Alien Caller

by Greg Curtis

  Ten more minutes saw him at the gate, where he received the usual welcome from her, a passionate embrace for coming back, and a slap for being late. But fortunately, when he explained why he’d been delayed, her attention wandered away from his tardiness to the object itself. More accurately, to the writing on it.

  “I think it’s Mentaran. The writing anyway. Though if it is it’s rather odd. The shapes of some of the characters are strange, and some of the other characters I’ve never seen before.” At first that surprised him, then after a few seconds thought it made sense. Why would he strand them on a completely unknown world, when he could leave them instead on one where he knew exactly what was there. Perhaps even one where he knew nobody would ever come looking.

  “Perhaps an old colony or an outpost?”

  “Maybe. Or maybe just a people they traded with a long time ago. It is old.”

  “I know. But it is a sign that there at least was once a civilization here. A literate one, and one that had some tool working ability. That means there could be an ancient city nearby too. Buildings, maybe tools and information about this world.” It was a lifeline for them. A chance to find out about the world, maybe even to begin a new society. And that didn’t compare to the possibility that the old civilization might still be around. There could be locals, maybe even with some technology.

  “Maybe.”

  “And some of those buildings would surely be very close to this thing.” Which made a lot of sense to him. After all, people didn’t usually build statues in the middle of nowhere. Cyrea reluctantly nodded her head, probably guessing where he was heading.

  “And some of them may have more technology inside.” She nodded again and then smiled at him cheekily.

  “You do know where the buildings will be?” David looked at her suspiciously, wondering at her smile. But he shook his head admitting the truth of his ignorance. If she knew where they were, he needed to know.

  “You say that this thing was buried?” He nodded carefully.

  “So are they. That entire expanse down there is an ancient flood plain.”

  “Crap!” David instantly understood what she was saying, and he knew she was right. How else could this thing have been buried? All of which could only mean one thing. He was going to have to do some digging. A lot of digging.

  He would have preferred it if she hadn't burst out laughing.

  Chapter Thirty One

  After five days of digging David finally found the bottom of the door, and thanked every god known to man for it. Even with the technology of the Leinians it had been a long, hard job, mainly though, because he’d had to dig out a two yard wide eight foot deep strip on all four sides of the building before finding the door. Luck had not been kind to him.

  Even finding the building had been difficult, as he’d used a thin metal rod pulled off part of the depot, to plunge down into the ground looking for solid building remains, but for perhaps the first thirty or so attempts when the stick had hit something and he’d started digging down, all he’d found were rocks and the remains of broken structures. This was the first intact one he'd found, and it was only intact because it was built like a bunker. Meanwhile, the entire area around the statue was looking as though an army of gophers had invaded.

  At least he hadn’t been digging it out completely by hand. Instead, a slight modification by the technicians to the Mentan’s foot groomer had turned it into quite an effective tool for breaking up the ground, though it also tended to turn his fingers white as he had to hang on to the device. After that, some steady work with a makeshift rake and a primitive shovel, allowed him to remove the soil relatively easily.

  The result was a flat roofed shed, or similar sized building, which was completely flush with the ground. One which when the rains came, would surely be surrounded by a moat. But for the moment, whatever its faults, it was a shed. Besides, later, if and when it seemed worth it, he could dig a trench and a sump to remove any water that collected.

  He celebrated his find by spending half an hour lying on the ground, recovering his strength and thanking the lord he didn’t have to do any more digging. But he didn’t waste that time. Instead he used it to study the structure closely, something that had to be done, long before even thinking about opening the door. He’d seen enough horror movies to know that entrances could be booby trapped, though he doubted at least that this one would have any bandage clad walking dead to worry about.

  Its architecture was uninspiring to say the least. Privately he’d hoped for something exotic and alien, and instead found a giant brick. It was built of bricks too. Large stone bricks, mortared together with something distinctly black. Or maybe that was just the dark soil still clinging to the mortar. The sides were plain, flat slabs of dark grey stone, the roof was covered in more of the same dark grey colour, though perhaps it was a type of slate rather than a brick. He hadn’t excavated much of the roof, and in most places the tundra still covered it.

  There were no windows in it. That was something he’d noticed days before. He could have tried to enter through a window instead of spending more days hunting for the door. But a building without windows made no sense to him at all. Apart from the fact that one might have let him see inside a few days earlier, it was simply wrong. What sort of people don’t need windows for light and air? But the proof was irrefutable. He’d dug all four sides down to their base, and never found a single window. Maybe they’d had some sort of skylight, still buried under the tundra? It was the only logical explanation he could think of. Or maybe they simply didn’t need air or light.

