The Void

The Void. Naomi Green ©2026

The nebula was a giant marshmallow buoyant in the starry black expanse. The spaceship sliced through its luminescent dust like a silver knife. Merlin didn’t know if he was hurtling, spinning or floating. Space and time seemed to have blurred. He had no idea how long it had been since the malfunction. He only knew he had no lights and no power. Only the light show of the universe showed its iridescent splendour as the spaceship wove in and out of its heady cocktail of blue-ringed planets, black holes and streaking stars. He knew he was on the eternal brink of death and yet somehow, his metal machine didn’t crash.

He was thankful he had only recently put on his IEVA – a spacesuit for indoor and outdoor use. He checked how much time he had left on his oxygen, and was shocked to realise it had only been fifteen minutes since the calamity. That was good. It meant he still had nearly nine hours before he would be forced to draw his last breath and turn his cutting-edge metallic home into a tomb. Anything could happen in that time.

A sudden jolt sent him floating off towards the galley. He grabbed a security handle on the wall. Then the spaceship was rolling, rolling, rolling on something solid. He must have hit a planet. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t had a head-on collision. Before he had time to think, the spaceship’s now battered elongated shape came to a halt. He grabbed a water bag and straw and a snack to zip into his pocket, thankful that he’d eaten his lunch-time protein ration. He threw open the hatch and jumped out, putting distance between himself and the redundant craft. For a moment he stood, sentinel, remembering the day his ship had launched. A warm day in Florida, his arm around his wife and 12-year old son, delivering his departing speech. He had been the first man to go solo, on a journey to find the edge of the universe in a rocket designed to withstand anything the universe could throw at it. Apparently. He let the palpable shock of realising he might never see his family again shudder through him. Then he turned away. The pitch black of this new planet seemed to suck him in. He couldn’t see anything at all and that made him wonder. Where were the stars, the universe for that matter?

His oxygen was his only lifeline. Earthly capacity. In all his travels he had never found a way to extend the shelf life of his air. It was frustrating but he had to find out if anything was out there. How else would he find a way home? He could keep going for at least four hours if need be. Then he would decide what to do. Return to the cold, charred remains of the ship, or keep going. He had the water bag. And he could urinate into his MAG. Sorted.

A sudden thought unnerved him. If he stepped away from the ship he would be in total darkness. He had his torch but he knew there were no atmospheric particles to carry its beam. It would only illuminate a circle on the ground way out in front of him, leaving the unknown at his very feet. It was too disorientating. He would only use it if he heard a sound up ahead. For now, he’d have to step out and brave the void. He turned on the torch and looked at the ground he had landed on. It seemed solid, with tiny furrows that could imply the surface of a miniature field, as if it were waiting for seeds to be planted. Perhaps he’d arrived at the beginning of a planet’s life. He felt a measure of excitement at the thought that he might witness such an event. Then he pocketed the torch and began feeling his way cautiously, like an actor on a dark stage, fearful of bumping into the props. Who knew what lay ahead? Some strange being, a hole, or worst of all, the edge of this nothing place?

It had been ten years since he had left his blue planet. He’d experienced voyages through glittering stars, tremendous dangers and enough alien life to rewrite the biological reality he knew on earth. The silver metal sheen of his home had slivered through the breaking orange and pale cream of countless sunrises and moonsets. His journey had been nearing its end: to find the final frontier, to boldy go…. But he didn’t feel so bold now. What was this place? Had it rewritten the rules of reality? Could this nothing be defined as something?

He took a few steps. The ground still seemed solid but he knew one step too far could send him spinning off into the endless, black void of space. He kept edging forward and after a while checked his watch. He’d been walking for half an hour. He tried using his radar to calculate the distance he’d been and realised with sickening dread, that he couldn’t. There was nothing to bounce the radio waves off. Bewilderment washed over him. The silence was suffocating and his heart pulsed with fear. But he kept his tremulous feet trudging, and as he advanced, began to think. What sort of reality was he hoping to find anyway? Memories of past worlds flooded his imagination. Kaleidoscope galaxies, alien life, and dazzling vegetation, peppered with the bizarre sounds of otherworldly languages, lay strewn across the landscape of his mind.

