Gina’s new dorm mate had golden skin and eyes like emeralds. Her name was Karfa. She was extraordinarily good-natured and kind. Her good nature communicated itself through Gina, until she began to act the same as her. Always seen together, avoiding the other students, sitting quietly, talking. They were interested each in how the other lived and what past experience they could draw upon to cast relevance in the present.
The one of golden skin’s eyes sparkled when Gina shared tidbits about her own upbringing, where even mundane things could become objects of lengthy conversation. She had enjoyed a high middle-class childhood, with all its privileges, parented by two nurturing, protective, civil servants, who had married in near middle age. They were social activists, in that they contributed to just causes, so long as none of it clashed with earning their livelihood. Gina remained apolitical throughout her young life, being a dreamer and an artist.
As for her friend, Karfa had immigrated from a foreign land, before émigrés were forbidden, and she had escaped the purges of recent months. Her tales of adventurous travels and of an exotic homeland fascinated Gina. She had never heard of such places. When she tried to look them up on a search engine, she was always confounded. But, she chalked it up to a dearth of information and consequently felt no concern.
When classes were due for a summer break, Karfa invited Gina to spend the weeks with her family, as they journeyed home, to visit friends and relatives. Gina fretted that she may not have time to get a passport. She was told she would not need one to travel to the homeland. They were not required in that land, plus the fact the family’s mode of transportation bypasses normal means of leaving and entering any country. Gina did not fully understand, but, Karfa would never lie to her.
Gina was home with her parents for a week.
The day they were set to leave, both Mommy and Daddy pressed money in her hand and cautioned her to keep her phone charged. Gina always carried the latest technology, but her parents still referred to it as a “phone.” She hugged them, when they heard the automobile, then slipped outside with her bag to meet them.
She had seen the car before. It was a make unfamiliar, of a body style to conjure planes and rockets. The inside was heavily padded. She and Karfa could fit comfortably in a wide back seat.
Karfa’s Dad’s face was huge, his eyes deep-set and green. His overgenerous mouth smiled in a welcoming manner, as her Mom said a gentle “Hi.” The Mom seemed frail. Her skin tone not so gold as that of her husband and daughter.
Gina just knew they would get along well.
She could see her parents, peeking out the door, as they took off. Still the protective ones, if letting her grow. She mentally hugged them, more.
The travelers entered the freeway, pointed north, away from town, running beneath a bright sky, with greenery spread over the low hills, the cars in seeming racing packs. Karfa’s parents, Arlor and Ola, were musical people. They enjoyed singing as they drove. Their favorite songs were the gentle, socially conscious ones, such as Louis Armstrong’s version of “What a Wonderful World,” and Cat Steven’s “Morning Has Broken.” Gina was thrilled to take in the concert, nestled in luxurious comfort, sharing warm feelings with the whole family.
For the first leg of the trip, Gina nestled and listened. After the singing ended, she took notice of her surroundings. Dad Arlor, she discovered, was not driving at all. The car was self-operating and it had a voice to communicate with Arlor to provide information and a device to receive a designated person’s instructions. Not entirely original, but a new experience for her.
About forty-five minutes since leaving home, the car made a turn onto a smaller road. The road led them up a steep incline and abruptly ended. Gina just knew they would have to turn back. Instead, the car accelerated and almost instantly left the solid Earth behind. “I always enjoy that sudden thrust,” Dad Arlor grinned, the remark aimed at Gina.
“Where are we flying to?” Gina gathered enough wit to say.
“Didn’t Karfa explain it to you?” he replied. “And, by the way, we are not flying. It’s a celestial highway. Only the initiate knows how to use it.
“Our homeland is not of the Earth. You see, the highway leads us to a hub, a gateway to the other dimensions. Our family’s origin is a beautiful land, known as (word untranslatable). You will love to visit this land.”
Gina wanted to believe and be relaxed, but fear had wormed its way deep inside her. She knew hysteria to be a few increments away, as the car leveled off and approached the hub. There was a man seemingly walking on the sky, hailing Arlor, who pulled up and put his window down.
After exchanging pleasantries in an unknown to Gina language, the man explained something to Arlor, which he explained to Gina. “There is a glitch in the distributor unit and we will have to wait about twenty minutes until it is taken care of. There is a waiting facility within the hub. We can have refreshments, stretch our legs and the like.”
They left the car and were ushered inside the hub, which Gina had found to be invisible until they went inside. She had to shut her eyes for the walk over there.
It was a huge facility, much like Grand Central Station, in New York, with cars lined up inside. She understood that Arlor had parked outside, due to space limitations. All used the facilities and later met at a food bar.
“Have I time to show Gina around?” Karfa wondered, addressing her mother.
She took her friend’s hand and they examined the gift shops, as well as businesses offering necessities, to be carried into specified dimensions, where one would be in trouble, or at least embarrassed, without them. They lingered for an hour until a musical sound gave the signal: System Repaired.
