Millennium Man #2:
"In Darkest Despair"
(Night And Day Act I)
by Jacob Milnestein

Gentle light filtered down from the canopy of stars above, illuminating the sand of the near endless horizon. In such soft light, it almost appeared as if he were walking on tiny grains of silver.

Head bowed, he continued his journey, naked feet brushing the strange, alien sand and filling him with a terrible sense of dread and foreboding.

He had walked this path many times during his life, constantly pacing the endless shore; shoulders slumped beneath the burden he carried.

The waves of the strange, unfathomable ocean remained calm and still, not daring to rise from their ordained state in spite of the moonless sky or to disrupt the traveller's reverie.

Abruptly he came to a stop, falling to his knees and panting with exhaustion.

The dull throb of his beating heart rang loudly in his ears, lungs crying out for air.

His eyes darted wildly to his sides, examining the vast and derelict landscape, desperately hoping for a sign of life to prove that he was not alone.

But there was nothing.

The sand was immaculate; untouched by the presence of any living creature aside from himself…and the dark, shadowy guardians that watched over him.

He turned, tears streaming down his thin face but the gods had receded from view, standing quietly just outside his realm of vision, watching upon him with their incomprehensible and featureless faces.

Fingers curled slowly into fists and the nameless traveller pounded down against the soft sand beneath, screaming silently at the dark and morbid elders that even now observed his torment.

He wanted to ask them why this was happening, to scream out and demand to know for what terrible crime it was that he was being punished but deep inside he already knew.

Silently, he wrapped his arms around his head and curled up in a foetal position upon the surface of the endless beach, starlight washing over him and giving him an almost spectral appearance.

High up above, the gods watched on impassively.

Regina Darling rubbed her tired eyes, turning slowly away from the white glare of the monitor screen.

Of all the people she had encountered, all the people she had interviewed, none had been more stubborn that the small box of white plastic and metal that sat atop the desk of her study.

Sighing she rose from her chair, dressing gown trailing at her ankles, and admitted defeat. She had to accept the fact that whatever secrets the internet contained as to the true identity of Millennium Man, it simply wasn't going to yield them it to her.

Agitated, she moved from the study and into the softer atmosphere of the living room.

Soft light spread from the two lamps in either corner of the room, converging and forming a mutual point of illumination, made all the brighter by the shadows that threatened to overwhelm it.

Silently she lit her last cigarette and slumped onto the sofa, flicking the television on with the remote control.

From the adjourning bedroom, her boyfriend Trevor snorted loudly and then subsided into the arms of sleep once more.

Idly she flicked through the channels, finally alighting on a non-specific music programme on KGPC.

Very rarely did she actually have any time to sit down and watch television with a pre-ordained manifesto in mind.

She had been working in television since she left university. It hadn't really taken her a very long time to get her own show, just a few phone calls from Daddy.

She smiled, comforted by the thought.

Whilst her father was not as significant a presence as Henry Burke had been, nor was he as rich as Denise Delgado's father, he was respected as a 'force' within the entertainment industry.

Regina herself had attended the same public school as Victoria Burke and Denise Delgado and, as such, was entitled to more than a few privileges in regards to her chosen career.

Some had called her sudden appearance at the top of the ratings a ‘meteoric rise to fame’, Regina Darling knew that it was simply a matter of being in the right place at the right time.

That familiar smug smile that had so unsettled Michael Manly grew upon her face.

Shortly after the sudden success of the Not Tonight, Darling show, Regina had met her current flame, Trevor Mason. There had been no significant moving of the earth or any other astounding revelations but both Regina and Trevor recognised that they both could benefit from the presence of the other.

The sex didn't hurt either.

Trevor was a businessman, the assistant manager of his father's company. He was comfortably well off, well groomed and upwardly mobile – what more could a girl want?

Yet still she found that she was not entirely comfortable with their mutual arrangement.

The appearance of Millennium Man a year ago had set something off inside her mind. It was as if the costumed hero had triggered some emotional response that she had absolutely no control over, like those sappy old stories of love at first sight.

Of course she was loathe to refer to her increasing infatuation with the Science Hero as anything more than desire but was still unable to deny that there was something there that she couldn't quite define.

She glanced down at the cigarette once more, noticing that it had already burnt down to the filtered tip.

Mechanically, she lifted it to her lips for a final drag before stubbing it out in the pristine glass ashtray.

There was still much she didn't understand, not least of all being the true identity of the object of her affections but none the less, Regina Darling had promised herself over a year ago that she would unveil the hero's identity and win him over with her feminine charms.

