It's about Time
Chapter 7
It had taken Rick a week to gather everything he thought he might need. He still didn't know just how strong the aliens were, but he'd been warned that they were really fast.
Not that he had been sitting on his ass all week long. Far from it in fact. Finding what he wanted hadn't been all that easy. Some of the things, yes, though others had been a lot harder. He had, however, gotten pretty far in his remodel of her courtyard that had been left to its own devices and was now a mess.
Actually it was still a bit of a mess. At least the mess was now a little more organized. All of the pavers that had made up the courtyard were now piled up in one corner and all of the weeds were now piled up in another corner. And all of the pots were in yet another corner. Their contents had been spread out all over.
The three new members of his family were stretching their legs and looking the place over. That was until one of them had found the bowl of water and the food bowl. The other two didn't want to be left out so they came bounding to join him.
Rick was smiling widely when he heard the front door. Janelle was off at her job so he closed the door behind him and ran to the front door.
"Delivery for Richard Castle."
"I'll open the double doors and you can drop them off just inside," Rick said then closed and locked the front door and jogged over to the double doors to open them.
"Just drop them right here, if you please." He watched as the two of them unloaded fourteen bags of compost.
"Thanks, guys." He even gave each of them a small tip for dropping them inside the doors and not out on the sidewalk. He had little hope that they would carry them all the way to the courtyard for him. In his Angel form he could carry several of them with ease so it would be quick and simple for him. He just had to do it when no one was home or watching.
Rick closed both of the doors, locked them, then ran to the courtyard. It was time to get busy with why he was there.
"You three ready to do your job?" he asked then proceeded to check his box to make sure he had everything. "Collapsible bowl for the water. Water bottles, one for you and one for me. Three pairs of handcuffs. Three sets of leg shackles. One gun and three bolts for said gun.
It was just about 2:00 pm so he picked up his three new buddies and put them in the box, then picked up the box and headed for a house phone. He needed to hail a taxi to get to the park.
\O/ + |X| + \O/ + |X| + \O/+ |X|+ \O/+ |X| + \O/
Rick paid the driver and picked up his box, looked at his passengers, and started walking.
The first one was right where he had last seen it about a week ago. This was a good thing but it also left him wondering just when they got to move at all. There were a few people around at this time of day, but it wasn't that busy.
Rick walked up to it and looked it over. It didn't look like anything had changed. Maybe it got to touch someone then stayed right were it was. Well, when he was done, that's just what it would be doing. Staying right there.
"Okay you three time to start work. Huey, Dewey, and Louie, your job is to keep your eyes on this statue. Don't take your eyes off of it," Rick told the three kittens that he had bought from a really nice lady that was selling kittens.
Rick smiled as he watched the three of them sit down and stare at the statue. Satisfied that the statue was going to stay a statue he pulled out a pair of handcuffs and attached them to the arms that it was holding to its face covering its eyes.
"There, that should hold your hands in place." It could still reach out and touch someone. It just wasn't going to be that easy now.
Rick turned to his box where he pulled out a metal stake, loaded it into his gun, and placed it on the ground. Next came a pair of shackles with a heavy chain between them.
Making sure that his buddies were still on duty he attached one to its ankle, removed the combination lock, then put it in place and spun the combination. Each lock had a different combination and he hadn't bothered to memorize any of them. He had no plans on ever removing them so it didn't matter.
With one leg secure he worked on the other. Then he looked up at his new friend and his buddies just to make sure. He picked up his gun and fired the bolt between the chains and into the concrete.
It looked nice and tight and Rick even tested it just to be sure. It could move its legs maybe an inch at best. "There, now let's see just how fast you are." He was pleased with himself.
He dropped his gun back into his box. "Huey, Dewey, Louie, come here, boys. Time for the next one." The kittens came bounding over to him and got lifted into the box. With the box in his arms, Rick headed for the next statue.
Rick was forced to delay his work on the next statue since this area had far more people. It wasn't that he didn't mind people seeing him doing it. It was just that he didn't need the questions or having them calling the police on him.
Then things got worse. He took the kittens out so they could move around and actually have some fun. This got people, mostly women and kids to come over so they could play with the kittens. So much so that the kittens didn't even have a spare moment to finish drinking some water from their bowl.
It took like three hours for most of the people to go away. It was closer to 5:00 pm when he finally got started on the second statue.
