The Mission

The table was uncharacteristically silent the night before the big mission. This was despite an excellent meal – it seemed that everyone in the Space Agency had caught something of the gravity of the coming mission, and despite many previous successes, there was a sense of great risk pervading the entire complex.
Even the four crewmembers themselves were somewhat subdued.

“A good meal, the night before you’re executed,” was a comment made by the pilot.

The Commander looked over her three team members.

“Gentlemen,” she said, quiet steel in her voice. “What do you intend to do?”

The flight engineer looked up. “We intend to fly the mission,” he said. But there was something unsaid behind his words.

“And?” asked the commander. In three years of training for this moment, the four of them had developed an excellent understanding of each other, to the point of recognising unsaid words and reading emotions as though they were written words.

The engineer apparently decided that there was little point in beating around the bush here.

“Commander, I think I speak for all of us – yourself included – when I say that what I really intend to do is to die testing this new technology. I can’t see how it’s going to work.”

The Commander nodded.

“You weren’t this morose a week ago,” she observed.

The Data Officer, who had remained silent until this point (nothing like his usual ebullient self), said “A week ago we hadn’t seen three probes fail to reach light speed. And break up in the process.”

The commander accepted this. But she felt constrained to say “Our best analysis suggests that an unmanned spacecraft has far less chance of success than we do. We’ve trained for so long, and we know the new drive very well. D’ran, you have simulated every mishap that has occurred to the probes this week, is that not true?”

“It’s true,” said the pilot.

“And if you were not confident that you could bring us safely through any of those mishaps, do you seriously think I would have reported our status as ‘ready’?”
Around the table, it was clear that the Commander was coming through loud and clear. She’d definitely stuck her neck out for the crew in the past, that much was certain. It took real spine to do that, given the gung-ho attitude of many of the executives within the agency. None of them could imagine her being blasé about the risks.

“Well, then,” she said, “Let’s enjoy this meal, and then let’s launch tomorrow and show the naysayers. For the record, I know the risks as well as everyone, but I also think that we’re the best people to overcome them, and if we can’t nobody can.”

* * *

The following morning weather conditions were perfect at the launch site. The preparations of the SupraDrive were also perfect – it seemed nothing could go wrong that day. The conventional rocket that would boost them into orbit for this historic attempt was fuelled with rather less than the usual fuss, as was the hypergolic second stage; and when the moment of the first available launch window that day arrived, all was in readiness.

The countdown proceeded as normal and the craft lifted off on schedule.
The crew reported a good separation from the launch stage, and the craft was placed into quite a circular parking orbit.

They had an orbit to prepare for the lightspeed attempt. Readying the spacecraft took only a few minutes; most of that time was for psychological preparedness, and they knew it. They spent a few precious moments looking at their world from orbit. For the Engineer and the Data officer, this was the first time in space; the pilot had flown twice before, and the Commander was a grizzled veteran. But even they took this moment to look one last time at their homeworld. Their orbit was high, allowing them an excellent view of the entire planet.

“It’s funny,” mused the pilot. “It feels so big when you’re on the ground. But looking down on the planet like that, you can’t help feeling tiny.”

The Data officer grinned. “My Dad used to say that every world was actually just a subatomic particle in some enormous universe, and the planets and stars in THAT universe are just subatomic particles in ANOTHER universe.”

“Nice idea,” chuckled the Commander. “I’d like to see them test it!”
The crew laughed.

“Places, people. Set your switches to readiness, then we’ll commence orbital maneuvering.”

* * *

The ship had completed maneuvering itself free of the homeworld’s gravitational field. It was time for the test to begin.

The Data Officer readied his instruments.

The pilot smoothly pushed the handle.

For a moment the craft seemed to hang motionless in space. Then slowly, gracefully, she accelerated.

The drive pulsed. The pulsation was just a little off-rhythm.
“That’s what killed the first probe,” said the engineer. He made a couple of adjustments. “That oscillation there could have torn us apart.

The four crew members breathed easier.

The engines thrummed with a stronger rhythm now; the heartbeat of the craft had been made regular again.

