Bad Order

by B. B. Ullman

  “Hold on—” My phone was buzzing in my pocket. “Hi, Ma?” I went to the front room to talk.

  “Mary, thank goodness I got through. This is just crazy, but they’re evacuating Adeline!”

  “What? Why?” I was trying to sound really surprised. Plus I hoped Ma hadn’t seen our road on the news. It would be one more thing for her to worry about, and what good would that do?

  “The siren for the dam went off,” Ma continued. “I don’t know if it’s legit or not, but they’re playing it safe. We’re up at the church and so is most of the town!”

  “THIS IS NOT A DRILL,” the tireless lady said in the background.

  “I wish they’d turn that damn thing off!” It was Meemaw, complaining nearby.

  “I’m sorry we didn’t bring snacks for you and Brit,” Ma said. “You could make milkshakes; there’s a little ice cream.”

  “It’s okay, Ma. We made pizza.”

  “I wish I were home,” Ma said longingly. “Is Albert okay?”

  “We’re fine. We’re out of the valley so no flood here.” I hated lying to Ma.

  “I know. Well, I imagine we’ll just hang out at the church for a few hours. Either a sensor is wacky up on the dam or we’ll see water in the street. What a dumb day!”

  “I kind of miss you,” I said.

  “I kind of miss you, too. Brit’s staying over, right?”

  “Yeah, she’s here. Plus Lars is going to hang out with us for a while. We were going to watch a show or something.”

  “Tell Lars thank you.”

  “Ma says thank you Lars.”

  He nodded.

  “Honey, are you okay?”

  Ma heard something in my sad pause.

  “I was just thinking that I love you.”

  “I love you, too, Mary. Tell Albert good night, and Happy New Year.”

  “Good night, Ma. Happy New Year to you, too.”

  My eyes rested on Albert sitting at the table. He appeared to be oblivious, staring at the piano, but I knew he was thinking. He was always thinking. “Ma says Happy New Year, Albert.”

  He memoed me the smiley pearl.

  The Commodore was still talking strategy and calculations.

  I looked down at my phone and felt a bittersweet twinge of missing Ma and Meemaw, but also a huge sense of gratitude that Albert was here with me. I realized that since Ma first brought Albert home from the hospital, he had sent me a memo every single day showing me that I was a girl like a pearl, like the most special in all the world. His memos had helped me be positive and confident and happy. Albert might have been sort of weird but he was the best brother I coulda gotten.

  It was too bad the whole world couldn’t get a nice memo. With all this rotten stuff going on and being on the brink of disaster, it seemed like that’s what everybody needed—a giant memo to remind us of everything good in our lives. There must have been tons of good stuff out there; like enough positive energy to—

  Something like a light bulb went on in my head.

  “Hey, Mr. Commodore, I have an idea.”

  Everyone at the table turned to look at me. “Contribute,” he said, sounding a lot like a robot—which I guess was what he was, sort of.

  “You guys are good at communication, right? I mean you collect and transmit data, like that’s your job, right?”

  “Indeed.”

  “I’ve been thinking about strategy. It seems that tricking the bad thoughts to go back to the half-constant only solves half of the problem. There’s still that imbalance that’s forcing stuff out, and the imbalance has to be fixed or we have that vicious cycle, like the Commodore said.”

  “I concur,” said Med Tech Tek. The other two SMHR units nodded in agreement.

  “So maybe we could make a happy commercial. People do it all the time. They make things seem fantastic with good pictures and a bit of nice music. I remember this commercial about coffee that would always get Ma all teary-eyed, and it was just coffee! Anyhow, that’s my idea.” I watched to see their reaction. I wasn’t sure I was on the right track because I was thinking that surely one of them would have thought of this.

  Brit got it right away. “It might work,” she said. “Like a message to get people to think positive thoughts.”

  Lars stared at his sister and then he got it, too. “According to you SMHR units, all thoughts flow to the half-constant, and if they’re good ones, maybe the balance could be restored that way.”

  “That should ease the pressure,” Saunders added, “which, according to the visitors, is what’s forcing the stuff into our dimension in the first place.”

