The First Knight

By L. Hamons

The ship, a classic saucer-shaped model with your standard blinking light array, settles neatly between two Carolina pine trees at the edge of the field. Joseph Erichson, 53 year old salty dog, surfer, and sailboat restoration enthusiast is the proud owner of the only two human eyes to witness the landing. Aw , shoot! , he mutters to no one.

Joseph, or Joey as he is called by the scores of young ladies who are routinely charmed by the twinkle in his eyes, a twinkle which is actually a squint resultant from 53 years without sunglasses, lingers at the bow he's sanding.

It's a strange picture that Joey takes in; the flying saucer framed by the open doors of the corncrib on his parents Nags Head spread. Joey's parents, Heidi and Joseph Erichson Sr., left the property to their only remaining son after their mini-van was t-boned at a busy Charlotte, NC intersection.

Before he inherited the property, you could find Joey at The Black Pelican on Hatteras Island, third bar stool from the cash register, any time after 2:30 p.m. Any earlier in the day and you would have to identify him among the many surfers riding on the diamond-studded waves.

Of course, losing both of your parents at the same time does strange things to folks. With Joey, it took all of the joy out of drinking and womanizing. Well, it took the joy out of drinking, at least.

So, when the classic disk-shaped ship lands on the edge of the Erichson's field at 3:45 p.m., a sober Joey is there to see it.

She-oot! , he says again. Joey Erichson carefully replaces the sandpaper to the toolbox, closed the box and secures the latch before stepping outside of the corncrib. He looks toward the landed ship and observes the light pattern circling the compact ship's hull. Joey begins cataloguing details: broad daylight, metal ship, no glare off the metal, seamless design, soundless engine, hatch opening from beneath.

Hatch opening! Joey abandons his meticulous catalogue and dives for cover behind his blue and white 1965 Shelby Cobra. Having the car up on cinder blocks proves to be a happy accident, affording Joey plenty of room to squirm beneath the auto body. In his career as a ladies' man, Joey had escaped many seemingly doom filled situations by using his quick wits and by not feeling shame at what he had to do to save his own skin.

So, what Joey feels while laying belly to the dirt beneath his classic sports car is not shame at his own cowardice. In fact, Joey tries to feel nothing, think nothing, and stay as still as a stone. After about two minutes of the statue act Joey turns his head to get a glimpse of the action at the edge of the field. What he sees when he turned his head is the face of a young man peering under the car at him.

At seeing Joey's eye widen the young mans smile softens as he says, "Take it easy Joe. I return in peace."

I'm SO outta here , thinks Joey as he attempts to jump away from the cordial newcomer resulting in his head losing a what's-harder-me-or-you contest with the Cobra's undercarriage. Seeing stars he decides to play possum. Instantly realizing how idiotic playing possum is in the current situation, Joey turns his face back to the newcomer, and says, "I guess that's better than returning in pieces."

Joey exits his ruined hiding place and stands to meet his visitor. Deciding on the direct approach, Joey extends his hand. "Joey Erichson. Nice to meet you."

"Well met!" says the visitor with a vigorous handshake. "My name is Arthur, and the pleasure's all mine."

"Nice ride", says Joe with a nod to the saucer snuggled in the pines.

"Oh, that! Quite a story behind it, actually. See, a friend of mine with peculiar temporal aspects gave her to me. I'd love to tell you about it, say, over lunch?"

"Lunch it is", says Joe, and the two head down a path worn through the grass, leading from the corncrib to the Victorian farmhouse at the center of the property.

Joe leads his guest through the unused sitting room and into the large country kitchen. Most of the rooms in the farmhouse are unused except for the kitchen and a bedroom.

"You need a dog," says Arthur as he opens the door to the enormous wood stove standing cold by the pantry door. "A dog would love a stove like this. I'll bet it heats the whole house in the winter."

"Actually," says Joe as he removes sliced ham, wheat bread, tomatoes, and a block of Muenster from the icebox, "The heat doesn't make it upstairs. I move my bedroom downstairs during the winter." Joe starts making sandwiches at the counter. He remembers the mustard and, realizing how hungry he really is, shrugs and grabs a big bag of Utz Potato Chips from the pantry.

"So," continues Joe, "are you going to tell me about the ship and why you're here? Or will I find out seconds before you start feeding on my living brain through my eye sockets, or would you prefer to conduct embarrassing experiments on me?"

