David nodded, gathered up the rest of the papers and followed her from the room.
Chapter 4: Lunar Eclipse
Maggie let Marcus pull her through the southeast entrance by the hand. The air felt warmer and drier than it had in Interchron’s cool caverns, and something about it felt electric. As though it were charged with static electricity. The sky above looked black, as dawn still loomed an hour away, but the barest shade of lighter blue had appeared in the east.
As they passed through the entrance, Joan walked by them, headed the other way. She guided a sniffling, brown-haired boy who couldn’t have been more than six years old, into the mountain.
Maggie opened her mouth to ask about him, but Joan’s eyes looked severe. A quick shake of her head told Maggie not to ask. Marcus observed the exchange as well. When Maggie raised an eyebrow at him, he shrugged.
Fifty yards below the cave entrance stood a group of people. Doc’s white, blustery, shoulder-length hair immediately stood out against the black, pre-dawn sky. Maggie identified the others by their figures or stance. Two men she immediately recognized flanked Doc. Nat, with dark hair and a grizzled beard, stood to one side. Karl stood on the other. He towered above Doc. His dark skin might have camouflaged him against the night if not for his exotic, light blue eyes that caught the moon so sharply.
A man Maggie had never seen before with black hair and sallow skin stood a few feet behind them. A little way above them on the slope stood Lila. Maggie could tell because she was a spitting image of Joan, complete with petite built and dark, bobbed hair. Jonah, who shared Maggie’s auburn hair, stood next to Lila. Maggie recognized the way he stood. Both he and Lila had their arms crossed over their chests.
David, looking like a shorter, stockier Marcus, stood off to one side by himself.
One and all, the people Maggie trusted most in the world stared up at the heavens, clearly mesmerized.
Maggie followed their gazes upward and gasped. The moon loomed in the sky, larger than she’d ever seen it. For being so big, it wasn’t brighter. If anything, it looked dark, as though a shadow lay across it.
And she saw energy. Little worms of energy wriggled in the sky around the moon. There must have been thousands, of every shape and color and length. She recognized Offensive Energy, Defensive, Constructive, Destructive, the blue ribbons she saw around Karl when he Traveled, and countless others she couldn’t identify. And then there were…wrinkles. Tiny dark areas she was sure weren’t energy. Rather, the energy seemed to…fold around them in a way Maggie couldn’t quite make out. Like tiny black holes.
“What the hell,” Marcus muttered. Squeezing her hand, he made his way down to where Doc and the others stood.
She allowed him to tow her along, casting glances up at the bizarre heavenly sphere every few seconds as they went.
“Doc, what’s going on?” Marcus asked when they reached Lila and Jonah. “Why is the moon so big?”
Doc’s voice sounded faraway when he spoke. Preoccupied. “Because it is closer to us. Its orbit has been changed.”
Maggie exchanged glances with Marcus. “Who would have done that?”
“Not us,” said Nat. “I think it’s safe to assume it was them.”
No need to ask who he meant by ‘them.'
“Why would the collectives change the trajectory of the moon?” Lila asked, sounding nervous. “Is it going to hit us?”
“No,” Doc said firmly. “Such a thing would destroy them as well as us, and they are far too egotistical for that. All Interchron’s sensors can tell us definitively is that in five days, we will experience a lunar eclipse.”
“How does an eclipse serve the collectives?” Karl asked, pulling his gaze from the sky to look at Doc.
Doc gave a single shake of his head. His eyes hadn’t left the firmament. “The energy resulting from the perfect alignment of sun, moon, and earth is…unique. Beyond that, I have no idea. There must be a reason.”
“There is,” David said firmly, and all eyes, including Doc’s, fell to him. His voice softened to a murmur. “Dark moon, dark prophecy, dark matter.” He turned his head, gazing at the rest of them unflinchingly.
“Do you know what this is?” Doc asked.
“Not for sure. I can hazard a few guesses.” David’s gaze returned to the sky.
Maggie couldn’t see his eyes in the dark, but she knew they were the same color-flecked hazel as Marcus’s.
