Afraid for his life, Timmy slammed the door on the rover. Rebecca cowered in the back seat.

I leapt from the vehicle, running to Bambi's side.

Too late. Her spirit had departed.

Her murderer, a Ss'sik'chtokiwij about my size had an adolescent companion.

Part of me wanted to punish the large stranger, to kill her, but another recognized her as some distant relation, someone who could be saved, converted.

I decided to forgive, and reach out to her, like Jesus would do.

I sat next to the stranger, watching her devour the poor mutilated woman.

The victim's pink zombie umbrella lay on its side, its arms ripped and bent, its good portion flapping like a sail in the wind. It flew away.

Pain hung from my back, concealing herself from the perceived threat.

The large Ss'sik'chtokiwij had an unusual growth around her head, similar to Grandmother's crown-like head plate, but downward sloping, in a fashion similar to flat rigid hair. I stared. "What's your name?"

"Xylena." She pointed to the other Ss'sik'chtokiwij. "And this is Savina, my little sister."

The younger one shyly hid behind the elder. We aliens don't have apron strings to cling to, but Savina did the Ss'sik'chtokiwij equivalent.

Xylena offered me part of Bambi's stomach. "Want some of this?"

I cringed. "No thank you. Who is your mother?"

"Who's yours?" she challenged.

I told her.

"My mother is Ssorzechola."

I recoiled at the name.

Xylena purred in amusement, nodding her head. "My mother was a kind, loving female before she devoured the contents of that container. After that, I myself could not bear with her company."

Pain frowned. "What...container?"

"In the Ancient Ones' craft. I hear she opened a...barrel of some sort, and became infected by parasites."

I shook my head. "She is dead. We had to stop her. To protect Grandmother."

Xylena sighed. "I should be upset, but I am not. After the worms, she was not the female that raised me anymore."

"Where were you all this time?"

"Around." She ate part of Bambi's intestine, glanced at the vehicle. "Mobile food carrier. I like it!"

"It's not exactly that simple. Tell me, Xylena. Do you ever think about spiritual things?"

In response, she only said "Huh?"

Clearing my throat, I approached the subject a different way. "Do you believe a Ss'sik'chtokiwij out there made us?"

"Like a mother? Yes."

"No, I mean, a maker of mothers, and mother's mothers. Someone who makes rocks, and Ss'sik'chtokiwij, and even that human you're eating."

Xylena took another bite. "I suppose anything's possible."

"I have encountered a being known as Jesus, who has done this act of creation. It is very exciting. I would like you to understand the concept, but I need to share minds with you to communicate the concept correctly. Would you please show me your secret tongue?"

I could feel Pain standing up on my back, to get a good look at this evangelism in action. She breathlessly kept her mouth shut, listening to my every word.

Xylena froze, facing me in a way that implied suspicion. "Did mother infect you?"

"No. Ssorzechola's way brought death, but what I have is full of life and peace, and love, forgiving and kindness. It teaches there is a life after we die. Please, allow me to show you."

Xylena looked uncertain, but still she climbed off her victim, exposing her Wooby Worms to me.

The younger one, in the meantime, gorged herself on the victim.

The moment Xylena saw me extend my own severed tongues, she let out a horrified shriek, shouting Xulrubdan as she fled in the rain. Savina also ran away, lost without her big sister.

Convenient, you say? Not if you're trying to win souls. Anyways, you know they'd come back eventually.

I would have chased them down to make another attempt, had I not been worried about the transmitter, and the poor children.

"Oh well," Pain muttered. "Perhaps you will do better on your next attempt?"

"Perhaps. I am being a little too frightening, I think."

To my surprise and delight, I found the transmitter not as damaged as I originally thought. Although it sparked, and the screens kept getting dim and fading out, the satellite dish still rolled around on its hydraulic armature, and the numbers changed, crosshairs on a grid sweeping back and forth over squarish dots representing celestial objects.

Not sure Bambi intended it this way, but what I once found an idle curiosity now proved to be vitally important.

Maybe she had viewed me as a big alien kid, our lesson like educating children on how to check the engine oil on a car. A cute little activity, like the scene in ET where they put the alien in a dress. I doubted she had intended it to mean, "You carry on in my stead if someone kills me," but that's how fate presented itself.

Glancing back to ensure the children were still safe, I turned my attention to the coordinates on the monitor, claw hovering over the lock button as the numbers rolled.

88687.0780760.

88687.0780765.

"What does that say?" Pain asked.

"They're numbers. Remember what Bambi said?"

"Oh. I still do not understand."

"It's an imaginary diagram based on theoretical space geography and objects found in a telescope. You must pretend a little."

I kept glancing between the vehicle and the numbers. I needed to get to coordinates 45496.0780761, and I was way off. Still, I hated to tinker with the machinery, when I didn't know what went to what.

Timmy opened the hatch on the vehicle, climbing out.

"Stay where you are!" I said in a loud stage whisper. "It's not safe!"

"What are you doing?"

I didn't answer, I just silently glanced at the screen.

88687.0780770.

The numbers kept getting frustratingly big. "It's complicated."

Rebecca stayed put, watching from the window of our vehicle. The boy, however, splashed up to me in the mud, momentarily jerking back when he noticed our dead friend.

