by Mark Roman
As early morning approached and Willie finally drifted off to sleep, his flaptop buzzed an alarm. Opening it he was amazed to see it was a signal from the planet below. Not from the base, but some distance to the west. Instantly he was wide awake and trying various codecs for interpreting the communication. Several frantic minutes later he had it. A picture jerked into life, fuzzy and jagged and jumpy at first, but soon settling down. It was a video feed showing something on the surface. A caption identified the source as Camera 1, Beagle 2. For a moment he took this to be a football score, but then grasped its significance. How, after all these years, had the crashed Beagle 2 managed to start transmitting images?
Of greater significance was the image the camera was showing. It appeared to be the carcass of some dead bird-like creature. The wings and beak were clearly visible; as were the clawed legs. Willie stared in amazement. Was this what the aliens looked like? He needed to get an idea of its size but, just at that moment, there was a knock on his hatch. He slapped his flaptop shut as the frizzy head of Lieutenant Zak Johnston poked itself into the tube by his feet.
“Peekaboo, Hilda! You playin’ with yer wazzeroo?” asked Zak, poking his head deeper until it was level with Willie’s knees. Despite Willie having had a thorough zero-G shower before coming to bed, some of the smell of the giraffe manure still lingered about his legs. “Whoa, dude,” said Zak fanning his nose. “That must have been a full-bodied one.”
“Medication,” responded Willie, nudging his flaptop as far from Zak as he could. “And who invited you in?”
“This isn’t a social call,” said Zak forcing his way into the limited space left between Willie and the inner surface of the torpedo tube. “What were you watching there, space rider? Lift the lid on yer dirty vid. Eight months shacked up on Mayfly III has made ol’ Zakkie as fruity as a three-balled tomcat in a cattery.”
“I was merely checking co-ordinates for tomorrow’s transfer to the surface, Junior Lieutenant Johnston.”
“Sure you were, dude. Sure you were.” Zak pulled himself all the way in until he was wedged practically nose-to-nose and toe-to-toe with Willie. “Come on, man. Show the show. Gotta get some satisfaction ‘cos I can’t get no girlie action.”
Willie shuddered with disgust and tried to convince himself that the lump in Zak’s pocket was a Mars bar or similar. Inadvertently he inhaled a lungful of Zak’s body odour.
“When was the last time you had a shower?”
One more breath and Willie decided he had to get out of there. Wriggling like a burrowing sandworm he scrambled his way out of the torpedo tube. Halfway down, his pyjama trousers snagged and ripped a revealing gash in the garment. He swore. Once outside the torpedo hatch he quickly removed the damaged trousers and reached into his sleeping-tube for his boxer shorts. With the predictability of a bad French farce, Emily Leach drifted past right at that moment. She took one look at his naked posterior and the other occupant of his tube and gasped in horror.
“Goodness gracious me, Lieutenant!” she exclaimed, whilst trying to get a closer view into the tube.
Panic stricken, Willie turned and cupped his hands around his embarrassment. “It’s not what you’re thinking, Miss Leach.”
“I shall be making a full report to Commander Dugdale. This sort of depravity needs to be nipped in the bud.” She focused her eyes on Willie’s cupped hands. “It’s utterly disgraceful. Imagine if Master Tarquin or Mr Snuggles had wandered past.” Not waiting to hear more excuses she launched herself toward the Commander’s quarters.
“Just great,” said Willie. He turned to the wriggling form of Zak as it emerged from the sleeping pod. “Thanks a bunch, Johnston.”
“No probs, dude. All part of the Zakster service.” He spread his clumsy hands and pulled himself the rest of the way out of the tube hatch. In the process he inadvertently pressed a red button labelled ‘FIRE’. There was a worrying mechanical click and the hatch door started closing slowly and deliberately.
The two crewmen looked at each other.
“You just pressed the ‘FIRE’ button,” said Willie folding his arms and giving Zak a baleful look.
“That must be ‘FIRE’ as in ‘Fire Alarm’,” said Zak, with no great conviction.
“I think it means ‘FIRE’ as in ‘Fire Torpedo’.”
“No way, dude. Must be mislabelled. NAFA would’ve disabled the Torps for sure. They ain’t that poor. Are they?” The hatch clicked shut.
