Dandin nodded to the doctor, letting him know that they couldn’t get any more answers here than they’d already been told. For the rest, they would have to go up to the soaring city that still stood in place directly above the travelers.
“We will find all the answers,” Dandin nodded. “The Emperor will find them.”
“Do you know about the signal?” the doctor hesitated. “We would like to know why you sent it to us.”
Dandin tilted his head, trying to understand the doctor’s words:
“You want to ask the Emperor why he turned on the recording you sent him?”
“What? No!” the doctor wondered.
Everyone looked at each other.
“Are you trying to tell us we sent you the message?” Jean-Pierre asked. “I’m completely confused.”
“You just can’t see everything,” Dandin smiled. “Come on up, and I will try to explain.”
Van was the first one to board the ship, but before he did so he bowed down to the ground again. The doctor and then everyone else climbed aboard. The chariot was not pulled by strange beasts, nor did it have an engine or any semblance of machinery. Just a smooth surface, like a platter with sides. Everyone fit freely, the ship was big enough.
As soon as the last passenger from Earth climbed into the chariot, the ladder pulled into the base of the ship, and it began to rise slowly.
The hum began to build again, and the soaring castle-island moved on. Everyone looked down at the huge beam of light penetrating the surface of the Sun all the way to the core, leaving not a scar on it. It pierced the surface of the star, and from it diverged circles of fiery power in different directions. Orange mixed with red and yellow. The surface absorbed this energy without a trace, it spread out in heat in all directions and shone with a calming light into the darkness of the impenetrable cosmos.
The ship rose above the edge of a floating island, the pillar of fire disappearing beneath the smooth surface of the city streets. The travelers had a view of the beautiful city. The higher they climbed, the more they realized that the island held thousands of houses and streets. Many yellow towers and domes densely clustered on the smooth surface of the floating block. The city shone with many amazing details and jewels. There were small and large multi-storey buildings, columns, arches and intricate aqueducts. The material that shone on all the buildings was, without exception, a bright yellow color. It resembled the surface of a planet, but it did not melt before one’s eyes, it was frozen and nobly soothed. Translucent stones of varying size and color were visible everywhere. Some were green, others red or blue, and all were shining with a pleasant light.