Star stuff, p.16
Star Stuff, page 16
"But you said that sometimes you—"
"I said at night!" Erry said. "Just wait. Patience, my strange friend from another world."
So they kept walking along the beach, and Erry found a pointed stick and managed to spear two fish. They cooked them on a campfire and feasted, and it was the best meal Rowan had ever eaten. They swam in the warm water, and they built sandcastles, and they talked for hours.
Rowan spoke about life on Paradise Lost—the strange aliens in casinos, the labyrinthine ductwork, the glittering bars she could only sneak into after hours, and her dream of a long-lost homeworld. Erry talked about nights in caves, lonely nights with only stray cats for company. About begging on the docks. About stealing food from the nearby town, and once spending two days in the stocks for snatching a sausage.
They spoke about their lost families. About loneliness. And they spoke about dreams. About a day when humans no longer had to hide in space stations and asteroids, a day when Earth shall be reborn. About a dream to overthrow the usurper, a day when the kings of House Aeternum returned to the throne, and when all people of Requiem could rise as dragons again.
They talked and talked until the sun set and the stars emerged.
Rowan did not recognize these stars. These were different constellations from those she could glimpse through Paradise Lost's portholes. Wherever she was, it was many light-years away. Maybe a universe away.
A world without technology, she thought. A world with magic instead.
In the moonlight, she looked into Erry's eyes. Erry looked back, solemn.
"Can we?" Rowan whispered.
Erry looked around, perhaps seeking soldiers, then looked back into Rowan's eyes. She nodded. "We can."
Erry took a few steps back. She stood barefoot in the sand, a skinny little urchin in a burlap sack. A hungry orphan with messy dark hair, with solemn eyes, with skinned knees and a broken heart. The girl in the fire. She stood there in the moonlight, gazing into Rowan's eyes … and changed.
Wings unfurled from her back like billowing cloaks. Fangs sprouted from her mouth and claws from her fingertips. Bronze scales flowed across her body, chinking like a purse of coins. She fell to all fours and grew larger and larger. A tail thrust out from her back, thumping the sand, and fire crackled in her mighty jaws.
Erry Docker stood on the beach—a dragon.
Rowan stepped closer, hesitant. The dragon snorted, and smoke puffed from her nostrils. Rowan froze, then mustered her courage, stepped closer still, and reached out her hand. Gingerly, she patted the dragon's snout. The scales were smooth and warm.
"Neat trick, huh?" the dragon said.
Rowan gasped and fell back a step. "You can talk!"
"Of course I can bloody talk!" Erry said. "I turned into a dragon, not a cow! Were you expecting me to moo?"
Rowan laughed. "I don't know. I don't have much experience with dragons. Or strange girls living in the fire. Or, well, really much of anything."
The dragon smiled, revealing rows of sharp teeth, and lowered one wing like a ramp. "Well, climb aboard! We're going flying."
Rowan hesitated again. "Is it safe?"
The dragon's eyes gleamed mischievously. "No. Nothing worthwhile is ever safe."
Rowan laughed. "Hey, I've fled alien exterminators through ducts. What's a ride on dragonback?"
She was still not sure this was real. But be this reality or dream, she was going to make the most of it. Rowan climbed onto the dragon.
"Hold on!" Erry said.
"Where?"
"Anywhere!"
Erry beat her wings. And the dragon soared.
"Whoa!" Rowan cried, slipping down the scaly back. She grabbed a dorsal spike.
The wings beat mightily, scattering sand below, and the dragon wobbled higher and higher, sometimes dipping, then soaring again, rising like some clumsy pelican with a belly full of fish. Rowan clung on for dear life.
And then, far above the beach, the dragon caught an air current and glided. The flight smoothed. And Rowan could finally relax and gaze around her.
I'm flying among the stars, she thought.
The wind ruffled Rowan's hair and flicked back her tears of wonder. The stars shone above and reflected in the smooth black sea below. It was like flying in a starship. Better than flying in a starship. It was freedom.
