1. THE SCOUTING PARTY
by
D.W. MANNING
They've only been on Earth fourteen days, and already
the oldest "kid" is getting restless.
"I want to dance on the air." Creo demands. Creo is
tall, blonde, and beautiful by human standards. "I'm tired
of having my feet stuck on the ground all day long."
danmanning.com © dan manning 2006

2. Pike considers this and shrugs. Creo wants a lot of
things. She isn't ready to fly, and he's not ready to let
her. Not yet. She'll have to stay attached until he is
sure it is safe. It has only been two weeks and human
preoccupation with time and impatience has already seeped
inside her. "Sure," he says. "And I want a beer."
She pouts. "You're impossible."
"And you're not moving toward the fridge." He moves
his arm from side to side, indicating that she should be
out of her lawn chair and moving toward the refrigerator.
They are enjoying a Tuesday afternoon. Sycamores and
silver maples rustle in the breeze. A wind chime, hanging
from a branch near the kitchen window, rings occasionally.
Humans, Pike has come to realize, rarely take
advantage of their immense capacity to relax. He doesn't
plan on making that mistake.
It is too hot in the sun so they sit just inside the
open garage door. The refrigerator hums to itself between a
small workbench and a broken-down Coke machine. Pike likes
the sound. It mixes well with the birds and the breeze.
He likes this world. He breathes a deep sigh of
contentment.
Creo groans, gets out of her lawn chair, and gets Pike
his beer.
Pike is in his forties, overweight, and balding. His
legs hurt when he walks. He hasn't chosen the best host,
but when they arrived it was the only thing available.
They wait for Billy's bus to arrive. Two school
busses have passed so far, and the next one will be
Billy's. This is Billy's fifth day at school. He doesn't
belong in school, but Pike decided they couldn't afford to
attract attention by keeping him out. He worries about the
boy. This world is already too much with him.
Pike pops the beer open. His host's preferences are
his own, so Pike likes his beer in cans. He takes one sip
and watches Creo wander around the driveway, looking into
the overhead spaces in the boughs of the oak tree that
towers over the tiny property. Creo is tall and thin and
well built, with a slender, graceful neck and perfect
posture. She has the best host out of all of them.
Her body lends her power over the males of this
species, and she's already experimenting with its power.
She reports that the males that loiter in front of the
supermarket are very interested in her. She isn't
interested in them, because her host had preferences also.
She wants a rich man. Creo has the means to get a rich
2

3. man, although her host probably didn't have the wits to
accomplish the task alone. This is, after all, a class-
based society they find themselves in. Her head is not in
this world, and never will be in this world.
She will not fall in love with the first guy she gets
serious with, but when she does meet Mr. Right, she'll
never come back. Mr. Right will be well connected and
wealthy. She'll try to mold the poor son of a bitch,
whoever he is, and when he doesn't change into the man she
wants, she'll move on, leaving him more broken-hearted (and
broke) than any man in the history of this world.
Pike knows all this and wonders what he was thinking
coming to this world. This world is not the world he had
anticipated. It is also the world he likes the most.
The bus finally arrives, and Billy steps out of it
into the sunshine. The "child" is seven years old. He is
missing a front tooth and his grin makes Pike grin. Billy
has his backpack over his shoulder and a note from the
teacher pinned to his shirt. He runs halfway up the drive
but stops and turns to watch the bus pull away. He waves
to his classmates and then runs up to the garage.
As soon as the bus is out of sight, the childish grin
disappears and is replaced by a serious, thoughtful
expression. "We'll need to find you a mate," he says to
Pike. He drops his backpack and opens the fridge.
"Oh really?"
"Most of the other students have two parents. One
male, one female. The parents don't always cohabitate."
He grabs a beer and pops it open.
"How are we going to manage this?" Pike asks. He is
suddenly bewildered. This sounds like a lot of work. He
is hoping to study the effects of beer on the primate
metabolism for a few more months. He grabs the beer from
Billy. "You're supposed to be seven." He takes a sip from
the beer. "Seven-year-olds don't drink alcohol."
"No?" Billy gives Pike a wide-eyed innocent stare,
but Pike isn't fooled.
"No." Pike says. "Now, what about this mate? How am
I supposed to attract one?"
"You'll have to get off your fat ass and start
running." Creo says. "I've been studying it on
television. The females like them trim, fit."
"Is that so?" Pike says. "Is that how you like them?"
"I will," Creo says. "As soon as you let us interact."
"It's been two weeks." Pike says. For some reason
her impatience to interact makes him uncomfortable. Some
3

