Space Junk

by Andrew Bixler

  Jumping up from his chair, he tosses the crumpled container in the airlock and plods into the living room. On the TV, a group of primitive humans is hanging out inside the same ancient-Earth apartment after which Beer modeled the interior of his ship, arguing about the best way to express pretzel-thirst. The picture-in-picture effect of the room-within-a-room used to give him vertigo, but he’s gotten used to it. He grabs the remote from the table, turns the sound up, and a chorus of one-liners and canned laughter accompanies him to the bathroom. When he’s finished emptying his bladder, he flops onto his faded green couch and stares at the screen, fidgeting with the remote until the show is over. Before he can get sucked into the next episode, he rolls off the couch and searches through the cupboards for something to eat. But nothing looks appetizing.

  He anxiously glances around the quiet room, waiting for something to happen. When nothing does, he trudges back to the cockpit and flops into the captain’s seat.

  “You there, Horton?” he asks.

  “Where else would I be?” Horton says.

  “You’ve been reading up on the black gold, right? Why do you think all these people are after it? What do you think they want it for?”

  “I have no clue. Even Ponce Raleigh never mentioned that part.”

  “I guess it doesn’t matter what it’s for,” Beer says. “What are you gonna do with your share, once we find it?”

  “I’ll probably start by modding my ship. You know, deck it out with all the craziest stuff I could never afford. What about you?”

  “You know?” Beer says. “I’m not sure.”

  “Hey, I got a groupie on me, can somebody take care of it?” Pants shouts.

  “What are you playing, Pants?” Beer asks.

  “Immaterial Girl,” she says. “There’s two more, somebody heal me! Why, you want to play?”

  “No, no… no,” Beer says.

  “Sure,” Horton says.

  “Well, all right,” Beer relents, “since there’s nothing else to do.”

  “Ha, I knew it.” Briefly lifting the sticker-plastered goggles transmitting the game into her cerebrum, Pants cackles and throws her head back. “You always make fun of it, but you guys think this game is brule! You want to play with girls!”

  “That’s not it,” Beer says. “We have a lot of time to kill, that’s all. It’s probably gonna be lame anyway.”

  “Yeah,” Horton says. “We just want to play so that the next time we make fun of it we’ll know exactly what we’re talking about.”

  Pants puts her face up to the camera and sticks her tongue out. “Are you guys going to quit whining and get in here?”

  Beer quickly installs the game on his ship’s computer and pulls it up on the window. The title screen shows a neon mushroom cloud turning a bunch of regular humanoid women into glowing mutants. From a few thousand choices, Beer selects a skinny rodent character with four arms and small round ears. He shortens her bright purple hair and changes the color of her fur to a bright shade of blue. Next he pores over clothing options and picks out a faded leather jacket and pants, and big goggles to rest across her forehead. He adds black boots and a few piercings, and her look becomes something like post-apocalyptic-biker-squirrel. Finally, he pulls her blank expression into a cocky smirk and saves his work.

  “Hey, what are you guys doing?” The One drops back into his chair, groggily rubbing his eyes.

  “We’re playing Immaterial Girl with Pants,” Horton says.

  “What the fish,” The One says. “Why didn’t anybody tell me? I wanna play.”

  “You better hurry,” Beer warns his little brother. “I’m almost done filling in my stats.”

  “You could wait for me,” The One complains.

  Beer laughs giddily. “The future waits for no one.”

  Adam wakes to feet in his face. He pushes them away and sits up with a jerk, momentarily unable to recall the identity of the person lying, head to toe, next to him. But the soft feminine snores emanating from the other end of the mattress quickly remind him.

  The TV casts a flickering glow over the dark room, muttering to itself, “Do you think that if you were falling in space, that you would slow down after a while or go faster and faster?”

  As Adam stands, he trips over a dark heap of clothes and loudly crashes into the wall. “Gah!”

  “Hey, I’m sleeping here!” Daizy complains.

  He sneaks into the bathroom and stares at his shabby appearance in the mirror. Cupping his hands in the tiny sink, he splashes a small amount of lukewarm water on his face and attempts to tame his extreme bedhead.

