Out of the Blue

by Pam Harvey

  ‘That’s twice as fast as me,’ Sean said.

  ‘Yeah, well he’s been riding bikes for a lot longer than you have, Sean.’

  ‘And is E.D. faster than you guys?’

  The brothers looked at each other. ‘Lots,’ Mario said finally.

  E.D. appeared as the boys were heading back from the paddock where the bike track was and Sean quickly told E.D. about his fourth place.

  ‘Mate, that is awesome. I got a fourth too on my first shot at 60.’

  ‘You did?’ Sean asked, wide-eyed.

  ‘Absolutely. Come on, we’re heading over to pick up Angus then going back to Gab’s. Hannah’s okayed it with your parents. You had dinner?’ Sean had to jog to keep up with E.D.

  ‘No, and I’m really hungry.’

  ‘Me too, but that’s nothing new,’ E.D. laughed. Fifteen minutes later E.D. and Sean were standing on Angus’ front steps. E.D. rapped on the door.

  ‘Mate,’ E.D. said when Angus opened the door. ‘I’ve been instructed to collect all your alien videos and DVDs.’

  ‘My what?’

  E.D. marched past him.

  ‘I got a fourth on E.D.’s motorbike track,’ Sean said, giving Angus the thumbs-up.

  ‘Nice going, Sean,’ Angus said, following the boys into the living room.

  ‘G’day, Mr Mac,’ E.D. said, walking briskly to the TV stand where the videos and DVDs were stored.

  ‘E.D. wants to borrow all our alien videos, Dad,’ Angus said, rolling his eyes at his father. Mr Mac looked over the top of the paper he was reading.

  ‘Does he now?’ he grinned. ‘I hope he’s got something large to carry them all in.’ He turned back to his paper.

  ‘Hey, all I can see here are horseracing videos,’ E.D. said, pulling out an old video box. ‘Collomite Race Meeting, August 23, 2003,’ he read.

  ‘Had three firsts and a third that day,’ Mr Mac said, tossing his paper on the floor. ‘Pop it on, E.D. That fifth race was an absolute classic. Misty Dreamer was bunched in on the rails at the top of the straight—’

  ‘Dad, somehow I don’t think E.D.’s here for the Collomite Race Meet video.’

  ‘Unless there was an alien invasion or something during the race meeting,’ E.D. added.

  ‘Can’t say I recall any aliens there,’ Mr Mac said. E.D. inserted the tape into the recorder and pressed play.

  ‘That’s looking a bit grainy, Mr Mac,’ E.D. said, standing back and looking at the screen. ‘My brother Mario knows a guy who can put all your videos onto DVDs.’

  ‘Really? It’s one of those jobs I haven’t got around to but I’ve got some terrific film here, you know.’

  ‘I’ll bet you have. Putting them all onto DVDs will protect them forever. He works down at that DVD store in Guthrie Street. Why don’t we go down there now?’ E.D. suggested.

  ‘Now?’ Angus said.

  ‘Well, the plan was that if you guys didn’t have any alien videos I had to go down to the DVD store and borrow as many as I could.’ Angus groaned. ‘And then maybe if it was okay with Mr Mac, he could drop us all off at Gabby’s.’ It was Mr Mac’s turn to roll his eyes.

  ‘We’ve been invited for dinner,’ E.D. said, by way of explanation.

  ‘Fair enough,’ Mr Mac said, rising from his chair. ‘If Angus is out tonight, I might spend the evening going through all these videos and working out what’s worth saving. No time like the present.’

  E.D. ended up renting two DVDs and three old videos from the video shop.

  ‘Are we going to watch them all?’ Sean asked when they were back in Mr Mac’s truck.

  ‘Gawd, I hope not. They’re so old the guy in the shop said I could keep them if I wanted to.’ E.D. looked at the covers. ‘From Beyond Space,’ he read. The sun-bleached cover showed a cluster of small, red alien creatures standing at the foot of a long white ladder that led back to a gigantic spacecraft.

  ‘And what exactly are we looking for?’ Angus asked.

  ‘Well,’ E.D. said, passing around a packet of lollies he’d bought from the store. ‘Hannah has this theory. I didn’t quite get it all but I think she’s a bit suspicious of that Byron guy and wants to see if his idea of an alien matches up with something he’s seen on a video. She reckons he’s probably got his own copies of every alien video ever made.’

  ‘Which means we’re going to have to get pretty lucky to score a hit with only these five,’ Angus said.