4. paternal predisposition left over from his host's
personality? He'd have to examine it later.
"We also need some 'bling-blang.'" Billy says
seriously.
Pike shakes his head. "Some what?"
"I heard it in school today. Money, jewelry, a nice
car."
"It's a social status thing," Creo says.
Pike likes his favorite world just a little less than
he did a few minutes before. "So I have to get in shape
and make some money?" He gets out of his chair. "Do I
have any running shoes?"
"In the laundry room," Creo says. "Check them for
spiders. They haven't been used in awhile."
He finds a pair of shabby white sneakers between the
washer and dryer and takes them back to the garage.
While he's lacing up his shoes, Creo says, "Why didn't
we pick a family that already has wealth and power?
Wouldn't that have been easier?"
"No." Pike says. "They'd have too many friends and
acquaintances. We'd be found out. Sometimes poor people
are already expected to be a little strange. These folks
were completely isolated. Virtually hermits."
"Oh." Creo says. "I guess that's why you're in
charge."
Pike doesn't like her sarcasm, but he lets it slide.
No reason for a confrontation. Last time had been
disastrous. But he can't let it go completely: "That's
right, I am in charge here." He stands up and takes a deep
breath. "I don't think this body can do ten miles."
"I doubt you can do ten blocks." Creo sits on the
workbench, her long legs dangling.
"Ten bucks says I can."
Creo says, "I doubt you have ten bucks, but you're on."
He tries to run. She's right. He can't go two blocks
before he is forced to stop, his sides on fire. Gasping
for air, he bends over and puts his hands on his knees.
The pressure in his brain feels like the onset of a
aneurysm.
Creo jogs up easily beside him. "I'll collect my
money when you get home."
Why hadn't he picked her host instead of this one?
"Up yours." Pike says between breaths. A term he learned
on television.
"Don't take it too hard," Creo says. "This will be
your baseline. You need a program. You need to get in
shape." She jogs away, intent on putting in a few miles.
4

5. * * *
Walking back to the house, Pike is nearly run down by
his neighbor, a man named Vernon Simmons, as Simmons pulls
his SUV into his driveway.
"Well-well-well!" Vernon says when he sees Pike
walking along the sidewalk in running shoes and shorts.
"Finally getting into shape neighbor?"
"Trying." Pike says. He's never seen this man
before, but the metabolic change in his body tells him his
host has a great dislike for Vernon Simmons. Pike knows
the man's name because his host knows the man's name. He
decides to make nice. "I've got a long way to go."
"I never thought I'd see the day." Simmons says as he
goes to his mailbox to check for mail. "Glad to see it."
"Maybe you'd like to come by for a beer some time?"
Pike says. He doesn't know why he asks, but it seems like
the neighborly thing to do. He has to start making
connections in this society somehow, whether he wants to or
not, so he decides to start close to home.
"Well that's a nice offer." Simmons says. "I might
just do that."
* * *
"No one noticed a thing, and the teacher was in my
face two times, asking me to explain things, and saying how
'amazing' my answers were. They weren't that amazing."
"What do you mean, 'amazing'"?
"I just had the right answers. That's all."
"And if no one noticed anything, why do I have a note
to go speak to your teacher?"
"Just tell them you read a lot to me when I was a
baby. It will affirm the bull-crap they feed people about
reading to children early. They seem to think it makes
some kind of difference."
Pike goes to the school the next afternoon at four.
"Your Billy has been coming up with some amazing
answers." Mrs. Devonshire says. "In fact, I've ordered
some standard metric tests to see if he's gifted," here she
smiles so wide, Pike is almost alarmed. "Possibly a
genius?"
"I'm sure he knows his metric system Mrs. D." Pike
says. "We read to him a lot when he was a kid."
"I'm sure you did." Mrs. Devonshire says. "I'm not
talking about the metric system, but the Preston Standard
5