A red light started flashing and the posh synthesized voice of Joanna Lumley announced, “Target locked. Please stand clear. Firing torpedo Number One.”
There was a sudden jolt and a sound like the opening of the ring-pull on a gigantic can of beer. Then an eerie silence descended and the light stopped flashing. Peering through the hatch window Willie could see his sleeping quarters had been sucked clear of all their contents.
Zak was peering at something flying past a portal window. “Cute teddy bear, dude.”
Dressed only in his pyjama top, Willie propelled himself to thrust Zak out of the way and look out through the window. He was just in time to see his half packed suitcase careering away from the spaceship, spilling his possessions towards Mars. In its wake followed a trail of other personal knick-knacks including Rupert the Bear, Willie’s dearest companion through the long lonely nights since his childhood.
“My clothes. All my possessions!” he squealed.
“Soz, dude. Could be worse, though, man.”
“Oh, really? I’d love to know what could possibly be worse than having everything I own launched into space.”
“Could have lost yer jimjam top. It’s cold on Mars, space-guy, so you’ll need a jacket or you ain’t gonna hack it.”
Willie felt like crying as he watched his things go. He noticed his flaptop, lid flapping open and closed, as if waving him goodbye. On its screen, he could just make out the Beagle 2 images.
“Hey, space-bud. Nearly forgot. Lord Dugdude wants to see you, urgentissimo. Said something about a special mission needing a space-magician.” Zak struggled to contain a snigger as he knew what the mission entailed.
Willie pulled himself away from the window and sniffed. “A ‘special mission’?” he asked, still a little dazed.
Zak nodded. “You were choice numero uno. Props to yer, man.”
Willie brightened. “Well, it’s about time I started getting some recognition around here. But I can hardly report for duty dressed like this.” He pointed at his skinny white legs dangling under a stripy pyjama jacket. Suddenly realizing they weren’t the only dangly things, he pinched his knees together and cupped a hand over his exposed anatomy.
Zak reached into the back pocket of his NAFA dungarees and pulled out a multi-coloured crocheted rastacap. He unfolded it and handed it to Warner. “There yer go, Loot. Tuck Sergeant Todger up in this. You’ll need a couple of leg-holes.”
Reluctantly, Willie took the item, trying not to think about its level of cleanliness and forced a hand through two locations where the crocheting was loosest. Then he slid the makeshift underwear up his pipe-cleaner-slim legs and pulled it up to his waist.
Zak covered his mouth, gripping his jaw to constrain the laughter that was bubbling to get out.
“How do I look?” asked Willie.
That did it. Zak couldn’t hold back any longer and the laughter burst out. “Looks good, man,” he said between guffaws. “Real good.”
“Thanks, buddy. I’ll remember this.” Willie fastened the top button of his pyjama jacket and set off toward the commander’s cabin.
18. 2029: A Space Body Scene
Willie drifted up to the closed door of Dugdale’s luxurious quarters, still dressed only in his pyjama top and Zak’s adapted rastacap. Attached to the wall was the gold plated name plaque bearing the name ‘Mission Commander Chad Lionheart’ which, like the seat in the Assembly Room, had been modified to ‘Flint Dugdale’. Willie shuddered as he pressed the intercom buzzer.
“What d’yer want?�
�
“Lieutenant Warner to see you, sir.”
“Who?”
“Lieutenant Warner, sir.”
“Oh yeah, Wobbler. Get yer butt in ‘ere now.”
The door swished open and the stench of stale food, BO, beer and Emily Leach’s perfume hit Willie full in the face. Flint was slouched like a basking, blubbery walrus, velcroed to a reclining armchair and eating two Pot Foodles at the same time. The sight of Willie’s apparel made him choke on his spicy snack.
“What the frig ‘ave you come as…Mr Blobby’s lovechild?”
“Wardrobe malfunction.”
“I’d say.” Dugdale coughed out some of the half-eaten noodles he’d choked on as he thumped himself on the chest. He took a deep breath. “Any road, before I say owt about t’mission, I’ve just ‘ad Leachy in ‘ere gabbin’ on ‘bout you and Zed Space-Brain. What you two gerrup to in t’privacy of yer torpedo tubes is up to you. But if yer flash yer multi-coloured codpiece anywhere else, I’ll cut them skinny legs off and shove ‘em up yer nostrils. Capiche?”
