“Don’t spill the beans,” she warned him, smiling slightly.

“No beans, no cats, just this. If it wasn’t for Harry, right now I’d be the happiest man on Earth.”

“Jesus,” she said again. “Must be something.”

He wiped his eyes with a corner of the flannel bed sheet. “Yup.”

Edward Shaw swirled the spoon in the cup of coffee and stared at the glass port mounted at head level in the sealed chamber door. He had slept soundly during the night. The chamber was as quiet as the desert. The clean white walls and hotel-style furniture made it reasonably comfortable. He could request books and watch anything he wished on the TV in one corner: two hundred channels, the chamber supervisor informed him.

By intercom, he could speak with Reslaw or Minelli or Stella Morgan, the black-haired woman who had given him permission to call from the grocery store in Shoshone, seven days before. In other rooms, Minelli had told him, were the four Air Force enlisted men who had investigated his call and seen the creature. All of them were undergoing long-term observation. They might be “in stir” for a year or more, depending on…Depending on what, Edward was not sure. But he should have known the creature would mean enormous trouble for all of them.

The threat of extraterrestrial diseases was sufficiently convincing that they had submitted to the rigorous two-day round of medical tests with few complaints. The days since had been spent in comparative boredom. Apparently, nobody was quite sure what their status was, how they should be treated or what they should be told. Nobody had answered Edward’s most urgent question: What had happened to the creature?

Four days ago, as they were being led to the sealed chambers by men in white isolation suits, Stella Morgan had turned to Edward and asked, conspiratorially, “Do you know Morse code? We can tap out messages. We’re going to be here for a long time.”

“I don’t know any code,” Edward had answered.

“It’s okay,” an attendant had said from behind his transparent visor. “You’ll have commlink.”

“Can I call my lawyer?” Stella had asked.

No answer. A shrug of heavily protected shoulders.

“We’re pariahs,” Morgan had concluded.

Breakfast was served at nine o’clock. The food was selected and bland. Edward ate all of it, at the recommendation of the duty officer, an attractive woman in a dark blue uniform with short, bobbed hair. “Any drugs in it?” He had asked the question before; he was becoming boring, even to himself.

“Please don’t be paranoid,” she said.

“Do you people really know what you’re doing?” Edward asked. “Or what’s going to happen to us?”

She smiled vaguely, glanced to one side, then shook her head no. “But nobody’s in any danger.”

“What if I start growing fungus up my arm?”

“I saw that one,” the duty officer said. “The astronaut turns into a blob. What was its name?”

“The Creeping Unknown, I think,” Edward said.

“Yeah. ‘Creeping’ or ‘Crawling.’”

“Goddammit, what will you do if we actually get sick?” Edward asked.

“Take care of you. That’s why you’re here.” She didn’t sound convinced. Edward’s intercom panel buzzed and he pushed the tiny red button below a blinking light. There were eight lights and eight buttons in two corresponding rows on the panel, three of them live.

“Yeah?”

“This is Minelli. You owe us another apology. The food here is terrible. Why did you have to call the Air Force?”

“I thought they’d know what to do.”

“Do they?”

“Apparently.”

“They going to shoot us up on a shuttle?”

“I doubt it,” Edward said.

“I wish I’d majored in biology or medicine or something. Then I might have some idea what they’re planning.”

Edward wondered aloud whether they had isolated all of Shoshone, blocking off the highway and the desert around the cinder cone.

“Maybe they’ve put a fence around California,” Minelli suggested. “And maybe that’s not enough. All of the West Coast. They’re building a wall across the plains, not letting fruits and vegetables through.”

The intercom system was wired so they could all talk at once or privately. They could not exclude the watch or the chamber duty officers. Reslaw joined them. “There’s only four of us, plus the four investigators — they didn’t isolate that clerk, what’s her name.”

“Esther,” Edward said. “Or the kid at the service station.”

“That must mean they’re holding only those people who might have touched it, or came close enough to breathe microbes in the air.”

