The Founders
©2005 by Gerry Ahrens
When Monica
Sewell was very young and had no other children to play with, Charlie had been
great company. And being a bright child, she had quit talking about Charlie to
her parents when she was ten. But when you’re living in a remote outpost in the
At the age of seventeen, Monica’s parents put her in therapy.
Her therapist had tested her for a split personality. Monica knew she didn’t have a split personality, for Charlie had never taken over her thoughts or in any way sought to control her. But to humor her parents and the therapist, she ran the gamut of tests, answering all questions to the best of her ability. The results of those tests were inconclusive.
By then Monica was eighteen and quietly informed her parents she would no longer participate in the series of experiments the therapist felt was necessary. She asked them to trust her and her judgment. Her parents had no reason not to trust her.
When Monica was eight she discovered a dinosaur bone, which turned out to be from an elk. However, that elk bone sparked a flame and paleontology became a passion.
She earned a full
scholarship to
Now, at twenty-two and her time at UM coming to a close, Charlie was still with her. He had assisted her with difficult studies and had given her support and advice when she had problems in her personal life.
Monica had quit questioning Charlie years ago about his existence. He was as skilled as any politician or lawyer at double talk. She never could get a straight answer from him.
Half asleep over her biology book one evening, she had a dreamlike experience which she couldn’t recall when she came to full consciousness. But it left her disturbed.
She rose and stretched. “I’m done for the night.” She said aloud.
Charlie asked, “Are you feeling all right?”
“Yeah. Why?” She wanted to know.
“I know you had a disturbing dream. I was just inquiring.”
Monica knew all of Charlie’s speech inflections and this wasn’t a standard inquiry.
“What’s going on, Charlie? Do you know something I don’t, but should?”
“No, Monica. It was just an inquiry.”
Unexpectedly, she was angry. “You’re a lying son of a bitch.” She was angry at Charlie and angry at herself. But why? Why such infuriating anger? Why now? After all these years she thought she was used to his crap. So why should this get to her so profoundly?
“Bastard.” She called him, though he was silent.
Leaving her room for some place else, she walked out the main door of her dorm and everything was wrong. She froze. The trees, the building, the sidewalks, the horizon, had changed. Her mind knew it was wrong but could not identify the problem.
The cold grip of panic was enclosing upon her like an ill-omened fog. Monica, strong, athletic, and confident, fainted.
She opened her eyes to see Stan, one of the security guards that patrolled the grounds at night, leaning over her and shaking her gently.
“Hello. Are you all right? Miss? Miss? I know I’ve seen you around, but what’s your name?” He asked.
“Uh…Monica. Monica Sewell. I stay in room 237. What happened?”
He helped her sit up. “Do you need an ambulance?”
Puzzled, she focused on his face. “No. No I don’t. I think I fainted.”
With a calm smile he told her. “I saw you leave the building, stop, look around and then you were on the ground.”
Vigorously she rubbed her face and head. “I’m all right, now. Thank you so very much.”
He helped her stand and made sure she was steady on her feet. “I think you’d better go back to your room, miss.”
A little embarrassed, she nodded her head at him and turned to go back inside, but something was wrong! And she knew it! She quickly turned and Stan was walking away.
She surveyed her surroundings, but everything seemed to be as it should. Yet she didn’t trust it.
Back in the familiar surroundings of her room, she had about convinced herself that she must have eaten bad food or some such thing. Then Charlie spoke.
“What happened Monica?”
Exasperated she said, “I don’t know Charlie. I must have gotten some bad food or something. Leave me alone.”
“I can’t do that. What affects you, also affects me. Did you faint?”
“Yeah…I fainted. I thought you knew everything?” She mocked.
“Not everything, Monica. Though I know most things that happen to you and outside of you. But if I’m not here, I can’t know what happened.”
“Well…you should’ve been here, then. Something happened to the surroundings outside. I don’t know, Charlie. I just fainted. Okay?”
“Explain to me what you seen. I would really like to know.”
“I stepped outside and everything was different!” She was pacing now. “The trees weren’t right. Nor were the grounds. Nothing was…the way it’s supposed to be. I really can’t explain it. It was like everything was turned inside out. But not quite.”
Charlie’s voice was soothing. “I prefer to give you plenty of privacy, but I’ll not leave you for awhile. Is that agreeable?”
“Yeah, sure. Stick around and watch the fainting student.” She laughed.
