Supernova

by Georgia Chioni

  “Where are we?”

  “In the bowels of Karagor. My labs. Here’s where we conduct our experiments. This is the future, my friend.”

  Mor looked around in amazement.

  “Look around you. Don’t tell me you don’t like this place. And it’s all mine.”

  “Not bad at all, I must admit.”

  Mor kept looking around.

  “Experiments? What kind of experiments?”

  “Anything you can imagine. Different things.”

  “What we used to work on?”

  “Things were different, back then…It’s good to be an idealist.”

  “Idealist? You mean our work?”

  “Yes. Space. We made it!”

  “What did we make, exactly? Satisfy our ego? Experiment? When the planet was gone, we lost everything. Now, we’re simply surviving.”

  “To answer your question: no, now, I’m not concerned with space. I’m focusing on my kingdom. That’s what I’m doing.”

  “What is it you want to achieve?”

  “I don’t know. Dominance, control. Follow me. I’ll show you.”

  They walked along a corridor. On both sides, there were doors with small windows. Behind each of them was a lab.

  “Look here.”

  A woman was seated on a chair. At least, that’s what she seemed to be doing as her face was deformed, like she had had several parts of it removed and stitched back in a clumsy way. The woman seemed to be in a lot of pain.

  “We bring sick people here. We give them vaccines.”

  “Is there any improvement?”

  “None, so far. The vaccines we administer are not supposed to improve their condition. They contain various viruses. We want to study their effects, in case there’s an epidemic.”

  Mor gave him a surprised look.

  “You’re killing them, rather than helping them?”

  “These people are doomed, any way. They are useful for the purposes of our experiments.”

  “If you told them what’s in store for them, do you think anyone would come?”

  Taurus smiled.

  “You’re always so sensitive!”

  The kept walking downwards.

  “Here…,” he said, pointing to a door on the right.

  A young man lay on a bed, with various wires all over his face.

  “This man here—and he did it of his own volition—came down into the bowels of the rock, in a cramped place, with only a wall away from the bottom of the sea. And he held out. He was constantly soaked to the bone, buried in absolute darkness and humidity. I thought he was going to die from hypothermia, but he made it. We brought him up here the day you came. He had lost track of time, but he endured. Now, we’re getting him ready to stay down there for a longer period.”

  He turned his head left.

  “Here, we’re working on an ultrasound machine. Ultrasounds have electric currents. When aimed directly at the brain, they can instantly treat panic attacks. Nobody’s going to mess with us anymore.”

  “Good,” said Mor in an ironic tone.

  “Human nature, my friend.”

  They kept walking, until they reached the end of the corridor, in front of a door made of steel.

  “In here, I’ve got the best one for you.”

  He pressed the button, dialled the code, and opened the door.

  That lab was different. It had many familiar machines, just like the ones they had on planet Neuron.

  “This is my own lab.”

  “What are you working on?”

  “Do you remember we initially studied arganiums, wondering how such small particles can appear in more than just one place? You see them in two different places, but you can’t track them down; only when they interact with another body…”

  “…and the wave function collapses. Then, only one particle can be in different places at the same time.”

  “Yes, but we’re talking about the same entity. They transfer the same messages. If you disrupt one, the other will be disrupted too, and react…”

  “Yes, in theory.”

  “If we can experiment on particles, why not on people? What do you say? We’ll make it together!”

  Mor looked at him silently. He was ambitious and ruthless, but he managed to pique his scientific curiosity in a unique way.

  “Think about it.”

  Mor didn’t take long to do so. The very next morning, he went down to the lab. He didn’t have much choice, after all. One day, after returning from the labs, Mor couldn’t take it anymore.

  “What do you want from me? Why are you holding me captive?” he snapped at his former partner.

  “I’m holding you captive? What are you talking about? How could I? You’re my guest, not my captive.”

  “Which means…?”

  “Which means you can leave whenever you like!”

  “Leave?”

