Exiled to the Stars

by Zellmann, William

  “It looks like our visible spectrum is on the high edge of theirs. We’re missing nearly everything there is to see, because we’re looking too high on the electromagnetic spectrum!”

  Susan frowned. “Well, how far into the infrared could they see?”

  Michiko’s wide grin faded slightly. “Uh, well, I can’t really be sure. My equipment didn’t go that far. But I think there’s a possibility that they could even see some microwaves!”

  Susan’s expression mirrored Michiko’s own excitement, now. “So, our people should be wearing night-vision goggles whenever they’re in spider-people territory. Who knows what we might find!”

  Michiko shook her head. “I think we may need something more sophisticated than night-vision. That only covers the near-infrared. We’re going to need instruments that can show us the deep infrared.”

  Susan straightened. “All right, Michiko. Write this up as a paper, and get it to me as quickly as you can. I’ll make certain that every scientist working on the alien project sees it and knows they need to move their researches down the electromagnetic spectrum. Including Arturo Venn!”

  Michiko smiled. “Thank you, Susan.”

  Eighthmonth 7, Year 48 A.L.

  Doctor Andre Benton slammed into Susan’s office, waving his tablet. “Did you see this, Doctor Renko? Did you see what that…that woman said?”

  Susan Renko straightened, shaking her head and suppressing a smile. “Good morning, Andre. I assume ‘that woman’ is Rena Ramos?”

  Andre dropped into a chair uninvited, his body stiff with anger. “Of course it’s Ramos! How dare she? How dare she?”

  “Stop it!” Susan ordered. Andre jerked, and she continued, “Now, close your eyes, take three deep breaths, and then you can tell me what’s happening.”

  Andre obeyed, struggling to control his seething anger. Finally, though, he regained enough control to speak in a calm tone. “Have you seen what she said about me in the newsie? She gave Kerry Jenson an interview, and when Kerry asked about my latest paper, identifying the Type 7 tablet thing as a communicator, she said, “Doctor Benton has discovered that we call them ‘tablet things’, so he’s decided they obviously must be like our human tablets. He often assumes the spider people thought like we do, that is, when he bothers to think at all.” He finished reading the quote, and barely restrained himself from throwing his tablet onto Susan’s desk.

  Susan suppressed a smile, and shook her head. “Andre, I warned you that it was too soon to publish that paper. You simply don’t have enough evidence that the spider peoples’ Type 7 tablet thing is a communicator. In fact, all you’ve done is get one to produce a buzz at the very upper end of the human audio range.

  Andre’s expression turned desperate. “But don’t you see? That buzz is a carrier wave! It has to be!”

  Susan shook her head. “No, it doesn’t. Now, you may be right, but I wouldn’t be surprised if you didn’t have years of work ahead of you proving it.”

  Susan sighed and shrugged. “I’m becoming very tired of this silly war between you two. The time has come for the two of you to deal with each other.” She made a decision, and straightened. “I want you to go up to Site One.”

  Andre’s eyes widened, and he opened his mouth to protest, but Susan forestalled him.

  “No,” she continued, “I won’t make you work for her, at least not yet. But you will work with her team.” She held up a hand. “I said, ‘with’, not ‘for’. I’ll instruct her to give you your own lab, and you can take your lab assistant. You’ll work independently. But since Rena is running the computer investigations up there, I want you to share your work with her. All of it. I’m going to order her to do the same, and share her team’s work notes with you. You’ll either learn to get along, or one of you will kill the other, and right now, I don’t much care which.

  “Now go pack. I have to call Rena.”

  Fourthmonth 17, Year 51 A.L.

  Susan smiled as her caller’s face appeared on her monitor. “Well, Rena,” she greeted the woman. “I haven’t talked with you for a while. How’s married life?”

  Rena Benton flushed. :Uh, Oh, it’s uh, fine,” she replied. “Uh, Doctor Susan, do you happen to have a Type 7 tablet thing in your office?”

