Part 1,Part 2,Part 3,Part 4,Part 5,Part 6,Part 7,Part 8,Part 9,Part 10,Part 11,Part 12,Part 13,Part 14
"Flag At the Edge of Space" page, Athena Home Page, Other Stories Home Page.
"Command officer's log, May 16, 2170, mission day three hundred and four. The end of our long journey is almost at hand." Hall paused, and looked up at the viewscreen in his quarters. It was showing the same thing that was on the bridge viewscreen. The stars were scattered across the background, but one star was far brighter than the rest. Rigel blazed with an intense blue, a brilliant point of light that could cast shadows if he was standing outside of the ship. If he ordered the Atlas to drop out of warp, he was pretty sure the view in space, dominated by one powerfully bright star, would be spectacular. But after coming all of this way, the last thing Hall was going to do was to order the ship out of warp so that he could sight-see. He finally resumed speaking, "We are now just one day away from our arrival at Rigel. Although the most optimistic dream we could have had about this star was that nobody was around, we have to admit that was unrealistic. Rigel is not going to be pristine and unoccupied, ready to be exploited by starships from the distant and young United Federation of Planets. This star shines like a beacon, urging anybody in the vicinity to drop by and have a look. In the past two months, we had detected the passage of four different starships, all so different in design that it seems unlikely that they were designed by the same race. Worse, scans of subspace radiation coming from the Rigel system indicates that the system is unusually active, and that lots of the radiation we have been detecting is clearly non-natural. There is a presence here. I am forced to admit that increasingly it looks like we have come this way for nothing. If there is even dilithium here, it seems unlikely that we could be able to access it. We might not be able to acquire a supply to allow the Federation to expand its fleet of ships and allow them to travel faster and further. I could even sense a growing sense of lowered morale among the crew as they increasingly face the fact that this mission might be a failure. All of them should've understood what we were getting into here, but I can fully understand their disappointment. It's hard not to feel disappointed after we invested all of this time and effort in this mission, and for no real results."
* * *
Hall entered the mess hall again. It was about half-filled, with first-shift officers getting breakfast before what could be a rather eventful and even historical day. The captain was somewhat surprised to find that the reconstituted scrambled eggs was not on the menu, and this was the second day in a row for that achievement. Did they run out of it already, he wondered. Instead, he had a choice of cereal or french toast. He choose the latter, but then regretted it when the amount of milk he was given was less than he would have liked, and it was watered down as well. He also got a glass of orange juice, but since the genetically-altered orange plants were prospering in the hydroponics labs, that was freshly-squeezed and was not that bad. At the senior officer's table, Abuna and Gerthe were already eating. The Canadian engineer had picked the french toast and added tea, while the Brazilian first officer went with the cereal, and clearly was not enjoying it.
"Good morning," Hall said, almost absently.
"Good morning," Abuna and Gerthe said, almost in unison and with the same relative lack of enthusiasm.
"So this is the day."
"It is," the first officer agreed. "I've read the third shift report summary. Five more alien starships detected. This star is quite a busy gathering point for ships. Also, evidence is increasing that the system has a massive planetary system, at least thirteen significant planets."
"Any class-M?"
"Several have the right size and fall within the range, but of course, with a star like this one, no planet could be naturally class-M. We can't rule out terraforming."
"But we can be pretty close," Gerthe remarked. "Nobody I know has been able to devise a method to terraform a planet that would take significantly less than a couple of thousand years."
"Nanotechnology," Abuna remarked. "It could rework a planet on a molecular level, turn it into whatever you need it to be."
"Would you really want to live on a planet that was modified using enough nanotechnology to actually complete the terraforming? Could you be sure that the nanotech was really cleared off when its work was done, or that it did its job perfectly and properly?"
"Not particularly," the first officer said. "On the other hand, we're not the ones that terraformed these worlds, if this had in fact been done. Maybe some race spent thousands of years on it."
At first, Hall thought that spending thousands of years to terraform a planet around a star that would only exist on the main sequence for twenty million years to be an inefficient use of time, but then again, even a stellar lifetime of twenty million years was incredibly long compared to the life of a person, or a culture. A race could build itself a world around Rigel, and then exist there for a long time, much longer than they could ever possibly exist as an ongoing culture, before the star would change and destroy those planets. If the worlds were rich with resources, then some race might find that expenditure in time and energy to be worth it.
