8. THE FIRST DAY

THE CASE OF MERCURY RISING, 8

I discovered almost straight away, whilst the non-terrestrial words were hop, skip and jumping through my mind, that there was a space downstairs (yes, there were stairs, quite petite stairs but stairs none-the-less). And that space downstairs was divided into what could be loosely defined as a microscopic toilet area complete with a the tiniest sink imaginable, and hot and cold water (not taps, but there was water available via a sponge-like thing that was sort of damp when it was pressed on). The larger part of the downstairs area was a kitchen in which stores of dehydrated food could be reunited with water until it was approaching edibility. All very utilitarian, but what did I expect? Especially from Igor?

Upstairs was the sleeping area and that consisted of one bunk that was supposed to be big enough for two and which would be beautifully snug with two in it, and a compact set of storage drawers than I guessed Angelina would require one hundred percent access to. And that was that. If I wanted a wee in the night (night? Who was I fooling?) I’d have to go down two flights of stairs. But I decided I’d worry about that later.

Angelina could see I was agitated and, being a woman, she knew why.

“It did say possibly non-terrestrial,” she pointed out when we returned from our tour of the accommodation and plonked ourselves in our two chairs.

I shrugged. What could I say? Put the word possibly in your description of anything and you’re really saying that you don’t know. And if Mercury Rising didn’t know, what was I getting agitated about?

“It’s going to be snug at night,” she said with a comforting little giggle.

“Yes, but what exactly is night?” I asked her.

Ever since we had first stepped into our strange vessel the interior had been flooded with light, and in all honesty I didn’t know its source though I suspected that somehow sunlight was being harvested and fed to us, probably by mirrors, though that was only a guess.

By the time we’d explored what was to be our home for the next two months, the monitor (we had to call it that because Mercury Rising didn’t understand the words screen or television) showed the Earth as a slowly shrinking disc against the stark blackness of space, but it was obviously our home world and the continents and oceans were still clearly identifiable. We had obviously and miraculously moved some distance though we had no concept of speed, and if the monitor hadn’t shown us we wouldn’t have been aware of any movement at all. Igor had obviously hit upon a supremely efficient system that was driving us away from home.

As I had understood it, the gravitational pull of the Earth was somehow neutralised whilst the gravitational pull of other celestial objects was somehow enhanced, thus giving us momentum.

“I think I’m going to enjoy this,” said Angelina out of the blue while I was lost in a mental admiration of the situation we were in.

“You are?” I asked, a little surprised.

“Well, think about it, Royston. We’re at work and there’s no Blinky standing over us, watching every move we make...”

“He isn’t that bad!” I said to our boss’s defence. And in all truth he wasn’t, though Angelina had seen more of him than I had, me joining the agency after her.

“I know,” she confessed, “but we’re not so often alone, are we?”

“The two of us?” I smiled, raising my eyebrows, because in truth, since she had moved into my home with me we spent just about every non-working hour together and when we were at home it was just the two of us. Igor had visited us last week, but that was a one-off rarity, and few people ever disturbed us, which was the way we both seemed to like it. At least, that was what I assumed.

“You know I rather like being with you,” she murmured quietly, “even though you are an old man ten years my senior? And we seem to get on well together?”

“And I think the world of you in my old age,” I added, not wanting the conversation to become one-sided like such conversations can be.

“Do you?” she asked. Her eyes looked directly at me, and they were huge eyes providing, I convinced myself, equally huge windows into her beautiful soul.

“You must know I do. I shags you, doesn’t I?” I quipped.

That last comment from me was meant to add a ray of light to what seemed to be developing into a moody and serious conversation.

“That’s something we do to each other,” she said, those big eyes suddenly alight, “and I didn’t mean when we do that! It’s being together that I like, even when we’re not talking, and, believe it or not, even when you’re asleep and I’m awake, which happens quite a lot.”

I knew that it did because my mother used to say that I could go to sleep on a clothes line, whatever that meant, and I knew that Angelina sometimes lay awake for quite long periods, searching for sleep and not finding it so readily.

“I think I love you,” I said, quietly, hoping that Mercury Rising wasn’t monitoring our private conversations.

“You only think?” she asked.

“I don’t know really what love is,” I confessed, “only it’s something that girls say to boys and boys say to girls when they’re being close and intimate. But I do know how I feel about you, and I’ll call the love if you don’t mind.”

“It’s a whole world more than a teenage few words!” she almost exploded, and I was sure Mercury Rising could hear every nuance of that.

“Of course it is!” I assured her. “Let me see, it’s wanting to be with you all the time and feeling that part of me is missing when you’re not there. It’s sharing thoughts with you, it’s believing you are the person who you seem to be and even more. It’s wanting to sleep with you, next to you in bed, and by sleep I’m not using it as a euphemism but as an exact description of two people asleep because they’re tired. Together. It’s wanting, oh sod it, to be in the same orbit as you all the time.”

She smiled at that. “I don’t think we’re in any particular orbit at the moment,” she said, and giggled.

I love that giggle. It perfectly complements that smile.

“And I love kissing you,” I said, continuing my exploration of the word love. “I find all sorts of joy when our our lips touch, the taste and the smell of your mouth, the astounding beauty of a brief fleeting kiss...”

“You old romantic!” she said, “and for the record I like, no, I love kissing you. Your manly breath, your strong tongue...”

“Now that’s getting personal! Who said my tongue was strong? You make it sound almost like a weapon of war!”

“I meant strong in the manly, virile sense,” she whispered.

“I wonder when it’s bed time?” I asked her, feeling moved by her very closeness to me.

“Whenever we want, I suppose,” she replied, “let’s ask the ship, shall we?”

“Go on,” I invited her.

“Mercury Rising, what is the time back on Earth, and is it bed time?”

The vessel made what I could only describe as a sort of mechanical snorting sound.

“It’s all times down there on the home world,” it replied mechanically, “depending on your location. So any time is what you so romantically call bed time.”

“Shall we?” I asked Angelina.

“Let’s,” she replied, standing up.

“Hey! It’s only half past three and I’m paying you!” came a different voice from the speaker.

It was Igor, and he’d been listening in!

© Peter Rogerson, 20.02.20