Bikini Planet

by David Garnet

  “That’s not my preferred option.”

  “How about the distress signal? Can’t you switch it back on? Or is being rescued too far down on your priority list?”

  “It depends who rescues us.”

  “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

  “I’ve no experience of the choices available to beggars.”

  “If someone answers the distress signal, they have to be on your list of approved rescuers? Otherwise you’ll say, ‘Thanks, but I don’t like the colour of your ship, I’ll wait for the next one’?”

  “No one, Kiru, is going to rescue us.”

  “No one will hear the signal, you mean?”

  “Even if they hear it.”

  “By the time they reach us it’ll be too late?”

  “No one is even going to try to reach us. Why should they? What’s in it for them? You and me, what are we worth? I’m the most precious person in the universe. But only, it seems, to myself. Space rescue isn’t a charity run by humanitarians. Or even alientarians. There just aren’t enough philanthropic selfless altruists in the galaxy.”

  “People like you?”

  “That’s right. Launching a rescue is very expensive, even making a detour takes time and money. And it can be dangerous. Sending false distress signals is a pirate tactic to lure ships to their doom. As I’m sure you know.”

  Kiru ignored the last remark. “What can we do?”

  “We can rescue ourselves.”

  “How?”

  “By becoming a very attractive salvage opportunity. We need a fast rescue from the nearest planet, or we have to snare a ship out of falspace with a lucrative rescue proposal.”

  “How?”

  “Like this,” said Eliot Ness, as he returned to the control screen.

  Kiru watched him. There was something different about him. Different but familiar. This was the first chance for a long time that she’d had to study Eliot Ness while his attention was concentrated elsewhere.

  She wasn’t sure exactly how much time had passed, but they had been on the lifeboat at least three weeks. Or perhaps it was nearer to three months.

  There was nothing within the pod to mark the passage of time. (Or nothing that Kiru knew about.) The symsuits slowed all their biological functions, making it even harder to judge how long they had been together.

  On board, there was nothing to do except sleep, eat and talk, sleep, talk and eat, sleep. There was something else they could have done, something men and women had done together since the dawn of time, but Eliot Ness always behaved like a perfect gentleman. He never made any advances, but kept his distance and allowed Kiru her own, small space.

  She often wondered how he would react if she made the first move. It was only an idle thought, but she had plenty of time for idle thoughts. He wouldn’t refuse her, she knew. He was a man, so how could he? He was old, but not that old. And the longer they were on board, the smaller the relative difference in their ages would become. In another ten years, say, he might be twenty or twenty-five percent older; but Kiru would be fifty percent older.

  It was a depressing thought, almost as bad knowing she had less than a hundred hours to live.

  Kiru had soon become used to the size of the capsule and learned where everything was. (Or everything Eliot Ness wanted her to know about.) What she didn’t learn was anything about Eliot Ness, who successfully evaded all of Kiru’s questions about his life. Despite this, he always had plenty to tell her. She’d never had much education, but thanks to her personal tutor she was on her way to becoming a galactic graduate.

  Eliot Ness seemed to have been everywhere, to know everything. If not, he must have had a datadek grafted onto his brain. Or else he was lying.

  Kiru had told him her own life story, which wasn’t worth lying about, although she stopped when she reached Grawl’s attempt to obliterate her brain and steal her body. She didn’t want to remember what had happened after, her few fantastic hours with…

  … whoever he was, whatever he’d been called.

  “Who are you?” Kiru asked, as Eliot Ness turned away from the screen.

  He smiled and shook his head.

  “Aren’t you ever going to tell me?” Kiru said.

  “No, but I’ll tell you who you are.”

  “Who?”

  “You are Princess Janesmith.”

  “Who?”

  “She’s the elder sister of Marysmith, Empress of Algol,” said Eliot Ness. “I met her on Hideaway when I was having some clothes made.”

  This was the first time he’d ever referred to being on Hideaway. Kiru had wondered if perhaps he hadn’t been on the pleasure asteroid. He could have been on the ship when it arrived and stayed on board when it departed.

  “You went to Hideaway to buy clothes?” said Kiru.

  “I was there. I needed some clothes. Princess Janesmith made me some.”

  “A princess made you some clothes?”

  “Forget the clothes, Kiru.” Eliot Ness paused, smiling briefly. “If I remember, that’s what you’d done when I first met you. The important thing is: from now on, you will be Princess Janesmith of Algol.”

  Everyone else had a false identity, now it was her turn.

  “Why?” she said. “Give me one good reason.”

  “So I can survive,” Eliot Ness told her. “Or you might prefer another reason: so you can survive.”

  Kiru nodded, but she was thinking of something else, of someone else. James. Before meeting her, he’d been with an Algolan princess. She was the one who sent him the box of blue worms. She had to be Janesmith, had to be the same person.

  “Your younger sister, Empress Marysmith, inherited the Algolan throne,” said Eliot Ness, “and she—”

  “My younger sister?” Kiru interrupted. “I mean, Jane-smith’s younger sister?”

