Rossetti looked left and right again. “Thank you your honors.”
The judges faded from view. The councilwoman turned to Jim with a smile. “At this moment there are four divisions of Commonwealth Rangers descending to the planet’s surface. I know it seems a little much for a simple investigation but we’ve detected some armed conflict during the last hour. The Rangers are there to protect the investigating team and foreign nationals. Thank you for your assistance Mr. Young, I’ve been waiting twenty years to give that order.”
“I thank you, councilwoman.”
“Before I go, I would like to give you a message from Special Agent Harvey of the Commonwealth Secret Service. He sends his apologies for not assisting you in the fight. Before the court permission was obtained it would have compromised our position.”
“Councilwoman, I don’t know the Special Agent.”
“Yes you do, he asked me to tell you that just because he likes men does not mean he can not be a trained killer. He also forgives you for telling him to get lost and calling him a queer, whatever that is.”
“Oh…. Ah… Is his name Peter?”
“I have no idea what name he was operating under but he’s listening to us as we speak.”
“Is he the one who eliminated the bad guys at the spaceport? If he is, I owe him one.”
Rossetti cocked her head for a few seconds then looked up. “He says you don’t owe him one, you owe him five. It would’ve been more but you moved so fast he couldn’t keep up.”
“Uh… thank him for me.”
“He said he’d like to see you at the Secret Service training school for escape and evasion.”
“I need to learn more?”
“Not as a student, as an instructor. When you’re rested we’d like a deposition from you on what transpired. In particular any evidence you may have regarding the practices of mind control.”
“I’ll do that.”
“Thank you again.” The councilwoman’s image faded.
Chapter 21
Jim sat back in his favorite armchair in the main living room of his house. He sat without moving. The pain of bruises scrapes and pulled muscles kept him stationary.
He briefly thought of the friends he’d lost, Doris, Andy, Jason and friends on Earth. He didn’t want to lose more. In a refrigerator sat a container of the good stuff. He put out the word to all the missions and people of the street that his friends Alfred and Phil were welcome at his house any time. The only one he was in contact with was Halbert who was happily watching his turnips sprout on Hebram. Isolation agreed with him and he was off the stuff…. sort of.
Ralph lay on the floor at Jim’s feet. He was exhausted after a long romp chasing squirrels. He didn’t want to harm the creatures; he just wanted to make friends and play. After years of trying, he had never found a squirrel that would cooperate.
Chris and Celia had new jobs. Both employed by the Young Companies. Chris was liaison with the Montoyas in charge of coordination between them in a number of cooperative ventures. Celia was Jim’s social secretary, arranging functions, meetings and extending polite refusals to the thousands of people who wanted a meeting with Jim to push a venture or request venture capital for one wild project or another. Jim was tired of business. He just wanted to live in peace and quiet for at least a time.
Redmond sat across from him, a glass of apple juice in his hand. The third person in the room was Sam, a tall, thin, gangly man with sandy blond hair. His rugged suntanned face showed many years of work in the outdoors.
“How many now?” Jim asked Redmond.
“Over eleven million, so far.” Redmond replied. “On that planet there were eighty six camps like the one you were in. Among the faithful were fourteen members of the Commonwealth House of Representatives, one member of the Commonwealth Supreme Court and seven heads of state of other planetary governing bodies.”
“How’d so many get elected?”
“Money,” Redmond said. “Due to their mutual financial assistance system, which created and channeled wealth, all a potential politician had to do was display the ‘handshakes’ and they’d be flooded with political contributions. Once elected, they were controlled by the installed mental triggers.”
“How’re they going to deal with all of them?”
Redmond leaned back and took a sip from his glass. “Each of the planets are taking care of their own. They’ve set up deprogramming clinics to handle it.”
“Most are sleepers, no immediate missions. Couldn’t they just forget them?”
“No. If someone unscrupulous finds their embedded triggers and uses them there’ll be hell to pay. They have to go through mental re-conditioning to remove the chance of control.”
Jim turned to the other person in the room. “Sorry Sam, this all must be confusing to you but there are things I’ve got to know.”
Sam nodded. “It sure nuff is confusin’.”
Jim turned back to Redmond. “And what about the leadership?
“About three hundred are now incarcerated.”
“I thought there’d be more. They had dozens of missions on each of a hundred planets.”
“It appears you shot Brother Anthony before he fully explained,” Redmond chuckled. “There were four levels. First there was the leadership who knew of the second book and the criminal activities. Another was the recruiters, councilors and workers at their shelters and missions who actually believed they were working for a legitimate church. They were trained on the first book Parnell wrote, the one with wise sayings and inspirational quotes.”
“The ones that ‘graduated’, the ones that questioned the quotes given in the bible classes.”
“Yes, it gave them the perception that their religion was superior to the rest.”
“And the other two levels?”
“One was the group they assigned you to, the businessmen, financiers, politicians and engineers. They were the power and money.”
“And the final group was the hit men, the doers,” Jim said.
“Yes and that device they were using is now under heavy guard. You were right; it was mind control communicating directly with the brain. While people slept in their beds it changed neural pathways and actually installed false memories. We have nothing like it in the rest of the galaxy. It’s way beyond our technology.”
“Where’d it come from?”
“They have no idea.”
“Their technologists must have been trained by someone.”
“They handled it recipe style. No understanding of how it worked, just how to use it. It was interesting how the false memories they installed in people were created. A trained operator acted out the memory in a 3V room or with live actors. A device recorded his brain activity and memory patterns. Another device installed them in the subject.”
“But forgetting where they’d been. What about friends and relatives? Wouldn’t they have known?”
“Was your surrogate wife, Carol, told where you went?”
“Uh…. No.”
“The subject returned with the implanted memory of a beach resort or skiing in the mountains.”
