SLEEPING BEAUTY WALTZ2
2:1
The shuttle dropped out of warp on the far side of Sol and slid through the stars. The engines recalibrated and the thrusters fired a cosmic tap-dance, fluttering like fat, purple roman candles before shutting off and leaving inertia to do the dirty work.
The pilot reviewed their progress and marveled at the numbers. An anomaly in the warp had put them a full five minutes ahead of schedule. The pilot decided to share the good news with the passengers who, as it just so happened, were fast asleep.
The cabin speakers crackled on.
Greetings, ladies and gentlemen, this is your pilot speaking…
The passengers groaned to life but none of them sounded remotely human. Their sleep-addled protests came closer in register to a recently reanimated corpse. Despite the growing threat of mutiny, the pilot displayed unwavering confidence in the importance of this particular announcement.
Due to our rigorous efforts to provide safe transport from system to system…
Now, there were three perfectly reasonable reasons why the pilot deemed it necessary to interrupt the precious respite of the human sleep cycle.
1. The pilot was obligated to promote a positive brand image whenever possible for ADASTRA INTERSTELLARS LLC.
2. The programming of the pilot’s logic-board further obligated it to promote a positive brand image whenever possible for ADASTRA INTERSTELLARS LLC.
3. In today’s hectic world of packed schedules and busy lifestyles, it’s nice to stop and relish the little things in life like having exact change or beating out rush hour traffic. It’s those kinds of small, personal victories that really put things into perspective and reinforce the positive brand image of ADASTRA INTERSTELLARS LLC.
We know you have choices when it comes to warp travel…
Passengers threw trash, water bottles, crumpled snack bags, and anything else they could find at the presentation console. The infant in the first row joined the revolt. Her high-pitched squeal, punctuated by uncontrollable gasps, sounded like the yoga mantra of an axe-murderer. The babel rose until a boy in the fourth row calmly, albeit rather clumsily, got up and approached the screen.
We should be touching down at Kronos International 7:50 Terra-Local, 2:35 Constant-Standard…
The boy pried open the floor panel and picked through the mess of circuit-boards and tubes. The others grew quiet, observing him like a nature documentary. After a spell, the boy’s face lit up and he turned around with a clump of wires in his hand.
Adastra Interstellazzzz…and we apprecia-tuh-tuh-tuh…
The speakers fizzled and cut out. The kid presented the tangled trophy above his head and took a bow. A light round of applause made its way through the cabin followed by a swift procession of yawns and sighs. The mother in the first row mouthed a silent “thank you” as she rubbed her child’s back.
The boy plopped down and put his headphones in. He scrolled to the Pillars of Creation, selected “The Flight Album,” and pressed play. Music warbled from the speakers into his ear canals. Atonal stardust melodies funneled inside and registered in one of the few enjoyable regions of the human brain.
He was about to drift off when something jabbed him hard in the shoulder. He looked up and a metallic arm recoiled into the ceiling panel above his seat. It would appear as though the pilot had deemed it necessary to administer a standard-issue sedative in order to prevent future attempts at sabotage to the property of ADASTRA INTERSTELLARS LLC.
The sudden pain startled him. His muscles all tensed up at once, but then he relaxed.
“Oh, right,” he said. A stupid-ass grin stretched across his face. “Free drugs.”
Ladies and gentlemen: Eugene Bohr.
2:2
The dust storm died down as Captain Adrian Wolfe finished her morning perimeter. She kicked the post to the Hazmat welcome board, knocking sand off the old wooden sign. She pulled out the stakes on either end of the spike strip, folded it up, and lugged it across the street.
She tossed it in the garage and locked the door. She stepped back outside just as a small passenger shuttle streaked overhead. It wobbled off course, struggled through the air and then touched down far afield of any known landing strip. Wolfe grabbed her mug from the porch, dumped the dregs, and went inside the outpost.
In the barracks, Kale shaved her head over the sink. Short hairs splintered away from the clippers, covering the dingy sink like sawdust. Austen brushed her teeth behind her, waiting for an opportunity to spit.
