Dark Side of the Moon

by P. C. Rasmussen

  "You like plants?"

  With a jerk he let his hand drop and turned to face the man suddenly standing there. The guy was about a head taller than Kyle with wiry steel gray hair, a full beard that covered the lower part of his face and electric blue eyes. He looked like a wrestler clad in a dirt-brown tunic and black pants that looked like leather. Kyle was quick to adapt to a situation and put on an easy-going smile. "You bet I do," he agreed. "This place is Heaven. The air is fresh, the scent in the air ..." He drew in a deep breath and let it out again with an appreciative sigh. "Man, this is awesome."

  The other man seemed unimpressed by his enthusiasm and eyed him darkly. "Who are you?" he asked.

  "Oh, yeah, the name's Kyle," he introduced himself and stepped forward, reaching a hand out toward him.

  The older man eyed his hand with a slight sneer on his lips before lashing out to grab the front of Kyle's prison shirt with both hands, lifting him bodily off his feet and slamming him into the glass wall of the dome. "Now this is a guess. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. But I take it nobody has warned you about coming in here without an invitation, huh?" he snarled, his tone icy.

  Kyle, with his feet dangling an inch off the ground, had to admit that he was bit rattled. "Yeah, I have been warned. But I don't listen to rumors. I like to check things out first hand," he said, forcing his voice to stay calm. He raised both hands, palms out, making no attempt to fight the older man. "I come in peace," he added with a slightly jittery smile on his lips.

  For a long moment he feared that this man would tear him limb from limb, but then he suddenly released him and stepped back. "So, you don't listen to rumors, do you?" he asked.

  "Nope," Kyle agreed and straightened his shirt a little. "Never have. I find it rude to judge people before I meet them."

  This earned him an arched eyebrow. "You've got guts, coming in here like this. What do you want?" the older man countered while eying him suspiciously.

  "Well, I'm new here, so I was kinda just looking around, you know?" Kyle was loath to admit it, but this guy had rattled him and that didn't happen very often. "Besides, when someone mentioned homicidal gardeners, my interest was piqued. It sounded like a bit of an overstatement, what with the cannibalistic tendencies and all."

  The older man's expression tightened a little. "Cannibalistic tendencies?" he asked. "You came in here despite that? That speaks more of idiocy than guts." His eyes narrowed under the bushy white eyebrows. "Or maybe you're hoping to get offed because you don't have the guts to do it yourself?"

  "Oh, no, no, not at all. That's not what this is about. I'm just ... curious, you know?" Kyle would have taken a step back if he could have, but the wall of the dome was right there behind him.

  The other man just stood there and looked at him for a moment, then grabbed Kyle's arm, making him flinch. "Come meet the others then," he suggested, but his tone told Kyle that any refusal to do so would probably result in bodily harm.

  The older man shoved him down a path going into the jungle and the further in they went, the denser the foliage and the heavier the air became. But it was a good heavy, a sense of life and breathing things around him, and for the first time since this atrocity had befallen him - your own fault, you idiot, he thought - he felt more alive again. That could of course be because of the adrenaline cruising through is veins right now. He was undeniably close to scared at the moment.

  After a while they broke through the tree line and into a clearing. A quick glance upward told Kyle they were in the center in the dome. Another glance around told him that the gardeners, whether they were crazy or not, looked like a pretty upbeat crowd. They ranged in age from eighteen and upwards and none of them looked like they had a care in the world. It wasn't what Kyle had expected to see and he wasn't entirely sure how to respond right now.

  "Gentlemen, ladies," the older man said, calling for the attention of the group of roughly thirty people. "Meet Kyle. He likes plants." This was said in a tone of voice that made it sound insulting. His words caused various responses ranging from joy to sarcasm.

  Kyle, still not entirely sure what would happen next, raised a hand in greeting. "Nice place you guys have here," he said while looking around again. There were long tables set out here and there with small pots and pans and whatever else they could find to grow things in.

