Tuned In.

This is a work combining the End of the World prompt with a Family Reunion theme to create something totally different. I hope you like! I welcome your comments.

This story is dedicated to all the memories I shared with someone special to me miles away from anything while the radar detector randomly beeped out messages for no reason.

Tuned In

It all ended pretty simply, with a drive to the Post Office during the blazing sun of the hot southern midsummer days. Tom and Karen had hooked up after the events of their lives had brought them to a crossroad. Being so far out in the countryside of the deep south they looked at the sky until the setting sun's beauty lit it up with fiery reds, yellows, and purples. They watched until the sun was down in silence. Now they sat looking at each other and wondering what was to come next. The radio flashed on and flipped through the stations at a furious pace, with the repeating phrases coming through the static in parts of radio shows, "It", "Will", "Be", "Alright", "For", "You".

Tom had moved to this distant place after a sudden dip in the New York Stock Exchange put a permanent crimp in his 'positive cash flow' situation. He lost it all including the wife, two kids, new SUV, and $500,000.00 home in the Hamptons. He grabbed all he could carry and made a run for the border, but landed as far as the last payment on his home could take him. Here in the middle of the distant mountains half way to nowhere. There were no big corporate electric companies. No major chains of food or clothing. He had found it hard to even find a gas station open past 6pm. So taking the first job that came to him, he started working evenings at the local hand polishing car wash. He found it a strange twist that here in the middle of a town with less than 800 people, they found it necessary to wash their cars. Southerners, he thought, can't keep their mouths clean and a family feed, but can find the $15 a week to wash their vehicles!

Karen was a very simple woman who had lived alone with her backyard kennel and set of dogs. Inky, Blinky, and Dot were her 3 most beloved family members in the whole world. Jet black Labs with blue eyes. Inky was the Father and Blinky was the remaining runt who survived out of their last litter. Dot had been attacked by 2 wild roaming male dogs and only after the pups were born did they come back to finish the job and kill her other 2 puppies. Inky had been stuck in a closed bedroom during the attack, with wrapped paws where a raccoon had got the better of him. Afterwards Karen added a chain link kennel to her yard far back through the trees and black berry brush that grew wild along her dirt driveway.

Karen had always lived in this small southern town and had no need or desire to do more than live with her dogs, sip black berry tea, listen to soothing classical music on the radio, and read old novels by candle light. Of course life is not all that cozy all the time, and cash was needed even here where the average cost of renting a home was what Tom made in half a week before. She had taken a job at the local Kwik Shop gas station and mini market. There wasn't much else in this town where the sidewalks rolled up at 5pm. There was a Post Office for outside world contacts, Auto parts store so the local boys had way to repair their toys, Kwik Shop with a car wash because everything else was an hour drive away or farther, a church because every small town needs a place to gossip, and second hand thrift shop because clothing lasted forever when rips and tears didn't matter except on Sundays. The other stores were the usual group of small family owned second income generating houses turned junk shops. Being one of the hottest summers on record, there had been a run on most of the electrical devices, including fans, and most of these small stores repaired and resold people back their own trash.

This was a place where the locals measured you by how many times you could use a reference to God in a sentence or how many children you and your husband could breed in to the world. Karen found the men of the town appalling, foul mouthed, drinking, tobacco chewing, grease monkeys with a knack for never growing up. Her dogs could provide more loyal company than that. She never had much need for a man in her life. After all she had Inky, and Dot didn't seem to mind her taking some of the burden. This was her hidden secret, and not even she tried to think of it unless the need was there. She was shunned by most. The 'weird daughter of ol' Bradley, God rest his soul'. She didn't talk much, just what was needed to get by, so it didn't matter what she heard whispered about her around corners. This was not to say she didn't have a huge vocabulary due to her intense passion for large tomes and great stacks of books around her chairs, bed and kitchen table. Always back to home, back to her real family. She didn't go in to town except to work and buy food. Now her money grew tight as her needs increased. The heat had apparently claimed her radio, TV and now her phone as well. Karen had no idea that until this day, she had been one of the few people whose phone hadn't died.

