"Liz," Max called again. It was hard to judge where his
voice was coming from. Max might be right next to her, or
on the other side of the diner. She couldn't wait, and
stepped out into the ally, feeling her way through the night
air even though she couldn't see anything. Her stomach
was doing flip-flops, and she had to struggle not to retch.
"Bell!" a voice called out. It was Sam's and he sounded
desperate.
* * *
"Bell!" Liz called, reaching out with her hands.
Nothing but air. Then . . . something.
But it wasn't Bell. Liz grabbed hold of something and
then suddenly realized that something was grabbing her
back.
It was hard, but alive. And Liz was immediately certain
that it wasn't human.
It felt like a claw and pulled Liz forward in a single
sharp movement. Liz felt a slight pressure on her neck,
and plunged into the darkness.
* * *
21
It took Max an instant to place the sound. By the time the
floor started to shake, he was already on his feet. He got
up so quickly that his feet got tangled in the chair. He
would have fallen if Michael had not been there, holding
on to his shoulder.
"Liz," he said, voicing his thought.
She had gone into the back. Max headed for the
kitchen at a run as the diner went dark. He banged into a
table and heard Michael and Kyle doing the same.
"Close your eyes," he heard Kyle say, and did so
immediately.
It helped relieve the nausea and the lightness in his
head—a little.
It seemed to take forever to reach the back of the diner.
Then Max's hand found the door to the kitchen and pushed it
open. Michael and Kyle were right behind him, he knew and
he pushed on. He felt the energy crackling in his hands as he
ran, fear for Liz summoning it. He would make whoever was
doing this regret they had ever come to Stonewall—if he
* * *
could see them long enough to strike at them.
The ground was shaking so hard that Max found he
had trouble keeping to his feet. Still, he felt his way back.
There were screams and the rumbling all around them
changed pitch. Something was happening.
"No!" Max said.
Then there was an odd whooshing sound, and the dark
cloud lifted. Max opened his eyes, trying to readjust to the light
in the alley. By the time his vision returned, he realized that the
rambling had stopped. In fact, the alley was deathly quiet.
And Liz was gone.
"Bell!" a frantic voice called out next to him. It was
Sam; he had a desperate look on his face.
Max knew exactly how he felt.
"Did they take her?" Sam said, his eyes wild.
Michael put a hand on the mans shoulder, and Max
knew what he had to do.
Reaching out, he cupped his hand around the back of
Sam's neck and concentrated. Slowly, the man crumbled to
the floor.
"What did you do, Max?" Michael said.
"Put him to sleep for a while, 1 think," Max said. Lean-
ing down, he touched the man's forehead.
"He's all right," Max asked.
"Liz," Maria said, from behind him.
Max shut out everything and concentrated on the prob-
lem at hand. "Michael, help me with him."
Together, they half carried, half dragged Sam into the
diner and drew the curtains.
"Maybe, we should call someone," Maria suggested as
Max and Michael drew all the blinds.
* * *
"No. No police. We don't call anyone," Max said.
There was no one to call. There was no one who could
help them—no one who could do what he had to do now.
"Isabel, I need to connect with Liz. Asleep or awake, I
need to know where she is, now," Max said, his voice tight
and controlled—nothing like the swirling mass of grief
and fear inside him.
"I'll try," Isabel said.
"No, don't try. Do it. Like you did with me when I was
in the White Room. Direct contact," Max said.
Isabel nodded and sat down in a chair. She closed her
eyes and fell immediately and deeply in to a trance. With-
out asking, Max knew that Isabel was pushing the limits of
her abilities.
A few moments later, Isabel came out of it, gasping for
breath. "I know where she is," Isabel said, taking deep
breaths. "She's not in the big room. She isn't on a table . . .
yet. Bell is there and someone else," Isabel said.
"Dawn?" Kyle asked.
"I think so." Isabel said.
"Where?" Max said.
Isabel pushed her way out of the diner and scanned the
road in the distance. "She could see outside for a second.
There was a window, or a screen."
Searching in the moonlight, Isabel pointed to a hill a
mile or so in the distance. "There, behind that hill."
Max turned to Kyle. "I need the keys to the van," he
said.
"Max, you can't," Isabel said. "It's too dangerous. You
said it yourself. Even our powers ..."
"I'm going," Max said, his tone inviting no argument.
* * *
"Then we'll all go," Maria said. Max heard steel in her
voice too. He understood. Liz was her best friend.
"No," Michael shouted. "Absolutely not."
"She's my friend," Maria said defiantly.
