* * * * *
When I awoke, my head was throbbing painfully.
I opened my eyes and blinked several times to make sure they were
functioning properly. I wasn't in the compartment where I had fallen
asleep a few hours before.
I was tied to one of the chairs in the "kitchen." Beside me, Verana was
bound to a chair by strips of cloth from her skirt, and across from us,
Marie was secured to another chair.
Kane staggered into the room. Although he was visibly drunk, he
appeared more sober than the night before. His dark hair was rumpled
and his face was flushed, but his eyes gleamed with a growing alertness.
"Awake, huh?"
"What have you done, Harry?" his wife screamed at him. Her eyes were
red with tears and her lips twisted in an expression of shame when she
looked at him.
"Obvious, isn't it? While all of you were asleep, I conked each of you
on the head, dragged you in here and tied you up." He smiled crookedly.
"It's amazing the things a person can do when he's pickled. I'm sorry I
had to be so rough, but I have a plan and I knew you wouldn't agree or
cooperate with me."
"What's your plan?" I asked.
He grinned wryly and crinkled bloodshot eyes. "I don't want to live in
a zoo on an alien planet. I want to go home and prove my theory that
this problem has a solution."