The Monkey and Squirrel fight for freedom. (34 page)

Wing commander Harry Glover looked on in amazement as his commanding officer punched the wall, shouting,

“That bloody hurt I shouldn't of done it,” then more calmly “I'm going to pound a punch bag in the Gym until I feel better, take over until the end of watch”, then he ran off down the corridor, leaving a dumbfounded Harry behind him.

“Don't worry sir, the frustration just gets on top of him sometimes and he just has to vent it off.” said warrant officer Clarkson.

Harry just nodded, thinking we're all going mad, we try and fail, again and again it gets to you. Now our enemy knowing we've failed again is coming to save the day, because the biodiversity of life on Earth is worth saving and they have friends living there. So they are going to save the Earth to save their friends and they'd like a wider range of plants and animals in their habitats. So stand aside the cavalry is coming, just rub it in with a shovel. All he could do now was hope that they were up to their boast and they did save the Earth.

Chapter 34

This time the lady is going to turn

The carriers matched course with Aimee 237, hailing the humans who were still trying, advising that they stand clear, in case Aimee 237 exploded. The humans complied, moving to a good observation point to watch the fire works. The first carrier fired, the dust and other small stuff caught in the beam was instantly turned into an exploding cloud of plasma, on the third strike one of the larger rocks got in the way fizzing off at a tangent. They continued in this fashion, for weeks the rubble orbiting Aimee 237 was greatly reduced, the largest lumps set on safe courses, the core had broken up but still revolved around the common centre of mass. Even when the orbit of Aimee 237 was no longer an immediate threat to Earth, the New People decided to carry on blasting away until it's orbit no longer crossed that of Earth.

Group Captain John Hampton watched them leave, job done, he had been in awe of the spectacle that was the result of such applied fire power, still resentful that it wasn't his to command. He and his men must have watched for hours over those few weeks, at what seemed like the gates of hell.

To think he could have been on the receiving end of punishment like that, anyway they had left the humans the tidying up to do. A lot of those lumps the New People hadn't bothered with, could still be a danger to a city or something smaller, but well within his fighters abilities to deal with. He sent his men out to chase down and deal with these lesser threats.

He could hear the politicians now talking about how the assistance from the monkeys had made the task easier, not the little fact that without them it wouldn't have been turned enough in the time left. 'Time to retire when this job is done and write my memoirs, don't let too much bitterness creep in if you want sales', was the note he made in his diary.                                                                                     

A collective sigh of relief, went round the world with the announcement,  Aimee 237 had been turned away. Some politicians publicly thanked the New People for their assistance in turning Aimee 237 on to a safe course, for many people this was the first they had heard of help from this source.

The Human Supreme party and it's brethren reacted all too predictably, shouting about the puffed up arrogance of those damned monkeys, trying to steal the credit for a great human achievement, turning up at the last minute, just to steal the glory. To all those who knew how desperately needed that help had been, it was delusional self justification, but the vast majority of humanity didn't know. So granted those claims more plausibility than they deserved, mentally cataloguing the assistance into political gesture territory, of lets be friends and not fight any more variety. For most people that was OK, they just wanted to get on with their lives. A small number of groups had been looking forward to Armageddon and judgement day. Their disappointment expressed it's self as a tirade of vitriol directed at the devils children, doing the devils work by interfering with Gods chosen instrument. It was safe to say the vast majority didn't share those sentiments, and couldn't understand how anyone could have them.

Major Johnson, shared the general feeling of relief, and unlike most had seen videos of the carriers in action, and the weekly deflection measurements. Those carriers had achieved more every day, than the massed fighters had in their best week, all those involved or associated with the effort knew exactly who had achieved what.

He had been surprised they hadn't put the video on the web, may be they didn't want to risk disturbing people.

All those nations building habitats were going to complete them, then gradually add more just not at the same frenetic pace, just in case there was a next time, they wanted bolt holes ready and the industrial capacity was a useful asset.

