Sun-Iesh Bernhardt
Role: Wife of Isaac Bernhardt. Never appears in person. Affiliation: Aerth / Galactic Human Empire. Citizen Number 2093/A9. Era: Originally contemporary with Isaac Bernhardt’s pre-experiment life; dead by the story’s present — “long, long, dead. Our experiment here has outlived her by… three centuries perhaps.”
Summary
A memory Isaac Bernhardt clings to as he realises what is happening to him at Kaisure Station. He can see her face clearly, knows her citizen number, remembers the daughter who once played Miranda in a school play at twelve. When he breaks into the station’s quiet chamber he addresses his plea for help to her at the empire hub — and receives a reply that reads like her voice, promising to contact high-empire on his behalf. The reply is in fact Oscar, speaking in her voice: “Darling, I haven’t got time to listen to your complaining. Will you be back in time for dinner?”
Whether Sun-Iesh ever knew what happened to her husband — whether the original Isaac even told her before he stepped into the caster’s source chamber — is not stated.
Appearances
- Ch. 04 — The Menagerie: Mentioned throughout as Bernhardt’s anchor; impersonated by Oscar in the quiet-chamber scene.
Related
Open questions
- Was the pre-experiment Isaac Bernhardt’s disappearance ever explained to her?
- Does the daughter survive? The story gives us the school-play anecdote and nothing else.