by Al
~ * ~
BOY TELEPORTED FROM
OWN HOUSE TO NEIGHBOR’S
~ * ~
Grafton, NY (Aug. 30)—Ten-year-old Bobby Milestone, who vanished into thin air while playing quietly in his own front yard today, was found an hour later in the home of Grafton neighbor Mr. Fred Warbling. The youth claimed to remember nothing that happened to him between the time he vanished and reappeared. “I was out front one second,” he stated, “and the next second I was on top of Mr. Warbling’s car in his garage.”
The youth vanished before the startled eyes of his uncle, Mr. Eugene Milestone, who was looking out the window when the incident occurred. “It was like somebody yanked him out of the air,” Mr. Milestone said.
This reporter was on hand and participated in the massive hour-long search, which was mounted immediately after young Milestone vanished. No explanation has been offered for the youth’s disappearance and subsequent reappearance.
~ * ~
Halpern called in the Milestone piece on Monday afternoon over Bill Greener’s loud protestations. All the rest of the day he double- and triple-checked his calculations, readying himself for the next day’s sighting. He rented a car and was on the road before nightfall, munching periodically on a bucket of fried chicken as he drove. Before leaving he sent a cable to Greener which read: I WAS RIGHT, YOU SUCKER. HAVE REACHED END OF SEARCH. WILL KNOW ALL TOMORROW. BRACE FOR BIG STORY.
He drove for four hours, pulling to a halt well before dawn at his calculated site. There was no moon and the visibility was bad, but he seemed to be on a road at the edge of a vast, rolling valley in the middle of nowhere. He shrugged and went to sleep for a couple of hours, awakening just as dawn broke. When he looked out the window, his eyes widened.
“My God,” he gasped, “I was right.”
There, a scant fifty yards off the dusty road, sat a machine. It looked like nothing so much as an airship, a dirigible-like structure with a long cabin slung underneath. It bore no identifiable markings.
As Halpern drew closer, he saw that his first impression had been a bit mistaken; the thing was not quite as rickety as it had first appeared. It was smoothly metallic and resembled a conventional cigar-shaped flying saucer.
And as he crept even closer, he saw that there was a doorway in the cabin underneath, and a figure leaning against it with his arms folded. Just as Halpern reached the ship, the figure waved languidly and turned away, disappearing inside. Cautiously Halpern poked his head through the opening—and heard someone say, in an even tone, “Please come in, Mr. Halpern.”
He entered the craft, stepping as if he were walking on eggs.
Inside, the cabin was a cluttered mess; stacks of papers and charts lay everywhere. A man was at the front of the structure, bending over a control panel composed of antique knobs and a huge bronze steering wheel. Two globes, one celestial and one terrestrial, were mounted on either side.
The man turned, and Halpern at once thought he looked vaguely familiar. He was strongly built, taller than average, and bore a slight resemblance to Teddy Roosevelt, with a bushy moustache and curling hair parted a bit left of center. He wore a pince-nez, and Halpern was at once taken with the calmness of the gray eyes behind it. He also wore a three-piece woolen suit with a watch-chain and fob attached.
“Please sit down, sir,” the man said, indicating a camp stool off to the right. “I’ll be with you in a moment.” He turned to the control panel, and Halpern spun around to see the door to the craft closing with a smooth hiss. Moments later there was a nearly undetectable bump. They were airborne.
With a sigh the man turned from the control board and confronted Halpern with those calm gray eyes.
~ * ~
“I must congratulate you,” he said, “on your perseverance. I was happy to see you’d found my little pattern. And that you were clever enough to notice that the last little x in my grid of x’s would be completed today.” The corners of his eyes wrinkled upward—in mirth or perhaps something else. “Very resourceful. You thought there might be something at the end of my rainbow of crisscrosses, eh?”
Halpern nodded cautiously.
The stranger suddenly thrust out his hand. “Well, you were right, of course. My name is Charles Fort, sir.”
