by Geoff Wolak
‘We will cooperate with you, not least because we have little choice. You will not leave us here to live alongside the humans.’
‘No, for your safety, we won’t,’ Jimmy emphasised. ‘John Wayne -’ He shot me a look. ‘- is a good shot. So, besides horses, what will you need? Seeds for crops, simple tools?’
‘Any tools would be of a great help. These cabins, we cut down the trees with lasers till the power went, and often use flint axes.’
‘Nothing wrong with a little manual labour,’ Jimmy quipped. He beckoned a guard, who rode over. ‘Bag of pistols, please.’
The bag was handed down. ‘Twenty laser pistols, for … shooting rabbits, and cutting down trees.’
The leader examined the pistols, others closing in. ‘It takes great nerve to hand us these whilst you are here.’
‘Not really. If we fail to return they’ll dial in at an earlier date – and send the US Cavalry to kill every last one of you; men, women … and children.’
The leader stood shocked, but controlled it. ‘I … thank you for the pistols.’
‘You’re welcome,’ Jimmy mocked. He led the man away. ‘Now, I’m thinking that we could develop a tourist trade in the north, in the summers.’
‘Tourists?’
‘Like you, our city dwellers like to get back to nature. If you operated cabins and hotels for them, you would earn gold, and that gold could be used to buy things from us, or barter with the Indians.’
‘We would have a source of income,’ the man said, nodding. He glanced over his shoulder. ‘This lifestyle is pleasing to us, but a warm bath now and then is also pleasing to us.’
‘Then I think we’ll need to plan a nice hotel north of here, with nice rooms and … warm baths for the guests.’
The Zim spokesman glanced over his shoulder. ‘Tell me, do you think this man, John Wayne, will be a threat to us?’
The trail back was a delight - a slow pace taken because we had ten unhappy Zim citizens walking along behind us, eight days taken to reach the Marines, who we found surrounded by Indians.
‘What the fuck happened?’ I asked as I dismounted.
‘They wandered past, we were polite, gave them some food, and … they made a camp here. More came, and we shot wild animals for them and handed them out and … and now we can’t get rid of them.’
Smiling, I shook my head. ‘We’ll be opening hotels here, so it’s only a matter of time before they start selling cheap tourist crap to white folk. Progress, eh. Signal home. And no one is taking a squaw back with him!’
‘Who’re the Zim, boss? Prisoners?’
‘No, they were stuck here, but are not the outdoors type. Three are pilots who’ll work for us on their old ships. These lot prefer space to … trees and bugs and the great outdoors.’
Back on 1938-world, we released the video of the Indians, every news channel running the story, and we invited historians and experts to create an outpost on that world. True to his word, Jimmy sent horses across, a hundred of them in two separate groups, males and females. Soldiers would take the animals south, along with basic metal tools, and walk all the way back. Hell, it was good exercise for them.
And as we returned to Trophy, word came in of where the orbital craft had been dispatched to, a world where it was 1700 at the time. There was no chance of them being seen, or of the Zim interacting with the plague-ridden masses in Europe. We sent Dark Star through, and it signalled the Zim craft, making the pilots an offer: stay here, or travel to the new Zim colony.
The Zim decided to return, having been living off animals they had killed from above, the animals well roasted and burnt to a crisp after lightning strikes. The craft appeared in Trophy, all landing in a line on the grass at the main airfield. The tired and weary pilots each received a warm shower, a warm meal, and were very grateful. Seems that 1700 had not suited the pilots; too many trees.
When they were ready to leave, Jimmy and I cheekily asked for a lift, and we passed through an enlarged portal, soon on the newly allocated Zim world and flying down to Wyoming. The craft landed in a field near a vast tented city, and we stepped down, no particular attention paid to us; there were hundreds of humans working here. We were pointed towards a particular area, and walked past dozens of rows of white tents, then past dozens of rows of white Rescue Force prefabricated huts, soon to one particular hut with a sign outside. There we met again the leader of the Zim.
