Space Junk

by Andrew Bixler

  She screams and drops her glass, spilling her drink onto the carpet. “Who threw that?!” she shrieks, her face turning a shade of red Zok has never seen before.

  The people around her pause for a beat and then laugh and turn back to what they were doing. Pi cackles hysterically, and Zok hides behind her until the glittering woman stomps away.

  “Roll again,” the dealer says.

  Zok’s hand shakes as he picks up the dice and tosses them. This time he manages to keep them on the table.

  “That’s the way,” somebody shouts.

  Zok gets the dice back and throws again.

  When they land, a scruffy scrapper wearing a tank top and a green eyeshade yells in his ear, “That’s it, you beautiful ackle!”

  “You’re a natural,” Pi whispers.

  Zok loosens the collar of his uniform and slugs back his glowing drink. The moment the stinging liquid hits his stomach, the room tips over. The night jerks forward in brief flashes of lucidity. One moment he’s ordering another round of drinks, and the next he’s in the restroom dry heaving as a broke space junkie tells him about his unrealized political aspirations.

  When he lifts his head, he’s in a dark room, seated at a round table alongside half a dozen menacing aliens, all of whom seem to be waiting for him to do something. He groggily turns to his left and sees Pi, wobbling in the seat next to him. He lifts his cards and squints at them, then at the cards laid out on the table. Unable to make sense of the alien symbols, he spreads out his hand. The other players collectively groan, and a stack of virtual chips appears in front of him.

  He looks over at Pi and presses his thumb to the edge of the table to collect his winnings. “This is-ss a bess time I ever had-dd.”

  “I’m glad.” Pi smiles at him and sips from her glass.

  He inadvertently stares at her superlative legs as she uncrosses and recrosses them, the edge of her dress slipping up.

  “I don’t us-ually have fun-nn like this-ss.” He laughs and holds onto his head. “My job-bb keeps me pret-ty busy.”

  “I know something about that,” Pi says.

  “I wasn’t sure if-ff I could trust you. It’s just, I have a duty-yy to the peop-le of the United Emp-ires…”

  “That’s very admirable,” she says.

  “Admiral?” There’s something about the lilt of her voice and the way she lifts her glass. “I can’t put my finger-rr on it-tt.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Please don’t-tt take offense.” He lifts his hands and frantically waves them. “But-tt I find you very-yy attractiv-vv. I’m not-tt sure what it is-ss. You’re beau-ti-ful, but-tt there’s something els-ss…”

  Pi smiles as she finishes her drink, and the next thing Zok knows, he’s being dragged across the casino floor and into the elevator. As soon as the doors close, Pi presses her lips to his and aggressively explores his mouth with her tongue.

  Her cold, stiff body presses against his, and she licks his ear. “Where is Adam Jones?”

  “What-tt?” Zok distractedly asks.

  “Where is he?” she asks again, rubbing her knee between his legs.

  “I don’t-tt know where he-ee is,” Zok mumbles, in his sexiest drunk-drawl.

  Pi shoves him up against the wall and kisses him again, hard. Holding his arms down, she leans in and whispers, “I hope you like it rough.”

  A high-pitched whistle screams through the house, prompting Silas to jump from his comfy chair in front of the fire and throw down the frayed copy of Ponce Raleigh’s notebook that he had been poring over. He stamps out of the room and down the hall, his steps muffled by a pair of flattened, faded slippers. When he reaches the kitchen, the kettle is spouting dense clouds of steam, and the room is draped in a thick fog. He turns off the stove, carefully removes the kettle from the burner, and pours its boiling contents into a chipped USU mug sitting on the counter.

  Quiet retakes its hold over the house as Silas shuffles back to his warm den, sloshing his hot tea and losing a sizeable portion to the floorboards. Steadying his hand, he just manages to keep the remaining few sips inside his mug as he falls back into his cushy chair.

  “Ahhh,” he breathes out deeply.

  Lifting the worn notebook from the table, he flips it open to one of the numerous slips of paper marking passages of interest.

