The Watcher

by Bill Stenlake

  The first thing is that the sort of material that is here on this planet; is very rare and very pliable, if you want it to be. The reason they can’t find stores of it, is because it is all around them. The buildings are made from it, as are the contents of the buildings. This planet actually lacks basic resources, but that is made up for by the pliable material they have here in abundance. The other thing that they find out; is that the reason why they haven’t come across any places where this material might have to be mined; is because you don’t have to mine it. It is all around, on the surface of the planet. The planet is literally made of the stuff. If you want some, then all you have to do is to collect up as much as you need from the surface of the ground. You could carve a bit out of what looks like a rock face, if that is what you want to do. But all you really need to do; is to gather it together and then mold it into whatever shape you need it for.

  Having read this information, the next thing they want to do is to try it out. They go outside and gather up a piece of material from the ground. When they try to mold it together, it just crumbles and falls apart. It soon becomes obvious to them that they have part of the instruction missing, at least that is what they hope is missing.

  Grillech wrestles with the controls. The people of Nitll have sent three craft up to meet them. That does not match with the information he has about this planet. GM3 had given the indication that these people were not in a position to fly out of their atmosphere. It said they did not have the capability to travel beyond their own planet. Well, from the looks of it, the craft that are on the way to intercept them are pretty well advanced. It takes time and great skill to design craft that you can just launch to intercept invaders. There is little doubt that the information GM3 has given them is very wrong. Now why would that be? Everything else that he has given them has been reasonably exact. It may have differed fractionally, but nothing to the extent that they are witnessing now.

  The engines of his craft are powered by the Air Micro Compounder technology. They don’t ever need refueling. They reproduce their own particles, so even if there was only one, it would be able to reproduce to satisfy any need. So they can’t be out of fuel. The engines do not need servicing. They are using a technology that has made that unnecessary. The only thing he can think of that might be causing the craft some problem, is the actual atmosphere of the planet he is approaching. He sets about to find the readings. That will tell him if it is very different from anything else they have come up against before. He comes up with nothing there that helps him.

  The craft is still moving towards Nitll. It is just not as smooth as it was before. The other thing that is really noticeable is that they are going significantly slower now. It is not anything he has done; the craft has just slowed down. It is not as if the engines are not working, because they are, but nothing like as well as they were earlier in the flight.

  The craft from Nitll are getting closer. They are coming in towards them, in a line of three. Three more craft have now been launched from the planet’s surface and they too are on the way towards them. Grillech knows it is only going to be a matter of time before they make contact with him. He has no idea, from the information GM3 has on this planet, how aggressive they might be or not. Anyway it doesn’t matter, because the other information is wrong, so that may be too. He decides to let it play out their way, at first. He will wait and see what approach they take towards their incoming craft. From the looks of it, they may not be the first people to have visited here.

  There is no communication as yet. The craft are almost upon them. The second group of three are getting closer too. They must be faster craft, as it hasn’t taken them long to get where they are. The front three craft starts to slow down. A message appears on the console in front of Grillech. It instructs him to slow down and stop. That is all it says for him to do. It repeats the message about five seconds later. Grillech presses the necessary buttons, so that he can comply with their wishes. It doesn’t take the craft long to slow down and stop. The three craft move closer and remain in the line of three. When they are close enough, they too come to a stop.

  ‘What are you coming to Nitll for?’ are the words that appear on the screen in front of Grillech next.

  Now he can’t really give the real answer to that one, can he? He decides to take a different tack. In the circumstances, what he is going to tell them is true.

  ‘We have a problem with our engines. We need to set down, so that we can look at them properly. We are not sure why they are not working efficiently.’

  Chapter 11 Ricardo

  Ricardo is just about to pick his stuff up, when he hears the sirens and sees the reflection of the blue flashing lights. He looks at the two guys behind the counter. They are backing away, as fast as they can. Ricardo realizes what has happened and why the police cars are there. These guys have seen him reaching for his weapon as he left the car. They took no chances and pressed the panic button. The gas station where he used to work had the same system. For some reason gas stations are popular targets to be raided. That is probably because they handle a load of cash.

  He really does not need this at this moment. That isn’t going to change things. What he really needs to happen, is for one of the guys behind the counter to go forwards and tell the police that this is a false alarm. It is not against the law to carry a gun. This is the USA.

  Thankfully one of the guys uses the microphone, from behind the counter. It is the one they usually use to talk to people at the pumps. This time they are talking to the police officers. Ricardo stays where he is at the counter. Even he realizes he needs this to be sorted out calmly. That is not something that he would normally consider. But he is tired and he doesn’t want to make trouble here, when he doesn’t need to. Something has changed, but he doesn’t know what. Give him the time to have a long sleep and then he might try to figure out what is going on within him.

