Invaders

by Vaughn Heppner

  “The white ship has something to do with the Polarions, doesn’t it?” I asked.

  “Not in a linear fashion,” Rax said.

  “A-ha,” I said. “So you do know about the crystal ornament.”

  Rax did not respond.

  “Is the device from Rax Prime?” I asked.

  “Logan,” the crystal said in a low voice. “We of Rax Prime do not like to air obscene history. It is unseemly and rather embarrassing. If you could desist from your slanderous accusations for a moment…”

  I waited.

  “I cannot say with one hundred percent accuracy that I know about the crystal ornament Debby described,” Rax said.

  “But you have an idea, don’t you?”

  “It is possible.”

  “That’s good enough for me,” I said. “What is it?”

  “This is a painful topic. I wish you would not pursue it.”

  “Look, Rax, the Min Ve is dropping hell-burners on Earth, and the President is trigger-happy against the North Koreans and Chinese. Americans are the last people on the planet who will stand for others dropping nukes on them. They’re going to demand retribution, which means the Earth is sitting on a powder keg. Okay. You don’t like airing dirty laundry. I get that. Who does? But I have to know the scoop. I’m the military man between us.”

  “That is incorrect. I am the strategist and tactician.”

  “Wrong,” I said. “I’m the man with the gun and the one who flies the Guard-ship. In the end, I have to approve all plans or they don’t get done. Now, I know you have data on the white ship and its crystal ornament. I need that data if I’m going to make a righteous combat decision.”

  “It appears I must defer to your will,” Rax said. “I find that painful, indeed. You are an aboriginal, and I am the certified Guard Unit Advisor. I advise you to forgo your unusual—”

  “You’re starting to piss me off,” I said, interrupting.

  “While I lack bodily functions, I, too, feel a surge of dislike within my matrix regarding you. If you continue this line with me—”

  “Are you going to tell me or not?” I asked. “No more beating around the bush. I want you to talk or to tell me you’re not talking.”

  “I will talk, but with extreme reluctance.”

  “Noted,” I said.

  “I will tell you but only because I have come to believe you will stubbornly refuse to continue assisting me otherwise.”

  I folded my arms across my chest, waiting.

  “In ancient times,” Rax said, “the Polarions fashioned incredible weaponry and tools. That is the myth. Certainly, no one in Galactic Civilization knows how to put a place out of phase as apparently happened to us. I suspect the Min Ve would dearly like to get his hands on such mythical technology. The Galactic Guard could use that, as well.”

  “Makes sense,” I said. “But what does that have to do with the crystal device on the ship?”

  Rax hesitated for just a second before beginning.

  “Long ago, the legend goes, a Polarion wished to augment his already considerable powers. They all vied with each other in creating incredible devices. One of them came to Rax Prime. He discovered interesting properties to the crystals growing in the shallow seas of the middle continent. The Polarion experimented with the crystals…

  “The Polarion became enamored with the crystals. He built a cyclopean laboratory and giant stone machines. There, he labored for many centuries, slowly bringing the crystals to a form of sentience. Some have claimed it was a blasphemous act. Yet how can that be, for I would not have been formed otherwise.”

  “There you go,” I said.

  “Others suggest that the Polarion went mad with his idea,” Rax said, as if he hadn’t heard my comment. “His crowning achievement was a vast dome of unique crystal, combining many like me into a harmonious matrix. It was a labor of love across many years, and it involved a masterful use of symmetry to augment the giant crystal’s intelligence and power.

  “The dome wasn’t strictly alive yet, and it wasn’t meant to act alone. Instead, while wearing a crystal circuit, the Polarion would link himself to the dome. It would act like an exoskeleton, as it were, but instead of augmenting the Polarion’s muscles, it would augment his intelligence and power.”

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “The legend asserts that there was a time of brilliance. The Polarion took his crystal creation with him, doing what Polarions did in the early times of the universe. I am only privy to vague data as to what those activities entailed.

