Kevin's Watch

No, not cereal--you can't eat it!

I began this three days ago and am still working on it. Not sure what it's going to become--either a short story that's 1/3 done or an unending serial with new characters/plot lines.

Either way, it's very much in a rough state, but I thought it'd be fun to share something hot off the presses. I'll add chapters as I finish them. Bon appetit!




The Satori, by David Williams


It sat entwined in cold sable, its light barely more than a candle’s flame. It did not move with the buoyancy of fire, and yet its stillness bespoke a silent life. About its spherical being fell a vast blue, deep and luminous. At random intervals, strips of lithosphere--the outer crust--jutted out in pale brown, edges tinged with a dull green. To the utmost north and south were caps of ice, as clear and stark as the black of space. The clouds seemed composed of one will, a formation merging with the southerly cap; its tendrils sprawled beyond the equator, over continents, until at last its reach became spots of white.

About this mottled pearl yawned an absolute sound, a humming that did not change or drop. With its unwavering throb came a vibration, tracing its form from all points. It was a soft rhythm, barely discernible. Below the pearl sat a single word, bold and white:

REMEMBER

Shifting her view to the left, Naero looked from the earth of yesteryear to the earth of present. It was much larger than the photo as it curved below the overlooking window. It was still a sphere--a delicate pearl--but no longer was it dappled with various colors--no verdant greens or aching blue. All that remained was a leaden sheet, a gray puffiness. It encased the globe, all-encompassing as a single ocean, and nothing could be seen below it.

Naero stepped back from the window and looked further down her left. The hall stretched to the west and then curved off after fifty or so feet. She pushed off the balls of her feet, the weightless air carrying her past the door behind her. It slid up into the ceiling, nearly as ambient as the hum. She floated horizontally for about thirty feet, down the east hall, until it ended abruptly. She faced a keypad, slightly larger than a control panel on an elevator, and pressed one of the buttons. A second door slid up, this time above her head. She pushed on her feet again, floating vertical for a few inches, until she clasped the first rung of a ladder.

Quietly, she began her ascent. The hum changed as she climbed higher and higher, its throb no longer continuous but erratic--thrum-hum-hum-thrum-hum-thrum. It grew in volume slightly, reaching an apex and washing over her entire senses like a light foam. The vibration remained constant, though, and at length the sound’s fingers receded and returned to its original frequency. She knew she was past the engine room, the top of the tunnel nearly upon her. She could not espy it in the darkness, her eyes confined to a tiny light behind each ladder rung. The outlines of a second panel began to form above her; she could see the buttons in their neon glow. Reaching up with her finger, she pressed, and the door slid.

Gripping the last rung, she did an effortless chin up, pushing her body past the opening and into a new room. It was a white circle, some one hundred feet in diameter. The ceiling was a concave surface, its middle point holding a shining orb that seemed to be the source of light. Everything looked glossy and ceramic, broken only by footprints on the smooth ground. Tables and chairs dotted the room, so undeviating in their immaculate ivory that they seemed an organic outgrowth. She had always thought the mess hall too big. There were only five people on this wing of the station, and this place could easily seat a hundred.

The gravity in the mess hall had been adjusted to resemble the earth’s pressure, in order to make eating and drinking easier. Soundlessly, her feet touched the white ground, and she smiled as she saw that all five of her bunk mates were present at the nearest table. They had a large pot of coffee and several steaming cups, as well as packets of sugar and cream. The force was still not substantial for complete walking; she wafted toward them as if under water, crouched slowly into her seat.

‘Hey,’ she said, her voice pressing with effort.

Devon sat across from her, his hands reaching for two packets of sugar. ‘I take it you didn’t get much sleep.’

‘Yeah,’ she said, and her voice seemed to evaporate as soon as it came out. The hum was not loud, but something about its nature--

‘Did you exercise?’ asked Devon.

She nodded, picking up the pot and tilting it. Coffee poured out, but it was hard to tell if it was flowing up or down. She pushed her cup up to catch it all. A drop floated diagonally over the rim of her cup, splotched against the white of her jumpsuit.

‘Shit,’ she said.

‘I know the feeling,’ said the man next to her. He was new and wouldn’t be staying long. He had been called to the wing for some tech job. Apparently a circuit on the outer skin of the station had fried, and that had been the explanation for the sudden cold. The rooms were so alike that she had accidentally walked into his, opened his locker and found a spacesuit cramped inside.

She remembered it now, looked quizzically across at him while also dabbing the spot on her suit with her right index finger.

