surprise you?”
“Beyond the sheer survival challenge, I would think the loneliness would be unbearable.”
“Although mine is an extremely patient and solitary race, I much prefer your company,” said Sara. She smiled a smile that told me she truly felt that way. I will always love that smile.
She showed me the valley outside the cabin. It had ample green growth on either side of a small stream that sourced from a spring in the valley floor and ran 200 meters before disappearing under a pile of large rocks. There were trees along the stream, also benefiting from the water supply. The remainder of the valley looked much like the barren area where my ship had first landed and appeared to support no life.
Our relationship grew over the months that followed. What started as a trusted friendship evolved into a complete melding of body, mind and spirit. Sara could finish my thoughts as easily as I could hers. Our physiological differences were minor enough to allow for a steady diet of passionate lovemaking, the intensity of which I had never before experienced. I attributed that to the incredible, almost telepathic, sensitivity we had for each other. My only regret was our inability to conceive a child. Sara explained to me that our outward physical appearance was much closer than our internal biology. Her species had a copper-based blood system and was adaptable to breathing a wider variation of gases. Genetically we were just too divergent to mate. Sara was certain of that outcome from the start, but I had stubbornly hoped otherwise.
Nonetheless, we lived happily together for over two years, enjoying each other’s company, and telling each other stories from our respective planets. We got water from the small stream near the cabin, and pulled wild onions and several other tubers from the ground as our main food supply. Although I spent a great deal of time writing and drawing from my memory of now distant places, Sara remained my favorite subject for both. I drew everything from face-only portraits to full nudes of her, never tiring of either. Days became weeks, weeks became months. By the time the months had piled up to years, my past had faded like a cheap photograph.
There came a time when I accepted my fate of living out my days on Moon A2-B. Was it the resigned apathy that accompanied my realization I would never be rescued? Perhaps it was letting go of the irrational idea that somehow this was all a nightmare from which I could awake. I prefer to think it was my eventual recognition that I had found my perfect soul mate in Sara, and that I had reached a point of complete contentment. I could no more imagine living without Sara than I could living without eyes or limbs. I needed nothing and no one else. If what Sara said was true about the metabolic slowdown effect of the moon, I was looking forward to a long and beautiful relationship between the two of us.
I’m quite certain that’s how our life would have continued, if not for the arrival of the invaders. I had been behind the cabin digging up some “potatoes” when Sara let out a blood-curdling scream. I ran to find her on her knees in front of the cabin. There was nothing else in sight.
“What’s wrong?” I shouted, fearfully scanning about. The fact that I could see nothing only amplified my concern.
“They’re here,” said Sara, staring ahead at nothing.
“Who? What?” I demanded, barely able to contain my rising panic. “How do you—”
“I can feel them coming,” she answered before I could finish asking. “We’ve got to hide.”
“Maybe they are—”
Again, Sara answered, “They are dangerous. They will ruin everything. We must hide.” Sara grabbed my hand and ran to the cabin. There was nowhere to hide. We only had a small hole we had dug into the floor in one corner of the cabin to store any extra tubers we harvested.
“We’ve got to run.”
“From what?”
“From them.” She pointed to the window. I ran over and looked out. Two hideous looking creatures were lumbering over the crest of the long hill that defined the east side of the valley. Their appearance was a forbidding combination of ape and insect, and both carried handheld weapons that glowed ominously.
“You’ve got to run. Come on.” Sara dragged me out the back of the cabin. I could hear the panic in her voice. I rubbed the stone hanging from my neck nervously.
“Run!” she shouted.
“What are you saying?”
“Trust me. You’re the one they are after. You’ve got to run!” Sara pushed me, and I stumbled forward, confused. I looked back over my shoulder and saw the two beasts heading rapidly down the slope. One of them had raised his weapon. I turned to run and managed only a couple more steps when I felt a strange tingle that started on the back of my neck and spread quickly throughout my body. My limbs went numb, and just before I slumped to the ground, I screamed Sara’s name as loudly as I could. Then the world went black.
Two figures in space suits struggled to drag the limp body of Jacob Brunner up the access ramp to their ship. Once inside they hoisted him up onto what looked like an operating table and strapped him down securely from his head to his feet. His hair was long and matted with dirt. A heavy salt and pepper beard covered most of his face. He was still unconscious. One of the men waved the other away from the table. He proceeded to pry open Jacob’s clenched right fist and removed the smooth brown stone from Jacob’s hand. Being careful not to touch the stone himself, the astronaut placed it into a clear box and then closed the top, locking it inside.
With a look of considerable relief, Captain Durnam pulled off the top of his suit and motioned for his partner to do the same. The other man quickly doffed his helmet. He had many questions. “What was that all about? Why did he run from us? And who is Sara?” machine-gunned Lt. John Strong, the younger of the two men.
“You didn’t read the file on this moon, did you, Lieutenant? Let’s get out of these suits and ready the ship for launch. Then we’ll talk,” said Captain Durnam.
Once they had green lights on all systems for the next launch window, the captain relaxed and began to speak. “We’re only here because reports from a drone that orbits this system indicated the presence of human life. Otherwise, this moon has been under a strict Level One quarantine for the past two years—and for good reason. When this guy’s original mission team left the moon, they took rock samples just like the one you see there.” He pointed to the smooth brown stone. “They were lucky to get back at all, and might not have, except for the quick action of the ship’s medic. He had observed one of the crewmen behaving erratically, and had tranquilized him before he could do any damage to the ship. That crewman had picked up a sample just like the one we found in Jacob Brunner’s hand.” He pointed again to the stone in the sealed clear box.
“What about the name he called out, Sara? Could there be someone else stranded out there? There were two people lost from that original mission, as I recall.”
“You’re right about that, but you saw the reports that brought us here in the first place. One life form detected. One recovered. Do another scan if you like. You won’t find anything or anyone.”
The lieutenant did just that, while the captain set the countdown for their launch. The scan came up empty. As the ship lifted off, Lt. Strong peered out from the window beside him. He could see the spot where they had found Jacob Brunner. The land was dry and barren, with nothing but craters and rocks to break up the surface.
“How did he make it two years out there?” the lieutenant wondered out loud.
“As it turns out, that is the one redeeming quality about the stone creatures. They can keep someone alive indefinitely. It has something to do with being able to control a body’s involuntary systems. Like any sentient creature, they seek companionship. Apparently, they don’t communicate directly with others of their kind. They lie dormant until another live being touches them and becomes a sort of companion-host. Then the creature can control the host telepathically.”
“When this guy comes to, do we tell him what happened?”
“Nope. There’d be no point. He wouldn’t believe you anyway. In fact, we’ll have
to keep him sedated and strapped down the whole way back, until he can get proper treatment.”
Jacob lay quietly where he was strapped to the table. There was just a hint of a smile on his lips. He slept on peacefully, dreaming of Sara and their life on Moon A2-B.
Ax stopped the story at that point, and emptied the rest of the rum from his glass. “The rescue part of the story I got from the official report filed by Captain Durnam with the Galactic Planetary Survey Commission.” Then Ax added, “Despite a year of the best treatment available, ol’ Jacob never did accept what he was told had happened to him. When I met him, the poor bastard was still searching desperately for someone to take him back to Moon A2-B.”
* * * * *
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Here is the beginning of my bestselling science fiction novel, Godmachine. Enjoy!