Fear of discovery by the two new prisoners faded into a somnambular state for Larry sometime after seeing a searing sun set into a wash of reds and oranges, painting the insides of his apartment with the colors of retreat and comfort. As he settled into his large, comfortable chair, Larry remembered tomorrow’s weather called for rain, the first he could recall during his time in the colony.

Relaxed moments like this still reminded him of Earth. And he longed for some of the creature comforts Earth provided. He didn’t miss political turmoil or haggles with his boss about the length of his articles. He didn’t really miss the constant barrage of advertising or the stress caused by Los Angeles traffic. Rather, he missed some of the satisfaction of being human again and not having to conceal his identity constantly save to a handful of people.

Seeing the last lashes of crimson in the sky gobbled by the inky black of night and the clouds rolling in, Larry felt more melancholy than usual. First he thought of his cat, Eddie. Not that Larry stood up as some sort of "cat guy," but now that Eddie could talk, something more existed than cleaning out the cat box and dumping a can of food onto the plate. Larry wondered where Eddie ended up.

And again he thought of Jetta. So close. His eyelids closed and he stretched back into the chair, letting the comfort of the thing absorb him. Just a few more minutes with her. Just some time to get the words out. Just a conversation to say … but then Larry caught himself.

Larry had never been very good at that sort of social expository.  Small talk felt more like dynamite going off in his head. Small talk, Larry felt, was always a poor substitute for a man simply clubbing a woman over the head and dragging her off. Well, perhaps not something that primitive. Maybe a drink first. Still, both parties usually had it figured it out quickly. “Oh Yeah” met ovaries, and that was that.

Really, Larry always believed, men and women knew whether or not it was going to happen in about 45 seconds. Everything after that was sizing up wallets, automobiles and level of crazy. The perfect example of this came just after Larry graduated college. Larry swore never to utter her name again, so he called her “Crazy Rose Girl.”

Crazy Rose Girl bumped into Larry during a conference for music industry reporters and the like. It seemed Crazy Rose Girl fancied Larry. And she’d vowed to get him. But when Larry met her, he realized it wasn’t meant to be.  Still, Crazy Rose Girl persisted and, within about three hours’ time, convinced him to return to her room and stay for a while. One thing led to another, and Larry ate breakfast with her the next morning.

Still, Larry didn’t feel anything. Worse, he’d begun to realize Crazy Rose Girl’s crazy quotient was way above average. Way above any of his former girlfriends or even above any of his near-miss relationships that usually ended in the phrase, “Go fuck yourself, Larry.” Rather, Crazy Rose Girl’s crazy quotient equaled Courtney Love discovering she had a weekend of with a stash of heroin, crystal meth and three bags of Cheetos in her kitchen cupboard. Just plain nuts.

For example, when Larry left the conference and went back to Los Angeles, Crazy Rose Girl returned to her home in Utah. However, she felt it fitting to call Larry fifteen to twenty times daily. And his email box overflowed with notes scribed with such random text as “I’m slathered in mayonnaise and wrapped in Saran Wrap ... for you. Want pix?” or “Hey baby, you must be a sweater, because you got me feeling warm all over!” or, the keeper of the bunch, “Sex is evil, sex is a sin, sins are forgiven, so stick it in!!!”

Soon after, the bouquets of roses started showing up. For fifteen consecutive days, Larry accepted delivery after delivery of a dozen long-stemmed roses, his own Berlin Airlift of pseudo-affection. On the sixteenth day, the roses stopped. Larry figured she’d just run out of money or the florist ran out of flowers. Either way, Larry got tired of tipping the delivery guy by the fourth day. So, he started handing the guy single cans of Miller Lite instead.

Now, in examining this relationship (with Crazy Rose Girl; not the floral delivery guy), the Larry of today would have been long gone using the 45-second rule. However, this was the Larry of 18 years ago. And not only did Larry define “desperate male” back then, he also served as the poster boy for insecure men across the globe. Worse, he’d also come off a couple of bumpy relationships that set him up for Crazy Rose Girl’s madness. He was a meek, accepting wunk. And so, as a result, not only did he eschew all of the email, the phone calls and the army of roses, Larry also put himself into an almost untenable relationship. He became caught in that relationship black hole of “Wow, she’s doing all this … there must be something to it that I don’t see” and “If I run now, I may miss something important or regret it.” So, he did something about it.

Larry decided that, since they been physically apart so long, he should confirm if any bodily attractionstill  existed beyond their one night of corporal, sexual wiggling. So, Larry bought a ticket to Crazy Rose Girl’s Utah craziness headquarters. But instead of following his numbed senses over the edge and into the brink, Larry gave himself an ultimatum. If he arrived at Crazy Rose Girl’s apartment, and nothing but crazy lined the walls, infested the carpet and played on her television, he’d hop on another flight and spend the remaining time with his mother in New England. If it worked out (and even as he boarded the flight, he calculated the odds of the relationship working about the same as Lindsey Lohan becoming a nun), then Larry would be no worse for wear. He'd simply get on with all the things his mother guilted him into from his thirteenth birthday.

Larry, however, discovered the former to be true. From the moment Larry stepped off the plane until the moment she barricaded him quite literally, in her tiny apartment, nothing made sense. Still, he tried to makr it work. But sometime in between moving his hand up to squeeze her breast or trying to pull the black thong from her waist to her knees, something … didn’t happen.

