Where the Hell is Tesla? A Novel

by Rob Dircks

“…Tomorrow? Sure… Of course, there’s our fee…”

  And Pete stops grabbing for the phone, and smiles.

  10

  I Was On

  Good Morning

  New York!

  From: Chip Collins

  To: Julie Taylor

  Date: June 4, 2015 5:43am

  I was on Good Morning New York!

  Hi Julie,

  So while Meg starts building what she can of the Interdimensional Navigation Controller (man, we need a cooler name for that), me and Pete embark on my favorite part of this whole thing so far:

  Awesome Man and The Brute’s

  Superhero Celebrity Tour.

  I’m not ashamed to admit it – I love the attention. TV show hosts, reporters, shit – EVERYONE is dying to talk to us, to touch the magic. And until we hit our hundred thousand dollar fundraising goal, there’s going to be plenty of magic to go around. We’re doing TV, radio, print, live public demonstrations of our powers – I know, total whores. Whatever. Bring it on.

  There’s one thing that’s kind of pissing me off, though. Pete keeps taking off here and there to visit his crush Meg. Ugh. Probably talking about money and working out and shit. It reminds me of that girl he took camping with us. Rebecca or something. He was totally into her, taking off with her into the woods every chance he had, but you and me got shitfaced and carved that bow and arrow out of a couple of sticks and sort of accidentally shot her in the calf. We never saw her after that. No wonder he doesn’t want me around when he visits Meg. Doesn’t want her shot in the leg. Good. I’ve got more important thing to take care of. I don’t really like her. Can you tell?

  Anyway, the highlight moment of the week? Our first interview on Good Morning New York with Sandy Maytime:

  “Gentlemen, so where are you from? Another planet? Someplace on Earth that hasn’t been discovered? Were you exposed to cosmic radiation, or an experimental drug?”

  Pete fields the question first. “Well, I wish it was something exciting like that. But really we’re just a couple of guys who are a little different, trying to get home.”

  Uh, Pete? That was boooorrrriiiinnnngggg.

  Sandy flatlines. Only two people in the entire studio audience clap. This is embarrassing. So I jump in.

  “Well, uh, Sandy, that’s… our cover story. See, we’re not supposed to tell the truth. It’s too huge. It could have universe-wide ramifications.”

  Sandy’s heart starts beating again, and she practically falls off her stool. Now THIS is exciting. “Oooh. Perhaps just a hint? Please?”

  “Well, Sandy, I could get in trouble for this…” Sandy smells a scoop “…but okay. We are, in fact, from another planet, on a mission of peace and protection.”

  Pete rolls his eyes, but there’s nothing else he can do – we’re in front of a bunch of cameras, the audience is finally tuning in, and I’m on a roll.

  “Our planet, uh, Xircon, is many millions of light years away. We were chosen from among thousands of top Alliance Officers to visit Earth. You see, your world is very special.”

  The audience is gripping their armrests. Sandy’s panting. “Our world? Us? Special? Why?”

  “I really shouldn’t.”

  If Sandy could personally write me a check for a hundred thousand dollars right now, she would. Not only am I giving her the first interview with two Alliance Officers visiting Earth, but I’m about to tell her, and her audience, and the world watching her show, and the advertisers paying for 30-second spots, why Earth is so darn special. “Please, continue!”

  “Well, all right. We have seen many worlds. But yours has more potential than any, more capacity for greatness. In fact, a great leader will rise from your people. A great leader! But there is one thing.”

  Pete’s looking at me like I’ve lost my mind, doing his not-so-subtle hand-slicing-across-the-throat move. And really, I have no idea where this story is headed. I’m like a demented, rambling storyteller from another planet (didn’t you actually call me that once?), with no ending in sight. I just keep talking and talking and talking, and now I’ve talked myself into a corner. I’m stuck.

  “And?” Sandy pleads.

  “There is one thing.”

  “You said that already. Please.”

  “And that one thing is…”

  Pete jumps in.

