Ms. Alverez began by saying, “You have a beautiful city here and I was most impressed by the colorful diversity of your citizens. I find it hard to believe that you built such a city in only 10 years.” Paul smiled, and replied, “I didn’t build it. I had a lot of help from a lot of very talented people. While the city you just traveled through was being built, there were eight others under construction at the same time. I owe it all to my Uncle Ken Verron and my Architect Benny Barry and a few thousand others. If you have time, I would be glad to show you some of the planet and not just Capital City.” The very proper Ms. Alverez politely informed Paul, “Unfortunately, I am not here for a vacation but to request your presence in Washington to appear before a Congressional Investigative Committee. There are several issues concerning relations with Verron and the House and Senate would like clarification on these issues. She then handed him a nicely folded blue document across his desk. He picked-up the paper and opened it to see the subpoena. He slowly folded the document and politely handed it back to the confident looking attorney. He paused a moment, then said, “Ms. Alverez, you and the members of this committee have obviously mistaken me for someone who actually gives a damn what you want. If Mr. O’Neal or his cronies in Congress want to speak with me, my office is open and I will be glad to discuss any issues they may have. Sorry you made the trip for nothing.” He looked at his watch then continued, by saying, “If you hurry, you should be able to make the 1 o’clock shuttle to Washington from Success. Nice making your acquaintance.” He rose from the desk and with a smile on his face, he asked, “Inga, will you see to it that Ms. Alverez is not delayed. She has a shuttle to catch back to D.C.” Inga had been working very close to Paul and could tell that through his pleasant smile he was about to explode. She immediately replied, “I’ll take her to the travel center myself” then turned to escort Deputy Assistant Attorney General Alverez out of the office. When Inga returned, there was a note on her desk, saying, “Gone for a run – may not come back – ever.” Inga loved Paul like a brother and knew how much he hated stupid political games. Ms. Alverez told Inga why she was there. If she had been a man, Paul probably would have thrown her out himself. She knew she may not see Paul for a couple of days and went into his office to finish his paperwork or pass it on the Zimuel.
Paul took over two hours to drain off his steam. Halfway through his run he calmed-down enough to think clearly and sort through his usual analytical thought processes. He wondered how he could love a place so much and hate it at the same time. He really did want nothing but the best for the people of Earth, but everywhere he turned he ran into resistance from those who wanted things their way. He then thought about how God must look at him and everyone else. It seemed God had been dealing with the same problem for years and he hadn’t given up on humans just yet. Paul tried to remind God that he was only human and knew when he half prayed it and half thought it, that God would remind him that it wasn’t his responsibility to be anything but a human. He realized that if he could think like God and act like God then he would be God and that just wasn’t about to happen. God had given him instructions and it was his job to follow them, whether anyone else agreed with it or not was irrelevant; God was still in charge of the plan. He smiled and thought, “Sometimes I forget that I have a boss too.” He then remembered the bumper sticker he had on his pick-up truck back on Earth that said, “My boss is Jewish Carpenter.” By the time he returned to the Mansion his mind was once again focused on doing as God led him and trying to please God, not man.
As he entered the kitchen he was singing to himself the old Rick Nelson Garden Party song that said, “You can’t please everyone so you got to please yourself.” Inga was in the kitchen with the Queen Mother and Zimuel when he came in. Zimuel was the first to speak, saying, “I approved everything on your desk to get it out of the way. Effective next week gay marriages will be legal on Verron.” Paul knew his friend was joking and got the hint, asking, “Was there anything in that stack on my desk that I needed to look at?” Zimuel responded, “Nothing bad. In fact there were several things that may cheer you up.” Paul shrugged and headed for the shower. Those at the table were surprised he didn’t take time to eat. His mother told the others, “Sometimes he just wants to be left alone, this is obviously one of those times.”
While Deputy Assistant Attorney General Alverez tried to explain Paul Verron’s response to her boss and then to the President’s Chief of Staff and eventually an angry President O’Neal, Paul was on his way to visit people who actually did want him and the Nation of Verron involved in their lives. He once again quoted to himself Philippians 4-8. What he needed to offset the negatives he was dealing with was an over-abundance of positives. He deiced to dwell on all the good things going on. His first stop was Darsai. Every time he went there he was uplifted. This day was to be no different. Instead of announcing himself and heading to the Palace to visit his Governor General, he decided to walk the streets of several of the cities and get a feel for what the attitude was among the people. What he found was a true desire by the people to make Darsai a great place. There was obvious pride in everything they did. He found some of the most beautiful jewelry he had ever seen on display where a man designed and made custom jewelry, art shops and handcrafted furniture. People were driving motorcycles and cars now manufactured on Darsai. Homes were being built everywhere and happy children were playing in the streets and yards. He made a jump to what should have been a more depressed area, the former Kingdom Niccaros. It had been left devastated when Hunter killed their god King and Queen and destroyed their city that held their temple to Nicci. Surrounding the lake where the palace of Nicci once stood was a city spread out for miles. It reminded Paul of pictures he had seen of early Chicago. The place was swarming with farmers and merchants selling their goods. The once dry desert area was now fertile and rich with agriculture. The desalinization systems were pumping fresh water deep into the continent and thousands of jobs had been created.
