Nowhere Man: Transporter

By Laura Jean Lysander

3rd edition; 

~A mystic, comedy Sci-Fi action-adventure sprinkled with innuendo of The Beatles.... meet quirky Kalantha Kirby, a humble Central Park worker- so busy helping others and engrossed with her sci-fi hobbies and Beatles music, not realizing what was about to happen to her extraordinarily;  After a strange event with her "hand" at work and even far deeper meditation session, Kalantha finds herself immersed in a mangled, dystopian future, or is it a dream?  She is hastily greeted by Ringo, a furry canine best friend, and his metaphysical master Olin Cian, who has been tailing her for quite some time in secret. They embark on a seemingly unplanned comedic (but not To Olin) dangerous and dire underwater and above heroic adventure. Not too long later they are joined by Cian's distant, Celtic Shaman right-hand man Timothy Ban Piobar, who offers Kalantha more insight into Olin's dark, unknown past. Together, they are swept into facing the task of saving humanity from the evil doings of the "Others", the "Gorm Granna"~ will this foursome of transcendental Superheroism be able to finish their mission?  Is love all you need? Read on, and find out…

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lysander's Literaries
• Release date: Jul 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393693512

Book preview

By

Laura Jean Lysander

FORWARD

The idea for this project came to me from a  lucid dream I had in the 1990s. It was starkly ominous and stuck to my memory as I awoke from it, and I jotted down whatever I could remember from the musings of the night. I placed this aside for years until I had more time to dedicate to it, for I kept getting stuck on the dialogue and other ideas about it or how to properly formulate it, first as a screenplay I had never written. It just needed far more dimension. I had never thought of publishing it, not even in a Novel form.

Finally, after arduously and with many editions of correction I began self-publishing some of my other work independently, and in raw editions. I went through all the jotted notes and adaptions I had of this project and sat down to write out the storyline in a Novel for I’m better at embellishment than omission, in case it was needed for anything, and because I seemed to be in the right frame of mind to deal with it. It turned out oddly ‘Far out there’ and more interesting than I could have ever imagined, in my little hobby mind, with a little help from the fab four and their immense talent.

I think it never could have been made what it is which is a hundredfold better without the iconic mention of the Beatles titles and legendary spirits, and I am in debt to the imagery it created with this project. I  truly wanted to finish it and polish it one day because it made me laugh, amused me, and had some merit... so why not?

Dedicated

to John, Paul, George, and Ringo...

The Beatles,

Mark Hamill,

and

a lovely little dog named Tonic;

For truly I am sure,

a Nowhere Man

exists within us all.

In deep gratitude

And special thanks 

To the Cover Artist,

Deanna Lynn Miller,

For her amazingly creative artwork,

And her incredible mother,

Lynn Miller,

Who helped with its organization

And

Creation

1

No one could have asked for a better day to be in famed Central Park, New York City, especially in the Conservatory Gardens. Birds were warbling, squirrels were subtly snickering and snatching someone’s honey nuts, and a particular and peculiar person had their smartphone up on high in her back uniform pants pocket when of course, it should have been turned off.

Here Comes The Sun was sweetly wafting through the personal earbuds hooked up to that particular person,  brightening the even lovelier day. It was Kalantha Kirby’s smartphone, and she had ‘forgotten’ to turn it off... kind of. She loved the Fab Four’s music and was never without her playlist of it nearby to listen to on her phone, and elsewhere.

It was such a bright, beautiful sunny spring day, one in the only two-and-a-half-week period when the double row of crabapple trees near the bathhouses in the Conservatory grounds bursting in full pink-blushed bloom,

and the petals were ever so softly starting to flutter down, papering the stone walkway between them with their delicate nature confetti.

Nannies with strollers were strolling,  the park personnel was planting and pruning, tourists were taking photos, and strange-clothed, newspaper-reading, odd-seeming gents with scrappy, sweet mutt dogs were sitting upon the benches in the mid-day springtime sun and shade.

Shootie and Kalantha, the duo of landscaping park workers on duty at the time and slaving away, were over more towards the fountain, re-planting, weeding, and tending to the flowers and grounds.

