Trace the Stars

by Nancy Fulda

  Troy laughed, then swung his way back toward the hatch that led out of the pilot’s globe, and back to the living module.

  “Leaving so soon?” she said.

  “I’ve still got a few hours sleep to get, before my shift!” he shouted.

  “And what about when—”

  Suddenly all of the electronics onboard fluttered and died, only to come back to life ten seconds later.

  “—all the equipment kicks over?” Caddy finished, realizing that the so-called “warp” had done precisely what was expected.

  “As if you don’t know the system restore drill by heart?” Troy scoffed. “Phone me when a real problem develops! You’ve got this. I am going to bed.”

  Caddy actually laughed out loud, her fingers automatically beginning to press the key sequences which would boot the ship’s software from the hardened disc in the “storm cellar” where radiation couldn’t reach. Meanwhile, she made a silent promise to return to this place and see her brother again. Maybe when she could bring her grandchildren and make a holiday of it?

  A Veil of Leaves

  M. K. Hutchins

  My heart thrilled as the skyman streaked toward the ground, like a single raindrop on a sunny day. What a lucky omen, to have a skyman return on my wedding day.

  Grandma smacked her gums. “Last time they came, they stole. Thieves. No good, no good.”

  The other women shushed her and I spoke gentle. “Skypeople didn’t steal anything.”

  “They built the lightfence between us and the ravencattle. Just as good as stealing.” Grandma had been a girl when that happened.

  But the Skypeople gave us lights and hotplates, too—they weren’t evil. “Ravencattle must’ve been sick.”

  Grandma opened her mouth, but the women told her to hush and paint her broadleaf. Most could barely follow their own advice, eyes flitting off into the distance where the skyman’s ship was landing. Each took a turn showing me what they’d painted in honey water, anyway. Sister painted a rock for a strong marriage. My cousin painted freshrain for strong broadleaf trees. My aunt painted something I didn’t understand, but she winked and giggled until Mother scolded her away.

  Soon enough the skyman strode up. He looked like a normal man, except he wore clothes just as silver as the hotplates the skypeople gave us. Red dust clung to it.

  He looked over us, face smooth as baby skin. He peered at the wreath on my head. “You’re in charge? I’d like a meal—the best you have.”

  Something silver sat inside his mouth. When he talked, it looked like he was chewing a grub.

  The woman nudged me forward and I swallowed my nervousness. A skyman, talking to me! “I’ll feed you at my home.”

  The women jabbered as he passed, trailing their fingers over his silver clothes. Except Grandma. She crossed her wrinkled arms and muttered. Every day of my life, I’ve seen those feral ravencattle through the lightfence, and I’m glad it’s between us—even if Grandma said they used to be tame. The sleek beasts snort and stomp, then stretch their twisty necks and bare their long teeth, so good at shearing leaves and grubs.

  The skyman ducked as we entered my hut. The women helped me build it for when my husband comes: straight lashed poles topped with a thick layer of thatch.

  “What do you eat now, without the ravencattle?”

  “I’ll show you.” I grinned. I’m the best cook for days all around. Papa says that’s why he could bargain for such a good husband for me. It will be lucky, to have a skyman smile on my wedding day.

  I waved my hand over the silvery hotplate and it glowed red. I pulled a handful of grubs from a basket—we’d just killed these yesterday. I slit them in two and squeezed their guts into a mortar before tossing them onto the hotplate. They sizzled and jumped.

  I added oniongrass to the guts and ground it, tossing it over the hotplate when the grubs were nearly done. I scooped it all into my best bowl, the one my brother made down by the river. Smiling wide enough to sprain my cheeks, I handed it to the skyman. It smelled like freshrain and celebration. “Here’s our best.”

  He was lucky I had a wedding tonight, or there wouldn’t have been oniongrass.

  The skyman’s skin greened. “Bugs? You eat bugs?”

  “They’re grubs. Can’t you see how big they are?” I frowned. Maybe his long fall did something strange to his brain.

