by Kumar Lomash
“What kind of craft is it and how many defensive crafts are escorting it Sir?”, Joti asked.
“It’s a LSC and it is flying alone.”, Garry disclosed hesitantly.
“An LSC! So a couple of people are flying to Peele, alone.” Joti confirmed with an interrogative tone. “I am sure you know what you are doing sir but an LSC has no defensive capabilities and we won’t be able to defend it sitting this far from Peele.”, Joti threw a disclaimer.
“Well, I am telling you what has been told to me. I want you to keep an eye on it till it gets back.”, Garry was clear in his orders.
Joti accepted the orders and left the room.
Kevin’s aircraft was still far away from Nole. Inside, an announcement informed that they will be on Nole in another 7 hours. It was also informed that gravity on Nole was stronger than on the spaceship. Everyone was instructed not to eat or drink any substance naturally occurring on Nole just yet. After an investigation which is underway, they would be told what is safe there. It was also mentioned that Nole had a lot of rivers, waterfalls and lakes especially around the landing site. However, It was not yet known if the water was safe for drinking or bathing. The announcement repeated every 40-45 minutes and went through the same list of trivias and instructions for the passengers. Kevin wasn’t paying attention to it anymore. He had never been keen on following instructions but that was only a part of the reason for his negligence towards the announcements. He was going through what Holum said to him earlier. He repeated the scene in his mind over and over again to understand what is going to happen on Nole but couldn’t. He didn’t have all the parts of the puzzle yet and he spent the next few hours going over what he knew.
The spacecraft started experiencing some deceleration. Kevin could feel it. He had always been able to feel the slightest of forces on the vehicles that he travelled on. He could close his eyes and feel how the spacecraft accelerated or decelerated. He knew when it was going up, away from a source of gravity or down, towards it. So much sensory information was overwhelming for Kevin. He was afraid of flying when he flew for the first time from his home to the Union, but soon realised that it was nothing but his senses telling him about the forces acting on his body. So, as the spacecraft decelerated slightly, Kevin was the only one to notice it. He knew a deceleration now only means that the spacecraft was entering the atmosphere of Nole. The air, even if thin, around Nole was providing some friction to the spacecraft. To reduce the friction on its surface, the spacecraft decelerated further. Kevin realised it was a good time to look out of the window, they were in Nole’s atmosphere now.
Looking out beyond the wings of the spacecraft he could see the blue planet. “It looks exactly like the Earth”, he thought.
A few hours passed by and Kevin was still looking out of the window. Holum was right, the view was really enjoyable. Kevin could now see a large piece of land, maybe something like a continent sharing its edge with a large ocean. He gathered that the landing site was near the shore. The land was lush green, like the old forests of Earth before humans destroyed it all. Kevin had seen them in books and documentary videos. As the spacecraft drew nearer the landing site, Kevin could see more details on the land. He could see mountains with snow and forests. He could see rivers running from the mountains to the sea. The spacecraft was now decelerating rapidly. It was travelling in a loop over the landing site and climbing down with every round it completed, in a helical path. The captain of the spacecraft broke silence and announced, “Please get back to your seats and prepare for landing.”. The spacecraft decelerated to a hovering velocity few feet above the landing site. Kevin could see that they were landing at a place midway between the mountains and the sea. As the spacecraft was about to land, Kevin saw two more similar spacecraft standing not far away. His spacecraft touched the ground gently. Kevin was not expecting such a smooth landing but he was glad he was finally here.
