Chapter 10

"Yeah mom, yeah I know… Is Jacob with you?" Klaatu watched as Sophie spoke into the phone whilst frying eggs at the same time for breakfast. Four hours had passed since Klaatu had arrived in her apartment and the time was now eight AM. She'd dozed off again and he'd watched her sleep for a while before wandering around her apartment. She'd changed so much since they'd last met. When they'd been together last time she had been a child, scared of her own shadow. Now, she'd grown up. She was a woman. Her apartment reflected her personality, the colours were all blues and creams and everything was spotless and neat. She woke up about half seven and after brushing her teeth and pulling her hair into a ponytail, she'd immediately called her mother. Klaatu remembered Helen and Jacob, and, despite the imminent danger they were in, he looked forward to seeing them again. Just as he'd looked forward to seeing Sophie and had looked for her as soon as he'd arrived, he was now sat at her kitchen table, watching her cook their breakfast in her shorts and strappy top.

"Okay, so we can come over later?" she asked, scooping the eggs onto readily waiting, buttered toast on plates. "Okay, thanks mom! Love you too, bye."

She hung up the phone before putting it onto the counter and turning with the plates, she set them down on the table before turning off the cooker and sitting down opposite Klaatu.

"We're gonna go see mom and Jacob later. We can help you. We'll do whatever we can to help you Klaatu." She said, starting on her breakfast, he found he was hungry and so began on his too.

"Sophie, you cannot do anything. If there is going to be a war then only I can fight."

"You can't fight a war on your own. You have no hope of winning like that!"

"You cannot fight. They will kill you."

"Then I will go down fighting!"

"Sophie. You cannot." He said dismissively although he knew this would not be the end of their conversation. They ate in silence until they finished and then Sophie paused for a minute before standing up quickly.

"Right, you're gonna pull your weight around here. You're gonna wash up." He just looked at her so she sauntered out and a few minutes later he heard the shower starting. He sighed before standing up and washing up the plates and cutlery. He didn't understand why they were being so slow about this, they didn't seem to understand that this would mean such a change for them, and they were dawdling. When she emerged from her room she was showered, her hair fell in a long plait down her back and she was wearing a pair of jeans and a shirt.

"So how long do we have before our imminent doom?" she said, her bare feet padding on the soft carpet as she walked over to him.

"I don't know, but it's not long."

"Well mom said we're welcome over at any point today. Jacob's there, she lives about an hour away and it's…" she glanced up at a clock, "Half eight. Let's go?"

"You're nowhere near ready." He observed and she laughed.

"I will be by about nine! I promise!"

At half nine they were leaving the flat after Sophie had a crisis about deciding which shoes to wear. Klaatu was completely bewildered as to how human women could take so long! She got into her car and he got into the passenger seat. She began to drive and Klaatu observed the people around him, how the world had changed in sixteen years. The army who were looking up at the sphere and GORT who had emerged to protect Klaatu. GORT was the one thing about Klaatu that terrified Sophie, she'd first encountered him as an eleven year old girl and she could only remember him towering above her and his hand lowering down to reach out for her and her mother. She remembered thinking she was going to be snatched up and eaten; she smiled at herself now for her childlike stupidity.

"What's so funny?" he asked her and she couldn't stop the smile turning to a grin, but she didn't take her eyes from the road.

"Nothing! I was just remembering how scared I was when I first met GORT! And what I had been thinking at the time, I found it funny."

"What did you think?"

"You know what I thought; you can read my thoughts at your will!"

"I'd prefer to have a real conversation."

She smiled, impressed and happy with his attempts to adapt to human ways. "Well, I thought he was going to pick me up and eat me."

"Eat you?"

"Yes. I was eleven, shut up." She grinned and even he couldn't stop the slight smile as he gazed out of the window.

"Are you gonna stay this time?" she asked quietly.

"What do you mean?"

"Are you gonna stay on Earth? Or are you gonna do your thing and then disappear again?"

He paused before replying.

"Sophie… After this is over, there may not be a me to leave."

"Don't…" she whispered.

"Don't what?"

"Don't talk like that, I can't take it. That's the problem with you. You're so… un-human, you don't understand human emotions, or how we cope, or the fact that if someone we love dies it kinda kills us a little bit too!"

He paused again and she realised what she'd said, they were close to her mother's house now though.

"Someone you love..?" he asked but she interrupted him sharply.

"We're not talking about this right now." She said, ending the conversation, her face stony and staring ahead at the road.

She turned into the drive and they got out, she led the way up the path and walked through the door, calling out.

"Hey mom! Jacob! We're here!" she called out and Klaatu looked around, he was a bit nervous as Sophie kicked off her shoes and he wondered why she'd spent so long choosing her shoes if she was barely going to wear them. He followed her through the house and they found Helen and Jacob at the dining room table drinking coffee. They smiled at him and greeted him warmly. They both sat down too and Klaatu filled them in on everything he'd told Sophie, she was deliberately not looking at him.

"What the war about?" Helen asked.

"It is a simple war, territory. The race in question simply wants more planets to take over."

"So it's going to invade ours? Why?"

"Because they think you are unprotected."

"But you're going to protect us?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Do you not wish me to?"

"Of course I want you to, I just wanna know why, why are you back here in our lives?"

"Because I am here to protect you. I wanted to come back before…" he said slowly and this was the first time Sophie looked up at him, but avoiding his eye, "I missed the Earth, I missed you…" he was speaking to them all but Sophie felt like he was speaking to her specifically. She looked up and met his eye at last; they looked at each other for a moment before she looked away sharply.

She stared at the ground, trying very hard not to look at any of them. She couldn't bear the embarrassment of what she'd said in the car. She hadn't meant to say it, she'd been thinking it since she was around seventeen years old but she was always too scared to admit it openly to herself rather than in passing to him. She was mortified, but she couldn't turn him away. She would have to grit her teeth, bear it, and await the following conversation.