He still sensed nothing behind or before him. Yet he felt hemmed in. Perhaps by ignorance of what was out there. Entrapment. Something in the impenetrable darkness would leap out and grab him. His breath came rasping, thoughts of sinister, unearthly beings over-powering him. Yet the silence was so complete, the crippling sense of fear began to diminish. He began philosophising. Why shouldn’t he find something? Some sign of life. After all, his own solar system had come from nothing. Though he had to admit, he’d always found that a slightly incoherent thought, especially after watching The Sound of Music. Nothing comes from nothing, Maria had sung, nothing ever could. Then he discovered that physics agreed with Maria. The fine-tuning of his known universe for the existence of life. The digital code in DNA suggesting an intelligent mind was involved. The fact that the universe had a beginning.

The random chance of evolution seemed increasingly unlikely. Surely, he mused, as his boots kept prodding, a cause has to be greater than its effect. Could matter create matter? Logically, something other created matter. Something immaterial, spiritual, then. Leading, of course, to a belief in a god and that he could never do. He knew one thing while goose-stepping through this chasm of black. It had space. He was walking through it after all. And it must have time. He had been at it for two hours already. But matter? Energy? Only myself, he thought ruefully.

The darkness was having a psychological effect on him, impinging on his straining eyes. His eyeballs felt as if the skin had been peeled back from staring into the abyss of nothingness, from searching desperately for some sign of life. Hot impatience detonated in his mind.

He started running. Almost hoping to crash into something, even if it gave him pain - anything instead of this desolate vacuum. He was running through his earthly memories: up into the gentle, rolling hills, enjoying the excitement of his son’s first camping trip. He was laughing along sparkling streams with his brother in the sunlit fields of their youth. He was winning the 100 metre race again at his school, sprinting across the line, hearing the cheering parents, collecting his silver cup. He was scurrying away from the strange dog who always pelted down the road after him when he was a boy. He was running into the arms of the woman he loved who had become his beloved wife and whom he hadn’t seen these ten years. He ran and ran until he found himself falling, keeling over on the unyielding invisible ground. He had stumbled on something. Something hard and definitely there. He yelled with delight and remained lying on the surface, scratching around trying to find the jackpot, the first sign of life. A sudden throbbing pain in his left foot stopped him in his tracks. You stupid fool. You tripped over your own boot. Hot tears crammed his eyes, but not for long. You can’t weep in a space helmet.

After that he walked, limping a little and feeling incredibly sorry for himself. He had four hours to go and his heart plummeted as he realised he’d have to turn back. Back to the metallic carcass to try and salvage whatever he could to repair the ship. Anger seeped into him, resentment at the darkness which wouldn’t let him find life. To travel fifty million light years to the final frontier and find nothing. It was shameful. How could he tell his fellow-beings back on planet earth. Sorry guys. I’m afraid Maria was right. He stopped, clenching his fist, wishing he could smash through the blockade of nihility. What a fool, he thought, you can’t personify the darkness, avenge it, make it pay. Releasing his pent-up anger into the relentless void, he shouted with rage. God, if you exist, let there be light!

The electro-magnetic spectrum burst into existence, its sudden brightness forcing him to his knees, cowering him against its majestic force. He covered his eyes from its penetrating power. He felt as if his whole body had entered a hot zone, the burdensome yellow light besieging the very atoms of his being. He trembled and shook, convinced he would be liquified under the sudden intense heat. He withdrew his shaking hands from his eyes and glanced tentatively around. Now the planet was the opposite. The void was gone. The light had come. It had dispelled the darkness but it had not brought any life. Just this dazzling, invasive light. Shimmering and undulating all around him. Submerging him in a tsunami golden wave. But how? He could not understand it. He had only said, Let there be light. Let there be light? He stood up, dazed and swaying under its glare. Had his words made this light appear? Did they have power? His mind was jolted by a sense of terror. Either it was god or it was him.

He whispered into the light show. Hello? Nothing. Anybody there? He thought about the power which might be his. He could create anything. He was master of a universe. All he had to do was order something into existence, as simple as ordering food in a restaurant. He had to experiment, just a little. He spoke. Let there be a red rose. For my wife. And there it was beside him. A darling red rose, perfectly formed with lush, blood petals. He gasped and stepped away, as if from a venomous snake. This was power indeed, but now what? What was he to do with it? Sudden excitement washed over him. He was a child again, a child with no boundaries. No parents to tell him what to do. To send him to bed without his supper if he did something wrong. He wasn’t accountable to anyone but himself. He could create…

He stood up, proud and tall and spoke into the fresh, virginal world.