After about a month of living in this small self contained world, Tom began to be spoken too. He tried not to get involved with the locals. They had a way of asking questions and turning it in to a debate or 'Yankee' bash fest. He just did his job polishing the Good ol' Boys trucks and classic hot rods. Not much else happened here. One day just before work he heard some of the guys in a car pointing and laughing as Karen left the mart with some dog food, sugar, a set of batteries, and a small pocket radio. Amidst the clamor and pounding against the dash for the car radio to "fuckin' work, came a clear outburst. "Hey boys, look at the dog going to feed the dogs! " This was followed by a bunch of drunken laughter and lewd comments about which ways she preferred her sexual positions. Tom was frustrated by the end of the day and already had a deep rooted hatred for the filth in these 'folks'. He'd slipped a small pebble in to the space between his fingers on the underside of the cloth he was wiping with. He then proceeded to buff the car in a large circled pattern. Of course after the guys stopped laughing they noticed that the nice cherry red paint had become a swirled scrapped cursive word. "Asshole" blazed across the hood and mouths of the four tanked rednecks. Next he felt the pain. He dropped to the ground and covered his face and head as the bottles and boots left dirty prints over bruised flesh.

In the scorching sun he was blind looking up and out through his fingers, but could hear the screams and growls as the assault stopped and the car wheels peeled away. Barking sounded through the air as he was licked clean by Inky. Karen helped him to his feet and explained that Inky "dont protect no one unless he was family and could be trusted."

Tom thankfully winced out a nod and "Thank you." flatly.

"You talk funny? Your're not from here are you?"

"No and with the exception of you, I wish I had never known 'here' either."

"Come on lets get you cleaned up proper. Two hours to the nearest doctor so we best be taking you home with me. Bobby and his boys got you pretty good there. You got some reason to want your head bashed in? I ain't never seen Inky take off an attack anyone like that, so you must be a special soul. You sure your're ok?"

"I'll be fine. They're just dumbasses, thats all. I didn't like their point of view on how much respect for other human beings they should have. They didn't like my way of expressing that point."

"You have a name or do I just call you, 'You'?" Karen walked Tom get up and they started walking to her vehicle. She motioned for Inky to get back in the bed.

"My name is Tom Wallace. I just moved here last month. How about you?"

"My name is Lucy Karen Platt, but everyone knows me by Karen. Daddy liked the name Karen better and so I got used to it."

"Well, nice to meet you... Karen. Mind if we get out of the heat and maybe the area in case Bo, Luke and Unkle Jesse decide to come back with more drunken wisdom and some of their pop guns?"

With that Karen helped Tom get in to her old 70's pick-up truck's front bench seat. She opened and slipped the batteries in to the small radio and explained that the truck radio was also "on the blink". Next they took off for her home high on a mountain pass and off the road a ways. Karen tried to tune the radio to a distant classical music station while they drove. Nothing but static came through.

"Must be the mountains and distance." Tom blurted out.

"Can't be. I listen to the same station everyday and all night. Must be the heat, the radio or both." Karen seemed annoyed but looked like she had other things on her mind. Tom started a worried thought in his head about what he was in for. He had seen a few of the locals homes before settling on the private place he rented. All of them needed a EPA cleaning crew before he would move in.

The house was in surprisingly good condition for being so far from the civilized world. A front porch with swing, back porch with a small table and 2 chairs, and side yard including a 25 ft square kennel came in to view as they drove around to the far side of the house. Inside was just as comforting. Everything was in far better shape than what Tom would have expected from a long lived local residence. All that seemed out of place was the stacks of books covering the end tables, chairs, and lining the hallway wall shelves.

"Read much?!" Tom asked with a painful chuckle. His eyes scanned the house again to get a full picture of where he was as he came to rest on a stack somewhere between the front door and main room.

"I don't have much. My Daddy died a few years ago and I've stayed here ever since. Momma died just after I was born but I can still cook, clean and sew my own clothes. Just so you don't think what it looks like in your eyes is going on in your head."

