tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-39751254520721591012023-11-15T09:45:16.212-06:00The Jason Offutt ExperimentI write two types of stories. Stories editors like and stories I like, but editors don’t. The stories editors like end up in magazines; the others end up in limbo. This experiment is for those stories in limbo. Editors have their opinions, so I’m looking for a more important opinion – yours, the reader’s. Each month or so I’ll post one of these stories. All I ask is for you to leave a comment telling me what you think of it and why. If you like the story, please tell a friend. Enjoy. -- JasonJason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3975125452072159101.post-34035715729822586042015-11-28T20:20:00.000-06:002015-11-28T20:20:46.888-06:00The Hunted<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;">The cold of the late January morning seeped into
Danny’s exposed face and hands as he stood outside the Penitentiary, the cold
metal doors clicked shut behind him. </span><i style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;">This is wrong,</i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;">
he thought.</span><i style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;"> This is all wrong.</i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;"> The sun, just coming
over the horizon beyond the thick stand of trees, bathed the world in gray from
behind heavy, dark clouds. He wrapped his arms around his chest, the thin state-issued
coat doing little to fight back the frigid air. </span><i style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;">Wrong.</i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; text-indent: 0.25in;">
Overnight, those clouds had covered the forest with snow. He needed the snow to
fall again to cover his tracks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Daniel David Wornall,” echoed from loudspeakers that dotted
the twenty-foot-tall chain link fence that enclosed the Chase as he stood
before the doors, reality starting to creep in. “The Hunters await deployment.
You have five minutes.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny’s legs, clad in thin, gray prison pants, didn’t
move. The whole thing was a mistake. It had to be. Danny had brought the police
to Kayla’s bloodstained body; he hadn’t killed her. He’d only …<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“You have four minutes,” the monotone loudspeaker
voice droned.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">One, two, three, Danny. Run. Run
goddamnit, RUN.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He pulled one leg forward; his gray slip-on tennis
shoe disappeared into the drift, the snow bitingly cold pushed up his loose
pant leg and over the ankle sock. His next leg moved faster. By the time the
loudspeaker told Danny he only had three minutes to run, he had disappeared
into the grayness of the snow-covered forest.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny ran awkwardly in the snow, not knowing what lay
beneath the thick, white blanket that covered the deer trail he’d stumbled
onto. He stopped, and listened. Quiet permeated the forest, like someone had
sucked out all the air. No birds, no animals, not even a passing jet broke the
silence. Just his deep, gasping breaths. His eyes grazed across the arm of his
coat; the bright orange nearly glowed in the gray and white morning. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Shit,” he hissed, and pulled at the buttons that held
his coat tight, keeping in what little warmth it could. The cold clung to his
skin like a wet towel as he peeled off the jacket, and threw it behind a
snow-covered bramble. He stood in a gray T-shirt. The cold might kill him, he
knew; but that orange coat made him an easy target for Hunters. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny wrapped his stiff, frozen fingers around the
low-hanging branch of a young beech tree to steady himself. Gloves would have
been nice, but Runners didn’t get gloves. The branch swayed as Danny sucked in
air and exhaled it in heavy bursts of steam. Great flakes of snow began to fall
steadily; within moments a white bead curtain weaved itself through the woods. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Thank God,” he whispered, leaning heavily on the
branch, his eyes trained behind him. Prints in the snow made by his state-issued
tennis shoes <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">no boots for you, dirtbag </span></i>were
going to bring every Hunter right to him. Maybe the snow would fall fast enough
to erase those prints.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A shout. Somewhere in the forest behind him a Hunter
had found his trail. Danny couldn’t hear their words, but he knew what they
said. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Goddamnit.</span></i> Danny had jumped over a bush,
and brushed away prints before running down the deer trail, but the Hunters
found the deep footprints anyway. That call was from the man who found his
trail. Danny knew that man. He released the branch, the small tree swaying
slightly, and pulled his freezing feet into motion. The Hunters were well
dressed. Heavy gloves, thick Carhartt coats, military boots, and hand warmers.
The cold wouldn’t even slow them. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny just had to keep moving.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The season was just turning cool the night Kayla died.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The sky had begun to darken; a pastel wash spread
across the western horizon past the Smithmeyer’s farm field that October night.
Stubble from corn stalks ran in rows as far as Danny could see. Kayla stepped
onto the wooden back deck where Karl Smithmeyer had grilled steaks just an hour
before, her mother Gwen sitting in a deck chair sipping a glass of wine. Kayla
leaned against the rail, and smiled, her parents now inside watching the news.
“The movie starts in an hour,” she said. “We really need to go.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A smile grew on his face. Kayla. Just looking at her
made his breath come fast. He turned and tossed a soft, loose spiral to Kayla’s
little sister. It hit her hands and skittered across the grass.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Just one more,” he said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Five,” Katie called, the ball back in her hands. She
never wanted to stop.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny turned to the girl, her hair tied in a ponytail.
“Two.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Four.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Three.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">She frowned. “Deal.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The snow now came hard. Danny paused; the visibility
before him was about ten feet. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I’m going to get through
this.</span></i> The snow didn’t affect his vision like it did the Hunters because
they were looking for someone in a bright orange Penitentiary coat, not a gray
T-shirt and light gray pants that blended in with the snow. His breath came
heavily as he jogged. The Gate was out there somewhere, and he was ahead of everybody.
All he had to do is get through the Gate, and he was free. He thought of the
old time punishments. The electric chair, lethal injections, and the barbaric
practice of making a criminal sit in a six-by-eight feet concrete jail cell,
until they died – like an animal in a cage. But those punishments weren’t
enough to deter most people from breaking the law; the Hunt was. Robberies were
rare, murders almost non-existent. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">As snow built on the trail, covering his hair in
white, he wondered if a little barbarism might be better than the Hunt, because
he knew who stalked him in the cold. Kayla’s parents Karl, and Gwen, and her
sister Katie were in these woods looking for him, armed with M4A1 carbine
rifles, and Beretta 9mms, and they wanted to cut out his heart.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; text-align: center; text-indent: -.5in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The movie faded into the background as Danny held
Kayla Smithmeyer in the dim light of the theater, the armrest folded back to
form one large chair. Her hair smelled of coconut, her breath of cinnamon, and
he inhaled deeply. They’d met their sophomore year in college. “You see that
guy,” Kayla had said to Jenny Kappleman as they sat in the university library,
anthropology books spread over the table. “I’m going to marry him.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Jenny shrugged. “You don’t even know him.” She paused
and took a long drink of the Chai mocha latte from the coffee shop downstairs. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Watch me.” Kayla stood, and walked across the study
lounge, the ΣΣΣ on the chest of purple sweatshirt like a shield. Danny sat
alone at his own table, ‘The Collective Works of Shakespeare’ open to ‘A
Midsummer Night’s Dream.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Are you Team Demetrius or Team Lysander?” Kayla
asked, the fingers of her right hand curled around a strand of her auburn hair.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny looked up, pulling off his glasses. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Just like Clark Kent, </span></i>Kayla thought. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">How adorable</span></i>.
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“What?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Hermia,” she said. “She’s supposed to marry
Demetrius, but she loves Lysander. Who are you rooting for?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He gently sat his glasses on the open pages of the
book, and leaned back in the hard library chair, a smile teased the corners of
his mouth. “Lysander,” Danny said softly. “How can you root against love?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">That was two years ago. They sat, wrapped around each
other in the empty back row of the eight-screen theater in Kayla’s small
hometown, their lips joined, the bad romantic comedy they’d come to see far away.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A stream cut across the trail, the falling snow melted
as it struck its surface. Danny jumped over the three-foot-wide gap in the
trail, then stopped, the gurgling of the moving water threatened death. He
looked down the stream; the snowfall all but blinded him. There may be another
trail downstream. If he could <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">this is stupid, Wornall.
You’ll freeze </span></i>make it through the water without getting frostbite; the
Hunters would lose his trail. The Gate was near. It had to be. He’d been on the
run for at least an hour. The Chase wasn’t that big. Danny jogged up the trail
about twenty feet, and slipped into the brush to the left of the trail, then
slowly backtracked, placing his shoes in his deepening footprints until he
reached the stream.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“You’re going to make it, Danny. You’re going to make
it,” he whispered through chattering teeth. The Gate was freedom. He just had to
reach it first, then Kayla Smithmeyer’s death would be forgiven.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">If he could forgive himself.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny draped an arm around Kayla’s shoulders as he
drove his roomy older model Buick. She kissed his neck. “Find a place to pull
over,” she whispered in his ear. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Really?</span></span></i>
“Really?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Kayla leaded away from him, and pulled her yellow
cotton blouse over her head. He stole a quick glance as she worked the hooks on
the back of the black lace bra. “Yes, really.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The abandoned farmhouse sat about a quarter mile off the
rural highway that connected the Smithmeyer farm to Collinwood. The headlights
of Danny’s car bounced over the ancient front porch as it made it’s way slowly
down the bumpy, unused lane. Tall, brittle yellowed weeds in the middle of old
tracks folded under the bumper. White paint peeled off the old boards of the
house like a sunburn, and black hollowed eyes stared from where windows once
stood. The car turned in a big arc to point back toward the highway. The
headlights suddenly shone over nothingness. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Whoa.” The car lurched as Danny pushed the brakes to
the floor. Kayla giggled; her jeans followed her shirt and bra onto the floor.
The car sat at the edge of a ravine. Danny could see Kayla bite her lower lip
in the soft green glow of the dash lights. She wormed her panties over her
buttocks, pulled them slowly down her legs, and held them over the floorboard. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“I want you,” she said, and dropped her panties. Danny
slammed the car into park and turned off the ignition as Kayla threw her arms
around him and pulled him on top of her.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The sex in the front seat of his Buick was only their
third time. Kayla’s fingers clutched Danny’s T-shirt as they moved; sweat
beaded over his body in the cool fall night. She’d moaned, then screamed during
their lovemaking, more from emotion than from the inexperience they both
shared. “I love you, Danny,” she whispered as she pushed back against him.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Love?</span></span></i> Yes.
Love. “I love you, too.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The water stung his feet, but Danny hardly noticed the
cold anymore. The snow was his friend, but he knew it would kill him as surely
as a bullet from Kayla’s family. They were out there, even Katie. A tear froze
on his cheek. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">God, Kayla. I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.</span></i>
Icy water splashed his legs as he trudged through the stream, the pain numbed
him. He wondered if he’d still have his toes if he made it through the Gate. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">After a few minutes – or an hour, Danny no longer
sensed time – a second deer trail appeared covered in a clean coating of
spotless snow. No tracks crossed the trail, no deer, no rabbit, no people. Danny
walked unsteadily back through the stream to a large branch that hung over the
water. Sleep pulled at him; he shook his head to try and dislodge it. He knew exhaustion
was one symptom of extreme hypothermia, and it terrified him. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Oh, God.</span></i> The exhaustion, the clumsy hands, the chattering
teeth. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I’m freezing to death.</span></i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny had to leave the stream now, if he didn’t, he’d
die here in the cold water of the Chase. The deer trail was the key. His head
slowly swung upstream, snow blinding him, but Danny knew the Hunters were
there, following him. Maybe even down the stream; if not now, soon. They’d see
his tracks on the deer trail if he just stepped out. Pain threatened to cripple
Danny’s hands as he flexed his fingers, the skin gray, blotched with patches of
blue. He didn’t know if his hands would support his weight. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">For Kayla.</span></i> He leapt and wrapped his frozen fingers around
the low branch. Danny’s hands worked; he held himself out of the water, his wet
pants legs immediately began to freeze. He swung forward, and back, the branch
moaned under his weight; then he launched himself over the brush on the far
bank, and landed in a crunch. Snow-covered sticks snapped beneath his body as
he crashed into the snow-covered timber; air shot from his lungs. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Goddamnit.</span></span></i> <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A rifle crack sounded from behind him. The Hunters had
heard his fall.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Kayla put the blouse back on slower than she’d taken
it off, and shimmied into her faded blue jeans. “That was beautiful,” she said.
She grabbed Danny by his cheeks, and kissed him deeply. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">It was,
honey. It was. Love? Yeah, I’m in love. </span></i>Then she pulled away, and
giggled. “I have to pee.” Her fingers caressed Danny’s smooth cheek, and she
smiled. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">My god, that smile.</span></i> “I’ll be right
back,” she said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The mechanism click was loud in the still night as she
swung open the door and stepped outside. A slight breeze flowed through the
boughs of the nearby trees, the grinding of the branches eerie in the darkness.
Kayla pulled her jeans to her ankles, and squatted in the weeds as her right
hand held onto the door. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">The ravine. She should watch out.
</span></span></i>“Be careful,” slowly came from Danny’s mouth. Oh, the taste
of her breath still lingered. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“I’ll be fine,” she said. “I’m just …” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A squeal past her lips as her hand slipped from car
door, and she tumbled backward.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Kayla?” Danny scooted over the bench seats, his pants
up, but unbuckled. “Kayla? Are you okay?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A groan blended with the hush of the wind, and a thud,
like somebody had dropped a watermelon. Then silence. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Oh, dear
God.</span></i> Fingers numb with fear fumbled with the latch of the glove box.
It sprang open, and papers flew. His insurance card, car manual, Sonic napkins.
The flashlight sat at the bottom; he hoped the batteries still worked. “Kayla?”
he called out the open door. There was no response but the wind in the trees.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny caught his toe on buried root and stumbled. A
sharp pang lanced through his chest as his knee buried itself in the snow. He
grabbed his right side with frozen hands<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">.</span></i> A rib, he
figured, from the goddamned stupid jump from the creek. A warm, coppery taste
filled his mouth, and he spat, a steaming crimson stain landed in the pure
white that covered the ground, and melted out of sight. A hospital awaited on
the other side of the Gate. He had to get to there. Danny pulled himself to his
feet, and kept moving, each step stabbed his ribcage. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Ten yards farther through the driving snow his teeth
stopped chattering, and he began to sway. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I should rest, </span></i>ran
through his head. Danny limped toward a massive white oak tree, its bare
branches reached out like comforting arms. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I’ll just sit and close my
eyes for a minute, and I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine</span></i>. His eyelids
became heavy, and he stumbled. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Don’t do it, Wornall.
You’ll die out here.</span></i> Then he heard the voice. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Two hours,” the monotone loudspeaker echoed in the
distance. “The Hunt has been two hours.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny shook his head; some consciousness seeped back
in. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Two hours? </span></i>Most hunts were over in two
hours. It must be the snow, slowing the Hunters down.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </span></i>The
loudspeaker meant the fence was close. If the fence was close, the Gate was
close. Danny quickened his pace, steeling his jaw against the pain. He rounded
a bend in the trail and stopped dead. He’d entered the Garden of Ghosts.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Kayla,” Danny screamed as he spilled out the
passenger door and onto the grassy lane. The ravine fell off the lane nearly
straight down, the front passenger tire inches away from the edge. “Kayla.
Answer me.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The cool wind brushing his hair seemed the only thing
alive in the night. He clicked on the flashlight, the dim yellow beam <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">damn batteries </span></i>nearly useless. Danny stood; his knees weak
from sex were now weak from terror. “Kayla,” he called again. Twenty yards
toward the crumbling house, the ground sloped to meet the lane. He scrambled
down the weed-choked pitch toward the bottom, the flashlight beam bounced over
decaying tires, and rusting metal; a fender, an oil drum, box springs, bits of
rotting cloth hung off the spindly coils like spider webs. Danny crawled over
the ruined husk of a 1940s truck bed and reached the bottom of the gorge, the
shadow of his Buick in the moonlight hung over him. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Kayla,” his voice softer now, almost a whisper.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The weak flashlight beam grazed something twisted
awkwardly on the floor of the ravine. “Oh, my God.” Kayla’s leg lay at an
impossible angle, unmoving from behind an ancient farm implement. Her shoe was
gone. “Kayla,” Danny’s mouth moved, but no sound followed. Gooseflesh pricked
his arms and legs as he slowly moved around the tiny, four-row planter that may
have once been pulled behind an Oliver, or some other tractor from a company
that no longer existed, and found Kayla.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">She lie silent, eyes wide, her mouth open like she’d
just been surprised. “Kayla, baby.” Danny stepped closer, his legs threatened
to spill him onto the junk-strewn ground. “Say something, Kayla. Please, say
something.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Then he saw it. A rusted pipe gleaming wet with blood
jutted from the center of her pale yellow blouse like it was giving Danny the
finger.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He screamed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Haunting eyeless sockets stared at Danny from peeling
skulls. Mouths, some fleshless, some starting to decompose, hung agape as Danny
stood at the edge of the clearing, the Garden of Ghosts. His eyes affixed to the
bodies of the Runners nailed to crucifixes, and planted in the snow like
scarecrows from a nightmare. Those killed in the Hunt were brought here, and
pinned in the clearing like giant specimens in a bug collection, then put on
television for everyone to see. Danny couldn’t tell how far the clearing
stretched; the gray haze of the falling snow made the Garden look like it went
forever. Maybe it did.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Placards marked “Child Molester,” “Rapist,” “Thief,”
hung from what was left of the necks of the dead. Great spikes driven through
arms, legs, and chests held these bodies to the rough wooden poles. These
people were dead before the nails sunk into their flesh. The bodies were just
here <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">to slow you down, Wornall.</span></i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Shit,” he whispered in a whiff of steam. He limped
through the dangling bodies, legs in decayed gray prison pants, and feet, some
in state-issued slip-on shoes, some bare and skeletal, hung at face level.
