Book 1: 3rd World Products, Inc.

by Ed Howdershelt

  A new voice came on the line that was at the same time a familiar voice. “Clark here,” he said. “Talk to me."

  "Stachel here,” I said.

  There was a moment's silence, then, “Stachel? No shit? How long has it been? Jesus, it must be more than ... eight years? Is there an emergency?"

  "No, Clark, not that I know of. Nice to hear you're still there. I only ever trusted about four people in the government after John died and you were one of them. I'm living on the west coast of Florida now, practically in the shadow of that space ship, and I'm into something and thought I might need help. Marshall can play the tape for you. Right now I just need a second name on the reactivation."

  "Probably no problem. Let me hear the tape first, though. Play it, Marshall."

  Clark listened to a playback of the call.

  "You got it,” he said. “You're active. I'll sign it in the morning. Here's another number for you, too. It goes straight to my office and someone will pick up day or night. If we have to let the FBI in we'll do it at this end and I'll be the liaison."

  I scribbled the number in my book and asked Marshall to find me a company somewhere to use as a cover entry, which he did almost instantly.

  "Good enough. If I'm out of contact more than three consecutive days without making other arrangements, send in a team. If I use the word Fulda for any reason in one of these conversations, I need help but can't talk freely."

  "Fulda. Got it. I'd like an ID check, too. Numbers."

  "Okay. Make it twenty-two on even days, fifty on odd days. Also, if you need to contact me, just call and ask for the manager. I'll say this isn't the video store and that you need to dial 686 instead of 596, then I'll call you back when I can."

  A number check was a simple sentry trick. If approached by someone claiming to be from my outfit, I'd ask for verification by giving a number. Their answer would have to combine with my number to make the right total for that day.

  Clark said, “Got it. Good enough. Anything else?"

  "Other than the fact that they may know every move I make and may even know a little about my past with the company? That they may have expected me to do exactly what I did tonight and may want to use me as a funnel? Nope. Not a thing. I'll just assume I'm never quite completely alone and act accordingly."

  "You seem to have a handle on things, Stachel. Okay, then. Nice hearing from you again. We'll have to reminisce over a drink sometime."

  "Sounds good to me. Okay, I'm gone for now, guys."

  As I hung up I could imagine Clark saying, “Play it again, Marshall. A copy on my desk first thing. Run an update on him. We don't want any surprises."

  Chapter Four

  My then-girlfriend Diana had moved back to Atlanta, Georgia, some months before in order to avoid losing a fat little college scholarship that she'd already stalled almost two years. A round-trip drive to visit her after she moved consumed 16 hours of a weekend.

  Diana was 24 at the time and more than half the students were male. In keeping with the way these things usually go, the frequency of our visits and phone calls tapered down over time. One evening we both admitted wanting to date and that was that for our previous relationship.

  We're still friends today because we could discuss the matter before discussions became an aftermath of actions.

  I called Diana that evening and after spending a few moments discussing the ship just offshore, confessed that I was renting “her” room to a blonde female I'd met at a bar. She laughed.

  "It was never my room, you bozo. You always came up to my house to get away from telephones and use my hot tub. Is she pretty?"

  "Damned right she is. That's why I'm calling you, Di. I need a reality check from someone who knows that turf. She looks to be in about her mid-twenties. What does a woman your age see in a man my age?"

  "A-ha. I thought so. Did she make a pass at you?"

  "Nope. She rented a room from me. I was just thinking ahead a bit."

  Diana giggled. “Are you asking me to help you plot your way into her pants, Ed? I don't know if that's really ethical. It might be against the International Woman's Club rules or something."

  "Funny lady. No, if I get in her pants it will be by my own sparkling personality and good looks. What I'm asking you is more along the lines of why she might find me attractive when she's working in a place with people her own age."

