Michael James Heartly

Chapter Two

 

Merry Christmas 

Six months later a purple haired astro-scientist was enjoying the solitude of being in orbit aboard the Buccaneer Three. While making an entry about one of her experiments, monitor two went blank. She smacked it. The graph popped on for a moment before going dark again. She used the intercom, “Raspin, monitor two in the science bay is out.” The speaker in the tiny dark compartment chirped, “S O Harker. Bridge, Report.” The fireplug-sized Science Officer replied, “More fucking electronics crapping out. Over.” 

          She continued noting data on the third monitor that was next to the two tanks of fetid brown water. One held exotic boy and girl sea creatures. The other, a solitary golden dwarf moray eel. The smell took some getting used to. Working in space? Not her favorite posting ever.

           Behind her, the civilian technician was finishing his inspections and clattering his way to her. Harker could see his usual smirk as he opened the rear hatch and floated next to her. He was the All-American boy: young, tanned, square-jawed, cocky, and sporting an antique blond mullet that stuck straight up in zero gravity. He immediately wrapped his knuckles on the first fish tank.

          “Hey Pinky, I think your fish are dead…if they are fish?” 

          “They are real, Drew.”

          “They don’t look like no fish I’ve ever eaten…” Without looking up from her pad, Harker countered, “They were captured in the Mariana Trench. Surely, you've heard of that.” With a low groan, she Velcroed her pad to the hull next to the large red ‘Tank Discharge’ button and set him straight, “And they are not mine. They belong to G R I.. And Captain Maxwell and I would be grateful if you stick to your end of the deal on this ‘trash tug’ as you call it. Neither of us have any dreams of spending a single sol on Mars. When can you fix this monitor?” 

          Drew smiled and said, “I put it on my list. Anyway, this scavenger gig is just a rung up the ladder for me…you two gals can keep your fish. I’m scheduled for review the moment we touch down five months from now.” He tapped the second fish tank and taunted. “Future dinner for Mars? I hear the food up there is better than the slop we get on this hulk.” He swept his gloved hand over the red discharge button and teased, “Oops... frozen fish now…”

She had had enough. She demanded, “Power meters?” 

          “77.6 percent. Good to go, retired second lieutenant,” he said, sarcastically emphasizing the ‘second’ part. He then pushed off and floated back toward the stern of the spacecraft. She angrily smashed her fist against the hatch button. The divider slammed shut. “Asshole,” she muttered. Inching closer to the eels’ tank, she searched for movement. Nothing. It was alive in there somewhere. Her concern evaporated when the forward hatch whisked open and her partner from the United States Air Force Reserve Command floated in. 

          “What a maroon,” she joked. “five more months with that animal. God help us, Penny.” 

          “He’s just jealous of your fish, Sunny. What’s our status?” 

           Penny Maxwell was a tall glass of cold water. She was a slender, serious, unflinching, and by-the-book woman. Sunny pointed to the fish tank and said, “I wish he’d quit disturbing Lucy and Ricky.” Penny chuckled and asked, “What’s the eel’s name?” 

          “Drew.” They both laughed. The rapid ticking continued as Sunny noted the Mariana snailfish’s heart rate. Penny reached to the compartment near the rear hatch and pulled out a small roll of gray duct tape. Yanking a length of it, she floated to the side of monitor two and fiddled with the wire behind it.

           “That’s it,” said Sunny. “Good ol’ G R I crap. Thanks.”

           “Gotta’ do, what we gotta’ do,” said Penny as she stowed the miracle material away.                “By the way, we’ve got a real spinner ahead. It’s that Chinese heap.” 

           Just then, they were bathed in a pulsing red light as alarm bells started ringing. The spacecraft’s calm, female computer voice echoed throughout the vessel, “Proximity Alert…Proximity Alert…” 

          “It’s probably nothing. Get his highness on it,” instructed Maxwell. Sunny alerted him,           "Raspin, this is for you.”

