You'd think, upon hearing the terrible news of his mate's abduction, ET would have gone ballistic, but Qulpari don't always react to things the way a human being would. Instead, he just meekly waved Rilquza aside and warmed his egg.

"Seriously?" Jamie cried. "The guy kidnaps your...friend and you're just going to sit on your egg?"

ET's neck shrank. "Yes."

"You should see their theatrical productions," Roy groaned. "Let's just say they'd have a lukewarm reception with American audiences...and Hamlet wouldn't go over so well in what constitutes as their theaters."

Pete frowned. "So...he's just going to sit on his egg and do nothing."

"I am meditating," ET replied. "That is not nothing."

Jamie put her hands on her hips. "Please tell me you're meditating on a battle plan, some way to rescue your friend."

ET got a faraway look. "Desire is the pathway to suffering."

"That sounds like a 'no' to me."

Colzest scampered through the battered doorway. "Rilquza, I came as quickly as I could."

The Abreya male nodded. "Thank you, friend. But Vorxora has returned, and Pabyeba is gone. There is nothing more we can do."

Colzest accepted this. "Where is Tolmina?"

"Norenio has lost her Grunkiahu. Tolmina is out searching for it."

"Oh. I see."

I watched ET doing breathing exercises atop his egg, disappointment clear on my face. "I guess that explains why none of his friends came to rescue him when he got captured on earth."

Jamie stared in disgust. "So what happens in their dramas? Does someone tell Romeo he can't see Juliet and he just accepts it? That would make a short play!"

Our nonhuman companions didn't get the reference, but Roy chortled. "You're not far off the mark. The most popular drama in Jufuceri history is Jana Naka, a four hour performance where a bunch of bad things happen to the heroes, and they just go 'Gee, isn't that terrible,' `I suppose that's what I get for wanting things' and 'Well, you shouldn't get so attached.'"

Colzest nodded. "Jana Naka is very good."

I frowned at ET. "I guess you're at least doing what Pabyeba asked."

He nodded.

I gave the other Qulpari questioning looks, silently asking if Roy told the truth, or if ET just had issues. The nonverbal signals I got in return indicated the former. "I don't understand. You went out of your way to help Gertie, but you don't want to save your own family members?"

Gertie...almost looked like she agreed with the aliens. She had that `Good Hebrew School Student' face as she took in the philosophy. "Maybe they just don't fight."

Pete looked skeptical. "They sure helped us fight Mold Guy!"

"We nearly died in the process," ET said. "I do not wish to put any of you in further danger."

Spike nodded. "We must leave this in the capable hands of the Navnadbu, our peace keeping force."

"But what about Pabyeba?"

"I will report the incident to the Navnadbu."

"He's right," Roy sighed. "They have their own police. You guys have already seen what they can do."

Jamie gave a nod in agreement, but Pete scowled like he knew something we didn't.

"What?" I said.

He only shook his head.

ET's pet had also disappeared, and we had no clue what happened to it.

"It's probably dead," Jamie grumped.

Roy looked more optimistic. "Oh I don't know. Buddy, my Dolcani, is always getting out and getting in trouble. I'm sure Vorxora's is perfectly fine. Probably found a female or something."

Norenio and Colzest fixed us supper while Spike reported the abduction. Rilquza questioned Norenio about the wisdom of marrying a human being, but she seemed very positive about it, so he let the subject drop.

Jamie sat down on her palette. "Why was Overstocks and Whats His Name after Pabyeba anyway? What did she do to them?"

ET sighed. "Pabyeba's...grand...parents (ET still seemed to have some difficulty understanding human familial relationships. His emphasis on the word 'grand' seemed to indicate someone much older) were on the council of judges that agreed upon the method of imprisonment."

"So you think she deserves this?"

You might as well have punched ET in the gut. This clearly had been a sensitive issue, something he wasn't proud of.

"You just said she didn't do that herself! How is it her fault? You can't help the family you're born into!"

"Look," Jamie added. "If Mold Man was doing what we saw him do back in the forest, maybe he deserved to be stuck in that tree."

Pete stared. "What's all this about a tree?"

ET didn't explain. "It was not an honorable method of punishment. We do not ordinarily use a thing so cruel and unusual. Our enemy's anger is understandable."

"Why doesn't your enemy meditate about that instead of committing murder?"

"I...do not know. I can only control myself."

Gertie fell asleep at the table, so Roy picked her up and set her down on her pallet for the night.

I guess a lot of aliens owned a hovering orb device. Spike got ET to locate one for him. He did something with it and it zipped around the hut like someone controlled it from afar, its mechanical eye zooming in on crime evidence like a bee near a soda can.

Charlie circled the object with interest, likely distracting the police from their work.

Gertie stared. "What's that thing doing?"

"The authorities here can use a drone like that like a mobile forensics lab."

Jamie scoffed. "Don't they need to take samples of stuff? Like blood for example?"

"Those devices can read a temperature without even touching a person's body, and see chemical compounds from a distance. Colombo could do his job from an easy chair."

"What if the evidence is hidden under a floorboard or behind a wall?"

As if in reply, the drone floated low, sticking a rod into a crack in the shattered door.

"If they want to dig deeper, they visit in person. A tool is only as good as the person, individual using it."

"What if the evidence gets changed remotely?"

"Like I said, a tool is only as good as the one using it."

Pete crossed his arms, looking generally dissatisfied with the police efforts. "You're right about that."

"What makes you say that?" I asked. "Did...something happen to you?"

