Alton One: Capsule 3

"Dinner last night was great," Rick said into the receiver.  "I really appreciate what you did for me yesterday."

"What do you think that was," Missy said.  "Was that really a U.F.O.?"

"That seems to be what they think in the Shoreline Daily News," Rick said, holding the paper out on his couch.  "There's a picture of a man looking up at the sky, and there's a U.F.O. up there.  It's clearly what we saw yesterday."

"I wonder if it's real.  I wonder what the experts will say.

"It says here that they blew it off as a weather balloon," he said.

Carrie started crying.  She and her sister were sitting on the couch next to Rick watching Cinderella on the television.  It was late, like past 10 p.m.  It was way past their bedtime.  He was so rapt in conversation he forgot to put his kids to bed.  Yet now Carrie was setting of her alarm.

"I gotta go," Rick said.

"I understand why.  I can hear the little sweat heart," she said.  "Bye.  And take care of yourself."

"Goodbye," Rick said, and clicked end, and set the phone on the side table.  He picked up Carrie and took her to the rocker.  "I want to rock too, Clarice said. And she climbed up next to Rick on the rocker.  He sat there, watching Cinderella.  After a scene a commercial was on, and Rick could hear deep breathing.  Carrie's head was limp on his shoulder.  And, just then, he felt a thud on his side.  Looking down, he could see Clarice was also out.

He slid Clarice's head carefully so it was resting on the arm of the chair, and got up with Carrie.  He carried her to her room, turned on the white noise of beach waves, and kissed her cheek.  He tucked her in, and covered her with her blue Cinderella blanket.  He closed the door and picked up Clarice.  He took her to her room, kissed her cheek, and tucked her in.  He turned on a fan on top the dresser, and softly shut the door.

A petite man with a pale, white face and black tights was standing in the middle of the living room. Startled, Rick screamed.

Alton One: Capsule 2

Rick Shane set Carrie in the sled, right in front of a smiling Clarice. They both smelled of the suns screen he rubbed over their exposed parts.  They were both decked out in their pretty bathing suits.  Around them were a variety of beach toys: two yellow buckets, two yellow shovels, a bag of snacks, towels, and sun screen.  He grabbed the string and started tugging the sled through the hot sand.  With his toes he dug in hard in the sand with each step, and half way to the beech his feet were sore and burning.  He moved fast.

If Marie were alive she'd see to it he remembered his sandals.  If she were alive he'd probably do a lot of things different.  If she were alive she'd be with him, perhaps carrying Carrie.  And if she were alive, she would have made sandwiches.  She even made sandwiches better than he did.

He listened as the girls innocently played, oblivious of how hard their dad was working at tugging them through the sand.  He admired them for that innocence, maybe even envied them.  Is he going to hell now for envying his two and four year old daughters?  He smiled at the thought.

It was a scorching hot day, near 90, and the sun was shining in a clear blue sky.  There were hundreds of people decked in their bathing suits scattered all over the beach, the playground to his left, and some scattered around their cars in the parking lot.  A teenage boy with the most perfect body lay with his arms over his head on his beach towel, showing the world his armpit hair and his six pack abs.  His body was brown, tanned by hours spent soaking rays.  Next to him was his girl in her bikini, sporting her perfectly tanned teenage body.  The world must seem so simple to them.  Oh, how he envied them, as he tried to pass by without kicking any dirt.

An older, morbidly obese lady a t-shirt meant to cover her body, yet failing as her apron hung out from under it, staining his vision, haunting his mind.  He looked around her for a path to take to the beach.  As he looked over her head he couldn't help but look into the sky. There was one cotton ball cloud overhead, and to the left was a line of exhaust where a jet was guiding through the sky.  And along the skyline of the water he could see the dark outline of a sailboat.  And immediately above that, in the sky, he could see an object.