The armbots travelling on the spacecraft stood towards the rear end. As soon as the spacecraft touched ground, the captain announced “Armbots first, humans to follow.” All armbots left the spacecraft one after the other. They had been standing so quietly in a corner that Kevin had almost forgotten about them. He saw a few of them closely as they passed in front of him and appreciated how simple and elegant they looked. He also realised that these armbots were deadly when confronted and therefore tried to stay out of their way. All but two armbots left the spacecraft. The two stood at the door to oversee the offloading of humans. Soldiers started leaving the craft one by one. Kevin stood up and got in line as well. He saw the armbots casually stand at the door, not even looking at the people as they climbed off the craft. As Kevin neared the exit, one of the armbots jumped in front of him to exit the craft before him. Kevin said, “Hey! come in a line.” The armbot climbed down anyways. Kevin started climbing down, after him the 2nd armbot on the craft jumped the line and followed Kevin. Both the armbots were following Kevin now.
Kevin looked around and took a deep breath. He could feel the rich oxygen in the atmosphere and felt rejuvenated. He started walking around to find Gemley and he soon realised that the two armbots were following him. It was clear to him that Holum was not joking when he said his safety was his concern. He ignored the armbots and started looking around and walking like a tourist. The soldiers who came on the first probe a couple of days back looked tired but happy because they were packing for the spaceship now. Suddenly Kevin felt a friendly push on his shoulders. He turned and saw Golli.
“Hey, Kev! Glad to see you here.”, Gollow said.
“Golli! Tell me, did you find any aliens here.?”, Kevin asked the first thing that came to his mind.
“No man. Very disappointed. I was hoping to see some.”, Gollow replied with half disappointment.
“Why? Did they tell you there would be aliens here?”, Kevin asked casually.
“No, but they said we might find some resistance.”, Gollow lifted his fingers to imply the word resistance in quotes.
“What kind of resistance?”, Kevin asked.
“The kind they don’t mind if you fire at.”, Golli responded casually.
“What do you mean? If there were aliens here, would we have started a war with them?”, Kevin did not like what he was hearing.
“That was the idea, my friend. We are not carrying guns and hundreds of armbots for a peace treaty. But since we did not find anything down here, I guess you can relax.”, Gollow tried to calm down Kevin.
“I don’t know, Golli, something is not right and it all seems to be a high level conspiracy to me. Holum has some secrets which he is not sharing with anyone and I don’t feel good about it.”, Kevin tried telling Gollow what he felt.
“I wouldn’t worry about that Kev. Holum is the wisest man on Earth, well, now Nole”, Gollow giggled and continued, “the Union is the only reason we are safe.”, Gollow’s deep trust in the Union showed clearly.
“I know you trust the Union completely Golli but Holum told me something that sounds like a conspiracy”, Kevin told some more.
“What? To you? Personally?”, Golli was a bit surprised and jealous.
“Yes, he came to me and said that I should wait for him and Ibu here, at a secure location.”, Kevin said.
“Oh, so we have been creating that bunker for you? I thought some minister was on this craft. That’s weird. How come you are so important now, that you need to be in a bunker?”, Gollow was worried now.
“And safety from whom? Do you see any threats here?”, Kevin was curious, he shared Gollow’s astonishment.
“I get what you are saying Kevin. I don’t claim to know what Holum knows but I would place my trust completely in him. Come with me, I believe Gemley is waiting for you after all, it seems.”, Gollow realised that Kevin was the special package that they were expecting in the 2nd probe.
Gollow introduced Gemley to Kevin who was waiting for him. He insisted on staying with Kevin while he is on Nole but both the others insisted that there was nothing to wo
rry about and that Gollow needed a 1 week rest before his next trip to Nole. Before Gollow left them, Kevin asked Gollow to find Joti on the spaceship and tell her what Holum had said. Gollow left for the spacecraft and Gemley led Kevin to a bunker. He told Kevin that the water in the river was concluded to be safe for drinking and bathing but he should not go alone and always be in the protection of the two armbots assigned to him. Kevin tried fishing for some information out of Gemley but he seemed to know no more than what Gollow or anyone else knew. As Gemley left Kevin, he said “it would soon be evening Kevin but it won’t be as dark here. Nole’s moons are very bright and they light up the night sky beautifully. We have no reason to be worried but I would still recommend not going far from your bunker.”
