Charger the Soldier (2 page)

The Grays embarked on a cloning program to
recreate their enormous lost population and forgot the incident on
Earth. But one day, primitive humans chanced on an abandoned
Betelle device and accidentally turned it on, sending a signal out
into the cosmos. The new clones of the Betelle empire relearned the
old history of Earth, realized the planet still had valuable
resources, and determined to put an end to the viral scourge. They
sent fifteen of their mightiest warships to Earth. However, when
they arrived in this distant corner of space, they were astonished
to find, not Dinosauroids, but creatures who looked something like
them.

However, these creatures had no tails. They
sported body hair instead of scaly hides. They also appeared to
have more intelligence than the Dinosauroids. Once again, a curious
Betellian decided to experiment.

>>>

Dart speaks to Reader:

Yes, Reader, you're now hearing what happened
about two million years ago. I got through sixty-three million
years in almost no time, didn't I?

Were these new creatures humans? We would
probably call them apes, but they were certainly the ancestors of
modern humans.

No, the Dinosauroids didn't disappear.
Remember, they were thriving when the Grays escaped into a
different time-line. They will appear again later in the story. I'm
afraid the Grays appear again, as well. Too many times.

You want to know what it's like to be
experimented on, to have your DNA altered? Blix will explain.

>>>

My eyes open. There is pain, and I cannot
move. An odor strikes my senses; it is sharp and rancid. My
confusion grows and panic sets in. I do not know where I am.
Whatever is holding me down is painful and keeps me from looking
around. I squint as a bright light hovers above me and shines into
my watering eyes.

I come to understand that I do not know who I
am, or what I am. A sound emanates from somewhere near; it sounds
like a scream. Then I realize the scream is coming from me, but I
do not know how I am doing it.

There are no trees and this place is cold and
damp. I remember the cave of my father that I live in, the images
of the hunt on the walls. There is no smell of fire here and that
makes me afraid. There are more sounds, like birds chirping, but I
cannot see where they come from. Then more pain comes. I twist and
try to escape, but am held fast and I cry out. The sound I make
before everything goes away is frightening and unfamiliar.

My eyes open. The feel of something wet on my
face causes me to flinch. There are eyes above me, looking at me. I
am afraid of them. Something sharp and threatening comes into view
and the wetness on my face begins to sting. I cry out against the
pain, hoping it will stop. Then a burning, numbing pain enters me,
causing my body to twist and heave. Unable to move, I try to close
my eyes. I cannot. The sharp thing is in my eye and makes me
scream.

Why is this happening? What is going on? Then
the thought of the hunt gives me a moment of peace. I feel the
stone in my hand, cold and hard, and I wait for the beast to get
close. We all yell and several of us attack the beast and hit it
till it stops moving. My stomach wrenches; soon I will eat. Then
the thought is gone and the eyes return to hang in front of my
face. The face with the eyes is becoming clear and it is
unfamiliar. I have never seen this face before and it makes me
shake.

My eyes open. It is dark. I hear familiar
sounds. They are sounds from the others, the others from the hunt.
One sound I know is family. I call out but cannot see the face that
goes with that voice. This dark has no round light that hangs above
in the sky, the light that returns when the bright fire goes away.
We will not hunt without the round light, the beasts can smell us
and hear us even when they can't see us.

A face I know passes my eyes. I call out but
it does not stop. I try again to move but my body is held fast and
this angers me. I try to fight, to move and strike out. My hands
feel around, touching smooth cold, then the warm flesh of my legs.
The eyes of pain return and something good nears my nose, smelling
like food. I try to bite it. It is food and I am relieved; my
hunger makes me eat till the food stops. I am still hungry and make
the sound to let the eyes of pain know. But the eyes are gone and
then I sleep.

