Adventure of Enrico and Dante: Episode III

"I really don't know how to the start song D."
"Just go for the hip hop and flip flop Enrico."
"Oh.......you mean drop the beat box like funk socks."
"Yea something like that Enrico" as Dante slowly rolls his eyes.
"OK......here I go. Now who you know leave the scene
Messier than canvas's by Jackson Pollock
Throwing multicolored thoughts at a rapid pace
I make a mess you dissect it and make sense of it
Then get back to me at your earliest convenience
Check my verbal sequence as I texturize these tracks
Seven layers to be exact eliminate the whack
With a firm brush stroke I M.C. paintily
Lyricists begin crumbling from my scumbling technique. How was that!"
"It was good but I have a strange feeling that was about Bob Ross? Come to think of it..........he is on the tube at the moment, lets watch."
So they make there way to the living room where they must go on a new adventure to find the remote. They looked under the couch to find nothing but some old cheese-itz(hmmmmmm cheese). They look behind the TV and to no prevail they find nothing. Just when they lost all hope and Bob Ross was going to be over in 5 minutes, they found the remote!!! It was in Enrico's hand the whole time.
"Garsh!!! I hate when that happens" Dante said.
"Me three WAIT two Wait too. Sorry, I hate when that happens" Enrico replied.
Dante takes the remote and flips it to Bob Ross. Enrico finds it awkward that Dante can flip channels and not only turn them. He thinks it must be one of those abilities that he has that Enrico doesn't. Kinda like how Enrico can tell the difference between American and Swiss cheese just by listening.
As the sit there watching Bob Ross, they start feeling outrageously happy. Three minutes of Bob Ross made them so happy that the band Thrice (<------totally EMO) didn't even phase them. When they finally snapped out of there phase of happiness, they realized what must be done. They must obliterate Bob Ross!

COMMERCIAL BREAK!!! Hi I'm Bob Ross, are you feeling down, miserable to the point where you don't think anyone cares? Well your right! No one does care. At least you were right about something. Thank you, here is Episode 3 already in progress.

New York city is destroyed and now the existence of the world now lies in the hands of Enrico and Dante. they must get to Bob Ross's headquarters located in Alaska. With both of there card miles used up and no money, it seemed everything was hopeless, but Dante had a great idea. He looked around and then he looked at Enrico and shouted to the top of his lungs "COMMERCIAL BREAK!!"

Bad credit! NO credit! NO problem! You can get a car as long as you have a job that pays 300 a week and a child for collateral! It seems harsh but is it........is it. Then come on down to Bob Ross's ford dealership and if we don't give you a price within 10 minutes, we will give you a bar of soap. YES you heard me a bar of soap if you don't get a price in 10 minutes or less. Thank you, here is Episode 3 already in progress.

"IT WORKED!!!!!" screamed Dante. "That was absurd like a verb" rapped Enrico. As they approach they door to the lair, they look at all the happy bushes in his paintings being used as slaves! That why he didn't want anyone telling about them in his paintings. Enrico and Dante then mustard (another one of those words that should never be used except in the sense of food) up the courage and rallied up the bushes to rebell. As the bushes break the doors open, Bob Ross throws paint thinner on them and they dissolve under there own weight. Everything slowed down as you hear the bushes screaming in the background. Dante falls to his knees with tears running down his face. Enrico has green and brown paint running through his fingers with a horrified look on his face. Bob has a flame in his eyes as he laughs oh so evilly as the floor is covered in paint. He runs up the stairs while Enrico and Dante are in the fetal position on the floor. It again seemed that the team was defeated but then they heard a scream. They got up and ran up the stairs and saw Bob.......crushed by a hippo? They looked at each other and then heard a whistle. They looked up and saw a small dark girl vanish into the darkness and the hippo followed. Amazed, Enrico said "You know what, this is by far the weirdest mission yet and I don't want to even know who that girl was. Lets just go home." "Agreed" Dante said. "You know what to do Dante." "COMMERCIAL BREAK!"