The man paused a moment to watch Halpern’s jaw drop, then went on: “You’ve become something of a pest these last few weeks, you know. But I must say you’ve been an interesting pest.” Once again his eyes seemed to twinkle.
“You can’t be Charles Fort,” said Halpern. “Fort died fifty years ago.”
The other’s eyebrows went up. “Did he? I suppose you need a bit of explanation, eh?”
Halpern said nothing.
“First of all,” the man said, “I really am Charles Fort. Or was, anyway, for a time. Actually, you might call me a kind of ‘overseer.’ I was sent here to Earth a very long time ago, Mr. Halpern. My life here as Charles Fort, from 1874 to 1932, was an enjoyable sidelight to my real task, and so to amuse myself I decided to document some of my own doings.”
Halpern’s eyes widened. “You mean you made all the strange things happen? The trees flying around, the puppies—all that?”
Fort smiled modestly. “That’s right. Beautifully ironic, isn’t it? That Charles Fort not only documented all sorts of bizarre phenomena, but actually caused them all!” Laughing, he gestured toward the controls. “I do it all with these little knobs. Flying frogs, double suns, night for day, day for night, invisibility—all the silly stuff.”
“I can’t believe it!” said Halpern. “Why?”
Fort’s laughter ended in a sigh. “Well,” he said, “I’ve been here a very long time. Doing a job.” He yawned, then glanced behind him out of the port windows, pushing at the rudder wheel a fraction. “Not a very exciting one, I’m afraid. Let’s just say my job was to start things rolling on this planet, as far as civilization was concerned, and then to—” A hint of a smile touched his lips. “—help things along, so to speak. Not to interfere,” he added hastily, “but rather to keep you moving, evolving, keep you on your toes. We’re not allowed to interfere directly, you know.” He smiled dreamily, fingering his lapel. “I always liked the clothes from the turn of this century best.”
Halpern was getting impatient. “But why did you invent Charles Fort?”
“Boredom, Mr. Halpern. Flying around in this ship all the time, causing mischief here and there—it all gets exceedingly tiring. So I decided to live among you for a while. I made up a being named Charles Fort. Gave him birth records, a family history, everything he needed. Granted, I was bending the rules a bit. But if all I did was chronicle my own doings, I wasn’t directly interfering, was I? And my job at the same time—doubly so, since I was not only perpetrating all those ‘unexplained phenomena,’ but bringing them to your attention at the same time. As I said, beautifully ironic.”
“But what’s all this ‘overseer’ stuff? You mean to say you came here just to play tricks on us?”
Fort sighed heavily. “For better or for worse, Mr. Halpern, somebody a long time ago decided that this was the way to bring young civilizations along. The object is, quite simply, to make you think. To make you look at the world as a strange and beautiful place with mysteries still not fathomed—which, of course, it is.” He gave the rudder another touch. “And the more you wonder about what’s behind this weird, wonderful universe you live in, sooner or later you’ll begin to realize that everything is rather neatly tied together—that it’s all a unity. And the sooner you come to understand that unity, the sooner you can, well, join the club, so to speak. While I was Charles Fort down below I cheated a little by sneaking some of that monistic philosophy into my books. But what’s a little cheating in a good cause, eh?” He smiled. “So you see, all my hijinks are really just a teaching tool.” Suddenly he came over to Halpern and put his arm around his shoulder. “I bet you can’t wait to get back and tell your story, eh?”
“Yes…” said Halpern cautiousl
y.
“Well, you must let me show you a few of my little tricks first, and then we’ll get you back to your office, safe and sound. You see, I know what it’s like to be a newspaperman.”
Once more the limpid gray pools of Fort’s eyes sparkled as he led Halpern toward the back of the airship.
“I have a little confession to make,” he said, smiling paternally. “You’re the first human being I ever let catch me in the act. That’s really bending the rules, isn’t it? But since I’m getting you back to your office, I guess I’m not interfering all that much.”
“Sure, why not?” said Halpern, suddenly buoyant, thoughts straying once again to Woodward and Bernstein. He laughed. “That really was a clever line of yours, by the way. ‘I think we’re all property.’ Very clever.”
