I heard the others talking as I faded in and out of consciousness.

"We've wasted a lot of time." Roy's voice. I could hear him sipping some kind of beverage. "I didn't know it would take so long to do this plant thing or I wouldn't have let you do it. Pete could be miles away from us by now, or even dead for all we know, Pabyeba too."

It sounded like Jamie had a drink, too. Something warm, judging by the steam wafting over me. "That couldn't be helped. We didn't know the first thing about destroying those...pollution monsters, and we could have gotten ourselves killed trying to fight them without the song."

"True. But our little excursion to Antarctica, and the Gemovo..."

"I thought we were actually going home. But the Gemovo, yeah, I didn't know it would take that long."

"He had to do it," my sister argued. "What if the pollution came back and Qulpari got sick again?"

Roy groaned. "We're leaving the moment he wakes up. No more playing with plants."

"What about Gemovo's son? We need him to fight Warkinde."

The man swore under his breath. "Okay, so we need to get him. But that's it."

I felt the bed shift as Jamie sat next to me. "How are we going to find Warkinde anyway?"

"Uh, follow the trail of destruction?"

"That's great, but only if he's not destroying the entire planet."

"We will help you." Olxebak's voice. "You track the pollution, we will search for clues elsewhere, in case Peeete has suddenly become wise and chosen not to fight Warkinde by himself."

Jamie scoffed, but Roy said, "Thank you. That will really help."

I faded out after this.

I awoke to find myself wetting a bed.

Not my fault. Someone had played that stupid prank of sticking my hands in bowls of water while I'd been sleeping.

Olxebak and Yizewo sat on the floor next to my bed, giving me this proud look like they'd just performed some beautiful ritual. No giggling or anything.

In fact, they'd dressed up in beautiful robes and necklaces, and lit incense to mark the occasion. Their outfits pooled around their small bodies like kittens crawling out from under a pile of expensive laundry.

They'd crafted special porcelain bowls for this specific purpose, a wrist shaped depression built into each one, ornately decorated with embellished versions of...stuff that Pete drew? It looked like an expert in crafting fine China had used their blue paint to draw Garfield, the solar system a stick man, restroom graffiti, and a bunch of English letters that don't go together. A couple things that stood out: Pete's name, and the English phrase, `Yizewo eats poop.'

ET had his arm around Spike, both of them smiling like they'd just witnessed my first Bar Mitzvah or something. Gertie had this `Boys are so immature' look on her face. Jamie's glance in her direction said `Do you see what I have to deal with?'

I guess Charlie found it funny.

I glared, shaking water from my hands.

Roy sat in a nearby chair, arms crossed, casting the ceremonial `pranksters' an annoyed look. Despite his lack of maturity, he didn't find this sophomoric prank funny either. "For the record, I saw bean sprouts popping out of your arms. I did not think that was a good idea to put your hands in anything. You wetting the bed was the least of my worries."

I frowned at my soaked pants. "Great. And me with no clean clothes."

"Actually, we got all the supplies back at the tent, and the textile students liked your designs enough to make you a...thing."

He handed me a long tunic with embroidered tree roots all over it, a fan collar, and...genie pants.

I held the goofy pants beside me to see if they had my size right. "Great, I'm going to look like Ali Baba," I grumbled. "What...time is it now?"

Roy rubbed his face. "Noon O' Clock. We've been spending the morning figuring out that map of yours. A group of plant experts are digging up Mr. Gemovo. Oh, and the girls got some education for once..." Both Jamie and Gertie groaned at the mention of it. "...Well, tutoring. I told some Qulpari what I needed, and got some eager volunteers...Don't think they'll qualify for the ITBS anytime soon."

I noticed he had also found new clothing: A NASA style flight suit, but in beige, with my tree root designs all over it. "Your outfit looks almost normal. How'd you manage that?"

"I showed them a picture of Michael Jackson onboard the Challenger. If any other humans come this way, they're going to be very confused."

I shook my head. "Does this place have a shower?"

Roy gave me an apologetic look. "About that...These guys are really into environmentalism, and not so much into privacy, because, you know, Qulpari, right? The girls got nervous when they saw it...It's in their greenhouse."

Roy said the greenhouse reminded him of the film Silent Running. Big domed building full of plants and little fuzzy animals, robots tending...not sure what they had left to tend, actually.

A lot of stuff in the greenhouse had turned brown and died. A shame, too, because they'd grown a lot of huge leafy plants, and would have been great for preserving my privacy, but, alas, they'd wilted, leaving a lot of ugly gaps and sticks and not much coverage. Poor...alien octopus-bunny things, they didn't have food, either.

