Kev

by Mark A Labbe

  “What?”

  “It can manipulate matter. If Aputi had that he could do more damage to the universe than you could ever imagine.”

  “Well, I’m not going to give it to him. I have to go back in time and stop him somehow, but I’m stuck on this show and don’t get many breaks. Anyway, I don’t have the black cube, so even if I do get a break, I have no way of going back in time and stopping him.”

  “Don’t worry, Kev. You’ll figure it out,” said Bok Choy, patting me on the shoulder with two of his hands. In that moment, I felt like Bok Choy knew more than he was letting on. I wanted to ask questions, but somehow knew asking questions would not lead to enlightenment.

  Bok Choy and I talked for hours, and I learned much, but nothing that really helped me understand my own situation. In that time I had two more green teas and two new experiences, The Induced Seizure Driving Experience, and The Auto-asphyxiation Experience, two rather terrifying experiences to have. After each, I had what I’ll call a follow-on experience, in which I witnessed some event in history, an event somehow connected to me. The first was my wedding on Riddent, and the second was of me telling the blue cube I wanted to go to a workshop that had all of the parts necessary for building the black cube. In that experience I appeared in the workshop, constructed the black cube and then pressed the little blue button on it five times. For a brief moment, I knew everything, absolutely everything, but the moment passed and I returned to the real world, lacking infinite knowledge. However, I knew that I must build the black cube.

  Bok Choy left some time later, and I decided to stay at the bar. Satisfied that I had had enough green tea to last a lifetime, and in the mood for a screwdriver, I motioned to the bartender, a gray-green biped with two heads and eight arms, and asked if he knew how to make a screwdriver, a reasonable enough question in a universe that appeared to be completely unreasonable.

  “Yeah, sure,” said the bartender. “Who doesn’t?”

  “I mean a screwdriver like they make on Earth.”

  “They’re the same everywhere, Kev.” I hadn’t told the bartender my name.

  After three screwdrivers, now quite drunk, I took a seat at the bar and had a look around, amazed by the diversity of the aliens that populated the bar. While I had always believed aliens, for the most part, would be quite different that humans, I never really imagined how different they would be. Looking at these aliens, I wondered how they evolved. What conditions led them to appear and function the way they did? Of course, I was on a planet with an atmosphere much like Earth’s, and similar gravity, so the aliens I saw were only those that could survive in this type of environment. What would aliens living in radically different environments look like? I could not guess.

  “Anyone sitting here?” said a woman’s voice. I turned and saw a beautiful blonde with a stunning body, naked except for a string of pearls around her neck. Had I seen her before, or at least someone who looked like her? Was she with Aputi in Alaska?

  Carefully maintaining eye contact, I said, “No. It’s yours.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Kev. Yours?”

  “Ruby.”

  “Oh, hi Ruby.” Hadn’t someone named Ruby sent a message to my communications device? Wasn’t it something about intercopulation?

  “What are you drinking?”

  “Screwdrivers, but I’m taking a break.”

  “Tell you what. Why don’t you have one more and talk to me?”

  “Okay,” I said, hoping I wasn’t violating my vows to the girl in any way.

  Ruby ordered a green tea and a screwdriver. After the bartender delivered the drinks, she held up her glass and said, “To happy endings.”

  I tapped her glass and took a sip of my drink, tasting something strange. “This a screwdriver?” I said.

  “What else would it be?” said Ruby, smiling, a smile that seemed to convey a warning.

  I woke naked in a bed in a room in a hotel on Gamma War, Ruby by my side, stroking my chest. However, Ruby had changed, and I found myself more than a little horrified. It wasn’t just my infidelity that horrified me. It was also the transformation that Ruby had undergone. This was no human, and from what I could tell it was no female, or at least was--well, she/he/it wasn’t human.

  “Did we?” I gasped.

  “Five times, tiger,” said Ruby, her smile now that of some strange demon, a pale red aberration wearing pink lipstick.

