by Carl Derham
*
“I just wish you could both come with me,” Oli said, with his bottom lip puffed out to twice its normal size.
“Well I could,” said Robbie, obviously aching to hear some more music.
“How exactly?” asked Pardy.
“The drone is able to synthesise human form. It’s simply more efficient to form a blank humanoid shape. How do you think that I interacted with humanity, offering the assistance that they required? You didn’t really believe that Einstein was Human did you? Or for that matter Pythagoras, Galileo or Newton. To be honest with you, I was getting a bit bored, waiting for you lot to work everything out.”
“Excellent.” said Oli. “And what shape would you like to assume to sample the joys of clubbing?”
“I don’t really know. What would you suggest?”
“Well, I think you should be a beautiful redhead,” said Oli, his eyes gazing up at the ceiling trying to imagine the girl of his dreams. “About five foot eight tall, curvy, not skinny, long flowing red hair and a soft southern Irish accent, dressed in a mini skirt and crop top.” He sighed at the thought, then gathered himself together and continued, “But really, it’s up to you.”
Oli swung the chair round to face the doorway where the drone usually appeared. The black mist crept across the floor and began to form a mound. The shape of the body formed first, a blank humanoid form as he’d seen before only taller, with a considerably more appealing shape. Then slowly from the feet up, the drone began to change colour. It grew high-heeled red shoes, then the most perfect pair of legs that Oli had ever seen. They seemed to go up and up, slowly changing colour until at last a tiny skirt began to form. Oli’s eyes followed the transformation, pausing for a few seconds just below the chin. Then her perfect face was formed with a bald head. Just as Oli was about to remind Robbie about the red hair, it started sprouting all over her perfectly rounded scalp, like playdough being forced through a sieve. Oli stared, open-mouthed at the vision that had appeared before him. Just then, the figure shifted her weight onto one foot thus pushing the opposite hip out and in a silky southern Irish lilt said, “how’s that?”
Oli was seriously doubting whether he would ever be able to talk to Robbie again. She was perfect, but he knew that he was talking to Robbie, who was most definitely a bloke. This was going to require some concentration.
“Wow! But you should definitely rethink the shoes. If you try and dance in those, your feet are going to be killing you by…what am I talking about? You’re a drone. It’s perfect! Now, how are we going to get into London without anyone seeing us, er…Roberta?”
Robbie explained how he would enter the North Sea well out of eyesight of land, travel up the River Thames underwater, and park the ship on the bottom of the river where they could walk ashore using the Go-ring. They headed for Earth and three minutes later were below the surface of the North Sea, surging towards the coast at close to three hundred kilometres an hour. They snaked their way up the river at a considerably slower pace so as not to make ripples, and came to rest below Embankment tube station.
“I’m sorry Pardy, but you’re going to have to stay here. They don’t let parrots into clubs. You can guard the ship while we’re gone.”
“Actually I am a bit tired after all the excitement of the last few days. I will enjoy the chance to rest. You go and have fun.”
Oli quickly downloaded eight hours sleep from the NFS and joined Roberta in the cargo hold, consciously averting his eyes from her legs. The door in the ceiling opened, revealing the murky water of the Thames, held aloft by a force field. Then the platform lifted them out of the ship and onto the roof. He had to feel each footstep gently as he went, because he couldn’t see more than one metre through the brown, murky water. He reached the edge of the ship and spotted the rusty iron ladder that Robbie had cleverly parked next to. With a single bound he glided across the gap and grasped hold of the rusty rung. He climbed the ladder and carefully peered through the surface water to make sure that nobody was watching. He spotted an amorous couple leaning over the wall of The Embankment. Oli could see that they were entwined in a lover’s grip and resisted the temptation to climb out of the water fully dressed and totally dry. He felt although this would be extremely funny, it would probably ruin the moment for them. After a few minutes, they continued on their way and he climbed the ladder to the gap in the wall. He had to be extra careful because some idiot had put a second moon in the sky and it was the brightest night that he’d ever seen.
Roberta daintily stepped off the ladder and Oli saw a rippling movement surge from her head to her little red shoes. Roberta explained in her melodious tone that this was a way of shaking off the water, like a dog shaking itself dry. Oli reckoned that she could say ‘poo bum potty pants’ and it would sound sexy.
As they walked across the street to Embankment tube station, he gave the ring a little tap and the force field disengaged. It wouldn’t be a good idea to go bumping into people on the tube and sending them flying.
