Bright Star (2 page)

I found a stack of bagged uniforms huge enough to scare me. A uniform package is as thick as my thumb and as wide as two palms of my hand, including shoes. In the storerooms, I saw enough uniforms not only for my lifetime, but also for the whole lifetimes of a thousand other clones. Maybe more.

One time, as a child, concerned about all the rations gone bad, I had asked Blasius what would happen if the food rations and canned water coming down the chute ran out. Blasius had smiled and replied that he didn’t think the rations would end. When I saw all those uniforms, I understood what he meant.

I am alone on a Ship intended for hundreds, perhaps thousands of people. No danger I’ll use up all the stocks.

I
GO
back in the cocoon, the room where Prince, inside his sarcophagus, rests in his cryosleep.

My one and only job is to check his sarcophagus. I can see if Prince’s sarcophagus is working properly from the lights. So my only task is to monitor the lights.

Blasius didn’t struggle too much to teach me what to do.

“You just have to keep this in mind, Phae. Green light, okay. Yellow light, there is something to check, but usually it’s just the refrigerant pressure. Red light… well, I haven’t seen a red light in a lifetime.”

I twist my mouth in a smile, remembering Blasius’s words.

“But if a light turns red, what should we do?”
I asked.

“A red light is the only thing that allows us to touch the console, Phae. The red light cancels the rule to never touch the console. Got it? Can we touch the console? We can’t. But if a red light flashes… we
must
touch it and enter the code.”

I got nightmares about this red light.

I asked Blasius what I should do, once I entered the code.

“Well….” Blasius seemed a bit confused
.
“The operating system will take control, I suppose. Corp will know what to do.”

This reassured me. Corp is the divinity that created Ship. If the matter would pass into Corp’s hands, I could sleep soundly.

I have to check two rows of lights. One along the edge of the sarcophagus lid, the other on top of the console. Not a very difficult task. The lights on the console are always green. Blasius said that perhaps—perhaps—they refer to the functioning of the operating system, while the ones on the sarcophagus lid are for the cooling system. Those on the lid sometimes turn yellow. In this case, I must turn a valve in the lower side of the coffin. I must be careful in doing so, because the frozen metal sticks to my fingers. Since Blasius died, this has happened only four times. No, maybe five.

That’s all.

I sigh. I sit on the metal edge and try to eat the ration I brought with me, reflecting on the emptiness and loneliness. The void is also having nothing to do. Not knowing the reason for anything.

Yet I have strange doubts sometimes. For instance, if Prince is so important, why is Ship so old? Why only two poor clones to take care of him? Why are we alone? I don’t know any other way of life than this, but sometimes I wonder, why me? Couldn’t Corp find another way to check the lights, without consuming our lifetimes?

I’m full of doubts even regarding Prince’s condition. Prince is sleeping, but he’s not dead. He’s not like Skeleton, slipped quietly into the incinerator without pain. Does Prince feel pain?

Maybe I don’t know many of the right words to explain this concept, but being locked in a coffin and frozen and shipped Outside alone in an old Ship doesn’t seem like a treatment worthy of a Prince. Why this? How dared Corp? Is it Corp’s fault?

Hatred and frustration assail me. They devour me again. I hope one day the same acceptance and resignation that Blasius seemed to have in his heart will wash over me, but that day is still far away. I put my ration aside and stand up and start walking back and forth.

The suspicion that Prince can suffer is horrible. Sometimes—I confess—I feel like entering the prohibited code on the console just to challenge Corp. I don’t care if Corp condemns me to death for having entered the code without a red light. Corp created me and gave birth to me to be Prince’s guardian angel. In my heart, I have to protect Prince from everyone and everything, so also from Corp.

I stop, my heart pounding, my soul screaming.

I know well that yelling and beating my fists on the bulkhead is of no use. I sigh. I close my eyes. Sometimes, to calm me down, I think that when Prince arrives at his destination, the powerful King fated to be his husband will be outraged by the treatment he received. He’ll grow angry and destroy Corp. He’ll use powerful weapons to blow up Ship, and my body won’t be forced to remain forgotten forever like Skeleton, with spiders weaving their webs in the empty sockets of my eyes. And Prince will have a long and happy life with his King.