It went quickly and was just as easy as the first one. Cuffs on their wrists, shackles for their legs that were in turn bolted to the concrete. "Two down. You three ready for number three? …Or not." Rick found them in a furry pile next to the box sleeping. "Maybe I should have used puppies." It was just a threat and the little trio weren't even listening.
Rick took a chance and moved to the third target for the day. Only when he rounded the corner it wasn't there. "So they do get around." That wasn't good news. He decided to walk the area anyway to see if it had gone far.
He did actually see one and it was standing on the concrete this time. But they all looked the same to him so he didn't know if this was the same one or a different one. It was all alone like the last two. And like the others it had its hands over its eyes. "You guys really can't risk seeing each other, can you?" It helped explain why he only ever found one at a time in any location.
"Come on, you three, I need the help." He would make it as fast as possible but he needed them awake and watching to make sure it stayed a statue.
Like last time Rick started with the wrists then moved on to the legs and was done just in time to watch the three of them drop right where they were sitting.
"Okay you guys let's go home." Rick picked up two of them and placed them in the box. He had picked up the third and was just placing it in the box when he heard the sound of the shackles moving and the spike being tested.
That had Rick spinning his head to look and he saw that it had lowered its still restrained hands and for the first time he could see its face. It had a face just like he expected. It had eyes, a nose, lips, cheeks, eyebrows. However, it was the mouth that had most of his attention. It was hanging wide open and yes, it had a tongue, but its mouth was filled with teeth that he could swear looked like those of a vampire.
"Aren't you lovely looking. …NOT!" These things just might turn out to be very dangerous. Especially when no one was looking for any length of time. It had only had a second to test its restraints. What was going to happen when it had hours during the night to test them?
Rick kept his unblinking eyes on it while he reached blindly for his box. Once he had it he stood up with it in his arms and backed away. Main problem was that he didn't have eyes in the back of his head so he didn't know just where he was going.
Now he had a quandary and it wasn't a good one. Stop watching the statue and have it seriously test its restraints or change into an Angel and fly as fast as he could and hope. Hope that it didn't get free too soon. Hope that if or when it did that it couldn't fly fast enough to catch up to him. Hope that the entire city or even half of it wouldn't see him.
Rick made his choice; he changed into his Angel form and leapt up into the air while trying to keep an eye on the statue. He took his eyes off of it and looked at the sleeping kittens and flapped his wings as fast as he could and hoped for the best.
He chose to fly just above treetops and all of the lower buildings. If anyone did see him they would only see him for a blink of an eye. He had never flown this fast before. He finally reached an area that looked safe enough to land on. Once he was down he changed to human quickly, walked out onto the sidewalk, and started looking for a taxi.
His one big hope was that if anyone did see him they would also see the statue and doing that would force it to stop flying and fall to the ground. That left him with a question. If it did crash to the ground or maybe slammed into a building, would it shatter into pieces since it was now basically a statue? Plus if he got into a fight with one was he the stronger of the two?
Killing was a sin so even killing one of these things was out; capturing them was all he had for now. Even if it was simply restraints and not an actual prison.
\O/ + |X| + \O/ + |X| + \O/+ |X|+ \O/+ |X| + \O/
Rick let himself in and went down to his room. Then he went up the stairs and out to the courtyard where he took the kittens out and put them to bed after making sure they had water and food.
His new problem was that he was too wound up to go to sleep. He was tired but his mind was still running a mile a minute so he searched for a book to read. He would go back to work on the courtyard tomorrow.
\O/ + |X| + \O/ + |X| + \O/+ |X|+ \O/+ |X| + \O/
Rick ran into Janelle in the kitchen since he was interested in breakfast. "Good morning. Do you have another shift today?" he inquired as he watched her look for a cereal box.
"I do but today should be a short shift. I'm taking someone else's shift so they can go on vacation." Rick thought she was a really nice woman and doing this for someone at the hospital only helped his opinion of her.
"A vacation sounds nice. Have you considered a cruise? Many cruise ships have rooms for a single person. Caribbean, perhaps, or Greece, maybe? Oh, I know, Hawaii! Who can resist Hawaii." Rick was thinking she worked too hard. "You might meet that someone special," he singsonged to try and make it sound more appealing.
She shot him down. "My husband was my someone special and I have too much work to do to take a long vacation."
Rick was undaunted. "Living in Hawaii might be really nice. No more snow, ice, taxis. Just the beach and sunshine and swimsuits."