"Nevertheless," Hall continued, "we have to accept the idea that Rigel is an inhabited system, and we're not going to go in there and scoop up as much dilithium as our cargo holds can carry. This might require a different approach, things like diplomacy."
"And we have no idea what kind of society could be existing here," Abuna said.
"Exactly."
* * *
Halfway through the first shift, the moment came. Since the day that the Atlas left Earth, its goal had been to reach Rigel. Now they were here, and approaching a system that was quite different from what they expected. Way back when, Hall remembered the mission briefing. Rigel was "officially" known as Beta Orionis, and it consisted of three stars, all of them young and hot. The main star was Rigel A, or just Rigel, and the other two stars orbited each other closely but were some distance from Rigel A. For most of the journey, the three stars together combined to show their light as a single point on the viewscreen, but within the past month, the individual stars started to become resolved. Within the past two days, the ship sensors had been able to pick out the individual planets.
"By all that we know about astrophysics," Abuna remarked from her place at the science console. "These planets should not be here. Rigel is a class B8 blue-white supergiant. Sixteen to twenty million years after it starts its fusion fire, it expands into a red supergiant and explodes. That's hardly enough time to get any planets going. One thing that I have been monitoring is the spectral lines from Rigel, and have used techniques to look at spectral lines for what could be photons originating in the core. As we suspect, there's a lot of carbon and oxygen in the core."
"So it's towards the tail end of those twenty million years," Weisser remarked.
"Yeah, something like that. I presume that this star will expand into a red giant before it explodes, but... I recall reading a paper where this might not necessarily be so. The core reactions could collapse suddenly, before the outer layers are completely used up. The star could supernova by bypassing the red giant stage."
"So anybody living here could get no warning?" Hall asked.
"Not necessarily. There'd be some subetheromagnetic effects that suggest it is happening, but it might not be much of a warning."
Yuniki commented, "Well, lets just hope it doesn't happen while we're in the system."
With an hour to go, the sensors were able to generate the first detailed schematics of the system, which the Atlas was approaching from approximately seventy degrees above the system. Hall looked at the updated schematics, and saw thirteen planets, ranging in size from a hot, inner Mercury-like world to a cold, icy and distant Pluto-like world. The innermost planet was one billion kilometres from Rigel, and the thirteenth planet orbited at more than six and a half billion kilometres. Beyond that, the influence of the companion stars would disrupt the orbits of further planets.
"Why no worlds closer?" Weisser asked.
Abuna started, "The only explanation is that during the early years of the star, the radiation was strong enough that it drove away most of the planet-forming material. What I am observing is that the star is surrounded by a thick haze of gas that appears to be effective in filtering out most of the harder radiation, including the ultraviolet. It's causing what seems like a huge corona to glow."
"Interesting."
Weisser looked up at the display, and noticed that the second, fourth, fifth, seventh, eighth and twelfth planets were all strongly suggestive of being class-M. Two of those worlds, the seventh and twelfth, actually orbited other planets. All of this was giving him something of a dilemma. "Captain," he finally spoke up. "Which planet should we approach first?"
Hall had to decide. Should they take a look at a world that might be underpopulated or not populated at all, or should they go for a more populated world? Sensors were showing a great deal of activity, but most of it was centered on the eighth planet. They were also getting readings indicating that the eighth planet was a source of energy and non-natural subetheromagnetic readings. The second and fourth worlds had relatively no activity, but were strongly class-M. Perhaps a more primitive species lived there, although to Hall, that made little sense. Every planet in this system was terraformed, and so the races living on it had to be, or had to have been, transplanted from somewhere else and was likely aware of interstellar travel. "Well," he started. "Our greatest fear is to not be wanted in this system. So far, we haven't been challenged, which might suggest that this system might be somewhat open and ships from many races can approach. That could change, though. We should take a look at one of the less-obvious planets first. Helm, set course for Rigel IV."
"Aye, sir."
Moments later, the Atlas dropped out of warp and approached Rigel IV. From a distance, it looked like any other class-M planet, with the usual mixture of greens and blues, along with the bands of white that were worked through the darker colours. Seeing this planet, Hall could not help but to think of Earth, and the other class-M worlds that he had seen on this long journey. There was something about such planets, something indescribable in mere words, that affected him. The sensation was peculiar in this situation in that this planet clearly could not exist in orbit around a class B8 star. This was a made world, and so it would say a lot about the people that designed and created the world.