  There was a pause, then Diana said, “Younger men can be stupid and boring and as shallow as puddles, Ed. Remember when you told me why you didn't hook up with that woman from Brooksville after you broke up with Karen? You said she had the face and body of a goddess, but the brain of a greedy puppy. You said she had an ego bigger than Texas and the personality of a badger if you crossed her. Your closing words were, 'looks damned sure aren't everything' or something like that."

  Oh, yeah. I remembered Lily very well, indeed. Someone at the bar had told her I was worth half a million since a lottery win. She'd flirtingly attached herself to me for the evening, as expected, until around closing time, when the jokester had asked me how often I played the Lotto.

  When I'd said I never bothered with the Lotto, Lily had realized she'd been the evening's entertainment. Her temper tantrum ended with the jokester on the floor with a broken nose. Lily had a nasty temper and probably still has one.

  "Di,” I said, “Those were your reasons, and you knew me for more than a few hours before we got together."

  "What do you want to hear, Ed? My reasons are the only ones I know well enough to offer as a possible explanation. If you're looking for encouragement to go after her, consider yourself encouraged. If you're questioning your desirability, don't bother. That's one of those 'personal preference' things. If you're questioning something else entirely, what is it, exactly?"

  I didn't want to tell her that I thought Ellen might be an alien with an ulterior motive for allowing my advances. Diana could be irrational as hell in her own right, but she expected much better of me and the rest of the world. I could imagine her arriving in the morning to try to talk me into seeing a doctor.

  "Di, every hustler and con artist on the east coast seems to make at least one trip through Florida. This arrangement has been too sudden and unusual to suit me, that's all. Add to that my natural weakness for tall blondes. I just felt I needed to recalibrate my sensors, you know?"

  I'd used a common technobabble phrase from a popular TV show for Di's benefit. She was a fan of the show in any of its incarnations.

  "Ah,” said Di. “Indeed so, Captain. One hand for your ship and the other for your beer, and all that. Proceed with caution. So you're just saying you're interested in her but you aren't sure why she decided to rent a room there?"

  "You boiled it down, ma'am."

  "Well, what would you tell me, Ed, if the situation were reversed?"

  "I'd tell you that I knew that question was coming. Okay, then, I'll give it some more thought. So, what's happening in your world, lady?"

  Diana spent the next fifteen minutes or so telling me about college life. It didn't sound too different from when I was in college all those ages ago. The guy she was seeing seemed to be an okay sort by her description and I said so. She quickly told me that she was only dating him and that there were no other plans.

  We rang off with a mutual hope that we could spend some time together soon.

  I spent the rest of the evening cleaning up the house a bit and Ellen's room in particular. That bedroom had always been the no-smoking room for my mother's yearly visits and other infrequent guests. Between visitors, it had been used as a staging and short-storage area for WiccaWorks products in various stages of clay-to-finished-stoneware manufacture.

  Once Sharon had moved in with Allan and WiccaWorks had it's own shop facility I'd had the house to myself, but I hadn't had reason to do much more than toss a few things in the room that had been taking up space elsewhere.

  By midnight I was finished, or finished enough. Ellen's room was clean and neat and the
closet and dresser were empty. Really cleaning the rest of the house could be a joint venture or my own part-time project for a while. I set the alarm clock for eight and hit the sack.

  Eight came, then nine. Ten arrived with no Ellen. It didn't really matter, since I'd made no plans for the day, but I was beginning to wonder if she'd had second thoughts about the deal. I spent the time cleaning the house on general principles and had managed to fill all three trash cans with odd items by noon.

  I had just swung two of the big plastic trash cans on my shoulders and was heading for the curb with them when the green Chevy turned into my driveway.

  'Great,' I thought. 'Her first daylight sight of me and I'm hauling garbage.'

  Ellen stepped out of the car and asked if the other trash can was ready to go.

  "I'll get it...” I said, but before I could say anything more, Ellen reached for the trash can. She tugged it up once to check the weight, then slung it on her shoulder as I had and carried it easily to the curb.

