Dark Matter

by Luke Donegan

  But the Dark Matter could find no mastery against hard rock, heated and bleached by the bright sun. Hot wind shredded the Dark Matter as it flowed from Erys’ body. It stripped away like mist into the white sky.

  Erys felt Sian’s fingers loosening on his wrist. Her legs and body were swinging in the sky.

  Their eyes met. He saw the woman he had tried to save in the zeppelin crash, a long time ago. Two moments, and all the time between. And all the things he had done. His recovery in the desert and his return to the Museum. His Teacher’s Passage. His own near-death and the infection he brought back. The destruction of the Ark!

  And her.

  All along the way his choices had gone bad.

  Sian’s eyes were flushed with fear. And also peace. She had given up.

  The ground pitched below her swinging body. Her dark hair streamed in the wind.

  Her loosening grip! Her blue-green eyes!

  Erys, what will you do to make your life meaningful? asked the emu man.

  Not this! Not this!

  But there had never been another choice. Everything he was he would sacrifice willingly, his entire existence, just for one more chance to hold her safely in his arms.

  He knew this as he looked into her eyes. Her beautiful, Spirit-laden eyes.

  Her fingers peeled away, and she fell into the sky.

  Chapter 17 IMMORTAL

  Two worlds existed side by side – the physical world and the world of Spirit. Normally they were separate and a creature in one unaware of its other self-existing in the other. Death was the barrier, a wall of darkness keeping the two worlds apart. And it needed to be so, for the Laws that governed one were different to the Laws of the other. Only when one passed through the curtain of death did one give up the Laws that governed mortality and embrace the eternal life of the Spirit riding the great wind.

  However, like images seen through windows, occasionally a creature in one world caught glimpses of the other world, moments when the gauze of death was thin, as in moments of deep sleep when dreams suffused between the two worlds. Or in moments of near-death, such as when Jay flew briefly on the great wind. Occasional moments only, for the natural balance of Law had to be maintained.

  Dark Matter changed all this. Dark Matter was a substance foreign to both worlds. It punched through the barrier of death so that one bled into the other. It gave to Jay and Erys an existence akin to living death, and through them the Spirit world pushed into the physical world like bubbles through mesh, violating and collapsing the Laws of both.

  Seething, oily Dark Matter saturated him. It replaced the blood in his veins and in his heart. It poured from his glands like sweat. It became the air in his lungs, drawing in and out of his mouth and nostrils with each breath. It replaced his life functions because now it fed him and he no longer needed food or water or air or blood. Dark Matter was all he needed.

  But more than that, Dark Matter was like a dog scratching at the door. It wanted to unleash him, to set him free.

  Clutching the cornice stone with one hand, Erys watched Sian fall. Her eyes receded, her arms spread wide as she fell towards the hard, red earth. Her lips whispered his name.

  Erys howled. He had nothing left to lose.

  He sucked on the Spirit of the world, gorged his engine of greasy darkness ... and Dark Matter punched through the barrier of death as Erys transformed into his Spirit form.

  His body was a streak of silver light, a ribbon in the sky that whipped in all directions, long and free. Little front claws and back claws grew from his body, sharp talons that scraped the wind. Silver scales covered the length of his sleek body, lighter and smaller underneath, capturing sunlight.

  His mind was a furnace. He had no conscious thought for he was now a creature of the Spirit realm. Only fire, hissing from his ears, from his nostrils and eyes. Erys opened his great jaws ... great rolling flames, rumbling from his belly, surging past teeth ... and released fire into the sky.

  His icy blue eyes peered through fire to sight his quarry. His tail slapped the wall of the Science Dome and he soared down, a flying silver beast, towards Sian’s plummeting figure. The silver streak of light slipped between her body and the Earth. As his belly rubbed the dusty ground the dragon caught her body between his now flameless jaws.

  The creature howled, and tears streamed from his eyes. He held her firmly but tried not to pierce her skin with his sharp teeth. He flew upwards and studied her face. Her eyes were closed and she had slipped into unconsciousness. As the dragon lifted high into the sky and wheeled south, he cried out against the wind, muscles and tendons pulsing along his length, wracked with emotion.

