The Touchstone

by Andrew Norriss

  ‘I suspected as much when you sent me the message.’ Kai smiled as she settled herself into a chair. ‘Fear not, Douglas! I owe you a life debt. If your request is within my power, you have my word that I shall not hesitate to grant it. What is it you want me to do?’

  The flat screen that Quomp had given Ivo showed a picture of the road ahead with a dotted green line indicating the route they should take and even warning of hazards like roadworks or traffic jams. It was a lot easier to use than a map and they were making good progress until, after about an hour, they came to a small village. They had slowed to turn right up a hill when a car shot out of the drive on their left and crashed straight into the side of the Toyota.

  The car was an elderly Volvo that looked as if it had been involved in several accidents before. Inside, with only her eyes and the top of her head visible above the steering wheel, was an elderly, white-haired lady.

  ‘I'm so sorry,’ she said when Quomp came round to see if she was all right. ‘I was trying to reverse into the garage. I must have got the wrong gear.’

  ‘Are you hurt?’ asked the Guardian.

  ‘No, no, I'm fine.’ The old lady was fumbling in the glove compartment of the car. ‘I've got my insurance certificate in here somewhere…’

  ‘Please don't worry about it,’ said Quomp. ‘As long as no one was hurt, I suggest we forget about it and…’

  ‘But your car!’

  ‘It's nothing.’ Quomp glanced at the crumpled side doors of his own vehicle and waved a hand dismissively. ‘A mere scratch.’

  ‘It looks like more than a scratch to me.’ A policeman had appeared and was staring at the damage, shaking his head. ‘What happened?’

  ‘It's nothing,’ said Quomp. ‘We've already agreed to…’

  The policeman held up his hand. ‘One thing at a time, sir. One thing at a time.’ He turned to the old lady. ‘What did you do this time, Doris?’

  ‘Is this going to take very long?’ asked Ivo when the Guardian came back to the car.

  ‘Gedrus tells me it may take some minutes to sort out.’ Quomp was holding the Touchstone in his fingers and looking anxiously at his watch. ‘But unfortunately, he also believes we have very few minutes to spare.’

  Douglas had spent most of the last two days working out what he should say when this moment came but now it had arrived it still wasn't easy to find the right words.

  Kai was looking at him expectantly.

  ‘Well,’ he said eventually, ‘you know when I found you in the garden, you told me you had to take the Touchstones back to your planet so you could win the war you were fighting and free your people?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Kai. ‘You earned the gratitude of myself and all my people that day.’

  ‘Right,’ said Douglas, ‘and when you get home you're going to ask Gedrus how you can win the war and overthrow the tyrant.’

  Kai nodded. ‘Preparations have already begun. My plans are laid.’

  ‘Yes,’ Douglas hesitated. ‘Well, I wondered if that was what you really wanted.’

  Kai smiled. ‘I can promise you, I have wanted nothing else since I was a child.’

  ‘Isn't what you really want,’ said Douglas, ‘just to do whatever is best for your people?’

  Kai frowned. ‘The best thing for my people would be the overthrow of the tyrant that enslaves, tortures and imprisons them, and has robbed them of their freedom.’ The smile had faded from her lips and, with her right hand, she was lightly fingering the Touchstone round her neck. ‘What exactly is your request, Douglas?’

  ‘You could be right, about winning the war being the best thing for your planet, but…’ Something in the way Kai looked at him was making Douglas distinctly nervous, ‘but I wondered if it was worth checking, you know? With Gedrus?’

  Kai was very still now. Not even her fingers moved as she held the stone around her neck.

  ‘That's my request,’ said Douglas. ‘That's why I came here. I'd just like you to ask Gedrus what's the best thing to do with the stones you took. What's the best thing for your people.’

  Kai still did not move or speak but her eyes bored into Douglas, every muscle in her body was tense and suddenly –

  ‘You've been caught!’ She spat out the words as she sprang to her feet. ‘The Guardians found you and sent you here, didn't they!’ Reaching across the table, she grabbed Douglas by the front of his shirt and hauled him to his feet. ‘They told you to come here, didn't they?’ Her grip tightened. ‘Answer me!’

  Douglas managed to nod his head.

