Dark Matter (Interchron Book 3)

by Liesel K. Hill

“Outside on the slopes," Karl said. "Southeast entrance. Something’s up with the eclipse. And Nat’s back.”

  Maggie frowned. Where had Nat gone?

  Marcus must have been confused too. “Did Nat go somewhere?” he asked.

  “Yes.” Karl sounded annoyed. “Doc sent him to the island—how long have you two been shut up in here?”

  “We—uh,” Marcus stuttered. “Have been busy.”

  Maggie rolled her eyes, feeling her face heat, and waited for the inevitable raunchy comeback sure to issue from Karl’s mischievous mind. It never came. His voice sounded utterly serious—troubled—when he spoke again.

  “Just come.”

  Chapter 3: The Poetry of a Joke

  David finished writing the final word and laid his pen down, rubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands. He didn’t remember ever being this exhausted when living in the collective. But then drones in the collective fed off one another’s energy. He needed sleep.

  He rose from the rock slab that served as his desk and turned toward his bed, but paused. A small-game trap, made from tough vines, sat on the corner of the desk. David picked it up, running it’s familiar contours through his hands

  His father had taught him to make these kinds of traps to capture small game when he and Marcus were just boys. He hadn’t made one for nearly fifteen years while he’d been living in the collective. Once he broke away, he’d begun making them again. It had felt natural, like he’d never stopped. Before David could speak, the trap prompted Nat to give him the name Trap.

  David had kept the trap with him, though there was no need for it here at Interchron. He found it calmed him. A tie to a simpler time when he’d felt safe. And a reminder of why he’d left the collective. What he fought for.

  Feeling distinctly uneasy about everything going on since they’re returned from the Canyon—not to mention what they’d seen there—David dropped the vine trap onto the desk, peeled off his shirt and fell into bed, pulling the covers over him. In a matter of minutes, unconsciousness took him.

  The drones moved robotically around David. Their bodies went through the motions of daily life, hands and feet performing the mundane tasks necessary to keep the citizens of the collective—or any human being—functioning.

  David watched them. No! Worse than that, he was one of them. His hands moved of their own accord. His feet marched to where he knew without a doubt he needed to be. No thought lay behind the action. No emotion. What was emotion? Only grayness existed in this place.

  The sun rose, the sky lightening by degrees. The beauty of the sunrise didn’t move him. His mind processed it as a computer would. Simply the brightening of the sky due to the natural turning of the planet. Necessary for life, but nothing of note.

  It had meant more to him once. He knew it had. Now, as the sun's first light pierced the darkness, he couldn’t call up that same reaction.

  The sunrise had once been so beaut—normal, natural. Exactly what needed to happen each day.

  The colors were—simply chemical. The wavelengths perceived by the human eye created different hues. A trick of biology. No more.

  Every time he called on the reaction he’d once had, it melted away, like water through stretched-out fingers. The collectives mediated emotions. Made it impossible to build up enough energy to have an emotional reaction to anything. Being part of the collective was the best thing for David.

  No. He wasn’t David here. That name belonged in the past. Or was it the future? He couldn’t remember. It made no sense. One cannot remember what hasn’t happened yet. Strange thoughts.

  Here he was simply one of many. A drone. What need did he have of identity distinctions when all parts were equal here in the grayness? The drone wasn’t even a he here. Gender resulted merely from the flipping of a chromosome. A chance falling of DNA. Its importance lay in the propagation of the species, but that didn’t mean such distinctions need be made outside the breeding houses. Here, all things remained equivalent.

  But that sunlight…

  When the drone glanced upward again, the sunlight seemed less bright. Less unique than a moment ago. Only another part of the landscape, ruled by the laws of nature. His earlier thoughts about it faded, washing out of his mind like the fading of so much color. Life should be lived with all things being equal.

  So why did he feel panic?

  It wasn’t adrenaline—the collective mediated such things—but the sense of it lingered. In his mind. No, in his heart. He needed to break away.