He stood and welcomed us, seemingly buried in paperwork, several humans assisting him. ‘I was not expecting you,’ he complained.
Jimmy explained, ‘We brought you the lost craft, twenty-two of them, and ten citizens who most definitely did not wish to remain on a certain human world that your citizens ended up on. The rest … they wish to stay there.’
I put in, ‘They’re all living in log cabins and getting back to nature.’
‘As many here wish to do,’ the man agreed. We all sat.
Jimmy said, ‘We’ll have an outpost on that world, so if you wish to chat to them you can.’
‘I may visit yes, but if they wish to settle there…’ He shrugged. ‘Many of those who left our world wished for such an isolation.’
‘We’ll keep an eye on them,’ Jimmy offered.
‘How’re you progressing here?’ I asked.
‘It will take time. All have a basic shelter, and many are building cabins – as you say – from trees. Some have walked off and wish not to be part of the main group.’ He shrugged again. ‘That is their choice. We now have the start of a concrete production facility, we have a quarry for rocks, and your people bring through metals and plastics each day. Your charts have pin-pointed oil, and we have laser drills.’ He held his hands wide. ‘It will take time,’ he repeated. ‘But, after the journey here, this manual labour is pleasing to us.’
‘I’ve sanctioned a few helicopters, and they’ll be brought through in parts,’ Jimmy informed our host. ‘They’ll also be more electric cars and buses brought through. That way you can disperse your people quicker - after you’ve made a few tracks and roads.’
‘We are grateful, and thankful. Our first meeting was … unfortunate.’
Jimmy lifted his eyebrows. ‘President Clayton was not the best human you could have started a relationship with.’
‘I never met him, but my parallel self did, before my other self was killed in some dispute. The people here say that your CIA killed him.’
‘Any dissent here?’ Jimmy nudged.
‘There are some who dealt with your CIA and Americans, and they will not sit quietly and make log cabins.’ He held his hands wide. ‘Accidents happen in the woods.’
‘Do bears like Zim?’ I asked.
‘No, as we have found out. A few have been bitten.’
I smiled. ‘Just as well you don’t taste like burgers, living around here.’
‘We’ve offered the others horses,’ Jimmy mentioned. ‘Would you like some?’
‘Yes, I know these animals, and we have similar on our world.’
‘I’ll send sheep across as well; pigs, rabbits.’
‘There are bison here, if I pronounce it correctly. Good eating.’
‘The humans nearly hunted them to extinction,’ Jimmy mentioned. ‘Maybe you’ll do a better job of it.’
‘There are not many of us, and most wish to disperse, many to Europe. It will be a very long time before industrialisation appears here.’
‘And others – back on your home world,’ I posed. ‘Do you think they would leave?’
‘Our scientists, on our home world, were working on shields in space, underground facilities. They will stay and fight.’ He shrugged. ‘They may prevail.’
‘Did your people colonise other worlds?’ I asked, wondering if I would get a truthful answer.
‘Yours was the only suitable world our probes found, and we were attracted by the dense EM signature that your world gave off. Once we had made the journey it would have been dangerous to try a return, or to attempt a journ
ey elsewhere. We lost five ships on the journey, many people.’
‘Do you believe him?’ I asked as we walked towards the portal, past hundreds of white huts.
‘Not at all,’ Jimmy said, surprising me. ‘What you don’t know, and must never repeat, is that we have three Zim defectors working for us. They each suffer from a psychological condition that means they don’t ever want to leave space; they hate grass, trees, open spaces - and small cuddly animals. And … they play computer games avidly.
‘What those defectors told me … was what I had assumed, in that their government had sent a hundred or more of its top agents along with those tree-huggers evacuating. Slumber was a senior figure, a fully-fledged party fanatic, and an expert intelligence officer working for their government.’
‘To keep an eye on those who left?’
