I was in love. You know how these things can happen. Once second I was walking out the door of my apartment’s lobby hallway into the under-ground garage and the next second my eyes were popping out of my head as this simply gorgeous creature walked in while I held the door for her.

“Thank- you.” she said to me.

“You’re welcome.” I somehow managed to reply.

I was in love. You know how these things can happen. Once second I was walking out the door of my apartment’s lobby hallway into the under-ground garage and the next second my eyes were popping out of my head as this simply gorgeous creature walked in while I held the door for her.

“Thank- you.” she said to me.

“You’re welcome.” I somehow managed to reply.

I made it down the rest of the stairs (all three of them) without tripping or falling and eventually came to, finding myself sitting in my car in the shared underground garage, my mind still trying to resolve the fact that there was a goddess living in the same apartme.... ‘condominium’ complex I was in. It was difficult for me to realize I didn’t even follow her across the lobby of our converted apartments to the elevator to see which floor she stopped at. Worse, I totally failed to note if she was wearing engagement or wedding bands.

Things like this just didn’t happen to me. I noticed everything, but was your typical loser when it came to relationships, so this opportunity came and went almost without notice other than the drool dripping from my lower lip and the one corner of my mouth. That and the tear which appeared as my subconscious reminded me that the likelihood of my ever having a date with someone like that was somewhere next to .... oh – maybe the next time someone on the moon saw the earth eclipse the sun, or maybe about a billion, billion to one. That didn’t mean I wouldn’t give it a try, mind you; it’s just that I was sadly prepared to take ‘no’ or mocking laughter as the likely answer – or both.

You might be asking, what’s so wrong with you that girls would turn you down flat without even a first date? Well .... do you really have time for my life’s story?

Actually, I’m really not all that bad. I have a great job, which I liked - probably a little too much as I spent upwards of seventy hours a week at it. I was paid well, enough so that I had my own light plane and had completed training and obtained my private pilot’s license. There was plenty of money so I could pretty much do or buy a lot of the things I wanted to use sometime during the thirty days vacation I was granted each year. Yeah, thirty days and nowhere to go which meant I had collected some obscene amount of vacation time over the last thirteen or fourteen years.

A few years ago they came up with the idea of a cap for the number of days we could save up. We had to turn in the excess and either collect it as cash or accept a small amount of stock in return. I think I had somewhere around three hundred eighty days, give or take, which I was forced to turn in. Other than that I was quiet, unobtrusive and about as interesting as a toadstool sitting next to a rock.

I liked girls though, I thought they looked really great and they always seemed to be so.... happy, gregarious, fun loving. The sound of a girl’s voice rang on my ears like the chime of fine crystal. Their perfume lifted me to heights my small plane had never thought possible and just having one nearby was delirium. If, by chance, she was actually talking to me, it was almost euphoria.

Talking to me .... Yeah, that was where I fell flat on my face. Something seemed to lock up inside me whenever I tried to talk with a girl.

One of the following days that week, as I walked across the underground garage to my car, I was wondering to myself which of these cars was likely to be hers. I began taking bets with myself concerning those which I felt were most likely. My car, like my plane, reflected the fact I had money to burn even if I had no one for whom I could burn it, so too I figured her car would somehow be a reflection of her.

It was another fine summer day’s evening and the hard top of my Tesla Roadster was off so I could enjoy the weather. I liked showing off that I was extremely ECO-friendly but didn’t like the low performance capacity of most of the electric vehicles available, thus – this roadster. With all the bells and whistles plus the highspeed chargers both here and at work I had close to a hundred and seventy grand invested in it. The two hundred mile plus range was available to me nearly all the time. About the only thing I missed was the car’s inability to lay rubber due to it’s amazing traction control system. Pick up? It had that in spades.

I pulled up to the street and waited for a spot into which I could insert myself. It didn’t take long, despite the traffic. Soon I was whooshing down the freeway at seventy miles per hour with the best of them. Thirty minutes later I was at work. Okay, so I lied.... I missed the throaty sound of a gasoline engine almost as much as the squeal of the tires on the road during a jackrabbit start. It was nearly time to once again find myself another sucker to go head on head for pink slips again. In a quarter mile beating this car was almost impossible for most gasoline cars in or even near it’s class. And there were a lot of them out there that couldn’t ever measure up to it in a quarter mile. How’s 3.7 seconds, zero to sixty sound? Not bad for a car which supposedly is only about a hundred and seventy horsepower? There’s a lot more to an engine than simply horsepower. That was simply a poor way of expressing torque for a reciprocating gasoline engine. Look at the Wankel. It had a much higher torque to horsepower ratio than reciprocating engines.

I managed to hold my own in a freeway rush with a Maserati a couple of months back but that was because he was more interested in trying to figure out why my car didn’t go vroohm, vroohm than he was in playing ‘my car can outperform your car from a standing stop’. I was just as glad, since once he gave up trying to figure it out he was long gone despite my acceleration curve. By the time we had gone another mile he was so far ahead I contemplated going for my plane in order to catch up. Still, in general, my car was no slouch, it just had a governor which held it under a hundred and twenty-five.

After my little encounter with my Goddess of choice, work the rest of my day was a little anticlimactic for me. I couldn’t get her out of my mind. She had to be fairly new to the complex since I had been there a couple of years and didn’t remember seeing her before. By the time I realized the end of the day had rolled around, it was a couple of hours past quitting time. That meant I had missed my golden opportunity to see her again when everyone was arriving back from work in the garage below our apartments - sorry, condos. I keep forgetting we own our apartments - condos. I’ll get that all straight in a year or two.

I locked my stuff up in the desk and in the small safe the company had installed for my use whenever I was working on classified crap, then hurried down to my car discovering I had forgotten to plug it in. No biggie. That simply meant my range was down to around two hundred miles instead of two forty. I drove home and made certain I plugged it in, setting it for a normal charge rate rather than rapid. In less than four hours or so it would be fully charged again. Entering the hallway which led to the lobby I hoped against hope that she would magically appear somewhere along my path but ~ no such luck. In fact, I wouldn’t see her again for nearly two months.

When I did see her again it was during a near collision at the door of the elevator shortly after eleven at night. I was exiting into the lobby as she was attempting to enter the elevator.

“Oops. Sorry. Are you okay?”

“Yes. Thank-you.”

“We’ve got to stop meeting this way, you know.”

“Pardon me?”

“The last time we met?... A couple of months ago?... Near collision at the door leading to the garage?”

She looked puzzled for a moment, “Oh. Yes, I remember. You held the door for me.” Then she did a double take, “Where are you going at eleven o’clock at night?”

“To work.”

We moved out of the doorway of the elevator which promptly closed and the elevator began to rise, having been commanded for an appearance at some other floor during the continuation of our conversation.

“Work? You work at eleven at night? Are you a janitor or night watchman of some kind?”

I laughed, “No. I just pretty much work all sorts of hours. I guess I don’t have much of a life.”

She laughed at that, “I suppose you don’t if you work ‘all sorts of hours’.” she fingered the quote. “What sort of work do you do?”

I noticed there were no rings on her fingers; at least not on the one that mattered.

“I write software. I’ve written code for some games in the past but now much of what I do is business or protection software.”

“Protection software? You mean like antivirus and stuff like that?”

“Uh, stuff like that should cover it. Pretty cut and dried. Stuff that can be used by both businesses and governments. Even wrote some code once to handle election day poll projections for a major network. A lot of my stuff is sold in Europe as well. What sort of work do you do, if you don’t mind me asking.”

“Nothing so interesting, I’m afraid. I’m a Paralegal specializing in Scientific processes and Technology.”

“Cutting edge stuff, huh?”

“Sometimes. Most of the time it’s quite dry. Well, nice to have chatted with you. I’d better let you go and get to work.”

“Not a problem. I enjoyed the diversion. Thanks.”

She smiled back at me as she walked over to the elevator, pressing the call button. The doors opened right away since the person who had called it while we were talking came down to the lobby to get out then the doors closed but the elevator hadn’t gone anywhere.

As she entered it turning to push the button for her floor she said, “Good night.”

“Good Night. Maybe I’ll see you later on.”

“Perhaps you will.” she replied as the doors were closing, cutting off anything else she might have said.

I walked out to my car and was halfway to work when I remembered that I had forgotten to ask her for her name or for a phone number, nor had I watched to see at which floor the elevator stopped. See. I told you my mind locks up when I’m around a girl.... especially a pretty one.

At work I got really wrapped up in what I was doing and didn’t stop going until it was nearly quitting time for the day shift, having put in close to seventeen hours straight. At least I had written a lot of code and it seemed pretty clean from the debug and the tests I had run on it. The big reveal would be if it needed any rewrite to fit in with the stuff everyone else was producing for this project. A humdrum approach to something for someone who needed it but didn’t want to spend the money for a specialized exotic, fast and wicked piece of software. I hadn’t figured out why they didn’t just buy something off the shelf since that basically was all they wanted the software to do. They could have gotten something fairly good for six or seven thou instead of spending closer to a hundred sixty for us to write it for them. Maybe they wanted their name incorporated in it or didn’t want to buy ten million licenses for all the computers they intended to use it on.

I wasn’t looking forward to the rewrite which was more likely to occur than not. It always happened when more than one or two people were producing code for a project and that was why code began to become cumbersome and slow in general. Due to slight differences in the way people write their code it became necessary to add wait-states or subroutines which then slowed the whole process and each of them would have their own subroutines instead of sharing them. The way I had my portion written it was blistering fast but that was only when it was dealing with crunching within it’s own self contained data slots. That wouldn’t hold up the moment I needed to transfer data from or to someone else’s code. At least I had made most of my transfer protocols semi-transparent so they could be integrated with others in an almost fluid manner. God help us if someone wrote their code in the same way and the two interacted like long lost friends. We would then have something on our hands that almost defied time. Yeah, and that was about as likely as having an eclipse every day for a week.

I stashed my stuff in my lockup and went down to my car. On the way home I picked up some Chinese. When I arrived at the garage and slipped into my parking place it was less than a minute later when a nice clean blood red Honda Accord also pulled in headed for a spot further down the garage. It drove past my parking slot as I was dragging my charging cord to my car. Suddenly it stopped with a squeak on the slick concrete of the floor, reversed and came back. I glanced up to discover it was my Goddess home from work, I suppose.

“So, that’s your car?” she said as she looked at the umbilical cord I was about to plug into it.

“Yep. All mine and all paid for.”

“Is that an electric car?”

“Yeah.” I held up the charging cord which led to the special wall mounted charger. I held it so she could see into the business end of the plug.

“Thirty minutes or so from now it’ll be fully charged again.”

“Do you mind if I look at it? Here, let me go park and I’ll be right back.”

Do I mind?

“Be my guest.”

While she was parking, I connected the umbilical and watched as the charging lights in the hatch changed color to indicate charge had commenced. The wall mounted charging pack began to make a light humming noise so I knew it was working.

I noticed she drove down eight or nine spots before parking and was back in a minute or so just about the time I was wondering if she was going to skip out since my space was on the opposite side of the doorway to the lobby.

“Do you have a top for it?”

“Yeah. But during the summer I seldom use it.”

“How long have you had it? What do you think of it?”

“Nearly fifteen months. I like it. It’s great for city traffic. Has plenty of get up and go so I can use the freeways. The only problem I have with it is the extremely limited range which is around two forty. Of course, if I’m going somewhere a fair distance away then I usually leave my car at the airport, take the plane then rent a car for use wherever I happen to be.”

“How do you equate the miles-per-gallon of a gas car to this?”

“That’s a tough one. I find it to be easier to think of it as miles per dollar. Gas cars can go distances I can’t begin to approach which sometimes bugs the hell out of me. That’s because they can refuel and I’m stuck refueling here or at work. The gas cars can refuel in about ten minutes where I need closer to an hour and a half. Their range is greater on a tank of fuel but in general they need to pay around forty-five to sixty dollars to go about three to four hundred miles. I can fill my battery from dead to full for between eight to ten dollars and for that I get over two hundred forty miles range at speeds up to a hundred twenty. Four hundred miles at, say, fifty dollars works out to be around eight miles per dollar. It’s even worse if the price of gas is higher. My two hundred forty miles at about nine dollars works out to be about twenty-seven miles per dollar. Even those hybrid cars are more expensive to operate, although they have greater range than mine. The claims for some of them are over forty miles per gallon which still works out to four hundred miles for about three and three-quarters dollars a gallon or close to forty dollars. That means they’re getting around ten to twelve miles per dollar. Better than those that are straight liquid fuel but still not as good as my straight electric. So just considering the fuel, my car is about a third to a half as expensive to operate but I can’t just go and go and go. I come out even better if we begin to consider performance and maintenance.”

“May I get in?”

“Be my guest.” I also tend to repeat myself a lot when I’m talking to a girl. That’s part of what usually turns them off.

“You said ‘just considering the fuel’, what about those maintenance costs?”

“There are a lot of things to consider there, actually. Reciprocating engines require a lot more maintenance than electric motors and it’s much more expensive. They also require oil and a change of same about every three thousand miles to keep the engine in working order. My electric motor can easily go for more than twenty thousand before it should be checked and even then it’s likely to need nothing more expense than a light cleaning; maybe a little lubrication for the bearings. My maintenance costs are low, at least for the first seven years or so. At that point the price of a replacement set of batteries will bring it at least halfway back toward the costs of operating a liquid fueled car. By then battery technology will also have improved markedly. Newer batteries just coming available are already able to bring the range up by nearly forty percent or another hundred miles in the case of my car. The batteries are becoming smaller and lighter as well as less expensive all at the same time even though the technology is switching to battery designs which are more expensive to produce; hooray for mass manufacturing, that brings the costs back down.

Then too, there are microturbine generators which are very fuel efficient and can power an electric car such as this one. That presently produces something like twenty-five miles per dollar which still beats the other liquid fueled vehicles but puts me right back into equal footing with their range characteristics. Then there is general wear and tear - like brake pads for instance. Braking is mostly dynamic on my vehicle which helps to recharge the battery and reduces wear on the pads. There are a lot of little things... the extra weight of the transmission and drive train is missing in this car, although the battery makes up for a lot of that. It all adds up but the big kicker is still the fuel and maintenance costs. Everyone screams about transferring the green house costs from the vehicle to the power plant but just think about this. All these companies are in business to make a profit so they have taken the efficiencies into account in those profits. That means that miles per dollar is still the best way to look at it and that tells us that electric, despite what anyone wants to say, is the most efficient fuel-wise and green-house wise when compared to a reciprocating engine in a vehicle.”

