Wormhole Pirates on Orbis

by P. J. Haarsma

  “I got that much,” I said.

  A dozen others kids stayed behind, and we discussed the match over and over again. No one had expected us to win, and everyone wanted to know how we did it. I wished Max were there to talk about it; she loved analyzing the game. As the other kids chattered, I glanced around the stands, hoping I would find her, but she was long gone. As we were about to leave, I spotted Ceesar. He was sitting with one of his gang, watching us from high above the glass. Buzz was nowhere to be seen — but sitting next to Ceesar was the Citizen Athooyi.

  “It was unbelievable, JT. I mean, I really can’t describe it. You’ve just got to try it. I mean, I was you during the game. I could see what you were seeing, smell it. I even felt it. It was incredible,” Theodore gushed as we sat in the pod at the Illuminate. Theodore had not stopped talking about the tetrascope since the match a few cycles earlier.

  “I thought you were going to ride Dop,” I said.

  “I was. But . . .”

  “But?”

  Theodore hesitated before saying, “I wanted to know what it was like to be you.”

  I chuckled. “Not much there, huh?”

  “No, honestly, it was the strangest thing I have ever experienced. But in a really good way. While I was scoping you, I was you.”

  “Wait. What did you see? I mean did you see . . .” No, I said to myself. I wasn’t wearing the helmet when Max kissed me.

  “What?”

  “Nothing,” I said. I thought about Max’s kiss. It wasn’t the first time since it happened. In fact, I don’t think I had stopped thinking about it at all. Max, on the other hand, was acting like nothing had happened, even right after the match when I returned home. I was starting to feel like I’d made the whole thing up in my head.

  Theodore was still looking at me, waiting for a response. “You mean about your father? In a way, I’m glad you’ve accepted what everyone else thinks is true. It’s kind of exciting, if you ask me.”

  “You can hear my thoughts with that thing?” I was shocked.

  “Only because you’re a softwire. That’s what the guys told me.”

  “What ‘guys’?” I wanted to know. “Were they inside my head, too?” Suddenly I felt embarrassed. My thoughts had always been my own. I didn’t want people knowing what I was thinking.

  “They’re my friends, JT. What’s wrong?”

  “How could they become friends in one cycle?” I didn’t like knowing that people could hear what I was thinking with that thing. It made me angry. The spoke was finished, and the pods moved toward the exit. “Well, please don’t do it again,” I snapped, and stormed out of the pod.

  Why was I so mad at Theodore? Did I care what people thought about me? No. But my thoughts of my father were new to me. As if I were trying them on for size, to see if they fit. It was still a lot to swallow. I headed for my locker.

  Another student stopped me in the corridor and said, “Hey, Softwire, when you gonna play again?”

  “Why?” I asked the alien. He was small and tough-looking. I had never seen him before.

  “Never scoped a softwire. Hope it’s like riding a Space Jumper. When you gonna play again?”

  “I don’t know. I’m not,” I growled, and added, “I’m not a Space Jumper.”

  The gruff little alien moved closer and whispered, “Don’t worry. Some of us think it’s burnin’, the whole Space Jumper thing.” He looked over his shoulder as if he were telling me a deadly secret. “We aren’t like the other Citizens. We’d crap crystals to meet a Space Jumper.”

  “They’re nothing special,” I lied.

  “You’ve met one?” The little alien became frantic. “A live one? Where? You’ve got to tell me about it.”

  He grabbed my arm, but I pulled away. “Let me go,” I demanded.

  “Sure, sure,” he breathed, calming down. “Let me know about the next match,” he insisted. “You’ll kill ’em. I know you will.”

  Inside my locker was the pob Dop forfeited for his loss. Grace was at her locker, and she was trying hers on.

  “Thanks, JT. These are the best!” she said.

  I rolled the tiny device in my hands. Suddenly it didn’t seem worth it anymore.

  The next cycle, Charlie informed us that he had to leave to deal with business matters.

  “How long will you be gone?” Ketheria asked.

