Karl in Space: Part 3

Karl raised his hammer high into the air and brought it down hard on a protruding nail, driving the metal shaft deep into the beam of freshly hewn wood. He stepped back and wiped his sweaty brow while admiring his work. The new grand hall was coming together nicely and swiftly, and Karl turned around to seek the familiar and approving words of Garland. The old man stood off the side, resting on his cane, and merely smiled.

Karl had settled into a familiar pattern of daily life, rising early and spending his days in hard labor, living with the transplanted human colony. He lost track of the days, and Trevor seemed disconnected as well. Sometimes his co-pilot would join them in their labor and other times he would disappear back to the wreckage of the ship, a quixotic quest to salvage some glimmer of technological hope.

Karl, on the other hand had made his bed and was now lying in it. Literally.

He has spent his first several nights with the girl Kaila, sleeping in her bed while she kept to the floor. After several nights he asked her if she wanted to join him. She did. Together, resting side by side in the narrow bed on the thin mattress of foliage, they began to touch each other. He had kissed her lips and she responded. Moments later Karl had pulled her garment up and then they made love.

The next morning Garland greeted them when they walked outside. They were bonded in a ceremony beneath the sagging willow tree. Afterwards, as the custom dictated, Karl had felled the willow to make a larger bed for their home.

It was slow going, but Karl had dedicated himself to the task, much as he had fully committed to the space academy. He learned the craft and soon his hands were hard and strong from the woodworking.

Now, with the structure of the grand hall in front of him, Karl felt pride.

“It’s almost done, father,” he announced to Garland.

Garland smiled, but shook his head.

“Be wary of arrogance, son, the prophets did not bring us to this planet to boast. Isn’t that right, daughter?”

Kaila had walked up silently and joined her husband.

“Space knight, your work is skilled, but beware pride, as my father warns,” she said, then leaned in to kiss his lips.

Karl’s lips, dry from toiling under the sun, touched her moist embrace.

“Thank you, wife.”

As Karl looked her deep in the eyes, he saw over her shoulder Trevor, running hard across the field toward them. He gripped Kaila and drew her attention to his co-pilot.

“Something is wrong,” Karl said. “Garland, look.”

The old man turned as Trevor arrived, panting. He had spent the day out at the wreckage, close to five miles away with scant shade in between.

“Karl, the transmitter, it’s working,” he gasped.

Karl shook his head, feeling sorry for Trevor. He had delusions of getting home from an unknown point on the other end of the galaxy.

“That’s great, but it doesn’t help, we’re millions of miles out of range for that thing,” Karl said.

Trevor shook his head, about to speak, but at that moment the sky exploded with noise. Karl covered his eyes and looked toward the horizon where two helicopters approached. They circled the area and landed, driving huge gusts around Karl and the others. From one of them, a familiar face appeared. General Sharpridge, the man who sent them into space. The engines of the helicopter died down and Sharpridge looked around. As if in a dream, Karl approached with Trevor trailing behind. The general’s eyes brightened.

“Jesus, Lt. Weis, Lt. Kidd, it’s good to see you,” he grabbed Karl’s hand and pumped furiously. “We had just about written you boys off.”

“General, what are you doing here? How did you find this planet?” Karl managed to ask.

"Planet? Son, this is Earth.”

Karl was having trouble thinking.

“But we traveled millions of miles, the jump…” Karl stumbled, short of forming a question.

“Must be a mechanical error,” the General said. “We lost you when the transponder went dark. We suspected you burned up in re-entry.”

Karl shook his head, “But these people, the aliens…”

The General looked concerned. “This is some sort of kook ranch in Kansas. Lt., these people are beyond wacky. If I could airbomb them right now, I would."

“Trevor,” Karl turned to him. “How?”

Trevor shrugged. “I kinda thought so, but I didn’t want to say anything. This was kinda fun.”

From the distance another helicopter appeared and touched down near the others. The general patted Karl on the back.

“We got someone who wants to see you, son,” he said.

Cautiously stepping from the helicopter was Kate, her red hair kicked up in the wind. She saw Karl and began running, her little legs furiously propelling her forward. A tear fell down her cheek and she jumped onto Karl.

She was sobbing as she held him tight. “I thought I lost you forever.”

Karl put his arms around her and everything felt right. It seemed surreal, as if in a haze, but he smiled.

“Husband? Who is this woman who touches you like a lover?”

