The Alien Consciousness. Revenge
Chapter 1
FBI chief Matthew Nicholson was looking at agent Jennifer Leeroy for a minute or more. Jennifer was looking at him. The silence dragged on.
"Agent Leeroy, if it’s not difficult for you, please answer a few questions," Nicholson finally broke the silence. "With pleasure, sir. Ask." Jennifer showed her willingness to listen to his questions with her whole appearance. Not only to listen, but also to give him the most comprehensive answers. "Where have you been the last two weeks? Why didn’t you get in touch?" Nicholson asked," a serious violation of instructions. Don’t you know?" "In Mexico," Jennifer quickly found herself with an answer. "Have you been to Mexico? Why on earth?" Nicholson looked surprised. "My client Maxim Polyakov, wanted to go to Mexico to have a rest. I had to accompany him. Everything happened so quickly, I had no physical opportunity to report to the Office," Jennifer explained. "Fine but what prevented you from reporting your whereabouts upon arrival at the vacation spot? Are mobile phones out there?" Nicholson asked. "Sir, you almost guessed. We were in a place where communication problems really arose. But now we are back. Everything is fine. I’m ready to proceed with the further fulfillment of my duties," Jennifer reported, glancing sideways for an instant. Nicholson did not pay attention to this. Doubt reflected on the face of the FBI chief. He no longer knew whether to believe him in guilty of agent Lira or to doubt. "Let's say ... But, what kind of strange SMS messages did you send to agent Kinsley agent? About Mars, ships? Have you been smoked there?" he asked sharply. Jennifer's eyes widened involuntarily. "Did he get them?" Jennifer felt her heart pound. Nicholson nodded in the affirmative. "Your night's messages put the whole Office on its ears. Even the cleaners wondered what they could mean. Leeroy, if this is such a joke, you can no longer come to the Office. You're fired. But if you have an explanation, I am ready to listen to it and make a fair decision. Well and where is your locket?" Nicholson's gaze settled on the girl’s bare neck. Jennifer's hand involuntarily stretched to her neck, but stopped halfway, returned. "And where is my locket?" she asked suspiciously. "If I ask, then it is necessary. Answer." "I lost him. On the beach. What? Have you found?" "You can say so. Your locket on Mars. Take the trouble to explain how it got there. We got an alert signal." "Alert? What kind of signal?" Jennifer's surprise was genuine. "But you don’t know?" Nicholson in turn was surprised. "I thought you already knew." A micro transmitter is integrated in your locket. When contact with the agent’s body disappears, the transmitter automatically turns on and starts to transmit an alert signal. So I'm listening to you, Jennifer. How did your locket got on Mars? Everyone in the Office is very interested to know this. And not only in the Office." "Well, Stacy! I will remember it... your present!" flashed through Jennifer's head. She, holy innocence, had no idea that all this time she was carrying a microtransmitter built into the locket around her neck. She was even then surprised at why Stacy Dodds gives her such a gift. Jennifer thought it was just a gift but it turns out, no ... The underwater snake. I'll get to you and pay you back!" Jennufer mentally threatened to Stacy. "Maybe someone found, and brought with him to the bar," Jennifer answered with an innocent look. "Leeroy are you kidding me, or do you consider me a complete idiot? What the hell is a bar?" Nicholson's face began to turn red. "Sir, I do not understand. Is the locket so expensive? I could not lose him? Sorry, I didn’t know. If I knew, I would leave the hotels in the safe. Next time…." "Do you really understand nothing? Maybe you're kidding me?" Nicholson interrupted. "But what should I understand?" Jennifer quite plausibly was surprised. "Leeroy, your transmitter was not found in a nightclub under the guise of "Mars" or in a bar with the same name. But on the planet Mars! Do you understand me or not! On the red planet Mars, the one that is in space millions of miles from us and you …" Nicholson raised his voice more and more, the whole conversation began to annoy him. But he should have received answers to tormenting not only his questions, "Leeroy, I look forward to hearing from you. How did your locket come to be on the red planet?" Jennifer initially tried to come up with some kind of explanation, but, realizing that she wouldn’t come up with anything believable, she answered the following: "I don't know, sir. I have no idea. I only know that I lost him on the beach. About Mars, sir I hear for the first time from you. Sorry, sir, I have a question for you too." Nicholson nodded. "And