The locals of the town of Hastings avoided Ore railway station if they could. Those nearest by used it from convenience, but timed their visits as not to linger. Most saw it as run down, broken, or even dangerous. Thanks to its place at the end of the line, more than one person took to calling it ‘the end of the world.’ In an ironic twist, few people with ill-intent chose to linger either; if you wanted to avoid people, the cracked platforms and rusted bridge of the small station offered a close to perfect escape. And every day, after school for many years, that’s just what Heather Aislinn did.
She raised her head to watch the most recent Service to Ore venturing off into the great unknown ahead, otherwise known as Three Oaks, then rested her chin on her knees once more. The vibrations of the track ebbed away, and so far as she could see, not a single commuter left for the large ramp back to the town; a long concrete path that kept Ore at arms length. She closed her eyes, and felt the stillness once more. Then, she frowned, and placed a hand onto the grimy footbridge. The trembles met her touch.
Heather opened her eyes, and raised her worn green digital watch. The time blinked ‘18:12’ back at her. A rumble like that might be the distant approaching Brighton service, but she knew that wouldn’t arrive for a good ten minutes yet. Trains diverged from their timetables, but rarely ever that way. And if this was a train, why couldn’t she see it around the corner to Three Oaks?
Heather stood, brushing in a distracted way at her long blonde hair and trousers to try and get some of the grime off, and stared over the ledge in the direction of the tunnel to Hastings station. No lights there either, and the rumble grew even more intense as she squinted. Her eyes traced up to the trees hanging overhead, a blanket of green in the otherwise grey, which now glowed with a rainbow of colour. Seeing light of any kind at Ore beyond the stars stood out, but as she peered down, the breath left her lungs, gazing at the tiny star now vibrating below.
Heather’s eyes burned as she looked at the bright little sphere, but she couldn’t pull her gaze away. It burned at the edges of the world. She could see strands of her hair pulling towards the orb as if it held a gravitational pull of its own. Just as she began to make sense of its shape, the orb let out a blinding flash, enough to make Heather stagger back and grab for the opposite rail, nearly slipping down the stairs. She shook herself and rushed back, but by the time she peered back over the edge again and blinked away the ghost image seared into her retinas, the orb itself vanished.
Taking cautious steps, she made it to the concrete of platform two, and began her slow approach to the point the tiny star emerged. Within a couple of feet of the spot, a raw stinging chemical scent stabbed into her sinuses. Memory of over-chlorinated swimming pools or over-zealous hand-sanitizer swam about her. Yet as she braved the final few steps, nothing stood where the orb appeared. Even the smell, so vivid moments before, now faded on what little breeze made it into the trench of the station.
Her spine attempted to leap and throttle her as a rumbling began about her. Convinced she faced her death, Heather wheeled about, and saw the Service to Brighton pulling towards the station. She watched it arrive, frozen in place, flinching at the hiss of the suspension. The conductor stepped out, looked about, and saw her. She stared back. He held the look for a few moments, then seemed to shrug and stepped back inside. Ten seconds later, the train pulled away, passing into the tunnel, and out of sight. Heather sighed, then flinched again and twisted to face the new sound, a rustling in the bushes behind.
The fences of Ore station stood in about the same state of dereliction as the rest, a large hole behind her. The dense untamed foliage on the other side rustled about, and a small sound emanated within it. She tilted her head, and then made slow approach, kneeling down, and peering into the gap. A glint caught her eye, one far less radiant than the star, but with a unique twist as its pair emerged to join it. A terrified tabby cat stared back at her, hair on edge and about ready to pounce. The poor thing looked terrified.
Heather raised a hand, and held it out very slowly, about a third of the way towards the animal. She gave a very slow blink, and looked away, waiting. She felt warmth, and then, the feeling of fur and whiskers brushing her hand. She gave a few gentle pats, and then, very slow, she reached in with her other hand.
