Wooden Ships

by Donald Piazza

  It read –

  “This is not a dream…”

  Not fully understanding the message, he read it again.

  “This is not a dream…”

  Adam chuckled as he repeated the message again. He looked up and Scott suddenly split into two Scotts. At first, Adam stood there dumbfounded trying to make sense of what he saw, but then panic shot through him like electricity, and he started shaking. His heart started beating so fast that it felt as if it were going to explode in his chest. His breathing became very rapid and he began to feel slightly light-headed. As he tried to catch his breath, he could feel perspiration profusely pouring from his forehead. Standing right in front of him were two individuals who looked exactly like Scott. They were mirror images.

  “Wha-wha-what the hell is going on?” Adam muttered incoherently, “And what do you mean this is not a dream?”

  Adam began to hear a peculiar sound, an oscillation that started very low, and as it continued to go higher in pitch, it became a rapid – “wah-wah-wah.” It was deafening and very painful, so Adam covered his ears hoping it would help deaden the pain.

  Instantly there was a bright flash and then the oscillation stopped. The two individuals that looked exactly like Scott changed or shape-shifted into two of the most unusual-looking creatures Adam had ever seen. Standing before him were E-1 and E-2.

  Then the room turned pitch black and there was complete silence as if someone turned off the sound. Images began scrolling in both vertical and horizontal directions that surrounded Adam and these two creatures standing before him. The scrolling images looked as if they were floating in mid-air and not projected from a display screen that could have been hanging from a wall, because there didn’t seem to be any walls. The images were numbers and letters, occasionally there were pictures and short video clips and everything was in vivid color. He looked around at this spectacle, the information seemed random, and strange, he wondered what it all meant.

  His attention now focused on the two creatures standing before him. They were both very tall with slender builds and looked almost like stick figures. Adam was five feet eleven inches tall and these beings towered over him by at least two feet. They looked as if they had human features, but what he saw resembled a mannequin, with no ears and just an impression of eyes, mouth and a nose. Their faces were as smooth as glass with a highly polished silver Mylar appearance to it. They were wearing what looked like a skin-tight one-piece jump suit made of a tan colored linen material that had a dark blue stripe that ran down the entire length of their bodies from their shoulders, under their thin arms down the side of their legs to their... “Wait they don’t have any feet.” Looking down he saw their legs came to a blunt point, which he guessed they were standing on. They stood about three feet away from him, and looking up at their faces, he could see his distorted reflection. In this reflection Adam looked shocked, his eyes and mouth were wide open.

  “Adam.” E-1 inquired.

  Adam heard his name spoken in his mind. The feeling felt strange and it had a slight metallic sound quality to it. Staring at both these strange looking creatures, Adam saw characters and images flash across the surface of one of these creatures’s face and then stop. It appeared their faces were some sort of a display screen.

  “Adam, can you hear me?” E-1 inquired again as more images and characters flashed across its face.

  “Oh Wow! This is starting to freak me out!” thought Adam.

  He wasn’t able to comprehend this weird situation anymore; shocked and scared to death he began screaming at the top of his lungs in fear – “AHHhhhh! WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON? AHHhhhh!”

  “Adam, do not be afraid,” stated E-2.

  “Adam, calm yourself,” stated E-1. “There is a lot of important information we need to convey to you – information that is of the utmost importance to you and all humanity on Earth.”

  Adam wasn’t listening and continued to scream, “AHHhhhh!” E-1 had no choice; it raised its hand above Adam’s head and by doing this, even though he continued to try, Adam suddenly stopped screaming.

  E-1 had placed Adam into a state of suspension. He was unable to speak or move, he just stood there frozen, and his eyes were wide open, darting back and forth between the two strange looking creatures.

  “Adam we have information that you need to know. Our species have been instrumental in the development and advancement of human beings on your planet that you refer to as Earth. We have had an influence on your species for over 400,000 years and have watched as your species went from hanging from trees to landing men on the Moon. There is a very appealing quality in most humans and there are some humans who are still evolving.” E-1 paused to see how Adam was accepting this information so far.

  Adam appeared to be calm but his wide eyes were still nervously darting from E-1 to E-2 and back again.

  “Adam, shall we continue with our message?” asked E-2.

  Adam took a deep breath as perspiration dripped from his forehead, and shook his head up and down for yes.

  Instead of towering over him, and to be less intimidating the two entities elevated Adam so he was now at eye level to them.

  “An evil alien species is traveling to your solar system as we communicate with you. They come here to plunder Earth’s resources for their own selfish purpose. They have no regard for the devastating effect it will have on life. When they have finished they will search the universe for another suitable planet. They will travel there with the same purpose of stripping that planet of its resources. Before they do, they will destroy your solar system by detonating the Sun. This will cause it to Supernova. The shockwave from this Supernova will fill their huge solar sails that will tow all their spacecrafts to their next destination. This is how they travel from one solar system to the next. The shockwave will completely obliterate every planet in your solar system.” E-1 paused allowing Adam to absorb this information.

