Author's Note: To anyone who has read my Gray Matter trilogy, this is, for all intents and purposes, a spin-off sequel of sorts. While it isn't entirely necessary for you to have read the trilogy to understand what goes on in this fic, it would benefit you greatly if you did so. Help you enjoy it a bit more. Anyway, enjoy.

Absolute Desolation:
Antimatter

Written By
Shadow Kitsune

Prologue

A raging fire roared, smoke billowing into the dark night sky. There were no sounds of fire engines or police cars or ambulances off in the distance, rushing to the scene of the blaze. There was nothing but chaos, destruction everywhere. Lightning lit up the jet black storm clouds, thunder rumbling off in the distance. Buildings were demolished, burnt, reduced to rubble. Bodies of people and animals lay strewn throughout the streets, their flesh rotting, festering, maggots eating out through their eyes and nose and mouth, and every other orifice imaginable. Such destruction, such chaos had never been seen before, or even imagined.

Two people stood amidst the thick black smoke, the stench of decomposing corpses. A fierce wind blew, whipping the flames of the blaze about in the wind. Two men stood facing one another, swords in hand. One, a young man with long, shaggy, jet black hair with fierce cobalt blue eyes, the other a tall, handsome man with short, spiked light brown hair with streaks of blonde throughout, his serious baby blue eyes transfixed on his opponent before him. They remained perfectly still, unmoving, staring each other down. They each gripped their respective weapons, tightening their grip on the hilts of their swords. With a single movement, they had charged for one another.

Swords raised, they brought them forth, clashing them together, sparks flying out into the air. A wave of deadly energy swept across the area, wiping out bodies, extinguishing fires, and annihilating what little was left of the rubble that were once buildings. The two enemies locked gazes, and suddenly a clap of thunder sliced through the silence, and they sprung back away from one another. The young man with the jet black hair released a violent surge of energy. His opponent launched a counter attack, jaunting to the side and unleashing a wave of energy of his own. Both of their attacks missed. They were spiraling towards one another, until their swords met once again, a wave of breakneck force energy sweeping across the area.

The two enemies exchange blows, constantly trying and failing to think ahead of the other. Their swords clash, over and over again. They charge, swing, meet, repel. They collapse on one knee, exhausted, but never willing to concede defeat. Even with nothing to lose, they continue to fight a meaningless battle. The tall man rises to his feet, and sets his sights on his nemesis. He launches himself forward, sword reared back over his head. The black haired man is tired, too slow to respond. He lifts his sword to retaliate, but has it knocked from his hand. The tall man smites him across the face with the hilt of his sword, the black haired man collapses. His nemesis stands over him, glowering at him. He smirks, and kicks the black haired man once as hard as he the stomach. The black haired man wrenches in pain, and the tall man grins in amusement.

He has him pinned, down for the count. The tall man rears his sword up over his head, and prepares to put an end to his struggle once and for all. He looks down at his enemy, and realizes how sad and pathetic he is. With a demented grin upon his face, the tall man brings his sword down. In the blink of an eye…

Drip…

His eyes wide open, mouth gaping. The tall man looks down, sharp pain in his gut, blood trickling, draining from his wound.

Drip…

The black haired man, recalling his weapon, thrust his sword into his lover’s stomach.

Drip…

The tall man thrusts his weapon into his lover’s stomach, realizing that now, they had both lost.

Drip…

The tall man collapses, lover’s sword still lodged in his gut. At his side, his lover, his enemy, lay with his life draining from his eyes, sword still in his gut as well. They turn their heads, facing each other, looking into one another’s eyes. The tall man strokes his lover’s hair, his face, and felt remorse, regret for what it has come to. They held hands, their lives finally reaching their end, draining out from them like water from a spring. They had made it… made it to the end of the world.

With open eyes she bolted upwards, gasping to catch her breath. She looked all around her to ascertain that what she had seen was not a reality, but a dream, a nightmare.

A phantasm.

Elizabeth Parks lay back down in her bed, staring up into the pitch black abyss of her ceiling. She glanced over at her clock which read twelve past midnight. She started her first day of working at an elementary school tomorrow, and she was nervous as hell. She had been having that dream on and off for the past three weeks, and had been sleeping relatively soundly for the last several nights, until tonight. She didn’t know what it meant, or why she kept having it. All she knew is that it frightened her immensely, and that any attempt to talk to her brother Dawson about it would result in him insisting that everything was going to be okay, that it was only a nightmare and nightmares can’t come true.

