Commandeer it. By what means, precisely, was Eshe meant to do that? Her forces were limited, and meant to be of use with the dead. A ship was not precisely living, and yet.
Prophecies, however, were not prone to transparency; neither were the gods in the execution of their will. The sky above danced with ships; most fell. Ordinarily, it would have been those which Eshe sent her Jackals towards, but in this case she knew that the bodies on board would already have been lost, with nothing to recover. One of them remained, solo, touched by the light but not marred by it.
That one, then. Evidently the gods were determined not to obfuscate their will itself - only the manner of its accomplishment. She extended herself into the bodies at her command, and wondered if the gods felt the same way about such things when they were setting her into motion. If that bore thinking on further, this was not the time for it. Ship trajectories were often difficult to estimate even with multiple vantage points as Eshe was able to access, and she would need to hold on to what concentration she had, when her Jackals died.
They were, as some would say, already dead. Their sacrifice had happened years past, when the last bit of their canopic fluid was used up and they fell into mindlessness. Or, perhaps, their sacrifice had happened further back than that, when the hot knife had split them open and the waiting hands had torn free the organs that they would no longer need. Her hand moved, resting briefly on her chest where there had once been a heart.
No matter. She grouped them together, three, waiting for the ship to pass low between the golden lances. Two bodies, crouched down, a third waiting posed upon them for hydraulics and machine power to do what muscles never could have, even in life. Through them, Eshe tossed the third up, feeling the vantage shift as her sight-through-him rose, onto the top of the ship as it danced between the beams. Moments later, the second cast up on high as well, and at that, the shearing of gold as the one remaining below met the threads from the sky.
Flesh melted; even this preserved flesh that remained in denial of the Resurgence Machine. Eshe felt it, linked to her own - it should have burned, she thought, but it was less that than an eternal chill, the coldest of waters pulling down, down, into frost and oblivion until nothing remained but ash and the knowledge that it had been fire, after all. As always, the temptation lingered to follow, to go down into the dead place and become nothing but ash. Some were lost, that way - lost to madness and screaming, until the canopus fluid ran out and they lapsed into mindless silence. Sometimes, the other Sekhem would choose not to line in additional fluid, just to speed along what indifferent respite could be gleaned. Other times, they hoped the mad one would come out of it, in time. Some did.
It was not Eshe's first death. She knew the path, and where to turn from it. It burned at her, but she was already the one upon the ship, balanced carefully as it flew, taking up position where the sensors would surely see him, a gesture to the cameras indicating the ground, the second an imposition behind him, prepared for whatever it was that the pilot on board the ship thought that the collectors of the dead did when they were forced to engage with the living.
Eshe found his voice, so like-and-unlike her own.
"Down. By will of the Spymaster. And if you would like to argue with the gods, feel free to take it up with them, but I am not going to."
The whipping wind could not steal his breath, for none of them had such a thing. Perhaps by the will of those same gods, perhaps for other reasons, the ship did not see fit to resist this command. Eshe directed it to land, near the city enough, close enough to her own position that she could move up close with the rest of her forces while the ship unsealed.
They were not alone, of course. Such was the way of places populated by the living. Hopefully those in the vicinity would not interfere with the will of the gods, or at least, with the will of the gods that were not currently annihilating what life scattered itself across the surface of Shu in such ways that even their corpses could not be gleaned from the slaughter.
Eshe waited, patient, beside one of her Jackals, letting the one she'd sent up top jump down onn mechanically supported limbs and wait beside the hatchway. Eshe did not choose to allow room for argument in either his voice or his posture.
"Open it."
Prophecies, however, were not prone to transparency; neither were the gods in the execution of their will. The sky above danced with ships; most fell. Ordinarily, it would have been those which Eshe sent her Jackals towards, but in this case she knew that the bodies on board would already have been lost, with nothing to recover. One of them remained, solo, touched by the light but not marred by it.
That one, then. Evidently the gods were determined not to obfuscate their will itself - only the manner of its accomplishment. She extended herself into the bodies at her command, and wondered if the gods felt the same way about such things when they were setting her into motion. If that bore thinking on further, this was not the time for it. Ship trajectories were often difficult to estimate even with multiple vantage points as Eshe was able to access, and she would need to hold on to what concentration she had, when her Jackals died.
They were, as some would say, already dead. Their sacrifice had happened years past, when the last bit of their canopic fluid was used up and they fell into mindlessness. Or, perhaps, their sacrifice had happened further back than that, when the hot knife had split them open and the waiting hands had torn free the organs that they would no longer need. Her hand moved, resting briefly on her chest where there had once been a heart.
No matter. She grouped them together, three, waiting for the ship to pass low between the golden lances. Two bodies, crouched down, a third waiting posed upon them for hydraulics and machine power to do what muscles never could have, even in life. Through them, Eshe tossed the third up, feeling the vantage shift as her sight-through-him rose, onto the top of the ship as it danced between the beams. Moments later, the second cast up on high as well, and at that, the shearing of gold as the one remaining below met the threads from the sky.
Flesh melted; even this preserved flesh that remained in denial of the Resurgence Machine. Eshe felt it, linked to her own - it should have burned, she thought, but it was less that than an eternal chill, the coldest of waters pulling down, down, into frost and oblivion until nothing remained but ash and the knowledge that it had been fire, after all. As always, the temptation lingered to follow, to go down into the dead place and become nothing but ash. Some were lost, that way - lost to madness and screaming, until the canopus fluid ran out and they lapsed into mindless silence. Sometimes, the other Sekhem would choose not to line in additional fluid, just to speed along what indifferent respite could be gleaned. Other times, they hoped the mad one would come out of it, in time. Some did.
It was not Eshe's first death. She knew the path, and where to turn from it. It burned at her, but she was already the one upon the ship, balanced carefully as it flew, taking up position where the sensors would surely see him, a gesture to the cameras indicating the ground, the second an imposition behind him, prepared for whatever it was that the pilot on board the ship thought that the collectors of the dead did when they were forced to engage with the living.
Eshe found his voice, so like-and-unlike her own.
"Down. By will of the Spymaster. And if you would like to argue with the gods, feel free to take it up with them, but I am not going to."
The whipping wind could not steal his breath, for none of them had such a thing. Perhaps by the will of those same gods, perhaps for other reasons, the ship did not see fit to resist this command. Eshe directed it to land, near the city enough, close enough to her own position that she could move up close with the rest of her forces while the ship unsealed.
They were not alone, of course. Such was the way of places populated by the living. Hopefully those in the vicinity would not interfere with the will of the gods, or at least, with the will of the gods that were not currently annihilating what life scattered itself across the surface of Shu in such ways that even their corpses could not be gleaned from the slaughter.
Eshe waited, patient, beside one of her Jackals, letting the one she'd sent up top jump down onn mechanically supported limbs and wait beside the hatchway. Eshe did not choose to allow room for argument in either his voice or his posture.
"Open it."
