In A Universe Without Stars 1: Skyeater

by J Alex McCarthy

  “I have this thing called a cell phone, it gets this little one hundred-forty character message from the air streams like magic. ‘Amazing!’ we have a group chat dedicated just to you. Do you feel special?” Alexander says.

  “I’m not a one trick pony, Alex. That’s not the only thing I talk about… I was going to ask for you to be my best man, I found this hot piece of tail down in Manchester and was planning on marrying her.”

  “Oh really?” Alexander says.

  “Yes, I was planning on dumping the broad I have now. To high class for me,” Wilker says with a grin.

  Alexander chuckles but stops. At least he got something from him. Wilker looks down.

  “I need your help, nobody will listen to me. I need you to vouch for me,” Wilker says.

  “I need this, I need that! I did vouch for you! We all did, the whole fucking university! But when we told you our calculations weren’t complete you decided to host a conference using all of our names and the school’s anyway,” Alexander says.

  “I already apologized,” Wilker responds.

  “Is your ego so immense to think a simple apology is enough? You tarnished all our names when your calculations were torn apart. Millions of dollars in funding is gone, Wilker. As the head of this school that hangs over me. Not you,” Alexander says.

  Before this mess they were once best friends.

  “I’m sure of it this time. I place my tenure on it,” Wilker says quietly. Alexander doesn’t answer.

  “You know how much I don’t like to beg,” Wilker says. Alexander looks at him. “Get on your knees,” he says.

  “I’m not going to su—“

  “No you dolt, get on your knees and beg,” Alexander says with a smile. Wilker looks around, the quad is mostly empty. He stands up and goes next to Alexander. He breathes in deeply. He bends over as to kneel but instead murmurs into Alexander’s ear.

  “I will never stoop that low, I will never kneel or beg. Not even to the queen herself,” Wilker says.

  “I never expected you too,” Alexander says.

  Alexander sighs and puts out his hand. Wilker pulls the flash drive from his pocket and places it in his hand. He doesn’t let go.

  “Will you please help me with the greatest discovery our generation has ever seen?” Wilker says.

  “Yes.”

  Wilker lets go and Alexander places it into his bag. It’s good to have his friend back.

  “I don’t know when I’ll be able to get to it but I will. Sometime. Maybe. It’s not my priority,” Alexander says.

  “Thanks my friend.”

  …

  Isabel stares out of her kitchen window. Looking at nothing really. Her mind lost in her thoughts, she sits at a chair at the island in her massive kitchen. The front door slams.

  “Isabel!” Wilker yells. Wilker strides into the kitchen with a purpose. She continues to stare forward out the window.

  He walks up next to her. “Isabel,” He mutters. He places a hand on her shoulder.

  A couple of balled up bloodied napkins are strewn across the marble counter.

  “Isabel.”

  She doesn’t hear him, his words pass right through her.

  “Isabel!” he damn near yells.

  She looks around. She snaps out of whatever state she was in. “Oh, Tom,” she mutters. She looks at her phone. “You’re a few hours early,” she says.

  “Nobody really likes my class so I gave them time to study other subjects.”

  “Stop, you know that is untrue. I listen to what the students say about you. They love you… barring your repetitiveness,” she says.

  “Isabel stop.”

  Her hazel eyes seem to glaze over as if she’s looking through him, as if she’s contemplating something.

  “Tell me what happened to you. I’m your husband and I deserve that much. You’re scaring me,” he says.

  She places a hand on his right cheek. “I’ll show you.”

  …

  Isabel stares straight ahead as she drives down a field road. Wilker sits in the passenger seat, looking at her. She doesn’t twitch or stir. She just stares ahead driving, like a machine. She’s always like that when she’s preoccupied. She hasn’t said a single thing the whole drive, it’s pissing Wilker the hell off.

  Wilker adjusts in his seat; the silence making him sweat. They come to a stop, Isabel pulls to the side of the road. She sits still, hands clutching the steering wheel.

  “This is where I am supposed to meet him,” Isabel says calmly.

