From a distance she can already see the alien. It is lying still on the floor of the corridor. What happened here? Is it just sleeping? The closer she gets, the more obvious it becomes that a fight must have occurred. The alien’s arms are strangely distorted. Its eyes are open. The creature lies directly in front of a side corridor, and it seems to be dead. Who killed it, though? She is scared.
Then she notices the alien’s weapon. She recognizes it as the thing that was aimed at her for quite some time. Eve picks it up. She saw how the alien had held it. The creature had reached for the button on the side. Could that be the trigger? She aims the muzzle back into the corridor and pushes the button. She only succeeds at the third try, using all her strength.
“What are you doing there, Eve?”
She whirls around. It is Marchenko’s voice. It comes from a half-height, spider-like body with four long legs.
“Is that you, Marchenko?”
“Yes, sure, who else is it supposed to be?”
Eve moves closer to the entrance of the corridor. Where did Marchenko come from? He moves a bit closer to her.
“Don’t you want to say hello?”
He seems strange to Eve. She cannot explain it, but there is something revolting in his voice. She is reminded of the witch in the fairy tale about Hansel and Gretel. This is how Marchenko spoke when he read that story.
“Nice to have you here,” she says.
“I am glad to see you.” Marchenko stops in front of her in such a way that she cannot look into the side corridor.
“What’s going on here?”
“Don’t worry, Eve, I have incapacitated this thing. It can’t hurt you anymore.” The robot turns around and points at the alien with a front leg. “You see?”
Eve uses this opportunity to squeeze past Marchenko. Then she utters a shrill scream. Adam is lying in the corridor, and he also isn’t moving.
“Marchenko, what did you do?” She aims the muzzle of the alien weapon at the robot.
“The alien attacked him,” Marchenko replies, “but don’t worry, he is alive. He is just asleep.”
She takes a look at Adam, but she does not find any injuries except for a well-treated wound on his head. She glances down at the weapon. If the alien had attacked Adam with this thing, he would look very different now.
“The creature slapped him with bare hands and threw him across the room. Adam was lucky not to suffer any serious internal injuries.” Marchenko must have noticed when she glanced at the weapon.
“You cannot believe a word he is saying.” Eve is startled when she hears this. This is also Marchenko’s voice. It comes from an odd-shaped lump of metal at the far edge of the side corridor.
“That is Marchenko 2,” the four-legged robot explains. “I managed to neutralize him earlier. He must have come here using Valkyrie. But now he no longer poses a danger. I simply did not have the heart to kill him. You know that I am not a murderer.”
That does sound like her Marchenko. They let Marchenko 2 go away after the first fight. Should she believe him? Everything fits together so well. Yet she has to test him.
“You remember how we went separate ways? You just wanted to find another way to the control center. I haven’t seen you since then. Why didn’t you return earlier?”
“Your memories must be all garbled,” the robot answers. “It was the cleaning mechanism that separated us, don’t you remember?”
That is true. Only the real Marchenko could know this.
“I told him earlier about what happened,” the voice from the corridor says.
“It’s just a cheap trick,” the Marchenko in front of her says. “He just wants to deceive you.”
He is probably right. Why should the real Marchenko tell the fake one what happened to him? He should have realized Marchenko 2 would use that to his advantage!
“Why don’t we simply wake Adam? He can attest to what happened,” the voice from the piece of scrap says.
“You know yourself he won’t be able to do that. He did not watch us trade places. It would be too dangerous anyways. We will only awaken him when he is ready. The fact that you would endanger your son just to prove yourself right indicates who you really are.”
Eve is confused. Who traded places?
“We did not trade places,” the voice from the corner says. “That was your evil plan, but it did not happen.”
Eve sees the alien moving one of its arms from the corner of her eye. So it is not dead after all. She is glad, even if it does not make the situation any easier.
