ArcadiA: A Game Space FastRead

by Peter Jay Black

  A shadow moved across the wall behind the arcade cabinet. My eyes narrowed. The little idiot had climbed into it. “You’re not clever, Matt. That’s so dangerous. Get out of there before you electrocute yourself.” I leaned down the side. “Come on. Get—” And then I stopped breathing.

  Wires, circuit boards, and coin mechanisms filled the interior. Nestled among these was a carved stone statue, around four inches high, of a person in a spacesuit, complete with helmet and backpack.

  The ancient astronaut held a glowing crystal in his gloved hands. I raised my arm, shielding my eyes from the intense blue light it gave off.

  A loud bang from somewhere behind me made me jump. I pulled back and gasped.

  Our great-uncle lay propped up against his workbench, tools and electronic components scattered around him.

  Where had he come from?

  I dropped to his side.

  The Professor wore his usual tatty lab coat, along with brown corduroy trousers, brown shirt, tie, and shoes. His flyaway white hair formed a stark contrast, but matched his pale face.

  I took his hand in mine; it felt cold and clammy. “Are you okay? What happened?” I glanced over my shoulder. “Matt? Get here and help me. He’s hurt.”

  The Professor’s eyes rolled into the back of his head for a moment, then focussed on me as his chest heaved in uneven rhythm. “Must. Stop. Him.”

  “I’ll call an ambulance.” I went to stand, but the Professor pulled me close.

  “No, Kira,” he said in my ear, his breath hot. “Stop him.”

  “Who?”

  The Professor pressed something to my wrist.

  Shocked, I pulled my hand free, discovering that I now wore a gold bracelet with ten blue crystals.

  “I’m sorry,” the Professor said. “No choice. Get to him first or Sagan will . . .” His eyes rolled into his head again, and he slumped unconscious.

  I leapt up, knowing that I needed to stop wasting time and phone the emergency services. I was about to leave when the arcade machine beeped and played a tune.

  A pixelated image of my brother’s face flashed up on the screen, then shrank and disappeared into the white ship, which flew into the red mothership at the top of the screen.

  Panicked, struggling to believe my own eyes, I gripped the sides of the arcade cabinet. My heart raced, and my mind struggled to make sense of what I’d seen.

  Then another white ship appeared from the side of the display, swooped in a wide arc, and flew directly at me.

  A flash of light yanked me forward, and darkness swallowed me up.

  Four

  A shuffling sound.

  “Matt?” I groaned and opened my eyes, only to find myself flat on my back, barely able to move, and staring at a plain grey ceiling with donut-shaped lights eight feet above me.

  Oh, no. I’m in a hospital, I thought. What happened? Is Matt okay?

  On top of these fundamental questions was the deep sense of impending doom. When my parents found out Matt and I were injured, they’d kill me.

  What got us? Then I remembered the fumes from the melted toaster, and how unwell our great-uncle had looked. Had he managed to call an ambulance? Was he also in hospital?

  A face slid into my field of view.

  We blinked at each other for a couple of seconds, and then I screamed.

  The face screamed too.

  My paralysis miraculously ended and I scrambled back, heart racing as I sat up, trying to tell myself it was Matt playing a stupid trick on me with a Halloween mask, but at the same time I knew full well it was not Matt or a mask.

  At that point I also realised I was on the floor and not in a hospital bed, but all my attention could focus on was the . . . creature.

  It stood a little under three feet and had long, spindly arms, stumpy legs, and an oval body with a spherical head the size of a basketball perched on top. It had no visible neck. It wore a T-shirt with strange writing on the front that could have been Arabic or Persian script. I had no clue. Below that was an image of a purple vole-like animal with pointy teeth.

  As though in a nightmare, my attention moved back to the face. The creature had large black eyes, grey-brown skin, a small nose and mouth, and rounded ears that stuck out from the sides of its head like mug handles.

  The little monster ran to what I assumed to be its parents, sitting in chairs diagonally across from me—scaled up versions of their kid, with less rounded features. The one with her hair in a bun glared at me while lifting the child onto her lap.

