Now that Squint is completely lost and homeless it's time to get down to business, there's a meeting of very important people taking place soon and Squint needs to cause a reaction from the Shadow Government so that the computers in the future can single them out from the records that get changed.  Then Prime Minister Ender will have all the information he needs to launch an attack against the Shadow Government from the future.

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Did you miss the previous chapter?  If so, then click here.

And if you'd like to start from the beginning of the story, then click here.

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Chapter 32 - Bump Set Spike

The sun was rising as the cab driver took me to the airport.  He tried making small talk, but I just wasn’t very talkative.  It took a while, but eventually we got there.  The cab fair was outrageously expensive in that city.

As I walked up to the airline ticket counter, I got the distinct feeling that I was being followed.  I tried to turn around to get a good look at whoever it was, but they kept turning to look the other way every time that I looked back at them.  I was running severely low on money by then, so when I got to the front of the line I put what little money I had left on the counter and asked where I could go with that amount.

The ticket agent was very nice to me and said that I could go to Kentucky.  As soon as she said that, the person behind me in line climbed over the rope divisors to get to a ticket counter from a different airline.  When he approached the counter he simply said that he wanted to go to Kentucky.  The other mans ticket agent asked him where in Kentucky he would like to go, and he turned to look at me as I was looking at him, just watching the whole scene unfold.  He blinked a few times and just shook his head rudely insisting that he just needed to go to Kentucky.

Then my ticket agent, who seemed to be paying attention to the same guy, quietly said something about going to a different place.  But she didn’t say the name of my destination out loud, she wrote it down on a piece of paper for me, and I nodded in agreement.  She took the money and gave me a ticket.  The only other thing she said was “Good luck.”  I thanked her and went on my way.  The other guy just kept starring at me.

The airport was built like a maze, but I was used to traveling by then.  I turned a corner and it seemed like someone who was just standing there suddenly began to follow me.  But after the security checks I could no longer see him.  I found my concourse and headed for the gate.  Suddenly I felt sick.  So I went into one of the public restrooms and stayed near the garbage can.  A Janitor was changing the garbage bag when I came in and I explained to him that all the traveling was making my stomach feel queasy and all the bathroom stalls were occupied.  He got the drift and told me to go ahead and do whatever I needed to do.  I heaved a couple of times, but nothing came out.  Eventually, after waiting a while, I felt well enough try again to continue the search for my gate.  I thanked the Janitor for his patience and walked out of the restroom.  About an hour later I was on an airplane, headed to my next destination.

I thought it seemed strange, but somehow, one of the ladies that was on the flight looked kind of familiar.  Then I realized, she looked a lot like the ticket agent who had sold me my plane ticket.  She caught me looking at her and she smiled.  I smiled back.  I definitely felt as if I had met that woman before.  I thought for sure I had seen her at the airport, but I just couldn’t remember exactly where in the airport I had seen her.  She may have been my ticket agent, or maybe we had just stood near each other in one of the lines.  I wasn’t sure how, but she definitely looked familiar to me.

When the plane landed at our new destination, as we were getting off the plane, I made eye contact with that woman again and we both smiled at each other.  The airport in this city was smaller than the last one.  On my way outside, I noticed that there was a U.S.O. office in the airport, near the exits.  I wandered around near that place for a while as I worked up the courage to go in.

Then I saw that lady that I had recognized on the plane.  She was sitting in the U.S.O. office, talking to an older gentleman behind a desk.  I tried to get a little close and listen in on their conversation, apparently she needed a ride to a nearby base.  He said he would make some phone calls for her and she agreed to wait patiently.

After a while I walked into the U.S.O office and looked around.  There were more people inside than I had thought.  There was a cup on the reception desk with candies in it.  I quietly reached into the cup, pulled out a candy cane, and sat down.

As I was sitting there eating the candy cane, I took my time, just letting people see me in that awkward out-of-place moment.  Eventually the older gentleman looked up from his desk and asked if there was anything he could do for me.  I thought for a moment, and then asked him if there was a recruiting center nearby.  He said that there was and wrote down its address for me on a piece of paper.  Then he asked if there was anything else he could do for me, I thanked him very much and said that it was all I needed.

Then I walked outside and saw that one lady again.  She was sitting on the curb outside the airport, apparently waiting for her ride.  I walked over to her and said hello.  She smiled and said hello back to me.  I asked if she minded if I sat down next to her and she said that was alright.  As I sat down we both started a conversation with each other.

