Terry Bisson - The Fifth Element

Just as the stewardess dropped her shoes, one by one, and crooned, “I’m on my way…”

Just as Zorg punched in more numbers: “645…”

Just as the engines peaked: RRRRRROOOOOAAAARRRRRRRRRR!

And Loc Rhod began his climactic Byronic stanza.

And the shuttle lifted off.

And the stewardess likewise: “Yeeeessss!”

And Zorg, smiling demonically, punched in the final numbers:

“321…”

BARRROOOOOM!

The mobile pay phone exploded.

Right Arm was no more.

Along with everyone and everything else that had been within sixty feet of the pay phone.

Zorg hung up and lit a cigar.

The stewardess’s scream softened to a satisfied whisper.

In the cockpit, the copilot said, “Landing gear secure.”

The captain locked in the autopilot and disabled the cockpit smoke detector.

‘Let’s light one up.”

Her face showed a mixture of relief, anticipation… and terror.

“Sir, we’re finally getting something!”

First Class! What’s not to like?

Particularly with the new FTL (Faster than Light) Warp-Hop-FoId&Jump drive, which uses the elasticity of stretched superstrings to pull both Space and Time into conveniently traversed, commercially viable trade and travel routes.

Certainly, Leeloo and Korben were enjoying their trip.

In Korben’s first-class cabinette they slept soundly. Leeloo’s little hand was cuddled comfortably in Korben’s big one, just as the two of them were cuddled in the warm, safe passenger area of the quarter-mile-long intragalactic shuttle.

Across the galaxy, however, a malevolent force was waiting:

The Dark Planet.

The Ultimate Evil.

Lights flashed across its surface, like random electric storms.

Nearby (relatively) in the admiral’s starship, a technician turned away from her view screen.

Across the galaxy in the other direction, the President was slumped at his desk.

A giant of a man, President Lindberg had, like Lincoln (an ancient leader of one of the constituent political entities of the United Federation), poor posture.

“It’s sending out radio signals!” said one of the President’s scientists, who was standing with the other scientists behind the line of generals.

The President groaned. “What the hell does it [want with radio waves?”

“Maybe,” the scientist said, “it wants to make a call”

The President and all the generals turned and looked at him in astonishment.

Zorg sat in his office at his teak desk.

He loved his desk.

The last teak tree on the planet had been cut down and sawed up to make his desk That made it

Picasso sat (or slumped, or squatted, or whatever it is that whatever it was does) on the desk, purring contentedly.

(Or whatever.)

BBBRRRIIINNNNGf The phone rang.

Picasso growled. (Or whatever.)

Zorg activated the intercom.

“I told you, I don’t want to be disturbed!”

“Mister Shadow on the line,” said the receptionist, enunciating slowly.

Zorg got to his feet. Picasso tumbled (or what

ever) to the floor.

Zorg picked up the phone with trembling

hands.

“Zorg here.”

The voice that came through was dim, weak, feeble, as if it came from the remotest reaches of Time and Space.

But it was no less impressive for all that.

“AM I DISTURBING YOU?”

“No! No! Not at all. Where are you?”

“NOT FAR NOW.”

“Gr-great!” stammered Zorg.

“HOW’S OUR DEAL COMING ALONG?”

“F-fine,” Zorg stammered. “Just fine. I’ll have the four stones you asked for anytime now. But it wasn’t easy.”

Silence on the line,

A black, slimy liquid began to ooze from the top of Zorg’s head.

“MONEY IS OF NO IMPORTANCE,” said the voice on Zorg’s line. “I WANT THE STONES.”

“The stones will be here,” Zorg said in terror. The black liquid was oozing from his skull, over his brow, down his narrow sunken cheeks. “I’ll see to it personally!”

“I CAN’T WAIT TO BE AMONG YOU.”

The line clicked.

Dead.

Instead of hanging up, Zorg stood motionless in the center of his palatial office.

The black liquid was slowly fading from his face.

Only his trembling hands showed his total terror.

Across the galaxy, the Dark Planet was suddenly lifeless.

Dead.

“We lost it,” said the tech on the bridge of the Admiral’s starship.

“We lost the signal,” said the general who stood by his side, speaking by direct FTL link to the United Federation headquarters in Manhattan, New York, Earth.

“Shit!” said the President.

“Aaaarrrggghhh!” screamed (or whatever) Picasso as Zorg sat on him absentmindedly.

“Sorry.”

Zorg hung up the phone. His hand was still shaking,

“We got something!” said General Munro, rushing excitedly into the President’s office.

He was almost fully recovered from his sojourn in Korben’s freezer. Only a few black frostbitten fingertips remained to be amputated.

“What do you have?”

“A location,” said Munro. “The signal came here. The contact was on Earth. Somewhere in the northern hemisphere.”

President Lindberg raised his huge eyebrows. The gesture was as impressive as the opening of a hangar door. “This— thing —knows someone on Earth? General, warn your man. He could have trouble. Tell him to keep his eyes open.”

General Munro saluted, then rushed out.

Peace prevailed in First Class Cabinette #318 of the intragalactic shuttle starship, Pride of Brooklyn. Korben was snoring gently.

Leeloo lay awake in his arms, watching him sleep. A flicker of what might have been love shone in her deep green eyes.

A kilometer ahead, in the cockpit, the captain clicked the last of a row of switches.

klikklikklikklik!

“Leaving light speed.”

The starship shuddered only slightly.

More like a snuggle, really—back into the familiar, comforting arms of Newtonian space.

Light filled the cabinette.

Korben stirred but didn’t wake.

Leeloo, was awake but not stirring.

What was more beautiful—the face she turned on Korben? Or the turquoise, cloud-flecked planet seen through the window, toward which the shuttle was swiftly descending?

“Ladies and gentlemen,” came the Head-Stewardess’s voice. “We have begun our final descent toward Fhloston Paradise. The local time is 3:28 P.M. The outside temperature is a constant 82 degrees Fahrenheit. We hope you enjoyed your flight today, and we hope to see you again soon.”

In the corridor, stewardesses were pressing the wakeup buttons on the cabinettes, one by one.

In one cabinette, Loc Rhod and the stewardess awoke with a start and began straightening their clothes.

The stewardess was embarrassed, but only lightly. The man who had ravished her was, after all, one of the most famous supercelebrities in the

“I wanted to tell you…” she began.

Loc Rhod silenced her with a finger to her lips. Dropping his sunglasses over his eyes, he left the cabinette—and left the stewardess to her sighs.

Clouds whipped by the wings like half-acknowledged thoughts as the shuttle drifted down toward a turquoise sea.

Hovering a dozen yards above the water was the Fhloston Paradise, a great floating hotel, modeled after the cruise ships of the past.

The shuttle suddenly appeared tiny as it drew near the great resort liner—like a sardine approaching a whale.

The stewardess hit the button on top of Korben’s cabinette, and he awoke.

He looked around.

Where was Leeloo?

He panicked.

The captain slid the shuttle into the receiving dock on the Phloston Paradise.