Danny stared at the ground as he moved through the crucified. The faces. He
couldn’t look at the faces. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A bit of orange at the base of one pole jutted from
the snow. He reached toward it and pulled; a prison coat came free. He stood in
the falling snow, holding the bright orange garment. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Damn it,
Wornall. You’re going to die from the cold if you don’t put it on</span></i>.
He’d tossed his into the brush, to help him hide from the hunters. But they
knew where he was; he could hear them in the distance, closing. It wouldn’t
make any difference. Danny shook snow from the coat, and slipped it on, his
fingers didn’t function well enough to work the buttons, so he left it open. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">More sounds in the distance, but closer now. Through
the snow, a trailhead entered the trees. Danny lowered his gaze from the
hanging bodies of the damned and stumbled toward it. A skeletal foot raked
across his hair as he passed beneath the last crucifix; he caught the scream in
his throat, and looked up. A grinning skeleton glared back, a patch of skin on
its cheek held all that was left of its beard. The falling snow collected in
that beard creating a macabre Father Christmas. The sign under its chin read
“Murderer.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny pulled the coat tighter around him, his frozen
hands in the pockets, and disappeared back into the forest.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The side trail was old, underbrush starting to choke
it closed. Danny almost missed it. The shouts behind him had grown silent, but
he doubted the Hunters had gone a different direction; his tracks were too
visible. He had to get off this trail quickly. Fifteen feet up the trail the
underbrush grew short, short enough to step over. Danny hurried to the stunted
bushes, and reached his aching leg to the other side, pins and needles stabbed
his foot as he put his weight on it and stepped fully over. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gotta hide the evidence, Wornall.</span></i> He pulled his cold, clumsy
hands from the coat pocket to grab a branch to sweep away the new tracks, but
something fell from the right pocket. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“What the hell?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He bent, wincing as his side stabbed with pain. A book
of matches lay on the snow. He picked them up and opened the cover; eight
matches remained. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Matches? Matches? Fire. Heat. No, no. They’ll
see. </span></i>The matchbook sat in his palm. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">But if I’m
far enough off the trail, a little fire. Just a little fire. They won’t see
that. They </span></i>can’t <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">see that.</span></i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny held the matches tightly in his right hand, and
wrapped the aching fingers of his left around a dead, leafy branch, wiping
fresh snow over his footprints as he backed toward the side trail. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The trial lasted less than an hour. Indisputable DNA
evidence on Kayla Smithmeyer proved Daniel David Wornall had raped her minutes
before throwing the twenty-two-year-old education major to her death. No one
listened to his story; the stone faces in the jury had already decided he was
guilty despite lack of evidence of a struggle. No bruising, no scratches, no
skin under Kayla’s fingernails. The jury sentenced Danny to the Hunt in front
of a national TV audience. Danny expected to see Katie cry as the deputies led
him out of the courtroom in handcuffs and ankle chains. She simply stared at
him like she wanted him dead.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> <o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A rocky overhang at the base of a small hill protected
Danny from the worst of the snow. The side trail weaved through forest, and led
him to this spot. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dear God, this is going to work.</span></i>
He slumped to the ground; sleep again tugged at him. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Fire. Have
to start the fire.</span></i> He knew if he fell asleep he’d never wake. He
rolled to his left side to push himself to his feet – then he saw the writing.
Rusty smears in a jagged line on the rock wall read, “I DIDN’T DO IT.” <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Blood?</span></i> The words were written in blood, drips of rust-red
dotted the stone beneath the scrawl. Danny crouched before the wall, and traced
his finger along the letters. They’d been written with a bleeding finger. I
didn’t do it. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I didn’t do it, either, pal. </span></i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">On hands and knees Danny swept snow away from the foot
of the overhang, making a spot to pile kindling. His hand hit something hard
beneath the snow; he reached his hand around it, and pulled out the branch. It
was white.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A stifled cry burst from Danny’s mouth as his brain
finally registered the femur, bits of dried flesh still clung to the surface.
He dropped the bone, and brushed away more snow. An orange sleeve appeared
under the white carpet, then a bare skull, grinning. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Did you fall asleep, buddy?” Danny mumbled, looking
down at the corpse of a man, a Runner. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">They never found him.</span></i>
“You’re supposed to be in the Garden, dude. Hanging in the Garden, but you’re
here, in this hidey hole.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A painful smile tugged at his cracked lips. If this
man was here, it was because no one found him. This place was safe; he could
light his fire. Danny pulled the orange coat from the snow, bones and remains
rattled out. “Sorry about that, but you’re going to save my life, mister.” He
placed the coat on the cleared ground under the overhang, and stood, his body
shrieked in pain. “It’s okay, pal. Happens all the time. Getting old. I’m
nearly twenty-three.” Danny grabbed branches, dragged them to the coat, and
began to break off twigs. “You’re going to help me make a fire, whoever you
are.” He sprinkled the rotted Penitentiary jacket with twigs, added larger
sticks, and bent over the pile. He still held the matches in his hand. “I don’t
care what you did to wind up here. I didn’t do anything, myself. I just wasn’t
fast enough to save my girlfriend.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">I DIDN’T DO IT. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Horatio. Horatio. Were you
guilty? </span></span></i>Was anyone in the Garden guilty of the crimes that
hung around their neck? Were pictures of the Garden of Ghosts enough to keep a
desperate kid from robbing a liquor store? It didn’t matter. All Danny knew was
that he hadn’t killed Kayla. He had to tell people that.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“I gotta get out of here.”<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Stiff fingers fumbled with the matchbook. Danny used
his thumbs to pull it open. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Eight matches. I’ve got
eight shots at this, or I’m going to die.</span></i> He laughed, the sound loud
against the snowy silence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Come on, Wornall, goddamnit.
Focus.</span></span></i> Danny breathed in slowly; his fractured rib stabbed
his chest. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Light the match. Just light the match. </span></i>Fingers
deadened by the cold fumbled with the paper matches in the plain green book. The
matchbook dropped to the snow.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Shit.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny tried to flex his fingers, but couldn’t. The
semi-frozen digits were locked into claws. His breath came fast. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I’m not going to do it. I </span></i>can’t <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">do it. I
can’t light a stupid goddamned match. <o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“Ease up, Wornall,” he whispered. “Ease up.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny slowly scooped the matches from the snow, and
pulled them open with the palm of his hand. The matches stood at awkward
angles. “Come on, man,” he said as he brought his nearly useless hands toward
his face, and felt for a match with his mouth. Danny’s stiff, cracked lips
opened and closed around the book, a stick protruded awkwardly; he clenched his
teeth onto it, and pulled. The match came free. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Yes. Holy
shit, yes. </span></i>He<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> </span></i>took a deep
breath through his nostrils; the cold burned his nose<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">.</span></i>
Danny slowly pushed the match between the knuckles of his right index and
middle fingers, and clamped them together.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny stared at it. This tiny, fragile paper stick
tipped with phosphorus and potassium chlorate, was going to keep him alive. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I did it. I freakin’ did it. Now light, damn you.</span></i> He turned
the matchbook clumsily in his hands, and pulled the match head awkwardly across
the strike strip.<span style="color: #222222;"><span style="color: #222222;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Nothing happened.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny took in a shallow breath and struck the match
again. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Still nothing. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">They’re too old. No. They can’t
be. They just can’t.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He cursed, and dragged the match head across the strip
again, and again, and again. Pop. The side of the match head fizzled, and
sparked, then died, a thin whiff of smoke crawled upward into the onslaught of
snow.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny giggled. The next match took fire immediately,
but he dropped it, the snow killed the small, yellow flame. The third match
lit, and he touched it to the arm of the prison coat; a tiny flame climbed over
the old, faded fabric, then took hold, and ate its way up toward the kindling.
The sticks began to crackle as they burned.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Heat flowed into Danny’s damaged hands and feet; the
pain was intense. Fuel logs stacked in a teepee over the kindling popped as
they burned. The loudspeaker had droned again as Danny built the teepee, he’d
been on the run three hours. No one had lasted three hours, except the man
whose skull Danny had pulled from the snow, and sat next to the fire. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“I don’t know who you were, Horatio, but thanks.”
Danny tossed another fuel log onto the fire; the teepee collapsed in a shower
of sparks. “I would have fallen asleep out here.” Smoke disappeared quickly
into the snow that seemed to hang in the cold, still air. The hunters would
have reached the Gate by now, Danny realized. Karl, Gwen, and Katie <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">no, not Katie</span></i> probably stood at the gate in their warm
winter clothing, just waiting for a bright orange jacket to come running from
the tree line. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Or maybe they’ve reached the Gate, and have
come back in, looking for me.</span></i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He flexed his fingers and toes, pain stabbed with
every movement, but they worked. They needed to work. He was going to leave the
Chase alive, and he needed fingers. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">And I am leaving the Chase
alive. </span></i>The fire popped and whizzed as pockets of sap in the logs
exploded. Danny threw on another log. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“How am I going to get past them, Horatio?” he asked,
the dancing flames cast grim shadows on the skull. “They’ll be waiting for me.
How can I distract them long enough to run …” <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">limp</span></i>
“…through the Gate?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">The fire cracked, and shifted again, and Danny
grinned. He’d set the woods on fire.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Dead trees lie everywhere. The Chase was a deathtrap,
not a recreation area. No one came through to clear the dead brush, and it
clogged the ground. Danny dragged heavy branches over his fire; Horatio was now
buried beneath the flames. The long-dead wood caught quickly, and the flames
leapt into the snowy sky. No one would see the smoke through the snow, but they
would smell it. The blaze rose to ten feet. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I need more wood. <o:p></o:p></span></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">He scrambled up the small hill that overlooked the
fire, snowflakes melted on his face as he climbed. On a clear day, he may have
been able to see the Gate, or at least the fence, and maybe a glimpse of cars
on the highway that stretched by the Penitentiary, but the gray haze was
complete. A dead fir lay on the hilltop; brown nettles still clung to the
branches. Danny smiled, ignoring his cracked, bleeding lips. This was it. The
long dead tree went over the side of a short drop off easily; beneath Danny the
dry fir burst into flames, and the fire quickly began to catch the boughs of
nearby trees. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Someone shouted in the distance. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent: .25in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">It’s started.</span></span></i> <o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">***<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Twenty minutes later, Danny stood watching the Gate,
which hung wide. He lurked behind the tree line, the dead man’s orange coat
hidden in the snowy bushes behind him. Nothing moved. No guards, no Hunters,
just the still falling snow. An ambulance waited outside the gate; exhaust spewed
into the morning<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">.</span></i> That ambulance was for him.
Warmth, food, water, healing. It was all there. Snowflakes gathered in his
unkempt brown hair, hair that just a few months ago Kayla had run her fingers
through. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">God, I miss you, Kayla</span></i>. The only noise
in the air came from behind him where he had burned the forest. Something was
wrong. This part shouldn’t be so easy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">Go, Danny. Run. <o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">But it was. His body flexed, and he limped from the
protection of the trees and onto the last thirty yards to freedom. Twenty,
fifteen, ten. Danny’s pace quickened, the lancing pain from the broken rib sent
tears down his face. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I’m going to visit Kayla’s
grave, first thing. Yeah, first thing. Kayla, I promise. I … </span></i>Five.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">A gun fired from the trees behind Danny, and his
shoulder exploded in fire. He stumbled, and his body twisted as he fell onto
his back on the frigid, snow-covered ground. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">No, NO.</span></i>
Cold seeped quickly into him as he bled warmth into the snow. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“I’m glad it was me.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">That voice. I know that voice.
That tiny, tiny voice.<o:p></o:p></span></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Ten-year-old Katie appeared in his line of sight as he
stared into the sky, her blond ponytail stuck from the back of a brown knit
cap, her blue eyes cold as the day. She pulled a military rifle into his sight,
and rested the hard, black muzzle on his forehead.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">“I thought you were my friend, Danny.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-style: italic;">What? Katie. Oh, God, sweet Katie.
</span></span></i>“We are friends, honey. I always played catch with you.” He
sucked in air; his face winced in pain. “I went to your soccer games. I am your
friend. I’ll always be your friend.” He swallowed, his throat dry. “Don’t do
this, Katie.”<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">She stood over him, her head cocked to one side. “They
said you killed her, Danny.” Her voice was emotionless, flat. “Why did you kill
my sister?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Danny tried to shake his head, but it wouldn’t move. “I
didn’t. It was an ac… an acc… .” His body shivered, the blood loss drained him.
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Katie. KATIE.</span></i> “It was an accident.” I
DIDN’T DO IT. “She just fell. I loved your sister, Katie. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-style: italic; mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I loved her</span></i>.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Katie frowned. “Then you can tell her that if you see
her,” she said, and pulled the trigger.<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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Jason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3975125452072159101.post-42546873775185085712014-03-02T21:52:00.001-06:002014-03-02T21:52:41.116-06:00Clark Bland Saves the Planet<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<i>Gloria. </i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">G-L-O-R-I-A. <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Gloria. <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">G-L-O... <o:p></o:p></span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark Bland stopped in the street and looked into the</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">morning sky blurred with
assholes. Swoosh. Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Losers.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">He started walking again, tiptoeing the thoroughfare's centerline like
a tightrope. He stopped at a weed jutting out of a large crack in the asphalt.
Sunflower, maybe. Or it could be a maple tree for all he knew.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">I'm not a damned farmer,
</span></i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark
thought. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">G-L-O-R-I-A. Glor... </span></i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">He jumped over another crack. The holes in the streets</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">were growing wider. Too
bad about the cars. If the cars were still running, then maybe people would
give a damn about the streets. But as Clark straddled the centerline, he didn't
need to worry about cars. He didn't need to worry about busses. He didn't need
to worry about somebody asking him for two bucks after they washed his
windshield while he waited for a traffic light to change. Everyone was up
there. In the sky.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">G-L-O-R...</span></i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark's toe caught one of the growing splits in the once smooth street
and he started to fall.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Damnit.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">His lunch box flew out of his hand, the turkey and cheese on wheat
squashed between the side of the box and Clark's can of Fresca as it spun in
the air.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Stupid Fresca, Clark thought as his face shot toward the gritty,
jagged pavement as fast as a speeding...</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark was in the air. Huge arms, solid as iron, grabbed him and put a
growing distance between him and the nose-bloodying pavement. The man was
dressed in a red and gold Spandex body suit. And he wore a mask. Damnit,
damnit, damnit. The man's golden cape fluttered around the two as they landed
three blocks from where Clark tripped. The dandy had also caught Clark's lunch
box.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You've been saved from certain bruising and possible nosebleed
by Captain Courteous," the costumed man said.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">It was another super hero rescue of poor Clark Bland.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Sorry about the shirt," the man said as he handed Clark his
lunch box. "It's blood from a mighty battle with Dr. Danger of Apartment
6A on Locust Street. It probably won't wash out. Oh, and I think a can of
Fresca smashed your sandwich."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark looked down at the front of his white Oxford. Blood was smeared
across it. At least the blood isn't mine, he thought, then paused. No, I would
rather it be my own blood. Clark's tie wasn't much better. Gloria could have
gotten the stain out, he thought as he clenched the lunch box handle in</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">his fist and watched
Captain Courteous shoot into the air to join thousands of other super heroes
out to save the world from whatever they hadn't saved it from yet.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark started walking again, faster this time. Can't go to work in a
bloody shirt, he thought. Too many questions.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark remembered a time before super heroes. A time when wars still
cropped up in the Middle East. A time when people still died from walking in
front of cars. A time when Gloria still cared.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"What do you think about the new SPA treatments?" Gloria had
asked Clark from across her bowl of oatmeal. Hot. With a few raisins and a
pinch of brown sugar. Always with just a pinch. Why bother eating something
healthy if you're just going to ruin it with sugar? Clark had heard her say
this enough times he now left sugar off everything.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">SPA. Super Power Advantage. Take a little here. Take a little there.
Then one day suddenly, BAM, you're Superman. What's the advantage, Clark
wondered, if everybody's got it?</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"That's like putting breast implants on a super model." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I didn't say I wanted breast implants."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> "I know, honey," Clark said, reaching across the table and</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">touching his wife's
hand, wishing like hell he'd picked another analogy. "I just mean that you
don't need either one—super powers, or breast implants."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Gloria squeezed Clark's hand. "You didn't answer my
question."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark smiled.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm happy with who I am," he said. "If people aren't
satisfied with what God gave them, I pity them."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Even those who can leap tall buildings in a single bound?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Why is she going on like this? Clark wondered. He frowned.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Yes, even them."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The clothing store at 95th and Duncan Avenue was already open. Good.
There were no cars out front, but that was normal nowadays. Most retail outlets
now relied on fly-in business, or at least flash-in business. The lights were
on, too. That was a good sign the store served customers without ultravision.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">A bell over the door jingled as Clark stepped inside.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"May I help you?" asked a hugely built man in skin-tight
leather. The man stood about two feet from Clark. He hadn't been there a second
ago, but Clark had felt the air pressure change as the man shot toward him in
super speed and he realized he had gotten used to people appearing out of nowhere.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Fraud. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I need a shirt," Clark said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> The man in leather stared at Clark for a moment, then</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">reached out to touch
him. Clark put up a hand. "I'm sorry, but I already know my size."
