Chapter 43: If You Can’t Dazzle ‘Em?

Late-August, 1986

STILL on GREG’S ISLAND, on a planet 350,000 Light years from Earth

Bob’s POV:

Okay, okay, OKAY ... Greg just crapped his drawers.

Linda was frantically flashing, “Spinner Bear, HAVE YOU LOST YOUR FLIPPING MIND?”

And Ed was just gathering flies with his open mouth.

But, in my defense, they’d all MISSED one critical thing.

While these guys are obviously more advanced, technology-wise than we were, I was probing and they have NO psychokinetic powers whatsoever.

They DO have some kind of translating device that makes communication possible, but when I tried communicating mentally I got zip, zero, nada!

They weren’t even close to our new little caveman friends!

Their device apparently has trouble interpreting sarcasm, however.

I just HAVE to fuck with them a little to try and find out what we can use against them if they get too uppity with us.

I’ve gotta get Greg and Ed onboard with me.

“Just what’s the problem, Kojak?”

The one who seemed to be in charge replied, “My name is Sintar. I do not know ‘Kojak’. This is our planet and you are interfering in this planet’s natural evolution!”

I tilted my head, “YOUR planet? Who died and made you God?”

<translated> “Yes, my people seeded this planet with lifeforms many centuries ago. Our goal is to study the natural evolution. When you saved that small child, you altered this island’s and perhaps the entire planet’s, history. Killing that beast has now changed it even more.”

I shook my head in disgust, “Well, excuse the hell out of us! That ‘Beast’ tried to kill us, we simply defended ourselves.”

Ole Sintar seemed to be getting more frustrated. “Just what race of people are you and how did you get here?”

You have no idea how badly I wanted to say ‘nunya’ again, but I decided maybe a little diplomacy might be called for.

“We are Human beings and our ship is up there.” I pointed to the sky, just to the north of their ship.

Okay, so I was bullshitting, but, I wasn’t going to tell him how we really got here.

Ahhh, now Sintar’s overly large eyes got bigger and he looked nervously at his buddy.

“How is it we did not detect your ship?”

I decided to assume some ‘Star Trek’ terminology, since I don’t know shit about space or spacecraft.

I just hoped I could keep a straight face, “Our ship is cloaked. We mean no harm and only wish to explore new worlds. We are a peace loving people and only wish to preserve intelligent life. Whether that is an alien lifeform or our own. HOWEVER, we are fully capable of defending ourselves if provoked and will not hesitate to do so!”

Sintar said something into his communication device that I didn’t understand. Linda tittered, flashing, “Oh my God, Spinner Bear! I just got in his head. He just asked someone up there to scan the area to try and find our ship! I UNDERSTOOD HIM.”

“Great sweetheart, stay in there and keep translating for me, okay?”

“Sure ... Oh, the guy on the other end seems worried, since they can’t find your ‘ship’. They suspect our species may be more advanced than them!”

Just what I needed to know.

Now I had a little leverage.

Ole Sintar assumed a less belligerent tone, “I feel we may have started our conversation badly. Please forgive me. What planet are you from?”

I snickered internally, “Alpha Setti 3,” continuing with my ‘Star Trek’ references.

Sintar must have relayed that and his face showed confusion. “I have not heard of such a planet. What galaxy is that in?”

I didn’t want to give these guys any idea that we were from Earth, so, since I’d read that the Andromeda galaxy was like millions of light-years away, I said, confidently, “The Andromeda Galaxy.”

His scrunched up face ‘unscrunched’ and his eyes were like Moon Pies.

“We have heard of that galaxy! We have sent probes there, but, the distance would take us many generations to travel to. Do you require the use of cryo-stasis to make such a journey?”

Ahha! I looked at him like he was an idiot, “No. We have the ability to make the journey here in less than 1200 hours.”

His eyes grew even bigger, “You say you are a peaceful species?”

It looked like he just gulped, hoping he had that right. I smiled, “Yes. We gave up being war-like after we conquered the Klingons and Romulans.”

Ed was struggling to keep from laughing out loud.

Sintar’s face was screwed up again. “We have not heard of such races. Perhaps that is because your ancestors have destroyed them?”

Now I had to suppress a chuckle, “That is correct. Our weaponry is so far advanced that other war-like races would stand no chance. Now, can we talk about this planet and this island?”

Linda was cackling, “Spinner Bear, Sintar was just told to do WHATEVER is necessary to please you so they don’t piss us off!”

Now I was REALLY struggling not to laugh. I watched as Sintar was still communicating with whoever was in charge up in the spaceship. Sintar began blinking his huge eyes and seemed to be nodding his head.

He spoke, “What is it that you propose? ... I’m sorry, I don’t know your name, sir?”

“Captain James T. Kirk, Commander of the Starship Enterprise!” Then, using my best ‘Marlon Brando’ voice, “And I have a deal, you cannot refuse.”

