An hour had passed since they escaped from the Grak ship. The stars through the window looked pretty much the same to George. But the Protector assured him that they had indeed changed dramatically.

“You see this constellation here,” said the Protector, pointing at a group of stars that looked as indistinguishable as any other. “When we left the Grak ship, this constellation wasn’t even visible at all. It’s the constellation of Rodlyn, or color as you would call it.”

“Color?” said George blankly.

“It’s called that because of the planet Rodlyn which sits in the middle of the constellation,” explained the Protector. “That’s where all the creatures talk in color. Their music is color, their food is color—almost everything is color. And such colors! You’ve never seen such vibrant purples and blues as you’ll see on Rodlyn. It’s quite a tourist attraction.”

“That’s impossible!” said George in confusion. “People can’t eat color!”

“You and I can’t,” agreed the Protector. “But the Rodlynians can. They guzzle it down like it was ice cream. And when they talk, it looks like a rainbow is coming out of their mouths. But they understand each other!”

George shook his head as if to clear it from a fog.

“Is earth visible from here?” asked George’s father. “Or the earth’s sun?”

“No,” replied the Protector. “It’s still a bit out of range. The sun is over in this sector”—he pointed at another patch of stars that didn’t look any different to George than the stars anywhere else—“but it’s too faint to see.”

“But these stars are all fake, aren’t they?” asked George. “You said they’re just a projected image, like on a movie screen, because we’re going faster than the speed of light.”

“True, but if the screen were gone and we were going slower than the speed of light, the stars would look identical to what we’re seeing,” said the Protector. “The projected image is very accurate and real.”

“Where did we just come from?” asked George’s father.

“Over in this sector,” said the Protector, crossing over to the other side of the screen. “You can just make out the planet Uth right here—“ he pointed to what looked like a star. “It’s not a star, of course, but because it’s like clear glass it reflects the light of the stars around it almost as brightly as if it were a real star.”

At mention of the planet Uth, George’s heart sank. How could he have forgotten? His high spirits at having escaped the Grak almost filled him with shame, as he remembered the Uth stones that were still back on the Grak ship. “What a pity,” he said sadly. “We should have rescued the Uth stones, and brought them with us.”

To his amazement, both the Protector and George’s father smiled. Had they gone crazy?

And then, the Protector slowly drew a small box from his pants pocket. And when he opened it—

“You brought them!” cried George in shock. The Uth stones sparkled and shone with a light that seemed to emanate from within. “However did you do it?”

The Protector laughed. “It wasn’t me,” he replied simply. “It was your father. He knew right where they were. The Grak had bragged about them to him, and pointed out where they were. So we grabbed them right before we came for you.”

George’s smile was so broad, it looked like his face would crack. What the Uth had told him was true—things had turned out all right. They were free of the Grak and on their way home. And they had brought the Uth stones with them!

Cautiously, George reached out to the stones, and gently touched one of them. As he did so, a small electric shock shot through his finger, and all the way to his toes. And with it came a surge of joy. Perhaps the stones knew of their rescue, and were grateful.

“I’m hungry!” cried Emberly’s plaintive voice suddenly, as she poked her head out of the Protector’s pocket. “Who cares about stars and rocks—where’s the food?”

Everyone smiled. “I guess, that’s not a bad idea,” said the Protector. “The food galley on this ship is a little room over through that door.” He pointed to a passageway across from the control panel.

Emberly swiftly hopped out of his pocket and darted down the passageway. “Isn’t anyone else hungry?” she called out after them.

George hadn’t realized until that moment how hungry he was. He was ravenous! All the worry and anxiety of the last few hours and days were falling off him, leaving him hungry and tired—and unstoppably happy.

“I’m coming,” he called out after Emberly, as he followed her down the hall.

He found her in the fluffiest kitchen he had ever seen. All the cabinets and counter tops were fuzzy and cushiony. Even the refrigerator was padded and decorated in pink. Emberly was straining at the door, trying to get it open. But her tiny Flibbet arms just weren’t strong enough.

“Here, let me help,” said George. Pulling the door open, he saw a variety of green and black items strewn about that didn’t look very appetizing. George’s heart sank in disappointment. It didn’t look like there was anything else in the fridge but the pasty teddy bear food!

Emberly climbed into the refrigerator and took a bite out of something shaped kind of like a carrot, but which was jet black. She let out a happy squeal.

“It’s delicious!” she cried. “Just like the food they gave us back on the teddy bear planet!”

George’s heart sank some more. Emberly had loved that food—but he hadn’t! If that’s all they had here, then he hoped they reached the Protector’s planet soon. Hungry as he was, there was no way he was going to eat that bland teddy bear food again.

“Want some?” said Emberly happily, ripping off a piece and holding it out to George.