My eyes open. A face I know is there. The
smell is familiar, for I have known this face many seasons. The
look from the face is different. It is studying me, touching me,
poking me. I shove the face away from me, then realize I can move.
All around me is cave, the rocks cold and hard, flat and smooth,
strangely even. There is no fire and no images; the cave is not
that of my father. It is different. I do not understand this cave
and it frightens me. More faces and sounds, sounds that are
unfamiliar yet known.

One face I know asks if I hurt. I say I do,
but do not know how I said that. Other faces are making sounds and
I seem to understand them, but I am confused, so I just sit and
listen. The bird chirps return, but that sound is from all around
me. I look about to find the birds and pain fills my back. I have
been hit, or stung, like happened once before when I was young. It
grows dark.

My eyes open. Afraid of what might happen, I
quickly look for shelter. I need a rock, and my hands reach out,
searching. The cave is bright and I find a good rock. It is hard
and I hold it near my chest. I will strike the first eyes I see. An
old one from the family walks toward me. I growl and lash out. The
old one says something I seem to understand but I refuse to listen.
I continue to threaten; I will strike the old one if he gets too
close. He backs away and I feel safe and powerful. This is a good
rock. I sit until the cave gets dark, and I watch the others and
wonder what is happening. No one walks toward me in the light of
the cave, but in the dark, one might try. I sit holding my rock,
waiting for a fight until I am no more.

My eyes open. It is the same cave, the same
faces. They have food and I am hungry. I rush them and they move
for safety. With the food, I run back to the safe spot. I growl at
faces who walk up to me, and I eat the food quickly. The food is
strange. It is not beast, and not from trees. I finish all the food
and look for more, but there is none. I sit for a long time, and I
am at peace. My eyes close.

My eyes open. There is much pain, the other
faces are hitting me. They have rocks and the pain is great. I must
flee. I move away from the hitting faces with the rocks and run
toward a corner of the cave, but they pursue me and continue
hitting. I growl and threaten, but they have no fear of me and the
pain grows. I fall and the faces hit me until it grows dark.

My eyes open. The cave has no light. I do not
know if it is day or night. The pain returns but it is less. I try
to move and find my leg will not work. I try to walk, but fall
down. There are no rocks near me and I fear the faces will return
to hit me again. I see a faint light and I crawl toward it. I find
myself outside the cave, and I know it is near morning because the
round fire is returning to the sky.

I think, what is sky, why do I now know this?
I see my hands for the first time; they are mine, which I did not
know before, but now I do. They are good hands, strong hands, I can
make many rocks move with these hands and use them to kill beasts.
My hands have made fire. The others in the group like it when I
make fire and they make pleasing sounds to me. The round fire in
the sky hurts my eyes but I feel safe and warm, I sleep for a time
under a tree.

My eyes open. The ugly faces with big eyes
have caught me. I struggle to get free and make the sounds that
frighten, but they do not go away. I am brought back to the cave
and the family. The evil eyes release me and I return to the corner
in the cave. I sit and ponder the word evil. How do I know this
word? Where did it come from? I sit watching for a long time, then
a family face is returned to the cave by the evil-eyed ones. The
family face shows much pain and cries. I understand pain and
crying, but do not know how.

There is a new light in the cave and I
approach it, but when I look at the light, I see another face. I
see another cave through this light and when I look around this new
cave, the same face returns to block my view. I make the sounds of
strength. The face in the light makes a strong face but has no
sounds. I reach out my hand to touch the light and the other face
does the same. Our hands touch, but the other's hand is cold. I
retreat to a far corner and sleep.

My eyes open. I decide to return to the light
of the other cave. When I look inside, the other face returns. I
see that it copies me. I raise a hand and the other face does the
same; I move my hand and the other face does the same. I show my
tongue and the other face does the same, but when I touch my face,
it touches its face.

I think the face is mine! It has the same
color hair and the same hands, and when a family member walks past,
they are also in the other cave. I am surer now that this face I
see is my face, and I decide to explore it. I call a family member
to come see, and I show this female her face. I stop and wonder,
how do I know that word, how do I know she is a female? I spend
much time looking at her and she stops to look at me; we are
different. The sharp sting in my back returns and so does the pain,
then all goes dark.

