"The most important thing to know is this," the image said. "Do not tell anyone why you are here until you get to the person you have to talk to. They are extremely clever out here, and very protective. They will do just about anything to make you break your confidence — and the strange thing is, they can absolutely follow through on whatever they might use to tempt you. And they will tempt you."
Hunter would have laughed if he wasn't hurting so much. "How can I be tempted any more than a chance to stay in Heaven with the girl I love, instead of coming back here to fight a war that will be almost impossible to win?"
The image smiled again but didn't completely understand.
"I think you'll be surprised by this place, Hawk," Tomm said. "Just go with the flow, as they used to say, and see what happens. Be strong, though. I'm sure everyone is counting on you."
With that, the image disappeared.
Hunter just stared at the empty piece of space where Tomm had just been.
"Wait! That's it!" he yelled.
He tried to activate the image again but got nothing more than a crackle of static. He tried again and again. Still nothing. The capsule was depleted. He couldn't even conjure up the first two images. In frustration, he threw the capsule away. It seemed to travel more than a mile before finally disappearing into the woods.
This was just great. Here he was, literally at the end of the Galaxy, with no way home, no way to contact anybody, nobody to contact if he did — and no idea what he was supposed to be doing here. He reached into his side pocket and felt one of his last apples had turned to mush.
And nothing to eat, either, he thought.
He got up and began walking again.
After an hour of trudging through the forest, he reached a long narrow field that led to another outcrop of rocks. He climbed these rocks cautiously and looked out on the other side.
He found himself atop a tall hill. Directly below him was a closely cut field of grass with a water fountain in the middle and park benches surrounding it. Beyond that was a main street that led into a small town. He counted two dozen buildings at most, both homes and businesses, on either side of the street.
He also saw lots of trees and flower boxes and streetlights and even fire hydrants.
Looking down on the sleepy little settlement, he just shook his head. "I came across the Galaxy — for this?"
He made his way down the hill and past the village green. His blaster rifle had been lost in the crash, but his ray gun had survived, tucked away in his holster.
He walked to the edge of the small town now, gun in hand. The village didn't look any different than a trillion other settlements scattered throughout the Galaxy's billions of planets. If anything, it looked like something more readily found in the Ball. Peaceful. Bucolic. Uninteresting.
It also appeared deserted. Hunter saw no signs of life. He studied the main street. It was well-paved and ran for two blocks where it widened out into the town square. There was a small bandstand here and a flagpole, but no banner was flying from it.
He moved down the street, sticking to one side, always checking around him, in back of him, and methodically scanning every door front. The names on some of the stores were vaguely familiar to him.
Howard Johnson's. Sears Roebuck. Woolworth's. Rexall. These were obviously places to eat, to buy clothes and appliances, to buy medicines. Though they were way down deep in his psyche, it was always a small triumph when he remembered something from his past life. But what were these ancient things from a long-ago Earth doing way out here, at a point just about as far away from Earth as one could get?
What about the Phantoms and the Saturn 5s?
He hoped he would find out.
"Hey mister, want a ride?'
Hunter turned around toward the voice; instinct alone had his gun up and ready.
What he saw was a very, very long ground vehicle, painted white, with many windows and four wheels. Hunter was familiar with this type of machine. It was called a limousine.
There was a teenage boy behind the steering wheel. He was wearing a black suit coat, a bow tie, and a black cap.
"What did you say?" Hunter asked him.
"I asked you if you needed a ride," the kid yelled back. "There ain't no buses running today, and you look like you've got someplace you want to go."
Hunter just shrugged. He couldn't search the entire planet on foot, looking for somebody he didn't even know. On the other hand, whoever was running Far Planet obviously knew he was here. It would have been hard for anyone to miss his grand entrance. So, he supposed, the best way to find out where he was going was to let them take him there. Or something like that. Like Tomm said: Just go with the flow and see what happens.
He climbed into the back of the limo.
They roared out of town and a minute later were speeding along a deserted country road.
The limo was so long Hunter could hardly see the driver. The backseat was incredibly comfortable.
His frame sank a good six inches into it. There was a fully stocked bar within reach. He even liked the twinkling lights that ran the length of the limo's interior.
He put his weary head back to rest. He couldn't remember the last time he'd gone to sleep. It sometimes seemed like he hadn't caught any Zs since he arrived in the seventy-third century more than two years ago. If he could just close his eyes, just for a few seconds and…
Wake up, Hawk…
He was suddenly awake, gun up and ready. How long had he been asleep? A minute? An hour? He couldn't tell. They were still tooling along the country road, but the landscape outside had changed. They were now driving past sand dunes, some covered with beach grass, some bare. Hunter thought he could smell ocean air, even though the limo's windows were all shut tight and the air-conditioning was going full blast.
They topped a hill, and the limo began to slow down. They turned left and were now on a gravel road, driving between the sand dunes. Hunter was tempted to yell up to the kid and ask where they were going, but he saved his breath. He knew he would find out soon enough.
They made another turn, and now straight ahead Hunter could see a single building standing out among the dunes. It was like a big box, with a huge rolling door on its front and a smaller door on the side. There was a long apron of black asphalt in front of it. Beach grass and sand covered the other three sides.
The limo driver pulled up to the front door, then looked into his rearview mirror for the first time.
"Want to stretch your legs?" he yelled back to Hunter.
But Hunter was already climbing out of the big car. He stood in front of the stark building; it was made of very thin materials, plastic and tin. As unremarkable as it was, it was familiar to him.
It was an airplane hangar.
He turned to ask the driver why they had stopped here and was startled to see the car had departed.
He just caught a last glimpse of it as it retreated back down the dusty road.
When Hunter turned back to the hangar, he found an elderly man standing in front of him. He was small, bent over, with a huge mustache and a nonatomic cigar jammed in his mouth. He was wearing mechanic's overalls and was rubbing his greasy hands on a very greasy rag. A name tag over his left side pocket read D. Jones. He looked vaguely familiar.
"You here to pick up the buggy?" he asked Hunter with a rasp.
"Buggy?"
The old guy looked at him like he had two heads. "Yeah, the buggy? Your wings? Your airplane?"
" My airplane?"
The old guy just rolled his eyes, put the rag in his back pocket, and opened the hangar door.