Crooked Paaff

CROOKED PAAFF 2 Mysteries and a Sales Call by Ben Small Š 2010

This story is based on ideas and characters from the book The End of Gath by myself and my sister, Betsy Allen.

It is dedicated to my friend and hero, Jeff Bond.

PART I March, 2010 The house of Adam Gomez, Bratenahl, Ohio, United States, Earth

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I was not happy about it. I was helping my father clean out some old stuff from the attic of the house my family had spent the last forty years in. Lately, my father and mother had been getting more serious about moving to a retirement community, so they wanted to lighten the load in the old house.

Under some old dusty carpets, I found a leather case.

“What’s this thing, Dad?” “Oh, that’s that old valise.That was your great grandfather’s, from his days in France.

He met Josephine Baker once, did I ever tell you that, Vincent?”

“I don’t know who that is, Dad. Mind if I take a look in the valise?”

“Not at all. I think it has some old postcards or something in it.”

“Yeah, French.”

I picked up another card.

“Here’s a neat one. Voyr oon mayzon avek dez ailz ... pardon my french. Do you know what that means, Dad?” “Uh, no. Let’s see it.”

“I don’t recall seeing this one. I kind of payed more attention to the girls.This is a rotten photo of a balloon and the Eiffel Tower.”

I stared at the postcard and realized that I hadn’t the faintest idea what the flying machine in the photo was.

“Hmmm ... look at that thing ... it isn’t a balloon ... it’s an air ...”

I’d never seen anything like it. No balloon, no propellor, the wings were too small to support a ship that size. What was it?

I sifted through the valise for a similar postcard but found only more burlesque shots.

“Dad, can I borrow this card?”

“Take them all, if you like.”

“Thanks, just this one.”

That night, I was watching TV and caught a program on PBS.

Thanks for watching PastFinders! Where we unlock the mysteries of the past for you! If you have a question about an historic artifact in your possession, contact us at findit@ pastfinders.public.com and put our Time Sleuths to the task!

I emailed the producers of the show about the postcard and I was a little surprised to get an immediate response. I met with a PastFinders producer from New York, a week later.

“Yeah, actually this is the third time this year one of these postcards has come up, so we may do a segment on this.

May I see the card?”

“Yeah ...‘Voir une maison avec des ailes!’ ...‘See a house with wings’ ... that’s on all of the cards, but this is a different printer than the others. Same photo, though.”

“So, can you use it?”

“Now, you have to understand, all our investigations on TV need closure ... a happy ending, see.”

“Oh, I see, so where are we?”

“Well, I’ll take this postcard, if it’s OK with you, and we’ll begin a producer investigation and if we dig up an answer, then, for sure, it’ll be a segment. How does that sound?”

“Great.”

Yeah, I didn’t believe her.

Two months passed and I finally heard from the show’s producer.

“Well, we ARE putting it on the show ...”

“That’s fantastic! Alright! I thought ...”

“Uh ... now, I should tell you, this won’t be an actual investigative segment. Unfortunately, this was an unsolvable mystery.”

“Oh well, but, it will be on the show?”

“Absolutely.You’ve seen the ‘History’s Mysteries’ segments we do every week?”

“You mean the short pieces, a couple of minutes long?”

“Sometimes five minutes, depending.Yeah, that’s what we’re going to do. We’ll pay you two-hundred for the use of your postcard. I hope you’re not disappointed.”

“No, no, that all sounds fine.”

I was disappointed. It wasn’t the money, really. I honestly just wanted to know what that ship was.

Still, I was looking forward to the show.

And now PastFinders looks at a few historical events that, as yet, cannot be explained!

!

S S ’ E I Y R R E O T T HIS MYS

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1905, Paris, France. A huge flying machine of unknown origin appeared in the heart of the city. It appeared to have floated in from the southeast. It swept by the Eiffel Tower, continued out of the city limits and disappeared into a cloud bank. It was followed by many carriages & automobiles but outpaced them. It moved at what was guessed at 60 miles per hour. It made no stops.

According to on-lookers, the ship’s hull had many decks and resembled a riverboat. It had two wings attached to the rear and a huge mast that ran through its center which had a large winglike rudder near the bottom.

The next day the newspapers declared that it must have been an aircraft built by Alberto Santos Dumont, an aviator known for his work on airships and also known for his surprise flights around Paris. Santos Dumont denied it was his ship and said that he was no where in the area at that time.

NON!

?

?

The Paris police were presented with a photograph of the ship passing the Eiffel Tower and this item that was reportedly dropped from the ship. It appears to be an illustration of a young woman smoking a cigarette and some sort of typography in a language unknown to anyone at the time ... or now, for that matter. On the reverse side was more of this writing but in a sloppy scrawl.

With nothing else to go on, the police declared it an unsolvable mystery and released the photo to a few printers who made these postcards. For a couple of years after, a small society of enthusiasts kept a watch for the ship day and night, but it was never seen again. It’s an Art Nouveau UFO! One of HISTORY’S MYSTERIES!

?

Damn.

PART II November, 1905 Aboard the Aerobuoyant Purviance, East Clement Station, Kaldic Union, Gath

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YEOMAN PAAFF!

HEY THERE! PAAFF!” “OH ... UH ...YESSIR?” “YOU’RE ON YOUR OWN UP THERE FOR AN HOUR OR TWO! DON’T FLY ‘ER OFF OR NOTHIN’!”

“AYE, SIR ... (you braying ass)”

“Leaving me alone on the ship again, it’s not fair.”

