Sagitta

by C M Benamati

  “No,” she said, “but my mom took me on a weightless plane ride for my ninth birthday. It was amazing, but it only lasted for a few minutes.”

  The intercom clicked on. “Attention: we’re cutting the main engine in three, two, one…”

  The noise stopped. He gripped his armrests as the pressure from the seat disappeared. His stomach rolled. He’d become accustomed to the deep subsonic vibrations of the rocket engine, and now that they were gone everything felt strange.

  “Sweet,” said Liz. She let her arms hang out in front of her. “It’s just like I remember. Too bad we can’t take these harnesses off and fly around the cabin.”

  “You wouldn’t get very far,” said the businessman. “There are sensors around each row of seats that will kick on a force field if something gets too close. You know, to keep things from going ballistic.”

  Morgan pulled out his phone and placed it in front of his face. “Check this out,” he said. He flipped it over quickly while simultaneously pulling his hand away, leaving it spinning about its axis. It drifted slowly towards Liz.

  A pair of flight attendants floated past like aerial acrobats, one facing port and the other starboard. The one closest grabbed a handhold in the ceiling and hung horizontally, frowning at Morgan.

  “Sir, I have to ask you to put that thing in your pocket.”

  Morgan scowled and snatched the phone out of the air.

  “Thanks,” said the flight attendant. He kicked off and went sailing towards the front of the shuttle.

  “That looks like so much fun,” said Liz, watching the flight attendant. “It’s too bad they make people stay in their seats.”

  “They used to let people move around,” said the businessman. “But there were too many lawsuits. Now the only way out of your seat is for a bathroom break.”

  “And with regards to that, you’re better off just holding it,” said Morgan. “The flight attendants escort you the whole way, and that robot suction tube takes no prisoners.”

  The business man chuckled. “No prisoners indeed.”

  Liz made a face. “Uh, gross.”

  “If you want, we can visit the core of the space station when we get there,” said Morgan. “There are padded recreation rooms where you can fly around. Some have obstacle courses.”

  “Have you done that?”

  “Once with my dad, while Mom was meeting with clients. It was a lot of fun, but I couldn’t control myself. I ended up crashing into this other kid and nearly knocked him out.”

  The sound of vomiting came from somewhere up front, and a translucent energy field flared up around a row of seats. Due to the high seatbacks it was impossible to see the actual parties involved, but from the anguished cries it was obvious what had happened. Yellow slurry rose above the center seat’s headrest before splattering into the restraining field, coating it with puke.

  Morgan laughed despite his uneasy stomach. “They missed the bag. I hope they all brought a change of clothes.”

  “That’s disgusting,” said Liz. Her face was pale. Her hair floated around her in a golden halo.

  “Yeah, they’ll be stuck that way for a while. Imagine being the people in that row.” Someone in the same vicinity made a tormented choking noise. “Look out, we might get a chain reaction.”

  “Stop talking about it,” said Liz. “Urbp!” Her cheeks puffed out, and she held her hand to her mouth, her eyes wide. “Yerk!” she said, jerking her head towards Morgan.

  Morgan squawked and held up his hands.

  She smiled. “Just kidding.”

  He lowered his arms and glared at her. “Not funny.”

  “Sure it was. You should have seen your face.” She looked out the window at Earth. “It’s gorgeous down there. The oceans are so blue.”

  Morgan craned his neck to look past her. A century ago, no one except for a select few ever got to see this view. How many people had died without ever viewing the Earth from above?

  Here he was, three hundred miles above Earth with the most beautiful girl he’d ever met. But she dated Victor. His mind began wandering. It was hard picturing them as a couple—Liz as beautiful and kind as she was, and Victor as uncouth as he was. Why would she date such a loser? Did she sleep with him? Yuck!

  The intercom came on. “Alright everyone, get ready for acceleration. This will be just a short burn to push us towards a higher orbit. Thrusting in ten, nine, eight…”

  Liz pressed herself back in the seat. “Thanks for taking me up here.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  The rocket fired and their bodies had weight again. Blood racing through his veins, Morgan inched his arm outward across the shared armrest until he felt the faintest pressure of her arm next to his. He dared not try for more.

