No Foolin' By Ariel Montine

Chapter 1 ~ Sweet Tea

What will Gail do when her crush, Kevin,
stumbles on a device from the space pod cabinet?

No Foolin'

By Ariel Montine

Chapter One ~ Sweet Tea

 I couldn't stand it any more!  Kevin was one of the most physically attractive guys in our school but it was painful to be around him because all he did was swear.  I figured the person who reformed him had first shot at him when he became real boyfriend material.  I also figured that everyone else got something out of it since they wouldn't have to listen to him swear anymore so it was not entirely selfish for me to get involved.  I was now convinced of the righteousness of my cause.  All I needed was some way to turn dreams into reality.

I love being within walking distance of school!  I get to go to all the extra curricular activities that I want to do.  There's a large white paneled house with a grand porch on the front that comes all the way down from the second story suspended on 4 pillars like an antebellum home.  I go right in cause the front door is never locked during the day.  Before doing anything I put down my things in my room and go to my Aunt Emma's study to check on her.

"Hi Aunt Emma! How's the writing going today?" I gave her a kiss on the cheek and a little hug as she as at the computer typing.

"Hi Gail, I wrote 30 pages of my new novel.  My muse has been good to me."

"Which means you haven't had a bite to eat yet today?" I didn't mind looking out for her since she sure looked out for us when we needed it most, both me, Gail, and my brother , Leo, who should be around here somewhere by now.  She isn't really a relative, but she took us in when our parents died in a crash.

"Dearest, my tummy isn't feeling well but I should start eating something.  Would you like to go make me a couple of grilled cheese sandwiches the way I like them and bring them to me with a soda. Sweetie?"

"Be right back with a platter, Auntie."

Off to the Kitchen straight away, where I got out what I needed to make up grilled cheese sandwiches like my auntie like them.  It didn't take too long to prepare a platter full of them and make a lunch plate for Auntie with the sides that she liked and to fill her favorite glass with soda and bring it on a tray with a flower in a vase back to her study so I could get her to eat, and rest a minute and chat intelligently with me.  The last is what I craved the most since Leo had no clue about intelligence    .

I presented the masterpiece of a food tray to my aunt in her study and was rewarded with a big smile and a even bigger hug.

"Thank you Sweetheart! You are so good to me!"

"What would you have done Auntie? If you had not been driving by the crash site and rescued us from the wreckage just before it exploded?"

"I would be, Miss Emmaline Sands,  a very poor and lonely woman. Not only would I not have the blessing of you and your brother in my life but I would never have been able to write that #1 best selling novel with the realism that propelled it to the top.  I can't imagine even trying to write about something as fantastic as a space pod crash landing on earth without adult survivors.  And since sabotage took the main ship out of hyperspace randomly, no one had a clue where to start looking for the pod.  And they would never look in the No-No Zone anyway since interference in primitive cultures was forbidden. "

"Funny how the events in your novel were how we came to live with you and that the novel helps protect our secret.'

"You and your brother were so good to load all the undamaged things in the pod's locker.  We quickly loaded the locker on the back of my pickup truck before the pod exploded.  There was nothing left but a giant impact crater, as if a meteorite had crashed there.  Your parents must have loved you and your brother a lot, since they did their best to minimize the impact.  They did not go to protection and stayed at the controls. When the pod crashed and they were killed instantly."

" I feel loved, from my parents, from my brother, and from you too, Auntie" she touched her aunt's arm and a few tears slipped out as she remembered them which turned to tears of joy for such a wonderful home that Auntie had made for them.

"Gail, go ahead to see to yourself.  You've done a good job taking care of me, just as you always do."

"OK Aunt Emma!  Success!" I disappeared back into the kitchen , where I saw my dorky brother Leo helping himself to the plate of sandwiches that I had left behind.  I had been generous so there was still plenty left for me so I took a sandwich and filled a plate with my favorite sides.  Amazingly enough Leo had filled a glass with diet coke with me and had reached me a fork out of the flatware drawer.  Sometimes I couldn't help but love Leo.