  “It has been 9,738 days UST since I began this unending search,” the page reads. “I am restless, my thoughts consumed by a new fear. When I began this journey, my sole concern was finding the ‘heart of the universe.’ But that was a long time ago, before I had dedicated the better part of a mortal lifetime to the pursuit. My worry now is one born of age and experience – that I will find what I’m looking for, that it will be all I ever dreamed, and that the search will be over…”

  Silas sets the book down, leans back and gazes into the trembling flames. Contemplating Raleigh’s words, he reaches for the machine on the table and switches it on. The box produces a barely-audible hum, but the screen stays dark. The red dot indicating the location of the black gold disappeared out of range shortly after Adam left for Scrapper’s Delight.

  “KCHHH-doomm…” There’s a loud crash from the front of the house and Silas jerks up, losing some more of his tea to the rug.

  “Fish and chit.” He turns in his seat and calls into the hall, “Is somebody there? Adam?”

  Just as he’s convinced himself that the noise came from inside his head, he hears the familiar rhythm of footsteps and creaking wood coming from the hall. A sharp panic rises in the pit of his stomach as he stares across the room and sees a dark, lumbering figure emerge in the doorway.

  Silas jumps from his chair, barely managing to keep from flinging his mug into the fire, and knocks the black gold detector on the ground. “Who are you?” he asks.

  A hulking man in a black raincoat steps through the doorway and into the light.

  “How did you get in here?” Silas demands.

  The thug takes a small control box from his pocket and shakes it. “Hacking airlocks as old as yours is easy as ration pie. It’s just a matter of finding the right code.”

  Silas groans and takes a step back. “What do you want from me?”

  “We’re not going to hurt you, Pops,” the man in black says.

  “That’s what it is,” Silas says, realizing the brute bears a striking resemblance to his old friend Brick Blankman.

  “I’m going to need you to come with us,” Brick says.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Silas tells him. “You can’t just barge in here and order me around. I have rights.”

  “I’m sorry, Pops. But I must insist – Foreman’s orders.” Brick takes a step forward, and two more henchmen in raincoats enter the room.

  “I should have known.” Silas reaches with his free hand and grabs the black gold detector. “Don’t come any closer, Blankman. I’ll shoot if I have to.”

  “Blankman?” Brick glances at his compatriots with a smirk. “That doesn’t look like any kind of weapon I’ve ever seen. What are you going to do with it?”

  “I won’t have to do anything if you turn around and leave right now,” Silas says, shaking a little as he awkwardly points the machine at Brick’s chest.

  Brick takes another step forward, and Silas fumbles the box.

  “Pew, pew,” Silas says.

  The Foremen lunge forward and, grabbing Silas’s wrist, Brick says, “Calm down, Pops.”

  Silas flails wildly, dropping the machine as the two flunkies take hold of him and lift him up off the ground. Brick snatches the metal box and stares at it.

  “Hey, don’t touch that,” Silas yells.

  “What is it?” one of the men asks.

  “I don’t know,” Brick says. “I’d better bring it along.”

  “You can’t do this, Blankman,” Silas shouts, as they carry him out of the room. “This is illegal. I’ll notify the authorities. I pay my taxes.” He twists his arms and tries to wrench free, but it’s no use. “W
here are you taking me? If you’re going to kill me, be a spaceman and do it here. Let me die in my own home, in front of the TV.”

  “We’re not going to kill you, Pops,” Brick says. “The Foreman just wants to ask you a few questions.”

  “What, he doesn’t have a phone? Why am I being dragged from my home against my will?”

  Brick shrugs. “That’s for The Foreman to say. I’m just doing my job.”

  “Oh, that’s just fine. Aren’t you embarrassed, harassing a helpless old man?”

  “A little,” Brick says, fiddling with the detector.

  “Hey, stop that!” Silas shouts. “You’re going to break it with those gorilla paws.” He grabs on to the frame of the front door as they drag him through it, but with a light tug his fingers rip free.

  “Look at this place,” Brick says, gazing out at space through the old dome. He steps across the lawn and picks up a rusty hood ornament.

  “Nobody said you could touch that,” Silas says, still squirming.

  “You’ve got yourself a little hunk of paradise here.” Brick tosses the hunk of metal back into the dead grass. “If you want my advice—”

  “I don’t.”

