Vacation Station

I’ll be the first to admit, the situation was ridiculous. We try to plan for all the unexpected events or little things that can go wrong. And for the most part, all that planning keeps us safe. Sometimes, though, the universe has its own plan. Next thing we know our plans diverge and collide, creating unexpected situations. Then all that planning goes out the window, or in our case, the airlock.

Before I fly us through a dark hole and we get into unchartered space, I should clarify some of the facts. First, it wasn’t like anything on the station was illegal. Celia and I had licenses for all the neurological and cloning equipment. We constructed the station in Elon7-sector 13, well outside of regulated space. Sure, cloning was illegal on Earth and within the UGN, the Unified Global Nations. But we were out on the edge of international space. Even the cloning lab had been registered with all the appropriate authorities. We were tinkerers, not mad scientist. At least I was a tinkerer. Celia was a true scientist.

Biochemistry and genetic manipulation were my hobbies. Back on earth, I engineered socio-economic biodomes for a major manufacturer. In fact, this trip to our vacation station, was to celebrate the massive government contract I’d won. My design focused on an ancient Egyptian themed dome for the Nile river basin. I’d won the UGN gold standard for environmental sciences. But splicing DNA and recreating ancient Earth species was my jam.

Of course I had all the basic cloning kits. I may be a hobbyist, but I’m not a slacker. I cloned species that went extinct in the early twenty-first century, like the tiger, lion, and North American wolves. I created fabled animals like the basilisk and the gryphon by splicing cross-

species DNA together. You should’ve seen my basilisk, Victoria. She was a beautiful blend of blue peacock mixed with the Philippine cobra. No self-respecting geneticist’s collection could be complete without at least one prehistoric dinosaur. Mine was the tyrannosaurus rex. I called him Tex.

Celia performed real magic, however. Her understanding of the human brain and the advanced neural mapping technology combined with all the free tech her company supplied, allowed her true genius to shine. Her inventions made our family escapes memorable. She’d built a unique super hibernation chamber, the Dream Room, trademark pending. A high powered super projector, basically a big ass antenna, allowed us to project our consciousnesses into the minds of other species anywhere in the galaxy.

One summer we swam through the molten rivers of J-11 as lava turtles. We flew as giant winged lizards through the hanging cliffs of Aliyah’s cove, suspended hundreds of miles above the ocean by monstrous purple vines. I even chased prehistoric prey through Tex’s dreams. All made possible by Celia’s genius.

“Do I have to go?” Leisha asked, pouting.

“We’re going as a family,” Celia said, irritation etched across her stern face.

“It’ll be fun,” I said, smiling around a mouthful of nutrient filled mush. “I’ve been reading about a new ocean world the UGN added to the galactic super web. Underwater caves filled with bioluminescent species.”

“Jace invited me to his party this weekend,” Leisha said, her pouting evolving into whining. “It’s the biggest party of the year. The girls will make fun of me if I don’t go.”

“Aren’t you too young for parties with boys?” I asked, pointing a spoon across the kitchen table at her, chuckling.

Leisha rolled her eyes, unimpressed with my humor. She frowned at Celia, brushing a strand of dark blue hair away from her glowing purple eyes.

“Come on Leish, you promised to take me flying with the phoenixes across Neuman’s super nova,” Kaylan said. He worshipped his older sister. He’d begged to have blue hair and purple implants just like hers.

“But it’s the last party of the year.”

“You’re coming with us,” Celia said. “End of story. I don’t want to hear any more about it.” Her sparkling blue eyes, flecked with tiny diamonds, grew hard.

“I hate you,” Leisha said, throwing her spoon down and storming from the table. Those were the last words Leisha ever said to her mother.

We arrived at the vacation station, and Leisha went straight to the dream room. I assumed she wanted to neural cast back home to her friends. Celia started the boot up diagnostics. Kaylan had power duty, inspecting batteries and generators. I slipped out of the airlock in an EV suit, squeegee in hand. A thin layer of green slime was building up on all the external observation windows. The space goop was attracted to the glowing lights. Typical checklist anyone might have to run through if they owned a space station.

“Neural monitor is online,” Celia’s voice cackled into my helmet. “Rex’s dreaming, Victoria’s dreaming, all the others sleeping in deep hibernation. Looks good.”

“Did you talk to Leish?” I asked.

“She’s impossible, teenage hormones, boy crazy,” Celia said. “She’ll get over it.”

“I just think you need to be little easier on her. Don’t you remember what it was like being a teenager.”