Back on the spaceship, Joti tracked the LSC which was now entering Peele’s orbit. She also looked at the signals coming from Nole to her satisfaction. She tried zooming in on the landing site on Nole in hopes of finding Kevin but could only see two armbots guarding a bunker apart from many parked spacecraft and other armbots doing rounds. She was not planning to sleep in her cabin tonight because of the duties given to her while also trying to wrap her head around the rumours running around, what Garry told her and if there was any connection between the two. Why someone would go to Peele on his own, she wondered when an idea struck. She brought up the primary console and started looking for the presence of known humans on the ship. The system would report if a queried person was on the ship or not. She started off by searching for her name, the system reported her to be present on the ship. Then she searched for Garry and her other colleagues who were all correctly reported. The next set of queries were for ministers of the Union but the system asked for a supervisor password. She knew the password but she also knew that a supervisor access would send a notification to all supervisors, including Garry. She thought of something she would say as an excuse if Garry confronted her and went ahead with keying it in. Finding out that Holum and Foss were the only ministers not present on the ship, she pulled out the travel logs to see if they were scheduled to fly out but to her surprise, she found that there were no such records. As she sifted through more data and continued to find pieces of what now seemed like a grand puzzle, Garry rushed towards the control room after seeing the notification. Unaware of Garry’s rush towards her, Joti kept looking, trying to understand what was happening. She typed Kevin’s id into the system to see what it said about him, maybe just for fun. As she pressed the final keys and waited for the system to respond, Garry entered the room shouting, “What are you doing?”.
Joti jumped up from her seat and turned towards Garry. She was trying to hide what the screen showed by standing in front of it, the results were clearly showing that Kevin was present on the ship. But she had to jump before the results were displayed so she was unaware of the results. Otherwise she would have been shocked to see the system wrongly report Kevin’s presence on the ship. She quickly pressed some buttons behind her back which caused the screen to go blank and back to the login screen. Garry was walking towards her all this time, he came near her and said, “what are you looking for Joti?”
“I am trying to understand who is travelling to Peele, sir.”, Joti responded.
“Now you know, don’t you?”, Garry asked.
“Yes.”, Joti admitted.
“What else did you see?”, Garry asked.
“What do you mean?”, Joti was surprised that Garry was concerned about something else too apart from Holum’s travel.
“Nothing.”, Garry concluded that there was nothing to worry.
He instructed Joti to move away from the console, then he logged in and revoked Joti’s supervisor rights. He told Joti that she won’t be able to see supervisor information for the night and that he would reinstate it in 24 hours. He justified this as her punishment for being too nosy.
Garry rushed out after being assured that Joti would keep working on her tracking task and report to Garry if she suspected something.
As Garry left, Joti wondered why he would lock her out of the system when he knew she had already found out about Holum’s travel. What was he trying to hide?
She went back to her search for Kevin’s presence on the ship. The system showed that this information is available but needs supervisor permission. Joti couldn’t believe this. Kevin was a regular passenger on the ship. The system needed supervisor permission only when asked for a minister’s location. She tried finding information on Garry, herself and her colleagues, all of which were reported correctly, without the supervisor password. She again tried for Kevin’s presence and failed for the same reason. She grew more curious but didn’t have all the pieces of the puzzle yet.
She looked at the other screen which was now showing two ships following the LSC which carried Holum and Foss. Those ships were different from the ships that Humans built. She quickly realised that Peele had some sort of alien civilization. These ships were alien ships escorting Holum’s spacecraft. This was a game changer for Joti. It was the first time she was looking at proof of alien civilization. A flood of questions and concerns poured from her mind. Why have humans flown so far only to find an alien civilization competing for their planet? Why did Holum and Foss keep this information from the rest of the people? Why were they meeting secretly? Joti’s worst fears were coming to life. She had heard a lot of rumours about aliens controlling the Union and the human civilization. All of this did not look far fetched now. She was worried for the human civilization and felt cheated. She kept looking at the screen with tears in her eyes. She didn’t know whom to trust anymore. Holum, whom she trusted unconditionally before, now looked like the ones who was hand in glove with the aliens.
