The Zygote Crystal

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The Zygote Crystal Page 7

by Ashley Thomas


  I then looked back to Joosthava and asked her, “Why do you keep appearing and disappearing for goodness sake. It’s very distracting, not to say rather un-nerving.”

  Joosthava just stared fairly blankly at me and said “You excreted all over my hair and face. It wasn’t very nice. I decided to just re-do the whole entrance thing. Cleaning your muck off would have used up useful time.”

  I felt very embarrassed as I replied “Yeh, sorry about that but your hair went a long way past normal when it comes to saying hallo, and I was choking. Anyway, what I meant was how exactly do you keep moving around in time and how come I still remember the whole thing, if we are now in a time space continuum that never actually experienced me regurgitating into your hair and face?”

  Joosthava explains about time and space some more….

  “Space time continuum,” said Cat sneeringly, “Which cereal avatar did you pick that one up from? Bet it was that loopy striped sabre toothed Takh going on about those frosted Starflakes you keep eating for breakfast, lunch and dinner!”

  “Shut up Cat, I wasn’t talking to you,” I said, followed by “So, Joosthava please explain so that I can understand.”

  As I said that that, Cat rose up onto his hind paws before slowly falling flat on to his back exclaiming “Oh Lord, we could be here until the next Millenium!!”

  Meanwhile Joosthava started to explain that the extraordinarily low basal level of micro-atomic activity in the cells of her body enabled her to oscillate them ultimately at frequencies not within the normal human range. I asked her if this was painful and whether dogs could hear her body, but she just blinked a lot and stared at me, rather like Cat often does.

  Anyway, after a brief pause, Joosthava continued. She said that by controlling the differential oscillation of her cells she could generate charged ripples that distorted space time waves in her vicinity, allowing her to move backwards and forwards in time and space. Though she could do this naturally, her capability to move large distances in time was significantly enhanced by packets of time mined from black holes. Normally with her own natural capability she could move herself and small objects, but with sufficient time packets she could move other people or larger objects with her. She could not however always easily control how far back or forward she moved in time nor the physical space that she moved to. She was getting better at this, and was in fact working with TIME-X on a device to enable greater control.

  I could feel my face screwing up as I listened and repeated some of her key words such as ‘oscillation’ and ‘charged ripples’. I found that I understood some of the words like ripples for example, because that was the name of a very popular dream chocolate which I frequently stuffed my face with. To be honest though I wasn’t entirely sure at all what most of the larger words she used meant, or why they were said in the order that they were. I tried to hide this fact by consciously unscrewing my face and trying for my best ‘sage like’ expression with periodic nods.

  My attempts to seem intelligent were however quickly blown by Cat as he said, “Oh for Zizzdum’s sake just give up moron and go and eat a Ripple.”

  I glared at him and asked Joosthava, “So where do you get your time packets from Joosthava?”

  Before she could respond Cat said, “She gets them free in packets of Starflakes you drivel ridden buffoon.”

  Cat wash

  I stood up at that point and politely said to Joosthava, “Excuse me, I think some of Cat’s input ports may be clogged with dirt. Nothing that a good long shower won’t cure.”

  I then picked Cat up by the tail and marched over to the kitchen sonic airwash and dropped him casually into it. As the door slid rapidly closed I could hear Cat yell “You’ll regr….” before he was cut off as the full blast ‘skin the surface of all utensils’ programme kicked in. His voice was mercifully then replaced by the thumps of his Rubanon body bouncing around inside the spherical cleaning container.

  I walked back over to Joosthava and said “It’s way past his bathtime. He really quite enjoys a deep clean. Now then, you were about to say where you get your time packets from?”

  “Yes,” she replied, “Are you sure he’ll be ok in there?”

  “Yes, Yes. He’ll be fine. And clean for a while after thank goodness. Now tell me please, time packets?”

  “Oh yes. Time packets. Well I basically mine them from black holes using a technique that I have developed in recent years,” she said with a smile, showing once again an appreciable expanse of perfect blue teeth as she did so.