  “Alas,” Rax said, “there is a record of an accident. I do not know the nature of the accident, but it weakened the Polarion. It strengthened the crystal dome, the ornament. More years passed, and the legend speaks of the crystal gaining dominance over the Polarion. In the end, the master became the slave, and the crystal dome became overbearing in its desire for power.

  “Other Polarions joined against the creature that had once been the greatest of them. The creative Polarion was a puppet to what the others now referred to as the Starcore.”

  Rax grew quiet.

  “It’s not made from a star, though,” I said. “It’s a giant crystal dome, right?”

  “Not just a crystal dome, but a special ornament with perfect symmetry and function. It grew in strength and ambition, but it also overreached.

  “There was a long war between the Polarions and the Starcore. I have heard it said that the puppet died. In its creator’s place, the Starcore took other living creatures, uniting with them to give it full power. It had to have this union with a biological entity in order to function at full efficiency.”

  “That’s different from you, right?” I asked.

  “I, and others like me, are seared into our armored sheathing,” Rax said. “One of the reasons for this is so we can never augment ourselves. We are crystals, and crystals can grow sometimes. I cannot grow. Thus, I am at the strength that I am. This limitation helps me to remain humble, which gives me proportion.

  “One of your great Earth thinkers had an adage about this. ‘Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.’”

  I tapped my chin with a forefinger. “Does this Starcore have anything to do with Neanderthals and apish hominids?”

  “I believe so,” Rax said. “According to the ancient legend, the Starcore fashioned an empire of underlings, using them as slaves. What you call Neanderthals and hominids were merely its ship slaves, creatures to fly and fight as the Starcore expanded its realm.”

  “Why did we see Polarions, Neanderthals and prehistoric hominids in stasis tubes in Greenland?” I asked.

  “I do not know the precise reason,” Rax said. “But now realizing that you might have stumbled onto the Starcore, I would hazard a guess. The Starcore’s servants built the Greenland complex. It must have put those servants into stasis for some long-lost reason. Likely, the Earth was its last outpost in an ancient empire. It may well be that those in the stasis tubes were its last servants of that distant era.”

  I sat down because I was starting to see implications here that I did not like.

  “Are you saying the Starcore purposely hid itself in an out-of-phase location?” I asked.

  “That could be a possibility,” Rax said. “Or maybe the crystal’s last slave killed himself while they were out of phase so the Starcore could never again run amok in the universe.”

  “Why would the nuclear explosions in 1951 have woken the crystal?” I asked.

  “That seems simple enough to theorize,” Rax said. “The nuclear explosions penetrated into the out-of-phase place. It was enough to begin something.”

  My eyes widened as I thought about a grim possibility. “Do you think the Starcore is using Debby as its personal slave in order to give it its unholy life?”

  “The possibility exists,” Rax said.

  I began to pace again.

  “I’m sure you’ve heard the old question about God,” I said. “Can He make a rock heavie
r than He can lift?”

  “I have not heard about that dilemma,” Rax said. “It is an interesting query, though.”

  “Not really,” I said. “The question comes from the belief that God can do anything. But if that’s true, can He make a situation He can’t handle. God is supposed to be all-powerful, right? But if He’s perfectly knowledgeable, by definition He wouldn’t make a situation He couldn’t handle. Because if He couldn’t handle a situation, He would no longer be the all-powerful God.”

  “Given that there is such a being,” Rax said.

  “Sure,” I said. “That’s not my point. God wouldn’t be God if He could make something He couldn’t handle. That shows me these Polarions were never gods.”

  “I simply likened them to Earth gods before to help you understand them.”

  “No,” I said. “You told me certain Galactic races worship them.”

  “Yes, I suppose I did.”

  “Well, this Starcore shows me the Polarions were never gods, as at least one of them made a situation that burst out of his control.”

  “What is your point?” Rax asked.

  “It’s an observation,” I said. “If the Polarions weren’t gods, they made an imperfect weapon.”

