Voyage to Alpha Centauri: A Novel

by Michael D. O'Brien

  “This is early for a constitutional stroll.”

  “I invite you to take with me a very long walk upon a beautiful mountain”, he whispered. “Are you interested?”

  “Ravenously.”

  “Good. Our excellent friend Volodya came to me just now with a message from Pia and Paul. They cannot leave KC deck, but they have asked that you and I return to their wedding place and leave a memento of that great event.”

  “Kosmos departs for Earth on Day 435”, murmured Vladimir. “Our opportunities to clandestinely visit the planet will be very few from now on.”

  “Then this may be my last chance.”

  We followed the pilot on a circuitous trail through the ship that brought us to a single elevator on a side street of Concourse C. We went down to the lower deck and boarded a shuttle without being observed. As before, it took the usual route out into space and precipitously down to the surface of Nova, leveling off over the ocean east of Continent 1. We landed at a geology base, donned our orange suits and hats, and boarded an AEC for the short flight into the mountains.

  Our approach was from a direction we had not taken during the previous flights. Avoiding the great north-south valley, where there was a good deal of ground activity and air traffic, we came up over the range from the east and dropped softly into the bowl of the beloved alpine glen.

  When we stripped off our suits and walked down the ramp onto the moss, the pure air invigorated me, and the chiming bells of the woods delighted my ears and my heart. Birds swooped low over the little lake; the waterfall burbled pleasantly.

  “I’ll really miss this place”, I said to Dariush.

  “I too am loath to leave it”, he replied. “It is like a portion of the world restored to Eden.”

  “We’ll remember it when we’re back on Earth.”

  “Yes. Now we must absorb every aspect, that it might live in our memories as a sign.”

  A sign? I wondered. Well, I suppose the place was a kind of sign—of love, of the eternally renewed hopes of wedding days. Of kindness and good fellowship. Of beauty.

  The three of us stood by the lakeshore for a time, just listening, looking, soaking it all up.

  Vladimir turned to me and gave me a piece of paper. I read:

  Neil,

  Will you permit me to make a memorial of the gift you gave to me years ago? I know that you gave it to me as something that is very precious to you, the little cube of turquoise. Paul and I treasure it greatly and do not lightly part from it. I hope you understand. Some day when we are back home, we will look up into the heavens, and we will see a bright star and know that on its best planet there is our cube. It is so much smaller than the evil cubes in the temple. But it is infinitely greater and more beautiful. It is, in a sense, a word that we leave behind us. Thank you for giving us such a word, for enabling us to “speak” it.

  Pia

  Vladimir gave me the turquoise, which sat in the palm of my hand, radiating its astonishing blueness under the warm sunlight.

  “They ask that it be planted beside the waterfall”, he said. “Will you do it, Dr. Hoyos?”

  “Of course.”

  We climbed up the low banks of the lake and stood beside the rim of the falls. I put the cube down on a bare rock, wondering if it would remain there undisturbed for eons. Perhaps Pia and Paul’s child or grandchild, or a person further down the line of their generations, would return on a future expedition and find it, recalling the ones who had left it here for him.

  Dariush closed his eyes and prayed for God’s blessing upon the young couple and their baby, and for all the lives that might come from them. He also prayed for the countless souls who had once lived on this planet.

  Prayers completed, Vladimir and Dariush made the sign of the cross.

  Immediately after that, the Russian peeled off his uniform and jumped into the water below the falls.

  Dariush and I stood above, laughing as he hooted and thrashed about.

  “I am, I regret”, Dariush commented in his most ponderous manner, “a little too old for that.”

  “Me too”, I said. “I’d hate to cross an infinite sea only to drown in a pond.”

  “Nevertheless, Neil, I think elderly gentlemen are still permitted to walk. Shall we?”

  “Let’s do.”

  We walked for an hour, circling the valley twice before returning to the shuttle for a lunch that Vladimir had packed for us. He was now sleeping, stretched out on a blanket by the falls. We two older men ate sandwiches and drank from water bottles. As we finished off the meal with succulent nova-fruit that tasted like a cross between kiwi and sweet lemon, Dariush gazed up at the snow-capped peaks around us, lost in his own thoughts. The afternoon had begun.

  “I would like to climb higher”, he said at last. “How is your leg? Would you care to come too?”

  “My leg’s no worse than it’s always been. Let’s go.”

  Because the sun was high and the air hot, we took a route up the lower slopes leading to the purple shadows cast by a mountain on the north side of the valley. The footing was easy going on soft turf, and the first traces of scree that had slid down from above with the passage of time. It was a gray shale, very small fragments.

  We soon passed out of the sun’s glare and saw a herd of deer higher on the glen, where the mountain proper began. They did not startle as we approached, and merely gazed at us for a few minutes before wandering off, nibbling grass as they went.

  Dariush and I sat down on a rock to catch our breath. The rise, though gradual, had demanded energy we were not used to exerting. I was seventy-eight years old, and he wasn’t much younger. For a time, we gazed over the valley, with its blue alpine lake, the pale green woods surrounding it, and on the far side of the trees, the AEC. By the falls, our pilot was still stretched out, asleep or drowsing.