  Tense, and really not wanting to know where I was, I looked to my right and instantly regretted it. I closed my eyes, muttered a few swear words under my breath, then opened them again.

  The strange room was still there.

  Great.

  Two rows of high-backed chairs faced one another, filled with an assortment of beings of various shapes and sizes. The strangest were three with eyes a foot apart on stalks, and a ferret-like woman with furry paws, wearing a bright orange skirt, a green blouse, and a giant hat covered in glowing, multicoloured feathers.

  Zero fashion sense.

  I squeezed my eyes closed again, trying to rid myself of the hallucination, and told myself to stop being silly and wake up.

  I opened my eyes again.

  Nope.

  All the creatures were still there, staring at me, while I sat on the floor by the back wall.

  Behind them were rows of windows. I clapped a hand over my mouth. Beyond the glass was the inky blackness of outer space, peppered with billions of stars.

  I swallowed. We were in some kind of spacecraft, and—

  “Jirana niem.”

  I jumped. Another alien—they had to be aliens—with black skin, a wide face, and wearing a dark green uniform, gazed down at me.

  “Jirana niem,” he repeated, indicating a vacant seat.

  Taking the hint, I got shakily to my feet and sat on the end of the row, opposite a humanoid man with a black beard, wearing a dark suit. Next to me was his polar opposite–a slender, tall alien with long blonde hair and a triangular face, who wore a silver dress that shimmered multicoloured rainbows under the lights. She also wore a silk scarf around her neck, both sides filled with metal pin badges showing a bewildering assortment of brightly coloured cartoon characters. I didn’t recognise any of them.

  The uniformed alien returned to the front of the shuttle, dropping into a seat. There was no pilot, only a set of controls, which he ignored, and a screen with readouts.

  A familiar shape loomed through the cockpit window ahead, nestled among an asteroid belt orbiting a purple planet and moon. Two pyramids sat either side of a giant dome, perched on top of a rectangular base.

  I leaned forward in my seat. From the arcade game?

  Thousands of windows glowed on hundreds of floors—the giant spaceship hung in the void, smaller spacecraft zipping about it like bees around a hive.

  How is that even-?

  “Et hald tuen krolor,” the alien woman sitting next to me said in a high-pitched voice.

  I gawked at her, mouth hanging open. I couldn’t help it.

  She smiled, revealing bright white teeth capped in silver which matched her dress. “Et hald your bracelet. It’s very pretty.” Even though her mouth still made the shapes of her native language, the alien woman’s words now came out in softly spoken English.

  Dazed, I looked down. Clasped around my right wrist was the gold bracelet with ten crystals embedded into it.

  Not really knowing what I was doing, I tried to remove the bracelet my great-uncle had given me, but I couldn’t find a clasp, and no amount of tugging could free it.

  “Are they Bluestones?” the woman asked.

  The black-bearded guy opposite gazed at it too.

  I covered the bracelet with my sleeve, but Black Beard still stared at my arm, his cold eyes boring into my flesh.

  Suppressing a small shudder, I tried to ignore the creep; I just wanted to wake from this weird nightmare. The
n I casually put a hand to my face and touched the skin around my eyes and temples to see if I was wearing virtual-reality headgear. I’d heard the Professor telling Matt how NASA used the technology to pilot Mars rovers. Or something like that, anyway. I wasn’t sure how realistic an environment they could create, but checking wouldn’t hurt.

  Finding none, and feeling utterly helpless, I spoke to the lady next to me. “Have you seen my brother?” When she shook her head, I added, “Can you help me find him, please?” Panic twisted my insides.

  Noticing my anxiety, the alien woman tilted her head. “Ask someone when we get there. The staff are very helpful.”

  “Staff?” I said. “Get where?” My focus moved back to the cockpit as we came to a sudden, jarring halt, pitching in our seats.

  The uniformed alien in the cockpit leaned over, checked the control screen, then addressed us. “Nothing to worry about.” He peered out of the window.

  Everyone else did the same as another white spacecraft approached.