6. Metric Exam for Gifted Students. It's the de facto
standard test for determining children."
"I see." Pike says. Billy is going to get a talking
to when he gets home.
When Pike gets home, he sits Billy down on the couch.
Pike paces back and forth on the living room floor,
mimicking a father-son talk he's seen on television.
"Son-"
Billy rolls his eyes and puts his hands up. "I'm not
your son. I'm at least fifty Earth years older than you."
"Just play along here." Pike says, annoyed. "I'm in
charge of this party, so listen up." He puts his hands
behind his back and continues pacing. "You've got to tone
down the showing off at school. And I want you to fail
that genius test they're going to give you."
"What test?" Billy says.
"Some aptitude test or whatever." Pike says. "It
doesn't matter. I don’t want you to draw attention to
yourself by acing some test."
"If I can advance a grade, I'm going to." Billy says.
He's not backing down. His seven-year-old dimples are
gone. His mouth is a straight line, grim, determined. His
water-blue eyes are steady. They make Pike uneasy.
"I suppose I can't really force you to fail it."
"You can't," Billy says. "By law, I have to go to
this crappy primate school. I swear to God, they coddle
these kids. No wonder they don't know anything when they
graduate. It's monkey school."
* * *
Pike walks every day, progressing after a few weeks to
a slow jog. He makes it one mile, half a mile more, then
two miles. He stops drinking beers and starts drinking
water. He loses weight. He has more energy.
They take their breakfasts together. "What did this
fat-ass do before we took over?" Pike wonders about his
host. He has recently taken a job at a retail outlet, and
is now managing a shift. "How could he live like this?"
He looks around the dingy house and knows he is already
doing better.
"Lots of them do," Creo said. "Look at this magazine.
Says there's an obesity problem."
Billy says, "Are you sure we picked the most advanced
species here? Couldn't we have been dolphins?"
Creo holds up her hands and wiggles her thumbs.
"Opposable thumbs. Can't beat 'em."
6

7. "We could have been monkeys," Pike grumbles, pouring
another bowl of Rings. "They don't have these obesity
problems."
"No written language," Billy says, without taking his
eyes off of the financial section of the paper. "It would
be boring."
"I'm not comfortable with these social requirements.
Why should we have to jump through all of these hoops?
Couldn't we stay here? This isn't so bad."
A few days later, Billy announces that he will handle
the money situation. "It's all right here," he says,
pouring over the stock market prices in the newspaper while
slurping down cereal. "Like this stock right here," he
circles it with a red crayon. "It's going to double within
two days, guarantee it."
"How do you know?" Pike asks, intrigued.
"I can see the good ones. The good ones stand out."
He points to each stock with his finger as he says, "This
one and this one and that one there is going to be huge."
"Huge?"
"Huge." He turns to the front of the business
articles. "These two companies are filing for bankruptcy,"
he says. "A week ago, this third company was considering a
merger . . ."
They buy a computer on credit and subscribe to a dial-
up connection to the Internet. That afternoon, after his
run, Pike opens an online brokerage account with the credit
card he finds in his host's wallet. He turns the account
over to Billy.
* * *
It is fall now and Pike is in the garage doing his
last set of presses on the weight bench he has recently
purchased. Creo is back from her dance class, where she
claims she can walk on air. "It's close anyway," she says.
"The leaps are fun. The instructor is a hottie."
"What's our next step?" Pike asks. Although in this
society, a forty-year-old man would never take advice from
a nineteen-year-old wisp of a girl, Creo is still the
brains of the outfit, although Pike is the leader.
"Prestige." Creo says. "We have no prestige living
in this shack."
"I'm not sure we'll be able to buy prestige." Pike
says. "I think I read that somewhere."
7