  “Yes, I knew that but I’m interested to know how you came to do that and also how you come to be here. We are supposed to be investigating your tax affairs. It’s a little unusual for the person I am investigating to turn up at my home.”

  She peered quizzically and said “Taxes, I don’t pay any taxes.”

  “Ahhh,” I responded, “That might be why we are investigating you I suspect.”

  “I don’t think so,” Joosthava replied. “You see as a government agent I’m exempt from tax, just like Mr. Cat is.”

  At this I roared with laughter and then exclaimed “Cat is not a government agent. He’s a ruddy robot. A bunch of chips, maracles and sub-atomic junction boxes. And he does what I tell him.”

  Just as I finished, Cat, who must have emerged from the sonic cleaner as the wash cycle had ended, sank some claws into my left ankle. I screeched with pain and surprise, lifted up my leg to try to shake him off and promptly fell back to the floor, banging the back of my head once again. This was becoming a regular occurrence. Cat then walked up my prone body and brought his face up close to mine. Both he and this Joosthava woman had no concept of personal space, believe me. Rather unfortunately though for him, the effect of his whiskers tickling the end of my nose caused me to sneeze rather violently again and so this time his face got goo’ed.

  “Oops. Sorry about that Cat,” I said.

  He stared back at me, shook his head vigorously and, as bits of goo flew side to side from his whiskers he said, “We need to go. If we didn’t need to go I might make you suffer more for putting me in the sonic cleaner, not to mention that sneeze. But, we have a job to do with Joosthava.”

  Cat stepped off me and as I slowly stood up I said - “I don’t think the job will last long. She’s already admitted to me she pays no tax - burbled something about being a government agent like you and therefore exempt from tax. However, I told her - you are not a government agent.”

  Cat sighed and replied “It doesn’t really matter what I am. At this point in time we have to focus on the job in hand and we need to start our journey to Messier 31 and work with Joosthava to find out what is going on there.”

  Confusion reigns in my head

  I was now really confused and made Cat understand this very clearly by saying with a healthy hint of heated sarcasm,

  “Just a moment Mr. Cat, let us examine some of the facts of life. You are a robot. A rubbery sort of tin can stuffed full of technology that happens to speak. Your job is to protect me, an Intergalactic Tax Inspector, as I go about my business of dealing, on occasion, with rather unsavoury characters. You exist to help me investigate beings who may owe taxes. So, what is all this nonsense about doing a job with Joosthava and finding out what is going on in some messy place? I refuse to budge one centimetre until you explain all this satisfactorily and I also demand to know why Joosthava called you a government agent like her. I’m getting really very confused and quite stressed as a consequence.”

  As I paused, Cat tilted his head to one side as he always did when he was trying to be nice and said, “Now take it easy boss. It’s all very easy to explain. You see HQ has received intelligence from Joosthava that time mining is taking place at an alarming scale around the black hole known as Messier 31. There are no records of any registered company that could be doing that. The conclusion HQ has reached is that whoever is doing the mining may well be earning a lot of credits by selling the time on, but not paying any taxes. Joostha
va, who knows the Director, happens to be a time mining expert and so the Director thought it would make sense for her to come with us in an advisory capacity. Naturally he would have told you all of this himself but as always he didn’t wish to trouble his best operative with details and left it for me to pass them on.”

  “Ahh,” I said, “Now I understand. We are not investigating Joosthava. She’s working with us. So, the fact she told me that she pays no taxes is something I don’t need to worry about obviously. I expect she was just joking like she was joking about you being a government agent. Ok, got it. Fully appreciate why the Director doesn’t want to bother me with detail. I need my mind uncluttered so that I can concentrate on the tough parts of the operation.”

  As I finished my last sentence I thought I heard Cat muttering something about having to have a mind first before one can unclutter it, but before I could ask him to repeat what I thought he had said he jumped in with, “We really need to get going boss.”

  “Absolutely,” I responded, “Let’s take the express lift to the hovercar bay.”