Iran was building a new bigger habitat and were planning to sell the old one when the new one was ready, the official reason being the old one would be surplus to requirement once the new one was operational. Unofficially it was the only way they could get shut of Charlotte Thatcher, short of a small war in the habitat. In that case they would have to rebuild or replace the habitat anyway, given the choices it was better to just build a new pure habitat and leave the whore to her filth.

Carl knew the way her wealth had grown she would probably be in a position to buy out the other two thirds, then it really would be Thatcher's realm, a woman like that with that sort of power, better think happier thoughts.  

Daisy was happy, the danger had been averted, now the wedding was back on, plans resurrected, it was all happening at top speed to meet the original date. He was expected to go with her intended Alistair Dale, on his stag night, to look after Daisy's interests, at least he knew what was required there, just make sure Alistair didn't get 'lost', he thought he could manage that OK.

Sparks, Knowledge, Elf and Torquay were very happy their friends had been successful, honoured to be part of the official reason for the intervention. They were proud of friends who couldn't just stand back and watch the disaster happen, the New People just had to help. Penelope had decided to visit the Jupiter colony once the cruise ships began the passenger scheduled services, just to see what it was about space that had been such a buzz for Plumber and his friends.

Chapter 35

An offer is made

The wave of relief, even touched some politicians, including some with previously undetected consciences, debates began about how to say thank you started in the political arena. This was helped along by the realisation that the monkeys held the high ground and had the most and biggest guns, being polite to them suddenly became the most sensible option.

After the usual very long tedious sessions, with some noisy but effectively toothless opposition, the decision was reached to offer the New People what they had demanded as theirs by right. Full equality with humans, and full recognition of their sovereign nation complete with a seat in the UN. The offer was radioed directly and sent to their business e-mail address, it was acknowledged with the statement ,'this has to go to chamber for discussion, we'll get back to you.'

The usual groups made vociferous noisy objections to the offer, some even detailing the way, each and every part offended them, and their fatuous reasoning as to why it was wrong to offer it. The majority of people were tired of this ranting, 'come on change the tune,' was most popular comment, as they switched to something else. The change in attitudes would take a long time to become more than window dressing, the idea that the space monkeys and squirrels were people, had never crossed most peoples minds, just as a future idea most could cope with, just not this year.

A special meeting of chamber was arranged to discuss the proposal from the majority of Earth's governments, as this was an unexpected offer, that at first glance looked to be everything they wanted. But as usual the devil was in the details, the little bits of vaguely worded clauses allowing for flexible interpretation, other small clauses and little exemptions tucked into notes and appendixes.

When it had been thoroughly examined by those with the best understanding of such documents, these additions undermined the substance, leaving the offered olive branch, big on show but effectively lacking in real  substance. The political machinery was operating as normal, give nothing and grab a lot, like the kings of old, only much more efficient.

That left the Newp with a decision to make, ignore it until they came up with a better offer or use it as a starting point and negotiate a real deal from there. The decision was straight forward for chamber, seize the initiative, take the empty soap bubble of an offer and turn it into something of substance, a foundation for future relations. Next up, was the question of who to send as negotiators, that became obvious as soon as they thought about it. Earth was informed, that the New Peoples negotiation team was on the way, with a suitable escort for the occasion.

On the carrier Judgement, escorted by Don't you wish you'd stayed at home, Tman signed to Chatty and the rest of the core negotiation team, Hacker, Ernest, young Einstein and Gardner.

“Again they foisting this on us, didn't they! It's just our bad luck, we happen to be the best ones for the job. Just because have had the most experience dealing with humans, even if was only with those idiots we took as prisoners of war, they actually managed to make me so angry with them.”

“Is that why you returned them to their commanding officer, getting rid of them before you lost control and did something you'd regret?” asked Gardner.

“It may have played a part in the decision, but the main reason was they were useless and extremely irritating to every one that tried to talk to them.” replied Tman.

“Were they exceptionally idiotic humans ?” asked Einstein.

“For fighter pilots they were, unfortunately not as samples of humanity.” offered Hacker.

“A fair assessment.” agreed the other seniors.

