Déjà Vu (First Contact)

by Peter Cawdron

  From behind me, a familiar voice says, “Jess? Is that—you?”

  Cradle

  The fine hairs on my arms rise in alarm, bristling against the suit’s undergarment. I know that voice, but it’s one I haven’t heard in quarter of a million years.

  “Mac?”

  I’m not sure I want an answer.

  Am I dreaming?

  Is this an illusion?

  Not more than twenty feet away, up beside the point where the two domes merge, a shadow moves.

  “Deaf two awe who mons,” is the reply, followed by a chuckle.

  I laugh, pushing off the slick floor and getting to my feet. Moon dust clings to my gloves, but I can’t help myself. I have to touch him. I’ve got to reassure myself of what’s real. Even though I’m wearing a cumbersome spacesuit, I sprint up the ramp. My PLSS bounces awkwardly on my back as I throw my arms around him.

  “Hey,” he says, struggling not to be knocked off his feet.

  I grab the sides of his face with my thick gloved hands and kiss him on the lips. It’s impulsive. Stupid. Human. There’s nothing sexual or suggestive about it. We were never even that close. Back in the day, Mac and I were professional rather than friendly, but he’s a piece of the past brought back to life—my past! If he wasn’t already stunned, he is now. He steps back a little, but I still have my arms draped over his shoulders. I’m not about to let him go anywhere.

  A voice from behind him asks, “What’s happening?”

  “Commander Jansen?” I say, immediately falling back into old habits.

  “Where are we?” Mac asks, looking at the golden domes on either side of the ramp. With the black sky above and the rocky lunar terrain at the bottom of the slope, nothing makes sense. I feel like Alice in Wonderland.

  “Where’s the Intrepid?” Jansen asks.

  Mac asks the more pertinent question. “Why are we on the Moon?”

  I stagger backward, taking in the sight of the two of them, wondering if I’ve gone mad. They’re both dressed in thin one-piece white cotton jumpsuits, although that doesn’t seem to have registered.

  Jansen walks forward, looking intently at me as she asks, “Why are you wearing a museum piece?”

  At first, I assume she’s talking about my antiquated spacesuit, but it’s the Snoopy cap that’s got her attention. In our day, these things were elegant. They were custom-fitted with small speakers and a wireless microphone. My cap has big, bulky speakers clamped over my head like earmuffs. Thick wires lead to a microphone protruding next to my mouth.

  I can’t help myself. I throw one arm over Mac’s shoulder and the other around Jansen’s neck, pulling them close. I bury my head between them.

  “I’m so happy to see you guys,” I say. “You have no idea how good it is to see you again.”

  “Again?” Mac asks. From his perspective, we were together just moments ago.

  Jansen asks, “What the hell is going on?”

  “Oh, boy,” I say, stepping back and looking at each of them with tears in my eyes. “Where do I start? What do you remember?”

  “Shakeout tests in orbit,” Jansen says.

  “An H3 leak,” Mac says.

  Vapor forms on my breath in the cold. Even though they’re both dressed in thin cotton, neither of them seem to notice the temperature.

  “Ah, a lot of time has passed since then.”

  “How much time?” Jansen asks.

  “Weeks?” Mac asks. “Months?”

  “Years,” I say, unsure how to break this to them.

  “Years plural?” Jansen asks, raising an eyebrow in surprise.

  “Oh, yeah,” I say, beginning to laugh. “Definitely plural.”

  Out of habit, I clap my gloved hands together, trying to stay focused, unsure how to continue. There’s nothing to be done but to throw it out there.

  “Roughly two hundred and fifty thousand years.”

  Jansen goes white. Her jaw drops.

  Mac laughs. “You’re kidding, right?”

  I turn, directing his gaze to the harsh sunlight scorching the decimated rocks strewn across the lunar surface. My boot prints are visible in the fine dust leading to the ramp. The contrast is unsettling. Not only is the ramp coated in a layer of gold, it has been machined so it’s slick and smooth. It reflects the light around us like a mirror. Golden domes rise on either side of us.

