Making the Galaxy Great

“Why do you appear to know so much about these refugees, Mr. Fleming?” asked the Colonel.

Jason felt his cheeks burning.

“I . . . have some contacts,” he stammered. “But if I tell you anything more, you have to promise not to send them back. They understand you might not let any more come here, but don’t return the ones who are already here. People are starving back on Dalus.”

“Not for us to decide, Fleming,” the Colonel reminded him. She stepped closer to him and he unconsciously stepped backward. “But I can promise you we’ll treat them fairly. Not like criminals.”

Jason hesitated. “They’re desperate. If you saw how many of them were packed into one little shuttle . . .”

“Mr Fleming,” asked Mr. Brown. “Have you been to Dalus to see this for yourself?”

Jason shook his head. “Of course not.”

“And you were nearly sent to prison because of lies that the Yrreans told about you and Agent McCauley.”

“Some Yrreans. But the refugees I spoke with actually helped us—”

“They knew they were breaking our laws by coming here. But if some of them assisted in exposing the scheme to undermine our agreement with the Haku, I can assure you our government will give them consideration.”

“Consideration . . .” Jason felt as if he’d just stepped into quicksand and if he continued to struggle, the situation would get worse. He glanced at McCauley, who merely shrugged as if to say she didn’t know who or what to believe. “I need to know they won’t just be hauled away.”

“Fleming, we can still send you to Moredale,” said the Colonel. Her voice was rough and serrated, a verbal hacksaw.

Jason’s brain involuntarily fixed on an image of Shelby. If he refused to tell the Colonel and the NSA anything more, would they really make him disappear into a prison nobody had every heard of? All he saw around the room were hard stares — even from McCauley. He relented and told the Colonel and Mr. Brown and the others about Grace and Tina and the mission, and about the regular shuttle loads of refugees.

“I don’t know where the others go,” he said. “But I was told there are hundreds around the country, or the world, maybe.”

A general uproar followed and Jason had a feeling in his stomach that reminded him of the time he’d gotten food poisoning after eating at a Mexican restaurant in his neighborhood that had closed soon afterward.

“I need to pee,” he said sheepishly. It was a miracle he hadn’t had an accident already. One of the soldiers showed him to the restroom and stood outside the door. Although they were in an old farmhouse, it looked like a restroom from any modern office building, with multiple urinals and stalls. As Jason stood at the wall and relieved himself, enjoying the sweet pain of finally emptying his bladder, he thought of Shelby and Evie. He imagined himself simply walking out the front door, across a couple of acres of fields, and out onto the main road where he could hitchhike home.

“Mr. Fleming.”

Jason jumped and nearly made a mess. Over his shoulder he saw Kuh-Re, his large eyes staring unblinkingly.

“Forgive me for startling you,” said the Marjan. “I also needed to . . . relieve myself.” Kuh-Re pulled a lidded trash can over to the next urinal, lifted one leg so he could rest his foot on the can, then reached inside his tunic.

“We have the same basic anatomy as humans,” he explained, though Jason hadn’t asked and wasn’t sure he wanted to know. “However, the placement is a bit different.”

Holy shit. I’m having urinal talk with an alien. It’s like halftime at a football game, but without the football game. Or the beer.

Jason suddenly wanted a beer almost as much as he’d wanted to have sex with Evie the first night they’d been together. He finished peeing, zipped up, quickly rinsed his hands and was about to hurry out of the bathroom without drying them when Kuh-Re spoke again.

“I am glad we finally met, Mr. Fleming. I have been following with great interest your adventures with Agent McCauley.”

“You have? How?”

Kuh-Re finished up as well. He carefully replaced the trash can and fastidiously washed his hands. “There is another of your human expressions I believe applies. I like to keep my ear to the floor.”

“To the ground, actually. People used to put their ears to the ground to listen for vibrations from approaching people or animals, even when they couldn’t see them.”

“Just so. I find that often we have to sense things that we cannot see.”

Was Kuh-Re trying to make a point in the most obscure way possible, or was he just being awkward with the English language? Based on everything that had happened over the last hour, Jason was inclined to believe the former.

“Kuh-Re, may I be so bold,” said Jason, trying to sound like a Marjan, “as to ask you a question?”

Kuh-Re bowed slightly. Jason took that as a yes.

“The Yrreans. Their technology is way ahead of ours. They could probably take over our planet without a lot of effort.”

“But with a great deal of what you would call collateral damage,” said Kuh-Re.

“Yes. A great deal of collateral damage. Still, I’m wondering why they would resort to secrecy and crazy schemes to try to move their people here, when they could just tell us they want Kansas and Texas and we can just go to . . . I mean, we would have to accept it. Is it possible that other worlds are, you know, keeping an eye on things? Perhaps even — yours?”

Kuh-Re cocked his head to one side. Jason had decided he did this when he was thinking deeply.

“Mr. Fleming, you are quite a fascinating fellow. Allow me to give you my card. Unfortunately, I rarely have the opportunity to leave this facility, but whenever you are here, use this card to get to me. Perhaps we could dine on a pizza.”

Jason took the card that Kuh-Re had retrieved from somewhere under his tunic. It was approximately the size of a typical business card but made out of some type of high-sheen plastic, or possibly metal, or something altogether new to Jason. It was black, with Kuh-Re’s name in English, along with Haku and Yrrean, in bright white. There was no phone number, or office number — but there was an embossed silver-colored symbol. Jason wondered if it was some sort of flag from Kuh-Re’s world.

“So, you like pizza?” said Jason.

“Yes. I enjoy many aspects of human culture. Your literature, your music — some of it. I am quite fond of the Baroque period.”

Jason thought back to his college Music Appreciation class. “Bach, Handel, Corelli—”

“Ah, Mr. Bach is a personal favorite. I do not care for much of the later music, the Classical and most definitely not the Romantic. It is much too disorderly for my Marjan mind.”

“So . . . no to Mozart?”

“Ah!” Kuh-Re exclaimed. “Mozart. He is uniquely human and utterly incomprehensible to a Marjan. It is as if he simply reaches out and snatches the background melodies of the universe. I find him a bit frightening.”

Jason had never heard Mozart described that way. But he had also never had a conversation with a Marjan before. And it occurred to Jason that the two of them had been in the restroom together for longer than was socially acceptable. He opened the door and held it for Kuh-Re.

Back in the living room, McCauley pulled him aside. “What the hell were you doing?”

“Talking to Kuh-Re.”

“Nobody talks to Kuh-Re. Nobody ever even sees him. They say he has a personal cloaking device and likes to wonder the halls unseen. What were you talking about?”

“Pizza. And Mozart.”

She shook her head, as if freeing herself from his words. “Jesus Christ, Fleming . . . Listen, I have to go meet with the Colonel. But she said you can go home to your family.”

“Can I fly in a shuttle?”