“S’ok, come on.” Heather said, as she lowered the cat to the platform. It shook itself off, and then without so much as a goodbye began to wander off the edge of the ‘Do not walk here’ part of the platform towards the hill, leading to the nearby houses. She watched it go, wondering if she’d had a friend at this station this whole time and never known. She guessed the station might be a fun place to explore as a cat, when it wasn’t exploding.
As Heather reached the bottom of the ramp to the real world, she gave one last look back at platform two. Nothing stood out, just the same old chewing-gum stained platforms they’d always been. But Ore changed that day; she looked at a space of safety, and could only see an orb shaped barrier.
Heather slid herself into the house, holding down the handle to keep the latch from clanking. The door met the warped wooden frame, swollen by damp. She grit her teeth, and tried to push it closed without making a noise. With one last shove, it crossed the lip, and she raised the handle, letting out a long sigh. She turned, and froze.
“Heather?” Her mother said, peering from the lounge. She’d stood from the sofa, but kept her distance. Heather’s body tensed, her hand still on the door handle, pushing back down. She couldn’t meet her mother’s eyes, so instead looked at a point just past her, the edge of a photo frame hidden by the doorway. “Is, everything ok?”
“Mhm.” Heather said, her fingernails biting her palm around the handle. She released her grip, flinching from the latch’s fast resetting, reverberating in the awkward silence.
“Are, you feeling hungry?”
“I’m ok.” Heather said, letting her hand drop, her eyes now on the sofa’s foot, where it dug into and left a small tear in the carpet.
“Well, if you do, I can make you something. Just, let me know ok?”
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“Okay. Thank you.” Heather gave a small bow of her head, and then walked towards the stairs. She tried to look at her mother before she passed out of view, but an ice sheet lay between them, distorting the person who stood so far away. Her fingernails now bit the handrail as she dragged herself up the steps as a maelstrom tried to pull her back down. She waited to hear her mother call her to return, but made it to her bedroom door without a sound.
The small room held a strange chill. Its single window held only single glazing, and a large crack ran up one side, an old jumper wedged against it but unable to block the winter winds. A dresser and bed book-ended the room, a fitting metaphor from the twisting piles of thrifted books filling the room. Hundreds of them, many still bearing their charity shop stickers formed spires of precarious knowledge, which she dodged about with deft care in spite of her tension.
The one other decor to the room sat beside the bed, a relic of a life before. The telescope glimmered in the faint streetlight through the small window, angled to turn this humble room into her own private observatory. She sat on her bed, and patted the side of the tripod legs, taking slow measured breaths.
Beneath the telescope, a large old water bottle sat next to a kettle, a light pink mug, and a small jar of value coffee granules. She eyed these, then rummaged on her bed to pull out a discoloured hot water bottle. Setting the kettle to boil, she slid the window open, and gently poured out the old contents into the void below, watering the weeds. Reaching to close the window once more, she instead found herself on her elbows, looking up at the multitude of twinkling lights.
She traced with her eyes the constellations of the night, each tiny pinpoint of light that made them up a star, or multiple. So many of the books around her talked about the stars, about the literal astronomical distance from Earth. As a child, it made the universe feel huge, full of all sorts of wonder and mystery. Now, it made Earth feel like a lonely place, remote, cold. She gazed at the stars with longing, then pulled the window closed behind her, the whistle of the night still breaching.
Sat on her bed, cradling the hot water bottle, and thinking of the stars, Heather closed her eyes and pictured the star at Ore. Maybe she’d seen some freak electrical disturbance, somehow not attached to anything. Maybe there’d been a fire and she’d let her imagination get away from her; so much so that there were no scorch marks left in its wake, and the cat remained entirely unsindged. Maybe she’d lost her mind and imagined the whole thing; she listed all these possibilities out loud, and isn’t talking to yourself the first sign of madness? She’d, just asked herself that out loud…
Heather never did sort food, or leave her room again that night. As she pulled herself under the covers, less of a blanket of snow now, one thought clung to her more than any other. She had to go back, not just because she needed Ore, couldn’t afford to lose this too, but in spite of herself, because she also wanted to know. When she pictured the tiny star, she saw the stars as she had in childhood, full of unknown possibility. There’d be a rational, non-fantastical explanation, but until the mundane truth emerged, she could dream.
