An Island in the Stars

by Susan Laine

  Finally a response. Sam blushed and looked away, worrying his bottom lip. Why did this heartthrob of a man have to flatter him? Couldn’t Marcus see how Sam reacted to his praise? He had a feeling sooner or later Marcus would discover his secret, especially now that they’d been put in close quarters by circumstance. The years of careful avoidance had apparently come to naught.

  “No. Shut up.” Cheeks aflame, Sam tried to look anywhere else but at Marcus, but that simply ensured his gaze landing on erotic carvings.

  Marcus shoved him in the arm playfully, chuckling in that infuriatingly sexy manner of his. “Don’t get upset. It was a compliment.”

  Clearing his throat, Sam avoided a further lecture. “We should do a complete search of the premises. Just because this main hall is sort of protected against that… razor beast, that doesn’t mean every area is secure.”

  Marcus shrugged. “Agreed.” He looked left and right. “Which way, Sammy?”

  Sam bristled. “My name is not Sammy. I’m going to the left. You can go wherever the hell you please.”

  With hastened steps, Sam made his way toward the square archway. Marcus was soon on his heels, smirking irreverently. “Best not to split up. You might need me.”

  “Yes, of course. ’Cause I’m a helpless egghead who can’t do anything manly alone.”

  Marcus merely laughed at Sam’s sarcastic tone and punched Sam on the arm again, though not hard enough to hurt him. “You’re hilarious. Lead on, oh brave and wise master.”

  Choosing to ignore the smartass comment, Sam reached the threshold of the doorway. His estimate had been correct. Beneath them, steep stairs descended in a straight line toward a gold-sand beach far below. Tree roots twined across the stairs, dry leaves piled in the corners, and vines crawled up the walls and along the window openings, with flowers hanging from the vines winding across the arched ceiling.

  As they slowly made their way down the practically vertical stair, Sam noted that the complex was built on several elevations. Grassy stone terraces protruded outward, each level expanding a bit more, much like the stairs they were using.

  The construction reminded Sam of the many pictures he’d seen in books about Incan architecture, and in places like Machu Picchu, Ollantaytambo, and Moray. Incan architecture was integrated almost seamlessly into its natural surroundings. The constructions here seemed to blend in with the jungle mountain as well, making it difficult to see exactly where one ended and the other began.

  Sam considered it fortunate he was so well versed in ancient cultures. They fascinated him, and he often used his knowledge of them in his artwork. Now he’d found another practical application for that same information. Who would ever have guessed it? Unfortunately, he had little knowledge of survival strategies.

  “Look at those doorways.” Marcus pointed at the closest terrace and the black opening behind it. He squinted as he tried to pierce the veil of darkness. “Maybe this whole temple complex is mostly underground.” He glanced at Sam. “Should we check it out?”

  Sam nodded. Going down the stairs would lead them to the beach but not much farther, so exploring the temple seemed like a better idea. “Be careful. The temple above might be protected against those… razor beasts, but these underground sections might not be.”

  Marcus quirked an amused eyebrow. “So you finally came around to razor beasts, eh? Although my original suggestion rocked too.”

  “No, flash-vamp-puss sucked.” The second Sam uttered the words he knew he’d been set up. Marcus’s chortling confirmed that Sam was indeed the butt of a ridiculous vampire joke. He closed his eyes and prayed for patience. “Funny ha-ha. Get moving.”

  Laughing, Marcus stepped onto the terrace. Overgrown trees, bushes, and flowers hid most of the stones the terrace had been built on. Marcus crouched, grabbed a stick from the ground, and tested its strength against the stone wall. A crack sounded sharply in the air, but the piece of wood didn’t break, so Sam figured it would work as a temporary weapon. Sam armed himself as well.

  Beyond the doorway only blackness greeted them.

  “I don’t suppose you still have that flashlight in that backpack of yours?” Marcus asked, casting a curious glance toward Sam’s bag.

  Sam snorted. “Do you even have to ask?” He reached for a side pocket, picked up the small flashlight he’d stashed in there so it wouldn’t fall out of his coat pocket, and handed it to Marcus. “It’s all we’ve got, so don’t waste it. I don’t have any more batteries.”

