Till Death Do Us Part

by David

I need to get back to Tabletop Mountain in time to stop the wedding.

The problem is, my airship is flying lower and lower, slower and slower. The cucumber is almost exhausted. There’s nothing left in the bin but a few yellow spheroids the size of golf balls, and lemon cukes just don’t pack the oomph of the phallic green ones. I burned the last of the bell peppers this morning, and the lone remaining radish is shriveled and dry. Before noon I’ll be stoking the furnace with nothing but onions, and do you know what they do to an engine!? I’ll have to get an entirely new carburetor. Besides, I barely have enough of those to get me to the border. I call my brother.

“I told you. I have to stop the wedding. Elise can’t marry the Varsuvian-B ambassador. That’s where I’ve been.”

“I’m telling you! I visited Varsuvius on the B line. I was suspicious. I admit that was mostly because I wanted Elise for myself. You know how I feel about her. But this is much bigger than me — the B Varsuvians aren’t like the ones we’ve met on the A line.”

“Here, they’re almost like normal people. They live in clusters, raise their offspring communally (the ones that survive the nursery), even trade body parts with us (where that’s permitted}. My point is they get along. On the B line they harvest humans for ‘living’ art displays. If you can call it living to have your face and cerebellum grafted to a mobile made from recycled appliances, a feature of half time entertainment at Venter matches! I don’t think of that just off the top of my head when people start talking about ‘the good life’. I was lucky to get out with my spleen intact!”

“There’s nothing here. It’s a temperate deciduous forest. This is early summer, and there is no fruit to be had. I can’t run this thing on bark, leaves, and twigs!”

I’m thinking about parts of Elise decorating private ballrooms on the B plane.

“Yeah, seriously, you know how hard this is for me to say, especially to you. I love her. Satisfied? Now, would you come get me? I owe you one bro.”

“Okay! I owe you two. Just follow my signal. Please?”