A Light in the Dark

by A. K. DuBoff

  As we neared the landing site, the details in the twisted landscape became clearer. I realized that the dark tendrils fanning out from the central crystal weren’t solid objects, as I had thought from a distance, but were rather a steady flow of tiny black particulates—the same fine cloud I’d witnessed in the canyon crystal on my homeworld shortly before I’d been recruited by the Hegemony. In fact, very little in the environment looked to be completely solid, with even former buildings and vegetation appearing to be riddled with holes that resulted in a sponge-like texture. The oddity supported the other evidence about lighter gravity—and reduced planetary mass, by extension—but it still offered no explanation for where that extra material had gone. For as thoroughly as the Darkness had consumed the planet, there was no outward evidence of it extending into space or elsewhere.

  Kaiden deftly maneuvered the shuttle into position above the plaza and directed it straight down. “Stars willing, nothing will swallow us…” he murmured while descending the final meters.

  I held my breath and braced.

  The shuttle bumped slightly and then all was still. Out the front viewport, the dark tendrils were unchanged. For now, the Darkness appeared to be ignoring us.

  I unstrapped my flight harness and jumped to my feet. “Clock’s ticking. This nasty stuff might eat a hole through our ship or clothes.”

  “I’ll get my supplies.” Toran raced ahead of me toward the common room.

  Kaiden and Maris exchanged glances. “We’ll need as much protection as we can get,” Kaiden told her.

  She nodded. “I’ll do what I can.”

  My stomach flopped. We were out of our minds to enter this kind of environment, but we didn’t have any other choice. With no way to learn anything remotely, we needed direct access to that central crystal. Though I wished circumstances were different, it was better to make the most of it rather than dwell on thoughts of alternatives that could never be.

  I rushed into the common room to gather my own hazsuit and pack of supplies. “These suits are already tainted,” I grumbled while slipping on the garment I’d used several minutes earlier. “There’s no way we can retain any sort of contamination containment.”

  “Yeah, I figured that would be a losing battle the moment we agreed to come here,” Kaiden replied with a weak smile.

  Maris paled. “Let’s hope legend holds and we do have an immunity.”

  I strapped my sword over the hazsuit. “Hey, if nothing else, we’ll find out quickly.” I wasn’t sure if my own words were comforting or not. While a swift death would be preferable in theory, there was no telling what it might feel like to be turned into a column of ash, especially when one’s final thoughts would be about how the mission had failed. I shook my head, chastising myself. That kind of thinking wasn’t productive.

  The others were uncomfortably quiet after my statement, likely running through similar scenarios to my own bleak vision of what our final moments might be like.

  “We’re going to make it through this,” I said. “It won’t stop us this easily.”

  “That’s right.” Toran looked around the room. “Is everyone ready?”

  I checked the seals on my suit. “Ready.”

  Kaiden and Maris nodded, their suits secured and supply packs slung over their shoulders.

  “Let’s go.” Toran led the way into the airlock and cycled it once we were all inside.

  My breath was loud in my ears inside the suit while I waited the ten seconds for the outside hatch to open. Finally, it released with a hiss.

  Without the roar of the shuttle’s engine to drown out the surroundings, I was struck by how quiet the planet was. Wind whipped through the open hatch, but there were no other audible sounds emanating from the mysterious black tendrils or anything else nearby.

  “Be careful out there,” Maris said. She waved her hand, and translucent purple shells appeared around each of us.

  “Thanks.” Steeling myself, I hopped out of the shuttle onto the black ground. My feet sank in five centimeters as the aerated ground compressed beneath my boots. I took several firm steps to make sure I wasn’t going to sink in further, and it appeared to be solid enough. “This is weird.”

  Toran paced next to me. “I have no idea what to make of it.”

  “I’m pretty far beyond trying to make scientific sense of this,” Kaiden said. “Let’s get to the crystal.” He set off in the direction of the monument two hundred meters to the north.

  Maris wrinkled her nose as she followed. “If I could smell anything right now, I bet this would reek.”

  Toran nodded. “I’m inclined to agree.”

  “That other world didn’t,” Kaiden pointed out while he forged ahead.

  “But that one had just been infected. This one has had months to marinate in its own destruction,” Maris countered.

  I kept careful watch on our surroundings, looking for any signs of movement by creatures that could attack us. “What a delightful thought.”

  “Doesn’t matter. Let’s get out of here before we become one of the permanent fixtures.” Kaiden picked up his pace.

  I jogged ahead to walk abreast to him. Catching his gaze as I approached, I gave him a reassuring nod. It was clear his nerves were starting to fray; we’d need to support one another and not give in to our imaginations’ worst case scenarios.

  Kaiden’s outward demeanor didn’t change, but he took a slow breath and nodded back. Nerves or not, he was still there in the moment with me. I had nothing to worry about.

  The first hundred meters from the shuttle, our path toward the crystal was fairly clear. We plodded across the black ground, leaving a path of footprints behind us. As we neared the destination monument, however, small tendrils of the Darkness started to sprout from the black ground.

  “I didn’t notice these from the air,” I admitted.

