Dark Side of the Moon

by C. Sean McGee

THE GREAT GIG IN THE SKY

  He was dreaming.

  But his little paws were so very sore.

  He felt like he had been walking for months and as he shuffled forwards, he caught his reflection in a small puddle of water that was being fed by a leak in a rusted pipe that ran above his head, along the length of the tunnel’s roof.

  He saw in his reflection, an old rabbit, like he, gazing through the murky water with the same tired expression. The older rabbit looked worn as if Time and age were clinging onto his skin, anchoring him to his past and frightening him into running so that when he stopped and assumed he could run no more, his skin hanged loose and little sheets and kinks rolled into round and simple folds.

  And it was hard to tell if he had stopped for good or whether he was just catching his breath before he tried one last time, to get somewhere.

  The old rabbit’s eyes were less than red; they were more of an orangey brown haze as if his spirit were now setting into the line of his imaginings and darkness were casting its shadow over his horizon.

  He had a single breath in his mouth of which he swished around like a piece of hard candy, passing it through his teeth and under his tongue and though a child might have crushed the air with their chafing appetite and scoffed one or two more without even an inkling of consideration, the old rabbit kept that single breath in his mouth and held onto it like life had done unto him.

  And when he finally exhaled, that last breath limped and hobbled out of his mouth and it settled just shy of his trembling chin. And though the old rabbit was terribly old, Theodore knew that the reflection was his own.

  He had; since he was a child, felt this constant familiar strangeness to his own aging, as if a grain of sand were being compared to an Earth in its reflection. And in time, when he would accept that he was no longer that tiny seed and imagine himself revolving infinitely around his own imagination, he would then see in his reflection that his oceans were not as full as they had once been and what was once lush and green was now arid and crackling under the effect of Time.

  And he had always felt; whenever he glimpsed at the pulling hands of Time in his own reflection, that he had been so small and insignificant when in fact he was momentous and telling and then that he was so handsome and relished, revered and adored when in fact every smile was a sneer of revolt and then that he had become learned and sagacious when in fact, he still knew so very little about himself and those who loved him and hurt him the most and then; in the end, that he was finally ready to run, when in fact, it was already too late.

  And so, a young rabbit stared into his reflection and saw an old rabbit looking back.

  “Where did the time go” he wondered. “And how did we ever lose track? Is this the same rabbit that amounts to wondrous things? And how long did we spend dreaming? Is this reflection really as it seems? Who are you old rabbit? I’ve seen you in times before. Is this; the face that greets me, the mask I always wore?”

  He turned away from the puddle and saw a winding tunnel; ahead by the end of the room. It was a small hole dug into the join where the wall and floor met and the hole travelled in a different direction. Theodore squeezed his body through and clawed his way down deep into the darkness.

  And he wasn’t sure in what direction he was now going for it felt that he was digging up and then around then he felt his blood rushing to his head and then he felt that even though he was lying flat that he was, in fact, standing still.

  And then he saw; just out in the distance, a shift in the colour and he rushed towards it with sprint in his paws as if Time had slipped of its grasp and lent him a second away from his own skin and he rushed and he raced, seeing the black and white shape always just another bound from his reach and then; when he came to some kind of an end, he looked behind him and though he could not see her, he could feel the threads of Time catching up with him, ready to weave him back into her fabric and he could feel his death being drawn into his shadow, a shadow he cast though there was no light about to do so.

  He looked at his sore paws.

  His nails were worn down to rounded stumps and the thick skin on his pads was cracked and bleeding but he had no choice. He dug his paws into the thick grey rock and tore away grain after grain and while his paws scurried away, he looked over his shoulder, feeling the footprints of Time creeping upon him and he turned his face back to the grey rock and he ripped away at loose stones and thick grey mud and he flung it all back over his shoulder and as he did, he turned his head and saw The Badger walking behind him through the darkness with something being carried like an infant in its quarrelsome hands and his paws they kept digging, but with every step of The Badger, they slowed and they slowed until they no longer dug, but instead they braced fearfully against the grey rock.

  The Badger stood before him and its size was immense and its eyes were as hollow as its intentions and the thing in its arms was his self, the old rabbit of whom he had shared a stilling glance. And the rabbit looked weak and failing, his hazy eyes having turned a midnight black and he sat like a young child in the arms of The Badger and he spoke.

  “I am not frightened of dying, any time will do. I don’t mind.”

  Theodore felt every beat of his heart sink to the tips of his toes.

  The old rabbit looked up to The Badger like a child would to his father.

  “Why should I be frightened of dying? There’s no reason for it, you’ve gotta go sometime.”

  And the old rabbit stared into The Badger’s hollow eyes following his own exclamation. He waited for any response that would concur with what he had said, but The Badger said nothing and The Badger did nothing.

  The old rabbit then looked at Theodore and he didn’t seem so sure anymore. He looked scared and so Theodore turned back to the rock and he dug and he dug and he dared not look over his shoulder. If Time were to make her mockery then she could do so without his avid attention and if he could, he would not swish that last breath around his stinging gums.

  The air was thick and his spirit was fading.

  And then Time spoke.

  “If you can hear this whispering, you are dying,” she said.

  And then Theodore woke on his bed in a fevered sweat.