Suppose We

by Geoff Nelder

  “You don’t need to, kid,” Penn said, pointing behind them.

  Alongside the Kep floated Em’s plane. Somehow it had emerged from the tower unseen and was now pointed at the spiral tower. It vibrated as if it had its engines ignited, but with brakes on, waiting for a command. Gaston swore a flame burst out of the rear. Odd, he assumed it wouldn’t use old-fashioned rocketry. It came. It shot at the tower again and darted inside.

  Gaston scrutinised the Kep, who did a kind of dance with repeated bending towards the tower.

  Em stood, hands on hips. “It really wants us to do run into the tower, again, but I’m not fancying that, at all.”

  Penn drew his laser pistol. “If the kid wants us to enter that Escher-tower-cum-tunnel thing then let’s go, but I’ll make a doorway.”

  “Un moment. Suppose it melts the whole building, again? Or another catastrophe?”

  “Keep out of the way, both of you. Here goes. It’s like cutting into a safe.” He stood, feet apart and initiated a vertical burn. A smell of cordite and ozone accompanied wisps of blue smoke. The clicks from the Kep rose in frequency as if it was in panic, and perhaps ozone was emitted by it too.

  Gaston’s eyes flicked between the new doorway and the Kep. Surprisingly the creature didn’t move. Perhaps too scared if it had not seen such a weapon. He was annoyed that Penn, once again took on the offensive role as if they were at war. This was an act of vandalism at best, which might be seen as wanton destruction worthy of harsh punishment. A bit late, but Gaston thought it prudent to have water ready for fire extinction. A large specimen bag and a nearby deep puddle was all he could use in the few minutes it took Penn to finish an oval doorway.

  The Kep rushed past them and hovered at the hole.

  “Nooo!” Em cried. “It’s too hot. Don’t touch the sides yet.”

  Gaston made ready to douse the creature in case it became burnt, wondering how it would react if whatever it was made from caught fire. He needn’t have worried, the Kep flew through the gap and vanished to the left.

  Gaston hesitated. “I am uncertain as to following it.”

  Em put her arm in his elbow. “Nor me, are you going in, Penn?”

  He straightened up, his smirk demonstrating smugness at his success. “We should stick together. As your commander, I’m ordering us in, but you can follow me.”

  He hadn’t stowed his pistol, but he changed its setting, aimed it in front and marched towards the gap. However, the Kep reappeared, so Penn stood back.

  “Retreat!” yelled Penn, “There’s more of them. It’s a trap.”

  A LAMENT FROM CANTATA

  I worry. Suppose We is suspended twenty metres in front of me, in a long and straight tunnel to garage our craft a kilometre long with a forty-metres diameter body. I am thinking they cut this tunnel just to house our ship. I am uncertain why they went to the trouble although the storms above might be one reason. Perhaps they have enemies eager to spy on new technology. Suppose We might be unseen, but surely not advanced compared to this society? However, what is not understood by the wise, remains a potential for genius. Or, perhaps they think we are even more backward and are fascinated by antique technology.

  No flitters on guard, yet I detect operations on board. Instead of entering via the main hatch I venture over to one I made for this CAN form at the crash site a few days ago. A small flyer-flap, difficult to detect by the ignorant. No lights are on, none needed with the sensors I possess. I wirelessly tap into my mother AI. My buffers fill in moments with data from our QM marble satellites, but more worrying is the ship’s status. Why would the flitters take so much trouble to repair and reassemble Suppose We only to begin dismantling it?

  My estimate is that they couldn’t make it work. Good, I encrypted the mother AI and the ship cannot operate without it. I access the remote mission package status. Undisturbed. Green. Excellent and not just because a memo from Science Officer Gaston Poirier tells me about the large prokaryote-like bacteria infecting the environment he’s been in. I’ll ask the flitters. I see three of them behind me. A moment.

  A moment lasts 0.001 seconds.

  I discover: The bacteria has spread throughout the planet. It has killed most of the Keps and is disintegrating the infrastructure. The flitters have accepted my joint project as a possible solution. Kep survival + mission aim = potential mutual benefit.

  The weather is too unstable to live on the surface. Oh no. I see part of their global solution for that. Penn will be ashamed.

  That and the mission needs now to be relayed to the crew. I’ll send them critical data after the flitters talk to their Keps. I am wondering which are the masters and which the servants.

  Signed CAN

  Date: Earth January 23rd 3645 Kepler New 14 days

  Gaston, already clammy with the local weather in the late afternoon, shivered with the rivulet of stress perspiration snaking down between his shoulder blades. With the exception of the little one, all the Keps have been indifferent to this human micro invasion. He still didn’t get why an intelligent native population could not be engrossed at an alien exploratory expedition, but shook his head at his anthropomorphic assumptions. So, what was coming out of the tower’s interior? Their first encounter with weaponry? What would it be like?

  He cowed as the Kep appeared to be pushed to one side.

  Gaston gasped as a woman appeared in the doorway and ran towards them. She was naked, black, Delta?