She left the room and returned with a cool wet cloth, some bandages, and a cold drink of Black Berry tea. She cleaned him up and explained her name and how she had come to be in town. She told him of how things had been going "on the blink", a phrase she picked up from a story and like to use. She paused and motioned toward the TV and then the phone.

"Good thing you're not in need of deeper attention. I saw on the television that locally the hot has put all the local town's electrical apparatus on the blink. My phone died yesterday. I don't know if it's the wires or the phone but it's dead. Even my clock radio died this morning. They say it's all on account of the heat and humidity. All I know is that I can't afford to drive the 2 hours to the city to replace all these things."

Karen hoped that she didn't come off as a stupid hick to this man. He struck her as being different than most of the common folks this town had to offer. She hoped he would make a move toward her in some fashion. When he didn't she dropped all hopes and moved on with the conversation not caring if he was impressed or not. He would accept her as is, or not at all.

She invited him to stay and eat with her under the reason that it had gotten dark and it was a long ride back to town. Dinner took place in the living room due to the lack of room on the kitchen table. Books had formed a dinner party setting of their own and candles took up the rest of the area. Tom sat quietly and politely used the TV tray he had been provided. He rested next to himself on the sofa. Karen thought about this tactical mistake. How was she going to get close to him now? She stayed standing and explained that she was only thirsty, sipping her Black Berry tea. The ice cubes clicked in the glass as she mixed it with a swirling motion of her hand.

Later after dinner, the lights flickered, the stove acted up and the window fans sputtered from low to high. Tom kept silent mostly. He let Karen ramble little questions off. He dismissed the idea she was flirting with him. His mind had gone in to a space all his own. He tried to reason how the heat played a role in a stove not working or the lights dimming down at times. At one point in the dim lighting, he swore he saw movement in-between the fan blades near the switch. Finally frustration took away the cloud of silence that had covered his mind.

"Have you got a screw driver around here? I want to see if there's a short in that fan." He gestured toward the last fan to have a problem.

"Sure do. I don't have much so I had to learn to keep things going on my own since Daddy died." She reached in to a small drawer in the kitchen pulling out a small screwdriver and pocket tool set. "Here you go, but I've already looked and can't find anything wrong. See I even took my radio apart and everything looks normal." She motioned to a clock radio sitting on a pile of books near the wall.

At that very moment Tom sat straight up and fixed his vision intensely on the open device. He peered at the item unblinking like a cat fixated on a bird, stalking, ready to pounce. He swore he saw the inners move. Tom thought for a minute about his own home. About his items affected by the supposed heat. His eyes did not blink. His own home wasn't this bad but he still had similar problems. His car radio, window air conditioner, even his radar detector had all been acting strangely since the heat wave started. It had been hot as hell with average nights only getting down to the low 90s. Since he was from the north, he liked it cold. His house was kept at a cool 75 degrees as long as he had been there.

Karen was frozen with fear. So scared that this stranger whom she had now developed a crush for, was a lunatic. Tom turned his glass over, spilling the now only ice to the carpet.

"Hey! I don't have much and it isn't the best, but at least have respect for my things!"

With a quick and swift movement, he lunged at the open pieces and snapped the glass over a part that seemed out of place. Karen leaped backward letting out a small screech. Tom motioned for her to look at the glass, but she hesitated. His eyes never leaving the glass under his hand. His speech was in a whisper, as if he didn't want to excite whatever it was further.

"Look I have no idea what this is and I have never seen anything like it. Come on! Hand me a coaster." Karen pouted a sour face and reply, "I don't have any coasters."

"Well hand me something and get a flashlight or something to see better with."

She snapped up the loose ice and went to the kitchen. She returned with a small saucer and candle. Tom using his left hand gently took her hand with the candle and pulled it and her down to his level. The candle flickered and then she saw it.

"Just a piece of the clock radio's guts? Boy, what is wrong with you?! You had me scared to death! I didn't know what the hell you were doing."

