Photon

The morning sun glinted off the partially rusted trapdoor, and the sea breeze caressed the long grass around them, giving the air a crisp, salty taste. Around them both, identical islands, hunks of rock dusted with greenery, bobbed peacefully in the water in all directions.

“Open it up, April.”

She nodded, and grabbed the long steel handle with both hands, and, with a grunt, wrenched it towards her. In response, three bolts slid inwards and with a hiss, the door rose slightly as stale air escaped. March lifted a glass bell jar off the floor and unlocked its clasps. Almost at once, the Heliso inside, an animal identical to a huge rat but covered in a fiercely bright coat of photons, unleashed a high-pitched scream. The bell jar shook as it thrashed around inside.

April dug her fingers into the muddy soil, and pushed them into the small crevice between the trapdoor and the ground. March, holding the bell jar’s lid closed with one hand, quickly tapped the passcode into the waist-high steel box next to him. With a hiss, it activated; small, stocky legs opened out on the bottom, and a large clamp emerged from its top. The legs slowly pulled the mechanical jack towards the huge trapdoor, and the clamp opened expectantly.

April took a deep breath, and small lights began to blink and move underneath the skin on her bare arms. They moved in small shoals up and down her nerves, until with a collective twitch, they began to coagulate around her wrists and joints. She stood up, casually opening the two-tonne steel door and lifting it until it stood perpendicular to the ground. The jack’s clamp shot forwards, and grabbed the door. Its legs splayed and April let go, as with a groan the mechanical jack took the weight.

April stumbled backward slightly, the lights under her skin dimming to nothing. Her skin was noticeably darker than before.

“Damn… that was the last of it.” She eyed the Heliso, still thrashing. “I couldn’t just shave a few photons off this little guy? You know, after we finish?”

March rolled his eyes. “I wish. No, Parelli wants it back in the same condition he gave it to us in. I owe that guy twelve ingots already; he’ll double that if there’s a bald patch on his Heliso.” He scratched the back of his head with his free hand. “We can survive a little cold until we get back to the base.”

The Heliso, noticing March distracted, stopped attacking the bell jar and threw its weight against the steel lid. March swore, slamming his hand down on the lid, but it was too late. The Heliso reached one small, violently glowing paw out. The photons attached to its fur began to glow even brighter, and a small lick of yellow flame flew up as they burnt the air.

“Hurry up, April,” March grunted, attempting to hold the lid down against the Heliso’s strength, unnatural for its size. The Heliso almost managed to force the lid open, but with a myriad of lights suddenly blinking and moving under March’s skin, he held it closed. “This little guy’s almost got me. Chuck the bait in.”

April fished through her pockets and unwrapped a small square of food. With a small wave in front of the bell jar to get its attention, she threw the bait into the dark hole. March released the lid, and with a singing blast the Heliso bolted. The tiny, grounded comet leapt into the hole, lighting up the huge cavern better than any electrical light. March still marvelled at the creature’s strange design. The Heliso was the only surface creature with metallic fur; not strong enough for defence, but magnetic enough to hold fine photon dust in its fur… it made them perfect living torches.

With the cavern lit up, April and March found the small, steel ladder and descended. The trapdoor led to a large, spherical cavern ten metres in diameter, at the centre of which was a large, glowing maze of roots, leading to a cone-like hive of faintly glowing buds. The unique plant had no leaves or flowers, but using the huge bundle of earth it held together around it with roots and symbiotic fauna to protect and harvest sunlight, it gathered photons; the master energy, the source of all life and technology, even the physics of Elesterr, the world around them.

Suddenly, the mass of roots shuddered in tandem, like a silvery wave glimmering in the bright light of the Heliso, happily eating the square of food in the corner. Small glimmers of light, similar to the ones that had appeared under March and April’s skin, travelled towards the centre, converging upon the cone of buds. It twitched slightly, and at the top of the cone, a single bud slowly expanded, inflating like a water balloon until it hung next to the others.

March pulled a blacked-out pair of goggles over his eyes.

“You got the case?”

“Here.” April handed him a large black cubic case, blacked-out goggles also pulled over her eyes.

March undid the clasps, also black. The dark oil used to cover and saturate the case would prevent the buds from losing their precious cargo to the environment.

He carefully opened it and removed a long thin sickle and a pair of gloves, everything blacked out with the oil. Putting on the gloves he gently pushed apart the buds at the bottom of the cone to single out one of the largest and brightest, filled with the most photons. The raw photon liquid vibrated with energy under his touch, fighting against the thick rubbery skin of the bud.