  “You should cooperate with The Foreman. She can be reasonable.”

  “What do you mean, she?” Silas asks.

  “Chit, I outed her again,” Brick mumbles. “She hates it when I do that. Forget I said anything.”

  The Foremen lug Silas aboard their sleek black sloop and seat him on a cold metal bench behind the cockpit. They don’t even bother to guard him as they prepare for takeoff.

  With a heavy sigh, Silas lifts his mug to his mouth and finds it empty. “What’s an old man gotta do to get a drink in this tin can?”

  The ship hums to life, and an aggressively beautiful woman appears on the window.

  “Yeah, we got him,” Brick says. “We’re on our way back.”

  “Tell her she’s not getting anything from me,” Silas yells.

  Brick glances toward the back of the ship and says, “He’s not going to be a problem.”

  “Oh yes I am!” Silas hears the old airlock grinding open, and he jumps out of his seat. One of the Foremen easily restrains him, and he watches out the tiny porthole as his yard fades away into the speckled dark. “Can we get some tunes in here, at least?”

  “Just keep quiet and sit still,” Brick yells. “Save your energy. Space travel can be tough on a person your age.”

  “Don’t patronize me,” Silas says. “I’ve been all over the universe. I lived out of my ship for years at a time, exploring planets that don’t exist anymore, in galaxies you’ve never even heard of. And you know, in all that time, there was one thing that was more important than any other – music. It keeps you sane. Well, clean water is important too, I guess, and air of course, and heat is pretty nice—”

  “Okay, fine,” Brick relents, tapping at the window.

  Silas immediately recognizes the marching rhythm and mocking chant of Napoleon XIV. “Oh, very funny,” he mutters.

  The Foremen glance at each other, chuckling, as Silas folds his arms and slumps down in his seat. Gazing out at the stars, he realizes it’s been a little more than ten space years since the last time he ventured outside his bubble. He laughs and his eyes begin to water as he’s overcome by a sudden rush of starry-eyed nostalgia.

  Brick glances back and asks, “What is it, Pops?”

  Tears streaming down his face, Silas whispers, “Home.”

  “Theater mode,” Adam says, and the lights inside the Asteroid Jones III dim.

  The ship’s wide front window transitions to black, and a list of a thousand fabled lost films appears across it.

  “Scroll,” Adam says, and the list begins to move up the screen. “Beer.” A perma-frosted double-size mug in the armrest of his chair fills with frothy amber suds, and he thirstily gulps the ice cold brew. When he sets the mug back in its holder, it automatically refills. “Recline.” His deluxe leather captain’s chair leans back, and the footrest extends. “Happy Birthday to Me,” he says, and bass throbs from state-of-the-art speakers concealed throughout the walls as the credits roll.

  He begins to drift off, in drunken celluloid bliss, when he feels something tugging on his mug. He glances down and jerks back at the sight of an indistinct phantom hovering over the armrest. His body is yanked forward as he tries to keep a grip on his mug, but the little monster is stronger than it looks, and he feels the glass handle slipping from his fingers.

  It finally rips free and Adam wakes, flailing and lunging after his imaginary beer. After a confused moment, he manages to recall where he is – sitting on a bench made of recycled plastic outside a women’s clothing store on the edge of a crowded marketplace in a dump on the other side of the universe.

  “Awww,” he moans.

  Patting himself in search of a cigarette, something feels off, but he’s not sure what. He fishes a bent cylinder from his pocket and places it between his lips. As he lights it, he spots a small spider-bot weaving between shoppers’ legs, dragging a familiar black cube.

  When his brain catches up with his eyes, he jumps to his feet, takes two clumsy steps into the crowd, and falls flat into the dirt. Shoppers stomp across his legs and back as he watches the artificial arachnid scuttling away down one of the connecting alleys. Wrenching his hand out from underneath a size thirteen work boot, he lifts himself off the ground and starts chasing after the grimy metal pest, when he remembers Daizy.

  He bursts into the store, panting, and leans against the counter to catch his breath. Daizy briefly glances up and then turns back to the rack of clothes she had been pawing through.

