Short Prose The Last Frontier David Ritchie Mother drug her foot like a bad imitation of the mummy in old scary movies. My three brothers and I howled. And her imitation of Boris Karloff's voice was so hysterical that Paul shot milk through his nose.           Shortly, there were the four brothers following Mother down the hallway, each dragging a leg and talking like Karloff. We laughed wildly as we fell against the wall and dropped right to the floor—including Mother.           We all lay there gasping for breath like just caught fish in the bottom of a boat. Someone snorted and it started us all again. I thought I wouldn't be able to get any air, like the time I dived too deep in a swimming pool and thought I would pass out before I got to the surface.           "Okay, you guys. Forget Earth. Let's go to the Planet Gary!" She put her hands in the air, the signal to pull her up, two boys on each hand.           She stepped into Gary's bedroom, put her hands on her hips and shook her head. She looked at us and rolled her eyes back 'til they were white like a zombie's and the lids fluttered.           "This planet better get itself in good order before the sun rises or all the aliens who live here will die horrible deaths!" She tried to growl, but there was still the remnant of laughter there.           She crooked her finger for the rest of us to follow to the next room.           "And here we have the Planet Paul and David. Oh, my God! Must've been a huge meteor that smashed here! Look at all the debris. And, oh, is that a polar ice cap? Funny how it looks like piles of…underwear!" Her look conveyed that we would clean this before dinner.           Mother then looked at me and jerked her head. Follow me, it meant.           "And here we visit the Planet Kevin. Looks like it has rings around it like… No, wait! That's not a ring; that's piles of stuff!"           She slowly swiveled her head to me in her imitation of that demon-possessed girl in that scary movie.           "Get me?" she said in that scary voice.           I nodded rapidly. "Yes, Ma'am."           She turned and left the room. From down the hall I heard her mumble in her best Darth Vader voice, "And they say space is the last frontier…" (David Ritchie is the Northwest Regional Vice President of the Washington Poets Association. His poetry and fiction have been widely published in the U.S. and abroad, including prior issues here and in The Animist, The Paumanok Review, Red River Review, Clay Palm, Parnassus Literary Review, ComradesUK, and Short Stories Magazine. He lives in the San Juan Islands.)