  “On Algol, it’s the youngest, not the eldest, who inherits everything. The youngest daughter, that is. Sons don’t matter. The Algolans have got everything back to front. The females are in complete control, the males are totally subservient.”

  “That’s insane.”

  Eliot Ness nodded his agreement.

  “They must be absolutely crazy,” Kiru continued. “Imagine a solar system run by women. Gossiping all the time. Comparing their hair, their makeup. Talking about babies. Going shopping. How long could an empire like that last?” She shrugged. “Longer than Earth’s recorded history, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, yes,” said Eliot Ness. “Never mind that. As I was saying, Marysmith, Empress of Algol, wants you, Jane-smith, her elder sister, dead.”

  “Why? Because she, I mean me, because I keep borrowing her clothes?”

  “It’s because you’re next in line to the crown. While you’re alive, you’re a constant threat to your sister. That’s why Empress Marysmith has issued an imperial death warrant. She wants you dead, and so her whole planet wants you dead.”

  This, at least, made sense to Kiru. Everyone had always wanted her dead.

  “If a whole planet wants this princess dead,” she said, “isn’t it dangerous to pretend to be her?”

  “Only if you’re on that planet.”

  “It isn’t the one you want to go to?”

  “No.”

  For some reason, she believed him.

  But for some other reason, she still wasn’t very reassured that this was a good idea.

  Then she remembered where she’d first heard of the Algolans. They were the ones who had attacked the pirates, wiping out their secret base, causing so many of them to wind up on Clink.

  “Don’t the Algolans have a war fleet?” said Kiru.

  Eliot Ness looked at her, obviously wondering how she knew, then nodded.

  “Wherever Janesmith is, a battle squadron can suddenly blitz in and destroy the entire world she’s on?”

  “Well, yes, in theory. But in practice, a royal death warrant is just a formality, nothing but ancient protocol. The real Janesmith is on Hideaway. If I know that, the
Algolans know that.”

  “I don’t want to be her.”

  “You’d prefer the certainty of dying here, very soon, rather than risk the remote possibility of execution by an alien bounty hunter?”

  “Do I have any choice?”

  “Trust me,” he said, “I’m not a doctor.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Wayne Norton had been right about his lifeboat voyage with Grawl.

  It was long.

  Long and quiet.

  As quiet as could be, in fact.

  He soon learned to say nothing, to ask nothing, not wanting to discover what measures Grawl would use to enforce his “no talking” edict.

  Norton could understand why spacers called the lifeboats “coffins”: This felt like living death.

  The only thing which broke the monotony were the cups of tea and the meals which Grawl gave him. Preparation took all of a minute, and Norton really envied the few minutes of distraction which Grawl found every day.

  Days became weeks. Counting was Norton’s only pastime, but every addition was even more depressing. There seemed to be enough supplies on board the lifeboat for a lifetime. Both their lifetimes.

  Had he lived so long for this? To be cast adrift on the endless ocean of space for the rest of his life?

  The long voyage grew even longer.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  “Welcome to my humble spacecraft, your majesty,” the first fat alien said to her. “Your wondrous presence lights up the whole ship.”

  “Your divine being illuminates the entire galaxy,” the second fat alien said to her.

  “Shut your toxic aperture!” said the first fat alien to the second fat alien. “I am captain, and I am talking to the transcendent princess. Please forgive this obscene intrusion, your terrific excellency.”

  “You fetid excrement!” said the second fat alien to the first fat alien. “I am the one who is on duty. Not that it is a duty to greet your imperial magnificence, but rather the greatest privilege of my entire life.”

  The two aliens were both identical, both almost spherical. Round scaly heads balanced on top of round scaly bodies. Grey on grey, with huge grey eyes. Small and squat, reptilian and repulsive.

  Who were they? What were they doing here?

  Also, where was here!

  And what was she doing here?

  She said nothing, did nothing, and tried to remember.

  One of the round aliens said, “My whole existence has been a prelude to this moment. Having reached this pinnacle of achievement, from hereafter my career is on the decline.”

  The other round alien said, “You must ignore my insubstantial crew, your great greatness. I will have it expelled into space like the putrid garbage it is. Say the word, and I shall also step out into the void so the entire ship can be yours and you are not contaminated by my wretched self.”

  “Please, your acclaimed wonderfulness, ignore this anorexic peasant. If such is your wish, of course. Whatever your glorious self commands or desires, it is yours. While you are on board, this ship is your ship and I am your captain,” said the other spherical alien.

  “No,” continued the previous one, “I am your esteemed luminescence’s captain. It was I who came to the rescue of your unique superlativeness. I seek no compensation for all my exertions and expenses, although if your prestigious self were to offer a reward for your salvation I would not be so rude and ignorant as to refuse any such tokens of gratitude.”

  She was on board their spaceship. They had rescued her.

  But what had they rescued her from?

  She felt exhausted, unable to stand, hardly even able to move. Although there were only two of the grotesque aliens, she was surrounded. The creatures kept rolling from side to side, wobbling all around her, and she couldn’t tell which was which. As they were exactly the same, it made no real difference.

