Pew! Pew! - Sex, Guns, Spaceships... Oh My!

by M. D. Cooper

  “Shh, everything will be all right,” Chip said as he dabbed at Ben’s forehead with a cold towel. “You’re fine, the ship’s fine, I’m fine.” When he said the last two words he did so with a slight rise in tone as if he was singing the words. Ben hardly noticed, though.

  “What happened?” Ben asked. “Did you get them off the ship?”

  “I did, and your plan worked flawlessly.”

  “Really? How long was I out?” The surprise in Ben’s voice caught even him off guard.

  “About a day, but I drugged you so you could sleep off the effects of the ordeal. I have to say I was impressed by the outcome. It could have gone better, or the plan could have been better, but all things considered, we were able to get the pirates off the ship. I suppose that is room for celebration.”

  “Oh yeah, what did you have in mind?” Ben sat up and brushed his now wet hair back out of his face. His body hurt and a part of him was glad Chip decided to drug him. If nothing else, I got to sleep a day and I’m that much closer to Europa.

  “When it comes to celebration, I am programmed to understand alcohol, food, and sexual intercourse are suitable functions for having a good time.”

  Ben smirked. “I’ll give you the food, but alcohol is running low, and sex is a no-go, buddy.”

  Chip looked at him puzzled. “Is it not a celebration worth having? You are alive and we are without the pirates taking over your ship.”

  Ben shook his head. “It’s not that I don’t want to celebrate, but you need to understand that we have limited resources, and sex is completely, one-hundred percent off the table. You’re a dude, I’m a dude, and we don’t do the two-dude tango.”

  “I’d love to tango,” Chip replied, the sarcasm to Ben’s ears not necessarily mimicked in the way Chip said it.

  “I know; it was written on the box you were shipped in.”

  Chip sat straight with his hands on his thighs. “How do you wish to celebrate then? I don’t think another marathon of World War IV documentaries is necessarily a celebration of life.”

  Ben shrugged. “I don’t know; there’s some macaroni and cheese I’ve been holding onto for a special occasion. Maybe I’ll cook that up and toss some hot dogs in it or something.”

  Chip formed what looked like a sour expression on his face. “You really need to learn a thing or two about ‘celebrating’ if you want to have a happy life.”

  “So says the robot,” Ben chided, nudging Chip on the elbow. “In all seriousness—thank you for saving me.”

  “I didn’t want to be left alone,” Chip said without looking at Ben.

  Way to make me feel important, Ben thought shaking his head. Sometimes I don’t think this guy gets it; or maybe I don’t get it.

  Chip looked over to Ben with a smile. “I’m only kidding,” he said. “I’ve been learning about humor by watching your video collection.”

  “Really? Most of them are war documentaries.”

  “Not all of them. Some are very ‘saucy’ I think.”

  Ben grinned. “You found the dirty videos huh?”

  “They were clean.” Chip shrugged.

  Ben laughed at how ridiculous the conversation was getting, but somewhere in the absurdity of the situation, his thoughts drifted to what he had just endured. The fact that two men boarded his ship and, in order to save himself, he took their lives, weighed heavy on him. The sudden anguish over what he had done shifted his mood. The laughter was gone.

  “Are you all right?”

  Ben shrugged at first, and then he said, “I’m just thinking about what happened. We killed those men. Does that make me a murderer?”

  Chip looked at Ben, nearly his natural expression taking over his face again. “As I understand it, what you did was self-defense, and you cannot be punished for it.” Ben understood the law portion of it, but it was the moral ambiguity he was having the biggest problem with, and it was one he hadn’t expected to have.

  “That’s not what I mean. No one will ever know about what happened, at least not in my lifetime, but I have to live with myself regardless. If there’s a God, will I be judged for that? The question formed without much thought about what he truly believed. Ben always considered himself an agnostic because adhering to atheism was too much commitment in his mind.

  “I don’t have any basis to answer that question,” Chip replied.

  “Of course not,” Ben said. “You know, I think I want to be left alone now.”

