Scorpion Shards

who’s quacking now?”

Winston turned to Michael, who seemed distracted and bothered as if the air itself was pricking his whole body with needles as he walked.

“What do you think?” asked Winston.

“He probably won’t help us unless we bring him the broomstick of the Wicked Witch,” said Michael.

***

Behind the physics building stood the observatory—a small domed structure painted a peeling institutional green. It was no more an emerald city than their path had been a yellow-brick road.

As they pushed their way through the squeaky doors of the observatory, they were met by the smell of old floor varnish and a twelve-foot telescope with pieces missing. It was an unimpressive observatory, consisting of little more than the crippled telescope, a desk in a far corner and an arrow on the floor pointing north—in case anyone couldn’t figure that out by themselves.

Across the room, a thin man, with thinner hair, fought with workers—trying keep them working on the tele­ scope, even though it was way past five o’clock. He was tall, with a slight roundness to his back from too many years making calculations at a desk. The four kids ap­proached the ranting astronomer solemnly like a small minion of misery, and when he saw them he waved them off.

“No classes today. Go home.” His voice had a hostile, unfriendly tone that could only come from many years of bitter disappointment.

Tory cleared her throat and stepped forward. “Dr. Bayless, we’ve come a long way—we have to talk to you.”

Bayless turned to take a better look at them, then, with a disgust he didn’t even try to hide, said “My God! What happened to you?”

“That’s what we’re trying to find out,” said Winston.

Around them the workers were staring and moving to­ward the doors, whispering to each other about the freaks that had just walked in.

“Go on,” Bayless shouted to the workers. “Get out— see if I care.” They were more than happy to oblige. “The cosmic event of a lifetime, and the telescope had to break down this month.”

He took a moment to look at the four of them again, shook his head—shuddering with revulsion—and let loose a bitter laugh. “Life’s misfortunes just fall at my doorstep, don’t they? If it’s not a ruined telescope, it’s the wretched of the earth. Well, how can I help you?”

“What can you tell us about supernovas?” asked Tory.

“What can’t I tell you?” he replied, slipping into profes­sor-speak. “Supernovas are the reason we’re all here. Ox­ygen, carbon, silicon—all the heavier elements are cre­ated in the explosions. Without novas, the whole universe would be little more than hydrogen gas ...” He paused and looked at them again, shuddering, but this time not laughing. “But you didn’t come here for an astronomy lecture, did you?”

“You predicted the explosion of Mentarsus-H,” said Tory. “We think our condition’s got something to do with that.”

Now Bayless’s look turned from revulsion to suspicious interest. He studied them intensely and began to pick at his ragged yellow fingernails.

“My prediction was luck,” he said. “At least that’s what my colleagues say.”

“Don’t go playing games with us, all right?” said Win­ston, pulling his thumb from his mouth. “If you know something, tell us.”

“You got a big mouth for a little kid,” said Bayless.

“I’m fifteen,” growled Winston.

Bayless sighed and nodded reluctantly. “All right, come on and sit down.”

Bayless led them to a corner of the observatory that had been set up as his office. Winston noticed that Mi­ chael kept his distance, breathing in gasps, like someone suffering from asthma, and shifting his weight from one foot to another like a caged animal. He’s got it bad today, thought Winston.

“The Scorpion Star,” said Lourdes to Bayless. “Tell us how you knew.”

Bayless leaned back in his desk chair, took a sip of cold coffee, and focused on his uneven fingernails, picking at them with an unpleasant click-click-click. Finally he spoke.

“It’s a curious talent,” said Bayless, “to look at the uni­verse and know what it’s thinking. To sense that countless galaxies would be discovered in dark space. To feel that the universe is even older than most scientists think it is. To glance at a star chart and see one star missing in the tail of the Scorpion, only to see it reappear when you blink.”

“Intuition?” suggested Tory.

“My mother had it,” said Bayless. “She chose to use it to separate fools from their money and turned herself into a sideshow freak. I chose to use it for more noble pur­poses. Biology . . . astrophysics.” Then he angrily flicked a fingernail in an arc over their heads. It landed on the dark floor, where it lay like a crescent moon. “Unfortunately science has no room for intuition. Scientists find a million ways to spell ‘coincidence,’ and so I’ve become a sideshow freak after all.” Then he smiled grimly, and added, '. . . like the four of you.”

His smile made them all squirm. Everyone but Tory.

“The star blew up sixteen years ago,” said Tory. “We’ve figured out the exact date.”

“Students of astrophysics, are you?” said Bayless, be­ginning on a new fingernail.

“No,” said Tory. “That was the day each of us was conceived.”

Bayless raised his attention from his marred fingertips to the four of them. “Remarkable,” he said, studying their faces, and movements. “Remarkable. Perhaps these ex­ploding stars have more to do with us than I’ve dared to imagine.” He pulled out a microcassette recorder from his desk and hit the record button. “Do you mind if I record all this?”

“We’d rather you didn’t,” said Lourdes.

He put his tape recorder in his desk, but Winston couldn’t tell if he turned it off.

“Tell me everything,” he said. “Everything to the last detail. . .”

***

They took a good hour to go through their stories, and Bayless listened, attentive to every word. When they were done, the astronomer was practically drooling with excite­ment.

“Shards!” he exclaimed, laughing with glee. “Shards of a shattered star!” He peered at them as if they were sub­jects he planned to study. The slight hunch of his back made him resemble a vulture.

“I’ve written about this sort of thing,” he said pacing a short, sharp path, “but never dared to publish it—but now I can present you as proof!” He looked at them with such awe, it made Winston roll his eyes. “Do you have any idea how special—how luminous you are? Why, the rest of us are mere smithereens compared to you!”

“Yeah?” said Michael. “So if we got these fantastic kick-ass souls, how come we’re so screwed up?”

His words stopped Bayless in mid-pace. “I don’t know,” he said. “By my estimation you should be living lives like no others—glorious lives with—'

“Shut up,” shouted Winston. Hearing what his life should have been made it all seem even worse. He started to stomp around like a small child, and Tory put her hand on his head to calm him down. It only made him angrier.

“We don’t need ought-a-be’s,” said Tory. “We need some why-nots.”

Bayless looked at them and sighed. The answers they needed were clearly not easy to come by. Bayless pon­dered his inoperable telescope for a moment, then turned back to them decisively.

“Science can’t help you,” said Bayless. “Not unless you want to wait and see what they find in your autopsies.”

The thought made Winston shiver, and he swore he could feel himself shrink a fraction of an inch.

“Then what do you suggest?” said Michael, his breath­ing heavier, his voice even more impatient than it had been an hour ago.

Bayless thought about it, sighed in resignation, and reached into his bottom drawer, pulling out an old deck of cards that looked like they hadn’t been used in ages.

“When I was very young, my mother made me read cards for rich old women. I once told a woman she was going to die before the sun went down. She stormed out of the tent in a huff and was promptly trampled by the