‘You’re going out there today?’ She nodded slightly to the left with her head, signifying outer space.

‘Yeah,’ he said, putting down his cup and standing up. ‘I really need to get dressed now, in fact.’

‘Why? You don’t have another job, do you?’

‘No, no,’ he said, looking absent-mindedly to his left side, as if there were a window to look out at. ‘I just want to get out there quick and get it over with. The gravity--’

His voice trailed off, and she leaned forward. She had never walked on the outside.

‘It’s hard to tell if you’re standing or falling--which way is up or down. You try to step but you think you’re never sure if your foot will land.’

Devon broke in, a loose smile on his lips. ‘You shouldn’t scare her like that. She’s never been on the surface.’

The man looked down at her in her seat, his eyes surprised. ‘No? You look like you’ve had experience, though.’

She sipped her coffee, shook her head. ‘Mm-mm.’

‘Well!’ the man said, and he kneeled down at the tunnel, pushing half his body through. ‘I’ll take you up sometime. Show you how to walk.’

She smiled, said “Thank you!” but wasn’t sure if he heard.

‘Well bye,’ said the man, his head disappearing in sluggish descent.

‘Was that a date, huh Naero?’ asked Devon, and two of his friends beside him broke their silence, laughing.

‘Oh quiet,’ she said. ‘I don’t like the grease monkeys. I’m a woman of class, you know--nothing vulgar.’

‘Don’t go down for the common cause, eh? Well, you’re missing a world of fun. The pretty boys don’t party; it’s funny seeing someone drunk in zero-G.’

His friends laughed again. It had a disquieting effect on her, the hum swallowing half of it.

‘You should see it. More exciting than fire in outer space.’

‘I’ll pass, thank you.’

She stood up, he following her languid motions as she wafted the five feet toward the tunnel.

‘Well, okay. But call me if you ever come out of your bunk. I know books are fun--but Jesus!’



I.

She had sat swathed in cushioned quilts and paper-thin linen, combating the cold. Her bunk was tiny, naught more than a ten foot by five compartment. The gray metal reached up just barely above her standing length. She often felt someone had tailored the room to her specific measurements. That was a funny thought to her. When night came and the lights in the upper-right corner dimmed to a whisper, she felt as if she were floating on some piece of driftwood, naught but a speck. In her hand rested a book, her eyes closing and opening, trying to keep her place and trying not to sleep. Along the air paced a harpsichord, as if it too was compelled by the low gravity.

She heard a knock on her door, and she swung back to a greater awareness. The sleep receded, replaced by a wave of shivers, shaking her spine. She was hoping that man would fix the heat soon. She swallowed, her voice on the brink of soreness. She needed a new bottle of vitamin C or a cold would come.

‘Come in,’ she said to the door. It slid open. The space it opened was small--so much so that one had to turn sideways to enter the room. The harpsichord plodded along, and a silhouette hung by her door.

It was a tall figure, no details apparent yet. She turned a dial on the side of her bed, raising the lights up a smidge. It was the man who had arrived recently--the technician. He was an imposing figure, his full mass obscured by the door’s tiny slit. He looked afraid to speak. She began to think the hum over the air was stopping him, but then--

‘I’m sorry if I woke you,’ he said, ‘But--’

Abruptly, a voice erupted over the speaker-system in the hall, outside her room. The acoustics of the hall made it hollow, almost shrill:

All adjuncts to Station 04 arriving at sector B-nine-dash-Delta report to the clearing facility for your cleaning card. You will be admitted for showers and additional hygiene at sixteen-hundred.

‘Showers at four-oh-clock,’ Naero said in a fit of whimsy. ‘I suppose it doesn’t matter, what with no sense of time here.’

She realized the man was still standing there--and that she was half-asleep.

‘Oh, I’m sorry. Let me--’

She turned the knob by her bed again. The light faded out quickly, then up too brightly.

‘Whoops, I--’

It took her a while to get it just right.

‘Sorry. What’s your name?’

‘Marcus--Marcus Reed. Look, I’m going out there now. Going to fix this damn heater; it’s a mess, I know it.’

‘Yeah. I had to steal some covers from the guy next door.’

Still shivering, she bunched them up, tucked them up to her chest.

‘Well, I’ll be right back,’ he said. ‘Say--’

He paused, as if he had just thought it up.

‘Would you like to go up with me?’

Her voice almost cracked, to her embarrassment. ‘Outside? I--no! Well, I’ve never--’

‘Ah come on. You’ll love it. You can’t look out windows your whole life.’