  The metal thing in his mouth bobbed like a second tongue. “You were supposed to do something creative with the plants to replace protein in your diet, not turn to bugs.” He sniffed at my food and recoiled. “I could lose my position on the committee over this. I’m supposed to bring back something succulent like tofu in all its variation, fried, simmered, marinated . . .” He sighed and shook his head. “You don’t even know what tofu is, do you?”

  I shrugged. Why should I? It couldn’t be better than my grubs. Even the bitter widow who lives nearest the fence agreed I cooked the best bowl anywhere.

  He tapped the metal thing in his mouth and started talking to himself, staring at his food. “Yes, I’m here. No, they’re eating bugs. Maybe if the presentation’s spectacular, everyone will still eat them. Here’s a picture.” He opened his mouth wide and tapped it again. He must have been talking to another skyman, because he paused like he was listening. “Poisonous?”

  He whipped his head up. “These are poisonous?”

  “Not the way I serve them.” I folded my arms. No man had ever insulted my food in my kitchen, and skyman or no, I wasn’t keen to start having that now. “They ate the broadleaf.”

  Grandma had told me the story a hundred times. With the ravencattle fenced out, people were hungry. There were so many grubs, without the ravencattle munching, that some people ate them. They died. Some people ate the broadleaf, but they died, too. The ravencattle ate both, so we figured it out: broadleaf and grub make each other safe to eat. Getting the grubs to eat the leaves by coating them in honey-water? That killed the grubs, made them safe, and tenderized them.

  Mine were the tastiest.

  “I agree, this expedition’s a complete waste of time,” the skyman said, not looking at me. “We can’t feed this to the ship. The locals could have just developed an immunity. Since we’re still looking for new smoking, grilling, or rotisserie techniques, I’ll . . . no, I’m perfectly capable of being in charge . . . oh. Oh.”

  The skyman tapped the silver thing in his mouth, then slumped into my hammock, digging the heels of his hands into his eye sockets.

  “You want a cup of freshwater to go with?” I asked.

  “No. I have to go.”

  “You came for one meal?” I frowned. It seemed like a long way to come.

  “Our chefs can only invent so much. Some of the most delicious foods were invented from necessity, and we’d hoped for something spectacular here. What did you think your colony’s for?”

  Bile burned up my throat. I must have heard wrong. After all, the skypeople gave us lights and hotplates. “You’re saying you took away our ravencattle, then came back a hundred years later hoping for a treat?”

  Grandma never lets us forget about the people who died when they fenced out the ravencattle. Her brothers, her niece, her mother.

  He glared. “It doesn’t take a hundred years for us, not with how fast we move. You were the most promising planet, you know. We restricted fuel on the last two worlds, and they only reinvented stir-fry and kabobs. We’d hoped for something spectacular down here. I can’t believe we got bugs. Poisonous bugs.”

  He marched out my door and across the dusty red ground. The women spilled in after he streaked back into the sky, in his teardrop of silver. They asked me what he wanted. I held up the plate of grubs.

  Grandma smacked her gums and shook her head at me. “Was your skyman everything you thought he’d be?”

  “No.” I didn’t see any point in lying. I expected Grandma to lecture me, but she just hugged me tight, like she wasn’t sure she’d get another chance to.

  The other women mut
tered about how crazy she was, but I didn’t pay them any heed. I hugged Grandma back, as if a single hug could apologize for all the times I’d rolled my eyes at her, too.

  It was a good omen that the skyman left before my wedding. I watched the grubs munch the leaves the women painted. They only ate the honey-water part, leaving the patterns behind. Then the grubs shivered and curled into balls, ready to cook. I sewed the leaves together for my veil while the women made the feast for the wedding guests, then I personally fried up my groom’s dinner. That skyman was crazy for not trying grubs in oniongrass.

  I fed it to my groom before both our families, both our villages. The skypeople lights from our houses flooded the red ground and the snaking roots of the broadleaf trees we stood between. He blushed and smiled, looking shyly down, then up at me. His eyes were the rich color of grub guts and he almost smelled as nice.

