Mr. Muxley Meets Mediocrity: Part I

The magnificent mothership landed gently on the large mound of dirt in the middle of Cougar Mountain Regional Wildland Park. It tipped over and rested its edge on the grass below. The driver decided to leave it be. Or perhaps he didn’t really notice since the ship had some sort of self-contained gravity field. The creature slid the door open manually and fell out. The man and his mastiff who had been watching the whole thing while sipping a cool cup of milk and eating mulberries made no move towards it, but continued munching. The creature stood back up and sighed. It brushed itself off and marched directly to the man and his mastiff. They both stood and the man smiled as the creature said one word, “Muxley.”

“Good morning, Mr. Muxley. My name is Mervin Maddox and this is my mastiff, Mercy. The dog made a small bark that sounded more inquisitive than malicious.

“Muxley!” it repeated, slightly maddened.

“Okay, I get it. Me Mervin, you Muxley. Whatever. Do you want some mulberries?” The alien did not respond now that he realized his voice recognition systems had not been completely activated.

The other, much younger man who had been camping a quarter mile away now pushed his way through the Monterey Cypress trees and made his way to the group. “Good day, mates. I’m Monty Montgomery. Would you like some M&M’s?” The other two merely stared at him. “Okay…then how about a Mars bar? Marshmallow? Junior Mint? Milk Dud?”

The alien motioned for them to follow him and up they went into the ship. There was nothing in it but a small console in the middle and what looked like a fat guitar leaning against it. He picked it up immediately and began to pluck the strings with a plectrum. Once he started, flashes of lights appeared on the wall. He began slowly, then sped up, and then slowed down again. The music was beautiful. It made the guests feel at ease. Even Mercy the dog, who had managed to struggle up the mound and into the doorway, swayed back and forth in dance. After it was over, a drawer slid out of the wall.

The alien walked to it and took out two devices. The first looked like a miter attached to drumsticks with wires. The other resembled a large retro mobile phone. He put on the miter and placed the edges of the drumsticks to Mervin’s temples. Nothing happened for a few seconds and then Mervin understood completely. Without speaking, the alien had somehow conveyed what he wanted. Mervin took the other device and spoke into it, “A, B, C, D…” and continued until he had finished the alphabet. He pushed a button on it and spoke again, “Milky Way, Earth, human, land, multiple, North America, United States, English, Oregon, Bellevue, male, Mervin, forty-two, camping, fire, motorboat, Cellar Door.” He was done. Monty stared at him like he was crazy. The alien took back the recording device and played it back in his own ear. After repeating this step several times he tossed it back in the drawer with its companion and picked up the instrument again; playing one chord so as to close the drawer. The wall appeared to have never been broken.

The alien let out a massive sigh and finally spoke comfortably, this time in English. “I have come as a scout in order to make contact with your people. We discovered this planet yesterday and we are anxious to meet you all. You must take me to various locations so that I may better understand your culture.”

The two men looked at each other then looked at the dog for help. Unfortunately, the alien had picked the two least qualified men as his guides. Neither of them had been outside of King County. “We don’t really know where to go.” The alien turned his gaze to the floor, not quite knowing what to say. Mervin continued. “Look, Mr. Muxley, we—”

“My name isn’t Mr. Muxley.”

“Then what does Muxley mean?” Monty asked.

“It doesn’t mean anything.” He was becoming more impatient. “That must just be what I sounded like since you don’t understand our language.”

Monty realized that he had asked the wrong question. “Well, what is your name?”

The alien spoke out in a mass of misinterpreted and possibly mythical monosyllables that made the men’s minds feel like maimed monkeys meandering their way through a maze of monsters and mutants.

“Okay…well we’ll just maintain calling you Mr. Muxley.”

The alien did not seem pleased with this but obviously considered it less important than the task at hand. “Take me somewhere.”

“Well, it’s almost time for breakfast,” Monty said. “We could head down to McDonald’s and get some pancakes or something.”

“No,” Mervin protested,” we shouldn’t give him fast food. Let’s go to somewhere more sophisticated.”

