Lord Craes daughter does her father some justice. I hear she leads her men well.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“No doubt she warms their bed and keeps their cocks happy. Her men must be weak as fawns.” Lord Reaver said with some certainty. “But enough. Come, Krel. Let us sup and see what more follies Stannes has in store or us.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Krel looked decidedly uncomfortable. “I hear that the Stannes Twins arrived with their Lord’s envoy.”[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]“Aye,” his father said, his gaze turning sly and Krel laughed easily as if reading his father’s thoughts. [/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]No matter the manner of his dark thoughts, they always seem to end with Reaver and Stannes intertwined, he thought sardonically.[/font]

[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]There was no history. In the time before time there was no life. At least, without the memory of what was, what use was the acknowledgement of life then?[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]Manifest Destiny did not come about by purpose. But, through the millenia, it simply sprang into being.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]From the One, an entire Quorom was founded and while others unlike themselves had termed them, "The Colony", in their perception, after the 'Event', they were merely "Of the Blood."[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The Blood of the One.[/font]






[font=Garamond][/font]



[font=Garamond]The One had come to the planet with nothing but pain and hunger and once it's hunger had been sated, it was thought.. No!...It was expected that the pain would diminish with the hunger.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]But it was not the hunger that caused the pain.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The sky above the nightside of the planet was that mixture of black and purple though purple seemed to be winning, the sphere having travelled along the event horizon of the phenomena.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The sphere did not perceive the change in color in space but that, of itself, was unimportant. For the event horizon of the phenomena was important to it for only one reason, the only reason that mattered to it's new self preservative way of thinking: The event horizon brought pain.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]And as it settled on the planet, and as space slowly turned from black to purple, there was something else that did not escape the creature's notice.[/font]
[font=Garamond][/font]
[font=Garamond]The pain was growing.[/font]

Themos




The glittery shuttle, flanked by several support ships from the full Blade compliments that accompanied, slowly descended in the slight gravity of the moon that served as the fortress for House Reaver.

The various fighter craft whose loyalty flowed to House Reaver parted to allow the small fleet to arrive which was typical of the Ceremony that certainly surrounded the arrival of another House.

Should House Reaver fail to honor the age-old tradition of Ceremony, the ire of all Houses would have been so unpalatable that even the conniving Lord Reaver knew better than to interfere.

Even ceremonies had their uses in keeping the precarious peace as the Houses plotted and maneuvered for ascendancy on Themos.

The four wings of the shuttle began to fold upwards as it began it's final preparations to settle into its berth, the escorts content to hover overhead.

Each House Lord had his own pecularity or eccentricity but all especially pandered to the traditions and ceremonies surrounding their young and here was no exception.


The Stannes Twins would disembark from their shuttle protected by the finest and most loyal guards to House Stannes. Even here in the bossom of an allied House...and especially moreso if that ally was House Reaver.

A saying on Themos told the situation well: Alliances were the convenience of the present but bloodlines were eternal.


Tessa and Linnes Stannes stood near the viewport that gave them an unrestricted view of the fortress moon.


"It seems Lord Reaver is anxious to move.." the younger (by a mere minute) Linnes spoke with a tiny hint of amusement.

"No doubt, Father's absence will bring much grief." Tessa answered matter of factly, as a servant put the finishing touches on her radiant hair display. Her eyes grew reflective and her usual cold manner furthered, "I wonder if the Lord Reaver has contemplated the gain and loss probabilities of trying to rid himself of us and end the Stannes bloodline."

Linnes laughed at the thought, her eyes wry with emotions so evidently removed from her sisters face. "Probably about a thousand times by now.."



*

For the twentieth time...

If I used a single neutron singularity, all life within a several mile radius would vaporize leaving most assets intact... but if it failed (as such devices were notorious for), oh how we'd pay. Still...

Lord Reaver scowled at the shuttle but moreso at the full compliment of two full Blades overhead.

"He challenges me in my own home!" he spat out signalling for his own fleets to be brought in to shadow his ally.

"You expect Lord Stannes to simply send his daughters without an appropriate escort?" Krel asked taking another drink as he too watched the procession from the Royal House Palace. "I am surprised the old bird settled for just two.." he remarked absently which sent the older man into another fit of thought.

"He probably has more laying just outside the sensor nets. I should send a Blade out there to see.."