“We're all agreed, they are coming to this carrier, we have accommodation for humans  here, they certainly won't have accommodation for us on any of their habitats.” signed Gardner.

“It's also a question of trust and quarantine, it's a far easier this way to control any opportunist would be immigrant species we don't want in our habitats. Remember all the humans we as a people have had dealings with to date, all have live in carefully controlled habitat environments.

These negotiators will be coming straight from Earth, therefore they could be unwittingly coming with a host of unwanted passengers, diseases, flora, fauna and fungi, we can't afford any environmental disasters. How many of their negotiators can we trust and how much we just don't know, so it will take time for us to find out.” signed Tman.

“That's the reason for the security contingent, complete with tasers, tranquilliser guns and so on.” signed Gardner.

“Yes, but it wasn't my decision alone, chamber was in full agreement.” protested Tman.

“Don't get upset, I'm here as part of the team not your biographer, although I am making notes of this historic event for posterity.” said Ernest.

“So you say.” signed Tman giving him a jaundiced look.

“As you all know, initial negotiations are taking place by e-mail, they wanted us to orbit at ten thousand miles and our escort at one million, what we have eventually settled on, is Judgement orbits at fifty thousand and Don't you wish you'd stayed at home orbits at a hundred thousand, how much have you managed to reduce their team too, Chatty?” asked Hacker.

“Ten main negotiators, limited to ten assistants each and a total of twenty news people with a multi media room for each group to use. We have fitted out twenty rooms as multi media rooms with ten work pods to a room, best to have a few spare I thought.” replied Chatty.

They continued with the minutia of organisation required for negotiations of this type, just so every one knew the basic offer and what they wanted, and what would be acceptable to each government. Then they discussed small points that could be accepted in the short term, the general agenda, frequency of refreshment breaks, that sort of thing, before getting to the substance of the end goal.

Eventually, everything was ready six days before the new Peoples carriers entered their designated orbits. When they did people on the ground could see them in orbit and realised how big the carriers were, they could be seen in the night sky on a clear night. The media responded with 'helpful' comparisons between the different carriers, using buses or trucks to provide a sense of scale and who had how many of each. This was enough to trigger another round of they’re threatening us, its a clear case of intimidation from the usual crowd, who were genuinely frightened this time.

But the real players wanted to keep things calm, so without such support media attention soon drifted to the actual negotiations. Which were being heralded as the product of gratitude and good intentions, but without a major driving force and lacking a sense of urgency they crept along.

Between negotiation sessions, the New Peoples human friends had been offered the chance to visit Judgement, most eagerly took up the offer and were impressed by what they saw. As Tman, previously called Lad by his human friends and Hacker gave them a personal tour, Knowledge had tears in his eyes, saying,

“I'm glad I've lived long enough to see this, you're really free and demanding to be treated as an equal by the people who made you a slave. I'm sure you're going to achieve that by the time these negotiations are over.”

Using a text pad Tman said,

“At the current rate of progress, that'll be a few years yet, but there is no rush, effectively we are already free. The longer we orbit here a visiting nation in negotiations, powerful but unthreatening the more humans will accept our existence, we will just become part of the background of their reality. On the positive side my latest interstellar probe, the fifteenth Procyon is the best performing yet, with the highest acceleration for mass expended.

All the instrumentation are functioning optimally and the A.I. looks to be the best so far. The pictures from our probes beyond the Oort cloud are giving us the first real pictures of star systems complete with small rocky planets. We will put these early pictures out on general release; when we get the close detailed analytical ones, we'll be keeping those for ourselves although we may sell some of scientific interest.”

“I understand that, you have done all the work, so the rewards are yours to benefit from; when you find a really interesting system are you going to go there, just to explore?” asked Knowledge.

“That's the idea, the probes are technology test beds, total pathfinders, the fastest has only just got up to a fifth of light speed and still easily avoiding obstacles. Hopefully it will get up to half light without it becoming problematic, obviously you don't want to find the unsafe speed in a crewed ship, they'll have to stay in the safe envelope.” replied Tman with his pad.

