The Dust and the Divide

“I thought wonder would unite us—but in Clivilius, belief and doubt split wider than any canyon.”

I stood alone, the horizon of Clivilius unfurling before me in an endless sweep of ochre and gold.

The air was still save for the whisper of wind that curled and shifted across the dunes, carrying with it the faintest sigh—as if the land itself drew breath. That sound, delicate yet insistent, only deepened the silence pressing against my ears. The blue sky arched overhead, vast and clean, unmarked by cloud or contrail. Beneath my bare feet the sand held the memory of sun, warm grains shifting with each small adjustment of my weight.

I had expected them to follow immediately. The Portal shimmered behind me, its colours dancing in patient invitation, but the seconds stretched into something heavier. Each moment pulled taut until it threatened to snap.

Had the Portal rejected them?

The thought slithered in before I could stop it. My mind filled the space where their voices should have been, each passing second sharpening into a blade of doubt. Had they faltered at the threshold, unwilling to cross? More likely, fear had seized them—Jamie's scepticism hardening into refusal, Paul's curiosity buckling beneath the weight of disbelief. The image of them standing frozen in my study, staring at an empty wall where impossible colours had danced, stung more keenly than I'd expected.

My gamble, so bold only minutes ago, now felt reckless. Naïve. The gesture of a man so desperate to share his wonder that he'd forgotten to consider whether anyone actually wanted it.

Why did I ever think this was a good idea?

The question rose like bile, bitter in my throat.

This was never going to work!

The words reverberated within me, a chorus of doubt that grew louder with each heartbeat. My chest tightened, breaths coming shallow, as if the vast sky itself pressed down upon me. The sunlight, fierce and relentless, warmed my skin—yet inside me a frost was spreading, lacing my veins with the particular cold of abandonment. Solitude, sharp and merciless, carved its way through the hope I'd been clutching.

And then—softly, steadily—it came.

Do not doubt me, Luke Smith.

The voice of Clivilius unfurled in my mind, quiet but firm, carrying with it a depth that transcended sound. It was neither male nor female, but something between and beyond—a resonance that brushed the edges of my soul. Not command but comfort. A gentle rebuke wrapped in reassurance.

Warmth bloomed in me, not from the sun above but from somewhere deeper, as though the very air of this place had chosen to cradle me. The alien landscape—the vast sky arched impossibly high, the rolling sands that shimmered in the light—no longer loomed as hostile unknowns. They softened, became familiar. Almost welcoming.

The weight of solitude eased, replaced by presence. I was not abandoned. Not truly alone. The voice—my unseen guide, my watchful guardian—anchored me, a beacon flickering steady against the storm of doubt. And though the silence of Clivilius endured, it no longer felt empty.

It was waiting. Just as I was.

Right on cue, as though my longing had pulled him through by force of will alone, Paul erupted from the Portal in a rush of motion.

He landed hard, shoes striking the Clivilian ground with a thunder that reverberated across the silence. Dust lifted in shimmering clouds around him, catching the light as it swirled. He stood there chest heaving, eyes alight with the reckless vitality that had always defined him—the sheer exuberance of his arrival making the vast emptiness seem briefly conquered.

Jamie followed, but with none of Paul's bravado.

His steps were measured, tentative, as if the air itself might resist him. His eyes, wide and unblinking, darted across the endless expanse of ochre dunes and crystalline sky. Where Paul charged forward, Jamie seemed to hover at the edge of disbelief, his awe tempered by caution. The two of them together—the bold and the wary—embodied the spectrum of human response to wonder.

"Did you hear it?" The words leapt from me, too urgent to hold back, my voice bright and trembling with excitement. The silence between us, thick and charged, begged to be broken. If they too had heard the voice, then what had until now been my solitary communion would become a shared covenant. That thought thrilled and unsettled me in equal measure.

They looked at me, then at each other, and without speaking gave their answer: a simultaneous nod. Small, simple, yet more profound than any declaration.

The relief that swept over me was almost dizzying.

It was not just confirmation—it was communion. The voice of Clivilius, the presence that had whispered guidance into the marrow of my being, had touched them too. Its resonance had reached across the divide, weaving itself into their reality just as it had into mine.

A weight I hadn't realised I was carrying slipped from me, the last remnants of doubt dissolving like morning fog. I was no longer the sole bearer of this strange inheritance. The path ahead, though daunting, was no longer mine alone. Strength stirred in me, quiet but fierce, born of the knowledge that this journey was shared—that we had crossed a threshold together, bound now not only by blood and love but by the voice of a world that had claimed us all.

"This is where life will begin anew," I declared, my arms sweeping wide to encompass the horizon.

Paul's reaction was not the awe I had anticipated.