“Morning, ladies,” Wolfe said.
“Morning, boss,” Kale said, knocking a clump of hair off the clippers.
“How many alarms has she slept through?” Wolfe said, eyeing her sister’s bunk.
Austen shrugged, swishing the foam in her mouth, cheeks full like a hungry squirrel.
“I don’t know,” Kale said. “I woke up to the first one, lost count after next five…”
“Sounds about right,” Wolfe said. “Finish up. We’re heading out soon.”
Kale nodded. Austen spit and rinsed her brush, splattering bits hair before sending them down the drain.
Wolfe kicked the bottom bunk and shined a flashlight up top. A pillow came flying down at her.
“What?” Wolfe said. “Least you got some kip.”
“Five more minutes,” Jas grumbled.
“Not today, sis,” Wolfe said. “Saw a bird go down due south.”
“Gulls or vultures?”
“Doves far as I can tell,” Wolfe said. “Though I’m keen to get there before any buzzards show.”
“Alright,” Jas said. She threw her feet over the side and hopped down. “Time to use our extensive combat experience to patch another flat tire…”
2:3
Eugene awoke to dull heat, a stuffy nose, and the steady metronome of emergency systems. The red hazards strobed along with the incessant beep, beep, beep of the back-up speakers. Light poured in through the exit hatch. He wiped some drool on his sleeve and stood up.
His legs disagreed. The nerve endings fired in unison and he stumbled on a bed of needles. He fell back in his seat and held his head. The lights and sirens massaged a headache gathering behind his eyes. He glared at the presentation console.
“I thought I killed you…”
Eugene pulled himself along the armrests, taking careful steps to persuade his legs to show up for work. Pinpricks shot up from the floor with each left, right, left. He wobbled to the end of the aisle and fell against the console.
The screen played an instructional video. Cindy the flight attendant cheerfully demonstrated government-mandated exit procedures over and over, every time as perky and inhuman as the last. Although it was impossible, Eugene found something quite smug in the way she smiled at the end of each loop.
He kicked open the panel again and pulled out every cord he could find. The screen morphed colors, blurred in and out of focus, and even went blank for one joyous second, but there were redundancies in place. Cindy kept up her energetic presentation. Eugene’s headache did the same. His left temple pounded. Both eyes twitched.
He went for the door and shot a look back at the console.
“Okay,” he said. “You win, Cindy. If that is your real name…” He ducked through the hatch and slid down the inflatable ramp. She smiled and gave her presentation once more for the empty seats.
The sun devoured color. All Eugene saw was perfect, blinding white. Then the bulbs went out, one by one, and the dunes rippled into sight like raindrops in a puddle. The sky was set to broil, the air completely dead.
Not a breeze. Not a breath.
Eugene’s pupils adjusted as he found his fellow passengers gathered around the tail of the ship. They gawked at the steaming engines. Their conversations alternated between amateur engineering, bitching about when help would arrive, and the best way to turn the whole ordeal into meal vouchers and hotel comps.
The group glanced over at Eugene as he approached. Some turned back to the engines with renewed interest. Others waved politely and flashed customer service smiles. The kind of look that asks is there anything I can do to help? while at the same time begging please, please say, ‘no.’
“Oh, good, you’re up,” the woman with the baby said. She rocked in place and patted the little one’s back. “Thank you again for helping with that screen. I didn’t think this one would ever sleep.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“We, uh, tried lifting you,” a guy said. “But you were, you know, still pretty out of it.”
“Sure,” Eugene said.
“Yes,” another chimed in. “We thought you’d be safer inside.”
“Uh huh,” Eugene said. “So, that’s why you’re all out here?”
“It’s not like that…”
“No, I get it,” Eugene said. He waved at the baby and smiled at the mother. He then turned around and flipped off the others as he went.
