Alan Dean Foster - The Last Starfighter

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The Last Starfighter
ALAN DEAN FOSTER
based on a screenplay by JONATHAN BETUEL
Copyright 1984 by MCA Publishing, a Division of MCA, Inc.
ISBN 0-425-07255-X
e-book ver. 1.0
for my nephew daniel, a fun one. . . .
1
The Xurian ship exploded in a blaze of flame, which was beginning to dissipate even as Alex drove his
gunstar through the expanding globe of hot gas and vaporized metal. They were homing in on him now
and he was forced to work twice as hard to dodge their attacks.
If the battle pattern held to form there ought to be a cluster of Ko-Dan fighters gathering for a flanking
attack off in the fourth quadrant. He pressed on with his own assault, relentless in his pursuit of the
Ko-Dan command ship, clearing one wave after another of the attacking enemy from the battle screen.
There they came! A host of them diving in on him from the side. But he was ready for them. The Ko-Dan
were valiant fighters, and they came at you in unending waves, but if your reflexes were sharp enough you
could out-maneuver them. Alex did so now, twisting a path through the assault as the attacking craft
struggled frantically to regroup in his wake.
Too late for them now, he thought grimly. His fingers were tense on the gunstar's controls and he kept his
eyes riveted to the battle screen, not allowing his gaze to drift right or left. The screen was all he needed;
plenty of power left, and all his weapons still functioned. But the Ko-Dan were crafty. Just when you
thought you'd slipped them, another wave of fighters would appear and begin their attack.
But he was through them now, through them all, and his main target lay directly ahead.
"Approaching Ko-Dan Command Craft," his computer announced eveply. "Prepare for final
confrontation."
Suddenly a host of lights proliferated on his screen. "Enemy squadrons in sectors three, six, seven and
closing fast!"
Trying to catch him between them, Alex thought grimly. Well, he knew how to handle that maneuver. He
thumbed the Evade controls and the gunstar rocked wildly. The images on the battle screen shifted as he
swerved to avoid the new attack while still holding a course toward the command ship.
Then there was red light washing over the screen and his fingers trembled on the controls. Warning lights
began to appear on the battle screen. He knew what they meant loss of life support imminent, loss of fire
control imminent, loss of ... loss of ...
The screen shook from the impact as the gunstar took a direct hit aft. Loss of drive, the computer told
him sadly, almost apologetically. He let his fingers slide from the controls. Too late now. Too late to try a
different attack plan, too late to avoid the coup de grace. It was a matter of seconds. The Ko-Dan did
not know the meaning of mercy.
The screen shook again and his field of view was obliterated completely. It was over. His ship was
destroyed.
He was dead.
Alex Rogan sighed as his battle screen came to life a last time.
YOUR GUNSTAR HAS BEEN DESTROYED. YOUR SCORE ON THIS MACHINE RANKS
YOU NUMBER ONE. PLEASE DEPOSIT ANOTHER QUARTER FOR ADDITIONAL
PLAYING TIME.
Another quarter. Twenty-five cents a resurrection. Cheap enough at the price. He slipped the coin into
the machine. A strong, insistent synthesized voice cut through the stagnant morning air, demanding and full
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of cosmic import.
"GREETINGS, STARFIGHTER! YOU HAVE BEEN RECRUITED BY THE LEAGUE TO
DEFEND THE FRONTIER AGAINST XUR AND THE KO-DAN ARMADA!"
"Yeah, I know, I know," he said impatiently. "Bring on the target lights already." He leaned both hands
against the console and waited for the game to commence.
Off to his left the sign on the trailer park general store popped and sputtered, fizzled and flashed.
Sometimes it spelled out ARLIG ARBRI, and sometimes TARGHT IGHT, and sometimes it made
sense. Like today.
The rest of the trailer park sprawled out across the dry ground behind the general store. It was Alex's
home, was the trailer park. His mother managed it. His father . . . he concentrated on the revived game.
His father had been gone a long time. A picture or two on the end table in his mom's bedroom. A
photographic image. Not a real person. He went after the Ko-Dan fighters savagely.
The trailer park was a self-contained little community located on the outskirts of Nowhereville, California.
A small village fashioned out of corrugated steel and fiberglass and plastic. Few transients stopped by to
make use of the park's facilities. The Starlight Starbright was not one of Southern California's vacation
meccas, and its inhabitants liked it that way. It was peaceful, and quiet, and safe.
It was driving Alex crazy.