  “Rhodium.”

  Oh my God. Pete’s a fucking genius.

  Forget stealing the meteorite – if Pete pulls this off, they’ll give it to us!

  “Excuse me? Rhodium?”

  “Yes, rhodium. A very rare metal here on your planet. Our readings show a concentration of over five pounds in Washington D.C., possibly a meteorite. There is a terrible creature searching the cosmos for such large concentrations, and we’ve been sent to retrieve it. To protect you from this creature’s wrath.”

  Sandy’s swooning. “Ooohhh! Like the children’s legend about the demon and the king.”

  “Uh. Yes.”

  I’m like come on, Pete, “Uh, yes?” Not exactly the most rousing ending, dude. The producer’s counting down to a commercial, the audience is frothing at the mouth, and we need a little Awesome Man polish. So I hop off my stool and raise both fists into the air.

  “Yes, Sandy. Like the children’s legend. Good people of Earth, your safety is our mission. A legend is just a legend. But greatness is real. AND GREATNESS IS YOUR DESTINY!”

  MAYHEM.

  Julie, people are passing out in the aisles, cheering for us, and for themselves, hugging total strangers, crossing themselves, you name it. Sandy’s wiping back tears. And the producer is standing next to the camera with a shit-eating grin and both thumbs up; he’s thinking: next stop, daytime Emmys!

  On our way back to the green room, people are crowding us for autographs, taking cell phone videos, and Pete turns to me and smiles. “You’re welcome.”

  “Thanks, The Brute. Now let’s go get us some rhodium.”

  11

  About That

  Meteorite…

  From: Chip Collins

  To: Julie Taylor

  Date: June 4, 2015 5:43am

  About that meteorite…

  Hi Julie,

  So the show went great. And the celebrity superhero tour was a blast. A hundred grand. Safe deposit box. Check. But our meeting with the government brass about taking their meteorite?

  Not our best moment.

  So me and Pete are sitting in your totally typical what-you-would-imagine government conference room – drab, maps on the wall, little American flags on the conference table. Four guys walk in. Two suits and two military. Big guns.

  Julie, last week I was a security guard, with a badge on my shoulder a third-grader wouldn’t take seriously. This week I’m meeting with the FBI and some big muckety-muck general with lots of stars and stripes and shit. So I’m kind of star struck, and I instinctively stand up and salute.

  “You don’t have to salute, son. You’re a civilian. Oh, wait. You’re an ‘Alliance Officer’ from another galaxy. So yes, go ahead, knock yourself out.”

  Uh-oh. I’m not getting the sure-take-our-meteorite-we’ll-gift-wrap-it-for-you vibe that I was expecting.

  The general leans right in, and does all the talking. No bullshit with this guy.

  “First off, let’s have that little shiny remote control thing of y’alls. And the wrench. No weapons allowed in the building, thank you very much.”

  Okay, bad vibe number two. They’re taking our shit. But we need the damn rhodium even more, so we pony up our bad-ass superhero weapons. (Well, my Shogun was bad-ass. Pete’s wrench was more goofy-but-sure-as-hell-gets-the-job-done.)

  “Thank you gentlemen.” Now he leans in even closer. “So let me get this straight: you expect us to believe that you two clowns are from another planet, and y’all need to take our rhodium meteorite to protect us from an imaginary monster in a kid’s story, so that we humans can achieve our destiny and send forth a great leader into the universe.”

/>   “Well, it does sound kind of far-fetched the way you’re saying it.”

  “You’re damned right it does. How would you say it?”

  “Well, I would say… I would start with… uh, Pete?”

  I turn around, and Julie – Pete is actually rolling his chair away from me! Like he’s trying to slowly escape out the door without anyone noticing. Thanks, dude.

  “I don’t think your friend Pete here is an Alliance Officer either, are you Pete?”

  Pete stops rolling and just looks down at the cheese danishes they put out for us. (They were actually pretty good, better than you’d expect.) I guess I’m on my own.

