The Camper: First Contact and the Planet Tamer (The Stellar Universe Book 0)

by Richard C Holmes

  “Please hold for the President to the United States,” was a phone call that no one could ignore and especially so the ranking officer on the aircraft carrier USS Obama at the center of a task force, stationed off the Colombian coast.

  "Admiral Smeaton, Robert Young, I have an urgent order Admiral."

  The Admiral was surprised but this President was well and truly in his good books, "Sir!" was all he said, but in a way that he hoped covered his readiness and not a hint of hesitation.

  "Admiral I have been reliably advised that if you fly a plane into the zone it will be a, how was it put, a 'barely survivable event' I believe the terms is. Consequently you are ordered to not do so. I would appreciate you advising me what zone and where!"

  The Admirals eyes nearly clicked, "One second sir, I'll pass that order down right now as we are about to do just that very thing.”

  The President heard some urgent orders passed, muffled, then, "Sir sorry, we were only a few minutes from doing that. The zone appears to be a large dark area, a sort of shield or hemisphere of something covering the jungle. It’s maybe ten miles or so across and half that high. No light is getting out, its an impenetrable barrier. NSA and CIA requested this tasking to the Joint Chiefs."

  He listened and did not feel enlightened. "Admiral I presume then it is both unusual and extremely interesting?"

  The Admiral could only concur, "Yes sir, satellite imagery shows just a black dome, an area like its been cut out of the jungle. NSA were excited about it. All their assets failed to penetrate it."

  After he finished the call, quickly, it was obvious to him that Kate had somehow done this and it was part of her plan. The 'end game' she called it. That confirmed it, and in their planning sessions she hadn’t mentioned this part at all.

  His next call to the NSA Director was not much more enlightening.

  "George, Robert Young. I've canceled all overflights in the Colombian jungle where the dark zone is. I was advised it was a 'barely survivable event' should it be overflown, however what can you tell me about what is happening down there?"

  As he sat in the 'Oval' listening, he went from surprised to incredulous when the Director of the NSA started with, "Sir the most notorious vicious warlord in South America has summoned about half of his army into one area to hunt down and eliminate a woman causing them grief. We’ve heard running gun battles for much of the night and early morning on radio intercepts, buildings burned down, screaming, in what looks like a one sided war. Just a short time ago the area at the center of the conflict was covered by some kind of barrier blocking out all observation. That's when I got onto the Joint Chiefs for a recon fly over or through."

  He looked at the phone as if it were an instrument of disinformation but he knew Director Joseph was the straightest of the straight.

  "Director you said Raymond was pursuing a woman? A gun battle? Half his army?"

  The Director came back with, "Sir, yes to all of those. Voice intercepts indicate a woman has caused all the trouble and Raymond is about to have a coronary unless she is nailed soon. He sounded frantic."

  ---oOo---

  Raymond looked up then around. It was dark, pitch black everywhere he looked but he could still hear. The jungle was never silent, but it was now. It sounded like every sound had been silenced, it was as if the whole jungle was doing what he had just done; looked up, looked around and wondered what was happening. And he felt fear. Building. Coming from nowhere. Building.

  As time passed however the sounds came up, he could hear the other men around him shouting in disorientation, calling out. A few had torches that they turned on but they worked poorly, instead of turning on a beam of light, they lit briefly then faded out to nothing, their light extinguished by whatever it was.

  Then just a minute or two after the darkness fell, into the near silence everyone heard it clearly. Very clearly as if she was right beside them, each and every one of them deep into their brains, "I have come, the gate is open," then silence again.

  Slowly, over just a minute, every single man present then started to feel uncomfortable. Then as the seconds ticked down it became worse, the distant feeling of unease and fear grew into more than just a distant nervous feeling. It became stronger, it solidified then it became tangible. Every single man felt himself tensing up till every muscle was locked rigid in terror, a terror that gripped them cutting off every other thought.

  Breathing became difficult as the terror gripped their throats like a strong hand choking them.

  As the seconds passed the terror grew until the screaming started, full deep screams of grown men in terror.

  For a minute it lasted. Nearly ten thousand men tipped their heads to the blackened sky then screamed with all their might. For the second minute they screamed, then the volume started to reduce as they collapsed into unconsciousness from terror or oxygen starvation or both. In the third minute few remained conscious till in the fourth minute there was silence again.

  ---oOo---

  Raymond had passed out in the second minute, his body falling limp to the ground, like when the strings to a puppet are cut. He lay on the ground unable to move, dead to the world, all his energy sapped.

  When he awoke it was light again. He looked up to see the sky above him. He looked down and around to see his men, some vomiting deeply into the dirt, others slowly coming to consciousness. He also felt like he would vomit but as he got to his knees then kneeling on his hands and knees with his head down he felt a little better.

  Looking at the ground, looking around slowly, he found himself looking at a woman's shoes, then her ankles then her knees.

  "Raymond it is impolite to look at ladies legs like that. Stand up please," she said.

  His hand went to his pistol but she smiled, "Raymond do you truly think you can shoot me? Your only chance is to do what I want. Stand up now."