  “Yes. If you wanna leave, you can leave. But you can stay and carry on with our task.”

  “Carry on together? You mean having me locked up in your labs down there?”

  “Isn’t that what we used to do on Neuron? The bad thing about you is that you're never satisfied. And you’re sensitive. Bad combination!”

  “I wanted to learn the secrets of the universe, not of dominance.”

  “OK, then. Go! But the device stays here.”

  “What you ask…”

  “I’ve already done it! I’ve taken your device, remember? But you can leave. It’s proof enough that I care! I give you a spaceship to go away. You can try your luck on another planet, my friend. What do you think?”

  There was no way he could go to another planet without the device, but Mor didn’t reply. He took a deep breath to stifle his rage and think calmly.

  “On another planet of our galaxy?”

  “Yes. There are five of them. I get on really well with two, and they have a high standard of living. I can send you to Abbar to work for the government, on space equipment. What d’ you think?”

  “I’ll think about it,” he replied calmly, and carried on with his work.

  Taurus’ lab was Mor’s second home. He preferred it to his dark room. That’s where he spent most of his time. He often slept in there. He had tried to talk his former colleague into giving him the device, but to no avail. He was toying with the idea of fleeing to another planet, but he didn’t want to abandon the work of a lifetime, locked in one of Taurus’ drawers.

  Then, one night, what he feared the most happened. In one of the usual slight tectonic agitations, a small piece of the carved prison came apart. Ashira took it away and hid it somewhere. When the guard made the standard inspection, he pretended to get an epilepsy seizure. Not knowing what to do, he went closer. As he bent over, the other man seized the opportunity to stick the sharp stone in the throat. He died on the spot. He snatched his magnetic card and gun. In a few minutes, he released the others. The thieves broke out of prison, killing another two wardens. There was only one way to flee that planet—stealing the device. They knew exactly how to reach Taurus’ office. He had interrogated them in there many times before.

  The dictator’s office was never empty. Especially from the moment he locked the device in the safe, one of the three sisters stayed in there. That night, it was Venera’s turn. She was the youngest of the three.

  Opening the locked door was plain sailing for Zanaia. The thieves stormed in. Venera shot to her feet, but had no time to react. Odora shot her in the leg. The girl doubled up with pain, and fell to the floor. Before the men got any closer, she had already thrown an arrow, piercing through Zanaia’s stomach. The other two grabbed her off the ground.

  “What you did really saddened me. I loved him like a son,” Ashira murmured angrily. He looked at Taurus’ desk. He saw a metal jack-knife with a chased handle. He grabbed it. He went up to the girl, and stuck its blade to her cheek.

  “…You saddened me, but I will forget it if you tell me where Taurus keeps the device.”
>
  She gave him a demeaning look, and burst out laughing.

  “I’m not kidding.”

  She kept laughing.

  He slashed her cheek deep. The girl gnashed her teeth in pain.

  One level below, her two sisters were having a restless sleep.

  “Venera!” Kaia snapped out of sleep, drenched in sweat.

  She looked all around.

  “Something happened to our sister! Let’s go! Quick!”

  The two Amazons grabbed their weapons, and ran out of the room.

  Venera lay on the floor, bleeding. Ashira kept torturing her, pressing his jack-knife on different parts of her body, while looking right and left, hoping to trace the device.

  All of a sudden, he caught a glimpse of a metal object studded with a dark metal stone. It was chiselled in a weird way.

  “When I was here, he always stood there. As if he wanted to protect something. Maybe, unconsciously…”

  He slid open the lid of the furniture, revealing the safe.

  “Something’s telling me it’s in here.”

  It was locked.

  “How are we gonna open it? She wouldn’t know…They’ll soon discover us, and we’ll be done for!”

  “No, let me think…”

  “Use his name as a code.”

  He did. It wouldn’t open up. Then, he keyed in ‘Karagor’. Still, it wouldn’t budge.

