The Gravity of the Game

  Table of Contents

  Front Matter

  Gravity of the Game

  Epilogue

  Also from Superversive Press

  GRAVITY OF THE GAME

  BY

  JON DEL ARROZ

  © 2017 Superversive Press. All rights reserved.

  http://superversivepress.com/

  Edited by Sarah Craft and Bethany Jennings

  Cover Art: Shawn King

  ISBN: 978-1-925645-80-4

  GRAVITY OF THE GAME

  Jon Del Arroz

  Hideki squared his shoulders, planted his feet, and turned his head toward the pitcher who stood in what would have been center field back home. Jared Stewart extended his hands over his head, and rocked from heel to toe. The moment of truth would come soon.

  Jared released the ball, which flew toward Hideki with incredible speed. The act of hitting was a near-magical one, something Hideki had described to many high school classes for public relations events. The human eye didn’t have time to capture an image and process where the ball would be in relation to the plate before it crossed. Instead, a hitter’s mind tracked the release point of a ball and estimated, based on prior experience, where it would be in the ensuing seconds.

  This would mark one of the few instances in Hideki’s professional life where he would swing no matter his perception of the ball’s location. The point he needed to prove depended on it.

  Hideki cocked his arms back in what many referred to as his signature swing. He took a fateful step, and unloaded all of the energy he’d held in reserve.

  In Luna’s gravity, Hideki’s swing had little resistance. The shoulder aches and pains that typically plagued him in the twenty-five years since his retirement from professional play didn’t bother him in the least. Everything came easier on the moon. Walking, breathing, catching, throwing. To be young again!

  The ball whizzed by faster than Hideki could remember seeing one thrown in his professional career. His bat missed it by half a meter. Jose Cespedes, Ichiro’s deputy commissioner for the World Baseball League, stretched to try to catch the ball, but it sailed past him.

  “What the hell kind of throw was that, Jared?” Hideki asked.

  Jared gave a pronounced shrug. “The gravity’s got my delivery going screwy, Commish. I thought I threw it straight,” he shouted.

  The hope had been that Jared’s distance would compensate for the gravity differential between Luna and Earth. After more than seventy pitches, it was time to admit failure. “This isn’t going to work.” Hideki flipped his bat toward the ground and planted the top of the barrel as if it were a cane.

  Cespedes stood from his catching position. He grunted and surveyed the open dome, the newest in EdgyCola’s sponsored Luna City expansion. They had been allowed access to the undeveloped area because their CEO was a rabid baseball fan.

  Jared performed an acrobatic Lunar leap toward them, overshooting by several meters before dragging his feet across the ground. He laughed like a child on a playground, and walked toward them. “As fun as this is, did you think of using someone more acclimated to this environment?”

  “Yes,” Cespedes said. “But if we can’t have someone from Earth come play for publicity, then there’s little point. People here want to see the stars from back home. Besides, we can never have a single league if Earth players can’t compete.”

  “This was a waste of time,” Hideki said. “On top of that, you forgot to mention the reverse problem. Luna natives or someone who’s lived here for more than a year wouldn’t be able to come play on Earth. The gravity difference alone would put too much strain on their acclimated bodies.”

  “You argued that before, Commish.” Jared bent down to pick up some moon dirt, and let it sift through his hands. “But we agreed that if we could send our all-stars here even for a limited amount of time, the league would see substantial profits. That’s what matters, establishing the market. The game will expand naturally from there. It always has before.”

  Hideki stared up toward the sky, seeing the shine of the reflective dome in the distance. It was thin. One could forget the dome existed if they weren’t paying close attention. A fresh dome like this gave the WBL prime opportunity to capitalize on the real estate before the development opportunity vanished. If they wanted to expand baseball, and keep the game going as mankind kept expanding toward the stars, they had to come up with a solution. Or be outgrown.

