Chapter 18: Greys and Draconians
‘You’ve done it, you’ve done it you crazy genius!’ said Professor Schriever, slapping
Barry vigorously on the back.
Barry had created the world’s first working anti-matter reactor, the world’s
first machine capable of 100% pure energy conversion, completely bypassing the now
seemingly Stone Age fusion reactor some unimportant mortals had been working on.
The absurdly enormous horsepower the reactor produced, mixed with the anti-gravity
Element 115 gave humanity the opportunity to create a vehicle that rendered all
current air and space transport obsolete.
Working on a hunch after confirming Element 115 served as the one of the
fuel sources for the alien vessel, Barry had managed after months of effort to get this
fairy dust to work in tandem with magnetism. This combined with the raw power of
the anti-matter reactor was a potent mixture, the result being propulsion and
manoeuvrability on a previously unimagined scale.
While the construction of the spacecraft’s body was left to Barry’s lesscapable colleagues, Barry worked on something entirely new. He was sure the alien
craft didn’t use its anti-matter/anti-gravity engine to cross the unimaginably vast voids
in space, as even with the new reactor it would still take many years to reach the
nearest star.
After being confronted with this dilemma he’d originally toyed with the idea
of wormholes, believing at first that the ship might travel through naturally occurring
ones or that it might even somehow create its own. He eventually discarded this idea
though after successfully creating one: it was a genuine wormhole but it became
apparent you couldn’t make one any wider than the width of an amoeba. Obviously it
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goes without saying that you’d never be able to let a ship containing a number of
humans and all their associated paraphernalia pass through something so small.
The theories and giant complex formulas he’d written on his blackboard were
amounting to nothing as the limits in the laws of physics were repeatedly getting in
the way. Every time he thought he came close to discovering the secret of interstellar
travel some pesky law would rear its ugly head. Barry became immensely frustrated
because the damaged alien craft wasn’t much help either, unwilling to shed anymore
light on the riddle of how it got here.
One morning Barry was surprised to find Professor Schriever standing outside his
living quarters.
‘You run like clockwork don’t you Barry? Always out of your room for
exactly 0700 hours, not a minute sooner, not a minute later.’
‘I like to keep to a routine.’
Ever since Barry was a child anything that deviated from his routine made him
feel uncomfortable.
‘You’ve been granted a Triad Level 4 access and you’ve also got full shuttle
clearance for Level 2.’
Barry was surprised by the slackening of the security restrictions upon him
and said: ‘I thought information was only given on a need-to-know basis.’
‘Yes, that’s right it is, but we realise you’ve been trying your best to get man
to the stars and we’ve decided to make an exception in your case. I recommend you
go down to Level 4 and take a look around, you never know, you might find answers
to the questions that torment you.’
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Level 4: Visitor Housing.
Completely unaware of what to expect, but knowing it wouldn’t be nice judging from
the horror his colleague Charles Delve professed to having seen on the lower levels,
Barry braced himself. The doors of the lift that connected Level 3 to 4 opened, after
which it quickly became clear that no amount of bracing would ever be enough. What
Barry saw was so earth shattering he thought the three levels of the Complex above
his head might fall in: Standing only a few feet away from his position was a greyskinned little alien. And this was not just any alien, this was the one that’d abducted
him in the Hickey Woods and boldly stretched his rectal crevice in strange new ways.
Carrying a ghetto blaster on its shoulder the alien danced to the rhythm of
Baccara’s Yes Sir I can Boogie.
‘YOU,’ Barry shouted. ‘YOU!’ he shouted again.
More aliens, attracted by the commotion began to gather round to witness the
spectacle, intrigued to see what the hairless monkey was so angry about. They found
watching the ape stamp its feet great entertainment and began to roar with laughter.
The rapid accumulation of these bi-pedal intelligent species would be a
monstrous situation to face for your average human, but they didn’t—as you might
expect—stifle Barry’s rage: he wanted more than anything to throttle the little git that
had left him with not only severe mental scars, but a rear end that now could
accommodate the winning marrow from The World’s Largest Vegetable Growing
Contest.
Among the aliens was a reptilian species called the Draconians. They were
particularly frightening to look at as they had green scaly skin, lizard eyes and a
forked tongue.
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One of these Draconians spoke above Barry’s tantrum. ‘So Kredendum,
exactly how many Earthlings have you terrorised in your short stay?’
