Moonweavers

by Savage, J. T.

  “Good luck, Scott,” the professor says as he shuts the door and enters the truck with the others. All the ghosts knew that you couldn’t use energy for too long to be in the physical world. It drains you and then it would kill you, so they left a couple prisoners behind that they used for just these tasks to drive the trucks and move the equipment. The two that were in the Bronco committed horrifying murders back in the 80’s as kids, but the police didn’t have enough evidence to hold them and just let them go. So that’s when the guardians took the law into their own hands and made these people zombies, in a way, thanks to Jades manipulating powers to control the minds of humans. So they use these two filthy individuals for their labor. If anything it kept them busy enough to not kill any more people. Safer for everybody really. Without their vicious, evil thoughts, they wont be able to hurt anyone. It was unanimous in agreement throughout the whole guard and deeply needed or else they would all extinguish each other just by moving stuff around, which is something that no one could afford or wanted to do. Would you really want to kill yourself to rake leaves in the yard? No. And the ghosts feel the same way. They know how much a life is valued, so they are not going to waste their second chance with limitations. They learn to adapt. The ones that they borrowed for the mission to go on top of the hill, they were well confident in knowing that Jade would change them and never think about a thing of what they did and they would go back to their happy little lives after everything was done with no one the wiser, just a little bit later to their destinations. She will worm it into their head that they were just caught in traffic. She has done it plenty times before and probably will do it again if they need more man power. Its just the way things have to be. They were just happy that these two scum buckets wouldn’t hurt anyone anymore and become useful for one day in their lives, at least. And boy, were they. They would mow the lawns, rake the leaves, drive the cars, move equipment, shine and clean the windows and the house and they wouldn’t have to be paid and the small cabin looks immaculate.

  The pain subsides with Scott in full wolf form. He hurries out the door. In a flash, he has gone after Links and the others scent up the mountain. Using his power of speed, he catches up quickly to the others, even though they left hours before. He sees them climbing the ridge above where the trucks parked at the bottom of the mountain. He quickly ascends the mountain and wait’s at the top for them. Links could have been up there just as quick, but he wanted to make sure there would be no problems with the water container. He knew it would be utterly useless if it would happen to spring a leak. It would have to be air tight. The two men carried it ever so gently up the hill like it was a priceless painting that they would have to pay for if they dropped . At the very peak of the mountain, they all stand and Links shows them the entrance into the cave. He moves the giant rock boulder that is wedged shut over the entrance. As he rolls it slowly over, the hole appears from underneath. He jumps down into the hole and the others follow. It’s a small jump, maybe fifteen feet down, but it leads to a bigger room that goes down and down farther into the center of the cave of the mountain. It was Links most sacred place in all of the county. There are cave drawings all along the walls of the entrance with symbols from just about every written language ever created telling people to stop where they are at for if they go any farther they are doomed to be cursed of releasing the biggest evil ever put to man. When they walk into the bigger room, they see seven clay pots that are completely sealed. Links said that in those pots were the other black matter that was caught throughout the years were trapped. He also said that throughout the three hundred year period, there was a clay pot for every year that he was there. There was clay pot for every three hundred year evil release to man through the mooners shift to earth. He also explained why he had to have a bigger capsule for this one, because it took him this much longer to find it. He knew he would have to have a bigger capsule for it. It only made sense to at least Links, if the others didn’t quite understand. Now Links walks to the very end of the cave to a wall where there is a big boulder and he moves that one too and behind it is another passage, but he doesn’t quite open it all the way. He opens it just enough to set the gap from the water tanks cap into that hole and sits down after its positioned perfectly.

  Scott asks, “Why bring the humans?” He knew that Links could have carried that up by himself. He didn’t need them.

  Links replies, “Bait. If anything is going to drag that black matter out of that hole, it’s going to be human bait. We just put them on the other side and wait. That’s the way it was always done. The dark matter is very predictable. It likes to hide away from the sunlight and when it hides in this mountain, this is one of the ventilation shafts that leads throughout the cave. It will be drawn toward the humans and into the water tank. It will get stuck and then we close it up forever and leave it with those other great pots right there. That works every time.” The big wolf growls. “Yea, but the mooners are always a big distraction. Just the last three hundred years, it wasn’t wolves that we had to deal with.”

  “What was it?” asks Scott.

  “You name it, . It was vampires last time. Before that, it was some god awful sea creature. Came right out of the river. Other times, there are fleas that get on rats and cause plagues or viruses that don’t have nothing better to do than to destroy the immune system. You just never know what the hell is going to be coming down, but its pretty predictable in its three hundred years of terror. Sometimes they stick around. Other times we catch them beforehand. Its why I am so calm all the time. It is hard to surprise somebody who come to expect anything. It is part of immortality. Antiques don’t seem so old. You don’t want to get immune to people getting hurt or killed, but it happens, after seeing so much death.”

  “How old are you?” Scott asks.

  “Oh, I stopped counting a long time ago, my dear friend.”

