The Eidolon

by Libby McGugan

  Sometime after that, I don’t know how long, I give in to sleep.

  I WAKE TO a sound. I hush my breathing, as much as I can in the thin air. The candle’s still yellow, it’s not sputtering, so we must be alive. So much for waking me in an hour. Danny’s lying, eyes closed, shivering. From the candlelight I can see his lips flubbering in a soft snore. What was that sound? The wind? Through the vent in the roof I can see it’s still dark.

  I check my watch. It takes a while to focus on the numbers and even longer to work out what they mean. 3.14.

  There it is again. Am I imagining it? It sounds like a voice. If the wind had a voice, it would sound like this, resonant and commanding. No, I was wrong; it’s not a voice, because there aren’t any words. So why do I know what it means?

  GET UP.

  God, Robert. You must be hypothermic. Voices in the head can’t be a good sign. A voice with no words. Like a thought, but coming from somewhere outside of me.

  GET UP NOW.

  I need to get up. Irrational or not, there’s no disputing it. I don’t know why but every fibre in me knows it’s right. From some reserve I didn’t know I had, I find the will. It takes over, becoming an urgency, an edge. I kick the wall of snow at my feet, toppling the candle and snuffing it out, then wriggle from the hole. It’s snowing again, the clouds inking out the stars.

  Something makes me turn, something over my right shoulder. A little higher up the mountain there’s something in the darkness, just visible through the blizzard. It’s insubstantial, like the shadow of steam on a wall, but something else is there. I rub my eyes, and when I look again, there’s nothing. But it feels like...

  Sudden certainty seizes me. I’ve got to get Danny out. I reach into the remains of the hole and grasp his ankles, tugging, dragging him into the open. “Wake up, Danny! Get up!”

  He mumbles, eyes still closed, and turns his face from the driving snow. “Danny!” I kneel over him and slap him hard across the cheek. “Come on, come on! Get up, dammit!”

  A low groaning sound issues from the mountain, as though something that lies beneath is awakening. Something enormous. We sink, suddenly a few inches lower, jolting downwards as though...

  “Move!” I’m on my feet, grasping Danny by the hood. His feet flail under him as I try to pull him away, but he’s fighting me, trying to free himself from my grip. “What the hell are you...”

  The ground creaks and groans and shifts. The shelter breaks apart and disappears, leaving nothing but frozen gusts of air as we scramble back from the collapsing edge, kicking furiously, the ground crumbling and falling away in great chunks that tumble into emptiness. It gains on us, ripping at more of the mountain until it reaches the snow under Danny’s feet.

  He slides away from me, his arms flapping wildly, groping for a hold. I catch his hood again with one hand and with the other, grasp his wrist. The groaning stops and the ground steadies as he hangs there, suspended, the wind gusting up from below, teasing. A block of ice breaks away and bounces into the darkness and Danny’s gaze follows it as he sways from the precipice. He looks up at me and for a moment our eyes meet.

  “You know what I’d do,” he says.

  Should I? My arms are beginning to quiver. I can hold on for a bit, but then... I’m not sure how long until... what am I thinking? “No. Hold on!” I dig my heels into the snow, jerking with his weight beneath me, and lean back. Nothing happens; he’s still dangling from the end of my arms, a dead weight. My legs are shaking now. I don’t know if it’s the shivering or the strain they’re under.

  “Robert...” Danny holds my eye. “You can’t... Just let go!”

  He slips a little, only a few inches, but each of them closing the gap to death. My limbs are on fire. It would be so easy to let go, just relax, release the grip and the pain will stop...

  And then what? From somewhere, I don’t know where, the certainty grips me again. It’s like when you look through the lens of a camera and adjust the focus until everything comes into sharp relief. A clarity, or absence of doubt. Something so obvious you wonder why you didn’t see it before. “No!” I clench my teeth, my eyes squeezed shut, my arms trembling with the effort, and with one last painful heave I haul Danny onto the ledge.

