"As with Earth, mutants were bred for slavery in many other star systems. As the humanoids became aware of this, small numbers began to mutiny, and were punished severely for it. They were poorly organized, rebellious, and few continued the cause after leaders were captured. Skirmishes were little more than an inconvenience. It would be many years before the mutants would successfully organize a true rebellion."
Lord
Kaschlin Ruhual, "Mutant War Memoirs"
Chronicles
of the Visitor, 2382 TS
CHAPTER V
Neila sat at her post behind Max in Dispatch the morning after Tiger Squadron had sighted the mysterious silver sphere hovering near the Security hanger bay. She couldn't shake the feeling that the sphere had something to do with the stolen shuttle and the terminal malfunction. That plus the news of her colleagues and friends was weighing heavily on her mind. She wondered if she could somehow use her association with Joe Thompson to infiltrate ECOS, but as quickly as she thought of it - she dismissed the idea. They would know she was stationed at Security. Joe was there when she lost her assignment at the Institute.
It suddenly occurred to her that ECOS would know even if Joe had not been there. John had called them 'a tight group'. They would have to be to spot the agents as soon as they received the orders. They probably have agents stationed in the most strategic places to enable them to know so much about security. She considered the implications of that possibility. Anyone could be involved: techs, controllers, troopers, pilots, dispatchers; a shutter ran down her spine. "My God. Talk about paranoia," she said to herself aloud.
"Paranoia?" Max invaded her thoughts.
"What?" Her thoughts suddenly switched off. She did not realize she had vocalized the last one she had.
"You said something about paranoia. What are you afraid of?"
"Oh, I don't remember."
"Well, what were you thinking about?"
"I was thinking about the espionage, actually."
"Espionage."
"Yeah. You know, spies."
"Well, what about them?"
"How no one knows who to trust. Someone you might least expect, maybe your best friend, could be working for ECOS."
"There's a scary thought."
"Yeah, a short
walk into
"That's a deep thought. Does this descent have anything to do with what happened yesterday?"
"Mostly."
"Me, too. John told you about the agents. Didn't he? That's why you were thinking about espionage."
"He mentioned it."
"What did he tell you?"
"That we tried to infiltrate and failed. ECOS found out about it before anything could be accomplished."
"Did he tell you about any of the agents?"
"No. But, I was thinking, one of them was probably with the other side. Who would know? If the group is as tight as John says, half of Security could be involved."
Max held his breath for several seconds before saying anything else. Then he exhaled loudly. "The first time Security became aware of a conspiracy was about five years ago. It seemed like a small operation back then. Just a small group of crazies trying to stir up trouble. We accidentally intercepted a message and headed off a heist at the Institute. After that, the group's activities slowed down for a while. Then they hit the Medical Frigate and took shipments of med supplies. The Council decided there was more to this than a few disgruntled weirdoes. Senator McPherson wanted the group stopped, so five of us were picked to infiltrate the organization. We never stood a chance. Before we had one name, they contacted each of us with couriers and a phony message to meet at TCS. We were to grab the shuttle scheduled for the excursion team. Nobody but the undercover team was notified. We thought it must be either a freak coincidence or a test of loyalties. Hell, none of us knew anything espionage. Anyway, Higgins and I were told to stand guard 'til it cleared the bay. What we didn't know was that the shuttle was rigged to explode as soon as we lifted off. As soon as it made the turn for taxi, the whole cockpit blew and the thing made a nosedive aimed straight at Higgins' ass. That's when I lost my legs."
She swiveled her chair around to face his back. "Oh, Max. You lost your legs saving Higgins." She felt deeply moved by his sacrifice. "I had no idea you were so brave."
He swiveled to face her then. "Nobody knows the truth, Neila. Nobody except John and Higgins; and the bastard that set us up." As they faced each other, they habitually averted their eyes to monitor each other console. "Higgins was my wing man, so it was easy to come up with some heroic cock-n-bull cover story. Since it was routine for a shuttle to be test flown by Security pilots before an excursion, nobody questioned our being in it when it exploded."
