by T I WADE
Nancy and Dr. Rogers were inspected for metal parts and, not finding any on them, the two visitors seemed to be satisfied. Roo looked at him, and VIN knew he was questioning why he had these metal implants. Why would a person ever need metal replacements was on both minds.
Once the two regained enough strength to walk farther than ten yards, they were taken to an elevator, which whisked them down to the central area. Suzi and Mars were with them as they entered the first cube, full of plant life and fresh scents. It must have felt like home to them, back in the thick Saharan vegetation. VIN could see and feel their pleasure as they saw the wonders Suzi, Mr. Rose and their team had produced to give the crew aboard America One better quality food than one could get on Earth. They wandered through the first cube, with Fritz close behind, always getting one of them to write down the name of what they saw.
The coffee and cocoa trees were not known to them, but the barley, wheat, corn, and many of the more common crops were. They got excited in Cube Three, where the bees were pollinating. They expressed delight at seeing the rabbits and chickens, and seemed oriented towards pet companions; they stroked them making clear their thoughts that the rabbits looked sweet and chicken eggs were good to eat. VIN and Suzi suspected that Tow and Roo might be vegetarians.
Over the next few days, they toured all seven cubes, slowly going through them with both sides learning new names for the fruits and vegetables that would soon enhance their communication.
After they went through the cubes they toured the rest of the ship, leaving the Bridge for last. Captain Pete and Ryan were hoping that by that time they would be able to converse with each other, at least on an elementary level. Captain Pete asked Igor and Boris to erect the first globe they found on Mars on one side of the Bridge as a memento; they were all eager to see their visitors’ faces when they saw their home planet of 10,000 years ago. Two posters displaying how Earth looked in modern times were framed and hung on the rear wall behind the globe; it was fascinating to inspect both closely and see such small differences in topography over 10,000 years.
What did surprise VIN and Fritz was when they walked by the first window looking out in one of the corridors. Both Tow and Roo stopped and looked at the blue glow of the shield around the ship excitedly; VIN was sure that it brought back memories for them. He was also sure that they didn’t realize that it was their own shield from Mars, which was protecting the ship. A sudden thought popped into VIN’s head, “I wonder if they think we are their offspring? I wonder if they think we are from the same tribe, maybe just changed over time.”
His thoughts made Roo and Tow look at him with inquisitive looks. He didn’t have the privacy of thought around them.
When he concentrated hard on the word “Rooooo”, he often got a smile and the word “Viiiiin” coming back at him mentally as a response, with several clicks and words exchanged between mother and son. This was becoming a joke between the new friends.
On some of the walks Mars, who was now walking well, joined them. Roo always walked with Mars holding his hand. He was only two feet taller than Mars and they seemed to get on well together. Mars had even perfected the click that was part of their language; like all children he easily picked up languages, a talent that made the adults jealous.
Saturn and Maggie joined them for a walk around the upper levels, once their legs could take the increased gravity. Tow always wanted to hold Saturn’s hand; they were also becoming good friends.
Finally, on the seventh day walking around the ship, after seeing the apartment they would be using, they entered the Bridge. Both visitors looked through the large forward windows, the enjoyment of looking out clearly expressed on their faces. They both gasped when they saw their globe from Mars standing in the Bridge, the same way VIN had found it in the cavern on Mars.
They gently touched the globe, but did not look happy. Then they saw the pictures of the current Earth on the wall and for several minutes, they inspected it, talking and clicking in a constant flow. They touched everything, and VIN suspected they were surprised to find everything cold to the touch; that was what went through his mind as they touched the globe, the posters, the seats, the computers. He led Roo’s hand to touch the warm coffee machine and the boy smiled. VIN had thought right.
Everything in the caverns—the controls, the walls, even the switches on the command console—was warm to the touch. He realized that warmth was important to them. Something cold wasn’t working, or was dead. The globe was cold. It wasn’t working.