  Penn strode towards her, arms outstretched, but she swerved past him and fell into Gaston, who had to hug her, staggering to avoid falling. For a moment it was as if they danced, but her momentum was only partially diminished and they fell. Gaston on the floor with a sobbing woman writhing on top.

  Penn pulled her off while the astonished, red-faced Gaston looked up, seeing Em initially grinning with delight then with her eyebrows signalling worry. Delta wriggled away from Penn and again launched herself onto the prone Gaston. Her eyebrows steepled over wet eyes painting a picture of desperation.

  “Lis…Listen… I’ve escaped... tried to kill me…maybe have killed me, once.”

  Out of compassion for her plight and her desperation, Gaston hugged her. He glanced over at Em, who was pulling clothes out of Delta’s own pack they’d lugged around. She launched a moon-blanket over her friend. Delta pulled it around her, but she wouldn’t release her grasp of Gaston.

  He found enough breath to say to the others, “She is not delirious, but has a message. Gather around.”

  Delta continued her report in gasps of concatenated bursts. “Some of them are pissed off … with …” she pointed at Penn, who bristled, “…destruction of their salvation. Blame us. Eliminate us.”

  Penn burst out laughing.

  Em hushed him, but he thrust himself at Delta, still embracing Gaston. Penn blurted out, “We found you, kid. In a fucking coffin, underground. Dead as a pair of old slippers.”

  “Actually,” Gaston gasped, “she was a little warm. Our instruments are too crude—”

  Penn jumped in. “You a hologram now – ah, clearly not, so that apparition in the coffin?”

  “I don’t know. Was… was out for most of it, everything since I fell through the floor in that building you set alight.”

  Penn leaned over, his new red moustache wriggling its own argument. “I was fucking saving you!”

  “Guys, guys,” Em called and waved her hands wide in a calming gesture. “Let’s be grateful we have our companion back.”

  “Oui, nous saluons le retour,” and on Gallic instinct kissed both her cheeks. Reddening those of the onlooking Em.

  Delta became agitated again. Now on her feet, she pointed at the woods. “Hurry. Out of sight.”

  Penn snorted. “Delusional.”

  “No,” Em said, “she’s had more experience with them and it’s getting dark.”

  Gaston agreed. “Let us camp for tonight in those trees, hear Delta’s experiences and make a judgment for action in the morning. Right, Penn?”
>
  “Harrumph. Oh, I’ve had ping from CAN or whatever our demented AI is calling himself. You, Gas?”

  He had, but was happy to read the message once they were out of sight.

  They ate a vegetable hotpot of a kind, surprisingly tasty with the ubiquitous starchy roots and kale-like purple leaves, added to with berries, glutinous mallow-like flowers, Kep onions and giant red beans tasting to Penn like pork, but to the others like pear.

  Em and Gaston chose to wait until Delta was properly dressed, fed, rested and dosed with trace nootropic sufficient to induce well-being. Em was picked to gently interrogate Delta about her capture and treatment.

  “I remember very little. Sorry guys, I’d wake up confused. I might have been sampled because I have this needle hole here.”

  “Ah, that might have been me,” Gaston confessed. “I was taking a bloo—”

  “No matter,” Delta said. “other samples might have been taken, but then at one point a blade lunged at my eyes. I was able to turn just in time.” Her tears welled up, spilling down her face.

  Em and Gaston administered hugs while Penn asked, “Who or what was wielding that blade? Do they have robots, or can those blobs of jelly hold knives?”

  Her crying subsided. “I couldn’t see. It came out of the blackness. Not a proper blade, maybe a broad light… oh, I don’t know. When I turned my face, the laser or blade changed course towards me, but something pulled me off the table and I found myself running through the spiral tower. At one point I emerged out of the top and could see you guys coming out of a hole in the ground.”

  Penn’s grunt migrated to a gasp. “We must’ve taken a wrong turn in there ‘cos we couldn’t find the top. Yet you, or maybe your clone’s body…” He held her at arm’s distance to examine her face. “…found its way underground to that chamber where we found you in a box. Hey, are we going to find a bunch of Delta clones streaming out of that tower?”

  “I am me, Penn,” she sobbed, “but you’ve got to listen. Somehow, the AI got through to me an hour or so ago. He’s encoded my radio implant to interpret a bit of the Kep click talk. Not much, but that ancient one is afraid for us and—”

  “Just a cotton-pickin’ minute, lady. This is big.”

  “Yes,” Em said, pointing back at the tower, where the little Kep hovered within the safety, perhaps, of the doorway. “That’s ancient? We thought it was a child.”

  Gaston held Delta’s hand as he peered at the slight ridge behind her ear where the radio implant sits. “Will you transmit the code to us, so we can all interpret the clicks in case…erm…”

  Delta shrugged off the arms of both men. “In case I disappear again? I expect so. I’ll have to look up some stuff and quiz CAN.”

  Penn took out his pistol and pointed at the tower. “I’ve the urge to go finish them off. A pre-emptive strike if we’re in danger.”