          Drew immediately floated for his domain: the rear remote-retrieval module. He slid into the retrieval bay chair and took the controls. Through the curved glass extension, even he had to appreciate the breathtaking nighttime view of Spain’s sparkling city lights. He was ready for action. 

          The Buccaneer Three was the size of a Navy Phantom Class submarine. At the stern of the ship were the ten round rescue pods for their bounty. Each was wrapped in gold Kapton to protect their borderline legal spoils from the harmful rays of the sun. From the rear porthole, the pods looked like a magnificent golden mountain range against the black expanse of space. Pod Number One was the crew’s escape pod. They named it R2. 

           Sunny floated through the forward hatch to the Bridge. She strapped into the copilot chair, logged in, and quickly overrode the alarm. The bells mercifully stopped. She could finally think. Calmly, she commanded the computer. “VRP please.” The Virtual Reality Projection bubble blinked as it popped on. A modest sense of control buoyed her as the video feeds from outside the craft were projected across the light blue walls of the bubble.

          “Proximity alert object, please,” she instructed. 

          Immediately, a green graph glimmered on the wall to her left. It looked like the spherical radar scopes from World War II. Clearly, Galaxy had spared no expense on that crusty accumulation of floating spare parts. 

           The threatening object in question was blinking on the upper right of the radar screen. She flipped on the intercom, “Bearing zero, seven, two. Range ten miles and heading away. False alarm. Yer off the hook, Mister Martian.” 

          Maxwell glided into the pilot’s chair next to Sunny and tethered herself in. She checked her instrument readout and summoned G R I Ground Control. “Ground…Buck Three.” 

          “Control here. Roger.”

          The Cap Con dude popped onto the bubble wall. He was round and bald with a full black ’stash and beard. He pushed his thick black glasses back with his forefinger as Maxwell continued. “Proximity alert…false alarm. Object is moving away from us.”

          “That’s affirmative, Buccaneer Three. You are coming up on Satellite 729 delta dash 20 at your nine. Prepare to engage.” 

           Maxwell commanded the spacecraft’s computer. “Show sat 729, please.” The image switched to the aft of the spacecraft. Sunny checked her readout and said, “Copy. Sat 729 in sight. Bearing zero one zero. Range five hundred yards. Copy?” 

          “Buck Three…Control. Copy that. We confirm.” 

           “Roger…Buccaneer Three out,” said Maxwell while flipping the off switch. The bearded dude blinked away. Maxwell then spoke into the ship’s comms. “Bridge, E O, we’ve got a real spinner out there. This is going to be a little delicate. I think we should adjust the flow. What’s the grab distance? Let’s take a gander.” Penny tapped a button, and the spinning dot appeared on the large cabin readout. Another tap, and the dot magnified.

          “That is spinning like crazy,” chimed Sunny. Behind them, they could see Raspin approaching cautiously. He pushed his head inside the bubble.

          “Grab and go. Easy peasy,” he suggested. 

          The satellite’s out-of-control spinning was mesmerizing. Sunny looked at Drew and said, “One mistake and they will be vacuuming up pieces of us.”

          “Copy that,” he reluctantly agreed. 

          Maxwell adjusted the radar scope. The green dot blinking near the top of the graph showed their bounty. Out of nowhere, a green square appeared at the bottom. Sunny noticed the strange pattern and lilted, “Hello?” She inspected the bright green object. The anomaly seemed to skip a beat. Then it blinked out…then it reappeared. Sunny said to Raspin, “This radar screen is on the fritz again. Can you check the baselines, please?”

          “Instrumentation?” asked Penny.

          “Possibly. Bearing one, nine, zero. Range five miles.” The three of them watched as their new problem slowly expanded to the full width of the radar scope. It appeared to be miles wide.

          “What the hell?” asked Drew. 

           “Copy. Switching to IR,” said Sunny. “Bearing one, eight, zero. Range four miles now.” She flipped the switch and watched eagerly as a new image labeled INFRARED materialized to her right. Sat 729 was in the upper field and was blinking from red to orange to red. The unknown at the bottom of the screen was a bright royal blue. 