A short while later, the Data Officer turned to the Commander.

“Rogue gravitational fluctuations,” he reported. “We’ll want to steer carefully.”

The Commander was pleased. So far they had eliminated the cause of two of the three probes malfunctioning. It looked indeed like their mission was going to succeed where the others had failed.

A light flashed on the Pilot’s console. He frowned.

“Commander, something’s wrong. I have lost control.

The commander looked over the Pilot’s controls. “Did you do anything unusual?” she asked.

“No Commander,” replied the Pilot grimly. “The readings were all normal until just a moment ago.”

She turned to the Data Officer.

“Tell me,” she said, “What was the cause of loss of the spacecraft in the third probe?”

The data officer replied crisply. “Inconclusive Ma’am. But I’d be prepared to suggest that it’s a better than even chance.”

“Right,” she said. “Lock in backup RCS.”

She turned to face our crew.

“Steady as she goes, people,” she said. “We’re not giving up yet!”

A moment later the Pilot reported “RCS back on line. We have control, but only very slight movement.”

“Data Officer, what do you read?”

“This can’t be right . .” he muttered, before announcing “We’re in the wake of
several incredibly large, fast-moving objects.”

“Can you dodge them?” asked the commander.

“If I start now we can,” he replied.

“Will it prevent us completing the mission?”

“Only if we hit one, Commander, and I’m fairly sure I can avoid that.”

“All right,” said the Commander. “Hang on, people!”

The Pilot made some path adjustments, and then shoved the levers controlling the SupraDrive into the “engaged” position.

The ship rattled. The acceleration was incredible, but the hull held.
“Steady as she goes. Prepare!”

At that point, the largest moving object could be seen in the window, and the ship was drawing inexorably close.

“Commander!” called the Pilot. “There’s no doubt in my mind that what happened to the third probe is happening here. The reason the information was sketchy is that the probe actually collided with something.” He pointed out the window.

Large globes whooshed past. In the opposite direction. The craft was heading directly for one.

The pilot made some extra changes. Far from moving the flightpath away from the object, he moved towards it. He even managed to steal some momentum from the object.
The meter on the bulkhead began to approach 1c, the speed of light.

“This is it, everyone,” he said. “Now or never.”

The globe slammed into another globe moving in the opposite direction along with the craft. Debris flew everywhere. But the craft was not there.

The spacecraft leapt past the speed of light. It only maintained that speed for a couple of seconds. It only needed to. As it was, it would take the craft several months to return under its conventional drive. No matter, they’d get home to a hero’s welcome.

* * *

A researcher at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN looked up from his readings.

“There it is again,” he said to a second scientist. “For a moment there, a neutrino seemed to be going faster than light! But that can’t be right . . .”

Communication

So, let’s take stock. What have we so far?

Well, we have one human miner, on a solo mission in the Asteroid belt. No special training beyond a Bachelor degree, and only a small spacecraft. Oh, and curiosity. Lots of that.

Which is why I didn’t run and hide when I discovered that this Asteroid was in fact a space station; no, I had to find an airlock and invite myself in, didn’t I?

I find air; thin, but perfectly breathable. Soon I have retracted my suit’s helmet and am breathing the atmosphere inside the asteroid.

I have been walking through long corridors for a short while when suddenly I notice – he’s there.

I behold something that I can somehow recognize as a living thing; yet something so alien that anything else is hard to determine.

He looks me in the eye . .

. . is it a he? Do human concepts of gender and grammar apply?

Cripes, I know nothing about this . . this . . being. I have to avoid thinking of it as an “it”.

I’ll call him a “he.” Doesn’t matter, anyway.

“He” looks me in the eye.

At least, I think that’s what he’s doing.

Those spots on stalks . . I think they’re eyes. They kind of look like human eyes to an extent. If human eyes were completely black and mounted on a tentacle. And he seems to be using them like eyes. So call them eyes for now.

Come to think of it, I don’t know what . . he . . means by looking into my eyes. I remember my guide warning me when I was in the Middle East that one girl was actually trying to proposition me when she looked into my eyes. For my part, I just meant to be open and honest.