  “If any shuttle detects the smallest issue,” the uniformed alien said, “even so much as a scratch on the paintwork, it will return to the shuttle bay.” He forced an awkward smile that wrinkled the corners of his mouth. “Our guests’ safety is paramount.”

  I frowned. Guests? Where are we going, exactly?

  Several people gasped as a colossal dark form moved into view. It was shaped like an aircraft carrier, but with ten turrets running the length of the hull, each with giant guns attached.

  “Only a security precaution,” the uniformed alien said in his breezy manner. “This entire sector is protected and patrolled by Flarion battlecruisers.” The forced smile returned. “Again, your safety is paramount.”

  The other white shuttle cut across our path, heading to the mothership. Once it was safely out of the way, our craft completed its journey, entering a giant hangar with hundreds more space shuttles lined up in neat rows.

  We landed, and the entire front section of the craft swung open like a pelican’s mouth.

  Dazed, I filed out with the aliens. As our group followed lit walkways across the vast hangar space, I gaped at the enormous cranes lifting empty shuttles from the deck and sliding them into giant racks as more shuttles came and went.

  My group moved through a glowing archway, and on the other side I stopped dead.

  Beyond was another colossal interior—a space hundreds of feet tall, topped with a glass roof. Thousands of drones, each an inch in diameter, zipped in and out, painting the air with vibrant light. There were cartoon characters and a myriad of signs in bright colours. The largest said:

  WELCOME TO ARCADIA

  The Galaxy’s Interstellar Theme Park

  Five

  I gaped at all the images vying for attention. This giant ship is a travelling theme park? I shook my head in disbelief, but sure enough, the crowds of aliens headed toward a set of glass ticket barriers staffed by stick-like robots. The aliens wore red bands on their wrists. The robots scanned them, and the glass barriers lifted, letting them through a few at a time.

  I held back; I didn’t have a red band. For a second I wondered if the golden bracelet would admit me to the park, but decided not to try my luck.

  On the other side of the ticket barriers stood a fountain with a statue in the middle—a thirty-foot-tall scaled-up version of the ancient astronaut from inside the arcade cabinet. Glass rods circled the statue, a few feet apart, running from floor to ceiling, with water cascading down the outside.

  More holographic alien characters jumped in and out of the pool, while family groups stood in front of them, having their pictures taken by an array of hovering cameras.

  The guests’ images appeared on a giant board—hundreds of photographs of bewildering alien diversity, with every shape and size of creature imaginable.

  Then one particular image caught my eye, and I gasped. “Matt?”

  Sure enough, my little brother stood in front of the fountain, both thumbs up, a cheesy grin spread across his podgy face.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.” I staggered toward the barriers. “You’re here?” I scanned the crowds of tourists on the other side, but couldn’t see Matt anywhere. Then my gaze moved to the ticket barriers themselves, and the robots checking each guest’s admission band before letting them through. How did you get in without a band?

  Someone grabbed my shoulder, and I cried out.

  A security guard loomed over me—seven feet tall and muscular, with pale smooth skin, sharp angled features, and glowing purple eyes. Obviously not human. He wore a blue uniform with body armour—not that he needed it—and had a device fixed to his back with a tube running to the corner of his mouth.

  As though to clear up any lingering doubt of his authority, the purple-eyed alien guard had a brass badge with a star-shaped logo surrounded by an octagon pinned to his uniform, like an old western sheriff. He also had a weapon or radio strapped to his belt: rectangular, with a thumb-sized spigot jutting out of the top.

  He rested a gnarled hand next to it, and glared at me as he let go of my shoulder. “Is there a problem?” he asked in a deep, artificial voice. The sound came from another device strapped to his neck.

  I swallowed, glanced at the image of Matt on the wall, then looked at the guard. “I’ve lost my brother.” I’d opted for the truth because I had a strong feeling the guard’s purple eyes could somehow allow him to see straight through any lies. Besides, it would have been impossible to make up elaborate stories, given my surroundings.