  “Meet who?” Wilker asks.

  “This is where I made contact,” she says finally looking at him.

  Wilker looks confused. “Contact with whom?”

  “Alien life forms, I fucking made contact with them,” she says slamming her hands on the steering wheel. She laughs to herself.

  She never curses, thinks Wilker. Never.

  “His name is Jahum. He made contact with me. He projected in front of my car and told me the coordinates to meet him here today. Last night, I got a little ahead of myself and wandered through the woods to find out where it was, that’s why I was such a mess. Here we are now,” she says.

  Wilker looks to the wooded area to his left. An open field is to his right.

  “That’s all you are going on? How in the bloody hell do you know it wasn’t some trick?! A prank even?! They fucking brought back Tupac and Michael Jackson and you believe this shit! I can’t believe you had me worried for this crap.”

  “I’m a scientist, Thomas! I only believe in the things I’ve seen with my very own eyes and I know what I saw! I know this isn’t a trick or some bloody prank!” she yells. She tries to calm herself by closing her eyes and breathing in. “This is real, he spoke to me and told me things that only you would know! Personal things!” She gets flustered, tears wailing up in her eyes.

  He’s never seen her like this. She is usually so composed and calm, even in the worst situations, even when she found out about her illness and learned that she was going to die. This is something else entirely, it’s inexpiable and illogical, and it’s shaken her to her core. And that scares him.

  “Jahum told me of my childhood, of secrets I’ve never told a single soul. He said he can see the past, present, future, and proved it.”

  What’s wrong with her? She usually never thinks in this kind of way. “But you cannot be a hundred percent-“

  “It’s my intuition and I know I’m right,” she snaps.

  Wilker looks out into the woods. He doesn’t believe a word of it. But—

  He looks at her, he looks at the mess of hair on her head, the same hair she gets up so early to do every morning so he wouldn’t see her in that state; he looks at her bloodshot eyes and the pleading look on her face. He needs to calm her down, even if he has to entertain this little idea of hers.

  “Okay,” he simply says. Her face lights up, her smile creasing the tears running down her face.

  “Thank you Tom,” she says. She hugs him. “I want you with me through all of this, as a friend and as my husband.”

  Maybe this is the sickness talking. Creating the illusion so she can believe she’s seen her dream before she dies. So she can have some kind of hope.

  Maybe she went made. The strain from her illness...

  She needs someone to believe in her and help hold up the possible weight of the situation. She did for him, when he was ridiculed at the university, when nobody believed him. Wilker doesn’t believe her but he’s going to support her every step of the way.

  “Let’s go.”

  …

  Isabel sits on a rock in a clearing in the forest. Wilker paces up and down. It’s been thirty minutes since ‘he’ was supposed to arrive. Jahum takes out his phone, no reception. He stops.

  Wait.

  If he didn’t leave work during their supposed meeting, was Isabel going to come here without him? He looks at her as she slumps on the rock. He walks over and places his hand on her shoulder. “Isabel
…” he stops.

  Whatever she thought this was, wasn’t. It must be her sickness, she’s hallucinating.

  “Sorry for my tardiness, thank you for waiting.” a deep voice says. Wilker pauses in his tracks. Jahum walks into the clearing. Wilker and Isabel stare at him.

  Holy shit.

  Jahum’s triangular head…it’s just wrong. Not human, not… The thing stands up straight on two legs like a human, but the body is oddly like a gorilla’s. His body is humanoid and masculine, with pecs, abs, two legs and two human like arms. There is two extra limb like appendages that hang off his hunched shoulder like dead things. His two large black eyes stare right into Wilker’s soul.

  Wilker’s heart skips. His heart shudders at the thing that stands before him. Oh god. An alien, a being not from this planet, living proof that they are not alone in the Universe. Wilker feels a sudden coldness in his heart and bottomless fear. His breathes labor.

  Isabel was right. Wilker glances at her; she stares at the alien with the same shocked look. Maybe she really didn’t believe it after all. Her fists are clenched. A tear rolls from her eye. Wilker has to say something but must first calm down. Isabel starts to shake.