“Roo, Tow, this is Ryan, Ryan; this is Pete, Pete,” thought VIN as they stood in front of the commanders of the ship for the first time. As usual Captain Pete was dressed as a captain, wearing his red flight suit with his rank on his epaulets.
Ryan was dressed in a blue suit showing no rank and VIN assumed that the visitors would take Captain Pete as the ship’s captain. He was right; they looked at Ryan quickly, but regarded the captain longer.
“Ryan, Ryan, Peter, Pete,” Tow and Roo said aloud to the two tall men in front of them. Whenever they did not receive a mental response from someone when they communicated telepathically, they spoke aloud as best they could. The name “Ryan” sounded odd but “Pete” sounded perfect. Captain Pete put his hand out and both stepped back quickly, but the small visitors took his hand together and felt it. They didn’t know how to shake hands. When the taller men spoke, the two visitors respectfully listened, trying to understand what was being said.
They walked over to the large windows at the front of the Bridge and looked out at the space around them. They looked out for quite some time, pointing at stars here and there, as if they recognized them.
“I think that it is time for them to visit DX2017,” VIN said to the two commanders as Fritz arrived on the Bridge. They were happy to see Fritz, and Tow went to stand next to him; they were getting on well. Fritz spent several hours a day with Tow trying to communicate and learning more every day. He had also now perfected the click, nearly as well as Mars.
Glancing out the forward windows, VIN noticed DX2017 had just come into view when Roo made a noise VIN had not heard before. He and Tow quickly went over to the windows and pressed their small noses on the glass, excited to see something they recognized.
VIN showed Roo how to look through the telescope, and got an excited response when the boy saw the planet up close and an exclamation of excitement when the boy must have seen the blue dome down on the planet’s surface. VIN was right; it was time to take them home.
“Mr. Jones, crew and astronauts, ready SB-III and the crew compartment for a flight down to the surface,” Ryan ordered over the intercom. “There will be quite a few of us on board. Our two visitors, Mr. Noble, Mr. Warner, Frau Von Zimmer, Frau Bloem, Igor, Boris, both doctors, with the emergency canister, please, and I would assume Suzi, Mars Noble and Mr. Rose who will want to tend garden. If anyone else has an urgent need to join us, please call the Bridge. We will have room for one or two more passengers. We leave in three hours. Out.”
Igor who had just walked in hadn’t met the visitors yet, and was introduced to them. They looked up at all the men, realizing that members of this tribe were all much taller than they. Igor befriended Roo and, with VIN, led the young boy to the area where they were testing the broken black box.
The boy knew what it was when he was shown the box Igor had put together again. He picked it up; it was cold. He placed his hand over the top of the box, and a blue glow began to emanate from the box. The onlookers were stunned, and Roo smiled at them.
“It is not broken, it is cold,” VIN thought as he tried to understand the words going through his brain. The word cold was already part of his foreign language knowledge. “I think that all the doors and openings down there are activated by body heat,” he suggested. Their eyes were still glued to the small shield around the boy’s hand. Now they had another shield as reserve.
VIN was very eager to get back down to DX2017. So was Suzi; she wanted to show the two visitor
s the gardens and how nicely plants were growing down there.
Tow and Roo were surprised when SB-III detached from the mother ship. They were sitting in the jump seats in the rear of the cockpit so that they could see everything. VIN was with them, standing up and holding onto the side of the now rarely used docking port tube. Jonesy and Maggie were flying the shuttle, Saturn and Mars were in the crew compartment with Suzi, and the door into the forward cargo bay directly from the crew compartment was open. There were many more flight leniencies now that space suits weren’t needed.
The excited passengers were strapped down and continuously chatted between themselves clicking many times a minute, enough for Jonesy to roll his eyes. He had not smiled since he met the visitors, and VIN thought it was time he made an effort to look happier and friendlier.
“I can talk to these guys through mental telepathy,” he told his partner, knowing what reaction he would get.
