Xenophobia

by Peter Cawdron

  “We can’t get our grain to market,” another voice said, a woman talking over the sound of heavy machinery whirring in the background. “We’ve had a few trucks through, but those drivers are pulling eighteen-hour shifts, working through all the farms in this region. The rest of the drivers haven’t been seen for dust. I called the distributor, but the phone just rings out. I’ve been talking to the factory, and they say they’ve got surplus for a week or so in the silos, so they ain’t too worried, but they can’t get enough hands on the factory floor. They’re getting stuff out the door, but even just a small drop in supply causes demand to skyrocket. It’s all out of balance.”

  The reporter spoke in somber tones.

  “US officials are understandably cagey when discussing possible military tactics in the wake of alien contact, and the presence of US fighters conducting daily flights over major US cities is intended more for human attention than as a show of force for the extraterrestrials. NASA officials have confirmed what is described as a ‘close working relationship’ and ‘cooperation’ with the Army, Air Force, Marines and the Navy, but what that means in practice is yet to be seen. Speculation is rife.”

  “There is the nuclear option,” a stern voice opted, and Bower got the impression that whoever was talking was ex-military. “While that thing was out by the Moon it was untouchable, but if we can see her in orbit we can reach her. All we need to do is weaponize our existing rocket fleet, just like the President suggested. He’s our Commander-in-Chief, we voted him in, we need to follow him. I believe in President Addison. He’s a good man. The Supreme Court has no right to suspend democracy because a bunch of left-wing liberals don’t have the balls to make the hard decisions. We will rue the day we let Congress impeach the man for defending our liberty. Nukes are all we’ve got against these alien critters. If we don’t shoot first, we won’t be able to shoot at all.”

  “Others, though, disagree,” the reporter said. “They point out that the use of nuclear weapons in space is likely to be counterproductive.”

  “Nuclear weapons,” said another male voice in sober, measured tones, “liberate massive amounts of energy. They’re spectacular on Earth. A flash of blinding light, a hail of radioactive particles, and the blast wave; a wall of superheated wind and debris, but space is full of radiation and energy already. It’s a hostile environment. In space, thermonuclear detonations are nothing more than a mini-star shining but for a second. They’re largely ineffective because there’s nothing to compress. If we were to detonate a nuke on the alien craft the electromagnetic pulse would take out any nearby satellites, say within a thousand kilometer radius, and we could end up losing valuable communication satellites or GPS capabilities for our military here on Earth. Whether we would cause any damage to the alien craft is debatable. From what NASA has observed, the alien shielding is capable of dissipating nuclear fusion, so it’s unlikely anything we could throw at them is going to even scratch the surface, let alone cause a mortal wound. Nukes just aren’t the silver bullet everyone thinks they are.”

  Another voice cut in, a woman’s voice.

  “This isn’t the movie Independence Day, there’s no hero to save us by shooting coke cans off the side of a UFO. If it comes to a fight, it’s probably going to be over very quickly and the outcome will be one sided. The aliens have adopted a polar orbit instead of circling above the equator. By doing this, they’re able to view every square inch of Earth in roughly a day and a half. If we turn this into a nuclear exchange there’s not a place on Earth they couldn’t bomb from orbit. They could obliterate human life over the weekend, so lets keep our pride and ego in check for a bit. There’s no war, let’s not start one. Now is the time for prudence and cool heads.”

  The reporter cut in, giving another perspective.

  “And US concerns aren’t confined to a potential space war. In the deep south of the country, the proliferation of small arms such as handguns and shotguns has stressed local police and state troopers, with reports coming through of murders to settle long-standing scores as well as petty crime escalating into murder. In one case, as yet unconfirmed, a neighbor was shot and killed in a dispute over water from a bore, while reports have come through of people being murdered over the possession of basic ingredients such as flour, sugar and powdered milk.