  The creature did not know where he was. He did not remember Erys. He did not recognise this landscape, nor even understand the formations of matter and liquids that made the hills and the desert and the ocean. But he understood the pull of love that dragged him to this creature between his jaws, for he could see her Spirit form, a dragon like himself, composed of scales of blue crystal.

  And he knew instinctively where he had to go.

  The dragon followed the line of the coast. It sighted the building on the peninsula, jutting out into the ocean. He soared towards the building, flames and smoke trailing behind. He skidded across the water, lifted up before the cliff and the building’s wall. Over the roof and down into the inner courtyard. Like a falling streamer he coiled to the ground ...

  ... and touched down on his two human feet, holding Sian’s alive but unconscious body in his tired and human arms.

  Under the weight of fatigue and Sian’s limp form, his body sagged. He collapsed to his knees and lowered Sian gently to the ground.

  The Hearth-Mother, followed by the children of Ocean-Hearth, ran into the courtyard. They surrounded the exhausted figures, bewildered and confused.

  The Hearth-Mother approached and knelt before Erys. She examined Sian, touching her fingers to the Scion-Curator’s neck to feel for a pulse. Relieved, she faced Erys.

  “Scion-Teacher?”

  With a great effort the young man lifted his face. Oily sweat poured in rivulets down his forehead and cheeks. His eyes were wild. Black and bottomless, tinged with red fire.

  “Hearth-Mother,” he whispered from the edge of endurance.

  “Yes?”

  “I beg for asylum. For Sian. She is in great danger.”

  Rhada gently brushed strands of dark hair from Sian’s closed eyes.

  “Yes, for you both,” she said. “You are welcome.”

  He raged and turned in his sleep. He flitted between forms and between worlds. Dark Matter oozed from every pore of his body, hungry, tasting the air. Tendrils inched towards Sian’s sleeping form, tasting her Spirit. Erys dragged them back.

  He was lost in a wash of stars. He slipped through the empty voids. Golden light from a thousand worlds poured into his body. He fed willingly, so terribly hungry.

  At times he half woke. Lost in the darkness, confused as to his whereabouts. Sian was beside him. Waves broke on the cliff below the hearth.

  At one point in the night, Sian asked him: “Where are we?”

  “Ocean-Hearth,” he replied. He was a thousand light years away.

  “How did we come here?”

  “I caught you. Peace. Sleep now.”

  We must rest. We must find peace.

  And his thoughts washed back to his Spirit form. Gliding, spiraling, free as the wind, silver ribbon of light. Surging across space. Where was it going? It had purpose. It had a destination. Stars streaked past. They grew more numerous, thickening. Stars and more stars, shimmering curtains of silver light. And beyond them the centre of the galaxy. Dark Matter, drawing all things towards it.

  And he was not alone. Something flew with him. He turned and saw a creature beside him – a creature composed of fire. Determined, flaming, wings stretched out wide.

  An unimaginably beautiful creature. Flying to share his doom.

  He woke to an empty bed.

  The
room opened out onto a balcony that overlooked the ocean. Grey morning light seeped into the room.

  Dawn.

  He dragged his body from the bed.

  Sian stood on the balcony, facing the ocean. The dark, endless waters surged and heaved beyond her. Her body rose and fell with deep breaths. As Erys stepped onto the balcony, she turned to face him. Her eyes were red with weeping. Tears streaked her face.

  “Erys,” she breathed. “I can feel it.”

  “What can you feel?”

  “She is gone.”

  He opened his arms and she stumbled into his embrace.

  “She is gone. Erys, I can feel it. She’s gone. She’s gone.”

  Her body shuddered with grief.

  “Oh, she is gone.”

  Erys could feel it too. The sun burst on the eastern horizon, red light spilling across the coastal lands and the city. Red light filled the Central Square.

  In his mind he saw the Curator of Nature, hanging from the hastily built gallows.

  “Xia, my master,” sobbed Sian. “I should have been with you. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  He shared Sian’s despair for her master, and he could feel all the emotions tied to her Spirit. But thinking about Xia Tsang made him think of his own master.