‘In part, but also to infiltrate any worlds they might have happened across, and to … I guess do what would be in the best interest of their species – and slow down any technological race that may be a threat. What the Zim intelligence agents achieved early on … was to make Clayton fear an alien attack through a portal, and so they created the elaborate ruse of the portal on Proxima. Only the Zim could reach it, so that meant only Zim pilots could go to other worlds, other than where the Zim first landed.
‘And those pilots, the pilots that attacked Sandra’s world – and the Zim that tried to infiltrate Seether whilst you were there – they were all top intelligence agents and badge-wearing party fanatics. Inside the Zim group that Clayton was dealing with, sat a hidden sub-group, the rest of the Zim none the wiser. Clayton’s military advisors were having ideas whispered to them, and they were playing Clayton in turn. And, to top it all off, The Resistance was whispering in peoples’ ears and screwing around.’
‘No wonder we won; Clayton had no one he could trust,’ I commented as we walked.
‘There were many groups working towards different aims, each with their own agenda, each believing that they were right,’ Jimmy said with a sigh. ‘And that’s the problem isn’t it, right there, the kernel of the problem with many political systems. You have a president, a cabinet, a party apparatus, lobbyists, the military, Congress and a Senate -’
‘All pulling in different directions, all trying to screw each other over, and all believing that they are right – and that they’re doing what’s best for the national interest.’
‘I’ve said it before, but a good dictator is better than a weak democracy.’
I smiled. ‘It has been said before, yes. Do you think Clayton knew of the solar flare on Sandra’s world?’
‘No, he was no monster, that was the Zim inner group,’ Jimmy insisted. ‘Clayton ordered the attack on me at that press conference, but beyond that he simply ordered infiltration teams.’
‘Poor guy, he must have been so frustrated,’ I let out with a sigh. ‘He made a plan, for a reason, and executed it, only to find that the reason was unsound, the plan altered without his knowledge, the execution tripped up.’
‘That’s what it is … to be a president in a democracy,’ Jimmy suggested.
‘Wasn’t like that for me in Africa,’ I insisted as we walked. ‘They loved me, we worked together, and we had the same objectives.’
‘You had no real cabinet, no Congress or Senate, no party apparatus or voters. You, my lad, were a de-facto dictator.’
‘Which was probably why I got so much done!’ We walked on. ‘Any of those intelligence agents still around?’
‘Plenty,’ Jimmy emphasised. ‘I think there are a few on the mother ships. We’ll learn from them, but never trust them, and when we’re ready we’ll get rid of them. Those mother ships and medium ships will be handed to Sandra’s offspring to operate and to look over -’
‘We’ll pass them over? Why?’
‘Because they could be wired to blow, for one, and two – we reckon that we could build better craft if we wanted to. Our guys are already suggesting that those ships are clumsy, and the ships used up most of their fuel to slow down in our solar system. According to our defectors, the fuel can’t be replaced; it was a one-off engine style, a one-way trip.’
‘Must be something on them that’s useful?’ I complained.
‘Nothing found so far, no special technology.’
Progenitor
On Seether, Selemba’s offspring had either entered school or nursery, or had been sent to the outposts. I made sure that the outposts would host many of her daughters, and my namesake in Britain took delivery of a hundred baby girls. Cuba received sixty, Fiji just forty, but a quick call and the Preethan President accepted two hundred toddlers, my agreement being that they were to be raised in Texas. He keenly dispatched suitable staff, hatchery and nursery staff, bus loads of toddlers soon travelling south, many flown down in our helicopters, up to sixteen fitted into the rear on each flight.
I then had to explain to the new Seethan President where his promised girls had gone. When I said it was Selemba’s wish he shut up quickly, not wishing to have his neck broken.
Selemba gave birth to another batch five weeks later, the new Seethan President told that he was the father. That fact meant that the babies went to a special hatchery, and would be destined for the best care, the best treatment and the best food. I wondered how many of these girls would end up looking like Pleb, and worried about how many might end up behaving like him. I pictured a few girls with broad shoulders - and great ball-passing technique.
