For your 2012 Aurora Awards Considerattion
My Name is Tommy
by Mike Rimar Copyright 2011
“Commander Paul says he won’t ever let me be Captain," I said. "He says I’m not smart enough.”
“Really?” Mom buttoned up my pajama shirt. “Commander Paul said that, huh?”
“Yeah.” I breathed in the strawberry smell in her hair. “I know I’m different. Other moms and dads think eighteen is too old to play with their kids. Is eighteen too old?”
Mom said something, but I was too busy staring at the fluffy clouds on my bedsheets. They looked just like the clouds in the old Earth vids. That planet must’ve been magical because those clouds looked gy-normous and floated in the sky like they were weightless.
“Tommy, are you listening?”
I tried to remember what she'd said, then shook my head and smiled.
She smiled back and I saw lines in her face where it used to be smooth. Everyday she seemed skinnier and skinnier, and her face looked tired all the time. Sometimes I worried it was my fault. Taking care of me must be hard, especially without help.
Mom reached for her reading pallet. "I've got a new manual to read tonight."
My shoulders sagged. Last year, mom took me to the ice cream factory on Ring B to see how ice cream was made. It was cool. Get it? Ice cream is cool. When I told mom that one, she laughed real hard. Then, she explained why it was so funny. Now, it’s one of my best jokes.
Tour Guide Sam showed us a big vat where the milk and sugar mixed together. “Wow,” I said. “A thousand litres.”
“I was just going to say that,” said Tour Guide Sam and gave me an odd look. Later, at the end of the tour, I got a free ice cream cone.
“Tommy,” mom said while I licked melted chocolate off my hand. “Did someone tell you that was a thousand litre vat?”
Air filled my cheeks. I wanted to tell her how the vat turned into a cartoon in my head. It started out flat, then stretched out, spinning around, numbers filling the spaces until everything stopped, but saying everything turned into a cartoon sounded made up. I blew the air out. “Yeah, someone told me.”
Mom nodded slowly, then ruffled my hair. “Eat your ice cream.”
Ever since then, she traded my good bedtime stories with tech manuals. As I crawled into bed, I scowled at the reader, wishing for more of that ice cream.
Mom looked about to say something. She looked very small in her uniform, and her lips moved very slowly into a smile. Mom did everything slow now, like her bones and muscles hurt to move. She didn’t eat much, and her skin had turned kind of yellow. She always seemed to have a cold because she coughed all the time.
Finding herself, she began to read about security protocols.
“Please read me The Three Little Pigs,” I said.
“Tomorrow night. Tonight, we read about security protocols.”
I slapped the crispy-clean sheets. “I’m sick of how security works, or how the engines work, or how navigation works. Why do I have to know this stuff anyway?”
Mom sighed. “All right, Tommy. You win. We’ll read The Three Little Pigs.”
Smiling, I settled in for a real story. The Three Little Pigs was one of my favorites.
“Tommy.” Mom put down the reader when she finished. “Do you tell anyone what we’re reading about?”
“That’s not funny.” I gripped a handful of blanket. “You know no one talks to me.”
Mom kissed my forehead. “I’m sorry, Tommy, dear. The others are so cruel. Maybe they were right. Maybe I should have--” She straightened suddenly, and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
“It’s okay, mom,” I said.
She meant abortion.
One day I heard some of the crew use that word. They looked right at me so I knew they were talking about me. I said the word inside my head until I got home to get a definition. When I was a kid I used to write strange words down, but usually spelled them wrong. Mom taught me how to use the computer on her desk. It had voice rek-ug-ni-shun, which means it understood what I said. Finding definitions was much easier after that.
When I definitioned abortion I cried all day.
“We have to keep our bedtime stories secret, Tommy." Mom kissed my cheek. "Don’t tell anyone, promise?”
“Promise.” I crossed my heart to show I meant it. The abortion word got me thinking. “Mom, who did you have sex with to get me?”
