Adventure Planet, Chapter One

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. “They” have never been to Adventure Planet, Earth’s first—and only—amusement park among the stars. It’s not a planet, of course. It’s a space station filled with all sorts of roller coasters, dark rides, simulated space adventures, and other entertainment. There’s even a theater playing the latest holo-films, so long as they’re space-themed. No different from an Earth-bound amusement park, really, but the novelty of it being in space has been more than enough to attract anyone with the money since 2073. People like my brother and his wife.

I was only invited to go with them because I’m so good with their children. How cliché, the rich parents run off while the lower-to-solid-middle-class female relative watches their children go nuts. It’s a good thing I happen to like their kids…and that they’re paying me five hundred dollars per day for three days to do this. As our space shuttle docks and I get my first glimpse at the see-through dome covering the park, I decide that maybe the gig won’t be so bad. After all, the park was built by my favorite mega-corporation; the station is even shaped like their signature mouse head, with the face serving as the park and the two ears as living quarters and the command center/engine room/miscellaneous station necessities.

As we disembark our shuttle and walk through the hotel ear, my nieces and nephews shove past me and run through the lobby, crying out their excitement.

“Slow down, you guys!” I yell at them, cringing at my own voice ringing through the lobby alongside theirs. I rush after them and grab the youngest two, five-year-old Merida and eight-year-old Chadwick, while the two oldest, thirteen-year-old Makiese and fifteen-year-old Agan, come to a screeching halt in front of a display of the solar system a couple feet away.

“Aunt Syl, come look at this!” Agan exclaims. I have never seen all the children so excited about the same thing before.

I drag the youngest two with me to the holographic display, although they hardly need to be dragged. Agan watches us with the broadest grin on his face while Makiese uses her hand to zoom the display out to the swirling image of the Milky Way Galaxy. I could catch flies with how widely my mouth is hanging open. I have never seen a holographic image of the galaxy so clear and crisp. It’s as though I could stick my hand right through the vastness of space and touch its very edges. Not even the International Federation’s Space Station has achieved such a detailed image of those sparkling stars and distant planets. Like an outer-space tornado, the eye of the Milky Way Galaxy threatens to suck me in. Then Makiese moves her hands, and a dizzying rush comes over me as we return to our solar system.

“Which planet do you want to see first, Aunt Syl?” Makiese asks.

“I...umm...” I look over my shoulder at their parents, but they have already started the check-in process. Shrugging, I turn back to my nieces and nephews. “How about Venus?”

“The goddess of love!” Makiese giggles while Merida and Chadwick make fake gagging sounds.

I laugh. “Exactly. Let’s see how beautiful she is.”

Like the conductor of an orchestra, Makiese smoothly moves her hands through the air, guiding the holograph to the desired planet. The planet that appears is nearly featureless and colorless, like a milky marble suspended in the deep darkness of space. I watch as the kids frown, disappointed in the lackluster truth of such a romanticized planet.

“You know, this is just Venus in the visible light spectrum.”

I jump at the voice and turn around to find a petite blonde woman with a pixie cut. She wears the uniform of hotel staff: a white blouse, a navy-blue business jacket decorated in golden stars, a navy-and-gold-striped skirt, and navy heels to complete the ensemble. Her deep hazel eyes meet my green ones. I shift back to the hologram, blushing, as she walks up beside me.

“There are other features you can check out,” she continues. She reaches her hand forward and swipes the image downward. In its place slides in the same milky planet, this time with brown, gray, and black clouds dancing over its surface. “This is Venus in the ultraviolet band.” She sweeps her hand down again. This time, an orange, brown, and black version reveals itself. “And this one is a false-color image reconstructed from radar data.”

“Wow.” I reach forward to touch the hologram, momentarily forgetting that the planet is not really there. I feel the woman’s eyes on me and quickly retract my hand. Struggling for something more to say, I glance at the woman’s name tag. “Well, Kelsey, thank you for your help.”

Kelsey laughs. “No problem. Is there anything else I can help you with?”

I force my eyes to stay on hers. “I...no, I don’t think so...”

“Sylvia!” my brother calls, waving his phone in the air. “Come on! I need to AirDrop the room key to your phone. Then Hope wants to unpack.” My sister-in-law waves at me as well.