"Daddy?" Carrie wailed.  He turned and saw that Carrie had decided to lean out of the sled.  She was half in and half out, more out than in.  He stopped pushing the sled, and watched as his daughter fell the rest of the way out.  She looked up and was smiling despite the sand that was now on her face.  She sat on her butt.  "Bucket," she said.  "Bucket."

Rick smiled.  He picked her up, brushed her off, and placed her back in the sled.  Despite interrupting her plans, she was still happy as happy is.  Clarice helped her daddy by putting her arms around Carrie.  "I'm helping you," she said.  "I'm helping you, da da."

"Thank you so much," Rick said, and started his march around the fat lady again.  Before long he wended his way though the sun bathers and a group of kids tossing a Frisbee and found an available spot in the sand only a few yards from the water.  Someone had tried to build a sandcastle by the water. Although it had been washed out by waves, he could still make out where the castle was and the moat around it.

He watched as Clarice jumped out of the sled, grabbed a yellow shovel and a yellow pale, and rushed to this spot. She sat on her butt in the mushy water of the moat and started digging.  "Come on, da da.  Get Carrie so you can help me."

Rick grabbed a towel from the bag and spread it out for the girls.  Then he did the same for himself, although he suspected he wouldn't have much of a chance to lie on it. The girls wouldn't give him a chance to relax and soak up rays.  The main goal today was to spend time with his birthday girls and relax in that way.  His goal today was to forget that his wife was in an accident; to forget that an 85-year-old man smashed into her as she was waiting at the intersection.  His goal was to forget seeing her lifeless body on the hospital bed.  His goal was to forget that there was no life insurance.  His goal was to forget his stupidity.

Within a half hour he had refurbished the sand castle, and somehow convinced his daughters to keep their shovels off it.  They were making smaller castles of their own design.  They encouraged their da da to work on the BIG sand castle. Once he felt satisfied he sat on his own butt, and closed his eyes, listening to the soporific din of waves.

After several moments of relaxing as such, he stood up, shed his shirt, tossed it onto his towel, and stepped into the water.  Clarice stepped in the water next to him, her but covered in wet sand.  Rick picked her up, and turned and, with a major effort and a grunt, picked up his baby.  They were both so heavy, so it seemed.

"I can help you," a female voice said.  Rick turned around and saw Missy Perry, the secretary at Shoreline health where he worked the past ten years.  "I can take Carrie if you want."

"Hey, that would be awesome," Rick said.  Now he was conscious of his aging body, and held Clarice so that she was blocking, so he hoped, his 12-pack abs, as so he liked to call his aging abdomen.  "Da da," Clarice wailed, "I'm falling." He shuffled his older girl back to where she was, exposing all his upper body.  "No one cares what your body looks like," Marie's voice shot through his head.  "Most guys on this beach look worse than you, and they don't care.  So why should you?"

"So you getting by okay," she said, as the two trudged through waves into deeper water.  "We all are praying for you and missing you at the office."

"I want to go REAL DEEP!" Clarice shouted.

"REEE DEEE!" Carrie repeated.

"Things are going great," Rick lied.  "I'm doing great."

"That's good.  You've been through so much."

"I'm glad you're here," Rick said, changing the subject, "It gets kind of heavy lugging two kids out here.  They love the water."

"I can see."  Carrie was hugging Missy's neck firmly.  Clarice, on the other hand, was leaning down at the water, slapping it.  As her butt was under water, and then her belly, her slapping was getting Rick wet.  He said nothing, enjoying the fact that she was just so happy.

"Rick, look!" Missy said, pointing at the sky.  "I swear that looks like a U.F.O."

Rick looked up.  "It's a flying saucer."  Rick looked around and saw that just about everyone on the beach was looking at it, many with their mouths hanging open.  The fat lady, the one he trudged around on the way to the water, the one with her gut hanging out, had her tongue lolling out the side of her mouth.  There was a lot of hymning and hawing, and "Oh my God!" one lady shouted. "What in the world is that," another said.  "Could it be?" another asked.

