Si in Space

by John Luke Robertson

  YOU START PUSHING BUTTONS, hoping to find the right combination to get this ship moving. John Luke hits some too and manages to engage the cyclone thrusters.

  The good news is you figure out how to steer the ship into open space. And yeah, you really can steer this ship.

  The bad news is this part of space isn’t so open after all. You steer the ship straight into an asteroid field.

  “Uh, Uncle Si?” John Luke asks.

  “Houston, we have a problem. A big problem.”

  These asteroids sure are big. And rolling around in all sorts of ways. Makes your brain a bit dizzy, Jack.

  But, hey—you’ve played the video games before. You’ve seen the movies. It’s not that difficult to avoid getting hit by—

  GAME OVER

  Start over.

  Read “Look at the Stars: A Note from John Luke Robertson.”

  DOWN THE LINE

  YOU DECIDE TO GO LEFT, so you ditch the three-wheeler and head down the hallway for a few minutes before reaching another intersection. Your hallway connects with a larger one, and this new passage has lots of people walking in it. And the weirdest thing is that they all look . . .

  Normal. Like the men working in the hangar, but even more normal than that.

  You see a man in a business suit carrying a briefcase. Another man right behind him wearing khaki pants and a button-down shirt. You pass a woman dressed in a hat and uniform, who appears to work at some kind of fast-food chain. There’s a girl in sparkly jeans and the kind of tennis shoes that light up.

  It’s sorta the way malls used to be when they were actually full of people. Or maybe even more than that, it’s the way a big-city sidewalk looks.

  A woman passes who looks like a librarian. A mechanic guy passes next, dressed in a grease-stained T-shirt and jeans.

  “What is this?” John Luke whispers.

  “Something weird’s going on. I know that.”

  “I feel like we’re back home and not on a spaceship.”

  You nod. For a few minutes you continue walking in silence. Just passing by normal people.

  You pull John Luke aside so nobody can hear you.

  “Here’s my thinking,” you begin. “These are all androids that are supposed to look like people. Or maybe they’re aliens wearing human costumes.”

  “Those would be some good costumes.”

  “Or they’re cones.”

  “Cones?” John Luke asks. “I think you mean clones.”

  “No, I think it’s cones.”

  “A cone is like an ice cream cone. A conehead.”

  “Well, whatever. Clone, cone. These regular-looking people are anything but.”

  You realize you’re speaking in a very loud whisper, so you look around to make sure nobody’s listening.

  “So what do we do?”

  “I say we pick someone who looks like us and follow them.”

  “A guy in camo with a big beard and glasses who’s walking around with a teenager?”

  You think for a minute. “Okay, let’s just find another teen boy. Clean-cut. Good-looking like you. Likable.”

  “And what?”

  “Follow him.”

  That’s exactly what you end up doing. The boy you see is wearing jeans and a New Orleans Saints jersey, so he has to be a good guy, right? He’s from New Orleans. He’s practically family.

  Which may be exactly what they want you to think right before they decide to eat you . . . well, right before something happens. You and John Luke just need to find out what that something will be.

  The teenager walks by himself in a crowd full of these regular-looking people heading toward an elevator while the two of you follow a dozen yards behind. He puts a hand up to push a white square panel on the wall, and a door slides open to his left.

  You stop and pull John Luke back.

  “Shouldn’t we go in?” he asks.

  A part of you says no. Another part says yes. And another part wonders how Rocky beat Mr. T in Rocky III. Because, really, there’s no way that could have happened.

  “I pity the fool.”

  “Uncle Si?”

  “Maybe we should split up.”

  Do you both go inside? Go here.

  Do you tell John Luke to go inside alone, while you take the elevator to another floor to look for the crew? Go here.

  END OF THE LINE

  “I DON’T THINK GOING BACK out there’s gonna help us any,” you tell John Luke.

  You realize this room has started glowing.

  Suddenly you feel a bit light-headed. Sorta strange. Hey—you’ve been a little off ever since coming to space, but now you’re feeling really wacky.

  “You feel that, John Luke?”

  “Yeah. Kinda seems like I’m floating.”

  “Well, we are in space, you know.”

  “Yeah. But this is different.”

  The door opens.

  “Quick, let’s go!” you tell John Luke.

  But as you start to run, something happens to you.

  You find yourself in the driver’s seat of a car. Wait, Jack—a hologram of a car, not a real one. It’s half-there and half-not.

  You’re no longer running. Now you’re racing.

  “John Luke?”

  He blows by you in a Jeep. A 3-D hologram-like Jeep.

  “Look at this, Uncle Si!” he shouts. “I think we just morphed into a video game.”

  You’re moving at breathtaking speed on some kind of grid. You try to keep up with John Luke but can’t.

  Then you turn around and see more glowing cars following you.

  You wonder if the others can hear the awesome techno music accompanying this race.

  A nice little drive in the middle of the 3-D video game funky dunky solar system.

  That’s a fact, Jack.

  You ride around for a few minutes, sending the chasing cars in circles and causing some of them to crash and explode. But they blow up just like something might in a video game or a book that has twenty-some endings. You don’t take it to heart.

