by Mack Maloney
Lisa had scribbled about half of this down in her notebook before she gave up. It was just too funny to go on. The state cops could barely contain their amusement. Pretty soon, all three of them were laughing out loud.
"I drove all the way down here and got lost for this?" Lisa groaned. The state cops laughed even harder.
"We've been here for five hours," one of them told her. "And it gets better every time!"
Lisa finally composed herself and pushed a button on the wall nearby. This opened a link with one of the interrogating cops in the other room, via a hidden earplug.
"Ask the guy with the muscles this question: "Is there a chance that you might be hallucinating this?"
The interrogator did as told. Surprisingly, the man nodded in the affirmative.
"Ask him to explain why," Lisa told the questioners.
The muscle man complied. He stated that everything on this planet looked so bizarre to him, he felt like he might be inside a "bender dream."
And what was that?
"The result of ingesting too much slow-ship wine.
"Or maybe I'm actually on a transdimensional holo-trip," the muscle man went on. "That's an excursion that comes with activation of one of the top-of-the-line holo-girls, like an Echo-623 or even a 773. Haven't you people ever heard of these things? Such mind trips can last up to a month — though not in real time. They usually take you to a deserted island somewhere in the thirty-fourth dimension, where there is no need for any bodily functions except to breathe, sleep, and have sex, sex, sex."
The state cops were howling by now. Lisa felt her face go flush at the man's insistent repetition of the word sex. How the two Betaville cops were managing to keep straight faces, she would never know.
"Did you say you suspect this might be a 'holo-trip,' is that the right term?" one of them asked the muscle man.
"A transdimensional holo-trip, yes," was the reply.
"Well, how do you know mat isn't what's going on here then?" the interrogator asked.
The muscle man just shrugged. "Because if this is a holo-trip," he said sadly, "where are all the girls?"
"Good answer!" one of the state cops said. They began laughing again, and so did Lisa.
"Ask the other one what he thinks of all this…" she was just barely able to whisper to the interrogating cops without cracking up again. "The guy in the superhero costume."
Of the three, he was obviously the most reluctant to talk.
"It just seems like a very odd place," finally came his reply. "On one hand, this town seems very primitive to us. It really does. The buildings, the streets, the vehicles. The way you are all dressed. But, at the same time, everything here looks new to me, or by some frame of reference, modern. As I told you before, I've been to a number of uncharted planets. The people on many of these worlds have no idea that a vast empire rules most of the Galaxy. Some weren't even aware that there were inhabited planets within their own solar systems or in the star systems close by. On all these planets though, the pace of civilization has been more or less constant. No one was living in caves and running around unclothed.
"But this place is different. It seems as if you have progressed to a certain time frame — and then stopped. People are obviously living, walking, talking, and going about their lives here, but it is almost as if someone had blasted you with a Time Shifter centuries ago — and never bothered to turn the activation switch off. The result being that all progress had ceased at exactly that point or at least slowed down in a very drastic way."
A pause. More laughter from the other room.
Then the priest from outer space said, "Either that, or you people just like it this way."
The interrogation went on for another ten minutes.
It almost became even more amusing, with the priest again doing most of the talking. The suspects' claims were so outlandish, even the craziest tabloid would have taken a pass on their story. Yet Lisa had noticed something. While providing no small entertainment for those on hand, the three men were not really saying anything specific about how they happened to arrive on the outskirts of Betaville or about the huge explosion on the farm nearby. It was almost as if they were intentionally deflecting those questions by going on and on about being from outer space.
So, Lisa made a notation in her book: "Shared psychotic persistence," and for a moment, she wondered if she might have just coined a new term for the lexicon of criminal psychology. All wackos began ranting after a while. Sure, some would start off rationally enough, even persuasively. But usually after ten minutes or so, the cracks in their head would start to show, and many would devolve into foaming, maniacal wrecks whose pronouncements became more outlandish with every breath.
But not these guys. They had a wacky story — and they were sticking to it. In other words, they were persistent in their shared psychosis.
Finally, the state cops had had enough. They drained their coffee cups and started gathering their things together.
"I'm not sure how the Feds want to tag this one," one told Lisa. "But unless we find pieces of a UFO or evidence of a small nuclear device out there, this one gets the loony wrap from us."
Lisa was inclined to agree with them. But she was here for the night anyway, and dealing with these kooks might provide her an education for future cases. Besides, she needed something to bulk up her first-ever solo report.
"I'm going to do a quick twenty twenty-two sheet on them," she told the state cops. "I'll send you a copy. And thanks for your help."
The two policemen put on their jackets and hats, handed Lisa their business cards, and left. Lisa threw both cards into the waste basket, then activated the microphone to the interrogation room.
"Do you have a spare room I can borrow?" she asked the man with the earplug. "I want to talk to these guys alone."
Ten minutes later, Lisa and the three strange men were sitting in a large hall on the third floor of the Betaville police station.
