Cosmic (12 page)

“As long as I go in with him,” said Max, pointing at me.

When I climbed into the Vortex for the third time I concentrated on happy thoughts of all the great stuff I’d done since deciding to be a grown-up—walking in the Gobi Desert and driving a car and flying in a plane when I should’ve been in Waterloo High playground. Max leaned forward in his chair and said, “I voted for you last time.”

“
You
did?!” I wondered who had voted for me. I never thought for a minute it was him.

“I vote for you this time too. I vote for you because I want you to come with us. Not my father. I want you to come because you are a loser.”

“A what?”

“A loser.”

“I’m not a loser. I’m Gifted and Talented.”

“When you were running down the sand dune, that made me laugh,” he said. “And when you were rolling on the floor in the space suit. Remember?”

“Not the details.”

“When you do stupid things—”

“They weren’t that stupid. I just—”

“Will you do something stupid today? Please?”

“I’ll give it my best shot.”

“Thanks for that.”

Then THUNK.

We were off again. Only this time when I got to the Forever bit, instead of thinking about flying and walking in the desert, the word “loser” stuck in the front of my brain and stayed there.

When we came out Hasan was still saying he wouldn’t go in. Dr. Drax said, “If the child needs more time to prepare himself mentally, perhaps this would be a good opportunity for the other dads to take their turn. Samson One and Monsieur Martinet can ride together, and then Mr. Xanadu can go on with Hasan.”

They looked a bit unsure, but what could they say? They took their turn and this time I got to watch from the outside. To start with, the washing machine chugged round at something like the speed of a light woollens wash. Then it went up a gear to something like colorfast cottons, and after that worryingly fast—like a spin dryer, and then it suddenly started to slow down again. I said, “What happened? Has something gone wrong?”

“No,” said Dr. Drax, “that’s the complete cycle. They’ve been in there just as long as you were.”

“But I was in loads longer than that.”

“They were in just the same time as you were—namely six minutes, including one minute at 10
g
.”

“One minute?!”

“Why?” said Dr. Drax, examining her fingernails. “Did it feel longer than that?”

It felt like a whole chapter of my life—say, about as long as I’d been at primary school.

When the dads got out of the Vortex, Florida was excited by the possibility that they might be sick. But they weren’t.

When they were done, Hasan looked at me and said, “Everyone else went on with you. I want to go on with you.”

“I’m a bit tired.”

“That’s so unfair. Everyone else got to go with you. Why shouldn’t I?”

Dr. Drax said she really thought I had made my contribution already today.

Hasan said, “Daddy, tell him he has to go on with me.”

“I’m afraid your daddy can’t tell him that,” said Dr. Drax, “because it isn’t true.”

Eddie Xanadu sidled up to me and said, “How much to make it worth your while, Digby? A watch? A car perhaps?”

“A car? No, thanks.”

“I don’t think you’ll be able to bribe Mr. Digby, Mr. Xanadu,” said Dr. Drax.

Then Hasan said to me, very quietly, “Come on with me and I’ll vote for you.”

And I realized that though Mr. Xanadu couldn’t bribe me, his son really could.

Knowing that the lifetime at 10
g
was only a minute made the fourth time easier. I was just starting to get my happy thoughts ready when Hasan said, “There was a war in my country.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Soldiers came to our village. They wanted to take away all the children. But my father paid the most important soldier some money so that he wouldn’t take me away.”

You could hear the engine warming up outside. Hasan started to talk more quickly. “That’s why he loves money. Because it can help.”

“Well, fair enough.”

“And the reason he always wants more money. I watched all my friends being taken away, all the children from my school. I watched our house burning down.”

He told me this. And then the engine started. And in my head I saw Glenarm Close, Bootle, all in flames, and
Mom and Dad and Florida all being taken away by soldiers. That’s what I was thinking when I got to the Forever bit.

I was still thinking about it when the ride was over. But Hasan was grinning. He said, “That was
fantastic
. I could do that again.” I suppose anything is fantastic compared to having your house burned down and your mates led away. He bounced out of the machine.

“Don’t forget to vote,” I called after him.

Everyone had voted for me.

