"Apologies," began the voice of Marilyn. Sophie finally looked up at a screen in the Electoral Center Command room. "With only two candidates left, Laurent Lapierre and our President Emilio, I feel compelled to reshuffle their order. Laurent played next but as you will see, the story makes more sense when they are reversed in order.

“Sophie, if you are watching, your father is great, his simulation makes more sense if broadcasted after Emilio's performance. It will be shown in full. I just wanted to make sure my ‘attractive guest’ awaiting her father's simulation, does not get taken by surprise or feel a single moment there was a problem, there is not." She winked and blew a kiss in the air.

Player Ranked #1

Emilio Sanchez

Players tried to perform in this game, they each were good. But Emilio was a natural, he gave it more feeling, as if he alone had read the script and was acting his role to perfection. He would be electrifying and even the real Jester.

This time Christian was the face, not the contestant. In the game, the Jester smiled animated by Emilio. With the Mexican in control, sheer insanity had returned in full force. The Jester looked directly into the camera and made a rapid succession of strange grimaces. Satisfied, he pushed away from the 3D printer. He was now sweating shiny oil those mentally unstable could.

There was little time but he genuinely did not care. He shoved his forearm into the medical opening and took the shot of morphine. It helped to calm him as his eyes took a second to refocus.

"Again," he said floating in the Io Observer arm in the machine.

"Sir, we do not recommend it. Do not impair your functions. It will make you drowsy for what comes next." Christian laughed.

“You hear that Wilfred?” He yelled as his stranded guest.

Without saying a word, Christian looked at the small screen next to the opening. His right arm still in the opening, he punched buttons with his left hand until something worked. The override code given to him by the President worked. Emilio gave him unrestricted access to the mainframe, he figured correctly his Jester might need to take control to help with the mission. Who cared if that gave him a drug supply. Images on the monitor blinked in rapid succession. There was a hissing sound as the machine delivered a second shot. The Jester's eyes rolled back in their sockets. “Again!” The moment his glazed focus returned, the Jester pushed the button again to the complete dismay of the men watching his every move down from earth.

“The dose might be lethal,” said the computerized doctor. He pushed the button.

The machine hissed again and sent a third dose of the drug in the man's tired body. In the real ship, in real life millions of miles closer to the sun, for the first time the real Jester was interested.

“That Emilio guy is brilliant,” he snapped loudly so the Ghost could hear in the back. The President had peeked his interest, the other clowns had not. This, made sense. But thanks to the game, the President had a roadmap.

In the game, Christian finally released the handle and began to float in the weightlessness of the ship. "Night-shade....." said the man as his mind left for a moment. Emilio did not know what the words meant to the Jester; his mind only told him they were the right ones to say. President Sanchez had a gift; he played others to perfection.

The real Jester was in shock. The name was his first role-playing character’s name. He had not heard it in half a century. Speeding to the grey rock, the Jester and Nick now both watched attentively. Emilio knew his shit. He had just almost overdosed in front of them, something only the Jester was ready to do. The President was no ordinary human.

The man in the virtual reality floated, knocked out by the drug.

"Hey honey, the kids need their breakfast!" yelled the Chairman from a distance. He had access to the ship's cameras and while restrained, was watching the Jester work. The ghost continued to yell humorous insults. "Wake up; I am sure that machine has more, get some!"

Moments later the Jester resurfaced. "Yo, yo, yo," he just spurted out. "I know what he's doing. For God's sake." The man waved his hands and feet in the air as if he was swimming a crawl. "Youppiiii..." The Chairman liked what he saw, in this state of mind, with some luck he could convince his jailer to release him.

"I have an itch on my lower back, can you help?" said the Chairman.

"Coming, with a friend." Christian looked around. He snapped on a pair of plastic gloves, pulled off a flat panel from the closest wall, and a clip of ten rockets with their floating alien creatures. He made his way slowly to the Chairman. "Nickou," sang the addict, "Nickou-kou-kou, I have a surprise for you." The man entered the detainment module holding the ten balls in a clip. "Awesome music choices."

"Thank you. Can I get someone to scratch?"

The Jester pulled a single globe from his clip. "You know what no one has done yet in the stupid game?” Emilio was playing the events most likely to happen. “You know what this is? No one has let your slummy pale ass loose."

"My birthday gift?"

"No you silly vampire, your way out."

"What?"

"You think I brought you over for fun? For your charming personality?” He unclipped one from the set. I will touch you with this ball. You will try to force yourself, that small mind of yours into that ball. If you manage it, I will shoot you back along with the creatures."

"Why?"

"I need you to tell me if this works. I want to make sure this works for me. I may be crazy, but I am not suicidal. We are getting out of this shit alive. Well, alive might be an overstatement."

Without more, the Jester pressed Nick's face against the ball. He was careful to push away as the swirling infection passed from the ball and possessed the ghost. It began to growl and snap its teeth. The Jester chuckled watching the possession by the evil creature.