“Thank you, sir. Don’t suppose you’d like to hear my side of the story at all. Just to give you a more balanced view?”
“Nope.”
“Didn’t think so.”
Willie took up a position in the furthest corner of the room, observing the monstrous, gravy stained creature that had taken control of the ship. He wondered if he and Zak could, and should, have done more to stop him.
“There’s good news. And there’s bad news,” Flint was saying.
“Can’t wait for the latter.”
“Good. I’ll save it fer last. Good news is: that tin tosspot InspectaBot has sent his thumbs-up. Certified t’base as ready and waitin’. Plus, he sent a video. About twenty mins since.”
“Thanks for letting me know.”
Dugdale shrugged the comment away. “’E reckons t’place is t’mutts nuts. Five stars. So, Wally, it’s all systems go. This time tomorrow I’ll be t’first man on Mars.”
“So pleased for you.”
Dugdale’s grin betrayed his delight. “I’ve forwarded everything to those NAFA jerks, so I expect they’ll give us green light any second.”
At that very moment his comms terminal beeped.
“Ayeup, that’ll be them now.” He turned, clicked the screen on and started the transmission.
A young male face flicked into life, revealing a set of rabbit teeth as he smiled.
Dugdale grunted. “T’gormless one. Nigel summat-or-other.”
“Langston.”
On screen Nigel was saying, “I say, Dugdale, old chap, what a spiffing report from InspectaBot, eh? Super stuff, super. And the video fly-throughs! Splendid, what? Those robots have done a marvellous job. Marvellous. We uploaded it to our FaceTube page and we’ve had hundreds of ‘likes’ already. Amazing. But you’ll never guess what all those conspiracy theorists are saying ...” Nigel broke off to laugh, although it sounded more like a neigh. “... Those nutters, what are they like?” This time his laugh was more of a snort. “They’re claiming the footage has been faked. Nothing but a CGI simulation! Har, har, har.”
Nigel wiped the tears from his eyes. Willie Warner had stiffened on hearing this news. He watched Dugdale’s reaction closely, but the commander was laughing along with Nigel.
“So, you’ve been warned,” said Nigel, wagging a pantomime finger at the camera. “Har, har, har. Where do these nutcases crawl out from?”
“Nutters,” agreed Dugdale.
“Seriously, Duggers, all looks triff. You’re all clear to go down. Bang on schedule. Super. Absolutely super. Remember to utter some immortal words as you set foot on Mars. That’s immortal, not immoral. Har, har, har. Best of British!”
Dugdale stabbed the screen’s Off button. “Pratt,” he muttered.
Willie stared at the blank screen. He suddenly felt butterflies in his stomach, remembering the images he’d seen from Beagle 2 and worried that the same had also been seen on Earth. His ‘close encounter’ was suddenly looking closer and closer, but he needed to stake his claim to the discovery. He felt excited and scared at the same time. “And the bad news?”
“Ah, yes. Yer off for space-walkies.”
“Beg pardon, sir?”
“There’s a job needs doing on the outside.”
Willie wasn’t sure how to respond.
“So, get yer arse down t’spacesuit bay and tog yerself up. When I give t’signal you go outside.”
“To do what?”
Dugdale gave an embarrassed cough. “Er, we ‘ave to bring in t’corpses. And when I say ‘we’, I mean ‘you’.”
“What?”
“The chuffers who snuffed it.”
“You mean: the unfortunate fatalities?”
“That’s t’buggers. You need ter bring ‘em indoors.”
“But Johnston released them into space?”
Dugdale scratched his head and grimaced. “Er, not exactly. That’s what folk are supposed to think ‘appened. Lionheart had Johnston suit first two up and tie ‘em to th’outside ert spaceship. We did t‘same for Lionheart after ‘is accident.”
“You mean they’re all outside? They’ve been there all the time?”
“Aye. In t’ship’s blind-spot.”
Willie blinked rapidly, trying to take it all in. “So there are three corpses in spacesuits out there. And you want me to bring them in?”
“Two and a half.”
“A half?”