One advantage to the whole `polluted water' thing: I'd been one of the few individuals brave enough to make use of the compound's many showers — nobody else wanted black crude dumped on their head. We nearly had its dozen sprayers to ourselves. A couple minutes of letting the water run and we had the clean stuff flowing out, eyeless octo-bunnies rushing up to get a drink.

Not your ordinary showers, obviously. You waved your hand over some crystal mushrooms, and a waterfall would pour from the ceiling. You stood on a pile of smooth pebbles and sand, the drainage pouring down channels into the various crops (when they weren't dead, of course).

They required very specific types of soap: Apparently something gentle enough to wash babies and octo-bunnies, but loaded with plant nutrients...and of course plants generally like all that decaying matter you scrub off your body anyway...not sure what they thought about underarm deodorant — I'd left mine back on earth.

We got some sheets of fabric from the textile school, my companions holding them up around me while I bathed. Qulpari gathered to stare at us, not understanding why nudity was such a big deal. I rolled my eyes.

Spike stared too. I...think he took his nennop job too seriously. He kept watching me and Jamie like he wanted to give a critique.

Roy chuckled. "El, a thought kept rolling around in the back of my head when you were doing all those tree pictures: Watching you, it was like watching myself, outside my body."

I stared. "Why?"

"When I had my first alien encounter, I became a little...obsessed with Devil's Tower. I, uh, sculpted it out of mashed potatoes, clay, and then kinda built a huge one in my living room out of dirt. I worked like a man possessed. Maybe I was, I dunno. My wife got tired of it and left me. Be glad you got, uh, someone who gets you."

I smirked at Jamie.

I suspected she'd been peeking at me, but she looked away quickly whenever I cast her a suspicious glance. Honestly, I guess I didn't mind that much.

While I washed, ET tested another sprayer, and upon finding the water clear, got himself cleaned up as well.

I...haven't been able to describe this properly until now, but I have, from time to time, had this feeling like ET is somehow an extension of myself, or maybe I was an extension of ET.

Like, as I bathed, I felt like we both experienced the shock of cold water and temperature change, the smooth rocks beneath our feet. Our movements under the spray mirrored each other.

I think we lost that connection when I'd been lured into Sovirox's trap, but now it seemed to have been restored. We looked into each other's eyes, each seeming to think the same thing.

Spike asked me if it bothered me if Jamie saw me naked, but I just blushed and told him to mind his own business.

Charlie, impatient with my human bathing ritual, fluttered out of the greenhouse, to explore the school or something, I guess.

"Hurry up," Jamie complained. "My arms are getting tired, and I want to go next."

"That is a good idea," Roy said. "We're already in a greenhouse. We don't want you taking root."

I scowled. "Ha ha."

"That wasn't a joke."

The thought made me shiver somewhat. "I'm almost done...But if you're in a hurry, there's showers all over the place—"

"I'm not going to get naked in front of them!"

I hurriedly dried off and got dressed. I used some of those alien high density towels, of course. Don't ask about the underwear.

And yeah, it kinda looked like I got lost in the costume department at MGM, a woman's blouse from a scifi movie, and Aladdin's clown pants. Jamie snickered at me, but what could I do? "Hey, the Gemovo said it wants clean delicious water like we got from Antarctica. We need to tell someone."

"It shouldn't be a problem since we cleansed the river. Well, unless it got super finicky and wants Perrier or something, then I guess it's out of luck."

Still, I called ET over and him relay the request to the other Qulpari in the building. "They will bring out the premium water."

I paled as I noticed something like bean sprouts emerging from my knuckles, and a leaf sprouting from my wrist.

Jamie squinted at my hands. "Do you know you can eat a Chia pet?"

My stomach flip-flopped. Were we having some kind of adult girl-boy moment? "No, but in this case, wouldn't it be considered cannibalism?"

"Only if it hurts. Otherwise, I mean, it would be like eating your hair or fingernails or something."

"You getting hungry already?"

"No..." her tone said yes, a little. "Just curious."

"That's a strange thing to be curious about."

Without even asking, she stuffed the leaf into her mouth. "Tastes like a spinach leaf."

I blushed. "You are so weird."

"Says a boy who's growing plants from his hands."

Roy rubbed his eyes. "Thanks, now I'm nauseous. Can we get this over with?"

Jamie ate the sprouts from my knuckles, handing me the sheet she'd been holding. "Turn around."

I did what she said.

"That did taste like a Chia pet. Kind of a celery flavor."