  The two younger humans stand next to the water container, patiently waiting for something to come out of the hole and fill the giant plastic capsule.

  “All these sacred clay pots without any lids you see, Scott, these are old pots. They were made from the Indians that lived in this area hundreds of years ago. Thousands of years for that matter. They were all kind tribes that lived around here then. It was a simpler age. They were hunters and gatherers. Now they are all long gone, except for Bear Claw and a handful of others. They have moved on, not from just their lives, but from their ghost lives too. They had respect for the land too. Not like these settlers that came in and ran them off their lands and just destroyed things. Now don’t get me wrong, Scott, I am not against humanity. I am just thinking that we ought to share a little wealth with the earth, instead of taking from it. It would just be greedy to take it all, don’t you think?”

  “I suppose it would,” Scott replied in a growl.

  “See, I knew you would understand. That is why I am going to teach you these things. They really need to be known.”

  “Know what?” asks Scott, curious now.

  “Know that if you fuck with mother nature, well, lets just put it this way. Every major civilization that was ever put on earth, was doomed to collapse. If not by human hands, by the earth itself. Just like you and me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Just look at where you come from.”

  “You mean the moon?”

  “Well of course, . Oh my God, you don’t know a thing, do you? What were you told all those years that you lived on the moon, Scott?”

  “That we took everything from the surface of our planet, the moon and it took revenge and it ate us.”

  “Well, that is partly true in a way, but I was there. You guys just kind of guessed at life after we left. You poor mooners are clueless as to what happened up there.”

  “How so?”

  “Just look at it. We weren’t drawn in. We lived in the moon. It didn’t swallow nothing. We were there to begin with. All we were was just a drilling operation, for Pete’s sake. Turned out wha
t our little planet, the moon rock, was really made of was a energy that could supply the spaceships that flew from other planets. It was like a giant gas station.”

  “Well, what happened? Why didn’t they come and save us from within the moon?”

  “I will tell you what happened. They left us there. Turns out, new technologies came and they used other types of engines that used other types of fuel.”

  “What kind of fuel?” Scott asks.

  “The very same thing we are going to capture tonight, Scott. Black matter.”

  “Say what?”

  “Black matter is the energy that they use in outer space. Its infinite and everywhere. They don’t have to stop now. They just pull it right out of space. With their new engines, they have an endless supply now. Its like running everything off air.”

  “And they just left us there to die?”

  “We were charging them an arm and a leg for everything they ran. Once they had the new energy source, we became obsolete. We should have thought about it a little more and made more advances, but we didn’t and we stayed. Things just got uglier after that. That moon up there is an entity just like this earth is and its alive. It captured those that let it and uses them for its own energy. Revenge? Maybe. But after extracting that much rock from the inner core of that moon there, I think it was the only thing it could do to survive. It was so weak. It used any energy that it had to its advantage which was the last thing left. Us.”

  “So my whole life is a lie?”

  “Its not your fault, Scott. Your ancestors did this to you. You didn’t. You were just born into it. You could blame us. We were the ones that were there first. It’s partly our fault. But we could never return to the moon and it wouldn’t do any good if we did. Their entrapped in it. What are we supposed to do about that? We can beam down here, but we can’t exactly beam back. Not after taking an organic form anyway at least. You’re not a spirit of the light anymore, Scott. Get used to it. You are stuck here. But you know what I miss most of all? I miss the traveling through space. We were just kids then going through space, looking for our next million. We went to a lot of planets to find energy that would run our ships. The moon rock was the best though. It made us a ton of money at the time but we just wasted it. Sure, we had nice technology, but no one to share it with. No way to grow. Then the moon took us back. It swallowed us whole. We were in mineshafts, mining out rocks and then one day we were just food. We were coming up to our three hundredth year when we finally escaped to this planet. It was the closest place to beam down to where the light would hit just enough to escape. What we left behind was our isolated little tombs that bred out new generations of a whole new species, which became you, my friend. Not everything that comes down is good and pure. Like this black matter isn’t good and pure. But you are, Scott. You were given the best gift of all. A conscience. Not like those other wolves. They are dead in the head. They will never feel love like you and I would and that’s why they have to be stopped. They are a menace and the black matter is a menace. It has no conscience at all either. That’s your biggest threat here on this planet. It doesn’t care if we live or die. It don’t care how much blood it has to absorb or splatter against anything. It just exists for carnage. So, being my son in a way, you are my ancestor, Scott. You must help us against any of the wickedness that comes down on to our new home. Are you in agreement with this or not?”

  “I’m here, ain’t I?” Scott replies.

  “Oh, you are on to my little trick, aren’t you?”

  “What trick is that?”

  “Why I let you transform into your wolf’s body all by yourself in a way. You could have done it on the way up the mountain with us, although it would have been hard.” Links said.

  “I don’t know if I could have,” Scott said. “It hurt this time really bad.”

  “The fact of the matter is that you came. You can follow orders. That’s good.”

  “What would have happened if I didn’t?” Scott asked.

