“Constructs?”
“Yes. Things like culture and other human ‘baggage’ – language, conventions – human stuff that we, or any sentient life form, invent.”
“I get it. Like ‘red’ means ‘stop’ and ‘green’ means ‘go’, and which side of the road we drive on.”
“Right,” said Bandi. “And the words we use, too. Those things change from place to place depending on the local conventions.”
“But some things are not invented, like two plus two equals four.”
“Exactly. There are three things that are common everywhere in the universe: mathematics, the laws of nature, and love.”
“And love is from heaven. God is love,” Kakko stated emphatically.
“If you have faith.”
Kakko looked at him. She was confused. Where did the ‘if’ come in?
Bandi had got into his philosophical stride. “Love exists. That is a fact. Then it is faith that tells us that it comes straight from God. God is love.”
“So faith is a human construct?”
“In one way, yes. In another, no.”
“Explain,” said Kakko with a sigh. She was struggling with this.
“OK. You can’t prove the existence of God. God could be just a figment of our imagination. But wherever you go, people seem to share the same idea about a Creator who cares about us…”
“But God doesn’t wait for us to invent Her,” protested Kakko. “She lets you know She’s there! I don’t make her up.”
“That’s the point. That’s what I was going to say. Everyone that believes, claims that the Creator makes Herself, or Himself, known to them – reveals Herself. And it is the same wherever you go in the universe. When believers of different faiths talk together, some of them quickly realise that they have all encountered the same divine Person, whatever Name they call Her or Him by.”
“So the Sponrons are one with God, even though they don’t keep to the Johian Scriptures?”
“Of course. They have their own faith. You remember Abby had a run-in with the churches in Persham?”
“Yes,” said Jack. “How could we forget? It makes me ashamed to be from Persham. It’s not the kind of impression I got when I was there when I was young.”
“They were there then, Dad. You were just lucky you didn’t meet them…” said Bandi. “Anyway, she came out of that believing firmly that God includes everyone in His Kingdom as long as they call upon Him, by whatever Name they know, according to their own lights, Scriptures or traditions.”
“She and Ruk are of the same mind,” said Jalli. “We’ll have to see they get a proper opportunity to talk together sometime.”
6
Various teams worked around the clock on analysing all the data from the alien space vehicle. It was quickly ascertained that it was of no known type among the local planets in Joh’s group and that there was no biological hazard. The vehicle had indeed once contained at least one living being – all the constituent elements were present in the right proportions for carbon-based life but there was nothing left beyond the simplest of molecules. The beings had completely decomposed.
“Nothing but carbon dust, water molecules and traces of heavier elements,” explained Kakko to her brothers. “We know a lot about them from the non-organic suit we found – size, body mass… they were a bit like us as well as the technology in the craft.”
“How did it know to come here?” asked Bandi.
“It was programmed to go into hibernation until it came within range of a star, when it would deploy its solar panels and ‘wake up’. Then it simply scanned the system, found a habitable planet and homed in on it – automatically.”
“But the crew had woken up too early?”
“Prof Rob knows something about cryogenics. He says, using current science, it can only work well for a few years. After that it gets risky. The temperature inside the craft would not have been more than a few degrees above absolute zero for much of their journey… Prof Rob thinks they were dead before that, otherwise the bodies would have frozen without decomposition…”
“Do we know where it came from?”
“This is the most interesting bit. Prof Unt from the maths end of things is going to be interviewed on TV tonight. Basically, they have extrapolated from the data of the craft’s course and speed, when we first picked it up, that it must have come from somewhere very far away indeed. There is no known habitable planet within fifty light years in the region of space from which it came. The most likely possibility is Gax sigma, a yellow star not unlike Daan, fifty-five light years away. The star has just one exoplanet in the Goldilocks zone. But looking at the carbon isotopes that help with dating, there appears to be hardly any carbon fourteen at all – which means many, many thousands of years. The craft could be hundreds of thousands of years old and come from anywhere in that part of the sky.”
“Outside of the galaxy?”
“Maybe.”
“So it could be from Mum’s planet,” observed Bandi.
“No-o. You’re kidding me? This craft comes from somewhere tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands of years ago. The Raikans haven’t even developed space travel yet. And anyway, Andromeda is not in that part of the sky.”
“So what you’re saying,” said Shaun, “is that this craft represents the work of people who lived many years before us but possessed the ability to fly in space…”
“And have even learned to respond to a state-of-the-art electromagnetic landing system,” smiled Kakko. “Technologically they were more advanced than us in their development of artificial intelligence. Their computer has continued to learn all the time it took to get to us – although it has had to be shut down most of the time.”
***
Like the rest of the planet, the Rarga-Smith family were clustered around their TV sets as Prof Unt and a couple of other scientists were being interviewed.
“So, you have concluded that the craft is no threat to us,” said the interviewer towards the end of the broadcast.
