[LNH/ACRA] Adventures Beyond Comprehension #3

[cabbagewielder at yahoo.com]

	Dalton Asters In:
	Adventures Beyond Comprehension  #3
	The Secret Diaries of Dalton Asters, Volume the Second
	Breaking the Rules
	A Killfile Wars Tie-In Event
	By Jesse N. Willey

	Sorry, I had to go email someone for a minute.    What was I talking
about again?   Oh, yeah.   How I met Crystal.   But that wasn't the
story I set out to tell.   I was trying to tell you about something
else.   Was it Phred the infant deity?   No... Was I telling you about
Electra?   No... I did that already.
	Oh yeah... my long string of problems with the Weinsteins.   The girl
I was emailing should have been a good reminder.    I didn't run into
Andrew again for sometime after that.  He had kept himself busy,
establishing his corporation as a major player by exploiting a web of
contacts both on and off planet.

	Crystal and I were seeing the world on $20 a day.   The Alien Abductee
Support Network had some rather deep pockets.   They sell posters and
books about a wide range of paranormal.   Occasionally, if I was really
scrapped for cash I'd sell a story to the tabloids.    I also knew
people sympathetic to the cause who'd put me up for a few days.
 That day was a little of both.   This guy would help with the story.
Unlike the New York Times, I didn't print a single story I couldn't
back up with facts, sources and eyewitness accounts.

	Which is, of course why we were visiting a cabin in a nearly deserted
part of the Alaskan wilderness.     It was deep in the forest in an
area covered by a six-foot winter snow.   If you didn't know this
place was there, you wouldn't find it.   Okay, you might but you
might not survive long enough to knock on the door.

	"What's that?" Crystal said.

	She pointed down at the snow.   It was just a fourteen and half inch
foot print.   Definitely humanoid.   It was nothing to worry about.

	"Nothing.   At least I know he's home," I said.
	"That who is home?" she asked.
	"I told you on the one way here... an old friend," I said.

	I walked up to the door.  It creaked open.    A brunette haired woman
answered the door.  I stepped back.

	"Yes?" she said.
	"I'm sorry I must have the wrong house," I said.
	"You're Dalton, right?   P'tok'olia said you'd be coming."
	"Oh.. and you are..."
	"Ghen'olita'tos.... But you can call me Jenn," she said as she
turned and shouted back into the house.  It wasn't until then that I
noticed the five inch long tail sticking out of her back and her
oversized feet.  "Honey, Dalton is here."
	"Uh... Dalton..." Crystal said.
"Come on in you two.  I'll fix you some lunch."

	We walked into the house and there was P'tok'olia.  But you can
call him Pete.  Pete stood about eight feet tall and his arms were
about five feet long. He wasn't clothed but was rather covered with a
mountain of body hair.

	"Hyk'ry'nof  kol hos pictu," I said.
	"Same to you Dalton, you lazy ol'bastard."
	"Dalton, what did you say to him?" Crystal asked.
	"May your sister not mate with a yeti," Dalton said.
	"Ummm.... And he's a..." she asked.
	"Sasquatch," Pete said.
	 "What brings you two out this way?   If you need money... forget
it," Pete said.
	"Nah... I just need to use your computer to send a story," I said.
 "I'm headed out to Montreal sometime next month.  I'll meet with
people from zines before then.  You'll get your back pay then."
	"You want to eliminate that debt and maybe earn some gas money?"
Pete said.
	"Sure... what's the catch?" I asked.
	"There is the business that wants to cut down parts of this forest.
If these woods get destroyed... Jenn and I will have to find a new
place to live," he said.
	"And you want me to do what?   Scare the developers?   You're a
sasquatch for Buddha's sake.  I think that makes you about a million
times more fit to do the old Scooby-Doo routine than I am," Dalton
said.

	Pete glared into my eyes.

	"I want you to talk to the C.E.O.   Word on the pipeline is he owes
you."
	"Oh Christ.  Not him."

	____________________________________________________

	Crystal drove that night.  She always did the driving.   Something
about me occasionally vanishing without a moments notice and
reappearing just as easily minutes, hours, days or even weeks later.
Apparently that's not the type of person she wants behind the wheel.
I can't see why.

	"Dalton, why are we helping them?" Crystal asked.
	"They're good people.  Why are you asking that?  Is it because
they aren't human?" I asked.
	"It's just when I saw growing up.  I was taught..." Crystal
said.

	I looked at the necklace and cross around her neck.

	"I know what you were thought.   Big spooky monster... it must be
persecuted and killed.   One must not suffer a bigfoot to live," I
said.
	"He's not a witch..."
	"Then what is it then..."
	"He just looked so strange."
	"Stranger looking then those lepers Jesus was so fond of?"
	"Well no..."
	"Well then let me tell you something else you should have learned.
There is no greater love a man can give, than he risk his life for his
friends... or something like that," Dalton said.

	She hated when I played it that way.

	"So... how do you reconcile it?" she asked.
	"Reconcile what?" I asked.
	"These sasquatches and what's in The Bible.   Flying saucers and
those weird chariots... that I understand," she said.
	"They're in there.   Some versions anyway."
	"Where is there a Bigfoot in The Bible," Crystal asked.
	"I told you... your version doesn't refer to them as such,"
Dalton said.
	"What  you mean is, it doesn't have them," she said.
	"Look, it's not your fault.   Your book is filled with lots of
falsehoods.  The existence of God... or at least a singular cognizant
god... human kind coming from just two people... Mary's sexual
history... and definitely the Mary being born without sin thing.   But
Bigfoots are in there..." he said.
	"Look... I'm used to your atheistic tendencies.  So just tell me,
where is bigfoot The Bible?" she said.
	"Goliath."
	"What?"
	"Sure... Goliath wasn't really Godzilla sized.  It just got blown
out of proportion," Dalton said.  "Then of course there was
Christ."
	"What?  Christ was not a bigfoot."
	"A quarter bigfoot... on his dad's side... and of course he was.
Why  else was there such a big deal made of him wearing sandals?
Everyone wore sandals back then.   It was such a big deal because his
feet were big."
	"And wait a minute... wasn't Goliath a solider?"
	"Are you saying a sasquatch can't loyally serve his country?"
Dalton said.