‘Yes I can,’ she said, raising up her book. ‘I’ve got a window here.’

‘Cute,’ he said, still not convinced. ‘What’s it about?’

‘Oh, this old thing? Was written a long time ago, before we all had to come up here. It’s about a forest fire, of all things. I’ve never seen either of them--a forest or a fire, I mean.’

‘Wow,’ he said. ‘You need to see a lot of stuff, then.’

She let a light bit of laughter pass through. ‘Well, I don’t know. I don’t like the way these people think, who write the books. This is an old book, you know. The people who wrote it had to live during a time when you had to always work. There was nothing but suffering back then. They lived at the whim of nature, everything falling apart. You couldn’t just put together a space station and forget it, you know.’

‘Well,’ the man said, ‘technology’s not perfect. You can’t get any heat, for instance.’

‘Yeah, but that’s just my point--a little maintenance every now and then but man is finally free. We’re no longer chained to the boundaries of a workforce. Can you believe,’ she said, flipping the pages of the book, ‘that the people in here abhorred leisure of this sort?’

‘No.’

‘Yes, it’s true. They believe it was all laziness and sloth; they failed to realize the things they abhorred was what they were building to. The technology has rose us to a natural state, an equilibrium with our truest nature.’

‘What’s that?’ he asked.

‘Entropy,’ she said quickly. ‘I’ve been reading newer books,’ and she pointed to the tiny shelf pinned against the wall, right above her bed. It was within reaching distance, and a book was floating idly at the edge. She yanked it down, read aloud the cover:
‘Corporate Militarism and the First Globalization,’ she said.

‘Sounds very boring,’ he admitted. ‘Well, I better--’

But she was on a roll. ‘But you don’t see. Mankind started to realize about two centuries ago that their chief goal was abolition from toil. It was a huge movement, like Romanticism. Except we weren’t blind by sentiment or gaudy pictures; we were alive, finally awake! Now we’re here, able to do whatever we want and make as much as we need. It’s a wonderful system, isn’t it?’

‘Yeah, I guess. Look, you wouldn’t want to come up, then?’

He stood there shifting his weight from side to side. He seemed anxious to go.

‘Marcus, right?’ she inquired.

‘Yes. Marcus Reed. I can get you a space suit.’

She felt her cheeks growing hot; the prospect of going outside was a challenging concept, and the pressure of this man’s offer felt strangely unbearable.

‘I--’

She looked at the books floating in their shelves. They looked strangely lifeless today. She cracked the one open in her lap, the one she had been reading. The words, though deliberately formed, hit her eyes as mere jumbles.

Maybe I do need to get out, she thought.

Marcus seemed to be reading her mind. ‘What century is this?’ he asked.
‘What?’

‘I mean, I thought people became more open with every century. Don’t you want to try something new?’

‘Oh hush!’ she said, sitting up and pushing a tress of hair out of her face. I need a haircut, she thought; it’s too big for a space helmet.

‘Look,’ she said, trying to sound undecided, ‘just leave your card here and I’ll find you--if I change my mind.’

‘So you’re not going?’

‘No, not today. I’ll think about it.’

Her tone was final. He said a few parting words, left a card floating in midair. She grumbled silently as the door slid back down. She’d have to un-strap herself from bed, get up, and pick the card out of the air. She hated messes. Some people had bunks filled with floating objects--so many you had to sweep them aside just to see the other end. She liked entropy to a certain extent, but!

She sucked in a long breath, her mind racing. She could see the details on the card, clear as a bell: the man’s profile and name, his bunk on the station, his date of birth, weight, etc.

Lots to consider today, she thought. She lowered the light back down, tried to read her book.


II.

She buried her eyes in the page, drinking the words:

“Life moved so fast for those on the planet that they barely had enough time to acknowledge each other’s presence. There were values quite different from ours: speedy transportation, money (and the lack thereof), Gods made to justify wars, and terrible strife that raced up and down the continents at uncertain times.”

It sounded to tragic to believe, Naero thought. How could such a world exist? She conjured up the ever constant plea of the poster: “REMEMBER.” It had implored to her from out of the past. The picture of the planet then had been from an ancient craft, called Apollo 17. She had no idea when such a thing had launched--centuries, perhaps a millennia. In any case, all that remained of an unspoiled globe was its empty shell. Why had humans done it? She wondered that question over and over. Couldn’t they see what they were doing? She kept reading.