"Your voice sounds better..."

"I've been resting my voice and drinking different hot fruit juices all morning. There's one that tastes like Jamaica juice that I've been drinking a lot. Something must have done the trick."

Holding a sheet, trying not to, you know, be a creep and watch her as she showered (though, I mean, fair would be fair, right?)...a fairly long time, my mind wandered.

Just like an extension of myself, ET did what I would have liked to have been doing at the moment, anything else, strolling among the plants, restoring them from their previous brown, decayed state.

Daxmeru the archaeologist came waddling up the rows, admiring my friend's handiwork. The two seemed to be interested in each other, hearts faintly glowing as they chatted. I guess ET did need someone to fill Meazquad's role.

I glanced at Spike. "Are you going to ask Jamie if she minds me staring at her?"

Spike only blinked in puzzlement. "Why would I ask that?"

Jamie giggled. "Yeah, Elliott. Why would he ask that?"

"This is what you get when your nennop doesn't come from the Hizord school," Roy whispered to me.

Jamie washed suds out of her hair. "You should try their telescope, Elliott. I don't know how they built it, but it's amazing."

Roy nodded. "I've seen a few high magnification telescopes in my day, but you can see dirt specks on a dust mite on the moon with that thing. And it's portable. On earth, you'd be lucky to get that kind of power from one the size of a house."

"I'll have to try that sometime."

Gertie's arms lowered a little. "It's still too far away to see mom."

I gave my sister an apologetic smile as I held my sheet. "Gertie, I'm sorry we're not rushing out to save Pete. We really got sidetracked with all this pollution and plant business...and the parallel universe thing."

The look on her face seemed to say I was right, but she told me, "Don't be. Warkinde is behind all this. The Gemovo and everything is how we beat him, and how ET gets Pabyeba back." She groaned. "My arms are tired."

Roy nodded. "I'd jury rig something, but right now I'm drawing a blank. I don't see anything tall and sturdy enough to be a good shower curtain hanger. We're almost done anyway...Right, Jamie?"

"Yeah, sorry." She dried off and got dressed. New outfit: Squaw dress with a fan collar, Swiss cheese leggings in a charcoal color.

By this time, ET had brought about a quarter of the greenhouse's dying plants back to life, including some ferns, like the rolling tumbleweed, that uprooted themselves and walked around to wherever the soil seemed richest, to absorb better nutrients. Jamie asked if they were the same as the thing the Gemovo had mentioned, but I shook my head. "It's a few miles out from the school. I'm not sure what the cardinal direction is—"

"Northeast."

"Oh. Right. You would know."

"Great job, ET!" Gertie called. "Love what you're doing with the place!"

"Thank you."

"It's cold," my sister said when she stepped beneath the shower.

"Yeah? Not as cold as that place, right?" Roy glanced at the crystal mushrooms. "Did anyone bump those things?"

Jamie shook her head. "The temperature changed for me too. I think they got a timer or something so you conserve water. It takes a minute for it to warm up."

"That's probably what it is."

"Gertie, did you guys warm up while I was out? No more hypothermia?"

My sister gave me a nod. "Yizewo has some nice heating machines, and the Qulpari here made me some longjohns. It's actually a little hot. I think I feel less sick than I did before too. I know that pink slime helped me breathe and stuff, but that just cleared up whatever Xetgupa did to me. I think Warkinde made me sick, too. I couldn't breathe good, but now with that magic no pollution song, my breathing is better."

"Glad to hear it."

"Roy, how is Tolmina?" I asked.

The man only groaned. "She's fine. Being coached by Norenio, on how to tell me how to be a husband. I hear our orange friend has been talking to Larven a lot. There might be a thing developing. Some nennop...Oh, and she's very happy we found Vadful. She got tired of looking for him."

"Is Rilquza still out looking for Pete?"

"Yes. He's been traveling the planet and talking to people. Not sure he's going the right direction."

"What about Larven? Is Larven okay?"

Roy shifted his feet. "He's fine, just tired of sitting around in the boat. He's been inviting friends over there, but they're disappointed he won't take them on a ride."

"Can he bring the boat up here?"

He whistled through his teeth. "It's a hovercraft, yeah, but there's a lot of debris he'd have to navigate around, trees, the Gemovo, and no canals or inlets going in the direction we'll be traveling."

Gertie finished her shower and got dressed. Her new outfit: Tunic with a ruff collar, similar centipede pattern, blue Big Bird leggings.

I stared at Roy expectantly.

