Star Fall

by David Bischoff

  The passengers had floated in, transferring from shuttle to air-lock in Null-G, to the opulent reception room.

  Here they stood now, passively, flowered plants floating all about them, bright-colored. Here they stood on the doorstep of this brave new space world. Here they stood, eagerly assimilating the information on how they should behave, hearing intimations of the glorious unfoldings awaiting them, just past the door ... waiting to be guided into a kaleidoscopic technological modern Eden by a football ...

  If he’d been in the proper frame of mind, Todd would have enjoyed it vastly.

  Alas, there were other things to think about, brood upon, except for the glib, preplanned speech issuing in rhythms perfectly cadenced to bring the heart to gladness. No doubt dozens of other subliminals were at work, but in his present truncated form Todd was barely aware of any of them. He concentrated on what the football had to say. Every scrap of information, every fact might come to be important in the future.

  “In the interest of your preparatory orientation, we shall briefly cover certain relevant facts,” the robot was saying. It rose slightly on whooshing airstreams. The jaws of its odd mouth parted wider and a lens extruded. From the cylindrical lens, streams of light exuded to converge in a multi-imaged holographic display, a curious combination of juxtaposed holographic recordings.

  They clung together like a cluster of glistening soap bubbles, only of multitudinous geometric variety: cubes, trapezoids, cylinders, and various permutations. Glowing with a greenish fire here, an umbral hue there, a magician’s block puzzle, waiting to be dissembled. Within the translucent sides of the assembly were compact little worlds. Forests, deserts, jungles. Bizarrely structured cities, parks, lakes, streams, fields. All micro-miniaturized, and yet exactly scaled.

  “Replicas, ladies and gentlemen,” intoned the robo-host in an excited voice. “Replicas of the many worlds awaiting your pleasure. You will no doubt enjoy the various preparations we have made for your entertainment; you will find the very newest systems available. Sports, plays, and operas. Fantastic real-fic programs. Drinks and food individually prepared to your personal tastes.

  “And yet, this ship has been built by nonhumans with alien passengers and crew. Within the Star Fall are biospheres especially attuned to diverse alien pleasures and living conditions. You will find aliens amongst you. Harmony is our goal, so please avail yourself of the opportunity to make contact.”

  A scream split the robot’s instructions like the tearing of its magnetic tapes. The group gathered around Todd gasped.

  “You will...” continued the voice, “experience pleasure such as—”

  The scream again, louder, like a bit of lost rolling thunder. The voice stopped, and harsh bright lights shone from the glare-strips, illuminating the room starkly. Through a doorway bounded a woman, her long hair askew. She slowed, darting her eyes at the assembled group. “Please.” She staggered toward them across the metal floor. Some of the passengers stepped back, startled.

  Philip Amber, slouching with a discontented frown till now, had stood to the forefront, looking uncomfortable in his temporary body. He did not move at all, and therefore it was to him that the woman staggered.

  Todd watched, unable to move.

  The woman’s clothes were torn and hung down in strips. Her forearm was burned and glistening blood ran down from her nose and lip.

  Immediately a group of three aliens erupted behind her sporting black armbands marked SFP. Azinatins. Only five feet tall, but with barrel bodies hardened from life on a 2.5 gee world. Grizzled grisly faces glared their single cyclopean eyes balefully as the police stamped after the woman, restraining cords dangling from thick-fingered hands.

  The woman had enough time only to trip into Amber’s arms and whisper something before the security force was upon her, dragging her away. The woman screamed back at Amber, yelling, “Get off the ship! You’ll die ...all die ... ” A fist quickly knocked her senseless. Two of the Azinatins wound their magnetic cords around her arms and legs, growling all the while at the stunned onlookers. The largest slung her over broad shoulders like a bag of light, limp laundry.

  Absolute silence.

  Then, as though remembering a cue a little too late, the supervising technician began to clap, shouting, “Bravo! Bravo!”

  The voice of the robo-guide erupted once more.