who found the locket? Have you been on Mars, sir? Maybe one of our agents? I did not know that the FBI had such enormous resources." Jennifer innocently looked directly into Nicholson's eyes. She saw how involuntarily his fists clenched. "Locket was discovered by the rover “Incredible”. It was attached to one of the walls of the pyramid. He was by chance in that area. Antennas caught the transmitter signal. The on-board computer processed the signal and transmitted to NASA. And they, in turn, "made us happy." Undoubtedly, the pyramid is an artificial artifact. This is not in doubt among any of the scientists. We don’t know who built it. Maybe Martians, maybe someone else. Hmm, I tell you that we got an unexpected situation. I have never encountered anything like this in my life," Nicholson answered slowly, as if choosing words. "On the pyramid?" Jennifer's eyebrows crawled up in surprise, "In what sense? Have a pyramid been discovered on Mars? I mean, like in Egypt?" she was not going to reveal the name of the builder of the pyramid to her boss. "In direct sense. Your locket was almost at the very top of the Martian's pyramid. Of course, the pyramid is much inferior in size to the Egyptian pyramids, but the shape is very similar. I ask you how it got there?" Jennifer shrugged. "Sorry, sir. I do not know. I don’t even have any assumptions. The information that you just told me above my understanding. I hope you don’t think that I flew to Mars in some inconceivable way, found the Martian pyramid there, left my locket on it and returned back?" "No, of course not. But I have a feeling that you are hiding something." "Maybe the Martians found my locket in Mexico, and took it with them to Mars?" Jennifer suggested, holding back a smile with difficulty, "Or did some earth scientist invent the teleportator? Threw the locket with a pyramid on Mars?" "Maybe. Answer me one more question. Why did you two weeks ago, that evening when you didn’t get in touch, didn’t meet our informer in the appointed place, and didn’t receive important information from him? Why didn’t you follow the instructions?" "Sir, I followed the instructions, did everything as needed. I met a man, but ....", an unforgettable meeting with Tondor flashed before Jennifer's eyes, "But an error occurred. I arrived there at the exact time and place. Met with a man. But the man was not the one with whom I had to meet. In my opinion, something is amiss in the management. Someone changed the information." "You think," Nicholson's voice sounded doubtful about Agent Leeroy’s guilt, "Then I have one last question. How did you enter my office last night. If I were alone at that moment, I would have thought you dreamed of me. The result of fatigue. But Mrs. Harper was in the study. She came to the hospital after your visit and your words. I saw you didn’t enter through the door. You got out of the wall." "I don't know, sir." I can’t walk through walls. I repeat, strange things have been happening recently in the head office. In my opinion, you and Mrs. Harper had a common hallucination. Maybe someone committed a terrorist attack, put gas into the central building? Sorry sir. I have no other explanation." "Where are you now?" "Outside the city, sir. What?" "I wait for you at my office in two hours. We have a long very long conversation." "I'll be there, sir," Jennifer closed the laptop lid. Thoughts in her head lined up in a logical chain. If it weren’t the locket or rather the micro-transmitter built into the locket no one would have known anything: "Well, Stacy, well, bitch, you’ll only catch my eye!" All this time, while Jennifer answered Nicholson's questions, Max was nearby. But the FBI chief never found out about his presence. *** They were in his car. Only forty minutes had passed since the moment Tondor's ship landed, and they went outside. Max and Jennifer were somewhat surprised that the ship landed exactly in the place where their adventures began. Max was also surprised to see his car safe and sound. He believed that she had long been dismantled for parts, or smuggled to Mexico. It seemed as if the car had been guarded all this time. In fact, it was. Jennifer was silent, considering the information received from Nicholson. The message that Mrs. Harper thundered to the hospital pleased her. Jennifer did not believe Nicholson, and was not going to go to him to the Office. She understood - there was a trap waiting for her. But what then to do? She didn’t know yet. Max endured, endured, and could not endure: "Jenny, how could you? How could you do this to me?" Jennifer wearily raised her eyes to the ceiling: "Lord, again! How much can you do about the same thing?" "Yes, did not say! I could not say!" "You are an FBI agent! Still does not fit in my head!" "Yes, I'm