           “Checking bogey at our six,” said Maxwell. “Range three point five miles. Sunny, check the sat atlas again. What we got tailing us?” 

          “Whatever it is, the bastard is dead.”

          “Drew…check guidance below…please.”

          “Aye, Cappy,” said Drew as he exited the bubble. 

          “It’s gaining,” said Sunny with urgency.

          Penny stiffened in her chair and said calmly, “I see it.” She flipped the voice-activated comms on. “GRI control, Buck Three.” Penny’s voice cracked as her speech sped up. “We’ve got a bogey up here! Do you have anything in our sector?” The bearded dude popped back on. He was looking down at his readouts. “Copy that Buck Three. Checking NASA and Space Command.” 

           Sunny then reached for the joystick. She swiveled the rear camera to focus on the unknown. Gleaming in the distance was a silvery band at the bottom of the picture. It looked enormous. Sunny mumbled to herself, “What in the name of…” 

          A moment later, Cap Comm responded, “Buck Three. Ground control. That’s a negative.” 

          “What? That’s infuckingpossible!” shouted Sunny. “Range now three hundred yards!” Just then, the bearded man blinked off and the blue bubble around the two women dissolved. Sunny quickly let go of the joystick and panted, “I didn’t do it…” 

Penny attempted to remain calm, “Ground, we’ve lost AI. Sunny, check VRP.”

          “I’ve got nothing.” 

           “Going to auxiliary…” The second Penny flicked the switch, the cabin running lights blinked out. All that was left were the hundreds of tiny LED indicator lights on the instrument panels. Tensions were rising fast. 

          “Must be a short circuit. Used crap, all of it!” complained Sunny. She punched her microphone. “Control. We have aux failure. Do you have anything?” She unbuckled, grabbed a handhold, and pushed herself to the rear porthole. She peered out beyond the golden mountain range and declared, “Penny, that thing is huge. Range…one-hundred yards.”

Penny raised her voice slightly. “Ground…do you read? Object closing. Please confirm.”

          “Buck Three, ground… zzz zzzz p p p p p p p.” The cabin speaker was spitting static. Maxwell reached over her head to a panel of switches and yelled, “Overriding to manual.” A loud thump and a click and…nothing. Sunny frantically shouted to below deck. “Drew, override! We are flying blind!” Drew popped his head up into the cabin and shouted, “Who’s trying to snake our mission?” 

          “Nobody,” barked Sunny. “That thing could swallow us whole if it wanted to.” 

Without warning, the cabin went silent, and all their instrument lights went out. They were frozen in total blackness. In what felt like an eternity, the emergency lights turned on with a soft murmur. As the slow, whirling hum got louder, Maxwell shouted, “Get below, Raspin! Check all backups.” His head had just disappeared when the emergency lights also dimmed out. Total silence. No light at all. Their spaceship was dead. Perfect. 

          “Peel, stow, and drop people. Suit up now,” said Maxwell as she grabbed her LED flashlight. Nothing. 

           “Batteries dead,” she said as she pulled out a handful of eight-inch-long plastic tubes from an overhead pouch. She bent two of them in half, releasing the bright iridescent green liquid. She gave Sunny a handful.

           “Click…click…click.” 

           Their faces were blush with instant green chemical luminescence. Once into the blacked-out cabin below, the green glow showed Raspin was already hanging in his suit. They quickly joined in suiting up. Penny pushed her comm button. Nothing. She lifted her faceplate. “Oxygen generators are dead. Helmets open.” 

          Drew shuddered, “What is happening? Did we get hit?” Maxwell handed him two glow tubes and said, “Doubtful. Everything is dead. Here…break these.” Drew broke them both. His white Snoopy cap stripe turned the brilliant green. Penny pushed toward the hatch and said, “R2…now people.” 