"I took my shower earlier while you were unconscious and the girls were getting schooled. I've lived here so long that a little nudity doesn't bother me that much." He folded up the sheets in a way that indicated a lack of practice. "El, we already had breakfast. They're serving Buzelod. I guess you haven't seen the cafeteria yet. I'll show you the place."

ET stayed behind to work on healing more plants. I offered to help, but Roy told me I couldn't. I'd scared him enough already.

In that glass domed room they had a culinary school of sorts, certain Qulpari serving as mentors as others took food items out of storage and set them out on electric range/preparation counters. The weird part: They didn't know how to be a real cafeteria. They didn't actually cook for me, they just told me how to assemble the ingredients so I could cook it myself. They helped me with it, but what kind of crazy cafeteria asks you to cook it yourself? Roy told me a lot of restaurants on Jufuceri were like that, though. I guess you learned to cook quickly there.

No tables. We ate our meals on lily pad things you spread on the floor. My breakfast: Fruit, and weird pancake things with beans and bug matter cooked inside (nadojri). The fruit tasted like tonic water and cinnamon. Not my favorite, but why would alien fruit taste like earth fruit? For utensils, I had a two pronged fork and a pizza cutter looking thing. The fruit (Katbibax) they peeled at the prep counter with a little machine that converted the rind and some other fruit into a drink. That stuff I liked better, though I would have preferred actual orange juice to something that tasted like mint, tamarind and some citrusy thing I can't even compare to an earth juice.

As I ate, Spike taught Jamie and Gertie how to read wampum. Roy tried to hold still while a Qulpari art student sculpted his image out of glowing gas with some fancy tool. Charlie found another flying creature like himself, but they didn't get along. The female seemed annoyed by him, preferring to just sleep along the cafeteria ceiling.

Beyond the dome, Qulpari in protective armor and helmets used their telekinetic powers to lift Gemovo's roots from the soil, others shoring up the dirt with energy force fields and plastic-metal `boards' to allow their co-workers to descend to lower strata. I guessed they'd be at this for awhile.

I gaped in astonishment at how well Roy held his pose all of a sudden. Perfect stillness, staring vacantly through the dome. "Have you done modeling before?"

"Do I look like it?"

"What are you staring at?"

"Nothing. Just...thinking. People don't pollute the planet out of spite. There's always some kind of financial incentive. I just don't know what Warkinde is after."

"He was just dumping waste. Maybe the money making is over at his factory...wherever that is."

"Yeah, but what does he make? You saw Yatgibi's place. It didn't require nearly that much...excess."

Spike's wrinkly face got wrinklier, his eyelids narrowing like he knew something, but he didn't verbalize.

I shrugged. "I guess we'll find out the answer when we get there." I turned to look at my sister. "There's something I don't get. You should have loved being tutored by a Qulpari, but you didn't seem thrilled when Roy mentioned it."

She rolled her eyes. "He wanted me to know human stuff, like our backwards ways of doing math."

Roy uncrossed his legs, which apparently had fallen asleep on him. "I'm still holding on to the belief that you will someday go home and I don't want you taking the short bus to school."

"Einstein didn't take the short bus."

"Yeah? Einstein first had to learn what math is before he reinvented it. I suggest you do the same." He recrossed his legs. "Believe it or not, I'm learning stuff too. Qulpari math is weird."

I stuffed nadojri into my mouth. "What else did you do while I was out?"

"Not much more than you've heard already. We did have their medical department examine that pink slime. They're very interested. Might help the Qulpari someday."

By the time I'd finished eating, ET returned from the greenhouse, walking hand in hand with Daxmeru.

They sat next to us, Daxmeru's frog irises and pupils fixed on ET's. Jamie apologized for breaking into his house, but Daxmeru seemed too much in love to care. He just waved his hand dismissively.

After a short conversation with my friend, he agreed to return home and help Tolmina and Norenio with the egg.

With heart glowing in affection, ET put an arm around him. "Thank you, friend. I am indebted to you."

"Nonsense. This is no burden to me. You are a friend. I am excited to help." He had been smiling, but now a glum expression appeared. He bowed his head.

"Daxmeru! Why are you sad?"

"It is my adopted daughter, Shasta. I am worried for her. She has gone missing for half a day. I will send her picture to your device. Please let me know if you find her during your search."

Roy crossed his arms. "Where did you see her last?"

"Out by the Jicfaro Swamps. We were investigating the unusual decay in the area, and she disappeared. I looked but couldn't find her. We love each other, she has no reason to run from me. I fear something bad has happened."

"That's roughly the same direction we'll be traveling...but you already knew that didn't you?"