By the time the interrupted travelers reclaimed their car, the lines within the hub were moving, at a rapid pace. Each driver swiped a card and proceeded into the tube, to be channeled off to the appropriate dimension. Dad Arlor, card in hand, drove up to the machine and properly ran his card. It was a matter of fact transaction, after more than twenty-five years of making journeys from his second home on Earth and the ancestral land he sought now to return to.
In the first indication something was going wrong, Arlor expected to be shunted to the left, but instead, the car did a hard right. A black curtain seemed to cover the dimension before them and right away it was almost too late to avoid going there. “Get out of the car. Run for it,” Arlor shouted.
The entire family fled the car. Gina was clumsy about getting free.
As the portal behind began shutting the petals over the opening, the family scrambled back through to the Earthside. Gina tried, reached out for Karfa’s outstretched hand, until a petal brushed the hand away, leaving Gina to scream out Karfa’s name as the last probability of escape quickly vanished. She turned a terrified eye on the black sweeping in around her and fought her way back into the car.
The precocious car announced, “New driver. Language: English. Please stand by.”
“What shall I do?” Gina implored.
The car repeated the last message. It conceded to her a frugal cab light, but nothing more. As she huddled in abject terror, the silence and the darkness seemed more oppressive by the moment. She was startled when the car began speaking again.
“No one is coming to the rescue. You are Gina Griffin. You have been granted the right to drive me. I haven’t the data to analyze this environment. There is no road and it will be strictly guesswork when we finally move. There almost has to be carbon-based life forms here, because the air is good clean quality. Whether it is to be benevolent or dangerous, time will tell. Would you like to rest here and start driving later? Are you rested enough to go exploring?”
“I think exploring. I’m too frightened to sit and do nothing.”
The car energized itself. The exterior lights went on and the cab light died. The headlamps cut but a short distance into the heavy blackness. Gina determined there were bluffs and stones. It appeared there could be no place to go. The car inched around, backing and turning at times. “Stones are sharp,” it said. “Putting dangerous pressure on the tires.”
The hours passed. They were getting nowhere. Against her will, Gina slept. At one point, she became aware the car was bouncing, shaking, almost careening downhill. But she did not fully awaken. After that, the ride became smooth. When she awakened, the dark had not lifted. The car had been sitting for some time, waiting to share information and to receive instructions.
“We are at a cross point. The terrain is smooth. There is no indication of a road or of sentient life. We may freely travel in any direction at all. Which way do you choose?”
“Any way but back where we started,” Gina supposed.
“And that way is -?”
“Just go the way we are pointed,” she said, finally.
The darkness so crowded in on her she felt she was breathing darkness. It was demoralizing to the point she knew herself as wilting, about to give up. She would never see her parents again or have wonderful conversations with Karfa. What was the use of trying? Her eyes brimmed with tears.
Then, a crack in the black of the night appeared, just at the horizon.
It was a brilliant blue-white that slowly grew as the car made its trek across the flat soil. After twenty minutes, a sun burst upon the arc of the planet, its light sweeping before it in an instant glow and sudden heat. The car turned on the air conditioning.
“I detect a forest, to the left a bit. If I may I will direct our course to it.”
“Yes,” she agreed.
With increased speed the car sought and then approached the forest. It stalled, needing to analyze the strange growth and the sprinkling of creatures in flight through the trees. After a lengthy pause, it announced, “There are a few growths poisonous to Earth beings in there. The winged animals moved away before a complete analysis could be enacted. They appear to be warm-blooded. Intelligent? Dangerous? I don’t know. I recommend we skirt the forest to check what’s on the other side, or beyond, even.”
“I will follow your recommendations,” she said. “What else can I do?”
“You have chosen the wiser course,” the car assured her.
The forest at one point towered higher than the tallest Earth trees. They were cruising around the bulge it presented in their pathway, when a hippopotamus sized animal swooped overhead, screeching like an eagle with a sore throat. It soared above the treetops, then again swooped and was hidden within the heavy foliage. After a tour lasting three hours, the car left the forest to follow a deep gash in the soil that had plants similar to grass along its inner sides. The car explained that the gash pointed to a valley with some form of life, though it had no clue if that meant good news or bad.
The car eased up to the valley rim, analyzing. “The life below is a mixed flora/fauna and I detect some sort of social structure. Whether it is an antlike structure, dog-like or human, I cannot say. Do you wish to go in and see how we are received?”
Gina’s very protoplasm cried, No,” but in the end, she realized she would have to make contact at some point, as a matter of survival. “Let’s go in,” she said.
“One suggestion, before we do,” the car advised. “Take the small black device that is plugged into the dashboard. Pin it on your shirt. The device will allow you to communicate with me and it will allow you to understand most forms of language and it will translate your speech to others.”
She gratefully made the transfer of the box from the dashboard to her shirt. Now she did not feel totally defenseless.