Instead, he stepped forward, his expression taut with something I could not yet name, and began to carve slow arcs with his arms. He moved deliberately, palms brushing the empty air, fingers curling as though testing for resistance. His body leaned this way and that, as though he expected at any moment to strike an invisible barrier, to feel the flat solidity of glass or wall.

"What are you doing, Paul?" My question slipped out, caught between amusement and genuine confusion. The absurdity of his movements—the almost childlike earnestness of them—broke the solemnity that had, until then, bound us in shared wonder.

"I'm trying to find the study walls," he said, his voice tinged with frustration, scepticism bleeding into curiosity.

"The study walls?" I echoed, incredulity rising. The image of my brother groping for invisible plaster in the middle of an alien desert was almost comical—a surreal scene painted against a backdrop of unending sky.

"Yes. Isn't this just an advanced form of virtual reality? Or maybe like a hologram?" His theories tumbled out quickly, a desperate tether cast toward the world he knew. I could see the battle unfolding in him: rationality clawing to reassert itself, trying to file this impossible place under the heading of the explainable. His hands, still swiping through the air, betrayed his disbelief as much as his words.

I shook my head slowly, moving toward the spot where I had left the textbook the night before. Its cover, dulled now by a thin coat of fine Clivilian dust, caught the strange light as I stooped to lift it.

"I assure you, Clivilius is very real," I said, my voice calm, steady—meant to anchor them as much as myself.

I held the book aloft. A simple object, laughably ordinary in our world, now transformed into something approaching proof. The pages were no holographic trick, no simulation conjured by wires or code. It was solid, weighty, its edges grainy with dust that no virtual construct could ever mimic. Here, it was a relic—a bridge between Earth and this vast, alien canvas, its very presence a quiet but unyielding refutation of illusion.

"I recognise this book," Jamie declared.

His arm shot forward in a sudden movement, snatching the textbook from my hands with a force that startled me. His fingers clamped tightly around its spine, knuckles whitening, the vehemence in his grip betraying not just frustration but something deeper—fear, disbelief, the desperate need to pull the impossible back into the realm of the ordinary.

"This is one of your stupid uni books that you've had sitting untouched on the bookcase, isn't it?"

"Indeed, it is," I replied, the words edged with a flicker of irritation I could no longer conceal. My hand darted out, reclaiming the book with a swift, deliberate tug.

The momentary struggle between us was more than a contest over paper and ink—it was the physical manifestation of the invisible battle raging beneath the surface. Faith against doubt. Revelation against denial. The textbook, absurdly mundane in its origin, had become a symbol of the chasm that separated our understandings.

"I don't understand," Paul broke in, his voice cracking faintly as he turned to meet my gaze. His eyes searched mine with an intensity that unsettled me, as though he hoped I could anchor him when the ground beneath him felt suddenly unreliable. His expression was a tangled weave—threads of confusion drawn tight with fear, yet glimmering through it all was a spark of something else. A dangerous gleam of wonder that betrayed how much of him longed to believe.

"There's nothing here."

"Apart from a pile of large boxes," Jamie interjected, seizing the opportunity to divert his attention. His tone carried the brittle edge of dismissal, yet his body betrayed him: he crouched low beside the stacked tent boxes, his hands brushing across the dusty cardboard as though touch might reveal some hidden trick. Curiosity leaked through the cracks in his scepticism.

"Why are all these boxes here?"

"It's going to be the first shelter here in Clivilius," I explained, and though my chest still rose and fell with the remnants of unease, my voice steadied as I spoke. The words carried a purpose I clung to, as though by naming the thing I could anchor it into reality. The shelter wasn't just fabric and poles, cardboard boxes stacked in the dust—it was proof. A structure that would tether this dreamscape to something solid, something that could be touched and lived in and believed.

"What the hell does Clivilius need a shelter for?" Jamie's retort cracked through the air. His tone was sharp, incredulous, as though my words had offended reason itself. His eyes narrowed, mouth tight, and I felt the familiar sting of his scepticism digging beneath my skin.

"And what even is Clivilius?" Paul added, his voice softer but no less pressing. His question lacked Jamie's sharpness, carrying instead the weight of bewilderment—someone still struggling to find footing on ground that kept shifting beneath him.

"This place is Clivilius," I declared, sweeping my arms wide in a gesture too grand to be ignored. The landscape stretched behind me—an expanse of ochre sand and blue sky, endless and waiting—and I tried to pour its immensity into my words. "And the shelter is for the start of our new civilisation."

The syllables came heavy, monumental, as though they were laying stone foundations across the dust.

But when I turned back to them, the vision I carried in my chest collided with their silence.

Paul and Jamie stood unmoving, their stares flat, their faces blank canvases painted with disbelief. The air between us thickened, their silence louder than any protest—a wall that reminded me just how far apart we stood. My conviction on one side. Their scepticism on the other.