  When he gets back to the living room, he finds Daizy on the ground pawing through his physical media collection, her tail sticking up and waving in the air.

  “Be careful with those,” he says, flicking on the light. “They’re fragile and really hard to find.”

  “I’m just looking.” Daizy turns and scowls at him. “It’s not like I’m going to break anything. Ooh, what’s this one?” She holds up a green half-circle with alien writing crudely scrawled across the front.

  “That’s nothing,” Adam walks toward her, reaching for the tape. “Don’t look at that.”

  Daizy tries fitting the tape into different players stacked next to the TV until she finds one that fits and shoves it in. A distorted image appears on the screen, and the tracking automatically adjusts to bring into focus three sinewy, wizened creatures with pale, dry skin and black marble eyes exhaling vaguely erotic, animalistic moans as they prod each other with bony, gnarled fingers.

  “Eww…” Daizy teeters back onto the bed with her hands over her mouth.

  Adam presses a button on the player, and the machine spits out the tape. “Yeah, yeah, we all got urges.”

  “Yeah, but FITS porn?” She looks at him, wide-eyed and grimacing.

  “Hey, you’re the one looking through my stuff,” Adam says. “Who said you could… Wait a minute – how do you know what FITS porn looks like?”

  “Uh, I don’t know,” Daizy stammers. “I’ve just heard about it.” She blushes and her tail frantically flaps against the bed. “What do you have besides porn?” Turning away from him, she leans off the edge of the bed and starts searching for another tape.

  “Don’t bother,” Adam says, noticing the light blinking in the cockpit. “We’re coming up on the starline.”

  “Finally,” she says, jumping to her feet. “I can’t wait to get out of these clothes.”

  “Hey, I’m not stopping you.” He grins.

  She punches his arm, shoving him toward the front of the ship, and he falls into the captain’s chair. He grabs an Ol’ Guard from the fridge and notices Daizy staring as he lifts the can to his mouth, so he snatches another one and tosses it to her.

  The starline is a colossal glowing tunnel filled with traffic. Ships stream out in reaching waves toward the fluorescent light radiating from its surface, a beacon to distant travelers. Adam leans over the dash and gawks, paralyzed, as they glide toward the gleaming, planet-sized cuboid.

  “You have to get in line,” Daizy says, pointing to a long string of ships waiting beneath a blinking green arrow.

  Adam guides his ship toward the swirling sea of arriving spacecraft and pulls up behind a big yellow banana boat with a hula girl painted on the hull. He gazes out at the ships darting around the giant building and for a moment, amidst the raging tide of life, the universe seems to open up before him, offering a glimpse of the boundless potential inherent in all things. Daizy appears unfazed.

  “So, what do we do now?” Adam asks.

  Daizy shrugs and sips her beer. “We wait.”

  “You want to play movie trivia?” he suggests. “This distinctive character actor served as the inspiration for a secret society whose members supposedly bore enough of a resemblance to its namesake to have been his offspring…”

  “Nah,” she says.

  “So…” The banana lurches forward and Adam pulls up. “You’re a scrapper too
?”

  “Yeah.” She sets her beer down and glares at him. “What, a girl can’t do that either?”

  “I didn’t say that. I was just thinking your ship was kind of small for it. You wouldn’t be able to haul much.”

  “You don’t have to haul much if it’s valuable enough.” She gulps from her beer. “You probably pick up everything you can find.”

  “Yeah, so what’s wrong with that?” Adam asks.

  An ad for Ferd’s pops up on the window, “—everything under the sun. Haven’t you heard? You can find it all at—” and Adam swipes it away.

  “It’s inefficient,” Daizy says. “Most of what you salvage probably isn’t worth the fuel to drag it.”

  “Hey, I do just fine.” Adam finishes his beer and crushes the can against the dash, in a gratuitous display of brute strength.

  “Well I do great.” She smashes her empty can between her hands and reaches into the fridge.

  “Why don’t we watch a movie?” Adam says, bringing up a list on the window.

  Daizy scrolls through, frowning. “Where’s the good stuff?”

  “This is the good stuff.”