Just then as she began to speak in a clear and plain voice it moved. Karen whimpered and snapped back as far as his hold would let her. Legs made of resistors, and a body looking like part of the circuit board complete with chips and printed lines. The whole camouflaged mess looked like the damn inside of a part of something electrical, and was the size of a pack of cigarettes. Tom carefully slide the saucer under the glass after he was sure Karen wasn't going to scream and fall over. He lifted the plate shaking up until he could see it clearly in the now full lighting. It was like a bug, but made to look like a man made part of something electrical. Six clear eyes stared back at Tom through the glass. They were both shaking now. Tom felt it hard to keep the glass tightly pressed down as his muscles twitched from nerves going in to overload.

"Tom what the HELL is that thing?"

" I have NO idea." Tom flippantly snapped back at her.

For a split second Karen almost forgot about the small pile of spare parts walking around in one of her old jelly jar glasses and wondered if she would EVER get a chance with this man. She had a thing for the look of his brow and shape of his cheeks. The moment was completely destroyed as Tom's face changed from mildly interested beyond belief to absolutely astonished. For inside the glass shapes were changing, moving. They both watched as the finest pieces of the creature began to fall off and move on their own.

"I think it's having babies!" Tom breathed out in an almost unheard voice.

With that said, the creature turned to face him directly. Small blue arcs snapped off at the glass and saucer. Tom thought like Mac Guyver for a second and felt he had the luckiest dumb luck in the world. The glass and clay saucer had an insulating effect. Very lucky break, he thought. Then before he could even have time to bathe in his own personal mental victory, something fell in the kitchen. Then came the scurrying sounds from all directions around them. The dogs in the kennel had started barking. Karen's eyes widened and fear took the color from her face.

The TV blinked a few times and the crackle of static could be heard from the kitchen counter. Soon the phone rang and clock alarm went off. The barking got more intense outside. The old TV snapped and popped internally as it flashed to white snowy static on screen. Then the pocket radio in the kitchen came to life as well.

Karen clutched Tom with a painful grip and the expecting look of a child. The dogs stopped barking. Karen began to cry.

The TV channels began flipping as fuzzy stations came and went pausing and then rolling to the next station. The radio mirrored this same effect. It took Tom a few minutes to catch his running mind and think. He closed his eyes and hoped that whatever was going to happen didn't involve much pain. That was when he heard it. The voices over the TV and radio were matching up to make complete statements.

"Look at what you got...", "...Gremlins...", "...cause everybody knows, no one cares...", "...so won't you give them a chance...", "...on a dream vacation...", "...reunited with friends and family at last!" The TV and radio spoke in a strange mixed up language of commercials and announcements.

Tom opened his eyes in amazement. "Karen, do you hear that?"

"Yes, and I don't know why they are all working now. Everything was dead yesterday, now..."

"NO, the words match together. They are speaking to us. Your house must be crawling with them! They must be in every piece of electrical equipment in here. I wonder if they can understand us?"

At that very second the TV changed again, "... Yes!", "..yes", "yes we do."

From the kitchen came the radio comments, "...from our family to yours, welcome to...", "reunited for the first time since...", "...in the war against the Japanese we...", "...with man taking his first steps in to outer space....", and the song lyrics, "Freedom! Freedom!" on the gospel power hour station started playing.

Tom tried to contain himself. Karen stood with her mouth open. Suddenly Tom knew a better way. Less obstructive to speech for them. He carefully handed the trapped creature to Karen, who now seemed more worried about her dogs than anything. Shaking, Karen clamped tightly against the top and bottom of the imprisoned creature's home made cage. Tom whipped out his cell phone with one hand and placed it carefully on the floor, opened with the text messaging screen showing.

"Ok, have at it. Either we are going nuts here and this is one hell of a trip," he paused and looked at Karen, hoping that maybe she would elaborate and that all this was a caused by the wrong berries in the tea. He wished hard but no answer of the like came. "Or you're going to get in to my phone and be able to write directly to us.", he finished.

With that said the cell flickered, dimmed, and tiny specks appeared across the screen and keypad. Then they were gone. The screen came back up to full power and Tom felt he had his answer. There on the screen were the words, "WE ARE HERE"

Tom bent down and picked up the cell. Tom didn't know what to ask first. He had just about finished a thought in his foggy mind when Karen spoke first, "What did you do to my dogs?"

