ME

The Ikran on the monitor swooped down over a river feeding from a waterfall in the middle of a seemingly impenetrable jungle growth.

As it circled around a dense cluster of trees, Victor stabbed a finger at one of the five monitors they had set up to get multiple camera views. "What's that?"

"What's what?" I stammered.

"Turn the bird around. I saw something."

"It's an Ikran," said Ibira.

"Let's not argue semantics. Turn it around."

The Thark chuckled, but didn't comment.

I gave Dino a turn, and a cliff with carved stone faces came into view.

Giant dreadlocked pig heads, looming over the forest.

"What the hell is that? Mount Pigmore?"

A few moments later, I saw arrows and spears flying at the screen.

"The fuck?" said Victor. "Aren't those guys supposed to be tree huggers?"

"Apparently they have sharp eyes," Ibira remarked.

A few moments later, a cloud of leathery wings filled the air.

I heard a chorus of confused and angry squawking, then something darkened the monitor, and all the screens displayed red error screens.

The blue guy's hands flew across a keyboard as he plugged a USB device into his hair.

"What happened!" Victor shouted. "Did someone step on a cable?"

Nobdar shook his head. "We lost the signal." He commenced a flurry of button pushing.

"Well, get it back!"

"It's not that simple. I ran a diagnostic. The device communication error is happening outside. Whatever the error is, it's happening on the Ikran itself."

Ibira snorted. "I believe it is called the `Na'vi Destroying the Equipment Error.'"

I saw a flash of something hitting water, then the error screen came up again.

"It's gone. The positioning satellite isn't even registering a location."

"Dino!" I moaned. "No!"

Ibira squeezed my hand reassuringly. "He's a survivor. He's probably hiding in the water."

"Oh well," Victor sighed. "I guess we'll have to continue our search the old fashioned way."

[0000]

BRIAN

Brian sighed. He'd just been taken advantage of, because of his god-like body swap with an alien. Fine, he thought to the female. Let's make a piglet. But can we please do it at your place?

It turned out she was blind.

I don't see you, Jake Sully.

That part about him being handsome she had only said to flatter him.

It seemed that cripples took the dirty jobs like feeding and interrogating prisoners, and since nobody else would sleep with them, they did what they could do.

When Tootie announced her intentions to their leader, no one batted an eye. They even gave her a potion for them to drink, one which smelled and tasted of alcohol.

Putting two and two together, Brian made sure to drink very little, and let Tootie drink it to the very last dregs.

He gave her her first quasi-conjugal right, and then, as she slept, he sneaked out of her hut.

Apparently he had mastered the art of mental deception, for he had hidden the entire scheme from Tootie's prying mind inside a coconut within the female's memory warehouse.

Either she had allowed him to go, or she was just stupid. He assumed it was the latter.

The tribe would later regret the placement of outcast tents on the perimeter without a guard or security measures in place.

Professor X would be proud, he thought.

Along the way, he grabbed several employee name badges and lanyards, hiding them in a bush outside camp.

People had to know what was going on here. Even if it killed him.

[0000]

ME

We wandered the jungle for hours in search of our lost comrade. The sun sunk below the horizon and everything glowed like decorations in a skating rink.

I had changed out of my dress, but I could still feel the jungle mites nipping at my ankles.

"Find anything yet?" I said into my radio.

"That's a negative, ghost rider," I heard Sam reply.

"Tell me something," said the four armed figure next to me. "Why does Sam constantly make comments about a ghost rider? Does it have anything to do with comic books?"

I shrugged. "I think it's from a commercial."

The radio chirped. "Guys, let's wrap it up. It's getting too dark. The porcupine doggies will probably be out soon, and they're damn hard to see until they're chewing on your leg."

I shot Ibira a confused look.

"They're not as cute as he makes it sound."

"Roger that," said Sam's voice. "Do me a favor and rub yourself with steak sauce so I can get a head start."

"I'll do you one better. I'll uncork a bottle of barbecue sauce and throw it on your ass as I'm running by!"

"You? With those short stubby legs?"

"I'll be sure to kick you in the crotch with one if you get in my way."

"Go ahead." Sam laughed. "I seriously doubt it would reach."

"In a few minutes, you're going to find out just how high my boots can reach. Over and out."

Ibira put the radio away. "Let's go."

Exhausted from our fruitless searching, my search party returned to base, seating ourselves in chairs in the cafeteria, next to a makeshift barrier of file cabinets intended to keep Sprint employees out of the other areas of the facility.

"We swept the area all around the building for at least a couple miles in every direction," said Ibira. "He was not thinking like a rational human being. We found his shoe prints, but the trails all went cold a few kilometers out.

"At one point, I thought I found a lead, but then it was like he turned into a ghost. His fevered shuffling footsteps just vanished. It's almost like he doubled back on the paths he made while on idle walks."