Want a Fanta. Dontcha want a. Want a Fanta. Dontcha want a. You look hot in all that plaster drink some fanta faster faster!

Eiríkr inn Rauda Ü


Dedicated to the Gaidens Blog of inactivity

Adventures of Enrico and Danté: Episode II

Well the tranformer is now totaled because Ol' Enrico cant drive stick, so Dante and Enrico are out in the desert walking angerly. Dante paces faster and cuts off Enrico and looks him straight in the eye. SLAP!!!!! Enrico falls to the floor and then leg sweeps Dante to the floor. Now they are both on the floor not able to get up, scurming on the floor like over-turned turtles. So they proceed to slap each other why they lay helpless on the scorching sand. After hours of brutal girl slaps and of dehydration, they are aimlessly swinging at eachother. Enrico says he sees a vision of a huge corn dog falling out of the sky and landing on Dante. Dante has a vision that Enrico has been consumed by a sand monster that looks like Barbra Streisand with a rats body. As they are laughing to themselves histarically, they come to there senses knowing that Dante's vision is the only one that is possible.

Hours later they finally look at eachother and Dante says "Enrico why don't we just get back up and walk to get help?" Enrico replies "I'd rather die being lazy then moving."

"Good point" nods Dante.
"Im sorry I slapped you in the face Enrico." Enrico being shrivled like a rasin because of his rediculous vonerability to the sun says like an old man

"Its all good. Im sorry I ninja swept you to the ground." By this time Enricos lower body is dust blowing in the desert winds. Finally, Dantes uses all of his might in a last effort to move, he throws his arms in the air hoping to fly. As he falls back to the floor his hand hits a power cord.

"What this be" he says quite gangsterly. He pulls the cord and the desert goes away and they are back into the tranformer. Everything is back to normal except the fact that Enrico has no legs. Dante rips off one leg and and proceeds to crazy glue it to Enrico's torso. So as the transformer walks into the sunset, Dante says "Did you even know this thing had that feature." Enrico replies "No if I did I would throw Kelly in here and let this baby rip!"

P.S This is all Alexanders Fault.

Eiríkr inn RaudaÜ

Pressed Against the Sky; Adrift

Your mind and your body function very differently depending on whether they are awake, or asleep.

------------------------------------------------------------

Mark threw on his black hoodie and left his apartment heading for his best friend's. He kicked through the snow on the city sidewalks as he ran along. He was anxious to get there. He took a route a couple blocks out of the way in order to avoid the bookstore where he worked. He was really late. So much so that he was strongly considering not showing up at all. He'd call in later and apologize, but as for right then his mind was racing with the events of the night before.

He had been coming from his father's funeral a couple hours from where he lived. He hadn't wanted to go at all, but there would have been no one else there. His father had been a drunk and a disgrace. So, he had put on his one pinsripe suit and gone to pay his father what respect he owed him and no more. There was a reverend there when he arrived and he had asked him politley but sternly to leave. He leaned down in front of the coffin, ran his fingers across the woodwork, said nothing more than goodbye, and lingered for a bit as the undertakers lowered his father into the earth. He walked away before they finished.
Michelle called him while he was on the train. He was glad to speak to her. He didn't like to think about himself too much and he loved being distracted by her.

