But mainly the computer was good for games. If youturned the volume control up, you didn't have to hearthe shouting.

The ScreeWee mother ship was in uproar. There wasstill a haze of smoke in the air from the last bombard-ment, and indistinct figures pattered back and forth,trying to fix things up well enough to survive thejourney.

The Captain sat back in her chair on the huge,shadowy bridge. She was yellow under the eyes, a suresign of lack of sleep. So much to be done ... half thefighters were damaged, and the main ships were in nonetoo good condition, and there was hardly any room andcertainly no food for all the survivors they were takingon board.

She looked up. There was the Gunnery Officer.

'This is not a wise move,' he said.

'It is the only one I have,' said the Captain wearily.

'No! We must fight on!'

'And then we die,' said the Captain. 'We fight, andthen we die. That's how it goes.

'Then we die gloriously!'

'There's an important word in that sentence,' said theCaptain. 'And it's not the word "gloriously".'

The Gunnery Officer went light green with rage.

'He's attacked hundreds of our ships!'

'And then he stopped.'

'None of the others have,' said the Gunnery Officer.'They're humans! You can't trust a human. They shooteverything.'

The Captain rested her snout on one hand.'He doesn't,' she said. 'He listened. He talked. Noneof the others did. He may be the One.'

The Gunnery Officer placed his upper two fronthands on the desk and glared at her.

'Well,' he said, 'I've talked to the other officers. Idon't believe in legends. When the full enormity ofwhat you have done is understood, you will be relievedof your command!'

She turned tired eyes towards him.

'Good,' she said. 'But right now, I am Captain. I amresponsible. Do you understand? Have you got thefaintest idea of what that means? Now - . . go!'

He didn't like it, but he couldn't disobey. I can havehim shot, she thought. It'd be a good idea. Bound tosave trouble later on. It'll be No. 235 on the list ofThings to Do .

She turned back to continue staring at the stars out-side, on the huge screen that filled one wall.

The enemy ship still hung there.

What kind of person is it? she thought. Despicablethough they are, there's so few of them. But they keepcoming back! What's their secret?

But you can be sure of one thing. They surely onlysend their bravest and their best.

The advantage of the Trying Times was that helpingyourself from the fridge was OK. There didn't seem tobe any proper mealtimes any more in any case. Or anyreal cooking.

Johnny made himself spaghetti and baked beans.

There was no sound from the living-room, althoughthe TV was on.

Then he watched a bit of television in his room. He'dbeen given the old one when they got the new one. Itwasn't very big and you had to get up and walk overto it every time you wanted to change channels or thevolume or whatever, but these were Trying Times.

There was a film on the News showing some missilesstreaking over some city. It was quite good.

Then he went to bed.

He was not entirely surprised to wake up at the controlsof a starfighter.

It had been like that with Captain Zoom. Youcouldn't get it out of your head. After an evening'sconcentrated playing you were climbing ladders anddodging laser-zap bolts all night.

It was a pretty good dream, even so. He could fellthe seat under him. And the cabin smelled of hot oil andoverheated plastic and unwashed people.

It looked pretty much like the one he saw on thescreen every evening, except that there was a thinfilm of grease and dirt over everything. But there wasthe radar screen, and the weapons console, and thejoystick

Hey, much better than the computer! The cabin wasfull of noises - the click and whirr of fans, the hum andbuzz of instruments.

And better graphics. You get much better graphicsin your dreams.

The ScreeWee fleet hung in the air, hung in spacein front of him.

Wow!

Although dreams ought to be a bit more exciting.You got chased in dreams. Things happened to you.Sitting in the cockpit of a starfighter bristling withweapons was fun, but things ought to happen

He wandered if he should launch a missile orsomething... No, hang on, they'd surrendered. Andthere was that thing about safe conduct.His hands wandered over the switches in front ofhim. They were a bit different from the computerkeyboard, but this one-'Are you receiving me?'

The face of the Captain appeared on the communications screen.

'Yes?' said Johnny.

'We are ready.'

'Ready?' said Johnny. 'What for?'

'Lead the way,' said the Captain. The voice came outof a grille beside the screen. It must be being translatedby something, Johnny thought. I shouldn't think giantnewts speak English.

'Where to?' he said. 'Where are we going?''To Earth.'

'Earth? Hang on! That's where I live! People can getinto serious trouble showing huge alien fleets wherethey live!'

The grille hummed and buzzed for a while. Then theCaptain said: 'Apology. That is a direct translation. We callthe planet that is our home, "Earth"' When I speak inSree Wee, your computer finds the word in your languagethat means the same thing. The actual word in Scree Weesounds like ...' There was a noise like someone takingtheir foot out of a wet cowpat. 'I will show our home toyou.'

A red circle suddenly developed on the navigationscreen.

Johnny knew about that. You just moved a greencircle over it, the computer went binleabinleabinlea, andyou'd set your course.

They've shown me where they live.

The thought sunk in.

They trust me.

As he moved his fighter forwards, the entire alienfleet pulled in behind him. They eclipsed the stars.

The cabin hummed and buzzed quietly to itself.

Well, at least it didn't look too hard

A green dot appeared ahead of him.

He watched it get bigger, and recognized the shapeof a starflghter, just like his.But it was a little hard to make it out.This was because it was half-hidden by laser bolts.It was firing at him as it came.

And it was travelling so fast it was very nearly catch-ing up with its own fire.

Johnny jerked the joystick and his ship rolled out ofthe way as the ... the enemy starfighter roared past andbarrelled on towards the ScreeWee ships.

The whole sky full of ScreeWee ships.

Which had surrendered to him.

But people out there were still playing the game.

'No! Listen to me! They're not fighting any more!'

The starfighter turned in a wide curve and headeddiiectly for the command ship. Johnny saw it launch amissile. Someone sitting at a keyboard somewhere hadlaunched a missile.'Listen! You've got to stop!'

It's not listening to me, he thought. You don't listento the enemy. The enemy's there to be shot at. That'swhy it's the enemy. That's what the enemy's for.

He swung around to follow the starship, which hadslowed down. It was pouring shot after shot into thecommand shipwhich wasn't firing back.

Johnny stared in horror.

The ship rocked under the hail of fire. The GunneryOfficer crawled across the shaking floor and pulledhimself up beside the Captain's chair.

'Fool! Fool! I told you this would happen! I demandthat we return fire!'

The Captain was watching the Chosen One's ship.It hadn't moved.

'No,' she said. 'We have to give him a chance. Wemust not fire on human ships.'

'A chance? How much of a chance do we have? I shallgive the order to-'

The Captain moved very fast. When her handstopped she was holding a gun very close to the Gun-nery Officer's head. It was really only a ceremonialweapon; normally ScreeWee fought only with theirclaws. But its shape said very clearly that things cameout of the hole in the front end with the very definitepurpose of travelling fast through the air and then kill-ing people.