“Why is everyone staring at us Oli?” asked Roberta.
“If you look closer,” said Oli, “you’ll notice that only the men are staring and they’re not staring at us, they’re staring at you. I’m sure you can figure it out.”
Oli was actually enjoying the attention. He’d never walked through the streets of London with such a beauty before, even if she was a drone.
“Holy oly!” said Oli, stopping suddenly and striking his forehead with the palm of his hand. “We haven’t got any money. How in the name of all that’s believable are we going to get into a club with no money?”
The usual scenario for a Saturday night out was that Oli never had any money so apart from the gorgeous fictitious model, the invincibility ring and his space ship parked in the Thames, it was just another night out.
“I believe you have cash dispensing machines,” said Roberta. “Why don’t we get some from one of those?”
“Great idea, but I don’t have a card,” replied Oli.
“No problem Oli, I can use mine.” She looked sideways at Oli and gave a mischievous smile.
“Roberta?” Oli looked at her suspiciously. “Are you talking about stealing money from a bank?”
“Well Oli, in view of the fact that we’ve just saved the planet from certain destruction, I think they can spare us a few quid for a night out.”
Oli thought about how he’d been refused a loan to buy his new drum kit last year and how they charged him twenty five pounds to send him a letter to tell him that he was thirty pounds overdrawn. He paused to moralise over Roberta’s logic, nodded his approval and they headed for the nearest bank. They found a cash machine and Roberta placed her hand against the card slot while Oli nervously looked over his shoulder. Her index finger dissolved into the slot and the screen flashed.
“How much would you like to withdraw?” Roberta asked.
The temptation to enter a five figure number was almost irresistible, but Oli was essentially an honest fellow and he entered the figure of a hundred and fifty pounds. That would pay him back for the letter and give them a good night out. The cash appeared, shortly followed by Roberta’s index finger. “Now that’s really sticking one up at the banks,” said Oli.
They got to the club and as it was past 1 am, there was no queue. The towering Godzilla of a doorman was staring so intently at Roberta, that he didn’t even notice Oli.
“Ahem,” coughed Oli, causing the doorman to glance to his right where Oli was looking up at him.
“Oh hi Oli,” said Geoff, “how’s it going? Are you…” he pointed his finger between Oli and Roberta, unable to hide his surprise, “together?”
“Hi Geoff. Yes, this is Roberta, she’s a friend from out of town.”
The doorman, obviously in a state of shock, moved to one side and held out a hand, offering them entrance. As Oli passed him, he felt a pat on the back and turned to give Geoff a cheeky wink.
They could hear the dull thud of the bass drum comi
ng from within and Oli’s heart gave a little flutter of excitement. Inside, the music was pounding and there were people jumping around like lunatics. There must have been five hundred people in the place. Now for the tricky part about meeting people inside a club, he thought; finding them.
Ed, Julie, Jay and Sara were fully implanted in their usual clubbing position; at the front, in the middle of the action. Ed, being six foot two, was the first to spot Oli pushing his way through the crowd on the stairs leading down to the dance floor. But who was that following him? No, surely not. There was no way that she was with him. She must be just following him, and as soon as they reached the dance floor she would branch off in the other direction to her waiting Adonis of a boyfriend. They reached the bottom of the stairs and after scanning the heaving sea of heads a few times, Oli saw Ed and waved excitedly. He started delicately pushing his way through the shoulder-to-shoulder people, frequently raising himself to his tip toes to spot Ed. She’s still following him, thought Ed, gaining in confusion with every step. Ed started to look around for a likely partner to the goddess. Nothing. No one that even came close to being a worthy partner, except for himself of course. As Oli got to within three metres of them, it became painfully clear to Ed that somehow, by some freak of nature, Oli had come clubbing with the most gorgeous girl that he’d ever laid eyes upon. Oli put his arms out to give Ed a big greeting hug and as Ed’s head was resting above Oli’s, he got a close up view of the girl of his dreams.
“How’s it going?” Oli shouted.
“Great. Who is that?”
“Just a friend. She’s from Ireland.” Oli gave Julie, Jay and Sara a big, ‘haven’t-seen-you-for-ages’ hug all together in true club-land style. Nobody was really paying any attention to Oli’s greeting, they were all fixated on Roberta and the same short conversation took place a further three times. It was impossible to communicate with more than one person at a time because he had to shout directly into the person’s ear in order to be heard. Oli grabbed Roberta’s hand and reeled slightly as he realised that it felt like real skin. He pulled her into the middle of the group. She gave a little girlie wave and a smile that would have melted Glurk. Robbie had definitely been watching too many Australian soaps, but it was working for Oli. She’s a drone, she’s a drone, she’s a drone, he repeated in his mind.
