"Cowboys and Aliens"

COWBOYS AND ALIENS
By Curtis C. Chen

"Thisss isss an exsssellent weap-pon," Halley said.

Eugene had been dealing with Varmits for as long as they'd been in California, and it still gave him pause to hear English words coming out of those tall purple sausages with tentacles. He pushed the Colt revolver back across the wooden counter and hoped his hands weren't shaking too much.

"I'm looking for something more unusual," he said.

"What-t do you mean?"

"Listen, I know you Varmits—"

"Varna'ut," the alien corrected.

"I know you folks make some interesting weapons," Eugene said. "I'm in the market for a repeater. I can pay."

Halley remained still for a few more seconds, then said, "Your name isss Eugene C-Creason."

Eugene blinked. "Yes."

"You p-play with children at-t ssstables."

Eugene felt his palms sweating. "Sometimes. It's just cards. No gambling."

The alien finally moved, twitching its upper tentacles. "My offssspring enjoy p-playing Go Fish." It paused for a second. "P-please wait-t here."

Halley disappeared into the back room of the small store. Eugene glanced out the window. Still no sign of Claud or Samuel. Maybe they'd changed their minds.

No, I wouldn't be that lucky.

Something landed on the counter with a heavy thud. Eugene turned back and saw a hunk of gray metal slightly longer than his forearm. There was a small lever that might be a trigger, and the pipe protruding from one end looked like a gun barrel, but all the other shapes attached to the frame were unfamiliar.

"P-P90," the Varmit said.

Eugene frowned. "Looks like something out of a rail yard."

The Varmit tapped the metal shape. "Barrel here. Sssight here. T-trigger here." It pulled out the long translucent box below the sight. The material looked like resin. "Ammunition here."

"The bullets don't go inside?"

"Met-tal c-coil in magazine ap-plies p-presssure. Ssspiral feed-d ramp-p loads ammunition int-to chamber."

Eugene had never seen alien machinery up close, and for a moment he forgot why he was there. The sound of Claud and Samuel crashing into the store reminded him.

"Down on the ground!" Claud shouted.

"Put your hands up!" Samuel yelled. "Eugene, where's the safe?"

"In the back," Eugene said.

Halley turned splotches that could have been eyes toward Eugene. "Why d-do you d-do thisss?"

"I'm sorry," Eugene said, his voice shaking.

"I found it!" Claud called from the back room. "But I don't see no weapons!"

Samuel waved his revolver. "Get back there."

Eugene followed Halley into the back room. Floating in midair between stacks of wooden crates was a glowing rectangle which framed a vision of another storeroom.

"You see?" Claud gestured at the glowing image. "Just a bunch of boxes."

"Inside the boxes." Eugene pointed. "There. The one marked 'P90.'"

Samuel was mesmerized by the view, swaying back and forth to see different angles on it. "It's like a window to another place."

"Another t-time," Eugene heard Halley say just before it shoved the three humans through the portal.



Photo: Colt Second Model Dragoon Revolver 1848-1860 by Michael Carøe Andersen, June, 2010

"To Serve Man"

TO SERVE MAN
By Curtis C. Chen

Jerry nearly jumped out of his skin when the robot spoke to him.

"Good evening, sir. Do you require assistance?"

Don't panic, Jerry thought. If this was a security model, you'd be on the floor already. So it's a servant, right? Programmed for convenience. Helpful.

He couldn't risk speaking, in case it tried to recognize his voice after failing to match his face. But he had to give some kind of response.

"Mmm-hmm," Jerry said, keeping his lips closed and nodding his head.

The robot was silent for a moment, then said, "We were told to expect you, sir. Please, follow me."

The bot turned and rolled away. Jerry exhaled. Obviously the bot wasn't linked to house security; it assumed Jerry had used a key, instead of bypassing the door circuit. He followed the bot through the kitchen. Sitting on the dining table was a crate filled with bubble-wrapped bronze shapes.

Modern art, he thought. Must be worth a fortune. Why are they all packed up like this?

"Missus and Master Calthorpe forgot this crate was still in the attic. Are these the correct items, sir?"

"Mmm-hmm." Good old servant bots. Jerry would have to do some legwork to find the right fence, but he was sure these hunks of metal would be worth more than the jewelry and bank notes he'd hoped to find here.

The bot lifted the crate. "Where is your vehicle, sir?"

Damn. "Mmm-mm," Jerry said.

The bot paused for a moment. "Do you have a vehicle here, sir?"