"Don't you get it? They only take women," Michael replied.
"So you're saying that I can't help save Liz because I'm a
girl?" Maria said, the challenge clear in her voice.
"Yes, in this instance, you can't go because you are a
girl," Michael replied. He was clearly struggling to keep in
control.
Max felt the seconds slipping away. If the ship left the
planet or even the immediate area, they would never find
it—and he would never see Liz again.
"You unbelievable, sexist—," Maria began, but stopped
herself.
"You need to stay, Isabel, and keep and eye on Maria," Max
said. "It won't be safe for either of you where we're going."
Max didn't make it an order; he had given up that right.
However, he would stop them if they tried to come. But
Isabel only nodded, and then she gave Max a quick hug.
"Come back, Max. And bring Liz with you," Maria said.
Nodding, Max turned to go. "Stay with them, Kyle," he
said.
"I'm going," Kyle said.
"We don't have time for this," Max said. "It's too dangerous."
"I know what's going on here, Max. Do you really think
your chances out there are that much better than mine?"
"He has a point, Max," Michael said.
"I can't allow it," Max said.
"Well, maybe, but you're not the King and not the boss
of me," Kyle said.
* * *
Kyle was right, but Max didn't want another person's
life on his conscience. He reached out his hand. To his
surprise, Kyle acted quickly. He leaned into Max for a
moment and grabbed the keys from Max's other hand.
Then he twisted his body away from Max. A second l
ater
he was holding the car keys.
"Nice try, Max, but I'm going. In fact, I'll drive," Kyle said.
Max felt the time ticking away. "Okay," he said, starting
down the street. The boys were immediately at a run and
reached the van quickly.
Kyle jumped in the driver's seat while Max and Michael
jumped through the side door. Before they were even sit-
ting, Kyle hit the gas and the van shot forward.
Even in his super alert and focused state, Max realized
that the van was running smoother than it had since
they'd gotten it. It also had more pickup, he noted as Kyle
accelerated quickly.
They tore down the empty road, past the place where
Dawn had been taken.
"There," Max said, pointing to the tall hill to their left.
Immediately, Kyle pulled off the road and onto the open field.
The van bumped its way through the field, bouncing
up and down. Kyle had to slow down to maintain control,
and Max felt precious seconds ticking away. Then, when
they were maybe two hundred yards from the foot of the
hill, there was a loud snap from up front, and the van
veered sharply to the left and came to a stop.
Kyle winced when he heard the snap. Something had
broken in the front end. He knew it didn't matter now. The
van couldn't take them any farther on tonight's trip.
If they succeeded in what they had to do, they would
* * *
fix or replace it. If they failed in what they had to do, they
wouldn't be needing transportation anymore. It would be
cheerfully provided by some mean-tempered aliens. And
the trip would be one-way.
"Van's toast," Kyle announced as he opened his door.
Almost as soon as they came to a stop, the three boys
had jumped out of the vehicle almost simultaneously.
Without a word, they started running for the hill at full
speed. They were there quickly, and Kyle was sure that he
had just beaten every sprinting time he had ever made on
the football team.
They started climbing the hill and were at the top in
less than a minute. Looking down, Kyle saw the ship.
There was no black cloud, no running lights. Just a large
cylinder sitting on some sort of landing struts in the rocky
field.
It looked smaller on the ground, and Kyle figured it
was maybe sixty yards across. It also looked a lot less men-
acing, but that was a dangerous illusion, he realized.
"They don't look so tough now," Michael said, echoing
Kyle's thoughts.
"We have to move quickly. Once they're in the air, we'll
never see Liz again," Max said.
"What's the plan, Max?" Michael asked.
"No plan. We just go in and hit them with whatever we
can, and we go from there," Max said.
"Looks like its about to go down on the street," Michael
said.
"And we're not leaving until it's finished," Kyle added.
Michael gave Kyle a thin smile, but Kyle could see
Michael's face setting into . .. what? His friend had had the
* * *
same look during the confrontation with Gomer. Michael
looked dangerous . . . and so did Max.
Kyle felt a rush of optimism and decided that he
wouldn't want to be those aliens in the ship right now.
"Looks like they haven't turned on the cloaking
device," Michael said.
"The what?" Kyle said.
"Whatever it is that creates the black cloud," Michael
said.
"It might be a defensive weapon, or just a by-product of
their energy source," Max said. "Let's hope we'll get close
enough to do some damage before they turn it on. Let's
go," Max said.