            They reached the circular door with a large number 1 emblazoned on it. Raspin opened the hatch. They floated in. Maxwell hit the auxiliary switch. Zip. The three of them watched helplessly as four glow sticks floated silently in the airtight pod. Three bright green forehead stripes glowed in the dark. Their environmental suits were dead. Soon, they would be dead. 

          Maxwell hit her comm button. “Mayday! Mayday! This is Golf Romeo Three. Mayday! This is Golf Romeo Three. We are out of power. Anyone receiving this on any frequency please respond.” 

           Raspin pointed to Penny and with a slight shudder in his voice said, “No worries. This pod can keep us alive.” Penny agreed. “Yes. We should be able to survive in this for a week. We will have to strap on oxygen to work. Raspin, you are gonna’ have to manually generate some power so we can get comms back.” He shook his head in disbelief. This was not how any of them had intended to die. 

          “This sucks. Best guess?” he asked.

          “Electronic Magnetic Pulse maybe,” said Penny, almost to herself. She then declared,             “We’re gonna’ sit tight and figure this out. We will work the problem, folks.” 

          “How?” Raspin said in frustration. Penny was silent. Her mind was racing to come up with an answer when R2’s instrument lights popped on. The unmistakable whirl of computers booting, and the sweet smell of ozone was a relief. 

          “Much better,” said Penny with a glimmer of hope in her voice.

          “How the hell did you manage that?” joked Sunny. Raspin hit the interior lighting switch which almost blinded them. They sat in silence as the hum increased throughout the spaceship. 

          “So much for EMP,” said Sunny. Penny nodded yes. She then tried to raise Galaxy Recovery. “Ground…Buccaneer Three. Do you read us?” Ground control crackled in her earpiece. “Buccaneer Three…Ground control…we copy. Status check.”

          “Roger, ground. All systems are green.” She then spoke out loud. “Checking telemetry. Copy?”

          “You are right on the line, Buck Three.”

           “Switching to secure channel.” Control replied, “Copy…on our mark…mark.” Penny motioned Raspin pushed himself out into the central tube. Sunny floated out next and held on to the hatch opening as Penny spoke into her Snoopy microphone, “We have mission clearance, copy?” His muffled reply could be heard from Penny’s earpiece. “Copy. You are a go for the next twenty-four hours.” 

          “We were eighty-sixed up here,” said Penny. “We had a bogey. Are you tracking it? Copy?”

          “Buck Three, ground. Negative spikes.” Eavesdropping, Sunny swung back inside the pod and said, “That is bullshit!” Penny waved her hand to shush her as she replied, “Look, somebody was messing with us. We lost all control. Now…you and I know who’s doing this. We want to file an immediate article 520 slash B complaint to Space Command. Copy?”

          “Roger, Buck Three. We will review. All readouts nominal.”

Penny shrugged her shoulders at Sunny and said, “Buck Three out.” Sunny said softly, “If an EMP had hit us, everything would have been fried. So, what was that?” 

           “Good question,” deadpanned Penny. Raspin snapped, “It’s the god-damn Eben’s, or the Gray's, or the Lizard people. We all know that.” Penny ignored him and ordered, “Let’s get out of this pod. Raspin, you check comms and power. Sunny, let's head up front.”

          “Roger that,” said Sunny. The three of them headed for the bridge. In the science bay, Sunny stopped in horror and pointed to the fish tanks and said, “Look, no readings. Flatlined.” Raspin moved to the speaker to listen for the telltale clicking.

          “Nothing…sorry kid,” he said. “Guess we’ll have to survive on powdered cod.” He moved his hand over the discharge button and threatened. “Preparing to jettison.” Penny slapped him on his chest. “A little trigger happy there Rambo? Look at the energy readouts. Something sent those graphs off the scale. This is bizarre. We need a full accounting. The complete checklist. Double check everything.”

           Penny and Sunny were in the VRP bubble. Raspin was at the back of the ship reviewing his auxiliary checklist. Everything seemed unaffected. They spent the next three hours scouring every nook and cranny of the ship when ground control popped on. 

