About an hour past by before I could see all of the United States below me, and I had thought of one way to recruit the people I needed to help me battle the evil beings the Father had told me about. But, for now, I just wanted to get home and see my family.

Placing my finger on the GOTO dent at the bottom of the dent panel, I thought of the wide prairie that ran down the middle of the United States and the glowing hemisphere of the Earth below vanished from before me to be replaced with the rain soaked prairie grass, which stretched for miles in all directions, not more than a hundred feet below the Dove.

It wasn't raining at the time, but the clouds overhead looked ominous. In the distance, I could see a few cattle that were standing close to an old barn that probably had a farm house close by, so I quickly flew the Dove down to within a few feet of a clump of trees that nestled at the bottom of a narrow draw that ran down between two of the rounded flint hills, which this part of the tall grass prairie is famous for.

I had hunted prairie chicken and pheasant in this part of the prairie before, and I knew how desolate it could be. That is one of the reasons I had chosen to land here. Another reason was that this was close to the city where my home was.

I touched the oval key, pushed the dent panel out of the way, stood up, walked around the seat and over to and down the ramp. As I stepped out onto the short green grass that was spread around this small wooded area, I felt that I was finely home. Although my home was actually quite a few miles away.

I stepped over to the wooded area to see if there was ample room to hide the large Dove in it; that is, if I cut down a few of the trees, but there just wasn't enough cover. I could still see the small valley beyond through the trees. If someone should ride by on horse back, they would be able to see the blue domed Dove from the valley side, or from the top of either of the low hills. I figured I would just have to find a more suitable place to hide the Dove.

"We who form the Dove can wait for you in the space beyond the atmosphere of this planet," Micro said, "The Dove will return to you when, and to where, you want it."

"Thank you, Micro. That's a good idea," I said as I walked back over to the Dove and up the ramp to get the scooter.

Before I sat down in the scooter, I got some of the gray and some of the green packets of food and water from a cubicle in the bottom of one of the Dove's rear seats to show my wife. Then I sat down in the scooter and drove it out of the Dove.

"How do I..," I said, and the opening into the Dove vanished. I was going to ask Micro how to close the opening, but my thought had closed it. I opened and closed it again before I told Micro to take the Dove into space above the Earth and wait for me to call for it, and the Dove vanished.

I turned the scooter and drove it up the steep slope of the hill, and, when I reached the top, I saw a black wall of rain sweeping across the prairie towards me. Before I could move, the rain swept over me and left me in darkness, but I wasn't getting wet from the heavy downpour.

"Does the scooter have a dome over the seats?" I asked.

"Yes there is a dome, Caleb," Micro answered.

"What I need now is some head lights," I said, and a bright light flowed out from the base of the scooter, so I could now see the prairie grass for fifty or sixty feet all around the scooter. I probably could have seen farther if it hadn't been raining so hard.

"I suppose you're going to tell me now that the scooter will fly," I said.

"Yes. Think of what you want the scooter to do, and the scooter will do it."

"Is there anything that you can't do?"

"Yes, there are many things we can not do, Caleb. The fact is we can do nothing until you want us to."

I was surprised at Micro's answer because they had been in control of my mind only a few hours earlier.

"When you took control of your thoughts, we knew that you were the true son of the Creators, so we no longer had to control your mind. And now you are in complete control of all the Protectors."

I turned the scooter toward the east and drove it forward, through the heavy rain, keeping it a few inches above the tall prairie grass. The rain wasn't splashing against the invisible dome as it should have been. The rain just vanished as it came in contact with the dome.

There were so many thoughts flying through my mind that I hardly noticed the passing of the rain storm until the sun broke through the clouds ahead of me. I mentally turned off the light that came from the base of the scooter, then I flew the scooter high up into the air above the prairie, and I saw the wide interstate highway about a mile to the north.