  “Only until the following cycle. Max will be in charge, and you are to come straight home from the Illuminate. No Quest-Nest until I get back. JT can contact Vairocina if there is an emergency, and I will be notified immediately.”

  “Where are you going?” I wanted to know.

  “I’m going to the moon Ki,” he replied, his eyes darting about the room. “It’s Citizen business.”

  He was lying. I could sense it. But why would he lie?

  No one else seemed concerned about Charlie’s business trip. Everyone was absorbed with their new pobs. Ketheria was the only one who really didn’t care for it. Some of the kids programmed their pobs to display little flowers floating in their hair, while others showed flying creatures or insects. Dalton watched broadcasts from the Citizens on Orbis 3, and Theodore used it to search for uses of the tetrascope. He was so obsessed with the tetrascope that I now understood why humans weren’t allowed near the things.

  I watched Max from across the room as Grace helped her with her pob. Things were different between us, and I couldn’t understand why. I just wanted to go up to her and talk like we always did. I hated this. I wanted my friend back.

  “Just go up and talk to her,” Ketheria whispered, slipping up next to me.

  “Who?” I said coldly, knowing full well she was talking about Max.

  Ketheria lifted her eyebrows and frowned.

  “I can’t,” I confessed. “I don’t know what to say. I’m just going to say something wrong.”

  “You don’t always have to be right, you know. It’s more about the conversation at this point.”

  “I don’t want to. Besides, she’s busy. Look at her.”

  “Light can’t enter a closed box, JT.”

  “Please, would you stop that? Where do you get this stuff, anyway?” I groaned. I didn’t want to be mean to her. It just seemed so strange for a little girl to spout these cryptic things. Ketheria laughed.

  “Just talk to her,” she said, with a sigh.

  But I couldn’t. I went to Charlie before he left on his trip, looking for some help. I figured he was older so maybe he knew things I didn’t. Maybe he knew how girls worked, and what made them do the things they did.

  “That’s a tough one,” he said, packing a small metal case in his room.

  “That’s why I’m asking.”

  Charlie looked at the floor and scratched at his ear as if he were trying to pull an answer out. “Well, you’ve known Max your whole life. You know her better than I do,” he said.

  “It doesn’t seem to be helping much.”

  “Well, why don’t you describe to me a perfect cycle with her. A time when both of you were all right, the way you want it to be again.”

  “I don’t know,” I mumbled. “I don’t know what she likes.”

  “Then you’re not paying attention. That’s the first thing you have to start doing.”

  I tried to think of a perfect cycle with Max. Before the kiss, they were all perfect. Now it was messed up, and I didn’t know how I was going to get it back again. Charlie wasn’t helping much.

  “You have to figure it out first and then make that happen,” he said. “No one’s gonna do it for you.”

  I was never going to figure that out. I went to my sleeper that night with an even bigger knot in my stomach.

  “JT, JT?” It was Max. My sleeper was out of the wall, and she was standing over it. I rubbed my eyes, trying to wake up faster.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked her.

  “It’s Theodore. He’s not here. I can’t find him in the house, either. I think he went out somewhere.”

&
nbsp; “Without us?” That was strange, especially for Theodore. We always forced our adventures upon him. I couldn’t see him going out on his own.

  “Did you check the garden?”

  “No, only the house.”

  “Let’s look there, then,” I offered.

  Even though we talked like nothing ever happened at the Labyrinth, I felt it in every word I spoke, like some huge trench carved out between us. I followed her out and into the garden, trying to think of something to say. I wanted to talk about what had happened. It was right there, right on my lips, but the words were tangled around my tongue. I could only talk about Theodore.

  “Did he say anything to you?” I asked her.

  “About what?”

  There it was again. Everything I said held some reference to what now stood between us. “Um . . . you know, about going somewhere?”

  “No.”

  The garden was dark, but several of the plants glowed green and pink, spilling their own light on the path. The top of the ring gleamed brightly, casting an eerie glow over the small forest.

  “Theodore!” I called out for him, but I knew he wasn’t there.

  “Where would he go?” Max asked.

  “I have an idea,” I said. “I think he went to use the tetrascope.”

  “Now? But there’s no game.”