"Mmm-mm." Jerry shook his head vigorously.

"Very well, sir," the bot said. "Master and Missus have authorized their guests to use the Jaguar for any transportation needs."

Jerry clapped a hand over his mouth to contain his excitement.

"This way, sir."

The bot led him to the garage and loaded the crate into a shiny green Jaguar sedan. Jerry sat down in the driver's seat and ran his hands over the steering wheel. He'd never felt real leather before.

"Master and Missus are expecting you back at the charity auction," the bot said before closing the door. "Your destination has already been programmed into the navigation computer."

"Mm-hmm."

The Jag pulled out of the garage, and the door closed on the servant bot. Jerry looked over the dashboard, searching for an access panel to override the auto-nav.

He couldn't find one. He pried off the plastic cover below the steering column. There were no wires; instead, he was faced with a mass of tubes pulsing with yellow liquid.

"What the hell?" he said out loud.

The dashboard beeped. "Command not recognized," said a female voice.

Jerry sat up and looked at the navigation display.

CURRENT DESTINATION: POLICEMAN'S BALL

"No!" He pounded his fists on the dash. "Stop! Pull over! Emergency! STOP!"

"Command not recognized. Voice authorization failed."

The doors wouldn't unlock, and cutting the yellow tubes just spilled sour-smelling liquid all over the floormat. Jerry clawed at the breakproof windows as the car sped down the road.



Photo: Robot After All by Théo La Photo, April, 2008

"Godwin's Backstory"

GODWIN'S BACKSTORY
By Curtis C. Chen

The elevator ride up to the seventh floor seemed to take forever. Michael's hands weren't cuffed, but the three armed guards behind him and Denford made it clear that Michael was not a welcome guest.

Michael said, "Do you remember the first time you learned about 'Godwin's Law?'"

Denford kept staring straight ahead. "I thought you only reported to the old man now."

"I'm not reporting," Michael said. "We're just chatting."

Denford didn't reply.

"I hear it happened on the Russian Far East desk," Michael continued. "A local sport diver sensed Teutonic wards all over a shipwreck near Sakhalin. Nothing of obvious intel value, so nobody was very interested at first—except one World War Two enthusiast, an up-and-coming CIA supervisor named Theodore Godwin.

"It turned out that his division was trying to set up a completely unrelated operation near Vladivostok, and the only reasonable way to get their agents on site was by submarine out of Japan. But it was a high-risk, low-reward situation, and nobody wanted to stick their neck out for it. Godwin really believed, but he didn't have the clout to make it happen.

"Anyway, a few days later, another wire comes across the desk with new information about the Sakhalin shipwreck, and guess what? Somebody who saw the diver's photos is pretty sure that was a Nazi vessel, and there could be military artifacts on board. Maybe even some of Hitler's amulets.

"Well, all of a sudden, everyone and his dog is rushing to greenlight a recovery operation, and Godwin says you know, as long as we're out there near Sapporo with a submarine anyway, why don't we just go ahead and run this op that my division's been trying to clear for the last two months?"

Denford finally turned to look at Michael. "Yeah, I know the story. There's nothing in the shipwreck but some fish skeletons, but the old man lucks out and snags some prize intel on Soviet Fleet deployments. He gets on the fast track to director."

"And nobody could ever prove that Godwin doctored those shipwreck reports, or persuaded someone to do it for him, but that's irrelevant. The real lesson was, if you can draw some kind of line, no matter how thin or how convoluted, that connects your proposal to Hitler, your chances of approval magically and dramatically improve." Michael shrugged. "Godwin's Law."

The elevator stopped, and the doors opened. Denford and Michael marched forward, followed by the guards.

"Was there a point to all that?" Denford asked. "Or were you just running your mouth?"

"We're never going to catch Hitler," Michael said. "We missed our chance in 1945, and it'll never come again. But he's actually more valuable this way.

"As long as there's still some mystery surrounding him, we'll want to know more. And some people can use that. They can sell the question without ever worrying what the answer is going to be."

The double doors to the director's suite opened.

"Sometimes," Michael said, "we don't really want to know the answers."



Photo: 1938 German Nazi Coin by Kevin Dooley, November, 2009

"Inconvenient Proposal"

INCONVENIENT PROPOSAL
By Curtis C. Chen

Janet looked where Tim was pointing. The giant overhead screen flickered, and the magnified view of the arena stage disappeared, replaced by glowing letters on a black background:

JANET
WILL YOU
MARRY ME?
TIM

The audience began applauding and cheering. Janet saw people looking around, searching for the couple who had just been put on display. She looked over at Tim. He was grinning like an idiot.