<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The man in leather shook his head and reached forward again.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"No, no. I know your size, too. I just need to touch you to find
your inner color."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark's raised hand stopped him again. "White. Just white." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The man in leather pursed his lips. "And you are?" He asked.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Clark. Clark Bland." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The man in leather laughed. "No, no, no. I mean who are you,
really? You're so</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">mysterious,
so unassuming, so ... vulnerable. You must be..." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Normal," Clark said. "I need a shirt. One with
buttons.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">One with a collar. One
with sleeves I can roll up when I get too hot. One without a lightning bolt on
the chest, or an explosion, or a monogram. One without a cape."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The man in leather shook his head slightly. "I'm so sorry. But
that's all we have."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Something was wrong with Gloria, Clark thought the evening she came
home talking about peaches. She was talking too much. That wasn't like her.
When Gloria spoke about anything, the state of society today or whether someone
took a co-worker's breast milk out of the office fridge and used it in their
coffee again, her words were precise, her sentences short.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Tonight Clark and Gloria were sitting on the couch watching people
they'd never know buy a vowel from Pat Sajak on "Wheel of Fortune"
and Gloria was rambling about the price of canned peaches.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"What's the matter, honey?" Clark asked. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"What do you mean?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You've gone over the heavy syrup versus light syrup</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">equation three times in
the last half hour," he said. "What's bothering you?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Gloria wouldn't make eye contact with Clark. Her eyes were on her
hands. Her hands were in her lap. Her fingers were racing over each other
almost as quickly as Clark could keep up with them. Clark reached over and held
her hands together.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">She looked up at him slowly. "I want SPA," she said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> SPA the wonder drug. SPA the enhancer. SPA the self-esteem sensation.
SPA had been on the market for six months and already there were more super
heroes than cops. City councils across the country were talking about
disbanding their now unused police forces. If normal citizens were doing the
work ... <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Normal. To Clark, a SPAed-up hulk pulling a little girl's cat out of a
tree could never replace a cop. A cop's duty was to protect and serve. The only
duty these SPAed-up freaks had to the world was to show off. Sure, all these
new super heroes spouted "truth, justice and the American way," but
who's to say all their truths were the same? Or their justice? Or their idea of
the American way? Clark didn't trust them—any of them.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">And my wife wanted to be one.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Honey, no. You don't need SPA. You can't want it. Y-y-y-
ou..." Clark began to stutter. "You're perfect already."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"No, I'm not," she said. "How can I be perfect if I
don't like who I am?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark had never heard this from his wife before. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"But..." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm weak, Clark," she continued. "I bought the peaches
in</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">heavy syrup because a
stocker at the grocery store saw me stand in the aisle undecided—for 5 minutes.
She said she liked the kind in heavy syrup, so I bought those. This high school
girl I didn't know told me what to buy and I bought it. Like a sheep, if sheep
bought groceries. Wonder Girl wouldn't have done that. Wonder Girl would have
bought the light syrup because, damnit, that's what she likes."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Who?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Wonder Girl," Gloria said. "That's who I want to
be." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"But you don't know what SPA will do to you," Clark said. "Your
health, your personality, hell, who you are will change. You won't be the woman
I fell in love with."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Gloria stared at Clark for a moment, then looked down. Clark saw a
tear run down her cheek.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm going to bed," Gloria said as she stood and walked
away.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The cape of Clark's new shirt got caught in the revolving door at
work. The janitor, the Karlinator—Man of Destiny, rescued him from a nasty bump
on the shin.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Thanks, Karl," Clark said, doing his best to tuck the
bright orange cape into the back of his pants, but most of the oversized shirt
Clark didn't come close to filling was already</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">back there. The door had ripped the bottom third
of the shiny cape so part of it still drooped around the back of his knees. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Sorry 'bout that, Clark," the Karlinator said. "That
was a</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">nice shirt." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark nodded and walked toward the steps. His office was</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">on the third floor.
Nobody used the steps but him anymore. At least the steps were sanctuary, a
place Clark could hide from ultra 10-key, mega accounting, and super word
processing. But he could never hide for long. Mitch Dingle the Amazing had
X-ray vision, and Mitch Dingle was a snitch.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">G-L-O-R-I-A.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> Gloria. Clark couldn't get that stupid song out of his head. Clark</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">couldn't get Gloria out
of his head either. She... <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark Bland. </span></i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark's name pounded into his temple like a</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">blow to the head. Christ,
Jerry, not so loud.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> <i>Bland. Get into my office. <o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">More pain. God that hurts. Jerry Bettendorf, Clark's boss, the Cobra,
was calling. And the Cobra had telepathy. I'm coming, Jerry, Clark thought.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Make it quick.</span></i><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The last few steps to the third floor of Waxman & Associates were
hell.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You're late for work again, Clark," the Cobra said as Clark
hurried into his office. The Cobra, hard and chiseled in silver Spandex, seemed
out of place sitting in a plush velvet chair. "That's twice this
month."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Cobra didn't ask Clark to sit.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I was <i>eight </i>seconds late, Jerry," Clark said,
pointing to his watch for effect. It didn't work.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Do you know how much Hanson could have gotten done in eight
seconds?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Hanson's got super speed."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Cobra stared at Clark and Clark started to sweat. The Cobra had
heat vision too, but Clark knew he wasn't using it.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm sorry you're not up to your job," he said. "But
I'm afraid you've rendered yourself obsolete. I'm going to have to let you
go."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark knew this was going to happen eventually. Everybody around him
worked faster than electricity could pass through Clark's brain synapses. It
made him old. It made him useless. But more than that, it made him angry.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Fired? You're firing me?" he screamed. "But I've
worked here 10 years."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Cobra stood and leaned on his desk, the wood creaking beneath the
massive pressure from a man on SPA.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Things have changed, Bland, and you haven't kept up." The
Cobra stood and walked over to Clark, resting a massive arm around Clark's now
insignificant shoulders. "Clark, you've fallen behind. Your productivity's
way down from last year."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Because SPA's way up from last year." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Cobra walked Clark toward his office door. "You like
baseball, don't you Clark?" the Cobra asked. "Of</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">course, everybody likes
baseball. What happens to an old workhorse of a pitcher who can't throw over
800 mph anymore, huh? He's cut from the team. Sorry, Clark, but you're an old
horse."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Cobra escorted Clark to the door.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Go get some SPA, Clark," he said. "Keep up with the
times."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">He pushed Clark outside his office and shut the door behind him.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Gloria was late the night her real life ended.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark had been home from work for two hours and Gloria was late—again.
Like her period lasting exactly five days, like the pinch of brown sugar on her
oatmeal, Gloria came home precisely at 5:05 p.m., fixed dinner if it was her
turn or worked in the garden if it wasn't, then she and Clark watched
"Wheel of Fortune," maybe had sex if it was Thursday, read a book
then fell asleep.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Every night, except the past three.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">It was 7:15 p.m. and Gloria wasn't home. Clark was worried, again. Pat
and Vanna couldn't have cared less.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">At 8 p.m., Gloria came home, but she wasn't Gloria anymore.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Jesus.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Sorry I'm late," said this mock-Gloria. Walking into the
living room wasn't the 5'4" petite brunette he'd met at a party, sitting
in the corner sipping a Diet Pepsi because she was too much of a wallflower to
talk to anybody. Walking into the living room was an Amazon. Tall, lean, hard,
with flowing black hair and a bosom that, if Clark were a physicist, he would
refuse to believe existed.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">That's why she's been late this week. She'd been taking SPA
treatments.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"My God, Gloria, you've..."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">In less than a second she rushed to Clark, her bosoms knocking him to
the floor.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Sorry. I haven't gotten used to them yet," she said, then
looked down at him. To Clark she looked crazed. "Take me," she said.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"No, Gloria..."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Call me Wonder Girl," she interrupted as she lifted him
from the floor, cradled him in her rock-hard bosom and flew into the bedroom.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The super guy in front of Clark at the grocery store check out line
had antennas. Nubby, shiny ones. He also had gray skin, and if you looked
closely enough, his skin was a little shiny, too. The guy looked like a slug,
so that's what Clark called him. Slug-man.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Hey, Slug-man," Clark said toward the guy's massive back.
Clark didn't care anymore. He'd been fired from his job because of people like
Slug-man, he'd lost his wife because of someone like Slug-man, he felt helpless
and alone because of everyone like Slug-man, and he didn't need to be pushed around
by any one of them, whether they meant it or not. "The sign says 15 items
or less. You've got 16. What kind of justice is that?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Slug-man looked into his basket, then turned to Clark. Clark had
exactly eight items. A 24-pack of beer, four frozen pizzas and three oranges.
Count 'em. Eight.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You're right, good citizen," Slug-man said. "I will
take my produce to the slower line and wait my true and rightful turn. Whenever
you are wronged in a supermarket checkout line, tell them Slug-man is
watching."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark hated the way everyone talked now. And he hated that the guy's
name really was Slug-man.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">In less than a second, Slug-man had scooped up his 16 items and zipped
into another line.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Kinda rough on him, weren't you?" It was Rudy. Rudy was the
manager of Ultramart. He worked the cash register because since people could
fly, it's hard to get them to work a check out line. "Those super guys are
good customers, too."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Rudy was normal. About Clark's size, and he walked funny. That's why
Clark shopped at Ultramart. He was supporting Rudy the Normal Guy, not
SPAheads.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You ever thought of taking SPA?" Clark asked as Rudy rang
up his groceries.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Yeah, I tried. But after one treatment they found out I was
allergic. Threw up for a week. I can still do this, though," Rudy said as
he froze one of Clark's oranges with his breath. "Oh, sorry about that.
I'll go get you another one."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark shook his head. God, not even Rudy was normal anymore.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"No thanks, Rudy. What do I owe you?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Thirty-one, seventy-five."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark peeled $32 from his wallet, handed it to Rudy, then took his
quarter in change and left the Ultramart, maybe forever.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark drank three beers on the way home. Hell, there were no cops
around to tell him not to. If Clark just made sure he didn't litter, he didn't
even have to worry about hassle from the SPAheads. He had three more beers at
home before his pizza was ready, and three during dinner. As Clark ate the
pizza he watched SuperNews with SuperChuck. The Great Doug Smith put out a fire
in an empty high rise. The Centaur stopped a flood by damming a levee no one
bothered to maintain anymore. And there was footage from Waxman &
Associates's security cameras. It was of the Karlinator—Man of Destiny rescuing
Clark from a nasty bump on the shin.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark hated SuperNews with SuperChuck. Later, Clark Bland passed out
on his couch.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm sorry Clark," Gloria had said. No, Gloria wouldn't have
said what this woman was going to say the way she was going to say it. She was
Wonder Girl now. Completely. "But I need more in my life."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">More? You just stopped a train wreck this morning with your tits and
didn't even muss your hair, Clark thought.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"What do you mean, more?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Wonder Girl stood in the doorway. Her hands on her hips in a very
comic book stance. Clark hated that stance. She stood that way all the time
now. Maybe she thought it made her boobs look bigger.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I need a strong man, Clark," she said. "A robust man,
a..."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"A super man?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Gloria glared at him. She could feel the sarcasm. It was one of her
powers.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Not exactly," she said. "A Moth Man." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">She's been cheating on me. <i>Cheating. </i>"Moth Man?"<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> Wonder Girl nodded.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You've been seeing Moth Man?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">She nodded again. "<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">We met fighting a nuclear disaster in Chile." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You're leaving me," Clark said, "for a copyright infringement?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Wonder Girl picked up the one suitcase she'd packed. She didn't need much.
None of Gloria's clothes fit her anymore. "Good-bye, Clark," she
said. Gloria was already gone, but she'd been gone for a while.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">A nanosecond later, Wonder Girl was gone, too. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh. Swoosh. Kaboom. Swoosh. Swoosh. Kaboom. Crash. Zap.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark's eyes slowly opened. His head hurt. Not the searing hangover
pain he'd hoped for, just a dull ache. At least pain would have taken his
attention away from his life. The ache just made him grumpy.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">A glow... <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Blam.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> ...filled Clark's living room. Not morning yet, is it? The thought
slowly wandered into</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">his
head through all the buffers he'd placed there with beer. No, can't be. Wrong
light. Too green for morning. Can't sleep through all these damned...</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Kaboom.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> Swoosh. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">...explosions. He stood, a piece of pizza crust fell from his chest
and onto</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">the floor. Clark looked
at his living room clock. "Three a.m.," he said, then looked at the
clock again. Yep,</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">sure
enough, it was 3 a.m. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark walked into his bedroom and grabbed his bathrobe to hide the
fact that the flap on his boxer shorts never staid shut, walked through his
dirty, beer can strewn living room, out his front door, and into a morning full
of too damned many explosions for his taste.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">But Clark was going to stop the explosions. He didn't have anything
better to do.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"And when did you notice this problem?" the Doctor had
asked.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Well," Clark began. He was lying on a couch. He'd always
thought lying on a couch, telling a psychiatrist all your troubles was
something you only saw on television, or in bad movies. He sat up.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I came here to talk about Gloria." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Gloria Bland? You mean Wonder Girl?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"No," Clark said. "Gloria. My wife." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"What about her? Certainly she's improved now that's</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">she's undergone SPA
treatments." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">What the hell is wrong with everyone? Clark thought. SPA</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">is not normal. <i>I'm
normal. <o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"She changed..." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Of course she changed," the Doctor said. "For the
better.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">She can fly, can't she?
Your Gloria couldn't do that." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">That's not the point. "She didn't need SPA. She left me when she
got it." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Why didn't you undergo the treatments yourself?" the</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Doctor asked. "You
could have been improved with her instead of as you are without her."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">What the hell's wrong with this guy?</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I like who I am," Clark said. "SPA doesn't improve
anyone, it turns them into someone else. Someone I don't like."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"But certainly you want to be better, better than," the
Doctor spread his massive arms as if to show Clark to himself,
"this."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Look," Clark said. He was getting angry with this guy,
doctor or not. "Do you even have a degree in psychology?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Doctor was silent for a moment. "No," he said.
"Before the treatment I was an arc welder."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">An arc welder?</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Empathy is one of my powers," the Doctor said. "The
psychiatric board said that was enough."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The Doctor was a SPAhead. Of course he thought not wanting to be a
SPAhead was a problem.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I think this session is over," Clark said, standing and
walking toward the door. "I hope you were better at arc welding."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Kaboom. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> SPAheads everywhere, Clark thought. He couldn't keep up</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">with them. The best he
could do was follow the explosions. 85th Street. 88th Street. 90th. 95th.
102th. When Clark reached 105th Street, he saw what all the</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">excitement was about. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">It was the office building where, until yesterday, he'd gone to five
days a week, except holidays, for the past 10 years to crunch numbers and make
a decent living. But it wasn't the building causing the excitement as much as
the mammoth flying saucer that had crushed the building's upper floors. A
flying saucer that was under a heavy barrage of heat vision, cold vision, laser
vision, sonic</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;">
</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">slams, mega
blasts and whatever silly little name the hundreds of super heroes attacking
the thing called their particular SPA gift.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Something in Clark's head tried to tell him he should be happy. Waxman
& Associates was gone, at least temporarily. The Cobra's red velvet chair
probably smashed, or on fire. But something else in Clark's head wasn't happy.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">G-L-O-R... <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Kaboom. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Atomicman's sonic blast missed the flying saucer by half a</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">block and destroyed the
indoor play area of the McDonald's where Clark had eaten lunch three or four
days a week since he'd started at Waxman & Associates. Clark instinctively threw
an arm over his face to protect him from the flying debris that wouldn't give a
darn about his arm. A couple of objects hit him. He lowered his arm and saw one
of the objects was a salt shaker.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Damned SPAheads, he thought, picking up the shaker and looking at it
for a moment. Zip here, zap there, smash this, crush that, don't bother
thinking, just destroy my life, my marriage, my McDonald's. He absentmindedly
slipped the shaker into the pocket of his bathrobe. Clark tried to see if
Gloria was up there, fighting the saucer, but then changed his mind. Wonder
Girl was probably up there, he figured. Gloria was nowhere near him, the flying
saucer, or the flattened McDonald's.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh. Bam. Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Whoever was inside that glowing green ship that was so shiny and
unblemished it looked like it just came off the factory floor, Clark thought,
probably didn't care about his problems, or the McDonald's. The pilot probably
had other things on his mind.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">So did Clark. He was tired, his head hurt and he wanted the SPAheads
to quit making so much noise so he could go back to bed.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Excuse me," Clark said to the nearest Spandex-clad figure.
"What's happening, and why does it have to be so loud?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Kaboom.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The super hero turned and faced Clark. The man's antennae bobbed as he
moved.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Slug-man," Clark said. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Slug-man smiled smugly. "You've heard of me, have you?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark brushed off the man's ego. "Yeah, yeah, yeah. We had a
mighty battle. Blah, blah,</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">blah," he said. "What's happening here, and why is it so
damned loud?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Slug-man looked at Clark skeptically. "We are under attack from
foul beings from beyond the..." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Yeah," Clark interrupted. "I can see that. Have they</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">actually attacked
anyone?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Slug-man stood silent for a moment. His fists rested on his</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">hips in a posture that
seemed to be very popular with super heroes everywhere this year.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Uh, not as such, no," he said. "But the dastardly
villains have destroyed the headquarters of..."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"An accounting firm," Clark finished. "And it's not
even tax season."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"But..."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark walked past Slug-man as the super hero was still talking. I'm
tired, Clark thought. I'm tired and it's Halloween every damned day. Clark put
his hands into his robe pockets and walked toward Waxman & Associates.
