Somewhere in the heart of the vast suburban sprawl that was Southern California, in a small house on a small, quiet street, a young man slouched on his sofa. His bunny-slipper-clad feet were up on the coffee table next to an empty pizza box, and there was a bottle of Sam Adams in his hand. He was tired from a long, hard day of packing -- he was moving tomorrow -- and was spending the evening zoning in front of the TV. His name was Rich.
Looking out the sliding glass door into his backyard, he could see that the rain had started up again (rare for Southern California), but there was roaring fire in the brick fireplace, and as anyone who had ever personally researched the issue would tell you, pizza, beer, rain outside, fireplace inside, and bunny slippers on the feet made for a very cozy feeling.
It was a little after 10:00pm, and the local news was on. The TV was on channel 13, so he fumbled around for the TV remote to change to channel 5. The channel 13 news was way too annoying for his taste -- it seemed like half their "news" stories were about ghost sightings, UFOs, "Roswell Rods" and other stupid stuff like that. On the other hand, the anchorman on the channel 5 news was a pilot, so they had lots of stories about airplanes -- much less annoying. Besides, the channel 5 Hollywood reporter was a babe!
But alas! The babe would go un-ogled tonight, because the TV remote was lying far out of reach, and there was no way the bunny slippers were going to budge an inch. They had told him so in no uncertain terms. Rich grumbled an oath against the forces of the cosmos that had inflicted this cruel injustice on him, took a swig of beer, and settled deeper into the sofa preparing to be annoyed.
Rain in Southern California was such an unprecedented event that the TV news rooms gave it top priority. It didn't matter what else was happening in the rest of the world -- the start of WWIII, peace in the Middle-East, somebody found the cure for cancer -- it all took a back seat to the rain. This time was no exception. Fully twenty minutes at the top of the program was devoted to "team coverage" of the "storm watch" where a dozen field reporters took turns reporting in very serious voices that it was indeed drizzling at their particular location.
Then, as he'd feared, as soon as the weather reports were over the dreaded UFO stories started. He gave it only partial attention as he debated anew the pros and cons of getting up to get the remote control.
According to the TV, there had been a fresh UFO sighting yesterday somewhere in Florida. A few blurry images were flashed on the TV screen showing a slender silvery shape lying in a small woods. A black, unmarked helicopter could be discerned hovering above the scene.
The video was shot by a family on a picnic, who hadn't noticed the 'UFO' in the scene until they'd watched it later on. "Imagine their surprise!" quipped the reporter un-cleverly. "Apparently, the only witness had been a young man who'd been jogging through the area at the time. Local authorities have yet to identify and track down who it was, and UFO buffs who visited the landing site only hours later found no trace of the alleged crashed alien ship."
The reporter paused for effect, then concluded, "Hoax or reality? You be the judge---"
The channel on the TV finally changed. Rich had had enough and had bullied the bunny slippers to walk over to where the remote lay. He mumbled disgustedly as he pressed the '5', "Gimme a break, they're not even trying to make these reports look real anymore. That was obviously just some old Star Trek mock-up. It even had the red pin-striping and black lettering on the side. They stick it in a forest and fool some local rube to say he'd seen a UFO. Jeez...."
The bunny slippers had no comment. They preferred keeping an open mind.
Rich gave up on the news. He muted the sound on the TV, turned on the stereo to listen to the Friday night 80's music program and sat down in front of his computer. "Let's see if Steve's on-line tonight...," he said.
As the machine booted, Falco was singing, "Come on and rock me Amadeus!"
Steve wasn't on-line, maybe he was visiting Krys this weekend, but there was an email in the in-box. It was from Jo. As Rich read the rather lengthy letter -- Jo was no Scrooge when it came to dolling out the verbiage -- his brow furrowed ever deeper until it seemed like his forehead would actually cave in on itself. When he got to the end, he just sat back in his comfy chair and stared at the computer screen.
At first assessment, it appeared that Jo had gone completely insane. In his email, he was actually claiming that the USS Virgo was a real live starship, and that our little band of fictitious characters were actually crewmembers working on the ship. He also claimed that he'd witnessed the crash of a runabout near where he lived and talked to a couple of Starfleet personnel that were in it. Then he went on at length about alternate quantum universes, timelines, sum-over-history and Stephen Hawking.
In the end, it all seemed like nothing more than the sad ravings of yet another 'Trekkie' who'd finally lost what little grip on reality he'd ever had -- except for one pesky little detail.
Rich recalled to mind the UFO story he'd seen on the news not fifteen minutes ago, and the blurry images of the slender spaceship complete with Federation markings, and the thought came unbidden that maybe Jo wasn't as crazy as he sounded....