Chronicles of the Eon of the Order of the Keepers of the Light: Depart From Our Borders

Part One Sector Daen-9

The anomalous zone in sector Daen-9 differed from other known Rifts in one respect: it did not attack. It — received. Ships entering it met no resistance, didn't lose navigation immediately, didn't see Shattered Ones on their screens. The zone simply was — quiet, almost inviting, with an inexplicable sense that something important was here, worth investigating.

That was exactly why the research expedition "Daen-9" remained in the zone three days longer than planned. Commander Eira kept wanting just a little more — the data was interesting, the zone behaved differently than the archives described, and each day brought something new. First officer Tarn suggested leaving several times. Each time, the commander stayed.

On the eighth day, two of the crew changed.

Not fell ill — changed. Technician Vei and navigator Sey. Outwardly healthy, readings normal, speech coherent. But — different. As though something in them had shifted, and now looked out from within with a foreign gaze. Vei began saying things he'd never said before — cold, precise, aimed at breaking something in other people. Sey stopped sleeping and began walking the ship at night, stopping at every viewport, staring into the darkness with an expression that made the others prefer not to go into the corridor.

The medic Ro couldn't reach a diagnosis. He wrote in the log: "No medical term for what I'm observing." Commander Eira sent a signal to Tayr — because there was no one else to write to, and Tayr always answered.

Part Two The Monastery of Tayr · Father Vars Reads the Gospel

The signal arrived on a Sunday morning — during the hour the day's Gospel reading was being read in the monastery chapel. Aen received it, as usual not interrupting the service, and waited for a pause.

Vars read the signal right there, in the chapel, without leaving. Then raised his head and looked at what he held in his other hand — the scroll with today's Gospel. Matthew. Chapter eight.

"Brothers," he said. "I've just received a signal. I'll read the Gospel first. Then I'll say why this matters right now."

He set aside the scroll.

"Keeper John Chrysostom explained this passage this way," Vars said. "The demons knew who stood before them. They cried out 'Son of God' — not in confession, in terror. They were afraid. And they came out of the men at once — a single Word was enough. But the city's inhabitants — people who should have rejoiced at the healing of two of their own — came out to meet Christ and asked Him to leave. Because a herd of swine — their property — had perished."

"Theophylact of Bulgaria added: they preferred the swine to the men. The material turned out to matter more to them than two healed people standing before them. And Christ left. He did not force their will. They asked — He left. This is terrible. Not because He punished them. Because they chose it themselves."

Vars looked at the brethren.

"I've just received a signal from sector Daen-9. Two members of an expedition have been seized by beings from a Rift. This is like those two in the country of the Gergesenes. We are entering seclusion. And I ask you to hold today's Gospel in mind throughout the prayer — especially its end. Because among those we pray for, there will be one who asks us to leave."

Part Three The Expedition · First Officer Tarn

· Daen-9 · Day Nine ·

When the reply came from Tayr — "received, entering seclusion, praying, hold on" — Tarn read it and felt what he'd already grown used to feeling at any mention of monastic practices: irritation, carefully disguised as skepticism.

Seventeen people will sit on a plateau and whisper words into emptiness — and that's supposed to help us nineteen million light-years away. Of course.

He went to the commander.

"Eira. Tayr answered. They say they're praying."

"I know, I read it," Eira said. She sat by the viewport, tired, with the look people have who carry a burden they won't hand to anyone.

"Do you believe it'll help?" Tarn asked directly.

"I saw what happened on the previous expedition, 'Daen-7,'" Eira said calmly. "Tayr prayed there too. Six recovered."

"Coincidence," Tarn said. "Correlation isn't causation."

"You're right," Eira said. "It isn't proof. But I don't have another instrument right now. Do you want to give up the only available action because it doesn't fit your worldview?"

Tarn was silent.

"Go to your post," Eira said. "And don't interfere with those who want to pray here, aboard. That's an order."

Tarn left. Walking down the corridor, he thought about how Eira trusted things too much that couldn't be verified. It was dangerous — especially for a commander.

She's asking something invisible for help. Like the people of that country of the Gergesenes — only the opposite: they drove the invisible away. She's calling it in.

He didn't know where that comparison had come from — he hadn't read the Gospel and knew nothing about the country of the Gergesenes. The thought had simply come on its own. He stopped in the corridor, stood a moment. Then walked on.

But the thought stayed.

Part Four The Monastery of Tayr · The Second Day of Seclusion

Aen kept the prayer watch in the chapel — his second hour running, having relieved Brother Le. Outside it was raining — the same steady Tayr rain he'd known for a year now. The chapel was quiet, faintly damp from moisture seeping through the stone walls.

He thought about the Gospel Vars had read. About the inhabitants of the country of the Gergesenes — about how they'd asked Christ to leave. That passage had always troubled him when he'd read it before: how could anyone see healing and ask the Savior to leave?

Now, praying for the expedition in sector Daen-9, he understood it differently.