The car eased into the bowl that was the valley, its brain prepared to turn and flee at the first sign of danger. The stems and leaves that brushed near her window were not so strange to Gina; just a bit different. She strained her eyes to see beyond some low trees that obstructed her view. And then there appeared a rooftop, a conical thatched roof. The car wove a path in that direction. It was a silent car. No residents of the valley had likely been alerted, by the time they stopped, right outside a long, low building that Gina characterized as a bungalow.
Gina stared intently at the building, unable to detect any movement.
“Get out and approach? Or leave?” the car suggested.
“I was sort of hoping somebody would have a peek to see what’s out here,” she replied. “I have never been so afraid.”
Then she thought of something. “Blow the horn,” she said.
Toot toot.
The car’s timid toots produced no reaction.
“Lay on it,” Gina insisted.
This time the horn startled the life among the tree branches, causing bird-sized critters to fill the sky, as they sought to distance themselves from the monster producing the horrendous sound. A face poked out the door and quickly vanished back inside. At least Gina assumed it to be a face. It was as black as had been the night, and it vanished too quickly to study for any discernable features.
Gina’s uncertainty increased. “Maybe we should travel on,” she suggested.
“Is that a decision or a question?” the car asked, to be clear.
“I don’t know. I guess we should wait and see if they come outside, to be sure if they are friendly or not.”
The car cut the air conditioning. “For a reason I have not yet discovered, the temperature has moderated, here.”
It quickly became clear why the heat diminished. Dusk was rapidly gaining on them. “Is the day here shorter than night?” she asked the car.
“It is,” was the answer. “The planet and its sun do not appear to be in synch.”
“We should probably move away from here to spend the night. Do you think we can find a safer place I can sleep?”
As the woman and car debated the next action, the darkness encroached rapidly. In the heavy darkness the house inhabitants, unnoticed, came outside. Only because their eyes glowed, Gina noticed them at all. They moved erratically about the car so that the eyes gave an appearance much like a swarm of fireflies. Their blackness and failure to be still made it impossible to gauge their features.
“What are they? Are they dangerous?” she said, her voice edging toward hysteria.
“I do not know how to classify them,” the machine responded. “Because they are an unmeasured carbon-based life form they are potentially dangerous. Only experience can sort it out. They apparently hide from the light, which may be why they would not come outside when I honked. Do you wish me to leave here?”
“Yes. I don’t think I can deal with them.”
The instant the car showed a sign of movement, the creatures fell back. Then they surged forward, grabbing at and slapping the doors and windows. The car slowly gathered speed, seeking to get away without causing injury. They were not runners; consequently, all were quickly outdistanced.
Coming out of the valley, the car requested to keep searching during the night. That way, Gina would be able to sleep as the need overtook her, but the goal of locating a sympathetic situation would be furthered, simultaneously. “Would you like some light, or do you prefer the darkness?”
“A little overhead light, please. Just to comfort me. I don’t want to see out of the car, just now. There are too many frightening things out there,” she said.
Plying the night, like a nocturnal beast, the stalwart vehicle broke through in the late night to a land that was cultivated and had villages and towns. By the time Gina roused from her sleep, they were paused on a road that mirrored rural America.
She prowled through Karfa and her parents’ belongings until there turned up some candy bars and bags of chips. The candy she unwrapped was embedded with salted peanuts. It temporarily satisfied the hunger but increased the thirst. “Go to the nearest habitation,” she instructed. “I’ve got to have some water.”
They came on a house made of piled stones, its general structure like what in the western states would be called ranch house design. There was a great old tractor by a field and a red truck parked by the house. Gina guessed the farmer to be hiding from the intense heat of the day. She instructed the car to turn in and pull up close.
“It looks so friendly,” she said cheered somewhat. “I am going to get out and knock.”
“Data showing now that the plants in the field affect your perception. Simply put: You will see what you wish to see, around here. You have an option to drive on.”
In her eagerness for something normal at last, the girl dismissed the car’s words. Here there should be comfort. There should be food and water. Her steps took her to a wide door, with glass to look through, beyond a lace curtain, which had been pulled to the side. Desperation pushed her to rap loudly on it and wait expectantly.
The face of a grandfatherly man appeared through the now opened door. “Yes?” he said, with a kindly smile.
“Please, I am lost and alone. I don’t have anyone to turn to for help.” She did not sound pathetic, but, rather, hopeful.
“Come in, young woman. So sorry for your trouble. Come into the house and wait, while I get my wife from the kitchen.” He paused, looking back from his traipse to the kitchen. “Would you like anything? A drink, or food, maybe?”
“Oh, yes. I am so thirsty and hungry.”
“Come into the kitchen, then, and we shall fix up a nice meal.”
“Thank you,” she said humbly.
She followed him until they came into a room where the man’s wife had just taken a roast from the oven. It was a fine cut of meat, filling the kitchen with a smell much like leg of lamb. She placed the roast on a rack to cool, before turning in surprise at the presence of a stranger inside her home. She regarded Gina with a blank stare for a moment, before her heart seemingly melted, and her demeanor became welcoming and warm.