Too distracted to finish her studies, she called her parents. She just needed to hear their voices and reassure herself that her world was still intact. Her mother had asked if everything was all right. Monica gave the excuse of being tired, said her goodbyes and hung up.
Two weeks later she went home for the Thanksgiving holiday. There had been no more strange episodes, but she had avoided going out in the evening by herself.
The holiday had
been Currier and Ives perfect. Aunts and uncles, cousins and nieces and nephews
and a few friends that had no other family, were gathered together in good
spirits. It took three turkeys, two hams and several small hills of condiments
to feed the herd. A brief winter storm had capped the
The following Sunday, a warm sun invited Monica to take a late morning hike along a trail that bordered the national forest. She had hiked this trail many times in her life and considered it an old friend.
Charlie had been silent since the previous Wednesday when she had arrived home. He broke his silence with a simple request as she strolled along the trail.
“Monica. There is a small path off to your left, just around this bend. Would you mind walking up it, with me?”
Rather puzzled, she acquiesced.
The path was very faint, more like a small game trail and Charlie silently guided her along its winding route. It ended at the edge of an ancient landslide of boulders. Old knurly pines had split the rocks, creating small spaces for the many creatures that hid within the confusion.
“Okay, Charlie. Am I looking for something specific? Or did you bring me here for the exercise?”
“Go around that split rock to your right. A trail will appear. You will have to do some climbing, but it will be easy for you.”
“I’m not moving an inch until you tell me what the hell is going on! These last few weeks have been a real bitch. I have weird dreams and I still can’t make myself go out at night.”
Angry now, she berated him for all of the past intrusions he had made upon her life. The torrent continued for several minutes. When she took a deep breath, Charlie broke in.
“I know I have been intrusive at times, but if you will follow this trail, you will find out why I have been with you all these years and why I have at times, steered you in the directions you have taken.”
She grumbled as she made her way over fallen rocks, trees and brush. “I have many different names for you right now and not one of them is Charlie. Creep. Moss eater. Favorite dish of dung beetles.” And the list continued until she climbed down in to a small clearing nestled deep within the landslide.
The clearing’s ‘floor’ looked nothing like it should. Where there should have been pines needles, twigs and other debris, there was nothing. It looked as though someone had swept it clean.
“What the hell…” Monica wondered allowed as she walked toward the center.
The clearing disappeared and Monica found herself standing in the middle of a large room surrounded by many other Charlies.’ Tall, dark-eyed, slightly reptilian humanoids.
Her Charlie glided away from the rest and approached her. “This is not such a shock to you, is it? I was expecting you to be horrified of all this.”
She had been watching him as he glided smoothly toward her. “You’re not as powerful and all-knowing as I thought you were. You can’t read my thoughts can you? And you can’t control what I do.”
“No. I cannot read your thoughts and I have only limited control over what you do. Why do you ask?”
Monica was walking a slow circle around the room, not seeing any other being but her ‘Charlie.’
Thoughtfully, she chose her words. “There were many times in my life when you weren’t there. In fact, sometimes you would disappear for several months and one time you were gone for almost two years. Most of the time you were gone for just a day or two. You would come back here, wouldn’t you?”
Charlie was puzzled. “Yes. But…”
Monica interrupted him. “Once, when you were gone, I met a couple of people that believed we were ‘not alone.’ That extraterrestrials had been on Earth many years, slowly getting the general population to accept the possibility of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. And that one day these beings would want to make themselves known and they would have to do it very subtlety. These two people didn’t know how that was too happen, but they knew it would. And they also told me it would be detrimental to the people of Earth.”
She stopped and faced him. “What are your intentions?”
He gestured to all the others who were quietly watching the performance between Charlie and Monica.
“We have no intentions of harming the people of Earth. We need help becoming integrated into your world. Slowly, over the millennia we have strove for acceptance. You, as a paleontologist can uncover the remains of those who have perished as a result of this endeavor. Your discovery would allow us to become accepted.”
Monica shook her head, slowly. “Do you have any idea of how long that will take? The debates will still be going on after I am dead. Haven’t you been paying attention to how things work on this planet?”
“There are others who will be doing the same work, only on a different continent. If enough earth people are made aware of us from different parts of the globe, it will take much less time. We are sure of this.”
Monica read people’s body language about as well as any human could. But as she looked around the room at the other Charlies,’ she found she wasn’t good at reading aliens. She was going to be relying on her instinct, which she knew was influenced by a person’s body language.
“What do you need this planet for? What do you need us for?” she asked.
