“Nosiree, Cap’n!” the tiny individual said cheerfully.
Jimmy watched as the little person hopped up onto the seat next to Nick, pulled up a series of holographic controls, and began to go to work right alongside Nick himself. The view through the little person’s helmet didn’t give Jimmy the greatest profile, but he saw an old man’s face with a beard and a moustache, and oversized, inhumanly pointed ears.
“Is that—?” Jimmy said, beginning to aim a finger at the impish being.
“It’s not polite to point, James,” said the smallish, space-suited creature. Jimmy watched as the Chief Engineer waved his little hands through numerous flashing diagrams and displays, tapping out instructions pantomime-fashion. A series of holo windows all blinked bright green, and the little man stood up and gave Astronaut Nick a proper salute.
“The drive’s good to go whenever you want it, boss,” he said.
“Thank you,” Nick said cheerfully, and then the little creature vanished—presumably through a hatch in the floor that James couldn’t see, since he was still staring over the edge of the sack in which he sat.
“Hang on,” Nick said, “this part gets a little weird.”
Jimmy had no time to prepare, as suddenly Nick’s finger zinged through a series of holographic triggers, and all the stars in space flashed like camera bulbs. They froze at that point, and grew even brighter, then they ran and smeared like melting wax across a black velvet canvas.
Jimmy’s stomach wasn’t happy with the accompanying sensation, and he slapped a palm over his mouth to keep from making a mess in Astronaut Nick’s sleigh, when just as quickly, the stars all snapped back to normal and Jimmy’s stomach righted itself.
In the distance, a dark sphere blotted out part of the view, with a thin crescent showing along one side where the sun reflected. In patches across the sphere’s black side, clusters of lights shone brightly. Familiar clusters of lights.
Jimmy almost leapt out of the sack.
“Ceres!” he said.
Nick merely kept manipulating his control holographs, and the view shifted dramatically as Nick’s sleigh zoomed down to the surface of the asteroid at an improbable speed. There was barely any sound, other than a variably-pitched humming that seemed to correspond with the sleigh’s motion through space. Eventually the sleigh came to rest on a pad not too unlike the one back at Olympus Mons, and Nick looked down at Jimmy as Jimmy sat perched in Nick’s sack.
“Ready to go home?”
“Yes! Yes!” Jimmy said, almost jumping up and down on the heap of gifts that had been cushioning him during the ride.
“Okay then, I have to close the sack back up,” Nick said.
Jimmy nodded eagerly, then held his breath for an instant while Nick shut the mouth of the sack tight. Again Jimmy felt himself being lifted, hefted, and carried. To eventually be set down on a flat surface some time later, after passing through what sounded like—in the muffled confines of the sack—several airlock cycles.
Jimmy practically burst out of the sack when next Astronaut Nick opened it.
They’d landed on the pad nearest to where Jimmy’s quarters had been—he knew this part of Ceres well enough that he probably could have walked through it blindfolded. As on Mars, there were no adults, nor even any children. Jimmy reveled in the miniscule gravity, and somersaulted his way down one of the corridors, whooping with joy at the freedom of his movements. No more clunky, plodding steps. Jimmy soared like a bird, artfully pushing off here and there as his toes and fingertips made contact. Given time, he’d have gradually settled to the deck. But on Ceres, even children possessed the strength of men, and Jimmy celebrated his return with an unselfconscious display of microgravity acrobatics that would have done any seasoned spacer proud.
Astronaut Nick trailed behind, his helmet off and clipped to a tether at his waist, while he towed his large sack of presents from another tether. Nick’s movements were much more reserved, but no less deft. He kept pace with Jimmy despite Jimmy’s headlong rush for home.
Finally, they arrived at the hatchway to Jimmy’s parents’ quarters. Jimmy slapped his hand on the palm reader and laughed as the door slid open, allowing Jimmy to spring inside and carom off one of the walls. They had a spectacular star roof which had been left open, allowing natural light to flood in through the centimeters-thick, ultraviolet-blocking vacuum glass.