  Our parents draped the veil with all its pretty wishes over both of us. Mother told us we had to make the wishes come true; his father said something about patience.

  The lights flickered. I froze; that had never happened. Then they blackened, turning the world to shadows. Murmurs hissed through the crowd. One of the women ran inside her hut, then rushed back out, shouting that the lights wouldn’t come back and the hotplate didn’t work.

  I clutched my groom’s hand. He shook, too. The hotplates always worked.

  When I heard the stomping hooves, I looked towards the lightfence.

  It wasn’t there.

  The ravencattle charged faster than I could think, eyes wide and wild in the moonlight. They trampled a man to death, right there, right in front of me, squishing his guts out like a grub’s.

  My groom grabbed my wrist and ran. Villagers panicked around us—some shrieking, some running—but his parents hadn’t lied in the wedding bartering when they said he was fast. He yanked me inside my hut and barred the door.

  It was dark, dark like the inside of my eyelids, dark like the blood of the broadleaf tree. People shrieked and shouted. Other doors slammed shut. Not even my new, thick thatch could keep out the sobbing of my village and the crunch as the ravencattle chewed at our trees.

  I held my groom and he held me through the dark night. When the sun rose, when light came, we cracked the door and peered outside.

  The broadleaf trees looked like skeleton hands reaching from the ground, leaves gone. Our cages of grubs at their bases were smashed open, empty. A few ravencattle peered at us as they chewed. Their hooves squashed the faces of our dead. Ten bodies, twelve? I couldn’t tell.

  We shuffled back inside the hut. I waved my hand over the hotplate. Nothing.

  “We’ll starve.” My groom’s handsome eyes trembled.

  What had the skyman said? I didn’t know what grilling was, but I did know smoke. Grandma talked about how her mother had cooked with fire every time we cremated one of our dead or burned out a rotted broadleaf tree.

  I peered out the door. A ravencow snorted at us. I took my veil—maybe the last bit of broadleaf in the village—and tossed it to the side. The ravencow charged after it. I dashed out, snatched sticks from under the broadleaf trees, then ran back inside.

  I grabbed a piece of flint and my silvery knife.

  His eyes widened. “We don’t need a pyre yet.”

  “Of course not, but I won’t have a hungry husband.”

  I sparked the sticks and blew gently. While they burned, I rubbed down a yellowroot with the last wisp of oniongrass, then laid it on the coals to roast. Hopefully, it would cook.

  I counted my baskets and jars. The other huts would have about the same. It couldn’t last.

  I looked at my knife. I didn’t want to face wild ravencattle up close, so I lashed it to my broom, then slipped out the front of my hut, scrambled up the side, and perched in the thatch.

  My groom scurried after. “What are you doing?”

  “We’ll need more food soon.” I eyed a ravencow as it wandered towards us. “Everyone will.”

  Maybe Grandma could teach us how to cook it.

  Freefall

  Eric James Stone

  Freefall was the best part of a jump.

  As she fell, Gina Wright looked down at Earth, half shadowed beneath her as dawn crept toward her landing target in Kansas, and relished the knowledge that she was about to demolish the world freefall record by more than 20,000 miles. This was going to be so much better than her spacejump from the old International Space Station. She would have forty minutes of freefall before she even entered the atmosphere.

  Using the gyros in her pressure suit, she turned away from Earth. The space elevator cable stretched like a strand of spiderweb past her toward the rotating hub-and-spoke wheel she had jumped from: GeoTerminal 1.

  A brilliant flash behind the terminal forced Gina to blink even as her visor darkened to compensate. After her visor cleared, she saw a ripple moving down the space elevator cable.

  Had the cable broken? No—the LED lights strung along it were still on, so power still flowed from the terminal. With a dad who was chief engineer for the elevator and a brother who drove one of the crawlers, she knew more than she wanted to about the elevator. “How high is it?” and “Can I jump off it?” were the only things that really mattered.

  She told her suitphone to call her dad.

  “What?” he answered.

  “What’s going on? I saw a flash and—“

  “Working on it. No time for idle curiosity.” He hung up.

