south side and start this day over. Only this time, with sanity. But as long as I was here . . . “All right,” I said. “Now what?”
“Here’s how this is going to go,” said George. “I’m going to sit here and let you ask me questions. As many questions as you want. And when you’re done, I’m going to ask you one question. How about that, huh? Pretty good deal.”
“What’s the question?” I asked.
“That,” it said, “is about the only question I’m not going to answer right now. But hang in there. You’ll find out.”
I sat back in my chair and drew in a deep breath. My heart was still beating quickly, but somewhere in our conversation it had stopped pounding like it was about to break my ribs. “I’m not sure what to ask.”
“How about how the ship works,” suggested George.
“How does it work?”
It smiled. I’m not sure if it was a natural expression for its species, or if the smile was done for my benefit, but the effect was a bit ruined because it revealed a twin set of continuous white ridges that seemed to run from end to end of George’s very wide mouth. “Good question. See, it’s an arc drive. As it turns out, all that string theory stuff the folks in your physics department are talking about . . . You know string theory?”
“Yes. Or at least, I know of it.”
“Well, it’s all wrong. There are just four dimensions, like everyone always thought.”
“How does that—”
It held up a three-fingered hand. “I’m getting there. See, it turns out you can locally impose additional dimensions, the same kind of curled-up little dimensions those physics guys love. And once you do that, you can kind of bend the bigger dimensions around them. And . . .” It did the almost-shrug again. “Arc drive.”
“That . . . didn’t really explain anything.”
“No, it didn’t,” George agreed with a nod of its massive purple head. “But if it did, you wouldn’t understand it anyway. So, let’s talk about something else.”
I rubbed my hands along the arms of the chair, feeling my damp palms sliding over the smooth wood. “Why Milwaukee?”
“Oh, it’s the name.”
“The name?”
George nodded. “Just slips off the tongue. Or it would, if I had one.” It opened its mouth wide and leaned forward so I could see. Behind the curved white bar that lined the top and bottom of the space, there was nothing but a smooth lavender cone. It closed its wide maw and sat back. “Truthfully, we wanted a place where the ship would get noticed—no sense parking it over some desert and waiting a month before someone spots it. But we didn’t want to park above some city so big or important that the first thing that would happen would involve a lot of shooting. Milwaukee seemed like a good compromise.”
“Could we hurt you with our weapons?” I asked, feeling like I was taking a chance.
“You could if we let you, but we wouldn’t. So, no.”
“Could a nuclear weapon destroy your ship?”
“Of course. We’re not magic. But again, we wouldn’t let that happen, so . . . don’t worry about it.”
“How can you speak without a tongue?”
“Carefully,” the alien replied. “And also, I think, rather well.”
I paused for a moment, leaning back and feeling the chair’s frame bend with me. George didn’t seem to be upset by my questions about the weapons, but then I had no idea what an upset purple hippo alien looked like. Maybe he was displaying rage and I just wasn’t getting the message. Except . . . I didn’t think so.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“Talking to you.”
“I don’t mean you, specifically.” I waved a hand toward the darkness. “I mean all of you. The ship. Why have you come to Earth?”
George blinked its small eyes. “Same answer, more or less. We wanted to talk with you. Except, with not just you, of course. With quite a few people.”