Christopher WunderLee - The Loony - a novella of epic proportions

At first, of course, they pretended that it was a real mission, but it didn’t take long for the team members to all know that it wasn’t. Most of them knew long before that, they’d studied the logistics, the technology wasn’t there. They could launch a guy up to orbit around our little pebble in the cosmos, but firing a guy to the moon was a whole other story.

Lights, like aliens landing on earth, lights. Lochner creeps through the underbrush, on his stomach, edging forward like a soldier on elbows and knees. As he came out from under a beautiful “Burning Bush,” moving one of its fiery branches out of his way, he could see the top half of the craft. It was approximately six stories high, about as wide as a high-rise apartment building, and lit up like a tacky house in the suburbs a few months before X-mas.

There are noises coming from the complexes, Albert can see people walking about as he crawls forward, milling about like it’s a cocktail party — it is a cocktail party. The great dome he watched go up is still there, so are the barracks, the supply tent (which is actually plaster & wood), the laboratories, everything. It’s a fully functioning base, but where are the guards? How come he could just walk up? Unless they’re planning for him to come, perhaps they’re final trip for him is the stars? Perhaps, this was all an elaborate plot to get him to show up and go with the aliens.

There’s a steady stream of well-outfitted people heading towards the ship, walking up the entry plank, and disappearing into the light. They’re all dressed up nice, the women with evening gowns and the men in tuxedos or their best military regalia. Albert slides down the hill on his hands and heels and merges into a line of partygoers, they don’t even notice the new addition — or they pretend they don’t. Don’t get paranoid. They’re ambling along, the conversation light, flirtatious. He needs to connect with one of them, cloak himself in the go-lucky ambience so he can walk right in. They’re all drunk. There are two women walking with their arms around one another, stumbling, giggling loudly, a bottle of vodka being passed between them. “Hey, howz about sharin’ a little Russian warmth with me?” They make eyes at him, give him a good once over, if he’s lucky they’re drunk enough to see him with alcoholic myopia. The one with the bottle, practically falling on her friend in an erotic embrace, thrusts forth her hand and he takes a good swig from it, puts his arm around the lovely closest and wanders on. They’re happy as hell to have him and before they’re even getting close to the ship, he’s between the two of them, touching their bare backs, laughing at slurred disdain, gathering information from tid-bits of comments, slapping one on the ass after she says something superficially interesting, feeling their wet lips contact his cheeks. They go on like this for about two hundred yards and then, there’s the starship, glowing, humming, with jazz music blaring out from within it, with the collective buzz of a thousand conversations, laughs, curses, fights, pouring out of its front door.

No one even hesitates; they seem to be as comfortable with entering the galactic battleship as they would be heading to the local bar for a good time. Albert let’s the crowd carry him in, right passed two marines, fully armed, standing in ready position. They enter an enormous hall, pass coats to doormen, are ushered into a grand ballroom that dwarves the dome they constructed to film the lunar landing. There are hundreds of people inside, all with drinks in their hands, dancing, talking, eating off a giant buffet table, and a full big-band going at it on a sound stage. A banner over it reads: “Project Marvel: the Future of Space Exploration!” Albert loses the girls in the crowd, but he doesn’t mind, they fulfilled their use and he got the chance to feel their asses a little, look down the fronts of their skirts to see the crescents of perky breasts, and felt their smooth, milky skin against his arms. All in all, his cover was beneficial on a two-fold personal and professional level.

It was about that time that he saw her, leaning against an ornate column as a general handed her a glass of wine and was mumbling something to her. Albert watches his face, he has the look of man who believes the night will end with the two of them rolling in sheets, a queer twinkle in his eyes, a coy flirtatious sort of way of beaming at her, gently pushing forward the community of two by touching her arm, placing his hand on her back as he leads her to their chairs, the tent of his slacks when he’s profiled. And she’s going right along with it; an actress so good the old chap really believes she’s just dying to get that stiff thing in her. He must have looked like this. People in on it must have watched them from afar, smirking at his infundibular eyes, his fantasy an inside joke for the surveillance team. “How can this guy believe she’s really interested?” “Hey, look at him now, he’s totally into it.” “Ah, that poor sop, wait’ll she breaks your heart.” “What an ass, he’s buyin’ her a ring, for god’s sakes.”

Albert stands across the dance floor from her, waiting for her to see him. It doesn’t take long and she crooks her head to laugh heartily at one of the general’s jokes, placing her hand on his forearm as she says something like: “oooh general Metterich, youuu make me laugh.” And then, there it is, a crinkle in her brow at first, unbelieving it’s him, acknowledgement slides across in shock, the cover-up smile and back to the general, never to look again. What does she think? Did he ever really matter? Where do they train these kinds of people? Lochner has images of sex training operations, of flirt tutoring, of bizarre experiments to make them used to everything, not shocked by any perversion, up for any nefarious request by the object of their mission, hundreds of beautiful girls, abducted from orphanages, and reared by the military to be sex soldiers — used on politicians, spooks, terrorists, their entire function, to get the guy to love you, to need you, to be willing to die for you. This is actually a pleasing idea, until you realize that one of them, one of them not probably really named Harris, was trained, was tortured, was manicured, to be his ideal, to be his love, to be the one who made him give up life and live a mutually subsidized lie. Then, he begins to sort of fear the underground, black operation, because that means that any woman could be one of them, that means the days of love-making, the hours of conversation late into the night, the walks on beaches, the cuddling over a movie, the dinners, the meetings, were all part of her job, part of the great charade that everyone was in on but him. His heart, his fantasies were on display, used by a tool of the black army to get him right where They wanted him to be, and it was so easy — Dr. Lochner meet Harris, now here’s what we need you to do…

He was her successful career, a name in her dossier, “Professional Experience” she could use to get more work.

* * *

Then, things got hectic, Lochner’s lovely fiancée tipped off the soldiers that an unwanted guest was present, witnessing their celebration. As he picked at the shrimp cocktail plate, Albert sees two heavy-set fellows in army green, stomping towards him — a serious purpose in their eyes. He’s up and over the buffet table before they can get to him, crawling on his hands and knees under the long tablecloth, with arms shooting into his cavern trying to grab him. Finally, the table ends and he shoots right out of it, joining the crowd again, looking back to see the army men still crouched down under the table. He heads right for the women’s john and ducks into a stall, puts his feet up and locks the door. He’s lucky enough that there wasn’t anyone powdering a nose, or sprinkling water over their eyes, or fixing lipstick when he went in, but the stalls are filled and he watches as slender legs shuffle beside him. She will have to pee at some point. He watches the shoes; he knows Harris’ shoes anywhere.