The Stars That Beckon

by Kevin J Simington

“Make it nice and slow, Kit. We don’t want the natives to think we’re trying to shoot them.”

  Kit flicked a quick glance at Zac. “OK, rookie. This is your job. I’ve got both hands full here, keeping us alive. You’ve practised this. Aim it directly in the middle of the door on the right. Select a discharge speed of 1 metre per second and fire when ready.”

  There was a dull clunk that could be heard through their hull as the cable was fired across. A few seconds later it came into view out the front of the shuttle: a thin cable with a flat disk at its end, moving in a straight line towards the sphere.

  “Activating the magnet now,” said Zac, when the cable was halfway across. It closed the distance and made contact with the door of the sphere—and bounced straight off again.

  “Well, that’s interesting,” said Kit. “It’s either a non-magnetic metal, or some other substance entirely.”

  Lance Catrell’s voice came over the comm. “Kit, I think we’ve got all the data we’re going to get at this stage. You guys need to get back. We don’t want you to push your luck.”

  “Roger that. We’ll pack up and head home. Put the kettle on for us.”

  38

  Two days later, at a council meeting on the afternoon of Orbit Day 6 (OD6), the decision was made to make a first landing on Nova. During the previous two days, several probes had been sent to the surface and had verified that the air was safe to breathe, with no obvious pathogens in either the atmosphere or the soil. Shuttles had also explored the two moons and found extensive mining works, together with what appeared to be large industrial complexes: large domed structures of varying sizes, constructed of the same dull black material as the hoop. All of these were similarly lifeless and unresponsive to all attempts at communication. Shuttle crews had tried to access some of the facilities but had found no way of activating what appeared to be the airlocks.

  “At least it solves one puzzle,” said nuclear physicist Arno Manchester. “why we haven’t found any sign of heavy industry on the planet. It appears that they did all their manufacturing on the moons.”

  “Yes, but we’re still no closer to discovering why they abandoned their planet,” said astronomer Carla Zangetti.

  “No,” agreed Lars Christensen. “In fact, we may never know. But our primary goal now is to establish a colony on the surface and begin to forge a new life for ourselves. I think it is fair to say that our colonists are all very keen to set foot on the planet.”

  “They certainly are, Captain,” agreed counsellor Prisha Naroo. “Itching to get some sand between their toes,” she said with a smile.

  “I suggest we send four shuttles down to the surface on reconnaissance missions; two to Northland and two to Southland. Lance, do you have any suggestions for preferred locations?” The two continents on Nova were located on almost opposite sides of the globe, centred around the equator, with the larger having slightly more land mass to the north and the smaller being centred slightly more to the south.

  “The shuttles may as well make use of the landing strips in the larger towns,” said Lance Catrell. “Obviously the shuttles are capable of vertical landings anywhere, using landing thrusters, but it would seem a good idea to explore the towns first.”

  “Can I suggest that each shuttle contain armed security personnel?” said George Leonidis, who had been strangely quiet in most council meetings since Wisecroft’s departure. “Even if there are no inhabitants, we still don’t know whether the planet contains dangerous predators of any kind.”

  “Yes. Agreed,” said Christensen.

  The rest of the meeting was spent planning the precise details of the recon missions. As Nova had a rotational period of 25 hours, two shuttles would visit each continent approximately 12 hours apart, so that they could explore during daylight.

  The next morning, Shuttle 1 came screaming out of the stratosphere and began a long, low recon flight over the equatorial region of Northland. The planet was lush with vegetation, interspersed with rivers and lakes of varying sizes. Their target was a moderately sized town on the east coast. It was situated on a coastal plain with the ocean on one side and mountains further to the west. As they approached the town, large, square, cleared patches of land became predominant, along with large storage sheds or agricultural buildings of some kind.

  “Farmland,” said Zac.

  “Overgrown now, though,” said Kit.

