Punishment

by Guerin Zand

  As usual everyone, including Sammy, burst out in laughter at my expense. Steve headed for the replicator and Cindy put her hand back on my thigh and gave it a nice little squeeze. This little would be tramp reminded me a lot of Julie.

  After dinner, the kids, Steve, and Katie decided it would be fun to sit back in the cafeteria and watch a movie. Now, there weren’t any flat screens or other devices us humans were familiar with so I was interested in how this would work. Ricky, the IT guy, went over to one of the viewers and I guess he coded something up. Next thing I know the movie appeared on one of the empty walls in the room. It was using the same mechanism, I assumed, that was used to put the room into external view mode. All of my time on a shuttle and this little trick would have been nice to know.

  Steve and Katie had chosen Space Balls for our viewing pleasure. I had no doubt that Ricky had not downloaded this movie legally. They were pirates. I had known this for a while but I didn’t like bringing up their transgressions like they apparently enjoyed doing with me. If the entertainment industry ever found out about these guys I’m sure a lawsuit would have resulted. That may be one of the reasons they wanted to remain anonymous. Can’t say I blamed them.

  Steve and Katie decided to introduce our friends to popcorn and soda. They had a little competition to see who could cajole the tastiest popcorn out of the replicator. They thought since they knew the different flavors of soda, and our friends didn’t, that they would act as the soda jerks for the evening and were suggesting a variety of different flavors for everyone to try. I didn’t think it was a good idea to tell them that our friends could have just pulled up their memories that were downloaded during their trip to the medical center and made the beverages themselves. That might have just upset them. I had to leave some surprises for later.

  Cindy had taken a seat next to me and was sharing her popcorn with me. She still was a bit too touchy-feely for me and I decided to excuse myself for a second. I got up and went over to talk to Stella who was standing in the back of the room.

  “What’s the matter, Guerin?”

  “I just needed to get away from Cindy.”

  “Why?”

  “She keeps putting her hands on me, trying to hold me close. She’s practically throwing herself at me.”

  “And since when has Guerin Zand had a problem with a beautiful young girl throwing herself at him?”

  “It just reminds me of some of the psycho-bitches I used to run into at the bars. I had a friend who was a bartender and usually when that would happen she’d come over to me and whisper ‘Danger Will Robinson’ or ‘DWR’.”

  “What does that mean?”

  It took a few minutes to explain the whole Lost in Space reference. If these guys were so smart why did I always have to take time to explain shit a child would know?

  Of course, depending on how much I had to drink, I often disregarded these DWR warnings and slept with those women anyways. Men who are reading this know exactly why, and for the few women reading this, if you don’t get it, that’s probably because you are one of those women.

  “Guerin, I don’t think you have to worry about that with Cindy. Have you decided to become a monk since Milly left you?”

  “No. Now, you may say I’m superstitious, but when a beautiful young woman is throwing herself at me I get a feeling that something bad is going to happen. I ignored that feeling when I met Milly and look where that got me. It’s like when I travel on an airliner. If they seat a super-hot model type next to me then I just get up, leave, and take another flight.”

  “Why?”

  “Because if that happens, I know the plane will crash. I have absolutely no doubt.”

  “That’s nonsense, Guerin. How many times has that happened?”

  “Well, never. Which just proves I’m right since I’ve never been in a plane crash.”

  Stella rolled her eyes. What can I say? These aliens didn’t understand basic monkey logic which is why they always underestimated me.

  “Now if they were to put me in the center seat with two would be Sumo wrestlers on both sides, well then, that plane will probably spend a lifetime on the ground waiting to taxi, both on takeoff and landing. Then it would circle the airport, until the low fuel warning light comes on, waiting for clearance to land. And that has happened more than once.”

  “You know, Guerin, sometimes when you actually talk to me, it scares me.”

  “I know. How can I see things others don’t? I get like these little epiphanies all the time. I’ve learned to trust them, I don’t know what to call them, visions? Revelations?”

  “I’d say I’m starting to understand you, Guerin, but that would be a lie. I seem to end up more confused every time you speak. What has that got to do with Cindy?”

  “Tell me, Stella. Don’t lie or hold back the truth. Is Cindy somehow related to Julie? If you lie to me, I’ll find out sooner or later, and then I’m going to be pissed.”

  “No. Why do you think that?”

  “It’s the way she, I don’t know, talks to me or looks at me. Like she’s playing with me the same way Julie has in the past.”

  “Are you telling me that the Guerin Zand, scourge of the universe, is scared of a little girl?”

  “Well this little girl has the body of a full-blown goddess and she is kinda cute and funny.”

  “That’s it?”

  “No. The real thing that has me scared is she’s Bree. She may be just a little girl but she’s probably smarter than the combined IQs of the entire human population. What chance do I really have against that?”

  “You’re right. You should probably go to your room, crawl into bed and lock the door.”

  “You don’t seem to be taking me very seriously, Stella?”

  “What’s really the problem, Guerin? You aren’t the same fun guy that I knew before you went back to Earth. Is it Milly leaving or your little ordeal at Gitmo?”