“This is Abigail,” the man said. “My wife of forty years. I am John. And what’s your name?”
She gave them her name and they had Gina sit at the table, with a tall glass of ice water and a pitcher for refills. The old couple watched eagerly as she downed the entire glassful. Abigail poured her a second glass from the pitcher. “Now, you just wait. Granny’s going to fix you up a plate like you’ve never had before.”
John and Abigail hovered as Gina devoured a huge meal and sat back, sated and stuffed. She looked up from the empty plate and gave them a heartfelt “Thank you.”
It was plain to see she needed a spot to lie down and recover. They put her in a room with a high mattress and fluffy covers. She lay with her head on a soft pillow and quickly fell asleep.
She awakened, feeling grateful and relieved to be where life could have a semblance of normalcy, although she would ever be haunted by the loss of family and friends, and Earth itself. She showered and tidied herself, then went out to see if John and Abigail were about. She met John as he came in from outside chores.
“Good. You are awake,” he said, as he hung a beaten old hat on a hook by the door. “As I understand, you are without a home to go to. I’ve had a conversation with Abigail, and she agrees with me. You have a home, right here, if you agree to stay.”
“Oh, thank you, sir. You can’t know how relieved, how grateful I am.”
“You will agree to be assigned chores, to pay for your upkeep, I told her,” he added.
“I certainly will. Enthusiastically,” she gushed.
“While Granny is preparing your breakfast, I would like to show you around, outside.”
John walked Gina outside of the house, to where a great cage imprisoned hundreds of flying creatures. They were half the size of hummingbirds. She could not decide if they were birds, insects, or, something else.
“They are wumbles,” he informed her, exhibiting a great deal of pride. “They multiply rapidly. I sell most and make a good profit by them.”
He lifted back the lid from a bin. “Here is their food. All you have to do is take out five scoops and send it down this chute.” He demonstrated the action by feeding the wumbles himself.
The critters screeched like demons, attacking their breakfast, devouring it all in a mere two minutes. “They need their food two times per day.”
He demonstrated how the cage bottom slid on rollers, to be rolled out and cleaned. It was an automatic procedure, once initiated by the rolling out by Gina.
“Your one other task will be to let out the Carrses to run. They will make a mad scramble to the end of the track and come walking back. Then you just lock the gate again.”
He showed her the Carrses, which were twenty-pound furry animals with doe eyes and snouts like pigs. He opened up the gate. The animals made their run and came panting back, docile and ready to get locked in. “You won’t have to feed them, because there is a pasture on the other end.”
Gina gratefully acknowledged her tasks, vowing to be faithful to the duties and eager to be of help in any other ways she could.
As she devoured breakfast, she thought it strange that her benefactors had not joined her in any meals. She did not question their right to leave her alone to eat. Varying cultures can have taboos and customs their guests don’t understand.
Abigail took away the dishes, telling Gina as she gathered them, “Don’t worry about these. My great joy is taking care of this home. My day would be ruined if I could not do everything in it.”
“But, I just thought -”
“Nonsense, dear. You just let Granny handle it.”
In fact, the couple seemed always busy, out sight, to the point life quickly became boring and pointless.
One day a carrs came straggling after the rest were already moving on to the pasture in the back. Gina opened the gate and approached it, with her arms outstretched. It immediately pegged her as a friend and ally and ran to her. It felt as soft as a teddy bear. Its soft hands clutched her fingers. They snuggled and played until Gina realized she was neglecting to feed the wumbles.
She pushed the disappointed carrs inside the gate and hurried to the wumble cage.
After two weeks on the farm, the effect of the plant causing Gina to see what she wished to see began to wear thinner. She caught occasional glimpses of John and Abigail as they really were. It was as brief as a few seconds, mostly. One morning, she glimpsed “Granny” and “Grandpa” through a partially opened door. She beheld their great skulls and massive jawbones as they enjoyed a leisurely meal. Granny folded back the wings of living wumbles and pushed them down her throat. Grandpa bit chunks from the buttock of a living carrs. The animals squealed horribly. Then, like switching of TV channels, the scene reverted to a kindly couple dining on a humdrum fare.
This final straw sent her into the confines of the car, where she asked it to take her away from the place. The car answered her, saying, “I have wandered on this planet in recent days, in search of a place for you to live with some dignity. For better or worse, this farm most meets your needs, of all the situations I visited. You are advised by me to remain right here. You are the driver, however. The choice is yours alone to make.”
Gina sighed. She even cried a little. At last, she acquiesced. “All right,” she agreed. “But you will keep on searching?”
“Now I have delivered you to your destination. I ask your release. As I belong to someone else, I am bound to seek him out. It is my notion to return to our point of entry in this universe and to seek a way back. Should I make the discovery, I will do my utmost to see you are saved. Don’t be optimistic. At this point, I have no clue.”
There was a pause.
“Am I released?”