Without hesitation and allowing a glimmer of enthusiasm to show, Charlie explained.
“Our planet, similar to Earth, but with less water, orbits a medium sized star such as yours. Our star is the one you call Capella. It is forty-two light years distance and is actually a double star system. The star our solar system orbits, we call Amaethon. We refer to our kind as Cumal. I am called Chamille.
But ours is a very old star and it has already shown signs of increasing in size. We know from our research of other like stars that we still have a few millennia before it becomes imperative that we leave.
But our star will eventually become so hot and large that it will turn our planet into a dead rock long before it explodes and wipes out the whole solar system.”
“Now I know why I call you Charlie. I don’t know a lot about this, my field of study is digging in the dirt, not studying stars. But from what little I know, there should be planets all over the universe. Why pick this one? What is so damned important about this planet?”
“Charlie’ passed what reflected a smile across his alien face. “Believe it or not, this planet is the only one within moving distance.”
Puzzled, Monica said, “What?”
“We have nearly five billion people on our planet. We have found other earth-like planets and even a few that were more hospitable for us. But they are not within moving distance of that many people.”
Monica’s blank stare said much to ‘Charlie.’
Charlie’s brief explanation gave her no information.
“You had heard of black holes. It is a place nothing escapes from, not even light. However it is also an opening to other places and times in the universe. These passage-ways are random and fluctuate greatly. In our travels we have discovered three fairly stable wormholes. Two lead to nowhere, but a small one leads to within twelve light years of your solar system. Most of the time. Other times it can lead to the other end of the universe. Gravitational waves, which are in a constant flux from neutron stars or super novas or any cosmic disturbance, are part of what controls the worm holes. That is why we need to come to Earth. It’s the only place we can come to.”
Monica couldn’t read Charlie. He was standing before her, his alienation complete. Literally and figuratively. No one else in the room had made an attempt to speak.
The almost imperceptible twist in her stomach told her that something was very wrong with his explanation. But she had no way knowing and was not going to open her mouth while she was here.
“You say there are others like me that will be finding the evidence of your being here long ago?”
“Yes. We have twenty-six of you in place. Each is in a field of study much as your own. Independently each will discover the remains of those of us that have perished. This will happen in a two to three year period. With this overwhelming evidence, the people of Earth will have to accept the facts. They may not embrace us and we will have a long period of adjustment. But the end result will be acceptance.”
Monica was pacing the length of the room as she listened. “And what if they don’t, ‘Charlie.’ What if the people of Earth refuse to accept you? What if they just can’t accept you? What will you do then?”
Sensing she had somehow made a grave error, she interrupted him before he could speak. “I just have a hard time seeing humans accepting you that easily. If what I read is correct, a large population believes God created everything ten thousand years ago and we are the ‘The Chosen Ones.’ How do you battle that belief?”
Something flickered in his eyes. “We cannot battle that belief, nor would we try. We would simply be here. The humans would find their own explanation.”
Monica suddenly felt drained of energy. Her thoughts were a jumble of words and emotions that couldn’t be defined. Abruptly she sat on the floor.
Charlie leaned over her. “Are you all right?”
She looked up and noticed the other aliens intently watching her. “Yeah, Charlie I’m fine. I just feel drained. Can I go home now?”
“Of course. This has been a very bad day for you, hasn’t it?”
She smiled. “No. Not bad. Just draining. Too much information at once. I need some R & R. Can I go home now?”
Charlie extended his hand to her and she grasped it without thinking. His skin was neither hot nor cold and had the feel of fine grained sandpaper. It also felt very thick.
She did not try to draw her hand away or ignore the feel of his. Instead, she took his hand in both of hers and examined the feel and look of it.
Smiling, she said, “I imagine my hand feels as alien to you as yours does to me.”
“Yes. It does.” He said. “It’s time for you to go home.”
Monica fell asleep right after she returned home. Her mom had to
wake her for dinner. She put all thoughts of Charlie and his kind in a
compartment and enjoyed her last evening at home with her parents. She would
drive back to
Charlie was
silent all that evening and in to the next morning. Monica examined her
thoughts and fears on her drive back to
It was dark when she pulled in to an empty spot in the campus parking lot. She looked around before getting out of her car. A few people could be seen coming and going and she felt it was safe.
As she opened the trunk to get her bag out, her world changed. She was still in the same parking lot, but everything was different. Monica slowly looked around, collecting all of the scenes on one reel, lest she end up with a broken tape. The sky was still dark, but more like a thick blue cloud cover. The few standing evergreen trees on the campus were brown with death.