  Marcus nodded, this time appearing serious and focused. “There’s a light on my iPhone, but using the app will eat up the battery. Let’s both try to conserve as much power as we can. I mean, who knows how long the days and nights last here.”

  Sam agreed with a curt nod. Though he’d never been a Boy Scout, he habitually had important things in his backpack and pockets. Who could have foreseen that packrat quality would come in handy on an alien planet? Okay, an alien moon. Big difference. Marcus flicked on the flashlight. The beam was compact but strong. Marcus walked past the threshold and entered the underground passage, Sam following behind him. The air started to smell stale, dust and grit covering the stone floors like a crunchy rug. But Sam saw no cobwebs in the corners, for which he was grateful. On Earth, jungle bugs could kill with a sting or a bite. Therefore it was a good thing this moon might be lacking spiders or other insects. Unless the temple kept them out too….

  All too soon into their exploration, they learned that underneath the mountaintop lay a vast array of passageways, a virtual maze that made navigation difficult. There were no writings or signs to indicate where to go or even where they were in the labyrinthine structure.

  “Fuck,” Marcus cursed after turning yet another corner and seeing nothing but a new, endless tunnel. “Where’s Ariadne with her ribbon when we fucking need her?”

  Sam gawked at Marcus’s back, stunned. Greek mythology. Yet another thing he hadn’t anticipated the hunk of a jock might be interested in. Given that they were lost in a labyrinth, the ball of twine reference was spot on.

  Marcus gave Sam a shit-eating grin over his shoulder. “Gotcha, didn’t I?”

  Sam blushed for the umpteenth time in Marcus’s company, caught red-handed with his disbelieving thoughts. “Shut up.”

  Chuckling, Marcus trod forward, and for a while neither of them spoke. The beam of the flashlight revealed numerous statues and reliefs along the stone walls, all of the same erotic nature as the ones above ground.

  But what they didn’t come across were rooms.

  “Is there nothing else here but these unending corridors?” Marcus’s frustrated harrumph reflected Sam’s own feelings. “This is ridiculous. Didn’t the folks who used to live here have any kind of quarters or chambers, kitchens or bathrooms or bedrooms, anything? Or are we fucking going around in circles without realizing it?”

  Sam had begun to worry about that too. Was there something different about the way the lizzies lived in the temple? Or were the two of them missing something obvious?

  He stopped and looked around with a discerning eye. “Let me borrow that light for a sec, will you?” Once Marcus had returned the flashlight to him, Sam shot the sharp ray onto the wall, inspecting it more carefully than before.

  “See something?” Marcus asked behind him, his warm breath fanning over Sam’s nape and giving him goose bumps.

  “It’d be weird for there to be no rooms.” Sam explained his actions as he continued to aim the beam at every curve and shadow on the wall. “Maybe we’re just not seeing them.”

  Sam crouched closer. A small, almost imperceptible crack revealed a stone door embedded into the wall so seamlessly no one would see if they weren’t looking for it or didn’t know it was there. The elaborate carvings and graceful reliefs made noticing the door even more arduous.

  “There are doors, so there must be rooms.” Sam straightened and pointed. “It’s there. But I have no idea how to open it. The whole thing has to weigh a ton. Maybe the lizzie
s are, or were, physically stronger than humans.”

  “In the carvings the lizzies do appear bigger, so it’d be normal to assume—”

  Sam frowned, remembering an article he had read a while back, so he interjected, “No, that’s not right. The lower the gravity, the weaker the muscles, bones, cells, everything. If we stay here too long, our muscles will slowly begin to… shit, what’s the word? Oh yeah, atrophy. And our bones will get thinner.”

  Marcus nodded in agreement. “Understood.”

  “This isn’t our natural environment. We shouldn’t be here long if we can avoid it.” Of those facts Sam was certain. He was less certain about everything else. “Of course, for all we know, for the lizzies this could have been their natural habitat, so the low gravity might have been normal for them….”

  “Gimme the light.” Marcus illuminated the statues by the door, one on each side. Both depicted raucous and lascivious lizzies engaged in acts of debauchery. Sam wondered why Marcus wanted to view them up close. But then Marcus sneered with amusement. “Believe it or not, the statue is the key. Or the lock. Or, um…. Shit, you know what I mean.”