Nick floated in behind Jimmy, and the hatch snapped shut.
Jimmy gradually came to rest against one of the walls, and when he was done catching his breath—the exhilaration of the moment having been almost too much to stand—his brow furrowed.
“Something wrong?” Astronaut nick asked.
“No,” Jimmy said. Then thought better of himself, and admitted, “yes.”
“What’s the issue, James?” Astronaut Nick said, allowing himself to slowly sink to the deck, along with his cargo.
“This is,” Jimmy said, then stopped.
“Yes?” Nick said, a white eyebrow raised over the top of the rim for his spectacles.
“It’s home,” Jimmy said. “But … it’s not home. I don’t get it. This is where we used to live. And look at how much room there is here! We have three compartments, and that’s not even including where we sleep! But … it’s too … it’s too empty.”
“Too empty?” Astronaut Nick said, keeping an eyebrow raised.
“Yes,” Jimmy admitted. “The furniture is gone, my Mom’s paintings aren’t on the wall, Dad’s Wall Ball trophy isn’t over in the corner in its case, and there isn’t the smell of bread baking in the bread maker.”
“Well, of course,” Astronaut Nick said. “Your request was pretty clear. You said you wanted to go back to Ceres—that you wanted to go home. So, here we are. This is home.”
“But it’s … it’s not the same!” Jimmy said, feeling more and more uneasy with each passing moment. “This isn’t how it’s supposed to be. I wanted to come home to the way things were before we left! I wanted it to be just like it used to be. I don’t want to be stuck here with a bunch of empty rooms!”
“So you want to go back to Mars?” Astronaut Nick asked.
“No!” Jimmy blurted. “I never want to go back there! I hate it at Olympus Mons!”
Astronaut Nick breathed deeply, and then sighed.
“Well,” the man in the red and white space suit said, “you’d better get used to living by yourself. You won’t have your family here to take care of you. Some of your old friends are present, but then, it’s been awhile since you left, and some of your old friends have moved on as well. There are other colonies in the solar system, you know. Not everybody gets to stay in the same place. In fact, most people don’t.”
Jimmy stared up through the star roof, his eyes beginning to brim with tears. He’d dreamt of this moment for so long, and now that he was finally getting to have his wish, he was realizing that maybe what he’d wished for, wasn’t going to be possible after all? No matter if Astronaut Nick was real, and could perform spaceflight miracles.
“You know,” Astronaut Nick said, “it’s really not too late for me to get you back to Mars. If we’re quick about it, we might even get you back in time for you to crawl into bed before your parents know you’re gone. That thing you feel in your stomach right now—the sadness—just think how your mother and father will feel when they wake up and you’ve gone, James. They won’t know where you are or what’s happened to you. There isn’t even a note to tell them.”
Jimmy felt his throat close up. He wrapped himself into a ball on the floor of his empty, silent former home, and began to cry.
Eventually he felt a strong hand touch his shoulder. Astronaut Nick’s voice was calm, deep, and gentle.
“James,” he said, “I’ve given a lot of boys and girls their wishes over the years. Not every wish is always meant to work out the way you think it should work out. Now, I’ll ask you one more time—yes or no—do you want to stay here on Ceres?”
Jimmy held his arms ac
ross his chest, not looking at anything. His eyes were shut tight, and the liquid that spilled from them was hot.
“I want it to be like it was,” he sobbed, his nose stuffed up. “I want my old life back!”
“I know,” Astronaut Nick said, maintaining his firm grip on Jimmy’s shoulder, “but one of the things you’re going to learn quickly as you get older, is that things are always changing. You will always remember how wonderful the past was—and these memories will be like treasure in your heart. But there isn’t any way to go back. Not really. Because you will change too. The you that used to live here, he’s already gone. There’s a new you waiting to come to life, at Olympus Mons. If you’ll stop being stubborn, and let it happen.”
“Nobody likes me there,” Jimmy sniffed. “They all think I’m a stupid, clumsy klutz.”