".. and have one Blade caught in a vice of several? A risk to be sure." Krel remarked sarcastically.

"Stannes doesn't have the testicles for a move like that!" Spat Lord Reaver but he ventured no further in speculation.


A holographic projection formed in the space high above the ceremonies and the images of the Twins exiting their craft was put on display for all.

"Proof that he does have testicles.." Krel commented dryly but his father was already thinking about something else.


Where is the old bastard, Stannes? he half thought and half murmured to himself as his son drank himself into a slow stupor.

Too afraid to face me after he postponed our action? and the old Lord's mind began to finally put the slivers of memory together to find a pattern.

Once he was done reacting (in those all too brief spurts) he was able to focus with crystal clarity on a singular objective and hold onto it until it yielded the results he sought.


He has been erratic of late. What is the old boy up too?


His gaze fell back to Lord Stannes' children.

While he felt the daughters of House Stannes held no greater purpose than to be bedded with Royalty (all perversions aside), he was not fool enough to let his opinions off the leash too publicly for even thought the twins were girls, they represented Stannes blood and Stannes power.

Not to be taken lightly, no matter how juicy their tart.


A point in fact he whispered to his son, taking the boy completely by suprise as evidenced by his choking on whatever it was he was drinking.


Fool boy! But you'll understand soon enough...

Everyone remembered a time when space was simply a black backdrop against a hundred million pinpricks of solar light travelling long after their sources were spent.

Or, everyone remembered the idea that space was, at one point in time, merely an infinite blackness with no beginning and no end.

From a time "before the great nova", "the great bang", or simply
"The Event" as some old manuscripts had written.

Most of the celestial bodies near the "nova" were incinerated to nothingness, including a particular planet that had played host to the traditional visits of The Colony.

Over the next few thousands upon thousands of years, the historical significance of the Event had diminished in the minds of people to merely a legend of a powerful nova. People, whose planets, resided within the space of a new color went on with life as before and soon, the blackness of space was merely a historical footnote in a content life.

For those that lived farther away from the Event still had yet to experience the fading of their black space to that of purple... or the changing of the purple to even the brighter colors of mauve or a pinkish hue.

But they would.

For even if the spreading of this effect had not yet reached their area within the galaxy they called home, they knew without a doubt that it was coming.

While fanatics placed large religious significance to the vacuum's changing visual spectrum, scientists soon realized that the effects of the color changes were not so difficult to bear as they originally thought.

In fact, some came to look upon the changing of space from black to purple as a beautiful, if somewhat abnormal, event. As if space itself were transcending.

Truly an inspired view that left one looking ahead with a certain confidence and idealism.









There were, however, also the skeptics. There were those of a more curious nature that measured the expansion of the galactic spanning effects and knew that no mere "nova" could have started such a phenomena. Stars would (and did) continue to live out their life and eventually either collapse or nova, no matter the color of space.

So what set the nova of the Event apart from others?

For the past few recent centuries, these questions formed the backbone of any scientific expedition to the Origin Point. To find the source of the Event and the source of the changing color spectrums of space.


It was an itch preying upon their scientific curiousity and it was an itch, unfortunately, that could not be scratched.


For out of the hundreds of scientific missions to the source, the number of those that returned numbered 0. And as the centuries slipped by, so slipped the numbers of expeditions until even the scientific community lost interest. The planets still existing in the multicolored space experienced no ill-desired effects. There was no overriding galactic emergency and so the curiousity eventually died.


Until Themos.


Until a House decided to send one of the Themien Blade ships, composed of the strongest substance known to their science, to the heart of what was only talked about in myths and legends. It was one of the last truly scientific endeavors of their time.


The changing colors of space had reached the very edges of known Themien space at the time of the launch and it was not until many years later that the ship returned.


With only a handful of survivors.

Their tale of the voyage one of adventure and suspense. Their discovery one that shook the scientists of this House to their core. Their tale of the return trip one that put fear into the Blade Lord.


A fear of what was coming.

The Blade Lord was a young Stannes.



For at the source, the nature of the nova was discovered. Something never before seen and something of which the significance was not yet fully realized.


