Starborn Odyssey: Voyage of the Lost (The Starborn Odyssey Trilogy Book 3)
Page 26
The machine was completed in less than a year. They were only days away from cutting the first of their own produced crystals for testing in one of their smaller saucers, when the unexpected happened. An alien ship set down within sight of their village. Gemma woke Shana first with the news. Shana told her to awaken the other senior members of the colony but to wait to wake the children until they knew what they were dealing with. Shana slipped out of bed and dressed, waking Elton to join her.
The village was still only one street but had many more buildings than when they had first arrived. Shana met her crew at the center of town and together they walked to the end of the street where the ship had landed. Kelsan was armed; the others decided that the difference in technology was such that being armed didn’t make much difference. And then they caught their first ever glimpse of the Saucerites.
The people were humanoid, but neither Earthling nor Reeshian. They were hairless and almost as white as snow. Their heads were almost twice as wide as a human skull, disproportionate to their faces. They stood about five feet tall but had exceptionally thin bodies and long skinny fingers. Their eyes were uniformly black and shone in the starlight. It was impossible to tell if they were happy, or angry, welcoming or condemning. Shana registered all of this in just moments. The Saucerites stood there, motionless, watching the Starborn approach.
Shana stepped forward a few feet, while signaling the others to stay back for the moment. No one objected; the situation was too surreal. One of the Saucerites did the same and said something Shana couldn’t quite hear from their current distance. She noticed that the Saucerites’ ears were almost flat to their heads but about the same shape as any other humans. They wore what appeared to be one piece outfits of solid colors, but all fashioned pretty much the same and completely unadorned of any sort of symbols of rank or jewelry.
Shana walked slowly forward and the Saucerite matched her step for step until they were about ten feet apart. The alien looked unblinking at Shana for a long moment, then took another hesitant step and spoke again. It didn’t appear to speak English, but immediately after its quiet voice spoke, Shana heard his words in English. She couldn’t see the interpreting device, but it was obviously there.
“We come in peace,” the alien said. It was so much like a script for an old sci-fi movie that Shana almost laughed—only nerves, and the fact that she was shaking, kept her from doing so.
“We welcome you, and thank you for all of your assistance,” she said—and then for a brief moment thought—I hope these are the Saucerites or that comment will be really embarrassing!
“We’ve watched your worlds for many years,” the alien said. So they were the Saucerites after all. “Those of you from what you call Earth and New Reesh have progressed rapidly. We could not afford to ignore your progression any longer.”
“So you are truly the people that were rumored to have been seen on our home worlds for so many years,” Shana answered.
“Yes, but not us alone,” the Saucerite acknowledged. He continued, “We have not made ourselves known on Earth because it is still not safe for visiting; they still make war. I fear they will go the same way as Grod, the little moon planet you recently visited. Those of you who left your home worlds behind—you who call yourselves Starborn— have learned to live in peace and without the greed that destroys so many civilizations. We’ve seen that it was just a matter of time before you would find a way to navigate the stars as we’ve been doing for the last two hundred million of your years. We are spread over a large number of planets, as you will be also before another millennia passes. We don’t settle where people are warlike but even we haven’t visited all of the worlds. We have a reason for giving you the tools to find your way among the stars. We will shortly give you the key for navigation, as well. But our reason is not altruistic, or selfless.”
Shana tensed at this, anxious to understand what that meant.
The Saucerites continued, “We dwell on forty plus worlds, mostly in the next spiral arm over from yours. By giving you the map, and the navigational tools, we wish to avoid you coming to our worlds.”
The statement came as a shock to Shana. Did they think the humans so unworthy? Or were they simply antisocial? She chided herself immediately for such a projection of Earth motivations on this alien race. She did not need to understand their reasons to respect them. Aloud she said, “We will honor your desires in this matter, of course. Your help and guidance is greatly appreciated and we will heed your advice in every way possible.”
“You will have no shortage of worlds at your disposal. Even we have barely put a dent in the galaxy, but will warn you that there are some warlike peoples, different from either of us genetically. Those of which we know will be included in the information we give to you, in hopes that it saves you trouble. We know that you almost got caught in a solar system war some years back, and you had the wisdom to leave immediately. We applauded your actions and it was one of the factors in our deciding that you Starborn have advanced beyond the pettiness of your home worlds.”