The sun held the course, scrambling the eggs in Eugene’s brainpan. His clothes were already soaked through with sweat; a testament to a life spent in climate control. He licked his palm and held it up, something he’d seen them do in movies.
The air was still yet dust devils spun erratically on the horizon. Whitecaps in a boiled-away sea. Eugene rubbed his forehead and blinked into the expanse. Nada, nada, nada in all directions. Then a twinkle caught his eye from the peak of a large dune.
It was that most prized of all objects. The catalyst for war and conflict since the dawn of man. Elusive, entrancing, and the most desired of all human artifacts.
The shiny thing.
Eugene’s feet sunk in the sand. Miniscule granules wormed into his kicks and found their way into his socks. The infinitesimal specks threatened to gather mass and transmute his shoes to stone.
At the top of the hill, he claimed his prize: an ordinary and, to be completely honest, utterly underwhelming pair of square-rimmed glasses. Still, something about them was familiar. Eugene shrugged, dusted them off, and put them on.
The world bulged at the middle and ran away at the edges. In the distance, low clouds danced over hills and twisted in funhouse mirror mirages. Windstorms tore through the far-off desert, though, up above there was nothing but blue skies.
Eugene turned to the shuttle. Everyone was more or less where he’d left them, except for one figure he didn’t recognize. On the far side of the shuttle, half-hidden in the wavering heat, stood an old radiation suit.
Eugene rubbed his eyes and squinted for a better look, but it was gone.
Thanks for the drugs, Adastra Interstellars!
Something whispered in his ear. A faint whine, some high-end frequency shifting into focus. He felt a tickle and looked down to see beads of sand rising from the ground. They twisted up toward his hands, caressing his fingertips. His nose started running. He sniffled and wiped it on his forearm and saw a streak of blood. A crack split in the left lens and spread to the right. The glasses splintered and jigsaw-puzzled apart as Eugene heard a voice.
I’m already home…
A wave washed over him and knocked him down and out before he had a chance to see the shuttle go up.
Flight 1890 Carbon City to Atlas Rock was gone. What was left burned toward heaven. The passengers nothing more than bones and ash and sizzling flesh.
The wind returned. Dust flew and swept through the flames. And that wicked old sun climbed higher and baked away the sky.
2:4
Captain Wolfe squatted over the kid. Her combat boots sunk in the sand. A steady stream of drool flowed from the boy’s mouth to the ground. Sand clumped around his chin like cat litter. She flipped him over and pulled out his wallet.
EUGENIUS P. BOHR
12 JUNG 4019
HEARTLAND DOME
CARBON CITY, EA
Wolfe pushed herself to her feet and got on the horn.
“What’s the mess?” she said.
“Whole thing’s junked, boss,” Kale said. She knocked around the inside of the smoldering starcruiser. She ducked under melted panels and exposed metal ribs. “Don’t know what happened, but it could’ve been a lot worse. If the core hadn’t sealed itself, we’d be looking at fused landscape as far out as Coulson’s Ridge.”
“Any leads?”
“Got the brain, but it’ll take more than a few to crack,” Kale said. “Found three kill-switches so far, so this baby’ll need the full treatment.”
“Load it in the Hellbender,” Wolfe said. “Austen, any pulses?”
“Negatory,” Austen said. The bodies spread out before her in a charcoal rainbow around the ruined engines. It was a bastardized version of that ancient symbol for unity and peace; different colors, different creeds all made equal in the ash. “Fourteen and a half black bags in all.”
“Where you get half from?” Wolfe said.
“Sir,” Austen said. “There was a little one…”
“Christ,” Wolfe said. “Do us all a favor and round up next time.”
“Affirmative, sir,” Austen said. “Sorry, sir.”
“Alright, kids,” Wolfe said. “That’s one ship blown to bits, fifteen dead, and only one survivor.”
“We like him for a trigger man?” Kale said.
“He’s just a kid,” Wolfe said. She nudged him with the tip of her boot. He groaned and rolled over. “I don’t like him for anything. O’Connor, perimeter check.”
