local settlement date 36,042
Not everything has hidden meaning. Some of it is bloody obvious.
King Namor Zujahrah
36 a royal visit
The castle had been removed from the engine of the royal family imperial star ship.
Its dark hard functionality was reason enough to want it covered. The shear mass of it made everything near it appear insignificant.
It was decided that before it could be covered again, a replica would have to be built. To replace the missing engine on the star ship. A star ship that did not go from star to star was not a star ship. The massive engine with a 20 kilometer diameter would likely have to be built in space. Unless the star ship could pull it up with a cable. A cable impossibly strong. Wherever it was to be built, to build it, computerized robotics would be needed. And technology that was still somewhat foreign. And materials not yet understood.
The other option was to blast the one they had back into space. This would be an option if they were willing to give up the paradise of Angel Island. Have it dry out in a day. One more option was to build desalination machines to replace the water. To build an irrigation system with new methods and machines. This would also take many years and many resources.
All these options went out from the premise that a star ship should have an engine. That it should be either seeking out a new star system or returning to their home planet to see why their was no communication between the two planets.
And still, space travel was not a high priority. Any fish would bare witness to it. Especially ones in Barbancorian rivers that had not ventured to exist there thousands of years.
The space boat that was to take them to the space ship had had many improvements and many fully automated tests. From their latest attempts, everything had functioned perfectly. The space boat had a little steam engine for fine direction adjustments in space where every action had the exact and equal reaction with no gravity or friction to alter the simple equation.
To move the space boat in space was quite a simple task. To get the space boat into space required much more energy. The space boat ‘Protocol' did not have an independent engine. It used a laser that had been adapted and was controlled from the space ship engine. The laser exploded the solid metal fuel in the more solid metal bell shaped back end of the space boat. The laser, with the help of computerized robotics, could direct the space boat's course as it lifted off the planet.
The space boat was made to accommodate six passengers. There was ample supplies of air water and food for 24 days in space. With their space boat they intended to look first at the condition of the star ship and a likely place for boarding. They had suits and cables for leaving the space boat. They had almost intelligent computer detection equipment that could send and detect communication.
It was very clear that if the ship did not want them to board, that it was likely close to impossible to board.
Almost impossible would mean the star ship was like a near moon. If they decided it had to be discovered what was in it, they would have to build a space station and mine a way in. If this was the course they had to take, they would spend their first trip in space determining where the first space station would be built.
There was the possibility that they, their ancestors had abandoned it, and left it orbiting the planet because it was the last place they had used it. It was too big to land on the planet. Without the engine it could not go anywhere. It demanded attention. That meant the people on the planet would have to embark on a space program.
All the knowledge of the space program. Even the knowledge that they were once in space had been forgotten with what still looked like purpose.
"A test, Old King. Or not a test. A remedy. To make us heal ourselves of the royal family and the priests. If that was it. Maybe we have passed the test. And are ready to either go back to our last planet or onward to the next."
"I love how you think, Drave King."
"Do you think we will return to the surface alive."
The Old King laughed.
"I'm willing to bet my life on it. And like the philosopher king always tells me, we never die for long."
Namor laughed with the Old King. Then he consulted Rabon before deciding that they were as ready as they were going to be. Before they could build an elevator from the space ship, they were as safe as technology would allow.
Namor, Barbaralba, the Old King, Rabon, a computer expert and technical mechanic from Salt Lake 6, and two reporters, Vin and Kaar, with digital cameras, movie cameras, and recording machines also experts in technical communication. With live feeds that would be broadcast in every theater on the planet. A thin layer of sand had been pumped onto the mountain engine so it could be used as a large screen for the largest images in written history.
As far as anyone knew.
One thing they knew was that the majority of the planet wanted to know what was up there. Some, when they could get there.
So there was nothing left to do but to get in the space boat and hope they had thought of everything they needed to think about when leaving the layer of atmosphere that protected them from the cold desert of radiation and dusty nothingness. A brutal vacuum that would be quick to suck their brain out of their exploding eyes and everything else.
Namor thought about it for a minute then looked at Barbaralba.
"I love you."
"We aren't going to die today, Drave King."
Namor smiled and felt his body pushing into his seat. After they broke the sound barrier, there was silence. Not much longer later, they were in orbit along side the royal family imperial star ship.
It was a beast. Namor thought he could hear millions of Draves burning. He knew it was in his head because around the screaming in his head was only the sound of breathing.
"Bleeding Terror."