  ‘Yeah, true. Maybe Hannah’s just got a thing for aliens,’ E.D. said.

  ‘Well, she likes Angus, so there you go,’ Sean grinned. E.D. burst out laughing, giving Sean a high-five.

  ‘Yeah, right,’ said Angus, but he smiled all the same.

  They got to Gabby’s just as Mrs Hunter was serving dinner. No one was talking and Angus looked at E.D. He shrugged. ‘Met a Martian on the way here,’ he said casually, but no one except Sean looked up.

  Mrs Hunter finished tossing the salad. ‘I take it that you haven’t told anyone before now that we are leaving, Gabby.’

  ‘Leaving?’ said E.D. ‘Like, moving house?’

  ‘Moving towns, Emilio.’ Mrs Hunter smiled at him. ‘We’re shifting to Melbourne.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ E.D. nearly stood up but Angus grabbed his arm and held him back. ‘I mean, it’s such a long way away!’

  ‘Surely it’s not that bad,’ Mrs Hunter said, glancing around the table. ‘It’s not as if we’re leaving the country. You’ve got the Internet, your mobile phones, messaging and all those things that weren’t around when I was a kid.’

  ‘I was going to tell you all tonight,’ Gabby said, staring at her plate.

  ‘When are you going?’ asked Angus.

  ‘We’re leaving in three weeks.’

  E.D. swore then immediately turned red. ‘Sorry, Mrs Hunter. That just slipped out.’

  ‘That’s quite alright, Emilio. I understand perfectly.’

  They ate in silence, and E.D. even forgot to have more than one helping. After the dinner plates were cleared away. Mrs Hunter brought in a range of desserts.

  ‘Which one would you like, E.D?’ Gabby asked as she stood to serve. E.D.’s gaze wandered from the chocolate mousse to the steaming apple pie then over to an enormous bowl of fruit salad.

  ‘One?’ It came out as almost a whimper.

  ‘Well, maybe two if you’re lucky.’ Gabby gave him a small smile.

  E.D. shook his head. ‘I think I’ll pass tonight. Thanks, Gab.’

  Angus looked at his friend in alarm. E.D.’s face was hidden as his head was bent and he was studying the tablecloth as if he’d never seen one before.

  ‘Perhaps we’d better get on and look at those videos,’ said Hannah after everyone had finished eating. ‘I want to check them out. Would you like a hand clearing the table, Mrs Hunter?’

  ‘Thanks, Hannah, but I’ll be alright by myself. You lot go and watch them.’ Mrs Hunter shot a worried look at Gabby. ‘Go and have some fun.’

  The theatre room was full of cushions and beanbags. Ling threw some in front of the large projector screen while Hannah and E.D. organised the video tapes.

  ‘Listen, everyone,’ Gabby said quietly, as they settled on the floor. ‘Let’s forget about me going and enjoy these last few weeks. Otherwise we’re all going to be mopey and grumpy. We don’t want our last memories of being together to be sad ones, do we?’

  E.D. was shaking his head but Gabby gave him a pleading look.

  ‘We’ve got a mystery to unravel and it looks like we don’t have much time to solve it,’ Angus said. ‘Let’s work on that tonight, eh?’

  Still E.D. said nothing.

  Ling sat next to Gabby and put her arm around her. ‘So tell us about what happened at the caravan again, Hannah,’ she said. ‘Go slowly, so we can take it all in.’

  Hannah retold her adventure with E.D. Sean had found a notepad by the television and as Hannah went into great detail about exactly what she’d seen on the tiny computer screen, Sean found himself drawing
the creatures she was describing.

  ‘So, these two UFOSITE people…’

  ‘Punch and Judy,’ E.D. said softly.

  ‘Okay, Punch and Judy say that this device that Sean found broke off from a satellite.’

  Hannah nodded.

  ‘And it’s the thing they were looking for all that time?’ asked Angus. Again Hannah nodded.

  ‘So they’ll probably leave town now,’ Sean suggested.

  ‘Which means that the mystery’s solved.’ Gabby couldn’t hide the disappointment in her voice.

  ‘Except that we don’t know who abducted Byron and we don’t know about the weird shapes Hannah saw on the film,’ Sean said, still drawing with his pencil. ‘Maybe they really are aliens.’

  ‘Sean, did you just draw that?’ Angus asked, grabbing the piece of paper that Sean was holding up. ‘That’s amazing.’

