Enigmas From Oneself

by Daffodil




The stars shone in the cold black void of space. The commander sighed and shook his head. "Mykic, this system is our last hope for fahndin' TROUBLE."

Mykic looked out the window. Their ship was approaching a star, Sol as their computer called it, and its nine planets. "You sure he's there?" he asked the commander with disbelief in his almond eyes.

A third and much shorter man looked up from the control panel he sat at. "'E's gotta be. It's the only system we 'aven't already been to. 'E's just gotta be 'ere."

A shrill beeping noise came as the door opened. A man with long blond hair, an orange button-up shirt, maroon pants, and boots that looked like moccasins stood in the doorway. The commander, who wore a dark green wool hat on his dark brownish-black hair, addressed him. "Hey Terep, got any news?"

The newly arrived man sat in the half-lotus position on a tie-dye cushion. He smiled and dimples creased his cheeks. "Kemi, I have a very good feeling that our search in this system should begin on the third planet from Sol. It's called Earth."

"Ah hope you're rahght, man," Kemi, the commander, drawled. "Vyda," he ordered to the man at the controls, " set our course for Earth."

"Aye, aye Cap'n."

Mykic sat down on the sofa that was adjacent to the window. "I sure am glad that this thing has hyper-drive. Otherwise, it'd take a hundred years. An' we're not the first group to have gone lookin' for TROUBLE. Why does the king have to be hidden in the universe? It'd be a lot easier if he'd just come forward now an' save us all this trouble."

Vyda replied, "The universe just doesn't work that way. It has to be hard, dog-eat-dog. Cannibalism."

"An' besides, TROUBLE doesn't even know he's the king of some distant (for him) planet," Terep pointed out. "Besides, our search is over. I got it right this time."



On the surface of Earth, four girls were walking down a street in their neighborhood. "Uh, did anyone see that besides me?" one girl asked her cohorts.

"Reine, dear, what exactly did you see?" the oldest girl replied.

"I saw a giant Volkswagen bus flying in the air. Did you see it too?"

A girl with wild blond hair patted Reine on the head. "You'll be alright, someday, maybe…"

The last girl quizzed Reine, "Where was it goin'?"

"Follow me!" Reine beckoned as she raced off through the bushes. The other girls reluctantly followed. They emerged into a field. Sure enough, in the middle of the field stood an enormous Volkswagen bus. Reine was conversing with four men who apparently came from inside its hull. Reine's three friends stood bewildered not only by the hulking ship or its men, but by the fact that they and Reine appeared to be speaking in some unknown foreign language.

The girl who had patted Reine on the head, named Phyliss, said, "Okay, how did we get inside Reine's head? That's the only place things like this would happen."

Samantha, the oldest girl, exclaimed, "Uh, Reine, can you please explain? Some of us don't speak that language."

Reine looked at the girls. She tucked her lone thin braid behind her left ear, where it joined her other hair. "Oh. Well, from what these guys say, they're from a planet really far away. It's called Albertane. Their people have been searching the whole entire universe for their king. Only their king doesn't know he's their king. That's what complicated everything. How come you can't understand them?"

Samantha's jaw dropped. "You can understand them?"

Reine nodded with a smile. Phyliss spoke next. "We always knew you were weird, I mean really weird, but now… Reine, I think you come from Albertane."

"Wow, you really think so? I always suspected that I wasn't from around here…" Reine announced this to the Albertanian men. They nodded and said a few odd words.

The last girl, Linda as she happened to be called, just asked, "Does the king have a name?"

Reine smiled. "They said that they don't know his real name, but they call him TROUBLE. After lookin' for him as long as they have, I'd call him TROUBLE too."

Phyliss sighed. "Well, Reine, if he's supposed to be from where you an' those guys are from, then we all know who TROUBLE is."

In unison, the four girls said, "Ivan."

"Well, I'll tell the guys that we're gonna walk to Ivan's house. I hope he's home."

A few minutes later, they reached his house and rang the doorbell. A guy wearing a black turtleneck answered the door. In a surprised tenor voice he asked, "Reine? What are you guys doin' here?"

"Hullo, Ivan," she answered. "Can you come outside?" He stepped out of the door and closed it behind him. Reine continued. "These are Terep, Mykic, Kemi, and Vyda. They wanted to talk to you."

Terep asked him, "Would you believe us if we said that we were from a very distant planet called Albertane? And that we came here in a giant spaceship shaped like a Volkswagen bus?"

Ivan thought about this. "Sure. Why?"

Kemi continued. "Well, ya see, we are an' we did. An' we came all this way to look for our king. But our king doesn't know that he's a king, or even that he's from Albertane."

Reine elaborated. "What they're tryin' to say is that they think you're their king."

Ivan smiled. "I always wanted to be a king! Groovy!"

While this was goin' on, the other girls stood looking from person to person, not comprehending. "Okay, can someone please tell us what's goin' on? In English?" Samantha exclaimed.

Ivan looked confused. "Weren't we just talkin' in English?"

Linda spoke this time. "Ivan, you too. We don't understand Albertanian."

This time Reine explained in English. "Okay, we've established that me, Ivan, an' those guys are all from Albertane. Ivan, we've been talkin' in Albertanian. That's why they didn't understand. An' we've come to the conclusion that Ivan is in fact the king. Y'all understand now?"

When they all arrived back at the field, the giant Volkswagen bus, which was called the Froghopper, prepared to take off. "You're sure you're not gonna stay?" Linda asked Reine. "You don't have to go."

"As much as I don't want to leave y'all, I want to go too. I have a whole new world in front of me… well, not literally. Besides, I can't let Ivan go alone. Sometimes it feels good to know you're not the only one who doesn't know exactly what's goin' on." She hugged each of them. "Maybe I'll stop by Earth sometime. G'bye."

Reine stepped into the Froghopper. Its silver door closed behind her and the space ship streaked off into the sky.



Before the ship left orbit, Kemi asked Vyda, "Can you wrahte a thank you an' put it in the Earth newspapers?" There was a flurry of typing and a beep as the thank you was sent. Then the ship and its inhabitants sped off towards home.





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