Random Acts of Kindness

THE NEW TOMORROW PEOPLE

by Selma McCrory

Copyright © 1996

"And it's going to be a sunny day in Atlanta, with temperatures in the low nineties...."

Scott Hayden listened to the radio on his bed stand as his father got his photography equipment ready. He was getting ready too, since he had gotten a job to help pay the expenses. True, a summer job paying minimum wage didn't earn him very much, but he liked the bookstore where he worked. His father had been hired to cover the Olympics for a newspaper in the midwest, as a local 'stringer', since they had found themselves in Atlanta that summer. It was a good thing that Paul Forrester was famous, but also that there were enough famous journalists there that he wouldn't be noticed.

Since Scott's job was only part-time, he wouldn't start until noon. He was mostly there to handle any extra crowds, since the mall was near several of the buildings where the Olympics were taking place.

"So, what are you attending today, Dad?"

"Let's see," Paul said, smiling as he adjusted the camera strap. "The fencing preliminaries, the ones you explained to me, and some of the swimming preliminaries. Maybe you can explain those to me tonight."

"Dad, that's easy," Scott said, leaning back on the bed. "It's just people trying to swim the fastest. Are you going to any medal events?"

"There are some this afternoon," Paul replied as he opened the door. "I still don't understand the medals. It seems to me that everyone should just have fun competing."

"They do that too, Dad."

"Then why have the medals?"

"It's hard to explain," Scott replied. "I'll try to this evening."

Paul smiled, and went out the door.

* * *

Two teenagers stood outside the Georgia Tech Aquatic Center, where some of the swimming events were being held. One of them, a girl with long blond hair in a braid, slipped two tickets out of an envelope. "It was so nice of your father to give me these tickets for my birthday!" she exclaimed, accentuating her normal British accent in a high squeak.

The older of the two, a young man with bright red hair and an American accent, shrugged. "He couldn't use them anyway."

"Megabyte, that's mean," the girl said. "He was very nice. I've never seen the Olympics in person. Besides, I'll be sure to have someone to cheer for, with so many people on our swim team and all."

Megabyte grinned. "Probably your only chance."

"Stop teasing me, Megabyte."

"Hey, gotta do what you're good at," Megabyte smirked. Someone collided with him, and he turned around. He stared at the other person, a young woman a few years older than him. "Lucy? What are you doing here?"

"Covering the Olympics for the Reporter, of course," Lucy said. "I was in Atlanta anyway, so I got Mr. Bishop to let me cover the Games for him. He got me credentials with the British Olympics Committee. What are you here for? And how's Adam?"

"We're going to the Games. Jade here got tickets for her birthday. And Adam's fine."

"Wonderful! So you decided to pop on over?" Lucy said anxiously. Megabyte was glad for her discretion concerning his and Jade's kind. Apparently, she had become less pesky than she had been the year before. Which was good, since dealing with Jade and Lucy both being energetic was more than he could deal with.

"Yep. Jade invited me to come, so I came."

Jade was staring at him, confused, so he said to her telepathically, What's wrong, kid?

She knows about us?

Yep. Get Adam to tell you about her. But don't start babbling off to her. She's a reporter, and she gets very curious.

Oh.

"So, are you just here for the swimming?" Lucy asked.

"Yes," Jade replied. "We're quite looking forward to it."

"You want to meet us for lunch?" Megabyte asked, wondering why he'd made the offer the second it got out of his mouth.

"Sure. But don't you still live in London? Isn't it evening over there?"

"Yes, I still do, and if you mean that it's bedtime, it's not. It's only three in the afternoon at home. By the time we finish it'll be dinnertime for us. A perfect time to eat lunch," Megabyte said. "And for you to file your stuff."

Lucy grinned. "I'll take you up on that offer. There's this coffeeshop down that way two blocks and around the corner. It's one of those chains like Starbuck's. Tell Adam I'd like to see him. I'll buy him a coffee if he'd like to come with us."

Megabyte grinned back, mentally amusing himself with thoughts of watching Adam and Lucy together. "Okay."

Lucy was craning her head around, and was staring at some person behind Megabyte. "Oh! I just saw someone I just have to meet. Sorry I have to go. See you later, noonish."

With that, she jogged off after several people with serious camera equipment. Megabyte turned to Jade. "You ready?"

"Ready!" Jade replied.

They went into the building and found their seats.