Does he mean one of those? The proposition? Surely not, we’re too different . . aren’t we? But maybe he doesn’t interpret me as being honest with me. Maybe he sees it as a challenge. Or as a greeting. How can I know?

As he . . looks . . in my eye, I realize – one of us has to make some kind of a move. I guess it’s up to me.

I raise my hand. This is so clichéd. I can’t help feeling like I’m one of the humans etched onto the plaque on Pioneer 10. . . and I find myself laughing. Well duh! This is exactly what the plaque was for – communicating the existence of humanity to some species from another world!

It occurs to me to stifle my laughter. Surely this is inappropriate for a human making the first ever contact with an alien, even accidentally.

But that idea vanishes as quickly as it arose. Why fight the laughter? We don’t seem to be able to muster up enough mutual comprehension to even exchange greetings. If the alien could or would take offense to my giggles, we would have made a hell of a lot more progress than we have so far.

I wish I had that plaque. Carl Sagan thought an alien might understand it. I didn’t, much. But maybe my friend here might understand it. Maybe if I can get him back to my internet terminal –

– No , that’d be stupid. Even if I was sure that he wouldn’t find something in my ships’ lifesystem that was potentially fatal, what guarantee do I have that he would understand that better than he does now?

In point of fact, maybe he does understand me. Maybe he can’t communicate that understanding with me,

How would I know, come to think of it?

I speak.

“I come in peace!” I say.

The alien looks at me again.

“Peace” I repeat, this time feeling really stupid. Obviously, the Alien understands nothing I say. And why would he? I don’t know why I expected otherwise! Maybe I just watched too much science fiction on the TV.

From nowhere the Alien extends a . . tentacle? A pseudopod?

He raises the pseudopod above his . . . head. and for a moment he pauses.

Suddenly I realise what is happening.

I think he’s trying to mimic my ridiculous pose, such as he can!

I move my hand slowly, gradually towards him. Gradually, slowly, he moves closer to me.

We make a brief contact, his tentacle against my hand.

So getting back to what we have – well, we can at least add one more thing to the list of resources.

We have an alien and a human who BOTH possess imagination and curiosity.

Beyond that, who knows?

Raiders

“Frankly, we’re not ready,” said the minister for Production, a frown creasing her face. “Our naval forces are at approximately 33% of the readiness levels from before the Lor’Tref incursion. We only have four carrier groups, and we may be able to scrape together a fifth if we really try; but five of the damaged carriers are probably total losses, and are really only good for scrap, and even the repairable ones will take years.”

The minister for defence grimaced. “That’s assuming I could find crews and pilots for five carrier groups. We lost all our first string crews at the battle of Io, right at the beginning, and you can’t maintain training and replacements for twenty years of full-scale war. Realistically, we’d be lucky to field two carrier groups; three if we throw absolutely everyone into the mix, including green half-trained squadrons and instructor pilots. And I needn’t remind you that this would be absolute desperation.”

At this point the room erupted.

“We can’t get up and running again without at least ten years to rebuild infrastructure!” interjected the minister for the Interior.

“We haven’t got ten years!” the Intelligence minister responded. “In case you haven’t noticed, there’s a fleet FIVE TIMES the size of the Lor’Tref first wave on a direct course for Earth!”

“Then we can’t survive!” shouted the minister for the Environment.

“We’re already in total collapse!” shouted the Treasurer. “We must find more resources as is!”

The chamber dissolved into chaos and panic, which only subsided once it was clear to the assembled members of parliament that no-one could hear them.

The Prime Minister touched the “enable” control again on the house sound system.

“Please people,” he said, “We’re not making things any better. Xiang Weiyuan,” he asked the Intelligence minister, “Is it possible that we’re mistaken? Could the fleet be heading elsewhere?”

Xiang shook her head. “There aren’t many habitable systems in this part of the galaxy,” she said. “If they’re following the kind of arc they are on, Sol is the only system that they could reach in about three or four million years. No, they’re making a direct line for us. Judging from colour, their drives are considerably less efficient than ours, but still my best estimate is that they’ll arrive in about five years time.”