  “There’s no doubt the emergency laws passed by the government have stemmed the initial lawlessness and panic that gripped the US, but rebuilding the trust of a nation in shock will take some time. And, as yet, there has been no direct contact with the alien craft.”

  The speaker changed to a woman with an indistinct accent that could have been from anywhere within the mid-west.

  “Don’t tell me there’s been no contact. You don’t have someone turn up on your doorstep from the other side of the country without hearing from them first. And yet you want me to think these aliens could come from a million miles away without someone knowing? Without someone inviting them? I don’t know what happened at Roswell, but it wasn’t no military weather balloon.

  “The military’s been lying to us for decades. They’ve been lying to the American people, lying to the government, lying to everyone. They’re the only ones who could have kept this secret. The government could never do it, they could never keep their mouths shut, but the military thrives on secrecy. I’m telling you, this is what Eisenhower warned us about, the military-industrial complex. All this, it’s been on the plans since then, since the late 50s. Look at the Federal budget. Look at what we spend on the military. Forget about the Democrats and Republicans, it’s the military that runs this country. Always have, always will.”

  “And,” the reporter said, cutting in over the top of the woman, “such sentiments are not isolated.”

  A Texan accent came across the airwaves.

  “It’s been easy to laugh at abductees. It’s been easy to laugh at those that saw a UFO and say they were drunk or delusional, but who’s laughing now? Now the grays are here in force, does anyone take NASA seriously anymore? And yet NASA still maintains the party line, saying, ‘there’s been no contact.’ Who are they kidding? We heard them bugs speak on the radio. I’m telling you, NASA has sold us out. They’ve been planning our enslavement for decades.

  “The government’s been trying to disarm the populace for the past fifty years, trying to take away our rights, to get to our guns, and now we know why, so Earth would capitulate without a fight. Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m fighting. Ain’t no alien gonna take my guns. Washington might surrender, but any goddamn alien sets foot in Texas he’s gonna be eating lead.”

  “Damn,” Elvis said, leaning forward on the broad steering wheel as he turned a corner. “Now, that’s what I’m talking about.”

  “You can’t be serious,” Bower cried, talking over the radio. “You actually want to shoot first and ask questions later?”

  “If we don’t shoot first, there won’t be a later,” Elvis replied, with a cocky tone that conveyed surety. He was chewing on some gum as he spoke. “You ever think of that, Doc? I mean, seriously, sure, we all wanna get along, but these are aliens. We’ve got to show them we’re not to be messed with. Peace through strength, it’s the only way, Doc.”

  “What about peace through understanding?” Bower replied, turning the radio down.

  “You’re talking to a grunt,” Jameson said, intervening in the discussion. “Army life is all about peace through hierarchies, peace enforced by authority.”

  “Please tell me there are cooler heads in Washington,” Bower replied. Elvis didn’t seem fazed by the implications of his comments at all. “Peace should be the default, not war. After a hundred thousand years, you’d have thought we’d have figured that one out by now.”

  “It’s all about agendas, Doc,” Elvis replied. “See, sarge is right. We have peace by adhering to a chain of command. For us, peace is something to be enforced with the threat of violence. Peace ain’t no picnic by the lakeside in summer. And so, you gotta ask you
rself, Doc, why are they here? What’s their agenda?”

  “I ... I don’t know, but that’s not a bad thing. We’ll know soon enough. We don’t have to assume hostile intent.”

  “We do if we want to stay alive,” Elvis replied.

  “And if they were hostile,” she asked, “what could we do about it? This isn’t some Hollywood movie where all you’ve got to do is get down their shield so our planes can fire missiles at them.

  “Imagine what would happen if a bunch of bushmen tried to attack you Rangers. Even if they got a spear away, you’d mow them down. They wouldn’t stand a chance. The difference between us and these aliens is going to be orders of magnitude greater. Any aggressive act by us would be suicidal.”