This was the highway that traveled from the southwest toward the northeast and into the city where I lived. The storm was traveling in that direction also, and I sure didn't want to catch up with it, so I flew the Dove slowly toward the northeast and stayed close to the wide highway.

In about twenty minutes, after dodging around the smaller towns along the highway, I saw the suburbs of the city: The suburbs were made up of small towns that dotted the outskirts of the larger city with no apparent break between them. I lived in one of the smaller towns.

I flew the scooter higher into the air, almost into the clouds, so that I could see the houses spread out below me, and a minute or two passed before I saw the roof of my house below. I quickly flew the scooter down into my back yard and landed it beside my fishing boat.

As I stepped off the scooter, I thought, "I wonder what time it is and what day it is? How long have I been gone? I'll have to get my watch," looking at my white sleeves and black gloves, I thought, "But it won't look very good on my wrist, though."

"Micro, can you tell me the time and how long I've been gone from home?" I asked.

"Yes. The time is 8:30 a.m., and you have been away from this house for ninety-three hours: That is three days and twenty-one hours Earth time, or two days, eighteen hours, and thirty-six minutes Sustenance time."

"How long is a day on that planet?"

"Sustenance makes one revolution in thirty-seven hours and twelve minutes."

"I thought the last couple of days seemed awfully long. That means that I've been gone for almost four days. Today must be.... Yes, Wednesday," I walked over to the patio and saw that it hadn't been cleaned since the party I had on Friday night.

"Peg must be waiting for me to clean it up," I thought, "Well, I'll just do that after a while," I walked over to the door that led into the recreation room, or rec-room for short, and found that it was locked, "That's strange! We never locked this door before. Maybe Peg's been afraid of everything since I disappeared?"

"Hay sweetheart, open the door," I said, as I knocked on the glass, "It's only me, Caleb!" The kitchen was just off the rec-room, so I didn't yell very loud.

"There are no people in this house, Caleb," Micro said.

I thought Peg would be at home because I saw her car and my truck setting in the driveway when I flew the scooter down into the back yard, but my daughter's car was not there, so I knew that she had already left for work. "Where could she be?" I thought.

I knew a way to open the patio door without a key, so I opened it, but to fix the lock again was going cost me a few dollars. I walked across the rec-room into the kitchen, which looked a little too clean: No coffee in the coffee pot, no dirty dishes in the sink, and the table wasn't cluttered with letters and bills as it usually was by this day of the month.

I walked on through the kitchen, through the living room, down a short hallway and opened the door into the spare bedroom where my radio shack was. Everything looked the same as when I last saw it. Except for the small pile of letters and cards on my desk, which were QSL's or confirmations to the contacts I had made on my ham radio. I closed that door and opened the door into my bedroom and went over to the bathroom door, which had a full length mirror on both sides of it, and, when I saw my reflection in the mirror, I was shocked to see that I looked so young.

"What happened to make me look so young, Micro?" I asked. I thought that maybe the food in the packets had something to do with it.

"When the Pass took you from this house to the planet Sustenance, it also took a few cells from the finger tips of your body. We built your new body from those cells and placed you into it."

"What... what happened to my old body?"

"The body ceased to live, but it was not harmed."

"Gee-golly damn, Micro!" I shouted, "If my old body is dead, then my family thinks I'm dead, and that's why Peggy is not here! She's probably over at her mothers right now crying her eyes out," I went over to the telephone beside the bed and picked it up, "Damn-it! I can't call over there and say I'm alive when they've already seen me dead! What the hell am I going to do now?" I set the phone down and turned to study my reflection in the mirror.

After four days, my face still didn't have a beard, and the scar on my chin, that I had had since I was a child, was no longer there. I was still about six feet tall, but I wasn't fat around the middle as I had been. Also, the blue and white suit, with the white boots, black gloves and the black hood, was form fitting, which let all of my muscles, all over my new body, show through. I looked like I was a twenty-five year old athlete who was ready for the Olympics.