Tim grabbed Janet's left hand in his right. His other hand disappeared into a jacket pocket.

Don't turn on the spots, Janet thought. Don't light us up.

A blazing white lamp swung around and centered its beam on Janet and Tim. Janet yanked her hand out of Tim's grasp, jumped out of her seat, and ran for the nearest exit.

She didn't stop until she reached the women's bathroom downstairs. Before the door could swing shut, Tim followed her in, holding an open ring box in one hand. Janet kept her back to him, but she saw the glinting diamond reflected in the mirror above the sink.

"What's wrong?" Tim asked. "I thought you'd be happy—"

"I was," Janet said. "Bringing me to the concert was a nice surprise." She pointed at the ring. "That wasn't."

Tim pressed his lips together. "Are you saying no?"

"We're not doing this here," Janet said.

"I thought you'd be happy," Tim repeated, staring at the floor.

Janet turned, stepped over to Tim, and placed both hands on his shoulders.

"I am happy with you. With what we have," she said. "Why do you want to change things?"

"I don't want to change anything. I want us to stay together." Tim made a hiccuping sound that might have been a laugh. "For as long as we both shall live." He held up the ring.

Janet shook her head. "Christ, how much did you spend on that rock?"

Tim smiled. "You like? Two carats."

Before Janet could say anything else, the diamond moved in its setting, making a high-pitched scraping noise. Tim dropped the box, put his hands over his ears, and fell to his knees.

Janet backed away and raised her arm a fraction of a second before the diamond lanced through the air at her. The face of her wristwatch took the impact, but the force sent her crashing backward into the bathroom sink. She cursed in an alien language.

The crystal embedded in her watch was cracked and glowing. The watch threw off sparks, straining to sustain its force field. The battery wouldn't last long.

Janet yanked off the watch and threw it into a wastebasket. She dumped out her purse and stabbed her cell phone with one high heel. She rolled Tim's unconscious form onto his side, pulled the cash out of his wallet, and tucked the bills into her bra.

"Sorry, love." She planted a kiss on Tim's forehead. "I'm not the one for you."

The wastebasket started to rattle. Janet picked up her weapon and checked its charge. She headed upstairs, ready to run or shoot.



Photo: A Proposal in the Museum by National Museum of American History Smithsonian Institution, May, 2010

"Post-Apocalyptic Day Care"

POST-APOCALYPTIC DAY CARE
By Curtis C. Chen

"Sorry, Mrs. H," Sarah said. "We're full today."

The baby's weight on Bianca's hip suddenly felt like a crushing burden.

"I can pay you extra—"

"You know how this works, Mrs. H. I've only got so much space here, and it's first come, first served. If you can't take Jacob in to work with you, I can recommend another day care down the road."

"He's not happy anywhere else," Bianca said. "Please. Can't you make an exception, just this once? I promise we'll be on time tomorrow."

"Then I'll take him tomorrow," Sarah said. "If I make an exception for you, for anyone, the other moms will hear about it, and then they'll all want some kind of special treatment. That's a slippery slope."

"But Jacob needs medication!"

"Every kid here needs medication. Heck, I gotta take tannic acid every three hours or I fall over."

Bianca jerked back involuntarily. "You're GI-compromised?"

Sarah shrugged. "The comet did something to everyone, right?"

"I didn't know."

Sarah paused, then raised one hand, palm up. "Maybe you can call in sick today. Stay home and take care of Jacob yourself? Could be good for both of you."

Bianca shifted her stance, and the strap of her messenger bag bit into her shoulder. She thought about the laptop inside and the presentation she had to give in less than an hour, and she bristled at this twentysomething girl giving her parenting advice.

"Suppose I just leave him here." Bianca took another step toward the house. "You'd have to take care of him, wouldn't you? You'd be obligated."

Sarah shook her head. "Don't do that, Mrs. H. If you abandon your child, I'll have to call the authorities, and you'll have to sit through a CPS interview and fill out a bunch of paperwork to get him back."

Bianca felt her skin flush under her collar. "I've known you since you were in diapers, Sarah. Your mother was my best friend. Does our relationship mean nothing to you?"

"You don't get it, Mrs. H," Sarah said. "This is about civilization. This is about making rules and following them. If we can't do that, if we can't maintain order in our society in the face of a little hiccup like this, how do you expect humanity to endure after the next big disaster hits?"