Sometimes I need more perverse thoughts to soothe me.

In them, Prince awakes and confesses that I, Phaedrus, am not a humble clone, a mere guardian angel without meaning except for checking the lights of his sarcophagus. He reveals that I am his King. Corp had locked us up here and shot Ship in the depths of Outside because he feared that our right and good power would undermine his evil rule of the Universe. So, I destroy Ship and eliminate Corp from the face of the Universe.

These are my prohibited dreams.

Yeah, there must be something wrong with me.

I’
M
DREAMING
of Prince when the bump awakens me.

I open my eyes in the dark of my cubicle. I sit up on my cot.

Again.

I remain still, wide-eyed in the dark. I felt Ship vibrating deeply, as if with a huge shiver.

The sound, or sensation, doesn’t repeat.

No matter. I jump to my feet and slip in the elevator.

I reach Prince’s cocoon, and seeing the green lights flickering on the sarcophagus edge, I let out a sigh of relief. The glass of the cover is coated with frost, and I can’t see Prince inside. However, the green lights say he’s all right.

I turn to the console.

And my heart nearly jumps out of my mouth.

Red light.

A red light on the console.

A red light
blinking
.

All the blood in my body freezes. My head swirls. I rub my eyes and look again.

The red light is still there.

My first instinct, childish and irrational, is to get back into the cubicle and curl up on my cot. Fear paralyzes me. But then concern for Prince perks me up. I have to protect Prince. It’s my duty. So, legs stiff with terror, I stagger toward the console.

Oh, Corp. I was wrong to complain. I’ll never do it again, I swear. Just give me back all the green lights.

Corp doesn’t listen. The light is still red and blinking.

I feel dizzy, but I have to do this. I put my finger on the letter B and press.

At once, something happens. The wall in front of me comes alive, emitting a blue light.

I shout and jump back.

Up ahead, on the wall, appears a giant version of the letter B. Below, other strings of letters that I can’t read.

“Please complete the code to log in.”

I jump and yell again. The voice came from the ceiling. A soft, pleasant voice. “Corp?” I call, trembling. “Are you there?”

“Please complete the code to log in.”

I turn, but the sarcophagus lights are still green. On top of Prince, the layer of frost is thick.

I approach the console. My right hand shakes uncontrollably, and I have to hold it with my left hand to enter the other letters of the code.

—R I G H—

I pause to wipe sweat from my eyes.

—T S T A R—

And the wall in front of me explodes with light as the matte surface shifts from blue to white. I have to squint.

“You are logged in,” the voice says. “Welcome to Cryodream, Hibernation Operative System. Press any key to continue.”

I press a key. The wall changes again, turning deep red. All that red hurts my brain, and I have to close my eyes.

“Seventh Sector under decompression,” the voice says. “Danger, danger, danger.”

The tone doesn’t match the words, because it’s extremely indifferent. As if all of this were a joke, for Corp. However, I understand the voice isn’t really Corp. Maybe a registered version of Him, or something like that.

“Danger, danger, danger. Press the key for the action, or vocalize the action. A: start the emergency protocol; B: close all the systems and run an emergency scan; C: contact Corp; D….”

“Yes!” I scream. I can’t believe I have such an opportunity. “I want to contact Corp!”

“Request accepted. Please wait
.
”

This is a blessing, a miracle. I can talk to the real Corp. I’m excited.

“Unable to access the communication channel. Channel busy or unavailable. Do you want to try the emergency channel?”

“Yes?”

“Request accepted. Please wait.”

I turn toward the sarcophagus. The lights are still green. How long will it take?

“Unable to access the emergency channel. Channel busy or unavailable. Do you want to try any other channel?”

“Yes, damn, yes!”

“Request accepted. Please wait.”

I snort and clench my fists.

“Unable to contact any other channel. Channel not found. The closest space traffic control is—”

An alarming pause.

“No space traffic control found. The closest Union Planet is—”

Another pause that makes me suspect the same answer.

“No planet found. Calculation of the return route to Earth in progress. Please wait.”

Corp has to be kidding, I tell myself.

“Impossible to calculate the return route. Earth not found.”