“But these small men barely knew that there troubles were racing to one singular point. They kept within the cheap squalor of buttoned-down existences and dreamed that they were free, entirely cut loose--”

Cut loose! She could not fathom a completely independent existence; why, without certain parts of this craft, she would be as dead as those stars. There was an unalterable virtue of co-dependence carved in her mind; the craft she floated in--or rotated, to be more accurate--was not alive without her and her without it. There could be no space station without humanity and vice versa.

“And these people remained trapped to the corporate undercurrents: stocks, bonds, munitions, temples, family, commitments, deadlines, jobs (steady or not), heart surgery, coffin crafting, baby making; they were oblivious in a word. They seemed unable to comprehend that this earth was not made for their usage; it had a carrying capacity, as any backbone does. Yet they continued to produce and populate and pollute--until that bone ceased to be. It snapped.

“The great corporations of the terra centuries formed government, bosses, levels of organization, and self-interest one might see active on any ship or space station. But whereas the people of today follow strict codes and practiced traditions for their very survival--the upkeep of their sole subsistence--these people were bound to the flesh and blood of power and lust for it. Today, the word “power” is just that--power to take and to give, such that a space station or space ship remains afloat and full of oxygen. That is the power of today. On earth the power was much smaller, more petty--in the hands of a few, their desire to dominate and spread forth a will similar to their holy Gods. From the baseborn to those flush with royal blood, none could deny their heart of greed, the existence of rich tapestries flowing and penetrating the grasping mind.”

And today such thoughts are impossible, her mind murmured. The book seemed to be following her logic as she read on:

“But now man is no longer bound to the strictures of civilization or the coercing of a social universe, blinded to the dying of their subsistence. Now that that subsistence has died, we must force ourselves into a cycle of creating our own survival. Survival is the keyword here, as our search for and harvesting of it dominates our will and thought. No man can busy himself with stratagems of backstabbing, now that the bloodlust in his bones vibrates for the right to breath, rather than a throne. Who can raise a hand to kill when that man you kill may be the one to provide you air, heat, or the light by which you read these words?”

She put the book back in its shelf. So true, she thought. This is man’s true nature: a co-dependence with each other, because without--

But then she thought: why had all great wars ended, though? Nuclear threat brought it on--a change in the environment. Man would have gone on slaughtering had there been no mutually assured destruction. And man would go on being selfish and aloof, had their world not withered. It’s not that man chooses to be noble--chooses to end wars or stop endemic complacency. Other facts choose for them; they have to fall on their faces first.

The thought left her empty, desolate. No, she thought. I don’t want to believe that, even if it’s true. I don’t want to imagine that man’s true nature is evil, only becoming good when factors push them to it.

She wanted a different belief, knew she would make one. She had to have something inside her--some kind of argument--that could combat such pessimissm. Until then--

The key of the harpsichord touched down over her head, a ripple of water across her turmoil. Ah, Bach, she thought, and she slid back into the covers.

III.

Naero stood shivering, but it was no longer because of any cold. She stood in the airlock, five inches of steel separating her from the maw of space. Marcus Reed stood next to her. She had found her spacesuit a bit stiff at first, but wearing it around for a couple hours had broken it in somewhat. She had no idea how the first pioneers had managed it; photos were alarming: the things looked twice as large as the wearers, billowy and cumbersome; videos showed them working in the suits with a wooden alacrity, unable to perform basic functions beyond walking and gripping.

By contrast, Naero’s suit was almost as svelte as a standard jumpsuit. Her only real complaint was a stylish one: the helmet; it struck her as too bulbous. Her breathing was quick, dashing fog against the glass.

‘You okay?’

‘Yeah.’

She looked at the suit Marcus was wearing. It was a duller shade of orange and carried more creases. It seemed a second skin on him, while hers--

She felt a bit of hair on her forehead, niggling her. Oh well, she thought. Try to ignore it.

‘You don’t have to do this, you know.’

She tried to slow her breathing, forced a smile.

‘No, I want to.’

He held his sidelong gaze.

‘What?’ she finally said.

‘Did you cut your hair?’

‘Oh,’ she said, putting her hand up to the glass, absentmindedly. ‘Yeah. I’ve always worn it down to the shoulders, but I was worried about this helmet.’

‘You could have just pulled it up, you know.’

‘I guess,’ she said.

She began to feel calmer. Before she knew it, Marcus had punched a series of buttons on the panel by the airlock. A pre-recorded voice, awkward and grainy, permeated the area:

Door will open in--one minute.