  He’s face down in the snow, gasping, quivering, hugging the mountain. A shard of moonlight slices through the snowflakes, the mountain quietens and the snow is still. We lie there, panting, staring through the blizzard at the abyss.

  “Thanks,” begins Danny. “I don’t know how you...”

  “Come on,” I get to my feet, facing into the wind. “We need to get down.” It still has me, that unwavering certainty.

  “Wait, Robert!” He sways to his knees. “There’s not enough light. We can’t walk in this!”

  “We can’t stay here.” I grasp his arm, hauling him upright.

  “Look what just happened! We could go over the edge!”

  “We won’t. We have to go down.”

  Danny flaps his arms like a toddler having a tantrum. “What makes you so sure?”

  I glance over my right shoulder, towards the place where I saw... I don’t hear any anything and I don’t see anything, but I don’t have to. It’s a feeling, more than a sound or an image, the memory of a shadow. Something else announces it, something undefined. It is like walking into a dark room and knowing, in that inexplicable visceral sense, that someone else is there with you, before you see them. I’m not frightened, I’m calm. Calmer than I’ve ever been. It’s watching.

  But there’s no point in telling Danny, he won’t get it. I turn back to him. “I just know.” I lead the way down the mountain, surefooted and confident in the descent, Danny stumbling behind, and something else, almost beyond sight, but not beyond perception. It follows us into the white noise.

  AS THE STEEP slopes surrender to a gentler gradient, the wind begins to die away and my steps slow. I turn back to Danny, waiting for him to wade closer, watching him sink into the powdery snow, bluish now in the fading night. Each step is laboured, like his boots are filled with lead. As he draws level, his harsh breaths score the air with steamy puffs and blend with the thick mist. I point ahead. The mist parts and moonlight glimmers on the shores of a vast lake. I put a hand on Danny’s shoulder, my lips cracking as I try to smile. I turn back, over my shoulder, eyes narrowing as I peer into the nothingness.

  And then, as a candle flame snuffs out with a breath, it’s gone, and with it the sense of stillness. The moonlight reflects on the snowy shores, but the lake itself is a deep black – not a ripple of light on its surface. A black hole in the tundra. A cloud consumes the moon, darkening the land again. I collapse face-down in the snow.

  Chapter Two

  THIRSTY. THERE’S A forest fire in your throat. Feel that by your left cheek? It’s wet. Turn your head, that’s it. Slurp it up. Cold, burning your lips, hot ice. Look around – white space everywhere, endless stellar brightness, fierce wind. A place to hunt yourself. Don’t eat snow. Remember? It’ll just make you colder. Danny told you, before. Where is he? Rest your head down, just sleep, it’s alright.

  No! No sleeping! Fuck! You want to die here? Then focus! The lake, remember? See that, ahead? Liquid water, mirror-smooth, black beneath the mist...

  Nectar. Dark, cold, nectar, trickling down inside. You’re colder now, the shivering hurts. And dizzy. You hate dizzy. You’ve never seen water like this. The sun’s glare hurts your eyes but there’s not a glimmer of light on its surface. The mist is parting, and there’s something behind it. Something dark. Why are you uneasy? You want to get away from it but you don’t have the strength or the will to move.

  Then rest your head, just for a moment. That’s it. Just for a moment.

  WHAT HAPPENED AGAIN? There was a storm, wasn’t there? Digging in the snow, the blizzard eating my face, a dark hole, a voice with no words. Danny dangling from a cliff edge – oh, God did he drop? Did I let him drop? What the hell will I tell his parents?

  No, no, he didn’
t drop. We had to go down, even in the dark. No question. Great feeling, certainty. Besides, the other man agreed with me.

  Who did? It was just me and Danny. Wasn’t it?

  Cold’s made me crazy, that’s all. Best lie still, a bit longer. Think of home.

  Not much left there for me, not now. When did it all change, again?

  IT WAS RAINING and cold, a typical February in England. I was late for work – my bike was still at the garage getting repaired, so I hitched a ride in a truck. Thank God for truckers. This trucker’s belly was an appendage on which to rest the steering wheel, and the cabin reeked of smoke.