an FBI agent. So what?" "What? Are you still asking? You could say something!" "No, I couldn’t. And I wouldn’t say if Tondor hadn’t done it instead of me." "Wouldn't you say? How at all? Never?" "Yes, I wouldn’t. Never. Max, maybe stop torturing me and yourself? What are you wanting from me?" "Nothing. And what should I do now?" "Humble yourself. You can leave me if it makes you feel better." "Shit! My girlfriend is an FBI agent! No, I can’t leave you. We are united by spacesuits." "All out, let off steam? Calmed down? Yes, I watched you first. Then fell in love. What else do you want?" Max wanted to say something, but changed his mind. Although he did not stop being offended. "And what will happen now?" he asked after a pause. "Nothing. No one will believe us that we were on Mars. No one will even seriously consider such a version. Everything will be occupied with the question of how my locket got on Mars. Did he fly there on a Boeing, or in a balloon?" "In a balloon, more romantic," Max said thoughtfully, and his imagination immediately painted a fantastic picture for him. They are together with Jennifer in a balloon, flying in open space to Mars, "Probably, all the aliens would have flocked to see such a sight. But he will burst." "Who will burst?" Jennifer did not understand. "Balloon. In a vacuum, it will burst." "Max, what kind of nonsense are you talking about? And then it will burst or not burst? What are you only thinking about? Think about reality. We are finally at home. Rejoice! With a chef I’ll shake things up. And about the fact that I did not tell you about my profession, what, well, sorry again. Even my parents do not know that I am an agent." Max looked hostilely around. They flew back to Earth in the morning. As soon as they left the ship, its hull turned pale, brightened, completely disappeared. And to tell where the ship is for sure, Max did not undertake. Although he knew, nearby. If there is a need or a threat to their life, the ship will appear and protect them. "I do not like. I have lost the habit. All sorts of little things to think about. Yes, and somehow noisy!" "Get used to it. But okay. First we’ll go to my house. Take a look around. Find out the news. I need to talk with some people whom I trust. You call yours too, find out how they feel there. Your uncle from the security services, maybe he will tell you something interesting." "I doubt it. But I will try." "Good. We will behave normally. We will try to acclimatize faster to an earthly, but already slightly alien life for us. It will continue to act on the situation. Did you check the car? Works?" "Not yet. Here I’m going," Max turned the key. The engine started immediately. Listening to uniform work, Max felt a certain satisfaction. In the end, nothing bad happened. Max did not have time to move. * * * "Hey buddy, how are you? Problems?" a noise was heard, as if someone had escaped from a hill, and small pebbles sprinkled behind him. "For the first time I hear a human voice in the last two weeks. I wonder who it is - a cop or an FBI agent? Maybe came to meet Jennifer?" Max managed to think, slowly turning his head. A rather welcoming smile froze on his lips. The next moment, the tension had already left him. The stranger was clearly neither a policeman nor an intelligence agent. In front of the car, a few steps from the bumper, with his hands on his hips, legs wide apart, stood a guy of about thirty. He was wearing a checkered shirt, unbuttoned on his chest. Shabby jeans, with a green grass stain on the right knee. On his feet are dusty black laced boots with thick ribbed soles. On the head of the stranger flaunted a broad, and also far from new, “ten-gallon” hat. Dark eyes, not knowing neither melancholy nor sadness, and a benevolent smile, conducive to continued communication. In general, a typical cowboy physiognomy! Cowboy Cowboy! You can’t say otherwise! That is how Max always imagined a true cowboy. "Hello, buddy!" The guy greeted, approaching the car from the driver’s side by the gait of a man who, at least in the next two hours, has nowhere to hurry. Noticing Jennifer sitting in the car, the stranger raised his hat a little in greeting, "Ma'am, my respect!" Jennifer nodded slightly in response, a mean smile. Her memory at that moment worked like a computer. Mentally, she fingered the faces of all the FBI agents she knew. There was no stranger among them. Perhaps random, it is not clear how a passerby found himself here. Maybe some of the locals. Or maybe someone from an unfamiliar agent. "Hello," Max answered, leaning out of the car, "Well, it's hot today." Realizing what he was looking at, the man grinned, and patted his tanned hand on an empty, worn holster that hung on his belt. "Kolt in a jeep. Left on the other side of the