Wolfe looked out over the crash site. The fire had burned itself out quick, but smoke still wafted from the shuttle’s husk. The ground surrounding the wreck glittered in the sun with bits of glass forged in the exquisite heat of the blast.
“Report, O’Connor,” Wolfe said. “Now.”
Austen gathered samples. Kale popped out the side hatch and landed with a crunch. Austen turned and watched Kale walk over to the Hellbender.
“Damn it, Jas,” Wolfe said. “Report or you’re on latrines for a month.”
“Sand,” Jas said over the horn. She emerged from the other side of the wreck and spat over her shoulder. “That’s the perimeter. Sand, sand, and more fuckin’ sand.” She kicked up dust and swung the hilt of her old Sidewinder on her hip. “Happy?”
“Overjoyed,” Wolfe said.
“Hold up,” Jas said. “I got something.”
“Keep it up, sis,” Wolfe said. “And I’ll have those commodes tongue-shined.”
“Full serious,” Jas said. She pointed over her sister’s shoulder. “On your six.”
Wolfe turned and shielded her eyes. Two dots wavered in the sky. They bobbled through heatwaves and grew larger. Carbon Corps airships from the base in Atlas.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” Wolfe said. “Kale, bring the Hellbender around…”
The Helldivers moaned on approach. Their propellers threw sand everywhere. They touched down and a platoon spilled out the sides. They stomped out guns loaded and trigger fingers itching like a recruitment commercial, but without the bombastic soundtrack. Techs in bio-hazard gear stayed onboard. Some leaned out and watched from the windows. One unwrapped a granola bar.
Crinkle, crinkle, crunch.
Major Charles Nero hopped out and straightened his wrinkled brown maverick jacket. He pushed his aviators back up his nose and swaggered over to Wolfe.
“Tell me something, Charlie,” Wolfe shouted over the fading engines. “Been going on months waiting for you and yours to look into missing persons about these cliffs. Now, one little ship goes boom and all of a sudden it’s a goddamned party?”
“That’s Major to you, Captain,” Nero said. He tapped his badge and motioned for his troops to fan out. “And I’m going to need you and your bitches to stand down.”
“We’ll stand up, thank you very much,” Wolfe said. “What’s your daddy got you doing way the hell out here?”
“Dad—” Nero stopped to clear his throat. He pulled a bag of rotten chew from his pocket, took a pinch, and shoved it in his mouth. “The General wants this area under quarantine.”
“That’s all fine and dandy,” Wolfe said. “But we can handle our own dust-ups.”
“You gotta clear out,” Nero said. “Forensics is gonna analyze the energy spike.”
“Ooh, an energy spike,” Wolfe said. “That the technical term now for a big, damn explosion?”
“Now, that ain’t polite,” Nero said. “And this ain’t Hazmat, Addy. We’re in unincorporated Terra out here.” He let a glob of tobacco juice slip from his mouth. “Means this ain’t your charge. Got a problem with that, you can take it up with the big man himself.”
“Suppose I will,” she said.
Kale pulled the duster around and braked hard, spraying sand on Major Nero and his troops.
“Okay, ladies,” Wolfe said. “Load the boy in back.”
Her order was met with a volley of clicks. Wolfe felt the familiar sensation of steel against her neck. Austen and Jas went stiff. The Major’s platoon took aim and waited, ready to make pointillism of Hazmat’s finest.
2:5
Deep in the mountains of East Terra, General Howard Mendax drank his Leaking Core neat. Monitors of all sizes encircled the walls of his observatory, casting the room in dim, flickering light. Cigar smoke and Tchaikovsky filled the air.
He knocked some scotch back and set the snifter down amidst the pieces of his disassembled pistols. He took a screwdriver to his wrist-plate and tightened the fake tendons, keeping his eyes on the screens. The security feeds displayed vacant desert and tundra, empty streets, abandoned outposts. The monotonous grain only disrupted here and there by movement in one of the isolated mining communities.
