The Space Sieve Read online

OVER THE COURSE of the preceding weeks, David had himself traveled to the world he called “The Graveyard of the Gods,” as well as to many other worlds in addition to those I have described. Indeed, several of the other places he visited had been the graveyards of worlds. Graveyards had a special appeal for David, for reasons he did not understand.

  But I, your narrator, do understand why he liked those places. First of all, they had a sense of solitude about them. Second, they reduced their occupants to their most simple level, stripped of all pretension. In a graveyard both the lowly and the mighty were all equal. Third, graveyards were interesting because they gave a sense of the culture that had used them. And lastly, David liked to see where societies had been brought to an end. Perceiving human society as often selfish and conceited, and while harboring a simmering resentment for the way his own culture sometimes treated people such as himself (and assuming others were the same) gave David a feeling of satisfaction to see civilizations that had met their deserved end. Or at least that was the way he felt about it, showing a substantial amount of selfishness and conceit himself.

  As I mentioned before, many creatures have the interesting characteristic that after they discover something, they long to tell someone else about it. Thankfully, while David had no intention of telling the world about this Device, he had developed a desire to tell his part-cousin Chip about it. On the whole this was good, as Chip tended to be more level-headed than was David.

  One morning in your month of July, he invited Chip over. This was gratifying to Chip, as he and David had been very frequent playmates in times past. But since the Thanksgiving party Chip had not seen much of David, who had not been interested in the sorts of things he and Chip used to do.

  Not that David was always around - David had always been more interested in homework than Chip. But Chip felt it was different now - he really never saw David anymore. Chip didn’t know whether David had found a new best friend, whether David had lost interest in Chip, or what. But Chip had accepted it and had moved on to other friends. And yet, none of these friends could hold a candle to David, in Chip’s mind. So when David called him that day, Chip dropped his other plans and went to see him.

  When David greeted Chip at the door he noticed the beaming smile on Chip’s face. David realized how long it had been since he’d spent time with Chip, and David smiled broadly too, and he took Chip up to his room.

  Chip’s happy attitude however, immediately dampened as soon as he entered David’s room. For there by the window, he saw the same black shape that had attracted David’s attention at the Thanksgiving party. Suddenly Chip had a cold feeling that it was this object that was the cause for him having seen so little of David in the past months. It was bad enough to think that he had lost David to another friend, to schoolwork, or perhaps a job or something else. But Chip began to wonder now whether he had lost David simply to David’s continuing obsession with this stupid, black thing.

  Chip’s smile was gone now. His wide eyes looked suspiciously at David, and his voice was formal and unfriendly-sounding as he asked David, “What is that thing doing here?”

  Looking at the Device, Chip remembered David’s younger sister had told Chip something about the dark object being in David’s room. Now that Chip saw it again, the comments of David’s sister seemed ominous.

  “Close the door,” said David.

  Chip smiled nervously. But he didn’t close the door.

  “That’s all right,” shrugged David. “I’ll close it myself in a minute.”

  Chip feigned calmness, then tried to portray the same playful attitude he had felt when he first saw David at the front door. Chip began to wonder if there was something wrong with David – if his best friend was somehow sick – and if perhaps he’d made a mistake. He asked himself if instead of just wondering about David, if he should have checked on him. He wondered if he should have tried to help David, and whether he’d already waited too long.

  Chip walked over to the side of David’s room. He ran his finger along one of the shelves. On it were two, small alcohol-powered toys that had been Leland’s – an airplane, and a dune buggy.

  Chip decided to try to make up for lost time.

  “I’ve always thought these were so cool,” Chip said. “Do you want to start them up? My dad has some old equipment and stuff we could use.”

  Chip took the dune buggy in his hands and walked over to David. “What d’ya think David?”

  At this point however, Chip didn’t really care about the toy. What he cared about, was David. He was subconsciously trying to diagnose David – to see if David was still the same boy he had known. And he wanted to get him away from the black object.

