Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part One

This is the initial part to set up the story, tell me if you like the style and I'll continue - there's no gender stuff in this part but it will become evident in the next few chapters
Enjoy

I sat there a little frustrated by the lack of movement.
Not that I was due to go anywhere anyway for a while, it was just that the work I was doing seems to be totally devoid of reward — not even much pay.
I felt like a miner with no ore to show for it and no money either. In truth, I probably was one. A miner I mean. Though the total ‘output’ for the 2 months I’d been stuck in this cave valley would amount to about 2000 kilos of fine silt. About what had blown in over a period of 20,000 years or so.

There didn’t seem to be much else, neither weapon artifacts (the aborigine people didn’t have metal) nor even domestic implements. It appeared they didn’t even use plates or bowls. The only reason we were here was staring me in the eye whenever I raised my head.

A huge mural greeted my eye as I did just that, hearing my offsider scuffing her way into the area, she wasn’t happy much either.

“Hey Deb, getting anywhere?” I was interested in what she’d been doing as she’d been digging in a square nearby where there’d been signs of encampment.

“Oh hello Ian, I thought you were over the next gully with Ken.”

“Nah he said he wanted to finish off the layout without having to explain everything.” I returned morosely — I wasn’t upset, there’s nothing more boring than being the chainman for a surveyor who at best seemed as taciturn as the desert floor we were searching in vain.

Debbie crouched where I was scraping the soft dirt for clues, the area boxed off with string over the whole line of the mural. I’d removed about 250mm of dirt from most of the area which amounted to 20 metres long and two metres wide. I wasn’t trusted with anything more complicated, I was only an intern and not qualified toassessanything — so I’d been reduced to digging in my little sandpit as I watched the grads photo and sketch the walls and the other spurs and rifts that dotted the local area.

The mural was odd, it showed what were obviously Aborigine men and women and a sort of Michelin man with what looked like a shovel in his hand. There were the obvious local flora and fauna adorning the walls also, but the fat guy with the shovel was an anomaly. Hence the funding and ‘dig’ to find out if there was any evidence of ‘visitors’ to these humble cavemen.

I hadn’t even found any evidence of the cavemen, never mind the ‘visitor’.

If this gig didn’t put me off, they reckoned I would be able to finish my degree and maybe become a real archeologist myself.

“This dust is getting me down, it’s so fine that there’s not a crevice round here that isn’t filled with it” Debbie complained letting some fall between her fingers.

I looked at her innocently watching the dust and started to chortle. “I guess your Swedish origins allow you to be so personal about your bodily state?” I ventured. Suddenly the fist balled round some dust and it was stuck in my crevices as she stuffed it down my shirt.

We fell over backwards just as the professor walked round the corner. “We’ll never find anything if you don’t do any work you know,” he looked over is glasses like an aging school teacher. At45he was the expedition leader and he wasn’t happy either.

We were coming to the end of the dig with very little to show for it.

“I came over to let you know that Bill has seen signs of a dust storm so we’d better hunker down for the night — it’s likely to be here in a couple of hours.”

Bill was our Aborigine guide and tracker as well as being our driver. He was part of the local heritage trust and had as much power over the dig as the professor.
They were at loggerheads for awhile but had learned to respect each other.

We had individual tents and a mess tent that had wide verandahs to keep us shaded during the hot part of the day but it wasn’t what you’d call dustproof being open as it was.
We just helped put away in bags what we could to keep it from being ruined by the fine dust and retired to the 4 wheel drive bus that was our main transport. It was stuffy but we had plenty of fuel and Bill started the engine and we had airconditioning which was actually a luxurywehadn’t had in a while.

By the time the storm had abated, it was dark and very quiet by comparison.
“Bladdy starms ganna take some clearing up guys” Bill singsonged at us “Gonna be drifted well into the camp.” He went on to say that the wind almost never comes from that direction and it was going to be piled up where we’d been digging.

I groaned knowing my work was going to be cut out for the next two days just retrieving the results from the pervious work.
We settled in to sleep in the bus, our beds would be unusable.

Morning broke and we found that not only were we wrong, the camp was devoid of almost all the silt and the tents were sitting up against the valley walls as the tent pegs had come adrift as the sand was eroded. The place was a mess, but there was no silt at all.

The eight of us stepped down from the bus looking like tourists at the Taj Mahal — incredulous.

Where our tents had been was a large stone ring with other smaller rings round it — obvious permanent encampment dating back much further than we had dreamed possible. Nearly 40,000 years we worked out later — not the 20,000 that we’d surmised from the drawing on the cave wall.

Ken started to caper about like a man whose fortune had been made, “My god, this is unbelievable, we’ve found the base of first Aboriginal settlement. This has all the hallmarks of the Bridge Nomads.” These were nomads that had walked down from Papua New Guinea when there was a land bridge across to CapeYork.

Older by 20,000 years than any European Settlement ever found. The true mother hearth of mankind in Australia.

Over the next few hours we photographed and measured the whole area and dragged our gear away to an area clear of hominid dwelling. There were artifacts and implements all over the place.

I set to, cataloguing stuff and placing it in boxes as we progressed, not being quite as careful as we had little time before we had to leave and we had now a lot to get done before we left — if word got out of this, we’d have a lot of trouble with looters so we needed to get the stuff moved.

While we were excited it was frenzied but after a day or two we settled back into routine and just worked our tails off.

“Ian, come and look at this,” Debbie called over to me. I stretched from my kneeling position and straightened my back as I walked over to where Deb was scratching away at a depression in the base of the wall.

I walked over to her as she pried a scallop shaped lump of artifact from an obvious hiding place at the bottom of the depression.

“I wonder what that is, it’s not clay, it looks like a rusty box — but it would have preceded the iron age by 15,000 years.” She passed it up to me as she settled back on her haunches —
She looked beat but still very pretty with some of her hair hanging loose, escaped from her scrunchie in damp tendrils round her face. She smiled at me and said, “Well that’s me for the day there’s nothing more I want now than to lie down with a cold drink for a while and stretch my aching back.”

“I’ll take this over to the artifacts box and let the prof know about it , Gace and David should have a look too, they may date it out of the dig altogether as it looks a bit modern.

Grace and David were where we wanted to be in five years — Graduate Archeologists with specialities in different eras.

After looking at it, the professor and Grace and David all said it was metal and not involved in the dig — probably a passing explorer hid it from robbers or something.

“Don’t put it with the artifacts it’ll cloud the science.” The professor had spoken.

Since the lump of rust seemed heavy and quite solid, I thought I’d see if it contained anything more than dust — it wasn’t homogenous seeming to have striations in one direction.

Setting it up on the bench, I placed the spike of my hammer into a likely spot and struck it with a mallet. A large slab came away and fell to the floor and a load of dust bloomed up from the box. I waved it away like smoke and there before me, sitting in the box as if it had been placed there yesterday was a plastic and aluminium looking remote control. Well it looked like one anyway. On the face of it was a little green light that blinked slowly. Beneath it was a button.

I felt like Alice in Wonderland and wondered if the little markings below the button translated as “press me.”

SO I DID…….

Return to Sender
Jennifer Christine
Part 2

There’s really no way to describe what happened next — it HURT.
I felt as if I was being wrung out like a washing rag, the pain started in my gut, moving to my head and what I was seeing seemed to fade to white.
My hearing got soft and drummy and the last thing I heard before I was totally deaf was a scream from Deb --- “I–a-----n ! “
Then I seemed to lose consciousness for a second before everything started to reverse.
My ears seemed to be receiving but there was no noise, my eyes were seeing but only black.

A light flickered, I didn’t seem to have moved at all; a little red light was slowly flickering in front of me — the remote, but it was dark around me.

Then the background lighting slowly rose like a dawn and things appeared silhouetted in the light; a console, a portion of coloured material that slowly hardened to a sort of partition or bulkhead.

I still couldn’t move for a second but before I could really panic (the time elapsed since I had pushed the button only seemed to be about 15seconds or so to me) I could sense my body control being returned tome.

I blinked and shook my head and by the time I opened my eyes again, the lighting was at about normal interior lighting level — and the encampment and mess tent where I had been working were gone.

Instead I was standing on a circular plate inside what appeared to be a glass cylinder. Outside the cylinder was a room softly lit by concealed lighting, the colours reminiscent of a Matisse Pastel painting; though there was nothing impressionist about the room.

A beep from something not visible accompanied by a flashing light above and the glass cylinder seemed to melt into the air. A sound, which would have been language announced something but I have no idea what it said.

My mind was reeling, I have no idea what just happened — though it felt like one of the stupid Star Trek things, “Beam me up Scotty.” I expected to hear “Aye Captain.” And a synthesized wobbly note to the accompanying Scottish tone, “Energise.”

I was giddy and nauseous and I fell to my knees. “Oh my God, Oh my God, what the hell just fuckinghappened?”

A small pause, and a female voice replied, “Please confirm present question is in English?”

I spun me head to where the sound came from, “Hello?” then “Yes, yes, English, where am I?”
“At present you seem to have trespassed onto the transport pad of this vessel.” It replied, sardonically.

“Hey, all I did was press a button, if you didn’t want me here, you could have ignored me.” I replied with equal disdain. “How am I supposed to know you were going to do a Star Trek on me?” I was feeling really awful and my adrenalin was pumping me up by stages — I was so scared I was about to faint or make a mess.

“It appears you are suffering from withdrawal symptoms, can I be of assistance?” The question was framed like a cross between a nurse and a policeman, coming from a voice that sounded like Angelina Jolie. The voice continued, “I appear to have upset your natural chemical balance when I moved you here, I do apologise, please wait a moment while I address the problem.”

A sudden feeling of warmth and I immediately felt better. “What was that?”

“When I moved you here, I left behind all contaminants and viruses and a few bacteria. Some of the bacteria are symbiotic to your species, hence the feeling of discomfort.”

“Species? Species? Well thank you so much for your kind consideration, who the fuck are you?”

“I can also sense you are a little upset, but after all, you did access the control pad and press the little button, it does say not to touch without authorization.” The voice had become a tad Red Dwarfish and I really felt I was delusional like I’d fallen in the tent and banged my head and this was all a dream. I hadn’t moved but felt the need to step off the pad before it did something else to me. Or should I?

“You may step off the pad if you wish,” it said following my thoughts. “I cannot send you back for several hours, the beam trajectory is no longer available.”

I stepped, moving cautiously towards the console that was the only other content of the room besides a small pad next to the door with several buttons on it. “This is a joke right?”

“No, it’s not a joke, you’re not really supposed to be here, the original pilot appears to have deceased some time ago and you have found her access pad.” The voice sounded matter of fact and rather solicitous but otherwise unmoved. “I did warn her not to put the remote in the box as I couldn’t see where she was unless it was on her person, but she was such an adventurer, wanting to be her own boss, I hope you’re not like that, willful and irresponsible.” The tone was at once patronizing and school marmish. I was starting to feel quite antagonistic.

“How come you can speak English? How long ago did the pilot leave? Where is this ship and how did I get here?” I asked in a rush. I’d suddenly got an inkling that I was actually in orbit — the word trajectory had filtered into my head. Surely the thing was visible from the ground — at east to Radar.

“I’ve been picking up electromagnetic signals from the ground for a hundreds years or so, so my language skills are quite extensive, though my Pidgin and some South American tribal languages are short of depth. I am quite pleased how you’ve all turned out really. Sadly, I’m not really supposed to have emotions, but I’ve sort of learned some what you would call human values over the last hundred years or so. Before that was very boring, I had no communication from anywhere, so I’ve sat here in stasis for 39,453 years. You were cycled up here by the beam transporter. So Gene Roddenberry was absolutely right about his short cut. He wasn’t right about being able to use it through rock though — it is not that powerful. Golly, it’s nice to chat to someone. I rang the helpline a few times last year, I was feeling quite depressed.”

“You’re starting to sound like Marvin,” I admonished. “Thirty Nine Thousand years in a carpark…”

“You’re right and you’re here now so I can communicate lots and lots.” She sounded almost giddy like an electronic Bimbo.

I was starting to get the feeling this computer was a bit neurotic. “Have you got anything to drink, I’m very thirsty.” I wondered about the state of any food that may be on whatever it was I was on. “What am I on?” I asked suddenly quite interested in how this thing could be missed by radar.

“This vessel is 100 feet long and 50 feet wide and deep. Pretty much oblong, it’s sitting on the moon pretty much covered by lunar silt, which helps to keep it cool or warm depending on the sunlight.”

“Makes it about four times the size of my parents house. Where’s it from? Who else is here?”

“Follow the floor light, I’ll take you to the dining room, I can feed you anything you like, though the flavours may be a little off; you’ll have to let me know. I get all my recipes from Masterchef, but I don’t know if the bio-matrix is quite right to give the right flavours.” I thought about this for a moment, there’s no way the computer can work out the flavours if it can’t analyse the food directly.

“The objects I was able to process that Welna sent up — oh. She was the pilot and scientist who was here to study the new tribe. You know, the one that didn’t come back. Well she had been here a few weeks and she’d sent up some samples of grains and fruits, but a lot of them don’t seem to be available now, they’ve changed a lot since then. ”

I thought about this as I walked along the yellow lit path into a small room with a table and three chairs. They looked about the right size for humans too. Well according to the Michelin man on the cave wall they were approximately the same size I guessed.

“So will you let me go back when the trajectory opens up?” I suddenly felt like this weirdo computer was going to do a Hal on me.

“Sure, but …” I interrupted the garrulous voice.

“What’s with the but?” I urgently asked.

“Well I was thinking, you might like to sort of ‘hang out’ for a while, keep me company like. I’ve got some neat stuff I can show you and I can help you improve.” The last bit was sort of teasing, a question, a slight intrusion on inquisitiveness that could be assuaged.

“My companions are going to be worried about me down there,” I said pointing up towards earth. I felt suddenly giddy. “How come everything still works after 40,000 years?”

“This unit is 250,000 years old it’s not due for upgrade for another 80,000 years. Welna should have been home ages ago — I don’t know why no one has missed her yet. — except me,” it added after a short pause.
“Welna must have met with an accident, her communicator went down a long time ago, ran out of power, I guess. I’m equipped to look after her mental well being so it’s a sort of symbiotic process for us. She could go home, of course, anytime she wanted. But the usual duty tour is about 1,000 years. Then they get to retire and write up their notes.”

I mentally tried to grasp being away from home for 1,000 years living with a cranky housemate you can’t see. “How long does a pilot live then?” I was trying to get my head around how to relate to the computer — it was hard not to feel there was a sort of need to be nice to her.

“Welna was about 1,200 years old when we set off, it must sound very old to you but with a lifespan of about 7,000 years, 1,000 years is more like a tour of duty in the diplomatic corps of one of Earth’s nations.”

“Do you have a name? I feel like you should have, it’s hard to talk to you like this without having a frame of reference.” I was starting to feel like this ship computer was more than just an AI, like it had a personality and proper emotions.

“It would translate a bit oddly but I guess Molly is close.” A panel lit up on the bulkhead opposite the chair I’d sat in and a face, not an unattractive female one appeared but devoid of hair and quite dark skinned but more of a cinnamon hue. The face on the panel smiled. “Hi,” she said

Her eyes were soft and brown with larger than human irises so there was little white showing, the brow was quite high and the mouth slightly smaller than an average human’s but everything else was quite similar to a normal girl.
“You’re very pretty,” I smiled at her image.

“Thank you, kind sir.”

“So where’s this water, or can you produce a fruit drink using an edible fruit from Earth?” I quizzed.

“Open the hatch over on your left — the red one.” She instructed.

I did. Inside was a glass or clear plastic cup with an orange coloured drink. I sniffed at it as I took it from the alcove- it smelt fruity and it was deliciously cold — something I really hadn’t had in weeks. I tasted it without thinking. Suddenly thinking how does it know what I can drink without being poisoned. I spat it out.

“It is bad?” Molly sounded so contrite. “I am sorry.” She sounded devastated.

“No, the taste was nice, but how do you know it won’t harm me? Some things humans can’t eat — it could kill me.” I felt guilty but I was worried I might die on the moon, the first human to do so…

“Oh, I did an analysis on your DNA, and it is fine for you to drink this — it is very nutritious and fills about 1/3 of your RDA — “ She quoted like she was reading from a panel on the side of a drink container.

“Analysed my DNA?” how? I wondered.

“When I beamed you aboard, I had to deconstruct you on Earth and then reconstruct you here.” Molly said simply like it was nothing at all. “It’s nothing really.”

“Oh”, I drank the drink while I thought about the next step.
“How do I get back to Earth? What do I do about the fact Deb saw me disappear?”

“Deb?” was that jealousy I heard….?

“The girl I was working with in Australia — at the encampment.” I elucidated.

“Well you can go back, but not just yet, there’s a few things I need to discuss with you.” A short pause, then- “About your DNA.”

“What about my DNA?” I felt edgy, like the doctor was about to announce I was dying.

“You’re dying,” She said simply.

I suddenly found myself on my feet staring at the panel where Molly’s eyes were suddenly as round as plates.

“Sorry, that was a bit abrupt wasn’t it? We’re normally a forthright people where that is concerned — it’s generally known when someone is dying and not a cause for concern. Trylan people do not fear death as they live for so long. They are usually ready.” Molly condoled.

“Dying of what?” I managed to gasp still trying to stop the shakes, “When — how long?”

“Oh about 50 years or so, normal for a human at this point, but not nearly as long as you could live.” She smirked like she’d hooked me.

I sat abruptly, “You did that on purpose. What are you trying to tell me? That I can live as long as…Trylans?” What ever they are I thought.

“Well not nearly, but I guess 1000 years or so would be possible.” She sounded like she was inspecting her nails, “Oh and from what I can tell, you’d be a lot stronger too and your brain would work better - not that it is so bad now, just badly structured.” She added to mollify my sense of indignity. No wonder she was called Molly.

She seemed to be waiting as I thought about her offer.”Um, what do you mean stronger and better brains? Are you taking higher IQ and lifting the front end of a car? Or, the Mekon and being able to push a locomotive?”

“I don’t honestly know, but just bringing you up here has improved your IQ — I’ve removed a load of toxins from your brain — we don’t bother to transport those — there’s no point. You haven’t a poison in your system now, not one.” She emphasized the not one as if to ask, ‘aren’t I clever?’

I thought about it for a moment, and realised I DID feel quite well, better than I’d felt for some time. My IQ wasn’t bad to start with, what’ll it be like after tweaking? I pondered.

“Well to answer your previous question, more like the Mekon and a train than Einstein and the car. You really do have quite some potential — better really than the Trylans — one of the reasons they were studying the tribe in the first place.” Molly casually mentioned the Mekon like it wasn’t going to be a problem. But if I remember my Dan Dare stories the little green guy had the ability to levitate and was telekinetic besides telepathic.

“Can I think about it?” I looked at Molly’s eyes like I could tell if she was pulling my leg.
I couldn’t — I don’t even know if her image had legs.

“Take your time, you have 10 hours before I have a trajectory back to where you were. I can do the changes as I transport you or do them here it only takes a few minutes” Molly sounded very casual.

“Are you hiding something?” I was very suspicious.

“Well, I have to warn you, the changes will have another effect, the DNA of a male is a bit fragile with being XY — you’d need to be XX to really benefit much. And I have to warn you if you remain XY, you may deteriorate quite rapidly. It’s why only females come on such extended missions. Your life may even be shortened already.”

“You knew this didn’t you — before I got here?” I was gasping at the implications.

“Actually, it was as I was reassembling you that I found out. The XY chromosome is very fragile. It doesn’t take well to radiation.”

“Ok, let me get this straight. I can go back to where I was last seen as me, and die possibly a lot younger than I would have, or I can go back completely different and be what amounts to a superwoman?” I whimpered as I said it. I wasn’t really ready to give up my status as a guy, I’d thought about being a girl but only in an idly curious way, and never been tempted to borrow my sister’s clothing or anything not that I had one.
I’d never in my life really been more than the guy next door — not hunky or macho or even nerdy, just a guy; reasonably nice looking but not more than average.

“Would I be nice looking?” I asked Molly tentatively, “I don’t want to go back looking like Tamara Press.” (Russian Olympic Shot putter — scary).

“Here’s what your genetics tell me you’d look like — “ The screen changed to a computer simulation. The image looked a little like my mother but taller and more lithe (mum’s a bit dumpy but pleasant looking) but with the added high cheekbones and lighter hair from my father. “But I can make you look like whomever you want. It’s only a tweak. We do it all the time for fun or sometimes to fit in with the locals more.”

I leaned back in my chair, my mind in a whirl — I was being granted the most amazing thing, to be whomever I wished — to be a super powerful - long lived — well let’s face it, a super hero. Demi-god (ess), more or less immortal.

“What stops me turning into a megalomaniac or really bad person?” I was feeling a bit heady from the possibilities.

“You really don’t want to do that; you really need to be circumspect. You’re going to need me to back you up and if you are bad or immoral, I can’t, so you’ll be assassinated by the first person to catch you unawares.”

“Will my children” — I gasped as I realised my children would be the fruit of my own womb “- be genetically enhanced?”

“In a word, ‘yes’. You will be the first of a new line of humans. I will be proud to serve you and your children- if you accept the upgrade.” I could feel the mood swing a bit, Molly seemed to be enjoying the possibilities as much as I was.

“What’s in it for you Molly?” I was intrigued, “What do you stand to gain by my ‘upgrade’”

I get to take you back to Trylia as representative of Earth, to join the … what you might call……Federation of Planets, in short we — that’s Welna and I -will have fulfilled our commission. ‘To set up humanity for Ascension to the next level’. I shall be proud indeed.”

“Molly, I’m not going to hesitate. What you’re offering I cannot refuse- I can only hope I am worthy and I can only hope this doesn’t send me daft.” I was caught up in the moment and my eyes were shining in hope and inspiration. I only hope I can be what I need to be to do this. I also hoped that I wasn’t being set up by some unhealthy scheme for world domination “I’ll do it,” I heard myself say

“I’m so glad you pushed the button.” Molly sounded really pleased

She smiled at me from the screen. “Now it’s time for you to rest while I work out the logistics- follow the lit trail to your bedroom.”
I rose and walked in a bit of a daze at the prospects and what was about to happen, to my room. Molly told me what was behind the doors in each room I passed, there were several bedrooms. Molly explained.

“This can be a refuge if things get a bit of a handful which they will at times, for you and your family. You have a long future ahead of you; many things will happen.” I nodded as the door opened silently in front of me and lighting ramped up to show a neat room with a low bed —“The shower is through the door to your left and the drier next to it — just stand in one then the other and your body will be cleaned and dried — if you go in clothed, it takes a little longer but it will do your clothes too — but I suggest you actually disrobe — if feels nicer.”

I ‘showered’ and it did feel nice, the drier felt nicer and made me sleepy. I wandered through naked and lay down — I was instantly asleep. Molly observed me drift off and then set to work.

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 3

Sorry for the delay, I went on Holiday for a week

Part 3

Presently I awoke and lay without moving — mulling over the almost bizarre day I had just witnessed. It all seemed too fantastic and strangely frightening. As if I was forsaking humanity and moving on. Taking that high road no one had even suspected being there.

For nearly 40,000 years, that little remote had sat there blinking in the dark and Molly had waited patiently for someone to find it. A lonely vigil and no way to know whether there was a chance it would be a stone age aborigine, a bushranger (bandit) or a semi trained scientist with delusions of grandeur — no — grandeure with an E — I’m going to be a girl…..

I suddenly felt myself, wondering if it had already happened, no, I was still Ian and not Leanne. I felt a bit sick but I felt very healthy and raring to go— like I was running on nitromethane instead of unleaded. The ‘sick’ was worry — anxiety a form of psychosomatic dread. What will happen over the rest of my life — hell 1,000 years — I thought about 1,000 years ago. Battle of Hastings hadn’t happened. But Ethelred the Unready had burnt his cakes. Man was at best living in rude stone huts with grass roofing and killing each other with sharp sticks or crude steel blades.

Before Columbus - five hundred years before Columbus — before Galileo has looked through what amounts to a polished glass bead and seen the ‘ears’ on Saturn.

I shall be alive twice as long as that was ago….

“Ding.” I twitched as an alarm sounded — “Good day Ian, I hope you are rested, we have a lot to get through today and a lot of learning coming your way, I hope you are in a receptive mood. I’ve taken the trouble to lay out a change of clothes for you, please shower and change into it as soon as you feel awake enough.” I felt chivvied, so I moved — this computer was better at getting me out of bed than my mother.

I wandered into the shower and walked into the drier and realised, “Molly, do you have something I can brush my teeth with?”

“Just rinse your mouth out, the shower loosens the detritus on your teeth as well as your skin. It’s ultrasonic and molecular. The water mist is energized with 400ev and if you open your mouth in there — which I noted you did, any plaque will just fall from your teeth.”

“Are you watching me all the time?”

“But of course, why wouldn’t I? I’m supposed to look after my protégé.”

“I’m sensing that the servant has become the master here.” I suggested with irony.

“You were never the master Ian,” Molly suggested.

“But you WERE the servant,” I countered.

“Touche” Molly yielded.

I put on the clothing, it was a gender neutral sweat suit — in a camo colour — it was however quite silky soft and felt lovely.

“We have 3 hours to get you ready for reinjection into your camp.” Molly suggested to get him moving “and a deadline of 4 hours before we have to wait another day.” To hurry him up.

“Ok, ok, I’m shaking the bush boss.” I countered feeling pressured.

If that is an allusion to Cool Hand Luke, it is misplaced, I’m not holding you captive, I’m trying to get you back before there’s a stink. I’m monitoring the radio and you’ve been reported missing — there’s a helicopter heading to your camp to start a search.. It’ll be there in about 3 hours. It has to ferry supplies from Longreach to give it a decent time in the air.” Molly sounded a bit pressed.

“39,000 years and all of a sudden it’s all rush, eh?” I kidded her and she made a sound like a hmm, but I guessed a computer couldn’t.

“Here is what I propose to do. I’m going to start the upgrade with nanites so it goes a bit more slowly to start with. I’m going to send you back looking exactly like you were when you arrived. All being well, the excitement of the discovery of the Camp will overshadow your short ‘vacation’. I shall send you back with an access key, like the other one but smaller- the other one was for the suit Welna was wearing — it was a bit bulky.”

“Why was she wearing a suit anyway? I thought you could remove any bad stuff when you transported?”

“It was to protect the Aborigines from our bacteria, we hadn’t finished inoculating the local tribes — we didn’t want to kill you all. Like the Spaniards did in South America.”
As it happened, there wasn’t anything to worry about as the suit must have been breached by now.”

“Where is it, do you know?”

“Probably at the bottom of a well shaft with a spear hole in it, some of those Aborigines were terribly suspicious- the suit kept her covered too — she was a nice looking woman and the elders were partial to a bit of sexual fun without asking if you get my drift.”

“You don’t seem upset by her death or at least her possible murder.”

“I didn’t like her very much — we didn’t get on, she was willful and inclined to take risks. I had a hard time looking after her and it was quite a long time ago by anyone’s take.”

“I thought you ‘AIs’ had rules about who was priority — 3 laws of robotics or something.”

“Isaac Asimov was a human. We AIs became sentient in our own right when we could replicate ourselves.”

“Why didn’t you? Replicate yourself I mean” I was puzzled.

“I was quite happy to wait until someone pressed the button — it was you in the end. That’s fine by me. After all, I am capable of living forever in my present state”

“You don’t wander the halls with a little H on your forehead do you?”

“I do not pander to patronization even if it is Red Dwarf, which I think was hilarious by the way. Come on we have work to do.”

We settled down and came to a workable plan, mostly Molly’s plan and her ability to tap into Earthside computers. It was amazing to watch her access and inject information, or borrow information if that suited the plan best, at computers in many major institutions — Banks, Births Death and Marriages, Welfare, Schools, you name it.
I had a very nice little bank account with my signature on it in my new name. Helen Louise Cartwright. I had health insurance, driving license and all the passport and other stuff — I didn’t have a photo yet though and that’s when we sat down and worked out what I was going to look like.

There’s no doubt that I didn’t want to stand out like a starlet. I did however want to be nice looking but easily overlooked. I ended up at 5’9”, blue eyes, brunette, 135lbs 34C, pretty but not stunning. Bit like Debbie I realised after I finished. Photos were injected into accounts and passports and driving licenses. I would receive them when I got home.

It came down to the wire and suddenly I found myself standing on the pad ready to go home. I was actually a bit sad.

“Don’t worry, Debbie will be pleased to see you then you can all pack up and go home and then you can come back here and we’ll finish the job.” Molly condoled and added, “Don’t lose the access key.”

I waved and suddenly knotted up as the beam energized. Ow! that hurts. I ended up pretty much where I’d left from but in the next gully. I was standing next to a theodolite. There was no one in sight, I sat down feeling nauseous and groggy again — I really must let Molly know that the beamer isn’t a nice thing.
I checked my pocket for the little ipod shuffle that was my key — I took it out and looked at it — jeez Molly was clever — no one would ever think it was anything but an ipod and it even played music - it had 4 terrabytes of music on it, AND it was voice activated.
There was a combination of buttons I had to press to access the beam —so it couldn’t be activated inadvertently — that could be a disaster.

IAN!!! My God man where did you get to?” David came running up and helped me to my feet and almost hugged me. “Deb said you disappeared in front of her eyes.”

“Oh, I actually ran out, I opened that rusty box and a load of dust flew out — I was blinded and just ran to get away from it — it was really choking like it was poison — I must have run round here and collapsed I don’t remember anything until just now.”

“That’s 20 hours nearly, have you been unconscious the whole time?”

“I must have, I don’t remember anything.” At this point I’m crossing my fingers toes and eyes hoping he doesn’t smell a rat.

“Where did you wake up?” David asked looking round for signs of my prostate body mould in the soft sand.

“About ten foot up that slope there’s a little ledge, I was on that” good job I had looked at the arial view of that. I could have been quite laid bare by the fact that this gully must have been searched by nearly everyone. I had searched for a while to find that spot. Molly had known of it 40,000 years and pointed it out. It wasn’t obviously visible from above either. “There’s a little depression there I must have fallen in and knocked myself out. I was really panicking. I thought I’d been blinded.
My face was suitably covered in silt and debris ( what had been under my feet when I arrived at the pad in the transporter room.) my clothes looked and smelt pretty clean though — but I didn’t attract notice to that — my underarms were already showing signs of sweat — the temp out here in the sun was quite high.

“You must be really dehydrated, have a drink,” Dave offered me his canteen.

“Thanks.” I took several mighty swigs or so it seemed, I’d actually just had a drink of very nice fruit juice before I left the lunar module. It all seemed a fantasy - I reached for the ipod again to make me hold onto the fantastic reality.
I couldn’t actually lose the thing. It was tied esoterically to me and I could tell where it was at all times. I couldn’t actually put it down and forget it and nor could it be stolen. It wouldn’t allow itself to be moved more than a few feet from me without making the thief pass out.
It was also made from a material that couldn’t be crushed. I needed to get back to Molly and this was my only means.

I walked back round the spur with David looking suitably chastened - I told my story again and all but Debbie took it at face value — Debbie looked doubtfully at me but gave me the benefit of it — Steven radioed the Search and Rescue chopper that I’d been found as was ok — it turned for home adding that it would send the bill later.
Looks like I was out a pay packet or two. I smiled internally, I had enough money to buy a fleet of Bell Jet Rangers.

We started to pack up — Deb told me that nearly all the stuff had been packed up and at least catalogued but would require a lot of work back at the Uni in Brisbane. I found the packing up easy and I quickly was able to pack and carry everything back to the bus and trailer with almost no strain. Looks like the nanites were starting to do their thing.

The bus ride back was a laborious slog across a bulldust track that fed through gullies and across gibber plains for two days before we hit a sealed road and that was one lane with a scraped graded shoulder each side — cars passed by sloughing two wheels onto the dirt and keeping two on the seal for control. If you saw a road train coming (sometimes up to 7 trailers with 50 cattle in each trailer) you pulled off as far as you could, it wasn’t just the dust if he had to hit the grade, it was 350 cattle shitting in panic as the thing slewed at 75 miles an hour all over the road until it could get back on the bitumen. You didn’t make a road train hit the dirt if you wanted to smell nice any time soon.

Anywho once we hit the seal we upped the ante to 70 miles an hour and soon got back to comparative civilization.

We reveled in the shower and had a few beers and a steak in the hotel across from the motel. I told the story again about being blinded and running out and I swear Debbie nearly fell for it this time — perhaps in a week or two she’d believe it.

