by Karl Morgan
“It does seem like a pretty glamorous idea,” Dave said. “But the truth is that it is a lot of work and negotiations and time spent away from home.”
“Admiral, do you want me to help you and Charlie or not?” Jon said flatly, smiling.
“Jon, I would be honored if you would join us on this adventure. Welcome to the team, Captain Jon,” he said with a beaming smile crossing his face as well. A second tone sounded on the control panel. Dave recognized this as a high priority message coming in. “Jon, I’ve got to take this call. I’ll shuttle down there this afternoon. Perhaps I can have dinner with you and Aliz later?”
“Aye-aye, Admiral, we’ll see you then,” Jon replied, “Far Sky out.”
Jon’s image disappeared, and after a second was replaced by the smiling beak of De-o-Nu, the new governor of the Gallicean planets in the Earth’s solar system. “Brother Dave, how wonderful to see you again, my friend,” he said.
“Brother De-o-Nu,” Dave replied. “It is great to see you too. I trust you are well and happy on Jupiter?”
“I was just flying through the Red Spot again this morning,” he laughed, “I remembered our first journey there with you and Charlie Watson. What was wonderful place! My people are amazed at the amount of resources we have found on this planet. It was a true blessing that we have been given this opportunity. But Dave, I have rather urgent news to report.”
Dave looked concerned. “Is everything okay, Brother? Did something happen?”
“Everything is fine, Dave. But we have made a rather extraordinary discovery on the outer planets of Uranus and Neptune. As my brother, General Fa-a-Di may have told you, those planets are much too cold for us to inhabit,” De-o-Nu started.
“Yes, I had heard that report as well, Governor,” Dave said.
“Our scientists thought we could at least mine those planets for resources that might be useful for your people and ours. I dispatched the Kong-Fa with a small crew and a large group of scientists to check it out. They first examined Uranus, where they found very large extractable quantities of many excellent materials. However, the crew experienced serious feelings of anxiety and sorrow while there. Our doctors on the ship could not determine what was wrong. Immediately after they left, those feelings subsided. As they approached Neptune, the feelings returned and were much more severe,” De-o-Nu said.
“That sounds very serious indeed, Brother,” Dave replied. “Please continue.”
“When they settled into a low orbit, those feelings disappeared, and were replaced by a constant buzzing in their heads, and we discovered what had really happened, Dave,” the Gallicean said. “We were encountering telepathic messages from highly intelligent, sentient Beings on both planets.”
Dave stood up at the table, stunned. “What! I can’t believe it! Our people never detected anything and we’ve studied those planets for a very long time.”
“I know Brother,” De-o-Nu continued. “Our chief physician on Jupiter, the esteemed Doctor No-o-Ka believes that our biology is much closer to those Beings than yours. Both Galliceans and Neptunians are gas planet creatures. Our minds must have enough similarity to theirs that we can sense their thoughts. We don’t know what they are thinking, but those telepathic transmissions appear as anxiety and sorrow in our brains. This is really amazing stuff, Brother.”
“I am as astounded as you, Brother,” Dave began. “What do we do now?”
“First, we have stopped all activity in the vicinity of those planets,” the Gallicean started again. “We are assembling a team of scientists from Earth, Gallia and Kalidus on Io to work on the problem. Somehow, we must be able to translate those messages so that we can understand them. I have discussed this with General Fa-a-Di earlier today. We are also suspending any further colonization of Jupiter and Saturn until we can determine if there are Neptunians on those planets as well. We cannot harm or displace another sentient species.”
“I understand and agree fully, Brother,” Dave said. “This is indeed an amazing revelation. It is shocking to think that humans have lived so close to such a species for thousands of years and had no idea. Please ask the team of scientists working on this to keep me updated on their progress. I am so sorry, Brother. I sincerely hope this will not affect relationships among our people.”
