Making the Galaxy Great

“Oh my God,” Evie exclaimed. “You’re finally back. It’s almost eleven.”

She and Shelby were on the living room sofa, watching an R-rated action movie that Jason probably wouldn’t have let his daughter watch. But it didn’t matter at all.

Evie was still wearing his t-shirt over her swimsuit, and the sight of her fabulous tattooed legs pulled up against her chest as she hunched on the couch banished thoughts of aliens to the far end of the galaxy. Shelby sat next to her, cross-legged with a bowl of popcorn in her lap. When he walked in, she set the bowl down on the coffee table so quickly some of it bounced out on the floor.

“Dad!”

Shelby hugged him and Evie pulled his face toward hers to kiss him. “Are you hungry? We saved some dinner for you.”

Jason’s stomach had been so busy tying itself into and out of knots for the past several hours that he’d almost forgotten how absolutely famished he was. He followed Evie and Shelby into the kitchen and watched Shelby take food out of the fridge and start the oven while Evie poured two glasses of wine. It was so blissfully domestic he nearly started to cry — until Shelby looked out the kitchen window and uttered a muffled shriek.

“Dad, I think there’s somebody walking around in the back yard,” she whispered loudly.

The bliss evaporated. Without thinking Jason reached into his pocket to be sure the rinjot was there. He’d made sure he grabbed it from the car seat before McCauley remembered about it. He told Shelby and Evie to get away from the window, then handed his phone to Evie and whispered, “Call 911.”

He started to creep to the back door but just then someone knocked on the front door. Shelby ran to the living room and peered between the curtains before Jason could stop her.

“It’s two men, and they’re dressed in black suits,” she announced. “Maybe they work for Agent McCauley.”

Jason very much doubted it. He motioned frantically for her to get away from the window. There was another knock. “Mr. Fleming,” said a voice from the porch.

“The police are on their way,” said Evie calmly.

But probably not fast enough.

“Mr. Fleming,” said the same man. A deep bass, like the lowest voice in a barbershop quartet.

Jason, Shelby and Evie huddled in the hallway by the stairs. There was a rattling at the front door lock and suddenly the door swung open. Clearly a standard dead bolt wasn’t enough to deter the men in black. Shelby shrieked and started to cry. Two tall men — dressed, as Shelby had said, in dark suits with white shirts and black ties — strode into Jason’s house, moving every bit as robotically as the Haku droid in the woods.

The taller of the two spoke mechanically: “Mr. Fleming, we need you to come with us, please.”

“I’m sorry, but who the hell are you?” asked Jason. His voice sounded so much higher and more trembly than the intruder’s voice.

“We’re from the United States government,” said the second man in black. Mercifully, his voice was nowhere near as deep as his partner’s. “We have some questions for you.”

Evie stepped out in front of Jason while he tried frantically to pull her back. “Hasn’t he answered enough questions tonight?” she said. “Who sent you? Was it Agent McCauley?”

The two men in black glanced at each other. “Has Agent McCauley been here?” asked the one with the bass voice. Jason gulped.

They’re after McCauley.

His stomach felt like a sushi roll being sliced up to be served.“The only time the government is really efficient is when it’s violating due process,” he muttered.

“What did you say, Mr. Fleming?”

“I don’t know anybody named—”

Jason’s phone beeped, indicating a new text message. Evie was still holding it after calling 911.

“Christ, is it Candice?” he asked her.

Evie stared wide-eyed at Jason and slowly held up the phone. The text was from McCauley. It was one word. Paintball.

He almost wasn’t quick enough.

He grabbed Evie and Shelby and pulled them behind the sofa. By the time he raised his head enough to aim the rinjot, McCauley had charged into the house and slammed one of the men in black — the one with the deep voice — into the stairs. The second one reached for his gun but she knocked it out his hand with a round kick then struck him square in the face with her fist. In another second he was on the ground.

Bass voice, bleeding from his chin, pushed himself up from the steps and aimed his gun at McCauley. But by then Jason had gotten close enough to fire the rinjot. The agent twitched almost comically inside his black suit and fell back on the steps. Jason kept walking toward him until he stood over him and fired again. Then he turned and fired at his companion, who was already unconscious on the floor in front of the front door. He was about to fire a second shot at him, too, when he McCauley shouted at him to stop.

“They’re down, Fleming. We don’t want to kill them. They work for the government, same as me.”

Jason put down the weapon. He was panting from fear and anger, while she seemed barely winded after having dispatched two burly men in black.

“Oh my God, that was, like, totally badass!” Shelby exclaimed. Her eyes sparkled as she stared at McCauley.

“Don’t forget the third dude. Out back,” Evie said.

McCauley nodded. “Yeah, he may have broken a flower pot when he fell.”

“Why are you here?” was all Jason could think to say.

“I finally talked to Michael. We were set up. I was afraid,” she said as she looked over the two men, “that they might send somebody here.”

“Set up? What does that mean?” asked Evie. “Why is the government chasing you? I thought she worked for the government.”

McCauley and Jason exchanged glances.

“Is it terrorists?”

“Not exactly,” McCauley told her. “But all of you need to get out of here.”

“The cops will be coming,” Jason said. “What do we do about these guys?”

“Let them try to explain why they broke into somebody’s house. They’re not supposed to exist and their IDs are fabricated so they’ll never be prosecuted.”

“What the hell does that mean?” said Evie. “They’re not supposed to exist? What’s going on here?”

Jason wondered if it might be time to tell Evie the truth, at least some of it. But McCauley said: “Long story. Need to know basis. Jason, we need to get to A-69 as fast as you can drive.”

“You’re taking him again?” asked Evie. “What’s A-69? Jason—”

Shelby grabbed Jason by the arm. “Dad, where are you going? You just got back.”

“Quick. Out the door,” said McCauley, pointing to the opening in the front of the house where the door once stood.

Jason took out his wallet. “Take one of my credit cards,” he told Evie, “and go to the nicest hotel you can find.”

McCauley put her hand over his. “Not your credit card. They’ll be tracking it.”

She was right, of course, and he was embarrassed by his near-mistake. “I’ve got money, Jason,” said Evie in a tone he hadn’t heard from her before. Irritation, disappointment, frustration. Maybe all of the above. He couldn’t quite tell.

He ran over to the antique side table that sat in a corner of the living room and opened the single drawer. Taking out a business card, he quickly handed it to Evie. “That’s my attorney. She has my will and all that stuff.”

Evie’s eyes stared back at him like tiny blue flames. “Your will? Jason, this is bullshit! Why are you going anywhere with her? You need to be going with us.”

Shelby pulled on his arm as he tried to make for the door. “Dad!”

“I’m sorry about this,” he answered helplessly. “Trust me, she’s not the enemy. We’re trying to fix something.”

“What? What are you fixing?” Evie insisted. “She just keeps dragging you away and neither of you will tell us what’s going on.”

They heard sirens a few blocks away.

McCauley waved at Shelby and Evie. “You two go. Now.”

Her voice was so forceful they finally complied, after one last silent appeal to Jason. He watched them scoot through the open doorway and out into the night.

“Give me your phone,” McCauley told Jason. She immediately dropped it on the floor and stomped it into tiny shards.

“I’ll buy you a new one. If we make it through this. That was an old model anyway. Don’t you upgrade?”

If we make it through this.

As they left, the words hung in his living room like a bad odor.