As he pushed and shoved at the controls of the game, the park was waking up around him. Funny, the
sounds a community makes as it comes to life. Toasters popping, percolators dripping, juice-makers
whirring wetly, younger kids complaining ("Ma, you know I hate orange juice with pulp in it . . . it gets
stuck in my braces!"), electric razors shearing male fleece, multiple throats agargling, and middle-aged
adults wheezing weakly as they attempt their morning exercises.
Radios began to come alive behind the general store. Country-Western mostly, but some guerilla rock
sneaking in here and there. Pork belly prices cohabited on the air with the news from the Middle East,
while unseen hucksters hawked everything from underwear to pickup trucks. Striving to be heard above
this din were the defiant peeps of finches and sparrows and the occasional stutter of a hidden roadrunner.
"Strange lights, they wuz, away up in the sky," one voice was declaiming insistently over the local talk
show.
"Sure they were, Mrs. Granwaters." You could hear the false sympathy in the deejay's voice, could
imagine him winking broadly at his invisible audience as he replied to his guest's declaration. "Now, how
many colors did you say it was?"
An elderly gent clad in T-shirt, faded coveralls and a battered VFW cap opened the door of the trailer
nearest the general store on the right side, holding a large dog dish. He set it in front of a waiting hound of
uncertain pedigree and patted the long-eared head as the animal ate.
When he rose it was to eye the thermometer that was nailed to the outside of the trailer. Used to be he
could read the height of the mercury inside the glass tube from across the road. Now he had to squint.
"Already up near ninety." He eyed the dog again. "Gonna be a sparklin' day, Mr. President. Sparklin'."
A shout drew Alex's attention to another trailer, though he didn't look up from the game. That would be
Elvira Hartford, from the sound of it. He fought to ignore the banal conversation as he blasted whole
squadrons of Ko-Dan fighters from interstellar space.
Sure enough, the woman in question stuck her head out a trailer window. It was full of curlers, giving her
the appearance of someone enduring an assault of giant pink caterpillars.
Across the walk that separated the trailers, her next-door neighbor Clara Parks was just settling into her
sun lounge and lighting up her ancient corncob pipe in preparation for the first smoke of the day. Clara
had smoked all her life and had put her feelings about the habit in concrete. She coughed a lot, Clara did,
but no one dared to bring up the thought of quitting. Clara kept a .38 special in her bedroom dresser.
Now she peered across at her neighbor, having a fair idea of what was coming. Clara Parks was
eighty-four.
"Clara, my 'lectric's out again! Pay attention, Clara, I know you're listening to me! This is important. I'm
gonna miss my soaps!"
"Settle your britches, woman." Parks chewed on the stem of her pipe. "I'll pass it on." She turned in the
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lounge chair and cupped both hands to her mouth, dangling the pipe from two fingers.
"Oh, Bill? Bill! Elvira's blacked out again. Pass the word on before the crisis hits."
The next trailer in line belonged to William Potter, aircraft mechanic, retired. Potter shaved his face the
way he'd bombed North Vietnam sporadically and ineffectively. Since no one tried to get near enough to
kiss him, it didn't trouble his lifestyle.
"Pass the word along to whom?"
"Don't get funny with me, Bill Potter," said Clara warningly. "Just pass it on."
"Damn women and their damn soaps," Potter muttered. He didn't say anything out loud, however, lest it
be discovered some day that he was a closet Days of Our Lives freak.
He walked along his porch until he could see all the way up to the Boone mobile and shouted toward it.
"Elvira's got no juice, and if she can't see her soaps, she'll hyperventilate!"
That was usually enough to provoke a response from the Rogan trailer. Jane Rogan was manager, bill
collector, mail distributor, sector general, field marshal and repository of all complaints as well as
dispenser of favors for the tightly knit community.
She was Alex's mother. She was the Boss.
The girl who emerged from the Boone trailer nearby was much younger than the manager of the Starlight
Starbright trailer park. She was carrying a small ice chest. Her name was Maggie and it was a source of
some ribbing from her friends. It was a name you had to grow into. Hard to visualize a teenager named
Maggie. Still harder to imagine two proud parents standing over a hospital crib and naming the wrinkled
little child in the white hospital room Maggie.
But certain names endure in families as a means of perpetuating the memory of relatives long since
departed, so Maggie Gordon was heir to the name of a favorite aunt on her father's side. It didn't bother
her anymore. Very little bothered the beautiful, dark-haired Maggie Gordon.
"Thanks, Mrs. Boone," she called back toward the trailer. "You have a nice day."
"You too, honey," Mrs. Boone emerged to study the sky. "Gonna be a hot one."
