Stan didn't care what state he was in, all he knew was the part he was in was wooded and rural. The last crime had blown up in his face, literally, Stan was still lucky to have a face. There was a warrant out for him or rather for Hal Forester. When it went south and the heat was on, Margot had come through for him, rather then turning him over to the police. Maybe, considering how deep they both were with this, she had no other option. Anyhow, her hick cousins had lots of land out here on the edge of a town called Lake Harbor which was as far north as you could get here. Her cousins, Norbert and Throckmorton, lived in the main farm house and let Stan use a guest cabin far away from the main house. This whole setup gave him the heebie-jeebies. Norbert who was slint eyed, balding bespectacled and mustachioed, Throckmorton who was chinless, buck toothed and always wearing a filthy baseball cap, also gave him the jeebies. Neither one talked to him much. The cabin was in the middle of woods. It had two rooms, a main one and a bathroom. It was bare wood, the fixtures of the kitchenette metal or white ceramic. The fridge was from the 50s. There were cabinets with canned goods. There was a single bed with a thin blue ticked mattress, faded sheets and a thin blanket. There a was table and chairs, ancient and battered. There was also a radio that barely got the local station and of course a generator to keep the whole shebang running. A single bulb high in the ceiling illuminated the whole place. At night it got very quiet and very dark. It was summer going into fall, he shivered under the thin blanket.

Stan kept having dreams of a little girl, in a ragged stained dress, with black hair and eyes of pure black. She'd open her mouth and silently black liquid would bubble up from her throat. He'd try to move, to run but in his dream he was rooted to the spot. She'd just gurgle and slowly, slowly raise her right arm and point at him accusingly. He'd wake up with his heart in his throat. Sometimes though, he wasn't entirely sure he was asleep but ya know he must have been cuz he'd find himself in bed. The wind would howl through the trees, and it would sound like someone screaming. One day when Norbert came to drop off supplies,

Stan asked, "Hey you ever hear weird things at night?"

Norbert stopped and looked at him with those slint eyes of his, the light gleaming off his spectacles. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, well ya know, maybe wolves or something, only it sounds a lot like screaming." Stan said. "it's creepy."

"That," Norbert said firmly. "Is just the wind blowing through the woods at night. It can sound, quite bad. But don't worry, it's nothing."

"Huh." Stan said. "Alright."

That night he heard it, he went outside but there was no wind. The static-y radio did report however that a local girl, 8, Blythe Mackenzie had disappeared walking home from school two towns over. She had red hair and was last seen wearing blue overalls and a green shirt. That night he dreamt of the black eye, black haired girl, not looking at him but at a newcomer, another little girl with red pigtails and blue overalls. The black eyed, black haired girl held out her hand and the new girl took it. As she did the color faded from her face, her eyes turned pure black. Both turned and stared at Stan. He woke up. He didn't sleep for the next three days. Sometime in the morning before the sun rose, he heard a noise like a car backfiring combined with a whooshing sound. There was flash of light outside the cabin. Then the sound of someone banging on the door. Stan found the rifle under his bed, he gripped it tightly. The banging continued. Now there was yelling.

'HEY STAN OPEN UP THIS IS RICK! OPEN THE FUCKING DOOR STANLEY!"

Rick, how did he find him? How did he know this was actually Rick?

"HOW DO I KNOW IT'S YOU!? TELL ME SOMETHING ONLY YOU AND ME KNOW!" Stan said aiming at the door.

There was sighing, "Doug Blevins made re-animated corpses to fuck." the voice said.

Stan put the gun down and went to the door and opened it. Rick was standing there, he was wearing tight black pants and a blue wife beater that shimmered in a weird way. Also had a spiked dog collar on his neck. He also looked exhausted, deep down soul tired.

"Come in, how the fuck did you find me? Where the hell were you?" Stan asked.

"I put a tracking device in you, remember, Stan?" Rick sighed, "And like Gloria Gaynor sang I'm back from outer space."

Rick slouched into the cabin and sat in the chair. Stanm closed the door and sat on the bed.

"Outer space, really?" Stan asked.

Rick took a cigarette from his pants pocket and held it out. Stan took it, Rick took out another one. Stan lit them with his trusty zippo and they smoked in silence.

Rick shook his head and sighed again. "Yeah, really. I've been out there Stan. Do you remember what happened in Milworth?"

Stan tried to concentrate, that name was a place, a town, something he wasn't sure had happened, maybe it was a dream. It was foggy but stuff kept breaking through. He remembered the town and some fragments of that summer but not the whole thing, that name Milworth… Milworth…. yes, the sensation was getting stronger internal fog was clearing. "Yeah kinda, you got busted for drugs and I dunno, I tried to go back, there were road signs but no one had heard of it. I wasn't even sure it was, ya know, real."

"Oh it was real alright," Rick said.

Stan took another drag on his cigarette, other things began to come back …were they on a spaceship….in outer space, he took another drag, the nicotine was helping. "So what happened after you got sent to space prison?"

"Who says I ended up in prison?" Rick said. "Lots of shit happened. Right now, I'm laying low cuz a group of megalomaniac bugs called the Gromflomites decided to take over the universe….they haven't gotten near earth yet."

"The who?"

"A bunch of cunts, Stan," Rick said.

"Look, you can stay here for now, but I gotta warn you, there is a warrant out for my arrest and I don't need too much trouble," Stan said.

Rick rolled his eyes. "I'm not gonna get you arrested, but there is only so long you can stay here, ya know."

"Yeah," Stan sighed.

They drank, later Stan cooked up a mess of beans and bacon which they ate in blue enamelware bowls with stale bread that Stan had to shave the green bits off of. They ate in silence, when Stan poured out a round of cheap whiskey into a tin mug Rick said nothing but drank it with him nonetheless.

"Fuck," Rick said after his first belt. "I missed that. Alien h-h-hooch, it doesn't taste the same."

Stan took a sip from his cup. "How does this keep happening?"

"What?" Rick drank more.

"You, me, how do we keep running into each other." Stan said and drank more, feeling the warmth inside him spreading and loosening his tongue.

"Look, I tracked you down this time, it's my f-f-fucking fault." Rick said and took another swig.

"I know, I know, I just ….Oy you are the last person I need here right now."

Rick scowled. "Look, do you think I wanna be here, Pines? My aunt and her lover didn't want me. Aunt Martha blames me that the s-s-shitty town she grew up in vanished off the m-m-map."

Stan gave Rick a look. "Oy."

"Yeah, look, so Milworth was shitty. And yes they remember cuz they were outside the radius of the amnesia ray…." Rick sighed, he met Stan's look with a nervous fidget. "There was n-n-n-nothing I could do! It was fucked… Está jodido! Stop fucking giving me that look, Pines!"

Rick turned away.

"If you wanna leave—"

"Ohh trust me Pines I'll leave, I'll leave right fuckin' now—"

"—Whoa, calm down… you can stay here, if you want. Just try and keep low."

"…You want me here?"

Stan said nothing, sighing he pulled out the bottle of whiskey and poured both of them another round. Rick smiled slowly.

"It gets lonely out here… you're better than the damned static on the radio."

"You fuckin' softy."