Bartlet Goes To Mars by Stuart Atkinson

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He looks like he's about to - "

But it was too late. Scared beyond words, Lewis Murry threw up.

And as the room echoed to the sound of a dozen camera shutters recording in full colour the vomitous mass spattered on the front of the President's shirt, Toby Ziegler knew that the headlines were the least of his problems. He could almost sense the cartoonists and satirists and talk show hosts wringing their hands at the prospect of renaming the President "Barf-let"...



An hour later, after donning a fresh shirt and washing himself clean in a secured locker room, Bartlet was back wandering around the second grade Art Class, commenting on the pictures and models its students had proudly prepared for him as part of their topic on "Space". Of course, almost every one of his aides had advised him to return to the Whitehouse and cut short his visit, fearing more damage would be done to his image, but Bartlet knew the damage had been done. He also knew - even without his wife reminding him of it - that the kids would have been crushed, so he remained, agreeing with her that he might as well stay and enjoy himself. And besides, the kids had worked so hard. Who was he to ruin the biggest day of their young lives?

And so he wandered, and mingled, and looked. Many of the pictures were very similar, featuring one or two dull brown or grey circles on an inky black background dotted randomly with white splodge stars. But reaching one table Bartlet stopped, his attention grabbed by a painting that stood out.

"That's pretty," Bartlet said, peering over the shoulder of a young girl identified by her chest badge as "Lisa". In contrast to those he had seen before, the sheet of paper spread out on the desk in front of Lisa was painted with brightly coloured circles of various sizes. Some had exotic hoops and rings around them, others appeared to be mottled, like bruises. Others bore craters, with sharp, raised rims. The background was decorated with five pointed stars, but they weren't just scattered over it randomly; Bartlet recognised the familiar outlines of the Plough, Orion and Cassiopeia, several of his favourite constellations. He smiled when he also noticed, tucked away in the bottom left corner of the page, a silvery flying saucer, carrying its ET-like occupant towards a flaming Sun with a smiley face.

"It's not finished yet," Lisa said seriously, staring at her picture with a frown, "I think it needs more stars." She looked up at Bartlet with huge, brown eyes. "Do you think it needs more stars?"

Bartlet shook his head. "I think it's fine just as it is Lisa, unless you want to put Cygnus on there - "

"This is the winter sky," Lisa huffed, looking up at him, and added, actually shaking her head as if she was scolding him, "you can't see Cygnus in winter; it's a summer constellation." And with that she turned away from him, grabbed a yellow crayon and continued to add detail to one of her planets, blanking him completely.Taking a deep breath, Bartlet moved on. He knew when he was out of his depth, or beaten.