As he walked back towards his apartment in the snow he was thinking about her and how she was really the closest thing to family he had left in the world. She had been his best friend since they were both seventeen. He knew that somewhere within himself he loved her more than anything, and whether or not he knew it she felt the same about him, but neither of them had ever brought themselves to overcome their fears of getting too involved with eachother. They had both had their own bad personal experiences and had seen firsthand how people like themselves had ruined beautiful friendships when the relationship got out of hand. She was, afterall, a really wonderful friend.
Just as he was thinking this a man in a black sweater with bright blue eyes approached him.
"Excuse me," he began "is your name Mark Teague?"
"Yeah, I am. Who are you?" He stopped where he was.
"I'm sorry to catch you returning from a funeral. I know it must be a rather bleak time for you."
"It is. Who are you? How do you know all this?"
"My name is John, but now, that's not really important. I'm with this agency." He was excited but seemed somewhat hesitant. His presentation was shaky and he seemed unsure of his words.
"Is this...?" Mark began, but then he changed the direction of what he was saying. "Listen, I don't really care to be bothered, so if you could just tell me what this is about quickly, I'd just like to get home."
"I understand. We hope you'll respond positivley. We see alot of potential in you. I'll just leave you with this card. Please call by tonight if you want to know more."
He thrusted a small black bussines card into Mark's hand. Mark looked at it as the man walked off behind him. It was black on both sides, with metalic silver engraving. Pretty cool he thought. On one side all it had was a many digit phone number. On the other simply the word "NO". He shoved it into his pocket and went back home. He turned on the light which was always too bright, turned it back off. He took off his suit, put it neatly away in his closet and then sat on the couch in front of the TV. It was usualy left on for saftey reasons, but he hated TV. He put it on mute and called Michelle back. He told her about the man "John" and the card. They joked about it being some sort of underground government agency like the "Men in Black" or something, but Michelle said that he might as well call just to check it out. He wasn't so sure. He figured it was probably just something stupid, and they were just trying to scare him by making him think they knew everything about him. How hard could it have been to have learned his name and what he had done that day anyways? Obituary maybe, and a very little bit of asking around. He told Michelle he wasnt going to worry about it, and that he thought it was sick to take advantage of a family death for whatever stupid thing he was selling. Whatever it was he'd been ok without it so far.
By the time they finished talking about it Mark decided he would just forget it ever happened. If worse came to worse he'd report the guy to the police, but as for then he would regard the man as a harmless salesman. He threw the card behind his couch, said goodbye to Michelle and then sat back to see if he could find anything worth watching.

------------------------------------------------------------

After that he might have fallen asleep. He wasn't sure. He hadn't really been very tired.
He would later decide that it had all been a dream, but it really did seem real at the time. He had fought with someone. They stuck him with a syringe in his neck. He wasn't sure if he had fought in his home or somewhere else. He remembered being strapped down at some point, and there was a dark figure creeping around him almost always just out of his sights. Everything was blury. Sounds were faded and jumbled, and the light kept changing. The figure moving around him reminded him very much of how a doctor moves around a lying patient. There were frequent blinding lights followed by thick darkness at other times. Then a man in a nice dark suit was standing above him. His face was in shadow. There had been alot of hushed talking the entire time, but what the man in the suit said he remembered.
"You're going to be having dreams like this. It'll be confusing, but try not to take it too seriously."
He then jammed another syringe into Mark's neck.

He woke up on his couch at home exactly as he had been when he hung up the phone the night before. Everything was a blur. It was almost like having a bad hangover at first. He stumbled into his bathroom and looked into the mirror. The stab marks from the needles were there on his neck! He'd call the police soon enough, but right then he didn't want to be alone in his house. Whoever that "John" was, he had known too much about him.
He threw on his black hoodie and left his apartment heading for Michelle's.

When he got there he immediatley began to explain what had happened. He was scared and he was stammering. She told him to sit down, and take a drink. It was all just a dream she said.
"No!" he went on "Look! I have the stab marks here! Look!" He showed her his neck and she looked at it. She put her hand on it.
"Mark..." She said.
"I told you! You see it right? I think this is real! This is serious! I have to find out who that guy is!"
"Mark. There's nothing there."
"What!? I just saw it this morning!
He sprinted to her hallway mirror. He looked where they had been. He put his hood down and checked the other side just in case. The stabs were gone.
"You were dreaming Mark!" Michelle said with a smile "And, now you're late to work. Yanno Welling is gonna fire you if you do stuff like that."
"Ah... Welling. Me and Welling are fine. He'll understand. It's funny you said I was dreaming. It's what I thought at first. But, then I thought that I couldn't have been. It was too real. I kept trying to decide for sure, but it was so hard to tell."
They just looked at eachother for a moment. Michelle was still smiling and Mark couldn't help but to feel silly.
"Ok, well... Now I guess it must have been a dream."
"Alright then." she replied "But, if anything else wierd happens call me, ok?"
"Haha. I always do don't I?"
"Yeah, you do."
They hugged, said goodbye and he took off.

