Frank and Lana turned to look at Katie. "Hey, Katie. I'm now living in Tontzville so I thought I'd visit Frank. I had some news to give to Frank anyway," Lana said.
"Remember Ryan Collins?" Frank asked Katie.
"Kind of. Quiet, weird kid? Dropped out after sophomore year?"
"I was his friend since Kindergarten. We kind of parted ways during puberty but when he dropped out, we stayed in touch with two or three letters a year. I haven't gotten a letter from him all year. Lana told me today that he killed himself."
"Oh my God, that's horrible!" Katie exclaimed.
"He had a book of poems accepted by a small publisher. It will be released posthumously," Lana said.
"I wish I would've been a better friend. Wrote more letters or to visit him..." Frank said. Frank suddenly stood up. "Katie, I'm going to take the day off. You and John are going to visit Martha Hall, right?"
"We don't have to. We can go tomorrow and you and I could..." Katie tried but Frank interrupted.
"No. Get her story. She's nearly 100 and she says she has proof that an alien crashed on her land back in the thirties. We need to get that down," Frank said.
"Do you want me to come with you?" Lana asked.
"Sure," Frank sighed. "I will see you tomorrow, Katie. Have fun with John and Mrs. Hall."
Frank and Lana left the Society. Katie remained in Frank's office. "Damn," she said.
"1938"
Martha Hall slowly stood up from her wheelchair to open the screen door for John and Katie. She then wheeled away from the door so they could come in. "Thank you for coming. I wasn't sure if your boss would take me seriously," Martha said.
"Frank's not our boss," John corrected.
"You'll have to speak up. I can't hear very well. I'm not young like you two," she said.
"You wanted to talk to us about a spaceship, Mrs. Hall?" Katie asked, shouting so Martha could hear her.
"Spaceship? Oh, yes! Please sit down. There are plenty of places to sit and I'll tell you all about when my husband and me had a spaceship crash into our field," Katie sat down on a couch, a cloud of dust erupted when she sat. John sat down on a recliner and immediately sank into it. "It was April of 1938. April...April 18th, yes."
Katie took out a pen and began writing down what Martha was saying on a notepad that she brought. "I was...I was 23 at the time. Wait. I was born 1915 so, yes, 23. And Jonathan was...Jonathan was...28?"
"Are...are you asking us or telling us?" John asked.
Martha didn't hear him and continued with her story. "We were out on the back porch when we saw a bright light in the sky. We originally thought that they were agricola burn-lightus," Martha said.
Katie stopped writing. "What?"
"What?" turning her ear to Katie. "You'll have to speak up. I don't hear too good. I'm not young like you two."
"Agricola burn-lightus? What is that?" Katie shouted.
"Oh, you know. When lights are in the sky," Martha flittered her hand in the air.
"Aurora borealis?" John asked loudly.
"That's it. Well, that's what we thought it was but then we saw something in the sky. Falling from the sky. And it was getting closer to the ground. It was burning, bright yellow and kind of...flickered in the dark sky. Then we heard it crash behind the tree line on our property. We got in our truck and drove out to where we thought it had crashed," Martha continued. "We saw a...a...oh, what do you call it?"
John and Katie looked at each other and shrugged.
"You know what I'm talking about. A giant hole in our field," Martha said.
"Oh, a crater," John said.
"You'll have to speak up. I don't hear so good. I'm not young like you two," Martha repeated. "We got out of the truck and went to the hole where in the hole we saw a spaceship."
"A spaceship?" John questioned.
"You'll have to speak up..." Martha began.
"A spaceship?!" John repeated louder. "What did it look like?"
"It was green. No, blue. It was a blue bulb shape. With a gold X-shaped contraption attached to it," Martha made an awkward X with her hands. "Jonathan slid down in the hole and when he approached the ship, the blue glass melted away. Inside the ship was the bones of a small child. 'What kind of monster would send a child into space?' we asked each other as Jonathan carried the bones out of the ship."
"So you think a country sent the ship into space, or at least tried to send a ship up into space?" Katie asked loudly.
"At first. Then we decided that the ship was sent from space. In 1938, people weren't trying to get into space," Martha said. "Kennedy got us into that mess in the '60s. But he's better than that..."
John interrupted Martha as he struggled to get out of the recliner. "Okay! What did you do with the spaceship? Did you tell anyone else about the crash?"
"No, we didn't. Police spoke with us but we said we saw the light but that was it. We buried the bones of the child and covered the hole with the ship with a bunch of boards and let the land lay fallow for nearly 80 years," Martha said.
"So the ship is still in the hole?" John asked.
"It should be. Jonathan and I never went back out there," Martha said. "You can drive out there. I can show you where it is."
"I think the part that gets me is why I care so much," Frank began. "We lost touch, we didn't really know what the other became. I still consider him a friend but he's not a friend, if that makes sense."
"It does," Lana reassured. "Now that Ryan is gone, you wish you could've been around to be the friend he may have needed but you have to ask yourself, even if you were around, would Ryan still have committed suicide?"
"Probably not. He was always depressed as a child and teenager. It was probably inevitable but I think what my problem is, is that it's almost been two months and Jen is still missing. I've found no clues to where she is, her boyfriend is blaming me and has even said I killed her and hid the body in one of the many isolated places I've learned about since opening the Society," Frank said. "I want to find. I want to tell her that I love her."
"Do you want to sleep with her?" Lana asked.
Frank looked at her and then nodded his head. "Yeah. I do."
Lana stood up and walked over to Frank. "You really care about this Jen, do you? Like you used to care about me?"
"Lana. What was between you and me is completely different. I can't compare it to anything," Frank chuckled a little.
Lana knelt down in front of him. "That's good. I would like to think that our relationship is one-of-a-kind and special," Lana began unbuttoning Frank pants.
Katie helped Martha out of the car and into her wheelchair. "If you lift up those boards, the hole and the ship should be under them."
John walked over to the rotted board lying on the ground. He bent over and began picking them up. They were nailed together and were lighter than they looked. John pushed away the boards and revealed a large crater in the ground. And in the crater, a gold ship with melted blue glass.
"Oh my God, she's not just a daffy old broad," John said softly.
"This is amazing," Katie said and began taking pictures. "Frank is going to love this."
Frank and Lana lay next to each other in his bed. Frank slowly ran his fingers against Lana's face as she played with his chest hair with her forefinger. "I have missed you so much," Lana said and kissed Frank.
Frank's phone on the nightstand next to the bed chirped. "Oop. Got a text message. Excuse me," Frank rolled over and grabbed his phone and looked at the message from Katie of the gold and blue ship. "Oh my God," he sat up "aliens!"
Next: A giant sinkhole opens up in Stull, destroying much of the town but leading to the return of Jen.
All characters in this story are entirely fictional. Superman and all related characters are Copyright (C) 2011 DC Comics. All rights reserved. Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.