  “Or perhaps the name of a family member we don’t know…”

  He keyed in a word, and the door clicked open.

  “How did you do it?”

  “‘Neuron’ was the word. Easy.”

  The small device was in the safe.

  “At long last! We’re leaving!”

  Just as he touched the device, the door opened, and in stormed Kaia and her sister. They opened fire, as soon as they saw Venera bleeding on the floor. When the door of the safe opened up, a light began flickering in Mor’s lab. Taurus had explained to him that, if anything like that ever happened, it would mean that the safe had been broken into. Mor felt threatened somehow, and started running towards Taurus’ office. Taurus was sleeping in his room. He often suffered from insomnia, so he took sleeping pills.

  Ashira hid. He wasn’t the target as he didn’t wield a gun. Inside Taurus’ office, there were some laser gunshots, hidden behind the furniture. Kaia tried to drag Venera’s body close to her. They were in two camps. The middle of the room had turned into a battleground. The sisters were fewer than the rest of the men, but they had more weapons. They turned the metal table around, and threw it onto the floor. Avora slithered across the floor in the dark, and slung a knife. It hit Zanaias in the arm. He let out a scream of pain, and dropped his gun.

  Mor crawled in through the half-ajar door. He didn’t have to think hard to realise what had happened. The two sisters gave them a look. He noticed Ashira trying to grab the device. At a run, he went closer, and punched him in the face. The man lay unconscious on the floor. Navi turned around and shot him. The laser, though, didn’t pierce through his skin.

  He snatched the metal object, and hurled it at Saoula, crushing his skull. Odora turned towards him. Before he had the time to shoot him, an arrow had already pierced through his right shoulder. The two girls snatched their sister, and shot at Navi. Mor grabbed the device. It was the perfect opportunity. He pressed the green button, keyed in the codes, turned it towards the door, and looked at the sisters. He threw the weapons to them. He whispered ‘thank you’, and jumped in.

  Seeing that Mor had activated the device, Odora shuffled in his direction. He sat up with difficulty to fall into the slot. Yet, just before he did, an arrow flung by Avora pierced through his body.

  THE PLANET OF GLACIERS

  He opened his eyes. He felt the ground underneath him. He realised he was lying down. He looked around him. A uniform white. The sky, the mountains, the ground. Everything was frozen. As he stood up, he noticed his body. It was white, too. His skin was hard as ice, just like his face. He was in the middle of a vast glacier, and didn’t know what to do. But he wouldn’t stay there.

  He began walking. He couldn’t tell for how long. He was completely indifferent to time as it was unimportant. He couldn’t feel the cold. Still, he felt exhausted and disappointed. What did he want? What was he looking for? He was doomed to wander around. Maybe, he just wanted to die. It wouldn’t take long. This way, he would find peace. As he walked, he knelt down, and touched a small rock. That’s where he would meet his death. He raised his head to take one last look at the sky. The wind had stopped blowing, and the fog had started to clear up. He looked around him. On the right, far afield, he could make out a mountain ridge. It was the first mound he saw after an endless roaming. He stood up and walked in that direction.

  The closer he got, the clearer the landscape. It was a mountain, quite high—the first he had seen. Just before its foot, the frozen waters receded, and solid ground began. The mountain was snowcapped. He cut off a piece of ice, and took to scraping the ground. After several seconds, soil came to the surface. His breath seemed to freeze, as he exhaled. He looked far afield. The frozen expanses seemed endless, infinite. They were without beginning or end. Was there some kind of life on that planet, or was it yet another place that had been destroyed?

  He was gripped by disappointment again. What’s the point of surviving if he had to wander around in that vast frozen wilderness? That very moment, everything was pointless. Wearied, he touched the ground, and bent his head. Where was he? What had happened? Was it worth roaming the galaxies and the planets? What was he looking for? He threw his hands up in the air, and let out a scream of despair, disillusion, and sorrow. A scream of loneliness. It was pointless. Nothing counted anymore. His voyage around unknown worlds. Everything was futile. He wanted to disappear. Should he pass through to another universe? What was in store for him there?