          Blinking on the bubble was the latest GRI college intern: a blond hair, blue eyed, fresh-as-a-daisy, full-breasted, Cap-Comm female. Her nasal voice echoed throughout the craft. “Galaxy Recovery vehicle Three we have a message from the National Security Agency.”

Sunny shot a look at Penny and mouthed, “N S A?”

          “Copy ground. Go ahead,” said Penny.

          “Mission for Sat 729 Delta dash 20 has been scrubbed.”

          “Say again control?”

          “Effective immediately, the back-up crew is in transit to liftoff at 09:00 hours PCT.  Maxwell, Harker, and Raspin… you have been relieved of your commissions. You will be transported to the Los Angeles base for debriefing immediately upon descent to the G R I platform. Prepare to be boarded. Ground out.”

          Silence.

          Sunny ripped her cap off and bounced it off her control board. “Well, crap! I am totally not ready to be back on earth this soon.” She closed her eyes and said, “All my shit is in storage. I’ll have to find another cardboard box to live in.” Penny grabbed Sunny’s floating cap, handed it back and said, “Prepare to be boarded.”

          Tugging the cap back on Sunny blurted, “Merry Fucking Christmas…every fucking one.”

 

 

 

Chapter Three

 

Headphones

While the crew of the Buck 3 were transporting to base, Commander Lang was winding up her run in the cool morning mist when the lone Tic-Tac self-driver stopped to let her sprint across Virginia Ave. With the Potomac on her right, the smell of freshly churned clay sparked a quick glance to her left as she headed for the Kennedy Center. One lone bulldozer was in the massive pit that was once the Watergate II. Her headphones were snuffing out the construction clatter and allowing her to speed along to Mozart’s Jupiter symphony. She hit the asphalt bike path and said, “Time.” The symphony faded for the computer, “You have twenty minutes to meeting,” 

          Right on schedule. 

          Underfoot, the bike path had been dug up. Like a race car in a chicane, she was working around the potholes and uneven pavement when her high priced headphones couldn’t cancel the distant rumble of trouble. She could make out the high pitch screeching of motor bikes approaching from behind. Gas powered? Her curiosity increased as she prepared mentally for a confrontation. She stopped and eyed the miscreants. Two bikers were plowing their way up the path leaving a trail of black smoke. Not a ‘dirt bike’ path she thought to herself. 

          Biker number one flew past her, missing her by inches. Her face showed no emotion as number two spun a donut around her, and zipped past. She diagnosed the situation. To her, they were like two baby bulls: snorting and grunting. 

          “Oh-ley, bring it on,” she thought to herself as they slumped on what appeared to be a combination of bike parts. Do-it-yourselfers she figured. Grease monkeys. Dirtbags. The telltale gurgling of the motors backfiring and puffing gray smoke betrayed their lack of motorbike repair skills. Still, she did appreciate the rarity of their rides.

           “Nice bikes,” she said sarcastically. “Junkyard going-out-of-business sale? You guys built those?”

          “Yeah. We rockin these sister,” bragged the blonde dirtbag number one. They were both wearing the latest in street wear. Raggedy jeans with oil stains and holes and three layers of different shirts. They topped-off their look with long black raincoats with hoods. Number two must’ve been the leader of the dirtbag team. He was heavier and older. His bright orange hair was standing six inches straight up. She didn’t see any gang tats. Amateurs, and only two of ‘em. No matter. 

          “I do not have time for shit talking. Later dudes,” she said, sprinting between them. 

          “Wait! Come back here, bitch!” yelled number one as he gunned his bike and sped alongside her. She didn’t break her stride. Number two flew past and spun around and shouted, “She’s an old woman Dee. Ain't worth the time.”

          “Naw man, she tight Freddy.” 

She leapt forward and hustled by them. The Kennedy center was yards away. They then drove past her again and turned around. The bikers tightened their grip on their brake handles and spun their rear tires. Blue smoke floated into the morning breeze, filling the path with the choking smell of burnt rubber. 