It was close to nine o'clock by this time, and having quickly made some overnight accommodations, Lisa was now intent on asking the three perps a few questions for her criminal assessment file — the famous 2022 sheet. After this, she would turn the case back over to the local cops. There was no need for a federal investigation here. Mentally challenged vagrants carrying a few sticks of dynamite — it didn't go much beyond that. She would leave it to the locals to figure out how the trio got the explosives and why they chose to blow a hole in the ground while dressed in Halloween costumes. Her guess was the men would get ninety days, either in the local jail for trespassing and destruction of property, or more likely, under observation at the state mental facility in Palmyra.
The hall was an old basketball court that had been cut in two by a brick wall. It held the town's only voting machine, a small army of old target-practice dummies, and a mountain of boxes containing the police station's Christmas decorations. While one of the Betaville cops insisted that he stay just outside the door while Lisa talked to the suspects, he also didn't bat an eye when she offered to buy the coffees all round. He took her money and was off like a shot.
There was a long table in the center of the hall; it was surrounded by many old wooden chairs. This is where Lisa had the three men sit, up at one end, facing away from the door. She took a seat directly across from them.
She thought twice about unhooking her service revolver; these guys were harmless enough, but her academy training had emphasized the wisdom of having a gun ready at all times. So she undipped it from her jacket holster and placed it on the table with a thud. The three men stared at it for several long, intense moments. Had Lisa not known better, she would have thought the trio had never seen a handgun before.
She looked up at them, smiled, and then got her tape recorder ready. The three men sat rigid in their creaky wooden chairs. Their eyes were off her revolver now and zoned right in on her. It was strange how they did everything in unison sometimes. She smiled again, and so did they, and suddenly, a very w
arm feeling came over her; it was almost like a glowing sensation. She reached into her briefcase to get a pen and caught a glimpse of herself in her makeup mirror. She was astonished at how attractive she looked. Her blondish hair was tousled and her makeup was fading fast. Yet the face staring back at her was the prettiest she'd seen it in a very long time. What a strange feeling.
It was almost as if…
She shook away these thoughts, pushed the tape recorder on, and began.
"Well, I've heard a lot about you three," she said. "And—"
"How?" the priest interrupted her.
"How what?"
"How did you hear about us?"
Lisa was stumped for a moment. She couldn't very well tell them that she'd been sitting behind the two-way mirror.
"News travels fast around here," she said instead.
The men just looked at each other, digesting this bit of information. Then all three nodded slowly, as if they'd just been given some bit of universal truth.
Lisa explained that she was an FBI agent and wanted to get a bit of background on them for her files. The questions would be nonintrusive and off-the-record; however, if they so desired, an attorney could be present.
"What's an attorney?" the muscle man asked her.
Lisa just stared back at him for a moment.
"An attorney," she repeated for him. "You know, a lawyer?"
"What's a lawyer?" the priest asked.
Lisa looked up from her sheet and took off her glasses. Were the three kooks goofing on her? Would they dare? She was an FBI agent, the last person they should be dicking around with. What were these guys up to? It was hard to tell. They looked too old to be in college, so she could dismiss a fraternity prank. And they were good actors; they were wearing their costumes like it was their everyday attire. But it also seemed as if they really didn't know what an attorney was.
"I'll take that as a no," she said, making an indication on the 2022. "So then, is it OK if we all have a talk?"
The priest replied, "If that's what is needed here, certainly… but I must tell you, we are all about talked out."
Lisa unbuttoned the top clasp in her blouse, then untied her hair and ran her fingers through it. The warm feeling remained.
"So let me see if I have your names right," she said consulting her notes. "You are Mr. Hunter… you are Mr. Zarex. And you are Father Tomm?"
All three nodded.
"And you claim that you are from outer space, correct?"
Again, they nodded.
"And, did you get here in, what? A spaceship?"
"We are not really sure," the priest answered. "As we told the officers downstairs, one moment we were on a planet very far from here; the next, well, we were here."
"Just like that, huh?" she asked with a smile.
The priest snapped his fingers. "Just like that…"
Lisa scribbled something on her sheet.
"So what about the explosion then?" she asked them. "Judging by the burn marks on your clothes, it's obvious you were very close to it when it went off."
"Close to it?" the priest replied with some amusement. "My child, we were right in the middle of it."
She smiled at him, but in a crooked sort of way. "Really?"
"I'm a priest," he replied. "It would be very bad luck for me to lie to you."
Lisa unconsciously undid yet another button on her blouse.
"So, what you're saying is when you landed here, that's what caused the explosion?"
The priest nodded. "Somehow the poof shot us right across the Galaxy, at an incredible speed. When we landed here, well, our arrival was heralded by a blast of no small proportions. Probably had something to do with a slight fracture in the time-space thing, that's my theory, anyway. But it certainly came as a great shock to us."
Lisa began playing with her hair. What the heck was a poop She was almost afraid to ask him. Plus, the priest was almost a little too smooth for her, and he'd done most of the talking already. She turned to the guy in the superhero costume.