The space ship went on forever as did the vast blackness of space. Spotted with countless stars.
"Breathe Namor."
"I am, through my ears."
The space boat floated along side the space ship half a day, slightly faster, covering over thirty kilometers. Filming and talking to the world. Showing the world their planet for the first time, likely since they left the space ship.
There was no clue how to board the ship until they finally happened upon what looked like a landing dock. Nothing looked like a door.
With the minute manoeuvers of the steam engines, they docked neatly at what looked like a place to dock a small craft. There was no gravity to hold it where it was and there were no forces to send it away. With the slightest of downward thrust, in relation to the space boat but not the planet, the space boat was stationary.
Rabon started he signal spectrum and detection of signal spectrum. While they allowed the computer to do its work of searching all likely binary signals and sending of same, Vin and Kaar opened the bay of the space boat and filmed the planet below. Below was endless ocean. The planet from where they were was nothing but water and patches of clouds.
Barbancor was rising ahead of them. There was a large mountain ranges. Somewhere there was the buried city of Magalax.
The rest of the crew ventured, with cables connecting them to the space boat, to move about in space. With the pretense to have a look at the star ship.
As they bobbed around, enjoying weightlessness, they were being boarded. The dock moved slowly into the star ship and an opening that would have to be described as a door, opened and swallowed them.
The door closed behind them and for a moment there was only darkness. Light grew slowly. As did the pressure.
No one moved until Rabon commanded everyone's suit to open their helmets.
"What is happening, Rabon."
"My speculation would be routine boarding of small craft onto the star ship. The computer communications have locked. We are inside."
A door opened.
There had been no indication of a door and there was no indication that there was anywhere else to go but through the door. There was no contact with the planet. From the planet point of view, the space boat had simply lost contact and disappeared. For the six it appeared that the environment inside the star ship was conducive to life forms of their nature. Rabon made the computer make another test of all elements in the air but nothing of danger was discovered.
Everyone stood and watched Rabon.
"I think we can leave our suits here."
After dropping their suits, they passed through the door into the hall. The hall was of no obvious dimension. It was neither well lit or dark. The walls had luminescence and the ceiling was somewhat lost in eternity.
"Which way."
"King's call."
Namor laughed.
"We have entered the absurd."
"This is our ship, King Namor. Our ancestors designed it for us."
"For them us. I think we go toward what seems like the direction that it is moving. Though it may not be moving at all and it is only the planet that is moving."
"The whole universe is moving."
"Then that way."
Namor pointed to the direction he thought was the front. It was the opposite direction of where they were fairly certain the star ship engine had been removed. And if the assumption that the engine must be at the back was true, maybe it made sense that the front was a good direction to chose. To find command. If it was at the head of the ship.
"Ah. Wait. Let us take food and water. And how do we find our way back here."
"That's not a problem. We will trace an electronic trail. Our ship knows where we are."
Rabon showed Namor the map function of his hand held computer. He showed the few paces they had taken from the space boat. Followed the instructions given the few steps and came to the space boat. They all strapped on food and water and continued down the hall.
They came to a room that looked like a lounge. A place to sit and do whatever it was people did on star ships thousands of years. Most likely what people, or creatures did wherever they were whenever they were there. It seemed strange to be on a star ship but it also did not seem like a star ship once inside it. It seemed like a new world. Or the old other world they had long forgotten.
They decided on a rest. A plan of attack and some food.
Namor stood up and screamed.
"Hello. Is anyone here."
Everyone looked at him, a little surprised at his outburst.
"I mean other than us."
He laughed as did everyone with him. Medicine for relaxing. But Namor was not relaxed.
"No. If someone was here, they would know a space boat had entered their star ship. They would contact us."
"Our star ship. This is our bloody star ship and I do not want to be so bloody lost and confused."
Namor threw himself at a wall.
It opened. Or it was not really a wall. He banged up against a second wall he could not see and fell to the floor.
The other five stood up to look at where Namor had vanished to. Then they walked through the wall that was not a wall and the five stood beside him. The Old King backed out and came back in again.
"What just happened."
Everyone looked at Rabon who was looking at his little computer that had no answer for him. Good because it indicated no environmental dangers.
Rabon looked up with eyes gaping and mouth open. Everyone else spun around to look at what was almost looking at them. At an arm's length away was a man that appeared to be looking at them.
"Bleeding beast."
The man pressed his face up against the invisible barrier.
"We come from the planet, the one the ship is circling."
"He's inside. He won't hear us. I don't think he sees us."