  David did not give Chip any hope for optimism, however. He turned away from Chip, disinterestedly. “Put it down,” he said, with an air of condescension. At that moment, Chip seemed strangely childish to David, and he wondered if he should have invited Chip over after all.

  But Chip didn’t give up. “No,” he said. “Hey, I’d really like to play with this today.”

  David walked over to the Space Sieve. He began to rub his hand over the Machine, almost caressing it. A frown crept onto Chip’s face.

  “Okay. Don’t put it down,” David told Chip, with an air of superiority, “it doesn’t matter anyway.”

  David placed his hands on the angled surface – the part of the Machine I have called the “keyboard” – and moved his fingers around in a deliberate pattern. Colored buttons protruded from the keyboard, and a stool appeared in front of the Machine.

  Chip’s frown increased, his brow furrowed. Strangely, his face suddenly looked quite a bit older. “Was, that stool there a minute ago?” Chip asked quickly. “That’s funny – I don’t remember those colored buttons either.”

  As David removed his hands from the keys and as the buttons and the stool instantly disappeared Chip involuntarily began to step backward toward the still-open bedroom door. David jumped back in front of the Machine and placed his hands on it. He moved them in a deliberate pattern, the keys and the stool re-appeared, and then David sat down and turned his head toward Chip. As he perched there, motionless he was disconcerting, almost spooky, to behold.

  Chip turned toward the bedroom door and as it silently slammed shut in front of him he jumped back, almost hitting the Space Sieve. But catching himself, he landed on the floor beside it. Immediately, he sat up, leaning on one arm. Eyes wide, he glanced at the closed door, then at David, and then at the Machine.

  When Chip jumped, he had inadvertently thrown the toy dune buggy that he was holding. It flew across the room and hit the wall, breaking off a wheel. But neither boy noticed that just then.

  “I told you it didn’t matter whether you closed the door,” David said. “But don’t worry, nobody’s going to come running to find out why it slammed because I made it so it didn’t make any sound. Did you notice that when the door slammed it didn’t make any sound?”

  Chip had noticed, actually. It was the primary cause for him jumping, and falling to the floor. His concern for David was beginning to turn to fear. Chip began to wonder something that a lot of you humans have wondered in your lives, namely, at what point does compassion for someone else become a futility, and properly subordinate to your own sense of self-preservation?

  In other words, at what point should you stop worrying about the other guy, and, figuring he is a lost cause, start worrying about yourself?

  As David sat at the Device he looked down at Chip imperiously. Chip pitifully looked back into David’s face trying to find there some flicker of his trusted friend.

  Then, as he looked back into Chip’s blinking eyes, David’s heart softened as he remembered when the two of them had once found a wild bird caught in a net that a neighbor had placed over some berry plants. David had removed the bird from the netting and held it securely in his hands. The creature had fought to free its
elf for few moments but quickly realized that escape was impossible, and that its life was literally in David’s hands. The bird was in a position where it could neither fight nor flee – all it could do was look at the boys with eyes wide, and hope. David remembered how bad it had made him feel to have terrified that helpless bird to that degree. And it was just a bird. Now, his best friend was looking at him the same way.

  For a moment, David realized how fond he was of Chip. He remembered all the campouts, all the bike rides, all the sleep-overs. He remembered his life as it had been before the Machine. He realized he was really scaring Chip. He was arrogantly taking advantage of a power that he had, and that Chip didn’t have. He realized it was wrong, and he didn’t like himself for doing it.

  David took his hands off the Machine and stood up. The stool and the colored keys once again disappeared.

  Chip pointed. “There!” he said. “I know there was a stool there – you were just sitting on it! And there were colored buttons too!” He stood up. “What’s going on David?” Chip involuntarily wiped a tear from one eye, and then from the other eye. He stood there, breathing hard.