Then came the epiphany.  Larry never experienced a no-kidding, dictionary defined epiphany before. But, at the very moment, his hand wrapped in thong, reality suddenly silent, cold and dead; with Larry incapable of finding his “Oh Yeah,” up smacked the epiphany like a sledge hammer; a tree blown into a building during a hurricane; a tank round to his chest. Here it stood, this manifestation deity, one that say before him, and gave him a “sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.”

Larry then took his clothes, moved out to her couch without a word, and fell asleep.

The next morning, he explained his reasoning to Crazy Rose Girl. In summarizing what he felt, he also explained the moment of clarity he experienced. “I’m just not attracted to you. I thought I was. But I’m not.” He told her that he felt like she had some things she needed to work out. After that, if she felt comfortable with herself, maybe they could look at it again.  He started to pack his bags.

Crazy Rose Girl stared at Larry and then walked to the refrigerator, where she removed a bottled of vodka. She found an empty highball glass, filled it halfway and drank it down.

“Well, I don’t know if there’s a need for that,” Larry said. “I’ll … I’ll just pack.”

As Larry started packing, he felt something latch onto his right thigh. Then, the scream. “PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEASE don’t go … I NEEEEEED YOU!” Crazy Rose Girl clutched at his leg as though Larry planned to steal all the food from her apartment, set it in flames and hand her remaining gold pieces to the evil tax collector. Larry stared at her like he’d been thrown into some Saturday Night Live skit without cue cards.

“I think you need some real help,” he said.  “I’m just going to finish packing and call a cab. That’s probably for the best.”

And Larry did just that. However, Crazy Rose Girl drove him to the airport, contemplating how she “might have to figure out some other solutions to get over this pain” along the way. Larry asked if he should call any of her friends. She said no. Larry climbed out of the car, and in about six hours sat across from his mother, drinking a beer.

“I mean … she was just nuts,” Larry said.

“We’re all crazy,” Larry's mother said, a lit cigarette waving in the cool blue twilight. “It’s just that some of us are less crazy than others. Remember that.”

And Larry did. In the same way he remembered that small-talk usually accomplished little in the way deciphering whether or not a woman he met would lead to something grander. He did, however, wish he’d taken the time to talk to Jetta before the airship crashed down, along with almost everything he thought about this planet and its realities.

Larry probably would have been long-asleep by now. Resurrecting this memory always caused him some anxiety, but once it passed, the thought of solving it usually knocked him out with the efficiency of an elephant tranquilizer.

Then came the knock on his door.

“I’m sleeping,” Larry said.

“I’m not.” Savjetna sounded troubled.

“You can’t come back tomorrow?” Larry asked, rubbing his face.

“I need to talk to you,” she said.

Larry rose and opened the door.

“So?” Larry said.

“Are you going to invite me in?”

Larry moved enough to allow her to pass. She wore her hair pulled back into a ponytail. She wore blue spandex leggings and an oversized t-shirt, and took a spot on Larry’s couch. Except for the four arms, she looked like she’d just climbed out of the bed of her sorority house and snuck over.

“I wanted to say I’m sorry,” Savjetna said. “I’ve been rather abrasive with you almost since the day we met.”

“It’s what you do.”

“It’s what I do during the day. I can’t help it.”

“So, all right. That all? I’m tired.”

“Well, I mean, if that’s the way you’re going to be about it …” Savjetna bounced up and darted for the door.

“No … I mean. Look,” Larry said, touching one of her arms. “I’m tired and you’ve obviously got something else to say.”

She stopped and looked at the floor.

“Please. Sit down,” he said.

She found the same spot again.

“There’s been … a lot of pressure lately. Things are changing. And … I’m …”

“What is it?”

“I shouldn’t tell you this.”

“No. Really. It’s okay. What is it?”

“My partner … he’s become an Emteeveen prisoner.”

“I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”

She nodded. “About two months ago. As you know, this is mostly a ‘soft’ conflict. A frozen one. So, it’s not like we’re piling bodies up for the toll of war. But not for the people behind the scenes. The ones gathering information or projecting their voices for change. He was one of those. And I mostly thought him safe.”

“And he got caught doing something he shouldn’t have been doing by the wrong people,” Larry said.

“Look, uh, the thing is … since you’ve been here, I’ve appreciated everything you’ve done for the colony. The little things no one sees. You’re a natural leader. And everyone here really respects that. They talk all the time about you.”

“Do they?”

“And so, the thing is, I’ve, umm … well, you see, my partner and I, we’d been on a bit of a downward trend for some time. Started seeing things from a perspective I didn’t like, but neither of us had the heart to really break it off. So, when he got captured … well, I think you can understand.”

“Mixed emotions, sure,” Larry said.

“The problem is also compounded by the fact that, umm, while our relationship started to fracture, I’d turned my eyes to someone else. Someone I could admire from a distance and yet see up close almost every day. No danger either. And then, like I said, that fool goes and gets himself captured.” Larry heard sniffles. Savjetna’s voice changed tone.

“Why are you telling me this?” Larry asked.

Suddenly, Savjetna bounced up and wrapped her arms around Larry and pressed her lips against his. Larry felt the warmth of her body wash over him. Wet and full her lips pressed into his, wrapping his arms around hers. For a few moments, he succumbed to her, and she felt as though something burst inside her, releasing this emotion.