I am on a cold table, the table is flat, and
I know what these names mean. The same evil eyes with the
gray-colored skin return to my eyes and use small metal tools to
cut into my head. I am bound and cannot fight, which angers me and
I shout out. I now understand that these evil gray things only
cause pain when nearby and, at the first chance, I will run from
this place. Pictures start flashing in my head. I do not understand
them, and do not know how they are possible.

It is a mirror. I now know the object in the
cave is a mirror. I try to say the word 'mirror' that is in my head
but there is something choking me, something is covering my mouth
and I start to panic. I cannot breathe and I fight for air. The
evil gray face reappears and touches me with a metal tool. The pain
is great, then I black out.

It has been much time. I know this because
many members of my family have been brought into this room and have
been cut with those sharp tools. We talk to each other with our new
words, and we ask if anyone understands what is going on, but we
are all lost.

There is one evil Gray that talks to me. It
tells me I have a name and it calls me Blix. I do not understand
all that this Gray says, but I try. Sometimes it will bring me from
the cave into a room to show me pictures. It asks me many times to
name what is in the pictures. I do not like these things called
'clothes.' They are tight around my neck. The Gray asks me again to
name the pictures. "Rock, tree, girl, fire circle," I say. The Gray
is angry and hits me, and tells me the sun is never called the
'fire circle.'

"I do not like this talk," I say to the small
gray thing. It says I must try, but I am unsure how it makes its
words and how I can hear them.

I find myself back inside the cave with
family, and notice for the first time that the entrance to the cave
is a door of bars that prevents us from leaving. This I now realize
and I feel trapped. "We must escape," I say to the small
female.

She agrees and asks me, "Do you have a
plan?"

I have to think for some time, unsure of what
'plan' means. Then I realize its meaning and reply, "I will find a
plan soon. We will plan to escape."

She agrees and tells the others. They all
like 'a plan' and we decide to plan together. The pain in my head
is growing less each day and I begin to feel like I understand why
my head hurts. It is because the Grays are putting into my head
many words I never had before and they all mean something.

I have begun to understand days. We are
awakened each day and given a task to complete. If we complete the
task right, we eat; if wrong, we are punished. We have to work
together to complete the tasks the Grays give us, and every day the
tasks grow more difficult.

The small female is called Reko, and the old
man is Ook. They work with me and we try hard to get the tasks
right so that we and the others can eat. I am understanding more
each day and it feels like my head makes things easier. I think it
tells my hands how to take care of the work. The rocks I once held
now seem primitive in some way. I have stolen some metal objects.
Reko, Ook and I are making a weapon.

Day fifty-six. Some time ago, the Grays
showed me how to draw the words I have learned and gave me very
thin bark to practice on. I have started writing a diary of events.
This will help us determine the pattern these Grays use. We hope to
exploit this pattern, which may be their weakness. We have
discovered, in our travels to different parts of this complex, that
there are other cells with barred doors. Reko observed that members
in these prisons are at varying stages of development, and that
some members are not progressing as rapidly. They are therefore
subjected to much torture and violence, so we have doubled our
efforts to escape.

Ook has begun to explore the lower areas of
this complex by using labor duties, such as cleaning, as a ruse to
find a passage out. I have developed a simple but effective weapon
out of the metal instruments we have stolen. Through a series of
gears and spinning shafts, I can accelerate a bolt of sharpened
steel to travel at great speed. It is designed to start traveling
through the air slowly at first, then increase in velocity, and
should easily penetrate the repulse field these Grays use as a
shield.

Day one hundred and eight. We are ready to
attempt our escape. At daybreak, when the Gray enters our cell, I
will launch the projectile. This will kill the Gray and give us
access to its control unit. With that, we can take the path Ook has
discovered to a place of safety. This will be the last entry in
this journal.