****
Halos stepped back from the particle chamber, his hand trembling at his side. The frozen lab played nasty with his long bony fingers, but he didn’t register the cold, only the chill of the unexpected. How many times had he watched the test chamber light up, swapping particles between his lab and the nano-craft on distant celestial bodies. He could see every test in his mind, and none of them ever looked like that.
Halos looked over his shoulder. No one else stood in the lab, and really, what did he expect? His people weren’t creative, and while they had a cruel streak a mile wide, they weren’t the prankster types. Putting all that aside, his only companion in the isolated laboratory didn’t know the science, wouldn’t know what Halos looked for in these tests. If his ‘protector’ saw the test though, even he would know something was up.
Varsus, his ‘guard’ appeared to still be out on the surface, where he spent most of the day. Halos held his breath, but the only sounds came from the varied consoles and the hiss of the oxygen system, trickling the ability to stay alive into his strange little prison. Once he felt sure the guard hadn’t decided on a whim to return, he made his way to the main readouts, and began to scour the data.
The more he devoured the information, finding himself as malnourished for the secrets of the experiment as he was, well, literally malnourished, little pockets of hope emerged. Essential gasses for liquid water, sensible oxygen levels, even a similar composition of nitrogen to their current artificial systems seemed present. The temperatures even fit the healthy range, a feat the planet they called home now needed colossal domes to replicate, sending quite an ironic chill down his spine. Hundreds of years of searching, and here was the payoff.
With a few flicks, the display went dormant. He blinked at the blank screen, as if surprised by his own actions, even as his intentions caught up. Too perfect. The family worked for so long, laboring under equal scrutiny and scorn, and for the first time in generations a glimmer of hope emerged. If he took this in now, and turned out to be wrong, they’d tear him apart. They might not even limit themselves to the figurative. That had to be his reticence.
He stepped back from the console, trying to get his breathing under control. Then, he turned on his heel, his long white lab-coat twirling behind him, and made for the door. A cell as his lab might be, no one restricted him from venturing to the surface up the long ramp; he wouldn’t get far if he ran anyway. Where would he go? They were all trapped on this world.
After a long walk, he reached the top of the ramp, looking out across the rust-red vista of their planet. ‘Planet’ stretched the definition, a just-about spherical rock, dense enough to provide enough gravity to live, but weak enough that his people last much of their muscle mass and elongated noticeably from their fore-bearers. Halos’s spindly legs weren’t what left him weak at the knees.
Varsus stood a distance away, peering at him with a stare equal parts vacant and malicious. He tried not to go ad hominem when he scrutinized his guard but the gormless prick made it hard to hold to his standards. Halos knew from experience he needed little reason to exercise his ‘authority,’ so kept his distance, instead reaching into his pocket, and pulling out a small box smaller than his closed fist, with a delicate set of lenses, a mini telescope at the top. He tapped on it a few times, then raised it and scanned the skies.
After a short hunt, he found the target, a small main sequence star over five hundred light-years away. His people still used their old time measurements from their former world, from the length of days, to years and therefore light-years as a measure of distance. A ‘year’ measured the length of time taken to orbit their old star, but fell well short of the time taken to circle their current. In all their years on this desolate world, they hadn’t completed a single orbit, yet as he turned to watch their new star emerge on the horizon, he couldn’t miss its visage.
A deep hellish red took crimson dust and turned it to blood under its enormous gaze. They sat fourteen light-days from their new star, a red giant, so large that even at that distance it gazed as a prominent eye upon them. Had his people still worshiped deities, such a sight would conjure the image of a vengeful god. But no one on this world believed in higher powers, fate, or miracles, even as he turned back, and gazed up at one. His people’s exile on Ori might be at its end.