  “Higher?” asked Dariush. I nodded, and we resumed our climb.

  We had not gone far when he paused and stood for a moment looking at a darker shadow at the base of a cliff directly ahead of us, about thirty meters away. He said nothing, but walked toward it with a purpose.

  When we arrived there, we saw what had not been evident from below: a low crawl space about three feet high. I’m sure we would not have entered it to investigate, if Dariush had not spotted something on the rock above the opening. Though overgrown with lichen, it looked like a crude image cut into the stone. He scraped away the growth, and we saw what was clearly the shape of a deer, no larger than a hand. Facing it was an image of a bird, the same size.

  “This is interesting”, he murmured. “Who could have made these?”

  “They look old”, I said.

  “Yes, very old. It may be there is a cave inside. Perhaps it was used long ago as a shelter for hunters during inclement weather.”

  He removed a flashlight from his pocket and pointed it into the dark recess below the images.

  “Not a cave. It is a natural tunnel, an irregularity in the mountain. I confess I earnestly desire to look within.”

  “Well, if you must”, I said dubiously. “Let’s hope there are no saber-tooth tigers in there.”

  He dropped to his knees and crawled inside. I followed with some reluctance, though my interest was piqued.

  We had gone a few feet through this tunnel when it took a turn, rising and to the left. A minute’s crawling brought us to the end, a stack of flat stones that blocked any further progress.

  “Too bad”, I said. “Time to go back.”

  “Wait, Neil”, said Dariush with excitement. “These stones were laid by human hands, and it was done from farther within.”

  He began to push on the topmost stone. It gave a little, and then toppled away into the darkness beyond. I crawled up beside him, and together we pushed away more stones. When the passage was clear, we crept onward, Dariush first and me at his heels. As he flashed his light around, we saw that we were now inside a small cave. We stood up, the tops of our heads brushing the roof. The air was dry
and smelled of dust. The floor was fine gravel and sand. The entire space looked to be no more than ten feet wide by fifteen or eighteen feet long.

  “There’s nothing here”, I said.

  “There is something here”, he replied with an odd tone of certainty.

  Foot by foot, we investigated the cave, until by accident we stumbled upon what looked like human remains. Though coated with dust and sunken into the gravel floor, it was clearly a skeleton, curled in the fetal position.

  Dariush knelt and inspected it carefully. “A child”, he said. “Or a young adolescent, judging by the length of the femur and fibula.” He flashed the light about the skull. “There is no damage to the cranium, and I can see no broken bones. It seems to me that this person died in sleep, not by violence.”

  “Sickness or starvation perhaps?”

  “Perhaps.”

  He pointed the light along the bones of one arm, which extended out from the rib cage, with the hand and fingers resting on a pile of flat stones. This pile was neatly arranged, a rough rectangle rising two feet above the floor. Dariush sat back and thought for a few minutes. Then, with deliberation, he removed the top stones and looked down into a cavity within.

  “There is another skeleton”, he said. “Also a child.”

  “I wonder what brought them here?” I asked. “What was their story? We’ll never know.”

  “The deer and the bird seem to indicate that they were here for a time. Time enough to leave a mark of their presence.”

  “Someone else could have made the images. I don’t see any tools here.”

  “These children may have used a stone to chip the image into the cliff. As you saw, it is crude, not incised mechanically.”

  Thinking that there might be tools or artifacts within the “tomb”, we removed more stones, fully exposing the remains. And that’s all there was—simple bones, a life interred in an unmarked grave, without history, without explanation. Yet the position of the other skeleton showed us that at least one had grieved.

  When we had finished removing all the cap stones, we noticed that the wall by the feet was twice as thick as the one at the head. Dariush directed his flashlight at that end, and now we saw that a double layer of slate fragments had been stacked inside the outer wall. He removed the top one and inspected it closely. There was a sharp inhalation of breath, silence, and then he said, “Hieroglyphics.”

  We removed every slab that had hieroglyphics, twenty in all, the thin slate covered in the ancient script we had come to know from the temple archives. The inscriptions looked to have been scratched with a sharp stone, the letters crudely executed, as if by an immature hand.

  “Can you read them?” I asked Dariush. “Do they make sense to you?”

  “A moment, Neil”, he replied, slowly poring over lines on the tablets.

  Without explanation, he arranged them side by side on the floor, sometimes re-reading one or another and changing their positions.

  “This is it”, he said at last, exhaling loudly. I could see that his hands were trembling.

  “What does it say?”

  “It is a chant. Or a song. Yes, a song, I think. It tells the story of these two. Shall I translate it for you?”

  “Can you do that?”

  “I may not have every word exact, but the meaning is more or less clear to me. It is the mind of a young person, not complicated.”

  And so we sat with our backs against the cave wall, and Dariush picked up the first fragment of slate. Like the others, it was an irregular piece with broken edges, about a foot wide by a foot and a half long.

  In his quiet voice, he slowly recited the following:

  I Kitha-ré write this.