Morgan joined in. “So what are we going to do?” she asked.

Nobody answered.

“I’ll bet my mother is frantic.”

None of them had been allowed to make calls out.

“You own the store?” Edward asked. “I’ve been wanting to thank you …”

“For letting you call? Really smart of me, wasn’t it? My family owns the store, the cafe, the trailer court, propane distributorship, beer distributorship. It’s not going to be easy keeping this quiet. I hope she’s okay. God, I hope she hasn’t been arrested. She’s probably called our lawyer already. I sound just like a spoiled rich kid, don’t I? ‘Wait’ll my mommy hears about this.’” She laughed.

“Well, who else here has connections?” Edward asked.

“We’re supposed to be gone for two more weeks,” Reslaw said. “None of us is married. Are you…Stella?”

“No,” she said.

“There it is,” Minelli concluded. “You’re our only hope, Stella.”

“Don’t be so glum,” the chamber supervisor intruded. He was in his mid-twenties, a first lieutenant.

“Are we being bugged?” Edward asked, angrier than he had any real right to be.

“Of course,” the supervisor replied. “I’m listening. Everything’s being recorded on audio and video.”

“Are you running security checks on us?” Stella asked.

“I’m sure they are.”

“Damn,” she said. “Count me out, guys. I was a student radical.”

Edward cut through his anger and frustration and forced a laugh. “You and me both. Minelli?”

“Radical? Hell, no. First time I voted it was for Hampton.”

“Traitor,” Reslaw said.

“Speak not ill of the dead,” Edward cautioned. “Hell, he was good for science. He boosted the space program.”

“And cut the hell out of domestic spending,” Morgan added. “Crockerman’s no better.”

“Maybe we’ll meet the President,” Minelli said. “Get on TV.”

“We’re going to be here for the rest of our lives,” Reslaw predicted with Vincent Price intonation. Edward couldn’t tell whether he was being serious or melodramatic.

“Who’s the oldest?” Edward asked, deliberately asserting leadership and moving them on to less timely subjects. “I’m thirty-three.”

“Thirty,” Minelli said.

“Twenty-nine,” Reslaw said.

“Then I’m the oldest,” Stella said.

“How old are you?” Edward asked.

“None of your business.”

“They know,” Reslaw said. “Let’s ask.”

“Don’t you dare,” Morgan warned, laughing.

All right, Edward thought, we’re in good spirits, or as good as can be expected. We’re not being tortured, beyond a few pinpricks. No sense learning everything about each other right away. We might be here for a long time.

“Hey,” Minelli shrieked. “Supervisor! Supervisor! My face…My face. There’s something growing on it.”

Edward felt his pulse quicken. Nobody spoke.

“Oh, thank God,” Minelli said a few moments later, milking the situation for all it was worth. “Just a beard. Hey! I need my electric razor.”

“Mr. Minelli,” the supervisor said, “no more of that, please.”

“We should have warned you about him,” Reslaw said.

“I’m known to be something of an asshole,” Minelli explained. “Just in case you might be having second thoughts about keeping me here.”

AAP/NBS WorldNet, Woomera, South Australia, October?, 1996 (Octobers, USA): Despite Prime Minister Stanley Miller’s decision to “go public” with news of extraterrestrial visitors in South Australia, scientists at the site have heretofore released very little information. What is known is this: The object discovered by opal prospectors in the Great Victoria Desert is less than eighty miles from Ayers Rock, just over the border into South Australia. It lies some 210 miles due south of Alice Springs. Its appearance has been disguised to resemble the three great granite tors of the region, Ayers Rock and the Olgas, although it is apparently smaller than these well-known formations. The Department of Defense has surrounded the site with some 90 miles of razor wire in three concentric circles. Current investigations are being carried out by scientists from the Ministry of Science and the Australian Academy of Science. Help has been offered by officials at the Australian Space Research Center at Woomera and NASA’s Island Lagoon tracking facility, although scientific and military cooperation with other nations is by no means certain at present.