The Fluiquosm, the Wulivery and the Xankatikitiki had long been associated with certain other predatory races in a League of Devourers, or Shizzalizaquosmni [SHIZzah-LIZzah-kwah-zum-nee, many-joined-eaters], which league members called simply SHLQ [sh-lok-wuh]. When engaged in joint hunting expeditions on any planet, the league was headed by a committee made up of the eldest or most powerful of each race. On Earth, this group had found the planet to be a predator’s paradise.
“Oh, it needs some work, of course,” gurgled the Wulivery chief known as Odiferous Tentacle. “Cities are not a proper venue for the hunt. The country makes prey so much more delicious. One has little food-things gathering around one’s legs, thinking one is a tree! They squeak delightfully when one seizes them up!”
The Wulivery were fond of trees, and at least partially in response to Wulivery sensibilities, the Fluiquosm and Xankatikitiki leaders had agreed to set up their headquarters near the old farm in Virginia where they had met the cabal. It was a convenient place, one kept secure by intelligence agencies who had no idea what was going on there, and the humans who kept the place under observation had been easily persuaded that they saw everything except the predators. While the signal towel flapped its continuous message of safety, while each footstep of other casual visitors was closely observed, the predators came and went without being noticed.
It was to this location that the one male and two female Fluiquosm involved in the abductions of Benita’s family brought the two young people, and later Bert himself, following his unsuccessful role as bait. Fluiquosm females often accompanied the hunters though they did not usually hunt, and in certain cases they might be sent alone, for it was the females who convinced captured prey that safe release would follow if the prey would only lie quiet. It was the females who convinced the prey it did not see what its eyes claimed to see or hear what its ears claimed to hear. In short, the females cast the veil behind which much bloody work was done, and in return for their talents, their thirsts were among the first satisfied.
The two young humans picked up in California were convinced they had seen nothing and heard nothing and needed only to sleep for a lengthy while. Though bringing them to Virginia had involved a lengthy roundtrip flight, the two Fluiquosm, Quosmlizzak and Kazzalamgah, had badly needed the exercise. They had placed breathing capsules over the noses of the boy and girl, wrapped them in egg film as protection against high-altitude winds, and during the flight had amused themselves by dangling the bodies just in front of airliners in midair, scaring the pilots witless. They did not desist until one plane lost altitude and almost crashed, which would have been a waste of blood, and therefore shameful.
Bert had also been obtained by subterfuge, though his female abductor had chosen to bring him back via commercial carrier and store him temporarily in a hotel. The airline ticket counter person, the clothing store personnel, the barber, the hotel clerk, all had been mind fogged into assisting the operation, and the Fluiquosm who had managed the trip remembered the whole process as having been great fun.
Bert had now joined the two youngsters, all three carefully cocooned in egg film and hung upright in the well-stocked larder tree where they could remain without damage for some days, until they were needed for something or, if that became appropriate, were sucked dry or eaten. Now that all the family except the woman had been brought under control, the predators assumed that Bert and the young people could be consumed immediately after the woman was in their hands.
To that end, a small but representative group of predators left the farm in Virginia and flew in a tiny shuttle to Washington, D.C., where they set themselves down in a small park not far from Benita’s apartment. The Wulivery had reconnoitered the woman’s lair during their previous attempt, and they knew it was vulnerable, though not in a way that would avoid detection. Each hunt had its rules as to number, age and type of prey, method of capture, how many points for particularly difficult captures, and so on. The rule-setter for this particular hunt had clearly stated that the woman had to be removed without any sign of violence. The prey was to be lured out with threats to the welfare of its offspring. Pistach nootchi, Xankatikitiki glafimmilox, even Wulivery vullaters would respond mindlessly to threats directed at offspring they had nurtured or borne. It was assumed human females would be the same, even though the ploy wouldn’t work on Fluiquosm themselves. Fluiquosm were without progeny pride, sometimes going so far as to drain their offspring when other blood was unavailable.