She was sitting in the driver’s seat having tossed her purse onto the passenger seat. She stopped asking questions and just sat there for a few minutes looking at everything before she once again began asking more questions. I wound up giving her a quick tour of the controls without turning anything on. I noted just about the time she was going to get out that the top-off charge on my car had completed so I tossed her the keys, “give me a minute to disconnect the charger and then we can go for a little spin.”

She smiled like I had just given a her a Christmas present.

After stowing the power umbilical, I moved her purse behind the seat and climbed into the passenger slot. I had her insert the key and turn it to the ‘on’ position, then began to explain everything to her again, this time with the electronics lit up.

“Be careful, the response of the vehicle is quite different than that of a gas powered car. It’s also capable of much faster pickup from a standing start. Until you’re used to it, go lightly on the pedals. Another thing you’ll notice, there is both regenerative braking and that which is found in liquid fueled vehicles. The regenerative will slow you down more gradually while charging the battery I suppose, I’ve never been quite clear on that. Why don’t we head on out to the freeway and drive on it for a bit?”

She waited for a much larger opening than those which I usually selected. She nearly crossed the street in her haste to pull into traffic, surprised by the fast response. She didn’t do too badly once we accessed the freeway, except she accelerated until she reached nearly ninety before she realized it. She quickly dropped back down to sixty five and then up to seventy to pace traffic. The scarf she had tied around her hair fluttered a little but the windshield directed most of the buffeting pretty much away from us as we flowed with the evening going home traffic.

We drove out for about twenty minutes before getting off to access the freeway back into town again. She seemed to be enjoying it. About halfway back she pulled off the freeway again going into the parking lot for a small shopping center which included an Applebee’s. She pulled into a slot and shut down the car.

“I hope you don’t mind. I’m hungry and the food you have in those bags is likely quite cold by now.”

“I don’t mind. I’m just as hungry and this is a nice place. I do have one caveat however.”

Her smile vanished, “and what might that be?”

“I’m buying.”

The smile returned, “My – Sir Galahad.”

“No. Just hungry, Tony.”

“Well, just 'Hungry Tony’, I’m Stacy.” She held out her hand in a limp sort of way and I gently shook it, “pleased to meet you Stacy. Welcome to my home away from home.” I indicated the restaurant.

“So long as you offer good food.”

“If it doesn’t meet with your approval I’ll buy the place and fire the chef.” I joked.

“I don’t think they have a chef. Cooks are more likely at places like this.” she smiled, her eyes laughing back at me.

“That’s okay, I probably couldn’t afford to buy the place anyway.”

We went in and managed to be seated less than fifteen minutes later.

A bit over an hour and a half after that we had completed our meals, we even accepted a small dessert sampling then went back out to the car. I took the bags of Chinese out of the car before opening the passenger door for her. After she was seated I walked back to drop them into a trash receptacle. By the time I returned to get into the driver’s seat she had her scarf on her head again.

“It’s getting cold,” rubbing her arms, “do you have a heater?”

“Let me get you a blanket.” I pulled one out of the storage compartment. “This is probably better since the car is open to the elements just now," I added.

She covered with it before we headed back. It wasn’t too long before we were back in the garage and she waited while I connected the car to it’s charger then we went in to the lobby elevator together. Going up she got off on the fifth floor and I walked her to her door.

“This is a surprise.” I mentioned when we reached her apart.... uh, condo.

“What is?” she asked.

“I’m on the next floor in the same set of rooms.” I pointed up.

“Really?”

“Yep. Had I known an angel lived down here I would have accidentally gotten off at the wrong floor a long time ago.”

She gave me one of those smiles that tell you the woman thought you were full of baloney but appreciated the compliment non-the-less. Once again she offered her hand for me to gently shake.

“Thank you for dinner and the ride in your car.”

“You’re quite welcome. Maybe we could do it again some time.”

She cocked her head thoughtfully, “Perhaps.”

That seems to be one of her more favored operative words.

Opening her door she entered turning back to hold it slightly closed, “Good night, Tony.”

“Good night, Stacy. Thanks. I enjoyed the evening and the company.”

She smiled again and quietly closed the door.

Walking back to the elevator I pressed the call button and waited for it to show up from wherever it is elevators go when no one can find them. Riding up to the next floor before making my way down to my room. Well .... At least now I had her first name and her phone number even if she didn’t give it to me. All the house phones had their own outside number but they could also be called through the automated in house switchboard by dialing the room number. Any in-house phone could call any other by simply dialing the room number .... Unless .... maybe she used a cell phone. At least I could still call her room phone.

Again I didn’t see her around for a week or so. That was okay since I was pretty tied up at work during that time. We were in the throws of integrating our separate pieces of work and as I had expected, things weren’t coming together very well. At least my work needed the least adjustment but overall the changes dropped the performance factor by better than fifty percent. Upper management wasn’t happy so we were burning the midnight oil to fix the product. A couple of the routines looked like they had been written during either a drunk or while someone was high on something. One of them was given to yours truly for complete rewrite due back in one week. Lots of luck there, guys. It would take me a week just to figure out what that part of the package actually needed in order to fill the requirements given to us by the customer.

I finally finished it but it took me two weeks of eighteen hour days, not one and I wasn’t happy with my product. At least it integrated well with my other piece of work. Now we spent another week refining the whole thing as a composite package. The speed was back up. Not all the way but maybe seventy five to eighty percent. It wasn’t as good as it could have been but it beat the requirement so it was scheduled to go out the door.

During the integration phase I managed to add some of the driver calls which would allow it to work with a couple of the new processors which were slated to hit the market soon. That meant it wouldn’t be obsolete in two months but would continue to function on next year’s machines and maybe even those of the year following that. Score one for the good guys. I even managed to sneak in a forty-four pane active logo with sound that showed up whenever the software was initially run. A half drunk St. Bernard with it’s brandy cask a kilter, barking at a snow ski which was half sticking out of the snow marking the spot where you could see a skiers foot sticking out of the snow. I like to ski, what can I say?

With my latest contribution ready to go to press, I packed up my stuff and went home for the day. I arrived back at the garage and was plugging in my car when that Honda Accord went by headed out. I was about to say hi to Stacy but the person driving was a guy who didn’t look anything like her. I went in and actually bothered to check the tenant list for her room. The name listed wasn’t Stacy’s. Some guy named Rupert Something or other. What kind of name is Rupert? The glimpse I got of him looked like he might be a wide- end for a professional football team.

It looked like my Goddess moved during the last week or two. No .... that’s not right. The Honda was still here, so something funny was going on. Maybe she had been visiting and borrowed the car from him. Things weren’t making a whole lot of sense at the moment. Next chance I got I need to take a look at the car and the guy.

I went up to her floor then down to the room and knocked but after three or four tries there was still no answer. I finally went on up to my room then tried calling. I got an answering machine on the third ring, “You have reached the residence of Rupert Mobius. If you’re a bill collector, your check’s in the mail. If you’re a long lost relative asking for money, I don’t have any. If you’re giving money away, the check better be a ‘cashiers’ and drawn on an offshore bank. All others, leave your name and number at the beep.”

I hung up.

Things just weren’t adding up, or rather they were but I just didn’t know what the totals meant. It took me a few minutes to realize there had been some sort of music in the background of the message. My mind kept at it until I had to call the number again just to hear the music for those few seconds.

Again, I hung up.

This time I was certain the music had been intentionally added to the message. That was a little strange. The musical message was repeated several times in the background. I wracked my brain trying to come up with the source. I’d heard it before, “Follie! Follie! Delirio vano è questo!” Folly! All is folly! This is mad delirium!

I agreed even though I was uncertain exactly what this Rupert had intended when he added that to his welcoming message.
It was another three weeks before I saw Stacy again. I had just walked down to my car when she drove into the parking garage in that Red Honda which Rupert had been driving only a few days ago. I pulled back out of sight hoping she hadn’t seen me then once she was past I rushed back into the lobby and pressed the button for an elevator. It seemed to take forever but the doors finally opened and I was in and on my way up to her floor before she entered the lobby from the garage. Just for safety’s sake I pressed the button for my own floor so the elevator would continue on up to my floor before it would go back down should Stacy have summoned it.

Hurrying down the hall past Rupert’s room I finally found a niche in which to hide until Stacy came up to go to the room. I knew I could have been all wet and she might live in another apart.... er, condo entirely but somehow I didn’t think so. I was right. It was only a minute or so before the elevator stopped at this floor and she got out walking down to Rupert’s apartment door which she unlocked, entered and closed again. It was some fifteen minutes of soul-searching before I decided to knock on the door and confront them to see what was going on. Something wasn’t right here and I wanted to know what it was before I made an even worse fool of myself trying to pursue someone who might be involved with Rupert. It seemed entirely inconceivable to me that someone so slight and obviously caring as Stacy would have anything to do with someone like Rupert who seem rather boorish and obnoxious in the few encounters I had with him.
I knocked on the door and received no answer. I tried once more with the same result. Finally I pulled out my cell phone and called the complex number then dialed the room.

“You have reached the residence of Rupert Mobius. If you’re a bill collector, your check’s in the mail. If you’re a long lost relative asking for money, I don’t have any. If you’re giving money away, the check better be a ‘cashiers’ and drawn on an offshore bank. All others, leave your name and number at the beep.”

“Stacy. Come to the door. I know you’re in there, I saw you enter the room. If you don’t open the door and talk to me I’ll call the police and the two of you can answer to them. Rupert, if you’re in there, I don’t know what hold you have over Stacy but it’s going to stop right now. One of you better open your door in the next thirty seconds or the next knocking you hear will be the police.”

I hung up and prepared to call 9-1-1 but the door opened less than twenty seconds after I had hung up. Rupert was standing in the doorway. I pushed past him which surprised both him and myself as I rushed into the condo to find Stacy of whom there was no trace.

“Okay. What have you done with her?”

“Who?” he asked.

“Who? As if you don’t know. I saw Stacy enter this condo less than twenty minutes ago and she didn’t leave. Where is she?”

“You’re mistaken. There’s no Stacy living here.”

“She may not live here, but she has a key to the door. I have a video of her unlocking and opening it and there is a date-time stamp on the video. I sent it from my phone to my office computer and It will automatically be sent to the police if you don’t tell me where she is.”

He seemed to deflate when I told him about the video I had shot with my cell phone. It had enough definition that it was easy to make out Stacy using a key to get in and the video continued as I walked up to the door so the room number could be seen.

“It isn’t what it seems.”

“I hope not, because what it seems to me is that you are either blackmailing her or you just killed her. If you’re thinking about doing the same for me, I’d advise you to think again because in less than twenty minutes my office computer will send that video to the police unless I send the command to reset the time back to begin it's count at thirty minutes again.”

“She’s fine. She isn’t hurt.”

“Then let me see her for myself.”

“That’s a little difficult.”

“Uh, huh. Then I think the police will make it un-difficult.”

“No. That is please don’t. This can all be explained.”

He seemed genuinely afraid whenever I mentioned the police.

“Then let me see Stacy and hear it from her own lips.”

Rupert sighed and thought about something for a few moments.

“You really care about her, don’t you?”

“What do you care? What’s your relationship with her anyway?”

“We... We’re sort of... brother and sister.”

“Sort of? How can you be 'sort of' brother and sister. The two of you look nothing alike. Tell me another bedtime story.”

“It’s true. We aren’t related by blood... exactly, but our lives are tied much as those of a brother and sister.”

“Well... brother, let me talk with your... sister and decide for myself that she’s okay.”

“I... okay. I’ll go tell her you’re here and want to see her.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“No. You won’t.”

For the first time he stood in my way and appeared ready to use force to stop me.

“I’ll go tell her. It might take a couple of minutes but she will come out to talk with you. I won’t stop her.”

“And you won’t touch her either.”

“I will bring no harm to her. All I shall do is tell her you want to talk with her. Wait here.”

“Why can’t I come in with you to see she’s all right? Afraid of something?”

“Wait. Here.” he said, looking more like a line-backer every second before he turned to walk back into the bedroom. I began to follow until I heard the door lock. Quickly I placed my ear to the door and could hear the last part, “...to see you. He’s waiting.”

It was nearly silent for perhaps four minutes then there was some strange sort of sounds before I heard the drawers of a dresser opening and closing. A minute or so after that Stacy opened the door. I glanced in but couldn’t see Rupert anywhere although I couldn’t see all parts of the room. She came out wearing a leotard which she apparently had quickly thrown on in her haste to come out to talk with me as I slipped into the room past her. She turned and walked back to me as I continued to hunt for a secret door which would have let him out and her in. The leotard wasn’t doing much to hide her figure.

“Tony, please. Please come and sit on the bed while I explain.”

She patted the bed next to her as she sat down on the end. I looked at her suspiciously. It would take some tall explaining to convince me of just about anything right now.

“Tony?” She had a plaintive appeal in her voice, once again patting the bed.

I grimaced then finally agreed, “okay. But put on some more clothes first. Okay?”

She went to the closet taking a wrap around skirt which more or less looked good with the leotard. I continued to ponder the impossibility of what was probably a two hundred pound six foot something guy turning into a maybe hundred- twenty pound five foot six or seven girl. Not going to happen. At least not with today’s physics.

She changed her mind pulling on a pair of shorts and a white blouse which she left untucked but which were over the leotard then she slipped on a pair of sandals before coming back to sit on the bed again. She was close enough that I could smell her scent, sort of strawberries I think. That was a far cry from the sweat soaked guy that had entered the room five minutes before she came out. And no, I didn’t find a secret door anywhere but there was that big trunk on the floor between the closet and the outside window.

“I want to see what’s in the trunk.”

“After I explain. All right? If I show you first, you won’t wait for my explanation and then I’ll have to move again. I like you Tony. You’re the first guy who’s treated me nicely and who hasn’t tried to get into my panties. I would like our relationship to continue and perhaps grow. May I please explain? In my own way?”

This was all beginning to sounding weirder and weirder but, “okay. No promises, but go ahead.”

“Thank you.” She reached out to touch my arm then realised what she was doing and quickly pulled it back, “Sorry.”

“Just explain. You’re making it sound like some sort of mystery.”

“Mystery. I suppose it is, in a way. Maybe more like a conspiracy. All right. I need to explain in my own way and at my own pace so please don’t get up and leave until I’ve finished and shown you the proof.”

“Fine. Explain and prove away.”

She took a deep breath and let it out. Her face was in a turmoil and it was about half a minute before she began to talk.

“My family came over to the United States during the second or third wave of colonization. We were outcasts from England but had been nobility so even though we were sent away the family was given a land grant here in the States which was quite generous. When that first generation died the land was split into three parts and given to the three sons. They in turn willed their properties down semi-intact through the years until one of those properties reached me... me.”
I began to ask a question but she placed one of her manicured fingers against my mouth, just below my nose.

“You said I could explain this my own way. No questions until I’ve finished.”