The crew of the blade ship called the source: The Engine of Creation. For the nova seemed to have ripped open an area of space and they could only speculate from where. Across dimensions, across universes they knew not but one thing was certain: the eventual result of this phenomena, this 'rip' pouring energies into their universe would have a profound effect on life throughout their galaxy and seal the fate of Themos forever.









To those of the Blood, for millenia upon millenia, as perception and self awareness expanded, it was simply 'that' which gave them life. It was simply 'that' which created the One. The Progenitor of the Blood.


And now, it was the herald of their coming.


..and the cause of their hunger.

*


The "Black Rim"




The black, familiar space looked like mere inky drippings upon the encroaching purple color that was evident some 40 light years from the Homeworld Themos. Set against this were several long vessels... Blade Ships.. whose fealty lay with Lord Stannes.

Aside from those gray ships, an equal number of maroon colored warships of similar style and design. Barrador ships which equated to Blade Lord Hark ships.

Two full Blades of different Houses often, in the past, would mean battle and perhaps a loss of status and power for the defeated.


Lord Stannes waited impatiently wondering if this meeting would go just like it had gone with Lord Reaver.

The old goat bleeted like a droid with a faulty vocal box..

"I want to be Vikar.. I want to be Vikar... I want to be Vikar..."

You'd think there were nothing else of import in the galaxy!

For that matter, perhaps in the old Lord Reaver's mind, perhaps there wasn't.


His daughters were making a ceremonious visit to the Reaver House in hopes of keeping the Lord's gaze on them and not on the goings on of the Stannes Blades.

If Reaver had been an animal, it would have been a carrion eater. And if the old man saw an opportunity to remove a competitor and move himself up the chain, he'd take it and damn the consequences.


Of the various Blade Houses, only House Hark seemed to hold it's mystique. They brokered no alliances and bargained with no house. Still, the visibility of his fleet was really the only tell-tale of their House's power.

Seven Blades.

And one of the Blades was from a minor House that resided within Hark territories. Of course, all of the Blade Houses had hundreds (if not thousands) of minor houses and families that hoped to ride the coattails of the particular Blade Lord whose territory they were established in.

But the Blade Lords, as a rule, did not encourage these minor houses to attempt to rise up.

As Hark had done.


The Blade Lords had felt that should minor houses grow in strength, the result would be a weakening of the Blade House strength. Which is how the rest of the Houses viewed Lord Hark's domain. With the Barrador minor house having a Blade Fleet of their own, several Blade Lords approached the man to encourage an attack on House Hark from within, promising various degrees of support to which the man Barrador rejected. A little envious of the servant of House Hark, Lord Stannes could only acknowlege that Barrador would remain staunchly loyal to House Hark, no matter the temptation.

The Barrador Family was so honored that evidently Blade Lord Hark felt it wise to come with the Barrador Blade entourage.

It unsettled Stannes but the meeting was important enough to forgo personal comfort.


Someone had to listen!

E'Scarrion - Forty Light years from Themien Space.



Proconsul Ferrai watched the clash of the thin sliver of reddish hue intermixing with the purple space above his planet. Such an appearance had been expected for the past five years and the adherents to the Holy Order of Celestial Lights were nearly foaming at the mouth with impatience.

The sight was to send signals to the Order worldwide to flood the streets and citadels in each district in defiance of the government's overlording policies. The sign from the heavens was proof enough of the Lord of the Dominion of Heaven's approval.

With such confirmation visually evident, Ferrai smiled and turned to address the crowd. Dawn would be approaching soon and the visual spectrum would be lost for the next fifteen hours.


"Citizens of E'Scarrion! Feast your eyes on the sky and look! THE SIGN! We were not meant to be the slaves of our government and it's war-making policies!

WHY ARE WE ARMING TO FIGHT THEMOS?!"


That the E'Scarrion government was contemplating war with Themos to halt the growing arrogance of the Themien Blade Houses was not yet public knowledge. Still, with the 'sign' given, Ferrai knew this would push the frenzied crowd over the edge.

Yes, with the people at his back, the government would be in the hands of the Holy Order of Celestial Lights by dusk.


The sun's crown had begun to cast it's light and the night sky faded from view. Still, the people had seen. Recordings had been taken.


Truly a Holy Day in the making.



"MORE SIGNS!" someone shouted and the Proconsul turned in slight confusion and as he did, behind him the crowds began to shout enthusiastically.