  “I don’t think you need a game. Remember the Festival of the Harvest on Orbis 2? I think you can scope whoever lets you.”

  “Theodore!” Max cried out, but her voice just scared a few plants and they scurried deeper into the garden. “Charlie’s gonna be so mad at me.”

  I was very aware that we were alone again. The silence was excruciating. Say something!

  “Max, I . . .”

  She stopped searching the garden and looked straight into my eyes. She might as well have taken a metal pipe to my knees. Why is this so hard?

  “What?” she said.

  “I . . .”

  She raised her eyebrows, waiting for me to speak. My nerve crumpled.

  “Should we leave the house and look for him?” That was the best I could come up with.

  “Where?”

  “I don’t know. He mentioned something about friends, Citizens he used the scope with. Maybe he’s with them.”

  “Do you know where to find them?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Maybe you should tell Vairocina. She could notify Charlie.”

  No again. “I can’t tell on him. But Vairocina could locate him. We’re all stained. It shouldn’t be that hard.”

  “She might tell on him, though,” Max pointed out.

  Charlie did show up at the Labyrinth after I had spoken to her. I had asked her not to tell anyone, so maybe it was a coincidence. I didn’t like doubting my friend.

  “I’m going back inside,” she moaned. “It’s cold.”

  I wished I had something to give her to keep her warm — a blanket, an extra skin, anything. I looked at her shivering and rubbing her arms as we walked inside. This is driving me crazy! I started to say, “Max —” But Theodore came through the light chute at the very same moment.

  “Where were you?” Max demanded as if she were his Guarantor.

  Theodore did a double take on us when he saw us standing in the hall. “Uh . . . I . . . um . . . What are you doing up?”

  “What were you doing out?” I asked him. “Charlie’s gonna kill you.”

  “You can’t tell him,” he snapped. “I’ve covered for you a trillion times.”

  “Where were you?” Max insisted.

  “I was with friends,” he said coldly.

  “I thought we were your friends,” Max corrected him.

  “You were using the tetrascope, weren’t you?” I said.

  He didn’t have to answer. His face went slack, and that told me enough.

  “So what?” he challenged.

  “So, why didn’t you tell us?” Max said. “We would have gone with you.”

  Would we have, though? Illegal things on Orbis have never stopped us before, but the tetrascope must be banned for a reason.

  “I didn’t think you would come,” he confessed.

  “Of course we would,” Max said.

  “You wanna go back?” He pointed eagerly at the light chutes.

  “Not now,” I told him. “It’s late.”

  “They’re still up. I know they are.”

  “Next time,” Max offered. “I can’t leave everyone alone, not with Charlie gone. We should go back to sleep.”

  Theodore fidgeted with his skin. His pupils were dilated, and his expression was manic. Could that be from the tetrascope? I wondered. I was worried about him, but I must admit that my mind was on Max. Why hadn’t I taken the time to say something? By now she had already returned to her sleeper.

  At the Illuminate the next cycle, no one spoke of Theodore’s late-night excursion. All anyone could talk about was our new pobs. If it weren’t for our skins, it would be hard to tell us apart from the other students. Once we were inside, Theodore raised his hand and yelled, “I’ll see you at the pods!”

  “Where’s he going?” I wondered.

  “To meet his new friends,” Max replied with a shrug.

  Theodore never did things on his own, and whenever we wanted him to do something, something that he considered risky, we usually had to drag him by his feet. But here he was traipsing off to see whomever to do whatever. It made me feel off-balance in a weird way. This wasn’t the way my world usually worked.

  I waited behind Max and Ketheria to get my tap.

  “Hey, Softwire,” someone hissed. “Come here.”

  I looked around and spotted the burly little alien, the one so intent on meeting a Space Jumper the cycle before, waving at me from under a stairwell. “What do you want?” I said.

  “It’s me, Nak. Come here!”

  I grabbed my tap and walked over to the guy. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Max toss her tap and turn to leave, but Ketheria grabbed her by the elbow and dragged her toward me. I felt my stomach hollow out. I wished I hadn’t seen that. The alien was waiting with a group of three friends.

