THE SPACE TRAVELER - By Ron Ernie

One afternoon I was in the yard just sitting in the sunshine.  It was quite calming as I drifted away into a strange dimension.

I was piloting some sort of space craft out among the stars.  It was peaceful, the dead silence was like nothing I ever knew.

I never traveled at the speed of a bullet in my lifetime and I really do not understand how man could even tolerate that kind of speed but my onboard computer screen assured me I was doing more than that.  Almost twenty five thousand MPH!

SUDDENLY the navigation screen came to life and projected an image ahead of my ship.

A spacecraft was operating a maneuver of sorts seemingly against a planet or star or some sort of habitat. 

The spacecraft kept aligning and then firing lasers at the object.  Every shot was a miss as the PURE WHITE SMOOTH OBJECT strangely bounced away from the lasers and constantly move in an arc back and forth out in space.  It was totally strange to see the way this planet could outpace the deadly laser shots being fired to destroy it.

Yes as I gained proximity to the object I noticed it was smooth and pure white. 

It moved in a back and forth arc at a very fast speed and changed direction as if being shot from a catapult.

The attack ship kept at it, firing missiles of light in a constant barrage at the white object it was desperate to destroy.

Then it happened.

The attacker began firing a stream of bullet-like pulses of light that hit the target with an unbelievable explosive effect. 

The bouncing pure white planet was pulverized to dust and powder before my eyes.

Suddenly, I thought I was now the next victim of that laser firing spacecraft as my body began shaking violently non stop.

Then I head the voice.

"Daddy Daddy Daddy"

It was a familiiar voice.  My son was screaming for me!  I came out of the sleep stupor and weakly said to him, "Nikko what's the matter why are you so upset?"

He replied to me with fear in his voice.

"Daddy, I was playing in the basement with my friend Ralphie.  We were having a game of ping pong."

"That's nice,  so what is the problem then."

"DADDY it's my ping pong ball,

IT BLEW UP IN MID AIR AND DISSAPPEARED!"