I live in the darkness, death knows me.
During the day I am a shadow,
breathing your sky, wings folded from the light.

Luna adores me from afar,
awaiting my return with fearful love.
I never stay, she kisses me with rotten breath.
Foul with cold and heat and nothing.

My bones she keeps in mounds.
Her heated face cooks my flesh, boils my blood.
Last I saw her, she smiled at me.
I left her with your hand drawn back.

I see your face, know your mind.
You don't remember Thor's hammer.
Soon you will learn, and before you hurt her again,
my wings will unfold, ebon, crimson, silver and gold.

Death laps eagerly at my feet,
awaiting the scraps from my feast.
Man, back to the forest quick.
Hide in shadows again,
grovel under the caress of fern and leaf.

I am a blade, the thief of sight.
I am a worm, and king of night.
I die, I live, I love you not.
You wrestle with a shade.
You sweat and heave and wonder why
the best you do, all you try,
alone, so alone. So cold, so hot.

When you reach for the torch
to light your way, I'll thrust it back
scar your face, char your teeth.
Your hair will burn, nose will scorch.

Back to the earth, mud and water.
Reach for her in anger one more time.
Molten gold beautifies, do not tempt me.
A bracelet for my lady.
Smoky dark and gleaming.

One of Five

This would be the first and only live show, and Ramed expected to be the wealthiest and most powerful man on the earth, perhaps in the universe. His daughter, Shelba, neither the oldest nor youngest moaned and gasped as a man of the household idly stroked her clitoris while watching the lens.

Ramed could feel the dampness of Shelbas hair, not quite dry from her earlier romp in the showers. From time to time her head would roll from side to side, when her breath became hot against his thigh, he would glance down and smile, but her eyes were closed in focused enjoyment.

Saneli giggled as she watched Ramed looking at his daughter, after the showers, the men would not normally be excitable for at least several hours, leaving the women to tease and please each other. Some of the men, would join in from time to time. Though spent and exhausted, the men usually slept, read or wandered off to the garages to work.

Ramed was obviously excited, and underlying the physical reaction, Saneli could feel that Ramed was impatient and concerned that the show would be as wondrous as he dreamed. Ramed had spent 20 years planning and orchestrating the coming show. He had even designed and built the lens that would magnify the show so that it would seem to appear as close as the roof of the palatial home he had built to view the show.

Ramed gazed up at the lens as he felt a soft hand grasping his penis, the chimes had begun a 5 count to the beginning of the show. Shelba had opened her eyes, hoping to time the opening waves of the show with her orgasm. She was also an artist and this was her gift to the family. Her emotions would color the music that accompanied much of the coming show.

Ramed knew, without looking that Shelba was now in control, her fingers working around her own opening, the man had retired and gazed upwards as did all of the more than one hundered humans scattered about the divan, under the lens.

The chimes struck the 4 count.

Ramed had not been interested in business, loving poetry and artistic endeavors. In time, he had become wealthy and famous in his own way, blending color, sound and emotion.

The chimes struck the 3 count.

The flashes were not orchestrated, but Ramed recognized the potential of the spectacle if he could orchestrate the flashes against the disk of the full moon. From that moment he began working on the show. Much of his wealth had been exhausted long ago, then much of his fathers, and then his friends. This moment would repay all that debt, and much much more.

Of the trillions of humans in the galaxy, less than a billion would not be watching the show live. Of course, the recordings would be played endlessly as the greatest show ever devised by man for pure enjoyment. Ramed would soon be the richest, if not most famous man in the galaxy.

The chimes struck the 2 count.

The unknown emotions of millions of artists, scattered singly, and grouped in hundereds on the surface of the moon. They waited in anticipation to add their emotions to the spectacle they were about to participate in. The packages would begin arriving soon. Some of them were plain rock, of different sorts, others were metals, some were mixtures of ores and metals.

Most of the packages had begun their journey to the moon years ago, men working on them as they travelled with the fusion drives. Refining, shaping, and nudging the packages with the drives. The first impact would appear to be at the exact top of the full moon disk when viewed from the divan in the home that Ramed now watched from.

Shelba had never told her father that she planned a surprise beginning, none of the rehearsals had ever had her holding him, nor the sweet hint of humor that she now added to the hum of the artists on the moon.

Ramed was pleased at the improvised preamble, he had often considered adding a light overtone, but could never blend the right feeling in. Now he knew that his daughter had found it and was using his flesh in her hand as the focus. Brilliant, talented beautiful child.

The chimes struck the one count.

The men, women and children arranged in shelters, some on the surface, alone in suits, others deeper, not able to see the flashes that approached. Some were not aware of the time of impact that would kill them. Each of them however were volunteers to participate, their emotions would color the symphony. In groups and couples and single artists, they waited for the show to begin.

There would be no zero count.

Shelbas hand tightened momentarily before fluttering away in confusion. Less than a million people knew how terribly wrong the performance had gone. Shelba knew. Ramed knew.

Ramed looked around at his household and family and friends surrounding him with confused exasperation. The audience he had gathered here were staring at the growing display in wondering adoration. They had no way to know that this was not his art being orchestrated in their view.

From the magnified view from the divan, the humans could not see the shape the blaze was forming around the moon. What could be seen was darkness as ebon branches growing from either side of the moon into the golden flare. Crimson pulses sludged along the ebony limbs, where they passed, silvered veins crept out into the gold as webs of blackness, silver and crimson grew and pulsed in the golden light.

A single observation satellite in a system polar orbit captured a clear video image of the wings forming within moments, and then with seven strong beats the golden body crashed into the earth, the wings folding around the globe. Gouts of energy spewed from the earth, escaping from the grip and enfolding of the monstrous apparition.

Close examination of the scene shows a horrific face, menacing talons, and the wings tearing at the earth, stripping away all the outer crust and then more and more of the core. As the core was reduced, you can see the tearing and gouging becoming more studied, as if planned and calculated.

The wings spread again, and with graceful movement, heavy with the glut of its feast the figure glides toward the sun, until glare swallows the figure in the view.

What is left of the planet earth is plated in gold, faceted cuts sparkle in the sunlight as it rotates and orbits the moon.