The Penultima is called the Penultima because it’s the next best thing to being in space. On the outside it looks like any other simulator but bigger. When you walk inside, though, you are standing in the biggest, best flight simulator ever built. It’s a full-size replica of the
Infinite Possibility
command module—five seats, multifunctional displays, even a PlayStation 3 for the boring bits of the voyage. You can tell they think it’s going to be a major attraction because it’s right in the middle of the Infinity Dome and the queuing lane is about a mile long. How much did Florida love strolling past the “Queue takes 45 minutes from here” sign! “It’s like this for a lot of celebrities,” she said. “I read that they opened Chessington World of Adventures early once, especially for Brad Pitt and all his kids.”

We spent the morning on the Penultima, learning how to guide a rocket through reentry. “Of course,” said Dr. Drax,
“on the big day, all that will be taken care of by those clever people over at DraxControl. But we want you to learn how to do it, just in case.”

There was a monitor shaped like a window. You could see the Earth, with clouds and seas rolling across its big curvy face. As the Earth got bigger you could just make out the glowing border of space and the atmosphere.

Mr. Bean showed us what to do. “Think of that glow,” he said, “as the flap of an envelope. Just slip under the flap and you’re on your way home. It’s as simple as that. It’s all about the angle. Max, you’re first.”

Max stepped up to the control panel and tried to steer us in. There was a kind of arrow on the screen to show you the angle. What you had to do was keep the front of the module lined up with it. Max would probably have been all right if his dad hadn’t been standing behind him saying, “Steady, Max, steady,” over and over. The more he said it, the less steady Max got, until suddenly, just as the glow was getting clearer, everything changed. The Earth spun around—continents and oceans whirled into each other. Then the entire planet completely vanished and everything was black.

“Now, you see what’s happened here,” said Dr. Drax, “is that Max didn’t get the angle just right—”

“I told you to watch the angle,” snarled his dad. “Why didn’t you watch the angle?”

“—and as a result,” said Dr. Drax, “the rocket has bounced off Earth’s atmosphere, a bit like when you skim a stone off the surface of the sea. My father, by the way, was rather wonderful at skimming stones. His record was twenty bounces.”

Through the “window” there was nothing but blackness punctuated by stars as we rocketed farther and farther into space. Florida said, “Can’t we reverse?”

“Not now. We’re drifting out of control.”

“But we’ll stop in the end? Everything stops in the end.”

“Not in space. In space you just drift on forever.”

“Yes,” agreed Samson Two. “It’s Newton’s first law of motion, I’m afraid. Unless an external force is applied, a body will remain at rest or will continue to move at a constant velocity. Forever.”

“So,” said Florida, “if we bounce off the atmosphere on the day, what do we do?”

“Hold on tight and enjoy the ride.” Dr. Drax smiled. “But don’t worry—it won’t happen. Show them, Shenjian.”

Dr. Drax reset the simulator and Shenjian took the controls. As we got nearer to the Earth, she read out all the changes in gravity from the monitors.

“She’s doing that just so that we down on the ground can hear that she’s awake,” said Mr. Bean. “A lot of people pass out during reentry. Also, it’s hard to move your hands.
You’ve just got used to weighing nothing when—
ping
—you weigh a ton.”

The blue seas and the white clouds looked so friendly and familiar, and then they were gone. The screen was filled with a blazing golden fire.

“We’re dead again!” yelled Samson Two. Shenjian didn’t even blink. “Or perhaps the machine is malfunctioning?”

Shenjian just kept saying the numbers.

Mr. Bean said, “We’re not dead and it’s not a malfunction. That glow is just us slamming into the atmosphere. We’re moving so fast all the little atoms on the outside of the rocket are shedding their electrons. It’s a pretty thing, isn’t it? Of course, you’ll have no time to appreciate it when it’s actually happening.”

Shenjian shouted, “Gravity five and rising.”

Samson Two said, “That means she’s back inside the atmosphere.”

“On your way home, Skylark,” smiled Mr. Bean. “Mother Earth is holding your hand. Just don’t let her drop you.”

And the golden glow flew away like wrapping paper, leaving the blue Earth looking as new as a present.

All of the children had a go at the reentry procedure. It made my fingers itch just watching them. Because the fact is, the
Penultima—the world’s most accurate rocket simulator—is just a big version of Orbiter IV—a game at which I am a consistent high scorer. Even the control-panel layout is the same. Reentry is a task you have to master to get past Level Seven in Orbiter IV.

I was twitching to play, but the other dads didn’t seem to be paying any attention at all. Monsieur Martinet said that watching the others reminded him of driving lessons, and the next thing they were all going on about cars. Monsieur Martinet said he drove a Mercedes and Mr. Xanadu said he had some Mercedes too “for midweek, you know.” Samson One said he preferred Land Rovers because of living in the desert, and they all started on about four-wheel drive. They talked about cars as though they were playing Top Trumps. Sometimes they made me feel like I was the only grown-up there.