  Taking another deep breath Adam finally found his voice: “WHAT? Is this a joke? This has to be a nightmare! Somebody please wake me up.”

  Not being able to express any sort of emotion both E-1 and E-2 just paused; to calculate their next string of information they would convey to Adam they conferred with each other.

  This brief pause gave Adam some time to comprehend the situation he was in, and little by little, he began to accept what he was experiencing.

  Visibly shaken and tired of these two creatures using his brain as their playground, Adam said, “Wait, before you two creatures start telling me more stories, I have a few questions of my own!”

  As images flashed on their faces, both Entities responded with a slight sound of harmony: “Please ask your questions,” then their faces went blank.

  “Where are we?” Adam was being a bit more assertive now.

  “Adam, years ago a microscopic crystal was implanted in your brain. This crystal allows us to communicate with you. This experience is occurring in your brain. To you, you are asleep and this seems like a dream, but this is not a dream.” E-2 continued, “What you saw in the hallway was a glimpse of a new Earth we created for all humans. The city landscape you witnessed is what your new species will be able to create from thought.”

  Shaking his head, not believing what he heard, Adam said, “OK, then who and what the hell, are you?”

  “We understand this must be a bit overwhelming for you Adam. Therefore, we shall explain who and what we are. Our species are from a planet that is approximately nineteen-quadrics from your solar system.” E-1 explained.

  “Wait! How far from my solar system did you say?” Adam now looked confused.

  “You do not understand the distance of quadrics. Therefore we shall convert to light-years for your understanding; nineteen -quadrics is equivalent to 1.5 billion light-years away.” E-2 explained.

  Adam’s jaw dropped when he heard this; quickly calculating in h
is head what this meant. With a bewildered look Adam said; “this means if you traveled at the speed of light, it would have taken you 1.5 billon years to get here, which is hard for me to believe!”

  “Adam, there is a lot of information we need to convey to you. There is no time to discuss the details of our existence and how we instantly travel through the universe, we shall give you a device especially created for you. You can activate it at a later time; it will give you all the information you wish to know about our species.” E-1 stated with urgency.

  Instantly a device appeared before Adam’s face. As it floated, it began to tumble and turn so Adam could see the device from all angles; it had a familiar look to it as if Adam had seen it before. This device was about 2 by 3 inches in size and about ¼ inch thick; the whole device was semi-transparent and had a pale bluish tint to it.

  “When you were one year old, playing in your back yard, we presented this device to you. You touched it with your left hand, which programmed it to your DNA signature, and only you can activate it by holding it in the palm of your left hand. As for the scar over your left eye, that was an unfortunate event that occurred.” E-2 continued to explain, “When you think of something you wish to know; it will show and tell you everything as holographic images.”

  “Please take care when using the device that no one will see the images it will project, you might cause some consternation to those that see it activated if you do.” E-1 explained.

  Adam slowly reached for the device, it had a cold feel to it and it hardly weighed anything. After examining it for a few moments, the Entities instructed him to put the device away.

  E-1 asked, “Adam, there is so much more we need to convey to you, may we continue?”

  “Yes, please continue.”

  Chapter – Seven

  O n a sunny afternoon, a man dressed in a jogging suit took a leisurely stroll down a residential street, the same street that Adam and Jen happened to live on. As he walked past Adam’s home, he stopped and took a mental note: a modest home painted blue with a small front yard and a one-car garage. He then continued his walk.

  At the end of this street parked, was a black Lincoln Navigator with dark tinted windows. The type undercover government personnel seem to drive. In the driver seat, sat a man watching this neighborhood. He seemed to be looking for something unusual. However, you could tell by the look on his face that he did not know what. The man in the jogging suit who was walking caught his attention. He carefully watched as the man walked up to his vehicle, opened the passenger door and then climbed in.

  “I like your disguise.” said the man sitting in the driver seat.

  “Thanks, but if I were wandering around this neighborhood wearing a black suit, I’d probably stick out like a sore thumb!” said Mr. Reynolds sarcastically, “Hopefully I didn’t draw any attention to myself.”

  “Well I think you achieved your objective,” said the driver. “Did you see anything out of the ordinary?”

  “No, but I think I have a good idea where the energy surges could be coming from,” said Mr. Reynolds.

  Sitting in the backseat were two additional agents with top-secret electronic sensing equipment, monitoring the neighborhood. The devices were so sensitive they were capable of sensing someone using a microwave oven at three hundred feet. As they adjusted the controls for sensitivity, Mr. Reynolds leaned back and asked; “Did either of you two gentlemen detect any energy disturbances?”