He tucked his scraggly beard over his shoulder and removed his undershirt. He ran his fingers over the medals bolted to his skin, his honorary Bleeding Heart embedded between his twin lung canisters where his ribs used to be. He unlatched the tanks and worked them around and around, took a deep breath, and ka-chunk…ka-chunk. He pulled them out and placed them on the table. He snatched up a rag and wiped out the build-up of ash, mucus, and dried blood caked to the insides of the artificial breathers.
2:6
“The witness stays…”
Major Nero shoved Wolfe to her knees and circled around. Sweat welled up on his forehead like a busted condenser. He pulled off his cap, smoothed his comb-over, and put it back on. His troops fidgeted. Their guns bobbed up and down as lactic acid in their arms became legion. Wolfe eyed Austen and Jas. She gritted her teeth and waited.
“Alright,” Nero said. “Y’all gonna play nice or do we need to order some more body bags?” He chuckled and wiped his brow. Then he made a big mistake.
He blinked.
The Major opened his eyes and Wolfe’s hand-cannon was pointed directly at his balls. His grunts panicked and swung their barrels, giving Jas and Austen a window to join the standoff. Kale hopped up on the Hellbender’s mounted gun. She swiveled toward the troops, causing one of the greener privates to wet himself. His crotch steamed in the heat. Kale snickered and flipped the safety off.
“The witness is unconscious,” Wolfe said. “And a minor. And in my zone. And my responsibility and I’m taking him with me and my finger is getting real tired and I’m running out of reasons not to blow your tiny dick off.”
Jas laughed. Nero’s face went red. Wolfe cocked back the hammer and jammed the barrel into the Major’s unmentionables.
“Fine,” Nero gulped. His pistol fell in the sand and he nodded to his men. They lowered their guns. “Have it your way, but the General won’t be—”
“Oh, when is he ever?” Wolfe said. She holstered her gun. Nero let another glob of tobacco go, catching on his shirt collar and stretching to the ground. Jas and Austen set Eugene down across the back seat.
Wolfe hit the roof, Kale hit the gas, and they all took off for Hazmat.
2:7
The General tossed the filthy rag in the dustbin and picked up the first canister. He shoved it back in place. Then the other. He screwed them until the seal was tight and he swiped his half-chewed Corto Maltese from the ashtray. He gasped and took a long drag. He let it out and watched the fumes cling to his hand. The wisps wrapped around the veins, hairs, and crevices in his ruined wrists.
The phone rang. He waved the smoke away.
“Yes?”
His voice was gravel. He chomped the cigar away from the receiver.
“I told you not to call unless you found him…”
He picked up his scotch and swirled it around. The liquid hugged the sides of the glass. A waltz crooned from the record player. He took a gulp as the melody swayed his head from side to side.
2:8
The Carbon Corps outpost in Hazmat used to be the old Sheriff’s place. Barnabus Cranston was the last Sheriff of Hazmat. His son Bartholomew, the last second-in-command, and Bart’s son the last deputy. His name was Jeb.
Those were the good old days back when Hazmat was a budding little suburb. Then one fine summer day the Seventh Brigade of Bloody Saints came marching in and gunned down three generations of law enforcement in less than 30 seconds. Same story as all the other small towns when the Native Terran Naturalization Act was passed. The opposition always said there would be repercussions if the bill was signed into law. Most folks took that as a warning that the Pilgrims would start arming themselves, endangering the law-abiding, godly colonists spread across the land. But, in fact, it was a threat against any attempt to fix, let alone acknowledge, the sins of Terra’s past. Many who supported the law were assassinated and are lucky to receive even brief mentions in textbooks. Those responsible for the attacks either disappeared back to their comfortable homesteads or were given verbal reprimands and put on paid administrative leave. At a certain point, historical threads become impossible to unravel when those in power keep covering up their seams.
The town moved on, as people tend to do, and the building was repurposed some years back with a sign and a fancy paintjob, but anything new about it had long since faded. The paint had dandruff and the sign dangled by a lone chain, twisting idly like an only child on a swing.