* * *

Scott was walking into the mall, after parking his bike and thoroughly chaining it up. He was halfway to the bookstore when he ran into his coworker, Lindie. Lindie was fussing with some car keys. "Hey, Lindie, "Scott greeted her.

"Hey, yourself," Lindie replied. "Julia's waiting for you. We've got all these guys that are from the head office—must be accountants, with all those suits."

"Thanks. Are you heading off?" Scott asked.

Lindie laughed. "No, we're far too busy for me to take off like this. If Julia's calling in afternoon people, it's really bad."

"Great," Scott said. "I can always do with the extra cash."

Lindie nodded, and turned to go. "Hey, Scott?"

Scott looked at her. "Yeah?"

"When you get in, avoid the head of that bunch. His name is Fox, he's this short, almost bald guy? Nasty piece of work."

Scott stopped short. "George Fox?"

"Yeah, you've dealt with him or something?" Lindie asked. "Never mind, I see you have. Be careful, Scott. I feel that if you get into his clutches, you might never get out again."

Scott shuddered. "Thanks. I think I'll go to the bathroom before I head on in. Catch you later."

"Okay," Lindie said. As they were turning away from each other, he heard her whisper, "Good luck, Scott."

She headed towards the mall exit. Scott started off towards the bathroom, but quickly changed course towards the doors he had come in. He wondered what Fox had said to Julia. Whatever it was, it must have been enough to make Lindie wary enough to warn him. He wished he'd gotten to know her better. At least she probably thought that he was a decent guy.

As he was musing over these thoughts, one of the security guards grabbed him. He could hear Fox's voice on the guard's walkie-talkie, and he was handcuffed.

He hoped that his Dad was all right.

* * *

Paul snapped another photo of the swimming competition. He'd been so fascinated by the swimmers; like all the athletes in the Olympics, each individual was interesting.

One evening, Scott had rented some of Bud Greenspan's "16 Days of Glory" tapes, explaining that he was a well-known documentary director, and that his name would come up in conversation with people he talked to. Paul had sat, mesmerized, by the stories he saw, especially the one about Oksana Baiul, the figure skater, since most of the TV coverage at the time was about the rivalry between Nancy Kerrigan and Tonya Harding.

He was still puzzled at the emphasis on people winning. Certainly, when Scott had run cross-country, he had done it for the joy of running.

A lot of the other press photographers were capturing the heats, but Paul smiled as one of the swimmers hugged his coach prior to the competition he was in. That one was a lot less interesting, but Paul still paid attention on how the competitors swam.

He was enjoying the whole thing. The atmosphere was pleasant, with the building being air-conditioned. He felt what humans would call ‘good vibes', with the fans enjoying themselves. In fact, he was vaguely aware that there were a few spectators projecting positive feelings. He smiled, musing the possibility that there were actually human telepaths in the building.

* * *

Megabyte and Jade were cheering their respective teams on. Megabyte was particularly pleased that most of the American athletes were doing well, while there were enough British swimmers to make Jade happy. It was too bad that the medal competitions were later in the evening. Still, it would be enough to watch Jade stay glued to the TV just to find out if anyone they had watched in the morning won medals. Jade's poor mom was going to have to survive Jade watching the ceremonies, even if they broadcast awfully late in the UK.

"Want something to eat?" he asked Jade casually.

Jade looked over absently. "Hm? No, not hungry."

"Well, I'm starving. I'm going to get a snack. Hold my seat for me."

His friend nodded absently again as he got up.

* * *

Megabyte was looking for a quiet spot to pop out in. Something approximating an alley. There had to be a space where he wouldn't draw attention to himself. He wondered if he could get into the staff corridors.

The door to one of the officials' areas banged open. Instinctively, Megabyte looked for a place to hide. A group of Olympic officials and a bunch of men in suits walked out, with a short, nearly bald man furiously gesturing from the centre.

Men in suits running around with other officials didn't mean good things. It was possible, of course, that they were businessmen associated with the Olympics, but he'd seen that bearing before, and it did not bring back pleasant memories. He prayed that these men weren't from the SIA, the Scientific Intelligence Agency. They probably weren't from the DSI, the British Department of Scientific Intelligence. His Dad was still associated with both, but not in the last few years, or he would have been able to warn him.

