L Ron Hubbard & Dave Wolverton- A Very Special Trip

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SCANNED BY PUDGE

FEB 28,2000

A VERY STRANGE TRIP

L. RON HUBBARD

DAVE WOLVERTON

Preface

A little over fifteen years ago, L. Ron Hubbard published a science-fiction novel, Battlefield

Earth, which became one of the best-selling and best-loved novels in its field. (That work has

since sold over five million copies and a recent Random House Modern Library readers' poll

ranked it among the top three best novels of the twentieth century.)

At the same time, as Ron reentered the field of science fiction after a hiatus of nearly thirty

years, he recognized how closed the genre had become to new authors. I happened to be a new

author fifteen years ago, and I well recall studying the markets for short fiction only to find that

among the top four science-fiction magazines, perhaps no more than ten new writers might be

published in any given year.

As on other occasions throughout his 55-year literary career, Ron came up with a great idea

to help aspiring writers enter the professional ranks. He initiated a contest to encourage new

writers and call attention to their work. He even arranged for top writers of speculative fiction

(science fiction, fantasy and horror) to judge the competition.

Thus L. Ron Hubbard's WRITERS OF THE FUTURE Contest was born. It has since

discovered and helped launch the careers of hundreds of talented writers who have gone on to

publish over 250 novels and over 2,000 short stories. It is widely recognized as the premier venue

in the field for discovering new writing talent. The L. Ron Hubbard Gold Award, which goes to

the annual grand-prize winner, has taken its place beside the Hugo and Nebula Awards as one of

the most coveted prizes in the field of speculative fiction. There is even a companion contest for

new illustrators.

My own involvement in the Contest began with a recommendation from M. Shayne Bell,

who had previously received a first-place quarterly prize. Shortly thereafter, I, too, managed a

first-place award, then a grand prize in 1987. I will never forget the annual awards ceremony)

being sandwiched between the likes of Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl and Luke Skywalker himself,

Mark Hamil. But more to the point, and just as Ron intended, that award most definitely helped

launch my writing career. Indeed, I received a three-novel contract from Bantam Books barely

two weeks later.

Needless to say, that award brought something else; for as Ron also suggested to his literary

agency, Author Services, Inc., some of those newly discovered writers were to be afforded what

amounted to a collaboration with Ron. In other words, some of us were to be given a golden

opportunity to place our names on a story by L. Ron Hubbard. Of course, I myself was among

those so honored, and found it to be a fulfilling collaboration.

The story Ron originally conceived, A Very Strange Trip, became a full-length L. Ron

Hubbard screenplay, replete with detailed directorial notes, character sketches and more. What I

initially found most intriguing, however, was the fact that the story concerned the time-traveling

adventures of a young West Virginian moonshiner, who inadvertently finds himself purchasing

Native American squaws.

It just so happens my grandfather was also a moonshiner from West Virginia, and likewise

purchased a half-Cherokee wife, my grandmother. It was all strictly illegal, but grandpa never

worried too much about legalities. Moreover, it was all part and parcel of my grandmother's

cultural heritage, as her mother had similarly been sold to her father and so on .

from time immemorial.

To some degree, then, writing this book gave me an opportunity to rediscover my personal

heritage. Then, too, I had long dreamed of studying paleobiology, and here was an opportunity to

delve rather deeply into the realms of mammoths and dinosaurs. Finally, I had wanted to try my

hand at writing comedy, a rare element in science fiction.

But there was another aspect to L. Ron Hubbard's A Very Strange Trip that immediately

intrigued me, and therein lies something of the L. Ron Hubbard legend.

In the name of research, I eventually traveled to the Cahokia Mounds where the Mississippi

and Missouri Rivers meet-once home to the temples of the priest-rulers of the Mississippian

culture. And what did I inevitably discover? In one sense or another, Ron, too, had made that trek

and, I might add, researched these matters to the bone. In point of fact, I found no aspect of

ancient life in these lands that Ron did not examine-from a study of Mississippian vegetation to

the Mayan pottery industry.

Yet remembering that a screenplay is not a book, and the art of adapting a tale from one

medium to another often requires some innovation, let me add one final word of introduction.

