People of the Darkness

by Ross Rocklynne

  These are the memories of Devil Star, O Golden Lights. And in them is the memory of the half-hundred green-lights who followed after, and the memory of the other things, of the drumbeat of longing, of the search through matter’s fabric, and of the hundred million years that passed.

  Chapter V

  The Golden-Lights

  They would see him from afar, streaming across the star fields, not pausing, hurrying only, hurrying to some place that had no location. And they would see him again, spinning along the axle of some galactic wheel. And still again, rigid in abstraction, grasping at space and its dust in a timeless query none of them would ever understand. He was there when they were born and there when they died. And his name was never known.

  The universe writhed. The parts of it assumed new configurations. Matter changed in its inevitable way, dropping toward that bottom level where time must end. Devil Star lived on.

  The mother green-light, dropping down the bands of space from the seventeenth band where her youngest lay in mindless contentment, paused in the sixth band of hyperspace. For, scarcely a light-year away, the giant body of the legendary creature hung sleeping. Full of tenderness for her child and for all life, she looked upon that aged purple-light with the awe of reverence. Out of what unexplained past had he come? Who was he? She drifted nearer, for a long time searching him with her visions. And he stirred, awoke and saw her. Restlessly, he turned away.

  “Green-light, leave me.” His thoughts came from what seemed an infinite distance of weariness.

  She scarcely dared to think; but she would not leave. Presently she spoke, whispering:

  “We have seen you from afar, often. And you have never spoken. And you must be lonely.”

  “Lonely!” The word came back at her in a racking burst. “I am not lonely. I do not wish to be disturbed. Now go.”

  She moved away, reluctantly, but she was filled with compassion. “Yes, I shall go. But I know you are sad — and indeed you are lonely. I shall come again. And the others will know of you, and will revere you, and perhaps those who seek knowledge will come to you. We shall not try to guess at the secret of your life. And you will have a name.”

  Tenderly, remembering the naming of her youngest, she renamed her oldest.

  “To us, you will be known as Oldster.”

  “You must have learned many things,” the young purple-light said timidly. He was called Burning Planet.

  Oldster muttered, “There are some who are different, such as you, Burning Planet. But what is it to be different? As you, I have searched and found nothing — nothing! And I am sad. I wish only for extinction. And it will not come.”

  “To be extinguished is—” Burning Planet was anxious to comprehend.

  “Yes.” Bitter amusement was in Oldster’s thoughts. “To be no more. To burn no more. I thought to master destiny; but destiny masters me, as you. I cannot exclude the universe which continues to give me life.”

  “But there is joy in learning! Is that not reason to live?”

  “Joy!” The word was uttered in such a frenzy of grief that the young purple-light timorously drew back in readiness for flight. Oldster’s immense body, seventy million miles across, quivered with lakes of blinding energy. “Can there be joy when I long for something that can never be? Oh, my son, leave, leave me in my sadness!”

  Burning Planet was overwhelmed, and could not make himself leave.

  Presently, as if from an infinitely deep space, came the suffering thoughts of Oldster.

  “There is space, and there are stars, and of the things to know about them I have little to seek out. I have traveled the star lanes for eons, filled with my longing, and the search for knowledge has been only the disguised search for my life’s completion.

  “Yet I have learned; but what I have failed to learn, my son, is the spark that keeps my hope and my life alive.”

  “There is a great secret that eludes you?” Burning Planet spoke breathlessly.

  The old being of the universe sighed as he absently studied a nearby group of meteoroids parading in silent cold line across the bright sky.

  “Do we have choice,” he whispered. “Did I have choice? For there was the band of decision — but you would not understand that, my son. Oh, the years have passed, and there is no answer. Space-time began; it fumed into being at some point unthinkably remote. Where? How? Why? We conceive no beginning, for beginning is time itself; and yet, from nothingness sprang matter. Result without cause. I have searched — searched downward into miniscule universes, striving to find that beginning which came into being without a first motion.

  “I have trapped matter’s smallest part, stripped space of all influences around it. And having trapped it, no longer sensed it. For observation is influence.

  “In that vacuous cage, did that particle move in paths of its own choosing? If it did, without cause—”

  Oldster’s thoughts broke off. Then, drudging, they came again: “But no. The universe decays, and draws life into decadence with it. There is no hope!”

  Silence endured. Timorously Burning Planet spoke, but there was no response. Reluctantly he withdrew from the aged creature’s presence, for there was more he would have known. He returned to space’s first level, pondering.

  I shall seek knowledge,he decided.I shall not be like the others, mastered by their own whims… by destiny? But I do not understand. I am not mastered… And from afar he felt it, the wax and wane of the life impulse. From the spiraling arms of a nebula, out of its green heart as if she had been hiding therein, a green-light drifted toward him. But Burning Planet’s time had not come. He continued on his way.

  There was Darkness.

  And the daughter of Darkness, Sun Destroyer.

  And her son, Vanguard, to be known for a long time as Yellow Light.

  And there were the millions, the tens and hundreds of millions of years that passed.

