Terra

by Robert Turnbull

  Luke joined in the laughter “And we thought we spoiled them honey.” As they looked back Dash rolled over on his side so more could rub his stomach, and back, and, head.

  Sky smiled warmly at the scene and then back at the rest of her family “I missed everyone so much.” She looked at her father and brother and then looked at Luke as she gushed “I’m so lucky, I have two homes…and now I’m home again, back to where I started.” Tears began to flow and did so even harder when she looked over and saw not only Tom tearing up, but tears rolling down her father’s cheeks.

  Jim looked at the grown woman his arm was around and smiled warmly. She was no longer a little girl, no longer was she the pretty little teen that flew out from Wheel 7 that fateful day, instead, under his arm was a strong beautiful woman. His trembling voice proudly resonated through the wheel’s garage.

  “Welcome home baby.”

  Chapter 27.

  Of course the rest of the day and most of the night was spent catching up and stories flew, a decade was a long time and things change. However the following day Jim gathered everyone that had been gone into a meeting hall and as they entered they could see men and women dressed in stylish, but unknown uniforms sitting at the head table.

  As everyone was seated Jim walked to the head table and smiled at his children and their friends.

  “This is Commander of the mission, Asa Wells.” Jim beamed at his kids in a strange smirk not unlike he did when they were young and he was about to spring a surprise on them “The commander here is…” he looked at Asa and shrugged “sort of our great, great, uncle, but neither of us could figure out how many generations. The other man is next to him is Captain Aaron Beets, the spaceship’s Captain. The young lady on his other side is their Chief Engineer and was responsible for giving us the new power source and force field.” Jim introduced the rest of the officers of the Wells, but it seemed no one was listening…new power source, new force field? To Sky it had been a decade, but Tom had left a little over a month ago…or was it two? His head reeled under the weight of impending questions, but his dad walked over to where his kids sat and put his hands on their shoulders.

  “Listen to what Asa has to say kids; he’s also their historian.”

  The short man in the gleaming white and gray uniform arose, walked to the front of the table and perched himself on the edge and clasped his hands neatly upon his thigh.

  “I know all this is happening fast my friends. Like your dad said, we are related. Med comp readings showed us that much when we scanned your people for disease. My blood samples are also in our data base and of course you all living here in this wheel confirmed that you are indeed some of our lost people.”

  “Lost people?” Sky asked softly and still confused, something that she wasn’t used to “Are you all from the other side of Terra?”

  The crew chuckled as Asa stood and started to slowly pace in front of them.

  “Oh, no my friends, we live on the next planet over. Terra is the fourth planet from the sun, we come from the fifth planet that we call Syrene.” Asa saw the confusion and spoke softer and slower hoping that some of this would sink in.

  “Syrene is sparsely populated by bird like beings called Avaintee, they evolved from dinosaurs much like those creatures that my people reported that you call your kids.” he smiled at Sky. “Anyhow I think that starting from the beginning would be best as your dad told me most of the relevant records were destroyed during landing and the meteor strikes…so…” he chuckled “let me begin a little before that.”

  Asa sat on a chair he pulled from the head table and sat facing Sky’s group.

  “We left Earth because of the possible threat of an alien invasion. My many times great-grandfather led the expedition along with his wife Susan. It appears that he never entered the exact circumstances or any other information about it, other than it was invasion related. Yet none of our Earth records ever mentioned any kind of invasion…none! It was as if it never happened, yet somehow did, strange really.” he chuckled “It seemed the world’s richest man also invented our portal drive and many other things that got us here…and somehow our great ancestor was involved in all of it.”

  Tom rubbed his neck and almost looked comical “Here? Meaning…” he pointed at the floor “Terra?”

  Asa smiled and nodded “Yes, Terra and Syrene. You see our journey was supposed to last a few months as this solar system and Earth’s was speeding away from each other at an enormous rate. So with a ship like the one you see outside, we set off toward Syrene. A little under a light year from this solar system, we ran into an asteroid field as we came out of one portal and in the split second it takes to jump to another portal that the ship created, the portal opened, pulled us in…and several hundred asteroids that were screaming straight for us.”

  He frowned as he fidgeted in his seat “So there was our ancestor’s ship, in a wormhole with asteroids all around them. Captain Wells knew that the second they came out of the wormhole the asteroids would come bursting out milliseconds behind them. Well, we arrived here at our destination solar system and were greeted by hundreds of objects slamming into our ship and the wheels it had attached to it.”

  Captain Beets stepped forward and nodded “I should mention that besides the spaceship the Wells is designed after, there were twenty wheels like yours attached behind us. Each, like your own, had its own smaller command ship in the center that held all the major data banks, controls for separation and landing. You see the main spaceship moved by forming a portal, and then jumping through it. Due to power limitations, the portals only allow the ship to go ten light years at a time, come out of the jump and create another portal to continue another ten light years, and so forth.” He sighed softly “It seems that as the asteroids crashed into the ship and wheels, they jumped again.”