"Splash water with me, Carrie," Clarice said.  "I love water. Splash. Splash. Splash.

Rick looked back and saw the object had to be a space ship. It hovered over the horizon, outside the covering of that huge white fluffy, cotton ball cloud overhead.  The sun shining brightly off it hard to make out any of the specifics of the ship.

An audible gasp from the bystanders on the beach rang out over the sound of waves as the space craft disappeared in a flash, and all that could be seen where it was was the clear blue sky.  Rick looked around, observing how people, young and old, fat and skinny, all decked in their suits, some in the water, some on the hot sand, were still gazing at the sky, probably hoping it would return.

Alton One: Capsule One

His name is Rick Shane.  He was lying in his bed, staring at the ceiling fan, watching as it moves round and round and round, swooshing ever so slightly.  With each revolution of the blades the string, dangling from the light, swaying by the motion, clicked as it bounced off the light.  Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

He can't help but to think of Marie, and how many times the two of them lay in this same bed watching this ceiling fan in action, usually emulating into a discussion.

One such discussion involved how many kids they wanted.  It was a unanimous decision there would be four kids scampering through the little house on  201 N. Columbia Avenue in Shoreline, Michigan.  There would be four kids to take to Lake Michigan on warm summer days.  There would be four kids to dress up in their warm clothing to take sliding on the hills by the state park on the lake.  There would be four kids.

He could feel the tear trickle down his cheek.  Yet before he could get lost further he felt a soft hand on his left hand.  "Daddy, are you gonna get up?"  It was Clarice.  He blonde hair was all fluffy and messed up from sleeping, and she looked so pure and innocent.  She kissed her daddy's hand, and smiled.  Yes, it was one of the three smiles he would never forget.  A smile that glows bright in his minds eye in the late hours of work when he's forced to listen to stories from children that would haunt most men.

He rustles his way out of bed, slips on the same shirt he wore the day before, and the same navy blue sweat pants, and picks up his older daughter.  "How old are you today?" he said, looking at her bright smile as he walked down the hall to the living room.  "How old are you, pretty?"

"Four-years-old," she said in her high pitched voice.  "Today is my birthday.  Today I'm four-years-old, da da."

He set her down and she quickly went to work, playing with the Barbie dolls she played with the night before.  Rick could hear a voice, and he knew right away it was Carrie calling out from her crib, behind the closed door.  Only she wasn't calling for him, she was merely talking, or, as Marie would say, thinking out loud.  "Carrie is one of those little girls who verbally communicates every thought that goes through her mind," Marie would often say.

"How old is your sister?" he said.  "How old is your baby sister?"

"Carrie is two-years-old," Clarice said nonchalantly as she continues playing, making no effort to look up.  "Come on, Barbie, it's time to make a cake.  Come on, honey, it's going to be a BIG day today.  We're going to have a birthday party.  Come on, honey, we have work to do."  She was talking to her dolls, and not Rick, he decided.  She was so cute.  Her mom would have loved to be here on this morning.

He opened the door a crack and peered in at Carrie. He was immediately overwhelmed by the smell of poop.  She immediately looked at him, and giggled.  "Da Da," she said, "Doah."  He pushed the door open and she put her arms up.  He picked her up. She squeezed him tight, leaned back, looked into his eyes, and kissed his cheek.  Her smile was huge. It was a smile that would be engraved in his mind as long as he lived.  You can't forget a smile like that so early in the morning.  You forget all the bad stuff, and moments like this you remember.  If he had a dime for each time he said that to a kid he'd be rich, he thought.

The phone rang.  He rushed to the desk to pick it up.  It wasn't on the desk.  It rang again and again.  "Where's the phone?" he shouted.

"Here da da," Clarice was holding it up.  He grabbed it, and said, "Hello."

"Hi, Rick," it was his mother. "Can I talk to the birthday girl."

"Absolutely," he said, handing Clarice the phone back.  She was all smiles.

