Dark Calling

“We will ensure they never open a tunnel to this world, by guarding each stone zealously. With no direct route of attack, Death will lead them to nearby planets and they’ll launch armies from there. When that happens… when the net is closing and the end looks certain… it will be your time.”

“What am I supposed to do?” I scowl. “Hold up a STOP sign?”

“You will open a window and slip away to another part of the universe,” Raz says. “And you’ll take the planet with you.”

He says it so simply that at first I nod as if it’s no big thing. Then it hits me and I turn from the edge of the platform and stare incredulously.

“Take the planet with me?” I repeat stupidly.

“When you’ve opened windows before, others have been able to slip through. This will be similar, only you’ll have to open a bigger window.”

“You’re insane!” I yelp. “I’ve never opened a window more then seven or eight feet tall.”

“That’s because you never needed a larger window,” Raz says calmly. “You can do far more than you’ve demanded of yourself. With our guidance you’ll learn to open a larger window and curve it, so it surrounds the world. That way, rather than propel the world through the window, it can close around the planet.”

I stare at Raz wordlessly. I don’t know what to think.

“Think of victory,” Raz growls. “Think of life. Think of the demons you’ll defy, the doom you’ll spare everyone here.”

“It’s impossible…”

“No,” Raz insists. “It can work. That’s no guarantee that it will—there might be obstacles ahead that we can’t predict—but we believe in the plan.”

My mind’s whirling. “But when I die, my piece of the Kah-Gash will link up with the others. You’ve already said you can’t control it.”

Raz clears his throat. “That brings us to the part you’re not going to like. As you say, we won’t be able to harness your piece of the Kah-Gash when you die, so we need to find a way around that. Kernel, what would you think if we asked you to make the ultimate sacrifice for the sake of the universe?”

“You want me to kill myself?” I ask with surprising calmness.

“No.” Raz leans forward, eyes sparkling. “We want you to live forever!”

A WARNING

We spend the night wandering the ark, sharing food and drink with some of the many creatures aboard. They don’t know who I am or the special task Raz has asked of me. They think I’m just another face in the crowd.

I’m surprised, as I talk with the sometimes multilimbed, multiheaded, multicolored aliens, by how alike we are. Not in looks, clothes, or customs. But they have the same concepts of good and evil. Family is important to them. Most are religious. They have dreams and hopes for the future.

“Are all civilizations like this?” I ask Raz as we stroll beneath trees full of bat-like beings. A few are playing a game on a chessboard.

“No,” Raz says. “We chose from the more compassionate species. They have a fighting spirit—we need warriors—but they can control their tempers. This world has to last an eternity. We cannot tolerate internal conflict.”

“It might happen anyway,” I note, watching a couple of bats chase each other through the branches, squealing happily. “People change, so I guess this group does too. You can’t know what they’ll be like in a million years. Groups might splinter. War could erupt.”

“Perhaps.” Raz sighs. “We’ll use magic to preserve the balance as best we can. Evolution will be curbed, so there’ll be no physical changes, but we can’t take all possibilities into consideration. We’ll plan as far ahead as possible. After that… as you would say, it’s in the hands of the gods.”

I still haven’t reached a decision. I’m weighing up all that the universe stands to gain against all that I will personally lose.

They want me to become a living tunnel between universes. Sometimes a mage becomes part of a tunnel, and lives as long as the tunnel remains open. They don’t age or die. If I agree to this, I’ll live until the end of time. Death won’t be able to claim me. I can keep moving the ark around, protecting this small pocket of survivors while all others are tracked down by the Demonata and slaughtered.

It’s not foolproof. My piece of the Kah-Gash might desert me when it realizes what I’m doing, or Death might find a way to trap the ark. But the Old Creatures think it will work. If I play along.

In their position, I’d force the guy with the power to accept. I wouldn’t give him any say in the matter. I’d open a tunnel, make him part of it, and leave him with no option but to do what was necessary.

But the Old Creatures believe I have the right to choose. It’s the creed they live by. They’ll guide their foster children in the right direction, but they won’t force us. Ever. Even if the fate of the universe is at stake.

It’s not a nice future—I don’t want to spend the rest of eternity as a cog in a machine—but if I refuse to cooperate and everything falls to the demon hordes, there won’t be any kind of a future at all. The Demonata will either get their hands on all three pieces of the Kah-Gash and destroy everything immediately. Or they’ll work their way through the universe, world by world, and gradually grind us into dust. Either way, universal catastrophe.

But if I stay, I’ll be surrendering all but a slim fraction of this universe to the demons. I might keep the millions on this world alive, but trillions of others will perish horribly. If I go back and link up with Bec and Grubbs… if we reassemble the Kah-Gash and test it against Death… then the universe has a chance. It might even be possible to save Earth.

Is it better to make a stand, fail, and lose all, or sacrifice unimaginable numbers of lives in order to keep a select handful alive? I don’t know! This task should have fallen to someone equipped to meet it, like Beranabus. He’d have said yes to the Old Creatures in an instant, without batting an eyelash.

“Perhaps that’s why he wasn’t chosen,” Raz murmurs. “We don’t know why the Kah-Gash selects those it inhabits. It might be random, or it might be the work of a higher force. Maybe the universe chose someone who would weigh both sides equally, who wasn’t so certain of his path that he’d ignore all others.”

“But what if I make the wrong choice?” I groan.

“You can only do what you believe is right,” Raz says. “Consider the angles. Heed your instinct. Decide. If you are wrong, at least you will have been true to yourself. Life asks questions of us all. We don’t always know the answers. Most times we have to guess.”

“But you think I should stay,” I press, trying to force Raz to decide for me.

“Yes,” Raz says. “But we also believed we were acting in the universe’s best interests when we encouraged evolution. We are not always right.”

I nod glumly. We’ve passed from beneath the trees and I can see the sky again. There are several moons, smaller than Earth’s, different colors. They look like huge marbles. Thinking of marbles, I remember when Art was stolen by a monster from another world. I darted through a window of light to try and rescue him. I didn’t know what lay on the other side. The safe option would have been to wait and consider my actions. But then the window would have closed, Art would have been lost. I’d have regretted my indecision for the rest of my life.

Raz squints at me. “You are going back,” he notes with surprise.

“Maybe Death can’t be defeated,” I sigh. “Maybe the Demonata have won and this ark is all we can hope to protect. But I have to try to stop them. If I run now, I’ll always wonder if there wasn’t something I could have done to save everyone.

“If I fight Death and fail, I’ll return to do what you wish, assuming I survive. But if I quit now, it’ll gnaw away me… at my soul… forever.”

I lower my gaze and wipe tears from my eyes. I don’t know when I started crying, but my cheeks are soaked. “Open a window,” I croak. “I’m going home.”

The journey back passes unremarkably. A series of lights, windows, and worlds. We follow a different route most of the way, but the chambers we pass through are much the same. I don’t explore any of the worlds. I’m