Meteor Mags: Omnibus Edition

by Matthew Howard

  The mother octopus had neither guarantee nor promise the two of them would return, but she had an unassailable, animal faith in Mags. She told her offspring the story of meeting Mags and Patches, how they had communed with her and kept their promise to help hatch the babies.

  The octopuses swarmed around their mother, raising their tentacles in union. They formed an image in their minds of Meteor Mags and Patches as goddesses of the great waters and the vast unknown space which lay beyond. Though they lacked voices, they filled the mental plane with what could only be called singing.

  “Bloody hell,” she whispered. “They think I’m some sort of deity.”

  Patches whined.

  “And you too, dear.”

  Then the mother octopus gave her final instructions to the young cephalopods, and she sank to the bottom of the pit.

  “Oh no,” cried Mags. “We were too late!” She dove into the obsidian depths, joined by Patches and the hundreds of babies. She ran her star-covered tentacles over the gigantic octopus head, hoping against all hope. But there was nothing she could do—nothing but witness the past.

  The mother octopus had watched over her unhatched children for years without any food at all. If not for Mags, she knew, she would have starved to death before they were ever born. She had impressed this on her offspring, and also the necessity of the terrible action they must take to survive.

  Opening their beaks, the young octopuses fed on their mother’s lifeless body. Mags turned away from the sight, but it was no use. Locked in telepathic communion with the babies, she lived the horrifying feast. Patches swam into her arms.

  Mags tasted the mother’s body. She devoured the tentacles and the network of neurons in them. Memories of losing her own mother came to her. She wept into the water. Her heart ached and pounded in her chest.

  Then she felt the wave of calm again. The octopuses sensed her stress. They regulated her neurochemicals, soothing her. Her terror subsided. Patches purred in her embrace.

  As one being, Mags, Patches, and the baby octopuses consumed the brain of the great mutant octopus. All of the mother’s knowledge became their knowledge. All they had ever felt, they felt together.

  As one living creature with thousands of tentacles, the swirling mass realized the mother was not gone at all. She had become a part of them, and they had become a part of her. There was nothing to mourn, as no one had gone away. A hum filled the water. It begged for a melody. The sound turned into white light. It filled everything.

  Mags opened her eyes. She scooped Patches into her arms and stood up. She switched off her headlamp and removed her mask. She no longer felt any fear or sadness—only joy, only unity, only love.

  The humming rose in volume all around her. Mags wiped tears from her eyes. She felt the minds of the octopuses touching hers, communing with her still. She understood the unspoken question in their hum.

  “Of course I will, darlings. Of course I will.”

  And there, in the darkened recesses of the asteroid caverns, Meteor Mags lifted her head, began a melody, and led the gathered octopuses in song.

  ★ ○•♥•○ ★

  Aboard the Queen Anne, Donny popped the cap off another beer. The dots on the monitor had not moved in several minutes. If Mags and Patches weren’t moving, he reasoned, they might be in trouble. Or they could just be feeding their weird little pets. He decided to give them one more minute.

  He looked out the window of the ship. Mags never seemed to grow tired of looking at the stars, thought Donny, but as an asteroid miner he had grown a bit sick of them. It wasn’t like you could touch them. They just hung there, stupidly, probably burned out millions of years ago and nothing but dead husks floating in space. Dead, dying, and death as far as the eyes could see.

  Donny frowned. “Getting morbid in your old age, aren’t you, Donald?” Then he hunched over. The bottle fell from his hand. Beer sloshed across the deck. “Ungh!” He dropped to his hands and knees, but he did not see the deck. Instead, he saw death.

  Darkness surrounded him, endless wet darkness. His arm struck out, meeting nothing. A giant skull hovered before him. Blood ran from its eyes. Piece by piece, it crumbled into fragments. A horde of smaller skulls descended upon it, devouring it.

  Donny stared. “What the—” An unusual thought came to him. “That was metal as fuck!”

  Donny’s fear suddenly vanished. The blackness around him faded. His hands found his chair. He pulled himself to his feet.