  “I love you,” he whispered, his words safely lost in the clamor of the ship’s acceleration. He closed his eyes and let the numbing power of the rocket wash over him.

  ∆∆∆

  After a few hours of drifting through space, the pilot sounded the acceleration warning. They would be using the rocket engines to bring the shuttle into a circularized orbit that closely matched that of Starlight Station. Flight attendants prepared the cabin, and the rockets flared to life. It was a jarring transition after the peaceful glide.

  “Where is it?” said Liz, after the maneuver was complete.

  “It’s coming up from behind,” said Morgan. “It will take a bit for it to catch up to us.”

  “Oh.”

  “Don’t worry, it won’t be much longer. The boring part is almost over.” He closed his eyes to enjoy the last few moments of freefall.

  “Boring?” She laughed. “I’ve been watching sunrises for hours, and you call that boring?”

  Morgan smiled. “Glad you like the window.” She had been glued to it the entire time.

  Sometime later the intercom clicked on. “Attention passengers, we’ll be docking with Starlight Station in about five minutes. We’re going to rotate the ship to give you all a better view. If you look to starboard, you’ll see your destination approaching just slightly below us.”

  Unlike the main engine burn, the thruster adjustments didn’t vibrate the hull strongly enough to carry noise into the cabin. Morgan didn’t realize the ship was moving until Liz pointed out her window at the Earth below them.

  “Everything’s spinning,” she said.

  Most of the passengers didn’t seem too interested, but a few people seated across the aisle, probably those who didn’t get to space often, were looking out their windows. Morgan leaned forward to see past the businessman at the opposite side, but the windows were too small for him to see anything out of.

  The intercom clicked on again. “For anyone using our in-flight data connection, we’re now passing our external camera feed to channel one. That’ll get you a better view.”

  “Sweet,” said Liz. Morgan turned, and saw her eyes flicking rapidly from side to side. She touched her palm, blinked twice, and then grinned as her eyes sparkled with photonic overlays.

  Morgan pulled out his phone and opened the data connection to the shuttle’s computer. It took him a moment to find the video stream from channel one.

  Each of the three modular rings that contained the majority of the station’s habitable volume connected to the central core with three radial spokes. Umbilical tunnels spanned longitudinally between the ring gaps, allowing people to travel directly from the central ring to either of the end rings. Docking clamps on the outer surface of each ring offered berths for freighters, cruise liners, and ISF patrol vessels. Small puddle jumpers and shuttles stood out like freckles on the station’s white hull plating.

  The pilot came back on the intercom. “Alright listen up. We’re going to synchronize our rotation with the station, so hold on. This gets a little weird, but it’ll be over in a few minutes.”

  Reaction thrusters fired and the station slid out of view of the camera. The slow sideways acceleration was soon accompanied by a slight downw
ard pull as the thrusters established circular motion.

  “ Ugh, now I am going to be sick,” said Liz.

  “Oh yeah gravity!” whooped someone from the front of the ship. “Come on go faster, I’ve gotta pee.”

  People laughed. Morgan held onto the armrests as the reaction force changed.

  “Prepare for repulsor synchronization,” said the pilot.

  A deep vibration filled the compartment as the shuttle engaged its repulsors. Gravity appeared. There was a slight clang from the ceiling and then the repulsors powered down.

  “And we’re docked,” said the pilot. “I’m turning the mic over to the flight crew. Y’all take care now.”

  “Thank you ma’am,” said a flight attendant. “Attention passengers, we have successfully docked with the central ring of Starlight Station. The local time is twenty-one thirty-six universal coordinated. Your harnesses are now unlocked. Please retrieve all luggage from the overhead bins and exit the shuttle from either the port or starboard umbilical connections. Thank you for flying with Commonwealth Spaceways.”

  “Finally,” said the businessman. He unclipped his harness. Morgan and Liz did the same.

