Free John Gone by Michael Kayatta Page A

were in semi-formal attire, most
wearing elegant sundresses and holding large, paper hand fans or
parasols. The men were under suits and sport coats, mostly white in
color, with some of the more rebellious among them sporting just a
dress shirt with rolled up sleeves.
    John slowly approached the party from its
side, but stopped behind the back corner before continuing around
it. He chose a small bench leaned against the outside of the
yacht’s main cabin to sit down on.
    “Why did we stop? Go talk to someone and find
out where we are,” Mouse urged.
    “We’re on the ocean?” John answered. “Why
does it matter where we are?”
    “The more data we have, the better chance we
have at solving this thing.”
    John looked left and right to make sure of
their privacy. “I can’t go back there.”
    “Why not?”
    “Look,” he said, lifting Mouse around the
corner and pointing it toward the crowd. “I’m in jeans and a
T-shirt.”
    “Put me down.”
    “Why?” John asked suspiciously.
    “Just do it, man,” Mouse answered. “I’m
helping.”
    John put Mouse down on the deck near his
feet. As he let go of its body, the robot bent its knees slowly and
tumbled clumsily onto its back, ending stiffly in a prone position
on the deck. He quickly leaned down to lift it back to its feet,
assuming the fall was accidental.
    Before John could reach it, Mouse rolled away
from his hand like a small go-kart and raced around the corner
using four small wheels on its backside. John stood up quickly and
chased after the bot, but stopped suddenly at the corner, afraid to
be seen by the mob of people on its opposite side.
    With Mouse gone, he sat back down on the
bench and lowered his head into his hands.
    Maybe if I just sit here for twelve hours
I’ll pop home again , he thought. Maybe this time I’ll appear
in my own bathroom and come out to find Mom fretting over some tea
in the kitchen. She’ll see me, get excited, and drop her mug on the
ground as she runs over and hugs me. She doesn’t ask me anything,
and we go to the police department where everything gets explained
to them, and they have some sort of specialist who gets this watch
off my arm. We find out that Virgil isn’t dead, just a bit injured,
and Molly hears that I’m back and comes to the police station to
meet me. She cries and tells me she’s sorry she ever accused me
of--
    John’s fantasy stopped abruptly when he spied
a white jacket sliding across the floor between the fingers of his
hand. He raised his head and stared at the possessed jacket in
confusion.
    “Take it,” the jacket said. John lifted the
white coat to find Mouse underneath, standing back to its feet once
the weight of the jacket was removed from its body.
    “Where did you get this?” John whispered
loudly.
    “Put it on,” Mouse answered. “Get out
there.”
    John sat defiantly.
    “Oh. My. Gosh. A bedroom in the cabin, okay?
There were a bunch of jackets there. No one will miss it. Put it
on!”
    John stood and put the jacket over his
T-shirt. It fit, but had obviously been intended for a slightly
taller man than he. The tails dipped low to his mid-thigh, and the
sleeves extended past his wrists to his fingernails.
    “Good enough,” Mouse said, tugging on his
pant leg. “Let’s roll.”
    John picked up the robot and placed it back
into his bag’s pocket. With a deep breath he walked around the
corner toward the party.
    “I look way more suspicious than before,”
John said under his breath toward his bag. “This is a bad
plan.”
    John made his way to the large buffet and
looked at the amazing variety of food lying across it. Other than
the vegetable and cheese platters, John was having trouble even
recognizing the options. At least the caviar and escargot he knew
from a show he’d once seen on the Food Channel. Most everything
else on the table was an alien concoction to him, made of varying
colors and smells with which he wasn’t familiar.
    “Snails!” Mouse shouted