Daxmeru gave a reluctant nod. "Please. I am very worried for Shasta." A tear rolled down his cheek.

ET put a consoling arm around him. "I will help in any way I can."

Roy drank some tamarind mint juice. "We'll keep our eyes peeled."

"I think tearing at your corneas will be counterproductive to the search."

"It's just an expression."

"Oh."

Smiling a little, Daxmeru departed the building with his heart glowing.

Yizewo approached my lily pad. "I and Olxebak are leaving. We will go ahead and speak to the citizens of Patlofark and Moycavaz and see if anyone has encountered a mischievous young human recently. With any luck, he will give himself away when he spends our money, or litters. We will leave your supplies and instruments in carriers. Let us know if you find Peeete or Pabyeba, or face Warkinde. We wish to help you as much as we can."

ET hugged her. "Thank you."

Olxebak bid us farewell too, and the both of them waddled off.

We made our way out of the school building. Roy brought out his communicator, studying the map. "One thing I'll never miss about earth: Unfolding all those huge maps and not knowing where the hell you are without reading a chart, like you're trying to get to a VFW for some wedding party, and you can't make it because you need a friggin' compass and sextant just to figure out where you are on that big map of America you grabbed at the filling station ten miles back. You're trying to meet with your brother's family, not locate the lost city of Atlantis!"

Jamie stared at the Qulpari workers levitating dirt and rocks away from Gemovo's roots. Amazing how long they could suspend all those plant roots for such a long time, but they had a lot of help. "I was expecting orange vests and hard hats."

Even more stare-worthy: Qulpari that went in behind the workers and gently misted the exposed plant sections, not constantly moistening them like clay...misting.

Roy put away the map. "I'm thinking jackhammers and backhoes would get the job done in centuries, not days, with a lot less delicacy...If we could do an operation like this on earth, I wouldn't have quit Public Works. Had to visit the chiropractor every week."

We found our things by the entrance, flecked from dirt from all the digging and uprooting. Someone had set flowers around them to make them less of an eyesore.

The `carriers' turned out to be basic little carts resembling rolling luggage, though a slightly larger one bearing our musical instruments could hover half a foot above the ground.

Jamie shook her head in disbelief. "I still think it's crazy that we can just leave stuff out like this and nobody touches it."

I looked up at the center of all the digging activity. "Where's the tent?"

She pointed to a pile of folded fabric in a cart. "We had to move a few hours after the forestry department got your model of the plant."

Roy grabbed the handle of a cart. "That's actually an oversimplification. Forestry is so big here that they specialize in exact types of trees and plants." He pointed to the cart next to it. "Take that one."

I pulled. My cart contained the containers of pink goop. I briefly wondered if Xetgupa's crown was slowly deteriorating the walls of ET's cave.

I hadn't gone but a foot when a bunch of workers pestered me with questions about moving the Gemovo. I had to tell them I'd been in a trance state at the time, but the more they asked, the more I remembered, and I felt myself going into zombie mode as I answered in robotic monotone. Guess that's what happens when you go overboard with the tree hugger stuff, I thought.

ET looked proud of me, but Roy got alarmed. He ordered the workers away, arguing that they endangered my health.

"Elliott! Snap out of it!"

I didn't respond. Roy shook me, raised a hand to slap me, but Jamie blurted, "Don't. Let me try."

She licked my face. That did startle me, but my brain didn't come out of plant mode until she French kissed me a couple times.

When I responded with a kiss of my own, she pushed me away and giggled. "Welcome back!"

"Let's get away from here before you give another lecture and turn into a tree." Roy had a look on his face that seemed to reflect disapproval, but also reflected some relief at me behaving like a normal boy.

Something made the sound of guts being ripped from a pumpkin. I cringed, instantly recognizing what had happened: A bumbling worker had torn Gemovo's roots. Her coworkers frowned and pointed, rebuking her for the mistake. I pretended not to notice.

A little difficult, skirting all those open root channels in the ground with all our equipment and so forth. The workers had covered a few gaps with planks, but we found it easier just to step over the holes and heft the carriers that way.

Charlie seemed energetic, or maybe feeling a need of something to occupy his time. He randomly flew into the channels with the workers, lifting dirt and rocks for them, which, to be honest, only helped half the time. At other moments he flew ahead and scouted the area for us. That didn't help much either, because he didn't tell us what he saw.

Barren soil, dead plants, holes where the Gemovo's roots had rested. I guessed the place would look better after the `transplant.'

Spike kept walking backwards, glancing between me and Jamie. I could tell he wanted to inquire about our relationship. We both tried not to laugh when he fell into a shallow channel.