  “What the fish happened to you?” She takes a shirt from the rack and holds it up to herself in the mirror. “You’ve been out there for two minutes. Why are you sweating?”

  “Never mind,” Adam says, brushing the dirt from his arms. “Some… thing stole the black gold. We have to go after it!”

  Daizy throws the shirt down and glares at him. “You chidiot, how did you let that happen?!”

  “I didn’t let it happen,” Adam says. “Some kind of weird little robot snuck it out of my pocket while I was slee— preoccupied.”

  “They’re called sweepers,” a voice behind him says.

  “Chit!” he shouts, jumping back.

  A native human girl with bright green hair stares at him from behind the counter. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  “You know what that thing is?” he asks.

  Glancing down at her oddly bulky phone, she says, “Sure, they’re all over the place. They pick up anything that isn’t nailed down and take it back to The Big Guy for ‘recycling.’ They won’t hurt you, but you gotta watch your stuff.”

  “In the big white building on the river?” Adam asks, impatiently.

  The girl rolls her eyes. “Yeah. You can’t miss it.”

  “Come on.” Adam grabs Daizy’s arm and drags her out of the store.

  “This is just great,” Daizy barks. “I barely had a chance to look around.”

  “There,” Adam says, pointing.

  They push through the crowd and tumble out into a narrow alley sandwiched between two tall buildings made of multicolored plastic. As they sprint down the winding tunnel, they pass a dozen more passages splitting off in different directions. Adam’s pace quickens as he frantically searches for the robot thief, and soon Daizy starts lagging behind.

  “Hey, wait up!” she yells.

  He stops and impatiently paces in circles until she catches up, holding onto her shorts and gasping for breath.

  “How do you…” she breathes in deep, squeezing her sides, “know we’re going the right way?”

  “I saw the thing scurry this way.” He checks his phone to confirm it still isn’t getting any reception and stuffs it back in his pocket. “We have to keep moving. We must be getting close.”

  A few blocks further down, the buildings begin to break up. A sliver of daylight cuts
between the plastic walls, and soon Adam and Daizy are outside the maze, standing on a long wood boardwalk overlooking an immense body of murky water. Across the river, which appears to be composed primarily of loose hunks of plastic and the poison sludge it breaks down into, looms the cracked skyline of an ancient city, its broken buildings and crumbled remains glittering under the sun’s hazy glow.

  Daizy steps to the edge of the boardwalk and leans against the sunbleached railing. “Well, we’re here,” she says. “Where is this place?”

  “If I had to guess…” Adam points over her shoulder to a big white building floating in the crud.

  “You can’t miss it,” she says dryly.

  The splintered boards creak and moan underneath their feet as they traverse the worn walkway. The smell, what had been a light bouquet of rotting plant matter and ammonia in the market, has matured into a nearly unbearable stench. Mountains of centuries-old crumbled cement are heaped in the water, so coated in waste they look like rotting trash icebergs. A few ghostly buildings that managed to survive the ravages of time are the only evidence of the world that once was.

  Adam and Daizy hold their noses, doing their best not to gag as they approach the ancient monument, its dingy white facade bobbing languidly in the water. A long bridge guarded by a pair of armed soldiers extends from the boardwalk to the building’s columned entryway.

  “How are we going to get in?” Daizy asks. “And even if we do, how are we supposed to find the black gold? You really fished things up this time.”

  “Don’t worry,” Adam says. “Just let me do the talking.”

  Adam approaches the guards and greets them, “Hello gentlemen, we’re here to see The Big Guy.” But the guards don’t respond or in any way acknowledge his presence. “Do we have your permission to pass?” They continue to act as if he doesn’t exist, and he takes a tentative step forward. “We’re going in now,” he announces, striding onto the bridge.

  Before he makes it two steps, one of the guards pulls his gun, and shouts, “Freeze!”

  Adam lifts his hands in the air, shaking and whimpering. The guard laughs, holstering his gun, and Daizy high-fives him as she walks across the bridge. Lowering his head and grumbling, Adam follows her into an airy lobby full of well-groomed earthlings, none of whom seem to take much notice of the awkward aliens standing in the doorway.