The Star Plume (5 page)

“Sure you are, as responsible as they come,”
Per nodded as he poured himself a tall glass of brownish
liquid.

Breen grabbed Per’s hand, sloshing some of
the brown liquid on the bar top.

“Careful you fool, what’s gotten into
you!”

Breen leaned and eyed Per’s beverage. “I sure
could use a drink myself. All this talking is thirsty work, you
know.”

“Oh, so now you’re demanding, are you? You’re
already running on credit, three weeks back, you owe me. What’d you
do with all that Coin they paid you? Some of that should be coming
my way.” Per poured Breen a short glass of the brown liquid.

Breen’s glassy eyes shown with Carbon Fever.
“It was like they knew someone would be coming, as I remember. They
seemed so certain.” He sipped his glass, trying not to gulp it all
down in one swallow.

“So I waited. Started digging around in the
bushes. I was hungry, thought there might be fruit or something.
It’s lush down there, so peaceful. I was eating berries, I’d found
some blue ones that looked ok. Was picking them right of the
branch. Then there, at the base of the bush, all bunched up and
covered in dirt, there’s this shiny thing.”

“The Night Prism.”

Breen wiped his shiny brow. “That’s right. I
dug around it and picked it up, shook it out. It started to jump
and tug in my hands. It was like a wild creature, took me by
surprise. The more I held tight, the harder it pulled, in every
direction.”

“And then it got away?” Per raised his
well-plucked grey eyebrows.

“Well, the man had come back to relieve me of
my shift, you see.” Breen took another sip, a larger one this time.
“I was worried, as was not sure if I was supposed to eat those
berries and all, those berries stain your fingers, and there is no
way to hide it, just has to wear off…”

“But the Night Prism ripped as you held onto
it,” Per said impatiently.

Breen nodded. He enjoyed telling a tale,
especially if there was free drink to be had. “That’s right. A man
called out to me by name, said I could go. I turned around with the
Night Prism in my hands, my fingers blue as could be. The man, he
must have been someone important, he was dressed all fine, he
shouted out, as surprised as me, and then he jumped at the Night
Prism. This startled the little silver bugger and it pulled so hard
away from me, flapping and luffing so, I thought my shoulders might
get yanked out of joint. Not as strong as I once was I guess. In my
prime, I thought I might be a Wrangler…” Breen’s eyes grew moist at
the memory of his younger, more hopeful days.

“But anyway…that’s when I tried to get a
better grip on it, shifted my hands up but it slipped away the
second I loosened my fingers.” Breen flexed his thick, dirty hands.
Grime lined the under nail of each finger.

“But that little piece got caught on my
zipper.” Breen showed Per the offending metal zipper along his
ancient jacket. It was meant to close a long pocket on the side of
the garment. It was half zipped and rusty, having not functioned
for well over a century.

Per squinted as he topped up his own glass
and Breen’s, then pulled up the nearest stool. He got as close to
Breen as his nostrils would allow without revolt. Then he inched a
bit closer, sure it would pay off.

“Breen, my good fellow, how did you get this
job in the first place?”

Breen gulped this liquid down and eyed his
empty glass. “He asked for
me
specifically,” he said, trying
to hide his pride.

“Who is ‘he’?”

Breen started to fumble with his jacket,
buttoning and unbuttoning the dull metal buckles. The wool was worn
thin along the bend in the arm and his dry patchy elbow shown
through in some places.

Per was in no mood for coy traders. “Breen,
out with it or you’ll never drink here again. You know your credit
is no good elsewhere. Who was it asked you to guard the Liquid
Mines?”

Breen finished his drink, sure it would be
his last. He uttered a word that stopped Per’s heart.

“Hyko.”

Chapter 8

If a being could be both alive and dead,
Princess Cressida thought, this is what it would be like. She was
conscious, of that she was sure. But she could not feel her body.
Any body or anything. In fact, she could not sense anything
corporeal. No touch, no smell, no taste, no sight. Wait. Sound? She
tried listening. There was the absence of sound, which she decided
was quite different from silence.