  ‘Who? Who found you?’

  ‘He's called Quomp. He's the Guardian for the Seventeenth Quadrant.’

  ‘Aaarrrgh!’ With a great roar Kai threw him to one side so that his head and arm banged sharply against the wall and he fell to the floor, stunned, and with an excruciating pain in his shoulder.

  Kai was striding across the room to the ship, shouting as she went, ‘A trap! A trap! And I walked into it like a three-week-old cub!’

  As she spoke she was stabbing rapidly at the buttons and switches on a control panel beneath the ship and, a moment later, a deep humming of energy pulsed through the floors and ceiling with a power that literally made Douglas's hair stand on end. The lights dimmed and, in the centre of the floor, the Harrier began to glow, the dull green of its paintwork covered in a flickering, luminescent blue.

  ‘No!’ Douglas was struggling to his feet, despite the pain in his head and arm. ‘You don't understand.’

  Kai had left the control panel and was striding across to one of the workbenches, which she threw to one side as if it had been made of paper, and knelt on the floor.

  ‘I trusted you, Douglas Paterson!’ She spun round and pointed a finger at him. ‘And you have betrayed me to my enemies.’

  Kneeling on the ground, she lifted a steel trapdoor and reached down into a hole in the floor.

  ‘Please!’ Douglas walked towards her, clutching his elbow. ‘I haven't betrayed anyone. It's only me. It's not a trap. There's nobody else, I promise.’

  ‘If you believe that, you're an even bigger fool than I am.’ Kai pulled out the case that Douglas immediately recognized as the one containing the two remaining Touchstones. ‘They have used you to find me. And I let them.’

  ‘The Guardian wanted me to make you ask the question,’ said Douglas. ‘That's all. That's the only reason I'm here. You have to ask Gedrus if what you are doing will help your people.’

  ‘You think I need to ask a librarian if fighting for freedom is the right thing to do?’ With the case under one arm, Kai was striding back towards the ship, picking up a helmet and a jumpsuit on the way. ‘You think I would let someone else decide if my people should be allowed to suffer or for how long?’

  ‘But you have to ask him,’ Douglas pleaded. ‘That's what Gedrus is for! Maybe he'll say it's all right. Maybe he'll say there's something better you could do, but you have to ask him. You promised!’

  ‘I promised to pay a life debt to you, Douglas.’ Kai was standing beneath the Harrier, pulling on the jumpsuit over her other clothes. ‘Not to the puppet master who told you to contact me because it was the only way to track me down.’

  ‘But he didn't!’ said Douglas. ‘I'm not here because the Guardian told me to come. I'm here because Gedrus said it was the best thing to do.’

  Kai had pulled the suit up over her arms and was strapping a weapons belt round her waist.

  ‘And did Gedrus also tell you that choosing to do the best thing might be dangerous?’

  She came striding over to Douglas, to stand directly in front of him. He never saw the weapon in her hand, but the beam of light that came from it slammed into his chest with the force of a steam train and sent him fifteen metres backwards to land with a bone-breaking crash against the wall behind.

  Oddly, as he slid down to the ground, the one thought that came into his mind was that being shot must have done something funny to his eyes. As he stared at the wall opposite, par
ts of it seemed to be bulging inwards. Like paint under the heat of a flame, sections of the corrugated iron were blistering up in great bubbles. At the same time the air filled with an acrid smell and energy crackled visibly round the room in blue and yellow sparks that danced from workbench to workbench.

  A second later one of the bubbles burst and, at head height, a swarm of metal objects the size of tennis balls flew into the room spitting flashes of light. Kai, standing on the ladder, poised to climb into the Harrier, used the weapon in her hand to shoot back at them, hitting the first six, one after the other with impossible speed and accuracy.

  Douglas watched as the balls tumbled to the ground but already more of them were pouring in through the hole in the wall. One of them landed on the front of the Harrier and, a moment later, both it and most of the nosecone disappeared in a blaze of light. Kai, meanwhile, had shot down a dozen more but then one settled on the back of her neck, buzzing like an angry bee. She raised a hand to pull it away but before she could reach it, a glazed look came over her eyes, her hand fell and she pitched backwards off the ladder and fell crashing to the ground.