The four-legged Marchenko also notices the alien awakening. “You better hand its weapon over to me,” he says. “We have to eliminate this thing before it is fully awake. Otherwise we don’t stand a chance.”
Eve looks at the harpoon. The weapon does not look as if it could be switched to stun. “Why don’t you use the weapon you used to incapacitate the alien earlier?” she asks.
“I ... you don’t have a clue. I have to recharge it first.”
The alien moves a second arm.
“It uses electricity?” Eve asks.
“Yes. I used a full charge against the alien, but it still appears to have survived. Now I can’t use this weapon for another 15 minutes.”
“You wanted to kill the extraterrestrial?”
“It attacked me. What was I supposed to do? Ask for mercy in a language the creature won’t understand?”
“To me the alien did not seem very aggressive. It even tried speaking our language.”
“But you still ran away, didn’t you?”
The extraterrestrial starts leaning on its arms. It is obviously trying to rise, but its strength fails and its arms buckle.
“You really should give me the weapon now,” the robot says. “Or do you want to fire it yourself?”
“I... will not shoot.”
“Then give me the weapon, or do you want all of us to die?”
Eve hears the Marchenko voice from the lump of metal. “Don’t give it to him! He attacked the alien first.”
“You notice something? He wants us all to die,” the robot answers.
The alien creature is trying once more to stand up.
“If you don’t hand me the weapon, I will have to knock you out,” the robot threatens. “My energy would be sufficient for that.” He starts to move his right foreleg.
“Watch out,” Marchenko’s voice warns her.
No, Eve decides at this moment. The real Marchenko would not have tried to force her to give up her weapon. She is not going to wait until she gets knocked out. And they cannot pass up the chance to negotiate with the alien. She pushes the trigger button firmly just as she feels a sharp pain in her lower legs and is swept off her feet. Simultaneously, the strong recoil of the weapon throws her backward, away from the robot calling himself Marchenko and toward the giant frog who has just gotten up. She sees a flame shoot out of the robot body and she feels something soft on her back as she is being caught. Her muscles twitch when the electric discharge of the whip hits.
She can no longer move, and then her mind saves her from the worst pain by letting her drift into unconsciousness.
May 9, 19, Adam
He is floating on his back, drifting through the sea. A gentle swell lifts him slightly upward. The sky is green, and on the horizon a white sun is setting, while a yellow sun stands directly overhead. The water is pleasantly warm and he floats in it even without swim strokes. Then he is suddenly shaken back and forth. He receives a painful slap on his cheek. And there is this giant eye over him, which looks at him as if it knew all of his secrets. Adam screams. The stare of this eye makes his blood curdle.
“It is okay,” Marchenko’s voice says. “You are safe. He is a friend.”
The voice does not come from the eye but from somewhere behind it. Yet it has an immediate calming effect on him. Adam looks around. The eye belongs to a body. It is a huge body, reminiscent of a frog. The creature now pulls back its arms. Those must have been sha
king him. Adam notices that he can feel his limbs again. There is an unpleasant tingling sensation, but it is starting to fade.
“Take your time,” Marchenko says.
What happened? He had been carrying Marchenko in his arms, wanting to turn into this side corridor... at that point his memory ends.
“Did the alien injure me like this?” He knows the creature must be an alien, even though he never saw one before.
Marchenko laughs. “If our friend had wanted to hurt you, you would look very different now. Did you see his arms?”
That is true. “So who did it?”
“Your good friend, Marchenko 2. He must have heard us coming.”
“And is he gone now? Or is that you?”
“Come on over here, if you can manage to walk again. You will definitely recognize me. I also know how you injured your wrist. Just ask me!”
“What about Marchenko 2? Did you defeat him?”
“Eve... pulverized him.”
“What?”
“She fired the alien’s weapon at him.”
“She did what?”
“You understood me correctly. It was self-defense. Marchenko 2 threatened her with the same weapon he used to knock you out.”
“What about Eve? Where is she?”