  "New blood." That voice made Kyle look around and face a woman of about fifty. She had the look of tough old leather about her and he immediately had no desire to get on her bad side. Her hair, a wiry mess of tiny curls, was almost white, her face furrowed by worry lines, but she looked a hell of a lot more alive than some of those chickens in the first dome. "What are you in for, son?" she asked.

  Kyle eyed her a bit nervously. She didn't really give off a maternal vibe, but at the same time he felt that she was in charge and he liked her immediately. "I took the blame for someone else's crime because I thought my dad would get me off the hook," he confessed readily. "Needless to say ... he didn't."

  This caused widespread laughter. The woman propped her hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes at him. Like the older man standing right behind him, she looked fit, not an ounce of fat on her frame. "Is that so?" she asked. "What's your last name, Kyle? I may know your dad."

  In part he didn't really want his father's less than stellar reputation on the humanitarian front to mess things up for him, but he didn't want to get off on the wrong foot with this woman either and hence decided to tell the truth and deal with the consequences later. "Whitmore," he said.

  It was funny how much influence that name had, even in this place. The majority of the assembled simmered down while the woman stepped forward. "As in Jonathan Whitmore, III? That Whitmore?" she asked, eyes narrowed, brow furrowed.

  Kyle pursed his lips and sent a sweeping look around to take in the reaction, a little confused by his first-hand impression of this crowd. In general, he felt no hostility right now, not even from the older man he had met first. "One and the same," he agreed, careful to keep his opinion of this to himself for now. He needed to gage their reaction before he showed anything.

  "And he let his only son go to LPC for a crime he didn't commit?" she asked. It was not yet obvious how she felt about him being his father's son and Kyle remained as neutral as he could.

  "Yeah. Not that it's really a surprise," he countered and shrugged lightly. This caused some poorly restrained titters from someone in the back of this group.

  The woman eyed him for a moment longer, but then took another step forward. "I knew your dad, Kyle," she said, her tone even but with a dangerous edge. "He's an ass if ever there was one."

  That did not sound promising, but Kyle managed to keep a lid on his present insecurity. "Is he the reason that you're here?" he asked, not sure she would divulge this information.

  For a moment longer she just stared at him and then a smile spread over her lips. "No, I can't blame him for that. But welcome to the greenhouse. If that old coot disowned you ... you can't be half bad." With that, she grabbed his shoulder and squeezed hard enough to nearly bruise him. "I'm Stella. And the big log who brought you in is Mike."

  Kyle refrained from showing any discomfort at the harsh grip and gave her a lopsided smirk in return, feeling his tense gut settle a little. "Thanks, Stella," he said and sent a quick look back at Mike, who looked a lot less threatening now. He nodded at him and Mike gave him a nod in return.

  The rest of them returned to what they had been doing before he turned up and the mood rose to its former level. Obviously Stella's say-so was good enough for them.

  "We've got things here you won't get anywhere else," Stella said and led him toward an open tent off to one side. It looked like some sort of mess tent with tables and chairs set up. Off to one side, a big canister of some sort was simmering away, giving off heat and the very heavy aroma of fresh coffee.

  Kyle's mouth began to water at the smell. "You've got coffee?" he asked, giving Stella an incre
dulous look.

  The older woman grinned broadly, showing bad teeth. "You bet your sweet ass we do," she countered. "Go grab a cup and then join me. I wanna talk to you."

  He nodded and did as he was told; mainly because what he was being told to do wasn't half bad. He grabbed a mug and filled it with the hot brew, then took a whiff of the heady scent. "Aw man," he groaned, then turned and headed over to where Stella had settled down.

  "It's fascinating how fast you can miss something as simple as coffee when all you can get is that sludge the machines produce, isn't it?" she asked and waved at a chair across the table from her.

  Kyle sank into it and took a careful sip. His taste buds almost exploded with joy. "You can say that again. This is as good as Brazilian," he countered, already in love with this heavenly brew.

  Stella continued to smile. "That's because it is Brazilian," she said and nodded toward the forest of greenery out there. "We've got coffee growing here and various other things you've only been dreaming of on Earth."

