Custodians of the Cosmos

by Drayton Alan

  “I been there lots of times. In fact, I have a little business there. We gonna leave our mark at old Falcon, you and me.” Nigel winked.

  The gesture was supposed to be reassuring, and on most people, it would have been, but the odd movement of his eyestache reminded Kale of a dancing caterpillar.

  “Thanks Nigel. I appreciate it.”

  Chapter 6

  The ship arrived at Space Station Falcon the next day and soon Kale and Nigel were headed for the heart of the action. Belle had been asked to report to the robotics center on the station to check the strange problems they were having with their robots.

  The station was situated out past the edge of Coalition space and into an area that was contested by several races and home to many more. This meant that Falcon was visited by a large assortment of different space faring cultures, each with its own peculiar rules and strict traditions. Any of which an incautious novice could easily transgress. Traders and smugglers, living at the edge of decent society, also frequented the place since it offered the entertainment and diversions such people coveted.

  Yes, it would be easy to fall prey to one of the station’s many notorious dangers. Unfortunately for Kale, Nigel was one of these said dangers. Maybe not Nigel himself, but everyone and every place he frequented on Falcon fell into that category.

  Kale and Nigel walked along the storefronts in an area of the station cheerfully named the Zippy Galleria. The station overwhelmed Kale. So many strange and wonderful things he had never seen in his isolated life on Earth. It felt like pure terror and joyous exhilaration all at once. But this was why he wanted to go into space, to experience a life full of adventure, excitement, and novelty.

  Falcon Station was big as far as space stations go. It was composed of seven large pod-shaped areas arranged in a circle all connected to each other and to a center hub. The corridors connecting the pods were crowded and small. This design was intentional and allowed for easy isolation of the separate parts of the station if any were damaged. The interior of each pod was color-coded, which would have allowed Kale easy navigation, if the alien race that had chosen the colors saw light in the same spectrum as humans. But for humans the seven section colors appeared as; grayish-beige, grayish-tan, grayish-taupe, grayish-bisque, grayish-khaki, grayish-fawn, and grayish-café au lait.

  “This color-coded station guide map is confusing,” Kale said as he struggled with a large folding paper map.

  “Are you crazy? Do you want to get us killed? Why not just put a big sign on you that says Rob Me I’m an Idiot? Put it away, I know my way around, I told you I would take care of yah. We got time to look around before my business meeting, whatcha wanna do first?”

  “I’d love to get some real food! Something not from a replicator,” Kale said.

  “That’s a prime suggestion, lad. I could fancy some good home cooking myself. I know just the place. They know me in there and the woman who runs it, Nanaberi, has a bit of a crush on me, so she always givin’ me big ol’ portions. Embarassin’, ya know.”

  “Large portions sound good. What’s the place called?”

  “Well it doesn’t translate well into English. But let me assure you that the name is misleadin’.”

  “Okay, so what’s the name?”

  “Umm… The Bloated Cockro… Beetle,” Nigel tried to mumble the last part of the name.

  “The Bloated Cockroach Beetle?” Kale asked. He was hungry, but that name made him reconsider.

  “Like I said, loses a lot in translation. In Warfian the word is Grochtc! Ulfin! Clepch! It refers to a Warfian story about food that’s so good, the vermin are too full to walk. It’s a real clever name if you speak Warfian.”

  “You know a lot about Warfian,” Kale said.

  “Oh, I don’t know all that much, but a friend of mine told me. He knows all that stuff. I’ll stop by and introduce ya to him on the way.”

  The sheer variety of people in the shopping area was mind numbing. People Kale had only seen pictures of in books. He recognized many of the alien races from his preparation for the academy; he saw Warfians, Canabians, Centaurians, and humans, to name only a few he was familiar with. There were quite a few alien races much like humans, but there were also many different and strange to Kale. The academy prep course had none of these people in it.

  They walked by one alien that reminded him of a cow, but bipedal. He tried not to stare, but the sight was overwhelming. The thing had a huge udder in the middle of its chest and small horns on its large bovine-shaped head. He didn’t realize he was staring.

  An elbow jabbed into his side. The force struck him so hard that it made him double over in pain.