  Sam suppressed a chuckle and hid a smile behind his hand. It seemed that Marcus still needed some work on his metaphors. How adorable.

  Marcus pulled on the male lizzie’s cock.

  A sound of stones grinding and chafing against each other echoed through the empty corridors and Sam’s bones, causing him to grit his teeth with discomfort and sprout goose bumps. Marcus grimaced and shivered next to him as well.

  The heavy stone door slowly began to open. Apparently the movable penis of the statue functioned like a lever, activating a hidden mechanism buried inside the wall. The grating noise was loud, and Sam winced, praying the underground area was as protected from predators as the aboveground areas.

  The new opening revealed a large dusky chamber, illuminated faintly by light wells in the vaulted ceiling. Though Sam couldn’t see them directly, he suspected that inside the shafts were either conveniently placed mirrors that reflected sunlight or crystals refracting sunlight. Breathable air must have been a byproduct.

  Considering how many light wells there were, Sam figured the chamber had to contain something important or serve a valuable role. The second he saw the walls lined with bookshelves, all filled with scrolls, he knew he’d been right.

  “It’s a library.” Marcus whistled low and gave Sam an admiring and approving glance. “You’ve got great instincts.”

  Sam smiled, ducking his head to hide his flaming cheeks. “You too. I wouldn’t have guessed to check the statues and their, um… appendages.”

  Marcus chuckled. “Looks like we hit the jackpot.”

  Sam agreed enthusiastically. He rushed to the closest shelf, gently took out one scroll, and unrolled it, inspecting the contents with great care. “It’s kind of like papyrus, a bit brittle to the touch, but legible, I think.”

  Marcus let out a relieved breath. “That’s good for us. I hope there’s something in there we can use to our advantage.”

  He took a gander at the premises, his gaze glossing over the table, and he rubbed his chin in thought. A scratching sound arose from his slight stubble, and Sam found it particularly hot. Marcus was already a man in every sense; Sam wanted him so much the urge unnerved him. He knew the feeling was both unrequited and hopeless, yet he couldn’t shake his heart loose.

  Then Marcus said, “You should stay here with the books. I’m gonna search for stuff we can use.”

  Sam frowned, baffled and disagreeing. “Why do I have to stay here when I don’t even understand the language? How will I be able to tell what could work in reactivating the portal in the chamber?”

  Marcus shrugged. “You’re better able to recognize the kinds of books we need.”

  “What? Two pairs of eyes are better than one. And you read too.”

  “Yeah, but not as much as you. You’ll be able to tell what’s more significant. I don’t know a drama classic from a computer manual.”

  Sam shook his head with disbelief and suspicion. “You’re exaggerating—or lying.”

  Finally Marcus whined out loud and brought up his hands in a gesture of surrender, which seemed to be full of frustration. “Okay, fine. You got me. I’m not good at sitting on my hands doing nothing. I need to do something, anything, even if it’s just walking aimlessly down hallways in search of… whatever.” Then he licked his lips anxiously and looked away. “Or… maybe I’m just scared of failure.”

  As surprised as Sam was about Marcus’s admission of restlessness, he refused to believe the latter could be true. “That’s ridiculous. You could never fail at anything you put your mind to. And you, afraid? You’re not afraid of anything.”

  Marcus smiled ruefully, hiding his eyes behind a thick veil of lashes. “I wish that were true…. But who knows, right? Maybe you’ll get lucky and some of these scrolls will have pictures in them, you know, like comics, where the pictures sometimes tell you more than the text.”

  Sam frowned in bafflement. Marcus was into comics too? Did he somehow know about Sam’s interest in them? If anyone had suggested it to Sam before they ended up on this alien moon, he would have denied the mere possibility of Marcus being a fan of comic books. Cool guys didn’t do comics, or at least so the unwritten rule of popularity went in high school.

  “Okay, fine,” Sam acquiesced at last. “But be careful, for God’s sake. And don’t go setting off any Indiana Jones or Lara Croft type traps either. I swear, if I see a giant boulder rolling my way, don’t think I won’t leave you down here to rot under it.”