"Entering standard orbit," Weisser said.
"Helm, complete one powered orbit. Commander Abuna, conduct some scans and lets see what we've got here. Yuniki, I want you to manage the tactical sensors, in case any other ship approaches, and monitor communications as well."
"Actually," the operations officer remarked, "I am picking up a number of transmissions, but nothing that is aimed specifically at us. It appears that there is some level of intrasystem communications, perhaps ordinary communications between the two more heavily inhabited planets in the system."
"Nevertheless, continue to monitor communications. Somebody might notice our presence here."
The Atlas began its powered orbit, moving from the day side to the night side, which was completely dark, and then towards the limb of the planet where Rigel would appear again, in its brilliant glory. "Captain," Abuna started, "I'm beginning to get preliminary data. This planet does not appear to be inhabited, and yet, I'm detecting infrastructure, abandoned cities."
"A lot like that planet we thought the alien woman came from," Hall said.
"A lot like that, but not quite as extensive. The construction seems to be confined to two of the four continents. The abandoned cities looks to be about a hundred to a hundred and fifty years since they were abandoned. On the other two continents, I'm reading even older ruins."
"Interesting," the captain started. "It seems almost like there were waves of settlement on these terraformed planets."
"Captain, I'm thinking that we should go down and take a look at this planet. I wonder if the same people lived here as lived on that other planet. The odds are against it, and yet... the architecture seems to be similar in a way. We need to take a closer look. I know that we might have to approach these other planets, and time might be a factor, but still--" A beeping sound distracted Abuna. She looked down at the alert, which the computer sounded when it found something that was important. Calling up the information, she said, "Captain, I'm picking up a small vessel, and lifesigns, four of them. They come across as... Vulcan."
"What?" Hall retorted. "Helm, hold our position here." He said that, and looked up. Rigel was just rising over the edge of the planet, and flooding the starship bridge with its bright light. The computer stepped down the intensity of the viewscreen images, which made the planet appear very dark. "Mary, can you confirm those readings?"
Abuna took control of the sensor routines, and conducted specific scans at the location the computer indicated had the lifesign readings. "Okay," she said. "I'm detecting a small ship, warp capable, and four lifesigns. The computer indicates that they're Vulcan, but not at one hundred percent certainty."
"What certainty?"
"About eighty, eighty-five percent similarity."
"How is that possible?" Hall asked. "Either they're Vulcans, and should scan as such, or else they're not, and should not scan. I mean, humans scan at, what, eight to ten percent Vulcan. Andorians are much less, as are Tellarites, and Kentyans are about the same as us."
"I'm not sure why, sir. I did a diagnostic on the sensors, and also tried some of the older algorithms. They're giving results that are even more strongly Vulcan. The only explanation I can think of is that this is a long-lost Vulcan colony that might have genetically drifted. Vulcan history does not record the existence of such a race, or a group of people departing Vulcan."
"Vulcan pride would not allow them to record such things," Quirk said, "or share such history with us."
"He's probably right. Sir, this does require closer study, and possible contact. I doubt that they live here, but have come to this planet for a reason. They might be able to tell us more."
"Agreed," Hall finally said. He at least had to make it sound like he was still contemplating the decision and was not simply following what his first officer was suggesting. Part of the delay came because he was thinking about how he wanted to be the one that led this landing party, but he had to realize that proper procedure was for him to remain on the ship. "Abuna, take down one of the shuttles, and attempt to make contact, and also confirm if the same people that once lived here also lived on that other planet we had visited. Take down a security crew, including Lieutenant Quirk, and Doctor Torres as well. Remember, you could be facing hostile aliens, and possibly Vulcans. Make sure the translator device is adequately programmed with possible languages that the aliens might be speaking, including interpretation and extrapolation algorithms. Remember, this is a first contact situation. Remember what you had learned, and what we had talked about in the past."
"Understood, sir."
