It had been like that with Captain Zoom. Youcouldn't get it out of your head. After an evening'sconcentrated playing you were climbing ladders anddodging laser-zap bolts all night.

It was a pretty good dream, even so. He could fellthe seat under him. And the cabin smelled of hot oil andoverheated plastic and unwashed people.

It looked pretty much like the one he saw on thescreen every evening, except that there was a thinfilm of grease and dirt over everything. But there wasthe radar screen, and the weapons console, and thejoystick

Hey, much better than the computer! The cabin wasfull of noises - the click and whirr of fans, the hum andbuzz of instruments.

And better graphics. You get much better graphicsin your dreams.

The ScreeWee fleet hung in the air, hung in spacein front of him.

Wow!

Although dreams ought to be a bit more exciting.You got chased in dreams. Things happened to you.Sitting in the cockpit of a starfighter bristling withweapons was fun, but things ought to happen

He wandered if he should launch a missile orsomething... No, hang on, they'd surrendered. Andthere was that thing about safe conduct.His hands wandered over the switches in front ofhim. They were a bit different from the computerkeyboard, but this one-'Are you receiving me?'

The face of the Captain appeared on the communications screen.

'Yes?' said Johnny.

'We are ready.'

'Ready?' said Johnny. 'What for?'

'Lead the way,' said the Captain. The voice came outof a grille beside the screen. It must be being translatedby something, Johnny thought. I shouldn't think giantnewts speak English.

'Where to?' he said. 'Where are we going?''To Earth.'

'Earth? Hang on! That's where I live! People can getinto serious trouble showing huge alien fleets wherethey live!'

The grille hummed and buzzed for a while. Then the