She preoccupied her mind with a few vacant thoughts, at last resting on the previous week’s class. It was one of her joys to teach technical data about the space station. She taught to varying age groups, mostly younger children and seniors. A week ago she had stood in one of the classrooms, before a group of four and five year olds. A picture of the Satori had been projected onto the wall, her laser-pointer roving over it.

“As you can see,” she had said, “the Satori is shaped like a tiger’s fang. Of course, tiger fangs are white--and what color is this?”

“Black,” the children had said.

“That’s right!”

Her pointer moved over the eastern end of the station, stopping at the base of the “fang.”

“This is the cockpit, where the pilots and radar are. Does anybody know what shape this cockpit is?”

A child in the middle slowly raised his hand.

“Yes?”

“An octagon!”

“That’s right!” She turned the slide, showing in bold letters the word “Satori.”

“Now children. The word “Satori,” is a Buddhist term. Does anyone know--”

She had not heard the air siphoning out, only saw the door pull back. The breach between her world and space elapsed.

‘Oh--’

She walked a step past the threshold. Marcus put his arm forward, as if to block her, but it was too late.

The moment she stood on the naked surface of the ship, she could not help--

Looking up, she espied the earth’s orb below her, staring back. Her perspective shifted entirely, and she realized she was standing upside down.

She did not remember screaming. All that remained in her was a sharp ping, a reddening glaze. Her eyes spun, adrenaline coursing hollow and acrid through her nose, her throat. She felt that she was on a precipice, impossibly high and tilting forward; she wanted to crawl on her belly, cling to anything. Trembling on the black ground, the gnawing sensation of no air and that she was falling--

Her eyes closed. She thought she heard a voice, a hand on her shoulder. No, that can’t be; I’m in the dark--oblivion. But the hand remained on her shoulder, the words falling until their sequence became meaningful.

‘It’s your first swim,’ something said.

She felt a curling sensation, as if something were digging her up from out of pulling waters.

‘Keep your head down; open your eyes.’

She thought she shook her head.

‘All you’ll see is ground.’

Her shoulders shook, but the hand remained.

‘Now,’ he said, the word long and winding--

‘No,’ she could only whimper.

‘Naero, it’s alright. It happened to me when I was a child. My grandfather taught me this. It takes time, but it’s just like diving.’
His hand tightened over her shoulder.

‘Just breathe slowly, and then follow the texture.’

‘What?’

A second hand touched her, this time over her right hand. She felt her fingers being lowered, guided down to the metal. It did indeed have a texture, she thought. Some parts of the metal stuck out more than others--

The hand guiding hers fell away.

‘See? Feel the lines.’

Blindly, she ran her gloved hand over an indentation, followed its geometric form. A square, she thought. She continued feeling forward, till at last she realized that the ship’s skin was a series of repeating squares, on and on.

‘Naero, open your eyes.’

She bit her lip, acquiesced at last. When she did, she realized her chin was buried in her chest. She let the black squares dominate; she dared not shift her gaze.

‘Do you know what shape the Satori is?’ asked Marcus.

‘A tiger’s tooth,’ she said.

‘Follow the squares--slowly now.’

Haltingly, her eyes climbed the squares--large at first, until at last the distance swallowed them and smoothed their lines. She continued her ascent, following the curve of the ship. She could descry two figures in the distance, walking the surface. They must’ve been miles off. She passed the figures in her eyes, upward to the great point of the Satori, its westernmost tip.

The gnawing effaced, her orientation recalibrated.

‘Pull me up,’ she said.

He gave her his hand.

‘One day,’ said Marcus, ‘we can practice walking forward.’

‘Is that a joke?’

‘No,’ he laughed. ‘I’m sorry. But it really is baby steps out here if you’ve never done it. I went through the same thing. We don’t want to overextend yourself; you’ll get very tired.’

His hand was back on hers, and she felt herself being pulled back, toward the airlock. She turned, her boots clicking with gravity’s pressure. Each step was labored, and her eyes remained on the ship’s architecture.



IV.

The sounds about her bed chamber were gray and windy, reminding her of a chapter she was reading. The chapter’s number eluded her, but it had gone on and on--page after dry page pounding But not just any falling rain: rain as it slithered down a window. The words had described a clear water, trickling down over clear glass and clear autumn behind it. It all rang together in her mind. She had never seen a season, never known the changes of weather first-hand. Her only experience with nature resided in the belly of the Satori, whenever she visited the harvesting sector. It was there that one could choose from a warehouse of essential foods: grains, wheat, vegetables, fruit--all of it organic and speckled fresh with water. She had been there two days ago, pursuing the lineup of apples. They were of the Washington cultivars--perhaps her favorite.

