7th Sun


By Rick McGrath

The bus had stopped outside the Space Hut Cafe. Inside the decor was early plastic verité, from the table's dusty daffodils to the melmac plate that arrived barren, save for the two fisheye eggs that bleared back from the scarred grey of the ancient dish.

Fuckin Yankees never have HP sauce, he thought to himself. They like ketchup. Ketchup looks like blood. The waitress put down the second plate. Pancakes, garnished with strips of bacon. He ate the pancakes, took the bill to the cashier, paid and cashed a traveller’s check for $100. Pretty quiet around here, he said to the woman at the cash register. She looked acutely Yankee old doll. Her low cut dress showed ample wrinkled cleavage, and her face might have looked good 40 years ago, before it had been weathered by sun and wind, but now, with yards of bright makeup making her look like some time-trapped doll, her body merely became an odd reflection of her face’s surprise.

Not much goin' on she said, looking him over with a practiced attitude. She motioned vaguely to the left. Cocoa Beach is real quiet this time of year. Best place to go right now is Satellite Beach, about 20 miles south on A1A. That's where the wind surfers hang out. She flashed a vibrantly toothy smile and handed him his change. Thanks he said and reached for a cigarette in his shirt pocket. She looked over his shoulder. The bus driver and his passengers were settling into their food. You with them? He looked around at his fellow passengers. A couple of airmen they had just picked up from Patrick AFB. Four fat elderly types, tourists from North Dakota, a middle-aged couple from Canada, and two men in black suits who kept pretty much to themselves ... and the bus driver, that was it. Yeah, he said. I'm a modern-day merry prankster. I'm on the bus. He winked at her uncomprehending face and walked out into the bright sunlight.

Up the street, around the corner and the only house to be seen was a squat white bungalow surrounded by ice-deadened palm trees. Beside it was the Orbit Bar. As he walked past the house he noticed a small sign on the door of the refurbished garage. Rock Store. The driveway was outlined with miniature black concrete monoliths, each displaying an inset crystal of quartz or amethyst. He walked up and touched the buzzer. A light came on inside and a woman in her 60s appeared to unlock the door. Come in she said, pulling back the door and kicking forward a welcome mat. He wiped his shoes. Inside, display cases ran down either side of the room, with finished pieces at the front and lapidary equipment at the rear. He walked down the isle until he noticed the trays of unworked raw rocks and crystals. The woman walked behind him, making small sales noises until her husband arrived from a side door. He’s about 70, grossly overweight and suffering from skin cancer to the right side of his face. The area looks like an empty, kidney-shaped swimming pool slowly filling with old leaves.

Hello he said, pleasantly enough. His eyes filled with a sudden longing. Are you a lapidist he asked, sneaking a look at his customer's hands. Sorry no he replied. The only rocks I've got are beach agates. Mostly little ones. Except for the ones I picked up on the beaches of the Queen Charlotte Islands. The shopkeeper nodded. Yes he said, in British Columbia. Always wanted to go there. Would, but now ... He paused and touched his face. His wife was fussing with a tray light in the front of the store. He pulled his hand to his chin.

Now what can I show you he asked, hustling down the narrow isle behind the counter. Polo ties? Belt buckles? Look at this incredible soapstone bookend. That's real lapis lazuli inlay. Did it myself. He turned quickly and patted an evil-looking grinder. With this rock grouter. The shopkeeper paused for effect. Nah he said. I like wild rocks. Whaddya got in the trays? The shopkeeper said I can see you're a man of natural tastes. You will be interested in my collection of metaphysical rocks. He pulled open a drawer and set a tray on the counter. This is an amethyst tooth he said, holding a dark purple dagger up to the light. Quartz crystal root, perfect amethyst crystal cap. Said to have strong medicinal qualities. His fingers rubbed the smooth crystal as he spoke. His customer looked around. What's that he said, pointing to the back of the tray. The rock looked like half a geode, an orange-sized Thunderegg, but instead of the usual mossy scene, the centre was clear except for an indentation that was cut into a perfect square. He picked it up and stared closely at the cut. Where’d ya get this he asked. The shopkeeper straightened up. Strangest thing, he said. He took the rock from the man and began quietly humming. The old lady reappeared, squinting.

