The Garbage Chronicles

CHAPTER 1

My observation is that there are two sorts of comets: one wandering, the other magical. None of the accepted scientific premises can be applied with respect to the behavior or physical makeup of a magical comet. Let those little minds obsessed with rules and categories stew over this one!

Scrawled note found on Uncle Rosy’s bedstand after his death

On the afternoon before the birth of the new magical comet, Tom Javik was escorted down a brightly painted sixth-floor corridor in Building B of the Bu-Tech Space Center. All the latest promotional colors were represented here in bright geometric shapes on the walls, ceilings, doors, and floor. The corridor was awhir with moto-shoes, as silver-uniformed government workers bustled to and fro.

“This has been redecorated since I was here last year,” Javik said, smelling fresh paint. He glanced down at the oriental man rolling at his side. The small man wore silver-colored nylon pants and a matching top, with canary yellow stripes down his sleeves and legs. An octagonal blue lapel tag indicated rank: “G.W. 1000.” This meant he held one one-thousandth of a job. He rustled as he moved.

“Haven’t you heard?” the G.W. said, not looking at Javik. “Bu-Free came in this week and redid the whole wing.”

“Bu-Free? What the hell are Freeness people doing in Bu-Tech? Are they setting up a giveaway?”

“Who knows? Here’s your briefing room.” He stopped at a purple and gold door and mentoed it, sending a thought command from his brain-implanted transmitter to a receiving unit in the door. The door slid open without having been touched.

As Javik rolled into the room, he was forced to narrow his eyes in sunlight which slanted across the floor. “Say,” he said, “this looks like the same briefing . . . ” Javik fell silent when he noticed the G.W. guide was leaving. The door slid shut behind the guide.

Javik was certain it was the same briefing room he had been in the year before. But it had been painted more brightly, with colorful geometric shapes like those in the corridor. And the galactic model was gone, having been replaced by a floor-to-ceiling CRT screen. The screen was dark, save for the words “Faith, Consumption, Freeness,” in white letters at the center.

Wonder what they’ve got in mind for me this time?
Javik thought, noticing a G.W. standing by the wall to his left.

The G.W. rolled forward to greet Javik; he was so similar in appearance to the guide that he might have been his clone. “Good afternoon, Captain,” he said crisply. “I am Leonard Nakato.” He touched hands limply with Javik in a Bu-Health-approved method of handshake. As much as practical, the expenditure of calories was to be confined to Bu-Health gyms. It was another Job-Support policy, based upon the centuries-old teachings of Uncle Rosy, founder of the American Federation of Freeness.

Javik returned the salutation. Then: “I was told to report for a presidential assignment. Is this the right room?”

“Yes,” Nakato said, revealing a slight oriental accent. “Come with me, please.” He pulled Javik’s white-uniformed arm gently, then released it when the men began to roll side by side toward the CRT screen.

When they stopped in front of the screen, Javik saw his own reflection in the dark glassplex: tall, muscular, and in his late thirties, with gold captain’s epaulets on the shoulders of his Space Patrol uniform. “Is the President going to speak with me by video hookup?” he asked.

Nakato mentoed the screen, causing the words “Faith, Consumption, Freeness” to fade. A large roulette wheel appeared on the screen, surrounded by what looked like green felt.

Deciding that this was the aerial view of a gaming table, Javik felt his lips mouth the word “What?” without making a sound.

“Mento the wheel,” Nakato said. The window shade on Javik’s left snapped down, making the screen image clearer.

“I’m not here to play games,” Javik said. “Who’s going to brief me?”

Nakato nodded at the CRT screen. “This is an assignment wheel,” he said.

“What?”

“Bu-Free’s idea. Some of their people were looking for things to do, so they got permission to set this thing up. You are to mento-spin it. The wheel will stop at the number indicating your assignment.”

“I should be talking with a general,” Javik said, “or at least a presidential aide.” He turned to leave. “I must have the wrong briefing room.”

Nakato checked a small clip pad that had been in his tunic pocket. “You
are
Captain Thomas P. Javik?” he asked.

“I am.”

“Then this is the right place. You are to mento the wheel.”

Javik turned slowly to face the screen. He closed his eyes and rubbed the fingers and thumb of one hand across his cheekbones.

