The Myth Of The Anal Probe

by David Larson

  “You might want to,” Mike said. “Because your ideas of what a relationship between two people should look like are jacked up.”

  “Not for us they aren’t,” Brizio said. “It’s the way we were raised. It really is the only thing that makes sense to us. Kind of like the way that you live is the only way that makes sense to you. I know how daunting what we’re asking you to do is, Mike. Man, I can’t even begin to think if where I would begin, if I was going to try to change almost everything there was, about the way we live life here.”

  Mike hadn’t heard a single thing that had come out of Brizio’s mouth. Across the floor Tawny had entered the common area and sat down. It looked like she was with the same group of people she was with the night he had wanted to punch the guy that had kissed her. It was the first time he had seen her since the two of them had had the altercation in his home.

  She had seen him sitting with Brizio and Mia but instead of walking over to say hello she simply had smiled at him. Seeing her there had launched a stabbing pain into his chest. It was so real and deep that it actually made him start. All he wanted to do was walk over there, take her in his arms, and hold her. Just once. If it was the last thing he ever did that would be fine. He could die knowing he had held her one last time.

  “Hello?” Brizio was saying.

  “What?” Mike said. “Were you talking to me?”

  Mia motioned over to where Tawny was sitting with her chin.

  “Oh,” Brizio said. “Seriously Mike you really have to get over that. It’s not healthy. And eventually…”

  Mike switched Brizio off again. The John guy had walked up behind Tawny and was talking to the group. They were all laughing, and talking, and having such a good time. It seemed to Mike that they were almost mocking him. Like the table of cool kids in the lunch room at school, pointing and laughing at a fat kid.

  John had his hands on Tawny’s shoulders. Mike wanted to just nail those hands to John’s nuts. That would give him something to get gropey with all day long. Then John leaned over, kissed the guy sitting next to Tawny, turned his head and kissed Tawny on the cheek.

  Mike was up and out of the chair before he realized he was even moving.

  “Hey wait buddy,” Brizio was saying. “Hold on. Where you going?”

  “Stop him Briz,” Mia said.

  But Mike didn’t hear any of that. He was already half way across the room. He was into that mode where people are either running away from the bear or turning to fight it. Whatever that person is, takes over at that minute and animates the body free of its own accord.

  “This is what you dumped me for?” Mike said to Tawny as he walked up to the table.

  “Mike,” Tawny said. “Don’t.”

  “Hey there,” John said, as he stood up, “I’ve wanted to get a chance to…”

  Mike punched John right in the face with everything he had. The force of the blow launched John up and off his feet, depositing him in stunned amazement on the top of the table.

  Gasps went up around the room as people that had never in their lives seen this kind of brutal demonstration worked overtime trying to process what their eyes had just witnessed.

  “Mike,” Tawny begged, “please don’t.” Tears were rolling down her face.

  Mike stood there like Muhammad Ali standing over a prone Sonny Liston.

  “Come on shithead,” Mike said in a low threatening tone. “Get up and we’ll finish this right here.”

  “What…” John was stammering, blood flowed freely from his nose. “What…what just happened?”

  Brizio was standing next to Mike now.

  “Hey buddy,” he said “maybe you should just go home and think about things for a little while.”

  “What?” Mike said like he was coming out of a trance.

  “Really Mike,” Brizio said.

  Tawny and another woman helped John off the table, and were cleaning up his face.

  “I’m sorry,” Mike said to John. Then to everyone, “really I’m sorry I don’t know what…”

  Tawny was crying and trying to help John out of the room.

  “Tawny,” Mike called after her. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Come on buddy,” Brizio said. “Let’s just get you home.”

  “Yeah,” Mike said dazed. “Let’s get me home.”

  Twenty-six:

  Serilda’s office was crowed and everyone there had a look of dire concern on their faces. Bob and Tawny sat on one side of the office and Gary was sitting stiff in his three-piece suit on the other.