  I ducked as a cartoon character resembling a winged carrot dive-bombed the crowds, chuckling as it went, and letting off miniature fireworks.

  Alien kids laughed, and jumped up and down with glee.

  I wanted to get the hell out of there.

  “What’s his name?” the guard asked, snapping my focus back to him. “What does your brother look like? What is he wearing? Age?”

  I lifted my finger to point at the photo of Matt, but stopped myself. I hesitated a few seconds longer, thinking. If my brother had snuck in without a band then I needed to watch what I said, or we’d both be in deep trouble. As far as I knew they’d invited neither of us, and I was sure telling this guard about how Matt and I had left Earth and wound up in ArcadiA wouldn’t go down too well.

  I shrugged and braced myself for his response.

  The guard’s eyes narrowed. “The rest of your family? Where are they? Your group?” He scanned the crowd. “Which shuttle party?”

  With reluctance, the tension rising, I shrugged again. It was all I could think to do.

  Besides, how can I explain the crazy situation I’ve found myself in? No one would believe me. I don’t even believe me. For a moment, I wondered if that was how everyone arrived at ArcadiA—kidnapped by an arcade machine. However, no one looked as disorientated as I felt, so I had to assume they’d come of their own free will.

  I huffed out a breath.

  Nothing made sense.

  My thoughts turned to our great-uncle. Does he know about this place? I guessed, from his cryptic message about saving Matt, that he did. I felt for the bracelet beneath my sleeve. When I next saw the Professor, he had a lot of explaining to do.

  A twinge tugged at my insides. I hoped he was okay. The Professor needed urgent medical attention, and the sooner Matt and I got out of ArcadiA and helped him, the better.

  The guard raised a bony finger and pointed directly at the photo of Matt. “Your brother?”

  I stiffened. How does he know that? Sure, we were both human, but there were other humanoid people among the tourists.

  “Come with me.” The guard motioned to a side door.

  With mounting fear, I stepped away from him. “You don’t understand,” I said in a quiet voice, trying not to draw attention. “My brother is here somewhere.” I waved in the direction of the fountain. “I have to find him. Can I look, please? I’ll come straight back.” As the guard shook his head, an impulse came over me. Run.

 
As if sensing what I was about to do, the security guard lunged toward me, but I ducked under his arm and squeezed past a group of aliens wearing bright yellow overcoats and ski masks.

  “Stop.” The purple-eyed guard dove through the crowds after me, but I was off—arms pumping the air, sprinting toward the ticket barriers.

  As I ran, warmth from the bracelet rose up my arm and into my chest. My entire body turned translucent, and I seemed to be as light as air. The world flashed past in a blur. A second later, unable to slow down, I glided right through one of the ticket barriers as though it didn’t exist.

  Shocked, I slid to a halt. Colour returned to my hands, and I felt my feet pressing the ground again.

  “What the hell just happened?” I looked back at the ticket barriers, panting, feeling every alien gaze on me.

  The purple-eyed guard raised his band and a robot scanned it. Then he stepped through the barrier, marching straight for me, his fists clenched, his face screwed up in anger.

  Panicked, my heart racing, I darted through the crowds—slower this time, careful not to repeat what happened moments ago—heading for the right-hand side of the atrium.

  I hurried along a winding path, weaving between the tourists, keeping low and trying to put as much distance between me and the guard as possible, while searching for Matt.

  A sign above a wooden archway read:

  BAYTOPIA

  All other ways blocked by slow-moving crowds, I hurried on through. The air grew humid as I followed a path between straw-roofed mud huts, flanked by a jungle of trees and dense undergrowth.

  A little way farther along I joined a line of people streaming toward a boat moored on a lazy river.

  My lungs were about to burst through my chest as I stood on tiptoe and peered over the crowds, but the purple-eyed guard hadn’t caught up with me.

  Facing forward, I let out a sigh. “I’m going to kill you when I find you, Matt.”

  “This way, please.” A red-uniformed alien with a woven palm-leaf hat and a jaunty smile waved people to the boat, ushering us onto three rows of bench seats large enough to fit ten people each.