I thought it was all too fanciful, but Amel would not let go of it and I could see then how much more interested he was in the fields that later epochs would call philosophy or theology than he was in the actual biological sciences which he had used to such advantage to shape and sustain his world.
"What if the transmitting stations, wherever they are, can draw to themselves the souls of all those who have finished their biological life, and what if these souls are drawn to Bravenna as surely as all those moving pictures are drawn, and what if the Bravennans use those souls as a concentrated form of energy, a concentrated expression of energy, enhanced and deepened and perfected by suffering so that those souls are like ripe and perfect fruit to the Bravennans and maybe even to others in the 'Realm of Worlds'?"
He went on describing this, how it seemed to him that the souls of human beings, thanks to their mammalian nature, might have a wholly different flavor than the souls of other sentient species, and this would make the souls irresistible to Bravennans.
Even as I regarded this as utterly far-fetched and unprovable, Garekyn took an interest and began to speculate along with Amel.
"And what if," asked Garekyn, "that is why they want to foment war on this planet, because they will have more souls to harvest, somehow traveling through the transmission stations as they are released from the biological bodies, souls drawn Heavenward through the beam of the transmission station as if through infinitely long tunnels of light?"
"I can't bear the thought of such a thing, such a horrible thing," Derek said more than once. Welf, always the practical one among us, simply shrugged and said that it was something one could never know for sure.
We went over all our experiences on Bravenna, and Amel listened attentively, but there was little to support such an idea as the harvesting of souls.
"I can believe," I said finally, "that they are feasting off the suffering of this planet, and fomenting it. I believed that really from the first moment it was suggested to me because I saw the film streams, and saw what they prized above all, and it was always suffering; but unless the soul itself is a spiritual and physical emanation of a human mind--virtually composed of the experience and suffering of that mind, unless the soul is materially changed by suffering and generated perhaps by the longing of the individual to understand its own suffering, well, then I don't know how it would work."
"Now that is an interesting observation," said Amel, "and I had never thought of it, but perhaps you are onto something, that suffering itself helps to generate the soul."
"I meant the energy given off by suffering, of course," I explained, "that it might organize into a soul. To put it another way, a being's unsatisfied curiosity might generate that human being's soul. And the fuel might be the collective suffering endured by that human all through his or her life, and some other intangible ingredient, perhaps, such as an overview, an attitude, a perspective on life, that too might help the formation of a soul."
I can remember this ever so clearly, this long conversation, our being gathered there and talking to one another as though we had all of the time in the world.
"This is what gives me the greatest hope," said Amel at one point with great excitement. "It is that if we can imagine a question, then there must be an answer to it. And it is merely a matter of hard work and perseverance to find that answer. In essence, no question can be imagined by us that is unanswerable by its nature. Does that make sense to you?"
I for one said that it did. So did Garekyn. I could feel the workings of my own mind as we so passionately discussed these things, I could feel my mind exercising itself just as one might feel one's legs when running and leaping and dancing. And it felt so good to me to be possessed of a mind and to be possessed of these questions.
"Whatever I do here," I said to Amel, "may it not have to do with the study of the concept of soul? May I not work on trying to discover how to measure the soul?"
"I would love for this to be your work," Amel answered immediately. Welf raised his hand with a little mocking laugh and said he would be delighted to go along with it, because he was eager to see just how I was going to measure something as completely imaginary as souls.
"And what if you do prove it," Garekyn asked, "that beings have souls and souls are energy and that these souls can be harvested from Earth's atmosphere, what then will you do? Can you ever strike out at Bravenna? Can you ever do more than shake your fist at the sky?"
My memory of the next few minutes falters. Amel protested almost angrily that what he could do was hunt out every transmitting station and destroy it, and close up every Chamber of Suffering in existence, but then he lamented t
hat this would make him the cruel "headman" that he had never wanted to be.
As for Derek, he seemed blissfully happy in the midst of this conversation and went off on his own tangent as to whether the souls of those who knew joy more than anything were not finer fruit to harvest than the souls who'd known so much pain. Welf was pressing my hand, signaling me he was ready for our home bed, and some coupling, and I caught the wink of his eye and sweet smile on his lips.
What happened next? I reached for the goblet that held my wine and I took a long easy drink of it, which one can do when the wine is weak and deliciously cold, and I saw the wine moving in the goblet, sloshing from side to side, and I realized that the entire room was moving, that the furniture under us was moving, and that Amel had stood and was staring through the great western wall towards the stars.
"What is it?" Derek cried. "The island is shaking. Look, look outside, the towers are moving!"
But Amel's face was turned upwards.
"It's Bravenna," he cried out. "Bravenna is moving! Look at Bravenna!"
Suddenly we were all at the wall gazing upwards, and we watched the erratic movement of the bright star that was Bravenna when suddenly that star grew huge and exploded and out of the vast darkness came a great shower of innumerable burning stars--flying in all directions--and the blaze that was the star itself grew larger and larger as Amel screamed again, "She's coming towards us, she's breaking up! She's coming down on us--."
A horrific roar swallowed his words. From all sides came the pounding reverberations of explosions. The towers everywhere were swaying wildly as if they were dancing, and the room began to rock from side to side. I saw fire descending on Earth, exploding against the shimmering dome, and then even here in this high room, even here above the city, I heard the roar of countless human voices.
Below us, people ran in panic over rooftops, and smaller buildings were falling sideways into the buildings next to them. From the balconies and open windows people were tumbling. Huge ocean waves the color of fire splashed against the great dome as if reaching to extinguish the endless flames.
The sounds of the explosions increased in volume until one deafening explosion after another shocked us and paralyzed us. Huge cracks and fissures broke up the walls.
Then great knives of fire appeared to slice through the dome itself.
"The luracastria, it's melting," Amel cried. I could see it. We all saw it, the towers melting, the dome melting. Our building shuddered. I fell into Welf's arms. Amel grabbed hold of me and ran with me towards the doors, waving for the others to follow, while with his other hand he dragged Derek along beside him. "It's the whole island; it's the whole world."
A fierce wind broke through the shattered walls and the fire blinded me. The roar of the population was as loud as the roar of the sea. I felt rain against my face but it wasn't rain. I could feel myself falling, and I felt Welf against my ear saying, "Hold on to me, Kapetria, hold on. Hold on. Hold on." I screamed for Derek and Garekyn. I screamed for Amel. I heard Amel's voice but I couldn't see him.