  She did not move.

  Above her more of the flying balls swarmed around the room, finally taking up their station in a great circle round the walls – and there was silence.

  Douglas was finding it difficult to concentrate. His vision was blurring and the pain in his chest made it almost impossible to breathe, but he saw the shape that emerged through the hole in the wall. It was a squat, broad figure, encased in black metal, and it lumbered its way across the floor with a gentle whirring noise, straight over to where Douglas lay.

  The pain in his chest was getting worse as the figure halted by his feet, raised its arms and pulled off its helmet to reveal the round and slightly sweaty face of Guardian Quomp. The Guardian knelt down and put a hand behind Douglas's head. Douglas found to his relief that the pain disappeared almost at once.

  ‘I'm sorry,’ he said. ‘I tried to persuade her…’

  ‘It doesn't matter,’ said Quomp.

  ‘I tried everything but she wouldn't listen…’

  ‘Don't talk. Just rest.’ The Guardian smiled reassuringly and then, amazingly, there was Ivo, white-faced, peering over his shoulder.

  ‘It's OK, Doug. You're going to be fine.’ Ivo turned to the Guardian. ‘He is going to be all right, isn't he?’

  Quomp did not answer. He was busy strapping something to Douglas's arm. Douglas's eyes closed as he worked.

  ‘I tried to tell her…’ His voice was barely audible. ‘But she wouldn't listen. I'm sorry… so sorry…’ His head lolled to the side and a moment later he stopped breathing.

  ‘He's dead!’ Ivo's voice was shrill and panicky in the silence. ‘We should have got here earlier! He's dead!’

  ‘I know he's dead!’ Quomp reached forward to tear open Douglas's shirt and a jet of blood shot up in the air. ‘Now if you could please step out of the way, I have a great deal to do.’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  ‘Lightning?’ said Mr Paterson. ‘Lightning?’ Mrs Paterson nodded. ‘Ivo saw it happen. There was a thunderstorm in the afternoon, Douglas was walking down the road and the lightning hit him in the chest.’

  ‘There was this sort of flash,’ said Ivo, ‘and there he was, flat out on the ground.’

  The three of them were standing in the waiting area of the County Accident and Emergency Unit. Mr Paterson had got the phone call when his plane landed at Luton, and had driven straight to the hospital where he found Mrs Paterson and Ivo already waiting.

  ‘Is he all right?’ Mr Paterson looked rather shaken. ‘Is he badly hurt?’

  ‘He was very lucky,’ said Mrs Paterson. ‘Ivo called for help and that man was passing.’ She pointed across the waiting room to where Quomp was trying to get a cup of tea from the drinks machine. ‘He turned out to be a doctor.’

  ‘He got Douglas breathing again,’ Ivo explained, ‘and then brought us both to the hospital.’

  When the Guardian came over to join them, Mr Paterson took his hand and shook it.

  ‘Ivo tells me you saved our son's life.’ He pumped the hand vigorously up and down. ‘I don't know how to thank you.’

  ‘I'm only glad I was there in time to help.’ Quomp retrieved his hand and dabbed with a tissue at the tea that had spilled on his sleeve. ‘It was a nasty accident.’

  ‘He's going to be all right, isn't he?’ asked Mrs Paterson anxiously. ‘He's not in any danger?’

  ‘I don't think there'll be any lasting effects, but of course it's not really me you want to ask.’ The Guardian pointed to a man in a white coat who had come into the waiting room. ‘That's the hospital doctor over there.’

  As Mr and Mrs Paterson hurried away to hear the latest news from the doctor, Ivo turned to the Guardian.

  ‘He is going to be all right, isn't he?’ he asked.

  ‘Unconscious for about eight hours,’ said Quomp, ‘physically a bit shaky for a couple of weeks but after that, absolutely fine. Could you give him a message for me, when he wakes up?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Ivo. ‘What is it?’

  ‘It's three things really. First, if you could ask him not to contradict the lightning story. It would save everyone a great deal of trouble if he didn't say anything about aliens and spaceships and being killed. I know he's not good at telling lies but perhaps he could say he doesn't remember too clearly how he was injured? I doubt they'll question him very closely, and you can always fill in the blanks. You don't mind telling untruths yourself, do you?’