I mentally sigh. “Thank you again, Kelsey, for all your help.”

Kelsey touches my forearm. “No problem, Sylvia. If you need anything else, just call the front desk and ask for me.” She winks and walks away. My heart won’t leave my throat.

In my room, I recline in the massage chair with a chilled sleep mask over my eyes. There are some advantages to having a rich Silicon Valley entrepreneur for a sister-in-law. Two hours into our stay, and my lack of sleep from the past few years is catching up with me and triggering a migraine. I can hear the kids in their attached room as they watch one of the mega-corporation's fifteen TV channels—an old cartoon involving a parallel dimension, witches, and demons—and playing space adventure. Or star battle. Something like that.

I suddenly feel a butt leaning against the arm of my chair.

“So, Aunt Syl,” Makiese begins with her infamous teasing tone normally reserved for her siblings, “you like that Kelsey woman.”

I know it’s not a question, so I ignore her.

“C’mon, Aunt Syl. I know you’re not asleep,” she insists.

I sigh but do not turn off the chair or remove my mask. “Yes, she’s pretty and nice. I happen to like that in women.”

“You gonna ask her out?”

I laugh. My head throbs in retaliation. “Ask her out? Maki, we’re on vacation. We’ll be gone in three days, and I’ll probably never see her again. So no, I’m not asking her out.”

“Too bad. She liked you.”

My stomach flips, and not from the migraine-induced nausea. “You think?”

“I know.” Her tone is far too confident for a thirteen-year-old discussing adult relationships.

“Well, the answer is still no. I don’t do well with long-distance relationships.”

Makiese sighs this time. “Whatevs.” She pats my shoulder. “Hurry up and get better. We wanna explore.”

I snort, and my head throbs again. “When you start having migraines, you’ll understand how impossible that is.”

“You sound like Mom.”

“A wise woman.”

As Makiese leaves the room, my mind conjures up images of a hazel-eyed pixie.

Turns out, Makiese is a jinx. My migraine doesn’t leave until late in the night, sending me to the toilet so many times that I might as well sleep there. By the next morning, it’s gone, but I’m dragging ass. I’m just glad to keep my breakfast down. The kids, though, want to run around the park and try everything at once—all while posting updates to Agan’s and Makiese’s various social media accounts. And of course my brother and sister-in-law are spending “quiet time” in the room. I guess that’s what they’re paying me for.

I do my best to keep up with the kids, but by lunch, I can feel my migraine headache trying to come back with a vengeance. I can’t get myself to tell them, though. This is their vacation, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and I won’t be ruining it for them. I swear to myself that I won’t.

I almost regret the silent promise when the kids drag me to the line for Space Epic, a tethered spacewalk experience. When we get there, we learn that Chadwick and Merida are too short to go. Chadwick and Merida are upset enough, but it’s the crushed looks on Agan’s and Makiese’s faces that break my heart.

“You two go on,” I say to them with a forced smile. The pain in my head is bordering on unbearable. “We’ll be over on the observation deck watching you.”

“Really, Aunt Syl? We wouldn’t want to put you out.” Even as he says this, Agan inches towards the line.

I shake my head, and it immediately pounds, but I suppress the tears stinging the edges of my eyes. “Seriously, go.”

Agan and Makiese race off, and I take Merida and Chadwick to the observation deck where other people wait to watch their loved ones fulfill a lifelong fantasy. I hear a child screaming as they’re dragged away from the deck, and I’m suddenly grateful that my little brats only pout.

We elbow our way to the front in time to see a seventy-something-year-old man and who I assume is his teenaged grandson drift by, waving as their tethers trail behind them. They both seem to be having the time of their lives. I happily wave back, but when I look down at Chadwick and Merida, my smile disappears. They look unbelievably crushed.

I glance from them to the old man and back. My smile returning, I kneel down and whisper for only them to hear, “You know, you’re lucky. By the time Agan and Makiese get through that line, they’ll be as old as he is.”

Merida and Chadwick giggle. The lines had been a major source of stress—and complaints—for me the entire morning.