  The next morning, Hideki bade a temporary farewell to his two colleagues before heading to the Luna City Children’s Hospital. A conveyer ushered Hideki into the lobby, where he scanned his thumbprint at the receptacle front desk. A holo-image flickered as an overlay on his glasses to direct him to the correct room.

  Hideki followed the directions up to a third floor room and knocked on the door. “Carl? Carl Suzuki?”

  A middle-aged woman sat in a chair beside a hospital bed. She stood and gave a small smile. “Mr. Ichiro?”

  A child lay strapped to a bed, plugged with tubes and I.V.s.—a chilling sight. Carl Suzuki looked every bit the ten-year-old boy from his Luna Wish Granters profile, but withered and thin compared to his holos.

  “Hello.” Hideki quieted his voice, unable to sound anything but somber. He was there to bring the kid some joy, but the hospital room and the child’s condition placed an oppressive weight on his psyche. A cool professionalism came over his face, an expression he often slipped into when greeted with bad news.

  Hideki cleared his throat, and forced a political smile. He stepped over to the bed and softly took the boy’s hand. “You must be Carl, and this is your mom?”

  The woman nodded. Her spirits appeared to lift with Hideki’s presence. “Thank you for coming. Isn’t that nice of Mr. Ichiro, Carl?”

  At first, Carl didn’t respond to Hideki’s touch or his mother’s question. The boy scanned Hideki. Those youthful eyes shone brightly as they fought the pain. He tugged lightly on Hideki’s fingers, and gave a grunt.

  It took everything in Hideki to not pull away, or recoil, from the touch that spoke so much of the cancer inside Carl. It reminded him of his own mortality. Instead, he stood and maintained his smile. “I’m happy to be here too,” he said, though it was a lie. His heart ached, seeing the boy in this condition. Carl’s grip had been so light that it made Hideki afraid to squeeze his hand. What if the child’s bones were so brittle they’d break at such a gesture?

  “Carl’s trying to say he’s happy to see you, Mr. Ichiro,” the mother translated. “I think he wants you to come even closer. I apologize, but he has trouble speaking. Sometimes he can only muster the strength to whisper.”

  Hideki leaned in toward Carl’s face. As he came closer, the foul odor of sickness overwhelmed him. He tried his best to breathe shallowly and stay positive for the boy.

  Carl gripped Hideki’s hand tighter. He didn’t attempt to sit up, but struggled to push sound from his mouth. The first noises were simple gurgles, but a whisper formed. “I… love… baseball. You’re… my dad’s… favorite. Thank… you.”

  For all of his thoughts about the general poor condition of the hospital, Hideki’s heart sank. It was fortuitous timing to receive the call in the first place from the Luna Wish Granters Foundation. Hideki would have come even if he didn’t have to visit the moon for expansion possibilities, but this gave his trip a far more important purpose.

  Tears streaked down his face, mirroring those in Carl’s own eyes. Hideki leaned yet closer and kissed Carl on the forehead. “No, thank you, Carl. Thank you. Baseball is for you. It’s all for you.”

  The flight back wasn’t bad, other than the typical re-entry turbulence into Earth’s atmosphere. After having spent a few days in Luna’s light gra
vity, decelerating into the force of Earth squished his body like a sardine in a can. Which is how the spacelines treated people on these flights anyway, even in first class. They crammed as many people onto each Earthbound flight as possible to save on fuel economy. Or so they said.

  The jet jolted and bounced around the sky as it broke through Earth’s atmosphere. Commercial flights were one of the safest forms of travel, with a one in a million chance or less of breaking up in the atmosphere, but how could someone in his position not consider the possibility of failing heat shields or busted components? The slightest malfunction and expanding the league would be the least of his problems.

  As with any normal flight, Hideki’s fears proved irrational. The jet touched down without incident, and Hideki parted ways with Cespedes and Stewart.

  Hideki liked Hong Kong, even though it was easy to get lost in the largest mega-city in the world. Almost fifty million people conglomerated here for a reason. It pulsed with life, full of lights and—most importantly for the WBL—full of business sponsors.