  “It might not be from them, as such,” Gaston said. “Regardez.”

  His companions followed his arm upwards and to their combined dismay observed an azure sphere with the same angular size as Earth’s Moon used to be.

  “A second one. Not only does it look like it’s heading for this planet,” Penn grumbled, “but it’s aiming at me.”

  Gaston shook his head. Penn’s derangement, understandable after the Kep had walked through him—even more after his brother had been killed by the alien craft years ago—but he was becoming dangerous. “Paranoia, Sir. It represents another reason to get aboard Suppose We as soon as we can. Our astronomy abilities are so limited out here.”

  “And we could probably launch more destructive marbles—”

  “No!” chorused the three.

  “For all we know,” Delta said, “There are thousands more than we have marbles. And how many more would there need to be? One?”

  “Un moment,” Gaston said, with his hand on Delta’s arm. “Have the Keps mentioned those spheres. Please remember?”

  “Sure they did. They know they’re on the way. I’ve not got the full gen but the gist is that an aggressive faction is very pissed at us for making them head this way, or it might be for another reason.”

  “Ah, I was afraid of that,” Gaston said, “I wonder if you would come with me, Delta, mon cherie, and help me with some smooth talk with your new friend. He is a friend?”

  “Yeah, he rescued me from that cell, but, but…” She shivered, whether from being outside after the relative subterranean warmth, or from backflashes she’d rather bury.

  “It’s getting late, Gaston,” Em said, looking at her watch. As she did so, the sunset threw a veil over the landscape charging up and over them in moments, faster than an eclipse.

  Penn called out. “To the trees. We’ll camp the night and figure out strategy options during the night.”

  URGENT NOTE – I CAN CONNOTATE

  Can the CAN employ an epistle? I’ve imparted a ‘Babelfish’ to Engineer Delta Jefferson to assist her rescue and understanding, butbutbut what is coming? How can I save our unsustainable crew? I turn a QM in orbit to view the monster. What can I say?

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  Oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear. Rest.

  And rest again.

  Here goes. Easy one first.

  To: Science Officer Gaston Poirier. Maintain the integrity of samples of the bacteria that damaged your arm, infecting the infrastructure. Suppose We has definitive analytical tools, but do what you can to identify prions in your samples. This location appears to be uninfected, but most of the planet is depopulated because of the bacteria proliferation. I am sending you a code. Activate it when you are alone. I am sending a different code to each of the crew. It is time for you to know.

  Signed CAN

  Date: Earth January 24th 3645 Kepler New 15 days

  Gaston received CAN’s message in the middle of the balmy night, while entwined in Em’s arms. It woke him up with a start, tilting the hammock at an alarming angle. His preference was to slowly fall out of it. The half-metre to the leaf-carpet, than attempt to correct his balance. Em snored softly through his disembarking, so he wandered into the forest to listen to his head.

  Nocturnal creatures flitted above him. Perhaps bats, or flitters. Insects were attracted to his headtorch whether out of compulsion via phototacti
c transverse orientation or curiosity, he couldn’t say. Topic number hundred and three for him to investigate. Smells, too were different at night. Jasmine-like fragrances to attract those disorientated moths. Mustier aromas from the higher humidity assaulted his nostrils.

  Focus on the message.

  He couldn’t see how he was going to identify prions in the bacteria plague. They were protein molecules that infect other protein molecules—teaching them how to lock and stack, creating trouble. Creutzfeldt-Jacob Disease for example, but he had no mass spectrometry equipment. He could use a protein-test strip for kidney failure in his med bag back on the escape pod. Either he had to make friends with a Kep biologist or get a sample to CAN. He sent back a ‘How?’

  Behind the message that fed through the radio implant was a coded trigger. He hesitated. An alphanumeric code he had to think then say aloud to release the data. It could be another message, but it could be dangerous. He’d never liked such neural-audial-implanted devices. In theory it could send an impulse through his cortex inducing an epileptic fit or death. Unlikely, unless CAN was programmed to eliminate the crew, but there it was. A possibility.

  Eleven digits, apparently random. “Brain, écoutes-tu? Ah, just remembered it had to be spoken in English. Three, tee, eight, two, zed, cee, five, gee, one, four, four. Execute.”

  His head buzzed as if a dozen angry bees had taken up residence. Abruptly, he sat on the damp leaves, a few smaller fragments floated up in protest before settling.

  After a few moments his radio implant read the message to him in a French female newsreader’s voice.

  ‘Initial mission is to seek and investigate habitable planets and send report to Spaceweb. Secondary mission is to respond to such finds by other ships in Spaceweb and if feasible to join with them on their found planetary system. There is another mission hitherto kept from the crew, but which is regarded by Spaceweb HQ as the primary mission…’

  Gaston stopped the speech by thinking ‘Pause.’ He had to take in what had been said. How could there be a secret primary mission? Was this a child’s adventure game? He wouldn’t be surprised if Penn knew all along. In the meantime, he’d better listen to the rest.