“Prolly older,” Merida whispered back, as though it were the world’s best-kept secret, “like, as old as Mommy and Daddy.”

I laugh, and a sense of pride sweeps through me. Five years old and already Merida can crack jokes. A girl after my own heart.

As the next pair—a man and woman holding hands—drifts out, a large man with a beer belly slams into Chadwick, knocking the boy against my leg.

“Hey, watch it!” I snap as I get Chadwick back on his feet.

The man turns his head to me and grunts before turning back to our view of space. Rude. But it isn’t his gruff dismissal that throws me off; it’s his eyes. Cat-eye slits for pupils surrounded by an orange iris flecked with gold. My heart feels as though it’s stopped. I’ve seen wild contacts, implants, and even tattoos on eyes before, but this—this seemed more vivid, more real. Those eyes were not human.

It takes all my courage, but I grab the man’s arm and force him to look at me. Nothing. His eyes are only the ever-popular deep brown, albeit cold from malice and annoyance. I stare at him for a moment before shaking my head to clear it.

“I-apologize to my nephew, sir,” I say to cover my oddness.

Again, he only grunts and pushes my hand off his arm. I let it fall to my side with no resistance. How could this be? His eyes so…so bizarre one moment, then normal the next? I shake my head again. I hope to all the forces that may be out there that I’m not starting to get the visual hallucination aspect of migraines.

By the time we get back to our rooms that night, I can’t rush to the toilet quickly enough. Vomit spews forth the second I lift the lid. I force myself to stop puking and get up long enough to see the children to bed—even if the TV is on—before closing the door connecting our rooms and retiring for the night, a chilled sleep mask over my eyes.

In my dream, I find myself in a desert terrain. Red sand as far as I can see. Large mounds gently slope around me, and patches of brittle grass dot the landscape. Light brown smoke dominates the sky, with only two faded pink orbs for suns. I cough and heave in the thick yet bone-dry air.

I search for any signs of life. It feels as though an hour has passed before I come upon a wooden door in a mound of sand. I don’t know why, but I reach for the metal ring-like handle and pull open the door. Inside is complete darkness. Then I hear a hiss. A glowing pair of orange irises with golden flecks stare directly at me. The hissing grows louder and the eyes grow bigger as whatever it is approaches me.

I slowly back away, but the creature follows me. When it finally steps into the light, my breath catches in my throat. A seven-foot reptilian humanoid with the head of a cobra towers over me. Its tongue flicks out and dances in the air in front of me. Under the hypnotic stare of those eyes, I can move no farther. The creature rears its head and then strikes at my jugular.

I wake up screaming in pain. Scrambling, I throw off my now-warm sleep mask and reach for my neck where the creature struck me. Nothing. Just a lot of sweat from my migraine medication and the nightmare.

It had felt so real. I can’t get the vision of that monster out of my head, and my neck hurts even if there are no marks. And the smell...God, the smell, like a rotting carcass left to bake in the sun. How could I dream so vividly? I’m too freaked out to even notice that my migraine is gone.

It takes me hours to fall back asleep. Six o’clock--apparently, my nieces’ and nephews’ new vacation wake-up time—comes far too soon. At least my migraine stays gone this time. Still, I can’t shake that nightmare, how real it had seemed. I have never smelled anything in a dream before. After getting some pancakes and sausage in me, though, I brush the matter off to my migraine and decide to make an appointment with my neurologist once we get back home.

Today, the entire family is at the gate when it opens. Of course, my brother and sister-in-law have their own plans again. Fortunately, they did arrange for the kids and me to go on a private tour of the park. While my brother and sister-in-law head off for an exclusive “adults only” club at the other end of the park dome, the kids and I wait for our guide. My heart almost tears itself out of my chest when I see her.

“Good morning. My name is Kelsey, and I’ll—Sylvia?”

I blush. She remembers my name! “Hi Kelsey.”

“Well, I’ll be darned.” She grins, and I can’t help but smile back. “This should be a fun day after all.”

I roll my eyes. “You say that to all the guests.”

“Yeah, I say that they’ll have a fun day. With you here, I might actually have some fun too.”

Before I can think of a reply, Chadwick says, “Aunt Syl, your cheeks are red! Like a tomato!”