  “Uhm-my goodness. That astonishes me—er—every time. Yes, ah, must get my bearings.” It cleared its metallic voice. “What you have just witnessed, ladies and gentlemen, is a small representation of what our entertainment computer has planned for you. Simulated adventures.”

  The audience was still too shocked to respond. Todd could not have responded even if he had desired to.

  “Yes, a mere sample of the adventures in store for you. All faked, all harmless, I quite assure you. But now—I’m sure that you are most exhausted from the day’s preparations and travel, and so I will let you go without further ado to see about your accommodations. You will see me flittering about hither and yon so do stop and bid me good day. Each of you has been assigned lodging in different portions of the ship, due to our full booking.” A flap, like a bomb bay door, opened in the robe-guide’s belly. Cylindrical guides dropped, halted midway to the floor, and then whizzed noisily, seeking out the holoscan pattern (and person) assigned to it.

  Todd abruptly found himself nose to nose with a particularly frantic specimen that hummed, darted up and down, from side to side like a constipated hummingbird. “Mr. Spigot,” it piped in a tiny, tinny voice. “Follow me and my directions, sir. Would you prefer a scenic or direct route to your compartment?”

  Hunk did not respond.

  “Oh, excellent,” squeaked the little thing, which looked like nothing more than a kid’s miniature null-grav copter. “I’m sure you’ll find me most satisfactory, sir. Most satisfactory. Your luggage has been taken care of—please just follow me. We’ll see what we can fit in, all right? Incidentally, you may think that I’m just a dumb, programmed machine. Due to the present work in microminiature electronics, I have fully as many neurodes as you do neurons, fully as much knowledge, reasoning, and emotional capacity. I am sentient.”

  Brief pause.

  “No matter. Excuse my enthusiasm. What will it be? A brisk walk through Dakota cornfields? A stroll through English countryside?”

  Nary a monosyllable from Hunk.

  “I can see you’ve come for the experience. As a matter of fact, I was rather hoping you’d allow me to take you on the special itinerary. For my edification as well as yours. What do you say to that, Mr. Spigot?”

  “Spigot! Listen to that, Alexandra Durtwood. Spigot, Todd Spigot, not Philip Amber. Amber is over there in my body, and I in his!”

  But his peripheral Vision promptly told him that Alex Durtwood was sexily sashaying away behind her personal buzz-unit.

  The little machine dived, twirled around. With the hiss of air-guidance bursts, it slooshed away. “Any objections, sir?”

  If Todd had his tongue, he knew he could spurt objections aplenty.

  But, curiously enough, Hunk seemed to play along with the little thing. It was hard to believe that so much enthusiasm and lunacy could be stored in one little hovering machine, no bigger than a cigar.

  “This way, Mr. Spigot. So glad to have found a hardy soul at last.”

  The buzz-unit led Todd into the complicated heart of the Star Fall.

  * * *

  Well, this was better than busting balls down below, thought Philip Amber as he strode along behind his buzz-unit. They passed through an array of levels, aswarm with sight and sound.

  Before long he would get his body back from Spigot. What a complication. Comparatively minor, though and actually fortuitous after the botch he’d made of that Durtwood hit. He had a pretty good disguise if the bozos down on Deadrock managed to contact the Space Authorities aboa
rd the ship. But, sooner or later, he knew he’d have to get that body back. For more reasons than one.

  Amber had quickly nixed the tour. He wanted to hole up in his accommodations and relax and think this whole bleeding business through, from start to finish. Maybe watch some holo, do some reading, enjoy this damned cruise as much as he could.

  Yeah, he thought. Keep on telling yourself that, buster. Maybe you’ll start believing it.

  But there was no way he could explain away the woman who’d grabbed him during the Star Fall orientation.

  Entertainment, bullshit. That woman’s blood had certainly been real enough; the imploring look in her eyes and on her face had not lacked essential sincerity.

  Amber had almost instinctively planted a few punches just then. But common sense and self-interest fortunately had come into play. Who the hell was this woman that he would want to make a foolhardy attempt to save her from a trio of security uglies no doubt only doing their jobs.