  Increasingly, David had been realizing the power of the Machine, and the power that he had while in possession of it. Most humans – when they receive what they think is some power or other advantage – will immediately begin to think of themselves as superior to other humans. To demonstrate that power to themselves – to heap that sense of superiority upon their own lusts – they will begin to hurt other humans, perhaps unwittingly at first. But in any case, they will think little of it. Eventually, they will begin to hurt other humans just because they can. Without realizing it, David’s mind had begun to travel down that dark path.

  But now, standing there looking at Chip, David became conscious of something that few men or women who obtain power ever realize. David recognized that he too was only human, and he had no right to treat another so carelessly. For David to have gifts, abilities, and opportunities that Chip didn’t have gave David no right to look upon him with contempt. Scaring Chip was wrong. David walked over to Chip and put his hand on his shoulder, and then David walked him over to the bed where they both sat down.

  “Chip,” he said, “I’m going to show you some things that are new today. I’m sorry if I was a little scary to you. I don’t want to be. I’ll try not to do that anymore.”

  For a few seconds, the two boys just looked at each other, then Chip glanced back at the Machine, and as he did he also saw the little dune buggy that he had accidentally thrown against the wall when he had seen the door slam by itself. He frowned. “I’m sorry I broke that. I always liked it.”

  David smiled widely, and impishly. “Don’t worry,” he said. “It’s nothing. Watch this,” he said.

  Once again he stepped over to the Machine and placed his hands onr the keyboard. As he moved his fingers the keys and stool appeared, and he sat down and operated the Machine. After a few seconds, without looking up, David pointed at his shelf and Chip looked. There, next to the airplane, was the little dune buggy, perfect, just as it had been before Chip had picked it up. Chip looked over to where it had been lying on the floor, and of course, it wasn’t there anymore.

  After a few moments at the keys, David looked at Chip and smiled kindly. “All right?”

  Chip, still concerned, nodded with feigned confidence.

  Raising a finger, David beckoned Chip to come sit on a second stool that had materialized beside him. Chip sat down.

  “Chip, I wanted to show you something today. Are you ready?”

  Without smiling, Chip nodded.

  “Okay then,” said David. “This will be a little strange.”

  He operated the keys then looked at Chip. “Here we go.”

  Involuntarily, Chip put his hand on David’s thigh near the knee, for support.

  “Are you sure you’re ready?” David asked. “This is going to seem pretty big.”

  Chip took a breath, and nodded. David smiled, and then looked back at the Machine. He worked the keyboard, and strange images momentarily appeared on the screen, then, the place David called, “The Graveyard of the Gods” appeared on it.

  At a point about five feet directly behind the Machine a small circle appeared and grew very rapidly. Inside the circle was a different place from David’s room. The circle grew and swept toward them until it was directly overhead, running down and around them from side to side. Imagine you were inside a large hoop that starts above your head, runs down to your left and right, and underneath you. You are suspended inside this hoop at its exact center. As you look to the front you see one scene; behind you, is another.

  The hoop swept over them and shrunk to a small circle behind them and disappeared. All of this happened very quickly – in about two-tenths of a second, after your manner of reckoning of time.

  David, Chip, and the Machine had traveled 2/3 of the way across their own universe and had penetrated through fifteen dimensions of reality to arrive at this location: The Graveyard of the Gods.

  David smiled and relaxed. In your own reality you humans create entertainment that seeks to convince you that you have escaped to another reality. For this reason, what just happened did not seem so strange to Chip even though, of course, he did not comprehend what had just happened at all. Helooked up at the blackness overhead then noticed the ground was paved with black, shiny cobblestones.

  The boys were in a vast yard, surrounded by huge, sculpted heads. Pathways crisscrossed between the heads, which were arranged in rows. One of these paths lead to a collapsed stone gateway.