“What about you, Mr. Digby? What do you drive?”

“A car.”

“But what kind?”

“A blue one….” I was trying to concentrate on the Penultima. “I don’t know much about cars.”

“But you drive for a living. Surely you have to know about cars?”

I’d forgotten about being a taxi driver. I said, “It’s more about knowing your way round town really. The
car’s just…tools of the trade really.” I remembered what Dad had said about taxi driving. “Taxi driving is about people, not about cars. You have to be a bit of a psychologist, a bit of a tour guide, a little bit of everything. I don’t really have time to be interested in cars…I even delivered a baby once.”

I think probably the baby thing was going a bit far—though Dad did sort of deliver a baby once. Everyone stared at me, like they were going to ask me to prove it by delivering another baby right now. Luckily Mr. Bean told Monsieur Martinet it was his turn at the controls.

Monsieur Martinet slipped inside the golden envelope just as neatly as Shenjian had. He crossed his arms and said, “Child’s play.” Then the screen went black and the simulator said, “Permanent Fatal Errors. Uh-oh, you are dead.”

“I don’t think so,” he snapped.

“Not quite yet,” said Dr. Drax with a smile, “but in a very few seconds. You forgot to open your parachutes.”

Next up was Samson One, who bounced off the atmosphere and toward the sun. It didn’t bother him. He seemed to quite like the idea of accelerating until you turned into a beam of light.

Mr. Xanadu seemed more interested in trying to buy the Penultima than he was in steering it. “Such a great machine.
If you sell it to me, I will add fighting monsters and lightly clad female aliens to the simulation. It would be popular and profitable.”

“The simulator is part of our training program,” said Dr. Drax. “Fighting monsters is not one of our training objectives.”

“But with a little work,” said Eddie Xanadu, “this could make your fortune.”

“I already have a fortune, but thank you for your suggestion.”

As she said this, he hit Earth’s atmosphere hard in a kind of interplanetary belly flop and burst into flames. “Marvelous graphics!” he said. “Please take a picture of me at the controls like a true taikonaut.” He gave me his phone and got the children to pose and smile with him.

Then it was my turn. I don’t want to brag about this, but I have completed Orbiter IV Level Fifty, when you have to do reentry while being chased by a giant squid. So it really wasn’t hard. Even so, Dr. Drax was impressed. “Would you mind doing it again just to make sure that wasn’t beginner’s luck?”

This time they tried to trap me. An unexpected meteor shower went by during the final approach. Luckily this is a standard Orbiter IV trap. You just have to remember that meteors have a gravitational pull of their own
and correct your coordinates accordingly. If you don’t, you get pulled off course. I was into the golden envelope for a second time.

Afterward, during the voting, Samson Two asked me why I was so good at the Penultima. I said, “Don’t tell anyone, but I’ve got a PlayStation game just like this.”

“You play PlayStation?” said Samson Two.

“A bit. I prefer massively multiplayer online games like World of Warcraft.”

“Those are unusual activities for a dad,” said Samson Two.

“But it turns out they’re good activities for a taikonaut.”

Samson Two smiled, nodded his head and then went off and started whispering to the others. Then all the children went off to vote. I knew I was going to win. I was the only one who would be able to save them in an emergency. I did the math in my head. Eddie and me were both on six. That meant if I got three, I’d definitely won. But I could still win even if I only got two, as long as the other two votes didn’t both go to Eddie.

When Dr. Drax came back in with the results, my heart was popping with excitement. “The children have decided,” she said, “who is the best daddy in the world. And who
is going to be the best daddy in space. He got four votes today….”

Four votes. It had to be me. I was going to space!

“He is Mr. Eddie Xanadu!”

Eddie got ten points altogether. I came second with six.

I did ask the children about it. “I just like having my photo taken,” shrugged Florida.

“But I can work the machine.”

“Yes,” said Samson Two, “you were the best at handling the rocket. But that means you are also the best at PlayStation. We don’t want a grown-up who is good at PlayStation. When people are good at PlayStation, they don’t get killed for hours and hours and you have to sit and watch them, waiting for your go. We don’t want some console hog. We want someone with no PlayStation skills.”

That’s the scary thing about children. They will vote to go into space with someone who is dangerously useless if it means they get a longer go on the PlayStation.