“Yeah! Like maybe talking to a rock, or a stone down there,” replied Jonesy, smiling.
“Yeah partner, just like you listen to engines complaining,” replied VIN smiling back.
“Hey! I can hear engines,” retorted Jonesy. “It is not telepathic, I actually hear the sound they emit. I’m not doing a circus trick. I can hear when an engine is screaming too high, or struggling, or vibrating. Not like you talking to yourself, thinking somebody is having a serious conversation in your head. Also, you don’t speak native tongue, so don’t tell me you know what they are saying. Maggie, put the nose down one more degree.”
“I can understand about forty words,” shouted Fritz from the crew compartment listening in on the conversation through the door. “I think Mars can actually have a full conversation with Roo.”
“Yeah! Maybe I would have more chance chatting up a sexy female Roo in Australia,” commented Jonesy still smiling.
“Jonesy, mind your manners,” added his wife looking at him sternly. The two visitors had made a lot of friends during their short stay.
As they descended down over three orbits, the little blue dome came into sight. Landing, Jonesy carefully and slowly pierced the shield which came as no surprise to the two new passengers. They saw the second dome where the tail of the ship stood, and the looks on their faces told VIN that they were aware of the dangers of no atmosphere in the second dome.
Disembarking, they were surprised to see Suzi’s neat, green vegetable beds, and especially the flower garden on one side. One by one they clicked off the names of what they saw and this time Fritz had a voice recorder to save the words. He pointed to a plant, recorded what they were saying and, repeated the name of the plant in German.
“Mr. Noble,” Ryan said, walking up to VIN, “I think somehow you and Fritz should explain to Roo, that it will be dangerous for them to open any doors we don’t know about down there.”
“I agree,” he replied and then thought about how he could get them to understand “no” and “danger”. Fritz figured it out for him. He walked up to the rope in front of the shield wall, made sure both newbies were watching him, and then aimed his arm towards the shield. The same word came out of the mouths of both small people. It sounded like “rice,” and it was the first time anyone had heard them say it.
Fritz looked puzzled. Tow ran up to him as he continued walking and stopped him with his fingers only an inch away from exiting the wall. She said a word that sounded like “potdam” three times and at the same time pulled his arm back.
“Rice, potdam,” VIN repeated aloud. Tow and Roo looked at him and nodded their heads like they had seen the tall people do. Now they knew what to say to them once they got underground.
The atmosphere hadn’t changed but the heat had, as the crew descended into the cavern one at a time. Ryan gave orders to open two air tanks to enrich the air as a preventive measure. He had wanted everybody to wear suits, but so far, opening doors hadn’t caused a situation. After everyone else descended, VIN showed Tow how to go down, and then Roo; he followed while Suzi, Mars and Mr. Rose lifted gardening equipment and baskets out of the forward crew compartment.
Tow was jumping up and down with excitement when VIN arrived but Roo looked unhappy. Roo noticed the hole made by the spider to open the first door into the forward rooms, and he pointed at VIN as Fritz had done at the shield wall. VIN nodded and, looking guilty, he hung his head to acknowledge he had done something wrong. Roo smiled at him and took his hand. They walked forward into the central room and both Tow and Roo whooped with excitement at seeing the five globes still in their original positions.
Roo put his hand and VIN’s on Earth, and the globe began to glow and get warm. VIN had taught Roo how to nod yes, but up to now, the word “no” hadn’t been in their learning curve. Now VIN said “rice” and shook his head from side to side.
Roo placed his hand on Mars, the second globe, but it didn’t warm to the touch. The boy looked at the globe seriously for a few seconds and then a few clicking words went through VIN’s mind. As the others look on, the boy’s face assumed a very serious expression; he pointed at the globe, then up into space, and finally to where VIN assumed Mars, the planet itself was orbiting. Aloud, Roo said “rice” and “no”. VIN knew what he was trying to say.