  “Better dead than red,” was all Elvis would say in reply, quoting an old Cold War mantra. Bower was tempted to take things further, but there was no genuine interest in debate on his part. Bower was frustrated by his close-minded attitude. Her words were falling on deaf ears.

  The radio broadcast was still going, the topic grabbed her attention so she turned up the radio.

  “We actually know quite a lot about them already,” said a woman in calm tones. “We know they’re bound by the laws of physics. They didn’t just materialize in our sky, they approached us over several months, and that tells us something important about their technology. Their spaceship is more advanced than any of ours, but not by tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of years, probably just in the order of a few hundred years to a thousand years at most.

  “Bear in mind, given the immense age of the universe and the almost four billion years during which life has evolved on Earth, a gap of a million years between intelligent species from different planets would not be unrealistic. If anything a gap of a million years would be quite small. That these aliens appear so close to us from the perspective of the physics we see in use is actually encouraging.

  “If the physical appearance of their craft is any indication to go by, their technology is based around what we would call biology. But, biology is simply physics applied to chemistry. Their craft appears almost organic, whereas our spacecraft are functional, designed without any regard to aesthetics. Their craft appears to be alive. Now, that could be an illusion, but spectroscopic analysis and radar suggests the spacecraft we see is a living organism rather than a collection of nuts and bolts.

  “As for their possible physiology, we can draw some clues from their approach within our solar system. Bear in mind that in slowing down over a period of months, they could choose any particular speed they wanted. If they slowed themselves faster, they’d arrive earlier, that’s all. But that they slowed at roughly a third of the acceleration we feel on Earth, roughly the same rate as gravity on the Moon, suggests this was a comfortable approach for them. If this assumption is correct, then they’re probably not going to be too comfortable here on Earth. Our gravity wouldn’t crush them, but it wouldn’t be pleasant. It would be like carrying your mother-in-law around on your back everywhere you went.

  “Now some people have raised concerns that all we’ve heard from the craft is a single, repeated message declaring their peaceful intentions. They wonder why we haven’t heard anything beyond that, thinking we should have established some kind of dialogue with this alien species by now. It’s been pointed out that the alien message was in every known language, including some that are geographically confined and essentially redundant, so the alien creatures seem proficient in communicating. But, again, everything we see is revealing. This limited form of communication tells us something important about our alien visitors and their level of technological advancement.”

  Bower was hooked on every word. She barely noticed the bumps in the road or the noise from the truck engine.

  “They’re capable of communicating broadly and simply, but not in detail. In the same way, we can process whale calls, taking samples and conducting statistical analysis of behavior patterns to construct a certain message that would be easily understood by other whales. We could even construct such an individual message for each species of whale, using their own distinct dialects, but we couldn’t necessarily hold a conversation with a whale. Again, this reinforces the notion that this alien species is hundreds, but not thousands of years ahead of humanity. Whatever means they have of communicating among themselves, it is vastly different to human speech, placing an impediment in their path when communicating with us.

  “And for the conspiracy theorists, it is important to note there’s been no attack. There have been no ray guns or super-fast spacecraft racing around, strafing the ground and blowing things up. If we look at the timing of their acts, from entering the solar system, to approaching Earth, to waiting at the Lagrange point, to announcing their presence, to moving into an Earth orbit, we can see there’s a pattern. They’re moving at a slow, deliberate pace. They’re giving us time to accept their presence. They’re not rushing in. This is much the same way we would approach an animal in the wild.”

  Bower was fascinated with the scientific press conference. She wasn’t sure who was talking, but this lady knew her stuff. She had to be from one of the space agencies. As her accent was American, Bower assumed she was from NASA.

  “We can observe structures on the craft that match Fibonacci sequences. This is something important to note, as it is a clue to what we suppose is the organic nature of the alien vessel.

  “For those of you that aren’t familiar with the term, Fibonacci was the first person to note that sizes and shapes in nature are ruled by a simple numeric principle. You add the last number in the sequence to get the next number, so one becomes two, two becomes three, three becomes five, five becomes eight, being five plus three. Eight becomes thirteen, being eight plus five, and so the pattern goes, always growing proportionately larger.

