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professor, and we are all very close to Brandon, the human prophet on Banor.”
    The physical prodding from the guards stopped and they all stared at one another for several moments.
    “Take them to the Belle-ub” the foreman finally said. He hurried away before the guards could argue.
    “What the extat is that?” Jumper said, turning around.
    The big guard then said, “Please, follow us. The Belle-ub will decide on this matter. Only he can help you.”
    The two guards went over and held the door of the greenhouse open for Jumper and Alan. There was a noticeable change in their demeanor. They now acted almost polite. It seemed that dropping a name or two was all it took to garner a little respect with these northerners. Jumper would have to remember that.
    “Who—or what—is a Belle-ub?” Alan asked Jumper as they walked behind the guards through the pup-tents into the nearby woods. Jumper only shrugged.
    They followed a trail in the woods for a short while and then came out the other side to a large clearing with a grand view behind it. They were on the edge of a great, flat, circular valley. The horizons were all far off. Small towns and structures dotted the valley in the distance.
    Immediately in front of them stood dozens of wooden cabins and thatched huts. It looked like pictures of Sheen villages Jumper had seen. On the north side of the village was a small airfield. Ten or twelve large rotorcraft—what his dad called “freaky helicopters”—were setting on the airfield along with twice as many hover trucks. Some of the trucks were moving back and forth loading the rotorcraft. That must be a shipping center for the locally-grown produce.
    Then Jumper saw them: Sheen in red cloaks, walking throughout the village. They were instantly recognizable, although the shine from their face and hands didn’t seem as bright to Jumper as the other Sheen he had met—or maybe it was because of the morning sunlight brightening everything around them.
    The guards led Jumper and Alan into the interior of the village and stopped at a public hygiene shack, where they waited outside for Jumper and Alan to refresh themselves. It was a welcome relief to Jumper, as they had been wearing the float suits for a complete day. The two of them stood under the cleansing blue light first undressed and then with the float suits back on.
    When they came out, Jumper was feeling much better. The two guards took them to a fire pit area and had them sit on a wooden bench to “wait for the Belle-ub.” They left them there alone.
    “They’re gone,” Alan said. “Should we make a break for it?”
    “Where to?” Jumper asked.
    “Back to that fuel station and see if the all-terrain cruiser is still there?”
    Jumper liked the idea, but something inside him told him to wait.
    “They might still be watching, and if they catch us running, especially stealing a vehicle, it might be all the justification they need to slam anklets on us and stick us way up north in the middle of the agritents. I’m with you, but I’m uncertain. It kind of feels like a trap.”
    “You might be right,” Alan conceded, “but we need to figure out something . I’ll bet they don’t need much of an excuse to force us into those greenhouses.” Alan looked around rapidly as he spoke. “What we need is some kind of diversion.”
    “Now that’s good thinking, Alan. Wish we had the signal flares that were in our cruiser.”
    “I wish we had the clothes we left in our cruiser, too. Where do you suppose we are?”
    Jumper pointed westward to the expanse in front of them. “That can only be the great valley of the Central Region. From here we can barely see some of the towns out there, along with a few bigger structures—one of those might be the arena the foreman mentioned. We’ve seen this valley on the horizon before, but from our local viewpoint back in the Midlands.” He pointed off to the south. “We’re at the extreme edge of the Northern Plains