  Susan nodded. “Of course. I have samples of all the different styles. Just a moment.” She rose and went to the display case containing her samples, and retrieved the Type 7. She returned to her desk. “So, what are you and Andre up to now?”

  Rena looked flustered. “Uh, we’d like to try something before I explain. Is that all right?”

  Susan smiled. “Of course, Rena. Just tell me what you need.”

  Rena nodded. “Don’t bother with the stuff on the front, for now. But if you hold the tablet thing like a human tablet, you’ll find your index fingertip on or near a small hole in its back.”

  Susan turned the tablet thing over, and nodded. “I see it.”

  Rena nodded in satisfaction. “Good. Now, see if you can find a pointed object to stick in the hole. Not hard, and you won’t have to keep it there. Just something to press in with, like pushing a button.”

  Susan found a stylus that fit the hole, inserted it, and pressed. It certainly felt like she’d pressed a button, but nothing happened.

  She raised her eyes to the monitor. “Nothing,” she said. Rena looked disappointed, and sighed. “I guess Andre was right. I hate that.”

  Susan grinned. “Okay, now tell me what that was all about.”

  The disappointment faded from Rena’s face, replaced by something like triumph. “Well, you know that Andre’s up at the city, right?

  Susan nodded. “I authorized it, of course. I’m not sure why it was so urgent, but he was sure there was something he could only learn in the city. I certainly hope it was worth leaving you at Site One, and a 2500-klick trip.”

  Her terminal gave a beep, announcing that Doctor Andre Benton was requesting to be cut in on three-way. She clicked ‘accept’, and then examined the two grinning faces occupying her monitor.

  “Good morning, Doctor Renko,” Andre said. “has Rena spilled the beans and ruined my surprise?”

  Susan smiled. “No, but if one of you doesn’t start talking soon, I will personally fly up there and paddle both your backsides.”

  Their smiles, if anything, became wider. “Well, Mistress, I was right!” Andre crowed. “The Type 7 is a communicator. Rena and I are using it now, and we wanted to see if it would work at the colony.”

  Susan was stunned. “It works? You’re using them now?”

  Rena nodded. “Yes, mistress. Oh, when we use them, we have to wear night-vision goggles to see images at all, and we need the new enhancers to see them in detail. But once we turned the frequency down to its lowest level we could hear each other fine, though we sound like baby ducks.”

  “At 2500 klicks?”

  Andre nodded. “With no distortion or attenuation at all. Actually, we suspect they’ll work planet-wide.”

  Susan’s frown was skeptical. “Planet-wide? Really? And how could you judge that?

  Andre just nodded, seeming unfazed by her skepticism. “We’re pretty sure, now, that the communication medium is part of the power broadcast system. The fact that we couldn’t communicate with you supports that. The power broadcasts reach the city and Site One, but not the colony. No power, no comms.” He looked self-satisfied, but Rena looked irritated.

  “Much as I hate to admit it, Doctor Susan, I’m afraid he may actually be right.

  Ninthmonth 12, Year 55 A.L.

  Ken sighed. He was tired. He’d led the colony for over a quarter of a century, ever since Cesar Montero’s death. And it had been a busy and turbulent quarter-century, leading the tiny, isolated, farming community huddled around the crashed ship and behind their walls, and driving it forward. He smiled. Far too often, it had been two steps back for every step forward.

  Now, though, not only was the colony flourishing, with a population approaching 20,0
00, but it was spreading and developing healthily. The mines were now a community of their own, as was the Seaport Project, and even the river fishing village. Not to mention the scientific communities at Site One and the City. They had a healthy economy, and trade and manufacturing were booming.

  Jack Brooks, the colony’s richest man, was gathering volunteers to set up another settlement in the valley outside the City. He was sure they would find a way to tap the spider-peoples’ power broadcasts. Ken wasn’t so certain, but he was gratified that Brooks was finding volunteers adventurous enough to try. Things were going well.

  Which made this the perfect opportunity for Ken to retire. A couple of years ago, he’d begun writing what he hoped would be a definitive history of the colony, from boost out at L-4 to, well, today. He was still working on the voyage, and was having difficulty dealing with, as well as writing, the account of his wife’s and daughter’s rapes, and his and his son’s beatings.