  Asa nodded “We aren’t sure why, perhaps it was due to damage that strikes had already caused, but we entered close to another planet, the second from this sun. So you see, not only did we bring asteroids with us, but being that close to the sun and another planet as well, the gravity instantly pulled the rest of the asteroids toward their massive bodies, and we were in their way. By then the main drives couldn’t jump again or we’d overshoot the world we wanted to colonize. So as more and more asteroids came out of the closing portal, they slammed into the ship.”

  Beets nodded sadly “We lost the last three wheels instantly, where they attached to the rear and as they broke away they burnt up in the second planet’s atmosphere. Of course most of the main command modules in the wheels had not been brought on line for landing yet, but somehow Captain Wells managed to get some of the command ships in the wheels online while his wife got them out of the debris field.” he sadly sighed “However, several of the wheels and the main ship were too badly damaged to make another jump, even a small one to clear them of this solar system. The main ship was limping along on auxiliary power as the main engines were damaged. Their engineers figured out a way to do a short portal jump, but it would mean the death of thousands on the most severely damaged wheels, so…”

  Sky nodded “...so let me guess, they decided to cut loose and give the others a chance to make Syrene.”

  “Close Sky, by the time everything had come to fruition, the planet you call Terra, loomed in the distance. Before starting out that planet had been briefly scouted by some portal drone and deemed too primitive, however it was decided better to chance it than to break apart in space and die. So now with seventeen ships, they cut the last six free. The wheels separated to head for the best landing spots they could find and scattered along the equator of this world you call Terra. As the rest jumped, they saw them enter Terra’s atmosphere and some of them broke apart…the rest had already gone from sight to the back side of this world and assumed lost.”

  “Or at least the ones they saw.” Jim added as the crew from the Wells sadly nodded. Asa stood and sighed…

  “So for the last three, check that, almost four hu
ndred years we thought all on board dead. When the main ship and wheels arrived they orbited Syrene, the surviving wheels landed in two groups of three and one of two, all within a six thousand square mile radius. When we got down safely, the main ship came down near one of the two wheels and they started building civilization anew.”

  Their Chief Engineer stood “The inhabitants of Syrene were frightened at first, but as they were slightly more advanced than our ancestors were when they left Earth, soon made treaties and pacts…”

  Asa smiled “…and now we all live together in harmony. They had none of the elements we needed to repair our main power sources so we basically had to start over from scratch. They soon discovered that the Avaintee had no interest in space…until we landed of course. They were more advanced that our ancestors in many things. Our ancestors were more interested in creating a new world for themselves and surviving. Thinking that all of you were dead, all efforts were turned to survival and making living within the guidelines that the denizens of their new planet had made for themselves. It would seem from our old records it appears that only humans had such little regard for their own world.”

  “So you weren’t looking for us?” Tom asked.

  “Yes and no.” the Captain answered “We’ve been working on our solar drives for decades, but it wasn’t until this last decade that we managed to make traveling between planets practical. There is a planet beyond ours that looks rich in important materials, but I guess we all needed to know that nagging question that our ancestors left us, ‘was it possible that anyone survived’. I don’t think any of us actually believed that we’d find descendants of…” Aaron looked embarrassed “alive, even after we hoped…”

  Asa nodded “And we needed these minerals from that next planet over and had to wait for it to get close enough to make the journey. As fate would have it, we found a new element and that solved our power needs…and that of a new drive for our spacecraft.”

  The Captain nodded in response “They brought enough back and once the drive was built and installed, everyone voted to come here before going to get more minerals and the new element. We had to be sure. So we came here only to find no signals,” he frowned “we never thought to check the old band widths. However Asa here insisted that we orbit and adjust our orbit a little each time as to cover the entire surface. When we saw artificial light at night or structures during the day, we sent out small remote controlled observation craft to fly lower and observe. We only found some reptilian creatures and never landed. We did find the remains of one of the old wheels but it was completely overgrown and lifeless…” he grinned “well devoid of human life that is.” There seemed to be some commotion and then the sounds of running feet and two troopers burst into the room.

  “We’re being attacked!”

  “Attacked?” Sky shouted “The kids?”

  A third man pushed through the troopers “Hard to explain.” he panted.

  “TRY!” Sky and Tom shouted back simultaneously.

  “Sir…ma’am…your kids seem to be standing between us and the attackers, and have their backs to the force field.” he scratched his head “But damned if they look like they’re going to attack the invaders, nor do the invaders look hostile anymore….it’s…it’s just kinda weird now.” the half panicked trooper muttered loudly as he scratched his head and sweat ran down his cheeks.

  Sky grabbed Luke’s arm, who until now had been silent and trying to soak everything in. However when it came to the two giant rexes, he knew they had become too accustomed to people and that could be dangerous for them. He slowed nearly pulling Sky off her feet “Whoa! All of your people are in the wheel…aren’t they?”

  Tom shot by “People yes, but not N’rog and they’re built like humans.”

  “So?” Sky shot back as she jerked him back from a running gait.

  “SO? Jesus Sky no one around here has seen N’rog…I don’t want them to shoot the N’rog…or the N’rog to harm anyone here.”