Gina hugged the steering wheel. “Of course,” she said, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
The girl watched the car go. When it was gone, she returned to the farmhouse, done with her chores for the day.
The one of golden skin’s eyes sparkled when Gina shared tidbits about her own upbringing, where even mundane things could become objects of lengthy conversation. She had enjoyed a high middle-class childhood, with all its privileges, parented by two nurturing, protective, civil servants, who had married in near middle age. They were social activists, in that they contributed to just causes, so long as none of it clashed with earning their livelihood. Gina remained apolitical throughout her young life, being a dreamer and an artist.
As for her friend, Karfa had immigrated from a foreign land, before émigrés were forbidden, and she had escaped the purges of recent months. Her tales of adventurous travels and of an exotic homeland fascinated Gina. She had never heard of such places. When she tried to look them up on a search engine, she was always confounded. But, she chalked it up to a dearth of information and consequently felt no concern.
When classes were due for a summer break, Karfa invited Gina to spend the weeks with her family, as they journeyed home, to visit friends and relatives. Gina fretted that she may not have time to get a passport. She was told she would not need one to travel to the homeland. They were not required in that land, plus the fact the family’s mode of transportation bypasses normal means of leaving and entering any country. Gina did not fully understand, but, Karfa would never lie to her.
Gina was home with her parents for a week.
The day they were set to leave, both Mommy and Daddy pressed money in her hand and cautioned her to keep her phone charged. Gina always carried the latest technology, but her parents still referred to it as a “phone.” She hugged them, when they heard the automobile, then slipped outside with her bag to meet them.
She had seen the car before. It was a make unfamiliar, of a body style to conjure planes and rockets. The inside was heavily padded. She and Karfa could fit comfortably in a wide back seat.
Karfa’s Dad’s face was huge, his eyes deep-set and green. His overgenerous mouth smiled in a welcoming manner, as her Mom said a gentle “Hi.” The Mom seemed frail. Her skin tone not so gold as that of her husband and daughter.
Gina just knew they would get along well.
She could see her parents, peeking out the door, as they took off. Still the protective ones, if letting her grow. She mentally hugged them, more.
The travelers entered the freeway, pointed north, away from town, running beneath a bright sky, with greenery spread over the low hills, the cars in seeming racing packs. Karfa’s parents, Arlor and Ola, were musical people. They enjoyed singing as they drove. Their favorite songs were the gentle, socially conscious ones, such as Louis Armstrong’s version of “What a Wonderful World,” and Cat Steven’s “Morning Has Broken.” Gina was thrilled to take in the concert, nestled in luxurious comfort, sharing warm feelings with the whole family.
For the first leg of the trip, Gina nestled and listened. After the singing ended, she took notice of her surroundings. Dad Arlor, she discovered, was not driving at all. The car was self-operating and it had a voice to communicate with Arlor to provide information and a device to receive a designated person’s instructions. Not entirely original, but a new experience for her.
About forty-five minutes since leaving home, the car made a turn onto a smaller road. The road led them up a steep incline and abruptly ended. Gina just knew they would have to turn back. Instead, the car accelerated and almost instantly left the solid Earth behind. “I always enjoy that sudden thrust,” Dad Arlor grinned, the remark aimed at Gina.
“Where are we flying to?” Gina gathered enough wit to say.
“Didn’t Karfa explain it to you?” he replied. “And, by the way, we are not flying. It’s a celestial highway. Only the initiate knows how to use it.
“Our homeland is not of the Earth. You see, the highway leads us to a hub, a gateway to the other dimensions. Our family’s origin is a beautiful land, known as (word untranslatable). You will love to visit this land.”
Gina wanted to believe and be relaxed, but fear had wormed its way deep inside her. She knew hysteria to be a few increments away, as the car leveled off and approached the hub. There was a man seemingly walking on the sky, hailing Arlor, who pulled up and put his window down.
After exchanging pleasantries in an unknown to Gina language, the man explained something to Arlor, which he explained to Gina. “There is a glitch in the distributor unit and we will have to wait about twenty minutes until it is taken care of. There is a waiting facility within the hub. We can have refreshments, stretch our legs and the like.”
They left the car and were ushered inside the hub, which Gina had found to be invisible until they went inside. She had to shut her eyes for the walk over there.
It was a huge facility, much like Grand Central Station, in New York, with cars lined up inside. She understood that Arlor had parked outside, due to space limitations. All used the facilities and later met at a food bar.
“Have I time to show Gina around?” Karfa wondered, addressing her mother.
She took her friend’s hand and they examined the gift shops, as well as businesses offering necessities, to be carried into specified dimensions, where one would be in trouble, or at least embarrassed, without them. They lingered for an hour until a musical sound gave the signal: System Repaired.
By the time the interrupted travelers reclaimed their car, the lines within the hub were moving, at a rapid pace. Each driver swiped a card and proceeded into the tube, to be channeled off to the appropriate dimension. Dad Arlor, card in hand, drove up to the machine and properly ran his card. It was a matter of fact transaction, after more than twenty-five years of making journeys from his second home on Earth and the ancestral land he sought now to return to.