  “Newbers, you are staring direct at a lady Guernsian. That could well be a fatal mistake on Falcon. If’n her husband see’d ya do that, you’d be dead about now. They don’t take kindly to alien men staring at their women. A more jealous and cantankerous critter-person you never met.”

  “Oh sorry, I didn’t know.” Kale looked down at the ground to avoid seeing the woman. “Just, I’d never seen one of them before is all. I swear, I wasn’t thinking anything.”

  “Don’t sorry me. I know you wasn’t thinkin’ nothing and any other human would believe you. But that don’t hold no water with a Guernsian Bull. You gonna tell him that his woman is ugly, on top of insulting him by staring at her? I want you to imagine a full-grown bull standing on two legs with some massive horns, sharpened hoofs, and a bad attitude. If he was jealous, ya wouldn’t be able to talk let alone make some lame excuse. In a fight, I seen ’em kill ten men with one swipe of their head. Course they was ten little fellas, but still impressive.”

  “Thanks, Nigel, I’ll remember that.”

  “You best remember. The trick to surviving on Falcon, Newbers, is you gotta keep your eyes down. You don’t wanna see nothing you aint supposed to, but still see everything you should.”

  Kale thought about that advice and tried to practice it. He looked at the floor about two meters in front of him. Only giving sideways glances to keep track of his surroundings. Not making eye contact with strangers, it must be something like that.

  As they walked past more stores, a sign in a store window caught Kale’s attention.

  “Oh look, they’re selling that holovid the officers were talking about the other day, The Pirates of Penzance. Maybe I should buy one?”

  “Oh, I can get those real cheap, ya don’t need to buy it here. I know the guy who’s selling them to everyone else. He has a direct link to the manufacturer. These guys here mark em up real high. What you need with some old play holovid, anyway?”

  “I overheard the captain and Commander Frakes want to have the officers put on a production of it. Sounds fun, right?”

  “That’s only ’cause you never been to one of the ship’s performances. Take my advice, you should plan on being sick that night. The captain’s plays are notorious and if ya don’t pretend to be sick to avoid it, ya will be if ya go.”

  “Well I’ve been around plays all my life. My parents put on lots of ’em when I was a kid. And I like that show, it’s a hoot. I might try out for a part.”

  “Well to each man his poison, I reckon. Me, I’m a man of commerce. Besides my expertizing the custodial field, I also have a thriving commerciallike enterprise. I been spendin’ my spare time pursuing financial inter-dependence. Like the deal I got going with Mr. Quibbler.”

  “Who is Mr. Quibbler?”

  “He is my partner in business. Our emporium is one of the finest and most diverse retail establishments on Falcon Station. Let me tell you, Mr. Quibbler has made me a wealthy man.”

  “That’s great, it’s nice you’re making a lot of money, Nigel.”

  “Well the way me and Mr. Quibbler got it set up, I don’t see my money ’til later. My investments are what you call un-liquid compounding. That means they just build and build, ’til later on when I takes and liquidizes them. Then I’ll be richer than Sam.”

  “Sam, who is that?�
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  “That’s just an expression, Kale. Sam is the guy everybody wants to get richer than. Like, Keeping up with the Johnsons.”

  “Oh, I see, but I heard it as Keeping up with the Joneses.”

  “Yeah, that’s one of them—ya gotta keep up with too. ’Cept the Johnson’s got more stuff, and Sam is richer than both of them two put together! So anyway, what was I telling ya?”

  “How you and Mr. Quibbler will be rich from your store.”

  “Yeah, that’s right, in fact we are almost there.”

  “Almost where?” Kale looked around for a big storefront, but it seemed like they had entered a crowded pod-access passageway.

  “It’s right up here, on the right,” Nigel said as they got pushed along by the crowds.

  A small opening appeared on the right side of the passage and Nigel pulled him into it. It appeared to be a maintenance alcove, there were pipes running through it and access panels on the walls.

  On the floor of the tiny alcove was a blanket with miscellaneous junk scattered about. If Nigel hadn’t pointed it out, Kale would have thought it a spilled bag of items destined for a donation drop box somewhere.

