Trespassers: a science-fiction novel (21 page)

Two rooms away, Stewart was fast asleep. Few things were as comforting to Stewart as the certainty that he could close his eyes at night and find a whole new day waiting in the morning. Stewart was no stranger to these overnight rooms. He had spent many nights here
—
not that there was anything wrong with his house, and not that he didn
’
t enjoy gazing out his back window at the night sky. His house had a great view, with a large balcony off the master bedroom. Stewart had selected a house located on the outer edge of the optimal cone of entry, with a view that faced
away
from all the alien activity.

When Stewart was away from work, he often switched his cell phone off and unplugged the landline. He shed his work just as he shed his work clothes. He enjoyed spending time in the pool, which was located just below the master-bedroom balcony and which shared the same alien-free view of the night sky.

His Limestone paycheck easily covered the house, the pool, a few fine cars, and a reasonable savings. It would cover a family as well. His wife wouldn
’
t have to work and could focus on bringing up their children. That
’
s the way he would want it. But he didn
’
t have a wife or any children. There had been girlfriends, and a few tried to stake a claim on him, his house, and his pool. But he wasn
’
t allowing that. He knew he wasn
’
t emotionally available .
.
. not for the time being, anyway. He pretended that he couldn
’
t put his finger on the reason .
.
. because he didn
’
t want to face the reason. Could it be the same reason he selected a home in just such a location with just such a view? It could be.

Down the hall from Stewart
’
s overnight room, Web
’
s room was vacant. Instead of counting sheep or sawing logs, Web was wrestling with static interference. He was hunched over the workbench in the lab, watching static electricity scramble the signal his transmitter was trying to broadcast. The static was from the coils being too close together. He hadn
’
t anticipated that. He was going to have to redesign several key components. Hell, he was going to have to rearrange the entire thing. So far, nothing was functioning up to par. He pushed himself away from the table, took a breath, and regrouped.

He knew he could master this. The only enemy was that ticking clock. If this was going to work, he needed to have the decoy heart signal ready
before
the trespassers picked up the real heart signal. Web heard the words of his old physics professor in his head,
The quickest way to do something is to do it right the first time
. Professor Schneider was by far his least favorite teacher, but he was always good for an inspirational quotation. And the professor was right. Web had no intention of chasing his own tail. It was back to the drawing board and time for some better ideas.

Once Web saw the prototype finally heading in the right direction, he suddenly felt an avalanche of weariness. He thought his watch was wrong when the hands showed 4:21. But then it made sense, and it explained the heavy eyes and the involuntary nodding. The final details of this creation would have to wait until morning. And he hoped the light of day would show it to be as sound as it seemed in the stupor of night. He stumbled down the hall and off to his room, falling dead asleep the instant his head hit the pillow.

The farmhouse was alive with activity. Dexim buttoned the sleeves on a borrowed shirt. The mirror told him it was a good fit. Fashion wasn
’
t Dexim
’
s immediate concern, though. He had a list of priorities in his mind, and he could see them as if they were written on a blackboard:

1. Tobi .
.
. needed a clean bill of health. He couldn
’
t have a team member turning into a liability. Without a doctor among them, Dexim would have to rely on Lyntic to administer a field exam.

2. Breakfast .
.
. they would be no good without fuel. There must be something to make in the kitchen downstairs.

3. Heart-signal tracker .
.
. that would be their guide. It needed to be operational.

Tobi unwrapped the towel from his face and set it on the dresser in the blue room. He inspected his reflection in the mirror. His eyes were bloodshot, but he was still alive. That would account for the big grin on his face
—
there was nothing like surviving a night on a new planet to raise the spirits. And he had a whopper of a story to tell.
I dropped from a moving spaceship onto a foreign planet without a speck of vaccine.
I held my breath to the nearest house, doused myself in bleach, wrapped my face in a towel, and got an injection of field serum
. The details would expand over time, but he had a solid base to start with.

Lyntic tossed a medical bag on the bed behind him.

“
Let
’
s see how you
’
re doing, this morning,
”
Lyntic said.

“
I
’
m alive,
”
Tobi replied.

“
I
’
ll be the judge of that.
”
She began laying out the tools.

“
So, you
’
re a doctor now?
”
Tobi joked.

“
Only because you
’
re a patient.
”

She located a plastic card inside the medical bag
—
a step-by-step guide to a field examination. Steps 1 through 3 guided her through the process of inspecting his pupils, his ears, and his throat, telling her to look for
symmetry of soft palate elevation
. It also told her to
test cranial nerve IX and X
, noting that
a lesion of these nerves will cause deviation of the palate
. She wasn
’
t sure what any of this meant, but what she was seeing of Tobi
’
s throat looked normal.