* * *
The shuttle, with Quirk piloting and Abuna beside him, entered the atmosphere and approached one of the smaller coastal cities. On board were three other security officers and Torres. The four security officers were carrying phase rifles, while the other two had sidearm phase laser pistols. They also carried tricorders and other gear, including the portable translation device. The shuttle entered the atmosphere on the night side, but flew into dawn. Rigel, its apparent diameter noticeably smaller than that of the sun as seen from Earth, but mercilessly bright, rose above the horizon as the shuttle entered the city. The alien ship was located on the outskirts, in what looked like an industrial section of the city.
"We're on approach," Quirk said. "Where should I land? How close to the aliens?"
"Give us some distance, about two hundred and fifty metres from the other ship. I've noticed that the four aliens have become a lot less mobile, and almost seem to be hiding. In addition, the readings seem to be fading in and out."
"Like in the war," the security chief added.
"What do you mean?"
"The Romulans developed this technique to mask their lifesigns, making them almost invisible to the sensors. They weren't invisible to the naked eye, but it was hard to detect them. They got better at it as the war went on. This might be something similar."
"But they don't completely disappear."
"The device to hide their lifesigns is likely aligned to some other kind of sensor beam, and not ours."
"We'll stop scanning them until we land, then."
Moments later, the shuttle did come to a landing. The section of the city was a dreary industrial section, with a number of low-rise structures that lacked the grandeur and stature of most other buildings in the city. The structures were flat, one or two stories tall, often made of preformed concrete and other prefabricated components. In many cases, the ceilings had collapsed, and a number of the structures were destroyed by fire. Walls had blown out, covering paved areas with bricks and rubble. Various vehicles that looked like cars, and even cars without wheels, were partly buried and destroyed by the rubble. Plants grew wildly among the wreckage, with some trees even rising through the centre of the collapsed structures. The paved areas were heaved and cracked, with tall grasses and other weed-like planets growing out of the crevices.
Abuna stood near the door, and said, "Risk another scan. Where are they?"
"All four of them are in one of the more intact buildings, and they appear to be stationary. Moving around gives them away, and I think they realize that now. I'd say they're almost trying to hide from us."
"Maybe their presence here is against some law or something. We'll soon find out. Kooligoo and Skivorsky, you'll remain here and guard the shuttle. If the aliens start to approach it, let us know immediately."
"Understood," Kooligoo replied.
"The rest of you, you're with me. Remember, the last thing we want to do it to get into a shooting war. Our objective is to talk to these people, even if by the standards of their people, they're committing an illegal act." With the orders given, Abuna opened the hatch and gestured for the others to follow. They stepped out into the morning sunshine--although it felt like late afternoon to the four--and the first thing they noticed was how bright it was. Abuna found herself squinting, and wondered if sunglasses were considered suitable landing-party equipment and if any were on board the Atlas.
"It's bright," Torres remarked.
"I noticed. The visitors likely were operating during the night, when things might be more manageable here."
The group moved into a laneway between two of the dilapidated structures, and had to watch for debris and up-heaved pavement. One of the buildings had a sign mounted on the sides with some extended text written on it. Abuna simply stopped, and Torres noticed that. "A problem? Do you recognize this?"
"This is exactly the same writing system as was used on that planet we approached when we had the alien woman on board."
"Two planets abandoned by the same race?"
"And I wonder if it is same cause here as there."
"We'd have to look around, and see if the city was abandoned in the same way, where it seems that everybody had enough warning to go home and die in bed." Abuna thought about that for a moment, and the first question on her mind was that if the population of this planet was lost, why was the planet itself not re-inhabited by others who lived or came to this system? The only conclusion she could quickly come up with was that some species, like the woman they had found, was vulnerable to the disease, and others were not. Other races feared coming here because they might pick up the disease. One exception was the group of sort-of Vulcans that they had detected. "As nice as it would be to learn the answers to those questions, our mission here is to meet these likely scavengers." The others said nothing.
Carefully, the group approached. Quirk was following much of his training and his experience during the Romulan War, and his fellow security officer and the other two easily fell in line as they tracked the aliens on their tricorders and approached their vessel. They came around an angle in the cluttered, deteriorating laneway, and looked beyond. The vessel was not much. It looked ungainly, even. It was a squat, angled thing sitting on four spindly legs. On top was a structure that looked like a control cabin, while vents that might have been engines were on all four sides. A ramp led down from a protrusion underneath the craft, but the hatch was closed. What Abuna noticed was how battered the craft looked. If it had been painted once, that paint was long scoured off. The edges looked seared, and the flat sections were dented and dinged. It was clear that replacement parts had been taken from other, similar craft.