Feeling more than a little aroused at the idea, Regina Darling stood up and padded softly over to the open door of the bedroom.

Her relationship with Millennium Man was still a long way off from blossoming but at least, in the mean time, there was Trevor.

Smiling once more, she slipped beneath the sheets.

He awoke abruptly, sweat running down his face and into his eyes, wide open with fear.

Driven by desperation, he threw himself out of bed, almost falling flat upon his face as he did so. His hands scrapped against the featureless grey walls as he pulled himself up to the thick, barred window.

Pushing the soft flesh of his face up against the bars, he glared out at the night with panic-stricken eyes.

To his relief the moon still hung pregnant in the sky.

Sighing he slumped back down to the floor of his cell, running shaking hands through his dishevelled hair.

As long as the light of the moon still filtered down from the heavens, he was safe.

Once more, he began to count the fingers on his hands in order to ward off sleep and the nightmarish landscape of that desolate place.

Outside, the light of the stars began to flicker…

She awoke with Trevor's arm slumped over her chest, his mouth wide open, a small pool of drool on the pillow beneath.

Grunting, she pushed his arm off her and climbed out of bed, barely suppressing a yawn as she stumbled over to the vast wardrobe in order to select her socially acceptable uniform of the day.

The early whispers of morning sunlight filtered through the blinds, carrying with them the sounds of the awakening city.

Briefly Regina Darling glanced at the calendar over the bedside table.

Her face instantly fell with dismay as she realised that tonight was the night of the party over at the Delgado mansion.

She had accidentally ran into Denise several months ago, before the city had come under attack by the mysterious invaders so admirably thwarted by Millennium Man, and had reluctantly promised to put in an appearance at the party.

At the time she had thought it a marvellous opportunity to corner Pacific City's wealthiest bachelor, Bruce Todd and secure her an interview for sure. Todd's recent death and the stir his diaries had caused had soon put an end to that though.

She bit her lip, trying to come up with a believable excuse for not attending Delgado's highly organised gathering.

From the bed, Trevor Mason murmured slightly before finally opening his eyes.

With sleep still at the corner of his eyes, he eyed her up and down, examining the exposed beauty of her naked body.

"Good morning." He smiled lecherously.

Disregarding his leers, she threw his crumpled trousers at him.

"Get up, Trevor." She snapped, profoundly irritated by the realisation that there was no way of escaping her commitment to Delgado's party.

"Who got out of the wrong side of bed, then?" He smirked, stretching his arms in a ‘v’ and yawning loudly.

She sighed and ran a hand through her uncombed hair.

"I'm really not in the mood for this, right now." She muttered, pulling her underwear up.

"I can see." He continued to smile and patted the bed lightly. "Why don't you come back to bed and I'll put you in the mood."

She paused to scowl at him before turning her back and examining the contents of the wardrobe.

Carelessly she removed a white blouse from its hanger and began to sleepily fumbling with the straps of her bra.

"Want me to help with that?" Trevor asked, still making no effort to lift himself up from the bed.

She didn't reply, channelling her frustration into her struggle with the bra.

"I hope you haven't forgot about the Delgado party tonight." She said bluntly, finally winning against the bra without his assistance and catching a glimpse of his rolling eyes in the full size mirror on the inside of the wardrobe door.

"I had." He muttered, disheartened. "But thank you so much for reminding me."

Regina Darling smiled viciously.

If she had to suffer then she was going to make damn sure he did as well.

"Make sure you shave before tonight. I know you don't have to maintain an appearance at work or even really bother showing up but if you're going to be seen in public with me I'd appreciate it if you made a little effort."

"Of course, Regina, dear." He muttered, not really paying attention.

"I mean it, Trevor." She snapped, shrugging into a pin stripe jacket and buttoning the suit trousers.

This time he made no pretence of listening, instead he rolled over till he occupied her side of the bed and closed his eyes.

She turned and looked at him, anger and disillusion surfacing before being suppressed once more her calculated masque of professionalism.

Whatever it was that had first attracted her to Trevor, it most definitely wasn't his personality.

Loudly she slammed the bedroom door behind her, hoping to wake him once more but to no avail, and searched the living room and study for her cigarettes before discovering the empty pack exactly where she had left it last night.

"Bloody marvellous." She snapped, the frustration rising once more.

Dejectedly she made her way to the apartment building's elevator and headed out to face another less than perfect day.