When organic food no longer sated her palette, she would detour from the market, head to the cafeteria. The food was not real meat, as no animals but humans existed; the cow’s beef, the pork slices--all synthesized or a vegetable extract. She fancied it retained its taste, as well as that heady aroma of crackling grease her ancestors extolled so. Still, she wondered how far a synth-burger was from the real thing.

At least we have real music, she thought. The data bank held a library that suited every taste: classical, rock, gospel, R&B, spoken-word, you name it. Getting music was much like the harvest sector, except instead of carrying a basket you brought a miniature hard drive. It was no bigger than the palm of your hand; you merely slipped it into the data bank, browsed the selections, and downloaded your choices.

She had popped her hard drive in the slot on the side of her bed, beside the light knob. It was an ambient piece, drowsy and unfurling, barely noticeable as she flipped the pages of her latest acquisition. She read on, her mind trying to sculpt the words. It spoke still of the rain and of the face looking out beyond the window. She wondered why that face watched so morosely, carried such easy thoughts. She thought the main character’s thoughts to be weak, though. Why, for instance, had he not observed the rain with elation? I would have, she thought--but then, I’ve never seen rain, never touched it. He grew around it, but it’s so hard to understand--

Well, she thought, if you want rain so bad just pour out a cup of water. She smiled at that, but then remembered that the low gravity would never perfectly duplicate the earth’s falling water.

Or when it had water to let fall, she thought sadly.

This ambient music is the essence of Mahler, she thought. Mahler’s Ninth had always seemed a frail heartbeat to Naero--a whisper threatening to blow away, victim to some wild breeze.

She laid her book down, frustrated. Sleep was far off, barely forming; her taste for reading had declined. She sighed, staring at the ceiling and following the lines of music, until she heard a voice outside:

‘Maybe you’re not the one, but I think it’s something you should reconsider.’

She sat up, strained at the voices. Two males, one of them rather incensed.

‘I don’t care what the Captain says! He’s not letting another one go out like that!’

‘What do you want me to do? You want me to tell the whole ship it’s off limits?’

‘No. I don’t care what you do, as long as it’s not another one of those stunts.’

Naero turned the music up, tried to let it go, but the voices persisted.

‘Look, I know you have enough anxiety as it is.’

‘Damn right!’

‘But you really--and listen--’

‘I’m listening.’

‘You really need to understand that it’s not entertainment.’

‘I know that. I was trying to help her.’

‘What’s her job! Does she work out there?’

‘No.’

‘Then why the hell did you take her outside!’

‘Look, bud. I’ve had enough of this. You don’t run this ship, Cap’n does. I’ll take as many greenhorns out there as I like.’

‘You arrogant bastard.’

A set of feet stamped off, faded down the hall. Naero unfastened her latches, floated out of bed and past her door. Marcus Reed was standing in the hall.

‘What was that about?’

Reed looked at her, a grin escaping him.

‘Someone that couldn’t shut his yap. Everyone thinks they run this ship sometimes.’

‘Was it over me?’

‘Oh no,’ Reed said, but she thought he was lying. ‘Someone freaked out last night, when I took them outside.’

‘Well, I should have calmed them down.’

He laughed at that. ‘Yeah, you’re a real trooper now. How many times have you been out?’

‘Five, last I counted,’ she said.

‘Well keep up the good work. One day we’ll walk from one end of the Satori to the other.’

‘Isn’t that forty miles?’

‘Heh, yeah. You might wanna bring a book.’

She tried to think of a new subject, then inquired:

‘So any news?’

‘What?’

‘Like what’s going on around here.’

‘Oh, nothing much. A few of us are going down to the docking bay. A Mars expedition is just returning. You could come, if you want.’

V.

More than “a few” had come.

It seemed half the ship’s tech crew had gathered in the tiny space that made up the docking bay. It was a fifty foot rectangle, walls brownish gray and the floor metal grating. There were two halves to the room: the airlock to the east, which accepted ships, and the reception room to west. Naero counted thirty-odd people, mostly of the piloting and maintenance sort. They chattered together, some standing, others meandering.

‘Captain on deck!’

Swiftly, the ragtag assembly straightened their lines. They formed two neat columns with a line of space between, so the Captain could pass through. Their silence fell over the room, palpable as the low hum that followed every sector of the ship. Faces were tight, mouths composed blank. A pair of boots entered the room, pounded down the length of the line, and stopped. The Captain turned, faced his subordinates.