  ‘No,’ said Ivo. ‘It's never been a problem.’

  ‘Good!’ The Guardian took a quick look round to check no one was watching, stuck his nose in the tea and determinedly sucked it up in one long, gurgling breath. ‘Second, if you could tell him I'm sorry not to be here when he wakes up, but that I'll be back in a couple of weeks and we'll sort out any problems then.’

  ‘You're not staying?’ asked Ivo.

  ‘I wish I could,’ Quomp put down his cup, ‘but I have to get Kai into custody, return the Touchstones to a Federation safepoint, write my report, then sort out a crisis on Trition V…’ He sighed. ‘It's always the same story. Too many problems, not enough Guardians.’ He looked over at Mr and Mrs Paterson. ‘I'd better be going before someone asks for my name and address. Look after Douglas for me and I'll see you in a week or two.’

  ‘Um, you said there were three things to tell him,’ said Ivo, ‘and you've only told me two.’

  ‘Oh yes.’ The Guardian paused in the doorway and smiled. ‘Tell him he did well. Tell him he did very well indeed.’

  Ivo went round to see Douglas straight after school the following day. His foot was still in plaster but Mrs Paterson picked him up at the school gates and drove him to the hospital.

  ‘He woke up some time in the early hours,’ she said, ‘and he's been asking to see you all day.’

  She took him to the ward where Douglas was lying in a bed in the corner, with a tube running out of his arm to a plastic bottle hanging on a pole. Then she went off to get the latest report on his progress from the staff nurse.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ asked Ivo.

  Mostly Douglas was feeling very confused. The last thing he remembered was lying on the floor of the barn while Quomp told him not to talk and now he was in a hospital bed with everyone telling him he'd been struck by lightning.

  When they asked him what he remembered, he wasn't sure what he should say. He wasn't sure of a good many things, and his first instinct had been to reach for the Touchstone round his neck and ask Gedrus for advice. But the Touchstone wasn't there. He had asked his mother to check the pockets of his trousers but it wasn't there either. It wasn't anywhere, and a part of him had always known that it wouldn't be. Only Guardians were allowed to have Touchstones. Quomp had been very definite about that.

  ‘The lightning,’ said Ivo, ‘is a story Gedrus made up. It explains why there's a scar on your chest, and you're a bit weak
and so on. I told them you were walking back from being at my house when you were hit, and all you have to say is that you can't really remember anything.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Douglas. ‘And what really happened?’

  ‘Well…’ Ivo took a deep breath. ‘What really happened was that you were dead – not for very long, fortunately, because Quomp put you back together – and then he brought you here to the hospital and I rang your house.’

  ‘But how did you find me?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘How did you know where I was?’

  ‘Ah!’ Ivo nodded. ‘That was the pellets. I planted these pellets in your clothes – one in your coat, one in your bag, a few more in other places later on. They were made of this metal that doesn't exist anywhere else so we could follow you with a detector. Quomp asked me to do it that evening when he took me home but I said only if he'd let me come with him.’ He paused, then added, ‘It was all right for me to do that, wasn't it? Only you did say doing whatever Quomp said was the best thing, didn't you?’

  ‘Yes, I did.’ Douglas stared at the ceiling. ‘What happened next?’

  ‘Well, when Kai picked you up we followed you in the car. I thought we'd be following you in some sort of spaceship but Quomp said if we used a ship it would show up on the Federation search screens and then Kai would find out about us from Gedrus. Anyway, the car was quite fast enough, or it would have been but then this old lady backed out of her drive and it was ten minutes before we could get away and even when we got to the barn, it was very difficult to get in. Quomp had about a hundred buzzbots – that's these little robots,’ Ivo cupped his hands as if holding a tennis ball, ‘about this big, that fly around and do anything you want, really amazing – but Kai had set up all these defence mechanisms he wasn't expecting and, even when he did get in, it was ages before the buzzbots knocked everything out. Quomp said it lasted longer than any other firefight he could remember. About five and a half seconds.’

  There were sections of this story that Douglas did not entirely understand, and even larger sections that he did not understand at all, but one thing at least had become clear.