  Hell, he didn’t want anything to do with women on a permanent basis anyway. They all died.

  Just like everyone else he got close to. He was a jinx to human life—a one in a billion statistical oddity with extraordinary luck. Bad luck, in that highly specialized area. People he hung around with tended to die very quickly.

  “Please step in here, sir,” said Ajax, his buzz-unit. “This is the fastest method of transportation to the area of your cabin.”

  “Personalized? Very nice.” Amber sat down awkwardly; He was having a rough time adjusting to Todd’s ungainly body. Another reason he was glad he had restrained himself from letting fists fly back there; this hunk of fat probably would be pretty pitiful in a fight, fair or otherwise. Best to keep it pretty much out of spats.

  He tried to shut out his thoughts for now, relax, and concentrate on the ship around him.

  But no matter how hard he tried to tune out his thoughts, the wild-eyed woman haunted him, “...he’s not what he seems ... we’ve got to stop him ... anti-matter ... saw it ... controlled ...”

  Then, of course, she’d been grabbed by the security force and trussed up so expertly. No question of sideshow entertainment. It didn’t have the panache, the professional sheen. It had the hazy ambiguity of real violence, real terror from the woman. The folks in charge had certainly glossed it over fast enough. The whole thing left a nasty taste in Amber’s mouth.

  Forget it, he told himself. Concentrate on how you’re going to get your body back from that idiot Spigot. First of all, he’d have to get the guy talking. Amber didn’t know what the hell was wrong with him. Perhaps negotiation would be fruitful—and if not, then a more forceful approach would have to be taken.

  The problem was how do you waylay a guy wearing a Mark Twelve? The tailor-made body was a good place to be inside of, but a bitch to intimidate. If it had been properly equipped for the Durtwood job, he probably would have had none of the problems. But alas, it had not been.

  Such were the ways of fate.

  He felt the transport car slip hushingly into the air-stream, smoothly swishing toward its destination.

  “For a small surcharge to my personal account, I can be maintained to act as an informal guide,” twittered the little buzz-unit, almost hopefully.

  “Maybe,” Amber muttered. God, he hated the sound of this whiny voice. “I’ll let you know. In the meantime, I’d appreciate silence.”

  “As you wish.”

  * * *

  Yeah. Go to his cabin, catch some shut-eye after a big meal (surprising how much the craving for food sat in him so heavily—he couldn’t remember when he’d been so hungry). Go out and cruise around, look to see what was happening on board this boat. Then outline his plans for getting the Mark Twelve back.

  He checked with the little guide about the necessary surgical facilities aboard; found that they existed. Trouble was, who was to engineer the change.

  The ride was most enjoyable, a streamlined roller coaster of a trip.

  Its end found it in a particularly opulent garden section of the ship. A thousand scents coasted on artificial air currents that tinkled sparkling crystal plants, whirred through leaves of purple-edged jade, black-veined green, to compose a sensory symphony of mingled sweetness, a stream of blended notes. Paths wound lazily like giant-snake trails, bordered by varieties of trees, bushes, flowers, and plants immaculately landscaped into patterns most pleasant on the eye. Just beyond a hedge clipped to resemble a giant beach ball, a silver fountain sprayed up and up, surrounded by thin wires of a grav-cage that separated the flow into different streams, composing an elaborate water sculpture. It glittered like cut diamonds in the soft glare-strips lined on the azure roof above.

  Not a biosphere, then ... just a little bit of greenery to decorate the entrance to an accommodation complex.

  “Question, Ajax,” said Amber as he stood, regarding the bright crimson and blue plumage of a fan-tailed avian preening itself on an oak branch. “I’ve been in biospheres before. But they’ve always been separate, noninterfering. How can you have such a variety of rooms, spheres, cubes, all using different gravities? Doesn’t it make quite a mess of conflicting forces? It’s a wonder it just doesn’t collapse in on itself.”