  “I said this was a giant mistake from the beginning,” Gary said. “I told you Bob that these people were far to primal to bring them here and turn them loose in our society.”

  “Yes, you did,” Bob said. “And obviously I should have listened. But…”

  “There’s no but here, Bob,” Gary said. “But is what got us here in the first place.”

  Bob was smirking.

  “What the hell is so funny,” Gary demanded.

  “Nothing,” Bob said suppressing a grin. “You said butt got us here. I just thought it was funny. Never mind. Wrong place, wrong time, I guess.”

  Serilda shot Bob a nasty look.

  “Ok, ok,” Bob said. “I’ll be good.”

  “What do we do with Mike now?” Serilda asked. “Obviously send him home of course.”

  “Obviously,” Gary agreed.

  “Can’t we just give him a little time to make amends for what he did?” Tawny asked. “I’m just afraid that if we banish him right now it might do irreparable harm.”

  “I’m not worried about harming him” Gary said, “we have no way to confine him here. We’ve never had to deal with anything like this before. We have absolutely no idea where he might be, and what he might be doing right this minute.”

  “That’s not totally true, Gary,” Bob said. “And you know it.”

  “Brizio is with him right now and if Mike were try to go anyplace Briz would let us know.”

  “Let us know so we could do what?” Gary demanded. “Run after him and ask politely that he not punch anyone else in the face? Suggest that attacking people might not be in his best interest? You have a wolf unleashed around sheep and your idea is to let the wolf calm down so he can try and be a sheep again.”

  “I think that’s a little melodramatic,” Bob said.

  “Let’s ask John if he thinks it’s melodramatic,” Gary suggested. “I think he might have a completely different opinion. Oh, that’s right, he’s still recovering from a broken nose.”

  Bob stayed silent.

  “I think that the question of sending Mike back is fairly simple,” Serilda said. “He goes back on the very next deep space flight. According to what the space center tells me that’s tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” Tawny said. “He’ll be devastated.”

  “I imagine he will,” Serilda said. “But we have to sacrifice his comfort to the safety of the rest of our community.”

  “What kind of security do you suggest we use on the trip back?” Gary asked.

  “Security?” Bob said. “What do you mean by security.”

  “What I mean is that you’re going to have a volatile human riding on an intergalactic space trip that will have freedom to do as he pleases.”

  “Come on, Gary,” Bob said “what would he do out there?”

  “I thought you were the great lover of Earth films,” Gary said.

  “I am.”

  “Prometheus, Space Odyssey, Alien…1, 2, 3, and 4. Need I say more?”

  “Those are movies, Gary. The fiction part of science fiction. They’re not real.”

  “They may not be real, Bob, but they’re the things that live in these people’s heads. It was humans that created these stories in the first place. Mike is not safe unrestrained on a ship.”

  “He’s not nuts, Gary,” Bob said defensively. “He’s just…delicate…in a twisted sort of way.”

  “That’s enough,” Serilda said. �
�We’re going to send Mike back in the morning. We’ll keep someone with him tonight and make sure he stays home. In the meantime Gary, see what you can figure out for security measures on the trip.”

  “Who’s going to tell him he’s leaving?” Tawny said.

  Looks were exchanged around the room.

  “I’d like to do it,” Tawny said. “I think it should be me.”

  “No,” Bob said. “You tend to make him stupider than he already is. I got him into this mess, so I’ll tell him he’s going back. I’ll ride with him on the trip home to keep an eye on him also. I think it’s better that way.”

  “Alright,” Serilda said. “But be careful. I don’t want another incident.”

  “Careful is my middle name,” Bob said smiling. “Or is it danger. I forget sometimes. Maybe Julio. Who knows?”

  Twenty-seven:

  “Hey buddy,” Bob said as he walked into Mike’s home.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Mike asked. “Did you come to gloat?”

  “How many times have I told you to stop smoking crack?” Bob said. “What on earth would I have to gloat about?”