  Kyle sent a quick look out over the green sea surrounding them, appreciating what Earth had lost so much more than he ever had before. "How cool is that?" he muttered and took another sip. Technically the coffee was still too hot, but he really didn't care. The taste was only surpassed by the scent and he knew he would die a happy man if he could only have a cup of this a day. That would make up for a lot.

  "So, you're Jonathan's son, huh?" she asked, her tone low, while she eyed him closely. "I don't really see the resemblance."

  Reluctantly, Kyle set the mug down on the table. "I guess I take after my mother," he said with a shrug.

  With a nod, Stella agreed. "Yeah, you do. I knew her too," she said. "Damn shame what happened to her. I always figured she would meet a sticky end with that husband."

  It struck Kyle as a bit odd that Stella would have known his mother that well. She had, after all, been dead twenty-six years. "How'd you know them?" he asked.

  Stella leaned back on her chair and folded her arms over her chest. "How old do you think I am?" she countered.

  Kyle frowned at her refusal to answer his question and then pursed his lips. Women had a tendency to be pretty sensitive about the age-thing, but Kyle had always believed in being honest. "About fifty would be my guess," he said after a moment.

  This drew a deep-bellied laugh from the older woman. "Hah! You are nothing like your father, that snake," she chuckled and scrubbed a hand over her mouth. "I'm seventy-four, kiddo. But thanks for the compliment."

  Kyle smirked. "Honestly, you don't look a day over fifty," he said and meant it too. He had no reason to charm her. No matter what her actual age was, she was too old for him anyway.

  "Well, I'm past that and then some. Not that it matters. Up here, you're either strong or you're dead. Unless you wanna live in a filthy lean-to in the first dome, that is," she said.

  "Which I don't," he admitted readily. "I'm used to better things."

  This made her laugh again. "I like you, kid," she said. "You really are nothing like your father."

  It was a repetitive thing with her that comment. "Why? Because I'm able to crack a smile?" he asked, fishing for compliments.

  The laughter died immediately and her expression turned serious in a flash. "Because you're nothing like him; at all. There's not a shimmer of any resemblance," she said while eying him closely.

  Kyle frowned a little at her insistence. "What are you trying to say?" he asked, but was already beginning to catch on.

  "You're a smart kid. If you're anything like your mom, you're smarter than most." Stella smirked. "I think you know what I'm hinting at."

  He mulled it over for a moment while staring at his mug. Then he raised his eyes to meet hers. "That would explain why he hates me," he said with a light shrug. "But it doesn't explain why he didn't ship me off to an orphanage the second she was dead."

  "And thereby admit that you weren't his?" Stella countered with slight surprise. "Your father is a very proud man and a very vain man. For someone like him to have to admit that his 'darling' wife was cheating on him ... that's just not gonna happen."

  He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the tabletop, his hands wrapped around the mug. "You think that's it?" he asked and suddenly felt like slapping himself for all the years he'd tried to live up to that man.

  "I don't know, kid. But the fact that you're so dissimilar from him and so much like your mom ..." Stella shook her head. "I think it would be a good thing for you if you weren't his offspring. But maybe I'm grasping at straws here. Alice was a good woman and you seem to be a good man, Kyle. It would be a pity if you were related to him."

  Kyle eyed her for a moment and couldn't help a cynical smile. "And you very conveniently avoided telling me where you knew them from," he pushed.

  Stella smirked. "You noticed that, huh?" she asked, to which he merely nodded. "Well ... I knew your mom more than your dad. I met him a few times and I really don't like him. Then she died and I ended up here and that's as far as that story goes."

  Kyle nodded thoughtfully. She wasn't really telling him anything worthwhile. "Why are you here?"

  A soft breeze rustled the foliage around them and Kyle briefly glanced toward it, somehow expecting some big grazing beast to turn up at the edge of the clearing. "I killed my husband," Stella said, drawing his attention back to her.

  "You did?" he asked and somehow wasn't surprised. "Was he abusive?"

