“Calm down, sir. You’re going to give the game away to the Ursines! They’ll be able to hear you!” Dale said.
I shook my head, knelt into the table and got as close as I could to my crew. I lowered my voice and said “That’s where you’re wrong. This isn’t a damn game. There is no joy being had here. This isn’t for points, or prestige. This is for humanity. And the quicker you realize this, the quicker we have a chance of saving our planet, the people on it and our selves,” I said, still feeling the rage burning within me. I managed to calm down and sat back on my chair. I didn’t bother eating the rest of my food. It was no good anyhow, being cold and spread across half the table. By now, one of the butler robots was sweeping the mess up.
The table went quiet.
We remained quiet for a long while. By then, everybody’s food was either taken away or being digested in their stomachs. We didn’t say a word to each other. We just sat there in silence as the ship moaned and groaned every few seconds. Travelling at the sort of speeds we were travelling at, I was expecting an uncomfortable and dangerous journey. But the ride was smooth and uneventful. The only turbulence we were experiencing was the mass of dread, terror and desperation that was colliding through us. We were scared. We were helpless and we were plan-less.
“There must be away,” I said into the silence that surrounded us. But I got no reply. It turns out my crew were also searching for answers, but just like me, they were coming up short.
Short wasn’t going to stop us from dying. Short wasn’t going to stop Earth being blown to bits. And short wasn’t going to make Borch and Ern disappear.
So short wasn’t bloody good enough.
Chapter Nineteen
“Don’t you think that it’s a little bit suspect, all of us being in here like this?” The old Spanish man asked in his perfectly pronounced English. The guy was a fraud. He’d lied to me, and I wasn’t in the best of moods to accommodate his mundane questions.
“This place will do just fine,” I said, sitting on the edge of my bed. We’d decided, well I guess I’d decided, that it would be a great idea if we all sauntered back to my quarters and held a little meeting. The whole point of such an exercise was to avoid the beady gaze of our two new friends, Borch and Ern, who for the record, we hadn’t seen since yesterday. I didn’t know where they were, and quite frankly, I didn’t care. All I wanted to do was get some ideas flowing in regard to what the heck we were going to do with them. We needed to get the upper hand on the Ursines and the only way we were going to manage that was to kill the two that were chaperoning us off to Earth’s Armageddon.
“I think we should fight them,” an unfamiliar voice said. I blinked a few times and then turned my attention toward the Spanish girl, who was speaking plain and clear English. I got off my bed and stood in dismay.
“You speak English too?” I said, not believing my ears.
“Si, well, a little,” she said, her accent coming out stronger toward the end of the sentence. I wondered if it was all an act. I was asking myself how all of a sudden both the Spanish girl and old man were talking plain English. That begged the question, what about the other one. What about the younger Spanish dude? Did he speak English as well, or was he actually telling the truth?
“We might as well come clean,” the young Spanish guy said. I looked at him and shook my head. “You’ve got to be kidding me!” I said, kicking the air around me as I found myself feeling a little flush.
“The three of us speak English just fine,” the older man interrupted. He was glaring at the two young adults as if they’d just given up the biggest secret in the world. The guy was pissed. It was obvious. He stared at the two of them and then turned to face me.
“You won’t understand the reasoning behind our decision to conceal our true language capabilities. So there’s no use in me explaining the whys or the hows. But I will tell you the whens,” the old guy said, giving me some sort of apologetic look. I ignored his pandering. His excuse would have to be pretty damn amazing for me to be able to forgive their lack of honesty with me, Dale, and Jess.
“Just get on with it. The gig is up. You have been rumbled,” Jess said from near the entrance of the quarters. The door was shut behind her. Dale was sitting on a chair in the bathroom. The bathroom was small, yet he was large enough to be in another room and it still felt like he was in this one. Half his body stuck out of the cramped bathroom door as he leaned in and got a better look at the three Spaniards in the middle of the quarters.
“When we were shoved into the prison cell with the three of you, we were unaware of who you were, why you were there and if you were a danger. We’d agreed that if we’d come across other humans then we’d play dumb. We’d act like we didn’t understand their language. We’d even be mute, to not draw attention to ourselves. It was working out just fine indeed. We’d play dumb and you would continue your mission. But then we realized how truly messed up this whole situation was. Here we were, pretending to not understand what was going on around us, watching you fly this ship into an asteroid field. That’s when I felt that I needed to make my credentials known. I couldn’t risk dying on this damned ship without at least trying to avoid death,” he said, moving a little closer toward me. He put his hand on my shoulder and gently gripped it.
“I mean; what else were we supposed to do exactly? You do know what they do with humans, right?” he said, still holding onto to my shoulder with his free hand as the other hand brushed his gray hair, parting his bangs like he was trying to make his intentions clear with the look in his eyes. But I wasn’t buying it.
“What do you mean?” Jess said, her voice sounding tiny in the small quarters we all occupied.
“I mean that this isn’t the first time they’ve sent humans out to the planet,” the old man said.
“Who’s they?” I asked, getting annoyed by the old Spaniards stalling.