hill. Do you know one of the commandments of cowboys? What not?" Max and then Jennifer shook their heads uncertainly. Until this time, Max was somehow not interested in the commandments of cowboys. And for Jennifer, cowboys existed only in Hollywood Westerns. "Ha, lol, I knew that you did not know! So listen! The main commandment of cowboys is to kill rattlesnakes! Anytime and anywhere! Till the end of one's days! Sorry, I probably scared you. Do not think anything bad. I'm not a real cowboy. Programmer. I work in the office. This is my image. Relax after work in the office. "Rattles" I shoot, but I'm afraid of them scary! "Ah," Max said with a sigh of relief. "They would say so," Jennifer stopped waiting for a trick from the stranger. After his explanation, the guy even became pretty to her. "Your beauty?" the cowboy programmer asked, meanwhile. "What are you staring at? Car, I ask yours? She’s been here already, I don’t know how many days. Let’s think it on Monday .... No, no, not on Monday. Before. She appeared here on Sunday. Our sheriff found her. Donut Adams, as we call him here. He’s sitting in the police department, and all day he does what he eats donuts. We studied in the same class. Yes, it was a long time ago. So, your car?" "If I sit in it, it means mine," Max answered, starting to get a little tired of the stranger's chatter. "Funny!" the guy said approvingly, and smiled even wider. "Somebody stole your car?" he asked sympathetically. Max made a grimace. "It's hard to say." "I thought so. And not only me. Probably the teenagers wanted to ride. Yes, such a car is hard to keep in safe. Probably costs fifty thousand? No? More? Well, what I can say! Is there the car alarm? No? How it is? Everyone has the car alarm! Be sure to set it. My brother-in-law got a new Ford …" "Congratulations," Jennifer interjected, not ceasing to be amazed at the stranger’s talkativeness, "Maybe he has a crush on me? Trying to makes an impressions on me?" suddenly flashed through her mind. Jennifer felt flattered. For a long time no one had given attention to her. She did not need it, but it was nice to think so. "So," the stranger continued to tell," my brother-in-law set auto alarm, as if he had not a car, but a bank safe with millions." And what do you think? They stole it anyway!" a satisfied smile appeared on the guy’s face, "How? Elementary. He forgot to activate all this crap when he was drunk!" throwing his head back, the guy laughed out loud and merrily. An involuntary smile appeared on Max's face. With his friend Vladik, no, not in the states, a similar story also happened at home. Well, it was very funny! "I wonder how long he will entertain us with his stories? Didn’t introduce himself. He didn’t ask what our name is. Is he really so simple? Maybe he just hanging noodles on our ears? Maybe he walked to my car? He wanted to unscrew something? And here we are. So, that's why he talks too much," his alertness gradually began to return to Max. "Are you from the north?" the cowboy suddenly asked, stopping laughing. He suddenly began to look around. "Looking for someone or waiting, Max decided, " I'd like to know only whom?” His accomplices?" "From Los Angeles." "No way. Ah, well I see you are not local guy. What's your name, buddy? Bob McKinney? But me, Teddy Forst. But, you are clearly a foreigner. Pronunciation gives out. How long did you moved to the city of Angels?" "Not really. Last year." "And the area? Sunset? Vilshar?" "Wilshar Memorial. What?" "I'm interested. And I ... ." Teddy turned his head to the hills, "from here nearby. Lives on the ranch. My brother and I breeds cows. Rather, he breeds, and I help on the weekend. In the morning we lost one cow. So, I'm looking for her." “You'll find it," Max reassured him, and thought to himself: "Now it’s clear why he keeps turning his head around. Unless, of course, he’s lying!" "Of course," Teddy cheerfully agreed. "But do you know who stole your car, don't you?" Max nodded in the affirmative. "Yah? And who?" Teddy perked up. "One my buddy." "That is a bastard! It’s not enough to screw his neck" Teddy sincerely rebelled. "No, Teddy. You did not understand. I gave him the car myself. A friend wanted to ride his girlfriend. They had a drink at the bar. And when they got to this place, Laura, his girl, wanted to take a walk. What happened next, I do not know, but they did not find the car. They were drunk." Teddy nodded knowingly. It happens to everyone! "Well," Max continued to invent, himself, surprised at his own revelry of fantasy. And how astonished Jennifer was sitting next to him, and beyond words! "For a long time, however, they were looking for a car, but they could not find it. The prairie is big. There are many hills. They looked in, speak for one, then the other - there is no car. Gone!" "Have they got home?" Teddy asked. "One couple gave them a lift. They also returned from the party, but another one." "It's good. It's cold in the prairie at night. Yes, and snakes …" Teddy suddenly fussed, spun in place, "Okay, Bob, man, do what you need, but I have to go! Glad you found my car." "Thank you, Teddy." "Soon it’s lunch time, but I still need to find a cow. Horned cattle can come across the block post. If it happened we can't get it back!" "Block post? What block post?" Jennifer asked sharply. All this time she sat in silence, waiting for the moment when the outgoing programmer finally left them, "There was not any block post." Teddy looked at them oddly. Incredulously and as if with resentment. " What, do you not know? Do not know anything?" "No. What should we know? Did something happen?" Max involuntarily squeezed Jennifer’s hand. He thought, now Teddy would say something about the ship and the alien. Teddy spat and, resting his tanned hands on his hips, stared at them incredulously. "Do you know nothing exactly? Have you both fallen from the moon?" Max startled inwardly: "How close. Almost to the point!" flashed through his head. "Definitely not from the moon. We have already said. No, we don’t know! Let's say it already!" "OK! Tony says this is the work of the Russians. But I say, cross-eyed - Japanese or Chinese." "Are you talking about the glow?" Max asked, beginning to understand something. He and Jennifer also noticed that on the horizon the sky has a strange color. As if illuminated from the ground. "Of course! What else? See how it blazes. To the top of the sky! Here everyone is just talking about it. The glowing began at night, three days ago, it still burns!" "Oil?" Max suggested. Teddy was offended. It seems that they are holding him here for a fool! "Oil. ... If oil burning, the sky would be black and sooty as I don’t know what! And it glows yellow, like the sun melting on the ground" "Sorry," Max said hastily. “Go on!" Teddy let out a noisy air, shook his head. "Okay, listen. No one really knows anything. But I heard a mysterious thing appeared in the prairie. Huge as I don’t know what. Lies to itself among the hills and glows!" “Did you see it yourself?" Max asked, exchanging glances with Jennifer. It seems that during their absence something happened that they have no idea. And not only Jennifer and he. "Yes how to tell you. From far away only. That same night, the marines arrived here. They barred everything around with barbed wire. They set alarms, motion sensors, surveillance cameras. And the block posts that I have cows in the stable. The marines themselves took this thing into the ring. Well, the local cops are on duty at the posts. Well ...." Teddy paused for a moment, apparently recalling a night outing, "It was a trifle to get through police posts. The guys themselves stared at this thing. In general, we got pretty close. We climbed the hill. Lay down. Jack by eye determined that the distance to the strange contraption is no more than two miles. And what is two miles, when this giant is the height of a multi-storey building, and in length - as I heard today he guys - two hundred, or even all three hundred miles south to the city! All yellow and glow. Lie down. We look. We take pictures, shoot on mobile. I can even show you pictures. Want to?" "We want," Jennifer agreed right away, holding out her mobile phone to Teddy. After a minute, Teddy returned the phone back to her. "You'll take a look later. I’m sure you haven’t seen anything like this in your life," he assured. "We will see. Tell us more," Jennifer hid the phone, looked at the far away mysterious glow. "I wonder what could it be?" she thought. "Ah, yes. So here we are. Below us is a spotlight. Barbed wire. Green berets. Guys said that they have been transferred from Omaha. Or maybe they are lying. Who knows! Around as bright as in the day. Steve wanted to cut the wire and crawl closer, but we held him. The guy could be detained by a military patrol." "Did you see something else interesting? Besides the light and unknown object?" Jennifer asked. "Interesting?" Teddy repeated thoughtfully, and moved his shoulders. "How can I tell you. For us everything was interested. Yes, everything. This thing looks the same from everywhere. No matter from what place you look at it - below, above or from different sides. Its glowing continuously. Not bright, the eyes are not blind, but it’s hard to look for a long time. Eyes hurt. We looked through binoculars and through a telescope. With binoculars, nothing bad happened. But when Steve looked into the pipe once, he then for about five minutes saw nothing around. Dazzled! Honestly, I have never seen anything like it in my life. And none of us have seen. Even