Next up was the reflex test. The plastic card advised her that no reflex hammer would be found in the field-exam kit
—
that obviously would have been a waste of space
—
and it advised using the handle of the scope. She took hold of his arm and, as shown in the diagram, tapped his ulnar nerve, which was commonly known in America as the
funny bone
, because of its location next to the
humerus
bone. When the first tap generated no response, she followed up with a few more tries, until Tobi felt as if he was under attack.

“
Are you sure you
’
re doing that right?
”
Tobi asked.

“
You better hope I
’
m not,
”
she said, as she took a closer look at the diagram,
“
because if I am, there
’
s something wrong with your arm.
”

Finally, Lyntic found the right spot, and the arm jumped just as it should. Tobi had been through plenty of exams in his life, but none like this. His childhood preoccupation with sports had managed to land him in plenty of exam rooms, being poked and prodded by doctors who repeatedly advised him to use his mind instead of his body.
Not everyone is cut out to be an athlete
, they would say, some deflating his bubble more gently than others. He didn
’
t remember any of them placing the stethoscope on his
right
pectoral muscle to listen to his heartbeat, though.

“
Over here,
”
he said to Lyntic, as he tapped the left side of his chest. She slid the stethoscope over.

“
Oh that was dumb,
”
she admitted.

The comfort he felt in her presence reminded him of home. And he couldn
’
t deny the qualities that made most men head over heels for her
—
the shape of her slender muscles, the way she moved, the way her hair fell across her shoulders. He knew why it drove men crazy, and it would have had the same effect on him back in his school days. But marrying his wife did something to him. It changed him in all the best ways. It wasn
’
t that he had been especially eager to commit himself to one girl or to forsake all others. But marriage gave him a clarity. It clicked with him in a way he hadn
’
t expected.

It was a single sentence that grabbed Tobi and reshaped his thinking
—
a sentence uttered at the end of his wedding ceremony, when the wedding official formally presented him and his new bride to the world for the first time.
Each belongs to the other
, the man said. Those words landed in Tobi
’
s mind the way no words had before. He belonged to Novina, and Novina belonged to him. It was where he was supposed to be. He had a place in the universe.

Up to that point, Tobi had always thought of life as a series of pursuits
—
chasing one thing after another. He knew the feeling of chasing sports, but he never belonged on a team. It was the same feeling he got from chasing girls during his school days, girls that didn
’
t belong to him. Then suddenly, at his wedding of all places, it occurred to him: You don
’
t pursue things that belong to you. You come home to them. Pursuit is for those who don
’
t have anything to come home to.

So, when he looked at Lyntic
’
s perfect shoulder and the way it rolled into the side of her breast, he wasn
’
t struck by an urge to pursue it. He knew it didn
’
t belong to him. Even the sight of the most beautiful girl in the world
—
which Lyntic could very well be
—
was merely a reminder of how much he loved his wife.

After Lyntic watched him close his eyes, stand on one leg, and touch his nose without tipping over, she pronounced him fit for service.

Downstairs, Jin leaned against the railing of the front porch. He waved his hand, like a lifeguard waving a swimmer back to shore. Mattie considered heeding his call like a good dog, then dropped her head and returned to sniffing the ground. Jin shrugged and rolled his eyes. When Mattie had awoken him with several tugs on his bed sheet, pleading for her morning walk, Jin had made her promise to be quick. But it seemed that Mattie
’
s idea of
quick
differed from Jin
’
s. He would allow her a few more moments.

Jin didn
’
t know much about Earth, and he knew even less about corn. But it was obvious that these tall, green stalks that surrounded the yard were close to being harvested.

“
C
’
mon,
”
he shouted and waved her in again.
“
Don
’
t make me come out there!
”
Mattie recognized these words. Over the course of her fourteen years, she had heard them on many occasions, and she knew exactly what they meant. They meant
wait there and I
’
ll be out to carry you inside
. That sounded fine to Mattie. She dropped her butt in the grass and rolled onto her side, knowing her chariot would soon arrive.

Lyntic headed downstairs to start breakfast.

Him
.
.
. the one she was trying not to think of .
.
. she wanted
him
on her mind, but it was only safe to dream about
him
when she was in another corner of the galaxy. Standing on Earth made the memories far too real. Thoughts of him always clouded her judgment. For instance, she knew it was absurd to think she would run across him during two days on Earth, but she could sense when he was about to enter a room or when he was extending his hand to hold hers. And in that same way, she was sensing that she would see him again, very soon.

Lyntic opened the refrigerator. She wouldn
’
t have to scrounge for supplies. The shelves were bulging. She removed a carton of eggs from the door and slid a tub of butter from the middle shelf. There was a familiar feel to all of this. When she and Dexim were kids, Earth felt like a second home. Whenever their father had business nearby
—
which was often
—
he would bring the family along. He liked to stay several weeks at a time, or even a month. In those days, you couldn
’
t drag Lyntic into a kitchen. It wasn
’
t until she met
him
that she developed a penchant for cooking.