Jamie helped him back up. "Careful, nennop. Don't hurt yourself trying to...nennop us. I'll, uh...let you know immediately if we need your services."

We passed by Vadful, who now lazily observed the Qulpari workers with his body snuggled up against another huge bird.

"C'mon, Vadful," Roy called, but the creature only drowsed and put a wing around his feathery companion, nonverbally stating he wouldn't be going anywhere. Roy scoffed and kept walking.

The `scorched earth' hadn't been localized to the school area. We walked through a field of dead alien grass. I bet it would have looked interesting, a whole field of bean sprouts as large as blades of grass, but with the pollution damage, it all looked like an unwatered lawn after an Arizona heat wave, brown, dry and dead. The large trees would have been impressive, but all the gumball colored hedge apples and oversized poison ivy shaped leaves had molted off, leaving a bunch of blighted tree branches, all curled up and twitching like dead spiders.

ET moaned in anguish about the devastation, but Roy just grunted, "We don't have time to stop and help the plants. Gemovo Junior is going to be it. I promise we'll help all your chlorophyll based friends if and when we rescue our missing carbon dioxide breathers."

"You are right. Although Pabyeba is also familiar with Jana Naka, and would understand the importance of the Gemovo, I also love her."

"I'd probably lead with the love part, Vorxora."

Further along, a smaller group of Qulpari and Abreyas examined the demolished remains of a machine and its pipes. I think it had been the thing dumping ooze into the water table.

"I bet we could follow those pipes and find Warkinde," Jamie said.

Roy stared at the equipment. "We don't know that for certain. It could go to some factory, but it is an idea. We'll come back to it once we find the Gemovo thing."

"They look like they're dismantling it."

"Hopefully they'll be too busy doing that to cover up the ruts and channels it left."

We hiked, dragging our supply carts.

"I wish we had a car or a truck or a motorcycle or something," Jamie complained as she pulled hers along.

Roy stepped around a fallen tree. "They do have nuveges and xerbas, but not close to here. Besides, we're looking for something. For all we know, we're stepping on it right now."

We slogged our way into a swamp. Not your normal type of swamp, by the way. Instead of water, plants grew in a translucent sludge, like gelatinized turkey broth.

Well, some plants grew in it. We hadn't reached the end of Warkinde's pollution yet. Swamp trees drooped in the...gelatin, their leaves resembling huge wrinkled pieces of kimchi. Lotus seed pods flopped from the branches, spilling something that looked like moth balls.

We called out to Shasta, but got no answer. Charlie kept scouting ahead of us, but again, unhelpful. He'd tell us things like "More swamp and dead things." One time he found a skull, but it was just some animal bone.

Yizewo had put some thought into the construction of our carts, so a couple had ski runners, and the others had sort of a boat bottom you could pull out, plus they all had convertible tops like baby buggies, which came in handy when we got hit by a brief rainstorm. Umbrellas would have been nice, but none had been included in the carts.

"This stuff is gross," Gertie complained as she lifted a goopy shoe. "It's seeping all over my feet."

Jamie put her hands on her hips. "I know! It's these stupid shoes with the open toes. Horrible design."

"Not for an Abreya." Roy helped my sister onto a tree root. "Those are thumb holes. They can do some...interesting things with their feet. Anyway, there's a way to wash that stuff out. I'll show you when we get to dry land again."

You know how sometimes clouds pick up tadpoles so that it rains frogs? In this swamp, it rained tiny cherry tomatoes.

Jamie actually ate one, but she spat it out the moment she bit down. "Tastes like motor oil!"

"It is the pollution," ET said.

"You sure? I've eaten some pretty gross things here..."

"They are the wrong color. It is the pollution."

Slow going in that gunk. Roy had to help us lug them over exposed tree roots, and up on sections of a crumbling stone bridge when we found them.

Jamie whispered something to Spike. A moment later, he and I had a little talk about what it is to be a romantic human, and I ended up dragging both mine and Jamie's equipment.

"That's how it starts," Roy muttered to me.

What could I do but roll my eyes and keep going? "Spike...what did you do before you decided to...nennop?"

"Are you having memory problems? You saw me at my place of business. Although I have enjoyed helping my fellow Qulpari find mates immensely, I enjoy a challenge even more, and I think your relationship needs serious help."

I groaned. "We're only young humans."

"No excuse. Young or old, you will learn or love will not grow."

"She's the only human girl my age on this whole planet. How do I even know she's the right one for me?"