  Nigel must have thought this a wondrous place. All Kale saw was a warn and dirty blanket covered with worn and dirty merchandise. In the center of the blanket stood a worn and dirty human-ish looking fellow. The man gave Nigel a big, toothy grin.

  “Well if it aint my good friend Nigel! And who’s this you brought with you?”

  “This here is my good mate, Kale,” Nigel said.

  “No doubt a fine upstanding fellow officer of the Coalition. Welcome to Quibbler’s Emporium of Rare and Exotic Collectibles, my friend.”

  The man offered a grubby hand, and before Kale had time to ponder its hygienic attributes, it had grasped his and was shaking it with practiced trustworthiness.

  “Maximilian Quibbler at your service. I’m so glad my good buddy and business associate, Mr. Van Mullet, has brought you by. We are having a special today on the very items a young man like yourself cannot be without.”

  “Oh,” Nigel said. “Kale’s not a regular friend.” The way Nigel said friend implied that he made friends all the time and brought them to Max Quibbler as part of their business arrangement. Thus, friend in this context also meant sucker, mark, victim, or dupe.

  “No,” Nigel continued. “Kale here is a fellow I work with on the Cosmos, no need for the special Quibbler sales pitch. He gets my discount.”

  Quibbler looked disappointed.

  “Have you heard from our special contacts yet?” Nigel asked.

  “Yes indeed, my good friend. I told them you would arrive today with the items in consideration. They are eager to make arrangements. They even gave me this for you, it will display a message when they are ready.” Quibbler handed him a small green tablet device.

  An alien man of a race Kale didn’t recognize, stumbled into the alcove and looked at the assortment of merchandise on the floor. The man seemed ready to speak so Kale and Nigel stepped back to give Quibbler room to work. Kale felt like he was watching a fly fall into a spider’s web.

  In an instant, Quibbler began spinning his words, making them sticky, and nearly invisible. Then with deliberateness, he wove them about the man, turning and weaving their delicate threads until the man was engulfed in his consuming verbiage.

  Before the poor fellow realized it, Mr. Quibbler had brought out an assortment of holovids from somewhere in his large coat. He’d unwrapped them from a cloth and began his sales pitch. As he spoke, Quibbler used strange gestures and hand movements in a hypnotic pattern. In a short time, the man was browsing the inventory. Kale wondered if the fellow even knew what a holovid was, but he looked fascinated by them now.

  It would only be a moment until Quibbler made the inevitable thrust into the man’s wallet and the subsequent sucking of it dry. Unable to watch this any longer Kale looked away. He looked around the small crowded alcove. On the wall nearby was another of the Please Give to the RSWOF posters, which were everywhere. The orphans on the poster looked like they had made a bad deal with Quibbler and were now destitute. It was too depressing to think about, so he looked down to examine Quibbler’s merchandise, which was also depressing. Besides five toasters, some cheap plastic trinkets, and worn clothing, there were four covered plastic bowls with tight lids. Each had a small air hole and a crudely handwritten sign stuck to it. He couldn’t read the sign, it was the strange symbols of an alien tongue. One bowl jumped and moved to one side.

  Kale pointed to the signs on the bowls and asked Nigel what they were.

  “Oh, that there’s Warfian writing,” Nigel said.

  “Yes, but what do they say, and what’s in the bowls?”

  “Them’s Alegarian toads, I wouldn’t advice lickin’ um. Not really safe for humans, but I never tried.”

  “Lick them? Why would I?”

  “Yeah, well, Warfians love lickin’ them some toads. Gives em a smooth tingly feeling for a few hours. Then afterward, they get real mean and ornery ’til they lick another.”

  “Does he sell them or just... rent licks?”

  “This is where Mr. Quibbler is real smart. He won’t sell them a toad at first, in fact, he gives the Warfian younglings a lick for free the first time. Then when they come back, he charges em and reads their credit chip. Cause sure enough that youngling will come back over and over buying licks until he eats the whole toad. That’s when Max pretends to get real mad and charges em for the whole toad and they aint cheap.”

  “That’s awful. Don’t the Warfian’s parents get upset?”

  “Sure, ’til he gives them a free lick; when they done he sells ’em a second toad half price. He’s the smartest business man I ever knew.”