  The door itself was metal. Iron by the looks of things which had seen better days or centuries. Perhaps originally it had been stainless, but no longer. It showed the effects of years of exposure to the elements; maybe even millennia. In short it was almost solid rust though here and there he could see patches of what looked like relatively intact metal. Metal with a gunmetal grey appearance.

  But the most important thing he could see was its complete lack of anything that looked like a trap. As far as he could tell the house was just one solid giant brick with a single entrance. Besides, after nearly a week of digging around it, he would surely have set off any traps that might surround it. The only traps that it could have were internal. And there was only one way to find them.

  In time he decided it was something he had to do.

  He was angry at himself for deciding to do it, especially when he’d promised Cyrea he wouldn’t even think of it before letting their technicians poke around first. But what choice was there really he asked himself? The technicians had no advanced equipment to test it anyway, and none of them were as experienced in defusing military munitions as he was. At least that’s what he kept telling himself. In truth after days of digging, he was just insanely curious to find out what was inside.

  The handle was unusual. At least for a house. It looked more like a fridge handle, a long steel plate, which when he finally tried it, pushed inwards.

  Despite its advance age and the rust everywhere, the handle moved smoothly, and he heard with satisfaction the click as whatever locking mechanism it used, opened. Before he’d even properly considered the dangers of actually opening the door, it swung all the way inwards on well oiled hinges, taking the decision out of his hands. He simply leapt to one side, hoping that anything nasty that might come out of the building would miss him.

  Perhaps thirty seconds later, as nothing bad had happened he risked peeking inside from the doorway. As the door had reached the end of its travel, it must have tripped a switch as he discovered light was shining out of the inky blackness, something that shocked him. How could it have power? Considering the age of the building, the rust on the door and the fact that it had been completely buried - after all how long did it take to bury an entire house with earth - he had not expected it to have anything actually working. But it did. Yet even more important than the fact that this ancient structure could still have power, was what that light showed
him.

  Inside was rack after rack of equipment. Mechanical equipment. All of it seemingly in good condition. He could see no sign of rust, at least from the doorway, and in fact, the odd panel still gleamed as if it had just been polished.

  Much of it he couldn’t make heads or tails of. There were things that looked like they might have been computers or televisions sitting on the benches though they could just as easily have been laundry machines. Other things might have been power tools. But most of it seemed to be just steel sculptures. Giant objects of mechanical spaghetti, complete with levers and gears, arms and legs, spread around the walls. What was sitting on the benches was far less than what was hanging from the walls, rather like tools in a farmer’s shed, except that the machinery hanging on the walls looked nothing like hoes and spades. It looked nothing like anything he’d ever seen before, but then it was alien. Of course he realized, much of it also made no sense because it was switched off, the machines apparently having folded up like umbrella’s to save space, awaiting their next use.

  In short order he also understood why the building had no windows. It wasn’t a house. It was a shed. But not a farmer’s shed. What was it Cyrea had suggested the planet was, an ancient trading post? Well if it was then these were surely the tools of traders. Cash registers, wrapping machines, forklifts and the like. They looked nothing like anything he’d ever seen in a shop or warehouse, but that he was beginning to realise, meant nothing.

  As time passed and nothing bad seemed to happen, David grew more bold, and dared to think about venturing inside. Though not before he managed to find a large rock from his pile of diggings and wedge it in the door frame. The last thing he wanted to be was trapped inside an airtight brick tomb.

  First, after testing the air and finding it somewhat stale and smelling of metal but otherwise breathable, he walked down the three small steps to the floor, and then carefully over to the far wall where at least half a dozen of the largest steel structures hung like sides of beef in a freezer. With his tongue stuck firmly in the back of his throat he touched one, feeling the cold metal under his fingers and noting the fact that it had not the slightest trace of corrosion on it. In fact, it had only the smallest trace of dust too. Power, lubricant in the door hinges and no dust, - this place had been built to endure.

  The main trunk was about a foot wide and six feet high, and was shaped with an almost aerodynamic curve so that it was pointed at the top, and then simply cylindrical with a slightly narrower waist. At the pointed end were a number of what looked like grills and plastic headlights, while the bottom end was a tangle of metal tubes and wires. Running off its sides were six projections, all hanging limply. They too were shaped somewhat aerodynamically, and possibly, though he couldn’t be certain, hinged in the middle. The bulges could be just that, bulges, and the lines around them could simply indicate where the plates connected.

  In his mind he tried to visualize what it would be like when it was fully erect, but failed. He couldn’t work out which way the legs went. But at least he realized they were probably legs. His best guess was that when open it would resemble a six legged saw bench. But why would anybody want something like that? Alternatively he realized, the legs could be arms spreading out horizontally, turning it into a giant metal spider. Something that didn’t appeal, especially after his time with the Mentan’s spider robots. But maybe that meant it was a wall or floor mounted electrical device with antennae? Like a radar station to greet ships arriving? That could be very useful.