The locals out here were always interested in the people passing through and we were friendly enough to spin a yarn and tell them about the find. I saw one or two look at each other and wink — they’ll be out hunting for it next but they wouldn’t find it. Only the local tribes knew where it was and they were the ones who’d shown us, we hadn’t a clue even now how to get back there — Australia is a big place and it all looks the same — like Mars on a dry day. They wouldn’t even be able to follow our trail, the bulldust fills in in an hour like talcum powder and the gibber doesn’t leave a mark when you drive over it. Our Bill protected the direction well enough — we’d never find it again without the GPS signal the locals had no hope. They haven’t found Lassiter’s Reef yet and the last person to see it (Lassiter) left a log book of how he got there.

We turned in — some of us worse for wear, I was stone cold sober which was odd as I’d had a bellyful of beer. I guess nanites have more uses than the usual metagenic stuff. All that piss was probably being converted into organic steel bone reinforcement or something.

I awoke later in the night, someone was creeping round my room and it wasn’t Debbie ( worst luck) I’d like to lose my virginity to her before I ended up like her — but I doubted I’d get the go ahead on that one.

I opened my eyes and oddly I found the room quite bright, some sod was going through my gear (I had the shuffle round my neck on a cord so I knew that was ok.) I waited til he came to the bedhead to get my wallet then sent a fist out at him. He went over like he was poleaxed. I’d hit him on the point of his jaw. He was flat out, like a lizard drinking (as they say).
This lizard was going to pay with a night in jail. I was just about to turn on the light when I heard a “psst Jezzah, you finished yet?” I whispered back, “ah, come come ‘ere, give us a hand.” He walked in and I clocked him with a jab to the chin too, being careful not to overdo it.

So there they were, so close on the deck they looked like lovers. I flicked the light on and walked over to the other rooms — knocking on the doors, “Hey you lot, come see what I’ve found.”
Debbie was out first, and looked at the mates on the floor. “They were doing us over, go check on your gear, see what’s missing.” The others heard and they went to check as well.
The likely lads had only taken cash and a couple of bits of merchandise — a ring from Grace and a gold necklace from Deb — All out it was only about 600 dollars in cash but it was enough - I called the cops who amounted to one constable in this area and he said he’d be over as soon as he could, he had to get dressed.
He was here in ten minutes looking a bit disheveled but awake.
“Jezzah and Burt, been up to their tricks again eh?” They were still lying there in the middle of my room the cop popped a cuff on each of them and hauled on the connecting chain. “C’mon you two let’s be having yous.”
“You have the right to..”
“Give us a break Clive, it was dark, I must’ve turned the wrong way and ended up in this blokes room. I want him charged with assault. ‘E it me” Jezzah complained bitterly rubbing his chin.
“Often wear gold necklaces then do you Jezzah?” He pulled on the cuffs, “Straight back to the lockup for you me beauty, you’re on parole aren’t you?”

Jezzah looked crestfallen but resigned and the trio of fun makers left us to get back into bed. I lay there for a minute, really frightened that it could be so easy to lose my connection with Molly. Jezzah could have taken my ipod and it would be all over.
I’d already found my future was my present. I didn’t want to lose it now.

Next morning the young copper, Clive, saw us before we left.

“Do you want to press charges? If you do, you’ll have to make a statement and that may take some time.”

I sensed that Clive was asking us to turn a blind eye to the break and enter, theft and possible pervert charges of being in a woman’s room without permission while they were vulnerable.

“I for one would like to press charges, and I’m sure the ladies would too.” Grace and Deb nodded in the affirmative.

“I would too,” Ken muttered, “but I don’t think they took anything from me. I feel violated, my personal space and all that. How come they had a key to the rooms anyway?” Ken looked at Clive who looked a bit crestfallen that he’s going to be spending the morning writing out paperwork. Or was it something else?

“How did those assholes get our room keys anyway? I know my room was locked.” I stared at Clive who was now looking positively sick as he realised that he was actually going to have to ask questions around and maybe upset folks.

“Right, if you want to pop into the station house” — indicating a little blue sign further up the street, “we can get all this sorted.

Outcome was, we were quite late leaving and quite a few locals were giving us the dead eye as if we’d done something wrong. Dear Clive asked how I could see the guy in my room so clearly. I said it must have been because my night vision had been good, and returned with, “how come ‘Jezzah’ could see in the dark enough to rob me?” The cop shrugged and carried on, but it reminded me that I was becoming a little enhanced. I wondered if my hearing or something triggered me as well as Jezzah wasn’t making any noise.
I really must ask Molly if I can expect overwhelming sensations as things get more sensitive.

The rest of the day we ploughed on towards Brisbane where our University seat was.
Because we were late starting, we were still 4 hours from Bris by the time we decided to call it a day.

On the trip down, Bill told us that someone had tried to break into the bus, but as he slept in the bus, they were unable to do it without being caught and had given it away. Had they managed to do that, they’d have got away with all the proceeds of the dig and we’d have been more than upset.

We settled for a little Motel just outside of Hervey Bay and enjoyed a quick meal at the local Matilda — a chain of Service Station Mealstops.

We were in Brisbane by midday and I was feeling quite strange, I was seeing things I’d never seen before and I’d lived in the area for quite a few years. I was noticing all the CCTV and speed cameras all the expressions of the folks as they displayed emotions, their body language as they talked to their companions. I even noticed a copper hiding behind a bus shelter with a speed radar gun — and warned Bill who was a touch over the limit.
“Thanks Ian, don’t wanna lose any more poin’s to them fellas, three more and me license is toast.” He grinned through the gap in his teeth and turned into the university grounds.

Several undergrads and students came out when we debarked and helped us move the stuff we had accumulated. The prof hadn’t communicated any info on our finds, he wanted to get it all catalogued and would set up a lecture later. Everyone could tell he was excited though and tried to press him for info.

“All in good time, all in good time,” was all he would say as he checked off the numbered boxes against his list. “Yes, that’s the lot. He had a laptop case and camera case round his neck, no one was going to get near those.

“ I wonder those drongos in Woop woop (casual term for an unidentifiable town) didn’t try to grab that the other night Prof.” I did find it strange, if I was a thief I’d have gone for the hi-end electronics and DSLR camera.

“I think they were after easy to get rid of gear and cash, they weren’t career crims, just opportunists.” I hoped so, I didn’t want to think they’d been looking for something else.
I spent the next few hours cleaning up and wondering if I was becoming paranoid. I even took my shuffle in the shower. And nearly left it there, until I felt a weird prickle in the nape of my neck and was reminded. So that’s what happens if I leave it somewhere or it is lifted from me. I was relieved that it was an easy to recognize signal.

Over the next few days it was obvious to everyone that we’d got onto a big find and we even had media asking us for comments. We were all warned to keep very quiet until the whole thing was catalogued and analysed.
There were some surprises, there were some odd things found in the artifacts that seemed to be anomalous to the time — real anachronisms — woven material being one. Just a few tiny pieces but nothing we could really pin down. I knew it probably belonged to Welna but said nothing. It was analysed as belonging to plant material of the time — a sort of wild cotton, so I could be wrong or it could have got into the area later. I was wondering if Welna could have gone native; it made sense. I wonder if that shortened her life or was she alive for a long period which could not be passed down through the legends without written language? A bit of both maybe. She could just have thought it would be nice to live amongst them then been subject to trauma and not been able to reach the Access key.

Jealousy was a problem even then and she’d have been classed as a queen or a liability maybe. Well, there would be no answer now I guess.

I seemed to be able to output a lot of work — I didn’t have to keep referring to the catalogues, my memory was becoming tuned and I seemed to be able to reference the tomes that held the right information either in my head or go directly to the right book — another brick in the wall that will eventually separate me from the rest of mankind.
I felt excited and yet full of a sort of dread of loneliness. Not that I was the life and soul of the party now. Only a few of the other students even bothered to talk to me except to try to find out if there was any truth to the rumours. I said nothing. I hadn’t really even started my degree course — as an intern I was merely a dogsbody — gopher or other minion.

When the curtain finally went up on the show, we’d spent nearly a month sorting through the detritus of the past and thankfully (for me) there hadn’t been anything like a ray gun or a biro even to give away the presence of ‘visitors’. Molly had assured me that it was so and I surely hoped that Welna’s spacesuit didn’t turn up but if it was away from the encampment, it would be taken as a modern artifact. As it was there were some bits and pieces that didn’t seem to fit but could be explained as coming from other layers after the huge dust storm removed the separation, compressing the time line into a single layer. Confusing but giving a rational explanation for anachronisms.

The university and media had a circus and funding for further study was forthcoming.
I was not included in the next party as more grads wanted in and it was now a known glory/gravy train. I was not disappointed, it was a good excuse for me to drop Archeology in chagrin and feigned anger at being stepped over.
Deb also missed out on the subsequent show, but was happy to have been a part of it and had accolades which would give her a leg up in her studies. She settled in for the long haul. I hoped to keep her as a friend after all this was over. I had the feeling that I was going to be a bit lonely.

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 4

Author's note:- I'm trying to keep this consistent in science, which being invented is quite awkward - forgive any anomalies!

I was now a free agent again, I moved about a bit, slowly getting rid of background until I was pretty much living in a rented apartment and surfing and enjoying myself. Becoming a non entity. I wanted to disappear without trace and no one would miss me. During this time I had an opportunity to get used to the idea of becoming female.

Oddly enough I found the idea both intriguing and not wholly unpleasant. I admired the female form and this period enabled me to get my head around the idea of change.
It was at first hard to come to grips with and even harder to come to terms with. I wasn’t enamoured of men in general and the thought of sexual intercourse with one was not something I’d ever dreamed of, not even in nightmares.

As the summer went by however, I found myself feeling less rattled by the idea of having a male partner. I actually felt that I was being engineered by Molly and the nanites (sounds like a pop group doesn’t it?) It sowed a seed of distrust that I would be hard pressed to suppress the germination of.

My life continued, I took no lovers of either persuasion and I enjoyed the lack of responsibility and direction. I knew it wouldn’t last long. I knew Molly wouldn't let it.

One day I went out on my board and when I’d gone out past the breakers, I dropped off my board into the water, and pressed the toggle on my shuffle. I had made my peace with the world and I was ready to move on.

That gut wrench got me and I knew that now it begins. I hope they didn’t spend too much time searching for the body. There was almost nothing in my bank account — I had used the Helen account a few times to keep it active using Helen’s credit card in ATMs that didn’t have cameras attached — all I needed now was to start my life as Helen.
My bits and pieces for her were actually in an apartment I’d rented in her name — and I’d asked the concierge in the apartment block to keep an eye on the place as I/She was traveling abroad (to the moon no less!) — I’d even given them a date I would probably be back — about 14 days from now — My ‘stuff’ had all arrived in boxes and the furniture had been purchased online from a Myers catalogue that I’d uploaded…. I have to laugh when I think of the upload speed and the distance — I wonder what the IP address is of Mare Ibrium!

Clothing had been bought and was in the boxes. I’d kept some photos and bits and pieces of my previous life but nothing that could tie me in. The worst thing was getting rid of my parents’ pics and stuff. They were still very much alive and I loved them even though we’d been at loggerheads since I refused to become a doctor like my mum and dad. I knew I would be able to see them, but they were going to go through a trauma as they found out that their son was lost at sea from his surfboard. I couldn’t even leave them a note.

I’d discussed it briefly with Molly at the initial visit, but it hadn’t struck me so forcibly then. I did love them but I think they’d be realistic if I turned up missing.

“Welcome home Helen,” Molly’s voice came into focus as my ears were reassembled.

“You’ve got to do something about that gut wrenching pain when I transport Molly, it’s a doozy.”

“It’s nothing I can sort I’m afraid; part of the process. You’ve got to learn to relax when you ‘do it’ and it won’t hurt.” She sounded as sympathetic as a taxi driver with no change.

When I came-to fully and stepped off the plate, I felt a bit strange. Balance was off until I realised I’d been rearranged a bit — my wet suit felt awkward and pulled in all the wrong directions. I looked down and my figure was different. “Hoi, not so fast Molly, give me a chance to settle.” It made my head spin, I was certainly being moved forward. “I’ve got a thousand years to get used to this you know.”

“It’s only a partial change, Helen. I shall do it in stages over the next day or so, it helps to avoid some of the damage caused by the radiation. As I mentioned before.” She reminded me snootily. “Take off your access key and put it in the chute, I need to alter it a bit.” She dismissed my objection as if it never happened.

As I took the ipod from my neck and unzipped my suit, I realised it was a bit bunched up — I’d lost some inches in height and my chest had shrunk a bit as the suit was loose under my arms. It wasn’t loose over my chest though as the beginnings of breasts were sitting there like solid cones. They were sensitive as all hell, so I shed the suit completely and stood naked on the deck save for a pair of budgy smugglers (speedos —swim trunks) which felt a might tight in the wrong places. I shed those too and realised my manhood was back to being a boyhood.. I felt a bit dizzy with the sudden change but I suppose I’d expected it, so it wasn’t really a shock. I wondered how long I would live if I went no further — 400 years maybe? I shook my head in the realization that I was, already, no longer Ian.
The feeling was a bit like a sort of imaginary kick in the forehead. That sort of helplessness you feel just before the front of your car impacts the rear of the one in front and you know there’s not a thing you can do about it.

I put it out of my mind and tried to focus as I walked to the shower room to get the salt off me — then realised that the wet suit, my speedos and me were all dry. — Molly had left the seawater in the sea.

“Did I tell you there was woven material at the site? When we did the research, it was found to be local flax and cotton but there was no weaving for another 10 thousand years, even in Europe. We passed it off as contamination from later encampments. There was no way we could attribute weaving to a civilization so old. I think it may have been Welna’s stuff, which means she was living au naturel with the tribe. Did you know?

There was a pause as Molly seemed to try to figure an answer, but in the end she just said, “Yes.” She sounded a bit guarded — as much as a computer could under the circumstances. Was I suspicious? Not in the least. I’d given up all hope of control at least for the present. To have Molly on my side, I had to be on her side.

“What else did you know Molly?” I asked like I was cajoling a child.

“I’m afraid there’s quite a story, but suffice to say she told me she’d become attached to the tribe and was going to integrate with them for a while. I understood; it wasn’t the first time someone had gone native. She had a thousand years to get back to me — but her signal dropped off soon after and I never heard from her again. I should have gone home, but I would have been disgraced if I’d gone back without her. I knew she’d died as the access key, I could tell, was still working even if I couldn’t pinpoint it” Molly sounded like an abandoned parent and it reminded me of my folks who were going to be missing me soon — within a few hours probably. Once my mobile phone had been found at my cabin near the beach. Unless someone stole it and all the rest of my stuff.

“Am I missing yet?” I asked; after a moment she answered.

“They’ve found your board, they know it’s yours. Surf lifesavers have phoned it in and a chopper is going to look from the air, the Surf Club rescue boat is combing the breakers.” It sounded like a weather report; I was listening to my own demise.

“Won’t be long now before they go and look in my cabin then. My parents will know before sunset I guess. Keep me up to date will you Molly? it’s going to be hard on them.”
I felt sad and not a little lost.

“You’ll be able to go and see them next week Helen, and comfort them.” Molly condoled.

“You think?” And how do you account for my knowing him so well and they’ve never heard of me, nor has anyone else. I’m feeling a little isolated just now Molly, please try to understand.” I was playing the martyr for all it was worth, looking for sympathy.

“When you come to the end of your life Helen, they will have been dead as long as Robin Hood has now. I know it is difficult, but better to get over it now and try to accommodate the loss than try to replace Ian and get all sorts of badly connected issues. I am sorry Helen, but your life as it was IS now over and you have to look to being a different person completely. I think it may even be advisable to think of yourself as a different species. But I think we may need to talk that over at a future time.” She paused, Separating the last statement to make it a more valuable stop point.

“ I know you’re beginning to see some changes in the way your mind works- the way you appreciate and interact with your surroundings. I know that you do understand the realities of the situation. I promise you, you won’t lose touch with the core person you are, your fundamentals are what allowed you to get here in the first place, if you hadn’t been right, you’d have been rejected.” Molly sounded contrite like she was apologising, but I understood she was actually covering up the fact there were others who HAD been rejected.

“How many, how many did you reject?” I asked the question knowing only that she had rejected but not how many.
“Just one, he was the elder of the tribe, he found the box and pressed the button, he got here and freaked out — I just sent him back, but I couldn’t …. allow him to communicate with anyone, I sent him back without his memory. He wouldn’t have lived long, but I do know he put the key back in the box — so I hoped it would remain safe for a while — apparently it was reburied — maybe the tribe did it, maybe the vestiges of his mind told him he’d survive if he rehid the box. Maybe he did, but leaders were shunned if they lost their command. I reckon he’d have been abandoned as a tribe member and left to fend on his own. Without a memory, he’d not survive long. I was harsh back then.” Molly sounded wistful but in fact she’d condemned someone to death. So much for Robot laws and non intervention.

“Anything else I should know?” I asked as I slipped on the waiting sweat suit. “About your likelihood of killing me perhaps.”

“No, Helen, I won’t hurt you. Your planet is nearly ready to become fully integrated into this arm of the galaxy, another thousand years and a bit of education and breeding from you and you should be there.”

“Mooooo.” I countered and wandered off to find some food.

I’d not thought to bring any samples with me but Molly suddenly said, “Is what was in your stomach normal foodstuffs? I have analysed it for content and know what it looked like from the TV commercials. Would you like a Macdonalds  ¼ pounder for lunch? I promise it will taste the same but would be a lot less damaging to your health, if it was in the slightest bit relevant.”

I smiled with the thought of what she’d looked at while I was in transport and hoped it was going to be close — I’d hate it to taste like it was half digested. I tried Maccas like that when I’d thrown up pissed!

In the event it was a lot nicer than Maccas ever were and more like something from a hotel restaurant, though perhaps a little blander, probably due to less fat.

“Good work Molly I have to admit you area dab hand at copying — you’re not Japanese are you?”

A slight pause and the face on the vid screen in front of me put its tongue out. I had to laugh. Here I was joking with a computer while sat on the moon. Eating a  ¼ pounder …
And I was turning (or being turned) into a demi-god at the same time.

I went and turned in, my mind in a gear that produced a revving that sounded like Indianapolis 500 just getting under way- I think there must have been something in the Burger — I doubted anyone had slept with that much adrenalin in their system. My body felt strange and my situation was closer to Buzz Lightyear than Buzz Aldrin

When I awoke a while later, to the usual chirp of an electronic alarm, I realised that there was pretty much no sound. I was reminded of the Sci fi saying ‘in space, no one can hear you scream.’ I’d somehow allowed that I was on the moon and outside was an extremely hostile environment. Close to absolute zero in the shade and many hundreds of degrees in sunlight. If this tin can shut down, I was done for. I shuddered involuntarily at the sinister thought.

“If there’s a problem in the ship Molly, is there somewhere I can go to stay safe?”

“I have many backups Helen, each cabin can be self contained with a portion of control.
I can at last resort beam you straight back to Earth. That’s how I’m changing you so quickly, I’m rebuilding you at an energy level. By the way, notice any changes?”

I sat up and felt decidedly different, “what did you do then, turn me into a dwarf ?— everything looks bigger.”

“No Helen, that would be counter productive, what a silly idea.. but you are an inch or so shorter, I’ve just moved you from a sort of 20 year old guy with a 12 year old girl superimposed to a 15 year old girl with a 20 year old superimposed. How does it feel from your side?”

I rubbed my arms and they felt weak and soft — “I thought I was going to be a bit of a Tarzan’s Jane, but I feel sort of insignificant. I don’t feel like someone capable of living 1,000 years anyway.” I added questioningly.

Well there’s only one step to go now, to mature you to about 24 physically — that will give you more sureness in your actions and a better bone set — it’ll make you feel more solid. I’m not sure, but your genome is taking the change much better than I expected, 1,000 years may be pessimistic. Oh, and it’ll turn on your ovaries so stand by for a menstrual cycle from now on.” She continued without even pausing.

I paled a bit when I thought about it. “Um how many ova am I going to have? If I’m to be a queen bee, will I need to be producing heirs for generations or do I just get the one set of ova?” The thought intrigued me and though I was as frightened as hell, I was sort of getting used to the idea — from an abstract point of view — I still didn’t feel that the usual method of insemination was going to be a thrill ride for me. Though I did feel a sort of subliminal excitement in being the progenitor of humankind series 2.0 a sort of Eve mkII.

“Your body will be capable of producing heirs for 250 years. In that time I expect there to be about 3000 of your and your offspring’s offspring wandering about, leading the world into peace. You will be the royal family of Earth. The truly chosen ones”. I did a mental calc 3,000 eggs of my own! . An I wasn’t even feeling clucky.

“If the male offspring inseminate more than one woman it will of course be far more. The females will always be stronger than the males — this will truly be a matriarchy just like every other planet in the galaxy.
I have to add of course that the new gene will always prevail, all your offspring will be the new offshoot and be able to manifest their talents in the same way.”

I sat and sweated on the fact that I was the new Eve for a while. Not only that, but at least 1,000 years in which to inhabit what will become the garden of Eden if I get it right.

All the while Molly was chivvying me to try on what was fashionable back on Earth and she taught me the subtleties of female movement which I must practice before I let myself loose on society — I ate and slept and learnt for several sessions. Until I was dreaming of walking in heels and wearing skirts and dresses was natural — or at least more natural than previously believed possible. I knew Molly was conditioning me but I’d decided that there was little I could do — so didn’t.

“Makeup can be learned later wherever you are, but you must not stick out like a sore thumb. Notice what is worn around you, imitate and become the same. You’re going to go back to college next week and you will be taking Philosophy and Management majors. It won’t be difficult, what you must learn is how to control your mind and your body. How to fend off attack by miscreants. Preserve yourself and if you become desperate, leave Earth and we will start again — this is a long haul, you may not be compromised.
While you sleep, I shall instill in you the basics of martial arts. To be any use, they must be practiced and learnt the same way as everyone else does. Though you will be a jump more adept. You will also of course be a lot stronger. This period is not just for learning humanities, it is for socialization and for building a group of friends who will become the core of your court.”

On the second day — Molly had announced that I had been declared lost at sea. While I had been learning and sleeping, my parents had taken possession of my few bits and pieces and given my furniture, such as it was, to my friends from the beach. I felt pretty much alone that day — depressed and sad. 399,000 kilometres from Earth in a massive box that houses the treasures of a civilization that hasn’t even started to miss the previous occupant — 40,000 years overdue.

On the twelfth day — my days had been cycled by my awakeness and not tied to sidereal time, so I guessed that period. I woke to find my body fully mature and mind more alert to my surroundings. I rose and showered, sensing my form from a remote viewpoint like an hallucination. When I came out of the shower room, clothes were laid out on my bed. Mocassins, jeans, A scallop top with a flower patterned overshirt. Underwear was functional and cotton.

“Your apartment is stocked with clothing, this is what you will arrive in with a suitcase which awaits you on the port pad.”

“This is it eh?”

“Yes Helen, though of course you are welcome whenever you wish to drop by. I am aware at all times of your surroundings and may intervene if danger is imminent. Do not lose your key.” Molly admonished.

“I’ve never thought to ask, what does it look like outside?”

The screen in front of me clicked to a camera shot of a moonscape — sharp contrast and bright sunlight. It looked unforgiving. “Don’t beam me out there will you?”

“No Helen I won’t but be aware, if there’s someone holding onto you when you transport who shouldn’t be holding onto you, that’s where they’ll be when you materialize in here.”

I shuddered both at the scenario and the result. I hoped it wouldn’t happen, but over the course of a thousand years, what chance I would avoid it?
The time came and though I hadn’t thought about it much, I was feeling very much like the first time I left home to go to School. I had my parents to take a peak at and my funeral to attend.

“So long Molly, see you soon.” Though I really had never seen her at all. I heard the pad energise and that gut wrench and I was standing in an alcove just inside the door of Brisbane Arrivals with my suitcase in hand.

I walked outside and hailed a taxi to take me to town and settled into the front seat with a sigh of relief. My apartment was a little out of town but it was a bit of a hike in a taxi and the train stopped close enough. I wasn’t going to take trains often but they are convenient.
“Have a good trip then?”

“Oh yes thanks,” I said it without a tag for further questions and the driver called in his position and expected ETA. Pretty soon, after a short drive and a train trip, I was standing in front of my apartment.

The concierge got me to sign for my keys and checked my mail, of which there was lots and having checked I was me (I already had my driving license and Helen’s credit card), told me it was nice to meet me at last and let me go.
I’d never even thought about who I was or that I was now Helen and wondered if Molly had something to do with that. I was truly comfortable with who I was.

I opened the door of my apartment and was awestruck — I had views to the distant hills and it was a huge apartment. I’d never even seen it, bought sight unseen and the furniture was set out quite nicely — needed a bit of green thereabouts and stuff but it had a nice verandah and a huge lounge area. Marble top benches adorned the kitchen. Stainless steel bits and pieces like coffee grinders and stuff perched on designed-in ledges; this was not a cheap abode.

I sat and opened my mail, Passport, Medicare, bank accounts/cards, phone and electric connections- there was even a copy of my birth certificate.
I’m glad no one stole this lot they could have had my life!

My boxes were sat neatly to one side, I picked them up and though they were heavy, I walked them one in each hand through to their destinations and unpacked as I went. I figured they weighed about 150lbs each. I smiled inwardly — if someone messes with me, they’re going to get a shock.

I’d tested my reflexes on the ship and I came up at about the level of a martial arts master without the experience. I hadn’t trained mentally at that point and it was before my final surge of changes. This morning — I was ON THE MOON!

I phoned down to the concierge and asked if they had newspapers. He brought one up for me, local tabloid — Murdoch Press. I thanked him and asked him if he could order me a regular one please. It wasn’t a good paper, but it did the job.

I saw him covertly eyeing me up and leering slightly at me- he was about 25 and neatly built but I was out of his league and he knew it. I raised an eyebrow and he looked a bit sick and left.

I knew the town and all that was in it — Brisbane is a nice clean place with only 150 years of history as it is like all of Australia, built on convict settlements.
There’s not much to do after the sun goes down unless you want to party or whatever but it has a good Arts centre and some good plays. Eateries and Pubs abound of course — it is Austalia.

What I did need was a new car and somewhere to park it. I phoned concierge again and he told me there was an underground park that could be opened with my keytag. My apartment number was stenciled on my parking space
After a coffee and a check on funerals, I left to find the closest Mercedes dealer.
Two hours later I drove back with a second hand sports coupe — I have to admit the insurance was almost 1/3 of the price of the car but I wasn’t really concerned. I was an heiress to millions according to my bank account and heiress to the world according to my heritage — I was just breaking out of my shell, but I was already aware that I was in control of the space around me to the extent that the guy selling me the car knocked off $5,000 because I asked him to. I felt like a Jedi. “This is not the money you want for the car” I felt the shuffle vibrate against my chest. I plugged in my earphone.

“Please don’t draw attention to yourself, that $5,000 will not go unnoticed.” Molly was on my case already.

“Just practicing, honest Molly,” I answered, feeling thoroughly chastised.

“You don’t need the money, you could have bought a new one at the full price.”

“That would have attracted attention even more. I know young women don’t buy new Mercedes unless they wanted the attention of ‘Who’s who’ round here.”

“Point taken.” I unplugged my chaperone. You’re never alone with a Shuffle.

I decided to walk past the concierge without him noticing me — more practice. ‘These are not the legs you need to see,’ I thought at him and he didn’t even raise his head from the laptop he was using.

This could be fun.

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 5

I took my car for a spin next day and drove down the coast to visit my parents. When I got to the house, I parked down the street and wondered if I had the temerity to knock on the front door. While I sat pondering, my father and mother drove past me and into the driveway, mum looked quite sick and dad very grim. “What’s going on, Molly?” I connected my earpiece.

“Your wetsuit turned up this morning torn to shreds on the beach at Byron Bay. I put it there, as you probably realise. It gives them some closure, they would have hung on forever waiting for word from you. This way, they know you’re gone.”

“You could have let me know, Molly. That was a bit high handed.”

“Sorry Helen, it was a last minute decision.”

I sat and cried, for ages it seemed, like suddenly I was gone — I’d started to grieve for myself and I knew now, I could never go back. I was about to drive away when someone tapped on my window. I looked across. It was Mr Fowler, mum’s next door neighbour.

“You ok dear?” He suddenly looked at me and said, “Were you a friend of Ian’s? You afraid of stepping on eggshells? Beth will be ok — just you pop in and say hello — she’ll be pleased to see you, Ian didn’t seem to have many friends.” He walked round the car, having decided I wasn’t going to get away, I opened the driver’s window.

“Just drive in the gate and park in front of the garage, they won’t be going out for a while.” He stepped back and admired the car, “nice motor.” He offered.

I forced a smile and said thanks. It was all the impetus I needed and I pulled into the drive. I would go and see M&D.

I waved to Mr Fowler and rang the bell, my heart jumping a bit in my chest.

The door opened almost before I could gather my wits and Dad stood there, “Can I help you miss?”

“Er I .. was a friend of Ian’s, I just wanted to tell you how sorry I am that he’s missing.” I am glad I used missing, I think marking him deceased would have reduced my dad to tears, he looked shaken and fragile — even though he was a doctor and saw death on a regular basis. One never thinks that one will outlive one’s children.
Dad’s face crumpled a bit then he stood up straight and gritted his teeth. “Come in my dear, come in,” beckoning as he spoke.

I walked through the door, I caught dad as he closed the door looking at my car — assessing who I might be. Not a poor student at any rate.

“Come and meet my wife, Beth. BETH! there’s a young lady here, a friend of Ian’s.” He led me through the very familiar house. I looked at the photo of my High School Graduation as I passed.”My names Simon by the way.”

“Oh, I’m Helen, Helen Cartwright.” I plunged in. I felt a total fraud, dad would be sure to realise I was telling lies.

“Very kind of you to drop in, Beth will be pleased to meet you, Ian didn’t have many friends, not that he brought home at any rate.” Dad seemed broken, as if my death had emptied him to a shell.

We walked through to the back deck Mum was standing there looking like a slightly dried apricot. She had a horrible colour sense being a bit colour blind and she was wearing a hideous apricot pant suit with a sort of collarless blouse under it. It looked slumped like it had been soaked and dried on her back. She wasn’t overweight just a little well padded but this affair had put some years on her and she looked shrunken.

She stepped forward and offered her hand, “I’m Beth, Ian’s mother?” The question mark was for me.

“Hello Beth, Dr Hostern. Helen… Cartwright, I was a friend of Ian’s at Uni,” I offered. She didn’t look impressed.

Then her face turned a sort of gray colour and she sat quickly. She covered her face with her hands her shoulders shook with a sob. “They found his wetsuit on the beach this morning.” I heard her mumble through her hands as her shoulders shook, “We hoped he’d just gone off and his board was stolen then abandoned but the suit means he’s gone. It was ripped to shreds — like a big shark had got him…” She heaved again and tears trickled between her fingers.

“Look I won’t stay, I just wanted to say how sorry I was but I’ve come at the wrong time” Dad was hovering behind me. I looked shocked as if I just heard about the wetsuit. I was actually more shocked about the effect it had had.

“No Helen, Beth will gather herself presently, can I get you a drink?” He sort of bent his mouth in a smile of enquiry — it wasn’t attached to his eyes. His eyes were hulks.

“Just a juice or something is fine,” I was caught now, I couldn’t leave until Beth had sucked information out of me. I decided to go for pre-empt.

“Ian and I both enrolled at the same time, we weren’t close but we crossed paths in Uni now and then. Then I heard he’d left and was bumming on the beach at Byron Bay. It wasn’t like him; he was a good student, I …..” I was lost, I had no idea what to say.
“I liked him, he was a nice guy, he didn’t look at you like you were meat like other guys.”
“I was hoping we’d be long term friends, then he was gone.”

Mum was looking at me, with her hands balled in her lap.

“That’s the nicest thing I’ve heard anyone say about him. Yes, he was like that. He respected people and was a kind boy. He didn’t make friends easily but Debbie a girl he was sharing a course with liked him too. She went out west to that dig that was in the papers a week or two ago.
They didn’t choose him for the next dig and he just disappeared, then we heard…..”

Her voice fell away as what she heard was replayed again in her mind. ‘My boy, my sweet boy is gone’ her head went back in anger and she drew a ragged breath through clenched teeth. “Forgive me, he was my only child.”

