Earthman Jack vs. The Ghost Planet (42 page)

Jack sat in the corner of the medical
bay, hugging his knees hard against his chest.  He sniffed to keep his nose
from running, and his red, puffy eyes stared across the room at the cold, hard
table where Shepherd’s body lay.  For a moment, Jack wished things were like
they were in the movies, where the wise old mentor’s body would magically
disappear and then his ghost would suddenly show up and tell him what to do.

But this wasn’t a movie.  Shepherd’s body lay there, cold
and still, a painful reminder that in reality, the dead didn’t come back.

Jack didn’t know how much time had passed since he watched
the last bits of life fade from Shepherd’s eyes.  All he knew was that he had
no more tears left.  He remembered crawling into the corner and crying, losing
himself in his own grief.  He didn’t notice when his companions had quietly
left, leaving him to his sorrow in private.  Jack didn’t blame them.  They
didn’t know Shepherd, and they barely knew him for that matter.  What type of
comfort would they have been able to provide?

As his grief subsided, thoughts raced through Jack’s mind. 
He thought about everything he’d lost and all the people who’d died.  His
mother, his friends, Major Ganix and the Regal soldiers, Professor Green, and
Anna.  Now, with Shepherd gone, what was left?  He had no home to go back to. 
No one was alive to take care of him.  He had absolutely
nothing
.

His stomach felt as though it were filled with lead, and a
blanket of hopelessness had wrapped itself around him.  He wanted to cry some
more, but he just wasn’t able to.  He gazed back at Shepherd, his once gleaming
armor now seemed dull in the pale light of the medical bay.

This is all your fault
, Jack thought. 
You’re
supposed to be the hero.  You’re supposed to be the guy who saves the day.  If
you really believed all that bull-crap about taking responsibility for your
actions, you wouldn’t have allowed yourself to die!

Jack got to his feet.  He walked over to Shepherd and looked
down at him.  The numbness inside gave way to a small ember of anger as he
gazed upon Shepherd’s motionless face.

“What am I supposed to do now?” Jack asked.

Shepherd did not respond.

“You were going to teach me,” said Jack, his fists
clenching.  “You said I’d get to learn to fight the Deathlords.  That we’d find
a way to defeat them, together!”

Shepherd did not respond.

“You said I didn’t have to go through this alone!  You said
you’d be there for me!”

Shepherd did not respond.

“WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO NOW???” Jack screamed.

Shepherd’s lifeless body lay still.  Jack turned away, sick
of looking at it.  He tried taking a deep breath, but the air tasted stuffy and
stale to him.  Suddenly, the room felt small, as if it were shrinking, closing
in around him.  He walked to the medical bay’s exit, and the doors opened with
a hiss.

Out in the hallway, he was greeted with better lighting, and
he sucked in the air as though he’d just come up from underwater.  His anger
died inside him, and again he felt empty and helpless.

Jack turned and walked, shuffling down the hallway of his
spaceship.  Everything was gleaming and shiny, friendly and new looking.  But
none of it alleviated the heavy sadness that had taken root inside him.  Jack
just felt tired, so very, very tired.

Images of his room at home sprang into his mind.  The small,
cramped room with the closet overflowing with dirty clothes and the tiny window
where sunshine would sneak in.  All he wanted to do was crawl into his bed,
pull the covers over his head, and sleep.  Sleep, and make everything go away…

Home
, Jack thought. 
I want to go home
.

Jack heard a small “hiss” noise.  He turned to his right
where a door in the hallway had opened and stopped.

Jack’s heart suddenly leapt, and it felt as though it were
caught in his throat.  His eyes went wide and his knees went wobbly.  He didn’t
move – he
didn’t want to
move, because he was afraid if he did, what he
was seeing would disappear like some type of mirage.

But it didn’t disappear.  It was there; Jack was sure of it.

Jack slowly turned his body and tepidly stepped into the
doorway that had just opened.  It was a small room, no bigger than most
people’s bathrooms.  Shoved into the corner, was Jack’s bed – messy and unmade,
as he had usually left it – with faded blankets adorned with starships and
superheroes all in a tangle.

