With time running out, the four, set on going to Witch Mountain, raced back into the hotel. Despite the rush, Sara wanted to make sure to tell Jack and Alex something.
“Thank you, both of you,” she said. “Seth and I understand that you don’t have to go forward with us. Yet you choose to.”
“You’re welcome,” Alex said with a warm smile. She turned to Jack.“Bring your cab around. I’ll grab my stuff and meet you in the lobby.” Next she addressed the kids.“Don’t worry. We’re going to get you home. I promise.”
Her confidence and enthusiasm helped them relax, and they nodded. Jack tried to talk her out of coming, but there was no way she would miss it— or leave the kids stranded.
“Just lay low till I get back,” Alex instructed.
“Laying low,” Jack said with a nervous shrug. “How hard can that be?”
Alex rushed off to her room, and Jack turned to face the two kids, who were both smiling. He eyed them suspiciously.
“She thinks you are very handsome,” Sara told him. “And potentially much smarter than you act.”
“Really?” Jack said, suddenly smiling, too. After all, Sara wasn’t just a gossip.“She was thinking about me?”
Jack wouldn’t have been smiling if he knew that Burke and his team had arrived and were entering the main lobby, greeted by a friendly concierge. “Welcome to Planet Hollywood. Are you gentlemen here for the UFO Space Expo?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” hissed Burke as his eyes started searching the crowd for aliens far more authentic than any of the convention-goers could ever have imagined in their wildest dreams.
Meanwhile, Jack’s smile had faded when he noticed Seth and Sara had disappeared into the crowd. Frantically, he began searching the exhibit hall and found them watching a play. “Is this a reenactment of a piece of Earth’s important history?” Sara asked, motioning to the play in progress.
Jack looked up and saw the poor quality sets and the bad alien costumes and just shook his head. “No. This is nerdy.”
Seth gave him a look.“What is nerdy?”
“You know nerdy,” Jack said trying to think of a good description. “Like people who believe in all this alien stuff.”
Seth smiled. “Like you?”
Before he could answer, something caught Sara’s eye.
“Jack Bruno,” she said pointing to the other side of the stage.
It was the Siphon. He was stalking his way through the crowd, his robotlike armor blending in perfectly with the costumed characters.
“Impossible,” Jack said, shocked. How had that thing survived the explosion?
The Siphon climbed up on the stage to get a better look at the faces in the crowd. Everybody assumed he was just part of the play.
“Oh, no!” said one of the actors doing a bad job ad-libbing a script change on the spot.“It is the arrival of the space creature from planet Gitoffthestage! Thankfully my weapon can destroy him.”
The actor pulled out a phony light saber and posed like he was going to engage the Siphon in battle. The Siphon had no idea what was going on. He used one of his real lasers to slice the toy in half.
The actor was furious. “Dude, that’s not in the script. You are so fired.”
Just then, the Siphon spotted what he was looking for. He locked his deadly stare on Sara, Seth, and Jack and started shooting at them.
“Look out!” Jack screamed, diving for cover.
Sara used her telekinesis to move props from the play into the path of the oncoming blasts. Assuming this was all part of the show, the crowd cheered wildly as each prop exploded in midair.
Sara looked above the stage and spied a very large, very heavy-looking lighting grid hanging from the ceiling. Refocusing her energy, she broke some of the cables free, and the entire metal structure swung down and slammed into the Siphon.
When the metal in his armor came into contact with the wires in the grid, countless volts of electricity started coursing through the Siphon’s body. He was knocked off the stage and into a giant glass Planet Hollywood globe. Everything exploded in an amazing display of colored glass and sparking electricity.
“Best convention ever,” one of the observers shouted to his friend.
Meanwhile, Jack hurried Seth and Sara down the escalator and into the casino, where he noticed a group of black-suited government agents ahead of him. He turned the kids in a different direction and started snaking through a maze of slot machines. But there were agents in every direction! In the middle of the group was Burke, smiling triumphantly as he moved toward them.
Jack frantically looked for an escape route. Suddenly an idea came to him.
He turned to Sara. “You listening to what I’m thinking?”
Sara smiled and nodded, message received. She focused her concentration, and after a moment, all the slot machines in the huge casino hit the jackpot. Hundreds of bells and sirens went off. Lights flashed wildly. Money started pouring out of the machines.
A riot erupted as gamblers deliriously scooped up piles of money. In the pandemonium, Burke lost sight of Jack and the siblings.
In the lobby, Alex stepped off the elevator, totally unaware of what had been happening. She heard all the noise and turned to see the casino in chaos. From the middle of it all, Jack and the kids came sprinting toward her at full speed. Grabbing Alex by the arm, he pulled her along with them.
“What happened to laying low?” she asked, running to keep up with them.
“Who lays low in Vegas?” Jack asked rhetorically. “Let’s go!”
They hurried out of the casino.
By the time Burke and his men made it to the parking lot, they had no idea which way Jack and the others had headed. Burke was fuming.
As they raced to their SUVs, Burke saw something that changed his mood. It was Jack’s cab swerving through the traffic, chased by the Las Vegas police.
Within seconds, Burke’s SUV joined the pursuit and was quickly followed by the other SUVs.
The taxi jumped a curb and raced down an alley. As it hurtled toward the other end, the cab ricocheted off garbage cans and Dumpsters, tossing trash everywhere.
Just as the cab was about to make it out of the alley, another pair of SUVs arrived and blocked their escape. The taxi slammed on the brakes and came to a screeching halt.
Once the cars had all stopped, police officers leaped out, weapons drawn.
“We got them!” Burke announced, taking charge of the situation. He held up his arms and waved off the police as he approached the back of the taxi.
“Our suspects!” he ordered.
The door to the taxi opened, and for a moment, nothing happened. Then, three figures slowly stepped out into the alleyway.
Now Burke was raging mad.
There was no Jack, Seth, or Sara. It was Dr. Harlan and his two assistants.
Harlan smiled at the assembled group and gave Burke a wink.
“Greetings, Earthlings!”