“Excuse me. We’d like to continue our questions and examinations.”

“Yes,” the Guest said, pushing aside the blankets and standing slowly.

“What is the state of your health?” Arthur asked. “Are you feeling well?”

“Not altogether well,” the Guest said. “The food is adequate, but not sustaining.”

The Guest had been allowed to choose between a variety of carefully prepared “soups.” The first tissue samples had revealed that the Guest could conceivably digest dextrorotary sugars and proteins generally found in Earth life forms. Purified water was being supplied in beakers passed through with the “food.” Thus far, the Guest had not excreted anything into the wide stainless-steel sample tray left open in another corner. The Guest had eaten sparingly, and without apparent enthusiasm.

“Can you describe substances that would please you?”

“In space, we hibernated—”

Harry emphasized the “we” in his notepad.

“And our nutrition was provided by synthesizing machines throughout the voyage.”

Arthur blinked. Harry scribbled furiously.

“I am not aware of the names of substances in this language to describe them. The food you provide seems adequate.”

“But not enjoyable.”

The Guest didn’t respond.

“We’d like to conduct another physical examination,” Arthur said. “We are not going to take any more tissue samples.”

The Guest withdrew its three brown eyes and then produced them again, but said nothing, standing in what might have been a dejected posture — if the Guest could feel dejected, and if body language was at all similar…

“You do not have to cooperate,” Arthur said. “We don’t want to force anything on you.”

“Difficulties with speaking, with language,” the Guest said. It stepped sideways in one fluid motion to the far right corner of the room. “There are questions you do not ask. Why?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

“You do not ask questions about interior thoughts.”

“You mean, what you are thinking?”

“Interior states are far more important than physical construction, are they not? Is this not true for your intelligences?”

Harry glanced at Arthur. “All right,” Harry said, putting down his notes. “What is your interior state?”

“Disorganized.”

“You’re confused?” Harry asked.

“Not at ease. Mission is completed. We will not survive this incident.”

“You won’t…” Arthur searched for clear words. “When the ship leaves, you won’t be aboard?”

“You are not asking proper questions.”

“What questions should we ask?” Harry tapped his pencil on a chair arm. The Guest appeared to focus its three sherry-colored eyes on this gesture. “What questions should we ask?” he repeated.

“Process of destruction. Past deaths of worlds. How you fit into the scheme.”

“Yes, you’re right,” Arthur said quickly. “We haven’t been asking those questions. We experience fear, a negative emotional state, and we do not really want to know. This may be irrational—”

The Guest lifted its “chin” high, revealing the two slits and a shadowed, two-inch-wide depression on the underside of the miter. “Negative emotions,” it repeated. “When will you ask these questions?”

“Some of our leaders, including our President, will be joining us tomorrow. That might be a good time,” Harry said.

“I think we’d better hear it now, first.” Arthur was uneasy at the thought of blindly springing information on Crockerman. He had no idea how the man would react.

“Yes,” the Guest said.

“First question, then,” Arthur began. “What happened to your world?”

The Guest began its story.

OFFERTORIUM

9

“You’re privileged, folks,” the new duty officer, a young, slender black woman in gray blouse and slacks, told her four isolated charges.

Ed Shaw sat up on his bunk and blinked.

“The President’s coming here this evening. He wants to talk with you and commend you all.”

“How long until we get out of here?” Stella Morgan asked, her voice hoarse. She cleared her throat and repeated her question.

“I have no idea, Miss Morgan. We have a message from your mother. It’s in your food drawer. We can relay any message from you to her that does not carry information as to your whereabouts or why you are here.”

“She’s putting on the pressure, isn’t she?” Minelli said. They had been discussing Stella’s mother, Bernice Morgan, a few hours earlier. By now, Stella was convinced, Mrs. Morgan would have marshaled half the lawyers in the state.

“She is indeed,” the duty officer said. “You’ve got quite a mother, Miss Morgan. We hope to get this all straightened out quickly. Labs are running tests around the clock. So far, we haven’t found any foreign biologicals on you or the Guest.”

Edward lay back on his bunk. “What’s the President going to do here?” he asked.

“He wants to talk to the four of you. That’s all we’ve been told.”

“And see the alien,” Minelli said. “Right?”

The duty officer smiled.

“When are you going to tell the press?” Reslaw asked.

“Lord, I wish we could do it right now. The Australians have told just about everything, and their case is even weirder than our own. They have robots coming out of their rocks.”

“What?” Edward sat on the edge of the bunk. “Is it on the news?”

“You should watch your TVs. There are newspapers in your food drawers now. Starting tomorrow, you’ll be getting CD machines. Infonet players. We don’t want you to be ignorant when the President gets here.”

Edward pulled open his food drawer, a stainless-steel tray that shuttled through the walls of the isolation unit, and pulled out a folded newspaper. There were no personal messages for him. His off-and-on girlfriend in Austin didn’t expect him back for a month or two; he hadn’t spoken to his mother in months. Edward began to regret his fancy-free life-style. He unfolded the newspaper and quickly scanned the headlines.

“Jesus, are you reading what I’m reading?” Reslaw asked.

“Yeah,” Edward said.

“They look like chrome-plated gourds.”

Edward flipped through the pages. The Australian Armed Forces had gone on alert. So had the United States Air Force and Navy. (Not the Army? Why not the Army?) Shuttle launches had been canceled, for reasons not clearly spelled out.

“Why robots?” Minelli asked after a few minutes of silence. “Why not more creatures?”

“Maybe they found out they can’t take the atmosphere and the heat,” Minelli suggested. “So they send remotes.”

That seemed to make the most sense. But if there were two disguised spacecraft — and why disguised? — then there could certainly be more.

“Maybe it’s an invasion,” Stella said. “We just don’t know it yet.”

Edward tried to recall the various science fiction scenarios he had read in books or seen in television and movies.

Motivations. No intelligent beings did things without motives. Edward had always sided with the scientists who thought Earth too puny and out of the way to be of interest to potential spacefarers. Of course, that was geocentrism in reverse. He wished he had read more on SETI, the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence. Nearly all of his science reading was in geology now; he seldom read magazines like Scientific American or even Science unless he needed to catch up on relevant articles.

Like most experts, he had grown insular. Geology had been his life. Now he doubted whether he would ever again have a private life. Even if the four of them were released — and that question worried him more than he wanted to admit — they would all be public figures, celebrities. Their lives would change enormously.

He shut off the player and turned to the comics page of the Los Angeles Times. Then he lay back on the bunk and tried to sleep. He had slept enough. His anger was getting to the point where he didn’t think he could control it. What would he tell Crockerman? Would he rattle the bars of his cage and hoot miserably? That seemed the only appropriate response.