Quantum Cheeseburger

by Jeremy Michelson

  I knew the Space Corps had a small presence on the old base. General Mattany had taken an interest in Dr. Kincaid’s theories and had arranged for some funding. I thought of the two hover jets full of space marines screaming in over Guydoro’s. They could have only come from the supposedly decommissioned Holloman.

  Which explained the silver hover jet that screamed over my head, heading toward Holloman.

  It was traveling subsonic, so no sonic boom this time. It disappeared into the heat waves miles ahead. I slowed the Jeep. Maybe going to Holloman wasn’t the best of ideas.

  I had some vacation time saved up. Mexico was nice. In places. Maybe a quick trip across the border would be just the thing.

  I pulled the Jeep to a stop. The engine rattled. Heat from the road baked my skin.

  Something shimmered off in the distance.

  A silver dot appeared in the sky. A second later it was a huge hover jet screaming to a stop in front of me. The prop wash from its stubby wings blasted me with dust and sand as it settled to the pavement.

  The hatches flipped open and marines in shiny silver space armor piled out. The black plasma cannons mounted to their arms whined as they powered up.

  I did the only sensible thing. I raised my hands and tried to be very, very still.

  Eight

  General Mattany’s office was small, but tidy. It smelled of pine cleaner and the general’s manly aftershave.

  The room was sparsely furnished. A couple worn office chairs and an ancient metal desk, painted battleship gray. The paint had been worn off the edges by the passage of generations of desk jockeys, leaving shiny bare metal.

  A single window was hidden behind a set of white blinds, blocking out the worst of the desert sun.

  General Mattany looked up from the tablet he held in his small, delicate hands.

  “Take a seat,” he said.

  As if I had a choice. Behind me was a bulky Marine in gray battle fatigues. His head towered above mine by a good twelve inches. The corded muscles running down his hairy arms and the lethal looking blaster rifle in his muscle-bulged hands told me I wasn’t going anywhere.

  I stepped into the room. His office was so small it seemed more like a closet. I wondered why the General hadn't commandeered something bigger. A metal chair with a cracked vinyl seat sat at an angle to his desk. I sat down. My stomach growled a little. It still pined for a Guydoro's burger.

  General Mattany’s small, dark eyes held mine.

  “You’re Kincaid’s courier, right?” he asked.

  I wanted to tell him I did a lot more than run memory sticks down here, but I didn’t think the general was interested in my resume.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “You were at Guydoro’s today.”

  It wasn’t a question. I squirmed, shifted on the seat.

  “I...”

  “Did you see the Stickman?”

  “I...” He already knew I was there. How much else did he know? “I...yes.”

  “Witnesses say there was a man with you who shot at the Stickman,” he said, “Who was he?”

  “I don’t know. He bumped into me and then the Stickman came in and he started shooting.”

  The general laced his delicate hands in front of him and leaned forward on the desk. His eyes were like the icy depths of space.

  “There was another man there. They were both talking to you. Who were they?” he asked.

  My arms trembled. My entire body trembled. I wanted to jump up and run. I wanted to scream at him–none of this is my fault! Stop trying to blame me for it!

  “I don’t know who they were,” I said, “I’d never seen either of them. The big one, the one in the black coat, called the older guy Professor. That’s all I know.”

  The General’s dark eyes glittered. “Where is the man in the black coat?”

  I averted my eyes. If I told him where the guy in the black coat was, I’d be ratting out Julie, too. I’m not sure why I hesitated. After all, less than an hour ago, she had ordered the guy to shoot me.

  “Son, this is a matter of utmost importance to the safety of our planet and the human race,” Mattany said, “Tell me where this guy is at.”

  I took a deep breath, rubbing my face. Why was I in the middle of all this?

  “What’s going on?” I asked, “Why did you guys blow up Guydoro’s? They had the most awesome cheeseburgers anywhere.”

  Mattany’s icy stare dropped a few more degrees. I shivered in the stuffy little room.