"Yes, I remember the incident. It was to be my whole year because of that explosion. They said it was a malfunction. Wow, some malfunction. It wasn't a cock-n-bull story, you did a heroic thing."
"I don't know, I guess." She saw his eyes move to her console. "Computer, scan sector 913 Crossbow," he blurted out suddenly and pointed to the monitor, "Your friend is back."
She spun around just as the computer responded, "SCANNING SECTOR 913 CROSSBOW . . . ON SCREEN."
"Max!"
"I know."
"We've got it!"
"I know! Magnify 47 Bravo. Analyze and report," he commanded the computer.
"OBJECT IS A HOLLOW SPHERE OF UNKNOWN ORIGIN AND COMPOSITION."
"Computer, locate and link Commander Decker and Zebra Squadron. Interface," Neila commanded, reestablishing control of her station.
"INTERFACE COMPLETE. COMMANDER DECKER IS NOT RESPONDING TO PRIORITY ONE LINK."
"Tom, emergency dispatch in Sector 913 Crossbow. Report visual."
"Roger, Dispatcher. Computer relay's up." He was silent for a moment. "Unknown origin. A UFO?"
"You tell me. I have a P-One to John. He should break in any second..."
"I've got it," John's voice cut her off. "Where are you, Tom?"
"ETA 00:68 seconds to visual."
"Mercy, I see
it!" another voice exclaimed. "Portside,
"My God!" another pilot interjected. "Look at the size of that thing."
"Settle down, pilots. You're scaring the women," Tom ordered. Then added, "Namely me," under his breath.
"Talk to me, Captain," John cut in.
"The sphere is pure white with a flashing silver colored glow. It's about the size of four Halberds' in a double stack. It's just hovering around our docking bay. I can't see any port holes, but there is a ring of dull light around the middle."
"John, look at your link," Neila broke in. "What kind of symbols are those." The terminal screen began displaying odd shaped designs in an erratic manner. Then the images flickered off to a blank screen.
"God, damn it!" John cursed loudly. "If this thing crashes again, I'm goanna..."
"No, wait. It's not a shut down, John," Neila cried as a wavy white line began to form an image on the dark screen. "It's a drawing of some kind." The line came back to the point where it began to form two solid shapes. The smaller filled itself with a reddish green color, and the larger was solid white except for one dot and one line, which remained black.
"It looks like
one of the birds in the
"I know this symbol. I've seen it before," Neila said. "Computer, analyze shape on terminal monitor..."
"...236," Max reminded her.
"...236," she repeated her terminal location number and thanked him for the help.
"ANALYSIS COMPLETE," it responded.
"Search ancient literature archives. Primary Reference: Religions. Secondary Reference: Symbolism. Classify and define.
"CLASSIFICATION
COMPLETE. IMAGE MOST NEARLY RESEMBLES SYMBOL REFERENCE DESCRIBED IN JEWISH
RELIGIOUS TEXT: KORAN, CHRISTIAN RELIGIOUS TEXT: BIBLE, DOCUMENT:
"Stop. Describe symbol and define."
"SYMBOLIC DESCRIPTION: 'WHITE DOVE WITH OLIVE BRANCH.' SYMBOLIC DEFINITION: "'PEACE BE WITH YOU.'"
Absolute silence filled their ears for a long moment after that. No one could believe what was heard. Each wondered if it could have possibly been the wildest of coincidences, or even a mistake. John was the first to snap out of the daze. "Computer, locate origin of message," he relayed to the computer through the link.
"DATA HAS BEEN ENTERED VIA SECTOR 913 SENSOR CIRCUITRY. ADDITIONAL MESSAGE ENTRY: 'HELP ME.'"
"Help me?" John repeated the message mostly to himself, but the computer confirmed it with an emotionless affirmation.
"Computer. Can you transmit a message back to the origin?" He asked.
"AFFIRMATIVE."
"Transmit an
affirmative response to message origin. Provide
"TRANSMISSION RELAY COMPLETE."
"Tom. Stay with the sphere. Follow it all the way into the docking bay and don't let it out of your sight."
"Roger, Commander."