------------------------------------------------------------

Things continued rather well for Mark from then on. He hadn't been fired from his job. Welling had told him when he called that afternoon that he had been prepared just in case Mark hadn't been able to come in that day, and so if he'd like he could just stay home. He semed to be very sympathetic to family deaths.
Welling was a grumpy old guy usualy, but he was sharp and always very insightful to talk to. He was one of those guys who knew everything about everything. He had a muzzle of grey stubble which was always just a little overdue for a shave, and a mane of flowing hair to match. He was enourmous and he wore wild shirts and panama hats. Mark had always thought that he was born to own a bookstore. Over the time Mark had worked there Welling had sort of taken on a crazy old uncle persona in Mark's life. Besides Michelle, Welling was his one confidant. For that reason he was one of the only people in the world who knew how Mark really felt about her.
Mark was surprised to find that Welling had hired a new guy. His name was Dan. He was the one who had covered for him the day after his dad's funeral. He listened to punk music and wore tight clothing. His hair fell into his eyes and he was always a mess. Mark worked with him a couple times that following week. He had told Dan he played guitar, because Dan asked him, and that was true, but he had learned in high school and he just hadn't kept it up after he graduated. Dan wouldn't leave him alone about it. He kept telling him he had to get back into it, and how they should jam together sometime and so forth. He was a pretty spazzy guy, so Mark wasn't really sure, but he did pull out his acoustic that week and began to play it again. He remembered everything he had learned. It was fun to have something relaxing like that to do. He started to practice more often. He even told Dan he could come over a couple times. He was a wierd guy, but he was easy to get along with for the most part. Dan played guitar also, but really, after hanging out with him a few times it became pretty clear that he could play anything.
Soon enough Dan and Mark became good friends. Before long they would be both hanging out with Michelle, and most the time this big guy named Terrin who was one of Dan's friends who almost never spoke. He was a bass player. It was pretty different for Mark, who had been pretty much a loner since high school and even into his short-lived college days. He enjoyed the new company though and he felt like his life was coming along rather comfortably.

But then there was another scare. It had felt like a nightmare, but Mark couldn't shake how real it had felt. Now, if Mark had only been experiencing frequent nightmares that felt disturbingly real, he would have simply ignored it and never told anyone, realizing that it wasn't really real and that there was nothing he could do about it. But, certain things began to happen in Marks life that led him to belive that maybe his nightmares should be taken a little more seriously.

Maybe he hadn't remembered the advice that the man in the nice dark suit had given him. But, then again, maybe that man was never real at all.