  A song came to Donny. It did not come over the ship’s speakers. It simply came to him, a chorus of voices, a wash of emotions and images, hundreds of singers alive with joy, and love, and unity.

  His eyes fell upon the stars. He no longer saw endless death in their distant lights. In fact, he saw them as a child, as if he had never seen them before. The Milky Way Galaxy sprawled before him, as if some god had splashed it on a canvas. It no longer seemed a dull, inhuman thing taunting him from afar. He felt he was a part of it, that he could never leave it, nor ever want to. It sang to him in a star-covered voice.

  And the melody, he realized, was led by Meteor Mags.

  Later, when he would tell this story, he could never pin down how long this went on. It might have been minutes or maybe hours. He only knew that while he listened, time had no meaning.

  Eventually, the song subsided. Mags’ voice came over the speakers. “Donny? Donny? Are you there?”

  “I’m here. What’s happening? I swear I thought I heard you singing.”

  Laughter chimed over the speakers. “Oh, did you hear that? All the way up there?”

  “It was like I heard it in my head. What the hell are you doing down there?”

  Donny heard nothing for a minute. Then the speakers came to life again. “I’ll tell you all about it when I get up there. Oh, and Donny?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I know what song we’re gonna put on the next album. See you in a few.”

  ★ ○•♥•○ ★

  “Check this out.” Mags tossed him a leather-bound book. “Patches found it.”

  Donny caught it. “What was going on down there? I had the craziest feeling up here and—whoa. What is this?” He flipped through the pages. They appeared to contain writing, but in a script he had never seen before. Some pages contained mechanical drawings for parts he did not recognize, machines he had never encountered. But strangest of all, the illustrations depicted some sort of dinosaur.

  “I don’t know, but it sure is a trip. Look at it! It’s like a manual to build some kind of spaceship, and a bunch of those bloody lizards!”

  “These aren’t lizards, Mags. These are dinosaurs. Look at this page here.” He held up the book for her to see.

  “That’s the bastard who chained me up and electrocuted me! If not for Tarzi—”

  “This thing chained you up?”

  “Yes, dickweed! Or something that looked just like it. He had me chained up and was frying me with those electric rods they carry. It—”

  “Mags. This is a Dracorex. It’s been extinct for more than, I don’t know, a hundred seventy-five million years or something. It’s fucking dead.”

  Her cigarette fell onto the deck.

  “Patches found this?”

  Mags picked up her cigarette. She almost took a puff, then looked at it. She walked over to the console and stubbed it out on an ashtray. Then she produced another and lit up. “A Dracorex.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “Aren’t you the little paleontologist?” Mags blew a series of smoke rings, staring out the window into space. “Yes,” she said. “Patches found it. We were on our way out, and she was sniffing around. As she does.”

  Donny looked over at Patches, sprawled on the corner of Mags’ bed. The tip of her tail flicked back and forth. Her face had relaxed into a feline scowl. She rested her chin on one of her legs. Donny was never sure how much of what Mags told him about Patches was real and how much she just made up. “What happened to you two
down there?”

  Mags laughed. “I got two words for you, Donny. Sentient tentacles.” She strolled over to her portable keyboard, set on a stand by the edge of her bunk. “Those things aren’t just alive and hungry, Donny. They’re intelligent.” She flipped a switch and sat down. Brushing her bangs back from her forehead, she told Donny exactly what she had learned inside the asteroid.

  “So that’s what I was feeling.”

  Mags arched an eyebrow at him. “What were you feeling?”

  Donny looked away, embarrassed. “It was—I don’t know how to say it without sounding like some kind of fucking hippie.”

  Mags smiled and leaned forward. “Let me help you, dear. You felt like everything you ever loved had died. And your whole life was meaningless, empty, and dead. And then, all of that melted away. And you felt the whole universe was an endless reservoir of love, and you were a part of everything.”

  She knew, somehow. “That’s exactly it, Mags.”

  Her lips curled into an evil smile. Then she laughed and laughed. “You fucking hippie!”

