I went downstairs to the kitchen to find Dad had just finished making breakfast. He'd made little breakfast sandwiches with English muffins, fried eggs and bacon. Now, he was sealing them up in little plastic sandwich bags. He saw me enter the kitchen and look at his work quizzically.
"I thought we could take breakfast with us and eat it while we think about the treehouse we want to build," he answered my unasked question. "I've got egg and bacon muffins, a thermos full of orange juice, and a couple of bananas. What d'ya think?"
"Sounds great."
He stuffed the sandwiches into a little duffel bag already mostly full and zipped it closed. "I've got a hammer and nails, a little saw, and pencil and paper so we can sketch out some plans before we get started. Anything else you want to bring?"
"That should be more than enough," I said. I had come to an important decision last night about what I would tell Dad when we got out to the backyard. I was pretty sure we wouldn't need the tools, but I had already planned out the whole discussion. Now was not the time.
"All right, should we get going?"
"Sure," I said, "Let's go." Joe, are you ready for this? I thought to my AI associate, Joe Torres.
I'm more ready than you are, I think, came his reply with a telepathic chuckle.
Dad and I walked out the back door across the lawn to the wooded part of our yard. "So, what ideas do you have about this treehouse?" He asked as we walked.
"I've pretty much got it all planned out. It needs to be invisible, first off, so people don't know it's there unless we want them to."
"Invisible, huh?" He asked, unphased by the idea. "We could paint it with camouflage, and it would be pretty hard to spot in the trees from a distance," he suggested.
Hmm, I thought, that would've been a pretty good idea for a regular treehouse. Maybe Dad's smarter than he looks. I glanced up at him appraisingly. "Not a bad idea."
As we walked through the trees, I noticed that my own comings and goings had started to leave a recognizable path. That was going to be a problem. I'd have to start taking different routes every day, maybe planting some bushes or something.
As we arrived at the spot where my Super-Secret Planetary Leadership Headquarters Treehouse Fortress lay hidden twenty feet up in a tree completely invisible thanks to advanced alien cloaking tech., Dad noticed the discarded planks from the old pallets I had used for my original treehouse. "Cool," he remarked, "those boards will be a good start. Is this where you want it?"
This was it. "Dad, can you keep a secret?"
"Sure," he paused, "I mean unless it's something your mother should know… What's on your mind?" He looked at me with a hint of concern, probably thinking I was going to talk about what made me so upset yesterday. In a sense, he was right, but it was a lot more complicated than he could imagine.
"We can talk to her about, maybe tomorrow," I started, "but I need you to promise, seriously promise, that you will keep my secret." I looked intently into his eyes as I spoke with all the earnestness an eight-year-old voice can muster. "It's very important."
He looked back at me seriously, worriedly. "If it's about your safety, or something… I can't make that promise, son. If I can keep it a secret, I will, but without knowing what you're going to tell me... You'll just have to trust my judgement."
I took a deep breath and sighed. "I trust you, Dad, but… I can tell you this: if the secret gets out, I will be in serious danger, and so will you and Mom."
"Tim, you know I would never do anything to put you or Mom in danger. I just don't know if you have the perspective, the experience to really know if that's true," Dad replied.
"Ok, but remember, I'm trusting you… I closed my eyes for a second to gather my courage, then opened them and opened a door I could never close.
"You know when I told you and Mom that I had an invisible treehouse? Well, it's true."
My father blew out a sharp breath, "Tim, is that what this is all about? I thought it was something serious! You had me scared to death!" He was smiling again. I knew that smile would be gone soon.
"You're not going to believe me until I show you, maybe not even then, but come over here. This circle of stones marks the invisible elevator. Stand right here with me." I positioned him inside the marked area and stood next to him. "Overhead right now is the invisible treehouse. It's actually the Super-Secret Planetary Leadership Headquarters Treehouse Fortress."
He let out a long whistle, "Wow, cool name!" He was still smiling at what he thought was my imaginary treehouse.