	____________________________________________________

 	It was a good hundred miles from Pete's office to where Weinstein
had his field office.   I'd heard some strange rumors about him from
the pipeline.   Apparently, he'd gone all Howard Hughes.    Flying
from city to city and living in sealed off rooms in various field
offices.   His assistant Ellie is practically the only one to deal with
him directly.

	The Alaskan field office was not impressive.  Eight stories and most
of it was storage space.    We got into the lobby fairly easily.
There was a plaque that listed who worked there and what office they
worked in.   Weinstein wasn't listed.   There was a conspicuous
listing 'Corporate Meeting Room- 137.'  It was right next to the
kitchen on the first floor, and had its own dedicated restroom attached
and had its own emergency escape.   Sounds like where he'd be to me.

	Only one thing kept me from the entrance.

	"It's just a matter of getting past the security checkpoint,"
Crystal said.
	"Any metal detectors?" I asked.
	"Yeah," she said.
	"Fuck it with a Snoopy Sno-Cone Machine," I said.
	"What?"
	"I don't like metal detectors.   Especially knowing Weinstein,
they might actually be sensitive enough to pick up my... well...
implants," I said.
	"You're wearing three sheets of tinfoil on your head and are
afraid they might detect fragments of metal the size of a molecule
inside your body?" she said.

	I know.   It's silly.   Crystal was right.  So we walked up to the
checkpoint.   A fat rent a cop uniform walked us through.    I tipped
my tinfoil to her.

	"Where are you two headed?" she asked.
	"Room 137," I said.
	"That's a restricted area."
	"Tell him, it's Asters.   He'll see me."

	I tried to charge past her.  She grabbed her weapon.   She fired at me
and almost hit me.   Crystal did her best not to scream.    I
immediately proceeded down the hallway somehow dodging bullets all the
way.

	"What the hell are you doing?" I shouted at the guard.

	She aimed her Glock at Crystal's head.

	"I told you, that's a restricted area you piece of shit."

	I knew what Crystal was going through.  It was the first time she'd
had a gun to her head.   Me, it's happened so many times now I barely
blink.  I don't like it.   But I can deal.

	A huge almost blurry shadow charged through the lobby.

	"What in The Lord's name," Crystal muttered.

	It was just Pete.

	The large blurred, but rather furry, arm pounded into the guard head.
 She fell to the ground.      While I had witnessed enraged Sasquatches
before.... never anything quite like that.    His teeth were bare and
he was going in for the kill.   A few of the guard's teeth lay on the
floor and there was a puddle of blood.

	You want to know something?  In all the years I've known him he has
never once explained how he turns blurry like that.

	"Pete... how did you get here?" I asked.
	"I drove, same as you."
	"How?  You're a..." Crystal said.
	"When the DMV form asks for race, I check the box for other," Pete
said.
	"You'd better clear out.   I'll take it from here," I said.
	"Good... I can't blur cameras forever y'know," Pete said.
"I'll be in the car."

	_______________________________________________________

	Andrew's office was utilitarian and ugly.  Wood paneled walls, wood
paneled floors-- and don't get me started on the ceiling.  Two rows of
hard wooden chairs lined either side of the clear Plexiglas table; a
leather chair, buttons studding the arms, sat at the end of the table.
And in that chair sat Andy.
   He hadn't changed a bit.  His suit probably cost more than my entire
wardrobe.  His hair had that scraggly Beaker thing going on (even if
his personality was more Benson Honeydew meets Kaiser Soze).  His eyes
seemed hollow.

	"Ah... Dalton... what brings you here?"
	"Like you don't know," I said.
	"Actually, I don't."
	"This forest development project."
	"What about it?"
	"You're destroying the habit of the sasquatchi."
	"You mean those mythical bigfoots you're always chasing after?"
	"Yeah, them," I said.
	"I'm sorry.  I can't help you."
	"What?  What do you mean can't help me?  Weinstein, you bastard...
you owe me for the tip about the metal sheets," I said.
	"As I recall, I offered to pay you quite handsomely.   You refused
the offer and spit in my face.   And now that your buddies are
squatters on my property, you turn to me for help?   That's not how a
friendship works, you know.  Or have you been out in space so long that
you've forgotten," he said.
	"Mister Weinstein.... I've seen these bigfoots.  They talk, sing,
watch TV and love just like... like..." Crystal said.
	"Like what?"
	"Like people. But not people."
	"Then why should I treat them any different than a cat or a dog?"
	"Can a dog drive a car?   Can a cat give you medicine when you're
poisoned and near death?" I asked.

	Andrew coughed.

	"More miraculous things have happened," Andrew said.  "You're
thinking small scale.  You're worried about two sasquatchs.   The
project I'm working on in these forests could save millions of lives
for generations to come."
	"And that makes it right?"
	"Look... there is another site I could use.   Getting the rights to
use it will delay it a week or two... but I'll deal with you.   You
just have to do something for me in Montreal," Andrew said.  "But
remember... after this... I owe you nothing."

	To Be Continued...

_____________________________________________________________________

This Document and all characters belong to Jesse N. Willey.