"We took care of them earlier today. Now it's your turn." said the lavendar alien.

Dillinger remained slightly skeptical. Everything he saw around him — this just wasn't possible. "How do I know this is real?"

"Your son's nose was broken this morning as a result of your actions." said the green alien. "We fixed it."

Dillinger felt a cold shudder run down his spine.

"And if that isn't enough…" said the lavendar alien, raising his weapon, "just in case you think to write this off as a dream…"

"Or a nightmare…" added the green alien.

"Remember this!" yelled the lavendar alien, bringing his weapon down and leaving a large mark on the bedpost at the foot of the bed.

"Start treating Keith with more care and respect, Dillingers." warned the green alien. "Or next time, your furniture will not be all that suffers. And be warned, any attempt to find us, will only result in tragedy for all concerned."

There was a flash of light and an explosion of thunder, and when the Dillingers' eyes had cleared, the room was back to normal. "That hadda be a dream." muttered Mr. Dillinger angrily. "It hadda be."

"I don't think so." said his wife, still terrified. She looked at the bedpost. It was still marked. "And someone did fix Keith's nose after it was broken."

"Hey, he had it coming!" barked Dillinger. "If the little twerp hadn't broken away from me…"

"You probably would have hurt him anyway." said Mrs. Dillinger, with enough anger in her voice to bother Mr. Dillinger.

"Yeah, well…" Dillinger couldn't think of anything to say. The room still smelled of ozone from the aliens' departure.

"What are we going to do?" asked Mrs. Dillinger.

The next day was yet another in a growing series of insufferably hot and humid days that this summer had produced. The kind where you figure that even if you could work up enough saliva to spit, it'd evaporate before it hit the sidewalk. The kind of humidity where your clothes and your hair make you feel like you've been stuffed into plastic wrap and tossed into a warming oven. Keith scarcely noticed, tearing through the neighborhood on his bicycle, jumping curbs, letting out a whoop every so often, and occasionally scaring traffic.

He raced out to the pond near Davy's home as fast as he possibly could, once he set his mind to it. He practically jumped off the bike as it clattered to the ground, and found the location where Jahv's dome-tent was located. Based on the presence of other bicycles, it was reasonable to assume that Davy, Martin, and even Niklas were out here.

Keith ran into the tent. "I heard the whole thing last night, you guys." he said. "Nice bit of acting. You ever get discovered for real, we should just turn you over to George Lucas."

"So what was the result?" asked Davy.

Keith sort of grinned. "Well, you scared them, that's for sure. I kinda think he's going to back off for a while, probably till school starts, anyway. He'll probably crack down on me again then. But he kind of said that whatever I wanted to do this summer was okay with him, as long as I didn't cause trouble or break the law."

"And what you want to do is —?" asked Niklas.

Keith laughed once. "Stay as far away from him as possible. If anybody's looking for an overnight guest, maybe for a couple of nights or so in a row, I'm definitely available."

"I get him first!" called Martin.

"I'm sure it'd be cool with my parents once in a while." said Davy.

Keith nodded. "With a little luck, I might not have to be home more than a day or two in a row this summer."

"What about your grandmother?" asked Niklas.

Keith shrugged. "Ah, she's okay. But she's getting too old to take care of me, and you know she doesn't like having other kids around. I'm glad I can stay with her most of the time, though. I just wish I could see my mom more often without HIM around."

"I still think you should report this." said Davy. "Maybe one of us could persuade our parents to take you in."

Keith raised a hand. "One step at a time, guys, okay? I don't trust the cops or any child welfare authorities to do the right thing. And for now — I'll take what I can get. If he leaves me alone the rest of the summer, that works for me. But I do owe you an apology. I didn't think anything could be done. You proved me wrong. Thanks for your help."

"Keith, we're your friends." said Davy. "What else could we do?"

"We could go to the pond!" announced Keith. "You know how hot it is out there today?"

"There is one other thing, that I think we should discuss." announced Jahv. "Two things, actually. The first is: we have heard you refer sometimes to others of your friends. A boy named Jonathon. Another who calls himself Sniv, although I should mention that that's a pretty rude word on a couple of worlds I can think of. Keyro and I are very glad to have all of you as friends, but we would like to meet more of your friends. Would this be possible soon?"

The boys considered the question. Niklas knew the others best. "I think so. I'm sure we could trust Sniv, and I know we could trust Jason and Fabian. I'm not so sure about Jonathon, but maybe. Maybe Randy, too."

Jahv nodded. "Good. We'd like to meet and know more of your friends."

"You said two things." remarked Davy.

"Remember when we used the holocron to visit a representation of our world?" asked Jahv.

"Do I?" said Davy. "The inside of my mouth is still healing from those flame berries or whatever they were."

"It occurred to us that there are many different planets and races out there." said Jahv. "And although we are banned from ever returning to our homeworld, no such ban exists for other planets."

"Yeah, so?" asked Keith.

"Come with us." Jahv and Keyro stood, and led the boys through a second doorway in the dome-tent. One that had not been there until recently. "It's taken some doing. Fortunately, Keyro's backpack contained a second, larger dome-tent. And an intact computer, complete with the necessary schematics. The fabrication equipment that makes dry goods similar to how our replicators make food has been difficult to convert for a project like this, but it has worked. And it's almost ready."

"What's ready?" asked Niklas. The interior of this second dome-tent was darkened.

"Lights!" said Jahv.

The second dome-tent was a hangar. And in the center of it, nearly complete, was a huge, sleek, gleaming shuttle, that looked like it was straight out of Star Trek, Star Wars, or something equally futuristic. There was no question that it was capable of interstellar flight.

"Ohhh, wow." whispered Davy, breaking the silence of the four boys. Jahv and Keyro were grinning widely.

Niklas started giggling. "What's so funny?" asked Keith.

"No one's going to believe it, you know." said Niklas, still giggling. "We're going to have to lie like nobody's business when we write the reports for school."

"What reports?" asked Martin.

"How we spent our summer vacation." said Niklas, finally breaking down into complete hysterics, followed quickly by Davy, Martin, and Keith. Jahv and Keyro didn't quite get the joke, but they laughed as well.

The entire group headed out to the pond to cool off, and there they spent the rest of the day, with the prospect of the greatest adventure of all yet ahead.