An incomplete space opera told in verse

"Flanders, it’s worse than ever before!"

said Lieutenant Kelly above the roar.

"If you want to live, remove the obstruction,

that turbine's moments from destruction."

Swallowing hard Gleb stepped to the portal,

on the other side waited the immortal.

Planet sized, beyond comprehension,

the turbines held it in suspension.

What Gleb saw drew out, “Hot damn!

I don't think I can--" BAM!

In a large conflagration, went

the turbine, the flames a short event.

The vacuum of space saw to that.

"Look out! That shrapnel will lay us flat!"

Screamed Kelly, running from the portal

of the space station, The Sleeping Immortal.

Gleb turned and ran from that hellish sight.

As turbine after turbine briefly ignite

then burst apart, a god is set free,

casting off its chains, deadly debris.

Taking its first breath,

it whispers, "Death."

They ran down corridor after corridor,

scanning comms that screeched new orders,

"Abandon ship! Prime objective lost!

Sleeper wakes, Execute: Code: Refrost!"

Gleb’s stomach lurched, as did the floor,

sending him headlong. Shrapnel tore

into the station, brief explosions

followed by howling winds. Visions

of Lieutenant Kelly sucked out

into space, passing with his last shout,

came to Gleb as he regained his feet.

Lieutenant Kelly, Navy elite,

blood running down from his head,

said as he rose, "Run or we are dead!

We have to get to the ship bay.

One ship has been ordered to delay."

"For us?" Gleb shouted, "Who's that crazy?"

"A pilot I know, names Grady."

They followed lines of red flashing light

A nightmare run, a desperate flight.

When they reached the ship bay's floor

they saw their ship by hangar's door.

Grady stood on the ship's entrance ramp

releasing the ship's magnetic clamp.

"Get your asses moving!" Grady yelled.

As the ship's clamp released what it held.

Grady raced up the ramp, out of sight,

as Kelly and Gleb did, the ship took flight.

"Holy Shit! I can't believe we made it!"

"Shut the hell up, we are still in transit!

Grady, how far along is the fleet?"

"What's left of it is in full retreat."

"My God! What of Code: Refrost?"

"Scrubbed, when the Magistrate was lost."

"The capital ship is lost?" Gleb gasped.

"May she sail a deeper sky." Grady rasped.

"What's the plan Duke?" Grady asked.

Kelly shook his head, his face masked.

Gleb rose, stumbled to the ship's rear portal,

through which he saw the risen immortal.

"What holy ground have we not trod?

What fool thought he could chain a god?

Will man's arrogance ever find an end?

What foul depths, in order to ascend."

"Are you finished with your oration?"

Asked Kelly, "Sit down for the duration

of the jump to Sector 7.

We travel to The Gates of Heaven."

The faint patter of rain? Could be.

But Gleb was too busy to go see.

Sitting kicked back, in the co-pilot's seat,

in a closed hangar, boots off feet,

he was busy planning a way home,

after so long between the stars to roam.

With closed eyes, he made plans to be home.

But what's this? Metallic steps, squealing hinges.

Must be one of Grady's wild binges,

drinking away his despair and fear,

hiding his panic behind a drunken veneer.

Or maybe the lieutenant with bad news,

more dour words, "Time to pay the devil's due."

Cliche sayings, and always bad news.

The steps persist and then fade away.

Gleb’s thoughts drift returning to the day

of red flashing lights and a perilous flight,

when an ascendent woke with terrible might:

I stood staring out the rear portal,

our ship fleeing the risen immortal.

Unbidden, came a thought, "..and I a mere mortal."

I spoke then of the vanity of man,

of what ambition costs, of a fool’s plan.

"Are you finished with your oration?"

asked Kelly, "Sit down for the duration

of the jump to Sector 7.

We travel to the Gates of Heaven."

Of course, we never made it to Sector 7.

I turned from a vision of enormous scale

resolved to tell Kelly my sordid tale.

"Lt. Kelly, do you know the name...

Hethenbarg?" I could only whisper my shame.

Kelly's eyes narrow and he simply nods,

sharp features arranged to dare even the gods,

a man all his life fighting against the odds.

I said, "My name is not Gleb Flanders,

a name gave to me by your commanders.

I am Dr. David Hethenbarg,

responsible for the death of Earth.

In my pride, I challenged God.

What sacred ground have I not trod?

What foul depths to become a god..."

"With my knowledge, obtained by my pride,

millions of wives, husbands, sons, daughters-- died."

I turned and pointed out the rear portal,

"For this-- my son! The risen immortal."

With my tale told, I fell silent.

My body shook uncontrolled and violent.

Lt. Kelly sat watching, silent.

From the helm, Grady yelled, " Nearing jump point.

On your mark Duke, we'll burn this joint."

The ship's engines cut as we neared the range.

The pilot readied systems for the phase change.

"Lieutenant Kelly, we must find my ship,

Forget The Gates of Heaven. A doomed trip."

In Sector 11, I have an airstrip---"

Kelly interrupted, "Doctor,

we sail for the 7th sector.

There, at the Gates of Heaven, we will find

whether your story and truth are aligned."

Turning to Grady, he said,"Burn her down."

Phase changed with a tearing sound.

Kelly and I were cast to the ground.

Done with his musing, his plans complete,

rising from the co-pilot's seat,

Gleb went to find the stowaway.

“To pay the Devil's due," Kelly might say.

With sure steps, he went to set his snare,

across the hangar, down a flight of stairs,

to pay what's due to his houses heir.

From a view screen, he saw what passed as rain

falling down on a desolate plain

that girded the remote research station,

repurposed for their incarceration.