She fought back. "Hawaii is for the young. Perhaps you should take your own advice. All of those lovely young women walking around in bikinis. If you like Hawaii so much why are you in New York?" She had yet to see him bring anyone home. Even if she did barely ever see him as it was.
Rick shook his head. "I'm needed here and before you say it, Hawaii has hospitals. I'm sure they would dearly love to have you there. You could sell this place and buy a condo if doing yard work scares you."
"Speaking of yard work you've gotten pretty far already. I'm interested in seeing it when you're done." It was still mostly a mess, but now it was a more organized mess.
"Have you been peeking?" Rick tried to give her the evil eye that she was cheating by peeking.
"My house, my courtyard. And you still need to send me the bill for the supplies you're planning to use." It was her house and he shouldn't be spending his money to fix it up.
"I'll make you a deal. I'll find you a cruise for one and a condo in Hawaii that you'll at least consider and I'll let you see the bills." He said see the bills, not pay the bills.
Janelle thought about it. Anything he found she could reject and not bother even looking at them. "Deal. What are your plans for today?" She was almost done eating and ready to leave for work.
"I got a load of compost that I need to work into the ground into the planting beds. I'm also expecting a load of stone for a wall along with some more supplies. I need to do some digging and put in a liner once I have a hole. Oh, and some paint and supplies." He had a busy day planned in the courtyard today.
"Digging, liner. What are you up to?" She was sure anything he did would be better than what she had now, but now she was curious.
"Oh, no, I'm not spilling the beans. And no more peeking or it won't be a surprise, and remember you promised to look at what I find for you. You deserve to be happy." He shook a finger at her.
"I made no such promise," Janelle countered though now she was thinking that she really was going to look at what he found for her. "Have fun digging." She drank her orange juice down and left in search of her purse.
Rick cleaned everything up and filled the dishwasher when he was done and turned it on.
"Huey, Dewey, and Louie, you three need to stay out of the way today. Today is your day off, we can play after I'm done digging my hole." Rick was dressed for making another mess and got started digging.
\O/ + |X| + \O/ + |X| + \O/+ |X|+ \O/+ |X| + \O/
He was interrupted twice for deliveries that he then had to move from the front double doors to the courtyard and pile it all up out of the way. Now he just needed the pump, tubing, fire pits, and the new patio furniture. Except he wasn't ready for that stuff yet. He would plant the plants before he filled the pool with water since they would all be on the other side of the pool up against the wall. He also needed to get the painting finished before he put in the liner to make sure he didn't put a hole in it.
\O/ + |X| + \O/ + |X| + \O/+ |X|+ \O/+ |X| + \O/
Rick threw his shovel out of his hole in the ground and looked around. He had shoveled all of the dirt to one side and needed to build the wall so that he could shovel all that dirt behind the wall where the plants were going to go. Yet he couldn't do that until the paint got there so he could paint the mural.
Fortunately the hole was only three feet deep. No one was meant to swim in it save maybe for a few fish that he needed to talk her into getting if he could. Plus he had one change he wanted to talk her into. Right now the only entrance was through his space. Meaning down a set of stairs, across the length of the house, then up another set of stairs. But there were three windows on one wall and he wanted to talk her into replacing the lower window with a door.
"What!?" Rick saw Dewey at the edge and looking down into his hole. "Sorry, no water yet and no fish for you." Then he heard the front door. "That had better be the paint and not the blocks for the wall." He was tired and didn't need to be moving blocks down the stairs, through his space, then back up the stairs and find someplace out of the way to stack them.
\O/ + |X| + \O/ + |X| + \O/+ |X|+ \O/+ |X| + \O/
Rick fell backwards onto his bed; he was dead tired. It hadn't been the paint and he'd spent the time moving two pallets of blocks for the wall two blocks at a time. "I need a massage!" Then he groaned when the front door bell sounded. "Blast!"
It hurt to get up and it hurt to walk up the stairs to the door where he found that the paint for his mural was there. He now had everything he needed save the patio furniture and the fire pits but the fire pits would just slip into the empty space so they could be last.
Now he was looking forward to going back to securing statues to the concrete. He also needed to check on the ones he'd already secured. Especially that last one. Was his plan actually working or were they strong enough to escape? That led to a new question. How long did these things live? What he was doing wasn't a permanent solution and so far he didn't have one. If there even was one. Which meant was he going to have to be doing this forever? As in forever kind of forever?