She put the phone to her ear, saying nothing, and listening to whatever her grandma had to say.  Rick could hear his mother's voice from the phone, but couldn't make out any words.  That is, until she started singing happy birthday.  That was a tradition of hers an every birthday.

Rick went into the kitchen, opened up a loaf of bread, grabbed four pieces, and stuffed them into the toaster.  He clicked the lever.

"Da Da?" She was standing by his side, holding up the phone.  He grabbed it.  He said, "Hello."

"I just want you to know that I think you ought to go back to work now."  That was mom, always blunt.  She just said whatever was on her mind, regardless of the appropriateness of the moment.  The last thing Rick wanted to think about today was money, because money made him think about not having a house to go along with not having a wife.  "I know this probably isn't the best time, but I don't know when a good time is.  Your house payment is due next week, and you don't have any money to pay it."

"I know mom," he said, trying not to sound melancholy, although he knew he probably failed.  He was so happy she was helping him with his finances, because that's something Marie did.  Rick had no idea any passwords, and felt completely out of the financial loop.  He realized as soon as she was gone how much she did, and how much he probably took for granted.  "I talked to my boss yesterday and she says I can come back whenever I'm ready."

"Rick, you're not going to be ready no matter when you go back to work," she said into the receiver.  "I know it's hard, I know."  She didn't know, he thought, yet left it alone.  "I know what you're going through.  I understand.  And maybe being around your work will help you get your mind off all that's going on in your life now.  Maybe that's the best therapy."

She was right about that, but he wasn't going to tell her that.  He loved his mom, but all he wanted to do now was somehow end this conversation.  "Mom, I have to get dressed so I can take my girls to the store. I have to get birthday presents.  I promised the girls I'd let them pick out there own present today"

The toast popped up.  He opened the refrigerator.  "How are you going to pay for them," she said.  "You can't just charge everything."

"Well, for now that's what I'm going to do," he said, grabbing the butter, and shutting the fridge.  "I have to get going, mom.  I love you."  He grabbed a plate from the cupboard, which was already open.

"Just remember, I'll watch the kids for you.  That should never be a problem for you.  I will watch those darlings anytime you need it.  And I love you too, Ricky."

He hung up the phone.  He watched his kids playing so well together with the Barbies.  He buttered the toast, and put on a layer of strawberry jam, a favorite of the girls.  Once finished, he turned around and just stood there a while watching his little girls happily play.

Alton One: Chapter 9

It was noon in Scottville, Michigan.  Sarah laid with her head on the couch pillow, playing with her i-phone, occasionally laughing, occasionally verbalizing something she read.  Mike watched her from the kitchen table while eating a chocolate chip cookie, his t-shirt covered in crumbs.  On the table were seven boxes of opened girl scout cookie boxes, with about half the former contents in either his or Sara's stomachs.

Bloated, roasting, he got up and opened the patio door, the same one Lance floated through on his way to Alton One.  The sun was shining bright over head, and a warm, toasty breeze that wafted through the door felt very refreshing.  As he peered out he felt it odd there were no shouts from children playing, and no squeaks and chirps from squirrels or birds.  The only audible thing outside was the rustling of leaves. "Do you think the police have people locked in their homes, or something else is going on."

"Why do you ask that?"

"Because it's eerie the way things have transpired?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, it's almost as though we're being cooped up in here on purpose?"

"What?"

"That we're being shown just enough to tempt us?"

"What?

"Well, look out there?"

She was not standing by him, holding the curtain with her left hand.  "Just look out there.  The sky is clear blue, and there's barely a cloud, just a few random ones.  Look at the homes across the street.  You notice anything odd about them?"

"No!"

"Neither do I.  I spent many hours sitting on this front porch with either Lance or his mother, and I never once ever saw a person come out of any of those houses.  Occasionally you'd see a car go up a driveway, and enter a garage, but once the garage door closed that was it."