Maggie nodded, made her way down the steep steps by peering carefully around the bulk of the ice
chest. Mr. Boone was just leaving the yard, having prepared f or a hard day of fishing. He hefted his
battered old rod proudly, like a soldier preparing for parade.
"Got yourself a great day for a picnic, Maggie."
"I can't wait. If it doesn't get too hot. Catch a big one, Mr. Boone."
He grinned back at her, secure in his age, his pension and his hobby. "I'm gonna try."
There weren't many fish to be had in the small desert lake nearby. That didn't worry Mr. Boone. As any
true fisherman knows, catching fish has nothing to do with fishing. The catching is an adjunct, a corollary
to the actual art of fishing, which consists of killing time on a small boat as simply as possible, utilizing only
the minimal amount of energy necessary to maintaining life while simultaneously consuming as much cold
beer and snacks as the body will tolerate.
Whether you caught any fish or not was, of course, incidental.
When Maggie reemerged from her own trailer she was wearing a bikini beneath a baggy sweatshirt. A
thick towel clung to her neck. The old woman who followed her out of the trailer was an elderly
reflection of the young girl. Granny Gordon refused to let life get ahead of her. Unlike many of her
contemporaries, she wasted no time running in place. The Sony Walkman dangling from her neck was
proof of that.
She gave her granddaughter a kiss and a friendly warning.
"You have fun, child, but be careful. No swimming under logs and no diving off the rocks. And you take
good care of Mrs. Boone's ice chest."
"I will, Granny. Are you sure you'll be okay?"
"Be news if I wasn't. Say, who's looking after whom here? Maybe you should stay and watch TV and I'll
go on the picnic."
"All right, Granny." Maggie smiled affectionately. "I give up."
"I'll be just fine, dear." Granny ran a hand through her still thick hair. Not all white. Not yet. "You just run
along and have a good time and don't worry about me. I'll do all the worryin' for both of us."
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"Fair enough. I fixed your lunch and put it in the fridge."
Granny nodded and did a little dip to barely heard music. Still a little life in the old stems yet, she mused.
Wonderful inventions, these new portables. She watched as her granddaughter crossed the courtyard,
heading toward the main gate. Lot of life in that girl. Looking after her wasn't work. It was a joy.
With that happy thought in mind she turned and re-entered her trailer, getting out of the sun while getting
down.
The woman hanging out laundry on the trailer across the way was in her forties, strong of body and
personality. Mention women's lib to Jane Rogan and she'd laugh at you, having worked for a living since
her teens. For all that life of nonstop hard work, she was as cheerful as a San Francisco socialite, and a
damnsight healthier.
"Morning, Mrs. Rogan."
The park manager peeked around her laundry.
"Morning, Maggie. You're looking spry."
"Feeling good, Mrs. Rogan. Did you find that picnic basket?"
"Uh-hum." She fumbled behind her, hunting briefly through mounds of white. "Here it is." She handed it
over.
"Thanks, Mrs. Rogan." Maggie's eyes searched the parking area beyond the gate. "Where's Alex?"
Jane Rogan shook her head, sharing a secret smile with Maggie. "He's up there. Where else?"
Maggie nodded knowingly. "Right. Hi, Louis." She moved away from the open trailer door.
An instant later a rubber dart clung to the metal nearby. It was retrieved by a tousle-haired ten-year-old
wearing a disappointed frown. His aim was still off. Either that or the dumb spacegun needed a new
spring.
"Morning, spaceson Louis," said Mrs. Rogan. She raised the visor of his space helmet and planted a kiss
on his forehead. He wriggled away, but slowly. He was concentrating on his work, which he carried out
with all the solemnity of a surgeon attempting the world's first brain transplant. This consisted of carrying
the small black-and-white TV while playing out an extension cord behind it.
Jane Rogan watched with one eye until her younger son had vanished into the garishly painted plywood
teepee that squatted near the back of the small yard. As soon as the sounds of morning cartoons began
to drift from it, she turned her attention away, satisfied that Louis was not going to electrocute himself.
This morning.
Another voice made her turn from the washing.
"Yoo-hoo, Jane?"
Granny Gordon was leaning on the back fence. Everybody called Mrs. Gordon Granny, not out of
deference to her age or status but because her real first name was Grendil and the old woman would
sock anyone who used it.
"Hi, Granny. How's the back this morning?"
Granny put a hand to her spine and smiled faintly. "Still workin'. Sort of."
"You ought to go see that chiropractor Dan Robbins keeps recommending."
The older woman shook her head. "No thanks. I like these old bones right where they are."
"What's doin'?"
"Well, Elvira's electric is out again and she's gonna get hyper if she can't see her soaps. She'll make
everybody's day impossible."