  She had found herself in a huge spherical room which was so bright she had to narrow her eyes, and yet it was a negative light which seemed to defy the laws of physics. The vast room was so bright that it was almost dark. The aliens were grey, and so was she, but they all cast brilliant shadows against the curved floor, the distant walls, the high ceiling.

  The shape of the room seemed very familiar, reminding her of somewhere else, somewhere much smaller.

  She tried to remember where it was.

  And who she was.

  “Does your majestic majesty understand me?” said one of the round creatures.

  “Yes,” she replied.

  “Paradise!” said the alien which had last spoken. “Did you hear that, you emaciated dirtbrain? Our honoured guest addressed me. Me! Not you.”

  “Can you hear me?” said the other grey alien, as it bobbed up and down and around. “Can you hear me? Can you? Can you?”

  “Yes,” she repeated, “I can hear you.”

  “Heaven, absolute heaven!” said the same alien. “This revered high personage can also hear me, you malnourished bacteria.”

  Their heads were gnarled and wrinkled with creases and cracks which could have been eyes and ears and noses, but there was nothing which moved like a mouth while they spoke. The sounds the aliens made seemed to come from deep within them, echoing and gurgling upward through layers of bubbling fat.

  They were only half her height, although probably four times her weight, and she wondered if she should have been scared of them. She was too confused even to be nervous.

  “Have you found the correct reference yet, you virulent wart?” said the other alien, or perhaps the one who had just spoken.

  “Here it is, you starving excuse for a life.”

  For the first time, the two round creatures became still, gazing up at an array of multicoloured lights which hovered in the air a few metres above their round heads.

  “This odd being does not look like an Algolan,” said one of them.

  “Maybe it is a bad picture, germ-features,” said the other. “Try a different reference work.”

  The lights blinked out, to be replaced a moment later by another rainbow of luminescence. The aliens remained motionless, staring at the glow.

  While they looked up, she looked for an escape route. She wasn’t in danger, not yet, but that might not last. Even if she could recognise a way out, that might be even more risky.

  Her body was slumped, her shoulders stooped, and her knees bent. She tried shifting her legs to become more comfortable. They would hardly move. It was as if her feet were stuck to the floor, which made the idea of escape even more theoretical. She peered up at the phosphorescent swirl, but she could see no pattern.

  It seemed the aliens, however, could.

  “Almost the same illustration, you disgusting skeleton.”

  “This being is not an Algolan, you insignificant amoeba. I have been fooled.”

  “That is not difficult, you moronic excrescence.”

  “You were also deceived, you gullible cyst.”

  “Not at all. I have always had doubts, you supporting scab. If it was a princess, why did it have no jewels or treasures or offing works of offing art?”

  “None that you recognised, you cultural savage. Algolan or not, this is an alien. Everything on board the lifesaver was alien. I do not yet know what is worthless and what is priceless. That is why I loaded the complete craft on board.”

  “That was my initiative, you mendacious particle.”

  She was wearing a slate. That was how she understood what was being said; but that was all she did understand.

  The aliens appeared to know far more about her than she did, but she was aware it wouldn’t be the best policy to ask who she was.

  “Your distress signal claimed you were an Algolan princess,” said one of the aliens.

  “I am Princess Janesmith of Algol,” she said, and she wondered why she’d only now remembered the name.

  “Janesmith,” she said, trying it again, “Princess of Algol.”

  The name sounded right, but was it her
name?

  “Algolan Princess,” she said, “Janesmith.”

  The first of the aliens said, “I heard you the first time, you elite product of generations of selective breeding.”

  The second of the aliens said, “But, your fabulous highness, I heard you first. It was I who responded to your graceful request for assistance, and I had the satisfaction of saving your perfect noble life.”

  “Shall we cut the coprolite, your patrician apexness? Are you really an upper-caste Algolan?”

  “How dare you doubt me!” she said.

  The two aliens scuttled away a few metres.

  As they moved off, the dimensions of the huge chamber seemed to change, the spherical shape becoming distorted. Her own glowing shadow stretched and slid aside, as if trying to detach itself from her body.

  The two aliens affected the light, she realised, the position of their bodies making everything brighter or darker. As the angles and intensity of the negative light altered, every perspective became optically warped.

  They never changed, always remaining grey, but everything around them appeared to be changed by them. And in a universe where vision was all, appearance was everything.

  “It has a voice of authority,” one of them said, moving closer again. “A positive sign.”

  “That is the translation device talking, mucus mouth,” the other said, also returning. “Your renowned potency must take no offence at my insistence, but your immaculate reflection does not match that of an Algolan.”

  She looked up. Although she could still make out nothing, the aliens must have been able to see an image in the random design of coloured lights which hung in the air.

  “I am Princess Janesmith of Algol,” she said. Again.

  She realised she was trying to convince herself as well as the aliens. All she could remember was that she’d been somewhere else. Now she was here. On board an alien spaceship. They claimed to have rescued her. Now she needed to escape from them.

  “You do not look like an Algolan,” said one of the bloated aliens.

  She stared up, but she still couldn’t see anything pictured in the shimmering gleam.

  “It is wearing a disguise, you trail of muck,” said the other alien.