In the first indication something was going wrong, Arlor expected to be shunted to the left, but instead, the car did a hard right. A black curtain seemed to cover the dimension before them and right away it was almost too late to avoid going there. “Get out of the car. Run for it,” Arlor shouted.
The entire family fled the car. Gina was clumsy about getting free.
As the portal behind began shutting the petals over the opening, the family scrambled back through to the Earthside. Gina tried, reached out for Karfa’s outstretched hand, until a petal brushed the hand away, leaving Gina to scream out Karfa’s name as the last probability of escape quickly vanished. She turned a terrified eye on the black sweeping in around her and fought her way back into the car.
The precocious car announced, “New driver. Language: English. Please stand by.”
“What shall I do?” Gina implored.
The car repeated the last message. It conceded to her a frugal cab light, but nothing more. As she huddled in abject terror, the silence and the darkness seemed more oppressive by the moment. She was startled when the car began speaking again.
“No one is coming to the rescue. You are Gina Griffin. You have been granted the right to drive me. I haven’t the data to analyze this environment. There is no road and it will be strictly guesswork when we finally move. There almost has to be carbon-based life forms here, because the air is good clean quality. Whether it is to be benevolent or dangerous, time will tell. Would you like to rest here and start driving later? Are you rested enough to go exploring?”
“I think exploring. I’m too frightened to sit and do nothing.”
The car energized itself. The exterior lights went on and the cab light died. The headlamps cut but a short distance into the heavy blackness. Gina determined there were bluffs and stones. It appeared there could be no place to go. The car inched around, backing and turning at times. “Stones are sharp,” it said. “Putting dangerous pressure on the tires.”
The hours passed. They were getting nowhere. Against her will, Gina slept. At one point, she became aware the car was bouncing, shaking, almost careening downhill. But she did not fully awaken. After that, the ride became smooth. When she awakened, the dark had not lifted. The car had been sitting for some time, waiting to share information and to receive instructions.
“We are at a cross point. The terrain is smooth. There is no indication of a road or of sentient life. We may freely travel in any direction at all. Which way do you choose?”
“Any way but back where we started,” Gina supposed.
“And that way is -?”
“Just go the way we are pointed,” she said, finally.
The darkness so crowded in on her she felt she was breathing darkness. It was demoralizing to the point she knew herself as wilting, about to give up. She would never see her parents again or have wonderful conversations with Karfa. What was the use of trying? Her eyes brimmed with tears.
Then, a crack in the black of the night appeared, just at the horizon.
It was a brilliant blue-white that slowly grew as the car made its trek across the flat soil. After twenty minutes, a sun burst upon the arc of the planet, its light sweeping before it in an instant glow and sudden heat. The car turned on the air conditioning.
“I detect a forest, to the left a bit. If I may I will direct our course to it.”
“Yes,” she agreed.
With increased speed the car sought and then approached the forest. It stalled, needing to analyze the strange growth and the sprinkling of creatures in flight through the trees. After a lengthy pause, it announced, “There are a few growths poisonous to Earth beings in there. The winged animals moved away before a complete analysis could be enacted. They appear to be warm-blooded. Intelligent? Dangerous? I don’t know. I recommend we skirt the forest to check what’s on the other side, or beyond, even.”
“I will follow your recommendations,” she said. “What else can I do?”
“You have chosen the wiser course,” the car assured her.
The forest at one point towered higher than the tallest Earth trees. They were cruising around the bulge it presented in their pathway, when a hippopotamus sized animal swooped overhead, screeching like an eagle with a sore throat. It soared above the treetops, then again swooped and was hidden within the heavy foliage. After a tour lasting three hours, the car left the forest to follow a deep gash in the soil that had plants similar to grass along its inner sides. The car explained that the gash pointed to a valley with some form of life, though it had no clue if that meant good news or bad.
The car eased up to the valley rim, analyzing. “The life below is a mixed flora/fauna and I detect some sort of social structure. Whether it is an antlike structure, dog-like or human, I cannot say. Do you wish to go in and see how we are received?”
Gina’s very protoplasm cried, No,” but in the end, she realized she would have to make contact at some point, as a matter of survival. “Let’s go in,” she said.
“One suggestion, before we do,” the car advised. “Take the small black device that is plugged into the dashboard. Pin it on your shirt. The device will allow you to communicate with me and it will allow you to understand most forms of language and it will translate your speech to others.”
She gratefully made the transfer of the box from the dashboard to her shirt. Now she did not feel totally defenseless.
The car eased into the bowl that was the valley, its brain prepared to turn and flee at the first sign of danger. The stems and leaves that brushed near her window were not so strange to Gina; just a bit different. She strained her eyes to see beyond some low trees that obstructed her view. And then there appeared a rooftop, a conical thatched roof. The car wove a path in that direction. It was a silent car. No residents of the valley had likely been alerted, by the time they stopped, right outside a long, low building that Gina characterized as a bungalow.
