SUNNYDALE, 1953

The students stood in wait. Their mayor was about to address them, and boy, were they keen on him!

"I sure do like Mayor Dick Wilkins, Junior!"

"He's almost as neat a mayor as Dick Wilkins, Senior!"

"Well, I think he's just even neater. Where's Jane got herself at?"

"Well, three months ago me and Jane had that terrific weekend date when her folks--weren't home-- but now she says she has to go away for six months."

"Those girls and their six-months sabbaticals. I saw my old girlfriend taking care of her younger cousin during one of them. He really kind of looked like my younger cousin, now that I think about it."

Now, all fell silent, as good American students always have, and always will, as their great Mayor entered the stage. He had news, though, that just wasn't great at all.

"Our red-blooded yet still mostly-segregated fighting men have fallen near Los Angeles. The dirty, filthy and possibly socialist Martian war ships have even shrugged off our terrific nation's ultimate weapon of pure peace--The Atomic Bomb!"

"No Fiddlin' Way!"

"Not The Big A!"

"We didn't even get to use it in Korea!"

The one true Mayor--for about the last half-century, anyway--held up his arms.

"But I say--The Valley Of The Sun---eerrr, I mean Sunnydale is a different place! By Gosh and Thunder, are we gonna let those Martians win?"

A humming was heard behind the crowd, and then a light seen. The Martian ship disintegrated everyone, except the Mayor, who had the Claw of Somebody-or-other for protection. He stood up, arms on his hips.

"Well, that was just rude! I could see their skeletons and everything. I mean, isn't it bad enough to have to see that sort of thing when vampires die?"

Curious, the Martians sent out a telescoping probe to directly view the Mayor. But at that moment, ash from the good citizens of Sunnydale blew into their Mayor's nose.

"AAAAHHH----CHOOOO!!!"

Wilkins looked on in horror at the tri-colored lens, now all covered in his--substance. It withdrew into the craft, and the ship pulled away. Wilkins cried out.

"Wait, I'm sorry! We're not all unsanitary!"

SEVEN DAYS LATER

Doctor Clayton Forrester, point scientist in mankind's effort against the Martians, shook Wilkins' hand.

"Mister Mayor, from your account, I am now certain that it was your sneeze that introduced the germs to the Martians that wiped them out. Must have been a nasty flu, too. We tried to keep the bodies for study,  but they dissolved entirely. Just as well. Who knows if they could have somehow regenerated themselves, given enough time?"

It was that damned Master, Wilkins thought. He just haaaddd to wish the Plague of Porionas on him, just because Dick deported his barrier-eating demon. The man didn't have papers. Now, Dick realized, his human germs were responsible for a genocide. No one, he thought, should have to die that way. Other ways, but not that way.

"Tell me, Doctor Forrester, we will one day be headed out there?"

"Oh, yes. Mister Mayor, we will one day have restaurants, housing, amusement parks--maybe even drive-in movie theatres in space."

Now that last part caught Dick's attention.

"Movies in space? When might we have that?"

Forrester looked distant as he spoke.

"In the not-too distant future..."