Starstuff (Starstuff Trilogy Book 1)

by Ira Heinichen

  “Is that Aaron’s Landing?” asked Barry, taking his mouth off the juice box straw for the first time in several minutes.

  Haber nodded. “I’m afraid it is.”

  “What happened?” Suzy asked.

  The city was a graveyard of crumbling and overgrown buildings as far as each of them could see from the hilltop. As with the road, nature was reclaiming virtually every millimeter of the city’s surface, be it horizontal or vertical. Even as dusk continued to fall, there was not a light to be seen turned on anywhere, nor any person or other sign of life. Belongings littered the ground and garbage fluttered about in the late afternoon breeze. It was as if the city had been turned upside down, shaken empty, and then returned to the ground never to be touched again. Clarke, standing at Petrick’s feet, let out a bark that echoed down over the valley.

  Haber didn’t answer Suzy’s question and instead continued walking the road that meandered into the vacant city.

  They were walking through empty streets fifteen or so minutes later.

  Clarke was trotting along at Petrick’s side, and they gazed upon the former glory of Aaron’s Landing. The dirt road leading to it had given way to some sort of harder rocklike surface once they entered. Haber had called it “perma-road.” It cut through at right angles in every direction. Buildings towered above them, some leaning precariously to the side, others almost entirely covered with growing vines and shrubs. The garbage was plentiful, complete with vehicles of an unknown design scattered here and there in the various streets. If Petrick used his imagination, he could picture it all bustling with activity.

  The children pointed out features to each other as they went deeper inside. Haber noted that they couldn’t help but wonder at this new world around them. They’d never seen such immense structures. It mostly awed them into a stunned silence, except for the occasional whisper and their tiny footsteps echoing among the fallen giants. Which was all for the better as far as Haber was concerned.

  “Hello?” Barry called out, making everyone jump in surprise. His voice echoed among the neglected buildings.

  They all froze for a moment to see if there would be any answer. There wasn’t one, and Haber swung around to look at the portly troublemaker. “Don’t do that again, Master Barry,” Haber hissed through his teeth. “We have no idea who might be left in this abandoned city.”

  “Well, what if they can help us?” Barry offered.

  “If anyone can help us, they’ll be at what has been our destination from the outset,” Haber answered him. “The port.”

  From Petrick’s perspective, the farther they went down the empty streets and the more their wonder and excitement had grown, the tenser the android had become. “Right, the port,” he said. “Where is it?”

  Haber pointed up to a sign that was hanging askew on a pole at the side of the paved road they were currently striding down. Each of the three children cocked their head to read the sideways message.

  Port this way.

  Below it was an arrow pointing what would have been straight ahead, had the sign been hanging in its proper position. Suzy chuckled at how the children had missed such an obvious set of directions, and they continued walking where Haber had been leading them.

  It turned out they didn’t have to walk for very long at all. The port was a massive domed structure at the very center of Aaron’s Landing. All roads in the large city, it seemed, spiraled in toward the port. It rose at least three hundred feet toward the sky, and as the group of four (plus Clarke) approached, they could see the massive emblazoned letters above an entrance two hundred feet wide: aaron’s landing spaceport.

  During its heyday, Haber had explained to them that morning, Aaron’s Landing had been the largest port on Indacar. It was a major stopover and refueling point for this entire sector of Fringe Space. It was the largest terrestrial port in three sectors, with most other systems using orbital stations as opposed to planet-bound docking. It could house over one hundred commercial vessels at one time, in addition to a couple hundred smaller private or charter ships. Four hundred thousand people had lived in the city surrounding the domed monstrosity.

  There were various advantages to having a terrestrial spaceport. No artificial-gravity charges, no shuttles to navigate up and down from the surface, and starstuff was easier to keep stable under atmospheric conditions. In a vacuum, starstuff started to do weird things. The downside was that, once built, orbital stations were much cheaper to maintain, and so terrestrial ports had eventually fallen by the wayside. In the vacuum of competition lent by its remoteness, however, Aaron’s Landing had thrived in an otherwise isolated and quiet region of space.