  "Didn't you hear the part about the safety of the planet and the human race?" he asked, "If you don't stop dicking around, there might not be any cheeseburgers anywhere. Ever. Now, where is this man in the black coat?"

  I remembered what the other guy said, the one the big guy called the professor.

  “The guy at Guydoro’s, the professor, he said something about Dr. Kincaid’s formulas,” I said, “He said Dr. Kincaid is wrong about the quantum lattice. He said not to use the formula.”

  Mattany drummed his delicate fingers on the desk. Muscles bulged along his granite jaw.

  My face went warm as I thought about the next part. "I think they also stole the memory stick with Dr. Kincaid's formulas," I said, "It's encrypted. Though, I don't think anyone can break it. I did the encryption myself."

  Mattany’s fingers stopped drumming. “That is less than reassuring, you realize.”

  My face went hot. It was probably red enough to light up the room. Why did everyone think I was incompetent? The whole thing was starting to make me angry.

  Mattany continued. “I really don’t give a crap about the memory stick. We already have the formulas.”

  “What?”

  “I brought Kincaid down here an half an hour ago,” Mattany said.

  Kincaid was already at the test site? So Guydoro’s perished for nothing?

  That made me even angrier.

  "Why the hell didn't you do that in the first place!" I shouted. I slammed my fist down on the desk. "I've been knocked around, thrown around, nearly blown up, shot at and kidnapped twice just in the last two hours! And now you say you could have just flown Kincaid down here! What the hell, bro!"

  Mattany stood up. He was a lot taller than I remembered.

  “You will calm yourself down right now,” he said.

  Normally I would have obeyed. I'm pretty compliant with authority, for the most part. I cross streets at the crosswalks, I don't speed (too much), and I pay my taxes on time.

  But the day had been stressful.

  I stood up. I wasn't anywhere near as tall as Mattany. I had to tilt my head back to look him in the eye.

  “I’m not going to calm down!” I shouted.

  The door behind me opened.

  “Excuse me General, I need to–Oh, you! Where have you been you fucking idiot!”

  Dr. Kincaid.

  I whipped around. Short, frumpy Dr. Kincaid in his stained lab coat. He stood in the doorway, a cup of coffee in his hand. Not just a cup. His cup. The one that said Quantum Physicists Do It With Momentum.

  That damn cup always pissed me off, too. Dr. Kincaid tried to explain it to me once. He even drew a bunch of formulas on his white board. I never did get it. He ended up shaking his head and calling me a bleeping idiot. Then he told me to go get him more coffee.

  “Where have I been? I’ve been almost killed because of you!” I shouted.

  Dr. Kincaid sipped at his coffee and scratched his scraggly beard. “Really, we don’t need the drama, I’m busy enough as it is,” he said, “Now where is my memory stick?”

  My face got hot again. I should have turned left and gone to Albuquerque.

  “Someone stole it,” I said.

  Dr. Kincaid erupted like a volcano. Only he spewed hot coffee instead of molten lava.

  “WHAT! You fucking idiot! How could you fucking let someone fucking steal my fucking memory stick! Do you have any idea what a fuck up this is!”

  “I just stopped for a cheeseburger! How was I suppo
sed to know I’d get assaulted by goons and aliens!”

  He waved a finger at me. “Don’t you take that tone with me,” he said, “I’ll have you kicked out of the graduate program in a heartbeat.”

  I started to see red. It tinged the edges of my vision.

  “Graduate program! I’m not in the graduate program, you jerk,” I said, “The university hired me to keep your shit together.”

  A hand landed on my shoulder. “You need to calm down right now,” General Mattany said.

  For an instant, I realized what an ass I was being. It was hard to recognize it in a room full of asses.

  Then Kincaid had to open his mouth one more time.

  “Yes, calm down that fucking pea-sized brain of yours,” he said.

  I shook with rage. The world turned red.

  I grabbed Mattany’s hand. Yanked it off my shoulder. I heard and felt one of his fingers snap. He yelled and I pushed him back. He slammed into the wall, shouting for guards.