The men were not paying attention to him. If this was one of the intelligence agencies, he prayed that his Dad had mucked up the reports sufficiently so that none of them could be easily found. That way, they wouldn't know what he or Jade looked like. However, it paid to be cautious. Jade!

What? Jade asked, alarmed by the tone of his thoughts.

Trouble. Possible intelligence agents. No, don't move yet! I'll see if they're after us. But be ready to get away at a moment's notice.

Megabyte quietly shadowed the crowd. The group had stopped, with an Official glaring at the short man. "Mr. Fox, you are disrupting the Olympics with only unsubstantiated mentions of threats to national security! This is an event designed to promote world peace! Which we won't get if the government attempts to disrupt the proceedings over one person!"

The shorter man folded his arms. "As I said, Mr. Tyler, this is a matter of national security. I'm hardly after one of your paying guests. This one is working in the guise of a photographer. You've already provided me with some assistance in the use of your office. I just need to remove one person, and they can be safely taken between races."

Jade!

Is it them? Jade replied. That DSI you were talking about?

I don't know. But they're talking about a photographer. They might be talking about Lucy. They may know about her, and the stuff she wrote on Colonel Cobb last year. Find her, and be ready to teleport her out. She'll be taking photographs, or in the press pool, or whatever. With luck, you won't attract too much attention. Besides, Adam'll kill me if anything happens to her.

No he won't. He can't, Jade replied.

I know that. It's an expression, Jade, Megabyte said, rolling his eyes. But he's going to be worried about Lucy if something happens to her.

Jade giggled. All right, I'll find her.

Megabyte nodded. He went to where he was headed originally. The doors were locked, but he was able to get past them. It was fortunate that the Olympics committee was using electronic locks. He smiled, put his hand near the lock and concentrated on getting it open.

He tried not to attract a lot of attention to himself while trying to find out where Mr. Tyler's office was. There was a chance that he could find who these people were looking for. If they were looking for Lucy, Jade would have to get her out fast.

Mr. Tyler's office turned out to be very easy to find. Megabyte just had to look for the guy in the business suit guarding the door. Praying that this Mr. Fox had just left paperwork inside, rather than more of his men, Megabyte ducked around a corner. And teleported.

* * *

As soon as Megabyte got into the office, he found out exactly why Mr. Fox was having the office guarded. Sitting in one of the chairs in front of the desk was a young man a few years older than him. He was handcuffed to the chair, and he looked very unhappy.

Megabyte wondered why he was here. For that matter, what did he have to do with Lucy? Were they not after Lucy, but after someone else? He didn't dare ask the agents, they might be SIA. But here was someone that he could ask.

"Who are you?" the young man asked, blinking from the sudden flash of light that Megabyte's arrival had caused. Megabyte realized that he'd teleported in front of a total stranger, just to add to the danger that he and Jade were probably already in. Best to take the offensive.

"I could ask you the same thing," Megabyte replied coolly. "But I think I'll stick with why you're here, and why this National Security guy is running around."

"That's Fox."

"Fox Mulder?" Megabyte asked, raising his eyebrows in disbelief.

"No, George Fox."

"Okay," Megabyte replied, looking around the office. "So, what does this guy want?"

"Why are you asking me?"

"Because you're the only one in here. I suppose I can always ask the guard outside," Megabyte said sarcastically.

"And are you going to tell him how you got in here?" the young man asked, craning his head towards the door.

"Well, I won't have to tell him if you tell me what this Fox character is doing here."

"Look, I don't know you," the young man said angrily.

"Well, I don't know you either," Megabyte replied. "But I don't know this Fox guy either, and he makes me nervous. I don't like Intelligence agents. I don't like them poking around where I am. And I don't think you like them very much."

"No," the young man admitted.

"So, tell me why you're locked up here," Megabyte said again.

"You're not going to believe this," the young man started.

"Yeah?"

"Fox thinks I'm a threat to national security because I'm part of an alien invasion."

"Why isn't he handing this to the INS? I mean, if you're an illegal alien."

The young man rolled his eyes. "Not that kind. The extraterrestrial kind."

Megabyte stared at the young man. Either this guy was crazy, or this Fox guy was, or both. "He thinks you're an extraterrestrial? You don't look like an alien."

The young man shrugged. "Thanks. Tell Fox that. But I'm not here to conquer the Earth. I was born here. All I want to do is live in peace."

"Yeah. I'd suppose an alien invader would say that. But, as I said, you don't look like an alien."