  They did a low overfly of the town, a typical, neatly laid-out grid of two-storey dwellings.

  “Nobody’s home. Let’s touch down and have a look around.” Kit glanced at Zac. “The controls are yours. Don’t disgrace yourself.”

  “I have control,” confirmed Zac. He banked the shuttle and lined up with the runway. As the shuttle approached, he activated the landing thrusters and raised the nose to retard their forward motion.

  “Get the nose higher, and watch your descent rate,” said Kit. “A little more thrust. That’s better. Easy does it. OK, level off now and hover.” The shuttle hovered 20 metres above the tarmac, perfectly stationary, with its landing thrusters screaming. “Now back the thrusters off and take her down gently.” The shuttle eased down towards the tarmac, with Zac perspiring as he concentrated on six different readouts and monitors all at once. It would have been a gentle landing except that Zac eased the thrusters off a little too much at the last moment. The shuttle responded by dropping the last metre and a half, touching down with a thud, a bounce and then a lesser thud.

  “Oops. Sorry, folks,” Zac said with a grimace.

  “Everyone still have all their teeth in place?” asked Kit, sarcastically.

  “That wasn’t a touchdown, that was a slam-down,” said Martinez from behind.

  “You did OK, Zac,” said Boyd beside her. “I didn’t really need those vertebrae in my back, anyway.”

  Zac taxied the shuttle to the end of the runway closest to the town and shut down the engines. They cracked the door and jumped down onto the tarmac. It was a surreal experience. They were standing on a new world, breathing an alien atmosphere, looking up at a different sun. They stood looking around and listening to the sounds of the planet. There were bird noises of different kinds, and, not far away, the sound of surf. The air had a fragrant, tropical smell, mixed with the clean, fresh, salty air of the ocean, which was on the other side of the sand dunes. There was no fence surrounding the airstrip, and its single building was a hangar of some kind. The runway simply ended with a strip of grass, with the first houses and streets only 100 metres further on. The hangar proved inaccessible, a white building with no apparent windows and an outline of several large hangar doors with no visible means of opening them. After several fruitless minutes of walking around the hangar, the group moved on into the town, sticking close together. They each had a simple projectile hand weapon, with Martinez and Boyd also armed with heavier-powered laser rifles.

  They came to the first house and walked all the way around it. It appeared to be two stories high and rectangular in shape, with a flat roof. The entire structure was made of some kind of off-white artificial material somewhere between plastic and concrete. There were recessed panels that looked like windows all over the building, but they were completely opaque.

  “Some kind of one-way windows,” said Zac.

  There were two rectangular door shapes, one at the front and one at the rear of the dwelling, but there were no visible handles or scanners. After unsuccessfully trying to gain access to the dwelling, the group moved on through the town. The streets were laid out in a series of four concentric circles, and the dwellings they contained were all nearly identical. The streets themselves were quite narrow, composed of a hard, sand-coloured composite surface of some kind.

  It did not take the group long to the arrive at the centre of the town, via linking streets that radiated outwards, cutting across the circular streets like spokes on a bicycle wheel. The inner-most street circled a large park of grass and shady trees, approximately 800 metres in diameter. At the centre of t
he park were three white-domed buildings, one large and the other two slightly smaller, clumped together on a sealed circular concourse. There were multiple paths leading to the central concourse, traversing across the park from different points around the inner-most circular street.

  “Town hall?” suggested Martinez.

  “Something like that,” answered Kit, as they neared the domes. Drawing closer, they found a large outdoor amphitheatre, a grassy, bowl-shaped depression, slightly to the side of the concourse, nearest to the larger dome.

  “Some kind of public meeting space,” said Zac.

  The three central domes were constructed of the same off-white material as the dwellings, and appeared seamless and windowless all the way to the ground. A circuit of each of the domes produced no visible means of access. There were door-shaped recesses at various points around the base of the domes, but they offered no clue as to how they could be opened.

