Journey's End

By Ron Mueller

As the Orb approached the void, the atmosphere was pulled away from the planet like the skin peeled from a fish. The telescope in Nadia’s orbital observatory showed the event in painfully clear detail. Then the waters of the seas followed in and upward swirling straw like path. A constant plume of air, water and all materials on the surface was lifted as if vacuumed from a rug. It was as if the soul was leaving the Orb’s body. The rotation of the Orb and the pull of the void caused a gigantic wall of water to travel around the Orb and through the deep canyons. Even as a constant stream of air, water and much of the top layer of the Orb was pulled away by the void, a twenty click high wall of water traveled swiftly ahead around the Orb. It scrubbed the surface clean of all structures. The walls at the top of the canyons were pulled up and out toward the void. The sound wave traveling out before the massive wall of water gave those ahead a few moments notice of their impending death. The winds picked up. At first the wind reminded those standing out before it of spring and hope. But swiftly, the winds howled and sang the song of death and the millions standing bravely and facing the impending doom were instantly pulverized by the un-measurable forces of the wall of water ripping the life from the surface of the Orb. The water lifted and all was pulled through space toward the void.
The watchers would forever hear the silent screams and would feel their skin being ripped from their bodies. They would forever, try to grasp the enormity of the catastrophe they witnessed. The sight of the barren rock left behind could never be scrubbed from their souls. The eternal silent scream of the dying Orb was cast into the surrounding vacuum of space.
It would spend the rest of its days traveling through the seas of space, lifeless, destined to travel forever with only the memory of the lives, the loves, and the glory which once flourished on its surface.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Around the World Publishing, LLC
• Release date: Dec 14, 2011
• ISBN: 9781452412566

Ron Mueller

About the Author Ronald E. Mueller [e-mail] Ron grew up in what is now Flint River State Park in Southeast Iowa. The 170-year-old house Ron lived in is built into a hillside. It faces a 125-foot-high cliff towering over the little Flint River. The house and the land talked to him about; the passing of time, the struggle to conquer the land, the struggles people faced and the wonder of nature. He climbed the cliffs, crawled into the caves, dove from the swimming rock, collected clams from the bottom of the pond, gigged and skinned frogs for their legs. He trapped muskrats for fur, hunted raccoon in the dead of night, and with only a stick hunted rabbits in the dead of winter. His young life was outdoors, and nature tested him. He walked to a one room stone schoolhouse uphill both ways. A stern but warm-hearted teacher, Mrs. Henry was instrumental in shaping his character as she shepherded him from the fourth to the eighth grade. A Montessori before its time. It was a great way to grow up. His experiences inter-twined with snippets of fantasy lend themselves to the adventures he leads the reader through.