She said she didn’t know that I was in the service.  I told her I wasn’t, yet, but that I was considering recruitment.  She eyed me up and down and finally told me not to get my hopes up.  I smiled and looked down at the ground shyly.  She explained that most people enlisted thinking that it was going to be an adventure where they could see the world.  But really, she went on to say, it was just another job.  She said that if I really wanted to go far in the service that I should think of it more like a career instead of an adventure.  Adding that it would be a lot of hard work, but that it would pay off in the long run.  And also that the government was a good choice for steady employment.

I told her that it sounded like good advice.  She told me her rank and how long she had been working for the military.  She really wasn’t joking about it being a career.  Then she said something that I didn’t understand.  I asked her what she meant, and she pointed to the parking garage across the street and said that a cop car had just pulled in and parked there.

I tried to look too, but I didn’t see any police cars.  I casually told her that she must have had a good eye for that sort of thing.  She seemed surprised by my response.  And I got the impression that she was testing me.  Much later, I learned that a lot of people who are running from the law choose to enlist with the military because they think they can escape the civilian legal system by joining the armed forces and going oversees.  But that never works.  The government has more red tape and bureaucratic double-checks than anybody would ever assume.

Eventually her ride showed up and she had to leave.  I said that it was nice meeting her and wished her luck on her trip.  She said, “You too.”  And then I was alone again.  I got on a city bus and went downtown looking for the other bus station.  I got directions from the bus driver and, after a lot of walking across town from the bus stop to the bus station, I had finally made it.

This time it was a much nicer-looking, and seemingly peaceful bus station.  I talked with the ticket agent behind the counter.  They apologized and explained that since I had already taken the one-time offer to trade my original bus ticket for a second bus ticket, they were unable to provide me with another exchange for a third ticket.  It was company policy and they simply couldn’t make any exceptions.  I could no longer use my current bus ticket because it was for a different departure city.  Not only that, but it was a ticket for yesterdays bus, which I had missed.  They kind of looked at me a little weird, and I pretended to get irritated even though I didn’t really want to take the bus.  Then I went to leave and as I was walking out through the bus station door, I reached into my pocket, pulled out my cell phone, pretended to push a few buttons and then said kind of loudly, “Yeah, they’re here.”  I had just enough time to hear somebody gasping in shock as the door closed behind me.

Then, calmly, I walked across the street to a post office.  I spent a minute looking for a public restroom.  And then I stood in line to buy a postcard and stamp.  I was going to write to my mom and mail her the postcard.  But I never wrote it.  While I was standing in line there was a man and a woman in the line in front of me.  After I started waiting in line, the man looked at me and then he looked at the woman and asked her if she was okay.  She said ‘yeah’ and asked him why.  He moved his chin slightly as if to point at me with his face instead of his hands.  Then the woman saw me and quickly buried her face in the mans chest, pretending to give him a big hug.  I could clearly hear her voice saying to him, “Oh my god, I’m scared!”  I didn’t want to bother anyone so I put the postcard back on the shelves and quietly left the post office.

Walking back across town was going to take a long time.  Somehow I hailed a taxi by accident, just by smiling at the driver.  He must have seen the huge luggage bags that I was carrying because the next thing I knew he turned the cab around and pulled to a stop in front of me.  He said I was lucky to have caught him at a good time because all the other taxi drivers were usually busy at that time of day.  So I agreed to get into the taxi, it just sounded like a good idea at the time.

Once I was in the car he told me to buckle up and asked where I was going.  I thought for a moment and said that I would like to go to the recruiting center.  “Are you sure?” he asked, and I sensed a little bit of nervousness in his voice.  “Yeah, why not?” I said.  And he explained that it was a very far drive away, and that I probably could not afford the trip.  I thought that was kind of a weird attitude.  I reached into my pocket and pulled out the piece of paper with the recruiting centers address on it, and verified with him that it was the right place.  He got onto his radio and started speaking with somebody in a foreign language.  Again, refused to take me there, but he had already begun to drive and was definitely taking me somewhere.

He wasn’t a very good driver, and he seemed to be in a hurry.  I asked him where we were going, and he answered me by saying “I’m taking you wherever you want to go, my friend.”  He got back on his radio and it sounded like he was arguing with someone on the other end of it.  I had no idea what they were saying to each other in their language, whichever language it was.

After his argument with the radio, the driver pretended to make small talk and asked me where I was from.  I told him I that had two cell phones, and I would give him one of them as a gift if he would just take me to the recruiting center.  It was just a simple prepaid phone, but I tried to say that it was valuable and had a lot of phone minutes on it.  The driver acted like he wasn’t sure of what to do next, he seemed genuinely confused.  Then he got back on the radio again.  Moments later he told me again that he was not going take me to the recruiting center.  I think I must have asked him about 3 or 4 times to drive me to the recruiting center, but each time he came up with a different excuse for not taking me there.

