Rattle The Stars

Chapter Nineteen: The Portal

Half an hour later, Jim sat at the front of the longboat with Silver, fenced in by the cyborg’s humongous arm. In one hand, he held the map so they could follow its pulsating light across the surface of the planet. With his other arm, he held Alice close, who sat next to him with her hands bound, tiredly glaring a hole through Silver’s head when she wasn’t nodding off from exhaustion.

Silver, for his part, refused to look at either of them, his eyes fixated on the path the map was lighting up for them.

Behind them, BEN stood sheepishly, and further back, a few pirates huddled around Dr. Doppler and Captain Amelia, who were bound together in the middle of the boat. Their weapons were trained on the pair, who glanced fearfully at Jim from time to time.

Alice slumped against Jim, finally giving in to her exhaustion. He hugged her tighter, wishing he could sleep, too.

Silver met his gaze, just briefly. His expression gave nothing away, but his eyes fell on Alice’s sleeping form. Then he looked away, and his frown deepened.

Jim lost track of time as they sailed along, and he started to drift off.
A sharp poke in the ribs jerked him awake.

“Out you go.” Silver hauled him up and shoved him off the longboat. BEN followed after, then Alice, helped by Silver. She stumbled to a halt beside Jim, her ankle still weak, her hands bound.

Morph whined in the pocket of her pants, then curled up next to her neck.
Jim patted the little blob’s head. “It’s okay, Morph.” He supported Alice with one arm and gave her a grim smile. “Sorry about the rude awakening.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Alice replied, her voice monotone and dead.

All but one of the aliens created a train behind Jim, Alice and Silver.

“Let’s go.” Silver waved them on.

“Jimmy…Al…I don’t know about you,” BEN noted nervously as they walked along behind Silver, “but I feel like I can see my life flashing before my eyes.” He pondered for a second before shouting, “Was I ever dancing with an android named Lupe?”

Alice nearly jumped out of her skin. “BEN, please!”

“BEN. Shh!” Jim hushed him. He added at a whisper,“This isn’t over yet.”

They walked along until they reached the edge of a massive cliff. The pulsating green and gold light from the map abruptly ended, right at a spot near the center of the cliff.

*

Alice looked around, then peered at the cliff. A sensation tingled in the back of her mind, like a vague sense of recognition. “Something about this place seems familiar.”

“Really?” Jim gazed at her as he drew the map out of his pocket. “How so?”

“I…I’m not sure.” She noted the alien trees and the foggy, greenish hue to the air. “I can’t help but feel as if I’ve been here before.”

“Huh?” Silver stopped and put his hands on his hips, his brows furrowed. “Where is it?” He glared back at Jim and Alice. “Where’s the treasure?”

The green lines that had led them here converged onto the map in Jim’s hand, then disappeared back into it.

“I see nothing!” Shouted another of the aliens. “One great, big, stinking hunk of nothing.”

Silver stomped over to Jim, his eyes blazing. “What’s going on, Jimbo?”

Jim worked at the map. Though he tried twisting and turning it, pushing the buttons like before, it wouldn’t budge, not even for him. “I don’t know. I can’t get it open.”

“We should have never followed this boy!” Cried a tiny alien wearing a bandana, who was all feet and no arms. She landed a kick against Jim’s back, sending him flying forward and toppling Alice in the process.

“Hey! Leave him alone!” Alice shouted.

Silver came to stand over both of them. “I’d suggest you get that gizmo going again…and fast,” he snarled.

Jim pushed up on his hands and knees and glared at Silver, but Alice wriggled closer to him. There was a semicircular indentation on the ground in front of them…and it had the same circular markings and lines as the map in his hand.

“Jim. Look.”

He glanced at her, then at the indentation. His eyes lit up, and he began to push away the moss covering the surrounding space.

As the angry pirates converged on them both, shouting for them to be thrown over the cliff, Jim planted the map into the indentation.

A flash of green light rippled out from the map and lit up the stone beneath their feet.

Jim helped Alice to her feet, and they backed away in awe as a ball of green light lifted from the map, supported by ribbons of the same green energy.
Jim and Silver both studied the globe, and Alice noted it contained hundreds of tiny planets and nebulas, much like the map had shown them back at Dr. Doppler’s home.

A deep humming noise turned their attention to the ground at the base of the cliff, however. They watched in wonder as beams of green light raced up the cliff from the ground to meet the map, then burst into a single, golden beam of energy that shot high over their heads.

“Oh, dear,” Alice breathed.

The beam of energy split into a triangular shape, and they all gaped as they saw the shifting form of a nebula within its frame.

“Oh, have mercy,” Silver breathed.

“The Lagoon Nebula?” Jim noted.

“But that’s…halfway across the galaxy,” Silver pointed out. “How on earth…”

Alice gasped as the faint familiarity she’d felt earlier congealed into firm recognition. “It’s the door. The door I came through!”

“What’s that you say, lass?” Silver peered at her with one eyebrow arched.

“This is how I came here. I remember it all now! I was on this cliff when Captain Bones found me stranded. I stepped through a glowing, green door, at the bottom of a rabbit hole. And I ended up here.”

Silver stared at her dubiously, while the pirates muttered.

“So that means…this is how you get home.” Jim studied the green globe. “This is the control center. It’s a big door…opening and closing. Just like BEN said.” He touched a star on the map, and the doors closed, then opened onto a massive red star in the midst of black space. “That’s how Flint did it. He used this portal to roam the universe, stealing treasure.”

“But where did he stash it all?” Silver complained, shoving Jim out of the way. He started touching several different planets and nebulas on the map, and the door opened and closed, showing first a sun, then a monstrous alien on a hostile planet, then deep, black space, quiet as death. “Where’s the blasted treasure?”

“Oh, dear,” Alice muttered as she stepped closer to the green console. “Perhaps now is not a good time to look for England on that map?”

“Maybe not.” Jim pulled Alice out of the way as Silver grumbled and cursed. He glanced around surreptitiously, making sure the pirates were distracted, then pulled a small knife out of his boot and cut the ropes around her wrists. “We can always come back later.”

“Treasure,” BEN interrupted, holding his head with wide eyes. “Treasure! It’s buried in the—“

“Centroid of the mechanism,” Jim recalled slowly.

“What mechanism?” Alice asked. “I don’t see a mechanism, except perhaps this map and this door.”

“What if the whole planet is the mechanism?” Jim’s eyes widened excitedly. “You remember all the machinery under BEN’s place, right?”

“Oh, yes, yes. I think you’re right!” Alice exclaimed. “So that would mean…the treasure is buried in the center of this planet?”

The pirates listened with open mouths, then began to cheer and picked up their digging implements, pounding gleefully against the cliff. The metal implements bent out of shape, though, and they realized it was fruitless.

“How in blue blazes are we supposed to get there?” Silver growled.

Jim stepped forward and moved in front of the console, pushing Silver to the side. “You just…open the right door.” His fingertips touched Treasure Planet itself on the map.

The door opened onto a menagerie of lasers hanging from the ceiling of what looked like a cavern.

Jim took Alice’s hand, and they both stepped toward the door. Jim put his free hand out, through the glowing green haze. “You just stepped through it, you said? When the door brought you here?”

Alice nodded.

“Alright.” Jim took a deep breath, then stepped through the portal, pulling Alice with him.




AlyCatAuthor