It was Kalantha who primarily worked tediously and unconditionally, as always. Shootie was the slick orator and self-proclaimed surveyor/supervisor role, talking her loud, hysterical mouth out of almost all manual labor.

Kalantha today was putting her all into it, certainly getting a little bit more than grungy, really gung-ho, her long, brilliant blonde hair was up in a ponytail, looped over and shoved under a gardening brimmed cap, and her bright, light blue eyes and salient, intriguing eyebrows were hidden behind mirrored rose colored aviator shade sunglasses.

She also had a rather delicate, elegant nose and uniquely ‘pretty’ features, if you could ever hunt to make them, hiding it all under all the dirty grime and hat/scarf-wear she always donned.

She honestly never minded, being seen as a bona fide hot mess, for the flowers were her babies, she loved working for them, around them, and nature all of nature, content knowing the garden and her seeds of work would show and grow, watching it all enhance the beauty of the park.

Shootie, her devil-may-care work partner, was a large, curvy, well-endowed lovely dark lady with the color of creamed coffee countenance; she had catty light brown eyes and full pouty lips, and intricately long, rainbow-braided hair under her gardening cap. She, on the other hand, was doing everything in her power to jokingly get out of doing any work whatsoever, and Kalantha, as said before, never minded, at all. It was a perfect combination.

Behind the two engrossed gardeners,  and across some hedges and the row of blooming trees, the odd individual of a mysterious figure (generous with that example) and gent, the so-named unknown to all ‘Olin Cian’ sat on an empty park bench with Ringo, his canine companion at his feet.

The New York Times newspaper he was reading was high up over his head, and you couldn’t see his covert face or torso behind it at all. He was flagrantly hiding behind it, peeping up every so often to stare secretly over to, and intensely scrutinize that bemired and bedraggled, dust-ridden Kalantha.

He had on this rather worn-at-the-edges black baseball cap, clean but seeming very used and frayed, so vintage the NY Yankees emblem in front had almost worn off and away and you couldn’t honestly figure out the initials if it was a Yankees or Mets cap; and his large,  capacious, daunting, discerning, sparkly dark blue eyes with such long lashes and strongly full yet blonde eyebrows would spy gaze over the top of the newspaper and cap brim every so often, then flick back down. You’d classify him as A rather jauntily handsome fellow, just odd, and you’ll see why.

Presently and with scrutiny, a Japanese tourist couple enjoying their walk in the park today was slowly strolling past Olin Cian and his scrappy, sweet, mutt Ringo lagging and stalling on purpose, deliberately. Giggling, they were taking funny photos with their phones on the sly of him, noticing him move his newspaper down to peek over and stare out, then hide behind it over and over again.

The couple made a blatantly pointed gesture towards Olin, humorously ogling at his mismatched clothes, even seeming to ridicule them. Of all outfits to wear, the Odd Gent seemed to have on some sort of a Shakespearean jacket or doublet, or...no, could have even been a coachman/horseman livery jacket of very dressy vintage wear ornament, not at all from this day and age, of 1800s styling, a spiffy black and midnight blue crushed velvet...

...silver pipings and buttons, an actual lush costume piece. It even resembled the likes of a velvet-tailed tuxedo vested combo, but the couple couldn’t figure out just what kind of period jacket it was, for it was not of this present fashion period at all.

And to make matters worse, Olin had worn underneath that doublet a flowing, old, flappy, rippled sheer white pleated renaissance shirt, also a costume piece, cinched with a satin sapphire blue cummerbund and topped with this funny dark blue velvet cravat tied bow tie, again not of this time, not even the clip on type for it wrapped around his neck in one long fabric piece and tied in a real over-large bow. He was wearing some old, black faded jeans for his bottoms, also aged and faded as his cap, rather worn out as if years old but clean, and black high-top sneakers, the Converse brand, also old but in good shape.

It appeared to be very strange attire for just a casual walk, let alone a stroll in the park. But then again this was Central Park, New York City, and oh the things you see and find here...