Wolfe sat at Barney’s old desk, diligently writing up her first round of reports for the day. Jas and Kale carried Eugene inside, plopped him down in lock-up, and went out on a patrol. Austen climbed up to her crow’s nest, unfolded her bipod, and got comfortable. Her scope rushed over town, quickly zeroing in on Kale as she crossed the street. She guided her rifle carefully, bouncing ever-so-slightly with Kale’s steps.
Jas stepped outside and grinned when she noticed their sniper checking out the engineer. She whistled to get Austen’s attention and made a kissy face.
Austen immediately darted her scope out into the dunes. She enjoyed her post. Just her eyes, a rifle, and the open country. It got lonely sometimes, sure, but that wasn’t always such a bad thing. At least no one was close enough to see her blush.
Wolfe hunched over a tiny desk lamp. A metallic fan whirred back and forth in its cage. Papers on the bulletin board fluttered behind her. The protocol updates and flyers of missing persons flapped up and down.
Eugene slept on a faded, striped cot. Sweat soaked through his clothes and into the mattress. There it joined the perspiration and tears of former residents. Mostly alcoholics, wife-beaters (both the asshole and the shirt), and the occasional dope withdrawal.
He tossed and turned in a fever dream and squeak! The hinge screw on the cell-door made a half-turn.
2:9
“A civilian ship?” the General said. “And you somehow let her beat you to it. Remarkable. No…”
He took a swig from his glass.
“No…”
And another.
“I said, ‘no,’ Major. You have until noon. Clean it up or I’ll have to rub your nose in it.”
He dropped the receiver and dumped the remaining scotch down his pipe while his other hand scurried over the gun parts on the table. He wiped his chin, slammed the glass down, and picked up his twin Mauser Boomslangs. The automatic turn-bolts hissed and he checked the sights. He caressed the wooden handles, holding them like newborns.
The General holstered his weapons and draped a tattered trenchcoat over his bony shoulders. He rubbed his hand over the steel plate covering half his bald, scarred scalp, feeling in each rivet with his fingertips.
With a wave of his hand the lights and screens went blank. He marched down the hall, the energy-conscious lights flicking on and off as he went to the exit. The door opened at the end of the tunnel and cold air swept inside. The daylight caught snowflakes in its tractor beam. They swirled in and melted, helpless.
The General stepped out from the observatory and took in a sharp, sub-zero breath. He walked the catwalk high over the ice-crusted wasteland. The Masada bullet hills coiled around the base of the mountain, rusted burial mounds of some ancient war. Massive cannons encircled the compound, aimed out at various encampments in the distance, communities of Pilgrims slowly making their holy journey toward the void Atlantic. One of the heavy guns recalibrated and adjusted a fraction of a degree, coughing up a rust cloud from its gears.
The phone in his pocket rumbled. He pulled it out and checked the text.
Don’t forget Genie’s flight arrives soon!
The General scrolled up through the chat history to determine the typical response. He sent a thumbs up and tucked the phone back in his jacket.
A jet-black Imperial Studebaker SS idled on the platform. The operator threw the relay and a warp gate roared to life. The General climbed in the back of the duneduster, opened the mini-fridge and poured himself a drink. He took a sip as the driver hit the gas and steered into the pylon.
Five seconds later they were on the other side of the world, a few miles outside the Carbon Corps base in Atlas Rock.
2:10
Wolfe tried to ignore it and finish her reports. The place was old after all and old buildings make noise. But it wasn’t the sound of pipes cooling or the foundation settling. Maybe it was a mouse or a kangaroo rat that had worked its way inside the walls. Wolfe scribbled faster as the sound grew. It sounded like morse code or a tedious drum solo that refused to end. It got stuck in her head, like a bad pop song, and it went a little something like squeak, squeak, squeakity-squeak…
It became louder, faster, faster. Then the noise dropped out entirely, leaving the room steeped in silence until there was a big…
The God Complexes 