His back was hunched, eyes blackened from lack of sleep.

Several hours ago the orderlies had brought round his food but the medication the doctors had given him to suppress his powers left him without appetite or inclination.

The drugs dulled his mind, made it hard to think and even harder to stay awake.

A shiver ran down his spine as he recalled the terrible dreams that had so recently returned to haunt him.

If only they could be dismissed so easily as an after effect of his medication.

Morosely he turned his attention back to the emptiness outside of his window. By any other light and to any other mind it would have been as horrifying as the endless beach he encountered night after night, but as long as the light of day remained he was able to obtain at least some security from its rows of emotionless, grey buildings.

The institution in which he had been imprisoned was a vast and ancient one, founded in 1912 to deal with patients suffering from abnormal mental illnesses.

As the century had progressed, the asylum had quickly adapted to specialising in the incarceration of those that had entered the public arena as self-confessed ‘supervillains’.

Its name was Alhazred Asylum and for a short while it had been enough to dissuade any superpowered beings in Pacific City, Lorrington or Harbour City from faltering from the right path.

Rumour held it that in his last days the esteemed philanthropist Henry Burke III was admitted as a patient to the asylum though for what reason the nameless prisoner could not guess. He tried his best not to pay any real attention to rumour.

As to how he himself had ended up within the cold, gothic walls of that terrible institution, the answer was very simple – he had chosen the path less travelled…that of a supervillain.

Once upon a time he had been a normal man, content in his everyday life and happy with his position amongst his peers and colleagues.

He was well educated, enjoyed a good relationship with those closest to him and had a life that was both fruitful and promising.

He was happy.

And then, in the early summer of 2000, Pacific City's first superheroes had appeared.

At first he had found it relatively easy to ignore them, after all they didn't really have any direct effect on his life but as time went by and those gaudy costumes began to fill the television screens and newspaper front pages more and more he had found himself growing increasingly irritated by their presence.

Slowly, the serenity and satisfaction he had worked so hard to achieve had leaked out of his life, leaving nothing but an empty man, plagued by the constant appearance of those distracting and hateful disruptions of everyday life.

It was then that he had truly descended into the darkness that had ended in his incarceration within the asylum.

Via means that he still did not quite understand, he had established a vague communication with the realms outside of normal thought.

That was the first time he dreamt of that starry and desolate beach.

Walking upon its strange shores, it had all seemed so beautiful, so full of possibilities. At first the nondescript deities that watched over that place had terrified him but, upon deciding that he had nothing left to lose, he forced his petrified mortal mind to accept them and, in doing so, had offered himself as a vessel for their powers within his own world.

They had never said either way that they had accepted his offer but, upon waking and discovering his new mastery of shadow, he had taken that as a sign that he had won their favour.

Hastily he had rushed out into the world to make himself known, a mistake that had proved all but fatal in the long run.

So eager was he to prove himself to the world and have his revenge on those costumed heroes that blighted the skies that he never truly thought of the consequences.

A sudden scratching at the walls caught his attention.

"Hello?" A distant voice whispered. "Hello, is anyone in there?"

He remained quiet.

"M-My name is Victoria Stroh. C-Can anyone hear me?"

He turned away once more. The last thing he needed was interruptions by other craving a forum to boast of their villainous schemes and how they would have got away with it save for the interruption of Millennium Man or Mysteria.

Slowly he raised his hand to rub his tired eyes once more and froze with terror, a fresh spasm of shock running through his body and setting his heart beating faster once more.

There, on the back of his hand, was a small black stain, no bigger in size than a penny.

His breathing became fallow as desperately he tried to scrub the black mark from his hand, cursing wildly at it and shrieking in terror.

In the distance he thought he could hear a voice somewhere far from his own inhuman cries of fear.

"What's going on in there? What's happening?"

From the other side of the wall, the voice continued unnoticed.

Tracy Newman tapped impatiently on the front door.

She had been trying to get through to Finnegan for several days, ever since he had failed to appear at work.

Of course she had tried making excuses for him but somehow she knew he had already blown it.

This was just another of his stupid temper tantrums at not getting his own way and this time there was nothing she could do to get him off the hook.

Angrily, she banged loudly on the door.

"Jim, open up, I know you're in there." She shouted.

A deathly silence emanated from behind the door.

She sighed loudly.

"You're not impressing me, Jim." She announced, placing her hands firmly upon her hips in a gesture of defiance.

Again, there was no reply.

"Okay, fine, have it your way, James Finnegan. I just want you to know that this time I won't be there to bail you out."