"Don't I know it," agreed Jane readily. "Pass the word back that Alex'll be over to patch her line in time
for her soaps. That'll hold her for awhile."
"Just for awhile, though. I swear, if they said on those shows that you could walk on water, we'd be
fishin' Elvira out of the river before sundown. I'll tell her Alex is comin', Jane."
"Thanks." Jane Rogan saw movement off to her right. Louis was taking deadly aim with his spacepistol
on a sleeping feline. "Louis, leave that cat alone and go tell Alex I need to see him."
"Aw, Mom, I wasn't gonna do nothin'."
"Wasn't going to do 'anything,' Louis. Now go and get your brother."
"A dumb messenger, that's all I am." He climbed to his feet and stared longingly at the unsuspecting cat.
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Then he sighed and exited the yard, heading for the store and taking time off to fire a few desultory darts
in the direction of old Otis's chickens. They squawked and fled for cover, making him feel better. When
you're real small it's important to know something's afraid of you, even if it's only a bunch of dumb
chickens.
As he walked he looked for Mr. President, Otis's old hound. Mr. President, however, knew Louis from
long experience. Since it was forbidden to chew the boy's arm off, the dog had learned to avoid his
approach. From beneath the cool safety of the trailer's bulk, he watched Louis pass.
Having taken as much time as possible to go from the trailer to the store, Louis finally mounted the steps
onto the wooden porch. Store and porch had been there long before the trailer park, but the old wood
was solid as iron.
Louis crossed the porch, keeping an eye out for scorpions. His big brother was eighteen. To Louis that
put him right up there with their mother, though not with Granny Gordon or Otis. Alex seemed impossibly
tall to Louis, who knew for a certainty that he would never, ever reach such impressive heights himself.
He'd also heard that Alex was good-looking, which just goes to show how much grown-ups know.
Because Louis knew it for a fact that his brother was just a malformed klutz whose sole task in life was to
make things unbearable for the only important human being on the planet, Louis Rogan.
At times he could be neat to have around, though, like when they went swimming together. Louis
conceded that as big brothers went, Alex wasn't all that bad. But today he was going swimming with his
own friends, and to compound the bad judgment, he was going swimming with girls. That lapse of taste
Louis could never forgive.
Now he strained to see past his brother's ribs, looking at the videoscreen that was alive with flashing,
rapidly changing lights. The images fascinated Louis. They were so alive, so full of movement and
trickery. Alex ignored his younger shadow, letting his fingers dance easily over the multiple controls.
Louis watched and tried to learn, knowing that Alex was a master at video games. Once he'd watched
during a trip to the big arcade in town while other older kids oohed and aahed as Alex ran up several
million points on Stargate, a game too complex for his ten-year-old mind to think of trying.
But this new game, this Starfighter, was even more complex, with half again as many controls to
manipulate. Yet Alex seemed better at it than anything else. Something one of the other kids had called
"rising to the challenge." Some kids wouldn't even try Starfighter because it ate their quarters too fast. On
a good day, Alex could play the game for hours on just one.
When he wasn't being interrupted, Louis reminded himself. So readily did he lose himself in the game that
he'd almost forgotten what had sent him to the store.
"Mom's lookin' for you, Alex."
"Yeah, sure." His brother replied without taking his gaze from videoscreen. His arms hung parallel to the
ground, still, relaxed. Only his fingers moved, depressing fire controls, adjusting thrust, guiding the tiny
microprocessed gunstar through the maze of enemy fighters. It was very much a virtuoso display. Alex
played the game as smoothly as Horowitz did his Stein-way.
"Come on, Alex. Mom'll be mad at me."
"What for?" Bright blue light momentarily filled the screen, fading to reveal a new series of targets
attacking faster than ever, relentless and uncaring. "She told you to come tell me she wants to see me.
Okay, you've told me. You're in the clear."
"Yeah, right." Louis brightened, tore his gaze away from the motion-filled screen just long enough to
locate one of the chairs that sat on the porch. Dragging it over, he climbed up onto the rickety platform.
For a breathless moment he was an adult, as big as Alex.
"Look out!" Somehow his brother avoided the wave attack from the left quadrant. Louis couldn't imagine
how Alex had seen the attack coming in time to evade. He swayed on the chair, mesmerized by the lights
and sounds, waving and bobbing wildly.
After all, it wasn't his quarter at stake.
"Get 'em, Alex, get 'em!"
Get 'em Alex did efficiently, professionally, avoiding every attack on his own vessel while methodically
eliminating ev erything the game could throw at him, quietly reveling in the simulated destruction and fully
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confident of his skills.