I wasn’t happy and she could see it in my face but I nodded my head acceeding once again to our ‘agreement’ which was mostly her agreement. At any rate I nodded my head for her to continue.

“A few years after receiving the property, there was an earthquake up toward the Northwestern end which opened up a small canyon. I – Rupert went to investigate to see what sort of damage had occurred and found something astounding. It was badly damaged having apparently crashed into the earth, burying itself. Now, however, it was sticking part way out of one of the walls of that mostly new canyon. The canyon had been there a while but before the earthquake it was just a depression in the land, hardly noticeable almost like some rolling hills and it was simply the low portion.

Throughout the following year I, that is, Rupert worked at digging his way down to that object reasoning from the angle of the visible portion that the part that was buried furthest into the hillside was probably the area where the greatest damage would have occurred and the object might be capable of being entered from that lower portion which was still buried. He was right and was eventually able to gain access to the craft. The interior was severely damaged where it had hit the earth but it was mostly intact, otherwise. Seeing the interior bought more questions than answers. During the next year he enlarged the tunnel he had created so he could use an all-terrain vehicle and small trailer to help him move some things from the craft up to his home where he could study them. Some of those things are what are in that trunk you see sitting over there. ”

I began to get up to go over to the trunk.

“No. Not yet. I’ll get to that in a while.”

I sat back down, more curious now than upset.

“The things he brought out were – strange, to say the least. Of course the craft itself was strange, a time capsule of sorts. A bit like those things people bury in cornerstones of buildings or schools do as a project so the things we take for granted today will be preserved as reminders of history a hundred years from now. Again, more questions than answers presented themselves.

He finally sent a few small items to a lab for analysis but not before he carefully took most of the items away and secured them in several storage lockers a number of states away. The number of lockers wasn’t necessary because of a large number of items but more to separate them so should one of them be discovered, the others would still be safe. He also obtained a locker here in town where a few additional items were placed just so there was something to be found nearby if it became necessary. That proved to be a wise precaution. The lab tested the dirt, the pieces of metal, and the artifacts he had sent to them in his effort to determine the era that represented the find. It wasn’t terribly conclusive but prompted an inspection of the crash site, which led to government intervention and eventual confiscation of the property and the find. The cover story was that Rupert had ‘donated’ the land to the Federal government for use as a ‘National Park’. However, since there was proven earthquake damage and that cleft in the earth could expand or change with another quake it was deemed to be too dangerous an area to be opened to the public and so it continued to sit ‘in the public trust’. Rupert was never given a penny for his property.

It wasn’t long at all before that 700 acre ‘park’ was fenced and the region surrounding the canyon beame heavily patrolled, the area was now classified as a ‘secret’ military reservation. The craft was too large to be transported and it’s metals too strong for our cutting tools so the cliff on each side was brought down to fill that portion of the canyon then more dirt was trucked in and dumped so the visible portion of the craft was again covered from view. Rupert was forced to sign a number of secrecy documents or immediately face a very long prison term, essentially indefinite.

The government agents found the storage unit in town, of course, which Rupert pretty much expected would happen. Two of the others were also located. Only some strange pieces of metal which might be coins and that chest and it’s contents were what remained successfully hidden.

What Rupert hid inside that chest were ten pairs of matched costumes, if you will, plus two unpaired – costumes. Those, along with a couple of devices and a battery were then taken and hidden from prying eyes. Each pair of costumes was slightly different than any of the others and they presumably were crafted for each of the occupants of the craft. Yes, there had been occupants. The evidence that three had remained in the craft was only partially conclusive so if there were others who survived they must have departed somehow or escaped onto the surface of that time. The outlines of the skeletons in the craft were – different. Still bipedal, like us, but proportioned quite differently. They crashed here a long, long time ago. Carbon dating of the surrounding materials indicated a sedimentary buildup around the craft showed the crash probably occurred back some one hundred and ten thousand years. That could be suspect since the craft did crash and likely buried itself that deep but it had to have been sufficiently long ago, perhaps thousands of years, that the land could recover from the scar of the crash such that no one could detect it, nor anyone living in the area might remember any hint of a meteor or other impact at any time in the recorded past. The ‘remains’ of the bodies tested inconclusively at ninety thousand years. Of course, carbon dating came into question later on and the original remains were no longer available for such testing so the samples which Rupert had 'stored' were even questionable concerning contaminationm, which would cloud any results.

With a lot of difficulty, Rupert tracked down a few legends found among the Indian tribes that held a connection to the deep past within that area which hinted at ‘moon-walkers’ who had come down to travel among men. Those moon-walkers had come around to the tribes some many tens of thousands of moons ago. Perhaps they were searching for the lost craft, we’ll never know for certain.”

She seemed to suddenly go off on a tangent, “Tony? Why haven’t you ever tried to have sex with me?”

That took me by surprise. I blushed and tried to cover it as I stammered a bit. I always do that when I’m flustered.

“Would you do it now? Would you allow me that pleasure before I finish explaining?”

“I .... It isn’t ....”

“Yes. It is. Except I will insist on your using a prophylactic.”

Suffice to say I was wholly unprepared for this development but accepted and during the next couple of hours things were – pretty interesting.

I woke up to find her cuddled across me. The warmth and scent of her body following sex, heady in my nostrils and against my flesh. She was quite a woman.

“Stacy, would you....”

She put her finger on my lips again, indicating silence.

“Are you convinced I’m a woman?”

“Without a doubt.”

“What if I were to tell you, this is all simply technology? Technology none of us understands nor which we able to duplicate but technology non-the-less.”

Technology? “I don’t understand. What technology?”

“This.” she pointed at herself.

I smirked at her, “uh huh. You’re trying to tell me you’re some kind of a robot?”

“No. But there are things which advanced technology can do that we, as yet, have no hope of duplicating. Stay here, I’m going to get a couple of things out of the trunk. I want your opinion of them before we talk much more.”

Now she had me more than curious so I readily agreed. She opened it, picked out four objects and brought them back to the bed after closing the trunk again.

“Don’t touch those. I’ll be right back.”

Again she crossed the room, this time to a closet where she lifted out a small television of some sort. It was then that I noticed all the dials and things finally recognizing it to be an oscilloscope similar to the ones I had seen a lot of the tech guys using. Curiosity was beginning to get to me as she set it up, plugging it in to warm it up while she came back to continue her explanation. Picking up one of the items she began to explain again.

“This is a battery, of sorts. It’s unlike any battery we make here on Earth. Batteries we make here are DC or direct current...”

I interrupted, “yeah. I’m familiar with the difference between batteries and the power we use in our houses; AC or alternating current.”

“That’s right.” She picked up another device.

“This is a flashlight. It’s a very special kind of flashlight as you will see in a moment. Notice the connection on the end here? This is where the – battery connects. It goes on like this.” She screwed the two together, showing me how it worked as she took it apart again then reconnected the two before turning toward the wall leading to the condo next door.

“Watch.”

She turned on the flashlight and just like any other it lit up the wall. Unlike any other I was accustomed to, it was quite bright and the beam didn’t have that ‘spot’ effect with a bright center dimming as you got further away from the middle of the beam of light. It was nearly evenly illuminated across the entire field. Even I was smart enough to know that meant the optics involved had to be pretty damn good, and pretty damn expensive too.

I watched as she began to fiddle with some sort of dials on the flashlight and a few seconds later the wall dissolved. Well, I guess it didn’t dissolve so much as we were looking through it into the room next door. That stunned me enough that it took me a few seconds before I tried to understand what was happening. She adjusted the flashlight again and we were looking past the condo next door and into the one owned by old Mrs. Peele. She was sitting there watching one of the soaps which were so prolific these days on her color TV. I had no idea she had one of those big screen LCD or LED or whatever things, it didn’t quite fit in with the reputation she had for being a little more, uh, archaic? That was when I suddenly realised that we were hearing and not just seeing these things. Suddenly spying took on a whole new meaning for me.

Stacy shut off the ‘flashlight,’ disconnecting the battery again. Now she picked up another of the things from the bed and connected the battery to it. Again it had dials and she began to mess with them until she found a radio station then she let me listen to it for a few seconds before turning down the volume.

“How did that sound?”

“What do you mean?” I couldn’t think. “It sounded like a radio station.”

“Of course but where are the speakers and how were we hearing the sound in such great fidelity?”

Now that she mentioned it, where were the speakers? For that matter, all the little receivers I was used to had this ‘tinny’ sound. Yeah, you would hear the notes but it wasn’t like you were somewhere listening to an orchestra. This, though, sounded different... almost like we were there.

Stacy fiddled with the dials once again until images began to flicker through the air as she swept past different Television stations.

“PBS.” She said when she stopped at an orchestral selection. Again the sound was pretty much like you would expect if you were in the room or area where the action was occurring. Of course it couldn’t be better than what had been recorded or was being transmitted, but it was a lot better than most television sets, even those home theater things. The only problem I could see other than the sound was the lack of a screen. Oh, there was an image all right and it was flat since that was the way it was being transmitted but it just – hung in the air of the room.

She shut it off and again disconnected the battery. By now, I was pretty impressed. The TV- radio thing could have been something recent in inventions although the sound and picture were beyond anything I figured we could come up with as yet as well as the size of the receiver. The flashlight... That was a whole different ball game. Going across to her normal Earth type flashlight, she pulled out a battery then took the two over to the oscilloscope setting them down next to it before she went back to the closet to get a small meter of some kind.

“This is a volt-ohm meter. Here look at the screen while I connect it across the battery from my flashlight.”

I did and when she held it across the case and the center button of the battery the screen read 1.443.

“Okay so what’s that supposed to prove?”

“That’s close to the voltage you would see from a normal 'D' battery like that, it’s the result of a chemical reaction. It should be just a little over 1.5 volts, but I’ve been using this one for a while so the battery is partially depleted.”

“So?”

“Now look at the battery I used to power those things.”

Again she connected the leads and this time the screen lit up and began fluctuating. It never stopped. It was like it couldn’t decide what voltage the battery was putting out. She adjusted the dials until the fluctuation displayed was a little more stable but it still didn’t hold still at just one voltage.

“Again, I ask, so? I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean.”

“Maybe if we look at them each on the oscilloscope.”

Again she connected the battery from her flashlight. The line across the bottom of the screen barely jumped up. It was enough that I could see a difference between connected and disconnected but that was all it meant to me. I looked at her in puzzlement.

“That’s what you see when a normal Earth type battery is connected to the scope. The jump from the bottom up toward the top indicates a DC source. An AC source would show up as a pattern ranging between the two extremes, top and bottom. The amount of rise of that displayed line indicate the voltage of the battery. Now watch when I connect this other ‘battery’.”

I didn’t miss her emphasis on the word ‘battery’.

When the leads were connected to the case and that center pin, the scope lit up with a pattern that kept changing. It didn’t escape me that nearly the whole screen was now involved not just some little barely noticable portion down near the bottom. I looked at her for an explanation.

“What you’re looking at is an AC signal. The output of that ‘battery’ is nearly forty seven volts as we measure voltage and there are more than a hundred-twenty different frequencies involved in that waveform. Some of them reach as high as the ultrasonic range or around sixty kilohertz.”

“Whatever that means. So, I take it that this battery is unusual?”

“Very. This isn’t some simple chemical process like the batteries we make here on Earth.”

“So why not take it apart to see what makes it tick?”

“I don’t want to do that until it’s no longer working. We might never be able to duplicate it so until it dies I don’t want to take the chance of permanently damaging it. The things it can power are too important for me at the moment.”

“All batteries run down sooner or later. Most of them don’t last more than a few years especially if they are in use.” I mentioned -- Mr. Knowledge over here.

“True, if we were dealing with a chemical battery. This battery’s output hasn’t changed appreciably in well over twenty years; since I first examined it with an oscilloscope. Prior to that, after the first four years I connected it to the flashlight and left it on for a year. The output was the same at the end of that year as it had been when it was first connected. Whatever this is using, it is unlikely to be a chemical process. Now watch the screen of the scope while I slip this μ-metal (she pronounced it Myou-metal) shield over the battery.”

“What does moo-metal do?”

“It’s μ-metal, and it redirects magnetism, in this case a small portion of the Earth’s magnetic field, around the battery rather than allowing it to continue going through it. Watch the scope.”

She slowly moved the tube of metal over the battery and I noted some of the lines reduced quite a bit so they were only about half as high as the others. I told her as I asked, “.... What the heck is that supposed to mean?”

“I believe part of what’s powering this battery is the Earth’s magnetic field. In essence this battery is using the Earth to create the output shown on the scope which powers these tools.”

“O-kkaaayyy. Let’s say I believe you for now. Why didn’t all of the lines drop down a little bit?”

“Because I think the Earth’s gravity is what’s causing the rest of those lines.”

“So why don’t you put some metal around it which will reduce the gravity and prove it?”

“At the moment, I’m not aware of anything which can do that appreciably. At least no where near as significantly as the μ-metal can affect magnetism. About all I’ve been able to determine is the lower frequencies are being generated by something which at the moment I believe is gravity and the higher frequencies shown on the scope are generated by the magnetic field. The interesting part is there are frequencies involved. I had always thought of the earth’s magnetic field as something static in a way, but this seems to indicate it is dynamic or constantly shifting. It might not go through a full polarity reversal like our AC current analogy but it does fluctuate. If the other lines are generated by gravity then it would seem that it does also.”

“Okkaayy.” I didn’t know what to think. I wasn’t into this techie stuff. I was a software type person and told her so, again.

“So if gravity is shifting all the time then why don’t scales show a weight change when we are on them? Or why aren’t we trying to float off part of the time?”

“I don’t know. I’m still trying to understand this. That isn’t the point. Are you able to accept that these devices are unlikely to have been invented here on Earth?”

I shrugged my shoulders, “I suppose.”

She sighed in exasperation.

“Let me get dressed then we need to take this last device out somewhere away from the city so you can see what it does.”

“Why not show me right here?”

“Because I don’t want to accidentally destroy the building. Damaging some dirt or a tree or two will get my point across without hurting anyone.”

“Uh, huh. I think I’ll pass on that one.”

“How else can I convince you of the extraterrestrial source of this stuff without showing you big whammy?”

“The big whammy? Why don’t you just go ahead with that part right here, because if that is a weapon, I’m sure as hell not going to let you get me out somewhere in the middle of nowhere so you can use it on me.”

“What? You think I’d... I wouldn’t... you don’t...”

She shut up and sat down on the bed as she started to cry.

Fuck. I may have been right in my fears but my method of presentation sucked. I went over sitting next to her putting my arm around her.

“Don’t touch me! How could you think I would do something so intimate with you and then turn right around and do something so... so... heinous? Here I am showing you stuff that leads up to my most important secret, I’m about to bare my soul to you and you... you... Get out. Get out, I never want to see you again.”