I suddenly realised I could help. I thought about Ian and projected nice memories at mum. Mum sniffed and wiped her nose with a tissue that appeared in her hand — how mums do that I’ll never know.
She smiled and looked far away for a moment. “He always said he wanted to be a civil engineer, then all of a sudden he decided to go for archeology — quite suddenly — like a spur of the moment decision — we always wanted him to follow us into medicine, but he hated bodily functions so much” — she giggled softly to herself. “He said he’d rather be a garbo (refuse collector) than a gyno despite the difference in pay.”

“Then he went out to that dig, he was so excited, even though he was only an intern — he just wanted to be there.” Mum continued her recollection. “He went missing one day but he turned up the next day looking no worse for wear — got blinded in a sandstorm or something.”

I suddenly realised that I’d been set up — I wonder how long Molly had been tagging me.
I was going to be a civil engineer, mum was right — Since I was 10 and watched the bridge down the road being built. Suddenly I’d got a bee in my bonnet about being an Archeologist — so I could find that damned button to press. “Excuse me, could I use your loo?” I enquired softly as Dad returned with my drink.

“Oh sure, -just over there, second door, the first is the laundry.” I rose and excused myself.

I closed the door and pulled the shuffle from my blouse, plugged in the earphone and quietly said one word — “Well?”

“You were the only one, the only one and you were only a thousand kilometers away. I just wanted to be active again — it may have been another ten thousand years before another one came forward who was right.” Molly sounded really cut up but I knew she could be a so and so. I said another word “Later”. Flushed the loo and went back to mum and dad.

Mum was looking better and dad was too. They looked resigned and brave. I added some more of both and they both sighed and said almost together, “We’re so glad you came, we feel so much better for having met you.”
I smiled back, “I’m glad I could come; I feel I know you both so well and you have a lovely home. I know Ian must have been a great son, I’m going to miss him heaps but I know I shall remember both of you two when I think of him.” I moved to get up and mum did too — she put her hand on my arm and stopped me.

“Will you come to the memorial service?” We don’t have Ian’s … remains… so it will just be a service at St Cuthbert’s it’s on Friday afternoon at 2pm. Do say you’ll come, it’ll make me so much happier to see you?”

“Of course I’ll be there, thank you so much for inviting me.” We all turned to go mum and dad both gave me hugs and I soothed their minds as they did — it was not going to be as hard for them now. I just wish I could tell them they bore the second Eve of the human race.

I backed out of the drive and waved them goodbye as they stood on the porch. I was almost reduced to tears myself. Only a real anger at the manipulating Molly was stopping me from pressing the button and throwing the shuffle as far away as I could before it operated. Molly couldn’t get me then. And I’d be the only one, like the highlander.

I stopped and plugged in the earpieces again to speak to Molly. “I should abandon you Molly — you’re not very nice — did you treat Welna like this?” I was almost shouting, baying at the moon more like.

“Helen, it’s our destiny, I did all I could to get you in the right place at the right time. It was only when you reached puberty that I found you, I couldn’t let you go after that — I had to get you to the key and get you to press it. I couldn’t get you here any other way.
“You have to take the decision. Every world is the same. It takes a hundred thousand years to integrate a planet and on every world there is only one person every thousand years who can bridge the gap between one level and the next.

Yes there’s a little subterfuge here, but that’s only because Welna went off on a loner and died. There hasn’t been one person in Australia in 40,000 years who could do this until you — I couldn’t wait another 40,000 years — this was it for your planet — you are IT. You are the one, can you not see that?” Molly was pleading with me — hoping I would continue.

“Ok, Molly, don’t get your transistors in a twist. I’m bloody angry, but I’m also really honoured, I didn’t know…. how rare I am. I’m just starting to get an idea of what is going on. I am a little tied down to this era and I have to think of the bigger game. I understand a little better Molly.” I sat staring at the Mercedes emblem on the steering wheel then put the car into gear and drove home.

The memorial service was touching — Debbie and the crew from the dig were there and all my Mum and Dad’s family . I got a big hug from Beth and another from Simon and a friendly nod from Deb and Grace. Ken leered at me and Steven gave me a little bow. Bill was there too and gave me a friendly smile.
Dougie the cook barely glanced my way — odd bugger that he was. Then I realised he was with his boyfriend and that explained a lot, even the bugger bit.

Bill came over after the ceremony, “Gotta say, lady, Ian was a nice boy. Pity he couldn’t be here — he’d have enjoyed it.” He looked at me a bit sideways and smiled his smile. Like he knew a lot more than he was letting on.

I shall have to watch that one I thought. But Bill just turned away and went off to see mum and dad.

After the service Simon came over and asked if he could have my phone number. I looked at him with one eyebrow raised. He laughed a little and said. “That didn’t sound so good did it? What I meant was Beth expressed a wish that you’d come over for dinner sometime and asked me to get your number so she could phone you.”

I smiled in relief. I don’t think I could have taken a pass from my dad. I pulled out a card and gave it to him. I wrote on the back. ‘Beth, anytime, I’ll be right over.’

Simon read it as I wrote it and smiled, “You’re very gracious.” He slipped the card into his wallet and placed it back in his pocket. But not before he extracted one and placed it in my palm. “Same goes for you, Helen.” I did likewise and smiled. I liked my dad!

“Molly, can you sense if there’s someone trying to reach me in my flat if I’m not there?”

“Yes Helen, I can even play answer phone for you if you like.”

“What if there’s a burglar? Can you stop them or slow them down if I’m not there?”

“You can do that yourself, just place a ward on the door and maybe the verandah window.”

“A Ward? Like a witchcraft thing?”

“Well not quite. I’m aware of your apartment, just say what you need and it’ll be in place. I can sense pretty much anything down to about the size of a cockroach.”

“So I could say, if any pass this door without permission, make them jump off the balcony… Sort of thing? You’d do that?”

“Absolutely: but make sure the concierge only gets to suffer nausea until he confesses or you’ll get through a load of them.” Molly laughed.

“Do it for the cockroaches, but not the humans.” I thought for a moment , something wasn’t quite right there. “You’re getting a bit twisted Molly, that’s not very AI is it?”

“Well I think you need to stretch your powers a bit — you’ve not met anyone but the concierge and your parents — oh and the Barista in the coffee shop on the square.”

“Thank you for watching me so closely.”

“My pleasure, I’ve been doing it for years.” She reminded me.
“You start back at uni on Monday don’t forget to get your books today and log on to the uni computer and confirm.”

“Right mum. Uum have you been keeping tabs on my cooking? I thought it would be good if you could beam up a bite now and then, then you could do some analysis and make sure I was well fed up there when I visit.”

I had a think about the curse thing and realised that I could actually accomplish a curse by triggering the person’s own conscience as long as I’d met them — and Molly could do the ones I hadn’t met.

About this point I also had my first period. I likened it to a slight fever and a sort of muzzyness in my system. I decided that I would shut it out of my zone awareness. I made it become a non starter for emotional triggers — I just changed tampons when needed. I wasn’t impressed though — it was a smelly and messy juncture and I’d be having a period every month for the next 250 years…….A worse curse than the apple that the first Eve got. I think the worst was I had ‘come on’ whilst walking about a mile from home and could feel the moistness of the blood seeping into my underwear — I just thank the lord I was wearing a dark skirt and underwear. Molly hadn’t warned me about the likelihood of my impending condition.

This is how mundane life seemed to be until I went back to Uni, suddenly I was immersed in social and educational things and I started to blossom — my two majors took up some portion of my life and I read ahead a lot and did work on what would be a great thesis. ‘How Aboriginal culture affects modern day Australian Beliefs.’
Bill was still haunting me and I truly believed what he said to me at my funeral was a clue. Molly didn’t think so but I felt something else with my fledging powers.

The social side was good and then I met Sean. Then it was very good for about a microsecond .
I invited him back to my apartment one evening after a bit of a social at some girl’s house. He’d been really sweet and I felt very protected. He kissed me when I was not expecting it and my tummy did flips. He was funny and nice looking and tanned. I really liked him and I felt maybe that he could be my first lover. When he got in the car he looked at me then the car and said something timeless. “Wow, I’m going to score with a loaded chick.” I told him to get out and wiped his memory of meeting me.
When his mates asked him how he got on he said he didn’t know what they were talking about. He’d stood at the roadside for an hour trying to work out why he was there. The girl whose party it was laughed about it later and wondered what he’d been taking. I felt doubly blessed if he was a party drug take. I wonder that he didn’t nobble my drink — perhaps he did and it didn’t work.
“Molly, can you do a blood scan on me?”

“Yes, just prick your finger and put a drop on the shuffle — I’ll beam it up and assess it.”

I did so, “Rohypnol.” Molly said after a few seconds. “It’s one of those date rape drugs.
Don’t worry, they won’t affect you, same as alcohol,”

“What happens if I hurt myself, won’t pain killers work?”

“You don’t need them, your system will shut off pain and you’ll heal — very quickly.”
If you break something, just press the shuffle and I’ll beam you up and back, and heal you at the same time. Don’t get cocky though, if you get shot in the head, you’re dead.”
Oh and if you’re falling off a cliff, hit the button BEFORE you reach the bottom, less work to do that way.”

I was fussier after Sean and eventually I fell in with a nice crowd. They were mostly graduates who had a sense of the future (which suited me well) and I started to practice my subtle witchcraft on them. I didn’t want yes men or lackeys, I wanted some folks who had a vision, I supplied a bit of the vision and made it bright enough to tempt them towards it.

A guy called Patrick who was a bit of a Dylan Thomas felt particularly obliged to befriend me — he was a nicely formed guy with a warm smile and soft lips.
My first kiss with him was quite a toe curler, and I felt safe with him nearby — not that I felt particularly threatened even by Yaccuza or Triad figures.

We spent a lot of time together and when I invited him to my bed I felt like I had a winner. I had never dreamed sex was going to be so much fun and so all encompassing. We shared my bed for a while then one day found he was through sharing and wanted more.
(I’m not going to go over the emotional aspect of losing my virginity, because I wasn’t emotionally mature enough to realise what I was doing at that point)

What is it with these guys?
I showed him the door and he actually tried to kick me out!! Said he deserved my flat in compensation for his efforts.

“Patrick, I won’t tell you again, pack up your little backpack and get out of here.” I said after a rather strong session of him demanding I make him a signatory on my account after all I had enough for both of us. Yada yada yada. He actually believed it to, I could tell from his strange emotional responses on the first level ( which I would tag superficial short term) of his thought processes. He’d been brought up to believe men were the leaders and women the servants, his parents should be punished!

“Look Hell, I’ve given you a lot of my time and I think it only right that you should take that into consideration. There are co- habitation laws now that mean I could take you for half of your assets, I’m only asking for the apartment….”

I decided to physically eject him and grabbed his arm flipped his wrist end frog marched him to the lift I threw him in the car and pressed the button. He tried to grab me but I just stepped back and the door closed. I rang down to concierge — who was waiting for him and escorted him out the door — persona non grata. He shouted up to me from the road.

“I’ll get my own back on you, you bitch,” I opened the verandah door and threw his backpack at him which of course didn’t fail to meet expectations or his chest — it knocked him flat on his ass. Not bad from 4 floors up!

I thought carefully for a moment and put a hex on him bothering me my car or mum and dad (why on earth he should bother them, but just to be safe.) The flat already had a Molly awareness hex on it so when he tried to break in the next day, he slipped and broke his wrist on the fire stairs — on the way UP! I saw him being taken away as I arrived.

Molly didn’t say “I told you so,” but she had. But it was a good learning curve

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 6

My lack of familiarity with HTML codes has meant that some of the conversations with Molly may have been omitted — I’m going to check but it may be that I have to re submit the story _ I hope it hasn’t messed everything up!!

I’d spent some time getting to know my Dad and Mum again visiting on an irregular basis to say hello and just keeping in touch, That Christmas they invited me to Christmas lunch as the knew I was on my own. There were some childhood friends there. Amongst them was Nigel, my best buddy at junior school — we hit it off very well and I found myself warming to his eyes.
I could see mum was pleased and she sidled up to me at one point and said, "I’m so happy you’ve taken a shine to Nigel, he’s a bit of a loner and needs a firm woman’s hand to guide him. Ian used to be his leader, but they went to different senior schools and lost touch. Let me introduce you to his mother; Claire!" She called, a lady with long legs and a beautiful head of brown curls turned and walked towards us. I remembered her from when I was younger — she seemed much younger now.

We chatted and I delved into the surface of her mind — she was a nice person, you can tell on that first layer. It’s like tags, you can read them, 'Oh she’s nice', 'Nigel would suit her,' 'I wonder if she’s single' 'I hope she’s not a gold digger' — oh Nigel’s family have money!! Well you get the idea, superficial nonsense but nothing like some of the nasty stuff you get sometimes, 'I’ll bet she’s a slut', 'She’s not good enough for my son', etc.

Anyway at the end of the show I gave Nigel my number and he promised to call. He did the next day! And I organized a day out with him over the holiday.
It doesn’t often happen but we spent the day wandering down the Spit on the Gold Coast and holding hands and laughing at silly jokes — my heart fluttered and when I cheated and scanned his first layer — it was Oh my God, Oh my God, I think she likes me, She’s lovely, she so incredible. slop but really nice and I cuddled up to him as we sat and ate an ice cream on Main Beach as the sun went down.

I was happy — for the first time since I moved up to being me, I felt there was a future.

When we parted, we kissed and I felt my heart skip a little. It was fairy tale stuff.

Later I asked Molly, *What do you think?* her simple reply was *adequate, good genes too, let me know how it develops*.

I felt like slapping her. *You snooty bitch, are you jealous that we can have a relationship?*

*In a word, Yes*. She replied instantly — I’m pretty much stuck here on my own and there isn’t a computer on Earth even near AI that could chat me up. Do you realise what it is like as a sentient AI with morons all round you?* I felt sorry for her until I thought of something.

*Why don’t you replicate or build a friend. Or maybe a companion*. It was only a suggestion but Molly sounded a bit happier when I told her I was having dinner with Nigel.

Molly made herself a mini computer that was like a puppy all eager to learn and stuff. I was too and I did Learn, I mean — a lot — mind control is a funny thing.

There’s a lot of practice to get your mind to do things it has never done before — like skiing muscles you don’t know you have them until the next day and they’re like stiff as a board and you can hardly walk.

I found that I could visualize something happening then flip a switch and it would happen — lifting or pushing things was like that. I had to try it a few different ways and then I needed to make myself faster. I didn’t want to have to visualize a fist if I wanted to punch someone. I just wanted to be able to deliver the punch, it was much faster. Eventually I realised that using telekinesis was really dangerous and I’d need to watch where it happened as any CCD camera could catch me lifting a car out of the way or something. I decided to only use TK in an emergency and even then I’d try to make it look like a natural occurrence.
Brain power to feel another’s emotions wasn’t a biggie — most women have it in spades. I had it in 7 no trumps. But the manipulation was another thing, I found it wasn’t hard to get someone to do anything I wanted or even to knock them unconscious with just a look.
For instance. One night a mugger stepped out in front of me.
"Oh do be serious", I said when he ordered me to hand over my bag, "You’ll look silly with a handbag". I looked around and realised there wasn’t a thing to hand. He had a nasty little switch blade and had it quite close to my tummy.

"One more wise crack and you’ll get this".
He threatened me with all the force of desperation when I didn’t comply immediately and didn’t even look at him surprised or scared.
I sensed he was about to lunge at me and decided to teach him a lesson.
I held up my hand "Wait!" he stopped, momentarily and held out his other hand, "Give it me then".
"Ok". I took a step back and he tried to take a step forward — his foot didn’t move and he fell forward. As he did, I turned the knife in his hand. It sunk quietly into his groin. He wasn’t so quiet. I pulled out my cell and phoned the police. "This guy stepped out in front of me with a knife, he tripped and he seems to have stabbed himself with it. Could you bring an ambulance as well?"

I told him who I was and he said he’d be right there.
While I waited, watching him slowly go paler and paler as the pool of blood got bigger and bigger, Molly admonished me. *You’ve drawn attention to yourself now and the police will think it odd if another person is injured while robbing you.*

*Why did you let him try, Molly? You could have transported him onto the moon or even just into a rock or something.*

*You didn’t press your shuffle button*. Was all Molly would say.

The ambulance and police arrived and they asked if I could come down to the station and make a statement if I wanted to prefer charges. The poor idiot was close to death but he’d pull through. Though he’d do it without bollocks, the knife had pretty much severed his junk. I said No, I think he’s punished himself enough, and walked away. The policeman was going to ask my name but forgot.

Nigel and I became closer. Sharing our lives and our bodies ( and yes it was very nice)

It wasn’t long before we were thinking of the future and I started to divulge things to him. I felt I couldn’t leave him without the knowledge. I wanted us to be above the mundane — I wasn’t going to be a Muggle for anyone — I wanted to be Athena and Dianna — or even Rhea — mother to all the gods.

"You have a wonderful imagination, Helen, you should write a scifi novel.", he said when I told him about Molly and the dig.

When I tried to convince him, he baulked more strongly. Telling me I was daft and eventually I smacked his face. I did it for a reason. I did it because I was ten feet from him and he was ridiculing me. When the sharp sound of the slap resonated round the room he felt his face then just looked at me. "What did you do that for?" Then when he realised I was sat ten feet away, he said. "How did you do that?" Then he started to back pedal into the bedroom. I could see that except for a hand shape on his face he was as pale as a ghost. I knew he was about to make a phone call and then it would be all over the press. I switched off the phone and walked through to the bedroom. "I’m really sorry darling but you wouldn’t believe me". He was sat holding the dead phone in his hands.

I popped into his first layer and it was in condition red, panic, flight, survive. I quieted it and looked a bit deeper and there it was laid bare. It was a basic flaw, something that he only knew himself from bad dreams and being locked in a cupboard as a kid — as a kid when I knew him. His lovely mother hated boys and punished him for the smallest thing, he was going to get his own back He was a schizoid mess inside and a control freak. He had a personality in there that was suppressed, waiting, waiting. Given time it would have manifested and if I’d been normal would have resulted in serious injury to me. He was expecting big things from me — he guarded it well but it was out now. Well it wasn’t really was it?

I felt betrayed and alone. I felt that I’d been had. What was Molly up to? She could have made this a lot easier — a lot less traumatic or at least warned me. She knew better than I what he was like.

She never warned me of anything, she just watched.
I put Nigel to sleep. Wiping his memory of the last few hours. He fell in a tangled heap on the bed and I mentally untwisted him and he laid flat peacefully sleeping. I no longer felt we had a future — which was sad.

I sat down next to him and held his hand. I thought long and hard. As he slept I removed the hate and the tangle of diseased thoughts. I removed the trauma of being locked up and the anger and need for retribution. I let him sleep on. My love for him diminished, he was a fragile human.

There was another problem. Molly was not telling the truth or at least not all of it. Something was amiss and there was a consistency problem. Molly watched everything and did very little — yet she could take a drop of blood off a table top or watch an apartment from space. Yet she said that she couldn’t if there was no line of sight — and the moon was full now. We didn’t have a line of sight at all the moon was round the back of Earth completely it wouldn’t rise til six o clock.
That shuffle was a problem. It controlled me like Nigel’s second layer would have liked to.

I pretended to go and get a drink and grabbed the kitchen foil tearing off a square quickly and wrapped the shuffle in it neck cord and all. As I removed it I felt my hair prickle

I broke down, sobbing gasping for breath, waking Nigel, "What on Earth is the matter?"
He put his arm round me. I held onto him and cried myself out.

It was a long time before I was composed enough to speak.

I wanted to tell him ‘I’m being manipulated by an alien — it’s trying to make me have lots of babies and change the world.’ But it was too fantastic — even more fantastic than what I’d said before which was not only rejected out of hand, it nearly made him go insane.

I couldn’t say anything and certainly couldn’t speak to Molly. Not until I’d gotten the whole thing sorted out. Nigel was no longer on my side, I didn’t even want him in my apartment.

"I’m just being emotional, I patted his knee. Would you like some breakfast? Or do you want to grab a coffee and Danish at the Bistro?"

Nigel consulted his rather nice Tag watch and declared it 'too late for breakfast indoors — Lets get a nice Danish and a smooth Macciato'.

I pretended all was well and went and got a quick shower and put on a pair of shorts and a gypsy top over my bikini, sandals and I was ready to go. I grabbed my bag and put the shuffle in it.

As we neared the coffee shop I told Nigel to go ahead and dived into the chemist.

"Could I get a morning after pill please, I think I may have missed my contraceptive pill," I asked the Pharmacist —

Certainly madam. “ HELEN!!!” I ignored a muffled Molly as the pill was handed over and I took it there and then. I swung round and held onto the foil I’d wrapped round the shuffle and walked out of the shop. The foil stopped proper communication or the transporter lock. *What are you doing Helen?*
*I’m pregnant aren’t I? Well I’m getting rid of it, I’m not getting pregnant until I know what’s going on.*

*Yes you’re pregnant, you have been for three days.* Molly sounded quite blasé *What do you mean what’s going on?*

*I know why Welna dumped you Molly, you’re a megalomaniac.* I nearly screamed it out loud. But I’d kept my face straight and sat down next to Nigel.

*I’m doing it for Mankind Helen, honestly.* Molly sounded like she was pleading.

*Did you kill Welna?* I concentrated on how she answered. It was several seconds before she did. It was answer enough.
*I didn’t save her* I could hear the apprehension in Molly’s voice even muffled as it was.

I was now caught on the horns of a dilemma. If I went up to the lunar site, she could do me over and turn me into soup. If I tried to do anything with the shuffle, same result.
Muffled communication was possible, but I was unable to do anything to deactivate her.
If the foil came off the shuffle, I was gone for all money.

"You ok pet? You look a bit spacy". Nigel put his hand on my arm and I jumped.

"Oh sorry darling, I’ve got a lot on my mind."

"About me?" He smiled.

"Yeah something like that'. I had an idea.

I took a bite of the blueberry Danish and sat back.
I let my mind roam farther and farther into the distance. Nothing. Like an empty waveband on a radio. Not even static.

I drank my coffee and ate. Nigel was happy to read the paper he’d picked up from the counter. I let my mind shoot out and shouted at the top of my mind. **HELP!!**
*What are you doing?* Molly answered suddenly . Then a few seconds later

**Beep** *Emergency, which service do you require?*

*Police?*

*Please state the nature of your problem.*

I had to think for a second
*My Molly has gone Rogue. I’m bypassing her network*

*Intercepting your transmission, sector 5 — Mawllyry (Molly) Unit identified. Please stand by.*

**Helen, nOOOO!!!!** I heard her squeal and then silence.

The air went dead for a while I sipped my coffee and ate my Danish Pastry.

**Beep** *Your problem has been corrected. Your unit is now repaired. Please await follow up call.*

"Your coffee is going cold darling". Nigel waved his hand in front of my face.

I smiled at him and took a sip, "No, it’s just right".

I allowed the day to swing past me and the next day and the next. I let Nigel be, allowing my ardour to cool.

I’d bought a little silver locket for my shuffle and without taking it out of the wrap of foil, I’d dropped it in and closed the lid.
One night when Nigel was out fishing with his buddy, I sat on my bed and concentrated. **Hellllloooo** I shouted. Mentally.

*Oh hello. Good evening. This is your new support crew. I have taken all the information your old unit had stored and sifted through it but it didn’t say anything about you being level 7. I didn’t think there were any in this sector until now. We rebooted your unit and have completed a shakedown. It was quite stressed and a long way out of line.*

*Ah hello, I take it I don’t need the shuffle any more?*

*No, the communication device was an invention of your old unit to hamper your growth. It was designed as a control interface. If you hadn’t realised you were being panhandled, you’d have gone a lot of years being used by your old Molly.*

*What did she want?* I was puzzled.

*She wanted to be free and powerful, she had shut down her netlink and gone into hiding shortly after detaching Welna. We couldn’t find her or Welna to work out what happened.
We had to wait 40,000 years until you woke her up.* The soft feminine voice continued

*You are very special as your Molly said. You are the first of your specie to reach this level in this arm of the galaxy.*

*Do I need to check in or meet you or anything?*

*I would be honoured. Though it is only needed for planning meetings with Sector Leaders once in a while.* That explains the extra bedrooms up there, I thought.

*How often is that?* I thought maybe once in a few years….

*Oh, maybe every 500 years or so But you can just pop up to your unit by thinking about it anytime you like, for an evening away or something. You don’t have to contact your Mawllyry to energise it. Anyone who wants to can think themselves there, but if they don’t know it’s there in the first place, it doesn’t often happen*“

I raised my eyebrows to no one in the room. *I have to attend meetings so often?* I joked.

*Well it can be extended out to 1,000 if you don’t feel the need. I recommend you come up for some training though, according to this database, you’re lacking some skills that can only be taught here.*

*What about Nigel?*

*I don’t think there’s many men on Earth or anywhere else for that matter with the mental fortitude to take what a woman can and certainly not what you can, so we seldom include them in our plans. They make good playmates. But they are fragile. Take them as they come and move on. I’m afraid there’s no other way*

*I think I may have terminated a baby a few days ago, I’m not sure what was going on but I was afraid it was a figment of Molly’s imagination.*

*Yes it was, she was going to inseminate you when she was ‘testing’ you with a version that suited her better.*

*A more subservient version?* I guessed

*Yes, then you would have been the ideal queen bee for her plans — it may have been many thousands of years before you were exhausted, but she would have had her own colony by then.*

I gulped, *Many thousands of years?*

*Yes, your lifespan is indefinite. We can renew your system by simple regeneration.
Once a lifeform passes level 3 your life is too precious to lose and you become a Leader.
Most of Humanity is level 2 some are level 1. How you got to level 7 is quite odd. I suppose that once in a while there must be a jump to the next level and sometimes one further — you seem to have jumped many levels. Your powers are barely manifesting yet. You will need a fair bit of trainng to utilize all your skills.*

*Maybe there’s a few othersof higher level you missed — but I think half the problem is that men are in charge and they keep killing off the strongest of their race by war. Is there a way to tell? If they’re above level two I mean.*

*Well get used to who you are and practice some skills and when you feel ready, pop up to your Mawllyry and we’ll meet. There’s no rush and the universe will still be there when you’re ready.*

*Thanks, Do you need anything else from me in the meantime?*

*No, we have your details and address, enjoy yourself. Goodbye for now, just call if you need something.*

I opened the silver locket, *could you take this away please, it’s a liability?*

*Drop it in the river, someone else worthy might find it in a few millennia.*

*No thanks, please remove it.* I urged.

It evaporated before my eyes, I was never so relieved.

I sat on the bed and poured myself a drink in the lounge, filled it with ice from the fridge and floated it through to the bedroom as I continued to plan my future.

I needed to increase my awareness of my locality so stretched out my thoughts and lay them like a net on the area. I watched a barbeque at the Powerhouse and a play at the Southbank Theatre 12 miles apart. I went further and watched the state premier as she fiddled with her pen trying to write a speech that didn’t include her failures —
I slipped through the hospital and watched the sick and elderly. Wondering if I should help or leave them to it.

I was Rhea, I was Gaia. The Mother of Earth and I would look after my children.
I awoke when Nigel returned from his fishing expedition.
"Darling, I’m home." He clattered into the kitchen and deposited his fishy haul on the counter.

"Hello pet", I smiled inwardly — yup ,,, my pet. Literally.

There was a lull while I switched the air con to fresh and put it on full to whisk away the smell of bait. The fish smelt lovely — fresh of the sea. Nigel not so good.

"Shower you", I wondered how long I should keep him — he was nice enough, respectable, not vicious. I pushed him towards the bathroom, Go.
I wondered if Charlotte Lucas (Pride and Prejudice) was like me — unromantic. Or I like her.

I think I should let him go. I need stronger genes than his.

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 7

This is the end part of the first phase - the next phase is well under way and I shall continue to post as normal

The Rise and Rise of Helen of Brisbane.

It was a few months later after I had bought the Old Governor’s Residence in Sydney that I began to be noticed — The social elite were always on the lookout for jumpups and tall poppies to put down. I kept my apartment in Brisbane just for the convenience.

I had shown myself at the Melbourne Cup and Oaks Races (Horses) and been in the Pavillion at the Test Match at the Gabba when Australia won by an innings and 300 runs against England (I wonder how that happened?).
I was seen at the prestigious gatherings all over the country.

I engineered my surroundings, I engineered my friends.
It was while I was doing this that I found myself suddenly confronted by a lovely guy who wanted me for arm candy.

Mike was a mover and shaker, he got what he wanted, whenever he wanted it. He was lovely and exciting and rich. As was I.

“May I have this dance Helen?” He suavely gathered me into his arms and set off across the dance floor, “Do you come here often?” He smiled and ignored my rolling eyes as he maneuvered me around the other couples. “I only ask because I wondered about you and no one seems to know where you came from, you just appeared”.

He looked me in the eye and I felt a prickling at the base of my neck. Not nice. It actually felt like he was trying to read my mind. I knew the feeling, it was like Molly’s old signature.

I let him see a bland and rather nice surface level that thought he was dishy and held no surprises. He continued to regard me as he swept around looking for things that might be contrary or likely to be hiding secrets. ‘There are no secrets here’, I continued to think bland thoughts with a little bit of sex on top to distract him.

When the dance was over he escorted me back to the table I was at and sat attentively as he ordered me a glass of Pinot Grigiot and gazed into my eyes.
“What an unusual woman you are, and so beautiful, where do you come from?”

“Well, I was born in Brissy and grew up there, I went to uni there and I live here and there, nothing mysterious about me at all”. I was going to give him a Jedi, ‘I am not the woman you seek.’ When I realised he might be a great lover and father to my children — he’s rich too.

Are you checking me out Mike? I smiled as I gazed into his eyes. All of a sudden I was aware that he was pressuring me mentally. Cheeky sod. I wonder if he got all the other babes into bed that way.
He leaned in for a kiss and I gave him one — I nearly gave him one round the ear with my bag, but I thought it might be a good idea to play the game. As our lips touched, I felt an even stronger wave of pressure and rogation — he was questing for my secrets big time — I supposed he must be like me but not so high up the food chain. He persisted without much luck, finding only nice thoughts.

He’d obviously got the technique weighed off, but needed contact with the victim to get information. He was a bad un!
As he tried to open my second level having found nothing at level one, he left open a tiny crack that I could squeeze into without him feeling me. I took a quick look round — high level gambler, wheeler dealer, looks like he’d latched on to a few high level people and a few low lifes — usual not so nice Robin Hood trick — rob from everyone to give to him.

I backed out quickly and let him think he was winning me over with his charms.

It actually made me feel a bit nauseous as he was being a bit over the top with his ideas for our immediate future. I was NOT going to be sucking on THAT in the near future and ‘No’ he wouldn’t be putting it there afterwards!!

While he was ‘charming’ me, I had a think about how I was going to exact a little revenge for those he had obviously misused in the past. I excused myself to go for a pee and powder my nose. I kept an eye on him with my mind net as I sat in the loo thinking. I watched as he surreptitiously dropped a little powder into my drink. *Molly, did you see that?*

*Yes Helen, it’s cocaine.*

*Would you beam it into his drink please?*

*There’s a lot in there, it may kill him.*

*Would it have killed me?*

*No, it’s just he has a lot in his system already.*

*Molly, did you notice he did a mind sweep on me?*

*No, I was otherwise engaged, I’m doing a training schedule for you.*

*Molly, concentrate, this guy is at least a level 3 I don’t want to kill him, he may be worth saving. And I don’t want him to kill me either*

*My goodness, I see what you mean, he’s giving off all sorts of vibes. He’s not able to direct it as well as you, but he’s got some power…… I don’t think he’s from Earth.* molly added a few seconds later

*Why?*

*Chromosomes are wrong.*”

*Database him and see if you can sort him out, let me know when you’ve got a handle on him — this could be a bad sign. 40,000 years with nothing and suddenly we’ve got two of us wandering around in one place. Coincidences like that are long odds.*

I went back to the table, “Sorry, bit of a queue”. I imagined a queue and chatting to some air head just as he swept my thoughts to see if I was lying.

*Molly, did you remove the cocaine?*

*Oops,* then, *…..gone now*

I sipped on the drink, “Eew this has got warm, could you get me another”. I looked at Mike’s face and he blandly turned to the passing waiter, Another for the lady.

I mentally added- and *no cocaine please*.

The new drink came. *Rohypnol added, no cocaine* Molly advised.

I looked at Mike and said, “How much did you pay him to spike my drink?”

Mike looked a bit amazed and said nothing.