Savjetna finally pulled away from the kiss, just inches from Larry’s face. She smiled.

“Because you’re not sleeping and neither am I,” she said and started tugging him toward his bedroom.

Thunder rolled in the distance and the first drops of rain pattered on the rooftop. Savjetna dragged Larry in, and closed the door.

In the dark, Larry wondered whether or not his prosthetic arms would go the distance.

The conversation with Savjetna transitioned from an extended, sometimes loud exchange to a quiet night in alone in the apartment. That transitioned to a night’s sleep and a new day. A new day brought Larry Milk his new duties around the colony, including various administration duties handed to him by Sienna himself. Working. Eating. Sleeping. Eating. Sleeping. One day transitioned to another. Then another. Then another. Days turned to weeks. Weeks to months. By the time Larry gave it any thought, seven months passed.

Within that time, his skin finally took on the pale blue tone of the natives. He wondered how long the treatment would take to take real effect (answer: about three months). Larry bound himself with clothing, made excuses and played recluse until then and no one seemed worse for wear about it. Larry’s hair grew longer and he sported a thick, brown beard. Both prosthetic arms were easier to manage, though in those first few weeks, he thought for sure they would fall off. Fortune, it seemed, smiled on Larry blending into his surroundings.

The upheaval from sometimes working journalist to commune living hermit progressed with little turbulence. The whole experience reminded Larry of his first time at summer camp. Bused to a location three hours from his home, Larry became immersed in a world of thick cement floors, steel bunk beds and children he did know. There were crafts, activities, good meals, bad meals and a dozen other out-of-character activities. Activities within the Rueclanahan compound mimicked those Larry exercised at summer camp, but eventually became his life rather than memories hung on the walls of his life. Even being called Knight Blossom became second nature. Larry imagined this is what it meant for narcotics police officers to go “deep undercover” and get lost in their roles.

Larry learned to enjoy the silences. Noticeable were the differences between a life of being smashed in the face with advertising all his waking hours and living this new life. He also learned the little social differences between these people and humans. How they greeted everyone when they entered a room. Instead of applause, they raised all four arms and vigorously shook them. And, of course, learning to live being stuck somewhere between 1981 and 1989.

Larry still distanced himself from any of the politics or the context of any religious involvement, though everyday he heard about “Larry Milk, the Messiah,” or “Larry Milk, the Political chess piece,” or “How Larry Milk can help the Realists gain ground.” Admittedly, at times, Larry found the amount of attention paid to him uncomfortable. Other times, simply difficult believing that he could somehow make a difference were he to out himself and try to make changes being himself. Eventually, each time this grand decision presented itself, Larry went back to being lazy and uninterested, perfectly satisfied with his life in the second story apartment hidden from the lot of it. That there was almost no chance Larry would return to Earth only made the idea of living as a hermit more plausible and easier to swallow.

Meanwhile, the Realists made little ground against or with Emteeveens or Adamants. The Adamants and Emteeveens pushed propaganda. Both sides version of right included the Emteeveens starting the doomsday clock twice more and the continued campaign to find Larry and bring him back. Larry’s presence loomed large within everything the Emteeveens did, including snippets of video from his time in the Emteeveen headquarters. Almost religiously, they vowed to find Larry and “allow him to take his rightful place in front of all his people.”

The Adamants, meanwhile, also spoke of Larry as a means to an end. “Larry Milk belongs with those of us who believe in a future for the planet. We believe that Larry Milk knows our destiny. And we know our destiny. And we can make things better in our schools, in our homes and in our lives. The Emteeveens are simply wrong about this evangelic future.”

And once, during a big political broadcast, Larry swore he saw Jetta Disco on a platform with her father, Iganacio Sheets. However, he dismissed it as something unrequited. Besides, over time, he formed a cozy friendship with Savjetna that included debating the “for better or worse” politics of the Realists. Savjetna didn’t have the same “it” quality that drew him to Jetta. Savjetna did, however, become more appealing over time and Larry thought he should ask her on a proper date. Things had moved that direction anyway. Even his own proclivity

As Sienna foretold, the camp started receiving prisoners. “Detainees,” they were called. One or two at a time. They were kept at Rueclanahan for a time, and then moved to the central location once they became hot political currency. Some stayed hours, others days. A handful asked for asylum once camp educators had an opportunity to “speak” with them. Some received it. Some were identified as spies and traitors. Savjetna was very good at knowing the difference. In vetting the prisoners, Larry recognized her as a real asset to the commune. Sienna did as well.

When Larry woke up seven months later and walked toward his office, Sienna met him halfway with a broad smile. “Got something you’ll want to see,’ he said, wrapping his left pair of arms across his shoulders and back. “Pair of prisoners transferring in.”

“So?”

“They seem to know you.”

“I’m not sure that’s …”

Sienna gave Larry the once over. “They ain’t gonna recognize you now. Come on.”

"This is just one big cup of bad news, Sienna. I ..."

"They won't know you from the corn in their turds. Now, let's go. You need to see how this is done."

This all reminded Larry of that one A-Team episode where no one got killed, bullets flew recklessly about and there was always some Goldberg solution at the end to fix things. Actually, all episodes kept this pattern. Hannibal smoked cigars relentlessly. Face walked around and, toward the television, Larry screamed, "Dude, you're STAR FUCKING BUCK!" And it turned out that Murdoch was never really all that crazy. Ironic, too, that the only black guy on the show drove them around in the van. Poor B.A.