‘Status,’ he said.

A man in the front row of the right column clicked his boots, saluted.

‘Captain! The shuttle has just docked and the room is receiving air.’

‘Good.’

The Captain turned from his men, faced the bay’s airlock door. It was around twenty feet wide and locked tight as a vault. Behind it could be heard the wheeze of air as it filtered the chamber.

‘Status,’ the Captain repeated.

‘Forty-two percent. Twenty-three seconds until habitable.’

Nineteen seconds passed.

‘Captain! Ninety-three percent.’

Lock mechanisms disengaged with an audible suction; the heavy gears that slid back the door began to warm up and rumble. The wheezing slowed to a trickle.

‘One-hundred, Captain!’

‘Now!’

Naero flinched as the door let a popping click, its sound rapping like hard steel against the roof of her mouth. The door split in the middle, the left and right sides slowly groaning. Smoke jettisoned out; the men did not move back a step.

‘Hose it.’

Naero watched as two men snapped from the column--the left one--and waded into the smoke. She saw their forms bend over and disappear for a moment, only to raise back up, hands holding a thick hose. They pulled a lever at the nozzle, and the smoke flew back into the airlock.

‘Ten seconds,’ said the Captain. ‘Five. Four--’

He stopped talking, put a shoulder on the two men operating the house.

‘That’s good, lads.’

He marched past them, into the airlock. The two men stepped back to their places in the column.

Naero’s eyes grew wide. She looked at Marcus, but he was un-phased. Her mind raced: this was the mission to Mars--the expedition!

The “expedition” was little more than a “space ball”--a metallic sphere with a round door. It stood no taller than the Captain’s chest.

‘Marcus,’ she began to whisper, but the door in the tiny shuttle pulled back. She half-expected a little green man to come waddling out.

Instead she saw something more shocking: an old man, curled in a fetal position. The man maintained his position even as he fell out of the capsule, as if he were made of stone.

‘Roland!’

The Captain fell to one knee over the old man. Was he dead or asleep, Naero wondered. She could barely see his face.

‘Roland,’ said the Captain again, clasping the man by the shoulders. The body stirred haltingly, its neck creaking up until it met the Captain’s gaze.

‘Randall--’ croaked the corpse. ‘Mars is--’

She could see the face of the body now; it was not old, merely emaciated. The eyes were glinting beads, fixated in the slopes of hollow sockets. The chin was barely more than a wisp of gray and black fuzz, and the cheeks seemed little more than jutting pinpoints drawn over paper. His neck dangled lifelessly, numbly.

‘Don’t try to stand,’ the Captain whispered. ‘What happened?’

The man groaned, grit his teeth, and then began to speak. His voice ground itself down, becoming drier and more wiry with every word.

‘I had food--enough for a year; you remember, don’t you Randall!’

‘Yes,’ the Captain admonished.

‘Enough for one trip--Mars--and then they would give me food to return with.’

‘Yes.’

‘Terrible!’ crowed the man on the ground. ‘Dead--all Mars. Dead. No more food. I had to ration--had to eat strips of foam padding the chair, the leather in my--’

‘No, Roland,’ said the Captain, his voice strangely weak. ‘Don’t talk anymore.’

‘No!’ shot back Roland, his lips quivering. ‘You don’t understand. They were angels. I thought they were stars but they came closer, until they had faces! And do you know what they told me? They told me that it is all light, every point--that we are but blunt clay, these minds. There is nothing here in truth--only a soup, mass of energy. What we see is from--’

The Captain struck him. The slap rang across the room, and voices began to murmur.

Roland head’s lolled on the thin rod that was his neck, swinging back and forth. Spittle ran down his chin, his words soundless.

‘You don’t understand,’ he started again, sucking breath. He pawed the Captain’s shoulders, barely able to move his hands up and down. Naero saw that he had no fingernails.

The Captain suddenly turned on the voices, his crew behind him. From his knees he look as desperate and as small as Roland; his face was red, a vein along his temple.

‘All of you,’ he said evenly. ‘Get me the sick ward. Then get out of here.’

The voices fell but no one moved.

‘GET OUT!’

Reed grabbed Naero’s forearm, a frown furrowing his brow. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

Wow you definitely have to finish this. I want to find out what happened on Mars!!!

Sorry for the long delay! I've been derailed by a mixture of college, other short stories, and the random poem or two!




VI.

