IMAGINATION'S PLACE
FICTION
JOURNEY TO THE LIGHT
By; Speaker Gerald Polley
All rights reserved.
Chapter 8
One afternoon Mr. Asad came
with a young woman. "This is my niece, Shalina," he
announced. "She's a graduate student, and would very much like to
spend a few nights working with you. Would it be possible?"
"Of course!" Carol piped. "I would be absolutely delighted! Interested in astronomy?"
"Calculus!" the young woman answered. "It's
used a lot in astronomy. I thought getting some practical
applications would be beneficial."
"Well!" Carol continued. "I have hundreds of
calculations that I haven't been able to work on. You can work to
your heart's content! I'd appreciate the help."
They had supper, talked about the things that
everybody talked about, politics, the latest movies. Their guest
was just so enjoyable! Dingleberry and Peter were late so Carol
went up with her new helper and began working. A couple of hours
had gone by, they chit chatted, and worked on some calculations
together, trying to figure out what stars were going where, one of the
machines transmitting what they were doing back to the main observatory
started acting freaky. Carol went over, bent down, and began to make
adjustments. She heard a strange noise, turned, to find her guest
standing behind her holding a hypodermic. Well, she wasn't really
standing. Her feet were about eight inches off the ground! A
winged being covered with soft, plushy fur, was holding her up by the
throat like she weighed nothing. Shalina was choking. The
being brought her closer and licked the side of her face.
"Eeck!" he moaned. "The taste of hate is so bitter,
so disgusting! Some like the taste of it. I don't. Do
you have any idea what's about to happen to you? It's going to be
one of two things, Either I'm going to destroy your physical form
then shred your soul and destroy that forever, or I'm going to put you
in this young woman's care and if you serve her faithfully for the rest
of your life, when you die I'll give you eternal life. Now, what
is it? Do you want to die forever, or do you want to live
forever?"
"I want to live!" the girl pleaded.
"Ah!" the being sighed, "Not so willing to die for your God, are you? Damned good thing!"
With his free hand he motioned to Carol. "The
safety cap for that thing," he remarked, "is in that pocket. Get it out
and cover the needle. Be careful!"
Carol didn't hesitate. In a moment she had the needle
covered and took the hypodermic. "That's a nasty substance," the
being answered, "that would've caused you to have blood clots.
They would've destroyed your brain and your heart. It would
probably have been determined they were caused by a chemical given off
by the baby. Now, young lady, I'm going to let go of you. You
know the words, you know what you have to do. And fully
understand. If you ever try to run a way you will die in agony
within a week! If you're given permission to be away for a while
and get delayed in transport, you will be protected. Do you
understand me?"
"Yes sir!" the girl managed. The being let go of
her. She got down on her knees and looked at Carol. "I give
unto you all that I am," she began, "my body, my mind, and, my eternal
spirit. I ask you to take that that I have given you, cherish and
protect it and give unto me eternal life."
The being looked at Carol. "Say 'You
have spoken the words and I have to reply. Do you promise that
you will give unto me complete obedience for the time of your service?'"
Carol repeated the worlds. "Yes!" the trembling girl before her managed.
"Say 'Then I accept that that I am given and will cherish and protect it.'"
Carol did so. "There!" the being answered, "Now,
have her give that to Mr. Asad tomorrow and tell him who gave it to
her! BoBo, right?"
The girl looked at the being in surprise. 'Yes!" she managed.
"My work here is done," the being concluded. "Oh,
you better help him." The being pointed down the stairs, spread
his wings, lifted into the air and soared away.
"Whooa!" Carol moaned. She went over to the
stairs. Peter sat on the landing trembling. "Oh oh!"
Carol gasped, and quickly went down to him. She didn't exactly
know what to do, but put her hand on his forehead and said "It's all
right, he's gone! He wouldn't have hurt you anyway."
Peter looked up at her. "That's damn easy for
you to say!" he muttered. "His power was burning me from way down
here. But it was as far as I could retreat. She all right?"
Carol looked back to the young woman who was now far
more than a guest, and wasn't exactly sure what she was to do. "I
think so," Carol answered. 'Look! I think you two just better go
down and go to bed. I'll finish the work."
"No," the girl sighed, "I must now perform my duties. Daniel is going to be rather upset!"
"Daniel?" Carol asked.
"Somebody I was interested in," the girl answered, "but under the circumstances I guess that's gone."
"I don't see why," Carol remarked, "if he doesn't
mind staying around here. There's all kinds of work! You
won't be a prisoner! You can get a place in the colony, report
for work every day. This situation doesn't mean that you can't
enjoy life. I enjoy mine!"
"Do me a favor, will you?" the young lady
asked, "Give me a new name? I don't think the old one means much
any more."
Carol looked at her strangely. "It's part of
the custom," Peter put in, "it's not an unusual request. When
they go under their protection they often give up their old
names."
Carol thought. "How about Cher?" she asked. "I've always liked that name.
"Me, too!"her new servant giggled. "Thank you! I like that!"
"Let's get to work!" Carol snapped. She put
her hand on her stomach. "Calm down!" she managed. "Boy,
he's getting rambunctious!"
They finished the night's observing and went to
bed. Carol was looking at something strange, but couldn't figure
out exactly what it was. Dingleberry would be back tomorrow and
maybe he could figure it out.
When she got up and came out in the kitchen, Mr.
Asad was just arriving. Cher went over immediately, held out the
hypodermic and spoke to him. Asad listened, wide eyed, and then
slapped her, hard! Cher backed off. Asad drew back his hand
again, and Carol found herself standing beside him, gripping it with
considerable force. "You dare," she snapped in a very deep voice,
"strike someone in my home who is under my protection, even under these
circumstances am I not respected?"