  “That’s right.” I nodded enthusiastically. “And then maybe the rip would naturally seal, the way you guys described it.”

  “That is an interesting proposal.” The Commodore bobbed his head and his turquoise eyes sparkled. “A marketing strategy to elicit positive energies—this could be very useful.” He and his comrades nodded as one.

  Albert sent me two smiley pearls and for a split second he looked into my eyes.

  “What are we waiting for?” said Brit. “Let’s go.”

  32

  Super bold

  The SMHR units had left the Volkswagen idling in Rona’s carport. It mostly looked like a normal V-Dub but it kept doing a jumpy, shimmer thing, and that didn’t look normal at all.

  Once again we all squeezed into the snug interior. Up in the front seat, the SMHR units sat quietly. The Commodore was driving, concentrating on whatever it was he concentrated on. In the back seat, Albert was sitting on my lap and Brit was sitting on Lars’s lap. Agent Saunders was squished in between us. Talk about sardines in a can.

  When we started off, the billowing cloud accompanied us, but once we were up, the Commodore eased off on the fog and we were able to see the view. The moon peeked out from behind a cloud, shining on the scene below.

  There was a parade of busses making their way south on 266. They were going in the opposite direction of us; Ma and Meemaw were getting farther and farther away from home. It sort of made my heart hurt to think of it. As I watched, one bus skidded to a stop and people poured out the door, shoving and fighting. All those nice people who had been helping each other in Adeline were now on the road, yelling and punching and being awful. If only they knew they were being poisoned by something that didn’t belong here. I just hoped Ma wasn’t on that bus.

  “I bet Ma is trying to call me right now. Can we get calls up here?” I asked.

  “Not in flight,” Med Tech Tek said. “Our electronics interfere with your devices.”

  I sighed.

  It seemed like the Commodore was driving slower than he normally did. I was glad because it gave me time to think. Below us, the lights of Adeline twinkled. They grew small as we crossed the valley, past fields where snow banished fences and borders. Everything looked so soft and pretty in the light of the moon that I wanted to hold on to the moment. I closed my eyes.

  In summertime there were strawberries down there, and over the bridge was Kahn’s U-pick Blueberry Farm. In the fall, Zucker’s Corn Maze—run by Rona’s brother-in-law, Earl—did a steady business with schoolchildren and families in search of activities in the country. It was really lame, that dumb corn maze, but the little kids loved it. We went there in second grade and learned about corn, and Brit threw up on the bus on the way back to school. I noticed that Brit was watching the scenery, too. Then all of a sudden we were looking at each other. Her eyes were glassy with tears, and so were mine.

  I reached over and held Brit’s hand. We knew we were heading into terrible danger; it was like we were going to war.

  “Zucker’s Corn Maze,” I said with a sad smile.

  “I hurled on the bus.” She grinned.

  “It was so gross.”

  We started to laugh.

  Lars reached out his lanky hand and gripped both of our hands. And then Albert pointed his finger and barely tapped the top of Lars’s hand—he didn’t usually do that sort of thing. Wi
th his little finger-tap, I got a memo loud and clear, like a trumpet blast. It said SUPER BOLD.

  The SMHR-vehicle was back in the cloud. The Commodore must have turned on the fog machine.

  “After you disembark, the triad will transmit the commercial,” Citizen Lady said.

  “Wait, what are you going to say?” I asked.

  Without fanfare, Citizen Lady recited, “People of Earth, it is critical at this juncture that you facilitate profound happiness.” She seemed satisfied with her marketing sound-bite.

  Brit and I shared faces of extreme disapproval.

  I imagined Citizen Lady broadcasting her message. She would sound about as warm and fuzzy as the annoying THIS IS NOT A DRILL voice. I tried to be polite. “Citizen Lady, I’m thinking that maybe one of us should do the talking. I think it would be more sincere coming from—you know—a human being.”

  The SMHR units considered this for about two seconds. “Agreed,” they all said.

  “It should be Mary.” Brit squeezed my hand. “Mary’s good at making people feel better.”