  Again she chuckled, obviously amused by that suggestion. "No, not at all. He just wouldn't die," she countered. "I was young when I married him. And twenty-five years ago, I had enough of waiting for him to die. I married him for his money and I wasted much of my youth on him. He was disgusting and he grew more and more disgusting by the day. In the end he could barely get it up, but he still wanted to have sex all the time. I kept hoping he'd have a heart attack and just die, but he never did. He kept clinging to life. At the tender age of ninety-four, he looked like a fucking mummy and smelled like formaldehyde and rot and all he could think of was to crawl on top of me every damned night. I got so fed up with it, I ended up smothering him with a pillow. At the time I didn't think about what I was doing. Before I knew what was going on, I was in jail. And when they passed that sentence on me ... I thought I would die. I thought I'd get up here and would get gang-raped and killed or worse. LPC isn't a place for a woman. I was still pretty back then, still had some life left in me. That was twenty-five years ago. And here I am, still around, still going strong, not so pretty anymore and nothing to show for all the years I wasted on that old, rotten bastard."

  "So, not innocent then?" Kyle asked, which again made her laugh.

  "Nope. I guess I got what I deserved. I shouldn't have killed him, should just have waited him out. I just got fed up," Stella said, her tone laced with regret. "I could have been a wealthy widow today instead of a lifer in LPC. But hey. You make your bed, you gotta lie in it."

  "I guess," he agreed and took another sip of the coffee. "What's this about the gardeners being dangerous? You guys seem pretty straight forward." He grimaced lightly. "Even though Mike did manage to make me wonder if I'd made the right decision coming over here."

  Stella sent a look out over the clearing and the people working there. "When you've got a rep of being borderline crazy, you're safer in this place. And Mike is excellent at reading others. If he hadn't taken to you, you wouldn't be here now. He would have either scared you back into dome 2 or used you as fertilizer," she said. "We have no qualms about killing others. We just want them to stay the fuck away from us. As you may have noticed, we've got a few younger women here. All of them are here because they are tough. Doesn't mean we want them subjected to either the moron twins and their likes or what lies beyond this dome."

  Kyle glanced up at the tent canopy above them. "What does lie beyond this dome? I've heard horror stories about the last two domes."

  "You mean Purgatory and Hell?" Stella asked and grimaced
lightly. "There are places where even the gardeners don't go. Domes 5 and 6 are those places."

  "Why is that? What's in there?" Kyle leaned back on his chair and stifled the urge to yawn. He was getting a bit tired, which so did not correspond with the mug of java he was drinking.

  Stella watched him closely for a moment. "Nothing human," she said matter of fact like.

  This made him sit up and listen more closely. "Nothing human?" he asked and she nodded once. "What do you mean, nothing human? Is it because they do unseemly things to others?"

  Again she chuckled, a low sound in her chest. "No, son, I'm not talking about the loonies. I'm talking about what's hiding in the last dome. It's definitely not human. I have to admit up front that I have no real proof of that. But considering what happened in dome 5 ..." She shook her head.

  "I've been told they eat people," Kyle confessed and eyed her closely for a response. Her expression didn't change.

  "Oh, I'm sure they do and the loonies are human. Or used to be. Cannibalism is a natural side-effect of a place like this. But I don't think they're crazier than anyone else here. I just don't think the thing they're paying tribute to in there is human," she reiterated.

  The idea of actual aliens - if that was what she was alluding to - had never really struck Kyle. He had always loved to watch weird movies, especially while stoned out of his head, but he had never really given much thought as to whether such creatures might actually exist or not. "Are we talking aliens here?" he asked.

  "That I don't know. I've seen glimpses of it. And what I saw ... wasn't human. Might have been an alien life form that's been lying dormant here on the Moon and was awoken by our arrival; might be something else too. Who knows? All I know is that what I saw ... wasn't human." Stella pursed her lips and glanced over at the others again. "No sir. Not human," she muttered.

  Kyle eyed her for a moment while sipping his coffee. "Well, I'll make sure to stay away from those domes then," he said and rose. "Thanks for the brew. And the welcome. But I gotta head back. I've made some friends in dome 2 that might get a little worried if I disappear for too long."