The young man seemed to bristle. "And would you know what an alien looks like?"

"Green, glary eyes—"

"Good afternoon, Scott."

Megabyte turned around to see the men at the doorway. The nearly bald man, Fox, had a tight-lipped smile. "Great," Megabyte mumbled.

One of the men with Fox grabbed Megabyte and proceeded to handcuff him to the other chair in front of the desk. "Conway! Search him first!"

The agent sighed, and searched Megabyte, particularly going through his pockets. He shook his head.

Fox nodded. Megabyte sighed as the agents, all except Fox, left the room. He was sure one of them was probably relieving the poor guard. "Look, if you're going to take me to jail, take me to jail."

"Just a minute," Fox said. "I want you to answer a few questions first."

"Like what?" Megabyte asked. He had a sinking feeling  he didn't want to know. At least Fox wasn't into the light-in-the-eyes sort of thing. And this time it wasn't ropes. And this time, he could get out just by thinking about it. But he still didn't want to be there. Maybe he could bluff his way out. After all, he could be just a curious lockpicker.

"How did you get in here?"

Megabyte shrugged, forcing himself to relax. "Oh, that. I waited for the guy to take a break, and then I picked the lock."

"An electronic lock?"

Megabyte shrugged again. "They're my specialty. Then I got curious, and started talking to him."

Fox nodded. "And the part about the green, glary eyes?"

"Something I saw. This really weird thing. Pods that contained wisps of energy that took over people. The possessed people had to go around in sunglasses because their eyes were green and glary, as a friend of mine described it. I saw it over in England. I don't know if it played here," Megabyte bluffed. He could see Scott cringing, and wondered why.

"I don't believe you," Fox said, glaring at him. Megabyte started wondering if his acting was bad, or if the guy was really nutsoid. Maybe just paranoid, but Megabyte wondered about what. He decided it was best to play along.

"It was on a tape," Megabyte offered. "I saw it where my Dad was working," Megabyte said thoughtfully. He wondered what was going on there. Scott was doing a regular round of looking awful, Fox was staring at Scott thoughtfully, and then he turned his gaze onto Megabyte.

"And how do I know this isn't a ruse?"

Megabyte wondered if he should have been taking acting lessons, or if this guy was a paranoid. Maybe he was just into conspiracy theories. Mind control and all that. "You don't. But I'm not part of an alien invasion, any more than you are or Scott is."

Fox went red. "I'm not an alien invader!" he exclaimed. "But I'll check out this story of yours. Where is your father?"

Megabyte shrugged. He didn't want this guy to know who he was, even if there was little chance he could get to the files about the Teleporter Investigation Project. Not that the files were really complete, with Galt being the nincompoop that he was, and Masters being corrupt. Now that he thought about it, it seemed that he and Scott were in the same boat. "England. On business. I don't have the number, I left it at home."

"Which is?" Fox asked.

"Vermont. Where'd you think it was, Mars?"

"How about any others that can prove your story?"

"Look, I came here to see the Olympics. I didn't bring any numbers with me."

"Do you even have tickets?"

Megabyte bristled indignantly. "Of course I do! How do you think I got in to the stadium? Turned invisible and walked through the wall?"

"For all I know, you could have."

"Gee, and I thought I watched too much X-Files. Look, I came in the normal way, they took my ticket. I trashed the stub," Megabyte lied.

Fox smiled, and started walking around the desk. Megabyte looked at Scott. He could barely touch the other boy's hand.

"I'm getting tired of this," Megabyte said. If he had to get out of there by teleporting, so be it. This jerk would never see him again. If he could just come in contact with Scott, he could take him too. Nobody deserved to be locked in an office with Fox. Nobody deserved Federal agents that didn't know what they were dealing with. And Scott, alien or not, didn't deserve to be locked away for one man's crazy ideas. He stretched, catching hold of Scott's hand, and closed his eyes. He imagined Fox's face as they disappeared.

Fox would never believe where his prisoners went.

* * *

Scott blinked, trying to get the flashes out of his eyes. He seemed to be sitting on a beach somewhere. He wondered where he was, but at least he seemed to be out of Fox's clutches. He turned to face the teenager, who was making himself comfortable on the sand. "Where are we?"

"We're on an island in the South Pacific," the teenager said, shrugging. "I come here all the time. By the way, I'm Megabyte. Sorry about how I treated you back there, I think I over-reacted."

