James Patterson - Watch the Skies

“Easy for you to say,” she said.

“Well, I have been around the block a few times -”

She interrupted me with a kiss. And, as the world spun and I saw the brilliant promise of summer in her eyes, I erased her memory of me.

THE GANG AND the family and I had our final council meeting at the KHAW transmission station that we had trashed in that early skirmish with Number 5’s goons.

“Checklist,” I said.

Emma began. “Caviar: one hundred percent confiscated and all female residents checked to ensure no alien inhabitation. Also, all dogs from the Holliswood pound safely adopted.”

“Good. Willy?”

“All incubation ponds drained and all larval Number 5s converted to crop fertilizer. All battery chemicals removed from groundwater, and all electronics fully rehabilitated. Wiggers’ farm restored to its pre-Number 5 condition.”

“Dana?”

“All aliens imported or bred by Number 5 have been exterminated… except for the ant-lion, which is on an interstellar freighter on its way back to its home planet.”

“Mom?”

“All essential civic functions restored. Remainder of town police currently investigating multiple missing-person claims, including loss of entire fire department.”

“Pork Chop?”

“Holliswood area schools back in session. New curriculum featuring effective math and science courses. English classes now including such pillars of modern literature as Stranger in a Strange Land.”

“Excellent. Dad?”

Dad threw a circuit breaker on the recently repaired broadcast shack’s wall. “Holliswood is now officially reconnected to the wider world, and the government authorities will doubtless be showing up to assist in putting the town back on its feet.”

“Joe?”

“Video scrapbook has just undergone postproduction. Screening ready to commence.”

I nodded, and he fired up the projector.

We watched Number 5’s landing party. The attack on the fire department. The takeover of the TV station and the Wiggers’ farm. Screen tests of human families being forced to dance. The High School Musical practice sessions at the civic auditorium, the caviar distribution, the alien nurseries, the incubation ponds… and then the scene at S-Mart where Number 21 kicked my butt, which once again got a good laugh out of everybody.

“That’s why we watch these things,” I tried to explain. “It’s like a football team reviewing the highlight reels at practice.”

“Yeah, but that scene’s hilarious!” said Willy.

“That’s nothing,” said Joe, and that’s when the real laughter began. Because somehow Joe had gotten the grainy black-and-white feed of me cutting my own hair in the bathroom.

“I was trying to look like Billy Joe Armstrong!” I protested as they all rolled with laughter. “You know, the lead singer of Green Day?”

“Yeah, there’s plenty to learn there,” said Dana, winking at me.

“Okay, gang,” I said after we sat through the final battle scenes and paused a couple of times to comment on things we could have done better. “Is that everything?”

“Oh, one last report,” said Joe, somberly.

I nodded for him to go on, though I couldn’t think what we hadn’t covered, and what would be making him look so glum.

“I’m still not certain that operational efficiencies have recovered one hundred percent at White Castle, Taco Bell, KFC, Burger King, Wendy’s, McDonald’s…”

“Well, I guess we can stop by and check a couple on our way out of town,” I conceded.

The strength of Joe’s embrace rivaled Number 5’s final squeeze.

ABOUT FIVE HUNDRED miles away, I finally stopped for lunch. The place kind of reminded me of the Holliswood Diner, although the waitstaff wasn’t nearly so cute.

I politely declined the waiter’s suggestion-a farm-raised catfish special-and ordered a bacon cheeseburger and a milkshake. Then I set about studying The List computer.

Number 3 was a real strange sucker from what I could tell from the few low-quality images I had on file. You know that crazy science fact about how your body’s 70 percent water? Well, his apparently is 70 percent fire.

Suddenly I detected a possible alien presence coming up behind me, and I got ready to spring into action. My first fourteen years on Earth may have contained some harrowing moments, but, until recently, they’d been pretty well spread out. I hadn’t met The Prayer till I was three, and I hadn’t met another top-ten baddie till just this past year… but these days it seemed I was barely getting time for a nap between serious encounters.

It was really starting to fray my nerves.

I got ready to leap out in the aisle to deliver a roundhouse kick at whoever was approaching.

“Don’t even think about it, Daniel,” said a familiar voice. It was Dad.

“I didn’t summon you,” I said, regaining my breath. “How’d you just show up like that?!”

“I think part of your brain must have known you needed some parental advice,” he said, sliding into the booth opposite me. “At any rate, let me do my fatherly duty and point out that there’s no way you should even think about going after Number 3.”

“Yeah, well I’d go after The Prayer himself if I thought I could find him.”

“Listen, son-you were lucky with Number 6. And you were beyond lucky with Number 5 just now. Believe me when I tell you that you won’t catch any breaks next time. The law of averages doesn’t allow for exceptions that big.”

“Whatever you say.”

“I mean it. He’ll roast you up like a kebab.”

And then a very bad thing happened. That grainy image of Number 3 on The List computer suddenly became crystal clear, as in 3-D high-def clear. In fact, he looked so real I moved my hands away from the keyboard out of some instinctive fear that he might reach out and burn my fingers.

But he didn’t reach out of the screen; instead, he spoke with a British-accented voice that reminded me of Anthony Hopkins from Silence of the Lambs: “Listen to your daddy, sonny boy. Why don’t you settle down with one of your imaginary friends and go to some nice American college with A &M or A &T in the name?”

“Now just hold on a second,” I said, thinking quickly to myself. This was my computer. And if he was trying to scare me off already, that probably meant he was worried about me. Otherwise, why should he bother?

I mean, sure, it was scary that he had been able to find me, to bypass The List’s formidable security programs, to overhear a conversation with my father, and to deliver his threat just like that… but I’d been through equally surprising circumstances just a couple times before, hadn’t I?

“Tell me,” I said, looking at his flickering face and acting as game as I could. “An interesting statistic I came across while reading about you: did you know that you have single-handedly contributed more to global warming than the entire industrial complex of Brazil?”

His flames visibly brightened in apparent self-satisfaction.

“Yes,” I went on. “Only, I’d always assumed that was a result of your flame throwing, your hundreds of acts of arson, etcetera.”

I had his attention and paused for maximum effect.

“You see, what I couldn’t have known, until I’d actually had a chance to speak with you, was that really it’s the tremendous quantities of hot air you release when speaking that explains it.”

His glow became white hot, and I could see he was about to try something, so I quickly switched off the computer.

“You’re really playing with fire now, Daniel.”

“Nice one, Dad,” I said, wondering what it was with him and his compulsion to make bad puns in all kinds of circumstances. “So, any chance we’ll be able to do a signal trace on him?”