"I am from the government," the German says, "and I am here to help." Eyes twinkling, knife-edge cheekbones gleaming, he scans our faces as if to make sure everyone gets the joke. From the laughter, I'd say he just outed a hundred Americans as heretics. If the White House gets wind of this, our careers are over.
"They took your guns," the German loves to remind us. "They took your freedom."
My head vibrates. That damned titanium stud clunking my tooth again. The only defense mechanism we can wear at all times is inside the mouth, he says. In time of peril, bite down on it. We don't believe the stuff he claims will happen next, but we of the titanium tongue stud now have a secret way to identify each other.
The German introduces new O.P. members, the first Native Americans to join our club. From Asia or India, people expect success, but from our indigenous people we expect indigence. All these tribes are segregated by choice on reservations, drinking and smoking away their government checks, voting with the 99 percent who just want what's rightfully coming to them, right? Well, we have a Chumash Indian who sells some kind of ore from the Rez to nuclear power companies, a Chippewa who makes outdoor wireless systems for utility and energy markets, and other Natives who are not only employed, but are employers. CEOs. A deaf Creek Indian tells us hard work, not his disability and minority status, got him to the top of a Climate Control Engineering company. Ha ha! He has us in stitches, that man. So does the Apache who supplies IT and logistics support to the Armed Forces.
"Nothing is impossible if you have the will to make it happen," the handsome Apache says. "If you really want something, you have to plan, act on your plan, and work hard to make it a reality." We laugh until we cry.
If these guys talk like this in public, they'll disappear. We're running scared. How does the German find us, and how many weeks in a row does he think we can get away with beer and pizza in the hidden underground of our favorite pub? The Other Place, better known as the O.P., dates back to the 20th Century, its plaster walls adorned with snapshots of political candidates who'd dined here, back when Americans voted in elections. Hidden in the cellar, the German has a montage of vintage advertisements aimed at voters, something people found so annoying, they agreed to make our Current Occupant (he whose very name makes us wince in shame) President for Life. No more ads, no more burden of casting a ballot. America--what a country!
With our beer, the German serves machinima videos, aka his "fictional" time-travel documentaries. We don't know what his time machine looks like or how it works, and neither does he, it seems. If I had a time machine, I'd find Hitler, kill him, and hurry home--but then I might not exist. Quantum complications mean the German can only save people who already died in real time. His animated videos show a mad scientist who travels to WWII Europe and rescues blue-eyed blondes from buildings about to be bombed, plus some Jewish kids from gas chambers. He's always in a life or death hurry, always wishing he could save more people, but he can only take so many at a time. Off to the 17th Century they go, to a cliff dwelling in the Rockies, where children salvaged from an ill-fated past are raised to adulthood. Legions of them will be zapped into a future of skyscrapers, electric cars, ration cards for toilet paper and bread, and students in olive drab, pledging allegiance to a flag where the stars have been replaced by the face of our Current Occupant for Life.
The mathematics of it eludes me. My business is ethanol production, not the physics of time travel or the art of war. By myself, I have no way to topple a regime.
Today the German shows us scenes from a future Ice Age. "It's the big one!" he says, arms spreading, voice trembling with energy. "Bigger than the one thirteen thousand years ago, and coming soon to a theater near you." Pausing, he seems to deflate a little. "Ach, the numbers. I could save the world if the numbers would line up for me." His body re-inflates, arms rising, eyes shining. "No matter! When the big wind blows, you know where to turn."
"Not the government!" we say in unison.
We leave in pairs or small groups, to avoid suspicion, through a tunnel system that used to be part of a brewery. We're all orphaned, single and childless, all ready to start over again in a new world if this one can't be saved.
The handsome Apache falls into step with me. Our cell phones light a path on the old brick floor, past doors that no longer open. I hug my arms, shivering in the damp, dark underground until we find the door that leads into a busy food court in the mall.
