The Stars Down Under

by Sandra McDonald

  He went on, a dozen or more carefully tended treasures laid out for inspection. AT Tingley’s wedding ring was not among the items.

  “That’s everything,” Malachy said, finally. His voice was very small. “I never take from the crew. I didn’t steal her ring.”

  Romero said, “It doesn’t prove anything. He could just be hiding it somewhere else.”

  Jodenny agreed, in principle. But Malachy’s misery was obvious, and she saw no particular reason for him to keep hiding the ring unless it was out of spite for Romero, who’d broken his nose.

  She said, “It was AT Shu, wasn’t it, who said that he saw Malachy take the ring? He could have taken it himself.”

  Sweeney said, “We already asked him. He denied it.”

  “He wouldn’t do it,” Romero said.

  “You’ve known him for how many days?” Jodenny asked.

  “He was the first person to welcome Hanne and me aboard the ship,” Romero said. “He helped us get oriented and find things and he wouldn’t have any reason to take it.”

  “And if he did take it, he surely would have gotten rid of it by now,” Jodenny said. “Still, the captain of the ship can authorize a search of his locker.”

  “I’m not going to do that, not yet,” Captain Balandra said. “Lieutenant Sweeney, talk to him again. Check to see if there are other items gone missing from crew berthing since AT Shu checked onboard.”

  The comm pinged. The bridge needed Captain Balandra’s attention, and the meeting ended as abruptly as it had started. Jodenny regretted that Tingley’s ring hadn’t been recovered but still held out some hope. She was glad that Romero’s punishment for fighting wouldn’t be too onerous, but wanted to make sure he understood that it could have been worse.

  “You don’t get to hit crew or passengers you don’t agree with,” she said afterward, as they celebrated Romero’s release with cold snacks in a corner of the galley.

  He raised his right hand. “I swear, Auntie Ellen, I’m never going to fight again.”

  He seemed sincere about it, though entirely too comfortable with calling her Auntie Ellen.

  Tingley snuggled closer to Romero’s side. “Do you really think Shu took my ring?”

  “I think you might never know,” Jodenny said. “But rings can be replaced, as much as it pains you. Your good name, and making sure Malachy’s not wrongly blamed, even if he did steal other things—that’s more important.”

  “Chief Myell was right about you,” Tingley said.

  Jodenny lifted her coffee. “Right about what?”

  Tingley gazed at her admiringly. “He told us that maybe the Kamchatka wasn’t the best ship in the fleet, and maybe we wouldn’t like it, but that the crew was more important than metal bulkheads. And then he said we might not like the crew, either, but there would be some people in the chain of command that we could trust to do what’s right. He said that person might even be an officer.”

  Jodenny’s cheeks grew warm. “Well, that was nice of him.”

  Romero added, “He said that’s what happened to him on the Aral Sea. He found you. Then he married you. Which is what made us think it was a good idea to get hitched before we left Fortune.”

  She wasn’t sure Myell would be happy to hear that part, but hoped she’d get to tell him soon enough.

  * * *

  With only twenty-four hours left until they dropped into Earth’s system, the Kamchatka’s engines throttled to power and the overhead lights blazed on. Jodenny, alone in her cabin when it happened, heard cheers in the passageway. The comm clicked on and Captain Balandra thanked the Engineering Officer for his hard work. Jodenny headed on down to the Hole in the Wall, where three of the four Lous were already leading a celebration.

  “Always knew they’d fix the old girl up!” Hullabaloo said, slapping the nearest bulkhead.

  Baylou kissed Hullabaloo and raised a toast. “To full power and hot water!”

  Even the bickering Zhangs found smiles and a compliment or two about the Engineering Officer.

  Everywhere she looked, Jodenny saw couples kissing or embracing. More than she’d noticed before—the days of inconvenience had inspired a bit of romance. Myell’s absence was like an enormous chunk carved out of her stomach and chest, leaving nothing but airlessness, imbalance.

  “What’s the matter?” Louise Sharp asked, her magenta hair obscuring one eye.

  Jodenny shook her head.