  Chip noticed one of the heads was made out of white stone. Most of the heads were made of black stone, and a few of red stone. The heads themselves were all polished, each was about eight feet high, and included a neck but no shoulders. Each stone head was on a pedestal, making each about twelve feet high overall. Most of the heads struck a noble pose. One carved head appeared to be laughing. One of the red ones was tilted up, and appeared to be crying in some kind of agony. Chip stood up.

  “Wait,” David said. “There isn’t any air here. We’re actually inside a bubble around this Machine. Let me put out an atmosphere so we can walk around.” And so, using the Device, he did.

  The two boys started walking down one of the paths, leaving the Machine behind.

  “Where is this?” asked Chip.

  They continued to walk. “It’s kind of interesting,” David said. “This planet was once a great civilization. The men attained levels of wealth, leisure, and power that we humans can only dream of. They became so great they came to think of themselves almost like gods. Because they were all great, they created this place – this final resting place – so their monuments would all be essentially the same – none bigger than the others – although they could all be different, and all would be large.

  David enjoyed serving as tour guide.

  “How do you know all this?” Chip asked, and seemed satisfied with David’s terse answer: “The Machine.” David knew all this because he had traveled here before, and had researched it.

  Chip stopped. There on the ground in front of him lay a small object of clear amber color. He reached down. David grabbed his arm.

  “Don’t touch it,” David said. “You can’t.”

  Chip trusted David. What choice did he have?

  “Why?” Chip asked.

  “This planet’s air was stripped away,” David said. “I put air – an atmosphere – here in this cemetery – but I left a skin on everything – it protects these objects around us from the oxygen in the atmosphere I created.”

  “Well what about our feet?” Chip asked.

  “I placed a different skin on the bottom of our shoes. It interacts with the other skin so we can walk on the stones. I could have fixed it so we could have touched things – but I didn’t think that you’d . . .”

  Chip squatted
down. David started to stop him from kneeling on the cobblestones, but Chip wasn’t going to – he’d heard what David had said.

  The small object lying on the ground in front of them had the shape of a young woman, lying in horizontal pose, carved into clear, reddish-colored glass. Next to her lay a pedestal, and a small white table upon which she had been resting. When the pedestal had fallen over eons ago, her small amber sculpture had broken off.

  “They really looked like us,” Chip said.

  “There were a lot like us,” David replied.

  In the distance, in the stark light of a dying sun were huge works of marble and stone: the remains of their city.

  “Notice that this is only one of a few sculptures of women that you see, and it’s small compared to those of the men,” David said. “It shows the place women had in this society. They were property, like a dog. Of course, they were valued more than dogs.”

  “What happened to all of them?” Chip asked.

  “Well,” David continued his tour guide speech, “they had this great civilization – they had it really good and everything – but one day their scientists noticed that the magnetic field of their planet had shifted a little. After a while everyone noticed because it got to where it was about 60 degrees off the poles – the magnetic poles of the planet were closer to the equator than they were to the rotational poles of the planet.” He held up his hands and made a ball shape. “So here’s the planet like this. Here are the north and south poles.” David pointed to the top and bottom of his imaginary planet. Then he pointed to the sides. “And here is magnetic north and south – closer to the equator than the north and south poles. It shifted that way for a long time. And then it weakened – long enough for the planet to lose all of its atmosphere – all of its air.”

  Chip had a puzzled look. “You mean the air on a planet is held down by magnetism?” Chip asked.

  “No,” David chucked, “the air is held to the planet by gravity, but the thing is, there’s the solar wind.” Chip looked blankly. David struggled to explain. “See, all these particles come streaming off the sun, and the planet’s magnetic field directs the solar particles to go up and over, or down and under the planet. If the magnetic field lines are at north and south, the particles from the sun mostly miss the planet, except some get through at the poles – that’s what causes the auroras.”

  “See,” David continued, “If that changes, then the solar wind no longer is directed around the planet – it impacts the planet, and especially where it hits the planet at the edges, it knocks the air molecules into space. The planet’s air is just slowly blown into space by the solar wind, just like sand blowing away in the wind.

