The Garden Sphere

By J. N. Sadler

Land rovers, Solace and Able, have readied the planet for the couple who have been chosen to start the new Earth colony on Mars. Evolution has a hand in the outcome.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Mar 25, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503554382

J. N. Sadler

Janet Sadler is a resident of Havertown, Pennsylvania. She has published two volumes of poetry with her illustrations: Headwinds and Full Sail and has been published in many small literary magazines. Once member of the Mad Poets Society in Media, PA, and also the Overbrook Poets in Philadelphia, she reads her poetry at local venues. She was the former poetry director at Tyme Gallery in Havertown, PA and at Baldwin’s Book Barn in West Chester, PA. She has authored thirty flash fictions novels. Twenty-seven titles have been published through Xlibris and can be found at Xlibris.com, under J. N. Sadler Author’s email address: [e-mail]

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THE GARDEN SPHERE

J. N. SADLER

Copyright © 2015 by J. N. Sadler.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 03/24/2015

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Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

CHAPTER 1

It was still dark that summer morning when Marta and Isabella rode the elevator to clean the rooms of the Cape Canaveral Space Launch in Florida. They had pushed the button for the fourth floor, but it went past it and continued to the top. There was no controlling the speed or the stops on the way. They looked at each other, confused and frightened.

What’s happening? This thing won’t stop, said Marta.

They watched the buttons light up as each floor passed. Isabella held onto the rolling bucket that held her cleaning agents and sponges. Marta clutched the broom, mop, and other items for sanitizing and dusting.

What will we tell them when we don’t show up to clean downstairs? What is happening to us? Isabella’s voice was trembling.

After a strange ride to the top, the door opened, and there stood the nose cone of the Elektra One space missile, shined up and ready for its scheduled launch. It was gleaming in artificial light, looking official and awesome. The elevator would not go back down, no matter how many times they pushed the buttons. The controls were frozen. The door opened for them to get out. They had no choice but to stand on the platform to which the giant rocket was chained.

They had dragged their equipment out with them. The door to the ship quickly slid open, exposing a panel of blinking colored lights. The astronauts’ chairs were modern, stark white with overhead masks and sticks with knobs on them for controlling something that they knew nothing about. They were up thirty stories high. No one was around to help them or even notice them.

They turned to face each other, mouths dropped open.

My God, what do we do now? What do we do? She looked over the railing at the stretched-out facility below. There were only dim lights outlining the buildings. They were blinking like stars as she dizzied and latched onto the iron pipe rail. I cannot look.

Isabella leaned down, and her eyes bugged out. The lights are out in the city. There are no lights anywhere. It is so dark except for the bright lights in the ship. What is happening?

They huddled in the nose cone. The elevator door shut, and the hatch of the ship closed behind them when they entered. They trembled as a thunderous noise and bucking of the rocket occurred; simultaneously, the craft was trembling.

Fasten your pressure suits, put helmets on, and buckle into your seats to begin the journey. This message came loudly from a radio somewhere in the ship. It was a robotic voice. Isabella and her friend put on the huge, ill-fitting suits. They were silver and very heavy. The gloves were too big to be functional. When they locked on their helmets, oxygen filled them. Breathing was easy.

There was a jolt from the craft that caused them to fall against their seats.

Sit down, for heaven’s sake and strap yourself in. We are shooting off to somewhere soon. Marta screamed.

They fell into their chairs and buckled the confusing straps as best they could before a loud, whistling boom shattered their eardrums. Like an enormous metal creature, the entire ship broke away from the shackles that held it steady and was catapulted into the sky, emitting steam and smoke enough to obliterate the blast-off. The radio was alive and squawking. NASA was having conniptions. Someone had sabotaged the takeoff. The three astronauts that were supposed to be flying this mission to Mars were waiting below for orders to board, and the craft had left without them. Was it unmanned, or did a bogus replacement crew get this far with their caper? There was no response to their communique. No one aboard had turned on the two-way radio device. All of the controls were taken over by an enemy force, by robotic command. They didn’t figure that these two unassuming maids would be bouncing around as ballast with their mop and bucket.

The thunderous gigantic engines fired high octane fuel into a mushroom cloud of flames and smoke. It belched and bucked and gathered power and heat. It thrust straight up then, arced as it took its place in the Universe on the star trail to Mars.

Marta and Isabella shook violently as the bucket floated by just missing their heads. The broom and mop looked like skinny upright monitors chasing each other off the ground, swaying.

I’m glad we have helmets. Our equipment is dangerous here. She ducked as the bucket passed by her head, again. All of the lights were blinking and changing colors as they glided in an arc, off and away from their home planet, Earth.

Look! shouted Marta. That must be Earth! It’s so small, and it’s blue!

Take off the helmet. We can breathe now, see? She took off her helmet. Her face looked like it had been run over by a truck. The G-force has pushed back her skin and left frightened eyes and a mouth that turned down, uncontrollably. Isabella had the same effect working on her face. They screamed when they saw each other.

After the ship had traveled a while, their facial expressions softened, and they again wore the countenances of innocent, scared, cleaning women with absolutely no idea what happened.

We should tell NASA what happened to us. We need help driving this space ship. My God! How are we going to land, and where are we going?

I don’t know how to use the phone. It seems like it is automatically flying itself. I hope it will settle down on some surface soon without our help.

And, what do we do when and if we land? We don’t know how to open the door!