  “Rolling stones don’t gather moss,” Marcus quipped and chuckled. “Besides… booby traps? This seems more like a revered brothel than a military fortress. But I’ll be careful traipsing on my tippy-toes, quiet as a church mouse.”

  Before Sam could get in a word in edgewise, Marcus had already nodded his goodbye and left the library with the flashlight.

  Sam did holler after him, though. “Shut up!”

  Vexed at Marcus’s rash actions, Sam was nonetheless now alone, confined in a strange room, at least until his companion saw fit to return. At the very least he wasn’t completely in the dark, thanks to the light shafts above.

  Since he had nothing better to do for the time being, Sam sighed in defeat and started rummaging through the countless scrolls in the library.

  Chapter 5

  “WHAT THE hell did I get us into?” Marcus murmured to himself as he trudged down the long, winding, utterly deserted hallways. A simple human voice echoing in the silence went a long way in comforting his troubled soul.

  With only the faint glow of Sam’s flashlight to guide him through the darkness, Marcus couldn’t help worrying about how every horror movie and game he’d ever seen and played started out like this—a person alone, with only a flashlight to aid him. Shuddering, he stopped every couple of steps to listen. It was silly because surely no one still lived on the island, no one sentient anyway. Every trick of the light and shadow play caused him to stumble and swallow nervously.

  Marcus began to feel it had been a mistake to leave Sam behind in the library.

  He smiled at the thought of the morose geek boy who seemed so troubled by Marcus’s presence and attention. Marcus had witnessed and relished each and every endearing blush, lip bite, and eyelash flutter. Sam was so cute, far more so than he even knew. Marcus wondered if the nerdy boy was still a virgin…. He was only seventeen, almost eighteen, so it was possible.

  Marcus confessed to himself that he hoped Sam was untouched. He really wanted to be the first to do any touching with Sam.

  But getting close to, or simply approaching, Sam had proved much harder than he had anticipated. Sam thwarted every effort on Marcus’s part, appearing sullen, withdrawn, and hurt, as though Marcus had done something to offend him. Marcus couldn’t fathom what he’d done.

  Was the cause maybe that Marcus was best friends with Simon, Sam’s older brother? Surely Sam couldn
’t hold that against Marcus. He and Simon had been best friends since fucking daycare. Marcus could do a lot, but turning back time was not in his bag of tricks.

  His ponderings about Sam’s reticence ceased when Marcus heard the gush of water. A beam of light on the floor grew as Marcus walked closer to another terraced balcony overlooking a wall of green vegetation and offering glimpses of a golden beach far below.

  On the side of the mountain, a waterfall rushed down a steep vertical incline, vanishing in the jungle beneath a cluster of sharp rocks.

  Marcus wasn’t a religious guy, but he prayed the water was fresh, sweet, and clean. He stepped closer to where the stone-and-grass terrace turned into the natural cliff’s edge, extended his hand into the stream, and waited. It wasn’t acid, he concluded with a smirk, since his flesh didn’t burn and peel off. He pulled back, smelled the moisture on his fingers, judged it fresh and harmless, and sipped a few droplets. The liquid tasted like fresh water, so he congratulated himself for such a beneficial find.

  “I rock, uh-huh, oh yeah.” He did a little victory dance in celebration.

  Marcus wasn’t ashamed to admit that when Sam had been down, Marcus had searched his backpack for supplies. He’d found a half-empty plastic bottle. Now he screwed open the cap and refilled the bottle with fresh water from the waterfall. Seemed like a sensible thing to do.

  “And now to be brave and do a blind taste testing,” he muttered aloud, for what it was worth since he was alone after all.

  He lifted the bottle to his lips, took a sip, and gulped the liquid down nervously. Then he waited. His throat didn’t burn off, his stomach seemed perfectly settled, and the aftertaste was the same as that of the tap water back home.

  “Score.” Marcus was glad he could at least check off one item on the list of things they needed to survive. “Next up: food.”

  Sam had been right. Protein bars wouldn’t last them for more than a day or two, even if they did their best to conserve supplies and fight off hunger. How long could a human survive on water alone? A week, maybe? Surely not as long as a month, Marcus figured.