  Donny could not help but join her laughter. “Fuck you, Mags.”

  “Fuck you, too! Do you want me to get your tie-dye and sandals ready?”

  “Hahaha. Damn it, Mags! Why do you always have to bust my balls?”

  “Cause I like you, ya sodding useless space miner. Now listen. You ever hear that Deftones song Diamond Eyes? Do you think you can get that sort of guitar and bass sound at the end out of your sax?”

  “Oh, for sure. Love that album.”

  “Good. And maybe keep it going for like thirty minutes like a Swans riff?”

  “Now that sounds fun.”

  “Good. Because this is the song I want to put on the next album. It’s called Octopus Mother. It goes something like this.” And then, accompanying herself on the keyboard, Mags sang.

  Give myself to you

  So that you may live

  All my everything

  All I have to give

  See the stars that shine

  If they all were mine

  They would never fall

  I give you my all

  There’s no future here

  But the one we make

  If we can’t have that

  Then the one we take

  Nothing ever but forever

  Nothing ever but forever

  We will all become as one

  Donny sat entranced. He had never mentioned it to anyone, but his favorite part of jamming with the Psycho 78s was listening to her sing. She had something so pure, so raw in her voice.

  Suddenly, an inbound message lit up the control console. “Incoming! And it’s marked priority.” He switched on the communicator to play the message.

  “Mags,” said Celina’s voice over the cabin’s speakers. “All hell is breaking loose here! There’s some kind of robot running wild and tearing everything apart! Fuzz and I are going to take it on, but we sure could use all the help we can get, wagtail. When you get this, get back to the club. And put the pedal to the metal!”

  Mags stormed over to the console without a word. She knew the distance between the club and the ship would mean a delay in the signal, but she opened a channel anyway. “Celina! If you get this, hold down the fort, convict. We’re on our way and ready to bring the noise. Mags out.”

  She took her seat. “Strap in, Donny. And get ready to kick some arse.” She looked over her shoulder. “You too, Patches. Celina’s in trouble.”

  Patches ignored the command, but she jumped up onto Donny’s lap. He clicked his safety restraints into place. Donny did not know Patches now understood every word Celina said. Nor did he know Mags’ very life would soon depend on her little calico cat.

  The Queen Anne kicked into high gear and sped back to the club.

  PART TWO: THE LADDER OF LIFE

  Hyo-Sonn, Kala, and Suzi sat in Club Assteroid’s garden. The garden provided fresh food for the club. It also indulged Mags’ floral passions. La Plaza Margareta may have ended years ago, but she had moved the statue of her great-grandmother here and surrounded it with magnolia trees. She had bolted a plaque over the garden’s entrance. It read, “Maggie’s Farm.”

  When Celina pointed out that Maggie in Bob Dylan’s tune was the villain, Mags responded, “So what? It’s anti-establishment, it’s got my name in it, and Rage Against The Machine covered it. Close enough!”

  The three young women discussed a mural Kala wanted to paint and unveil at Mags’ birthday party in November.

  “What about a historical mural?” Kala asked.

  “You mean like great women of history?” Hyo-Sonn bit into a peach plucked from a nearby tree. “We could do ones from that book she has, like Annie Besant and all them.”

  “She’d rather have pirates,” Suzi said.

  Kala laughed. “She so would. Oh, that gives me an idea. We could do a mural of her great-gramma.”

  “And her gramma, and her mom,” said Hyo-Sonn. “That way we get pirates and great women of history!”

  Suzi chomped on a fresh orange. “And it narrows down how many people we have to paint. Damn, these things are good.”

  “You’ve really turned this garden around, Suzi. It was kind of a shambles when we got here, wasn’t it?”

  “Ah, it’s no big deal.” She spat out a seed. “If you want farming done right, hire a farm girl!”

  Kala smiled. She had never cared for Suzi’s provincial and frankly racist attitude. But she could tell something had changed in the young woman since they were captured and subsequently rescued by Meteor Mags. Kala supposed anyone could change, given enough time and the right setting. “I don’t know if we have enough details to paint all that. Do you think Mags would tell us some more stories?”