“It was at that, wasn’t it?” Fort smiled.
~ * ~
VIOLENT INCIDENT
AT DATA TERMINAL
~ * ~
Albany Complex, NY (Aug. 31, 2082)—An intruder dressed in pre-Millennium clothes and claiming to be an employee of the Albany Sun caused minor damage at this station’s mid-Complex terminal earlier today. The man, who identified himself as Nathan Halpern, stated in loud terms that he was a top Sun “columnist,” demanded a “typewriter” (such devices have not been used at the Sun since it was computerized over forty years ago), and further demanded to see one Bill Greener, whom he identified as his “editor.”
The lone operator at the terminal at the time of the incident, Rupert Popkin, attempted to calm the intruder down, but as Popkin stated later, the man “went into a wild fit, repeating the names Woodward and Bernstein over and over and claiming he had been kidnapped by a UFO and put into suspended animation.”
According to Popkin, who suffered minor cuts and bruises, the man then became violent and had to be taken into custody by security personnel, but somehow managed to escape while en route to Albany Complex Psychiatric Center. Witnesses at the scene reported that he ran off shaking his fist at the sky and shouting, “I’ll find you if it’s the last thing I do!” As of this time, he remains at large.
Curiously, a check of files shows that an individual named Bill Greener did work at the Sun in the late twentieth century. However, no record of anyone named Nathan Halpern has been found.
THE NEW KID
By Al Sarrantonio
Thursday
I hate being the new kid in school.
Today was the same as it’s been ever since I moved here. When I got off the bus the line of bullies, sixth graders with a few fifth graders thrown in for spice, were waiting for me. Chunky Fredericks, the biggest one and the leader, smiled his gap-toothed grin and said, “Nice to see you again, loser!” He slapped me on the back, hard enough to make me stumble, and then the rest of them were on me. When they walked away singing, “New kid! New kid!”, I was left on the ground with my books all over the place and my lunch stepped on. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich doesn’t taste so good when it’s flat.
They got me at lunch, too, and then again as I walked to my bus after school.
I hate this. The only good thing that happened today was that I heard a rumor that another new kid was coming to school.
If only that would happen!
Then maybe the bullies would leave me alone!
~ * ~
Friday
It’s true!
Today our teacher announced that a new student would be arriving in our class on Monday. That didn’t stop the bullies from beating me up today, but even while they were doing it I could feel the weight lifting from me. Chunky Fredericks even sighed and helped me up after they were finished beating me up at lunch.
“You know, loser, I’ll really miss whomping on you,” he said. “Next week you’ll be one of us.” And then he slapped me on the back—but in a friendly way!
I can’t believe it!
On Monday I’m saved!
~ * ~
Monday
My dream has come true!
For the first time since moving here, I walked untouched from the bus to class, and when I walked into my classroom, shielding my face against spitballs and thrown candy, the strangest thing happened: nothing.
Nobody hit me, no one shouted, “Get the new kid!”
Slowly, I lowered my hands from my face.
No one was looking at me.
They were all looking at…him.
The new student was in the front row, right in front of the teacher’s desk. He was kind of weird looking, with a really thin face and skinny arms with long fingers, and kind of pale, almost light green skin.
He was trying real hard not to be noticed, but of course everybody was staring at him.
“Hey, freak!” Chunky Fredericks said, standing up with a wadded-up paper in his hand. He drew his hand back to throw it, and I flinched—but then I realized that he was going to throw it at the new kid and not at me—
At that moment the teacher, Mrs. Adams, came in, and Chunky sat quickly down.
“Later, freak,” Chunky mumbled, as Mrs. Adams started class, and I realized with a sudden feeling of freedom that there was someone in the classroom quaking with fear, and it wasn’t me!
~ * ~
At lunch they got the new kid, of course.