  “Has my tale unhinged your thinking process?” Rax asked. “I would almost say that you are blathering about nothing at this point.”

  I hardly heard him. “I’m beginning to wonder if some of the Greenland personnel escaped onto the Earth before the rest entered the stasis tubes. Maybe those individuals were the first people on Earth. Wouldn’t that be crazy?”

  “It is a remote possibility, I suppose,” Rax said. “But it is certainly not germane to our problem at hand.”

  “Everything in germane,” I said, “as it might help us figure out how to defeat the Starcore.”

  “The Min Ve could defeat the crystal if he could rain orbital rods against the white ship.”

  “Problem solved,” I said.

  “But I doubt the Min Ve would willingly do such a thing,” Rax said. “Likely, he will desire the Starcore above all else. The promise of great power often drives people to reckless endeavors. If the Min Ve takes the Starcore, the ancient crystal will surely be free again. The crystal entity outsmarted the greatest of the Polarions. It will have no problem outthinking the Min Ve and its crew.”

  I thought about that. “Maybe that’s the answer. Let’s help the Min Ve take the Starcore. Once the Min Ve leaves with his prize, Earth is rid of both of them.”

  “That is an extremely provincial outlook,” Rax said in a scolding tone. “Eventually, the threat of the Starcore could come back to haunt Earth. It would likely use the Earth as a steppingstone for further conquests. Instead of being rid of the problem, it could make a bigger one the two of us could never hope to stop.”

  I shook my head. I couldn’t believe I’d sent Debby back into the Starcore’s hands. I—

  “What makes the Starcore so powerful?” I asked. “I mean, if it’s simply power hungry…”

  “The Polarion fashioned a unique weapon. The Starcore has unique powers.”

  “That’s what I’m getting at,” I said. “What kind of powers?”

  “I believe it is able to tap into the cosmic energy of the universe.”

  “What is that?” I asked.

  “The basic form of energy binding the universe together,” Rax said.

  “You lost me with that one.”

  “I suspect the crystal’s ability to use cosmic energy was severed sometime in the past. Otherwise, it would never have needed to hide from its enemies. Perhaps that is the process Debby has been engaged in all these years.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Some of the ornament’s crystals cracked. Debby has been replacing them since 1966 would be my guess. Yet no Earth crystal could take the place of a Rax Prime crystal. Thus, the Starcore must lack its full potential. The great danger then is that its vessel regains a space drive and goes to Rax Prime to replenish itself.”

  I stood there stunned, staring at the little crystal.

  “What is wrong?” Rax asked.

  “The Min Ve thinks he came to Earth to find some legendarily powerful weapon. Instead, the Starcore must believe this is the chance of a millennium to finally start anew in the universe, to leave Earth and reenter space.”

  “Yes,” Rax said. “That is true.”

  I kept staring at the metal-encased crystal. I wondered if he was in secret league with the Starcore. After a time, I realized that was the wrong fear. Maybe Debby had played me for a fool. Maybe she had stayed young since 1966 because she was the Starcore’s tool. I didn’t want to believe that—and I didn’t know it was true. But given everything Rax had told me, it made the most sense.

  I sat down at the controls. This was going to take some deep thinking. Because whatever we did next, it would be best for humanity if we made the wisest move possible.

  -37-

  I sat hunched over the spy-drone screen Rax used to show me what was going on at the Far Butte site. All I saw was windblown sand and yellow grasses swaying on the slopes.

  “Nothing,” I said. “I think the Starcore is still out of phase.”

  “Notice the tracks down there at the bottom of the hill.”

  I tapped the screen, zooming in, soon seeing tank tracks. I followed them until they abruptly disappeared.

  “What’s causing the tracks to appear and disappear?” I asked.

  “The out-of-phase mechanism appears to be malfunctioning,” Rax said. “I suspect the crippled Starcore doesn’t know everything the completed crystal of the past knew. According to my calculations, its symmetry has more than a mere esthetic purpose.”

  “What’s that mean in plain English?” I asked.