I know it’s true, but I shoot him my best aunt glare anyway.

“I think it’s cute.” Kelsey winks at me, and I giggle nervously. “Come on, let’s get this tour started before the rug rats get restless. First stop, CGImagination Station!”

For the first time this vacation, I am fully enjoying myself. The tour has taught me new things about my favorite mega-corporation and shown us parts of the park we never would have discovered otherwise. Kelsey is so knowledgeable with a great sense of humor. Her laughter is absolutely infectious. No migraine to make me wish I was dead, no alien eyes to freak me out. By lunch, I’m starving and invite Kelsey, who’s on her break, to eat with us. She accepts.

As we eat tasteless burgers and overly greasy cardboard pizza, Kelsey asks us about our vacation. Agan and Makiese are more than happy to tell her all about their little space walk, while Chadwick and Merida try to talk over them about the heroes they met from their favorite sci-fi movies and TV shows. Kelsey seems to focus on each of them as though they are the only people in the world who matter. When a break in their talking comes, she turns to me.

“What about you, Sylvia? How’s your vacation been?”

I shrug. “Pretty good, for the most part.”

She cocks her head with the most adorably quizzical look on her face. “For the most part?”

“Yeah, I’ve had a couple migraine attacks—”

“Oh, no! I’ve heard those are horrible.”

I nod. “Well, they’re not the best feeling in the world, that’s for sure. They might be getting worse, too, considering this weird hallucination I had—”

“What kind of hallucination?” She leans in closer, as though she can’t wait to hear my response.

“What’s a hall-u-sion?” Merida asks.

I force myself not to giggle and decide to give her the oversimplified answer. “It means that I thought I saw something that I really didn’t.”

Merida’s bushy eyebrows pinch together. “How can you do that?”

I reach over to ruffle her curls then stop when I realize that she probably wouldn’t like it. “I think that’s something for your mommy and daddy to explain to you when you’re older.”

Merida crosses her arms and pouts. “You and mommy and daddy always say that.”

“That’s because some things are too complicated for you and the other squirt.” Agan jabs his thumb in Chadwick’s direction.

“Hey!” came the chorus of Merida and Chadwick.

Kelsey taps on my shoulder. “What kind of hallucination did you have?”

I think back on the man with alien eyes and shudder. “Visual. I thought I saw this guy’s eyes turn a really weird color, but it must have been my mind or a trick of the light…”

“I feel another ‘but’ coming.”

The younger kids giggle at “butt”. I roll my eyes.

“I did have a really weird dream, too. Like, overly realistically weird.” I pause, but Kelsey doesn’t say anything. “I got attacked by this…I don’t know…reptilian-cobra-humanoid alien. It had the same eyes as the man I saw.”

Agan’s head shoots to me at this. “Do you think that guy was an alien?”

I narrow me eyes at him. “What do you mean? Don’t be silly, Agan. You’ll give your brother and sisters nightmares.”

Makiese smacks me on the arm. “I won’t get nightmares.”

“Watch it, Maki. No hitting.”

“I’m being serious, Aunt Syl,” Agan says. “I mean, look at where we are. We’re at a theme park floating in space! If we can do that, who’s to say that aliens haven’t done more than that.”

“And how exactly would I be seeing them in my dreams?”

“I don’t know. Maybe your migraines mean that you’re…what’s the word—”

“Sensitive,” Makiese replies without looking up from her phone.

“Yeah, sensitive! Maybe you’re sensitive to them, and they know it, so they have sent these images down to you—”

“And made me feel a bite to my neck?”

“Well, maybe they’re trying to warn you that something bad’s coming. Maybe they’ve sent the message out to a lot of people and you’re the only one to pick it up—”

“Enough, Agan. Seriously. You’re going to give Chadwick and Merida bad dreams, then I will have to stay up with them tonight.” When I look over at the two youngest children, they seem more enraptured by Agan’s story telling than afraid. I shake my head. “Now, no more alien nonsense. We only have one more day here, so let’s go enjoy what we can of it.”

I turn to tell Kelsey goodbye and thanks for the tour, but my voice catches in my throat when I see that her hazel eyes have turned orange with specks of gold and cat-eye pupils.