An enormous boost in power had them propelling at a high velocity through a cloud of meteors. The ship dodged and weaved, missing them all by incremental margins. It was on automatic pilot, but they didn’t know what would happen next. They sat as still as they could, strapped into the immense chairs in front of the panel with the erratic blinking and beeping lights.

The big bucket, mop, and broom were flying around the cramped quarters, hitting the walls and swatting at their faces. They could see outer space with its stars and distant planets through the clear, front shield. After the meteor shower, they glided peacefully in deep darkness, now and then a pinpoint of light flashed in the dreaded unknown.

The two suited captives sat still as they whizzed away to a foreign sphere.

I’m glad I’m not alone in this mess, aren’t you? Isabella could not turn her head to see her partner in this dilemma.

Yes, I have to be thankful for that, too. I wouldn’t care so much if we knew what we were doing, where we were going, and how much money they would pay us. How are we going to get back?

Let’s not panic. We’ve come this far without incident. It’s the landing that I dread. No one is at the controls. Isabella crossed herself and bowed her head.

It’s a robotic journey. Someone other than NASA is manning this ship, look. She pointed to the controls being invisibly moved on the panel. The ship took a hard left and picked up speed. A large planet could be seen in the distance. Could it be Jupiter? queried Marta.

I don’t think so. There was a mission to launch tomorrow to go to Mars. That’s all I know. I don’t listen to the news. We will know if and when we hit the mark and land safely on a red planet.

I wish I wasn’t hungry. Maybe there is some food around here. Isabella unstrapped herself and floated crazily up to the ceiling of the craft.

Get down! Marta gasped.

Oh, my God, it’s just like being an angel floating in space. I don’t feel fat anymore. I am weightless. Isabella glided by Marta, just missing her helmeted head. The bucket swung gracefully out of the corner and bumped into her, along with the broom and the mop.

Marta looked up at her friend who was suspended above her.

Look for the food and be careful.

Why don’t you come and join me up here. It’s fun. She giggled as she propelled herself to the other side of the cockpit.

I am afraid that if I join you, I will not be able to get back to my seat for the landing.

Oh, come on. We’ve got time to learn how to maneuver in this environment. Besides, we have to have something to eat.

What the heck. Marta unfastened her seat belt and slowly lifted up to the ceiling next to Isabella. She bumped right into her. They were like two balloons, bouncing, and bobbing, and hovering over the control area.

Ooh, this is fun. Where do you think they keep the food?

Isabella looked around, pushing the big bucket aside and fighting for space with the broom. I see a supply closet. It’s got to be in there. Push me in that direction, and I will see.

Marta shoved Isabella toward the supplies. She bounced away from the door and had to be pushed again. They played out this aerial ballet until she managed to open the door. It was a refrigerated compartment with frozen food that was pureed and put in tubes.

There were: beets, tuna casserole, macaroni and cheese, spinach, and so on. She bent down from her suspended position in the air and was knocked against the wall from a thrust of the engines. She banged her helmet on a panel of switches. All of the doors that held the tubes, like the old-time automats, opened, and the tubes floated in all directions around her. She grabbed at one and missed as she floated away, inexperienced in how to handle weightlessness.

Marta floated up to help her. She discovered that there were handles on the floor that they could anchor themselves to, but they had to focus. She was actually walking on her hands through the hatchway to the room that had a blizzard of colorful tubes hanging in the air. Isabella was trying to swipe one out of the air to eat it. They floated by each other.

This is fun, Come on. Chase your favorite food, said Isabella as she floated past. She caught one that flew by and opened the top. A ribbon of brown pureed beef stew began to emerge. She put it to her mouth and sucked it all out, swallowing it without even tasting. Her stomach began to visibly inflate as she finished it. The empty tube and cap floated off and hung in the air with the full ones. Oh, my God, look at me! I am blowing up. I have such gas.

Marta was guzzling from a tube of apple pie. Her suit swelled when she was finished, as well. She burped and flew around the space module like a balloon losing air. She and Isabella were laughing, hard. Bright-colored food paste stained their mouths. The air became foul from the issue of methane from their digestive systems. Gravity was the culprit or lack of it they managed to grab the handles on the floor and walk on their hands back to the cockpit.

I think I soiled my suit, said Marta, looking down at herself.

Me, too. I wish we knew what we were doing. What now?

We have to find a way to clean up this mess.

Good luck finding a washing machine, said Isabella.

They were forced to look through the heat shield that showed a furious bright comet heading directly toward them.

Oh, my God! It’s over. Our lives have ended. Brace yourself. I’ll see you in the next world! Isabella hunched down in her seat, ready to be annihilated.

Marta was frozen. She couldn’t look. She was more concerned with how to clean her suit.

The ship rolled away and lurched forward with an enormous thrust that threw the two women against the back wall, and Marta got hung on a peg, unable to get away. She kicked her legs as one would in a swimming pool. Isabella floated by, like she was actually swimming, but she had no control of her direction. She observed the labels on drawers and buttons as she swirled around. One of them said, Laundry. She grabbed onto the handle as she passed it a second time around and remained stable, still suspended above ground.

Marta had freed herself and bounced towards Isabella in her misshapen space suit. An immense lateral explosion occurred outside the space craft, near enough to have impact. The ship sped at incredible speed forward and around the gamma rays emitting from the maverick meteor. It had collided with a piece of another sphere and caused what looked like a nuclear explosion in the black void of space. Gravity returned for a short time while the ship lost control and dodged and weaved, lurched up and faced down and finally, spun like the hour hand on a radio-active watch. The