"Yes! Moon Flame, listen to me. I must know something. Whether you--if the others--if <i>they</i> remember. Remember the moment of birth! Remember the mother--the dying father--<i>the band of life</i>--"
His aura quivered. He strove not to read concern in the gaze of Moon Flame.
"I do not remember it," said Moon Flame slowly. "Birth? Death? Father? You speak in riddles, Devil Star. Come now, faster! I see the others in the galaxy beyond. Forget that silliness!"
For a clairvoyant second in his time-scale, the raging thoughts of Devil Star swelled. And subsided.
"You must listen," he said tensely. "We must all beware. For all of us will die!"
Moon Flame did not lessen his speed. "Die?"
"You do not understand, Moon Flame. Death is our destiny. It was destined long before we were born."
Moon Flame stared. "Then if this strange thing is destined, no one can win against it."
"No one?" Devil Star swerved in his backward flight, brushing the violet furnace of a super-sun. He said, "I shall win, Moon Flame. I shall fight death--the death green lights will attempt to give us. I shall interrupt destiny. I shall be its master!"
But Moon Flame did not understand. He brushed Devil Star aside with an impatient tractor ray. With a scornful glance backward, he went shooting off leaving Devil Star caught in a wake of incandescent sparks.
Devil Star stared after him, but all he saw was the immortal blaze of his life's years.
Devil Star had five million more years of peace, of caniptious play. And then....
He was alone, and cradling his loneliness, atop a galaxy shaped like a masterfully blown, brimming wine-glass, with the bubbles of stars clouding about its rim. The moment of his curse had come, for a vast cunning had grown in him. He would lie here, shielded by a giant star, and he would wait.
The waiting was not long. Came the beat of a life force. He felt himself tremble. Deep inside something was whispering that he should forget, turn back--play--skim along the surface of life as did Moon Flame and the other energy children. Accept destiny!
Destiny! The cunning shift and quiver of sub-atomic particles that began when the universe began.
The life force pressed in, strengthened. And with a thread of vision he saw a matured green light, her central core burning with an hypnotic, frightening radiance.