Well, I didn’t get out. I helped her stand up from the bed, wrapped my arms around her and held her while she cried. It took a minute or two for her to realise I hadn’t gone and we were standing there naked as jay-birds with me holding her. Of course my little companion downstairs was getting a bit testy during that time. I think it was him nudging against her that finally brought her around.

When we got up from bed the second time I suddenly remembered I hadn’t been wearing a condom this time around but didn’t feel this would be a very good time to mention it. Again, she seemed to have appreciated how much I tried to help her to feel as good as I knew I would. We were both basking in afterglow when I suggested a two-some shower.

“I’ll wash your back if you’ll wash mine.” I suggested.

She smiled and led me to the bathroom. By the way, don’t get this girl wound up because she slings a really wicked soapsuds filled towel. I guess the washrag wasn’t large enough to do the kind of damage she had in mind. At any rate, she can have a good time and I was just beginning to wonder what it would be like to spend the rest of my life with this live wire. As we were drying off she picked up the conversation right where she had left off.

“Without seeing the other device operate, can you accept that these things are unlikely to have been developed here on Earth? That they are some kind of advanced technology?”

Again I was guardedly non-committal.

“I’ll grant you that for the sake of argument. At least for the moment.”

She shook her head, “All right. I’ll accept that for now. Come on over to the chest with me. I want to show you something.”

She led me to the chest before she continued explaining.

“I told you there were ten pairs of costumes stored in here when they were first found. Now there are only nine. Due to stupidity one part of a set was lost forever and the second remains in permanent use and is no longer recoverable. I... Rupert – had two sons. They found the chest up in the attic one day and decided they would play a joke on some of their friends. The joke backfired, terribly. The two boys invited five of their buddies over to the house then they each put on one of the matching pairs of... costumes. They weren’t prepared for the changes those costumes would bring about nor for the reactions of their ‘friends’ when they went out to get assistance to remove the costumes. The two were repeatedly raped until one died. The other could not get out of ‘her’ costume presumably since she was now pregnant and would need to go through the entire gestation period and give birth before the costume would permit ‘her’ to exit it, if then. I’m still uncertain about that part, although some time after a birth it is possible to exit the costume.

As a result of the death and the pregnancy, Rupert no longer has two sons but instead now has... had two daughters. He moved the chest, securing it away somewhere safe, keeping it close so he could protect it, so that sort of thing couldn’t easily happen again. The one suit, costume remains unavailable since Melody opted to remain a female but different than she had been when she was pregnant. The other two suits were not a matched pair but each appeared to be half of what were two other sets. One male and one female.”

I must have looked very confused at this point but she opened the chest anyway and the first thing I saw in it was – her. Or rather, her skin.

“They skinned people?”

“No. These are all artificial.”

“They look real.”

“Yes, they do. If it’s any consolation my first thoughts were the same as yours. It was quite a few months before I learned differently. These are all some kind of technology.”

“So what are you trying to tell me?”

“Tony. What if I wasn’t the person you thought me to be? What if .... what if this woman with whom you just mated wasn’t a woman to begin with?”

“What? You mean you’re one of those transgendered people?”

She smiled, “I suppose that might be one explanation. Not wholly accurate but considering the wider meanings it could be one explanation. The difference is, I can get pregnant.”

“So you’re a woman.”

She sighed, “not exactly. Maybe you better sit down. You’re not taking to this explanation very well.”

I sat. “Okay. If you’re not transgendered and you’re not a woman, then what are you?”

“The name I was born with is Rupert.”

“Yeah. Right.”

“Sarcasm doesn’t become you, Tony.”

“Neither does being taken for a fool. No way you’re Rupert. At least not the Rupert I met here less than an hour ago. And not unless you are able to considerably change your height and weight in less than five minutes.”

“I can do both. And it’s because of this technology.”

“There you go with that technology stuff again. What technology?”

“This technology.”

She reached up behind her neck, under her hair and I heard a ‘snickt’ sound. Her body began to fill out and elongate as she continued to lift on her hair and the back of her head, drawing her head up and forward until it popped off another head which had been wearing it. Her body continued to – warp – until it was nearly eight inches taller and filled out in a way nearly no woman could possibly match. She continued to remove that outer wrap which was the Stacy I had come to know so intimately. I nearly lost my cookies right there. She continued to explain, her voice now dropping a couple of registers and beginning to sound more like that of Rupert whom I had met not too long before.

“I – I had sex with a guy?” I asked both in shock and in revulsion.

“No. You had sex with Stacy. Who was and is very much a woman.”

“But, you’re Stacy. I don’t know how, but you’re Stacy.”

“The body was pure Stacy. My mind was... a combination of the two. That is the technology I was talking about. If you need more proof I can give it to you but you would need to cooperate and try on one of these ‘costumes’.”

“As if that’ll ever happen.”

“Then I think we have nothing further to discuss, Tony. I think you better go. I need to pack and leave before you do something stupid.”

"Yeah. Like knock your block off.”

“Do you really think you can do that?”

I thought about that. He was taller than I was and probably outweighed me by fifty pounds all of which looked like pure muscle. I thought about it, “no, I guess not. I... Could I have a couple of days to think about this?”

“Take all the time you need; but I’ll be gone in less than an hour. I can’t afford the chance you’ll come to the wrong conclusions.”

“Such as.”

“Such as telling the Federal government that they didn’t get everything from that ship they confiscated.”

“Oh, yeah. The Ship. Was there ever really a ship?”

“Yes, there was and probably still is. Here you have seen just a few of the technological marvels which came from it.”

“Yeah. Right. I’m not stupid. We can’t manufacture that sort of thing.”

“True, we can’t. But someone or something, did. Just take the time to consider one thing, would you? If that ship was tens of thousands of years old and this technology existed in it, then what do you suppose they have for their technology now?”

My face suddenly felt cool. That was true enough. If this technology was something that could be discarded as unimportant enough to warrant not trying to recover it from the crash then what had replaced it? Worse yet, could this stuff be tracked? Probably not, but we couldn’t wait around to find out. Then another thought crossed my mind.
If this stuff was thousands of years old and could do this sort of thing which we had no hope of duplicating and it was unimportant to whomever it was, did we really want to meet up with them in a dark alley somewhere? Or with whatever government agency was working on this stuff trying to understand and possibly duplicate it?

“Stacy. We need to get this stuff packed and get the hell out of here in a hurry.”

Rupert smiled and pulled the ‘suit’ back up drawing the flopping head back over his own then resealing it before his body went through that ‘warping’ thing again in what I guessed took about thirty seconds. Stacy hurried over to retrieve the things she had been showing to me before placing them back into the trunk closing it before she headed for the closet to bring out some suitcases. She put them on the bed and began to carefully place some of her clothes into them.

“Stac, leave that stuff. I’ll buy you some new things. We don’t have time to waste. We’ll just grab the trunk and split for the airport. We can rent a car somewhere along the way after we ditch the plane and hide out until we think this out.”

She smiled and came over putting her arms around my neck before she planted a big one on my lips, her cute little body tight up against mine.

“Don’t you think we could cover our tracks a bit better if we looked like twins?”

“Twins? How the hell are you ever going to look like me? There’s no way I’m going to let you skin me so that technology stuff can make a copy.”

“You still don’t get it do you, you big lunk? The technology IS the suits. And I won’t look like you. You’ll look like this.” she pointed back as herself.

I think I must have turned ashen. I felt cold and then hot and she just laughed.

“Come on. I’ve always wanted a twin sister and now I can have one. For a while anyway. Just remember not to have sex with anyone. Or open the suit pretty damn quickly afterward so it will go through a reset.”

“But ....”

“No buts. Come on. It’s fast and mostly painless and I’ve got plenty of clothes for the both of us.”

“But how will I pilot the plane? My license is in my name not that of some girl.”

“Oh. That could be a problem if anyone checks. Okay. Maybe when we get to wherever? Just for a little while? It’ll be fun, I promise. And we can twin up on people.”

“You aren’t going to let go of this are you, Stacy?”

“Not on your life, Toni. And that’s spelled with an I not a Y. Ever since I started wearing some of these outfits I’ve wanted to be one of a pair of twin girls just to see how much fun we could have. You’re the first person whom I explained this to who didn’t run off to report me, walk out on me, or consider the men in the white coats. If you think I’m going to let you get away without a fight you’ve got another think coming. I’ve been alone far too long.”

“Okay. I get that. But do I have to be a girl?”

“Oh come on. Rupert did it. Are you a coward? You could try it on here in my condo just to see what it looks and feels like. You’ll have to change back though so we can go fly in your plane. I promise I won’t dress you like some tramp and once we’re both dressed in a similar manner I guarantee you’ll be surprised.”

“I’m already surprised. I just know I’m going to regret this. This’ll just be for a few minutes right?”

She assured me that once I had tried on the... costume and some of her clothes then she would help me change back.

“Besides, I kind of liked our little tryst and wouldn’t mind an encore or two or fifty.”

“Against my better judgement. Okay, what do I need to do?”

“Just take off every stitch of clothing you just began putting on and start pulling this on.” she pulled out the second skin which look like her.

“Be certain you get your toes and fingers into the correct places before you continue to put it on.”

I began to do what she said. A couple of minutes later I had the ‘suit’ pretty much on with the head flopping on my chest.

“I look ridiculous. Kind of like a thin Schwarzenegger like female impersonator.” It wasn’t a pretty picture.

“That will all change when you put on the head. You saw me do it.”

Yeah, I saw her do it but I still didn’t believe it. I sighed and started to stretch the head over mine. I couldn’t understand how this was supposed to work when I was huge compared to Stacy and this was supposed to be an identical twin of her. I got the head over mine and still felt ridiculous.

“So now what?” I asked muffled through the head/mask.

“I’ll close the back of the head this time and press the switch, but you’ll need to learn to do this for yourself.”

She pulled together the back of the head and I felt the strain across the mask front where it pressed against my face. I felt her push something just below the hairline on the back of my neck and there was this ‘snickt’ sound. Moments later I began to feel really weird. Kind of sick like I was going to throw up but not, and the feeling of the suit against me was going away. It felt like my bones were doing something strange at the same time as I could suddenly begin to see things moving slightly up all around me. Where I had felt the feet of the suit against mine I could now feel the carpet. My whole body felt, I don’t know, different? I had a bit of a headache so I reached up to rub my temples and encountered... hair? Oh yeah, the suit. My arm accidentally impacted one of the things which was now on my chest and I nearly fainted.

“Holy Shit that hurt.”

“Sorry. I should have warned you about that. Breasts can be a bit sensitive.”

“You think? Wait a minute. Breasts?”

I gently reached up to touch the two new attributes and discovered I didn’t feel the suit, I felt... I don’t know... me?
In a panic I moved toward the mirror but my balance was way off. My hips seemed to move in funny ways as well. More carefully now I moved to the mirror and stared before I half turned toward Stacy with my eyes wide and a little panic on my face.

“Stace? You mean it’s true?” That was about the time I realised my voice sounded like hers.

“Every word. Cool isn’t it?”

“Cool.” I repeated dumbly.

“Oh God. You’re not going to be some ditz are you? As a guy you were intelligent. I thought you would be as a girl, too.”

“Put it down to initial shock.”

“Come on, Sis. I’ve got everything you need in the other bedroom. I’ll help you get dressed and do a touch of makeup then we’ll take a look in the mirror. You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to have a twin sister.”

Yesterday began Tomorrow.

“It was a dark and stormy night...”

“Aw Jack, you start all your spook stories out like that; least you have for the past five years. You gotta make this story different. You know, jazz it up or something. Make it seem normal, like it could really happen.”

“Normal? You want normal the day before Halloween?”

“Normal? You want normal the day before Halloween?” I countered.

“Aw, you know what I mean, Jack.... Your stories always go into some Never Never land which bears little resemblance to reality. To make it scary you have to make it seem like it could really happen.”

“Who’s telling this story anyway?” I protested to Lane.

I was beginning to seriously wish I hadn’t invited him along on this little pre-Halloween night out in the wilds of my back yard. Lane, by the way, is one of my buds. Him, Tyrone, and Jeremy. All three were represented here tonight, at least physically if not mentally. Tyrone and Jeremy were here but they didn’t seem to be too happy about it. Guess they’re not camping or woodsy types. Tyrone spent his time laying in a big supply of firewood while it was still light out and I think he was trying for a bonfire merit badge or maybe he wanted to melt down the stone barbecue in which it was blazing or something. I could hardly cook over it, everything would have ended up like a crispy critter. Maybe he intended to use it as a signal fire.... you know, something like those huge fires they used to call for assistance in the Lord of the Rings?

Looking at the flames leaping up through the grillwork, I was worried they would jump to the trees around us or maybe melt the metal framework which had been installed a few years ago to replace the old iron supports for cooking pots, all of which had mostly rusted away over the many years. The new stuff also provided a small grill on which we could cook pancakes and stuff. There was also a shallower area where we could set a coffee pot and pans so they’d keep warm if we shoveled some of the hot coals under that part of the grill but I hardly needed them at the moment. Hell, I could barely get near the thing to rescue the coffee pot which I swear had started to glow on it’s own.

“Hey, Tyrone. Don’t you think there’s enough wood on the fire? I don’t want to melt the grillwork.”

“It’s getting to be night, Jack. It’ll be cold and we need to be able to see. You never know what kind of animals might be lurking out there.” He pointed at the trees around us.

“Yeah, see. In that case we should be facing away from the fire, not into it.”

Where the hell was I? Oh yeah. The trees. From outside these few acres surrounded by what was probably the only dense woods remaining for twenty miles you’d never know there was a large clearing here in the middle, unless you saw Tyrone’s signal fire which I swear was getting bigger. The clearing was a great place though and we frequently used it for large family gatherings during various holidays. Well, holidays when the ground wasn’t covered in snow anyway. Of course with Tyrone’s fire snow didn’t have a chance and I fully expected to see grass growing on the nearby dirt by tomorrow morning. Lane continued causing me to revert my attention back to him.

“You’re telling the story. But you still need to jazz it up a bit. Make it interesting.”

“Interesting. This is supposed to be a Halloween story not some campfire girl’s picnic. Jazz it up. Lemme think for a minute then, okay with you?”

“Sure, if you make the story interesting.”

“Any suggestions?”

“It’s your story. Don’t ask me, we’re just listening to it.”

“I could’a sworn you were trying to tell it.”

“Nah. I’m no good at telling stories.”

