Deep Yellow (6 page)

"His grey-white skin,
spiky teeth, bad breath, and staring eyes would freak out the
locals. Culturally, he is used to standing very close to people.
Too much of a risk. Base controller duty only," Soohan had said to
Williams.

The only advice
Williams could give which Soohan had not covered was, "Boys, don't
stand and gawp at other men when you are in the privy." Soohan
raised an eyebrow but she understood what he meant. However, when
he said, “Any problems and Mr Scotty will beam you up.” She had no
idea what he was talking about.

Williams gained
confidence and got back into his schmoozing ways. He found that if
he kept the hotel staff supplied with paper money, they all
received good service, twenty-four hours a day, whichever hotel
they were staying in. The front desk also enjoyed receiving money,
and Williams hired and paid for vehicles through them, meaning that
he didn't have to interact with the drivers too much.

One of the technicians
drunk too much local intox and ran up and down a hotel corridor
naked. Despite his body shape, the hotel staff didn’t think
anything of it and quietly just popped him back inside his room.
They must have thought he had an accident at birth, plus they
probably weren’t expecting someone from another galaxy to be
running around naked in their hotel.

They had all been
watching hilarious alien encounter films together in William's
suite. The technician couldn’t resist a little showing off.
However, Soohan was not happy, so the technician was sent back up
to the cruiser.

"We got too
complacent," is how she phrased it. Williams made eye contact with
her and she rolled her eyes, giving a slight smile. They tightened
all their procedures after that, but there were some narrow escapes
with the aliens.

One episode occurred
when Williams and an engineer visited a city square. Williams
wandered around admiring the buildings, leaving the engineer to
calculate any scanner obstructions, which he scribbled into a
notebook. Williams glanced back at the engineer and was unsettled
to see a Police Corps type officer approaching him.

"You are taking a lot
of interest in the buildings here. What are you up to?"

"I'm from Greenland,"
the engineer said, swallowing audibly.

"You're not from
around here, are you?"

"International
exports."

"Got a right one here.
Hey," the officer gesticulated to his colleague, "come over here a
minute."

Williams looked back
at the engineer standing between two officers. Remember what Soohan
had said: “Do not panic. Just talk and smile.” If it became a real
problem, he would have to call for an extraction. If he did, it was
all over, back to the cruiser and a solemn return journey to
Vorsan.

"Hello, officers, he's
with me." Williams approached the officers with his best smile
whilst taking off his sunglasses.

"Is he with you?"

"Yes." Williams gave
the engineer a reassuring nod. The engineer froze, turning his head
back and forth not knowing whether to speak or run.

"What are you, his
carer or something?"

"Yes, that's right."
Williams said. He racked his brain for carer. Care giver? He
understood.

"He has a thing about
buildings; looks at them, then draws them. You know, keeps him
occupied. He's fine. I will look after him."

The officers exchanged
glances. One of them scratched the side of his neck. A tinny voice
suddenly emitted from the little black box fastened to his
shoulder.

"Got a call, got to
go," the officer said to his colleague.

"Harmless delusions,"
he said back to his colleague, who nodded.

"You take good care of
him. Keep him out of trouble. Have a good day." With that, the
officers walked off at a fast pace.

Williams waited until
they were out of earshot.

"You can breathe
again. No problem, they've gone to deal with something."

"What did he mean by
‘harmless delusions’?"

"Don't worry about it,
it's an alien thing." Williams blew a breath out, went back to the
hotel, and reported what happened to Soohan. She was okay with it.
The Police Corps here had little technology to assist them, no ID
scanners for example.

Over the days, they
made a list of prospective locations for holographic
reconstruction. They had to be places that were not too large, but
enough for the audience to take an interest in. Williams eventually
drew up a physical geographic outline of the places he wanted
captured.

They had to abort from
three of the suggested locations. Skin colour aside, they stuck out
as being too different, and all the locals zoomed in on them trying
to do things for money. They couldn't walk down a street without
being approached by someone in a wheeled contraption asking if they
wanted a lift. The hotel staff continually ran around trying to
offer assistance, when they both wanted to be left alone. Soohan
became the subject of glances continually from the men, and as calm
as she normally appeared, Williams detected her discomfort in
crowds. They transported back up and took stock for a while on
board the cruiser.

After a quick revisit
to their favoured locations, Soohan went back up to record her
findings for the Association's First Contact library and Williams
organised the engineers.

Back on the cruiser, a
technician transferred the geographical outlines into wire diagrams
and then transposed them onto a grid mapping system. Next, he
programmed the co-ordinates into their first class military grade
invisible scanning cameras, which the engineers released into the
air. Flying silently around external and internal locations, the
“sense-around” cameras recorded smells, sounds, and images. Any
problems, obstructions, or unnecessary bumps would cause the device
to self-destruct. Quite a few were lost in various locations, but
self-vaporisation meant no fragments remained behind.

Working with a
creative engineer, they designed some scenes to be played out
whilst the challengers were inside the worlds. For example,
Williams had seen some people performing a mock fight outside a
popular tourist location. This would add some interest, a bit of
culture in between the death. The finer details such as the hard or
soft beam people requirements and the scope of the security bots
would be worked out later. The Twins were employing a military
experienced holo engineer who would head up some of this work.

One day, the captain,
being bored with space docking and all the tales of the alien
worlds, transported down to check on security issues after giving
stern warnings to the rest of his crew to stay put. Williams
laughed as he remembered pulling the captain out of a renowned
nightclub they had visited together. Williams had smoothed it all
over with the club staff by giving out some paper money. He had got
the captain back to his hotel suite, sobered him up, changed his
clothes, and then got him transported back on board the ship. “Once
Deep Space Corps, always Deep Space Corps.”

