“Are you all right, Dev?” Katou-Zimmer was eyeing him with her characteristic maternal mix of detachment and concern.

“Fine, fine. I was just thinking of Diana.” He bit down on a piece of bread. It tasted, remarkably, just like bread. And why shouldn’t it, he told himself, considering how the aliens had taken on corn and wheat and soy in bulk during their brief sojourn at Earth. It even had tiny black seed-like specks embedded within. In regard to taste and content it certainly was a safer bet than, say, ship-synthesized seafood.

“A shame, that.” Seated on the bed near his wife, Jakob sipped black tea. The miraculous synthetization technology of the alien ship could duplicate a wide variety of proteins and carbohydrates, but for unknown reasons it had difficulty with common sweeteners. The tea itself, however, was fine. “She was a steadying force.”

Dev nodded, took another bite of his mock roll, and glanced toward Reed. The big man was eating standing up, a habit he had acquired while on various unwholesome assignments around the world that had occasionally required him to vacate his location with unseemly urgency.

“What about you, Gavin? What are you going to do when we get home? Besides go to the beach.”

Reed deliberated for a moment before looking back and responding. “I’ve given it a lot of thought. Initially, it didn’t seem like a viable notion. But the more consideration I’ve given to it, the more doable it seems.” He let his gaze rove over his companions. “I thought we might take over the world.”

Jakob lowered his cup. Katou-Zimmer just stared. Dev smiled at the joke, quickly perceived that Reed was not joking, and tried not to stutter as he responded.

“Considering that as an actual hypothesis, Gavin, I have to regard it as something of an impossibility for four ordinary people.”

The big man eased himself away from the wall he had been leaning against. “Not for four ordinary people—and for what it’s worth, I don’t consider either myself or any of you as ‘ordinary’—but for four people who are backed by a patently superior and enormously powerful alien technology.”

Katou-Zimmer spoke gently. “Gavin, the aliens in control of this vessel have no interest in our petty terrestrial politics. They have stated as much. All they want is to be rid of us and to be on their way.” She glanced at her husband, who nodded in agreement. “They want to leave. The last thing I would expect them to want to do is linger in the vicinity of our solar system with an eye toward helping the four of us do anything. Our interests, whether ordinary or absurd, are not theirs.”

The big man was unmoved. “I completely agree.”