  “Where am I?”

  “At the hotel. Do you want to do it again?”

  “You drugged me!” I cried.

  “Well, of course I drugged you. You wouldn’t have come with me otherwise.”

  “You violated me.”

  “Yes, and you enjoyed every minute of it.”

  “I did not.”

  “Yes, Kev, you did.”

  I jumped out of bed and raced out of the room, went down to the lobby of the hotel and then out the front door, heading toward the beach. As I neared the beach I saw the bar, rushed over to it and grabbed a stool. On the stool next to mine I saw my clothes and on top of my clothes I saw the blue cube, a grim reminder of The Show.

  “Did you have fun?” said the gray, barrel-headed, eight-armed bartender, seeing the wild look in my eyes.

  “What’s your strongest drink?” I said.

  “Green tea, of course.”

  “Give me three,” I said, scanning the area for signs of Ruby. “What was she? He?”

  “Oh, that my friend is a Nidian hooker.”

  “A prostitute?”

  “No, no. They’re called hookers because the hook in their victims by drugging them.”

  “Why didn’t you warn me?”

  “I don’t know. You looked like you were enjoying yourself.”

  “Well, next time could you warn me if another Nidian or whatever gets near me?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  Three green teas later I had managed to calm myself down. Of course, Ruby had appeared while I was in the middle of my third green tea experience and had her or his or whatever hand on my thigh, stroking it gently. I brushed its hand off my thigh and said, “No more. Leave me alone.”

  “Oh, come on Kev, it was fun.”

  “I’m married.”

  “So? She will never know.”

  “Of course, she’ll know. I’m going to tell her. Do you have any diseases?”

  “No, but I’m pregnant. This will be the third humo-nidian child in history. Well, sort of.”

  “I don’t believe you. Wait. Third?”

  “It’s true,” said Ruby. “Nidians always get pregnant after intercopulating.”

  “What?” I cried. “What the hell? By the way, when are you due?”

  The Nidian hooker, now back in the form of the beautiful blonde, smiled and said, “In about an hour, your time.”

  “So, who are the other fathers?” I said, utterly confused. “Have you been to Earth, because I’m pretty sure that the girl and I are the only humans to have left Earth.” I wasn’t sure about this, wondering if Clive had at one point in time left Earth.

  “They are all yours,” said Ruby.

  “No, they aren’t.”

  “Yes, they are. You just don’t remember.”

  “Remember what?”

  “You don’t remember how many times we’ve met and how many times we’ve intercopulated. It’s okay. I know about your memory problems, Kev.”

  I passed out.

  The Nidian Connection

  “Kev,” said the girl. I opened my eyes and stared up at her for a moment before remembering my experience with Ruby, confessing everything. She picked me up off the ground, a sweet smile on her face. “It’s okay, Kev.”

  I took a deep breath and sat at the bar, the girl sitting next to me. Ruby was nowhere to be seen. “Where is she?” I said.

  “She went to Nidia to give birth.”

  “So, I’m a father. How is any of this possible? This is the first time I met her. I’m sure of it.”
<
br />   “Kev, you’re not sure of anything. When you get your memories back it will all make sense.”

  “You mean if I get my memories back. I don’t think I ever will.”

  “You will, Kev. You will. You just need to stop traveling in time.”

  “But, I haven’t been traveling in time. I don’t have the black cube.”

  “Yes, I know, but you were traveling in time before. You have time lag. You’ll remember eventually. Hopefully, I’ll be around when you do so I can keep you from going insane.”

  That didn’t sound promising.

  “I think I need to see my children,” I said, determined not to abandon them even though I had not sired them willingly.

  “You’ll see them soon, Kev. Don’t worry. Anyway, you already know them. You’re a good father. You’re a wonderful person. You have absolutely no idea how wonderful you are.”

  I felt tears coming on and wiped my eyes. Overwhelmed and confused, all I could do was roll with it, but I couldn’t just roll with it.

