The Dust of the Stars (Sci-Fi)
A science fiction short story written in 1976 by Amy Potter
The music of the spheres was the only sound to be heard; the myriad of stars, the only sight. Endless millions of stars—tiny pinpoints of light — shining, shining for eternity.
My only feeling now is of movement—of an endless, beginningless search for something that may never be found. I float swiftly past the reds, blues, yellows, whites of these millions of stars.
I can even behold now stars that were once invisible to my physical eyes because of their wavelengths of light. I cannot ever reach or touch them. I can never get close to them. As soon as I draw near, they appear to pull away, as opposite poles of a magnet repel each other.
I am but a spirit wandering forever midst the eternal heavens.
Only a faint memory exists of another time when I could hear a different music, when I saw not the stars and the endless blackness of space, but others like me, and sky, and waters, and earth. Now I “see” no one—nothing. I remember when my feelings were not only that of a ceaseless movement.
It was a different but equally unsatisfying time, long, long ages past, for then, too, I was in a never-ending search.
I still know not what I look for. Emptiness and vast vacuum are prevalent around me now. I have no body—only my thoughts which flow before me to tell me my experiences.
And I search on and on like this for eternity.
***
Suddenly the empty skies are filled with tiny particles of a shining matter. Perhaps this is it! Perhaps I have found it at last. This dust of space may be what I have been searching for.
I take my mind and put it in the center of the vast field of dust. It swirls before my mind energy, creating whirlpools that remind me of those caused by the sea I once knew. And as my mind thinks back to that time, this stardust swirls faster and faster, growing smaller and smaller with each revolution, until finally, in only a few moments to me, but an eternity to my former self, it forms a dark, solid orb, hard and cold.
My mind snaps back to the present. What is this thing I have created? It brings to my mind a ball — a round ball of star’s dust.
Once again, my mind reels back. A ball is for throwing, but how can I now throw this ball? I have nothing to impel such a ball. Nothing, that is, except my mind energy. And as instantly as this thought passes through my mind, the ball itself is suddenly thrown towards the center of the universe (from which I have just traveled) with a speed unbelievably fast.
I follow the ball closely with my mind. Eternities pass which to me are less than hours in my new manner of thinking. Many pieces and minute chunks break off in the ball’s rapid rotation through space until, when it has finally slowed to almost zero motion, millions of smaller balls are strewn in its path. These many balls are quickly caught in the gravitational “pockets” of the four-dimensional universe. Some of them are far away from the star’s gravitation pockets; others are too close, and the gravity pulls them into the star’s body, causing explosions of varying magnitude.
Now I must ponder on whether I have upset the energy flow of the universe. Most certainly I have caused a general increase in the energy flux. Sparks are flying everywhere. Sparks to me now—supernovas to my former self.
But even through all this I still have that same empty feeling—the feeling of something unfulfilled. Then I suddenly wonder what all this energy would do to me! What would it be like to have my mind energy converged with the star energy? So I carefully expand my mind until I am the Universe!
***
I feel no different from before. I do not feel as though I am spread thinly across the universe although my mind touches all of it that was just ages ago so incomprehensibly large to me.
I feel just the same except for a sudden, instantly passing increase in my energies — a feeling that, if I still had a physical body, I would describe as a quickening of the pulse.
I take a deep mental breath and look about me. Now that I am the Universe, I should be able to see if there really is more than one universe, as some used to say in my previous existence. And then I see what I had really been searching for all along.
To all sides of me—of My Universe — there is life. Life exactly like my own, going on in space so huge as to be inconceivable to any being still on the physical plane.
Even though I am all the Universe, I am not alone—not alone by far. Just as eternities ago I had cast off a binding physical body to enable my spirit to be free, I now cast off my spirit to allow my energies to be free. Energies is not the correct word, of course, but there is no physical word to express the freedom I now have.
I feel my new self teaming with the life forces of an entire universe, millions of galaxies, each containing millions of stars, teaming with worlds being born, living, growing, dying; I communicate in a new way with those others like me. This is now my world, and the memory of being a spirit endlessly wandering gradually becomes more and more dim.
Still I am moving and searching, along with my companions now. I am alone no longer. I—we — grow stronger and larger, converging, understanding, realizing, being at oneness. There are no words to describe the joy, the happiness, and the ecstasy.
And still more stardust awaits us.
Thanks for reading.
Amy Potter
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