Monty thought for a second and tried again, “okay then, how about Mooby’s?”

“That’s just as bad!” yelled Mervin. “The best place to get breakfast around here is Miss Milly’s Mess Hall at the Mill.”

“Oh, yes!” Monty’s eyes lit up. “They have the best muffins!”

“I agree,” Mervin agreed. “But their specialty is Melons. The owner’s daughter-in-law, Miss Minor, says they get their recipes from some restaurant in France.” The men grabbed their belongings while Mr. Muxley put a masking charm on his ship. They piled into the small moss green truck and drove off towards the ghost town of Monohon. Click here for the next installment...

Microstory 50: How Different People Count

This is not exactly a microstory, but it isn’t the first time I’ve used a different format, and it probably won’t be the last. I’ve been really busy this week, and I just can’t be spontaneously creative right now. I wrote this several years ago for no reason at all. It shows how different kinds of people look at counting.

• Mathematicians: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13
• Other Mathematicians: 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, 29
• Cheerleaders: 5, 6, 7, 8, 1, 2, 3, 4
• Computers: 0, 1, 0, 1
• Rockers: 1. 2. 1, 2, 3, 4!
• Romans: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI
• The Offspring: Uno, dos, tres, cuatro, cinco, cinco, seis
• Astronauts: 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
• LOST Fans: 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42
• Nihilists: WHO CARES!
• Nietzsche: 1; me.
• Camera Operators: 5, 4, 3, (2), (1)
• Morons: What?

Microstory 49*: Excerpt from Crusade

“All right, basic plex mechanics; the astral planes are full of matter. They’re full of matter because they exist in compressed space. Now, the lower the dimension, the more compressed it is, which is why traveling across a single planet is exponentially faster than flying between stars. Why is it faster, you ask? Why is more compression better? Well, you see, it all has to do with gravity. Gravity holds us in place. It attaches things together. People to planets, planets to suns, suns together, moving around a galaxy. It’s all about attraction. But thanks to a little human ingenuity, we have ways of subverting that gravity. But we can’t subvert it if it’s not there, or there’s not enough, which is why faster-than-light travel within empty space is all but impossible. These compressed astral planes, however, change all that.

“Once an astral collimator transmits a vessel into a tunnel inside astral space, we use our gravity manipulators to counteract the effects of the gravity from the proverbial astral walls and slide right through. The better we are able to manipulate the gravity, the faster we go. But it’s not instant. It’s never instant. Enter, astral snappers. Though still not instant, they get you about as close as you’re ever gonna get. They form a wedge of astral space, thereby increasing their gravitational pull which we then reverse from one direction and harness from the other to use to our advantage. In other words, the snappers temporarily close the tunnel behind us and in front of us, giving us more to work with. What does this mean, you ask? It means we go faster; much faster. Again, not instant, but pretty damn close. Instead of hours, we could potentially reach another planet in a matter of minutes.

“This, my friends, is what solidifies our status as the most powerful group of people in the galaxy.”

Microstory 48: Halo

The Halo is a multipurpose device used by all adults in the Core. It is a ring of Amber color, though it can be shaped into other forms by means of stretching. It is typically worn, in ring form, a few inches above the head of its user. It maintains its position via the user’s own telekinetic field but, unlike most objects, does not require constant concentration in order to stay aloft.

The Halo includes many functions, primarily as a computer and as a storage locker. Most people wear bionic conduits that are linked up to the system-wide data network that are fully capable of processing as much information as an external computer. There are times, however, such as when watching an Earthan television show, that a single screen that can be viewed by many people at once is desirable.

Perhaps a Halo’s most used component, though, is the cache. It creates and bridges a connection between the user’s current dimension and a portable and artificial dimension. Because it is artificial, objects inside do not suffer from the radiation of most simplex dimensions. However, Haloes are specifically designed to not allow the storage of still-living organic entities. Any attempt to tamper with a Halo and allow this function is illegal. These laws and safety guards are to prevent people from being able to trap each other in a Halo.