Williams could not
resist transporting up some artefacts, well quite a few actually,
which he intended to put into the holo scenes. He always left a
large pile of paper money behind.

During their final two
weeks, he invited Soohan to go on a holiday on her own, as she had
mentioned reading about some ancient historical sites. She went off
on her own adventures, and so did Williams.

Coming back to the
present, he felt around his backside. The tattoo had healed well.
Could not resist it. How about that for a keepsake from an alien
planet?

What a planet, small
but incredibly mixed in terms of culture, language, health, and
technology. Though ripe for First Contact in a quite a few years
yet, it was the raw, chaotic nature that he enjoyed. There was no
reliance upon implants and virtual technology, etc. In amongst the
disarray, and as basic as the place was, people just got on with
it. He knew of many Elytians who lived their whole lives in virtual
holo worlds. Puffing on his smoke, he savoured the taste, then blew
the smoke out across the room.

Soohan was a wonderful
source of knowledge, calm and respected. Despite the serious outer
personality, Williams saw a softer side who liked a little intox
every now and again. It was refreshing rubbing shoulders with an
academic rather than the vacuous airheads in the beamcasting
business. A little older than him, Williams knew that her holiday
had been fruitful, judging by the amount of time she spent logging
her findings.

"Similarities," she
kept saying.

His last memory of her
was when she was sitting in her cabin, hunched over a desk with
three displays screens on the go. With a furrowed brow, she
dictated instructions and commands whilst tapping at a
keyboard.

He took her death
badly. Selfishly, he thought how she could have been the show’s
“expert” sharing her experiences of Inhab-47 and explaining about
the inhabitants’ culture and life.

She had accompanied
her husband to a far-flung planet, re-visiting a community that had
shunned First Contact. The Elders had turned their back on all the
health and technological benefits. News channels suggested there
were disagreements between the young and old. It was likely that
the Elders felt threatened by outside influence, whereas the
younger members of the population wanted to embrace change. Soohan
and her husband were part of a team sent back to discuss the Elders
decision. Their skiff had crashed whilst flying across rocky
terrain on the way to a key meeting. There had apparently been an
engine malfunction. An investigation revealed no evidence of
tampering but conspiracy theories remained.

He was saddened just
thinking about it. She was a bit like the older sister that he
never had.

"Soward Tslus, um, sorry ... Williams, we will land
in thirty minutes," Williams's virtual assistant said.

Since returning from
Inhab-47, Soward had assumed the name of Williams for promotional
purposes. It added an “alienness” for the audience, as well. He had
changed his assistant's appearance to a tall, white-skinned male
with wavy black hair wearing white patterned clothing. His round
face had facial hair and he wore a large pair of silver-rimmed
sunglasses.

"Thank you," Williams
said. Inhab-47 man faded.

Williams changed into
another one of his colourful alien shirts. It helped to rebel every
now and again; well it was expected if you were in the beamcast
business, he laughed. His producers didn’t approve, but they didn’t
approve of anything unless it made credits and upgraded their
status. The terrible twins, he called them. Ayleth and Mayleth
Lkardis were born and bred Elytians who lived in the Platinum
District. A plush, expensive area with full security and butler
services. They were always happy to let everyone know of their
presumed superiority. In their fifties, they were identical in
looks, dress, and mannerisms. Mayleth, though, spoke with a softer
voice than her brother, but the vocal tone and attitude were the
same. She could be discerned as the female twin because she wore
neck jewellery, had her hair severely pulled back into a tight
knot, and there were a couple of slight bumps in her chest
area.

Despite their pinched
looks, lack of humour, and other attributes, they always managed to
provide credits to back beamcast shows, many successful, which
Williams reluctantly appreciated. Importantly, they had backed
Convict Challenge. The costs were enormous, but the payback would
be worth it.

***

After negotiating the
ramps and walkways of the dock, Williams made his way into the maze
of corridors and offices. The Beam Casting Company had rented out a
huge military Holo World facility on a planet not far from Elytia.
Space and Police Corps used the facility for training purposes such
as rehearsing pirate raids and running command scenarios. It was
shaped like two different sized round plates. The smaller one, “The
Hub” sat on the surface and was the centre of all functional and
technical operations as well as staff quarters. They had
restructured some of the briefing rooms into a studio and a cell
block. Deep underneath lay four cavernous rooms used for projecting
the holographs. The “rooms” were over three kilometres long.

The twin's four
assistants, two men and two women, met Williams in the lobby
outside their temporary offices. Identical facially, in body shape
and features, they wore the same black business suits with grey
cravats. Williams was used to their “personalities”, they didn’t
have one.

"Director Tslus,"

"you are,"

"one minute late,"

"please come this
way," the assistants said, one after the other.

Williams found it
easier to have a fixed grin when visiting; best way to cope. Their
office was a work of art in itself, with dark moulded ceilings
continuing to dark wall panels. There were a few antique oddities,
statues, and a stuffed Heelly, a kind of domestic cat, in one
corner. No holos, pictures, or anything colourful; it was dark,
drab, and cold.

The twins sat behind
their sparse desks, peering at him from the moment he entered. They
had sharp, pinched faces. In fact, everything about them was
pinched, Williams would say if asked.

"Ah, Soward, please
sit down."

A hard beam chair
appeared and Williams sat down. The seat was uncomfortable, not
meant for visitors to spend much time there.

"I’ve viewed your
latest technical meeting," Mayleth said.

"All seems in order,"
Ayleth said.

"Holo worlds, studios,
guests, cameras, security, transport, it is all coming together.
The holo worlds look and feel great," Williams said.

"Any other predicted
problems ..."