Gina stared intently at the building, unable to detect any movement.
“Get out and approach? Or leave?” the car suggested.
“I was sort of hoping somebody would have a peek to see what’s out here,” she replied. “I have never been so afraid.”
Then she thought of something. “Blow the horn,” she said.
Toot toot.
The car’s timid toots produced no reaction.
“Lay on it,” Gina insisted.
This time the horn startled the life among the tree branches, causing bird-sized critters to fill the sky, as they sought to distance themselves from the monster producing the horrendous sound. A face poked out the door and quickly vanished back inside. At least Gina assumed it to be a face. It was as black as had been the night, and it vanished too quickly to study for any discernable features.
Gina’s uncertainty increased. “Maybe we should travel on,” she suggested.
“Is that a decision or a question?” the car asked, to be clear.
“I don’t know. I guess we should wait and see if they come outside, to be sure if they are friendly or not.”
The car cut the air conditioning. “For a reason I have not yet discovered, the temperature has moderated, here.”
It quickly became clear why the heat diminished. Dusk was rapidly gaining on them. “Is the day here shorter than night?” she asked the car.
“It is,” was the answer. “The planet and its sun do not appear to be in synch.”
“We should probably move away from here to spend the night. Do you think we can find a safer place I can sleep?”
As the woman and car debated the next action, the darkness encroached rapidly. In the heavy darkness the house inhabitants, unnoticed, came outside. Only because their eyes glowed, Gina noticed them at all. They moved erratically about the car so that the eyes gave an appearance much like a swarm of fireflies. Their blackness and failure to be still made it impossible to gauge their features.
“What are they? Are they dangerous?” she said, her voice edging toward hysteria.
“I do not know how to classify them,” the machine responded. “Because they are an unmeasured carbon-based life form they are potentially dangerous. Only experience can sort it out. They apparently hide from the light, which may be why they would not come outside when I honked. Do you wish me to leave here?”
“Yes. I don’t think I can deal with them.”
The instant the car showed a sign of movement, the creatures fell back. Then they surged forward, grabbing at and slapping the doors and windows. The car slowly gathered speed, seeking to get away without causing injury. They were not runners; consequently, all were quickly outdistanced.
Coming out of the valley, the car requested to keep searching during the night. That way, Gina would be able to sleep as the need overtook her, but the goal of locating a sympathetic situation would be furthered, simultaneously. “Would you like some light, or do you prefer the darkness?”
“A little overhead light, please. Just to comfort me. I don’t want to see out of the car, just now. There are too many frightening things out there,” she said.
Plying the night, like a nocturnal beast, the stalwart vehicle broke through in the late night to a land that was cultivated and had villages and towns. By the time Gina roused from her sleep, they were paused on a road that mirrored rural America.
She prowled through Karfa and her parents’ belongings until there turned up some candy bars and bags of chips. The candy she unwrapped was embedded with salted peanuts. It temporarily satisfied the hunger but increased the thirst. “Go to the nearest habitation,” she instructed. “I’ve got to have some water.”
They came on a house made of piled stones, its general structure like what in the western states would be called ranch house design. There was a great old tractor by a field and a red truck parked by the house. Gina guessed the farmer to be hiding from the intense heat of the day. She instructed the car to turn in and pull up close.
“It looks so friendly,” she said cheered somewhat. “I am going to get out and knock.”
“Data showing now that the plants in the field affect your perception. Simply put: You will see what you wish to see, around here. You have an option to drive on.”
In her eagerness for something normal at last, the girl dismissed the car’s words. Here there should be comfort. There should be food and water. Her steps took her to a wide door, with glass to look through, beyond a lace curtain, which had been pulled to the side. Desperation pushed her to rap loudly on it and wait expectantly.
The face of a grandfatherly man appeared through the now opened door. “Yes?” he said, with a kindly smile.
“Please, I am lost and alone. I don’t have anyone to turn to for help.” She did not sound pathetic, but, rather, hopeful.
“Come in, young woman. So sorry for your trouble. Come into the house and wait, while I get my wife from the kitchen.” He paused, looking back from his traipse to the kitchen. “Would you like anything? A drink, or food, maybe?”
“Oh, yes. I am so thirsty and hungry.”
“Come into the kitchen, then, and we shall fix up a nice meal.”
“Thank you,” she said humbly.
She followed him until they came into a room where the man’s wife had just taken a roast from the oven. It was a fine cut of meat, filling the kitchen with a smell much like leg of lamb. She placed the roast on a rack to cool, before turning in surprise at the presence of a stranger inside her home. She regarded Gina with a blank stare for a moment, before her heart seemingly melted, and her demeanor became welcoming and warm.
“This is Abigail,” the man said. “My wife of forty years. I am John. And what’s your name?”