The statement gave Shana such a rush of happiness, that she wondered if there was a transmission of more than just words. The feeling emboldened her to ask a question that had been on her mind for a long time. “What of the little blue people we saw on the primitive moon near here? Are they someone you rescued from another world?”
“Yes,” he answered. “Their world was in a neighboring system and that location was the most like their home world. They are very timid and prefer to be left alone, but you aren’t forbidden to make contact. We can give you a code that would let you enter their protected environment, but they are a dying race, and we urge both caution and compassion in deciding whether you wish to make contact. Their genetic codes are too different from any other species we’ve found, and there wasn’t a sufficient variation in the group we saved, to save the race. They live long but there have been no new births in more than a hundred years. We chose to let them live out their time in peace. Even our science can’t save them and the loss of their gentleness saddens us greatly.”
Shana was stunned into silence for a few moments. The story was too horrible to even think about. They’d looked so happy and content going about their lives when they looked at the recordings of them. Shana had been unaware of the rest of her group joining her and Elton spoke up.
“We will of course, leave the little folk in peace.”
Shana was glad he’d said it since she’d been choked up by the tale. The alien did not nod, but Shana felt a wave of gratitude. She thought, suddenly, that there was no interpretive device; the Saucerite did not need it. He spoke, and willed the words to make sense in Shana’s mind. She could almost feel the empathy as if it was a tangible thing.
“Yes; we have extremely heightened senses,” the alien acknowledged, surprising her further.
Shana asked, “What do you call yourselves?”
“We have many names but the name you use, ‘Saucerites’ has a nice ring to it.” Shana was startled; this seemed to be a joke, but there was no evidence of humor on the alien’s face. Still, she felt as if he was transmitting a humorous feeling in her direction, and she smiled. “But if you prefer, we’re best known as the Elleavan.”
She smiled at this.
“We also wanted to let you know,” the Elleavan continued, “that one of your saucer ships, the one that was not destroyed, did succeed in getting the message that you were still alive to your ship Prometheus, and we thought you might find some comfort in knowing it.”
“Have you been monitoring Prometheus?” Elton asked impulsively. “Do you know what caused the gravity loss? Do you know if they are okay?”
The Elleavan seemed to think about his answer carefully. “We caused the gravity loss. We probed Prometheus’ power source, as part of our evaluation of your species, to decide whether or not to help you. The probe caused some damage, which we did not anticipate, but nevertheless it was necessary. There was a time, initially, that we b
elieved you might need to be restrained from further exploration. But we have since changed our opinions on that matter.”
“What changed your minds?” Shana felt emboldened by the openness of the Elleavan, and sensed they were neither concerned about her questions, nor rushed to leave.
“We probed the Prometheus twice. Both times, we intercepted thousands of transmissions being directed toward the ship, from your saucer ships. They were being sent in non-space, which is also non-time. Although you cannot travel through time, some things can—and our energy of our probe pulled one of the saucer’s messages through time. Even so, there was no way for the transmissions to be received by the ship. But someone on the Prometheus did receive part of those non-space messages, when our probe created the smallest opening for it. Your first saucer ship had transmitted not just informational messages, but after some time began to transmit personal ones, addressing one person by name. Our scans showed that he heard the message, at least, a portion of it. This should have been impossible, but it was not. And this showed a degree of empathic potential that gives us great hope for the advancement of your race.”
“And the saucer ships?” Gemma asked. Shana had not seen her appear, but the hologram was standing next to her. The tone sounded more human than Gemma had sounded in a long time.
The Elleavan tilted its head toward Gemma, its most human gesture yet. “The first saucer ship jumped out of non-space too close to a star, and was engulfed. The second crashed on a moon, and on inspection, the circuitry was destroyed. The entities piloting the craft no longer existed. The third remains active, but uncontrolled jumps through non-space can only go on so long before disaster strikes. They will not survive forever.”
Gemma nodded curtly.
“You are the second reason we decided to assist the Starborn,” The Elleavan said to Gemma.
No one spoke for a long moment. “Why?” Gemma asked, finally.
“The sophistication of your program, and the clear connection between you and your Starborn friends, proves to us that your race is ready to handle our technology with maturity, empathy, and thoughtfulness.”
Gemma nodded. “We will strive to,” she said.
The Elleavan looked as if it was preparing to leave.