  The panic rose in earnest now. His adrenaline spiked. It immediately evened out, which intensified the panic, spiking it again. The collective fought harder to keep him calm.

  The drone—no David! His name was David!—had to get away. He knew how to do it. He knew it would hurt. He’d done it before—when? He couldn’t recall, but he had.

  The adrenaline grew, too fast and high for the collective to keep up. In one sudden motion, accompanied by a ripping sound and a searing rush of pain, David broke free.

  Blink.

  David sat on his butt on the forest floor. His heart ran marathons in his chest cavity and fear clutched at his spine. The setting around him looked entirely idyllic. Peaceful forest. Green shrubs sprinkled with glowing spring buds. The trees stretching heavenward reached so tall, they made him feel little. Yet, the fear remained. Where was this place?

  The snapping of twigs on his right brought his head around and the terror spiked. Vaguely, he wished for the mediation of the collectives to control his fear, if not his curiosity.

  The woman who stepped from the foliage immediately laid the fear to rest. Maggie stood before him, and a soft smile played across on his lips. She wore brown pants, torn and bloodied above the right knee. Her blouse was pastel blue, he thought, and faded enough to cast doubt. The left shoulder had been burnt away, and whatever incinerated the fabric left an angry welt, red and blistering, on her white skin. Her face looked haggard, stained with dirt and tears. Red-rims bordered her eyes. A streak of white ran through her auburn hair.

  Alarmed, David moved to go to her. She crossed the clearing and knelt beside him. Laying a hand on his arm, she gazed down into his eyes. “Are you okay, David?”

  David closed his mouth a moment later. A strange question, given her state. “I’m fine, Maggie. What happened?”

  “Don’t be afraid. I won’t let the monsters hurt you.”

  “Maggie.” He grasped her arms. She laid a hand on his shoulder and pushed him down with surprising firmness. Strangely, he looked up at her. Too far up, as though she were far taller than her real height.

  Her face crumpled. “I’m so sorry, David.” Tears leaked from her eyes.

  David’s alarm intensified.

  “I have so much I want to say,” she whispered. “All of it, perfectly inadequate. You won’t understand right now anyway.” The last sounded like an afterthought.

  “I’m right here, Maggie," David said, wishing he could make his voice firmer. It came out as a soft whisper. "I’m listening. Tell me what happened.”

  Maggie locked her gaze on his, her eyes deep blue pools of grief. David reached up and cupped her face with one hand.

  “I don’t know,” she sniffed, “if one person can communicate a lifetime of emotion to another without words. If we can, I hope this does.” She leaned down and pressed her lips to the spot directly between David’s eyebrows. He froze. It had been twenty years since he’d been kissed in any way by anyone. Collective drones performed the necessary acts for reproduction. Kissing was not one of them. David shut his eyes and leaned into her, clutching her elbows with his hands. The kiss felt motherly, but he’d take what he could get from Maggie.

  Whenever she drew near, something in his gut ached, drawing him toward her. Sometimes he swore the pull was physical. Like a hook tugging at his intestines, except it wasn’t truly his intestines. The tug came in some part of his soul housed so deep inside him, he couldn’t point to where it was.

  Her lips
left his forehead. She pressed her cheek there, slick with tears.

  “It’s okay, Maggie,” David whispered. “Please, let me help.”

  “I’m so sorry,” she whispered back. “For all of it. I’m sorry I have to do this at all.” She pulled back and looked down at him. Far down. “It’s the only way to save them.”

  Her head swiveled to look back behind David. He didn't hear anything. Perhaps she’d sensed something neurochemically.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Marcus is back there. So is your father.”

  David gasped. “My…what?”

  Maggie dropped her voice to a whisper. “You have to find them, David. Whatever else happens…it’s more important than you could possibly imagine.”

  He opened his mouth to ask her to explain. Maggie sat back on her heels, closed her eyes, and raised her arms. She gathered energy, though for what, he couldn’t say. After a moment, she placed the palm of one hand against his stomach. Oddly, it lay over the exact spot in which he always felt the pull.