“Nobody?” Astronaut Nick said, a hint of amusement in his tone. “Don’t be too sure about that. Let me read you something I got in my e-mail not long before I came to visit you.”
Jimmy vaguely sensed Astronaut Nick rummaging for something in a pouch strapped to his thick, red-colored leg. He brought out a small touch pad and used his thickly-gloved fingers to deftly slide and tap along the pad’s surface, until a white screen with text on it glowed up into Nick’s old face.
“Let’s see, this comes from someone named Contessa Canfield—a classmate of yours if I am not mistaken. I’d been expecting her to ask for a set of super blocks building modules, which she’s been dying for since her birthday, but you know what she asked for instead? Let me read this. She said: Dear Nick, please help Jimmy Carrico to be happy. He’s my new friend at school and no matter what I do I can’t cheer him up. Not even telling him about you makes him smile. I’ll give up anything you were going to bring me this year if you can find a way to help Jimmy be happy. Thanks, Tessa.”
Jimmy sat in stunned silence, his tears momentarily forgotten.
“Tessa wrote that?” he mumbled.
“She did,” Astronaut Nick said, turning off the pad and sliding it back into the pouch on his leg; then zipping the pouch closed.
Jimmy raised his head and stared up at Nick.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go back to Mars, James? Seems there’s more than two people who’ll miss you an awful lot if you’re not there to see them tomorrow. Any girl who’d give up presents in the hope that she could bring joy to a new friend, is someone I’d say is worth keeping by your side. Not many children grasp the true meaning of Christmas. I think Tessa is one of them.”
Jimmy felt a new lump form in his throat. He debated his choices, staring around him at the barren walls of his former house.
“But it’s still going to be so hard,” he said forlornly.
“Yes,” Astronaut Nick said, “but that’s also something you’re going to have to get used to. Just as your Mom and Dad got used to it. Just as every adult gets used to it. But just because something is hard, doesn’t mean you won’t ever be happy. In fact, you just might find that the harder something is, once you get through it, the happier you can be on the other side. Because happiness isn’t a time or a place, James. Happiness is in here.”
Astronaut Nick’s stubby, gloved index finger tapped Jimmy’s chest.
“It’s also in the other souls with whom you share this universe. You’re not old enough yet to really understand, but someday very soon, I think you will. You just have to trust an old man to know what’s he’s talking about. Can you do that?”
Jimmy’s eyes leaked new tears, but he nodded his head stiffly.
“Yeah,” Jimmy snuffled, “okay, I think I get it. Maybe. Mom, Dad, Tessa, I don’t want them to be sad. And they’d be sad if I was gone. And now that I’m here, I am realizing here is gone too.”
Astronaut Nick said nothing, he merely squeezed Jimmy’s shoulder.
“Take me back to Mars, please,” Jimmy said.
Nick wordlessly opened his sack, and let Jimmy crawl in.
Sunlight.
A new day.
Jimmy rolled out of his bunk and came to rest lightly on his feet, his balance a bit unsteady. He’d spent much of the night enjoying Ceres’ gravity. Being suddenly back in Mars gravity was unsettling. But also, strangely, for the very first time, comforting too.
As if on cue, Mom’s head poked into the compartment.
“James, dear,” she said, smiling, “wake up and come see! It’s magic!”
Jimmy pulled himself up and walked—thud-footed—out of his chamber and into the family living and dining area. The heady smell of freshly-baked bread hit his nose, and Dad had put some music on the surround sound speakers. Something cheerful, with bells in it. A tune Jimmy suspected he’d heard before, but couldn’t quite place.
“Good morning, Jim,” Dad said, perched over by the bubble window. “You really should come see this.”
Jimmy walked slowly over and then leaned into the window, his eyes scanning about.
There were space-suited figures wandering around outside. Adults and children alike. A thick blanket of white fluff covered the ground to a depth of several centimeters. One of the adults was wadding a packet of the snow in her hands, then playfully flung it at one of the children. Promptly, all of the children stooped to collect snowballs of their own, and almost immediately a spectacular multi-target barrage of hurled projectiles ensued.