  “That’s true,” Lars interjected. “She just did it a few minutes ago.”

  Albert memoed me a silly thumbs-up.

  I felt a growing panic when it began to dawn on me that I’d have to say something to tons of people. I didn’t like being the center of attention. What was the right thing to say? What were the words? Getting wedged into making this commercial was starting to make me feel sick—but then I remembered super bold and I considered the alternative; annihilation was definitely worse than stage fright. Yeah, I could do this.

  Med Tech Tek turned to Saunders. “As soon as you are able, call your superiors to reiterate that they must stay away from the anomaly.”

  Saunders nodded.

  “We’ll unlock the garage door remotely,” the Commodore said. “And once the lasers are engaged, we should be able to recalibrate them to cut a new channel next to the old one. Albert’s job is to power up the machine and mentally construct the fractals into their proper algorithms.”

  “What about the commercial?” I asked. “How are you guys going to film it and broadcast it?”

  “Easily accomplished from our—er, automobile,” Med Tech Tek said. “The triad will signal the lab and our integral craft can transmit the message far and wide.”

  “Okay. Okay,” I repeated nervously. “I just gotta think of what to say.”

  “The timing will be tricky,” Citizen Lady said gravely. “As soon as Pearl attempts inspirational thought, the negative energies will swarm to overwhelm her. It is critical that the channel is baited and operational before Pearl speaks. The energies must be distracted.”

  “So Mary has to fight off all the negative energy and give a speech to the entire world at the same time? No pressure there,” Brit said sarcastically.

  33

  Remember my love

  The V-dub had stopped buzzing. “We have arrived,” Citizen Lady said.

  Albert opened the door and got off my lap. I followed Albert, and then Agent Saunders wriggled out, unfolding himself like someone emerging from a clown car.

  Once he was out, Saunders immediately called his boss and told her to keep the BETI force away and to keep the local police and press away, too. Hopefully they had enough clout to make this happen. I fought the urge to call Ma and Meemaw. If they weren’t acting like themselves, I was afraid I couldn’t do what I had to do—no, I couldn’t call them.

  “Pearl will commence the commercial as soon as the triad detects a backward flow of energy,” the Commodore stated. “At that point we will give a signal.”

  “Wait, what’s the signal?”

  At that, the car lit up like a lamp. It glowed softly pink, illuminating the snow and the billowing fog.

  “Pink light—got it.” I bobbed my head, trying to look attentive. “And how are you going to amplify Albert’s thoughts?”

  “As soon as we measure a sufficient charge, we can amplify it exponentially right at the mouth of the new channel.” This time a thin blue beam shot out of the left headlight.

  “Okay, the blue beam is the amplifier.” I stood there for a long moment. Brit and Lars came and stood by me and Albert. We had stuff to do, but I was reluctant to see the triad go. “Well, thank you for everything, guys.” I smiled at the three oddball SMHR units, squished in the front of their ridiculous flying Volkswagen. Maybe they were just machines, but they had gone above and beyond their jobs. They were funny individuals, and they made the choice to help us. That seemed pretty nice to me.

  “Mr. Commodore, Citizen Lady, Med Tech Tek, I believe you are way more than just data collectors.”

  The Commodore’s turquoise eyes glistened. “Thank you,” he acknowledged, and he showed me one last crazy smile.

  I held up my hand and waved their silly four-fingered wave. “Goodbye.”

  The three SMHR units did the same. Then the doors of the Bug closed with a click, and the vehicle hummed and pulsated. We stood back as it lit up like a welding torch. The buzz it emitted tickled my temples and ran down my spine. The now-familiar fog puffed and billowed as the car assumed the shape of a flying saucer, which rose in the air. It disappeared behind the cloud it created, but I had to assume it was up there, hovering, ready to play its part.

  The fog followed the Bug, clearing the air where we stood. I was amazed to see we were in the middle of our backyard. I didn’t notice any BETI guys; hopefully they had all retreated. The scratchy, unnerving feeling of the red mist was strong, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. For some reason, most of the energy was shooting straight up like a geyser, but it had to be going somewhere—and somewhere it was seeking conscious minds to ruin.

