Planet America (16 page)

A jester
? Hunter thought.

A delicate hand pushed back the low-slung fool's cap, revealing the face of a very attractive young girl. Blonde. Sweet.

"Why do you feel you are one who's being called back?" she asked Hunter in a high-pitched melodious voice.

Hunter shook his head. "I really don't know. I have this thing inside me that's saying I must find the Home Planets—and, I think, one in particular. I just feel I
must
get there, somehow—"

"So, you have this compulsion and that flag?"

"Is that enough?" Hunter asked in reply.

She smiled. "It's more than enough. But what of your companions here?"

Hunter looked at Tomm, Zarex, and the robot.

"They helped me get here; they helped me find you," he replied. "I want them to come with me."

The girl laughed. "Well, at this point they have no choice. They've seen me, they've seen this way station. They now know the secret of this place."

Zarex and Tomm seemed relieved.

"I've got nothing else pressing," Zarex deadpanned. "And I've been known to visit a strange world or two in my lifetime."

Tomm also managed a smile. "A chance to journey to a place that isn't supposed to exist?" he said drolly. "How can I pass that up?"

Even 33418 made a squeaking noise. He had nowhere else he could go either.

"I guess it's the lot of us then," Hunter told the girl.

Tomm looked up at her. "Now these Home Planets," he said. "They are close by? Right?"

The girl laughed again. "Look around. Does anything seem close by to you?"

With that, she snapped her fingers, and a bright golden ball suddenly appeared in front of her. She studied it for a moment, then said, "You will have to go immediately. Our time is growing short here—"

"Wait a moment!" Zarex said. "You
have
to tell us
how
we are going..."

She shook her head no.

Zarex pressed her. "But what will our means of transport be?"

Again, she shook her head. "I can't say. Those are the rules."

The three humans looked at each other. "Well, how long will our journey take?" Tomm asked her.

The girl just smiled and then winked. It was clear no answer was forthcoming.

She passed her hand over the ball, and suddenly all four were reduced into a Twenty 'n Six box that had appeared in her other hand. The girl manipulated the globe again. The Twenty 'n Six box turned into a smooth, pearl-colored stone. She examined the stone for a moment, then turned to the northwest, toward a piece of the night sky that was particularly devoid of stars. Or at least any that were "close by."

Then she held her hand up to her mouth and blew on the stone.

There was yet another bright flash, and suddenly the stone rocketed away at great speed. Traveling at a velocity that rivaled even that of Hunter's flying machine, the stone was out of the planet's atmosphere, out of its orbit, and out of the star system completely, all in the blink of an eye.

Part Two

Ashley's Dream

8

Lisa Lee was lost, and she didn't know why.

Either her map was too old or they had changed the highway signs in this part of Illinois recently. She'd been driving for hours and yet didn't seem to be getting any closer to her destination. None of the landmarks were as they should have been, and it didn't help that her watch had stopped running early in the trip. As a result, she had no idea what time it was.

This was not good. This trip was her first solo assignment as an FBI agent. She'd been nervous since the git-go. She was out of the FBI field office in Chicago, and up until a week before had always worked with a partner. Now, finally, she had a case of her own. She'd waited for this day ever since graduating from the academy sixteen months ago. And what happens? She winds up lost!

Her only consolation was that her survival kit was holding out. She had three Cokes remaining from a six-pack. Her large bag of Fritos was only half gone. She had ten cigarettes left. Not bad for nearly a full day of driving. She opened a Coke now, downed a handful of Fritos, and lit a cigarette, all in the same motion. She checked her gas gauge. Her vintage Pontiac Firebird was notoriously bad on fuel. Stepping on the gas pedal was like flushing a toilet. But she had had this ideal notion that the long drive down from Chicago would actually be good for the car's engine. Muscle cars needed a long drive every once in a while to blow the carbon out of the motor—or at least that's what her brother told her the day he gave it to her, as a present, for getting her special agent's badge.

However, a muscle car was not the best vehicle to get lost in; when the gas gauge started plunging, it was only a matter of time before you either had to find a filling station or wound up at the side of the road. She prayed this would not happen. Being late for her first assignment would be bad enough; running out of gas and getting stranded would be dreadful.

