A Year Near Proxima Centauri

by Michael Martin

  We could not make our minds up. The choice of architectural features was astonishing. In one corner a hovering buttress was still aloft, tethered to a post. Elsewhere in jumbled piles were columns, entire double helix staircases and domes of various shapes clad in various materials, some of which were self-motivating. We took a close look at a complete Halmatrope cellar, carefully removed and placed on lumps of Couth, still with its slats and splat-backed sampling chair and drainage gully. Architectural styles and periods jostled together; collapsed Trake frames, half-jettied Drisk hovels; a broken pediment from a Palissandrian Nullion plumper and too much to ever take in in one visit. The proprietor seemed pleased when we left his stock untouched and went home. I wondered if we could ever find the place again even if we wanted to. Perhaps it vanished as soon as we left.

  When we arrived home we found that our ablution suite and gratification suite had finally arrived all the way from Conima. It was months since we had ordered them. We had expected to hear of their arrival from the Import Office, but an attached note stated that the punitive Import Tariff had been removed from our Credit Rating without our authority. To make matters worse, without even opening the case, we knew that the gratification suite was much too small and that the ablution suite was not the model we had ordered, I ’screened through to the supplier on Conima at great expense. He checked his records and said that the delivery code was identical to the order code. He could change the suites if they were unopened and charge us for the collection and delivery but the process would take another three months.

  We went straight out for a meal to console ourselves. We knew just the place to visit. Each time we had been to the market we had smelt the delicious vapours coming out of its small unassuming doorway and had vowed to visit it. It was run by Spansules, there was little room inside, only four tables, but only one of them was occupied. Two Drools had brought their small son with them, he was loud and unruly. We ordered wild mulver steeped in Nullion skin secretions and Gormandine. We sipped an unusual little Halmatrope while we waited and the young Drool’s behaviour worsened. He started whining for the ablution suite and his parents asked the Spansule waitress where it was. She pointed through a door and the young Drool rushed through it, never to be seen again. After some time had elapsed his mother went to look for him. She rushed back for her husband. They were gone for quite some time. Our mulver arrived and as we tried to savour it we were continually disturbed by comings and goings. I was going to have a word with the parents when we gathered from the outcry that the young Drool had been too small to use the ancient ablution suite and had disappeared through the grill. It was a salutary warning not to spoil other people’s meals by bringing along offspring. We left without having our customary Algarglanon and returned to face our own ablution suite and gratification suite problem. They would probably have to stay. We might go through the whole process of ordering replacements and still get the wrong consignment.

  Henry introduced us to his second cousin, Neville, a fifth-generation Traker, older than Henry. I asked him if he was familiar with the Dolbury Joint. “Oh, yes,” he said, “barefaced soffit tenons with diminished haunches and two-face pegs. Cost you extra of course.” I was impressed but I said we would settle for a standard job, He was disappointed. He measured and cut while Henry and his cousins assembled. They were given no opportunity to sleep while Neville worked. The roof followed through from the existing roofline. We had not taken much notice of our roofing material before. The pitch was quite low to diminish resistance to the winter’s green vapours, so the covering was really only evident when looked down on from the hill above and then the tenacious foliage that sprouted on it made it blend in well with its surroundings. We asked Henry what it was.

  “Split Splandrite,” he said, “more durable than Couth.”

  I asked him where it came from. Apparently millions of years ago when the galaxy’s first advanced civilization, the Yolmi, developed the ultimate in fast food they discovered that the self-delivering burger containers damaged the atmosphere as they sped through to the customer. So they gathered them all together and contracted for their disposal. By chance, the entire load was dumped on Provender where it formed a third continent. The disposed containers immediately reacted with the higher atmospheric pressure and Noxule gas and hardened into a substance which was resistant to weather, yet supported life. It is all that remains of the Yolmi, as food became faster and faster so did their lives, until near the end they were thinking and communicating too fast for any other species to comprehend. Recordings were made of their final scientific conclusions before they vapourized but fast enough machines have not yet been developed to interpret and reveal this priceless knowledge. Instead, their packaging is extracted in great blocks of Splandrite and skilled splitters separate each layer. They are then fixed to roofs, face upwards, the original monogram on the front just visible when they are wet. Henry told us he had some second-hand Splandrite with a growth on to match ours. We were growing fond of Henry, he was building a fine extension in his own good time.