None of that had anything to do with this situation, Larry portended. However, A-Team jogged through his head like an overweight accountant looking to lose a few pounds. Larry stopped questioning why these things popped into his head. Coping mechanism? Maybe. Larry figured he'd just let the episode, rich wouth its Sotuhern California backgrounds and Robin Hood polt lines, play out in his head. The nervousness wasn't going away.

Larry’s innards tightened a bit as he walked with Sienna toward the large descending airship settling onto the landing pad as the sun crawled up in the sky. They stopped about 10 meters short of the airship and Larry took a position behind Sienna’s left shoulder. When the cabin scraped against the cement paid, the doors opened and, escorted by a pair of Realist guards, were Axel and Uhlenhuntor! Both marched off the shuttle shoulders slumped in short steps, their faces devoid of any emotion.

“Recognize them?” Sienna asked over his shoulder.

Larry said as much and, as both Emteeveens walked past toward the holding pen, Larry managed to adjust himself to be behind Sienna and out of view. When they passed, Larry realized Savjetna stood behind him.

“A good catch for us. Close to power. Inside knowledge. The Emtwits will want them back yesterday!” she said, victoriously swinging her fist.

Sienna laughed a little. Savjetna arched her back and neck like a proud wolf. Larry stood silent.

“Nothing, Knight?” she said.

“It’s a good time to be a Realist?” he asked half-heartedly through gritted teeth.

Savjetna stared at Larry for a moment. “Something troubling you, Knight?”

“No.”

“That doesn’t sound very reassuring,” Savjetna said. Larry realized he wasn’t looking at her as he spoke.

As Savjetna and Sienna walked off together, Larry wondered what Axel and Uhlenhuntor did to get themselves captured.

Or why.

-- From “My Politics” by Adamants leader Ignacio Sheets

Eight years before Larry Milk began changing his clothes to get a good night’s sleep in his Rueclanahan apartment, something extraordinary almost happened.

Within a small string of planets named the Blanchard System 3,276 light years from Earth spun a small, aquamarine body that a bored scientist with a huge government grant discovered. He would later call the planet “Megus,” The scientist discovered that Megus is much like the planet Neptune, an ice giant about four times the size of Earth composed of water, hydrogen, nitrogen and helium.

To a great many glasses-wearing, 11-year-olds building Styrofoam solar systems speaking to science fair judges, Megus had the distinction of being “the farthest planetary body from Earth that could be discovered, ever.” Megus also had a rocky, tumultuous surface that looked very much like “the ass end of Norway,” according to the scientist who both discovered and named Megus, Dr. Peter Blanchard, saying so during his Nobel Prize acceptance speech. Scholars, critics and journalists alike regarded the famed astronomer and physicist as someone of higher intelligence, but curtailed vocabulary.

“There is nothing but tundra as far as the eye can see. That’s blanketed by massive sheets of ice and thick piles of snow composed of helium, ammonia, and equal parts despair. We have recorded wind speeds greater than two thousand kilometers per hour and there are thunder and lighting events that roll across the planet. Compared with the other thirteen planet-like bodies within this system, Megus is a doozy. Mountain peaks reach several miles into the atmosphere, clustered like soccer moms in front of the doors of a Nordstrom Department store that’s selling Dooney and Burke purses for 20 percent off the retail price. The largest of these peaks are buoyed by even larger glaciers that stretch for hundreds of kilometers,” Dr. Blanchard told a mostly bored crowd of sophisticates and bureaucrats who were more concerned whether or not the smoked salmon served at the mixer following the event would be chilled and the booze would be free.

By the time his 45 minute dissertation ended, audience members asked just two questions.

“Why,” a reporter asked, “did you call it Megus?”

“Well,” Dr. Blanchard said, “it seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Then, a man in large round-rimmed glasses and a brown tailored wool suit asked the second question fiddling with a gold pocket watch. Dr. Blanchard recognized the man as a noted quack and a denizen of all things conspiratorial. Dr. Blanchard also knew the man as something of a pioneer in individual space travel, an astrophysicist of some note published the world over and a holder of better than 100 patents who followed in the footsteps of Dick Rutan and others

However, Dr. Blanchard winced at the thought of answering any question from Dr. Maximillian Pendragon Chain. So, when the Dr. Chain raised his hand to be recognized for his question, everyone in the room noted the visible tension that accrued in Dr. Blanchard’s shoulders, neck and face. After all, as Dr. Blanchard recalled, by anyone’s standard of being long-winded, Dr. Chain was a hurricane churning in the Gulf of Mexico. A simple question such as “where is the bathroom” could cost someone an entire afternoon, whether Dr. Chain would ask the question or be responding to it.

However, the audience, scholars that followed, and future acolytes of Dr. Chain’s work would also note the surprise Dr. Blanchard felt by the brevity of Dr. Chain’s question.

“Can,” Dr. Chain asked, “this planet sustain life?”

