That night, Nate feigns sleep as the night nurse checks on him. Once she is gone, he gets up. Putting on his shoes, he prepares himself for his search. He won’t be sure what equipment he needs until he checks the engines out – and he still has to figure out how to get the equipment without arousing suspicion, but he is confident he will figure it out as he goes. Then, he hears a noise in the hall and freezes. The door opens. “Nate, are you here?” Derek whispers, entering the room with a large bag.

“What are you doing here?” Nate asks.

“What am I doing here? I brought you all the crap you told me to get you,” Derek responds, irritated.

“What?” Nate says. He looks through Derek’s bag. Inside are a chisel, a hammer, gloves, flashlights, a current meter, cable cutters, and a set of electrodes. “How did you get all this?”

“How did I get all this? What do you mean how did I get all this? You told me where and how to get it!” Derek exclaims, raising his voice.

“Shhh!” Nate says, checking down the hallway. Nobody is there. “Never mind; we’ll talk about it later. I guess we’re working together now.”

“Of course. We always work together on all your adventures. We’re partners,” Derek says, grabbing Nate in a one-armed side-hug.

“Oof!” Nate says.

Finding custodial work aboard a large luxury cruise ship bound for Pookatel, Nathaniel, Haticat, Fred, and Doctor Bill are able to escape Cartop while making a profit. They buy and store up food, tools, spacesuits, and other supplies, saving most of their money to one day buy a spaceship. The passengers are mostly Humans and the boys enjoy the Human food and entertainment onboard during their off hours, including the exciting light shows.

The ship travels slowly and the trip to Pookatel takes three weeks. The boys disembark with the rest of the passengers. Making their way through the crowds, they stop for a moment near a window to see the landscape near the spaceport. Pookatel is a low-gravity, airless world of smooth, rainbow-marbled rocks. It is home to several dozen Human colonies of airtight, domed structures connected by covered, pressurized streets. Sharp shadows fall across the rocky scene due to there being no air to bend the light and soften their edges. The dim blue of the nearby Ohllalleaho nebula is just faintly visible in the starry sky, the edge of the nebula starting just beyond the point that Pookatel’s sun’s solar wind would tear it apart.

While the others look outside, Fred looks around and notices some Human police officers watching them and talking to each other. When the boys start to move, the police follow. “Hey, those police are following us,” Fred says.

“Which police?” Nathaniel asks.

“Them,” Fred points out. Nathaniel and the officers lock eyes and the police start to run towards them.

“Run!” Haticat yells.

The plan is put into motion the next time the kids land on planet Cartop. They climb onto the couch-unit while inside The Mama-And-Daddy. Nathaniel wears a backpack. “What’s in the backpack?” Daddy asks him.

“Books, so I don’t get bored on a long trip,” Nathaniel answers with a partial truth.

“Oh, good idea, but then you’ll miss seeing all the pretty pavement,” Mama comments.

“It’s okay,” Nathaniel insists.

The next morning, Nate blinks himself awake. The cobweb is still in the corner of his ceiling. He is too hot. The heater is acting up again. It seems he is either too hot or too cold all the time. After stretching, he climbs out of bed. Looking through the window, he sees it is cloudy.

Shaking off his grogginess, he suddenly remembers something. The cobweb was gone yesterday! Had it been rebuilt in one night? That must be it, he thinks. History can’t really be changing. He feels silly for having entertained the idea for so long already. Looking back at the cobweb, he sees a large, black spider with a large, round, shiny abdomen. It has claws at the end of each foot. The abdomen has swirls of many colors. It is certainly not a cob spider. Nate remembers much arachnid trivia, but is unfamiliar with this species. It scurries away and slips through a hole in the wall. Then he notices the wastebasket near his bed overflowing with tissues. Where did all those come from? He doesn’t remember using them. Had someone snuck in while he slept and placed them there? Nate doesn’t want to think about these things now. He wants breakfast. He makes his way to the cafeteria hall and finds himself sitting with Derek again.

The children prepare for liftoff. “Power up complete. All systems are active. Running functionality checklist,” Haticat reports.

“Power supply and propulsion systems are operational,” Doctor Bill reports.

“Navigation systems online,” Haticat reports.

“Pressure seals are completed and holding,” Fred reports, “Emergency life support is operational.”

“Automatic safety check complete,” Haticat reports. Haticat and Nathaniel sit down next to each other at the pilot control station. “Where should we go?” Haticat asks.

“I still haven’t been to Lectipas,” Doctor Bill says.

“I want to explore someplace new I haven’t been to before – somewhere far away where The Mama-And-Daddy won’t follow us,” Nathaniel comments.

“Go to planet Candy!” Allison yells.

“We were just on Candy,” Nathaniel says.

“I’ll scream the whole way if we don’t go to Candy,” Allison threatens.

“No, we need to stop for fuel first. I don’t think Candy Wizards will accept tools and dresses as payment,” Nathaniel says.

“Aaaaaaaaaah!!!” Allison screams. She doesn’t stop.

The Mama-And-Daddy immediately leaves Cartop and travels to Earth. When Nathaniel and Allison awake soon after landing it is late afternoon according to the local time zone. “Wake up Nathaniel; we’re going to a restaurant,” Daddy says.

