“Yes, boss.”
They dragged me out. In the corridor Fatty said, “Let’s untie his feet and make him walk.”
Skinny said, “Shaddap.”
Peewee was just inside the entrance panel but didn’t move, so I guess she had had another dose of that blue-light effect. They stepped over her and dumped me. Skinny chopped me on the side of the neck to stun me. When I came to, they were gone, I was unstrapped, and Peewee was sitting by me. She said anxiously, “Pretty bad?”
“Uh, yeah,” I agreed, and shivered. “I feel ninety years old.”
“It helps if you don’t look at him-especially his eyes. Rest a while and you’ll feel better.” She glanced at her watch. “It’s only forty-five minutes till we land. You probably won’t be disturbed before then.”
“Huh?” I sat up. “I was in there only an hour?”
“A little less. But it seems forever. I know.”
“I feel like a squeezed orange.” I frowned, remembering something. “Peewee, I wasn’t too scared when they came for me. I was going to demand to be turned loose and insist on explanations. But I never asked him a question, not one.”
“You never will. I tried. But your will just drains out. Like a rabbit in front of a snake.”
“Yes.”
“Kip, do you see why I had to take just any chance to get away? You didn’t seem to believe my story-do you believe it now?”
“Uh, yes. I believe it.”
“Thanks. I always say I’m too proud to care what people think, but I’m not, really. I had to get back to Daddy and tell him . . . because he’s the only one in the entire world who would simply believe me, no matter how crazy it sounded.”
“I see. I guess I see. But how did you happen to wind up in Centerville?”
“Centerville?”
“Where I live. Where ‘Junebug’ called ‘Peewee.’ ”
“Oh. I never meant to go there. I meant to land in New Jersey, in Princeton if possible, because I had to find Daddy.”
“Well, you sure missed your aim.”
“Can you do better? I would have done all right but I had my elbow joggled. Those things aren’t hard to fly; you just aim and push for where you want to go, not like the complicated things they do about rocket ships. And I had the Mother Thing to coach me. But I had to slow down going into the atmosphere and compensate for Earth’s spin and I didn’t know quite how. I found myself too far west and they were chasing me and I didn’t know what to do … and then I heard you on the space-operations band and thought everything was all right-and there I was.” She spread her hands. “I’m sorry, Kip.”
“Well, you landed it. They say any landing you walk away from is a good one.”
“But I’m sorry I got you mixed up in it.”
“Uh . . . don’t worry about that. It looks like somebody has to get mixed up in it. Peewee . . . what’s he up to?”
“They, you mean.”
“Huh? I don’t think the other two amount to anything. He is the one.”
“I didn’t mean Tim and Jock-they’re just people gone bad. I meant them-him and others like him.”
I wasn’t at my sharpest-I had been knocked out three times and was shy a night’s sleep and more confusing things had happened than in all my life. but until Peewee pointed it out I hadn’t considered that there could be more than one like him-one seemed more than enough.
But if there was one, then there were thousands-maybe millions or billions. I felt my stomach twist and wanted to hide. “You’ve seen others?”
“No. Just him. But the Mother Thing told me.”
“Ugh! Peewee . . . what are they up to?”
“Haven’t you guessed? They’re moving in on us.”
My collar felt tight, even though it was open. “How?”
“I don’t know.”
“You mean they’re going to kill us off and take over Earth?”
She hesitated. “It might not be anything that nice.”
“Uh . . . make slaves of us?”
“You’re getting warmer. Kip-I think they eat meat.”