"Don't lecture me," Bianca snapped. "You don't know anything about the real world. Rules get bent and broken all the time."

"Maybe in your world, Mrs. H," Sarah said, "but I'm trying to make a better one. Now please excuse me, I've got kids to watch and you need to get to work."

Sarah closed the door. Bianca fumed on the porch for a moment, then looked down when Jacob tugged at her sleeve. She couldn't help smiling back at his upturned face.

She's right, Bianca thought. I want you to live in a better world. I do.

She turned and walked back to the car while dialing her phone.



Photo: The Quad by Bill Barber, July, 2007

"Fools for Love"

FOOLS FOR LOVE
By Curtis C. Chen

"I need to speak to her. Now," Rebecca said.

The doctor shook his head. "Look, Miss Sachs—"

"Special Agent Sachs."

"Miss Cargill is very weak. We're lucky she didn't lose consciousness during delivery. You can arrest her tomorrow."

"I don't want her, I want the father. He's a fugitive. She may know where he's going, and we need to catch him before he crosses a border."

The doctor hesitated. "Nurse Lemperson will accompany you."

"Fine."

Lemperson led the way into April Cargill's darkened room. Rebecca couldn't help noticing how young this girl was—just like all the others.

Having her baby taken away from her was going to be a tremendous shock, but she'd have the rest of her life to get over it. Rebecca tried to convince herself that would be enough.

She shook April's arm gently. "Miss Cargill?"

April opened her eyes. Rebecca held up her FBI badge. "I need to ask you about Charles Risznowski."

April smiled. "Is he here?" Lemperson shook her head. "I wish he could see our baby."

"Did he tell you he was coming back?" Rebecca asked.

"Oh, no," April shook her head. "He was clear about that from the beginning. I just hoped—wow. I'm really dizzy. Is that normal?"

"Just keep your head still," Lemperson said. "It'll pass."

That's what you get for incubating a half-alien baby, Rebecca thought. "April. Did Charles say where he was going? How he was planning to travel? Airplane? Train?"

"No. Is he in some kind of trouble?"

"He may have information pertaining to a matter of national security." Rebecca leaned forward. "It's very important that we find him. And we can give him the good news about your baby. It's a boy, right?"

"Yeah," April said, smiling as if the world were a beautiful place. "I'm naming him Charlie."

Rebecca forced herself to smile. "That's a good name."

"I'm sorry," April said. "Charles never said anything specific about where he was going. But it sounded like it was going to be a long trip. He said he needed money."

Of course he did. "How much did you give him?"

"I didn't have any cash handy," April said, "so I just gave him my debit card and PIN number."

Rebecca contained her excitement, calmly patted April's hand, and stood up slowly. "Thank you, April. Get some rest."

She nodded at Lemperson, walked out of the room, and ran to the elevators, dialing her phone.

"Center, Sachs," Rebecca said. "I need live tracking on all bank and credit card activity for April Cargill." Rebecca stepped inside an elevator and pressed the lobby button.

"Risznowski's using her accounts?" said the voice on the phone.

"Yeah. With any luck, he'll lead us to his buddies before they skip this dimension. And listen," Rebecca said as the doors closed, "the mother's not going anywhere. Wait twenty-four hours to take the baby. Hospital staff's already suspicious, and we don't want to cause a scene."

"Delay extraction? Are you sure?"

Rebecca closed her eyes and saw April's innocent, trusting smile. "I'm sure."



Photo: Newborn Life by Roger Penguino, January, 2010

"Shoot First"

SHOOT FIRST
By Curtis C. Chen

"Police Inspector!" shouted the voice inside Takeshi's head. "This man is not our suspect!"

Takeshi relaxed his trigger finger. If Buki had decided the man was not a threat, it would not fire a round no matter what Takeshi did.

"Down on the ground!" Takeshi said out loud.

The man in the hooded sweatshirt, baggy jeans, and sneakers looked around, eyes frantic. The alley had ended in a blank wall. There was nowhere to run.

"I repeat, this man is not our suspect!" Buki said. Takeshi ignored his weapon.

The man dropped to his knees, sobbing. Takeshi pulled a pair of handcuffs off his belt with one hand. "Put your hands on top of your head," he said.

"I am innocent," the man said.

"He is not our suspect!" Buki said.

"Be quiet," Takeshi said to both of them.

He handcuffed the man, dragged him to the unmarked police car at the mouth of the alley, and put him in the backseat. Takeshi closed the door and snapped his pistol back into the shoulder holster which doubled as an antenna and charging station.