  “Lame.” She leans back in her seat, wrapping her tail around her ankles, and sips her beer.

  “There’s no winning,” Adam grumbles.

  “Sure there is,” she says. “It just doesn’t look the way you think it does.”

  He glares at her and murmurs, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You’re up.”

  “What?” he involuntarily shouts.

  Daizy looks at him humorlessly and points toward the window. “It’s your turn.”

  “Oh,” he says, slinking down into his seat.

  An impassive man in a dingy white uniform waves them forward from inside a floating booth at the head of the line. Adam pulls up and the spiffy attendant mimes something through the window.

  “What the fish is he saying?” Adam asks.

  Daizy shakes her head. “Turn to the utility channel.”

  “—ional passengers?” The man finishes just as Adam opens the feed.

  “Hello?” Adam says.

  “What’s the holdup?” the man impatiently grumbles.

  “Uh, no holdup,” Adam says.

  “How many passengers?”

  “You mean, including me?” Adam asks.

  The attendant closes his eyes and sighs dramatically. “Including yourself, how many total passengers are you transporting?”

  “Just two,” Adam says.

  “Please state your destination.”

  “Earth…”

  “Are you carrying any animals, fruits, or vegetables?” the attendant asks.

  “No,” Adam says. “Unless rations count as vegetables.”

  “They do not.”

  A bill appears on the window, and Adam’s shoulders slump. “Are you kidding me? That’s almost enough crits to pay off my ship.”

  “So what?” Daizy whispers. “Pretty soon you’ll have more credits than you’ll know what to do with.”

  Adam nervously fondles the cube in his pocket as he considers his options. “Fish,” he groans, pressing his thumb to the window.

  The man in the booth impatiently waves them forward. “Please allow your ship to guide you to the coordinates on your screen.”

  “Where do we—” Adam starts to ask, but he’s interrupted when the Asteroid Jones II abruptly accelerates, weaving through traffic as it glides up across a holographic grid of transparent red light. In a few seconds, it arrives at the coordinates indicated on the window and parks itself in a tight space behind a huge metallic sphere.

  Ships are packed in around them on all sides, separated by nothing but virtual dividers, and Adam immediately feels claustrophobic. “Another line?” he moans.

  “Would you relax?” Daizy says. “We’re going to be on the other side of the universe in the blink of an eye.”

  “I guess I imagined the blink of an eye being a little faster than this.” He falls back against his seat and sighs. “What do you want to do until we start moving?”

  “Wait,” Daizy says.

  “Hmph, I guess there’s only one thing left to do at a time like this,” Adam says, swiping at the window to scroll through his movie list as he reaches into the fridge for another beer.

  “What’s going on?” Dave asks.

  “I don’t know,” Steve says, crouching around the side of their company van. “I can’t make out what they’re saying.”

  On the other side of the lot, Zok is talking to a tall, blonde bombshell. Steve tries his best to eavesdrop on their conversation, but their words are drowned out by an endless stream of ships passing over the black pyramid, creating an unrelenting soundtrack of whirring engines and howling wind.

  “Let’s get out of here before they notice us,” Dave says.

  “This is ridiculous.” Steve steps out from behind the van and begins stomping across the lot.

  “Hey, wait a second,” Dave calls, scurrying in pursuit.

  “I’m so glad we could arrange this partnership,” Steve hears the woman saying as he approaches.

  Neither she nor Zok notices him until he’s close enough to touch them. But before he can utter a word, his arm is forcefully seized and twisted around his back.

  “Ow, ow.” Steve shimmies and hops, struggling to wrench free.

  The woman looks at him curiously, and asks, “Who are you?”

  Dave catches up, waving his hands, and explains, “We’re from the ICA. We don’t want any trouble. We’re looking for the Asteroid Jones, same as you.”

  The woman nods and Steve’s arm is freed. He turns and glares up at the muscular bodyguard who apprehended him and mutters, “Thanks.”

  “What do you know about the Asteroid Jones?” the woman asks.

  “Well, nothing,” Dave says.

  “But we want to help you find it,” Steve adds. “Admiral Zok will vouch for us.”