  With drudging energy, Oldster heaved his vast body into a ragged motion that took him for the last time across the light-streaming rivers of the sky, into the first deeps of the darkness that Darkness had crossed. There, beyond sight of that meager pinpoint arrangement of matter that was this universe, he drew his visions in about him, and drew in his thoughts as well, striving to cancel them out.

  Millennia would pass, though, and still he would be trying to blot out the memories of his life. Still he would fight his agonizing need. His was failure, for he had not created.

  As for the band of decision — with his fading consciousness he searched back through time. He had imagined it. It had never existed!

  He would sleep now. He would decay downward to that moment when the centripetal urge for life would grow too feeble. The last hounds of his defense would wander off. For now he could not be disturbed.

  * * *

  “Awake, Oldster.”

  The serene yet lordly voice echoed through and through that immeasurably deep cavern of thoughtlessness where Oldster resided.

  “Awake, and awake to the high moment of your long life.”

  The field upon field of overlapping energies that was Oldster quivered with the beginning beat of the old torture. Forces that had all but nullified themselves trembled out of balance. The vast body heaved and turned and its portions writhed. Then it held rigid.

  Awareness had come to Oldster: awareness, strong and lashing. He beheld the fact of his return to life with an icy horror he had never expected to endure again. His thoughts lashed about like those of a being in a trap of pain. For one moment of illusory freedom he felt his pain depart, as he plunged back along time’s trail to the gone days of his youth.

  “Awake.”

  The sweet years of youth, when he had no thought but for play. Let them come again! But no. He felt memory swept away, and he was returned to his future. And from outside the packet of canceling forces that was himself had come a… voice.

  “No!” The word shouted within him. It filled the closed universe that he had fashioned for his
awaited death. And he knew the muted denial was bursting in violence to him who so cruelly shattered his dream of night. “No, whoever you are, whatever, leave me! Leave me alone, not to think, not to live. Ah, you have made me live again, as Sun Destroyer and Vanguard, when I would have none of them.”

  His thoughts spiraled away, thrown out in convulsive denial. The awful agonies of returning sensation spread crazily to the limits of his being. A vision trembled involuntarily…

  “And it is of Vanguard that we would speak.” The thought vibrated in serene, lordly compassion against his thought swirls. “Now, you who were born as Devil Star, look upon us!”

  Wave upon wave of horror engulfed Oldster as that command drove in. He would not! He was master of himself, of his environs. The rebel thought endured, however, only long enough to be swept away by the shattering failure of his life. His central resolve dissipated. Not to fight, not to reach — ah, there would have lain happiness!

  Thinly at first his visions moved from him; then they fumed out in thick beams designed to bring full revelation of that energy creature whose unafraid thoughts pried into his.

  And as he saw he lay silent in that emptiness, quiet in his congealed wonder.

  Momentarily, his thoughts dwelt in that long-gone moment when Dark Fire moved in splendor toward him, with her destiny of creation and death. For here was splendor beyond imagination, with the promise of something wondrous, and something tormenting; but here also was destiny, in these ranks upon endless ranks of beings, hanging in somber immobility against that lightless sky.

  He saw those thousands upon thousands of golden-lighted energy beings gazing down upon him in serene sublimity. Their formless thoughts flowed around and through him, without discord, with peace.

  “Golden-lights,” he whispered, and as he spoke the words he was moved beyond thought.

  How long?

  How long!

  And from that concourse came answer, from one of them, from all of them — he would never know.

  “For longer than you can dream, Oldster. For longer than the life of a star. You have slept, slept ages beyond calculation. Yet here, in this pulseless emptiness, we have found you. And the time has come.”

  “The time,” whispered Oldster.

  “The time of glory.”

  There was a rustling of thoughts flowing, thoughts unfettered by fear, nor chained to hope. And the golden central cores shone in beauty.

  “The time of glory that comes to you, Oldster. For you are the last of your people. And we are of Vanguard, and those who came after Vanguard.”

  Now that unlocated voice swelled, filling the darkness with its lordly sweetness.

  “For see, Oldster! We are all that you dreamed of — and more. We stem from Vanguard! And Vanguard gave life more than he dreamed. Clearly and purely we see the answers to those ultimate questions Darkness himself asked. Sun Destroyer herself, in her ancient past, never dreamed that her vain quest would be reached in us — through her!”

  The giant words drummed against Oldster; he strove to break through to their meanings, but shadows obtruded themselves. Fear came unbidden and uncontrolled. He quivered, searching amongst those serenely watching beings with their crystal-sparkling, golden-drenched bodies for some sign that would make meaning burst upon him. For a while, he reveled in the belief that soon he would understand. He waited, letting his visions rove from one to another of those untroubled golden ones. The answers did not come. In depraved ugliness came doubt, shouting at him.

  “No,” he cried bitterly. “You speak of impossible things. There are no answers. You are mockeries. What is it to me who you are? I, Oldster, want none of you — I do not want hope! Now leave me, leave me alone in my sadness.”