Louis edged closer and closer to the machine, drawn by the sights on the screen. His small face was
aglow with delight. Alex was so good it was more fun to watch him than to play yourself. Well, almost.
So much pleasure, and all for a quarter. Being good helped, though. Somehow the game wasn't as much
fun to play when it only lasted a minute or so.
"Blam, blam, blam!"
"Cool the sound effects, Louis. I can't hear the machine. And move your head, will you?"
Once more the screen showed him the command ship. It loomed huge on the battle screen. He tried a
different evasion pattern this time, hoping to avoid the squadrons of enveloping fighters that had shot him
down the last time. It didn't work. He was dead again.
Dying a lot this morning, he thought.
"Nuts!" He gave the console a whack before jamming both hands into his pants pockets. "Not fast
enough. I should've had it that time."
A new voice chimed in. Both boys turned to see Otis staring at the screen. "Heard you almost hit eight
hundred thousand, Alex."
"That was yesterday. Would've too, if Louis hadn't bumped my hand."
"Did not! Wow!" Louis pointed toward the screen. "Seven hunnert and . . . and . . ." His face wrinkled
up in confusion. The number was beyond him.
Alex eyed the screen with careful indifference. "Seven hundred eighty-two thousand. Almost as good as
last night."
"Yeah, and I didn't hit your hand this time, neither," Louis shot back.
"No, but you stuck your fat head in my way."
"Did not!"
"I heard you were in the millions last week on Stargate in town," Otis said.
Alex shrugged, concealing the pride he took in his accomplishment. "Yeah, but lots of guys do that
around the country. Stargate's easy compared to Starfighter." He added casually, "Though I haven't
heard of anybody else breaking half a million besides me."
"Maybe you'd win a national contest if they held one."
"I guess I might have a chance. But only the big game companies run contests like that. Atari, Sega,
Nintendo, Williams. I never heard of the company that makes this Starfighter game. Must be some new
outfit."
"Maybe so. Maybe they will have a contest if they get big enough."
"Yeah. You going to pay my way to it, Otis?"
The older man chuckled. "Not on my social security I'm not, Alex. Tell you what, though. You keep
practicing and if a Starfighter contest ever comes up, we'll see about gettin' you to it."
Alex grinned. "It's a deal."
Otis nodded to his right. "Looks like somebody lookin' for you, Alex."
He turned, saw Maggie exiting the side gate carrying a picnic basket, towels and a small ice chest. The
chest was sweating, suggesting inviting contents. At the same time a new pickup pulled in off the highway,
rolled into the parking lot in front of the store. It was filled with kids Alex's own age, all laughing and
joking while fighting not to spill over the tailgate.
"Come on, Alex, they're here!" Maggie broke into a trot, managing her awkward burden easily as she
headed for the truck.
For an instant Alex wondered what the hell she was talking about. Then memories from real life came
flooding in.
"Silver Lake! The picnic. I forgot." He started to run after Maggie.
"Hey, Alex." Louis pointed at the game. "You won a free credit."
"What about it?"
"You just gonna waste it?"
Alex concealed a smile. The greed was as bright on his little brother's face as a thousand-watt halogen
lamp. He deepened his voice, trying to imitate the game.
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"Starfighter Alex Rogan requesting permission to turn over gunstar controls to my little brother Louis,
sirs." A brief pause, then he added, "Telepathic communication confirms okay. She's all yours, Louis."
Unable to believe his luck, the ten-year-old hastily wrestled the chair he'd been standing on around until it
fronted the console.
"Oh boy!" He hit the start button, his small fingers waiting tensely above the fire controls. Alien warships
appeared on the glass, firing out at him. Grinning, Alex turned to follow Maggie while Otis just shook his
head and started back toward his trailer. Louis's excited voice followed both of them.
"Okay, alien dorks, you're dead, cause it's me, Louis Rogan flyin' the gunstar now!" A bright red flare
filled the screen and Louis's expression immediately became one of inexpressible disgust. "Oh, crapola!
Gimme a chance, willya?"
Everyone in the pickup was already wearing swimming gear. Well, he could borrow some, Alex knew, in
case Maggie had forgotten his. Or he'd shock them all by swimming in the buff. Sure he would.
It was Jack Blake's pickup. Not that he'd expected anything else, just as there wasn't anything he could
do about it. Besides owning the pickup, Blake had money for gas. Money for gas, money for beer, for
movies, for concert tickets. Which was another way of saying that his parents had money.
What was it they'd learned from the Constitution? "All men are created equal."