He turned his massive back on her and leaned into his conversation. The shopkeeper lowered his voice. I got this from a feller a couple of months ago. He said he found it on Satellite Beach. Said he went down with the boys for a little drinkin and poker and maybe a strip show or two. Got too drunk to drive back, so he slept on the beach. Sometime during the night he hears this noise that wakes him up. Listen, he says to me, I'm not feeling too good, not too good at all but all of a sudden there's this long, low noise and think I can see lights, but who knows, its happening all around me. Now, he says, there's lots of dunes there and they're protected by state law so you can't go walkin on them, but that law is designed to protect the public, not the thorn-infested plants. I cut myself good goin up the first dune and there was nothin on the other side. The noise seems louder off to the left, so I skirt the ridge and I think I see a big ball-shaped object with a band of purple light pulsing around it like, well, an electron around the nucleus. So there's this ball, and as I look at it I can hear a voice. Don’t know what it’s sayin, though. Then the thing just disappears. No wild UFOs, no nothin. I'm feelin real tired so I just lay down on the grass. Next thing he knows he wakes up and its light. Morning comes fast here. Just about 6:15 - sunrise. So he gets up and walk down to the spot where he saw the Ball. Nothin different. Then out of the sand he see this peekin through. He tries to tell me its a piece out of the Ball, but I don't believe him. Don't get many UFO stories around here, what with the Cape real close. The shopkeeper turned the rock in his hand, feeling the square hole with his fingers. One thing, though, this rock has been machined. He held it over a small counter lamp. I figured somebody lost it. There's lots of RV campers who hide out on the beach so they don’t have to pay parking fees. Most RV guys like working the stone. But this is good. Very good. Equipment is everything. So I bought it off the kid. Curiosity piece. The man held out his hand. How much, he asked. Ten bucks, the shopkeeper said, including tax. You got it, the man said, pulling a crisp ten from his wallet. He slipped the stone into his pocket. It made a noticeable bulge. Like a rock singer, he smiled to himself.

He got back on the main road just in time to see the bus pull away. Asshole he screamed and broke into a run. Then the light turned green and the bus, with his suitcase, turned onto the bridge crossing the Banana River. Fuckin hell. He kicked the sidewalk. Looked into the sky. Exhaled. OK, be cool. I've got my money. They'll find my stuff and leave it at the head terminal in Titusville. He looked at his watch. Two o'clock. OK. Back to Satellite Beach for more beers. He touched the rock in his pocket and stuck out his thumb to the oncoming traffic.

The fifth guy picked him up. A 50-year-old local in a beatup Chevy. Introduced himself as Sonny. Still a space nut after all these years. He had only seen six liftoffs, though. They were all the highly publicized ones. To catch the other shots, you had to be in the right place at the right time. Seems NASA gives only about four hours warning. One of these days, though, he kept saying, scratching the whiskers on the side of his weather-beaten face, it'll be my seventh time. Seems the only other person ever to see seven liftoffs said it was like a religious experience, with dizzy spells and the most wonderful feelin of well-being. Now, Jessy, he says, don’t you go takin the road of satan by callin that any ree-ligious experience. It was a total disaster, he says, with all them astronauts and that nice woman teacher gettin blowed to pure smithereens. Jeez, there's hasn't been a shot for years. His eyes scanned the horizon in the rear view mirror. Sometimes you hope you'll see one go up in the mirror - that's why I like to drive this road. Don’t you worry, boy, I'm going to be there for the seventh, sooner or later.