  He released her and stepped back.

  The Teacher has betrayed us, he thought. It is because of him that Xia died. He fashioned this calamity.

  Erys closed his eyes and Dark Matter surged within him. It powered a human emotion, a basic need - a need for vengence

  “I have to go,” he told her.

  “Where?”

  “Back to the Museum.”

  “Stay with me, Erys.”

  He stepped away.

  “They will kill you,” she cried. “We have lost too much already. Please, Erys.”

  “He has to be stopped.” Erys was blind to everything but his desire for revenge. “It is time to end this.”

  Her hands gripped the balcony railing behind her. “Erys! Don’t leave me!”

  He walked from the room and closed the door. In his mind he did not believe he would see her again.

  Two soldiers barred the doors to the Museum. They lifted their batons as he approached. He walked up to them without concern.

  “Scion-Teacher. We are under orders to arrest you,” said the first soldier.

  “You must accompany us to the Courthouse,” continued the second.

  Erys looked from one to the other. The first soldier pulled a leather strap from his belt. “Hold him,” he said to his partner.

  The soldiers moved to detain him. Erys lifted his arms. Tendrils of smoke poured from his hands and coiled around the two soldiers. He wrapped their bodies, arms and heads within thick bands of darkness. The soldiers panicked, struggling to wipe the smoke from their masks. They brushed vigorously at their bodies and arms, terrified the alien substance was poisonous. Their gloves passed through the smoke with little effect.

  Erys gripped each by the throat. He lifted them with ease off the ground. Their boots flailed uselessly in the air. Erys’ fists crushed their strangled gargles. After a few moments their legs began to still.

  Before he forced the life from them completely, he tossed them to the ground, twenty feet from the Museum doors. He pulled the strands of Dark Matter back into himself and looked to where their bodies had landed. His own body heaved with deep breaths. His pulse raced and Dark Matter raged in him like conflicting currents in a river bend, drowning all thoughts of mercy and peace.

  The public areas of the Museum were deserted. No-one visited anymore. No attendants staffed the front desk. He walked beneath the statue, through the foyer and down the corridor to the elevator without meeting a soul. He rode the elevator up through the Museum to the Doctor’s rooms.

  The elevator doors opened and the Scion-Doctor stood there waiting.

  “Scion-Teacher. He knows you are coming. He asked me to ...”

  With barely a thought Erys shoved the Scion-Doctor aside. The young man sprawled to the floor.

  Inside the ward the Teacher lay on his bed, a fine sheen of Dark Matter hovering above him like a spray of mist. The Doctor stood by the bed, leaning over the Teacher. Dark Matter curled across the Doctor’s shoulders, pooling between his shoulder blades.

  There was no doubt in Erys’ mind that the two were colluding together.

  “Erys! You have come,” said the Teacher as his scion entered the room. “There is much we need to discuss ...”

  Erys thrust his hands forward. Two mighty tentacles of black smoke exploded from his palms and reached across the room towards his adversaries. The Doctor fell backwards, waving his arms to ward off the attack. He fell on the floor, kicking out uselessly with his legs.

  The other tentacle splayed out like a many-fingered hand and lowered itself about the Teacher, trapping the boy like a bird in a cage. Erys clenched his fist and the cage contracted. The second tentacle swung away from the Doctor and joined the first to reinforce the cage.

  Erys stormed forwards as the smoke narrowed in to crush the Teacher.

  “Erys!” cried the boy.

  The mist around the Teacher thickened to protect him. It pushed out to meet the contracting cage.

  Erys, now at the foot of the bed, opened his mouth and roared. A huge stream of Dark Matter laced with fire surged from his gut. It splashed against the cage, seeped over its frame like a viscous slime, consuming the Teacher.

  In layers, Erys poured out his anger, his hatred and his hunger for revenge. The stream was thick with frustration, thick with despair. It steamed and hissed as it came into contact with the bed and the floor. The bed sheets burst into flame.

  The bed collapsed under the pressure, folding in on itself until only a mangled frame remained.

  Erys roared and spewed more bile, but the flow was lessened now.