"If you turned your neck a couple of turns, now that would be spooky to the children back at home," he said. The sand in the ball stopped moving for a fraction of a second.

He waited a moment then looking directly into a camera and did his best Groucho Marx impression. "Yo, shitty Dracula, can you hear me," he said to the sand and pretending to hold a cigar. There was no discernible movement. “I will take that as a yes.” In the room, the possessed growled.

"Here comes a headache," he joked as the Jester grabbed the floating wall panel. He turned it over. On each corner in its back were magnets. “I was told this works.” He began to snap off some of the magnets and approach them to ball. As he did, the monster growled in Nick’s body. As only a man on drugs could, the Jester slapped the ball violently against the magnet. The sand moved. He was torturing the monster, but it was still there. "Not enough?"

Christian pulled on a second panel and a third. He slapped half a dozen magnets against the ball. The creature yelled and while this happened, the Jester took some phone, selfies and sent them to the audience. Finally after twelve magnets were wrapped around the ball, the ghost's head collapsed from pain.

“So?” Christian slapped Nick's face. "Too late, asshole. I am not paying you to sleep on the job, you worthless immigrant!" The viewers cringed. In the real Io Observer, Christian and Nick were watching wide-eyed the digital pair go at it. The real Jester was smiling ear to ear. On the television, the Chairman’s mind returned to his body. "You back?"

"No, I am actually your ex-wife. You make fingers feel big."

On the television, Christian kissed the bald head. "So, were you in the ball?"

"Yes." Without waiting for more, the Jester touched the head of the Chairman once more and the creature from the ball returned and the sand began to swirl.

Speaking to the enraged entity back on the ghost’s body, Christian added, "I guess it's no to playing deejay for the rest of the ride?" The creature growled. Christian put the ball with the Chairman’s mind back in the rocket, clipped it back in the plastic casing and returned to grab the other pieces of the system.

“Patrick,” he snapped it the air.

The Colonel replied, “you can talk, your blood is Minestrone soup right now.”

Both Jesters (the one played by Emilio and the real one watching) chuckled. Back in the Io Observer, the real Jester looked at Emilio’s performance with shock. Few things hit home, but Emilio was no ordinary man. What he was doing was pure witchcraft. The Jester’s real plan was to use the Chairman to test a way to escape in one of the balls. Every word, every expression of the man on the screen was doing was eery and perfect.

"Awwww, you love me after all," said the real Chairman watching the simulation with real Jester.

"Another word and I will skip that part when I have to perform.”

The passengers turned to watch the virtual reality. Emilio playing the Jester followed the lead of the other players. He engaged the landing protocol at 6,000 in energy. He zipped his suit, set and operated the static generator and crash landed the capsule into the powdered rim of the Crater. It landed at the perfect location. Once on the ice of the glacier, the Jester quickly assembled the rocket launcher. He was ready.

Then, the solar energy arrived, bent down over the rim of the Crater and began to form a vortex. Emilio had a gift, he knew waiting would fail yet he looked up at the sky. “Laurent,” he said out loud. Sophie in the Command Center was standing feet away from a large screen looking at the President’s game. He had just called her father’s name in this strange place. “Laurent,” he repeated. Sophie was not dreaming.

One by one, the creatures made of hand-sized puffs of sand came out of the cracks in the ice. Like a diver surround by glowing jelly fish, moving randomly around him, the creatures ignored the Jester and his launcher. For a moment, Emilio wondered if this would work. He felt like he only needed to wait. He looked up at Mars and the red planet, like a cat’s eye it blinked several times. “Laurent, now.” On cue, the creatures appeared to be looking up and reacted to the blinking of mars, their home world.

One by one, the puffs moved closer to the balls racked in the clips as if they knew they were passengers with assigned seats. As the creatures touched the balls, the sand fell lifeless and the energy transferred in the balls.

Next to the large white cannon, the Jester began to load the clips of ten balls. “Hope you like the music,” he said as he launched the Chairman’s ball. He shot the first globe in the direction of earth. Then he swiveled the entire device. "Sir," began Command in his ear, "you need to point the launcher to the left. The creatures must be sent to earth." The Jester ignored the instructions and launched to mars. "Sir, you understand, we need these creatures to save the world...."

“Trust me,” he said shooting the rockets upwardly. Christian watched, from the safety of his ship as Emilio playing himself unfolded the simulation precisely as planned. The man was incredible. He knew of his plan, yet let him go anyways. The Jester shot ball after ball toward Mars.

As the vortex collapsed and the last rockets took flight, the Jester removed his suit glove. His hand instantly began to freeze in the cold. He barely was able to touch the last ball he had reserved for himself. It took non-frozen skin. Christian removed his helmet. He bit off his finger and stuck the blood dripping end against the ball. The last launch was programmed to shoot in seconds. The transfer happened. The monster took over a dying body.

The Jester shot himself last into space in the direction of mars.

Ahead the nearly one hundred creatures flew.

The game simulation ended.