"Right," I agreed. "They start out crazy looking, and all of a sudden they're all casual and orderly, like he's golfing."

Ibira sighed, frowning at the table. "It's like the jungle swallowed him up."

"Hey," said Sam. "Wasn't that a line from Predator?"

She gave him a blank stare. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"So much for our Indian tracker," Victor muttered.

"Your little technological experiment didn't work so hot, either," Ibira grumbled.

"My experiment is in the bottom of a river somewhere. What's your excuse?"

Ibira glared at him. "When Iss wants someone or something gone, no mortal power can prevent her."

[0000]

BRIAN

Brian wandered out into the jungle, searching for a place to rest, one that wasn't a tree.

His blue foot got stubbed on a hard metal object. Despite the presence of hooves, he did have parts down there that could get hurt.

Stifling a scream of pain and rubbing the injured area, he discovered the offending object to be a yellow metal pipe.

Hopeful that it would lead him to a base, he followed it through fields of bubbling alien milkweed stalks to a clearing full of cracked dirt where the pipe hit an elbow joint.

As he crept further along, he noticed something trailing him.

A spiny, hairy shape calmly stepped in his path, opening its mouth.

"What would you do if the people you knew..." it sang in an oddly familiar voice, complete with musical accompaniment coming out of giant flowers nearby.

Another Direwolf popped out of a bush, also distending its jaw. "...Were the plastic that melted and the chromium too?"

And then, in unison: "Who are the brain police?"

Direwolves did not just sing Mothers of Invention to me, Brian thought. I must be dreaming all this.

A horse thing with eyestalks and a featureless face clopped out from behind a tree, continuing the song through a set of gills on its neck.

The creatures seemed harmless enough, and he still thought he was dreaming, or hallucinating, so Brian stepped past them, following the pipe across another stretch of dirt.

He tracked the pipe as it cut straight through a meadow of lollipop plants, over a ridge, then the ground gave way. He found himself falling down a cramped little tunnel in the dark, banging his elbow on a ladder on the way down.

After another minute of free fall, his head hit something hard and unyielding, and everything went pitch black.

[0000]

ME

I didn't get a kiss that night. Ibira was too worried about Brian. She said she had to go consult Iss, roll bones and read her cards.

"I'm not into all that," I said. "But I'm praying for him."

When I went to bed, I drifted off into Na'vi limbo again.

Once more, I lay in the shaman's tent, filled with smoke, and like before, I found dad watching me.

This time he didn't look too happy. "I told you to follow the map and come find us!"

"Dad," I said. "My team's got other stuff to do. We're missing a team member. I got a tracker placed in my body. I can't just sneak out."

"Why don't you, I don't know, cut the tracker out?"

"No way. If I get in deep shit with my sleepwalking, I want someone to know before it gets deeper. Hypothetical example: What if I wander outside and fall into quicksand without my chip? What happens to me then?"

"I'll find you."

"That's bullshit, dad. The people at this place are my friends. I can't just go walking off!"

"Can't, or won't?"

I awoke in the med lab, strapped to the rubber table. Sal and Grace stood over me, staring in concern.

I still wore my jeans this time, but my shirt had been removed. It...stung a little. "What did I do now?"

Grace scowled. "It looks like you were trying to cut out your tracker with a Scout knife. Fortunately your activities did not go unnoticed."

Ibira leaned over the bed, two arms crossed, one stroking her chin, the fourth on her hip. "Do you always...play Indian in this fashion?"

I sighed. "More or less."

"Do you remember me kissing you?"

I swallowed. "You mean just now? While I was asleep?"

"Yes." She rubbed her face in frustration. "It seems your problem is not as sexy as I originally thought."

"I...take it he didn't enjoy it."

Ibira flushed a little orange. "Not...at first."

I turned pale in horror. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Your...other self...he got a little grabby. By then I knew it wasn't really you..." Her orange color deepened. "So I taught him some basic lessons in boundaries."

Now my cheeks were flushing the other way. "Thank you. I really respect that. I'm glad you...can tell us apart." I started feeling a little better about the situation.

I frowned at my chest. I could see little white and blue striped things rolling around in my knife wounds.

"I put maggots in your cuts. I hope you don't mind."

I smirked at her. "No, that's fine. I've heard some very good things about that kind of medicine."

"Your boyfriend definitely has some balls," Sal remarked. She cleared her throat. "Thankfully, your cuts weren't very deep and not in any particularly vital area, so you can still do your job and everything."

"Great. At least there's some good news."

And then Ibira asked something that made me feel worse again. "Jason, what's `Jirdixad yirazah suxcada xeslajav' mean?"

In Na'vi, it literally meant I wanted to rip off her loincloth and screw her in every possible orifice.

Feeling hot in the face, I muttered. "It's not something I want to explain in mixed company."

