Page 37 of The Space Traveller's Lover

GUILT

It’s your memories that make you who you are!

Shaillah is restlessly pacing in front of the twin golden columns leading into the space-tunnel. She looks up and around in despair. No matter how hard she thinks about going to the UniverseScope, she’s still in the same place.

“What’s going on? Rothwen!” she shouts, kicking the immovable columns’ bases as if she were fighting an imaginary giant.

In the middle of her outburst, she realises that Athguer has appeared in front of her. Standing under the high arch, he is patiently looking at her, waiting for her to calm down.

“Ah, Shaillah, it’s good to release your inner anger,” he says as she suddenly stops kicking and dejectedly stares at him. Her ashen complexion, from her lack of sleep, is plain for him to see.

“Where is Rothwen?” she moans.

“He is preparing our departure,” Athguer gently says.

“Why didn’t he mention anything to me? Not even Zula-Or knows where he is.”

“Oh, Shaillah. Never expect to know where Rothwen is all the time. That’s how he is—”

“Why am I not allowed into the UniverseScope? Why can’t I summon the scouting-crafts?” she snaps .

“Kuzhma-Or’s orders. You should stay down here during the reconstruction.”

“I suppose I’d better go back into my room. Or shall I call it my prison?”

“I was on my way to the lab towers. Do you want to come with me? It’ll do you good to think about something else.”

Shaillah can hear the muffled rumble of the transport-craft as it rises alongside the railings behind her. She turns around and walks towards the waiting craft without answering, biting her lips as she swallows the spurting bouts of bitterness and sadness.

She keeps looking towards the brightening horizon as they jump in and take their seats, avoiding eye contact with Athguer. As they slowly glide over the ocean into the pink-orange morning sky, he doesn’t interrupt her thoughts, letting her come to terms with her predicament.

“If it makes you feel any better, he asked me to look after you before he left,” Athguer says after a while, trying to break the lingering silence.

As the aircraft pushes through the dome walls and breaks out into the outer ocean, the capsule’s smooth body slides seamlessly through the densest concentration of jellyfish and wandering sea creatures that cannot disperse fast enough, provoking a subtle smile on Shaillah’s stony face.

“Kuzhma-Or is right. I shouldn’t be witnessing all the devastation. It would be too hard to bear,” she mumbles.

“Shaillah, it was going to happen anyway—one way or the other. Things are going to go the Rom-Ghenshar way,” Athguer replies in a matter-of-fact tone.

“Killing, exterminating, obliterating?” she mutters in distress, covering her face with her hands.

“No, no. Redesigning, transforming, expanding, creating a better world,” he ripostes with a reassuring tone.

“A better world?” she asks dismissively.

“Yes! When we finish rebuilding the cities of the new world—”

“A new world,” she says in a poignant tone, “ruled by the Rom-Ghenshars.”

“That’s the law of the universe, isn’t it? The superior mind will, in the end, prevail,” Athguer boasts, firmly staring at Shaillah.

The transport-craft reaches one of the towers. Steadily, it swerves around the enclosing iridescent rings as it rises higher and higher. Shaillah looks away from Athguer’s piercing eyes as she keeps gazing at the tapering silvery walls all the way to the very top.

“I should not feel for the humans anymore, Athguer. But most terrible of all is the guilt … the guilt!”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Shaillah. You tried to convince them, they did not listen. It’s their fault.”

“Maybe it isn’t such a good idea to keep my memories. I feel so vulnerable, so tied to my past. It’s hard to bear. I can’t take it any longer.”

“Yes, you can, you can. You are a Rom-Ghenshar, remember?” he rebuts. “But with that very special ancestry I’m reluctant to destroy. It’s your memories that make you who you are!”

Shaillah is taken aback by Athguer’s deep-felt response. With a long drawn-out sigh, she tries to cast out her wrenching insecurities and jitters. “I thought you were wary of my memories, my state of mind.”

“Let’s say I was concerned … but not anymore,” Athguer reveals as Shaillah inquisitively stares at him.

“As it turned out, it’s been fascinating to see how you’ve flowered into this amazingly fierce but sensitive creature, able to conquer even the coldest, bleakest of hearts. I’d hate changing you any further.”

Shaillah’s face beams up with a widening grateful smile, but it soon turns sombre. “I haven’t conquered anything,” she glumly replies.

“You don’t know it yet, but you have. Remember my words, Shaillah. I’m seldom wrong. No. Correction. I’m never wrong,” Athguer asserts.