  Ricardo turns round as the guy talks to the police officer. Both officers are out of their vehicles now and have drawn their guns. They are standing beside their police cars. The guy behind the counter says that he is going to come out to them. The other guy appears to be happy enough to stay where he is. The other customer even deems it safe enough to come towards the counter too. He buys his stuff and then makes for the door.

  ‘I don’t think you should go out just yet’ the guy behind the counter says. ‘Wait until my colleague has cleared this thing up with the police officers.’

  ‘I need to go now’ the customer says, getting agitated as he says the words.

  The guy is now outside talking to the police officers. He is pointing inside at where Ricardo is standing. The other customer is also in the same line of sight though.

  ‘Just wait for a few minutes. It won’t be long!’

  ‘I said I need to go.’ The man is really getting stressed now. Ricardo has hold of his things and just moves a couple of feet further to one side. He had already moved aside when the other customer came to the counter. Ricardo notices that this man has a bulge in his pocket too. And to think they weren’t worried about this man. Ricardo has seen enough people like this when he was behind the counter, to know that this guy is unstable. It could be drugs, or it could just be the type of guy he is. He tries to attract the attention of the guy behind the counter, to let him know this guy is carrying. He has already seen this too. He decides to use the microphone to talk to the guys outside. He doesn’t want the customer to hear him, so he ducks down behind the counter and speaks in a lower volume.

  ‘Watch out for the man coming out now. He’s spooked and is carrying.’

  That is all he says. By this time the man is starting to open the door, to go out onto the forecourt. The police officers are immediately more alert. They take a stance and point their weapons towards the man, as he emerges from the kiosk. The other guy moves backwards and takes cover. He is expecting it to be Ricardo who comes out of the kiosk, but it isn’t him.

  ‘Stop where you are. Hey, it
is you, Mario. Keep your arms where I can see them. Drop the bag and put your hands in the air.’

  Mario drops the bag alright, but that is where he stops obeying the police officer’s order. He makes a grab for the gun inside his jacket.

  ‘Don’t do it Mario. Keep your hand out of there.’

  Mario pays no attention. He dives to his left and starts to run towards the back of the gas station forecourt. The police officers start to run after him. Mario has brought his gun out, but he is not aiming it at the officers. He is just holding it as he runs away.

  ‘Stop Mario; or I will have to shoot’ one of the officers says, as he chases him.

  Mario is having none of it. He has reached the corner of the building and has now turned the corner and gone out of sight. The officers run to the corner, but stop before they go round it, just in case he has gone round the corner and stopped. They see that he hasn’t, so they resume the chase.

  Ricardo watches the scene in front of him erupt. He couldn’t have planned it better. He says he is going now, to the guy behind the counter. He takes his things with him. He passes the other guy, coming back in from the forecourt.

  ‘Well would you have believed it’ he says to Ricardo as he passes.

  ‘I think he was going to use that on you two’ Ricardo replies, as they pass.

  Ricardo makes it over to his car. He puts the things he has bought on the back seat and then hops into the driving seat, starts up and leaves as swiftly as he can, without attracting any more attention.

  The question he has to answer now; is whether he goes to the hotel the guys had told him about, or does he believe that might not be a good idea, as the police may come back and ask about him too.

  He needs the sleep, so decides to risk it.

  Before he went to sleep Ricardo had still been thinking in terms of his next target. The place he knew he had to have a go at, is The White House. If he can do some serious damage there, then that will have a serious rolling impact on the whole country, maybe even the whole world. That is what he went to sleep thinking. When he wakes up, more or less twenty four hours later, he is feeling completely different. He can’t put his finger on it still, but there has been a big change. First of all, he knows that he can’t do The White House. There is no way that he is going to be able to carry out an attack on the White House, without some pretty heavy support. Well, he will need some kind of support.

  Anyway, the place is too damned well-guarded. All they have succeeded in doing by what they have done so far is to alert the authorities that some people are causing massive disruption. The authorities have responded. They have ramped up the security everywhere that is a prime target and they have brought loads more military and police onto the streets. There is no mileage in trying to attack these people and places. They are expecting them to be coming and they are ready too.

  Ricardo wonders why he is thinking this way. It is very strange. For his recent history, he has just been doing things. He hasn’t known what he is going to do, or where he was going to do it. He has had no interest, or intention of, questioning anything. He has just done things blindly. Recently he would have just gone and tried to raid the White House, for example. He wouldn’t have thought about the consequences of what he is doing, he would have just done it. Now he is thinking things out.

  He still feels the need to cause disruption. That need is still there. It might well be disruption with a small d rather than a large D, but it is still there. He needs to go to a place, or places, where they can’t always be covering everything all the time. Maybe rather than causing riots and stuff like that, he can try to terrorize people instead. Go to some place and carry out something, then hop into the car and go off to somewhere else and repeat the exercise there, and so on and so forth.

  He likes the idea of that. He only has to decide where he needs to go to do this stuff. He gets the map book out of the car and goes back to his room. He is going to spend another night here, so he has plenty of time to work this one out. No one has come looking for him, after the situation at the gas station. Thankfully the other guy diverted the heat off him.