Several hours later, the tracking monitor showed Holum’s flight returning. It was flying alone towards Nole. She stood up and walked over to the captain’s room and found him staring out of the window, again.
“They are on their way back, Sir. Everything looks fine.”, Joti reported in a monotonous voice.
Garry turned and looked at Joti. She looked tired and sad. He realised that she knows now of Holum and his connections with aliens. He said, “Things are not as bad as you think, Joti. Have faith in your leaders.”
“Will that be all, Sir?”, Joti wanted to leave as soon as possible. Maybe the secrecy and the conspiracy were too suffocating for her.
“Thank you, Joti. You are excused.”, Garry turned back again to look out of the window.
As Joti left the Captain’s room, she found Ibu on his way inside.
“Hello, Minister.”
“Good morning, Joti. You look tired?”
“Yes, Sir. Long night it seems.”, Joti tried bringing on a smile for Ibu. She respected him.
“Go and take rest.”, Ibu was being kind.
“Are you going to Nole today, Sir? I saw your travel log for today.”, Joti remembered.
“Yes! my students and I”, Ibu clarified.
Joti wanted to say that one of Ibu’s students was already on Nole but Ibu seemed to be in a hurry.
“See you later, my dear”, Ibu said as he entered Garry’s room.
Joti went back to her room.
Ibu and Garry were chatting and it seemed Ibu was not happy about his flight plans.
“But I thought we were short on fuel, Garry. Why can’t all of us travel together?”, Ibu asked.
“I am just following orders from Holum.”, Garry clarified.
“But the K’s and I are just 10 people. We can easily go in one spacecraft. I don’t need a separate LSC for myself.”, Ibu said for the last time.
“Did you meet Holum yesterday?”, Garry asked.
“Yes, what about that?”, Ibu asked.
“Did he ask you to trust me completely and not question my decisions related to your travel or in general?”, It seemed Garry knew what Ibu and Holum were talking about yesterday.
Ibu thought for a while. Well, yes, he recalled. Holum did ask him to listen to Garry in his absence.
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��Fine, so I am flying separately?”, Ibu asked.
Garry answered, “Yes”.
On the spacecraft, Gambhir and 8 others were sitting together. Gambhir asked one of the K’s he knew, “Who is the new Guy?”
“His name is Ken, that is all I know”, the other guy responded.
“Hey Ken, I am Gambhir.”, Gambhir shouted.
“Hi Gambhir.”, Ken replied in a low voice, he looked shy and weak.
“Are you excited we are going to Nole?”, Gambhir asked.
Ken smiled nervously and said nothing.
The spacecraft started hovering and entered the tunnel towards the exit.
Ibu’s LSC was 2nd in line to enter the tunnel. As his spacecraft left the spaceship, he tried looking outside to find the spacecraft carrying his students but couldn’t. He was unaware that the two spacecraft were going in opposite directions.
On the spaceship Holum reached his office and summoned Garry immediately. Meanwhile, he opened his drawer and took out a pen-drive which had K written on it. He carefully examined the display on the pen-drive which showed the status as “Locked”. Holum kept the pen-drive in his pocket and took out another, similar looking pen-drive from his desk. He wrote “K” on it and pressed the button on the pen drive several times in a pattern. Maybe, he was entering a password in morse code. The status on the pen-drive turned from “Unlocked” to “Locked”. He kept that pen-drive in his other pocket.
As Garry entered the room, Holum asked him to ready his LSC and that he and Boris would be travelling together. Garry’s reaction was minimal, it seemed he already knew what was happening. Suddenly, an officer rushed in and apologised for interrupting Holum and Garry.