We walk together through the revolving glass doors to the sidewalk. A crowd has gathered around the giant vid screen that feeds us updates from the White House. Instead of the usual photos of the Occupant's latest family vacation or cocktail party with celebrities, or his wife's reminders to conserve energy, eat less and walk more, we see an Orange Alert. A man's face emerges on the screen. Those knife-edge cheekbones. The twinkling eyes. He looks more fit and fierce than the Russian dictator who's poised to relieve us of our own inept Current Occupant for Life. Trouble is, the Russian would take away more than our guns. The 99 percent worship him.
I grab the Apache's arm. The German walks past us, right there on the sidewalk, in his trademark greenish-brown suit with elbow patches, gold wire glasses and hat, his curved wooden cane tapping the cobblestones. On the street he's one of a thousand cute little old men who look underfed, now that Social Security is dead and food rations go to young women and children first. He tips his hat to us and hurries on.
Old? How did he trick us into imagining that?
"Treason!" the President reads from his teleprompter. "This mad man goes by various names and appears harmless, but we believe he is a master manipulator created by the Tea Party."
I manage not to share a smile with the Apache, nor turn my head toward the vanishing German.
"He wants to bleed America's resources, undermine our negotiations with Russia and destroy the World Union to come." The voice sounds hurt, like a little boy. "He spreads fear and loathing. His latest act of terror is a machinima video so terrifying, it's had seven million hits in the past hour. Pay no attention to these lies. The biggest threat we face is Global Warming, and only you can stop it. Personal sacrifice..."
Big, white flakes of snow drift down, down, in front of the vid screen and to the ground. Sheer coincidence, I'm sure. Screaming, the crowd scatters.
Three men in black leather, riding big high-tech motorcycles, glide to a stop on the bricks of the Ped Mall and face us. We pretend to be riveted to the White House news but my heart pounds so hard, they'll surely hear it with some electronic surveillance trick.
"O.P.," the tallest one shouts, pointing at me.
"Best pizza in town." I shrug, trying to look casual. All three men tromp the snowy sidewalk and tower over us.
"O.P.," the man hisses. "One Percent. We know what you really are. And you know...the German."
The Current Occupant's two-story-high face looms over us. "This is only a video!" he shouts. Instead of the usual flag in the background, the German's machinima plays unstoppably. Ha! Good for him. What nightmarish images. Like woolly mammoths suddenly frozen in ice, the Russian dictator and his jack-booted thugs halt in a march to the White House, their feet iced to the pavement. Citizens in olive drab petrify beside the cherry trees. A wild white wind swirls around the Capitol and turns it into a giant vanilla cone. Oddly, the shape reminds me of the Kremlin.
The Current Occupant looks away from his teleprompter. "Would somebody just shut the damn thing off already?" Blink, blink. "Well, try harder!"
A north wind gusts into the Ped Mall. In unison, the men in black turn from the vid screen and point their red laser-light guns at us.
"Freeze!" As if the irony of that command is beyond the men in black.
The end wasn't supposed to be so near. I'm not dressed for this. My coat of many pockets, my hiking boots, Oskar and Schindler, my cats--the German can't promise he'll able to send us our pets! We'll be lucky if we end up in exactly the time and place he programmed into these titanium studs. My employees--
The Apache squeezes my hand. Lean and brown, he feels solid as a mountain. Far-seeing and wise, like all those old Native photos, his eyes are calming. The press of his flesh against mine fortifies me.
"One more move, and we obliterate you!"
They won't. Not until they've tortured us for information.
The Apache knows me only as The Virginian. His steady gaze locks mine. "Aaron," he whispers.
"Ruth," I confess. Suddenly, I like my name. "Wherever you go, I shall go."
"To the new New World?"
The German's Promised Land, even though he can't make promises, but in him we trust. Not the government.
Aaron smiles, and I glimpse a flash of titanium. Hands tightly held together, we bite.
# # # #
NOTE: My second contest entry, "Comrade Cruises," brings The German back for more time-traveling and saving children.