Bullshit. When did he get equality with Jack Blake? Somehow the writers of the Constitution had left that
one out. He'd asked his mother about it.
"There are no guarantees in life, Alex, and it isn't always fair." That's what she'd told him. Jane Rogan
versus Thomas Jefferson, et al. From what he'd observed of life so far he'd long since decided he'd be
better off listening to his mom than any of the founding fathers. Most of them had been rich, too.
The pickup was a big, fat, bright red Dodge Ramcharger, with a chrome towbar on the front and four big
bright deer spotters mounted atop the cab. Even the damn rollbar was chromed. Conspicuous
consumption.
Blake sat lazily behind the wheel, cowboy hat slightly askew, looking like something out of a sarcastic
Way-
lon Jennings song, the kind Jennings used to sing back before he and Nelson got big, in west Texas
towns like Breckenridge. In the back a couple of kids sipped cokes (the beer would emerge from hiding
later, at the lake), leaning back in lawn chairs and soaking up the rays.
Just plain unfair, Alex mumbled to himself.
As he passed the row of rusty mailboxes mounted near the store he paused to peer inside the one labeled
ROGAN in reflective plastic letters. A daddy longlegs scurried for cover as Alex's fingers probed.
Jack Blake waited behind the wheel of the idling truck, racing the oversized engine. He was fully
conscious of his status in the local adolescent hierarchy and gloried shamelessly in it, not yet old enough
to realize that it would all vanish the moment he entered the adult world beyond, where they didn't give a
damn about ostrich-skin boots or red pickups. For now, though, he was a king, and there was nothing
altruistic or benevolent about his despotism.
His eyes traced the outlines of Maggie's body as neatly as Mrs. Hawkins's opaque projector traced
scientific drawings for projection on the screen in their darkened science class. Foxy chick, Maggie
Gordon, even if she did hang around too much with that nerd Alex Rogan. Rogan was harmless, though.
Beneath Blake's notice.
Cindy Hammond sat next to him, staring impatiently out the window, anxious to get to the lake. He
looked forward to finding out if she'd fall out of her bathing suit. Such thoughts didn't keep him from
coveting Maggie Gordon. More important than having either one of them was having what was denied to
him. It was the taking that was important, the acquiring, though Blake formed the idea in much cruder
language.
"C'mon, Alex!" one of the boys in the back yelled.
"Pile in. . . . Jump in, Maggie!"
She handed up the basket, ice chest and towels, then climbed agilely over the tailgate, making sure to
leave room for Alex to follow. She saw him inspecting the mailbox.
"Did it come yet?"
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"Not yet." Reluctantly, as though it might still appear, Alex shut the front of the box. It didn't close all the
way. Mailboxes never did. All manufacturers designed them so they wouldn't close completely, Alex
knew, on explicit orders from the post office.
Seeing this, two of the guys in the truck bed began razzing the slow-moving Alex.
"What is it this time, Rogan?"
"Yeah, you joining the foreign legion or signing up for Space Shuttle school?"
"They don't take vidiots for Space Shuttle pilots, Rogan!"
Not one to be left out of the chorus, Blake leaned out the driver's window. "Yessir, folks, step right up
and meet the boy adventurer Alex Rogan, on the last leg of his worldwide trip to nowhere."
Alex continued toward the pickup, a sour smile creasing his face. "Very funny, Blake. If you guys think
I'm gonna stick around here, watch you shine your pickups, get drunk and vomit every Saturday night
and wind up at City College like everybody else, forget it. I'm gonna do something with my life!"
"You sure are, turkey," said Blake readily. "You're gonna go to work for old man Fargi fixin' TV sets. I'll
remember what you just said when you come over to fix my big-screen Sony."
"You haven't got a big-screen Sony, Blake."
The driver of the pickup smiled smugly. "No, but I'm going to, which is more than you can say for you,
dumbutt."
Alex had a brilliant riposte prepared, but the duel was interrupted by a voice not as easily dismissed.
"Alex?"
Wincing, he turned to look back toward his tin house. It was his mom, sure enough, leaning out one
window to call to him.
"Alex, Elvira's electric is out again." Innocent enough on the surface, commanding underneath.
The occupants of the truck were unable to stifle their laughter. His face burned. At least Maggie wasn't
laughing, though at this point that was small comfort. He tried to make his reply sound manly and forceful,
to no avail. No matter how hard he tried it still came out sounding like a whine.
"Ah, Mom. That'll take all day. I was going to Silver Lake."
She nodded, looked sympathetic as she gazed past him toward the truck full of his friends. Unfortunately,
someone had to fix the elec tricity, and Alex was trailer park repairman number one.