He only sighed.

The device drifted outside to take more readings.

Norenio's cooking was amazing, pizza with alien ingredients, but nobody but Roy really had an appetite, being too worried about Pabyeba. "I'm sure she'll turn up eventually."

Roy was trying to cheer us up, but Jamie didn't share his optimism. "I don't want her to just show up. I also want her to be alive."

"I know," Roy sighed. "But you're not Batman. If you were on earth and your friends sister got kidnapped, would you seriously consider taking the law into your own hands? Or would you do the sensible thing and let the police do their job?"

Jamie nonverbally admitted defeat.

Pete had an expression on his face like he might possibly take the Batman role, but didn't say so outright. Instead he asked about Sovirox and his wooden prison.

We explained the whole situation.

"That's really bizarre. Who would do that?"

ET looked depressed. "I agree. If only Pabyeba's buizjal had not approved of such an unjust punishment."

Rilquza stepped outside to search for ET's missing pet.

To inspire us to think about other things, Roy made his communicator project some recordings on the wall. Skipping past Flowers in the Attic and an infomercial with Richard Simmons, he had the Goonies and American Tail. He at last understood Pete's joke about the skeleton.

I asked him why I saw copyright warnings before a few of them.

"There's a Qulpari outpost in Antarctica. They made arrangements with a few people for supplies, including vinyl records and videotapes. I'm sure if lawyers knew how to find the Qulpari, they'd be collecting all sorts of fines...though I'm not sure if the law covers this method of transmission."

Jamie rose from the table, fists clenched. "Wait, there's a secret base in Antarctica? Why the hell did we have to go to the moon?"

That woke Gertie from her slumber. "Uhhh?"

"It's nothing, sweetie," Roy said. "Go back to sleep."

She flopped back on the pallet.

ET moved his egg close to the table. "The men in white suits would have been able to trace your primitive spacecraft to their location and put even more Qulpari in danger."

Jamie snorted. "Sure! Before or after they froze to death?"

I set down the pizza I'd been half heartedly nibbling. "ET's right. They would have found a way."

Jamie sat back down. We returned our attention to the program. Norenio and Colzest cleaned up.

Pete pounded the table. "Seriously? We're going to watch movies while the bad guy is out there killing or at least torturing your friend?"

"What else can we do?" Jamie asked.

My sister hadn't gone back to sleep. "The Navnadbu will rescue her. I'm sure of it."

"Gertie, I expected better from you."

She looked at him sadly. "And I don't understand why my life partner can't trust the Navnadbu to do a good job. They're smarter than regular police."

Pete scowled at the comment. "Okay, fine. I hope you're right." He looked even more agitated when Colzest had us tend our neglected plants, encouraging 'sound therapy' for them. My tomato plant developed some really nice fruit. I guess they were right about me keeping the 'important' powers.

Charlie must have been worn out from our adventures, for he'd laid down and slept immediately after he got something to eat, snoring as I worked.

Roy turned in, Norenio spooning against him on a pallet. ET warmed his egg with eyes closed. It made me think of Big Bird from Sesame Street for some reason. Spike lay next to him, lids half open, I guess to take over if ET fell off the brooding pad. Rilquza still hadn't returned. I guess he'd had enough of the place for the time being.

Even after the movies, and babying our plants, I and Jamie still couldn't sleep with so much weighing on our minds...and having no front door. We just laid on our pallets, staring at the ceiling.

Rilquza came back from his search, ET's wiggling alien fish pet in tow. "The chase was long and difficult, but I think we both enjoyed the exercise, and the opportunity to get out."

ET drowsily smiled as the critter rushed up and slurped him. "Thank you, Rilquza." His eyelids sagged shut again.

The Abreya glanced around for a moment. It seemed he still hadn't recovered from being cooped up so long, for he shortly stepped back outside, taking Wotrevi with him.

I thought Jamie had drifted off, but she rolled over and smirked at me.

"What."

"I was just thinking about you and me in biology class, with you trying to free all those frogs...and that kiss. It was so funny. You acted like you were drunk, and were performing some ridiculous scene from an old movie...but your breath was clean...kinda romantic in a weird sort of way. I know that ET had some part in it, but was it all him?"

I reddened a little. "Not...completely. I...Think he could sense that I...had those feelings for you, and just didn't have the guts to, you know...show it."

"Come to think of it, I did always notice you acting a little flustered around me before that day..." She pecked me on the lips, but being depressed about Pabyeba, thinking about how I stupidly opened that tree. I pulled away.

She patted me on the back, and laid down.

Spike's sideways glance told me he approved, which kinda embarrassed me.

Gertie, who had been resting with her eyes closed, suddenly sat up. "Tiffrid's alive!"

I rolled my eyes, dismissing the statement as wishful thinking. "You have no way to know that."

"I...I do. I...just have this feeling that he's okay. Everyone on the ship is okay."

My sister, forever the optimist. "It'd be nice if you were right, but I don't know. You don't have any proof."

"I don't need any proof. They're okay. I just know it." Smiling contentedly, she resumed her rest, looking like she could sleep better than anyone else in the hut.

"And what about Pabyeba?"

The question took a little bit of the wind out of her sails. "I...don't know."

I slept for an hour or so.

When I got up to go to the bathroom, my sleep fogged eyes glimpsed a small human figure creeping out the front entrance with a loaded satchel, one hand clutching Gertie's musical instrument.

When he noticed me following him, Pete ran.