"I'm sorry." I dragged Bambi off to the side a little.

Timmy stood on his tiptoes, staring at the damaged machinery. "It's still working?"

I nodded.

"Are those numbers supposed to match?"

"Yes. I'm not sure why the numbers keep climbing."

"Did you try the keypad?"

I frowned. "Keypad?"

He pointed to arrow buttons on the side of the screen. "Maybe if you push down or right, it'll go the other way?"

"I don't want to break it."

"It's already broken. It wouldn't hurt to try. Maybe you should just push the down button."

"If this goes wrong, you'll be stuck here forever."

"I don't know, I'm not sure any of us are going to live too much longer anyway."

The way he looked at me, I could tell he meant I should have done more to save Bambi, and didn't have confidence in me anymore, but didn't say so.

"Very well. And you're certain that down is the best arrow to press?"

"I think."

I pushed the down arrow.

The button did not merely depress, it broke off, falling inside the machine. Sparks exploded from the square hole, smoke rising from loose wires touching flammable components and catching fire.

Abruptly, every single light on the board, every monitor, useful or otherwise, shut off, leaving the whole compartment dark.

"Well, we tried."

The boy reached up, flicking the power switch on and off. Nothing happened.

"Let's go back to base. There's nothing we can do."

Instead of obeying, Timmy only flicked the power on and off, then brought a wrench out of Bambi's bag, striking the machine with it.

Pain asked me for an explanation, but I told her not to worry about it, it was just an annoying human machine, and we'd figure it out.

If I'd been a human parent, the defilement of public property would have bothered me, but as an alien I just viewed it as a chunk of useless metal, so I let Timmy vent his frustrations, striking the device every which way he chose.

The boy dropped to the mud and wept.

[0000]

I placed a claw on his shoulder, because I thought it the thing to do.

Oddly enough, he didn't flinch at my touch. Instead, he sniffed and placed his hand over my chitinous one.

"Cmon. You're wet. Let's get you back to the base so you can dry off."

His shirt had become damp as a washcloth at this point, but he still wiped his nose on his sleeve. "Yeah."

Humans, in their obsession to save electricity, shut electrical things off, even when broken or disconnected.

The moment the boy's thumb clicked the transmitter's power button to the off position, I noticed that someone had scratched the letters NO below it with a knife. It had been constructed, as Roger would describe it, "Ass backwards."

Beep.

The machine suddenly uttered the rattling noises I've heard in old movies involving the Apple computer and `floppy disks'.

With a wheezy breathing sound, the targeting monitor came back on.

I gasped. Within minutes, the numbers would correspond to the upper screen.

45496.0780861.

45496.0780839.

45496.0780780.

45496.0780761.

I mashed the lock button down as quick as I could, then hit transmit.

The panels exploded in fire and sparks, making burning smells like the antique electric heater the scientists placed in my cage on one of the colder days.

All the lights went out, and no amount of pounding or flicking switches could make the machine work again. Rebecca, who had been watching from within the cab this whole time, returned to her seat.

Timmy frowned. "You think it actually sent the message?"

I just shook my head. "I don't know."

In a state of sorrowful dejection, we once again boarded the vehicle.

We'd left the base with a body, and now we returned with one. Not eager to see the men's reactions to this unpleasant turn of events. I feared I'd just signed my own death warrant.

Still, the woman deserved a dignified burial, so we put her in the back of the rover for transportation to base.

As the only adult sized individual present, I had no choice but to ruin the driver's seat with my spinal plates, and I attempted to drive.

The children knew exactly what to do. Though maddening how much they coached me, I took it with humility, not wishing to wreck. Thanks to them, we avoided a collision with a large boulder.

My original intent: Drive up to a greenhouse, give the woman a proper burial, then drive to the entrance.

We never got that far.

We'd been running on backup diesel this whole time, the solar energy long ago depleted. The engine stalled about a mile up from the processing station, and no amount of backup power could get it going again.

I recalled that Bambi had silenced the screeching `service engine' alarm a few yards away from the transmitter, but had only muttered, "We'll switch it to diesel. It'll be fine!"

Nobody corrected her, but Timmy gave her a funny look, like it possibly could be the diesel, not the solar power.

Now that we knew the truth, we couldn't do anything about it.

I humored Timmy by carrying him around below the vehicle, opening panels, so he could play auto mechanic, looking at the wires and pipes and everything with a serious expression. Rebecca got out and did a similar thing.

At last Timmy groaned resignedly. "I think we just ran out of gas."

And so we walked.

In the downpour.

We abandoned our vehicle with the technician still inside, allowing it to become a mausoleum with tires.

I hoped, once we returned to the compound, we could at least bring someone back to give the woman a proper burial.

The storm lessened somewhat, changing from a semi-impenetrable wall of rain to a regular but heavy shower. My shell glistened like an opal, but the children would have to spend some quality time with towels and a drier to avoid catching cold. Rebecca shivered and sneezed. I patted her consolingly on the back.

At one point, Timmy slipped and fell in the mud, but I caught him and picked him up.

When we returned to the fortification, we found the main door hanging wide open, and everyone inside of it dead.