“I’ve finished translating the prophecy into English,” he said.
Maggie’s ears perked up. He’d done that for her, and she was anxious to read it.
“A few passages might be helpful,” David continued, eyes on the heavens. “We need to figure out what they’re doing. Immediately.”
“Why would they need to use Traveling around the moon?” Karl boomed. “And for a lunar eclipse?”
“You see Traveling energy?” Doc asked, looking both thoughtful and intense.
“Yes. Lots of it. It’s wrapped around other energies. Ones I can’t see and identify. I assume it’s because those come from abilities I don’t have, right Doc?”
“Most likely,” Doc said quietly.
“My mom said some of it is definitely Protective energy,” Lila offered.
“Healing too,” Marcus nodded from beside Maggie. She noticed Lila nodding. Lila had some small talent in Healing, though for some reason she fared much better with bone and cartilage than soft tissue. With Marcus, it didn’t matter.
“Lots of Concealment,” the stranger said, and everyone turned to him.
“Sorry everyone,” Nat’s deep voice rumbled. He scratched absently at his beard. “This is Tristan. I came across him by chance on the way to the coast. He saved me from a pod of Arachnimen I didn’t sense. If not for him, I'd be a drone by now.”
Maggie shivered. Everyone else exchanged troubled glances.
“Why didn’t you sense them, Nat?” Doc asked, casting a worried glance toward his brother.
Nat shrugged. “They were Concealed. Obviously, I wasn’t on my toes. Doc, Tristan is a Concealer. He has one of the most powerful abilities I’ve ever come across. Second only to Clay. He can also communicate telepathically over great distances.”
Maggie, along with everyone else, turned to look at Tristan.
Small, deep-set eyes sat above a long nose. He didn’t smile at anyone. On the contrary, his scowl looked utterly unfriendly, and though he stood lower on the slope, he somehow managed to look down his nose at…everyone.
“Well,” Doc addressed him. “If you’ve saved Nat’s life, you are most welcome at Interchron. I’m sure we can put your talents to good use here.”
The man bowed his head in Doc’s direction. “Good to be among others again,” he said, his stone face and pretentious tone suggesting the opposite. “I traveled alone a long time before meeting Nat. Anything I can do to help.”
Doc gave him a tight smile. “Thank you. I look forward to hearing your story. For now, you see Concealment being used in the heavens?”
“A great deal of it,” Tristan said, nodding arrogantly. “More than a single individual, even one strong as myself, or many working together, could accomplish.”
“Agreed,” Karl said. “Same with the Traveling particles I see. This must be the energy of thousands.”
“Maggie,” Doc said.
She jumped at the sound of her name.
“You’re being very quiet. What do you see in the firmament?”
Maggie took a deep breath. “All of them. I see all of them. Most I can’t identify, but I see them. Thousands of kinds of energy, all being woven together. The most complicated tapestry imaginable.”
Maggie pulled her gaze from the sky to find everyone staring at her. Marcus, only inches away, looked troubled.
“What?” she asked.
He only shook his head.
“Tristan has brought other news,” Nat said. “In some way, I think this,” he waved his hand to indicate the sky, “makes sense. Though I’
m not sure how exactly.”
“What news?” Doc asked.
Tristan answered. “The collectives will all merge into a single entity.”
“We’ve known that for a while,” Lila said.
Tristan gave her a cold look. “Yes. So Nat told me. But now it’s actually happening. Five days from this moment.”
“Which is right about the time the lunar eclipse should occur,” Doc said, nodding. “That must be it. We’re seeing them weaving together the minds of drones they already have. It has already begun.”
“Why the eclipse?” David asked. “They don’t need it for the merge. They must be planning to use its energy for something else.”
A cold fear fluttered in Maggie’s stomach. This didn’t sound good. “What do you think it is, Doc?” she asked.
“I can’t imagine,” Doc said. “Nat, other than a Concealer,” he nodded congenially at Tristan, who stared back coldly, “what else did you find?”