She was trying to find a town called Betaville. It was in the southwestern part of the state, forty-four miles off Interstate 55. She had taken the exit the AAA traveler's guide had recommended and had proceeded west on State Highway 67A. But twenty miles into this, she'd come upon a detour, which brought her to a Temporary Route 467B. She was forced to travel on this empty, straight-as-an-arrow highway for nearly an hour before returning to Route 67A.

So the question was: Had she passed Betaville already? Had the detour swung her too far north to see the town? She didn't know. She'd been due at the police station at noon; it was now getting dark. The highway seemed unending, no towns, no signs, no gas stations. She dragged heavily on her cigarette and then nervously checked her lipstick in the mirror.

It seemed like she'd been driving for days.

It was just around the time she saw the top of the moon peeking over the eastern horizon that her fuel gauge needle hit empty.

It was now nearly five o'clock by her estimate, and she could have made it to Betaville and halfway back to Chicago by this time. Her cell phone had been on Roam, which in this part of Illinois simply meant the chances of actually making a phone call were little and none. A very creepy sensation washed over her. She tugged at her skirt, it was too short to begin with and now, after such a long ride, it had really become very uncomfortable. Her pumps were beginning to make her feet ache, too. Not a good outfit to be stranded in.

The Firebird finally began running out of gas just as she was approaching the top of a fairly steep hill. She drained the last of her Coke, took one final drag of her cigarette, and then started urging the car along, for just a few feet more, just to the top of the hill, where, on the faintest hope, she might be able to roll down the other side and into a gas station.

The car began sputtering badly with about twenty feet to go before the crest of the hill. Lisa gripped the wheel tighter, pushed the accelerator all the way down to the floorboard, and swore loudly. Somehow this and the few drops of gas left in her lines was enough to just make the top of the rise.

But then the car died for good.

Well, this is just great.

She was late, she was lost, she was out of gas, and her cell phone was not in range. The nose of the car was pointing to the pinnacle of the hill. It was getting dark.

She screamed twice, then fixed her hair, and lit a cigarette. There were only seven Marlboro 100s left. Rationing would soon have to begin. She dragged on this one heavily and thought back to those days, not so long ago, when she actually thought of herself as a lucky person. Lucky to be smart enough to make it through the Academy. Lucky to be pretty enough to actually corral a good field office. Lucky to be persistent enough to get a case of her own in nearly record time.

She looked at the full moon, rising quickly now above the field to her left. The face seemed to be laughing at her. A brisk wind blew by. She crushed out the cigarette and really tried very hard not to cry.

Then she climbed out of the car, walked the last few feet to the top of the hill, and discovered that she'd been lucky one more time.

Because on the other side of the hill, not a quarter mile down the road, was the town of Betaville.

Lisa arrived at the small police station just as the clock in the town square was striking six.

She'd managed to roll the Pontiac down the hill, and the first place she came to was a gas station, where she promptly filled up. She also bought a fresh pack of smokes and a spare Coke from the vending machine. The ladies' room was surprisingly clean, enough for her to check her look, freshen her makeup, and slap the wrinkles from her skirt and jacket. She'd taken her contacts out and put her glasses on, as she thought this made her look a bit more astute.

She took the parking spot next to the chief's Jeep and calmly walked into the red-brick station. The desk sergeant knew who she was right away. He said something about some people expecting her all afternoon, but added that he knew the FBI was busy, and could be excused for being late every once in a while. She turned down his offer of a cup of coffee and wordlessly followed him through a pair of swinging doors and down the bright, white hallway beyond.

They eventually reached a door marked Conference Room. Next to it was a door marked Janitor—Private. This second sign was actually a bit of misdirection, to keep secret what kind of room actually lay beyond the first. Lisa's escort opened the janitor's door and let her in. Inside was a tiny room with a glass panel installed on one wall; it looked into the room next door. Two State Police investigators were peering through this two-way mirror. They stood up as Lisa entered. She acknowledged their chivalry with little more than a nod.

