Rocket Boy and the Geek Girls

by Phyllis Irene Radford

  “I don’t suppose,“ said Frees, snapping madly away with his old Pentax, “that you could land us down there?“

  “No-o-o way. Nobody could land down there. Except maybe your meteorite.“

  Frees nodded and glanced around the area for landmarks. He found one of particular interest — the cabin on Perelandra Circle, which was, he calculated, mere hundreds of yards from the crash site. If there were people in that house, they couldn’t have avoided seeing the off-world visitor plummet to earth.

  oOo

  The house did not look lived-in. There were no vehicles around it. No smoke curled out of the chimney, though the air was beginning to cool slightly with the onset of evening. Stan contemplated his approach. He could sit here until his eyes froze open, feeling like a poor man’s Spenser, or he could get up and boldly go where no one else had any right being.

  He did not know martial arts. He did not carry a gun, mace, or pepper spray. He was a poor excuse for a red-blooded American homeowner. Despite these minuses, he started up his car, pulled off the shoulder of the badly paved road and drove brazenly into his driveway. No one ran out shooting. He heard no slamming of windows or doors.

  He took a deep breath, then got out of the car, patting his pocket to make sure his cell phone was still there. At the first sign of trouble, he would call the police. He should have called them before, he supposed, but what was he supposed to say? “Hello, officer, I’d like to report that someone pretending to be me is writing an advice column from my summer cabin.“ Oh, yeah — that sounded believable.

  He slammed the door of his car, then opened it and slammed it a second time. Then he approached the house, while having a loud conversation with himself. The front door was unlocked. He hesitated again, thought about the police again, then opened the door. “Hello?“ he called. Silence. “Halloooo!“

  The place was clean — had even been dusted — though the cleaning service wasn’t due to go over the place for several weeks. He made his way through the living room toward his office, where he knew he would find evidence of habitation. A glance told him it was the center of the interloper’s activities. The computer was on and apparently downloading something. Even as he watched, it finished up and returned to the main e-mail window. Curious, he opened the message icon that had appeared at the end of the download.

  “Here’s your new batch of goodies, Arlen. There’re some real doozies in here,“ said the message, and was signed, “Alec.“ Probably an editorial assistant. Still more curious, Stan opened the download and read,

  oOo

  Dear Arlen,

  I was lunching the other day with an important client, when suddenly in the middle of the meal, she got out a mirror and a dental pick and began cleaning her teeth right there at the table! I almost came unglued. Try to imagine a sophisticated-looking woman in a Christian Dior suit sitting in a five star restaurant giving herself a root-planing!

  I am in a complete dither — this woman represents our most important account, but now I’m afraid to be seen with her for fear I’ll find out she’s got some other private chores she likes to do in public. I find it hard to believe she’s never been thrown out of a restaurant for this. What should I do?

  Stymied on Staten Island

  oOo

  Fascinating. It really was a doozy. In a sudden fit of unnamable urges, Stan sat at the keyboard, opened a word processor file, and wrote:

  Dear Stymied,

  Since you’re eating in five-star restaurants, I must assume you must have a little cash to throw around. Next time you’re out to lunch with your client, slip the ‘maitre d’ a twenty and ask him to toss the woman out on her ear at the first sign of dental hygiene. Alternatively, you might consider stationing a couple of friends at a nearby table with instructions to squeal “E-ee-w! Gross!“ the moment she goes for the floss.

  He was absurdly pleased with the response. Pithy, he thought. Doing an advice column could be a kick. That did not answer the question of how someone else had come to be writing an advice column in his name... or rather, his face.

  He was on the verge of searching the room in answer to that question when he heard the back door open and close. A peculiar humming tickled his ears. Hair rising all over his body (his chin felt as if it were in contact with a hedgehog), Stan slipped from the chair into the closet four feet behind it. Once there, he tried to peer through the louvers but found he couldn’t see a thing. He settled for listening.

  What he heard was a bizarre series of clicks, whistles, hums, chirps and hoots that were answered by a similar barrage of sounds. He thought he could almost make out words, but couldn’t imagine what language he was listening to. It sounded made-up, but then the only made up language Stan had ever heard was Klingon, so he hardly counted himself as an expert on the subject.

  The sounds became suddenly more forceful and then, Stan heard his answer to the letter read back in strangely accented English. The reading was followed by a particularly loud hoot. “This misses the point entirely! For someone to display her teeth so prominently in a public place — well, it’s a miracle a fight didn’t break out. How irresponsible!“

  “That is point, Ketzel, and I believe it is you who has missed it,“ said a second voice in perfectly unaccented English.

  “How so? Clearly —“ (Stan could hear the manic depressing of keys on his keyboard.) “Clearly, to suggest this action is merely rude is to minimize —“

  “Ketzel, who entered that reply? This file has just been downloaded.“

  There was a pregnant pause.