  Had thrived. That past tense was ever so clear as the foursome stepped under the large letters and through the wide opening into the structure.

  Windows were shattered and cracked, entire staircases had crumbled here and there, and there were no man-made lights to be seen in the lobby they’d stepped into. They could see huge signs that had undoubtedly once displayed a myriad of arrival and departure details to the travelers below, which now sat dark and useless. Counters lined the back wall as far as the eye could see around the gentle curve of the building, all empty. Paper and garbage littered the floors. Water dripped in a few places from pipes that must still have been managing to collect water somehow but had cracked open from disrepair.

  “Where are all the people?” Barry asked in a hushed tone.

  “Good question . . . ,” said Petrick.

  “If we continue inside, I believe I can get us onto the ship tarmac,” Haber said. “It’s open-air there, so we’ll be able to see a little better, at least until sundown. And if there are any ships that still leave from here, that’s where we’ll find them.”

  It seemed like a good enough plan, not that the children were going to argue with Haber anyway. As they passed through the abandoned security checkpoints, Petrick strode ahead to catch up with Haber.

  “Haber,” he said in a quiet tone once he reached the tall android. “Did you know it was going to be like this?”

  Haber sighed in a very humanlike fashion. “I knew it was a distinct possibility that there had been a significant decline, given the time that has passed and the travel ban.”

  “Do you think there will be a ship here?” Petrick asked.

  Haber didn’t answer the question at first, which led Petrick to believe that the android was suppressing his first thought on the matter. “If we are going to find one,” he said finally, “it’s going to be through here.”

  Haber gestured to a large pair of security doors marked with caution and authorized personnel only. The android reached them and pushed forward. They scraped along the floor, stuck.

  The large doors did, however, open just enough for Clarke to slip through ahead of them and disappear.

  “Clarke!” Petrick called after the naughty dog.

  There was a small yelp from the other side of the door, and before he could think about it, or anyone could stop him, Petrick forced his way through the crack after him.

  It was pitch-black on the other side.

  “Clarke,” Petrick hissed.

  A rustling sound caught his attention. He wished he’d brought Barry’s torchless. The worried sounds of Haber and his friends behind the stuck doors reminded him he hadn’t really thought anything through before rushing in. More rustling noises spurred Petrick forward in the darkness. A small wiggling shape took form, tangled in some kind of hose.

  “There you are,” said Petrick. He dropped to his knees and reached out to untangle the poor dog.

  But that was when Clarke barked . . . behind Petrick.

  Petrick jerked his hand back. The small not-Clarke creature hissed and snapped its teeth right where his fingers had been. Clarke rushed toward the tangled creature, which screeched and made a run for it.

  The hose unraveled as much as it could as the creature fled, and then snapped tight. The creature strained for a moment. The machine next to Petrick tha
t the hoses were connected to creaked. Clarke snarled and ran in pursuit of the stalled creature, which screeched again and pulled desperately at the hose to get away.

  “Wait!” Petrick tried to stop Clarke as the machine began to tip from the strain . . . but it was too late.

  With a long groan and a short crash, the hosed machine tipped over. Petrick managed to scramble out of the way just as it hit the floor, but he was not spared the muck that splattered out from it.

  It was thick, slimy, and stunk like swamp muck. Petrick wiped it from his eyes in time to see the furry creature round a corner and disappear, hoses and all. Clarke was snapping at its heels, clean as a whistle. He stopped at the corner, chest and ears up, and gave a bark as if to say, And don’t come back!

  “Petrick!” called Suzy from the door. “Let me through, you robot,” she said, presumably to Haber.