Karl’s smile dropped and he turned to look at Kaila.

Kate pulled her head from his chest. “Husband? What’s she mean, Karl?”

Karl looked at them both.

“Oh crap.”

“What do you mean, ‘Oh crap?’” Kate looked him in the eyes.

“I thought…I thought I was on another planet,” Karl said.

“So you got married?"

“Aye, he is my husband,” Kaila said. “And I’m with child.”

Kate looked at him again and stepped back. She had a different set of tears now. She threw her hands against his chest and screamed ‘Why?’ He grabbed her and pulled her close. It washed over him and he asked himself the same question. Why? What had he done?

Garland had watched the scene unfold without saying a word. He cleared his throat. “The prophets test us in many ways, my son. Now you must choose.”

The old man laughed.

THE END

Karl in Space: Part 2

Karl’s eyes were burning, no matter how hard he shut them, the bright light was everywhere. He thought he heard himself screaming, but he couldn’t be sure - it may have been Trevor. Then there were the alarm bells. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to tell something had went wrong. It seemed to go on forever, but it could have been minutes, then everything began to shake. Trevor definitely was screaming now, Karl thought before everything went black and he faded into unconciousness.

When he woke up, everything seemed blurry. The window in front of him was dark, but the faint emergency lights had clicked on and he could see Trevor was hitting the console furiously.

“You’re awake,” he said. “I thought you were dead.”

“No, I don’t think so,” Karl said. “What happened?”

“Bad stuff.” He pointed to the instruments, charred and almost unrecognizable. Karl hit the communicator but heard only a static hiss.

“That won’t work even if it did work,” Trevor said. “Look.”

The guage in front of him had burned out, but the numbers were still visable.

“We went 400 million miles,” Trevor said. “That’s out of radio range.”

Karl sucked his breath in. It couldn’t be.

“That’s gotta be wrong,” Karl said. He fumbled with the harness and let himself free, but he didn’t float. They were somewhere, but where? The cabin was at an angle, and he climbed up the inclined floor to the hatch. He could see light peeking through the edges, which may be a good thing or a bad thing, he thought. On one hand, it meant the cabin wasn’t airtight anymore, worse case scenario in space travel. Then again, if there wasn’t any air out there, they would have been dead already. He told Trevor, who merely shrugged at the suggestion of opening the hatch.

“What the hell,” Karl said. He grabbed the handle and pushed hard. It flew open and Karl tumbled out, caught in his momentum. He yelled as he fell several feet and landed on ground. Whatever he was face down in looked a lot like grass, he thought.

“I don’t know where we are, but it’s not going to kill us,” he yelled back into Trevor. He brushed himself and turned to look around. Standing twenty feet away was a group of people, oddly dressed but definitely human. An old man stepped forward.

“Welcome, space traveller. Our people have been expecting you.”

------------

The old man was named Garland and when he spoke Karl somehow understood him. Trevor poked his head out and also had no trouble communicating. Millions of miles from Earth and they had found intelligent life that spoke English. Incredible, Karl thought. It was much better than finding a planet of apes.

After introductions, Karl pried as much information as he could from the old man.

“We come from a planet called Earth,” Karl said.

Garland nodded his head wisely.

“We, too, came from Earth. In the Before Time,” the old man said, stroking his long, grey beard.
Karl was confused once again.

“How is that possible? No human ship has ever been this far before.”

Garland’s eyes lit up. “Precisely, my son. No human ship. We were taken here by a kind and benevolent species known as the Turgeen. They told us to colonize this planet, spread the goodess of humanity. We have not seen them since.”

“I guess that makes sense,” Karl said. If he could travel millions of light years anything made sense.

“Here, come to our village and we will give you food and shelter, travelors,” Garland said. “My daughters will see to your needs.”

Two women stepped forward, young and wearing long, rust colored frocks. Their hair was tied back in braids and one of the girls took Karl’s hand.

“Let me help you,” she said, smiling. “I feel honored by your physical presence, brave one.”

Karl, flustered, timidly pulled his hand away.

“Please, that’s ok. What’s your name?”

“My name is Kaila, space knight.” She held the edges of her garmet and courtsed. “I will offer you my bed to rest.”

Karl in Space: Part 1

As the weightlessness overtook him, Karl could feel himself start to drift upward in the tiny capsule, and let out a curse when his head bumped against the metal ceiling. He pulled himself over to the window and looked out, watching the curve of Earth change, flattening and turning into a circle as the craft left the planet behind. It never got old for him, that first sensation of crashing into space, and he smiled behind his heavy helmet.