  He dials up room service and gets some food brought up to his room. For the first time in a long time, he has a beer too. God, it is a long time since he last had a beer.

  He switches on the TV and hears about the chaos that some people have been trying to cause in New York. The station he is watching, say that the police think that there might be some of the gang still on the loose out there. They had thought they had got them all, but they are thinking now it may not be the case. Bridges and tunnels are all closed. The ferries aren’t running either, but they will be soon, I’m sure, thinks Ricardo

  Chapter 12 The Watcher

  Before they go to their travel pods for the long journey, they sit down together to have a talk. Bluechen & Marlitta also sit with them. They are as involved in this as everyone else. The Watcher has one major concern before they embark on their journey and that is the craft they are using. The engines the craft has are adapted. The weapons the craft has are adapted. They are probably alright for a peaceful mission, in that they would be alright for basic defense, but a little underpowered for any form of attack. The craft was adapted to follow GM3 across the Universe, to try to follow him and save The Keeper from being abducted. That use was all it had to do in the first place. They have got to earth; they have failed to prevent The Keeper from being abducted. Now they have to take on a completely different role. Now they have to be the aggressor. They have to turn the wrong into a right and that isn’t going to be helped, with a craft that isn’t designed for that purpose.

  The Watcher puts it to the rest of them, that despite the relative urgency of trying to catch up with GM3, time would be well spent if they could take a detour and try to find somewhere that they can build a new craft, with the latest technology. Probably the ideal place to have done that would have been the last planet they visited. Their technology was advanced; albeit with a bucket load of outside help no doubt. The people of Parlantte though, seem to lack something in this whole process. They have been given the information to resist outside attack and change, but the way they are using it, without any regard for people like The Watcher, is probably something that has not been foreseen.

  The argument The Watcher puts to them, is hard to disagree with. George and Cassie go off to prepare some food for everyone. Bluechen and Marlitta go with them. Draton, Elkante, The Wise Soul and The Watcher bring up a program of charts. They are trying to find somewhere where they can stop and do what they need to, but still remain roughly on course for their destination. There is a long way to go, so in theory there should be plenty of places they can go to. There are of course, but there are some basic requirements too. There are materials they are going to need. There may be those on some of these planets, but they need to have already been mined. Then, of course, there is the little matter of atmosphere on a lot of these planets. They have come up with one or two very quickly, which have the right materials, but they also fail very quickly, because the planets are incapable of supporting life. That is apart from the fact that means; the items they need are still in the ground.

  They carry on with their search. They do it methodically and investigate each one as they come across it. Food is brought to them and they devour it, while they continue with their search. Planet after planet comes up as a possibility, but time after time there are failures that can’t be overcome. The Watcher tells them that they should have a break, but the four of them carry on regardless. The Watcher of course doesn’t need to stop.

  George and Cassie are working on another screen. They are checking the planets that the others have checked first. The Watcher has given them a list of the ones they have discarded, so they know them and can tick them off.

  The Watcher and his team are getting quite close to their destination now on the chart. They are getting to the point, where The Watcher feels they might be getting too close to Boristal 7. In that they are l
ikely to be detected by GM3 and so be in danger of being too close, without a defense to resist his attack. The Watcher has little doubt, that given the opportunity, GM3 would attack them and destroy them, if he thought he had even a small chance. He probably regrets not doing more to destroy The Watcher, when he was on earth.

  Bluechen and Marlitta have gone to get some refreshments for the team. Draton, Elkante, The Wise Soul and The Watcher are taking a rest. George and Cassie are way back across the Universe, in their follow up hunt, checking on the planets that the others have already looked at.

  The Watcher is getting ready to expand the search area. It is not what he was hoping to do, but if the needs demand it, then that is what he has to do.

  Bluechen and Marlitta return with the refreshments. George and Cassie stop too and sit down with the others, to have their drinks. The Watcher continues to set the search area to some different parameters. It means widening the search corridor on both sides. In reality that should mean virtually doubling the possibilities of finding a suitable planet for them to use, to do what they need to. That is to fully upgrade their craft. In reality it is the best they can hope to achieve. There is hardly any possibility that they are going to have the facilities and time it will take to build a totally new craft. That would be the ideal scenario, but that just isn’t going to happen. Even to do the necessary upgrades, is going to take a fair amount of time and a great deal of help from the people of the planet they hope they are going to use.

  The refreshment break is rather longer than they intended. That is due to The Watcher insisting that everyone take some time to catch up on their rest. He says he needs everyone to be totally on the ball when they resume. He is also saying this, because it is taking him longer to set up the new search pattern. Again that is because the craft does not really have the capabilities to easily do what he wants it to. He finds that, after a few unsuccessful attempts, he can only get the equipment to deal with extending the search area on one side at a time. It just can’t take in the magnitude of space he wants it to look at, in one go.