“She is lying right next to you. She is still asleep. You can try to wake her up. Or should our new friend take over that task?”
“That’s okay, Marchenko, I will do it.” Adam concentrates on his limbs. They obey him, so he rolls to his side and then gets on his knees. He has to take it easy. Then he looks around. He sees the silhouette of the alien at the entrance of the side corridor. It is not very brightly lit, but he immediately sees that Eve is indeed lying next to him. He looks at her. Now that he knows she is not his sister she appears even more beautiful to him. Did Marchenko already tell her about it? It is time to wake her up. He gently strokes her cheeks. She becomes agitated and then suddenly jerks upright. He barely manages to get out of her way.
“Where is he? Where is the bastard?” she gasps, looking around in panic.
“He is gone,” Marchenko says. “But look. Adam is here.”
Eve turns around and looks at him. Yet she shows no reaction. Has she forgotten him? Then her eyes light up. “Oh, Adam,” she says. “I am so happy to see you.”
“I am, too. I mean, that you are here,” Adam says and blushes.
They embrace.
“But what happened to Marchenko 2?” Eve asks, looking at Adam.
“I was unconscious,” Adam replies.
“You finished him off, Eve,” Marchenko says. “He can’t endanger us anymore. Never again.”
“I didn’t want to do that.”
“I know, but you had no choice. Otherwise we would all be in his power.”
“You know what the worst thing was? Up to the very end I was not sure which of you two was the real one.”
“I can imagine it. He was very clever about that,” Marchenko says.
“Why did he know so much about us?”
“He wanted to kill me with his electric whip. In order to buy time I told him what had happened. And then Gronolf intervened.”
“Gronolf? Is that the alien? Do you understand his language?” Adam asks.
“We are still working on our communication. So far we have managed to exchange names.”
“Can you teach us his language once you have learned it?”
“That won’t be possible, Eve. Some of the sounds he uses are in the ultrasonic range, and you could not pronounce them. Right now, I am recording all of his utterances, analyzing the context, and later I will attempt to create a linguistic model.”
“That sounds doable,” Adam admits.
“It works as long as we are dealing with something we can see at the moment. Once we talk about abstract issues, it will become more difficult. Maybe then symbols will help us.”
“A sign language.”
“Yes, Adam.”
“How long will it take until we can converse fluently?” Eve asks.
“That will be a lengthy process. Maybe never.”
“Lengthy?” Eve looks at Marchenko and then at Adam, obviously distressed. “That’s bad.”
“What is the problem?” Adam asks.
“You wouldn’t know this. We might only have a few days left. Something really huge is approaching us.”
“Something huge?” Adam gets up slowly. He needs to move around now.
“I don’t know what it is. On the map it looked like another planet.” Eve looks as if she has not told them everything yet.
“And how do you know it is approaching us?”
“I called it,” Eve explains. “I thought I was sending a distress call. I had no idea the thing would go on a collision course right away.”
“You used the aliens’ systems? That was risky.”
“What do you know about this, Adam? You were gone, I had lost Marchenko, so to me, this seemed to be the only way out.”
“Eve did the right thing,” the AI’s voice says. “From her perspective, it was the sensible approach. It is always easy to judge things in hindsight. Understanding these strange systems was already an enormous achievement. This might help us avert the threat.”
“Do you think the alien actually needs our help?” asks Eve, tilting her head.
“I don’t know,” Marchenko says. “It would be better if he can manage it on his own. If he can’t solve the problem and we also fail at it, he won’t be as restrained as he is now. I think we are in his good graces because you killed Marchenko 2 in front of him, but if you later become responsible for the death of his species, he might not be so happy.”
“I can sure understand that,” Adam says.