  When the roof was finished, matching perfectly with the old roof, we felt that some form of celebration was deserved, even if the whole project was scarcely half finished. As Henry fixed the last Splandrite we brought out the Halmatrope and plates of cold Nullion with slices of Gormandine. We sat on the patio in the hot sun with our eyes barely open and the sounds of the baby Riticules in our ears on the sundial.

  Henry turned up the next day with his plasterer to show him the job. He was quite young, short with long thin limbs, ending in long thin filaments.

  “This is Lesley,” Henry said.

  “Are you an Ochran?” I asked. He was; a tenth-generation Ochran. Yes, he said, his great grandfather probably had done Mr Skeg’s ceiling and yes, he could do something similar for us, but it would cost extra. We left him to measure up and make notes. Henry took me aside.

  “You know about Ochrans?” he asked in a hoarse whisper. Then he reminded me. They alternate sexes from day to day. Today he was male. He approached us.

  “Tricky, but I can do something for you.” He spotted my wife and grinned broadly. “Good day to you,” he said, fixing her with a stare that made her blush.

  “Start tomorrow, right?” he said to Henry, who nodded.

  The next day Lesley turned up before Henry did. He spotted me as he daintily unloaded his tools and gave me such a lovely smile that I was quite taken aback until I remembered that Lesley would be female that day. When Henry and his cousins arrived Lesley flirted outrageously and got very little work done until they fell asleep in the afternoon. The next day Lesley cornered my wife in the kitchen and would not let her out until she kissed him, then later he picked a fight with Don.

  The workmanship was exquisite but I wondered how long we could put up with Lesley. One day he would be a real nuisance to my wife, the next a real nuisance to me. Meanwhile, Henry and his cousins fitted the windows.

  My wife and I walked up the hill one afternoon and were dismayed to see dozens of temporary structures in shockingly bright colours scattered among the trees. Now and again a head would appear through an opening, then retreat when we were spotted. Dorf, even on our hill now. Goodness knows what they were eating. The hill was quiet otherwise. Usually as we walked we could hear creatures scuttling away through the undergrowth at every step, but not that day.

  We passed Mr Skeg. “Dorf,” he grunted, “we should Instamort them all. Still, they’ll be gone by tomorrow, you’ll see. Eat what they can and go. Probably ate your Pallions,” he added with a twitch, and carried on home.

  We said nothing to each other on the way home. Somehow, we both knew that we would never see our Pallions again, whether or not we had the Dorfs to blame.

  AUGUST

  We had been warned how hot August could be in Provender. It was too hot to venture out at all in the middle of the day and most things became too hot to touch. Henry and his cousins worked short mornings, beating holes through into t
he original part of the house and then drove home to fall asleep. It was time for George, the plumber, to start. He began in the extension, fitting his pipework in each room before Lesley plastered the walls. He tried hard to avoid Lesley but inevitably he would find himself having to fight Lesley off for one reason or another. He rushed through the extension pipework and refused to come back until Lesley had finished completely. I questioned Henry about Lesley’s marital status. He was indeed married. It was a simple process, Ochrans sought out partners whose sexual cycle opposed theirs and enjoyed deep and long-lasting relationships, while none the less retaining a fascination for other species.