  “Neither did I.” Kaiden frowned at the pulsing energy pathways of the dark particulates.

  “Let’s try to step around them.” I eyed our path ahead, but I couldn’t tell if the ground closest to the crystal monument was the black spongy material we had been walking on, or if it was a mat of the tendrils.

  It was possible that it didn’t matter either way. However, given our working hypothesis that we were attacked because we’d interrupted the energy flow of one of the larger tendrils, it was reasonable to assume that the attributes would scale down, as well. My companions had all instinctively stepped around the small tendrils when they’d first appeared in our path, so I definitely wasn’t the only person thinking in those terms.

  By the time we’d gone another twenty meters, it was clear that avoiding the small tendrils might be unavoidable. I slowed my pace. “Decision time.”

  Kaiden looked at the path ahead and then back to me. “We can’t give up now.”

  “Agreed, but we should be prepared for a fight if the ground turns on us,” I replied.

  Maris groaned. “How in the stars are you supposed to prepare for that?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know, but I have a sneaking suspicion it’s about to happen.”

  “Elle,” Kaiden took a step backward and a fireball appeared in his palm, “move!”

  5

  I tensed as my gaze shot down to my feet. Four of the slim, black tendrils had started to wrap around my boots. I tried to raise my right foot, and the tendrils elongated but didn’t let go.

  “Stars!” I took two rapid steps back the way we’d come. The tendrils maintained their hold.

  “I’ll get it!” Kaiden said, bringing back his arm to throw a fireball.

  “No.” I held up my hand. “If we start attacking, everything around us might go on the offensive.”

  I took several slow, cautious steps, and the tendrils continued to let me move, though the Darkness remained wrapped around my boots up to my ankles. “Look, it’s not stopping me.”

  “We should just let it latch onto us?” Maris didn’t look
convinced.

  Kaiden took a hesitant step into the patch of tendrils that had snagged me, and they flowed over the toes of his boots. “We might not have another choice.”

  Maris refreshed the protective shells around us, but the new magical barrier appeared to have no effect on the tendrils or ground. “You’re all out of your minds.”

  “Takes one to know one, Maris.” I smirked.

  She rolled her eyes and stepped forward into the now-writhing tangle of dark tendrils. “Just go already.”

  Without further delay, I continued toward the crystal monument, taking slow, gentle steps to avoid disturbing the ground too much. The tendrils seemed content to wrap around my feet and then move aside as new tendrils rose to take their place. I kept watch on the behavior as I pressed onward to make sure it wasn’t getting any more aggressive.

  Toran brought up the rear of our party, looking extremely concerned about the risky strategy. As the strongest of us, I’d expect him to be less worried about being snared by something as narrow as my pinky finger. Nonetheless, the strange properties of the Darkness were enough to put even the largest warriors on edge. And, despite his appearance, I needed to remind myself that Toran was an engineer and family man at heart, not a veteran fighter.

  We shuffled our feet across the ground like we were wading through ankle-deep water. By the time we were thirty meters from our destination, the strange ground covering had wrapped us up to our knees. It took all my concentration to keep from panicking. So long as we could move, there was nothing to worry about… though that could change at a moment’s notice.

  “Almost there,” I said. “Toran, you ready to hook into the control system?”

  “Assuming it still works, yes,” he confirmed.

  The crystal monument loomed before us, standing nearly three stories. Though it should have been glowing blue, the crystal was now off-white and was filled with a swirling cloud of the dark particulates. Dark tendrils seemingly flowed out from the crystal, thickening and merging into the apparent energy conduits crisscrossing the landscape. What had once been a chrome enclosure surrounding the crystal with a touch-surface access panel was now dull black and beginning to crumble.

  I scowled at it. “That doesn’t look like it’s in very good shape.”

  “It’s not.” Toran swung his pack forward on one shoulder so he could root around inside. He retrieved a screwdriver and proceeded to prod at the interface panel; the corroded metal flaked away. “These wires are shot.”

  “Dead end?” Kaiden asked, his brow tight with concern.

  “Didn’t say that.” Toran dug deeper into the ruins. “The components next to the crystal still look functional—I need to cobble together a bypass around the typical interface protocol.”

  My concerns receded the slightest measure. “But it will work?”

  “It should.” He got out more tools and started chipping away at the corroded metal until the salvageable interior components were exposed.

  There was nothing for us to do but wait. I moved my feet on occasion so the tendrils wouldn’t work too far up my legs.

  “This is so eerie,” Kaiden said under his breath while he paced next to me.

  “I’m kind of getting used to us being the only ones roaming around an alien world,” I replied, trying to bring some levity to the situation.

  “This was a thriving colony,” Maris shot back. “We’re not alone.”

  “There’s no one here anymore, Maris,” I said.

  Her face reddened. “Those dark columns over there? I think those used to be people.”

  My heart skipped a beat. I’d been so focused on the ground and the crystal up ahead that I hadn’t been paying attention to the other features in the surroundings. The columns Maris had pointed out had seemed like any of the other mass of dark tendrils stretching in every direction, but I could now make out the heads and shoulders atop the vertical shapes. They were posed in combat, some with arms up for an attack while others were bent over, shielding their heads with their arms. At first, I thought that they were defending the crystal. As we got closer and I was able to assess the arrangement, it instead appeared that they were in the process of fighting something coming from the crystal.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to diminish anyone’s sacrifice,” I murmured.