“The humans,” the guy said.
I looked at him and then at my crew, who to be honest were taking this a whole lot better than I was. Inside, I was freaking out. I was kicking and screaming. I was beyond angry. What right did he or the other two have to hide information from us? I thought we were all in this together. We were fighting the same fight after all. But I guess I was mistaken.
“Please, stop the lies. This is insane. Can’t you see what’s happening?” I said, my hands raised slightly at my sides as I began to feel restless.
“They are up to something. I can tell. I see it in their eyes,” I said, pointing at the three of them individually. “Why else would they lie so much?” I asked. But nobody answered. The room fell quiet and the old man continued to stand and stare at me.
“That’s where you’re wrong. We’re not lying. At least, not now. I am telling you the truth. The humans have sent other humans to the Ursines before. I don’t know how many or who sent them, but I do know that something big is happening. The humans, or at least some of them on Earth, are planning something. They are sending these things gifts. Gifts in the form of spaceships. Weaponry. Technology. Even blueprints for brick work, like buildings and structures. Ask yourself this, why on earth are these things so much like us? Why do their buildings and their ships look so much like ours?” the man said.
I shook my head.
“That’s preposterous! There is no sense in that. Why on earth would they do that? Sending the Ursines equipment and technology would only result in one thing,” I said, sitting back down on my bed. I was feeling faint. All of this information was hurting my head, and I needed to get myself thinking clearly before I overloaded.
“War, it’s the only reason I can see them doing this,” I said after a few seconds, coming to the realization that not everything was as it seemed.
“It’s like they’re baiting them. Egging them on. Building them up, so they can knock them down,” the old man said.
The room went quiet again. Real quiet. For a very long while. Even Jess was speechless. It took some time for it all to sink in. But
stuff still didn’t make sense.
“That doesn’t explain shit,” I said finally. “It doesn’t explain why you decided to remain quiet. It also doesn’t explain why you lied to us. But above all, it doesn’t explain why or how you know all of this,” I said.
“Did I not say that I wasn’t going to tell you the whys or the hows?” the old man said.
I nodded my head.
“Yeah, you did. But that doesn’t exactly scream trustworthy to me. If you know something, and you’re deciding to hold it back, then I don’t think we can co-exist on this ship.”
The old man shrugged his shoulders. He had a certain carefree attitude that really grated on me. We were on the cusp of nuking Earth, killing all human life on it and he was acting like he couldn’t give a hoot.
“I’m not holding anything back. I said I wouldn’t explain the whys or the hows because quite frankly, I don’t actually know the hows or the whys. But I do know the whens. When it began and when it will end.”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. The guy sounded like a conspiracy theorist high on illicit drugs, about a brain cell away from retardation. It was safe to say that I didn’t trust him. Or like him.
“I don’t even know your name. Hell, I don’t know none of your names, and you expect me to believe that the humans basically sent us out here, among many others, knowing that these things were planning some sort of attack?” I said.
The old man broke into a smile.
“I guess a name is the least I can offer you now that we’ve been properly introduced,” he said, putting his hand out for a shake. I left him hanging. But then I decided to clasp his hand in a firm shake. It made no sense in antagonizing the man. Especially given the fact that I thought he was crazy. I didn’t want to risk him suffering some sort of space rage. Because that’s what I figured was going on here. These people were obviously crazy. Crazy from the lack of sunlight, or food, or contact with other humans. And now that they were among the living once again, their ratty brains were trying to make sense of this all. But their consciences couldn’t come to terms with the fact that they were about to become responsible for the entire decimation of the human race. It was easier for me to come to terms with because I knew I don’t have a choice in it. But the whole point of summoning this meeting was to talk strategy, not conspiracy. So I had no problem shaking this guys hand. I thought it would probably be in my best interest to do so.
“They call me Roderick Freeman,” the guy said.
An eerie stutter of silence fell across the room. I let go of his hand almost immediately. My eyes opened wide in shock. I couldn’t believe it. It couldn’t be. It just couldn’t be.
“No bloody way. No chance you’re Roderick Freeman,” I said.
But the guy smiled and shrugged his shoulders once again.
“I admit, it’s probably hard to believe, but I am Roderick Freeman,” the guy said.
Jess walked toward the two of us, got real close to the old man and huffed.
“Roderick Freeman was the first man to be banished into space for treason against Pilgrim Tech,” she said, giving the man the once-over. She didn’t take her eyes off him. She stared at him until he blinked. She continued, “But that was over three hundred years ago. Roderick Freeman was shot into space in a prison pod and left to die in the vast vacuum that is deep space. There is no way that you are him. One, Roderick would have died at least two hundred and fifty years ago. The guy was eighty-two for Christ’s sake. And two, even if you were him, and you managed to cheat mother nature and father time, that still wouldn’t explain how you ended up on the Ursine planet, or why you were banished.”
The man looked at her, and then at me. He took a few steps back, surveyed the whole room and sighed.