“Definitely not. As I have said,” reiterated the professor, “we can say with certainty, from the condition of the craft and its possible occupants, that it left its home planet at least 50,000 years ago. The carbon fourteen would register anything less. We know its speed – it would have been constant as it has no independent drive. It only possesses attitude engines and a forward-arresting motor with sufficient fuel for landing. Looking back along the path it must have taken, and that the nearest possible star is fifty-five light years away, I would estimate that this craft has been in space for a minimum of a million years.”
There was a moment’s silence as the interviewer took in this piece of information. “So this, then, is definitely the oldest man-made object we know about?”
“Not man-made. This craft was made by a biological intelligent being with four limbs and the size of a human being but they weren’t human. The craft began its journey when the precursors of human beings were still simple life forms living in the seas of Planet Earth One.”
“Amazing… What will happen to this craft? What do we propose to do with it?”
“This is still yet to be decided,” said one of the other scientists, “but, in my opinion, it should be preserved in a transparent walled vacuum chamber as it is, in its own building where all can come and see it for the next million years.”
“A special museum?”
“Precisely…”
“Wow, the oldest known intelligent beings,” said Bandi. “Pity they didn’t perfect the cryogenic chamber – I would love to have met them.”
“I’m not so sure. I reckon they would be quite unhappy waking up a million years in the future having missed the place they were heading for and finding themselves in a relatively backward world,” said Kakko, with as philosophical an air as she could muster.
“If they are citizens of heaven,” said Shaun, “one day, Bandi, you may get to ask them.”
“You never know. It’ll be pretty cr
owded there… in heaven,” replied Bandi.
“But I reckon you’ll get to meet anyone you want to,” put in Jalli wisely. “Otherwise it would be a limited place and heaven is by definition not limited, any more than the depth of love is.”
“Amen to that!” said Kakko.
***
The conversation concerning the long-term home of the craft hadn’t got very far before a second craft was seen coming from the same direction. The mood among the populace was now definitely one of alarm. Was this the beginning of an invasion? Were they all going to be as innocuous as the first craft appeared to be? Already there were completely unjustified claims of biological pollution, of the first craft calling others in in some kind of way, and other bizarre ideas. An impromptu demonstration formed outside the president’s offices demanding this second craft be met with force. They were calling on the government to institute a defence capability and arm the space vessels they possessed. One of their most vociferous spokespersons was Kris Salma, the man who had made Jalli’s life a misery the previous year at her agricultural college – the man who had got himself dismissed for his racist comments. He paraded a banner: No Aliens on Joh.
The government sought to reassure the people. The craft that had already landed was not armed in any way. It had been carefully screened for any alien biological elements and contained no chemical substances not already abundant on Joh.
They were also adamant that no weapons would be manufactured; history of other worlds indicated that in every place where weapons had been made, they were always used – used against people of the same planet. Joh had so far been spared any internecine violence – but the existence of arms would be tempting fate.
“The greatest danger that these craft pose,” said Prof Rob, “is that which sets us against ourselves.”
As the craft drew nearer, it was identified as identical to the first. It made the same manoeuvres as its sister, moving into orbit ready to land.
But then things seemed to go wrong. It appeared to lose confidence in the automatic system and pulled out, then readjusted to resume a semblance of the correct course. The engineers in the Joh control room strove to regain control but the signals from the craft’s computers were confusing.
“What’s it playing at?” demanded the senior engineer. “Get that control back or we’ll burn up.”
But the craft continued its descent under its own command. A last-minute correction on its part avoided annihilation and then it was within a single degree from bouncing off the atmosphere and out of orbit altogether. Eventually it got it right.
“It’s coming in… It’ll make it!” declared a technician, with relief.
“But where?” asked Rob. “It might survive the atmosphere but the ground is pretty hard.”
“It’s on track for our runway… but it’s on its own. It is not locked into the EMLS. It’s going to take a hell of a pilot to land that thing accurately.”
“Do you think it’s under pilot control?” asked Prof Rob.
“It’s not being landed by computer – I’m sure of it.”
“How long to touchdown?” called the station commander who was standing peering over the shoulders of her technicians in the control room.
“One hour, twenty minutes.”
“Sound the alarm. I want everyone living around this place at least a mile away – and not up or down the flight path!” she barked into a headphone. “That includes all but level five in this office, too. Your job is done.”
People rose from their stations and moved toward the door. Kakko hesitated. The commander eyed her. “Are you level five, Kakko?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Then out… now.”
“Yes, ma’am.” She rose and headed for the door but not before she received a wink from the commander.
Kakko, Prof Rob and the drome staff who were not needed at this stage watched and prayed as the craft approached. It was making a good fist of things but, as the technician had guessed, it looked as if someone was trying really hard to control the craft in an unusual environment. Unlike its predecessor, this craft deployed its wings rather later and had, yet again, to readjust its approach. In the end it was the speed that did for it. The touchdown was on the runway but without the EMLS there was no magnetic arresting and the craft hurtled on beyond its sister ship off the end of the tarmac, through the perimeter fence, across a ploughed field and into a ditch and its associated hedge a hundred metres beyond the buildings. Fire engines followed the line across the field as best they could but the mangled craft didn’t seem inclined to burn.