"It has to start somewhere," I offered with a shrug, the movement a poor disguise for the sting their lack of response left behind. The words tasted smaller than the vision they carried, stripped of grandeur by their dismissal. Here I was, proposing a beginning that could reshape everything we knew—and they saw only discomfort, dust, and absurdity.

"What the hell do we need a new civilisation for?" Jamie's voice rang out, sharp and uncompromising. His incredulity was palpable, every syllable laced with contempt for the notion. Where I saw promise, he saw intrusion. Where I saw potential, he saw absurdity.

"I'm quite happy with the current one, thank you very much!"

"You'll see in time," I answered, forcing calm into my tone though the sting of his words pressed against me. My voice was soft but resolute. "It will all make sense."

I clung to the conviction in my own reply like a rope thrown across a flooding river. Belief was all I had—belief in the unseen, in the sleeping potential buried within the dust at our feet.

"Fuck time," Jamie snapped, his voice rising with each word, brittle patience splintering into fury. "I'm going home. This place is shit. It's just dust, for God's sake! There's enough of that in the outback."

His rejection struck like a blow to the chest, his words brutal in their simplicity. Where I saw a canvas for the future, he saw only emptiness—a wasteland no different from the barren corners of Earth. The gulf between us yawned wider in that instant, impossible to ignore.

I stood rooted, the weight of disappointment pressing heavily across my shoulders. I had wanted awe, maybe even wonder. What I received instead was scorn.

And then he turned.

His movement was sharp, decisive, propelled by the frustration boiling inside him. Dust puffed up with every step of his retreat, swirling around his legs as he strode with unflinching determination back toward the Portal. His march was more than footsteps—it was a declaration of his refusal to embrace what I had offered.

I watched him go, the vibrant colours of the Portal beckoning at the edge of vision. Each stride carried him closer to retreat, to the familiar world he clung to. And I remained still, caught in the ache of his rejection, watching the possibility of shared wonder dissolve into the dust he despised.

As Jamie drew nearer to the Portal, something shifted.

The air itself seemed to harden, thickening into a resistance almost visible—like glass fogging over with breath. His strides, once brisk and purposeful, faltered. Each step dragged, his body straining as though he were wading through unseen currents. Muscles coiled tight across his frame, every movement labouring against an invisible weight.

He reached the edge, close enough to stretch an arm toward it, yet it was as if the distance stretched with him, mocking his effort. His face contorted, lips pulled back in a grimace of sheer exertion, sweat gathering along his brow and tracing thin lines down his temples.

Watching him falter there, on the brink of return, stirred something cold and unfamiliar in me. It dawned sharp and sudden: Clivilius might not be merely a place. It might have intent. Will. A say in what futures unfolded within its reach.

"Well, off you go then," I said, bitterness bleeding into my tone despite myself. His rejection of Clivilius—of me—was a stone lodged in my chest. If I was to build something new here, I could not afford to let such doubt take root.

"I'm trying," Jamie ground out, his voice tight, breath hissing through clenched teeth. His whole body seemed to quake with the effort, shoulders bunching, veins taut across his arms as he forced his hand toward the shimmering threshold.

"What do you mean you're trying?" Paul's voice cut in sharply, panic flaring bright where earlier there had only been curiosity.

"I mean I'm trying to leave, but the bloody thing won't let me!" Jamie's frustration exploded, his words ragged with fury. He lunged forward, his body pitched with desperate determination, arm outstretched in a final bid to break free.

The effort was Herculean—yet the result was damning. His hand drove forward, only to meet resistance that should not exist, his palm halted in mid-air as though pressed against an unseen wall.

The struggle was both shocking and illuminating. Human will against something far larger. Something that did not yield. In that moment, the truth gleamed stark and undeniable: Clivilius was not a passive landscape.

It was a force unto itself. And Jamie was caught in its judgement.

The instant his hand brushed the neon swirls of the Portal, the world convulsed.

The air shuddered as though recoiling, and a deafening crack ripped through the silence—sharp and violent, like the sky itself had been torn in two. A blinding flash followed, searing across my vision in an eruption of white fire. Sparks cascaded outward in a shower of light, falling around us in chaotic rain that fizzled against the dust at our feet.

Jamie's cry cleaved through the aftermath—a raw, jagged sound that mingled pain with disbelief. He staggered back, clutching his arm, his body twisting in a clumsy retreat from the force that had struck him. His movements were frantic, desperate, as if fending off an invisible assailant that lingered even after the light had died.

When at last he steadied himself, his hand was pressed tight against his chest. The sleeve of his shirt hung in tatters, scorched and smoking at the edges. Wisps of grey curled upward, carrying the acrid tang of burnt fabric.