  “I thought you said no one was at home.” She panted as they broke out into the near mile wide inner circle of the wheel and dashed toward the garage “Besides you said the N’rog weren’t hostile and just observe.”

  Luke slowed his pace and changed direction toward the garage to follow his wife “Jesus Sky you’re right. I pray they aren’t those alien invaders the Wells crew was telling us about.”

  Sky paled as thought of what alien weapons could do to the dinosaurs that she had raised from birth, they had no shelter and were outside of the shield. Her mind reeled as she clearly heard Lady roar at the top of her lungs…and feared the worse.

  Chapter 28.

  It took far too long for the mad dash through the large hangar sized garage and to the large door that opened too slowly to suit any of them. That included Tom’s crew who had been with the kids for such a short time.

  They burst out into the open of the wide cleared area to see the two giant rexes standing with their backs to the jungle miles away and looking straight at the humans running toward them. Sky came to a skidding stop and grasped her dad’s arm.

  “Radio everyone to stop and not to shoot!”

  “Baby?” her dad looked puzzled as he pulled his radio. His baby girl had been gone for slightly over ten years, but the woman he now was getting to know, he trusted.

  “EVERYONE STAND DOWN!” he shouted. One by one people stopped as they stood in place as Jim looked at Sky.

  “That’s the kid’s way of us telling to stop. There’s no danger, they’re turning their backs to what we see as the danger.”

  “But they’re just dinosaurs.” Jim replied.

  As Harry ran past his old commander he laughed “Yeah they are…just trust them.”

  Sky and Tom’s crew reached the force field and Jim radioed to turn it off, there was a slight tingling and then it was gone and Dash nearly stumbled forward toward the humans. He steadied himself and turned to back to away from the rest as Lady turned and lowered toward Sky.

  “What is it girl?” Sky asked.

  A strong hand grasped her from behind and Tom’s hand shot past her to point to the rows of corn in the distance. From out of the corn walked Lilra and Murg followed by hundreds of N’rog carrying strange weapons.

  As the humans and N’rog gingerly approached each other and stopped mere yards apart, Sky signaled the kids to back away. She could see they were confused, probably by the scents of the newcomers. They seemed to sense they didn’t mean harm, yet that protective instinct to protect the tiny humans was strong…but Sky gave them the ‘friend’ signal and they calmed and followed her orders.

  Gina and Tom walked up to the leaders of the N’rog and shook their hands, and jokingly reminded what the interaction of their pheromones do to both races. There were chuckles as the N’rog leaders explained that they rubbed scent masking plants over their bodies and broke out long hidden cashes of weapons, before coming to help fight the invaders.

  Murg looked at the long chrome and copper weapon in his hands and chuckled “We saw the strange ship land, but only saw some people heading toward your home Tom. We thought your people were being invaded, so we sent for any help we could get. Amazingly not just the rest of the humanologists came, but many of the warrior caste as well…to help humans.” he grinned “We were amazed.”

  Lilra smiled as she still kept an eye on the humans that were keeping their distance.

  “It is…uhhhm ok? Safe?”

  Tom smiled “Completely safe Lilra. The ship is from our people, the old ones long ago that brought us to your world.” Seeing confusion there was a quick briefing, introductions to Sky and Luke.

  Lilra nodded and smiled “Very well then, we shall return to our base and when you have worked out all…hmmm, whatever you all have to work out, come and visit.”

  “And bring your friends from that other world too.” Murg chuckled “since Lilra got me into all of this, I always seem to have more questions than answers.” He half waved, half saluted as they
quickly vanished into the rows of corn while Tom and the rest headed back to the waiting humans that were standing by the wheel’s garage with puzzled looks on their faces.

  “Somehow the kids knew.” Sky muttered “It seems that we have more questions as well…again. Jesus, but how did they know?”

  “Don’t care,” Harry grumbled “ran all the way out here and never got to eat…want food!” That drew a lot of relieved laughter as it was time to relax, as it had turned out, the deadly invasion was in reality new friends attempting to help. Luke put his arm around Sky as they slowly strolled into the confines of the clearly marked force field boundaries. This time Sky motioned for the kids to enter as her father smiled, he understood only too well about wanting to protect kids.

  Gina and Tom slowly walked next to them and nodded as they headed off in another direction. Tom shouted back over his shoulder to the rest, including his dad.

  “Too much for me, too much stress, too much excitement, let’s all take a few days to let all this sink in and then we all get together and talk. For now all I want is food.” Gina whispered into his ear and giggled musically as Tom looked back and laughed “Yeah! And that too.”

  ******************************

  Three days later a huge meeting was held with the crew from the Wells, Tom’s expeditionary group, and Sky and her husband. Over the following days all was explained, asked, and answered.

  By the end of the week, Tom and Gina took representatives of all groups to meet the N’rog and another three days was spent pretty much doing what they had done before…and no one found it boring. New questions, new answers, new friends, all seemed right with the world.

  Soon the time for talking was over and back at the wheel the question everyone knew would be asked, was asked by Asa.