  “More to the point,“ continued the unaccented voice, “Where is the person who entered that reply?“

  There was a flurry of movement. One of them had left the room. Stan held his breath. A few moments later, the flurry was repeated in reverse.

  “There is a ground vehicle before the house! Someone was here.“

  “Excellent logic, Ketzel. Although, I should say the vehicle’s presence suggests someone is still here.“

  “Would you, er, scan, please?“

  There was a muted twittering sound and Stan’s hair saluted again. Instinct drove him to the floor of the closet to hide in a jumble of ski jackets, bleacher blankets and two large teddy bears he had purchased, but never given to his niece. It was from this motley refuge that he saw the closet door swing open and peered up into the face of a giant, frilled lizard. Hovering near its shoulder was a sleek, silvery object that bore an uncomfortable resemblance to the probes used by Martians in the movie “War of the Worlds.“ The lizard’s monstrous, orange eyes swept the closet, coming to rest on the assorted debris on the floor.

  Stan, numbed to speechlessness, prepared to surrender. The lizard’s mouth opened and perfectly intelligible English words came out.

  “I don’t see anyone.“

  “Ketzel,“ said the sleek, silver probe, “observe.“ A gleaming tendril issued from the probe and aimed itself at the tip of Stan’s nose.

  The lizard’s eyes focused. “Oh,“ it said.

  “E-ee-ee-ee!“ said Stan, and fainted.

  oOo

  “It’s him. There are some differences between the 3D and the 2D, but it’s him.“

  “I would have to agree. I suppose it was remiss of me not to suspect he would have to return to this domicile at some point. It is nearing the time of year when many of the inhabitants of this particular society go on vacation.“

  “Vacation?“

  “Similar to what you were doing when we became... lost.“

  Stan assumed he was dreaming. The only viable alternative was that, sometime in the recent past, a short-order cook in Tahoe City had hidden his stash of recreational drugs in a jar of chili powder.

  “He poses a singular problem. What do we do with him until we can leave?“

  Do with him?

  “We don’t have anywhere near the resources we need to leave... do we?“

  “No, we do not. The engine refit is nearly complete, but the long-range nav
igational array is still a shambles, and the port gimbals suffered severe damage when we skidded sideways among the rocks. Really, Ketzel, we are fortunate there is anything left of the forward steering mechanism at all.“

  Stan was dismayed to realize he was listening to a real conversation taking place somewhere behind him. He opened his eyes. He was stretched out on the sofa in his office staring into the glass panels of the tambour door of a bookshelf. Reflected clearly in the panels was one helluva tall reptile and the sleek little probe Stan had seen in an earlier psychotic episode. He closed his eyes then opened them again. The reflections were still there.

  Abandon logic, all ye who enter here, Stan told himself, and studied his uninvited guests as they continued to ponder his fate.

  “Perhaps if we just keep him here, quietly, no one will notice.“

  It was probably not really a reptile, Stan thought, but merely looked like one. Maybe he was some sort of intelligent dinosaur — the kind Bob Bakker would just love to find on his front porch some cool summer evening. Hello, I’m homeothermic. It did resemble Bakker’s drawings of dilophosaurs... except, of course, that it was wearing his sister Genevieve’s fuschia sun-dress. Absurdity rose in his throat, nearly choking him. “The vehicle before the house may draw notice,“ said the Martian probe. “And it is probable that someone will mark his absence. He may well have informed someone else of his intention to come here.“

  “I did.“ Stan sat up and turned to look at the... whatever. “I told my agent, your editor, and several close friends that I was coming to Tahoe to see who’s been using my address — and my face — to publish an advice column.“

  There was a heavy silence, then the dilophosaur shuffled to face him. “Hello,“ it said and its rubbery mouth curled into an approximation of a smile. “I’m Ketzel.“ It glanced sideways at the probe floating silently beside it. “I’m from — well, very far away — and I’m lost and I need to get home again.“

  “And you left your ruby slippers at home, right?“ Good response if this is a hoax. Please let it be a hoax.

  The reptilian head canted sideways. “Excuse me?“

  “He makes a reference,“ said the probe, “to a popular movie — ixltl, to you — in which the lost heroine gets home through the agency of a pair of ruby slippers she has inherited from a deceased crone. Yes, Mr. Schell, that is essentially correct. We have crash-landed on your world and our only means of getting home is damaged, though not beyond repair. We have hopes of earning enough capital to purchase the materials necessary to restore it.“

  Stan blinked. “You’re kidding.“

  The probe floated over to the sofa, pausing to hover right before Stan’s startled eyes. “You suspect a hoax, and this is understandable. Please notice that I am not suspended by any wires.“

  Stan waved a trembling hand around the probe. It was as good as its word. “OK. I see that.“

  “Ship,“ said the lizard. “Show him where you crash-landed. That will prove we’re not a hoax, won’t it?“

  oOo

  It was a spaceship. By God, it was a spaceship! Kerwin Frees’s hands shook as he let the foliage fall back into place. He took a step back from the mound of uprooted shrubbery. It had crash-landed here and had been carefully concealed. And there were signs that it was under repair.