  “What was I supposed to do? I wanted to do something good, and I ended up being a monster! That’s what I am! A monster!” he thought.

  He began descending the mountain. He had gone up that path before. His soles stuck, as if they had suction cups. He didn’t feel the cold at all.

  On his right, he heard a noise. A piece of ice hanging like a stalactite came apart, and fell to the ground with a bump. When he took a closer look, he saw an opening. He hadn’t seen it when he went uphill. It was hidden by the snow. He went closer with difficulty. The path was narrow, while he was quite stout. The opening led into a cave. He walked in. It was big, full of stalactites and stalagmites. He felt the heat, and a strange smell assailed his nostrils. It smelled like burning.

  All of a sudden, he saw him standing opposite him. It was Odora with a skin like dry lava ruining everything in its wake. Almost formless, with the lava running from his head all over his body. His shape put Mor in mind of a volcano, rather than a human being. It was clear. He had passed through with him. The transition had affected his molecular biostructure again, with different results. Ice and lava pitted against each other.

  The more he stared at him, the more hatred overwhelmed him. Yes, he hated him; he was to blame for what had happened to him. He had been lied to, fooled, and exploited. Yet, he had made his choices, and had to pay the price. That was standing right in front of him, a mass the colour of fire, and he was his enemy. He couldn’t remember feeling more enmity than he did at that moment. He could feel it surging within. He clenched his fist. The cold gave him strength. Without much thought, he let out a raspy scream, and charged him, his mind blurry. So did Odora, clenching his two fists. Mom’s first punch in the head and jaw threw him out of kilter, and sent him hurtling to the ground. Mor didn’t wait. He lunged him with all his might. The thief fell once again. Mor threw himself over his body, and tried to strangle him. Odora let out a cry, and spewed lava onto Mor’s face. He stood up, his face stinging. He touched it. One cheek began to melt. Odora stood up. He attacked him at a run, and pushed him on the wall, hitting him hard. Mor did the same. The two men came to bl
ows, and were at the mouth of the cave. Mor was trapped under the thief’s body. They were literally at each other’s throats outside the cave, close to the edge of the path. Trying to disengage himself, Mor pushed him over, and soon the two men were tumbling down the cliff, till they reached the flat frozen surface. Both of them were exhausted.

  Mor was the first to sit up with difficulty. He stepped on Odora’s chest. He let out a scream, raised his fist, and punched him in the chest with as much strength as he could muster. His body and neck had begun to freeze. When he saw there was no more resistance, he jerkily took off the device. It was time to set off. He pressed the activation button and, as soon as the screen flickered, he keyed in the codes.

  “At long last, I’m getting out of here!” he murmured.

  The black ray formed, but was soon gone, just like the first time he had tried it on Neuron.

  “The magnetic field,” he mumbled. “The magnetic field.”

  That was the problem. The device couldn’t trace the particles that would create the magnetic field. He had to make it happen in another way.

  “Think, think…”

  His gaze was fixed on Odora. Then, he had a brainwave, as he saw the man’s frozen surface—where Mor had punched him—slowly thawing. The only solution was to bring him round as soon as possible, and create the magnetic field with the heat, making him a superconductor of energy with minimum resistivity. Once he recovered, he would freeze him on the spot, so as to create a quantum lock. This time, though, he wouldn’t follow him. He was still unconscious, and most of his body was frozen. Mor cut his legs off from the knees down, and threw him away. They were just like two chunks of ice.

  Odora was slowly recovering, his temperature rising. Mor wasted no time. He activated the device, creating a magnetic field, thanks to the heat. The gate opened. He went closer and turned around to take one last look at his opponent. Not knowing what had happened, Odora tried to stand up to follow him. Only then did he realise he couldn’t move as he had no legs.

  “Not this time, pal.”