  He relaxed his hand slowly, his addled brain realizing that she was quite correct. The better part of half his army had so far failed to capture or kill her, or even get close he was thinking.

  "Raymond," she said when he was finally standing, "I am ready to kill you all. Nearly ten thousand of you. You made it easy for me by bringing them all into this area so I don’t have to hunt them down. It would be but the work of a moment to overload your nervous systems. Thank you."

  He stood looking down at her, shaking his head, wondering what she was saying. Had he done what she wanted? Him having nearly half his far flung army here was unusual. He looked around seeing his men, his fighters laying on the ground, coughing, many retching, others laying unconscious still from what she’d done.

  She raised a finger, "Raymond behold a fate," then she tipped the finger and pointed to a bare patch of ground. Seemingly like oil flowing upward something started to form. At first it was just a dark area. Then it got darker. Then it rose up slowly till it was almost as tall as the girl but it was three times wider. As he watched features started to form, eyes, a mouth, a nose. Then it began moving from side to side, just a little as if it was testing its limits, like a dog testing its lead.

  "Raymond he is the demon of the underworld, infinitely hungry, infinitely cruel, unstoppable. If I release him he will feed on you. His legion of brothers is himself, all are one, one is all. A feast of ten thousand would be welcome to him, none would withstand his hunger."

  As he watched another rose up a short distance away, then another and another till in the area around him he saw hundreds. Hundreds and hundreds. "Raymond, a million of him is still him, each hungry, each unstoppable but every single one a small piece of the same."

  Then the terror filled him, moved into him to inhabit every piece of his body. He felt the evil coming off the demon as it looked at him swaying. He could feel its desire to devour him, to rip the flesh from his bones.

  "Raymond would you like to reconsider my offer? I can assure you that it’s the best offer you'll get today, possibly the last offer of your life, if you make the wrong decision. However I wou
ld understand if you feel you can't go on any more, if you want to shed the burden."

  He understood that threat very well. Almost no part of his body did not hurt like the devil. His brain felt like it was bruised, hurting, barely able to string a sequence of thoughts together but this he understood.

  "Woman what you ask is impossible! How will I keep control if I change, if I do what you ask. You might as well kill me now."

  ---oOo---

  The demon illusion mixed with raw fear was her ultimate threat, her ultimate projection. Tinging it with the terror, it struck deep into Raymond and his army into a primal race-memory place normally kept locked away, only opening slightly in the worst of nightmares.

  She’d damaged their senses, made them so susceptible to suggestion she could have made them think there were naked voluptuous women in front of them but women would have been harder as they’d have been out of place. Easier was something that provoked the terror she was feeding back into their minds. This primal fear monster, the bogey man of legend, was pure elemental fear.

  Now she knew she had him. He’d given in, surrendered control to even reconsider her offer, but he was now looking for an excuse for what she wanted him to do.

  He was looking for someone or something else to be responsible now that he had failed.

  Time to give him a different kind of kicking.

  “Raymond are you a man or a child still? Do you want to wail at the fates denying you everything instead of making your own way in life? I expected better of you. Now do you want excuses or do you want to accept my offer and make it work? Quickly now. Make up your mind."

  She waited just a few seconds.

  "Raymond! WAKE UP. You've seen a small portion of what I can do. Do you honestly believe I came here without having a path to follow to make it work when you accept my plan? It is not an easy plan, it will require you to work and work hard but my plan will succeed."

  She watched Raymond close his eyes, she saw his shoulders slump. She saw he knew he was beaten, there was nowhere he could go; she understood that, she’d engineered it carefully.

  Now or within the next few minutes he knew she could kill him and his army or he could accept her offer. At least he believed it.

  She could see what he would choose, it was quite obvious; the thought of an immediate and horrid death or something later that was not certain, it made the choice easy.

  "What will you do if I accept then?"

  She knew with this question his acquiescence was only moments away. "I shall work with you so that you prosper. You have seen me as an enemy working against you, what would I be like working FOR you? Think about that. Do you think I don't have a plan? I told you I had a plan. Why are you not listening?"

  His head dropped, then he nodded slowly. What else could he do?

  ---oOo---

  Diversion

  AK+3 (cont)

  Returning to the Secretary of State’s coveted office she was smiling as she did her level best to confuse and confound him. He needed it, he needed something to shake him a little to free up his mind from ‘the normal’, things he’d accepted as excuses for failure.

  They’d been talking about her role, how she was working to reduce the drugs trade and make changes that saw to it’s eventual demise.

  “No,” she said to the Secretary of State when Columbia came round, “actually Raymond and I bonded, in a slightly one sided way. We have reached an accommodation, an understanding. If you were to approach him, you’d find him to be surprisingly receptive to suggestions especially if there is aid attached.” She was leaning back on the settee looking relaxed and comfortable.

  “An accommodation? With Raymond? Raymond Garcia, the warlord? How did you do that?”

  She chuckled, “You just need to know how to ask. Get his undivided attention. Make it known he needs to pay attention and take options seriously. That’s the trick.”