  “All right,” Chip said as he rose from the couch and walked slowly out of the cabin. He looked back for a moment, but Ben did not look up.

  As Chip disappeared behind the dividing wall, Ben’s face fell into his hands. He hadn’t cried since he was a child; even when his arm was torn from his body and he was being discharged from the Army for a bullshit accusation, he shed no tears at all. But this was different. Death had a finality to it that affected him deeply.

  “God,” he said, looking up at the overhead, his face red and streaked with tears. “If you’re real, I hope you will forgive me for what I’ve done.” Ben stopped talking, trying to formulate whatever words were gnawing at him and straining to be uttered under the burden of a heavy heart, but he came up empty-handed. Ben never had a way with words, but he knew what was blocking him from putting his thoughts into words. It wasn’t a lack of faith that God wouldn’t forgive him for what he had done, but that Ben didn’t deserve to be forgiven. “Fark it, it won’t change anything,” he said softly. With his eyes looking up, he fell back into the cushion of the couch and let his head rest against the cool bulkhead, drained of all energy and wallowing in self-pity.

  Maybe Chip was right, he thought. Maybe I should celebrate, but I feel too much like shit right now. Ben looked up, letting his vision fade until he succumbed to a sleep where his dreams temporarily took him to a better place.

  chap+er +en

  Two months passed, feeling like three, and Ben and Chip turned out to be a good team. Ben gave orders, and like an enthusiastic puppy, Chip was always there to please him. To Ben it was a great working relationship and he found himself depending on Chip more and more. For Chip, Ben wasn’t sure if the robot even felt anything about it one way or another, but he maintained steadfast enthusiasm, and now the fruit of their labor was paying off in a big way. They arrived at Jupiter’s moon three days ahead of schedule, and the past conflicts no longer weighed heavily on Ben’s heart. Things are better than ever, he thought as he wiped sleep from his eyes after Chip woke him up to tell him the good news. I finally get a fresh start.

  Europa grew larger as they approached her. Ben watched as the rocky orb glared back at them stoically, an unwilling victim of the expansion of humanity’s footprint in the solar system. But like most things not of man, what it wanted paled in comparison to what mankind would force to happen on their behalf. Ben felt a tinge of dread, but excitement swelled in his heart as he looked at the future, straining to see through the hydrogen-rich clouds surrounding the moon. Below the cloud cover was a new world, frigid and dangerous, unwittingly beautiful as it revolved around its host planet. The light reflecting from Jupiter gave the clouds a silvery appearance, and Ben wondered if it would look like daylight on the surface, beyond the thick, hazy clouds.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Ben asked without looking away from the monitor. The high-resolution image filled the screen with an unimaginable clarity that he had no idea was possible. Even the best telescopes from Earth could not peer at the moon with the kind of definition he was now seeing.

  “It is,” Chip replied, his eyes not moving from the screen. “But where are the communications satellites? Aren’t those necessary for landing on the surface?”

  Ben shrugged. “Maybe they are shielded by the clouds.”

  “Perhaps, but the radio isn’t chirping with activity.”

  Ben looked away from the monitor. “You do realize this is Europa, right? The population here is so low they probably don’t emit a lot of radio waves. I’m
sure it’s fine,” he said, trying to maintain his composure. He didn’t like being questioned, nor did he like the fact the questions being asked made him question himself.

  “I’m sure you’re right,” Chip replied as he stroked his thin mustache. It was trait he picked up from watching Ben play with his scraggly whiskers. Not being able to grow real facial hair, Chip always toyed with the short hairs above his lip.

  “Do you want to steer her in?”

  Chip looked at Ben, his eyes widening in an attempt to look surprised. “You mean fly the Shistain?”

  Ben shrugged. “Yeah. I mean you did help me fight off the pirates and you’ve made a good companion for the rest of the journey. I think you make a good crew member for me to be the captain of.”

  “I think I would like to fly the ship,” Chip replied, the facial expression actuators making him smile politely.

  “Take the helm; I’ll watch from here,” Ben ordered.