"Because she's the only human girl your age on this whole planet. You have answered your own question."

"Okay, but if I went back to earth, and found someone else that liked me..."

"She told me she left everything for you."

"Yeah, but that was also because of ET!...Vorxora!"

"Jaaymee has nothing bad to say about Vorxora. Jaaymee says Vorxora is cute. She is only homesick."

I sighed. "Thanks, Spike. I think you're figuring out this nennop thing."

"Thank you. I eagerly await the day when, like all good nennops, I can coach you in lovemaking and the producing of your first egg."

My face flushed hot. I couldn't believe the words coming out of his mouth. Did he really just say that? "What?"

Spike frowned. "Too soon?"

My face got hotter. "Spike, as much as I appreciate your help, you're...not going to be doing that."

Instead of taking the hint, he only nodded and said, "It is too soon."

Since Charlie continued...being unhelpful, Roy rigged up a sort of harness so he could at least assist in carrying stuff. "Can you imagine Larven's hovercraft going through this mess?"

Amidst the trees, we began seeing...bowling ball things. They stood on tall stalks like corn, but they grew in the sludge, came in swirling candy colors, and had lips.

"Yarizmos," ET muttered.

Roy pointed. "Kids, stay away from those things. They're fun to kiss, but the fruits are like prunes on steroids. Could give Ex-Lax a run for their money, no pun intended."

A great deal of them had sunk semi-lifeless into the glop. "They don't look very healthy anyway."

Roy smirked. "Yeah, I prefer to have my laxatives a little fresher myself."

Throughout all this traveling, we'd called for Shasta several times, but nobody answered back. We couldn't help but wonder if she'd sunk into the baleza and drowned.

Past another section of broken bridge, we arrived at a clearing.

A manufactured one.

At center stood a glowing red and black machine, shaped like a `bacteriophage' virus cell.

Roy sighed when he saw it. "Well that's lovely. And it's right in between us and Gemovo Junior."

I stared as the machine puffed clouds of smog from its crystal shaped head, clawing at the gelatin with its spider legs. Oily gunk spread from its base as it dug deeper. "What is that?"

He leaned in closer. "Looks like...it's drilling for something. Oil, maybe?"

ET shook his head. "Fossil fuels are too inefficient. There may be other substances they are trying to extract from the baleza."

"The gelatin, you mean? Warkinde rode a flying bike that belched out something that looked a lot like fossil fuel."

"Those are fueled by substances twice as toxic to the environment, but you don't extract it from baleza."

"Does the stuff they're drilling for have anything to do with the slime monsters we saw?"

He nodded. "Among other things."

Jamie donned her collar and waded closer to the machine.

Roy grabbed her arm. "Wait. That could be private property."

"Yeah? I'm kinda assuming that Qulpari have better environmental laws than we got on earth, and it looks like something Warkinde would build." She flipped the switch on her collar, waded closer to the machine, and practically screamed a line from Twisted Sister: "We're not gonna take it...!"

The crystalline head exploded. Fire erupted from its core.

Roy quickly jumped out and pulled her back, on account of the flash and flames leaping out to consume the oily junk surrounding the machine.

ET coughed on the fumes. "You should have sung the purification song."

"I'm tired of that song. I wanted to blow something up."

"Mission accomplished. Next time, ask an adult to help you." Roy tugged the handle of his carrier. "C'mon, let's get out of here before we choke on the fumes, or someone finds out we've trashed their machine."

Pipes stretched out for miles from the exploded machine. Spike examined a section a few yards from the fire. "We should follow this. It may lead us directly to Warkinde."

Roy prodded it with his foot. "Possibly. As I said about the other one, it could also just as easily lead us to a chemical refinery...or the pipes that were dumping that crap into the river."

We reached the end of the baleza swamp, entering another field of dead bean sprout grass and wilted wildflowers.

We probably shouldn't have rested about a half mile from the destroyed machine. All of a sudden, the air filled with the type of rumbling sounds you'd only associate with a biker gang.

From the distance, they looked like bikers. I mean, the bikes hovered above the ground, but the smog blowing chrome tubes and stuff kinda-sorta looked similar if you squinted.

They zoomed closer.

Qulpari. Super low seats, to account for super short motorcyclists. They practically stood on the middle of the bike.

Not ordinary Qulpari, either. They seemed to be cyborgs, like something out of Captain E-O. Unnaturally pale, and hooked up to all sorts of painful looking machines and devices, like something out of a horror movie. I got the impression these were dead or dying Qulpari, kept alive by equipment.

Twenty of them. Way more than us.