There were shadows hung agains the growing brightness of the sky, as if hovering several miles high in the distance. They had not been seen against the early morning night and as Ferrai continued to gazed at them in puzzlement, he noticed that he could not recognize them.


Surely they were ships! He prided himself on knowing government secrets and he recalled no secret of this kind.


And just as he began to put his confusion to sound a shadow fell over him and the thousands below his pulpit.

Gazing in the sky, the largest creature he had ever seen, the size of a star cruiser! hovered several hundred feet above, it's four long limbs on each side unfolding releasing smaller dots that were creatures themselves.


His mind was numb with shock.


The shadows in the distance were also opening their legs and suddenly the crowd's frenzy began to shatter giving way to fear.



"It's a trick! It has to be a trick! Holograms!" his voice shouted into the speaker but the crowd reacted to the high tone of fear his own voice carried.


Truly the government won the round! Somewhere in the back of his disbelieving mind he gave the government credit in eclipsing heavens changing color. He cursed the Order's own stupidity in allowing the government time to create this massive hoax..



It was not until the creatures touched ground and were scrambling over discarded vehicles, buidlings and technology that he realized...



..this was not the government..



And that it was real.



The crowd's fear began to feel numb as he turned for one last time down from his vantage point seeing several pockets of people walking around in either shock or dispair.


It was as if their minds were gone, unable to come to grips with the realities unfolding.



And to his own surprise, he found himself unable to move as well.



His eyes remained open long after his position was overwhelmed.

*

Organization came naturally to the Blood. For from the One came the first brood. The first Quorom.


At first, reproduction came slowly as the millenia of evolutionary responses and reactions changed that original colony sphere. The hatching of that mutated form of the old Colony had, at first, no concept of other than a half imprinted instinct and a nugget of self growing self awareness.

And a growing perception of it's own hunger.

Survival had been the first act and yet, as more self aware concepts formed, as it's ability to protect itself improved, and as it felt more secure such notions as race and 'bloodlines' seemed to come more frequently.

For what good was evolution if it improved a creature but not it's entire race?


But even evolution could not change simple math.


For The One was alone.




It was a problem thought insurmountable but as the years progressed, new thoughts resulting from forming synapses created a rudimentary ability to reason.


And as this reason grew, influenced by its overpowering instinct for survival, realization came upon The One at a certain point.

Though the Colony was no more, the faint and scattered memory imprints of generations past hinted at their numbers and what numbers they were!



And so The One pondered on the possibility of 'others'.



The perceptions of The One at this point were formidable indeed and as it began to extend it's perceptions in an almost unconscious need to locate others like itself, it found that its mind had grown indeed.


The planet that served as home since it's hatching was suddenly not alone. In fact, a whole wide sea of teeming life was open to The One and once discovered, the hunger grew.

The mind of The One yearned to spread itself across the pinkish hue of space to these other grounds and the more its mind pondered, the greater the abilities surrounding The One grew.

What The One wished, what The One desired and hungered for soon became reality and the rudimentary telekenisis sharpened into natural ability.

It was not overnight nor was it exactly painless but The One was patient. And pain was no stranger. In fact, pain was seen as something natural and if something was not painful, it was something not to be desired.


But there was something more.


For between the blooms of life seen in The One's mental eye were 'others'. And for the first time, the math held an emotional trigger for The One realized something: It was lonely.

And while the Colony was no more, these 'others', these beacons drawing its attention were of the Blood.


And that was enough.

*


The "Black Rim"


Garrighe Barrador narrowed his brows as he glanced at the Blades of House Stannes arrayed before his own fleet. Cross his arms, he knew if a fight developed he'd be hard pressed to prevent his ships from being shattered.

House Hark was spread thinly at the moment as the other Blades were protecting the new trade routes opening up and keeping them secret from the other Themien Great Houses.

He briefly wondered what Lord Stannes had said to the aging Lord Hark to convince his master to send Barrador's fleet to meet. He also briefly wondered what would possess the great house leader Stannes to meet with one of a lesser house. As equals no less! It was unheard of! All the other Blade Houses held House Hark in contempt for dealing with Barrador's minor house and now, here, another Blade House was doing the same.

It gave his family an exposure that it truly did not need. Exposure that amounted to being surrounded by circling sharks ready for a bloodletting.