  “Why won’t you explain things to me? I don’t understand why you won’t.”

  “Let’s take a walk.”

  The girl led me down to the beach, taking my hand in hers. For whatever reason, I grabbed the blue cube before she pulled me away from the bar.

  “Can you at least tell me how to get off this show? B24ME is going to kill me.”

  “You’ll figure it out. You always do. Do you know this planet is orbiting a black hole?”

  “It is? So, the green tea experience was real? I really got sucked into the black hole?”

  “Sort of. You were sucked into it once before, or maybe many times, but you only told me about one time. You see, your green tea experiences are things that have really happened to you in the past, at least most of the time. Sometimes they are hints you are giving yourself. The follow-on experiences are generally things that have happened in your time bubble, usually more recent events.”

  “Time bubble?”

  “You explained it to me once, but I have to admit, I didn’t understand. I wouldn’t be giving much away if I told you that you invented green tea. Of course, that statement is a direct violation of the rules, but I think it is a stupid rule.”

  “I know you’re not going to explain that.”

  “I’m not, but it’s true. Kev, you have done many things in your life, amazing things. Green tea was something you created for yourself. I think it is your way of dropping hints for yourself. That or you just like reliving the past in some hallucinatory way.”

  “What is green tea like for you?” I said.

  “Well, the other day, I had The One Million and One Orgasms Experience, my personal favorite.”

  “So, that has really happened to you?”

  “You should know.”

  “Dammit, I’m getting pretty sick of not remembering things. You can’t give me a hint?”

  “Nah, that would spoil the fun. Anyway, as I said, you’ll figure it out and then you’ll probably lose your memories all over again. You keep doing that.”

  “On purpose?” I said, now suspicious not just of everyone around me, but also of myself, and now quite certain I was playing some sort of game, a game with rules I could not remember.

  “Maybe.”

  “Great. Changing subjects. Aputi killed off pretty much everyone on Earth or maybe everyone. I’m pretty sure he did, anyway.”

  “He did.”

  “I think I know how to stop him now.”

  “How is that?”

  “He has a little brown cube with a yellow button. I think he used that to pnuke everyone.”

  “So, what are you going to do?”

  In that moment, I remembered the blue cube and how I had used it in my green tea experience to go to the workshop that had the parts for the black cube. “The blue cube,” I said.

  “See, you’re already starting to figure things out.”

  “So, you know?”

  “Of course, I know. Are you going to do it right now?”

  “In a bit.”

  “Do you want to make love?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “I’m much better than a Nidian hooker, you know.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  The girl disappeared after we made love, so I went back to the bar and ordered a green tea.

  “By the way,” I said to the bartender, Trikna. “I haven’t paid you for a single drink.”

  “You’ve been drinking green tea, so the drinks are free.”

  “Why?”

  “Sponsored drink. You should know, Kev.”

  “I take it you aren’t going to explain that any further.”

  “Rules are rules, my friend.”

  My green tea experience was The Valenese Bull Riding Experience, a horrifying ride on an eighty-foot tall monstrosity that would like nothing better than to throw you off its back and onto the barbed spikes that lurked below. Of course, I fell off. Following that I witnessed the birth of one of my Nidian children, something I prayed I would soon forget.

  “Hello, Turd Fondler,” said B24ME. “I trust your visit to Gamma War has been entertaining.”

  “Uh huh. So, what’s the next challenge, you psychopath?”

  “Now, now, no need for insults.”

  I noticed that Trikna and all of the patrons of the bar had disappeared and wondered where they had gone.

  “Where is everyone?” I said to myself.

  “I can answer that question, Turd Fondler,” said B24ME. “Gamma War is about to be sucked into the black hole that lurks nearby. Do you want to know what your next challenge is?”

  “What?” I cried, certain that B24ME had something terrible in store for me, something along the lines of getting me sucked into a black hole.

  “Escape Gamma War before you are consumed by the black hole.”

