“The hangar lacks any conventional aircraft, but then, we didn’t come here for conventional aircraft, did we?”

“Clayton, you’re out of your mind. You don’t even know if it will fly.”

“My dearest Julia, it’s been sitting in this rust trap for over half a century, but I’ll bet my right family jewel this thing will take us to the stars.”

“Don’t call me dearest. I’m your co-pilot, not your girlfriend.”

“Figure of speech, love. Figure of speech.

He liked the way she complained when he teased her, but then his manners with women had always been lax.

“How did you find this again?”

“My old man thought all this desert might be worth something someday and bought it for a song in the late 1950s.”

“So he built the hanger?”

“No. Funny thing is, the thing was already here.”

“He knew about this vessel and didn’t tell anyone or do anything about it?”

“Not as far as I could tell. He did leave detailed notes about his studies of it. When he died, he willed me his engineering journal along with all of this. Brilliant man but totally eccentric. Kind of like me.”

“What was worthless back then is worthless today. Who cares about a hundred acres of sand and dust in the middle of New Mexico?”

“Hand me the flight suit from that hanger on the wall to your right and get one for yourself.”

“Here, and I’m not your maid, either.”

“Just put the bloody thing on, will you?”

“What is this anyway? Not a typical pressure suit. It’s light as air.”

“I guess the original pilots were built pretty close to us. I always figured aliens would be, well, you know, alien.”

“Now what?” We’re dressed up like a couple of cosplayers at a ComicCon.”

“We go inside and fire this baby up.”

“You know how?”

“Yeah. Dear old Daddy took exactly one trip in it. Didn’t write down where, but he did put down the date. October 26, 1985.”

“Damn, that date sounds familiar.”

As Clayton and Julia walked toward the strangely unaerodynamic craft, a doorway appeared in its side, opening and extending a ramp in invitation.

“Convenient. How did it know we were here?”

“Some sort of advanced AI according to Pops.”

“You sound like you’re about to go on holiday. Don’t you take anything seriously?”

“You’ve known me ever since uni. What do you think?”

“Shut up and get in. I hope I’m not making a mistake following you on yet another of your crazy adventures.”

“You love me and you know it. Now let’s sit down and strap in.”

“You call this a control panel? It’s solid metal. There’s only one thing here.”

“The big, red button. Fantastic. Dad preset the controls so the craft will pilot itself.”

“Where?”

“To wherever Dad went over thirty years ago. Care to do the honors?”

“Sure. Why not?”

Julia leaned forward against her harness and mashed the red button, the size of a dinner plate, down with both hands. Then the open hatch slammed shut, the ramp swiftly retracted, and looking out the viewing screen in front of them, the hanger shimmered and vanished.

All of the hidden controls and displays abruptly materialized on the control panel, presenting two critical pieces of data. The first was labeled Present Time and indicated 7 July 2018 at 9:02 a.m. The second said Destination Time 7 July 1947.

“Oh crap, Julia. The Roswell aliens were time travelers.”

I wrote this for Saturday Mix – Double Take, 7 July 2018 hosted at Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie. The idea today is to take a pair of homophones and use them in a poem, short story, or other creative work. The homophones are:

• lacks and lax
• hangar and hanger

I was feeling a bit whimsical, and this is what came out. By the way, October 26, 1985 is when Marty McFly took his first trip in time in the 1985 film “Back to the Future.”

Oh, it is pure coincidence that the supposed alien spaceship crash near Roswell, New Mexico occurred on this date in 1947.