He thought of his desperate plan,

of the humble mouse, and dishonest man,

of the lies he tells himself his whole life's span:

"One last crime that I must indite.

One more sin to set my wrongs right...

One more epic I must compose,

and one last task before my final repose.

My son, I'm sorry for what I plan to do.

It was never my intention to hurt you.

But, you most of all, I must undo."

Lost in these thoughts, he made for the room

where the stowaway sat, his son, his doom.

An old rusted droid from a past age

bearing the memories of a man's rage

greeted him, "Father, do you remember

when, among men, you ruled, emperor?

Now, I've never seen you feebler. <Now, you look like an old geezer.>

Sitting on a nearby crate, Gleb said,

"It's true what they say, Time wastes away.

Even you, it will betray one day."

"Ahh, to hear the philosopher orate!

Do you speak of fate? So unlike you.

You do not sound like the father I knew.

How long I slept for this to have become of you.”

Father and son, once of the same blood,

met as strangers on a planet of mud,

and began a catastrophic talk

away from which neither would walk.

"This droid is a sort of message,

across the vast emptiness of space, a bridge,

from my eternal self to you in bondage."

"I have been to Sector Seven.

I destroyed the Gates of Heaven.

I went to Sol and saw the ruin of earth.

Father, you can not imagine my mirth.

Your greatest triumph, a greater failure.

Our once grand name, now a terrible slur.

The irony isn't lost on me, be you sure."

The old man flinched as he heard these words.

He felt sick as knots formed of his innards.

His son had matched his greatest shame,

to blackest deed they both lay claim.

A terrible rasp, "Time wastes away...

Even I, by the trek of time, decay.

I hope my death marks the dawn of better days."

"Father, you will not die. I have plans for you.

The fable of hell, I will make true.

I will cast you in their eternal fires.

You will burn where Time never expires.

You will find that Time does not waste away,

nor will your body decay,

and never will there dawn a better day."

"Magience?" asked Lt Kelly.

"Yup, science and magic mixed," said Grady.

"How else do you hijack a phase change

with a single repeater from long range?"

"Magience," solved Grady, "nothing's more clear."

Sitting up, he reached for another beer,

"This has been such a lousy year."

Kelly nodded his assent, "You're not wrong.

It feels like I've been running headlong

since the Senate voted for war.

Those bastards have a lot to answer for."

"Speaking of heinous crimes," Grady said,

"How do you think he keeps his head

being responsible for all those dead?

Kelly sat and thought for a time,

cracked a beer, tried to fathom the crime

of a man who had destroyed Earth.

He found the hollow feeling of dearth.

"The first time I killed a man, I cried.

All the rest, my eyes stayed dried,”

Said Kelly, looking sad, without pride.

Then suddenly, “Did you feel that, Grady?

Like something just sunk?” asked Kelly.

“Hell yeah,” said Grady, “felt like a phase change.

You ever feel that outside point range?”

“Never in my life. Where’s the old man?”

“The hangar. Said he needed time to plan.”

For the hangar both men ran.

In a storage room underground

An eternal tableau unwound:

An imperfect father judged by his son

to be worthy of hell for what he’d done,

An injured son in a terrible rage

committing the same sins, on a rampage.

In the end both deserving the same cage.

"Enough Father, I come to claim you."

"My turn to pay the Devil's due."

Beyond the fringes of the atmosphere

appeared the eternal celestial sphere

and with its coming came an end.

Below, the planet began to rend,

"Witness what it means to ascend!"

Oceans boiled and raged and seethed.

Entire mountain ranges were upheaved

into enormous sunderings.

Lighting ripped through earth and sky, thundering.

The immortal sent out a hand of light

that held the research station safe despite

the plant’s demise, for a god’s delight.

Dr. David Hethenbarg waited for

His son as a deafening roar

Filled the room where he sat in fear

As his end, his doom came ever near.

Inwardly, he wrestled with his last hope.

So foreign a thing toward which he groped.

Such a laughable thing toward which to grope.

And yet across the endless span of years,

That seemed so filled with other’s tears,

He had never known a fear like this,

So sweet and pure, a gentle kiss,

Nor a hope towards which to reach

That did not wholly seem to leech

The color out of life and others, each.

Could such a ridiculous thing,

deemed so worthless by many a king,

be what quells this devouring hate?

Love…? Could it change our fate?

Across an empty familial space

A father reached toward his son and grace,

hoping to fill that hollow, empty place.

A rising hope swelling in his breast,

A father rose up dispossessed

Of his tyrannical driving pride,

That all his life he allowed to preside,

And walked across the empty space,

To where his son sat in a metal case,

And there he took him in love’s embrace.

Grady and Kelly ran down the hall,

toward the hangar feeling very small.

They had seen a view screen of outside,

“How have we not already died,”

yelled Grady to Kelly who led.

Kelly kept quiet as he ran ahead,

keeping his dour thoughts unsaid.

They reached the hangar and searched the ship,

“No doctor, no time, start the fucking ship.”

“We just going to leave him?” asked Grady

sitting at the controls, “Engines ready.”

Hitting the steel wall Kelly growled, “Damn it!

One last place to check, stay in the cockpit

Set the phase change, when I’m back we split.”

At a wild sprint he left the ship

Alright Kelly lets make this a quick trip.

Across the hangar, down a flight of stairs,

raced Lt. Kelly unawares

of the stowaway, its identity,

how it was a god-like entity.

Kelly ran muttering obscenities.

Bursting through the storeroom door

Kelly saw the doctor knelt before

A rusted droid propped against the wall

And watch the following befall:

The droid reached for the doctors face

And struck it with a fist like a mace,

Knocking the old man back a pace.