Unable to hold anything resembling a decent conversation, almost in unison they began to wave their arms in the air and leap about like mad fools. Roberta watched how it was done and joined in. Every guy on the dancefloor was catching a sneaky look at Roberta. Even some of the women were glued to her every gyrating move. Oli began to think that maybe he should have toned it down a bit, after all, they weren’t meant to be drawing any attention to themselves. Oh well, he thought, it’s done now. Might as well enjoy the moment.
Two hours of solid dancing elapsed and Ed lent over to Oli’s ear and shouted, “let’s go get a drink!” Oli nodded and made the going to get a drink sign to everyone. Julie and Sara had their eyes closed and were lost in another world. Oli knew from past experience that it was best to leave them alone, so he grabbed Roberta’s arm and followed Ed and Jay to the bar. They had already composed a cover story to explain where he’d been for two weeks. He’d been travelling around Egypt, had changed his flight and met Roberta on the plane back to England. He was going with her to Ireland for a couple of weeks and would be back soon. But in the quieter bar area, Ed and Jay weren’t interested in Oli’s version of events. Their interest was fully reserved for Roberta. She gave them the same story and they both scrutinised every word as it formed in her perfect mouth. Oli thought, they definitely should have toned it down a bit.
“You have my permission to marry her,” said Jay.
“You have my permission to dump her so I can marry her,” said Ed.
Ed and Jay enjoyed a beer while Roberta, who was totally into the music, jiggled about in front of them. Another two hours passed and Roberta was propositioned more times than any other nano-drone-Human-facsimile in history. Eventually, the final tune finished and the lights came on, politely informing everyone that it was 6.30 a.m. and the time had come to drag their sweaty bodies back to their homes. Sara was still dancing around with her eyes closed, moving in perfect harmony with the sound of silence. Julie gave her a tap on the shoulder and she jumped as she opened her eyes.
“Time to go home hun,” said Julie. Sara puffed out her bottom lip, disappointed that a great night of dancing had come to an abrupt end. Julie gave her a big hug and they went off to get their coats.
“Everyone’s coming back to ours Oli. You coming?” asked Ed.
“Ah…Oli,” the soft Irish voice of Roberta whispered into his ear. “We have a problem.”
Oli guided Roberta away from the others. “What is it?” he enquired
“The tide’s gone out and the ship is sat on the mud in full view of thousands of onlookers.”
“How did that happen? Aren’t you on the ship as well? Didn’t you see it happening? What are we gonna do now?”
The others were watching Oli and Roberta. It was obvious that something was wrong, but what? Was this the first lovers’ tiff? Were they about to break up? And what the hell was she doing with Oli anyway?
“I was enjoying the music,” said Roberta. “It was only when the music stopped and I heard the sound of something touching the outside of the ship, that I twigged. It would appear that they’ve hung straps around the front and rear of the ship and are about to lift it onto a lorry.”
“Can’t you just force your way out and fly away?”
“Yes of course I could, but I would probably take half the crane with me and scatter the area with debris. There are thousands of people around. I can’t risk injuring them.”
“We’ve got to get back there now,” said Oli.
They hurried over to the others, who were staring across the dance floor at them, Julie’s left eyebrow raised in that all-to-familiar questioning stare.
“Sorry guys,” said Oli, quickly thinking of an excuse. “We got the flight time wrong and we’ve got to be at Heathrow in an hour. I’ll give you a bell when I get back.” He gave everyone a big Oli hug and much to the delight of Jason and Ed, so did Roberta. They ran out of the club and headed towards the ship. Oli had to shout at Roberta to slow down. Not only was it extremely rare to see someone in high heels breaking the four-minute mile, but Oli was completely worn out after all that dancing. When they reached the Embankment, they pushed through the massive crowd and reached the police railing that had been erected to block off the area around the crane and flatbed lorry. The ship was just appearing over the top of the wall wrapped in a tarpaulin with two slings attaching it to the arm of the crane. The army chiefs had realised that there was no way of keeping this under wraps, so they had decided to lift it in the light of day and carry it off to the nearest airbase, fifty kilometres north of London.
“I wonder what it is,” came one voice.
“Is it a boat that’s sunk?”