  He didn’t understand. Where were they? What was all this? He trusted Maggie too much to fear her. Even so…

  “David.”

  The voice came from far away. He didn’t think he’d truly heard it. It seemed more like it came out of his own head.

  “David.”

  Everything around him became vague. Indistinct.

  “DAVID!”

  With a gasp, David lunged into a sitting position. Lila leaned over him, kneeling on the bed beside him with one hand on each of his shoulders. When he lunged upward, he nearly head-butted her.

  “Whoa!” Lila said. “Easy. You okay?”

  David’s breath came too deep and ragged for having been asleep. A sheen of sweat covered his bare arms and chest. Lila studied him from inches away with sincere worry in her eyes. He turned his head away.

  “What are you doing in here, Lila?”

  Lila sat back, looking annoyed. “Things are happening. Nat is back. This whole eclipse thing is obviously freaking Doc out. He wants us to meet the team out on the slopes. Southeast entrance. I knocked like sixteen times and you didn’t answer, so I came in. You talked in your sleep and it was really hard to wake you up. You sure you’re okay?” She glanced down at his torso. “Please tell me you have something on under this blanket.”

  David rolled his eyes and turned away from her, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and throwing back the cover, exposing the dark pants he wore. “I’m fine.” He turned his head slightly back toward her. “Did you hear what I said? In my sleep, I mean.”

  She hesitated, running a hand through her black, shoulder-length hair. With dark, hawkish eyes to match, she looked like a slightly younger version of her mother. “Not really. Mostly incoherent babbling. I caught Maggie’s name a few times,” she added quietly.

  “It’s not what you think,” he said softly. “Somehow, it felt like more nightmare than anything else.”

  Lila raised her hands as if in surrender. “Hey, none of my business either way.” She slid backward off the bed and to her feet. “You gonna get dressed or what?” She walked purposely away from the bed and toward his work area. He knew it was her way of giving him privacy, though he noted she didn’t move to leave.

  It wasn’t surprising, though. In the past months, he and Lila had spent a great deal of time together. They never talked about anything of much importance, but she was always there, and rarely let him get away with anything. Obviously, she wasn’t planning to leave until he came with her.

  David pushed to his feet and went to the closet.

  “What is all this?” Lila asked a minute later.

  David had pulled a shirt over his head, so her voice sounded muffled. He yanked it down around his shoulders and turned. She’d picked up the papers on the desk and now read them, brows drawn down in concentration.

  A sliver of self-consciousness at having her read it slid down David's spine. A foolish emotion to have. Nothing stayed private in the collectives. Why should he develop insecurity now? He finished dressing before crossing the room to her.

  She raised her gaze from the paper she read, her eyes inquisitive, but completely serious. “What is this, David?”

  He shrugged. “I told Maggie I’d translate the prophecy for her. I'd mostly finished before we took Kristee to fetch her and Jonah. Now that she’s back, I wanted to finish it. I think I finally have." He shuffled through the stacks of paper on the flat rock slab. He’d separated the prophecy into parts, based on what it referred to. “There are some interesting things about eclipses in here. Maybe I should bring them to the meeting.”

  After a moment of sifting through pages, he became aware of Lila still staring at him. She hadn’t gone back to reading the paper she held.

  “What?” he asked.

  “It rhymes.”

  He frowned. “So?”

  “You’ve translated the prophecy into poetry. David, it’s beautiful.”

  A strange sensation in his cheeks—heat, he thought—made him duck his head. Lila didn’t turn her gaze away. He wished she hadn’t read the papers to begin with. He cleared his throat. “You know, Lila, with how little respect you have for boundaries, you might do well in the collectives.”

  Lila stared at him blankly for several seconds, then burst out laughing. The laugh took him by surprise and he jumped, dropping several of his papers. Once he’d gathered them again, he raised an eyebrow at her.

  Lila’s grin filled her face. “Did you just make a joke?”

  David frowned. “No.”