"I'm working lunch and dinner at the cafe, Alex. I'll be gone all day."
That was a low blow, he thought angrily. Why did mothers always have to fight like that? Must be a
talent passed down from mother to daughter, one of the many unfathomable maternal secrets boys could
never share. She wouldn't think of ordering him to do it, oh no.
He sighed, knowing that he'd already lost the battle, just as he knew she wouldn't have asked him to do
the work if she could have managed it herself.
"Okay, Mom, I'll do it."
She smiled back at him and he felt better. But only for a moment.
Turning back to the truck he sought Maggie's eyes. Maggie, who somehow managed to look twice as
pretty as any other girl in town despite the lack of makeup and the baggy old sweatshirt she wore on top.
He forced his reply. It made him sound noble, which was not how he felt.
"You better go ahead," he said.
"No, I'll wait for you." Romeo and Juliet, Tristan and Isolde, all the great tales of heroic love he'd studied
in school thrilled him no more than those few words from Maggie.
"No, this could take a while." More than a while, but he needed to use the lie now, to spare both of them
later embarrassment. "I'll catch up with you later."
She understood. He could tell by the look on her face. It was a small consolation.
"Okay. See you later."
"Sure," he muttered. "Later."
"Yeah, we'll be lookin' for you to fly over," said Blake, leading the others in laughter as he peeled the
pickup out of the lot and toward the highway.
Alex could still hear the laughter in his ears long after the big engine had faded into the distance.
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2
People who spend their lives in big cities see blue sky only on television. Oh, on rare clear days they may
think they're seeing sky blue, but it's not real, only a fake faded blue like the kind used in dyed turquoise.
To see the real sky you have to leave the city, get far away from the megalopoli. Out in the country the
universe crowds a little nearer the Earth and the hues of the spectrum have meaning.
The one other place where colors are always rendered purely is in any advertisement for faraway
regions. This extended to the starfield map which covered part of one wall of Alex and Louis's room. It
was surrounded by equally garish, less enlightened posters reflective of the more mundane aspects of
reality. The walls of the boys' room were more colorful than their clothing.
Especially that particular evening, when Alex finally shuffled into the room. He was exhausted and filthy.
Beneath his nails was the kind of sand and grit you can't wash out, the kind you learn to live with for days
until repeated baths have soaked it away-the kind of grime that has the look and consistency of black
concrete. Alex's spirits were lower than the surrounding desert's water table.
The small desk was filled with notes and scribblings for school. He slumped down in the used office chair
and swiveled to face the center of the room as he wrestled with his muddy boots, carefully removing
them and setting them aside so as to dirty the floor as little as possible.
Then he leaned back, letting his eyes focus on the mobile dangling from the ceiling. It pivoted in the light
of sundown, aimlessly reflective, its indecision about how to turn a mirror of his own feelings.
From beyond the thin wall and window came the conversation of neighbors. Alex recognized each one
and began to silently mimic the rarely changing words.
"Pleasant day today, eh?"
"Yep. Goin' be a pleasant day tomorrow, too."
"Goin' to be a pleasant summer, accordin' to the Farmer's Almanac."
The talk continued, but Alex had stopped imitating the unseen speakers. Instead he found himself sitting
straight up in his chair, frightened and aware. Aware of how that conversation had reached him virtually
unaltered on hundreds of similar evenings. Aware that if he didn't so something, and do it soon, he'd be
fixing 'lectrics and patching water lines and repairing recalcitrant garbage disposals while listening to the
same chatter for the rest of his life.
Such simple, cunning traps existence laid for the unwary! His mother owned the trailer park outright.
Easy enough for him to ease into handling the books as well as the repairs, to take over day-to-day
operation of the business from her. Was that what mom really wanted for him? Was she carefully and
efficiently leading him down that safe, secure, lethally dull path? He'd always doubted it before. Now he
wasn't so sure.
One thing he was certain of, though. If he fell into that waiting trap and allowed himself to take the easy
way out of making a living, he'd never escape. Never do anything in the world. It would be exactly like
Jack Blake had said, and the laughter that had trailed back to Alex from behind the pickup would follow
him, in the slightly more circumspect fashion of adults, for the rest of his life.
Damned if it would!
He slipped on clean shoes and fled from the friendly, warm room that had suddenly turned cold and alien
and threatening, rushed outside into the mild air of evening and forced himself to slow down.
There was nowhere to run to, except out the road or down into the desert. Not that he was running with
thoughts of any particular destination in mind. He ran to prove to himself that he, Alex Rogan, was still in
control and that life hadn't sealed him up in its smothering blanket of paycheck and taxes and eight-hour
workdays. Not yet it hadn't. He was going to do something.