What she didn’t tell him, however, is that the tall man with the light brown spiked hair with streaks of blonde from her dream… was him. She was troubled by what it could mean, but despite her best efforts, none of it ever made any sense.

It was all just a dream, a nightmare, and it was nothing at all to worry about.

Or so she hoped.

As she closed her eyes to go back to sleep again, the image, the face of the young man with the shaggy black hair appeared before her, and as she opened her eyes once more, a heavy weight bore down on her chest.

Who was he? Why was she dreaming of him, and her brother? And why were they fighting? Why couldn’t she get this dream out of her head, off of her mind? Why did the image of this mysterious young man plague her like so?

Elizabeth got up from bed, throwing her night robe on and tying the sash around her waist as she headed for the kitchen to take some sleeping pills to help her get some rest before she had to get up for the first day of school tomorrow. The light was on, and that could only mean one thing, that Dawson had just gotten home from work. He was sitting at the kitchen table eating a sandwich in a dirty sleeveless muscle shirt and old, ratty jeans. He had smudges of car oil on his arms, hands, and face, as though he had been lying underneath a car all day long.

“Did you just get home?” Elizabeth asked as she came into the kitchen unannounced. Dawson jumped up in surprise, nearly choking on a mouthful of his sandwich. When he saw Elizabeth standing before him, he managed to settle himself and swallow the wad of sandwich that had gotten lodged in the back of his throat. He caught his breath, and swallowed hard.

“You scared the living shit out of me,” Dawson replied. “I thought you were in bed.”

“I was. But I woke up and couldn’t go back to sleep, so I’m taking some sleeping pills so I’m not completely exhausted when I get up tomorrow morning,” Elizabeth replied.

Dawson took another bite of his sandwich, and nodded, smiling as he swallowed.

“Oh, yeah, you start teaching tomorrow, don’t you?” he asked.

“Yeah, I’m kind of nervous, but excited at the same time,” Elizabeth responded.

“I could see why. But I’m sure you’ll do fine. You’ll be great teacher,” Dawson assured her.

Elizabeth smiled and blushed slightly.

“Thanks,” she said as she opened the cabinet containing the various medications in search of some sleeping pills.

“So what’s keeping you up? Nerves?” Dawson asked.

“No, not really,” Elizabeth replied as she got herself a glass of water to wash her pills down with.

“What then?” Dawson asked, finishing the last bite of his sandwich.

Elizabeth popped the pills in her mouth, and followed them down with a gulp of water.

“I had that dream again…” she replied.

Dawson wiped his mouth with a napkin and froze when she mentioned the dream again. He looked up, and tossed the napkin down on his empty plate as he stood up.

“Lizzie, I’ve told you a million times already that it’s just a dream. There’s nothing to be afraid of. You can’t let these things bother you so easily. Dreams are just that, dreams. They can’t hurt you,” Dawson said, walking up to his little sister, placing his hands on either shoulder. “And even if they could,” he added, “I wouldn’t let them.”

Elizabeth looked up into her brother’s big baby blue eyes, and grinned back at him. She sat her glass of water down on the counter and wrapped her arms around him. Dawson returned the favor by putting his arms around Elizabeth as well.

“Thank you, bro,” Elizabeth said. “I know you wouldn’t let anything bad ever happen to me. And I’d do the same thing for you.”

Dawson laughed, and pulled his sister back from him, looking her in the eyes.

“I’m sure you would,” he said. “Now it’s getting late. You should get to bed so you’re fresh for tomorrow morning.”

Elizabeth nodded, and stood up on her tip-toes to give her brother a peck on the cheek before heading back off to bed.

“Good night, sis,” Dawson said.

“Night, bro,” Elizabeth said as she smiled back at him.

“Good luck tomorrow.”

“Thanks, I’ll need it,” Elizabeth said as she headed back to her room.

As Elizabeth closed her bedroom door and lied back down on her bed, she pulled the covers up over her and turned over on her side. She closed her eyes, and began to slowly slip into a sweet slumber until suddenly, the image of the black haired man flashed before her again. Suddenly, she was wide awake.

‘Who is he?’ she wondered. ‘And why do I keep seeing him in my head?’

She lay there for a long time after that, dwelling and pondering on her dream and the image of the man she kept seeing, until finally, she fell asleep, and slept soundly for the remainder of the night.

--

‘It’s the start of a whole new life for me…’ Alex thought to himself as he finally arrived the city of Elk Springs, Colorado. As he departed the bus station, he stood at the edge of the town, mountains rising up off in the distance. He slung his backpack over his shoulder, and narrowed his eyes as he breathed a light sigh. ‘Where do I go from here?’