First Sighting of the Merenthaal
Earth, 2118
My first glance of the Merenthaal filled me with a cold terror beyond anything I had known, and during the previous two years I had experienced horror enough for three lifetimes; the horror of war and survival and the gradual breakdown of human civilization on Earth. Our world had become unrecognizable since the meltdown had started, near the end of 2116.
The Merenthaal and their enemies, however, were a vastly different kind of terror. I had only heard rumors until this point, most of them difficult to accept; then, suddenly, they appeared on my street, in the center of Jakarta.
As I watched the alien beings I could feel the knot of cold growing from the center of my stomach and I knew that my legs would no longer support me. I grasped a stone column on the sidewalk and slowly slumped to the sidewalk. The rumors I had heard about these creatures, if anything, were heavily understated. The lethal determination in their eyes and raw power in their graceful, deadly movements inspired awe and dread in equal measure.
The Merenthaal spared no mercy on their enemies - the Baccaran: creatures no less formidable than they. I felt sheer panic but I could not tear my gaze away from them as they battled on the street not five meters from where I cowered. Although they seemed to be people, they were not human people, that much was clear. They were something more than human and less than human.
My instincts told me to remain as still as possible. These entities were hunters and killers; characters that had sprung out of a whimsy, a fantasy, a fiction to entertain the mind. They were not meant to enter our domain – the real world – and terrorize us.
They fought with knives and swords and axes – bows and arrows, hands and legs; pulses of energy. I had been told that our sophisticated weapons of the twenty second century hardly phased these beings that some were calling "Merenthaal" and others "Baccaran".
In the next moment one of the human-like creatures turned its head and looked at me; into me. It was a soul-less being. It had been ordered to destroy, and so it did. It lunged at me and I knew this was my last second of life.
The moment before it would have run its claws or fangs into my soft flesh an invisible bolt of energy thrashed the monster from its right side and sent it spiraling into the column next to mine, obliterating it in an explosion of stone and dust.
A few seconds later a woman ran into my field of vision and halted in front of me, in the middle of the street. She fixed her eyes on her enemy and positioned both hands in front of her in a martial gesture. My would-be killer jumped to its feet and fled to join its comrades who had been forced toward the next intersection by the Merenthaal warriors, who, at this moment, outnumbered them.
Then, the woman looked at me. I will never forget that look -- I will never forget that face: thin, fine. Her shoulder-length hair was a tangle of soft dark curls framing her girlish face. Her eyes, however, were ancient. They were bright brown eyes, clear in their battle fury. I could not reconcile the incongruity I was seeing.
This woman was small and slender and strikingly beautiful. She was dressed in garments made of fine linen and silk in earthy tones. The purple sash holding her tunic to her narrow waist floated in the breeze. She held an intimidating sword in her left hand. She had a large knife strapped to her thigh. The terrifying creature had fled from her. And she was human; as human as I, or at least, she had been at one time. She appeared to be thirty or forty years old, but her eyes were ancient with knowledge and experience.
Stay down. She recommended, almost casually. The city will be clear in an hour. Only later did I realize that she told me this without opening her mouth.
This was my first glimpse of the Merenthaal - both human and non-human, as they fought their nemeses: the Baccaran.
In an hour the city was clear. In three months, the meltdown was stabilized and there began a new era on the planet we call Earth.
Twelve years after that, the woman who had saved my life, whose name is Zoe Amata, in a solemn ceremony witnessed by Merenthaal and mortal humans alike, accepted me as an apprentice of the Merenthaal.
The next year I boarded a small deep space cruiser called the Antarious, with a team of forty-three Merenthaal, destined for the Tau-13 sector. A settled world would be monitored and I would begin to practice the theory I had been studying. I did not see my homeworld, Earth, for two years.
By the end of seven years I was initiated into the Merenthaal Order as a junior officer. I had passed through a process -- parts of which I could not describe using human language -- and I was rendered immortal.
I miss the life I had as a mortal human; I miss the way life was in that state. I miss my status as a citizen of Earth and the privileges that come with it. I also cherish my new reality. I love what I have become and what I have chosen to do. I love the Order under which I serve, and I love the people – human and non-human – that I have the privilege of serving with.
It has been almost ten centuries since my first voyage. I am now stationed in the Hanthran system, observing the world of Ophilion.
– Philip Costa, commander and research officer, The Henosis. - TS-3067 (Terra Standard Calendar) (8453-G – Ophilion Calendar)
Personal Note
The Henosis (in Ophilion orbit)
The Ophilion C.A.S event (Critical Annihilation Scenario) was one of the most catastrophic and truly global events I have witnessed. Had we not intervened, the outcome would have been much worse.
Yes, the Terran field agents broke some rules, but I believe they kept the important ones, and I am willing to testify in the Galactic Court on their behalf. I will also testify in favor of the Ophilion team members who, at great personal cost, and being very young, volunteered to serve their people. I have served with the Merenthaal during sixty-three C.A.S events in our galaxy, but this one holds particular significance for me.
– Philip Costa, commander and research officer, The Henosis. - TS-3072 (Terra Standard Calendar) (8458-G – Ophilion Calendar)
The End of an Era
Filos-Paas, Ophilion
We take in the elegant beauty of the sunrise over the Keptal mountains in silence. I hold Aphias' left hand, Noladia, his right; the others stand around us as our Elder sits, wrapped in a thick karani robe, taking in the majesty before him. The cool breeze blows in from the desert, but the temperature will rise quickly and the day will be a hot one, and, Aphias is convinced, his last.
His Journey to the Stars will soon begin, he believes. We scoff respectfully and tell him that he has many years left with us. He tells us that he has delayed too long already; he is eager to travel now that balance has been restored. At one hundred forty-three cenro he has outlived his peers to become a beckon of wisdom for his people at a time of great change for Ophilion, his homeworld.
As I think back on the last three years I recall the horror and the humanity; the catastrophes, the restoration and the love that I have witnessed. This is not my homeworld; I came from the distant world of Earth. I have become part of this world because it was my duty as an officer of the Merenthaal to do so.
The Antarious glides slowly by in front of us, one hundred meters from the ground, and from her lower windows the children drop large white lemilo blossoms that sail and twirl in the breeze. Aphias cracks a smile.
The Ophilion are starting over, and I have been here to assist. It has been an honor. I will be called to other worlds; but not yet, I hope.
Arthur Keats, commander of the Antarious, 8461-G (Cenro 3-M)