8. "It takes a lot of money." Creo says. "That's a
prerequisite. We might want to join a church, you know, to
do some networking. They have lots of cults around here."
"We could do that." Pike says. "Spot me."
* * *
A few months later Billy buys three properties. He
wants to move and rent out the shack, but Pike forbids it.
Pike enters his first marathon, and is on the fundraising
committee at the church. Billy is class president. Creo
burns all of Pike's NASCAR tee shirts. Creo begins seeing
her dance instructor's father, a divorced CEO of a major
fiberglass manufacturing company.
"I think we're almost there." Billy says, sipping
champagne. Although he's chronologically seven years old,
he has a taste for champagne.
"No we're not." Creo says flatly. We're not even
close."
Billy frowns. "Now why do you say that?"
Creo is getting ready for her date. She has become
like a charm for her rich boyfriend, attending high society
functions downtown for the third week in a row. "We are
new money", she says.
Billy doesn't understand. The money has been rolling
in. Pike knows exactly what she's saying. He smiles as she
explains it to Billy.
"It's like a club," she studies her reflection to put
silver earrings in her newly pierced ears. "We might have
money, but we'll never be like, I don't know, the Kennedys
or anything. We'll be just another moderately well off
family."
"Why couldn't we be Kennedys?" Demands Billy.
"According to my plan, we should accumulate, with our real
estate ventures alone—"
Creo sighs. "It doesn't matter how much we
accumulate," Creo explains in a tired voice. "We're new
money. We're not old money. No amount of real estate or
money is going to change it. We'll just be considered
hillbillies who got lucky. Bumpkins."
"Bumpkins?"
Outside, a car horn beeps once.
"That's what I said," Creo makes her way to the door.
"I got to go."
She exits, comes just short of adding a "ta-ta" and
finger wave, and she runs out to the Lexus in the street.
8

9. "Why doesn't that boy ever come in when he picks her
up?" Pike says. He'd like to meet the guy who's probably
screwing his first officer.
Billy sits at the kitchen table pouring over real
estate listings. He grips his cell phone in one green
tentacle. He says, "Bumpkins?"
Pike notices the tentacle. "For God's sake Billy, put
that damn thing away."
"There's nobody here but us chickens." Billy says,
grinning. He gently puts the phone down and the slimy
green appendage disappears under the table.
"I don't want to see that again. Do you understand?"
"Yes sir." Billy says. He changes the subject. "I'm
thinking of investing in a REIT with some of the guys in my
investment club. What do you think?"
Pike backs toward the kitchen. "I have no idea what
you're talking about. I'll be in the garage. Just keep
doing what you're doing."
He sits down in his lawn chair with his fit body and
clear head and realizes he wants off of this planet, fast.
He's never felt more alone. Billy will crunch numbers
until early morning. Creo is out with her boyfriend. She
probably won't come home at all.
His two crew members alarm him. Their pursuit of
whatever it is they're chasing consumes them. He has
suggested they study this race scientifically. The medical
knowledge they could impart would change everything.
Everything. But Creo and Billy don't listen to him. They
don't care. They are busy with their selfish pursuits.
Why does Pike want to help these primates when it
wouldn't advance the mission? Is he also looking for this
"prestige" Creo keeps yammering about? Does he want to be
a savior to these hapless primates? Is he looking for a
big payday like Billy? Why is he working so hard to become
fit?
He releases a tentacle and holds it in front of his
face, regarding it like something from another world he's
never seen before. Go back home?
He looks over at the refrigerator, standing like a
steadfast soldier, humming its marching dirge, keeping the
beers cold. Pike hasn't given up the beer. He's just
switched to microbrews and designer beers. The guys at the
gym call it Fu-fu beer. Pike has lost forty pounds of fat
and replaced some of it with muscle. He's getting serious
with Sandra, who he met at the gym. He has to do a little
mind-trick to keep her from noticing anything unusual about
9