Stunned, Dr. Blanchard waited almost 20 seconds for the next 27 parts of Dr. Chain’s question, but none came. A broad smile crossed Dr. Blanchard’s face. He removed his reading glasses and smiled. He elaborated for a few minutes on the gaseous properties of the planet followed by some meteorological data he had on hand, and noted that the planet’s interior is mostly ice and rock. And after spending almost five minutes saying many of the same things he had said previously, Dr. Blanchard said this:

“Yes. I would say it is capable of life.”

Dr. Chain thanked Dr. Blanchard, and then scurried through a side door.

Six months later, sunk into the bowels of a Manhattan high rise, Dr. Chain began the countdown sequence to launch his life’s work into space. How had he managed the logistics of moving that much Earth? How did he bring in that much steel and titanium? How did he do it all without so much as a snoop from the National Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation or any other government watch group? The start of the countdown made the culmination of the day even sweeter.

Not that there weren’t pitfalls. Tedious came the creation of the Boron nitride walls and constructing the massive inner magnetic coil for the base thrusters. Acquiring enough Uranium from illegal sources across the globe and its handling? Warp sequencing calculation that crashed massive racks of data-processing servers over and over again. Chain, now 86, wondered why he hadn’t died at several points of this creation. And the finishing calculations for the cryogenic sleep cell were still not complete. However, the time was now. Max Chain knew it.

Dr. Chain’s journal noted that he would climb into the capsule at approximately 8:54 p.m. At 8:55 p.m., he ignited the revised ion boost thrusters. At 8:59, he started the fusion processing core for the Pendragon Warp Drive. At 9:07, Dr. Chain’s assistants sealed the hatch, bidding the reclusive madman goodbye.

The next morning, the New York Times reported that the roof and most of the concrete and steel infrastructure of Normandy Owners Corporation at 140 Riverside Drive in Manhattan exploded as if a bomb went off. Many thought some sort of terorrist incident struck the city again. Thirteen people inside the building were reported dead and another 46 injured by falling debris. Many witnesses watched a massive silver column lifting silently into the sky, a glowing blue streak trailing behind like a comet’s tail.

The space vehicle broke through the ionosphere a little less than four minutes from its leap out of Gotham. Dr. Chain realized long ago that he could serve no other purpose on Earth and now, his opportunity for change lie elsewhere. He reached a gnarled hand toward an LCD touch screen littered with the ship’s controls. He pressed a button labeled “Megus” and hoped the computer would do the rest.

The ship’s onboard computer showed that Dr. Chain had 30 seconds before the cryogenic freeze system kicked on and put him into a frozen sleep for the journey across light years. Dr. Chain lie back, closed his eyes and thought of the rolling hills of his Bavarian boyhood home.

Thirty seconds later, the Pendragon Warp Drive clicked on. In the blink of an eye, the rocket screamed across galaxies. It ripped through the atmosphere of Megus in less time than it took for Dr. Blanchard to leave Stockholm, Sweden, catch his flight back to Los Angeles, drive to his condominium near Jet Propulsion laboratories and click on his TiVO recording of Mike Rowe’s “Dirty Jobs.”

However, not everything went as planned. Although everything other system worked as Dr. Chain designed, the landing system failed. The computers miscalculated both speed and distance. Dr. Chain’s rocket managed to wedge itself between a pair of titanic, frozen ammonia-based glaciers.

There, Dr. Chain remained for better than seven years, collecting atmospheric data and keeping Dr. Chain alive.

However, six galaxies away, at about the time that Larry drifted to sleep after the arduous arguments with Savjetna Pennywise, Dr. Chain’s rocket stopped collecting data and brought him out of his hibernation.

When the effects of Dr. Chain’s hibernation wore off, he stared out a mostly frost covered window, breathed a heavy sigh and muttered only three words.

“Damn. Wrong planet.”

With that, he reactivated the ion engines. The thruster buckled at first, but then ripped free of the massive ice blocks holding them back. Not sure entirely where he was or exactly where he should go, Dr. Chain put his life to chance again.

Instead of using scientific calculations and pinpoint theories to move himself back to Earth or onto the “right planet,” Dr. Chain instead inputted the 11-digit phone number of his daughter living in Germany and the record of the New York Yankees during their 1927 World Series run and pressed ‘Accept.’

The Pendragon Warp Drive began whirring to life. However, his calculations wouldn’t require him to undergo the cryogenic freeze again. So, he sat up, pulled some freeze dried food fro ma locker and enjoyed the ride.

-- From the journal of Savjetna Pennywise

In just mere moments together, Savjetna Pennywise had intrigued Larry.

He had to be careful, however. Larry knew this about himself. He became easily intrigued. Take Internet memes, for instance.

Larry found them deplorable and mostly banal wastes of time. Thousands of half-rendered JPG files sent and resent through countless electronic mail forwards. Each time one of these forwarded wastes of time dropped into Larry’s inbox, he could not smash the 'delete' key fast enough. These meme motivational and demotivational posters ate through the Internet like a cavity and Internet service providers should have been better about quashing them the moment people started liking them. As Internet phenomenon went, they were Jerry Springer and Morton Downey Junior tag teaming a single mother who was mainlining heroin while smoking Kents as her crying toddler and 100 million Americans watched. Larry hated all of them.

Except one.

One particular day, the subject line read, “Invisible Cinnabon.” Not sure what to make of the e-mail contents (though sure it wasn’t a virus or scam), Larry opened the attachment, a small JPG file, pixilated and blurred. As he expected, it was, indeed, one of those false motivational posters with the black border. In the center, an obese young man in a black shirt sat cackling with his hands up, his face contorted into something between joy, sheer ecstasy and terror. In white letters below the photo, a caption with two separate lines read, “Invisible Cinnabon. It’s delicious.”