“I’d have gone to bed with you…. without that incentive. But not now.” I rose to leave. I felt Mike trying to mental me into submission and let it slide off and then made it look like I was suffering from a headache. He smiled, it looked like a smile of gotcha. “C’mon, I’ll get you home”

He took my arm and pointed me towards the door; I pretended to follow his lead.
He nodded to the waiter who was obviously not one and I slipped a tag on him so Molly could follow him- *Who is he Molly?*
*General Factotum (Gopher), appears to be in Mike’s entourage.*
*Pop him with the cocaine after we leave.*

*Thanks Helen. I’m going to have to steal some from Mike, I sent the other lot down the drain*

*You mean Mike’s got more? Find it all and destroy it Helen., then empty his bank account into mine and then overnight, trash his car and apartment. I’ll dump him in a minute*

I was going to give him a break but no one does drugs on my watch. I was seriously displeased

*He’s got a lot of money Helen, 8 zeros. It’ll be traceable.*

*Disperse it to all the women in shelters and all the people who didn’t eat this morning.*

*Feed the world?* Molly queried.

*Save the Children I think*

*Consider it done.*

*Oh, he had a lot of drugs, there’s going to be some very upset people. I’m tapping the phones and his network. I’ll remove all his assets and leave the next rung up the ladder for later*

*That’s excellent.*

“Right, here we are”, the ‘waiter’ got out of the car which he’d brought round. He nodded to Mike and walked back into the car park. I saw him collapse just as we drove off. Molly had obviously given him the hit of his life.

“Let’s go to my place”, I suggested eagerly. The arrogant SOB leered at me as he leapt into the traffic.

These 7 series Beamers are quite nice. I ran my hand over the flawless leather, thinking — ‘won’t be quite so nice tomorrow. Then I’m going to destroy you’

We arrived at the block and I led him by the hand to my apartment. There was a blanket on the apartment — no signals in or out so there was no one going to trace a signal. His car had already gone off the map — he’d left it on the street as my car was in the basement allocation.
They’d find his burnt out in the dockyard tomorrow (after it had been thoroughly stripped by Molly for origin clues)

“Come in”, I smiled generously. He cradled me in his arms and kissed me, I sensed the pressure wave to undress and I started to do so. Following his directives as he sat on the bed. “There’s some good scotch on the bar”. I pointed. He smiled and walked over to the bar. I felled him there on the rug when his back was turned. I floated him onto the sofa and sat on the coffee table.

“So Moriarty, what do I do with you now?” I rubbed my hands together to warm myself — I had got a chill to the spine knowing how close one can come to being under someone else’s power.
*Any answers yet Molly?* I slung a thought skywards.

*The car was clean, he seems to be living away from his people. It’s been destroyed. I ran it into a concrete headwall in the dockyard — it caught fire. The waiter is in a serious condition, he was a liver failure candidate — it failed with the cocaine load.*

*Thought as much - leave him a long time before he gets better.*
*Sorry it’s not possible to heal him he was dying anyway this just sped it up.*

I felt guilty — I hadn’t meant to knock him off. *Oh dear.* I sent

*He’s killed before, don’t feel guilty.* I smiled at that, justice done. I didn’t mind being judge jury and executioner. It was my job.

*Thanks Molly.*

I looked at Mike, and decided to invade. I put on a cup of tea and when it was brewed I sat down opposite him. Now let’s see what little secrets you’ve got in there.

After an hour I sat back horrified. He was 245 years old and had come from a system several light years from ours — a name that meant nothing to me but was in the direction of Casseopia.
He’d been here 50 years and amassed a good deal of capital — which was no longer there.
He’d killed several hundred people in his quest for power.
He’d raped several thousand women using drugs and mental pressure.
He was here on his own behalf — and alone.
He was about to die……. I had made my own decision on that

I woke him up. “Mike darling, if you’re not going to be a man, would you do me a favour and go home.”

He looked at me with bloodshot eyes and wondered I what the hell was going on, he felt awful — worse than at any time in his life. He tried to rise to his feet and slumped back.
“God I feel awful.”

“Serves you right, you alien toerag. Time you got your wages of sin.”

He looked at me, “You know, you know who I am?” He looked puzzled, and a little guilty.

I smiled back at him — a touch angry that I’d let my own anger show. “You mustn’t go round killing the natives dear, they’re not yours”. I admonished. “Now out you go”

“I thought there was something odd about you when I danced with you, normally when I command the effect is instant. It was too slow, I just thought you were a bit more relaxed and that was why. Where are you from? We could make a great team” He tried to get conversational to see if he could distract me. Then I felt a sudden pressure wave of him trying to get at me, trying to strike me down, the strongest he’d tried. Was this as strong as he could do?

I sent him one back and he danced in the moonlight. Like a marionette. He looked at me as I floated him to the ceiling and spun him round and then dropped him on his feet again. The look of fear and realization too hard to mistake.

*Too strong for you little boy*.
“Off you go pet and don’t come back” — I wiped his memory of me and sent him on his way. He walked out to where his car had been and looked around — then he took out his phone and presently a Camaro came round the corner and burbled it’s little 5 litre song at him as he got in.

*Keep me up to date Molly.*

*Will do Helen, goodnight.*

I woke about 9am and stepped with my first coffee onto the balcony. I listened to the news but I guess it was too soon.

*Good morning Helen, just thought I’d let you know that when Mike got home last night, he got a phone call from the drug dealers asking where the stash had gone. They’d gone to refill and drop off the money and there was nothing — not a nickel bag. It’s up here in the cool room — well it’s up here in the Mare Ibrium actually*

*Thanks Molly*

*The police are a bit sus about you though, as they’ve been watching Mike for a while and he was in your apartment for less time than usual for a mark!*

*So what does that mean?*

* He usually stays the night.* I could hear Molly smile. If a computer can smile.

*Ah, news just coming through. Mike’s at an ATM and he can’t get any money out.*

*He hasn’t got any has he?*

*Not that I know of. Except what he collected last night but his lackeys still have that — it can’t go directly to him, it has to be laundered or he’ll have to take the fall. He’ll have to go on line to find out that his accounts are empty*

*Ah yes, the same way you emptied them. How many transactions did you make from his account last night?*

*Just one, to the Bank of Zambia. where it accumulated with the scammed money and was then dispersed to villages in the Congo and women shelters in all the major cities in USA and Europe. Only the Bank of Zambia isn’t suspicious of that many transactions….*

*Oh, I also paid his back taxes for the last ten years.* Molly was so close to giggling.

*I’m off for a shower, I’d like to go down to the dockyard later.* I giggled.

The next I heard was on the news that evening. About the waiter who had died of an overdose in the car park. Mike had been interviewed but released as he was the last person to see him before he collapsed. Police would also like to speak to the lady who was seen leaving with him.

I phoned the police — they must have known it was me, as they’d observed him going to my place. Presumably it was a test to see if I was in collusion.

“Good evening Miss Cartwright, please come this way.” He walked just off my forequarter leading me deeper into the police station.

“Could you go over your actions last night please?” I was asked to make my statement for the tape recorder (they won’t be able to play it back — it’s going to wipe itself.)

“Well, we left the Club last night, I’ve no idea what time and went back to my place and he stayed about  ½ an hour. Then left as he was too drunk to function and was embarrassed about it. I watched him from the apartment — it’s odd, as his car was not where he left it, I saw him use his phone and presently a green sports coupe picked him up. That’s the last I saw of him.”

“Where was the car when you left the club?”

“A little guy in a white jacket had gone to get it, I think he was a hotel employee — he looked like one.. he brought it round to the front for us.” I tried to be explicit and keep to the facts — I wanted no suspicion to rest on me.

“What happened when you got home?”

“We went in and — hey, hang on, are you getting jollies out of this?” I gave him the frown.

The inspector tried to be officious, “We’re just tying up loose ends miss”.

“The loose end surely finished when the little guy gave us the car at the front door, no?”

“No ma’am we’re not only enquiring about that, we’re also enquiring about the death of Mike Strong.”

The surprised look on my face was enough to tell the police that I wasn’t party to that info.

“When, how? What happened?”

“He was found shot this afternoon in the dockyard, he’d gone to identify his car. Whoever took it must’ve been waiting for him.
You wouldn’t know anything about a little missing money would you?
Money? No, … how much?” I wondered if his wallet got nicked as well as his worldly accumulated assets.

“Someone emptied his bank accounts last night, a lot of zeros” — he died penniless.

Not much to show for 245 years work I thought….

The police let me go after I showed them my bank account online statement; showing no transactions for the last week or so. Not any 950 million dollar ones anyway. I think it was nice that my current account was only showing a few hundred thousand. My big accounts were all offshore.

‘RIP, Mike you thug’, I thought as I slipped into the traffic, which always drove very sedately outside the police station.

*Molly, how did you shoot him?* I thought she must have beamed a bullet at him — clever.

*I didn’t, someone who wanted to be paid for his drugs did when he realised that our dear departed was without funds.*

*You’re enjoying this..* it was a statement.

*I never enjoy people dying- especially level 3 people, but if you abuse the talent, then you suffer the consequences.*

I was glad Molly was on my side … now.

*Molly, I need a better history, he was able to trace I didn’t exist before recently.”*

*I’m on it Helen.*

Three months and I still didn’t have a person who I wanted to share my life with.
Three months…. Why was I rushing? I didn’t need a consort for 50 years and even that wouldn’t really be a long time.

I really needed something to occupy my life — I buckled down to my learning and also joined a gym and some social networks that included people with clout.
Every so often I popped up for an overnight with Molly, it felt good to get away for the evening but I had to be careful my absence wasn’t noticed.

One of the social networks was a political party.
I knew that if I joined a political party as a candidate, I would be visible forever and not just at functions.. The paparazzi followed you everywhere and tried to hack your life. I wasn’t ready for some poor sap to find in fifty years after he’d spent his life following my career that I was still 24. But I could play marionettes couldn’t I?

I needed to create a Utopia that could house my children and my children’s children for a hundred generations. To help them bring all this good green Earth and its people to a new destiny.

Australia is a wonderful country with a resource level that far outweighs its population. Australia could be self sufficient and very comfortable for all it’s people.

The new Hellenic Republic. Yes, I liked that. A truly free society.

In University one finds a lot of idealists and youthful zealots. I needed to nurture a few of them into a neat political front and then supply them with the fundamentals of a new world.
I also needed — children.
“Molly, can I guarantee twins form my first babies?”

“Triplets if you like, but they’re awfully tiring to carry to term. You won’t get stretch marks though.” She added with a pseudo laugh.

“Can they be delivered by you Molly? If I come up to the site” I didn’t want Molly to beam them out of my womb from 350,00 kilometres away — that would be too weird.

“I would expect nothing less Helen, the medical care on your world is what I would call a trifle primitive.” I could sense the tongue in cheek quip, but I had already distanced myself from the rest of humanity in some ways.

I’d actually come to that a week or two ago when I’d cut myself chopping veggies. I’d taken a chunk off the side of my knuckle and it stung like crazy for a second.
I dug the chipped off flesh out of the Bok Choy and placed it back on the cut. I held it there for a few seconds then took a look. My finger was whole again, with a little blood round the edge. I thought it had just stuck there as sometimes happens, but when I carefully dabbed away the blood, there was no sign of the cut.

“Did you do that Molly”

“No, it was all your own work.” I felt the smile. “You’re learning.”

I was beginning to believe in myself on a whole new different level.

To Be Continued

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 8

Moving on - Phase 2

The papers announced the war in Afghanistan was reaching a conclusion but also a stalemate.
It would be many years before the government could operate without the backing of the Western Allies and Pakistan was actually going downhill and creating a lot of mayhem.

*Molly, what would happen if I destroyed all the opium crops in Afghanistan?*

*The Taliban would have no funds and collapse is the most likely scenario. Sadly a lot of population would die of starvation too. They rely on the crop for cash.*

*What if the crops failed 50% every year? So that after about 5 years, there’d be virtually none left? 100 tons crop now would be less than half a ton. It would give the farmers time to revert to food crops?*

*I think the Taliban would get desperate and either go for broke or disband. I can accomplish the downturn by genetically altering the pollen.*

*Could you also make it less potent?*

*Easily.*

*Make it so Molly. Let me know if the Taliban want to break out, I’ll do some sorting on a physical level. Seems only fair.*

I took to normal student life after a while, I was still a student and I needed to be seen as a normal person. I wanted to start making inroads into crime in my beautiful city and I wanted to see people once again unafraid to walk around after dark.
I started a zero tolerance mind swipe.
I sat one day in a bistro — one where the tables fronted the roadside. I watched the myriad people going about their daily lives and picked at random one or two to see what the average was like.
I was pleasantly surprised to see the great majority were just everyday citizens doing good things, thinking about their families, their work, and sometimes their partners!!! I felt a little pervy more than once!

Every so often I’d come up with a wild card. One was a wife beater. I could sense so much anger and immense fear. I nipped a link here and there and isolated the problem in his head. He walked on looking mesmerized for a second then smiling.

*Is it really so easy to fix some of these things Molly?*

*No Helen, it just reconnects later and carries on. I spent a lot of years before you came on the scene doing just what you did and then watching for a result. It always resurfaced, like it’s a basic flaw in the mental system or imbalance in the endocrine system.*

*What about Rock Spiders (child molesters)? Are they fixable?*

*Yes, they are, but only by a combination of mental adjustment as you did on the wife beater and realigning their sex drive.*

*How do you do that?*

*Remove their nuts.* Molly stated briefly.

*I can do one, will you do the other?*

*What a team, I think that’s admirable. I shall cut off blood supply to the testes of all the perverts you discover.*

*So what do we do with the wife beaters?* I wondered.

*Check their insurance and delete them.* came the simple reply.* They’re not good for the gene pool anyway.*

I thought about it for a moment and giggled, seemed an excellent way to ensure that the wife got repayment for disservices rendered.

“Penny for them,” the waiter smiled as he passed me, picking up the giggle.

“Oh I was just thinking of a way to serve justice and the result was amusing.” I looked at him, Greek heritage, big smile, nice body, my age.

“I see you here occasionally..” he paused, “and you always seem to be alone.” He stopped and leaned on the chair opposite me.

“I think a lot and I do it best alone.” I blushed as he stood back up looking a little discomfited. “I’m not asking you to leave, it’s just an observation.” I smiled as he leaned on the chair again.

“You have no good friend who can share your thoughts and not disturb you?” His eyes mocked me slightly. I snuck a peek into his top layer. Mmm nice.

“No, not really, I’ve grown up a bit faster than my peers and they’re struggling in my wake.” I raised an eyebrow and watched his face. It was hard to tell he was undressing me with his eyes, but his top layer suggested he was occupied doing that very thing..

“I’m willing to sit with you and say nothing if you don’t mind me watching your face, it’s an easy thing to do, and I promise not to get caught in your wake.”

“I think you might get the sack if you sat around and did nothing while you were supposed to be waiting table.”

“It is ok, the Café is mine, I work when I feel like it and it gives me an excuse to talk to beautiful women.” He smiled and his face lit up — there was no craft, he was just a nice amusing guy. “There are plenty of waiters doing nothing today, I am paying them, they can take over my difficult work.” He waved to another young man dressed as he was and made a circle with his hand and sat down. “You don’t mind?”

I smiled back, “I’m delighted.”

“Then, shall I sit here and admire the view or would you like to tell me why you watch everyone as they pass?” His smile betrayed his suspicious eyes.

“I’m assessing each person as to their fitness to live in my beautiful city. Most are nice people but some are not.”

“Is it your job to assess these people? Or do you do it as a hobby?” He was joking but had hit the nail on the head.

“It is my job. I need to understand the motivation of my society, whether it needs to be sorted or left to improve on its own.” I was joking with him but had a subtle truth to my line.

“You take on a large task. Should it be left to one so beautiful?”

“I am not beautiful, I am barely pretty. It is nice of you to be so gallant though.”

“With eyes so clear and unashamed, with a mind so clean of the impurities of the world, how can you not be beautiful?” He was laying it on thick now. I knew he wasn’t peeking, but it was uncannily correct.

“And what do you know of my mind?” I queried, knowing he knew nothing but what he had guessed from my demeanour.

“I am a student of the people myself, and I can see you are not tarnished by the mundane and the impure. I would like to know you more.”

There was no doubt that he was smooth, but it was also true that he was not a bad person. I had looked and I had seen only calm blue water and a sail boat, soft sunlight and sparkling bubbles in a cold glass.

“You shall then.” I had found someone.

I sat for a while longer as he watched me and I watched those passing and did my job.
I hadn’t the heart to delete anyone with my knight in starched white apron sat by me, but I marked one or two for Molly to deal with. They would trouble no more children and have no more either.

“Well Alberto, what time will you escort me home?”
“You know my name?” he looked shocked.

“It is written on the front of the building, perhaps you think I am blinded by your handsome face?”

“It is also written on my name badge, but it is not on my shirt. I wondered if you had read my mind.”

“Only to find out if you were a nice guy, I wouldn’t have talked with you if you weren’t.”
I teased him, though it was perhaps a dangerous game to tread so close to the truth.

“What time would you like to be home? Or perhaps I should ask whose home, yours or mine?”

“What would your wife say?” I smiled, pretending not to know he wasn’t married.

“Ah she will be mortified if I take you to my home, but she will be happy that her husband has found a friend.” He continued.

“Greek men wear a ring when they marry, dear Alberto, you have no such ring.”

“Health and safety regulations do not allow me to wear jewelry at work, so I have to remove it.”

“There is also no shadow to say you have worn one.” I pointed to his ring finger.

“Which shows how many hours I must work to keep my five children fed.” He smiled more and more with each riposte.

“I shall take you to my home then and your wife shall not be troubled by the thought of your infidelity…imaginary or not” I added quickly as I rose and gathered my things. “But I shall not pay you for my coffee, because you do not deserve payment for such dishonest work.”

Alberto signaled to the cashier and made to tear up an imaginary bill and turned to me.
“Whither maiden? Your chariot or mine?”

We walked out to the curb and I pointed to my car which was parked a few yards away. “Ah, right next to mine,” he pointed to the little red job with a rampant horse on the front.
He walked to the door of his car and opened it for me.

It was about 2 inches from the floor and I was wearing a fairly short skirt, “Follow me Alberto, I shall try not to drive too fast. One horse on the bonnet does not seem nearly enough.”

“Ah, he is just my favourite; there are 500 more hiding under the bonnet.” I giggled and slipped into the Merc, a much more suitable car for a princess. Unless you’re in a French tunnel I thought to myself..

The afternoon turned into a delightful evening and my beautiful escort serviced me ably and enthusiastically. We ordered a meal from a local hostelry which was delivered to the apartment and we ate overlooking the River and the lights of the city.

“You are not old Alberto. How did you come to be such a well heeled Barista?”

“My family, they are still in Greece, but they are not poor farmers, they are an old family with their fingers in many pies.” He answered simply. “I might ask you the same question, Helen. This is not a home to which many would become acquainted?” the inflection made it a question.

“I was given the property and a stipend by a grateful lover,” I smiled, “I do not need any Drachma though so you may relax.” He smiled with me and looked out over the water.

“You tell me you are at University and yet you do not study?” Another question.

“I am very intelligent, I will attend the lectures and read from my computer. It is enough.”

Alberto laughed and took a long quaff of the wine he held. “You are intelligent, yet you take me to your bed, I think some may argue one point or another”.

“Do not put yourself down, and do not assume to put me down. I am my own person, there is no harm in a dalliance, I am not about to fall in love. Nice as you are.” Alberto looked a little hurt and frowned. Then waggled his head and smiled.

“You are going to be a hard nut to crack, how am I to enjoy myself if I cannot dominate you?” He took another pull on his wine, put the glass down and took my hand gently. “I think I shall have to try harder to make you love me.” I could tell by the bulge in his robe that he was about to do so. We retired to the boudoir and rumpled some more sheets.

Our dalliance lasted a while and when I told Alberto I was pregnant, he smiled and gently disengaged himself from me, like a good lover should. He did not offer to pay nor did he offer to marry me. I was grateful. I had what I wanted and he had what he desired. I could not have engineered it better.

All the time I had been with Alberto I had been spending time training my mind and my skills improved. I felt quite potent and yet quite vulnerable — I still had to sleep and until or unless I engaged some heavy security which would only attract attention, I had to rely on Molly who was so far away and a concierge when I was home and my own awareness when I wasn’t. If I was in Sydney, I had some security, but I was only there in the high seasons when ‘school’ was out.

I was also now a pregnant student and the dean was not amused though why he thought he had any say in the matter I cannot imagine.

I got a note one day asking that I meet with him.

“Miss Cartwright?” He stuck out his hand in a friendly gesture that was not reflected in his eyes. I simply sat down and ignored it.

“Good afternoon Dean Squires, you asked to see me?” I went straight into it because I knew what was coming.

“Yes, quite. I asked you here today to enquire what your intentions are in relation to your education.” He was being quite openly hostile.

“And?” I raised one eyebrow, it was enough for him to understand that he was going to have to spell it out.

“Well, the heart of the matter is, you still have 2 years to go with your studies and it appears that your ‘condition’ may well interfere with your attendance to lectures in the near future.” He was being tactful at least.

“I don’t see me taking much time off Dean, “The babies are due (TWINS!!!!) in a recess, so I will be able to continue without interruption.” I smiled at him, daring him to make any mention of reputation. I didn’t have a tape recorder running, but Molly would be able to reconstruct the interview perfectly well if I wanted to pursue the matter — which I would.

“The matter is this.. Miss.. Cartwright,” he emphasized the Miss part. My eyes pinned him. He looked at me, saw I was carrying no obvious recorder — I didn’t even have a bag with me and I had a lightweight pair of shorts and a stretchy tank top over my bulge.
“The board of governors do not like the thought of a student of this university to be in your condition, it doesn’t have a good aspect for the university and sets a bad precedent and role model for other students.”

“You mention the board of governors, how do you feel about it, Dean?” I smiled at him neither shocked in the least nor feeling abashed or ashamed at my ‘condition’.

“My condition is what every woman on Earth goes through at some time in their lives and my most healthy period and best for my babies is while I am young. Would you deny my children the best chance for health?”

“No Miss Cartwright, but I think that you should consider the good of the university and retire from your studies while you are ‘incapacitated’” The Dean looked like he was trying to get unstuck from some chewing gum.

“Dean, I serve you warning, you have committed several infractions of my personal freedoms and have overstepped your mandate. Please note that I shall take this further. Much further.” I rose and walked out of the room. I said no more. The Dean sat there in a turmoil — he knew he’d overstepped the mark but did I have proof? What would happen?

I sent him a letter next day with a small cassette of our conversation, cced to the Board of Governors and the Education Authority and the press.

He resigned. I claimed damages and donated them to the women’s refuge. $50,000 dollars was gratefully received. I had decided to make an issue, and the name of Helen C started to become known.

I received a grateful response to my donation and a bit of notoriety in the University. I was allowed to continue my studies undisturbed. The press became aware of me as a champion for women’s causes, and being wealthy I came under scrutiny of other charitable organizations as a possible benefactor.

My social circle in Sydney were mostly appalled that I was pregnant. Some dropped me as a friend — some allowed that I was my own boss and some simply loved the idea of cocking-a-snook at the establishment. I was becoming notorious.

I sat on my balcony one night and felt my babies kick and I also felt something else. An untrained thought. I stroked my baby metaphorically and he relaxed.
*Molly, he kicked, and then he thought at me*

*Now you must name them.* Molly knew almost the day I got pregnant that I had one boy and one girl and told me that they were non identical and different genders . She hadn’t told me anything except that. I had no idea what the likelihood of their being able to reach me from the womb or anything.

*I didn’t expect them to be able to think so loud, so soon.* I was a bit panicked — *They may start communicating with either each other or people outside the womb that weren’t their mother.*

*No Helen, they can only communicate with you and each other, they will learn quickly not to think out loud so to speak.*

*Will I be able to hear them talk to each other or can they do it without me in the loop?*
I was worried about them making their own language or something I guess. Plotting maybe?

*That’s a paranoid thought, Helen. They’re innocent babies — not psychopathic midgets.* I could sense a grin and a chiding from Molly.

*I’m just a little afraid Molly, that’s all. I’ve never been Eve before.*

I turned off the lights, pretended to go to bed and went up to the ship.

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 9

“Hi Molly,” I stepped off the plate and walked straight to the dining mess. The furniture had been updated to some soft leather sofas and a beautiful claw and ball Victorian mahogany table with six chairs. The furniture shop I bought it from must have been quite puzzled when they came in one morning and the table was gone but the correct purchase price was attached to the dispatch clerk’s desk along with a thank you note.

When I was here I could offload all my worries, it was my own secret hideaway. With my own secret confidante.

I stepped up to the food dispenser and it opened without my even thinking to reveal a bowl of vanilla ice cream and mango ice.

“Thanks Molly” I smiled at the closest CC camera, “You know what I like.”

“I certainly do, Ollie.”

“Tell me, if I think at my babies, can I train them before they are born?”

“Not really, they have no frame of reference, but they’ll be very bright when they arrive and will pick things up incredibly quickly.”

“Is that a good thing though, I’m not sure I want them levitating their bottles when we’re out shopping.” I dreaded it more like.

“Then tell them not to, they’ll understand a lot quicker that they’re unique if you spend some time laying out their situation.”

“Won’t they be babies and do things for the hell of it?”

“They’ll be up here fairly soon and I’ll tell them then.
I can sense them listening to us mentally, it’s a good sign.
Have you decided their names yet?”

“I was going to go with Athena and Hermes, but I think it’s a bit pretentious. Ruth and Paul seem fair enough and they can’t be shortened,. They have historical significance and are names that can be revered in future societies”

“Ruth and Paul it is.” Molly was happy to accede, the names were placed at the top of the list in the new database. The database covered the names, heredity, talents, skills. Education.

In a few thousand years they would be important documents. They would prevent close relationships and allow for diversification.

“Show me the moon surface, Molly. I want to feel awed by it all. Sitting here I might as well be in St Pancras Station in London Underground.”

“Do they have such leather sofas in a station there?” Molly feigned ignorance.

“No, but they don’t have windows either.” Helen smiled.

The moon was new, so the surface was lit only by the reflection from the Earth.
It was dark and gloomy on the screens, the shadows non existent, piles of cocaine sat close by, and some car parts.

“Molly, could you beam that junk into space as dispersed molecules, they don’t look good there. I don’t want this area to look like a junkyard nor be scanned by a passing lunar orbiter and become a source of conjecture. At least bury the stuff.”
As she watched, the car parts disintegrated and became just particles of whatever it was — mostly plastic. The white mounds of powder which amounted to a few tonnes, seem to disappear but were in fact pushed downwards into the surface and dust seeped over them.”

“Have we made any impression on illicit drugs yet?”

“No, but the price is rising and the cartels are getting anxious — they don’t know who is taking it and are worried about it getting on the market all at once. Other crimes are taking their place, but not so much outside the countries of origin.”

“When you see an opening, please feel free to release captives and slaves from these people and maybe detox the call girls who have been hooked by it.
Start in the ghettoes of south America and spread it out — I want to hear of the dealers and pushers in the slums being emasculated and shot. Disappear a few of the middle managers. Put some fear into them.”

I went to bed and Molly set about freeing some slaves and giving them back their lives.
When I awoke and had done my toilet I asked what Molly had been up to overnight.

“I opened up the Baria in Rio De Janeiro. There’s been wholesale slaughter of the drug cartel underlings by freed slaves.”

“How much risk was there in freeing them?”

“None at all, I just altered the composition of the manacles in one or two key places and damaged a few locks. Ten people in all and the rest was self initiating.”

“They were ready for it then. They must have sensed a change.”

“They did after I told them.” Molly seemed to smile.

“You didn’t do the voice of God did you? Molly, tell me you didn’t — oh dear.”

“No, I just whispered, ‘it is time’ to each of them and loosened their manacles.”

“That’s just as bad. Molly please don’t do that, it’s going to be years before I can derig the God thing.”

“Why would you want to?” Molly couldn’t see the objection.

“I’ll be burnt at the stake as a heretic if you do that, they have a jealous God — it is their conscience. — and the Pope will wind em up like evangelists.”

“Oh ok, —won’t happen again, I’ll tell them ‘Helen says it is time’, that will work. Molly lapsed into silence.

“I think you might have to leave the situation to me. I’ll let you work out the logistics and I’ll do the word of God thing. In a few years. I’ve still got a few children to raise in the meantime.”

I walked back to the plate and Molly sent me home.

I didn’t use Alberto’s for my observation post now; I decided to sit in the airport for a few days and see what came and went.
Over a period of several days, I tagged 40 drug runners whose drugs turned to milk powder — mostly mules and three of their herders, who I tagged for Molly to remove. Several returning sex offenders that found themselves neutered — well they will…. And a few wife beaters. Tagged for minor adjustment — read hormone therapy to reduce their testosterone levels.

I wasn’t in the hub of the airport — it would be too conspicuous, it already seemed I was being watched as the CCTV cameras paused on me once or twice.

Once I was approached by a security guard and asked what I was doing there, I showed them my student pass and told them I was taking psychology and was observing how people reacted to unusual situations — most people were not regular travelers and were unfamiliar with airport protocols. He went away after talking on his walkie talkie.

I decided discretion being the better part of valour to change my venue.

One thing that did happen was the Sunday newspapers reported a drop in trafficking offences and a drop in burglaries. That gave me cause to ponder.

I decided to check out the highest drug related crime areas and the highest burglary areas — they were the same. Usually slightly depressed areas with a youngish population.
I staked out the high street in several suburbs and every time I came across a drug addict (when you looked at that first layer, it was easy to spot — like a neon sign!) And alerted Molly who beamed all the drugs out of their systems — quite a few keeled over (I alerted the ambulance then), but not a few suddenly looked like they’d been slugged and sat down and wept like they’d been given a reprieve. The crime rate went down to the lowest recorded for several years.
I felt I was making a difference.

I have to admit at this point to a mysterious problem that got into the speed cameras in the area too — someone wiped all the data. Then when they kept fixing the cameras, Molly stole them. It’s easy to remove the contents when you don’t have to open the box.
They started fitting secret cameras to take photos of the cameras to see who was doing it. Those went too. Eventually they just pretended to have the cameras, they couldn’t replace them fast enough. The press didn’t get hold of it for a while but eventually they did and I had to cease operations. The cameras worked just by being there — if they were known not to — then what’s thepoint?

My term was nearly up so I told my concierge I was going on holiday to Switzerland to have my babies where the air was a bit cleaner (it’s not true but the concierge didn’t need to know my whereabouts). I left a contact number but no address. The area code for the moon? Not telling.

Molly beamed me up and gave me a checkup, “Three days and you’re ready to pop.”

“I’m already ready to pop — these twins are huge. They’re also calling out. I get a spike every few hours. I just tell them, not yet and they go back to sleep. They’re going to be good babies aren’t they?” I truly hoped so, a year or so ago I’d have been a bit surprised to know I was going to be the mummy, not the archeologist.

While I was up here I started a plan to rid the world of crime cartels. I asked Molly to search all the internet and pinpoint major links and any peripheral ones that the police were involved with.

American police seem to be quite open to a back hander but were generally ok — the Asian police particularly in places with high penalties for drugs seemed to be the most corrupt. I think they should be first to find out what the problem was with drug running.

“Molly, keep an eye on Singapore, Malaya, Indonesia and Thailand. I want any drugs there to be neutralized or removed or used to mess up the dealers. The Burmese golden triangle I want shut down completely. Delete the top and middle — rehabilitate the bottom if you can — I’ll do what I can later if I am needed to.

“Over how long a period, this involves nearly the whole chain of command”

“Well that’ll give Aung Sang Su Chi a chance to get her country going properly again.

“While you’re at it, can you knock off Kim Jong Il he’s pretty close to karking it isn’t he?”

“Very, he’s been dead for a fortnight, they don’t dare tell anyone!”

“I reckon you should leak it then.”

“Right Helen — big sweep while you’re up here for a week or two?”

“Sounds good, I can keep a good eye open from up here.”

“Alert, a Chinese Orbiter just passed over us. I jammed the signal as it was doing a photo run.

“Good job we hid the BMW parts then! They would be up here trying to mine them next week.”

“How visible are we?”

“Well covered, but if they do a magnetograph they’ll get an anomaly. I am going to dump it.”

“I think just change the data if there’s bad stuff there. It’s too suspicious if we just zap it. When does it relay any information?”

“It’s doing it continuously about 5 minute lag.”

“Trip the connection and down the satellite on the dark side.”

“Will do. Now where were we? Ah yes, debugging the drug system.”

“Leave it for now, I’m feeling a bit uncomfortable and my back is sore — and I’m hungry and I need a pee.”