I sighed, my attempt to gently impart my frustration at his insistence that I take my story somewhere I wasn’t prepared to go having also been frustrated. I began the exercise of trying to wrack my brain, or perhaps wreck it, in search of something I could add to my story which would ‘jazz it up’ enough to satisfy Lane while still seeming to be a Halloween story, at least minimally. Nothing was coming to mind. Despite my ability to create stories almost on demand, my mind had completely derailed with Lane’s interruption and demand coupled with Tyrone’s insistence of adding two more pieces of log to the fire. I managed to keep one of them off of it. How he could get so close to the fire to add wood was beyond me. Trying to remove the one piece had me feeling like I was going to burst into flame along with the eight foot stone barbeque.

“Sorry guys, I can’t think of a thing. Not even the story I was going to tell.”

“That’s okay, Jack.” Tyrone shrugged back at me, “I’m not really into ghost and ghoul stories anyway. You got WiFi at the house? If it’s a good modem then I could probably still use it out here even though we’re a three or four hundred feet away.”

“Give it a shot. It’s the only access point out here so it’s easy to find. The password’s Madagascar with a capital M.”

“What kind of gas in the car?”

I shook my head, “Just find it and I’ll type in the password.”

“Okay, be right back.”

He went to his tent and returned less than a minute later while I pondered the possibility that he might yet graduate next year despite himself. Don’t get me wrong. I like my buds but sometimes they could be a little dense, know what I mean?

“Hey Jack, what’s the name of your access point? The only one I can find has a really weird name.”

I shook my head again, “it’s probably mine.” I partially subvocalized.

It was, so I typed in the password and Tyrone was on and playing one of those on-line games mere seconds later.

“Why do you even bother going to an outing like this when you’d rather be gaming?”

My curiosity was getting the better of me. This might be valuable information should I ever wish to get a degree in the psychology of gamers. Who knows, I might have come up with a whole new area of study.

Jeremy took this opportunity to hit the sack since there wasn’t going to be any spook story and he didn’t have his computer with him. Lane opted for the same. I cleaned up for a bit leaving the funeral pyre for the ironware for the last in the hopes it would die down a bit so I might actually see the glow of the metal diminish back to something that approximated cookware. Finally ready to hit the sack myself, I asked Tyrone if he was going to sleep sometime soon.

“We’ll be getting up with the sun so you might want to get some shut-eye.”

“Whenever.”

I didn’t get any other response out of him so I figured he was good until his batteries died, which couldn’t be all that long. I headed for my tent and the land of Nod myself.

The next morning I was up early. Well, early for everyone else. The normal time as far as I was concerned. Tyrone must have gone to his bedroll at least a few hours ago since the fire had nearly died back to something nearly usable, showing only a few low flames, well comparatively, and a thick bed of moderately hot coals which were still enough to cause me to remain at arms length from the crematorium Tyrone had called a cooking fire. Closer inspection of the coffeepot caused me to wonder if it had always been oval or if that was a new thing. It seemed a little more.... squatty, for lack of a better term, as well.

I poked a couple of small twigs into the coals of the fire since they seemed to still have a lot of life in them and less than a minute later the twigs were burning which allowed me to slowly add some of the smaller of the large pieces so I could get a cook fire going. I probably wouldn’t have needed to do that but I also didn’t want the coals to lose their heat while I had breakfast cooking. As I started some coffee then continued to prep everything else so we could have a reasonable breakfast I mused upon the fact that Tyrone had been at least partially correct, it had been cold last night. Snow likely wasn’t all that far away.

It wasn’t long before the guys began moving around. I suppose the aroma of the coffee and the cooking bacon were what finally got them up. I figured Tyrone got into the food last night after we had all gone to bed. The bacon wasn’t in the igloo chest but was out on the stones of the barbecue, still in it’s plastic wrapper fortunately. Actually that was probably a good thing since it got cold enough it might have frozen the bacon and that would have made it a bit difficult to prepare. The heat from the stones surrounding the fire had kept it thawed. Hell, the heat from the stones had nearly slow cooked all of it. Kind of like an outdoor crock pot.

Lane and Jeremy were out and more than ready to eat in very short order. Once again Lane’s usual lame comments were prolific.

“Hey Jack, gezz man, the house is just up the hill. Why can’t we eat inside?”

“This was supposed to be a camp out, Lane. What would you have done if we were fifty miles off into the trees and scrub?”

“Hey. The only reason I agreed to do this is because it was here. You wouldn’t find me fifty miles off in the scrub or the trees for that matter. I’m a city person, not a hermit.”

“Lane, you disappoint me. Wake Tyrone up would you? Tell him to get his sorry ass out here to eat breakfast.”

“Yeah sure. When did he go to bed?”

“How would I know? He was playing his game so I figure he didn’t hit the sack until his batteries died, however long that would have been.”

“Well, if they were fully charged he probably had four to six hours. He always buys those more expensive batteries so he can use his laptop for more than just a couple of hours. He nearly went bonkers on the plane last year when his factory supplied battery didn’t last more than ninety minutes. Haven’t you ever noticed that the batteries he uses stick out way below the notebook? They’re somewhere near four times the capacity of the ones that come with it.”

Lane walked over to Tyrone’s tent as he was saying all that.

“What the heck? Hey guys, he turned his tent around during the night.”

He walked around to the other side and peered in, “Guys. He’s not in here.”

“He has to be. He wouldn’t have wandered off. Is his computer in there?”

“Lemme check — nah. Not here. His backpack’s gone too. Maybe he went back to the house last night.”

I quickly checked my pockets, “if he did, he couldn’t get in. The house is locked and I still have the key. Jeremy, would you check to see if his car’s still here?”

“Sure. Be right back. Save me a dozen pieces of that bacon will ya? And maybe four or five of the pancakes. Hope you have syrup.” Jeremy trotted off to go around the house down to where the cars were parked. I put another dozen slices of bacon on so I would have them ready when he got back.

“Hey Jack, d’ya think maybe somethin’ happened to him?”

“Something? Like what, for instance?”

I dunno. Like maybe a wild animal got him?”

“Lane, all the wild animals are long gone except maybe for a skunk or two. The city’s grown and pushed them out during the last couple hundred years. Where would they live?”

“Why not in here?” Land indicated this small patch of woods we were bivouacked in at the back of my family property.

“Yeah. Right. Any animal that could drag one of us off without a trace and take the laptop along for the ride would have to be pretty damn big. That would mean the wild animal you’re conjecturing would need miles of forest in which to range for food. If it had been taking people for it’s food all this time there would have been an outcry so loud you would have heard it in the next county.”

“It was just an idea, man.”

Jeremy returned looking grim, “Hey guys. His car’s still here. Maybe he’s playing some kind of practical joke. It is Halloween today, you know.”

“That makes the most sense I’ve heard all day.” I replied.

“Yeah. It isn’t like him all that much but it makes sense.” Lane threw in as the two of us nodded our heads in agreement. It wasn’t like Tyrone. He was Mr. Laid Back as long as he had his on-line computer game. If the net ever went down for more than a couple of hours then I hoped the police department had a nice strong strait-jacket to hold him until it came back up again.

“Maybe he developed a funny bone and this is his first attempt at a serious joke.” Jeremy added to the fray.

“Or maybe he wanted to recharge the battery in his laptop and took it up to the house.” I added.

“I thought you said he couldn’t get in?”

“Maybe I was wrong. I thought I locked the door but I didn’t check everything. Look breakfast is nearly ready so let’s eat, then clean up the area. If he’s here, we’ll find him. If he isn’t then a half hour or so to eat breakfast, clean the area up and make the fire safe won’t hurt anything. We’ll make certain the fire’s out then we’ll check the house first and the property second before we get others involved in hunting for him. If he’s not anywhere around then we can begin to wonder or worry. I certainly don’t want to hunt for him on an empty stomach. Especially if, as you said, he’s playing some kind of Halloween joke.” I didn’t bother to add, ‘that only he would understand’.

“Good idea, man. Lemme get a cup and I’ll go for some of that coffee.”

I filled another pot with water from the spigot installed in the side of the rocks which held the metal framework and grill. I wanted some hot water for the dishes when we did our clean up. The stones were still so warm that the water came out of the spigot hot. Heating it over the coals would bring it up some more but it was already close to the temperature I wanted. At least the pile of wood over in the lean-to was enough to last three or four normal days thanks to Tyrone. Well, three or four days of cooking; not if he came back and wanted another bon-fire. I gave some thought to making him clean the grillwork of all the tar the burning wood deposited on it. That would take a couple of hours to get the job done right and I figured with his fire and now these antics he’d earned at least that much.

What the hell? What’s my large kitchen pan doing there in the embers of the fire? I grabbed the tongs from next to the stones to slowly fish it out of the fire. The damn thing was glowing it was so hot. Good thing it’s cast iron, a left over from the house and it probably was used back in Grandfather’s day if not before. I left it on the concrete pad surrounding the fireplace so the heat could drain away. I figured I’d have plenty of time to get to it later after we learned what kind of joke Tyrone thought he was pulling.

As we finished breakfast I continued to wonder how my pan got down here. It took a bit for me to connect the pan and the bacon then my mind reverted to Tyrone. Okay, so the house probably hadn’t been locked and he went up to get the pan so he could prepare some bacon. I wish he had just wakened me. I could have prepared it quickly and without all the potential disasters he had set up. Speaking of Tyrone, I figured the smell of the food would have enticed him back from wherever he was hiding but we finished eating, cleaned up and then sprayed the fire enough to be certain there were no hot embers. He still hadn’t shown by that time and if he wanted me to fix him breakfast after we discovered what kind of game he was playing, he had another think coming. My pan had cooled enough that I could handle it again. Something about it was off a bit but I couldn’t place it at the moment. I did have a few other things on my mind.

I made a mental note to come back after the guys were gone to clean out the barbecue fireplace so it would be ready for the next time or the winter, whichever came first. Tents and bed rolls were taken down then prepped once again for storage before they were taken to the little shed we had built here in the clearing.

Grandfather had kept telling me when I was a kid, “That would be quite a fall, Sonny Buck.”

The shed used to cover a well before it was capped and hadn’t been in use at least as long as I’d been around. The building itself was newer because when we were kids we used to play near the old one and Gramps had been worried one of us might fall through the old wooden floor into the abandoned well. He had a layer of inch thick plywood laid over the hole, then a double latticework of rebar four inches apart and a ten inch thick layer of concrete poured into the area below, through and above the rebar. That came out to be a ten by ten final floor size and now we kept all sorts of stuff in there including the ride-em mower for the lawn which surrounded the house.

My attention came back to the tasks at hand, “I’ll take care of all this from here guys. Let’s get up to the house to see if he’s there. Unless he climbed the walls I don’t believe he left the property. We would have heard the old gate creaking if he tried to get out.”

“Yeah. What’s with that anyway? It sounds like a gate from out of a horror flic.”

“You get to be well over a hundred years old and see if you don’t creak, Jeremy.”

“He’s gotcha there, Jerm.”

“Aw shut up, Lame. You were asking the same question when we got here.”

“Come on you two. Let’s focus here, okay? The target is Tyrone or lack thereof.” I was checking the house as they followed me around still bickering with each other.

“There don’t seem to be any unlocked windows or doors,” I noted.

“That doesn’t mean anything. He could have locked them after he went inside.”

“True enough.” I admitted as I unlocked the front door and we went in, “Okay, I’ll search the upstairs. You two take this floor and the basement.”

“Basement? What the hell would he be doing in the basement. He likes his comforts. He was probably upstairs in a nice soft warm bed all night while we froze out asses off in those bedrolls on the ground.”

“Jeremy, I don’t know how your ancestors ever made it here from wherever it was they left. Besides, I thought we decided he was trying to play a joke on us. If so, then he’s probably hiding out here somewhere.”

“Good point, Jack. Come on, Lame. Let’s go look.”

“Quit calling me lame. It’s Lane, with an N.”

“Then quit calling me Germ. Lame.”

The two of them began their search while still grumbling at each other. I just shook my head and went upstairs to begin my search in the attic. An hour later, I had finished my search in the attic and the upper floor. No Tyrone. There were six big trunks upstairs and he could have easily fit into any one of them but the straps binding them were still in place and there was no way he could have re-fastened them from inside any of the trunks.

Completing my search I began to traipse down stairs but came to a halt when my mind finally registered the fact that the small table here on the landing was back over to the spot where I had found it when I took possession of the property. I picked it up and moved it back to the spot where I wanted it while my mind went through a number of strange mental gymnastics. All these little things were beginning to take their toll. Why would Tyrone be doing them? If this was a joke of some kind then he was going to an awful lot of seemingly non-related preparations.

Breaking away from my thoughts and looking around it suddenly came to me that the mirror had been moved back as well. Damn it, he should know better than to be rearranging someone’s house. I angrily took the mirror from the old spot along the wall and brought it over to hang behind the table at the location where ‘I’ wanted it to be. I couldn’t find the nails I’d used to hang it there. Nails hell, I couldn’t even find the holes in the wallpaper. Setting the mirror on the floor against the wall, standing back where I could see most of the wall all at one time, I reconsidered my location. It had to be close to that spot so I began looking for evidence of the nail holes for several feet each side as well as above the table. No holes. Tyrone couldn’t have covered them over so well that I couldn’t find some trace of one of them. My hair began to stand on end and for the moment I beat a hasty retreat downstairs where I found tweedle dee and tweedle dum sitting in the living room talking.

“If you two finished searching here and in the basement why didn’t you come up and help me upstairs?”

“We figured you’d be right along. Didn’t find him huh?”

“No. I didn’t find him and neither did you apparently.”

“Nope. There’s one room we haven’t checked though. It’s locked.”

“That’s because I keep it locked. That was one of the stipulations in the will.”

“That you have to keep one of the rooms locked all the time? You know how weird that sounds?”

“Hey. If keeping it locked is all I had to do to own this great old house and the twenty-six acres of property around it then I’ll keep it locked.”

“Are you allowed to go in at all?”

“Sure. It’s just that when I’m not in there it must be locked. Come on I’ll show it to you.”

We walked down the hall to the last door on the left and I fished for the keys.

“Hey Jack, what’s in that room?”

“It’s Great, Great, Great, Great or some such thing Grandfather Grant’s study. I don’t go in here much except to dust and clean a little. When I was just a kid Gramps would let us play in there so long as he was in there. He used to lock it when no one was in it, too.” I opened the door leading to the room and the three of us trooped in to glance around.

“He’s not in here, unless there’s a secret passage or something.” Jeremy quickly noted as he toured the room. “Cool furniture though. And some really old books,” he added as he looked through the built in bookshelves careful not to touch anything for fear the books would turn to dust.

“It’s the original stuff.”

“Cool. Gotta be worth forty or fifty grand then huh? Great furniture. They sure knew how to build furniture a couple hundred years ago.”