"That's okay," Scott replied, realizing that the teen probably didn't act that way usually. He wasn't sure that he'd act any different under the circumstances. "I know Fox and I sound crazy, going on about aliens. But it's the truth. By the way, I'm Scott. Scott Hayden."

"Great to meet you," Megabyte said, grinning at him.

"How did we get here?" Scott asked, looking around and noting the sea, the long stretch of beach, and the weird structure behind them.

"I teleported us here."

Scott swung around to look at the teenager. "Teleport? You mean going from one place to another just by thinking about it?"

Megabyte grinned. "Yep. I do it all the time. It's a good way to get out of handcuffs too. I see you're a science fiction buff."

Scott grinned back. He liked Megabyte. Yeah, he'd been a little rough in that room, but nothing that Scott couldn't handle. "Not really. I figured if I was going to get accused of being an alien invader, I might as well know what I'm getting accused of. Although sometimes my life feels like it's science fiction. Hey, thanks for getting me out of that mess."

Megabyte waved him off. "Hey, it's nothing. I've been in a lot worse scrapes than that. I've had someone try to drop a ceiling on me. Not something I'd recommend for your health."

Scott nodded. Now that the surprise of his experience had worn off, he suddenly started getting worried. "I've got to warn Dad."

"Who's your Dad?" Megabyte asked, getting up.

"Paul Forrester. He's a photographer."

Megabyte nodded sagely. "Makes sense now. Hold on a minute."

Scott watched as Megabyte's eyes glazed over. Megabyte sat there for a moment. "What's going on?" Scott asked.

Megabyte blinked. "I just talked to my friend Jade, asked her to look for a photographer, since she's there already. You see, we have a friend in the press corps, working for a London newspaper. She'd be able to recognize your Dad if he has any notoriety."

"Yeah, he has notoriety, all right," Scott said. "Paul Forrester is a rather famous photographer."

"Okay. Then our friend will know about him. Trust me."

Scott grinned. "I see that teleporting isn't the only thing that you can do. You're telepathic, too?"

"Yep. And I can sometimes open electronic locks. Not mechanical ones, but anything involving electronics I'm good at."

"What are you?" Scott asked, curiously.

"We call ourselves the Tomorrow People. We're supposed to be Humankind's next stage in evolution, but we're taking our own sweet time getting there. We can't kill, either. I've tried. Didn't work too well."

Scott nodded, smiling, and then frowned. "I hope Jade can get Dad out of there."

Megabyte smiled back. "She will."

* * *

Jade teleported herself in next to Lucy, who jumped. "Lucy, we need your help," Jade said rapidly, looking around to see if anyone had seen her pop in. She only had a limited time before someone noticed that she wasn't supposed to be there.

"Sure, what do you need help with?" Lucy asked. She shifted her camera to her side.

"Who's Paul Forrester?"

Lucy blinked. "Oh, he's one of those big-name photographers. That's him, over there. The worried looking one. What's up?"

"Can't tell you now. I've got to talk to him."

Lucy started putting her camera away. "Just a moment, I'll take you to him."

"No, I need to get him out of here. Megabyte says to stay still. We're all in trouble, but they don't know about you."

* * *

Paul looked around. Something was wrong. The crowd was still enjoying themselves, all the events were going all right, but he had a feeling of wrongness. Perhaps it was those that he could feel. The telepaths. He put his camera down and decided to see if he could help.

"Excuse me, Paul Forrester?" a voice from the side asked. A teenager with blond hair came up to him. She had an accent that he had heard described as British.

"Yes?" he asked. She was wearing no badges, nor was she dressed in the outfit that many official people at the Olympics wore.

"I need to talk to you, but not here. Could you come with me, please?"

"Why?"

"Well, it's about this guy named Fox. I think he's some kind of Federal official? And about your son. But we've got to get out of here. I'm not supposed to be here."

Paul followed the teenager. She led him to a deserted space. "What's this all about?" he asked, sensing her growing nervousness.

She looked up at him. "He's safe. But this Fox guy is here and he's really nasty and I don't think either one of us wants to run into him."

Paul touched her, and suddenly understood. "You're a telepath."

"Yes. How'd you know?"

"You feel—different. It's like you're one of my kind, but you're not. I've suspected Humans would develop like us, but I didn't think that you would develop so soon."

