“That’s the point, Patrick,” I said. “Parade enough BS in front of people, and they start to doubt everything. You don’t have to convince the public you’re right, if you can convince them everyone else is wrong.”

“A month ago, the world was a safe, sane place,” Patrick said as he sat. “Relatively, anyway. When did it all go down the rabbit hole?”

“Eventually, the Loranna will catch us,” Sheldon said.

Nat looked up. “Catch us how?”

“The cloaking field is not impervious to detection, simply difficult to detect. Even for ships. You have to be looking for your target, and you have to have a reasonable idea which direction to look. But if they get us in their sights, well, they will probably be armed.”

“They can’t cover the entire planet, surely,” Nat said.

“True. But predictive analysis can zero in on us. Eventually, we will cross paths.”

“Unless we go truly random,” I suggested. “Darts at a map kind of thing.”

“That would be less efficient but would certainly make things more difficult for them.”

“How about hovering over the White House?” Nat said.

Patrick waved his hands. “I think they have rocket launchers.”

“Let’s not do that,” Sheldon said.

I took another swallow of coffee, sighed, and settled back. “So the problem seems to be that the most populated places with the best news platforms are Western democracies, speaking broadly. But those are also the countries where the Loranna are likely to be able to bury the story.”

Nat nodded. “That about sums it up. As long as all we’re doing is making an appearance, they can simply alter the record or come up with some alternative explanation. We need to get more interactive. Do something that involves some kind of physical contact.”

“It appears we already are,” Sheldon said. “Three news stories have just popped up involving flying saucers that closely resemble the Halo. All involve somewhat ludicrous interactions with humans. At least one mentions anal probes.”

“Dammit. They’ve started proactively desensitizing the public to news stories about us.” Nat sat back heavily. “I hate to admit it, but I’m kinda stumped.”

A gloomy silence settled over the group. Each person stared into space, avoiding eye contact. Then Patrick spoke up. “Physical evidence. Sheldon, do you have any technology that we could give away that wouldn’t cause a catastrophe? Something that couldn’t be explained away?”

Nat laughed. “Like a couple of orange alien lizards?”

Patrick smiled back at her, then shook his head. “Too risky. If they escape, we’ve lost everything. I mean something we can hand out.”

“You mean like a light saber?”

“Yeah, something like that. Although I think one of those in particular would cause a lot of trouble.”