Hey you, fool-clown, are you lost, on a  lunch break? You know The Delacorte Theater is over there, way over that way, The male Japanese tourist chided, then pointed behind him, snarking, japing, and walking past with his petite partner girlfriend, snapping another intrusive photo with his selfie stick. He wrote the word weirdo in Japanese under it in text, and sent it out on social media to his profiles to grab some laughs from his friends back home, figuring the odd man must be one of the actors of the theatre in the park performing soon, on his break or one of those vagrant corny stand-up clowns who blew up balloons and created magic shows for the kids, but...

...They didn’t see any bags with him for his accessories. He just had that little well-groomed mutt and that Newspaper. Maybe it was a trick dog show?

Olin pulled the paper down from his face, peered back and forth, darted his eyes the same way comically, then smiled warmly and acknowledged the couple, nodding to them silently. They then broke out in loud laughter again at him, finally passing him by and shaking their heads, moving over to a snack cart to buy some ice cream.

He wasn’t seemingly homeless or smelled funny, they thought, and wasn’t bothering anyone so no reason to call over any cops or park employees. He was just... an oddball.

Olin glanced down at his little scrappy dog mutt Ringo and nodded to him in silence, very slightly in the secret reverence of best friend camaraderie. Ringo glanced up at him and tilted his head, that famous doggie tilt we all love as if some form of transmuted silent telepathic owner-mutt communication was going on with the peculiar duo.

Martha My Dear the Beatles tune started to play on Kalantha’s smartphone, one dedicated to of all things a dog; Kalantha’s phone playlist was still running and still in her back pants pocket. It was one of the picks in her particular playlist which she still hadn’t turned off.

Ringo, yawned, stood up and doggie stretched, his paws padding down upon the stone walkway, and he proudly, purposefully trotted past the Japanese tourist couple near one of the snack carts with a strange sound of mumbled growling, then it switched... to honestly more like tinkling, garbled mocking genuine laughter coming from him.

The tourist couple immediately heard it, the laughter, jolted, and glared down at Ringo as he pattered by, confused, baffled, actually wondering if they caught what they thought they did... laughter, from a mutt? 

Ringo rounded the bend and made his way, sprinting towards Kalantha, who was crouching down and gathering up her gardening tools, she was about to break and take lunch. Ringo came right up to her side and just placed one of his little cute furry paws on her knee.

Startled, Kalantha turned to look over and down at him, and her eyes lit up, squinting with adoration, staring into Ringo’s unusual lookers, one a bright ice blue, the other a  pastel lemon yellow. She couldn’t figure out what breed he was, maybe a cross between a Jack Russel Terrier, Catahoula leopard dog, or Australian Shepard...maybe even more but he was very cute and oh so curious.

A small visiting miracle of the day, she thought. She gave him a soft pat and liberal scratch behind his half-upright flopped-over mottled ears before she stood up and stretched out her bordering-on thin, lithe, lean-muscled frame of a body, and started walking with her co-worker Shootie, her gardening conspirator...

(if you’d call her that) towards the women’s bathhouse quarters to finish up the shift. Shootie-? She was still slinging one-liners and jokes, mountains of them, Kalantha barely able to keep her breath in with chaotic chuckles, unaware of the little pooch still meandering behind them.

Ringo steadfastly started to covertly follow them all the way, up until he just couldn’t tag them anymore as the employee room door closed, then he wane-fully straggled, made his way back to his mismatched, eclectically clothed partner, and jumped up on the bench, pawing at Olin’s newspaper to get his forlorn friends attention.

Olin’s fingerless-gloved hand emerged from behind it, waving out and holding up a paper money bill. Ringo snatched it in his mouth and made his way over to a hot dog vendor right outside the gated park steps, pawing insistently at his foot. The vendor stared down at him, peculiarly surprised.

Ringo was peculiarly balancing, he stood on his back feet with a tottering dance and reached his muzzle up to hand the vendor the currency bill. And the vendor, with snarky glee trying to make any bucks at all, actually took it, staring in confounded confusion down upon it, shaking his head.

The bill had President Obama’s face on it and was... a seven-dollar note. He burst out laughing at it all and dug into his cart, taking out a long, watery hot dog, placing it in a bun, and handing it gently down towards Ringo.

