In the early 1900s, a dark shadow covered a small town in rural America. A metal shape hovered in the sky, unseen in the shadows of late evening.

"We are nearing the subject's residence, Commander."

"Prepare the landing team. Assign the strongest available Starmen; this mission is of critical importance."

"Yes, Commander."

"Instruct the team that I will not tolerate any mistakes. The subject must be brought back here alive and unharmed. Understood?"

"Yes... Commander, if I may have permission to speak?"

A brief, uneasy silence, followed by a somewhat grudging "Granted."

"Why is this human to be taken to work on Unit XX? Wouldn't it be better to --"

"This human has been determined to be a mechanical genius well ahead of his species' pace," replied the Commander icily. "You have received your orders, Lieutenant. Take care they are executed properly, and that this 'George' arrives here safely."

"...Yes, Commander."

=====

George awoke, and the first thing he noticed was an excruciating headache. The second thing he noticed was that he was lying on a cold metal floor. He slowly pushed himself up until he was sitting, managing to mutter "What the hell is going on?"

Looking around, George saw a room with each side a seemingly identical shade of metallic gray. He shivered; wherever this was, he decided, someone needed to start a fire and heat it up already.

A rectangle opened out from the wall in front of George; belatedly, he realized it was a door colored just like the rest of the wall. Through it stepped a tall figure whose very appearance confounded George. It was fully white-skinned, the color of milk; its limbs seemed very slender, but still imposing; it had a tail that looked much like its limbs which hung low towards the floor; its face had very minimal features, and had what seemed to be ears projecting upwards from its head. It was wearing a long robe of royal purple, upon which was an emblem of an upward-pointing triangle with three squares below it.

None of this registered in George's mind, however, like the figure's eyes: a narrow, cold pair of blue eyes that seemed to pierce right into his thoughts.

"Your name is George, correct?" spoke the figure. Its voice was unsettling to George; it seemed to convey no emotion.

"Y-Yes..." stuttered George. Under normal circumstances, he was a calm and composed person, but at this instant he was too shaken by the situation to retain any of that.

"We are currently departing the region of your planet. You are to work in our mechanical automaton development unit. If your work is successful, we will one day return you to your planet. In the meanwhile, you will reside on this ship in Unit XX."

George heard these words, but his headache, shivering and confusion made them incomprehensible. "You... want me to work on machines? I'm just a farmer," he said, with much more calm in his voice than he had thought possible.

The figure stared at George without blinking. With the slightest hint of amusement, it said, "Our analysis shows your innate mechanical skills are far beyond the current human level. You will learn quickly."

Silence followed this statement, with George racking his brain trying to determine what questions to ask. "Who are you, and where am I?" were the first two that came to mind.

"I am Commander Relpa, and this is the GMS Valess," replied the figure matter-of-factly. George realized that while these may be the true answers, they did not benefit him much.

Suddenly, a thought crossed George's mind. "Where is my wife Maria? Where is my daughter Elizabeth? Are they here too, somewhere?" he asked. He tried to mask his worry from being obvious in his voice, but failed.

Relpa hesitated, then said, "Maria is also aboard this ship. She will accompany you in Unit XX." Relpa's mouth opened, as if to continue speaking, but then closed again.

George used every ounce of self-control he could muster to ask and not scream: "Where is my daughter, Relpa? Where is our baby girl?"

Relpa turned and faced away from George. "She... was deposited in the home of your sister Emma. She will not be accompanying us," stated Relpa.

George could not contain himself any longer. He yelled, "Why the hell should I believe you didn't do something terrible to her? Why should I believe that she's even --" He choked for a moment on his sudden tears and stared at the floor. "....alive?"

The commander turned back to George. "For all that what we do crosses certain standards, we are not barbarians, George. Your daughter could not accompany you here... because you and Maria are to raise one of my species." George looked up at Relpa in bewilderment.

"His name is Giegue," the commander continued. "He is a very young child, little older than your daughter. His parents were killed in a tragic incident, and he has no living relatives; he is our responsibility. Knowing that we were to going to be retrieving you for work in Unit XX, we decided, to use the human metaphor, to 'kill two birds with one stone'. That is, we have also brought your wife so that you may both work on the machines and be Giegue's adopted parents. Unit XX will serve both roles."

George stared at Relpa with defiance in his eyes. "Why should I go along with this?" he said angrily.

Relpa, showing emotion to George for the first time, said with determination, "At the moment, you don't have much of a choice."

With that, Relpa turned and exited the room, and the door closed behind him. George collapsed onto the floor.