I am finding it strange to be rewriting things that I first wrote so long ago. It is probably nearly forty years since I last touched this. I knew the book and its entire concept was flawed and anachronistic and had given up hopes of resurrecting it.
My determination to type it up now is mainly nostalgia. It means a lot to me because I had invested so much time, energy and hope. I once estimated that there was probably between two and three thousand hours of work in these two volumes – with all the writing and rewriting. Time spent at my typewriter in the dead of night over five years while everyone slept. Time stolen from sleep and days at work jaded with fatigue.
It all came to nothing.
This works as a short story, though I conceived it as part of the collage that comprised the novel.
A lot of these ideas went on to become Sci-fi books in their own right. This one was the basis of Zero to Infinity – the book I have just typed up from manuscript and is now awaiting a rewrite when I get round to it.
32.
Messny finally arrived at the very edge. Behind there were still a few twinkling stars visible at the very limits of vision which were the furthest galaxies, but ahead there was no light at all. He was peering out from the event horizon into the void. This was the edge of the universe. Beyond this point there was an infinite sea of nothing. This was the edge.
This was the furthest point from the centre of the universe that it was possible to go. Nothing existed beyond this point. That was impossible for the human mind to grasp. Behind him galaxies, light years across, consisting of trillions of stars, tumbled and swirled outwards in raging cartwheels of power, but were nothing more than the faintest prick of light. There was no night full of stars here, just a bereft inky blackness, a portent of what was to come.
Messny faced outwards into the total blackness ahead and had never felt so all alone. It was a loneliness like no other human being had ever experienced. It felt like all anguish was gathered into his mind and he could hold it in his hands; it was as black as the sky he was looking at. Somehow standing here made everything totally pointless. Peering out into the void he was reminded that all life, all light and all evidence that it had ever existed, would eventually be extinguished. Turning to peer back into the centre of that universe from whence he had come he could feel the distant lives of the rest of humanity lost somewhere in those furthest reaches and knew that even after all time had passed their light would never reach this spot.
He had achieved his mission and now, standing alone in his life-preserving suit, hanging in space, he could survey all that had been achieved, could ever be achieved and what it really meant. It meant nothing. He sighed with the most melancholy sigh any man had exuded, a sigh without the slightest taint of hope. His mind picked its way through the most morbid of thoughts. This is not the way it was meant to be. He was not moved to joy or any sense of accomplishment by the staggering success of what had been achieved. Quite the opposite. Back on Earth human beings had contrived to solve the greatest problems in the universe. They had created a machine that could take a human being to the edge of infinity. It was the most spectacular achievement in the history of humankind. Yet all it served to do was to remind him of their complete impotence and unimportance in the face of entropy. No matter what wonders they performed it was all ultimately doomed. The universe would die.
Standing here had brought it all home to Messny. A deeply saddened feeling caused the lines to show up deeply etched in the young skin of his face. His eyes glistened and his flesh drooped in defeat as he stared out into the future.
Messny had spent twenty lonely years in isolation in his single-man craft in order to reach this point in space. Throughout that entire journey he had been tended to by the ship’s computer with all its psychological expertise and, as far as he was aware, had come through the experience completely sane.
At last he had emerged at his destination and his eyes had once more seen their first view of space for twenty long years. It was a shock. For two decades he had become used to the dreamy flowing vivid colours of hyperspace as he travelled between the folds of normal space and time. His eyes were used to its brightness and vitality. He had dreamt of the skies of Earth, so full of stars, with the Milky Way like a girdle of smoke. He had counted off the constellations and fed off his memories. Here was the reality. To be surrounded with nothing.
Twenty years of fighting loneliness with an iron will and rigid system of work and play devised by a machine. In fact he had been living in his past. His mind had constantly been running through his memories and wondering about places, people, friends and loved ones. They were all gone now. On top of the twenty years he had been awake there were all the hundreds of years in hibernation. Who knows what strange dreams he wove in that strange medium? Did those dreams take shape to become other beings nightmares?
What would the world look like now? Would it still be there? Did humans still exist?
What strange thoughts assailed him?