“I’m not sure how it all ties together,” Nat said quietly. “I found a small boy. Benny. His group was attacked and—most likely—all assimilated two days ago. He came into contact with a strange creature. A man he refers to as the Shadow Man. I think it may have been a Cimerian.”
Doc snapped his gaze toward Nat, his eyes as wide as Maggie had ever seen them. The shock in his expression dropped a healthy mound of terror into her stomach.
“I don’t know what one has to do with another, Johann,” Nat continued, “but this can’t be coincidence. Something big is happening.” Nat gazed at Doc and the two brothers shared a long look.
“Everyone inside.” Doc’s voice sounded soft, still full of the shock adorning his face.
The group shuffled toward the southeast entrance to Interchron, and Maggie didn’t think the trembling in her legs had anything to do with not having slept.
*******
“And then,” the brown-haired boy sniffed, wiping his nose messily on his forearm. “Téa pushed me into the river.” Tears ran down his cheeks and he hiccuped. “I think she became the Darkness.”
Joan, sitting beside him—ever the mother hen—handed him a handkerchief. He wiped his nose, rather than blowing it. It made his face look cleaner. The boy trembled like a brittle leaf, so Joan put an arm around his shoulders and he leaned into her.
She then turned a grim look on the rest of the team. Maggie felt the weight of her worry. They sat around the conference table, listening to Benny’s chilling story. Doc frowned from the head of the table. Maggie had settled at his right hand. Marcus sat next to her, with Lila on his other side, followed by Jonah and Nat. Across from Maggie, Karl lounged. Joan, her arm around Benny, sat beside him. In the far corner, David sat Alone.
Joan had taken Benny to medical first, where the Healers assured them his injuries were minor. Then she’d brought him to the conference room where the team listened to his story.
Tristan had gone to freshen up and settle into the rooms he’d been assigned. If he was as strong a Concealer as Nat said, he'd soon be joining the team in these meetings. For now, he needed to recuperate from a long journey.
“Benny,” Joan said gently, wiping more of the boy’s tears with her hands. “I know this is difficult, but it’s very important you tell us everything you remember. This shadow man you saw, whose eyes and mouth were sewn shut? Did he say anything? Did you hear any conversations he had?”
Benny sniffed, nodding. “He said he was looking for separ-separ-separated…people.”
“Separatists?” Joan asked softly.
Benny’s bright, wet eyes said she’d guessed correctly. The collectives often referred to individuals as separatists. Especially those involved in Interchron’s rebellion.
“Anything else?” Joan asked quietly.
After a moment, Benny looked up from his contemplation of his lap again. “He said something about someone who was…v-vanquished?”
Joan frowned in confusion. The others around the table wore identical expressions. They turned to Nat, who shrugged.
It tickled something in Maggie’s memory, though. Days before, she’d stood on a cold mountain, surrounded by enemies, with David, Jonah and Lila by her side.
David stepped forward, his shoulder brushing hers. “The Union’s prophecy calls for her death. Does the Union now denounce it?”
Justine’s eyes flashed toward David. “The Vanished One has nothing to say.”
Maggie glanced toward David, who sat on his own, arms crossed over his chest and studying the table in front of him. He didn’t react to Benny’s story.
“Vanished, Benny?” Maggie asked. “Were they asking about the Vanished One?”
The boy’s face lit up again, eyes the color of chocolate brown innocence. “Yeah, that’s it.”
Joan and the men looked askance at her, but didn’t voice questions. They would do so out of Benny’s hearing. David didn’t look up. Instead he turned his head away.
“What else did he say, Benny?” Joan asked.
Benny's eyebrows furrowed in thought. He shook his head, then stopped. “Oh, he said something about dark matter. Make it be active, or something. But no one can make dark matter do things.”
Maggie’s eyebrows climbed to her hairline, as did everyone else’s. Dark matter existed, but Maggie had only a vague notion of how to define it. This kid sounded…well versed.
“You know what dark matter is, Benny?” Joan asked, not bothering to keep the incredulity out of her voice.
Benny shrugged. “My dad studied the compost.”
Maggie smiled. She didn’t think ‘compost’ was what Benny meant to say.