Asad looked at her wide eyed. "Of..of course!"
he managed in a broken voice. "Of course you are respected in
these circumstances! A thousand pardons! I ask your
forgiveness! And I ask the young lady's forgiveness. I acted
completely inappropriately! I must ask your most gracious husband
to sit down with the young lady and interrogate her, get as much
information as he can. I'm afraid my personal involvement would
exclude me from doing so. If she is under your protection I will
see that no charges are brought. But the one who sent her, that
is another matter! That is outside of your authority. That
matter I will deal with."
"Absolutely!" Carol answered, releasing his
hand. Zorba came over and took Cher's shoulder. "Come on!" he
instructed. "I'll take you in to headquarters. You can talk
to an investigator while I'm doing my rounds and then I'll finish up."
Cher looked to Carol. "Go!" she instructed.
Everybody quickly left. "You broke his wrist, you know!" Peter remarked.
"What?" Carol asked.
"When you grabbed his arm," Peter answered. "I
heard the bones crack! Amazing control! He never
complained!"
"Oh, my Lord!" Carol cried. She ran after
those departing. "Mr. Asad!" she cried. The man turned and
remarked "Yes?" Carol lifted the arm she had grabbed. She
took the hand in one hand and the arm in the other. She slowly
positioned it and finally said "There! Sorry!"
Asad flexed his fingers and turned his wrist,
staring at the arm. "Incredible!" he muttered, "Absolutely
incredible! I've heard of such power, I've never seen it.
Incredible!"
Carol saw Dingleberry coming. "Excuse me!" she
remarked, "Professor! I've got a question. Can Pluto move?"
Everybody looked at her as she walked off and
muttered, "Can Pluto move?" They hurried off but most of
them wanted to be there to hear the rest!
Peter walked up and stared at Carol. "What is it?" Dingleberry asked.
"She's one of them!" Peter remarked. "She has
the power! One of them was here. She must be one in a physical
form. I saw him! Just his presence burned me! I don't
understand why she doesn't."
Dingleberry smiled. "She's female, boy!
She's balancing us! She's probably getting a lot of that power
from us."
"Whoa!" Peter sighed.
"Now," the Professor asked, "what's this about Pluto moving?"
"It's moving!" Carol answered. "It's moving
all over the place, up, down, in, out! I wasn't sure at first but
I've got a couple of week's readings now. Somethin's goin'
on! Somebody is effecting it but it's movin' all over everywhere!"
Dingleberry stared at her. "We'd better go
look at those readings!" he snapped. "I don't like this! I
don't like this at all! Anybody else I'd say it's probably misreadings,
but not with you! Whoa, one of them was here?"
Peter nodded. "Whoa!" the Professor repeated
again. They quickly went up to the observatory and everything
else was forgotten except going over the readings. They were
still at it when Cher came back. Carol went down to spend some time
with the children while the others continued to work. But no one
could quite figure out what was going on. Dingleberry came
down. "I've laid out the movements in a chart," he remarked,
rolling it out. "They seem to repeat themselves in a series,
short movements, then, long ones. It looks familiar but I can't
quite get it."
One of the children came over, climbed up in a chair, and
looked down, then smiled. "H, E, L, P!" he cried. Everybody
looked at him. "What?" Carol asked.
"It's Mars code," the boy answered. "Daddy uses it all the time on his radio. I recognize these letters."
"H, E, L, P, help!" Carol snapped. "Help! Somebody's calling for help!"
"Oh, God!" Dingleberry answered. "If that's true how
in the hell do we answer? Even at the speed of light it would
take days for a signal to get out there!"
"I don't know!" Carol answered. "We'll send it
to the observatory. Maybe somebody there knows somebody, maybe somebody
from last night can help."
"That would be far more likely!" Dingleberry answered. "Why in the hell hasn't anybody else seen it?"
"Nobody happened to be looking!" Peter answered.
"That's the thing with astronomy. You have to be looking! There's
thousands of telescopes out there, but none of them with the capability
to detect movement happened to have been watching."
Dingleberry nodded. "Well! We've got
other things to do," Carol remarked. She looked to Cher.
"Everything all right?"
"Yes ma'am!" she answered. "They thought it might be good
if I have somebody to talk to, a professional counselor. Would it be
all right?"
"Absolutely!" Carol answered. "Have they found you housing?"
"I think we're moving," Cher answered.
"Not yet," Carol answered. She walked
outside. "Irish!" she cried. In a few moments her
neighbor came to the fence.
"Yes?" he asked.
"House guest!" Carol snapped. "She won't be any trouble. And you won't be, right?"
"Oh boy!" Irish answered. "I may have to ask somebody's father to speed things up a little bit."
"No," Carol answered, "I will." She went
back inside and called Mr. Asad. "I don't want to interfere," she
began "but I'd like Cher to stay at Irish's place. I don't think
it would be appropriate if his lady wasn't there to make sure
everything was acceptable. Could I ask a favor?"
There was a few moment's silence and then Mr. Asad
answered "Well, she was coming for a visit. But I guess the
wedding can be arranged a little bit sooner than we thought.
Can't put it off forever!"
That evening Mr. Asad came in with a very attractive
young lady, and, a little girl. Without a word the young lady came
forward, grabbed Carol into her arms and kissed her on both cheeks,
then put her head on her shoulder and muttered "Thank you! Thank
you! Thank you!" Carol gently pushed her away and answered
"You're quite welcome!"
She was gathering quite a little group around her,
and she was supposed to be a prisoner! This was a prison?