  “You work at the mine?” he asked after I told him where I was going.

  “Yeah.”

  His eyes narrowed as he glanced from my face to my hands. “You don’t look like a miner.”

  “No. I’m not a miner.”

  “You some kind of manager, then?”

  Maybe I should have walked. A stroll through Middle England in the pissing rain might have been easier. “No, I work in the Dark Matter Research Lab.”

  He frowned.

  “It’s down a mineshaft.” I hoped this might help, but it didn’t. If anything, judging by the way his face folded in on itself, it only made things worse. “So where are you headed?”

  “Whitby, then have to be in Scarborough by ten.”

  “Right.” I watched the fields and woods whip past and yawned. My head felt thick, and it ached.

  “So, what’s dark matter, then?”

  I knew it was coming, and I didn’t have it in me to explain. “It’s the missing piece of the universe.”

  He snorted, “Missing piece? Haven’t we got enough problems already? Sounds like a wild goose chase, if you ask me.”

  Well, I didn’t.

  He shook his head, like people do when they think it’s all a colossal waste of taxpayers’ money. “This do you?” he said, pulling into the lay-by. He peered at the sign that read: Middlesbrough 12 miles and, underneath, Potash Mine ½ mile, with an arrow pointing to the left.

  “Thanks a lot – I appreciate it.”

  I jumped down from the truck and waved as he pulled away, then ran the half-mile down the road that led to nowhere but the mine.

  Tall, grey chimneys puffing out smoke struck into the sky, a collage of drab buildings huddled low around them. The hum of machinery quivered on the air and the smell of diesel was thick that day. It used to make me feel queasy, but you get used to it. The changing rooms were empty – I was really late – and after donning the orange suit and helmet – safety first – I headed for the entrance to the lab. It’s not a very grand entrance, given what goes on down there. It’s nothing short of a disappointment. If it weren’t for the sign above it which reads:

  DARK MATTER RESEARCH LABORATORY

  RESTRICTED ACCESS

  AUTHORISED PERSONEL ONLY

  you’d walk right past it. It’s always dim in the entranceway. I used to think of all the people who work in the finance sector in somewhere like London or New York whenever I pulled back the caged door to the lift-shaft. They’d be wearing suits as they walked up those broad, smooth steps and disappeared through revolving doors into a building made of glass. And inside there would be an escalator to take them to the main foyer. Here, you had to grapple with the cage door just to get it to open. No lift attendant to tip his hat at you. Why did I choose this job again?

  I clanged the door shut and pushed the green button on the control box that dangled from a thick wire in the corner. I swear, one of these days it would drop off and I’d be stuck a kilometre under the planet in a bloody lift shaft. The cage shuddered and began its descent, and the earth exhaled its hot breath on me, its morning salute. I adjusted my helmet, fumbling with the headlamp, and a pool of tepid light spilled onto my palm. I tapped the torch, and the light stuttered and went out. Bollocks.

  The descent took several minutes, and the air grew stuffier with each of them. Lights set into the rock face swept from my feet to my head in slow, regular pulses.

  I ran my hand over my stubbled jaw, and yawned again. Glancing at my watch, I winced. Zimmer was going to be pissed off. He wanted an early start – today of all days. Given all the hours I’d put in, he couldn’t really pull me up on it, especially since they didn’t pay overtime. Ever since we got the scent that we were on to something, about a year ago, I’d spent most of my time at the mine, probably more than Zimmer himself. Not when things were really bad for Cora, though. Then I would take some time off to be with her, even though it didn’t seem to help. I think she found it easier when I wasn’t around. She needed her own space, she’d said. I didn’t want to think too much then about what that meant, so I threw myself back into work. Before long, if I got home before nine on a week night I was doing well. And the weekends were almost as bad. It was like a drug, like gambling: the thought that it’s there, that we almost have it, and if we put one more coin into the slot, the next run might be the one that pays off. We were close. We knew that from the preliminary results, all we needed was to verify them. And if we found the nature of dark matter? If we solved the mystery of what’s all around us? That’s what kept me going. Zimmer and I had already been invited to speak at the Annual Conference on Astroparticle and Underground Physics the following week to present our findings and I’d had provisional acceptance of a paper I’d submitted to the Journal of Physics. I had a call last month from the physics lead at the University of Manchester, offering me a temporary lecturer’s post covering for a computer scientist on long term sick. “Between you and me,” he’d said, “we need some fresh input, someone who’s on the cutting edge. It could lead to a full time post.” There was growing interest in the scientific community. Ears were pricking up, and it fuelled the drive to reach the finish line. It would change everything.