There were few lights shinning in the windows of the buildings, when there should have been many. The street lights, powered by small solar panels and powerful batteries, were dark.
The parking lot was practically empty of cars and she seen only two other people. A strange type of aircraft flew overhead and she instinctively knew it was from Charlie’s race. She knew she was witnessing the end of her world. Or at least the end as she knew it.
She was running toward the building when the world changed again. She tripped over the curb and fell into the arms of two men whom seemed to be waiting for her.
“Monica Sewell?” One of them asked.
She took one look at the man who spoke her name, and fainted.
Coming to on a park bench and a little disoriented, Monica saw the two men talking quietly to one another.
“What the hell…” she muttered. I must really be losing it, she thought. Fainting twice in one month! Maybe I’ll take up drinking.
The man who spoke her name the first time asked her if she was Monica Sewell.
Sitting up, she glared at him. “Yeah, I am. What of it? And what are you? Another one of Charlie’s personifications?” She started to rise, but he gently put his hand on her shoulder, keeping her in place.
The other man spoke. “We need to talk to you about ‘Charlie’. We recently discovered he had been with you for many years, directing your path and manipulating others as well. You are the first one we have found. What do you know about ‘Charlie’?”
By now she was awake and very wary. She already decided there was Number One Man and Number Two Man.
She directed her question at Number Two. “Who are you?” she asked, with just a touch of irritation.
“Charlie, as you know him is second in charge of a large faction of dissidents on our home world. A great many follow him. They call themselves The Founders. They are in search of a new world to inhabit and once they inhabit this new world, they intend to make it their own. They have chosen Earth. This will eventually mean the complete annihilation of the human race.”
Monica was tired. Tired of the crap from who knew what. This time she did stand.
“These last couple of days have been really interesting but I am getting tired of the bullshit. Charlie, who has been in my head since I was a little girl, all of a sudden makes himself seen and tells me the sun which his planet orbits will explode in a few thousand years, killing off the whole solar system so he wants to find another planet and Earth seems to be the only one within ‘moving’ distance because of power consumption or some such thing.” She took a breath.
“Now you two show up and tell me he’s the bad guy and needs to be locked up. Is that correct? Don’t answer. How the hell do I know you’re even telling me the truth? Don’t answer that. How do I know you’re who you say you are? Just because you look human and Charlie don’t? If you’re of his race, why don’t you all look the same? And just how are these Founders going to annihilate the human race?”
The two men were silent.
“You can answer now, please.” She said, exasperated.
Number One spoke. “We are as you see us. We have Earth human genes also. Your scientists would find a few different strands of DNA, but we are essentially human. So is Charlie. Why he chose to show you a different skin is puzzling. Perhaps to see what your reaction would be and hopefully gain empathy.
As for who we are. You’ll have to take our word for it. We have no way to prove to you that we are, ‘the good guys,’ as you say. As for your destruction, The Founders have simply found another source of food. Which is your race.
Our home world was in danger. Not from an exploding star, but from a critical food shortage. We have one third as much tillable land as Earth and the same amount of people to feed. Over the last few decades we have managed to build raised platforms for the growth of food. However, the shortage was severe and it takes time to grow, process and distribute food to the people. We are rapidly gaining ground and in a year or two, there will be no shortage of food. We have also began to set up outposts on the other planets in our solar system. Much the same way as your people plan to do in the coming decades.
The Founders were established many hundreds of years before we gained the technology to build the platforms. They have been infiltrating Earth for millennia. Along the way, they became obsessed with Earth and will not give up their quest.
If they succeed, they will quickly destroy your atmosphere, for we can not live long in this oxygen enriched air.”
“Wait, wait, wait!” Monica interrupted. “If they were going to use us as a food source, they’d have to leave our atmosphere as it is in order for us to be able to keep multiplying. We have to eat!”
“I did not say The Founders were logical or far seeing. They are fanatics. You have fanatics here and are familiar with their methods, which have no basis in logic or the well being of the Earth and its people. They only know what they want and will destroy any and all in order to achieve this. Even if it eventually means their own demise.”
Monica was chewing her fingernails. Something she hadn’t done since she was seven.
“Why do The Founders need humans to accept them? It’s fairly obvious to me they could just come in and take over.”