I asked him again where we were going, and he seemed to get very irritated with me.  He said, “My friend, look, I am taking you where you want to go.  Just trust me.”  But I didn’t trust him.  I told him that I changed my mind and that I wanted to go to the airport now instead of the recruiting center.  The taxi driver nodded slowly, and said that he would do that.  A moment later, he asked me again where I was from.  And I quickly said “Washington.”  I had intended to mean Washington State in the pacific northwest, an area very much near where I grew up, but ironically, Washington was also the name of my nations capitol.

The taxi driver cursed in a language that I did finally understand and then he slammed on the breaks.  I didn’t know what was going on.  All he said was “You can get out here.”  But I looked out the window and realized that we were stopped in the middle of the highway, with cars passing us on the left and horns honking angrily behind us.  I blinked, confused, and asked, “What?”  Then the driver got very angry and started shouting at me to get out.  I thanked him for the ride, took my bags, and got out of the cab.  I don’t remember if I even paid the driver or not, but he peeled out and left in a big hurry.

The airport wasn’t far from where I was now, that crazy taxi driver had gotten me most of the way there and I would be able to walk the rest of the way.  While I was on my way to the airport, I saw some survey workers and asked them if they could offer me a light.  They looked confused and asked me what I meant.  I told them I was dying for a cigarette, and they thought that was a funny joke, but said they couldn’t help me.

When I got back to the airport I decided to call my mom from one of the phones at the airport because neither one of my cell phones was getting any reception from their network.  Then something practically impossible happened.  As I was talking to my mom, I saw a girl just standing there, maybe 15 or 20 feet away from me.  She was starring at me with her eyes wide.  And I recognized her immediately.

It was the girl I had recognized on the bus that previous night in a different city.  The one that spoke a foreign language and had starred at me when she sat in front of me on the bus.  Normally I probably would have just called it deja-vu or a coincidence or something, but it was obvious that she had recognized me too.  She was just standing there, gawking at me like she was seeing a ghost.

I turned to look around and see if there were any other unusual surprises as I told my mom I needed to get off the phone, but that I would call her again soon.  I looked back at where the girl had been standing and now she was nowhere to be seen.  I hung up the phone and spent some time walking around, just looking to see if I could find that girl again.  I didn’t even know what I would say to her once I found her, I was just intrigued by the statistical improbability of running into the same stranger twice in two different cities.  I couldn’t find her anywhere and eventually I gave up on my search and called my mom back.

She asked what I wanted, and so I thought for a moment and then said that I wanted to come back home.  She laughed and said ‘sure’, and asked when I would be back.  But I nervously told her that I had already ran out of money, and I didn’t have enough to get there.  She asked me how I intended to get home, and I sheepishly asked if she could use her credit card to pay for my plane ticket back.

My mom was not happy.  She got frustrated and told me to call her back in about an hour so that she could have some time to think about it.  I agreed to call her back and thanked her for thinking about it.  Then I went outside and waited for an hour.  It was a long hour, and I was worried.  I felt bad about asking my mom to pay for my plane ticket home, but I didn’t want to make a habit out of being homeless either.  Ultimately, I justified the decision to myself by thinking that I could eventually pay my mother back for the money that I would owe her, and that homelessness was not a valid alternative to swallowing my pride and asking for help.  I thought I should have a backup plan in case she refused, but I couldn’t think of anything.  I realized that if my mom did refuse to help me, then I would be in a very bad situation, lost in a strange city, without any money, and not knowing anyone there.  I thought my best opportunity would either be to enlist with the military and go to fight in a war oversees, or search high and low for a temp-job in this local area, something that would pay cash at the end of the day would be best so that I could eat without having to go hungry while waiting for the first paycheck.  I could live on the streets for a while until I saved up enough money to get a small apartment.  It could take a while, and it would be a rough experience, but not impossible.  I could survive it, even though the prospects were unpleasant.

Or then again, I might die in those streets, cold, lonely, and frightened.  Just another homeless bum that nobody knew, a John Doe.  My family would probably never find out what happened to me.  I began to feel scared again.  I didn’t want to die, and I didn’t want to be homeless in my last days either.  I kept thinking about that building I had seen with the strange message spelled in the lights shining from its windows… ‘Y ME’ it had read.

