Then time threw orbit wires around the planet Terra and silver-suited men looked out through domes of glass. And in the center of the universe the Singer and his Father spoke of final victory. The ancient World Hater heard their whispered plans and trembled.

The Prince of Dragons gazed through a thousand fields of stars, and across the gleaming universe he saw the Prince of Planets and steeled himself for conflict. The light of the Invader glinted from the Singer’s Sword. A great galactic storm was gathering among the stars and Terra lay directly in the wake.

THE FINALE

I

When worlds cease to roll old orbits soon become shallow star tracks filled with cosmic trash and planet crumbs—the final will and testament of human genius.

The Singer felt a chilling wisp of air pass through the vacuum. He stood upon an asteroid and gazed upon the Center Star, still bright with fire for all its years.

Terra lumbered slowly through the radiance. She looked tired. The Singer’s eyes softly saddened as he remembered her once glorious past.

He thought back on that desperate day he felt the cables on his wrists and begged the world cease its senseless murdering of love. The weary planet almost stopped, then rolled slowly on to plod the silver track before it.

“It is her final trip!” a voice behind him said.

He did not need to turn around. He knew who had followed him to his pedestal in space.

“Her very last!” agreed the Troubadour.

“Do you remember, Singer, the last day we spent together there?” World Hater asked.

“It was the day I …” He stopped and looked at his hands, “the day I knew the greatest pain of men. It is hard to call to mind that I died …”

“The day I marked your hands,” the Dark Prince finished the thought.

“Now we must go back,” the Singer said. “Terra must swelter in the final fiery war. Her death will grieve the Father Spirit.”

“No need to grieve. Microworlds die every day,” sneered the old antagonist.

“Yes, but dying worlds are to be grieved, and this small mass is held in high esteem: she is Earthmaker’s special love, and now …”

Again the World Hater finished the words: “ …and now she dies a glorious death of hate in a bloody war that resurrects my joy in universal bitterness. Destruction and decay shall pave her way to nothingness.” He laughed.

The Singer spoke above his laughter: “The time has come. What we began before the Great Tribunal must be resolved.”

“Yes, now, out on the Plains of Man, in the bright new capital of Ellanor.”

The Dark Prince stretched his arms outward into space. A flame exploded on his hand. Its amber incandescence flickered on his smirking face. “I’m going down,” he said, gesturing with his blazing hand toward a range of snowcapped mountains, “to the Caverns of Death.”

He rolled the flame into a sphere between his heavy palms and hurled it away toward Terra like a meteor. It was all but lost to sight when it struck the planet, lighting up the desert where it fell.