"Peg wouldn't recognize me now. That's for sure! I may as well not bother her for a while. Maybe later on, I'll talk to her and try to explain what really happened to me."

I left the bedroom and opened the door into my radio shack and went in. As I shuffled through the letters and QSL cards on my desk, I realized that I had been reading without my reading glasses, which were laying on my desk.

Then, I thought of Peggy. I could see her, in my mind's eye, bringing me a cup of coffee and finding me slumped over my desk. "Damn, I bet that was hard on her!" I said as I left the room.

I went into the kitchen and thought about leaving a note to my wife, but I didn't. I went across the rec-room and out onto the patio. Then I picked up the beer cans, swept off the patio, and then put the broom back in the rec-room.

I had to at least hear my wife's voice, so I picked up the phone that set in the corner of the rec-room and dialed the number of my wife's mother's phone. My mother-in-law answered her phone with a curt "Hello!". I asked if I could speak to Peggy, and she said, "Just a moment!" A few seconds later Peggy said, "Hello", as sweetly as she had always answered the phone.

"Hello, Peg," I said, "this is Caleb. How are you feeling, Honey?"

"I don't think you're very funny, young man!" Peggy said, and she hung up.

I laid the phone hand-set down in its cradle and sat down on the couch beside it, and thought, "My voice must not be the same either, for Peg would have recognized me if it was. I guess I might as well leave because she'll never let me explain to her what happened."

After closing the patio door, I walked over to the scooter and sat down. My plan to get the help I needed to fly the space vessels depended on my families help. Therefore, I was going to have to find another way to get the people I needed. I placed my hand on the white sphere and flew the scooter up out of my back yard, through the clouds into the blue sky above them.

"Bring the Dove to this spot," I thought, and, when the Dove appeared in front me with the opening in the side open, I drove the scooter forward and landed it on the black deck behind the two rear seats.

"There are probably thousands of people that would help me if I knew how to approach them," I thought, as I stepped off the scooter and walked forward to the Dove's left front seat, "But how can I tell anyone that I need their help to fly space ships in a battle against evil beings that I've never seen." I sat down and touched the black oval key, which closed the ramp, then I touched the finger dent on the console that made the dent panel appear in front of me.

"Micro, how long will it be before the evil beings attack us?" I asked, as I flew the Dove up through the atmosphere into space.

"If the evil beings have detected your movement from the planet Sustenance to this planet, they will be in this galaxy in ten years or less."

"Then, I have almost ten years to get the people to help me," I said, with a sigh of relief.

"Yes, if the evil beings have not improved their mode of travel, you have almost ten years after they detect your movements in this galaxy."

"And if they have improved their mode of travel, what then?"

"The evil beings could be in this galaxy at any time."

That took the wind out of my sails, so I asked, "Can I run all of the space ships by myself?"

"Yes. But you will have to be inside of each vessel to control the weapons. We cannot destroy anything unless you, or one of your race, are touching the weapons' controls."

"That means that I'll have to get at least three hundred people to help me," I thought as I drove the Dove toward the moon, "I could just land the Eagle on Earth and ask the people for their help, but if the government found out that I was by myself, they would want to take the Eagle away from me. However, if I told them I was an agent for a large galactic empire, I just might get some help."

As I drove the Dove down to and through the blue dome of the Eagle, which set on the gray surface of the moon, I thought, "That's what I'll do. I'll call the empire... let's see... Caleb's Empire. No that won't do. I know what I'll call it, Calorn. For the first part and last part of my name, Caleb Thorn."

"The Galactic Republic of Calorn sounds all right to me," I said as I landed the Dove on the hangar deck beside the shimmering green column, "and that may convince them that I came from a large empire."

I touched away the dent panel, touched the blue oval key, got up from the seat and walked out of the Dove. As I stepped through the shimmering surface of the green column, I thought control deck, and instantly I was standing on the green circle in the center of the Eagle's control deck. I walked over to the two seats, which had the white sphere between them, and sat down in the one on the left.