  Hyo-Sonn laughed. “Oh, you know how Mags is. Every time we try to get her to commit to something, she says the same thing: I’ve got cargo to ‘liberate!’ Lizards to exterminate!”

  “Dance poles to lubricate.”

  “Ewww! Gross, Suzi.”

  “What? I’m just sayin’.”

  Above them, unseen, a pair of cybernetic eyes watched them converse. The young cyborg did not understand the conversation, but it sensed the presence of organic material, machinery, and meat. This would be a good place to grow. It flexed its metallic fingers.

  Suzi continued, “But seriously, I think it’s a good idea. Maybe we could do like one scene from each of their lives, real big. And don’t forget Patches.”

  “No, we can’t forget Patches,” said Kala. “But which scenes?”

  “Do you remember that story Mags told us about her ring?” Hyo-Sonn asked. “And then something about the GravGens.”

  Kala sketched in her notebook. “Yeah, and that scene where she met—”

  Suddenly, the ductwork above them exploded. The cybernetic infant fell through the shrapnel to the ground. Its metallic lips parted in a roar.

  The young women fell to the dirt, shielding their faces. Suzi looked over her arm. She had no idea what she was looking at, but it was not good. Kala screamed something, but it only registered as noise. Suzi rolled out of the way. A chunk of ductwork crashed beside her. Her hand closed on a shovel’s handle.

  Suzi rose to her feet, growling like an animal. Behind her, Kala and Hyo-Sonn scrambled away from the monster. Suzi gripped the shovel with both hands. She ran at the snarling thing, and with all the force she could muster, swung the shovel like a baseball bat.

  The metal blade smashed into the attacker. A shower of sparks and lightning erupted from the point of contact. The wooden handle insulated Suzi from the electricity, but the force pummeled her backwards through the air. She landed on her back in the dirt, knocking the wind from her lungs. The shovel fell from her hands.

  But her attack was not in vain. She had smacked the cyborg several meters backwards. As it struggled to regain its footing, Hyo-Sonn’s arms encircled her, pulling her away from the monster and towards the exit. Another chunk of the ceiling
fell where Suzi had been gasping just seconds before.

  The cybernetic infant stood and hissed at the trio. Its metal tongue lashed the air between two rows of sharpened teeth. An orb of sparks crackled around its body, and its eyes glowed red. It was not yet as tall as the girls in the garden, but its diminutive stature did nothing to soften its horrifying visage. It charged.

  Suzi scrambled to her feet.

  Hyo-Sonn released her. “Come on,” she shouted. “Come on!”

  Kala had made it to the door already. She stood ready to punch the access button and slam it shut as soon as her friends made it through. But as Suzi and Hyo-Sonn ran towards her, Kala got a good view of the thing attacking them. Her artistic eyes captured its details. And what she saw sent a chill through her soul. For the attacker was not entirely alien. In fact, its face looked incredibly familiar.

  Hyo-Sonn and Suzi ran past her. She punched the button outside the doorway. The door to the garden slid shut. Though sturdy, it was not opaque. A Plexiglas sheet six inches thick and set in a metal frame, it gave Kala a perfect view of the monster who pursued them.

  The cyborg slammed into the Plexiglas. Kala watched it howl in anger. Its metal fingernails raked the other side of the door. The plastic curled up and fell away in strips. She looked into its red eyes and memorized them.

  “What in the fuck is that?” Suzi shouted.

  “Let’s go,” said Hyo-Sonn. “We need Celina!”

  The cyborg placed its hand on the metal doorframe. A bolt of lightning erupted from its hand, engulfing the frame.

  Kala screamed. She fell back from the door.

  “Kala!” Hyo-Sonn caught her friend. The doorframe crackled with sparks. The controls smoked and sizzled.

  “Fucking hell, let’s go!” Suzi yelled.

  They ran down the hall as fast as they could.

  ★ ○•♥•○ ★

  Hyo-Sonn pounded her fist on the door again and again. “Celina!”