Quantum Void

by Douglas Phillips

  You live on the surface? Yes, in homes not very different from yours on the hill.

  Your science? Biology, chemistry and enough physics to get us here.

  Do you have a second species? Not like you do, but dolphins and chimpanzees are pretty smart. Dogs, too, Wesley added.

  Many of the questions from one side were reciprocated on the other. Marie watched carefully, especially when each Dancer spoke. There were differences between them. The shading, though subtle, was definitely lighter on some. One Dancer who seemed to match the female description had asked questions slightly different from the others, more involved and with deeper meaning.

  “Can I ask a question specifically to the person at the right end of the line?” Marie asked. Zin translated, and the Dancer at the end dipped slightly in response. “Your homes on the hillside are quite beautiful. I’m curious what they look like inside. Does each house belong to a person or family? Do you sleep and eat there like humans do? How about… sorry, I guess I have a lot of questions.” She could think of ten more she’d like to ask, but Zin had recommended they take it one step at a time.

  Once the translation was provided, the Dancer dipped several times as she responded. Tonia translated. “She is very happy that you ask. Houses are shared, and eating is often communal. But spaces within each house are individual. She invites you to see her space.”

  “I’d love to see your house… your space. Yes, I’d like that very much,” Marie answered. She turned to Zin. “Can I do that?”

  “It might be a little complicated, but not impossible,” Zin replied.

  “Because of the water?”

  “No, not at all. The water is no issue. You saw me walk across the sand. Once set up, you could do the same and walk right into her house. No, the complications might be with others who share the house. Particularly if they are Dancer youth.”

  “Oh, I didn’t think about that.”

  Zin turned to Tonia. “What do you think?”

  Tonia turned to the Dancer female on the end, and they had an extended conversation with considerable dipping.

  “Why do they dip?” Marie whispered to Stephanie.

  “I think they’re laughing,” she responded.

  Tonia spoke in English. “Quite good. Very good. The youth in her home already know the human form. An artist in their city makes human dolls. The smallest youth play with them.”

  “Oh God, now I’ve heard everything,” Tim said.

  “Please visit,” said Tonia. “But just one. You, please.” She pivoted to Marie and spoke in the Dancers’ language to Zin.

  Zin acknowledged. “Tonia will set it up,” he told Marie. “This will actually work out well. We’ll split up. Marie, you will follow Tonia to this Dancer’s home while the rest of us visit a science laboratory and a kleek shell processing facility.”

  “Really?” Marie said. “Wow, I’m honored. Tell her I’m really honored to be invited to her home.”

  Zin performed the required translation and the Dancer dipped several times.

  “I don’t think they’re laughing,” Marie whispered to Stephanie. “Maybe the dipping is more complicated than that.”

  “Or maybe it’s just a nervous tic,” Stephanie mused.

  Without saying a word, Wesley broke ranks from the line of humans and stepped forward to the wall of water. He looked straight ahead to his counterpart in the middle of the line of Dancers. The Dancer twisted its central spine, the rod they’d earlier called a stalk, and pushed off the sand to move forward, close enough that Wesley could have reached out and touched it. Marie tensed.

  Please, Wesley, no handshake, she thought, but she didn’t say anything. Neither did Zin.

  Wesley seemed to be thinking the same thing because instead of reaching out, he stood tall and then dipped slightly to his right. He waited, and the Dancer dipped too. Then he dipped left and his counterpart followed. That was all they needed and within a few seconds the two were doing a dance—synchronized or not, it was hard to tell.

  A base drumbeat appeared from nowhere and coincided with their motion.

  “Are they doing that?” Marie asked. “The drumming?”

  “Yes, I believe they are,” Zin answered. “I’ve never seen this before. It’s really quite interesting.”

  There were certainly no drums around and no discernable motion from any of the Dancers, yet somehow, they were generating the sound.

  Marvelous creatures, Marie thought. They seemed so simple, yet they had created a society of high technology, with advanced tools and education. Their history must have been just as complex as human history. You didn’t become a civil society without some pain and strife along the way. Perhaps it still existed somewhere, just not here.

  10

  Beextu

  Mykonos. Maybe Paros or Samos. One of the Greek islands. The Dancer’s town was a spitting image. Small white and blue houses, curving cobblestone streets, even colorful flower boxes on the corners of each house. Beyond the lack of sidewalk cafes, the major difference was that this town was submerged under a hundred feet of seawater.

  Marie followed closely behind Tonia and the Dancer, whose name she couldn’t pronounce until Tonia graciously shortened it to Beextu. When Marie said the name, the Dancer dipped both left and right, clearly delighted to hear her name spoken by the human. The creature tried to say Marie, but it came out Meezhie. Close enough.

  Their air bubble technology was wonderful. Zin had fitted a belt around Marie’s waist, with a canister of nitrogen and a wire that reached out to one side and touched the wall of water. Somehow, the wire transferred an electrostatic charge to the water and created an egg shape that surrounded Marie and moved with her every step. No matter which way she turned, the ground was solid, if damp, and unless she extended her arm fully, she never got wet. It was like walking through a downpour with a transparent umbrella.