          Then, in some sort of ritualistic ceremony, each raised his hood. She was not intimidated. She almost laughed out loud. The two revved their motors once more and released their brakes. As they flew by, Dee ripped the headphones off her head. She turned around to see the tails of the two black raincoats fluttering into the woods. Pulling her tiny comm piece from her jacket, she commanded. “Show me my earphones.” A map appeared. The red dot showed her position on the bike path. There they were. The tracking beacon in her headphones was moving north. She figured they were heading into Rock Creek Park. She would deal with them later.

#

The white marble walls of the Kennedy Center rose before her. That morning, she chose to enter the KC via the parking garage. She turned up F Street and hit the North exit. The guard saw her and stood up in his little booth. She waved. He motioned her onward. She jogged into the top floor of the parking garage. A quick right, then up a set of metal stairs and she pulled her ID badge and slid it through the card reader. She was in. She ran past the scores of large show posters hailing from eons ago. It was Loading Dock One. She was running as fast as she dared, zipping through another door and turning right into a large room. It had red steel poles about ten feet apart. Above was a grid of small I-beams. She worked her way past the large rolling racks of matte-black dance floor. 

          “Hello old friend,” she whispered as she passed under the Opera House stage. Down to the left and up another set of stairs and she was in the dressing room area. A sense of comfort filled her as mirrors framed with metal caged light bulbs blinked past. The dressing rooms still had that marvelous pancake and powder smell. As she quickened her pace, the coffee aroma hit her. The canteen was tempting. Maybe a fresh slice of hot apple pie? But she hurried around another corner and galloped by an open door. A stagehand shouted from it,      “Hey Sparky!”

          “Hey Hank!”

          “Where are your earphones, young lady?”

          “I’m on my way to get ‘em…ciao.”

          She used her ID to enter another door and flew down two more flights of metal stairs. The cinder block walls had changed to concrete, and the air was chilly. She still had time. Down a narrow block-long hallway she approached the glass partition and its armed guard. She held her ID up and the door opened. 

           She had made it all the way to the other side of The Kennedy Center. If she had managed any farther, she’d have been floating in the Potomac. In front of her was her apartment door.

#

If you wanted to build a spy center close to the Pentagon and Capitol Hill and have access to the Potomac River, where would you build it? Right in front of everybody. A long time ago, a mixed-use building was built on the South side of the large white Kennedy Center rectangle: The Reach. A sleek, modern building nestled in a small pasture that edged the highway. But deep under the collection of dance studios, classrooms, galleries, and theater spaces was the Department of Defense, and her center of operations. Her lair.

#

Scan, scan, and push. Slowing her breathing, the pitch black room calmed her. Clap…clap. Small blue LEDs filled the space. While yanking her sweaty jogging top off, she quickly headed for her office. She tossed her jacket onto the black laminate counter on her left and sat in a white egg chair hanging from the ceiling. 

           “Thank the maker,” she said out loud as she pried off her shoes. Her leggings and sticky socks were next to be shoved off. She then opened her fire-engine red 1955 Imperial Frigidaire and fanned the door to cool her overheated naked body. A refreshing electrolyte drink filled the ticket. She pressed it against her forehead.

           Her meeting was in two minutes. She started moving her unclad sepia body toward her desk when she remembered the folks in Command had castigated her for ‘accidentally’ revealing her breasts. Puritans. Even though she kept her home at a comfy seventy-five degrees, she had a quilt handy on the kitchen counter. She wrapped it around herself and sat.

“VRP Felix,” she said as she untied her hair bun, letting her tresses fall behind her. A hologram spread from the floor to the ceiling in the dark room. Before her was a still photo of a small office and a brown office chair. A separate square to her right showed her sitting at her desk. She picked up her hairbrush and tried to straighten her damp mane as if in front of a mirror. She pulled the quilt tighter. No costume malfunctions in front of the boss.

