Life on the Dead Planet

Zyrik wiped the sweat from his brow depositing a comet tail of white loam across his dark forehead. The skeletal remains of a once bustling civic center stood around him in a perfect circle. Dust devils danced amongst a sea of jagged rock outcroppings that rolled eternally across the plane like waves frozen in time. 

The digger-bot sat perched on the edges of the crater. A blemish scored into the landscape like a footprint in fresh snow. Zyrik watched ponderously as the sky blue robot -the only splotch of color on as far as he could see- scooped and brushed away ash cubic foot after foot, slowly revealing a circular ruin beneath half a mile of silt. It’s 10 spidery legs curled up like a child in the womb. 

Like an old photograph of the sea, he thought. 

His grandfather back on Mars had a fondness for old photos and films of his native Earth and for the sea. The former had not rubbed off on Zyrik while the ladder did. The sailing classes he’d taken that summer on Earth had been foundational in his life. It had cost his parents a small fortune but in the end they all agreed it had been worth it. Zyrik had never touched the sea since but the experience was the bedrock of many life decisions. The perennial root of his sense of adventure that had led him to join spacer school at 17, marry and then divorce before he was 25.

The small planet near the center of the Milky Way had once had a name but the corporate scientists had renamed it Zeta B389. As a spacer you visited exotic locals, usually with science teams or corporate reconnaissance drones. If you were hard up like Zyrik often was then you would take on a second job either hauling heavy science equipment or, if you couldn’t fix it yourself, acting as the replacement for a faulty drone. 

If you asked him he would say it was like any other job. On his ship, The Black Fin, there was no fancy equipment or switchboards that required a PHD to operate like in the movies. It was a humble blue collar Martian job. But in truth Zyrik felt like the explorers of old albeit without the genocidal proclivities. Most of the planets he visited were dead already. Either having seen civilization come and go or barely able to support any life save for a few microscopic bacteria. Zyrik had been overseeing the digger-bot in this section for over 18 hours. Over the course of the day Zyrik had seen the inclement weather of the dead gray planet change from sweltering heat to bitter cold and back again. Very rarely did a planet have an oxygen rich atmosphere that allowed him to remove his helmet outside of his ship and feel a cool breeze across his bald head.

The digger-bot squeaked to a stop. He worried he’d forgotten to oil the damn thing but that wasn’t it. Something had been detected! The spirit of adventure came alive in him once again. Time to stop daydreaming and do his job. He could already see something golden shimmering in the sea of gray. It gave him the sense of being watched. Zryic scanned the bleak overcast skies for the vapor tail of a drone but the sole spectator was a tiny blue sun veiled through gray clouds..

This digger-bot was a mechanical archeologist but designed to operate under the supervision of a real archeologist. However the galaxy was big and the few archeologists left were expensive. Spacers on the other hand were a dime a dozen and digger-bots were not worth much more. When the task was done the bot would be left on the planet or scrapped for parts. Zyrik patted the chassis, glad he would not receive the same treatment, and slid down into the crater.

He brushed away the topsoil with his clumsy gloves, sighed, and then with one twist of the metal seal removed the glove. The sweat on his hand instantly cooling and collecting a thin coat of ash wind. You weren’t supposed to touch the artifacts but sometimes the desire to be a part of history was too much for him to resist. He may be the first and only human to ever touch the piece and all though no one would know it felt important. Something strange and human inside of his ancient DNA demanded a contribution to the immortal battle between life and time. 

Using his fingers he imprinted himself on time while trying to pry up the hunk of metal from the ground but it did not budge. The sandy dirt burrow beneath his finger nails. He’d be picking this planet out of them for days but Zyrik thought it was a nice feeling. It reminded him of planting seeds in the town greenhouse. 

He stood and motioned for the digger-bot to lower one of its mechanical arms down to him so he could operate it manually. The arms of the digger-bot remained coiled up like the legs of a dead cellar spider, save for one arm extended down into the crater like reaching for divinity. It was an incomprehensibly complex machine with an A.I. brain to match but humans were the reigning galactic champions of fine motor skills. Zryri just needed the excavation arm to lower. He shrugged like the owner of a disobedient puppy. The digger-bot, with its 12 thin arms folded up neatly, sat inert. He tried to signal again, the arm was also his ride out of the crater. Dust could have clogged the sensor but then the sensor light would have been solid yellow. Flashing blue meant everything was fine. Right?