"Another old ship," Torres remarked. "Does everybody keep their ships forever in this section of the galaxy?"
"Maybe they work too well," Quirk remarked. "We keep building new ships because we have the resources to do so. We can't speak of others."
"But then, they're likely scavengers," the first officer added. "They likely don't have state-of-the-art equipment." She consulted her tricorder, and found that they were still holding up in one of the more intact buildings in this industrial complex, and still trying to use their sensor-interfering devices to hide.
"Commander," Quirk started, as he stood against--and towered over--the woman who was their leader. "Do we go after them? It could be dangerous in enclosed spaces."
"To be honest with you, Wayne," Abuna started. "I'm at a loss at what to do. We're not hostile. We're not here to steal from or attack these aliens. We want to make contact, and learn more."
"On the other hand, they might not understand our objectives, and could become hostile towards us."
"Do you have a suggestion?"
"Our aim is to draw them out. One way to do that could be to approach their ship." Quirk took out his tricorder and scanned the rickety-looking vessel for several different readings. "It's not shielded, and I don't detect any obvious booby traps or other dangers. It appears to be scanning us, however, and possibly relaying the information to the aliens."
"Okay, here's what we'll do. Torres and I will approach the vessel. We'll act like we're looking at it, and not attempting to approach it to board it. However, I want Quirk and Asselstine to remain back here, and cover us, and monitor the approach of the aliens. You're our protection."
Quirk thought about it for a few seconds, and though he felt uncomfortable with the plan, he could not come up with an alternative. His plans were equally as risky as Abuna's ideas, although in his plan to approach the aliens at their location put the risk on his shoulders, and not on those of the non-military officers. He had always worried about people like Abuna, who had not gone through the war, and were Starfleet officers with a different outlook on life and a different purpose in the service. More than once, he was worried that people like Abuna would get themselves killed, and take along some others as well. His purpose was to prevent it from happening. "It's not the best plan," he finally said.
"Agreed," replied the first officer, "but it's the best one we have right now."
"Very well. Lets proceed."
Quirk and Asselstine took up covering positions, where they could see the alien craft clearly while keeping the most likely approaches of the aliens within the sights of their weapons. He gestured to the first officer that he and his partner were in position. Then he watched as Abuna strolled out into the open, with Torres beside her. He had this fear that the aliens would spring to the attack at this moment, but even he had to admit that they were not in the position to open fire immediately. They would have to travel some distance before they could get into position, and that would give Quirk a lot of advance warning.
The two security officers put on their headsets, which allowed them to communicate without handling their tricorders. The devices also scrambled the transmissions as they were sent. "Dmitri, you there?" Quirk started.
"Yes, sir," Asselstine replied.
"Keep an eye on that ship, especially if there are any energy readings that could be weapons fire."
"Detecting nothing," the other security officer replied.
The exchange was heard by Abuna and Torres, who had also turned on their headsets. They had the translating device also on the system, for the time when the contact would come. "We've been scanning too," she continued. "This looks to be a small cargo vessel, underpowered for its size. It doesn't have warp capability, despite what we thought from orbit, nor does it look like it can dock to something with warp capability."
"So it came from one of the two populated planets?"
"That seems likely."
The two officers walked around the ship, scanning it and examining it visually. Abuna, who had downloaded samples of all known Vulcan writing systems into her tricorder, was looking for any labelling or anything else that might be considered writing, to see if there was any connection with Vulcan. However, they could see no writing. Abuna, despite Quirk's objections, finally turned and walked up the ramp to the closed hatch. Beside the hatch were some controls, but they were unlabelled and required some kind of device--almost an alien version of a key--to operate. Up close, Abuna could see how much wear the ship had. The controls were all scratched and chipped from heavy use, and most of the materials had suffered from a great deal of corrosion, and attempts to repair the corrosion.
"I take it that knocking on the door won't get us in," Torres remarked.
"Mostly because there's nobody inside," Abuna remarked. "I wonder though... how these aliens can leave their ships unprotected like this. Anybody could just come along, and--"
Quirk cut into the conversation, saying, "Commander, they're moving now, all four of them, approaching the exits."