  Typical, she thought. If I were Kyle, he’d explain things, expect me to help solve them. But no, I’m the idle child who wastes her life jumping.

  She shouldn’t let her dad’s attitude spoil the thrill of the jump. Activating the gyros, Gina turned her back on the terminal.

  Minutes later her suitphone beeped. She answered it.

  “Gina?” Her father’s voice was strained.

  “Yeah?”

  “Sorry about before. We lost the counterweight.”

  Gina sucked in a sharp breath. The geostationary terminal had to be at the center of mass for the space elevator. Without the asteroid counterweight beyond the terminal, the weight of the cable would pull the terminal—and all the people on it—down to Earth. “How’d it happen?”

  “That’s for later. What matters is what we do about it.”

  If the terminal was falling, that meant her dad was falling with it. “Dad, do you have a way to evacuate?”

  “No,” he said. “But we’ll be fine once we detach the cable. Without its weight, the terminal will settle into a stable orbit.”

  “Oh.” Of course they had contingency plans.

  “Is there any way you can get over to the cable?” he asked.

  “I’ve got some backup rocket thrusters for maneuvering in case the gyros go out,” she said. “Why?”

  “You’ve got a vibroknife that will cut through nanofibers, right? For cutting your chute cords if they get tangled? I remember you telling me that.”

  “Yeah.” Gina was surprised he remembered anything she’d told him about jumping. “Again, why?”

  “Kyle’s bringing a cargo crawler up. If we detach the cable up here, he’ll fall.”

  Despite the fact she was already in freefall, Gina’s stomach seemed to sink inside her.

  “I’ll let him die if I have to.” Her dad’s voice cracked. “One life against thousands. But if you can get over there and cut through the cable underneath his crawler, then he can keep coming up and we’ll all be safe in orbit until the company sends a rescue ship.”

  With the gyros, she oriented herself toward the cable. The station’s slingshot had flung her in the opposite direction of its orbit to put her into a freefall path to Earth. She hoped she had enough fuel to cross the distance in time.

  “Usually it’s good old dependable Kyle coming to rescue me after some crazy stunt.” She chuckled, trying to laugh away the sudden weight of responsibility. Risking her own life was easy—having someone else’s life depend on her was dif
ferent. “Whose plan is this, anyway?”

  “Kyle’s. He said if anyone’s crazy enough to make it work, it’s you.”

  A few feet away, the cable lights flew past Gina in a continuous blur. But her fuel readout flashed 1% in crimson. It had taken almost all her fuel to change her trajectory enough get to the cable. But there wasn’t enough left to slow her descent relative to the cable. She needed to wait until Kyle’s crawler moved past her in any case—she had arrived at the cable above him. But soon her fuel would be gone entirely, and her freefall path would take her away.

  Still thousands of miles out of the atmosphere, her chute was useless. There was no way she could stop herself, and that meant she could not cut through the cable—the vibroknife would be torn from her grip if she tried cutting at this speed. She was going to fail Kyle, fail her dad, unless—her mind raced as she saw the possibility—unless she could get Kyle a spacechute.

  “Dad?” she said.

  “Still here.”

  “Can you patch me through to Kyle?”

  “Hold on.”

  After a few seconds, Kyle’s voice came on her phone. “Hey, sis. How’s the view from up there?”

  She ignored his banter and began unbuckling her chute. She was falling fast toward his crawler, so time was limited. “You’re the only person on board the crawler, right?”

  “Yes.” Kyle must have sensed her urgency, because his voice became all business.

  “You have a spacesuit?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “I’m falling too fast to be able to stop and cut through the cable,” she said. “But I’m removing my backup chute and I’ll attach it to the cable just before I pass you. It’ll slam into the crawler at a pretty good clip, but it’s nanofiber so it should be okay. Then you can go out and get it.”

  “I’ve never done a spacejump,” he said.

  “I’ll set the chute for auto, so it’ll release at the right altitude. You’ll be fine. Trust me.” She used a tiny bit of fuel to get close enough to the cable that she would be able to attach the chute.