10. him. The mating on this planet is fantastic. If for
nothing else, he could stay for that.
A wave of despair finds him as he sits in his lawn
chair. The team is wasting their opportunity here on
Earth. There has to be more than just pursuing money,
prestige, and love. There has to be more than this.
He lets his tentacle fly and curls it around the
refrigerator handle, dripping plasma. He opens the
refrigerator door.
Just then, Vernon Simmons walks in from the darkness.
He's carrying a six-pack of beer under his arm. "Saw your
light on and thought I'd take you up on that invi-" He
stops and stares, mouth open, when he sees Pike's tentacle
extended six feet and wrapped around the refrigerator
handle.
Pike jerks his appendage back and tucks it in but the
damage is already done. Vernon's eyes move from the string
of semi-translucent muck on the refrigerator door handle to
Pike and back to the door again.
"Holy sh-"
"Vernon, hold on a minute!"
But it's too late. Vernon disappears into the night.
* * *
"Well imagine that." Billy smirks, not taking his
eyes off of his computer monitor. "So he caught you with
your thing hanging out."
"Shut up Billy," Pike says. It's bad enough the
neighbor knows without Billy's sarcasm. Billy's
insubordination grows with every passing week. His success
in the stock market and real estate is making his head
swell.
"What do you think he'll do?" Billy asks.
Pike frowns. "I'm not sure."
"Well, you know what has to happen." Billy continues
to click away at his computer.
"We don't have to do that." Pike says. As much as
Simmons gets under the skin, he doesn't deserve to die.
"You know the rules." Billy looks at Pike and his
calculating eyes are cold. "We didn't come here to make
friends. We came here to scope the place out. You’ve put
us at risk."
"No one's going to believe him." Pike says.
Billy won't hear of it. "Can't have one of the
natives blabbering on about spacemen." He lights a
cigarette and takes a long, slow drag. He snaps the Zippo
10

11. shut with a flick of his wrist. "Once we hit the big-time,
people might take him seriously. The media will try to
uncover everything about us when I step into the political
arena."
"I told you not to smoke in here," Pike says.
Billy ignores him. He exhales the smoke through his
nose.
Now Pike is worried. "Political arena?" This has
gone too far. He's going to have to recall the mission.
Creo and Billy have gone over the edge and are too involved
to make rational decisions. How did he allow this to
happen? They are all seasoned scouts. What is it about
this planet that makes it so difficult to stay focused?
"I'm going to be president some day." Billy says, as
if he is talking about going to the store for milk. "They
said in school today that anyone can become president.
That might be true, but you have to have connections. You
have to have lots of money. Lots of it. Advertising,
campaigning, it all costs money. I'll have to start on the
local level first. We're going to have to move into a much
nicer neighborhood. I have some properties already on the
short list." He trails off and thinks to himself and
dreams of bigger and better things.
Pike goes to the small living room and sits down on
the old, run-down couch. What is causing them to act so
strangely? What is driving them to recklessness here on
this planet when they have been so methodical and careful
elsewhere?
And then he begins to wonder about himself. What does
he lack that Creo and Billy possess? Why isn't he himself
driven to succeed like his two colleagues?
He pulls a metal case out of the coffee table drawer.
He sets it on the coffee table. He flicks open the two
latches on either side but doesn't open the case. Kill
Simmons? No. He'll go over and talk to him first.
"A dictionary." Pike says suddenly. He goes back
into the kitchen.
"Do we have a dictionary?" Pike asks Billy. He
doubts they do. The Pike family doesn't seem very bookish.
"In Creo's room." Billy says. "What for?"
"Just looking something up."
"You're still going to take care of the Simmons
problem?" Billy says absently.
"May I remind you," Pike says, bristling, "that I am
in command here?"
"I'm sorry sir." Billy says, but Pike doubts his
sincerity.
11

