Hargon walked
slowly alongside his companion. He was dressed in the usual attire for such an
exercise. His loose trousers and long flowing frock coat covered his bare
torso. A white linen he felt was sombre enough for the occasion. As he walked
his companion talked.
‘I wonder what
it will be like?’ he said.
‘What’ Hargon
asked
‘Death of
course’ the man replied. His name was Dasghar, Lord Dasghar; and he was going
to die. It would be a civil execution though, there was no blindfold, no
strapping of the condemned to a table saw or pumped full of drugs in a prison
cell lit with fluorescence and pity. No, Dasghar had the right to choose his
own end and he had chosen the old way, the death of deaths for those who had
finally grown tired of the immortal life on Heav’r. To be thrown from the
cliffs of Saa’aar
The planet had
been settled thirty thousand years before. A planet three times the size of
Earth but relatively the same mass in the goldilocks zone of a stable yellow
star. It had been named Heaven to begin with, all that time ago, but the
language changed, the isolation of the inhabitants had changed them and
eventually the name had stuck at the elongated vowel sounds of Heav’r.
The planet
seemed a vast blue gem from space. Criss crossing the azure globe were tremendous scars
of land, only a few kilometres in width, but thousands of miles in length. The
cliffs beaten by wind from one side and blessed by sun the other the settlers
had soon learned how to grow crops on the vertical drop. But the bulk of their
food came from the sea.
The settlers had
swept to the oceans, fertile with new vegetation and grains that were slowly
interbred to create a new set of cereals and a food stock that resembled what
the humans recognised as food. Their actual content and flavour was far removed
from what was expected, but they were bred to resemble the past lives that the
first visitors to the planet had so longed to recreate on their new home.
Times had
changed now. The peoples had split. The farms were still there, deep under the
waves, but many had moved to the cliffs now. The mechanised farming provided
what was needed for the regulated communities to continue. Great houses lined
the five hundred mile coastline of the great northern cliff of Saa’aar. In the
prime weather position atop the single feature, the great cliffs; seven miles
high in some places just to walk out over them and look down was too much for
some people..
Hargon’s heels
clicked against the smooth stone. It was like a polished marble floor, the
natural top to the great stone barrier cut clean to hold the instiutions of the
planet. Their destination from the transport pad was the old execution
platform. Built thousands of years ago but renovated every millennium or so
against the fine spray of the clouds that curled around the top of the ridge.
Hargon noticed Dhasgar stared straight ahead, his lips moving silently, perhaps
offering up a prayer to some long forgotton god.
‘You have had
the injections Dhasgar’ he said, ‘you understand what that means?’
‘I know full well’
Dhasgar said eventually, his step in line with Hargo. ‘my gene enhancements
have been switched off, there is no way to reverse it.’
‘There are more
pleasant ways for this to occur Dhjasgar’ hargon grimaced.
‘I have
committed an ancient crime’ Dhasgar whispered, ‘I will pay the ancient
penalty.’ He paused, as if to say something more meaningful, but then changed
his mind and concluded, ‘I have been alive for far too long anyway. I am
resigned.’
Hargon let
Dhasgar walk a little ahead to steady himself. The two guards walked with im,
weapons trained on his head and heart. Dhasgar was a criminal, of that Hargon
had no doubt. He was a large man, perhaps two metres tall, and dressed in a
simple black body suit; but beyond this he was not unusual beyond the various
genetic enhancements that allowed him to adapt to the planet. The slightly
heavier gravity, a more developed skeleton, and given the society’s move to the
top of the world, his wings.
None would be
available to him today. He thought he could see him start to slow as the poison
administered worked against his inbuilt genetic changes. Eventually he would
have collapsed, had his end not been imminent. Hargon slipped his robe from his
shoulders. He was the Lord high executioner of the planet heav’r and as such
his was the responsibility to bring an end to this man. He would have preferred
it to have happened in a sanitary lab where he could have had more control. He
passed the doubts from his mind and took a breath. His chest expanded with a
violent force as he felt the bones begin to push out and their centre’s start
to hollow. His back arches and the flesh, remoulding itself fell away to the
floor in ribbons from his shoulders, three metre long braids of wet bloody flesh
swung in the breeze against the faintest of mists and began to harden and grow.
