Ulysses & the Fugitive - Ch. 20: The Return
By Alfred Underhill
A month had passed since Nera had brought down the other saucer and wiped out the
remaining hyssopshebolith on Earth. Ulysses sat in a conference room inside the CIA's Denver
office. He waited for O'Flannery to enter the room. In theory, he was there to provide the final
account of the events that transpired after Nera's victory, yet Ulysses figured he'd be answering
questions about what happened for the rest of his life. He stared indifferently at the TV in the
corner that silently broadcast CNN.
He didn't feel too bad today. The past month had thrown his emotions in every direction.
He wasn't sure if he had really processed it all yet. If he was being honest with himself, it would
probably take him years to really work it all out. But at least for right now most of what he felt
was annoyance at being forced to wait for agent O'Flannery.
After another fifteen minutes of tedium, the door to the conference room opened and
O'Flannery stepped in. He smiled at Ulysses and set his planner down on the table.
"Ulysses," the agent said, "thanks for coming in. I know you must be getting tired of
having to answer questions and make statements. Hopefully today will be it; at least for a little
while. Do you need anything before we get started? Drink of water? Use the restroom?"
"I'm good," said Ulysses. "I appreciate the offer, but I just want to get this done."
O'Flannery nodded to him. "All right. Let me get setup and we'll jump in." The agent
produced a small digital recorder from his planner. He flipped through some printed papers and
turned to a fresh page in his legal pad.
"First question: what is the nature of your relationship to the ET known as Nera?"
Ulysses shifted in his seat. "She's my girlfriend, or I mean, she was my girlfriend."
"How did you first make contact with her?"
"My friend Giles and I went to Burning Man earlier this year. I met Nera wandering
around the playa."
"Do you know why she was in that particular geographic location?"
"Yeah. Something about the alkaline nature of the playa dust made it so the parasites
couldn't detect her. By the time I met her, she had already collected some of the dust into
containers that she carried with her wherever she went."
"Where you able to communicate with her directly during your first encounter with her?"
Asked the agent.
"Only a little bit. There was a lot of pointing and gesturing. I thought she was like, from
Europe and on drugs, or something."
"But as you continued to spend time around one another, you were able to communicate
more readily through spoken words?"
"Well, sort of," said Ulysses. "I know you how this works, but I guess I'm here to state
this for the record: Nera uses a kind of telepathy to spoof human speech. To you and me, it