  “The crystal or ornament’s symmetry gives it its power and its intellect. It is a crystalline intelligence, after all. Our symmetry is critical.”

  “Why?”

  “That is the wrong question for now,” Rax said. “How that affects our strategy is more important.”

  “I guess so,” I said. “Your point is that it’s not thinking straight.”

  “Do you mean that as a pun?”

  “What? No. It’s a saying. The thing has been trying to recreate itself, hasn’t it?”

  “I do not follow your reasoning.”

  “I once saw a bronze statue in Napa, California, during a car show there in August.”

  “What bearing could that possibly have on our dilemma?”

  “That statue reminded me of Michelangelo’s David. It had that look, is what I’m saying. Anyway, the statue of a man had a mallet and chisel, and was in the process of carving himself out of stone. The statue was called, ‘The Self-Made Man.’”

  “Yes, I see,” Rax said.

  “That’s what the Starcore has been trying to do. Yet, how does one make oneself? It’s arrogance.”

  “True, as we all have a creator.”

  “Right,” I said. “The Starcore must have blind spots it doesn’t even realize anymore.”

  “That may not make a difference,” Rax said. “The crystal was brilliant in ages past, almost as powerful as the rest of the Polarions combined. Even crippled, it will still make a formidable opponent.”

  “Yet, if it was using Debby,” I said, “it made a mistake. If it wanted to capture me, I still managed to escape.”

  “Unless it wanted you to escape for reasons we cannot understand.”

  “We’re screwed if it’s that smart.” I sat back and threw up my hands. “This is getting us nowhere. Why not move the spy drone and see what’s happening at Station 5?”

  “That will be a matter of moments,” Rax said. “I have already taken the drone higher than before. I will begin a sensor sweep—Logan, do you see that?”

  I bent toward the screen. It was difficult to credit my eyesight.

  Five hover-pads like those I’d seen in Greenland zoomed across the desert sand, kicking up dust as they flew
inches above the ground. That wasn’t the incredible part. Small hominids were riding the hover-pads. The proto-humans were furry like dogs, their fur ruffling due to the speed. Each of the apelike humanoids clutched a pulse-rifle like the one I’d used in Greenland.

  “It would appear I miscalculated concerning the radioactive levels at the Greenland site,” Rax said. “Some of the hominids have clearly been revived and armed themselves with ancient weaponry. It appears the Starcore is attempting to storm Station 5.”

  “Why would it do that?” I asked.

  “That is an excellent question. Possibly, the Min Ve is about to use the station against the Starcore. The crystalline intelligence must be trying to thwart that.”

  I could just imagine the news flash if someone from CNN saw the apish hominids in action. Could the Starcore have teleported them from Greenland to Nevada, or had there been hominids and hover-pads stashed aboard the ancient white ship and finally been taken out of storage?

  As we watched, orbital rods rained down upon the hover-pads. Each rod possessed tremendous kinetic energy like a meteor. Space meteors could wreak horrible damage if they hit. Neither rods nor meteors needed any extra explosive force to destroy things. The force of the strikes was enough. The nearby rod-impacts made the crafts wobble wildly. Then a rod hit a hover-pad and obliterated it and its occupants. The shockwave upset the rest of the hovers, toppling the hominids onto the desert sand. The next few seconds ended any sign of them or their advanced weaponry, as more rods annihilated everything with repeated kinetic blasts. Finally, perhaps to hide any evidence, a new kind of rod struck the ground. A gigantic fireball devoured everything, leaving blackened soil and glassy lumps of fused sand.

  “Wow,” I said. “That was weird.”

  “The last rod was composed of dense uranium,” Rax said. “That is what produced the incendiary blast. The white-hot metal vapor ignited upon the rod’s impact. This strike was highly informative.”

  “Because you’re a master strategist you understand every implication?” I asked.

  “I do not rate as highly as that. In comparison to anyone on Earth, I am a masterful strategist. I believe that was the term I used before.”