The Watcher

by Bill Stenlake

  The first action that takes place, is when The Watcher brings them all together, to talk to them before they leave.

  ‘You may all be expecting to be following the Grand Master, as he calls himself. We will get to that eventually, but for now there are things we must do. His powers have been taken away from him. I mean by that, his powers that he had access to as a Guiding Master, have been removed. He no longer has access to the Air Micro Compounder engines at all. His androids will have been automatically downgraded. I have been updated with information that tells me that he recruited some people and split the Universe into quadrants. These people have gone on a systematic campaign of attacking and taking over planets, particularly ones with immense wealth. They have set the people to work, to gather this wealth for them. There are countless planets over the Universe that have been taken this way. The good news is that the technology these people have used too; was that of the Grand Master. That of course too, will now have been downgraded to basic levels.’

  There are questions already that the others want to ask, but they will wait until The Watcher finishes saying what he has to say. The Watcher continues.

  ‘O believes that we will best serve the cause of restoring The Balance, by visiting these planets and helping the people to regain their own destinies. They may well not notice, or realize, that the people who are keeping them in check having overpowered them, will not be in the position to keep that position any more. They will, of course, need some help and that help will come from us.’

  ‘Can one fighting ship do all this?’ Cassie asks. ‘I mean these people have taken over whole planets. Can we fight an army with this ship alone?’

  ‘George, I think now is the time to take everyone down to the transport room. You will not have seen that on your tour of the ship. It wasn’t quite ready for you to see. I believe that everything will have been loaded on by now.’

  He looks across at George. George smiles back at him and nods.

  ‘Follow me please everyone.’ He takes hold of Cassie’s hand and leads her out of the control room. They follow George, to where the android had taken him earlier. This is the direction that leads to where O is; except it is not O they are going to see. Draton, Elkante, The Wise Soul, Bluechen and Marlitta have not seen this part of the ship. Cassie hasn’t either. In fact The Watcher has not seen where George is leading them, but he does know what they are going to find there.

  George opens the door to the transport room. He walks in and waits for the others to file in behind him. The area is empty. It is not what they have been expecting to find. There are some puzzled looks on their faces. George is not surprised at all. This is what he had been expecting. The area is not quite empty. There is a small control desk in the corner. George walks over to it and then opens a drawer. The others stay where they are, while George does this. He lifts some goggles out of the drawer. He has six pairs in his hand when he walks back to them. He gives them all a pair of goggles, except for The Watcher. The Watcher does not need them and neither does George. George can see what is in the transport room and so can The Watcher. The others can’t yet, but when they put the goggles on, they too will be able to see what is in there. George tells them to put the goggles on. They do and the expressions on their faces change immediately. They all look through the goggles and then take them off again. When they have them on, they can see the miniature versions of the fighting ship they are in. When they take the goggles off, then they can’t see them.

  ‘How do they do that?’

  ‘I have no idea’ George replies ‘but I can see them without the goggles.’

  ‘How can you do that?’ Cassie asks him.

  ‘Apparently it is because I am who I am. The Keeper will be able to see them without goggles. Spirit will be able to see them without goggles. The Watcher can see them without goggles. I assume that O can see them without goggles too, but I don’t know that. What I do know, is that no one else can see them. They won’t have these goggles to use and even if they did, they would not see anything thru them. If you take them off, you will notice that I have given each of you, your own pair of googles. They are marked with your name on. Try swopping them around and see what you can see with someone else’s goggles on.’

  They do that, several times, before finding their own marked pair and putting them back on. In front of them are four miniature versions of this ship. When they get up close, they find that these miniature ships are also marked with names on.

  ‘I presume that the same rule applies here’ The Wise Soul says to George. He is standing by the one with his name on it.

  ‘That’s right, but of course not quite in the same way. Your craft can only be opened by you and it can only be flown by you. The weapons it has can only be fired by you. Each craft is a two seater, but you will be flying them alone. We thought about putting an android in each one to help, but have decided against that. We believe that the people on the planets we are going to rescue will have seen enough of androids and robots. They will be less trusting when we land and they see androids emerging from our fighting craft.’

  ‘I thought no one could see them without the goggles?’ Elkante says.

  ‘That’s true, when we want it to be that way. When we land, we can make them visible. We could just bring them back to the mother craft, but it has been decided that we might have the smaller craft land first, after we have won the planets back.’

  ‘You are not in any doubt we can do this then?’ Draton asks.

  ‘There is no doubt that The Balance will be restored. I think you should open the craft up and get in, to accustom yourselves with the layout. They are amazingly simple, but I will come round to each of you in turn and show you what you need to know.’