Oh, and remember that worker guy that was helping Yatgibi? The one that jumped out of his factory and glided away earlier? That Qulpari now hung back, behind all these cyborg things.

They didn't talk, they just used telekinesis to hurl metal cubes at us, fired pistols with searing laser bullets. Some of the cubes exploded in flame and smog clouds.

Silver cubes, covered all around with circuits. Red lights glowed from their six faces.

A dozen projectiles came flying our way. By the time my brain registered a bullet, wreathed in searing phosphorescent light, it had already burned a hole through my shoulder. I howled in pain.

Roy got shot in the leg. A silver cube struck Spike in the head, and he crumpled to the ground. Another shiny block exploded, showering us with soil and dead plants.

A cube hit Charlie, knocking him out of the air. He crashed with a yelp into the dirt.

ET jumped in front of me, arms spread, fingers extended like a wizard. Hundreds of deadly objects froze suspended in the air.

Laser bullets stopped directly in front of my face. A couple more froze near Jamie's heart. A forehead shot for Roy.

"AC/DC!" ET shouted.

I wrinkled my eyebrows. "What?"

I thought it would have been a good idea to turn all those bullets and stuff around and kill our attackers, but he's too good natured for that. He just threw them at a few of their bikes, causing them to explode, throwing riders to the dirt. "AC/DC!" he repeated.

"I don't understand."

Charlie, though, had brought out his conga drum, pounding a familiar beat. Psychedelic illusions filled the air, distracting our assailants.

Gertie rushed for her Wayutra, plucking out familiar chords. Dark clouds formed above our attackers.

My jaw dropped. "You're kidding."

"Nope!" Jamie fastened her collar around her neck, faced a biker, and shrieked, "Thunder! Aaah aaah aaah aaah aaah!" The bike shattered, throwing the cyborg rider into the soil.

Spike blew on his shofar, and sinkholes opened in the ground. The bikes floated right over the holes, so not of immediate use.

Lightning, produced by Gertie's instrument, destroyed two more of the bikes. The riders fell down sinkholes with surprising muteness.

ET telekinetically threw my `flute' to me, but I couldn't play. "I need sheet music."

Roy clicked a button on his communicator, and holograms of the song, in Qulpari musical notation, appeared before me.

How did they know this song so well? I stared at him in bafflement, but had no time to ask.

I played, sending down showers of snow, which seemed to slow our enemy's movements. Roy treated a biker to a swarm of gnats.

Some of them, the ones still conscious or not fallen down sinkholes, fled on the two bikes that remained, or scampered away on foot...perhaps they had some personality or self preservation instinct, or maybe their controller decided to regroup. Six cyborgs, though, just brushed themselves off and advanced.

Six. More or less evenly matched.

Well, seven counting Yatgibi's friend, but he mainly hung back behind them, clenching his fists.

The cold may have made the cyborgs sluggish, maybe jammed their weapons a little, but they still advanced on us.

Those metal cubes hadn't been designed as mere bludgeons. One cyborg pushed buttons on a machine implant attached to his arm, and a silver cube cracked open, transforming into a spider thing.

I blinked, and it was on Roy's shoe. He screamed as its small claws tore a hole through his foot. He kicked it away.

A second spider smashed through Gertie's musical instrument, snapping the strings and shattering the frame. The fretboard cracked and broke apart.

A third one leapt like a flea onto my sister, raising blades to slash her throat.

Gertie had gone through so much already, I couldn't bear to see her hurt again. In a blind rage, I grabbed the thing and threw it to the ground, smashing it with a rock for good measure. I only noticed my palm had been sliced open when the machine stopped moving, and had started work on the one that injured Roy.

ET didn't see this either, not at first. He'd been using his power to smash the other little robots that had come to attack us, including the one that just stabbed Spike through the shoulder.

Noting that the cold slowed down our enemy's machinery, I'd picked up the flute, and in between the fumbled notes and the bloody pipe, ET finally noticed.

"Ouch." He grabbed my hand, pressing a glowing finger to the wound.

The cut stopped bleeding and closed up, but I'd distracted him from defending the others.

Something exploded. Jamie yelped, then let out muted grunting like someone tried to strangle her.

I glanced back, and the color drained from my face. "Jamie!"

From what I could tell from the debris, a machine had jumped on her amplifier collar, and apparently blew up, leaving a black-purple spider shaped growth around her throat, bits of metal embedded in her skin.

The visual: Like a man with big hands had tried to choke her to death, and left handprints with a glowing coal in its center. She grabbed at the growth, but it refused to come off.

"Jamie!"