The HonJon bar in Satellite Beach was half-filled with windsurfers, oblivious like brightly plumed birds in their water gear. They were noisily drinking beer and kept shifting around in erratic, aggressive movements. A slight whistle crept down from the plastic-palm roof, and the place fell quiet. The whine sputtered, then slowly began again like the whistle on an electric water kettle. There she blows ... forty knots, someone said, and they all filed out. He knew what was happening. A windsurfer himself, he knew the joys of a full gale and six-foot waves. The HonJon windmeter on the bar’s roof signalled the advent of wavedancer winds, when your arms burn with the heat of exertion, but your board soars fast like a pelican’s beak along the soft underbelly of a fifty-mile wave. But that was years ago. In Spain and Portugal, when he paid for his European vacations by charming women with windsurfer lessons beside the tranquil seas. He finished his beer and booked a room at the Satellite City Motel. He pulled out the stone and flopped on the bed. The events of the day had thus far been less than exemplary. He laid back on the bed and fell into a fitful sleep, dreaming of that split-second before the wall of flame engulfed the occupants of the Challenger Shuttle.

He woke with a voice in his head around nine o'clock. Picking up the rock he grabbed his windbreaker, locked the door behind him, and walked out of the motel and onto highway A1A. HonJon’s was screaming, but he walked past the bar and down to the beach parking lot. He took a windsurfer from the top of a Jimmy 4X4 and walked to the water. The surf was painfully cold, but his skills remained and he got windborne before getting wet past his knees. There was a sharp breeze from landward, and he moved out from the surf, quickly becoming a dark shark’s fin of sail arching smoothly northward. The voice called him in, and he flipped the sail to tack into the shore. A confusion of smallish dunes, silver against the moon, stood out behind the black water. He hit the beach running and struggled through the sand until he was safely behind the protective vegetation.

The cops found him the next morning. The bright red sail of the windsurfer had flapped like a distress signal, and a private plane returning to Daytona after a trip to the Bahamas radioed in the sighting. He had no idea of what had happened since he fell asleep in the motel. There was no denying the stolen windsurfer, though, but the cops let him off lightly, booking him for theft under $200. No jail. No bail. They took him back to his room and suggested he might go visit some other nice part of Florida. He said he was catching the next bus to Titusville. They left it at that. He sat on the bed. Suddenly cold, he put his hands in his pockets and hunched his shoulders. His right hand closed around the warmth of his geode. He pulled it out. It was warmer. He looked at it. Funny, the back wall of the perfect square hole looked less distinct. Slightly out of focus. He shook his head and put the stone back in his pocket. One thirty. Time to catch the bus.

He was sitting in the small, decaying-50s terminal when Sonny, the friendly driver walked in. He looked once, then again, then broke into a grin of recognition. Leavin so soon, kid? Heck, man, you oughta stay a few more days. They're gettin ready to send up The Atlantis, or so I hear. Got the big Hubble Space Telescope and everythin. She's on the runway right now, really close to the gantry. Could be anyday. Wha did I tell ya. Gonna be my seventh. He stuck out his chest. It’s gonna be good. Where you goin? Titusville, he replied. When's the bus come? Three forty-five. Sonny wound out his arm with a great flourish, running his right hand up his left sleeve in the same movement. I got two. I also got beers coolin in the pickup. Wanta waste some time? Sure. The two walked out back and got in Sonny's real car, a ‘69 Camaro Pickup. Only one of 50 ever made. Sonny patted the shining hood. Got it the same day Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon. Clean your feet first. The doors ka-thunked, blotting out the street noise. He felt the increased air pressure in his ears. The car was completely stock, red with white tonneau over the never-used bed. The only idiosyncrasy was a poorly executed sign over the dash. In Old English biker type, the words read: The Seventh Sun. Sonny gave him a self-conscious smile. I got that painted on by my wife after I saw the sixth burn. It was the Challenger. Whatta sight. The pickup was approaching a turnoff to the beach. Let’s go up here. He jerked on the wheel and veered onto a sandy road. The car lurched crazily. Hey, Sonny, watch the beer, fuck, almost spilled all over my jacket, great, eh?, fuckin smellin like a brewery on a hot bus. Sonny grinned. Oh yeah, lookit that beach. He floored the Camaro and sped like a burning satellite beside the unfurling surf.