  “No need for that, we are late so we’ll Fastmove to the lightship using my latest portable eMDaDD,” said Cat.

  “Oh, no”, I said, “Not Fastmove. Not eMDaDD. You know how ill that makes me!!”

  As I backed away from Cat, determined not to be Fastmoved anywhere, he leapt into my arms with a shiny small object held in one of his front paws. I realised too late that this was his latest modified portable eMDaDD. Before I could get the second syllable of ‘Oh poo’ out of my mouth, my mouth was momentarily where poo would ordinarily be. Without warning, I was travelling through space again in that inside outside, topsy-turvy, gut wrenching way that I had come to associate with Fastmoving.

  To the lightship

  Under duress, I was Fastmoved to the flightdeck of our lightship. I actually took full shape again upside down with my head stuck in a gap between two control consoles. Something was also jammed uncomfortably between my buttocks. I found out that it was the only ‘pointy’ lever still needed in a modern lightship. I was sure Cat had made me materialise like this on purpose. Luckily, I was wearing my TZED trousers which were built to protect the more sensitive parts of hoverbike riders. I managed to pull my head out of the gap it was stuck in, extricate myself from the somewhat invasive lever and tumble onto the floor.

  “Was that entirely necessary?” I growled at Cat as I sat up.

  He didn’t look up from the console he was now tapping away at but replied, “We needed to get here fast as we are already behind schedule because of all your blathering with Joosthava. That’s why I used the eMDaDD.”

  “OK,” I said grumpily, “But was it necessary for me to materialise in such an undignified and uncomfortable position?”

  “Hummm” pondered Cat as he looked up, “Necessary, probably not. But funny, very much so. Funnier than the sonic bath was for sure.”

  “Alright,” I replied slowly. “I hope that’s all that’s going to happen because I finally got you to take a bath. At least now you smell a bit better. And speaking of smelling better, where’s Joosthava? If she’s working with us on this mission, where is she? Why didn’t you eMDaDD her?”

  “There was no need. As you’ve already seen, she has her own way of moving about. I’ve no doubt we’ll see her shortly.”

  By this time, I had seated myself on a high stool well away from the offending lever and I was beginning to feel a bit better. Just as I started saying “How soon will we be ready to take off Cat?”, it all happened again.

  That blasted woman, or whatever exactly she was, appeared again out of nowhere a few centimetres from my face, blue teeth flashing. I fell backward in shock once again, as my stomach and bladder contracted, and crashed this time to the floor of the lightship. I groaned and shook my head slowly from side to side. I was sure this time I had broken something, I could feel a sharp pain as I tried to move my lower back. Then, as Joosthava yanked me unceremoniously up from the floor by the neckline of my shirt, I remembered that I had an airpen in my back pocket. I think it must have snapped as I landed and the jagged edge of one of the 2 broken halves was now impaled in the back of my thigh.

  “Why do you keep falling over?” asked Joosthava.

  “I keep falling over because you keep turning up unannounced at the end of my nose. Please don’t do that again,” I responded in an exasperated tone.

  Her face took on a rather sad expression as she said, “I am sorry but whilst I am getting better at determining the time that I move to, I cannot so easily work out the space. It’s easier for me if there is something or someone I can lock onto as I time vault and I’ve been using you. But you are hurt?” she ended in a concerned way.

  I explained what had happened with the airpen in my back pocket and before I knew where I was, she’d sat down on a stool and upended me over her lap. As I marvelled at how strong she was, she pulled the airpen out of my thigh. I let out a sort of stifled squeaky scream while Cat trotted over with a SurgoPod, which she slapped onto the wound to seal it.

  As Cat waddled away, and she shoved me off her lap to the floor I heard him guffaw “Mind you don’t hurt his brains doing that.”

