Free A Little Rhine Must Fall by Erin Evans

remotely alien-looking in sight. Anywhere.
    Deerhurst had now joined Cecily and both the Fae. They were all talking in hushed voices and none of them looked happy. I drifted closer, followed by Jonathan.
    “Problem?” he asked.
    Deerhurst frowned. “These were the coordinates and the time given by the one transmission we received. Perhaps we were mistaken.”
    “Or maybe it is a distraction!” The Unseelie Fae snapped. “A plot to learn of our weaknesses before destroying us!”
    “Why would they ask us to meet if they intended to destroy us without talking?” Cecily retorted. “We must have misunderstood the transmission.”
    “Nonesense,” the Seelie Fae joined in. “The Fae were extremely methodical in checking the coordinates. Unless you think that the vampires made a mistake?”
    Things were quickly disintegrating into an insult free-for-all. I listened for a while, learning some very interesting new racial slurs, but grew bored with all the posturing. I decided to take home a souvenir. Something to show the girls when I was old and gray and could say words like “aliens” and “moon rock” and they would shrug it off as “crazy old mom.”
    There was a great looking rock right in the middle of where we had first appeared. I bent to pick it up and realized that there were numbers scratched into the ground beneath it.
    “Umm, guys?” I tried to interrupt the growing argument.
    “Perhaps you will feel differently after I drain your blood !” Cecily was crouched, fingers like claws, eyes completely black, ready to spring at the Unseelie Fae.
    “Hel loo !” I said louder.
    “Take one step, bloodsucker, and you’ll be able to use your head as a soccer ball!” A sword was pulled out of nowhere and held like someone who knew what they were doing and meant business.
    “Stop it, everyone !” I yelled, pouring all the Voice into the command that I could.
    There was silence and five heads slowly turned to look at me. Deerhurst and Jonathan were smirking. Cecily was looking ashamed of herself. I couldn’t guess what the two Fae were thinking. Or, at least, I really didn’t want to know what they were thinking. It didn’t look too friendly.
    “Do you have a suggestion, Mrs. Cavanaugh?” Deerhurst asked politely.
    I held out the moon rock I had found. “I found this,” I started and was interrupted by one of the Fae. They looked so similar that when they were both scowling at me, I couldn’t tell them apart.
    “Just like a human to be gathering souvenirs when the future of the world is at stake!”
    “I’d like to stake you,” Cecily muttered, not soft enough to be unheard.
    “Stop!” I commanded again before things could get out of hand. “This rock was right in the middle of where we appeared. Look at the ground underneath it.”
    Four heads almost clacked together in their haste to examine the ground. Deerhurst was too cool for that and stood still, waiting for someone else to tell him what they were looking at. He caught my grin and gave me a wink. I got the feeling that, although he liked me, he would like eating me just as much.
    “There are more coordinates written here!” Jonathan announced.
    “And it appears another date,” Cecily added.
    Deerhurst sighed. “Things are never easy, are they? Well, it seems that we will need to return to Earth and discuss things with the rest of the Synod.”
    “How do we get home?” I asked, realizing that, if I really cared about the answer, I should have asked the question before I landed on the moon.
    Deerhurst pulled out a palm-sized crystal. “We hold hands and all say domus .”
    “You’re kidding, right?” I asked. I looked around. Everyone looked serious. “Come on guys, does no one else think that the WAND is seriously lacking in imagination?”
    Jonathan made a face. “They have the Zipline. They make the rules. We’re just lucky they don’t decide that we all have to dance around a pole ‘sky-clad’ and sing the