They’d trained his photographic memory in public school so he closed his eyes and flipped through the manual he’d read a few days before and tried the arm signal again. Nothing. A wind gust blew over the crater. The digger-bot shivered, its bolts groaning against the cables that kept it grounded. A pang of fear gripped Zyrik’s chest as the giant metal beast seemed to teeter on the edge. He was at the direct bottom of a crater. If it fell he and the digger-bot would have no other course except for a fatal collision. He composed himself. Calculating the odds that the cable would snap. Or the ten foot bolts that he had drilled into the ground would somehow come loose. 

He blinked the dust from his eyes and started to climb the side of the crater and out of the path of the ten ton robot. It took him only ten minutes but it was the hardest Zyrik worked since planet fall. He gripped the edge of the crater with bare hands. His sweaty palms gripping the loose dirt. One foot from the precipice he stopped to gather his strength for the final push. He looked up expecting to see a veiled blue sun behind the endless cloud cover and instead saw a shadow of a man. A tall slender thing that looked more bird than man.

The glowing yellow eyes that took up most of its head seemed to peer down at him in childlike wonder. Zyrik yelped. Overcome with the animal instinct to flee from this towering creature he let go of the edge and rolled head over heels back to the bottom. He scrambled to his feet ignoring the sharp pain of a hairline fracture in his shoulder blade. 

Panting his face plastered with dust and sweat he cast about for a weapon and sign of the alien. He carried no ray gun, he was not Buck Rogers. Spacers were not expected to find anything living. 

The oxygen rich atmosphere that he basked in now had not existed when the dominant species had thrived on this planet. The alien loomed on the crater edge. Its thin frame nearly invisible through Zyrik’s blurred vision and the backlight of the sun. He blinked the dust away, unhooked the helmet from his belt, and put it on repeatedly pressing the decontamination switch with his tongue. When the cleaning fog disappeared so had the alien. 

Through the overwhelming sensory input of the HUD he gleaned that the wind was in fact an oxygen storm which explained the hallucination. He shrugged and signaled the digger-bot. This time the arm immediately whirred to life and lowered as the sweeper arm rose to join the bouquet.

When he saw the golden artifact in full he nearly dropped to his knees. The exposed golden disk was just a piece of it. It was the golden eyes of the creature he had just seen. Zyrik stepped forward to look upon this mighty work. The soft glow of the dying blue sun reflecting on the golden surface of the artifact was mesmerizing to his eyes. Eyes born in another galaxy, to a child of another sun. 

Examining the strange alien there came again the feeling of being watched. But he could not take his eyes off the effigy. The long neck with flaps peeling off so it resembled a stalk of corn. The small beaked lips parted so that it resembled the crucified idol worshiped by the Crist Cultists. The fearful religion that annually terrorized the streets of martian villages, hoisting their staffs tipped with depictions of a bloody martyr like military flags.

Next came the coffin which looked like gigantic wooden makeup compact; etched with weaving patterns, part fractal and part celtic knot. The wood was petrified, glassy and cold to the touch. The digger-bot lifted the objects out of the crater and into its holding bay before returning to retrieve Zyrik . 

There was no pilot seat inside the spider like contraption, the destination was the crater or the ship. Too many spacers had taken joy rides on company equipment to go sightseeing on the strange new worlds. Spokesman claimed important research sites had been lost due to this but Zyrik and his fellow spacers knew they were mad about the time and fuel that had been wasted.

Inside the cargo hold Zyrik peeled off the suit enjoying the cool of the metal container on his sweat soaked undershirt. Locked in the pressurized metal cube with his hoard of gold and antique wood Zyrik felt like the ancient kings of Egypt. Locked in the dark with their earthly possessions, believing themself ready to fly into the Duat only to be dug up and stashed away in the British Museum thousands of years later. Spirited away not on a spaceship but an airplane. Zyrik was never told where they took the things he’d found. Most, he assumed, went to the hordes of the feudal water barons of Earth but some might have made it to Martian scientists or maybe a museum. 

Through the single tiny window of the cargo hold a ray of blue sun swept over the face of gold and then Zyrik. In that brief moment he thought he saw the face contort in pain but that seemed to be the artist's intention. In Zyrik’s experience alien tech ran the gamut from primitive to down right nightmare fuel. He’d once been to a planet where they worshiped the dead so fervently they built cathedrals out of bone. The species bones were mostly hollow and made of glass so that they shone kaleidoscopically when touched by the sun. When the wind blew through them they emitted screams like 100 dying pigs. The glass cathedrals would have been beautiful if they had bothered to clean the flesh from the bone.

