Maybe the wizards could put it all back together and get something out of it.
Even as that thought crossed his tricky mind, the president realized how forlorn that hope was. He cussed a while, really got into it, said every dirty word he knew, which was a staggering lot because he had been in politics for twenty-five years. He smacked the bulkhead with his fist, which made him wince.
Damn and double damn!
When he finally calmed down, he began to survey the size of the mess he was in. What had he said to the television people as he stood in front of Egg’s house? He remembered, all right. “I have in my hand a saucer computer that contains a formula for an antiaging drug, a Fountain of Youth drug, some call it.”
Well, he didn’t have it. That was a hard fact.
He was sitting down, trying to control his breathing, when there was a knock on the door.
“Yes.”
The door opened. It was O’Reilly.
“The air force reports that a flying saucer went into orbit from central Missouri ten minutes ago.”
The president lowered his face into his hands.
O’Reilly’s eyes went to the junk strewn on the blanket of the bunk bed. “What’s that?”
The president didn’t look up. “That pile of crap is the computer that Egg gave me. The bastard smashed it to bits.”
A wave of self-pity swept over O’Reilly. He didn’t much care if anyone else got access to the Fountain of Youth drug, but as a very high government official, he knew he was fully entitled to a prescription and had let his hopes soar. Now they came crashing down. He sagged against a bulkhead.
“So what are we going to do?”
The president gestured futilely. “We’ve got to get our hands on that saucer. Somehow, some way.”
O’Reilly had never seen the president so low. He kinda enjoyed that, but he felt pretty low too. “It’s gotta come down sometime, somewhere.”
“Yeah,” the president said. Then he added, “Maybe.” A moment passed; then he asked, “Is that saucer Solo stole from Douglas still up there?”
“Yes.”
“Well, Solo isn’t in it. He was sitting in Egg’s kitchen telling lies. Have the FBI find out if anyone is still at the Cantrell farm. For all we know, there is no one in either saucer.”
“That’s impossible!”
“And find a tame judge somewhere that will issue arrest warrants for all that bunch: Solo, Egg Cantrell, Rip Cantrell and Charley Pine.”
“What’s the charge?”
“Hell, I don’t care. Make something up. Income tax evasion, bank robbery, treason, sex with farm animals, whatever. Go, O’Reilly. Make the calls.”
After his chief of staff closed the door and the president was alone, he began scooping shards of computer back into the case that had held it. He wondered, Was Solo lying?
A thousand years!
Oh, my God!
Rip, Egg and Charley floated near the saucer’s pilot seat while Adam Solo busied himself with the comm gear. If anyone was out there listening, he didn’t say. The three floaters balanced themselves in the weightless environment by using a finger on the back of the pilot’s seat or a touch of the overhead or floor or bulkhead. Didn’t take much, they discovered.
They watched fascinated by the planet they were spinning around, although it appeared that the planet hanging there in the black void was revolving slowly under them. Above it all, in the inky blackness a billion galaxies wheeled in the eternal sky.
“We are going to need a plan,” Egg said. “We can’t really stay up here in this saucer very long, not without toilet facilities and more food and water.”
“Amen to that,” Charley said. She was regretting not making a pit stop before they left.
“What are they going to do now?” The president asked the air force chief of staff when his plane landed at Andrews Air Force Base. The general was there to meet him and walked with him to the helo, Marine One, that would take the commander in chief back to the White House. The general had so much chest cabbage that it was difficult to see that the front of his suit was blue. The four large silver stars on each shoulder were pretty gaudy too.
“Ah, I dunno, sir,” the chief of staff said.
The helicopter pilot was a marine major. The president stuck his head into the cockpit and asked him, “What are Rip and Charley going to do with that saucer?”
“I’m sure I don’t know, sir,” the major said, so the president took his seat and strapped in.
When the chopper landed on the White House lawn, the president went down the stairs and returned the salute of the enlisted honor guard. The first guy in line was a navy petty officer third class. The president paused and asked, “What do you think the Cantrells are going to do with that saucer?”
“They can’t stay up there very long, sir,” the petty officer said. “Ain’t got a head in that thing, I heard. I kinda figure they’ll find a place to hide it and wait.”
The president took a good look at the sailor’s face. He looked maybe twenty years old and shaved perhaps twice a week. “What do you think they’re waiting for?”
“Aliens, sir. A starship.”
P. J. O’Reilly nudged the president’s elbow, trying to get him to move along. The old man wasn’t moving. He looked at the sailor’s name tag. Hennessey.
“Thanks, Hennessey. Glad to know that someone around here is thinking about possibilities. Keep it up.”
“Yes, sir.”
The president walked on into the White House.
The new partners, Harrison Douglas and Johnny Murkowski, were wondering too. What would Egg, Rip, Charley and Adam Solo do next? Presumably they were in the Sahara saucer orbiting the earth.
“Are they really?” Murkowsky asked. He was in the left seat of his Citation V, and Douglas was flying copilot. They were in the flight levels, on their way back to Connecticut, where they kept wives, mistresses, extra clothes and Christmas decorations. Their companies were also there.
“I’ll admit, seeing Adam Solo at Cantrell’s farm was a shock,” Douglas replied. “I checked with a contact in Space Command ten minutes before I drove up to the place. That saucer Solo stole is still in orbit, circling the earth every ninety and one-half minutes.”
“And Solo isn’t in it?”
“Apparently not.”
“Well, who the hell is?”
“Damn if I know. I kinda suspect no one is. That being said, if anyone is in that thing, it’s probably somebody we don’t know about. It’s up there going round and round, thinking big thoughts.”
“It?”
“It,” said Harrison Douglas. “If anybody is flying that thing, it’s probably an alien. Some critter from outer space. Hell, I bet Solo is an alien himself. He flew that saucer right off that salvage ship like he knew what he was doing.”
“You know, we’ve got ahold of something that is a lot bigger than it looks,” Murkowsky said.
“Who knows how many aliens are out here running around,” Douglas mused, “looking like real people, but ready to do something rotten. Something terrible. Conquer the world or blow it up.”
Murkowsky was dubious. “Why would an alien civilization launch a starship across the void, at tremendous cost in treasure and perhaps lives, just to blow up stuff, eat kids and scare the crap outta everyone?”
“Man, weird people have been writing stories like that for a hundred years. The bookstores and movie theaters are full of them. I know it sounds goofy, but maybe it could happen.”
“Let’s assume, for the sake of argument,” said Johnny Murk, “that aliens are rational creatures who have done a ton of research that we would like to have. Research that is going to make us rich.”
“Okay.”