Because scripted comedy does not always play on paper, I could not always translate, so to speak,

Ron's story word for word. By the same token, however, a novel allows one to read a character's

thoughts, and so I afforded myself a degree of literary latitude in just that sense-interpreting the

thoughts of Ron's characters.

I hope the result is as fun for you to read as it was for Ron and me to write.

Dave Wolverton

CHAPTER I

“The prisoner will now rise for sentencing," the bailiff of the Upshaw County

Superior Court intoned with a solemn expression, stopping in mid-chaw to hold a wad of tobacco

in the side of his mouth.

Nineteen-year-old Everett Dumphee stood and smoothed back a lick of his blond hair. He

was big and strong-boned. He quietly made sure his flannel shirt was tucked into his new pair of

Wrangler jeans, and stared at the judge with a heart brimful of dread.

Beside Dumphee, his girl, Jo Beth, sat quietly and held his hand. Everett's ma and pappy,

and uncles and cousins were all packed into the courthouse. The benches could not have held

more of them. Even the old preacher who lived in the cave up by Blue Grouse Creek had come

down for the court appearance.

Judge Wright was middle aged, slightly chubby, and he was staring hard at Everett with a

mean look in his eye, like a hound that's holed himself a 'coon. Judge Wright glared a minute,

then said, "Everett Dumphee, you've been found guilty of runnin' moonshine. Before I sentence

you, do you have anything to say for yourself?"

Dumphee cleared his throat, found it hard to talk. "Uh, I didn't do it, Your Honor, sir."

Judge Wright made a little snarling face, as if Dumphee had poked him in the belly with a

sharp stick. "I don't want to hear that! I know it was your uncle's car, and you said you was late

for a date. But you was caught red-handed, drivin' down old Bald Knob at ninety miles an hour

with ten gallons of shine in your trunk-and when the police flashed their lights, you revved it up

to a hundred and forty!"

Dumphee's pappy shouted, "Aw, he's just born with good reflexes, Your Honor! You can't

blame the boy for that."

"You shut your yap in my courthouse," Judge Wright said, pointing the gavel at Dumphee's

pappy. "If your boy has such good driving instincts, put him on the racing circuit-not runnin'

shine!" The judge cleared his throat, tried to regain his composure.

"Now, Everett Dumphee, I'm a fair man-or at least I try to be . . ." the judge said sweetly.

"But I'm tired as get-out of you Dumphees running shine. My grand pappy sent your grand pappy

to prison for it. My pappy sent your pappy to prison for it. And I'd send you to prison right now,

but for one thing: you Dumphees can't help it that you're all so inbred that you ain't bright enough

to figure out right from wrong."

Dumphee's mother gasped, and Dumphee spoke up, trying to defend the family honor, "Uh,

sir, I ain't-"

"You've had plenty of chance to say your piece!" the judge brushed him off. "Now I'm

going to say my piece. Dumphee, boy, your problem is that you're uncivilized. You give

West Virginia a bad name. You live up in them hollows with your dogs and your guns and

your moonshine, marrying your cousins and playing your fiddles. Jethro Clampett has got

nothing on you-

"Uh, Bodine,” Dumphee said.

"What?" Judge Wright asked.

"Jethro Bodine is his name. Jed Clampett is his uncle. I watched that show on TV, and

Bodine is his name. We get 140 channels on our satellite dish, now."

"Are you trying to be a wiseacre with me?" the judge asked.

"Uh, no, sir;' Dumphee said, affecting a thick accent. Judge Wright always talked with a

thick accent, as if he thought that he sounded like some southern gentleman. But the truth was,

with modern television pumping educated standard American English into every home in the

hills, practically no one in West Virginia spoke like the judge did anymore. Dumphee thought the

judge sounded like a hick. Still, it sometimes helped to sound like one of the good ol' boys.

The judge said, "Because I've got a hundred acres of good farmland at home, I don't need no

wiseacre, and if you are being a wiseacre with me..."

"No, suh!" Dumphee said louder, in an even thicker accent.