  Finally, the group stood together on the slight rise at the rim of the amphitheatre and gazed around the huge park. Fruit trees of various unknown varieties appeared to be scattered among other vaguely familiar shade trees throughout the park. A large creek or small river meandered its way through the park, flowing from the south-west, curving around the southern edge of the amphitheatre and exiting the park to the north-east, towards the ocean. There were footbridges across the creek in various places, as well as larger bridges where the streets of the town crossed it.

  “Looks like there will be plenty of fresh water,” said Martinez.

  “Morning tea time,” said Kit, sitting on the grass and unwrapping an energy bar that she had taken from the dispenser that morning. The others did likewise, and they sat together, munching peacefully.

  “This is incredible!” said Zac. “I mean, this is paradise! The temperature is perfect, the air is clean and sweet, the whole town is just immaculate. And we haven’t even seen the beach yet!”

  “It’s too good to be true,” said Martinez, sceptically. “I don’t like it. There is no way a civilisation would build something like this and then just leave it all. Something bad has happened. And if it’s happened once, it can happen again.”

  “And what’s with the grass?” asked Boyd.

  “What do you mean?” said Kit.

  “Does it look like it needs mowing to you?” Boyd replied.

  “He’s right,” said Martinez. “It’s as if it was mowed a few days ago. Nothing is overgrown. Same with the lawns around the dwellings and along the sides of the streets. If this planet has been abandoned for a while, we should be wading through waist-high grass.”

  “The agricultural fields that we flew over were all overgrown,” said Kit. “They give every indication of long-term abandonment. Maybe the grass in the town has been genetically modified to only grow to this height. This civilisation is arguably 3,000 years more technologically advanced than us, so you would think that by this stage they would have solved the lawn mowing problem.”

  “Maybe,” said Martinez.

  “What was that! Over there!” exclaimed Zac, standing up and pointing towards some dense trees on the far side of the park. “I saw something moving!”

  “What was it?” asked Martinez, as she and Boyd jumped to their feet. Boyd activated his rifle while Martinez took her optical scanner from her vest pocket and started searching.

  “It was some kind of four-legged animal. I only saw a glimpse as it walked between a gap in that bunch of trees.”

  “How big?” asked Martinez, still searching.

  “I couldn’t really tell. Bigger than a dog, that’s for sure.”

  Martinez kept scanning backwards and forwards for a couple of minutes, but no further sighting of the creature was made. “Can’t see anything now,” she said, sticking the scanner back in her pocket.

  “Let’s start to head back,” said Kit. “We’ll go via the beach. Zac, you’ve got the bio-sampling kit. You and I will collect samples of soil, sand, grass, and any leaves from trees and bushes that we can get along the way. When we get to the beach, we’ll need to get a water sample, too. Boyd and Martinez, keep those weapons handy. I don’t want to be something’s dinner tonight.”

  A little over an hour later, they were back on board Genesis.

  39

  At the council meeting later that afternoon, the results of the recon missions were being discussed with great enthusiasm. Nothing noxious or poisonous had been found in any of the biological samples brought back to the ship. The soil samples contained plenty of microbial life, which boded well for agriculture, but it was impossible to ascertain whether any of that life would prove dangerous to human health. Only time and exposure would tell them that.

  All four shuttles had had very similar experiences: pristine, empty towns with inaccessible buildings. All four towns had a large central park with similar domed structures at the centre.

  “They certainly seem to have found a formula they liked, and they stuck to it,” said Lance.

  “Yes. But let’s discuss some of the puzzling aspects for a moment,” said Christensen. “Where are all the ground vehicles? None were found in any of the towns. Where are the planes or their equivalent? None were found, despite the existence of airstrips. Where is their power generation? Surely their dwellings have power. And, of course, the greatest mystery of all: where are all the inhabitants?” He looked around the table, with raised eyebrows.