The walls were littered with posters of professional
wrestlers and kung fu movies; dirty clothes erupted from the tiny closet and
were strewn about the floor.

A small window above the bed looked out into the starry
night of outer space, and there was even a banged-up digital clock duct-taped
to the wall.

Jack stepped back into the hallway in disbelief, and the
door hissed shut.  He stared at the shiny, inviting hallway door dumbly.  Was
his mind playing tricks on him?  Had he really seen what he thought he had just
seen?

Jack stepped forward again, and the door hissed open in
response.

Nothing had changed.  Jack stepped inside and looked
around.  It was his room.  It had all the same posters, all the same clothes,
the same faded and stained wallpaper – it even
smelled
the same as he
remembered it!

Jack collapsed on his bed and buried his face into his
pillow.  He wrapped the blankets around him, and a giddy laugh suddenly escaped
from his throat.  It felt exactly like his bed!  It
was
his bed!  He was
home!

How?
wondered Jack. 
How is this possible?

Jack rolled on his back and looked up at the water-damaged
ceiling with a single lightbulb hanging precariously from its socket.  That was
his ceiling, all right. 
This was his room.

Jack sat upright in bed.  His mind was racing.  He knew what
was happening was impossible.  Every detail was exact – to a tee.  How could an
exact replica of his bedroom exist on a 50,000-year-old spaceship?

Jack thought about the ship.  He remembered how, while he
was piloting it, it seemed to change itself into what he was familiar with.  He
thought about finding the empty room where he could punch and kick and throw
his tantrum.  He thought about how he had found the medical bay the exact
moment he needed it.  And now, he had found his bedroom when all he had wanted
more than anything in the world was to go home.

Jack got out of his bed and walked back into the hallway of
the ship, the door closing behind him.  Jack stared at the door, his brain
buzzing.  Could it be?  Is it possible?

I’m hungry
, thought Jack. 
I want some food
.

Jack stepped forward, and the door, which moments earlier had
led to his bedroom, opened.  But this time, it was not his bedroom at all.

Instead, Jack was greeted with a large room, filled with
scratched up wooden tables, its walls lined with faux wood paneling from the
1970’s.  Dirty green-red-and-white colored lamps hung from the ceiling.  In the
corner stood a scratched and rickety pool table and an on-the-fritz jukebox. 
The smell of bad pizza hung in the air, and Jack’s heart thumped in his chest.

It was Big Jim’s Pizza Palace.

Everything was exactly as Jack remembered it, down to the
counter Fred would stand behind, serving up slices and yelling at annoying high
schoolers.  In the kitchen, Jack could see the aged and blackened pizza ovens
fired up, and a fully cooked pepperoni pizza lay waiting on its conveyor belt.

Jack hopped over the counter and looked at the pizza with
amazement.  He picked a piece of pepperoni off the top and tasted it; its cheap,
greasy goodness ran down his fingers.

This was what I wanted
, thought Jack. 
This is
what I was hungry for!

Jack looked around the room as if someone might be watching
him.

“Is that what you do?” Jack asked the empty pizza parlor. 
“I think of something… and you give me what I want?”

Jack felt a small tingle in the back of his head, as though
the ship were answering him.

“It’s like… that stuff Professor Green was talking about? 
The quantum stuff – like Shepherd did?  You can manifest things?”

Jack felt a tingle again.  He smiled, a feeling of
excitement washing over him.  That’s why the ship was so special!  It wasn’t
just something that flew through space.  It wasn’t just a ship that was able to
teleport anywhere it wanted.  It wasn’t even that it had some type of psychic
link with its user… it was a machine that was able to manifest anything its
crew needed!  That’s why it could change itself to make it easier to fly, and
that’s why it could keep the Deathlords from figuring it out.  The ship could
literally alter itself to suit any situation!

Suddenly, Jack found himself running out of the room and
down the hallway to the medical bay.  He stopped outside the door, his chest
fluttering with nervous energy.  He closed his eyes and thought really hard.

Alive
, thought Jack. 
Be alive!

Jack opened his eyes and stepped toward the door.  It hissed
open, and Jack found the room inside to be brightly lit and fully repaired once
again.  The computers that were previously crushed and shorted out beeped and
booped, all in full working order.

