For Kurt and Sandy

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Flash sighed, a happy sigh, and smiled as he looked out on the cosmic view from his ship. Lem was always by his side. She didn’t say much, but seemed to enjoy just being there.

Flash picked up the Ololian book. It was like a magic book, because it had the unique ability to write itself… as though information was being downloaded… but from where?

There was always something new for Flash to read, and that helped pass the time, which he had plenty of.

Leafing through the book one day (I use the word day, even though that’s not really what it was), a picture jumped out at Flash, and he looked closer. A grinning, green-skinned alien face looked back at him from the page. The expression was jarring. The color gave the face a ghoulish look. As off-putting as the image was, there was also something familiar about it. Flash couldn’t place it. He had seen the countenance before somewhere.

He began reading the text, and the hairs stood up on his neck.
The narrative described his own visit to the blue planet. The lifeless (but for plants) world that he had considered making his permanent home.

He read about the path leading from the rock down to the beach, his dream of the TNI2 crashing down the cliff, and his swim in the sea.

In this version, however, Flash did not return to the mother ship, but had made the lonely place his final home.

The shocking image depicted what he would have looked like in time if he had stayed. He recalled the dream of sinking his own roots into the soil. It had turned from a dream into a nightmare. More horrifying still, he read that some of the trees on that planet were once people like him, who decided to stay.

He closed the book, and Lem noticed that he had gone pale.

What is it? she asked, concerned.

Nothing.

It was a near miss for Flash. How he could have ever, for one second, considered staying in that place?

Well, now he was home, and had no thought of ever leaving it again.

Flash studied the data that he had been collecting since leaving Earth. Between that, the archive in the computer’s memory banks and the Ololian book, he had more than enough to keep his mind occupied, and entertained.

An alarm sounded. Something was out there.

The radar screen showed an object heading for the mother ship.

What is it? Lem asked, concerned.

I’m not sure. It looks like A sputnik sized sphere.

A what?

Possibly a rogue satellite, Flash guessed.

Lem looked closer at the screen. That is not metal, she announced, wide eyed. It is organic matter.

Flash strained to see what was out there, and Lem looked on nervously, hoping it was not going to collide with their ship.

Soon the object came into view.

Flash and Lem stared at it, trying to identify what it could possibly be. Spherical, as Flash had said. It was orange in color, with some sort of tail that trailed behind it.

Lem wondered if it was a comet. Flash thought it looked like a basketball.

It followed the mothership’s trajectory, gaining on it slowly, until it arrived at the hatch on the TNI 2 which was docked to the mother ship.

Please don’t open the airlock, Lem begged.

Flash was intrigued. Lem’s anxiety turned to terror when an appendage reached around the sphere and unlocked the hatch like a key.

The portal opened, and the strange orb swam, tendrils curling behind it, into the pod like an octopus entering its undersea den.

Lem gasped. They could hear it just below them, manipulating the mechanism of the door to the main cabin.

Their worst fears were realized as the hatch slid open.

This was not the first time Flash had had a surprise guest come aboard his ship. These visits shot through his mind in a fraction of a second. Galaxy Girl from the Procyon, Geronimo, the Shepherdess of the Stars, Peck, and even Lem herself had arrived in just this way. And then, of course, there was his daughter.

Flash derived some comfort from this, but Lem cowered, her eyes wide. She did not like surprises.

There it was, now in plain view. An enchanted Jack-O-Lantern floated into the cockpit.

I heard you were having a celebration! it said through it’s enormous hollow grin. Flash could only laugh. He knew he must surely be dreaming.

It was as though Mr. Pumpkinhead could read his thoughts, because he said, as his vines unfurled, taking the form of arms and hands, I am not a dream.

I don’t think you understand the power of your imagination.

You spoke me into existence a long time ago, planting my seeds in the fertile minds of children.

You said it yourself. If the universe is infinite, then everything is not only possible, but everything IS. You thought I might show up again someday, somewhere. Well, here I am.

Once Lem understood that he was not a threat, the three sat and talked together about their adventures.

Flash ordered up a hot, steaming meal of macaroni and cheese, and Mr. Pumpkinhead said it was the best he had ever tasted.

They talked for hours, and then Mr. Pumpkinhead unlocked the hatch and left, the way he had come. Lem and Flash were a little sad to see him go, and very happy that he had come.

---

Twelve years ago, I posted this to my blog, about something that had happened about twelve years before that:

I used to make up stories called “The Adventures of Mr. Pumpkinhead.” They were silly, fantastic stories about an enchanted jack-o-lantern who loved Kraft Deluxe Macaroni and Cheese Dinner. He had a friend named Rocky, who was an enchanted Lake Superior beach stone, and another friend named Sylvia, who was an enchanted spaghetti squash. I’ve lost my one copy of the book I made, and maybe it will show up again somewhere, someday. One day as I was recounting the time Mr. Pumpkin head used his magic finger to open and start a car at a car dealership, drive it away, get arrested for grand theft auto, and then be put in jail (he used his magic finger to unlock the jail cell and walk out), my friend’s son looked at me and said “You’re Mr. Pumpkinhead, aren’t you?” I don’t know that I’d thought of it that way before, but the question resulted in this oil pastel that I call “Self Portrait as Mr. Pumpkinhead.”