She laughed until she coughed so much I had to slap her back a few times.
“You mean who is your father?” she managed to say. “I can’t answer that, my love. I made a promise to him.”
“Why doesn’t he want me to know? Is it because I’m stupid? Didn’t he want me?” I sucked in air. “Did you want me?”
“Don’t ever say that.” Her arms were around me before I took another breath. “I always wanted you. You're the most precious thing to me--and you are not stupid.”
“I know I’m supposed to act more like a grown up.” I squeezed her back, but not too hard. I didn’t want to break her bones. “My brain just doesn’t work that way."
“No." She sighed. "You’re not like the others. You see, with only so many people, well, our forefathers gave us tests to check babies when they were still eggs. If we found something wrong--”
“You have an abortion,” I finished.
“Yes.” She held me at arm's length. “As captain I had so many responsibilities, and I might have waited too long to have children. When the tests came back, I wasn’t surprised with the result, but I wanted a baby so badly, and I knew this old body couldn’t go through another pregnancy.”
She paused long enough to give me a quick kiss and hug. Then she drank from her teacup as if it was some magic strength potion. “But rank has its privileges and I carried you to term. That means the full nine months. My decision didn’t sit well with the others. Some have forgiven me, but many still harbor ill feelings. You’ve been paying the price all your life, and for that I’m so very sorry.”
I looked at her for a long time. “If you had an abortion I would not be here, right?”
She nodded, tears bubbling in her eyes.
“Then don’t be sorry.”
She hugged so hard it hurt, but I didn’t stop her. I just held my breath till it was over. Our talk made me happy. I learned many things I hadn’t known. One more question still bugged me. “Mom. Do I have to make a baby with someone?”
She turned away. “Tommy, you can’t make babies."
“Oh.” I was glad she couldn’t see the smile on my face. Babies are hard work.
# # #
“When do you think she’ll go?” Ensign Will whispered to Commander Paul, but I heard him.
The Command Center was a five-sided room. Each side controlled some part of the Plymouth Rock. In the middle of the ComCen was the captain’s terminal where mom usually was, but she’d been called out. Mom left me at the navigation terminal, which was always empty because the Plymouth Rock always went where it wanted.
I never minded. The terminal had an excellent 3-D generator for things like planets and star charts, and I'd pretend to float within the universe. Sometimes, mom would set little projects for me like find this planet or search that solar system. She told me she was looking for a secret planet and I couldn’t tell anyone what I was doing.
“I don’t know.” Commander Paul didn’t try to whisper. “She’s getting thinner every day, but her mind is sharp as ever.”
“What about him?” Ensign Will nodded toward me. “You think he knows anything?”
Commander Paul snorted. “He barely knows his own name, never mind that his mother is dying.”
I spun in my chair. “Mom is dying!”
“Eavesdropping is a bad habit, Tommy,” said Commander Paul.
“I’m sorry.” His scolding was unexpected. “But, you said my mom was dying?”
“See what I mean?” He frowned. “We could have meant anyone.”
For some reason I felt better. Someone was dying, which was bad, but it wasn’t mom. “I’m sorry, Commander Paul,” I repeated, and turned back to the star chart.
“What are you doing there?” Commander Paul put two thick hands on my shoulders. "Look here. I know this part of space. We passed through it just a year ago.”
“Five hundred million, nine hundred and sixty-five thousand, five hundred and twenty kilometers,” I said, overcome with a need to impress Commander Paul.
“What?”
“That’s how far away we are from where you put you finger.”
“Really?” Commander Paul leaned forward and typed something into the console. He smelled like limes.
The exact same number flashed on the screen and I swelled with pride.
Commander Paul brought up another map and touched a planet. Not mom’s secret planet though. I couldn’t talk about that.
“How far are we from there?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “What's the scale?”
Commander Paul grunted and touched a key. “There.”
Numbers whirled in my brain. Space between a cartoon planet and Plymouth Rock folded like paper, then spread out again. It was a very big number and I concentrated hard. “It’s 239,893,393,756 kilometers away.”