"So what are you getting at?"

"Those people never went outside anyway.  They were house potatoes. It seems every neighborhood has house potatoes.  They have their windows closed, curtains or shades closed, and they sit in their houses all day.  No one knows what they do.  They only leave to go to work or to pay bills."

"Okay, what does that have to do with this.."

"The only exception is Mrs. Schaffer.  She's out and about in her yard all the time. You can tell by all the pretty flowers and plants in her yard.  She reminds me of my grandma.  Every time you pass her she has something to tell you. If you spend time with her she has a nice story to tell.  If your'e interested, and I'm always interested, she could entertain you for hours."

"I don't get your point."

"My point is she's a useful person."

"And."

"And we're useful people.  Lance is a useful person.  Lance is doing something all the time.  For crying out loud, look at all the stuff he wrapped around this house.  He may be the laughing stock of the neighborhood, he may not, but either way, he's productive.  He doesn't sit around all day playing video games, watching TV, and doing things that don't effect the lives of other people."

"So you're saying house potatoes are non productive members of society."

"They at least look non productive.  What we don't know is what they are really doing with their lives.  I remember dad told me once that he felt like he was a house potato for about ten years when Jimmy and I were little, really little.  He felt like he was useless to society; that all he did was watch kids, work, watch kids, work, take his wife on a date, and stuff like that.  He had no contact with his friends.  In fact, he went so long without hanging with his friends he felt he was antisocial.  And that's when he came up with the term house potato, because he suspected others probably thought that of him."

"And?"

"He wasn't a couch potato at all.  He was outside more than the couch potatoes in the neighborhood.  He was outside walking with his kids, us, down the street.  He was teaching us how to ride bikes.  He was pulling us in the wagon.  He was taking us to the state park.  He was taking us camping.  He was taking us to the store so we could buy Christmas presents for mom.  He was busy raising his kids.  He was invisible to the rest of the world because he was raising kids."

So, that sounds great.  What does it have to do with this."

"Well, don't you feel like a house potato right now?"

"Oh, yeah, I see what you mean."

"Do you?"

"Yes, I guess I do."

"That's my point.  Maybe... maybe.... maybe we are a part of the plot.  Maybe the alien let you go on purpose, ever think of that."

"Mike?" Her face looked a sudden fret.

"Look, Sarah, the bad aliens, if that's what they are, kill people.  As far as we know, there's no way to escape their evil grasp.  But you got away.  You got away and you returned here, where, coincidentally, you have me, who was kidnapped by aliens in the past, and Lance, who, by the way, is on a spaceship."

Sarah hugged Mike, tight.

Alton One: Chapter 8

"So now what do we do?" Sarah said. She was sitting on the couch.

"I have no idea." Mike said. He was slouched in the love seat, staring at his Kindle Fire. By moving his fingers he created the word "SILENCE" to start a Words With Friends game. "Ah, beat that move!"

"How can you do that at a time like this?"

"I needed a brain break, Sarah. My head is fried." He closed the Kindle case and set it on the sidetable alonside the empty Coke can.

"We may both be fried soon," she said, and burst out laughing. 

He joined her.  He laughed so long and so hard his stomach cramped.  He tried to force himself to stop laughing, even went as far as to pinch his cheek, and it was no use.  He hopped out of his seat, laughing all the way to the kitchen.  He opened the refrigerator and grabbed a Coke.

"Here, you need this," he said, talking with difficulty.  He was still trying to fight off the laughter.  "Boy, I needed that.  We needed that."

"Yes."  She said.  She sighed. 

"Here!" he proffered her the can again.  "Take this, would you."

"No, I'm trying to be good."

"Not today you're not.  You deserve a day off.  You deserve a treat.  In fact, I think I'm gonna go to Northside and get you an ice cream sandwich.  I know that's your favorite."

"I'd love that, but what if the aliens are out there?" She took the Coke, clicked it open. Drank. It seemed to bring some color back to her face, for a moment any way. "Mike, I don't want you to get hurt?"