Karl grimaced. “The what, now?”
“I think he means cosmos,” Marcus said, also fighting a smile.
Benny frowned. “That’s what I said,” he muttered darkly, glaring at Karl.
“And what did your father tell you about dark matter, Benny?” Doc asked. “Did he explain what it is?”
Benny nodded. “He said it was all the stuff in the universe we can’t see. We only know about it because it weighs a lot, and pushes other stuff around.”
Doc smiled broadly, as if at an excelling pupil. “That’s right. We can measure it by default, but it’s nearly impossible to define. The Shadow Man, Benny,” Doc went on, looking tentative. “He said he made dark matter…active?”
“Yeah. He’s stupid. No one can make dark matter do anything. How could he, if he can’t even touch it?”
“You are a very intelligent young man,” Doc said, sounding genuine.
Benny shrugged again.
“Anything else you can remember?” Joan asked gently.
Benny shrugged. “His voice sounded funny.”
“Funny how?” Joan asked.
The boys shrugged again, not meeting anyone’s gaze. “Like he was whispering in my ear from far away.”
Joan frowned and opened her mouth to ask Benny something else. Doc raised his hands behind Benny’s back, as though to tell her to let it go. She closed her mouth again.
By this time, Benny’s trembling had lessened considerably. Doc leaned forward, speaking softly and slowly.
“What did you mean,” Doc interjected, “when you said your sister became the darkness?”
Benny peered up at Doc, his eyes full of tears and intelligence. He shrugged. “I don’t know how to do it. My dad did it too. To save us from the collectives. He became the darkness, and sucked everything in, and we got away. Téa did the same thing to save me from the Shadow Man.” The boy’s voice cracked when he said his sister’s name and a fresh wave of tears cleaned his already spotless cheeks.
Doc studied Benny’s face, and Maggie wondered what thoughts zinged around in his brain. At times, she’d give almost anything to be a fly on the inside of Doc’s head.
“Did the shadow man get sucked in when Téa became the darkness, Benny?”
Benny, who’d regained some control of his emotions, shook his head slowly. “I don’t know. I didn’t see. He didn’t com
e after me, though. I got away. Then I ran into Nat.”
Benny looked toward Nat. Maggie and the others followed suit. Nat gave them a small, sad smile. “Literally. Tristan and I had nearly made it back to Interchron and I felt a strange energy coming toward me. Before I could decide what to do, Benny came barreling out of the brush and knocked me down.”
Doc nodded, taking a deep breath. “Benny, I’m so sorry this happened to you. You’re welcome to stay here with us. We’ll take care of you.”
Benny's eyebrows hiked in surprise. “I know. My dad already told me that. What about my parents? And Téa?”
Doc gave the boy a sympathetic look. “If the collective already took them away, there’s little to be done, now.”
The boy’s eyes welled up once more. “I’ll never see them again, will I?”
Maggie’s heart broke for him.
Doc took Benny’s hand in his. “Never say never,” he said gently. “The people here at Interchron are trying to bring the collectives down. If they fall apart, you may get your family back. Will you help us?”
Benny squared his jaw resolutely. He scrubbed the tears from his cheeks and rolled his shoulders back. “Yes. What should I do?”
Maggie smiled sadly. The thought of a child so young having to live in a world like this, having to fight for the return of a lost family, brought sadness. On the other hand, something about Benny struck her as noble. He’d obviously come from a decent, loving enough family to want to fight for them. Good for him. Maggie prayed the collectives would be defeated in Benny’s lifetime, at the least.
“I have an important mission for you, Benny.” Nat said, and the boy straightened his spine further, at rapt attention.
Maggie saw Doc raise an eyebrow at Nat, and rightly so. Somehow Nat knew what to say to get Benny to respond.
“Go with Dana. She knows everything there is to know about Interchron. She’ll find you something to eat. Eat up all your food. Then go straight to sleep. We need all the help we can get. You must be strong and well-rested if you want to help us bring down the collectives.”
Dark Matter (Interchron Book 3) Page 6