Loner in Space

by Steve Simons

  Paul lands rather awkwardly and there's instantly a pain shooting up his leg. He must have broken it. Paul's attention is diverted to the sound of a helicopter. Paul wonders where the noise is coming from. He scans the sky until he sees the flying spot, heading towards them. Then he sees that there are two more behind the first. Paul tries to find a comfortable position for his leg, but it is almost impossible.

  The helicopters are so much closer now. Should Paul try to stand and wave? Then he remembers how large the craft is and that it is sure to be spotted from the air, even if a quarter of it is now buried.

  Paul waits until the helicopters are clearly visible. He carefully stands up, his ankle gives forth a stabbing pain, to remind Paul of his injury. He makes sure he doesn't put any weight on the ankle and waves to the leading helicopter. There is someone leaning out the side, they wave back to acknowledge that they have seen him. Paul points to himself and to the alien, repeats this, the person at the helicopter side nods and holds up two fingers, then raises a third, then a fourth. Paul shakes his head. Then the person indicates some form of gun. Again Paul shakes his head to show that they have no weapons. A line is lowered from the helicopter. The person at the side of the helicopter shouts down at Paul through some sort of tannoy system, Please do NOT touch the line, allow it to touch the ground first, then raise it and fasten the belt around your prisoner.

  Paul is surprised that it is a woman who is speaking, somehow he had expected a man. Secondly, that she thought that the alien is a prisoner. Paul shouts back that the alien is not a prisoner, but a friend and that he is injured. However, he might have saved his breath, the lady cannot hear him and just repeats her instructions about the line and putting the belt on his prisoner. Paul decides to obey and sort things out afterwards. He waits until the line drops right down to the ground, then he picks it up and hops across to the alien, carrying the line and belt with him. The lady calls down to Paul to ask if he needs help, as he shakes his head, she reels out more line, so that it reaches across to the alien. Paul has difficulty at first, getting the belt around the alien's chest. He also has difficulty figuring out how it fastens. The lady shouts out some instructions as to how the belt should be fastened. Soon Paul's alien friend is heading skywards. Paul can see that the lady is rather reluctant to handle the alien, she has even put on some gloves and a face mask. Soon the line is heading down to collect Paul.

  ~~~~~~

  Chapter 20  Care

  Paul whilst really glad to see his father, is somewhat worried as to what he has to say about Paul's exploits with the alien craft and the fact that he'd even tried to fly it, let alone leave the earth. Paul is most disappointed that this first meeting has to be through a glass window, as he has been put in quarantine. Paul can see that rather than appearing to be angry and cross, his Dad is looking worried and concerned about Paul's well being, his first words are, You sure had us worried, you've been gone for several months, are you alright?

  Paul replies, Apart from some damage to my left leg, and a cut or two I'm fine thanks Dad. Have they told you anything about the alien and how he is?

  Paul's Dad tells Paul that he had knows nothing about any alien, all he had been told was that Paul had been found safe and sound.

  Paul tells his Dad about the space craft that he had found and about his flight to the alien planet, then the fact that the aliens had looked after him, then tricked him into being a decoy. He also told of Dr Greenstuff and how supportive and friendly he had been, then about the latest alien that Paul had managed to rescue from the craft, about their teamwork to get the craft down as safely as they could. Paul can see that his Dad doesn't believe anything that he has been saying, he thinks that Paul has suffered a knock on the head and has dreamed all this.

  One of the medical staff, a lady, clothed in some sort of protective suit, comes into Paul to check him out. She starts by looking at instruments that are attached to him. Paul refuses to co-operate, when she wants to check lines going into him and sensors attached to him. Paul insists that she tell him what they have done with the alien, he wants assurance that the alien is being well treated. He tells her that the alien needs an atmosphere of helium and CO2, also it requires water and sunlight, plenty of it.

  At first the lady appears to be ignoring Paul's pleas and protests, but when he starts to tell her about the alien's requirements. She stops what she is doing and whips out a note book and notes down what Paul is telling her.

  Paul says that he insists on seeing the alien to make sure he is alright. He mentions human rights, then changes this to 'alien rights'. The medic disappears off, closing the chamber carefully before she goes. A few minutes later she re-appears with an elderly gentleman with white hair and beard to match. The man, not dressed in protective clothing, but instead in normal clothes, dispenses with niceties, instead he launches straight into, My colleague here tells me that you know what the alien needs to survive. Is this true and how do you know these things?

  Paul quite taken aback by the man's brusqueness, is silent at first. But prompted by the man's prompt of Well I'm waiting! Feels obligated to reply.

  Paul says, I spent several days on their planet. I found it difficult to breath, it turned out it was because of the low levels of oxygen, high levels of CO2 and also helium.

  The impatient man replies, Yes, yes, but how do you know this?

  Paul silent again for a moment or two, eventually says, They rescued me and found that I was having trouble breathing their air, so they put me in a special chamber with high levels of oxygen. Then I spent several days communicating with one of their people.