  Draton, Elkante and the Wise Soul are standing by their miniature fighters. Cassie wanders over and takes a look at the fourth fighter. She knows before she gets there that it is not going to have her name on it. She is a little disappointed, as she knows she has skills that she could use in one of these, just as well as the four who have their names on them. The fourth fighter, of course, has George’s name on it. Bluechen and Marlitta wander round and look at the fighters. They were not expecting to see their names on the miniature fighters.

  Cassie looks up and sees that George is looking at her.

  ‘Did you decide that there wouldn’t be one for me?’

  ‘No’ George replies ‘it was not my decision. I was told who would be flying these, when I went to see O. O made the decision, I believe. Who else could it have been?’

  ‘I made the decision with O’ The Watcher speaks for the first time in ages. ‘While these four are in their miniature versions of this, I need people too. You have already proved how good you are. I chose you, over everyone else, to be with me on the mother craft. You are the one who will be in charge of the weaponry, when we are in battle. Remember they will be able to see us in this craft. They won’t be able to see the miniature craft, so we will receive the bulk of the attention. I need the best shot, the most able marksman, to protect this ship. You will also have Bluechen and Marlitta to direct too. I will guide the ship, but you three will have to repel any attacks

  ‘I am sure that you can do this better than any of us.’ She replies with a smile.

  ‘You would have thought so, but O reliably informs me that you have something really special; a unique talent. This is a talent that he has been unable to replicate in an android. You either have it or you don’t, and you do!’

  ‘What he is telling you is the truth.’ The voice they hear comes through the air. No one in the transport area has spoken it. ‘I am O.’ they hear next. Then the voice is not heard any more.

  ‘While George is showing Draton, Elkante and the Wise Soul how to get into their fighters and how to use fly them and use the weapon systems, I think that you, Bluechen and Marlitta should go back to the control room. From there I will show you what you need to know, when it comes to the time for battle.

 
George settles down to work with his three men, while The Watcher takes Cassie, Bluechen and Marlitta back to the control room. Bluechen and Marlitta are surprisingly excited, that they too will have a role to play in all this. They would rather be involved in the outcome than to just be along as passengers, which is rather what they feel like at the moment.

  When they reach the control room, there are three little booths there. They weren’t there when they left. Like the goggles and the miniature fighters in the transport area, these booths each have a name on them. They can’t help but smile. They are their booths. They have a part to play in this, just like the other four have. The Watcher spends the next hour instructing them, on how the booths work. The weapons are on the outside of the craft, but they are all operated from the booths. Like the fighters in the transport bay, each booth can only be used by the person whose name is on it.

  In the transport bay, George takes about the same time, to teach the others how to fly their craft and use the weaponry. It is all most impressive. O has managed to arrange that each fighter can be tried as a simulator, while George is showing them what to do. George does not need to learn all this. He found that when he was with O, that the information was already in his head. He knows how to fly this machine and he knows how to use the weapons.

  They are ready to start the fightback. They gather in the control room ready to leave.

  ‘The other thing that is really different about this craft; is the time it will take for us to reach the planets we need to, in the Universe. We will not have to use the travel pods. We will literally reach our destination, wherever it might be, before we know it.’

  Chapter 36 Vee and Bar

  Vee and Bar move away and search the city, for more places where the attackers are trying to overpower the authorities. They find quite a few places, but find that the word is actually getting around ahead of their arrival. The command had been that there would be no more communications once they had started their assault, but in the light of the action, things turn out differently. Time after time, as Vee and Bar arrive on the scene; the battle in that place is soon over, when they realize what they are up against. There has been no word from Joe and Franz, but that is never going to come. No one appears to step up and take full control. The surrenders come thick and fast, in London at least.

  The same happens when they veer off and make their presence felt in the other cities around the country. Word has spread and they find that when they get to some of these other cities, that the attackers have already surrendered. The authorities don’t know what to make of Vee and Bar, but they do know they have turned the tide of the war very much in their favor. They have in fact, done so much more than that. They have almost single-handedly broken the resistance of the attacking force.

  They are having no communications from the authorities at all. In the light of that, they go from city to city, checking the situation and where necessary, taking a telling hand in the situation they find. A few hours later they tune in to a broadcast, which lets them know that the attackers have surrendered everywhere. Only when they know this, do they take a break from what they have been doing. They do this to decide where their next move going to take them. It doesn’t take them long to realize, that they need to hop across the channel and do what they did in the UK, to some parts of Europe. By the time they have appeared in Paris, Lille and a few other cities in France, the attack is starting to fall apart there too. They fly to Spain, Portugal, Germany, Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands, but find that morale is by now quite low. As soon as they reach a country, it seems to get broadcast and the surrenders soon follow. Country after country gains control of the situation that had been, until their arrival, on a knife edge.