Liquid photons, harvested from every plant and animal that lived upon the photoplant’s rocky outer shell. The roughly spherical island floated upon the dark sea, kept stable by a mass of thick oil under the surface, was an isolated ecosystem, like the hundreds of thousands like it all across the planet. The photoplant crashed into the planet in the form of a micrometeor, a dead hunk of rock strong small enough not to do anything but interrupt the area around it, but large enough to create waves if it hit the ocean and craters if it hit the land. The creatures that lived atop it grew and developed, feeding the photoplant with sunlight converted into photons. When the photoplants inside grew large enough that the buoyancy of the photon energy outweighed the plants and rock, the island would rise into the sky as a Micrometeor and orbit Elesterr, until the photoplants would use up their photon supplies, starve, and fall back to earth. However, some of the larger islands were equipped with hatches leading to hollowed out caverns, allowing harvesters to reach the photoplants and take the photons before they flew back into the sky.

Which was why March and April were here.

“Hang on to your equipment.” March said, as he wrapped the sickle around the bud’s base. April pulled a tourniquet out of the case, a blacked out cover with buckles to hold it in place.

March took a deep breath, and twisted the scythe, cutting the bud free. Instantly, the world shook. The Island around them dropped suddenly, a portion of its buoyancy removed.

Photon liquid spat like fluorescent magma from the severed stump, clumps shooting to the ceiling like a radiant inverted waterfall. The Heliso abandoned the bait, screaming in fear. It bolted for the open trapdoor, scaling the ladder and throwing a disarray of moving shadows across the cavern.

March roughly grabbed the tourniquet off April and clasped it to the bud, tightening the buckles until he was sure nothing would slip out. The severed stump quivered, and the wound quickly shrank to nothing, shrouding the cavern in darkness. The Island began to level out, sunk a little further into the sea.

March heaved himself to his feet, and fastened the equipment back into the case. Then, he carefully placed the bud into the case’s central compartment, and locked it. He pulled his gloves off, surprised how clammy his hands were.

“That was a big drop. I think this Photoplant is getting a bit old; its photon liquid isn’t that potent.”

“March!”

“What?” he said, lifting the case with one hand. The insulation in the case would keep the Photobud safe; he could drop the case into a crevasse, and the delicate bud wouldn’t be damaged.

“The Heliso bolted.”

“What do you- Ah, dammit!”

Suddenly, March realised he was standing in darkness, the only light a dull glow from outside; compared to the intense light the photons gave out, virtually non-existent.

“It can’t leave the Island.” March said, eyeing April. “It won’t get far.”

“March, it’s sunset.” April pointed at the sunlight coming through the entrance. It had dulled to a serene orange. “We’ve got maybe an hour before we’re needed back.”

March blinked in surprise. Harvesting the Photobud had taken longer than he thought.

He wiped his brow. “We’ll find it before then. We’ll get the equipment to the ship, and then go looking for it. We’re in the fourth sector; none of these Islands have the space to support life. It’ll be the only animal for miles.”

April climbed the ladder, and March handed up the case before climbing up himself. He removed his goggles, blinking at the sudden clarity. The sun was almost touching the horizon; the clouds were basked in a gradient of yellow and orange. Around them, the flowers began to close, their photosynthesis done for the day. The Islands around them began to glow as the plant’s harvested Photons massed in their stems, to be delivered to the Photobud below. In the orange light, a thousand huge yellow lamps glowed softly, lighting up the water, revealing the vaguely embryotic orbs of black oil below them, like a three-dimensional shadow.

Some of the larger Islands in the distance glowed more brightly than the others, their unharvested Photoplants almost saturated. Beside them, a particularly large Island was glowing very brightly… worryingly so. There was a violent splashing below them.

April gasped in wonder. “Stars above…”

March pulled his black goggles back on, staring as well. “The Photoplant in that one is more saturated than I thought.” He increased his pace, half jogging to the ship. “If it begins to rise, we’re in trouble.”

April fumbled with her goggles. “Why?”

“It’s huge. Chances are, it’ll have an oil reservoir below it that’s just as big.”

He reached the ship, a small arrow-shaped vessel made up of a two-person cockpit, a small cargo hold, and a massive Photon engine that took up the entire back and sides. It was anchored to the Island with landing gear in the shape of four hooks that dug into the ground, preventing it from slipping into the water. He grabbed a tranquiliser pistol, and tossed it to April.

He missed, as the Island violently pitched to one side.

March grabbed the ship to stabilise himself. “What the hell…” he pointed to April. “Go find that Heliso!”

She nodded, grabbing the pistol and jogging away.

March ran, almost falling over as the ground continued to shift and shake around him. To his horror, he saw the brightly glowing Island beside them begin to rise, slowly at first but very gradually picking up speed. He reached the jack, and disengaged the clamp. It let go with a small twist, slamming the trapdoor. He locked it with difficulty, and grabbed the jack as the legs folded back into the bottom and were replaced with four spherical wheels. Beside him, the Island had almost completely left the water. It was huge, almost three times the size of the one he was standing on, kilometres across. He watched in horror as the top of the island, now a Micrometeor, threw tendrils of light into the sky, it’s energy disrupting the cloud formations above. The sky itself seemed to be on fire; the light this Micrometeor was emitting would be seen for hundreds of kilometres.