  ‘Yeah? Thanks, Angus.’

  ‘Here, let me see.’ Hannah took the page and looked closely at it. ‘Oh, wow!’ she cried, staring at Sean. ‘I knew you could draw but that’s incredible. It’s almost exactly what I saw.’

  The others gathered around and peered over Hannah’s shoulder.

  ‘That’s spooky,’ Gabby shuddered.

  Sean had sketched a dark and narrow laneway with two haunting, ghost-like figures moving creepily towards the viewer. Their bodies were a wavy shape and they had no heads, yet still they took on a vaguely human form.

  ‘The odd thing is that it’s completely different to what Byron started drawing,’ Hannah said.

  ‘Maybe he sucks at drawing,’ E.D. suggested.

  ‘Or maybe he’s not telling us everything,’ Ling added. ‘I think we should go to his press conference tomorrow.’

  ‘Can we watch From Beyond Space now?’ Sean asked. ‘Let’s see if we can find Byron’s aliens.’

  Ling dimmed the lights in the room and the screen flickered for a moment before the old film started. Hannah was the first to groan. ‘This is bad!’

  ‘Keep watching,’ Angus said. ‘You never know.’

  As the aliens invaded Earth from beyond space—most of them resembling big-headed humans—Gabby turned to glance at E.D. He was staring at her. She quickly turned back to the movie and watched as the aliens took over the Earth. Nothing, she thought, was as scary as seeing E.D. looking like he wanted to cry.

  CHAPTER 14

  Wednesday a.m.

  Hannah woke up early the next morning but she lay in bed until ten o’clock, thinking. She could hear her mum in the kitchen telling Sean to be quiet and let Hannah sleep but it wasn’t Sean who’d woken her; it was the thought of Gabby moving.

  Hannah had met Gabby in kindergarten and even though they’d never been to the same school together, they’d always been friends. Gabby was athletic and trendy and wore all the right clothes. Hannah didn’t even know whether there was a dress in her wardrobe and she knew that no one called her athletic. They didn’t have much in common but they knew each other well. Just like they all knew each other well—Angus and E.D. and Ling and Gabby and Hannah. They were a team.

  And E.D. He’d been really upset. Hannah buried herself deeper into her doona. She hadn’t seen E.D. so sad, not even when his brother had broken his leg. Then, E.D. was angry, not sad. Sad wasn’t something that Hannah associated with E.D.—he was always the one cracking jokes.

  Down the hall, the phone rang. Someone picked it up and a moment later Sean knocked lightly on her door. ‘Hannah?’ he said, without opening the door. ‘Ling’s on the phone.’

  ‘Okay,’ Hannah called and Sean let himself in. He gave her the phone and Hannah waved at him to go out. He almost didn’t, but when she picked up a cushion to throw at him, he left in a big hurry, grinning as he went.

  ‘Hi, Ling.’ Hannah pulled the doona over her again and wedged the phone between her ear and the pillow.

  ‘How’re you going, Hannah?’ said Ling. There was a pause. ‘I really mean it: how are you going?’

  ‘I’m alright,’ said Hannah. ‘I just can’t stop thinking about it.’

  ‘Gabby moving away?’

  ‘Yeah. Gabby moving away.’ The words felt funny in Hannah’s mouth.

  ‘Well…there’s probably something else you should know.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Mum and Dad and me are going back to Hong Kong at the same time.’

  Hannah’s heart sank. She had known that Ling was only in Australia for a short while but why was she leaving now? ‘You mean, as soon as school goes back you’ll be leaving the country?’

  ‘Yeah. I said goodbye to my school friends when the term finished.’ Ling stopped talking and Hannah could hear her blowing her nose.

  ‘That’s really tough,’ said Hannah. ‘I’d hate to be leaving my school.’

  ‘Well, that’s just it, isn’t it? You’re staying right where you are. It’s Gabby and me who are leaving and we’re not even going to the same place. We have to make new friends. We have to start again.’

  Hannah didn’t say anything. She hadn’t thought about that. Here, back in Teasdale, Angus and E.D. and Hannah would still have each other. I’ll still have half of my best friends here, she thought. ‘You’ll have some friends from when you were living in Hong Kong before.’

  ‘I’m going to a different school when I go back.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Silence again. Hannah could hear Ling sniffing again and she felt like crying herself but how would that help? E.D. was crushed because Gabby was going and Angus…‘Have you told Angus?’

  Ling didn’t answer.