Brightnight 36, 3876
The machine—which the larger foreigner had carried—is full of surprises. First of all, he was amazed at its intelligence. Together they managed to get at least some rudimentary communication going. Gronolf now knows that the machine calls itself ‘Marchenko,’ that the alien he met first is ‘Eve,’ and the other one is ‘Adam.’ Pronouncing these names is difficult, though, because the alien sounds use only a small part of the acoustic spectrum. It is as if he had to sing constantly in a different voice. However, the two aliens have even greater problems with his name. In order not to cause them unnecessary frustration he lets them believe that ‘Gronolf’ is his complete name—how could you teach someone to pronounce a word, if they cannot hear half of it? Only the machine can pronounce ‘Gro_#_-nolf#_$__#’ correctly.
The true nature of Marchenko is still a mystery to him. He probably does not come close to doing him justice by using the term ‘machine.’ During their attempts at communication, Marchenko has proven to be much more. He still cannot judge how much more. Sometimes the machine reminds him of an Omniscience. An Omniscience consists of the compressed information, thoughts, and emotions of numerous Grosnops. The Knowledge Scientists developed this concept many cycles ago, because the machines built by the Motion Scientists had become too complicated over time to be controlled even by the most talented individuals. A spaceship like the Majestic Draght would be impossible without being controlled by an Omniscience. Yet this Marchenko machine is much too small for that. Not even this shelter building could contain an Omniscience!
If Gronolf is honest with himself he would have to admit the second surprise was really a shock. He urged them to walk to the control room and offered to carry the machine. Yet the machine refused. He did not understand the reason for this, but he agreed. A few milli-bubbles later, Marchenko suddenly stood behind him on four legs. While Gronolf’s own species also has the ability to regrow limbs, that takes many bubble periods, not just a moment. He was particularly impressed by Marchenko’s trick of letting his legs crawl separately from his body. At that moment Gronolf recognized that he had seen one of those legs accompanying the alien Eve. He’d stepped on it—crushed it—when he’d turned to follow her as she’d run away.
&nb
sp; Now it is time to go to the control room. Due to Marchenko’s abilities, Gronolf hopes they will be able to solve the problem caused by the alien. His anger at Eve has dissipated since she saved his life. The situation had been obvious—Eve used Gronolf’s own weapon to punish the four-legged machine that had knocked him down. He was still not sure about the role of that other machine. It must have had its own agenda, which should be impossible for a machine. Perhaps it was defective—or had been programmed by a different faction of the aliens. What a mess it would be if these aliens started to continue their squabbles on this planet! Therefore he prefers to believe in a defect.
Gronolf does a leg squat and then stands up again. His muscles need to be moved. The long, thin wound on his side, where the hot wire dug into his skin, is already starting to close. It will take only a few days before it is completely healed. He gestures with his touch-arms to get the aliens to start walking. They talk in their low-pitched language and then follow him, with Marchenko taking the lead. Adam and Eve let their touch-hands meet. Strange how that species managed to survive without load-arms!
He watches the aliens through his rear eye. Now Eve strokes the grass growing on Adam’s middle bump. Why don’t they just rip it out? Does it maybe fulfill some ritualistic purpose? Due to their sizes he can easily tell the two apart. Is that a normal variability? Or is Eve younger than Adam and therefore shorter? At some point he will have to ask Marchenko about the purpose of the protective clothing. These creatures’ skins are probably so sensitive that they have to protect themselves against foreign environments all the time. This would indicate they developed in a place with a low injury risk. Gronolf tries to think of such places on his home world, but he can only think of the slime swamps of Eltok. Yet there, due to the population of sawtooth crawlers, the injury risk is actually much higher than on many beaches.
They are making good progress and will soon reach the control center. He hopes Eve told the others that the general will be waiting for them there. Gronolf still does not have a bright idea as to how to honorably dispose of the remains. The general probably used to like sitting in his command chair, so it is fitting that he stayed there after his death. Gronolf does not mind seeing him, as it is good to be reminded of one’s mortality, and he also feels a bit motivated by the presence of a high-ranking officer. It would be a great honor for him to save the world under the eyes of the general.
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