in the movies. It is incomprehensible. Huge, long and yellow. As if to take the full moon, erase all the spots from its disk, and stretch it for two hundred miles across the sky. It would be almost it. Of course, we did not see all of it. Well, this thing. It only begins here, then goes far south, to the prairie. I think there, too, a lot of marines and green berets. No way to get through. Although, the wire can probably be cut. Today we are going to go there again. You can come with us," Teddy suddenly suggested. "Thank you, Teddy. We would love to, but we have to go." "Well, it's not Russian. I did not hear that they have such technology," Teddy doubted again. "Then the Chinese or the Koreans," Max suggested, reflecting on the fact that, judging by the manner of communication, Teddy is not very much like an office programmer. He looked like cowboy, yes. But not like the programmer. "Maybe they. Who knows,"Teddy said uncertainly. "Are there many policemen?" Max asked. "From all over the state. In the city there was one patrol car per district. The authorities came in large numbers. Some flew by helicopters. Probably from Washington. Some bosses gathered. Yes, the funny nights have come!" "What do they say on TV?" Jennifer asked. "On the TV? Well, I somehow did not pay attention. There was no time to watch. Why do I need news on TV when I can see them with my own eyes? The local newspaper wrote something about a black hole, not forgetting to drag another end of the world. But authorities quickly shut them up. Maybe there is something on the Internet. Amateur photos, videos. But I doubt it. I think the government has banned the dissemination of any information regarding the odd thing. Have you seen?" Taddy gestured with his hand at a tree growing near the side of the road. The same tree near which they first met Tondor. The tree from which, in fact, all their adventures began," Impressive, isn't it?" Teddy continued to say, "Previously, an oak grew on this place. About ten years ago, lightning burned it. Look now. The trunk is red. The branches are blue. And everything glows. Miracles. Journalists came here too. And not only local. They wanted to make a report. No matter how. The marines raided, all the footage was taken, the journalists were politely asked to leave the restricted area. Of course, something serious happened, since they did not begin to stand on ceremony with the journalists. Today, however, for some reason no one is here. I'm about the cops. Probably, they were also thrown to the object, as they call a luminous contraption. So you can go to the tree, take a closer look." "Already went. Watched. Interesting," Max answered. "Yes? Well, me, too. I even broke a piece of a blue branch. He put it on the the table in the living room. And what do you think? Glowing! Bulbs do not need to be turned on! Christy, my girlfriend, said to bring one more. She wants put it in the bedroom. She likes the way the branch shines. I don’t know, maybe I’ll bring it today. There are some lot of it on rhetoric tree. Strange, today there are no cops near the tree. All the days were around but today nobody. Bob, have you seen anyone here?" Max frowned. "Let's me think, it seems, nobody. Just met you." "Strange, Teddy repeated again. "Something is wrong here. Maybe something happened in the prairie?" "Teddy, how did you get to the tree?" "Like you — by my feet!" Teddy thought the joke was successful, and he laughed again cheerfully. Max smiled too. Jennifer's face showed only a semblance of a smile. Mentally, she built the course of the future conversation with the boss, although she was not going to go to him. So, just in case. Stopping laughing, Teddy explained: "Everything is very simple. There was no one here at that time. Like now. And we were returning home with the guys. Well, after our sortie. Your car was already here. Then, of course, I did not know that she was yours. We thought that gasoline was over and the driver went to the city for help. Although, he could call the nearest technical assistance service station. But, frankly, we were not at all interested in this then. It's just an abandoned car and nothing more. And it were not our business." Max nodded in agreement. "Well," Teddy took a breath, licked his dry lips, I'd like to drink something. Do you have beer or cola?" Max opened the glove compartment, looked inside. "Sorry, buddy, it's over." "I will get along. So, listen on. When we returned home, the tree was already glowing, as it is now. It glows during the day, but not so noticeably. But at night the glowing is so strong that you can't take your eyes off! In a word, we stared for quite a while, and when I woke up, I suggested to break the branch. I thought than it was cool idea. The guys didn’t want to, they