become an enchanted island: with wars and bloodshed and prejudice and inhumanity forgotten.
Some such was her thought. It washed over her, the vision, and vanished in the acute reality of the moment. Such a dream was athwart the invasion plan of the aliens.
She was out of the car. She was opening the rear door. She stood at Walt’s head. He’ll have to help me, she thought, he has information I want.
She felt for the pattern of his body. She experienced it. Concentrating with the full force of the human brain, she began to mend the breaks and ruptures and wounds.
It took time.
Don’t reheal his mutant bridge, she thought. Leave him defanged.
His jaw returned to its socket. The dried blood on his skin no longer led from vicious gashes: they had closed and were knitting.
She was finished. He was still unconscious.
Even as she turned to heal the farmer, a section of her brain drew conclusions from the fact she could be relieved of her powers. Some outside force was responsible for holding the bridge closed in her mind. It could be turned on and off.
But why, when the force controlling her bridge had vanished, had Walt’s bridge remained intact? She reviewed all the information she had.
There are two compartments of mutants on the alien ship.
Then each compartment must have its own . . . frequency. The aliens selected Walt, she thought, to kill me because his bridge operated on a different frequency than mine.
Speechless the farmer had watched her heal Walt; now he relaxed under the soothing fingers of her thought. He felt the bone in his arm being made whole again.
He no longer needed to cough.
*
She tried to create a bridge in his brain; but she could not; it was outside the pattern. If she were to give him one, it would require surgery.
She was once again in the seat beside him.
“You’re a, you’re an angel,” he said. Awe made his voice hollow. “I’ll be God damned if you’re not an honest to Jesus, real live angel.”
“I’m human.”
“ . . . you couldn’t be.”
“Well, I am.”
He frowned, “ . . . lady, after what I just seen you do, I’ll believe it if you say so. You just tell me, I’ll believe it.”
“I’ve got to get into San Francisco. I’ll have to leave you. You can catch a ride or something.”
He scrambled out of the car.
Impulsively Julia reached in her handbag for a bill. She found one. “Here,” she said, thrusting it on him, “this is for your milk.”
The farmer took it automatically. He put it in his wallet and put the wallet back in his overalls without bothering to watch what he was doing. He was watching her.
If they’re all as easy to convert as he is . . . she thought.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“What?” she said.
“If you’re human, what am I?”
“We’re not quite the same,” Julia said. “Maybe some day we will be . . . .”
She wheeled onto the super-highway and headed toward San Francisco.
She switched on the automatic-drive and turned her attention to Walt.
She was unable to awaken him. After such a severe shock as he had experienced, his nervous system demanded rest; he no longer had the recuperative powers of a mutant.
Even if I alert Earth, she thought what can we do? How can we prepare? I could . . . but I’m only one. They’d gang up on me and kill me in a minute . . . . Earth will fight; at least we won’t give up. I’ll have to get us as ready as I can, and we’ll fight.
I need Walt. What kind of weapons will we be up against? Where will the invasion strike first? When? He’ll have scraps of information that I can put together to tell me more than he thinks he knows.
How can I convince him to help me?
. . . if I’ve figured it out right, there’s got to be records somewhere. Birth certificates, things like that. If I’m right about babies being missing the year of the last big saucer scare, there’s got to be birth certificates. I’ll check newspaper files in San Francisco.
If I can just find Walt’s birth certificate! That will convince him!
She thought about the space station floating somewhere in the sky; she tried to picture the aliens who manned it.
God knows how, she thought, but we’ll fight!
*
In the space station, the aliens were in conference.
**There can’t be any doubt but that she’s dead,** Forential projected.
**Your Walt is a good one,** Lycan thought. **Best mutant on the ship.**
Jubilation flowed back and forth. The other aliens congratulated Forential.
**It was nothing,** Forential told them.
**I feel infinitely better, now that she’s out of the way,** the Elder commented.
**We’ll strike with the main force a day before we planned to,** Lycan told them. **That’s best all around. We expect most trouble from the American Air Force. It will be least alert on a Sunday morning.**
*
In San Francisco Julia drew up in front of an unpretentious hotel on Polk Street. Walt, was still unconscious in the back seat.
After she arranged for a room, she returned to the car. She seized Walt at his arm pits and hauled him to the sidewalk. She held a tight distortion field around his body. He was dead weight against her. She draped one of his arms about her neck. When she began to walk, his feet shuffled awkwardly.
She felt as conspicuous as if she were smoking a pipe.
She wedged her body against the door of the hotel and dragged Walt inside. Although he was invisible, the effect of his body pulling down on hers was readily apparent. She half stumbled toward the elevator.
The clerk, a counterpart of the one she had had in Hollywood looked up in annoyance. He snorted through his nose. He eyed her narrowly. He seemed about to leave his position behind the desk.
Julia propped Walt against the wall and rang for the elevator. She smiled wanly in the direction of the clerk. Shaking his head and grunting his disapproval, he settled