  After a while Louise, Hullabaloo, and Baylou took her up to the galley, which was open for a special hot buffet. Jodenny didn’t think she could eat, but they plied her with food and some warm beer, and took her down to the passenger lounge to play pool, and she didn’t stumble back to bed until the wee hours.

  When she woke with a raging hangover, Farber said, “Have a good time?”

  Jodenny pulled a pillow over her head. Karl nestled his golden chin against her arm and gave a sigh.

  By the time they were due to drop, her headache had abated to a manageable state and her stomach no longer felt in utter revolt. The wallvids in the passenger lounge were keyed to exterior feeds so that the assembled crowd could watch Mars, Demos Command, and Earth appear when they slid out of the Alcheringa.

  “I don’t think I’m up for another party,” Hullabaloo said from where he sat curled up on the sofa.

  Baylou patted his arm. “Maybe a sedate one.”

  The comm squawked. “Alcheringa drop in five, four, three, two, one…”

  The entire ship shifted back into normal space, and the passengers applauded.

  Demos Command appeared first, the massive space station like a giant cobweb with a shiny blue heart. A sliver of Mars hung behind it, not as red as Jodenny had expected. Earth was the brightest dot in a background of stars.

  “Zoom in on the old girl,” Baylou said. “Home sweet home.”

  The edge of the wallvid came equipped with a manual zoom control. Someone adjusted the focus so that Earth hung white and brown against the darkness. Gray sooty clouds covered much of the globe. Jodenny knew the atmosphere hadn’t always been that way. The Debasement had done that. Then a green bulbous spaceship slid out from behind the curve of Earth. Its hull was pockmarked green metal, with no portholes but many strange knoblike protuberances. It had large thrusters sticking out its backside, but no glow of engine thrust. The overall shape was ungainly, no sleek lines or sweeping curves. The size was hard to judge. She figured it was several times larger than the Kamchatka. Maybe even bigger than the Aral Sea, which carried several thousand people.

  The crowd in the lounge had fallen silent.

  Hullabaloo finally asked, “What the hell?”

  Another ship slid into view, and then a third. Three enormous ships, hanging in Earth’s orbit.

  Her skin ice-cold, goosebumps rising across her neck and down her spine, Jodenny said, “Aliens.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The village of the People was bustling with activity when Myell walked into it. He supposed he looked absurd in a half-torn shirt and red skirt, but the trek up a switchback cliff path hadn’t provided much opportunity to improve his wardrobe.

  At first no one noticed him, but then people began to murmur, someone else laughed, and children squealed. Two men approached Myell warily. Myell stopped walking. The men stared at him, their eyes wide.

  One of them fell to his knees in the dirt and bowed down.

  The other yelped and ran away.

  Myell scratched his head. His hair was stiff from salt, and his scalp itched. He was sunburned all over, especially in places that never normally saw the sun. He hadn’t worried about it before, but he hoped the People would let him get some sleep before they made him dive over a cliff again.

  He was still standing there when the Bunyip, the Roon, came striding toward him.

  It was larger than he remembered, tall and wide and bedecked in its fine helmet and cloak. The green skin on its head and arms gleamed in the sun. Its claws looked sharp enough to tear an animal,
or a human, into bite-size pieces.

  Myell wanted to flee but he was too tired, so instead he held his ground.

  The Roon stopped and considered him with a tilted head. Spoke in clicks and whistles. But the voicebox it carried had apparently been damaged, and no language emerged from its speaker. A crowd formed around Myell, respectful and awed, and Shark Tooth pushed to the front of it. He cupped Myell’s face in a strangely intimate way and thumbed his cheeks.

  “Chief Myell!” That was Nam, jogging his way. “Thank Christ. What happened to your face?”

  Myell touched his cheeks. He felt raised ridges, like welts.

  “Looks like you got tattooed,” Nam said.

  Shark Tooth was speaking enthusiastically, the Roon was talking in its own language, and the noise of the crowd was growing louder. Myell said, “Maybe we could sit down?” and the next thing he knew, Nam had steered him into one of the huts. The interior was cool and dim, and Myell drank gratefully from a large jug of water.

  Several children peeked inside, giggling and gawking, as Nam said, “We’d given you up for dead.”

  Myell waved his hand. “It’s never that easy, sir. What’s happened with the Roon?”