Ringo snatched the frankfurter in his jaws, whining what actually sounded like a ‘thank you’ and trotted back in and over to Olin once more, jumping up on the bench next to him, curling up to enjoy his newly won lunch...

Olin Cian stared outward remotely, peeking secretly up once again from behind the paper, his wide, spacey eyes scanning the park stroll-way lined with crabapple trees within the conservatory Gardens, in front and all about him, at the visiting meandering people smirking mockingly at him and his dandy attire. It didn’t phase him. He found it curiously intriguing that they bothered with him at all.

He could hear another song playing, softly, somewhere, as did everyone else in the distance, and right away he marveled at the coincidence if there were any, for he knew there was a coincidence, though everyone else...didn’t. He knew why it was going on, why the wind or someone nearby was playing this tune and seemed to stifle a small laugh due to it;

And, ironically due to his presence being there in the park at that bench was the reason why it was playing, and with just a mild, comic thought that it was playing for him, he had a feeling it was just for him; of course, it was, and he grinned inwardly to himself in a sad, melancholy sort of way... for it was the Beatles song...Fool on the Hill...

Olin Cian sighed deeply, and continued to overtly pretend to read his paper...

Later on that day, a few hours near quitting time within a gardening storage room in Central Park NYC near the Conservatory gardens, Kalantha and her colleague cohort comedian Shootie were wrapping up their shift.

Kalantha was in the back of the storage employee room, standing and facing a long table full of new seedlings and sprouted bulbs about to be replanted tomorrow. She was tending them and spraying them with mist softly, tenderly, as if they were her own babies, for, she didn’t have any. Babies, that is.

Shootie started washing her hands at the work sink, (even though they were very clean) glancing upward warily to her left, for alongside and above the sink on the wall stood a long shelf with a full, eclectic collection of Fantasy and Sci-Fi DVDs, books, small superhero figurines, old movies, and comics...

...intricate yoga manuals, a plethora of various sacred texts, many of them; Buddhist, and Hindu, Vedic tantric mysticism, many types and versions of the world’s sacred scriptures and interpretations, numerous books of lovely poetry and astronomy/physics/astrology textbooks as well. Stacks upon stacks of it all, a vintage library of Fantastic fantasy and soul-spirit menagerie.

Now And Then a rare, previously unreleased Beatles song now available, started playing upon the speakers of the employee pod player also stationed on the shelf...

Shootie took a sly, confounded peek over at all the profuse paraphernalia on the shelf above, rolling her wide eyes at it and then letting out a bellowing laugh.

Hey girlfriend, y’all want me to turn this wailing thing off? She asked Kalantha, about the music.

Kalantha peered up from the seedlings, still fogged and in her botanical baby world.

Huh? Oh, sure...if you want to. I kinda like it though, especially that tune it’s one of my faves.

Shootie shrugged and turned the music down low, squinting, closely examining the menagerie of spiritual texts and collectibles up on the shelf, then turned her odd gaze back to Kalantha discerningly, scrunching her already generously heart-shaped lips into a twisted pucker.

Girlfriend, don’t y’all ever get sick of this? What a hoard stash! Tyrone my man would die for it, especially the sci-fi stuff and figures. Why are you keepin’ it here? Y’all hidin’ it out? Is it... for sale? How much?

Kalantha’s eyebrows perked up at the blatant yet truthful deduction of her hoarded stash. It was library-worthy.

Ah, nope, I don’t get sick of any of it. I think... it’s kept me sane. Your friend Tyrone can borrow anything from it at any time if he likes. Just pick out whatever you want from it; If you think... he honestly wants most of it, he can have it to keep. A lot of that was given to me as hand-me-down gifts. Everyone seems to like giving me their old scriptures theologies, fantastic collectibles, throw-outs, or whatever they don’t want anymore knowing I’m involved in all those volunteer charities. I have it all, all of it on digital anyway, the movies and books, most of it.  That’s why I left it all here, for the employees to enjoy except for the action figures. Those...yeah, I kinda still collect. Kalantha cheerfully responded, without looking up, with a small