He double-checked with the computer. “How did you do that?”
I wanted to tell him about the cartoons, but then I saw his eyes, cold and gray as metal. I shrugged instead.
“Savant,” he said under his breath. Just then mom entered the ComCen and Commander Paul shuffled away with a casual, “Carry on.”
Savant. The word kept repeating in my mind. Or was it servant, and I just heard wrong? I didn’t serve anyone, so why would he say that? Concentrating on star charts was impossible, and I asked to be excused.
“Hello, Plymouth Rock computer,” I said when I got home. “What does savant mean?”
“Hello, Tommy. A savant is one with detailed knowledge in a specialized field. A wise one.”
A wise one, I liked that answer.
“Reference Idiot Savant,” said the computer, then definitioned that savant.
That definition made more sense. That definition made me cry.
# # #
“Want to know a secret, Tommy?” Mom peered over her reader. She looked more tired everyday.
“What?” I whispered even though we were alone in my bedroom.
She leaned in close and I smelled liquor on her breath. “No one knows why we’re here.”
“In my room?”
“No, silly, here on the Plymouth Rock. You see, many years ago, even before your great-great-grandma Deloris was born, there was a fire. It damaged the ship’s main memory core and wiped out a lot of essential information, such as why so many people chose to live on a space ship, and where we were going in the first place. Since then we've recreated most of our history in stories and songs but the captain of the time had the forethought to make a copy of our original manifesto.”
“Mani-what-so?”
“Manifesto. A declaration of our true purpose. That copy has been passed down from Smith to Smith since Captain Bill.”
“Captain Bill? Wow!” Of all the Smiths, he had the most great-greats in front of his name. “But why don’t we tell anyone? Why is it a secret?”
Mom tucked my blanket under my legs. “Because the Captain Smith of the time believed the fire wasn’t an accident but an attempt to hide our true purpose. Time proved him right. Our songs and stories have distorted the truth to fit what people want to hear.”
“Like the one where a giant lizard ate the earth and everyone stays on the Plymouth Rock because the lizard only eats planets?”
“Yes.” Mom smiled. “Like that one. Most believe the Plymouth Rock is where we belong and we’ve no need to go anywhere else.
"The truth is we are a ship lost in the galaxy. Only luck has kept us alive, but I fear luck is running out.
"The engineering faction has been reporting more mechanical failures. Our factories are unable to make new parts because of dwindling resources. We have food to feed us, but if the ship fails, all the food in the five rings won’t save us.
"The ship is dying.
"Commander Paul and others like him don’t want to see the truth. Their faith is in the Plymouth Rock. Faith is good but useless if misplaced.”
Mom gave my hand a quick squeeze. “I’m working on a plan. We have to keep this between you and me. You know how the others are. They might not like what I have in mind. Tommy, when the time comes, I'm going to give you the manifesto.”
My toes tingled with excitement. This wasn’t just a secret; it was a big secret.
# # #
“I know what you’re up to, Mallory.” Commander Paul blocked our way like a bulkhead.
“Move, Paul.” Mom’s soft tone surprised me. I knew what in-sub-ord-nishun was, and Commander Paul was doing it. No one ever used mom’s first name. Until I was five, I thought her first name was Captain.
Commander Paul stayed where he was. “I see him sneaking around the old navigation terminal. Why is he looking at star charts, and how does he know how to calculate distances like that? Oh, yeah, he showed me that little trick.”
“It’s a gift.” Mom put an arm around my shoulder.
The corner of Commander Paul’s mouth curled. “Thought you might say something like that, so I did a little looking myself. Something I should have done eighteen years ago. Damn it, Mallory, why did you have him? You knew he was damaged. Look at him, eighteen years-old and can barely dress himself.”
“Tommy is standing right here.” Mom’s voice took on a hard edge. “Stop talking as if he wasn’t.”