Namor had forgotten about the transparent wall in front of him that had just thrown him to the floor in his haste. He put his hand on it and the man on the other side put his hand to almost the same spot. Almost touching.
"He knows we are here."
"Why can't he see us."
"Maybe he doesn't believe in us."
Everyone looked at Barbaralba and waited for an explanation.
"It he isn't 36,000 years old, he may know the wall is here but never anything else."
The man turned and walked away.
Namor pounded on the invisible wall.
"It may also be one way glass. Though I am certain it is not glass. But it may be that he actually doesn't see us."
"But he knew we were here."
"We are here."
"He knew we came through the wall."
"He sensed something beyond his wall. His wall is not the same as our wall. He may have picked up on our being here. Voices in his head. But he may be very used to having voices in his head."
"Voices in his head."
"Everyone has voices in their head if they avoid entertainment and communication with others long enough, everyone will hear them."
"You mean they will go crazy."
"No, they will listen to the voices. We hear them and assume they are only our own voices in our own head. And really, they are. But they are a collection of millions of years of evolution and instinct. You and Barbaralba are both right. He knows we are here but he doesn't believe it."
"We have to get through to his side of the wall. Let him. Those in there know that we have come back."
The Old King shook his head.
"What."
"Did you get any of that recorded."
"Yes. I haven't turn the thing off since we got in here."
"Me neither."
"They don't know what it is like to look at the stars. Can you imagine never imagining what a star is. Or a moon. Or a planet. That, what we are looking at, is a space cage. They are the third part of our crazy experiment."
Everyone looked at the Old King for further explanation but he did not give any. He stood and searched the world inside to see what creatures he could see.
They all stood and tried to see clearly into the world inside the inside of the star ship. It looked like a jungle. There were bugs and birds. Animals ran by them so close they could touch them if there was not a barrier between them. But they saw no other people. Just the one man that had wondered what was on the other side of the end of his world.
Namor pounded on the barrier. Even on their side of the barrier his pounding was not more than the rustling of a leaf of a tree that had been struck by a breeze.
"What are we looking at."
"Exactly. I don't think after 30,000 years it is what it was. But I will guess that other than a possible experiment to see what happens to people looked in a space prison for a few hundred generations. It may be back up. Back up of a gene pool from as many species that can live in a hundred kilometers of raw life."
"I think, Old King, it is madness to have them, this garden, a secret from us. And us a secret from them. I think something went wrong with us."
"Oh, I don't know. Many things go in many directions, Drave King. I don't find it at all strange to have such a simple and basic back up of us. Thirty thousand years is not long for a species. I think we will find other stranger things on this star ship."
"But if they are inside and no one is out side, they would go on as long as the star ship went on."
"We are up here."
"If we hadn't gotten space technology we wouldn't be here."
"No. And neither would they."
Namor smiled at the Old King and put his arm around him.
"I like your brain, Old King."
"I am glad to have someone who understands me, King Namor. I waited many years for you to come along."
They walked along the barrier looking to see what they could see in the star ship garden until inside the barrier night was falling. The light was dimming in the garden. There had not found any nature outside the barrier. But they had also not had much time to explore.
So they walked through the second barrier, the light barrier, back to the corridor. Rabon went to work detecting with his computer until he discovered electronic devices that opened door on the other side of the corridor. The other side of the inside. And the discovered rooms of what one would classify as civilized dwellings.
And they were all along the corridor.
Plumbing, with water that tested safe to drink. And electronic devices. And everything seemed to conduct information. The rooms knew that they had entered them but it was the room and not a living creature.
The rooms were not lined with gold or silver but there was no questioning the luxury. It was whatever one needed it to be. Barbaralba requested a pool to swim in and one was granted her. It did not appear like magic. It was there for her to find. There were plants like one would find in a garden in the castle.
Namor allowed himself to forget where he was and join Barbaralba in the pool.
"I think I understand it."
"What do you understand."
"We are mad primates; both creative and destructive. And we are megalomaniacs. And it isn't really a sickness. It is what we are. It is the beginning of us getting to the point where we will understand that we can do whatever we want to do. It is our decision. We are really the gods. We are just not very adapt at it yet."
"What do you think that man believes."
"He believes something like anyone else believes who spends their life in ignorance of the stars and millions of years and billions of years. A cleaver caged animal."
"Do you think he will want to leave the star ship to visit a planet."
"Some of them will want to see it once they can understand it. It's a big leap to go from a box to a universe. Especially if the box is so safe and beautiful."
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