Page 10 of The Enduring Universe (The Rages Trilogy #3)
IRAVAN
Iravan circled the expansive city of Irshar, noting each crevice from where the Virohi seeped.
A thousand links whipped out of him like arrows as he drew on the combined power of all the Ecstatics. He flew through the Moment, converting pure Ecstasy into hair-thin constellation lines. He leapt between the stars of the Virohi, tying the lines to each other, drinking in the power coursing through him.
His trajection manifested like the most intricate web. When he had trajected plants in the past, he had always felt their life. Now the instant the trajection rendered toward the cosmic creatures, their voices filled his head, , they screamed, and his rage spiked, sweat coating his skin. The falcon within him snarled in response.
His constellation lines burst with power.
The Ecstatics cried out. They strained within the Deepness, their power filling Iravan, coursing through his veins, turning his skin translucent. Iravan tugged at the trajection lines. He could see Ahilya trying to anchor the Virohi and return them to Irshar, but Iravan pulled them toward him by trajecting their stars within the Moment, and they collected out of the architecture in a swarm, swept up in his storm. Their howls echoed in his ears, but he paid them no mind.
The Virohi gathered to him, forced to obey his will. Within Irshar, their snaky foggy forms shuddered, paused, and shuddered again.
The creatures had destroyed Nakshar, weakened the very universe. They had infiltrated the Moment and ruined it. They were going to eradicate life.
He would erase them.
With all the power of the Ecstatics tethering him, Iravan roared as he pulled the Virohi to the tunnel of the Conduit. His plan hinged on taking them through the Moment and obliterating them with the bomb within the Deepness. Inch by inch, the Virohi seeped into the Conduit, their shrieking loud in his ears, and Iravan cried out a command to Dhruv, to begin the extermination.
Dhruv obeyed, and a blinding flash that lasted an eternity reverberated in Iravan’s eyes, filling the evervision. The first of the explosions launched, and he sensed Ahilya’s panic, but a wave of jubilation rose in him. It was working.
He beat his wings, and form by snaky form the Virohi were yanked from the Conduit into the Deepness where they did not belong, explosions attacking them as soon as they arrived in the velvety darkness. It was a manifestation of his imagination, he knew, but Iravan saw the scaly bodies of the cosmic creatures squeezing through the tunnel of the Conduit, only to be met with destruction. He saw massive black holes erupting across their bodies, breaking them down. He saw their alien mouths open in an endless scream, viscous blood oozing out. Their skins burned in a cleansing fire, and he thought grimly, Yes. Destroy.
Sweat broke out over Iravan. Tears blurred his eyes.
Irshar trembled in the jungle, shaking like a leaf in a storm. Dhruv shouted over the communication bead, but Iravan could not hear beyond the roar of the falcon. The Moment shuddered and dust motes within it whizzed around in confusion and anxiety. All trajecting architects could see his actions. They could feel the effects even if they could not understand what he was doing.
The yearning burned in him, pressure from a thousand lifetimes. The Ecstatics swayed in exertion. Irshar cracked underneath him, a whole section of rooftops exploding into powder as the cosmic creatures leached out of the architecture toward him. Their destruction was rendering in the first vision even as they burned in the Deepness; Iravan saw their snaky, misty forms distort like a fabric rent with holes, as they fluttered toward him.
The effort from the tethered Ecstatics pierced his ears. Dhruv’s hologram flickered over his wrist, and the Virohi screamed , as he pulled them into the explosion, puncturing their consciousness repeatedly, breaking them apart as they hovered over the ashram.
Ahilya’s will grew in his heart as she attempted to stop him. He felt her alarm and despair, her desperate attempt to bind the creatures back in Irshar. They both knew that he was the stronger of the two. She had only just learned of her power. He had been aware of it—conditioned within it—since birth.
Iravan thought, Is it really just this easy?
Relief made his muscles weak. A few more minutes until the bomb reached its full potential and then it would be finished.
He pulled the Virohi, one final tug as smoky forms filled the sky, pouring toward him. Irshar wobbled, debris falling as he sucked the cosmic creatures away.
And in that instant when he felt Ahilya’s hold slip, the precise instant when the last of the Virohi were pulled in the Deepness, Iravan reared his wings. “Now!”
he screamed.
Dhruv pulled the switch on the bomb, blasting all the remaining sungineering power of the device into the Deepness with maximum prejudice. The explosion blinded Iravan momentarily. All three realms shuddered, slamming into each other. The connection with the Ecstatics broke.
Architects fell out of the Deepness, their lights winking away. Their power severed from Iravan, and he spun in the darkness all alone, tumbling head over heels. He floated in his first vision, and saw through the bead on his hand the battery sizzling, sparks flying, Dhruv’s frantic gestures as he attempted to contain the device.
The Virohi had been exploding only a second ago, but with Iravan’s power severed, they slammed into his mind, escaping the Deepness to return through the Conduit, weeping.
The battery detonated into sudden fire.
The universe shook, stars and possibilities turning to powder.
The Moment shattered.