  “Tell them. Tell them what you told me,” Nak demanded excitedly.

  “Tell them what?” I protested.

  “Tell ’em about the Space Jumper. You’re a Space Jumper, aren’t you?”

  “He’s not a Space Jumper,” Max corrected them.

  “No, no, it’s all right,” he whispered. “It’s burnin’. Don’t worry. Show ’em, Dass.”

  Nak elbowed his tall friend to the right. Dass’s skin was smooth and thin, like that of an onion. He proceeded to pull his leather collar down and expose a tattoo of the symbol of the wormhole pirates. The marking glowed with different colors, changing from blue to purple to green.

  “You’re a wormhole pirate?” I gasped.

  “No, no, no, no, no, no. But it’s burnin’, isn’t it?” Nak replied.

  “Why would you do that? What if you get caught?”

  “My brood would skin me alive, but that’s half the fun, isn’t it?” Dass grinned, exposing an extra row of teeth.

  “Tell us about the Space Jumper!” Nak pleaded.

  “Space Jumpers are disgusting,” Max spat. “They’re just as bad as wormhole pirates and just as violent as Neewalkers.”

  Max grabbed Ketheria and marched off, mumbling something I couldn’t hear. I turned to follow her, but Nak grabbed my arm again.

  “What?” I said, trying to shake him off.

  “Neewalkers are burnin’, too!”

  “Let go!” I wrenched my arm free and ran after Max.

  “When are you gonna play again?” I heard Dass call out.

  I was late for study spoke, and so I had to sit in my pod alone. Part of me wondered if Theodore was even there, or off using the tetrascope again. It was impossible to concentrate on the screen in front of me, thinking about Theodore and Max. I was going to have to do something. I knew I had to talk to Max about what
had happened. She might be able to pretend it was nothing, but I couldn’t. I felt like something had changed between us, and I didn’t like it. When the spoke ended, I found Ketheria at the locker.

  “You ready to go home?” I asked her.

  “I’m going to play Quest-Nest with Max,” she replied.

  “But I thought Charlie said we were supposed to go straight home.”

  “Max is in charge right now.” Ketheria turned to me. “Just talk to her.”

  “I have been!”

  “You’ve been talking, but you haven’t said a word to her about how you feel.”

  “I don’t know what that is!”

  Ketheria shook her head and swiped at the numbers of her locker. “Give it time; you will.”

  Ketheria was now Max’s new partner in Quest-Nest. Just like that, too. No comment. No We’ll play later. Nothing. It made my brain boil. A few cycles after Charlie got back home, we all went to the Labyrinth to watch Max and Ketheria play.

  It didn’t help that Max and Ketheria were simply awesome, easily beating their opponents. In fact, they never lost as a team. It was really amazing. Usually only students came to watch the school league matches, but more and more Citizens began coming to watch their matches.

  “Your girlfriend’s good,” Ceesar said one cycle, standing behind me at our usual table.

  “She’s not my girlfriend,” I argued. Ceesar made me feel uneasy. I looked and saw Athooyi. He was watching me, too.

  “Why aren’t you playing?” Ceesar whispered.

  “I need a different kind of helmet. Mine’s busted.”

  “Go see Tinker. He’s the best. He’ll take care of you. Tell him I said I’ll pay for it.”

  “I can pay for it myself.”

  “No, you can’t. Get a helmet,” he ordered, and slipped back with Athooyi as Charlie returned.

  “Who’s that?” Charlie asked. “He looks like the guy from your match.”

  “He isn’t,” I lied. “I need to get a helmet if I’m ever gonna play again.”

  “I thought they had them at school.”

  “Not for softwires,” I informed him.

  “But you’re only going to play in the school league, right?”

  “Yes, Charlie.”

  Ketheria went with me to Tinker’s. Theodore was nowhere to be found, and Max said she was busy. I knew it was an excuse, but I was beyond making an issue of it now. Charlie made the chits available for my new helmet and programmed my skin to allow us to go. We headed to Tinker’s place at the Labyrinth right after our study spoke.