The Prime Minister nodded. “All right, then,” he said, solemnly. “Madame Jacquard, you and General Tambotha have both already vouched your concerns with the current state of the Star Fleet. I suppose I can take it as read that there is no possibility of rebuilding to some level of functionality in five years?

The minister for Production shook her head.

“In five years, we will have replaced most of the fighters and bombers, but working at maximum output I can’t see us completing more than half of the repairs. I think we can count on the two new carriers from the Australian orbital shipyards coming on line by then, but most of the ones we laid down during the war will still be a long way from completion. And that’s not counting the escort ships; most of those are damaged to some degree.”

The Prime Minister looked over his glasses at the Foreign minister. “Keith, you have been very quiet. What do you believe are the chances that we could stall this fleet?”

Keith shrugged. “We don’t even know what they want,” he said. “Land? Technology? Industry? Energy? We don’t even know if they want Earth’s wildlife to use as pets. Without that kind of critical information, I can’t even begin to put together a plan.”

“Hmm . .” The Prime Minister stroked his chin and stared at his hand. Finally he turned to the Defence minister. “What do you need to counter a fleet of this size?”

“Thirty carrier groups, fully equipped,” General Tambotha replied promptly. “Any less and we’re just fooling ourselves.”

“So . .” the Prime Minister said, a thoughtful look on his face. “I believe that we have only one option left. . .”


* * *

The Prime Minister’s shuttle was indeed fitted with a more efficient drive than the Alien fleet. Moreover, instead of the gigantic space behemoths possessed by the aliens, the shuttle was small, light and nimble. It took him less than a week to achieve maximum speed, and before half a year had passed on Earth, the fleet was heaving into view.

The news was not pleasant.

“The fleet looks bigger than we expected, sir!” said the Prime Minister’s aide, staring at real-time data from cameras on the side of the spacecraft.

The Prime Minister tried to hide his concern. He looked around at the rest of his team. The three-man bridge crew stayed stolidly at their stations, but despite their professionalism, it was possible to see the tension etched into their faces. As for his diplomatic officer, his personal aide and his military analyst, each could see with his or her own eyes the gravity of the situation.

“Get an estimate on the military capabilities of the nearest large vessel,” he ordered the analyst.

“Yes sir,” said the analyst, walking to a nearby console.

She frowned.

“Sir, I could be reading this wrong, but I can’t see any obvious weapon emplacements.”

The Prime Minister raised his eyebrows.

“Unarmed, then?” he asked.

“Unknown, sir,” she said. “They could be hiding weapons systems. Or their weapons may be completely unknown to us.”

“Understood,” said the Prime Minister. “Deborah, I want you with me.” The Analyst gave a curt nod. “And you, Ivan. David, stay here. The rest of you,” he said, looking around at the bridge crew, “Be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. I hope the three of us will be out soon, but if all else fails, David needs to report to the Parliament.”

He nodded at his aide. “I know you want to come with me, David, but this is important. You MUST try to get back if the rest of us are taken.”

The Prime Minister straightened.

“Pilot, take us closer to the lead ship. We shall try to make contact with them using Neutracode.”

* * *
The aliens were at least familiar with basic Neutracode, so there was little difficulty in arranging for the Prime Minister’s party to be invited aboard.

The Shuttle was guided into a vast hangar bay. Deborah, the military analyst, noted that the hangar could have easily swallowed a Kennedy-class light fleet carrier.

The thought comforted no-one.

Eventually the spacecraft was guided to hard dock on one of the many platforms. The Prime Minister had time to fleetingly wish he hadn’t been so stubborn in refusing Tambotha’s strong suggestion that he bring an armed honour guard, but it was now too late.

He inserted his translator into his ear.

As the door slid open, he beheld a tall, vaguely humanoid shape (if you ignored the fact that it possessed four upper limbs instead of the usual two and the crooked, goat like lower limbs). The being was lithe and fur-covered; if anything it resembled a giant, six-limbed otter. It held what looked like a computer terminal in its hand.