‘ML 275 has Joined’ popped up on the lower left of the projection. Then ‘DD 25 has joined’ scrolled by. The projection jittered as the top of the office chair became a tan blur. DD25 was in the chair. She was guessing he was probably a retired officer. She only knew him as Control. The fingers attached to the blurred human typed: “08:00 meeting commences. ML 275 to DD 25.” 

          “Yes sir. ML 275 at the ready,” she said. “I understand we had a fast mover yesterday.”

          “Code in,” the blurred image growled.

She pushed a button, and the projection disappeared as the desktop monitor flipped on. She quickly went to her egg and grabbed her ID lanyard. She adjusted the slippery quilt as she merrily hopped back to her chair. The monitor displayed the same blurred-head view. 

          “Line secured,” her computer confirmed.

          “Thank you, Felix.”

          Crap, no headphones. She had to go old-school. She pulled out an old gaming type of half headset with a microphone boom. When she placed her ID on a glass pane to her right, a small compartment latch on the desk popped up. Inside was a small key. Silver, with a quarter inch circular shaft with ridges. It looked like the old Coke Machine keys. She put it into the round slot in the compartment and said, “Thunder.” 

Control countered. “Flash. On 3…2…1…” They twisted keys together. Her ancient headphones were uncomfortable, she squirmed as she said, “Yes, sir?”

          “I caught a glimpse of you without that big red thing on your head. That’s a first.”

          “Don’t get used to it sir,” she replied.

          “I have a brief,” scowled Control.

          “About the Thalassians sir?”

          “The USP is nothing. A geostationary orbiting pirate hulk grabbing a Chinese Satellite suffered a catastrophic loss. A crew of three owned and operated by Galaxy Recovery.” 

          “G R I?  When is Galaxy Recovery gonna have their clearance revoked? I wouldn’t trust them to build me a doghouse. How many dead this time?”

           “No dead. The ship lost all power. Even battery life. The commander, a retired Captain Maxwell, filed a complaint with Space Command. Her co-pilot claims she saw a UAP. Perhaps Santa Clause is coming to town.”

          “Again?”

          “Mali…I don’t think I’ve ever seen your hair down before. I like it.”

          “You have me at an advantage, sir. All I can see is a blur. It’s unusual for Surfers to be away from their power source. The Promers then?” 

          “We believe it was the Rums.”

          “The Meitneriums? They never interact with humans.”

          “Running the data. We think the Rummies are up to something.”

           An uncomfortable pit was forming in her stomach. She stood up, tightened her wrap, and walked to the refrigerator. As she swung the fridge door open, she could hear Control behind her saying, “We are sending replacements. Debriefing tomorrow in Los Angeles. Details arriving via secure transmission.”

          Pulling the fridge door closer to look over the top she said, “The Meitneriums never work for free. What is the off world requite?”

          “Three figures at least.”

          “Over a hundred? How long will this take?”

          “Unknown.”

          “I am due for my adoption guardian status hearing in three days.”

          “Sorry Lang. We’ve had a class five interaction. Your leave is cancelled…indefinitely.”           Mali slumped against the refrigerator. Her burgeoning maternal instincts were being snuffed out. She barked, “Rums?”

          “We believe so.” She pulled out a bowl of large mango slices and faced the screen. The blurred head pointed at the camera and said warmly, “I really do like your hair. We’ve got the location of your gear.”

          “I can handle it…sir.”

          “Under the Connecticut Avenue arches. Between Beach and Cathedral. Back-up is on the way. They will be discreet.”

          “I will take care of it, Sir…Felix, ML 275 out.” 

          The virtual reality wall blinked out. Mali stood silently in her kitchen and dropped her quilt to the floor. 

          “Felix.”

          “Yes…?”

          “Vanilla please.” Irritated, she slid her left foot under the quilt and launched it to the black granite counter. Bullseye. 

          Instantly the unmistakable scent of vanilla filled the room. She crushed a huge slice of mango, placed the bowl back, slammed the refrigerator door and shouted, “A Rummy Santa! Shit. What now?”