  “The what?”

  “The Bunyip.”

  One of the village women brought in a plate of kiwifruit, shelled nuts, and hot bread. Nam said, “Dr. Gayle’s trying to talk to it, heaven help us all. When it climbed out of the surf and you were presumed drowned, the villagers weren’t too keen on letting us go. For a while I wasn’t even sure they would let us live.”

  Chief Elder arrived in the hut, a small entourage in tow. They all peered at Myell’s face and argued about something. Myell wished he had a mirror so he could see what the fuss was about. Tattoos, Nam had said. He blamed Free-not-chained’s hot hands, and wondered what marks she’d left.

  After the elders departed it was Gayle’s turn. She arrived dressed in a native skirt, with seashell bracelets rattling on her wrists.

  “What happened to you?” she demanded of Myell. “Where did you get those clothes?”

  “Where did you get yours?” Myell asked.

  Nam said, “Forget fashion. What happened after you dived off that cliff?”

  Myell hesitated. “Maybe there’s somewhere more private?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” Gayle said. “None of the natives understand a word we’re saying, and I’ve made minimal progress with the Bunyip. It can’t even make half the sounds we do, never mind understand them.”

  Myell rubbed his neck, hating the scratch of salt and grit. “We could take a walk instead.”

  “I don’t understand your paranoia,” Gayle said.

  Nam said, “He wants to take a walk, let’s take a walk.”

  But the People had other ideas. A celebration had already commenced outside, and Myell was escorted to a seat of honor among the elders for several hours of singing, dancing, clapping, drum beating, didgeridoo playing, and the ceremonial roasting of a sad little pig. Nam sat nearby, silent but watchful. Chief Elder presided over the telling and dramatic reenactment of many tales, none of which Myell understood. On the other side of the bonfire, the Roon played some kind of pebble game with Gayle and two children. Its gaze drifted more than once to Myell.

  “You don’t trust it,” Nam said, passing along a plate of charred pork.

  Myell eyed the charred meat and passed it on to Shark Tooth. “Neither do you.”

  “You called it something. Roon?”

  “That’s what they call it. The people who fished me out of the ocean.”

  “The ones who tattooed you?”

  The ridges itched when Myell touched them. “I don’t know who did that.”

  The men of the tribe rose to dance. Shark Tooth pulled Nam and Myell to their feet. Nam said, “No, really, I’m good,” and Myell also tried to decline, but they were swept into the foot-stomping, thigh-slapping crowd. The women cheered and clapped. Nam’s evident mortification, a Team Space commander dancing with the mostly naked natives, cheered Myell up. He would have taken more delight, but at that very moment his right ankle turned beneath him and he started to crash to the ground.

  The Roon caught him. Its grip was careful but strong. Its teeth were so close that Myell could see slivers of pig caught between incisors and smell its meat-scented breath. The alien held him upright while the dancers spun around them and Nam pushed his way over.

  “Put him down,” Nam ordered.

  Gayle, standing at the alien’s elbow, said, “He’s just examining him. He won’t hurt him.”

  The Roon’s flat gray eyes narrowed, but it gave no indication of understanding them. Myell shuddered as it leaned even closer. The alien’s nose holes widened as it sniffed Myell, actually sniffed him, as if he were an appetizer or maybe even the main course.

  Nam didn’t have a mazer, didn’t even have a knife, but he grabbed the nearest scaly arm as if to physically wrestle the Roon. The grip on Myell released, and he fell to his ass on the hard ground.

  “Told you!” Gayle said.

  The Roon made several clicking noises and retreated a few steps.

  Nam kept a wary eye on Myell and said, “You okay?”

  He rubbed his ankle. “Only wounded my pride.”

  The Roon walked off. Gayle followed. The drums, already loud, grew in volume as women dancers joined the men. Children lit torches to illuminate the encroaching dusk, and Myell let Nam help him up.

  “Let’s take that walk,” Nam said.

  * * *

  Afterward, as they sat on the edge of the village swatting bugs, Nam said, “You have the strangest adventures.”