“Yeah, well, we couldn’t actually recover all of ol’ Lionpaw. All ‘is innards got sucked out by the urine suction unit. What was left of ‘im were all floppy. So we folded ‘im up and stuck ‘im in a bag.”
“My God, that’s horrific.”
“Weren’t too bad. It were one of Leachy’s knitted bags. It ‘ad a friggin’ flower on it.”
“Oh, that’s alright then ... if it had a flower on it.”
“We squeezed it into a spacesuit and that were it.”
Willie shuddered. “But why? Why keep the bodies at all?”
“Sylvia Rothschild wrote a will, didn’t she. Some bollocks about wantin’ to be buried on Mars. So we had to bring ‘er body with us. As for Penny Smith, ‘er death were unnatural. Foul play. So Doc Airy Fairy’s gorra do a post mortem on ‘er. On Mars.”
Willie was speechless. This was all news to him, particularly the part about Penny Smith’s death. “Unnatural?”
“Got ‘er ‘ed bashed in.”
“But she was so ... lovely. So beautiful. Who would do that to her?”
Dugdale shrugged.
“So there’s a murderer on board! What do NAFA say?”
“’Ad to hush it up or they’d ‘ave aborted the mission.”
“Terrific,” said Willie, staring out through his commander’s porthole at the planet below.
“So ‘ere’s t’plan,” started Dugdale. “You get kitted up. I’ll get t’rest of t’dozy beggars in t’Assembly Room and tell ‘em good news about Mars and give ‘em last-minute instructions. When I give t’signal, you sneak outside and bring stiffs indoors secret-like. Get ‘em hid proper, and we’ll shift ‘em down t’surface later, once everyone’s settled in and doing all their hippy stuff.”
“Where shall I hide them?”
“Use yer gumption, Wonga. InspectaBot’s pod is empty. You can sling Rothschild and Lionpaw in there. Shove the Smith woman in a cupboard or under a bed or summat. OK?”
“Why’s Johnston not doing this? He took them out there.”
“Says he’s disabled. Can’t walk on account of his verruca. Doc FairyLand’s given ‘im a sick note.”
“Verruca?” Willie was so outraged his mouth opened and closed like a toothless carp’s.
Dugdale beckoned him to come closer, which he didn’t.
“One more thing, Woggler. I ‘aven’t decided which of you two clowns is comin’ down to Mars with us and which is stayin’ up ‘ere to keep t’home fires burnin’. So play yer cards right and I’ll see
yer right, lad.” Dugdale tapped the side of his bulbous nose.
Willie was speechless.
“What yer waitin’ for? Bugger off.”
*
The suit room smelt like a men’s changing room where sportswear has been festering in the lockers for weeks and the toilets have overflowed.
“Oh joy,” said Willie with a grimace as he entered. “This is why I love my job so much.”
All the spacesuits looked way too big for his skinny body. Picking one off a peg with a sigh he started to pull it on. As he eased his feet into the boots he shuddered to discover they were disconcertingly moist. The seat area seemed moist, too. Once he’d zipped himself in, Willie floated in damp misery, mourning the loss of all his personal possessions and awaiting further instructions.
About twenty minutes later, Zak Johnston’s dreadlocked head appeared in the doorway. “Poo-wee,” he said, wrinkling his nose at the smell. “Not lovin’ the scent of Eau de Ferment, dude.”
Willie stared back, unamused.
“Message from Dugzilla. The sheep are in the pen.”
“Sorry?”
“The bats are in the roost, dude. You know, the donkeys are in the shed. The snails in the snailery.”
“Do you mean the colonists are in the Assembly Room?”
“Bullseye. That’s it, man. Master Duggit says: ‘It’s time for you to leave, Grasshopper’. I’d go, but for my toe.” He waved a piece of paper at Willie.
“Yes, verruca. I’ve heard. How tragic for you.”
“Sure is, Spaceguy. Bugs in the boots. In fact, them boots you’re wearin’” He pointed accusingly at the moist space-boots on Willie’s feet.
“Lovely.”
Not wanting to think too much about the microbial war raging around his toes, Willie drifted out of the suit room without so much as a backward glance at Zak. He made his way to the double hatched airlock. After closing the inner door behind him, he shut his eyes to brace himself for the horrors that awaited outside. After a long pause, he pushed the button to open the outer door and pulled himself out of the ship.