  The man resumes his, Yes, yes, but how did you communicate? They don't talk English surely?

  Paul smiles and says, Well actually they can, through use of sign language. We had great difficulty at first but through use of drawings, objects and then the use of sign language we managed to build up some quite interesting conversations. It was through one of these that we managed to talk about the make up of their atmosphere and also what they needed to survive. They are essentially plant people living on, oh what is the word again? Paul racks his brains again and suddenly, as he recalls the colour of their skin, it comes to him, the word is, Photosynthesis, that's it. They create their own food, which is a sort of sugar. The alien that I had managed to communicate, so well with, unfortunately died on the ship, he was trying to save their captain. He had helped me ward off the attack that his people were planning to attempt on the human race. The alien you have, is he OK?

  The man has now lost any sign of his impatience as he answers, Well he's not been doing very well, but that was mainly, as we didn't understand what his body needed, but we should be able to provide for his needs now that you have helped us.

  Paul asks, Can I see him? He helped me land the craft and I owe him my life for that.

  The white haired man, smiles and says, From what I understand, you both did some saving, that was some feat getting him out of that damaged craft single handedly. Nurse, can you fetch this young man a wheel chair? I think it would be good for both of our patients to have contact.

  The nurse hesitates at first, then smiles and rapidly departs, then re-enters the room somewhat cumbersomely, with wheelchair in tow.

  Paul objects, I don't need that, I can manage. He attempts to swing his legs off the bed and is reminded by the sharp pain in his left ankle that he had landed awkwardly off of the rope.

  The man smiles again and says, I think not. Independent young man aren't you? Mind you I don't think you would have survived, had you not had such a nature. The man, then turns his attention to Paul's Dad, whom he had ignored all this time.

  Paul's Dad had just stood the other side of the glass wall dumbfounded at the treatment of his son and the things that had been said. So it was all true, what Paul had said, was not just a dream. Paul had flown to an alien planet and brought one of t
hese things back with him.

  The white haired man, says to Paul's Dad, Hello Mr er.

  Paul helps out with, Simpkins.

  Yes, hello Mr Simpkins, I will fetch you shortly and you too can see the.... er.... friend that young Paul has brought back with him. Oh by the way I am Professor Heston, bio-medical specialist. The professor holds out his hand to shake Paul's Dad's hand then laughs at his stupidity, there's a glass wall separating them.

  ~~ Later ~~

  The alien is in a transparent plastic tent like structure, there are bright lights shining down on him. Paul asks the Professor if the water in the glass beside the bed has been boiled. The Professor smiles at Paul and replies, Ah yes, we anticipated that would be a requirement, we wouldn't want to introduce any unnecessary bugs into the equation, this poor chap has enough problems as it is.

  Paul asks, How do you think he is getting on?

  The Professor replies, Well as I'm sure you appreciate, it is difficult for us to tell, as we know nothing really of the way their bodies work. All we do know is that he appears to be responding well to the new atmosphere and also the lighting. He appears to be more comfortable. We haven't seen any signs of consciousness returning as yet, but it is early days, as they say.

  Paul walks over to the plastic tent and pushes part inwards so he can touch the closest arm of the alien. Paul reassuringly says, Its OK you're amongst friends, we will look after you until your people can be convinced to come peacefully to collect you.

  The alien's eyes seem to have a bit of a sparkle about them. Paul isn't sure if it is a trick of the light, or if consciousness is returning. Paul hears a high pitched sound and he knows that the alien is talking to him. As Paul still does not understand their language, he resorts to the only method of communication that he knows works, sign language. He requests some paper or a white board if there's one available. The nurse comes up with a pad of white paper and a pencil. The Professor suggests that she fetch a flip chart from some room or other.

  Paul's Dad stands watching Paul in amazement and adoration at his son's determination to reassure this alien who has become a friend, and this, for the boy who found it difficult to make friends.

  Paul is soon sketching away and signing. The alien is now sitting up and attempting to sign back.

  Paul asks if there is any way that they can get some paper and pencils into the alien. The Professor nods at the nurse she takes a pad into the back of the tent and slides it into a compartment, then signs to the alien, to show him how to fetch the paper and pencils. Paul and the alien resume their conversation once the alien has retrieved the paper and pencils.

  After some while, Paul looks round at the Professor and announces that they have a plan to effect the alien's safe transfer back to his own kind. Paul had established that the alien craft will not have completely left earth orbit, instead they will be waiting up there to see what happens and also be checking if any of their kind have survived the crashes. They will have detected that this alien has survived. They will be formulating plans to effect recovery. Paul said that they can use this knowledge to suggest a friendly transfer. They would need to make arrangements for the alien to make a transmission to his people's.

  The Professor discusses the plan in more detail and then says that he will need to talk to 'his people to get their clearance', however he did not see any real reason for not giving it a try. The Professor departs.

  Paul's Dad seizes the opportunity to congratulate his son on his achievement.