The boys moved quietly but quickly down the other
side of the rocky hill. The ship was less than a football
field's length from the bottom.
Kyle's heart was hammering in his chest, but not in fear.
He remembered the feeling from the big games of his high
school football career. He was "flipping the switch." That
was what they had called it on the team. Flipping the
switch was the change that came over you when you
played the game. Athleticism could get you only so far on
the field. To win, you had to turn a corner, you had to get
aggressive. Kyle felt pretty aggressive now. He felt like he
was ready for anything.
"Come on," Max said. "Let's get as close as we can with-
out giving ourselves away."
The trio had taken less than ten steps when Kyle heard
a click from up ahead. Kyle kept moving until Max's hand
went up and he said, "Stop."
Instinctively, Kyle went as quiet as possible. Something
* * *
was ahead of them, and Max was pointing to it.
There was that sound again, a high-pitched click, fol-
lowed by another one. Kyle couldn't place the sound, then
he realized he didn't like it—it sounded unnatural.
It took Kyle's eyes a moment to focus in the moonlight.
Then he saw a figure up ahead. It was tall, taller than
Michael—mabye seven feet in height. And though it was
roughly the shape of a person, Kyle immediately knew
He was looking at a monster—something out of a
nightmare that Isabel and a girl named Jessica had shared.
The color of its reptilian-looking skin was hard to make
out in the moonlight, but Isabel had called it brown and
Kyle thought that was probably right. The shape of the
head was the creepiest thing about it. The mouth was
wide, but the head was relatively narrow at the top, and it
came to a rough point in the back of the creature's skull.
The yellow eyes were hard to look at. They had a mali-
cious intelligence. And they were looking right at the three
boys.
"He sees us," Max whispered.
"Why isn't he doing anything?" Michael wondered
aloud.
"I don't think he takes us very seriously," Max replied.
Michael lifted his hand, "Well, he can take this seri-
ously."
"No," Kyle whispered back. "No fireworks or energy
balls or whatever it is that you guys do. You'll sound what-
ever kind of alarms they have. Let me take him the old-
fashioned way. It'll be quick and quiet."
Max turned his head in surprise.
* * *
"I've taken down two-hundred-and-sixty-pound defen-
sive linemen on the field," Kyle said. "If I get into trouble,
I'll call you and you can come back for me. Come on,
we're losing time."
As if to punctuate Kyle's comment, the ship began to
hum. Then a few of the exterior lights switched on. If the
ship took off...
Max studied him for a moment, "Okay. He's yours."
Turning to Michael, Max said, "We'll circle around him
and meet up at the center of the ship."
Kyle nodded and took a step toward the creature.
"Man, are you ugly," his whispered to himself.
Freshman year, the coach had decided that all the play-
ers take a karate cour
se offered by the phys ed depart-
ment, for discipline. Like most of the guys on the squad,
Kyle had not taken it very seriously, but there was one
thing the instructor had said that Kyle had remembered.
He had been showing them how to crack boards with their
hands.
"Before you strike, see your hand breaking the board. If
you can't see it, you'll never be able to do it," he had said.
This is just like the all county championships. Now there
were some scary guys, Kyle thought.
Kyle noticed the creature eyeing him with interest.
When it tilted its head, Kyle got the distinct impression
that it was amused by him and his friends. There was a
sound of footsteps from the direction that Max and
Michael had gone. The creature's head turned quickly and
scanned the area. It fixed on Max and Michael.
That was it. Kyle started running. He was less than fifty
yards from the alien and he covered the ground quickly.
* * *
As he got closer he saw that the creature was fairly
bulky up top—broad in the chest area. Its legs and lower
body were thinner. Kyle knew what to do now. When he
was only yards from the alien, he got himself ready and
fought back the revulsion he felt.
Massive upper body means a higher center of gravity, he
heard the coach say in his head. In that case, hit them low,
the voice continued.
At the last second, he threw himself forward, at the crea-
ture's lower thigh. He hit the creature with his shoulder.
The creature didn't have time to move. The alien obviously
didn't, think humans posed it a physical threat.
Then again, maybe he knows something we don't, Kyle
thought as he took out his opponent with the best hit-
and-wrap move of his post-football career. Like he learned
on the team, he wrapped his arms around the alien's rough
skin so it couldn't throw him off.
The rest was physics. The alien was going down.
He met with much less resistance than he expected.
The creature immediately fell back, and Kyle realized that
it was lighter than it looked. Though he couldn't be sure,
Kyle thought he heard a solid snap as he made contact.
Kyle and the creature went down together in a heap.