The Opening (The Universal Portals Book 1)

by J. Blanes

  “I agree. Let’s exchange roles and make it our prisoner,” Dylan proposed coldly. “We’ll take it hostage and use it to buy our freedom.”

  “He’s not one of them,” Keira said firmly. “If that’s the case, why would he be scared of us? Why would he faint? As Albert always says, it makes no sense.”

  Keira had a point, but the others were not moved by it. “I don’t know and I don’t care,” Dylan replied. “It could be the key to our freedom, and that’s all that matters to me.”

  “I agree with him,” Albert said. “It could be a simple defense mechanism, like the animals that pretend to be dead in the presence of a predator. I don’t buy it.”

  It was time to make a decision. They could leave it there and act as if nothing had happened. The aliens would scratch their heads trying to understand their reason, and maybe reward their good behavior for having spared one of them, but they discarded the idea right away because it was a long shot and they would probably gain nothing from it. The other option was waiting for it to wake up right there, but they could do the same more comfortably in the kitchen, so the decision to take it with them was approved unanimously, although for different reasons.

  Dylan wanted to keep it hostage and use it as leverage to improve their situation, maybe even gain their freedom in exchange for the alien. Albert could not wait to interrogate it and extract as much information as possible, and with a bit of luck, technical details about their technology. Just how he would manage to communicate with the alien would be such an exciting and interesting problem that he could barely wait to start. In contrast, Keira just wanted it to wake up and see what happened. Even with the scorpion tail, she found it hard to believe that this little creature could be one of their captors. Apart from his size, which didn’t match their thin but trusted theory about tall aliens, she knew that it had been genuinely scared of them; its scream firmly attested to that fact. In addition, another, more revealing truth bothered her. Separating some social, intelligent beings like them from their planet, their home, and their families required a calculating, soulless personality, a far shot from the one that this scared little thing had displayed on his first appearance.

  “Who will carry it?” Dylan asked with no intention of doing it himself.

  Albert sighed. He felt that it was his duty as a scientist to be the one to care for the alien while in their custody, though he really didn’t want that responsibility on his hands, not with a completely unknown species with who knew what kind of needs. He just wanted to study and interrogate it, not care for it. However, he didn’t expect that the other two would take such a boring job.

  “I’ll do it,” Keira volunteered eagerly. “You’ll probably hurt him with your big, clumsy hands.” Albert and Dylan couldn’t care less about her insult and breathed in relief. “OK,” they both said at once.

  Keira knelt beside the alien and touched it hesitantly. Despite the suit covering her hands so she could not touch its skin directly, she could feel that it was strangely soft and squishy. She grabbed it, one hand behind his body, the other supporting its head, like carrying a baby. It was heavier than she expected, and its body bent as if made from rubber, making it difficult to keep it from slipping from her hands. With a body so soft, she wondered how could it have made such noisy steps, and she switched her attention to its feet. At first sight, they seemed soft, like the rest of its body, but by touching them, she felt that their base, the sole, was actually very hard and rough, probably to avoid slipping. If they were metallic, that could explain the noise, but how could they be? They were its feet, its real feet, as it had no shoes or any other kind of clothes on him. Him? That also piqued her curiosity, because it lacked all the usual attributes that could identify its sex, at least in the human sense. It could be a he or a she, or maybe neither, as she had no idea how the aliens reproduced. For now, until it could clarify that matter by itself, she decided it would be a he, as she had called him until now.

  Back in the kitchen, she carefully put him on the table face up and sat on a chair close to him. Dylan sat in front of her on the other side of the table while Albert served himself some water. When he turned around to ask the others whether they wanted some water, too, something he saw made him waver for a second. Keira was lost in her thoughts, staring blankly at the little guy on the table, and Dylan was stretching, his arms extended back, and yawning with his eyes closed. What made Albert waver was not them but something he had barely been able to see in a glimpse, something in relation to the little alien.

  “Do you want some water?” he asked them, pretending not to have seen anything.

  “No, thanks,” they replied.

  Albert approached the table and sat with them.

  “Don’t we have to tie him up?” Dylan put the idea on the table. He was worried about the possibility of losing such a valuable asset. He expected a simple yes or no, but not Albert’s shocking reply.

  “Let’s not go to such lengths,” Albert said calmly. “In fact, it’s clear he won’t wake for a long time. We should go to sleep and check on him later in the morning.”

  If it weren’t for the winks that accompanied his words, they’d have thought he had gone crazy. The signal made them understand that he had realized something, and they played along.

  “Yeah, you’re right,” Dylan replied, nodding in complicity. “Now that we have him, we should rest for a while.”

  “I’m tired, too,” Keira said.

  They left the kitchen and pretended to climb the stairs, but they stayed outside the kitchen, next to the door.

  “What’s going on?” Dylan whispered.

  “If I’m right, you’ll see by yourself in a moment,” Albert replied enigmatically. Then, he peered through the door. “Wait for it…Wait for it…” he whispered. “Now!” he shouted as he barged into the kitchen.

  “Aha, gotcha!” he exclaimed triumphantly.