  Surprisingly, though, he was also finding it therapeutic. Oh, the pain was still there, of course, and he knew it would never go away. Not completely. But now it was a dull, permanent ache, rather than the tearing, horrible pain he’d carried for so many years.

  But there was no time! Running the colony was a more-than-full-time job, and his book was progressing very slowly. Sometimes a week would go by without writing a word.

  He wasn’t worried about the colony. Lee Jenson was a good man, and would make a good leader. He and Ken had endlessly discussed plans and proposals for the future of the colony. But Lee was the one who would implement them, not Ken.

  He looked around. He was actually standing in a city built by meat-eating spiders over 500 centuries ago. And to a certain extent, it was still functioning. He shook his head. He’d been dealing with the issue of the spider people for sixteen years now. He was glad to be handing it off to Lee, although he was proud that today would kick off a new phase in Alien Technology Studies. He would go out with a comparative bang.

  He turned to Susan Renko, on his left. She had to be in her seventies or eighties, at least, Ken decided. But she was still an attractive woman, still seeming only middle-aged, and handsome, in a fashion-model way. The blonde hair was streaked with gray, now, but she made no effort to conceal it.

  “Well, Susan,” he said, “we come to a major milestone in Vlad’s plan. Are you happy?”

  Her smile was full and her face filled with satisfaction. “Very,” she replied. “And I’m proud of you and I thank you for establishing these ‘Long-Range Explorers’. I’m confident that they’ll bring us the spider peoples’ technology.”

  Ken smiled and raised a hand. “Don’t thank me. Thank Lee and that son-in-law of yours. They managed the impossible: getting the Council to see the future.”

  “Well, here comes Lee, at least. I hope we can get the show started.”

  Ken smiled. “Patience, Susan. It’s a sterling virtue.”

  Susan’s smile didn’t fade. “But a limited one. Sometimes it’s impatience that’s the virtue.”

  Finally all the white lights were set up, overwhelming the city’s dim red ones, the crowd, such as it was, was assembled, and the cameras set up and tested.

  Ken stepped to the podium. He looked out over the crowd. There were only a few dozen of them, members of the scientific community studying the city. But he knew that the cameras were taking his image to the colony, to Site One, to the mines, to Seaport, to the fishing village, virtually everywhere that man had spread on Crashlanding.

  “Good morning,” he began. “And welcome to one of the most momentous events in the history of the colony, as well as my final act as Colony Administrator.

  “Sixteen years ago, we discovered that we were not the first civilization on Crashlanding. That others had been here long before us. They died out, but they left us amazing works of development and technology. We have spent the last sixteen years trying to understand their legacy.

  “Today, we take a large step in that effort. The spider people lived underground. They apparently almost never visited the surface, except for food. To the best of our knowledge, they did not fly, not in space, and not in the air.

  “But they had what we think was a worldwide civilization, connected by a system of tubes with cars running through them. Today, thanks to the foresight of the Council and your new Administrator, we will make a large stride in understanding the spider people, and exploring the world they left us. Here to tell us about it is your newly-elected Administrator, Lee Jenson. Messer Jenson?”

  Lee stepped to the posium with a confident smile. “Thank you, Administrator Terhoe. I will do my best to fill the shoes of the giants that preceded me, Cesar Montero, and you, sire.”

  He turned back to face the cameras. “As Administrator Terhoe said, we have spent the last sixteen years studying the legacy of the spider people. We have been hampered by the fact that we have found no written materials other than labels on equipment. So, we are like blind men, carefully feeling our way, and trying to avoid destroying anything important.

  “Our scientists agree that one of the biggest factors keeping us from learning more is that so far, we have found only two installations; one that we think is a power station, and another, where I stand now, that is an actual city.

  “But if we are right, and this was a worldwide civilization, there must be many more installations, where we can learn what we need to know. We need to find the schools, the factories, the scientific laboratories, and the thousands of other installations that can boost us on our own way, and make us truly the spider peoples’ inheritors.

