He was a nice looking guy, taller thanall of them but probably not over six foot tall. He looked like he wasin decent shape but probably didn't spend ... lot of time working out."So, what do you think?" Beth probed."Well, so far he seems pretty nice," Randi told her, "but relax, we'vegot a ways to go and we aren't going to grill him." He looks pretty good, too," Denise added.Earl returned with the drinks and sat back down beside Beth barelyglancing at Joan. They talked getting to know one another. It was noticeably quite cool in there and I felt my balls retracting in response to the lower temperature. There was activity going on around me — I heard at least one man and two different women whispering as I stood, blindfolded, feeling extremely exposed."Face me," the male voice from my left hand side ordered. I turned to where I thought the voice was. "Now stand up straight."Even through the mask I caught the flash of the bulb — I just hoped that all they were going to do was take photos.. Walt reached out and touched the middle with his hand and felt it go through like a finger into Jell-O. "What the Hell?" He said as he launched himself with his remaining strength through the barrier. He crashed into the next room and lost awareness once again.Worker Bots immediately sensed a new infrared pattern matching humanoid characteristics from within the room. Deep in the control functions of the ship, a maintenance software program produced the first start of contingency-based AI code.. "Hi Dad." She said in a small voice.Dad moved faster than I'd imagined he could and embraced her, holding her tight in his arms."Oh, sweetie. I'm so glad to see you." He said gruffly, his voice choking up."I'm sorry, Daddy. I didn't know what to do." It's going to be okay. Everything's going to be okay."I stood back and watched them. Was everything going to be okay?I suppose that depends on what your definition of 'okay' is.We sat down finally and ate dinner together as a family for the first.