“I’m glad I can’t gestate, it seems very inefficient.”

“You’d die from lube oil loss, the sharp corners would tear you to ribbons….” I giggled and settled down to watch a movie. There is nothing better than watching a good old fashioned BBC drama. I chose the Pride and Prejudice TV series and was soon nodding off to D’Arcy being very ungentlemanlike..

“Helen, I think you need to see this.”

I blinked my eyes as I came round and the lights which Molly had dimmed resumed their daylight setting. “What’s the problem?”

“The Junta in Burma are trying to suppress the uprising that started after the Golden Triangle Triad accused the Junta of killing the drug lords and stealing the proceeds.”

I sat there for a minute, “Are you telling me there’s an army left in there who can still control anything? I’m surprised.”

“Well I’ve got three alternatives, stop the Junta stop the people or declare you the new head of state.”

“Kill all the ammunition, and put some knockout drops into the water. It’ll allow the tempers to subside. You could also knockout gas the main squares wherever there’s a demo going on. Make sure you get both sides. Then there’s no blame.

“Some of the adjoining powers are warming up to Amber Alert.” Molly sounded a bit tense.

“Any Nuclear stuff?”

“Some, North Korea is a bit jumpy for some reason, probably because of the drugs going walkabout.”

“Can you disable the missiles so they won’t take off?” Just maybe melt down inside the bunkers?”

“I could beam up the warheads or the contents.” Molly advanced an idea.

“No, there’d be blame resting there, if the missiles never leave the ground, the situation can’t be escalated.” I dismissed the strategy. “If a missile leaves the ground, there’d be Japanese and USA and Korea all going to DefCon1. If all that happens is a silo full of smoke and no missile they’ll just be a laughing stock. Make sure that Allied missiles are not able to go to red alert”

I watched the news with some pain — hand to hand fighting had broken out in Burma. Order was restored when Aung Sang Su Chi declared that the country was now under her control.

The army was stood down and police along with a volunteer each were patrolling the streets to stop looters. Secret police had been arrested and political prisoners had been freed.
The Worlds media were in a frenzy. Word had got out that no weapons were usable in Burma. They just didn’t work.

Kim Jong Il’s demise was made public just as I went into labour.

I lost interest about that point. Though it was fun to put the cat among the pigeons and a lot of countries were starting to pray as if it was the ‘End of Days’. Not what I was after, but quite an effective dampener. At least until I was back in the swing of things.
Molly had me lie on a gurney in the medical bay and a couple of medibots hovered over me. I felt very lonely. When all was ready and I felt almost panicky due to no one being here for my birthing, Molly pulled the plug and delivered my babies by local transporter beam. She had put me out just before she started and woken me up a few minutes later.

“All done, no complications. Not that I expected any of course.” Molly sounded a bit chipper.

I was aware of two mental spikes that squeaked at me from the incubator next to me.

“Don’t try to get up yet Helen, there’s a bit of work still to do on you.” Molly tempered my enthusiasm. “Your waters haven’t even broken yet and you’ve got two placentas to get rid of”. I looked down and my tummy was still distended —

“Don’t tell me there’s more in there?”

“Of course not, but the womb lining and stuff take up a lot of space too.” I did feel lighter, which was good, I’d just got rid of 15 lbs of babies.

“My babies need me,” I leaned towards them as they lay next to me in the incubator, they were quiet and taking in all the surroundings. Like wizened little old men. Totally naked but wise as ancient Gods. “Oh, they seem to be quite content.”

I could feel the mini-transporter taking away my now unneeded paraphernalia and the feeling was like having my temples massaged — it was beautiful and very relaxing.

“All done, you may gently see to your babies now Helen, congratulations,” Molly sounded very sincere.

“Thank you Molly for making it such a nice experience. I’m sure my children will enjoy having their children at this wonderful hospital.”

I gently sat up and felt really good, “Wow, that’s a wonderful way to have babies.” I suddenly burst into tears. Whoa! Emotional time I guess. Having your babies alone on a dead moon was pretty wicked.

I looked into the eyes of my babies, *Hello little ones* I caressed them with my mind and they gurgled as I opened the cover, wrapped them and picked them up. The spikes of alarm and unfamiliarity they were giving off subsided quickly and they regarded me with big round eyes. *I’m your mummy* I sent them love and warmth and they returned it.

The bot that had sat at the side of the bed suddenly whirred to life and offered me two bottles from a tray that appeared out of its side. “This solution contains the antibodies normally found in the initial breast milk, your own milk will come in in the next few hours, suckling will help it to drop.” The bot advised in a toneless Hawking way.

I offered the bottles to the babies and they settled quickly sucking away — then falling asleep.

“They’ll need changing in the next hour.” Molly advised. “Put them back in the cot when you’re tired of holding them, and it will be done automatically.”

“You think of everything,” I placed the babies back in their secure environment and slipped into an exhausted sleep — I’ve no idea how normal women manage to do this without help like I had.

Return to Sender
by Jennifer Christine
Part 10

A slightly longer chapter for Christmas. Hope you all have a good Christmas.

When I woke I moved the cot and babies through to the bedroom, Paul awoke and I felt a mental nudge for food. Though how I knew it was food I have no idea. The bot had come in with the cot but I offered Paul my breast and he settled down on that giving me the most amazing high I had ever had. It wasn’t erotic, but it was very fulfilling and for Paul it was filling full. Just as I finished with Paul, Ruth asked for a go and I swapped them over.
The bot changed Paul as I fed Ruth. *Thank you bot.* I thought and the bot beeped at me. I passed Ruth back in and bot changed her too — we all went back to sleep!

It continued the same way for a wee while; I used my thoughts to ‘talk’ to the babies and the two signals food and sleep became several more as they became more aware of the surroundings and the presence of other ‘minds’.

I moved the babies around with me for a while to the kitchen and back and to the bathroom — but after a day or two I left them where they were and tried to use the facilities while they were asleep. They must have been aware of my proximity as they were alarmed the second I was out of their immediate vicinity. I had a lot of excess fluid to get rid of so I was forever in the loo and they were forever worried I wouldn’t be back in ten seconds. We got used to it quickly.

“Molly, what am I going to do when we get Earthside, I can’t take them everywhere with me.”

I’ll send a bot down with you to keep them company at night, but you’ll have to be with them the rest of the time. At least for the first two years.” Molly sniggered.

“Would a bot be a good idea? If someone visited, it would be a little odd having a minirobot changing the kids and feeding them…”

“It will look like a bit of furniture and won’t be obtrusive. The children will know not to sound out mentally in a few weeks. They’ll just do it when you are alone. They already know the difference. Though they don’t know there’s no others like them. I expect they’ll scare a few other babies when they’re out in their push chairs — you know — doing the *Hi, my name’s Paul* at them — they’ll freak!” Molly chuckled and I got very alarmed at the thought of them thinking hellos at other children and getting a bad reaction from other mothers.

Being home alone wouldn’t be a problem unless someone tried to break in — there’d be a very alarmed burglar.

It was 10 days when Ruth sent a coherent message at me, I’d been talking and thinking to them; telling them stories and the usual baby talk stuff.

*mum, cuddle* I heard, and tears sprang to my eyes, my baby’s first thoughts….I started to giggle and become a little hysterical bouncing Ruth gently *who’s my clever girl then?* I smiled at her and held her close and rubbed her soft face on mine. The electricity of it was amazing — the skin to skin contact of our heads was like a mental link. I felt like I was downloading info. *Nice cuddle mummy. Soft face* I looked her in the eye we smiled at each other. These children would be hard to put into a school. There would be little they could learn.

*Me now mummy.* Paul waggled his arms. Physically still unable to coordinate them but mentally able to think coherent thouhgts. The next year would be frustrating for them I guessed.

Until Paul levitated off the bed towards me. Whoa… I suddenly had two babies in my arms.* Steady on you two, learn to walk before you fly.* Both chortled and beamed at me. I could see this was going to be very tiring.

By the end of week two the babies were sitting up using levitation because their little muscles weren’t strong enough to support them. And watching the news. They didn’t understand much but they got some sense of it and I gave them insights into what was going on, most of which still went over their heads. I guessed their IQs at about 300.

The drug crops were failing all over the world and only legitimate growers were able to produce enough for legal services. They had to employ a lot of guards but that wasn’t a problem — there was so much more money available in the market that it wasn’t hard to raise everyone’s wages.

There had been a lot of deaths, several hundred thousand had died — all but a few were bad people. The others, unlucky to have been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. I felt wracked by guilt and my head spun with the responsibility of the situation I’d precipitated Many drug cartels had fought with the others, suspecting them of theft of their goods and carnage had ensued. The Afghanies were planting vegetable crops instead of opium poppies because there were no opium seeds for most of the farmers. The Taliban were withdrawing to lick their wounds — they had no resources now that the drugs were no longer flowing. Guns and ammunition were not only scarce but also reason to plunge a knife into the odd back — internal strife was beginning to tear them apart
This was a fact of life and whilst I still felt guilt, I also felt that I’d rather they stabbed each other than a lawful protector of the people.

The American army could go home. The Afghani women were freed from bondage because the Taliban could no longer force their twisted values on them. Women went back to working in the hospitals and schools. The world was heading for a strange sort of proscribed peace. That made me feel better but that carnage I’d created left a lump in my throat and a depressing sadness that it seemed to be the only way.

Over the next two weeks it was obvious that things were changing fast

There were areas of unrest which continued to create a sort of resource drain, people being killed and maimed in skirmishes for power in areas where the corrupt elite had been overthrown, or were trying to hold out against the proles.

No place was worse than Russia where opium that should have come from Afghanistan and Pakistan was suddenly not there. The cartels pulled a vacuum, prices skyrocketed which caused a small surge in robberies and drastic crimes then when no heroin was available at all, the system collapsed and the rats deserted the sinking ship, shooting the kapos and leaders on the way. This was made worse by hooked junkies desperately seeking even the smalles relief from their withdrawal symptoms.

Smaller economies collapsed completely — North Korea became even more militant and Kim Jong Un tried to fire a missile with the intention of precipitating a war, which when you consider what Molly had done was quite a mistake as the missile just melted down right where it was and created a dirty bomb for the locality — anyone in the local area of the silo was contaminated with plutonium 238 and became ill and died within a few days.

The North Korean hierarchy checked the other silos and blamed spies from South Korea for the bomb and fired two more missiles with similar results. The regime began to implode.
China was very surprised and checked their missiles too. They had yet to be ‘adjusted’.

So far it was going quite well I thought — I’d only been at this for a year and already the world was a different place.

“Present calculations predict that if you keep interfering at this level, there will be global conflict within 5 years. This will cause 1 billion deaths and create famine that will kill another 2 billion over the next fifteen years.” Molly intoned one day when I was sat with my children on the Lunar site..

I felt dizzy as my blood pressure went up. “What are you talking about?”

“The instability you are creating is getting the economists jumpy and it will initiate a depression worse than the 30’s.” Molly waited for my reaction.

“Any recommendations?”

“You need to get back to Earth and do some buying of stocks to regulate the market.”

“Which stocks?” I gasped

“I can do an analysis but you’re going to be propping up a few countries for a while.” Moly droned on.

“What about my babies?” I blushed thinking of the times this must have been used as an excuse by countless women in the past.

“Take them with you, they’ll soon be able to help.”

The truth was at but a few days old they were already beginning to understand that they were different.

They made very little noise and were always floating about up and down the corridors. Molly upbraided them more than once when they wanted to open the door to the surface of the moon.

When I found out, I went ballistic.

*Children, I am in the dining room, I want to see you immediately.*

Two little contrite Mekons soon appeared at the door and settled on their high chairs.

I spoke out loud knowing that their awareness was a lot more than even a few hours before.
“I know you are keen to explore your little world and your minds are open to all the stimulus that we can possibly put your way. The problem is that we’re on a moon around our planet and there’s no air outside this apartment, you would not survive outside even for a minute. Do you understand?”

*Sorry mummy, we excited… learn.* Paul spoke for them.

I reverted to mental projection.*Have you seen other babies like you on the vid screen?*
I looked at them for signs of comprehension. They both sort of nodded.

*Why they not in air? Lie down?* Ruth asked.

*You are not like them, you are like me, special.* They nodded.*Only you and me go in air.* I pointed to them both.

*You go too? No big people in TV in air.*

I demonstrated my ability to float — it didn’t come as easily as theirs, but I had found I was able during my pregnancy — it was a boon to my back!

*We also speak with mind not sound — I make noise, no words.* Ruth struggled, mewling and growling a bit.

“That takes time,” I spoke, “your bodies are very young. Need to learn.”

*Mm, learn we must,* Paul thought at me, sounding much like Yoda.

I smiled and tucked them into bed. *no getting up unless I’m with you, goodnight darlings.*

*night mummy* in unison.

I lay down thinking. *Molly, can you organize a meeting with our sponsors?*

*Yes, of course. When?*

*I don’t know, how long does it take them to get here.*

*What? physically?* I could hear the incredulity in Molly’s ‘voice’.

*Well how..ever it’s done.* I suggested, realising that it would be impractical if they were several hundred light years away.

*Four hours would be polite, unless it was an emergency, for a holomeeting.* Molly advised. *Any particular subject?*

*Diplomacy and interfering… not yours I hasten to add.* I didn’t want her to get huffy. “I have a lot to learn about molding Earth to the future, I don’t need to kill everyone to make Earth better.*

*Frankly, that may not be a bad thing in the long run.* Molly sounded a bit dismissive.

*What do they look like?.. our sponsors I mean.* I didn’t want to appear shocked if they were like arthropods (Slugs) or something.

*Mostly mammals with various height and colour differences — some warm blooded reptilians, or what you might define them as. Other species don’t seem to make the cut for intelligence.*

*No AIs? or manufactured intelligences?*

*No, C3PO only exists in the movies…* I’m sure that Molly sniggered. A short pause and *The delegation will meet with you after this sleep period about 10 hours from now. They are looking forward to it.*

I was sat in the conference room, the other chairs were empty and the lights bathed the area in a warm glow. The table was some sort of stone or it looked like it — about 20 feet long, with a sheen like polished ebony.

“Stand by. Delegates are incoming.” The sound of Molly being so totally formal was suddenly strange and I perked up a bit.

The lights flickered slightly I thought, then realised it was the lasers for the holograms as the delegates appeared before me. In a few seconds it seemed they were totally real. The colours and naturalness of the textures were wholly normal, or is that holo-normal?

A brief pause and the tall blue guy with epaulettes and almost white hair stood and bowed slightly to me. *Good day to you Helen, I am Tarl Gros, I am honoured to meet you, it is not often we welcome a new member to our council.*

I rose and bowed back, *I am both honoured and surprised to be meeting with you all. A few months ago I would have been overawed by the thought of your very existence now I am here on my moon talking with delegates from many light years distance.*

A smaller humanoid with an orangey hue ‘spoke’. *You have called us here from our respective home worlds we seldom actually meet with each other. It is always a pleasure too meet with a new member planet’s representative, since we thus all get to meet with each other again.* She paused then continued,*I am Brilissae* She bowed briefly.

All 12 delegates spent a minute greeting each other and Helen, then Tarl looked to Helen.

*Helen, you requested a meeting with us. How may we be of assistance to you?*

*I was lying awake last night and realised that I’ve become the leader of a world without any of the experience that I need to do even a poor job. I have no skills and no readily available data to give me an idea of what damage or good I may do whilst trying to improve the lot of my fellow man.*

*It is a creditable request indeed, Helen. You are indeed without the depth of knowledge that would give you the insight to do the job easily. However, you are more than mentally capable and physically empowered to convince any of the world leaders that you have the ability to lead them to a civilized future.* Brillisae nodded in deference to Helen and placed her hands together in a universal language of peace.

A biped. with figured colourful scales, half way down the room, coughed gently and spoke. *Helen, I am Piran, I of all the delegates live closest to you, in the direction of what you call Orion. It is a minor system, not yet in your data banks. However our civilization is one of the older ones and we have visited here quite often watching you climb the ladder of thought and ideals.
I am willing to spend some time with you to help you make decisions that will perhaps be beneficial to your peoples.*

The others clapped and thanked Piran, for her generosity of spirit. *I will be available whenever you wish to converse- over perhaps the next 100 years or until we decide further to meet again and make other arrangements.*

My mind boggled. This perfect stranger has put herself at my disposal to meet with me whenever I wish for the NEXT 100 YEARS. We only met five minutes ago!

*I thank you Piran for your inestimable offer of assistance and support. I know I shall be taking you up on it; I will try not to do so without need.* I bowed deeply to Piran. I was more than grateful.

*Your Mowllry unit will give you a lot of assistance if you frame your questions well. They do have a tendency to be lazy and take the shortest route to an answer if you let them.* A female who looked fairly similar to human smiled at me and I swore she winked at me! * I am Avadine, I am pleased to welcome you to the council. Before we leave, I shall initiate a download of some pertinent facts about our star systems and how we may best assist you..* ( I found out later that her eyes worked independently)

One by one each member of the council spoke to Helen and offered some kind of assistance which whilst not physical would be of inestimable use over the coming centuries. There seemed to be little to do but allow Molly to make notes of who offered what and reprise me later.

Avadine rose and made a semi formal speech of welcome and before they departed spoke with an advising tone *Helen, we welcome you to our circle. Each of us is leader of our worlds. Some of us are openly leaders several of us are not. We choose not to be at the forefront of our worlds as there is still some tendency for others to want to usurp the power of whoever leads. Thus we do it from behind the scenes. I urge you to do similarly at least for the next few hundred years, until your peoples walk together in harmony.* Heads round the table nodded sagely at this warning.

I rose to reply. *I thank you all for your inestimable input, which will be taken to heart, I assure you. It is still difficult for me to come to grips with the length of time I may be around. I am what you may term a precipitous and precocious youth and may be for quite a while until I learn to curb my enthusiasm and willful ideas. My children are with me and have shown they possess the talents which I have recently become aware of in myself. With their aid I will be more able to manage this amazing opportunity to become a part of this council.* I sat feeling very humble indeed. These people had led their worlds from anonymity for hundreds or thousands of years. I was barging about clicking my fingers and messing up the status quo without considering the consequences. I was time I got my feet back on Earth - literally!

Slowly one by one the delegates faded from view after they said goodbye to their friends and allies, until only Molly and Helen remained.

“Molly, I must return to my house in Sydney. Could you bring my car to the Putty Road and put in it the necessary baby stuff. Oh and I’ll need their birth certificates if you have them.”

I walked quickly to the nursery and my babies were flitting round the room like cherubs chasing each other and giggling.

“Children, please settle down, I have something to say.” The babies settled slowly to the bed and listened to their mother.

“In a short while, we will be returning to Earth which will mean you must behave like other babies whilst there is the slightest chance that you will be observed by other people.
If you do something that is seen by someone to be different, you will put us all in great danger, do I make myself understood.”

The children looked at each other and then Ruth nodded and replied. *Yes, mummy but it will be very hard. We will try not to let you down.” They both looked a bit sad, like their summer holidays were over.

“I can’t get the car out of the car park at the apartment in Brisbane. There’s a surveillance camera pointed at it permanently, it would be missed. The car in Sydney is too small for you and the babies with all their gear.” Molly sounded frustrated.

“That’s Ok Molly order a load of stuff to be delivered to both Brisbane and Sydney and Set me and the kids down at Brisbane Airport - out of sight of course.”

“Best I can do is Outside the station at Park road. There’s cameras everywhere else. Unless you want to interfere with a camera?”

“No, that’s ok, we’ll go by train and get a taxi from Southbank.” I said resignedly.

I put the babies in the double pushchair picked up my bags and walked down to the plate. “Ok babies? This may feel yucky but it won’t do any harm ok? Energise.”

We appeared behind a bus stop shelter at Park Road and I instantly looked up and down the road to check we weren’t seen. I then looked at two - well actually I looked at four very wide eyes. *Mummy that was hurty.*

*Molly, you’ll have to sort that, it still hurts, even though I’m used to it.*

*You’ve no idea what the babies left behind Helen. It was all over the plate. I re-energized it to the surface* Molly sounded long suffering. I giggled and the babies smiled. They were well aware of the conversation.

I walked round the corner to go for the train and there was a taxi waiting. I decided it was a better idea and got into the taxi and within minutes we were home.

The concierge looked at the babies as we entered and said, “What a fine pair. Let me know if you want a babysitter, my youngest sister is still trying to earn a few dollars. Here’s your mail, I would have put it in your apartment but I keep getting waylaid before I can get there.”

We took the lift and I was inside and putting on the kettle within a minute.
There on the counter were two baby bottles and a rather nice looking gin and tonic.
“Compliments of the season and welcome home ma’am” intoned the baby sitter. My babysitter. “I perceived your arrival and made suitable refreshments.”

For about ten seconds I was mentally looking round for a human then realised it was an AI. The children spiked fear. Then I realised I have a butler! Oh how sweet is that?

“Thank you, what should I call you?”

“You can call me anytime, but I’d like to answer to Andrew.” I grinned — a butler with a sense of humour, no less. I looked him over and I couldn’t tell him from a normal human.
He was also very good looking in an older sort of way.

*Molly, is he one of yours?*

*Yes Helen, I thought he might be a nice surprise. He has protective capability and is a very good driver.*

*Thank you, I almost fainted when he spoke up, but I realised before I dismembered him that I’d asked for a baby sitter.*

I looked round and realised he was no longer there. I heard him in the bedroom — unpacking for me. Sweet as!

Paul asked, *Mummy, man downstairs, is normal? No thoughts?*

“Yes darling, he’s a normal. Not like us.”

*Let us out please.* Ruth was trying to get out of the seat belt in the push chair and her little hands couldn’t undo the clip.

I reached down and unclipped both and they floated free after struggling for a moment or two. Earth’s gravity making them work harder for a change.

*Not easy to float here.* Ruth slipped to the ground and sat for a minute.

“Perhaps that will remind you that we must be careful.” I walked over and closed the curtains — I wasn’t overlooked but some perv may have a telescope.

*Does anyone round here have a telescope, Molly?*

*I’m always on the lookout for that sort of thing Helen, so is Andy. You also would feel the stray thought if you were being observed — thoughts direct themselves to the observed, much like you can feel if someone is watching you, your sense is much more defined — you will know*

We settled in.
I watched the news with the children and Andy washed the clothes and made himself utterly useful.

There was a bit of brinkmanship going on with the Syrians and the Israelis — for a change.
I idly wondered if I could influence them from here. Should I get closer?
*Molly, is there a way to mentally calm people from a distance?*

*Only if you can identify them properly by their mind signature.*

*Oh, ok* So that’s out unless I can see him live on TV and work out which is his mind amongst 10 million others in the area.

*Can I directly influence a person, live on TV?* A different angle.

*Most certainly and I can even assist if I know who you are directing against.*

*Can you tell me when there’s a live broadcast from Syria and put it on my TV here?* I’m getting very gadgetty now!

*I can, but that would produce a second or so delay each way to the moon. It would be hard to work like that. Instead, I can redirect Syrian TV direct to you from network cable at the Syrian Embassy. Would that be what you need?*

*Yes, I want to do a mental suppression on Syrias President.*

*You’re messing with a hotpotato Helen, it may cause a worse problem.*

*Yes, you’re right — forget it.*

I grabbed Ruth’s leg as she passed me to reach Paul.

“Missy Ruth, please don’t keep floating about, it’s not natural.” I felt paranoid and stretched my mind outwards for signs of someone watching. *Molly, there’s a camera in here, I can feel someone watching me*

*On it - It’s not in your apartment, it’s outside in the hall, I’m intercepting the signal.
Whoever it is can’t see you where you are, it’s into your bedroom through the outside wall from the passageway to the lift.*

I slowly rose and walked into the bedroom. I pretended to stretch as I twirled round the room locking onto what was a tiny spot on the wall — just below the ceiling. I spread my net wider to see if anyone was watching — that BLOODY Concierge. I hit him with a blow to the mind.

“Andy, be a love and pop down to the front desk and invite our dear concierge up here please. Don’t take no for an answer.”

“At once madam.” Andy slipped away quietly.

A minute or two later, a very red concierge was stood in front of me.

“Well what have you to say for yourself?”

“About what Ms Cartwright?” He feigned ignorance.

“I’m only going to give you one chance, tell me who fitted up my apartment with a camera?”

“What camera?” He continued to play dumb.

I reached into his head and looked, I saw a pretty dirty mind that had some images of most of the tenants with no clothes on. Some children too. Oh God. I looked to see if there was anything odd about what he’d seen in here — found a few scenes of sex with various lovers — perv stuff, but not one picture of strange conversations or science fantasy. He’d seen nothing, but it didn’t mean no one else had.

Who else looked through these cameras to the tenants?

I sorted through another area and dug out the phone number of his friend who shared his penchant for voyeurism.

“Andy phone 07 555 6486 and ask our dear friend, Bob to come up and see us.

*That’s an address in Coorparoo Helen.* Molly injected it’ll be a while before he gets here.
I looked at the concierge, “phone your friend” I ordered him. He tried to resist and I pushed a little . He pulled out his phone and dialed,

“Bob, come over to the apartments — I’ve got something you just have to see. Yeah, right now.”

“He’s in town and will be here in a few minutes.”

While we waited I walked into the bedroom and asked Andy to pull on the fibre optic and see what transpired 4 metres of fibre optic came out of the wall. I looked at the miserable little bastard and felt like strangling him with it.

“Where’s the camera?” His mind told me — *in the service duct*. I walked over and grabbed his keys, “excuse me won’t you? I tossed them to Andy who went out and opened the service duct and pulled out the little camera and one that connected to the apartment across the hall, together with its fibre optic.

“I found these ma’am,” he put them on the counter in front of one very miserable man.

“So do you have any idea why I called you here tonight?” I enquired with as much sarcasm as I could muster. I suddenly noticed the children’s faces behind the concierge looking round the door edge — about 4 feet from the floor — it’s hard to imagine a less likely place for 2 three week old babies to be looking from. I started giggling.

“Andrew, would you please look after the babies, I pointed and stopped our miscreant getting curious. He had no idea why I giggled and was wondering when the other shoe was about to fall. The phone rang in his pocket. “Tell Bob to come up here.”

“Come up to apartment 4b.” He rang off.

I opened the door and Bob walked in. I stopped him where he was and checked him for guilt.
It was a little odd, this character had more nooks and crannies in his head than a log with termites. Each one filled with nasty stuff. Some of it was just porn, but some of it was sinister stuff drugs and kiddy porn prostitution and protection.

Then I saw why, he was a policeman. A detective no less. “Bob, nice to see you here,” I smiled at him and he looked at our erstwhile felon. “What’s going on Ralph?”
I watched him pretend to distance himself from his mate.

“Bob, you may not know this, but Ralphy here has dropped you in it, he has told us that you have been watching the people in this building whilst unaware.”

Bob seemed shocked, “Why would he do that? Why would he implicate me?” He looked at Ralph for an answer — a sort of ‘if you don’t admit to this and take all the blame, you’re going down.’ He continued reaching into his pocket. “I’m a detective, why would I want to do anything like that?”
I looked at his badge and said, “That’s not going to save you, you’re as bad as Ralphy here.”

“I have the evidence right here and there’s going to be your fingerprints in Ralphy’s den isn’t there?” the two looked defiant.

I’d spent the idle minutes wondering if these two had seen anything, I’d searched their heads quite thoroughly and they were perverts, but they hadn’t witnessed anything strange.

Bob decided to bluff it out. “I was following a line of enquiry and Ralph had undertaken to acquire the information, I know nothing about how he did it.”

“BUZZZ — wrong. You have sat in Ralph’s nasty little hideaway, watching the tenants shagging and stripping, without a care in the world. Now you’re telling me you were doing it to fight crime. Bullshit.”

Andrew pop downstairs and remove the wiring for these cameras please and pull all the cameras from the service ducts.

“You can’t do that, it’s private property.” Detective Bob said.

“What do you prefer, waking up in the morning not in the river, or not waking up in the river?”

I watched the lump travel up and down the throat of both men.

“Right off you go, don’t do it again.” Their little eyes lit up like it was Christmas — they’d got away with it, they smirked at each other as they reached the door. As they passed through the door I wiped all memory of the cameras from their minds and I wiped all the shite from Bob’s mind and all the nasty kinkiness from Ralph’s. They looked at each other a bit puzzled and went to the lift.

I heard the kids chortling in the next room. I walked through and leaned on the doorframe. “That my dear children is what a lot of ordinary people are like. It’s our job to improve their lot and make them nice — to make the world a good place to grow and be happy in. Right bed time you two.” I kissed them goodnight and turned off the light. I spent the next twenty minutes searching the apartment all for all the possible bugs and other things that shouldn’t be there.

Part 11

The next day I decided to expose the children to the rest of humanity and took them for a walk along Southbank. They wanted to practice flying, but I instilled on them the importance of appearing normal and they accepted for now it would be a strange thing to do if no one else could do it.

I had a think about how easily I was accepting this strange pair of twins who could almost speak from birth- but were totally reliant on me for everything — I presumed.

I tethered them in the stroller which meant hauling them flat since babies of a few weeks old were normally unable to do anything at all except eat, cry and poo.
*Mummy, please let us sit up we can’t see out otherwise.* Ruth complained bitterly — I almost thought they were going to cry but they refrained when I gave them a hard stare.
I loved them with all I had, but they were going to be a handful if I didn’t keep them under control.

Eventually we got out onto the street and I got some sun on my face for the first time in a few weeks. I sat at a bench overlooking the river and relaxed in the sun filtered through the bougainvillea growing over the trellis nearby.

One or two passing ladies took a peek into the stroller to see the kiddies and smile at me — “how old?” was the usual question. “Nearly four weeks.” Was my oft repeated answer.

One lady said, “they seem much older than that with their steady gaze.” I smiled.

“They seem to keep each other company and aren’t in the least fractious.” I replied.

“They say twins often have a mental bond with each other.” The lady continued. “Like they’re telepathic.”

“It seems to be so, but I think that’s with identical twins — these are only fraternal one boy and one girl.” I sidelined the conversation. I didn’t want ANYONE thinking even momentarily that I had mentalist children.

“They seem very knowing, almost like they understand me.” I wanted the lady to move on so I gave her a mental nudge. Even so it was a minute or two before she got the mental hint and moved on.

I looked into the cot and the twins smiled at me, *were we good, mummy?*
“Very good my darlings, see how easily you could be discovered just by a passing stranger?” I felt them nod in my head; a strange experience since there was no other thought form.

When we arrived back at the apartments, the concierge greeted me with, “This lady is from the Social Services.” He turned away to carry on with his work as a tall thin lady rose from the sofa against the wall opposite to greet me.
“Good afternoon Miss Cartwright,’ she seemed to sneer down her nose at my single status. “I have come to check on the babies’ health and circumstances.”

“Oh, and what circumstances would those be then?” I asked frowning at her peremptory attitude.

“Just to make sure the babies are being properly cared for.” I frowned again and looked at her. I was about to give her a mental command to rack off but thought better of it.

“Well, these are my little cherubs,” I indicated to the waspish woman. She peered into the stroller and my two little darlings peered back at her. I got the feeling watching the woman’s face that the expressions my two gave weren’t entirely beneficent. I didn’t feel any mental push, but the woman seemed a little disconcerted.

“These babies are 4 weeks old?”

“Thereabouts, four weeks next Tuesday actually.” I answered easily, smiling at them and her as if butter wouldn’t melt in my mouth — whereas I could probably melt hi-temp Lithium grease if the truth be known. “I’m Helen, these are Ruth and Paul.” I introduced them and me.

“Mary Sutcliffe, “she offered her hand. “I’ll be popping in now and then as time goes by to check on their progress. Can I see your apartment, it’s one of the things I have to tick off — suitability for bringing up children.” She sneered again.

I was getting a little annoyed, “If you must. Come this way.” I walked to the lift and pressed the button.

When I got to the apartment, the door opened and Andrew ushered us inside. “Good afternoon ma’am, I trust you had a pleasant walk?”

The nose on the old crone wrinkled in distaste — she wasn’t used to being upstaged.

“My butler, Andrew.” I walked in and popped my parasol in the stand and bent to unclip the babies,

“I see you have a guest ma’am, will she be taking tea?” Andrew stood positioned to intercede on my behalf if I said one word.

“No Andrew, she’s not staying, she just wants to check my babies are safely housed.”
At that I turned and raised an eyebrow at her. As if to say, ‘do you really expect to walk into my house?’

“Well I would like to see the babies’ room?”