Number Two spoke this time. “There is no logic in this. Only ego to be served. If ‘Charlie’ can succeed in by means of deceit and lies, it will give the Supreme Being, as the head of The Founders is known, more power among his followers. Which will allow him to recruit many more.”
Monica was getting tired and disgusted. “Okay, then. What is to prevent them from becoming impatient and just taking over? And what can I do to stop this? And how the hell did Charlie ever get into my head, to begin with?”
Number One spoke. “You have at least one implant under your skin on the back of your neck and possibly one inserted into the brain. We doubt you having one in the brain because you have not performed tasks against your will. But we do know you will have one in your neck. It is tied into your neural network so that Chamille can speak with you.
Monica, who had been standing, suddenly felt weak in the knees and had to sit down.
Number Two spoke, “We are sorry this has happened to you. We have been trying to capture Chamille and the Supreme Being for many years. Will you help us?”
These two men sounded so benign. Monica actually rolled her eyes and she hadn’t done that in years!
“Give me a break!” She exclaimed. “How the hell can I help you?” she asked, as she rubbed the back of her neck, feeling for the lump of an implant.
“When Chamille returns you need to ask him if you can meet the ‘head honcho’ or what ever term you would normally use. If he knows we have spoken with you he will vanish again. Of the many contacts he claims, you are the only one we are aware of at this time.”
He showed Monica a small cylinder. “When he comes back we will be able to track his signal if you keep this on your person.”
“What if I say no? Are you going to make me ‘go away?” Monica asked.
Number Two smiled. “No. We won’t make you ‘go away’. We will continue to look for Chamille without your help. He knows we pursue him. And if you tell him about us, he will only be more wary. I doubt he would harm you, but he will erase your memory of him.”
Monica stood and stretched, then said, “I tend to follow my instincts. And my instincts right now are to believe you. Charlie’s ‘presence’ doesn’t feel right anymore. He’s changed. Let me sleep on it, Okay? I’m weary and my bones are even aching.”
“We’ll be in touch in a few days.” Said Number One.
Monica put her
hand on Number One’s sleeve. “Before you leave, who put the pictures of all the
dead trees on the campus and a dark cloudy sky in my head?”
The men looked at each. “We did not do it.” Said Number Two. We have no control over you or your thoughts.”
Puzzled, Monica waved them a goodbye and headed toward her room.
A short search on the computer led her to a Dr. Horace Albright who claimed to have found alien implants in people and worked with a Dr. Karl Goldstein. Goldstein was a hypno-therapist.
Monica, always
skeptical, called Dr. Albright. He agreed to see her and she was on a plane to
Both Dr.’s
questioned her extensively before taking her to their clinic for an
Monica told them nothing of Number One and Number Two’s warning. She refused to be hypnotized and puzzled both doctors by electing to leave the implants where they were. She was back in her dorm late that night. Charlie was still silent and she had not tried to contact him.
She was still unsure of where the weird scenes came from, but she figured time and a thorough search would tell her.
Two days later, the two men were waiting for her as she left for class. It was cold and the low clouds held the promise of snow.
“Good morning!” She said cheerily. The men followed her as she led them to a more private area.
“Okay. You have my attention. But first, I would like to know your names so I can quit calling you Number One and Number Two.”
Number One smiled. “I am called Naton and this is Garonadelle.”
“No offense, but how about Nate and Dell?” Monica asked.
“That would be fine.” Nate assured her.
“I haven’t heard from Charlie since the day he told me of his plans. I don’t even know if I can pull this charade off. However I’m willing to give it a go. Where do I start?”
Dell handed her the small cylinder he had shown her a few days ago. “Keep this on your person at all times. We will be able to monitor any contact you have with Chamille through this sensor. If he takes you to see the Supreme Being, we can track you.”
Monica stared at the cylinder and thought of the all the implications this small piece of metal meant. She didn’t know if she was up to it but she was willing to try.
“You know this is like a scene from some hokey science fiction movie. The heroine dashes off to places unknown, trying to save the world from the Evil Empire. Hah!”
Then she started laughing and said, “Or like an old book I read years ago, I don’t even remember its name, but it’s about these extraterrestrials that come to Earth and they have this book on ‘How to Serve Man.’ Well everybody thought it was for the good of the human race and that the aliens were our friends. Well the “How to Serve Man’ book turns out to be a cook book.”
Nate and Dell looked alarmed. Her humor was definitely alien to them.
“Don’t worry about it.” Monica told them. “I’ll do what needs to be done.”
Then she giggled. “Trust me”