  Myell squinted at the distant firelight. The singing and dancing hadn’t abated, even if the guest of honor had disappeared. He didn’t feel adventurous. He was tired, hot, and still covered with sea salt. The only part of the story he’d omitted was Free-not-chained and her band of crocodile women. He could push Nam’s credulity only so far.

  Nam slapped at an insect on his neck. “That Sphere, on the women’s island—it’ll take us to this Nogomain? Garanwa. The one who wants to stop the Roon. The one who needs your help, maybe take his place?”

  “Allegedly.”

  “You should have gone through,” Nam said. “Taken the chance while you could.”

  The second-guessing stung in a way that Myell hadn’t expected. Before he could object, however, Nam added, “We can’t go there now—the risk’s too great that the Bunyip, Roon, whatever you call it, will follow. We can’t ever let it gain control of the network and all the Spheres.”

  “You’ve got a plan?” Myell asked.

  “Keep you away from it,” Nam said. “It’s obviously interested in where you’ve been. We’ll have to leave on our own, get back across the plain, without it noticing.”

  “Sounds impossible.”

  “I’m working on it,” Nam said.

  They went back to the hut that Nam and Gayle had been sleeping in. Shark Tooth came around, urging them back to the party, but finally accepted Myell’s bleary-eyed refusal. A young girl brought a basin of fresh water and Myell happily rinsed himself and the clothes he was stuck wearing. Nam sat outside, keeping an eye out for Gayle or the Roon.

  Myell had no idea what time of night it was, but as he lay down on one of the pallets he told himself he’d just close his eyes for a short while. He wished Jodenny were there to lie with him. She would curl over him, her legs twined with his, her breath warm on his cheek. Sometime later he woke, muddy-headed and exhausted, to the sound of men arguing outside the door. More precisely, Nam was haranguing Shark Tooth.

  “This high, long hair, tiny waist, talks a lot? How far could she go?”

  Shark Tooth’s reply was all in his native tongue, and explained nothing.

  Myell hauled himself to the doorway. “What’s wrong?”

  “Gayle’s missing,” Nam said. “I don’t see the Roon anywhere, either.”

  The party had ended, with only embers glo
wing in what had been the central bonfire. A few last stragglers were heading off toward their huts. Shark Tooth was coated with sweat and dust and looked ready to sleep off the feasting, but Nam was insistent.

  “Where does it sleep?” he demanded, making shapes in the air that were meant to resemble the Roon. “Where does it go when it’s not here?”

  Myell rubbed his gritty eyes. He too tried sign language, simple words, pantomimes, until Shark Tooth abruptly nodded and called out across the village. Two of his men appeared, wobbly on their feet, wine drying on their chests.

  Shark Tooth gave them orders. The men stumbled off, and Nam said, “Maybe now we’ll get somewhere.”

  They got nowhere. Neither Gayle nor the Roon was anywhere to be found. Shark Tooth grabbed some torches, handed them off to Nam and Myell, and led them into the jungle on a narrow footpath. The going was tricky, the insects merciless, and they had to wrest their way through brush and moss and mud. Their flashlights made the going only a little easier. Snakes slithered out of their way and other animals moved in the undergrowth.

  “Keep an eye out for crocodiles,” Nam said as they crossed a small stream.

  After twenty minutes of hiking, they came to a clearing where a large, low shelter of vines and twigs had been erected and roofed with palm fronds. The work of someone with a lot of time on his hands, Myell thought. Someone who had painted ocher symbols on a door fashioned from branches. The symbols looked like a greeting of some kind, or maybe a warning.

  Shark Tooth called out, but the Roon didn’t appear. A knife in hand, Nam pulled open the unlocked door. From inside came the stink of rotting meat and something sweet, like candy.

  “Good lord,” Myell said.

  His torch illuminated dozens of dead birds strung from the shed ceiling. Exotic birds, red and yellow and blue, some of them with their feathers half plucked, some partially dissected, others fully intact. One or two stirred on their vines, as if still alive. Other animals were pinned to the walls or crammed into glass cases—wallabies, bats, frogs, even a koala. They suffered from rotting fur, empty eye sockets, splayed legs, and pinned wings. Death and decay, nothing but it, and it seemed like the specimens had been collected out of cruelty, not curiosity.