“Why is it covered up? Are there bodies inside?”
The group of people that had gathered, were mainly clubbers who had just completed a night of revelry, and they were not really in any state to understand what was going on. Most of them would probably forget about it within a couple of hours.
Oli watched in despair as they lowered the ship onto the flatbed lorry and, with the straps still attached to the crane, they dragged five huge chains over the top of the tarpaulin and attached them to the lorry. It was going nowhere, not without the lorry anyway. With a convoy of two army vehicles, police cars and motorbikes to clear the roads ahead, they headed off.
“Oops!” said Oli.
“Double oops!” said Roberta, aware that with the departure of the convoy, most of the eyes had turned on her.
“Let’s get out of here Oli. I have a plan.”
As they walked along the Embankment, the twilight of Sunday morning gave a haunting glow to the cold mist hanging over th
e river. The two moons had departed the night sky and Oli began reminiscing about the morning walks he had taken with girls whom he’d met in clubs.
“Oli? Oli?” said Roberta giving him a little nudge on the second attempt. “Come back Oli. We’ve got some thinking to do.”
“Sorry Robbie,” Oli had decided to revert back to the name Robbie. It would distract his mind from all the thoughts he was having about Roberta. “Miles away. What’s the plan?”
“Well Oli, the plan was to send the micro-drones outside to plant plasma-charges on the chains, then at an opportune moment, blow the charges and lift off.”
“Great plan. What’s with the was?”
“The was Oli, is standing in front of you. I used all the micro-drones to construct Roberta. I can make some more, but it’ll take a several hours.”
“Gumph!” said Oli stopping to smack the palm of his hand on his forehead.
“Hopefully,” said Robbie, “when they reach their destination, they’ll have to undo the chains to take the ship off the back of the lorry and then I can lift off. I say hopefully because that plan is reliant on the army being completely incompetent.”
They both decided that a captured alien spacecraft was going to be treated with a little more security than an illegally parked car, so they sat on a bench looking out over the river. Plan after plan went through Oli’s head. Go to the base with the Go-rings, break in and take the ship by force…No!
Lift off with the trailer attached, sod anyone who got in the way…Absolutely not!
“Matter Transform Bubble!” shouted Oli, as a passing couple looked back and muttered something like “bloody clubbers!”
“The ship can pass right through the chains,” continued Oli.
“The effect of the Bubble begins one metre from the ship's hull,” explained Robbie. “If it worked at the surface, it would transform the ship at the same time.”
“But won’t it cut straight through the chains that are securing you to the truck?” ask Oli.
“No Oli. The bubble needs a free run around the ship in order to form. If anything is lying within the field it will not form.”
As Oli was looking skyward for inspiration, a pigeon flew out of the mist and settled on the railing surrounding one of the old houseboats that Oli had always dreamt of owning.
“Pardy!” he shouted, jumping to his feet and startling an old man taking his dog for an early morning walk. “Sorry,” he gestured to the old man with his hand over his mouth. “Pardy could go outside the ship,” he continued at a whisper. “When the convoy gets to where it’s going, she can leave the ship, wearing a Go-ring, plant the charges and Bob’s your uncle.”
“Firstly Oli, computers do not generally have any relatives and secondly, we have only one Go-ring, which is currently nowhere near the ship.”
Pardy was fast asleep on her perch, completely unaware of all the excitement.
“Pardy,” whispered Robbie, in a voice similar to that of a young child who had just kicked his football through his grandfather’s greenhouse. “Pardy,” he said a bit louder.
“Yes. I wasn’t asleep. Just dozing,” she said, ruffling her feathers and looking around to remind herself of her unfamiliar surroundings.
“We have a slight problem Pardy and we need your help,” said Robbie.
He relayed the story to Pardy who stood on her perch, silently ingesting the fact that she was aboard an alien ship, on an alien planet, being taken to a base where they would try to get into the ship and subject her to all kinds of examinations and she would probably never see her mother again. Obviously, that was looking on the absolute dark side of the situation, but she always found that if you did that, things could only get better. Oli and Robbie had decided that she was their only hope. She would have to go outside the ship without any protection and fly around, planting charges on the chains. She’d missed out on the night of clubbing and now she had the chance to save the day.
“Yippee!” she squawked, flapping her wings in excitement.
“She wants to do it,” said Robbie.
They didn’t know how long it would take to reach the base, so they caught a cab to Oli and Ed’s flat in Fulham.