Slug-man zipped in front of him.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm afraid, good citizen," Slug-man said, holding his hand
up to Clark. "No matter how mighty our past battle, I cannot allow you to
go into harm's way by walking into that building."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark looked at the man's chest, which was big enough to play football
on, then up to his face.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Boom. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> Kaboom.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> This has got to stop, now. No more rescues, Clark thought</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">as he pushed his hands
deeper into the pockets of his robe. His right hand hit the shaker he'd picked
up from the ruined McDonald's, and for the first time in weeks, Clark Bland
smiled. Yes, it's time to put a stop to all this.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You're right, Slug-man," Clark said, pulling the shaker out
of his pocket. "It's dangerous around here."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Slug-man took a step back from Clark.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Not completely invulnerable, are you Slug-man?" Clark said
as he pointed the shaker at the super hero. But Clark</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">didn't see a super
anything in front of him. He saw something that had choked the life out of his
world. "SPA's not perfect, is it?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Good God, man." Slug-man shouted in the same way Adam
West's Batman did right before he said something obvious. "That's salt."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark shook some salt at him. Slug-man screamed as the salt crystals
made contact with his exposed slug-skin.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Are you going to let me walk into that building?" Clark
asked.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Never."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;"> Clark flicked more salt. Slug-man winced in pain. "How about
now?" <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Slug-man held up his hands. "Sure," he said. "Fine,
just stop it with the salt. I'm</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">rescuing puppies tomorrow and I don't want to look bad on SuperNews
with SuperChuck."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Wussy, Clark thought as he stalked toward the revolving front door of
Waxman & Associates.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The flying saucer loomed above Clark, suspended in the air by a
science his world would never achieve. Wouldn't need to, he thought, when
everyone can fly. The ship was massive, its green glow enveloping him now, too.
He could see hundreds of SPAheads bouncing off an invisible force shield above
him. Idiots, he thought, although Clark really didn't know what he was doing
either. Clark just wanted to go back to sleep. He just wanted to stop the
SPAheads from invading his life for a few more hours today.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark stepped through the broken glass door his cape had caught on
that morning. The Karlinator—Man of Destiny was off the clock. There would be
no more rescues today. The electricity was off in the building, but the flying
saucer's glow gave Clark enough light to find his way.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Where? Clark wondered. Where in the hell am I going? Why am I here?</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">But Clark knew why he was inside a building that was smashed by a
gigantic, green flying saucer. He didn't have any more to lose.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark noticed the sound of the explosions deadened when he walked
under the greenish glow of the space ship. KABOOM was now ka-boom. They were
even fainter as he entered the stairwell and started up the steps. He wondered
how he had gotten so close to the ship when all the SPAheads were kept at bay
by the force shield. Maybe, Clark thought, no one has tried walking up to it.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The belly of the ship had crashed through the ceiling of the third
floor. His floor. The floor he'd lived in from 8 to 5 for a decade. The floor
on which SPA had made him useless. Clark looked around. Remnants of the ceiling
were scattered over the floor and over the desks, his desk.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark walked to his desk and brushed the debris onto the floor. His
stapler was still there. He'd forgotten to take it with him. Clark looked at
the spot where a picture of Gloria once rested. A picture from a day they'd
spent in the park. She'd plucked some bright yellow dandelions and stuck them
in her hair. Clark loved that picture. She looked so beautiful, so natural.
So...</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">ka-boom.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark looked up at the space ship. It was a few feet from the top of
his desk. He climbed up on his desk and touched it. The metal was cool.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">bam. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">ka-boom. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">There were no vibrations from the explosions. The</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">SPAheads were doing
nothing, he realized. "Open up," Clark said to the belly of the
flying saucer.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;">
</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Open
up, damn you. I'm tired." Nothing.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark picked up his stapler and tapped it on the bottom of the ship.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Open up," Clark said. "Please."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">A vibration. A whir of something pneumatic. Clark turned and saw a
circular opening appear in the center of the ship.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">It was like that in the old movies, Clark thought. Why not?</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">A figure dropped out of the ship onto Mitch Dingle the Amazing's desk,
knocking a picture of Mitch's girlfriend, Goldenrod, onto the floor.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The stapler fell out of Clark's hand. The figure looked like him. It
looked human, mostly, but normal, not SPAed-up. It</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">held an unfolded piece
of black paper covered with constellations.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Am I anywhere near Barnard's Star?" the figure asked. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark shook his head. "Uh, no," Clark said. "Wrong
solar system." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">The figure bowed to Clark. "Thanks," it said as it climbed
back into the flying saucer. Clark heard the whir again, and felt a vibration
in the air as the opening closed in the belly of the ship. A moment later the
ship noiselessly lifted itself off the remains of Waxman & Associates and
disappeared in the early morning sky, leaving hundreds of SPAheads wondering
what in the hell just happened.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark was angry the day he walked home from the psychiatrist/arc
welder's office.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Damn you," he screamed into the sky. He picked up a piece
of crumbling asphalt and threw it as hard as he could into the air. It hit
nothing and fell back to earth a few yards away from where he stood.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Useless. Obsolete. Old horse. I need a strong man. But certainly
you want to be better than this. Clark screamed into the afternoon and ran as
hard as his</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">35-year-old body would
let him. Sweat poured down his face and his back and into his underwear. His
side hurt, his breath was short. He couldn't run anymore. Clark felt his legs
go out from under him, but he didn't brace himself for the fall. What's the
point, ran through his mind. I'll just be rescued.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark's knees hit the pavement first, rocks digging through his pants
legs into his flesh. His elbows hit second, rocks scraping off skin.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Swoosh.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Strong hands grabbed him before his face hit the road. The SPAhead
lifted him into the air, then lay him softly on his stomach in the overgrown
grass on the roadside.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">It took a minute before Clark could catch his breath enough to speak.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You're late," he wheezed. "<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">I know," said a soft, feminine voice. "I'm sorry." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark rolled over to look at her. It was Wonder Girl. He</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">hadn't seen her since
the day she flew from their home to be with Moth Man.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Are you OK?" she asked. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark nodded. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Do you need help getting home?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">" Clark shook his head. "No," he said. His voice was
shaky, weak. "Gloria, don't go. I love you. Can't we..." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I'm sorry, Clark," she interrupted. "I can't be with
you." As Wonder Girl flew into the sky, Clark lay in the grass and</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">cried.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">***</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"There he is," Clark heard Slug-man say as he walked out of
Waxman & Associates and into a morning that was starting to lighten with
dawn. "The one with the salt."</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">In less than a second, Clark was surrounded by SPAheads. He put his
hand back into his robe pocket and grabbed the salt shaker, but Slug-man was
keeping a good distance from him behind the Wolf, Martin the Nearly Invisible,
and the Stealth Bomber. But someone was pushing their way through the mass of
muscles that encircled him. It was Wonder Girl.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Clark," she said, rushing to him. "Clark. Did you do
it? Did you send it away?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark nodded and the throng of super heroes gasped like they were in a
bad sitcom.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Wonder Girl grabbed his hand gently. Clark tried not to look at her,
the woman who had left him crying. But he couldn't stop himself. She was
beautiful, of course. All SPAheads were. That was one of the fringe benefits.
But Wonder Girl's beauty didn't match Gloria's. He knew it never would.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"I always knew you were a hero, Clark," she said. "I'm
sorry I gave up on you. Can you forgive me?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Before Clark could answer, a SPAhead in a double- breasted Spandex
business suit and perfect hair muscled his way between them.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"You've saved the planet," the man said into the microphone
he carried.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">It was SuperChuck from SuperNews.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Tell us how you did it," he said. "What are your
powers? How did you chase off the terror from beyond the stars?"</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">Clark was silent for a moment. He could see the look of anticipation
in the faces of every unmasked SPAhead around him. The masked ones were harder
to read. But Clark knew</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">what
they all wanted. They wanted to know his secret. How he had saved the planet
without them.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Because I'm better than you," Clark said simply.
"Because I'm normal. Now get out of my way. I'm going home and going to
bed." He looked at Wonder Girl. Her face was awash with pride for Clark.
Clark could see Gloria in that face, bits and pieces of the girl he'd pledged
his love to forever.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">"Alone," he said.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
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<span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Verdana;">As Clark moved through the mass of super heroes, they let him pass. By
the time Clark passed the ruined McDonald's, he realized his headache had gone,
and that stupid song was finally out of his head.</span><span style="font-family: Times; mso-bidi-font-family: Times;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Jason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3975125452072159101.post-67447892436595463672011-01-05T12:21:00.002-06:002011-01-05T12:22:02.171-06:00Hinkley WeptRoy Hinkley stared into the afternoon and cried. <br />
The day, he could see through the window above his desk, was blue, bright and sunny. Branches swayed slightly in a warm, pleasant breeze. The sound of birds calling, playing and mating were all around him. A cockatoo had perched on his window sill for an hour and not even crapped. Everything was storybook perfect in Hinkley’s world. And he had grown to hate it.<br />
Ten, fifteen, twenty years? Roy Hinkley had given up counting the time of his imprisonment. Time mattered little to him anymore, he wouldn’t let it. He was alone. He had almost come to accept that. The handful of citizens he was imprisoned with in this tiny, deserted, forgotten community were all insane. They had to be. No, he couldn’t let time matter.<br />
A waft of supper caught the breeze that blew into Hinkley’s home. Fish. Always fish. What Hinkley wouldn’t give for a goddamned hamburger.<br />
At first, Hinkley had been the savior of these survivors. It was Hinkley who had purified water. It was Hinkley who gave them shelter and it was Hinkley who had fixed the generator to bring precious electricity. It was Hinkley they came to when trouble approached. But Hinkley hadn’t found a way home, and they never forgave him for that. How, he wondered, had all of the responsibility fallen to him? <br />
One smiling man passed by his window, his ruddy face bearing with it a natural, wholesome health that comes from living close to nature. Hinkley waved and smiled back at the fool who was going to who knows where. To swim, to eat, to fondle himself while hiding amongst the trees, trying to remember what it was like to be with someone he didn’t hate? The man didn’t see Hinkley’s hand gripping a physics book so hard his knuckles turned white, he just whistled as he walked from view.<br />
Hinkley dropped the book, his fingers sore from the unconscious effort, the unconscious anger. He picked up a screwdriver and gave a few final twists to his latest project. The handle on the big breaker switch moved easily and Hinkley began to laugh. For the first time in years, Roy Hinkley could laugh.<br />
<br />
Hinkley still had to string the breaker to the device. And something could still go wrong. He knew that. One of them could ruin everything, it had happened before. Endless times. Then they would find out about him. And what would become of Roy Hinkley?<br />
Nothing, he thought as he walked through the trees, bales of copper wire hanging from his shoulders. Nothing could go wrong this time. <br />
Stringing it up would be no problem. That could be done in a few hours and by nightfall the device would be activated and he would again be happy. By nightfall, he would again be sane.<br />
Building the breaker switch had been the hard part. The copper wire was easy. Hinkley had gotten the wire from the generator, but no one would miss the electricity. They had quit using electricity. Their devices had worn out long ago and replacing them was impossible.<br />
Hinkley dropped behind a bush as he heard someone walking through the trees. He couldn’t see who it was, but they were whispering. About me, Hinkley thought. About the Great One who failed.<br />
<br />
Sweat ran down Roy Hinkley’s face as he broke through the night-darkened trees and stepped into the community’s main clearing. His grin was almost painful. The end of his final project was near. With work-bloodied hands he connected the last wire to the breaker switch he’d mounted atop the communal dinner table. The copper gleamed in the evening firelight. On the other end, the wires were attached to the device.<br />
Hinkley had found the device two days ago, bright, shining and sticking half out of the water. <br />
It was Russian, obviously. The words spelled out in big red letters betraying its homeland. The tiny characters perfectly set on the inside of a service plate showed how the device worked and how it could be used. Hinkley had wondered how the device had come to be here, half sticking out of the water like that. But he didn’t really care how, or why it was here. The nuclear warhead was there, now, in the water, just waiting for him.<br />
Hinkley stepped away from the table and cleared his throat, the noise wavering under an unexpected rush of startled laughter.<br />
“I’d like for everyone to come out here for a minute,” he said shakily in the direction of the piecemeal houses they had constructed years ago, houses that had protected them soundly from tropical storms. “I have something to show you.”<br />
Hinkley heard a slight murmuring among the buildings and the lost souls came out. The old bat was primping herself like somebody really cared. Her husband came with her. He was drunk, again. But, Hinkley thought, why shouldn’t he be?<br />
The happy girl came out, too.<br />
The skinny, boyish man and the aging debutante came from the shadows of the trees.<br />
Fornicating, no doubt, Hinkley thought, his mind racing. Hinkley was never invited to the trees. Hinkley was never asked to release himself. Everyone thought Hinkley was above that. <br />
The last of the lost souls came from the direction of the water. It was the Captain. The jolly, fat captain.<br />
“What is it, Professor?” The Captain asked.<br />
Hinkley was giggling, and he couldn’t stop. He pulled the cover off the bamboo-handled switch and motioned for someone to join him at the head of the table. <br />