The people of Gergesa weren't evil people. They were people for whom the familiar — however dangerous — mattered more than an unfamiliar good. The two demon-possessed men had been part of their world — terrifying, but known. The swine — their property, their security, their future. Christ had disrupted their familiar order — and even if that order included suffering, it was their order. Change demanded something of them — a new vision, a new arrangement of life. That was harder than asking a stranger to leave.

There's someone like that in the expedition. Someone who sees what's happening and asks us to leave — not because he's evil, but because our presence demands he change his picture of the world. And that's harder than accepting help from something you don't understand.

Aen prayed. Not only for Vei and Sey — for everyone aboard. For Tarn, whom he didn't know, but whom he sensed in the commander's signal, between the lines — someone's resistance, cold and logical.

Lord, have mercy on him. Not because he's wrong, humanly speaking. Because he stands at the threshold — and might enter, or might ask to leave. Let him not ask.

Part Five Daen-9 · The Third Day

· Day Eleven ·

Vei sat in his cabin, unmoving for eight hours now. The medic Ro checked in every two hours — readings normal, he's just sitting. Sey, who had walked the ship all through the second night, suddenly lay down and fell asleep by the morning of the third day — deeply, as he hadn't slept all week.

Tarn, meanwhile, stood at the viewport on the bridge, looking into the anomalous zone. It was beautiful — he hadn't stopped noticing that, even now. Deep blue, with sparse flashes that weren't stars — something else he couldn't classify.

He thought about Vei and Sey. About what Vei had been like before — calm, a bit withdrawn, a good technician, reliable. And what he'd become: those words, cold and precise as scalpels, aimed straight at the place that hurts. This wasn't illness in the medical sense. It was something using Vei as a tool.

As though someone else is speaking with his voice. Someone who knows what causes each of us pain.

Kira. He suddenly remembered a story he'd once read in the Order's archives — about Keeper Kira, of the monastery of Iriel. A being that had entered her during battle and spoken with her voice. He'd read that report as a curious document. Now — as a description of what he was seeing with his own eyes.

And she was freed. In the Name of Eternity. By a Word.

He stood at the viewport for a long time. Then — slowly, the way one does something one isn't sure is right, but does anyway — closed his eyes.

Four words. He remembered them from a conversation with someone, long ago, on another station. "Lord, have mercy on them." He hadn't attached any meaning to it at the time. Now — he said it. Quietly. Almost soundlessly. Toward the viewport, into the deep-blue anomalous zone, toward nineteen million light-years in one direction and toward Tayr in the other.

He didn't know what it meant to pray. But he spoke the four words. And that was more honest than staying silent.

Part SixHealing

· Day Twelve · The End of Seclusion at Tayr ·

Vars was reading the closing prayer of the seclusion when the message arrived from Daen-9. Aen received it silently, read it through, then raised his head and — for the first time in three days — smiled.

After the service, Vars read the message. Then read it again.

Vars sat with the message for a long time. Then said — quietly, to the empty chapel:

"'The whole city came out to meet Jesus and begged Him to depart.' And there — one man said 'thank you.' One. That's enough. That's already not the country of the Gergesenes."

Aen looked at him.

"Father Vars. And those who asked Christ to leave — did they see Him again, later?"

"Yes," Vars said. "He returned there later. The Decapolis — the ten cities. Later, thousands there listened to Him for three days. Because the two who were healed — the ones who had lived among the tombs — went and told others. He left when they asked. But He left a seed. And the seed sprouted."

"Tarn," Aen said quietly. "He's the seed."

"Yes," Vars said. "One 'thank you' is already not a closed door. It's already — ajar."

EpilogueAfterward

The expedition returned. Vei and Sey underwent a full examination — no traces of possession, no residual effects. Vei spoke at length with Kira, of the monastery of Iriel — she'd flown out specially, because Vars had asked. They sat together for several hours. What they spoke about, no one asked. When Vei came out, his face was such that Aen — who happened to be in the corridor — turned away, because grief and relief of that kind, belonging to someone else, aren't for outside eyes.

Tarn wrote a report to the Order — official, technical, with data on the navigation recovery and the crew's condition. At the end — a final paragraph, clearly added after long deliberation — he wrote:

"I recommend the Order study more closely the correlation between the prayer practices of monasteries and the dynamics of anomalous phenomena in Rift zones. The data from expeditions 'Daen-7' and 'Daen-9' deserve serious study. I am personally prepared to provide additional observations."

Commander Eira read this paragraph and said nothing. She only wrote, by hand, in the margin, out of old habit: "Welcome."

On Tayr, that evening, Vars read today's Gospel again — no longer for the brethren, for himself.

"The whole city came out to meet Jesus, and begged Him to depart from their region."

He thought: and the two who were healed? They followed Him. They didn't stay with the city. After He left — they went and told others. And the whole Decapolis listened for three days afterward, without dispersing.

Sometimes He leaves — when asked. But He leaves behind those He healed. And they tell others. And that changes everything.

Vei will tell others. Sey will tell others. Tarn has already begun — with a report and its final paragraph. The seed is sown. The rest isn't our business.