  My mother took me and said,

  “Kitha-ré, now you are about to become a woman,

  For your body shows the first signs.

  You have been chosen to be among

  The chosen of the Lord of the Night-gods.”

  I cried and said to her:

  “I do not desire this.”

  She put her hand over my mouth, and she was afraid

  Because of my words, but none heard what I said.

  And my father hid his face.

  In the dark when sleep was upon the city,

  I heard them weeping.

  With the sacred hundred I went.

  We departed at the rising of the sun,

  borne in vehicles upon the Great Road until the setting of the sun,

  And we came up unto the mountains of the Temple

  Of the Lord of the Night-gods,

  That we might see the sacred heavens-ship

  And thence be taken into the Lord of the Night-gods’ mouth.

  Yet I was afraid.

  Pho-rion was with me, the one who is dear to me.

  Yet I was afraid.

  Unto the Temple we came, and the guards led us within.

  The ninety-eight who were with me took the drink that gives sleep,

  And ate the mash that hastens the blood flow.

  I made as if to eat and drink but I did not,

  And none saw me.

  In the forecourt of the Temple, the hundred lay down on the floor

  for sleep.

  Pho-rion did as me: he ate and drank not, and was awake.

  And none saw him.

  We two did not sleep. Tomorrow we would die.

  He touched my hand.

  The lights were extinguished, and the guards stood near;

  At the Gate with their lamps, they stood and watched.

  Then did a man of light walk in through the open gate,

  The light was in him and around him; he was like a god.

  The guards did not see him, though their eyes were open,

  And the three eyes of the Lord of the Night-gods,

  The all-seeing eyes in the stone above the gate,

  They did not look upon him.

  Who is this? I thought.

  And I was afraid.

  He came to me and touched my head.

  “Kitha-ré, do not be afraid”, he said to me.

  “How do you know my name, O Night-god?” I asked him.

  “I am not a Night-god”, he answered me.

  “Who are you, and why do you come to me?”

  Pho-rion lay as one struck by a spear;

  His mouth was open as he watched and listened.

  “I am a servant”, said the man of light. “I am sent by the Sky-father unto you.”

  I said, “The Sky-father of old was broken. He was angry and he was shamed.

  He is no more.”

  The man of light said, “The One you call Sky-father is Creator of all things

  And he lives. In him, there is no evil.”

  “What is evil?” I asked.

  “It is that which hurts you and would take away your life.”

  I said, “I do not desire that my life be taken from me,

  Yet it is the will of the Lord of the Night-gods.”

  He said, “The Lord of the Night-gods is evil.

  The Lord of the Night-gods is like unto a serpent.

  And this day he is broken.”

  “How is he broken?” I asked, for I did not believe him.

  And I was very afraid,

  For the man of light had spoken words-that-bring-death-to-him-who-speaks-them.

  The man of light touched Pho-rion’s head

  And Pho-rion quaked at the touch.

  He was very afraid.

  “The Sky-father has heard your cries unto him”, said the man of light.

  “I did not cry unto him”, I said.

  “You cried unto him when you were at work in the fields.

  On the day when Pho-rion who is dear to you was with you;

  You were among the tall plants for cutting the harvest,

  And no others were nearby to see you or hear you.”

  “How do you know this?” I asked.

  “The Sky-father saw you and listened,” he said, “when
you two raised your arms

  Unto the sky and desired to go up into the heavens.”

  I did not answer him, for he had seen what no man could see.

  For on the day when Pho-rion and I had raised our arms,

  Music was in our mouths (it is forbidden),

  And we made as if to fly with our feet (it is forbidden),

  And we shook the seed pods that make sounds sweet to the ear (it is forbidden),

  And we desired to go up into the heavens.

  That day we desired not to be among the chosen of the Lord of the Night-gods.

  We cried together in the fields of harvest, for there was no escape.

  We held each other

  And we said, “We cannot go up into the heavens, for there is no path,

  And we will die.”

  Then did the man of light take our hands,

  We two, Pho-rion and me,

  And raise us up.

  Though the guards were awake, they did not see us;

  They did not see the man of light lead us to the gate.

  We went out unto the road under the stars.

  And he took us from there down through the forest unto the great lake.

  There we came upon a little boat at water’s-edge,

  And the man of light bade us enter it with him.

  He poled the boat down the lake.

  He made music come from his mouth.

  It was sweet to our ears,

  Though we did not know his words.

  Far from the lights of the Gate he brought the boat to shore.

  We got out, and he took our hands and led us by a little path.

  The path went high into the mountains.

  We were sore tired in our flesh with climbing, Pho-rion and me.

  We were afraid in our hearts, for we had fled

  From the will of the Lord of the Night-gods.

  But when fear came again upon us in this way

  The man of light said, “Do not be afraid.”

  For he knew our inner thoughts.

  The sky beyond the great mountains grew pale

  And still we climbed.

  We came to a high place between two mountains,

  The sun sailed up into the sky.

  And we saw a wondrous place below us,

  A small valley, with a lake and fall of water, and trees with music in them.

  Here we stayed.

  We lay down on the grass of this place, Pho-rion and I,