The dragon flew for an hour, maybe more, until they reached a little island. There the dragon glided down and landed on the sand. The island was only a few feet wide, and a single tree grew from its center. Still, compared to an HVAC duct, it was quite spacious.
Erry transformed back into a human, and the two girls stood facing each other. Seashells glimmered in the moonlight around their feet.
"I call this place Moonlight Island," Erry said. "I come here sometimes. I once flew out into the deep sea. I just kept flying and flying, and … I wasn't going to come back. I was going to keep flying until I found whatever land my father came from. Or until I became so exhausted that I fell and the sea claimed me. Instead I found Moonlight Island, a single tree in a big dark sea. I've only been here a few times. It feels … sacred."
"It's your engine room," Rowan said softly.
Erry held her hands. "You can stay here with me, you know. In Requiem. Maybe I can teach you to become a dragon. Or you can just ride me at night. You don't have to go back."
Rowan lowered her head. "I don't belong here."
"You don't belong in Paradise Lost!" Erry said. "They hate you there. Just because you're human. I know what that's like. People hate me here because my mom was a prostitute. Because I'm just a homeless orphan. But together we can do anything. We can show them all. We—"
"Oi, girl, you all right?"
Rough hands grabbed Rowan from behind.
Somebody pulled her.
Cinder filled her eyes, blinding her.
Rowan coughed, soot in her mouth, ash in her eyes. She struggled, but the hands tightened, yanking her back.
"Rowan!" rose a distant cry. It was Erry's voice, but she sounded miles away.
"Erry!" Rowan called out, but she couldn't see anything, and her enemy was pulling her, and the cinder blinded her, and she coughed and coughed and fell onto a hard metal deck.
She blinked, rubbed her eyes, and looked around her.
Rowan was back in Paradise Lost.
* * * * *
"Oi, you all right, girl?"
The hands released her.
Rowan flipped onto her back. She found herself looking up at an alien.
An alien!
She scampered backward and raised her fists—just like Erry had taught her. "Don't touch me! I can fight!"
He was a large alien, twice her height, and vaguely humanoid. He had green skin, a bristly white mustache, and four arms. A hardhat topped his head.
"Oi, calm down, I ain't gonna hurt ya, girl," the alien said. "I'm just the mechanic, I am. They sent me down here to fix the furnace. Said it stopped working. I found you sleeping inside. Did you know you could have burned to a crisp, girl? That furnace is just two minutes away from—"
Suddenly the furnace flared and belched fire. The flames lit the engine room. Rowan cringed in the heat.
"Two minutes early." The alien nodded. "Yep, it needs to be serviced all right."
"Sleeping?" Rowan whispered. She rubbed her eyes. "I was asleep in there? So it was just a dream . . ."
The towering green alien knelt by the furnace. With one hand, he opened his toolbox. With three other hands, he pulled out a wrench, a plyer, and a screwdriver. He began to work at the furnace, unscrewing some bolts, tightening others, humming as he worked.
Rowan stood for a moment, watching.
"Sir, is …" She licked her dry lips.
Is there a beach inside? she wanted to ask.
Is there a magical island and dragons in the sky?
Is there a girl like me, an orphan? A girl in the fire?
But she felt foolish. She could bring none of those questions to her lips.
The alien looked back her. He harrumphed, his white mustache bristling. "What's that, girl?"
"You're … not going to kill me, are you?" she asked instead.
The alien placed down his tools. He turned away from the furnace.
"No, girl." His voice was soft. "I'm not going to kill you. I know it's hard being human. I know most aliens see you as a pest. But we're not all like that. I would never harm you. And I promise not to tell anyone you were here."
Tears flowed down Rowan's cheeks, and she hugged the alien and wept onto his shoulder.
"Thank you," she whispered.
The green alien smiled, and his mustache tickled her forehead. "It ain't nothing at all, girl."