He turned to his co-pilot, Trevor, who was watching the Earth from another window.

“Wow. It’s pretty,” Trevor said.

Karl liked that about him. He didn’t use too many words when only a couple would get the job done. Karl figured that said something about his personality, something that translated into a good astronaut. Time will tell, Karl thought, and maybe his first mission with the guy would be a success.

Karl pushed back from the window and floated forward to the front of the craft, pulling himself past his partner and toward the controls. With a shove off the ceiling, he propelled himself down and grabbed the control seat. He strapped himself in quickly, before the lack of gravity made him drift again. Now clear of the planet, it was time to get down to work, and he was eager to get started. He began punching numbers into the computer, prepping the craft for the test of the jump drive. The precise calculations were crucial in aligning the engines, otherwise the craft could end uncountably off target. If all went well, they would make history for the longest space jump ever attempted. If it didn’t go well, Karl had said his goodbyes the best he could. It seemed like forever he was standing on the tarmac, looking at his wife.

“Hey baby, don’t look so glum,” Karl said, brushing the red hair out of her eyes. “I’ll be back before you know it. And I’ll be back a hero.”

Kate sniffled, grabbing his hand and holding it tight. “You know I don’t care about that. I just want you. And I want to have your baby.”

They had this conversation before.

“Listen, Kate. You know I don’t want to bring a child into this world knowing I might not make it home someday. I grew up fatherless and swore that would never happen to my kid.”

Kate was about to cut him off, but he stopped her by gently placing his finger over her mouth.

“That’s why when I make it back from this one, I’m retiring,” he said.

Her eyes lit up and a tear fell down her cheek.

“And the first thing I’m going to do in my retirement is knock you up.”

The conversation played through his mind on repeat as he crunched the numbers. When he planned it, he thought it would be a little more romantic, but Kate didn’t seem to care. And he didn’t care either.

Trevor pulled himself into the control seat next to him and strapped in, flicking a switch on the console that started up the engines. Since the invention of the jump engine ten years ago, testing had moved slowly and cautiously. Too much was not understood about how exactly it worked, other than it got astronauts around the galaxy faster than ever previously imagined. The first tests were done hesitantly and over short distances. Ten months ago a mission successfully went from the Earth to Jupiter and back again. Now it was time to push the limits. They were ready to jump farther than ever before, the edge of the known galaxy and back.

Karl finished his work and looked over at Trevor, who nodded back. Karl hit the communicator button to raise the base.

“This is Prometheus, calling Houston,” Karl said. After several moments a tiny, metallic voice rang back, echoing through the shuttle.

“This is Houston. What’s your status Prometheus?”

Karl hit the button again. “Ready to jump, Houston. Here goes nothing. Wish us luck.”

“Roger, Prometheus, come back in one piece. I don’t want to give that cute wife of yours any bad news. Houston out.”

Karl smiled and tightened the belts across his chest. “You ready to do this, Trevor?”

“I guess so,” Trevor said. “In 30 seconds. Thirty, twenty nine….”

His counted down and Karl tried to keep his breath steady. In front of him was just the stars, steady in the night. He put his hands next to his side and gripped the side of the chair.

“Five, four, three, two, one. Ignition.”

Trevor pushed the drive lever forward and the stars blinked.

March 13, 2008

Kate wasn’t happy she had to go to so much trouble to round us up, but still she took Karl off for a practice called “co-habitation” and I hadn’t seen him since last night. They left me tied up in the barn with the Crazy Persons, who were tending to their wounds from the battle. When I woke up in the morning, they were already pounding Grandslam breakfasts. Karl and Kate walked into the room and he came over to see me in the corner.

“Hi Pat.”

“Hi Karl.”

We exchanged some small talk, me still tied to a chair, him not seeming to care.

“So, things are getting a little weird with Kate.”

“Really, Karl? You think so?”

He shuffled his feet. “Yeah, I had to clean up her habitat last night. Then I had to take out the garbage this morning. Then I had to walk Abito.”

Kate started looking around.

“Karl? Karl? Where are you Karl?”

Karl raised his hand.

“I’m over here, Kate. Just talking to Pat.”

“You never want to hang out with me, Karl.”

“I’m sorry, Kate. I’ll be right over.”

He looked at me. “See you later, Pat.”