  "You're a strong lady,” I said. “I like that."

  Her face flickered slightly with concern. “Is it unusual for a woman to display strength here?"

  I shrugged and said, “I don't see it often, but it happens. The image they try to sell most is 'soft and pretty', but please don't change to suit the advertising world. I like you just fine as 'strong and beautiful'."

  She flicked her eyebrows up at me with a grin and asked, “Have you changed your mind since last night, or am I still renting a room?"

  "I cleaned and prepped into the wee hours, ma'am. I was hoping you hadn't changed your mind about moving in. Would have been a lot of work for nothing."

  She was wearing blue jeans, sneakers, and a western-style shirt. Or was it a blouse because the buttons were right-over-left? Her eyes caught mine looking her over and she grinned again.

  "I thought you might be in a cleaning frenzy, so I dressed for helping."

  "A frenzy? Me? Did the house look that bad last night, or are you just a very good judge of people?"

  "I'm a good judge of people, of course. If the house had been too dirty I wouldn't have rented the room."

  I nodded. “Good save, there. I'll try not to inadvertently corner you like that again. You know, you look damned wonderful by daylight, too. That must be why I'm chattering like this. It's because I don't have a tail to wag."

  Ellen laughed and took my arm to lead me to the car. Gary had been unloading her luggage and had all but two small bags out of the back seat. Ellen picked those bags up and one of the larger ones and Gary and I brought the others as we followed her into the house.

  I offered them refreshments and showed them around the house a bit, then Gary said he had to be elsewhere in a little while and excused himself. As he pulled away, I asked Ellen how she intended to get around town.

  "No car?"

  "No car yet, Ed. If you're ready to begin being my escort and guide, we can do something about that as soon as I have a driver's license."

  "They're going to want some kind of ID before they issue you more ID, Ellen."

  She went to her purse and pulled out an envelope. “Will these do?"

  I looked through several documents that included a birth certificate from Iowa for an ‘Ellen McMasters’ and a Social Security card.

  "No idea if they'll do or not, Ellen. Where'd you get them?"

  "One of our people put them together. He seemed to think they'd be good enough for my needs."

  I wrote down the name and Social Security number.

  "What are you doing?” she asked.

  "I'll run a global search on these bits of info and see what comes back,” I said, turning on the computer. “If I can't turn up anything that doesn't necessarily mean the government types can't, but it would be a good sign if the name and birth certificate could withstand a deep genealogy search."

  Ellen looked a bit pensive as I entered the name and other info into a temporary-text file so I could copy and paste as needed. I opened three separate browser windows for the three main genealogy search engines and entered the name, then opened a global search engine page and entered all but the first three digits of the Social Security number.

  I handed her the paper I'd written the info on and closed the temp-text window without saving the info. The text program I'd used was an antique from the early days of PC-DOS computing. It opened and closed its own temporary files in its own subdirectory (nowadays euphemistically called a ‘folder') rather than using the ‘TEMP’ directory as today's programs almost universally do.

  When the session was over I could rename the temporary-text file and save the info. The program would make a new temp file when it didn't find the old one, but as far as Ellen could know (I hoped) the info file was gone, overwritten in the usual method by the next block of info pulled off the Internet.

  Half an hour later we abandoned the effort. The McMasters surname came up often, but there were no solid matches of names, dates, places, and other such details. The part of the Social Security number I'd entered came up on eleven credit-check sites, but none of the prefixes matched.

  "Well, ma'am,” I said, “Unless they look where we can't, I'd say that stuff'll probably get you a driver's license."

  In the reflection of the glass-front cabinet I saw Ellen watching me shut down the computer and unplug the modem to prevent thunderstorm damage. She glanced at the envelope in her hand and then put it back in her purse in silence.

  When I turned to face her, she quietly asked, “You don't have any difficulty with the idea of helping me with this?"

  "Help? I'm afraid I won't be much help. You're the one who has to test and sign for the license and you'll do it anyway, with or without me."