  And slowly, a form rose from the seething mass of darkness, a small figure the shape of a boy. It spread its arms and blue flames lit along their span. The flame built slowly, becoming purple then red. The arms stretched wider. And to Erys’ amazement, the arms transformed into the wings of a bird.

  The flaming wings of a bird of fire!

  The wings tipped forward, dipped slightly and up ... and the figure rose above the bed, pulling free of the mass of sticky Dark Matter.

  The creature hovered above Erys, waiting until Erys’ bile was spent. When Erys was done it gently lit on the floor. The creature flapped its wings and shook its body. Flames leapt across its body, consuming the last droplets of Dark Matter remaining from Erys’ attack.

  The creature hooted like an owl. Erys looked at its face. It had a boy’s face, but covered with blue feathers which ran to purple, red and yellow down its neck. A small beak, yellow and curved. Teary eyes, glistening with hazel light, full of pity.

  Then the creature folded its wings, and they became arms again.

  Jay stood before Erys, unsteady on tiring legs. He reached out with skinny arms towards his scion.

  “I am not your enemy,” he said softly.

  He stumbled forward and Erys caught him.

  “If you are ready to listen,” said the boy, exhausted. “There is much I need to say.”

  The Doctor and the Scion-Doctor carried the Teacher into the sitting room by the eastern windows and placed him gently into a chair. The boy was like a rag doll. His arms and legs were now useless unless animated by Dark Matter.

  “Are you comfortable?” asked the Doctor.

  “Yes. Thank you, Samuel. Perhaps some water. Tobius?”

  The Scion-Doctor bowed and left the room.

  First names. Erys had never known their names. He sat opposite the boy, ready to distrust his every word.

  The Teacher took a slow, shallow breath. Every breath hurt him deeply.

  “Scion, I did not betray you,” he said.

  Erys glared at the boy.

  “I wanted to, believe me,” continued Jay. “You and the others were breaki
ng the Law. Every fiber in me strained to report you to the Ascendancy. But I did not.”

  The Scion-Doctor returned with a glass of water. He lifted it to the boy’s lips. Jay took a couple of mouthfuls and coughed. “Thank you, Tobius.”

  The Doctor and the Scion-Doctor retreated to the window and waited, reluctant to leave the Teacher and Erys alone.

  “I do not believe you,” said Erys.

  “It is the truth,” replied Jay.

  Erys screwed up his face with disbelief.

  “Do you want to know why Ariel chose me and not you to be Teacher?” asked Jay. “It is because unlike you, I am committed to the Law. Even more so than she was, for, though she did not like it, Ariel accepted Xia Tsang’s breaking of the Law. You, however, embraced it. How could you ever have been its champion? Every molecule in your body longs to break the Law. No. You could never have been Teacher.”

  Erys glared at the boy. How easy it would be to rake his body with fire and reduce him to a cinder.

  “Ariel chose me,” said Jay. “But in the end, even I was not strong enough. I failed. I helped facilitate Aberration.”

  Erys felt his anger slip beneath a suffocating weight of oblivion. The Ark was destroyed. Nothing could ever change that.

  “The Ark was not an Aberration,” he said earnestly. “It may have been against the Law, but it was never an Aberration.”

  Jay shook his head. “No, I did not mean the Ark. It troubled me, yes. But I do not think it was an Aberration. And ... I am truly sorry that it was destroyed. Xia Tsang was a visionary. She had a beautiful vision, one that will no longer be.”

  Jay looked through the window at the bright, heat-filled day.

  “No, I did not mean the Ark,” he said. “My failure was elsewhere. I pulled something into this world. An Aberration of a different kind.”

  He turned from the window and looked at Erys. His eyes were thickening pools of black, matched only by the darkness in Erys’ own eyes.

  “You and I, Erys. We are the Aberration.”

  Erys studied the Teacher carefully, and he understood. He could feel Dark Matter boiling through him. He was soaked with it.

  “I am sorry Erys. I did this to you. When the Teacher was in Passage, I was drawn after her. I went too far. I went beyond this world, and I was ... touched by something. I brought it back with me. And when I dragged you in, I unwittingly infected you with it. This was before I really understood what it was.”