“Captain Javik?” The voice was impatient.

Javik opened his eyes and mentoed the wheel. He felt a click in the back of his brain as his thought command was accepted by the CRT roulette wheel.

The wheel spun in a silent blur.

“Round and round she goes,” Nakato said, “and where she stops . . . ”

The wheel slowed, then stopped. A red pointer was over the number fifteen.

Nakato mentoed a pen to make an entry on his clip pad. The clear plastic pen floated out of his tunic pocket and moved across the paper without being touched. Then the pen floated back into the pocket.

The wheel faded, being replaced by white letters and numbers against a carmine red background:

ASSIGNMENT 15

GUNA ONE

“This is a search and scout expedition to Guna One,” a pleasant woman’s voice said, “largest planet in the Aluminum Starfield. It was the landing region used by the arch recycling criminal, Winston Abercrombie. When he was Garbage Thrust Commandant for the Federation in the nineties, Abercrombie catapulted hundreds of thousands of full garbage canisters to the region, intending to retrieve them for his own diabolical scheme. If successful, he would have undermined the AmFed economy with a glut of recycled goods, thus putting millions of manufacturing people out of work.”

“Public enemy number one,” Nakato said. “He’s never been apprehended.”

“Abercrombie may be on Guna One,” the woman’s voice said. “No one is certain. Your assignment is twofold: First, see if there is any unusual activity in the region. Second, locate Abercrombie and bring him back for trial. More details are provided in a briefing tape on board your ship.”

The screen darkened. Then the original white-lettered message reappeared. The window shade snapped open, filling the room with sunlight.

“I’d rather go to the Columbarian Quadrant,” Javik said. “That’s where the garbage comet originated.”

“The what?”

“The garbage comet.” Javik’s voice reflected irritation. “It’s been writing the same sky message for more than eight months: ‘We are not your garbage dump!’”

“Oh?” Nakato looked up at Javik with a blank expression.

“It’s only the biggest cosmic mystery ever,” Javik said. “And you don’t know anything about it?”

Nakato shook his head.

“Look, I deserve the Columbarian assignment . . . if there is one. I was the one sent to stop the comet last year, you know. I feel . . . well . . . responsible for it being here.”

Nakato was unresponsive.

“Maybe I could find out what caused it,” Javik said. “I hear a hundred missiles have been fired at the thing, from behind Bu-Tech-made clouds. But the comet’s too quick. Hell, it has the capability of moving five, maybe six times the speed of light!”

“Your assignment cannot be changed,” Nakato said. He slipped the tiny clip pad back into his pocket.

“Is
anyone going to the Columbarian Quadrant?” Javik asked.

“I don’t know.”

“What
do
you know?” Javik asked. His deeply set blue eyes flashed angrily.

“You leave tomorrow,” Nakato said, unruffled. “Report to Robespierre at nine a.m. Field sixteen.”

Javik seethed, but he held his tongue. He recalled the many quarrels in his career and all the hot water into which they had gotten him. He was on the comeback trail now, fortunate to hold the rank of captain. The fights flashed across Javik’s brain in a blur of fists and faces.

“I’ll be there,” he said.

At shortly past midnight, two magical comets hung in the ionosphere over New City, trailing delicate jet-ray tails of light across the deep blue starcloth of space. These were especially fiery comets, one large and brilliant blue, the other much smaller and cosmic pink. As the larger magical comet watched proudly, a tiny white nucleus with no visible tail emerged from the pink nucleus of its mother. The baby comet gasped for air and cried.

Anxious glances were exchanged between mother and father.

Reluctantly, the mother passed her newborn child to its father. Now the tiny white nucleus burned next to the father’s brilliant blue fireball.

Words drifted across rarefied air as the cosmic pink comet spoke. “I wish he didn’t have to go so young,” she said.

“You know it’s necessary,” said the blue, his tone deep and mellifluous. “We’ve discussed it thoroughly.”

“We’ve
discussed nothing! You did all the talking—and the deciding!”

“Now, dear . . . ”

“Don’t you ‘now dear’ me!” the cosmic pink comet snapped, flaring an angry, hot shade. “I should have as much to say in this matter as you!”

The blue comet began to flash electrically. “There are laws,” he said, his voice reaching a crescendo.
“Now go, woman! We will speak of this later!”

