"Yeah," said Sam, a little absently. He was still trying to process the crazy talk. Some of it was easier to figure out - the reference to Rich Rider was obvious; if there was one thing Sam had gotten very good at reading out of a conversation, it was when people were measuring him against his predecessor.

The first part, though -

- was going to have to wait.

"Yeah," he repeated again, this time sounding much more in the present. Run (or fly, as it were) now, decode weird creepy monologue later. He swooped in, grabbed Robbie under the arms, and started flying - fast. "I really hope you wore your deodorant today, dude."

He didn't have a path in mind, beyond "not running into things" and "away from the creeper." Nothing was jumping out as a particularly safe place to hole up and get everything straight. Downed spaceships: no, he'd seen Alien and weird shit could be hiding on those. Dead greenery: no, might have dead or undead wildlife. Like that vicious bunny rabbit from that one Monty Python movie.

Place where the ground turned into the ceiling: kind of big and glaring, wasn't it?

"Okay. We're flying. Now what?"