VIN interpreted, “It seems that because we took the globe from Mars, and put in on the Bridge, the planet is not alive or something. The Earth globe became warm when we touched it, actually quite hot, but Mars stayed cold.”
Then Roo put their hands on Ganymede the third in line. It stayed cold. “‘Rice,’ ‘no’, ‘potdam,’ ‘dangerous planet’,” he stated in perfect English, shocking everybody.
Fritz replied to this by asking, “Why potdam?”
Roo looked at Fritz understanding what he was trying to say and moved his left hand around in the air showing a floating movement, and suddenly he crashed his hand downwards, as if something was falling. He then pointed upwards and said, “SB-III” copying how Ryan had said the name of the ship over the intercom and then showed his hand crashing to the ground.
“I think he is warning us of possible gravity problems, and that we could have problems landing on Ganymede,” Igor suggested, watching the boy intently.
“I agree,” VIN said. Then, still holding the boy’s hand, he touched the fourth globe and Roo abruptly pulled his hand away from the fourth planet.
“We have found that moon to be Europa,” said Boris and Martha Von Zimmer nodded.
“The fifth globe is Titan, I believe. If need be, we can bypass Jupiter’s moons if they are too risky to land on, but we need to land somewhere for water and nitrogen. I think Europa could be a possibility,” added Petra Bloem. “We won’t get back to Earth very quickly without finding supplies somewhere.”
“Well, even though it seems they have a base on them, the red dots are now very small, hardly visible. I was sure Europa had the second largest red dot, after Mars, but maybe I’m wrong. Both these planets are cold to the touch and the red dot on Titan has grown to be the same as the dot on Mars. It seems that these dots are changing in real time.”
VIN put his and Roo’s hand on the fifth globe, Titan. It became hot to the touch, so hot that he had to pull their hands away, and the red dot began to glow with a life of its own. This didn’t happened when he touched them by himself; Roo had some connection to the globes. Then Roo pointed back to Ganymede, stated one word, “potdam” and then he did the same to Titan. He looked VIN in the eyes, looked at Europa, and nodded “yes” to try and tell VIN that this was the moon that was safe to go. He noticed Tow was nodding an affirmative to what her son was saying.
Then Roo noticed the closed doors to the other rooms around them. He immediately walked over to the door that still had the hole in it. Somehow it had closed while they were away. He looked at VIN knowing that he was the cause of this destruction, and smiling, he beckoned VIN forward. Roo placed VIN’s hand on the door, and Roo was surprised when nothing happened. VIN got the shock of his life, and so did the others, when Roo touched
the door and it immediately opened. Roo now knew why VIN had caused so much destruction to get through the door. He didn’t have the same powers.
Fritz touched Roo on the shoulder and then took out his mirror and with it opened the door to the command center. Now Roo looked surprised at how he had opened the door, took the mirror out of Fritz’s hand and covered it with his own. Then he touched the wall where the door pocket was located, and it closed and then opened again. Everybody was learning something new this day.
Roo went into the command center followed closely by VIN who mentally said “potdam.” Roo immediately stopped and carefully searched VIN’s face for what he was trying to say. VIN showed him the door opening and closing mentally saying “potdam” over and over again. Then he acted clutching his throat as if he couldn’t breathe, and then Roo knew what he was trying to say. He pointed at the space around him, breathed in deeply, and VIN nodded back, hoping that the boy understood that opening new doors might be dangerous. Then he pointed at the power room’s door and stated aloud “potdam” this time for everybody to hear. Roo looked at him, puzzled; why would that room be dangerous? But he nodded that he wouldn’t open the door.
The command center seemed to be the only place that interested Roo. He knew his way around the console hitting switches here and there. The sounds around them changed, the lights lowered in intensity, and the humming ceased. He looked surprised that he couldn’t control the power in the caverns as he wanted to. Weeks later when they were able to communicate, VIN learned that the “boy” was 36 years old, but didn’t understand that the base was being powered by a second source.