He remembered the pageantry of his farewells just like he remembered the words of his family and friends – ‘An impossible task – a suicide mission – utterly pointless.’
He had heard it time and time again. Perhaps he should have listened.
‘Man has to challenge the universe! – To challenge infinity!’ Messny had defiantly stated in defence of his stupidity.
But what strange compulsions caused society to devise such a pointless task? A journey with no chance of reporting back for centuries to come?
Was it merely a propaganda campaign? A distraction to take people’s minds off the real issues? Was it just that there was too much money, too few challenges, too little work for too many – they needed something to do? Was it to face a new challenge and test human capability to its limits? Did they do it because they could? Because it made them feel important?
Probably all of that and more. But that did not explain why he had agreed to become the cretinous guinea pig. He had so much to live for. Was it ego and vanity that had made him accept this one-way ticket? Did he really believe that he was, out of all the countless billions, the only one who could cope with all the stress and demands? Was his ego that big?
The answers eluded him.
Messny knew that a man could convince himself of anything. If people tell him often enough, if they flatter, if they are convincing, then the man will come to believe the most irrational of things.
He had duped himself.
Now, standing on the edge of the universe, possible with all traces of humanity long gone, he had to live with it. If he was fortunate enough to live to return he might well find humanity confined to fossils and artefacts in a thin layer of dirt. He could possibly be the last remaining specimen of his species – the last man standing. He’d known that when he left but to be here and facing the reality of that possibility was another thing altogether. For Messny it seemed not so much a possibility as a fact. He believed they were all gone. All that was left of humanity were a band of light and radio waves radiating out through space forever. As the front expanded it was weakening and weakening until it was swallowed up among the other energies. At that point humanity was lost forever – a squeak in space, formless, meaningless and unnoticed – the fate of all man’s achievements.
He had to make himself believe that wasn’t so. Mankind had prevailed and survived all the cataclysmic events that could have occurred. Maybe in all the time that had elapsed they would have become wise, less belligerent, more tolerant and less greedy?
He allowed himself to imagine his triumphant return. Perhaps they will have predicted the event and would welcome back a lonely old man in his metal cage – a man who had been to the edge and back and he would be a hero? Perhaps they had been teaching children about him for generations and they had been taught to see him as a romantic, heroic pioneer, risking his life, giving up his life, to explore the limits?
It was hard to conceive. It was equally hard to take any heart from. The blackness out there was without any shape or form. It was devoid of compassion. The only colours were the ones his eyes were forming from phosphine in his own retinas.
He returned to his craft and turned it to face out into the inky darkness of the void. Nothing showed up on his instruments. He turned on powerful beams of light as if that might illuminate the infinite. They shone like fingers reaching out into the nothingness and fell short. The light crept.
From outside the craft, travelling at a fraction off the speed of light of light seemed to hang motionless in darkness with two beams of light inching forward at a snail’s pace. There was no up and down other that the orientation imposed on it by the alignment of the craft.
Watching that light creep made him question whether he could truly be considered to be at the edge, at the actual event horizon. His mind could not really grasp the reality that there was nothing beyond this point.
He peered out. Maybe somewhere out there was a faint pinprick of light? Another entire universe? Maybe a myriad more? Perhaps there were an infinite number of universes out there in the void? Each with their galaxies and living creatures?
Messny was now convinced that his whole mission was totally pointless. Being on the edge was of no importance what-so-ever.
As he peered and the beams crept out his eyes played their tricks. The phosphine flowed and he could make out patterns like bricks, a latticework. There were concentric blue rings that flowed out from the centre of his vision like ripples in a pond. He blinked but he could not lose them.
Messny decided to move. He had not come all this way to be so passive. It was stupid to just sit and stare even if the ship’s instruments were recording everything they could. He needed to do something positive as well if only for the sake of his own sanity. That was the only reason they had conceived this project as a manned mission. There are things a person can pick up that a machine cannot.
Scanning the monitors he noticed one that attracted his attention. The ship was pointing out into the void yet the sensors were reporting that there was something solid ahead. It was incongruous with the other input. There was no report of the slightest gravitational pull. He peered out through the viewport. Somewhere ahead there was matter but it had no gravity. How could that be? What sort of matter could exist at the event horizon?