------------------------------------------------------------

"Hey Michelle."
"Hey Mark, what's going on? It's pretty early..."
"Yeah, I'm sorry if I woke you, I know you don't work today."
"It's ok. What is is?"
"You remember the really bad nightmare I had like a month ago."
"Yeah, I do. That was really wild. Why? What's up?"
"Ok, listen, I had another one that was like it."
"Oh..."
"It had the same guy as the first one. I couldn't see his face but he was in a nice dark suit."
"Ok. Did he talk to you? Do you remember?"
"No. I can't remember. This one was way less clear. All I remember was that for a moment he was there and then the rest of the dream... It was horrifying."
"Well... That's too bad Mark. But, yanno... If it's just a nightmare, it's just a nightmare. You'll be alright, wont you? I mean, it's not real, afterall. You're awake, you're talking with me. You're ok?"
"Yeah. I'm ok. You're right. I'm ok. It's just that..."
There was a silence.
"Mark! What?"
"Well, you remember when we went to that Radiohead concert, and you forgot your keys in the car and I ran back for you?"
"Yeah, I thought I'd be stuck there alone, cos your crazy friend didn't want to wait for me!"
"Hehe... Dan. Well, anyways, did you notice how fast I got to the car and back?"
"Um. Yeah. That was ridiculously fast."
"No kidding. I didn't know I could run that fast! Ok, and then you remember we went to that fair."
"Yeah. Thank you, by the way, I had alot of fun."
Mark blushed a little, because she had thanked him already so many times. He was glad the conversation was over the phone.
"Yeah, anytime." There was a pause that lasted just a little bit too long. he heard her inhale like she was going to speak, but, he started first, because he really had a point to make, and he didn't want for the subject to change. "Ok, gimme a minute her, girly. Sorry. You remember how I told you I was terrible at carnival games?"
"Uh huh! And then you went and won them all! You liar, you!" She laughed.
"Exactly! And the wierd part is I really am awful at those games! I wasn't lying! I'd never done well at that sort of thing untill that night!"
"So, what's your point Mark?"
"Well, get this. In my dream, I used all those abilitys. But they were enhanced, I was amazing. Unstoppable even."
"Like a carnival game superhero?"
"...no. I wish. That's the disturbing part."
"Well, what is it?"
"It was violent. I was no hero."
"You were a villain?"
"More or less... Yeah."
"Did you kill anyone? Cos, yanno they say only crazy people kill people in their dreams." She was trying to make light of the situaton, but Mark was pretty serious in his response.
"Well... I'm not sure."
"Mark. Like I said, if it was just dream, it was just a dream. You are ok now right?"
"I am. This morning, though, I got up, I was terrified. It was seven am. I got up and ran to your place..."
"What? So... You're coming here right now?"
"Well, to be exact.. I got here at like 7:05."
"What??"
"I woke up and it was only a couple minutes before seven. I threw on some clothes, and I ran out the door and all the way to your place. Then I looked at my watch and it was 7:05."
"Mark... You would have been doing like 40mph." She laughed.
"Well, I ran past the speedometer thing and it clocked me at 34."
She bursted into laughter. "Mark. Seriously, are you coming here right now or not?"
"Listen, Michelle. I didn't want to scare you by coming up there so early, so I called instead. I've been out here on this bench the whole time."
Michelle looked at her watch. It read "7:08". She went to her window and moved the curtains. Sure enough Mark was there sitting on the bench across the street looking back at her window over his shoulder. She was quiet. She heard him laugh over the phone as he smiled at her and waved.
"You really aren't kidding are you?"
"Nope."

...to be continued...

- Isaak Evoleros

A Beautiful Discovery

The sun was shining as Michael walked out of the movie theater with a few of his friends and their wives. Michael was 25 and single. He had his share of crushes as a teenager and dated a girl a few years back, but they never felt right for each other. He had never fallen in love.
“We’re going to grab some dinner. You hungry?” his friend asked.
“I’d better get going. I got plans,” Michael replied.
“Plans, huh?!”
“Yeah, I got to pick up some groceries and get home. Tomorrow’s going to be a long day.”
“Groceries? Sure...”
“I’m out of milk,” Michael said defensively.
“You’re out of milk almost every other day.”
“I drink a lot of milk, so?”
“Come on, just admit you like the architecture behind register number nine!” his friend said teasingly.
“Shut up,” Michael said as he faked a punch at his friend. His friend laughed.
“I’ll see you later, man.”
“Night,” Michael said as he turned to walk to his car.