  “That’s Vice Admiral.” Zok dismissively glances at the two pleading men. “They’re hangers-on. I highly doubt they will be of any help to us.”

  “That’s not true,” Steve says. “I’m sure we have something to offer. If we could just speak with The Foreman…”

  The woman crosses her slender arms and smiles. “You have my ear.”

  “Oh, umm,” Steve mutters. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, sir?”

  “We apologize for the intrusion,” Dave says.

  “That’s my fault.” Rubbing his arm, Steve glances at the black-clad security guards surrounding them. “All we’re after is Adam Jones. We know he has something you want, and you can have it. We just want him.”

  The Foreman defers to the vice admiral. “What do you think, Zok?”

  “I think these guys are useless,” Zok says.

  “Coming from a guy who buys an obscene amount of compu-porn,” Steve mumbles.

  “AHAHAHA,” The Foreman cackles. “I knew there was something off about you, Zok.”

  Zok stares down at them, red-faced and shaking.

  “I’m just kidding around,” Steve says. “Chit, I like… smut.”

  “I like your style, boys,” The Foreman says. “Why don’t you come inside and help us work this thing out.” Fluidly turning toward the giant pyramid, her golden hair sweeping across her back, she slips into the stream of customers crowding the walkway and disappears into the dark building.

  Zok follows close behind, grumbling under his breath.

  “I don’t know about this,” Dave says.

  “Come on.” Steve grabs Dave’s arm and drags him across the sidewalk and through the crammed entrance.

  The pair pushes against a roaring mob of alien bodies flowing in sweaty currents through the lobby, and Steve cranes his neck to look ahead.

  “What do you see?” Dave shouts over the bustle.

  “More of the same,” Steve says. When he spots The Foreman and Zok ducking into a hallway at the far end of the cavernous room, he grabs ho
ld of Dave’s arm and starts shoving people out of the way. Progress is slow against the tide, but they finally stumble out into the hall. “Chit, I think we lost them.”

  They sprint to the end of the bright corridor, past a room full of well-aged humanoids performing obscene acts in candle wax, and they find The Foreman and Zok waiting in the elevator.

  “Nice of you to join us,” Zok says.

  Stepping into the spacious box, Dave tells The Foreman, “This is quite a place you got here. I visited a couple times when I was a kid, but it’s something else now.”

  “That’s very kind of you,” she says, as the elevator lifts off. “It’s my home and my life’s work. It’s come a long way.”

  “But you didn’t build it yourself,” Steve says. “It started out as a small trading post, put in place by the first Foreman some five hundred years ago.” He looks at Dave and grins. “I bet you didn’t know that.”

  The Foreman smiles and touches Steve’s arm. “Of course, I didn’t do it all myself. A lot of hard work went into building Scrapper’s Delight.”

  Steve feels his muscles relaxing as he looks into her eyes, half-hypnotized. “Well, it’s something.”

  “Hmph,” Zok scoffs. “Eloquently put.”

  “I had no idea The Foreman was a beautiful woman,” Dave says.

  “I’ll take that as a compliment,” she says, turning her gaze on him.

  “Guhh…” Dave’s eyes glaze over, and his mouth drops open as she moves her hand to his shoulder.

  The elevator doors slide open, and the four unlikely allies step into the nautical lobby outside The Foreman’s office. Steve immediately dashes toward the coffee machine in the corner and sticks a small disposable cup underneath the spout. He presses the button for xpresso, and the machine hums and shakes and leaks a thick black tar. Gingerly lifting the cup to his mouth, he slurps a tiny bit of the dark liquid, and his lips instantly pucker. “Ahh,” he sighs and coughs, eyes watering. “It’s a fine brew.”

  “Please, gentlemen,” The Foreman opens the door to her office and waves them inside.

  Zok takes a seat on a wood bench in front of the fake fire as Steve and Dave wander around the room, gazing at the trinkets lining the walls. Steve steps across the plank floor to The Foreman’s monstrous desk, the surface of which is buried under a mound of miscellaneous scrap, and he plucks out an electronic rod in the shape of a thumb. He gazes at it for a moment, turning it between his fingers, and then knocks it against the edge of the desk a couple times.