12. "And don't you forget it young man."
He finds the dictionary in Creo's room, on a small
bookshelf next to the bed. The bedroom is littered with
discarded clothes and stuffed animals. A green gown is
draped over the back of her vanity chair. The vanity, a
small white table with a mirror, is littered with makeup.
A little black dress and Capri pants are draped over the
bed, which has been carefully made. Pairs of shoes are
lined up neatly in rows of six in the closet. Posters of
shirtless young men adorn the walls. The room smells of
perfume. Pike grabs the dictionary and flees.
When he goes back downstairs, Billy isn't at the
table. Billy has been leaving in the evenings, and not
coming back until dawn. For some reason, he won't say
where he is going. Pike worries that he'll hurt someone.
Billy has no love for the creatures of this world, and this
worries Pike. His cavalier attitude toward killing Simmons-
Simmons!
Pike rushes to the tiny living room, pokes his head
around the corner, and finds Billy sitting on the couch,
holding the weapon.
"What are you doing?"
"What I know you can't." Billy says. He stands up,
all four feet of him.
Pike stands in the doorway.
"Let me through Pike. You know the rules."
"Just let me talk to him." Pike says. "I'm positive
no one will believe him if he says anything."
"We can't be sure of that." Billy says. "Even if no
one believes him, he's still a threat. Maybe he'll try to
take matters into his own hands. These primates are
xenophobes. It's in their genetic makeup. You know we
can't let him run free now that he knows."
"There must be some other way," Pike says. "I order
you to store that weapon." The gun's white light pulses in
time with Billy's pulse. So far Billy has kept it pointed
at the floor. The pulsing quickens slightly.
"Let me through," Billy says.
"You'll attract police attention." Pike puts his
hands on his hips.
"This thing doesn’t leave a body," Billy says, holding
the weapon up. "Not a trace."
"I said no," Pike says.
"I should have been given command of this mission."
Billy says. "Instead, I've been cast as the offspring of a
sub-par human," he points a finger at Pike, "who was on the
public dole until we showed up."
12

13. "I told you it's better to choose a host family that
doesn't have a lot of connections." Pike said.
"I don't agree with you." Billy says. "We should
have taken wealthy hosts. Wealthy people can be snotty and
moody and no one questions it. Rich people have big
estates with plenty of room and plenty of privacy."
"Still," Pike says, "people would catch on."
"So what?" Billy says. He puts the weapon back in
the metal case.
Pike releases a breath he's been holding.
Billy says, "Nobody pushes rich people around. Plus,
the interactions I've had at school indicate that these
apes hardly know themselves, much less each other. Every
human is wrapped up in themselves; they barely have time to
notice others."
"Are you through?" Pike asks.
"I suppose." Billy says. "I just wish you would have
thought this through before you stranded us with this loser
family. It's going to take years to get where we need to
be."
"And where's that?" Pike asks.
Billy, little "seven-year-old" Billy, looks up at Pike
like he's lost his wits. "You just don't get it do you?
Money talks on this planet. Bullshit, yours in particular,
walks."
Pike watches his diminutive colleague stalk out of the
room. He hears the refrigerator door open. He hears Billy
drink milk from the carton. The refrigerator door closes
and then the back screen door opens with a squeak and
closes with a bang.
Pike picks up the weapon, tucks it in his belt, covers
it with his shirt, and goes next door.
* * *
Pike pushes the round, lit doorbell button twice
before he hears heavy footsteps inside. The door opens and
Vernon's son, William, peers out.
"Is your father home?" Pike says. He hopes he's not.
"He's bowling." William says. He is seventeen, with
a shock of red hair, and a baseball cap on backwards. He
wears an avocado green Abercrombie & Fitch tee shirt, baggy
shorts, and flip-flops. He looks Pike up and down. "You
don't look like no alien."
"Is that what he told you?"
"He was probably drunk." William says. "There's no
such thing."
13

