Soft come the dragons

eyes.
    An hour passed, and I could not look away.
    It was a shifting mass of liquid fire. It was all the fires of all time. It was Nero in Rome. It was Chicago. It was San Francisco after the earthquake. It was the great Moon Fire—a thousand domes filled with burning atmosphere. It was all fires of all times. And it screamed. It tortured its lungs. It was all the fires of all the times and all the victims of all those fires of all those times. It was Alpha and Omega. It was Hell living. It was Heaven dying. The fires roared. The victims screamed.
    I fled in fear, through the refrigeration units, tripping the shut-off switches. I slipped through cables, through walk, madly searching for a way out—but really wanting none. Looking to see if my body had yet blackened, I looked onto control deck. Amishi's body was draped over a chair, his neck broken. Malherbe was literally shredded, and Alexander was lying in a red-black pool, his hand clenched into a fist. The temperature was seventy-nine. The sun had not murdered them.
    A sign said: JESSIE. STOP IT FOR GOD'S SAKE. ITS YOU. AMISHI SAYS IT'S YOU. THE MONSTER IS A ROBOMECH YOU'RE DIRECTING, AND WE CANT STOP IT. WHY, JESSIE? THE FACE YOU PUT ON IT WITH PLASTIC FLESH—NO EYES, JESSIE. AND BLISTERS AND SCARS. HORRIBLE. COME TO YOUR SENSES, JESSIE. MY GOD, JESSIE . . . JESSIE, LISTEN. LOOK, TURN THE SHIP AROUND. NOT TO THE SUN, JESSIE. THAT'S WHAT YOU WANT, ISN'T IT? NOT TO THE SUN? STOP THE ROBOMECH. STOP HIM NOW, JESSIE! NOW! NOWNOWNOW! NOW—
    I wept. I wanted to turn around. I didn't want to turn around. Both and neither.
    I soared, spinning through the decks of the ship, upward toward the outer shell, the refrigeration units off. The heat more and more intense. Whimpering.
    Whimpering.
    The sun is one great god-eye. The sun taketh away, and only the sun can returneth.
    The heat is strong on my mind. My body is forty decks below, and the temperature there is a hundred and four. The heat is stronger on my mind in the outer shell. It hurts me, it hurts. The walls of flame sting and are Hellish.
    Please Mandy . . .
    Please Mandy . . .
    Help me to come home again. . . .
    The sun offers no consolation, but stares with two black and empty eyes . . .