"Diagnostic running," Buki said. "Testing audio transmission. Police Inspector Yamashita, if you can hear me, please respond—"

"I can hear you just fine, Buki," Takeshi said, stepping away from the car. "I did not feel a need to respond earlier."

"So you heard me say this man is not our suspect." The computer inside Takeshi's service weapon sounded more than a little hurt.

"Whoever he is, he resisted arrest. That gets him a trip to the station." Takeshi paced beside the car. "Did you compare his face to the police library?"

"Yes," Buki said. "I had ample time to perform the search while you were arresting him for no good reason."

"Innocent men do not run from the police," Takeshi said. "But I take it from your tone that his record is clean?"

"Maybe you should see for yourself."

Takeshi sighed and took his augear visor out of his jacket pocket. He fitted the translucent yellow panel over his eyes and waited for Buki to power up the display.

After a moment, two images glowed into being, appearing to float half a meter in front of Takeshi's face. The image on the left showed a hyper-color image of the man he had just arrested, as recorded by the sensors built into Buki's front sight assembly. The image on the right was a magnified scan of a student ID from Kyoto University, showing a photograph of the same man and naming him as Daijiro Nakamura.

"I have already cross-referenced with public records," Buki said. "This man is the second son of Genkichi Nakamura, CEO of Transfuture Technologic. Daijiro has no connection to our primary suspect or his associates. And considering the Nakamura family reputation, it is unlikely that Daijiro would involve himself with such people."

"Thank you for the information, Buki," Takeshi said, "but you still have a lot to learn about police work."



Photo: SIG Sauer P220 by Ken "kcdsTM," January, 2008

"It's Better to be Lucky"

IT'S BETTER TO BE LUCKY
By Curtis C. Chen

Everything smelled like smoke. Jenna wondered how she was going to get it out of her clothes and hair—like all Regulans, Harold would be able to identify the hydrocarbons and know exactly where she'd been. She hadn't wanted to use the casino, but Dr. Caffrey had insisted it would be the fastest way to launder his payments to her.

Jenna pushed the flashing button on the slot machine again. She just had to lose the rest of this stake to fake a gambling habit, and she could go home.

A row of glittering sevens ratcheted into place, and the machine went crazy.

***

The manager's office smelled of old wood and oiled leather. Jenna wondered if he was going to comp her a room. She had heard casinos sometimes did that for high rollers. That would be convenient; she could get cleaned up without putting suspicious motel charges on her credit card.

A stocky man came in and sat down behind the desk. He smiled at Jenna with dead eyes.

"Hello, Mrs. Pokorny. I'm Mr. Wick. It seems we have a problem."

"Did I do something wrong? I'm sorry—"

"No, Mrs. Pokorny, nothing like that. In fact, the casino apologizes for any inconvenience you may suffer as a result of this incident."

Jenna couldn't read Wick's face at all. That scared her. "What do you mean?"

Wick sighed. "That slot machine downstairs should not have paid out for you. Not your fault, of course; these things are random. But it does complicate things."

"I was supposed to lose money today," Jenna said, understanding. "Not win it."

"Exactly," Wick said. "This is not a situation we anticipated."

"But I don't want the money," Jenna said. "You can keep it. Dr. Caffrey's going to pay me more than enough just for scanning Harold's brain."

"Well, that's very generous of you, Mrs. Pokorny," Wick said, "but all our slots are wire-locked. The gaming commission already knows the Seventh Heaven machine has paid out. They'll want to know who won the jackpot, for tax records."

Jenna's heart sank. "That's going to be public information?"

Wick nodded. "Now, there may be an easy way to resolve this situation. If we can identify some service you can provide to us in exchange for the balance of your winnings, we'll be happy to call it even. But I can't imagine what you could do that might be worth five point three million dollars to my organization." He paused. "Except for one thing."

Jenna swallowed the lump in her throat. "My husband."

"No, Mrs. Pokorny! We'd never ask you for that. Who do you think we are?" He leaned forward. "You can keep your husband. We just want one of his Regulan friends, alive, for Dr. Caffrey and his associates to study. Just one alien. Maybe an in-law you don't like, somebody who won't be missed. We're not picky. Do you think you could do that for us, Mrs. Pokorny?"

Jenna felt lightheaded. She saw hazy spots flashing around Wick's head, and then she fainted.



Photo: Slot machines! by David Zeuthen, September, 2006