Like a Fox on the Run

No, he wasn’t an astronaut. He wasn’t a scientist or engineer. But his work was just as indispensable as any of those aforementioned. His official job title was Building Maintenance Technician II. Most of the intelligentsia working there never even bothered to learn his name. The majority knew him only by his lifelong nickname, “Buck.” He was just the dude they called when a breaker tripped or the toilet was stopped up. Still, he never let it bother him. He was just proud to be able to set foot on the premises. As a kid, he’d dreamed of going to space like the people in the comics he read. They would instill in him a lifelong dream of going to space. Fixing an AC unit or unclogging a Trash-Vac duct might not be the stuff of a Flash Gordon webisode, but it got him closer to his dream than anything else could Besides, everyone had a part to do and he was doing his. He might be just a little cog in a big machine, but even the smallest cog is vital to make it all work smoothly. In a time when so many were out of a job and full of despair, he was helping to keep this country great, and to him, that meant something. The way he saw it, they needed someone to fix things around the office just as much as they needed someone programming long-range probes to stars, hundreds of light years away.

In the end, it was the Old Man who would have the last laugh on them all. When the government decreed NASA be dismantled and replaced by the Authority, he was one of the last to walk out of the gate over there at MSC. By that time, the astrophysicists, computer programmers, and engineers had long since been let go.

The old geezer would just grin and drawl, “I reckon a properly functionin’ shitter trumps a college-edge-ee-cated egghead any day.”

Life is priorities. Everyone’s different. And sometimes, it only takes seconds for you to realize yours ain’t exactly the order you thought they were.

 

~ “The Ponderings of an Old Spacer” ~

By

Tanner “Tiger” Thomas

June, 2203

Chapter 5

Gideon Tuttle drained the last of the white lightning from the Mason jar, as he stumbled out the old screen door onto the front porch of the ramshackle shack he called home. It was barely past three and already he was on his second jar of the day. He was having a hard time walking now. His legs were unsteady, his knees wobbly. He leaned against one of the porch’s timber supports and pulled out a hand-rolled cigarette. Cursing the Health Nazis who’d succeeded in pricing manufactured cigarettes out of the reach of the common people, he pulled out a box of matches. He scraped the head down the post, igniting the match. His hands were so unsteady it went out before he could light his smoke. Cursing vehemently, he pulled out another, spilling half the box in the process. It took three matches before he finally got the cigarette lit.

Inside, Rayford lay stretched out on a raggedy old sofa, propped up on some pillows, as he self-medicated with pain pills washed down with homemade Alabama corn squeezin’s. The bandages on his stump and foot needed changing but he was too lazy to do it himself. His live-in girlfriend would be back from town soon, and she could do it then. Besides, the Braves were playing on the MV.

Junior had gone down the road to sneak into a neighbor’s pond. He wanted to see if he could catch a couple of catfish for dinner. The old fart took pride in his channel cat, and fed them weekly. As such, they tasted a lot better than those muddy yellow scavengers they pulled from the river. If he caught a nice string, he planned to fry them up with some hushpuppies. Although his father and brother delighted in ridiculing him as a half-wit, Junior actually was more intelligent than the others gave him credit for. He’d just been beaten down so much by them, he was afraid to stand out. Over the years, he simply learned to follow the path of least resistance. If they said he was worthless, then he was worthless. If they said he was stupid, he was stupid. Life was much easier if he just played along with it.

It was around three thirty when the two black aerocraft came over the tree line and touched down onto the weed-strewn dirt patch that passed for Gideon’s front yard. His first thought was that it was a ‘beam raid … again. Panicked, he turned and reached for the screen door. It must be the Feds this time, because those were some badass-looking machines coming down.

“Rayford!” he slurred drunkenly as he almost fell through the door. “It’s the law!”

“Aw, goddamn!” Rayford tried to sit up, but he was too inebriated. “Where’s Junior? He’s gotta hide the shit, Paw!” Outside, the two pit bulls, Sally and Lee Roy, napping under the house, had been awakened by the commotion and sprang into action against the intruders.

“Worthless ass piece of shit ain’t never around when you need him!” Gideon ranted as he grabbed the antique double-barreled shotgun next to the door. “Best part of that boy ran down his mama’s leg!” He broke open the barrels to check their load and then slammed them back closed. He then staggered toward the back door. “You stall them till I get into the woods!”

“Don’t leave me here, Paw!” Rayford whined as he gawked fearfully out the window at black-clad men with big guns disembarking from the two craft. The telltale phtewww! phtewww! of a pulse rifle and the agonizing yelps of Sally and Lee Roy indicated that two piles of charred dog flesh now littered the front yard.

“You can’t run and I can’t carry you! Take one