  Mr. Quibbler finished selling his newest best friend, the guy that had blundered in to his store, the last remaining special edition copy of the greatest holovid ever made. The alien had no clue what it was, but knew he needed it so badly that he had spent all his money on it. The fellow went away smiling, facing life with a wonderful holovid and a suffocating mountain of debt.

  Quibbler turned his attention back to Kale. When his eyes focused on him, a shiver went up his backbone.

  “Humans can lick the toads if they want.” Quibbler said. Making it clear that he’d missed none of Kale and Nigel’s conversation.

  “Will it make me warm and tingly?” Kale asked.

  “No, but the toads kinda enjoy it.” Both he and Nigel had a good laugh at Kale’s expense. “Now don’t be sore,” Quibbler said. “I could tell when I met you, you was a man of good humor, young Kale. Did you have your eye on anything in particular or did you wanna browse my holovid inventory?”

  Before Kale could answer, Nigel said, “He was ogling one of them Pirates of Penzance holos in a window on the way here.”

  “Oh well then, I can see you’re a young man of refined taste. I happen to have only one left.”

  He produced a small grubby towel from his pocket. Wrapped inside was a holochip in a protective case.

  “I can sell you this special bona fide gold star edition, for only fifty Coalition credits.”

  “Fifty! The other store had em for thirty-five.”

  “Yeah sure, if you want the standard edition, this here is a limited gold star edition.” And, sure enough, someone had put a shiny gold star on the cover of the small container.

  “But since you saw thirty-five, it hurts me you’d think you got cheated at old Mr. Quibbler’s. I want you to have it as a special memento of our making acquaintance. So here ya go.” He held out his hand for Kale’s credit chip, scanned it, and gave him the video. Kale didn’t remember settling on a price, but when Quibblers hand went out, Kale’s hand put the credit chip in it. It was part of some sort of natural reflex, like getting whacked in the knee with a hammer.

  “We’ll come back later,” Nigel interrupted. “I gotta go feed this starving young fella here, I promised him a steak dinner at The Bloated Roach.
”

  Mr. Quibbler smacked his lips, and said, “Shame I can’t be joining you. Nothing like a feast with friends.” He smiled and waved bye-bye.

  Nigel pulled Kale out into the stream of passers-by and they were carried downstream until the flow emptied into a large food court. There were tables of all sizes and shapes designed to accommodate nearly any alien’s special feeding requirement.

  Kale gawked as they walked by a family of scaled semi-aquatic folks just as the father was dumping a large bucket of minnows into a table that resembled a shallow aquarium. The entire family dunked their heads into the table and inhaled the small fish.

  A family of Guernsians was quietly chewing at another table that resembled a trough. Kale looked away, remembering Nigel’s warning. The immense bovine male was impressive.

  Nigel led them to the end of a line that led to the service counter of The Bloated Roach. As each person in line reached the counter, they ordered, the owner screamed at them, they handed over their money, and she rudely shoved a bag into their hands.

  As Kale and Nigel came near to the front of the line. Nigel said, “Just say Grotworm, that’s Warfian for steak, don’t say nothing else.”

  It was Nigel’s turn, and he said, “Grotworm.”

  The woman, Nanaberi, growled and shouted something in Warfian and handed Nigel a sack. He paid and moved away quickly.

  Kale now stood in front of the women—she was impressive. At least eight feet tall and her skin was dark and craggy. Overwhelmed, he could only stare.

  She screamed at him in Warfian until he finally said, “Grotworm… with a nice baked potato.”

  The room erupted into chaos. Nanaberi grabbed Kale by the shirt lifted him in the air and screamed even louder. Everyone in line became upset, shouting at Kale. She dropped him back to the floor, and she held out her hand. Kale was flustered, petrified, and confused. He just stared again.

  “Give her your money!” Nigel yelled.

  Kale shoved a wad of paper money into the woman’s hand and she mashed a sack of food into his, which he dropped. He bent to pick it up. The people in line became unglued, someone even began a Warfian death chant. Nigel expected the scene to erupt in carnage at any moment. So, he walked away, preoccupied with finding a table far enough to be out of the fray but still with a good view.