De-o-Nu laughed heartily. “Dave, there is no chance of that,” he began. “What has happened here is the best possible news. The people of Gallia do indeed want to expand and grow our society. But one of the greatest aspects of expansion is finding new life and forming new relationships with Beings we never knew existed. These Neptunians are like brothers to the Galliceans. In all of our journeys, we have never found any new species of sentient life on gas planets. Many Galliceans were beginning to feel that we were alone in the universe, like freaks of nature. Now we have found new life that lives like we do. This is a great honor and joy for all Galliceans. We owe that to you and your wife, Ambassador Darlene. Thank you, Brother Dave.” De-o-Nu smiled broadly. “Jupiter out.” The screen went blank.
Dave sat quietly for a moment, trying to assimilate the information on Neptune and Uranus. This was a monumental discovery that could change the course of history for all life in the galaxy. He pressed a button on the control panel, and the smiling face of his communications officer, Lia popped up on his screen. “Yes, Admiral,” she said, “What can I do for you?”
“Lia,” he began, still impressed by the blue of her eyes, “can you find out when Aria and Darlene are due to jump back?”
“That would be tomorrow at 0800, Dave,” she replied, “I’ve seen the schedules already.”
“Great, then there is time for me to get there before then,” he said. “Please send Chief Engineer Lanz a temporal jump request for two people. We need to go as quickly as possible.”
Chapter 18
Bill Brewster was pretty certain his mother had gone crazy. When Darlene and her very tall friend Aria had arrived three days ago, he had been very happy to see her again. Since he had moved to Northern California four years ago to take his first job after getting his master’s degree in biomedical engineering, he had only seen his parents on holidays. The first two days were totally normal. The two ladies had gone shopping in San Francisco, picking up items for his condo as well as some clothing for themselves. He had breakfast and dinner with them each day. He had been surprised how good a cook Aria was, but was very happy for the gourmet meals, compared to the microwave entrees he usually ate after a long, grueling day in the lab.
Perhaps it was the amount of wine they had all drunk with last night’s dinner. His mother had started talking to him about traveling in time and Beings from the future and other planets. She was a lab technician from San Diego, who was married to an accountant. Now, he was supposed to believe they were living eleven centuries in the future. As a highly educated engineer, he knew that was not even possible. Yes, she must be mad. But what about Aria? Was she living in the same delusion his mother was? He rolled over in bed and tried not to think about it. The smell of brewing coffee and frying bacon drifted into his head. It was impossible to resist those scents. As he pulled on his jeans and a tee shirt, he realized the entire episode last night must have been a dream.
He walked into his kitchen to find Aria standing in front of the cooktop, managing several pans at once. He pulled a cup out of the cabinet and poured the fresh coffee. This was exactly what he needed to pull the cobwebs out of his mind. “Good morning, Aria,” he said.
She turned around smiling and nodded. “What was she wearing?” Bill thought. It had seemed like a simple matching pair of slacks and top from behind, but when she turned, he had seen that it was more like a uniform. It had some form of rank insignia on the shoulders, and a number of other things pinned to the front. She wore a wide belt that had a number of strange devices clipped to it.
“Good morning Sweetheart,” Darlene said as she entered the kitchen behind Bill. He turned to see his mother wearing a similar uniform, except there
were only two small disks on the lapels, and she wore a red sash with odd symbols on it. She took a cup and filled it with coffee. She moved to the refrigerator to get the half and half and sat at the table.
“Ladies,” Bill started, somewhat bewildered, “It’s a little early for Halloween, isn’t it?” Aria giggled as she opened the oven and pulled out a quiche. The fragrance filled the room. “Wow, Aria, or is it General Aria; that looks wonderful.”
“It’s Colonel, if you really want to know,” she said as she cut a wide slice of quiche, added three strips of bacon and hash browns to the plate and slid it in front of him. “I didn’t think the uniform thing was a good idea, but your mother insisted. I thought it would just be more confusing.” She prepared two more plates for Darlene and herself, and joined them at the table.