“That’s the thing,” Commander Paul growled. “He shouldn’t be here. You saw the tests.” He stepped closer, hands open at his sides. “Mal, we could have tried again. All you had to do was abort.”
“No,” said mom. “I told you in the beginning I would never do that. I wanted Tommy.”
“You wanted him? What about what I wanted? One child, Mal. That’s all I’m allowed. One! And this is what I get because of what you wanted. This--this retard!”
Commander’s Paul sneer hurt like a slap in the face.
Mom held me closer. “Stop it, Paul. You’re scaring Tommy.”
“What were you thinking, Mal? What did you really want that you risked playing God? A little puppy to pet and hug when you came home at night? Because that’s about all he’s good for, and barely housebroken, too.”
“Shut up, Paul.” Mom was so mad, I actually felt her get warmer. I tried to step away, but her arm held me close like a magnet.
“Are you happy with our son, Mallory?" Commander Paul pressed his attack, unaware of his danger. “Because, I’m not!”
Mom finally released me. Hands clasped behind her back, she straightened to her full height. Her face was empty of any emotion.
I knew that look and stepped way back.
“Commander. Either get out of our way or mutiny.”
That took Commander Paul by surprise because his mouth clamped shut, and he moved aside standing at rigid attention. When we passed him, he saluted, raising his hand so fast I felt the breeze on my cheek.
Mom didn’t return the salute.
As we passed, I braved a look back at Commander Paul, seeing his gray eyes differently, comparing the forehead, the thin lips, the square chin.
That’s how I learned who my dad was.
# # #
The insistent knocking stopped and the door opened. Someone must have found the command override, something I learned from all those tech manuals.
Commander Paul entered first, followed by Doctor Marcie who touched mom’s neck and wrist, then slowly clasped her hand around mine. “Tommy,” she said, quiet and low. “You’re going to have to let go.”
I held mom’s hand tighter, trying to squeeze warmth back into the cold stiffness. “No. I want to be here when she wakes up. Maybe she’ll make bacon and eggs or pancakes. They’re our favorite.”
“Tommy,” said Doctor Marcie. “Your mother has been sick for a long time. Surely, you’ve noticed?”
I looked quickly at mom’s pale, still face. “She got real skinny and lost her hair.”
“Yes, after effects of her treatment. She had a disease called cancer, but I’m afraid the treatment didn’t work. She’s gone, Tommy.”
“Gone?” My throat ached. “But she’s right here.”
“Be straight with him,” Commander Paul snapped. “Your mother is dead.”
I matched his hard stare with my own. Words caught in my throat. She couldn’t be dead. She wouldn’t leave me--alone.
Moaning softly, I buried my face in Doctor Marcie’s shoulder so my dad wouldn’t see me cry. I didn’t have to worry. When I looked up again he was gone.
The funeral was the next day. The Plymouth Rock’s flag--an old sailing ship bumping against a large rock--draped over my mom’s casket like a tablecloth. People I had never seen before crowded into the launch bay.
Dr. Marcie and other officers said nice things about mom. Sometimes, I laughed but most times I cried. When no else had anything to say, two ensigns folded the flag into a tight triangle. The huge bay door rumbled open, and Commander Paul wordlessly handed me the folded flag.
I barely reacted to his presence as the casket atop a wheeled truck pushed through the pressure field and into space. The coffin lifted, turning slowly. The bay doors closed with a boom that shook my bones and I knew my mom was really dead.
Almost everyone shook my hand. Commander Paul didn’t. He hadn’t said a word for my mom, and he was among the first to leave when the big doors closed. I didn’t care, not about him, or about anything.
Doctor Marcie gave me a quick hug followed by a peck on the cheek. “Come on, Tommy,” she said. “Let’s get you home.”
I never heard the Plymouth Rock’s passageways so quiet, like everyone went to sleep after the funeral. The only sound was our footfalls. They were a lonely sound.