Still, Stannes was as conniving as the rest of them, looking towards the interests of their own houses first (as was proper), and yet, there was an urgent and completely abnormal sincerity to his request for a meeting.

That in itself aroused enough of Hark's curiosity act.

And yet, the fact that Stannes had allied with the despicable Lord Reaver was enough to temper their curiosity with caution.

But what worried him more was that his own son was besotted with Lord Reaver's daughter, Shayles.

It was a union that cause him nightfilled worries. If he somehow died, his son would be the heir to House Barrador and if he was so bewitched by the Reaver woman, he might break the bonds shared between the Barrador and Hark families.

Hark would have no choice but to shatter House Barrador to protect a flank that for centuries never needed protecting if his son were to do something stupid.

And if this meeting with Stannes was a facade to try and destroy him, it would be the coup of the decade. Weaken House Hark, strengthen House Reaver and solidify the Reaver-Stannes alliance. With a success like that, Reaver might be bold enough to push for dethroning the current Vikar of Themos, Varriathorn.


The formal meeting vessel was floated out between the two blade fleets. Soon Stannes and Barrador would be taking their personal shuttles with attendants to the meeting ship where they would discuss what needed discussing under each other's guns. Each would bring their own staff and servants to be served the traditional wine and foods for even now, such ceremonies demanded observance. Each bringing their own people was also added insurance that one wouldn't try to poison the other. Even then, they each had testing kits and human tasters.

Barrador thought it distasteful but tradition was tradition and it only takes one time for one to lower their guard and they are dead.

Treachery was the life blood of Themos and it's Great Houses the pulse.

"My Lord? Your shuttle is ready."

Barrador sighed. It was time for a minor house to meet a greater house and withstand the insult that implied.

*

The Blood have a hierarchal complex within their organization. From the First Quorom came the Second, from the Second came the Third and so on.

Above the First Quorom, the Olden reigned. Demigods they were in the telekinetic, telepathic mutations of the old, now forgotten Colony. The Olden were, in fact, remnants of the old Colony, drawn together by the overwhelming strength and power of the One.

Their coming together was not a quick thing and for a few millenia, it was only on the strength of the One's telepathic calling that the others retained a semblance of sanity in their growing awareness across the vast empty stretches of space.

Every single one had come to a self awareness but with each it varied. Some were more like mindless creatures, recognizing a telepathic link and a connection but drawn to it as if by mere instinct. Others had a more tempered growth that separated their mental faculties only by their individual experiences.

Some, however, did not survive. But even as those died, a telepathic release flooded the surrounding space. In the normal blackness of regular space, such deaths and subsequent releases faded into nothingness, the essence of the particular creature lost forever. However, in the changing color of space, their essences seemed to linger longer. In the purple colored space it was barely noted. But as the color of the starry void brightened to a mauve color, the telepathic release at death became distinguishable. And as the mauve turned even lighter to a pinkish hue, the telepathic essence of a creature remained carried along by some strange property. The imprint left was carried along by this pink event horizon, over centuries, and eventually found its way to the One.

At first, painfully...

The mind of the One was battered by a mental assault the likes of which it had never experienced. The fragile mind of the creature, still in a state of evolutionary flux, found itself invaded with sensory feelings, with sensory inputs and ghost experiences for which it had no context because they were not the One's experiences.

If the One could have screamed in the vacuum it existed in, it would have. As it was, it released a wave of mental anguish prompted the others to quicken their pace as best they could

Though unknown at the time, this experience would shape the actions of the One much later in the future. In any event, the experience aided in breaking several mental barriers allowing the One to perceive the galaxy and those around it in a different light.

Cause and Effect were now not merely a happenstance of environment that the One adjusted too but, rather, it began to see behind the causes... the domino effect of actions, if you will, and how events could be linked together.

And, if the One tried hard enough, the realization that certain actions undertaken could produce an alteration of events agreeable to it's existence began to form.

And thus began the rudimentary beginnings of...


Purpose.


And this was the great revelation to the One in this particularly undistinguished century of existence. Purpose.

Not only the realization of it but the defining of it.



And as the others entered the backwater star system the One inhabited, it began to realize that it's purpose need not only include itself but...


It reached out telepathically to touch these similar... minds!


...Others as well..