And now came the most daring part of the plan. Abuna knew that her aim was to make contact with these people, and hope that they were not violent or too lawless. Getting involved in a firefight was the last thing that she wanted, since the repercussions of that could go on for many years, or even decades. She had to come up with a universal gesture that showed that she was unarmed, and not a threat to them. "Understood," she finally said. She stepped down the ramp and walked out into the open, making herself an extremely vulnerable target.
"Commander!" Quirk all but shouted over the commlink. "You'd better get under cover."
"Nobody said they're going to come out shooting," the first officer remarked.
"But if they do?"
"I'm relying on you two to keep a sharp eye on the aliens and to make sure that if they look like they're going to shoot, then shoot first."
"This could be a very foolish mistake," Quirk said.
"Don't I know that. No matter what we do, we could be making a very foolish mistake, and we won't know until it's too late. I'm taking this chance."
Abuna stood out in the middle of the open area, looking like she was unconcerned for her health and safety and was simply waiting for the arrival of friends. Torres slowly walked up beside her, unsure if she was being brave or foolish. However, he could pick up subtle signs that the first officer was tense and a little worried. The heartbeat was elevated, and the breathing a little fast and shallow. The tension and the fear was certainly there. More than once, Abuna glanced towards the laneway, where Asselstine and Quirk were waiting to cover any mistakes.
"One of the aliens is emerging now," Quirk said over the headset commlink. "To your left, by the pile of debris, fifteen metres away." In front of them was a mound of wreckage, mostly twisted metal and what might have been plastic or other composite materials. A lot of it was burned and smashed, and it had been scavenged through. Shipping crates and other storage devices had been pried open, and the debris thrown about. The debris protected one of the entrances to the building, and it was through this that the first alien stepped into view. The being was humanoid, and clearly Vulcan-like as well. The build was much the same, as was the slight greenish tint to the skin. The hair was straight and dark, although worn long and rough on these aliens. The hair did not completely cover the ears, the upper tips of which ended in a distinctive point. The clothing was on the rough side as well, consisting of boots with baggy pants over that, and for jackets, long, heavy jackets in dark colours.
"Vulcans," Torres remarked. "Strongly Vulcan in appearance."
"Much closer to Vulcans than any race we encountered being close to us. But they're not Vulcans. There must be some genetic drift if they left Vulcan such a long time ago that the Vulcans have no record of this."
"If you believe that," the doctor said.
The alien stepped into the open. He had what looked like a hand weapon, but was not aiming it. He must have been aware of Asselstine and Quirk taking up cover to protect the two Atlas crewmembers out in the open. He glanced twice in the direction of the hidden two, but looked back at Abuna and Torres. He spoke, in a loud voice, "An dan e?"
The translation device picked up the words, but could not find a translation match in the Vulcan database, or in any known database. "Nothing," Abuna said.
"Must be the local Rigellian dialect," Torres added.
"Maybe the Rigellian has a translation device that can handle the Preserver dialect."
"Rigellian?"
"We can't call him a Vulcan or sort-of Vulcan. Call him Rigellian instead."
The alien moved closer, and spoke again, "An dan e? An zolard pa nzan."
"If only we could understand his speech." Abuna decided that if the Rigellian could speak, so could she. She stepped forward again, and said, "We're humans, from a planet called Earth. We're here to make contact. We're explorers."
"An devrubnan ketsan. An letse or brekhnan."
"What is he saying?" Torres asked.
"Why does every sentence they say start with an?"
"They seem to start with an too. A strange language."
"Anyway," Abuna faced the alien, and said, "Do you understand the Preserver language? Can you translate through that?" As if to show what she meant, she got close enough to the Rigellian that she could show him the screen and its display of Preserver graphics. He seemed to recognize those symbols, which made Abuna much more optimistic that they could perhaps learn to communicate. The Rigellian pulled out his communications device, and contacted the others in his group. Of course, Abuna had no idea what he was saying, but was using the tricorder to record his speech, perhaps for future study and interpretation.
Through the headset, she heard Quirk say, "Commander, the others are coming out."
"If they approach unarmed, or in a non-threatening manner, you and Asseltstine will come out too. This just might work."
"Against all odds."
"True."
Moments later, four Rigellians and four humans stood in a ruined, paved area on the ruined world of Rigel IV. Quirk and Asselstine kept their hands on their rifles, but held them down, while the Rigellians holstered their weapons. Clearly, this group was afraid of something, but that something was not the strange aliens they had never encountered before. Maybe just coming to this plague planet might have convinced the Rigellians that these newcomers meant no immediate harm.