“Yeah. Most of it came from Philadelphia. You can still see the maker’s marks. It was brought out here when Great, Great, Great, Great Grandfather Grant came West on his way to the Great Plains. He stopped here and met Multiple Great Grandmother Holister. He courted her, married her and they had three kids. They lived here for about twenty years until he got the wanderlust again then they moved nearly five hundred miles further West. Their eldest daughter married one of the Williams boys. That was when they gave him and her this house and the surrounding farm for a wedding gift. That’s how it came to be in the Williams family. We’ve had it ever since. Except we’ve sold off parts of the land to developers. I wish there was still more land around the house than there is now.”

“That explains this painting I guess. Who are these people?”

I glanced at the side of the room where the fireplace had been built as my eyes took in the painting hanging above the mantle before they looked back down at Lane, “That’s them. That’s Grandmother Holister and he’s Grandfather Grant. I guess they were about twenty five or so when that was painted. My Mom told me that painting was made a couple of years after they were married somewhere around a hundred and seventy years ago. Their first daughter had been born by the time that painting was made.”

“Guess that’s where you got your looks, huh?”

Now I was certain Lane’s elevator didn’t go all the way to the top. There was no way I looked anything like Grandfather Grant.

“You know, with a wig and a little makeup you’d look just like this Great, whatever, Grandmother of yours.”

HUH? I turned back toward Lane and the fireplace as I looked up at the painting with my mouth hanging open. In all the time I’d been growing up here I barely paid that painting lip service. It was a fixture which as a kid I just accepted the same way I would the curtains on the windows or the wallpaper on the walls. Now I took a good hard look at the two people in the painting, especially Great, as Lane said, whatever Grandmother Holister.

“You got all your marbles Lane? There’s no way I look like a woman. She was a looker according to Grandmother Fisher, even when she was in her nineties and Grandmother Fisher was just a little girl.”

“I’m fine man. Can’t you see it? The face, the eyebrows, even the complexion. You look like her. A male version maybe but your face is the same.”

I couldn’t see it. Jeremy hadn’t said anything so I figured he agreed with me.

“Jeremy, what do you think about it? Do I look like multi G Grandmother
Holister?”

“I dunno, man,” he said rather absently, “but that dude looks seriously like Tyrone.” His attention had been focused on the man in the painting.

“He should. He’s a Grant just like Tyrone.” I replied with some aggravation present in my voice. No way did I look like a woman.

“No, man. You know that scar Tyrone has on the side of his face where that nitwit tried to cut him in school? This dude’s got it too. Same little twist at the top. This painting could have been made just this last year or two with Tyrone and you dressed in period clothing like they do for those old tyme pictures you can get in the malls sometimes. Now that I look at her though, Lane’s right, you could double for your Grandmother. You’re thin enough that you could look like her especially if you had makeup and a wig on. Where’d you really get this painting man? You and Tyrone cooking up some sort of Halloween joke?”

“Huh?” Now I walked over to the fireplace and began to take a good look at the painting. Having lived with it most of my life, I never paid it much attention. It was always in the background and I had never bothered to give it half a thought. He was right though, the man in the painting did look like Tyrone, even to that slight scar on the side of his face. That began to bother me for some reason so I turned my attention to Grandmother Holister.

“No. No joke.” I began quietly. Something was beginning to raise the hairs on the back of my neck again.

I continued, “But I see what you mean about the scar. That’s got to be seriously weird. I still don’t see the resemblance between me and Grandmother Holister though.”

“You gotta be blind man. Ask your’s and Lane’s sisters to come take a look at it. I’ll bet they’ll tell you the same thing.”

“Oh yeah. Sure. As soon as Lane tells them what to say.”

“Then have them bring a couple of their friends along. I’ll bet they’ll all tell you the same thing.”

“What? That I dressed up like a girl so someone could make a painting of Tyrone and me? You gotta be outta your gourd, man. There’s no way. Come on, we need to check the land before we call the cops about this.”

I was still rankling over them trying to say I had worn a woman’s wedding dress to pose for a painting which I knew had been over that fireplace presumably since some time long before I was born. I doubt anyone would have changed it for a Halloween prank since having it made would have been costly, not to mention I would have had to pose for it. At least I think I would. I could understand someone defacing the old painting to add that scar to the man’s face though. The problem I was having just now was that I was beginning to see the resemblance between me and Grandmother Holister as I gave it more thought. I guess I had initially rejected it out of hand since they were trying to say I had dressed like a woman to pose for the painting. My mind finally came to the conclusion that, yeah, I probably could look a bit like her since we were related — however distantly.

We made one more search of the house top to bottom before we started on the property. A search of the land revealed no clues to Tyrone’s disappearance so I finally dug out my cell phone and made the call. The police told me that unless I suspected foul play there was nothing could be done for twenty four hours. They would send someone out to take a report and if there was no Tyrone by this time tomorrow afternoon then it would become a missing persons case.

Lane, meanwhile had called his sister, Tracy and asked her to call my sister, Caprice and a couple of their friends then all show up here at the house.

“We’ve got ourselves a real Halloween mystery and we would like your opinions concerning it. Tyrone’s gone missing and there’s a weird painting we’d like you to see. Make certain the girls all know Tyrone well enough to recognise him in a picture, okay?”

“If you guys are going to try to scare us we’ll make you regret it.”

“No. Nothing like that sis. We’re just confused and worried and this whole thing is just plain weird. We need some eyes and brains that aren’t tied up with seeing things that aren’t there. We already called the cops but they won’t do anything for twenty four hours on a missing person case.”

“You make it all sound so mysterious. All right I’ll call the girls and we’ll be there as soon as we can. If this is really a joke I’ll make you regret it.”

“If it’s a joke then it’s on us. Not you guys.”

╠╬ ╬╣

The girls showed up about an hour later. They didn’t seem all that enthusiastic about it. I guess they thought we were going to pull some Halloween trick on them. Their tune changed a little when they saw the painting.

“That’s Tyrone, and that’s you in drag.”

“Not hardly. That’s my multiple great grandmother Holister - Grant.”

“You’re joking. That looks so much like you that if that wedding dress was still around I’ll bet we could make you look just like her.”

My Sister piped up at that point, “that painting was there when I was a little girl. See the little mark in the lower left corner? That’s where Jack hit the painting with one of his toys when Grampa lifted him up to look at it.”

How the hell did she remember that? I didn’t even remember it until she mentioned it just now.

Carol continued her interrogation, “Did you search the whole house?”

“Yep. Upstairs and down.”

“Is there an attic?”

“We searched it and the basement, too. No signs.”

“Would you mind if we do the same?”

“Be my guest.” I offered magnanimously. The guys and I sat down to wait for their verdict.

It was half an hour later when the four of them met back here in the living room then traipsed off together to the attic. Ten minutes after that they were calling me up there.

“You found him? Where was he?”

“No. We didn’t find him but we found something else.”

“Something else? What for instance?”

“That’s what were going to show you. Come on.”

Jeremy and Lane got up to come with me but Tracy said, “No. You two wait down here. We won’t be long.”

The two girls accompanied me up to the attic closing the door at the top of the stairs once we arrived.

“Look over there.” Caprice pointed to several of the trunks I’d been meaning to move out of the attic so I could put in a game room. The girls had one of them open although the loosened straps showed they had looked in the others as well.

“Well. Don’t just stand there, go look at the things we found.” They had a bunch of white stuff draped across the trunks so I went over to look at whatever the hell it was they were talking about. I nearly shit a load right there when I figured out what it was.

“How the heck could that stuff even exist now? It’s been a hundred and seventy years, give or take. Clothing just doesn’t last that long even when it’s packed.”

“We don’t know but the fact is, it does exist and everything is there including the wig.”

“The wig I could maybe understand. Mom and Gram told me that grandmother Holister began to lose her hair when she was in her seventies so she had a wig made. That’s probably it.”

“Okay. That explains why it isn’t made the way they are now. Try it on.”

“Do what?” I almost yelled.

Two of them pushed me into one of the chairs which were stored up here as my sis told me, “Try it on! We want to see how much you really look like great grandmother Holister.”

“I’m doing this against my better judgement. None of you better tell those two yayhoos downstairs about this.”

“We won’t. We just want to see how close you look to the person in the painting.”

“I didn’t pose for that.”

“We know. Your sister told us that it had been above the mantle ever since you were both little kids so there was no way you could have posed for it. We just...”

“We want to see how much you could look like grandmother Holister if you wear the wig and the wedding dress,” Sis said right out.

“What! You’re all nuts. You want me to wear the wedding dress?”

“And the undergarments and all. There’s something going on here and we want to see just how close you can look to being grandmother Holister. This could be important.”

“I certainly don’t see how.”

“Trust us. We won’t tell a soul.”

“Sis, if this is some kind of Halloween prank all you guys and Tyrone have come up with, I’ll make you a bunch of sorry son’s or daughters of bitches.”

My sister looked hurt, “It’s no prank, Jack. We just want to know. We’ll help you get dressed and after we know then we’ll help you take it off and put it away again. No harm, no foul as you’re so fond of saying.”

As much as I was curious about that painting, now I was also totally embarrassed about the thought of wearing a woman’s clothing and wig. That coupled with the near certainty that I didn’t remotely look like Grandmother Holister even though everyone was insisting that I did and that I had an inclination that my acceptance of the idea was due to external influences, had me almost to the point of doing this ridiculous thing just to prove them all wrong.

“And what do I get out of this farce? Say I do this idiotic thing and prove I don’t look the least like her. You’ve still gotten me to wear that stupid gown and make myself a laughingstock.”

“Well.... if you don’t look like her then.... we’ll make certain no one spills the beans about you doing it.”

“No deal. You don’t spill the beans no matter how it turns out.”

“So you’ll do it?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Afraid we’re right or afraid you’ll be made to look foolish?”

“I’m not afraid you’re right. But.... aw hell.... Okay. Let’s get it over with but NO ONE else sees me and that goes double for the guys downstairs.”

“We promise.”

“Aww, hell.”

I had finally given in when Tracy and Caprice said they would go downstairs to have Lane and Jeremy go on home promising that they weren’t going to stick around very long either.

“We’re helping Jack sort some stuff we found and then we’ll be leaving. Besides, Carol has a heavy date tonight so we can’t stick around too long.”

Ten minutes later the two of them were back upstairs discovering that I was part way into some of the undergarments having reached the point where a corset was being cinched around my waist. It wasn’t taken in all that far since my waist was kind of narrow anyway. The girls had me sit down after that so they could button up the shoes. That bothered me a bit as well because they fit just fine while I had rather hoped they would be ten or twelve sizes too small.

The whole farce continued for another twenty minutes before the gown was dropped over my head and the million or so buttons up the back were being fastened. The shoes had heels of about an inch and a half or maybe two high which I found to be a little difficult to get accustomed to but at least they did fit, which had me becoming more and more concerned that I might really look a lot more like Grandmother Holister than I had been willing to admit, even to myself. In fact, most all of the stuff fit, even the ear-rings which were screw on rather than pierced, for which I was ever so thankful. At least until I took them off later and my ears protested my treatment of them.

The girls helped me go downstairs without killing myself, then on into my room where they did a little cosmetic work before placing the wig on my head. They began to murmur to each other before leading me out of the room to help me down to great grandfather’s study where they had me stand in front of the fireplace while they posed me much in the same manner as our multiple great grandmother had been standing in the painting. Caprice snapped a pic on her cell phone so I could see how it all turned out.

To say it was a shock would be a gross understatement.

Lane had been right. I looked just like Multi-G Grandmother Holister, enough so that I could have doubled for her.

“That’s unbelievable. If she wore that wedding dress back then she had to have caused a scandal.”

That got my curiosity up, “Why’s that? It seems pretty much like every other wedding dress I’ve seen, not that I’ve seen all that many.”

“Maybe now. But not back a hundred and fifty years or more ago. Her shoulders uncovered, and the tops of her breasts showing. Most places they would have run her out on a rail, I think.” Sis continued.

I couldn’t see it. I mean it’s just a wedding dress after all. What’s the big deal with it being.... what did they call it? Uh, strapless? “Strapless?”

“Yes, strapless. You’ve got to remember people were a lot more straitlaced back then. Of course Mom always said Great Grandmother Holister was.... well, before her time? She was into investing and farm and ranching and handled all the financial dealings but sent her husband out to make the actual contacts. She pretty much ran it all and there were a few stories she told to me that made me think Grandmother Holister knew an awful lot that even most men wouldn’t know back then.”

I didn’t know what to make of that. I didn’t remember Mom saying much about Grandmother Holister except that she was a looker even when she was in her seventies. We spent about a half hour down there looking at the painting while Sis continued to snap at least a half dozen pics of me here and there during that time. She even framed the painting itself and took a pic of it.

“Caprice, I hate to be a wet blanket but I’ve got to be getting home to get ready for this evening.”

“Me also.” Antoinette added.

Sis looked at me and then at them, “would you mind terribly if I take them all home? I’ll hurry back and help you out of all that.”

“Nah. Go ahead. I’m okay here alone. I’ll survive until you get back. I’ll probably just sit here or in the living room until you return. Take the key to the front door with you so you can get in without me needing to figure out who’s at the door. That way no one will see me dressed like this. All I’d need is for those yayhoos to come back and find me dressed like this.”

“They wouldn’t know it was you, anyway. Thanks, sis. I won’t be long.”

“Don’t call me that. Just because I’m in this wedding gown doesn’t mean I’m a girl.”

“Uh, huh. I’ll hurry.”

“Okay, Caprice. See you when you get back.”

The girls gathered their things and hurried out. I went around checking the doors and windows quickly to make certain everything was locked then sat back down in the study. I got to thinking about the painting and the clothing I was wearing. There was something not quite right here. The clothes fit too well, like they were made for me and there was no sign they were as old as I knew they had to be, even though their style matched that of the dress in the painting. Hell, the clothes should have been dust inside that trunk. This had to be some kind of a Halloween trick everyone was playing on me, but I was darned if I could figure it out and it had to be costing whoever was doing it a pretty penny. I sat there for maybe another ten minutes trying to decide why they wanted me to dress like Grandmother Holister. I mean Sis was right, I looked enough like Grandmother H. that most of the people who knew me wouldn’t be able to tell who I really was.

A cold breeze blew through the room which caused me to check the windows and then the flue of the fireplace to be certain they were all closed, which they were. It was almost becoming second nature to me to gently hold my skirt and train out of the way. After checking the flue I carefully cleaned my hands so I wouldn’t get the gown dirty. It needed to be preserved for a long time.