  When he landed, he hopped into a hovertaxi and stared out the window the entire ride home. Carl’s face haunted him in the reflection of the cab. No matter what he tried to ponder, he couldn’t shake the image. They flew past Chien Silicon Edge Stadium, home of the Dragonflies, and he wished silently that he could bring the boy to see a live game before his cancer caught up with him.

  At some point during the drive, Hideki fell asleep, which he discovered by waking with a kink in his neck, his head pressed against the window. The hovertaxi parked at the 10th floor landing pad atop the four hundred story apartment building where Hideki made his residence. To make the last leg of his journey easier, Hideki could have directed the driver to one of the upper landing pads, but Hideki didn’t like to share his wealth or identity with strangers. He gave a thumbscan to auto-debit a payment from his account on the cabbie’s scanner, and walked inside.

  Even on the lower levels of this building, the lobbies had a posh, modern theme. Marble slabs coated the floors and walls, bending the eye to a shiny manufactured-gold elevator door. Hideki pressed the button for the elevator, stepped in, gave his thumbscan again, then shot upward.

  He gave one more scan to open apartment door and he was back home. The place had high ceilings, built with similar gaudy marble as the lobbies. The design was more lavish than Hideki’s personal style, but his wife liked it. Her approval was what was important in a home. At the same time, he couldn’t complain about the view, which overlooked Kowloon Bay.

  He took off his coat, stepping into his entryway. That simple act gave him a sense of freedom, finally off work.

  “Hideki?” A voice called. Susan. The warmth of her voice further relaxed him. How could he spend so many days away from that sweet sound?

  “It’s just me, honey,” Hideki said, launching his coat over the back of his couch. He loosened his tie and headed for the bedroom. The jet landed late, and Susan likely went to bed several hours ago.

  When he arrived at the bedroom, Hideki saw her. He stuttered a breath, as always when he returned from a long trip. Her beauty was unparalleled, even in her sixties. Her skin looked smoother than the Luna dome, and her smile conveyed an honesty that made the rest of the world appear a liar. Cosmetic upgrades took away any lines in her face that she would have had, which Hideki had protested when she first expressed her desire to have the procedure. It seemed a silly argument now, wanting her to stay natural. She countered his argument by reminding him that he’d had a hair follicle regrowth and coloring therapy that brought back his natural youth, so why should she not be able to do the same? Susan never lost an argument.

  No matter what she’d done, she was beautiful. Susan did leave a few strands of grey in with her dirty blonde hair, forever keeping her at that late-thirties relative age that she said was her favorite time in life. “It’s a time when you know who you are, you’re trying for yourself but you’re still at the top of your game, you know?”

  Those words could have come from his own mouth, and thinking about it made him long for the days when he played for Ginowan City. They came so close to the World Series, a treasure that teams qualified for and competed every four years, but it was not to be. If only he’d been three or four years younger, perhaps he would have had another shot.

  But could he complain? He made his way into coaching and then into the front office. That landed him here, one of the youngest commissioners in decades. His tenure could last a long time, and he’d be able to make great strides for the game.

  If he were smarter, he would have lain on the bed, and fallen right into Susan’s arms. But Hideki had stress that he carried with him to the point where it made his head buzz and his shoulders tight. He couldn’t lie down. Instead, he stepped to the window, staring out toward the horizon, where the moon shone down on the bay below.

  Susan slipped behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and gave a squeeze. “What’s wrong, Hideki?”

  “Nothing,” he said stubbornly.

  “I know you better than that. Come on. If you can’t talk to me, who can you talk to?”

  That was the billion yuan question. Who could he talk to? Hideki let out a breath through his nose, as he once had been instructed by a fellow teammate who attempted to teach him meditation. Airflow held vital importance in achieving that restful state. Hideki took to the breathing as stress relief, but ignored the rest of the talk about ki and energy. “I’m sorry, Susan. I shouldn’t have shut you out when I’m just back from my flight,” he said, turning to return her embrace. “I just… I don’t think the Lunar expansion proposition will succeed. It was a naïve dream.”

