Golden and Silver and the Tumuli.

Golden and Silver and Tumuli.

The next morning after breakfast Ben went out to take Penny a morning walk. Sunny excused herself and said she was going down to see Mr Weatherglass.

“Will you bring me a dozen eggs back with you please.” said Mum.
Sunny took the empty egg boxes in a plastic carrier bag and rushed off down the lane.
There was something odd about the farmyard as she entered it. Too quiet. She felt a tingle of fright.

She knocked on the kitchen door. It had always been open before. No reply. Slowly she turned the handle. It was not locked. The door groaned softly as it opened and Sunny peered in. No one, but as the light streamed across the stone floor she thought she saw something slither away into the darkness. Something was terribly wrong. She quickly shut the door and ran around the house and the buildings shouting.

“Mr Weatherglass – Mrs Weatherglass!”
When she stopped shouting the quiet wrapped itself around her. Somehow the Ursa Major thing, whatever it was, must hold the key to what had happened to Mr and Mrs Weatherglass.

She ran all the way home and into the bedroom. Ben had his computer plugged in now. She started it and brought up “Google” and typed in Ursa Major.

Thousands of sites came up and it didn’t take a minute for her to realise that it was the Plough and the Bear all rolled into one. She printed out the star map.
“Sunny, did you get the eggs?”
“Oh, no, I’m sorry there was no one there.”
“No one there, that’s funny, there’s always someone there.”
“Mum, is Ben back yet?”
“He’s been back and gone out again. Said he was going over to Hawk’s Nest.”
“Oh, flipping heck.”
“Why, what’s wrong with that?”
“Well, it’s difficult to explain right now. I’ll go over and find him.”

Things were happening too fast. She had to get to Ben before the Canisters in the chimneys opened and dropped their horrid load down into the farmhouse.
Oh how she wished that she could fly in the daytime. It was going to take ages to catch up with Ben.
Run, run, run. She burst through the opening into Hawk’s Nest. Ben was no where to be seen. The dreaded silence wrapped itself around her again and she knew that Ben had somehow been taken the same way as Mr and Mrs Weatherglass.

Fetro had completed the first stage of his lair beneath the Tumuli. He had now installed ten of the egg shaped pods needed to store and examine the nearest neighbours on earth. He travelled slowly along the chamber looking closely at his motionless prisoners. Mrs Weatherglass had her pinafore on and still held tightly to a dishcloth. Mr Weatherglass even held his old black pipe in his right hand. Ben appeared to be asleep in his jeans and black T-shirt. The next two pods contained his newest acquisitions Sunny’s Mum and Dad. They were barely visible through a white gas in the pod that was processing them. All had small puncture marks somewhere on their exposed flesh where a Fetrocap had bitten them and injected the transportation fluid. These Fetrocaps were now dead. The act of biting their last movement, the same as a bee dies when it has finally planted its sting. The fluid they had lost was a vital part of their bodily function.

Now he was increasing the size of the cavern. Soon he would install the incubators for breeding Fetrocaps from the powder spores that were their beginnings.

Some thing moved behind her. Whatever it was it had knocked over some of the rubble strewn across the floor. Sunny glimpsed a shadowy snake like thing disappear into the darkest corner. She knew it had been heading for her.
Fear gripped her tightly now. What to do next? What could she do?

To start with she got out of Hawk’s Nest as fast as her feet would take her. Looking across the moor to Fairy Moor Farm she stopped. The farm was outlined as it always was from here. The chimneys were prominent.

Oh, no, the chimneys. Surely the voice hadn’t moved that fast. Had he?
All the brimming confidence of her youth disappeared as quickly as the bubbles in Fairy Moor stream. She was truly frightened, truly alone. Some instinct from deep inside made her look up. Searching the endlessness of the star speckled heavens she shouted out to them.

“Dear God, if there is one and you are up there somewhere, please help me.”
Nothing happened, no flash of lightening or crash of thunder, nothing. Sunny looked down again and sighed deeply. Somehow she did feel better, less alone, stronger inside.
Once again she was running, running. Down the bracken slopes through the gushing beck. Taking no notice of the wet undergrowth now sticking to her jeans and the soaking from crossing the stream.

