Mike looked under the vehicle and saw that it seemed to be floating about six inches off the ground. A door on the side slid open revealing a spotless white interior and two seats at each end facing each other, that looked to be extremely comfortable.
“Age before beauty,” Bob said stepping aside to let Mike in first.
Mike climbed into the “car” and Bob scrambled in behind him. They sat facing each other, the door slid shut, and the outside of the car disappeared.
“What the hell?!” Mike said.
“Yeah,” Bob said as he gazed out at the countryside that they seemed to be hovering over in overstuffed white loungers “you might call this the original Vistacruiser.”
“Is this thing invisible now?” Mike asked as he poked one index finger at the scenery just to make sure they were still enclosed in something.
“Uh, no,” Mike said “I mean we don’t have some sort of cloaking device or anything. Or Harry Potters’ invisibility cloak. Although that would be just cool as hell,” he slapped Mike on the knee, “wouldn’t it?”
“What the hell is this then?” Mike asked.
“All of our transportation is under ground,” Bob said as he sat back in his seat, and the “car” began to silently move ahead “It makes things so much easier this way. No traffic to muddy up the scenery, or speeding cars to drive someone into next week by mistake. What you’re looking at here is a giant cylindrical “television” screen for the lack of a better word. We’re actually underground in a giant tube speeding toward our destination. And before you ask,” Bob said as he held up a hand to stop Mike from interrupting his train of thought, “it knows where we’re going because I told it where to take us.”
Bob tapped his temple and smiled to indicate the chip.
“What moves it forward?” Mike asked as he watched some of the most beautiful country side that he’s ever seen slide silently past him.
“A sort of magnetic rail,” Bob said.
“And why didn’t you ever give this to us?” Mike asked.
“Well,” Bob said as he watched the world go by, “we did. It’s called Maglev and you use it every day. Of course, you don’t use it to its fullest potential because the big oil companies put the screws to it. Thought someone was trying to take their rice bowl. You know what they say… you don’t want to break nobody’s rice bowl.”
“That takes a ton of electricity though,” Mike said. “Doesn’t it?”
“Yep, ole’ buddy, quite a bit.”
“You people don’t seem to be really into fossil fuels here. Where’s it coming from?”
“You people?” Bob asked as he raised both eyebrows in mock indignation.
Mike gave him the finger.
“Natural sources,” Bob answered. “Wind, solar, sea current. Hell ole’ buddy, we even get quite a bit from the gravitational pull of this planet, and all three of our moons.”
“Three?” Mikes asked surprised. “I only saw two.”
“And you were only outside, what… ten minutes?” Bob said. “Man, you people are quick to judge.”
“Whatever,” Mike said impatiently “how do you do the gravity thing. That would really help out at home.”
“Yeah,” Bob said, “you’d think that wouldn’t you.”
“We picked a guy up a couple of hundred years ago, ummmm…” Bob snapped his fingers to help materialize the name in his head. “Fig, no, shootin’, no…” Bob’s eyes lit up “Isaac, that’s it. Isaac Newton.”
Mike crossed his arms to show distain for the little floor show.
“So we bring Isaac on board and this guy is like a real dyed in the wool genius. We were explaining thigs to him and he’s taking notes and asking all the right questions. And we were all thinking like wow, this guy is really going to shake things up down there. There were high fives all around, and the crew hung back to see where this all went.”
“Where did it go?” Mike asked.
“You tell me Einstein.”
“He discovered gravity.”
“Do you have even the smallest,” Bob held his thumb and forefinger close together, not quite touching as he looked at Mike through the gap, “infinitesimal idea of just how ignorant you sound when you say that?
“That,” he went on, “is like saying that Christopher Columbus discovered America. Like all those people that had been living on that continent since the dawn of time never noticed what they were standing on?”
“No dude,” he continued through Mike’s distant irritated stare “gravity was always there. The simple fact that Adults on your planet are perfectly comfortable running around saying stupid shit like hey an apple fell on this guy’s head and he discovered gravity is one of the most disappointing things you dudes have going. Isaac discovered the relationship of mass of objects and their attraction to each other. He wrote all of this down in a book called Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica. But you all just accept the moronic apple horse crap.
“He had the answers Mike,” Bob said, “he was just too enlightened for his fellow fellows.
“Of course, all of that information didn’t just go away,” Bob continued “you use it every day. But do you know what the majority of all that amazing knowledge goes into?”
“I’m sure you’re about to tell me,” Mike said.
“Weapon systems and ‘national security’,” Bob said.
Mike turned his head back toward the beautiful exterior and clamped his mind firmly shut about the plight of his compatriots back home.
“If we’re underground, how am I seeing all of this?” Mike asked as he stared out the side of the car. “Is it just a scenery loop?”
“Nope,” Bob answered, “it’s a direct feed from a kind of a camera above us. I could tell you how it works, but your head would explode, and I’d be covered in Mike parts. Let’s just say that we’re seeing the same thing we’d be seeing even if we were above ground right now.”
Mike continued to watch the beauty passing and simply nodded his reaction to Bob’s explanation.
Mike was certain of one thing. He never wanted to go home. There was nothing there for him anyway. Both of his parents were dead; he was an only child with no siblings. Sure, he had a few friends. But no one was really going to miss him anyway. He was getting the sinking feeling that the people that populated this planet were never going to let that happen. Hell, they couldn’t even let him walk around outside by himself. How were the ever going to let him live here permanently?
He thought that maybe if he were able to show them that he was capable of controlling his more basic animal instincts, that he was able to act more like them. If he could show them that he wasn’t in any way dangerous to their very existence…
Maybe they might let him stay. He had to work on that very, very hard. He had to be on his very best behavior at all times and show them that he was capable of being a very positive addition to their world.
The scenery stopped sliding past the car and the door made a light whooshing sound as it slid open. Mike was amazed that the view outside looked just like it had from the inside.
“Here we are space man,” Bob said winking at Mike. “After you.”
Mike stepped out of the capsule car and onto beautiful lush grass. In front of him was a fairly nondescript, two story building with a plain glass entry way. Just like the place he had started from, the flora engulfed the building and made it an amazingly beautiful addition to the rest of the landscape.
Several people were in front of the building. Some of them were chatting as they waited for their capsule to appear from under the ground, and others sitting on benches as they took in the view. Bob led Mike into the entry way, and toward an unremarkable set of wooden double doors.