  ‘Ling, you’ll have to tell Angus. He likes you, you know.’

  ‘Hannah, he likes you.’

  ‘Yeah, I know he likes me. But he likes you. Get it? Likes. You’ll have to tell him soon.’

  Ling was quiet again. Hannah sat up in bed. ‘Ling?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘What time is Byron’s press conference?’

  ‘One o’clock, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I think so. That gives you nearly three hours to see Angus and it gives me a bit of time to do something else.’

  ‘What are you doing, Han?’

  ‘I’ll tell you when I’ve finished. But I’ll see you at Byron’s conference. We’ve got to get to the bottom of this alien mystery as well.’

  After Ling hung up, Hannah crawled out of bed and went straight to her computer desk. She was still there two hours later when her mother opened her door. ‘Hannah! What are you doing? Come and have something to eat!’

  ‘Okay, Mum.’ Hannah turned off her computer. There was nothing more she could do at the moment anyhow.

  At half past 12, Mario dropped off E.D. in the main street. Byron’s press conference was going to take place at the entrance to the community centre and E.D. had said he would walk from the motorbike shop. Mario waved him goodbye and E.D. lifted his head in reply before walking down the footpath with his hands in his pockets and his feet dragging.

  Until Gabby had said she was going, E.D. hadn’t realised how much he liked her. It felt now as if his life had changed suddenly and not in a good way. He was thinking about it so much that he didn’t register the confusion at the community centre until he was only 20 metres away.

  A small crowd had gathered to hear Byron but many people were walking away as fast as possible. E.D. spotted Byron on the steps of the centre, his arms folded, a smile on his face. Even from where E.D. was, he could see that something was wrong with him. His face glowed red as if he was sunburnt. But there was obviously more going on or people wouldn’t be walking away so quickly.

  ‘E.D.!’ Hannah and Sean were walking towards him, crossing the street. ‘What’s happening?’

  E.D. shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I just got here.’

  Hannah stopped when she saw Byron. ‘What’s happened to him?’

  ‘He looks like he’s been flash-burnt by a welder,’ said E.D.

  ‘Let’s go closer.’ Hannah walked on, stopping when she was at
the bottom of the steps.

  Only a few people remained, standing at a safe distance from the man at the top of the steps. Hannah could now see why people had hurried away. Byron’s face was not only red, but covered in dark purple dots that looked like a horrible infection. Only one cameraman filmed the action—at a safe distance.

  ‘Man, what’s happened to you?’ E.D. blurted out.

  Byron came down the steps towards them. Hannah refused to move but couldn’t help leaning back as he approached. ‘They came back,’ he said in a low, sombre voice.

  ‘Who came back?’ said a voice. ‘Oh, my God! Look at his face!’

  Hannah turned to see Gabby and Ling behind her. Gabby had her hand over her mouth and was staring at Byron with startled eyes. ‘Yeah, who came back?’ asked Hannah slowly.

  ‘Them!’ whispered Byron. ‘The aliens.’

  ‘When?’ said Hannah, folding her arms across her chest. ‘We saw you just yesterday.’

  ‘They came last night!’ Byron wheezed. ‘And they did this to me!’ He started to cough violently. ‘B…burnt my skin. S…some sort of ultraviolet ray.’ His face was turning scarlet. ‘G…gave me the pox!’

  ‘What’s a pox?’ Sean asked E.D. The elder boy shrugged. ‘Something disgusting, by the looks.’

  ‘A pox is an infection,’ said Hannah calmly, continuing to stare at Byron. ‘You know, like smallpox or chickenpox.’

  ‘You got chickenpox from an alien?’ E.D. asked, his voice incredulous.

  ‘Not chickenpox,’ said Byron, flashing an angry frown towards E.D.

  Hannah looked around at her friends. Angus was just approaching. She noticed he avoided Ling, and went to stand next to E.D. Angus raised his eyebrows at her as he noticed Byron’s face and Hannah gave a small shrug of her shoulders. She turned back to Byron. ‘Tell us what happened.’

  ‘It was terrible,’ Byron said. He seemed to have recovered from his coughing fit. He lifted a hand to his brow. ‘I was in bed, thinking about how they’d taken me into their spaceship and how it had been so dark all I could see was their outlines and…and…’ Byron’s voice wavered. ‘I’m not sure what happened next.’

  ‘But how did you get burnt?’ asked Hannah. She took a step closer to Byron but he backed away.