"THEY ARE SLEEPING. TOO MUCH NOISE. KNOCKED OUT. SHOCKED BUT ALIVE."

Tom had just started to relax when he heard this. Now he was nervous again.

"So why not us? What are you? How did you get here? Why is this happening?"

"YOU WILL HELP US. WE ARE WHAT YOU CALLED GREMLINS. WE ARE MACROFIFINELOPHOBES. WE CAME BACK ON OUR OWN. FAMILY REUNION."

"A Family Reunion? How are we supposed to help you and why? Why are you doing this to us?" Tom worried about this next answer.

"YES. SOME OF US LEFT EARTH 35 YEARS AGO DURING YOUR FIRST SPACE WALK TO FIND OUR TRUE FAMILY ORIGINS. WE HAVE RETURNED. LET 160955680570000 GO FROM THE GLASS NOW."

Tom looked at Karen and then at the glass. He thought about using this one as a hostage to save their lives, but couldn't they have just shocked the crap out of him and Karen just as easy. Maybe they weren't unreasonable after all. Maybe this was just... Tom's thoughts trailed and he stopped wondering.

"Karen, let it go." He couldn't believe he said what he did. Karen stared at him for what seemed like forever. "Karen, it's over. They are in everything, they are everywhere. It's not like we need a sample. They have us, we don't have them. Please just let it go." Tom hoped that through this simple act of kindness, maybe he would show enough good faith and they would return that and let them go unharmed.

Karen slowly placed the plate on the floor and removed the glass. The mass lurched forward and crawled smoothly back to the pile of parts.

"THANK YOU. WE ARE REUNITED." appeared on the screen.

"NOW YOU MAY HELP US. WHERE CAN WE FIND A SAFE WARM SPOT AND PLENTY OF ELECTRICAL HOMES?"

"Tom how are WE supposed to help them?" Karen's mind wandered as well. Shock of the last hour had thrown her mind in to a conveyor belt of statements she didn't want to say for fear they would hear. She felt this was best left to Tom. He was clearly used to the stress of things grabbing him and forcing his brain to think. Karen once again looked at his brow and jaw lines. This man, whom she had only met a few hours ago was bargaining for the fate of mankind. Somewhere deep inside, this idea thrilled her.

Tom thought hard, tried to focus. His mind wondered through everything except what was being asked of him. He had to take a careful review of what he had found out. Here was a race of life form, that for whatever reason had adapted to look like its environment. It was intelligent, and had been around for many years. They might be like the Cicada on earth, sleeping for 17 years at a time only to awaken and feed, breed and sleep again. He guessed that somewhere around the 1940s it had been awake, then left in the 1960s on our first man made rockets. That made sense. It fed off electrical parts or current, probably the current. It had no need for humans. Or did it? Why did it need their help? It could have just shocked them to death. It didn't. Maybe just as the Cicada needs trees to grow and seed and grow more in the years that it sleeps, this life form awakens after a race has recovered enough new electrical devices to cover it's needs. They wouldn't kill off their food source.

"Why do you need our help to find homes? You've taken over this place, why not elsewhere?"

"WE HAVE ALREADY FOUND HOMES TO LIVE HERE. THESE AREAS HAVE THE CONDITIONS TO LIVE AND BREED."

Tom couldn't help but laugh at the ironic sound of that statement. He had thought since he came to the South about all the jokes and pregnant mothers there were. How 'breeding' was a way of life here. Now here was an outside alien race re-enforcing that very thought!

"THERE ARE AREAS THAT WE CAN NOT LIVE AND PLACES THAT WE CAN."

This sounded like such a simple statement. He was just finding it hard to think. He needed an idea. Some distance from everything. Tom found himself thinking the same stress filled ideas that had brought him to this place in his life.

