In 1947,
Trinity College students Symonds (a theologian) and Alex (a scientist) visit the elderly
Aleister Crowley. Crowley discusses the possibility of resurrecting from the dead with the help of
sex magic rituals. The students deliver a letter, from which Crowley learns that one of his students gave away the secret of the "
Moon Child"
ritual to a
science fiction writer. Finding no money in the letter, Crowley curses those who "steal his time", spits blood at Alex and dies. Symonds takes his watch. Fifty years later, Symonds has become a lecturer at Trinity College and is the head of the local
Masonic lodge. Alex is a physicist who is paralyzed and uses a wheelchair. A Dr. Mathers arrives from the
California Institute of Technology with a "virtual reality spacesuit": he is conducting an experiment in which a human will connect to a virtual reality generated by Trinity’s supercomputer, Z93. Journalist Lia Robinson arranges an interview with him. Victor, a follower of Crowley, works as a programmer on the project. He conspires with literature professor
Oliver Haddo to insert "Aleister Crowley's binary code" (the locations and contents of all rituals) into Z93 as a
virus. Before the first official tests, Victor takes Haddo to the laboratory and Haddo puts on the "spacesuit". Crowley possesses Haddo's body. He delivers obscene lectures and scandalizes the faculty. He claims the Aeon of Horus will begin in three days, when he is fully incarnated. Only Robinson believes that Haddo is Crowley, after conducting an investigation in the library. Crowley forces Victor to participate in a sex ritual, and makes him his disciple. Mathers and Victor conduct an experiment by placing Professor Brent in the spacesuit. He finds himself in the virtual reality, where he meets Crowley. Brent has a heart attack and his brain stops responding to the outside world. Robinson and Mathers, with the help of Symonds, try to prove to the dean that Haddo was in the spacesuit before Brent and was "programmed" by Victor. Meanwhile, Crowley is looking for a red-haired girl for the final ritual, the "
Chemical Wedding", which is supposed to stabilize Crowley's power in this world. He intends that several people will be killed, including Robinson's roommate. Robinson follows him, and Crowley and Victor catch her at the ritual site. Alex explains to Mathers that the spacesuit is imbued with an
elemental, the result of a
ritual performed in 1947 by rocket engineer
Jack Parsons and science fiction writer
L. Ron Hubbard. In order to find Lia, Mathers and Symonds interrogate Brent under hypnosis, but receive only a few Masonic terms. To find out the location of the Chemical Wedding, Mathers dons the spacesuit himself. Symonds operates the control panel, replacing the data disc with the recording of Brent's journey with a "Space Flight Simulator" disc that can reverse time. Mathers discovers that Brent was entering a black hole that consumes space and time. While Crowley and Victor perform a ritual using Lia's blood, Mathers appears near Crowley. Initially trapped behind an "invisible barrier", Mathers breaks through that barrier. He knocks the syringe containing Lia's blood out of Crowley's hands, stopping the ritual. When Mathers vanishes from the laboratory, Symonds loads the "Flight Simulator". Time flows backwards. The spacesuit returns, but Symonds discovers Haddo inside. It is again the day of the experiment with Haddo. Symonds discovers no one remembers anything about the last three days. Alex explains to him that somewhere there is a parallel world where Crowley did reincarnate, and that world is worse than ours. Alex has only two questions - who killed Lia’s roommate Rosa in the current reality, and why was Mathers able to pass through the barrier. A newspaper lying nearby carries a headline that
Al Gore has won the
2000 United States presidential election. Scientists attempt the virtual reality experiment. Victor cannot reset the date on the spacesuit, which is set three days later. Mathers tells him the password to the spacesuit, which is his date of birth (which coincides with the date of Crowley's death, 1 December 1947). The computer, in response to the password, displays the words "Moon Child". At Haddo's lecture, Symonds and Alex discover that Crowley's watch, which Symonds was carrying with him, has disappeared. ==Cast==