  The buzz-unit hovered by Amber’s ear. “Yes, sir. Very delicate gravitation governors we have. But, sir, once you have mastered the force of gravity, anything can be done. The various life chambers are lined with null-grav fields, thus canceling out any conflicting gravity systems. Some of our biospheres, for example, particularly the ones toward the center of the ship, are allowed to rotate, thus creating their own gravity. One enters on the gravitational axis of rotation and walks down to normal gravity. This, sir, is a combination of both Earth and Morapn science and technological systems, both wildly divergent, and yet oddly complementary. And, I might add, both very advanced. So, if you see something that you are not familiar with in action, most likely it is one of the Morapn systems. This is one of the reasons for the continual conflict and misunderstanding between two great civilizations. This is why both heartily condoned a mutual project in the Star Fall—both as a symbol and as an experiment. It seems to be working very well.”

  “Fascinating. Now—I should like to examine my facilities.”

  “Of course,” the buzz-unit said, executing a neat aerial about-face. “This way, please!” The flying machine navigated the twisting path beyond it, leading Amber through the bracing garden section to his cabin section.

  The cabins themselves were quite ordinary ... perhaps to serve as a note of familiarity for the human passengers; an oasis of normality. Ajax led Amber to number C-25. Hovering level with the code sequencer, the little robot emitted a series of high-and low-pitched squeaks and squeals. The door opened, revealing a single, average-sized room.

  Ajax instructed him where he could find his personal key and then buzzed away.

  Maybe four meters by six, the room was not exactly spacious—but it seemed crammed with just about every convenience imaginable. A serviceable looking hydro-bunk with temp-adjustment settings lay in an obsequious niche in the back. Pleasantly-formed furniture—a bubble couch, a massage chair, a shiny coffee table—tastefully sided a 3-D tank, a septophonic music unit, and of course an elaborate pleasure computer unit, its keyboard and readout screen embedded in a wall. Yes—and even a food-service compartment, to the left. Dial-a-meal.

  He gobbled down a hasty lunch, checked his luggage—yes, there it was, in the closet—and settled down on the bed.

  Consciousness feathered away, the transition smooth, easy.

  He dreamed ...

  Fiery images of energy formed; matrices of complex grids.

  Someone played tic-tac-toe there. He lost three games to some invisible adversary. Suddenly he found himself climbing the grids of searing energy, like a ladder. The rungs ate into his hands, and he seemed to smell his own flesh burning. But he had to go upwards
, upwards, into the low-slung, lightning-shot cloud ... for something fearsome followed, something that wanted him ... was on his heels, on his trail ...

  A cube-shaped moon—like a giant cigarette lighter—hung half obscured by thunder heads in the stormy skies.

  He looked down into the darkness below. Climbing behind him was the figure of a powerfully built man. The face looked up, was lit by a flash of jagged lightning.

  It was his former body.

  The MacGuffin, Mark Twelve.

  Hate blazed in its eyes. “You’ll not get me back,” it said in sonorous tones that rivaled the thunder-bursts for volume. “I’ll get you!”

  He hastened his ascent, feeling tremendous vertigo as he thought of how far he had climbed. Suddenly, he heard the flutter of wings. Peering about fearfully, he found himself surrounded on all sides by all manner of birds, earthly and otherwise, propped on the energy lines with clawed feet, regarding him with their beady, emotionless little eyes.

  A keening sound from beyond the thick night wrapped around him. He stared into the pitchy sky through the square of crisscrossed energies like some rear window into his subconscious, and the keening sharpened, gained timbre. A speck of light blinked in the distance, a north by northwest star—growing, shivering off light in shimmering streamers, it rapidly approached, grew into a form: a banshee like ghost swirled round with grave shrouds. Wailing like a lost soul. Its face was an empty-socketed skull, taut with dried skin. Its jaws were open, and it wailed and wailed like a freaked-out patient of some psych ward. Held in bony fingers, unraised, was a sharp butcher knife, which shone blindingly in the lightning ...

  The wails became simpering words.

  “You will love your mother. You will do nothing against the moral codes that have been placed in you. Love your mother. Love your mother.”