14. "There certainly isn't." Pike says. "The Bowl-A-Rama
on Plainfield?"
"Yea."
Outside, Pike considers it for a long time. Now he
can't eliminate Simmons without also eliminating the son.
Pike would come under suspicion immediately. No, he has to
convince the team that killing the Simmons' is not an
option.
* * *
Pike calls a meeting. It's time to lay down some
ground rules. Getting them both at the house at the same
time takes some scheduling, since Creo isn't home very
often, and Billy is busy buying, selling, making deals and
hustling.
"We can't kill Simmons, and we won't." Pike says. "I
made a mistake, but now his son knows something is going
on. I'm not killing them both. If they were going to
report us, they would have by now."
"Pike," Creo says. "If I didn't know better, I'd say
you’ve got some of your host's leftover humanity inside."
She's no longer a teenage girl. She's a mature woman.
Somehow, she's managed to accelerate the maturation
process.
Pike notices that Billy has grown at least a foot, and
put on several pounds, all of it muscle. They are now
dangerous. Creo is a predator, and Billy is depraved.
"Are you forgetting why we're here?" Billy asks.
"We're the scouting party." Pike says. "But I make
the decisions here. I'm going to report that this place
isn't right for colonization."
"That's ridiculous." Creo says. She takes a step
toward him. "You can't do that. This is perfect."
"We won't let you." Billy says. "You've lost your
mind. There's been some sort of transference from your
host's psyche. You're not thinking clearly."
Pike raises his voice for the first time since coming
to the planet. "I'm in charge here!" It isn't very
convincing.
Billy laughs. "You think. You've done nothing to
promote our situation here. Creo has made the connections.
I've made the money. You've done nothing except put us at
risk of being discovered. You have failed as a leader."
Creo is silent. Her arms are crossed. Her eyes are
shining with enjoyment as she nods her head in agreement
with what Billy is saying.
14

15. Pike has lost them. He realizes this as they file out
of the room without waiting to be dismissed. It is a
mutiny. He won't last the week if he remains.
* * *
William Scott Pike wakes the next morning, biting back
a scream. The parasite has left him. He has been gone for
a long time. He has the vague notion that he has been in a
deep hypnotic state for a long, long time.
There is searing pain from the hole in the small of
his back. An animal noise escapes him. He sucks in air,
his face squeezed in pain, his fists clenched.
"It will heal." A voice says in his head. "I
bandaged it the best I could."
He lifts his head from his pillow. At first he
doesn't believe his eyes. He's hallucinating. He closes
them, opens them, and then shakes his head; he tries to
drive the hallucination away. The thing doesn't disappear:
An octopus, or jellyfish (Pike isn't sure), floats in the
air three feet off the ground. It is translucent and
rubbery, with four disturbingly human eyes in its central
mass that watch him from slightly bulged sockets.
The pain in his back makes it impossible to do what he
wants, which is throw something at it, try to make it to
the door, and run.
"Don't be afraid." The thing says. "Your wound will
heal."
"What the hell are you?" William Pike demands, but he
knows what it is.
"You would call me a parasite," the thing says. The
voice is high-pitched and laborious, as if forming the
words is difficult. The sound doesn't travel through the
air, but forms in his head. "We've had quite a symbiotic
relationship, you and I."
"Under my arms," William Pike says. He looks at his
left ribcage. Red marks are still there, where the thing
had gripped him. He feels the marks with his right hand.
The skin is rough and almost shredded. "You were holding
on back there."
"Yes." The thing says. "Flattened against your back,
fused to your spine."
William Pike isn't the same man he was months ago. He
is thinking clearly, He is in shape. He is focused. The
creature has blended with him. It has left something of
itself behind, nestled within his psyche.
15

16. The thing says, "I figured out the reason our people
can never colonize your planet. I had to search your
dictionary for the word, but I found it."
What is this thing talking about? William Pike
wonders. Some chemical? Something in the atmosphere?
When the creature doesn't continue,
"What?" William Pike asks.
"Ambition." The thing says, and moves a tentacle, as
if to make some kind of gesture. "It is your ingrained
ambition that would tear our people apart. It is what has
torn my crew apart. Blind, senseless ambition."
"And that's it?"
"It is part of what makes you human. There is no way
to combat it. Your people would never submit to our
control."
"Did it affect you?"
"No," the thing said. It expanded slightly and then
returned to a smaller size, breathing. "I think by the
time I reached you, your will had already been broken.
Perhaps as you age, you lose your ambition. Maybe you call
it wisdom."
"What about my son and daughter?"
"It is early." The alien says. "You'll find them
both sleeping on their stomachs. It's the only way we can
sleep with any comfort. I suggest using a spatula. Should
come right off."
"Then what?"
The floating mass begins to fade. "The weapon is on
the kitchen counter."
16