  “My little ordeal? Really, Stella? How is it I spend almost four months being tortured and you all call it a little ordeal. I bitch slap one Trogan emperor and it’s a fucking crisis of universal proportion.”

  “Well, he is the emperor of a fairly large stellar empire. Your just Guerin.”

  “I thought I was the chosen one. The savior of humanity. Doesn’t that make me at least slightly important?”

  “You really shouldn’t let that go to your head. You can always be replaced.”

  “I wish you would replace me. That would make my life a lot simpler.”

  “Relax, Guerin. Maybe you should just stop thinking and start having a good time like everybody else. You know all that thinking is usually what gets you in trouble. You have a pretty girl who wants to spend some time with you, so lighten up and enjoy.”

  “The last thing I need is another Bree girlfriend.”

  “I don’t think she wants to marry you, Guerin.”

  “You sure?”

  Stella laughed and pushed me away. “Go have some fun and try not to be such an asshole.”

  As I walked away I turned back towards Stella and said, “But, Stella, that’s part of my charm.”

  Chapter 9

  Team Briefing

  The next morning I woke up and took a shower. As I was getting dressed there was a knock at my door. It was Katie and I let her in.

  “Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes, I did Katie. Did you?”

  “Not as well as you. I saw Cindy sneaking into your room last night. What happened to the whole bit about them just being kids?”

  “Well those rules only apply to you and Steve. I’ve already done my bit to become the turd in their alien punch bowl. Besides, when Cindy told me her father was a Council member, I figured it was just one more way for me to stick it to them, so to speak.”

  “You used that girl just to get back at the Council?”

  “No Katie. You must think I’m a total asshole. I like Cindy, and she wanted to be with me. I didn’t go looking for a way to get back at the Cou
ncil and that’s not why I let her in my room. The fact it might piss off her father was just a bonus.”

  “I’m not sure just what kind of an asshole you are, Guerin, but if you hurt that girl you’ll be answering to me.”

  “Do you think with all the shit I’ve been through that your little threats scare me? That girl is a Bree which means she is a shitload smarter than all of us. If you want someone to worry about, you should be worried about me. I know that they all seem really nice, and they are, but you need to wrap your head around the fact that they’re not human and they have an agenda.”

  “You know Stella is right. You are paranoid.”

  “You know what I went through and you think I’m paranoid? Just don’t worry about it, ok? Let’s head down to the cafeteria and grab something to eat. We have a bit of a mission and we should brief you and Steve before we return to Earth.”

  When we arrived at the cafeteria the whole gang was there. Jackie was introducing Steve to the detox beverage and the rest were enjoying their breakfast.

  “Good morning, Guerin.”

  “Good morning, Cindy.”

  Katie rolled her eyes and shook her head.

  I grabbed a plate of steak and eggs from the replicator and grabbed my morning cup of Joe. I sat down at the table and Cindy, of course, sat next to me.

  “Roger, do you want to brief Steve and Katie on our little situation? When we’re done with breakfast we should head down to the control center and we can review the scans Sammy has collected of the area in question. Then we should pack up and head back to Earth.”

  Roger started. “Our friends have been performing some detailed surveys of the Earth while they are here and they found an anomaly in the Black Hills area of South Dakota.”

  “Does it involve a young boy named Rocky Racoon?”

  “Thank you, Steve. No one else got that reference but me when they first told me about this.”

  “Well, the lyrics actually refer to the Black Mountain Hills of Dakota but there actually isn’t a state named Dakota and the Black Mountain Hills are normally referred to as the Black Hills, so I think the Beatles were just not well informed or it lyrically sounded better.”

  “Exactly, Steve”

  “What are you two talking about?”

  “The Beatles, Katie. Have you never heard of the Beatles or the song Rocky Racoon?”

  “Whatever, Guerin. Do you two mind if Roger gets on with the briefing now?”

  Roger proceeded to inform them of the situation in South Dakota and that the three of us would depart for this location as soon as we could make the arrangements on Earth. Of course, Katie and Steve asked the same question as to why we needed Earth transportation when we had portals. Sammy explained the issue with being detected and I took the time to reiterate that we are supposed to be doing this without help from our friends. The fuzzy rulebook and all. Our friends help should only be called on in the direst of situations.

  We finished our breakfast and then followed Sammy and the rest of the crew to the lower deck and into the shuttle’s control center. There Sammy pulled up the thermal images and overlaid them onto the 2D photo images. There he pointed out the discrepancy. Then, as aliens tend to do, Sammy decided to start showing off.

  The room became a 3D holodeck, for lack of a better term, like the recreation area. We were all standing in a virtual reality scene of the lodge itself.

  “Ok, we have to get us one of these for our own. This is too cool, and it is also extremely useful.”

  I looked at Steve shaking my head. “If you can fit it in your pocket before we leave, then you can take it home.”

  Sammy explained to Roger how to navigate our viewpoint in this virtual world and we walked through the access road and the trail we would need to traverse to actually get to the lodge.