  “Young master,” Haber’s voice called. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” Petrick replied after wiping muck away from his mouth. He hadn’t got all of it, and after calling out he coughed and spat out the rancid taste. “Clarke!” he said. Clarke looked over at him. Petrick snapped his fingers and pointed down at his side and the dog trotted dutifully over.

  A moment later and both were squinting into the bright light of Barry’s torchless. Haber, Suzy, and Barry all breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of an uninjured Petrick. Then their faces turned sour.

  “Oh my land,” said Suzy in horror. “What is that smell?”

  “It’s all over you,” said Barry.

  Haber pointed his own torchless toward the fallen machine, which in the light looked more like a tank or container. food waste, it read.

  “Ewww,” the children all said in unison.

  Haber reached out for Petrick’s hand and helped him up. His shirt and pants clung to his body, slick with years-old food waste. Before Petrick could ask what in stars’ name he was going to do to clean himself off, Barry was reaching into his new pack and pulling out a fresh set of clothes.

  “You can borrow these,” he said, handing the clothes over. Petrick and Suzy stared at him.

  “You keep fresh clothes in there?” Suzy asked.

  Barry shrugged. “I always have. You never know!”

  Petrick shook his head but took the clothes.

  Haber, during their conversation, had wandered a short distance away. He returned with a towel in hand. “Use this to wipe off,” he said. “I was hopeful the water basin over there could be used to wet it, but it appears as though there is no running water in this section of the facility.” The android was clearly dismayed at that discovery.

  “So, this place is abandoned?” Suzy asked.

  “Let’s move on and find out,” he answered, gesturing for them to leave Petrick alone to wipe down and re-dress. They turned their backs and walked a few paces away.

  “No peeking,” said Petrick. He stripped his nasty clothes off as quickly as he could.

  “Ew, Petrick,” said Suzy.

  “Who’d want to?” Barry giggled, and he elbowed Suzy, who giggled, too.

  After a vigorous wipe of the towel, Petrick slipped on the traditional homespun tunic and trousers that were the customary garb for Indacarans. They were simple clothes, soft and durable. Petrick exhaled at the touch of the fresh fabric.

  Both Barry and Suzy giggled again at the sight of Petrick when they turned back around. The clothes were baggy and too short for him, being Barry’s size, and they did fit rather ridiculously.

  Petrick didn’t mind. “Let’s go,” he said.

  Haber nodded in agreement.

  It turned out the whole food waste fiasco had gone down behind what was obviously a former kitchen and cafeteria of some kind, or kinds. Moving through to the front, where customers would’ve come in, the group noticed that similarly styled restaurants and other shops stretched as far around the great circle of the concourse as they could see. All were dark, in various states of disarray, and all were ringed to face a massive wall of glass.

  The glass looked out over the furthest interior of the port. Down below them was the circular tarmac, from which ships would maneuver into berths underneath where they were currently standing. The tall glass windows surrounded the open tarmac in a giant ring, and though they could not see the berths that lay below their feet, they could see the ones that were opposite them in the circle . . . all of them were very, very empty.

  Opposite the windows and the various chairs and benches that were situated in front of them were the wall-to-wall shops and restrooms and kiosks and cafés and restaurants.

  Barry wrinkled his nose. “It smells in here,” he said.

  “Probably long-rotted food,” Petrick said, gesturing to an abandoned café next to them, which held coolers that had been broken open and had black sludge oozing from the inside.

  “We must circumnavigate the concourse,” Haber said. “See if there are, in fact, ships in any of these berths.”

  “I can’t see any from here,” Barry offered.

  “Exactly why we must explore to the other side,” Haber responded impatiently.

  Barry groaned, and Petrick stepped in before Haber or Suzy could smack him down, verbally or otherwise.

  “Just a little further,” he said, patting his chubby friend on the shoulder. “We have to see if anyone is here. Why don’t I carry your pack for a little while?”

  Barry shrugged Petrick’s hand off. “And hear for the next million years from you and Suzy how I couldn’t carry my own weight?” he said haughtily. “No thank you. Lead on, Mr. Haber.”