“I am confused Colonel, you got that right,” Bill started, “but I’m more worried that the two of you are medically confused, if you know what I mean.” He took Darlene’s hand and squeezed it. “Mom, you know I love you, but this is all pretty crazy. You know that, don’t you?”
“Billy, I know it is confusing to you. How could you ever imagine any of this being true? I realized that last night after dinner,” Darlene replied. “I can’t believe it myself sometimes, but I have been living in the future for the last eight months. I have done things and seen things I thought were impossible. But it is happening. It is real.”
“First, I just talked to you on the phone last week. Second, let’s say I decide that it’s true,” he said. “What am I supposed to do with this information? Do I keep it a secret that my parents are flying through space and time a thousand years in the future? That part is easy! Everyone would think I’m nuts if I told them about any of this.”
“Billy honey, I want you to come with us,” Darlene said. “Your future is there and you and Cybil will do wondrous things.”
“Pack my bags, sell the condo and fly into space, right?” he said, almost shouting. “What if I say no, Mom?”
“That’s okay too, sweetheart,” she replied. “Your dad and I only want you to be happy. Aria told us that time is very resilient. If you don’t do the things we know you can do, someone else will fill the void. Perhaps the results won’t be exactly the same, but the future will move forward.” Darlene motioned to Aria who pulled a small metal box from her belt and set it on the table.
“What the hell is that?” Bill said. “Is it a blaster or something to make me go?”
“Of course not, silly,” his mother said, trying to calm him down. “That’s a big reason Aria is here with me. I don’t really know how to use all these things, and she is an expert in time and space jumping.”
“Bill,” Aria began, as she tapped buttons on the small device. “This machine can erase some of your memories of our visit. You’ll remember almost everything, except the details of this discussion and the one last night. You’ll remember how happy you were to have your mother visit, and what a great cook I am, but nothing about time travel and the rest.”
“When will I see you again, Mom?” he replied with tears starting to fill his eyes. “Is this it now? Can I ever see you and Dad again?”
“Of course Bill,” Darlene replied, stroking his hair. She stood up and wrapped her arms about him. “It’s time travel, silly. We can come here for a couple weeks a year, with maybe a few short visits as well. But that’s future time, son. To you, it will seem like we are just away a week or so at a time. For all you know, we might be on a cruise or something.”
“But won’t you and Dad get like fifty years older in one year of my time then? I think I might notice that!” he said.
“Bill, people live a lot longer in the future,” Aria started, “I’m seventy five years old. My life expectancy is between four and five hundred years. Since Dave and Darlene have been living in the thirty-second, they’ve been treated with modern medications. There is no reason to believe that they won’t live as long, or even longer if you end up in my time.”
“That’s the story from last night about Cybil and I fixing human DNA so people live to be a thousand, right?” he asked. Darlene and Aria nodded in agreement. “I don’t know, Mom. This still seems like a big joke. I don’t know if I’m prepared for that. Can I just say no for now, keep the knowledge and let you know in a couple days?”
Aria frowned in disapproval, but Darlene waved her off. “Sure Billy, if that’s what you think you need. But you have to keep all of this very secret. If more people hear about this, we might have to erase memories from all of them. It could quickly get out of control. Okay?” Bill nodded his agreement, clearly relieved to have some time to think. “Aria and I have to visit her stepson Matt in San Diego for a couple of days. When we come back, you can give us your decision.” Darlene smiled happily as she bit off a piece of bacon. “This really is excellent, Aria.”
Bill’s doorbell rang. As he left to answer it, Aria started, “Darlene, I think this is a bad idea. He’s convinced we’re crazy or something. It wouldn’t surprise me if we came back and found ourselves in a mental hospital somewhere. I need to erase his memory before we go. It would be worth my rank to let him wander the area telling his friends and coworkers that his mother has gone insane.” She continued tapping on the device on the table as Bill returned to the room, followed by Dave and Cybil.