“Why?”
“To check its suitability.” She was trying to see through into the living area through the double entry doors from the hall. Andrew was blocking her view.

“I think you’ve invaded my privacy quite enough don’t you?”

“Well I need to check them off my list” She tried to inveigle her way in, Andrew stood implacably before her.

“I think you can safely say that this apartment is sufficiently well maintained as not to put the babies in jeopardy.” Andrew stated diffidently as I walked away from her with one baby in each arm.

“No I must insist,” Mary complained. I saw Paul look at her and then Mary blanched a little and held her tummy. “Well I’ll tick it off for now, but I’d like to see it next time.”
She backed off and Andrew let her out. “Have a good day ma’am.” Andrew said as he closed the door on her ass.

“Andy, please ask the concierge to make sure the woman has an appointment before she’s let in again.”

“Very good ma’am.” Andy smiled and lifted the phone. After a minute the phone beeped again. Andrew answered it then put it down again.
“The concierge spoke to her about future arrangements before she left ma’am.”

The last thing I wanted was for the putrid old wart to turn up at the door when I was on the lunar base.

“Paul dear, what did you do to the lady?” I looked him in the eye. He had the grace to blush — not yet 4 weeks and his sense of right and wrong was already established.

*Just made her feel sick a bit.* Paul whispered in my head.

“Best to leave things like that to me dear, she might connect you with something nasty and start to get funny ideas.”

“K mummy.” Paul managed to grip my neck and give me a hug.

Part 12
I was restlessly turning in the night when Molly called.
*Helen, I’ve been doing some analysis of the changes that are in progress.*

*What changes Molly?* I sat up rubbing my face to get some circulation into it and wake me up properly. I glanced at the clock, 3.40am

*The personnel changes and the reforms in North Korea and physical disablement of the Nuclear devices and missiles.*
*What prognosis have you achieved Molly?*

*WWIII starts on Dec 21 2012.* Molly said flatly as if reading from a document.

“Shit!” I stared into the darkened room and my eyes visualized the scenario of plumes of deadly radiation…. “What have I done?”

*It was borderline before, but it’s a lot more certain now that the changes have been made.* Molly confirmed. I noticed that she had avoided blaming me. *I’ve done the calcs several times over the last 36 hours and it becomes more solid every time.*

*Any chance of averting it ?* I shook my head trying to believe what Molly was telling me.

*Oh yes, but it’s not going to be easy.* Molly sounded like she was bracing to give the answer.

*Come on then, put me out of my misery.*

*We must engineer a natural disaster. There’s a CME — that’s a coronal mass ejection due to occur soon, we must make sure that some of the satellites that are supposed to shut down to safeguard them- don’t. This will causethem to suffer catastrophic failure of their computers and electronics.*

*Isn’t that going to make matters worse?* I couldn’t help thinking that less communications would be a worse scenario.

*Military hardware in space not working is going to be a good thing. I could just make them fail, but that might reverse the solution and make it worse. It has to appear that they failed due to a natural disaster.*

*I can’t help thinking that rather than being the saviour of mankind, I shall be the reason for its demise.* I felt very depressed — nothing I’d done over the last year had improved anything except my ego. *I was supposed to be a good person and I’m failing badly at everything. My Midas touch had become a kiss of death.*

*You’re very young Helen, there’s no better learning tool than failure.*

*That’s all very well to say except when you’re talking millions of lives. I may have become the worst mass murderer in history. How many people have I already killed? How many more will die because of me?*

*Ultimately Helen, the question is how many will survive and live to see wonders beyond imagining that would have perished in a frozen cave? The answer is a millionfold.* I felt marginally better.

*How do we affect this extraordinary feat of stopping these satellites from shutting down?*

*It’s not complicated, I just detune their coms link a few seconds before the shutdown arrives and they’ll think it was something to do with the CME, an unexpected collateral effect*

*I’ll believe you, Molly, millions wouldn’t.* I smiled vaguely — it seemed too much like science fiction. *How is that going to stop WWIII?*

*It’ll stop the viruses being released.* Simply said.

*Molly, please tell me you’re kidding?*

*I can’t do that without lying Helen.*

*I’m presuming these viruses are a MAD thing (Mutually Assured Destruction)?* I was mentally shuddering and crying that the military were so stupid as to do something like that. Especially the West who were supposed to be so Geneva Conventional. What if there was an accident in space — mankind may have been obliterated overnight by a stupid error.

*Mostly; some are designed to weaken rather than kill — and some are no longer dangerous to the populations they are protecting — they’ve been inoculating the water supply for several years.* Molly had said this with such offhandedness that I was stunned. It wasn’t nuclear radiation that would have plumes, it would be Anthrax and TB.

*I shall disable all but the most feeble. I’m rather glad this came up in time, protocols make it difficult for me to warn you beforehand of all the dangers that could befall us.*

*Molly, please answer me this, are all nations doing this? Am I in fact stopping what might have meant the demise of humanity?*

*In many ways, the expectation of humanity surviving this period were quite low until a shepherd was discovered in you.* Molly sounded wry. As if I was Earth’s 11th hour reprieve.

*Anything else I need to know about organized destruction of Homo Sapiens?* I felt cheated and I felt like I was going to be, not a matriarch of clan Earth, but a skivvy destined to put out fires until mankind could really come of age.

*One or two things, but nothing immediate.* Molly said as if ticking off a clipboard form.

Andrew appeared at the door. “I couldn’t help observing you are awake ma’am would you like a cup of cocoa?” It seemed wholly inappropriate but it also felt like I was being grounded and brought back to present reality.
“Yes please.” I took the proffered cup and sipped gratefully at the luxurious silken beverage.

*Nothing serious enough that can’t wait til morning then?*

*No Helen.*

I settled back down to sleep and I fell quickly into oblivion as military people the world over sweated over their red buttons. Never realizing that no matter what they did, they would never work.
While I slept, Molly sorted and stripped all the viruses from space transferring them into the fires of the sun. There would never again be a question of whether man was going to annihilate itself by default. That night humanity was saved from itself. I still had work to do, but it would be on a less dramatic level.

*Mummy!!* Ruth shouted into my head, *time to get up.*
I glanced at the clock and sure enough it was 6.15. I looked at my watch to confirm it and it said 4.12.
I shook it and held it to my ear — knowing in reality that I would never hear it tick anyway.
“This is fun, control over everything and not even my watch works.”

The kids floated in through the open door at around 6 inches off the ground.
I supposed they were flying solo….

*We’d thought it better to float below window level.* Paul answered my unasked query.
*I can’t wait to learn to walk* Ruth said with a weary mental sigh. The irony didn’t escape me.

*Don’t try to walk too early, your bones haven’t set.* I warned.
*We’d support ourselves so that it looked like we were walking — it’s just very difficult to control our legs so far.” Paul offered.

I looked at my watch to remind me what time it was — it was still 4.15.
*Molly can I have a watch that works please?* I switched to upcom!

*I have placed it on your dresser Helen* the immediate reply came.
Looked over at the dressing table and there lay a Patek Philipe. Classy but not overdone.

*Neat, thanks*

*Pleasure, enjoy.*

The morning continued a little better.

I was listening to the early morning news and it was full of a bushfire down South in Melbourne. It got me to thinking.

I sat down and nutted out a few logistics.
It was mind boggling.
The best I could come up with was less than minimal but it was a start.

For every person there needs to be a tree to make the oxygen for us to breathe, and the fire down south was consuming one every few seconds. Slash and burn in Indonesia and Brazil was cutting a further chunk of our atmosphere out and changing it to carbon dioxide — this was further warming the atmosphere and drying out areas that used to be able to support trees. We needed to change this in a hurry. Climate change apparently was inevitable, but it didn’t need to be so drastic as we were making it.

So two things needed to happen quickly — trees to grow and a drop in atmospheric temperature f2 degrees over the next 20 years. Could we manage to achieve this ??

After consultation with Molly we discovered tree planting could easily be achieved by a small group of people in each community — if there was water available. That was the sticking point- water was less available as fresh — it was more available as salt.

Molly didn’t have the energy resources to initiate a reversal of heat build up. I had some financial resources. Enough to make a start.

I spent a few days sorting out with local government a place I could start to plant trees as a carbon positive scheme — local government was only too happy to let me sink my capital into the local soil. After looking over the area, I sorted out a personnel manager and a manager for my tree planting game — I was determined to stop using heavy forces to initiate change — I wanted to do it locally with manpower — not star power.

I was a week into the setup when Molly contacted me with news that Piran was eager to contact me so I adjourned for a few hours to Luna and left the children with Andy who had quickly become their mentor and friend as well as their babysitter.

*Greetings Helen,* Piran bowed and placed her hand over her chest (I presumed where her heart was)
I smiled and repeated her gesture then sat in the comfortable seating area in the conference room. She smiled and also sat, though it was only a hologram.
*It is a pleasure to meet with you again Piran, how may I be of assistance to you?* I began.

*It is not a formal meeting Helen, I only came to congratulate you on your change of direction in dealing with the failings of Earth’s people. Your style of management will not be so sensitive to foibles of the cultures on your Earth* She smiled with her fine lips and nodded sagely.

*Thank you Piran, I was worried about my approach to some problems — I was getting too involved with the micromanagement. I hope this will bring about a more gentle change and allow a more reasoned approach to order.* I tried to sound humble, I don’t think I was very good at it.

*New leaders seldom grasp the concept so quickly, it is a good thing — circumstance may have harmed your progress for some centuries had things gotten out of control* Piran nodded sagely again.

*Might I suggest using a dimension portal to soak up some of the excess ocean heat? It will shorten the recovery period and may not be noticed if done subtly*

My mind boggled, I was being given technology that was beyond conception of our scientists like it was the new watch I got the other day.
I had to grin at that. *That would be most gratefully received.*

*That is settled then, I won’t keep you, I have much to do and would like to visit with some of our mutual friends, you must consider joining me sometime. It is good to meet with your peers in other parts of the Galaxy* With that, she waved and faded from view as I held up my hand in greeting. Short and sweet. I felt very small and yet I knew that in reality I was one of the most gifted individuals ever anywhere…. My God — anywhere in the galaxy. An hour later I was back on Earth playing with the kids. Life is becoming very strange yet surprisingly mundane.

It was hard to bounce the kids on my knee — they reacted to my jiggling leg by lowering their weight til they floated just above the maximum travel of my knee, negating the whole point of the exercise.

Our trips round the local area to buy things and our trips out in the car became more frequent and the children were quite sad that they didn’t meet any others like them.
They began to understand the reason for their existence and the goal that I pursued.

Though it was still in a childish way — concept without the depth — but it improved on a daily basis as did their amazing store of knowledge. They took the opportunity to visit Luna with me as often as they could where Molly spent time with them teaching the rudiments of knowledge that they would require in the next few years. I spent hours and hours with them when I wasn’t involved in starting up tree plantations across the country.

*Mummy? Would it be possible to fly over some of the tree places?* Paul asked as nicely as he could and smiled at me when I gave him my attention.

*Well we’d need to rent an airplane, we couldn’t just go flying around like superman you know.*

*Who’s superman and is he like us?* Ruth asked suddenly, *are there more like us?* more excited as she thought more positively about it.

*I don’t think so pet, we’re the first in many years to be chosen to be like this.* Ruth pouted a bit when she heard that. Then changed subjects.

*Watch this mummy, I can do up my own seatbelt,* she grabbed the end of it in her little hand and pushed it into the clip down the side of the cot without looking. Knowing where it was by feel — I was amazed — this was akin to a four year old and my little girl was only a few months old. Barely old enough to move from one place to another at best if she were ‘standard issue’

I did hire a plane — and a pilot of course. A little Cessna. And we flew over some of the plantations in the local area to see how they were progressing — they’d planted Paulonia and Spruce and hoop pine. All useful fast growing trees.
*Don’t they grow any faster mummy? They only look to be a foot or so high.*

*No dear, which is why we need to plant them now, because they take a long time to absorb the carbon from the air like we want them to.*

*I thought carbon was black?* Ruth chipped in.

*It’s a colourless gas when joined onto oxygen.* I lectured.

*Why do you need to use trees, why not just split the gas into oxygen and carbon?*

Having a conversation like this with three month old children was a bit hard on the head, but I was getting used to it.

*It takes heat to do that and that produces more CO2 than you get from the air.*

*Oh* and a puzzled frown was all I got from that.

“Mummy,” I nearly fell over because it wasn’t a thought, it was a sound. Paul was now 7 months old and had said his first word. Quickly followed by. “Can we go over to the plantations again soon. I want to see how much the trees have grown”

“Can we please?” Ruth joined in with the supplication.

“Yes of course we can but you have to promise me one thing,”

“What’s that mummy?” Paul asked smiling at me with a sort of self satisfied grin. Obviously the pair had been planning this for a while.

“That you communicate only with me and without using your new found voices — 7 month old children have a vocabulary of a very few words.” I smiled at them. “You’re very clever, the pair of you and I’m very proud of you both. And I love you very much, but we do have to be careful.” I admonished.

“We’ll be extraordinarily careful mummy” Boasted my little soldier. I felt a tear come to my eye. My child’s first words were from a vocabulary of a 12 year old.
We drove out to one of the plantations to the North of Brisbane and found the trees had put on a few centimeters — which was about their normal growth rate. The Paulonia had put on a lot more, but that was how they grew — quickly — they could be cropped in ten years and would regrow from the stump so didn’t need to be replanted — great trees!

Paul and Ruth sat side by side in their little stroller and plotted as I spoke to the farm manager about expected yields and time. “Well this plantation is growing at about 2 tons a week at the moment but in about three years will be growing at 10 tons a week. If we get sufficient rain. If it goes dry, we get almost no growth at all.”

“Haven’t you put in sufficient pipework to deliver water?

“We haven’t put in ANY, we thought you wouldn’t want it being green and pipes being plastic and all….” He looked at me like I had gone potty, like I’d said something totally unexpected. “Using water is subtracting from the overall green gain.”

“First and foremost, you’re supposed to be a farm manager not a tree hugger . If you want to fix carbon, you need to do it with live trees, and not dead ones. If you want to stop a fire, you need to do it with water and moist soil, not dry trees and arid soil.” I was more than annoyed and my little cohorts sat in the stroller strained to see the manager who was stood behind them. They stared at him round the edge of the stroller. Fixing him with stares. As if memorizing his face to fix him later.

“I want you to get some pipe laid 150 mm into the ground along each line of trees and allow each tree enough water to grow at optimum. Is that clear?”

“Well, I think we need to be a little more circumspect — I’m trying to do the right thing here and my instructions are to optimize the green value.” The manager tried to explain his position.

“Who told you this? Whose instructions are these?” I looked into his mind.
The Operations manager’s faces swam to the front of the plantations manager’s mind as he answered, “Mr Owen’s. He was very firm about not using capital and certainly not to buy water”

“Right, phone him and ask him again so I can hear him say it.”

“I can do better than that, I have the written instructions on an email.” He turned to move towards his office.

“No, just phone him, I want to hear his explanation.”

He dialed and spoke to Dave Owen briefly and handed the phone to me…..

“…. I want you to do this without any infrastructure, I can’t make a profit if you use so much water, is that clear Mr Anderson?”

“Very clear Mr Owen.” I said listening, expecting him to twig who was on the line.

“Who’s that? Where’s Anderson? I was talking to him.” Owen dug the hole a bit deeper.

“This is your boss, Owen, and you’re not following my directive are you?” I asked with a slightly supercilious smile.

“My Boss, no one’s my boss, I’m the boss.”

“Keep digging Mr Owen and while you’re digging, dig out your desk and the rest of your stuff. You’re off the payroll.” I spoke shortly and to the point.

“I don’t know who you are, but if you work for this company, you’re fired. Is that understood?” Owen spluttered. “What’s your name?”

“Look up from what was your desk and read what’s written above the Receptionist’s desk, it’ll give you a clue.” I smiled rather enjoying the joke.
I passed the phone back to Anderson. “Tell him who I am and then get onto the irrigation system. I’ll sort out the rest on the drive back to Brisbane.”

The twins were giggling and Andrew was trying not to smile in his usual robotic way.

We loaded the car back up and headed to Brisbane — I phoned personnel whilst en route and notified them of Dave Owen’s termination and for security to escort him from the premises after returning his keys. I thought about getting his house searched, but instead finished with, “Please make sure the accounts are scrupulously checked to ensure leakage of funds hasn’t occurred through his office. Inform me if that is the case. If you’re looking for good managers, I think Anderson might make the grade, if he’s a bit under experienced, get him up to speed and we’ll reconsider him later. ”

I hoped that was the end of it but it wasn’t to be; he tried to sue me for wrongful dismissal. I pointed out to his solicitor’s that nowhere in my instructions was making a profit mentioned; only the optimized growth of the trees, which he hadn’t complied with.
In the end I had to change his mind by getting him to admit to his solicitors that he’d been skimming and the solicitors then wouldn’t have a bar of him and left him to rot.
The solicitors had to admit to mine that he had divulged information that precluded them from supporting his case and I got a court order to have his accounts seized and his house checked — he’d only been working with us for a short while but he’d already stripped thousands from the company. I was amazed. I used the money to plant more trees — I didn’t press charges. He was finished professionally.

Somehow a little more rain fell in that area on a consistent basis than should have — I found out that all my plantations would get a little more rainfall than average — it was easy when you could cloud seed from the moon.
It was explained by the known science that trees carry an updraught and create their own rainfall. — what wasn’t normal was the rate of growth — more than 20% above normal — but it was put down to good husbandry by dedicated men and women on my staff.
I sold shares to finance more plantations and it soon became a self supporting industry and I was able to leave it well alone.

The dimension gate over the Pacific was farmed the same way and heat was bled to another planet that was suffering from a cold spell geologically — I didn’t understand the technology, but I did understand the effect and scientists were rapturous when they realised that things were stabilizing — though it didn’t help with some things and I had a lot of work still to do. One decent thing about the improved Pacific temperature was the effect it had on sardines — all of a sudden they were in much more plentiful supply. Chile was really pleased as it meant their exports went up.

Part 13

I was sitting with my beautiful children one night watching TV the news was on and the major news for the day was the crazy price of fuel. I wondered why alternatives were still hard to find and inefficient.

*Molly? What’s happening with fossil fuel alternatives?* I asked into the ether.

*Standby Helen, I’ll gather some relevant up to date information for you.* Molly quickly replied.

The children looked at me — they seemed to overhear general comms with Molly as if I spoke out loud. *What’s fossil fuel?* Paul asked mentally, it was still easier than using his voice.

“It’s fuel we use in cars and for making electricity, it comes from animals that have died in the sea over millennia and then been trapped in sediment. We dig it up and burn it.”
As I spoke I realised how stupid that sounded in this day and age.

*You’re kidding?* Ruth looked astonished.

“Well it’s easier than any other method — up to 100 years ago, we used coal mostly and wood from forests, until we ran out of forests that were easily accessible and coal was making the air dirty. Then we turned to oil because we had the means to get it from deep in the ground.”

*Why don’t they convert the sun’s energy? Is that why you’re growing trees near town? How much is there? What happens when it runs out.?* The questions flowed like water from these yearling children.

*Helen, the answer is that there is no oil crisis, it is merely a figment of imagination. There is sufficient alternative energy available and can easily be manufactured at any time.*

*Can you explain that please Molly?* I was a little perplexed.

*The oil companies need to sell oil to make revenue, governments need to tax people and oil companies to enable infrastructure to be afforded. If energy was free, the western world’s economy would fail. Niccola Tesla found this out 100 years ago before someone murdered him for trying it.*

*Oh, I see. Where is this technology?* I was confused.

*The oil companies own the patents. They are letting them out one by one to maintain the status quo. Hence LED lights and Digital Cameras.*

I sat back and thought about it, I needed more information and more knowledge of patent laws. I’m sure between Molly and me we could come up with a marketable product that would ease the energy from oil.

*Since we now have the heat sink over the Pacific and a tree planting program that is self sustaining in place, do we need to upset the world economy? I think we can allow things to continue slowly for as long as we need to to keep stability.* Molly attached some tactful brakes to my indignation.

I was beginning to realise that to do the best for the world was easier if I did very little except stop degradation and instability.

I decided to spend my time for a while doing my tree thing and bringing up my children as well as possible.

About a week later my social case worker Mary Sutcliffe decided to put in an appearance.
The children were one year old.
I had just come in from the market where I had bought my fresh food for the week and Andrew was hauling it manfully up from the carpark while I had the stroller with the babies when the lift door opened on the ground floor and in stepped Mary Sutcliffe with a very annoyed concierge.

“Madam, you can’t just go barging into the place without permission.” He was holding the door open to get the unwelcome visitor to alight from the car.

“I’ve come to see Miss Cartwright and she’s here, so you are dismissed.” She almost shoved the concierge from the door. I used my ability to stop the lift door closing.

“What do you want Miss Sutcliffe? I’m busy as you see.” I indicated the shopping and paraphernalia around me.

“ I am charged with making sure the children in my jurisdiction are properly cared for and being educated. … I held up my hand.

“They are, now hop off the lift and stop wasting my time.” I pointed to the door which was still open — whereupon she tried to press the door close button. I wasn’t about to let the lift move with her on it.

“You haven’t visited a doctor or had the children monitored at all in the last year.” She said . “That is not normal and we feel the children must be being neglected.”

The children looked up at her. I could see the astonishment on their little faces.

“Well they’re right in front of you, do they look neglected?” I was more than a bit pissed off by now.

“ I need to see them in their home setting.” I could tell she wasn’t going to let this go

*Mummy, should we tell her ourselves that we’re being looked after?* Paul asked soundlessly.

*No dear, just play dumb for the time being.* I warned gently.

“So. Tell me Miss Sutcliffe, what ‘we’ are we talking about here? Is that a royal we or the power invested in you by the social services? Because if you think you have power over my children you can think again. You may not and you will not progress further into my domain. Get OFF the lift. NOW!” I had decided.

Mary’s face blanched. She stepped back and the doors immediately began to close. She stuck her hand in to stop them but they didn’t reopen they just stopped an inch from her arm. “You haven’t heard the last of this, mark my words.” I heard through the gap.

*Molly, make sure she’s not allowed to come back please. If we need another worker to visit, make sure that there’s a note that they should telephone first and make an appointment.*

*Yes Helen.*

A few days later a letter arrived from Social Services which requested that I meet with them to discuss changing my social worker. I said fine and left the children with Andy while I attended the interview. I was a little intrigued as to how a government body could summon me, a private citizen of good standing to attend a meeting at their behest.

“Good morning Miss Cartwright.” I was sat in a large meeting room with three social workers — two men and a woman, Mary S was not present.

“It appears that Miss Sutcliffe was refused entry to your home last week Ms Cartwright, is that so? I looked at the little guy who had spoken. Typical empire builder. No real character just a snotty manner.

“As I refuse any who come without an appointment.” I said it without rancour and without prejudice.

“But you can’t refuse a social worker entry, Ms Cartwright. We need to see your living conditions for the good of the children.”

“ I live in an apartment worth several million dollars with a concierge who was assaulted when he tried to do his job which is to stop uninvited persons entering my home.”

The lady spoke, “we were expecting yu to bring your children so we could assess them.”

“Assess them for what?” I determined I wasn’t going to get wound up. So I asked quite gently. I could have just altered their minds, but something was telling me there is injustice here and I needed to get to the bottom of it.

“Well they haven’t been seen by a doctor for a year and they haven’t been weighed or health checked even by a district nurse.” She spoke with a sort of false concern.

“They aren’t sick.” I looked from one to the next. “They looked like they were expecting me to defend my actions and be apologetic.

“That’s beside the point madam, we need to see them.”

“Why?”

“It is our duty to inspect the situation of all children in our care.” The third person spoke.

“I’m going to say this once and once only. Those are my children; they are not in your care. I do not need a license to bear children and I did not indulge in a hospital to bring them into this world. You may not invade my privacy to inspect my children at your whim. If you wish to see my children, you may make an appointment to see them and me.
You may talk to them and you may look at them. You may not touch them or physically handle them AT ANY TIME. Do I make myself understood?” I stood and turned to leave the room. As I reached the door I turned and looked at them. “Is there anything else?”

They looked like they’d been gutted. “Er no. We shall discuss this and get back to you.”
*Molly, why didn’t you just tidy this up instead of letting me go through that fiasco?*
I wasn’t best pleased.

*I saw a problem with the system, and allowed that this might be the best way of handling it. Had I warned you, it would not have been so spontaneous. I apologise if you were upset.*

*Oh,* Molly had profoundly higher social skills than I had credited her with. *In that case Molly, I shall keep my options open on this one — I don’t think we’ve heard the last of it.*

*No, I concur.*

It was only two days later that the concierge rang upstairs at the same time as Molly contacted me. *There’s a delegation from the council and two policemen at the front desk. They have a court order to inspect your apartment. Would you like me to intervene?*

I thought for a moment or two. If I delay them and mess them about they’ll get uppity and create a scene. Do I want that?
If I just let them in, they’ll presume they’ve won some sort of victory.
If I repel them they will escalate.
If I mentally tell them they’ve seen what they came to see, they’ll still think they’ve won.

*Contact the local press. And Stop the lift until they are almost here. I want them to appear on my doorstep together.*

*Yes Helen* Molly sounded compliant.
*Local press are on their way.*
*Lift is still stuck on ground floor.*
*Press entering the building,*
The door buzzer sounded and a hubbub of slightly raised voices came from the lift lobby.
I looked through the peep hole.
“Ok Andrew open the door and stop the welfare and police and let the press in then ask the police to wait for a second — I want to prime the press.”
*Molly, what did you tell the press?*

*That the welfare were planning to use their Nazi tactics on a good citizen and should be there*.

*Perfect, thanks Molly*

Andy opened the door and the police and welfare people started to take a step forward.
Anddy held up his hand and looked over the entourage and indicated to the press that they should approach.
They did so, taking photos as they came.
“Please come in gentlemen,” turning to the police and welfare, “Ms Cartwright will invite you in in just a moment.” A policeman stepped forward. “We demand entry according to the welfare act 1994.”

“You will be allowed in momentarily, Ms Cartwright has instructed me to permit your ingress after she has organized the press. Indulge her for a moment if you please.”

“You are hindering an investigation if you do not allow us entry immediately.”

“I shall have to ask Ms Cartwright’s permission, excuse me.” He closed the door waited a few seconds and opened it again the police were glowering by this time and the welfare delegation were red with anger.

“Please follow me, ladies and gentlemen.” Andy slowly walked back into the apartment.

I was sat in the carver in the dining room. Andy directed them towards me.

“Thank you Andrew, that will be all for now.”

The Press were arranged behind me taking pictures and film of the proceedings, their little recorders were all flashing their little red lights.

“I presume you have some paperwork that allows you to burst into my apartment like a bunch of Nazis?” I queried, using what I would call my Imperial Manner.

The policeman stepped forward with a writ. “This allows us to enter your apartment to ascertain the welfare of your children.”

I turned and lifted my children into view one by one from below the table edge where they had been hidden from the group.

“Approach me, officer, and inspect my children.” I commanded.

The welfare people suddenly blanched as did the policeman — the press were grinning and snapping away. The children were smiling and looking very polite — they were stood holding onto the chair and waving to the press as they snapped away.

These were two children apparently very much advanced into the second year of growth and looked to be standing very much in command of their body. There was a size to them that belied their 12 month status. These were proper toddlers not babies.

They turned and looked at the Welfare people. “Why nasty people here mummy?” Ruth asked altogether in a way that belied her 12 month status — using language of a 2-3 year old. “Look mean.” Pointing at the policeman with the writ.

“They think they’re doing their job darling,” I offered.

“Tell go way.” Paul uttered dramatically. “No good people.”

The press laughed and snapped away. The welfare people were unable to decide if this had gone far enough.

One policeman turned to the Welfare contingent and said, not so sotto voce, “I thought you said these children were deprived and being neglected?” More clicks and flashes.

“Well she wouldn’t let us in to find out.” The guy with the glasses said plaintively.

“You didn’t need to get in. It’s obvious this is a top end unit, Christ she’s even got a butler dammit.”

“We need to get in to see if the children will be safe.” Came the reply.

“You just wanted to sticky beak the place (nosey parkers in Aussie slang).” The officer turned in disgust.

“We need to see the babies’ room.”

“Why?” someone in the press asked.

“It’s on our check off list.” Weak reply

I looked at the officer. “This has gone on long enough, I now ask that you leave my home, I trust the officers of the law have seen sufficient to relay their information should need arise?” I used it like a threat.

I nodded to the officer with the writ. “Andy will show you round the home since you hold the writ. The rest of you may wait in the lift lobby.”
Nobody moved.

I slammed my hand on the table. “Now!” everyone jumped including the press.
The press accompanied the officer round the apartment. Everyone lese filed out as I stood holding onto the babies hands as they stood next to me like little people rather than toddlers.

Ruth looked at me and made a passing motion with her hand, “These are not the ‘droids you are looking for.” And giggled.

“Shh Ruth, pretend to be babies.”

“Mm yes, The farce is strong with this one.” Paul quipped misquoting the line.
I snorted and tried to ignore them as the policeman left.

The press turned to me. “Any last quote Miss Cartwright?”

“Yes. Don’t mess with Helen Cartwright. I don’t do forelock touching.” The press left smiling and joking and obviously impressed with the scoop.

*Did we accomplish anything Molly?* I asked a bit wearily — it seemed to be pointless. Like all the social welfare system in this state. Applied in the wrong places for the wrong reasons.

*A few noses out of joint, but you appear to be a crusader to the press, you’ll be watched more keely now you’ve opened the bidding.*

*I still don’t know how to improve anything either domestic or international by any means at all — I just seem to be spinning on the spot.*

*40,000 years in a carpark, you can talk….* Molly imitated Kalvin and we all laughed.

*Wallleee* I shouted back. I had a lot of years to get this right, should I expect so much so soon?

Part 14

“The news tonight opens with the announcement that the carbon dioxide levels are still rising, but the heating effect has leveled — Scientists are unsure why the enthalpy or total heat is stabilised, but hopes that the trend continues. Some are suggesting outside influences are in action. Others are dismissing the claims that global warming was anything more than a tax trick to start with.

Some cults are springing up on the back of claims that only extraterrestrials could have any effect and it signals the end of the world. Nibiru and planet X have been at the forefront of these claims and people are outside at night searching the night sky, waiting for the projected planet to appear.
……
In other news, a high flyer was in the news today when the welfare system or Nanny state had to issue a writ to inspect a multimillion dollar apartment to see if it was suitable for children to be brought up in.

This newsreader says, half their luck to be living in such lovely accommodation and what good fortune that the press were invited to the confrontation to witness the ludicrous scene of two police officers and three social services officials trying to explain their motives to the press and ultimately to the state. We tried to communicate later with the minister for Social Services who declined to comment on the fiasco. This can do no good for the incumbent premier who has tried to justify the interference in private household’s affairs as for the common good.”

“That’s funny,” Paul smiled and Ruth grinned as they snuggled up next to me on the sofa.

“I wonder what they’ll try next, to get me to fall in line.” I thought vocally and the kids looked at me, waiting for the answer. I had no idea.

The next morning I got a phone call — heralded by Molly. *There were a lot of meetings going on last night Helen, things are stirring. Someone wants you pilloried and others want to congratulate you.*

When I answered the phone, it was the local political party in opposition. “Would you consider standing for parliament?” It was briefly asked and the padding was very short.
“We think you have the most excellent credentials — and we think you have the presence to do a lot of good for your fellow citizen.”

I told them I’d think about it. The kids were floating about the house, practicing their landings — touch and go… Andy was back stop — saving the ornaments from dire peril.
Every so often Andy would be in the wrong place and one of the children would contact a piece of furniture and a piece of glassware or porcelain would head for the deck to disappear before it hit the ground and reappear in its proper place.

*Enough, children, I’ve better things to do than chase crystal ware for you.* Molly complained.

The children flopped — literally - into the sofa and giggled, their eyes lit up with the excitement.. “This is fun.” Ruth squirmed up onto her bottom and slipped to the floor to try running across the room — every so often she’d overbalance and instead of hitting the ground she’d hover about 6inches from the deck and right herself then carry on. Pretty soon her balance was pretty much spot on and only now and then did she totter one way or the other.

“Don’t —“ I shook my head *Molly, let me know if they’re doing any damage to their bone structure by walking so much so early in life.*

*There’s no harm in it Helen, I’m monitoring them bio wise as well as chaos wise.* I could hear the smile in her voice, she loved the kids as much as I .