  “But… look at us! Look at what we can do! We’re clearly not from here!”

  “See, there’s where we can agree. Y’all are most definitely not from around here. You can fly, for Christ’s sake. But another planet? Come on, son. I think we both know where you’re from. And I think I know what you need the rhodium for.”

  “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”

  The general presses a button in front of him, and another grunt walks in, pushing in a table with wheels. (He’s huffing and puffing, the poor guy, even though the table weighs max ten pounds.) The general nods, so the grunt stops, and lifts the cover of the box on the table.

  It’s an Interdimensional Navigation Controller.

  Just like the diagrams. Sitting right there in the middle of the table.

  “Now do you have a clue, son?”

  From: Chip Collins

  To: Julie Taylor

  Date: June 4, 2015 5:43am

  Re: About that meteorite…

  Hi Julie,

  So we’re totally snagged. It was a terrible lie, we’re awful at it, so of course we’ve been found out. For a few minutes, though, I was holding it together, feeling like all this danger and excitement has made me a more courageous guy. Heck, I can take this guy’s shit, this General Dickhead (he never introduced himself, but I’m sure that’s his name, or it’s close). What’s so scary about him?

  But the second he trots out the controller, I revert right back to my natural instincts.

  I burst into tears.

  “G-General, sir. (sobbing) We- We’re just a couple of guys trying to get back to our dimension. I’m really sorry about lying to get the rhodium… (more sobbing) We just needed it to build… that.”

  Now I’m really blubbering, so General Dickhead hands me a hankie from his pocket. I blow my nose in it and hand it back. “Thank you, sir.”

  He waves it off – guess he’s not keen on a pocketful of Chip snot – “No problem. Heck, who even needs a rhodium meteorite now? You can have this here pre-built controller! Free. It’s on us.”

  Me and Pete look at each other. Is he serious?

  “Are you serious?”

  “Sure, son. Take us back to Room 3327 with y’all, get us into that Interdimensional Transfer Apparatus, and you’re free to go. Go home.”

  “Wait. So you know about all this? Everything about Tesla?”

  “Sure. Of course. We’ve got the journal. And this here controller. Everything. They don’t know about it in your dimension?”

  “No. The FBI lost the journal and the controller. They’re total morons.”

  The FBI agent sitting next to me chokes on his danish and glares. Sorry, truth hurts sometimes, dude.

  General Dickhead smiles. “Well, we didn’t lose either one of them. Heck, we’ve even got eyes on that hotel 24/7. Got to see your little pillow fight the other night, too. Cute. Oh, and you both snore, by the way.”

  “It wasn’t a pillow fight. We were testing out the gravit- hey, you’ve been watching us this whole time?”

  “Shit sure, yes. I didn’t even have the boys here pick you up until today, I was having so much fun keepin’ an eye on y’all this week. You’re a hoot.”

  “Not cool.”

  “Ha! You think I care about ‘not cool?’” He leans in even closer (how close can this guy lean?). “Now listen up, and listen up good: with the intel and the resources you’re going to lead us to, like more of those shiny little weapon thingys, you get your trip home. We win. You win.”

  “Intel? Resources? Weapons? What are you talking about?”

  “Shit son, wake up. Don’t you know what’s going on? Haven’t you turned on a TV since you’ve been here?”

  Pete and I shake our heads. We haven’t had time to watch any TV – because we’ve been on TV, bitches!

  “…well if you had turned on a TV, or read a newspaper, or paid any attention at all, you’d know we’re at WAR, son! A war for FREEDOM! If we don’t subjugate the rest of the world, how can everyone have the freedom they deserve? A freedom they don’t even know they want? AMERICAN FREEDOM?” He catches himself going into a frenzy, and tones it down a notch. “But TECHNOLOGY wins wars. So you’re going to get us what we need to win.”

  I’m not liking the sound of the word “subjugate” (remind me to look up what it means later), and it’s sounding like he’s giving me orders (fuck that), so my courage ticks up a little. “So why don’t you just go yourself? Why do you need us?”