And Larry laughed. And laughed. And laughed.

Larry couldn’t stop laughing for better than 10 minutes. Tears streamed down his face and for the first time in his life. He felt his sides actually aching. Larry would close the image file, walk away, come back, open the image again and laugh just as heartily. This went on for an entire evening. Sheer joy, Larry thought.

And in feeling this joy, Larry wondered what other genuine laughter he might have missed along the way by deleting those other forwarded emails. The thought of so many Internet memes missed intrigued him and he became a bit obsessed with it for a time, scouring Web sites and message boards for others that might have dropped off his radar. Unfortunately, none equaled the joy brought to him by “Invisible Cinnabon.” Larry realized that the one meme made him easily intrigued by the many others washed around the whirlpool of the Internet.

So Larry learned not to take things so seriously and stop being such a prude about things forwarded by friends. Or much else. "Invisible Cinnabon" stood alone for its joy quotient. However, after his kidnapping from Earth and the events the led him here, all he could do for now was feel a little sorry for himself, sitting in his small apartment, thinking about losing Jetta Disco in the airship crash.

Savjetna intrigued him, certainly. Jeez, did I move on too fast? Wait. Move on from what? Larry sat confused and figured he needed a nap, but the opportunity for conversation and to learn more about the planet politics intrigued him. Larry figured if he could gain more knowledge from a Realist point of view, it might help him cope with his new life in the commune.

Still, Larry sat for two hours watching the sun sink into the horizon making the skies pink and orange before deciding eat dinner and go to the meeting. When Larry arrived, almost everyone from Rueclanahan filled a room. Savjetna stood at the front of the room cast in debate with someone from the audience. Her voice rang with energy and rhythm. Larry thought he caught her eye as he took a seat in the back of the room.

There were about 75 seats on either side of the large room; painted the shade of a ripe orange. Savjetna stood just in front of the first few rows along a wide center aisle. The room was surprisingly still and attentive, smelling of that lavender and cinnamon Larry caught earlier.

“We have banished from our own lives the intolerance of those who seek to put us in a yoke. Many of us have bled and suffered and we have yet gained little if we continue to tolerate those who are despotic, wicked and capable of as bitter and bloody prosecutions as we have seen before,” Savjetna said.

“And what about the coming of Larry Milk?” the person in front of her said. “He’s here. They told us that.”

“They’ve told us so many things. And to what we give credence of there is what brings weakness to our actions. Who among you actually believes Larry Milk has really come to save us? Another Emteeveen lie! Larry Milk is worlds away and yet, somehow, they want us to believe they have brought him here. How exactly would they accomplish that? Magic? Spells?”

“What about technology?” Larry said is a voice much louder than he intended.

Savjetna turned to him. “Stand sir and be recognized!”

Larry realized he needed to choose his next words carefully for fear of giving himself away. “I’m Axel Foley. I’m new here, and new to the cause,” he said and paused. “Is it out of the question that the Emteeveens have a technology to bring Larry Milk from wherever he is to here?”

“Preposterous,” one man said, standing. “We can barely move ourselves around this planet.”

“The Emteeveens do have all the best technologies because they hoard the resources and labor,” another voice said. “What is so obscene about the claim by Mister Foley?”

“It is, my friends, that if Larry Milk were the messiah, he would have come to us. We would not have needed to go and seize him. For all his knowledge and all the so-called good things that are embedded into our cellular core, Larry Milk could have at least made the effort,” Savjetna said, sneering.

“But your supposition is that Larry Milk is something,” Larry said, moving toward the center aisle of the room. “What if he is something else? Something much more ordinary?”

Many of the heads in the room turned toward Larry with eyebrows raised, spitting whispered comments ebbing out.

“Not possible,” Savjetna said. “Larry Milk is Larry Milk. What he would bring to this world’s society could not be measured by ordinary terms. Larry Milk is welded to our DNA, friend. As much as we may suppress that idea, it exists.”

“But when did you realize this? Who told you that was true?”

Someone Larry did not recognize stood up. “Friend, this is a fact in your life and ours. We should not debate the inexorable truth about our lives.”

“Isn’t that what being a Realist means? Challenging the notion of every truth? That someone tells you Larry Milk is part of your DNA doesn’t mean its true or, for that matter, not true. What someone has told you is a story and you've made a choice to believe it,” Larry said.

“There’s science and data and reports to back this up, friend,” Savjetna said. “This isn’t a truth. This is like having another arm. It just is.”

Larry paused and walked closer to Savjetna. He rode pure adrenaline now and liked it. “But just suppose,” Larry urged, “Larry Milk was just a guy. He lived a boring life. A hump. Just a nobody. Never climbed a mountain. Never wrestled a lion. Never met a soft couch or a good television program he didn’t like.”

“Friend,” Savjetna said, “that the Emteeveens have decided to play this Larry Milk card against all of our egos and mutual trust. They know it’s the one biological trump card they’ve couldn’t play because the stakes are too high.”

Finally edging his way to the front of auditorium, Larry stood just feet from Savjetna. “That … what? We’ll all be overcome? We all will run screaming and cower at Larry Milk’s feet?”