Grace, on the other hand, didn't care. "He just told you he wants to fuck you boneless."

Ibira covered her mouth, her whole body turning a tangerine color. I think she was stifling a laugh. "We must have a discussion about this later...have you been chewing Ximur claw as I suggested?"

"I...didn't notice any difference, so I..."

She pressed some into my hand. "Well try it again. You can't get better if you don't take something for it."

My friends undid my restraints.

"You sure you want to do this? I might try it again."

"I trust the Thark's remedy," Grace said. "And I'll be monitoring your movements."

Ibira rubbed me with her tusk. "Good night."

I did as my girlfriend asked and chewed the root this time.

Upon reaching REM stage, I returned to the shaman's tipi, this time with Nawkedla curled up next to me.

The moment I stirred, she plugged my hair into hers, lifted my loincloth, and eased down on my lap as she gave me tongue.

I awoke to the sensation of warm liquid pouring all over my clothing.

I sat up straight, staring in disbelief at the one eyed face staring back at me.

"Dino! You're alive!"

My pet licked me in the face, nipping playfully at my lips.

"He was outside making noise again," I heard Sam saying. "He looks fine, but apparently the equipment is gone."

And so I spent an hour washing my clothes.

I gave up trying to sleep, staggering off to breakfast.

The winged creature perched on my shoulder as I groggily set a tray on the buffet railing in the cafeteria.

Dino gobbled up a large portion of my alien meat. I scolded him, but Osmifa was nice enough to give me a replacement, and extra for my pet. I scooted on down to get coffee.

"I see your friend is back," I heard Ibira saying as she joined me at our table.

"Yeah." I dropped a bit of meat into Dino's mouth. "I wish I could do something about the breath, and the peeing."

"Have you tried rubbing its nose into it?"

I shrugged. "He seems quite comfortable lying in it."

"I'm not sure what to tell you then. Perhaps if you slept in an Itorwo, you wouldn't have so much to clean."

"Is that like a tent?"

"More like an adobe hut, but yes."

"You could pee on Dino," Sigma suggested as she set a tray down next to me. "I've heard stories about that working with cats."

I reddened. "I'm not going to pee on it!"

"It was just a suggestion," she laughed. "Would you mind if we try to fit Dino with another device today?

I swallowed a bite of food. "Sure. We still need to find Brian. I'd like to be able to go home sometime this century."

I glanced at my watch. "Crap." I quickly put my tray and dishes away, hurrying to the call center.

The moment I stepped into the room, Skinhead came marching up to me. "We're going to go over a few calls."

And so I found myself back in the viewing booth.

"Your stats haven't changed," Dennis said as he brought the numbers up in the air. "But that's okay. We're working on it. You understand the metrics just as well as I do. One thing that's hurting you is your frequent use of the supervisor button is the main reason. Your customers are being made to wait too long."

"But I didn't know what to do," I stammered. "I didn't know we were selling dresses and then there were questions and things I didn't know how to-

"Jason," Micro Manager interrupted. "You know we're taking overflow from other companies."

"What else do I not know that I'm supposed to know?"

"Jason Jason Jason.." His tone was like that of a parent scolding a small child for getting an F on a test. "The knowledge is all in here." He pointed to his temple to add further insult. "All you need to do is use it. You need to be more confident. It makes the customer believe in you. There will be less need for you to get a supervisor."

Sure, I thought. And get fired for screwing up a customer's account instead. "What if I give them the wrong answer, even confidently?"

"You won't."

Bullshit, I thought. "The point is, I can't be confident if I don't understand what I'm supposed to do. I need help, and it takes awhile to-"

Dennis invaded my personal space, slapping a meaty hand on my shoulder. "Jason. I'm here for you. I'm always here for you. Instead of going through the intergalactic supervisor system, the next time you need a supervisor, just page me. I promise you'll always have my undivided attention."

His voice took on the tone of a preacher about to break into an altar call. "All you have to do is ask. That's all you need to do."

I sighed.

Dennis activated a recording of me fumbling through his first shopping order call. "For future reference, when it's customer service, there are inflection marks over some of the words to make it more upbeat. That's how you tell that it's not collections."

I sighed. "Okay. That's all I needed."

In response, Dennis placed his hand on my shoulder again, his eyes seeming to bore straight through my head like an angry bull. "Jason. You're going to get better. That's what I'm here for. To help you improve. I believe in all my heart that you will be the best employee in this company if you try hard enough. I'm making you my special project. All I ask from you is for your cooperation. A little cooperation, that's all. Can you do that for me?"

I shrugged. "Yeah."

He fast forwarded the recording to a bit where I was stammering. "You trip over your words,like you were unsure of yourself, even though you've handled calls like this numerous times." He skipped ahead to another part where I stuttered again.

