Master of Space and Time by Rudy Rucker

with exotic vegetation—very strange, as this morning we’d had nothing but crabgrass. I got back to my feet and spotted Nancy in a patch of light spilling from our living-room window. She was crouched down by a bush, eating something.
    â€œWhat are you doing, Nancy? What’s that bush?”
    â€œIt’s a porkchop bush,” she said, waving the greasy bone she’d been gnawing. “And there’s a fritter tree right next to you! You really came through for world hunger!”
    I glanced at the tree I’d bumped into. Sureenough, there were thick bunches of golden fritters hanging from its branches. I picked one and bit into it. The fritter was sweet and crisp on the outside, moist and doughy in the middle. Porkchops and fritters had been Nancy’s favorite meal when she’d been growing up in Virginia. No wonder she was out here eating.
    â€œBut where did they come from?” I asked.
    â€œI was lying in bed reading when all of a sudden—it was about ten o’clock?”
    â€œGo on.”
    â€œAll of a sudden a little box popped out of nowhere. I knew that you and Harry were up to something, so I thought it might have jewels or something precious in it. When I opened it, there were just a bunch of seeds. I was in a bad mood, so I threw them out the window and kept reading. But then a few minutes ago I heard leaves rustling and I came out here to see what it was. It’s food plants, Joey! It’s the solution to world hunger, just like you promised me. You’re wonderful!”
    â€œDon’t you want to hear about my trip?”
    â€œJust taste one of these porkchops!”
    I felt around on the porkchop bush till I found something fat. I snapped it off at the stem, a perfect little porkchop, grilled to a turn. I got myself another fritter and filled my stomach. Each fritter had a seed like a cherry pit in its center. The porkchops bore their seeds nestled against their bony stems. I pocketed several seeds of each type.
    â€œThis really is good, Nancy. And they grew in just two hours?” I looked around the yard. There were five or six of the bushes and three of thetrees. “I’m glad our trip did some good after all.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    I told Nancy about our trip to the looking-glass world, about Gary Herber, and about the parasite that had made it back to Earth. She made me show her the spot where the brain had bitten me, and she said that she hoped I wouldn’t have to get blunzed. I agreed—the idea of a big needle in the skull didn’t sound too appealing—and told her how I was worried the slugs might come after us tonight.
    Just then Serena appeared in the back door. “Wet.”
    â€œYou wet your bed, honey?”
    â€œBed wet.”
    Nancy and I went in, changed Serena, looked at our five million dollars, made sure the front door was locked, then took Serena out back for a fritter. “Taste this, Serena.”
    â€œYes,” urged Nancy. “Mommy used to like them when she was little.”
    Serena bit, chewed, swallowed, and approved. “More.”
    Just then I heard the sound I’d been half waiting for. A police siren.
    â€œNancy, I think that might be the slugs coming to get us. We better run.”
    â€œThat’s just the police, Joe.”
    â€œBut they might have been taken over by Gary-brains. Quick, let’s head for the woods.”
    â€œThere’s bugs in there, Joe, and snakes.”
    â€œPlease.” The siren was drawing closer.
    â€œOh, all right.”
    I picked up Serena, and we ran for the woods.Thick and viny, the woods came right up to the edge of our housing development. It was kind of swampy in there, and the built-up land the tract houses were on sloped down at the edge. We slid down the slope and stared back at our house.
    Sure enough, a motorcycle and two squad cars with flashing lights were pulling right into our driveway. Five cops with