  “I see an exit, Uncle Si!”

  You keep leaning forward. That’s what’s propelling this game.

  John Luke’s glowing Jeep Wrangler takes a jump and goes flying.

  “You okay, John Luke?”

  He’s hooting and hollering.

  Soon you’ve evaded all the cars following you.

  The song is coming to an end.

  The Exit sign is approaching.

  You aim your car straight at it and then . . .

  You’re out.

  You’re floating, flying, rushing—hey, wait a minute. Now you’re falling, fumbling, tumbling, turning over and over.

  Then your head hits something and you black out.

  When you wake up, you call out for John Luke, but he’s nowhere to be found. You’re in a large, empty warehouse, and it’s glowing, but not blue like the racing room—more like a metallic gray. You notice several doors along the walls.

  “Hello?” you call out. “Anybody there? Hello? Is it me you’re looking for?”

  But nobody’s looking for you, Jack.

  When you open the first door and peer in, you get this weird sensation inside. ’Cause you hear a familiar sound—a waka-waka-waka-waka. Reminds you of Pac-Man. So you shut that door.

  Feeling braver, you open the second door, and now you’re on a street covered with massive dudes fighting. You get out of there.

  By the third door, when Donkey Kong starts chasing you, you realize you’re stuck in some kind of arcade game nightmare and you can’t get out.

  John Luke must’ve escaped, but as for you? Well, it’s game never over for you, Jack.

  You’re gonna have to blast asteroids and defeat space invaders and try to slay the dragon in its lair.

  You’re not sure how this happened or how you got here, but you’re pretty sure it’s gonna take you a lot longer to get out of this.

  If you can get out.

  High Score:
0000000000000000

  THE END

  Start over.

  Read “Look at the Stars: A Note from John Luke Robertson.”

  WRONG

  YOU RAISE YOUR HAND. Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it never did you any harm. “So, hey, Jack, I’m just wondering—refresh this ole head of mine, will you? What’s the mission again?”

  The teacher’s eyes come to life. He looks at you and nods. “Yeah, yeah, sure thing.”

  The others are all looking at you too.

  “Something I said? The man asked if we had questions.”

  The teacher turns and presses something in the wall, then faces you again. “The mission. The great mission. Anybody want to tell our new friend here what the mission might be?”

  “Infiltration,” one voice says.

  “Assimilation,” another says.

  “Disintegration,” a third person says. It’s the guy with the ponytail who answered the door when you knocked.

  “Well, that sounds dandy,” you say. “Can I add indigestion to that? ’Cause, man, I ate these pickled eggs, and woo-ee.”

  Nobody laughs. Nobody even smiles.

  Then the door opens and three men walk in. They all look like pirates. You can’t help but let out a laugh as they approach you.

  “Ahoy, me mateys!” you say.

  They gather in front of you. The one you’d call Blackbeard—since he’s got a long, braided black beard and the fluffiest of hats—smiles back at you.

  Then he cracks his elbow over your skull, and like that, it’s lights out, Jack.

  Go here.

  SAFETY DANCE

  SO YOU MADE IT. You’re here. You’ve arrived.

  You’re in a safe place. No free-fallin’ here, Jack, ’cause hey—you’ve landed.

  Did you bring your friends? And do they dance? Because if they don’t dance . . .

  We can dance. And sing.

  Hey—nobody made you come here. This is dance hall days, baby! Come on, Jack. Get out on the dance floor.

  Confused?

  Maybe the lack of oxygen is making you hear strange sounds.

  Maybe this is the most brilliant piece of prose and you have no idea what the meaning is behind it.

  A black duck call entity in the deepest reaches of space?

  What does it symbolize?

  Two helmet-wearing danger lords ruling the darkest spaces out of reach?

  Whom do they stand for?

  And the jackalope?

  Look behind the clues. The truth is out there.

  Huh?

  Seek, and ye shall find, Silas.

  Wait, what?

  Maybe you need more answers in this life. If so, then open the Bible, Jack.

  Maybe you need more fun in your life. Then pour yourself a glass of tea and do what you do best.

  Dance . . .

  THE END

  Or is it the beginning? Go here.

  HUNGRY LIKE THE WOLF

  BOTH YOU AND JOHN LUKE decide to peer into the door slot. You see two figures with their backs toward you. They’re talking, but you can’t understand them. Their language is unfamiliar and sounds like some kind of animal howling. You start to say something, but John Luke puts up a hand and says, “Shhhh!”

  Then he motions for you to watch.

  From the back, they appear to be ordinary men. They’re wearing black outfits. You see a couple of helmets on a table nearby. One is silver and the other is gold.

  “Mr. Mister?” you whisper to John Luke.

  “The misters,” he whispers back.

  “Any difference?”

  “Shh.”

  One of the men walks over to the side of the room you can’t see. Then he comes into view again, and you see his face for the first time.

  “What’s wrong with that dude?” John Luke whispers, jumping back from the horrifying sight.

  “I don’t think that’s a dude. Guy must be an alien lizard in disguise or something.”

  That said, you both start sprinting down the stairs. You can’t get away fast enough.

