The Opening (The Universal Portals Book 1)

by J. Blanes

  “Yes,” Albert said, “when can we go?”

  They put their helmets on as Blip left the kitchen and sealed himself in the control room. The others headed for the secure room, which was then sealed, and waited for Blip to lower the ramp. Seconds later, some light rays gradually inundated the room. The light was intense and blinding, and their eyes had to adjust to it.

  Once the ramp touched down, Albert was the first to step on it by popular demand. Keira and Dylan knew how important this moment was to him. As he walked down the ramp, his breath increased, and his heart pounded more fiercely. He stopped halfway to calm himself and take a deep breath before resuming his steps. He looked around but only saw a vast and desolate landscape, as the forest of columns lay on the other side of the ship. He walked a little more and positioned himself at the lower border of the ramp, just before touching ground. He looked back at Keira and Dylan and nodded to them. Keira gave him a thumbs-up signal and motioned him to continue. It was a pity she couldn’t take some pictures, but she comforted herself by thinking about the hell of a story she would write when they returned to Earth. Even without her notes, she would never forget a single detail from this trip.

  Albert breathed deeply again and stepped to the ground. What he felt could not be described with words. It was beyond imagining. It didn’t matter to him that this was a barren, unexciting planet or that he had arrived there by nonhuman means; nothing would ever surpass the thrill of the first moment, the moment when a person steps where no one else has before. Kudos to Armstrong and Aldrin, two of his heroes, he thought proudly.

  He waited impatiently for Keira and Dylan to join him, the latter with big, low-gravity jumps that instantly infuriated Blip. “No jumping! No running! Or I cancel the trip immediately!” His voice resounded directly in their ears. Dylan obeyed like a scolded child.

  They walked along the ship’s length until they reached a spot where they could glimpse the first trunks of the forest.

  “Wow! They’re big!” Dylan remarked on the obvious, as some of the columns were as tall as the tallest redwood trees on Earth, and as wide as ten cars side by side.

  They continued walking until the whole forest came into view. About two hundred yards ahead of them, thousands of magnificent column structures were entangled in a disorganized maze of chaos. As Blip had explained, some formed complete arches, immense and imposing, beautiful and worthy of the envy of any good sculptor. However, most of the columns were incomplete or broken, bending and leaning against each other, as their quest for space forced them to ultimately join their fates together. The floor was full of broken chunks at various stages of decomposition. More than a forest of columns made by microorganisms it seemed like a mammoth forest of prehistoric dead trees, petrified and fossilized for posterity.

  Their first impression was one of absolute, silent astonishment, followed by some gasps of awe as they slowly switched their attention to the different structures that, for some reason or other, were more impressive than the others—like a solitary structure with three joined arches that belonged more to the ruins of a cathedral than to a remote planet, or the seven adjacent columns that formed a massive, impenetrable wall, bent to one side as if saluting invisible giants that passed by. Nothing escaped their attention.

  “Look, there’s water under the columns!” Dylan exclaimed suddenly.

  It was hard to see at first glance due to the whiteness that blurred lines, but if they looked carefully, they could perceive that chunks of columns on the floor were partially submerged in some liquid. As they focused their attention more on the liquid, they noticed that it spread outside the forest line, extending to just a few yards in front of them.

  “You’re right,” Keira agreed, “there’s some liquid in front of us and under the columns. Blip, do you know what it is?”

  “The ship has identified it as water,” Blip informed them through the intercom, “with other minerals and substances dissolved in it.”

  “Nice!” Dylan exclaimed excitedly as he crouched and grabbed a stone from the ground. Then, he threw it with force and at a slanted angle, making it bounce many times over the water before it hit one of the columns, drilling a hole through it.

  He shouted with excitement like a child with a new toy. “Wow! It went so far and—”

  “What went so far?” Blip’s voice interrupted through the intercom. He had heard Dylan and wondered what happened.

  “Eh…nothing…” Dylan stammered, angry with himself and his big mouth. The others were not happy with him either. When he would learn to shut up? If Blip knew what they were doing, he would cancel the trip for sure. “I said we went far to get here,” he lied, trying to cover for his mistake.

  “Yes, you did,” Blip said, apparently convinced by Dylan’s weak explanation.

  They all breathed a sigh of relief and wasted no time in grabbing more stones and throwing them enthusiastically at the columns. Due to the low gravity, the stones bounced high on the water and reached long distances, several times more than they would do on Earth.

  “Look at us; we’re like children,” Keira panted after throwing twenty or thirty stones.

  “Yeah,” Dylan agreed. “It’s good, isn’t it? This trip down here is worth every minute.”

  Blip’s voice interrupted them again. “You have ten minutes now.”

  “I want to see the columns more closely,” Albert told them. “I’m going over there,” he added, pointing out one of the columns at his right. “Do you want to come?”

  “I’ll continue throwing…I mean, I’ll continue admiring the view a little more,” Dylan replied.

  “Yeah, me too.”