Why had he brought me there? But her thoughts were not drifting upon the docking bay or the Captain’s strange reception.

Her mind did often wonder there, but now she was thinking of the airlock that Marcus Reed had taken her to, some two weeks ago. It had been her first time on the naked surface--the time when she buckled under her own weight, the earth a gazing orb and the black space a yawning vastness.

She wondered why Marcus had taken her out when the ship was upside down. Had he waited for it to rotate, she wouldn’t have experienced that terrible sensation. She felt resentful, but then she realized that Reed had done it to harden her. By showing her the worst first, she could handle anything after. Still, she preferred walking on the station when it was right side up.

This time she was by herself in that square compartment. It would soon be her sixth trip out. The black walls no longer looked so constricting, so uninviting; she could savor the welter of space, its slow trill of vacancy. No longer did fear cling to her; anxiousness now resided in quaint appreciation, the leisurely quiet of outer space.

She had conquered the harshness during that first dive, had turned the great fear in on itself. When the airlock opened, she would see not a threatening vision but a piece of scenery that she had mastered.

A knock on the airlock shook her reverie.

‘Marcus?’ she called over her head, her eyes on the control panel.

The door behind her opened; it was the Captain.

Her back stiffened, memories of Roland and the docking bay lacing up.

‘Good day, Ms. Naero,’ the Captain said.

Looking in his face, she was surprised he remembered her name. It was a face in the last apogee of its youth, gray hairs pushing back the veneer of black around his skull. It was a trim, neat haircut; even his eyes seemed polished and tight as they gazed over Ms. Naero coolly.

‘Come to walk with me?’ she said, smiling faintly.

‘I suppose. I do like the view.’

His voice seemed removed, servant to an occupied mind. Her smile faltered.

‘I was wondering,’ she said, ‘before we step out--’

‘Yes?’

‘Why did you strike Roland?’

The glaze of distance sifted from his eyes. His face did not betray him, though; pursing his lips, he bit forward uneasy words:

‘I am sorry, Ms. Naero--sorry you had to see that.’

At that, formality began to leaf through his voice again. He spoke as if reciting from memory:

‘Had I known you were there, I would not have struck him. I had assumed only the technical crew was present; they are hard men, used to seeing a failed mission or a broken spirit. And surely it was hard on me. You see, Roland was my brother. I wished for the fear to leave his eyes, just as I was afraid it would infect the crew. Their minds are trained, but their hearts are ever human, trying to reach out. They know too well, from the nature of their work, what wilderness awaits out there for them.’

‘Roland,’ she probed, ‘is he--going to be alright?’

His eyes lifted, as if Roland’s condition was an oxymoron. And then his lids buckled back down, his stern glance on the floor.

‘Forgive me, again,’ he said. ‘There is much I would suppress. I was not Captain of the Satori when Roland was sent off to Mars. You saw the “ship“ he traveled in, that tiny space ball. That was, what, two years ago? Yes, there was another man stationed here who helmed this ship. He and my brother--well, politics, to put it shortly. Roland was sent off over some disagreement, some series of harsh words. And I--I was not yet Captain. I was powerless to stop whatever plot was moving against him. Had I only studied harder, made connections faster--’

Naero’s voice came quickly: ‘It’s not your fault,’ and a hand fell from her and laid itself on the Captain’s shoulder. His eyes did not raise.

‘But I--I could do nothing. And now here he is, returned. And nothing can be done. He can only be left to his room, attended to and fed by the nurses when his body calls for it. Otherwise, he is not living. His mind is running like an unstopped stream. His words twist all ways, his voice cracking and raising. He speaks still of the angels, recites Mars as if it were his religious litany. He strikes fear into me, and I am his family.’

Naero swallowed. ‘Captain,’ she said, ‘what do you think is out there on Mars?’

He looked up at that. ‘Oh,’ he said. ‘Don’t believe Roland. He’s not right--not there at all. I believe Mars is fine; the trip back merely broke him. A year without enough food, the tight confines--’

‘But didn’t he say they had no food? If they were fine, wouldn’t there have been someone to give him food at Mars?’

The Captain considered that, then said, ‘He lied about the food. He said he ate the padding of his chair, but the chair was untouched.’

‘Still,’ Naero whispered, ‘there must be something in what he says.’

The Captain stepped forward to the control panel, let Naero’s hand slip off his shoulder. He punched the combination to let the air out of the room.

‘I wonder,’ she said, as the air hissed.

‘Yes?’ the Captain asked.

‘Sorry--just musing.’


END: PART I