HITCHHIKERS MAY BE SPACE MONSTERS by Ken Gage ©1999

I theorize there are so many admonitory signs posted around the country that no one pays attention to them. The only 100 percent effective sign I've ever seen is on the Arkansas Interstate: "Hitchhikers May Be Escaped Convicts."

-- Jerome Beatty, Jr.

from Smithsonian Magazine, April 1995

Space monsters! You may have seen pictures of them. Maybe read a story. But it's all documented; all true. The lies are reserved for history and biography books.

"So what's your line of work?" asked field reporter Tom Mura.

The stranger popped his eyes out in alarm. And then just as violently relaxed. "Why I once played the discordian. Professionally, I mean. But I gave it up to work on a special project for Dr. Edmund Redding at the Cowan Institute. He was sort of a nut-job. You ever hear of the Werewolf Sequencer?"

"No. What is it?"

The stranger looked about nervously. Upon seeing nobody was around, he told Tom more. "It's a machine used for experiments in hypnotic regression. You could ask Ann Taylor about it. Or, better yet, Fernando de Fuentes. The dangerous part started in the Great Pyramid of Yucatan, where they found those two mummies. Aztec maybe. But that night we learned somet'ing. Never...never resurrect a mummified werewolf!"

"Sounds positively loopy!" chuckled Tom as though he'd been had.

The odd man shrugged. "If by that you mean to say it sounds unusual...well, fine. Yeah, it certainly does. Let me tell you, though -- some people's lives are so mundane, so boringly conventional that it would pain any biographer to make account of them. Common everyday folks. Nice, often, but predictable. A marriage. Or two or three. About as many kids as marriages, plus one. There's always a mystery kid stuck in the equation of marital bliss. An orphan, an adoptee, a cloning experiment, a long-lost relative recently returned by his cosmic abductors maybe...who knows? I don't!"

Tom Mura appeared startled. But he listened. Politely.

"So much of the world is too beaten up by life to do anything but have a normal, unimaginative, cookie-cutter existence. Or are they simply too lazy? Too dull-witted? Too insecure...cowardly?"

"Well," Tom cleared his throat, "you might be on to something."

Invisible claws of ice plucked at the strangers thoughts. "Maybe the real barriers to creativity exist only in the mind. Like monstruous guardians who, being only mental illusions, patrol the darkness of our ids and plant those seeds of fear in order to suppress our internal greatness for some dark purpose. What colors must be imprisoned in these shells of clay? What beautiful, vibrant hues are straining for release?!"

"I happen to be the world's foremost authority on Godzilla Countermeasures," Tom suddenly uttered, changing the subject.

"What's that?"

"I was there after Godzilla stomped Tokyo. And I was there to witness the light bombs over Osaka. I know why herbivores like Angilas have an instinctive hatred for carnivores like Godzilla. And at Shinko, I saw Godzilla buried in an avalanche of rock and ice."

"Indeed...?"

"Yep. I'm full of secrets. I helped defeat Rodak when the Space Avenger first came to our world. And it's my belief there shall be a second coming!"

"Hmmm, sounds delightful."

"Now, like I said, I am set up in Godzilla Countermeasures. I had to destroy the files on the oxygen-destroyer so that I could remain in business. It all works out. But I've never played the discordian."

"I used to live with dead people."

"Let's hope they stay that way," said Tom with a wink.

"I currently work on Venus."

Paydirt! Toms eyes almost exploded when he said, "Venus?" He saw a sign there once. Or was it a tribulation? It read: HITCHHIKERS MAY BE SPACE MONSTERS.

Worst scum in the galaxy live on Venus. Watch any science fiction film or TV show and you will soon learn the truth of it. The Earth-conquering Benefactor from the Roger Corman documentary It Conquered the World used to reside on Venus, along with eight other super-beings of an alleged "dying race" and known murderous inclinations. Zontar is another popular denizen from that planet. And then there's the Inka invaders (Inkazoku in Japanese) who menaced Earth from their Venusian headquarters and, if it hadn't been for the intervention of National Kid, might have destroyed humankind.

Maybe you know all about them. Read a couple newspaper articles about UFOs. You probably have already realized that fiction is reality and reality has been fictionalized to protect the guiltless and guilty alike. Even Earth has its bad spots

Sure, Mars has its fair share of vicious criminal tenants too. But Venus remains, tenacles down, the homeland of the most terrible villains ever loosed upon the Cosmos. Recounting their evil machinations would be an all day affair, better left to madmen, writers and the clergy. Or Hollywood documentaries. Any horror film is one. Venus is watching our every twitch and stutter. God help us all!