I was real quiet, still not quite believing my good luck, slipping out onto the playground to eat my lunch by myself, but after a while I couldn’t help noticing the group of kids huddled in the spot where they normally beat me up. There were things flying into the air from the center of the group, a paper bag followed by some kind of food and then a jacket and then a shoe, and when the group dispersed a few minutes later, laughing, there was the new kid on the ground, looking dazed the way I had so many times. He gathered his stuff and crawled off, and for a moment then I got scared because Chunky and his friends were heading my way, still laughing.
But they kept walking past me as I hid what was left of my lunch behind my back.
Then, amazingly, Stinky Peters, who was even bigger and uglier than Chunky, and who always brought up the rear of the gang, stopped as he went by and patted me on the head.
“You know, Bud, you’re all right!” he said, smiling, and kept walking, lumbering away to catch up with the rest.
And when I walked to my bus after school, they weren’t there, waiting for me, but were instead in front of the new kid’s bus, in a circle, laughing, as more books and clothing flew up into the air.
As good as I feel about being left alone, I feel sorry for the new kid.
~ * ~
Tuesday
The bullies did to the new kid what they used to do to me, stealing his pants at lunch, Chunky Fredericks and Stinky Peters fighting over who got to turn them into rags. Stinky, being bigger, finally won, and I think he tore the legs off with his teeth because when he ran by as the bell rang ending lunch he tossed the trousers at me and laughed, “Here, Bud, a little present!”
I returned them to the new kid, who was cowering on the ground, trying to cover himself up with pages from a ripped up notebook. I’ve got to say, seeing him close up, that he’s even weirder looking than I first thought—his legs are spindly and his face is long and oval shaped, the eyes too big and shaped like dark almonds.
“Here’s your pants,” I said, giving them to him.
“Thanks,” he said, in a thin, almost whispery voice.
He started to say something else but then Stinky was calling to me, “Hey, Bud! Leave the freak alone—the bell rang!” and I ran back to class.
After school, there was a big circle of kids in front of the new kid’s bus again, and I went home unbothered.
In a strange way, I feel kind of lonely.
~ * ~
Wednesday
Not a bad day for me.
But another bad one for the new kid.
The gang of bullies went after him at lunch again. This time Stinky put his arm around my shoulder and said, “Come on, Bud! Join in the fun!”
; I had no choice and went along with him, but I just didn’t have the heart to turn the kid’s English book into confetti or his lunch into mush.
When the gang dispersed, I stayed behind.
“You look better without pants,” I said, trying to cheer him up.
When I held out half of his English book he flinched.
“Hey, I won’t hurt you,” I said. “If fact, until you came along, I was the one they beat up on.”
He looked up at me, his almond-shaped eyes suddenly brightening, and said, “My name’s Oort. Want to be friends?”
I hesitated for a moment, thinking that maybe Chunky and Stinky wouldn’t like it, but then I said, “Sure, why not?”
At that moment I saw Chunky and the others heading in our direction.
Oort groaned and said, “You’d better leave. Looks like they want to get in a little more fun before the bell rings. See you later?”
“Sure.”
I backed away as the gang arrived, Stinky rubbing his hands in anticipation, and watched from a distance as the rest of Oort’s books flew to pieces above the laughing circle that surrounded him.
But it looks like I won’t be lonely anymore.
~ * ~
Thursday
Turns out Oort’s a pretty nice guy.
I wish I could do something to help him at school, but he seems to understand what being the new kid’s all about and takes it as best he can.
He came over after school today, and after we cleaned him up and got most of the dried mud and peanut butter out of his hair he wasn’t in too bad shape. We played video games for a couple of hours and then did our homework, and I managed to sneak some snacks up to my room. Oort really likes potato chips, it turns out, and scarfed them down like he’d never had them before.
“Don’t they have potato chips where you came from?” I asked, joking.
“Actually…no,” Oort said, a little hesitantly.
“Where’s that?” I answered, amazed that there could be anywhere without potato chips.
Oort shrugged, still stuffing his face, and said, “Just…somewhere else.”
“I can’t imagine a place without potato chips…”
