Making the Galaxy Great

Jason was escorted by two soldiers in a standard-issue black SUV — much slower and decidedly less fun than an Yrrean shuttle. He had to borrow a phone from one of the soldiers to call Evie. She didn’t answer, no doubt because she didn’t recognize the number he was calling from, so he left a message. Within a minute, she called back, breathless and anxious and full of questions.

“Is it really you? What number are you calling from? Is it even safe for you to call?”

“I’m fine. I can tell you more when I see you,” he replied. “Is Shelby there?”

“Umm, your ex-wife came and got her. She drove back from someplace with her new boyfriend. He seemed like a dick. And I think you’re in serious shit with her.”

Jason was certain he was, and in this case at least, he deserved to be. Candice would certainly use this as leverage against him. She would never want full custody of Shelby, since she could hardly wait for Jason’s weekends with her. But she would certainly extract some sort of payback.

The soldiers drove him to the hotel where Evie was staying. They dropped him off at the front entrance and the car drove away without a word. Evie ran out through the sliding front doors of the hotel. She didn’t hug him; she grabbed him by the shoulders.

“What the hell? Were those soldiers? You look terrible. No offense.”

The hotel was located on a main thoroughfare lined with chain restaurants. As they stood under the porte-cochere in front of the building, Jason smelled processed, flavor-enhanced food coming from one or more of them and his stomach puckered. He thought he might faint.

“I’m so hungry I could eat something deep-fried,” he said.

Evie had already checked out, so she drove them to a chicken restaurant and while they ate, Jason gave her a highly edited and mostly fictional version of his night’s adventures. He told her that the girl he’d helped outside The Grinder had placed a flash drive in his pocket that had information for a government probe that Agent McCauley was leading, that the probe involved some very wealthy people with influence inside the government, and that the men in black who’d come to the house were trying to stop the probe and kill McCauley.

“And you,” said Evie, her beautiful eyes as wide as coasters. “They almost killed you. And us. I was scared shitless.”

“So was I,” Jason admitted. Of course, he’d been even more scared later on, between riding an alien shuttle and almost getting sent to a place called Moredale that didn’t officially exist.

“But where did you and Agent Nasty end up last night?” asked Evie. “I tried to call you like a dozen times.”

Jason told Evie one piece of the truth: that McCauley had destroyed his phone.

“So those guys would’ve tracked your phone? Sounds like real life spy shit.”

Jason nodded. “Then McCauley — Agent McCauley — took me to a safe house, while her team tracked down those guys and she presented the information to the Department of Justice on a video call.” Jason found that once he started with his bogus story, it became easier and easier to accumulate ever more outlandish details.

“Whoa, that’s kind of cool,” said Evie. “I’ll have to start watching the news for a change.”

At that point, Jason realized he’d overextended the lie. “I doubt it’ll be in the news,” he said with what he hoped was a convincing grimness. “They’ll probably cover it up so it doesn’t make people worry about who’s really running things and start more conspiracy theories.”

“Which would be true,” Evie pointed out.

After eating they picked up Jason’s car. Since his car was near the Oasis Mission, it reminded him that he needed to stop by and warn them Grace and Tina that the US government knew about the refugees now.

“Are you coming back to the house?” Evie wanted to know. Not his house, but the house. The slight grin on her face instantly sent blood rushing to Jason’s private parts. Why was Evie coming on to him and not furious with him? After all, because of him she’d been scared for her life, and had to flee to a hotel with his daughter while he disappeared for several hours with a frightening government agent.

He told her he wanted to get a new phone first.

“Then I guess I’ll go by my apartment and check on Stormy,” Evie said with no particular conviction.

After she drove away, Jason went to the Oasis Mission. Four huge black SUVs lined the street in front of the old church building. None of the usual suspects were loitering outside, not even Prince and her owner. Instead, two men in dark suits stood on either side of the entrance, hands across their genitals and sunglasses over their eyes, despite the fact that it was overcast.

“Mother fuckers!” Jason whispered to himself. He hopped out and ran toward the door of the building.

Both of the men guarding the door were considerably larger than they’d appeared from the street. One of them held up a hand as Jason ran up the steps. “Mission’s closed today,” he said informatively.

Jason stared up at him, trying to look unfazed. “I’m just here to pick up a friend.”

The suit shook his head slowly, emphasizing how unimpressed he was. His posture implied that he would be willing to toss Jason down the steps with the slightest provocation. If only I had McCauley with me, Jason told himself. They’d be inside already and the two robots in suits would be on the pavement with cracked ribs or worse.

And that made him wonder: did McCauley know what was happening? He couldn’t contact her, because he didn’t have a phone. Come to that, she didn’t have a phone, either. But what if she did know? In fact, what if she knew, even when he spoke to the Colonel and Mr. Brown, that this would happen?

Jason could hear distant thunder in his head. McCauley was out of reach. He was thoroughly alone and powerless, and his thoughts galloped in reckless circles. There was nothing he could do without her help. And maybe she wouldn’t have helped him anyway.

He sighed and rubbed his eyes and decided he needed to rest and think, at home. But Evie would be there, and for the first time he could remember, he didn’t think he wanted to have sex.

Cursing and smacking the steering wheel as he drove away, he nearly collided with an ancient van that swerved and flashed its headlights. One headlight, actually, since the other was burned out.

He made an immediate u-turn. The van disappeared down an alley — not the alley behind the Mission, but one a block further away — and Jason followed. When the van stopped, he stopped.

Immediately, the front passenger door on the van opened and McCauley ran back to Jason’s car. As he started to open his door, she grabbed his arm with her hand and literally pulled him from the car.

“Follow me,” was all she said.

“What are you doing here? And what—” Before he could finish his sentence, she had clapped a hand over his mouth.

“Just be quiet for once.”

Grace and Tina had hopped out of the van and Tina dashed toward Jason with a look of fury on her face. If not for McCauley she surely would have assaulted him.

“Not his fault!” McCauley said firmly, holding up her hand. “I told you, Fleming did everything he could to try to protect you guys. They were going to shoot him.”

That wasn’t precisely true, but Jason wasn’t inclined to argue the point.

Tina frowned and helped Grace push aside a dumpster to reveal an old wooden storm cellar entrance at the back of one of the sagging brick buildings along the alley. Grace then opened the padlocked entrance with a key. As she descended the steps into the cellar, Tina motioned to Jason and McCauley.

“Are you two coming, or what?”

The steps were narrow and the opening was short. Jason crouched and penguin-walked down the steps, involuntarily waving a hand in front of his face to ward off any cobwebs he might encounter. Once they’d reached the damp stone floor, Tina climbed halfway back up the steps and pulled the door shut. Jason was about to point out that they were now in total darkness when suddenly three flashlights turned on. He was looking at the illuminated faces of Tina, Grace and McCauley.

“So, I’m the only one without a flashlight?”