  “Seriously?”

  B24ME didn’t answer.

  I pulled out the blue cube and said, “Cube, take me home.” Nothing happened.

  “B24ME, the blue cube isn’t working.” I received no answer.

  I sighed, climbed over the bar and prepared myself a green tea and a giant screwdriver in an oversized pitcher. If I was going to die, I could at least be drunk and in the middle of a green tea experience when it happened.

  I remember drinking quite a bit and getting terribly drunk. I remember the sky growing dark, the ground shaking and then taking a sip of green tea. I remember hearing children laughing and playing and then hearing a voice say, “Welcome to The Nidian Hooker Experience.” What followed, an alarming encounter with Ruby, left me dazed. Following that, I found myself sitting in a conference room, all white with white furniture. In one corner, floating in the air, I saw a black cube, about a foot on a side. In another corner, I saw a floating yellow sphere. Across from me, I saw Clive when he was a kid, a wide grin on his face.

  I heard B24ME’s voice coming from the floating black cube. “So, it is settled then. I take it you want me to begin immediately.”

  “Kev definitely wants that, B24ME,” laughed Clive.

  “Great,” said B24ME. “Tell you what, Kev. I will give you a five second head start. Five, four, three, two, one…”

  I woke in a red room, on a red bed, naked and covered with lipstick kisses. To my right I saw Ruby. In the doorway to the room I saw three children, three boys who all looked like I had when I was a child. The youngest had to be at least three years old. I knew I had three children with Ruby, but didn’t think it possible that the youngest of them could be that old.

  “Did we?” I said.

  “No, I thought I’d give you a break. Anyway, I want our next time to be special.”

  I looked at the boys. “Are they mine?” I said to Ruby.

  The boys shouted, “Daddy,” and jumped up on the bed, tickling me, laughing and screaming.

  When things calmed down a bit, Ruby introduced me to my sons, Kev the first, Kev the second and Kev the third, confusing, but maybe not so. The o
ldest was nine years old. The second was six, and the youngest was three.

  “But, I thought you just had Kev the third,” I said.

  “Kev, you were circling a black hole,” said Ruby. “Time was passing more slowly for you relative to me.”

  I should have known that, of course, but in my befuddled state, I hadn’t thought of it.

  “Daddy, will you play hide and seek with us?” said Kev the third.

  “Or Mister Spider?” said Kev the second.

  “What’s Mister Spider?” I said.

  “Tickle torture,” said Kev the first, smiling.

  I chased the boys around Ruby’s house for hours, hell bent on being the best father possible. I forgave Ruby for taking advantage of me, but requested that she not do it again. She reluctantly agreed, although I believed she would do the same thing again, if given a chance.

  We had dinner together and Ruby explained what she could, or rather what she was allowed to explain. Apparently, Ruby was in on whatever game I was playing.

  I had last seen Kev the first and Kev the second four years ago, according to Ruby, although that made no sense to me at all. Four years prior to this, I had been in Vermont, had I not? I remembered the girl telling me I had been traveling in time, and remembered her telling me I was quite old. I remembered the present year, or at least what I thought it was. I tried to wrap my mind around things, but found myself too befuddled to make sense of anything.

  I looked at the boys and Ruby, feeling terrible for not remembering them, offering an apology. Ruby and the boys took no offense. They knew I had serious memory problems, and anyway, were just happy to see me.

  After dinner, B24ME spoke up, “Having a nice time with your family, Turd Fondler?”

  “Not now, B24ME.”

  “Look, Kev, we have a slight problem.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Do you remember the Proth Sphere?” said B24ME.

  “Yeah, what of it?”

  “It was real.”

  “What?”

  “Because of you, the universe is being sucked into a giant nozzle, Kev. You have to stop it.”

  “Wait a second. Is this another stupid challenge?”

  “Absolutely not, you twisted bastard. Your nightmares have come true for the entire universe, and that one in particular is going to be the end of us all.”