  There is going to be a lot of tidying up to do, but at least the attack has been repelled. There will be a lot of people going in front of the courts, but even more who have died for their cause. Vee and Bar have done what they were put back on Earth for, well they haven’t really. They need to follow up Ricardo. He is much more dangerous than any of the people they have had to deal with today. Ricardo is being controlled by The Grand Master. Then there are the other two, who are also under his control. It will be no good if they surrender. There won’t be any point in accepting that. They won’t behave like other people do. They will set things up, like they have in the UK and then walk away and leave the others to take the consequences. Ricardo is quite definitely not here for them to find, either in Europe or in the UK. Ricardo has gone back to the USA.

  Vee and Bar make a detailed tour of Europe before they leave, to make sure that everything is under control. There are a few individuals still trying to cause disruption, but they are being targeted, as and when they are discovered. There are no big weapons left to fight, just the small pockets of individual resistance.

  Vee and Bar make their way back to London. By the time they get there, it is a different city to the one they had left a few hours ago. The total curfew has been lifted already. It was deemed to be the best way to get things back to normal, as quickly as things could be achieved.

  They turn their attention onto where Ricardo has gone. They find the records of his flight and so set sail for the USA. At the speed they can go at, it doesn’t take very long for them to get to the other side of the Atlantic. As they near the shore, though, they realize that something has picked them up. They have been rather direct in their route. It appears that people must have been watching the goings on, on the other side of the pond. Reports of the miniature craft and how it has dealt with the attackers there; have obviously gone before them. It is no great surprise then, that they are being expected to move over from there, particularly as they have been having their share of the trouble too. That is despite the USA authorities reacting in a much more serious way. They had mobilized their armed forces much more quickly than in Europe and The UK. The only difference really being, that there is a much easier path to procuring weapons in the USA, than in the other parts of the world where there has been this trouble.

  Vee and Bar are probably about a hundred miles out at sea, when they are joined by several fighter jets. They easily out maneuver them, but soon find they have more to contend with. Again and again they manage to fly their way to escape the attention, only to find they have more jets to contend with. In the end, they turn round and make out to sea again. The jets manage to keep up their close attention for a while, but in the end they have to turn back to refuel, which is the one thing that Vee and Bar don’t have to do.

  They land on an island, way out in the Atlantic, and make a plan to try to get to the USA again. They know from previous experience in the UK, that the authorities won’t want to let them just get there and do what they want to. That will be now, despite the evidence they are leaving all around the globe behind them, that all they are trying to do, is to stop this uprising.

  They will only want to capture them and then try to get information out of them, rather than let them do what they have been put there to do. They will have to find a way to arrive, with less of a trail to follow. They consider some different options that they might try to take. The main issue is of timing. There is little doubt that the authorities in the USA will be on the lookout for their arrival. They will also be concentrating on the entire country too. They have much better equipment and more advanced equipment than their counterparts in Europe. They think that even if they take the option to fly in below what they believe to be the radar line, that there will still be a possibility that they will be seen entering. The fact they know they are there, is a major downside to most things that they think of, to get into the country.

  It is only when an airplane flies over the island that they are on, that an idea comes to them. They have to assume some things, but they believe it is worth a shot at what they have thought of. There are a few things that have to be resolved before they can try it. They manage to make the necessary adjustments to their craft, using some materials that they raid from a couple of places on the
island. They search their radar for another airplane to come over their position. They don’t have to wait long for that to happen. Obviously they do not know what its destination is, but there is nothing they can do about that.

  They are far enough from the USA, not to have to worry about their aircraft being in the skies. They are hopefully far enough away, that their equipment will not be able to pick them up either. They do need to approach the aircraft from an angle where they do not see them coming, even maybe just a flash of light, if the sun catches them in their approach. They are banking on the craft not having the sophisticated detection equipment that has picked them up, on the inward journey the first time to the USA.

  Bar takes them up into the sky. He soon catches up with the aircraft, although it is several thousand feet above them. He waits and listens in to their communication channels, to see if they have been spotted. It would appear that they haven’t. He decides to take them in closer. The sooner he can get them where he wants, the more likely they are to succeed in both this part and the final part; getting into the USA. They approach as quickly as he dares and soon he is flying right on the tail of the aircraft, but maybe fifty feet lower. Again they listen in to see if they have been picked up. Nothing is being said in the cockpit to concern them. Bar takes them right under the airplane and searches for a secure place for them to continue with this journey. There is nowhere obvious, so he attaches their craft to the underside of the airplane. Hopefully they can fly like that and then, when the undercarriage is put down for landing, they can then move in to the recess for that, for the landing itself.

  As they reach the coast, the plane is approached by a couple of fighter planes, but after a minute, they leave the airplane alone to carry on to its destination. They must have been checking that Vee and Bar were not flying near to the airplane. Obviously they felt they would be able to detect that. They did not suspect that they might be able to actually attach their craft to the airplane.