His stomach clenched. A Micrometeor, this size, would displace more than just water…

The jack he had been wheeling hit a small rocky outcrop, and he almost let go in surprise. He swore, and looked back at the ground.

And froze, his curse catching in his throat.

The jack hadn’t hit a rock, but a black clump. A worm, easily a metre long and covered in oil squirmed feebly, its mouth gaping and shutting silently as its membrane burned at the sudden light blasting from the Micrometeor. Around him, several others thrashed weakly in the field of glowing flowers. Flowers that were being slowly submerged in a thick, viscous layer of oil…

March choked in panic, ripping the jack from the small puddle of oil that had surrounded it. Tendrils of the foul liquid still clung to the bottom as he dragged it as quickly as he could to the ship.

“April! April!” he roared as he heaved the jack into the cargo hold, the thunderous crashing of water around their Island almost drowning him out. The huge waves that swept through the plants mixed and intertwined with the tendrils of oil that choked them.

April suddenly appeared, panting. Her goggles, clamped around her eyes were ringed with sweat. In her arms, the Heliso lay limp, still glowing fiercely.

“Sorry, you sounded so urgent I left the tranquiliser pistol back where I found the Helis-”

“Leave it!”

“March, what the hell is going on?!” she screamed.

“That Micrometeor ascended too quickly! It’s brought the oil reservoir to the surface!”

Even amidst the chaos around them, March saw her face pale as she took stock of her surroundings. Every Harvester knew what happened when an oil reservoir came to the surface. All the foul creatures, gases and toxins trapped below the waves below would smother and choke every living thing for kilometres around.

Nothing could survive an oil reservoir eruption.

March jumped into the cockpit of the ship, causing it to shake, dislodging the hook slightly.

“Stick the Heliso in the hold for now, I’ve clamped the case and the jack in place, it should be fine-” He hit the ignition. And then again. The engine remained silent.

April placed the limp Heliso in the back of the hold, slamming it shut.

“April!” March shouted. “You left the piston gaps open! The ship’s leaked all its Photon energy!”

April jumped into the cockpit, and shook her head furiously. “No, no, I locked them down with that button, there!” she pointed at the set of three buttons below the radar.

“You’re supposed to-” the ship rocked violently, almost throwing March out. He held hiself steady with the dashboard. “you’re supposed to close the external flaps with the sliders, or the energy leaks out!”

The Micrometeor had finally left the water completely, and had almost broken through the clouds. In its place, a huge spike of oil was growing thinner and thinner as it stretched.

April quivered in fear, her lips trembling. “I…I’m sorry! What do we do?”

March let his head drop to the dashboard, his panic being slowly consumed by despair. The violent light all around them was causing such heat that sweat dripped from his brow to the dashboard. But soon, the oil, the deep, black blinding oil would block the light, the heat. The sudden drop in pressure would cause it to erupt hundreds of metres into the air, coating the world around them in choking, constricting nothingness…

Fuel.

March jumped out of the cockpit, the world around him a swirling mess of black oil and screaming white light, both twisted together into churning vortexes of chaos. He barely hearly April screaming as he threw the hold open and ripped the case off the wall, almost dropping it on the Heliso. He pulled it open, grabbing the Photobud with his bare hands. Photons began to surge through the skin into his hand, charging him. He ripped the tourniquet off, the blinding light of the Photons nothing to him now, and squeezed the contents into the nearest piston gap. The Photons bounced around the inside of the ship, causing the inner mechanism to glow as liquid attached itself and began to transfer its energy to anything it touched. It was a long shot, but the only way he could siphon any fuel to the ship’s engine. Thankfully, the power cell of the ship took thirty treated Photons to fuel it for a day, and the Photobud held over three hundred. March hoped enough energy would reach the cell.

April released the hooks as March jumped back into the cockpit. April closed the doors and sealed them. March hit the ignition.

C’mon, please…

The power cell exploded with life and started spinning madly, the instruments and dials flitting around wildly. The Photon liquid that had attached to the metal around the cell was suddenly pulled into the centripetal gravitational field caused by the power cell. The ship’s engines screamed from the sudden influx of energy.

Without hitting the accelerator, the ship fired forwards, colliding with an oncoming wave of oil and slamming through it, raw energy in the form of light, heat and noise forcing itself through all external hatches. The ship tore through the wave, a meteor of light spiralling upwards as more tendrils of oil threatened to engulf them, escaping from the depths…

Suddenly, the oil was gone. March closed his eyes in relief, but it was more than that. A strange tiredness had crept over him, and in the corners of his eyes flashing lights erupted, and strange sounds punched his ears. The ship tore into the distance, and March, oblivious to everything, slipped into darkness. And, behind them, the last of the huge Micrometeor vanished into the clouds, leaving a spraying darkness and a sky comprised of light alone.