After a while I became curious and began examining the desk which I had frequently cleaned of dust but never really looked at very closely. Eventually I found a small hidden compartment which held an old style but really clean and new looking cap and ball revolver and which appeared to be loaded. Of course to be a period weapon it had to be a percussion type.... I went through a ‘duh’ moment. Surprisingly the revolver had the Colt name stamped on it. I laid it on the desk top thinking to ask Tyrone about it. Then I remembered he was still missing as my mind waded through the fog again. I continued my examination of the room. This was the first time I had really looked around in here other than to do some cleaning. I don’t know why I never spent the time to take a good look around. Glancing up at the painting, something seemed different about it but at first I couldn’t place it. It took me a couple of minutes to figure it out. You know how oil paintings slowly attract dust which becomes a part of the painting, kind of dulling it a bit? I knew it had been carefully cleaned by a restoration company maybe ten years ago but there’s just something different about freshly drying paint and two hundred year old dried paint. That little revelation disturbed me a bit and I moved away from the painting to continue my examination of the room as I continued to consider the ramifications of the nearly fresh paint. Again I wished Tyrone would hurry and get back from town.

One of the book cases was a little loose, unlike the other three. I finally found a latch which allowed it to move away from the wall exposing a small compartment behind it in which three rifles were stacked vertically on a shelf. Below them was powder in tins and nearly two or three hundred cast lead balls like those which were used before sealed bullets came along. The rifles were percussion revolver types and also had the Colt factory markings on them. They looked like they had been used a bit but were still in very good shape. The powder horns looked new and by their weight they must still have plenty of powder in them. There were three tools each holding a couple dozen percussion caps as well and those looked to be new. The caps as well as the tools. Closer inspection showed the rifles to be loaded and capped. Again, the caps looked new. I was glad Tyrone had thought to keep the rifle guns loaded. One never knew when Indians might show up or maybe that gang of bandits which the Sheriff had mentioned when he and his posse dropped by the other day.

Something seemed wrong with that thought and it took me a while to figure out that I had to be imagining some of these things. Mostly the conversations. First of all Tyrone was missing, not somewhere in town. Secondly the Sheriff hadn’t been out to the house in years if not decades. Third, town was nearly to my doorstep now, not two miles away like it was in G-G-G-G Grandfather Grant’s time. I shook my head to clear the fog as I heard the snap of the latch which held the bookcase closed then I began looking carefully through the book titles on the shelves. While the books looked old, they no longer seemed so be so ancient to me as they had when I was a kid. A light touch showed me they wouldn’t fall apart so I pulled one from the shelf gently opening it to find it had been hand written for the most part. There was some printing in it but the spellings were difficult for me to get around. The mantle clock struck eight and I began to wonder where Tyrone... I mean Caprice, might be. Surely he should.... she should have been back by now. It suddenly hit me that the mantle clock had chimed and I hadn’t wound it in all the years I had lived here, so.... who did? A closer inspection showed it was running so maybe the chime part had also been wound up a bit and I bumped it or something which set it off. Strangely.... the time was correct.

Light through the windows was waning quickly and I again wondered when my husban.... sister would get back. I began going around the house lighting the oil lamps in the areas we would be using when.... she finally returned.

I first heard the wheels on the road outside and which sounded like they were headed for the barn, it wasn’t long after that when the front door opened and closed again. Moments later my husband entered the room.

“There you are. You haven’t changed out of your wedding gown?”

“I need some assistance with the buttons. If you would be so kind, Sir.”

“Jacqueline, you look positively scandalous in that gown.”

“I know. I thought that poor painter you hired to produce our wedding portrait was going to faint dead away. He never did stop blushing, but he did a good job on the painting.”

“That he did, my dear young wife. When I could get him to keep his mind on painting. I had no idea that I was going to marry a tiger when I met you. You’ve been good for me and while I know farming, you know the managein’ so between us we’re coming out smelling like roses.”

He led me to the bedroom as I turned my back to him and he began to unbutton the long double row that would allow me to finally slip out of the gown once again. Free of the gown and some of the undergarments I turned to help him out of his uniform jacket so we might return to just being two ordinary people raising our family here on the farm. A little later during our devotions to one another, we thought we heard something at the front door for a moment but as we continued to listen nothing came of it. Although I could have sworn for a moment I had heard a woman’s voice calling to someone named Jack but it faded quickly.

Our daughter had been born just this month a year past and I think our next child was likely conceived this night.

The next morning by the time Tyrone was getting up I had already fed her and was preparing breakfast and a snack for him. He worked hard at our farm and the past two years had been good. We had a running surplus which Tyrone traded for some of the things we needed from town as well as sold to Adam Jackson, who then took them upstate along with the things he bought from others to sell to the city folk, so we were both prosperous.

“Good morning my Love.” Tyrone held me close giving me a long, lingering, searching kiss holding me snugly to him before settling down at the table so I could serve him his breakfast. I still blushed when he did that, even after two years and a child. And now, maybe a second one would be on the way.

I turned away to get the skillet of eggs and potatoes which gave me a moment to hide my face and collect myself lest I laugh with joy or he see my blush. Turning back after a moment, I crossed to the table to scoop his eggs and potatoes onto his plate before placing the pan on the stove then returning with my apron around the handle of the coffeepot so I could fill his cup. The preserves I had already brought in from the root cellar were in the jar that was on the table so he could help himself. We still had an almighty number of jars down there.

“Tyrone. I’m thinking we should send some of the preserves to Adam this trip. We can get five cents a jar for the preserves and he will replace the jars for free. We might have near a hundred which we could easily spare. That’s another five dollars.”

He nodded with a mouthful of food then swallowed before answering, “if you think we can spare them then go ahead. He said he could always sell your preserves. If I remember rightly, he makes twelve cents a jar so he would be quite happy to have ‘em.”

I’ll have Jeb bring them up to pack with the things they’re taking to town and add them to the tally.”

He spooned himself two big helpings of sugar into his coffee as he always did and I made a note to add sugar to the list of supplies we needed to get the next time he and I went to town. I returned to preparing his morning snack and the lunch which he would be eating later, while he continued to eat his breakfast.

He hurried today. We had extra help coming and our mare was soon to foal so she needed to be checked. The hired help would be arriving almost any minute so they could work the land and tend the animals while he busied himself with plowing the new acreage he had just opened up this spring. That meant I would need to bring up more from the root celler so I could prepare breakfast for them as well. There’s a lot to do to keep a farm the size of this one going. My poor Tyrone worked from sunup to past sundown. At least he trusted me to keep the books and our accounts paid or collected and up to date. This mornings trip into town by two of the help would take a load of our surplus to Adam. As soon as I could I needed to get out to see how many eggs we could send with the load. I would need to add them to the list and the tally. At fifty eggs to a dollar that could add up to a dollar pretty quickly. We had enough chickens that we were never hurting for eggs, even when we sent so many as a hundred on to Adam to sell.

I noticed Jeb coming to the door with Tom and Jim a half pace behind him and gaining. I put twelve more eggs on the skillet then added enough potatoes for a small army to the pan along with more of the spices and small greens and vegetables I always added to my mix. The eggs weren’t immune receiving a small helping of the greens, finely chopped, and just a touch of onion, also finely chopped, before going onto the skillet. Jeb couldn’t handle the peppers so I kept his eggs separated from the others then added a touch of the chopped green pepper to the others.

~ ~ ~ ~

A great deal of time has passed as it frequently has need to do. Our daughter has grown into a fine young woman and one of the Williams boys began courting her. Tyrone was making noises about moving further West as he had been for the past three years but I think now he finally means it. I took him aside and mentioned to him something about Mr. Colt and his needing investors, or so I had heard.

Tyrone looked at me a little funny before he said, “Is this another of your premonitions, Jackie?”

“Premonitions? Whatever are you talking about, Mr. Grant?”

He gave me a little grin, “And where might I be finding this Mr. Colt and what is it he wants to be making?”

We had a rather productive discussion which culminated in Tyrone sending off a letter. Four months later we had our reply and Tyrone went to see Mr. Colt while I had to run the farm using only our hired hands. When he returned two and a half months later, he brought three rifle guns and two revolvers with him.

“I’ve invested in Colt’s factory. We worked at getting him an order from the Army but it’s only for a thousand of his revolvers. I’m confident that once they have them, they’ll want more. If that keeps up then we’ll get our investment back. I’ve only put a thousand into it so it isn’t like we will be destitute if his venture doesn’t pan out.”

“That’s all right, Ty. I have other investments I’ve been thinking about.”

“More premonitions?”

“Why can’t we call them rational guesses?”

“You?? Rational guesses? Miss emotional here? I think I’d place more faith in your premonitions that I would in most peoples facts, my love. Now, how’s the farm been while I’ve been gone?”

We continued to talk about the farm, several times in fact during the next two months and decided to give it to Amanda when she married. One of the conditions would be that Tyrone’s study be kept locked unless someone was using it and all the furnishings and books we didn’t take with us were to remain in the study and not be sold so we could recover them if and when we returned to retire in town nearby.

It was soon after harvest that we packed up and moved on toward the Plains. Tyrone and I had practiced with those revolvers and the rifle guns for a month before we left. I felt like an army when I used one of those rifle guns during practice. I could hit one of the empty bean cans four shots out of five and barely missed with the fifth nearly every time.

When we finally arrived at the area Tyrone had been told about, we were quick to assert our rights with the claims office. They had little choice since we had paper which confirmed our right to the land we had laid out. During the trip we had used those rifle guns only once in anger and that was when three miscreants meant to rob us since we were driving our wagon alone rather than accompanied by others in a procession. I had been in the back when they stopped Tyrone. He made to go for his revolver and one of them shot him in the shoulder. When they climbed onto the wagon I shot the first one in the head and the other in the chest. I heard another begin riding away as I grabbed for one of the rifle guns. Resting it’s barrel on the driver’s seat of the wagon, it took me two tries to hit him since I wasn’t accustomed to shooting at a moving target. Especially not one which was on horseback and moving at a goodly clip. I was upset that I had wasted a perfectly good shot but Tyrone didn’t seem all that put out about it.

Tyrone wasn’t badly hurt although I thought they had killed him. He had a passel of blood on his shirt and was cussing up a storm but otherwise he was just mad. One of the two I had shot was trying to get up and Tyrone just took the reins in his good hand and we drove off soon passing the one I had shot as he rode away. We found his horse some little distance down the road grazing in a small patch of grass. Either it had it’s fill or the grass wasn’t all that good because after we passed, it took to following us and did so clear into the next town.

I had doctored Tyrone as best I could but we needed a doctor to take the ball out of him. The town’s doctor turned out to be the barber so we had our doubts but he did a good job of it telling us that Tyrone would be good as gold in about a month. Tyrone wasn’t in much condition to say anything since the doctor had given him a whiff of something after getting him liquored up and Tyrone was rather woozy for a spell. I obtained more supplies before setting out for our homestead. It was likely good that Tyrone hadn’t been awake for that since the store keep overcharged us something fierce. I mentioned his prices were some five times more than we had been paying and he simply said the costs of transporting the goods from back East to here mounted up very quickly. I filed that thought away as something about which we might be able to take advantage in the near future.

We settled down on our land and while Tyrone wasn’t in any shape to do much toward beginning our home, I could still cut a passel of wood and did so on some of the more likely trees we had nearby. While I couldn’t make rails by myself, I could still bring down a tree or two and remove the branches for use as shorter pieces as well as firewood. With the help of our horses I was able to begin some turning of the land as well.

Tyrone was up and about very quickly but his shoulder didn’t mend much for a few more weeks. After that it was stiff in colder weather but he made do and by the time the second month passed once he was up and about, we had our first home. It was also the stable which backed up against one wall but it was somewhere to stay until we could build our main house. That didn’t begin right away since the weather closed in and we lost five months to the cold and snow. Winters here were a bit more fierce than back home. I guess it was because it was flat and the winds could get themselves up to a goodly pace driving the weather before them. I still had a problem with him putting too much wood on his fires. He finally learned his lesson when he nearly burned down our lean-to and the stable in the dead of winter.

When spring rolled around we had lost one of the horses but the other was in fine spirits. It was the one which continued to follow us so we finally took it in. Tyrone was doing well and other than some aches he was a whirlwind of action. I had constantly reminded myself of that store keep’s prices, which went up during the winter and didn’t seem to fall back down as much when spring and summer came about.

Tyrone and I spent a sizeable amount of time discussing that very thing when I finally suggested we build our home in the town which wasn’t more’n two miles distant. That would serve to provide us with a nice residence in town as well as offer us a base to begin something which I had been considering all Winter. I began to mention something called the Transcontinental Railroad to him, which wouldn’t be likely to come about for piece yet. Still, it was something to begin considering, especially since, if I was recollecting right, was going to be coming along somewhere around 1865 and that wasn’t all that far away. The discovery of Gold in the Oregon Territory was certain to fuel that need.

We sent a nice letter to Mr. Huntington in Sacramento, promising to add one dollar to his every two if he would help finance Mr. Judah in his railroad project. After all we were well to do but not as well off as Mr. Huntington. As it was, we didn’t need to spend a dollar since Mr. Huntington brought in several others who had considerable money. They started the Pacific side of the railroad gamble.

I mentioned again to Tyrone that, “I would like to start a Fargo business along with a new general store. I think we could offer more to these people at a lower price than that robber who has no competition to speak of.”

“I’ve been considering the same thing. I’d like to start up a bank as well. My Uncle got me into banking a bit when we invested in that railroad back East. It won’t be long before one or more of the railroads will be coming along, it’s just a matter of time. I’m trying to get my Uncle to find out just what Congress intends to do about it all and give me a hint as to the path it’s going to follow. It’d be nice to pick up a bit of land in it’s path and work a deal with the railroad in return for the land.”

“What sort of deal were you thinking, Tyrone?”

“Well, you want to start that Fargo business and a general store.... If I could pick up enough land along the path or in several of the towns the railroad is going to pass through then maybe I could trade that for some services only the railroad could provide.”

“Services? What kind of services?”

“I think I’ll leave that for later. It all would hinge on getting the land and making the trade and there’s no guarantee of that happening. Best you begin your planning for your General Store and Fargo business. You might want to consider a small bank branch in the store as well. It could be off to one side since neither it nor the store will be very big to start. With careful planning and a little effort they could all grow. For now, just begin to decide what sort of goods the store would need to offer and I’ll try to learn the shipping rates the railroad would impose. From the cost of the goods and the shipping costs you could begin to plan your selling prices. If you can’t sell the same quality for less than Evans’ store then there is little profit in starting it up in the first place.”

What he said was true enough but I had information he didn’t.

“Tyrone. What if I could show you the most likely path the Union Pacific will follow when they finally begin their way West?”

He looked at me like I was some kind of a witch.

“Now. How would you be knowing that? Is this another one of your premonitions?”

“Something like that.”

“We’ve made good money on each of the ones we acted on.” He lowered his head as he considered his next words.