  Kincaid hadn’t moved from the doorway. His eyes were wide. I took a step toward him.

  Energy coursed through me. I felt like a lightning bolt. The air crackled around me.

  Two burly marines armed with plasma rifles shoved Kincaid aside. He disappeared. I heard a crash like coffee cup shattering. The sound filled me with glee.

  “Holy crap, what’s wrong with him?” one of the marines said.

  “Shoot him!” Mattany shouted.

  They snapped their plasma rifles up and pulled the triggers.

  That was the point where I expected to die.

  Nine

  Blue white plasma fired blinded me for a moment.

  Things exploded.

  Chunks of office pelted my body.

  I blinked. My vision cleared, though it was still red tinged at the edges. Charred wood and drywall littered the floor. The acrid, nostril stinging smoke started to clear. I saw the two marines.

  They stood in the doorway. Their jaws hung open.

  I glanced around. A huge, smoking hole took up most of one wall. Bits of flame licked around the opening. Had they missed me and hit the wall instead? It didn’t seem possible.

  “Get him!” Mattany shouted.

  The marines raised their weapons again.

  I decided not to push my luck.

  I leapt out the opening and ran. Mattany’s office was between a couple huge, metal sided hangers. I sprinted down between them. Stumbled out to a stop out on the enormous tarmac.

  I saw acres of concrete and rows of big hangers. Too many. Some of them looked all spiffy brand new. Ringing the edge of the tarmac were tall, black poles. The tops glowed with green light. The air above them shimmered and rippled. The entire sky above the base was brown. Brown as in a sand storm. But the air was still.

  This wasn’t Holloman.

  An alarm started bleating. A monotone voice came over a public address system. Announced there was a code 23.

  I guessed code 23 meant me.

  I ran.

  I had no idea where I was going. I pointed my feet for an area beyond the hangers and booked.

  Shouts rose up behind me. Soldiers piled out of the hangers. Weapons in their hands, of course. A small hoverjet nosed out of a hanger. Lifted off the tarmac in a cloud of gray dust and came my way.

  Which royally pissed me off.

  I hadn’t done anything wrong. All I did was stop for a darned cheeseburger! Now I was being chased by the military, and being accused of bringing the world to the brink of Armageddon?

  Come on.

  I passed the edge of the runways, onto the sand and dirt. The soldiers were little specks behind me. I angled between two of the strange black poles. As I went between them my skin tingled. Suddenly the sky was blue again.

  Some kind of cloaking field? Did we have technology that advanced on earth?

  I guess we did now.

  I glanced back. The little hover jet was joined by one of its big brothers. The silver jet surged toward me.

  I don’t know what else to do. So I ran faster.

  The whine of turbofans screamed behind me. I turned my head and saw the little hoverjet right on my tail. A plume of dust rose in my wake. I realized I was going really fast.

  The hover jet fired sizzling plasma blasts at me.

  I zig zagged. I dodged rabbit brush and cholla trees. Leapt small arroyos and reddish gray boulders.

  Rock and dirt exploded to my right, peppering my face.

  I zipped the other way.

  The big hoverjet roared overhead. It shot past and turned around, settling near the ground. Pulse cannons on its stubby wings fired blasts of blue-white at me.

  I didn’t know what else to do.

  I jumped.

  My legs throbbed with power and pushed off from the ground. The next instant I was flying through the air. The sound of my feet pounding against dry hardpan soil was gone. The only sound was the air rushing past me.

  Higher and higher I went. The arc of my momentum carried me over the big hover jet. I looked down at its glistening silver back. The pilot in the cockpit craned his head up, his mouth hung open.

  The ground rushed up. I hit. Hard. I tumbled, rolled, bounced off rocks and cactus. I got up.

  I ran.

  I ran faster.

  A glance back. The hover jets were hot on my tail. I poured on the speed.

  They fell further and further behind.

  I thought of them shooting at me. It made me mad. Again. I hadn't done anything to them.

  I ran even faster.