“People are lemmings, friend. As much as we all have the sense to be Realists in this room, there are literally millions of others on this planet would just as soon throw themselves onto a motorized cheese grater for Larry Milk than listen to reason.”

“Or maybe they aren’t lemmings and you’re giving too much credit to Larry Milk,” Larry said, his voice sharp, something anxious rising in the center of his chest.

“That would be like giving too much credit to plasma or blood or intestines. As you know, we cannot separate ourselves from our biology, friend. And yet you persist with this. Why?”

Larry stood where Savjetna stood and looked at the crowd. “None of us should be waiting for Larry Milk. We never should have. We should be waiting on whatever is in ourselves for change. Waiting for someone to come along and remove us from our problems and fix things is a bad idea. This is how we get bad governments. Hero worship and believing the best of us won’t turn into the worst of us.”

“And what do you know of this. You’re new. You’re barely a Realist. Why don’t you go sit down and shut up,” someone shouted.

“I’m here with you. I’ve chosen to make my life as Realist. More important, I’ve chosen to make my own decisions about my life as a realist. My messiah is me.”

Savjetna stared at Larry for a moment, and then walked back to his seat in the back of the room. Savjetna led further discussions for another hour or so before the group broke up and went their separate ways. She didn’t waste any time finding Larry.

“What was that about?” she said, her brow furrowed.

Larry started walking back toward his apartment. “It’s an open forum. You said so yourself.”

“Yes, but … there’s a pace to these things.”

“You the pace maker?”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

Savjetna stood silent for a moment, and then brought out a broad smile. “You’re new. You’ll get used to how we do business as Realists. Really.”

“I won’t,” Larry said. “Really.”

“I think you will,” she said. “You’ll understand.”

Larry managed a short laugh. “No,” Larry said, “I don’t think you’ll ever understand.”

“What’s that mean?” Savjetna said, moving close to Larry again. She smelled like something sweet from a candy store. “Are we dancing with one another here?”

“I don’t dance,” Larry said. “I’m a bad dancer.”

“I like dancing,” she said. “You should learn.”

“I don’t know if I’d like dancing with you. You like to lead.”

“I do like to lead. But, I’ve been known to let my guard down.”

Larry felt this was going somewhere he wasn’t ready for it to go, so he stopped himself, wiping a hand across his face.

“Banter’s never been one of my strong suits either,” he said. “Have a good night, Savjetna Pennywise.”

-- From the personal journal of Savjetna Pennywise

“It is a great day for Emteeveens and the people with whom we work alongside,” Mark Goodgoodman said, raising his left hand. “As you can see behind me, the Apocalypse Clock is still ticking. However, I am proud to be able … to do this.”

The camera spun around and showed Goodgoodman pressed a saucer sized blue button. The clock stopped. Larry took a breath.

“I wish he’d just let the thing tick down,” someone nearby muttered.

A panel helped slide the button away. Goodgoodman continued. “We stop the clock this time because of something unprecedented. Something once thought unattainable. Something that’s happened for all of us. Something for which we’ve waited our whole lives.”

Goodgoodman let the words hang in the air for a moment, and then dropped his bombshell.

“Larry Milk has come to save us. He is here.”

Several gasps and mixed conversation swelled around Larry, who suddenly felt a bit naked. Alone. Although clad in the garb to hide his identity, Larry felt as thought a bright, steady spotlight focused squarely upon him. He bowed his head a bit more as he listened.

“We have seen Him. We have met with Him. He has been in our presence. However, just as we were about to bring Him to you, the Adamants chose to act as they always have acted. Conspiratorial and against what would benefit the whole of our peoples. And, in what could be described as nothing short of an act of war, kidnapped Larry Milk. They are holding him now. They hold our messiah in chains.”

Goodgoodman went on for almost 10 minutes about planet-side politics and the ramifications of taking the messiah from the Emteeveens. Larry figured that either Goodgoodman had no idea that the Realists stole Larry from the Adamants, or knew and was omitting the fact as a political tactic. Goodgoodman wrapped the rhetoric then he closed with something of a mission statement – for everyone.

“With the clock now shut off, we all now have a cause for greater good. You know it. I know it. Your friends, family and neighbors know it. What is that greater good? Find Larry Milk. He is eager to take His place at our side; to show us the way. To lead us as one people. To strengthen our weaknesses; to bringing full circle the prophecy inculcated into each and every one of us.  Make no mistake. He is among us. Let’s return him to his rightful place as our leader and savior. Thank you.”

As Goodgoodman said the last lines, the screen changed from Goodgoodman to an image of Larry at the Emteeveen headquarters speaking with Goodgoodman. It stayed on for what seemed like forever before the connection went dark.

“Oh, shit,” Larry said under his breath, watching as the reactions around the room became more pronounced. And then, Larry felt the bottom of the whole thing really fall out when Sienna stepped onto a dais and addressed the crowd.

“Folks, the coming of Larry Milk is big news. But before we all get too excited, let’s remember our cause. Let’s remember who we are. We are about changing the face of this planet through real efforts and real commitment from you,” Sienna said, his voice filling the room. “But now, you may have notice our new resident. But I haven’t had a chance for you to meet him. He’s right there tucked in the middle of you all. So, please, let’s give a Rueclanahan welcome to Axel Foley! Axel, come on up!”