  Petrick caught Suzy’s smile as he looked over toward her, and he smiled back.

  There was some fight left in the little complainer after all.

  Barry’s reluctance to move from where they’d been had been well founded. They reached the other side of the giant concourse after nearly a half hour of walking, but nothing was any different. None of the berths below the concourse had proven to have anything inside them except for more garbage and invading weeds. They finally stopped and sat down once they reached a panel of the observation glass that had shattered, leaving the concourse open to the tarmac down below.

  A gentle breeze wafted in from the missing window. It smelled of the forest wind that blew down to the center of the port through the open roof. Through that giant egress, they could see in the pink and orange tones of the clouds above that the sun was finally setting. The night would soon be upon them, and there was no ship.

  “You’re sure we’ve gone around the whole thing?” Petrick asked.

  “One point one two times, to be precise,” Haber said. “Two thousand, one hundred thirty-seven steps.”

  “You counted each of our steps?” Barry asked.

  “I’m programmed with the ability to map physical locations and spatial movement.”

  Barry nodded as if he understood. “Neat.”

  Petrick sighed to try to ease the knot that was growing in his chest. Even when they’d seen the decaying city from that hilltop, even when they’d walked through the obviously abandoned port building, even when Haber had shown his own doubt about their finding a ship . . . Petrick had still expected there would be one somehow. Somehow.

  “What are we going to do?” he said aloud.

  “We could go home,” Suzy said, but without any I-told-you-so to it.

  “It will soon be completely dark,” Haber said. “We must camp here for the night.”

  “Can we camp down on the tarmac?” Barry asked, miraculously with another juice box in his mouth. “We can look at the stars that way.”

  “It would be unwise to camp exposed to the elements when we have suitable covering in here,” Haber replied dourly. The android seemed just as anxious as Petrick.

  “I’m not talking about tonight,” Petrick said. “We need to get off Indacar.”

  Haber looked helpless. “I do not know, young master,” he said.

  Petrick felt light-headed. He sat back down on
the carpeted floor and ran his fingers through the low, tightly knit knots of old, dirty carpet. “We have to find another way,” he said.

  The directive hung there, and Petrick’s three companions didn’t know what to say.

  “Perhaps,” Haber said finally, “we should take the time to consider other options.” He gestured to their packs, which were stuffed with supplies. “Right now, I suggest that we set up camp. I will prepare three of the meal packs, and we can speak more on the matter tomorrow.”

  Petrick let a breath out he didn’t realize he’d been holding, and he nodded his head, trying to calm down. He knew that Haber was right. But the knot in his chest was still very much there and tightening, and no amount of sleeping bags or reconstituted food packs was going to loosen it.

  They had to find a way off Indacar.

  18

  THE SOLDIER WAS STARING at his Companion.

  Slink turned and stared back at him, which made the young man snap his head straight ahead. Slink smiled at him and ran his eyes over the soldier’s soft, youthful skin, which peeked out here and there from the standard Authority uniform. The fabric was a pale gray, tight, and glistening with sweat.

  “You’re curious about my Companion,” Slink said to him.

  Slink gave a small tug on the mental link. Everyone else in the cramped scout ship was looking at them now. They were a dozen or so of the Authority’s finest . . . or at least the most available. Slink’s Companion grunted from the tug, and its head lolled slightly to the side.

  “Would you like me to ask it a question for you?” Slink asked. The soldier kept his eyes straight forward and mouth shut. The room was tense. “Anything in particular? Like, perhaps, when you’re going to find the courage to speak up?”

  Slink laughed. He instantly regretted doing so. The air of the scout ship stank of rust and years of uncleaned grime. It was nothing like the pristine sterility of the capital ship or the headquarters he’d become so accustomed to. This was the Authority outside of those facilities—slowly decaying from neglect.