  The black sky is menacing. It’s the disconnect. Given it’s daytime and we’re outside breathing air, it feels as though the sky should be blue like on Earth, but it’s not. I can see the realization on Mac’s face—everything’s wrong.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, reaching up to the locking rings on my forearms and removing my gloves. I toss them on the ramp. There’s something oddly satisfying about the act of discarding them. They’re solid, real. That they clang on the ramp and slide to one side is strangely reassuring.

  “Wait,” Jansen says. “So we were dead?”

  “Yes.”

  Mac walks forward with his arm outstretched before him, approaching the end of the ramp.

  “I wouldn’t,” I say, seeing his fingers held out at arm’s length.

  “I can feel it,” he says, withdrawing his hand. “It’s like a curtain. When my fingers pass through the membrane, the tips start to swell with the pressure drop.”

  “What is this place?” Jansen asks, having moved on from the shock of being dead. “We’re on the Moon, right? Earth’s Moon.”

  “Yes.”

  “But hundreds of thousands of years later?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve been here for how long?”

  “On the Moon?” I say. “About nine hours. Before that, seven months on Earth.”

  “You were on Earth?” Mac asks, but before I can reply, Jansen asks another probing question.

  “And before that?”

  “In the Proc,” I say.

  “Wait? What?” Mac asks. “We never launched.”

  “Yes, we did,” I say. “I don’t know all the details, but we were attacked and the Intrepid was destroyed.”

  “And we were killed?” Jansen asks.

  “Yes.”

  “All three of us?” Mac asks, circling his hand around between us.

  “Yes.”

  He goes to ask something else. He’s wondering why I was resurrected while he wasn’t, but Jansen cuts him off.

  “And this place?”

  “It’s an alien base,” I say.

  “What happened down there on Earth?”

  “Best I understand it, Homo sapiens went extinct.”

  “Fuck,” Mac says.

  I can’t argue with that sentiment.

  “But you came from Earth?” Jansen asks.

  “Our civilization collapsed—several hundred thousand years ago. It seems we were so dependent on tech we went the way of the dodo, but these guys have resurrected us. Not just the three of us. They’re repopulating Earth. There’s not much down there. Human technology is antiquated. Disease is rampant. They’re barely into the industrialized age. They sent me up here as an ambassador of sorts.”

  “And?” Jansen asks.

  I laugh. “And you two appeared out of nowhere.”

  “Un-fucking-believable,” Mac says, raising his hands and running his fingers through his hair.

  “I don’t understand,” Jansen says. “Why resurrect us here and now?”

  “They saw me coming,” I say. “They watched me land—watched me bound across the surface to get here.”

  “So we’re like a welcoming committee?” Mac asks.

  “I guess.”

  I walk up to the point where the two domes connect and touch at the smooth curves, but there’s no sign of any levers, buttons, or any way of opening either dome.

  “That still doesn’t answer why,” Jansen says. “I mean, why us? Why now? What do they get out of reuniting us as a crew? Why send the two of us out here?”

  Jansen’s right. There has to be a reason this extrate
rrestrial species revived them. Somehow, their brain fragments survived the fire in the workshop on Erebus. Like me, they were relics. That allowed them to be restored, but why? And why now? Why not earlier while I was on Earth?

  I step back, taking a good look at the way the domes merge, and then turn, looking down the ramp to the rocky lunar surface.

  “It’s a security trap,” I say. “We’re caught in a holding pen.”

  “Why do they want to trap you?” Jansen asks, sounding nervous.

  Oh, that’s a loaded question. Are these the aliens of Procyon Alpha? Victory didn’t think so, but with Mac and Jansen here beside me, I’m getting nervous. The link with that star system has gone from coincidental to undeniable.

  My heart races. I tell myself, two hundred and fifty thousand years have passed. A lot can change in quarter of a million years. I hope. I’m expecting the gold domes to slide open and expose a wall of eyes. I want to believe in Victory’s vision for this age, but I’m expecting to be torn apart by tentacles. Again. I have to push beyond my own doubts.

  “They’re looking for intent,” I say. “They want to know why I’m here.”

  Mac asks, “Maybe they see you as a threat?”

  “Maybe,” I reply, nervous as hell. “I think they sent you guys out so they could observe me. They want to see how I react.”