"Max. Dispatch the bay watch. Clear the bay and stand by. Full isolation gear. Have medics get a team in there with a PDU for an emergency transfer to the Frigate. Full precautions. No exceptions. Inform them I'll have a security team waiting. I want gear and assistants ready."
"Aye, Commander."
"Neila. I want you in the hanger bay. Your background could be handy."
"On my way, Commander."
"Okay, people. Look sharp. We're dealing with the unknown. A completely foreign situation. Do not let that get in the way. Slow you down. This thing appears to be making peaceful contact. Asked for our help. We don't know what that means. Stay alert. That's it."
John and Neila crossed the docking bay clad in the red isolation suits of security just as the glowing sphere silently descended to the deck of the bay. The distorted image of the bay was reflected on its hull gave it an eerie sort of transparency, so that it blended into the environment. Then it stopped to hover at about eight feet above the deck. A single pedestal telescoped down to make contact with the deck, until the total weight of the sphere rested on top of it. The pedestal rotated clockwise to expose a brightly lit portal down the length of it. The rotation stopped.
The bay was silent, motionless. All eyes focused on the portal. Every team stood poised. Alert. Waiting. Time was nonexistent and all consuming. Nothing was happening and the tension was machete thick.
John quickly surveyed his people. He worried the calm would lull them into either dropping their guard or jumping the gun. He needn't have. If he could have read their minds, he would have known they had as much fearful anticipation as he did. "Keep it frosty, people," he calmly told them, just in case.
He shot a look over at the Chief of Medics, David Sinclair. David kept his team stood behind the PDU. The PDU was a Portable Decontamination Unit, developed before the first Earth research excursions. Its sole purpose was to decontaminate the returning research teams and their specimens before they left the shuttles. The units were designed to analyze the host and the microbes it contained. David's fear was that it might give a false reading or eradicate a microbe vital to the survival of the alien host. He checked to assure himself it on the manual setting. Satisfied, he nodded to the Commander, who returned the nod.
At last, a long shadow passed over the portal. "Commander," a trooper alerted him.
"I see it, trooper," he returned.
Another shadow passed toward the opposite direction. Finally a bipedal floated down the tube at an unhurried pace. The bay was suddenly alive with sounds of redlines. The creature was humanoid in body shape. Two legs and two arms around a torso, and a head attached to the top of it. The outer covering was white, fitting tight on its body but inorganic. The head was protected with a dark bubble shape, which obscured it from view.
The creature stepped forward and promptly fell against the wall of the pedestal. It grabbed at the bubble with gloved hands and shoved it up like a visor. Then it staggered another half step, fell back against the pedestal and collapsed in a heap on the deck.
David's team of medics sprang into action. He darted ahead of them to kneel beside the creature and pass a scanner over it. He looked up. His face was full of confusion and disbelief.
"He's human, John."
John frowned. "Human?"
"That's what these readings indicate. There are a few physiological differences, but just looking at him, I can't dispute it."
"Contaminate?"
"Nothing we can't handle. Let's get him in the PDU." The team lifted the body into the PDU and sealed the lid. A blue circle of light immediately enveloped the body, passing over the length of it from head to toe. David watched the readout on the side as it scanned. John and Neila walked over to the PDU and peered through the transparent lid. Neila noticed he wore no extra breathing apparatus on the bubble helmet. She could see that his skin was slightly darker in color than hers, though pale. "Red blood cells have a higher concentration oxygen to hydrogen. Sodium and mineral content are higher than normal, too." He stopped talking and, frowning at the PDU, shook his head incredulously. Neila had kneeled down to face level with the alien. "These readings are off the scale, John. I don't know. He is human, but according to these readings, he had to have come from place other than Earth. No Earth human would survive long with levels this high."
The alien briefly regained consciousness. He turned his head toward Neila and moved the closest hand up to touch the lid. Neila responded by doing the same. David frowned even more at the readings. Then the alien opened his eyes on Neila. A weak smile crossed his lips as his skin gained a slight color. Then he slipped back into unconsciousness. "Welcome to Terra," Neila whispered.