“A restaurant?” Nathaniel asks, instantly awake.

“Yes,” Daddy says. The four boys are immediately teleported to the couch-unit where they join the girls.

Allison slouches in her seat with a scowl on her face. “I’m hungry now,” she says.

The couch-unit rises and moves forward, leaving the ship. “Stop whining,” Mama says. Looking around, Nathaniel sees that the ship has landed on a grassy beach. The couch-unit follows a dirt road inland. They pass by many flowers.

The girls start making quick glances at the boys and giggling. What is it they could have noticed? “He’s so,” Allison says.

“When he,” Sarah adds.

“I know,” Matilda says.

“Really?” Allison questions.

“Probably makes it,” Matilda comments. They all burst out giggling.

“The girls’ brains are getting stupider. They can’t make sentences,” Nathaniel whispers.

After several days on Binerty, The Mama-And-Daddy departs and spends one full sleep-cycle travelling to a planet named Cartop. The candy is now eaten, Allison is now eating the kitchen jelly, and the boys and girls have learned to avoid each other. The planet Cartop has no oceans, forests, or deserts. It is completely covered by a continuous surface of pavement punctuated only by parking garage entrances leading to a vast underground city spanning nearly the entire globe. Transport is primarily achieved by automobiles on the paved surface above or by subways, elevators, or moving walkways below. Nearly every surface underground is covered with lights, illuminating the city. Powerful atmospheric scrubbers keep the air clean. Cartop is dominated by the Zleesnits and Nops, though large minorities of Humans, Ninos, Hammer-Faces, Dendophorites, Heltas, Bezerms, and robots of all kinds also live there.

“We’ll be arriving at the planet Binerty soon,” Mama announces as Fred, Doctor Bill, Nathaniel, and Haticat play in their room. A new planet? Why was The Mama-And-Daddy changing its routine? They run up to the tower observation window to view the outside. The ship has already dropped out of overlight mode. The tiny, pale disk of a planet can be seen in the distance.

“What do you know about Binerty?” Nathaniel asks.

“Only that it is listed as a Human-colonized world,” Haticat answers.

“I guess we’ll find out more soon,” Nathaniel states.

The next morning during a breakfast of mostly fudge, Nathaniel and Haticat look out the window and realize that they have left the planet Candy and now sit on Gruezhe. Strangely, this is a different part of Gruezhe they have never visited before. They sit in enormous spaceport, far bigger than any they have ever seen. Instead of a flat, gravel plain, there are landing pads and strips surrounded by blue-brown moss-like plants.

Heading outside with Allison, the couch-unit leads them to a nearby hole in the ground. Descending a ramp into the hole, Nathaniel and Haticat are surprised to find a track with open-air cars. They are directed to climb on and strap in. “I’ve heard about these, but never seen them,” Haticat informs Nathaniel, “They’re called roller-coasters. Only the big playgrounds on Gruezhe have them.”

Nate gets out of bed and rubs his eyes. He is running a little late. He knows that a nurse will eventually come by to make sure he doesn’t miss breakfast, but he hates being told things he already knows. Hurrying, he puts on his slippers. He looks around at the flowered wallpaper and sighs.

Now in the breakfast line, he scoops scrambled eggs onto his tray. He hopes there aren’t any shells in them like last time. He skips the sausage and takes one pancake. Taking a half-pint carton of orange juice, he finds his way to an empty table and sits down. Two seconds later, another man sits down next to him. “Morning, Nate,” the man says.

“Hey,” Nate responds, slightly nervous. He does not know who this man is.

“I’m Derek, by the way. We do this every day. You never remember me,” the man says, shoving a forkful of pancake in his mouth. He has three times as much food on his plate as Nate does. Nate is surprised that the staff let him get away with it. The nurses at least are always fussing about Nate’s nutrition.

“All right. How long have you lived here?” Nate asks.

“Me? About six months now,” Derek replies.

“And I’ve been here about ten?” Nate asks.

“From what I hear,” Derek answers.

“Oh,” Nate says. He drinks his orange juice.

“Man, these sausages are amazing; you’re missing out,” Derek says.

“Mmm,” Nate says.

“I don’t know what Pierre puts in these things, but that man is a culinary genius!” Derek says, “I tell you, I really missed him when he went back to Guiana for his brother’s wedding.”

“Yeah,” Nate responds. He does not remember a Pierre.

Derek stuffs a large forkful of pancake into his mouth – so big he can barely close it. Talking with his mouth full, he says, “I wish they had real Vermont maple syrup. Instead, we get the fake stuff. Pierre says it’s not in the budget. Greedy bastards.”

“Why are you in here – at the facility?” Nate asks.

“Well, let me ask you something, Nate. Do you believe in aliens?” Derek asks.

“I used to,” Nate says, “I’m not sure anymore.”

Derek cracks up laughing. “I ask you that every day. You always give the same answer.” He laughs some more. Finally, he says, “Anyways, aliens killed my whole family – my wife, my kids, my in-laws – and they tell me I’m not managing the loss well.” Derek laughs again. “Oh, also they tell me that there are no aliens and that I actually killed them all myself with a hot frying pan.” He stops laughing long enough to stuff his mouth with pancake.