Sumeru - 7. Chapter 7

Dan put on his suit and took his equipment and weapons. He hurried towards the building at the end of the runway and entered it.

The others sat motionless, tensed, unable to turn their eyes from the building. Half an hour passed, then Dan stepped out. He returned to the ship and joined the others. The men in the cockpit calmed down.

“Nothing,” Dan said. “I saw and heard nothing. I didn’t sense a thing. All was quiet, too quiet, I think.”

“I’ll send another message to ground control Earth. We think they don’t receive them, but they might get them, who knows,” John said.

“What do you want to tell them?” Dan asked. “We’re haunted by ghosts? We don’t have proof of an alien presence, although I’m sure the aliens are here.”

“Dan’s right,” Rob said. “We must look for a sign. They must have left a trace, something, somewhere. We must let Earth know if intelligent life is present on the planet.”

“This is a useless endeavor, Rob,” James said in a resigned voice. “There’s only three possibilities. Either Pete died of a natural cause or Pete activated an old automatic defense system, installed by a long gone civilization, or Dan’s extraterrestrials are responsible for the attack. If the aliens are here, we will not find them. They’re far too advanced and sophisticated to be detected by us.”

“Bullshit,” Dan said. “How can you say so? They could be hiding anywhere. We’ve seen nothing of this god-damned planet.”

“But one man got killed after getting off the ship,” John said. “Our mission’s completed. We verified the Dyson ring, but the objects are not active as far as we can tell. We detected the remnants of an old extraterrestrial civilization. We have evidence. We’re not alone in the universe. Let Earth decide on how to proceed.”

“These extraterrestrials could come to Earth,” Rob said in a warning voice. “They have detected us. They took out our communication system.”

“Not to forget. They killed Pete,” Dan said.

“If they are as sophisticated as you think, Rob,” James said, “then I would guess that they have already found out about our planet of origin. It’s all in the computer, isn’t it?”

“Shit,” Dan said. “That’s it. They took out our communication system and took over the ship’s computer.”

“You don’t have proof,” John said. “This is all speculation. I’ll report to ground control Earth now. No more solo actions and individual decisions. Safety of crew and ship first. We’ll do the proper thing now and stick to protocol.”

Dan narrowed his eyes. Rob and James looked aside.

John straightened. “Make the ship ready for launch,” he commanded. “Time to go home.”

The men prepared the ship for take-off. The computer plotted the course to orbit, but the men distrusted the result. They checked the data manually several times. When they were finally confident that there was no fault in the flight calculations, they settled in their seats and got ready for take-off.

James held out his hand. The feather of the tiny creature was placed on his palm.“I took it through decontamination,” he said. “We must take something back to Earth, something real, not just a bunch of computer data.

“Enough,” John said. “This was careless and you know it.”

Dan gave a disapproving grunt. Rob said nothing. James put the feather into a pocket, then put on his glove and strapped in.

“Start the launch sequence. Now,” John commanded.

“Launch sequence started,” Dan confirmed.

The take-off was programmed for automatic launch, but the men focused on all displays, prepared to detect the slightest deviation and take-over manually.

The engines came on.

Rob let out a sigh of relief. “Functions,” he said. “I almost expected the engines were dead.”

The ship taxied. Thrust increased and the ship rolled down the runway. The ship was rapidly taking up speed. Spaceship Shiva was designed to take off like an aircraft. The atmospheric conditions on the planet were ideal for it. All systems functioned properly. The ship proceeded on the plotted course. The men were pressed hard into their seats. They ignored the pain and their eyes never left the controls and displays. The ship soon reached the upper layers of the atmosphere. It climbed higher and reached orbit. The flight behavior gradually changed from aircraft to spacecraft flight mode. All systems worked fine, no failures occurred. The ship left orbit and set course on the edge of the system where the warp drive would be activated.

The planet fell back and became an orb in space. They had left exoplanet X104C7, named Terra or Earth 2 in the public domain and sometimes Mount Meru by NASA.

“Course set,” Dan said. “No discrepancies, no deviations, no warnings. Everything’s okay.”

“Good to hear,” James said in a low voice. “I almost expected we would not make it.”

“We still have a long way to go,” John said. “Watch out. Be on the alert. We must safely reach the edge of the system.”

And then all went black.

That was all they remembered later.

Naamah could barely breathe.

