Smoking Power

Chapter 6

Gareth leads us to a room with multiple screens lining the wall. Each screen is the size of a small flat screen TV. All of them is showing a selected part of Earth. Kind of like zoomed out security cameras.

Gareth stops walking in front of one in the corner of the room. This one is a zoomed out version of Earth. Every now and then you see a satellite or a piece of space junk floating past.

"This is our viewing room." Gareth waves his hand around the room, "we made our own satellites and sent them all over the world. All of them are in space, orbiting around Earth. The only reason that we can see things so closely is because the have a magnification of up to x9730."

"Why exactly are you spying on everyone?" Declan slowly asks Gareth.

"We like to keep a check on things." Gareth simply says, "evidently this is how we found you guys. We can see everywhere except for a few selected areas."

"Which selected areas?" Amber examines the screens, fascinated by the technology.

Gareth shrugs, "Hogmer outposts, your homestead, a couple of other shelters made by some of our enemies." I let out a relieved breath when he said he couldn't see the homestead. Gareth seems like a really nice bloke, but he may not be the only one with this technology. But that still doesn't answer how the homestead got compromised.

"Why are you showing us this?" I ask him.

Gareth lets in a deep breath, "because I believe that we have a common enemy, the Hogmers. I don't know why you were fighting them or why you were at that bomb shelter and it isn't my business. I have seen multiple people and species trying to battle it out with Hogmers but none of them survived for as long as you guys did."

Declan gulps, "survived?"

"Yes. A lot of people have died from them. This mansion used to be filled with my strongest warriors, my family and my friends. Now only a couple of us remain from that ghastly fight we had with Hogmers. Others, were hit by their spitballs. None have survived from that type of injury before."

I nod my head at Gareths explanation. That explains why Gareth doesn't like them and why this place is practically deserted. Amber leans over so only Declan and I can hear her, "Declan, it's probably the power you have in your legs that let you survive."

Gareth doesn't know what our powers are so we'll try to keep it that way. I clear my throat loudly, "So now that we have these very insightful information. What do you expect us to do?"

Gareth smiles now, "you guys are strong and I believe that you are the only ones that can stop the Hogmers."

"Stop the Hogmers?" Declan seems quite sceptical.

"Yes, stop the Hogmers. The ultimate weapon against them. It's called a 'lavapick'." Gareth leans in closer and whispers it like its the secret to the universe.

Declan tries to stop himself from smiling. I can tell that he thinks Gareth hit his head, "A 'lavapick'? What does it do?" Declan speaks to Gareth as you would speak to a four year old.

If Gareths noticed Declan teasing him, he doesn't let on, "A lavapick is a metal stick thing about the size of pen. It can create huge waves of light and heat when the controller wants it to. The thing is though, the lavapick can do this on any frequency. So it can create masses of light and heat to only one race."

"So this lavapick is basically a wand?" Declan smirks at Gareth. He is enjoying himself way to much here.

Gareth looks appalled at Declans attitude to something so important, "it's not a wand." Gareth spits the word out as if it's a serial murderer. "The lavapick is the key to our success." Yeah I'm kinda starting to agree with Declan with Gareth being crazy.