  THE CAGE BUMPED to a halt and I dragged the whining doors open, this time in the bowels of the salt mine where the air smelled of scorched rock. I pushed the doors closed behind me and walked down the corridor, my boots echoing on the concrete floor. A man shuffled towards me from the other end of the corridor, pulling a large trolley. He wore a safety suit and helmet like everyone down here, but his were blue and I didn’t recognise him.

  The man glanced up then lowered his eyes without smiling as he passed. I glanced back. Piles of cardboard boxes overburdened the trolley, full of books and paper files and bits of electrical kit. Maybe Zimmer had decided to clear out some of his mess, I thought. About time.

  Ahead of me, a door. Someone had amended the sign reading:

  RESEARCH LABORATORY CONTROL ROOM

  ACCESS RESTRICTED

  with the word ‘MOTHERSHIP’.

  I suppose that the bottom of a pit is an odd place to study anything.

  I pushed open the door and froze. It was all wrong. Five men I didn’t know were dismantling computers and packing them into cardboard boxes. They picked files from shelves and thumbed through their clipboard lists and none of them would meet my eye.

  “What the hell’s going on?” I strode towards Chris, lounging back on a swivel-chair, his feet perched on an empty desk as he watched the men pack. Nothing winds him up, I’ve always thought, and this confirmed my suspicions. He twirled a pen between the fingers of his right hand and observed the scene as though he was watching a TV show. His short dark hair was just visible beneath his helmet and he ran his left thumb over a carefully sculpted beard. Two men moved to either side of his table and began to pull it out from under him. He lifted his legs free, but in his own time. When he planted his feet on the floor, he looked up at me.

  “Nice of you to show up. But you shouldn’t have bothered.”

  “Why? What’s happening?”

  “They pulled the funding.”

  “What? You’re kidding me.”

  “Does he look like he’s kidding?” Chris glanced at a man standing in the shadows. He was lean, in his late thirties and dressed in a suit that would cost me several months’ wages an
d then some. He stood with his back straight and his hands clasped in front of him, watching with a detached air. His eyes briefly settled on me.

  “What do you mean, they pulled it? Who pulled it?”

  “It came from the top.”

  “They can’t just take all this stuff! All of our data...” I snatched a file from the top of a nearby box and glared at the man carrying it. The business man took four long strides towards me.

  “Mr Strong, that file is no longer your property.”

  “And who the hell are you?”

  From behind me, three other men in suits closed in. Not slim, like the first, but bulked out and standing several inches above the rest of us. They didn’t speak – they didn’t have to. Chris’s pen stopped twirling.

  The lean man’s eyes were still on me. “I’m Steven Ryan from Organol Security. I realise this is unexpected, but we’ve been tasked with taking possession of the contents of this laboratory.”

  “Tasked by whom?”

  “Her Majesty’s Government.”

  “What?” I glanced at Chris, who nodded.

  Ryan continued. “It’s my duty to remind you that we require any files you may have on these premises. We appreciate your cooperation.” He spoke with the reassurance of a priest but there was no doubt he was comfortable with violence. “Do you have any other files?”

  I caught Chris’s eye. “No. I have backups, but they’re all here.”

  Ryan watched me for a moment, without speaking. I wanted to punch him hard in the face.