With a scowl, she turned away and marched back down the winding hallway of the apartment building.

From behind the closed door of Jim Finnegan's apartment, a high-pitched, girlish giggling broke the deathly silence.

"How wonderful to see you again, Regina, dear!"

Regina forced a smile to her face, finally confronted with actually having to acknowledge the other woman.

"Denise," She said, eyes rolling behind the safety of her sunglasses. "Its been quite a while, hasn't it?"

Smiling her abnormally manic smile, Denise Delgado slipped her arm under Regina's and led her away from where she stood.

"You simply must tell me everything, dear!" Delgado exclaimed.

Regina shot an apologetic look back at Trevor who stared blankly back at her.

"Soooo, Regina, sweetheart," Denise purred, leading her old school friend through the large crowd that had assembled in one of the mansion's many spacious rooms, pausing only to smile sweetly at those that offered compliments on her dress or the turn out of the party. "How is life at the top of the food-chain?"

"Well…" Regina began.

"Of course, it's been absolutely dreadful for me. There was that beastly business with those primitives and that silly diamond…" She patted Regina on the arm again. "I nearly died, Regina, sweetheart."

Out of the corner of her eye, Regina Darling suddenly spotted her escape route.

Standing awkwardly in the corner, cradling a still full glass of wine, Michael Manly stared morosely at his feet.

"Excuse me a moment, Denise." Regina announced holding a finger up to prevent further comment from her ‘friend’.

She elegantly slipped her arm out from Denise's, resisting the urge to break her arm in the process and made a beeline for Manly.

"You've just saved my life." She whispered in his ear.

He looked up, startled by her presence.

"Oh." He muttered. "Its you."

"Charmed, I'm sure." She smiled acidly. "Why so blue, Michael?"

He murmured under his breath and returned his gaze to his feet.

Regina stood awkwardly at his side before finally glancing once more at Denise Delgado, stalking desperately towards her next victim.

Quickly Regina jumped up and enthusiastically waved to the poor woman, unaware of the danger she was in.

"Victoria!" She cried. "Over here!"

Victoria Burke glanced at Regina and then over at the approaching form of Delgado.

It didn't take her long to make her decision.

Within a minute she had managed to circumnavigate the perils of conversation with Denise Delgado and crossed through the crowded halls of people to where Darling and Manly stood.

"Hi, Victoria." Regina beamed. "You know Michael over here, don't you?"

"Yes." Victoria said, in a somewhat reserved fashion. "Yes, we've met before."

Regina's smile grew.

"Of course you know him, he used to be your high flying favourite son, didn't he?"

Both Manly and Burke looked awkwardly at one another.

"I've been meaning to talk to you, Michael…" Victoria began before stopping and glancing at Regina.

The other woman waved a hand.

"Oh, don't mind me, Vic, we're all friends here, aren't we?" She said brightly.

"We don't have anything to talk about." Manly muttered.

The mood quickly soured.

"I can't believe you're acting like this." Victoria snapped. "This is because of the cancellation of The Manly Side isn't it?"

Michael Manly remained silent.

"Jesus Christ, Michael, what did you expect? Its not personal, I made a decision on behalf of the company, for the company. You must see that."

"I would have expected more from you, Victoria." Manly accused. "After everything we've been through together."

"Our…" Victoria stopped and looked at Regina before continuing, slightly more subdued. "Our ‘personal’ lives have nothing to do with our working relationship. I made a professional decision and I'll be damned if I don't stand by it."

"I thought you were better than that." He shouted, drawing attention from the others in attendance.

"And I thought you were an adult." Victoria Burke snapped and stomped back into the silent crowd.

Michael Manly stood silent for a moment, the focus of everyone's attention.

"I can't do this anymore." He said quietly and placed his glass down on the nearest table, walking slowly away and out towards the hall.

"Well," Regina Darling whispered quietly to herself. "There's a turn up for the books."

Mentally she filed it away from notable mention on tomorrow's edition of Not Tonight, Darling.

"Looks like he's not gay after all." She smiled with bitter irony.

Hours had passed.

Silently he rocked back and forth, his sleepless eyes still wide with subdued panic.

The stain of shadow upon his hand had grown steadily, slowly creeping up his arm and darkening the flesh beneath. Despite hours of furious scratching he had not been able to remove it, instead now it was encrusted with dried blood and flaking skin.

With wild eyes he continued to scan the surroundings of his dull, hospital room.

The growth upon his body continued to spread…