Obviously, it is illegal to use Haloes in the presence of veiled citizens. In one incident in Earth year 1709, a criminal of a mischievous temperament, referred to as a Loki (also based on Earthan mythology, specifically Norse) snuck onto Earth. Having no real knowledge of the planet’s geography, he found himself in a remote area of Romania. Wearing blue and white robes, he walked around a small village, Halo hovering above his head. The villagers worshipped him as the second coming of Jesus Christ, and lavished him with gifts. He was eventually reprimanded by Martian police. They were able to convince the villagers that the man was actually a false prophet who was using witchcraft to mimic the properties of the Lord, and also that they were servants of God, particularly vessels of angels, come to cast out the demon. The villagers wanted to burn him at the stake, however the police were able to remove him with no trouble. Before leaving, the police proclaimed that the village was thereby protected from other such witchcraft and that no witch would be able cross its borders. This was to prevent further witch trials, as were common in those days.Though the village was from then on left to its own devices (as most Earthans are), not one more crime was committed there for the nearly hundred years it survived before its population diminished to nothingness and it vanished into obscurity.

Microstory 47: The Advancement of Nick Fisherman

A few weeks ago, I began writing a weekly flash fiction series called The Advancement of Mateo Matic. You can find it somewhere around here (*looks around*). The official description is that “a man is only able to live for one day every year. Every 24 hours, he is sent forward in time exactly 365 days.” I began writing this story as a sort of primer for what’s going to happen next. The characters and their stories are fictional, but the premise is 100% true. I belong to a long line of people who are affectionately known as Salmon. We all have our own schedule, but all Salmon are passing through time...incorrectly. Like my protagonist, I am destined to disappear at the strike of midnight following my 28th birthday. That’s today. I will return to the timestream in exactly one year. Fear not, my loyal readers. I have written hundreds of short fiction stories, and they are already loaded, timed to be posted on their proper date. I urge you to continue to visit my website. It’s awesome. I will see you all again on April 29th, 2016. Please make sure my search history has been wiped while I’m gone. Thanks.

Microstory 46: Lost Dog

“I was on one of my regular walks a few weeks ago when I came across a lost dog flyer. I decided to take a picture of it in case I ran into the dog along the way. Several miles away, I thought I saw another lost dog flyer, but it wasn’t. It was a found dog flyer. I pulled up the picture I took on my phone earlier and compared. Neither picture was of great quality, so I wasn’t 100% sure, but they sounded similar enough. Then I noticed that the lost dog was reportedly last seen wearing a red collar, and the found dog was said to have been wearing a blue collar. Wanting to be certain no one was colorblind or something, I began to dial my phone. Before I could press send, a dog trotted up to me. It looked just as close to the dog or dogs from the flyers, but it was wearing a green collar, and it didn’t have a tag. Were there three missing dogs? I called both numbers, and they were both out of service. I realized that these fliers could be years old, and were just never taken down. I took the dog I had to the vet to see if it had one of those microchips, but it didn’t. I had no choice but to keep it. It wasn’t until later that I found out she was pregnant.”

“Cool story, bro. All I asked was how much for a puppy.”

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: March 27, 2020

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Yesterday, Mateo called his parents and asked that they be in Las Vegas in one year’s time. He spent the rest of the day with his aunt, exploring the city with what little money they had. They got to know each other a little better. She didn’t know where his birth father was, but she suspected that he too was some kind of traveler, and that he was completely out of control of it. It made him feel better to know that the reason Mario wasn’t in his life might be a pretty damn good one. Mateo and Daria gave each other a hug just before midnight. “Oh, dry mouth,” she said. They were departing at the same time. Once he jumped back into the timestream, he walked to the agreed upon motel and knocked on the door. His father, Randall sighed. “Well, we got a vacation out of this.”

He could see his mother, Carol packing behind him. “But it’s time that we leave. If we don’t get back to Topeka in 24 hours, you could be stuck in the middle of nowhere.”