She burst into Fairy Moor kitchen and stopped still. The quietness, the dammed quietness.
She ran through the downstairs rooms then upstairs. Shouting, “Mum, Dad”
Knowing all along that it was no good. She was exhausted. A wriggling shape scurried away into the dark behind the Grandfather clock. She stepped back, more sliding noises in the pantry. Even something moving in the fridge.

She ran into the stable and jumped behind the straw bales. Kept still and listened. It was quiet but not the same type of quietness. The Fetrocaps were not in here, she knew it. Tiredness, fear and exhaustion were starting to take their toll. Then she realised she had another energy store complete with its own powers waiting for her when she was asleep. So she collapsed down into the welcoming sweet smelling hay and her eyes rolled up in their sockets. Sleep came at once.

It seemed almost immediately that she was awake again. That special awareness. She peeled away from the sleeping Sunny and stretched away through the stable door up into the now darkening sky. She could remember the shape of the stars that formed Ursa Major from the computer printout. After all they had been up there in the heavens all her life. Now she knew their name but the shapes had been familiar to her all her life.

She flew as high as she could above the moor. Tumuli were all over the high ground and none seemed to fit the Ursa Major blueprint. Then a flash of pale blue movement caught her eye. It rocketed away into the sky. The “Voice” leaving for some where. She flew across to the point of origin of the flight. Yes, there it was, a grouping of Tumuli that exactly represented the star map for Ursa Major. Even so there were many Tumuli to pick from. It seemed that the blue thing had set off from the middle of the cluster. She didn’t have the time to check every one so she went for the middle.

She went round the mounds. No sign of any entrance. Then a wriggling shape, not distinct enough to identify. The “Voice” must have left guards. The wrigglers were happy in the dark. She would have to take care. The saving grace of all this was that she was positive that this was the correct place.

Suddenly it became too late. From the long grass behind her a Fetrocap shot up the gap at the bottom of her jeans and bit into the flesh above her ankle. Everything went black.

The prevailing wind was from the west and the old brave blackthorn that grew on the otherwise open moor leant to the east. It had endured the mainly westerly wind since it germinated from within the starling droppings that had transported it to this wild place almost one hundred years before. It had seen the seasons change for many years now and sheltered the wind from the blackface sheep during many a storm. In the distance the moor road crested the ridge and most nights the young gamekeeper could be seen swinging his motor bike down the remote road on his way home to the village. Tonight the full moon was rising and it was almost possible to feel the earth slip sliding away to the east. The gamekeeper was riding alone and full of the spirit of the moor. He set the throttle on his bike and stood up on the foot pegs. Then he held his arms out wide and guided his bike down the flowing curves and swells of the lonely moor road purely by the balance of his body. Fully entranced by the force of the wind against his body and the beautiful loneliness of the moving moor. He was elated.

His motorbike needed fill ups of petrol to keep it going. He needed these solitary sessions on the moor to fill his spiritual tank and keep it going.

As the deserted road ran out he sat down and disengaged his thoughts. He was surprised to find that the first mental image to fill his mind was that of a certain young girl from Fairy Moor Farm.

“Trig the Tramp, Doodle Doodle Doodle Doo,”
“I’m Trig the Tramp, Doodle Doodle Doodle Doo”
“I have a camp, Doodle Doodle Doodle Doo,”
“With no lamp, Doodle Doodle Doodle Doo.”
He had woken up in a Salvation Army Hostel for homeless men. It was far, far superior to anything that he had lived in as far back as he could remember. He hated it and as soon as he had enough strength he slipped away and bought a carrier bag full of cider from the nearest off licence. He hid behind some bushes and took a very large swig. Then he sat down and finished the bottle. He knew exactly where he was going – back to his ramshackle home in the woods. He was happy there. He didn’t really know the way but he had no fear that he would not be able to find it. Some in built navigation within his brain had taken over. All he had to do was buy a top up to his supplies of cider as he passed the supermarkets on the edge of town and keep going.
Never mind if it was pitch black – he would end up at his shelter. No probs.