What are you worried about me for?  I'm worried about you.  I'm worried about you, Sarah.  "You have a point."  He sat next to her. 

She said, "We need to do something, though. We can't just stay cooped up in here forever.  There's a dead body staring at us for Christ sake, and aliens out and about that are killers." 

"Well, how 'bout if I call 911 and tell officer Joe Bean I saw an alien, and the alien scared the crap out of me..."

"You were there when I Disappeared," Lance wrote.  What did he mean by that? What are these coffins?  If Tsatso had a coffin, and this evil, alien that killed the cop and tried to kidnap Sarah are two different aliens, then why do they both have coffins, or whatever those things are?  Are they from the same place?  Are they from two different places?  What's the connection here?  And does this other alien have anything to do with the urgency of Tsatso needing Lance?  Man, it almost looks like there's some kind of connection here. 

"...and then I'll tell them about everything that's happened.  I'll tell them about the body.  Hell, I'll just show them the body.  Hell, they'll see the body on their own..."

There's also the U.F.O. sightings reported in the papers.  There was more than one sighting, so does that mean there's more than one U.F.O.?  Is there some kind of intergalactic war going on in the space over Skitville?  Are we in the middle of some kind of Star Wars battle?  And if so, where are the aliens from anyway?  And why in the world did they choose Skitville?

"...I just wish we weren't trapped in the middle of this, you know what I mean.  You know how all your life you kind of want to believe in the extraterrestrial and you kind of believe in it but it's a belief that's on the surface.  But you..."

The aliens who kidnapped me were not from Alton?  I know they weren't.  But the alien Sarah described wasn't like Tsatso. Sarah, you're wrong there.  It wasn't like Tsatso at all.  The question that has me about Tsatso...

"...know what I mean.  I always supported Lance, but, as he said, it was a hobby to him.  It wasn't something you expected to really happen.  You never...

...is whether or not he is a prisoner like he was with me on that ship.  No!  If he was a prisoner now, he wouldn't give Lance a choice?  No, that would't make sense.  If Tsatso was a prisoner, and he was being forced to take Lance, he would just, you know...

"...expect to actually see or meet an alien.  Well, I suppose Lance did.  Lance I think believed a lot more than the rest of us stories like...

...Kidnap Lance...

"...you know, he would... Mike?  Mike, are you with me?  Am I talking to a wall?

"I'm sorry, I just can't stop thinking about Lance's blog.  It just reminds me so much of..."

"Of what, Mike?  What does it remind you of?"

His fingers dug deep into the couch fabric. He took in a deep, slow breath.  "You do have a point, Sarah.  And, yes, I'm listening, Sarah. I really am."

"You were not.  You were staring at the blank TV." She smiled.  She was so sweet.  Mike studied her face. Her features matched her innocence.

"The coffin, you know, whatever it was, it just appeared in front of me.  It was in the back of Mr. Foster's house.  It just appeared, as though it knew where I was gonna be.  I don't think it was Tsatso.  I don't think if he's the way you described him, that he would do such a thing.  This was a bad, an evil, alien.  He, she, it, tried to kill me.  There was no doubt about that.  It tried to kill me.  There was no choice.  If I didn't run, it would have killed me right there. 

"Sarah, can I ask a question?"

"Ask away."

"How did you get the blood on your hands?"

She looked at the ground.  Her hands were shaking.

"Never mind, he said.  I shouldn't have asked."

"No.  No."  She looked in his eyes.  "THE ALIEN HELD A BALL, AND IT WAS COVERED IN BLOOD!  She squeezed him.  "It tried to touch it to my shoulder.  And that's when I started to run.

She cried.  Mike put his arm around her, and she wrapped her arms around him, and cried.