  “OK, I’ll be back in a minute.” Albert started to walk toward the forest but stopped abruptly at hearing Keira’s voice.

  “Look…at…that…” She could barely speak because of her surprise. She was looking over the small ship, at the sky beyond it.

  The others turned around. What they saw left them speechless again. There, farther away in the sky, and a little blurred by the haze, their big ship stood stunningly, floating in the air with its mind-boggling size, now apparent in all its immensity. The spherical ship seemed like a giant moon that had suddenly decided to come closer to Earth, defying all physical laws to show its entire splendor. It was a hypnotizing sight, and they could not move or look away from it. During that time, their open mouths were never able to articulate a single word. Even the most ardent and passionate “wow” would never give enough credit to such an extraordinary view.

  They could have remained like this forever, but Blip’s voice broke the spell. “Seven minutes.”

  As if woken from hypnosis, they resumed what they were doing, pretending nothing had happened. They all felt that sharing their impressions was not needed this time. They knew what the others had seen and felt; talking about it would not add anything of value. Everything they needed to remember was already engraved permanently on their minds.

  Albert was already sloshing through the shallow water. He arrived at the edge of the forest and started to study the column formations. As was always the case with him, he let his mind wander. He quickly went from one column to the next, each time to examine closely a new, interesting detail that caught his attention. In no time, he was out of sight of his friends, who were distracted by a stone-throwing contest they had just established.

  “Time to come back,” Blip’s voice announced into their ears.

  Keira and Dylan stopped their game and started to walk back. “Albert! Time to go!” Keira shouted.

  “I’m on it,” came his reply seconds later. The truth was that he was having trouble finding his way back. He had roamed the columns absentmindedly, paying no attention at all to the path he was following. He looked around, but columns everywhere hid the small ship from his sight. He started to get a little anxious until he remembered the ship on the sky. He started moving
around, looking up from time to time, trying to catch a glimpse of the ship between the few cracks and gaps that the columns allowed.

  “Albert, you have only two minutes; come back now,” Keira insisted, worried that he would let his curiosity get the best of him.

  “I’m on it,” he repeated again. He was now very worried about his situation. The columns were very big, and only part the sky above him was visible. Each time he tried to lower his sight to look ahead, his eyes inevitably hit the whiteness of a column. Then, as he was about to despair and cry for help, he saw it. Through a small gap made by two broken columns, he could see clearly part of the ship’s surface. He only had to walk on that general direction, and he would be out of there easily.

  “Albert, what’s going on? Only one minute now!” Keira’s tone sounded tense and worried.

  “Albert, back on the ship now!” Blip also shouted at him.

  “I said I’m on my way,” he replied roughly, even though he knew it was his fault.

  He walked as fast as he could. It was impossible to walk in a straight direction because of the columns that interrupted his way, but after several short detours he could finally see the edge of the forest about a forty or fifty yards ahead. He also sighed, relieved when he could glance at the small ship as he moved closer to the edge. Suddenly, as he was about to stop to catch his breath, the sky seemed to fall over his head. He tried to dodge it, but it was too late, and the whiteness quickly shifted into total darkness.

  FOURTEEN

  The helmet bore the brunt of the impact, and Albert quickly regained consciousness. His head throbbed, and he felt a repetitive pang coming from his left leg. He was lying on the ground, partially immersed in water. When he tried to crouch, a sudden wave of acute pain coming from his leg made him groan and desist. What was happening? He looked at his leg and immediately found the reason: a big chunk of column lay on top of it. He tried to push the column away with one hand, but it didn’t budge. He tried a second time with his two hands, mustering all his strength, but it was too heavy and resisted all his efforts. He looked around and felt with his hands under the water for something to use as a lever. Another broken piece of column lay next to him, apparently the one that had hit him on the head. It was too small and useless, but it gave him an idea of what had happened. He reasoned that when he’d tried to dodge the fallen piece, he’d fallen and broken with his head and body one relatively small column, which then fell over his leg. The small piece that fell over his head had not made him lose consciousness but, rather, his fateful attempt to avoid it. An annoying headache and lying stuck under a column were the result of his clumsiness.

  Hurt and trapped under a column, he could only call for help.

  “Hey, guys, I think you need to come here and help me a little,” he said as calmly as he could, trying not to make a fuss about his situation. He waited a few seconds and repeated his call when nobody responded the first. “It’s now or never,” he said more loudly.

  No response. He tried several times more, but he never received a response. The impact with the column seemed to have broken his communication device. For the first time, he realized what a dire situation he was in. Trapped helplessly by a column of microorganisms, with his suit soon to be disintegrated by the corrosive atmosphere, and nobody who could find him on time, a painful and terrible death being burned by corrosive acids awaited him. An increasing feeling of desperation ran through his body, and panic started to seize him. He could deal with the dying part; he had never feared dying. But dying alone, on a remote planet, and in so much pain terrified him.