"Hi Sis, how was your day?"

"Hi Leo and thank you.  OK I guess.  I think I am going to go out for cheerleader.  They are holding some tryouts soon."

"That sounds wonderful. Anything happen out of the ordinary?"

"Not that I could tell but I haven't had a chance yet to check the armband"

"You might want to do that quick as you finish your snack.  The magic detectors have been going off regularly since the ambient magic in the air is becoming much greater than the threshold value."

"I'll go check on it right after I finish.  You've got me curious and I don't for the life of me understand what might be happening." She hoped this was another of her brother's false alarms but eventually something that he's worried about has got to be real.  It's the law of averages at work.

Ok! Where was I? Oh yeah! Kevin, the guy who looks like a dreamboat and sounds like a sewer.  I was in luck because Kevin was on the way past our house on his bike after having made a delivery for his mother's lawfirm.  Having anticipated his return, I held out a glass of sweet tea toward him as he was in sight of the house.  The sweet tea did the trick since he stopped to pick up the glass and began drinking it immediately.  His crude language did not come into play because he was busy drinking.  I led him into our yard underneath the canopy swing so he could get out of the sun and sit down at the same time.  The swing had room enough for two barely. 

Just before Kevin sat down, I noticed a book shaped item laying on the seat propped up by the arm rest.  While this should have raised a red flag, at the time I thought nothing of it.  As Kevin tried to steady himself and slip all the way back in the seat, he accidentally grabbed me on wrist on top of the wrist band.  All of a sudden, Kevin was covered in a rainbow swirl of lights enveloping Kevin like a  cocoon. He went limp having lost consciousness. 

 I called to Leo, "Help! looks like something went awry." 

Leo took one look at Kevin and said, "Thats not normal!   At least its not normal for Terra.  Let's get him inside first."

 Leo was very helpful and we both took a hold on Kevin.  We both together moved him into the house. I tried to make Kevin comfortable as he lay on the couch in the den. 

Leo asked me," What happened just before he got all glowy?"

"He was getting settled in the swing trying not to spill his sweet iced tea.  He grabed a hold of my wrist for support to snuggle himself in the swing.  It was close quarters and the two of us barely fit in it together."

"Grabbing your wrist on your arm band by itself could not have done it.  At most it could only have provided magical energy for something else to work.  Was there anything else in the swing?"

"Nothing important, Just a book.  I'll go get it."  I went back out and I realized that the object wasn't a book at all but it was a device from our secret closet.  On the cover it said "Transmutation" I brought the device that looked like a book back inside and showed it to Leo. 

Leo took the book like device from me.  In his other hand was a scanner from our secret closet. 

Leo looked like he had seen a ghost when he exclaimed, "It's magic!"

"No foolin'? Magic?" I knew from his expression that this was deadly serious and we had no clue how to proceed from here.  With Kevin out of it, I wondered what Kevin was turning into and when his transformation would be complete.    

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Interlude

Oops! forgot that this was a new recording so I should introduce myself.  If you are sensing this recording then I'm guessing that you are not one of the aliens that are native to this planet they call Earth or Terra.  I'm just a normal girl born on Ceti Alpha V.  My real name is Glivney ,but I go by Gail on Earth.  I'm stranded here with my brother Linthan who goes by Leo on Earth.     

Out of the multitude of items that survived in the storage locker, you would have thought that perhaps someone might have thought to bring along a couple of spare distress beacons.  Unfortunately, No.   

My native life form is like a pixie but Linthan would call himself Elven.  Even if Earth were not xenophobic, My people's tenets require us not to reveal our true form.  We have armbands that use some kind of technology for others to perceive us as Earthlings.  We had them on before we crashed so even Aunt Emma, who took us in, hasn't seen us as we are really.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~