"I'm going to activate the elevator now. It'll feel like you're still standing on a solid surface, but we'll rise up through the air and end up in the Welcome Hall. Ready?"
"Beam me up, Scotty!" He said jovially, then he switched to a deeper voice. "Or make it so, depending upon which version you like," he chuckled at his own joke.
I shook my head and willed the elevator into action. His smile vanished. His eyes flew wide. His jaw went slack as we started rising into the air. A few seconds later we were inside.
He looked around as if he had been transported aboard the actual USS Enterprise. What the fu…" he looked at me and caught himself, before he said fudge. He saw the giant windows behind us and rushed over to look out as if he throught he might see the surface of Mars outside. It was still our backyard, but from the twenty-foot height I had specified for my Headquarters. I had all the displays turned off, so they looked like regular glass windows, but were perfectly clear with no hint of a reflection.
He turned and walked a few paces in the other direction, "The tree trunk should be right here… Is that a throne?" He looked at me incredulous. "Tim, what is this?"
"I told you. It's my Super-Secret Planetary Leadership Headquarters Treehouse Fortress." I walked up the steps onto the dais and sat down on the throne, facing him. "And I'm the Supreme Ruler of the Entire Earth Solar System and Nearby Space as recognized by the Galactic Union."
There was a thunk as the forgotten duffel bag hit the floor beside him. He blinked twice. "Wow, cool title… I mean, what… how… Tim, what the hell is going on here."
"Well, remember when you let me have those two pallets and said I could use them to build a treehouse?"
"You did NOT build this from two old pallets!"
I laughed, "No, of course not, but I did bring them out here and built a pretty cool little platform in this same tree. Anyway, when I finished, I was standing up in the tree, looking out over the yard when suddenly… an alien spaceship appeared. Well, actually it was a local interdimensional transport vehicle. Anyway, a door pops open and out walks a big green alien from outer space. He's all like 'Take me to your leader' and I'm like, "I'm the leader, what can I do for you?' Then he's like 'I want to build a refueling station at Jupiter and I can pay the Earth Leader for it.' Then, I was like 'Not so fast, before we even talk about deals, I need a super cool treehouse, that's fit for a king, because I am one.' So, he's like 'No problem, I can have it done before breakfast. What exactly did you have in mind?' So, I drew out the plans for this place, and he checked them over and said, 'Wow, these plans are so cool it might take me until lunch.' So I was like…" and then I did my best to imitate Dad's captain Picard voice "Make it so."
At this point, I had to pause to catch my breath. "And so here it is! Wait until you see the rest of it."
I think my father was in a state of shock or something, he just stared at me while I talked. Then, "There's more?! This room is huge, how big is this place? Spaceship? A green alien? Jupiter?" Then his eyebrows shot up, "How much did he pay for Jupiter? That's where you got all that money, it wasn't a gaming company dividend… Tim. "You can't just sell Jupiter for a few thousand dollars."
I smiled, "Exactly! I held out for a partnership deal! We're equal partners in the refueling station. It'll be operational in about 8 months. He's fronting the capital outlay for construction, but I'll be paying for half of that from a percentage of the revenue stream. Once that's covered, I get half of the net profit, in perpetuity."
"Revenue stream… in perpetuity… How old are you, and what have you done with my son?" He was shaking his head in disbelief, but there was a smile there, too. I mean this was practically Trekkie heaven. How could he not be smiling?
I stood up again, and gestured toward one of the doors, "Why don't we both sit down in the dining room, and I'll tell you everything. Would you care for a cup of coffee? It's one of the most popular products I've introduced through my galactic trading enterprise."
He just stared blankly. He was completely speechless. I took his hand and led him through the doorway into the dining room. Dad sat down at the table, and I sat across from him. A small tray floated over with a steaming mug of coffee, with a splash of milk and a teaspoon of sugar, just the way he always made it. He just stared at it like it was a flying dragon, instead of just a flying serving tray with a cup of hot coffee, with an identical but smaller mug of hot chocolate for me.