LANGSTON MARSH EASED AHEAD of Rathman and deposited a five-dollar bill in the swaying pot next to the sign reading, DEPOSIT A DOLLAR AND ASK THE PROFESSOR A QUESTION.
“I figured I’d pay for a few extra up front,” Marsh told the figure seated on the grass-stained blanket, who reminded him of Kris Kringle, Santa Claus himself. The grass was damp with a mist that had washed in over the water and then washed out just as quickly. But his shoes still left their mark in the form of impressions across the faded fabric, which dried quickly in the brief reemerged late-afternoon sun. He’d skirted the signs reading, THEY WALK AMONG US, TRUST NO ONE, THE WAR IS COMING, and ALIENS GO HOME!, wondering if the scent of lacquer was the product of his imagination or the result of a fresh coat tracing the original letters.
Dr. Orson Wilder cocked his gaze casually from the pot to Marsh and smoothed the tangled hair from his face. “Answers are free for my friends.”
“And is that what I am, Professor, your friend?”
“We share the same goals, so I’d say close enough.”
“I’d still prefer to pay.”
“You failed. You wouldn’t be here if you’d managed to take the boy into custody, would you?”
“Should I be charging you for the answer too, Professor?”
“A waste of your money, since I already know it.”
“An unexpected development was to blame. No matter. We’ll have the boy before long.” Marsh glanced toward the five-dollar bill bent into the pot. “So I might as well get my money’s worth.”
“Okay,” Wilder said, squinting up at Marsh through the last of the day’s sunlight, which made him look spectral, almost as if he were glowing. “First question.”
“Tell me about the boy.”
“I already did. When I called in the report. I did my part.” Wilder’s eyes tried to hold Marsh’s gaze longer and failed. “Don’t make me regret that.”
“As you’ve been regretting for any number of years now?”
“We make strange bedfellows, don’t we, Marsh?”
“Strange bedfellows with a common purpose: forestalling an alien invasion, the kind of invasion your work here twenty years ago proved was possible. The mere proof of their existence was enough for me.” He stopped long enough to fasten onto Wilder’s stare until the old man looked away again. “Your work validated my entire life’s purpose. Now tell me about the boy,” Marsh repeated.
“That’s not a question.”
“What did the boy tell you?”
“That he was an alien. That his mother rescued him from Laboratory Z just before its destruction. That he’s being chased by other aliens, or some kind of robots, cyborgs, they’ve managed to manufacture.”
“And you believed him?”
“I believed he believed what he was saying.”
“And what did you tell him?”
“The truth.”
“Why?”
“Because he deserved it. And that counts as a question. Leaves you one left.”
Marsh fished through his pocket, like a man unused to carrying cash, and managed to emerge with a twenty-dollar bill this time, placing it atop the five. “You could have told me that on the phone.”
“The boy’s not your problem.”
Marsh glanced toward Rathman, who was hovering like a statue at the edge of the blanket, so big he blocked a measure of the sunlight from this angle. “I’ll be the judge of that, Professor.”
“What’s coming is your problem.”
“And what’s coming?”
“They are. Or, should I say, they’re coming back.”
“And you know this how?” Then, when Wilder failed to respond, “I still have nineteen answers left.”
“This boy’s the key. I don’t know how but I know that much. See, I saved you a question.”
“He’s an alien, like all the others,” Marsh said, stiffening.
“He’s an alien, but nothing like the others, the ones you’ve exterminated.” Wilder’s expression changed, almost pleading now. “I came to you because I believed in your cause, believed my experiments had contributed to the problem you were determined to solve.”
“They killed my father, Professor. There’s no place for them in our world.”
“You’re missing the point, Marsh.”
“And what’s that?”
“Eighteen left now. And the point you’re missing is that maybe we had things wrong.”
“Wrong?”
“Seventeen. Since you asked, I think this kid is some kind of refugee, or was brought here by refugees.”
“I didn’t ask that.”
“Then this answer is for free. I’m afraid the aliens your teams have been tracking are refugees too and that our real problem is not them so much as who they came here to flee.”
“Really?”
“I’ll give you that one for free too. And, yes, because after meeting this boy it’s the only thing that makes sense.” Wilder stopped and gave his money pot a shove to start it swaying again. “You said you investigated what happened at his house. What did you conclude?”