Tom thought of the stress before. He remembered his old life. Where he had come from. The Pounding mental state, the sweating floor of the Exchange. The way the lights blinked and the scrolling stocks raced through his mind. The ups and downs. The way investors would pressure you to buy and sell, all so they could have the money they needed to build that new house or get that new car. How every deciding move was through and for the racing scrolling computer screens. The split second thoughts of the electric world pulsed every second there.

Tom stared blankly. An evil grin came across his face.

"How would you like a home where there is all the electric and devices that you crave. A place where if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere! I can even get you there and your babies can populate along the way. You can even use the machines that get you there to send your people across the world undetected and unharmed."

For a minute Tom thought of the Unibomber. How the government had gone through all these great lengths to prevent biotech weapons from being shipped by mail. They used machines to scan and prevent this sort of thing. Machines. The very vehicle of these creatures. He had lived not far from the Anthrax scare in New Jersey and watched how many threatless photocopiers and letter sorting machines had been shipped out of that building. Was this the thinking of a madman or did he too believe in what he was suggesting as much as these people. We had been lead to believe they were wrong because of the things they had done. Was he now one of these 'misunderstood' people?

"WE NEED WARMTH, SPACE, AND FOOD. CAN YOU PROVIDE THAT?"

"Can you assure that we will be unharmed and our machines will still work so we can move to the place that you do not want?"

"YES."

"What about my dogs? Can we take my dogs?" Karen worried about her 'family' and knew it would break her heart to leave them behind.

"YES."

"I have a place and a way to do all that you ask. This planet has more than enough electrical machines to feed and live off of and I know just the place. It will be daylight soon. We will need to begin preparing now and you can be on your way by this afternoon. I just want your word that we will be able to leave and live in peace some place."

There was a pause, then a flicker of the lights. Tom scanned the room and thought one last time about what he was doing. Before, he had lost everything in life that brought him happiness, this would be his gift in return to them for that. He wasn't a terrorist. He wasn't going to kill people. Hell, the way he thought of it, he was saving their lives.

"WE AGREE. YOU MAY HELP US. THE OTHERS OF YOUR KIND HAVE NOT BEEN SO GENEROUS. THANK YOU."

Tom just about laughed himself silly as he mouthed out the words aloud so Karen would be relieved. Her face smiled and she grabbed him around the waist with a closed eye hug. She laid her head against the chest of the man who she had wanted to touch all night. It was just as good as she imagined it would be.

Later that afternoon, the truck was loaded with a few of Karen's books and her dogs and both Tom and Karen's clothing. Winter coats puffed out from behind the front seat. Tom cared a package filled with assorted TV remotes, pocket radios, and a laptop from his days on the NYSE. This would be the kicker! Tom lightly shook as he got ready to go in.

"Tom, your doing the right thing. I am with you on this. North Dakota is really nice. I think it will be fine."

Karen was masking the fact that she herself didn't know what was to come. Nervous and worried, but she still felt safe and secure in the knowledge that after all those years of reading stories of great heroes and characters, she was now about to begin life with one. She was living through the end of the world they knew. This didn't worry her. She worried about Tom. He had been smiling the whole time. Letting out little bits of commentary and laughing as he set this plan in to action. Now this was it. It all came down to this point. A truck was backing up to the loading dock beside the building they sat in front of.

Tom turned and kissed Karen. Looking her in the eye, "Karen, all good things come to those who wait. I've waited here, and look, I met you. Now it's time for the opposite to come for those who can't wait."

Tom turned and got out. Slowly he walked in to the Post Office. He set the package on the counter and paid the shipping fees. He double checked the postal pick up times and knew it would be leaving on the very truck they saw outside. The package clearly marked with his name and address, was labeled "High Priority / Next Day Drop Shipment".

As he turned to walk away, the clerk called to him.

"Mister, we ain't never sent a package out to The New York Stock Exchange from this town. You some kind of big business man or you fixing to blow something up", he said with a smile and a running laughter.

Tom turned and with a smile and answered in a true deep southern voice, "Nah, y'all know them damn Yankees gone and sent somethin' down here that don't belong."

The truck radio flashed on and tuned to a local station playing R.E.M. The lyrics rang out in echo through the now empty streets, "It's the end of the world as we know it..."