I looked at my watch.  About an hour had passed since I talked with my mom.  I nervously walked to the phones and called her back.  She agreed to pay for my plane ticket back, but she had conditions.  First I was to pay her back as soon as I was able to.  Secondly, I needed to go straight to my flights boarding area as soon as I get the plane ticket, and just wait there, no matter how long of a wait time I have before my flight, even if it doesn’t leave until midnight, she told me that I had to do that favor for her, or else she would never help me again.  I understood her reasoning for the request, she just wanted to make sure that I didn’t wander off again, like I did at the bus station.

The only other condition was that she didn’t trust me to know her credit card number, so we came up with the idea that I would go to the ticket agent and give her my moms phone number and then my mom would arrange to purchase the plane ticket over the phone with them while I was still there at the counter.

I agreed to do it.  But when I went to the ticket agent and gave her my moms phone number they said they weren’t allowed to do it that way.  I explained the situation, and asked them what to do.  Eventually they said that my mom could order the plane ticket on the internet, and then once it was paid for with my name on it, I would be able to pick up the ticket there at the counter.

My heart sank for a moment.  My mom absolutely hated computers.  She had never even bought anything online before.  And even the thought of giving her credit card number to a website made her cringe.  I asked them if there was any other way to buy a plane ticket, and the they told me that the internet was the only other way.

I slowly walked back to the phones, dreading the fact that I would now have to beg my mom to shop online for my plane ticket.  She was upset, but she kept her composure.  She wanted me to stay on the phone with her while she searched online but I didn’t have enough quarters to keep the phone call going that long.  Eventually she told me to call her back in another hour to see if she was able to figure it out on her own.  I apologized profusely, and she said I owed her big time for this.

About an hour later I called her back and found out that she had successfully purchased a plane ticket for me and that it was now waiting at the ticket counter with my name on it.  I was so grateful, I couldn’t begin to express all the thanks that I owed her.  She reminded me about our deal, that I would go straight to my planes boarding area after getting the plane ticket, and not to wander away or go anywhere else, no matter how long it takes.  And I promised that I would follow her instructions unwaveringly.

After talking with my mom I went to the ticket counter and claimed my ticket.  It was right there waiting for me just like she said it was.  I only needed to show my identification to the ticket agent.  From there I went to the security checkpoint and waited in line a while for the screening process.  After the security area, I found the right concord, and followed it to my gate.  Then I was in a large open circular room with many rows of chairs all near the walls, and gates for different flights spread out evenly across the room.

I looked at my watch, I still had about five hours to wait.  Remembering the promise I made to my mom, I found an empty seat near the windows at the back of the room and sat down.  Hours went by, it was very boring.  My watch started beeping and I realized that it was time for me to take my medication.  But the pills always made me feel sleepy, and I was already tired from not sleeping the night before.  I weighed the consequences in my mind for a moment and ultimately decided not to take my pills yet, I should wait until I’m safely on the airplane to make sure that I don’t fall asleep and miss my flight.  ‘I cannot afford to miss this flight!’  I thought to myself.

Some time later I opened my eyes and realized that I had fallen asleep.  Panicking, I scrambled to look at my watch.  Thank God, there was still about an hour left, I had woken up just in time.  Slowly I picked up my bags and walked over to the gate in the corner of the room where my flight would be boarding soon.  Some other people were already beginning to congregate there as well.

Sitting there in my new seat I tried to get comfortable, but almost right away I could tell that something was not right.  My plane wasn’t scheduled to board for another hour, and there were already a lot of people there.  I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but I just knew that something was wrong.

Then someone began handing out name-tags to apparently random people, some of the names sounded almost like popular last names that I had heard before, but they weren’t spelled the same.  In fact, some of the misspellings looked phonetic, like whoever wrote them down had only heard the way the names had sounded and didn’t bother to spell-check any of them, some of the spellings were way off to a degree that almost made me laugh out-loud.  And it wasn’t just one or two name-tags with misspelled names, it was nearly all of them.  But still people were showing up to claim their name tags, saying “That’s me.  I’m soandso.”  Some of them even tried pronouncing the names as they were misspelled, leading to even more twisted variations of the names.

The person giving out the name-tags was standing right next to my seat.  And out of curiosity, I pretended like I was one of them and asked if they had a name tag for me.  They only replied dismissively that they didn’t think so, without even bothering to look.  That’s when I realized why I wasn’t fitting in, all of the other people looked rich, and I looked (and probably smelled) like I was homeless and living on the streets for the past couple of days.

There was one word that I kept hearing that group of people repeating over and over, “Federation”.  It was like all they were talking about was ‘Federation this’ and ‘Federation that’.  I tried to listen for the context, but then they got quiet.  There was a sweet older lady sitting next to me and we struck up a conversation.  She asked me the typical small talk questions, and I answered all of her questions honestly.  Then I accidentally let out a small burp.  I could tell instantly that she was with the same group as name tag people, whether she had a name tag or not.  She frowned and looked away, I apologized for being rude and she dismissed the incident politely.