  The others soon appeared behind him and quickly understood the reason for his ruse. In front of them, the little alien was sitting on the table, ready to jump off, with an expression of disbelief. He pretended innocently to faint again, but it was too late.

  “Don’t bother,” Albert told him, “you’re not deceiving anyone.”

  The little alien sat back up, and his expression changed to one of pure terror. “Please, don’t kill me!” he pleaded unexpectedly in perfect English, surprising everybody. His voice was masculine, soft, and pleasant, though not deep.

  “Wait, do you speak English?” Albert and Keira asked at the same time.

  “I…I speak all important languages that exist in this galaxy, plus the human ones,” the alien said with a tone that exuded fear, his voice trembling. Then, to their astonishment, he knelt and clasped his hands in front of him. “Please, don’t kill me!” he implored again in a way that felt a little too theatrical.

  “Why would we kill you?” Dylan snapped in exasperation.

  “Why? Because you’re Humans,” he said with conviction, like an obvious statement.

  Dylan wondered what he meant by that. “We’re humans, so?”

  The little alien gave him an astonished look. “So, everybody in the galaxy knows you’re a primitive and cruel species that enjoys killing others and themselves,” he explained, emphasizing the words as if talking with a child who had difficulty grasping the most elemental concepts.

  Dylan didn’t like the tone, but he could only grumble some incoherent words. Albert and Keira couldn’t help but smile.

  “We won’t kill you,” Keira told him in a reassuring voice.

  “Seriously?” The face of the little alien lit up. “You promise?” He swiftly jumped to his feet with a charming smile on his face.

  “We promise,” she said, smiling back at him.

  The little alien couldn’t believe his luck. Nonkilling Humans. Who could have predicted that? Unless, of course, they were deceiv
ing him and were planning to kill him when he least expected them. His smile vanished, and he took a defensive stand.

  “My name is Keira,” she introduced herself, “and he’s Albert…” She turned and pointed at him.

  “Hi,” said Albert, raising his hand.

  “…and he’s Dylan.”

  Dylan said nothing but raised his hand hesitantly when Keira stared at him menacingly.

  “What’s your name?” Keira was trying to build some kind of rapport between them.

  “My name?” The alien seemed to ponder about it. “I don’t have a name. My masters don’t call me anything.”

  They had not expected that new piece of information. “And who are your masters?” Albert asked eagerly.

  “They’re the ones who made me and everything in here, too,” he explained.

  The words “made me” were eye-opening. From the start, they had regarded him as a member of some weird, alien species, but this fact changed their perception of him completely.

  “Are you some kind of robot?” Keira asked in disbelief. She was the most surprised by his revelation. She had touched him, heard him, and sensed his feelings, and none of them belonged to a robot. It was true that he had some strange features, like his cylindrical body, the sharp edges of his nose, and his hard feet, but they weren’t enough to prove that he was a mechanical being.

  “A Robot?” The alien smiled. “What a ridiculous idea. I don’t know that species. I belong to the Blips, created to serve and obey my masters.”

  “Then, you are a robot…” Keira said still not grasping it.

  “I’m not a Robot; I’m a Blip,” he insisted. These Humans were really thick, he thought.

  “A robot is not a species,” Albert clarified. “In our planet, we would call robots the things…the beings like you.”

  “Oh, I see,” the alien said, “a simple matter of mistranslation. I’ll reprogram my dictionary. Cross out Blip; enter Robot. Done.”

  “But you’re so alive; how can you be a mechanical thing?” Keira was still in shock. She needed to hear more about it.

  “Thing…mechanical…That’s outrageous!” the alien blurted out, deeply offended. “I’m not a thing; I’m a living being, like you. And my masters created me with biological processes, not mechanical. Do I seem like this ship to you? I may have some enhancing nonbiological implants, but that doesn’t make me a mechanical thing.”

  When he finished his rant, everybody was staring at him in amusement. Albert found it especially fascinating. A biological robot, not only programmed to behave like humans but with a psychological complex. What an extraordinary technology and, sadly, how far ahead from their own.

  “I’m sorry,” Keira apologized. “I didn’t mean to offend you. What I meant is that it’s hard for me to believe that you’re a robot. You’re very sophisticated, too different from the robots I’m used to seeing on Earth.”

  “It’s a perfectly understandable mistake coming from a Human,” the alien said in a patronizing way. “I accept your apology.”

  Until now, they had been standing around the table, and Albert decided to sit down. It was time to put the games aside and start with was important. The others sat down, too.

  “Listen to me,” he told the alien. “You had your fun with Keira, but now you will have to answer my questions, and depending on your answers, we will decide what to do with you.” He made this threat with no real intentions of harm, just to scare him a little.

  His words had the desired effect, and the little alien opened his eyes wide. “But you promised…” he said with alarm in his voice.

  “No,” Albert interrupted, “Keira promised. You know, she has a kind heart, and frankly, me too. But Dylan over here is a true Human, one of those who likes the killing, just for fun, and if he finds your answers unacceptable, I don’t know what he could do to you. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, yes, I understand,” the little alien replied, intimidated, his eyes fixed on Dylan, who was playing his part by staring back at him with his scariest face.

