“Pete, e on,” Gramps said.
“Take my hand, baby,” Mama said once agaier was trying to work himlf up to do it wheched her breath and the out a long sigh. The beeping sound from the mae o her bed turned into a steady drone and Mama’s eyes drifted shut.
“No,” he said. “No.” He kept saying it over and ain, building up until he was screaming. No, he should have taken her hand. No, she couldn’t be gone. She couldn’t be dead. She couldn’t have left him all alone. No.
Gramps picked him up aer thrashed, still screaming as Gramps carried him back out into the hallway. A doctor rushed into the room past them. Gramps t him doeter saw that Gramps was g, too. “Pete,” he said. “Just stay here. Okay? Plea?”
Gramps turned and walked slowly bato Mama’sroom—no, not Mama’s room. The room where Mama had been before she died.
No, Peter thought. It couldn’t be real. None of it could be real.
That’s wheer ran.
He didn’t think about running. He just did. No oopped him.
He burst through the hospital’s outside door and ran across the parking lot. Whe to the field oher side of the parking lot, he kept running. A cold fog swirled around him, and his shoes were soon soaked from the wet grass, but he tinued. When he finally was out of breath, he dropped to his knees and sobbed. No one came looking for him. He was alone.
A deep groan came from above him and the wind kicked up, blowing the fog away. A brilliant light shone down on him, tht to look at directly. He squihrough the wind and his tears, eing the outline of something incredible.
It was a giant spaceship, the size of a jet plane or even bigger, h in the air over him. Its wings spread out to cover most of the field, and it was tipped down so its no pointed directly at Peter. Astonished, he froze there, uo believe what he was eing. Lights puld oside of the craft.
The beam of light tightes focus oer and began to swirl in a storm of color. He cried out, but the light picked him up and stole him away.