The join with his back first before his wings pulled themselves upright, thin parchment
like webbing spread between the fine joins as a leathered, almost translucent
pair of wings rose from the floor. In a matter of moments Hargon was
transformed. His wings spread and fluttered, his reinforced chaest and
musculature flexed as he stepped forward, a wing span of some seven metres, he
flexed and pulled himself up into the air a metre or two before landing behind
the motionless Dhasgar. He folded his wings and spoke.
‘Lord Gazeal
Dhasgar. You have been charged with treason and murder and have been found
guilty. Your sentence is that you are ended as a sentient being on this planet.
You have chosen the old death from the cliffs. I am here to ensure this sentence
is carried out. Do you have anything to say?’
Dhasgar stood
motionless. He did not say anything but simply peeled off his body suit and
stood naked before Hargon. He was muscular but stood with a passive stance, a
comfortable one. He shook his head. Hargon was worried. Usually they would
speak. Most to claim injustice, some to plead for clemency, others to justify
their actions. But Dhasgar was calm and did not blink. He walked naked to the
platform: a twenty metre beginning of a
bridge to the abyss. It was made to look like polished stone, but in reality
was created from the same plastics and polymers that made up most of the buildings
and vehicles. It stopped dead before open space. In the distance he coujld see
the outline of wings as people dove and played out in front of the cliffs,
riding the winds. Dhasgar stopped a metre or so from the edge and looked back
over his shoulder. Hargon walked between the two guards who lowered their
weapons.
‘Hargon’ he said,
‘I am truly sorry’.
‘For your
crimes?’
‘No Hargon’
Dhasghar said. His face cleared like a man suddenly struck by lucidity while
drowning in his own madness, a tear welled in his eyes and he breathed out. ‘I
am sorry for what’s to come. ‘ he breathed in as if stifling a pain and put his
hand to his ear and yelled in pain.
Hargon stepped
forward. ‘what’.
‘The voice calls
me’ Dhasgar cried, ‘I must obey’ he breathed in and Hargon heard a crack. His
ribs expanded. He was trying to change! The poison in his system had not
worked. Hargon’s eyes widened as Dhasgar smiled, a wide manic grin that hurt to
look at. Hargon turned to the guards and yelled at them to open fire, pointing
at Hargon, but when he turned back he saw nothing but air.
‘Damn it! He grabbed
a pulse rifle from the taller guard and leapt off the platform after the
distant falling shape he knew was Dhasgar. He pulled himself into a dive and
aimed the rifle. A trail of blood lined the way as he fell through the organic
spray result of his transformation. The black shape ahead started to twist and
turn. Hargon fired a burst with the rifle that flew past the tumbling shaped. He
steadied himself and fired again, grazing the figure. He heard nothing, but saw
the shape start to slow as it turned to face him. Rather than the wings Hargon expected
however he was faced with a changed Dhasgar, yellow eyes and blackened skin, a
huge wingspan erupted behind him. The effect was like a brake and Hargon was on
him immediately, a last burst of his rifle went through the upper left quarter of
the Dhasgar creature’s right wing, it bared its teeth as Hargon crashed into
it.
Now more bear
than man Dhasgar snarled and clawed at Hargon who could only attempt half-hearted
blows against a creature twice his size. Hargon pulled himself free from and
stretched his wings out, watching in despair as the creature tumbled another
half mile before levelling out. Hargon followed from a distance, knowing full
well he had no hope of stopping Dhasgar in his current from. He swooped low
towards the sea and then just as he had vanished form the platform, the sea
swallowed him up, a turn and a dive and he was beneath the surface.
Hargon swept low
over the waves trying to see a sign of the escapee, but nothing. The occasional
movement was no more than a sea snake or the tendrils of the gigantic
jellyfish, some several hundred metres across who lived in the deep caves at
the foot of the cliffs. Hargon took a final look at the surf crashing against
the green and yellow veined rocks before sighing and beginning the slow climb
back to the summit of the cliffs. It was not going to be easy. The most
dangerous man in a thousand years had just escaped justice, and Hargon was to
blame.
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