  She allowed her fingers to extend for just a moment, long enough to skim the surface of the wall of water. Caribbean warm. She touched a finger to her tongue. Salty, even saltier than an ocean on Earth. They’d already talked about microbes and whether there were dangers to humans. The same argument that Zin had made for abandoning the clean room on Earth also applied to Ixtlub. Whatever microbes were in this water had followed a different evolutionary path from that of any microbe on Earth. Their ability to survive within a human body was unlikely. Of course, Marie had just put that theory to the test.

  Somebody has to be brave, why not me? Deal with it, Tim.

  She marveled at her surroundings. They walked—she walked, they flitted—up a narrow path that wound its way across the side of the main hill of the town. The buildings mostly looked like family houses, but a few were larger. All had windows, including shutters that could be opened or closed. Occasionally they passed a house with a Dancer inside, which usually resulted in a quick flit away from the open window, or the flash of a tentacle and a shutter quickly closed. She wasn’t sure if they were naturally shy, or whether she represented something the regular townspeople weren’t expecting to see.

  She watched Beextu move. It wasn’t quite swimming, but her body was definitely pushing water. Most of the motion was in the skirt that surrounded her body, with her tentacles merely dangling below. Sometimes, especially when going up a hill, she would touch her central stalk to the ground just between cobblestones, flex and then push off, giving added propulsion. It was a move both graceful and powerful. These creatures could move very quickly when they wished.

  They crested a small hill and stopped at a door to one of the houses. The door itself was dark green and appeared to be made from the kelp trees, just like the platform where their transfer chairs waited. Beextu squeaked and the door opened.

  This is going to be really interesting, Marie thought. She reached up to her headset and switched on the video camera. She followed them inside, ducking through the low doorway. Her air bubble easily kept up, and she found herself standing in a small room with several passa
ges off in multiple directions. There was no furniture, but the walls were decorated with a color pattern that varied in intensity, shifting as if the pattern were projected.

  Beextu and Tonia pivoted to face her. At this close distance, it was easier to see Beextu’s eyes. Circular, and protruding only slightly from the top of her smooth crown, but translucent white like the rest of her body, which made them blend in. Zin’s comment during training finally made sense—that human eyes would be easily noticed. She thought about her own dark eyes and how much they contrasted with her light skin. Human features taken for granted turned out to be unique. Whether they were beautiful or ugly depended on whom you asked.

  Beextu said something, and Tonia translated. “She welcomes you.”

  Marie looked at Beextu, not Tonia. “Beextu, this is amazing. I can’t tell you how happy I am to be here.” Even if most translated words would have to come from Tonia, repeating Beextu’s name might help to make a personal connection.

  The Dancer swayed gently and was silent for a moment. There was no telling how the protocol for a social call worked on this planet. Tea and cookies? A tour of the house?

  Conversation and connection. These were keys to bridging any gap between intelligent beings. It probably didn’t matter that their backgrounds and biology were different. If they could find common ground, good things would follow.

  I must appear strange to her. An alien creature in her house. She may be just as nervous as I am.

  An idea popped into Marie’s head. Her watch, wearable technology, had a few photos from home stored on it. She touched its screen and swiped a few times to find the right picture.

  She looked up at Beextu and carefully moved her arm closer to the edge of the air bubble. She twisted so Beextu could see the image it displayed, a boy about five years old petting a rabbit. “My nephew, my sister’s son. His name is Owen.” Marie held her hand over her heart. “He’s a sweetheart. Cutest little boy on Earth.”

  Beextu came closer, twisting the top of her body. Tonia translated, though there was no telling if the relationship with the boy would be clear. Did they have sisters or sons in their society? How did their children come into being—through birth, through hatching, in a petri dish? At least some of this information was probably in one of the NASA documents that Marie had never managed to read.

  Beextu’s translucent eyes came within inches of the edge of the bubble and she peered at Marie’s arm and watch. Would she even understand what she was looking at? The ability to make sense of a three-dimensional object portrayed on a flat screen might not be universal. Even cats and dogs back home had a difficult time with it.

  Beextu backed away and then, in a burst of water that made the air bubble bulge inward, she sped away and through one of the passageways.

  Marie looked at Tonia. “Did I do something wrong?”

  “I don’t know. Please wait,” Tonia answered.

  A minute later, Beextu reappeared from the passageway, slowly, with small figures following, hiding behind her. As they approached, Marie leaned to the right to see around Beextu, and the tiny figure flitted, quickly disappearing again.

  “I can’t see them very well,” Marie said. “But I think I know who they might be.”

  Beextu spoke and Tonia translated. “Youth. They are mine. I told them you are human, a real one.”

  Marie bent down slightly. “It’s okay, I won’t hurt you.” Tonia translated.

  One tiny head peeked from behind Beextu, followed by another. They moved farther away, miniature versions only a tenth the size of an adult, but complete with tiny skirts and skinny tentacles. Their heads bobbed up and down like a spring, and their skirts rolled with waves. Beextu looked positively stiff by comparison.

  “Oh, my God, they’re so adorable,” Marie gushed. She adjusted her headset, hoping the video camera was capturing the scene. “Will they come closer?”