were scared, but I didn’t, I went to the tree and broke it off. Then police cars appeared, and we got out of here. We had no need for extra problems and questions. Yes, and they could pick up the branch. But I really liked it," Teddy suddenly stumbled, and looked at Max with suspicion, as if he hadn’t chatted with him for a good half an hour before, "Listen, Bob, I wanted to ask you something." "Ask," Max was somewhat wary. "You didn’t walk out of town, and not along the road? You don’t have a car either. You walked from the prairie. On your foot. I have seen." Max calmly looked Teddy in the eye. "Do you see the light?" he pointed with his chin to the side where he and Jennifer had come from. "But what's in there?" " Our crew shoots film a bout the Martians. Cool blockbuster," Max lied, and did it without blinking an eye. "Are you kidding?" Teddy gasped in disbelief. "No, go .... and see if you do not believe me. Of course, if the guards let you pass. In-kind shooting. A film crew from Hollywood itself!" "But the glow. Glow what is that?" "Do not you understand yet? Oh, Teddy, Teddy! The Martian ship glows, what else!" Max wanted to laugh, but by willpower, he restrained himself and did not laugh. Teddy knocked his worn hat with wide brim over the back of his head and stared at the Martian ship smoldering a kilometer away from them with yellow and scarlet glow. It is not known why, but the ship of Max and Jennifer, as if eavesdropping on their conversation, and wanting to help them in this situation, appeared somewhat invisible and became visually accessible for observation. "It glows well!"Teddy said after a moment of silence. "They set fire to the shed like that! I've seen the light before. I thought it was another tree. Will they shoot for a long time?" "Yes, for a week or more. If everything goes according to schedule," Max answered at random, hoping that in a week they would not be here anymore and that he would no longer have to meet the outgoing cowboy. A pleased smile spread across Teddy's face: "Bob, who built the ship? You?" Max grunted: "You say it yourself - me, of course not! Specialized company. In Hollywood. You can’t make such a ship in the barn behind the house. It should look like a real one. Even take off! Like ours, for example." "That's for sure," Teddy agreed immediately. He stood and continued to smile. Then a shadow of concern fell on his open face. 'Probably remembered the cow,' Jennifer thought hopefully. 'It’s time for it' she was not mistaken. "Heck! The cow!" Teddy exclaimed. "What cow?" Max was surprised. "Yes, that one, which is missing. I told you." "Ah, well. Now I remember." "Okay, Bob, I've get to go. It was nice to talk. With you too, miss." Teddy politely nodded to Jennifer. She smiled back. "Bob, ig you be in our area, come to our Ranch. My brother and I will be happy to see you. And your girlfriend too. Our Ranch Cheerful Cowboy is nearby. Here everyone knows it. Do not get lost. Well, give me your paw!" "Thank you, Teddy. I’ll definitely come to see you." Max shook the cowboy’s sinewy hand extended to him, got out of the car. Teddy, as if sneaking quickly began to climb the hillside. "I wish to find a cow faster!" Max shouted after him. Teddy turned around, waved his hand. "Bob, are there many Martians in your movie?" Teddy shouted loudly. Max could not help smiling: "A dozen or more. What?" "But when they show it on TV?" " In three months or about." "It's a long time!" Teddy shook his head and, adjusting his hat, which had slid to one side, began to climb the hillside again. When the top of his hat was hidden from view, Max got back into the car, started the engine. Taddy tired him with his chatter, but, nevertheless, left a pleasant impression. "What do you think?"Max asked when Teddy completely disappeared behind the hill. "I think strange things are happening here. But on the other hand, the current situation is in our hands. Perhaps they will forget about us. At least for a while. I really hope so!" Jennifer knew how the FBI agents work, and realized that she wouldn’t be left alone for a long time. Perhaps an incomprehensible object will distract attention, but for how long, she did not know, "In any case, it makes no sense to stay here. Come to me. I need to talk with people I trust. It will help to clear up the situation. Yes, and Max, it would be good if you contact your relatives. Especially with the uncle from the security services. Maybe he will get some useful information for us," she repeated almost word for word what Max had already heard from her. "I'll do it if you insist,” Max agreed. The car started and, gaining speed, rolled along the highway in the direction of the city. Towards the unknown.
To be continued
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