Page 2 of Sky Song
“I still would…”
Cricket quietly slipped away and went to the lab, taking a chrome-encrusted elevator down to the lowest level whereworkstations with stacks of litmus test slips and vials of bodily fluids waited for the techs to process the submitted specimens.
She understood why her co-workers wanted to stay and watch. Meeus’ strict immigration policies prohibited non-humans from gaining residency, and even alien visitors were rare. Here, on Shadush city-continent, regular people knew of aliens from documentaries, not from real life.
But Cricket’s Earth upbringing meant she had no curiosity left where aliens were concerned. She’d seen aliens of all stripes, even though the species of their silver-clad visitor eluded her at the moment. She’d worked alongside aliens. She’d been accosted once or twice by predatory Peralis and opportunistic little Xosas. With her experiences so diverse and not altogether pleasant, she remained ambiguous toward Meeus’ alien prohibition. It sure was safer this way.
“Not my business, not my problem. Keep your nose clean and think about mama,” she repeated her mantra as she tugged on a pair of protective gloves and covered her face with a clear shield.
Not everyone at the lab was as obsessed with protective gear as Cricket, but she refused to take chances. Clearly, the fact that she replaced someone who had died of exposure to chemicals had something to do with it. On her first day, it was Salty who had demonstrated the proper procedures to Cricket and regaled her with a story of Igor.
Igor used to process piss and poop samples, but occasionally helped with tissue analysis. Either because his training on tissues was inadequate, or he just got too sloppy with the face shield, but something got into his system and he died. Right here, at the lab. In the middle of the day. Just turned blue and dropped to the floor.
And by ‘blue’ Salty meantblue. The skin of Igor’s entire body had turned an electric shade of cobalt. His nails, too, andthe whites of his eyes. He had foamed at the mouth before he passed, and the stuff was also blue. To add to the horror, his body had started dissolving immediately upon death into a blue gooey mess.
No one at the lab really knew what the hell Igor had ingested, but after his liquified body mass was removed, the floor tiles had to be replaced - the blue stain wouldn’t come off.
Cricket adjusted her face shield and fetched a tray of samples. She was grateful to have gotten this job, even though the legend of Igor’s untimely blue demise continued to haunt her a little.
Before too long, excited voices of her co-workers reached Cricket as the party was returning from the show.
“Emma!” Young Terrance burst through the doors ahead of the others. Cricket turned after a small hesitation. Six years, and it still took her a second to respond to the name. She was Emmaline, Cricket to her mother and a few others who’d known her since childhood. But here, on Meeus, she had adopted a shorter and simpler version of her real name.
“They were so cool, the aliens!” Terrance bounced up and down from excitement, earning a censoring glance from scowling Kim.
“I can’tbelievehow different they are! They never tell us about the cool stuff in the studies. Emma, I wish I could travel to all those different worlds. Maybe I will… No scratch that. Idefinitelywill.” Terrance emphatically bobbed his head, setting off an atmospheric event in the cloud of his shaggy coils.
“How about you travel to Pepper Pass city-continent first,” Kim scoffed, “to see your mother.”
Terrance’s exuberance momentarily dimmed. “I don’t have any money. I’m still paying off my fines,” he admitted. Even his hair seemed to droop.
Salty snickered. “Is it for that rented rider that you wrecked at the plaza?”
“The rider’s insured. It was that stupid statue. Who knew a pile of twisted wires was so expensive?”
“It was a city-commissioned object of art,” Kim said.
“It was a piece of garbage that deserved to be demolished,” Terrance countered, indignant. “They hadn’t let us into Atticus so we were rushing to get a spot at another club, and there you go.”
“Atticus?” Kim’s eyebrows snapped together, riding low above her prominent nose. “What business do you have going to a place like that?”
“It’s a cool place.”
“And dangerous.”
“No, it’s not,” Terrance scoffed at Kim. “Just because there arerumorsabout aliens being spotted at Atticus, doesn’t mean it’s true. We went there several times to try and see one, and we never did.”
“But now you have,” Cricket stated in a heavy-handed attempt to redirect the discussion and stave off a tornadic argument about the dangers of the club between Terrance and Kim.
“Oh, yes, I have!” Terrance perked up again, eager to talk about the aliens. “The Xosa was the first to arrive - a skinny little bastard, looked shrewd. And that Gaorz!” Terrance roared with laughter, ignoring Salty’s annoyed look. “Blue lips. The Tarai was normal-looking, except for the big ears, really distracting. Tana-Tana, Perali, Rix - they were, I don't know, kind of a lot like us. The Sakka gave off a weird vibe. And…”
“Terrance,” Cricket interrupted him. “You said a Rix alien?” And as she said it, it clicked. The shiny silvery alien with large black eyes was Rix. It had to be.
“Yep, read his name tag myself, that’s how close I got,” Terrance boasted. “His name’s Lyle.”
“But Rix aren’t one of the consortium nations.”
Terrance’s face acquired a blank look. He was a nice kid but not the brightest bulb in their lab chandelier, and facts like what nations made up the intergalactic consortium perpetually eluded him.
