Footfall

One hell of a guilt trip. “Or maybe there were pictures of the Predecessors,” Wes said. “Maybe they were destroyed as blasphemous, in the period when they thought the Bussard ramjet diagram was the shape of a Predecessor.”

“Perhaps,” Arvid said.

“And then-excuse me,” Dmitri said. He spoke rapidly in Russian. After a while the Russians moved away to their own corner, leaving Wes Dawson alone again.

They don’t trust me. I might do something to warn the aliens. At least I have a few answers. I need answers!

Nat Reynolds could remember exactly when he got into trouble. It started the second morning after the aliens blew up Cosmograd, ending the science-fiction convention where he was guest of honor, and stranding him in Kansas City . He was sitting in Dolly Jordan’s breakfast room, with good coffee and eggs sunny-side up, trying to think of what to do now that all the stories about alien invaders were turning bloodily obsolete.

Why couldn’t it have been Wells’ martians? We’d have had ’em in zoos inside of twenty-four hours.

“There’s somebody here to see you,” Dolly Jordan had said. She set another plate and a coffee cup at the table.

Nat looked up with irritation. Someone he’d met at the OZcon? But the man Dolly led into her breakfast room didn’t have the look. He was too old (although there were older science-fiction fans) and too well dressed (although some fans dressed well), and what was it? He just didn’t have that sensitive fannish face.

“I’ve looked all over for you,” the man said. “Hah. You don’t remember me, do you? I’m Roger Brooks. Washington Post.”

You’d think the press would know by now: no science-fiction writer can be expected to function before noon. Nat shook his head. “I have a lousy memory.”

“It’s all right. Mind if I sit down?”

“Dolly already set a place for you.”

Brooks sat. Dolly appeared with a coffeepot. She was plump and cheerful, and smart enough not to chatter in the morning. After she filled Brooks’s cup, she went back to the kitchen, leaving them alone.

“Why were you looking for me?” Reynolds asked.

“Because you probably know where the government is.”

Reynolds shook his head in confusion.

“Just before the aliens arrived, all the science-fiction writers vanished,” Brooks explained. “At least all the hard science-fiction writers did.”

“Oho!”

“You do know something.” Brooks leaned forward eagerly. “What?”

“Nothing real,” Nat said. “A month or so ago, Wade Curtis called. Asked where I’d be when the aliens arrived. When I told him I’d be Guest of Honor at OZcon, he changed the subject.”

“And that’s all?”

“Yeah. Wade wouldn’t ask me to violate that kind of promise. What’s this about the government?”

“The President left Washington two hours after the aliens blew up Kosmograd,” Brooks said. “By yesterday morning, the Cabinet and most of the Pentagon brass were gone.” Brooks shrugged. “No stories left in Washington . Nobody there knows what’s happening.”

“So you came looking for me?”

“Yeah.’ The writers vanished a couple of weeks ago. Then just before the aliens arrived, the President sent an important intelligence officer to Colorado to talk to them. I figure that’s where the government went, to Cheyenne Mountain. Kansas City’s on the way.” Roger sipped his coffee. “When the hotel said you’d left with the whole SF convention, I took a chance and came to the chairman’s house.”

“Sorry you went to so much trouble for nothing—”

“Maybe not for nothing,” Brooks said. “Look, the writers are in Cheyenne Mountain , I’m sure of it. You were invited. You have the invitation, I have a press pass and a VW Rabbit diesel with more than enough fuel to get there. Want to pool our resources?”

I don’t have any invitation to Cheyenne Mountain . I was booked at the OZcon, so I wasn’t invited. All I had to do was say so!

And I always sign too many book contracts. I have trouble saying no. If I were a woman I’d be pregnant all the time.

Reynolds stood at a second-story window at Collins Street . The apartment building was separated from the street by a wide grassy strip. The buildings were old brick, with a new McDonald’s just down the block.

They were in Lauren , Kansas , somewhere near Topeka . He’d never been in the town before, and didn’t want to be here now, but there wasn’t much choice, because while they were driving across Kansas the sky erupted with paper airplanes carrying baby elephants.

He’d met Carol North at the convention, and his address book showed she lived in Lauren , Kansas . They’d gone to her apartment. We could have kept on driving. There can’t be that many aliens. They can’t be everywhere…

Instead they’d parked in an underground lot and waited.

The invaders came.

A ceremony, Reynolds thought. It even makes sense. Humiliating, but it makes sense. And once they’ve put you through that, they leave you alone.

What do they want?