  "That doesn't answer my question."

  I sighed and sat down in the computer chair.

  "Why are you asking that question, Ellen? Why do you seem to need to know whether it bothers me that I'm helping you to get a fake ID? After handing me cash to rent a room for a few months, apparently to avoid signing in anywhere, why are you at all concerned with how I feel about all this?"

  She maintained her level gaze at me. “I just am,” she said.

  "Well, then, just be,” I said. “I have my reasons, and they don't add up to your rent money or your legs. I think you're beautiful, but that's not the reason I'm going along with your program, either."

  "Then why are you ... 'going along'?” she asked.

  "To see where it leads,” I said. “To see if you're real or not. You're an adventure of sorts at a time when I need one."

  She sat gazing at me, apparently waiting for more.

  "Ellen, you could be a pretty grifter who has simply come here to screw the locals out of some money, or you could be an international spook of some sort needing to be as near the ship as possible, or you could be a number of other things, including what you say you are; an alien setting up to monitor everybody."

  Ellen said nothing. She put her purse aside and settled back on the couch as if to listen to a story.

  I rattled off the info and Social Security number I'd written earlier and said, “If you ask me in twenty years, I'll be able to tell you that info. I don't forget stuff. If you're a grifter and you pull a scam, you'd better lose that ID instantly because I'll give the info to the cops. If you're a spook and you do something nefarious, the same thing happens. Prove you're what you say you are and everything's cool."

  "So we're back to getting you some proof?"

  "We never left that zone, ma'am. As much as I'd love to believe you're from that fancy ship out there, I need some proof. Otherwise, you're just a rather nice-looking woman who rented a room here. Could be you're a runaway wife or a wanna-be movie starlet who intends to pull a publicity stunt that will make her a name she can take to the bank later. Could be you and Gary are gonna try to rob a few banks. How the hell should I know?"

  A small smile formed on her lips. “We are definitely not bank robbers, Ed."

  "Kewl Beenz, El
len. Glad to hear it. We can rule out your being surf bums, too, because in this part of the gulf the surf is just about nonexistent."

  Motion beyond the open front door caught my attention. A car with one of those magnetic signs on the door pulled into the driveway of the empty house four doors up the block and a man and two women got out of it. The stocky woman who got out on the driver's side was wearing a bright red blazer. The man and other woman were in casual clothes.

  The Decker house had been empty for three months due to a messy divorce action. In those three months I'd seen only a few lookers checking out the property. It was in rough condition and the price was a bit high, yet here were a pair of shoppers the very morning after I'd checked in with control.

  "Ed?"

  I turned back to Ellen. “Hmm? Sorry, Ellen. I was just wondering how many screaming brats they'll add to the neighborhood. Sometimes I'd like to move way out in the country and dig a moat around a hundred acres or so."

  "You don't like children?"

  I noted that she hadn't asked if I had any of my own. Most people ask that, rather than if I like kids or not. They just assume that a man my age has spawned at some time. I looked for her opinions in her face and found none.

  "I prefer that they be in someone else's vicinity at all times."

  Her eyebrow raised at that and she nodded slightly as she leaned back on the couch. Bear jumped into her lap and wadded himself to fit and Ellen's hand moved to stroke him. I waited to see if she'd comment further, but she didn't.

  "Ellen, why did you and Gary pick me?"

  Both her eyebrows went up at that. “Could you be more specific?"

  "Sure I could, but why waste time going through the motions? Let's drop all the pretense. I just want to know how and why you decided to use me. You can't really have considered me the best candidate for an escort or landlord. I figure you were working from a list of some sort and location played a big part in choosing."

  Ellen said nothing as she looked at me. She hadn't quite frozen completely; her hand was still mechanically petting Bear.

  I reached over and tapped her watch with a fingernail. “Hey, Gary, how about ringing in on this? If I knew why you picked me I might be more useful."