  We had decided that, when George came back to finish the heating system and fit our ablution suite, we would have the Noxule gas system, with all its drawbacks. We were not going to be forced to pay ridiculous prices for solar power, just after we had made this decision, coincidentally we heard a knock on the door, I opened it and, standing in the midday heat, totally unaffected, was a smoothly presented Dorf. He introduced himself and showed me his card. Aha, I thought, not a tourist, but a salesman. Did we have central heating? he asked. We said no. Were we planning to have any? We said yes. Which sort? Noxule gas, we said. He laughed. It was a studied controlled laugh. Had we considered nuclear power? he asked. We laughed, rather hysterically, I thought later.

  “Ah, wait a minute,” he said, “You’ve been taken in by all the bad publicity of the past.” We had to admit we had.

  “Now,” he said, “nuclear power is cheaper than ever. Pay nothing today and defer your payments until later.” He told us that his company from Manufex would install the unit for no cost at all. Then we would have cheap clean power for ten years. Then what? we said.

  “Oh, who can look ahead that far?” he chuckled, good-naturedly.

  Then I remembered the trick. They had tried it on Conima years ago. You get your free unit, cheap power for ten years, then you have to pay them a fortune to remove it and until they do your house is worthless and you have a Hazardous Zone Confinement Order placed on you. I showed him to the door and watched with great relief as his Stromba grated off down the drive, sparking now and again on the bumps. I hoped that no creature in the vicinity would be taken in.

  The roads around Bepommel were busy now. The Palissandrians descended on their holiday homes in August and the prices went up in the markets and the restaurants and all the artisans rushed to do their bidding at extortionate prices. We had reached another impasse on the extension. George would not finish his plumbing until Lesley had finished the plastering and Henry could not finish until Lesley finished. Lesley, in the meantime, was carrying out some emergency trompe-l’oeil plasterwork for some Palissandrians. We wondered how they would react to Lesley. Perhaps they had a plasterer every vacation.

  There were several Palissandrian holiday lodges beyond Mr Dobson’s and we chanced to meet a couple walking on the hill in the early evening. They said they were having a party the next evening for their Palissandrian friends who were staying in the vicinity and would we like to come. We could imagine what a formal affair it was likely to be, but Palissandrians always provided good food and drink, so we said we would love to come.

  The next evening we took the Stromba up to their lodge and found a secluded spot to hide it before passing all the lined-up Ferenziculos, Masquerandis and other exotic vehicles I had never even heard of. Our hosts, Melissa and Rupert, greeted us at the door. We were the only Conimunculi and we felt a little ill at ease. It was so tong since we had worn our best clothes that even after letting them fully out they were conspicuously too small. We were offered Halmatrope. I glimpsed the bottle and felt dizzy, the 22406! How had they ever got hold of it? And then to offer it to guests without comment. I saw new arrivals after us take the Halmatrope and drain it during conversation without a thought. We were in a dilemma, should we creep away into a corner and savour it to the last drop or socialize and try to make the best of it?

  The choice was taken away from us when our host, thinking that we were shy, ushered us over to meet Dr Dilsby and his wife. He was an old Palissandrian now, the last remaining living member of the galactically famed scientific team that carried out the relative relativity experiments. Dr Dilsby had been a junior member of the team that developed the Luminule. This was a capsule containing measuring devices and two scientists which had been developed with the capacity to exceed the speed of light. The purpose was to pursue a light particle, overtake it and see how it behaved. The experiment was a failure. As the Luminule gathered speed in the cyclotron at the precise moment that it overtook the light particle, all the lights went out in its cabin and the scientists could not see a thing until they had slowed down again. It was remarkable to be in the same room as a creature of such renown, let alone be introduced to him. Strangely, as is often the case with great creatures, he was modest and seemed far more interested in hearing about me than discussing his life, which I did give him an opportunity to do, early on.

  A magnificent buffet was laid on. When we were called through we just did not know where to start, there was even a section of “Fresh Food” carefully enclosed so nothing could escape. We decided to try some. We stepped in and I seized a pair of little creatures in spiky shells and gave one to my wife. We watched the Palissandrian next to us. He opened his mouth wide, tipped his head back as far as it would go then held the shell above and gave it a sharp rap with a piece of Trake. I tried it and the creature leapt out of its shell with the shock of the knock and straight into the welcoming shelter of my mouth. I swallowed hard and felt it wriggle and slither all the way down my throat. It was delightful, a true gastronomic experience, and the after-taste was superb.