All the aliens laughed heartily except the one called Kredendum. It was now
clear to Barry that this individual had a habit of abusing humanity, and this wasn’t the
first time he’d had a second awkward reunion with one of his abductees.
Kredendum solemnly turned off his ghetto blaster because Baccara’s Yes Sir I
can Boogie, didn’t seem an appropriate backing soundtrack to this sordid and highly
humiliating new episode in his life.
The crowd of aliens, having got their fill of scandal began to filter away until
there was only Barry and Kredendum left standing alone. Barry by now had ceased
shouting. Kredendum steadfastly looked down at his feet in silence until he eventually
decided to at least have a go at explaining himself.
‘I always feel embarrassed and don’t know what to say when this happens.’
Kredendum had not used telepathy to communicate with Barry because he felt
it might scare him as it had done in the woods.
‘Sorry would be a good start.’
‘Sorry,’ said Kredendum. ‘I am trying to change my ways: I’m going to HAA
meetings now.’
‘HAA meetings?’
‘Human Abduction Anonymous meetings. I have a problem: I’m an addict.’
Barry Broomfield was never one to hold a grudge against a person, or an alien
as it was in this case.
He looked at the extraterrestrial hard and said: ‘Let bygones be bygones.’
It is a quite remarkable thing that Barry could find it in his heart to forgive this
being after the abhorrent act he’d perpetrated upon him, but the truth was that there
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were other reasons for Barry’s forgiving heart. Firstly he wanted to know the secrets
of Kredendum’s vessel so that hopefully he might be allowed some time off. But
secondly and probably more importantly he needed a friend as every human inside
The Complex seemed to be suffering from some kind of cerebral atrophy.
So what if he’s a hideous monster from a nightmare that turned out to be real.
And so what if he probed me, God knows I could do with a companion in here.
He held out his hand and said: ‘Friends.’
Kredendum glanced up from his grey feet and placed his hand in Barry’s. He
was aware that humans showed respect to each other with something they called the
handshake.
Barry felt revulsion on noticing the little suckers on his new friend’s
fingertips, but nevertheless managed to control his urge to throw up. Kredendum was
feeling likewise disgusted when he saw Barry’s fingernails, having always thought it
nauseating how these hairless monkeys had keratin formations on their hands that
housed more dirt than the internet.
After their reluctant handshake Barry and Kredendum strolled around Level 4
of The Complex with Barry getting introduced to some of the alien’s friends. It
occurred to Barry that on the entire level there wasn’t any other human presence
except his own.
‘So what are you and all your people doing down here?’
‘The Draconians have lived under your feet for centuries. This is just another
outpost for their empire. We’re here to serve them.’
‘The Draconians?’ queried Barry.
‘The big green lizards. Greys like me have to be subservient to them because
they’re the master race in this galaxy.’
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‘That sounds terrible.’
‘Well it could be worse: I could be human.’
‘Don’t humans run The Complex?’ asked a confused Barry.
Kredendum laughed, although it wasn’t the maniacal one he’d used when
abducting people. ‘Of course not, although they probably like to think they do. Who
knows what the apes think.’
‘Hey, that’s my people you’re talking about,’ replied Barry indignantly.
‘Okay big guy, don’t take it to heart. Humanity’s becoming more like us
anyway.’
‘What do you mean?’
Kredendum momentarily toyed with the idea of leaking to Barry some
information that would shed light on the grim future in store for the human race.
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘So those Draconians, they’re your masters, you have to do everything they
say? That’s saaadddd.’
‘Well, it’s always been the way of things. It just makes me laugh how the
humans think they’re the ones controlling us. Those stupid phosphorous lights they
have for example that they think stop us from going out, it’s pathetic.’
‘Ah, but humans shot down your spacecraft. We can’t be that stupid if we
managed that.’
‘Your lot never shot it down, my own people did coz I was on the run for
performing unlicensed abductions.’ Kredendum looked back down at his feet in
shame. ‘I couldn’t help myself: I was addicted. Seriously mate, I’ve got it under
control now.’
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The conversation between the hairless ape and the little alien then gravitated
towards Kredendum’s damaged spaceship. Barry revealed the things he’d uncovered
about the anti-matter/anti-gravity reactor and how he managed to build his own.
‘Wow I’m impressed. Maybe humans aren’t as dumb as I thought. You
figured all that out yourself?’