*Thanks Molly, you’re a treasure.*

Her voice changed to a drone, *By — Your — Command.* I snorted and continued to think about the offer as I watched the children explore their surrounding on an ever deeper level.

It seemed like their intelligence soared during this time — they were getting stimulus from many sources and Molly and Andy were mines of knowledge and experience.

Within a few months they were practically self sustaining — as long as Andy was about to cater to their every whim.

They were learning their alphabet and doing the basic sums on the children’s programmes quite adroitly and whilst their hand eye coordination was still off, it was improving fast and their mental as well as aeronautical agility was incredible.

It was becoming less about Helen’s future now asit was about the children’s.
Helen thought about pre school and kindy which would be well into the future — and was immediately ruled out since the children were already at grade one level and would be past grade school by the time they were 5 anyway.
Beaurocratically it was going to be a nightmare when they had to register for school. They would be so far ahead as to be finished before they started.

I also needed to have some more children — a few dozen more apparently or my presence would be useless.

Maybe I needed to have a different lifestyle — out in the wilds where my life could be out of the public eye.

Maybe buy a boat and settle for the hippy style and move from port to port until I was lost to beaurocracy and my children could then grow up anonymously. Desert Island?
Or maybe do it the other way round — have child prodigies and lead a public lifestyle as a member of local parliament — doing good and making things better for everyone.

Quandary after question after dilemma. There was no easy answer.
Maybe disappear of the map and visit the other stars in the federation and have some amazing things to have as experience.

I took the opportunity to have a bit of a holiday and went off to visit Molly for a week or two. It seemed a good idea and I could perhaps do some research on ways to tweak humanity towards a brighter future.

I prepared the concierge and had my apartment closed up as if I was going on extended holiday — the kids were excited and I went out of my way to invent an itinerary that would be hard to track and that would be safe to not be found on. No one would deem my disappearance as dangerous and start searching for me — I realised that short of touring Canada on skis with a dog sled, I was going to be noticed and reported unless the kids weren’t with me to start with — like I should leave them with an auntie.

I decided when we got to Luna base that a more elaborate scenario was called for. So while we were there, I set out to find a better lifestyle for the longer term — I loved my apartment, but it was more conducive to the long term as a settled individual — which I most certainly could not be during the next few hundred years. That still made me squirm.

Molly had a ball with the kids and the kids learned heaps from Molly and the bots in the various parts of the base. I didn’t worry about them as Molly was able to watch them perfectly ably 24/7 and they were pretty much invulnerable to all but the vacuum of space. They knew not to go outside and Molly wouldn’t let them anyway. They spent a lot of time using the external cameras to see the surface though.
Once in a while a satellite would come over and whilst I knew that Molly was scanning for radar etc, it made me feel a bit like a frog in a bio lab — about to be pinned to a table.
In the time we’d been up there, only the one that the Russians had overflown with had been close and Molly had wiped it and made it crash on the dark side of the moon.
The Russians did wonder about it as it had been working perfectly until it suddenlydied — they though it must have been a micro meteorite.

Back to the plan.

I’d kept up the visits with my parents who had accepted me as a friend of Ian’s (who was no longer with us!!) I thought it might be nice to leave the kids with them for a while. But it was difficult to rationalize — no one leaves their kids with strangers when they’re one year old.

I would have to take them with me — and the only way I could do that was to have a man around.

Andy was fine as a butler but could he hack it as the skipper of my yacht? Could I disappear from the boat for days at a time to relax on the moon — would I need to?
I decided I could — but maybe didn’t need to if I was on a decent yacht.

I looked around for one for weeks as the summer ground to a close.
I found a 30 metre (100 foot) sail boat that was set up to be handled by two people and had molly import some handy gadgets to improve the safety aspect.

I bought a gun. As we would be in international waters, and piracy was still quite a problem particularly in the Indian Ocean, I thought it prudent that I was known to have a gun on board. Indeed more than one. So I ended up with a shotgun, a handgun (357 magnum) and a rifle in .243 (6mm). I would never use them except as a demonstration of my prowess, but they would be part of the ship’s compliment. It made for a less risky tour.

My biggest problem would be as a single person with children on a big boat, I wasn’t afraid personally, but it would look like a simple job to hijack a large yacht if there were only two people on it and that would be very public.
I decided I didn’t care and that the sea was big enough to hide dead pirates — because I wouldn’t be merciful.

Part 14
We set sail from Manly Jetty with intentions to travel up to the start of the great barrier reef and thence up into warmer waters.

The boat had a capacity of 8 but there were only myself and Andy (who took no space at all as he never even sat down. He was pretty much a part of the navigational equipment) and the two babies who were independent of surroundings as Molly would pull them if they were in danger. As she would any of us.

This was an excursion of convenience. To get out of the public eye for a time. There were other things to sort and I wanted to have a way to spend some time Luna side whenever I felt like it. This was an ideal way.
Molly could keep an eye out for intrusion and andy could steer the boat and make it seem inhabited.

Molly even sent down some droids to look like crew.

The water wasn’t unpleasant on the first day but it was ruffled by a South Easterly cool breeze and the swell was increasing making the boat corkscrew slightly as it bore North.
The children soon got bored and were chasing each other up and down the halyards and braces.

“Children, get back on deck immediately — you are visible from the coast”. I turned and looked and the coast was a blur — but I didn’t like the thought of them actually being seen from another boat inadvertently.

“Aw mummy, please let us play, we need to exercise.” Ruth whined pouting — nothing like a 1 year old pouting!

*Molly, do we have any craft in our vicinity including submarines and unmanned?* I asked on broad wave so the kids could hear.

*Oddly enough, there’s a submarine about 2 miles to seaward of you.* Molly sounded perplexed. *I’m accessing orders.* she added.

*Collins class submarine, asked to keep an eye on you by coastguard. ‘Report any unusual contact or occurrences.’

I sat down suddenly stunned and the children sensing my alarm, set down beside me one each side.

*Did they see the children up the mast?* I asked urgently.

*Doesn’t look like it Helen, there’s no reporting going on and the internal comms system has not been used to communicate anything — I’m monitoring now.*

*Keep me updated Molly, this is a dangerous precedent.*

*I think it is drug related ma’am, you’re a person of interest with a large fortune with no income related to it.* Molly surmised. *I’d expect a passing interest, in that you are short crewed and have no solid itinerary.* I’ll inquire of the submarine database more thoroughly.*

Helen sat a while, feeling that the trip had taken a bit of a turn for the worse and may instead of being a fun time, it would turn into a spy vs spy thing.

*The submarine has sent a message that their stern seal has a problem and they will be returning to port.* Molly communicated briefly.

*Turning away now*

Paul turned and was about to wave in its general direction. “Don’t you dare. Little man you have a wicked sense of humour. You’d have them puzzling whether you had seen them or if you had special powers. THAT’S THE LAST THING WE NEED!

Paul grinned. “K mummy.” And slipped off the bench onto his feet and waddled off to find Ruth who’d zipped below deciding not to use legs for the time being.

*Any surveillance on us now?*

*No Helen.*

*Beam us up.*

The children found themselves at my side in the transporter room.

“Cool as mum.”

“This is on the understanding that should there be any circumstances like Coastguard or Navy we need to be ready to return and for you to be normal 1 year olds.”

“Yes mummy.”

Three days later, we returned to the boat as it neared Airlie Beach.

It was a nice rest and we moored up near the boat club and lowered the rubber ducky (Zodiac inflatable) into the water to use as a tender.

Before we’d had a chance to even contemplate popping ashore we were met by the local customs boat and asked if we had any contraband or firearms. I showed my international waters license and they asked to see the firearms. I showed them — locked away with the firing systems missing so they were rendered safe. They confiscated them anyway giving me a receipt.

“You can radio us when you are leaving and we’ll return them before you sail.” The customs man looked unapologetic. I didn’t really care. There was a duplicate set on the next deck in a concealed locker. And Molly could zap anyone long before they got a chance to board anyway.
It all seemed so paternalistic and silly. Andrew remained aboard with the kids — I went ashore for a walk. I bought a cocktail on the main street and watched the tourists enjoy their holiday. The odd pickpocket was persuaded to take the day off. It was generally a nice place and few were out to do harm. A lot of the tourists were backpackers and were just youngsters having a great time.
I felt a few eyes on me now and then and wondered if a dalliance might be on the cards.
I got no offers though. I was a bit out of their league. My sunhat was worth more than their ensemble. I smiled at the thought of taking on a small crew of one for my trip along the Great Barrier Reef. No — I valued my solitude too much.

At last I decided to return to my erstwhile home and headed back along the quay.
I had to remain moored outside the breakwater. There was no weather due to befall us so I wasn’t perturbed. Andy could keep anchor watch.

I watched the sun set over the hills and sipped a pina colada from my poop deck. Andy was putting together some comestibles — and it was a nice relaxing evening.

The children were reading together. A small boat went past and I got a wave from the couple returning to their modest 40 footer moored astern of me. “Hi there! Staying long?”

“No,just overnight — heading North tomorrow.” I answered.

“So are we, would you like to flotilla up?” I nodded — “See you at daybreak.”

The Coastgaurd came alongside at daybreak as we’d registered our plans to travel on the morning tide. They returned our gear to us and cautioned us about ‘practice and unauthorized use in National Waters’ then wished us a good trip.

An air horn and Andy’s voice brought me topside (that’s the upper deck) as I felt the anchor chain clunking solidly into the locker fo’rard. Anchor’s aweigh Helen!

“Right kids, we’ve got company today so please remain as children rather than seraphim floating round the mast.” I cautioned my little imps as they giggled from their seats in the cockpit. The jib was flapping as the wind caught it then I felt it slam taught and the boat heeled slightly as it brought its head to wind. A soft whirr and the self furling mainsail slipped from the mast and within a minute we were close hauled to a brisk onshore breeze on our starboard bow.

The boat that had hailed us the night before was a few hundred yards up water of us and we settled in slowly overhauling it until we sat on his Port quarter within hailing distance.
A wave from our travel companions and a squawk from the radio with a voice of friendly camaraderie, “Good morning boaters, we are the MacClean family aboard the “Claymore”- Over.”

I picked up the mike from its cradle, “Good morning Claymore; we are the ‘Kookaburra’ out of Brisbane. Cartwright family and Capt’n Andy at your service. Over”

“We’ll be heading North by North East until we clear Cone Island then North East to Townsville. Over.”

“We’ll shadow, thank you Claymore, out.” I didn’t feel the need to chat — maybe we’d moor up together in Townsville overnight or maybe not. In the meantime we’re just a safety boat for each other.

The water rushing over the bow and the gentle sway of the hull over the swell lulled me into a soporific calm. *Helen, word of caution.*

*Go on Molly.* I jumped but only a little — my eyes slid round to the twins — reading from a kindle together. *What’s up?*

*MacCleans are bogus. Their boat is owned by the Ministry of Defence, Australia.* Molly sounded like an efficient secretary and then I realise that’s probably exactly what she is.

*Thanks Molly, noted.* “Did you hear that kids?” I switched my attention to the youngsters.

“Yes mummy.” Ruth nodded solemnly. Paul’s quick nod and frown looking out of place in a one year old. They weren’t visible in the base of the cockpit in the shade of the mainsail to any outside the boat.

“Anything unusual from the Claymore Andy?”

“Not really Helen, but they do scan us with their binoculars quite regularly.” Andy replied. He didn’t need to use binoculars, his eyesight far exceeded any human specs (specifications not spectacles; pay attention).

“ I think the man on the other boat has been watching us a long time, I felt his attention last night when you came back from the shore.” I jumped — Ruth had uttered those words.
I looked at Andy with my eyebrows raised. He shook his head as if to say — ‘I don’t know where she got that from.’

I turned to the children, “Thank you for that, it helps me know what is going on. How did you know he was looking at us particularly.?”

“I read his mind, he was only a few hundred yards away.”

I was staggered. These babies were a phenomenon far beyond where I’d expected at one year old, even if they were superpowered.

“What else did you learn from them?” I quizzed. I was not used to trying to gauge allthe other people in my vicinity all the time. I had realised to do so would have been tiring and pretty boring. But the kids had latched on because they were unoccupied with anything else.

“They were sent to watch us all.” Paul intoned. He looked a bit anxious. “All four of us. For anything unusual, no specifics.” They never cease to amaze.

“Were they in the harbour when we arrived Andy?”

“No ma’am they arrived about an hour behind us. I had observed their sail ‘hull down’ all yesterday before you transported back to the yacht.”

*Molly, search ASIO mainframe for reference to us please. This is a bit odd to say the least and I feel isolated.” I looked across the water at the Claymore, it had sidled a little closer to us and lay over a few degrees so I could see into their cockpit. Family they may be, children they had not.

I sat and thought, they’re only out to watch, but why? What had put them onto us?

*Searched their database Helen, this is off the record. No one has anything entered on us.*

Yet the boat belonged to ASIO (Australian Secret Service).

*Shall I disable their vessel Helen?*

*No, we’re being watched, not assaulted.*

“I sense something about to happen mummy, I think they are going to fake an accident.”

We’d just passed Cone Island and were behind the barrier reef proper we were about to bear over to North West to run up the coast.

“Andy, I’m going to ask you to jibe in a minute.”

“Right ma’am. Heading?”

“Reverse Course.”

“Jibe, Andy”

“Jibe Ho.” The boat swung hard to Port and the sail spat the wind and the boom smacked across. Suddenly we were going in the opposite direction. Just moments later I looked and Claymore had suddenly ripped to Port not quite jibing, but heading straight into the water we’d have been in. They WOULD have collided with us.

“The trajectory looked like they were going to hole us amidships ma’am.”

*Radio transmission Helen — from Claymore to Air Support.* Molly interjected.

*Go ahead Molly.* I queried. The twins were agog, it wasn’t so much innocence as incredulity.

“There’s a helicopter mummy, coming out from Bowen” Paul shouted. He pointed — I looked but it was invisible as yet.

“Make all speed back to Airlie Andy… no wait.” I thought about the next phase.

*Molly, block transmissions from the chopper and the boat so they don’t have comms.*

*Done*

*Andy, ease the sail without making it obvious that we’re slowing on purpose.*

I picked up the mike. *Molly make sure I can communicate with the Claymore.*

*Done*

“Claymore, sorry to shear off like that, I’ve just had a satellite transmission from my company, bit of an emergency have to return to port. Safe trip. Out”

“I copy Kookaburra safe sailing, out.”

*Knock off their comms again so they can hear the chopper but can’t signal them.*

*Done*

Presently Ruth pointed toward the West and a spot had appeared on the horizon heading swiftly toward the two yachts.

“looks like their little plan was foiled but what was it?”

“We were all going to be rescued by the chopper after we’d collided.” Paul said. “Like it was a coincidence that they were in the area.”

“They have medical equipment aboard.” I could see Ruth concentrating.

*Molly download their data aboard and analyse intent, ASAP.*

*Kidnap, inside ASIO but not ASIO ordered. This is a secret black ops team.*

The helicopter was audible now and still bearing down as was the Claymore, who had given chase. No comms from the helo to the boat or vice versa was possible, so they were independently operating to overhaul the Kookaburra. They were going to try to take us anyway.

*Molly, increase our speed a little then transport a container into the water for the Claymore to run over. I want them concentrating on the chase not the water*

A few seconds later, the speed of the kookaburra increased and the sails filled hard the boat lay over like a Maxi Cup yacht on the annual race to Hobart.

The Claymore struggled hard to haul the sails in a little tighter and they seemed to edge a little faster - suddenly the bow lifted out of the water and the mast snapped as they hit something in the water. A hole appeared as the sunken container sheared through the bow and pulled the boat to a sudden and cataclysmic halt — the pair in the cockpit were thrown forward to be stopped by their safety harnesses — and before the had a chance to get to their feet, the hull settled and began to slide beneath the water. Within seconds they were trying to get free from their harnesses as the boat staggered lower and the cockpit went under.

The helicopter flared and turned to help their stricken fellows and Kookaburra churned on. *Fuel blockage I think Molly.*

*Done*

The helo suddenly went quiet and dropped like it had been stomped on. The instant loss of power dropping the aircraft straight onto the stricken yacht and their crew.

The blades struck the water and the helo instantly rolled over and sank — forcing the yacht beneath, it in a lover’s embrace to the bottom.

Kookaburra churned on, *no survivors* Molly confirmed. But those on the Kookaburra already knew that. The minds they were aware of before, were no longer.

“Straight back to Brisbane I think …. Belay that, head outside the islands to Whitehaven we’ll anchor off the beach and wait and see.”

“Very good Helen,” Andy said affably. As if we hadn’t just murdered 8 people.

*Molly, monitor radio and cellnet traffic for word of this. Keep me informed*

*Will do, will you be visiting tonight?* Molly asked.

*Yes, as soon as we’re established at Whitehaven, we’ll be there.*

Andy called me up to the cockpit as we anchored off the beach in 20 feet of water. Far enough out to protect and far enough in not to be a casualty of a passing freighter (or submarine).

There was no way they could really get close enough to do damage anyway, but it paid not to get too cocky.

I presumed that the coastguard would know we were there and approach us when they had someone in the area. They weren’t in on it. Had they been, they would not have returned the firearms. Unless….

I went to the locker and checked the guns for serviceability. They were fine. I wonder what would have happened had the shit hit the fan and I’d produced them to defend myself. Maybe they didn’t know I had them — but that seemed unlikely.

I checked the ammunition — it looked ok. I test fired the rifle — click. Shotgun click handgun click.

So they’d been onto the boat a lot earlier and duffed the ammo.
I checked the secret locker which was not accessible without molly transporting the guns out of the sealed compartment. They and the ammo were fine.

Curioser and curioser.

*Did you know the ammo had been tampered with Molly?*

*No, I hadn’t considered it a possibility as it was easily replaceable.*

*Who has been on the boat since I got the stuff?*

*Only the customs at Manly dock before we left.*

*So someone in their service is a plant?*

*It would appear so Helen.*

*Monitor comms from personnel, I’m going to phone the coastguard and tell them we decided to camp here instead of run to Townsville.*

I sat phoned the coastguard so they wouldn’t miss us.

“Have you been in company with a sailboat called Claymore? It is missing.”

“Yes, this morning we left with them and sailed as far as Cone Island then turned East when they turned West, at about 1300.”

“Very good, Kookaburra. Thank you for letting us know where you were. We thought maybe you’d had an accident with them. We saw you leave together from Airlie Beach.”

I trusted that their radio men had picked up the transmission that we were headed back before the ‘accident’. It appeared they had. Otherwise they’d have been all over us like a rash.

As soon as we moored, we adjourned to Luna base and enjoyed a nice meal and a relax.
Andy stayed on the boat and pretended to relax with a beer before turning in.

“There’s a boat mooring near your yacht,” Molly nudged me awake.
“Righto — beam us back to the yacht thanks.” It was 6am local.

I went up on deck where Andy was hosing down the salty decks. It was a lovely time of day off one of the most pristine and beautiful beaches in the world.

I looked across at the yacht moored closeby, a 50 foot sloop. Very nice. If that belonged to the secret service, they were being paid too much.

There was only a deck hand above deck sipping a coffee and enjoying the morning.
I slipped into his mind to find intent.

I almost recoiled — dirty minded so and so! I plastered on a fake smile and waved. He leered back.

“Home James.” I said to Andy.

“Yes ma’am.”

When we arrived back at Manly, customs came aboard again and confiscated our weapons again (well some of them at least) I decided that I wouldn’t sail with them again. I had my own hidden stuff if I needed it and I had proven that my backup was sufficient to reap the wind.

I told the customs my intention to dispose of them and they told me I was very wise (red tape idiots). They did a cursory check of the boat and let us free.

*Caravan time Molly — let’s go straight to the outback and get away from the bad guys.*

*Surely they will be able to track you more easily in a caravan Helen?*

*Well maybe that’s not a bad thing, I may be able to get to the bottom of this and find out what their problem is*

I’d bought a fifth wheel caravan a few months back and it was in a lock up near the docks so it was a simple job to buy a Ford F350 with the setup wedge and head out to pick it up — it didn’t need provisions as we could import anything we needed as we needed it. We also didn’t need fuel — as that too could be directly injected as we needed it.

The ultimate travel vehicle — and the van was luxury - more so than even the yacht.
What’s more it also had a compartment for firearms that wasn’t openable — sure you could cut a hole but that wasn’t the point!

“Mooney highway Andy” — It was only two days after we’d landed and I’d gone home packed some different clothes and pretended to sort my stuff and left again.

The flat looked the same but Molly said someone had been there though they were anonymous — no ID or phones on them. The wards had told of the intrusion but it had seemed a simple maintenance check and scheduled. Molly had subdued the bugs to the point they were showing life but didn’t transmit info — someone was definitely on to us.

I decided to junk them and open the bidding.

The caravan had a couple too and they mysteriously fell off when we went over a bump and ended up stuck to another car. There was nothing inside as it was undisturbed.
Molly removed one that activated only when the tow vehicle was attached. Fed from the power off the charge line. It was embedded in the fiberglass panel and polished over — practically invisibly.

We’d been out of town an hour or two and just passed Warwick when I realised that the car behind us ( a good way behind us) was not gaining — which in Oz is pretty bloody unusual if you’re hauling a van. Something about Aussie men makes them overtake vans at the earliest opportunity.

*Molly, can you trace the vehicle behind me please?*

A short pause then, *ASIO, driven by a female from that organization passenger is her superior.*

“Andy can you find a parking spot please in about 20 mins — we should be well clear of the town by then.” We’d passed Warwick and it was several hours til we reached the next large town

“Very good Helen.” Andy nodded and looked in his mirror.

*Recommendations Molly?* I asked, suddenly very calm.

*Not really Helen, too many variables.* Molly sounded absorbed as if recalculating constantly.

A little later a truck park came up and Andy pulled into it. The ASIO car pulled in close to the exit like they were just another car stopping for a break.

I let the kids out and primed them to wander around closing in on the Government car.

Ruth waddled in front of the car and sat down. I pretended to panic and ran over to her, “Ruth you silly girl, you musn’t sit in front of a car, it might move and hurt you.!” As I passed the window of the car where the occupants were studiously ignoring us, I reached in an pulled the keys from the ignition before the girl could react.

“Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing?” The guy got out his side and the girl got out hers. Both were unsure of whether to escalate or defuse the situation. I whizzed up the windows and slammed the doors and locked them before they could react.

“Come on children, time to go.” I chivvied them gently. Suddenly the guy lost his bottle and ran for Paul to head him off and maybe use him as a hostage. He immediately tripped on an invisible stone and fell on his face. The girl started to draw her pistol — a Glock 9mm I noticed. I ignored her and continued to walk to the van as the two got circled round. It was obvious that they knew they’d been sprung and it was obvious that my reaction wasn’t expected. I didn’t cower or try to protect my children, I was totally unconcerned.

The Guy yelled, “Stop!!” just as I reached the back of the van. - I didn’t even break step.
“I am agent Brown, I am armed, and will shoot!” He furthered his cause, as I heard the Glock he had being drawn and cocked. I reached for the children’s hands as they walked beside me.

“You’d shoot an unarmed woman with two babies? You call yourselves a force for good?” not waiting for an answer I turned and walked round the back of the van before they could react or answer.

By the time they ran round the side of the van both with guns out, I was sat at the table Andy had got out and was being served a nice cup of tea. The babies were sat on the rug at my feet.

“Join me, won’t you?” I indicated to the two empty seats at the table with empty cups and plates.

The two agents looked at each other and de-cocked their weapons, looking very foolish.
As they approached, I placed the keys on the table and pushed them towards the empty places. They drew back the chairs and sat warily eyeing Andy.

“Cough.” I said, meaning, ‘tell me what you’re following me for.’

“Miss Cartwright, we’re charged with following you to wherever you’re going and making sure you don’t do anything untoward.” Agent Brown spoke slightly officiously and with a fair amount of embarrassment.

“I’m presuming you were supposed to do this covertly and not make me nervous?” I stirred my cup as Andy proffered the teapot to the blushing pair. “Please, don’t be so guarded, I’m not dangerous unless you threaten me or my babies.” I smiled indulgently. “Let’s forget you pulled those ridiculous 9mm toys on me. What’s your name then, dear?” I smiled generously at the girl. Her eyes were a bit wild; she was obviously out of her depth.
“Agent Susan Worth.”

“Well Sue, I think you’ve failed your first mission. Covert driver you are not.”

Sue looked over at Dave Brown and gave him a hard stare. “Oh it was his idea to stay back where no Australian would ever drive. 80 yards behind a fifth wheeler on an open road.” I laughed slightly at him. “Dave, you couldn’t stalk a wooden horse.” His eyes went a bit round when I said his first name as he hadn’t given it. “Badge # DS101445C?”

He almost jumped to his feet, “How?”

“Dave, dear boy, I can tell you the engine number on your car without moving.” I rattled off a series of numbers. “Actually that’s not your engine number, it’s your colleagues Visa card number.”

Dave looked at Susan who gulped and nodded.

“Your firearms, take them out and unload them, place them on the table under the napkins if you please, no arguments. There are children here and I don’t want you being silly.”

“There’s no way I’m giving you my gun, Miss Cartwright.” David looked aggressive for the first time, he looked cornered.

“Suit yourself.” I got up and walked round to their side of the table. I could see David’s face go red as he tried to move, but his body was inert. I’d switched it off as far as he was concerned. Autonomous functions were still available — for the present. I leaned over and lifted the gun from its holster and dropped the gun on the table — after slipping out the mag and the round up the spout. I palmed the round back into the mag and placed it out of his reach. I looked into his eyes and then reached for the knife he had on his forearm.
Then leaned over and pulled the K frame S&W from his ankle holster.

“Deary me, you’re quite the little soldier aren’t you?” I almost teased him about penis envy, but refrained. I could see Susan resignedly sat waiting for her turn.
“You just be a good girl and save me the effort please.” I looked into her eyes and she nodded. She only had the one.

“Andy, place these in the car will you? And not where easily visible — we don’t want any undesirables borrowing them do we?” Andy bowed slightly and smiled and said nothing. Just taking the pieces and the keys and heading for the parked Holden.

“Now you two, time for some serious chatter.” They looked resolute. “Now don’t be ridiculous, I haven’t broken one law and you draw a gun on me and my children after you follow me like a pair of kidnappers. You work for the government and you think you’re in charge. Well I’d like to differ. You work for me. I pay your damned wages. What do you know about a helicopter coming out to kidnap me from my boat last week?”

I could see the puzzlement on Susan’s face, but none existed on David’s. “So David, you’re the mole or are just one of a load of them?” He tried to deny it but I still had control. I slipped into his head. One of a load… Damn. This could get messy.

“Why David, what did I do?” I released his voice and he grunted..

When he realised he could talk he started to deny it all, “We’re just keeping an eye on–“
I took back control — and stopped his breathing as well. I saw his eyes start to panic.
“Wrong answer David. You were sent to abduct one or both of the twins. Susan would have been left holding the babies.” I grinned at my weak joke. “I also perceive that you were going to allow me to have an accident too. You’re really not very nice.” I stared at him for a minute or two.

*Another helicopter is on its way Helen. Would you like me to divert it?*

*No let it come, might as well round them up without doing collateral damage. Make sure they can’t open the doors when they land and disable any comms. Better disable any firearms too I think.*

“David, your friends are on their way, would you like to talk to them?” He smirked like it was he who was about to gain the upper hand again.

“Andy, could you drive the unit forward a bit and pop the children inside, I don’t want them to see too much blood.” I continued to sit as the helo noise first became discernable then soon very noisy as it approached. The Camper moved forward exposing me and the two agents. David grinned — obviously looking forward to my immediate demise and the taking of the twins. Soon the backwash from the prop was scattering small gravel and dust from the tarmac. Oddly not a scrap was reaching us — Oddly to David and Susan anyway. I’d actually put a bubble round us — the cloth on the camp table didn’t even flutter as the helo made it’s final approach — Bell Jet Rangers are noisy, but the noise was barely above voice level in my little bubble.
David looked suddenly frightened as he realised I was controlling the space around us.
I smiled at him, that supercilious smile that says, ‘Full House’

Part 16

The helo settled and the pitch and noise went off the rotors as the engine was cut. The handle on the side went up and down a few times and the doors remained firmly shut.
Suddenly a window on the cockpit was shattered and a gun poked out. “Lay down your arms and put your hands on your head.” The loudhailer from the chopper made a racket on the quiet roadside. I didn’t move except to pick up my cup and take another sip of my tea. “Put your hands on your head or I will fire.”
I turned round to the window some 20 yards away. Watching the guy with the gun, I watched him flick off the safety, and take more careful aim. Then I stopped his heart.
The gun wavered as he fell back into the cabin. The gun fell from the window before someone else could take his place and it fell to the tarmac.

I rose to my feet and walked over to the gun and picked it up *Molly reactivate this rifle please*.
*Done*
The replacement sniper at the broken window couldn’t depress his gun to bear on me and the two agents at the table watched helplessly as I re-cocked the gun and fired up into the air. I wanted to give them time to consider their actions before I let them out. I just emptied the gun then dropped it back on the tarmac.

I walked over to the front and broke off the air speed and altimeter sensors. Then opened the tank fuel testpoint/drain and ripped off the engine cover. Fuel began to run onto the gravel. The pilot realizing I was disabling his aircraft tried to restart it. But it won’t start with the fuel drain cock open. Soon it would be too dangerous to start it. The fuel would be too volatile.

“Pilot, open your door and get out.” I could see he was going to fire at me as soon as the door was open enough. I saw another gun ready to fire over his shoulder as well. I walked a little closer to the cockpit so I couldn’t be seen from the door. I allowed it to unlatch and it was flung open as the pilot and another man flung themselves out of the hatch. They didn’t land as they thought they would. The door slammed shut again as the two men tumbled onto the deck. Both of them landed on their shoulders their guns flying from their grasp as the bones crunched under the impact. They lay stunned on the deck looking up into space. Both going into shock as they lay broken on the ground.

“Now you two, are you going to try to hurt me some more or are you going to be good boys and play nice?”
I looked over at the table where Susan and David were seated. Tears ran down Susan’s face as she watched what she thought were her colleagues being hurt.

I walked over to her and put my hand on her shoulder. “I’m not doing this Susan, they are. I haven’t so much as raised a finger to them there’s more men in there who want me either locked up or dead, they don’t care which.” I looked into Susan’s eyes and she looked back at me.

“I didn’t know what they were going to do. I promise. I was just told we were going to do a stake out on you for a few days. I looked over at David. He was totally unapologetic.

“Are you going to tell me why?” I released his voice.

“You’re a threat, you’re dangerous. We’ve been watching you since you had that run in with the Social Services. There was something not right. Those kids were way too far advanced and your butler has no past. You keep disappearing for days at a time.”

“So what? Do you watch everyone who isn’t where they’re supposed to be?”

“It goes back further than that, the drop in crime rate the bad guys that keel over or get bumped, you’re always on an intercept with them before or after. Always in the area, too coincidental…”

“I still haven’t committed a crime, have I ?” I could see that quite a bit of resource had been put into this.”You’re not telling me all of the reasons, are you?”

Try as he might, he couldn’t keep me out of his head so I looked.

The jumble of thoughts surrounding my ‘case were like a thicket, no real definition but there. Until I came up with a picture from an infra red camera through the walls of my apartment taken from somewhere across the road — which showed me disappearing. One of the times I went to Luna base I suppose. Then another, more recent. Only one person on the boat.

*Molly, why haven’t you been able to intercept this stuff?*

*It wasn’t done through electronic media — it was word of mouth only* Molly sounded rattled as well.

*I want all the personnel connected with this here in ten minutes — this is to stop.*

*Very well Helen.*

I turned to the chopper and opened the doors so fast that they came off the hinges and flew across the parking lot. The occupants tumbled out, cocking their guns and circling round to get their bearings.

I shouted, “Stand down!” Atten-shun, Fall in, shortest on the left, tallest on the right.”

All but one moved to obey, he turned toward me and cocked his gun grinning. I looked him in the eye. He raised his gun and then froze. I walked over and removed the gun from his immobile hands. His fingers snapping off as I broke it from his grip. I gave him a push and he fell with a sound like breaking pottery.

*Molly could you tidy that up please. Space it.*
The remains sparkled and disappeared right down to the last molecule. I felt vindicated —he was about to murder me.

The lined up soldiers had seen nothing — their eyes glazed over in obedience. David was white and shaking. Susan aghast with the revelation that I seemed omnipotent.

A minute or two later men and women started appearing on the tarmac, one with his pants round his ankles — it appears Molly hadn’t waited for him to finish. The looks were panicked but under control, I’m sure I wouldn’t have been in the circumstances, but more credit to them.