Then I casually asked her what the Federation was.  She suddenly turned pale and looked very surprised, as if I had just said something to her that nobody should ever say.  “What?” she whispered in a low breath.  “You know,” I insisted, “The Federation.  I hear so much about it.”  And she nearly fell out of her chair.  “Oh, we’re just a, uh, group of old friends.” she stammered nervously.  Other people nearby were beginning to stare at us now, and I heard people all around me hushing each other.

Just then I heard my name being called.  It was coming across the intercom system, being broadcast to the entire airport.  Then I head the voice say something about a white courtesy phone.  And then I realized that my mom must have called the airport trying to contact me.  “Oh!” I said to the sweet little old lady, “did they just call my name on the intercom?”  She said she didn’t know, even though had just told her my name in small talk.  And then she looked at me like I was a stark raving lunatic when I reminded her what my name was.  “Oh well,” I said, “I guess I should go find out.”

Then I wandered off looking for a white courtesy phone, whatever that was.  Eventually I found a white phone attached to the wall near where the hallway opened up into the room I was in.  I picked up the handset and said “Hello?”  Some one on the other end of the line asked who I was and I told them my name.  They told me to please wait while my call was being transferred.

I expected to hear my moms voice on the phone line, but nobody ever spoke up.  I said, “Hello?” a few more times, but there was only silence on the phone.  I waited a few more minutes, just standing there with the phone up to my ear, not sure of what to do.  Eventually I hung up because nobody ever came on the line.

Then I went back to my seat at the boarding gate.  The nice little old lady was eager to talk to me now.  And she asked me some more questions.  More people had shown up, and even more were still walking in periodically.  She told me that she thought I had a very interesting last name, and asked me what nationality it was.  I told her it was check.  “Huh?” she gawked at me.  “Czechoslovakian,” I elaborated, “At least that’s what my mom always used to say.”

“Oh, is your mom check too?  What’s her maiden name?” She inquired.  I told her that my mothers maiden name was the same as my last name.  She looked at me funny like she really didn’t understand, and I actually had to explain to her about how my father was a ‘deadbeat dad’.

“Oh, how sad!” she proclaimed.  “Honestly,” I said, “I feel like I’m better off without him.”  I said, trying to be polite while thinking a bunch of other things that I would rather say about him.  “But he’s your father.  How can you really feel that way about him?” she insisted.  And I said, “But, I feel that way because he is my father.  If he were just some random jerk on the street then I wouldn’t care nearly so much about it.”

She said that was fair, and we went on talking.  Eventually she said that we could talk more freely once we were on the plane, but then she had one last question.  “Just out of curiosity… Why did you decide to go to Tel Aviv?”

Now I was the one with the wide eyes.  “Oh wait,” I said, “You’re going to Tel Aviv?”  Suddenly, a switch was flipped, and she had the wide eyes again.  “Yes, that’s where this flight is going!” she said, a little taken back by the question.  “Or are you getting off at the layaway in New Jersey?”

I glanced around the room and finally figured out what had been wrong.  “I’m sorry,” I said, “but I think that might be your gate over there.” I pointed at the next gate over which had relatively very few people in it.  She looked over that way for a moment, then back at me.  Then she looked at the marquee sign nearby which read Tel Aviv and pointed it out to me with a confused look on her face.

Slowly I pointed in the other direction, toward the marquee with my flights destination displayed on it, just sitting there by the doorway, blinking.  There was a moment of pure magic when she finally realized that she had brought everyone in her party to the wrong gate.  She jumped to her feet, looking back and forth between the two signs.  A moment later it must have occurred to her that she and almost her entire group had been sitting in my gate with me that whole time, and their gate was the one next to us.  It was perfectly understandable since they were right next to each other.  Personally, I would have just shrugged and kept waiting for the flight to board.

However, instead of just shrugging it off like an honest mistake, she basically ordered everyone in her party to stand up and move to the next gate over.  Then she literally went around to everyone who hadn’t yet got up, and she told them to stand up and walk to the other gate.  She explained to all of them that they had gone to the wrong seats, and pointed out there actual seats, which were essentially right next to the first seats they had gone to.

I didn’t understand what all the fuss was about.  But apparently they really wanted to make sure that everybody was in the right place.  I stayed in my gate of course, I had a promise to keep.  I took my medication as soon as I was on the plane.  Then I was in the air and on my way back home.  Finally, I could take a nap.

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Did you enjoy reading today's chapter?  Then stay tuned for more tomorrow.

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