He decided to go see the Cyclops community. He was well received, even by those who had no idea who he was. When Chief Hesoid recognized Paul, he was upset that he had not told him he was coming. He was embarrassed that he could not show his friend and King his hospitality. When the people realized who Paul was, he was swarmed with well-wishers and people thanking him for the things he had done. The community had prospered since he became their King and the community was living far better than ever before. Several of the big Cyclops soldiers were always near their Chief and Paul let them know how proud he was of them and how thankful he was for them being a part of the defense of Darsai. The 11 to 12 foot tall men in body armor, with only one single viewing port in front of the headgear and extensions made on the top to accommodate their horns, were frightening. They carried Klelta designed weapons given to them by King Hon and 20 of their young men were on Klelta being trained in commando techniques and even developing piloting skills. Paul was glad they were on his side.
Paul knocked around the planet for most of the day and visited several of the new communities started by the Xhondarian transplants. The new residents had discovered iron deposits and were mining and refining iron ore, they had discovered diamond mines already in existence, but greatly increased their production and the seafood business was booming. With newly created fish farms along the coat and fast growing feed formulas for the fish, the operation was shipping tons of fresh fish to Xhondar and Tecalna every day.
Paul made a stop to explore his newest planet, Hope. He hadn’t even been involved with it for a year yet and God had blessed the little planet that almost lost its entire population to the Volvs. The fact that there were any survivors was a miracle in itself. Based on the abandoned settlement and farms across the two continents, it appeared that Hope previously had about 3 million residents. After searching the small islands, an additional 500 people were located who had never been exposed to the Volvs, life as they knew it continued on like normal, except they often wondered what happened to t
he other people who they used to trade with on the mainland, but that number still only left a little over 30,000 original residents. It was refreshing to find an entire community in tack. They were able to offer some insight into the history and customs of the people who had lived there before. When exposed to the technological advances offered by their new leaders, most of the island dwellers opted to remain as they were, with the exception of the medical advantages. Numerous people who had sustained crippling injuries were regenerated and childhood diseases were completely eliminated. They did take quickly to motorized boats that could make the trip to the mainland in hours instead of days. Paul knew it would simply be a matter of time before the entire community modernized like the rest of the planet. They were just glad that there was now a large village for them to sell fish, sponges and tropical fruit to.
The older men on the planet were determined to learn what they could to become soldiers. They were determined to be ready if the Volvs ever came back again. The men had all been young and helplessly watched as their Mothers, Fathers and siblings were drug away by their invaders. Several of the women had a desire to join the Marines as well. Paul was most pleased when he stopped by an empty orphanage. It was now being used as a small hospital with regeneration, rejuvenation and symptom diagnostics available. It also had a full maternity ward. He made a stop by Governor General Dumas’ residence to see if there was anything he could do for him. He was unaware that the 300,000 citizens of Hope had unanimously voted to retain Brigadier General Dumas as Governor if approved by King Verron. Paul knew the Colonel would much rather be out fighting aliens, but agreed with the residents of Hope to leave him in place, but he did decide to make him an actual General and increase the military presence on the planet, he would soon be the commander of an entire garrison to be in place on his planet in a few months, Dumas was thrilled.
Paul was about to make a jump to Beangagarrie then chided himself for being so stupid; he would last about two seconds there like he was dressed. He went back to Verron instead and decided to take Marcus along with him to evaluate the space program of their newest ally. With both of them properly suited-up, he made the gateway to the space center on Beangagarrie to find Commander Alkawara. Over the past few months, the residents of Beangagarrie had grown accustomed to the appearance of the men in metal bodies, as they referred to them. When Paul and Marcus arrived, they were soon escorted across the large production bay to Alkawara. The smiling Commander had been running tests on Verron steel to see if his chemists could bond the alloy from Verron using their chemical weaving process. He escorted Marcus and Paul to a workstation where there were stacks of Verron Steel panels for evaluation. As they watched, the technician took two panels of Verron Steel and laid them end to end against each other. He then used something very similar to a calking gun, with a plural component mixing system, to run a thin bead of chemical along the seam. As they watched, the process began and the bead of activator actually made the two pieces of steel slowly grow and weave together, becoming one solid piece. In minutes Marcus picked-up the now single piece of Verron Steel. Even with his decades of metal fabricating experience, he could not determine where the seam had been. It was simply one continuous piece of steel. Concerned that it may be weaker at the seam, he stacked a dozen completed panels on a skid to take back to Verron for stress evaluations. They would be bent, shot with plasma rounds and even whitematter rounds to see if there was a failure. According to Alkawara, the chemical process made the two pieces become one, just like it did with their stone, plastic and steel structures on Beangagarrie.
Paul had worked for 3M when he was right out of college and felt they were probably the most advanced adhesive manufacturer in the world, but they could never have come up with something like this. If it worked, there would be no need to weld their ships and if they received a rupture in their shell during battle, they could be renewed right on the spot. Alkawara had assured them that the chemical reaction would work even in deep space with no oxygen to feed the reaction; temperature was irrelevant as well.