"You say this like you're not human," the girl observed. "Are you an alien? An extraterrestrial I mean? You don't act like one."

"And how does an alien act?" Paul asked curiously.

"They're nasty and they possess people and they have green eyes and they don't like sunlight."

"I know of some species like that," Paul replied quietly. "We tend to avoid them."

"I wish we could," the girl replied. "But we're also likely to blow ourselves up if we're not careful. I'm Jade, by the way. Do you mind if we get out of here?"

* * *

Lucy watched the federal agents with some bemusement. After all, it was so like Adam and his friends to get into this kind of trouble. She wondered if they'd told Adam to come to lunch. She wondered if they were going to stay in Atlanta in order to eat lunch. These were, after all, people who were in London one moment and Florida the next.

She'd seen Jade bustle the photographer off to one of the exits. She wondered if Jade and Megabyte were still in the building, or even in Atlanta. Probably not. There went her chance of checking in with Adam, unless she ran into him in London again.

A short agent and a tall one came up to her. "Ms. Allen? I'm George Fox, Federal Security Agency. We'd like to ask you a few questions."

"Yes?" She replied, shifting her camera to shake his hand.

"You're with the Reporter?"

"Yes. Actually, I'm covering for them locally. They're based in West London."

"Ah. I'm told that there was a young woman, not out of her teens, that came up to you. She subsequently left with another photographer. Paul Forrester."

"Oh," Lucy said, hoping that no one had been nearby when she was talking to Jade. "Yes. I remember talking to someone like that. She asked if I could point out Paul Forrester to her. I did."

"Did she say anything else?"

Lucy shrugged. "Just that she had a message for him."

"Someone said that you talked to her for a while."

"I made an idle comment about my boyfriend. I was a little distracted."

"Is your boyfriend here?"

"No, he's not. I was hoping to meet him for lunch with a couple of friends, since he's going to be in town. Came in all the way from Australia, can you believe that? But the reason I mentioned him is that he looks a tiny bit like Mr. Forrester. Must be that they're both dark-haired. But I was describing him to her, and got carried away."

"You're sure? She didn't say anything else?"

"I'm sure, Mr. Fox. Can I go now? I'm not much help, I'm afraid. And, I need to go interview Jeremy Rogers, who just qualified for the 100 meter backstroke finals. He's got a good chance of winning the medal. Plus, if I don't hurry, I won't get my story written up, and my paper won't pay me for my work."

"Very well, Ms. Allen," Fox said, reaching inside his jacket to produce a card. "Please feel free to call if you can tell us anything else."

"I'll be glad to," Lucy said. "May I go?"

Fox nodded.

* * *

Fox swung around the corner. Forrester wasn't in the press area, so he'd ordered his men to sweep the area, despite Mr. Tyler's protests.

Capturing the alien was far too important to give up. There were others. The young man that had been in the office with Hayden was dangerous. The alien had never shown an ability to disappear before, therefore that had to indicate a second wave of aliens. He'd have to come up with some sort of defense. But first, he had to find Forrester before he disappeared.

He came around the corner and found Forrester and the girl. "Forrester!" Fox yelled. The alien got out his sphere and was concentrating on it. The girl shrank against Forrester and closed her eyes.

Fox tried to tackle Forrester, but missed as he and the girl disappeared in a flash of light. He fell to the floor where the two had last stood. There was nothing but empty air. He got up, deciding to first check the center, and then, when he got back to Washington, to do some research on this new variety of aliens. They had to have shown up before.

He wondered how he was going to fight this new wave. Forrester had always been relatively easy to catch, since he was stuck with a human body and limitations. But this new group, the ones that could disappear, would cause more problems. How did you catch someone who was suddenly not there?

And then he remembered what one of them had said."...turned invisible and walked through walls." If all this new group could do was run and hide, then maybe, just maybe, he'd find a way to fight them. It would be hard, but not impossible. He would catch all of them.

* * *

Scott blinked as his father and a teenage girl materialized. Megabyte stood up and greeted the girl with a hug. Scott jumped up and was enveloped in a similar hug by his father.

"Is this your Dad?" Megabyte asked Scott.

"Yeah. This is him. Paul Forrester. Dad, this is Megabyte."

The girl looked questioningly at Megabyte. Megabyte said, "Oh. Yeah. Scott, this is Jade. She's one of us."

Jade grinned. "You're never going to believe this," she said, practically jumping up and down. "Paul's an alien!"