She stepped back, sniffing, and pulled out her pocket watch. "Sir, you're a mechanic. Do you think maybe … maybe you can take a look at this? Maybe fix it?"
The alien tapped his chin. "Hmm, yes, I suppose the furnace can wait for a moment. Let's take a look-see." He took the pocket watch and popped the lid. "Ah, would you look at that! Marvelous clockwork. These are rare machines. Where did you find this?"
"My father gave it to me," Rowan said. "Before he died."
The alien looked at her, eyes sad. "What's your name?"
"Rowan Emery," she said. No alien had ever asked her name. No more than they would ask a bug's name before squashing it.
"Yes, Rowan Emery, I think I can fix it. And I'll show you how. In case you ever need to fix your little friend yourself."
The alien took a magnifying glass from his toolkit. He held it with one hand, and with the other three, he held delicate tools. Like a surgeon, he tinkered inside the pocket watch, moving some gears, rerouting some cables, and replaced a battery he said was almost drained. Rowan watched, trying to memorize it all.
"And … that should do it." The alien snapped a final piece into place. "Ah, here we go!"
Delicate golden wings extended from the pocket watch. A head emerged with glowing little eyes. Tiny legs extended. As Rowan watched, her pocket watch transformed into a mechanical dragonfly.
Like Erry turning into a dragon, she thought.
Her dear friend Fillister hovered before her, wings beating.
"Ello, Row!" the tiny robot said. "My word, what a long sleep I've had. Blimey, you've grown. How long was I out?"
Rowan smiled and wiped away a tear. "A long while, old friend."
She held out her palm, and the dragonfly landed there.
"I'm sorry, Row," Fillister said. "But I'm here now. I'm back. And I promise you'll never be alone again."
Rowan sat in the corner, holding Fillister on her palm, watching the green alien fix the furnace. Finally the mechanic closed his toolbox, nodded, and turned to leave. At the door, he looked back at Rowan.
"Today I saw a girl inside a furnace," he said softly.
Rowan leaped to her feet. "Really? You saw Erry? Is she okay?"
The alien smiled. "I didn't see any girl called Erry. I found a girl called Rowan, curled up and asleep, dreaming in the darkness, about to burn in the fire. A girl with a broken little dragonfly. Things can be fixed, Rowan. Broken things can become whole again." He tipped his hardhat. "Goodbye."
Many times after that day, Rowan returned to the engine room, sat for long hours, and gazed at the furnace. Sometimes it was cold. Sometimes it roared with fire. But Erry never returned. And whenever Rowan dared leap inside, she found only ashes, no portal to another world.
Maybe she had dreamed it all. Or maybe fixing the furnace had closed the portal. Rowan didn't know.
But Fillister was back with her. And not all aliens hated her. And broken things could become whole again.
She spent most of her time in the ducts, but now she had hope. She dreamed that she could fly among the stars again. She never forgot flying on a dragon.
One day, on her fifteenth birthday, Rowan returned to the furnace. She sat in the corner, placed Fillister on her knee, and ate a sandwich stolen from a bar.
She was almost done eating when the furnace roared to life, fire crackled between the iron bars, and heat flowed up a chimney.
And just for a second, Rowan thought she saw her. Smiling. The girl in the fire. The flames soon vanished, and the girl was gone.
When Rowan stepped closer, her bare feet scattered warm powder. At first she thought it soot. But when Rowan knelt, when she ran her fingers through the golden grains, she smiled.
They were grains of sand.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
Both Rowan and Erry appear in other works of mine.
Would you like to know what happens to Rowan? She's the main character in a series titled Children of Earthrise, which begins two years after the events in this story. The first novel in the series is titled The Heirs of Earth. You can find the Earthrise series here: DanielArenson.com/Earthrise
Would you like to learn more about Erry? She's a character in a trilogy titled The Dragon War. The first novel is A Legacy of Light.
But for now, let's keep going. There are more stories to tell.