“No, thanks,” said George firmly. “Here, let me get it out for you, so you don’t have to stand there shivering and eating in the cold.” He pulled the black carrot-like thing out, and set it on a fuzzy table, then set Emberly next to it.

“Well,” said the Protector as he came into the kitchen. “Find anything good to eat?

“Isn’t there anything here besides teddy bear food?” said George dismally.

The Protector laughed. “I’m afraid not. This is a teddy bear ship, you know.”

“Then, how long until we reach your planet?” asked George. “Soon, I hope.”

“About six more hours,” said the Protector with a smile. He was about to say more, when the ship lurched slightly, nearly throwing George off his feet.

“What’s going on?” cried the Protector. “It shouldn’t be doing that at all!” He turned quickly and darted out the door, with George close on his heels.

When they reached the control panel, George’s father looked at them with a white face. “I don’t know what happened!” he said worriedly. “That light there suddenly started to flash, and then the ship swerved and lurched.”

The Protector didn’t say a word, but feverishly began hitting buttons and knobs on the control panel.

“What is it?” asked George. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m not sure,” said the Protector. “There was no indication of trouble before. But now we seem to have a problem in engine number two.”

“Is it serious?” asked George, biting his lower lip.

“I can’t tell just yet,” said the Protector, flipping some more switches. Suddenly a series of red lights started to flash along the top of the control console. The ship lurched once more.

“Blast it!” cried the Protector. He grabbed a knob, and pulled back on it gently. The ship suddenly felt as if it were screeching to a halt, and George was nearly pitched into the window.

“We’ve got trouble!” said the Protector, working the controls feverishly. “I’ve slowed it down, so we’ll be coming through the light barrier any second.”

Sure enough, a few seconds later the windows went completely dark, as all of the projected stars disappeared. Then the light shield screen slowly began to rise, revealing the same stars out the windows they had been looking at before—the real ones, this time.

“The number 2 engine is dying!” cried the Protector, punching at the controls. “That will leave us with just one engine. This is bad!”

The ship suddenly started to jump and twist as if it had gone crazy. George grabbed onto a fuzzy chair for support, only to feel the fluffy chair back pull free in his hands.

“Get down on the floor!” commanded the Protector. “We’re in for a rough ride until we slow down some more.”

George dropped to the fluffy floor, glad for once that the teddy bears had made it so soft. He didn’t stay there for long though. The ship nearly flipped upside down, throwing George clear across the room. As he sailed through the air, he saw his father hanging on to another of the fuzzy chairs for dear life. It looked for a second like George would collide into him, but somehow he managed to zip by without touching him.

“We’re nearly under control,” said the Protector, who had miraculously somehow stayed at the control panel. The bucking and twisting of the ship seemed to contradict him, as it jerked around as much as ever.

And then, suddenly, it stopped. Everything was quiet. Everything but Emberly, who came trotting in from the kitchen, with black smeared all over her face.

“Can’t you keep the ship from bouncing around?” she demanded hotly. “It’s very hard to eat with it moving so much!”

George picked himself up off the floor, and crossed over to the control panel. The Protector’s face looked ashen.

“This is bad,” he repeated, to no one in particular.

“How bad?” asked George worriedly.

“There’s no hope now of making it to Dluron,” said the Protector sadly. “And the radio’s gone, so I can’t even call them for help. We were almost in range of radio contact, too. I wasn’t able to communicate with them before.”

“What are we going to do?” said George, fear starting to rise up inside him like a cold wave. “Are the Grak going to catch up to us now?”

“Not very soon,” said the Protector. “We’ve come too far for them to find us very easily. But if we end up adrift in space, they probably will find us, eventually. We need to find a planet to set down on—and quickly! Maybe we can get some help from the natives to fix the ship.”

“Do you know of any planets around here that we could go to?” asked George.

“Not really,” said the Protector, pulling out what looked like a star chart from a lower panel. “We were in a very remote part of space when we left the Grak ship, a place where there were few friendly planets around. Let’s see if we’ve travelled closer to anyone we can go to for help.”

“How about the color planet?” said George in sudden hope. “You said it’s a favorite tourist attraction.”

“Too far away still,” said the Protector. He flipped through the chart. “No, we need something much closer than that.” He studied the chart silently for a moment. George’s father came up behind George, and looked anxiously at the chart.

“Here’s a possibility,” said the Protector after a moment. He paused, then glanced up at the gauges. “Yep, we might just make this one. In fact, it’s probably the only planet we can reach that will sustain life.”

“Are you sure?” asked George’s father in a tight voice. “Maybe it would be safer to just wait here in space.”

“But we’d be picked up by the Grak if we did that!” cried George.

“Maybe so, but even that’s better than being killed on some uninhabitable planet,” replied George’s father.