Eventually the biological isolation tent was deployed with some difficulty. Water was being pumped out of the ditch for fear of pollution. Red hazard lights were flashing in all directions.
This time the reception crew knew how to get inside the craft. They inserted their probe and found two creatures in flexible suits strapped onto a kind of plate and humped over a console. They were not human but they did appear to have four limbs and a torso with a head end. No neck. They showed no signs of life. But if they were dead, they had died very recently.
It was quickly ascertained that they were not dead. The impact, however, would have taken its toll on any variety of flesh and blood – if that was the way their bodies worked.
A makeshift tent was set up in the field and the bodies carefully brought out and laid out on trolleys. Like humans, they were kept rigid by some kind of internal skeleton. Doctors were sent for but as soon as they saw their patients they recommended the attendance of a veterinary surgeon. They found one in Jalli’s agricultural college. The staff and students had all been outside watching the craft land. Jalli had her hand to her mouth – after all of Kakko’s traumatic scrapes it would be just like her to get killed right there on Planet Joh. But as Kakko was vacating the scene she had rung her mother. And then again afterwards to say she was safe. Jalli was grateful that her girl was at last thinking about what it feels like to be an anxious parent. If nothing else, her experience with Tam’s people had taught her that.
Jalli and the staff learned that the vet was required to advise on the treatment of the occupants of the craft long before it became public knowledge that there had been any. They were asked not to talk about it. In fact, Jalli knew before Kakko! A fact that did not go down too well when Kakko found out later.
Samples from swabs from the creatures’ skin and from inside orifices at the head end were analysed at the scene but they failed to show any kind of bacteria at all. A doctor made the observation that in his opinion the creatures were far more at risk from the environment on Planet Joh, than Planet Joh was at risk from them. But the damage had already been done. The integrity of the craft had been breached by the impact before the hatch had been opened. The question was how and if they could restore the creatures to consciousness.
When Jalli and her family were reunited in White Gates Cottage that evening, Kakko was filling everyone in on the bits that were not on the news and correcting the bits that were that were not true. She was not privy to anything not in the public domain. Five hundred metres away from the spacedrome and a kilometre away from the crash, she had not seen the monitors in the control room or what was happening at the site. But she knew there was nothing to panic about. Rumours of a cover-up of facts circulated. People were talking about invasion, weapons, deadly microbes, poisonous gases; and accusations of a conspiracy were growing. Apparently there was a plot in which these aliens had been invited to Joh. Some expressed a theory that working on spacecraft and their engines was only part of what the professors at the spacedrome were up to – it was all a big cover-up for sinister goings-on.
“I don’t know where people get all this rubbish from,” said Kakko.
“People are frightened of things they don’t understand,” said Jack. “People have always been worried about what others might be getting up to. Sadly, on Earth, many people were quite right to be distrusting of their leaders. The further away you are from th
e action, the more suspicious you are… You’re fortunate to be on the inside to some extent, Kakko.”
“Yeah. That’s true.”
“And people are suspicious of anything to do with people from outside, including us,” muttered Shaun. He was feeling despondent because he was going to have to visit outpatients the following day for a check on his leg, and the hospital was not his favourite place on the planet.
Kakko was trying to think of something to cheer him up when there was a knock on the door.
“I wonder who that can be,” said Jalli.
“The thought police,” suggested Shaun.
Jalli went to the door and came back with Dzeffanda Pinda from Wanulka.
“Look who it is!” exclaimed Jalli. “Come on in, Dzeffi. What brings you here?”
“A white gate, of course. I was so pleased when I saw it. I was on my way out to Parmanda Park.”
Everyone stood and welcomed her.
“Tell us your news,” enthused Jalli. “How did the project go?”
“Ah. Brilliant. Yeah… I did a project about some little beetles and I learned so much – mainly from watching them. I know exactly what they get up to. Now I go to the park and places and watch nature all the time – especially the little things that people mostly overlook.”
“So a great success, then?”
“Yeah. I got a C+ which is good for me… I know you got As but I’m not so good with words. There was this other girl who studied some variety of songbird. She did loads of research in books and didn’t do half as much as I did outside. She got an A, though, because she’s clever with words, and she can draw, too. You should have seen her project. The teacher said her presentation was perfect… He said nice things to me, too, but he said that I needed to ‘organise my research better’ and ‘use proper sentences’… He went on about sentences having to have, like, a verb in them. He said a verb is a ‘doing word’ – but these beetles aren’t doing stuff a lot of the time. Mostly they’re sitting in the sun and waiting for other bugs to come by.”
The Spark (White Gates Adventures Book 4) Page 6