Michael pulled into the parking space outside the grocery store and turned the engine off. He sat in silence for a few moments with his hands and head resting on the steering wheel. “Just get out of the car and walk inside,” he whispered to himself.
A few moments later he jumped out of the car and headed for the store. The sun was low on the horizon and storm clouds were moving in overhead. He was halfway across the parking lot when a drizzling rain began, tapping on the roofs of cars in the lot. Michael loved rain. Lightning, thunder, rain; all aspects of a thunderstorm he loved. The drizzle turned into a downpour and he started running.
By the time he got inside he was soaked. His wet shoes squeaked on the floor as he walked to the back of the store. The store was quiet and not many people were shopping. He grabbed a carton of milk and started to walk towards the front of the store. He stopped halfway down one of the aisles, his hands shaking. Nervously, he walked back and forth for a moment.
“Sir is there anything I can help you find?” a store worker who was restocking the shelves with food asked him.
“No, I’m fine. Thanks.” Michael continued walking towards the front of the store. His hands weren’t just shaking, they were vibrating. He took a deep breath and headed for register nine.
Michael walked up to the register. “Hey, Sarah,” he said smiling.
“Michael!” she replied happily.
She was beautiful. Long, brown hair, beautiful brown eyes, and the prettiest smile on the happiest face. She had a quiet, relaxed demeanor, but she wasn’t shy. She was always cheerful and talkative with the customers in the checkout line. Michael had never seen her unhappy. He always remembered the first day he saw her. He had just moved into the town and was getting groceries, and he couldn’t help but watch her out of the corner of his eye as he waited in line. That was three months ago. But today was the day he was going to do something about all that.
“How are you?” he asked sincerely, though nervous.
“I’m good. I’m good.” She looked at him head to toe, the water still dripping off of him. “Raining a little, huh?” she said laughing. “I love the rain.” Michael smiled and couldn’t help but stare into her eyes for a moment. He set the milk carton on the counter.
“Is that everything?” she asked, breaking the silence.
Michael nodded while scratching his head nervously. “Just ask her,” he thought. He got his wallet out and handed her the money.
“Are you okay?” she asked. “You seem like something’s on your mind.”
He picked up the milk and put his wallet back in his pocket. “Yeah, I’m alright.” She handed him the receipt. He looked into her eyes. She looked into his. “Have a good night, Sarah.”
“Okay, you too,” she said quietly with a puzzled look on her face.
Michael headed for the door carrying the milk carton, scolding himself under his breath. The automatic doors opened as he approached the exit and he sighed, then stopped walking and stared at the carton in his hand for a moment, thinking to himself. He turned around and took a few steps back towards her. “Sarah?” he asked.
She looked over at him. “Yeah?”
“I was wondering… if you haven’t eaten dinner yet, if you…” He swallowed. “…wanted to grab some with me?” He held his breath.
Sarah’s face turned into a smile. “I’d like that.”
He breathed a sigh of relief. He smiled.
______________________________________
Five years later...
Sarah was happy and sad, terrified and excited. Her eyes teared and she wiped a tear off her cheek. A quivering smile graced her face. “I love you,” she said.
Michael embraced her and kissed her. “I love you, too.” He held her in silence for a few moments.
Tomorrow he was leaving her for three months. Three months he wouldn’t see her. Three months he couldn’t hold her. For three months he would be orbiting 250 miles above her.
“You’ve got to go,” she said.
“I know.”
“12 hours.” She sighed. “You nervous?”
“As heck,” he said. “Does it show?”
“You’re covering it pretty well,” she said smiling.
He stared into her eyes and smiled. She smiled back. He kissed her again.
“I love you,” he said.
“I love you, too.”
Michael smiled and headed for the door to the complex. He kept looking over his shoulder at her and it was like the first day he saw her, watching her out of the corner of his eye at the store. He opened the door, paused and looked back at her. He smiled. She smiled. He stepped inside and the door shut behind him.

7 a.m. The alarm clock in her motel room sounded, and Sarah rolled over and turned it off. She took a deep breath. She placed her feet on the floor.

