He looked up as the telescope motors ground into action. Lights flickered on the control panel.

He stared at the main switches, and then reached out for them. They were so cold they hurt.

‘Ow!’

The big dish turned towards the moon, which was just over Blackbury.

There was a clattering from the printer beside him, and the endless stream of paper it was producing now read:

OIOIOIOOIOIOIOIOOOIOOOOIOOOOIIOOIIOOIOIO

HEREGOESNOTHINGGGGOOOOOOOOOIIIOIIII

WELLIMBACKOOOOIOOOI . . .

Mr Fletcher had just bounced off the moon.

‘Vot was it like?’

‘I didn’t have time to see much, but I don’t think I’d like to live there. It worked, though. The sky’s the limit, Mr Einstein!’

‘Exactly, Mr Fletcher! By the vay, where did that young man go?’

‘I think he had to rush off somewhere.’

‘Oh. Well . . . we should go and tell the others, don’t you think?’

It was a quiet night in Blackbury Central police station. Sergeant Comely had time to sit back and watch the little lights on the radio.

He’d never really been happy about the radio, even when he was younger. It was the bane of his life. He suffered from education, and he’d never been able to remember all that ‘Foxtrot Tango Piper’ business – at least when he was, e.g., pelting down the street at 2 a.m. in pursuit of miscreants. He’d end up sending messages about ‘Photograph Teapot Psychological’. It had definitely blighted his promotion chances.

He especially hated radio on nights like this, when he was in charge. He hadn’t joined the police to be good at technology.

Then the phones started to ring. There was the manager of the Odeon. Sergeant Comely couldn’t quite make out what he was saying.

‘Yes, yes, all right, Halloween Spectacular,’ he said. ‘What do you mean, it’s all gone cold? What do you want me to do? Arrest a cinema for being cold? I’m a police officer, not a central heating specialist! I don’t repair video machines, either!’

The phone rang again as soon as he put it down, but this time one of the young constables answered it.

‘It’s someone from the university,’ he said, putting his hand over the mouthpiece. ‘He says a strange alien force has invaded the radio telescope. You know, that big satellite dish thing over towards Slate?’

Sergeant Comely sighed. ‘Can you get a description?’ he said.

‘I saw a film about this, Sarge,’ said another policeman. ‘These aliens landed and replaced everyone in the town with giant vegetables.’

‘Really? Round here it’d be days before anyone noticed,’ said the sergeant.

The constable put the phone down.

‘He just said it was like a strange alien force,’ he said. ‘Very cold, too.’

‘Oh, a cold strange alien force,’ said Sergeant Comely.

‘And it was invisible, too.’

‘Right. Would he recognize it if he didn’t see it again?’

The young policemen looked puzzled. I’m too good for this, the sergeant thought.

‘All right,’ he said. ‘So we know the following. Strange invisible aliens have invaded Blackbury. They dropped in at The Dirty Duck, where they blew up the Space Invaders machine, which makes sense. And then they went to the pictures. Well, that makes sense too. It’s probably years before new films get as far as Alfred Centuri . . .’