Chijindu

Scylla

I grew up in a mining colony, orbiting just off of the 110th Radian of the Kuiper Belt in the Copernican System. There wasn’t much there except rocks, rocks, more rocks, and, oh yeah, rocks. My father was a miner, his father was a miner, and his father’s father was a miner as well. The trend of my bloodline goes all the way back, in fact, to the first generation of workers to leave Earth when the colonies first launched. All I knew was rocks, boiling hot sunrises, and freezing sunsets.

The only real perspective I had of the wider solar systems at the time was through a smuggler named Joseph. To the eyes he was just that, your average Joe, but you didn’t have to talk to him very long to find out he was running Polysilicate Phenobarbital routes to serve the older boys who worked in the mines. 
The Boys would huff the PSP after a shift  to pass the time. When he wasn’t pushing PSP, Joe was hanging around with them telling travel stories. I didn’t care much for the drugs, I saw what they did to people. My addiction was the stories. I’d drop off my dad’s lunch and then sneak off to the spots where the guys were huffing and eavesdrop on the tall tales. 

Joe mostly bragged about bar fights and shootouts, but a few stories were odd. His mood would change and he’d get a far off look in his eyes telling us about places we should never go. Planets covered in cannibals, stars that had irresistible siren songs, and deep space wive’s tales. None of us believed any of the more far fetched stuff, but it was all enough to spark a travel itch in me. I fell into a trance when I listened, and knew I wanted to become a smuggler.

On my 14th birthday, the arm of a cobalt rig crushed my father. They said it was a historic collapse. The very next day, I started working at the same site to help with bills. My mother caught Auroral Typhus and passed within a year. Joseph was graduating to weight, and needed runners and gunners. Naturally,  I jumped at the opportunity.

It’s been 15 years. I run my own crew now. Joseph died in a bar fight and willed his two-seat cruiser to me. It was a rust bucket at first, but we retrofitted it with a warp drive for deep space travel. As long as we had a clear field for warp launch, we could go 310 lightyears in about 25 minutes. The costs nearly put us in debt, but the profits were worth it all.

There were three of us on this run. The crew needed to be light weight because we were hauling enough tonnage of PSP to put Cthulhu down. 
“We’re almost there. Get some sleep. Once we clear this star system, and get into open space we can start the warp. Should take about 6 hours to do so,” our navigator, Lincoln announced.
Lincoln was ex-military. I didn’t want to add him to the crew at first, given his previous occupation, but he’s become an asset. Trust is a rare currency in this business, and I grew to trust Lincoln because he stays clean, he’s calm in a pinch, and he loves money. His choices are predictable.
“Hang on. Addam, Lincoln, there’s a small star in the port wake. Do you see it?” Eva asks.
“Yeah.”
“Roger.”
We were approaching a star that was small and red.
Eva continues musically, 
“Perhaps we can use its gravity to slingshot into a clear field for our warp. I’m sure the Baron will appreciate an early delivery, and–” 
“What about that asteroid cloud? I don’t want to risk a collision in dead space.” Lincoln interjects.
“We’ll use the servo drive to push us onto a new vector long before we reach it,” Eva offers calmly.
I watch Eva explain the calculations to Lincoln, and they reach an agreement. With Eva my trust comes easily. Her red hair shines in the twilight as she moves her fingers  along the hologram map. She is the most mesmerizing sight I’ve seen since I first started running with Joe.  She’s a natural Spacer. I know better than to doubt her judgment. It doesn’t hurt that she loves me as much as I love her. We set our course towards the star.

“SNAP THE FUCK OUT OF IT!”
My head rebounds from the dashboard. I catch a glimpse of Lincoln’s horrified face. The high gravity and high pressure alarms let off deafening sirens.

“Why’d you hit me?” I sputter. 
I wipe blood from my eyes and catch my breath through my mouth.

“What’s going on?!  Is Eva Okay? Where is she?” I frantically search the cabin, my nose throbs and my head spins.

“WHO THE HELL IS EVA? WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO? Are you trying to kill us? I woke up and you were at the console locking the controls. We are heading straight towards whatever THAT is.”

I lift my gaze to where Lincoln points. A red light, not bright enough to be a star. To its left, a massive field of debris. Not asteroids, but ships. Thousands of spacecraft. Floating. Lifeless. We are soon to join them. Lincoln becomes calm as he stares into the light. As we approach we see its contour. It isn’t a small star at all, but the pupil of an eye.