Cornucopia was its name; a co-op that looked to be run by survivors of the Age of Aquarius. The cashier was congenial, chatting up Trent while she tallied their bill. Melissa and Jasmine took the bags to the car while Trent finished the transaction.

“Oh,” the cashier blurted, her eyes locked on something beyond their large show window, “here comes old Isaac. Have you seen him pedalling around the village yet?”

Trent heard the copper pipe chimes above the entrance begin to clang. He shook his head but could not bring himself to turn around.

The cashier spoke softly: “Comes in here every afternoon without fail. And he always buys the same stuff. Canned goods mostly; soup, lentils, that sort of thing. I kid him about stockpiling for Doomsday, but I don’t think Isaac gets the joke.”

Trent heard the methodical scuffling of feet passing across the oiled wood floor. He grabbed his receipt and hastened for the door.

*

Trent spent more energy trying to keep his anxieties in check than he did cooking dinner. The food was delicious, but Melissa wasn’t swallowing his forced joviality. Over dessert Jasmine began to show signs of too much sun and surf, so Melissa tucked her in early. When she returned to the deck she was armed with two glasses of white wine.

“So?” she asked.

Trent shrugged.

“You’ve not been yourself since you got back from that damned assignment. What’s troubling you? Still this Dark Matter business?”

He sighed with authentic resignation. “I honestly don’t know. I just have this heavy feeling. I’ve had it since I went down into that damned lab. I don’t seem able to shake it.”

“But you’ve covered stories far more disturbing than this, hon. Teen shootings, sweatshops, terrorist cells…”

“I know, but I was able to wrap my head around those. I’d almost always uncover at least some of the causes behind the problem: poverty, loopholes in corporate law, whatever. Those cases would always offer at least some promise of a solution. But this…”

His words trailed off. Melissa reached over and entangled her fingers with his. They sat and looked skyward; Melissa at the gleaming stars, Trent at the cold hollow between them.

*

Trent did not dream of Dark Matter that night. He did not dream at all. Dreams require sleep, and Trent knew none. Even his reliable trick of monitoring his breathing failed to lull him.

He shut his eyes and fought to shut off his brain.

But Night was lodged within his head. Constellations shimmered and blinked. They were smeared across the seemingly endless curve of his calvaria, like his very own planetarium.

Between and beyond the nuggets of silver light stretched the vacuum of dead space; still and lightless and seemingly silent.

Seemingly, for there was a grating, grinding sound; underlying and ever-present, like the gears of some unfathomable machine turning, slowly turning…