Let there be air. He tore off his space suit and breathed in. That was good, it was so good.

Let there be a beautiful snow-capped mountain range. It appeared, sparkling far off in the distance.

Let there be fields in front of it full of sheep and cattle. They burst into his vision in the foot hills. He heard them bleating and mooing. He laughed heartily.

Let there be pretty houses nestled near the fields. And so it was.

Let the sky teem with birds. The blue vault above teemed with the flurry of many wings and the swooping birds sang. Then he had a fabulous idea. He shouted into his new-born sunlight. Let my spaceship be completely repaired and ready for departure.

Let there be… he hesitated. Did he want people? What would they be like? He suddenly felt an immense responsibility. Should he say how he wanted them to behave? Could he? Would they be kind? Would they become greedy? He decided not to go there. He would think about humans tomorrow. After all it was the first evening of the world. Mine, he thought. He had once been proud to own his first car. Now he owned a world. He felt giddy. Then a sudden pain gripped his stomach. He doubled over in fear before realising he was famished.

It was one thing being a farmer, but this? He felt like a magician. Let there be steak and chips on a plate and a glass of red wine. And apple crumble and custard for dessert and chocolates. Surfeited, he pricked the stars into the black expanse above and placed the moon, perfectly. Then he fell asleep, on a damask-covered marble bed, on a hot summer night, King of his world. Softer light awakened him early the next morning. Shock juddered though him until he remembered. He yawned and got up, smiling inanely and made himself a stream nearby in which to wash and indulge in a morning swim. How wonderful, he thought, as he splashed about in the pure, bracing water. How perfect it all was.

Refreshed, he sat on the bank, drying himself with a soft blue towel. How had this happened anyway? Perhaps evolution had come full circle. Perhaps he had advanced beyond any human being on earth and now he was able to be his own god, create his own reality and decide what the rules should be. How appealing. He could do away with any moral boundaries that had crippled the human race for millennia. Freedom from a god was what they’d always strived for. How exciting to be the forerunner. He began planning. He would make perfect people. They would obey his every wish. They would bow to him and serve him for the rest of his life. The force of his own ego seemed to throttle him. Why did he want that? Didn't he wish for their happiness as well as his own? Was he the only one who really counted?

By the afternoon he felt he was thinking more clearly. He realised that with such power came responsibility. To do the right thing. He wanted a good world, didn't he? With peace and joy for evermore? Of course he did. We can start all over again, correct all the mistakes… What larks! his grandfather would have said. Of course there would need to be rules, boundaries. He paused. But what if the first people didn’t agree with my rules? What if they rebelled? I’ll have to give them a choice, a way of showing me that they would voluntarily comply. After all, relationship must be based on free will. Let’s see now. He’d devise one simple law. If his people disobeyed it, it would show their allegiance was to themselves. He thought further. But if they chose their own way, the good intentions he had for his world would be supplanted. Catastrophic consequences would ensue. Then blame-shifting would occur. It was his fault, he made our world. How disheartening. How terrifying! They would come for him. They would sacrifice him on the altar of their own blunders. This was madness.

The idea of being a supreme ruler took on a malevolent quality. Fear congealed within him. He whirled around madly, afraid that someone was already behind him, dagger drawn. He began to feel paranoid about his own motives. He couldn’t resist the desire to be in power so how could he resist becoming corrupt? And what about his subjects? How would he quell any uprising? What if they became destructive and mustered armies; built weapons. He was overwhelmed by a sudden need for defence. Like a liquid spear, a desire to bring weapons of warfare into being shot through him. In his mind’s eye, he saw nuclear warheads spiralling upwards from the ground all around him, arcing over his head on their destructive warpath. Planes roared above, tumbling bombs from the sky, explosions ricocheting off the beautiful mountains of his creation in the distance. Thick black smoke poured out and choked him. Thousands of foot soldiers emerged from the dark mist brandishing swords, muskets, rifles, grenades. His wife’s perfect red rose wilted in the heat and the petals turned into bloody rivulets at his feet. He baulked and swayed, falling on the soft green grass and groaning in agony. No no….!!

He stood up, resolute. A line from Shakespeare flitted into his memory. His command was urgent. A horse, a horse. My kingdom for a horse! A black stallion appeared at his side, saddled and ready. He mounted and galloped wildly through the verdant landscape to the pristine silver machine that would take him home.