I spent most of the day tied to the chair, watching people eat Denny’s. In the afternoon, Kate came over, with Karl trailing behind.

“Well, well, well. I just got a call from our benefactor. He’d like a few words with you.”

I asked who that might be, in the nicest way possible, although I may have used a couple of obscenities.

Kate turned to Karl.

“Karl, your friend shouldn’t talk to me like that. Apologize.”

“I’m sorry, Kate,” Karl said sheepishly.

Kate turned back to me and confirmed my joke before about Denny’s underwriting the movement was, in fact, entirely correct. The CEO of the company would touch down in his helicopter in minutes.

This took me off guard. The head of Denny’s was no stranger to the news and I saw his picture everywhere. He had turned the company into a Fortune 500 powerhouse and sent stock prices soaring. Worth billions, he was on the short list of richest people in the country. That he was involved with these nutjobs, well, I would have to see it to believe it.

As Kate promised, I could soon hear the roar of a helicopter. After several minutes the engines died down and into the barn strode one of the most powerful men in America: R. Chadwick Krementz.

“Is this the son of Flair?” he asked Kate, pointing at me. He cut straight through the chit chat. Kate told him I was and he strode over to me.

“Your old man has given me a lot of trouble, boy. Every time my people try to bribe him, he puts us in something called the Figure Four. It hurts.”

I chuckled. Good old dad. Krementz stared at me.

“Laugh now, boy. I’ll have the last laugh. With you, I will get my legislation through the Senate and soon all marriage will be illegal.”

“What?”

Krementz bent down to look me in the eyes.

“My profits will go through the roof. All my research shows married people don’t eat at Denny’s."

“So if no one’s married…” I reasoned.

“Exactly.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “Are you on drugs?”

“I’ve never touched a drug in my life, boy. What do I look like? Some Hopi Indian?”

At that moment I heard a loud scream and into the room ran Jason, who I thought had died a grisly death, but was very much alive, yelling loudly and sloshing gasoline on everything in sight. A couple LARPers had survived and started to engage the remaining DLF crazies. Jason made a beeline to me and hit Krementz over the head with the gas can, then with his teeth he gnawed my bonds loose.

“It looks like I’m going to win after all,” Jason said. Up close I could see the end of a wooden sword was broken off in his stomach. “This module wasn’t that hard.”

“Jesus, are you OK?”

“Never mind about me, get the man-bride out of here, I still have one more spell I need to cast,” he told me.

I didn’t argue and was able to grab Karl. He turned around like he wanted to stay with Kate, but when he saw her stomping on the head of a LARPer, he thought better of it. As we ran out of the barn, we heard Jason yell one more time.

“Wall of Flame, Level 10!” and he dropped a match.

The barn exploded in flames and Karl and I stood outside for a while watching it burn to the ground. Finally, there was nothing left but a smoldering pile of wood.

Karl kept his eyes on the fire when he finally spoke.

“Want to go get some Denny’s?” he asked.

Everything was as it should be.

THE END

March 12, 2008

We ran hard.

Karl slowed us down because he kept tripping over his wedding train, but I pulled him along. We could hear the robot dog behind us, but there was a large group of people in a field ahead of us. If we could get lost in the crowd, we’d be safe. At least, that’s what we told ourselves.

After the ritual near-execution, they locked us in one of their sheds and threw some more Denny’s at us. The door was unlocked, but they posted Crazy Person 3 outside as a guard. I told Karl to get some sleep because we were going to get out of there. He looked scared and wanted to stay in case Kate wanted to deprogram him again, this time without a condom. I ignored him and when it was still dark I shook him awake. I cracked the door open a bit and saw the guard.

“Hey, do you hear something?” I said to him.

He turned around. “Shut that door and be quiet.”

“No, I’m serious, I hear something. It sounds like someone’s watching a Julie Roberts movie…one that involves a wedding.”

“What?”

“Yeah, I think it’s coming from over there,” I waved my hand in a general direction. “I’d hurry. It might be Runaway Bride and we all know how that ends.”

The guard took off and we started in the opposite direction. At that point I realized being still dressed as bride and groom might slow us down. At least they didn’t put heels on Karl.

So after hours of fleeing we heard Abito behind us. There weren’t any signs of civilization around the farm, so it was fortunate to find a group of people standing in the middle of a field. As we got closer, we saw they were dressed strangely, in capes and cardboard armor, holding large wooden swords and axes. We tried to blend in, but it didn’t work.