  Kit and the other shuttle pilots had been invited to the meeting, and Kit spoke up. “It’s possible we may never get answers to some of those questions, but in terms of the location of aircraft, my money is on those hangars at each of the airstrips.”

  Christensen addressed the pilots who were all sitting at one end of the long conference table. “Is there anything that any of you saw that gave you concern regarding either the planet’s safety or its suitability for settlement?”

  There was silence as all of the pilots shook their heads.

  To the whole council, he asked, “Can anyone suggest any reason why we should delay settlement any longer?”

  Again, there was silence and the shaking of heads.

  “Then I suggest we expedite plans for settlement. First, we need to select a site. From the four towns we inspected this morning, the town by the sea, visited by Kit’s shuttle, seems to me to be most ideally situated. Any thoughts?

  Regina Boyle, biologist and budding agriculturalist, spoke up. “I agree. The town offers the greatest potential for access to biodiversity. The ocean is right there on the doorstep, with, hopefully, an abundance of edible aquatic life. The lake eight clicks to the north-west offers further resources. The mountains on the western edge of the lake provide access to a potentially different biodiversity. The town is also in a very temperate equatorial region. I would say it is ideal.”

  “Does anyone have an alternative suggestion?” asked Christensen. No one spoke. “Good. Then let’s make that our colony site. In terms of logistics, I want to play this very safe. No one has spent a night on the surface yet. I suggest that Kit’s team, with a few more volunteers, head down after breakfast tomorrow morning and set up a temporary camp. I would like you to spend 48 hours there in order to ensure that it is safe. Thoughts?”

  Kit asked, “How many of us do you want down there?”

  “A dozen or so should be ample. Not too many, in case you have to get out of there in a hurry for some reason. You might want to include two additional security personnel in your group and take night-vision goggles.” Christensen smiled. “I don’t think you’ll have any problems getting volunteers for a camp-out in a tropical paradise.”

  He continued, “Providing the camp doesn’t highlight any major problems, we can anticipate moving the rest of the colonists to the surface the following day. I see no reason to delay. Using six shuttles, with each shuttle flying two trips, we can have our entire population on the surface by mid-morning. That will then allow us to land Genesis itself, which is a high-risk manoeuver. Scans show that there is a large,
raised ridge of land one kilometre to the south-west of the town; That would be an ideal landing site. It would provide a slightly elevated position to avoid possible future flooding, while still having a gentle enough gradient to the fields and the town below to allow easy offloading of equipment and land vehicles.”

  “Until we either build permanent dwellings ourselves, or gain access to the town’s existing dwellings, Genesis will be our hotel on the hill, and our safe haven. People can sleep safely on board, and the food dispensers will sustain us until we become agriculturally self-sufficient.” He looked around the table and asked, “Comments or suggestions?”

  “What about a name for the town?” asked Zac.

  “Yes. Good point. We need one, don’t we?” said Christensen. “I’m open to suggestions.”

  “What about Seahaven?” Zac relied. “You just used the term ‘haven’ yourself, and I think it suits. At least we could start calling it that, until we have a vote or someone comes up with something better.”

  “Yes,” said Prisha. “It is just the sort of name we need. One that expresses our desire for safety and protection. It is a good name.”

  “OK,” said Christensen. “Let’s run with Seahaven. To be honest, I think we’ll all be so busy from here on that we won’t have time for organising a vote. Let’s call it Seahaven for the moment and see if anyone complains.”

  No one ever did.

  40

  Nova Day 1

  The shuttle touched down mid-morning in what was now being called Central Park, landing on the circular tarmac in the centre of the park where the three domes were located. On board were Kit, Zac, Jaz, Keo, Grizzle, Prisha, Regina, Martinez, Boyd, George Leonidis and Dylan Dresner, a beefy and somewhat surly security team member. Despite her desperate pleading, Melody had been left on Genesis in the care of a kindly woman with a daughter two years younger than Melody. Jaz was present in the advance party as the medical officer.