  “Give them time,” Tonia said without translating.

  “They’re so sweet, Beextu. Beautiful children, er youth.”

  Tonia translated everything in the back-and-forth between Marie and Beextu.

  “Thank you, Meezhie,” Beextu said. “They will grow, as plants do. As humans do.”

  “How old are they?”

  “Four hundred days, very young.” Marie had read that a day on Ixtlub was somewhat longer than on Earth. Their equivalent age must be a few Earth years. According to the same information, Dancer lifespans could be as long as one hundred and thirty Earth years. Beextu’s children were just as she said, very young.

  Marie bent lower and her voice rose naturally, childlike. “What are your names?”

  “Not yet,” Beextu said. “They will take names later.”

  “Can they speak?”

  “Yes. Too much. They don’t know when to stop.”

  There were some squeaks from the tiny Dancers and Beextu spoke directly to them. One of them squirted off to the right, faster than Marie had seen any of the adult Dancers move. Just as quickly, it returned to Beextu and circled her several times, squeaking repeatedly before finally settling down.

  “He makes a show for you,” Beextu said.

  “Because I’m new?” Marie asked.

  “He says you look like his doll.”

  Marie laughed, and the tiny Dancers zipped behind Beextu at the noise. “Oops, sorry, I didn’t mean to scare them.”

  “Their doll makes no sound. You do.”

  “I’m not a doll, I’m real.” Marie spoke to the children, hoping they too could understand Tonia’s translation. “I’m from a place called Earth. Your mother and I are friends.” Marie looked up at Beextu. “Or at least I hope we will be.”

  The ice broken, Marie and her new friend had many questions and much to say to each other. Tonia translated every word, though the delay in a longer conversation was somewhat irritating. The more they talked, the more Marie felt comfortable within the alien place. The difference between their outward appearance was impossible to ignore, yet intellectually they had more in common than Marie expected.

  Beextu was well educated in science. Her primary expertise was in the biology of her species—and of the Workers, the land-dwelling species who were on the other end of a fascinating relationship of symbiosis. At first, Marie thought Beextu might be a physician, but her knowledge was broader than just biology. She easily spoke about their planetary system, understood the difference between their red dwarf star, Earth’s yellow dwarf and the hypergiant where Core resided. She demonstrated a knowledge of orbital mechanics and even answered Marie’s practice question on whether they had launched satellites. Yes, they had, with the help of the Workers.

  Beextu held an official role of some kind within a government body. She had regularly engaged with Core and with other members of the galactic consortium. Beextu’s experience with the consortium and her perception of future human involvement consumed the rest of their conversation.

  Toward the end of the visit, Beextu’s children ventured close enough to Marie that one poked its head through the air bubble and for a moment was within arm’s reach. Marie wanted to touch the miniature Dancer, but a quick motion from both Beextu and Tonia made her think better of it. There were still some barriers that weren’t to be crossed.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  The day was long, but eventually darkness fell across the shallow sea. Their overnight accommodations consisted of one room with several narrow passageways, each dead-ending in a cove where soft material had been placed for sleeping. The main room had walls on three sides but was open to the sea on the fourth, the water held back through the technique of enhanced surface tension that the Dancers managed so well. The room was located halfway up the hill and the view across the picturesque town was magnificent. Beyond the edge of the town, perhaps a mile away, the white-sand seafloor stretched undisturbed into the distance.

  The room also had tables and chairs, sized appropriately for humans, and the team was happy to get off their feet for a short b
reak. Zin had distributed a tortilla wrap to each person, a compact and simple meal and a welcome reminder of home.

  Marie soaked in the view like she was enjoying a moment at a Caribbean restaurant. She had finished telling her story of Beextu’s house and her children. Stephanie asked if she’d captured it all on video. “You can’t imagine how well that’s going to play on TV when we return home.”

  “Yes, it’s wonderful that you were able to learn more about their families as well as Beextu’s role as representative,” Zin said to Marie. Zin still stood while everyone else sat. “But in your description, you implied there was some measure of disharmony? Tell us.”

  “Yeah, a very interesting conversation,” Marie said, finishing her food. “Core came up a lot.”

  “So, they’ve met Core too?” Wesley asked. He sat at the table across from Marie.

  “Yeah. Tonia is Core’s emissary to the Dancers, just as Zin is ours. The Dancers’ first contact with Core was about a hundred years ago. Since then they’ve had contact with several other civilizations… through Core. I guess he’s kind of a clearinghouse for the developed planets. Maybe even the matchmaker.” She looked up at Zin, who was standing close.

  “Roughly, yes,” Zin said. “It depends on the civilization, though. It’s tricky business.”

  “That might be an understatement,” Marie said.

  “So, it sounds like you learned something?” Wesley probed.

  Marie looked up again at Zin. “Well… it’s a bit awkward. Sorry, Zin, I’m just not sure if I should repeat this with you here.”

  Zin turned his brow bulge down in the middle. Was he insulted? His facial expressions could be surprisingly human. “I can leave, if you wish.”

  “On second thought, maybe you should stay,” Marie answered. “It might be good for you to give us a response.”

  “Sounds juicy,” Wesley said. “Do tell.”