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The Nuisance aboard Wanderer’s Destination: Part One

Thirteen-year-old Clyde Rawlzer was an odd child, as was understood by the people who lived on board the Wanderer's Destination Station. At least, for those of the people that knew him. Which were, of course, the people who worked and kept the place suitable for the visitors there.

   He was an only child. And only had his mother to raise him, since his father had died during a visit at one of the domed cities on Mars. The air systems had shut down, and his father shared the same fate as the rest of the city.

Fortunately for both he and his mother, she had graduated from Harvard University with a degree in electrical engineering, and had found work here on Wanderer's Destination. And since she was constantly in need, she and Clyde had the privilege of living in one of the rooms in the lower levels of the station. It wasn't nearly as luxurious as the rest of the rental rooms higher above, but Clyde thought it was satisfactory.

   His mother would work ten hours every Earth day cycle, which left her with little time spent with her son. She didn't want to spend the last four hours of every cycle educating him, so she had taught him how to read on his own early on. At first, he would read a lot of the basic subjects that were taught in public schools, and was supposed to write reports as proof that he read those subjects in the first place. Eventually, he no longer had to write those reports since he had the eager desire to tell her excitedly what he learned from each book.

   As he grew older, he would spend some of his free time during his weekends at one of the public computers reading various articles on the sorts of things he hadn't read about in the books his mother had him reading. He would read some on current affairs of the colonized planets, others on culture, and sometimes even on past historical events. 

  Mainly, he read anything that he felt he could glean from. His favorite kinds of articles, however, were the ones that discussed facts about people.

Certainly, Clyde admitted to himself, people could be depressing sometimes. He often came across wealthier travelers visiting Wanderer's Destination who he could tell, just by reading the expressions on their faces, disapproved of him. He had grown used to that, and he had learned to cope with the idea that he couldn't be accepted by everyone. So he never revealed any vexation of those unfortunate encounters.

  There was one other thing, though, about people that bothered him with some significance: their hidden secrets.

Yes, secrets. As a matter of fact, there were moments he was easily paranoid by the fact that any person he talked to could bear information that was being suppressed for unknown reasons. Why did people keep secrets, he always wondered. Were most secrets too dangerous to tell?

  Sometimes, he drifted too far into those suspicions. And sometimes, he would talk to his mother about those suspicions. Since she was the only person that he could carry a long conversation with. But sometimes, she would tell him that those suspicions of his could get him in trouble, if he were to ever let his suspicions take control.

  And unfortunately, according to the reality of curious children, that sort of thing would happen eventually.

It was a Saturday, and to Clyde's disappointment, the systems to the public computers weren't functional. So, he thought he might as well take a walk throughout the station and, if he was lucky, maybe meet a merchant trader and hear stories about odd customers that came from different cultures.

On that enthusiastic note, Clyde slipped into his tall leather boots, fit on his corduroy jacket and left his room.

  Casually, he strolled through the long, carpeted hallway and towards the lobby. To his left, there were either elevator doors or doors that led to the lower-leveled compartments of Wanderer's Destination, possibly where his mother was right now. To his right, there was the view of space outside through a window as long as the hallway. He stopped, taking in the view of the stars. And then, as he walked closer to the window, he could see Mars from below. It was odd to him that this station hovered over this planet where his father had died. He supposed that his mother still wanted a sort of memory of him.

  Just as he was about to turn towards the lobby, he felt a large mass of weight plummet straight into him. Finding himself flat on his back, he felt something moist move around his face. Clyde looked up to find the long-nosed face of a dog standing over him. Smiling, he gave it a friendly scratch behind its left ear and stood up slowly. "Now who'd you run from?" He said good naturedly.

  "Hey, there! Grab hold of him!" Said a small voice. Clyde turned to see a young girl of maybe twelve years running towards him with a leash in hand. She had short blond hair that curled at the ends, a slightly pudgy face that made the smallness of her nose seem significant to the skeptic's eye (Clyde counted himself as a skeptic, at least), and greenish eyes that were certainly full of character, which was a mystery to Clyde, who had only heard her utter six words to him.

  Of course, he obeyed those six little words. But he very gently held the dog by the collar, since it was already quietly staying put. She quickly stooped down to hook the leash to the collar and stood up, a tired expression on her face. "Thanks," she said, "I'm sorry he knocked you over."

  "That's fine," he said as he let go of the dog's collar, "what's his name?"

  "Jasper," she said. "My daddy named him after a fellow soldier he knew."

  "That's neat," Clyde said automatically, "especially since Jasper here is a German Sheppard. These kinds of dogs were helpful during wars, you know."

  "Yes!" She said delightedly, "That's what my daddy tells me. I just keep forgetting what Jasper's breed is. What did you say he was?"

  "A German Sheppard."

  "That's the name. Thank you for the reminder!"

  "No problem," he said, looking up from the dog to face the girl. And he stopped himself short of whatever he was going to say next. Instead, he only stared.