  “Tawny,” Bob said dejectedly. “I’m sure it’s over between us. I’m not sure I can ever make that right.”

  “Hold on, Amigo,” Bob said. “I never wanted to come between you and Tawny. The thing that I can’t get into your head, is that there is no one else for Tawny. You’re not for Tawny. Only Tawny is for Tawny. I don’t know how else to get you to understand that I’m not standing in your way here. Relationships are just different on Hale. You got caught up in one, and your drowning in it.”

  “I just want to see her again,” Mike said. “Do you think you could make that happen for me? I know that if I just could talk to her one more time I can get her to understand everything.”

  “That’s not going to happen brother,” Bob said. “That actually is why I’m here right now.”

  “What do you mean?” Mike asked suspiciously.

  “I mean that you’re going back to Earth.”

  “What? When?”

  “First thing tomorrow morning,” Bob said sadly. “I was trying to plead your case but I’m afraid it’s out of my hands now.”

  “You,” Mike said. “You were trying to plead my case.”

  Bob was silent for one of the first times in his life.

  “You want to stand here and feed me some sort of worthless bullshit about you trying to keep me from going back to earth…tomorrow!”

  “Why are you so upset, buddy,” Bob said. “I honestly did everything I could…”

  “Liar!” Mike yelled into Bob’s face. “I’ll be out of the way now and you’ll be free to worm your way back into Tawny’s life.”

  Mike turned his back on Bob.

  “How could I have been so stupid,” Mike was muttering to himself. “How could I not have seen that it was you all along that was going to torpedo my plans with the woman I love?”

  “Hold on,” Bob said as he reached up and touched Mike on the shoulder.

  Mike spun around and punched Bob right along the side of his head. Bob went to his knees and tried to stand back up. The entire inside of Mike’s home went black. The only things visible were the two men and the silver spike of the antenna in the middle of the floor.

  Bob struggled back up to his feet.

  “Stop brother,” Bob struggled to get things back under control. “Just stop for a second…”

  “Stop!?” Mike yelled as he grabbed Bob by his shirt almost lifting him of the floor in his rage. “Stop? So what, you miserable lump of shit, so you can lie to me some more?”

  Mike shoved Bob back as hard as he could. He wanted to beat Bob for all of the hurt he had felt over the last few days. Bobs body flew backwards and lay motionless on the floor.

  “Get up shithead!” Mike yelled.

  Bob lay there. A small rivulet of blood ran down his cheek and he coughed. A small silver needle stuck up out of his chest right where his heart would have been.

  “Oh Jesus,” Mike said as he threw himself on the floor next to Bob. “What the hell did I do?”

  He was holding Bob’s face I his hands.

  “Please,” Mike was sobbing. “Please get up. Please be ok.”

  “I don’t…I don’t think that’s going to happen brother,” Bob croaked out. “I love you Mike. I’m sorry for the things I put in your life. Please forgive me.”

  Mike collapsed into a sobbing pile on the floor of his Haleian home.

  Twenty-eight:

  Mike was standing in the same clearing near route 28 that he had driven into the night he was picked up by the Haleian spaceship. His truck was right where he left it and the keys were still hanging in the ignition. He looked up int the night sky and sighed.

  Someplace up there was an interstellar spaceship, commanded by an overly severe man in a three-piece suit on its way back to a beautiful planet, inhabited by beautiful people. Mike gazed at the stars. On one of the planets, orbiting one of those stars the most amazing woman he had ever known grieved for the loss of her friend at his hands. And someplace on that planet a small six-inch-high man stood on a black pedestal, surrounded by ethereal beauty and told fart jokes to tourists.

  Mike got in his truck and started it. Immediately the radio came to life. A piano started a low mournful riff…

  She packed my bags last night. Pre-flight. Zero hour 9 am.

  Mike smiled to himself as he put the truck in gear. He had a lot of work to do, and so little time.