All the citizens the community could any longer mobilize crowded into the municipal garage on late Monday afternoon, where they squeezed together to find space between the road department’s half-ton truck and the snowplow that occasionally scraped the streets come winter. Some of those gathered still defined themselves by their positions of employment – Louis Johnson, the baker at the corner market; Carol Hendricks, the freelance piano instructor and part-time organist at the non-denominational church; Thad Kelso, the last remaining banker who unlocked the town’s bank on Saturday mornings just in case a villager needed something as strange and rare as a loan. Most however could claim no positions of employment to supplement their names with meaning, and instead opened their wallets to display glossy photographs of progeny who had long ago departed by means of that highway bisecting through town. No one remained young, and though they had seen much during their time, everyone felt confused at the sight of that odd, deflated monster sprawled out upon Hank Reverman’s flatbed trailer.
Sheriff Conrad strode into the garage, and the assembly turned their attention away from the flatbed to watch Abner grunt and curse as he climbed atop a nearby tractor sometimes used to mow the weeds that had taken over the park. Satisfied with his elevation, the sheriff addressed the crowd.
“Dan Blankenship found that strange thing Friday morning behind his trailers. Thing must’ve floated in with the flooding until it got snagged in the woods. I’ve asked you all to gather to help decide what we better do with it. I know the rest of you have an opinion of government as low as I do, so I didn’t want to go asking for help unless we all decided doing so was unavoidable. We’re all intelligent and capable people. We’re all of good character. I think we can figure it out for ourselves. So I’m going to ask you all to listen close to what Beth’s learned about this thing that washed up back behind Dan Blankenship’s trailers.”
The crowd applauded stiffly as Abner pulled Beth onto the tractor.
“Well, I had to drive all the way to the library over at the county seat to find out what that thing is on the flatbed,” Beth began. “It wasn’t easy to get any answers. I couldn’t find anything in the old newspapers or magazines. Couldn’t even find anything in the microfiche files. I had to use a computer to get onto a website.”
The crowd gasped. They remained off of the map, remained untangled by that intrusive network of computers and wires that impeded on a person’s privacy and trampled over their security. Abner held up his hand, and the crowd took a breath and recomposed themselves to hear what Beth had discovered.
“I believe the thing on Hank’s flatbed is a ‘Fu-go’ balloon.”
Glenn Alexander, whose marriage had taken a terrible toll on his hearing, cupped his hands to his ear and shouted. “What did you call it?”
“A ‘Fu-go’ balloon.”
“What kind of name is that?” Frannie Rensing screeched.
“It’s a Japanese name.”
“What’s that?” Glenn shouted again.
Frannie screeched louder than before. “She says it’s a Japanese name.”
Glenn frowned. “Goes to figure something that strange would have a foreign name.”
The crowd buzzed with anxiety. Neighbors shared troubled faces. They stepped closer to Hank’s flatbed, and Glenn Alexander almost stretched a finger out to poke at one of the dark bombs.
Beth rapped upon the tractor’s hood to regain the crowd’s attention.
“The Japanese launched thousands of balloons just like the one sprawled on Hank’s flatbed during the war. Seems they were all just furious when Captain Dolittle got them back after Pearl. They were desperate to find a way to drop bombs all over our mainland. Balloons were the best they could come up with. They made them out of paper and rope. They attached bombs to them and then filled them with hydrogen before just releasing them into the wind. Then, they just prayed that the jet stream would carry all those balloons right over us, so that those bombs would explode from Tacoma all the way to St. Louis.”
Irene Wilson raised a hand. “How did they aim them?”
“They didn’t aim them at all,” Beth answered.
“How in the world did they think that was going to work?” snorted Ralph Sampson.
“How am I supposed to know,” Beth growled.
“Did they hit anything?” Abner asked.
Beth shook her head. “Not really. Most of the balloons never made it across the ocean. A few bombs reportedly fell on open land, doing no one or nothing any harm. But there were people killed. Five children and a minister’s pregnant wife were killed when they came upon one of the balloons during a church picnic. They got too close, and they were all killed when the bombs detonated.”
The crowd inhaled, and they quickly shuffled back away from Hank’s flatbed.
“How do we know those bombs aren’t about to blow all of us to pieces?” Alexander Glenn again shouted.