“Aye, marry,” Valadrakul replied.
“What does the Empire intend, then? Have we word? Does mount an expedition to free the men, or offer ransom?”
“Nay,” said the wizard. “That lordling John Bascombe, him that they call Under-Secretary for Interdimensional Affairs, has but moments ago said that such an effort would serve no good purpose, that the people of Earth do not harm prisoners. Among themselves, the mind-readers say he fears lest Earth be affronted thereby and fight on the side of Shadow ‘gainst the Empire.”
“Think you this is truth?” Raven asked.
Valadrakul shrugged. “Who can say?”
“Think you, perhaps, that this Under-Secretary Bascombe might himself be a creature of Shadow?”
Valadrakul considered that carefully before replying, “In truth, I know not, but methinks he be otherwise. His reasoning is not valorous, yet ‘tis sound enough. Perchance he has such creatures among his counsellors, but I think he be not one himself.”
Raven nodded.
“What think you would befall,” he said, “should we free these men from durance, and bring them hither?”
Valadrakul spread his hands. “Who can say?” he said.
“Perhaps,” Raven said slowly, “Messire Pel Brown can say.”
* * * *
There was nothing on the six o’clock news Sunday evening about a spaceship, nor on the ten o’clock on Channel 5, nor the eleven o’clock; in desperation, Pel even tried CNN and CNN Headline.
“They wouldn’t have anything,” Nancy told him. “Not if the networks don’t.”
Pel protested, “Sometimes they have stuff the networks don’t. You remember the boys in Baghdad, don’t you?”
“Of course I do,” Nancy said. “And I know they break a lot of stories. But that’s different, it’s all international stuff. They wouldn’t have something like this if the networks and locals don’t.”
“I know,” Pel admitted. He put out the cat, and they went to bed.
It gnawed at them both through the night; at breakfast they were both surly, even after coffee.
Nancy spent most of the morning at job interviews, while Rachel was at her kindergarten. Pel made his Monday morning calls, but had no all-day projects or out-of-town appointments, so he was home again for lunch five minutes after Rachel’s bus dropped her off.
Ordinarily, a family lunch together was a cheerful event, but the tension still lingered, poisoning the atmosphere; Rachel wolfed her sandwich and left the table, while Pel and Nancy ate in sullen silence.
“It was a joke,” Nancy said, without preamble, as she carried her plate to the sink.
Pel didn’t have to ask what she was referring to. He shook his head. “How could it be a joke?” he asked.
“What else could it be?”
“I don’t know, but it wasn’t any joke.”
“Of course it was.”
“No, it wasn’t, damn it.”
Nancy turned to face him, hands on hips. “It had to be, and don’t you swear at me!”
“It was not a fucking joke!” Pel shouted.
“Well, then, what the hell was it?” she shouted back.
“Daddy?” Rachel said from the doorway.
“I don’t know what it was, but no goddamn joker would be able to walk through our basement wall like that!”
“It was a trick, Pel! A hologram or something!”
“Daddy?”
“You think a hologram sat on our couch drinking beer? You think a hologram would wear a velvet cape that Rachel could feel?”
Nancy had no immediate rejoinder, and as she fumed, trying to think of one, Rachel was able to get Pel’s attention by yanking at his sleeve.
“Daddy!” she yelled. “The man’s back!”
For a moment, Pel didn’t understand. Nancy was quicker; her mouth opened, then closed, and she demanded, “Where?”
“In the basement, of course.” Rachel looked as disdainful as only a little girl can. “I heard him knocking and calling for Daddy.”
That got through to Pel; he stood up so fast his chair started to topple over backward. He snatched at it and caught it before it fell, jostling the kitchen table. His coffee sloshed onto the placemat; he ignored it as he headed for the basement stairs.
* * * *
“They may be back with a court order,” Susan said. “They may even try to condemn your property and take it by eminent domain.
Amy sipped tea before replying. “Then what?” she said.
“Then I try for a restraining order, claiming their order violates your property rights and your right to due process.”
Amy glanced out the window at the thing in her back yard; it was still damp from the morning dew and gleamed gold in the sun. “Then what?” she asked.
Susan shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said. “This isn’t really my field. I’ve never done a national security case before.”
Amy shuddered slightly and put down her teacup. “Do you think it’s really a national security thing?” she said.
Susan considered carefully before answering, “I don’t know.” She took a deep breath and continued, “That’s what the Air Force people claimed, but if that thing out there is a fake, the way they say it is, I don’t see how they can make a national security claim stick.” She picked up her own cup, which contained instant coffee rather than tea. “Of course, if it’s a fake, there is the question of how it got here,” she added just before she sipped.
“It fell out of the sky,” Amy said.
Susan nodded and lowered her cup. “I know it did,” she said. “So does the Air Force; they’ve measured the thing’s mass and the effects of impact and can probably tell you exactly how far it fell and how fast it was going when it was hit. What they can’t tell you, though, is how it got up in the air in the first place, because they don’t know-and that’s what has them so worried.”
“So you think they’ll be back?”
“Ms. Jewell… Amy, I really, honestly don’t know.”
Amy accepted that and delicately sipped more tea. Susan gulped coffee.
“At least you kept them from setting up those lights,” Amy said a moment later.
Susan shrugged deprecatingly. “For now,” she said.
“Thanks,” Amy said. “I know I would never have gotten any sleep tonight with those things out there.” She hesitated, then asked, “Did you talk to any of the people who were inside it?”
“No,” Susan said. “I probably can, if you think it would help, but I haven’t yet.”
“Are they in jail?”
Susan looked at her watch. “So far, they probably still are,” she said, “but the police won’t be able to hold them for very long unless you press charges.”
“Me?”
Susan nodded. “They were charged with trespassing, vandalism, and malicious mischief-they dumped that thing on your land, smashed your hedge, ruined your lawn-you could probably claim reckless endangerment, too, since you were out there at the time. But if you don’t press charges, the cops will have to let them go. You don’t hold people without a charge, not in the U.S.”
“And if I press charges?”
Susan sighed. “None of them could give an address or show any means of support. None of them had any money or identification except for their ‘Galactic Empire’ stuff. None of them have asked for a lawyer, or used their phone privileges. They’re all staying strictly in character. You can probably get them held for a couple of weeks, at the outside, since they can’t make bond and the feds don’t want them released, but more than that…” She shrugged.
Amy put down her cup and picked up the teabag by the string, toying idly with it.
“Susan,” she said, watching the teabag, “what do you think is really going on here?”
Susan chewed her lower lip, then admitted, “I don’t have any idea.”
Amy looked up. “Do you think they could really be from some Galactic Empire?”
Susan hesitated, then said, “I don’t believe in little green men.”