Watch the Skies

Chapter 35

I’D LEFT LUCKY at the house with Mr. Gout-but one of the bigger problems with the telepathically adjusted is that, while they’ll do what you tell them to do, they generally won’t do what you’ve forgotten to tell them to do. Like taking the dog for a walk.

By the time I got home, poor Lucky was practically putting on a Number 5-style disco dance.

Since Mr. Gout had been diligently alienproofing the house for the past twenty-two hours, following the blueprints Dad had given him, I told him to go take a nap. Then I materialized a collar and leash and took Lucky for a much-needed stroll.

I don’t know if you have a dog, but it’s a real responsibility. I mean, they need to be fed, and they need to be walked, and if they make a mess on the sidewalk, you need to take care of that too.

Lucky seemed great and all, but I quickly decided that-after holding him back from chasing his third squirrel, and two neighbors’ cats before that-until I had completely crossed every alien off The List, I couldn’t possibly let myself be a dog owner.

Emma was going to kill me, but she and everybody knew that my responsibility here-to safeguard the Earth from a deadly alien scourge-was more important than providing a happy home for one dog. How did Mr. Spock put it? The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.

Especially when “the one” is a squirrel-chasing, cat-hating, car-barking, sidewalk-dookying dynamo of energy incapable of walking in a straight line.

And nearly incapable of being coaxed into a two-seater Ferrari-which is what I had to do… to make the four-mile drive to the local SPCA.

Chapter 36

I PARKED MR. GOUT’S Ferrari in front of a stenciled, rust-streaked OFFICE sign on the side of the first building we came to at the SPCA, not more than a mile from the TV transmission station we’d visited last night.

Lucky cowered on the passenger-side floor as I got out of the car and went around to open his door.

“Come on,” I said, patting my legs in encouragement. “Come on, boy!”

He was having none of it. I conjured a te

“Can I help you?” she asked.

She looked like Jane Goodall, that woman who studied apes in Africa, and she reminded me of somebody else I knew too, though I couldn’t quite remember who.

“Um, we found a stray. No collar or anything, so -”

“Don’t want him yourself?”

“I, um… my family is away a lot, and I have a full-time job, and -”

“Must be some job,” she said, glancing disapprovingly at the Ferrari. “Bring him inside, and you can fill in some paperwork.”

“Come on, Lucky,” I said, materializing two more bacon bribes as the caretaker turned her back.

“You’ll just need to fill in where you found him, and anything you’ve noticed about his health. I take it his hair was already singed before he made your acquaintance?”

“If you’re thinking I-I mean, there’s no way I -”

“A half dozen pups have come in these past few weeks with burns worse than that. I’ve called the police, but they say they haven’t been able to find anything. I’ll tell you, there’s something very strange going on in this town. The way the dogs here bay all night, always in the direction of Old Man Wiggers’ farm -”

“Old Man Wiggers’ farm?”

“Right over that ridge,” she said, pointing back into the woods. “I thought the crazy old coot had retired from farming, but, given the amount of noise he’s been making, I guess he’s reconsidered. Been driving the dogs and me crazy. Bulldozers, loudspeakers-I’d swear he’s even been blasting with dynamite back there,” she said, rubbing her eyes.

I glanced down at Lucky, who had finished his treat and was looking back up at me, tail wagging like crazy. “So, I, um, can just leave him with you?”

“This is the pound, and he’s a stray, right?” Her penetrating blue-eyed stare was making me really nervous, like she was grokking my thoughts.

“You want to know what our euthanasia policy is, don’t you?”

I nearly swallowed my Adam’s apple. I was going to have enough trouble explaining this scenario to Emma and the gang without having to confront the fact that Lucky might get put down.

“The only thing we do to animals here is vaccinate, spay, or neuter. We hope they get adopted-because any dog will have a happier life with a loving forever home all its own-but we don’t kill here.”

“You ship them off someplace for that?” I said, tears welling. Forget “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one”-what kind of an alien monster was I?

“Any animal that comes here gets food, shelter, and veterinary care for the course of its natural life.”

I nearly leaped across the counter and kissed her. I suddenly realized who she reminded me of: my alien grandmother, Blaleen. Another great lover of animals, although Blaleen was more into elephants than dogs.

This woman had also just reminded me that you humans can be about the best, most compassionate beings that have ever inhabited this particular dimension.

Chapter 37

OF COURSE, THE first thing Emma asked when I returned to the house was where Lucky was.

“Um,” I said.

“Where is he?” she repeated.

Now my family and the rest of the gang were giving me subzero stares too.

“Well,” I said, materializing a piece of bacon on top of Emma’s left shoulder and telekinetically pushing open the kitchen door behind them.

Next thing we knew, Emma was pi

“Lucky! Stop!” she laughed as I mentally placed some bacon in her pockets. “You’re tickling me!”

In the end, of course, I hadn’t been able to go through with it. I mean, I’m sure Lucky would have had a good enough life there at the SPCA, but I also knew what my grandmother would have thought of it, to say nothing of my friends and family.

“So I learned some interesting things today,” I said.

“For starters, Dana, I need you to check out current and historical satellite maps of the area. There’s a farmstead belonging to a Jarrod B. Wiggers a couple clicks east of where we were last night. I want you to scan recent images of the property to see what’s changed there over the past few weeks.

“Emma and Willy, I need you to check Mr. Gout’s handiwork here at the house and assess any weak points. We need the defenses to be tighter than a Tinkertoy in case any aliens decide to pay us a visit. Oh, and speaking of Mr. Gout, I sent him home.”

“So you just let him go back to being a scumbag landlord?” asked Dana.

“Well, I did give him one slight adjustment-I implanted a firm rule in his head that from this day forward he must be kind to his tenants and never charge them a pe

“Mom, Dad, and Brenda,” I continued, “please walk the neighborhood with Lucky and keep an eye out for anything strange, okay? I don’t think Number 5’s going to try anything just yet, but we know he’s capable of surprises.

“And Joe, I need you to come with me to the van. We’ve got some theoretical physics equations to work through.”

“Does it involve Avogadro’s theory of spontaneous taco creation?” he asked hopefully.

“I think there are some Cool Ranch Doritos left in the back,” I said.

“That’ll do,” he said.