“Aw, you little beauty. It’s been so long since I’ve had a smoke ...”

“And so goddamn long since I’ve had any of that.”

“As soon as I get my leave, why ... uh ...”

“Here! What’s this now?”

YYYAAAAAHHHHHH ...

... HHAAHOO!!!

“HERE! STOP THIS THING! WHERE IS THIS PLACE? GOD HELP ME! WHERE ARE WE GOING? WHO’S STEERING THE SHIP? PIRATES? WATCH OUT FOR THAT TOWER! WE’RE GOING TO CRASH IF YOU DON’T WATCH OUT!”

NOW THAT’S TOO CLOSE!

“I need to write a note for help.”

“Please-help-thisship-is-being-takenby-pirates.”

“Just need someone to catch it now ...”

“HOORAY! SOMEBODY CAUGHT THE NOTE!”

“I’LL BE RESCUED! YA HEAR THAT YOU PIRATES! HELP IS ON THE WAY AND THAT’LL BE YOUR DOOM! HAHAAAA ... AH!

GOD HELP ME, WHAT’S THIS NOW?

YYYAAAAHHHHH ...

The Aerobuoyant Purviance returned to its port on Gath with Yeoman Paaff on board.The ship and Paaff seemed to be unharmed, but on closer inspection, both vessel and man were found to be just a bit crooked, with their left sides raised slightly higher than their right sides. His Majesty’s Aerobuoyant Fleet Ruling Council’s official report on the matter stated that a freak wind had damaged the Purviance and Paaff had been injured in this accident. His vision of a great city with a huge tower was a hallucination from a blow to his head. Anyone who knew Paaff, knew that this explanation was sound, given that he was a clumsy clod. But anyone looking closely at the ship could see that it wasn’t actually damaged in the normal sense.The hull was not twisted or ripped open as one might expect. It was as if half of the structure had been unbolted then moved up six inches and rebolted.The case was closed, but no answer has ever been found to explain these puzzling observations.

+24.12

+24.18

Damn.

17.25

17.19

-08.10

A study of damage to the ship HMAB Purviance conducted by His Majesty’s Aerobuoyant Fleet Ruling Council – diagram 12–

-08.16

PART III October, 1905 Werggery’s home in space, approximately 80 million miles from the planet Gath.

Dudgeon, a purveyor of rare goods and oddities has managed to get an audience with Werggery, that cyan scion of an ancient race, living alone on an asteroid watching over Gath.

“Thank you, Eft. Now Dudgeon, you know that I already possess a matter transporter.”

“Master Werggery, I’m telling you this matter transporter will far outperform your present unit and at a very reasonable price.”

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“How reasonable?”

“Well, uh ... for you, just 5 million kyrbyrs.”

“Hum, 5 million. It better be damn good for that much.Would you say it’s 5 times better than my unit?”

“Ten times better!”

“Uh huh ... 10 times? Well, well ... can you prove that?

“Yes! Let me demonstrate it for you.”

Very well, Dudgeon, it happens that I may have to move a great number of people off Gath in the near future and I know my transporter would be insufficient for the task. I will purchase this unit if it can transport an Aerobuoyant from the planet Gath to the planet Earth.”

“What? But ... such a large object ... all the way to Earth ... that’s a least a parsec.”

“That is ten times the mass my transporter can manage and ten times the distance. But, if that is too great a task for this machine ...”

“No, no! I believe this unit can handle that order ... I uh ... it will take a great deal of calculation, of course.”

“I’ve got the time, if you do.”

Dudgeon set to work, calculating the trigonometric parallax of Earth, the mass of the object to be transported, the dimensions of the protective energy field to surround the object, the site and duration of the reassembly on Earth, and so forth.

“Everything is ready, Master Werggery.”

“Wonderful! Let’s give it a go. Right about now, the crews at East Clement Station will break for the evening.The Aerobuoyants will be abandoned. Do you have the coordinates set for our subject ship?”

“All is ready.

Now ... ignition!”

“Well done, Dudgeon, it’s working perfectly!”

“Yes! Yes! It’s there!

It’s on Earth!”

HERE! STOP THIS THING! WHERE IS THIS PLACE? GOD HELP ME! WHERE ARE WE GOING? WHO’S STEERING THE SHIP? PIRATES? WATCH OUT FOR THAT TOWER! WE’RE GOING TO CRASH IF YOU DON’T WATCH OUT!”

“What was that?

A voice on the ship?”

“What in God’s name? I didn’t pick up any life readings ...”

“Dudgeon, you clown! You transported that ship with a man on board. Why didn’t your machine sense him?”

“I don’t ... it should have picked up brainwaves ... electro-chemical activity ... something!”

“But it didn’t. Can you return him in one piece?”

“Well, of course ... I ... uhhh ...”

“HOORAY! SOMEBODY CAUGHT THE NOTE!”

“Just an adjustment or two ...”

“It’s returned to Gath. Good work, Dudgeon! It appears the man and the ship survived the trip. But ... well ... hmm, they look just a bit off, don’t they?”

“Yes well, maybe a bit.There may have been a minute flux in the reassembly.”

“Ah well, too bad. But well done, Dudgeon, well done, on an extremely complicated mission.”

“Thank you Werggery ... you’ll buy the unit, then?”

“Uh ... no. I’m sorry, no. I deal for the most part with creatures like that one, who possess very low brainpower, it just wouldn’t do. Also, I prefer things to arrive not so ... crooked, you understand, old man.”

Damn.

The End

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