On the observation table lay Shepherd.  Jack rushed up and
began to shake him.

“Wake up!” said Jack.  “Come back!”

Jack continued to shake Shepherd, but he remained
unresponsive.

“I need you alive!” yelled Jack.  “Be alive!”

But it was no use.  Shepherd was dead, and he wasn’t
returning.

Jack stepped away from the body.  He looked up at the
ceiling, and around the walls of the room.  “Can’t you bring him back?” he
asked.  “You can manifest a freakin’ pizza!  Can you manifest a living
Shepherd?”

Jack’s head tingled again.  But this wasn’t like the other
times.  It was like a big, loud “No” in his brain.  Jack’s heart sank.  His
ship could give him the warm, smelly blankets of home, the hot pizza with the
cheap cheese and pepperoni of Big Jim’s, but not a living, breathing Shepherd
to save the day.

“That’s your limit isn’t it?” asked Jack.  “You can’t
manifest life.”

Jack’s head tingled in response.

“What do you think I should do?” asked Jack.  “What is there
that’s left for me?”

Jack waited for a response, but none came.  The only sounds were
the rhythmic beeps of the medical machines.  Jack sighed.  The ship that could
give him anything couldn’t give him an answer.

Jack looked down at Shepherd.  It was hard for him to
believe that at one point, he’d have given anything never to see the man
again.  And now, he’d give anything to have him back.  Whether it was teaching
class or fighting off an army of Deathlords, Shepherd always seemed to know
what to do.

Jack thought back to his last detention with Shepherd.  It
was the very first time Jack had felt like the guy didn’t have it out for him.

“There are people out there that believe life is just
something that happens to them…” he heard Shepherd say in his memory, “that they
have no control over the events and circumstances they find themselves in...”

Jack closed his eyes and remembered sitting in the classroom
after school, Shepherd leaning against his desk looking down at him.

“But the truth is,” continued Shepherd, “we are the ones who
shape the lives we live.  We are the ones who allow good things and bad things
to happen to us.  By taking responsibility for our actions, we are able to make
our lives better.  When we play the victim, we allow our lives to be
miserable.  If you can take responsibility for yourself, decide to make your
life better – and take action to that effect – then you are the master of your
own destiny.  And when that happens, you are capable of great things.”

“I’m just a kid,” responded Jack.  “I’m not capable of
anything.”

“You know that’s not true,” said Shepherd.

“It is,” said Jack.  “Nothing I do ever works out.  I didn’t
want my planet to explode.  I didn’t want you to die.  I didn’t want to leave
Anna behind.  I didn’t want any of this.”

“What
do
you want?” asked Shepherd.

Jack sighed.  His chest tightened again, as if he were
preparing to cry.  Jack fought against the feeling.  He was tired of crying. 
He was tired of feeling sad and helpless.

“I want to rescue Anna,” replied Jack.  “I want to stop the
Deathlords, and I want to make them pay for what they’ve done.”

“And what’s stopping you?” asked Shepherd.

“I’m scared,” said Jack.  “I’m alone, and I don’t think I
can do it.”

Shepherd nodded.

“When we play the victim, we allow our lives to be
miserable,” he repeated.

“But if I take responsibility, then I am the master of my
own destiny,” said Jack, finishing the thought.

Shepherd nodded.

Images of Anna flashed into Jack’s mind.  The way the
sunlight caught in her hair by the cornfield behind school.  The cute and
awkward way she looked when she showed up at his doorstep.  Her smile when she
tasted her first chocolate milkshake.  In a way, she was the only thing from
Earth that Jack had left, and now the Deathlords had her.  They’d taken the
last thing Jack had that reminded him of home, and in that moment, he knew he
had to get her back – that it was his responsibility to save her.  But in a
way, that realization made him even more frightened.

“What if I fail?” asked Jack.  “What if I die?”

“Then you die advancing,” said Shepherd.  “And you fail
trying to succeed.  But it’s not the outcome that’s important, Jack.  It’s the
action that matters.”

“It’s my decision,” said Jack.

“Yes,” replied Shepherd.

“It’s my responsibility.”