She sat on a bench holding a cup of hot coffee at the launch viewing area at Kennedy Space Center. Her hands nervously fidgeted on the cup. “T-minus ten, nine, eight…” a voice spoke over a loud speaker. She took a deep breath and stood up. Terrified. She was simply terrified. “…three, two, one…” Her mind raced, but she smiled.
“zero.”
______________________________________
Three months later...
Michael’s eyes were closed as he drifted along through the modules of the International Space Station, propelled by the silent airflow of the ventilation system.
“Michael,” a voice with a Russian accent came echoing through the module. His eyes popped open and he turned to face the man. “Your wife is on the line from Houston.”
He livened. “Thanks, Vladimir.” He floated over and put the headset on. Vladimir drifted away and out of the module.
“Sarah!” he exclaimed.
“I miss you, Michael.”
“I miss you, too.”
“What were you just doing?” she asked.
“Drifting around, thinking of you.”
“Oh, really?” She laughed. He smiled. “Shouldn’t you be working or something?” she said jokingly.
“Who comes here to work?” he said laughing.
There was a long pause in speech, just breathing. He stared out the window at the Earth below. All he saw was the boundary between land and water. No state borders. No country borders. Just Earth. “I wish you were here to see this, Sarah,” he whispered. “But I don’t think I can do this again to you, and to the baby.”
On the Earth below, Sarah placed her warm hands on her stomach and smiled.
“This was a mistake,” he said solemnly.
“What was?”
“Leaving you alone.”
“Look, Michael, you’ve been through a lot the past few years. We’ve been through a lot. Maybe this was a mistake, but we shouldn’t regret it.” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“We fall so we can pick ourselves back up. And we have both fallen. We’ve both made mistakes, Michael.”
“Do you think we’ve done some things right?” he asked.
“You didn’t walk out the door of the store. I didn’t say ‘no’” She placed her hands on her stomach again. “We’ve done things right everyday.”
“I’m coming home tomorrow, Sarah, and I’m staying home.”
“Michael-“
“No, I’ve already thought about this. There are more than enough job opportunities for me at NASA, JSC and JPL. We’re going to be a family soon, and I need to be closer to home for that. Okay?”
“Okay,” she said.
“I’ll see you tomorrow morning. I love you.”
“I love you, Michael.” The line disconnected.
______________________________________
Eleven hours later...
“Three, two, one… and we have re-entry communications blackout,” a control operator’s voice came over a speaker.
“Twenty-five minutes and he’s on the ground, Sarah,” a man said popping his head into a private room off of the main control room in Houston, Texas. “And congrats on the baby, too!”
“Thank you, sir.” She stared out through the wall of glass in front of her at the control room. There was a large video screen covering an entire wall that had various diagrams and numbers, information she didn’t understand, just that it had to do with her husband coming home. Time passed quickly.
“End of blackout. We have communication and downlink online,” the controller spoke again.
“Discovery, this is Houston. We have you on com,” another controller spoke.
“HOUSTON!” a voice from the shuttle yelled over the radio then crackled into static.
“Discovery, Houston. Please repeat.” Silence.
Sarah stood up. Silence.
“Do we have downlink?” a man yelled aggravated.
“Yes, sir.”
“Discovery, Houston. Please-” The man was cut off when a voice from the Shuttle came through loud static.
“HOUSTON! We… oh, no!” The voice ended. All that was heard after that was screams.
Through the screams, Sarah heard a name. Her name. She gasped for breath and fell to the floor as video of what was left of the shuttle came up on the control room’s main screen, a fireball streaking across the blue morning sky.
She heard the entire control room grasp, but all that noise faded into nothing in her mind as she held her stomach and cried out.
______________________________________
One month later...
Sarah sat on the living room couch holding a cup of coffee and a photo album. She wiped a tear off her cheek as she flipped through the pages.
The doorbell rang. She walked to the door and opened it to a man wearing a suit and tie and a woman wearing a skirt and blouse, each with a single black book in hand.
“Good morning,” the woman said.
Sarah placed her warm hands on her stomach and she smiled.



For the family and friends of the crew of Challenger and Columbia.

-Adam Ferrier

A Better Life Part I

The light reflected red onto the wet pavement. Steam rose off of the hot asphalt. Maria felt a warm stinging in her eyes. Everything was moving so slow. Her life until than had been all about speed, flying through life so that the unhappy moments would be just a blur. She heard the crunch of glass as someone rushed to see if she was ok. She took a deep breath and the pace quickened. Then she began to hear the screams. A woman. Her voice slowly went from a shrill cry to a despondent weeping and Maria knew someone had died. Staring at her reflection on the wet pavement she wondered how she had gotten to this point. How does life change in an instant? Or had she been racing to this end for a long time coming?
Four years earlier life was slow and easy.......
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‘Oye Maria!’
Leave me alone Alex, I’ve told you a million times I’m not gonna go out with you. Maria walked past him and his cousins her eyes to the ground. They looked her up and down. The trailer court they lived in seemed to get smaller with every day. She climbed the termite eaten steps to her family’s trailer. They’d only been in it 8 months but the ones before it had all been the same ‘Is this really better than Mexico? No puede ser.’