  He shook his head, “No Kate, I’m doubting you now. Raymond’s been our number one enemy in South America for a dozen years. How did you ask him, what did you do? Come on. Level with me, it’s a trust thing.”

  She shook her head slowly. “Only works for me, but basically I bullied him. Badly.”

  She saw the disbelief and confusion.

  He was shaking his head slowly from side to side. “Trust Kate. Without trust what have we got? Am I on the team or not?”

  He had her with that one. She sighed slowly. “All right then. I threw grenades at him, but only little ones, mostly. I burned down his office and garage. I ah, terminated some of his soldiers, I put feces into his coffee pot then when he had the inevitable diarrhea, I put a grenade in the toilet pan.”

  She smiled sweetly at his horror.

  “Those were the nice bits. I threatened to kill him and his army of ten thousand and change if they didn’t accept my generous offer. I convinced him that I’d summoned a demon from the underworld to eat him and his army unless he did what I wanted.”

  Cliff shook his head from side to side, “A demon? What are you talking about?”

  She smiled, “Sir, I overloaded their senses and brought up images, along with suggestions and tons of fear, that a demon was about to devour them. I can project fear, raw emotions, forcefully and directly into brains.”

  “How Kate? A machine?”

  She shook her head slowly, “Our brains work with electrical signals. Mine is receptive to them which lets me feel intentions, but also I can project. With effort I can make others in a small area feel what I want. Terror, raw naked terror is a primal feeling I can trigger surprisingly easily. Raymond felt that.”

  “So then,” Cliff said slowly, “you have bullied a warlord into accepting your idea for the region. You want me to meet with him. Why should I?”

  Some days it was difficult keeping a civil tongue in her head. This was one of those days. Visiting her island was feeling just so good. A swim in the lagoon, a hot tub as the sun set, a walk in the evening listening to the insects. She let her mind wander for a moment, looking for calm. She was almost there.

  “Sir, because you will create and win at every possible level. Firstly, with the aid you will offer Raymond, he will begin to develop the region. Tourism, raw materials, housing, farming will and must all replace the drugs based economy he now has. Cost to this administration will be a few billion. Payback in the destruction of the drugs trade in Colombia will be ten times that. You get that on your resume’.” She smiled at him. “I want you to steal every single bit of credit you can. I want you to make it work and bring the spotlight onto the success you create. That matters. I don’t exist in this.”

  He nodded. She was consistent.

  ---oOo---

  The Camper. Part 2

  Timeline AK+10

  It had been a dozen years since Resident and Companion first sat then chatted long into the early hours. They’d talked about possibilities, of where the human race was going and the likelihood of extinction. He’d always been pessimistic about the survival of the race, but the way Resident put it, it left him feeling almost depressed and that wasn’t normal for him.

  During the day he’d wandered the bush. He’d walked beside the small stream and listened to the chuckle of the water over the rocky creek bed, then he’d wondered what it was to be human. What was it?

  Was it the ability to laugh, to cry, to communicate and learn? Those sounded like grand ideas and ideals.

  Then he’d wondered if it was the ability to wipe its own species out? That was right up there as a possibility but Resident had said it happened to other species so it wasn’t unique to the human race.

  ---oOo---

  Over the following years they’d met a few times when he went camping.

  Each time they chatted, sat quietly then 'shot the breeze', something he enjoyed mightily especially if he wasn’t completely sober. Each time Companion came also, flopping by the fire, enjoying the flames.

  He wondered if it was a 'male thing', sitting by the fire s
taring into the flames. Was it the fire meshing with testosterone, maybe harking back to primitive times when hunter-gatherers sat round the fire? He would have to ask some women friends.

  Companion had also visited by himself to spend an hour by the fire. He’d greeted Companion with, "Hello friend, sit a while and enjoy," which they had done in companionable silence. Eventually Companion had stood, looked him in the eye, nodded as if to say 'thanks for the company' then run off into the night to explore and enjoy the darkness.

  The contact cheered him up as sometimes he'd felt lonely and isolated which was silly. He came out here to be alone but maybe that was part of being human.

  Maybe then, being contrary was to be human? He could add that to the list.

  ---oOo---

  He went camping regularly, at least a few times each year in the more mild months when the weather was benign and conducive.

  For this trip he’d been here a few days, with a few more to go before food ran out. His need for escape may have dwindled but now he was into his first single malt and enjoying it immensely. The fire was burning brightly warming his front, face, legs, making them as warm as toast. The padding on his chair kept his back warm then a beanie on his head capped off the experience perfectly. For internal warmth, a single malt did the trick.

  As camping trips went, this was pretty much ideal.

  ---oOo---

  The New Genus

  He was just sitting quietly thinking about Resident, mulling over the visits he’d enjoyed so much, wondering what Resident was doing now when he heard, "Hello the camp, permission to approach," in a woman's voice.

  Luckily he'd only had the one single malt else he might have commented in a sarcastic tone asking if this was some kind of way station or crossroads for people to pop in and out of. The next thought was that this one was female and young sounding. A serious bonus.