  “Can’t. We haven’t figured out the combination to that damned lock!”

  Come on. It’s impossible.

  The whole U.S. military/industrial/intelligence complex can’t figure out 0-0-0-0? “It’s not rocket science, General. It’s actually pretty fucking obvious.”

  “Don’t try my patience, son. 0-0-0-0? 1-2-3-4? What do you think, we’re idiots? It was the first thing they tried, back in ’43. Tried every goddamn integer combination. Every decimal combination to eight places. Nothing.”

  (Meg’s Official Theory on the ITA Lock Combination:

  Why are we the only people in the ITA other than Tesla, if other people have tried 0-0-0-0? Meg’s theory: our home dimension is the ONLY ONE with a combination of 0-0-0-0. So wherever we go, our combination somehow travels with us, like a personal dimension ID or something. And the other dimensions’ combinations must be numbers between the digits, like 1.235952346920234098, so they’re virtually impossible to guess, and even harder to dial in on those little manual luggage-lock dials. So if you’re from this light gravity dimension, your combination might be 4.948300298765493812 - 8.857466200193823219 - 1.868473629911204934 - 0.958433772898431340. In other words, fucking impossible to crack, or to get just right on the dials. But me and Pete? 0-0-0-0 clicks right in. Boom. Meg’s so smart. It pisses me off.)

  “But if you open the door for us, we can follow you right in.” He holds up the Shogun and admires it. “And get our hands on some primo-grade weaponry. Or an army of folks like you with superpowers. Bingo!”

  “No. I don’t think Tesla wanted the ITA to be used for war stuff. Actually I’m sure of it. Tesla wanted to light the world, not darken it.”

  General Dickhead pounds his fist on the table. “Fuck Tesla!”

  Wait. Did this asshole just say “Fuck Tesla?”

  I stand up, fists clenched. I mean, Tesla’s not my favorite flavor right now either, but at least he’s trying to help us. General Dickhead is just a douchebag, trying to use us to get his war rocks off. To do whatever subjugate is to the rest of the world. Screw that.

  Anyway, Pete’s got my back, and stands up too, ready for a fight. Then everybody else gets up, revealing their holsters. So much for no weapons in the building. It would be a real Mexican standoff, except that they have guns and we don’t have shit anymore. And I know I can practically fly, but bullets are bullets, and these guys have lots of them.

  But before I can say something stupid and get us shot, Pete lunges for the window. On his way (cue the super-slo-mo thing again), he grabs the Controller from the table, and me, and we both hurtle through the window, with a million shards of glass (if I never crash through another window again that’s just fine with me) and a thousand bullets following us. Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! Peoww! (I’ll stop now. You get the idea.)

  PEOWW!


  I’m hit.

  Fuck! I’m dying! I know it! The pain rips through me, and as we land on the ground (the conference room was like thirty stories up, btw), I’m ready to pass out.

  “Don’t pass out, dude! Don’t pass out! We gotta go!”

  But I’m just seeing white dots and shit, and Pete sounds like one of the grown-ups from a Charlie Brown cartoon, and the crazy Peowws are all around us, and I look down and see my pants are turning red – this isn’t good.

  “Pete… tell Julie… I love her…”

  Pete looks down and I can just make out that he’s rolling his eyes at how stupid I am, and I know I’m going to be okay.

  “It hit you in the ass, you big baby. Let’s go.”

  He throws me over his shoulders (try that in OUR dimension, dude!) and leaps off, down past the Lincoln Memorial, back on to the highway, a half-mile with each bound, headed for New York.

  “They’re gonna have attack helicopters and shit after us in no time. You think we can make the hotel?”

  “Not carrying you. And we have to stop and get Meg first.”

  Meg? Huh? I’m about to say “But…” when the look in Pete’s eyes says it all: No buts. We are going to get Meg whether I like it or not. Which I don’t.