“Tommy.” Dr. Marcie placed a hand on my shoulder. “When you have limited living space, perfection is ill advised. We have to allow certain illnesses and diseases as a natural way to keep our population under control. Other times, we have to take steps to weed out aspects that might be seen as unfruitful to our society.”
“Okay,” I said, unsure what she meant.
“I just want you to understand, Tommy, you never should have been born. Tests showed you would have had severe brain and organ damage. Your mother knew this, but used her position--no, that’s not exactly true. She thought she forced me, but I could have denied her. She wanted you so badly, and the likelihood she could conceive again was so remote.”
Dr. Marcie brushed back a lock of hair gray as the walls in the industrial ring.
“You were barely more than an egg when I operated, hoping to repair what damage I could. Truth is, I had no idea what I was doing, checking ancient textbooks every step of the way. All these years, I thought I had failed.
“But your mother never saw you that way. Mallory carried you to term and gave you life. She made you a success. I should have told her that. Now, that’s too late, so, I’m telling you, instead. Tommy, you are a success.” She hugged me, and I hugged her back because I thought that’s what she wanted, even though her perfume made me kind of sick.
Dr. Marcie kissed my forehead and walked away. When the passageway was empty again, I clutched my mother’s flag to my chest and entered my silent home. I put the flag atop the kitchen table and stared. My mom was dead and all I had to remember her was a giant satin napkin. What was I going to do?
Like a flash of light in my brain, I knew. I was a success, and I was a Smith. I rushed out the door, positive I was doing the right thing, the smart thing. By the time I reached the Command Center, I convinced myself that everyone waited for me, standing at attention and saluting. With head held high, I stepped through the doorway.
No one saluted.
Commander Paul, dressed in utility coveralls, glanced at me. “Scan for any debris fields that might damage the hull.” He smiled a cold smile at his order. A Captain’s order. And everyone obeyed.
I cried all the way home. By the time I arrived, I was tired and empty. “I’m sorry, mom,” I said to the holo-picture on her desk. “I tried to be the captain, but they were right. I’m just a--a retard.”
The picture hovered within a silver frame. Mom and I, cheek to cheek, stared out, forever happy. She was much better then, her face rounder, all the lines gone, her hair brown and wavy. The tears came again. Mourning, it was called. I definitioned it. I didn’t like mourning.
A small red light at the bottom corner of mom’s computer flashed on and off. There was a message waiting for her. Everyone knew mom was dead. Someone was playing a dirty trick and I jabbed an angry finger at the playback button.
“Hello, Tommy.”
It was mom’s voice. I jumped and hid behind the chair.
“If you’re hearing this, then I’m dead. I arranged to have this message automatically sent to you when someone struck my name from the active roster. First, I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you I was sick. When I first found out, I was sure I could beat the cancer. Then, when the chemotherapy didn’t work, I was just afraid. Most of all I didn’t want you to worry. I don’t know if that was right or wrong. If I hurt you, please forgive me.”
“I forgive you, mom!” I rushed around the chair. Mom was on the computer monitor, sitting in her leather chair. My heart hurt in my chest and my whole body shook. I placed my hand on the empty seat, wishing so bad that she was there to hold me and ruffle my hair.
“Tommy, I have something important for you to do. Something I couldn’t do myself. Being captain means you have to do things even though you know they’re wrong, but you--” She coughed as though her lungs clapped together. When she finished she looked up and gave me a sad smile. “Look at you now, tall and strong. I did my best to give you a normal life when others thought you shouldn’t have one at all. It’s too late to ask your forgiveness for that now.”
Mom touched her nearly bald scalp with a shaky hand. “Tommy, I'm not sure how, or why, but you can do calculations in your head like a computer. We’re going to put that gift to work. Remember all that studying we did, all those tech manuals we read together?”
I listened to every word she said, pinching my leg when I felt myself wandering. What mom said was important, but mostly it was her voice I wanted to hear. Then the message ended.
“I won’t let you down, mom,” I said to her fading image.