Larry froze for a moment. Is this guy nuts? Wasn’t the leader of the camp in on the idea of hiding him? Larry’s “fight or flight” meter sat somewhere in between. However, after a few moments of thought, he figured it best to walk up and wave rather than try to avoid it. Ensuring he was still bundled, he walked up, gave a quick wave.

Sienna leaned into Larry’s ear. “Stop by my office when this is done. We should probably talk.” Larry walked off stage. Sienna made a few notes about the evening meal and some other administrative items, then thanked everyone for watching. Larry greeted about a dozen people whose names he wouldn’t remember then walked to Sienna’s office. He leaned back in his desk holding a large mug of something warm.

“Looks like you’re wanted man, Larry,” Sienna said, a broad smile crossing his face.

“So, you know?” Larry said, sitting.

“Of course. I run the colony.”

“Then what the hell was that with bringing me on stage. I almost crapped myself.”

“Hide you in plain sight. But now you’ve got a bigger problem.”

“What’s that?”

“If even only 20 percent of the people who watch those broadcasts believe that you’re here and that you should be brought to them, then you’re going to have a whole lot of people coming after you.”

Larry sighed.

“Don’t make it any easier for us out here, either, Larry.”

“Sorry.”

Sienna leaned forward in his chair. “Well, I suppose the bigger picture is that you’re probably going to help us somehow. And really what that means is that this world will probably be a better place to live in the end. Is that what you want?”

“Why would you think that’s what I want?”

Sienna looked at Larry for a moment. “What do you want?”

“I want to go home. But that’s not going to happen anytime soon. So, I’ve been allowed to live with you. Whether or not your world becomes a better place isn’t up to me. That’s up to you, isn’t it?”

Sienna shrugged. “I suppose,” he said. “The Emtwits have never brought you up in any of their political stuff until now. So, they wouldn’t have played it unless they knew they could get you back. But who knows? You’ve probably got as much time as you want. We’re about as remote as you can get and, to be honest, the Emtwits don’t like to work that hard.”

“Seems like they’d be willing to work a lot harder now.”

Sienna shrugged his big shoulders again.

“I suppose I’ll be in my apartment then,” Larry said, rising.

“Larry, don’t worry too much about all of it. If your world is anything like our world, then you come to realize that things for regular people aren’t the same as they are for people like Goodgoodman. They’re different.”

Larry paused at the door and turned to Sienna, nodding. “Yeah, but I’m not regular people. And now, neither are you.”

“One more thing,” Sienna said, rising to meet Larry. “You should probably know we get prisoners in from time to time. Hard to call ‘em that really. They’re more like visitors. They can leave anytime they want. But look around? Where are they gonna go? We’re in the middle of a desert,” he said, laughing and sipping his drink. “Like we did with you, we take them and put them into a holding room for headquarters. We keep them in the place next to yours.”

Larry dipped his head.

Sienna’s face turned sour. “I’m just saying it doesn’t look like you’re physical appearance has fully taken over yet, and these two we’re getting in about a week are Emteeveens. Emteeveens are a bit more fanatical about their messiah than the rest of us who’ve sorta weeded you out of our systems are. They’re gonna be looking for you. We won’t. So, stay out of their headlights if you can. We’re gonna have some people looking after them, but that doesn’t mean they won’t flip they’re lids if they figure out you’re who you are.”

"And why, exactly, do you need to bring Emteeveen prisoners here?"

Sienna paused and put his hands on his hips. "Well, according to someone more in charge than me, it seemed like a good idea at the time."

Larry turned to walk out and smacked into a woman. They both tumbled.

“Oh, sorry!” Larry said as she took a tumble.

Rising, she dusted herself off and looked at Larry. “That’s okay … Axel, right?”

“Right,” Larry said, reaching up to pull the folds of his hood closer.

“I’m Savjetna,” she said, extending her hand.

Larry, instead, bowed. “A skin condition, sorry,” Larry said. “Should be gone soon.”

“I’m one of the educators here and a political scientist. I help our community stay informed about the Realist movement and keep them reminded. I … am talking too much. Sorry. What do you do?”

“I was … a journalist. Then, I came here.” Larry thought Savjetna’s smile sweet and her eyes a cooling blue, but she only reminded him of Jetta.

“Exciting! So few journalists remaining. Perhaps you’d like to come to our discussion tonight after dinner. We’re discussing the nature of the Realists and all that. You’re new. It might give you a chance to meet some people. Want to come?”

“I’ll think about it,” Larry said. Savjetna gave him the location.

“What does the political scientist think of Mark Goodgoodman’s address?” he asked.

“Well, aside from saying Larry Milk was coming to save us, standard stuff from him. This is the fifth time I can remember he’s turned that clock on and turned it off. But, you have to wonder what he’s got up his sleeve with that whole bit about the savior,” Savjetna said.

“What if it were true?”

She paused, her features becoming more focused. “It’s not true. What we do here. That’s true.”

“But, no kidding, what if the savior had come? What if Larry Milk landed here or was brought here or something? Doesn’t that mean something?”

“Well, yeah.”

“What does it mean, then?”

Savjetna paused again, and smiled and chewed on a fingernail. “Go eat dinner, then come to our discussion, and I’ll tell you what it means.”

Savjetna walked off and Larry watched her go.