  “And if you’re a threat,” Jansen says, “all they have to do is blow the airlock, right?”

  “Flush us all out onto the regolith,” I say.

  My heart is beating at a million miles an hour.

  “Mac, can you help me doff this thing?”

  By thing, I’m referring to my cumbersome spacesuit. I want to show our hosts I have nothing to hide. I hold onto Mac’s shoulder and switch between leaning on one foot and then the other, releasing the straps on the over-boots. These thick rubberized boots protected my feet from the extreme temperature variations on the lunar surface. I toss them on the ramp, watching as they flop around in low gravity. My suit has a second, built-in pair of boots that resemble white work shoes.

  Mac helps remove the hoses connected to the front of my suit. They swing from the Personal Life Support System, bouncing against my legs. He unclips the PLSS and takes the weight of it as I step away, freeing myself from the straps.

  Jansen pulls on the zip at the back of my suit. I wriggle, ducking my head beneath the collar. I shimmy backward so I can step out of the thick protective layers. The stainless steel collar catches on the back of my Snoopy cap. I can’t quite reach it as my arms are already half out of the sleeves. Mac sees what’s happening and eases me through the open zip at the back of the suit. Once my upper torso is free, the suit trousers collapse to the ramp, allowing me to step out of them.

  “This is like peeling an onion,” Jansen says, seeing me standing there in a water-cooled undergarment. Orange tubes wind back and forth on top of my cotton underwear. They run along my arms and legs, wrapping around my groin. Coils extend the length of my torso and back. On the Intrepid, we wore water-cooled garments, but they were snug. They had lots of loops. If anything, they looked like chainmail. This Apollo-era garment appears fragile. It’s as though one loose thread could cause the whole thing to unravel.

  “Yeah, old school, huh?”

  I unplug the rubber cooling pipes from the outer layer of the suit and it finally crumples to the ramp in front of me.

  “You look so sexy,” Mac says, laughing at me. Sarcastic bastard. I’d punch him playfully on the arm, but he’s just out of reach.

  I unzip the water-cooled garment and peel it from my sweaty body. I’m left standing on the ramp in a damp cotton shirt and shorts. I’m also wearing a slightly used flight diaper. It’s a little baggy and definitely soggy. I’m really hoping the aliens don’t want me to pull that off as well. Finally, the Snoopy cap goes, leaving my hair matted and wet with sweat. I slick back my hair, using my fingers as a comb.

  “Now what?” Mac asks.

  I hold my hands out wide, showing that there’s nothing left, saying, “We just want to talk. That’s all. I came all this way just to be able to talk to you.”

  The point at which the domes touch dissolves, opening and allowing us to venture inside. Mac and Jansen follow behind me, being wary of this world even though it’s where they originated. Technically, so did I, but like them, I have no recollection of my rebirth.

  The glare of the Sun makes it difficult to see inside. Shadows move. My heart is about to burst through my ribcage. I’m waiting for those goddamn tentacles once again. I’m looking for a sea of eyes in the darkness. This is it. This is the last roll of the dice. This is all I’ve got. Against my better instincts, I step forward.

  From within the dome, a voice speaks.

  “Jessica Elizabeth Rowe. Astrobiologist. Intrepid.”

  “Yes.”

  “Eliza Jansen. Commander. Intrepid. Jonathan James MacArthur. Specialist. Intrepid.”

  In unison, they say, “Yes.”

  My eyes struggle to adjust to the darkness. We’re breathing an oxygen-rich atmosphere. The temperature is barely above freezing. These creatures understand Old Tongue.

  “What does the Procyon Alpha launch of twenty-one thirty-two want with us?”

  I edge forward, leaving the bright sunlit lunar surface behind, feeling my way in the dark. There are several figures in the soft light. They’re tall and thin, reaching up to ten feet in height. These aren’t the aliens of Procyon Alpha, that much is clear from their appearance and their description of us as a crew. They’re humanoid. They have distinct heads, shoulders, arms, and legs, only they appear stretched. They’re thin and elongated.

  “We need your help,” I say. “Not the three of us. The people of Earth. The people you put down there. People like me.”