"My point is, this is 1991. Everyone else up in those hills is trying to raise marijuana and

driving Porsches. But you folks-you're living in the past." The judge shook his head so woefully,

Dumphee almost wished that he were a marijuana farmer, just so he'd get some respect. At

Dumphee's side, his pappy was stiffening, getting red in the face, blood pressure rising so high,

Dumphee feared he might burst a vessel.

The judge sighed. "You got to go out and see the world, son. So, I'm going to do you a favor.

I'm going to civilize you."

The judge took a long, deep breath, stared Dumphee in the face. "I hereby sentence you to

the maximum penalty for your crime: ten years of watching television in the West Virginia State

Prison."

The words hit Dumphee like a fist in the belly. It was so unfair. He really hadn't been

running shine. He hadn't known that his uncle had that keg in the back! It wasn't fair that he'd go

to prison. Didn't the judge know what men did to each other in there?

At his side, Jo Beth squeezed Dumphee's hand and whined. "I'll wait for you," she promised,

while his ma broke down sobbing. His pappy's face was so red that Dumphee figured the old man

would go out to the truck, get his rifle, and find a shady tree to lay under while he waited for the

judge to poke his head out of the courthouse.

But now the judge was shaking his head sadly.

"That's right, son. I said 'prison.' But if that don't sit well with you, then I'll set aside that

penalty on one condition: you enlist in the United States Army for a period of no less than five

years-I do suppose you can shoot?"

"He can knock the eye out of a red-tailed hawk at three hundred yards, Your Honor!"

Dumphee's cousin shouted.

"Yeah, I ought to fine him $500 right now for shooting raptors;' the judge grumbled. "Well, I

figured as much. And you look strong enough to wrestle a bear. What do you say? You can avoid

prison, and this will give you a chance to get out of them hills, see the world.

"Some folks say you can take a boy out of the mountains, but you can't take the mountains

out of the boy. I don't know if I believe 'em. You'll either come back a new and better man, or

else you'll be the Rambo of moonshiners."

Dumphee stood, seething. It wasn't fair. He had plans for his life. Plans for him and Jo Beth!

He wasn't a hillbilly. It was true that his family engaged in moonshining, but this wasn't

unsophisticated hooch stewed up in a bathtub. His pa had a computer, and got orders over the

Internet. Some English fellow would send e-mail, telling what he wanted, then send bottles to fill

with names like "Boar's Breath" and "Hair of the Hound 0' Morgan"-sophisticated whiskeys out

of Scotland and Ireland.

Sure, the Dumphees were selling forgeries-and had been making a lot of money at it for the

past twenty years-but in the past few months the whole family business had begun to go

somewhat legitimate. The new "Dumphee Clan" whiskeys were selling better in France than the

forged labels ever had.

What did this hoary old judge know about civilization? He probably thought that the Internet

was some fancy new device used to catch a trout!

And as for his Porsches, well, the old souped-up T-bird that the government had confiscated

could outrun one of them overpriced, unreliable Porsches any day!

The judge stared at Dumphee expectantly. He offered, "What do you say, son? The Army, or

prison?

"The Army would be easy for a fellow like you, what with the Soviet Union falling apart. I

wish we had a war I could send you into, but I figure, given five years of enlistment, something

ought to come along....

And if you're lucky, I'll get shot, Dumphee thought. He sighed.

"Guess I'll have to take the Army, Your Honor," Dumphee said, feeling queasy.

Jo Beth squeezed his hand. He figured he could always send for her after he got out of basic

training. They could get themselves on the waiting list for some little dumpy army apartment.

Hell, Dumphee thought with resignation, at least he isn't making me enlist in the Navy.

"Bailiff, remand this boy to the custody of the U.S. Army," the judge said.

Everyone stood up a bit dumbfounded. Everett's uncle came and slapped Dumphee's

shoulder, apologized for getting him in trouble.

Jo Beth fell apart and started weeping. "Oh, Everett;' she said, trembling as she leaned

against his shoulder. "This is so terrible. So terrible."

"It won't be that bad,” Dumphee said.