She willed herself forward, not knowing if
she was merely shrouded in darkness or numbed by the transition
from the Night Prism. There! she heard a sound, a fine high-pitched
repetitive squeal. She stopped to listen more clearly and the sound
ended. Perhaps it turned a corner away from her? She moved in a
different direction, toward the source of the sound. There it was
again, that high-pitched squeal. What a shrill noise! She tried to
move away from the sound, deciding best to avoid its maker, but it
followed her as she turned a corner and climbed up a slope.

Wait a minute. She stopped to consider this
strangeness.

How was she moving? She stopped and thought.
She could not see herself, could not feel herself. No feet, no
legs. But she was definitely
moving
. Without a body.

Princess Cressida turned to retrace from
where she started and the wailing began again.

Ahhhha.

Then she remembered Wrangler Zav’s ‘Ahhha’ as
he had disappeared into the Night Prism. This was it. This was the
change.

She was sound. Which meant Wrangler Zav was
sound. Which meant she should be able to hear him. She stayed very
still and tried harder to listen to the Nothing.

Then she caught it, a faint low tone from a
ways away. She waited. It seemed to be coming closer. She could
tell it was Wrangler Zav. She was not sure HOW she knew. She sensed
the pulsing undulation, so different from her own, and was certain.
She moved toward it.

*******

As he waited for Cressida, Wrangler Zav tried
to recall how it all worked. The up and down was disorienting,
especially at his age. When he’d been a young man, it was a kick,
all this out of body stuff, up and down. Back then, there had been
lots of jokes, young men still getting used to their strong bodies,
suddenly losing them to sound waves, sneaking around, all under the
threat of capture by the Dark Spectrum. It had been easy then, to
be so reckless. But Zav did not want to get captured.

He moved, gauging the density of the
material. Forward, up and down. He stopped for a moment,
remembering. No backward. Never backward.

He hoped they’d only need to hide out a short
time. He didn’t fancy getting stuck in the Nothing. No thank you.
When he’d been here so many years ago, the universe had not been on
the edge of war. A trip to the Nothing had been a prank, a dare. He
moved again, spooked by the stillness.

Odd. He remembered it being slower going last
time.

Truth was, he didn’t mind this freedom. Not
one bit. His old body, his knees and back, all the moveable parts
really, were worn out from years of riding the Plumes and chasing
runaway stars. There was no avoiding it in his profession. He’d
lost count of the number of times he’d busted himself up tying down
a young upstart star.

This effortless oscillation was freeing.

Now where in the blazes was that Princess? He
followed a high pitch he heard in the distance. Sounded like
complaining. Had to be her.

*******

As she rounded a corner, she heard Wrangler
ask her, “Do you still have the Night Prism?” She stopped, so
relieved at having found him. It was beyond disconcerting to move
in a place one could neither see nor feel.

Wrangler asked the question again, this time
using her name at the beginning. She felt like he was surrounding
her, his sound was everywhere. She tried to reply but was unable to
speak without a mouth or a body to make sounds.

“Unnnth…” she said. Or thought she said.

Wrangler explained quickly, “Listen now. To
talk, don’t try to speak, in the regular way. Just keep on moving
along and then
think
about what it is you want to say to me.
It’ll come through via your wavelength.”

Princess Cressida decided now was not the
time for questions, so she started to move. That, at least, she had
figured out how to do.

“I don’t know. How would I even know if I’ve
got the Night Prism? I don’t even know what has happened to me!”
She moved as quickly as she could, her pitch rising.

Wrangler slowed himself down to a crawl,
trying to come up beside the Princess.

“For now, suffice it to say you don’t need to
worry about getting gussied up while we’re in here. Is there a part
of you that feels slower?”

“Slower?”

“Yes, kinda like it’s a dead weight, dragging
you down, slowin’ you up. Try bouncing off that wall over there,
see how it feels.”

As she moved, she noticed a slight drag as
she climbed upward. She explained this to Wrangler. He made a high
pitch sound of relief.

“Good. That’s the Prism. Best hang on to it
or we’ll lose our way back. Me, I don’t fancy hangin’ around here
longer than we need to. Alright, follow me.”

“Wrangler, what are we?”