  “Who are you?” Wilker asks. His voice wavers. His heart slows, his muscles unclench. He is calm again. He needs to take command. He needs to control himself. He needs to take control. Control.

  As he relaxes Jahum’s head makes a very slight nod. Wilker wouldn’t have caught it if he wasn’t staring so strongly.

  “My name is Jahum,” says the alien. “I am the leader of the Astrons, I have come to give you knowledge, power and a warning.” His mouth doesn’t move. Telepathy but it sounds as if he’s speaking through the air.

  Wilker places a hand on his wife’s shoulder. She looks up at him, and the tension eases out of her body.

  “Why did you contact my wife? What purpose do you have with her?” Wilker asks.

  “She is the head of SETI and one of the most brilliant minds on this planet. Even if I didn’t have other motives in coming here, that in itself would be worth the trip, to get a glimpse at where your advancing species was headed,” Jahum says.

  Isabel smiles and snaps out of her stupor.

  “Thank you,” she replies.

  “But I came here today to give you knowledge, power and a warning,” he mentions again. Knowledge and power.

  “A warning of what?” Wilker asks.

  “In the coming weeks, an alien race will attack Earth. I came here to give my powers to a select few. Isabel is one of them.”

  “What power?”

  “The power to create and destroy. Strength beyond human comprehension,” Jahum replies.

  He looks at Isabel.

  “The power to comprehend them and the universe.”

  He wants to make her into a god? Impossible.

  “Why? Why give us your power? What do you get in saving us?” Isabel asks. “There have been many theories on why the human race has never been in contact with alien life forms. Either they never existed in the first place or we were too insignificant for them to care.”

  “I am not saving your race, even with my power there is a very slim chance of your survival. The invaders are the ones who betrayed us and destroyed my people,” Jahum says. His facial expression doesn’t change, he speaks as if he has no feelings at all, contrary to what he is saying.

  Wilker just stands there, thinking through what Jahum said. He’s only saving Isabel.

  “How small of a chance?” Isabel asks.

  Jahum doesn’t answer.

  “How many will die? Can you please tell me?” Isabel pleads.

  “Even with my help, there will be billions lost. With a feeble chance of winning. If your race loses I will take the chosen to another planet to start anew,” Jahum says.

  Isabel looks down. He’s going to leave the human race to die.

  “What about us?” Wilker asks.

  “Us?” Jahum replies.

  “The rest of the human race. Are we just going to get left behind and slaughtered!? What gives you the right to choose who lives or dies?” Wilker yells.

  Jahum doesn’t flinch, as if he expected Wilker’s outburst.

  “How can you tease us with your power and give it to a woman who is going to die? How can you do that!?”

  Isabel looks up at Wilker, she can’t believe what he just said. How can she be that selfish?

  “When she accepts my power, all her sicknesses and alignments will go away. She will become something different.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Wilker mutters. As soon as those words left his mouth, Wilker’s feet leave the ground. He starts to float into the air, towards the sky above.

  “You don’t have to believe my words about the invasion but I can and will show you my power. For Isabel’s sake your support is the most important,” Jahum says.

  Jahum raises his hand, ten rocks lift from the ground and glow steel blue. They come together under Wilker and merge into one solid piece.

  “I can create,” Jahum says. He squeezes his hands together. The rocks explode out into a harmless blue mist. “And I can destroy.”

  Wilker slowly hovers back to the ground and lands on his feet as if nothing happened.

  Wilker shakes and pats himself down. He’s whole. He looks at his wife, their gazes lock. He calms down. This being wasn’t lying, at least not about his powers, maybe it’s not as bad as it once seemed.

  As long as Isabel survives.

  Wilker can be happy so long as she lives.

  “Will I have to fight?” she asks.

  “Yes, but your power will be different from the others, their powers will be of strength and might but yours will be the one of understanding. In time you will have both strength and knowledge, but for now it is one or the other,” Jahum says.

