bob and his friends

by nick nelson

bob b was just a guy. or so it seemed. he went his own way. his best friend was his dog, lightning, whom he had known all his life, because lightning was a year older than he was. his second best friend was mike, a martian. and his third best frtend was chumbo, a chimpanzee, now at this time, the imperial authorities had declared it a crime to be friends with a martian. but bob didn’t care, because that as just the way he was. mike was hiding out in an old abandoned warehouse out on the abandoned highway beyond the outskirts of town. when the sun went down, bob, always accompanied by lightning and sometimes by chumbo as well, would bring bring food to mike, usually cheeseburgers and fries, but sometimes a steak sub or a ham and egg sub. martians do not require much liquid, and mike could usually get by on rainwater he collected in a big old oil drum, but when there was no rain for a spell, bob would bring him a bottle of water as well as the cheeseburger or sub. sometimes bob would be stopped by the highway patrol who would ask him where he was going, and bob would say - i am just going for a walk to get some exercise and my dog needs it too, as he is getting old and can use the exercise and the fresh air out here beyond the city as well. the highway patrolpersons never suspected a thing, but just said , that’s all right buddy, you take care now and your dog too. and if chumbo was .with them, they would add, and your monkey too, even though chumbo was a chimp and not a monkey because most people do not know the difference. one brisk afternoon bob and lightning and chumbo were on their way out to the old abandoned warehouse when they noticed they were being followed not by highway patrol car but by a young woman on a bicycle. she rode up and asked them, where are you guys going? she had a name tag on her shirt that read - hi! i’m nancy. > bob answered as he always answered the highway patrol, that he was getting some exercise and fresh air and so forth, and nancy seemed to accept this. but she pedaled her bike no faster than bob and lightning and chumbo could walk, and kept moving a little way ahead of them and then falling back to where they were, bob suspected that she was an agent of the imperial security police, so they did not go alll the way out to the old warehouse, but stopped at the city line, and sat down and shared out the ham and segg sub they had brought for mike, and also the bottle of water they had, because it was the dry season. bob offered nancy some of the humble repast, but she politely declined, saying i eat healthier food than that - which confirmed bob’s suspicion that she was an imperial agent - and she laughed, but in a perfectly friendly way. the next day they got up earlier than usual and made the trip again, and saw no sign of nancy or anybody else, but when they got to the old abandoned warehouse mike was gone! and they never saw or heard from him again.