For a few minutes, the two groups of aliens faced each other awkwardly. The Rigellians communicated in their language, while Abuna simply stood around and wondered if first contact situations were supposed to go like this. It was as if either group was reluctant to make the first move, although Abuna realized that the Rigellians had to move first. Eventually, they must have agreed. One of the four, the only one of whom was a woman, moved away from the group and approached the Rigellian vessel. She climbed the ramp and tapped in some kind of code onto the panel with a key-like device. That caused the hatch to retract and allow the woman to enter, before they closed again.
"Now what's going on?" Torres asked.
"I'm hoping she's getting something that would allow us to communicate," Abuna replied.
"And what are we supposed to talk about?"
"First contact stuff."
"What's that?"
Abuna realized that if she had learned in her training what she was supposed to say to a newly encountered race, she had forgotten it. All she could think about were stereotype lines like "we come in peace; take me to your leader." Maybe she could ask safe questions on like where they came from.
"Somehow," Quirk added, "this is not quite how I imagined first contact would occur."
"Neither did I."
Within a minute, the hatch to the Rigellian craft opened again, and the woman returned. She was carrying a bulky-looking piece of equipment which resembled an oversized tricorder. She and the three male accomplices looked over the device and discussed among themselves, presumably, how to operate it. To Abuna, that suggested that the device was not in common use. Finally, the woman approached Abuna, and said something in her language. On the screen on the device, whatever she said was translated into the Preserver language.
"Yes," Abuna remarked, "we're in business now." She used the tricorder to visually record the image on the alien device, and set the programming to isolate the Preserver characters and then translate them. The message appeared on the screen. "Who are you?"
It was a simple question, so the first officer provided the simple answer, "We're from a planet called Earth. It is a long way away." Her words were translated into the Preserver language, which the Rigellians were then able to handle and get a translation into their own language.
That prompted the Rigellian woman to form another question, which Abuna's tricorder soon translated. "Your kind has not been observed here before. Have you travelled a long way?"
"Some seven hundred and seventy light years," Abuna answered, and watched as her message was translated and interpreted by the aliens. This was a decidedly slow way to talk, but at least they were making progress.
The Rigellian got that answer, discussed it with her comrades, and formed her next question, "Are you working for the hunters?" Right away, Abuna had no idea who the "hunters" were, but assumed that they were an aggressive species that might have existed in the vicinity. "You have come a long way. Do your people control a large volume of space?"
"No, we're not working for the hunters," Abuna replied. "We don't control a large volume of space. We're members of the United Federation of Planets, a grouping of five like-thinking races."
After a surprisingly long time discussing the situation among themselves, something that Abuna and her group did not have to do, the Rigellian woman spoke and had the device she was holding display her words in the Preserver language. Abuna soon got the translation. "Why have you travelled this long distance, to this specific star?"
"We've come in search of dilithium."
"There is no dilithium on this planet," the Rigellian replied.
"What about in the system?"
"The twelfth planet in the system contains dilithium, but the Hunters control that planet, and they do not let others approach it."
Abuna read those remarks on the tricorder screen, and felt a little disheartened. They had travelled over seven hundred light years and had spent already a year of their lives coming to Rigel in the hope that the system might be unoccupied and might yield dilithium. Only the latter probability was true now, if what the Rigellians said was correct, but the system was occupied and the other race was called ‘Hunters,' that was not a good thing in her mind. "So it is not possible to buy or somehow barter for the dilithium?"
"It is possible," came the response, via the Rigellian device and the tricorder. "But the price might be too high."
"What is the price?"
"The Hunters want to rule. They want tribute. They want slaves. They do not care about other races, and so they would not agree to sell dilithium unless you want to become a conquered people."
"I see."
"But us Rigellians are not like that. We tolerate the Hunters in this system because they are stronger than we are, and they won the battles that mattered in our history. We attempt to live our lives the best we could... but it is not easy. To prove our generosity of spirit, we invite you to our planet. You may approach in peace."
"Yours is the fifth planet?" Abuna asked. She knew that the fifth and the eighth planets were the most heavily populated, with the "Hunters" being the occupants of the other planet.