If only he knew what.
It was dark outside, desert nights black as the days were bright. In the darkness the neon sign outside the
general store sputtered into intermittent life. Out back the big halogen lamp came alive, showing the way
for residents and visitors alike.
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He needed to do something, anything, to take his mind off his sudden terror. But there wasn't anything.
Only the radio and the television and one quarter-eating machine.
He'd run away from passivity and bland acceptance, so radio and TV were out of the question. They
represented a return to threatening reality, not an escape. On the other hand, the game was interactive,
dependent on his movements, on his decisions. Not like in real life, where such decisions were reserved
for adults. At a videogame any kid could be in command, could make life or death decisions (if only in
the abstract) on the glowing field of the screen, no matter if they concerned only eating dots, demented
gorillas or a not-too-bright knight in search of his kidnapped princess.
Or defending the Frontier against Xur and the Ko-Dan Armada.
The people who'd installed the game one Friday had told him it was a difficult one. At first it had been
hard for him, but now he'd grown bored with all but the hellaciously difficult upper levels. Most kids
never reached them and watched in awe as he sauntered rapidly through the lower ranges that defeated
their best efforts.
Now he played alone on the porch, and the machine responded with whizzes and explosions and mock
commands as he methodically worked his way up into the rarified strata beyond half a million points.
"Yeah, yeah," he muttered aloud, impatient as always with the basics. "Let's speed it up, huh?"
"Prepare for target light practice, Starfighter," the machine warned him in the same tone as always.
Better now. As the play grew steadily more involved he started to take an active interest in the glowing
goings-on. Already he'd run up a high score by concentrating on adding bonuses in the preliminary
rounds instead of simply blasting his way through each stage.
"Ready," he murmured, as if the machine could hear and understand. It could not, but it added to the fun.
He was relaxed again, calm and confident. His early fear had been wiped out by the need for him to
concentrate on every aspect of the game lest he get blown away through carelessness. He'd mastered the
game, true. He could play it in his sleep. But carelessness could trip up the most skillful player. Alex had
always prided himself on never losing a videogame because of some stupid, thoughtless mistake. The
game had to beat him. He wouldn't beat himself.
Someone else had heard the buzzes and pops and whines and had come out to see the light from the
screen reflected on Alex's face. Otis lit his final pipe of the day as he strolled over to watch. He liked the
games, too, but played only rarely. His hand-eye coordination wasn't as good as it used to be, and he'd
worked too many years to start squandering his quarters now.
It was just as much fun to watch the kids play, especially one as good as Alex. The coordination of
today's kids never ceased to amaze him.
In addition to liking the game, he also liked Alex Rogan. That prompted him to ask, "Where's Maggie?"
Alex's eyes never turned from the screen, but he heard.
"Good question. Out having a good time, I guess. At least, I haven't seen her since she went off with
everybody else this morning."
Otis concealed his smile. "Oh, I see. And you never have a 'good time,' that it?"
"Sure I do, Otis. I have some great times." Otis had insisted that Alex call him by his first name ever since
Alex could remember. "Mr. Davis" was someone else, the man who picked up pension checks at a
mailbox. Otis, on the other hand, was a friend.
"I love fixing the electric system, checking the plumbing, plunging toilets and cleaning up animal stuff." He
made a face. "Otis, I don't even get a chance to have a good time around here."
The game let loose with a flurry of bright lights and electronic sound effects. Alex had advanced still
another level. Now he caught his breath, flexed his fingers while waiting for the next setup to materialize.
"Things change; always do. I ought to know." Again the smile around the stem of the worn pipe. "You'll
get your chance, boy. Important thing is, when it comes, you got to be ready for it. You gotta grab it with
both hands an d hold on tight."
"Real profound, Otis."
"I don't pretend to be no philosophy professor, Alex. I didn't make as much as some folks either, but I
took care of what I made because I knew what I wanted out of life. A hundred bucks invested right is
better in ten years than a thousand bucks squandered now. I ain't rich, but I'm comfortable. I don't have
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摘要：

TheLastStarfighterALANDEANFOSTERbasedonascreenplaybyJONATHANBETUELCopyright1984byMCAPublishing,aDivisionofMCA,Inc.ISBN0-425-07255-Xe-bookver.1.0formynephewdaniel,afunone....1TheXurianshipexplodedinablazeofflame,whichwasbeginningtodissipateevenasAlexdrovehisgunstarthroughtheexpandingglobeofhotgasandv...

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