Monday, October 31, 2011

An Early Planet

              Hey, this is your buddy, Clark Jackson.  Look, I know you’re not going to believe this, but I made an incredible discovery the other day.  I found an invisible portal that allows me to visit other worlds.  Just imagine, other worlds!   I can explore worlds that no other person has ever, ever encountered or even seen pictures of.  I can meet alien species and learn about their cultures.  Maybe it doesn’t seem too exciting to you to meet real-live aliens, but it’s the most exciting thing I can think of.  I get to meet aliens!  All I have to do is survive my encounters and keep my secret hidden from the feds.  You know that if they found out they would take this opportunity away from me and use the portal for their own purposes.
                Just like with anything else, there seems to be some rules to the portal system.  The coolest thing is that when I’m in there time doesn’t pass on Earth.  I return at the same time on the clock as when I left.  So far, I’ve also learned that only one individual can go in there at a time.  Maybe it’s so armies can’t go through to conquer other worlds.  I can only guess. 
                Before I go on, I know you will be able to read my official reports when I file them with David Englund for his book, Upsetting the Tides.  But I can’t wait to talk about some of these things and I want to get them off my chest.  Especially some of the things that won’t exactly make it into the book, like today’s visit.
                Anyway, I want to tell you about this interesting planet I visited today.  It wasn’t all that different from Earth except everything was a little lighter in color and grew taller.  I think that last part was due to the fact that there’s less gravity on the planet.  I was able to run a mile (about) in under five minutes.  I’ve never been able to run that fast.  Oh yeah, the biggest thing was that there were three moons there.  They were close too.  Even though it was daytime, they were pretty bright.  Three moons!  How cool is that? 
                Still, the place was a little spooky.  I’m not a scientist, so I can’t quite put my finger on it, but something was off about the place.  Things looked like they do here but it felt odd.  It smelled like . . . kinda like sausages.  The area I was in looked like woods to me.  At least none of the plants or trees moved or did anything else freaky.  No one seemed to be around.  I could hear little critters on the ground near the portal but that was the only life I could find.  Something intelligent had to live there.  After all, something opened the portal from their side. 
Maybe I didn’t venture far enough away from the portal.  I suppose I could have stayed longer.  This is still all new to me and I want to remain cautious.  I hate to admit it, but as excited as I was I was also nervous.  And scared.  The reality of the situation dawned on me; I was walking on another planet.  No human has ever been here before.  What did I think I was doing?  I didn’t stay.
                I guess the thing to do is keep going to planets.  I’ll learn and get better at this.  I’m sure I’ll meet an actual alien soon and then I’ll tell you all about it.
                Clark 

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