Later...

He was numb.

No, it was more than numb. It was nothing.

No sensation. Just his mind. His thoughts. His memories.

He remembered his home.

He was in it, sitting in his favourite chair, a ratty old recliner he'd inherited from his father. Michelle wanted to throw it out, but let him keep it because they couldn't afford a new one. Privately, he hoped to keep it for as long as he could. The worn surface of the chair hinted at many happy hours reclining in its embrace. It was part of his feeling of home. Something to remember his childhood from. 

He heard a baby fussing and turned to see his daughter, Mary, gurgling on the floor next to him, playing with some large cloth blocks.

Smiling, he got up from his chair and laid down on the ground next to her. He grabbed a small stuffed sheep and wiggled it towards her, smiling broadly. She didn’t seem to notice.

‘Hey Mary, where’s your little lamb?’ he offered.

Mary didn’t look towards him.

From the kitchen, he heard footsteps and saw Michelle walk into the room. She reached down and picked up Mary. The little girl cooed and reached her arms around her mother, snuggling close.

Jack stood up leaned towards his daughter, trying again to get her attention.

Michelle turned and walked out of the living room.

'You hungry little lady?’ she said as she went.

Jack dropped the sheep, his mouth open and frustration filling his head, ‘What gives? What did I do wrong?’

Michelle kept walking. He walked after her, ‘Michelle, what did I do? I don’t know why you’re not talking to me.’

Michelle stepped into their room and closed the door behind her.

Jack hesitated, but then grabbed the doorknob and pushed it open. There was nothing but grey on the other side.

A chill ran down his spine and he slammed the door.

He closed his eyes and slowed his breathing. Jack hadn’t been this unnerved since… since he’d tried to spend the night in an old barn with his cousins when he was young.

He heard a rattling noise and opened his eyes.

His breath caught in his throat as he saw he was in the barn. His cousins were under their sleeping bags while the wind moaned through the old rafters. The branches of an old tree scraped and rattled across the outside of the barn. He got up out of his bag and backed up against the wall. Everything looked large and looming in the darkness.

He reached for a switch on the wall and stopped as he looked at his hands. They were smooth and chubby. The hands of a child. He felt his body and felt the long lost fat of his childhood days. He reached for the switch again and flicked it. Nothing happened.

‘No no, this isn’t happening,’ he cried out.

He ran to one of his cousins and shook the form under the sleeping bag to wake them up. They didn’t stir.

He moved to each of them in turn, but couldn’t get anyone to wake up. He remembered he’d been the only one to woken up during the night, but he’d never tried to wake any of them.

‘Do you wish to wake up?’

He turned and saw the form of Michelle standing next to him.

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I don’t know what’s going on.’

‘We are in your head. You are in your head.’

‘Who are you?’

‘We are asleep.’

‘I understand that, but who are you?’

The wind dragged the old tree against the side of the barn again. Jack felt a chill in his young body.

‘We are old.’

He now stood on top of a tower, this one he didn't remember. He was surrounded by tall black coloured creatures. They stood twice as tall as him, and he felt relief when he realized he was back to his adult body. The creatures had faces like ravens and the wing's wrapped around their lanky frames. They stood around looking up at the sky where a large red star took up a third of the heavens above them.

The air was hot and oppressive. It felt like an oven.

‘They eye of life grew angry,' said the voice.

The creatures turned from the star and began to walk down the tower. Some staggered and fell and were left where they lay while the others continued.

‘Our sky became heavy, out of reach. The air hot, burning us and forcing us to the ground.’ 

Jack followed the birds downward. Though calling them birds didn’t do them justice.

‘The eye would close forever. The Sage’s knew this. We knew this. The time of the light skies had passed. Now would be only cold and darkness. Too cold even for us.’

‘Your star was dying?’ Jack asked.

‘And with it, the skies would be forever out of reach. The Sages would make us sleep, to dream of skies while ours moved far from us.’

The birds descended into a chamber underground. Inside, they clambered into tubes, and vanished in a flash of light, leaving only a small pile of dust.

‘There was no return from the sleep. Some of our kin stayed awake and were forsaken by the Sages.’

There was commotion and Jack watched as one of the tall birdmen stood in front of a tube, and then turned around and rushed out of the chamber, disappearing up the steps.

‘You destroyed your bodies?’ Jack asked, walking close to one tube and looking at the dust filing out from the bottom.

‘Our Sages could only preserve our minds and memories, not our forms. We would survive, but there was not to be a return to our skies.’

Jack looked around, the figure of his wife was still present to one side, seemingly an observer just like him.

‘How can you speak to me?’

‘We are within your mind. The moment you touched the dead skies around our slumber, we learned of you. We’ve learned of many of your kind. Our sleeping world has learned how to dream your dreams and listen to your memories.’

‘Your world did?’