  Jahum suddenly closes his eyes and stands very still. Wilker looks at Isabel.

  “I guess you were right. Sorry I doubted you,” he says. Isabel hugs him.

  Wilker wonders if this pending invasion is the reason for the stars disappearing at night, it was whatever is coming for them.

  “How does this process work?” Isabel asks Jahum.

  Jahum opens his eyes. “I’m…I’m sorry. I will not be able to give you my powers today.”

  “What? Why not? After all you’ve just told us?” Wilker asks.

  Jahum looks off into the sky, peering through the canopy of trees.

  “I have to leave, I may have found someone who could save us all. I will be back here, three weeks from now at five A.M. to give Isabel her power and take the both of you somewhere safe to prepare for the final invasion. That will be the morning ‘they’ will come.”

  “There is going to be more than one invasion?” Isabel asks.

  “What is to come is complete annihilation,” Jahum says.

  “How will people believe us?” Wilker asks Isabel.

  “I don’t know. Maybe I can use my status,” Isabel replies.

  “I ask of you to not tell anybody about our meeting…but if you must, speak of me closer to our next meeting, as opposed to earlier. It would do me harm if you tell any sooner,” Jahum says.

  Both Wilker and Isabel nod. Jahum raises his five fingered hand and a blue crystal appears in it, it’s about the size of a bottle cap. It’s a pendent for a necklace.

  “Thomas Wilker, I give this to you. If I need to contact you before our meeting it will be through this.”

  A blue light pulsates slowly from it. Wilker walks up, touching Jahum’s skin as he takes it. Wilker’s jerks his hand back. His skin was scorching hot. And with that, Jahum disappears in a white light.

  …

  The drive home is silent. This time Wilker drives and Isabel is in the passenger seat. She stares at her knees. Wilker slams his hands into the steering wheel. If Jahum could give them what he claimed, he probably could’ve healed her, that should’ve been the first bloody thing to ask for. Isabel places a hand on his arm, b
ut she doesn’t look up.

  Wilker looks at her. She’s going to live and yet he’s going to die instead. Wilker has always accepted death as an inevitability; he’s come to terms with that.

  But to have a time limit imposed on him puts a whole other twist to it. At least she can survive this. He has to look at the positives now. Everybody else except her is coming with him.

  He wants to break the silence and cheer her up. “So…what was it like to finally meet someone from another planet? I remember you always telling me that was a dream of yours.”

  She looks up. “It was…One of the biggest…It was amazing. I never thought it would be like this, how composed you and I were. I still have so many things to ask him,” she says with a smile.

  “Don’t worry, you’ll soon have all the knowledge in the world,” Wilker smiles. Isabel puts her hands on his on the gear switch and squeezes. All he wants is for her to be happy.

  …

  It’s silent again as they walk into their kitchen. Isabel isn’t speaking again after the long car ride, when she talked about what to ask Jahum next time. Like how old is he and his race, how does the universe actually work and questions of the sort. She walks to the kitchen island and leans on it.

  She starts to cry.

  “What’s wrong?” Wilker asks. That seems to be the question of the day.

  “It’s you,” she says. “Why are you so calm? When you learned you were going to die?” she mutters.

  “Everybody dies someday. I guess now by years end it’s my turn.”

  “Fuck you!” she says as she coughs into her hand. How is he so calm? He doesn’t know he’s scared to die, and of the nothingness of death and not existing but maybe it’s the realization of knowing that there isn’t a damn thing he can do about it. Maybe even though he believes Jahum, his consciousness doesn’t.

  “I don’t care as long as you are safe,” Wilker replies.

  “No! No, this isn’t right, I came to terms with my death. I stayed up countless nights crying in the bathroom and begging to whatever God that could hear me for forgiveness. I asked myself what did I do to deserve to die. Why are you going to take me out of the life of the man I love and why are you going to hurt him? And when I received no answers, I finally accepted it, that there was no way out and that I was going to die.” Her face is red and slick with tears.