Alton One: Chapter 7

Her hold on him was a life grip, so hard he tremmored with her.  Her head was snug on his shoulder, and he could smell her hair spray.  On a normal day he would have made a commical remark about it, but there were no words for a moment like this.  She was scared to death, and he could smell that too.  He let her hold on as long as she needed.  What in the world brought THIS on? he wondered.

She let go and an immediate flow of warm blood rushed down his arms to his fingertips.  She stood in front of him with blank stare, shivering. 

"Sarah!" he held her hands. They were cold as ice.  "Sarah!  What happened?  Who did this to you?"

"Hold me, Mike!  Just hold me!" He did.  And he guided her to the livingroom, and sat with her on the couch. All the way, he never stopped hugging her.  "Who did this, Sarah?  Who hurt you?"

"The coffin!"

"What?" A shiver rushed up his spine. His mind immediately recollecting Lance's story. "A coffin? Like the one Lance wrote about?"

"The coffin.  It was a coffin.  And an alien, like the one you drew.  It was an alien.  It came out of the coffin.  It came and tried to take me.  It tried to take me." 

She squeezed him again, hard, very hard. 

"Sarah, you have to tell me what happened.  You have to tell me everything."

"I can't.  I can't!" She started crying.  "I don't mean to be a baby."

"It's okay.  It's okay."  It wasn't okay.  Tsatso took Lance, and he was supposed to be a good alien.  Now this.  "Did Tsatso do this to you?  Was it Tsatso?  The one I drew was Tsatso."

"Yes," she said.  It was Tsatso.  Only..."

"Only what?"

"Only he wore black.  He looked mean.  He grabbed me and I ran."

He let her squeeze him again.  She cried hard, and he made no effort to stop her. 

Civilian on the front lines

So do you ever have a dream you think could easily be turned into a story if you had the time to write it down.  Last night I had one of those dreams.  There were a bunch of guys all hanging out in front of this building, and we were writing in our journals.  One guy was passing around a picture book, and having all of us guys write things in the margins, between the pictures.

We all had on our regular clothing, so it was obvious we weren't real soldiers.  I didn't even have a helmet, at least not yet.  I could tell you I wasn't a real soldier because I have asthma and would never be accepted into a real military.  But desperate times call for desperate measures.  For whatever reason, the real military was desperate, and they called on us.

Some of the guys are trying to find their spot for when the battle starts, and I'm just sitting in a lawn chair.  A couple of the guys are amazed how calm I can be at such a stressful moment.  I didn't say anything, although I'm not necessarily as calm as I look.  I'm relaxed to a certain degree because I know I have no control over what happens to me, and I believe in God.  Although I'm still afraid of dying.  I worry what would happen to my wife and kids more than anything.

Then someone says, "You guys know we're on the front lines!" And this causes a bunch of guys, including myself, to crawl down at the front of the porch, duck to behind the fence, and see how we would fit in that spot. I lied down and noted that my head stuck over the barrier unless I was lying down.  I aimed my gun at the distant darkness, and my entire head and shoulders was out in the open; an easy target.  I supposed if I had a helmet on the bullet would ricochet off me.  Where is my helmet?  Please give me a helmet?

I wondered if the fence wasn't completely done.  I wondered what was out there waiting for us, if anything.  Obviously there was something out there or we wouldn't be here.  Then I heard a scuffle, and that's when I realized there were a bunch of kids hanging around also.  They were playing.  One of the guys says, "This is the front lines. All kids I want to gather over there."

So now I'm looking around hoping to see my kids; or hoping not to see my kids.  None of the kids I saw running to my left were mine.  Then I forget about the kids as I'm trying to get my spot ready for battle, although I can't find anyone to help me.  I'm kind of irritated that the battle ground isn't ready.

Then my attention is brought back to the kids again as I hear scuffling to my left.  I look over there thinking I might see warriors pent to kill us, yet what I see are all the kids grouped in a large circle amid a white picket fence.  I hear a truck pull up, and all the kids get into the truck.  I keep watching this even though I know I should be getting myself ready, yet I can't help but to watch the kids until everyone of them is in the truck.  They were snuggled close back of the truck, but at least they'd be alive at the end of the battle.  I couldn't predict the same for me, being that I was amid the med on the front line.