  “Don’t think about that now.” Toran said.

  Kaiden swallowed. “Everything is backed up in the Master Archive. That’s the important thing.”

  “Let’s focus on what we’re doing now.” Toran cast me a cautionary glance before pulling his interface equipment from his pack. I rarely saw strong emotion from him, and I definitely wasn’t eager to be on the receiving end of a reprimand in the future.

  I kept my distance while Toran continued to work. Not knowing what may be lurking in the Darkness around us, I rested my hand on my sword hilt, ready for action.

  Kaiden shuffled over to stand next to me, then turned sideways so he was facing me while also being orientated away from Toran’s and Maris’ sightlines. “Everyone’s on edge,” he said over a private comm channel. “You didn’t say anything wrong.”

  “I could have phrased it better,” I replied over the same private link.

  “Even so, Toran is having an especially rough go of it because today is his daughter’s birthday.”

  My chest constricted. “Oh, I didn’t know.”

  “He mentioned it to me while we were walking to breakfast. Don’t say anything to him about it, but I thought that context might explain some things for you.”

  “Thanks.”

  Kaiden brushed his gloved hand down my arm. “Hang in there. We’ll be back to the ship soon.”

  “Yeah.” I glanced over my shoulder at Toran, who appeared to be finished hooking up his equipment. I switched to the general comm channel. “Were you able to access the crystal interface?” I asked.

  The large man grunted. “Sort of. The connection is working, but I haven’t been able to decipher the data logs.”

  “Will you be able to?” Kaiden asked.

  “If this is just a security safeguard, then yes,” Toran replied. “If it’s because the data is corrupted, then there’s nothing I can do.”

  I looked out at the Darkness swirling around us. I wasn’t sure if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but I thought I saw movement in the shadows. “And how long before you know either way?”

  “I have absolutely no idea, which I know isn’t helpful,” Toran replied. “It’ll take as long as it takes.”

  “Can’t fault honesty.” I kept my attention on the place where I’d seen movement moments before. “Work as quickly as you can.” I realized just how stupid the obvious statement sounded as soon as I heard it out loud, but no one called me on it.

  Two minutes passed in the unnatural silence of the world. At last, Toran made a satisfied huff. “I think I’m finally getting somewhere.”

  I perked up. “Really? What have you found?”

  “No specific what yet, but maybe part of a how,” he replied. “It traces back to my vision.”

  “About how the Darkness spreads through the crystalline network?” Kaiden asked.

  Toran nodded. “I believe I may have identified the signal that controls the Darkness’ spread.”

  “That’s huge!” I exclaimed. “Now we can counteract it, right?”

  “Maybe eventually, but that would take so much more research that it’s not worth thinking about yet.”

  My excitement faded. “Okay, what do we know, then?”

  “I’m copying the records to a portable drive, but at first glance, this signal looks to have segments similar to the records used for crystal backups,” Toran revealed.

  “Wait, you know how to read the backups?” Kaiden interjected.

  “I can’t decode it myself, no,” the other man clarified. “There are maybe three people alive who know enough about the storage medium to decipher a fraction of a
backup record without the crystal interface. I’ve just seen enough interfaces to recognize the organizational structure of the code when I see it.”

  “That’s weird that it’s coded,” I commented. “I always thoughts the records were a physical thing… You know, crystal-y.”

  “Yeah, me too,” Maris agreed, looking over Toran’s shoulder. “Really, can you even call that a ‘code’?” She tilted her head.

  Toran held up his tablet so I could see the contents of the screen. From a distance, it reminded me somewhat of a complex molecular model from chemistry class. “It’s a code in the sense that it’s an alphanumeric representation, though there’s also a relationship component. Really, it’s too complex for a person to understand—even super computers only know how to interact with the crystal storage medium, not recreate it.”

  “What does that mean for the Darkness—or alien tech, however we want to refer to it?” I questioned.

  “I know too little to say,” Toran replied.

  “And if you had to guess?”

  He hesitated. “My hunch is that this alien code taps into the crystalline network’s reset ability and overwrites it with its own instructions to restructure the physical reality inside each crystal’s zone.”

  I let the words sink in. “That’s pretty out there, but it weirdly does explain everything.”

  “I don’t like that hypothesis,” Kaiden said. “That means that these aliens understand the tech on a level that is far beyond ours.”

  “Not liking the implications doesn’t make it incorrect,” Toran replied. “But, like I said, it’s a wild guess.”

  I took a slow breath, sorting my thoughts. “This confirms some of the ideas we’ve been tossing around about what the Darkness is and its purpose, but that doesn’t get us much closer to stopping it. We somehow need to trace where the signal is coming from.”

  “Well, I can tell you for sure that it’s being sent via the crystalline network, so it’s a planet somewhere in this galaxy,” Toran replied.

  “Narrowing it down to a whole galaxy, that really helps.” I sighed.