I took the oval Pass from one of the pouches at my waist and placed it in the depression on the console. The Pass turned blue and I touched the left dent on the console, which placed the dent panel in front of me, then I placed my fingers on the dents at the bottom of the panel and raised the huge vessel from the gray surface of the Moon and headed it toward the horizon and the Earth.

When I stopped the Eagle, a few miles above the surface of the moon, to think of a place where I could land the large vessel on Earth, I sat watching the swirling clouds that covered the central and eastern part of the United States. But I couldn't think of anyplace that would be large enough and still be close to a highly populated area.

"I guess I could let the Eagle hover above a city," I thought, "and take the Dove down and land it. That should be enough to impress the people."

"Damn it!" I said, "That would only scare the hell out of everybody! I'll have to find a way to get help without anyone seeing these large vessels. Not for a while anyway."

I headed the Eagle toward the Earth and stopped it a few hundred miles above the clouded atmosphere and well above the orbit of the space station, which was being built by the U.S.A..

"Caleb," Micro said, "many radio frequencies are being used, by the people of this planet, to ask you to identify yourself."

"Damn-it, they must be able to see the Eagle on radar!" I said, as I looked for a dent on the panel that would let me hear the calls from below, "Can I tune them in and talk to them, Micro?"

"Yes. Touch the viewer dent."

I touched the viewer dent, and the scrambled sound of many people talking, all at one time, burst onto my ears. Also, the viewer showed the overlapped and blurred faces of the many men and women who were doing the talking. With my mind, I tuned out all but one of the people, and this one was a young woman who was saying, "Please identify yourself or we will be forced to fire upon you."

"I had better use the Father's language," I thought, "so no one can say that I spoke English. And I'll just use my first name so no one can connect me with my old self."

"Can I talk to her with thought-voice as well, so she can understand me?" I asked Micro.

"Yes," Micro answered.

The young woman on the viewer stopped talking for a second then asked, "Who was that?" She had heard me speak to Micro.

"My name is Caleb! What is your name?"

The young woman had a strange look on her face as she said, "I.... I didn't transmit that question. Who's fooling around out there?" she had turned to look behind her.

I smiled and said, "No one is fooling around. You asked me to identify myself and I did. My name is Caleb. I am the Captain of the space vessel Eagle, which is the flag ship of the Galactic Republic of Calorn."

"Where... Where are you?" she asked suspiciously.

"I'm about a thousand miles above the United States,"

The young woman leaned forward as if to touch something and then she said, "Lieutenant Scott, I think I've made contact with that UFO!" and a man's voice, sounding as if it was coming from an intercom speaker, said, "Good, Sergeant Hanly, I'll be right there!"

Using my mind, I broadened the scene on the viewer to include the whole room, which was crowded with electronic paraphernalia, and an Air Force officer opened a door and walked into the room.

"Whose is it, and what's it doing in our space?" the officer asked.

"I don't believe I'm in your space, Lieutenant!" I said, "I'm well above the atmosphere of your planet. However, if you feel threatened, I'll move out away from the planet a few miles," which I did, "Is this far enough?"

The Lieutenant motioned to the young woman and said, "Turn off that mike, Sergeant!"

"The mike is off, Sir," she said, "I'm not transmitting anything. He... he just knows what we're saying, and his voice isn't coming from the receiver!" she paused, "The UFO just moved out into space to about a hundred thousand miles, Sir."

"How the hell can he hear us if we're not transmitting?" the Lieutenant said, "What kind of shit is this!"

"If you're going to use foul language," I said, "I'll speak to someone else!"

"Sergeant, has he identified himself?" the frustrated Lieutenant asked.

"Yes,Sir," she said as she picked up a note pad, "He said his name is Caleb, and that he is the Captain of the space vessel Eagle, which is the flag ship of the Galactic Republic of Calorn."