  Something dark floating on the water caught his attention. It was not a good signal in a white-only world, as it could only indicate something that had come from him. He grabbed it and examined it. It was a small piece of navy-blue fabric from his suit. He frantically looked for a hole in his suit, but luckily for him, it was part of an outer layer, and his skin was not exposed. The suit still held together, although it would not for much longer. He had to do something, and fast.

  He desperately looked around again, this time making an extra effort to twist his waist and look behind his back. The effort paid off, as he found what he was looking for. A complete, unbroken column was standing just two feet behind him. His plan was to get a grip on it and pull himself free. All columns had rough surfaces and plenty of coarse bumps that he could grab as handles.

  With a quick movement that made all his backbones crack like broken nuts, he extended his right arm back and up, until he could get a good grip on the highest column bump he could reach. First step, success, he thought, now for the second. He took a break and mentally prepared himself for this critical effort. Then, he used all his remaining strength to pull himself with his right hand, at the same time pushing the column over his right leg with his left. He closed his eyes and clenched his teeth as the veins on his temples swelled up to the point of almost bursting, but his battle for freedom was over in just a few seconds, when he lost the grip on the column, screaming in agonizing pain. He looked anxiously at his right palm. The suit over it was torn to pieces, almost completely gone, and he was bleeding profusely. A burning sensation rapidly transformed into intense pain, and he instinctively submerged his hand in the water. He had never surrendered before, but he was smart enough to know when his options were over. Instead of crying and blaming his luck, he strangely found that he could simply accept his fate and die peacefully. He leaned back until his whole body lay submerged in the water, his open eyes fixed on the distorted shapes that danced across the surface.

  Floating pieces of his suit slowly drifted away as the water gradually dyed red.

  “Go back to the ship, now!” Blip shouted into Keira and Dylan’s ears.

  “But he’s still out there; we can’t leave him here,” Keira replied in a thick voice. Blip had been nagging them for a while now, trying to convince them to return to the ship without Albert. They suspected that if they went back, he would take off, leaving Albert behind.

  “Trust me,” Blip said, trying to reassure them. “I know how to find him, but you need to come inside first. Time is of essence.”

  Dylan didn’t know what to do; their time was long past, and their suits had started to disintegrate. If he ventured inside the forest without knowing exactly where to go, he could face a similar fate as Albert’s. On the other hand, if Blip was telling the truth, they could be wasting precious time.

  Keira tapped on his shoulder. “I’ll go inside. If Blip is telling the truth, I’ll let you know. He won’t dare to leave you both stranded here.”

  “Do you realize I can hear you?” Blip interrupted.

  Dylan ignored him. “OK, I’ll keep watching.”

  She walked away and entered the ship. Blip was waiting anxiously in the control room.

  “How can you find Albert?” she asked firmly.

  “Oh, you stupid Humans!” he complained, waving his arms in the air in exasperation. “Haven’t you realized yet that we possess technologies that you don’t even dream exist?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What I mean is what I said. I…can…find…Albert.” He emphasized each word and wondered whether Humans had really evolved at all. “Let me put it simply, and see if you can follow; feel free to stop me anytime if you get lost. First, a fact: I can find Albert. Second, another fact: Dylan and you are the only ones who can bring him back. Third, more facts: you cannot go outside to find him in your worn suits unless you want to die with him. Fourth, a simple inference: you must change into new suits before going to find him. Fifth, another simple inference: you must both come inside because the new suits are inside. Sixth, a happy conclusion: I tell you where Albert is so you can go back in your new suits and bring him to safety. Is that clear enough, or do we have to dawdle more until Albert is dead?” He inclined his head sideways and gazed at her, waiting for her answer, hoping that this time he had expressed him
self in terms any Human could understand.

  Dylan barged into the room. He had been listening to Blip and thought they had nothing to lose. He was their only hope, anyway, and Albert was dead unless Blip could really help them.

  “You know where the suits are,” Blip said simply. “I’ve already opened the compartment.”

  They were ready with the new suits in less than a minute and joined Blip in the control room.

  “I’ve already located him,” he informed them. “Come, I’ll show you.”

  As he said this, he leaned on the column that he had used to pilot the ship and plugged himself in again. A 3-D projection of their surrounding area appeared out of nowhere, floating in the middle of the room, startling Dylan and especially Keira, who found herself in the middle of the projection and jumped aside in surprise. The 3-D was so real that it seemed as if a portion of the planet had been cut out, shrunk, and transported into the room. It was not semitransparent, as in movies they had seen, but completely opaque and it gave a perfect aerial view of the zone. Their ship, every column, and even the water were represented in precise detail and shown in their own natural colors.

  “Wow! What’s this?” Dylan exclaimed as he moved around the projection, grinning in amazement. It felt so real that he tried several times to touch it, but his hand only found air and passed through it.

  “This is the result of the ship’s scan of this area,” Blip explained. “I told you repeatedly, we have technologies that you don’t know about. Next time, you’d better listen to me when I say I can help. Anyway, Albert is perfectly visible in his dark blue suit and the red water around him.”