Darlene rose and embraced her husband. “Dave, what are you two doing here?” she said. “This is an unexpected surprise.” She hugged Cybil and kissed her cheek. “It’s great to see you here baby.”
“You see what I mean Dad?” Bill began, “Those outfits are pretty crazy, right? Have you ever met Aria before? She tells me she’s a colonel. I think there’s something very wrong here.”
Dave considered the gathering in the small kitchen. “I have to agree with you son,” he said. “Those outfits do seem out of place for Sunnyvale, California.” He turned to Aria, saying, “Wouldn’t you agree Colonel? I’m surprised you’d allow it.”
“Dave, the ambassador was very demanding and convincing,” she replied. “She thought this was the only way to convince Bill that what we are saying is true.”
“Short of a jump of his own,” Cybil responded. Bill was overwhelmed and sat heavily on a chair, holding his head in his hands. “It’s okay, little brother,” she continued, “I moved to the thirty-second three months ago.”
“But I talked to you two days ago,” Bill muttered.
“Time travel, silly,” she replied. She sat next to her brother and rubbed his shoulders. “Maybe we are all really crazy. Maybe just you are. There’s one way to find out. Come back with me and I’ll show you so much in one day that you’ll never want to come back.”
“No time for temporal tourism now, kids,” Dave interrupted. “Bill, I need your help right away. I want you to jump to the future with me now. I think you have unique skills that are desperately needed right now.”
“You need my skills Dad?” Bill said. “Like what?”
“You were recently promoted due to your work on a project to allow amputees to control prosthetic parts using their brain waves, right?” Dave asked.
Bill nodded slowly, saying, “Yes, but the whole thing was dropped when the first trials were not that great and we couldn’t get the funding we needed from Corporate.”
“I seem to recall that a big part of the research focused on translating certain brain wave patterns into signals that could operate the devices,” Dave continued. “You were trying to learn what individual mental signals meant, and then tie those to the mechanics of the prosthetic. The normal mental signal to move an arm would then move the prosthetic arm. That is what we need right now.”
“Dad,” Bill replied shaking his head slowly, “if you are really in the future, don’t you already have better technology than that? I would be surprised if my twenty-first century education could add anything.”
“As far as medicine is concerned, you’re absolutely right, son,” Dave acknowledged as he sat across from Bill and looked h
im in the eye. “If a person loses an arm, a new one can be grown from the stump of the old one within a few weeks. Son, what we need is your knowledge on decoding brain signals and finding ways to translate them. Believe it or not, the fate of three civilizations rests with our ability to do exactly that as soon as possible.” Dave took Bill’s hand and squeezed it tightly. Bill looked up and smiled as his father. “Son, I want you to go with me now. If I’m crazy, we’ll just be walking out the door into the sunshine. Then you can take all of us to the asylum. If you end up in the future, you can work on this project and help us complete it quickly. When that is finished, you and Cybil can go on your vacation in the future, or if you prefer, you can come back here. I love you, Bill. I need your help. Please come with me now.” Dave finished.
Bill Brewster looked around at his family and Aria all smiling at him warmly. He was almost convinced he was the crazy one now. “Sure, Dad, I’ll go,” he said at last. “I don’t want to be the only sane person left. I might as well join the craziness.”
“Thank you Billy,” Dave replied. He turned to Darlene. “Sweetheart, I think you and Aria should continue your trip and catch up with Matt. Cybil, Bill and I are scheduled to jump to the Io Star Port on our signal.”
“Okay, Dave,” she replied. “Aria and I will take care of every-thing here. Billy, there are others from the thirty-second who can handle the loose ends if you’re gone a while. Remember, it is time travel, so you could jump back in six months, and it would still be today here.”
Bill answered, “If you say so Mom. I think it might take a long time for me to wrap my head around that! I’m still pretty sure that when I walk out the door, I’ll still be here and it will still be now. But, how can a guy argue with both of his parents and his crazy sister? Doesn’t this get confusing with people flying through time everywhere all the time?”