"I...I have some Tourettes, okay? I can't help it. I wasn't nervous, I just couldn't make the right sounds."

I wasn't lying. It might have been a mild form of the disease, and it wasn't like I blurted curse words or anything, but I did have verbal tics that popped out of my mouth unbidden from time to time.

"Jason. I don't believe that for a second. You talked with customers just fine before then. But here you change all of a sudden."

He just called me a liar.

Fine, I thought in annoyance. Don't believe me.

"Just be more confident in what you're doing."

I frowned, nodding just to shut him up.

Dennis opened his mouth, and more waves of bullshit washed over me. I agreed with everything he said for about ten minutes as my self esteem got trampled in the dirt.

At last, he said, "That's all that's come to my attention so far. Other than that, you're doing good. You did some good payments, and you're moving through those answering services a little faster. Not as fast as I'd like, but faster. Hopefully your next calls will be that much better now that we've had this talk."

Sandwiching a compliment inside a mountain of complaints is not the best way to go about motivating employees, but it's not something you bring to the boss's attention. Especially when he's too thick to comprehend the idea of being wrong.

"Did you have any other questions or comments?"

I nodded. "This collar," I groaned, tugging it down. "It's so irritating. Every time someone calls, it's like I've got mosquitoes biting me in the neck. I understand about the microphone, but can you at least disable the vibration feature?"

"Jason," Dennis sighed. "It's set up that way to ensure that you give the client your complete and undivided attention. You can either wear it around your neck or put on a vibrating testicular ring."

I stared at him in horror. "Excuse me?"

He opened a desk drawer, offering me a plastic bag containing something that looked like a black watch band. "It goes around the base of your testicles. The device vibrates whenever there's a call coming in."

My whole face turned hot with embarrassment.

As I gawked at him, waiting for the punchline, he added, "It's unopened. Never been used. I want you to have it, just in case."

I didn't take it. My face got even redder. "Why can't I wear that around my wrist, or my ankle or something?"

"It's the wrong shape and size for that. Besides, it would make it too convenient to remove or shut off. We want you snapping to attention every time a call comes in. Plus wearing that device on your wrist could be construed as obscenity."

"Too late. It's already obscene."

Dennis shrugged. "Obscenity is defined by the society you inhabit."

"By that same token, I should be able to wear it on my wrist."

He shook his head in apparent frustration. "Jason Jason Jason. You're not on earth anymore. Haven't you figured that out? In order to continue doing business, our client requires that each and every employee complies with dressing and equipment codes."

I rolled my eyes. "So the client requires me to wear a vibrator around my dick. Right. I'd love to see the paperwork on that one!"

"I can show you a copy," Dennis said with complete seriousness. "But it's written in Gemrala. I'm not sure your translator comes with that language." He offered me the sex toy again.

"Fine," I sighed. "I'll keep the collar. I'm not wearing a vibrating cock ring."

He nodded, putting the obscene thing back in the drawer. "I'm glad we have an understanding. Anything else?"

I shook my head no.

"You're free to leave."

At last I got to escape, returning to my cubicle.

After five answering machines and a payment, I had a supervisor call.

When I tried to summon Dennis, he said he was busy helping someone else, and the customer hung up before I could do anything to solve the problem.

After struggling through calls for a few more hours, I at last got permitted to take my lunch break.

On the way out of the call room, I found a small child sized figure staring up at me. It seemed he'd been waiting awhile. For me.

"Damn I hate those outfits," Victor grumbled.

"Did you...want something?"

"Kid, we need you to coach the little guy again. He's not cooperating."

I shook my head. "Sure. No problem. Am I going to get to eat lunch before I come back here?"

"Um, I'll have to clear it with your supervisor."

Dennis conveniently wasn't there to respond.

"Get some pants on and hurry down to the lab. Quick."

[0000]

BRIAN

Brian came to on a concrete floor, his whole body racked with agonizing pain.

It was dark, but his eyes seemed unusually well adjusted to it. He could see every crack, crevice and feature of the industrial concrete corridor.

Staggering ahead, he reached a T-junction in a dimly lit corridor, feeling his way down one side until he began to see light.

A rodent popped out of a hole in the wall, a rodent with nasty looking lion's teeth, no nose and floppy dog ears.

The thing scuttled out in front of his path, its eyes glowing bright red as it stood on its hind legs. Its mouth opened.

"You're probably wondering why I'm here, well so am I, so am I..."

Mothers of Invention again, Brian thought. Maybe Frank Zappa lives down here.

The rodent seemed to chuckle in response.

Brian's foot slipped over the edge of something, and he found himself sliding ass backwards down a dark cylindrical slide that wound every which way for what seemed like miles, eventually stopping at a metal grating, which rushed up at him too fast for him to adequately prepare for.

He saw stars, then fell unconscious.