Millennial Hospitality II

While I stood reciting my prayers, one of the male guards from the procession turned off his suit, stopped floating, and walked over towards me, stopping at last when he was still 30 feet from me. Addressing me in English, he said forcefully, "Tonight you don’t run away, airman Baker."

Nervous and stammering, I replied, "Tonight I don’t run away. -- I’m going to follow my orders like a man or die like one."

Then the guard said forcefully, "You know that if anything goes wrong with this plan we can kill you any time we want to."

Standing my ground still shaking in fear, I replied, "Yes, but I haven’t given you any reason to kill me. --."

The guard smiled and replied, "You are quite right. We could have killed you in your shack the other night if we had wanted to." Then he turned and walked back to the procession. Stopping for a minute near the shorter woman he said, "See, now he knows for sure that we will kill him if anything ever goes wrong. Now talk to him." -- Chapter #8

The Teacher continued, as though teasing childishly, "My bones take five years to heal. Yours take only a few days. Charlie, why do you suppose that your bones heal up so much faster than mine?"

I puzzled over this for a minute or so. Then I answered --, "Well, of course. You see, you’re a beautiful young woman. I’m a strong young man. A young man’s bones just naturally heal up much faster than the bones of a young woman."

With this, the Teacher, the Generals, and the entire room behind me broke into hysterical laughter. Harry, the USAF guards, everyone was just absolutely hysterical with laughter. -- Only the three star General was still sitting, holding his sides in laughter as he did so. Still laughing, the Teacher started to get control of herself. Speaking loudly to the crowd, she said, "See, I told you that talking to Charlie was going to be fun. He isn’t anything like the other observers before him."

Then, the Teacher turned to me. She was smiling and still laughing. Between giggles, she stated in a beautiful feminine voice, "No, Charlie. That isn’t the reason that your bones heal up so much faster than mine." For the first time, I wondered if she was really human. -- Chapter #9

Out to the southwest of the building, perhaps 200 feet to the southwest, the scout craft was just starting to carefully lift off. It was facing away from me, and no one was looking my way. I realized that I was taking my life in my hands by approaching the craft and its group of new white people, but the guard’s life depended on it. I ran up alongside the pilot’s window and began shouting, "Your guard! Your Guard! Don’t leave without your guard." The nose of the craft continued rising up as the craft continued its slow lift off. Then I realized that none of the people on board understood English. The pilot looked over at me as I was jumping up and down less than 20 feet from the craft. He obviously intended to continue lifting off. -- Chapter #18

-- the huge blocks of ice continued breaking off the face of the glacier and cascading down into the river valley throughout the rest of the afternoon, and all through the following evening. A huge section of the glacier was breaking up and I was very worried about what the future -- Chapter #9

--With that the Teacher and her cousin went half skipping back to the scout craft. It seemed as if this was the first time in a very long time they were going to be able to choose their own clothes.

In the fullness of time, the scout craft lifted off and continued on down the valley to the southeast. -- Chapter #17

--That morning, as I drove in to breakfast, I thought things through. A gravity powered spacecraft, coming to earth from outside the solar system, would be very conscious of the position of the earth’s moon and the direction that the earth was traveling in its orbit. A pilot of a large, hard to maneuver passenger craft would almost certainly prefer to land at sun down during the night of the full moon. At that time, the earth would be moving away from him so he would be approaching the earth by first trailing it in its orbit in much the same manner that a navy pilot lands on an aircraft carrier. He would have the full moon on his right and the sun on his left, and therefore be entering a smooth balanced gravitational field as he approached the earth to land.

On the other hand, -- after waiting only two weeks, he could also take off easily at midnight during the night of the new moon. During such a take off, he would be taking off directly away from both the sun and the moon and heading directly out of the solar system. He could quickly accelerate to whatever speed he desired because during the night of the new moon, the moon is between the earth and the sun, so taking off at midnight, the pilot would have gravitationally smooth empty space in front of him during the take off.

-- I noted the phase of the moon and wondered if seeing a deep space craft was really going to be that simple. -- Chapter #19