“Why don’t you do the honors, Gilligan?” Professor Roy Hinkley said then screamed in laughter as the idiot flipped the breaker and the whole goddamned island exploded.Jason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3975125452072159101.post-58531600510906872412009-12-15T10:13:00.001-06:002009-12-15T10:24:23.417-06:00A Just Cause<span style="font-weight:bold;">By Jason Offutt<br /></span><br />The hot wind pushed David as he walked the narrow path, gripping a line of cable so he wouldn’t be lost in the night. The sand thrown by the wind stung his skin, but he no longer noticed. The sand would sometimes bring blood to the small patch of his face he left exposed to breathe, and maybe it did tonight, but the dry air evaporated any moisture it touched. <span style="font-style:italic;">I may find out in the morning, </span>he thought. <span style="font-style:italic;">If I light the lamp.</span> The satchel over David’s right arm shifted and almost fell, but he didn’t let go of the cable to secure his load. He couldn’t risk being lost in the wind.<br /><br />David paused, the weight of the satchel made his arms weak and his back ache. His body was old, but how old he’d long ago forgotten. He steadied himself with the steel cord anchored in concrete and hoisted the strap of the satchel back onto his arm. The load was heavy and he knew the thick leather strap would leave a bruised strip across his thin shoulder in the morning. But he wouldn’t see it.<br /><br />Squinting through dirty goggles, David could see a squat, black shape through the sand. He was almost home. He grunted and finished the last few yards to the cabin. <br /><br />“Marta,” David called in the darkness as he walked through the sand room and into the small home. The only noise he heard over the wind was a wheeze from the far side of the black cabin. He slowly lowered the satchel to the wood floor and pulled out a bottle. “I’ve brought you some water.”<br /><br />David’s boots scraped on sand as he walked through the darkness toward the wheeze. No matter how careful he was when he came home to Marta, sand always found its way into his home from the entryway where he left his desert clothes. David couldn’t get away from the sand, but after the years, he was used to it.<br /><br />“Marta?”<br /><br />Another wheeze. <br /><br />David felt for the chair he kept beside Marta’s bed and sank into it. He was tired. The trips to the well were almost too much for him. He wondered what would become of him and Marta when the trips to the food drop were too much, too.<br /><br />“How do you feel?” he asked, although he knew she wouldn’t answer. Marta had been sick for weeks, her breathing becoming thicker, louder, until she couldn’t spend the oxygen to speak.<br /><br />David reached in the darkness until he felt Marta’s dry, cracked face, cool in the stifling heat of the cabin. He smiled as he stroked her brittle hair with stiff fingers.<br /><br />“Do you remember when we were children, Marta?” David asked into the darkness as he dabbed water onto her dry, cracked lips. “Do you remember the grass that grew around this cabin? Do you remember the trees and the blue river?”<br /><br />Marta’s breath came in thick, wet gurgles, like an ancient drainage system clogged with leaves. David patted her vein-strewn hand.<br /><br />“I know you do.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />A fireball screamed toward David’s head. He laughed and threw up his hands, a wall of water rippling in the air above him. The fireball careened off the wall, dying in a hiss as it fell harmlessly into the green grass. David smiled. He’d won again.<br /><br />“That makes the fifth in a row,” David called into the pasture that surrounded the cabin. “Aren’t you tired of this game yet?”<br /><br />“No,” Karl said from somewhere in the chest-high field they would soon have to cut. David heard a giggle in his brother’s voice.<br /><br />He smiled and pulled his arm back to throw something that didn’t yet exist.<br /><br />“Then catch this.”<br /><br />“Boys,” said a voice behind David, the tenor of the word staying his hand. “You need to stop.”<br /><br />It was Father.<br /><br />David’s fingers crackled with the static electricity he was pulling out of the air. It would have given Karl a nice shock, but now he knew his hand would ache all day with the unused energy. He brushed his hands on his wool pants, but it just made the feeling of bugs crawling through his skin worse.<br /><br />Father laid his hand on David’s shoulder. Father was a large man and the weight of his hand, calloused and scarred from a life of work, was heavy on David. David had grown almost as tall as Father, but he felt he would never be as large.<br /><br />“Karl,” Father called into the grass. “Come here, now.”<br /><br />David tried to steel himself, but he shook as Father leaned close to his ear.<br /><br />“Karl is still a child,” Father said as softly as his voice would allow. “But you, you are almost a man. You have been drawing life from the earth. And worse, you’ve been doing it for play. A man knows better. The balance is to keep the plants alive. It is to keep the water fresh. It is life for the earth. It is not for us. When we use up the balance, something has to die. Remember this, something has to die.”<br /><br />David winced as Father squeezed his shoulder under a hand that worked the land. The big man paused as his hand clenched his son. David thought he felt Father tremble.<br /><br />“Your mother is sick,” his voice a whisper now. “But I cannot help her because the balance must not be used. Not to make her well, not ever.”<br /><br />“Mother …” David started.<br /><br />“Enough,” Father said. “Just show me, and show Karl, how grown up you can be.”<br /><br />David watched the tall grass, Father’s hand feeling like a millstone on his shoulder. A small section of weaving grass moved against the tall stalks swaying from the wind. A moment later, Karl stepped out of the grass, his shirt blackened from one attempted attack that never made it far past his hand.<br /><br />“Come here, Karl.”<br /><br />Karl walked toward his father like his legs were much shorter than they were. He stopped outside Father’s reach. <br /><br />“Am I in trouble?” he asked.<br /><br />Father nodded and reached for him, his arms longer than Karl had thought. A hand wrapped itself around Karl’s budding bicep and dragged him closer.<br /><br />“Yes, you are. But I won’t scold you now,” he said, relaxing his grip on David. “A new family has moved to the valley and needs help building their home. You boys will go. I have animals to tend.”<br /><br />David knew it wasn’t animals Father had to tend. He’d already fed the livestock. Father had said Mother was sick. He was staying behind to tend for her.<br /><br />“Yes, Father,” David said, looking into his father’s sad, weather-creased face. “We’ll represent the family well.”<br /><br />Father smiled and gave the boys a push.<br /><br />“Just see you get home by nightfall.” <br />--<br /><br />The soup was warm. David turned the cup up and drained it quickly. Everything was warm now. He longed for a nice cup of cool spring water, or maybe a piece of ice. The warm wind of night whistled outside the cabin, bringing sand from many miles away. There were no trees now to block the wind, so it carried the sand everywhere – and the wind was always hot.<br /><br />“The soup is terrible, Marta,” David said in the darkness, Marta’s thick breathing the only sound to interrupt the wind. “I’ll try to give you some, but don’t blame me because it’s bad. The soup packet was the only thing at the food drop when I arrived. The others must have missed it.”<br /><br />Or they knew it was bad and left it.<br /><br />David felt his way along the wall from the dry sink to Marta’s bed, his shoes scraping sand all the way.<br /><br />“I heard a report on the wireless while I was out to the well,” he said. “A team digging atop the Old Forest has found viable acorns and a few other seeds. Trees, Marta, trees. If they can grow enough trees, maybe the sand will go away.”<br /><br />Marta coughed.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">That sounded like blood, David thought. I must risk the light soon. </span><br /><br />David’s leg hit the chair and he sat on the old wooden furniture, left over from the days when the cabin was Father’s. Father may have even built the chair himself, but David couldn’t be sure. So many things had come and gone.<br /><br />“Here’s some soup, Marta,” David said, scooping some of the watery, tasteless liquid in a spoon and slowly finding her mouth. <br /><br />“That’s good, Marta,” he said. “I’ll find something better soon.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />The valley stretched for miles. Tall, green trees as thick as hair on a child crowned its sides. Ten families lived there. In the fall four other families visited the valley from the other side of the mountains, bringing apples and dresses and honey and news. The news was never good, it was always of death and the desert growing from someone outside the valley using the balance, but Father had to know everything. He cursed the news to Mother when he thought Karl and David were asleep in the small cabin’s loft.<br /><br />Karl ran ahead of David as they walked toward the land of the new family. David carried four wooden mugs and a bucket of water he’d dipped from the spring behind the cabin.<br /><br />“What do you think they’re like?” Karl asked, bouncing along the trail to the river.<br /><br />“I think they’ll be people,” David said, smiling at his brother. “Or maybe monsters with horns and long noses and bottoms as big as a bear’s.”<br /><br />Karl laughed and tossed a ball of fire at David’s feet.<br /><br />“Maybe you’ll like a monster,” Karl said, laughing and kicking dirt toward his brother.<br /><br />David skipped over the tiny fireball, water lapping from the bucket and onto the dusty trail.<br /><br />“Karl. Father said you can’t …”<br /><br />He froze and Karl ran into his back, water splashing from the bucket down David’s leg.<br /><br />“Hey, watch it,” Karl said. “What’s the …”<br /><br />David stood in front of what was once a great elderberry bush. The plant was still tall over him but its branches and stem, full and healthy when David and Karl went to the river the day before, were brown, lifeless. No berries would grow from this bush again.<br /><br />“What happened?” Karl whispered.<br /><br />“It’s dead,” David said.<br /><br />“I know it’s dead,” Karl said. “Do you think we did it?”<br /><br />David stepped past the bush and looked down the trail that was lined with elderberry bushes. They were all dead. <br /><br />“I don’t know,” David said. “But the elderberries are gone.”<br /><br />Karl sniffed and wiped his nose on the sleeve of his shirt.<br /><br />“It was us,” he said, a tear running down his cheek. “Father told us not to use the balance, and I did anyway. I killed the elderberries.”<br /><br />David gently grabbed his little brother’s face and turned it toward him.<br /><br />“No,” he said. “You mustn’t think that way. We don’t know what happened to the elderberries. The new people may have used the balance because they don’t know any better. Father may have used …”<br /><br />A branch snapped. David dropped his brother’s face and turned toward the sound. A girl holding a wooden pail now stood on the river path. Her brown, curly hair ran behind her ears and over her shoulders, cascading down the back of a once-white dress.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">She’s beautiful.</span><br /><br />David smiled, and thoughts of the elderberries were gone.<br /><br />“My name is David,” he said, pulling a wooden cup out of his satchel and dipping it into the bucket of spring water. He held it out to her.<br /><br />She smiled and reached her hand out for the drink.<br /><br />“I’m Marta.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />David awoke sometime before midnight although the drop alert hadn’t sounded. He sat in his little bed across the cabin from Marta’s, sweat sticking the sheets to his skin. He wondered how long it would take his eyes to die in the darkness, leaving him blind like a cave fish. He smiled. Cave fish didn’t exist. The war had taken away enough of the world’s water, fish probably didn’t exist anymore. Birds and squirrels probably didn’t either. He didn’t hear news of fish or birds or squirrels, but the news rarely talked of anything but the schedule of food drops and the desert.<br /><br />Marta wheezed.<br /><br />David propped himself up in bed with tired, sweaty arms. Marta’s breathing was thicker. He ran a hand through his thin, greasy hair and stared into the dark cabin. A kerosene lamp sat on a stand next to Marta’s bed, but David hadn’t lighted it since the day Marta told him she was sick. There wasn’t enough oxygen in the air anymore to share it with fire. The war had seen to that.<br /><br />She coughed again and grew silent. <br /><br />“I’m going early to the food drop,” David said into the darkness. “I’ll bring you home something good, Marta. A potato, perhaps. The man on the wireless said there are still potatoes and sometime they’re at drops. I’ll bring you something more than soup.”<br /><br />David rose and moved across the wooden floor, the boots he slept in scraping over sand. He pushed open the thick canvas curtain he’d nailed over the doorway to keep the dust in the sand room. Dust wasn’t good for Marta’s condition. He sat on a board he’d nailed into the wall and pulled on the heavy wool, sand-encrusted clothing that kept the wind from bleeding him.<br /><br />He hadn’t gone to the drop this early for a long time. People were mean early. David pulled a short-bladed knife he’d once used for hunting off its hook and slipped it into his pocket. Before Marta was sick, she made him leave the knife at home. Now, he had to make sure he made it home to her. <br /><br />He slowly pushed open the door against the hard wind, the darkness of night brighter than the darkness of the cabin. David missed the day, but the day was different now. It would kill you with its heat.<br /><br />David felt his way around the side of the cabin until he found the metal cable, then he started his long journey to the drop.<br /><br />--<br /><br />Father took a long drink of spring water before he looked at David.<br /><br />“You want to marry Marta?” Father asked. “You’ve only known her two months. I’m not even sure I like her father yet. He’s too good at cards.” <br /><br />David felt a trickle of sweat run down his back. He fiddled his hands under the table until he saw Father smile.<br /><br />“She is a pretty girl,” Father said. “And smart. Are you sure you want to marry a woman smarter than you?”<br /><br />David smiled, too.<br /><br />“Didn’t you?” he asked.<br /><br />Father laughed and slapped David on the back, almost sending him to the floor.<br /><br />“Then you’re ready,” Father said. “When is the wedding?”<br /><br />“Too…” David started, but his voice squeaked. <br /><br />“Tomorrow,” he said. “If we can have the loft in the barn to live in until I’ve built a home. I’ve already cleaned it and made some furniture ...”<br /><br />Father put up his hand, stopping David’s words.<br /><br />“Tomorrow will be good,” he said, his voice growing loud. “I’ll have all the valley here.”<br /><br />David frowned.<br /><br />“Do you agree to tomorrow because of mother?” he asked. “Is she worse?”<br /><br />The door crashed inward. It was Karl. David’s brother spilled onto the floor, sucking the air like he was suffocating.<br /><br />“Karl,” Father screamed. <br /><br />Father ran to him and pulled Karl’s face to his chest.<br /><br />“The news,” Karl whispered through the little breath he had left. “The news is here.”<br /><br />Father lifted Karl’s face and stared into his eyes.<br /><br />“What has happened?”<br /><br />Karl tried to speak, but the words didn’t come. Father put a hand up until Karl caught his breath.<br /><br />“The war has moved,” he whispered. “The desert is growing outside the valley.”<br /><br />David started toward the door, but Father grabbed his arm.<br /><br />“No David,” he said. “You can’t do anything about the outside. You can do something about the valley. We have a wedding tomorrow. That’s what you need to think about.”<br /><br />David stood for a moment, watching Father comfort Karl, the great man for a moment blocking everything else in his life. He put his hand on Father’s and smiled. <br /><br />“I’ll go tell Marta.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />Three people stood in the dull glow of a tungsten bulb hanging from the roof of the drop when David slid through the door. He stood in the 20x20 tin shell of a building blinking to get used to the light. He didn’t enjoy the light now. When you’re not used to something, it becomes uncomfortable.<br /><br />David looked around the room when his eyes let him. He knew these people, Michael, Jennifer and Donnaly. He’d grown up with Michael, and he’d watched Jennifer and Donnaly grow from babies, and he hated them. They took what they could from the food drops. David had a few scars from them all.<br /><br />“David,” Michael said, shuffling over the sand-covered concrete floor toward him. “The potatoes the wireless talked about. The potatoes are mine. If there’s anything grown, I’m taking it – not you.”<br /><br />David pushed a hand into his wool jacket, fingering the knife.<br /><br />“Marta’s sick,” David said, feeling his jaw muscles tense more with every syllable. “I’m taking what I want for her.”<br /><br />Michael looked at David’s arm sticking in his jacket pocket, then at David’s eyes. <br /><br />“Sure, David,” he whispered, backing toward the far wall. “Whatever you want.”<br /><br />David relaxed his grip on the handle of his knife. Nothing was going to keep him from helping Marta.<br /><br />Nothing.<br /><br />--<br /><br />The summer had grown hotter than David remembered any other.<br /><br />“Are you hungry?” Marta called from the loft as she saw David walk across the field toward the farm. She’d been at the hay door for hours, waiting for her husband to come home from the small patches of green trees that dotted the valley. Waiting for him to come home with something more to eat than potatoes. <br /><br />David walked through the stooped yellow grass, brittle from lack of water, his rifle hanging at his side. No meat again tonight. The trees were barren of life as they’d been since the war found its way into the valley. David walked into the dry, dusty barn and crawled up the wooden ladder nailed into the wall, wondering what would happen when all the trees were finally gone and there would be no more wood to use for building.<br /><br />He crawled through the trapdoor to Marta’s smiling face.<br /><br />David stood and placed his rifle on the wall rack under the trophy of a buck he’d brought home two falls ago. She ran to him and wrapped her arms around his neck.<br /><br />“I didn’t see anything, Marta,” David said, holding his wife. “I’ve been hunting every day for weeks and we’ve had no meat. We have to have meat.”<br /><br />Marta grabbed David’s chin and turned him to face her.<br /><br />“We have potatoes and other roots,” she said, pulling his eyes to hers. “The war hasn’t killed the tubers. We will eat. Don’t think we will starve if animals that aren’t there don’t jump in front of your gun.”<br /><br />David smiled. She was right. Marta was always right.<br /><br />“What has happened here, Marta?”<br /><br />Marta frowned, her limp, sweat dampened curls clinging to the sides of her face.<br /><br />“What do you mean?”<br /><br />David slowly released her and walked to the table, sinking into a chair he had built before the trees started dying. A dinner of soup was already on the table. Marta had known he wouldn’t find any game.<br /><br />“We’ve killed the valley,” he said, grabbing a wooden cup filled with water. “The outsiders grew the desert, but I’m as guilty as them for bringing it into the valley. I’ve used the balance, too.”<br /><br />Marta knelt beside him, moving the cup so she could grasp both of his rough, dirty hands.<br /><br />“You’ve done nothing,” she said. “You and Karl played as children. That didn’t create the desert. Throwing fire and water at your brother didn’t kill anyone. It didn’t kill the deer and it didn’t kill the forest.”<br /><br />David turned his head from Marta.<br /><br />“We killed the elderberries,” he whispered.<br /><br />A tear ran down Marta’s cheek, diverted by her smile. <br /><br />“I was always partial to blackberries, you know?”<br /><br />David held his wife and cried.<br /><br />--<br /><br />Two more people came to the drop. David didn’t recognize them. Strangers never came to the valley anymore. Since the desert had invaded the valley, there was no need. They were young people, David thought, although he couldn’t see their faces through the scarves that covered their mouths. They held themselves like young people – tall and straight, not beaten down. They stood away from Michael, Jennifer and Donnaly and settled near David. David clenched the knife so hard his hand hurt.<br /><br />“Why are you here?” Michael hissed at the new ones. “This is our drop.”<br /><br />One pulled a scarf down to his neck to reveal a narrow chin just sprouting tufts of blond beard.<br /><br />“Our drop has been shut down,” he said. “We had no where else to go for food.”<br /><br />“You’d better find one,” Michael said. “Because you’re not welcome he …”<br /><br />“Michael,” David said, stepping forward, his hand aching in his pocket. “Remember your place. We have guests who are hungry. We should treat them well.”<br /><br />Michael struck the side of the metal building with a fist, the cheap tin rattling from the blow.<br /><br />“Why are you saying this, David? Your wife is dying. She needs the food these people will take.”