She gave them her name and they had Gina sit at the table, with a tall glass of ice water and a pitcher for refills. The old couple watched eagerly as she downed the entire glassful. Abigail poured her a second glass from the pitcher. “Now, you just wait. Granny’s going to fix you up a plate like you’ve never had before.”
John and Abigail hovered as Gina devoured a huge meal and sat back, sated and stuffed. She looked up from the empty plate and gave them a heartfelt “Thank you.”
It was plain to see she needed a spot to lie down and recover. They put her in a room with a high mattress and fluffy covers. She lay with her head on a soft pillow and quickly fell asleep.
She awakened, feeling grateful and relieved to be where life could have a semblance of normalcy, although she would ever be haunted by the loss of family and friends, and Earth itself. She showered and tidied herself, then went out to see if John and Abigail were about. She met John as he came in from outside chores.
“Good. You are awake,” he said, as he hung a beaten old hat on a hook by the door. “As I understand, you are without a home to go to. I’ve had a conversation with Abigail, and she agrees with me. You have a home, right here, if you agree to stay.”
“Oh, thank you, sir. You can’t know how relieved, how grateful I am.”
“You will agree to be assigned chores, to pay for your upkeep, I told her,” he added.
“I certainly will. Enthusiastically,” she gushed.
“While Granny is preparing your breakfast, I would like to show you around, outside.”
John walked Gina outside of the house, to where a great cage imprisoned hundreds of flying creatures. They were half the size of hummingbirds. She could not decide if they were birds, insects, or, something else.
“They are wumbles,” he informed her, exhibiting a great deal of pride. “They multiply rapidly. I sell most and make a good profit by them.”
He lifted back the lid from a bin. “Here is their food. All you have to do is take out five scoops and send it down this chute.” He demonstrated the action by feeding the wumbles himself.
The critters screeched like demons, attacking their breakfast, devouring it all in a mere two minutes. “They need their food two times per day.”
He demonstrated how the cage bottom slid on rollers, to be rolled out and cleaned. It was an automatic procedure, once initiated by the rolling out by Gina.
“Your one other task will be to let out the Carrses to run. They will make a mad scramble to the end of the track and come walking back. Then you just lock the gate again.”
He showed her the Carrses, which were twenty-pound furry animals with doe eyes and snouts like pigs. He opened up the gate. The animals made their run and came panting back, docile and ready to get locked in. “You won’t have to feed them, because there is a pasture on the other end.”
Gina gratefully acknowledged her tasks, vowing to be faithful to the duties and eager to be of help in any other ways she could.
As she devoured breakfast, she thought it strange that her benefactors had not joined her in any meals. She did not question their right to leave her alone to eat. Varying cultures can have taboos and customs their guests don’t understand.
Abigail took away the dishes, telling Gina as she gathered them, “Don’t worry about these. My great joy is taking care of this home. My day would be ruined if I could not do everything in it.”
“But, I just thought -”
“Nonsense, dear. You just let Granny handle it.”
In fact, the couple seemed always busy, out sight, to the point life quickly became boring and pointless.
One day a carrs came straggling after the rest were already moving on to the pasture in the back. Gina opened the gate and approached it, with her arms outstretched. It immediately pegged her as a friend and ally and ran to her. It felt as soft as a teddy bear. Its soft hands clutched her fingers. They snuggled and played until Gina realized she was neglecting to feed the wumbles.
She pushed the disappointed carrs inside the gate and hurried to the wumble cage.
After two weeks on the farm, the effect of the plant causing Gina to see what she wished to see began to wear thinner. She caught occasional glimpses of John and Abigail as they really were. It was as brief as a few seconds, mostly. One morning, she glimpsed “Granny” and “Grandpa” through a partially opened door. She beheld their great skulls and massive jawbones as they enjoyed a leisurely meal. Granny folded back the wings of living wumbles and pushed them down her throat. Grandpa bit chunks from the buttock of a living carrs. The animals squealed horribly. Then, like switching of TV channels, the scene reverted to a kindly couple dining on a humdrum fare.
This final straw sent her into the confines of the car, where she asked it to take her away from the place. The car answered her, saying, “I have wandered on this planet in recent days, in search of a place for you to live with some dignity. For better or worse, this farm most meets your needs, of all the situations I visited. You are advised by me to remain right here. You are the driver, however. The choice is yours alone to make.”
Gina sighed. She even cried a little. At last, she acquiesced. “All right,” she agreed. “But you will keep on searching?”
“Now I have delivered you to your destination. I ask your release. As I belong to someone else, I am bound to seek him out. It is my notion to return to our point of entry in this universe and to seek a way back. Should I make the discovery, I will do my utmost to see you are saved. Don’t be optimistic. At this point, I have no clue.”
There was a pause.
“Am I released?”
Gina hugged the steering wheel. “Of course,” she said, the tears streaming down her cheeks.
The girl watched the car go. When it was gone, she returned to the farmhouse, done with her chores for the day.
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