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Astronimek

 Astronimek. In our ancient history, those who studied the stars and their profound motions were scholar-priests, reinforcing the binding supplication we had to the night skies. When Titr overtook Hruesk, it was time to push north in pursuit of Those Who Thunder, and when Viviq aligned against the other Six Sisters, we prayed with battle dances in hope that the sky would once again be lit. Even since the first hatching, we have been tied to what lies beyond. 


I bear the title Astronimek now. The rites, songs, and measures all live within me across uncountable hatchlings. Standing on the Starmantle, I feel this weight as an undeniable vastness. Vast as the eternity beyond. 



Skyward. Ships crowd and throw long shadows across ancient desert, some so massive that I can sense a subtle pulling exertion. The ceremony has drawn many from far and wide. My scales and feathers quiver in excitement, exultance. I have stood here so many times before but the feeling does not diminish. It grows. Hot air awash in elated voices flows over me, mixes with incoming pheromone communications in droves and I shiver, toothy muzzle wide, feeling lurid-vertigo pinpricks down my spine. 


A new communique flashes, brings exciting sweetness. It holds one word, one that travels amongst the crowd like a great tide. 


Completion.


I am an Astronimek. I bear undying legacies from ages past, when my kind were supplicants and slaves to the motions of the stars. Within me lives those memories. 


But now, lit from behind by the birth of a new star forged not by random nature, but by own our whim in a miraculous dawn, we are slaves nor supplicants no longer. And this is the birth of that future.

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