Both Ed and Greg were rolling on the ground with their knuckles in their mouths, having completely lost it.

Sintar asked, “Are your friends sick?” Looking concernedly at my laughing comrades.

“No, no, just a case of gas, er, indigestion. We ate some of that Beast and it didn’t agree with their delicate digestive systems.”

It’s a good thing these beings didn’t understand humor!

Sintar almost smiled, “Those things were never meant to be food. Their presence here was simply for population control studies.”

Something about that pissed me off.

“So, to you people, these humanoids are nothing more than entertainment? You say you don’t want us to interfere, but yet, you set them up to be slaughtered!? I am thinking that YOU may be a war-like species!”

His little communicator was going nuts, Linda was losing it and Sintar’s eyes liked to bug out of his head. “No, no we are not war-like species! We take no pleasure in seeing our subjects killed. You must believe me!”

The fucker was about to shit his overly tight spandex-like pants.

I grinned, evilly, “Okay then, this is what we want. First, you will cease surveillance of this island. Second, you will tell me exactly how many more of those beasts there are here, so we’ll know when we’ve killed them all. And lastly, you tell your superiors that all we want is to use this island as a place for our fellow travelers to relax occasionally. We will not harm the current inhabitants or otherwise interfere with your continued study of this planet.”

Sintar seemed to relax, and was talking to someone on his communicator. He finally said, “My superiors have agreed to your demands. They want me to ask if you want that we should relocate the humanoids to the mainland?”

I had to think... “How many humanoids are left here?”

“There are only 3 Family units left. One is without a female. There are a total of 9 offspring, so a total of 14.”

I nodded, “You can leave them here. We want to make friends with them. If they wish to relocate, we can take them there. How many more beasts or predators are there?”

He blinked a few times, “There are none remaining. We only put that one, male, here a short while ago. The remaining humanoids are in the caves not far from your settlement here. We have already deactivated the three satellites we had over this island. Are you sure we can still study the rest of this planet?”

I was going to just say, ‘yes’, but Greg and Ed were now standing and Greg blurted out, “Um, excuse me Captain...”

He had a stern look and was minutely shaking his head. I said, “Go ahead, Scotty!”

He smirked at me and Ed was about to lose it again, “Ah, Sintar ... you said you put that Beast here, where did it come from?”

Sintar’s face contorted and his communicator was babbling.

Linda giggled, “He’s trying to figure out how mad you’re going to get when he tells you the answer.”

I patted Greg on the back, “Good question, Mr Scott ... So, Sintar, just where DID it come from? Hmmm?”

Sintar turned light blue, it must be the color they turn when blushing. He stammered a bit, “I’m afraid it is not indigenous to this planet. We brought them here from the planet Zepron in the Milky Way Galaxy.”

Greg huffed, “What the hell? How can you profess to be studying ‘natural evolution’ then introduce a non-native predatory species!?”

HE was pissed now, and Ed and I were loving it. Greg now had the football and we decided to let him run with it.

“You, you must understand! This planet has no natural predators to these humanoids. We were afraid they would overpopulate the other two land masses and this island. We felt we had to do something!”

Greg shook his head, disgustedly, “So, you had the bright idea to introduce an alien, predatory species, that these humanoids were incapable to defend themselves against!?”

Sintar’s now light blue face was darkening rapidly, “We only brought male ‘Beasts’ as you call them. They cannot reproduce. They will eventually die out as a species.”

Greg huffed, “Just what is the current population of the other two landmasses and how many ‘Beasts’ have you put on them? Aren’t you concerned of the possibility they may wipeout all of the humanoids?”

“There are approximately 25,000 on the landmass nearest here, with 25 predators and 35,000 on the larger landmass with 35 predators. In the last 30 cycles (days) only 500 humanoids have been killed by these ‘beasts’. There are now only 31 beasts on the larger landmass as the humanoids there have constructed traps and have managed to kill four of them. They are not totally defenseless!?”

Ed blustered, “It is highly illogical ... to say you are studying ‘natural evolution’ then not allow ‘evolution to progress naturally?”

Ed was killing me as he had one eyebrow raised just like Leonard Nimoy does as Mr Spock!

Sintar was getting flustered, being questioned this thoroughly.

He cleared his throat, “So, what do you want, then?”

I grinned at Ed, “Yes, Mr Spock, what do you and Mr Scott suggest?”

Greg gave Sintar the ole ‘stink-eye’, “You say you can remove these predators whenever you want?”

“Yes, they are all tagged with tracking devices. These devices are subdural and we can send a signal that will terminate them whenever we deem it necessary.”

I decided to try something. I caught Sintar’s eye and, using thought pictures, PUSHED, “You will kill all of the predators ... NOW.”

Sintar was yelling something into his communicator that didn’t get translated.