  Morgan retrieved his backpack and they followed the line of people out of the shuttle. After stopping at the station’s bathrooms, they took an elevator up one level from the landing pad to deck one of the central ring. As was common on most rotating stations, the annular decks were numbered from the outside in.

  From the excited conversations, nearly everyone from the shuttle seemed destined for the space show, which was taking place on the observation ring at the forward end of the station. Morgan and Liz followed the crowd.

  “Are you two going to the space show?” said the businessman.

  “Yeah,” said Liz. “You?”

  “Yes, but for work I’m afraid. I’m Jonathan Kerrigan by the way. I should have introduced myself earlier.”

  Liz shook his hand. “We should have too. I’m Liz and that’s Morgan.”

  “Hi,” said Morgan. On sudden impulse, he looked back over his shoulder. The deck was clogged with people visiting the shops on either side of the central walkway, but Victor was taller than most and easy to spot. He was a few paces behind them. He locked eyes with Morgan and mouthed something that Morgan couldn’t figure out. What does he want?

  Morgan turned back around. Victor’s laser stare bored into the back of his head. Liz was oblivious. She probably doesn’t want to be reminded about him right now. Morgan grit his teeth, hoping Victor would buzz off somewhere and not follow them around the entire time. What if he doesn’t? What are you going to do about it?

  “It’s like a huge mall,” said Liz, as they passed a McDonald’s. “Except we’re walking on the inside of a monstrous spinning drum.”

  “Uh-huh,” said Morgan.

  “Check out the view!” Liz pointed down at the large windows set into the floor between the walkways leading to the shops. The stars outside weren’t twinkling, since there was no atmosphere. The sun was sliding into view in one of the windows, which automatically darkened to prevent people from going blind. The earth dominated the view on the opposite side.

  “It’s like we’re in a galactic cement mixer,” said Liz.

  Morgan looked back over his shoulder. Victor was still there, about fifty feet back, and he was watching them. “Uh-huh.”

  They dodged a bunch of school kids who weren’t watching where they were going. Despite being owned by a military organization, Starlight Station had shops, bars, and casinos on the central ring. These were huge tourist attractions. In addition to the service fees collected at trading hubs on the aft ring, the tourism income paid the salaries of many of the station’s personnel. When coming in for shore leave, the multinational crews of the ISF peacekeeping fleet often set up booths selling coins, clothing, and trinkets bearing their ship’s crest and serial number.

  “This place is just huge,” said Liz over the noise of the holoarcade they were passing. From the other side of the walkway, the smell of deep fried goodness wafted towards them from the food court. “It’s got everything. Hey, look over there.”

  Little kids were seated around a booth, their eyes alight and their faces set in frantic determination. Above their heads, miniature fighter drones rocketed past, zipping through holographic hoops. The track seemed to run the entire circumference of the ring. Display screens tracked the position of each remote control fighter as the children piloted them around and around, their hands grasped around joysticks. Occasionally one of the kids would reach out and press a button in mid-air, although there were no buttons being projected. After a moment, Morgan realized they must be seeing a graphical user interface through their retinal implants.

  “Hey,” cried one of the girls. “Not fair!”

  There was a screeching noise behind them. Morgan turned to see two of the little ships locked together in a shoving match. The girl screamed when one of the ships spun and fell from the sky. Morgan ducked as the tiny vessel tumbled towards his head. It fizzled out of existence about a foot from his face. Of course it’s just a projection.

  “Pretty good graphics with these new games,” said Mr. Kerrigan. “And good sound too.”

  Morgan straightened up. “Yeah,” he said sheepishly.

  “Still, it can’t be as good as the real thing,” said Mr. Kerrigan. Did you know that twenty civilians are getting to ride in the new fighters? They’ve never done that before.”

  “What do you mean?” said Morgan. “I thought they were giving everyone rides.”

  Mr. Kerrigan raised an eyebrow. “You mean everyone at the show?” He chuckled. “That would take forever. No, they’ve got the simulators set up for that. They sold some special tickets to a bunch of rich folks, plus gave a few to some VIP’s. I saw Senator Newman earlier with a red ticket.”