  By whom?

  He glanced up the hill toward the little cabin on Perelandra Circle. By someone in that house?

  He turned back to the ship, his camera bouncing against his chest. Evidence. That was what he needed. He pulled a couple of arms-full of greenery away from the vessel and began shooting. He was between shots, looking for a different vantage point when he heard someone approaching from uphill.

  As often as he had allowed himself to imagine an encounter of the third kind, as often as he had invented his response, he had never imagined he might panic. But he did. He stumbled to the bow of the ship and threw himself into a ramble of underbrush, just barely able to twist into a position from which he could see the stern before he was forced to freeze.

  A man appeared first — a bearded man in a forest green shirt and jeans. Frees had no time to be disappointed before ‘it’ came into view — a reptilian alien lifeform decked in bright fuschia. It was a sun-dress, he realized, a woman’s sun-dress. That fact had barely jolted him when he noticed the sleek metallic object floating between the two other figures.

  The reptile, speaking, began pulling camouflage away from the vessel’s nether end. Words floated back to Frees’s ears — English words. “See?... This... Ship... .believe us?“

  Another voice spoke. The reptile’s mouth wasn’t moving, nor was the man’s. The voice came from the floating ‘droid’ which now bobbed about the stern. A moment later, it began moving forward toward Frees’s hiding place. His throat felt as if a peach pit was stuck in it.

  “As you can see,“ the floater intoned in perfect English, “the bow planes have suffered the most damage. We are currently attempting to procure the materials necessary to repair them.“

  “Will you really be able to do that?“ asked the human, and Frees’s eyes were drawn to his face. It was a familiar face. He was certain that if his brain wasn’t caught in some insidious form of paralysis, he’d be able to put a name to it.

  “Ship is fully capable of self-repair,“ said the reptile. “We only need the materials. That’s why we... availed ourselves of your cabin.“

  The man nodded. “And my face.“ He sighed. “OK. I believe you. Good God, do I have any choice?“ He turned to look at the reptile. “How can I help?“

  The reptile’s mouth widened without revealing teeth, had it any. “Don’t show the whistle on us, please.“

  “Blow the whistle,“ said the droid.

  “Whatever. Please don’t do it. Let us continue with our ruse. We’ll be out of your chair soon, I promise.“

  “Out of your hair,“ said the droid.

  “Whatever. We’ll be out of it. What do you say?“

  The man glanced back and forth between the two aliens. “Can I go inside the ship?“

  oOo

  Kerwin Frees was gasping by the time he made it back up to the road. He was closer to the house than he’d meant to be, but the aliens and their human cohort were still downhill in the ship. He started to turn toward his concealed car, but caught sight of the vehicle sitting in the driveway of the cabin. He hesitated only a moment before hurrying to investigate it. It was a small Japanese sedan, fairly new. He slipped in through the passenger door and went speedily through the glove box in search of — ah! Registration.

  Stan Schell. Now he knew where he’d seen the guy before — on the back cover of several science fiction novels in his massive collection... and in a number of widely-separated newspapers. Science fiction writer and advice columnist, what a combination.

  The revelation gave him pause. He glanced around the property. No other vehicles — no camera crews. Nobody. OK, not a movie, then. Could it be a hoax? A publicity stunt of some sort? He had no way of knowing, but he had ways of finding out.

  oOo

  The ship was real. At least insofar as Stan could tell. Not that he had much experience with these things except on paper, but the craft was not a Roswell Special — there wasn’t an ounce of tin-foil in it, nor one stick of balsa wood. It was made of metal and something that was like plastic or fiberglass. It was big, too — nearly as big as a semi — and complicated-looking.

  Inside, they showed him which systems were working, pointed out where repairs needed to be made, let him sit at the controls. He kept trying to be skeptical, to pass it all off as an elaborate hoax, but he could think of no one he knew who would or could orchestrate such a hoax.

  He found another reason to disbelieve the hoax angle — Ted Barnett had assured him that the advice column with his face on it had been appearing and gathering loyal readers for months. It had evidently become a household word in homes where no Stan Schell novel had ever been read. Meanwhile Stan (I-don’t-read
-that-section) Schell had gone unawares — where was the joke in that? Maybe it was a conspiracy intended to see how long it would take a writer to discover his identity was being plagiarized. Maybe it was a test case to see if an identity could be plagiarized. Maybe... .

  Maybe these were aliens.

  “Pardon?“

  The lizard looked at him through its gigantic orange eyes, its hands (or whatever) folded before its chest in a prayerful gesture. In his sister’s sun-dress. His laughter, already uncontrollable, segued into a fit of hiccups.

  “Ship! There’s something wrong with Stan Schell!“

  Oh, there certainly was. Either he was going not-so-quietly mad, or he was receiving the most extravagant gift the Universe could offer a writer of science fiction.