  Keira took Albert by his arm and whispered into his ear. “Is this really necessary? This is psychological torture, and I’m not comfortable with it. I know he’s some kind of robot, but this is wrong.”

  “It’s important that he believes we mean business,” he whispered back. “He’s a master at deception. We cannot risk being misled by him. Just bear it for a while.”

  Keira sat back. Albert was irritatingly right. She didn’t like it a bit, but they were prisoners in a battle they had not started, and they needed badly some information.

  “She just told me that if you lie to us she won’t stop Dylan,” Albert lied to the little alien, turning Keira’s innocent act into a devastatingly physiological victory by crushing all hopes that his only potential ally would help him if things escalated.

  The little alien shook his head vigorously. “I won’t. I won’t lie, I promise,” he said.

  “Let’s start with a simple one,” Albert said, his eyes locked on him. “Why are we here?”

  “I don’t know,” the alien replied.

  “This is not a good start,” Albert said menacingly. Dylan also pretended not to be happy with his answer by awkwardly mumbling something that sounded more like a groan, making Keira chuckle.

  “But I really don’t know; the masters never told me,” the alien insisted.

  Albert didn’t know whether to believe him or not. He tried with another, simpler question. “Let’s say we believe you. Let’s try another one. Are there other Humans or captives on this ship?”

  “We’re the only beings on this ship,” the alien replied happily to a question he really knew how to answer.

  “There is no one else, not even other aliens?” Dylan couldn’t resist interjecting into the interrogatory. How could they believe that a ship bigger than a city had no one else on board?

  “Aliens?” the little alien asked back in confusion. “What’s an alien?”

  “You’re an alien,” Dylan shot back, complicating things more.

  “No,” the alien denied, “I’m not; I’m a Robot. I just programmed myself with this fact. You know, I told you I was a Blip, but then you told me I was a…”

  “OK, OK,” Albert interrupted impatiently, “we know the story.” He closed his eyes and sighed, mustering all the patience he could. “Let’s put some rules on the table,” he added after mulling things over. “Dylan, don’t say anything to him unless previously approved by me.” He shot a threatening look at Dylan, deterring him from complaining. “And you,” he said looking at the alien, “you will only talk to answer my questions directly, without wandering endlessly in matters that don’t interest us. Understood?”

  The alien looked down. “Understood,” he said.

  “Alien is what we call your masters,” Albert tried to explain.

  “They’re not Aliens, they’re Tolok,” the alien interrupted.

  “What?” Albert asked, confused.

  “Tolok,” the alien repeated.

  “OK, good, Tolok,” Albert repeated with a little frustration. He had lost his line of thought because of the interruption and was trying to resume his speech. “What was I saying?”

  “Your last word was Tolok,” the alien tried to help.

  “No, before that,” Albert said, irritated at the alien’s constant interjection. “You know what? It doesn’t matter, just shut up,” he said finally.

  Keira was enjoying enormously the path the interrogation had taken. Albert and Dylan’s incredibly amateur display of ineptness was really amusing but a total waste of time.

  “What Albert and Dylan tried to ask you,” she intervened before things got worse, “is whether or not there are more Tolok or Robots on this ship.”

  “Oh! That’s easy! Why didn’t they say so?” the alien said while staring at them i
n incredulity. “I already said there’s no one on this ship except us. No Tolok, no Robots, no one else.” He spoke slowly, clearly enunciating the words, giving them time to think in between and hoping they would understand such basic notions. They were incredibly dumb, these Humans, he thought. No wonder all the things the whole galaxy rumored about them.

  Albert thought about it and said nothing. Dylan didn’t believe the alien. It was a lie to make them think they were alone and relax, just to strike them when they least expected it.

  “If there’s no one else, why are you here with us?” Albert asked him.

  The little alien looked down again. For some reason, he seemed ashamed to answer and remained silent. He kept his head low but looked up with his big eyes, like a child that expects a scolding but silently begs for forgiveness with his sad expression. Albert was impressed again by this robot’s manipulation of their feelings to his advantage.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Keira encouraged him, “just tell us the truth.”

  The alien looked at her and nodded. “I…I’m…” he stammered. “I’m here because I’m your guide,” he said finally.

  “Our guide? What’s that suppose to mean?” she asked, intrigued.

  The alien hesitated again. “I’m supposed to help you understand how things work in here,” he confessed, “and on the other ship, too…”

  “What?” Albert interrupted him, visibly angry, pounding hard on the table with his fist, startling the others. “I can’t believe it! He’s our missing instructions!” he shouted. “Don’t you get it? The missing instructions, the finding out things by ourselves, he was the one in charge to teach us that! He was supposed to be there with us the whole time!”

  Keira and Dylan finally understood him, and his rage. Because of the little alien, they had been kept in the dark about everything on both ships. The food, the water, the bathrooms, and who knew what other things they didn’t yet know. This alien was supposed to have taught them from the start about all those things, making their lives less miserable. They all looked at him with incredulity.