Crossing the dual carriageway at the bottom of the wood was a prob though - really dangerous. The traffic never ceased, even through out the night. He sat in the dark among a clump of nettles at the edge of the tarmac. He sang to himself until the headlight beams ceased to illuminate the sky. Then he struggled up and wobbled his way across both carriageways without once looking either way. He fell into the long grass at the other side laughing loudly. He had made it! Headlights lit the sky and traffic roared past again, unaware of the raggy body and his liquid load now struggling over the wire fencing.

Trig could not remember any other life. He never knew a mother or father. He had been brought up in a children’s home after they had long gone. The people in charge were not friendly people, always shouting at him with his slow learning ability. They were only smiling and kind to the visitors and officials that came during open hours. When the doors were shut they behaved much differently.

He was only happy when he was away from them and by himself. He plotted to run away at the earliest chance and the opportunity came one day when the home was in the process of moving to new premises. It was so easy. He just walked away in the dark of night. The staff didn’t even know that he was missing for two days. By that time he was long gone.

He found life on the road to be his calling and he befriended many animals along the way. Particularly stray dogs, as they were his fellow kinsmen. He also would help any old or sick animal – no matter what. For a year he kept an old hen with him in his battered bag. Wherever he stopped he let it out to feed among the grasses and scraps. The old hen would repay his kindness with an egg every two days. It would cluck with great pleasure every time it lay. The noise of the hen’s joy was music to Trigs’ ears. He wanted nothing more from life. Never troubled or harmed a single person.
As long as they left him alone.

He could smell the pine greenery as he fell over the wire of the fence. The barbs drew blood from his legs as they snagged. He felt nothing. Gathering up his bag and his drink he pushed on up the steep wooded slope on autopilot. There was no other noise than the rustle he made through the pine fronds. Very little light filtered through from the skies above. He was alone again and happy to be so. Up and up went his route, then across a bit and down a bit. There it was the plastic sheet and branches of pine shelter – home. He lifted up the flap. The breeze caught it and it fluttered slightly. He waited at the entrance. Something was not quite right. Agh, well maybe just a rat. He dropped down into the dry bracken bed and fell asleep.
Slippery creatures moved quietly towards him under the dark cover of the dried plant material that was his bed. He never felt their bites.

Fetro had all the local humans from within a radius of 15 kilometres now safely under his control. Sunny was the only one of them that knew the location of his base and he was pretty sure that she had told no one else. His little earthly campus was safe from intrusion, at least for the immediate future, long enough for him to become well established.

The Fetrocaps had managed to become acclimatised to the earth’s atmosphere and now it was time for him to do the same. He had to leave his craft in his own self preserving cocoon and float through the cavern on inspection trips before returning to the mother craft and pulling away into the sky before it became light. Slowly he began allowing the air of earth to enter his cocoon. Just as it had been allowed into the Fetrocap transporters. He was becoming acclimatised. The final, most difficult stage was for him to be altered physically from his alien body to that of a human. Then he could travel at will amongst the earthlings without detection.

The pods with their captives now covered male, female, young and old. The pods were even now collecting every conceivable piece of physical and mental information from their contents. Then he would have all the information necessary to make the final change. All he needed now was a human shell that he could use.
The sensors from his craft signalled that a human had entered the 15 kilometre radius. It was a single male human. Surely the Gods had been kind to Fetro; this would be the shell he needed.

When Trig regained consciousness he looked about. He could not move his head and it seemed he was inside an aeroplane cockpit.
“You’ve done it this time Trig,” he said to himself, “had too much, over done the cider.”
It was very dark whereever he was.

Then floating towards him from the dark distance he could make out a pale blue presence. It became somewhat clearer as it neared but never distinct. It looked like a blue jellyfish. The edges soft and fluid. It came closer and closer until the whole of the canopy was engulfed in this blue jelly. Despite his drugged state he felt frightened. Then the blue started entering the pod. It was filling up from his feet. Slowly it came up and over his chin then his eyes then over his head. He was used to being bullied and sang in his mind: -

“ Trig the Tramp, Doodle, Doodle, Doodle Doo,”
“I’m Trig the Tramp, Doodle, Doodle, Doodle Doo.”