“Uh, I don’t think there’s a wedding anytime during the Battle of Gledora,” a dude wearing a helmet told us. He had a long pony tail and was pretty ripped. He looked around and everyone else laughed. He was clearly the leader.

“Who’s going to get married? Prince Gyxag? Baronness Haunt? C’mon!” he laughed.

Everyone laughed again with him.

“Listen, we’re sorry to crash your costume party, but…” I got that far before he became upset. His face turned red and, curiously, he began rubbing his chest.

“Costume party? Costume party? We’re LARPing. What are you, an idiot?”

One of his friends touched his shoulder. “You’re out of character, Jason.”

The one called Jason turned around and punched his friend in the face, silencing anymore protests.

Karl was confused. “What’s LARPing?”

The leader became even angrier and the rubbing became even faster and more furious. “Live action role playing, jerkface.”

Karl nodded his head, “Oh, more acronyms.”

“Listen, we’re LARPing, too, but it’s kind of intense,” I said, an idea taking shape in my head. “I don’t know if you guys could handle it.”

A silence settled over the group. Apparently I had thrown down the LARPing gauntlet.

“We can handle anything. What’s the module?” Jason asked, and then huffed when we looked confused. “The story?”

“Uh, it’s an oldie where we come from. See, it involves the ancient land of…”

I nudged Karl.

“Chlamydia?” he offered.

“Yeah, that’s it,” I agreed. “Specifically the Great Battle of Syphilis between the Brave and Virtuous Virgin Warriors and the evil armies of the Redheaded She-Devil Vampire Whore Queen.”

Jason scoffed. “That doesn’t seem too tough.”

“Yeah, but you have a sub-module,” I said authoritatively. I was getting into it. “You have to protect the man and man-bride from any foes, particularly the robot dog.”

Jason conferred with his compatriots. They accepted, and not a moment too soon. Jason looked over to the edge of the woods and said he saw Abito.

“You can see that far?” I asked him, squinting.

“I have really good eyesight,” Jason said.

The LARPers swarmed around me and Karl and I lost sight of the dog. I didn’t even see when Abito hit the first defenders but I heard the screams. I won’t go into too much detail, but the battle between the LARPers and the DLF lasted for several hours and, suffice to say, I have never seen so much death in my life.

Yet, ultimately, we were recaptured.

Rats.

March 11, 2008

I had been at the DLF compound for about 20 minutes before I was thinking I should have taken my chances with the knife welding maniac.

Karl was off being “deprogrammed” of married life and they left me to wander around their farm and interact with other members, sort of like a really boring choose your own adventure novel. And when I decided I had enough and tried to hide in a barn, they came and found me to talk about their silly beliefs. The nebulous and vague cause attracted all types of agendas; people who professed to truly not believe in the practice of marriage, people who couldn’t get married and were bitter other people were happy and, of course, September 12 conspiracists.

I hoped I wouldn’t have to stay too much longer. If I had any idea where I was, I might have started walking, but I felt bad about leaving Karl here at the farm. Come to think of it, farm might be a misnomer, because in the course of running and hiding throughout the day, I didn’t see anything growing. They derived all their sustenance from Denny’s to-go orders.

Around dinner time, Karl finally turned up. He was very excited.

“I had sex with the redhead!”

“What?”

Karl told me as part of the deprogramming he mentioned he might return to his marriage and she insisted on doing it to nullify the sacrament or whatever.

“Uh, I guess way to go, bro.” We had an awkward high five.

“Yeah, and she’s a lesbian!” Karl seemed really happy about this fact.

“No!”

“Seriously, she’s in love with some girl, but there was something about time travel.”

I figured he’d misheard, but when we were sitting around a picnic table eating Denny’s a little later, I asked her and sure enough, there was time travel involved.

We were sitting with Kate and let’s call them Crazy Persons 1 through 3 when her eyes got a distant far away look.

“Just after I graduated law school, our Shaman Schriss Babler showed me a portal that let me journey into the past,” Kate said wistfully. “There in the Middle Ages I eyed a fair maiden who I fell in love with, a fair maiden named Kaila. Alas, our love was not meant to be, for fear the whole space time continuum would crumble like soda bread.”

“Long distance relationships are tough, anyway,” I offered.

She snapped out of her reverie and glared at me. “Shut up and eat your Denny’s.”