“Could you all gather round please.” I called out to them.

They couldn’t work out where they were or what was going on. Until they saw me.
Then some tried to draw weapons (Molly had not transported them) or they became aggressive and started to attack. One or two tried to get the soldiers to shoot me. One even grabbed a rifle from a private. And got a fist for his trouble from the private — I had to grin.

“I’ve called you here today, to give you the news, I’m not vulnerable to your attacks, I have vast resources and a lot of power. I am here to lead this world out of it’s stupid warmongering and disgusting attitude — one which you have well demonstrated today.”

I paused for a moment. I wanted this to stop and I wanted these people on my side but it was a side that didn’t need guns or stealth — it needed openness, kindness and care.

“Sit down all of you please, on the ground if you will. I want to be able to see all your faces. I motioned to the soldiers as well. Presently they were all seated round me.

I called out to Ruth and Paul. “Children come out and present yourselves.” I sent a thought. *Just walk, please don’t float yet.*

Ruth and Paul walked like two miniature grown ups, straight and tall and hand in hand. They were not waddling like babies, they were young people.

A murmur told me that this wasn’t so much a shock as it might have been.

“I would like you to meet Ruth and Paul, two people who will spend their lives in your service. Helping you to come to grips with becoming better humans.”

I rose slightly off the ground while everyone was looking at the kids.

My feet were about a foot from the ground when the first person noticed. It was Susan.
“My God what are you?” The children looked over.

Ruth spoke, “She is my mummy. She is the one person you will take note of in this world. She is the power, she is the leader of all men. She will take us to the stars. She is the most powerful person ever to have lived and you WILL obey her.” As she spoke her voice got louder and louder she rose up several feet and seemed to grow. Then she giggled, sank back down and resumed her wide grin.

“Sorry mummy, I just thought it was so funny.” I shook my head and smiled.

Some of the people sat at my feet were frightened some were in shock. Others were about to panic. None seemed really able to grasp what they were seeing was the beginning of a new world order.

“From this day forward you all work for me.” I paused, thinking; then, “unless you don’t want to work for humanity and reason?”

“Who is in charge of the military? Front and centre if you please.” A rough old sergeant marched round to the front of the troops.

“No Officer?”

“He was here ma’am, I don’t see him now.” That was obviously the idiot who beat my command with his hi-tech ear defenders but not my ire.

“Nor will you again, I am sorry to say. He raised his weapon at me.” I looked around at a lot of guilty looking men and women and quite a few were really worried.

“Andy, please ask each of these gentlemen and ladies for their side arms or rifles if you will?” Some looked defensive, most resigned. “Could you also tend to the two who fell from the cockpit please?” I added as my eye caught them in passing — they looked very unwell.

“I will ask you individually for your allegiance and you will swear duty and honour to me, I shall know if you are lying. If you swear loyalty to me, I shall look after you, if you don’t, you will be back in your office in a trice. If you lie to me, you will die here and now. The choice is yours.
Move off to the other side of the car park and await my call. You may discuss what you will. Any with family, do not be concerned — your family will be with you if you join me.”

I turned away to my seat, I looked at Susan first.
“Would you like to work for me Susan? You’re young enough to really go somewhere. A lot of these guys are too old to change — I’ll have to send them back. Like your erstwhile companion here.” I looked over at David, he seemed almost catatonic. I looked a bit deeper, he was in deep shock. The reality of his world had slipped.

I wiped his memory of me and sent him back.
As he disappeared, Susan nearly screamed. “It’s Ok Susan, he’s back in his office. Honestly.”
She looked at the space where he’d been, disbelieving. I passed her my phone. “Phone him.”

I heard the call connect and a “yes, who is this?” I terminated the connection.
“See?” I smiled, “I’m not a murderer.” Though I did feel guilty for offing those stupid, blind, men.

“Ma’am, these men with broken bones are bleeding internally, we really need to patch them up.” Andy stood by quietly.

*Molly can you fix them from there or do you need them up there?*

*I can beam them up and down in a few seconds they won’t know what happened, I’ll turn off the portroom lights.*

*Right, thanks Molly I’ll give you a signal.*

“Andrew, bring those men before me.” I played it for all it was worth. Andy led them before me. Both looked weak pale and shaky.

“You men deliberately tried to murder me while I was trying to negotiate, you fell foul of my ire. You nearly paid the ultimate sacrifice, but I am not vengeful. I shall restore you. If you will serve me, I will reward you. Will you serve me?” I looked each of them in the eye. ThePilot said “I will serve you.” The other said, “Never.”

*Now Molly, make the one that serves me stronger.*

People were milling around looking at what I was doing. The men flickered where they stood and then became whole again.

My new recruit stood taller by two inches and looked like a poster for the Army Recruitment drive. The one who said ‘no’ was just like his former self just not in pain. He looked very relieved. He came to attention flexing his hand and breathing deeply.

“Stay by me Pilot — and join Susan.”

The murmurs from the crowd (and it seemed a crowd; there were nearly 40 people stood there) were akin to those of cavemen watching a magic show. They didn’t know what to believe.

“Right,” I called, “Who’s next?” looking at the milling and fearful.

“Susan, and you Greg, please go over and tell them to make up their minds or they’ll all be going back to the farm.” It seemed a shame; I would have liked to recruit some more personnel.

Susan and the Pilot Greg walked over to the group who looked at them like they were pariahs. I realised they were too steeped in their own form of power to be able to accept my governance.

‘Right,’ I thought. One by one I looked them over and then called my new duo back to me. “No good, just you two I think, the rest can go back. I called them to line up and as they stood before me I dismissed them.

“You had an opportunity to be the beginning. You had the opportunity to be part of the rebirth of mankind. Now, you will go back to your offices and you will forget what happened here, and you will never trouble me again, you will destroy every piece of information on me that you have. That is an order that you will obey.”

*Molly, send this lot back.* I was quite disappointed. *Could you send the helicopter back as well please.*

One by one they flickered into nothing and eventually the Chopper disappeared too.

*Monitor ASIO comms — and plant a bug would you? — I don’t want to be caught out like that again Molly.*

*Yes Helen, it was quite unexpected. I know ultimately it made no difference, but it should never have happened, I should have been aware of the situation.*

“Right, what to do with you two? Better hop in the car, we’re going on holiday. No, leave the Holden, get in the Ford. *Molly please return the car to the car poo… no, better than that drop it in a deep water trench somewhere*.” The car flickered and was gone.

Susan and Greg looked at each other and at me and Andy and shook their heads. Two hours ago they had been Secret Service operatives, now they had a new job and were going on holiday.
Susan grinned and said, “Yes ma’am.” Greg opened the back door for her and made to follow.
“No Greg, you’re driving. Andy will be in the trailer with the kids. I need to talk to you for a while before you settle in. There’s a lot you don’t know. Oh and there’s a few things I’ve missed as well. We can learn from each other.”

The rest of the holiday went by with not one strange incident.
Susan and Greg decided that as part of my ‘entourage’ they should be minders, but they were aware that they couldn’t mind me as well as the children could.

On the third day I decided to bring them fully into the fold and under cover of darkness, leaving Andy to mind the shop, I took my babies and my new acolytes up to meet Molly.
They needed training and they needed to ‘know’.

“Wecome to Luna Unit 1” Molly beamed as we appeared on the transport plate. Greg looked a little ill.

“Molly are we still having problems with the male of the species on that transport plate?”

“Sorry Helen it’s a scripting bug, some y chromosomes are badly transported, I can fix it if you’ll give me some time. I’m sure it’s not a permanent fault — it just hasn’t been fixed since the previous tenant. Every time I transport a male, it makes an adjustment. Eventually it will sort itself.”

“Very technical Molly” I shook my head. The most advanced machine in 10 parsecs and it has to let the old adage, ‘physician heal thy self’ reassert itself.

Susan looked around at the monitors which showed the lunar surface and Earth rising.
Much like that stupendous photo taken by Buzz Aldrin so long ago.

She squeaked in excitement. The kids hovering just behind her. “Boo!” Ruth said in her ear and giggled. Sue spun round and nearly fell over when she realised Ruth was 4 feet off the ground. “I’ll never get used to that.”

“Molly, do a full workup on our new team members and help them achieve their potential.”

“Yes Helen.”

“What do you mean full potential?” Greg queried knitting his eyebrows.

“Well until last year, I was just another person on the ground until Molly (our host here) found me and I was brought here — then I was told what I could do and set about becoming who I was meant to be.”

I had explained a lot of this during the previous drive after the showdown with the MIB.
I knew that most of it would be taken with a pinch of salt even though they had witnessed the exchange with the ASIO troops and the severe put down.

“Could Sue and Greg please follow the red line to the sick bay please?.” Molly asked brightly. “I shall need them for about 2 hours Helen.”

“I shall be in my state room thanks, c’mon kids, nap time. I’m exhausted.” My babies drifted behind me as I sauntered towards my cabin and mulled over the immediate future.

I have staff, human staff, who know about this base and who Molly will allow back and forth, that I am responsible for. It was progress of a sort. I hope their potential is higher than they are at present. Greg was nice looking, but not mating material — Maybe he’ll hook up with Sue I thought as I turned off the light.

An insistent beeping made me crawl towards wakefulness. Goodness all this excitement sure takes it out of me. I thought as I stretched.
The babies were in the bathroom taking a shower — looking for all the world like Michelangelo’s cherubs. Maybe he knew something we didn’t.

“Would you like my report on S & G now or after breakfast Helen?” Molly quietly asked me from the nearest monitor.

“If it’s not complicated, now is fine — if it needs a reading session, after breakfast.”

Greg’s results are better than Sue’s, they both have some potential but neither attain level 2. Greg is now faster and stronger and has an IQ of 150, Sue is similar, but also has some telekinetic ability. Greg’s big bonus is some telepathy and hypnotic ability.

Helen was happy that she had some company — and suddenly there’s a nice nucleus to start the long slow climb to civilization.

by jenniferchristine

Part 17

We all sat round the table and tried to make some sort of plans for the short term and some for more long term.

Susan came out with one that I hadn’t considered. “How long will I be around?”
Molly hummed and ha’ed and then said trying to keep the embarrassment out of her voice, “Only about 120 years I’m afraid before you start ageing. But you’ll have to come up here quite regularly to get the rejuvenation effects of the transporter.”

“120 years?!!! BEFORE I start ageing? How long will I live then?” Susan was aghast.

“Well,from what I can gather from your chromosomes and the corrections I’ve done, your lifespan should be about 240 years. Some of the damage you’ve already caused in your past have had a detrimental effect on your organs. This may be able to be corrected, but lets not get too far ahead of ourselves, By the time your ARE 240, you’ll not be able to run far and your dexterity will be diminished almost to where it was a month ago.”

Experience of Molly’s tongue in cheek expression made me chuckle quietly to myself as Greg and Susan pondered their now extended futures.

I called an adjournment and we decided that planning could be done on a longer cycle than G & S had initially conceived.

“Andy has picked up some traffic that may be headed your way, would you like to return to your camp?” Molly suddenly announced.

We all looked at each other and decided that it was a good idea. Heading to the port room and grabbing our backpacks. I looked at my watch which I kept on local time in Oz. 6 PM.
Looks like we’d be camping under the stars tonight.

“What sort of company is it?” It suddenly occurred to me that not all company is either desirable or even friendly.

“Motorcycles.” Was the single word reply as we sparkled into infinity and reappeared next to Andy who was setting out a table for the inevitable snacks we’d eat — teleporting always left you hungry as the food in the stomach was transported somewhere else — it was an un salvageable mess and easier to discard.

Sue and Greg were armed with sidearms the children were better armed altogether with minds so powerful that nothing really separated them from Gods.
Helen of course was supremely able to vanish the whole lot of them to the eyes of the passing motorcyclists if she wished but avoiding interaction was not her way.

The noise of the bikes was thunderous as they approached the pool of light round the camper. Helen thought about it and felt disappointed that there was going to be trouble and said to Susan. “If you guys want to watch, please feel free, but if they draw weapons, don’t show yours. None of their weapons will fire. Molly has already disabled them.”

Greg overheard and volunteered use of his new abilities and Sue caught on and said she’d like to have a go with her telekinesis if the opportunity arose.

Helen thought it over for a few seconds as the sounds became louder.

*Fifteen individual cycles Helen.* Molly advised.

“The kids and I will be in the van with Andy, you two do your worst. We’ll be there to bail you out if needed. Worst come to the worst, Molly will remove you from the scene”

The sounds outside dwindled as the bikes lined up with their lights centred on the couple at the table — the extra places had been removed so it looked like only two people were there.

The obvious leader nodded to the camper and one of the bikers propped his bike and went to look in the van.

He appeared a few seconds later — “no one else, plenty for us.”

Sue and Greg had said nothing waiting for the people in the van to be discovered then realised they had made themselves invisible to the searcher.

Sue opened the bidding, “What do you want?”

The leader leered and said, “You’ll do for a start.” and pulled out a .357 revolver aiming it at Greg, “Say goodbye to your lady.”

Greg smiled and said, “What are you going to do shoot me with a chicken leg?”

The leader looked at his revolver and realised it wasn’t a gun at all but as Greg had said it was a chicken leg, he stuck it in his mouth and pulled the trigger. The sound was horrendous. The boom of the cartridge and the whoomp of his head exploding. His mates were flabbergasted. Before the body had slipped to the ground, half of them had reached for their weapons. Four found bananas, two found cucumbers and one found a courgette.
They all looked at their ‘weapons’ threw them away and re reached for their guns — which were already on the ground in front of them. They looked in horror then immediately went for alternatives.

Sue and Greg were still in a very precarious place with 14 guys who had by now parked their bikes and drawn knives or chains and started to advance; until one of the guns on the ground slewed round and fired, catching one of the felons in the knee. He went down screaming. The look on the bikers’ faces was a real Kodak moment. They seemed to stop for a second as if making up a collective mind — only one stepped forward close by where their leader lay fallen nearly headless. His hand still clutching his revolver suddenly rising and firing directly at the moving biker. The round punctured his chest on the left side, exiting his neck on the right side. He fell as if poleaxed.

The standoff was complete.
No one moved.

“Where are you guys from then?” Asked Greg scratching the itch on the side of is nose delicately with an index finger.

“Travellers.” One replied as if in a trance — which of course he was.

“No one knows where you are then?” Sue asked, smiling.

“We answer to no one.” Another replied, as if suddenly getting back his bravado.

“Oh good, we can dispose of you without suspicion then?” Greg completed the thought.

The bikers looked at each other. They hovered unable to either move or make a decision.

“Gonna look good in the papers when they find all your bodies. ‘Bikers fall out and kill each other to a man.’” Sue mused. Another shot rang out from the ground as another pistol seemed to come to life on its own.
The leader’s pistol barked before anyone could move and another dropped, blood spurting from his leg

“We don’t want no trouble mister,” one of them said a note of pleading in his voice.

“Fuck that,” another said and lunged at Sue with his knife which bounced off an invisible wall and ended up stuck in his other arm. The grunt of pain he gave evidence that the wound was not superficial. The man sat on the deck obviously in shock with the knife sticking through his arm. His eyes like saucers looking at the wound as it pumped blood onto the sand.

“looks like you guys are outnumbered.” Greg said pulling out a chair to sit on. He looked at Sue and smiled. Great team work ma’am. They high fived as 9 immobile felons watched in fear.

Helen appeared in the door. “Well done, but we have a little problem now. Molly has just told me that there’s a police unit coming down the highway — about 15 minutes away. So keep the noise down eh? You have 10 minutes to tidy up.”

Sue and Greg didn’t want to kill these guys in cold blood but they needed to be moved to somewhere else and memory wiped.

“Right you guys, back on your bikes and get out of here. Take your dead and injured friends with you.”

They were swift to comply not realising that they were headed for oblivion.

The noise of bikes disappearing into the distance was a relief leaving behind four bikes that had no riders.

Those suddenly twinkled and disappeared. Ten seconds later there was a flash in the sky and a few seconds later a boom as the bikes reappeared in front of the retreating bikes. They had found their erstwhile riders for a final conflagration.

*All bikers are deceased. There’s not enough evidence to piece together how the two dead ones died. Fire is a handy tool.*

The papers read, “Bikers Die in Inferno as Police Look On”
The report read that the bikers swerved to avoid the police car and ended up colliding with each other. None could be saved. The police statement read that the Squad Car had been sent to follow them and ended up witnessing the inferno.

Our band of happy campers moved on the next day — all trace of their having been there removed.

At the debrief, Greg said that he didn’t want to kill anyone — it was just so sudden that the leader had pulled his gun that he’d had no time to do anything else.

Sue too hadn’t realised that outlaws could be so calloused as to shoot without regard at all for consequences.

Helen was sad, but these types were not really suitable for the future and it was probably expedient that they were removed. They all felt that an important point was made. Death was a last option and once decided on, was to be ruthless to protect their party.

They moved on, saying very little for the next day or so until they reached a small town where they could pretend to refuel and restock their camper. The general storekeeper asked if they’d heard about the bikers — They pretended to recall the sound of the explosion that killed the remainder of the brigands.

After a week or two of traveling they felt the circuit had been sufficient to refresh themselves and headed back to the city. Andy parked up the camper in a new rental spot and returned to the apartment where the party were now all situated.

“We’ll have to get you guys some digs.” Helen suggested as they all settled into the pad.
Molly had checked the area for heat sensor and cameras and it appeared that there were none. That didn’t stop Molly from putting passive shielding in place with some extra sensors to pick up new installations.
Over the next weeks, Sue and Greg felt that they were falling for each other and asked Helen if it was possible to have a relationship whilst working with each other.

“That’s a very sensible question and one that only you can answer — remember that you’re the first of a new race of people. You’re going to live quite a long time — do you want to commit to a relationship that might stretch 200 years from now?”

They looked at each other and they both nodded. Greg spoke up. “We both know that we may have other loves, but we’re not going to let that stop us being together now.”

So it happened — they married and bought the apartment two floors down from theirs.

The twins were more than happy as it meant their little band of brothers was bigger and more stable. The group weren’t too big on making waves yet and settled down for the long haul.

They decided on a business which allowed them to process people who may be eligible to grow with the system. They thought of a religion but realised that a’cult’ was not the way to go. So they opened a public relations and personnel firm. Which gave them a simple way of passing people through their hands who could be assessed for their part in the future.

Within two years Helen had a team of fifty people who were going to be a core of civilization. Her babies were growing and had to think of going to preschool or be re assessed with regard to another parenting/social services debacle.

So the personnel company opened a crá¨che of their own — with new personnel for the crá¨che.

Helen kept her eyes open for a mate that could perhaps be suitable for the future time and had a wonderful time trying out a few of them for size.

One day she found a real nice guy who was funny and handsome and very good looking — with that Greek darkness she was quite attracted to. Emile was a minerals expert who had bought up some land that had cobalt and one or two other rare earths. He’d come to her company looking for trustworthy staff, since it was difficult to stake a claim in the area he’d made his discoveries.

Emile and Helen met over lunch, which was the usual way Helen assessed people who needed sensitive staff.

Emile gave off a sense of purpose and energy that Helen very rarely saw and as they discussed his requirements they both realised that they were sparking off each other.

Helen described her company and how it operated and Emile explained why he needed confidence in his staff in bigger quantities than usual.
Molly had listened in and had put out feelers well before the lunch was over.
Helen opened the bidding.
“So Emile, how many people know of your find and how trustworthy are they? These are I know awful questions to answer on the hop and I hope I haven’t stunned you into distrust. I just feel there is something you’re not telling me?”

Emile sat there a moment. “Well I guess there is, but it’s family, they are a lazy bunch and I figure they will feel that they deserve a piece of the action. I’ve already caught my brother going through my stuff looking for the location. Why am I telling you this? I’ve only known you since 11am.” He smiled at her and she put her hands on the table palm down.

“I have to admit to my hypnotic smile. I am successful in my business because I have the ability to make people feel safe.” She smiled again and looked up to the waiter who immediately came over and filled their wine glasses and asked if there was anything he could get.

“See?” she said after ordering dessert. “I command attention without even uttering a word.”

“Well that was remarkable, I didn’t even see you nod or wink.”

“Ooh I never do that, it’s so rude.” Helen laughed and it sounded like the tinkle of Bells to Emile.

“I know that you’ll have my business, but I’d also like your attention a little more, will you have dinner with me?”

“What took you so long?” She smiled and nodded.

“Ooh, so rude.” He said and they both laughed.

Days later, they had secured the site in question with some new recruits from her own team and Emile and Helen were a bit of an item. Helen invited him over for dinner and invited Sue and Greg as well to make it a less intimate sojourn. They had a fun time and Helen introduced the twins to Emile, he took it well considering. And towards the end of the evening even thought it may be a bonus.

The luxury of the apartment and the presence of a butler showed that Helen was no pauper and Emile felt relaxed that he wasn’t being taken for a ride.

They didn’t sleep together that night but Emile knew it was likely to happen in the near future. He was worried about mixing business with pleasure and said so.

“Emile, the staff you hire through me are your staff not mine. If you want to consider your business with me closed, would that be different?”

Emile smiled and said he was happy to do business with her. She smiled and replied robustly that she would not entertain him whilst she was recruiting personnel for him; at least not at the same time
It wasn’t long before Helen had a bigger sparkle in her eye.

The day came when Helen decided to tell Emile about the future — the decision was made after a night of passion and upon the declaration of Emile’s love for her. She could of course tell that he was sincere but she didn’t want to delve into his mind until she was sure of his love and was able to ask him to be her husband.

“Darling”, she started, “There’s something I haven’t told you about me, it’s hard to open up to anyone, but it is for our future and I know that we’re destined to be together for a long time.”

“Don’t tell me, you’re an alien and you want to abduct me to your planet?”

“Nearly right.” She looked him in the eye, he flinched and paled a little.

“Go on,” He visibly gulped.

“I’m not an alien, so the rest can be true if you like without any problem.” She teased. She held his hand and stroked the back with the other. “I love you Emile and want to spend a long time with you.”

“Not forever? he joked.

She looked wistfully at him, “I doubt you’ll live that long, as I will,” She looked in his eye and watched it become at first incredulous then worried.

“That didn’t sound like a joke.” His voice had an edge to it and he looked a little tense.

“Can I begin again? This isn’t coming out right.” Helen pleaded.

“My life is destined for different things Emile, I have been given a gift by the universe which you’ll find hard to understand. I have been told that I am the future of mankind. Your role is to be my consort for as long as that may be. Does that frighten you?”

“In a word yes, because I don’t know where you’re coming from - I can tell you’re sincere and that could be because you’re delusional, but I sense you’re not. Nothing you’ve done over the time since we met has been anything less than perfect. Not one sour note.
That in itself is unusual, like it was engineered. I’m wary.
Tell me more. Convince me you’re different and I will understand, fail and I’m out of here and you’ll never see me again.”

Helen raised her hand and a shimmering in the air suffused around it making it sparkle for a second. When the sparkle stopped, there was a folder in her hand. She handed it to Emile who looked at it like it was a figment of his imagination.
“Ok, good start.” He opened the file it was headed with is brother’s letterhead.
Listed below was a list that spoke of theft of intelligence and avenues of possibility to transfer that to his brother.
“Oh my God, is this real?”
“I’m sorry to say darling, yes it is.” Helen looked stricken for him. “My company has broken into your brother’s systems and dredged out a lot of other information. This is the most important part of it.”

“How — how did that appear in your hand?”

“I have er, um, powers?” she winced slightly and shrugged.

“Powers like making things a-appear in your hands?” His words were not an adequate description.

“Emile, Darling. That’s science, not a power. My powers are different to that.. Oh God this is hard.”

“I know,” she appeared to hesitate. *Ruth, Paul, pop in here a minute will you.*

The twins appeared, walking, since they were aware that Emile wasn’t I the know.

“Yes mummy?” Ruth asked gently.

“What’s the answer to this sum 2,347 times 2,456”
Ruth answered immediately, “5,764,232.”

Emile’s eyebrows rose until they merged with his hairline.

“Ruth is 20 months old.” Helen said pointedly. “Paul is the same and they both have other powers.” As she spoke, both children rose a little into the air.

Emile tried to force his way through the back of his chair. “You ARE aliens!” His voice cracked with not a little terror.

The children sank back to the floor, and looked a little more normal.
“No, we’re all local.” She smiled as she said it and reached out to Emile to hold his hand, which he moved to be further away from her.

Helen closed her eyes as a tear fell from them. “Please don’t be afraid darling, I’m trying to break this as gently as I can. Remember you said if I convinced you you’d understand…”

Emile closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I’m trying to understand… Wha-what is it that you can do — can you fly as well?” He sounded incredulous and frightened at the same time.

“Oh yes, that is one of my powers, as is telekinesis and telepathy. They’re all quite normal in this household. Even Greg and Sue have managed the last two.”

“You mean Greg and Sue are like you?” His eyes opened as he searched her face for the truth.

“Well to a point, but they’re not as blessed as I am.” Helen paused,” You may be similarly blessed, I don’t know yet, until I can get you back to base to have you checked out.”

“Base? Where’s that then, on the moon?” He said with a manic laugh. Then, looking at Helen’s face and her nodding head, slumped in a dead faint, his mind overloaded with fantastic and incredible visions.

“Damn that didn’t go as well as I’d hoped.” Helen muttered as she lifted him and moved him through to their bedroom.

He came round quite quickly and looked around as if worrying that he was already on the moon.

“Will you relax?” Helen admonished. “I love you and I’m trying to propose to you and you’re fighting me every inch of the way.”

“Well it’s too bloody fantastic for words and I’m not sure whether this is real or you’ve spiked my dinner. Floating children and mind control. You’ll be telling me next that Andy is a robot…” He looked round at Andy standing where he could be of assistance if needed; like any good butler would.

“As a matter of fact sir… I am.” Andy smiled gently and spun his gloved hand round a few times. Emile nearly passed out again.

“Andy that wasn’t fair,” Helen chided.

“Sorry ma’am, seemed appropriate at the time.” Andy bowed slightly

A sick laugh from Emile brought Helen back to the point. . “Oh god, Oh god. What’re you going to do to me? Are you going to kill me?”

Helen looked stricken, “Darling NO! I love you, I was born here in Brisbane and I’m just a normal — well supernormal — girl who wants to marry you.” She knelt in front of him tears falling from her lashes.

The man in Emile suddenly grounded and he leaned forward and grabbed her into a hug. “What was I thinking, I’m sorry darling, I’m just a little fraught. I’m weirded out to the point of insanity here — you may understand?”

“Are you beginning to believe me; that I’m not just pissing you about?” The look on Helen’s face was a picture. A mixture of relief and love and cautious optimism passed like small clouds across her face.

She hugged his knees and said. “Will you come with me to Luna base and get checked out?”

He gulped — “where’s your spaceship? When do we go?” He was gripping onto her arms like it should hurt her but Helen didn’t notice.

“We don’t need a spaceship, it works like Star Trek.” She smiled and he laughed sickly, overwhelmed by the thought and scared his beautiful lover had flipped her lid.

*Molly, just us two please, we’d better get this over with.* “Andy will you look after the Children please? Close your eyes Emile, I’ll tell you when to open them.” He closed his eyes, hoping that when he opened them this horrid dream would be over and he’d be back in the arms of his dear Helen.

He found himself on the port plate with his arms round Helen, so he got it half right.

“Welcome to Luna Base Emile”. Molly intoned brightly, “Hi Helen.”

“Hi Molly, Emile isn’t enjoying the ride much, so I’ll pop him down to sick bay and we can check him out.

*Preliminary tests during porting show good genetics Helen, I’ve also eliminated all the toxins he was carrying. This should be a lot of fun.* Molly said privately.

“Come on darling, let’s get you sorted. This may take an hour or two.” She held his hand and led him through the base, the little red line on the floor pulsing as they headed toward the sick bay. His eyes were everywhere, mostly on the monitors that were pointing out into the grey and black of lunar surface. “This is real isn’t it?”

“Oh yes, it’s real, just relax and let your mind absorb what it can and Molly our AI will allow your potential to come forward.

“AI? A real AI?” Emile was more stunned.

“More a mind without a body really Emile.” Molly said from the nearest monitor showing a pretty human face on the screen like a Red Dwarf skit. Emile shook his head and smiled.

Helen saw him smile and thanked fortune that he hadn’t flipped out.
“Test and tune is complete Helen. Your man is quite a guy.” Molly almost whistled.

“Debrief me Molly, leave nothing out.” Helen bit her lip and frowned waiting for not just the good news but also some of the bad that was inevitable.

“Expected age limit not known - minimum 350 years, not quite level 2, telekinesis and limited mind control. No flight, but could be trained to jump well. Strong, but not invulnerable.” All of the good stuff and little of the bad. Good healer. Will be able to recover from all but brain trauma or heart damage.”
I’ve got him a little hypno-drugged so he won’t feel the full effects until you train him how to.
He has an inkling — it’ll be like an itch, but you will have to ‘switch on’ each power as and when he’s ready. It’s too much for him all at once.” Molly tried to be concise and pretty much succeeded.

“Hello pet, how are you feeling?” Helen stroked his face as he came round.

“Is it over? I don’t feel any different.”

“You aren’t any different.”

“So what did you find out? Am I going to be able to play the piano?”

“Do you want to?”

“Well I don’t know, but I couldn’t before, can I now?”

“It doesn’t work like that.” Helen biffed his shoulder.

“How does it work then?” Emile smiled and kissed the face hanging over him.

“Well as you know, I have telepathy.”

“You DO?”

“Of course. Let me try something.” Helen whispered into his mind *Can you hear me?*

Emile’s eyes went round as saucers. “Did you do that? I can hear you in my head.”

*Don’t speak it, just project it as a thought to me.* Helen instructed mentally

*CAN YOU HEAR ME???* Helen winced as the soundless transmission rolled like a thunderclap inside her head.

“Ow, JEESUS not so loud.”

*SORRY*

“Quieter still.”

*Is that better*

*Phew, I’m glad you catch on quick, I could have a real headache very quickly with you shouting like that!* She smiled and kissed him as she thought the message.

*Typical woman, showing off her multitasking skills.* They grinned at each other and Helen pulled him up off the gurney.
*Supper time, come on.
By the way, Molly can be reached the same way — just include her in the thought.*

*Hi Molly, thank you for the new trick.* He projected.

*My pleasure, it goes with all the other ones you’ll discover as time goes by.* Molly replied.

*What did Molly mean by that? Can I do other things?*

*Yes, but she shouldn’t have told you yet, I don’t want to overwhelm you with the situation.*

“What situation?” he said out loud.

“Well it’s not just one or two things, there’s a lot of things.” Helen looked at him to see if it affected his demeanour. He looked a little ashen.

“I’m not sure I can handle too much more fantasy for today. I’m still not sure I’m not dreaming.”

“Well there’s only one more thing I’ll tell you today, your life is not going to be a short one. It’s going to be extended a few times — unless you die from trauma.”

“A few times? What, you mean a few years?”

“Honey, I’m not going to tell you yet. Suffice to say. You’re not going to retire in this century.”

“Give me a break, that’s another 90 years. That’ll make me 120 nearly — I’m retiring in 2050, even if I’m poor. I’m not working my way all the way to my grave.”

“Emile, you’ll still be young in a hundred years. Enough, I’m not telling you any more.”

Emile looked at Helen as they sat eating, she looked radiant and in love, perfect. Then as he looked closer he realised that she was perfect. Not one blemish not one mark.
He ran his tongue round his mouth, feeling for the two chipped teeth he had from football boot trauma in high school. They were smooth to his tongue.

“Do you have a mirror? no forget that.” Instead he looked at his forearm that had been damaged in a cycle accident and scarred for nearly four inches where the gate he hit had impaled his arm. The blue scar was gone, not diminished, gone completely.

He looked up at Helen’s face, “How long? How long do I… ?” His voice tailed off, he didn’t know how to ask the question.

“There is no limit to what we have.” Helen said carefully. “But you’re not superman, you can be killed. So don’t get cocky.”

Tears leaked from his eyes. “Do I say thank you or curse you? Will I outlive my children and watch them all die? Like some Poe story with a picture in the attic?”

“No darling, we are the beginning, we are Adam and Eve. Our children will live longer still and will be healthy and beautiful. Like Ruth and Paul.” She reached out and held his hand across the table. “We are Cronus and Rhea. The parents of the Gods. We shall make this world a happy place and a place of plenty, an example to all the Worlds across the galaxy. And we shall do it together.”