  I was a machine. My legs pumped like pistons in a race car engine. The landscape went by in a blur. All I could see were smears of brown and blue. I felt my clothes tearing away. I grabbed at my pants and came up with a handful of smoking denim. I tossed it away into the screaming slipstream.

  That’s when I began to realize something was really, really wrong with this situation.

  The Sacramento mountains loomed up ahead of me. It felt like I was dropping toward them like a stone. Right about then I realized I didn’t know how to stop.

  So I jumped.

  My leap took me up, up, up. I passed over the sheer brown rocks of the foothills, gliding over the juniper and spruces of the higher elevations. My arc reached its peak and I fell into the thin forest near the top of the ridge.

  I smashed into a scraggly spruce, dropped to the rocky ground. I lay spread-eagled, gulping air. I raised my arm. Steam smoked from my skin. I was also buck naked.

  What the hell just happened to me?

  Ten

  Oh how I wished I had a Guydoro cheeseburger with green chilies and bacon. That and a gallon of Coke. My stomach let out a fierce growl and gave a painful twist in my gut.

  Some shorts would have been nice too.

  Shoes, also.

  Since I was wishing, a helicopter would have been super awesome.

  The sun baked my bare skin as I made my way down the mountain. Rocks and spruce needles and little cactus plants assaulted my naked feet. Scraggly bushes scraped my skin and threatened to tear off my dangly bits.

  Hiking was something I enjoyed. I often went hiking in the Sandias or the Sacramentos or up around Santa fe.

  However, I never went hiking naked. And even if I did, I’d at least wear boots, for pity’s sakes.

  Julie never wanted to go hiking with me.

  We’d gone camping a couple times. All she did was complain about how uncomfortable it was. The mattress pad was too thin, the ground too rocky, the wind made the tent flap too much. It was too cold. It was too hot. There were too many trees, she couldn’t see the view.

  All she wanted to do was hang out with me at the lab. I’d even hacked into the security system and got her a badge.

  I stopped and slapped my hand to my forehead.

  Holy crap, I’m stupid.

  I sat down on a moss covered rock and started to cry. My life was over. I’d lost Dr. Kincaid’s memory stick. My finance was some kind of spy and I’d let her into
a secure government facility. Now she was trying to kill me. And the military was trying to kill me. Dr. Kincaid probably wanted to kill me.

  Well, Kincaid was always threatening to kill me, so I guess that was kind of normal.

  The worst thing, besides being naked on the side of a mountain, was that I had gotten Guydoro's blown up.

  A lot of people were going to want to kill me for that.

  If I didn’t die of thirst and/or hunger first.

  I ended my pity party, got my naked butt off the rock and kept moving.

  Halfway down the mountain, I stumbled on a thin, clear stream of water dripping from the rocks. I put my face to it and lapped it up. Normally I wouldn't drink any water in the forest that wasn't treated. I didn't want to get giardia, but then dying of thirst seemed like a worse alternative at the moment.

  Having my fill, sudden weariness overtook me. I could barely keep my eyes open. I found a shallow cave nearby. It had a faint, musky animal aroma to it. I didn’t care. I curled up in it, not minding the rocks and twigs that pressed into my skin. Seconds later I was asleep.

  Eleven

  I woke with a start. To total darkness.

  For several dizzy moments, I had no idea where I was. I sat up. Smashed my head against the roof of the cave.

  Oh, right. Cave.

  That’s when it all came rushing back.

  I sat and shivered in the cold night air as the memories unreeled.

  My next thought was to bash my head with a rock and render myself unconscious again. There didn’t seem to be much point in living.

  Except...

  I thought about how I got up on the mountain. How I escaped the soldiers. And how I escaped the goon in the long, black coat.

  Something had happened to me.

  I thought about Guydoro’s. The spotless white ceramic plate in front of me, the top bun askew.

  The stinging and tingling in my mouth that wasn’t the green chilies.

  The thin man in the brown suit leaning toward me, gripping my shoulder. I’m sorry about this, but it’s the only way they’re going to understand.

  The son of a bitch put something in my burger.