“Funny you should mention that, I once went to a Denny’s,” Karl said. We all turned to look at him and after several moments of watching Buffalo Chicken Sandwich sauce drip down his chin, we realized that was the end of the story.

Kate looked at me again. “Tell your retarded friend I’m going to punch him in the stomach.”

We ate in silence for several more minutes when I decided to ask another question.

“What’s the deal with the Denny’s? Are they underwriting you guys?”

Crazy Person 1 or 2, I can’t be sure, threw his meal up in the air and screamed “He knows too much!”

Several hands grabbed me and held me on the picnic table. Kate looked down at me.

“You just had to be too smart for your own good, didn’t you? Now we’ll have to kill you.”

Karl started crying.

“And kill him too, he’s probably going to go back to his wife anyway,” she said.

I tried to get a word in, “Listen, I think we’re being a little hasty here and I think you’ve misread the state of my friend’s marriage.”

They didn’t listen and dragged us both to a field. They didn’t want to just kill us the easy way, so they dressed us up as bride and groom and were going to light us on fire like a wedding cake candle. Karl, obviously, was the bride. A crying bride, at that.

“Pat! I don’t want to die! Tell them who your dad is!”

I elbowed him hard in the side. Kate jumped close to Karl's face.

“Who’s his father?”

Karl sniffled. “Senator Flair, Senator Ric Flair.”

This made Kate very happy. She decided I could stay as a political prisoner. Karl, however, was still set to die.

“Now listen, I’ll only be your political prisoner if Karl lives.”

Kate thought about this and agreed. Who said you can’t negotiate with terrorists?

“But you two have to promise not to run away.”

I looked at her and held my hand up.

“I promise we won’t run.”

March 10, 2008

At Karl’s suggestion, I had locked the guest room door and got a pretty decent night’s sleep, only marred by the sounds of violent lovemaking coming from upstairs. It seemed like Karl was on the receiving end of all the masochism and I faded off to sleep listening to the sounds of my friend’s screams.

We had big plans for the day. It was Karl's birthday and he was going to take me sightseeing around the city. Unfortunately, that took about 20 minutes and then we got stuck in traffic for 6 hours. Karl didn’t seem to mind because Coby was at home celebrating the Sabbath, which apparently falls on Mondays now.

We got back in time for dinner and navigated our way to the dining room. The trick was finding a path through all the urns that littered the floor, placed in awkward positions like blocking the bathroom door or at the bottom of the stairs or in front of the dishwasher. I had asked about them the first day and found they held the remains of her ancestors.

“Aren’t Jewish people buried?” I said.

“I’m a reformed Jew, you dick.” She flashed a knife.

I had charted a course through the urns the day before, but they were moved around during the Sabbath so it took us several minutes to find a way to the table, with Karl offering suggested routes.

We ate Karl's birthday dinner (matzoh ball soup) in silence for several minutes before I had to ask a question. Karl had cautioned against too much of that, but I didn’t see anyway around it.

“Is he part of your religion, too?” I said pointing to the tall bald man that had been hitting a small gong in the corner throughout the meal. “Is he from TNG?”

He was. Coby explained it was a compromise she offered Karl that was compatible with her beliefs.

“Too bad it’s from a Lwaxana Troi episode. Those are the worst,” I said with a chuckle.

I was taken off guard when Coby heaved herself across the table and stabbed a butter knife between my thumb and first finger.

“Lwaxana Troi episodes are the best,” she hissed, looking into my eyes.

Karl and his wife retired to the bedroom for more brutal intercourse and I fumbled around with the Tivo trying to find Cops. I gave up after punching some buttons and decided it was probably bed time. Sometime later I heard a scratching on the door. It was my friend.

“Hi Pat.”

“Hi Karl.”

He came in and told me he had to sleep in the kitchen tonight. He had a blanket so it wasn’t that bad, he explained. We sat on the bed and talked about baseball. I heard a noise and asked him if he could always hear the trucks shifting gears on the highway, but he said it was just Coby moving around. He said she never slept and watched Barbra Streisand movies for several hours at night.

Sure enough, I could hear the TV turn on. Then a scream.

“What happened to Yentl? Who recorded Cops?”

Uh oh. Karl grabbed me by the shirt, “What have you done?” he said, fear in his eyes. “We’re doomed now! Doomed!”

The door to the bedroom started shaking. Then the blade of a knife came through the wood. Karl and I retreated to the top of the bed, shrieking, as the door would not hold too much longer.