She was wearing a pink summer dress that went down to the knees, and long boots that mostly covered everything else the dress hadn't. She also wore a straw hat that was pulled slightly forward. The hat, of course, was what he paid the most attention to.

"Um. . ." he stammered, "your hat."

  "What about my hat?" She responded, a frown creasing her forehead.

  "It's tilted in a weird direction." He said in his usual automatic tone.

  "It is?" She said. Then she put her hands to her hips, but still held fast to Jasper's leash. "You know," she said, "I don't know you very well. But if you're one of those superficial boys. . ."

  "No," said Clyde, "most people say I have rather serious idiosyncrasies."

  "Idio. . . What?"

  "It's nothing superficial," Clyde assured her, "I tend to pay attention to small details. I won't assume, but you're dressed in a way as if you've visited a part of a planet with a warm climate."

  "I have," she said, "and I prefer to look that way."

  "Well, I'd like to help you succeed in doing that. Just tilt your hat slightly to the right."

  "Why the right?"

  "To be honest, I don't know. I've never seen anyone do otherwise."

  "Well," she said haughtily, "I've always ignored critics." And she let the comment hang in the air for about five seconds. Then, her hand reached towards her hat. "How far to the right?" She asked.

   But Clyde wasn't paying attention. Instead, he looked past her. There were plenty of people walking through this hallway, but his eye caught sight of one particular person who moved towards his direction.

  The man that he looked at was maybe five foot six, which was merely Clyde's estimation. The man wore a long trench coat, buttoned up only slightly past the waist. Those details didn't bother Clyde all that much. There was something else a lot more significant about him.

  The man's feet didn't exactly move the same way everyone else did. Certainly, everyone had the right to walk their own way, but this was different. His feet would sometimes walk at a steady pace. And then, every few seconds, they would turn slightly, as if they were uncertain of where to go. The odd thing was that whenever the man turned his feet, it was toward the doors that lead towards the lower levels of the Wanderer's Destination. They always tilted to the right at those moments. All of this wouldn't have been odd if the man was an employee, since the lower levels were where most of the employees had gotten their tools and equipment. If he was lost, why hadn't he asked the lady at the desk where his room was?

  "Yes," said the girl, "you've already told me to tilt it to the right. But how far?"

  Embarrassed, Clyde realized that he had quietly voiced the words "tilting to the right." He glanced at her, and saw that she had moved the hat to the right. "Uh. . . Perfect!" He stammered. And walked quickly past her when he saw the man enter one of the doors that lead to the lower levels of the station.

The man in the trench coat moved down a slim hallway, hoping that he was headed the right direction. He had to meet with the others on time. At this moment, though, that was going to be difficult. Now that he noticed the kid that was following him.

He swore under his breath. Can't have this rascal follow me, he thought to himself.

He turned a left corner. And, at this turn, he could see that the hallway turned right up ahead. At that point he was doubting that he was going the right way.

Nervously, he shifted his weight, feeling the shoulder holster to his pistol rub up against him. At that moment, he remembered the fact that he had a weapon, thought about it, then discarded the random idea he had in mind. Nah, he thought to himself, I won't go that far.

  He turned around, expecting to see the young boy walking towards him. He was correct, of course, and decided not to show hesitation. "Are you lost, kid?" He asked.

The boy, who looked as if he was maybe twelve or thirteen, still walked towards him.

  "Actually," the boy said in an even tone, "I was about to ask you that."

The kid continued to walk toward him.

  "As a matter of fact," the man said, "I take it it's easy to get lost here."

  That was a terrible response, the man thought to himself. And he could see in the boy's expression that he had thought the same thing. The boy was now directly in front of him.

  "Well," said the boy, seeming to ignore the oddness in the whole situation, "where do you need to go? I live here, so I'm sure I can help direct you."

  That was the problem. He couldn't tell this kid where he wanted to go, he would blow his cover. The man shifted his coat uneasily, and knew by the kid's expression that that movement was a terrible mistake.

  The boy took a glance at the handle of the pistol that revealed itself from behind the coat. Without thinking, the man reached for the weapon. But to his surprise, the boy had already reached for it and pulled it out.

  The boy now held it sideways in both his hands. Quickly the man reached for it, grabbing hold with both hands as well. They both struggled for the gun, pulling at it so hard the man thought it might accidentally fire. Then, the boy quickly lifted his leg and pushed against the man's stomach.

  Both of them fell flat on the ground, with the man succeeding in retrieving his weapon. The boy quickly stood up and bolted back up to the hallway, surely to warn the people that there was an intruder on Wanderer's Destination.

It didn't matter what happened now, his cover was blown. Quickly getting up, he aimed his pistol towards the child and switched the setting from "safety" to "fire."

  He pulled the trigger.

Click, came the response.

What? He thought, frantically pulling the trigger over and over only to receive the same response. He examined his pistol, and his breath stopped when he realized in horror why it wouldn't blast. The kid's got my magazine.

   Not knowing what he was doing, he started to run, hoping he could catch up with the little nuisance before he warned the others on this station.