  Albert sent me a memo that described the mental trick that helped keep the spiders from settling in. He accompanied it with a cartoon of three people—Saunders and Lars and Brit—with ice cubes on top of their heads. Protection essential, he memoed.

  “Albert says you’ve got to know how to keep the red mist out of your heads.”

  The three of them paid close attention as I tried to explain. “The trick is to imagine your mind is a snowy landscape and it’s all clean and white and cold. It’s like you build an icy wall around the field that is your mind—but you have to stay calm. I think this makes it too boring for the red spiders to be drawn in. It worked for me, for a while. Just be as neutral and boring as you can.”

  “Like Saunders.” Brit smirked.

  “Hilarious,” he replied.

  I ignored their sparring. “Lars, is your guitar in the truck?”

  “Yeah, why?”

  “I think we could use some music for the commercial. You know, for the mood.”

  “I’ll go get it,” he agreed.

  Saunders pushed his hat down in a determined way. “What was it you said back there, Mary—that we might as well be super bold?” He grinned a tight half-smile. “Operation Super Bold in progress.”

  When we reached the garage, we discovered that the SMHR units didn’t exactly open the lock—they blasted it to smithereens. Saunders pushed the door and we all filed in.

  “Albert, you get started,” Saunders said as he flipped on the lights. “I’m going to stand guard outside.”

  “Hey, Saunders—” Brit tossed him the earpiece. “Thanks for not turning us in. You’re okay.”

  “Copy that,” he replied, all business except for a slight upward twitch of his mouth.

  Albert memoed me a picture of the electrode thingies. They had to get placed on his head with some kind of gel—he promptly handed me a tube of the stuff.

  “Brit, help me. We have to stick these on Albert’s scalp.”

  Brit and I hurriedly placed the electrodes while Albert fiddled with the machinery.

  “Mary, what are you going to say?” Brit asked.

  “I’m not sure. The only stuff I know about is you guys and living here on Myrtle Road.”

  As I placed the electrodes on Albert, I kept thinking about
my life. It was a small life with Ma and Meemaw and Albert and good old Brit. We didn’t do big things or go on neat vacations. The grades I got at school were just okay. But I had to admit I liked my life. Ma loved us, and so did Meemaw in her blustery way. And I had a best friend who I could depend on and laugh with—it only took one arch of an eyebrow. Brit had Lars, and I had Albie. And that’s all I knew for sure on this New Year’s Eve.

  Lars showed up at the door with his guitar in hand. He’d run from the truck and was breathing hard, making little clouds in the cold garage. He put the guitar strap over his head. “Ready when you are.”

  “I guess I’ll be ready when Albert is.”

  Albert sat on a tall stool, his head a tangle of wires, like a little Medusa. He’d already powered up the computer. For a moment he was stymied by a demand for a password. Finally he typed remembermylove and he was in. He flipped the toggle switch and then muscled the big lever to ON. From the window came a white flash accompanied by an electrical sound—like clashing light sabers. Hopefully the lasers had engaged. Albert conferred this was so by showing me six white lines, like the spokes of a wheel, converging at a white-hot center. I guessed that was how the lasers “softened” the dimensional membrane.

  Next he was prompted on-screen for an equation, which he entered, and things began to happen on their own. His face went blank as he concentrated inward, conjuring his thought puzzles, constructing the fractals smaller and smaller to tunnel into the half-constant.

  Albert stared and stared at the screen, trying to find his way. His pupils were black manholes and his baby face was tense. Good, brave Albie, I thought—but as I did, the spiders swarmed around me. I couldn’t linger long on sentimental thoughts. Remember the icy wall, the snowy blank slate. Stay calm.

  Suddenly Albert memoed I-AM-IN.

  34

  The commercial

  Albert shared a tree-limb pattern that repeated and repeated until it was a tunnel that twisted like a white wormhole in a vast darkness. He sent thoughts of joy into the wormhole—little things that pleased him; like math, and Ma, and natural beauty, and Pearl.