“This would be a bit more costly than the others if’n you’re wrong.”

“Tyrone, haven’t our whole lives been a continuing gamble? What would it cost to pick up a hundred sections laid out end to end along a particular path? It won’t be all that much of a gamble since a railroad will need to follow the path of least resistance and if we buy cheap and don’t sell too dear then we can make some money. Then again, what if we bought cheap and just gave them the land, or most of it in return for partial ownership in the railroad plus those services you mentioned? Perhaps at very favorable rates and locked in for some fifty years or so? We could make our money by using the railroad rather than by attempting to gouge them.”

“Wife, there are times when I’m glad you’re not a riverboat gambler. All right, just where are these miles of land you want me to buy up?”

First step was getting a good map. Well, first step was getting a map of any kind. The next was in marking it up to show what we needed to buy and then Tyrone began investigating the path to learn what it would cost us to obtain the land. Nearly a quarter of it was dirt cheap. The rest, not so much. We finally held nearly a hundred and forty-two sections; a hundred and thirty-one square miles and nineteen bits and pieces associated with them.

While Tyrone was handling that I was putting together my letters to our potential suppliers from the information I had gathered from the shipping crates when Mr. Evans wasn’t looking. The crates and barrels of goods he had in his store had the suppliers names on them and I had made note of those during each trip to town so by now I had quite a list. I sent letters explaining what I was considering and requested information as to their prices, quantities and shipping. The bolts of materials were the biggest problem since it appeared they had to be shipped all the way from New York City. That was where our connections to the Eastern railroads came in handy.

It took us a powerful long time, nearly five years, but the general store and Fargo took hold. Our prices weren’t nearly so high as those of our competition and he lowered his below ours very quickly once we went into business. He had hoped to put us out of business by undercutting our prices. We dropped ours to just fifteen percent above our costs and he was out of business in less than five months. We didn’t raise our prices until the winter and even then it was only five percent rather than the nearly fifty percent Mr. Evans had always imposed. We also gave people fair price for any furs they brought in to trade, even during the winter since we could store them and then ship them in large quantity to a railhead some two hundred miles away to be taken by train back East where furs such as beaver and fox were still commanding goodly prices. We weren’t out to gouge as much out of folk as we could, we wanted to make a profit but if our prices were so high that we caused everyone to lose their homes and move on then where would we be?

The railroad came along in 1867, passing by us as it continued West. As I had been telling everyone who would listen, the railhead was some five miles away from our town. Tyrone and I had obtained quite a few acres of land about a mile out from the rails and somehow the town just drifted in that general direction until everything was over there and all that was left here were some old buildings which were slowly returning to the dust from which they had originally sprung.

Our deal with the railroad had our Fargo business pretty busy by the time my Tyrone died. He had reached nearly seventy and had been a ball-a-fire right up to the last. He would have wanted it that way, he never could stand just sitting around. Said it was a waste of time while there were monsters to slay. I never knew exactly what to make of that but it was one of his favorite sayings. Over time we had obtained a second large farm, three houses, one of which was here at the farm and one off in Grantsville some fifty miles away. The Fargo was up and running in nearly twenty different towns and we held stock in four different railroads, seventeen bank branches, twenty five general stores and we were partners in two warehouse ventures plus six combine storage facilities. We even had a mill where we could grind our own flour and right next door was our large bakery which made just about every kind of baked goods you could imagine. We even brought in fruits from all over via the trains so we could make pies and fritters and other things. Got to the point where we were doing so much that the railroad, with a little gentle insistence on our part, finally put in a siding right up next to our bakery so’s they could sidetrack the more’n ten carloads of fruit and produce we received every couple of weeks. We also loaded the cars with grains, furs and beef which were then shipped back to the cities for sale. Someone discovered that slowly releasing carbon dioxide through a pipework in the cars could cause some cooling of those goods held withing which helped to prevent spoilage. We had a plant made which let us capture compressed CO2 for that purpose so we could keep everything fresh while stored and shipping on the train cars.

It wasn’t too much longer before I was getting to be a bit tired myself. I was getting on a bit and missed my daughter and wanted to see her children again so I moved back to the old farm to be with her and her husband. I took most of our clothing and those rifle guns and the one remaining revolver back with me. The other had been lost when Tyrone died. No one could recall having seen it anywhere. For the next few years I had the time to just sit in the study where I gazed upon that old painting Tyrone had some young man paint of the two of us. I still had my wedding dress and most of the clothing which was up in the trunks in the attic. They had been carefully preserved along with all my under things and the shoes which matched the dress. I guess I msut have fallen asleep for a bit since I had this wonderful dream of my Tyrone and how much in love we both had been. As I woke, he held out his hand and I accepted it before we walked out to watch the sun setting in the West. It had been a perfect harvest as usual and Halloween was coming on. I needed to make some pies for when we had our relatives and friends over for the Holiday.

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“So you wish to report two missing persons rather than just one?”

“The first went missing yesterday. That was Tyrone Grant. I saw my brother Jack only a couple of hours ago and when I returned he was gone as well.”

“Perhaps he went out to look for this Mr. Grant.”

“He wouldn’t have done that. At least not until I came back to help him. Besides, his car is still here as is Tyrone’s.”

“Do you suspect foul play?”

“I don’t know. It’s just all so strange. Please, this isn’t a joke. Try to find them.”

“We will. Thank you for the report and I’ll have a case number sent to the address you gave to me.”

Caprice sat down looking at the painting on the mantle. Something had changed but it was subtle. She finally pulled up the images she had on her cell phone and compared those poor details shown behind her brother with that of the painting above the mantle. It took a bit before she realized the heads on the people in the painting had turned. Multiple great grandfather Tyrone Grant and multiple great grandmother Jacqueline Holister were now looking at each other rather than at the painter. She took another photo of the painting as a tear dropped from one of her eyes. Then she got up, walked from the room before locking the door then continued to go out of the house, locking the front door before crossing the porch going down to her car in order to return to her own home where she could begin to consider all of this in familiar, and hopefully safe, surroundings.

The night continued to close in and the weather shifted as Winter gave notice that it was on the way.

It was fast becoming a dark and stormy night....

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The Great Plains were a broad expanse of flat land, much of it covered in prairie, steppe and grassland, which lay west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains in both the United States and Canada. This area covered parts of the U.S. states of Colorado, Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Texas, and Wyoming, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. The Canadian portion of the Plains were known as the Prairies.

The term "Great Plains" was used in the United States to describe a sub-section of the even more vast Interior Plains, which covered much of the interior of North America. It also was a reference to a region of human habitation frequently referred to as the “Plains States” with native inhabitants referred to as the "Plains Indians".

In Canada the term was little used, the term “prairie” was more commonly used in Canada, and the region was known as the “Prairie Provinces” or simply "the Prairies."

Traveling from the East as one approached the prairie they would first come aware of an immense plain consisting of tall grasses. The ‘tall grass prairie’ eventually passed to a region where both the tall and the short grasses were present in varying degrees. This portion of the prairie encompassed about half the total area which had an area of approximately 1,300,000 km2 (500,000 sq miles). The entire region was about 500 miles (800 km) East to West and 2,000 miles (3,200 km) North to South.

Of the two, short grass or tall grass, tall grass claimed the larger area. Grazing and farming depended to a great extent upon the ground and the nature of the grasses present. The Great Plains were eventually to succumb to the settlers who hunted the native animal specie to extinction and plowed the grasses under in order to establish either crop or grazing land for specific uses as they desired. Perhaps half of those native grasses, which supported many forms of life such as the North American Bison which were hunted to near extinction by the mid to late 1800's, had been plowed under by the end of the nineteenth century. It was not much longer, perhaps barely into the twentieth century (1900s) before most if not all of those native grasses had been plowed under to make way for Man’s own use of the land.

The term "Great Plains", for the region west of about the 96th meridian and east of the Rocky Mountains, was not generally used before the early 20th century. Prior to that time the region was almost invariably called the High Plains, in contrast to the lower Prairie Plains of the Midwestern states. Today the term "High Plains" is used for a subregion of the Great Plains.

It is assumed that during the Cretaceous Period (145-65 million years ago), the Great Plains were covered by a shallow inland sea called the Western Interior Seaway. However, during the Late Cretaceous to the Paleocene (65-55 million years ago), the seaway had begun to recede, leaving behind thick marine deposits and a relatively flat terrain the seaway had once occupied.

Paleontological finds in the plains have yielded bones of woolly mammoths, saber toothed tigers and other ancient animals, as well as dozens of other large animals of over 100 lb (45 kg) — such as the giant sloths, some horses, mastodons, and the American lion. These animals dominated the area of the ancient Great Plains for ‘millions of years.’ The vast majority of these animals went extinct in North America around 13,000 years ago during the ‘end of the Pleistocene Period.’

In general, the Great Plains had and still have a wide variety of weather throughout the year, with very cold winters and very hot summers. Wind speeds were often high. The prairies supported abundant wildlife in undisturbed settings. By the end of the 1800s Humans had converted most of the prairies for agricultural purposes or pastures.

The first Americans (Indians) who arrived in the Great Plains were successive indigenous cultures who were known to have inhabited the Great Plains for thousands of years perhaps even so many as 10,000 years. Some of those tribes have tales which were handed down verbally at the time of others who were present and who ‘communicated with the Gods.’ Was that a recipe for alien communication? If so, where did they and their descendants go? Were they eventually rescued? They would have been birthed as humans even if educated as aliens. Those descendants couldn’t ‘take off their skins’ to become aliens again so were they assimilated into the tribes which crossed into the Americas or??? Of those ‘others’ there has been precious little or no trace today. Most of those who were known to have inhabited the plains entered the North American continent in waves of migration, mostly over Beringia, the Bering Straits land bridge.

Historically the later Great Plains were the range of the bison and of the culture of the Plains Indians, whose tribes included the Blackfoot, Crow, Sioux, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Comanche, and others. Eastern portions of the Great Plains were inhabited by tribes who lived in semipermanent villages of earth lodges, such as the Arikara, Mandan, Pawnee and Wichita.

With the arrival of Francisco Vá¡zquez de Coronado, a Spanish conquistador, the first recorded history of encounter between Europeans and Native Americans in the Great Plains occurred in Texas, Kansas and Nebraska from 1540-1542. In that same time period, Hernando de Soto crossed a west-northwest direction in what is now Oklahoma and Texas. Today this is known as the De Soto Trail. The Spanish thought the Great Plains were the location of the mythological Quivira and Cá­bola, a place said to be rich in gold.

Over the next one hundred years, founding of the fur trade brought thousands of ethnic Europeans into the Great Plains. Fur trappers from France, Spain, Britain, Russia and the young United States made their way across much of the region, making regular stops at settlements of Native Americans and other fur traders, most especially at the yearly “rendezvous” so named for the French traders and some families which participated in it each year. After the United States acquired the Louisiana Purchase in 1803 and conducted the Lewis and Clark Expedition in 1804-1806, more information about the Plains became available and various pioneers entered those areas. Manuel Lisa, based in St. Louis, established a major fur trading site at Fort Lisa on the Missouri River in Nebraska. Fur trading posts were often the basis of later settlements. Through the 19th century, more European Americans and Europeans migrated to the Great Plains as part of a vast westward expansion of population. New settlements became dotted across the Great Plains as the land was “tamed”.

(information leading to the setting of this story copyright wikipedia and my few history books)

Tale 17 of the "I remember Tomorrow" Anthology.

All characters and businesses in this work have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no intentional relationship whatsoever to anyone or anything bearing the same name or names. The characters and business names contained herein are not even distantly inspired by any individuals or businesses known or unknown to the author, and all incidents described or alluded to within this work are pure invention. No affiliations, involvements or gender assignations due to the use of any images contained within this work are to be implied, intended or inferred.

Image ‘Young Bride’ #11290645 used under license-XL  © Fotoskat / fotolia.

The Painting Over The Fireplace - copyright  © 2011 by D. A. Trask

All rights reserved.

The posting of this story chapter on the site known as BCTS (Big Closet - Top Shelf) in no way indicates this work is public domain and, in fact, this copyright contains an implicit license on the part of the author to permit this portion of the work to be maintained by BCTS for the reading enjoyment of those who frequent that site (BCTS) and such posting shall not be considered as authorization for any further posting of this work at or upon any other location or site.

Except for small excerpts of 200 words or less used in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means now known or hereafter invented, designed, or conceived, or in any retrieval system for any purpose, is forbidden without written and specific license of the author or his/ her heirs or Estate.

NOTE:

I gave up trying to figure a way to re-post this without placing it on the front page again. The shortened version was posted October fifteenth, 2011 and although early, traded upon the Halloween mood which was just beginning to build. It was not entered into the Halloween story contest.

(Original Comments)

A bit of a paradox going on here.

Submitted by WebDeb on Sat, 2011/10/15 - 4:06pm.
Without giving too much away. He sort of became his own ancestor. Without his "Great something Grandmother" he would not have existed. Somehow he contributed to his own birth 150+ years later. Perhaps he landed in a parallel dimension or this gives a hint of reincarnation?
Anyway excuse my curious mind. Congratulations on a most entertaining debut story. Out of curiosity, did you intend this to be entered in the story comp? Although it was set pre-halloween I think it could qualify and be a worthy entry.
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Interesting.

Submitted by WinterWolf on Sat, 2011/10/15 - 4:07pm.
Interesting.
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Good Story.

Submitted by Maggie_Finson on Sat, 2011/10/15 - 4:59pm.
Weird and that's appropriate to the season.
This has a lot more going on than has been shown so far, I can see that.
Maggie
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painting over the fireplace.

Submitted by Anesidoras_Urn on Sat, 2011/10/15 - 7:17pm.
Thank you.
Yes, the story was intended to follow the 'beat of a different drummer'.
So many Halloween stories follow the ghoul, goblin and ghost patterns that it is difficult to come up with something new. This story was written to make use of the concept that the veil is drastically thinned during this time of year and as such many things can happen which otherwise would not.
It isn't necessary that those 'things' be malicious nor that they be something which is detrimental to the human condition, therefore, this story. It hopefully has sufficient mystery in it although I could have written a great deal more, embellishing upon that which I did present but I wanted something short and to the point since I am working on no less than six MUCH longer stories which I hope to be able to begin presenting around the turn of the year.
Thank you for your kind comments.
Anesidora
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Interesting Story...

Submitted by Eric on Sun, 2011/10/16 - 6:08am.
...a very quiet story, and as you said, something a bit different. Interesting scene-setting at the beginning.
Did I miss something, or are the four old guns in the desk and bookcase just there to flout Chekhov's Law? They don't seem like a clue to the time shift since it's still the male Jack who discovers them, even though he hasn't seen them before.
Eric
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