It muttered something in its own language. Before the translator provided him with an English version of its speech, the Prime Minister was able to note that the creature’s voice was so high-pitched as to be almost ultrasonic.

Honoured human visitor, it said. We [word unavailable!] that you be granted quarters immediately. Then please follow the robot to meet with our masters.
A few minutes later, with the team’s gear stowed and a call made to the ship to tell them that there was no immediate danger, the Prime Minister and his entourage followed the strange, spindly robot to a conference room.

In this room an older alien waited.

The Prime Minister bowed from the waist. It wasn’t really part of his culture, but he felt that a gesture of respect could do little harm; and as it turned out, the being seemed to understand.

Honoured human visitor the being said, I am leader/negotiator Barcoum of the Djiv. May your [word unavailable] be [word unavailable] all of your [unavailable].

The Prime Minister tried not to smile, despite the gravity of the situation. Despite the dearth of language connection between the two species, it was fairly obvious that Barcoum had given a generic traditional blessing.

“Honoured leader Barcoum. I am the Prime Minister of the planet Earth, which we believe to be your destination. I would speak with you if you will allow it.”

The being paused for a moment, presumably listening to his own translator, which appeared to be similar in size and function to that possessed by the human.

Similar sophistication level in electronics, mused the Prime Minister.

After a moment, Barcoum reacted to the message.

Emphatic yes, he replied. We wish that you would speech with us. Inquiry as to the topic?

The Prime Minister cleared his throat.

“We are here to inform you that we, the humans of the Sol system, wish to surrender unconditionally to you.”

The reaction of Barcoum was not what the Prime Minister expected. Although it was hard to read his alien features, the Prime Minister was sure that a blank look had passed over its face. After a moment, Barcoum looked the Prime Minister in the eye.

This “surrender” shares no concept in our vocabulary. Honoured Leader/negotiator, I apologise, but please explain this idea to us.

“It means . . that we will not resist you or attempt to prevent you from obtaining that which you want,” said the Prime Minister. “We are prepared to discuss whatever you want with us, and all that we ask is that you do not harm the people of the Sol system.”

This time there was no mistaking it. Barcoum did a double take. But the alien recovered quickly.

You will not resist us? Good. Very good. Excellent. And your bargain is acceptable.

“My bargain?” asked the Prime Minister.

Your Bargain, said Barcoum. The alien seemed pleased. We of the Djiv will extend to you every courtesy . . and of course we shall spare you from the [word unavailable] of our mighty armed forces.

The part of Barcoum’s statement about armed forces seemed as though it had been added on the spot. The Prime Minister wondered what that may mean.

“What is it that your people want, honoured Barcoum?” he asked.

Barcoum nodded its head. We have prepared an audio visual presentation for our previous . . conquest, it said. Please follow Barcoum.

The Prime Minister and his entourage followed the tall being, who ushered them into what was clearly a small cinema, despite a range of stylistic differences. Barcoum motioned for the humans to sit in the strangely shaped chairs.

I shall leave. The presentation shall take place and I shall return, said Barcoum, who immediately left.

Finally alone, the Prime Minister turned to his two advisors.

“Well, what do you make of that?”

Ivan, the diplomatic advisor, was silent. “I’m not sure,” he replied. “Barcoum appears friendly, but there’s something he’s not telling us. Maybe we’ll be better equipped to answer that question once he shows us this presentation.”

“I’m concerned, sir,” opined Deborah. “He didn’t even know what ‘Surrender’ means. This fleet could crush us like an egg. And did you hear how casually he threatened us? Almost as though the threat meant nothing!”

The Prime minister nodded, but inwardly he was still wondering. He wondered if he and his team had misunderstood the situation.

A moment later he had his answer.

The screen came to life. The images on it were marginally distorted, and the colours slightly too pink, but everything was nonetheless fairly understandable.

Through their translators, the three humans heard the desires of the Djiv:

CRAZY BARGAINS!! NEVER TO BE REPEATED OFFER! ALL STOCK MUST GO!