Dark Matter

by Luke Donegan

  Jay’s eyes were viscous pools of dark fluid. His hand reached out and grasped Erys’ hand. Erys felt power surge through the boy. The Teacher pulled Erys closer, and Erys winced with pain.

  “Dark Matter is within me,” whispered Jay. “I can feel it. Can you see it, in my eyes?”

  “Yes.”

  “And I can see it in yours. It is in us both.”

  He released Erys and relaxed back on the bed.

  “It is a corrupting force,” he said. “Perhaps I am too corrupted to care about the Law. But what I do know, is that if you ever use Rhada against me like that again, I will cast you out. Do you understand?”

  Erys nodded.

  The Teacher rolled away from him.

  “You are my scion, but I despair for you,” said Jay. “I have no respect for you.”

  And these words hurt Erys more than he could have imagined.

  “Rhada, who I trust above all others, believes that you are doing the right thing.” He uttered a short, sharp laugh. “It must have taken some work to convince her. But you did. And so I submit. Not to you, or to Xia Tsang or the Taxidermist. And not to Ariel. But to Rhada. I’ll submit because she asked me to. Against my better judgement, and with a heart full of fear, I submit to her. Because my Passage is scratching at the door, and if the last thing I achieve with my pitiful life is to give her hope ... then that is what I will do.”

  A coughing fit wracked his body, and Erys grimaced. He had succeeded. But slowly, as he walked from the room and along the corridor, his worry grew. What if he had made a mistake? Despite his disparity with the Teacher’s views on the Ark, the Teacher was the moral anchor of the community. With that moral anchor uprooted the community was now adrift towards aberration. It was up to Erys to steer them right.

  Have I done the right thing? Am I saving the world or will I destroy it?

  A dizzy spell stopped him. He leant against the wall and closed his eyes. He remembered his dream, aberrant creatures flowing from the Museum ...

  ... and a fury about to be released.

  Cool, blue light bathed his face. It was cold in the cistern, buried beneath the Museum. It reminded him of the caves of the emu people. Those caves too had been cool and moist.

  Moisture clouded the inner surface of the unit before him. Its refrigeration component had failed some time during the night. The numbat young inside were in no immediate danger, but the component needed to be fixed.

  Erys transferred the numbat young into the next unit, laying them gently beside their bandicoot cousins. He inspected the tangle of gas and coolant hoses underneath the unit. One had frayed against the metal housing. Over the next hour he removed the damaged hose, fashioned a replacement section and refitted it to the unit. He re-calibrated and bled coolant through the system. Lost in his thoughts, he worked automatically.

  He thought about what he had achieved. His moral argument had convinced the Teacher to preserve the Ark. He had felt pride when informing Xia Tsang and the Taxidermist.

  He ran tests on the repaired capsule, and satisfied it was in order he began replacing the numbat young. As he completed his work, footsteps approached. He lowered the capsule’s lid and turned to face the Curator of Science.

  “Scion-Teacher,” said the Curator in greeting.

  “Curator,” bowed Erys.

  “How is your work progressing?” asked the Curator.

  “Well. I have just completed maintenance on this unit. Everything is in order.”

  Erys wondered at the Science Curator’s presence. While the Curator was aware of the Ark he was not actively involved in the project. Erys could not remember seeing him in the cistern before.

  Jack Gaunt surveyed the cavern, his face like a hawk’s. Erys caught himself feeling eager for the Curator’s ascension. He knew this was an evil thought, but once Jack Gaunt became Director, the pressure of secrecy would be largely gone. Even if the Teacher changed his mind, Jack Gaunt as the Director would protect the Ark.

  “I am hearing a lot about you these days,” said the Curator finally. “You are the subject of much conversation.”

  Jack Gaunt approached the capsule Erys had repaired and looked through the lid at the frozen numbats.

  “Xia tells me you had success with our Teacher. The boy was prepared to betray us, but you persuaded him otherwise. Tell me, how secure is his cooperation? Is there a risk he may change his mind?”