  “Yes, sir,” Chip said, rendering a salute with his left hand. Ben smirked at the lack of actual military courtesy displayed by Chip’s programming. You would think the company who built him would have at least programmed him to salute with the right hand, Ben thought as Chip walked behind him for the bridge. The truth was that Ben was suddenly nervous and wanted to be alone. What if I was wrong to come out here? What if this was all for nothing, or I die trying to land on this alien world? The questions going through his mind were overwhelming, and the only way to quiet them was to prove he was right all along. But for some reason he didn’t have the strength to fly the ship as the dread coursing through his body beat away at his morale.

  The Shistain drifted closer to Europa, creeping at a slow pace of five hundred kilometers per hour. Ben watched through bleary eyes as his emotions got the best of him. Europa basking in Jupiter’s light was more astounding than viewing Mars had been. He felt like a grain of sand in the presence of such celestial bodies dancing across the expansive darkness. When he first made his plan to come here, he was wet behind the ears and just a kid. Now, he felt he had the future by the balls and he wasn’t willing to give it up for a goddamned thing.

  “How far out are we, Chip?” Ben yelled from the cabin into the bridge. It was only separated by a steel bulkhead, but the sound of the air recyclers droning in the background made it hard to hear when speaking at a normal volume.

  “We will enter atmosphere in twenty minutes.”

  Ben smiled. In less than twenty minutes I will be a European…wait, that’s not right, he thought. “Hey, Chip. What would you call someone who is a citizen of Europa?”

  Chip came from around the corner and looked at Ben quizzically. “I don’t think there is a name for it in my database.”

  “Would European be right?”

  “No, Europe is on Earth, Ben.”

  “I know that, but the names are similar enough. The same word could be used for both.”

  “No.”

  “But.”

  “No.”

  Ben shrugged. Whatever, it isn’t worth arguing with a damned sex-bot anyway. “Just take us in and cross your fingers we don’t blow up on entry,” he said.

  “Is that a possibility?” Chip asked with no sense of humor about it at all.

  Ben winked. “I don’t think so, Chip, but you can never be so sure.”

  Chip nodded. “If you die, I will miss you. I’ll try not to crash the Shistain,” he said, turning back for the bridge. For some reason, Chip’s declaration didn’t make Ben feel any better about their possibly -imminent demise. That joke went the wrong direction, he thought, leaning against the bulkhead and staring at the monitor as Europa filled the screen with its hauntingly majestic presence.

  Ben felt the rumble of the ship as it entered the atmosphere surrounding Europa. It wasn’t as harsh as reentering Earth’s orbit, but after months of floating through vacuum, the sudden slowing down of the ship and increase in gravitational forces felt uncomfortable. Ben was only one hundred and fifty pounds, but he felt much heavier, especially as his lungs struggled to draw breath. Ben tried to call out to Chip, but without sufficient air in his lungs, he was drowning in open air. Miraculously, the pressure lifted and breathing became easier again. Ben sucked in huge gulps of air as he steadied himself against the wall.

  “Chip,” he said as loud as he could.

  “Yes?” Chip responded as he peered around the corner.

  “How fast were you entering atmosphere?”

  Chip’s eyebrows rose. “Much too fast, Captain. I apologize for any discomfort you may have experienced. I adjusted speed as soon as I felt the pressure in the cabin increase. I hope entry was not completely unpleasant.”

  Ben gawked at Chip. “Are you serious? I thought I was going to die not even two minutes ago.”

  Chip smiled sheepishly. “I understand. The mistake will not happen again.”

  Ben glared at the sex-bot. He was angry, but more so at himself for trusting piloting the ship to a machine programmed to stimulate sexual desires. The only piloting he was programmed to do involved “ship entry into a black hole”. “Make sure it doesn’t happen again,” Ben ordered, still relishing the cool air as it touched his lungs. The crushing gravity felt like a giant had been standing on his chest, and he didn’t doubt there might have been some bruising if he dared to pull up his shirt and take a look.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And Chip?”

  “Yes?”

  “Have you found any communications towers now that we are in atmosphere?”