  Both agents shook their heads almost simultaneously and muttered, “No!”

  “I think we’ll head back to headquarters but we’ll come back later this evening and monitor the neighborhood again,” said Mr. Reynolds.

  After college, Mr. Reynolds joined the Navy as a Cryptologist, the science of studying, analyzing, and deciphering secret codes and ciphers. However, after six years, the Navy offered him a job working on secret projects for the government. When his superior informed him of unusual energy surges, detected by a government spy satellite that were emanating from somewhere in this neighborhood, Mr. Reynolds gladly volunteered for this special assignment. When he learned these were not just ordinary energy surges, but something a little more unusual, he was even more intrigued and eager to investigate them and find out the source of the strange anomalies.

  Mr. Reynolds assembled a team of three agents to help in his investigation. Roger and Jim were technicians, certified on the latest top-secret electronic sensing equipment. Mr. Sullivan had a degree as a foreign language specialist and counter intelligence agent, and acted as Mr. Reynolds’ backup. All the agents were well trained and armed.

  At the end of Adam’s workday, he began to get excited to go home, because tonight he and Jen were going to ask more questions of the device that E-1 and E-2 had given to him. The night after Adam’s dream encounter with the Entities, he used the device to show Jen how the Sun exploded, destroying the Earth and the whole solar system. The destruction was unbelievable and very scary. For Jen the display terrified her. She had a difficult time trying to comprehend the messages from the device. How could such a tiny wafer of nothing project stunning holographic images by just thinking of something? She wished Adam would get rid of it. She was convinced that if the government found out about that device, they would take it away from Adam and lock them both up for good. However, Adam didn’t seem worried. He assured her no one could use the device except him; it’s programmed to his DNA signature. However, that still didn’t give Jen any comfort.

  As Adam turned down his street he didn’t notice the black SUV parked on the corner, however he did see that Jen was already home.

  He pulled into his driveway, grabbed his coat, and climbed out of his car and locked it. He walked up to the front door of his house and paused. He got an eerie feeling as if something wasn’t quite right. He carefully looked up and down the street trying to find something out of place, but the uneasy feeling soon left him and he unlocked the front door and entered.

  “Jen, I’m home!” he announced as he hung his coat in the hall closet.

  “I’m in the kitchen.”

  He walked into the kitchen and saw that Jen brought some Chinese take-out home for dinner; he guessed she wasn’t in the mood to cook.

  Down the street in the back seat of a black SUV, two agents, Roger and Jim were adjusting their electronic sensing equipment hoping to detect any unusual energy surges coming from their vicinity. Mr. Reynolds, sitting in the passenger seat was watching the house that Adam just entered. It was getting dark so he put on a pair of night vision goggles to help him see any activity.

  “How was your day?” Adam was smiling hoping this would put Jen in a good mood.

  “How do you think my day was? I had a very hard time concentrating on work. I kept thinking about all this stuff.” Jen sternly said with a look of deep concern in her eyes.

  Adam decided to keep quiet for now. He walked over, gave Jen a hug, and kissed her on the forehead. Jen tried to forget about everything, and as she sighed, she began to relax.

  During dinner, they both ate quietly. When they finished eating, they sat there looking down at their plates not saying much, until Jen spoke-up. “Adam, please tell me about all this stuff again, I’m still trying to make sense of it.”

  Looking at Jen, Adam saw a person who was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. He looked Jen straight in her eyes, carefully picked his words and began telling her again what the Entities had told him, “There are these alien creatures that travel through the universe in search of planets they can pilfer natural resources from. They can detect these planets from thousands of light years away and when they have completed pilfering, they destroy everything.”

  Jen responded; “Do you have any idea how ridiculous that sounds?”

  Looking embarrassed Adam said; “Yeah I do, but it’s what the Entities told me.”

  “And our planet is on their hit-list? I
s that what you’re telling me? And exactly what are they going to take from our planet?” demanded Jen.

  Adam had a serious expression on his face, “Water, air, minerals; anything and everything they want or need.”

  From the back seat of the black SUV parked down the street, one of the technicians monitoring the neighborhood started getting excited. His equipment was capable of eavesdropping on people’s conversations by pinpointing his Bi-directional device toward any building.

  “Hey Reynolds, you might want to hear this!” Roger handed Reynolds an extra pair of headphones, he put them on and listened intently.

  “First off, where are these aliens traveling from?” asked Jen.

  “From a planet near the giant red star, Betelgeuse; that is the head star in the constellation of Orion’s Belt,” explained Adam.

  The technicians, Roger and Jim started to chuckle from the back seat of the SUV, as one of them commented; “What the hell is this guy talking about?”