Jamie no longer looked defiant. No longer furious. He looked lost—his face pale beneath the sheen of sweat, his expression a mask of stunned bewilderment.

"What the hell was that?" Paul's voice broke the heavy stillness, cracking high with panic. He lunged toward Jamie, fear quickening his movements, hands already reaching to steady him.

My own legs carried me forward before I had truly decided to move. Concern pulled at me, disbelief pushed me on. I closed the distance between us, heart hammering, mind scrambling to reconcile what my eyes refused to deny.

"Jamie! Jamie, are you okay?" The words tore from me, urgent and raw, my voice cracking under the weight of panic. My hands reached instinctively for his arm, fingers brushing against the scorched fabric—brittle and crumbling at the edges—as I pulled gently at his wrist, needing to see the damage for myself.

What I found left me reeling.

His hand—so recently pressed against the furious glow of the Portal—was untouched. The skin, pale and smooth, bore no mark of burn or blister. It was a miracle, and yet not a comforting one. Because where flesh had been spared, something else had not.

The acrid stench of singed hair filled the air, unmistakable, clinging thick and sour to the back of my throat. I swallowed hard, eyes widening as I took in the strange, almost surgical absence of hair along his forearm. Gone—stripped away completely, leaving the skin bare and vulnerable.

The detail struck me as grotesque. Bizarre. And in its way, more chilling than any visible wound.

"This fucking place is trying to kill me!" Jamie's voice shattered my stunned silence. He wrenched his arm back violently, jerking away from my touch as though I too had burned him. Anger and fear fused in his words, each syllable sharp, barbed. His eyes blazed, wild with fury—but beneath it I caught the tremor of real terror.

"What the hell were you thinking bringing us here?!"

"I didn't know that was going to happen!" The protest burst from me before I had time to shape it, breathless and desperate. Guilt coiled in my chest, hot and suffocating, while the words stumbled into the air like broken fragments.

I had wanted to show them wonder, not danger. But here it was, undeniable: Clivilius was no longer only possibility and promise.

It had teeth.

The weight of our reality pressed hard upon me. My vision of this world—bright, expansive, hopeful—faltered under the sudden shadow of its peril. The joy that had filled me at the thought of building anew shrank back, cowering behind the fact that I had led them blindly into something I did not yet understand.

"Let me try," Paul said suddenly. Determination settled over his features, a stubborn set to his jaw as he turned to face the Portal.

"Are you insane? Didn't you see what just happened?" Jamie snapped, his incredulity raw, his sleeve still smouldering faintly at the edges.

"Maybe you did it wrong?" Paul countered, the words almost casual, though I caught the edge of hope behind them. It wasn't bravado—it was a grasping for explanation, for control, for some rational key that might unlock what had rejected Jamie so violently.

"Oh, fuck off, Paul." Jamie's retort came sharp, the venom fuelled by frustration as much as pain.

"Hey! Don't speak to him like that," I cut in, the strain of it all breaking through my composure. My voice rose sharper than I'd intended. The last thing Clivilius needed was division—yet here it was, growing wider already.

"Fuck you all," Jamie growled, low and dangerous. His anger pulsed outward, raw and unfiltered. His eyes burned with a wildness I scarcely recognised—defiance laced with betrayal, fear hiding behind the shield of fury. His stance was all bluster, defensive and ready to lash out, yet in his trembling shoulders I saw vulnerability, stark and unguarded.

"What the hell is wrong with this thing?" Paul's voice broke through, strained now, pulled from the lip of panic. He stood at the Portal's edge, his arm extended, straining forward into the same unseen resistance that had repelled Jamie. Around him the air fizzed and spat, a low crackle rising from nowhere, as though the Portal itself had grown hostile.

"There's nothing wrong with it," I said firmly, though my chest was knotted with doubts I couldn't afford to show. I forced resolve into my tone, masking the turmoil beneath. My steps were quick, decisive, carrying me past Paul. My jaw clenched, eyes fixed on the roiling surface of the Portal, I pushed aside fear and hesitation.

If words wouldn't convince them, perhaps action would.

The light reached out to claim me, wrapping around my body in its restless glow. The familiar sensation returned—disorienting, weightless, as if suspended between heartbeat and breath. For a moment, the alien vastness of Clivilius dissolved.

And then—abruptly, jarringly—I was back.

The study closed around me, its walls solid, its air thick with dust and the faint scent of home. The shift was so sudden it spun my senses, leaving me reeling between two realities that could no longer be kept apart.

Behind me, through the shimmering membrane of the Portal, I knew they still stood in the dust of Clivilius. Trapped. Unable to follow.

The implications of that settled over me with a weight I wasn't yet ready to carry.