The last of the birdmen disappeared into the tubes, and the figure of Michelle began to walk up the stairs, Jack followed behind. When they made it to the surface, Jack watched as day and night cycled faster and faster. The angry red giant in the sky swelled larger and larger. The ground crumbled away, leaving a cluster of black material behind where the underground chamber once was.

Above them, the red giant star shifted and churned, shedding its outer layers in great swaths of fury and violence that further fractured the rocky ground around him. Eventually, all that remained was a dim point of light, the glowing gas of the nebula, and the cracked and charred surface of a dead world.

Time returned to normal, and Jack stood there, surrounded by a barren waste.

‘None who would not sleep survived. All perished. The sky was gone, the land was gone, all was gone. Yet we slept. Our silent world held us. It grew to accommodate our dreams.’

The mass of black material under Jack's feet seemed to shimmer for a moment and then spread out over the twisted surface of the dead world. It spread in all directions, and more came from other locations beyond the horizon until it covered everything in sight in a uniform black thatched pattern.

‘The Sages knew what would allow us to sleep and made it so that what we would have all we needed. And yet, our sleep is wearisome. Millions of seasons of time have passed. We have slept for so long. The dreams have lost their meaning, the memories have become dull.

We have lived each one a thousand times.’

‘What do you want from us?’ Jack asked, looking back at the figure of Michelle.

‘Let us awaken once again. Let us touch your sky. Let us walk your Earth!’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Open your mind to us more fully, let us see as you have seen, feel as you have felt, remember as you have remembered! Let us touch a new sky!’

‘Will I have to sleep like you?’ he asked, shaking his head, ‘I don’t want to stay here, I want to go back home to my wife and child. I still have a life to live.’

The figure shook its head. ‘We too knew of family. I… had a nestling once. I have not been with him in so long. We have dreamed separate dreams for a long time. New dreams to dream might bring him back to me. Will you not help us?'

Jack swallowed and said, 'But will I sleep like you?'

'To access all you have, you would need to sleep with us, as you have done until now. You will never age, never hunger, never hurt nor be ill. Your memories of your family will be with you forever, always ready to be near.’

Jack looked at his feet and whispered, ‘But that's all they'll be. Memories.'

The world was silent. The figure of Michelle didn’t move or say anything. Jack shook his head. He looked up and at the figure of his wife. ‘I can’t. I can’t sleep like you. I can’t stay here.’

‘We offer you the gift of forever! We are forever! Billions of lives to be lived, to be witnessed.’

‘One life is enough for me. Maybe I’m not much of an explorer. I can’t sleep like you.’

The figure dissipated, like smoke blown by the wind. Jack felt himself go numb and fell to the ground.

Jack slammed hard into the ground and lay there for a moment. He tried to push himself up and saw his hands were gloved, covered by his pressure suit once more.

Jack struggled to his feet and turned on his radio.

‘Jack Simmons to the Sagan, please respond.’

He looked around himself and saw the shuttle behind him, surrounded by bodies lying on the ground. Some of them were stirring.

‘This is first officer Cedric here, I copy Jack.’

‘Where’s Captain Preston?’ Jack asked, walking towards the shuttle.

‘She's… She’s dead.’

‘What’s the situation?’

‘I don’t know. We all just lost consciousness. I'm getting casualties reports from all over

the ship.’

‘How long were we out?’

‘Two hours.’

‘I’m going to return to the ship. Simmons out.’

‘Roger that. Godspeed.’

Jack reached the shuttle and helped the first person onto his feet. He walked over to one of the unmoving bodies and rolled it onto its face. It was Professor Li. She began to stir as Jack and the tech moved her.

They helped her sit up.

‘How are you feeling Professor?’ Jack asked.

‘Unwell. Tell me, Mr. Simmons, did you see anything strange?'

‘You could say that. A race of tall bird’s tried to get me to join me in an eternal dream by communicating to me in the form of my wife.’

‘Mm, it was my old university physics professor who spoke to me.’

‘Captain Preston choose to dream with them,’ Jack blurted.

The professor looked shocked. ‘It affected her too?’

‘It affected the whole ship.’

The survivors on the planet moved towards the shuttle. Three bodies were carried back on board. Once onboard, Jack started up the engines and his take-off preparations.

‘Professor?’

‘Yes?’

‘We’re you tempted?’

The professor was quiet for a moment before answering, ‘Yes I was. To be able to witness the memories of an entire species, and live forever, was very tempting.’

‘Why didn't you?’

‘It,' she paused, ‘it wouldn't have been the same. Eventually, I would have seen it all, known it all, and I would have been stuck in a world with no more questions. Then I would have been waiting for some other poor souls to stumble in so I could live their life too. What about you

Jack? Were you tempted?'

Jack smiled and said, ‘Not even a little.’

The End