Anna. Mrs. Rebka's name was Anna. Some idiotically calm fraction of Lise's mind filed that fact away.

Anna Rebka, who was also the boy's mother.

"We need to get it off him!"

"Something to handle it with," Dvali said. "Gloves, a stick, a piece of paper—"

Turk yanked a pillowcase from one of the spare pillows and wrapped it around his right hand.

Strange, Lise thought, how the flying thing had ignored Turk in the street, how it had ignored Lise, for that matter, and the other adults, all easy targets, but had lighted without hesitation on Isaac. Did that mean something? Whatever the flying thing truly was—and she did not doubt that it had sprung from the ash, like the ocular flower or the host of carnival objects the news was reporting from Port Magellan—was it possible it had chosen Isaac?

The others stood back from the bed as Turk reached toward the creature with his wrapped hand. But then another strange thing happened:

The flying thing disappeared.

* * * * *

"The hell?" Turk said.

Isaac gasped and sat suddenly upright, put his hand to his face and felt the freshly revealed skin.

Lise blinked and tried to replay the memory in her mind's eye. The flapping thing had dissolved—or at least that's how it had looked. It had turned to liquid all at once and instantly evaporated. Or, no, it had seeped away, like a puddle of water drawn into moist earth. There wasn't even a wisp of vapor where it had been. It was as if it had drained directly into Isaac's flesh.

She set aside that troubling thought.

Mrs. Rebka pushed past Turk and reached for the boy—fell on the bed beside him and took him into her arms. Isaac, still gasping, bent his body against her and ducked his head into her shoulder. He began to sob.

When it became obvious nothing more was about to happen—nothing monstrous, at least—Dvali asked the others to step back. "Give them some room." Lise retreated and grabbed Turk's hand. His hand was sweaty and dusty but infinitely reassuring. She couldn't begin to guess what had just happened, but the aftermath was utterly comprehensible: a frightened child was being comforted by his mother. For the first time Lise began to see Mrs. Rebka as something more than a spooky, emotionally distant Fourth. For Mrs. Rebka, at least, Isaac wasn't a biology experiment. Isaac was her son.

"What the fuck," Turk repeated. "Is the kid all right?"

That remained to be seen. Sulean Moi and Diane Dupree sequestered themselves in the motel room's tiny kitchen nook, talking fervently but quietly. Dr. Dvali watched Mrs. Rebka from a careful distance.

Gradually Isaac's breathing grew steadier. At last he pulled away from Mrs. Rebka and looked around.

His peculiar gold-flecked eyes were large and wet, and he hiccupped a couple of times.

Diane Dupree emerged from her conference with the Martian woman and said, "Let me examine him."