Paul and Marcus next went to see the Verron team of technicians who were working with the space program on Beangagarrie. They were being housed in an orbiting R4 and commuting to work each day from there. The refitting was nearly finished and about ready for a test flight. The ship that had blown its reactors was being fitted with four Verron whitematter reactors, antigravity reactors, g-reduction system and onboard artificial gravity adjustable to the planets 4.6g gravity. Jon Morgensson was leading the operation and greeted them with a smile, saying, “A few years ago I was watching people assemble Saab Jets and thinking I was working with the best crew in the world. I could not in my wildest dreams imagine that a group of aliens that looked like lizards would far surpass the best of the best I have ever worked with. These guys are brilliant and work like plow-mules, have you seen that stuff they’re doing to bond our steel?” Marcus and Paul indicated they had. Jon continued, by saying, “I took samples to the R4 machine shops for destructive testing and metallurgical analysis. The computer sensors on the R4 could not tell the difference between the seam and the original material. All diagnostics indicated it was one piece; no seam could be detected.” Marcus and Paul toured the ship being retrofitted and were once again amazed by the fact that there was not one square corner or straight line in the ship. It reminded Paul of a honeycomb and as he recalled, honeycomb technology was used to make super-light and super-strong aircraft components on Earth; these people had applied it to an entire ship to make a plastic ship as strong as steel.
Leaving the hanger, Alkawara escorted Paul and Marcus to a nearby warehouse and opened the door. This place was at least as big as a hanger for a large jet airliner; stacked from floor to ceiling, the entire warehouse was filled with pallets of gold bullion. Alkawara smiled and told Paul, “When the young ones were here, they told us of how valuable this substance was in your world. We would like to give this to you for our thanks for saving our ship and helping us to advance our technology. It should fit in the ship you have in our orbit.” Paul wondered where he was going to put it, but politely thanked the man for his generosity. He was then told how gold is used in their electrical wiring and even their plumbing since it was very conductive and corrosion resistant and very cheap to make. It basically had little value on Beangagarrie and was used instead of copper, aluminum or brass.
He then showed them the inside of their control console for a nearby computer system. Where on most PC boards you would see silver, aluminum or copper, everything inside this was gold. Paul wondered what a PC board from here would sell for on Earth. As they were returning to the space center to see if Morgensson needed anything before they left, Alkawara took them to a heavy steel door with an elaborate security system. They entered the door and were in a small control room with a window overlooking a research lab. Alkawara told them, “I can take you no farther. The chemicals on the other side of this viewing port would turn your body armor to nothing in seconds; we have already tested some of the panels you gave us. So far we have found nothing that can resist what we are attempting to develop. The next time we run into the Volvs, it will be a completely different outcome.” Through the window the two Verron’s watched as a tiny drop of liquid was placed in the middle of a 3 foot square piece of Verron steel. At first it looked like nothing happened, then the hole was the size of a dime and in a flash the size of a half dollar, then six-inches and growing exponentially, the panel was disintegrated in seconds; not a trace of the panel exited. Alkawara smiled and said, “We’re still trying to determine how we can deliver the proposed warhead and how we can handle it safely. It absolutely cannot be anywhere near a piece of metal. We will soon figure out how to best handle it then we will be ready for the Volvs.” Paul and Marcus were disturbed that such a thing existed. Neither had ever seen anything that could destroy Verron Steel in seconds. Suddenly Paul felt very vulnerable and was glad these people from Beangagarrie were his friends.
While Paul and
Marcus were on Beangagarrie, Metsis and Robert Lawson were on a training mission to a small moon that orbited a big planet somewhere on the edge of a galaxy called Hoag’s Object, by Earth Astronomers, and galaxy N45 with planet Number 4387 by Xhondar. They weren’t going to Planet 4387; it was only a reference point for one of its small moons that was noted 14,000 years ago: Saying, “sentient species noted – planet can sustain humanoids.” It wasn’t much to go on, but King Paul was determined to eventually explore all 11,387 known worlds discovered by the Xhondarians back when Xhondarians had nothing better to do than spend a lifetime searching for inhabitable planets. So far Metsis had been assigned to explore that horrid bug planet, with millions of varieties of every insect imaginable. Then he was sent to what they assumed was a low oxygen atmosphere desert planet with no known life-forms. Planet 3160 did not have any known life-forms, but did have the disgusting eight-legged sand-dwelling rodent like crabs that were big as a house and always hungry. They didn’t stick around long enough to find out how they survived and as they were leaving, the creatures began to spit giant super-heated balls of molten earth at them. The creatures evidently could ingest the sandy soil and melt it inside their bodies and spit it back out. On a place like that, they would never run out of ammunition. And of course there was the swamp planet filled with things that had not yet evolved enough to crawl out of the primordial ooze. Since the planet had obviously been this way for billions of years, it sort of shot the evolution theory all to pieces; nothing had evolved there.
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