“We have a little under six months left on this ship. That’s plenty of time for us to get to know each other better. But I suggest that we spend a little time apart from each other right now. If Borch and Ern find us in here together, they’ll know we’re conspiring. That will give us enough time to get things ready,” he said, summoning his two co-conspirators toward him.
“That would suggest that you have a plan?” Jess asked before he left the quarters.
Roderick turned around and broke into yet another one of his crazy faced smiles.
“I’ve been waiting for this moment for a very long time. Of course I have a plan. But it isn’t foolproof, and it will take some doing to execute. But they do say that nothing good ever comes easy,” he said, the three of them soon leaving through the swooshing doors.
I turned to Jess.
“I don’t trust the three of them. What absolute crackpots! To suggest that the humans have been sending people up into space to bait an alien race into war is absurd. Why would they risk such a thing? Let’s not forget that we’re carrying a nuke that could destroy the whole planet a couple times over. The next thing that old coot is going to say is that the humans supplied the nuke as well! Come on, this is so stupid. We should be focusing on a plan of action,” I said, realizing that both Dale and Jess were deep in thought.
Jess was the first to break out of it. She looked up at me, eyes moist and hair sticking to her forehead. The quarters had become hot thanks to our collective body heat.
“Is it really that crazy?” she asked.
I looked at her and nodded my head.
“Yeah it’s crazy! You’re talking about a collection of many minute things all coming together just so humanity can trick and fight a race that was ill-equipped and savage before they supposedly gave them weapons in the first place. You tell me with a straight face that it makes sense to you. Forget about the Spaniard saying that he’s actually Roderick Freeman for a minute. Forget that humans don’t live for three hundred plus years. Forget all of that and tell me that you believe this to be some sort of tactic. That the humans have given these aliens the technology and resources to fight them. To nuke them. But then you’re going to turn around and say that the joke’s on them? That they are expecting an attack this big? That a so-called megaton bomb is all in the plan? That twelve thousand miles of warships are a walk in the park compared to what they have planned?”
Jess continued to stare up at me.
“We can hope, right?”
I laughed.
“And to what end would this prove useful? To what end would baiting, arming and fighting a huge alien force be a good thing for humanity?”
“The same reason any war is fought….resources,” she replied.
Chapter Twenty
Everyone had left the captains quarters by the time I’d calmed down. But I wasn’t calm enough. Jess had offered to stay with me to talk through the various issues we were facing on the journey to Earth, but I’d told her that it wouldn’t be necessary, and that I was fine on my own. The truth was, I needed to be alone. The constant sound of everybody talking had given me a mighty headache. And I’d needed another shower. So I jumped in and let the water drain down me. I myself felt drained. Drained of my strength. Of my faculties. Of my beliefs. Drained, much like the putrid, dirty water that was flowing down the plug hole as I scrubbed myself with gel that smelled minty. The mint extract rose up my nostrils and filled me with a freshness that was artificial. I didn’t feel like I smelled anymore. I smelt fresh, fresh as a man could smell. The sort of freshness that is usually associated with waking up in a good mood. Jumping into the shower and embracing a great cleansing session.
But as I stepped out of the cubicle, the shower room all fogged up and the mirror in front of me steamed, I didn’t feel cleansed. I felt dirtier than I’d ever felt before. The idea that I would be responsible for the end of mankind was pressing down on me. And quite frankly, there was nothing I could do to make myself feel any different.
As I dried myself, I came to the conclusion that there was no stopping this anymore. No matter how hard I tried, the world would end. No matter what absurd plans I lay ahead of me in the next six months, they would be squandered by the harsh reality
of what was surely to come. There was no use stopping it. There was no use fighting it. What was done was done. And I had the next six months to come to terms with it.
But there was still a voice that echoed in my head. A voice of reason. Of hope. It told me to not give up. It showed me fragments. Fragments of memories. Memories of war stories. Stories that both inspired and intrigued. In them, the odds were always stacked against the hero. But you’d never hear a war story where the hero would fail. It was universal knowledge…common knowledge even, that hero’s always got the job done. They always prospered, and evil was always defeated. But then again, it made me think.
What if the stories you heard, the war ones, the ones with the hero’s winning were the ONLY ONES you ever heard? What if human history had left out the really bad parts? What if the people on Earth had been fooled into thinking that we were the lucky ones? That the species that came before us, the dinosaurs, the great wooly mammoths and the ape people that are directly related to us were all unlucky, and we, humanity, were on a roll when it came to things going our way?
But if you look back on history, our history, you’ll see that humans weren’t as lucky as we thought we were. Mother nature had been cruel to us on many occasions. Many people were born in poverty. Born in economic hardship. These were the times before the great change. The great change being Pilgrim Tech.
A massive change indeed.
It was a change that consisted of a unified world government. One system for all. No more famine. No more economic hardship. Everybody was equal. Everybody did their part. And humanity prospered. It was around this time of course that we made first contact, and with that, a whole new age was born. It was an age of even greater prosperity. But fast-forward many years, and many more generations, and you’ll see that the prosperity didn’t last. That our technology was now inferior. That humanity was no longer lucky.
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