I saw that she had written Calorn the way it sounded to her, so I said, "Young lady, Calorn is spelled with a capital C," and then I added, "Calorn is the home planet of the Fathers of Mankind."

"Oh my god!" the Lieutenant said, wiping the sweat from his brow, "They're extraterrestrials from outer space! You better get General Thatch on the line right away, Sergeant!"

"Yes Sir!" the young woman Sergeant said as she reached for a telephone.

"Captain Caleb, Sir, are you still listening?" the Lieutenant asked as he looked around the room.

"Yes, I am listening."

"Sir, are you... eh... are you... human? That is, do you look like us?"

"Yes, Lieutenant, I am human!" Then I asked Micro by thought, "Is there a way that I can show them what I look like?"

"Yes. You can place an image of yourself before them."

"If you have a television set and a video recorder," I said to the lieutenant, "turn them on and you can see what I look like while I tell you why I am here."

The lieutenant stepped over to a television set, which was among the other electronic paraphernalia, and turned it on, and I placed my image on its screen. With my thoughts, I made my image on the screen move back to also show the moon and stars which were behind and above me.

"I am Caleb," I said, "Captain of the space vessel Eagle. I am also a representative from the many worlds of the Galactic Republic of Calorn. I come to this world in peace to ask for the help of some of the people of your planet."

"I had better get this right the first time," I thought.

"We have been in a battle with an evil race of beings for many of your years," I continued, "and now the evil beings are attacking some of the worlds, such as yours, which are not members of the Republic of Calorn. Therefore, the Fathers of the Republic have authorized me to lend you the vessels and weapons to protect yourselves; however, we do not have the people to man these vessels, so you will have to operate the vessels with your own people, and I will train them.

"Also, the people who are chosen to man the vessels must be free to choose their own destiny; therefore, the countries of Earth must stop their bickering and pull together into one united nation."

"That should sit them back on their heels," I thought, "Now I'll have to put some teeth into what I've said. Micro, bring four of the largest vessels from the Fathers home planet and space them evenly around the Earth and about as far away from the Earth as the Eagle is now."

"Nevertheless," I continued, "I will place four vessels around your world to protect it until you can protect it yourself. That is, if you want to help us and yourselves. I will wait two days for your decision."

I pulled my image from the screen of the television set and said:

"Thank you Lieutenant and thank you Sergeant for allowing me to speak. If you will call me two days from now and tell me the worlds decision, I will be ever grateful. Good bye for now." I mentally blanked the viewer and lay back in the seat.

Off to the left of the Eagle, one of the large vessels appeared with its ten miles long and three miles high domed shape blocking the light from the stars. "It looks like a large Vulture about ready to land on its prey," I thought, "And that's what I'll name the large vessels, Vultures, and I'll name the vessels that are a little smaller, Condors. The ones that are the same size as the Eagle will be called Hawks. I think these vessels are far enough out in space that there size won't scare anyone."

Sitting up, I pushed the dent panel out of my way and stood up to go below to the apartment deck. I felt as if I had been awake for more then one day, and I wanted to crawl into a soft bed and sleep for the next two days. But I knew that my job had just begun and there were many things I would have to reason out in the those two days, like: How I was going to pick the people that I needed, and how I was going to train them to control the vessels and the vessels' weapons, which I knew very little about myself; however, there was no doubt in my mind that what I had told the people would pull them and the countries of Earth together into one very strong nation, regardless of their political beliefs, but if it did not, I would just have to try a different way to get the people to help me.

"Nevertheless, I will be a very busy man for the next few years," I thought, as I walked over to the green circle in the center of the oval deck and stepped on it and stepped out of the shimmering green column onto the apartment deck.

Smiling, I said, "Micro, I believe that I'm going to enjoy being the Captain of the Eagle!" then I walked across the deck and entered one of the sixteen apartments.