<br /><br />David relaxed his grip on the knife. <br /><br />“We all need it,” he whispered. <br /><br />The light in the building turned red and the whoop of the drop alarm sounded into the night, cutting through the moaning wind outside. David renewed his grip on the knife and pulled it from his pocket.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">For Marta.</span><br /><br />The building shook slightly as the hum of a motor filled the gaps in the alarm. A metal plate began to move on the center of the ceiling. It crept slowly off the opening of the great pneumatic tube that brought food from a place David didn’t know. He heard the vacuum rush over the drone of the wind and the alarm and food in boxes, cans and bags shot from the tube and landed in the center of the dirty floor. No one noticed the plate slide closed as they rushed toward the food.<br /><br />David grabbed a can with his free hand, and shoved it into a sewn-on pocket of his wool jacket. He reached for a bag, but Donnaly kicked it out of his reach. He heard a crunch and looked to see Donnaly lying on the floor, blood rushing from his nose. The youth with the blond beard stood over him. David shoved two more cans into his pocket.<br /><br />The youth stepped over Donnaly’s writhing body as his partner gathered food. He handed David the bag Donnaly had denied him.<br /><br />“It feels like a potato, and maybe a carrot,” he said. “Tell your wife we hope it makes her better.” <br /><br />--<br /><br />“I’ve made you a new shirt,” Marta said, smiling at her husband as he walked through the cabin door, a bucket of dirty water in his hands.<br /><br />David sat the bucket on the floor and took his wife in his arms. She clutched a gray shirt in her hand.<br /><br />“I can’t wait to wear it,” he said, smiling. “Is today a special day?”<br /><br />Marta wiggled out of his grasp and back to the floor.<br /><br />“No. Unless you call finding a ream of cloth in a box special.”<br /><br />David smiled and kissed his wife.<br /><br />“Then it is a special day.”<br /><br />He stripped off his sweaty, sand flecked shirt and dropped it to the floor. <br /><br />“This is nice,” David said, slipping on his new shirt. “Where was the box?”<br />Marta bit at her lower lip.<br /><br />“It was in the loft,” she said. “It was your …”<br /><br />“Mother’s.”<br /><br />David stopped buttoning the shirt. He pulled a chair from the table and dropped into it.<br /><br />“It’s …” <br /><br />Marta pressed her fingers over his lips.<br /><br />“I know the pain your mother had before she died,” Marta said, reaching to hold her husband’s face, rough from days without shaving. “I know you and your brother watched your father stand helpless over her. That doesn’t mean you should ignore her now. Think of the shirt as a gift from her, not me.” <br /><br />David pulled Marta’s hands from his face.<br /><br />“Father couldn’t care for her,” he said, standing and taking her again into his arms. He buried his face in her thick, brown hair and breathed in her scent. “He wouldn’t take away her pain. I won’t ever let that happen to you.”<br /><br />David pulled back. He looked into his wife’s eyes and smiled.<br /><br />“Thank you for the shirt.” <br /><br />--<br /><br />The wind was stronger as David neared home, or maybe, he knew, he was weaker. Tired muscles bunched in his arms and shoulders as he pulled open the door to the cabin against the wind and slipped inside. The cabin smelled of sweat and urine, as it had since Marta had become sick. In years past, he could burn a candle to cover a smell, but not anymore.<br /><br />“I’m home, Marta,” David said. “I’ve brought fresh food and cans. Maybe they’re beans.”<br /><br />Marta coughed in the darkness. Something had come out with that cough, David realized. Beans and a carrot wouldn’t make his wife well. <br /><br />He dropped the food onto the sand-covered wooden floor of the cabin.<br /><br />“I’m sorry, Marta,” he whispered. “I can’t help you with food and water anymore.”<br /><br />A tear ran across his cheek as he walked toward Marta’s bed. He hadn’t cried in years. He couldn’t afford to lose the moisture in the desert air. David reached the wall and felt his way to the small table next to his wife’s bed.<br /><br />“I have to see you,” he said as he fumbled with seldom-used matches and lit the small kerosene lamp. Her hair was still brown and full of curls, but her worn, pail skin, yellow in the firelight, was stained in patches from blood. “You’re still beautiful, Marta.”<br /><br />He forced a smile.<br /><br />“Just forgive me for what I’m going to do.”<br /><br />David closed his eyes. Marta was dying. <span style="font-style:italic;">And would it be life without her?</span> He sucked the oxygen-thin air into his lungs with shallow breaths as he strained to find the thing that had once come so effortlessly to him, the thing war and foolishness had drained from the world. There was still balance in the earth, he knew, or everyone would be gone, wiped from a lifeless planet. <span style="font-style:italic;">But how much remained?</span><br /><br />David relaxed as his mind met a once-familiar touch. The balance felt cold. He didn’t remember it as cold, but nothing was ever cold anymore. David’s fingers grew heavy as the balance rushed into him, a blue glow of energy growing over the hands that once hurled walls of water at his brother.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">I can fix everything,</span> ran through David’s head as the energy of the balance took him over.<br /><br />David bent low over his wife.<br /><br />“I love you, Marta,” he said, and rested his blue, pulsating hands on her chest.<br /><br />Marta gasped under his touch, the thick liquid wheeze slowly becoming clean, steady breaths. Her eyes crept open, but David didn’t know if she could see him.<br /><br />“David,” she whispered in a voice he never thought he’d hear again. The voice was weak, but clear. “What have you done?”<br /><br />David brushed the hair from her face.<br /><br />“I’ve made you well, Marta. We can be …”<br /><br />The small lamp in the cabin flickered as David felt the balance ebb from his fingers. His shoulders slumped. The balance was gone. He’d taken it all and something had to go. He took one last look at Marta as the oxygen slowly left the air and the small flame died, forcing David’s world into darkness again.<br /><br />“I …” Marta whispered as her weak body sank onto her bed’s stained mattress. <br /><br />“Marta,” David wheezed, the hot air of the cabin growing thinner. He found her hand and held it gently. “I’m sorry, Marta.”<br /><br />Her hand grew limp in his and Marta’s life was gone.<br /><br />Tears welled in David’s spinning eyes as he kissed his bride’s forehead and lay down next to her, waiting for his turn to die.Jason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3975125452072159101.post-91804301369245884202009-05-05T13:22:00.002-05:002009-05-05T13:38:01.087-05:00When I Was Young<span style="font-weight:bold;">By Jason Offutt</span><br /><br />“You do realize what you’re asking, don’t you?” Mr. Halloran asked. Halloran, of course, was not his real name. But as David sat in the man’s office, a bank of security cameras lining one wall, he really didn’t want to know.<br /><br />Why David was here, in this office harmlessly tucked between a CPA and a Baskin Robbins, was, according to official government reports, crazy. “People go to jail for this,” his friend Frank had said one afternoon drinking beer in David’s living room. “Forever.” But David made an appointment through a guy who knew a guy who knew a guy, and walked into the storefront, its window sign “Daylight Donuts Opening Soon” lying to the world. Yeah, David knew what he was getting into. <br /><br />“Of course I know what I’m asking,” David said, looking at his hands tightly grasped each other in his lap to keep from shaking. He knew it was dangerous, he knew it was expensive, and, most importantly, he knew it was illegal. Highly illegal. “I know the consequences.”<br /><br />Mr. Halloran smiled and took a small sheaf of paper from a drawer of his spacious desk. He pulled a gold-tipped pen from his jacket and set it atop the contract.<br /><br />“Good,” he said, pushing the pen and paper across the desk toward David. “Then, Mr. Donallen, it seems we have an agreement.”<br /><br />David pulled his hands apart, waiting for them to shake, but they didn’t. He’d never done anything like this before and was he … afraid? Maybe. David picked up the pen, twisting it in his fingers, then he picked up the contract. “Why the risk?” Frank had asked after the game, holding his car keys and a handful of chips for the road. “If it’s because of Karen, don’t throw your life away for a girl. Have you ever seen ‘Carrie’? It doesn’t end well.” <span style="font-style:italic;">Karen?</span> David wondered as he watched Frank walk out to his car, occasionally popping a chip into his mouth. <span style="font-style:italic;">I dated Karen in high school.</span><br /><br />“I, of course, expect you to read the contract through,” Mr. Halloran said, leaning forward on the heavy wooden desk. “But it’s pretty straightforward. You pay me $100,000 and I send you into the past to do whatever you want for two days as long as you don’t kill or impregnate anyone. And you can bring anything back with you as long as it’s not living or irreplaceable. But, most importantly …” He paused, staring at David in the way David suspected pythons looked at rats before devouring them whole. “… you’ve never seen me before. You’ve never heard of me and you’ll never request my services again.”<br /><br />David nodded and signed the contract without reading a word.<br /><br />“I understand.”<br /><br />Mr. Halloran smiled again, his teeth shining with a whiteness not achieved through nature. <br /><br />“Then you will meet me at these coordinates at 5 a.m. tomorrow,” he said, handing David an envelope. “Wear Levis jeans, a white Fruit-of-the-Loom T-shirt and white Converse tennis shoes.”<br /><br />“Converse? Why?”<br /><br />“Because where you’re going, they don’t make Nikes – yet.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />The desert was cold as David drove his 4-cylindar Saturn along the desolate road. He followed the road to the “coordinates” Mr. Halloran provided. Normal people called them directions, not coordinates. This guy was government, David thought, wondering what branch he’d worked for before dabbling in back-alley time travel.<br /><br />Something large ran across the road. David mashed his right foot into the brake pedal, his aluminum and plastic car sliding to a stop in the sand as the animal disappeared into the darkness. He was a nervous driver. <span style="font-style:italic;">And why not?</span> he thought.<span style="font-style:italic;"> It’s not like any car today can withstand a collision.</span> David once had a car that could have plowed over that mystery animal without even leaving a smear on the grill. But that was 25 years ago. “You didn’t kill it, did you?” a teenage, sweater-wearing Karen had asked years ago at a thump (Damn Frank for bringing her up), her voice rising to a level only heard by dolphins. The raccoon had shot out of the darkness and David didn’t swerve – he couldn’t; it happened too fast. But he’d scraped the bloody mess into a grocery bag and buried it in the sand because Karen was crying. Karen had screamed when he hit the raccoon. His car hadn’t noticed. <br /><br />David started back down the dark, desolate road. Four miles later he found Mr. Halloran standing near a black Ford Excursion, looking at the stars through a long, white telescope, an open can of Budweiser in his right hand. Nice cover, David thought, if anyone was watching. He pulled his car to a stop and stepped out wearing Levis jeans, a white Fruit-of-the-Loom T-shirt and white Converse tennis shoes. It was 4:58 a.m.<br /><br />“Nice and punctual,” Mr. Halloran said. “Good work.”<br /><br />“Of course,” David responded, walking toward the man. His stomach hurt. <span style="font-style:italic;">This is stupid,</span> he thought. <span style="font-style:italic;">I can’t go through with it. Damn the $100,000. Damn the consequence. Damn this man with the white teeth. But … what if I didn’t do it?</span> David frowned. This had nothing to do with a girl he hadn’t thought of for 25 years … well, yeah, it did – sort of. <br /><br />“We’re getting married after high school, right, David?” Karen asked the April before graduation. David smiled at her … she was wearing a great sweater. “Sure, baby,” he said, wondering when he’d get to the base that let him do more than look at that sweater. Then he frowned. “Can we be married in college?” he asked. Karen nodded slowly as she leaned in to kiss David, and he forgot where he was. A month later, they graduated. Two months later, she convinced him to sell his hotrod for something with more doors, to hold all the babies they were going to have. Three months later she dumped him for a guy named Kurt. Kurt had a Camaro. Yeah, David realized, this had to do with fixing something that never should have happened.<br /><br />Mr. Halloran reached into a cooler in the front seat and pulled out a can of beer.<br /><br />“Drink it,” he said, handing the beer to David.<br /><br />“Why?” David asked, feeling the cold, sweaty can shoved into his hand. “It’s 5 o’clock in the morning.”<br /><br />“Because you need to relax. You look terrible.”<br /><br />David cracked open the beer and took a drink. <span style="font-style:italic;">Sure, I look terrible,</span> he thought, <span style="font-style:italic;">I might wind up in prison – one of those federal prisons I’ve seen on the late, late movie. </span>David’s host rummaged in the Excursion and pulled out a briefcase and opened it, the spring-loaded latches cracking loudly in the cool morning air. Inside was a stack of money.<br /><br />“Here’s $5,000 in period cash,” he said, handing it to David. David started to speak, but Mr. Halloran held up a hand. “I don’t want to know what you’re going to do with it.”<br /><br />David pushed the cash into the pockets of his jeans and untucked his shirt to cover it.<br /><br />“May I ask you a question?” David asked.<br /><br />Mr. Halloran nodded and finished his beer. <br /><br />“How do you know how to do this? Send people back in time? It’s not like building a bomb, the technology’s top secret.”<br /><br />Mr. Halloran grabbed another beer from the cooler. <br /><br />“I was one of the physicists who developed this technique before the government stepped in and took it from us and made time travel a felony,” he said, taking a swig of beer. “The money’s nice, but I really do this to give the government the finger.” He stopped and looked at David with tight, suspicious eyes. “Just remember to be back here at exactly 5 a.m. in two days. Now, please close your eyes. I don’t want you to see a thing.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />Then David was in 1976. No bright flash of light. No tunnel to spin him through time. No DeLorean. Nineteen seventy-six was just there when he opened his eyes. At least he assumed it was 1976. He stood in the desert night. Mr. Halloran was gone. His telescope was gone. His Ford Excursion was gone. There were old tire tracks in the dirt, but nothing the size of tires on that Ford behemoth. David’s Saturn was gone. But there were a couple of beer cans in the dust. David bent and picked up a discarded Budweiser can. It had a pull-off tab.<br /><br />He smiled. Yes, it was 1976.<br /><br />David screamed and hooted into the night. It was going to happen. It was actually going to happen. The only thing he’d ever regretted losing was here. But he had two days. Two days to relive a dream he’d had at least twice a year for the past 25 years. He was going to town to buy a car.<br /><br />“You’re breaking up with me?” David asked Karen, his eyes pulled tight, like Dirty Harry’s. “Yes, David,” Karen said. Her hair was different today – it was less like Jan Brady’s and more like Farrah Fawcett’s. “I’ve found a real man. He’s got a job and a tattoo and a Camaro. He treats me like a lady.” David looked at Kurt standing by his deep green Chevy. A cigarette hung out of the corner of Kurt’s mouth, a mouth framed by a dirty blonde thing that wanted to be a mustache. “Hurry up. The races start in an hour,” Kurt said slowly, the cigarette bobbing with each syllable. Karen grinned and ran to Kurt. He slapped her butt and she giggled as she slid into the passenger seat through the window. Yeah, Kurt had welded the Camaro’s doors shut; he was a real racing fan. “But,” David whispered, knowing Karen wouldn’t have cared if she’d heard him. “You made me sell my car.”<br /><br />The lights of the city shown over the desert hills like a false dawn. David’s drive from the city had been brief, just enough to get him out of the way of prying eyes. But it was 1976 now. The city wasn’t as big as it would be. David figured he had at least 15 miles to walk before he reached the city limits. He hoped to find a telephone before then and call a taxi. Heck, he figured, he had $5,000, he could afford it.<br /><br />--<br /><br />The big box of a taxi picked David up at a Kerr-McGee station he’d found at the end of the dirt road. The station wouldn’t be there 25 years from now, David thought. Not even a shell of a building will be left sitting at the roadside. Maybe he should tell somebody? No, he decided, sitting in the back of the cab. He drank a Coca-Cola from a glass bottle he’d bought at the station. The cola tasted different than David remembered. Better. Not as sweet.<br /><br />“Where am I taking you?” the cabbie asked. <br /><br />David burped a soda burp in the back seat, manic giggles taking hold. <span style="font-style:italic;">I’m from the future,</span> he thought. <span style="font-style:italic;">Oh, yeah, I’m here in 1976, too, but I’m in third grade! Where am I taking you? Ha!</span><br /><br />“A hotel,” he said, choking back a laugh. “Any hotel, as long as it’s near a Ford dealership.”<br /><br />“Ford dealership?”<br /><br />David laughed out loud.<br /><br />--<br /><br />The Howard Johnsons, its orange roof strangely comforting, stood three blocks from Williams Motors, the Ford logo within view of David’s room. He’d requested it – a room with a view of Williams Motors. He knew the desk clerk was watching him as he walked up the stairs toward Room 214, thinking he was nuts and hoping he wasn’t dangerous. By then David couldn’t be sure he wasn’t both. <br /><br />Room 214 was cold and smelled of cigarettes, but David didn’t care. In 1976, David realized, everywhere was a smoking area. There was a radio in the room and a television, but no HBO, no ESPN, no cable TV to speak of.<br /><br />David lay on the bed. He’d called in a wake-up ring for noon, then he was going to find a McDonalds to see if the burgers tasted the same. Then he was going to go to a movie theater to see “Carrie.” Then he was going to go to a bar and get drunk on 10 bucks. That was his plan for 1976. That, and the car.<br /><br />The car.<br /><br />David’s life had changed in 1981. Summer jobs filled his pockets with money he couldn’t spend on movies, pizza, dates or beer. He saved his money for his 16th birthday and the car. The car was beautiful. Dark, forest green, two-door, with dual exhaust that made the engine sound like an Army caravan driving to the front. But the stereo could drown out that noise, the memory of how “Highway to Hell” and a joint could make life outside the cab go far, far away.<br /><br />Then came Karen. Then it was gone. <span style="font-style:italic;">It was my own fault,</span> David thought lying on the bed at the Howard Johnsons, the hum of an inefficient air conditioner coaxing him into sleep. <span style="font-style:italic;">I’ve never been in charge … until now.</span><br /><br />--<br /><br />“Have you ever had a dream that was so vivid,” David asked the graying bartender at the Desert Crossing after he’d eaten his fill at McDonalds for a dollar and seen a movie that he’d seen before for the first time. The bartender looked like he probably didn’t want to have this conversation. “That you thought it was real?”<br /><br />“It’s called lucid dreaming,” the bartender said, putting another squat, brown bottle of Budweiser amongst the wall of empty ones in front of David.<br /><br />David stopped in mid-thought. “What?”