She took a seat next to them, retrieved her notebook, and peered through the two-way herself. Two uniformed Betaville cops were interrogating three suspects in the next room. The men were sitting in metal folding chairs; the cops were leaning on a desk in front of them. Both cops had laptops open nearby.

Lisa scanned the three suspects and then let out a groan.
Here we go again
, she thought,
just afoot away from the loony bin
. It was her own fault though. The big reason she'd been able to convince her superiors to let her out so soon on her own was a special forte she'd carved out for herself and her partner, back when she had one. It was simple talent really: Lisa would take on any case no one else in the Chicago office wanted, i.e., the far-out stuff that never went anywhere except into a mountain of paperwork. Many times these cases involved your assorted psychos, vampires, mad bombers, and cannibal wanna-bes. It drove her partner nuts and hastened his early departure, again part of her plan. But the problem was, now she was stuck with the wacko cases alone.

In this instance, the Betaville police had arrested the three suspects the night before, after they'd been caught trespassing on a farm just outside of town. Minutes prior to their first being spotted, there had been a huge explosion on the farm's north forty, one that shook every building in Betaville and even a few as far away as Plato, some twenty miles to the west. The owner of the farm quickly alerted the police about the explosion, and they found the three wandering aimlessly through an alfalfa field, their clothes and hair still smoldering from the blast. Careless use of explosives was the other pending charge.

But why did the Betaville police call in the FBI? For one thing, the Bureau was always notified whenever there was an incident where large numbers of explosives were involved. But there was also her oddball factor as well: The suspects, Lisa had been told, were "three guys in Halloween costumes."

They were also claiming to be from outer space.

"OK, let's go back to the beginning. Do you know where you are?"

The three suspects shrugged in unison.

"Haven't we been over that already?" one asked.

"It's important that we hear it again," the cop said, winking at Lisa through the two-way.

She had already begun to scribble notes. The three suspects were wearing what appeared to be Halloween costumes. The first guy was dressed like a superhero, complete with a black one-piece suit, wacky boots, a cape, and a double-X logo emblazoned on his chest. The second guy was wearing a perfectly ripped, tight-fitting muscular uniform that would put any pro wrestler's wardrobe to shame. The third guy, he being the oldest, was dressed in a long cassock and a white collar. The Betaville cops had already dubbed him "The Priest from Outer Space."

Lisa scanned the trio's arrest report. They had tested negative for drugs and alcohol—or at least nothing showed up on the local cops' sobriety devices. And though they looked ridiculous, the three men seemed coherent and intelligent. They were also extremely curious about their surroundings, studying in minute detail the ashtrays on the table in front of them, the slowly rotating ceiling fan above, the extremely dirty cups the Betaville cops were using to drink their hot, black, foul-smelling coffee.

"We don't know where we are," the diminutive guy in the priest costume finally said. "We thought we did, but now we're not so sure."

"OK," the second cop said. "How did you get here then?"

"But we've told you that at least a half dozen times," the guy in the ripped shirt with all the muscles said. "How many more times are you going to want to hear it?"

"At least once more," the first cop said, trying to suppress a grin.

All three suspects groaned, again in unison. The big guy and the one in the superhero costume wearily looked over at the priest. He'd done most of the talking, one of the state cops told Lisa. Almost as if he was their spokesman. She made a special note of this in her book.

The little man began their story again. He started off by explaining how he and the guy in the caped costume were actually interplanetary travelers. They'd hooked up with a group of soldiers who roamed outer space looking for honorable battles to fight; they were called the Freedom Brigade and were quite heroic. Many of these soldiers eventually died, though, in a war on a moon at the end of the galaxy called Zazu-Zazu. They'd traveled to this Zazu-Zazu place because somewhere on the tiny satellite there was once a beacon that swept the entire universe, looking to bring all of their lost brothers back home again— here, to
this
planet. The guy in the cape learned about the beacon and thought he was one of those being called back. So when he and the priest found one last dying trooper on the battlefield of Zazu-Zazu and were given the barest directions by him, they set out to find the Home Planets, the place the beacon was calling everyone back to. Along the way, they had battled a huge death star, space pirates, had met princesses, and discovered a long lost world covered with ghostly robots. That came after the muscle man had joined their quest.