“Fantastic, when you build that ship, I would really like to have a tour of it.” exclaimed Jimmy.

“So you can build one for the Chinese?” asked Hacker with his pad.

“No, just for my own pleasure, I'm not building anything new these days I'm just a figure head for interesting projects. Of course as you have proved a fusion drive and ram scoop are a feasible way to get to other stars, there are at least three R&D projects I know of under way to produce their own version.” answered Jimmy.

“We have discovered seven, spread over three power blocks and two independent nation states. We are monitoring them all in-case they come up with developments we can use. As you know we just don't have anything like the number of minds to compete in research effectively, we are totally dependant on humans for most pure research, most of our research is in the applied sciences.

There is little doubt that they will be able to at least replicate if not better our version of the fusion drive, all our technology is human based after all. Every thing we have made or invented, in the last thirty three years, could have been produced by humans.” Tman informed them. 

“I know why they haven't, its because they cost analyse everything new to death, when they can see military applications or a way of making bucket loads of cash, it's fine and dandy to spend money developing it.” declared Jimmy.

Penelope piped up,

“It was one of the things that really annoyed Plumber, when he found out about it, they robbed the pensions and welfare budget just to fund a space arms race. Just to placate  paranoid politicians, callously depriving the most vulnerable, at their time of greatest need, after most had spent a lifetime paying taxes. Paying for the greed, corruption and incompetence, of government, politicians and institutions. He always made a point of paying his taxes, as he said it's only fair that the rich pay their fair share, from each proportionate to their wealth, is what he all ways said.” 

“Sounds just like him, a closet socialist.” volunteered Sparks.

“He never seemed to be a lefty to me.” said knowledge.

“He was pragmatic and fair minded, a believer in natural justice.” answered Sparks.

“That fits the man I knew.” acknowledged Knowledge.

“He was the most decent man I've ever known.” said Penelope defensively.

“No need to get defensive, we are his friends too, just not in the same intimate way as yourself, he was one of us. All of us soon realised these 'worker units' were intelligent beings, with their own thoughts, feelings and desires. What had been done to them was wrong, so we did what we could for them, trained them well and taught them to keep themselves safe in that environment, it was a small thing but all we could do at the time.” said Elf

“I say that was a very big help, it allowed us time to make wriggle room in our minds and pass on the knowledge and wisdom we had obtained to the youngsters. It was that time that made even thought of attempting to escape, possible. Without you and the few like minded crew on the other stations, we would have died as slaves, unable to even think about freedom.” said Tman using the pad.

“I see you've got back up to speed on that thing again, it must be hell in the negotiations being restricted to that thing?” asked Sparks.

“Between ourselves we sign as usual, although discreetly, you never know if there could be a reader of sign on the other side, and we use a lot of stock phrases on the pad to speed up our replies. We can rapidly build up a diplomatic way of saying 'no way in hell are we agreeing to that.' it's a game or a dance, the rituals have to be observed. As you expediently steer the diplomatic grind in the general direction of your objective. Of course the other participants are all doing the same, a contest of the mind, willpower and endurance, it can get truly exhausting.” replied Tman with the pad.

“That's the glue that has held you all together, for all these years, you had a cause, an idealistic cause. Doing the little things to help, that you knew you could do without any one noticing. I had wondered how they had got so many things in place on the ground, when they couldn't get there, you did it for them, you crafty old subversives you. And Elf don't think I've forgotten that intimate crack, I'll have you know that Plumber was the only man I met who saw more than just a desirable body! Admittedly without that desirability he wouldn't have looked at me twice, our friendship came later as we got to know each other as people, rather than servant and master.” said Penelope.

“Its a shame to break this up, but we need to get some sleep before the next session. Tomorrow is a short day and the day after is a rest day, who's up for a picnic in the core garden tomorrow afternoon, where we can sit round and chat to our hearts content. It is obvious we all have lot to say to each other, we need the time and place to say it, and I think that would be ideal, do you all agree?” said Chatty using her pad.