help but lean away. I reached behind me with one hand and found the edge of the gray box. “That . . . doesn’t make any sense.”
George stopped, and both its ears gave a twitch. For the first time I noticed a kind of musky, damp leather smell in the air. “Unfortunately, it makes the only sense.” Its big mouth had done a fair job of imitating a smile before, but now it did an even more convincing job on a frown. “Your civilization—not just what you call America, or Western civilization, but the whole enterprise that human beings have constructed since the glaciers receded eleven thousand years ago, is coming to an end.”
“Because you’re killing us,” I said, more than a note of anger entering my tone.
George gave another body-twisting shake of his head. “Because you are.”
“But . . .”
“In the very near future. Your civilization will collapse under its own weight. Under the force of the stress you’ve created on your environment and the failure of institutions that you’ve pushed to the limit. You’ve had a good run, but it’s nearly over.” It thumped its two heavy hands together in an expression that looked very much like frustration. “You asked why we had come when we knew it would cause you harm. This is why. We came, because harm was already coming. Our visiting you will accelerate that collapse, and we’re sorry about that. But the collapse is coming anyway.”
“But . . . if your technology is so much better . . . could you help us?” I struggled back to my feet and almost fell over the green-cushioned chair. “You could tell us what to do. You could save us.”
George shook both hands over its head. “We are saving you. That’s what I’m telling you.”
The combination of confusion and relief almost buckled my knees. “You’re saving us?”
“No. We’re saving you, Doc. You. Samuel David Harold Fetherstonhaugh.”
“Me?” My voice cracked, turning the word into something close to a screech.
The alien waved a hand at me. “Sit down, please. Let me try to explain.” With that, George stepped heavily back to its own chair and settled again, the alien’s thick legs straddling the bench.
I stood a moment longer, breathing heavily. Then I sat down, gripping tightly to the arms of the chair, never looking away from the purple being across from me. “You came to save me.”
“Yes. You and a few thousand others, yes.”
“A few?” I said. “But . . . you said you’d invited 147,000 and . . . something.”
“147,162.” George gave a slow nod. “But while we’ve been talking, quite a number have reached a decision.”
“What decision?”
“About whether they’ll come with us.” He spread his big hands again. “You might have guessed it by now, Doc, but that’s the question. The one question I have for you.”
I had the impression again that there was something else out there in the darkness. Other shapes moving around me. “You want me to come with you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s our way of saving you. And this time, I don’t just mean you personally, but you, all of you.” It gestured at the image still hanging in the air on its right, where the tiny ships could just be glimpsed in the distance. “You’ve already seen that we’ve recorded your history. We’ve done the same with your art. We have your music and your images and your writing. But that’s not you.” It paused for a moment, leaning its big-chinned face my way. “We need you.”
By then, I felt so twisted around, I could only repeat its words. “You need me.”
“Yes,” said George. “Because that’s how you save us.” There was a long pause, during which there came another of those rumbling sighs. Then with a sweep of George’s hand the image hanging in the air beside it became a view of Earth that sped rapidly away, and away, and away until any sign of the planet was lost in a swirl of stars. “We know you, but we are not you. Not human. What we’re offering you is a chance to be a