“Earth not found? Are you crazy?”

“Return to main menu. Please wait. Danger, danger, danger. Press the key for the action, or vocalize the action. A: start the emergency protocol; B: close all the systems and run an emergency scan; C: contact Corp….”

I panic. I haven’t the faintest idea what to do. I don’t know what key I should press, but I know the B because it’s the first letter of the code, so I press it on the keyboard.

“Request accepted. Please wait. Emergency scan in progress.”

The wall in front of me comes alive from floor to ceiling. A circular shape, crossed by blue lines, appears. The circle slowly rotates on itself. While I look at it, squinting in the light, some lines divide the circle into slices, starting from the center. The core is white and pulsing. Rows and rows of letters appear around the ring, but I can’t read the words.

The first slice of the circle turns green.

“First Sector checked.”

The second slice on the right turns green, too.

“Second Sector checked.”

I blink. Inside of me, the awareness that I’m looking at a representation of Ship explodes. I open my eyes wide in wonder. I had a vague idea that Ship was circular, and the magic image, or scheme, confirms this. The white center is the nuclear reactor pit. Around it unrolls the ring of the command bridge. Then I make out the lines of the eight huge main galleries running from the center to the edges.

Now I understand the whole scheme, and its simplicity is disarming. Ship isn’t a mysterious, impenetrable place-entity, but one of those things Blasius called “spaceships.” According to Blasius, these sorts of flying machines rose up by the dozens from the surface of Earth, carrying people to unknown and beautiful planets.

I shake my head. “Blasius, if only you could see this!”

I try to locate our position on the map. How foolish not to understand the truth immediately. We aren’t at the center of Ship. Ours is just a small cocoon like many others, in Fifth Sector. A blue dot, pulsing slightly, shows our current position.

One after another, the Sectors light up and turn green. “Third Sector checked, Fourth Sector checked, Fifth Sector checked.”

I start to relax.

“Sixth Sector checked. Seventh Sector under decompression. Eighth Sector checked.”

The slice of Seventh Sector turns red and start flashing.

“Seventh Sector under decompression. Danger, danger, danger. Automatic isolation in progress. Do you want to see the affected area?”

“Yes!”

The circular shape of Ship grows to fill the entire wall and then escapes from it. I stagger, dizzy. Seventh Sector enlarges until it covers the whole wall, then becomes three-dimensional, rotates, and—before my amazed eyes—turns real. I yell again. The wall is gone, and a hole opens in its place. A passage toward Seventh Sector.

I need a moment to realize the wall is still there, and I’m seeing an image of Seventh Sector on it. I know it, although I don’t understand how it could be possible. I’d like to touch the weird wall, but I dare not.

In front of me yawns one of the suspended walkways toward the machinery rooms, immersed in the dimness of a row of dusty LED lights unrolling along the floor. I don’t think there’s anything unusual.

I turn to check the sarcophagus. All green lights.

“Is it a joke, Corp?” I cry to the ceiling.

No answer.

Out of the corner of my eye, I perceive a red circle forming in the bulkhead next to the suspended walkway. I blink. The ring-shaped brilliance becomes more pronounced, turning orange, then yellow, then white and blinding.

I watch, stunned.

The section of bulkhead inside the circle trembles, then falls on the walkway handrail, bending the metal under its weight, and bounces down into the darkness. The image is noise-free, and this makes it perhaps more dramatic. A hole of darkness now opens on the side of the walkway and seems to swallow me.

I back away, but I notice it only when I feel the cold metal of the sarcophagus behind my legs. I collapse on the edge, my whole body trembling. A groan escapes me. “Oh, Corp!”

Something white flashes in the dark inside the hole.

A pale, jointed leg sprouts from the gap.

A giant spider leg!

I shout. I crush my back against the lid, half to protect Prince, half to disappear inside. A disgusting, colorless, spiderlike creature slips out from the hole and pats the platform carefully before lying on it. I know it’s not here—I’m watching an image of Seventh Sector—but chills cover my whole body, and my very soul screams to run. I know I can’t escape. I have to protect the sarcophagus with my own life, even if a part of me, a childish, detached part of my brain, shrieks wildly to escape.