  “You would have been held as a liability of course. Depends on your actions too. Lets just say that making wise decisions will be very beneficial.”

  “Why does this always work?” Scott asked Links.

  “I wondered about that over the years myself. The only conclusion I could come up with is they migrate like other animals. Like when birds go south for the winter and fish navigate to the seas in certain patterns and a caged lion will walk the same trails like a figure eight over and over all day long making patterns in the ground. Elephants will travel thousands of miles together going in the same direction every time. We don’t know why, but my niche is, if I put something in this hole, they come out and I cap it up. Humanity is better for it.” Links chuckles. “I have other jugs on other mountain tops and so do the other elders. Why none of them have ever broke, I don’t know. See how big those jugs are over there?” Links points toward the old pottery. “Each one is at least a foot thick.”

  “But what if say an archeologist came barreling through this cave hunting for treasures and stuff or dinosaur bones and runs across one of these pots that are all over the world? What if they crack one open and release this stuff? I mean, Jesus, you are supposed to be all wise and shit, but don’t you have a back up plan?”

  “It has happened in the past. Not around here. Germany and in the Swiss Alps. The mountains altitudes though slow it down to a certain extent. Keeps it from growing bigger, faster. Keeping it away from food is the hard part. It’s hard to battle something that can just make you evaporate within it to grow. Cold climates like this help too. If this is set off in a tropical atmosphere it could be devastating. That’s why we do keep the jugs in colder climates as well.”

  “Yea, but Links, what if the mountain caves in and cracks all these pots open? That shit will just seep out. Can’t you just put it back in space where it belongs?”

  “It wants to eat and grow before it goes back into space, Scott. It is part of its migration. It just can’t break through the magnetic atmosphere unless it follows something else through.”

  “Don’t people from other planets come down then? Don’t you talk to them or something? You used to supply them gas for Christ’s sake or magic rock power. Whatever the hell.”

  “Oh, they don’t stop here. There is no need to. Earth is a first class planet. They are like cavemen to them. They’re not interested. Not in the slightest. As a matter of fact, they don’t even waste their time coming out this way. They explored this part of the universe long ago. That’s the only reason we have set the rock station up over here. Once they realized that we were a first class planet and there wasn’t anything around here, they went in a different direction to explore better areas with more advanced lives that could do stuff, not little ants on a hill. Like your measly little planet here. It’s a great big world out there. That was a long time ago. It’s a long way to stage five. That’s at least where we would have to be. I don’t see how that would happen.”

  “I see,” Scott says.

  The ground starts to tremble and shake a touch. They here the rumble approaching them a little louder. The dark matter starts to enter into the giant aspirin shaped water canister. It swirls around and around, trying to get out. The men quickly flip it down and throw the lid on and tighten it up. The drum shakes and wobbles. The men climb on top. It jumps a little as it goes faster within the water tank. Around and around, trying to get a momentum going.

  “The canister is too light. It’s not heavy like the pots. We are going to have to bury it.” Scott and Links start digging a big hole in the middle of the cave floor. Scott makes great headway in the dig being part wolf. His front paws move in a blur as he digs through the earth below. The big ape’s arms work like a backhoe picking up giant piles of the earth and setting it down to the side from within the hole. He says, “Enough”, and climbs out of the hole quickly. The hole has to be eight feet deep. He sets the giant canister within it, knocking the two young men completely off in one jerk. The
y all come to the hole and bury the thing deep within the earth. They all pack the earth tight. When it gets covered up, Links walks over to a big boulder, the size of a refrigerator and moves it over to where the hole was and sets the giant rock on top gently to mark the spot. He walks over to a dugout shelf with various smaller pots with lids and he opens the middle one, sets his hand within it. It comes out dripping with white substance. Scott recognizes it as whatever the marks on the cave wall were all around them. Some type of ink or paint. Links walks over with his white hand now covered in the substance. In his other hand is the little pot that holds the liquid. He starts to mark little lines all along the top and sides of the rock and a handprint on the very center of the top of the giant boulder. He then returns the pot to the shelf where the others were. He smacks his hands together and they both turn white. He wipes it on his legs, smearing white paint all over the sides of his body, trying to get it off his hands but just smearing it all over his hair. He smacks his hands together one more time and points toward the exit of the cave. “We are through here for now,” Links says and they all walk out. Covering the entrance with another giant boulder, Links closes up the secret place so no one can come in and find its treasures. “Lets just hope that it’s the last of them for awhile,” he says as he places the last boulder over the entrance from where they jumped down into the chamber. Links tells the two young men to take the trail back to the truck and go back to the highway to where they need to go. The two men quickly head down the path. Links walks to the very peak of the mountain where he stood earlier that day. Scott comes behind him. Links turns and says, “Follow me,” and disappears off the edge. Scott blindly follows. The jump down, rock to rock, ledge to ledge, until they meet at the very bottom of the mountain and take the old trail that the big man has trotted down so many times before back to the cabin.