“It’s a remote planet, all right,” said the Protector, before George could object anymore. “The chart doesn’t show that it has any inhabitants that have the ability to talk. Just plants and simple animals. But its atmosphere has been carefully assessed, and it will easily sustain life. In fact, it’s kind of like a jungle planet!”

“Boy, I don’t know …” said George’s father, rubbing his chin. “If it’s such a good place, why haven’t people moved there?”

“It’s too remote,” replied the Protector. “We’re still in a part of the galaxy that is just plain empty. But if this planet were close to mine, believe me, there’d be people there. Lots of them! Jungle planets have a lot of potential, not only for sustaining life, but for conversion into retirement communities. People like all the green plant life.”

The Protector began to adjust the dials and switches on the control panel. “I’ll head over to it now. At normal speeds, we could be there in a few seconds, but as weakened as we are without engine number two, it will be about twenty minutes.”

George’s father still looked worried, and was pacing back and forth. George peered through the screen, trying to see if he could locate a planet in the vast inkiness of space. “I don’t see any planet out there,” he said after a moment of careful scrutiny.

“Nevertheless, it’s there,” replied the Protector. “We’re now heading straight for it. I’d better go check the emergency gear in this ship, to make sure we’ve got the survival tools we’ll probably need.”

“Survival tools?” said George’s father in alarm. “I don’t think we should go down to this planet at all!”

“Not to worry,” said the Protector with a slight smile. “All I mean by survival tools are simple things, like tents, blankets, knives, things like that. The information on this planet indicated there are no hostile animals or creatures, and it is very docile. The blankets and other things are just to make us more comfortable.”

George started to follow the Protector down the hall. “Why don’t you stay up by the control panel?” the Protector said suddenly. “Keep an eye on it, and come tell me if any more flashing lights come on.”

“Sure,” said George, a bit disappointed. He didn’t know what any of the dials were, and didn’t know how he could possibly keep an eye on it. The survival gear sounded more interesting.

George resumed his place by the front window, and watched the stars, as well as the control panel. His father continued to pace back and forth behind him, muttering worriedly to himself. It was obvious he didn’t like the idea of going down to this planet at all.

After a few moments, George noticed the dim outline of what looked like a small moon coming toward them. It seemed to be growing larger. A nearby star bathed it in light, and as they approached, George could see swirls of white and green across its surface.

“Clouds and rainforests,” said the Protector, suddenly at his side. “That’s what we’re seeing. It doesn’t have nearly as many oceans as earth, which looks more blue from a distance than green, because of all the water.”

“What about the emergency gear?” asked George’s father in a tight voice.

“It checks out o.k.” replied the Protector. “We’ll have what we need.”

The green and white planet was drawing slowly closer. It now looked like a large marble sitting in space, with swirls and gashes of green mixed with the clouds of white.

The Protector moved some controls and adjusted some of the instruments. “We’ll be landing in about five minutes,” he said.

The planet loomed larger and larger in front of them, and soon seemed to swallow the entire screen. Now that they were this close, the planet looked massive. George could see some small patches of blue in some places—oceans or lakes, apparently.

“It’s about the same size as earth, even though it looks bigger right now, since we’re so close,” said the Protector.

“What did you say the name of this planet was?” asked George’s father.

“It has no name,” said the Protector. “Just a number designation—L91.”

The ship suddenly rocked gently from side to side. “That’s the outer atmosphere,” said the Protector. “Any second now, we’ll feel a bit of a jolt, then we’ll be through.”

Hardly had he said it, than it happened. With a bounce that nearly knocked George off his feet, they entered the full atmosphere of the planet. Some of the clouds were reaching out to them now, nearly touching them. Through the clouds they could see bright patches of green. They were low enough now that it looked similar to when George had flown on an airplane to Los Angeles two years ago with his family. He could see hills and rivers, and a distant shoreline of what must be a large lake or an ocean. There were clouds everywhere.

They sank lower, and were now completely submerged in clouds. George always felt nervous flying through clouds, wondering if the ground would suddenly reach up to them so rapidly they would crash.

But it didn’t. The Protector was glued to the control panel, concentration written all over his face. As they burst through the lower clouds, they saw what looked like a vast forest stretching out beneath them. The gentle sunshine from the nearby star—which served as this world’s sun—made it look incredibly similar to earth.

The Protector steered the ship towards an open meadow patch that he saw nearby. “We’re almost there …” he said under his breath. George sat down on the floor, not wanting to be pitched from his feet when they landed.

And then they were down. The Protector made a perfect, gentle landing, which was so soft all George felt was the slightest bump. Looking out the window, he saw a blanket of trees towering above them.

The Protector sighed with relief, and turned to face them. “We have landed,” he said crisply. “Welcome to L91.”