The news had just reported that Sumeru space security had detected a spaceship from the planet Ki, a planet in an outbound region of the galaxy with a young civilization. Sumeru space security had teleported the ship from a location near the rock planet Cailan to the Sumeru security section for investigation. A heated discussion followed that mainly turned around the question as to how a primitive spaceship had managed to protrude so far into the star system without detection.

Naamah listened with only half an ear. He found there were far more interesting questions that needed immediate answers.

The room system announced a visitor. Naamah let him in. Tamiel entered the room.

“Did you hear the news?” Tamiel asked with excitement.

Naamah pointed to a chair.

“Yes,” he said. “But all they ask is how could the ship protrude into the system without detection. Don’t they see what the hell is important instead?”

“Important for us, not for the general public, not for Sumeru security,” Tamiel said.

Naamah listened again into the news, but they had changed the topic.

“Ki,” Tamiel said. “A primitive civilization. They made it to Sumeru. I’m stunned. The planet is 25,000 light years from here.”

“Not so primitive a civilization it seems,” Naamah said. “We’ve discussed this a thousand times. It was on the agenda of today’s annual meeting. Ki is a civilization that developed the warp drive. I guess they used one on their ship to get here.”

“Why did they come here?” Tamiel asked with breathless excitement. “They could have gone anywhere. Why did they not fly to a neighboring system as any such civilization does when they start to explore space. Why here? Why to Sumeru, a 25,000 light years distance. What a risk to take!”

“The answer is plain to see,” Naamah said. “They have figured it all out and wanted to pay us a visit.”

“Do you believe so?” Tamiel asked, his face flushing. “This would open so many doors, so many ways to go.”

“What?” Naamah asked.

“Reconciling with the past, reconciliation between civilizations,” Tamiel said.

Naamah looked at him blankly. “Has it gone to your head?” he finally asked.

Tamiel smiled faintly. He rose to his feet. “We’ll talk tomorrow,” he said. “I have something to do now.”

Naamah stared after him as he walked to the door, then logged on to the news channel again. He closed his eyes to better record what was downloaded directly into his memory. He remained logged in until late at night but didn’t learn anything new. Finally, he logged off and went to the window.

Nobody raised the most remarkable point, he thought. The ship had been taken in to the security section. They had located the planet of origin, probably by reading the ship’s computer, and taken the ship in and not destroyed it. They had not regarded the ship a threat. It wasn’t a threat to Sumeru, of course. It was steered by a primitive species. But usually Sumeru security took out any intruders at once. Perhaps they were curious, Naamah mused. He stopped short.

“The council. That’s it,” he said.

The entire meeting had been recorded and saved to the Sumeru archive. Thousands of individuals had probably already downloaded it and saved it to their memories. Thousands of individuals had already heard the name Ki, the argument Azrael had brought forward and the Devas’ proposal of sending a teacher to Ki. Sumeru security had had no choice. They could not have shot down a spaceship from Ki, a planet that was considered worth of Sumeru teaching activities.

“Devious smart ass,” Naamah shouted, jumping to his feet. He was boiling with rage.

Only now did he understand why Azrael had publicly made the proposal. Even Commander Jeva, head of the council, had frowned at it. Azrael had made sure that everything was recorded, archived and saved to thousands of individual memories. Thousands of eyes would monitor each and every step of the Asuras. Whatever they did in the Ki system would not go unnoticed and unmonitored.

Naamah’s face flushed even more. Azrael had upset his plan. More, Azrael had seen though his plan right from the start. He had not bought a word Naamah had said and had let Naamah run into a trap. Naamah had made a fool of himself. The devious Deva had won. Just for the record, Azrael had said.

“Devious smart ass, devil, liar,” Naamah shouted.

Then he slumped down in a chair. The Ki spaceship came back to his mind. He jumped back to his feet and headed for the door. He wanted to see the ship and the men. Now that the Asuras were responsible for the planet Ki, as Azrael had pointed out to the council, Naamah felt he had every right to see the men from Ki at once. He doubted Sumeru security held the same point of view, but Naamah didn’t care a bit. He would find a way to get in to where they kept the men and the ship. Naamah hastened along the corridor and entered a teleporter.

They sat in darkness. No sound could be heard. A few minutes went by in silence.

“Everyone’s okay?” John asked finally.

The men confirmed quietly.