Arthur laughs. "While you may possess quite a tasty brain, I would rather have that sandwich you're making. As far as experimentation goes, the original pilot and crew of the craft may have had a masochistic bent. I, however, do not. You see, the space ship at the edge of your field was stolen from the Grey Men by my boyhood teacher, Merlin the Magician. The Grey Men, by the way, are not men from outer space, as your popular culture believes. In fact, they are demons from another dimension. Their goal is to cause humanity to believe that this great earth was seeded by a superior race from another planet and not by God. However, the experiments you speak of are real. You see, those foul creatures from hell must inhabit the body of another, for they have no flesh of their own. It would seem that those wretched fiends are plotting to build their own bodies from human parts. This isn't exactly lunch-talk, now is it!" Arthur gives a hearty laugh as he bites off nearly half of the sandwich that Joey placed before him. "Mmmm, another?" Arthur grunts, asking for another sandwich.

"I don't know about men from outer space or demons," says Joe, "but I like you, Arthur. You're an original." Joey prepares four more sandwiches, just in case, and the two eat silently for a few minutes.

After draining his third can of cola, Arthur belches and looks at Joe. There is an intensity in his eyes that was not there before and it causes Joey to put his sandwich down. Looking closely at Arthur, Joey realizes that this man is much older than he had originally thought. The man who had at first seemed like a golden beach-boy from space now gives the appearance of a ruddy, seasoned warrior. This is the real him , thinks Joey, here it comes .

"Joey, I need you to believe in the pan-dimensional demons. And I need you to believe in Our Lord God Almighty. I've been watching you for a long time, Joseph. You have great potential. First, take my hand." Arthur extends a meaty hand to Joey, who, as if in a dream, takes hold.

The farmhouse falls away to nothing, and Joey finds himself flying through the air. I must have a concussion , thinks Joe. He feels he is holding something, a hand? When he looks to his hand all he sees is his television remote control. I'm going to change this channel, mute this, switch off the power something! But the remote feels squishy in his hand, not made of hard plastic but of flesh instead.

Joe flies down the Atlantic Coast of the U.S. He sees the Florida panhandle and feels himself descending. Passing Cape Canaveral, Joey finds himself landed in a swampy field about 3 miles from the central launch point for the United States Space Program. Still clutching the remote, Joey turns at the sound of an engine. He turns to see a white van bumping down a gravelly road winding through the swamp. The van stops near Joe and he can see that the van has its top sawed off, and is fully carpeted with 1970's gold colored carpet.

The driver's door slams and a young male makes his way around the front to the vehicle. The man lifts the hood and peers at the engine. Seeing what he was looking for, Joe observed the young man reach into the engine and turn something. As soon as the turn is completed the man's form blurs and wiggles before reshaping into the form of a Grey Man!

I'll change his channel , thinks dream-logic Joe. He points the remote at the man and presses the channel button. The Grey Man from outer space shifts shapes back into that of the man. For a moment the man looks at his own hand in disbelief. He sniffs the air and looks around suspiciously. Detecting no other presence, the man then turns something beneath the hood causing his form to quiver into a new shape.

Now Joe is not looking at Grey Man or human, he is looking at a boiled-skinned demon from hell. The demon continues work on the car's engine while the air over the bed of the van begins to blur and quiver. Four other forms materialize, all dressed as Hispanic laborers. The newcomers look at the van's driver and erupt in what sounds like Latin. The driver looks at himself and howls in rage. He returns to the engine of the van and makes his final manipulations, changing all five of the men into Grey Men, and the cut-off van transforms into a ship exactly like the one currently resting in a Nags Head pine grove.

They may look hideous and have strange abilities , thinks Joe, but how can I be sure they're demons?

"Look inside the heart of the one at the controls," booms Arthur's voice inside Joey's head.

Look inside his heart? Joey looks at the former van driver and shrugs to himself, Might as well try.

Joey's mind travels away from his dream body and straight through the chest of the van's driver, who seems to feel this because he begins to yell his head off. Inside the chest of the shape-shifting driver, Joey sees a thick, oily, black substance. Joe's head is filled with the stench of sulfur and worse, as the slick black substance begins to throb and wiggle toward him. Should I be leaving? Joey begins to exit the man's body but is held in place as a tendril of the oily matter touches his mind. At the touch of the substance Joey knew tremendous pain, malice, hatred, and the wretched absence of God.

And then he was back at his kitchen table, across from Arthur. "I believe", says Joe.

"Excellent!" cries Arthur as he lifts Joe from his chair and hugs him like a brother. "You are the first, Joseph! The first Knight of the New Round Table!"

Joseph Erichson paused a moment and took a mental inventory of his life. Adding it all up, it didn't seem that there was much to lose by joining the New Round Table. "I'm in," he says.

"Very good!" says Arthur, settling back into his chair. "We'll begin training tomorrow."

"What will we do first?" asks Joe of his new leader and teacher, "Can I learn to pilot the ship? Shall we train in mind control to combat the power of evil?"

"Actually", says Arthur with a twinkle in his eye, "I thought you could teach me to surf!"

The End

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