  When everyone had finished we expected them to form into small groups and earnestly debate but not a bit of it. They obviously preferred to leave their Palissandrian customs behind and adopt the local ones. Jackets came off, ties were loosened from around etiolated necks and low-frequency vibration music replaced the dainty high-frequency background sounds that accompanied the early part of the evening. Our hosts and their friends were transformed and, emulating Drools, they stomped and whirled around; some imitated Drisks to whoops of encouraging laughter, even Dr Dilsby did a passable Colwig which cleared the floor and sent everybody into a ring around him clapping. We suspected that if we had not been there someone might have danced like a Conimunculi but they were polite enough to leave us to carry out that embarrassing display ourselves.

  We headed home exhausted in the early hours of the morning, leaving our hosts and their few remaining guests fast asleep. On the way into our drive the Stromba swung out too far turning into the garage and hit the new ablution suite, damaging its wing and shattering one of the suite’s Molar ball and claw feet. We could not send it back now, even if we wanted to.

  My friend from Conima, Mayhew, ’screened me. Could he come to stay? We had vaguely invited him months back to visit us in August, thinking that all our work would be finished. He was the galaxy’s worst guest. He needed more space than most guests but we loved him. He said he would come as soon as he could. Three days later I received a ’screen from Mayhew, He was not at the Cosmodrome. He was not in Bepommel. He was not sure where he was, and could I pick him up?

  It transpired that, at the Cosmodrome, Mayhew had leapt through an open door of a vehicle, thinking it was a taxi and slammed the door. When he noticed there was a passenger in the back seat already, another Conimunculi, he started chatting away in his usual affable manner. The driver assumed that the two passengers were acquainted and pulled off to his predetermined destination. The passenger naturally assumed that Mayhew had a right to be there as the driver had permitted him to stay. It was not until they pulled up outside Corto-Probax House in Nolbergale that Mayhew realized that he had not yet given the driver any directions. Then he discovered that the vehicle was a Corto-Probax chauffeured limousine for executives and it was not available for the two-hour drive to Bepommel with a non-executive, let alone a no
n-employee. By then the passenger had become an old friend and invited Mayhew in to use a ’screen and have a Halmatrope. Mayhew, unfortunately, had the Halmatrope first and then another and another and forgot about the ’screen and us. He and his friend left Corto-Probax House and decided to sample the cuisine of Nolbergale. They sampled one restaurant after another, losing track of time and eventually space. When Mayhew woke up in the early hours of the morning he was behind a restaurant wearing nothing but a Drisk suspender belt and some discreet pink material, possibly lent by two Copuli. His friend was nowhere to be seen and two bladderats were eyeing him suspiciously. With no means of identification, proof of Credit Rating or clothing it would not be easy to persuade the restaurant owner to let him use their ’screen. He stayed in hiding until he heard signs of life inside. They, of course, remembered him as soon as they saw him. One or two items of his clothing were scattered about the interior. Some—creature had also handed in his wallet containing all his documents. It was then that he ’screened me. The Drisk restaurant proprietor helped fill out some details of how to find them and I set out on the two-hour journey with resignation. This was the least you could expect from a Mayhew visit. When I eventually found him he was in the sort of establishment we would not normally patronize but in Provender every new experience is valid. He was by now a lifetime friend of the proprietor and his wife, a rather sultry little Drisk who had no doubt provided Mayhew with the suspender belt. He insisted that he bought me a meal before we left. I had poor expectations of the quality of food there, but I could not refuse. We were provided with a house Halmatrope. It was dull and lifeless. I expected the same of the food, but when it came, I knew from the first steaming whiff that we were in for a treat. Mayhew thought so too.