  “Their scientists first noticed a drop in the pressure of their air. Then people started to die at a younger age, some plants died out, and then other stuff happened. Eventually practically everything died as their atmosphere became thinner and thinner. This was a long time ago, though.”

  “So they had no enemy that killed them.” Chip said. “Basically the natural – you know – environment on their planet changed and it killed them.”

  “Yes,” said David. “The air being blown off the planet killed everything except a few types of creatures living at the bottom of their oceans. You know, it doesn’t take much for a planet to end up like this. People back home worry about having everyone die from wars or from an asteroid impact or something, but there are a million easier ways life on a planet can be wiped out - it’s really very natural.”

  “For another thing,” he continued, waxing somewhat philosophical, “most planets have enough trapped underground gas that it could kill everything if it escaped,” he shrugged. “Under our own oceans and crust lie enough trapped gasses and stuff that if it escaped, it would poison our atmosphere, if not actually allowing our entire atmosphere to ignite.

  “Of course, were our atmosphere to ignite, it would kill almost everything on the surface of the planet almost immediately. But since most of the sea creatures also rely on oxygen, they’d die pretty soon too. Really, before too long the only thing left alive would be anaerobic bacteria and worms living at undersea vents that were . . .”

  “Okay, okay David.” Chip interrupted. It was troubling how casually David was when talking about the ways all life on Earth could end.

  But David continued. “Most planets have cycles that if interrupted would kill everything. Like the carbon cycle on our own Earth. Funny, if it weren’t for the volcanic activity on our planet, a lot of which is caused by the fracturing forces caused by the gravity from our large moon, before long our planet wouldn’t have enough carbon dioxide in the atmosphere to sustain plant life. And well, without plant life . . .”

  Chip interrupted again. “David,” he said, “I think this is very interesting but I really don’t think we need to . . .”

  “Take asteroids,” David continued. “People worry about a big one hitting the Earth and killing everything and making a lot of dust or whatever. But what they also ought to worry about is a really big one barely missing the Earth. See, the gravitational effect that would have on our planet’s orbit is the really scary thing. With only a fraction of a degree’s worth of change to our planet’s orbit, it would become too hot or too cool to sustain life the way it does now. Or, the planet’s orbit would become more elliptical – too hot part of the year and too cold the rest of the year – to sustain life.

  “Even worse are gamma rays. You could have a sun explode – a supernova – somewhere in our own Milky Way galaxy or even a big sun in nearby galaxy, and it would produce enough radiation to wipe out all life – not just on Earth but all surrounding galaxies. In fact, since the radiation would travel at the speed of light we’d never even know it was coming until we all started becoming fried. Hey you know what? I could just look on the Space Sieve to see whether one has already exploded and when it’ll reach Earth!”

  “David,” Chip replied, “you understand don’t you, that we live on Earth, and our families?”

  “Well,” David continued, “with most of it we could at least see it coming. With the gamma rays there’d be nothing at all we could do . . .”

  “David, I don’t think I want to – I mean – what good does it do to know any of this if there’s nothing we can do . . .”

  (But of course in David’s case, he could do anything he wanted about any of it. He had, after all, the Space Sieve.)

  David sighed and looked around the graveyard. “What’s really not natural is for there to even be any life on a planet at all. Like this place – all the power, all the glory, all the wonders these people created. Yet one small thing changed, and it is all gone.”

  “Yeah, okay. Okay.” said Chip, trying to move on to something else. He looked up, and gazed at the stars overhead. “Boy, the stars are really clear here.”

  David nodded and looked too. “Yeah, it’s the thin atmosphere,”

  “David, why do the stars here move, like those two?” And he pointed.

  David thought for a moment then explained, or so he thought. He was the one who was supposed to know everything, after all. “Those aren’t stars moving, they’re probably asteroids, or maybe rocks that are in orbit. With the thin atmosphere we can see them easier.