Moments later it broke and Karl’s wife stood there.

“You’ve done it now, Karl,” she growled.

“It was him, take him!” he said, pushing me.

As she approached, the window in the bedroom shattered and through it bounded a robot dog, followed by a short redhead.

“You’re domestic bliss is over, breeder!” the redhead yelled and stuck Coby with a caddleprod. The redhead turned to us.

“You’ve been targeted by the DLF, do not resist,” she told us.

“The DLF?” we asked in unison.

“The Domestic Liberation Front,” she replied, annoyed we had to ask.

I heard about these nutjobs on the news. They firebombed a bridal store in Akron last week.

“Oh thank God,” Karl said with tears. “I’m so happy. Where should I go?”

This clearly bothered the redhead. I suppose she was hoping he would put up a fight. Still, she told him to go wait in the van. They were about to leave when I reached for her arm.

“You can’t leave me here! Please! Just give me a ride somewhere,” I said with one eye on the shape of Karl’s wife on the floor.

She grudgingly consented and I met Karl in the van, where the robot dog was biting his toes. I asked what her name was.

“My DLF call sign is Liberator 45,” she said proudly. She seemed irritated once again when we didn’t recognize it.

“Oh whatever, just call me Kate. And the dog’s Abito.”

March 9, 2008

“Hi, Pat! Over here!”

Karl was standing on the other side of the security check point, waving his hands and jumping up and down. At his feet, I could see he had a sign with my name on it, kind of like the ones limo drivers hold up, except this one was scrawled in crayon. And there were several misspellings.

It probably was a little bit of overkill, seeing as there were only a handful of people snaking their way to the baggage claim, and you usually only do that if you don’t know what whoever you’re meeting looks like, but it was sweet. I hadn’t seen my old college chum in years and this was the first time making my way out to Texas to visit him and his wife.

Karl ran up and hugged me, pulling me close. He held me for several moments, whispering “I’m so glad you’re here,” over and over, his mustache tickling my ear. After I was able to disengaged him from my person, we grabbed my bag and make our way to the car. As we drove to his house we caught up on our Gonzaga days.

“How’s Sophia?” Karl asked, mindful of a car passing him on the left. He still was a good driver.

“She’s good,” I said.

Sophia Bush. My girlfriend.

“Is your ex still bothering you, uh, Miley?”

Miley Cyrus. My ex-girlfriend.

“I got a restraining order. She was being kind of childish,” I said absentmindedly, distracted by the cityscape of Houston. “How’s married life?”

Karl looked like he really wanted to say something, but he stopped. He took a deep breath and collected himself.

“Everything is wonderful. I am very happy. Every day is a gift from Yahweh.”

He fished a notepad and pen from the backseat. He wrote a message as he continued to work through the traffic and slid the pad over to me.

‘She has the car bugged’

Ah, wonderful. This seemed normal. With the conversation gone, we drove a few more minutes and stopped at a modest sized home in a shady suburb. It was a pretty house, Karl had done well for himself. There were kids playing in the street and neighbors waving from porches.

“They seem nice,” I commented about an elderly couple who were enthusiastically swinging their frail arms in a greeting.

“They live in fear,” he said as we walked up the front steps. He put his key in the lock and turned to me before opening the door.

“Are you afraid of knives?”

“I guess as much as the next guy.”

“I’m really afraid of knives.”

With a sigh, he pushed the door open and we walked inside. A whizzing noise and a loud thunk made me look to my right. Buried into the door frame was a quivering, seven inch knife.

“Holy Christ!” I jumped back.

“How dare you speak that name in this house,” thundered a female voice, and the person I assumed was the knife thrower.

“Pat, I want you to meet my wife, Coby,” my friend said. I think the knife was meant for him, but he seemed OK with it. His wife waddled over to shake my hand, her inflated belly leading the way. I shared pleasantries and asked how she was.

“Oh, I got Karl’s seed in my uterus, so everything’s hunky dory,” a statement I couldn't place as sarcastic or sincere.

She pulled the knife out of the door and stuck it in a belt with several others.

“Make yourself at home, but remember, if you cross me, I’ll cut you.”

The situation was turning out to be less than optimal.

Reset

Alternate history or alternative history is a subgenre of speculative fiction (or some would say science fiction) and historical fiction that is set in a world in which history has diverged from history as it is generally known. Alternate history literature asks the question, "What if history had developed differently?"