The tank treads and magnetic suspension of the digger-bot made for a smooth ride other than rhythmic swaying caused by the wind. So huddled in the dark amongst his spoils Zryic was lulled to sleep by the winds of the dead planet. He awoke because of a dream the impression of running through the woods to get away from some creature that is gaining on him. Then realizing there is no point in running away so he hunkers down to weep and die. But instead of dying he woke up with the fear still knotted up inside. Then the feeling of being alone. Like the smell of his mothers perfume the dream brought memories out of the darkness of the past. The time his wife had left him for the last time and how he somehow knew it was forever.

He also recalled one word from the dream. “Thief.” but he didn’t know why. His whole life he had been a honest and noble person. He drank and used stimulants like everyone but he did not gamble more than he could afford to lose and he never, ever, stole. 

Give it back! Hissed a voice. It sounded right next to him. He swore he could feel breath on his neck. But that made no sense. His back was to the wall. He shone his wrist mounted light around the storage crate landing on the effigy. It was how he left it, tied upright in the corner.

The wind slammed into the cargo hold howling as it flew past. He pressed his ear to the wall and heard it again faintly at first but growing with each utterance.

 give it back…Give it back.Give it back!Giveitback! GIVEITBACK!GIVEITBACK! GIVEITBAaaaack!  

It wasn’t possible. Nothing could explain this. In his wide travels across the galaxy he’d seen a lot. But there was no planet in existence where the wind spoke. And certainly not in english and on the behalf of the dead. With all the evidence at hand Zyrik concluded that he had in fact had lost his fucking mind. It had been a long time coming.

He tried to ignore the terrifying eyes of the alien effigy and stared out the small window. The blue sun was setting and sparking the veil of clouds with a magnificent violet and blue fire. Then he saw it clear as anything, a creature the same species of the statue walking along a ridge line. Two bird-like legs, a small beak, and two golden dinner plate eyes. It stopped walking and looked at him before disappearing behind the fog of Zyrik’s horrified and thrilled breath on the glass. Frantically he whipped it away but the being was gone. It had never been there but Zyrik did not care anymore. If he was crazy he would let it consume him all at once. Not take him piece by piece like his grandfather.

He tried to envision the world as it was before. Towering buildings spread across the entire surface. Winged humanoids gliding in skyways from one place to the next. A yellow sun warming the carbonated air. Doomed to fall but not now, just someday. When the oxygen polluted their air and they could not escape the atmosphere. 

On Mars they were descendants of scientist terraformers. Everyone took part in giving life to the red planet. They never forgot the teachings of their ancestors who escaped the water barrons of Earth. If they needed a reminder they need only look to their celestial neighbor to see what would become of greed and isolation. 

Zyrik turned to the golden idol standing in the corner looking to space with simultaneous awe and fear. A painfully human expression on something alien. Zyrik noticed the eyes had no pupils so he imagined another look. This time it looked down on this puny being that would disturb its rest and steal it from the land of its ancestors.

“You want to go back huh?” 

Silence from the effigy.

“I understand.”

They arrived at the airfield an hour later. Digger-bots came from all directions. Some moving slowly, laden with rock samples or possibly more gold effigies. Zyrik would never know other than what he overheard from the other spacer in the canteen. Spacers were notorious boasters. 

Zyrik looked up at the interstellar cruiser hovering above the planet like a moon elongated in a funhouse mirror. He could taste the ale already. Smell the musty yellow playing cards and cigarettes dripping ash on the ripped green felt table. That would have to wait. He had business to take care of. If he left now he would be a thief. 

This world was not dead. It was as dead as his grandfather. True the body was gone but the soul lived on in Zyrik. The love of adventure, the longing for an ocean that no longer was, and the fondness for the ancient black and white pictures. 

He took his ship and cargo, leaving the digger-bot behind. Unlike the digger-bot, The Black Fin was his and he could take it for a joy ride wherever he wanted. He looped about the sluggish line of haulers making their way up to the cruiser and shot off. Pushing the thrusters to the edge of what was safe in atmosphere he made it to the dig site in less than an hour. He didn’t care about fuel costs. By now the digger-bot had plugged into its terminal. The corporate overlords would know what he found. The bot recorded everything. They’d know he’d let it go, or stolen it. He didn’t care. This was more important than the job or the money.

The setting sun shone silver across the petrified sea. The only thing out of place was the crater he’d made. Hovering over it he opened the bombay doors of his humble schooner, tipped his hat, and let the effigy and coffin fall back to the dust it had come from. 

The wind howled against his windshield but did not say a word as he raced across the horizon letting the g-force cocoon him against his chair. He circled the ridgelines on his way to the airfield looking for alien ghosts and laughing to himself when he saw none. There was just him and the dying sun, setting over a planet that teemed with memory.