"All right, it's your turn," she said to him. "Tell me your version of everything that's happened since you arrived here. And I mean everything."
Hunter almost laughed in the pretty girl's face.
Everything? What did she want to know exactly? How they had made a very hard, very undignified landing on some very hard ground.
Or maybe he could tell her about the certain unpleasant smell that surrounded him after he'd popped in, and how his eyes had been nearly sealed shut by soot and mud, and how it took him a second or two to draw in a real breath? Or how he saw the tiny red stars dancing around him, shrinking into infinitly as his jump became final. How these stars — yes, they were real — stung his face and hands as they slowly faded from view. Or how he sneezed and felt his whole body shake in response, confirmation that all of his vital organs had arrived intact?
So she wanted to hear everything? Obviously she couldn't handle everything. What made her any different from the two guys they'd just spent the last five hours talking to? The people here had a strange way of interpreting the truth — a tendency to twist it to fit their own beliefs. If she didn't believe that they were visitors from outer space, how then was she going to believe everything he could tell her?
This had been a big mistake. Hunter had convinced himself of this by now. And it was all of his doing. Over the billions of miles traveled, never once had the thought occurred to him that the people here wouldn't know about Zazu-Zazu, the Freedom Brigade, the Home Planets, and the long, strange journey needed to reach this place — assuming this was the right place. But it was apparent soon after the Betaville cops showed up in the smoldering alfalfa field that they didn't have the slightest idea what he or Tomm or Zarex were talking about. The problem was, by that time, some very crazy-sounding stuff had spilled out of their big mouths, and once gone, it was impossible to get back. It was also very clear by the reaction of the cops that this planet wasn't aware of spaceflight or that anything or anyone existed beyond its own atmosphere. Not a good sign, considering what Hunter and company had come here to do.
They were cuffed, put into a squad car, and driven to the jail. It was at that point the three silently agreed Pater Tomm would do most of the talking from then on, at least until they could figure a way out of this mess. And the padre was good at spinning. Once they were brought to the interrogation room, he was able to avoid giving the cops any more information by simply repeating over and over the bare essentials of what they had so foolishly blurted out to them already. By never deviating from this speech, they'd hoped to eventually wear down the Betaville cops, to the point of disinterest. Or at least that was the plan.
But that was where they'd made their second mistake. The three of them had naively assumed that once they'd talked themselves blue to the police, they'd be allowed to go free. But that certainly didn't seem to be the case now. The Betaville authorities clearly thought they were crazy, and they were not about to let them run loose in the streets. Instead, they were going to be processed, poked, and questioned. Investigated. For days, months, even years.
There was no time for any of that.
So instead of answering the pretty girl's question, Hunter posed to her one of his own.
"Would it really be so unusual?" he asked her suddenly. "I mean, would you be that shocked if it turned out that we were telling you the truth?"
She almost laughed, at the same time pulling the top of her blouse together.
"You mean that you were somehow transported here, from outer space?"
All three men nodded.
"Have you ever heard of anything like this before?" Hunter asked her.
She paused a moment.
"Well, it's an interesting question coming from you," she said finally. "I mean, sure, I've read stories. Mostly in the tabloids. People visited by beings from outer space. Or being carried away in their ships. Or just disappearing and never coming back."
"And you just don't think an
y of that is possible?"
She rolled her eyes. "No one does," she said.
"But why not?" Hunter pressed her. "It's a big universe out there."
She looked out the nearby window. The stars were shining brightly beyond.
"Big? It sure is," she replied, pointing toward the night sky. "But it also looks very, very empty from down here."
"But that all depends on how you look at it," Hunter told her. "From our perspective maybe it looks very busy, very full."
She laughed again. "Yeah, that's rich, pal. But OK, even if someone was able to somehow get off this planet, which no one has ever even tried, the distance to get anywhere else is prohibitively great, isn't it?"
She checked her notes. "Of course, the guys downstairs said you claimed you can travel more than a light-year a second. Boy, that's fast."
"And again, you think that's impossible?"
She looked right back at him. "Yes sir, I do."
Hunter paused for a moment. This wasn't going anywhere, and they were running out of time. The Betaville cop would be back with her refreshments soon, and that would just make a difficult situation even worse.
So he worded his next question very carefully.
"Let's say we were able to convince you that we are telling you the truth… and that we came here from outer space because we had this overwhelming need to. Or at least 1 did. What would you do then?"
She laughed, then reached into her handbag and came out with her car keys.
"I would tell you to take my car and just drive right around the planet, baby — see this lonely little place that had drawn you over billions of miles — and then I'd write a book about you, and we'd all become millionaires."
Hunter was surprised by her answer.
"Really?" he asked her.
"Really," she replied.
Hunter thought about this for a moment then looked over at Zarex and Pater Tomm. That was good enough for them.
"Padre?" Hunter said to Tomm. "After you…"