Not much had changed when I returned to the ComCen. Everyone still ignored me, only this time I didn’t mind as I shuffled over to the empty navigation terminal. When no one watched, I pulled out the small notebook from the satchel slung over my shoulder.
My fingers brushed the cover like it was sacred. Whatever she wrote must have been really important because she used real paper. Taped to the notebook’s back cover was a wafer-thin data sleeve. The Plymouth Rock’s manifesto.
I reread the notebook’s first page and removed a small candlestick from the satchel. Mom called it a flare, and that I could find one in any of the emergency utility rooms spaced around the ship. The flare fit snug in a tight space between the computer and the floor. Checking my notes, I flicked the flare’s trigger, counted to three, then hurried for the nearest alarm button.
Smoke and red sparks filled the ComCen. The emergency klaxon was the loudest thing I had ever heard, but I managed to yell “Fire! Fire! Fire,” above the noise as thick smoke filled the ComCen.
“Everyone out,” Commander Paul shouted. “Let Fire Control take care of it.”
I joined the crowd heading for the door, but never quite got outside. Commander Paul stood in the corridor looking back at me. “Get out there, you retard.”
“No.” I smiled at him. “And my name is Tommy, you retard.” I pushed the button to close the door, then another to lock it. “Hello, Plymouth Rock Computer,” I read from the notebook. “Temporary lock on Command Center access. Protocol 234235, Smith, Tommy, Captain.”
The door had just begun to slide open when it slid back shut with angry shouts from the other side. “Change Command Center access code. Protocol 234235, Smith, Tommy, Captain. Code is now 02-5468+85744*85453. Confirm 02-5468+85744*85453.”
“Hello, Tommy,” said the computer. “Confirmed, Captain.”
“Good,” I said, whistling air through my teeth. No wonder mom looked so tired all the time. She’d been busy. When the computer removed her from the active roster, it triggered all kinds of little programs she’d written. The best one so far made me the captain of the Plymouth Rock, at least for a while.
With a small fire extinguisher from my satchel, I doused the flare and coughed. The emergency vent-late-shun pumped most of the smoke out, but the air still smelled like dirty socks.
When mom first told me to look at the old star charts, she wanted me to look for a special planet with water and air to breathe. And I found it too, the very first day I looked, but star charts were so fun, I didn’t tell mom.
It was a pretty blue planet, with greens, and browns, and whites and two small moons that chased each other round and round.
Mom’s planet trailed blue like a comet as I switched star charts.
A loud boom at the door made me jump. “This is the Captain. Open the door, Tommy!”
“Not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin,” I whispered and turned back to the star chart. I touched the planet. “Hello, Plymouth Rock computer,” I read from the notebook. “Lock coordinates on new destination.”
“Unable to comply, Tommy. Access has been denied.”
Wow, I thought, that was fast. Mom once said Commander Paul was an ass, but not a dumb ass.
I’d always laughed at that one, but not now. My fingers trembled as I typed in the words and numbers mom had written in the notebook; codes that allowed manual access of the navigation computer. Again, I brought up the star charts. The space between mom’s planet and the Plymouth Rock folded together, then stretched out again. I typed in the numbers floating in my head, then made the computer search using those numbers until it found a planet that matched that distance. At first it found a giant gas planet, so I told it to keep looking.
A loud pop came from the door, and a thin blue spike of fire poked through the metal. Commander Paul was trying to cut his way in with a torch. Sweat stung my eyes as I waited. Then mom’s special planet came into view and I typed the command to make that the our new destination.
Next, I inserted the data-sleeve into the computer and transferred the file so anyone could look up the manifesto to learn new stories and new songs.
I tore up mom’s notebook, stuffing the bits into a nearby recycle chute. All I had to do was wait for Commander Paul. He was gonna be real mad, but what could he do? He was the captain and I was just a retard, but like it or not, the crew followed my one and only order.
With nothing better to do, I went back to the navigation station and played.
The End