  “This pattern is important because it’s natural. We see it everywhere in our world, even if we don’t realize it. Look at the swirl of a sea shell, or the point at which branches stem out of a tree or the veins on a leaf, or the shape of a hurricane as seen from space; these all fan out using numbers found in the Fibonacci sequence. Pineapples, pine cones and sunflower seeds all grow in a pattern described by Fibonacci numbers. Look at the length of your upper arm relative to your forearm, or your thigh relative to your lower leg and you’ll find the same basic ratio described by Fibonacci.

  “In regards to the alien craft, our telescopes can resolve segmentation in the cilia, the fine tentacle like appendages surrounding the girth of the craft. The ridges covering the body of the spacecraft follow the same scaly pattern we see on snakes and lizards, with the length and breadth of each section following the Fibonacci ratio. Toward the rear of the craft, hidden in shadow, there are slits or fins, similar to what we see in the mouth of Baleen whales. Although we’ve seen no sign of chemical propellants, we suspect these structures provide propulsion. As a proportion of the overall length of the craft, they too match the Fibonacci ratio.”

  Bower wasn’t sure how much of this Elvis understood, but he seemed to be listening intently, as was Jameson.

  “From this we infer that the alien creatures themselves must have harnessed some biological process to construct their craft with a form of biotechnology native to their world, perhaps using the equivalent of what we would call nanotechnology. Certainly, the oily, metallic rainbow sheen seen on the underbelly in low light echoes experiments with nano-materials on Earth. At its current altitude, over a thousand miles above the surface of -”

  The radio crackled.

  “Sarge, we’ve got Marines holding the airport.”

  Static broke up Bosco’s voice as he continued to talk. “They said fighting is fierce to the north and east, with armed militias in the south. They advise we approach from the west, coming through the city, using the supply route from Mozambique.”

  Jameson’s face lit up.

  “Tell them we owe them a round of beers, semper fi.”

  “Roger that,” came the reply from
Bosco. “Hey, could you pass a message to Elvis for me?”

  “Sure.”

  “Tell that Southern fucker, if he touches my stuff again he’ll be joining Elvis Presley singing Hound Dog at the Pearly Gates.”

  Jameson laughed, looking over at Elvis and the grin on his face. “Consider it done. Over.”

  He unfolded his map, allowing it to sit slightly on Bower and up against the dashboard as his finger ran over the lines and curves.

  “OK, we’re here, about eighty clicks north of Lilongwe. We need to get off this road, cut inland and then south-west, as though we were heading for the border, before turning back to the capital.”

  Bower didn’t say anything, but the thought of spending more time bouncing around in their antiquated old truck, with its tired seat springs and stiff suspension, didn’t exactly fill her with joy.

  Chapter 07: Seeds

  As evening approached, the Rangers drove against the exodus fleeing Lilongwe. Refugees trudged against the setting sun blazing in their eyes. Thousands of grim faces passed by silently on either side of the truck as the Rangers drove against the human current. There must have been some noise. People must have been talking, but the diesel engine seemed to be the only sound breaking the tension in the air. Africans walked on in a trance, barely acknowledging the US Rangers as they drove past. The swell of men, women and children spread out beyond the dusty track and into the surrounding plains. They shuffled on with their hand-carts, goats and cows in tow.

  Bower sat there feeling numb at the tide of human misery. The truck followed the Hummer east toward Lilongwe, slowly weaving its way through the refugees.

  Bower’s heart went out to those staggering on toward what they thought of as freedom in Mozambique. They couldn’t know the misery that would await them in the overcrowded camps. There was nothing she could do, nothing any of them could do. Without a concerted effort from the International Community there was no way to prevent Malawi from imploding. On they drove, kicking up dust, but the refugees didn’t seem to notice.