Danger Magellan's Invasion of Earth

Chapter 8

Chapter 8

"Nora!" Dan exclaimed just as I was about to go to bed on Saturday night. "I need your help!"

"What is it?" I asked. I had just gotten home from the first swim meet of the year, with my muscles aching from breaking my 50 freestyle time. If there was one thing I didn't want to do at that point, it was helping Dan with whatever crazy scheme he had concocted.

"I'm going to ask Arthur to homecoming, and I need you to help me out," Dan said.

"How are you going to ask him out?" I asked.

"Arthur offhandedly mentioned that he had taught himself Morse Code in order to decode Illuminati messages," Dan explained. "I'm going to ask him to homecoming in Morse Code."

"I don't think Arthur will appreciate you using the alleged communication method of the Illuminati to ask him out, but whatever," I said. "Why do you need my help? I was going to go to bed."

"Moral support," Dan explained. "Also, I barely know what Morse Code is, so I'm going to need your phone to look it up."

I took out my phone and handed it to Dan. "Can I go to bed now?" I asked.

"Not yet," Dan said as he found a website that explained how to use Morse Code. "I still need you for moral support." He ran into the guest bedroom, and I followed him, my muscles screaming. Dan had completely redecorated the bedroom with posters of his favorite bands, and even at this late hour, I could hear Blaze running on the wheel that Dan had recently placed in her cage. It was as if Dan's hedgehog never slept.

Dan walked up to the window and opened the blinds. I glanced outside, and saw that the guest bedroom faced towards Arthur's window. Before long, Arthur peeked out his window and noticed Dan and I. He waved nervously, still wearing his Alien Hunter hat. I moved out of the way, while Dan reached for the lightswitch. He rapidly flipped the lightswitch on and off four times in a row, signaling the letter "H."

Arthur looked confused for a moment, but he quickly figured out what Dan was doing. Meanwhile, Dan continued to signal. A few minutes later, Arthur figured out his message.

H-O-M-E-C-O-M-I-N-G-?

Arthur grinned and reached for the lightswitch in his own bedroom. Arthur's signals came much faster than Dan's, making them rather difficult to figure out. "That was a dash and a dot, right?" Dan said. "The first letter must be an N then."

"No, he's not done with this letter yet," I said as I observed Arthur signal two more dashes. "It's dash, dot, dash, dash, which makes it a Y."

Arthur paused for a while and then signaled the next letter, which was simply a single dot. The third letter was three more dots. Dan and I then used the Morse Code website to translate Arthur's message.

Y-E-S

"What do I do now?!" Dan asked.

"I don't know," I said. "Figure it out yourself." I briefly glanced down from the guest bedroom window and spotted the spaceship that had landed in Arthur's backyard nearly a month and a half earlier. Even with the clear view of the ship, I still couldn't figure out what it was or where it had come from. However, it was obvious that it was the same object that I had seen on the day that Dan arrived. The conical shape and fins were unmistakeable.

I went to bed shortly after Arthur agreed to go to homecoming with Dan, but the two of them continued messaging each other in Morse Code well into the night. I was certain that Dan didn't understand half of what Arthur was sending him, but that wasn't my problem.