  “Red ticket?” said Liz. She pulled hers out of her pocket.

  “Yeah,” said Mr. Kerrigan. “Red tickets are for the VIPs. General admissions are blue tickets.”

  “But look at this,” said Liz, holding out her ticket.

  Mr. Kerrigan looked down and stopped walking. A man behind them almost bumped into him.

  “How did you get that?” said Mr. Kerrigan in a hushed voice.

  “A recruiter gave them to us,” said Morgan. “An ISF captain.” He pulled out his own ticket. He’d had no idea it was so special.

  “Someone just gave you red passes?” Mr. Kerrigan had a pained expression on his face.

  “Yeah,” said Morgan. “Are you sure they’re VIP tickets?”

  “Quiet,” said Mr. Kerrigan.

  A family paused to gawk. The little kids had funny pointed ears, and the lettering on the dad’s shirt said ‘I’d rather be flying the Enterprise’. The shirt made no sense to Morgan, but then again he didn’t pay much attention to popular culture.

  “You should put those away before you get jumped by fanatics,” said Mr. Kerrigan, eying the family.

  They pocketed their tickets.

  They had arrived at one of the bridge points along the central ring. There were six bridge points around the perimeter of each ring, located sixty degrees apart. These were the points that connected the rings to each other. Most of the traffic was heading towards the bridge labeled ‘Forward’.

  “The space show’s that way,” said Morgan, pointing. “Shall we go?”

  “Aren’t we already?” said Liz, skipping ahead. “Come on!”

  “After you,” said Morgan, as he and Mr. Kerrigan followed. He turned and looked around. Victor was nowhere in sight. Just where’s our chaperone got to?

  “Did you tell her about the bridges?” asked Mr. Kerrigan in a low voice.

  “No,” said Morgan. He slowed, until Liz was a few paces ahead of them. “I can’t wait to see what she does.”

  Each space bridge was a great tube that spanned the fifty-meter longitudinal gap between the stations’ rings. Except for a four-foot wide walkway and a few stiffeners, it was
almost entirely composed of concave structurally reinforced windows. Morgan had spent hours in the space bridges between rings. They were his favorite places to go whenever he got the chance to visit Starlight Station.

  This bridge was lined with people on both sides. Liz was rushing straight ahead and didn’t seem to notice the view. It wasn’t until she walked past a gap in the human plaque clinging to the edges of the tunnel that she finally paused, turned, and stared.

  “I’ll leave you two at it then,” said Mr. Kerrigan. “I’ve got to get to work. Red tickets, phew! I’m jealous. Maybe I’ll see you flying around out there. Once again, it was nice to meet you.”

  “Take care,” said Morgan.

  Liz didn’t notice as Mr. Kerrigan waved goodbye at her. She stepped to the side and put her hands against the pressure glass. Morgan joined her.

  The view was dizzying. The station’s core hung above them, massive, glowing like a pearl from countless spotlights. And yet, it was a mere splinter against the galaxy. In front of them, a thin band of Earth still glowed, the atmosphere alight with the last few golden rays as the sun dropped below the horizon. Below them, land and ocean alike were engulfed in shadow, almost invisible. Here and there, lightning flashed between cloudbanks.

  “Oh my God,” said Liz.

  “Crazy view, huh?” said Morgan, his eyes adjusting to the darkness. They would soon be entirely in Earth’s shadow.

  Liz’s eyes flashed as she looked something up. She pointed at a glowing yellow and white patch of land that was rising in front of them as the station rotated. “Look, there’s China. I never thought the city lights could be so beautiful.”

  “Yeah.”

  They stood in silence, angling their heads to track the sunset. As their eyes adjusted, the Milky Way took on an unearthly glow. The blanket of stars enveloped them, wrapping them up with the colors of space.

  Chapter 20

  It was nearly eleven o’clock at night, station time, when they stepped out on the observation ring. To Morgan’s relief, Victor was nowhere to be found.