  He lashed out at them, feeling his old agonies, and knowing that they, in their serene perfection, could not understand that they had but doubled and redoubled his tortures. For they and their kind must die and vanish in the stampeding downgrade forces which led to universal quiet. They too were but atoms trampling over each other in that mad rush toward the bottom level of inertness. Even perfection must die, ruled by destiny.

  He started to withdraw his visions, when they, far from retreating, whirled nearer, their bright golden centers glowing in upon him until he was trapped in a blaze of fire. The inbred contentment of their thoughts pulsed through him. He fought against that dominance. He quivered with the dread that in spite of himself they would fill him full of that anesthetic hope he had no use for.

  Then, thundering through his thought swirls, came that lordly measured voice, sublime in the surety of its owner’s purpose:

  “Oldster! You have not failed!”

  “Not failed!”

  Convulsively Oldster flung back the words, like a missile to be hurled.

  “Not failed? You are mockeries, you golden-lights, and now you must go, and go forever, and leave me alone in this lightless emptiness. Not failed!” The words seemed to echo in their frenzied dreariness. He felt the outermost limits of his being expanding, and quivering with miniscule outflarings of yellow energy, as if he could drive them away by the pressure of his physical being. Failing that, he would drive them away with the whip of his contempt.

  “I, Oldster, who used to be Devil Star, have failed in ways your blind minds would never perceive.”

  His thoughts drummed, violent in their unthrottled hate. They did not retreat, but continued to surround him and smother him with that sense of peace which he must battle if he were to keep his sanity.

  “You do not understand failure, you golden-lights, you who stemmed from Vanguard. Could you ever feel the tortures of Vanguard himself, or of those who went before him — of Sun Destroyer, of Darkness? Ah, I can see it. You have reached a perfection beyond such burrowings! And I shall not let you give me peace.

  “For I have failed, and I will continue to be tortured with my failures. You would not understand.”

  “We understand.”

  That voice, in its merciless love of him, drove in.

  “We understand, and we say you have not failed. For see! You have created, and has not that driving urge to create been the great pain of your life?”

  His thoughts swept out in blind denial. “Leave me, golden-lights, leave me! I have not created.”

  “You created us.”

  Deep in the fabric of him he was at last torn. In those insidious words was a horror he dared not recognize. “No,” came his agonized muttering. “You are giving me hope. And I have lived too long with torture to endure hope.

  “Leave me.”

  “We shall not leave, Oldster, until your great life has reached its completion.” The sublime voice vibrated sweetly on the emptiness. “You created us — as surely as if you had sired Darkness himself. For did you not guide Darkness to his life’s completion? Was it not the thought of you that brought Sun Destroyer back along Darkness’s path? And was it not you who guided Vanguard, you who, in your greatness, saw us in him? Yes, Oldster, you are our creator — you are the creator of life!

  “And it is life that will endure, and has ultimate meaning.”

  Oldster hung laxly in that sphere of golden blaze, his exhausted mind devoid of will for battle.

  “Then I have created,” he whispered. Peace flowed, scouring at the bitter longings of his life. Deep within was a warning voice, but now he would not heed it. Not to fight, not to rebel — ah, how sweet to accept it!

  He was theirs. Let it be so. Let them lead him to his life’s completion. They in their all-knowingness could not be questioned. He had created. The thought held white and pure before him. Let the thought be so.

  “Life that shall endure,” he muttered.

  “Oldster!” The sublime voice rang. “Life does endure! For is not life the rebel from dead matter? Matter is death, for it grows old, powdering and graying toward its entropic destiny. But life is the rebel. Life builds and grows and evolves toward its high destiny which we know, but which you cannot know. But this you
shall know. Life masters itself. Life is outside destiny — and has choice!”

  Laxly he hung, accepting those dazzling meanings. Now it was over. He would not fight. And then, from somewhere, from a thousand directions, he felt their thoughts grasping at his thought swirls, filling him with that drugged peace he knew with Dark Fire, that companion of his lost years, when he faced her in the band of life.

  “Oldster.” Inward hummed that lordly, loving voice. “Now you will know you have not failed. For are you not life, and the greatest rebel of all life?”

  “And life has within it the dark rebel!”

  Chapter VI

  A Time of Glory

  After this, there shall be no more years, no more of memory or wonder or battle. There will be no more of Darkness, of Sun Destroyer, of Vanguard who was called Yellow Light, or of golden-lights. And this will be as Oldster wills it.

  For now within him, in this moment before the universe must cease to exist, comes knowledge. The moment is the same as when he hung pendant in the forty-eighth band about to release his central globe, obedient to the relentless urge of destiny. He has been transported to that unlocated cosmos which lies beyond time and space dimensions. He is in the band of decision.

  Again he looks upon those swinging suns with the rapt wonder of youth. It is the same band for which he looked so long!

  “Look upon this, Oldster, for the time of glory comes. In its last moments, your life can know no higher joy.”

  Distant yet near, the sweet voice drifted in.

  “Now you inhabit that place you searched for. And it is a place that belongs to life alone.”

  “My last moments.” The thought was examined wonderingly. From far down came feeble denial. “No, golden-lights. For I have tried to die. I cannot. I am trapped to life by the destiny that created me.”