  But Chip continued, “How come they’re getting bigger? And look! Now they’ve changed directions.”

  “That’s weird – I, I don’t know why they would do that.” David grew suddenly nervous. “Hey Chip, let’s uh – get back to the Space Sieve okay?”

  “The what?” Chip asked. But David was already running toward the Machine. Chip followed.

  When they arrived back at the Space Sieve, it appeared frozen. The buttons, instead of their constantly shifting colors and shapes, were locked into position. David sat down and motioned for Chip to do the same. Touching several buttons, David brought the Device to life. Images appeared on the screen.

  “Sh
oot!” David exclaimed. “Those aren’t asteroids – they’re ships!”

  “What? They’re what?!” Chip asked. “You mean there are people here?”

  “Shut up!” David said. Then he looked at Chip, who was looking back, eyes wide, like that scared little bird again.

  “Chip,” David said quickly. “I need you to just be quiet and watch for a minute, okay? I’m kind of worried and I need to concentrate, okay?” David took Chip’s hand and put it back on his knee again. “Here, hold on to me.” They briefly traded nervous glances, and David turned back to the Machine.

  As David operated it, the skin flowed off the land and the objects around them, and for an instant it seemed that the two of them were inside a bubble. But then the bubble around them could no longer be seen. As David worked the keys and images flashed across the screen, to Chip it seemed as though David’s operation of the Device was not as smooth as it had been before. He wondered why David didn’t just get the two of them out of there.

  But David wasn’t trying to leave. Succumbing to his own vanity, more curious than afraid, he was lingering to study the situation.

  “You know what the odds are?” David said, really to himself. “Do you know how vanishingly rare it is to run into intelligent life in the middle of nowhere like this? I mean, nobody should be here, and yet, there they are.”

  “David, one of the lights is still getting bigger. But the other one’s disappeared now.”

  “I know, I know!” David said, his mood tilting more to concern. “Do you know what the odds are that if you do run into creatures out here that they would have inter-dimensional capability? Chip I’m sorry. I should have been more prepared before I brought you out here, before I risked . . .”

  At this moment, Chip and David were both seated in front of the Machine with Chip at one side, and they were facing the Machine. Neither of them therefore, was looking behind them.

  But behind them, creeping out of the darkness was one of those two ships, and the beings inside were far ahead of David in their thinking. Recognizing that he had begun to scan them, one of the ships had continued to approach from space as a diversion, while the other had entered an inter-dimensional seam and had slipped down and re-appeared behind the two boys.

  You may be wondering why the Device didn’t warn them of this. Understand please, that this Machine is not these boys’ mothers. It is a Device. It didn’t warn them for the simple reason that David had not told it to warn them.

  In the darkness, the one ship crept closer, behind David and Chip.

  It was triangular in shape, pointed at one end, and this pointed end was approaching the two boys. The ship was twelve feet long, and five feet wide at the back end. It was eighteen inches thick. Essentially, it looked like a huge slice of pizza, without the crust, moving toward them, point first. It was largely gray, but was covered with tiny red and black rectangular tiles. Chip continued to look at the Device and at David, who was furiously working the Machine learning what he could about the ship that he knew was approaching overhead.

  Then, Chip turned and from the corner of his eye caught a glimpse of the pointed end of the ship that was now about fifteen feet away and approaching slowly. But by this time, the ship had turned, and was coming alongside them.

  He turned quickly to face it, and immediately his heart jumped and hammered painfully in his chest. He tried to speak, but could make no sound. He wanted to jog David, to warn him, but his aching body felt rigid as stone.

  Once Chip saw it, the triangular ship suddenly illuminated itself in a blaze of blinding lights - largely brilliant white, but also with some red effects. Now David spun toward it and his mouth gaped.

  And as he did so, he took his hands off the Machine. The keyboard, and the symbols on its screen, froze.