Sailing Beyond The Sun
By Jonathan Malory

Damon had never been this terrified before, or this far away from home. There were nine other 'recruits' sitting around the small claustrophobic cabin, a motley bunch in differing degrees of shock and fear. They hadn't known that Damon was intensely claustrophobic when they had press-ganged him and the others into service with the Commonwealth's Navy. There was a young woman sitting on the hard cold bench next to him, he looked at her nervously like he was a trapped animal. She had long blond curly hair. Her face was so friendly with a warmth and honest concern that seemed so out of place in such rancid surroundings. He couldn’t believe someone so obviously delicate could be chosen to serve in the Navy; what possible use could she be as a fighter?

'It's okay' she smiled, 'I'm frightened too. You’ll feel better once the sedation wears off.' She grasped his hand tightly, somehow comforting him.
'Thank you.' Damon was glad of the company in fear; he began wondering what his chances were of stealing a launch and making it back home by himself. The idea was ridiculous, it had taken them months to get here, he had no way to know in which direction home lay and it was unlikely that one of those little launches had anywhere near enough fuel to make the journey.

He began to panic again, thinking about the huge distances that lay underneath, above and before him; if he could start off home right now it would take months. If they’d have known he was like this, surely they would not have enlisted him; what use could he be as a soldier, he was frightened half to death just sitting on a bench.



He looked out through a porthole at the stars in the endless dark of night and was reminded of his childhood, the time when there was a full solar eclipse back home on the farm. Nobody knew there was going to be an eclipse, they were in too remote a place to catch recent news, and Damon didn’t know such things existed.

He thought about those few minutes before the sun was gone forever, ironic really, as he sat in its warmth watching the little grasshopper rubbing its legs together; so close, only moments to go, to utter despair, yet the safest and happiest he’d ever felt. It was the first time he’d been allowed to come home from school for the summer in his life; the hills behind the house were yellow and burnt by the sun instead of green, he thought for a moment that the bus had left him in the wrong place. His father soon ended such silly thoughts when he came out, open-armed, to greet him. Back at home for three months; his room, the safest place in the universe, just like it always was and smelling of summertime. Damon spent his

days alone fishing in the creek or throwing stones in the garden pond, hypnotised by the ever increasing circles. He didn’t mind being alone, it made a change; he was normally surrounded by hundreds of other children. All striving to be popular and to be the best in their subject; none of them as truly happy as Damon was on that dreadful day. He wanted to see what the tree looked like in the summertime; what creatures inhabited his old friend while he was away at school. He enjoyed the climb up the hill in the blanketing sunshine; he enjoyed scuffing his feet in the dust and causing his own little cloud systems that drifted gently away over the house to the south. It had felt like hours had passed as Damon relaxed under the shade of his old friend listening with his eyes shut to the gentle rhythm of tiny lives; the grasshopper was his favourite, he’d never seen one before in real life. It was a magical experience followed by a necromantic nightmare, he hadn’t really noticed with his eyes closed that the sky was getting darker; it didn’t register as a possibility in the early afternoon, sun barely past its zenith and dissolving the shadows. The rest of his life would be blanketed in darkness; stuck up on that big old hill, under that spooky tree forever. He’d never known that total blackness of such a magnitude could ever happen, even during the night there were little lights around the house and the moon shone nearly all the time. It seemed that time was everlasting as he tried to fumble around the tree to make sense of his

circumstances; he was sure that blindness hadn’t struck him, yet he couldn’t see the house at the bottom of the hill. The sparkling pond, the flowers in their pots around the back door, the seesaw that never got used; all gone, erased from existence by powers unknown. He screamed for the longest time, clawed his way downhill hoping for the world to switch back on with every thought; the once playful dust stinging his eyes, a constant reminder of his pitiful dilemma. His rescuers were two fairies dancing across the bush, coming right at him; they were the only things visible, so bright and dazzling there could be no doubt they had been sent by the heavens to come and take him to safety. His father pulled up to the house leaving the headlights on; Damon was covered in dust, tears and blood when he bundled him up and soothed away his sobbing. Much too late now, the damage was indelibly etched onto his young fragile mind.

Impending doom and darkness had been in the back of his mind since that day, his current situation had thrust it forth like the sword of Damocles hanging by a thread threatening to snap; snap, that was it, he was ready to snap. He had to get out of this place now! He was going to start clawing at something or someone just like that day on the hill. His heart was threatening to rumble his ribs free and empty his stomach simultaneously. It felt like there was a workshop vice being tightened on his temples, why was it so damn hot in here? It should be freezing!


Why isn’t somebody shouting, look at them, don’t they care? Aren’t they frightened? They’re probably too stupid to snap. He couldn’t break, he had to keep it real; but the ringing in his ears was toing and froing like a tidal swell on a dark southern ocean, from deafening roars to maddening whispers. Each surge attempted to wash away his sanity like pebbles in the sky. The ringing was softly yielding with sinister intentions, like a long silence before a cataclysmic explosion.

‘My God, let me out!’ He wailed, but the voice of the klaxon was louder than his. The crooning of the woman over the Com was louder still.

‘All new recruits report to the white zone immediately, new recruits to the white zone immediately!’ What? He thought, what white zone, he was going to crack. This was it; he knew it.

‘It’s okay,’ The young woman was still holding his hand. ‘We just follow the white line along the walls; I’ve been here before. Just stick with me till your head clears.’ Half a dozen of the others relaxed a little when they overheard this and began scuttling out of the cabin, manacles scuffing their feet like teeth searching for the bone. Damon did not follow, he was too confused; just like the time when the sun ran away. He was small again and helpless, but this time he had nowhere to run,

screaming wasn’t going to help. He had to get a grip on his claustrophobia before anyone noticed. If they threw him in the brig, trapped and locked inside, it would be unimaginably worse. The woman was standing in front of him now; it looked like she was saying his name but there was no sound, like he’d muted the news broadcast. He could see his own terrified visage mirrored in her eyes, as if it weren’t him but the facsimile of himself he always watched in his sleep-time wanderings. She kissed him. There was no shock or feeling of saviour, but it gave young Damon something to focus on.



‘Damon!’ He could feel she was trying to pull him to the door. ‘DAMON! C’mon, believe me, if you go along with it now it will be far better in the end. You don’t want them to put you in a psych ward.’

‘Okay… I’m coming daddy,’ He followed her into the corridor in a trance; he must cling to the dream. Much safer than the fear, don’t be dashed upon the rocks like falling stars. He must have fainted because he was on the floor looking up at the pretty young woman.



‘Get up, get up. Quick they’re coming, we can’t be still out here when they arrive.’ She sounded like their lives depended on it, it was all he had so he got up and concentrated all his energy on following her; leaving the sun behind him forever.