  “I’ll arrange for a four-wheel drive pickup at the Rapid City airport,” I said, and I started planning. “That’s the closest airport to our target area. This area is not actually in the Black Hills National Park but is to the north-east of Rapid City in the Cheyenne River Reservation. That’s about a little more than an hour’s drive, and then maybe twenty more miles on the access road before we have to hoof it. Then we have about an eight-mile hike along this trail and most of it is up a fairly steep grade to this little valley where the lodge is located.”

  Roger looked at me. “Have you already gone over the surveys before now?”

  “Yes. This is all available on the viewers in your rooms. What do you think I was doing all night?” Katie gave me a dirty look. She had her own idea of how I had spent most of my night.

  “The problem is we can’t just go in there as tourists or hunters. This is a reservation. This access road is closed to the public. Typically hikers who are going into the reservation are expected to file their plans with the local native American authorities in case they were to go missing.”

  Roger spoke up. “I can take care of that. We’ve had similar recon missions in remote areas and we can get IDs showing you work for the Department of the Interior. The cover will be there have been reports of poachers setting up camps in the mountains. This will get you access to that road and allow you to carry weapons without questions. I can have the paperwork waiting for you at the Rapid City airport when you arrive.”

  Sammy took over. “Tommy will be handling the IT aspect. He’ll download these surveys to your node in our matrix, Guerin. He needs to convert them to a format you can use and reduce them to simple 2D images. Cindy will be monitoring your communications in case you need to get out in a hurry.”

  “I thought Ricky was the IT guy and Jackie was the communications officer, Sammy?”

  “They switch roles periodically, Guerin. This is part of their training.”

  “How do we communicate?” Katie asked.

  Cindy handed everyone on our team, except me, a small box containing the alien earbuds. “You should already have one of these, right Guerin?”

  “Yes, I have a one back at the house. I’ve never used these for anything but translation. How do we use them as communication devices?”

  “It’s simple, Guerin. Here, use this one.” I took the earbud from Cindy and inserted it in my ear. She also took an earbud for herself. “Can you hear me, Guerin?”.

  “Yes,” I said out loud.

  “You don’t have to actually speak. Just think who you want to talk to and think what you want to say.”

  “Like this?”

  “Yes. I enjoyed last night very much, Guerin. I had to get to work early so that’s why I left. I don’t want you to think I was trying to run off.”

  “OK! OK! I think I got it. Thanks, Cindy.”

  “Are you and your girlfriend going to let us all in on how they work, Guerin?”

  “She’s not my…, Oh never mind, Katie.”

  Everyone was giggling. Fucking Déjà vu!

  “These earbuds don’t work like earbuds we’re used to. They aren’t little speakers in your ears. When I used them as translators I could hear the person talking to me in their native language but in my mind, I heard them in English. Maybe my mind just received the meaning and since my native language is English that is how I perceived it. They connect to your implant and push this information directly to your mind, sort of like I pushed my thoughts to you.”

  “To communicate to another person using these devices you don’t actually have to speak.” Cindy started to explain. “When you’re wearing these, you become part of a communications network and everyone on that network can communicate to another member of the network by thinking of that person and what they want to say to them. It takes a little getting used to but as you can see it didn’t take Guerin that long to figure it out. We’ll set up a network for just your team and us. The number of people on the network can be as many as you want but we should keep the number small for now.”

  “Does everyone on the network hear everyone else’s conversation?”

  “No, Steve.” Cindy continued he
r explanation. “If you want just Katie to hear than just think of Katie and start thinking what you want to say. If you want everyone on the network to hear then think of everybody before you start talking, or thought-talking. There is feedback that will let you know who is receiving your thoughts. It’s hard to explain, but you’ll recognize it with some practice.”

  “We’re definitely going to have to start practicing as soon as we get back to Earth. Hopefully, we’ll have enough time to learn the ins and outs before you head out.” Roger was concerned this tech may cause problems. “If we can’t get it down before then we’ll use standard coms and hope Guerin can handle coms back to the shuttle using his earbud.”

  “Can we tune out certain people on the network?” I asked.

  “That’s possible, Guerin, once you have a little more experience. The only problem is you would have to tune them back in before you could hear them again. This could be a problem if the other person needed to urgently communicate with you when you’ve tuned them out.”

  “Why would you ask that, Guerin?”

  “A couple of reasons, Roger. Certain members of the team might think this would be a good way to annoy me.” I looked directly at Katie and she gave me that “who me” look. “And what if things get confusing? With everyone broadcasting you might need to talk to one specific person.”

  “If there is a lot of chatter, is that the correct word?” I nodded yes to Cindy, “If there is a lot of chatter on the network your mind will filter the others into the background and bring the one you want to hear into the foreground, so to speak. It’s more complicated than that but it’s the same as if you were standing in a room full of people talking. Your mind focuses on the person you want to talk to and you ignore the background voices.”

  “We’ll have to work out some sort of comm discipline for the team. We will refrain from playing games with them. Understood?”

  We all nodded in agreement.

  “One last question, Cindy, I think. What if a team leader wanted to listen in on all communications on the network, even if they weren’t expressly sent the information by the sender.”