  “Yes, you did!”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “David.” Lila set down her paper and rested both hands lightly on his arm. “Do you mean you sincerely think I should enter the collectives because I'd make such an amazing drone?”

  “I—no.”

  “Then you made a joke,” Lila grinned. “You just don’t know it. You were totally razzing me.”

  If her grin widened any farther, he feared her face would break.

  “If I didn’t know better,” she laughed again, “I’d say you were spending too much time with Karl.”

  “I…haven’t been.”

  “I know!”

  David didn't understand why his remark made her so happy. It hadn’t been particularly kind.

  “Oh relax, David,” she rolled her eyes at his expression. “You’re becoming more human. More an individual every day. It’s good to see. Like the brother I never had, all grown up.”

  She gave him a somewhat smaller grin, showing her teeth. After a moment, David smiled back. He often didn’t understand Lila’s sense of humor. Sometimes her behavior struck him as downright strange, but he could tell she was being sincere. Even if he didn’t understand her excitement, she obviously thought he’d done something good. It made him feel…pleased. Emotions were peculiar things. Most of the time he couldn’t understand why he felt what he did.

  Why did a smile make one feel so good? Why did tears in one person bring them to the eyes of so many around them? Emotions seemed…contagious, which made no logical sense at all.

  “Bring it all,” Lila said. “Everything you’ve translated.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, you want to give it to Maggie, right? She’ll be there. First time she and Marcus have come for air since—” She cut off when he glanced away, her expression chagrined. “Sorry, David.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he murmured. “It’s nothing.”

  “If it’s nothing, why do you stare at her all the time?”

  “I don’t stare at her all the time.”

  Lila barked a mirthless laugh. “Uh, yes. You do. And you need to knock it off. It’s pissing Marcus off. He’s never gonna be open to forgiving you for all your brotherly drama if you keep making eyes at Maggie.”

  “I’m not,” David stopped, struggling for the words. “It’s not…you make it sound…so physical.”

  “Isn’t it?”

&nb
sp; “No. At least, there’s more to it.”

  “Like what?” Her voice took on a gentle tone. “Try and explain it to me.”

  “I feel…drawn to her. I can’t…stop looking at her.”

  Lila broke into giggles again. “Yeah, you think she’s hot. That’s the epitome of ‘physical’ David.”

  David let out his breath in frustration. He didn’t have enough words yet to explain what he felt toward Maggie. It was more than simple physical attraction. He was certain of it.

  “Look,” Lila took his hand. “I get it, David. Whatever you feel for Maggie is your business. But you and Marcus fighting might cause problems in the group, and what we’re doing is too important to risk it. You’re still getting used to what your emotions and…sensations mean. Just don’t automatically do whatever those urges tell you to do. You know it’s causing friction between you and Marcus, and you want Marcus to like you again, right?”

  She already knew the answer. He’d told her as much. He nodded anyway.

  “So, don’t do it. Problem solved.”

  “Me not looking at Maggie will not solve my problems with Marcus,” he said quietly.

  Lila's smile shrank but didn't completely disappear. “No, probably not. But it’ll be a good step in the right direction. Right now, doing that is putting up a wall you’ll have to get past before you can start mending things with him. Okay?”

  He nodded reluctantly. He understood the logic. He simply found it hard not to stare at Maggie when she walked into any room.

  Lila dropped his hand. “Let’s go.”

  “Where’s Jonah?” he asked as he gathered up the papers with the prophecy written on them.

  “Meeting us there,” Lila said.

  “How’s he coming along?”

  She shrugged. “We’re hitting a lot of walls. I'm not sure why. Doc thinks he has a psychological block. Jonah’s frustrated. Just gotta work through it, I guess.”

  David nodded. “Did they tell you where Doc sent Nat yet?”

  “Of course not.” Her voice took on a slightly higher than usual, nasal quality. He’d heard it from her before. “We’re not part of the group named in the prophecy.” She dropped the tone before continuing. “I’m hoping since they invited us all to this meeting, they’ll tell us now. But in order to find out, we have to actually get there.” She slid her eyes significantly toward the doorway.