  “We still do not understand their writing. We still do not understand their power system. But we have now begun to be able to manipulate it, to make it work for us. We have learned to use their communicators, that can connect us worldwide. And now, we have learned to activate the tube car system, or at least a part of it.

  “Today, we will launch four of those tube cars. They will each be occupied by a team of four of the brave men and women who volunteered to become Long-Range Explorers. Each car will go in a different direction, to return only after six months. In the meantime, of course, they will carry the spider people’s communicators, so they can report the marvels they find.

  “And now, to present the sixteen brave young people who will dare this adventure, I would like to introduce Colonel Ronald Creding Junior of the Explorer Corps.”

  He stepped away, and Ron stepped nervously up, tablet in hand. Lee moved to join Ken and Susan. He smiled. “Well, here they are, the sacrificial lambs.”

  Susan shook her head. “No. I see them as our hope, our saviors. If they don’t succeed, Lee, you’re the one who will have to lead the development of a colony trying to survive on wind and sun power.”

  “Believe me, Susan,” Lee replied, “I know how much is riding on their success. But if anyone has ever literally traveled into the unknown, its these Explorers.”

  Susan nodded, a sudden pride in her expression as she shushed Lee so she could hear Ron announce, “Vladimir Kenneth Creding,” and “Cesar Vladimir Creding.” As two tall young men stepped forward.

  Lee startled. “Creding? But that means…

  Susan nodded. “My grandsons.”

  Sixthmonth 21, Year 59 A.L.

  It was a momentous occasion, but the gathering was small, crammed into the Dorm 7 classroom of the old ship. The public ceremony had taken place hours ago, and the celebrations were still going on.

  This ceremony was for those most most intimately involved in bringing the colony to this point. Lee Jenson, the Colony Administrator, was there of course, with his wife, Kerry. Retired former Colony Administrator Ken Terhoe was there. The Credings were there, Tara, Ron Junior, and Elaine. Doctor Susan Renko was there, along with those scientists she considered worthy of the honor.

  Old Lars Norstrom was there, as was the former Jana Matuchek and her husband, Angel Koh. The entire Council was there, of course, along with several specially-invited former Council m
embers.

  Lee Jenson walked to the teacher’s terminal at the front of the classroom. There was no introduction, no fanfare.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” he began, “We are gathered here to commemorate the most important moment in our colony’s short history. I say that because from this moment on, our colony can be confident of an apparently infinite power source. No longer do we have to worry about whether the colony can exist on wind and solar power. No more will be have to worry about whether we might have to step back to nuclear fission for our survival. No more do we have to worry about our outlying settlements’ energy requirements.

  “Today, we have completed the move to the spider peoples’ energy broadcasts. We now know how to convert their energy for our own use, and how to redirect the power broadcasts.

  “You all know these things. You have all been intimately involved in this accomplishment. And you all know that the celebrations are ongoing, and threaten to last for days. But we, gathered here, all know of the extraordinary efforts it took to reach this point. We are here to symbolically mark the end of the old, EarthGov colony, and the founding of the new, independent Crashlanding colony.

  “So, I want to call up here Former Colony Administrator Kenneth Terhoe.” There was a rush of applause as Ken strode to the dais. “Ken, would you issue the command, please?”

  Smiling broadly, Kenneth Terhoe turned to the computer, which now displayed his avatar, his beloved wife. “Computer, please begain shutdown of all onboard fusactors!” He mashed his thumb on the authorization panel. “Authority accepted,” the computer replied. “Shutdown routine running.”

  The cheers and the waving arms couldn’t conceal Ken’s move to wipe a tear from his eye.

  Tenthmonth 14, Year 60 A.L.

  “Mistress, I think you’ll want to see this.”

  Susan Renko raised her head from the images the Long-Range Explorers had been sending. Her shoulders were a bit slumped, now. Though she had continually warned herself that it might take years to find the kind of things they needed, she’d been unable to keep from getting her hopes up.