“I wouldn’t want you to have to go through this again. I’m so sorry, mom and dad.”

“Don’t be,” Randall said. “It’s given me an idea. We’ll test it out later.”

Despite the fact that the route was an hour longer, they drove through Arizona and New Mexico to get back to Kansas. They had always had a rule about Utah; in that it was off limits on principle. Ever since Colorado legalized marijuana, it was kept in the same category. They called these locations “loci non grata”. In only a few years, these policies would become impractical, as more and more states were following Colorado’s lead.

Almost exactly halfway into their trip, they were passing through Las Vegas, New Mexico when the car began to smoke. “No, no, no!” Randall cried. There was a loud tapping sound as the old vehicle slowly decelerated to a complete stop. He tried the key, but it wouldn’t turn over.

“Honey, it’s smoking. You can’t drive a smoking car, even if you get it started.”

“Well, I don’t know anything about cars!”

“I think it’s the radiator,” Mateo jumped in. “In movies, they pee on it.”

Randall turned around and gave him the stink eye. “That’s only when they don’t have water.”

“You are not going to spray water all over the engine, not having any clue what you’re doing. We’ll call a tow truck. I don’t even know why you don’t drive an electric car like everyone else.”

Randall ignored her. “Okay, Google...”

“Yes?” came a comforting voice from the aether.

“Would you please send us a tow truck?”

“It’s already on its way. I could also retask a nearby drone to assess the vehicle’s condition before the truck gets here,” the computer suggested.

“That would be great, thanks,” Randall answered.

“No problem, Randall the Man.”

“Randall the Man?” Mateo asked.

“She and I are really close,” his father explained.

Moments later, they could hear a soft buzzing sound, coming from the distance and growing closer. A small drone appeared from the trees and greeted them. Randall stepped out of the truck and lifted the hood. Mateo watched as the drone zipped back and forth, scanning the system and analyzing the data. It even checked the undercarriage. Once it was done, it hovered in front of Randall’s face. “I have begun orders for two parts that you will need to return your vehicle to working condition. I need your authorization for payment.”

Randall began to lift his hand to the drone but Carol stopped him. “Wait, how long is this going to take?”

“The parts will arrive by long-distance drone late tonight. Your car should be ready tomorrow afternoon,” the drone answered.

“Randall...” Carol started.

He placed his thumb on the drone which responded with, “payment accepted.”

“We need these parts, either way,” Randall told his wife. “We’ll rent a car and come back for the truck next week.”

“Would you like me to send the rental car to this location?” the drone asked.

“Make it the cheapest one you have.”

“The cheapest driverless car, please,” Carol corrected.

“Authorization required.”

Randall placed his thumb on the drone again.

“If you would like,” the drone began, “I could play music while you wait.”

“Classical. Please and thank you.”

While they were waiting for the rental car to arrive, Mateo called Leona to ask how things were going. She was liking her classes, but she was swamped. She was taking more than a full schedule of courses, and just could not skip today to see him. She said that she would be waiting for him at the house when he got back, though. He smiled. He had only known her for a few days, but he liked her quite a bit. She had matured so much since he had met her. His parents were about the same as they always had been, and he hadn’t kept in touch with most of his friends. Seeing the changes a young adult goes through over the years in such a short period of time was phenomenal and bizarre. It was like a four dimensional television series. But even that took longer to experience.

It was exciting to be riding in his first driverless car. The seats were faced towards each other, as there was no need to be at the wheel. Mateo was given the whole back seat where he was able to sleep. When he woke up later, he found his parents to be napping. That was just awesome. Why his father refused to move with the times and own one of these himself was something he didn’t understand. They would later tell him that the concept of owning one’s own car was going out of style anyway. Many people preferred to inform an app on their phone that they were in need of getting to a location, and a car would just come get them. If the prospect wasn’t rendered meaningless by his condition, Mateo wasn’t sure he would like that. The freedom of having his own possessions made too much sense to him.