Pixie stepped quickly forward. “Can the children meet you?” she asked, her voice almost too quiet to hear.
The Elleavan replied quickly. “No. This is our last visit to you. We will feed the data into your computer for redesigning your ship’s guidance system to accommodate the vast charts and new navigational algorithms necessary for non-space travel. We will also transmit our charts, to take you safely through this quadrant of our galaxy. There are a million worlds here alone; we’ve never in all our years gone beyond one quadrant. Your Earth is at the very edge of the section of the galaxy that we are from, and we rarely have gone beyond it. It’s been more than enough to occupy us without going further. There are many more worlds than you can visit in ten lifetimes—even your lifetimes.” This last was directed to Gemma, they knew, although it wasn’t clear quite how they knew. The Elleavan spoke to Shana again. “Earth was just close enough to our world that we’ve learned a lot about our history from watching yours. Don’t under any circumstances take the technology or knowledge we give you to your home world of Earth. They are still making war, and should they begin to travel we would have to destroy them.”
There was a pause, and when next it spoke, the Elleavan sounded weary. “It’s very taxing dealing with your type of communication, so we must leave now. We won’t be back, now that we have delivered what you need to explore without encroaching on our territories. Fare well, and in peace.”
He turned and walked back to his group and then back to their ship.
“Thank you!” Shana called out, too late, but received no confirmation that he’d heard her. She felt somewhat like a child standing there watching the grownups leaving, yet felt full and happy. They would have all they needed, and it was the end of thousands of years of mystery. They could learn to navigate quickly, and return to Prometheus, and bring their families home to Hope. And then . . . and then they could begin to think about more adventures.
They all stood there and watched the Elleavan ship rise up and then simply disappear into the dark sky so fast it was startling even to them. Shana looked around and realized everyone else was as stunned and elated as she was.
No one spoke for a long moment. Then Tanya began to giggle, and couldn’t seem to stop.
“What?” Kelsan finally demanded.
“It’s just . . .” Tanya had to fight to say it. “Weren’t they supposed to be green?” and then she collapsed into laughter. It was such a ridiculous thought that Shana began to laugh too, and then the rest as well.
As they turned to go back to the village in the early morning light, they saw that most of the younger generation was out, coming towards them, and extremely excited about what they’d just seen—although they’d only seen the ship rising from the ground and did not yet know all that it portended. There were, of course, recordings of the entire meeting, stored on their Links, for the children to watch later.
“Who woke you up?” Shana asked warmly as she reached the group of them.
“I did,” Gemma said. “They deserved to see.” And Shana could not disagree with her.
“We’ve learned so much in the last half hour,” Elton said.
“And have much more to learn,” Gemma agreed. “The Elleavan have provided even more than they promised—the history of their people, and their science in other areas. We will be very busy.”
“First things first,” Shana said. “Let’s see about getting my brother on the phone.” She grinned, and Gemma, for the first time in a very long time, grinned back.
Epilogue
And so at last humankind took its place among the stars.
The crew of Prometheus was brought to Hope, where after a joyous reunion they joined the young colony, which continues to thrive to this day.
The Striders that remained, with the exception of Gemma and Cap, all voted to take the Prometheus back to Olympus, the first world other than Earth or New Reesh that the human branch, as we knew it, made home. They succeeded in reviving the MCS (Old Miss) sufficiently to keep it in orbit as a museum, and stayed there to tend it. It was maintained as a testament to humankind’s first endeavors to save humanity from possible oblivion in a world of uncertainty.
And the adventure continues.
About the Author
Haines Sigurdsson was born in 1944 and grew up on a farm outside of Atlantic City, New Jersey, where he worked hard and read all the science fiction he could get his hands on. Haines is a traveler, a musician, an expert campfire builder, and a dreamer. Haines now lives in retirement in Largo, Florida with his family, where he enjoys the warm waters of the Gulf, and has finally had time to write. His first complete works, the Starborn Odyssey trilogy, grew out of his life-long hobby of studying astronomy and space travel theory.
Enjoy the entire
STARBORN ODYSSEY TRILOGY
by Haines Sigurdsson:
STARBORN ODYSSEY
STARBORN ODYSSEY:
VOYAGE OF PROMETHEUS
STARBORN ODYSSEY:
VOYAGE OF THE LOST
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