“She’s got it way easier than I did. Have you met my mother?” Celia said. I had, and Celia was right, her mother was a monster.

“What’s this?” Celia said. I heard an alarm beep behind her.

Like I said, you plan for everything you can think of. But sometimes the universe creates something completely unfathomable. Who knew that the green slime coating the window was actually conductive biomatter? Or that when said slime is exposed to a direct radiation surge from a blue supergiant, the slime gained a transitive property, allowing it to transfer power on an unknown frequency. So, when all the power flickered briefly, as it did when the primary power cells came online, I thought nothing of it.

“Are you seeing this, Darwin?” Celia said. A diagram of the station's power system appeared in the corner of my helmet. It showed power transferring between the sleep room and my lab. One name softly glowed in the sleep room, Leisha. One name glowed in my lab, Tex. Leisha’s neuro link was connected with Tex. I never thought Leisha was the slightest bit interested in my clones.

Another alarm started screaming behind Celia. Another image appeared in my helmet, the life monitors of my family.

Leisha’s name flashed angrily for a moment, then the bar dropped to zero. An angry red heart icon glowed next to her name. The icon for heart failure.

“Checking the lab,” Kaylan buzzed in my helmet. Before I could respond Celia's voice cut.

“Darwin, I can’t wake Leisha up.” Panic in Celia’s tone. Celia never panicked. An electric flash of fear shot through me.

Tex’s monitor started flashing. I switched my helmet monitor to Kaylan’s body cam. Through his camera, I watched my lab door slide open, sighing softly. I was looking up at Tex’s open jaws filled with razor sharp teeth. Saliva dribbled to the floor, splatting in large puddles. An enormous pink tongue licked at the curled back lips. Tex roared, a sound that sent my heart pounding. Cold panic gripped my chest and I felt like I was suffocating.

“Oh crap,” Kaylan said.

Tex scooped him up in his massive jaws in one quick fluid motion. I listened helplessly to the horrible crunching until Kaylan’s body cam failed. His life monitor bar dropped to zero, just like Leisha’s. My boy didn't even have time to scream.

“Celia?” I called. Only silence.

“Daddy,” A mechanical version of Leisha’s voice crackled into my helmet. “What’s going on? Why am I inside Tex's head?"

“Leisha, honey are you ok?” Her life monitor said she wasn’t, but it was clearly malfunctioning, right?

“Hold on, honey, I’m almost inside.” I reached the airlock and thumbed the open button. Nothing happened. I tried again, and again nothing.

“The system is in an emergency state,” Celia said, her voice barely a whisper. “Exterior doors are locked, interior doors are open for easy access to systems and hardware. It’s the factory safe mode.”

“If I make my way to the south door, it has a manual override.” I said. “Meet me there and let me in.”

“Daddy, what’s going on. Why did I eat Kaylan? Why did he taste so good?”

“Not now, Leisha, let me get inside.”

I pushed through the zero gravity as quickly as I could. As I came around to the south side the long open observation deck became visible. It had been Celia’s idea, an observation deck that let us peer into the void. We’d made love there the first day we arrived at the station. I imagined our naked bodies floating through infinite space. The floor had been too hard and the air cold against our skin. But I loved it. That was the night we made Leisha.

Celia appeared there now, running along the corridor. Then I saw the shadow. A lumbering giant blocking her path. Celia screamed and started to run the opposite way.

“Leisha, is that you? What are you doing?”

“I can’t help it, I’m so hungry.”

“Leisha, don’t eat your mother.”

It was too late. Tex was a prehistoric alpha hunter. He closed the distance in seconds and clamped his jaws around Celia. Or were they Leisha’s jaws? The dinosaur lifted her up and shook her like a puppy might shake a new toy. Blood splashed against the smooth surfaces of the space station windows. I watched, horrified, while the t-rex tore chunks of flesh from my lifeless wife.

“Warning,” a cold robotic voice broke into my helmet. “Environmental danger detected. UGN cleansing protocol initiated. Please evacuate immediately.”

An alarm blared throughout the vacation station. The t-rex in the observation deck looked up at me. Blood stained its jaws. It waved its tiny, clawed arms franticly. The giant purple eyes, Leisha's eyes, glistened with what I took for tears. A countdown appeared in my helmet.

Ten, nine, eight, seven…

“Daddy…”

“I love you, honey.”

“Did I eat mom?” The t-rex pressed its giant nose against the observation glass.

Four, Three, two…

I could see the propulsion flame from the UGN missile reflected in the glass, rapidly approaching our vacation station, our little lunar home away from home.

I told you the situation was ridiculous.

End

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