Even with their delays, they got back to the safety of their home by midnight. Leona was cooking them a midnight snack of buttered noodles. His favorite. Mateo was brushing his teeth when he remembered what his father had said earlier. He went back downstairs. “You said you wanted to try something.”

He looked at his watch. “Oh, yeah. It’s almost time.”

“What is it?”

“Say goodbye to your mother and your...Leona.”

After that was done, it was nearly time. Randall timed it out, then held his son in a tight embrace. “I’m going to try to hold you down. If that doesn’t work, maybe I’ll get to go with you.”

“I don’t think that’s going to work,” Mateo said.

“It worked with you and your aunt,” Leona said.

“It just doesn’t...” he tried to find the words. “It doesn’t feel the same. When I jumped to Vegas with her, it felt much different than my jumps. It was...more forceful, more jarring.”

“Well I’m going to try it,” Randall said. “If it doesn’t work, then fine. What’s the worse that could happen?”

A year later, Mateo learned the answer to that question. His father had succeeded in neither keeping him from jumping, nor jumping with him. He had, however, suffered a heart attack, and died.

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Siftens Landing Part V

Click here for the first installment of this series.

Click here for the second installment of this series.
Click here for the third installment of this series.
Click here for the fourth installment of this series.

Father Siften, Sabrina Lander, Ryan Lander, and Madam Kapka were out looking for little Moe when the explosion came from behind them. They ran towards it, stumbling onto the bottom of the hill where Billy and Kyle were lifting an unconscious Allison from the ground. “Oh my god,” Father Siften yelled.

“She’s okay,” little Moe assured him. And she really was okay. She would have a nasty bump on the head, but she would live.

“We have to get back to the houses,” Sabrina exclaimed. They raced up to meet the horror. The Siften house was on fire, and the flames were licking at the side of the Kapka house. They got there just in time to hear the sirens from emergency services. They did a headcount and found that the only two who were not present were Mama Siften and Mister Kapka, who were each known to be out running errands.

While Father Siften was coordinating with the sheriff, Ryan was talking with the kids who had caused the explosion. “How did this happen?” he asked.

“We’re sorry,” his daughter, Libby answered. “We just wanted to look at your fireworks.”

“Was this the work of my Ferocity Sunstrikers?” The children kept their heads down in shame, but nodded affirmatively. A deputy had heard the conversation.

Madam Kapka, who was a veterinarian, was treating Allison’s wound since the paramedics hadn’t arrived yet. Allison woke up confused and backed away. “No, no, honey. It’s okay. It’s me.”

“I don’t know who you are,” Allison said in fear.

“This is my mother,” Kyle explained to her.” His voice was enough to calm her down.

“What happened to her?” Madam Kapka asked while continuing to work.

The boys were afraid to answer, but Billy decided to be the bigger man. “Kyle and I were fighting, and we accidently bumped into her, so she fell down the hill.”

“Is anyone else hurt?” Madam Kapka asked after she had done all there was to do with Allison’s head.

“No,” Kyle replied. A second deputy had heard the conversation.

The firetruck finally arrived, followed closely by the ambulance. The firefighters sprayed the house with water while paramedics loaded Allison up and drove her away. A few other firefighters went into the house, even though there were told that no one was in there. The deputy and the sheriff spent some time whispering to each other over to the side, trying to figure out what they were going to do. In the end, it was decided that the children would be separated from their parents, and that the parents would be brought in under suspicion of some form of child abuse. The parents and children screamed and pulled away from the cops, trying to reach each other. Then they all stopped and watched as one of the firefighters came out of the Siften house carrying a body. It was Mama Siften. She had come back without anyone knowing. The firefighter shook his head at his superior. She was dead.
Days later, after all legal charges were dropped, everyone moved away from each other, and never went back to the hidden cul-de-sac again. Once she graduated from high school, Allison ran off with Kyle, and they haven’t spoken to their respective families since.

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Honestly, I'm glad that's over. Now I can start on the stories that I really want to tell. Next Saturday will be the premiere of Mr. Muxley Meets Mediocrity.