  The voice I’m hearing has a slight, metallic sound as though it’s passing through a speaker. It seems to come from the ceiling rather than any one of the creatures standing before me.

  “We have restored the race of Homo sapiens. Is that not enough?”

  “How do you know our name?” I ask. “How is it you’re speaking our language?”

  I feel dizzy. At first, I assume it’s the thin atmosphere, but it’s not. They’re inside my head. It’s not telepathy. They’re not putting thoughts in so much as impressions. In the same way someone’s tone of voice or their hand gestures augment their words, these creatures are imprinting ideas on my mind. The result is, I feel manic. I’m hyper-aware. It’s as though all my senses are amped.

  I reach out, touching what feels like a bench, only rather than being at waist height, it’s in line with my shoulders. “Who are you? Where are you from?”

  “We all come from the same cradle,” is the cryptic reply.

  I’m closer now. I can see their features. Smooth, pale skin. Long straight hair. Large dark eyes. Small nose. Petite mouth. They’re wearing clothing similar to Mac and Jansen.

  “You’re human,” I say. I can feel them within the confines of my mind. I’m getting the biggest goddamn caffeine hit of my life without a single drop of coffee touching my lips.

  “Homo erebus,” is the reply.

  My head is spinning with the realization of what has happened. These are the remote descendants of Gal, Pretty Boy, and everyone else I saw on that alien moon.

  “I—I was there,” I say. “On Erebus in orbit around Styx. I fought against the aliens enslaving your ancestors. I saw what the artificial intelligence did. It waged war against you, blocking your passage to the stars.”

  Mac taps my shoulder. “Wait. They’re human? What happened to them?”

  I understand his question, but he’s missing the point. Asking what happened to this species implies their evolution somehow went wrong. Over hundreds of thousands of years, their evolutionary trajectory has naturally led them here. It’s not a mistake—no more so than Homo sapiens evolving from Homo erectus. If anything, we’re a primitive species relative to these guys. We’re their Homo erectus. Resur
recting us is akin to our attempts to revive past species such as the mammoth.

  For now, I ignore Mac, wanting to learn more from our captors.

  “You were trapped,” I say when there’s no other comment forthcoming. I’m wracking my mind, trying to find something they might relate to from that era. “Ah, I knew Gal-san Kushim and the AI Xerxes. They were fighting to free you.”

  The humanoid is surprised by my comment. Before he can utter a single word in reply, I feel his response. We’re linked. This crazy form of non-verbal communication is two-way. He’s trying to figure out how to describe the passage of deep time.

  “Xerxes won our first battle.”

  “I met him,” I say. I don’t mean to cut this guy off, but for me, the memory is fresh, bursting with excitement. “I helped him. Wait? Did you say first? The war had been raging for centuries by the time I got to Erebus. That wasn’t the first battle.”

  He’s quiet.

  I can feel what he’s thinking. I mumble, “It was your first win.”

  The humanoid nods, saying, “War has always and will always be. There were so many battles. Far too many were lost.”

  “The Constellation,” I say as the realization hits.

  “That was their first win.”

  I feel weak at the knees. Humanity has been fighting the AI for longer than anyone has dared to imagine. Even as I boarded the Intrepid, an artificial intelligence was plotting our demise. They killed billions. They ravaged humanity.

  Gal didn’t know.

  The AI must have remained hidden as humanity recovered. Perhaps it underestimated the devastation and suffered losses of its own. It must have worked away in the shadows. Thousands of years passed before the war became overt. Even then, the full extent of what Gal was dealing with remained unknown. I wonder what happened to him and Pretty Boy—and then I wonder no more.

  “You were stuck there on Erebus,” I say, understanding what transpired after my time.

  Being an astrobiologist, I know how evolutionary pressure shapes a species. The rise of civilization doesn’t stop natural selection, but it does dull its edge. Premature death no longer rules with cruel indifference. When civilizations emerge, survival of the fittest becomes the survival of all. Genes drift rather than being aggressively selected. But when a civilization falls, life and death once again become a filter. Future generations are shaped by those that live to reproduce. This species has been caught in a biological tug-o-war for hundreds of thousands of years!