Hey, Sonny, the Challenger, how far up was she when she toasted? Could you see anything? Sonny shook his head. She was close, kid, close. You could still feel the heat from the liftoff burn. She's up what, five, ten miles, when you see bright orange for just a split, then it’s like a nucleus splitting, huge balloon of smoke with crazy particles spinning off in three directions. I thought one part was the Challenger, blown free and out over the Atlantic, so maybe the crew could bail out or survive the fall, or somethin. Sonny drew in a sharp breath and exhaled slowly, clenching his fingers tighter around the wheel. But it wasn't. The poor fools musta vapourized. Turned into hot gas. Wonder if they saw it coming? He slowed the pickup. Did you find any relics? Sonny eyed him suspiciously. Why do you say that? Shit, man, that was a big explosion. A big piece of hardware. Shoulda been lots of pieces around. Yeah, well, sure there was. Some of my friends found pieces of metal. But they kept passin off junk ... anything they couldn't explain. Anything that looked burned. I never did. Never really wanted to look for that kinda stuff. Isn't it like the Titanic? Like a tombstone, but in lotsa little pieces? Sonny slowed and pulled the pickup to a stop. I will tell you one thing, though, he said. The Challenger was the act of the devil. Sure as God. Look, you gotta see it my way. I'm out in the boat, fishin off the Cape, with the radio on the coast guard channel. Next thing you know I'm listenin in on start of the official four-hour countdown. I almost shit my pants getting into position A, about five miles out. I get on the flying bridge with my high-power binocks, and I'm right there. I follow that sucker like a leech right to explosion and then zoom back for the bigger view. Just then I sees Satan's face in the smoke, and the three burnin bits fan out to make horns and a tail, so help me Jesus. That's why I gotta see the Seventh. Sonny looked at his watch. Twenty after three. You gotta get back.

He was leaning over the open window, saying goodbye to Sonny when he put his hand in his jacket. He still had the stone. Fuckin unlucky stone. He pulled it out and passed it over to Sonny. Here, this was found on the beach around here. Who knows where it came from. Yours, for the beers. And the ride. See ya. He got on the bus. Five minutes later he was peering out over the endless dunes as the bus turned north out of Satellite Beach.

Sonny was still in the pickup when the bus pulled out. He sat there, holding the stone, staring deeply into its enigmatic facets. Slowly he moved over on the seat and opened the dashboard storage compartment. Inside was a lot of junk to go with the registration and insurance, but there in the back was a stem of quartz crystal. He pulled it out. It was perfectly square, a form of quartz he had never seen before. He had found it on the beach, in an unpopular area where the dunes bunched up and made a small stand against the sea. The protrusion broke the wave’s symmetry for windsurfers, who generally preferred to head south from Satellite Beach, rather than face the continual surveillance from observation posts built around the Cape. Gingerly he positioned the stem in his left hand, and brought the square end of the crystal up to the hole. It fit perfectly. Carefully he pushed the stem all the way in. There was a sound like a click, if only for a split, and then the voice fairly boomed in his ears.

The sun had been down for two hours, and there was still an hour before the moon rose. Sonny crept up the beach towards the dunes. The phosphorescence on his wetsuit glinted like an icicle in the sun. He crept up and over the dunes, down into the tall grass, through the protective marshy moat area, and slowly up behind The Atlantis as she sat at the gantry, bathed in light and the steam of space, a high-rise of fire and fury. When the sentry drove by, Sonny half-crawled, half-slithered to the gantry base. A voice boomed over the loudspeakers. Attention. Ten Minutes and Counting. All personnel, Leave the Launch Area Now. Attention. Sonny made the firepit, directly beneath the vaulted splendour of the booster rocket’s four giant engines. In his satchel the crystal pulsed with a purple light. Seven Minutes and Counting. He pulled out the crystal and stared at it. It flickered slightly in the shadows. Three Minutes and Counting. He pulled the crystal stem from the geode and looked into the swirling depths of the perfect square. A face appeared. It had no eyes. Above him, the Shuttle’s high speed pumps began to whine.

Welcome, Seventh Sun, it said.


© 1990 Rick McGrath

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