Linda flashed, “Holy shit! They’re asking him if he’s sure they should activate all of the elimination nodes in the predators. Sintar just screamed yes!”

After a few more exchanges between his ship, Sintar spoke through his translator. “We have decided that Mr Spock’s argument was both logical and correct. Some of our scientists were against the idea of introducing the predators all along. They forced the Captain to activate the devices to terminate all of the predators. The Captain wants me to assure you we wish to be friends with you and your species, Captain Kirk. With our compliance with your wishes, may we now continue our observations of the two other landmasses?”

“Yes, we have no reason to interfere with your people as long as they remain humane in their treatment of the humanoids. And of course, leave us alone. We WILL be watching you, however, to insure we can peacefully co-exist here.”

Sintar relaxed and almost cracked a smile, “Very well. You have our assurance of your demands. Please tell your superiors that we are truly a peaceful race. The inhabitants of our spacecraft are mostly researchers and scientists. We have no desire to create hostilities toward anyone.”

I took a deep breath.

I began thinking that maybe I should take up poker!?

I nodded at Sintar, “Nor do we. We may look around the mainland occasionally, especially if we have to relocate the natives, but we will not interfere with the ‘natural evolution’ of the rest of the planet. You have our word on that.”

“Then I shall rejoin my ship. We have another crisis halfway across the galaxy that needs our attention. Farewell my friends...”

And we watched as a beam of light appeared over our two new friends just before they disappeared from sight.

Greg started laughing, “Brother, I can’t wait to tell Charlie about this!”

Ed was just grinning, with one eyebrow raised.

BACK ON EARTH, NEAR McLean, VA

WILLIE POV:

After Sarah left, Maggie and I kissed, talked and made out a bit, right there in the booth. I kept an eye out so Diane wouldn’t catch us too many times. Both Maggie and Diane seemed to have fun with it whenever Diane ‘caught’ us.

We also got into a deep conversation about ‘us’. Now that she was ‘covered’, I could tell her things easier. We practiced our telepathy and she was picking up on it quickly.

It also seemed we were falling even more deeply in love with each other. I told her about my early history, but stopped just short of my falling in love with my little Bian.

I didn’t want to get all weepy.

She told me about hers and I discovered that her early love life was much different than mine was. And far more heart-rending.

She was 17 and a cheerleader during her Junior year in High School when she fell in love with Dirk, the quarterback of the Varsity football team. He was 18 and a Senior.

He treated her decent, considering he was an arrogant jock. When he graduated, the major colleges weren’t knocking at his door, so he decided to go to the local Junior College. They had a very competitive football team, so he hoped that he might get a second chance at a scholarship from a Division 1 College.

He lucked out that the same Junior College also drew two freshman wide receivers that were destined for NFL fame. They had come from a big city and had gotten overlooked.

Maggie didn’t luck out, since she’d messed up taking her ‘pills’ when she had a bad case of the flu and got pregnant. Maggie discovered this just before Dirk started summer training camp for his Freshman year.

At first Dirk told her he’d marry her and was eager for her to have his baby.

Two months later, Dirk realized his football fortunes had changed. He’d been talked to by scouts for two big Universities and was told he had a good chance to get picked up for a scholarship. He then told Maggie she needed to get an abortion, since there was no way he wanted to be a ‘Daddy’ now.

He said if she really loved him, she would do this so they could stay together.

The problem was ... she was well into her second trimester of pregnancy and a legal abortion was nearly impossible to get now.

Maggie was nearly in tears, “I knew I had to tell my parents. They were both upset, but, told me they loved me and they didn’t want me to abort their future grandson or granddaughter. I made up my mind that I was going to keep the baby. Dirk wasn’t happy at all and started getting his friends to all say they had sex with me and that there was a good chance the baby wasn’t even his. I told him he was a bastard and I never wanted to see him again.

“I thought that was the end of it. By Winter break, I was five months pregnant. I was trying to get ahead in school so I could still graduate, since I was due about a month and a half before the end of school.”

I looked at her, “So, you have a child?”

Maggie was shaking her head and the tears started flowing, “No! When football season ended, Dirk came by the house to tell me that he was concerned about me. He had just been told he was getting a scholarship to Ohio State University.”

She was really sobbing now, “He said he wanted to get back together, so we went out for dinner. He was all lovey-dovey and I really thought he still loved me. But, after dinner he drove me out to a secluded spot in the country where three of his friends started beating me and kicking my stomach. Dirk kept yelling that he wasn’t going to let me ruin his life! I kept telling him I wasn’t going to do that; I just didn’t want to get an abortion. The last thing I remember before I blacked out was him saying, “Now you won’t have to!”

I held her in my arms, vowing to myself to track this ‘Dirk-bag’ down and kill him.

Maggie hugged me tightly, “You don’t have to, Bill. He’s dead. He was knifed to death in prison. Dad said they take a dim view of guys like that and he got what was coming to him.”