  I clambered to my feet and as rage started to build in me I yelled “I’ve had just about enough. It’s all I can do to deal with the usual God-Cat-Robot-Megalonutter freak from the lab, now I’m getting manhandled and persecuted by a part alien, tax avoiding blue-toothed sadist killer who can’t stand still in space or time for long enough to draw breath. I’m exhausted and we haven’t even left Earth yet!!”

  “Don’t fret,” said Cat, “She won’t be here long.”

  I breathed in deeply and said, “I know that, she normally just stays long enough to take another year off of my life by scaring the poo out of me!”

  And with that she was, unbelievably, suddenly gone again.

  Minus Joosthava again

  I was really exasperated and in a very irritated tone said to Cat, “Look Cat, this is so obviously not going to work. She keeps popping in and out like a Mud Lizard’s tongue. How can we work with her if she’s never here? I thought you said we were in a hurry on this one.”

  “Don’t worry about Joosthava,” Cat responded, “She knows what she’s doing. She’s reconnoitering our journey. She will be back.”

  I grimaced and said despairingly, “Oh no, not again,” before leaping into one of the flight crew chairs and strapping myself in as fast as I could. “Hah, at least this time when she pops back into my face I won’t fall over and hit my head. I’m ready for her. And what do you mean she’s reconnoitering?”

  “To reconnoitre - to survey or inspect an enemy’s position,” said Cat.

  My eyes screwed up as I repeated the word “Enemy, enemy, enemy….what enemy? Is there something you’re not telling me ‘Mr Cat’? In fact I’ve realised I need some answers on a number of things…..”

  “Such as?” enquired Cat.

  “Such as who’s the enemy Joosthava is reconnoitering? Where is this black hole that we’re going to and also, most importantly, when you get to a black hole it’s not like there’s likely to be somewhere to land is there? I’m not an expert on black holes but don’t most living things steer well clear of them as there is a very strong likelihood of getting sucked into the blasted things?”

  Cat wandered over and sat next to me and calmly began to address my multiple questions.

  “Well it’s like this,” he began. “We don’t know there is any enemy but there might be and that is why Joosthava is reconnoitering. You are right, things do get sucked into black holes but we have supersub-atomic electro-neural boosters specially fitted to this lightship. They will allow us to resist the pull of the black hole, should we need to. And, as to where we land, because Messier 31 is being mined there are mining platforms anchored all around the edge of the black hole. So, we’ll head for one of those. Now, are you satisfied?” he ended.

  “Not entirely,” I said a little ‘whinily�
��, “I am nervous about all of this and not knowing what’s going to happen next.”

  “Ok,” said Cat, “Perhaps you need to ask Joosty when she gets back to teach you a bit of time travel. Then you can try to find out what’s going to happen next yourself.”

  “Since when do you get to call her Joosty?” I said.

  “We’ve been friends for a while,” said Cat.

  I looked quizzically at him and said, “ First you tell me you’ve met her and worked with her before. Now you tell me she’s your friend! Since when do you have friends? I’m sure there are things going on here that I am not being fully kept in the loop on as usual!”

  “We don’t really have time to worry about what you don’t know - we’d be here centuries for goodness sake. We really need to take off,” said Cat.

  And she’s back!

  Cat scooted back over to the navigator’s console and started to move his paws over what I expected would be the screen showing the flightpath we were due to take. I felt a gentle vibration through the chair I was still safely strapped into and knew that we were preparing to take off. I began to swivel my chair away from the front viewport to face back again towards Cat, to ask him how long the journey would take. However, I only got about 90 degrees of ‘swivel’ completed before she was there again. Remembering the last time with the hair business I kept my mouth tightly shut, but to my surprise no soft tumbling hair hit me in the face. This time her hair moved in a quite different way.

  She had actually materialised on my lap, her face again no more than a centimetre from my face - talk about invasion of personal space! Then without any warning, I felt the chair tilt backward and it didn’t stop until its back hit the floor. Yet again I was horizontal because of her and yet again there was a thump, although on this occasion the back of my head was cushioned by the back of the chair. Good thinking all round on my part to strap myself in. Goodness, could I be smart at times I thought.

 

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