“All systems stopped working, “ Dan said in a low voice. “What happened, John? Did we drop out of real space?”

“I don’t know,” John replied. “The ship didn’t initiate the warp drive. It doesn’t feel like flying in warp mode.”

Lights went on, glaring and painful to their eyes after the complete darkness.

Dan let out a terrified cry and then the men sat, paralyzed, in shock, unable to think a single thought.

They were in a hangar, so much they could see, but it was unlike any hangar they had seen on Earth. They saw a wide hall with high walls, a ceiling and a floor of a whitish material with a honeycomb pattern. The glaring light added to the surreal view. The men stared out of the window.

“They’ve got us,” Dan said finally. “They’ve taken the ship. I don’t know where we are.”

“Calm, men,” Rob said. “No rushed actions. They could have taken out the ship, but they didn’t. They’ve taken us to their place. They have an interest in us. They have no intent to do us harm. That’s at least what I think as an anthropologist.”

“What can you tell of their intents and motives?” Dan asked. “Don’t judge prematurely. Your words. You don’t have to calm me. I’m perfectly prepared for this kind of situation. We expected it, after all, when we set out to find the Dyson ring.”

“Rob’s right,” James said. “They must have at least a few human traits, provided those who took the ship are identical with those who lived on the planet. The buildings, the streets, the runway, the control center, the desk in the building, the monitors, all human-like in size and design. Their physical traits should resemble us to a high degree.”

“This hangar doesn’t look like a man-made hangar,” Dan said, never turning his eyes from the hall.

“Not in design,” John said. “But in functionality. We recognized it at once for what it is.”

“Not too difficult,” Dan said with a grunt. “The obvious place to park a captured ship.”

They fell silent for a while. Nothing happened outside. James got up, went through the ship and looked out of a window in the rear of the ship.

“It looks the same in the other direction. I would say the ship is in the center of the hangar,” he said. “Where are they?”

“I guess they watch,” Rob said. “They had the means to seize the ship and transport it through space to this place. I would guess they have also the means to watch us and listen into.”

“Do you think they understand what we say?” John asked.

“I guess so,” Rob said. “They may still be learning our language, but I guess they’re already quite good at it.”

“Come on,” Dan blasted out. “Stick to the facts and spare me this bullshit. They didn’t capture us to learn our language. We’re here for security reasons. They want to figure out where we come from and why we’re here.”

“I agree. We’re here for security reasons,” Rob said. “I’m of the opinion, however, that they already know where we come from. They had access to the ship’s computer. I’m certain they pulled the data from it.”

“They blocked the communication system in all likelihood,” John said. “We don’t know if they pulled data from the ship.”

“I bet,” Dan said. “I agree with Rob for once, but I don’t think they have already figured out everything. Else they would have blasted us from space.”

“You project human traits on them,” Rob said. “What do you think from a physician’s point of view, James?”

“Like I said, I suspect they have human-like physical traits,” James said. “Their actions so far make me think that they have also human-like psychological traits, the intent to figure out who we are, the activity of monitoring us on the planet and taking us here. This hangar is a physical three-dimensional place, floor, walls, ceiling. They orientate themselves three-dimensionally and hence perceive the world in a three-dimensional way. Their brain works three-dimensionally. It needs three-dimensional input, eyesight and a sense of balance. See the glaring light here. They can see and they can hear. Blocking our communication system was the first thing they did. They understand communication, know of its importance. They can speak and hear.”

“All systems stopped working. We can’t use the sensors to check on the conditions in the hall. Oxygen will last for 48 hours. We have the suits and helmets, another twelve hours,” John said.

“We can’t do anything but wait. I’m pretty sure they’ll soon come forward,” Rob said.

“We could put on the suits and get out,” Dan said.

“No,” John said. “Too risky an endeavor.”

“I would rather wait until they invite us to their place,” Rob said. “They might rate our getting off the ship as the willingness to intrude their space.”

“I see what you mean,” John said. “You’re the cultural expert. How shall we proceed?”

“Prepare ourselves for first contact,” Rob said. “They are monitoring us. Let’s talk about Earth, so that they get an idea of who we are and why we came here. Let them know of our intents. Put your words with care, though. Control voice and tone. Don’t give off a misleading impression.”

They were thinking about it.

“Okay,” John said. “Let’s start with talking about our mission. That’s probably what interests them.”