Dutifully, the smaller comet bowed her nucleus. “Yes, Sidney,” she said, trying very hard not to show the sarcasm which often irritated him: Demurely, she turned ninety degrees and sped off into deep space, trailing six magnificent plumes of cosmic pink gas.

I’ve never seen her more lovely,
Sidney thought.

Any Earth inhabitant watching the sky at that hour would have seen a great blue comet dropping toward Earth, with a tiny white flame burning next to its nucleus. And had this observer been outside, oddly enough he would have felt cool. For the Great Comet was an electric fireball now, so cold that it left a layer of frost on the building tops below.

“Papa!” the baby comet cried out. “Papa Sidney!”

Sidney spoke tenderly to his child: “You are a new life force, son, with emotions much like those of a fleshcarrier. Physically, however, you resemble no other creature in the universe.”

The baby comet cried softly.

“For the present, you have lungs, a heart, and other organs. Gradually, however, these will evolve into higher states. The emotions are different: They will stay with you always. There will be problems, but you will grow much wiser in only a few days.”

“What are emotions, Papa?”

The Great Comet stopped its descent now, dimming and hovering a few kilometers above the surface. Below, New City twinkled like a distorted reflection of the universe.

“They are strong feelings, son, which will cause you to behave in certain ways. You must learn to control your emotions, but do not become callous in the process. Retain some vulnerability. This is perhaps the most important part of being alive.”

“I do not understand.”

“You will have to discover such things for yourself. Find the fleshcarrier Tom Javik. He will help you. And you will help him.” The Great Comet glowed orange now, imparting warmth to the baby.

“I don’t want to go, Papa! I’d rather stay with you, roaming the universe!” The little comet felt himself shaking all over. Mercuric perspiration ran down the sides of his molten rock body. He felt weak. “I have so many questions to ask you! Where did you and Mama meet?”

“On a singles flight to the Jahuvian mountain planets—one of the most romantic places in the universe.”

“And she ensnared you?”

“I was a willing captive. There’s one more thing you should know: Avoid water on your outside surface. Too much of it neutralizes your magical powers.”

A great gust of wind blew all the mercuric perspiration from the little comet’s body. Then the caressing warmth of his papa soothed him. The little comet wished he could stay in this place forever. It was so secure, so peaceful. He narrowly opened the yellow cat’s eye on top of his body, trying to see his papa. But he saw only a warm orange glow.

“I will not dry you again,” the deep, mellifluous voice said. “Go forth now, and do what is meant for you.”

An irregularly shaped piece of molten material fell from the Great Comet’s nucleus. It tumbled toward Earth.

“Don’t leave me here, Papa!” the little comet cried out.

“Remember my words, son!”

“But Papa!”

“Become a Great Comet yourself! Make all creatures love and fear you! Place them in awe!”

The magical comet Sidney pulled away now, rising quickly toward the heavens. Soon he was out of Earth’s atmosphere and traveling away at many times the speed of light. He became a speck in the distance, blending with the background of space.

The dense chunk of material comprising the little comet’s body glowed bright red as it spiraled swiftly toward New City. Then it dimmed to a flicker and hardened, floating down on a cushion of magical air. With a dull thud, the piece fell to the skatewalk just outside the entrance to Javik’s condominium building.

Tom Javik padded out of the bathroom module in his robe and slippers, crossing his unit to the kitchen module. He wore unmotorized slippers, the illegal type frowned upon by Bu-Health. The kitchen module was small, with black and gold foil-fleck walls, a mirrored floor, and a black plastic table by the window. A conveyor counter still had the dirty plastic dishes from dinner on it. Javik mentoed the conveyor, causing it to squeak noisily as it carried the dishes into a disposa-tube on one end. Machinery inside the wall whirred.

As he paused to examine an electronic letter on the table, the faint notes of a rock waltz reminded Javik of an old tune he and Sidney Malloy knew. For a moment, he thought of the way sounds and smells could bring back old memories.

The stereo system fell silent at his mento command. He looked out the window. From the 261st floor Javik could see the sparkling lights of downtown New City on the other side of the lake. Somewhere beyond the opposite shore in that cluster of government office buildings was the White House office tower.