“It’s hard to be a Rom-Ghenshar with human feelings. You have to fix it, Athguer,” she pleads.

“You’ll find it will get easier. Accept your past and then embrace the future. But remembering where you come from will make you even stronger.” Athguer stresses his words while briefly patting her shoulder.

As they reach the very top of the tower, the spiky cap opens up like a thorny flower, swallowing the hovering craft into its haul. They descend slowly, swerving around a thick luminous central column, its shiny edges flickering like a candle’s flame.

“It’s a photonic mast,” Athguer explains. “There’s one in every tower powering the labs. It comes from our central processor’s antimatter core.”

Spellbound, Shaillah looks down, following the swirling edge of the light-producing column.

As she looks back up, she inspects the transparent overhanging decks, lining up the inner walls and forming an infinite winding helix.

Inside the spiralling wide aisles, the busy android robots and automated machinery bristle with activity.

She tries to focus on a single action, but her eyes cannot adapt soon enough to the fast-changing goings-on flashing through her startled pupils.

“Machines making robots, which make machines, which make robots, which make machines.” Athguer gloats while Shaillah keeps utterly engrossed in the never-ending movements.

“Ad infinitum.” She marvels.

The transport-craft keeps descending, swerving around the dense photonic mast. As it approaches the lowest level, it smoothly comes to a halt while the side doors slide open.

Shaillah follows Athguer into a vast chamber awash with white light from every angle.

In the distance, she can see rapid flashes of lightning crashing against each other and bursting into multiple afterglows.

Soon she finds herself standing under a mesh of interconnected fibres, tendrils, and globules, all brightening and bursting randomly around her with a subtle all-pervading crackling sound.

“Welcome to one of our brain network hubs!” Athguer announces.

“Fascinating!” Shaillah exclaims. “It looks like an everlasting lightning storm.”

“Ah, it is the brain energy field, communicating, relaying information.”

Shaillah opens her arms and starts spinning around, tipping her head back while taking in the mesmerising spectacle all to herself.

“Here, I can load any particular brain field and closely inspect it, even edit it in detail. Do you want to see yours?” Athguer prompts her.

She suddenly stops her whirling dance, staring at Athguer with a mixture of doubt and suspicion.

“It will last as long as you want. Relax, think of nothing, and I will load it here. As soon as you start thinking about stopping the transfer, it will unload automatically,” Athguer reassures her.

“Okay.” Shaillah nods as she stays perfectly still and folds her arms tightly around her body.

Suddenly, myriads of fluorescent light streaks brighten the whole place up, frantically bursting and merging into each other while noisily crackling all across the rapidly warming air .

“Oh, who are you thinking of, Shaillah?” Athguer chuckles.

She immediately stops the transfer while sheepishly looking at Athguer. She knows he knows who she’s thinking of.

“Let’s go back now.” Athguer starts walking away while beckoning her to follow him.

“You need to rest. And after that, you have so many things to occupy your mind. I can show you more of my labs. You can visit Zula-Or and the beautiful Rom-Enjie cities, swim in our beautiful ocean, play with the tame marine lyshars. There’s so much to do. ”

As they reach the transport capsule, Shaillah never says a word, deeply absorbed in her lovelorn thoughts.

Athguer puts his hand over her shoulder, stopping her before she boards. “And another thing, Shaillah. Do not feel guilty, my dear. You’ve achieved something amazing already,” he proudly tells her.

“What’s that?”

“You have changed Rothwen. He’s never been the same since he set his eyes on you. He’s changed all our plans, been very lenient—and I mean very lenient with the humans—because of you.”

“Oh!” she exclaims while staring dumbfoundedly at Athguer.

“He could have finished here long ago. He could have sent the destroyer-crafts in advance, eliminating every single living thing, making our takeover far easier. But instead, he chooses to keep this planet alive, builds one of our command bases here so he can be close to you; waits until you’re ready to fly with the Grand Fleet, and, in the meantime, reconstructs the whole planet while trying not to harm the humans.

He even sends the guardian robots before the soldier robots to protect everyone—all because of you! ”

Shaillah’s bewildered face glows with the intensity of her reviving soul.

Never in her wildest dreams could she have imagined the extent that Rothwen would go to be with her.

Then her tumultuous thudding heart starts aching so badly that her chest feels as if it’s collapsing, trying hard to understand why he has gone away without even an explanation.

“Will he ever come back?” she wonders.

“Wherever he is, I’m sure he is thinking of you!” Athguer tells her, without a shadow of a doubt in his deep-set sharp eyes.