As the craft proceeded it became clear from the instruments that whatever was ahead extended in all directions to the limits of the instruments. Whatever strange substance was out there it was utterly dark, was unbelievably immense and consisted of a substance that mankind had never encountered before.
Messny’s mind was buzzing as he tried to comprehend what this might be. There was nothing that he could relate to. All he could do was wait for the ship to draw near.
When it finally came into sight it was startling. In front of the ship, illuminated by the twin beams of light was what appeared to be a wall – a smooth, immense flat wall of inky blackness. From the ship’s instruments it was as straight as could ever be imagined and yet, analysing out to the limits of the instruments it was clear that there was the faintest curve which indicated that they were looking at the most miniscule section of a huge sphere, a sphere that contained the entire universe, a sphere of a size beyond all credibility.
Messny’s mind was reeling. It was the most ridiculous thing to have encountered. There were no words to describe it. Here, in space, at the edge of the universe, at the event horizon, was a wall.
Messny spent many days travelling parallel to the wall, investigating it with every instrument at his command. He stopped at many points to sample the wall but found nothing that could pierce it. The only things he could deduce was that it was made of a smooth, black, reflective substance. Up close it resembled a plastic that absorbed all energy. Even his most sophisticated equipment could not penetrate it. Messny ran his hands across its strange surface. It was solid yet it was soft, seeming to yield like rubber. He had the impression that his hands were entering into it but encountering increasing resistance. He could not understand this baffling substance.
There were times when he was beginning to doubt his own sanity. Could this really be possible? Yet the instruments told him that it was. His task was to find out as much about the phenomenon as he could even if that tested the powers of his own imagination.
Outside the ship the wall slid past in an unchanging manner. It displayed not the slightest variation in texture or colour. Its substance was unknowable. It was an inky blackness that soaked up all energy like a sponge giving it the effect of having vast depth.
Eventually Messny reached the end of his patience. A decision formed in his head. There was nothing more to be ascertained concerning the nature of this barrier from continuing this approach. It was uniform and unyielding. His last recourse was to try to break through. His task was to find out what was on the other side.
He began to prepare. His first task was to send off a hyperspace capsule home. Whatever happened he wanted people in the future, if there were any left to receive it, to know exactly what he had discovered and the action he was undertaking.
He released the capsule containing all the data with a heavy heart. It felt like he was saying a final goodbye, as if he was acknowledging that he would never return. The capsule was an end.
But he knew what he had to do. He selected a section of wall and set the craft heading straight at it at maximum power. He set the ship’s lasers at full power and blasted at the wall with every ounce of power the ship could muster.
As the craft closed nothing appeared to be happening. It looked as if this was a suicide mission and that he and the ship would be annihilated in one great self-made collision, a colossal mistake. But he did not care. He was reconciled. It felt preferable to go out this way in one quick burst of energy than to attempt the journey home. He was convinced that it would have broken him. Better this way.
Ahead the wall loomed in front of the viewport and Messny braced himself for the flash of impact. It was obvious that the lasers were making no impression what-so-ever. Whatever strange substance that wall was made of was not going to succumb to anything he could throw at it.
At the moment before impact the section of the wall directly ahead seemed to become transparent. It wavered. The instrument went haywire. Messny flinched as the nose of the craft hit the wall. Instead of a massive flash the ship seemed to melt into that barrier and suddenly they were through.
Messny flung his hand in front of his eyes as a searing light flooded the control room. The viewport immediately responded and darkened the screen as the ship was bathed in an intense blinding yellow light.
Ahead of him a yellow orb hung in the sky radiating light, heat and a range of other energies. Messny glanced at the monitors and could see that behind him, in the black of space, the sky was crammed with stars.
It sent an overwhelming shock through Messny that brought tears to his eyes. He let out an involuntary sob which transformed into a strangled wail. The emotional impact was so great as to send him reeling.
The yellow light of that orb flickered a welcome – it was the sun.