  There. He’d finally said it. Admitted to himself that the pitfalls were insurmountable. He hadn’t wanted to say the words because he felt like he was letting that boy, Carl, down. The kid stuck with him even through the trip home. More than just a dying kid to whom he couldn’t grant a wish, Carl was a symbol of Hideki’s failure.

  “What happened up there?” Susan said, sliding her hands gracefully off of him but managing to snag his hand in the process. She tugged him over to the bed, seating herself and patting the spot next to her. Her care was tender, true. The same woman he married all those years ago.

  Hideki had no choice but to sit down beside her. Susan went to work unbuttoning his shirt from his neckline all the way down to his belly, revealing the sleeveless white undershirt below. All the time, Hideki talked, telling her about the plan and how it had failed. He paused, reflecting for a long moment before he told her of the boy, Carl. He couldn’t control his tears. That moment came to mind so vividly. What would he have done without Susan’s bosom to dry his face?

  She stroked his hair.

  “I don’t know what to do, Susan. There’s no way baseball can work on the moon.”

  “You gave it your best shot, dear.”

  “There has to be something I can do. The fans deserve better; Carl deserves better. I’m the commissioner. It’s on me to make this happen.”

  “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” Susan squeezed his shoulder, which was more tightly wound than a hardball. She started to work the knot, and Hideki melted into her.

  “Perhaps you are right. Maybe the club owners will have some thoughts tomorrow.”

  “Let tomorrow’s worries stay then. Let’s go to bed, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Hideki overslept.

  It marked the first morning he’d lost track of time since he was in secondary school. His teacher had shamed him by making him stand at the front of the class, his peers watching him the entire hour. The punishment humiliated him—being singled out like that. He vowed never to be late again, and over the years became known for his promptness and professionalism. It had become a matter of pride. But with the jetlag from returning home the prior evening, he’d forgotten to set his alarm.

  Hideki scrambled to get his suit on, leaving the cuff links and tie for the car ride. He gave Susan a quick kiss g
oodbye. After he fell apart in her arms the prior evening, he wanted to say so much more, to thank her for all of her patience through all of the years. For whatever reason, it always seemed like there would be a better time and a better place for that.

  By the time he reached the World Baseball League offices, he was twenty minutes late. Many of the owners or representatives from the league’s two hundred and fifty teams met behind a closed conference room door, discussing their agenda without him. Hong Kong real estate proved a pricey office for the WBL, where space was already at a premium and had been for a couple hundred years, but being there did create a certain air of seriousness and prestige.

  Hideki stepped inside.

  “First on the docket is Toluca’s team’s wish for a new stadium, and to move that stadium into Santiago Tianguistenco. The problem is, this infringes upon Mexico City’s territorial rights based on a signed agreement between the ownership group of the Toluca Coyotes and Mexico Verde, Inc., dated November twenty-second, twenty-two-sixty-three,” said Jose Cespedes, reading from a document on his tablet. Cespedes glanced up from the screen, catching Hideki’s eye.

  Toluca’s representative, Yonder Cabrera, stood as Hideki attempted to take his place at the table. The man pushed his chair into Hideki’s path, cutting him off. The brim of Yonder’s cowboy hat lifted, and his complexion turned to a fuming, bright red. “That agreement was always meant to be temporary and was not disclosed upon the purchase of the team. Our current location is not viable given the state of the market. Are you really going to cower to Mexico City because of their already higher share of revenue? All of you small market owners, beware the league!” Yonder wagged a warning finger toward all of them.

  The argument had been presented ad nauseam over the years. The topic of the move was posed during every quarterly meeting since Hideki became commissioner, and summarily tabled. No one wanted to lend their political capital within the league to either team, leaving a stalemate for the Coyotes for five seasons running. Hideki understood Yonder’s pain, but now wasn’t the time to encourage that squabble.