As the kids are being driven off in the distance, the sound of the truck brings me back to reality.  In real life it's probably a truck going by my house as I lie sound asleep.  Then I look in the distant woods where the enemy is probably waiting to kill us.  There appears to be a good chance they will succeed, although you hear no talk about defeat  We are all willing to fight to, obviously, save our kids.  I also have no idea who the enemy might be, and that in itself sends a shiver down my spine. Who am I going to kill?  Why? Will I be able to pull the trigger?  Will I simply cower behind the shield.

Another idea crosses my mind.  I remember in past dreams during similar stressful and scary situations hiding behind the barrier that is my dream.  I know that at any point I can just duck and be still, and no one will see me.  It is, after all, a dream. I remember running in the woods once, away from some killer chasing me, pent on killing me.  And as I'm running I picture a hole in the ground under some stump, and I find that spot, duck into it, and then I can hear as the bad guys are looking for me.  But they never find me.  When I wake up I'm still alive.

So now here I sit, back in my recliner, waiting for the word that it's time to duck for cover, in my battle spot.  I'm assuming now that whatever we have right now is what we will have for battle.  We are the last stand.  I hear a jet over head, loud  It's close.  And instead of looking up at it, I look around at my fellow soldiers.  They are all afraid, as I am, that bombs will be dropped.  None are.  Then, just when we are feeling the sense of relief, another jet goes overhead louder than the first, then another and another.  For about five minutes there were several jets go over head, yet we cannot see any of them in the still darkness.

I know that the lights are on around us, as I can see the glow of our lights of the distant forest.  I can see no soldiers in the field, although I have no idea if our soldiers are out there in camouflage, or if the enemy is.  The dream is set up here so that it's as though I'm just all of a sudden in this spot.  I have no idea of anything that transpired in my life before this scene.  It's kind of like that old TV show Quantum Leap.  The main character in that TV show would all of a sudden take over someone's life, and make things right.  That's where I was, in some soldiers body trying to make out who I was and why I was there.  Only I was me in my dream.  I just didn't know why or where?

A man all of a sudden appears, and I think he's the enemy.  He's telling us what we need to do to survive the war.  He's trying to get us to give up.  He has a gun, and he keeps waving it.  I'm afraid of guns, and am afraid he might shoot it.  Then he aims it at me.  A fear drenches through my body that he will kill me.

The room is full.  I hear a baby cry, and kids innocently bantering about their fake worlds.  Men and women in the room are more solemn, as they wait.  Wait for what.  Then the crown in the middle of the room clears as men in uniform enter.  The men have a stack of journals and a photo book that they pass around.  The women found solace as they find notes from their presumed dead spouses.  I still do not see my wife nor my kids.  I know they must be around somewhere or I wouldn't be here in my spirit form.

Finally I get a chance to look at the photo book.  I see what the men wrote in the columns.  I find not one mention of dead or battle.  The words are all things like "It's a beautiful day out here.  I can hear the crickets chirping."  Each quote is followed by a signature.  I look for something I wrote, and find nothing. I look for my journal. I find nothing.  Why am I here?

Suddenly two more men donned in high military gear enter the room  All the women and men are silent, including the kids.  One of the men says, "I would now like to present the highest metal award to a man who is not in uniform." Now I realize I'm standing behind this man.  I hear sighs and rapid chatter from the folks.  "I would like to provide the award to Rick Frea."

That's when I'm pushed forward.  The military men stand aside, and I'm pushed forward.  Smiles and smiles and smiles across the room on every person I saw.  Yet my eyes quickly find a lady, and my arms go around her, my head upon her shoulder.  Two women and two men wrap their arms around both of us.  Happiness.