‘Yeah, pretty much. But I know there’s something else, something I’m
missing. How did you get across the chasm of space Kredendum? Even with the antimatter reactor it would take years to travel to the nearest star.’
Kredendum shook his head and said: ‘I can’t tell you that: it’d be like giving a
child a machine gun. You’ve got to figure it out for yourselves and earn the right to go
beyond this little speck of dust you call home.’
‘Come on, give us a clue at least, you did after all, you know; probe me.’
Kredendum paused to think about it. Maybe I can give them a hint; maybe I
owe them that.
‘Look, okay I’ll give you a clue but you won’t like it, and it probably won’t
help you much,’ said the alien. ‘You’ve got to think beyond the three dimensions.’
Sitting in his living quarters back up on Level 3 now, Barry tried to think beyond the
three dimensions just as Kredendum advised. It goes without saying a scientist of his
brilliance was fully aware of Einstein’s work with regard to the fourth and fifth
dimensions. The problem was, he didn’t see any way how he could he turn that
knowledge into propelling a huge craft across the unimaginable distances in space?
‘It doesn’t make sense. Kredendum, you need to give me another clue, come on lad.’
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‘You’re going to keep coming down here asking for clues until I’ve spelled
out the whole thing for you—aren’t you?’
‘Well if you could tell me it all now straight off, that would really help. You
know Kredendum, the emotional damage after what you did to me still hasn’t healed,
and that’s not all, I still can’t sit down properly.’
‘Don’t go laying the guilt trip on me Broomfield. I’ll give you one more clue
and then that’s it; got it?’
Barry nodded in agreement.
‘What is the shortest distance between two places?’
‘A straight line,’ answered Barry perplexed.
‘No, not if they exist in the same space.’
‘That doesn’t make sense either. How can you make two separate places exist
in the same space?’
‘I’ve given you your last clue and that’s it, that’s all you’re getting out of me.
You’ll have to figure out the rest yourself, but don’t go getting your hopes up coz you
might be figuring for a long time.’
While Barry attempted to squeeze more information out of an unwilling Kredendum,
a grizzly curmudgeon of a man muttered to himself whilst busy at work inside Barry’s
living quarters.
‘What a mess! That orang-utan hasn’t vacuumed once, the carpet’s filthy. And
just look at the kitchen.’
The curmudgeon continued to mutter his discontent, branching into more
general moaning about the terrible state of the world and how it was no place for an
old man anymore. The perpetual bad mood that’d become his signature character-trait
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was due to the fact he was the CCTV maintenance man for The Complex. It was his
job to keep the four thousand odd cameras inside the base recording every second of
every day. It was not an enviable job. Overworked and overstressed, he would
regularly find his services required in middle of the night to patch up some
malfunctioning piece of equipment.
The man’s complaints persisted as he fixed Barry’s shower cam. ‘Christ
almighty, it’s blacker in here than a coal mine.’
Distracted by the obscene mildew build up and the fact that he’d rather be
anywhere else, the sour-faced man innocently forgot to tighten a screw fully. This
seemingly innocuous mistake would have a profound impact on Finbar Cedric
Broomfield’s life.
How on Earth can you make two places exist in the same space? thought Barry, still
agonising over how Kredendum’s craft was capable of travelling such enormous
distances.
His alien friend had been adamant in his refusal to divulge anymore hints
concerning the secrets of interstellar travel. This left Barry at a dead end.
‘I just can’t figure it out,’ he said aloud in frustration.
Having already tried aimlessly meandering his way along The Complex’s
corridors, waiting for inspiration to strike without success, Barry felt he might as well
take another look inside the recovered alien ship: desperately he hoped that he’d
ignite a creative fire after seeing or uncovering something he hadn’t noticed in the
countless hours he’d already spent in there.
Around 90 to 95% of the technology inside Kredendum’s craft Barry hadn’t
yet been able to decipher what it was actually for, never mind how it all worked. He
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doubted now whether he possessed the ability to achieve the task he’d been given,
wondering miserably if it was just simply beyond the human brain’s capability to
comprehend interstellar travel.
The pioneering discovery he’d already made seemed worthless to him now. In
his mind that was yesterday’s news. Over the months he’d come to hate the precious
ship with all its unsolvable puzzles that made his head spin. But most of all he hated it
for not revealing his holy grail, the secret of space travel.