  “I don’t think so,” replied Erys. “He disfavours the project and believes we are breaking the Law. But he has given his word. I believe that is enough.”

  Jack Gaunt looked skeptical.

  “In any case,” said Erys. “He is very sick. I don’t think he will survive for long.”

  “Yes,” muttered the Curator. “Passage. I have spoken at length with the Doctor on this subject. On Restoration Day, the boy was caught in the Teacher’s Passage. He went too far and returned to us damaged. And then he did it again. He instigated a semi-Passage in which you yourself were caught. Tell me, Scion-Teacher. How far were you willing to go?”

  “I beg your pardon?” Erys was confused.

  “Passage is self-fueling,” said Jack Gaunt. “The further one goes in, the harder it is to turn back. I am surprised the boy was able to come back at all, damaged as he is. But you were a passenger. How far were you willing to go? What did you see, and how did you decide it was time to turn back?”

  “I saw ...” He paused. He did not want to remember.

  “What?” demanded the Curator.

  “I saw Dark Matter.”

  The Science Curator’s eyes widened. He almost looked excited.

  “Dark Matter? How did you recognise it?”

  “I knew it because it was the most terrible thing I have ever seen. Nothing has ever frightened me like that. Not even when I fell from the zeppelin.”

  “Did the boy see it too?”

  “Yes,” nodded Erys. “It was his purpose to show me.”

  The Science Curator pondered his next move.

  “I think it is time,” he said to himself. “We will not get a better opportunity.”

  The Curator looked at Erys with something like pity in his eyes.

  “Scion-Teacher, come with me to visit the Teacher. We will collect Masodi on the way. There is much to do. It is time I revealed my hand.”

  “Scion-Director, I would get up ...”

  “Peace,” said Jack Gaunt, placing an uncharacteristically gentle hand on the Teacher’s shoulder.

  Jay relaxed as the Science Curator pulled a chair beside the bed and sat. Erys stood with Masodi at the end of the bed, observing.

  An oily black liquid pooled behind Jay’s eyes.

  “Your eyes, I must say, are fascinating,” said the Curator. “Do they hurt?”

  “No.”

  “Are they damaged? Has your sight been impaired?”

  “On the contrary. I see too well. I can see beyond the thin veil of this world. I know some of your intentions.”

  The Curator smiled. Erys had never seen the man smile.

  “That is a sad irony. You see better, but your body is useless.”

  “Yes.”

  “You have seen what lies beneath the Museum. The Ark. The animals. The project that keeps Xia and Gregor and young Erys here so busy.”

  “Yes.”

  “And what do your eyes show you about this project?”

  “I see that it will fail.”

  Erys shuffled with discomfort. He wanted to interject, to reject this claim. But he was not part of this conversation.

  “Why will it fail?” asked the Curator.

  “Because they are breaking the Law. I fear they will unleash an Aberration.”

  “And yet you allow it to go ahead. Why?”

  The Teacher glanced at Erys momentarily before returning his eyes to the Curator.

  “I cannot see the future,” explained the Teacher. “What I do see is the truth. Our hope for the future hangs by a thread. While I believe he will fail
, my scion has convinced me there is no hope otherwise.”

  “Hope,” said the Curator.

  The man stood and paced the room. Eventually he turned to face the bed.

  “You are absolutely correct,” said Jack Gaunt. “They will fail.”

  “I disagree,” objected Erys. “Xia Tsang and ...”

  Jack Gaunt cut him off.

  “Xia is a good scientist, but she has calculated incorrectly. She allowed hope to cloud her judgement. Even if you succeed in bringing these animals out into the world, what of Passage?”

  Erys was speechless.

  “Passage will destroy many of your species before they can reproduce,” explained the Curator. “The others ... how will they survive in this desert we have made of the world? I am sorry, but the Ark is doomed to fail.”

  “How do you know?” argued Erys. “We must have faith that life will find a way to survive.”

  “I’m afraid I do not share your faith,” said Jack Gaunt. “I need something concrete to believe in.”

  “You talk of failure,” said Erys. “At least Xia is trying.”