  ~~~~~~

  Chapter 21  Making Arrangements

  The Professor tells Paul and his Dad that two of the alien craft have been spotted by satellites orbiting the earth. So the alien was right about them hanging around. He adds that arrangements are being made to sort out satellites and jets to keep an eye out for any craft that enter the atmosphere. Clearance had been obtained for making the transmission to the alien craft and a team were writing a script that the alien can use.

  Paul is concerned that the speech be kept simple, mainly from the viewpoint that he has to deliver it to the alien by his often home made sign language. The Professor suggests that they get a sign language expert in to help Paul. Paul is a bit reluctant at first, he is worried about the effect on the alien and the trust that he and the alien have built up. The Professor suggests that perhaps the sign language expert could be just around, but not directly involved in the communications. Paul still has his reservations about this, but gives in.

  The hours tick by with nothing happening, Paul is getting more and more impatient, but is amazed at how calm and unworried the alien seems to be.

  Finally some action. The Professor comes back with a rather portly, lady with what Paul considers to be an owl like face, not helped by the extremely large glasses, that give the impression of having very large staring eyes. The lady is introduced as Daphne Wakes. She signs as she says hello.

  The Professor points out that Paul can understand and talk English, it is the alien in the plastic tent who is having difficulty in understanding.

  The Professor presents Paul and Daphne with the speech that has been prepared. Paul thinks that he had best explain this new person's presence in the room and also what they are planning to do. He sets about signing to the alien, who is keen to learn what is happening.

  When Paul has finished, he rejoins Daphne and the Professor. Daphne starts to criticise Paul's signs and the fact that he is making up his own signs. Paul takes an instant dislike to this Daphne person, who, is she to criticise what he's doing, at least he's getting the message across. However, Daphne goes on about how important it is to standardise these things and that it won't help if the aliens can only understand Paul, what happens if they return some day and a professionally trained sign language person has to deal with them, they will be back to square one, or even worse, total confusion. Paul is still of the opinion that it is working and if it isn't broke, why try to confuse things now, attempting to fix it. Daphne reads the speech out loud, so they can all hear and consider it and how, it can be best conveyed.

  Paul wonders what kind of idiot wrote this speech, it has a lot of complicated words and phrases that, even he is struggling with the meaning of. Paul objects to the content of the speech. Whilst Daphne goes on to consider what signs to use to convey it. Paul's Dad nods at Paul's specific objections as they go through it line by line. Paul thinks 'Wow amazing my Dad actually agrees that my points are right, I can't believe it.' However, he gets so frustrated at being ignored, by Daphne and the Professor, that he goes away for a moment, grabs paper and pen; comes back and starts writing.

  After a while, Paul says, How about this? Then sets about reading what he has written. He sees that his Dad is smiling and nodding as Paul reads out his version of the speech. He gets a quarter of the way in, when Daphne objects on the grounds that he has departed from the spirit of the original speech. It is then that both the Professor and his Dad come to his defence, stating that Paul's speech is far easier to understand and far less open to misinterpretation.

  Daphne is most put out by their objections and, in a huff asks them, who the linguistics expert is?

  There is silence. Then the Professor and Paul's Dad look at each other and together pronounce that Paul seems to be. This is the final straw as far as Daphne is concerned, she gets up and storms off out of the room. After she has gone, the Professor remarks that she had taken the speech with her. Paul's dad says, We don't need it do we? Paul already has it written out, don't you think?

  The Professor smiles and encourages Paul to go on. As they go through the rest of the speech, the Professor and Paul's Dad, occasionally suggest a better way to put a particular phrase. At the end there is a great feeling of achievement. The Professor says, Now that's what I call teamwork.

  The alien has been watching with great interest, as all this had been taking place, whilst he had not known what had been said, he was most
interested in the reactions, especially 'when the other person had left in such a small time.' as the alien had put it.

  There's a noise from behind the group, they look round to see that Daphne has returned, she has quite a sorrowful and nervous look on her face now. She meekly says that she owes them an apology and hopes that she can still be of service. Apparently her bosses had been quite enthusiastic about Paul's re-write. She pointed out that her first instructions had been to let no changes be made to the speech, but that had apparently been some hi ranking government official who had long since gone.

  Paul smiles and asks Daphne how he can convey a few of the lines that they had jointly written. Daphne, who's tune has now changed, enthusiastically suggests a couple of ways, that they could be conveyed. The alien enthusiastically watches, as Paul practices.