Free Watchers of the Dark by Lloyd Biggle jr. Page A

the Dark has done.”
    A tiny crescent of blackness appeared at the edge of the glowing disk. Suddenly it widened and plunged inward to form a sinister finger that lay across the galaxy’s remote perimeter, pointed unerringly at its heart.
    It continued to grow. It bulged unevenly, filled in hollows, bulged again. Its base oozed outward, and it began to lengthen. Then the tip darted forward, leaving a widening emptiness in its wake, and when the movement finally stopped the finger had become a muscular arm with incongruous bulges and indentations, a vast corridor of cancerous Dark.
    No stars shone there. No lines of commerce or communication crossed it. Stars there had been, and habitable worlds with prosperous societies and intricate networks of trade and travel, but the Dark had consumed them.
    “So that’s the Dark,” Darzek mused. “But what happened to the suns that were there? Are they just— gone?”
    “Gone,” EIGHT agreed.
    “How could a sun vanish?” Darzek demanded.
    “Vanish?” EIGHT repeated, puzzled. “They are there, but they are lost to us, to the galaxy. The Dark has taken them. The native populations have been afflicted with madness—the madness of the Dark. They have evicted all foreigners and confiscated their property. They have terminated all trade and communication with the rest of the galaxy. What the Dark does with them we do not know.”
    “Then it’s some kind of revolution,” Darzek mused. “The Dark doesn’t literally consume the worlds. It merely enslaves them—which could be worse. All right. I understand that much. Now tell me what is known about the Dark. Everything.”
    EIGHT darkened the ceiling screen, and Darzek and Miss Schlupe composed themselves to listen attentively.

    Darzek’s certified pass looked like a blank strip of plastic. It first admitted him to a special transmitter built into a room-sized closet just off EIGHT’S reception room. He emerged in a narrow corridor, and EIGHT, stepping out of the transmitter behind him, remarked, “This is the Hall of Deliberations.”
    Darzek looked about him and announced, “There doesn’t seem to be room for much deliberation.”
    “That is merely what it is called. The Council does not meet here.”
    They walked past other transmitters. Darzek counted eight and asked, “One for each member of the Council?”
    “Yes. These connect only with the official residences.”
    They turned abruptly into a large room, or what had been a large room. The arching ceiling could just be glimpsed above the enormous structure that filled it. Darzek squinted uncertainly into the dim red light of a tunnel that opened before him.
    “You must enter here,” EIGHT said. “Walk slowly, and do not be alarmed at anything you hear—or feel. Supreme has been notified that you are coming. It will simply verify your pass and confirm that you are yourself.”
    “Where do I show the pass?”
    “Hold it flat on your hand. There. Now walk slowly.”
    Darzek took a firm grip on his suitcase and held his other hand out in front of him, palm upward. He had the foolish illusion of being a small boy entering a House of Horrors in an amusement park. He took a step forward. And another.
    A blast of warm air whipped past him, and incongruously he felt cold. His skin began to prickle, as if gently probed by icy needles. Already he regretted the suitcase. He had left his arsenal with Miss Schlupe and brought little more than a change of clothing against the possible several days that the conference might last; but after a few steps the almost-empty suitcase became staggeringly heavy, and he had the sensation of a tremendous weight crushing down on him. Each footstep commenced with an agonizing struggle against gravity and ended with intense relief and a reluctance to take another. His limps became numb, and dizziness swept over him. He had a sudden apprehension about his automatic. Would Supreme admit an armed visitor to a meeting of the Council of