She sniffed. "You're always so positive. 'If life hands you a lemon, make lemonade.' That's

the way I've got to think. I just-I just always knew you would make it out of these mountains

someday, but I never thought it would be like this. I thought you'd go to college."

"Well, I still can go to college;' Dumphee said. "Just looks like I'll be doing it on the GI

Bill." He'd always been good in school. Not brilliant, but he imagined himself to be a cut above

average. Given that, and the fact that Dumphee was a fighter, he'd always figured he'd do okay in

college.

Dumphee's wrists were cuffed, so he couldn't hug Jo Beth, but she just squeezed his hands

and leaned into him. He could smell the sweet perfume on her neck, feel her pleasant curves

through the fabric of her cotton dress. "I'll join you, after you get out of basic training. I'd wait for

you, even if it took till the end of time. Nothing can keep us apart."

The bailiff took Dumphee right then and led him down to the recruiter's office in handcuffs.

He got to stop once, outside the courthouse, to say goodbye to the redbone hunting hounds in the

back of his pappy's pickup.

Then he was gone.

CHAPTER 2

Dumphee had seen the Army propaganda on TV: "Be all that you can be;' the advertisements

said.

But, apparently, the Army figured that Dumphee wasn't fit for much. Some sergeant took

one look at his record, and chewed his lip thoughtfully for all of half a second. "Moonshine

running? At 140 mph? Boy'd make a hell of a driver!"

So they sent him to basic training down in Georgia.

Yet part of Dumphee recognized that his life was being stolen from him, bit by bit, minute

by minute. The recognition first hit when Jo Beth wrote him a letter a week into basic training,

telling how his cousin, Montague Dumphee, was being such a sweetheart and comforting her

through this lonely transition period.

Dumphee had always known that Montague wanted his girl. Last fall, when they'd been out

on the big annual family bear hunt with Uncle Ned, Montague had asked Dumphee all kinds of

disturbing questions about "how far he'd got" with Jo Beth. And he'd had an unsavory gleam in

his eye. Dumphee fired off a letter forbidding Jo Beth to have anything to do with the boy.

But by the time the U.S. Mail got the letter to her, it was probably already too late. She

wrote back and told Dumphee how Montague had taken her on "a couple of picnics;' and how he

was a real gentleman, and she didn't like Dumphee slandering "my Montague."

Two weeks later, Dumphee got a call from his ma. Jo Beth and Montague had moved into a

little house outside Bald Knob.

It all happened so fast, Dumphee felt stung. Something important had been taken from him-

twenty-four days of his life. And in that meager time, the woman he'd planned to marry, the

woman who'd promised to wait for him through ten years of prison, had run off with his cousin.

It's amazing how love for a woman can make a smart man act stupid. Dumphee walked

around like a wounded critter for half a week, and during a live-grenade practice, for all of two

seconds he held on to a live one, wondering how Jo Beth would feel if he just tucked that grenade

down his undershirt and let it blow his heart to bits.

Then he figured, Naw, she ain't worth it, and he imagined Montague's leering face and

chucked the grenade toward it, setting a new camp distance record for hurling a grenade.

For the rest of basic training, the boys in his platoon called him "The Launcher."

But the appellation didn't stick.

Dumphee didn't really mind basic training, and it appeared that being a driver wouldn't be so

bad after all. It beat being on the front lines if he went to war. He was transferred to a driving

school in Virginia, where he learned the basics, like how to change a wiper blade and tighten a

fan belt.

After that, he concentrated on advanced army driving techniques, like how to "dodge-and-

drive" in case someone began shooting out your windshield while you tried to deliver some

general to an Arab liquor store.

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SCANNEDBYPUDGEFEB28,2000AVERYSTRANGETRIPL.RONHUBBARDDAVEWOLVERTONPrefaceAlittleoverfifteenyearsago,L.RonHubbardpublishedascience-fictionnovel,BattlefieldEarth,whichbecameoneofthebest-sellingandbest-lovednovelsinitsfield.(ThatworkhassincesoldoverfivemillioncopiesandarecentRandomHouseModernLibraryread...

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L Ron Hubbard & Dave Wolverton- A Very Special Trip

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