  “Negative. This moon is very quiet, but I am continuing to scan.”

  That wasn’t the answer I was hoping for, Ben thought as he took a seat on the couch. You would think there would be some kind of satellite or communications tower scanning the area for incoming traffic. There’s no way there’s people down there with no way to communicate off world. “Chip, can you see if there are any artificial light sources in the area?”

  “I’ll run a scan.”

  Ben sat back and waited, the gnawing in his heart telling him that he most likely spent the last several months on this ship for nothing. When Chip returned he replied with a solemn shake of his head.

  “What the farking fark!” His lungs were still sore for entry, but his anger was afire enough for him not to care. He punched the cushioned portion of the bulkhead, and the lagging covering it wasn’t enough for him to not hurt his hand. The pain brought forth a new set of expletives.

  “Damaging yourself isn’t going to solve any of your problems,” Chip said. It was hardly comforting to Ben.

  “I can’t believe we came all this way for nothing.”

  Chip shrugged. “It wasn’t for nothing. You said there was work here.”

  Ben pointed at the monitor. “Do you see work here?”

  Chip shook his head. “No, but if you could show me what you read, then maybe we can figure out where to go from here,” Chip suggested.

  Ben reached in his pocket and pulled out his tablet. He opened the icon with images saved and tossed it to Chip. “Here you go,” he said, huffing and puffing as he paced around the cabin.

  Chip looked at the image and scrunched up his nose. His fingers moved across the screen, making the picture larger. “Oh,” he said.

  “Oh, what?”

  Chip looked up at Ben with the closest expression to sorrow he could manage. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but we did come all this way for nothing.”

  Somehow, hearing his worst fear said aloud, even knowing in his heart it was true, was unsettling. “Seriously?”

  Chip nodded.

  “How do you know that?”

  Chip showed Ben the image enlarged enough to read the fine print. “This is an advertisement for a video game, Ben. It’s a new release, and should be available at your nearest gaming store. Is it possible the scantily clad woman in the image may have distracted you from the fine print?”

  “Oh, for fark’s sake.”

  Ben felt like someone had ki
cked him in the chest with a lead boot. He collapsed back onto the uneven cushions of the couch and leaned his head back against the bulkhead, quietly thinking to himself. I should have expected this, he thought, Dad always said I was too quick to jump on the next idea and here I am, months away from home and humiliated.

  “Chip, can you please direct the ship back to Earth?”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  The word “captain” burned Ben’s ears. I’m not a farking captain. I’m just a guy whose stupidity outran his dreams.

  The hard burn of the Shistain pulling out of Europa’s grip jostled the small ship, pushing Ben back into his seat, but not with the same pressure and discomfort as he experienced upon entry. Leaving orbit felt peaceful, and they entered the dark expanse of space. Ben breathed better, but he knew it was probably all in his head. Just like everything else, he thought as the fine print of the stupid advertisement popped into his brain. Why do I do this to myself?

  Chip walked in and sat down next to Ben, resting his hand reassuringly on Ben’s knee. “We have a course plotted for Earth. Do you want to the estimated time until we reach it?”

  “Eight months and twenty-four days?”

  “Close, but twenty-six days,” Chip replied. His correction only made Ben feel more defeated, if that was even possible.

  Ben exhaled, slapping his hand over his face, fighting back tears. “I had everything planned out,” he said. “I was going to have a fresh start, a new beginning. Now, I spent all of my savings to get here and I have nothing to show for it.”

  Chip looked at Ben. “You have me,” he said.

  Ben’s hand slid from his face his eyes met Chip’s, the longing expression on the sex-bot’s face matched exactly how Ben felt. Their eyes peered into each other with matched tension. The loneliness in Ben’s heart came bubbling to the surface and he felt something he never felt before. “I don’t know—”

  “It’s all right,” Chip said as he wrapped his arm around Ben’s shoulder, pulling him closer.

  “It’s been a long time since I felt I had anyone in my life who gave a shit.”

  “I know,” Chip replied, a friendly smile formed by unseen motors manipulating the contours of his face.