"Yes." The Rigellian woman opened a compartment on the device, and removed a small wand-like object. The Preserver text on the device explained what it was. "This is a code transmitter. Transmit the signal it emits on the frequency shown, and you can approach the planet. We are taking a great deal of faith in your that you are not allied with the Hunters, and we hope that our faith is not in vain."
"I see," Abuna remarked. She had the feeling that the Rigellians knew that she and her crew and ship were new in this section of space, but that did not automatically imply that they were not allied with or known to the "Hunters." Maybe experience has shown the Rigellians that newcomers to this region of space might not be familiar with either species. "Your trust is not misplaced. We have not deceived you or lied to you in any way."
"That is good. You are then honourable people. Sometimes, I think that there are too few honourable people in the galaxy."
Abuna tried not to laugh. She was pretty sure that these four Rigellians were on this planet to scavenge what they could, to steal from the dead, if that was possible. "I will take this information back to my captain."
"That is good."
About a half hour later, the shuttle was back on the Atlas, and the crew had gone through the process to make sure that they had not picked up anything. Since this planet apparently was occupied by the same race that met its demise on the other dead world they investigated, Captain Hall was not too worried that the officers could pick up anything, but he wanted to make sure. Afterall, this world had been abandoned for a long time, while the other two worlds remained somewhat crowded.
Hall was returning to the bridge with Abuna, after the two had been in an engineering lab, where Gerthe had examined the wand that the Rigellians had given him. It was as they had speculated, a sound-generating device where the frequency patterns were hard-wired into the circuitry. It seemed unlikely that the Rigellians would actually use such devices for security purposes, but Gerthe suspected that it might be used to identify particular ships. The Rigellians could have transmitted a message home indicating that the ship bearing this particular rod was a friendly ship. "So that's the situation," Abuna explained. "One dead world, the same people and likely the same demise as on that other planet, and two different races. Neither evolved here."
"Clearly," Hall agreed, as the two got onto a turbolift. Hall tapped the code for the bridge, and then stood at ease as the lift car powered up. "Rigel will exist as a main sequence star for twenty million years. That's not enough time for sentient life to evolve, not even enough time for planets to fully form."
"But the terraforming?"
"On a scale beyond our comprehension. Maybe the original inhabitants were so stretched by their efforts that they did not last too long."
"Or else," Abuna said, "one of the two races could be the original inhabitants. We have the Rigellians, who look like they're related to the Vulcans, although as we have heard, the Vulcans don't talk about groups leaving their society. Then there is this other group, the Hunters. What a terrible name."
"Call them Orions then,"
"Orions?"
"Sure," Hall started. "We've come to a star with an established name on Earth, and encountered two groups. The first ones got labelled ‘Rigellians,' so for the other group, will go to the formal name of the star, ‘Beta Orionis,' and from that get Orions."
"Well, it sounds better than Hunters, I guess."
"And yet it fits. ‘Orion' was said to be the hunter."
"Isn't it interesting how the ancient Greeks manage to anticipate that correlation?"
"Yeah, I've noticed."
The lift stopped at the bridge, and the two got out. Hall glanced around. After a break, the first-shift crews were back at their positions, as the Atlas was about to set out on the relatively short run to the fifth planet. Right now, both were rather close in their orbits, and only about twenty-three million kilometres separated them. "Status?" Hall asked, as he took his place in the centre of the bridge.
Yuniki replied, "All systems are normal. We've continued to monitor activity around the fifth and eighth planets. The eighth planet has more activity, but the ships are moving only within the system, and they're giving us and this planet a wide berth. They are also avoiding the Rigellian planet."
"Very well. We've been extended an invitation to visit the planet of Rigel V, the possible home world for the Rigellians. Based on what we have heard so far, our mission to find dilithium has not been a big success, so perhaps we can make first contact with another race, and even gain an ally out here."
"We know so little," Abuna cautioned. "Our entire knowledge of the Rigellians, and these so-called Orions, is based on the words of four Rigellians who might have been nothing more than scrap collectors."
"Well then, lets learn more..."
Part 1,Part 2,Part 3,Part 4,Part 5,Part 6,Part 7,Part 8,Part 9,Part 10,Part 11,Part 12,Part 13,Part 14
"Flag At the Edge of Space" page, Athena Home Page, Other Stories Home Page.