"I know, kid, I know. Scott told me."

"Are you an alien too, Scott?"

"Partly."

"I see we'll be talking about this for a while," Megabyte joked. "I'm glad to meet you, Scott, Paul. I hope this Fox guy has a test for sanity, sometime. He sounds like one crazy dude."

Paul looked at the two Tomorrow People sadly. "He's limited. He can only see what he believes, not the truth. Many people are like that, but he has narrowed his beliefs to the extreme. We will always be invaders to him."

Megabyte frowned and nodded. "I guess we'll have to worry too. Heaven knows what he made of us. At least if it gets too bad, there's an advantage to having a Dad that works in intelligence. He's blocked knowledge of our existence before, he can do it again."

Scott frowned. "Your Dad works in intelligence?" he asked.

"Yeah. He works for someone else, though. An agency called SIA. He's not affiliated much with them anymore, but he was when I discovered my abilities. He managed to hush them up, because he wants me to have as normal a life as possible."

"You're lucky!" Scott said. "We've been moving from place to place since I was fourteen."

Megabyte shrugged. "I'll see what I can do. If he's as single-minded as you think, maybe Dad can exert some influence. Make them see how much of a one-track mind this Fox has."

Scott reached into his pocket. "We have an additional problem," he said. "Fox still has my sphere. The metal is alien. It would provide the proof he needs. Besides, I can't do much without it."

"I'll go get it," Jade said, and popped out.

"Thank you," Paul said.

"It was nothing," Megabyte replied, with his characteristic shrug. "I don't like being treated like I'm a freak. Besides, that Fox needs to be put out of production before he realizes what we're becoming."

Scott nodded, still distracted by thoughts of Fox having his sphere. "He's frightened of anything strange."

"He's going to be very scared of us, then," Megabyte replied. "Whether he likes it or not, eventually his and everyone else's kids and grandkids are going to be able to teleport and there's nothing any of us can do about it. And we're the same species as he is. We don't have any alien blood."

"He's not going to care," Scott replied. "We're not normal."

Megabyte nodded. "A lot of people are scared," he said, turning to Paul. "Should we be scared?"

Paul smiled gently at Megabyte. "No. Most space-faring species have learned how to be peaceful. The ones you encountered were a rare kind that haven't learned to live in peace with other species yet."

"So, what's it like on your world? Scott told me that you were energy beings, but he couldn't tell me very much," Megabyte said to Paul.

"We have a beautiful world where there's no hunger, no war. Where people live in peace and are dedicated to learning and teaching, not fighting."

Megabyte whistled. "People made of smoke and cities made of song," he said in awe. At Scott's confused look, he said, "another science fiction reference."

Jade popped back in, causing another round of blinking. "Here it is," she said cheerily, handing Scott's sphere to him.

"Thanks. How'd you get it?" Scott asked her.

"Oh, it was nothing. Fox took his jacket off. I just took the opportunity to rifle through it. He never noticed. That's what he gets for leaving it in a public area."

"We'd better be getting you home," Megabyte said. "It's near dinnertime for us, and I'm sure you'd like to get your stuff and get out of there."

* * *

Paul, Scott, Megabyte, and Jade were all standing on the main street of a small town in Vermont. Paul and Scott had been able to gather their things since Megabyte and Jade had teleported them in and out of their apartment. "Home," Megabyte said. "I hope you like it. It's a nice place to live."

"Thank you," Paul replied. "It's beautiful."

"I think so, too," Megabyte said quietly. "Who knows, someday we'll meet again. I live in London right now, but I will be back in the States in a year or two."

Paul was scribbling down an address on a piece of paper. He gave it to Megabyte. "Her name is Liz Baines. You can reach us through her," he said. "She's a reporter."

"Another reporter. Lucy will be happy," Megabyte replied. "See you someday."

Paul and Scott watched as Megabyte and Jade disappeared in twin flashes of light.

"Is humankind really going to become like them, Dad?"

"Yes. Humankind is changing, and they are there to make sure the change happens, so that when humans become a spacefaring race, they will be ready to meet other civilizations."

"If Fox and others don't find them and try to kill them off."

"I don't think he can. Even if he finds one, there will always be others to continue. Even if Fox cannot see that, others can."

"In other words, the future's so bright, we'll have to wear shades?"

Paul looked at him in incomprehension, and then smiled. "Yes."

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