One of the children saw Jimmy and his parents looking out through their bubble. The space-suited child loped over to stand at the window.
Tessa waved at Jimmy, and Jimmy—cracking a wide grin—waved back.
“You ought to go out with them,” Dad urged with a smile.
“Can I?” Jimmy said enthusiastically, his head rapidly clearing.
“I don’t know,” Mom said, suddenly getting a better look at Jimmy in the morning light. “Your eyes are puffy and it looks like you’ve been crying. Do you have a cold?”
“I’m okay,” Jimmy said. “Really. I’m alright. Let me go rinse up and use the latrine, and I’ll be fine.
“Well … okay,” Mom said.
Five minutes later, Jimmy was at the same observation dome where he’d stood the night before—or thought he’d stood the night before, when Astronaut Nick had first made his acquaintance. Ten minutes after that, Jimmy was outside in a suit of his own, running in the kangaroo-hop fashion all the other children had learned to adopt since coming to Mars, until he too was engaged in the great snowball war which had come to the slopes of Olympus Mons.
When things quieted down, Tessa and Jimmy found themselves paired off and walking over to the landing pad where the big shuttles ordinarily touched down.
Jimmy hadn’t dared speak a word of his experience to his new friend. He wasn’t sure she’d believe him—because he wasn’t sure he’d believe him, either. The memory of the prior night was already becoming soft around the edges, and tinged with the flavor of dreams. Of course it wasn’t possible that Jimmy had actually ridden in a hyperspace sleigh back to Ceres, when the journey from Ceres to Mars, and vice versa, ordinarily took weeks. Even when Ceres and Mars were closest to each other in their orbits around the sun.
But then Tessa pointed to something up on the pad.
She and Jimmy loped up to see what it was. They found what appeared to be a large, green-and-red, striped stocking, containing numerous thin, red-and-white striped sticks, each wrapped in plastic. There was a little colorful hand-written tag attached to the stocking that said: For Contessa and James, soon-to-be best friends. Merry Christmas, Nick.
“Do you really think—?” Jimmy said, awed by the note.
“Yes, I really do!” Tessa said with hushed reverence.
They passed the gift stocking between them, examining the solidly tangible feeling of the candy canes between their gloved feelings.
“Nobody will believe us,” Jimmy said, smiling.
“They don’t have to,” Tessa said. “Right?”
Jimmy thought about it, then laughed out loud and said, “Right.”
But what about those naughty kids? They could really get carried away back then! Mercedes Lackey wrestles with that notion in this special Secret World Chronicle installment.
—KO
The Longest Night
A Secret World Chronicle Prequel Story
Mercedes Lackey
The absolute quiet was broken only by the crackling of flames. Vickie Nagy gave up trying to be interested in her book, sighed, and put it down on the bed beside her. Tucking her legs up under the plush velvet spread, she wrapped her arms around them and rested her chin on her knees, brooding, as she gazed into the fire in the fireplace at the foot of the huge bed.
Under other circumstances she’d have been luxuriating in the comfort. This was probably the best bedroom she’d seen outside of pictures in magazines, ever, especially for someone like her, who wallowed in fantasy novels and historical romances. The fireplace was only there for the ambience, not for heat—though these buildings were probably the oldest on the North American continent, the magicians who ran and staffed this very special school kept things nicely modern when it came to amenities. Central heat and air, plumbing and wiring that met every modern standard, even satellite television and internet. There wasn’t a piece of furniture in here that either wasn’t an antique older than the USA, or had been built to look like it was. The dark wooden bed was a huge Tudor canopy number, complete with red velvet bed-curtains matching the bedspread that you could pull shut all around, isolating you from noise, and creating a cozy, dark cave. But there was also a good reading light and her own cassette deck (usually playing classical music) in the headboard of the bed—which also had a cupboard she could stash books in. The mattress was more comfortable than anything she had ever slept on before. There was a faint scent of sandalwood from incense burning over the fireplace.
A Fantastic Holiday Season Page 8
