Today, my first-ever short story was published, with Havok. It’s called “Luminous Matter.” If you’re reading this after June 18, read the story on the archive page but you’ll have to become a member (and it’s a no-brainer; seriously, it’s a great deal to get tons of stories for very little). Let’s explore the themes behind this story, but first make sure to go read it.

I began with a question: What if you met an angel, but “Do not fear” was not what you heard? It’s always intrigued me that in almost every Biblical encounter, angels lead off with that statement. “Don’t be afraid” seems to imply the people they talk to are, in fact, afraid. Why exactly? I’m sure their sudden presence contributes to it. Matthew describes it like lightning. Their appearance is also said to be dazzling. And although they usually look like men, there’s something different enough about them that must be terrifying. It’s the Uncanny Valley effect.

But there’s something more fundamental about angels: they reflect the holiness of God. And that can indeed be a scary thing to encounter. See Isaiah 6 for example. When you stare into absolute moral perfection, you see all your own flaws and regrets and shortcomings on full display.

That’s what I wanted to explore, and then I added another layer: what if an angel could be trapped? We see in Daniel 10 an unnamed angel that was “opposed by the Prince of Persia for twenty one days.” This seems to refer to a fallen angel who restrained him somehow. He had to be helped out by another angel, Michael, in order to deliver a message to Daniel. In Revelation 20, an angel binds up Satan with a chain, and throws him into the abyss for a thousand years. So while angels are dazzling and powerful, they have limits.

Here’s where I get extra speculative: what if human scientists restrained an angel, during an experiment meant to trap dark matter? It’s certainly a double “what-if,” although it’s not too wild of a possibility. Jacob “wrestles with a man” in Genesis 32, restraining him, and this person seems to be an angel. Dark matter, on the other hand, has never been caught and is still quite mysterious. But there are current and upcoming dark matter experiments that might finally solve this mystery.

Putting all this together, I imagined a dark matter researcher that accidentally traps an angel in his particle collector. This man has a religious background but it’s not part of his daily life. He has colleagues that are Muslim, atheist, and opportunist. Each of them have a different response to the angel, and in turn the angel affects each of them in unique ways. For our protagonist, he wrestles most of all with his conscience and personal regrets.

A lot of stories show angels as peaceful or kind of bland, or else it seems to be an angel but really it’s a demon. You end up with sentimental stories or horror flicks. I wanted to hone in on the ways in which even a good angel is frightening –– especially to people trapped with it in a lab underneath Antarctica. But at the same time, this angel –– who our protagonist regrets ever meeting –– brings about personal redemption. Read the whole story here.

What would you expect if you encountered an angel?