<br /><br />“A dream that’s so vivid you think it’s real is lucid dreaming,” the bartender said. “That’s what it’s called.”<br /><br />“How do you know that?”<br /><br />“I’ve got a Ph.D. in psychology.”<br /><br />“Then what are you doing here?”<br /><br />The bartender shrugged. “Better tips.”<br /><br />David knocked over an empty bottle as he reached for the full one. He wasn’t just getting drunk anymore, he was fine tuning his logic circuits.<br /><br />“But that’s not what I mean. I mean a hope, a goal of such proportions it’d be a Bible story if any of those guys were still alive to write it. And you made it real.”<br /><br />The bartender shrugged, looking around the bar. The joint was empty except old Lonnie at the corner table who was afraid to go home to his wife. He’d bought a bucket of beer a half-hour ago, so he was set for a while. <br /><br />“Yeah,” he said. “I guess so.”<br /><br />“And say,” David went on. “That in order to make that dream come true, you had to do something that sounds impossible. No, no, more than that. Crazy. It sounds crazy.”<br /><br />The bartender picked up an ashtray and shook the cigarette butts into the trash. He wiped it methodically with a bar towel like he had no intention of actually cleaning it.<br /><br />“Such as?” he asked.<br /><br />“Well, say you could only accomplish this goal if you traveled backward in time.”<br /><br />The bartender stopped wiping the ashtray.<br /><br />“Backward … in time?”<br /><br />“Yes,” David said, taking another drink from the short, brown bottle. “Because all you longed for, all that was with you during the years of your life when you were actually happy, doesn’t exist the way you remember it. You can only find it in the past.”<br /><br />“Like an old girlfriend?” the bartender asked. “Or the way Ike ran the country?”<br /><br />“Yeah, something like that,” David said.<br /><br />“Well,” the bartender said, putting the still dirty ashtray back on the bar. “I’d go back for my eighth grade history teacher, Miss Desmona. She was young, funny, and the prettiest thing I’d ever seen. Too bad I was 14. How about you?”<br /><br />David grinned from behind the lip of the bottle.<br /><br />“A Gran Torino.”<br /><br />The bartender stared at David like he’d told him he didn’t have enough money to pay the bill.<br /><br />“A Gran Torino?”<br /><br />David nodded. “Yes.”<br /><br />“A car?” the bartender asked. “The Gran Tornio model’s only four years old. Why couldn’t you just buy one used and wash it?”<br /><br />David shook his head. Frank had suggested the same thing, although 25 years in the future, Frank had used “restore” instead of “wash,” then he’d called David a dumb ass. “You’re risking everything for a car,” Frank said from the rolled down driver’s window of his Lexus, still chewing the last chip. “Don’t do it. It won’t turn out well.” David nodded. If Frank didn’t understand, no one would. It wasn’t about the car; it was about David before life crept up and smothered him. It was about the last time David really smiled – he was inside that car.<br /><br />“But that’s not what I want,” David said to the bartender. “I want a new one. A brand new one. One with paper dealer floor mats to keep mechanic’s oily feet off the real floor mats. One without any preset radio stations. One with that new car smell. One that’s mine, and has only been mine,” David paused, taking a deep breath. “I’m talking about a first love.”<br /><br />The bartender pressed his elbows into the bar and frowned.<br /><br />“So, what you’re saying is if you were able to travel back in time, you wouldn’t tell your younger self to avoid doing some of the stupid things you’ve done in your life?”<br /><br />“Nope.”<br /><br />“You wouldn’t buy stock in a company you know will make you millions or bet on the World Series even though you already know who wins?”<br /><br />“Nope.”<br /><br />“You wouldn’t kill Hitler somewhere around 1936?”<br /><br />David frowned. “Well, I hadn’t thought about that …” <br /><br />“You’re telling me instead of all these things, you’d buy a car?” <br /><br />David took a long pull from his beer. “Well,” he said, putting the bottle down on the bar hard enough to shoot foam out the top. “Yeah.”<br /><br />The bartender handed David his tab and took his beer.<br /><br />“Then you’d better settle up,” he said. “I think you’ve had plenty.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />David awoke with a headache. Not that he cared. It would be gone soon enough. Besides, nothing was going to get in the way of today – nothing. He got out of bed, showered, and dressed in the brand new bellbottom jeans and Gilligan shirt he’d bought at J.C. Penney’s the day before. Pulling back the curtains and looking down at Williams Motors, David wished he had a friend here to share in this. Frank had been his friend since high school. Frank had ridden in David’s Gran Torino, he’d driven David’s Gran Torino, and he’d barfed in the passenger floorboard after a night of tequila shooters their senior year of high school. “You’re actually going through with this,” Frank said, drinking coffee in David’s kitchen the Saturday morning David drove to Daylight Donuts Opening Soon. “Is there any way I can talk you out of it?” David shook his head. “Well,” Frank said, pushing away from the table. “Don’t expect me to chip in for your lawyer. The government investigates friends, too.”<br /><br />David scanned the Williams Motors lot. A bright red, two-door 1976 Gran Torino sat in front. He’d walked by it yesterday, its smooth curves prettier than a Playboy Bunny’s, its long hood hiding a 351-cubic inch engine that roared like a beast the ancients would have written into mythology. A salesman had asked David if he needed help. David nodded. “Tomorrow,” he said.<br /><br />The bedside clock – with a face and hands, no angry red digital numbers here – read 8:52 a.m. It was time. <br /><br />Williams Motors was quiet when David walked onto the lot. He figured he was the first one there. How many people buy cars at 9 a.m. on a Tuesday? He stood in front of the Gran Torino, the same model Starsky and Hutch screamed around corners in as they chased TV criminal stereotypes through town. But Starsky and Hutch didn’t belong in this car – David did. The car was exactly like David’s high school beast – almost. David’s was green, but he didn’t care about the color. He pictured his young self behind the wheel, his long hair parted in the middle blown back by the wind rushing in the open window, an AC/DC tape in the 8-track player, and a can filched from Dad’s beer fridge wedged between his legs. Was it his car? No, but it was close enough.<br /><br />“May I help you find something?” a salesman asked. David stood numb, like a man in line at the DMV. A tear ran down his face. <br /><br />“Are you OK?”<br /><br />“Yeah,” David said. “I want to buy this car.”<br /><br />“Great,” the salesman said. “This model has a 351 cu…”<br /><br />“I know everything about the car,” David interrupted. “I don’t want to haggle.” He pulled from his pocket the wad of bills Mr. Halloran had supplied him. The salesman didn’t flinch. In this era it wasn’t weird to pay for things with cash. “I just want to drive. I’ll pay the sticker price. I just want to do it now.”<br /><br />--<br /><br />The 1976 Gran Tornio came equipped with air conditioning. It was warm enough to ask the heavy Freon to whisk away the heat, but David wasn’t having it. He wanted the wind to whip his hair, he wanted the roar of air to battle the music from the stereo, he wanted to be open to the world. His first stop was a record store down the street. His new car – his brand new car driven 4.1 miles – came to a rest smoothly by the curb outside Penny Lane Music. David was dizzy when he went in, and the incense in the store didn’t help. He bought AC/DC’s TNT, Led Zeppelin III, and as much Uriah Heep as he could find – just like high school. <br /><br />And David drove, and drove, and drove. At 59 cents for a gallon of gasoline, David pushed the V-8 engine like it ran on air. He laughed as the lyrics of “old” songs blared from the stereo. When the round dash speedometer hit 70, David didn’t realize it, the car ran so smoothly. He felt 18 again – like he should have always felt. He pulled into a gas station on the highway and bought a case of beer for the price of a gallon of milk back home.<br /><br />Home.<br /><br />He was supposed to be back in the desert by 5 a.m. It was 12:30 a.m. David pulled out of the gas station’s gravel parking lot, thumping the dash with his thumbs to AC/DC’s “It’s A Long Way To The Top (If You Wanna Rock ‘n’ Roll)” and drove like a teenager. <br /><br />David didn’t want to go home, but he …<br /><br />He pointed his red beauty toward the desert and drove like a demon.<br /><br />--<br /><br />“Mr. Donallen?”<br /><br />The voice came at him from a tunnel. David cracked open an eye. It was still dark. He felt around him. He was sitting in a car – <span style="font-style:italic;">the</span> car. <br /><br />“Where am I?”<br /><br />“You’re home.”<br /><br />Mr. Halloran stood by the window of David’s Gran Torino. He was dressed as he was when David left. <br /><br />“You’ve been gone … our time … about five minutes,” Mr. Halloran said. “I see you’ve been successful, so our contract is fulfilled. It’s been nice working with you.”<br /><br />“Oh …” David started, but his host had already slipped into the driver’s seat of the Ford Excursion. The ridiculously huge vehicle pulled away from David, its black hulk blending in with the desert night.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">I did it,</span> David thought, rubbing his hands over the Torino’s seats, drinking in the 1976 new car smell like spiked Homecoming punch. <span style="font-style:italic;">I did it.</span><br /><br />The car. The wonderful car. The car where he’d first kissed a girl … Karen. The car was his. His youth, his music, his world of Donkey Kong, baseball games and Judas Priest was his again. David looked into the rearview mirror. Was his hair thicker? He hooted and grabbed a pull-tab beer from the back seat. The engine roared with the turn of a key. David fired the Gran Torino’s headlights, clicked the floorboard bright-beam switch with his foot and slipped the transmission into drive. He drove past the spot where a Kerr-McGee once stood. He drove into the city. He drove to his neighborhood, and the drive was as good as a first kiss. No. It was better. His cubicle-and-computer job, his 134 bowling league average and his blood pressure pills were never allowed in here. Here David was content. He smiled.<br /><br />David pulled the brand new 30-year-old car onto his street. He pictured pulling his beauty into the driveway, turning the key and the Gran Torino’s engine dying in Mel Torme tones. Then he’d walk into his house, fall into bed and forget everything that happened until morning when he could relive it all over again.<br /><br />But he couldn’t.<br /><br />Black SUVs, almost like Mr. Halloran’s dotted the neighborhood. But these trucks weren’t driven by anyone friendly. They were sinister. “Is there any way I could talk you out of it?” Frank had asked. “Nothing’s worth throwing your freedom away, man.” <span style="font-style:italic;">Damn it, Frank, they got to you. You turned me in,</span> David realized. Sweat began rolling down his back as he sat at the stop sign to his street. His fingers bit into the hard plastic steering wheel. <span style="font-style:italic;">Right to go home,</span> ran through his head as he glanced down to the arm that would activate the turn signal. <span style="font-style:italic;">Right to go home. </span><span style="font-style:italic;">Good God, I’m going to prison.</span> <br /><br />“Thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, thump …” slowly grew through his speakers as AC/DC’s “TNT” flooded the cab of the car and David smiled. He casually flipped on his left turn signal, turned onto a side street and kept driving. David thumped the steering wheel with his thumbs as he drove, burning the 59-cent a gallon gas, leaving the black trucks in his driveway, leaving his house, and his grown-up memories. <br /><br />The penalty for time travel was life in prison. Young David wasn’t ready for that. He drove to the highway, then kept going. The world would probably catch up to him, he figured, but not today.Jason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3975125452072159101.post-19238750278013189012009-03-22T20:39:00.003-05:002014-12-13T20:07:31.106-06:00Just Whisper in Santa’s Ear<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>The below short story is under copyright. Don't do anything silly.</em><br />
<br />
<strong>By Jason Offutt</strong><br />
<br />
We went to the mall the day Dad saved Christmas. Technically, it wasn’t Christmas <em>Day </em>he saved, it was Christmas Eve, but I figure anything that falls within 12 days of Dec. 25 is still Christmas. He didn’t do anything noble. He just saved his family from evil, that's all. He could have saved us on Arbor Day, or Presidents Day, or even July 12, but what happened to us picked Christmas Eve, so when I say he saved Christmas, I mean he saved Christmas for us.<br />
<br />
I grinned as I sat at the breakfast table, milk dripping from my chin and back into my cereal bowl. I grinned because I’d figured out Dad’s plan. Sure, last night he’d only said, “we’re going to the mall in the morning,” as he scratched his belly in my doorway. “And if you don’t get to bed, Stu, Santa will put your hand in a bowl of warm water while you sleep.” But I could tell he was hiding something. We had to be going to the mall for a reason, and that reason was to buy me the new Mega GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4.” I’d only asked him for this new video game system 472 times since Christmas Present Begging Season began after Halloween. Besides, I was 10 years old. I didn’t believe in Santa.<br />
<br />
“I made poopy,” Bennie said. His face popped above the tabletop and disappeared again. Bennie was my brother and he was three. But Bennie wasn’t important right then, at breakfast, on the eve of me getting me the most prized Christmas toy of my life. Bennie was fun, but he wasn’t Mega GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4” fun. <br />
<br />
“You’re not getting a Mega GameStation,” Dad said as he cut a bite off his eggs and crammed it into his mouth, the yellow bit all drippy and gross. “You’ve got an Ultra GameStation. What’s wrong with it?”<br />
<br />
“Poopy,” Bennie said. His head popped up on the other side of the table.<br />
<br />
I looked up from my Sugary Chocolate Puffs, the milk dark brown after only half a bowl. Sugary Chocolate Puffs is the best cereal on the planet. “It’s chocolate chocolaty madness,” the guy on the commercial screams while doctors tie him into a straight jacket. “Now with a Surgeon General warning. Who loves Sugary Chocolate Puffs cereal?” I do. <br />
<br />
“‘Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4’ won’t play on the Ultra GameStation,” I said as I poured more Sugary Chocolate Puffs into my bowl. There was a two dollars-off coupon for the game “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4” in that box, and I had to eat my way down to it before we left for the mall.<br />
<br />
Dad's fork clanked on his plate, the sound loud even with Bennie yelling “poopy.” Dad was the kind of dad who brought home comic books for me sometimes when I didn't even expect them. He’d take me to a really cool movie up to three times before saying no. But that was it when it came to spending money. He and Mom bought me an Ultra GameStation last year after my Super GameStation caught fire. Maybe he was serious. No, no, he couldn’t be. He was a kid once. He had to know when I went back to school after break, everybody in my grade would have played “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4” but me, and I’d be an outcast like that kid who still sucks his thumb. Then the real horror struck me; the kid who still sucks his thumb will have probably played “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4,” too. Then where would I be? Yeah, Dad had to buy me a Mega GameStation. How could he not?<br />
<br />
“Then why are we going to the mall on Christmas Eve?” I asked, in a surprising display of bravery in the face of Dad dropping his fork.<br />
<br />
“Because we’re taking Bennie to see Santa,” he said.<br />
<br />
“Santa,” Bennie yelled. “Poopy. Santa. Poopy. Santa. Poopy.”<br />
<br />
Sure we were. After breakfast, Mom and Dad changed Bennie’s pants and loaded us into the minivan. The traffic guy on the radio warned us to stay home. “You’ll die if you leave your house,” he said. Heck, Dad probably shouldn’t have taken us to the mall that day at all. It started to snow and, unless I heard “Bill Nasty in the Sky” wrong, there was some problem with syrup and a chicken truck. But Dad was taking us to the mall for something really important and Christmas-related and it was all because of me. I was sure of it.<br />
<br />
--<br />
<br />
Snow covered the road by the time we pulled into the mall parking lot; the traffic guy on the radio screamed something about mass chaos and the end being near. The only spot available was way back near the Burger King, so Dad took it.<br />
<br />
“You know, they hire people to sit in the empty seats at awards shows on TV,” Dad said as we got out of the car. “Malls do that, too. They hire people to park in their parking lot, then bus them back home for the day.”<br />
<br />
“Why would they do that?” I asked, although I should have known better. Dad always had an answer. The whole class laughed when I read my history paper on the ancient Sumerians who invented mathematics just to figure out how many lawyers it took to screw in a light bulb. The teacher gave me an F.<br />
<br />
“Business, my boy,” Dad said, and dropped a hand on my shoulder to start our alpine hike to the mall doors. “If the parking lot is full, people driving by think they’re missing out on something like a sale, or a soap opera star signing autographs, or looting. So they’ll want some, too. In Third World cultures, entire economies are based on the number of spots not available at mall parking lots.”<br />
<br />
“Don’t listen to your father, boys,” Mom said, pushing us to walk faster in the cold. “He’s just confused by the fact that the parking lot is full on Christmas Eve.”<br />
<br />
Big fluffy flakes fell slowly to earth as we walked toward the building. Mom held onto Bennie’s hand so hard he squealed, and occasionally dropped into The Noodle so she had to drag him. Mom didn’t hold my hand when we went anywhere in public anymore. She either figured I was big enough to take care of myself, or if gypsies were going to snatch me, they’d have done it by now. Bennie wasn’t so lucky.<br />
<br />
Dad pulled open one of the doors at the front of the mall, a blast of heat and the mixed smell of Americanized ethnic cooking from the food court enveloped us. Dad hated to go to the mall. I loved it.<br />
<br />
“Well,” I said, pulling off my gloves to shove them into my coat pocket. My coat was big and brown and looked like something Daniel Boone wore when he felt like killing bears, which was all the time. We were at the mall, and it was time to call Dad’s bluff. “I think the game store is this way.”<br />
<br />
“And why,” Dad began, grabbing my arm and pointing me in the opposite direction. “Would we be going that way, when we’re going this way?”<br />
<br />
He was only teasing me. We came to the mall for a Mega GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4,” but that would be the last thing we did. Of course. Why would we go see Santa with the biggest, best present of the year already tucked under Dad’s arm?<br />
<br />
“And don’t fool yourself into thinking we’re here to buy a video game,” he said, steering me toward the food court. Santa’s throne was always at the end of the line of booths, next to Mr. Wok’s Egg Noodle Emporium. “You’re not getting a new one until the one you have catches fire again. And don’t get any ideas.”<br />
<br />
At that point it hit me. I don’t know why the thought waited until that moment in the mall, right next to the condiment table in front of Dave’s MasterBurger. Maybe it was the tone of Dad’s voice. Maybe it was his 474th denial. But there it was, doubt creeping into my head. Would Dad really not get me the Mega GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4?” Would I have to spend another year playing “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 3” on my lousy Ultra GameStation? Was my life already over at 10?<br />