  David ran his hands over its body a lot more, trying to work out the details of which way its hinges if they were that moved, but its secrets were well hidden. Nothing moved under his hands, and he had to face the likelihood that they were in fact just single pieces of moulded metal.

  He turned his attention to the pointy end and in particular the strange lumps around its neck. They made even less sense than the rest of it to him. The rest could be switches or sensors, but the lumps could only be lumps. They weren’t attractive, weren’t aerodynamic, and surely couldn’t do anything useful other than to sit there like steel moles. But then again he realized, whoever had built these things, wasn’t human. They might be aesthetically pleasing to them. Like fins on a classic car.

  Experimentally he pushed harder at them, trying to see if they might move with a little more pressure, like switches that had frozen up over time. But they didn’t budge an inch. They were solid and had been moulded into the metal.

  His hands moved on, exploring the rest of the pointed head end, which was far higher than his own. In fact he had to stand on the tips of his toes just to touch it. Then he did and wished he hadn’t. The tip turned out to be a switch, even though nothing moved under his fingers. At first.

  His first clue that something was wrong, was when several of the lumps he had been so critical of, suddenly turned sky blue. He leapt back startled, realizing that this thing too had power. But more important than that he realised, he had turned it on.

  At first, the blue lights didn’t really seem that threatening as nothing else happened. They were just a little worrying. Then the thing started moving, and he leapt backwards again in shock. Then he took a few more steps back, all the way to the steps and then the door, as the thing grew more active.

  First it was the tips of the legs that moved, perhaps the bottom six inches or so, all writhing in unison like snake heads. It was not a pretty image. Then, once they had had their turn the knees started flexing, and he realized the machine was slowly testing out its systems. Next it was the turn of the hips, and he watched all of the legs moving in unison like a spider's. Cold ran down his spine at the sight. He’d never liked spiders, and this thing, whatever it might be, could be the granddaddy of them all, even if it had only six legs.

  He gripped the door tightly, and kicked away the rock he’d so carefully placed in it. The ancient steel door could be his best defence. It might also be his only one.

  In time the machine seemed to have finished its testing, and it stopped moving, something he hadn't expected. Maybe it had done all it intended to. Gone through its checks and powered down. It could be. He began to breathe again, daring to hope that that was all it was going to do. He should have known better.

  A sudden whirring noise caught him by surprise, and then he watched with horror as the machine was slowly lowered to the floor, like a pull down bed from a wall. Its legs in turn moved into their walking positions and in seconds he was staring at a six legged metal spider as big as a pony. A spider that was staring back at him, if the glowing blue eyes on the top of its head were anything to go by.

  Then it moved, and he nearly had a heart attack.

  Its front legs moved forwards, then its middle pair, then the hind most, and it took a careful step towards him. For a fraction of a second David stood there, frozen in shock, then he leapt backwards, slammed the door shut behind him, scrambled up the bank, and ran for the grass behind it, praying it wouldn’t be able to follow.

  It was a faint hope.

  He turned in time to see the door handle being pulled inwards, and then the door opening slowly, silently, to reveal the spider. A split second and a million panicked heartbeats later he watched the mechanical nightmare smoothly leaving the shed as if it was something it did every day, simply pulling its legs in tighter as it squeezed through the door, and then letting them extend out to their normal width when it was outside. It even closed the door behind it, before it lightly vaulted the eight foot high trench wall, David had just scrambled up. Quicker than he could believe possible it ran towards him, its legs moving in a sinuous harmony, and David knew he couldn’t out run it. Two good legs or not, it was faster than him. A lot faster.

  He grabbed the only weapon he could find, the rake, and held it before him as it charged, ready to fight it, if only he knew how. But he didn’t have to.

  Even as he was bracing himself for its mechanical onslaught, the machine stopped, eight feet from him. Then it just waited, blue lights
on its head glowing, moving not a muscle while he in turn waited for it to pounce. It didn’t. As the eternally long seconds ticked by, it just stood there, patiently waiting. Like a cougar, waiting to strike.

  Taking his courage in his hands David, backed away from it, step by cautious step, daring to hope it might let him go. He never took his eyes off it and for some reason with each cautious step it did nothing. Perhaps it realized he was armed. Perhaps it had done all it was going to do. He almost dared to hope. But it wasn’t to be. After only four steps the machine moved once more into life, taking a couple of quick steps towards him. But again it stopped eight feet away, and David swiftly realized it was a pattern that was going to continue. He took a few more backwards steps and watched as it did the same. Sure enough it was following him. Why? Though was that as important as the fact that it wasn’t attacking him? Probably not.