  Who knew that space could be this terrifying.

  Go here.

  DANGER ZONE

  MISSION SPECIALIST WADE TURNEY heads down the slope with you to investigate the spacecraft. One thing you can’t help wondering is what Wade’s “specialty” happens to be. Why don’t they call you a mission specialist too? Can he do magic tricks or speak like a ventriloquist? Like, seriously—you want to know his special feature.

  But you’re mainly just relieved you were able to keep John Luke from volunteering. It was touch and go for a while, but you finally convinced him by promising he could come along on the next scary, uncertain mission.

  It doesn’t look like this spaceship’s been active for years. There’s a coating of grime and dirt on it. You and Wade examine the surface, trying to find a door in.

  “Hey, you think the door is in the part that’s sunk into the ground?” you ask Wade.

  “I’m not sure,” he says.

  Some specialist you are. I give your specialty level a D minus, Jack.

  You think the back of the spacecraft is what’s protruding from the ground, as if the ship crashed straight into the surface. But it didn’t explode. That’s the crazy thing. It resembles a dart stuck into a board.

  “I found something.” Wade gestures to a panel on the ship’s side.

  “You guys okay down there?” Commander Noble asks.

  A doorway slides open.

  “Yes, sir,” Wade says. “Think we just located an entryway.”

  “Be careful.”

  “Wish I had a gun,” you mutter.

  It always feels better having a defense mechanism in your hands when you’re entering a strange, alien-like spaceship stranded on some lifeless moon full of odd-looking antlers.

  Forget the Duckmen—you need the Buckmen.

  Wade points his powerful flashlight into the open doorway. Then he steps inside.

  “What do you see?” Commander Noble asks right away.

  “Nothing yet.”

  You follow him in. You’d be feeling okay, except your space diaper is causing a bit of a wedgie, and it’s starting to really annoy you. But other than that, you’re doing great.

  Of course, the skeletons you encounter on the ship don’t really settle so well with your stomach. In one room, you find two of them sitting at a table as if they’re involved in the longest game of chess ever. You expect to find cobwebs or something around here, but yeah, this ain’t no haunted house. Haunted spacecrafts on Martian moons don’t get cobwebs. Just bones.

  “Think those were humans?” you ask Wade.

  “Check out that head. Does that look human?”

  You squint closely at it. “Actually, no. That thing kinda looks like a jack-o’-lantern.”

  “The skeletal remains of one.”

  You both enter a room with several tables and chairs, like some kind of kitchen or dining area. No skeletons can be seen in here. Closed doors lead off in two different directions.

  “How’s it look down there?” Commander Noble asks. “Does it appear to be dangerous?”

  “‘Right into the Danger Zone,’” you start to sing.

  “Oh, boy,” Wade sighs.

  “You sound just like Willie.”

  “I should be with you. Let me come down!” John Luke shouts over the radio.

  “You stay there. We’ve got this,” you fire back, hoping you can keep him from striking out on his own.

  “We discovered what are almost certainly the remains of a couple life-forms down here,” Wade reports. “Still checking out the ship.”

  “So what do you say, Jack?” you ask him. “Which door?”

  Wade shrugs. “You sound eager to choose. Go ahead.”

  You shine your flashlight at one door and notice some markings on it. They look like scratches. Like some rabid animal was tearing at the door, trying to get in. Or maybe it was trying to escape. Or maybe it was just a la
dy with long fingernails who really wanted to leave this party?

  The other door doesn’t have the markings on it.

  “It’s probably smarter to open that door first, right?” You point to the door without the markings on it.

  But maybe that’s what they want you to think.

  Do you open the door without the scratches on it? Go here.

  Do you open the door with the scratches on it? Go here.

  COUNTING STARS

  SMALL WINDOWS line each side of where you and John Luke are sitting, and through them you see the fading, falling world outside. For a while all you can do is look ahead and try not to think of that crawfish boil you had last night. You eventually feel the blasters stop and rip away from the ship, and then things calm down. You glance to the round window and see nothing but darkness. But soon something else comes into view.

  Something that stops your breathing it’s so beautiful.

  “Look at that,” you say over your headset. It’s your home planet . . . but so quiet and still, it feels impossible that you actually live there.

  “It’s amazing,” John Luke says. “Wish I could take a picture.”

  “Take the picture in your head. Snap. There it goes. Just like that. Better than a Polaroid.”

  Commander Noble is talking a lot, and there’s back-and-forth with Pilot Parkhurst and Mission Control that you can hear on your earbuds.

  “You two doing okay back there?” Commander Noble asks.

  “We’re ready to start floating,” you say.

  For the next half hour, it seems like things are going smooth and steady. Until Commander Noble tells Mission Control that he’s spotting something strange. Then he sends you an interpersonal message only you can hear on your radio headset.

  “Silas,” he says, “we have a little situation.”

  “‘Move out—don’t mess around,’” you sing back.

  “What?”

  “Never mind. What’s wrong?”

  “It looks like we’re not the only ones out here,” the commander says. “There’s another ship—a massive one—and it’s closing in on us.”