* * *
What if we finally snapped a photograph of an alien... but everyone who saw it went insane?
* * *
LIFE
Neon lights flickered, the last pot of coffee percolated, and even the janitor had gone home when the first photo of an alien life form came in.
Eliana sat alone in the sprawling office, her coffee mug down to dregs, her eyelids heavy. She often stayed late. She liked the silence of the night, the hundreds of monitors gone dark, and the headlights from the highway outside streaming through the windows like beacons from other worlds. While her coworkers spent evenings with spouses, friends, children, safe and warm in cozy houses, Eliana sought her quiet time here. She had always been alone. She had always been a dreamer. The stars had always been her family, her port of call.
"It's here." She sat up in her chair, and tears filled her eyes. "The first photo. It's here."
Her breath trembled. She could scarcely believe what she saw. The alerts popped up across her monitor. A life form detected. Data streaming in. A photo being downloaded.
Her mug fell from her hand, spilling its last drops of coffee across the desk.
She leaped to her feet.
"Oh stars, it's here. It's downloading."
In only a few minutes, the last bytes of data would arrive—arrive from out there—and she would be the first person in the Agency, the first human in history, to gaze upon alien life.
She spun away from her desk. She padded across the carpeting, barefoot, and placed her hands on the windowpane. The highway stretched outside through the desert, and above shone the stars, countless, brilliant, the celestial roads of the cosmos.
"I always knew," she whispered, voice trembling. "I always knew you were out there."
As tears streamed down her cheeks, she was a girl again, a girl alone in a very different desert, in a very distant country, climbing up the hill with her father, lying in the darkness, gazing up at the stars, the falling comets, the brilliant moon, the Milky Way the elders claimed was the heavenly path of chariots. The war had taken her father, and her life had taken her here to the Agency, but the stars remained forever above her, forever inside her, forever a dream of finding a better world. Of finding wisdom up there. Of finding hope.
She blinked the tears from her eyes. For so many years, the others would mock her, pity her—the woman with no family of her own, no house but her trailer in the valley, no life other than her search for other life, for life above.
But it was worth it, she thought, fresh tears budding. I've found that life. I've found the hope and wisdom I've always sought—up there. In the stars.
Behind her, her computer dinged.
The data had downloaded.
The photo was here. The first photo of alien life.
Shakily, Eliana sat back in her office chair and leaned forward. The file blinked; she just had to click. She just had to open it. She just had to look.
And yet she hesitated.
How would one process such a thing? How could one prepare to see such a monumental sight, such a fundamental discovery, the culmination of one's dreams in an image? Would her brain process it at once, or would the photo sink in slowly, breath by breath? Perhaps she should wait until tomorrow. Perhaps she should wait until her coworkers returned, to look with them, to—
She realized she was panting. She took a deep, shaky breath.
Just click, Eliana, she told herself. Just look … and the universe will open up before you, full of light and wisdom, full of welcome and comfort.
Again her tears fell. Perhaps all the hatred she had felt, all the loneliness—the fire that had taken her parents, the flight across the sea, the life in darkness, the unbearable loneliness of stargazing—perhaps it would all fade. Perhaps the eyes of the alien would gaze upon her through the monitor, telling her it was all right. That she was safe. That they had always been watching, that the cosmos was not cold and dark and barren but warm, full of life, full of love for her.
Her hand trembled on the mouse.
She clicked the file open.
And she looked.
And it looked at her.
Eliana lost her breath.
It's … it's …
Her breath shuddered. Her fingers shook. Her reflection stared back at her from the monitor, superimposed over it, staring back at her, gasping, pale.
Oh stars.
She screamed and placed her palms against the monitor. But she couldn't stare away. She trembled. Her cry echoed, hoarse, torn.
"So ugly," she whispered. "So ugly …"
She fell to the floor. She curled up. She wept.
She wanted to rise, to smash the monitor, to run, to jump out the window, to die. To die. To stop seeing. To gouge out her eyes.