Having given birth, and quickly recovered, Selemba requested a helicopter, and flew over to the Preethan capital in Denver with a small entourage. By now the average Preethan lad in the street knew about her, the queen from the land of the ancestors, but they also knew that she was a Seethan. The leadership offered a reserved welcome to her, not wishing to upset me.
Selemba approached the President, and told him firmly that they would mate, leading the man off before he could consider a reply. Having mated, the man a little flushed and appearing nervous, Selemba returned to Seether and got on with whatever it was she did all day. Eating for more than two, Selemba enjoyed huge Tuna steaks that had been brought up from Galveston and sold to the Seether, a few pineapples and coconuts now to be seen in Seethan territory, even as far north as Canada.
As Gilchrist was working hard to fix America, Selemba grew big, her condition nothing that concerned her; having kids was as routine as shopping. When due to deliver, she flew back to Preether and demanded a hatchery be made ready. She delivered twenty-four girls, the Preethan President delighted, not least because Selemba explained just how strong and healthy each girl would be, and how many offspring they would produce in a lifetime.
I visited Selemba often when I was in Seether, and our relationship developed, starting from scratch, and starting from a damn bad opinion I had of the little bossy-boots. Much of Selemba’s outward persona was an act, and my daughter was just as bright as Shelly had been, quite an academic, and too good to be just a breeding machine for the Seether. We both knew what was at stake, and being the progenitor of a species was an honour, as was being the proud father of the progenitor of a species.
As time moved on we became closer, and Selemba helped me to make subtle changes to the political and social system here, her enforced consort – the President – scared of her, which helped greatly. The poor fellow feared for his life.
Then one day, some six months after Selemba had arrived here, alarm bells sounded out; portals had opened. We fixed their locations and drove around, helicopters overhead ready for trouble, drones closing in, orbital craft above.
We raced around to a school, screeching to a halt and shocking the bored guards at the gate, all the while wondering if that numb-nuts Pleb had appeared again. Inside, we found a portal disgorging hundreds and hundreds of smartly dressed girls, each no more than ten years old. They held hands and walked though, each carrying a backpack.
The school staff had rushed out at the odd sight of girls walking out of thin air, and a Seet
han teacher handed me a note that he himself had been handed by a polite young girl. I scanned the Seethan words with my data-pad. ‘From Queen Selemba, look after them well.’
I faced the guards, and we exchanged puzzled looks, the helicopters loudly buzzing overhead. The President turned up with his police bodyguard, he was taking no chances; the men were there to stop Selemba from breaking his neck. He studied the girls as they all marched out of the portal and lined up, and by time the portal closed there were a thousand of them.
I told him, ‘They are from the future, sent from Queen Selemba, who … can move back and forth from worlds and time.’
He was pleased, very pleased, and hastily arranged buses and teachers, delicately asking when I thought Selemba might leave. I gave him my best, fatherly disappointed look. When my data-pad bleeped, it was our man over in Preether.
‘Paul, a portal opened here, at a school -’
‘Same here.’
‘Yes? Well, we’ve got a thousand young girls.’
‘Us too.’
‘Oh, well, we’ll … just ask the Preether to raise them I guess.’
‘That would seem like what they’re here for. Keep me posted.’
With my pad bleeping, I answered the first of six calls. ‘Yes?’
‘It’s Rescue Force Fiji, boss. We … just had a portal open-’
‘Girls?’
‘Yes, boss, four hundred. We’re swamped.’
‘Ask home for more staff. Got to go.’ I selected the next caller, Paul in Britain. ‘Yes?’
‘Mister Holton, a portal opened an -’
‘You have girls from Selemba.’
‘Yes, six hundred of them.’
‘Look after them, ask for more Rescue Force staff, and quickly.’
