By Nate Swanson
Joe sat near the edge of the roof, bathed in the cream-colored glow of Jupiter’s broad disc. “Why is it always some damn birds?” They loved building nests in the Slip Time Cooler housings, and he could just see a feather poking out. These dumb old models. Why didn’t they put grates over the intakes and stuff? Stupid engineers.
Below him, Kat peered up. “Birds?” Her face was scrunched, the closest it ever got to a frown. “I haven’t seen anything flying on Europa in the five years I’ve lived here.”
“Really?” Joe was new to the moon. “Sounds amazing. You know, birds have it out for me.”
Kat huffed. “Folks say they didn’t survive the last phase of the terraforming event.”
Joe pulled out his hyper-driver. With a sound like angry bees, the fasteners came loose. Once the cover panel was removed, he could see the grateless intake. Sure enough, a nest sat over the valve: two eggs, no babies. He carefully pulled it out and held the evidence over his head. Flashing a lopsided smile, he set it on the unit.
Inside, he died a little. He knew what needed to be done.
“Weird,” Kat said, her face relaxing into her customary grin. “There was a species introduced, but it went extinct centuries ago.”
Joe was glad for once that he hated all avians. “Not so weird. These units condition air by running it through a previous, colder time—in this case, two hundred years ago. Sometimes, the time slip lets the birds through to this modern era. They love it here. It’s warm inside the housing and a great place to incubate their eggs and stuff. Hand me my viewer.”
Joe winced as Kat dug around in his toolbox. She eventually extracted a silver tube with a crystal lens on both ends and threw it to him. Her toss was low, and Joe almost fumbled the catch—incompetence personified.
He inserted the viewer into the Slip Time port, put his eye to the lens, and peered into the past.
“Morons.” He grunted. “Whoever set this up didn’t vet the location. This rock was a frozen wasteland in the middle of terraforming, and somehow, the idiots placed the unit against the one tree within a hundred yards.”
Moving the unit would involve permits and stuff, and they wanted it fixed today, so he’d have to go back and cut down the tree. “I’m sure it will be fine,” he mumbled.
Joe climbed down the ladder and walked to the van. When he glanced back, Kat was still staring at the bird nest atop the unit. He called over his shoulder, “You comin’?” By the time she made it to the van, he was still struggling to pull the orange suit over his dad bod. He brushed aside her attempts to contain his dark hair under the hood. Despite his being bald on top, it was long enough on the sides and back to cause issues. Kat fumbled twice while trying to snap his helmet into place.
Could corporate find me a competent assistant just once? Do they even try?
Once he’d squeezed all five feet nine inches into the bright rubber, he ran his hand over the emblazoned chest proudly. In bright letters it declared: Joe Enza, Certified Time Slipper.
Kat nodded to him as the time portal whined to life. The purple glow of the slip radiated lightning streaks and static, but he didn’t hesitate as he stepped in. Gotta keep the help impressed.
Everything fuzzed, and then his boots crunched against snow. Pulling the Vibroblade saw off his belt, he stalked toward the only organic thing in sight. He hated to destroy one of the few living things in the early stages of the semi-terraformed landscape, but… A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.
Plink.
Something bounced off his helmet. He looked up. Birds.
Plink, plink, plink.
A larger stone fell from the talons of a feathered fiend. He ducked out of the way and stumbled, hitting his knees. Slush splashed up to his faceplate. He reached up to wipe it away but only smeared dirty water over his view. Frustrated, he plunged his hand into his pocket for a rag. Rubbing it over his helmet cleared the water but left a large black streak. Another large rock hit with a resounding snap. Fine cracks spider-webbed out from the point of contact. A thin stream of icy air leaked through, chilling his face.
Joe pressed on toward the tree. He had one job. A simple job. Despite his zig-zagging, the occasional pebble still made contact. Smears and cracks hindered his vision, but he focused on the brown thing in the white landscape, stumbling forward despite the barrage of small and not-so-small bits of stone. Reaching out, he felt bark through his glove.
The flock’s collective screeching grated in his ears as he placed his saw against the trunk. A couple of strokes, and the tree tumbled into the snow.
As he ran back, the flying menaces threw themselves at him, angry, bitter, and violent, but his suit could handle a lot of abuse. Reaching the portal, Joe lurched through and fell to the ground, exhausted.
Joe waved his hands, directing Kat to remove his helmet. She fumbled at the latches. As soon as it came off, a large wet glob of poop hit Joe square in the face. “Close the portal!”
Kat squeaked and lunged for the shut-down switch as four ancient avians circled above.
“Hey,” she said, “the moon has birds again!”
Joe wiped his face. “Marvelous.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
It’s nice to know there’s still poop in the future I was worried
LOL, yup, gotta keep stuff fertilized.
A fun read! Characters are well done, and the action encourages the reader to go for more.
Thanks, it was a lot of fun to write.
Very creative story! I kept hoping cutting down the tree wasn’t a bad idea.
It all worked out in the end.
Fun story, and clever – great version of Joe.
Thanks Rosemarie! I had a ton of fun writing this. People are encouraging me to use this character or a version of him in other writing. We will see.
The “dad bod.” 😂
Yup, just like his author.