Carol entered the room. “Darling, Amy called. They finally got around to examining your Earth made bed sheets. They found two sets are made from something called Egyptian Giza cotton and…”
“Let me guess,” Jim sighed. “Egyptian Giza cotton is extinct. I’m going to make another billion when they clone the DNA and start growing it.”
“That’s right,” Carol laughed and handed Jim a beer. “Here you are darling.”
“You don’t have to run around after me. I could’ve had an autoserve get that.”
“What else do I have to do? You gave Chris and Celia jobs. I had to quit mine. Seven light years is a little too far to commute.”
“I told you. I’ll buy a 3V station and you can manage it.”
“I don’t want you to buy me a job.”
“Ok then. I’ll switch off all the cleaning robots and you
can be a housemaid. Do you know how to use a broom and a…”
Jim was interrupted by a solid kiss that lasted a long time.
“Shut up!” Carol said when she eventually broke contact and pulled a chair over next to him.
Sam laughed. “Ah likes watching ya dern lovers,” he said in a heavy, Georgia, country accent. “You two is the friskiest people ah has seen in a coons age.”
Jim tuned to face him. “So Sam, how have the last couple of weeks been for you?
“Dern confusin’. Everywhere ah goes there’s machines and more machines.”
“At least you’re doing better than the Native American they recovered.”
“Uh… Native what?” Sam said.
“Native… Uh… Indian,” Jim chuckled.
“He thainks he’s dead. Keeps a chantin’ his death song.”
Redmond leant forward to catch Jim’s attention. “Could you keep asking Sam questions? Yours are better than mine. You know more of the history.”
“I’d like to hear some more too.” Carol said. “It’s all so interesting.”
Jim turned to face Sam. “Sam, after General Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House, what did you do?”
“What else could ah do? Only eighty or so left in ma regiment. The war was still a goin’ but we’d had enough. We jest said our farewells and went back home.”
“Back to Georgia?”
“Yep.”
“I heard it wasn’t too good back there.”
“No it weren’t. That there scallywag Sherman done tore up everythaing. The carpetbaggers got ma farm fer taxes. Nothin’ left fer me.”
“How did you live?”
“Ma farm was gone so what could ah do? Ah worked at anythaing ah could gets. Diggin’ ditches, pickin’ fruit, loadin’ and unloadin’ wagons.”
“So, how did you end up out west?”
“Ah joins the Federal Army, Seventh Cavalry. Heard there was some Injun trouble. They sent me ta Fort Riley Kansas.”
“Were you in the war with the Cheyenne?”
“Nope, the Battle of the Washita was a year bafore ah gots there. Later ah was in a few skirmishes with the Lakota.”
“They’re up north.”
“Three years ago they moved us ta Fort Abraham Lincoln in the Dakota Territory.”
“You were in the Dakotas?” Jim said. “Did you ever visit Deadwood City?”
“Yep, went thair a couple a times,” Sam chuckled. “That was one wild town. Fallen ladies everywheres.” He turned to Carol. “Uh… Sorry ‘bout the crude language ma’am.”
“That’s all right,” Carol laughed. “Keep talking.”
“In Deadwood, did you ever meet a man named William Hickock?”
“Who? Wild Bill?” Sam laughed. “He weren’t in Deadwood, ah met him in Hays, Kansas, another wild town. Played cards with him one night. That was bafore he shot two troopers from the Seventh. Ah saw it happen. Thair fault. They was drunk and attacked him.”
“So, you were gone when he moved to Deadwood,” Jim said. “How did you end up in Arizona?”
“Was in the Seventh Cavalry five years, then they transferred me ta the Fifth Cavalry out in the Arizona Territory. Ah weren’t too pleased. Had a dern good commander in the Seventh, even though he was a Yankee.”
Jim broke into a broad smile. “What was his name?”
“His name was Custer, Colonel George Armstrong Custer.”
“What year did you leave the Seventh Cavalry?”
“That was last year, 1875.”
“It was lucky they transferred you to the Fifth Cavalry,” Jim chuckled.
“Why’s that?”
Second Book of the Time Stone Trilogy
To Wake the Living
Other Books by the Author.
The Time Stone Trilogy
The Time Stone
To wake the Living
Victim of Circumstance
To Wake the Living
Sequel to The Time Stone: Due to his knowledge of “Ancient Times” and the people of the 21st century there is a hazardous mission only Jim can handle. An automated colony spaceship from Earth with humans in cryogenics has orbited a remote planet for centuries unable to wake its passengers. An action adventure cliffhanger with a detailed exploration of a future society.
Adult Language and Situations.
www.WhiteOaksProductions.com
The Mediocracy Trilogy.
The Mediocracy
Of Mud and Time
Counting Comets
The Mediocracy
The new human colony on the planet Pollux 4 is a disaster. Barry, a new arrival to the planet, suspects the leadership is to blame. Mismanagement is rampant amongst the entrenched leadership clique. Something is drastically wrong with the way the colony was assembled.
Persecuted as malcontents by the governing body, who see them as a threat to their positions, privileges and especially their egos, Barry and his fellow dissenters have to escape this rule by the mediocre. They decide to leave the main colony and brave the hazards of the newly terraformed, alien planet on their own.
An action adventure and an exploration of an alien world.
Adult Language and Situations.
www.WhiteOaksProductions.com
About the Author
Robert F Hays – Retired from the military in 2001 with a total of 28 years in service. As a member of both the U.S. and Royal Australian Army he served in Vietnam, Sarawak, Panama and the first Gulf War as well as UN peacekeeping in the Sinai. Brought up in Australia, he has traveled extensively. Degrees in Mathematics, Earth Science, History and Education.
The Time Stone (The Time Stone Trilogy Book 1) Page 39