  “With that I agree. Xia has made a good start. But it is an end we are in need of. The problem is not that species have become extinct. That is the result. The problem is, and has always been, Passage. You can release all the animals into the world you want, young man. But while Passage exists, you are wasting your time.”

  The Science Curator returned to his seat and drew it closer to Jay.

  “I have found a way to destroy Dark Matter,” said the Curator eagerly. “I can end Passage and return the world to the way it was. Imagine. A world with no Passage, where people, and all forms of life could live out their natural lives. A world in which you,” he said, looking at Erys, “could release your animals and have them survive.”

  Erys stared at the Curator, wondering if the man was speaking truthfully.

  “There is one thing I lack,” continued the Curator. “Someone who has undergone Passage and come back.”

  He looked from Jay to Erys and back again.

  “I need someone who understands Passage and who is willing to sacrifice themselves.”

  And that was the catch.

  “You’ve been there, Teacher. You’ve seen it. You can do what I need. But ... you can't come back.”

  With Passage gone, we could succeed, thought Erys. A sacrifice! Would he be willing to go that far?

  “Teacher?” asked the Curator. “Do you understand what I am asking? I need you to help me. Or if not you, your scion.”

  Would he be willing? The memory of what he had seen terrified him. Waste and emptiness. Could he go there? Erys asked himself.

  “Teacher. Look at yourself,” continued Jack Gaunt. “You are broken. You are good for nothing else. Help me make a difference.”

  Could he sacrifice himself for the good of the world? Erys asked himself. What else are you good for? But to make a difference, and to be remembered.

  Erys knew the Teacher could not do it. Jay did not have the strength. But Erys, he was strong. And since falling from the zeppelin he had been living a borrowed life.

  Yes! He would do it!

  Erys stepped forward to offer himself. Just as he was about to speak, the Doctor entered the room.

  “Jack, you are needed,” said the Doctor. “The Director. His Passage has come.”

  The Curator rose and spun around.

  “Where is he?”

  “Being taken to the Ascendancy,” said the Doctor. “His Passage will be there. You must go to him. Escorts are waiting in the foyer.”

  “How soon...”

  “It is very near. Go now.”

  “Yes,” said the Scion-Director. “Masodi?”

  “Yes Curator,” answered the boy.

  “You will become Science Curator as I become Director. Accompany me.”

  Jack Gaunt turned quickly to the Teacher before he left. “This does not change anything,” he said. “I will receive your answer on my return.”

  The Curator of Science and his scion followed the Doctor from the room. Erys and Jay were left alone. Erys sat in the chair vacated by the Curator and tried to collect his thoughts. He felt something rising up within him. He searched the eyes of the Teacher. They were eyes like a stormy night. Dark and impenetrable. Did the Teacher feel it too? The Science Curator would now be Director of the Museum. He would protect the Ark. And he knew how to defeat Passage. All he needed was a sacrifice. A life, his own or the Teacher’s, and the world would be restored.

  Erys felt lighter. Buoyant.

  He remembered something Saskareth told him in the desert.

  You are a light that almost went out. A light surrounded by darkness. How will you give meaning to your life? How far will you go?

  As he left the room he experienced a moment of clarity. A sense of purpose, of meaning, he had never known before. It emerged past his lips and escaped into the air like a silent, invisible vapour. It made him smile.

  This feeling. This hope.

  Chapter 13 BETRAYAL

  Erys woke with a start. Something was coming. Something bad.

  He looked through the bedroom window at the city and the desert beyond. The sky in the east glowed with violet light. Orange fire crusted the horizon. The three buildings of the Ascendancy squatted like massive black creatures, lurking before the dawn. Inside, the Ascendants were also watching the dawn. Endlessly thinking, they pondered the betrayals of the past and the wretchedness imposed on their wards in the city below. As light spilled over the horizon they were reminded of the relentlessness of time and they wondered what horrors the future held.

  There was much to do, for everyone.

  By the time Erys met Masodi, now Curator of Science, in the Science Dome, his unease on waking was forgotten.