<br />
I walked with my family through the food court in silence, except when Bennie occasionally laughed for no reason. At that moment, I wished I was three, then the highlight of my day wouldn’t be over.<br />
<br />
The line for Santa started at Pandora’s Pizza. It usually started as far back as Jolly’s Cracker Hut, but this year it was at Pandora’s, just two booths away from Mr. Wok’s. <br />
<br />
“None of these kids seem very excited,” Dad said softly, leaning close to Mom. He nodded toward a boy walking away from Santa’s throne with his parents, the boy’s eyes big and blank, like he was in a Japanese cartoon. “They’re pretty quiet.”<br />
<br />
“Yeah,” Mom whispered. “Usually they’re like …”<br />
<br />
“Satan,” Bennie screamed. <br />
<br />
“Bennie," she hissed.<br />
<br />
“Satan, Satan,” Bennie yelled. He’d leaned way out of line and spotted Santa on the throne, a little girl on Santa’s big, red lap.<br />
<br />
“Bennie,” Mom said, picking him up. “It’s Santa. San-ta.”<br />
<br />
“Sa-ten,” Bennie slowly enunciated, then giggled.<br />
<br />
I leaned out of line, too. Maybe Dad wasn’t fooling around. Maybe I wasn’t going to get a Mega GameStation at all. Maybe… . The little girl who had been on Santa’s lap walked by holding her mom’s hand. She stared at something, but I couldn’t tell what, unless it was at the guy at Potato Heaven’s fixins bar who had his right pinky up one nostril to the second knuckle. I looked around. Nope, she wasn’t staring at him. I turned back toward Santa. It was Christmas Eve, so the guy in the red suit might just be my last hope. I was going to have to do it. I was going to sit on Santa’s lap.<br />
<br />
“Mommy,” Bennie said, Mom's hand still holding his in a death grip. “Why I’m gonna sit on Satan’s lap?”<br />
<br />
“His name is Santa, Bennie,” she said. “And you’re going to sit on Santa’s lap to tell him what you want for Christmas. Then tonight, he’s going to come to our house and put your presents under our Christmas tree.”<br />
<br />
“Satan’s comin’ to my house?” Bennie screamed. Bennie had only two volume settings, loud and off. And he wasn’t off enough. <br />
<br />
I didn’t listen to any more. The whole Santa thing was silly. I knew that. I mean, it wasn’t like he was real, like vampires or killer robots from the future. He was something grownups invented to keep us from doing anything stupid for an entire month. So why was I going to sit on Santa’s lap and tell him I had to have a Mega GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4?” For the same reason people on death row pray – they’ve run out of options.<br />
<br />
The line moved and we stepped even with Mr. Wok’s Egg Noodle Emporium. There were two more kids ahead of us. The others had sat on Santa’s lap and filed soundlessly by, holding at least one parent’s hand – sometimes two. I took a deep breath; my mind was set. This was my lowest moment. Well, if that’s the way things had to be.<br />
<br />
“I’m going to do it, too,” I snapped to Mom and Dad, not looking at either. A warm feeling rushed over my face. “I’m going to sit on Santa’s lap.”<br />
<br />
“Satan.”<br />
<br />
“What?” Mom asked. I could hear the grin in her voice. Her little boy wasn’t growing up after all. For one more Christmas, I was still her iddle, widdle man. “Since when?”<br />
<br />
“Since Dad told me I wasn’t getting a Mega GameStation for Christmas.”<br />
<br />
“Yes,” slid from Dad’s mouth in a stifled hiss. He wanted to scream it, I could tell. He’d beaten me and he wanted to gloat. I wish he had. “Remember this moment in a few years when you ask for a car,” he said.<br />
<br />
I let my head hang, my chin hitting the zipper of my Daniel Boone coat. I’d have a zipper dent on my chin when I got to Santa, but that was okay because my folks didn’t bring a camera so there’d be no photographic evidence of my moment of shame. I just hoped none of my friends were here or I wouldn’t have to worry about being an outcast for not playing “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4.” I’d be an outcast for something much worse.<br />
<br />
Another family walked by, the little boy quiet as the rest. <br />
<br />
“Geez, that kid looks like a zombie,” Dad whispered to Mom.<br />
<br />
Pfft. What did Dad know about zombies? Zombies were all green and smelly and made ‘Uuuhhh’ sounds. That kid didn’t look anything like a zombie. Then the next family was finished. We were next. In just a few minutes, it would be over with. I looked at the boy who’d just told Santa his secret wishes. He shuffled by, holding each parent’s hand. His face was slack, like his muscles were controlled by a puppet master who’d dropped all the string. That was the third …<br />
<br />
“Ho, ho, ho,” a voice bellowed. I looked away from the boy who walked lifelessly by, and into the eyes of Santa. The blue, blue eyes of Santa. Ohmagod. We were it. We were next. Mom nudged me in the back, but I couldn’t move.<br />
<br />
<em>Hey, kid,</em> a voice said, but didn’t say. It wasn’t really a voice because I hadn’t heard anything. <em>Come on over. Santa wants to see you.</em> I tried to open my mouth, to ask, to beg Dad to get me out of here, out of the mall. I wouldn’t ask for a Mega GameStation again – ever again. Just take me home. But I was lost, Santa’s eyes were …<br />
<br />
“Hey kid,” the same voice said, but this time the words came through my ears. Santa’s elf stepped into my line of vision. The elf was dressed like an elf was supposed to be dressed; green tights, pointy hat with a bell on the end, and a big red belt. He was my size, but he wasn’t a dwarf. He was just a little man, and old, really old. He smiled at me; his smile stretched too wide for his pointy little face. “Come on over. Santa wants you.” <br />
<br />
The elf touched my hand with long, spindly fingers, and I screamed.<br />
<br />
“What’s wrong with you?” Dad said, pressing his hand in my back and pushing me toward the elf – the evil, evil elf. “You said you wanted to sit on Santa’s lap, so sit on Santa’s lap.”<br />
<br />
<em>Yeah, what’s wrong with you?</em> The grinning elf told my head. <em>Santa just wants to know your secrets. Your deep, deep secrets. Come on over. Everything will be better after you talk to Santa.</em> The elf took my arm and led me away from Dad, his little fingers like vice grips in my flesh. I knew I was going to die. The elf pulled me toward the big, red suit and lifted me up to Santa. <em>Santa wants you.</em><br />
<br />
“Ho, ho, ho,” Santa said in loud, booming voice. Mom and Dad were smiling, and I was there, stuck on his lap. “Whisper in Santa’s ear what you want for Christmas.”<br />
<br />
Then the stench hit my nostrils. Santa smelled funny. Not Grandma after a few too many ‘special Pepsis’ funny, but old, wet trash funny; and not just old, wet trash. It was something else. Santa’s blue eyes, as blue as a summer sky, burned into mine. I couldn’t look away from him. His skin changed as he drew me toward him. The soft pink hue spread away like a drop of dishwashing liquid hitting a greasy pan. His face grew slick and green, and his beard, big, white and fluffy, was different up close. It was alive – infested. The beard crawled over itself as he leaned closer to me.<br />
<br />
“What are your fears?” Santa whispered, his breath scrambled across my face like ants looking for a place to crawl inside my head. “What makes you stay awake at night?”<br />
<br />
I felt weak, dizzy, like I was going to sleep, but the smell. The smell. It was ... it was something familiar. Something that churned my stomach. “Poopy Satan,” I heard Bennie say from what sounded like miles away. That was it. Santa smelled like Bennie’s diaper pail. Bennie’s wet, sweet-sour smelling poop-filled diaper pail. My stomach lurched and I heaved; a brown, milky Sugary Chocolate Puffs goo splattered across Santa’s bright red shirt.<br />
<br />
<em>Hhhhiiissssss,</em> shot through my head as Santa dumped me off his lap. I hit the hard mall floor in front of Mr. Wok’s, the breath shot from my lungs.<br />
<br />
“Hey, are you okay?” Dad asked. He lifted me off the floor in front of Santa’s throne and held me like a toddler. Then he turned to Santa. “I’m so sorry.”<br />
<br />
“It’s not the first time,” Santa said to Dad, smiling, his voice different than the voice he’d used on me. It was soft, low and jolly. “Or the worst.” Santa wiped his shirt with a rag the elf put in his hand, and waved at the next kid. But Santa was just Santa again. Pink skinned, cotton-bearded Santa.<br />
<br />
“We lost our place in line,” Dad said, cradling me against his shoulder. “Bennie won’t get to …”<br />
<br />
“Bennie won’t care,” Mom interrupted. “Let’s just go home.”<br />
<br />
I leaned into Dad’s ear.<br />
<br />
“Santa’s a monster,” I whispered.<br />
<br />
Dad looked at Santa, another unsuspecting kid on his lap, telling him her secret hopes and dreams, and fears. The elf stared at me and grinned.<br />
<br />
“Yeah, he’s a big one,” Dad said as we started our long walk back toward the mall doors and away from any store that carried the Mega GameStation with ‘Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4.’ “But I wouldn’t call him a monster. Your Mom’s brother Albert’s a monster. The fire department had to cut through a wall just to get him out of the house.”<br />
<br />
“Hey …” Mom started, and we went home.<br />
<br />
--<br />
<br />
“You sure you’re okay, honey?” Mom asked, looking at the thermometer she’d slid out of my mouth. It wasn’t one of those fancy electronic ones Mom could have just wiped across my forehead; it was one of the old-fashioned mercury thermometers I had to hold under my tongue for 10 minutes. I sat there, listening to the motorized angel next to our tree, clicking as it moved back and forth, spreading joy and goodwill to all who weren’t trapped on the couch listening to it click, click, click. <br />
<br />
“I’m fine, Mom,” I said. We’d driven straight home in the snow as the guy on the radio recited Bible verses from Revelation. Somebody in the background beat on the studio door and shouted words I’m not sure were supposed to be on the air. When we got home, Mom had me put on my pajamas and lie on the couch while Dad took Bennie to the hardware store. Dad said he’d seen a guy in a Santa suit ringing a bell in front of the store by the snow blowers and he wanted Bennie to sit on some Santa’s lap. “I told you why I threw up.”<br />
<br />
Mom frowned. “Because the mall Santa was a zombie lord and he was trying to devour your soul.”<br />
<br />
What part of that didn’t she get? “Yes, yes,” I howled. “I saw him change right in front of me. His skin turned green, his beard moved like it was full of bugs, and you saw all those quiet kids. Dad even called them zombies.”<br />
<br />
“You want ‘Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4’ so badly,” she said, and crossed her arms, signaling the conversation, to her, was over. “You’ll be lucky if I don’t take away your ‘Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 3.’”<br />
<br />
I shut up. Mom wasn’t listening to me. She hadn’t seen the Santa monster. The grown ups hadn’t seen a thing.<br />
<br />
Dad and Bennie got home after dark, supper already cold. “I saw Santa,” Bennie screamed at Mom as he jumped out of Dad’s arms and ran through the living room, throwing his coat, gloves and hat wherever they landed – on the floor, the Christmas tree, the ‘click-click’ angel.<br />
<br />
“What took you so long?” Mom asked. <br />
<br />
“The Santa at the hardware store wouldn’t let Bennie sit on his lap unless I had a receipt,” Dad said, holding up a box. “So I bought a nail gun.”<br />
<br />
“What are you going to do with a nail gun?”<br />
<br />
Dad shrugged, taking the heavy tool from the box, a box decorated with a big red bow Dad peeled off and stuck to Bennie’s head as he screamed by. “I don’t know yet. I might build the boys a tree house, or a trebuchet.”<br />
<br />
“Tree Boo shay,” Bennie squealed, jumping over the couch arm and landing on my feet. “Daddy gonna build a boo shay in our tree.”<br />
<br />
“You feeling okay, champ?” Dad said, leaning over the couch, snow still in his hair. <br />
<br />
I nodded. <br />
<br />
“Still think the mall Santa is a monster?”<br />
<br />
I nodded again. Dad didn’t believe me either, I could tell by the way he was grinning. It was the same grin he gets before he asks Bennie to pull his finger.<br />
<br />
“You’re telling me you bought yourself a nail gun on Christmas Eve?” Mom asked, appearing over the couch next to Dad. Her arms were still crossed. Oh, yeah, she was pretty mad. Mom had more hand signals than a third base coach. <br />
<br />
“Well …” he started, then a knock sounded on the door. A loud, slow knock. Thump. Thump. Thump. Dad smiled. “Hey, I’ll get the door.”<br />
<br />
I sat up, Bennie still on my feet, and watched Dad walk to the front door. Who’d be at our house on Christmas Eve? Dad opened the door, our holly wreath swung freely on its nail. I screamed. Standing at my front door, in the snow on top of our “The Fredericks” welcome mat, was the mall Santa and his bad elf.<br />
<br />
“May I help you?” Dad asked.<br />
<br />
<em>We’ve come for you, Stu,</em> the bad elf’s voice rang in my head, his evil little face demonic in the flashing red Christmas lights that framed our front door. <em>You got away today, and nobody gets away from Santa.</em><br />
<br />
I screamed again.<br />
<br />
Shut the door, Dad, I thought, but the words wouldn't leave my throat. Shut the door, Dad. Shut the door, Dad. Shut the door, Dad.<br />
<br />
“Momma,” Bennie said. “You said Satan’s gonna come to my house. You said it. You did.”<br />
<br />
“How did you find our house?” Dad asked mall Santa, my brown puke stain still on the big, red shirt. “You trying to get us to pay for dry cleaning, or something?”<br />
<br />
<em>He’s going to eat you,</em> Stu, the bad elf said in my head. <em>He’s going to eat you all up.</em> The elf grinned, the points of his teeth slid over his slug-like lips.<br />
<br />
“You may find this funny,” Mom said, turning toward the door, toward the thing that was there to eat me. “Our son thinks you’re a zombie lord who works undercover as Santa to secretly devour the souls of children.”<br />
<br />
“Yes, I do find it funny,” the mall Santa said, the red flashing lights making him look like he stood at the Gates of Heck. “Because it’s true.”<br />
<br />
I screamed again. <br />
<br />
“Ho, ho, ho,” boomed from mall Santa’s mouth, his voice faded more into a hiss with each ho. Mall Santa’s skin started to waver, just like it did in front of Mr. Wok’s; the pink rushed away in a flood of oily green. A centipede, or something like a centipede, dropped from Santa’s beard and into the snow on our front step.<br />
<br />
“Holy crap,” Dad spat and slammed the door, the doorknob caught the bad elf in the face. The door rattled shut, our holly wreath dropped to the floor. Dad slapped the deadbolt locked, then locked the knob. “Call 9-1-1,” he screamed at Mom.<br />
<br />
He’d seen it, too. He believed me now, because he’d seen mall Santa’s flesh crawl. Dad turned toward Mom, then the door exploded, throwing Dad across the room with a pile of splintered, white wood. He landed on the coffee table and slid off onto the floor, a jagged splinter of our front door stuck from his leg. I stared at him for a second – only a second. He didn’t move.<br />
<br />
“Merry Christmas,” the bad elf cackled, and stepped into our house. <br />
<br />
“Run,” I screamed at Mom and I grabbed Bennie’s hand. <br />
<br />
“Dennis,” she whispered at my Dad’s body that lie in a lump on the floor next to the clicky angel, the phone fell from her fingers. <br />
<br />
“Ho, ho, ho,” mall Santa hissed and stepped into my house. <em>My </em>house. <em>Run, little man, run, </em>the bad elf said to my head. <em>You taste better when you’re scared.</em><br />
<br />
I pulled Mom and Bennie down the hallway. <br />
<br />
“Ho, ho, ho,” mall Santa thundered behind us. I could hear his heavy boots thump like cinder blocks on our hardwood floors. “Ho, ho, ho.”<br />
<br />
<em>He’s getting closer,</em> the bad elf cackled. <em>Closer and closer. Have you been naughty? Have you been …</em> Then the bad elf was gone. He was there, in my head, then he just wasn’t anymore.<br />
<br />
“Ho, ho, ho.”<br />
<br />
I ran through the hallway, the hallway that led to all the bedrooms, montage picture frames showing the evolution of our family, from Mom and Dad looking gangly and teenage-dumb, to Bennie’s first haircut when he kicked the barber in the groin. My family history flew in a blur as I dragged Mom and Bennie to my room. I was 10, where else would I go? Where else in this house was my castle, my fortress?<br />
<br />
“Satan’s at my house,” Bennie screamed. Mom was crying. <br />
<br />
“Help me push the bed in front of the door,” I wheezed at Mom as I yanked at my big wooden bed, my NFL blanket advertising to the world what a big boy I was. “Then we can climb out the window. Then, then …” then I smelled Bennie’s sour diaper pail. Mall Santa was there. He was at my door, and I was too late. My bright white bedroom door, a poster of “Gloriana, Zombie Killer” taped to the back, crashed against the wall, my shelf of Zombie Hunter action figures (not dolls, action figures) slammed to the floor. <br />
<br />
Mall Santa stood in my doorway not looking like Santa any more at all. Its face, once round and rosy, was pointed and green. Centipedes danced around its chin, some fell to the floor and skittered under my bed. It grinned, showing two rows of sharp, pointed teeth. “Uuuhhh,” it said, smiling at me. “That’s what I’m supposed to say, right?” Bennie started crying and mall Santa laughed, the sound spewed from his pointy mouth like he was eating a cat.<br />
<br />
Mom stepped in front of me, and threw her arms across me and Bennie. “Stay away from my babies,” she whispered.<br />
<br />
“Noble,” mall Santa hissed. “But I’ve come for Stu’s soul.”<br />
<br />
It pushed Mom noiselessly away from me and Bennie. She just fell to the floor and didn’t move. “What are your fears, Stu?” Santa said, his voice pounded in my head. No need to whisper now. “What makes you stay awake at night?” <br />
<br />
Mall Santa sniffed the air and grinned. I was scared, and he could smell it.<br />
<br />
“I’m going to enjoy you,” he said as he loomed closer to me, close enough to swallow my soul. Then Dad was there, behind mall Santa, blood splatter dotting his face. Dad grabbed a black, plastic box off the top of my TV and swung it in a wide arc, bringing it down corner-first on top of mall Santa’s pointy head. The black box – holy crap. My Ultra GameStation – exploded in a shower of plastic shards. Mall Santa’s scream bit into my head as the big, green thing collapsed on my floor; the system motherboard and my game CD of “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 3” stuck from its ruined skull. Dad stood there for a moment, looking down at the body like he might give some Tarzan scream, then he collapsed onto my bed. <br />
<br />
“Dad,” I whispered.<br />
<br />
He opened an eye. “Call an ambulance,” he said. “I’m hurt real bad.”<br />
<br />
Ohmygod. “What happened to the elf?”<br />
<br />
“My nail gun works great as a hammer,” he whispered.<br />
<br />
And that’s how Dad saved Christmas. The police had a lot of questions, but since it was a home invasion, and the invaders were a green zombie lord and his minion, there were no charges. Bennie screams a lot at night now, and Mom started taking prescription medications with vodka. Dad got out of the hospital on Dec. 30, and the first thing he did was buy me a Mega GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 4.” He bought it for me within 12 days, so it still counted as Christmas. And me? Mom and Dad believe everything I say now, and maybe when the Extreme GameStation with “Blood Oozing Zombies of Dread 5” comes out next year, a little trust will count for something.</div>
Jason Offutthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03536260451364743010noreply@blogger.com0