‘Papí! You’re home! Her smile quickly faded. Are you ok? ¿Que te paso??’ Maria loved her father, she felt safe with him. When they were crossing the border 7 years earlier and she was tired and scared he had carried her. When they got to the other side he whispered in her ear: ‘we’re here, we’re home.’ She sat down on the couch next to him. His face dotted with sweat he was so pale he could pass for a gringo. ‘What’s wrong? What’s wrong Papí? PAPÍ WHAT’S WRONG? He just looked at her. And then all of a sudden he wasn’t there. The life in his eyes was gone. How quickly life changed. She didn’t cry that day, she sat on stained carpet staring at the fake paneling cursing the day they left Mexico, hating herself. He left Mexico to make life better for her. He worked three jobs to give her a better life. It got him no where but dead.

The next morning Maria woke up with swollen eyes though she couldn’t remember why. As she stared at the ceiling the sadness washed over her as she remember how her father died there in front of her. Her mother burst in, ‘Apurate Maria, you’re going to be late for school.’ And like that she forgot. She shoved the thoughts, the memories, the sadness into a dark corner where no one would notice. That afternoon Alex and his cousins were outside like they always were. ‘Maria venga, quiero mostrarte algo, she gave him a skeptical look she remembered the times before when he’d tried to take advantage of her, ‘Come on I wanna show you something.’ As she walked over to him she had a feeling things were changing. Alex’s voice was kinder somehow. He handed her an envelope. ‘We thought you and your mom might need this....you know, until you figure something out.’ She took the money. She swallowed her pride and though she knew she would owe him.

When she went home that afternoon the trailer seemed different. ‘Maria, venga.’ People were always telling her to come, like she was a dog or something. ‘Que Mamí?’ But when she turned the corner her stomach turned. There sitting next to her mother, the place where her father always sat was Jose the sleazy neighbor. ‘Come say hello, this is my friend Jose, he’s going to stay with us for a while’. Life seemed to be getting ever darker. ‘What’s in your hand?’ Maria’s mother was full of coy deceit. She eyed the envelope with curiosity that would have killed any cat. ‘It’s a note from my teacher, she wants to meet with you.’ Deception ran in the family. ‘Ay Maria, tell her I’m working’ Maria went to her room and hid the money in her shoes. She knew one day she would need it.

Days turned to weeks as she got closer to Alex and became a member of his crew. She found the taste of liquor kept memories and her conscience locked away in their dark corner. She did anything asked of her. There were no lines for her to cross. Her shoe pile got bigger and she neared the point of no return.

Before she knew it she was walking to her car, the rain trying to penetrate the ground cold beneath her feet. She thought to herself that her heart was like the cold hard ground. Killing off the love that tried to grow in it. And she thought she didn’t care. She put a box full of old shoes in her car along with a small suitcase filled with clothes and a picture of her papí.
She pulled out of the trailer court, turned south and put her foot on the accelerator. She made it three blocks. The light was yellow. Yellow like the last sunset she saw in Mexico. She pressed ever harder on the accelerator with her stiletto clad foot. The caddy pulled out slow and she tried to slow down and she tried to swerve. But as impact became imminent she closed her eyes and saw her fathers eyes the moment before he had died. She saw something she hadn’t remembered. In his coal black eyes she saw confidence and pride. Love was there to. The cars collided and they effects rippled through her body. Life slowed down and she felt each hit as the car was tossed about in the intersection. She opened her eyes and watched as the sky seemed to be laid upon it’s side.

-Indigo Castner