That night, I dream again of the desert planet. This time, I’m in the middle of a tented market. Aliens of all kinds swarm around me, with some humans thrown into the mix. Each tent is manned by at least one reptilian-humanoid with a snake’s head. Everyone wears long, dull-colored clothing and headcloths covering the lower half of their faces to protect themselves from the heat and sand. Compelled by some unknown force, I weave my way through the crowd to a stall at the center of the market. There, I find an asp-headed reptilian-humanoid in black clothing that resemble a Muslim hijab and abaya, the sleeves of the abaya ending in beautiful turquoise embroidery—the most color I have seen on the entire planet.

The asp-woman grabs me by the elbow with a clawed hand and pulls me close. In my ear, she hisses, “Be careful. They are watching you.”

I wake up with a start. Again, the dream had been so vivid. I can still feel the asp-woman's breath and slithering tongue on me ear. I grab my pillow and throw it over my face to stifle a groaning scream. What in the world is happening to me?

Day three. Our last full day at Adventure Planet. Between the migraines, the hallucinations, and the dreams, I think I’ve had more than enough. I need to get home and see a neurologist. I don’t want to deprive my nieces and nephews of their fun, though, so I can wait until we leave tomorrow morning.

I can’t think of any attractions or rides we haven’t already seen—that we’d all be interested in, that is—and so we go through and do our favorites again. I have no clue what my brother and sister-in-law have been doing this whole time—well, OK, I know exactly what they’ve been doing, and they’re probably doing it again, but it’d be nice if they were around for their children, for once. Still, I don’t mind riding It’s a Vast Universe with them one more time, even if the song gets stuck in my head, or watching one more show in The Last Frontierland. Then we get to Infinityland.

True to its name, Infinityland seems to go on forever. I truly don’t know how the creators got so much to fit within the confines of the park dome, especially with all the other lands squished in along with it. As we wander, Makiese even spots a ride that we haven’t gone on before: Exploration Space. Unfortunately, Chadwick and Merida are too small to ride. Fortunately, Agan and Makiese volunteer to take turns entertaining their siblings while I ride with first one then the other. Agan, as the eldest, stakes his claim to go first.

The line should take forever, but my brother and sister-in-law thought ahead and got us “One-Step” Passes for the final day. Lame name aside, they’ve been incredibly helpful in skipping every line we come to. Just a swipe of our wristbands, and we’re whisked to the front. We miss out on all the decorations and details put into the queue—the story of the ride—but as I see sand everywhere and snake carvings up on the ceiling, I think I’d prefer to not see it. My dreams have provided me with enough snakes lately.

The ride itself is based on an old Earth ride based on a popular action film. Same safari-style cars, same rocking back-and-forth, same tendency to break down every few hours. (At least it doesn’t break by the time Agan and I make it into our car.) The premise, though, is a bit different: the riders are tourists on a distant planet, but the planet’s native inhabitants haven’t taken well to the human presence and fight to get us off their planet. A bit of Jurassic Park meets a colonist’s worst nightmare.

By the time we round the first bend, the ride morphs into my worst nightmare.

Reptilian-humanoids. Reptilian-humanoids everywhere, all with snake heads. Asps, cobras, rattlesnakes, coral snakes...

We pass close to a cobra-headed snake, and like in my dream, it strikes at me. Another with an asp head fake-throws its spear at Agan. The car jerks left and right, narrowly missing each of our attackers. Agan is laughing and having the time of his life; I can hardly breathe. My mind keeps flashing back to my first dream, the creature’s glowing eyes and the pain of its crushing, venomous bite. My head starts pounding so hard that tears pour down my cheeks. I have no choice but to lean over the lap bar and hold my head, cutting off the sights and sounds of the ride—but not my flashbacks.

By the time the ride ends, Agan is shaking my shoulder and asking me repeatedly if I’m OK. I assure him that I am, but when we get back to the others, I tell them that I have to call their parents. All around me, everyone’s eyes are the orange-gold eyes of the cobra reptilian, all waiting to strike and devour me.

My migraine returns, and words flash before my eyes: SOON TO BE A FEATURE FILM.