“We’re sound. Pure unadulterated sound. The
Night Prism can only handle wavelengths. We can’t be light, so we
got converted to sound.

“Where are our bodies?”

“All scattered about, spread along this sound
wave as particles of sound. Not your clothes of course, that got
left behind. Bit embarrassing when we go back to the other side.
But never mind about that now. Stick close to me and if you hear
something else besides me, slow yourself way down but don’t stop.
Keep moving. The guards can detect waves, though if I recall right,
they’re more likely to detect light.

As it happened, his warning came just in
time.

*******

The guard Koe returned to the guard station.
There, he found several others playing Sinew on a large table in
the middle of the rectangular room. In a corner, a newbie suited up
for the first time, struggling with the thick black material. The
newbie had his suit on backward and the others snickered at him as
he struggled to zip it up from behind. Koe pealed off his own heavy
suit, grabbed a drink from the fridge and settled down to join the
game. He thought about telling the others exactly what the Dark
Spectrum had said but everyone was in high spirits and he didn’t
want to dampen the mood. Except for the newbie, this group was set
to rotate out shortly, back to the other side. It had been a long
twenty years for them all.

On the wall opposite the main door, several
large screens displayed various readings and measurements of
temperature and pressure. A complex chemical formula took up the
entirety of one screen, with percentages below each of the listed
compounds. The percentages changed by a few points up and down
every few minutes.

Koe rolled the dice and drank deeply from the
bottle. This was only his fifth interaction with the Dark Spectrum
and it was as terrifying as his first. His friends watched in
surprise as Koe continued to drink from the bottle until it was
empty. He wiped his mouth of the harsh clear liquid and took a
breath. Seeing the others staring at him, he laughed off his
unusual behavior.

“What?! Darkness makes me thirsty!” He wiped
his mouth again for effect.

The newbie had finally figured out his suit
and was zipping it up. Hale, the most senior of the guards, called
out to the newbie, “Don’t forget your sealant, lad.” The newbie,
walking awkwardly in the tight suit, stopped in place and turned to
the shelving, on which stood several metal canisters marked
‘Sealant’. He selected one, shook it, and then sprayed a thick
stream of bright yellow fluid along the suit’s main seams. That
completed, he walked toward the table for any last minute
advice.

The alarm that sounded from a screen in the
upper right corner made him jump. The siren rose in pitch and then
descended, filling the room with its sound. The screen itself
flashed orange and black.

Rather than acting, everyone simply stared.
Not one of them had ever seen that screen alert before. Not in
twenty years. They knew what it was but…could it be?

“What does that alarm mean?” The newbie had
been studying all the different measurements of this unique system
but didn’t have them all memorized.

Koe placed the bottle back on the table and
shook his head. He looked at Hale, who nodded.

“It means we have an intruder.”

Koe turned to suit back up. He wanted to tell
the Dark Spectrum. This news would please his Sire.

Chapter 9

Stars are sneaky creatures. When they wish to
be undetected, they travel the skies without light, called being
'On the dark'. Stars travel on the dark all the time, kind of like
flying under the radar. But, like most creatures, they leave behind
evidence of their presence. In particular, Stars shed ‘Radiance’ as
they move through space, a persistent trail of dust particles and
gases. It is this Radiance that makes up the Star Plume.

The first Star Plume was discovered by
chance. A Trader named Grolock found he got an extra ‘kick’ when he
followed a star’s path. Anything to save time. He started following
the stars, even the ones traveling on the dark, tracking them by
the Radiance wake.

It was later confirmed by the High Senti that
the Radiance moves forward, like a current, so travelers on the
Star Plume are pulled toward their destination. The Senti liked to
take credit for major discoveries, so they were always dispatching
members to measure and manipulate. But all the Traders knew it was
one of their own and Grolock lived on in Trader lore, long after
his passing.

Naturally, the mapping of the Star Plumes
followed. The rush to be the first to map the outermost reaches led
to many a barroom brawl, as Traders and even Wanderers tried to win
the right to name a Plume. In the end it was decided by the Stars
themselves, who after all knew the universe better than most, had
been around the longest.