  Masodi steered a hover platform through the huge and detailed hologram of the Milky Way. As they flew through spiral arms of the galaxy, stars glanced across their faces.

  “I didn’t actually see the Director,” said Masodi, explaining the events of three days before. “We arrived at the Ascendancy and were met by the Administrator and the Doctor. They led us to the Chamber of Passage, this large, circular room in the centre of the building. Only the Curator of Science could go in, the Administrator told us. ‘Passage and the passing of knowledge is shared between the Director and the Scion-Director. No-one else.’”

  They examined the centre of the galaxy before them. The black hole rotated slowly, sucking in plasma from nearby stars, consuming all before it.

  “Before he went inside, the Curator told me ... he said: ‘Masodi, much now will fall to you. You know what you have to do. As the Curator of Science, it is your responsibility to complete our work. We will not meet often, and will speak even less. But, Masodi, while I may not be able to help you, I will be with you in spirit. I have faith in you, and you know what you have to do. Talk to the Teacher and his scion. One of them must be convinced. It is the only way.’

  “Then he hugged me, which he never has before. And then, he was shown into the chamber. I waited outside with the Administrator and the Doctor. We were there for hours. After a while I fell asleep. Then I woke when I heard screaming. It was happening. The Director’s Passage. The screams were terrible.”

  And Erys thought about the Teacher, about Ariel, and how she had screamed with the agony of those final moments, as Dark Matter consumed her Spirit.

  “After another hour, the Administrator went in. The Doctor wanted to join him but he was prevented. When he returned the Administrator told us it was done. The Director was gone and the Curator of Science was now the new Director. He told me I was now the Curator of Science. Again the Doctor was refused entry. And that was that.”

  The platform hovered twenty feet from the centre of the galaxy. The black hole tugged on a nearby star. Plasma wrapped the black hole in a corona of fire. Erys had to shield his eyes from the flash of exploding energy.

  “So, it is left to you,” he
said. “Tell me. How much do you know of the Curator’s research?”

  “I know it all. See there,” he said, pointing at the black hole. “This is what we call Kafka’s Paradox, a point of immense gravitational pull that draws the galaxy around it. Even light cannot escape. When Kafka broke the Law of Science he created Dark Matter, a point of gravitational pull that draws to it a different kind of substance – Spirit. Dark Matter resides here also, and it is feeding off the Spirit of every life form in the universe. The more it feeds, the stronger it becomes.”

  Erys closed his eyes. In his mind he saw millions of flashes of golden light being sucked from their worlds into the bubbling, growing mass of Dark Matter at the centre of the galaxy.

  “In fact, as Kafka’s Paradox gets stronger, our life spans are becoming shorter. It has been happening since the Quark Wars.”

  “What can be done?” he asked. “I assume that Jack Gaunt found an answer.”

  Masodi looked away. “Both you and the Teacher have entered the Spirit state and seen, or experienced, Dark Matter first hand. One of you needs to go back. The Curator theorised that if the Paradox could be turned in on itself, it would consume itself and be destroyed.”

  “And the one who does this?”

  Masodi shook his head.

  Erys gazed into the light of the holographic galaxy. He imagined massive creatures of Spirit flying around the sphere of Dark Matter, struggling to escape its gravitational pull.

  “Tell me something,” he said eventually. “I am not a scientist, but I do know that energy cannot be destroyed. Just exchanged. When someone’s Spirit is consumed, where does that energy go?”

  “That I don’t know,” said Masodi. “Jack Gaunt’s theory is that Dark Matter is feeding something else. Perhaps there is a wormhole, siphoning the energy off to another part of the universe, or a parallel universe. I don’t know.”

  Erys smiled nervously. “You don’t inspire confidence. If you are not certain about this, how can you be certain about the rest?"

  “I can’t be certain we will succeed. But the Curator is a brilliant scientist and I have faith in him.”

  Masodi flew them back to the walkway.

  “So what do you think?” he asked as they exited the gallery. “Should we meet with the Teacher?”